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TIL about Hoover, the talking seal. He first learned to vocalize from the human family who saved him and his accent reflects their New England speech. Additional sources in the comments.

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0aW1 TIL that monosodium glutamate (MSG) has no extraordinary negative effect on the human body, contrary to common perception
arjb TIL Mao Zedong ordered the people of China to kill sparrows because they steal grain. Since sparrows also eat insects, their absence caused a locust epidemic that ravaged crops and killed millions of people.
0O0M TIL that when Lawrence Anthony, an international conservationist famously known as the ‘Elephant Whisperer’, died, some of the elephants he worked to save came to his family’s home in accordance with the way elephants usually mourn the death of one of their own.
rNkM4 TIL a skydiver had a seizure while 9,000 feet in the air and was saved by his instructor pulling his ripcord
R76L8 TIL Both men and women's faces age at about the same rate until about age 50. At that point, women's faces begin to age at three times the rate of men's due to the drop in estrogen with the menopause also cuts the production of collagen – the protein in skin that gives it its elasticity.