It’s worth being curious about the world because it keeps your mind healthy, and it’s a ton of fun on top of that. There’s always something new to learn, and it is a humbling experience to realize just how many things we don’t know. And one of the best places on the internet to face this head-on is the ‘Today I Learned’ group that gets millions of visitors every week.
We have collected our favorite interesting and fresh facts from the TIL community that helped us expand our minds, and we hope that they’ll help you, too. Put on your thinking cap, get your brain ready, and let’s get into it.
#1
TIL for 21 years, Andromachi Papanikolaou volunteered to undergo daily cervical smears so her husband, Greek physician Georgios Papanikolaou, could perfect the Pap test. As such, she helped create one of the greatest cancer screening tools in medical history, saving millions of lives worldwide.
septagons:
Wow, I guess this time we really can say: Thank your for your cervix
Image source: No_Idea_479, anon
#2
TIL In 1837 a British woman named Caroline Newton bit off part of a man’s nose when he tried to kiss her without her consent. He took her to court but lost with the judge saying “When a man kisses a woman against her will, she is fully entitled to bite his nose off, if she so pleases.”
Image source: Ill_Definition8074, Natalia Blauth
#3
TIL in 2023 about 45% of US adults between the ages 18-29 still lived at home with their parents, which is the highest percentage in 80 years.
Image source: tyrion2024, Sandra Seitamaa
Staying curious and learning new things and skills is a great way to keep your mind active. Moreover, learning new things is a lot of fun (or is that just us?), and it’s an excuse to socialize more actively with others. However, staying curious as you age is a bit of a challenge.
For one, you have lots of responsibilities in your life that leave you very little time for education. Work, parenting, etc., are your main priorities, and you don’t have much space for intellectual exploration.
Moreover, you might become set in your ways and assume that you already know everything that is worth knowing.
#4
TIL that for the bee sting scene in My Girl (1991), production used thousands of real bees on a 10 year old Macaulay Culkin. To attract them, his hands were coated in a queen bee scent, and when the director yelled “cut,” Culkin was told to run into the woods to escape.
Image source: Zipp-Storm
#5
TIL about Ruby the painting elephant. When her keepers at the Phoenix Zoo saw her scratching in the dirt with a stick, they gave her a brush and paints. For 3 years, zookeepers did not publicize the knowledge that Ruby could paint. Eventually her paintings were sold to raise money for conservation.
Image source: Acrobatic-Post9811, Kyle sb
#6
TIL the majority of the oxygen we breathe comes from photosynthesizers in the ocean, not from trees.
Image source: dumbfu, Fellipe Ditadi
Recent research shows that curiosity tends to drop off in middle age and pick back up later on in life. Older adults become more selectively curious. Specifically, older individuals show curiosity about topics that they already know and care about.
In other words, general (trait) curiosity tends to fade and decline over time, but specific (state) curiosity can rise as all the demands and pressures in life ease, allowing you to pursue more of your passions. Genuine interest in topics can lead to massive enthusiasm in learning more about them.
#7
TIL that in 2024, archeologists in Spain found the skeleton of a 6-year-old Neanderthal with Down Syndrome.
Image source: Sebastianlim, Trnava University
#8
TIL in 1997 three-day-old Zephany Nurse was kidnapped from the hospital by a woman dressed in a nurse’s uniform. However, Zephany was reunited with her biological family 17 years later after she became close friends with a new student at school who coincidentally turned out to be her younger sister.
Image source: tyrion2024, Christian Bowen
#9
TIL when John Williams first played the two-note “Jaws” theme for Spielberg, Spielberg laughed, thinking it was a joke and expecting something more melodic. Williams replied, “The sophisticated approach you would like me to take isn’t the approach you took with the film I just experienced.”
Image source: Giff95
Which of these TIL facts blew your mind a little bit? How do you try to stay up to date with the latest science and other news? Would you say that you’re a curious person by nature, or do you lean toward thinking that you already know everything there is to know about the world?
What are some interesting facts you recently learned that you genuinely can’t believe you didn’t know until now?
