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TIL that the NES gun used in duck hunt worked by you pulling the trigger, making the screen flash, surrounding the ducks (targets) in white and the diode in the gun begin reception. The photodiode in the gun detects the change in light intensity and tells the computer that it’s pointed at a target.

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KOgMa TIL the 1679 Habeas Corpus Act was only passed in Parliament because its supporters jokingly counted a fat lord as ten votes and the opposition never noticed
rRvgx TIL predatory dragonflies the size of modern seagulls were present on the earth about 300 million years ago. The leading theory suggests that their large size was due to high oxygen concentrations (over 30% unlike the 21% today) in the atmosphere.
Z8yPY TIL that a holocaust denial group offered $50,000 to anyone who could prove that gas chambers were used to intentionally kill people at Auschwitz. They were forced by a judge to pay that money, and an additional $40,000, to Auschwitz survivor Mel Mermelstein who provided proof of that very fact.
bZ7N TIL that in 1894, an entire bird species, the Stephens Island Wren, was single-handedly wiped out by a cat named Tibbles
oxBR TIL that in 1917 Alexander Graham Bell predicted that “the unchecked burning of fossil fuels would have a sort of greenhouse effect” on the planet, and argued for the use of alternative energy sources such as solar energy.