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TIL the sinking of the Titanic was a popular subject for early African-American rapping (known as Toasts), specifically the story of a fictional black worker named "Shine" who tries to warn the captain about water flooding, but is ignored.

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pLvA TIL Pentagon freaked out in the 1980s when they realized Finland had, against their expectations, managed to build two Mir submarines capable of diving to 6000 meters. They went on to shut down the whole Finnish submarine industry by privately threatening the country with heavy sanctions.
Jyjv TIL that the Geneva Convention requires POWs to have access to tobacco
RN0l TIL American Association of Physical Anthropologists: Human beings are so biologically similar that if we were dogs we’d all be of the same breed.
VR4m TIL it took 6 hours to render one frame of the rain soaked T-Rex in Jurassic Park.
N7m0P TIL that it was once common for people to sleep in segments (1st sleep & 2nd sleep) with a period of wakefulness in between. People used the time between sleeps to do things such as read, use the toilet, pray, smoke tobacco, have sex, etc.