› added 2 years ago

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TIL that smoke from wildfires is composed of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) that interact with UV radiation to create benzene and formaldehyde compounds in the atmosphere, causing a burnt plastic smell.

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KOBP9 TIL that a peice of horse tack known as the 'Bearing Rein' was extreamly in the 18th and 19th century to keep horses heads up due to a fashion, they were often tightened til the point of discomfort for the horse, until a story about a horse was released in 1877 and bearing reins fell out of fashion
mxDAE TIL of the Hmong people, who communicate by whistling - the valleys of the Himalayas they live in make for ideal transmission, sometimes carried as far as 8km. They even perform whistling courtship ceremonies, and once in a relationship, lovers can make up their own ‘secret’ syllables!
kOQWE TIL that the city in the world with the most chess grandmasters per capita is Beersheba in southern Israel, with one grandmaster per every 23,000 residents (in comparison, Moscow has one grandmaster per every 170,000 residents, and St. Petersburg has one grandmaster per 215,000 residents)
GY4Z1 Today I learned that when Alexander the Great conquered Egypt, many Greek-Romans came to Egypt as tourist. Many of them ended up carving their names stating “so and so was here, and the work of these Egyptians are great” in the tombs of the Valley of the Kings.
BXDd TIL in 1984 Ronald Reagan had 525 electoral votes, more than any other president