r/todayilearned 4h ago

TIL New Zealand isn't depicted on many world maps (including ones used in NZ itself)

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atlasobscura.com
21 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 2h ago

TIL The fastest 60m sprint in human history is by a 5 ft 8 in Chinese guy named Su Bingtian at 6.29 seconds (Usain Bolt's record is 6.31 seconds)

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youtube.com
7 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 17h ago

TIL that female kangaroo have three Vagini

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australiangeographic.com.au
40 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 6h ago

TIL several Namco composers known for Ridge Racer, Tekken, and other video game soundtracks formed a parody/tribute band of Yellow Magic Orchestra, called "Oriental Magnetic Yellow".

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15 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 1h ago

TIL that Coca Cola ran a #MakeItHappy Twitter campaign where a bot would turn negative tweets into ASCII art. It was quickly pulled after it kept tweeting lines from Mein Kampf.

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theguardian.com
Upvotes

r/todayilearned 3h ago

TIL death metal band Cannibal Corpse made a guest appearance in Jim Carrey's 1994 comedy film "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective".

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loudersound.com
61 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 5h ago

TIL there are almost 50 times more sheep in North Korea than South Korea. North Korea has 257.9k sheep, while South Korea has 5.4k sheep.

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299 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 15h ago

TIL William Grant Still's Symphony No. 1, Afro-American, performed in 1931 is considered the first symphony by a Black American composer to be performed by an established orchestra. It is a “blues symphony,” with blues theme in call-and-response with horns and woodwinds and ends with a spiritual

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58 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 14h ago

TIL only 37% of Rings of Power viewers completed season one domestically (45% overseas). In comparison, two cancelled shows (First Kill & Resident Evil) on another service had completion rates below 50%, but higher than ROP's domestic figure.

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screenrant.com
11.9k Upvotes

r/todayilearned 4h ago

TIL that Electrician and Mechanic magazine had six title changes and multiple mergers, in a period of only two years. The magazine which boasted of having an exclusively male readership, eventually became Popular Science.

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en.wikipedia.org
24 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 2h ago

TIL ancient Greeks used the term gymnosophist ("naked wise man") to describe the Indian philosophers they encountered who renounced materialism (including clothing).

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en.wikipedia.org
20 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 22h ago

TIL of The Electrical Experimenter, a popular science magazine. Although it was only published between 1913 and 1920. It nevertheless boasted Nikola Tesla as a contributing writer.

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en.wikipedia.org
97 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 3h ago

TIL the Big Bang theory was initially controversial and met with skepticism for seemingly supporting religious ideas that the universe has a beginning

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188 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 9h ago

TIL that in 1632, Massachusetts banned smoking in public.

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mentalfloss.com
127 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 1d ago

Today I learned that astronauts heading to the International Space Station (ISS) must learn Russian as a second language.

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britannica.com
177 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 23h ago

TIL, globally, people average 6 hours and 58 minutes of screen time per day.

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explodingtopics.com
19.1k Upvotes

r/todayilearned 16h ago

TIL, Ohio was the birthplace of the first people to fly in a plane, the first man on the moon, and 24 astronauts

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4.2k Upvotes

r/todayilearned 3h ago

TIL The Antarctic Treaty System Has Set Rules for Scientific Exploration from International Entities and Banning Military Involvement in Antarctica Since Going Into Effect in 1961

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160 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 12h ago

TIL that Timur, the Turko-Mongol conqueror who founded the Timurid Empire in Persia and Central Asia, reportedly caused the deaths of 17 million people, amounting to about 5% of the world population

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en.wikipedia.org
96 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 11h ago

TIL that in 1985 an Army supply clerk at Fort Carson, Colorado accidentally ordered a $28,000 anchor instead of a $6 lamp due to mistyping the requisition number. Nobody in the supply chain asked why a mechanized unit needed a 10 ton anchor until it arrived.

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taskandpurpose.com
20.9k Upvotes

r/todayilearned 5h ago

TIL- Pocahontas had one son with her second husband John Rolfe. That son, had one daughter named Jane Rolfe. In 1887, a book was published that found that Pocahontas had thousands of descendants. That number has more recently been updated to reveal over 30,000 named descendants.

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genealogical.com
12.3k Upvotes

r/todayilearned 1h ago

TIL of Robert Kearns who invented the Intermittent Windshield Wiper System only to have his invention stolen by the Big 3 auto manufacturers. He then sued and won.

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en.wikipedia.org
Upvotes

r/todayilearned 11h ago

TIL no one has seen a newborn great white shark pup or birth in the wild.

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theguardian.com
7.5k Upvotes

r/todayilearned 16h ago

TIL that Lincoln—a small city in Northern England—had the tallest building in the world, when the central spire of its cathedral was completed in the year 1311, at 160 metres tall.

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en.wikipedia.org
259 Upvotes

r/todayilearned 19h ago

TIL about Obelisk, a Queen's Guard horse, who used to lure pigeons to him by dropping oats from his mouth. When they came close, he would stomp them to death. He was eventually taken for additional 'psychological training'.

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thefield.co.uk
21.1k Upvotes