› added 5 years ago

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TIL that up to 90% of Asian schoolchildren are nearsighted

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via reddit.com

wLpyM TIL an Ohio company including a physicist & biomimicry expert is developing a football helmet liner based on the shock-absorbing pelt of hedgehog quills. They've mimicked the structure of a hedgehog quill with a polymer which lets it bend but not break & mimicked the spacing & angle of each quill.
EgEnX TIL Arlington estate, where the national cemetery is located, was once owned by George Washington's step son, who built a house in the property to serve as a memorial for his step father. His daughter Married Robert E. Lee. In 1955 Congress voted to rename the House "The Robert E. Lee Memorial"
x6V55 TIL that Crispin Glover was replaced as George Mcfly after Back to the Future 1, using an actor with prosthetics of his face, leading him to sue Universal Studios.
Gdog TIL: a Thermos flask creates a highly efficient thermal insulation by creating a partial vacuum between 2 barriers. Since there’s virtually no air/gas/matter, there’s nothing to carry energy away (bar the canister itself). This is how rocket fuel is stored - in a giant Thermos.
l71vV TIL an eggcorn is the alteration of a phrase through the mishearing or reinterpretation of one or more of its elements, creating a new phrase having a different meaning from the original but which still makes sense and is plausible when used in the same context.