› added 3 years ago

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TIL that the Chinese warlord Zhang Zongchang, who ruled Shandong during a turbulent period of civil war and was known for his exceptional brutality and sexual exploits, kept his elderly mother near him at all times. Even on campaign, he gave her a personal railcar to accompany his army in.

grZNy TIL that, in order to test the effectivenes of their program, Big Brothers Big Sisters of America intentionally left nearly 500 at-risk children on an 18 month long wait list to compare their behaviors to those children placed with a mentor.
rRwpe TIL it is estimated that approximately 70% of people at some point in their life will experience 'Imposter Syndrome', where they don't believe that they deserve their success and are worried about being found out as a 'fraud'.
69P6W TIL Runner’s trots or Gingerbread Man is the sudden and explosive need to empty one’s bowels in the heat of a race. This occurs due to shunting of blood away from the intestines and toward the muscles. Runners also lose control of both their interior and exterior sphincter muscles at the anal canal
a8Q8N TIL that in 1924, top light bulb manufacturers formed the Phoebus Cartel to secretly shorten bulb lifespans to only 1,000 hours - making us buy light bulbs more often and paving the way for planned obsolescence
6EdwW TIL Facebook created two AI chatbots to converse with one other, only to shut them down when they began speaking in a language they had created for themselves.