› added 4 years ago

140

TIL about the weirdest ever state in Europe, Neutral Moresnet. It was a condominium between Belgium and Germany for 100 years, was 900 acres large, formed a quadripoint border, had Esperanto as an official language, and only existed because of Zinc and Brass Mine.

Read more discoveringbelgium.com

via reddit.com

466X TIL cats drink by creating a water column, not scooping with their tongue.
JdV1 TIL a ‘philodox’ is someone who loves their own opinions.
BP6k TIL using baby talk with infants has valuable implications for language acquisition. This exaggerated speech style gives babies information about their ambient language, allowing them to break up what they hear into smaller chunks and process the patterns in their language more easily.
WkkBX TIL There are still large concrete arrows across the US from the Transcontinental Airway System, which helped pilots prior to radio navigation
D1aAY TIL the Normandy beach landing scene in the movie Saving Private Ryan alone cost $12 million. It involved up to 1,500 extras, partly consisting of Irish Reserve Defense Force members and was called the “best battle scenes of all time”