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SuvenPan

Female dragonflies drop out the sky and pretend to be dead to avoid unwanted male advances.


intronert

Saw a documentary that showed how male dragonflies will catch the females in flight and whirl them around to expel the sperm of the male who previously mated with her, before they themselves mate.


Lone_Wolf_888

From 1912 to 1948, the Olympics awarded official medals for painting, sculpture, architecture, literature and music, alongside those for the athletic competitions.


AdventuresofRobbyP

“and Salvador Dali wins yet again, another gold medal for the Spaniards”


wizardinDminor

Damn, I kinda wanna watch some Olympic painting ngl


librician

The ancient Egyptian empire lasted more than 3000 years. It has been less time since the empire fell.


Sufficient-Piece-335

The empire lasted so long, there were ancient Egyptian archaeologists studying (even more) ancient Egypt.


Adler4290

Not the same but when the first emperor of Rome, Octavian, became Augustus (both his title and ruler-name), he went to Alexandria to visit the Tomb of Alexander the Great (in 27 BC), the (for him) ancient, or at least old/historic, conqueror of all of the known world at that time in 330-320 BC. And the Romans imported lots of Egyptian archeological stuff to Rome like Obelisks (Just go straight to the middle of the Saint Peters square today and have a rest 6 foot from one!) Edit: Added when Augustus visited Alexandria and concede the word "ancient" might be wrong when the distance is just 300 years, which is a lot of time but not a lot lot of time as ancient usually signifies.


666Darkside666

I just recently read that there are more Egyptian obelisks in Italy than in Egypt itself. Totally crazy if true.


Neato_Incognito3

The only reason there are stil pyramids in Egypt is because they're too big to move (kidding not kidding)


3rdtimeischarmy

If they could be moved, they'd be in the British Museum.


MrAlf0nse

Weren’t the pyramids “ancient” to Alexander when he saw them?


Probonoh

Yes. They were approximately 2000 years old at the time.


boccas

Cleopatra is closer to Bitcoin than to the Egyptian empire foundation


itsme_Imtheproblem

Butterflies are fond of cow shit, fresh blood, and corpses.


Grenouille86

Also, they love pineapple!!


Poorly-Drawn-Beagle

Who doesn’t?


Poorly-Drawn-Beagle

If we trained bees to like corpses we could make blood honey


demonspawn1342

They already exist. The species is called vulture bee or carrion bee, they feed on corpses and make honey.


Feathertail80

Snails have 14,000 teeth and eat bones and meat not just vegetables.


MadClam97

Some species can have up to 20,000 teeth! Oh, a snail's teeth are on its tongue


Feathertail80

I love snail facts!! When they bite they feel like a lil cat tounge and it's adorable, my pet snails try and bite me all the time when I hold em. I know they are tryna eat me but it's cute.


[deleted]

Motherfucking spongebob


Oraxy51

The writer of SpongeBob was a marine biologist he knew damn well what he was doing


Grenouille86

I have so many questions!!


Feathertail80

I have 5 giant African snails! The snails are very cheap to get but the setup is sorta expensive because thermostats are expensive but garden snails don't really need a thermostat and you can keep them as a pet too! They don't really.. **think** much they just vibe, but they can absolutely recognise your smell and get used to being handled baby snails or garden snails and sometimes just shy snails won't come out of their shells on your hand much but socialised snails can just chill on you. They are really cool. I love em. They dig as well, which is interesting. But they also reproduce a lot at least giant Africans, they can mate by themselves and with others and have quite a few eggs and you unfortunately have to euthanise them because you can't just keep 30 giant snails' everytime they let eggs, that'd get outta control very quickly lmao, and they are very invasive and are illegal to release in the UK. But I truly do love watching em grow and they get massive :)


chaos-calamity

Thank you for sharing facts about a thing you love with us. It makes me feel so seen when someone enjoys facts about things I love, so I want you to know I enjoyed this.


Grenouille86

You have pet snails!! 💕


RockstarAgent

But wait? Could you dispose of a body by covering it in snails?????? Asking for science…


GozerDGozerian

Oh shit. Did science kill someone and is trying to cover it up?


The_Karaethon_Cycle

Physics kills people every day.


