› added 6 years ago

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TIL that the man who created Fu Manchu, Sax Rohmer, had virtually no knowledge of Chinese culture and created the character because he asked a ouija board how to make a fortune and it spelled out CHINAMAN.

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wLp07 TIL that Daisaku Ikeda, a Buddhist philosopher, holds 395 honorary degrees including 202 honorary doctorates from more than 59 countries across the world.
6E80J TIL Russian cosmonauts used to carry pistols into space in case of a bear attack at their landing site
mxbAR TIL about Phineas Gage who survived a traumatic brain injury when an iron rod was driven through his entire skull, destroying much of his frontal lobe.
VMLJ8 TIL that Mister Rogers once used an egg timer and simply let it run for sixty seconds on a television broadcast—in order to demonstrate how long a minute is. Unlike most TV made for kids, "Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood" was deliberately slow and contemplative.
OoeXY TIL of Michael Durant, who was taken prisoner in Mogadishu in 1993. He was tortured for 11 days until he heard a helicopter playing “Hell’s Bells” by AC/DC. His superiors knew it was his favorite song, so they had rigged a helicopter with a loudspeaker and flown over the city looking for him.