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TIL famous French philosopher René Descartes died in Stockholm, Sweden after contracting pneumonia at the cold and draughty castle of Queen Christina which he agreed to teach her 3 times a week at 5am.

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WkarX TIL hypnosis can be used as an alternative to general anesthesia in some surgeries (local anesthesia is still used). The practice of hypnosis during surgery to reduce pain has been around for centuries, and more than 34 clinical trials and numerous published papers have shown hypnosedation works.
NXYgJ Today I learned that, while A. A. Milne, the creator of Winnie the Pooh, named the character after his son's teddy bear, Pooh's design was actually based on another teddy bear named Growler, who was owned by the son of Milne's illustrator, E. H. Shepard.
16Z77 TIL that in 1982, to protest Border Patrol inspections that were harming tourism, the city of Key West, FL declared independence. The mayor named himself Prime Minister of the Conch Republic, declared war on the US, surrendered one minute later, then applied for one billion dollars in foreign aid.
NXEWe TIL that Cavalese, Italy had two major Cable Car disasters 22 years apart (1976, 1998) with only a single survivor between them. Both times, a person who had a variant of the family name Schweizer was implicated as having caused the accident through negligence.
NbAQ TIL Jerome Flynn, who plays Bronn in Game of Thrones, had a Number 1 single in the UK in 1995 and was produced by Simon Cowell