Share your thoughts—and all the cool and surprising things that made you say ‘Today I Learned’—in the comments at the very bottom of this post. We’ll see you there!
#10
TIL in 1947, scientists dumped crushed dry ice into a hurricane just to “see what would happen.” The storm then made a 135-degree turn, strengthened, and struck Georgia—sparking public outrage and threats of lawsuits over the experiment.
Image source: alphbernardo, Getty Images
#11
TIL (also) that a man with HIV developed a type of cancer that looked nothing like any cancer known to doctors. Right before he passed, doctors discovered his tapeworms had cancer and his body started developing tapeworm cancer as the HIV impaired his immune system.
Image source: geosunsetmoth, Karolina Grabowska
#12
TIL Anne Hathaway had a miscarriage while acting in a one-woman off-Broadway play where she played a pregnant character and had to simulate giving birth on stage every night during the show. It was her first pregnancy and she was overwhelmed by the loss, however she eventually gave birth to 2 sons.
Image source: tyrion2024, Lee Jeong-woo
#13
TIL about the “Fever Effect”, in which the symptoms of Autism seem to improve whenever an Autistic person develops a fever.
Image source: Sebastianlim, Matteo Fusco
#14
TIL that in Victorian London, mail was delivered 12 times a day and people complained if a letter took more than two hours to arrive.
Image source: nic_tesla, unknown
#15
TIL the slang word “stan”, invented by Eminem’s song of the same name, was not a deliberate portmanteau of “stalker” and “fan”, but a mere ‘happy coincidence’. Eminem chose the name simply because it rhymed with the word “fan”.
Image source: AmiroZ, Brendan_linden
#16
TIL that “Necroprinting” is the practice of building 3D printers using the mouth of a deceased mosquito as a nozzle, producing results that are better than commercially available printers.
Image source: geosunsetmoth, Rapha Wilde
#17
TIL there is a town in Australia, where half the population lives in underground homes because surface temperatures regularly hit 113°F (45°C). The golf course has no grass, so players carry a swatch of astro turf to tee off from on each hole.
Image source: rizkar99, qwesy qwesy
#18
TIL it took Germany 92 years to pay off the 269 Billion USD it owed for losing WW1.
Image source: shihao21
#19
TIL a convenience store in Pocatello, Idaho has a video rental section called “Christina’s Corner” which was created for a woman with Down Syndrome who is mostly nonverbal, so that she could still maintain her routine of renting movies after the video store next door had closed.
Image source: Sandstorm400, ROCKY13573
#20
TIL in 1989 Li Jingwei, at 4 years old, was kidnapped by a neighbor who lured him away by saying they would go look at cars (rare in rural Chinese villages). At age 37, he posted a map of his home village online that he drew from memory, which helped lead to its location & a reunion with his family.
Image source: tyrion2024
#21
TIL about Social Reorientation, a period in teenage years in which the brain naturally reduces dopamine during parental interaction and increases dopamine during peer interaction.
Image source: Kemilio, National Cancer Institute
#22
TIL Japan has more than 31,000 “Yakult Ladies” who deliver probiotic drinks door to door. A lot of their customers are elderly people living alone, so the deliveries double as a wellness check. If someone doesn’t answer the door, the Yakult Lady will call their family.
Image source: Aihui-EasyMate, bryan…
#23
TIL of a couple who tried to conceive for 20 years, failing multiple IVFs and surgeries. Scientists used a new AI-guided robotic system that scanned 2.5 million microscopic images of a single sample, found the only 2 viable cells hidden inside, and successfully started a pregnancy.
Image source: Similar_Detective861, Rod Long
#24
TIL aphids are one of the most destructive insect pests in the world largely because they can reproduce asexually via live birth with a one week gestation period and telescopic pregnancies, where nymphs are born pregnant with another embryo.
Image source: brevity-soul-wit, Alvesgaspar
#25
TIL a Swedish pilot flew commercial airliners for 13 years for 3 airlines without a valid commercial pilot’s license. He accumulated 10K hours in the air. To get hired, he used a fake license he’d created himself. He said, “It was a fantasy creation. It wasn’t laminated… It was surprisingly easy.”
