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There’s certain information that you can share without receiving many follow-up questions. Australia is wider than the moon. "Oh, wow. That's interesting!" It’s illegal to own only one guinea pig in Switzerland, because they’re social animals who get lonely. "Hmm, that makes sense!" M&Ms got their name from the businessmen who created them, Forrest Mars and Bruce Murrie. "Huh, never knew that!"
However, there are also plenty of topics that we’re not necessarily expected to know much about, or to even be curious about. Where to bury a dead body, how to pick up a severed human head, and what spinal fluid tastes like are not exactly ideal small talk conversations to have with your colleagues… But one curious Reddit user asked others to share their best fun facts that make other people respond, “Why the [heck] do you know that?”, and readers certainly came through in the replies.
Enjoy this list of facts that you might not want to share with other people upon your first time meeting them, and be sure to upvote all of the wild facts you could have lived your entire life without knowing. Keep reading to also find interviews with J. Keith van Straaten, host of the Go Fact Yourself podcast, and Tara Dorrell, Researcher and Scriptwriter at the QI offices in London. Then, if you’re interested in learning even more bizarre, and perhaps unsettling, tidbits of information, check out this Bored Panda article next!
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#1
If you plan on using a baseball bat as a weapon, put a long sock over the end. When someone tries to grab the bat you can rip it away with ease and continue with the baseball beatdown
To learn more about why we should never end our education when it comes to fun facts, we reached out to J. Keith van Straaten, Host, Co-Creator, Co-Producer and Co-Writer of the Go Fact Yourself podcast. "What makes life interesting and expansive is a willingness to examine the stories we tell ourselves -- and a willingness to change the narrative," J. Keith told Bored Panda.
"What usually makes a fact fun is that it challenges an existing narrative. In a small way, fun and random facts remind us to stay humble and be open to being surprised," he explained. "Plus, if you need something to talk about at a party or on a date, you've always got something in your pocket."
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#2
This will get buried but - Don't ever bury a dead body in an Area without any vegetation. The high nitrogen content in our bodies helps plant to grow and there will be a weird grassy patch at the top of burial Site and anyone would be able to spot it.
#3
Spinal fluid tastes like a mixture of bananas and a 9volt battery. And I don't want to talk about it.
We also asked J. Keith if he has learned any fun facts through his podcast that might make people ask, "Why in the world do you know that?" "So many!" he shared. "A few that come to mind: Famed astronomer Carl Sagan sued Apple for calling him a b**t-head. The Bellagio Hotel's lake is wider than the Titanic was long. The currency of the Cook Islands featured a [shirtless] woman riding a shark... Harley-Davidson once sold its own fragrance called Black Fire."
#4
Back in the day, poor families would collect their urine so they could sell it to tanners. Hence, “p**s poor.” If you were poorer than that, well, you didn’t even have a pot to p**s in.
#5
Opossums eat ticks like we eat potato chips. They'll hoover up 5,000 ticks a week and never get lyme disease themselves.
And when it comes to how J. Keith and his co-host Helen Hong find the fascinating facts they discuss on the show, he shared, "Dozens of hours of internet searches go into each episode of 'Go Fact Yourself' -- and sometimes even visits to our local library."
"A great resource for lesser-known facts are interviews on YouTube," J. Keith noted. "You pick up a lot in a spoken discussion that hasn't already been disseminated in articles. Of course, when possible, we go to the sources themselves -- making calls to professors and authors to make sure we have our facts straight."
#7
If you feed a human body to pigs, they will eat just about all of it except the teeth. Several murderers in rural areas have used this fact to their advantage.
But despite all of the research they do for every episode, it doesn't sound like J. Keith will get his fill of fun facts any time soon. "Our show is based on the interests that our guests have, many of which I don't share. So there's always more facts to investigate and more knowledge to celebrate," he told Bored Panda.
"'Go Fact Yourself' uses trivia about topics our guests love, to bring people together with experts on that topic. It's always a point of pride when we ask a question of our guest that even our expert didn't know the answer to," J. Keith shared. "Or to discover something NOBODY knew about (Did you know Celine Dion sang the wrong words to one of her songs on a best-selling album??)"
If you're interested in learning some fascinating fun facts about various celebrities' favorite interests, be sure to check out Go Fact Yourself on their website right here, wherever you listen to podcasts, or if you're in the Los Angeles area, you can go to one of their live-audience recordings!
