Nobody wants to be perceived as gullible. So if you hear something that sounds too good, too absurd, or too devastating to be true, your first instinct might be to simply deny it. “Yeah right, that’s a good joke!” But history has shown us time and time again that truth is stranger than fiction, and we’ve got a list below that proves that point.
Netizens have been sharing surprising facts that sound too ridiculous to be true, so we’ve compiled a list of the most amusing ones below. From scientific fun facts to random tidbits of information about modern companies, we hope you enjoy scrolling through this treasure trove of knowledge. And be sure to upvote the facts that you find hard to believe!
#1
There are more libraries in the US than McDonald’s.
Image source: MayurBhat, Robert So
#2
The entire state of Wyoming only has 2 escalators.
Image source: Kukantiz, Phearak Chamrien
#3
That Netflix was founded a year before Google.
Image source: ToxicSpook, Anastasia Shuraeva
#4
The Giza pyramids were built when Mammoths still roamed the earth.
Image source: TheRealMajour, mustangjoe
#5
At its furthest away point, you can fit every planet in our solar system between Earth and the Moon.
Image source: anon, Zelch Csaba
#6
There is a point in the Pacific Ocean named “Point Nemo” which is the furthest point from land. In fact, it is so far from land, the nearest humans are often astronauts in the International Space Station when it passes overhead. The ISS orbits the Earth at a maximum of **416 km** while the nearest inhabited landmass to Point Nemo is **over 2,700 km away**.
#7
The 15-20 largest container ships in the world create more pollution than all of the cars in the world.
Image source: GiGGLED420, Ray McKay
#8
If you have 10 dollars in your pocket and no debts , you have more wealth than 25% of Americans.
Image source: TheSlipperyPot8o, kaboompics
#9
Pluto has not gone half way around the sun since its discovery.
Image source: anon, NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI
#10
The longest domestic flight in the world is in France (Paris to Réunion).
Image source: roadierunway12, bbc.com
#11
John Tyler, born 1790 has 2 living grandchildren as of 2017. Not great grandchildren, just regular grandkids. I think he was in his 80s when he had a son and his son was also pretty old when he had these 2.
Image source: tatsuedoa, George Peter Alexander Healy
#12
There was no grass in dinosaur times. It just seems so strange because it’s so ubiquitous today.
Image source: GrandDukeOfNowhere, Ivett M
#13
The four largest US cities(by area) are in Alaska.
Image source: Skeptik7, Ryan Schreiber
#14
Having six fingers is actually a dominant trait, but the genes for it are so incredibly rare that pretty much no one has it.
Image source: TheJaiGitster, Drgnu23
#15
The entire captain planet cartoon was a all star cast. It had Whoppie Goldberg, Jeff Goldblum, Tim Curry, Meg Ryan.
Image source: Foolishpuck80, DIC Entertainment / Hanna-Barbera
#16
In the US, the legislation which prevents the government from banning gay marriage was passed in 1868.
Image source: Governor_Humphries, Wallace Araujo
#17
Nintendo was founded in 1889.
Image source: abusiveyusuf, Jeff Dlouhy
#18
Polar Bears have recently been migrating further south and mating with Grizzly bears, creating a hybrid called Grolar Bears. They were separated for so long they took on different phenotypes, but they aren’t distant enough to no longer be able to mate and create viable offspring.
Image source: TheRealMajour, Corradox
#19
A Chihuahua is more Closely related to a Grizzly bear than to a Hyena.
Image source: anon, Ellie Burgin
#20
Fungi are actuly more closely related to animals than plants.
Image source: Emilybeths, Femke Hansen
#21
You can’t choke an owl.
Image source: ephemeralkitten, Jeremy Waterhouse
#22
The state of Maine has more Black Bears than Black People.
Edit:
15,000 Black People.
30,000 Black Bears.
Image source: Crashbrennan, Regan Dsouza
#23
The best thing for you to do if you’re stung by a tarantula hawk wasp is to lie down and scream.
EDIT: Laying down prevents you from falling over/hurting yourself when you’re in the throes of pain, and the screaming helps cope with the pain level. Nothing else is really going to help you.
Image source: anon, Renee Grayson
#24
It’s illegal to hunt whales in Arizona, a completely landlocked state.
#25
Googolplex is such an absurdity huge number that if you wanted to try and write it out you’d need a tool that could imprint on subatomic particles; Also there aren’t enough subatomic particles in the universe to even write the number.
