› added 6 years ago

162

TIL- Most elephants weigh less than the tongue of a blue whale.

Read more globalanimal.org

via reddit.com

nlxb TIL that Joycelyn Elders, the Surgeon General who was fired for suggesting the teaching of masturbation as a prevention of risky sexual activity in younger people also suggested that drug legalization would reduce crime.
78Gd7 TIL that German scientists in the 1930s were the first to conceive of the atom bomb, but their research was abruptly ended in 1939 when the government conscripted them. The Nazis never got close to making a functional atom bomb because their scientists were in the battlefield.
E10gP TIL that the first recorded mention of altitude sickness was in 37 BCE, when a Chinese official noted that a trade route to Afghanistan passed a mountain that caused sickness as travelers ascended it - in the report, this place was named “Big Headache Mountain”.
Z8Xlp TIL that during the filming of "The Beach" in Thailand, Leonardo DiCaprio and Tilda Swinton were forced to swim in the sea when their boat sank due to sudden storm. DiCaprio and Swinton and crew members spent half an hour swimming at sea before rescuers arrived.
0dy8v TIL of the Turpan water system, an ancient network of thousands of hand dug wells and 5000 km of underground canals built under the Taklaman desert to channel groundwater to the Oasis city of Turpan, used to irrigate agriculture and provide water to the many caravans traveling the Silk Road.