› added 6 years ago

424

TIL The bottlenose dolphin sleeps by shutting down half its brain along with the opposite eye. The other half remains awake at a low level of alertness to watch for predators and to surface to breath. After about two hours it reverses the process so the other half can rest.

Read more scientificamerican.com

via reddit.com

8xvX TIL of the Cat Organ, a 16th century piano-type contraption played by a trained bear which yanked the tails of cats in order to create music.
vVJB TIL that although the United States Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, having no longitudinal bearings, need not keep to a time zone, as a matter of practicality they operate on New Zealand clocks since resupply flights originate in Christchurch, on the South Island.
7rP7P TIL A Japanese man discovered the massive heat - transfer air currents known as the Jet stream in the 1920s. His work went completely unnoticed because he published his findings in Japanese and Esperanto.
rLMo TIL that in the Aboriginal Australian language of Ritharrŋu the polite response to a sneeze is “Klas bin gurruwan” meaning “You have released nose-water.” The sneezer then responds with “Bla mela nana!” meaning “I am dry now.”
M7XE8 TIL the director Tony Kaye of American History X was regarded as unemployable by Hollywood because the studio wanted Edward Norton's cut which had an additional 18 minutes of footage. Kaye took out $100k in ads condemning Norton and studio and tried changing his name in the credits to Humpty Dumpty