› added 5 months ago

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TIL that male porcupines pee on female porcupines in order to determine if the female is ready

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via reddit.com

0wbaL TIL that California trains and employs prisoners to fight fires, but then bans them from getting the license they need to become full-time firefighters after they are released.
yXMJ TIL of the “electrolaser”, a real world directed-energy weapon which fires laser-guided lightning bolts. When fired, a laser forms a channel of supercharged plasma out of the surrounding air, creating a path for the lightning and also causing a sonic boom.
j77v TIL - Target has become so proficient at analyzing customers buying habits that they can predict a female customers pregnancy and due date with an 87% accuracy
KOZ4R TIL that the dust storm that sets off the events in the film "The Martian" isn't plausible because the atmosphere on Mars is about 1% as dense as Earth's and the winds in the strongest Martian storms top out at about 60 miles per hour, unlikely to tip or rip apart major mechanical equipment.
dDXjB TIL that the star Betelgeuse gets its English name due to a 13th century translation error from the Arabic ‘Yad al-Jauzā’ (Hand of Orion) because some one mistook the Arabic letter for Y (ي) for the letter for B (ب). Written as part of a word, the only difference is an extra dot on the bottom for Y.