› added 1 year ago

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TIL no one has seen a newborn great white shark pup or birth in the wild.

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d8oaj TIL that even though seed-bearing plants evolved ~360 million years ago, all plants that bare flowers or fruits have only existed for the past ~140 million years. Before seeds, plants used to reproduce through spores. The only living ancestors of these plants are ferns, horsetails, lycophytes.
X0Dok TIL In 1965, an excavation team discovered the Sword of Goujian in a tomb in Hubei, China. Encased in a nearly air-tight wooden box next to a skeleton. The sword is over 2500 years old but was in perfect condition, test affirmed that the blade could easily cut a stack of twenty pieces of paper.
695QQ Today I learned that the company CommerceOne was worth $21.5 Billion in 2000 and sold for less than $20 million in 2004
6EboZ TIL In 1936 John F Kennedy lost his class presidency election at Harvard
EgbpX TIL that in 1845, the screw-driven HMS Rattler proved the superiority of screw propellers over paddle wheels by winning a 100-mile race against the paddle-driven HMS Alecto. Rattler then towed Alecto backward at almost 3 knots in a tug-of-war, leading to the rise of screw propulsion in ship design.