#8
There are 923 words in the English language that break the “I before E” rule. Only 44 words actually follow that rule.
#9
Blue whales have an average [finishing] of 150 litres out of which only 15 litres enters the female. The 135 litres remaining just.... And you wondered why the ocean is salty.
To learn even more about the beauty of fun facts, we reached out to Tara Dorrell, Researcher and Scriptwriter at the QI offices in London. QI produces a variety of fun shows that will actually teach you something, including QI, The Museum of Curiosity, Why Workshop, and No Such Thing As a Fish. When it comes to why we should always keep learning new facts, Tara told Bored Panda, "It’s a way of constantly indulging your curiosity. Learning doesn’t have to be dry and systematic; finding random facts about the accidental creation of mauve, or the original uses for chainsaws is still learning. At QI, it helps to admit you don’t know something, because then comes the fun of discovering more about it. It does make you realize just how much you don't know about, but learning through peculiar trivia stops it being so daunting."
"It could also help you uncover a newfound passion for tardigrades, Icelandic history, or Bartitsu," Tara added. "At the very least you’ll be the most popular person at a pub quiz! And we’ve managed to get 20 series of a TV show out of finding fun and random facts, so there are clearly some benefits."
#10
So let’s say you wanted to make a sword, an average sword requires about 1.5kg of metal. So if you were to take the blood out of 600 humans, roughly 3,000 litres of blood, and extract the iron, you could smelt it down and create a sword with it. Then boom, a sword literally made out of your fallen enemies.
Tara was also kind enough to share some of the wild facts that she's learned through working at QI that might raise some questions from others. "People might recognize the 19th century ballet dancer Marie Taglioni as the first person credited with dancing on pointe. It’s less well-known that she was so popular at the time that after her final appearance in Russia, a group of her fans supposedly paid 200 rubles for a pair of her shoes - which they then cooked as a fricassee and ate," she told Bored Panda.
"There’s also plenty to be said about the very first treadmills (originally used as a punishment for inmates), how ants measure distances (by counting their steps - researchers tied tiny stilts to their legs to check), and why the Thames has so many hyperactive eels (cocaine in the water)," Tara added.
"It’s the bizarre facts about supposedly mundane topics that usually spark the most interest. They’re more likely to be mentioned in everyday conversation than, say, an Ulfberht (first trademarked Viking sword) is, and no one ever expects you to have a wealth of knowledge about ant stilts and treadmills," she noted.
#12
Most victims in "survivable" plane crashes died of jet fuel burning and choking them. Smoke hoods could save hundreds of lives if installed on airplanes, likely many more than flotation devices since ditching is incredibly rare. BONUS: backwards facing seats would make a plane crash much easier to survive thanks to the g forces pressing you against the seat instead.
#13
A nursing sperm whale’s milk comes out in the consistency of cottage cheese so the calf can “eat it” in the water.
We were also curious about Tara's research methods for QI shows. "Everyone approaches it slightly differently. Our office is really just an eclectic library, with books on 17th century Scottish slang, the cheeses of the world, the many uses of laudanum, and everything in between," she told Bored Panda. "Book research isn’t for everyone though, and some resilient researchers spend hours trawling the depths of the internet for the most fascinating (and least disturbing) facts they can find."
"Some people take a more hands-on approach by going to exhibitions and lectures, or by speaking directly to the actual experts - scientists, researchers, and historians with the most eccentric specialist subjects," Tara added. "They’re always keen to discuss their work, as it’s often so niche that no one else ever asks them about it."
#14
Eating your boogers gives your immune system an extraordinary boost. Those who do rarely get sick- by ingesting very small amounts of foreign bacteria caught in the nose, the immune system forms necessary antibodies to fight that same bacteria when it’s dominating your coworkers. Gross people FTW!
#15
If you want to burn down a building, put potato chips in a toaster with a trail leading from the toaster to other highly flammable things. The potato chips leave no residue and the toaster will pop back up after the chips catch fire so there's no way to find the start of the fire.
We then asked Tara if she imagines she'll ever reach her fill of fun facts, or if there's always more to explore. "The ethos behind QI is that anything can be interesting if you’re curious enough. There’s always another question to ask, another lead to follow, and more information to be found," she shared.
"Even the most banal topics can become a source of fascination - did you know that lightning rods were a fashion fad in the 18th century? Or that Tiramisu was once used as an aphrodisiac in brothels? Our research always starts in a place of complete ignorance, the same as anyone else. That’s what allows us to question things we might otherwise dismiss or overlook - which in turn leads us down even stranger paths, and end up with even more questions," Tara told Bored Panda.
