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TIL Galileo Galilei's middle finger is on display at the Museo Galileo in Florence, Italy.

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8aoeV TIL of xenobots; Synthetic lifeforms designed by AI which are part robot, part organism, the size of a grain of sand and capable of performing tasks such as pushing payloads, cleaning debris, working together in swarms and even reproduce new xenobots
8eWD4 TIL that as a teenager in 1826, future American frontier legend Kit Carson ran away from his saddlery apprenticeship in Missouri and traveled to what is now New Mexico. His master advertised about his runaway apprentice, Carson, but only offered a 1-cent reward to anyone who would return him.
kO4Bm TIL baseball player Dave Parker once hit a home run that landed in a moving train coal car and traveled 150 miles.
16Zy7 TIL Jaws directly contributed to a surge in shark hunting, and consequently a drop in shark populations. Peter Benchley regretted writing Jaws, "Knowing what I know now, I could never write that book today. Sharks don't target human beings, and they certainly don't hold grudges."
LQgpm TIL The tallest dam on earth, the Usoi Dam, is not man-made. The dam is a landslide from the 1911 Sarez earthquake that blocked the Murghab River in Tajikistan. In 2015 the dam survived a 7.2 magnitude earthquake with no signs of deterioration.