› added 11 years ago

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TIL Scientists had to purge Urban Dictionary’s data from IBM’s Watson’s memory because it learned to swear.

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rKnw TIL that when the 1937 Marijuana Tax Act was passed, only the birdseed industry successfully lobbied against it by arguing that hemp seeds gave birds shinier feathers than other seeds. Because of this, birdseed producers are legally allowed to import hemp seeds into the US (deactivated) today.
VM5QG TIL One reason the Lockheed F-117 and the HB1001 look like retro low-poly computer models is because they literally are. In 1974 when Denys Overholser leveraged 60s Soviet algorithms to calculate radar reflection, computers weren't powerful enough to reliably perform this function on curved surfaces
P65V TIL During WWII, when he realised his guns had malfunctioned, an RAF pilot prevented a German bomber from bombing Buckingham Palace by cutting the German plane in half with the wing of his Hawker Hurricane.
D1Gxp TIL 70% of all Americans have an affair during marriage.
7rZ8L TIL Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) and Richard Wagner (1813-1883) were frenemies, and one of the last nails in the coffin of their friendship was Wagner's allusion that Nietzsche's ill health was the result of "excessive masturbation".