› added 13 years ago

167

TIL many office thermostats do not adjust the temperature, but people feel the warmth changing because of a placebo. This effect is called ‘the placebo button’.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

EgEXW TIL that California is named after a fictitious island described in a series of 16th century Spanish romance novels. The island was described as being inhabited by beautiful black women who wore gold armor.
9w4pD TIL about the Welsh Christmas tradition Mari Lwyd, which entails the use of a horse's skull mounted on a pole and carried by an individual hidden under a sackcloth, requesting (by singing) to get into people’s houses in order to get food and drinks
neNDr TIL: The BBC used the opening bars of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony during WWII because it simulated the Morse Code "V" for Victory ...-
kJex7 TIL health professionals are more likely than the public at large to buy generic painkillers, because they realize that they’re just as effective as name brands
PYwJV TIL that Charles Morton, a 17th century minister and scientist, wrote a treatise on how birds migrated to the Moon and back every winter. Morton believed that they would encounter no air resistance or be affected by gravity, and use excess fat to sustain themselves.