Image source: tyrion2024
#26
TIL After the last republic of Florence fell to the Medici in 1530, Michelangelo went into hiding for 3 months. Nobody knew where he had disappeared to until a 6.5 feet/ 2 meter wide hiding hole was discovered under the Medici mausoleum in 1975. The walls were full of sketches drawn by Michelangelo.
Image source: Mors_Acerba
#27
TIL China built millions of new homes that sat empty for years, on the assumption that people would eventually live there.
Image source: Empty_Nestor, Chinaunderground
#28
TIL that, in 2006, 2 miners got stuck in a cave. When they requested an iPod with the Foo Fighters on it from rescuers, the lead singer, Dave Grohl, sent them a note promising tickets to the next show. After they were rescued 2 weeks later, they met him in person, Groll even writing a song about it.
Image source: Maleficent-Agent-477, Raph_PH
#29
TIL the entire town of Whittier, Alaska (pop. ~270) lives inside a single high-rise building containing a school, police station, post office & grocery store. An empty unit hosts visiting dentists. The town is accessed through a single tunnel, which closes at 10:30pm, locking residents in overnight.
Image source: rizkar99
#30
TIL the oldest organ donor in US history was Dale Steele, a 100 year old World War II veteran who passed away in 2026. After he passed away, his liver was successfully transplanted into a patient who was able to go home just five days after the operation.
Image source: Kyzzz
#31
TIL about the Lavender Scare, a moral panic about homosexual people in the United States government which led to their mass dismissal from government service during the mid-20th century. It contributed to and paralleled McCarthyism and the Second Red Scare.
Image source: Karthak_Maz_Urzak
#32
TIL of “going to the people” movement, aka “the mad summer of 1874”, when as many as 4000 students abandoned their studies in the city or burned their degrees and moved to the countryside, intending to adopt the life of a peasant. Most of them had no experience of what that life was like at all.
Image source: Mors_Acerba
#33
TIL that in 2015, former Google employee Sanmay Ved purchased the Google.com domain for $12 after it briefly appeared as available on the Google Domains platform. As a reward for reporting the incident, Google paid Ved $6,006.13, which he later donated it.
Image source: Validator_Profile
#34
TIL when the writers were writing scripts for the TV series Community, they often wrote into the end of the scene “And then Donald says something funny” – meaning Donald Glover would just do improv. “Donald’s response would be to riff a line funnier than we could have come up with,” Dan Harmon said.
Image source: ouble-decker_trams
#35
TIL some severely neglectful orphanages were described as “silent” because infants learned that crying doesn’t bring attention or comfort.
Image source: DMan1629
#36
TIL that Frederic Tudor known as the Ice King created the ice trade out of thin air. People ridiculed him for trying to sell winter to the tropics. His most profitable trade was sending ice to India. Packed with dense sawdust a 3 month trip with 180 tons still yielded 100 tons of delivered ice.
Image source: Gnomeslikeprofit
#37
TIL that to avoid an automatic R-rating from the MPAA for its title, the producers of Meet the Fockers needed to find an actual person with the surname “Focker” to prove that it was an actual name and not simply wordplay of the expletive.
Image source: WavesAndSaves
#38
TIL that 94% of Bosch is owned by a charity, which donated over €200 million to social causes last year.
Image source: lxlviperlxl
#39
TIL that December 25 being the birthday of Jesus was decided by pope Julius I around year 350, and nobody really knows why Julius made this decision and chose this specific date. There are various theories, but his actual reasoning for the decision is lost history.
Image source: PeasantLich
#40
TIL Moses declared all debts to be absolved every 7 years in conjunction with the Shmita, the Sabbath year.
Image source: mpressive_Cress_983
#41
TIL that after teaching a bonobo how to comprehend English, he started trying to speak; “it was discovered that Kanzi was producing the articulatory equivalent of the symbols he was indicating, although in a very high pitch and with distortions”.
Image source: krizzalicious49
#42
TIL about wet-bulb events – when it’s so hot and humid that your body can’t cool by sweating. A wet cloth on a thermometer bulb normally cools it more than one without a cloth. But when humidity is very high, the wet- and dry-bulb temperatures are the same. This can ultimately be a lethal event.
