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TIL Issac Newton was a firm believer in alchemy and studied for years to find a method to create the substance known as the Philosophers Stone, which could apparently turn base metals into gold.

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dyE8 TIL Matt Damon and Marky Mark have a pact to just go with it whenever someone mistakes one for the other.
D1vjp TIL That many larger mammals, like blue whales and elephants, rarely die from cancer - Referred to as Peto's Paradox - Academic sources in video description
xVPeb TIL in the US radio-controlled clocks precisely coordinate time shifts with the official atomic clock at the Physical Measurement Laboratory in Boulder, Colorado. The atomic clock keeps time for the entire country and will neither gain or lose a second over the course of 100 million years.
b9dgQ TIL that Confederate soldiers could not be buried in national cemeteries, nor were they afforded any benefits from the United States Government. When the reburial corps in the late 1860s found remains on battlefields, they'd remove the Union soldiers and leave the Confederates.
nQjb TIL the Lee-Enfield rifle has been in active service with at least one military since 1895 (currently still used by the Canadian Rangers)