› added 8 years ago

158

TIL that human intelligence increased dramatically once we started extracting more energy from food via cooking

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Ooy8Y TIL when Facebook acquired Instagram in 2012 for $1B, the 15-month old Instagram had only 13 employees
840L TIL The aircraft carrier USS Yorktown was heavily damaged after destroying a Japanese aircraft carrier during the first carrier battle in history. After 48 hours of emergency repairs, it ended up helping destroy two more carriers before being sunk, and inadvertently saved the other US carriers.
0wQVL TIL the US had nuclear-armed suicide commandos called Green Light Teams
LkGDP TIL that the oldest firearms still used by the American military are the M2.50 caliber machine gun and the Colt .45 M1911 pistol. Both were designed by John Browning more than a century ago.
pNde TIL that in 1997, four years before being arrested for spying for the KGB, Robert Hanssen was caught using a password cracker on a federal computer. When asked about this, he said that he was simply trying to install a color printer, and so he needed the administrator password. They believed him.