› added 6 months ago

59

TIL that I went to high school with someone who won the Nobel Prize. Congratulations David!

Read more seattletimes.com

via reddit.com

x9xg TIL The James Randi Educational Foundation will pay $1,000,000 to any person who demonstrates any psychic, supernatural, or paranormal ability under satisfactory observation. In the 50 years it’s been running, no one has passed the preliminary test.
Oo8M1 TIL that according to one legend, the funeral escort of Genghis Khan killed anyone and anything that crossed their path in order to conceal where he was finally buried. After the tomb was completed, the slaves who built it were massacred, and then the soldiers who killed them were also killed.
6EayY TIL that historically, polio was not widely fatal. 72% of all infections were asymptomatic; 24% resulted in mild illness; 1-5% resulted in more serious but short-term symptoms. But polio was still feared, due to the <1% of cases that led to permanent paralysis and death in a further 5-30% of them.
W75J8 TIL that ostriches eyes are bigger than their brain
gNVA TIL in 1945 an airplane crashed into the Empire State Building, injuring elevator operator Betty Oliver. When rescuers attempted to lower her on an elevator, the cable snapped, plunging her 75 stories down. She survived the fall, and to this day holds the record for longest survived elevator fall.