Image source: Ribbitor123
#43
TIL Steve Jobs’ design obsession went so deep he demanded Apple computers look perfect on the inside. Inspired by Zen Buddhism and Bauhaus minimalism, he believed in “deep simplicity,” and insisted that even the hidden internal engineering look as polished as the outside.
Image source: alphbernardo
#44
TIL in 2021 NFL player Alvin Kamara had yet to spend any of his salary after 4 yrs in the league despite signing a $75m contract in 2020 with the New Orleans Saints. Instead he lived off of his endorsement deals. He said “My mom ain’t never had this much. It would be a shame if I got this & lost it.”
Image source: tyrion2024
#45
TIL the U.S. FDA’s regulation on sunscreens hasn’t been updated since 1999, and only 2 of the 16 ingredients currently being used in U.S. sunscreens are considered safe and effective.
Image source: wooahwoosah
#46
TIL that the oldest known human voice recording ever made in 1860, was never heard by it’s inventor. Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville’s invention only was able to capture sound waves on paper, yet had no way to turn them back into sound. Only 148 years later was when it was first heard.
Image source: Gayc0b
#47
TIL The Onion didn’t publish their print newspaper set for release on September 11th, 2001 as well as the subsequent issue. Employees went on a week long break and some threatened to quit if an issue about the attacks were released.
Image source: MajesticBread9147
#48
TIL The Liver is the only vital organ in the human body that can fully regenerate. Even after two-thirds of its healthy tissue has been damaged or removed. With full anatomical restoration taking only 3 months.
Image source: WestTransportation12
#49
TIL Steve Burns left “Blue’s Clues” because he was starting to go bald. “I knew I wasn’t going to be doing children’s television all my life, mostly because I refused to lose my hair on a kid’s TV show. And it was happening fast.”
Image source: Giff95
#50
TIL at the current rate of erosion, approximately 30 centimeters (12 inches) per year, in about 50,000 years Niagara Falls will have eroded the remaining 32 km (20 mi) to Lake Erie, and the falls will cease to exist.
Image source: Acrobatic-Post9811
#51
TIL that during the 2014 World Cup, the Singaporean government aired an anti-gambling PSA where a boy complained that his father bet their life savings on Germany winning; this backfired when Germany actually won.
Image source: duga404
#52
TIL a 9-year-old girl researched the decibel levels of public hand dryers after noticing her ears were ringing after using one. Nearly 4 years later, her research was accepted into the Canadian journal Paediatrics & Child Health, and Dyson planned to have her meet with an acoustic engineer.
Image source: Sandstorm400
#53
TIL Marvin Pipkin, as a new GE recruit, solved the “impossible” task of making an inside-frosted lightbulb—a job handed to new hires as an induction ritual into the challenges of research—since every previous attempt had failed. Nobody had told him it couldn’t be done.
Image source: ralphbernardo
#54
TIL that alcohol use in America likely peaked during the 1830s. The average American drank 7 gallons of pure ethanol a year. Midwestern corn farmers converted their grain into whisky to prevent spoilage. A gallon cost only 25 cents. Americans averaged 4 shots of whisky a day, at under a penny cost.
Image source: Gnomeslikeprofit
#55
TIL Dionysius I, ruler of Syracuse, wrote poetry which wasn’t always well received. After Philoxenus, another poet, criticised his work, Dionysius imprisoned him for a day. He then released him, read him another poem and asked for his opinion. Philoxenus replied “take me back to the quarries.”
Image source: Mors_Acerba
#56
TIL Seth MacFarlane was 25 years old when Family Guy premiered in 1999, making him the youngest showrunner in Hollywood history.
Image source: tyrion2024
#57
TIL the playwright Eugene O’Neill disowned his 18-year-old daughter Oona over her marriage to 54-year-old Charlie Chaplin. He never saw Oona again and never met any of the eight children she had by Chaplin.