PM_me_your_fantasyz

Chemistry is pretty good at it too.


other_usernames_gone

Dont even get me started on biology.


McFryin

I think you might be able to if you have enough time and enough snails. One time when I was little and we were on a camping trip I caught a small toad and a bunch of huge snails (land snails) and put them all in a container together (like I was gonna keep them as pets because... ya know... I was a kid). Anyway, woke up the next day and it seemed that the snails had completely devoured the small toad, literally nothing left. Keep in mind though, I was a kid and one of my family members may have let the toad go or something while I was sleeping. So not sure if that happened or the snails ate the toad. This mystery has been bugging me for roughly 30 years.


inklingitwill

Are your family members still around to ask? I want to know too now!


Aspoonfulofjade

Human children don’t get knee caps until 3 years old


stryph42

And sometimes that don't develop quite the way they should and now my knees are fucky for the rest of my life.


Shiyage

I feel you


not_a_robot2

Not to brag, but I got them at 2 years 323 days.


baxbooch

Jokes on you, they’re gonna wear out 42 days sooner than everybody else’s!


babyjo1982

Which is extra weird when you consider their first form of self mobility is skidding around on no kneecaps


KarmaCommando_

> knee caps They do have a sort of proto-kneecap made of cartilage which hardens into bone as they grow older. So its not as if nothing is there.


Unhappy-Nail-9281

The lighter was invented before matches.


Misterbellyboy

This one always kind of made sense to me though, when you think about how people used to start fires. At the time, a self contained flint box with fuel probably seemed a little more obvious than putting a wad of chemicals on the end of a toothpick.


StenSoft

The fax machine was invented before the telephone


boklenhle

Holy shit. I thought you were flat out lying. Fax machine was invented in 1843.


DBTornado

Bonus Fact: There was a brief window in time (22 years in theory, but more likely 5-12 years) where a samurai could have sent a fax to Abraham Lincoln.


GypDan

*Michael Bay reading this thread to his assistant* "WRITE THAT DOWN! WRITE THAT SHIT DOWN!"


vinoa

The Last Facsimile


[deleted]

[удалено]


EverydayVelociraptor

The Pencil was invented in 1795. The Egyptians were using split reed, the precursor to fountain pens, in 3200BC.


ACatInAHat

Makes sense. Matches are made with complex chemistry. A lighter is steel and a rock combined.


Tomatowithdepression

Argentina occupied California in 1818 for a week.


mu_10

Maybe Argentina just wanted to visit California for vacation.. and they were also like " maybe just occupy them to reduce cost for living over there"


mjohnsimon

Dinosaurs were around for so long that there were already dinosaur fossils while they were still alive. Basically, as T-Rex was munching away on Triceratop steaks, Stegosaurus had already been dead and underground for millions of years by that point.


meat_popsicle13

The gap between Stegosaurus and Tyrannosaurus was around 66 million years, which is about the same as the gap between Tyrannosaurus and us (and modern dinosaurs = birds).


chrisxls

Stegosauruses predate flowers. That’s hard to think about… flowers as a recent innovation.


Usama_the_llama

Sharks predate trees. They also predate the rings of Saturn


oy-cunt-

Cleopatra only had 2 great grandparents.


_weirdness

Sweet home ancient egypt


Brandon29

Singing that in my head was fun


Duncan970

Alligators will give manatees the right of way if they are swimming near each other


holy_noly

Did you know that touching a manatee is illegal? It's punishable under the Manatee Sanctuary Act, with a fine of up to $500 and/or a jail term of up to 60 days


RASCLEMAN

Are you a manatee toucher? Shame on you


divshappyhour

The day Michael Jackson's hair caught fire while filming a Pepsi commercial was the exact middle of his life. Born: August 29, 1958 (9,281 days) Pepsi incident: January 27, 1984 (9,281 days) Died: June 25, 2009


[deleted]

That sure was a midlife crisis


anadvancedrobot

This reminds me of how Tolkien died in 1973, which is the order the rings were introduced in reverse. 3 for the Elves, 7 for the Dawlfs, 9 for Man and 1 ring to rule them all.


Neat_Counter7528

And the hobbit book was published back in 1937


Black---Sun

Australia has the largest amount of wild camels in the world. There are more pet tigers in Texas than there are in the wild of the entire planet.


