› added 4 years ago

65

TIL about comparative mythology. Anthropologist reconstruct ancient religions based on trends in their cultural descendents. Zeus and Jupiter (and many others) likely evolved from the Indo-European "*Dyḗws Ph₂tḗr" ("sky father")

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8b14 TIL: Henry III received a polar bear as a gift from King Haakon of Norway in 1252. The bear lived at the Tower of London and was given a long leash so it could swim in the river Thames and catch fish.
e0YV5 TIL that a teaspoonful of a neutron star weighs six billion tons
VMyJp TIL Billy Joel never sells front row tickets at his concerts
RRn6 TIL that the first message sent over the Washington-Moscow hotline (aka “Red phone”) was “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog 1234567890”. To make sure all keys on the teletypes were operational.
AVdx TIL that the programmer for the Original Doom, John Carmack, broke into a school to steal an Apple II computer using home-made thermite; he later went to juvenile detention and forced to undergo a psychiatric evaluation.