› added 10 years ago

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TIL that unexplained crystalline formations known as “tin whiskers” grow from most metals and cause electronics to fail. Nobody understands how they form.

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mRjv TIL The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus was a hoax designed by the U of Conn. to test 7th graders ability to decipher fake news on the internet presented as real. They all failed. Some even maintained it was real even after confronted with the hoax, a phenomenon called belief perseverance.
woEdP TIL: In WW2, the Japanese developed Defoliation Bacilli Bombs to launch biological attacks on farmland, reservoirs, wells and populated areas using anthrax, plague fleas, typhoid, cholera, and the bubonic plague. Unit 731 created it, and became bioweapons researchers and were not prosecuted.
1aeNX TIL The Bohemian Grove is a private campground in California where the rich and powerful go to party. In 2000 a camera was sneaked into the campground and shot the infamous video which showed the members acting out a 'Ritual' known as the Cremation of Care in front of a 30 foot owl.
D166Y TIL that Willie O'Ree, the first black man to play in the NHL, was blind in one eye. It was caused by a ricocheting puck that hit him in the face when he was 18 and he kept it a secret for his entire 21-year career.
n8eW TIL indoor prostitution was legal in Rhode Island from 2003 to 2009. During those years, reports of rape dropped by 31% and female gonorrhea cases dropped by 39% according to a study done by the National Bureau of Economic Research.