› added 1 year ago

46

TIL that barnacles are actually crustaceans, closely related to crabs and lobsters- their larvae look very similar to crabs, and upon finding a suitable site to adhere to, they will activate their cement glands, grow a hard calcium shell, and metamorphosize into adults.

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JdXj TIL that the United States Navy shot down an Iranian Airbus A300 after it was incorrectly identified as an attacking F-14 Tomcat fighter. The entire 290 civilian passengers and crew onboard were killed.
j6gVa TIL the iPhone Steve Jobs demoed on Jan 9, 2007 at MacWorld was a buggy prototype, barely functional at the time. They had to meticulously rehearse the presentation so the phone wouldn't crash mid-show. The final version was only completed weeks before it hit stores.
M71ZB TIL that in 1957, Congress voted to de-authorize Fossil Cycad National Monument in South Dakota because the site became devoid of fossils due to pillaging and they were no longer able to justify it's existence as a unit of the NPS.
69l9Y TIL it takes orders of magnitude greater computational resources to recognise a loved one in a photograph than it does to perform a complex arithmetic calculation. This is called Moravec's paradox. We effortlessly do as humans what computers find incredibly demanding, and vice versa.
QJkBL TIL the most powerful radio station ever was so strong locals could hear it in pipes, bedsprings, and pots and pans. It was located in OH and it's broadcast covered the eastern half of the US.