Image source: jaykeith, Tara Winstead
#26
Harvard University is over 100 years older than the United States.
Image source: odin99999, prayitnophotography
#27
The world’s largest desert isn’t the Sahara. It’s the entire continent of Antarctica
——-Deserts aren’t measured by grains of sand or amount of camels; it’s all about precipitation, and Antarctica takes the cake. The roughly 5.5 million square mile continent only gets about eight inches of rain a year.
Image source: skye_sago, Luis Quintero
#28
A ton of people is only about 11 people.
Image source: Icantunafish, cottonbro studio
#29
HD Video has been around for over 20 years, only became popular with consumers in the past 5/10 years.
Image source: JDM_MoonShibe, Caleb Oquendo
#30
If you cut a hole in a net. It will have less holes.
Image source: guywhoclimbs, Valeska Huyskens
#31
France lends power to Britain so they don’t get power surges from boiling the kettle, which happened several times in 2013 after a tv programme ended.
Image source: ZenxFold, H. Hümâ Yardim
#32
There are more whitetail deer in the U.S now than at the time of first European contact.
Image source: Illhunt_yougather, Aaron J Hill
#33
Saudi Arabia imports sand ..
Image source: Indianfattie, Juan Pablo Daniel
#34
When you receive the wrong type of blood when given a blood transfusion you can become overwhelmed with a feeling of dread like something bad is about to happen.
Image source: anon, Tahir Xəlfə
#35
The introduction of metal helmets in WW1 causes head injuries to increase.
#36
Water is a bad conductor of electricity.
*Pure* water absolutely is an insulator. Water is also really good at containing things that are good conductors of electricity therefore most water, non-pure water, is a good conductor of electricity.
Image source: Zediac, Monojit Dutta
#37
Vikings did in fact *not* have any horns on their helmets.
Image source: MacheteDont, Fernando Cortés
#38
Otters carry a favourite stone in their pocket.
Image source: ShetlandPoodle, Jim
#39
That if you knock your tooth out and put it back in the socket it will grow roots back and save the tooth.
Image source: Leanne1719, kaboompics
#40
27 US states have land that is farther north than the southern most point of Canada, with 13 of them being completely north of the southern most point of Canada. The most surprising is that California has land north of Canada, but New Jersey does not.
.
Image source: 5a1amander
#41
Most people have already met psychopaths and sociopaths in their lives, without really knowing which ones are crazy.
Image source: anon
#42
Ada Lovelace designed the first computer algorithm roughly 100 years before the first computer.
Image source: LDodge7047
#43
Wasabi is really hard to find, and most times the “wasabi” you’re eating is horse radish with food coloring.
Image source: anon
#44
The New York City metro area has a greater population than all of New York State.
Image source: anon
#45
The saying “money doesn’t buy you happiness”. People often read into the surface of the sentence and disregard it; but aren’t aware of the research behind it.
Money does not buy us happiness after a rearching a certain threshold (73k USD a year last time I read, but with time I’m sure with time the amount has inflated). After we fulfill our basic physiological needs through money, money is unlikely to buy us happiness.
So subjectively it might not be true for a lot of people, but objectively the statement “money doesn’t buy you happiness” is likely to be correct.
Image source: wscjustin
#46
More Americans believe they’ve seen a ghost than met a trans person.
Image source: Jolly_bob_
#47
People who sing with accents are actually faking it. Different hemispheres of the brain are responsible for speech, harmony and rhythm. That why, for example, British vocalists (Adele, etc.) have no english accent while singing.
Image source: MetalManic
#48
The most expensive grocery store item on a per pound basis is saffron. It’s about $5,000 lb.
Image source: Skeptik7
#49
There is a polar bear “jail” in Churchill, Manitoba. Polar bears who get too close to the town and/or attack townspeople are shot with tranquilizer darts, airlifted, and dropped off at the jail. IIRC, they are released into the wild again a few days later.
Image source: QueenofKnights
#50
That humans are 60% genetically similar to bananas.
Image source: anon
#51
Contrary to popular belief, Napoleon was actually average height and wasn’t short for the time. He was 5’6” and the average height of European men at the time was 5’5”-5’7” depending on which historical record you read.
Image source: MiYu23
#52
For any given language, the most common word will occur 2x as often as the second most common word, 3x as often as the third most common word, and so on. It’s called Zipf’s Law and it works.
Image source: etymologynerd
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