› added 1 month ago

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TIL that Neptune was discovered in 1846 not by accident, but because astronomers noticed Uranus was wobbling off course. Mathematicians used Newton’s laws to predict where a hidden planet should be and when they pointed a telescope there, Neptune was right where the math said it would be.

Read more nasa.gov

via reddit.com

9YJWQ TIL of Australia's pyjama girl mystery: an unidentified murdered woman's body was on public exhibition in a vat of formalin many years for identification. Ten years later the husband confessed to killing her - he was once a waiter at the detective's regular restaurant who he had known many years
eAjk TIL Neil DeGrasse Tyson considered becoming a male stripper to make money during graduate school. When he visited the club, the dancers came out with lighter fluid soaked jockstraps and set them ablaze while dancing to “Great Balls of Fire.” He chose math tutoring instead.
Z8Abp TIL that spiders legs extend using hydraulic pressure from their circulatory system, and when they're crushed the legs curl in due to the loss in pressure
4O6 TIL Facial disfigurements creep us out, because our subconsciousness scans the disfigurement as a potential disease.
ANb0w TIL that, according to his daughter, in 1996 Reuben Mattus sat at his kitchen table for hours saying nonsensical Danish-sounding words until he came up with his brand name, Häagen-Dazs