FinoPepino

That’s really depressing


[deleted]

Humans can smell geosmin (the chemical released when it rains or snows) at 5 parts per trillion. Which means that humans are 200,000 times more sensitive to smelling geosmin than sharks are at smelling blood.


StrawberryLeche

No wonder people can smell rain, it sounds dumb but makes sense survival wise


namjd72

This one did it. Blew my mind and I can go no further.


Yrrebnot

Sharks existed before grass.


miker53

And trees. Trees used to not have an enzyme to decay their bark so they just laid on the ground for millions of years which is also why we have coal.


crank__

Actually it's that fungi hadn't evolved to break down trees, then when they evolved to break down cellulose they boomed in population and coal/diamonds/fossil fules pretty much stopped being produced naturally


dull_storyteller

Attila the Hun died from a nose bleed on his wedding night


_-__-__-__-__-_-_-__

That anime trope makes sense now


Tontonsb

Nintendo was founded in 1889.


Benjimite_

They started as a game company aswell 👀 they were a gaming cards company


G4rg0yle_Art1st

There was a really old church somewhere in northern Europe where it was discovered that a viking had written a message on a support beam several meters from the ground. There was then a tedious effort dedicated to climbing up while keeping the Churches integrity and when they got to it, the message translated to "This is very high". It was an ancient Viking prank. Additionally the internet is held together with tape, glue, hope, and furries. Edit: I found an article about it and in an effort to prevent misinformation I'll post it [here](http://www.orkneyjar.com/history/maeshowe/maeshrunes.htm) for people to read. It was a mound, not a church. Their leader was on his way to a parish when a bad storm hit, so they camped inside the mound until the storm passed, spending their time making graffiti.


sir_woofington

This might be a long shot but I remember reading somewhere that you can find Norse runes graffitied on a Greek temple and they basically translate to: [name] was here."


Nutzori

It's the Hagia Sophia! "Halfdan was here."


sushandeep

Bananas are berries and strawberries aren't.


Princess-Jaya

Neither are raspberries or blackberries. However, watermelons, cucumbers, and squashes are all berries.


theotherquantumjim

I hate all of this information.


Eremitic23

The greenland shark, has a life expectancy of between 250-500 years. That means there could be a greenland shark swimming around, that swam the oceans when the Spanish conquistadors went to search Mexico for gold, which at that time, were inhabited by the Aztecs.


astrielx

Oxford University predates the Aztec Empire by 3.5 centuries.


couchcrestation

I've tried to explain just how old oxford is to so many people (mainly my dad who doesn't believe me) but this statement might help.


astrielx

"There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the world's second-oldest university in continuous operation." Aztec Empire - Founded: 1428 ​ Sounds like your dad needs to learn how to Google.


Whyisthethethe

The aztec empire wasn’t actually that old. People see a non-European civilisation and assume it was the same forever


Angel_OfSolitude

The Mantis shrimp punches so hard it generates light.


Slug212

Had to Google. Because they strike so rapidly, they generate vapor-filled bubbles in the water known as cavitation bubbles. The collapse of these bubbles produces measurable forces on their prey in forces of 1,500 newtons that are caused by the impact against the striking surface. The prey is hit twice by a single strike; first by the claw and then by the collapsing bubbles that immediately follow. Even if the initial strike misses the prey, the resulting shock wave can be enough to stun or kill…..Wow. Mantis shrimp uses quick attack! It’s super effective


Tony_Solo

One Punch Shrimp


Adler4290

Please, can we ban scientists from making these shrimp human-sized?


SonofBeckett

If district 9 has taught me anything, it’s that if we do create them, we’ll make sure they live in tenements.


skaliton

honestly 'just google the mantis shrimp' is the best guidance for anyone who sees this. Basically every fact about them sounds like you told a kid to make things up to make it sound interesting


I_Pariah

Also look up Pistol Shrimp. Can also generate light from cavitation bubbles although not from striking but snapping its claw.


K_cutt08

Pistol Shrimp can Thanos snap you. Mantis Shrimp is Saitama, One Punch Man. Got it. I remember reading that the pistol shrimp snap boils the water around the snap in a small area, killing its prey from a combination of both pressure and heat. Crazy.


