› added 5 years ago

136

TIL: Former French colonies still have to pay a "colonial debt" to France.

Read more pambazuka.org

via reddit.com

R1A9 TIL The Red Cross raised half a billion dollars for Haiti and only built 6 homes
D16Be TIL in 1381 over 70,000 peasants from across England revolted against their lords, led by a farmer named Wat Tyler the 'Peasant Army' marched into London, sacking parts of the city and killing any wealthy elites they found
woEY TIL the FBI hired an informer to supply terrorists with fake bomb powder in the lead up to the 1993 WTC bombing, but the plan was called off and real explosives ended up being used. The informer passionately maintained that the attack could’ve been prevented.
wmDo TIL that people literally grow trees and roots into bridges, chairs, “people trees”, ladders, fences, jungle gyms, tunnels, etc… It’s known as “Tree Shaping.” Theoretically, it can even be used to grow homes.
BOxW TIL of UCSC grad student Jim Kent who wrote a program to allow the Human Genome Project to assemble and publish the genome. The research was largely motivated by concerns that Celera Genomics, working on a parallel project, would patent the data. Kent’s results were released first by 3 days.