› added 6 years ago

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TIL that the Higgs Boson's media nickname "The God Particle" came from physicist Leon Lederman. He wrote a book and wanted it titled "The Goddamn Particle", poking fun at how hard it was to find. The publishers changed the title to "The God Particle" and the nickname stuck.

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5V0BD TIL that Thalidomide, the drug responsible for thousands of birth defects across Europe in the 1950s/60s, was developed by a doctor who had previously worked for the Nazis, experimenting on concentration camp victims
BZLr TIL that newgrounds.com is one of the oldest websites still around. It was founded in 1991.
neaYY TIL that Winston Churchill spent Christmas 1941 in Washington as a guest of President Roosevelt. After electrifying Congress with a speech, he stayed up Christmas Eve watching a movie with his new BFF Roosevelt and the Canadian prime minister... then had a heart attack and shrugged it off.
grV0b TIL that they're building robot spy animals with cameras in their eyes that can walk and move around to film documentaries from angles that would be impossible normally
e9PL TIL Glass has been recycled for almost 3,000 years. It never wears out as a raw material. Just one recycled clear glass bottle saves enough energy from the manufacturing process to light a 100-watt bulb for four hours.