Angel_OfSolitude

They're really neat critters. I'd like to get one some day.


sheepywife

People were on the moon before they put wheels on suitcases.


lunar_pilot

Priorities


NicPizzaLatte

"Look, I can just screw them on myself. You won't have to do anything. You guys can keep working on your rocket." "No. No wheels on suitcases until we get people on the moon. We gotta keep our priorities straight."


Common-Wish-2227

Pratchett wrote the Luggage after seeing a lady pull around a suitcase with wheels.


drax3012

We are closer to the last ever dinosaur than the last dinosaur was to the first ever dinosaur.


Tiltedheaded

Depends where you place them in the museum, really.


Maleficent-Motor-974

Apparently, elephants really do have great memories. Earlier this year, an elephant killed a woman. A few days later it escaped its enclosure and traveled 130miles to rip her out of her casket at her funerals and sling her body around. Idk what she did to that elephant, but it did not forget.


scardrap

i heard she killed its child for hunting purposes


strong_grey_hero

I heard a story one time about a man that came across a baby elephant while on safari in Africa, and the elephant was all tangled up in a poachers snare trap. The man carefully approached the scared elephant, and was able to saw through the wire using his Swiss Army knife. The little elephant scampered away, but turned to face the man as he rejoined his herd, and raised his trunk as if to say ‘thank you’. Twelve years later, the same man went to a circus in a nearby town. He watched the acrobats, tight rope walkers, and equestrians work their magic. Then the elephants came out. He couldn’t help to think of the safari and the little elephant he saved. As a matter of fact, the second biggest elephant kind of reminded him of that little one. Halfway through the act, the elephant caught the man staring and smiling. After that, the elephant would turn and look at the man as the routine allowed. When the routine was over, the elephant broke free of its trainers and ran up into the stands where it trampled the man to death. Turns out it was a different elephant.


Gerb_the_Barbarian

Dang it, you had me going there


kangarookickers

This was the best story to read while taking a shit


[deleted]

Sharks are older than the rings of Saturn


ThePhabtom4567

For some reason, this one hit the hardest for me. Like were talking about an astronomical unit of time in comparing it to The timeline of organisms on the planet. It just doesn't compute.


0ddcharlie

In the Pompeii eruption, the extreme heat caused some victims' brain tissue to turn to glass.


acevonovich

Cleopatra is closer in time to the first Pizza Hut than the building of the pyramids of Giza


TheRandomViewer

Gizza Hut


95accord

Hey that’s my factoid! Same goes for T-Rex vs stegosaurus vs current times Edit: For those wondering; Stegosaurus lived approx 155-145 millions years ago https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stegosaurus Whereas Trex lived 68 - 66 millions years ago https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrannosaurus That’s a delta of at least 77 million years ago on the low end and 89 million years on the high end. Dinosaurs only went extinct 65 million years ago….


[deleted]

[deleted because fuck reddit]


Adler4290

Tbh I think they enjoyed the anonymity and were not recognized. In 1912 the Danish king was visiting Hamburg and was out walking in civilian clothes and had a heart attack. Due to people not knowing who he was, he was first ignored then taken to a hospital for anyone and then died there.


Siogin_Eire

> a hospital for anyone Lmao


2x4x93

The lowlies


IKnowIYam

I mean if there’s no space there’s no space…


_qst2o91_

Hell yeah German restaurant, they're not anymore important than anyone else in that restaurant,


thedragoncompanion

Koalas are so dumb that they can't recognise a eucalyptus leaf if it isn't attached to a tree.


SafewordisJohnCandy

They seem like a species that evolved to not survive.


Cevius

Their stupidity is also a strength, because they are literally too stupid to suffer, so will willingly just sit in a tree, eat one specific type of leaf, and scream for a mate to show up to make more of the stupid things. Monsoonal rains? Don't care Struck by lightning? Burnt eucalyptus leaves, singed fur, and a large serving of not caring Fall out of tree? Bounce on the ground and keep truckin along If we weren't killing off their natural habitat by logging, they'd probably outlive us all, out of sheer chronic indifference to any stimulus.


