› added 6 years ago

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TIL about "lonely negatives," such as disgust, disheveled, inept and inert. These are words that, due to a prefix or suffix, appear as though they should have a positive root but none exists or it has vanished from usage.

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xVD1k TIL of the Octopus Stinkhorn. The fungus erupts from the egg by forming into four to seven elongated slender arms. The arms unfold to reveal a pinkish-red interior covered with a dark-olive spore-containing gleba. In maturity it smells like putrid flesh.
pYmpO TIL of the Old River Control Structure, meant to prevent the Mississippi River changing course. It if fails, it would cripple the US economy & lead to a global food crisis. Several experts have recommended letting the river shift course naturally to avoid this.
GYYG5 TIL that in the Hamilton Musical, a R&B/Hip hop style Broadway musical about the forming of the USA, there is a reference/inspiration taken from Biggie Smalls "Juicy"
7r81b TIL the members of the 1980s pop/rock band Toto were prolific session musicians. Their work includes Michael Jackson's 'Thriller'. Collectively, the members have been recorded on over 5,000 albums, selling over 500,000,000 albums.
OoLNa TIL in the 1930s a DuPont chemist found that crystals of a substance called PTC (phenylthiocarbamide) tasted very bitter to some but were tasteless to others (about 75% taste bitterness). Researchers found three variants in a gene called TAS2R38. Two copies of this variant make you non-taster.