› added 8 years ago

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TIL a team of scientists suppressed genes for beak development in a chicken embryo to find out what bird ancestors looked like – and the embryo grew into a chicken with the face of a dinosaur.

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e06Kb TIL the phrase "souped up" predated automobiles and was actually a reference to injecting horses with steroids to improve their performance.
GAPQg TIL a Spite House is a building constructed to irritate neighbors and potential land owners. Because long-term occupation is not the primary purpose of these houses, they frequently sport strange and impractical structures.
DQerr TIL our hands and feet wrinkle in water to provide better grip on wet objects
kJd6d TIL that the current solicitor general of the U.S., which represents the federal govt. before the Supreme Court, was Miss Idaho before her legal career
KOjwG TIL that the brand name Häagen-Dazs doesn't actually mean anything—it was just made up by American founder Reuben Mattus to sound Danish, though when pronounced it means roughly "garden toilet" in the language.