› added 10 years ago

65

TIL the plot of the pilot episode of the show “The Lone Gunmen”, a spinoff of the X-Files, featured 3 conspiracy theorists thwarting a secret government plot to fly a plane into the World Trade Center and blame it on foreign interests in order to boost defense spending, it aired march 2001.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

Wkw09 TIL Japan has the shortest national anthem in the world - it has only 4 lines and 32 characters.
yQyPJ TIL that the Plague of the Middle Ages likeky did not make 10% Europeans resistant to HIV by increasing the frequency of a protective genetic mutation (CCR5-Ä32), scientists DNA tested 4900 year old skeletons and found the mutation was already common in the Bronze Age
WkaJd TIL that the former ruler of Turkmenistan, Saparmurat Niyazov (also called Turkmenbashi), outlawed beards, lip syncing, and gold teeth because all three annoyed him.
6Dyl TIL Robert Noyce passed up being the worlds first trillionaire by making his patent on silicon chips public domain. Thus allowing technological innovation leading to modern day electronics.
vP1Ej TIL of Serge Voronoff, a French surgeon that was known as the "monkey gland man". He claimed to rejuvenate his patients, transplanting the testicles of executed criminals into millionaires, turning to using monkey testicles when supplies ran low. Over 500 men were treated with his technique.