"As long as we remain inquisitive, there will always be something interesting to learn. Imagine how bleak the world would be if there was nothing left to wonder at!"
#16
When you are drowning in salt water, the salt water makes your lungs bleed and you end up drowning in a mixture of water and your own blood.
#17
Lemons are a cross between a citron and a bitter orange. Either they were a rare naturally occurring hybrid or they were man made, in which case... life does not give you lemons.
Finally, Tara added, "If this has whetted your appetite for random and bizarre facts, then there’s plenty more to be found on QI - new episodes out every Friday on BBC2 and all series available on BBC iPlayer (five and a half solid days of viewing if you’re [intense]). Our weekly podcast No Such Thing As a Fish can be found wherever you get your other, more conventional podcasts, and our many, many books are available online and in your local bookstores."
You can find QI's website right here, and No Such Thing As a Fish's website right here!
#20
According to some cannibals, the most delicious part of the human body are the eyeballs, they like licking them. Edit: I´m not the cannibal.
#21
Owls have tube shaped eyes, rather than spherical ones. This makes it difficult to move the eyes in their sockets, but is counteracted by the ability to rotate their heads 270 degrees in either direction.
#22
Bones can be some of the most effective and terrifying shrapnel, second only to liquid copper. Bones splinter when you put them in bombs, and can do horrific amounts of damage to soft tissues. Liquid copper, on the other hand, which is not that difficult to get in an explosion, can get through almost any armor like it's nothing. Learned that from a friend who did a tour in Iraq as an infantryman
#23
Bears eat a ton of grass and twigs and stuff before the hibernate to constipate themselves and pretty much prevent waking up mid winter to s**t. However, when they finally do wake up in the spring, their first s**t is a mean one.
#24
If you're going to stab something, always make sure to stab and twist the knife. If you stab without twisting it will just leave a slit that can easily be mended. If you twist it leaves a hole that can't be so easily mended.
#25
That an empty kindle is actually slightly lighter (like we’re talking very very minuscule numbers) than a kindle completely filled with books which means that information in digital form has weight (electrons and protons and s**t) so then by that reasoning you can weigh the internet. Vsace did a whole thing on it and I watched it in sixth grade and are in college and still remember it. People don’t believe me so I tell them to look it up
#26
Most men who climb Mt. Everest or other very tall mountains experience an erection due to how the altitude impacts blood pressure.
#27
At a single time, the sloths body mass can be comprised of one third feces. It takes several hours for the sloth to excrete its bowels completely.
#30
It takes 10,000,000 bananas to [end] you from radiation poisoning if you ate them all at once or 274 everyday for 7 years to die from radiation poisoning.
#31
The stringy things inside bananas are called phloem bundles. They allow the nutrients of the banana to travel the length of the fruit; they're kinda like the vascular system of the plant.
#32
The best way to clean up blood without leaving a smell is salt. Just put salt and scrub, the salt helps the blood clump into pieces making it easier to clean too. Edit: many of you asked about taking it off clothes, so... Baking Soda-Mix one part baking soda with two parts cold water in a bowl and dab onto the stain using a cloth. Leave for thirty to forty minutes, then wipe off all remaining residue. Lemon - To lighten dried-in blood, simply rub half a lemon over the stain and sprinkle some table salt on top Edit 2: apparently it depends on the fabric ^ (I use that when I did RNA and got tired of purchasing new uniforms)
#33
Tarantulas taste like shrimp. I told this once to a random stranger because they brought up how they didnt like shrimp. They immediately hounded me about how I knew this.
#37
In ancient Babylon people would build their most valuable possessions (fine wine, among others) into the walls of their basement, which in the region was usually a naturally occurring cave, so when the taxman came he couldn't see it to count it.
#39
The longest word in English. I have it memorized. Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis. It's some sort of lung disease, if I'm not mistaken.
#41
That Disney is the biggest importer of explosives in the world Edit: This commercially they don’t beat out the US department of defense
#44
Birds need gravity to swallow, so a bird in space would die very soon. Edit: I understand there's no oxygen in space, but by that logic humans couldn't survive in space either. I meant if they had space suits like humans do.
#46
if you drink bleach and survive, doctors will have to remove your stomach and esophagus, and extend your intestines to your throat like a tube. and it has to go over your ribcage
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