Image source: CatPooedInMyShoe
#58
TIL after having been missing for 171 years, the lost exploration ship HMS Terror was finally found after Inuit hunter Sammy Kogvik recalled going into Terror bay and seeing what he thought was a mast sticking from the ice. After arriving at Terror Bay, searchers found the wreck in just 2.5 hours.
Image source: ebastianlim
#59
TIL that there is an active volcano in Antarctica called Mount Erebus that literally spews crystallized gold dust into the air every single day.
Image source: watermelonhouses
#60
TIL reggae singer Shaggy, known for “Boombastic”, developed his signature singing voice as a US Marine by mimicking his drill instructors. He sang his first hit “Oh Carolina” in that voice because he thought it sounded cool, and when it blew up he realized he’d have to sing every song that way.
Image source: Kyzzz
#61
TIL about the Breakthrough Starshot project, which proposed sending gram-sized robots to the nearest star system Alpha Centauri by using a massive Earth-based laser array to accelerate tiny light sails to about 20% the speed of light. The probes could theoretically reach Alpha Centauri in 20 years.
Image source: ScienceTeacher1994
#62
TIL that an amateur player called Chris Moneymaker won the 2003 Poker World Series. His friend, Dave Gamble helped him travel to the tournament. Both were their real last names.
Image source: Full-Butterscotch870
#63
TIL that many major cities have disabled thousands of crosswalk buttons but keep them installed anyway because removal is too expensive. In New York City, only about 100 of 1,000 buttons actually work.
Image source: myassisgrassss
#64
TIL a UK man drove for more than 70 years without a driver’s license or insurance. It was finally revealed after he was pulled over for the first time ever in his 80s. He had never been in an accident, caused anyone an injury, or made anyone lose out financially by hitting them while uninsured.
Image source: tyrion2024
#65
TIL that during the 1970 World Cup qualifiers, members of the Australia national team consulted a witch doctor preceding their game against Rhodesia. Australia won but didn’t pay the witch doctor, so he cursed their team instead. After that, Australia failed to qualify for the World Cup for 32 years.
Image source: ModenaR
#66
TIL that wolves outperform dogs in following human social cues when they are raised alongside humans.
Image source: Pitiful_Magazine_805
#67
TIL There is evidence that dinosaurs suffered from cancer.
Image source: haddock420
#68
TIL Megan Fox met Brian Austin Green in 2004 when she was 18 and he was 30. They engaged in 2006, broke off their engagement in 2009, reunited and married in 2010, separated in 2015, reconciled in 2016, dismissed their divorce in 2019, split again in 2020 and divorced in 2021. They have three sons.
Image source: Berisha11
#69
TIL the public can make voluntary donations to the British government without a reason. In 2005 for example, a total of £5 was donated.
Image source: PohnaTew
#70
TIL about PAN-PAN. PAN-PAN is the international standard distress signal that someone aboard a boat, ship, aircraft, or other vehicle uses to declare that they need help and that the situation is urgent but for the time being, does not pose an immediate danger to anyone’s life or to the vessel.
Image source: johnsmithoncemore
#71
TIL that a single county in Pennsylvania produces 60% of the mushrooms grown in the entire USA. Kennett Square in Chester County is dubbed the Mushroom Capital of the World. They produce white button, portobella, cremini, shiitake and other varieties.
Image source: Gnomeslikeprofit
#72
TIL only 23 video games have been released with an Adult Only (AO) rating from the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB).
Image source: Johannes_P
#73
TIL that Doctor Who’s first ever Christmas episode “The Feast of Steven” is one of the few missing episode to be considered irretrievably lost, as the episode was never sold to overseas broadcasters, and so no copies of it were ever made before the original tape’s junking.
Image source: Sebastianlim
#74
TIL despite boxed Kraft macaroni and cheese being an iconic example of American processed food, it is significantly more popular in Canada, where 55% more boxes are consumed per capita than the US.
Image source: NateNate60
#75
TIL six bull sharks trapped in a golf course lake near Brisbane after floods in 1996 survived there until 2013, a 17-year stay that researchers described as the longest uninterrupted period ever recorded for bull sharks in a low-salinity environment.
Image source: jacknunn
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