› added 3 years ago

82

TIL (According to Brent Berlin and Paul Kay's 1969 study Basic Color Terms: Their Universality and Evolution) Names for brown, purple, pink, orange, and gray will not emerge in a language until the language has made a distinction between green and blue.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

n7oo TIL through coarticulation, your brain decides the placement of your tongue and lips based on the sounds that follow the first letter. i.e. your lips are shaped differently for the /k/ in kid vs. /k/ in cop.
J1D6v TIL scientists trained a ferret to run through the Fermilab particle accelerator's main ring to keep it clean.
nGjP TIL a World of Warcraft player had 36 accounts on 11 computers simultaneously and raided by himself
XEEl6 Spies used it as a secret weapon. A president tumbled from it. Hitler wanted it destroyed. Just what made this train so intriguing?
Oka6 TIL that in 1969 President Richard Nixon had proposed a form of Basic Income (or Negative Income Tax) for poor families in the US, but it was promptly defeated in the senate.