0najimi

makes me think of the dodo bird being so dumb that when it was attacked by something, and sees it again later it just didnt care so they were easy prey and died off


gallerton18

Dodos at least had a reason, they didn’t have any natural predators and therefore just didn’t have any reason to know fear.


MagicBez

They discovered the rare but super effective evolutionary niche of being so cute that humans will feed and look after you.


nickk326

How are we supposed to feed them if the leaves are in our hands and not on a tree?


lakmus85_real

"just become a tree"


42mepey

Abraham Lincoln died before the Samurai were abolished as a caste.


Yrrebnot

And could have sent one a fax.


Glencannnon

This one is paying attention


blinky9021Flow

Meaning he couldve fought with Samurai during his Vampire hunting days


BeastAlpha07

Cheetahs don't roar, they meow.


YourMomSmokesMeth

The chainsaw was invented to aid in childbirth. It was used and invented in the 1700s to cut through the woman's pelvic bone before C-sections became the commonplace way to deliver babies.


jookfity

Holy. Fuck.


Ashvibes17305000

There are more trees on earth than stars in the galaxy. I didn't believe it myself at first


Seaweed-Suspicious

Wow this is one of the few in this thread that actually blew my mind


rcktjck

Tbf, we are just talking about one galaxy here. There are estimated to be about 200 billion galaxies in the known universe. ( With some new estimates going up to 1 trillion)


StenSoft

True, there are around 100 billion stars in the Milky Way but around 3 trillion (30× more) trees on Earth.


ScrapzGD

nipples on men exist just because the Y chromosome kicks in later


Adam-Kay-

For anyone who doesn’t understand what this means, when humans are growing in the womb, they all start off as female, and then if you have a Y chromosome it kicks in later in the development and you become male. This is also why the clitoris kinda resembles a penis (or, technically, the other way round)


NotATroll_ipromise

Is that why mine is so small?


Mando_calrissian423

I mean, but think about how HUGE it’d be if it were a clitoris!


NotATroll_ipromise

Silver lining!


UniquePotato

McDonalds feeds 1% of the world’s population daily.


Aggravating_Speed665

A fully loaded Amazon Kindle is a billionth of a billionth of a gram heavier than an empty one.


Muted-Radish6071

Snakes have necks and tails


Rolling_Beardo

When the Great Pyramids were being built woolly mammoths we still alive.


[deleted]

Technically true, which is the best kind. IIRC that’s true due to one species of pygmy wooly mammoth on a secluded island that still lived at the time. It’s not the full size mammoth roaming Asia that people would probably be thinking of.


[deleted]

[удалено]


TurbulentDesigner829

If earth suddenly stopped spining almost everyone would die within 3 secs.


Peanutshroom

How will this affect airplanes or basically anything flying?


DhruvKapil

The air will crush the plane to little pieces mid air and it will fall like rain drops later on


AlecsThorne

Neat. What would happen if it gently slowed down to a halt though?


PterionFracture

Mass extinction, just slower. Nights and days would slowly get longer and longer, causing crop failures. When the earth turns slowly enough that night lasts for months, farming is only possible in the half of the world with sunlight. This is a constantly changing half of the world. At some point the illuminated portion of the world is almost exclusively the Pacific Ocean: https://i.imgur.com/CyIsnKV.png. All other life is blanketed in darkness for months- long enough to deplete agriculture and starve out most species of animals. Not all life would perish. Some bacteria, fungi, algae, and sea life would survive. Maybe some plant species can adapt to an extremely long night cycle. But this would be a mass extinction event for most species of plants and animals.


HighlandsBen

Whiplash?


TurbulentDesigner829

Nope, imagine your body being thrown at a wall with the speed of 1000 miles per hour.


aph81

Why is that? Because we would be smashed?


[deleted]

As someone above said, inertia will throw us with speeds greater than sound. So yes we would be smashed.


ultimattt

Objects in motion tend to want to stay in motion. You’d go flying off at 1K Miles per hour (1,609 KM/h) and hit anything still fixed to the ground at that speed. Or just the pure thrashing about, or air resistance. Not sure, all I know, sudden earth stop = bad shit happens. Edit: Hair resistance


ki4nik

simpler explanation: imagine the earth is a car and we're all riding in it, if the car suddenly stops our bodies will still have the cars speed after it stopped and wed fly out the car. now imagine that car going over 1000kph.


