› added 12 years ago

80

TIL there’s a fruit in japan whose extract is 300-times as sweet as sugar, and is commonly used for treating diabetes/obesity.

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1AgX TIL between 1970 and 1973, four Israeli fighter pilots translated The Hobbit from English to Hebrew to pass the time in an Egyptian prison, where they were held as POWs. The pilots’ translation was published commercially in 1977, and up until 2012 was considered the best Hebrew version of the book.
0dbOp TIL there's a millipede named after Taylor Swift. The leader of the team who discovered it named it as such for two reasons: 1. Taylor Swift's music helped him through graduate school and, 2. the millipede is only found in Tennessee which is Taylor Swift's home state.
Lkg4r TIL that almost every alphabetic writing system in the world is a descendant of the Phoenician language.
LOmd TIL in 1912 a group of investors were sold a 480 inch instead of a 480 foot skyscraper for $200,000 because nobody bothered to read the plans properly.
PxgV TIL Tania Head faked being a 9/11 survivor and served as President of the WTC Survivors Network