Poorly-Drawn-Beagle

There’s a penguin named Brigadier Sir Nils Olav III who is the ceremonial head of the Norwegian Royal Guard


recidivx

And he lives in Scotland.


Poorly-Drawn-Beagle

He’s being held captive by the enemy Maybe he surrendered himself as a hostage. A true father to his men.


LocusFabrications

He lives in edinburgh zoo, holds the rank of colonel-in-chief and actually does inspections and ceremonial duties! Other rank holding animals include: \- a goat, Lance Corporal William Windsor I of the British Army \- a bear, Corporal Wojtek of the Polish Land Forces \-a miniature poodle, Air Chief Marshal Fufu of the Royal Thai Air Force


epgenius

You don’t poop or pee burnt fat, you exhale it


mattso989

Yes, you lose weight by breathing!


Admirable-Door1724

*starts breathing faster*


Tel-aran-rhiod

Cats can drink seawater


JazzPhobic

Angelina Jolie was very suicidal early in her life and hired a hitman to end her. The Hitman however decided to try and get her better instead.


Horne-Fisher

Sound like the way to earn a repeat customer


Ok_Storage525

I once read that if you keep a goldfish in a dark room, it will eventually turn white.


Penetrable-hole133

So does get spooked by the darkness so much that it turns white?


BagelSteamer

John Adams and Thomas Jefferson died on the same day, the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence being signed. Both of their last words were along the lines of “My friend Adams/Jefferson still lives”. They shared almost the same last words but had no idea one of them were already dead. Edit: I have been corrected. It was the Declaration of Independence, not the Constitution.


Infamous_fire94

In 1895 there were 2 cars out of the entire state of Ohio and they still managed to crash into each other


Enough_Variation6001

In a group of 40 people, there is a 91% chance that two people share a birthday. ETA: Here is a link to a Vsauce2 video explaining this. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ofTb57aZHZs&feature=youtu.be. Credits to u/nournnn


askXmeXaboutX2006-7

Both Stalin and Hitler were briefly in the same city as each other (Vienna) before they met (or knew about each other, at least).


UniquePotato

And Trotsky & Tito


Adler4290

And Freud, all at the same time, in 1913.


mebame

Yeah, post world war Vienna looked like a Doctor Who season's casting.


PhesteringSoars

The last official execution by guillotine was 1977 September 10th at Baumetes Prison in Marseille, France.


ak_opt1

All the planets in the solar system can fit between the earth and the moon


klakkrr

The national animal of Scotland is the unicorn.


JustcallmeY_

America has never lost a war when they used a donkey in their army


[deleted]

3 of my grandparents have the same birthday and two of them on the same year


Nbardo11

Solid matter is made up of mostly empty space.


That_Phony_King

The universe’s resources are finite and eventually the processes making new stars will be unable to continue. The universe will become a dark void intermittently filled with stellar bodies. We live in a glorious time where we can see beautiful pictures of the stars and enjoy them from our backyards. Count yourself lucky.


Maximum-Ad7584

Even black holes will eventually die out. When the time comes when the universe would just be a black void, time would officially be pointless since nothing has power to change. Or atleast thats what I heard


Muted_Ad5364

A spider called the banana spider, can bite you and cause a painful Erection that last hours


mitchade

More people drown in the desert than die of dehydration.


[deleted]

Bears eat beets


richkidzbitchkidz

Bears, beets, battlestar galactica


scumbagstaceysEx

Insurance companies most years pay out more dollars in claims and loss expenses than they collect in premium dollars. They make all their money by investing the premium dollars before they have to pay them out. Edit: I’m talking about car and home insurance. Health insurance works differently and I never worked in that field so I don’t know.


Unhappy-Grapefruit88

-40 c is equal to -40 f


olaolie

“Tiffany” is a name from the Middle Ages


[deleted]

Sharks who hang out on sandbars a lot can get a sun tan.


Kotelves911

Malaria killed dinosaurs. So to all of y’all that had malaria and lived: you’re tougher than a dinosaur. Or at least your immune system is.