“Did You Know?”: 30 Interesting Facts About The World You Probably Didn’t Learn At School
Did you know that sloths can hold their breath longer than dolphins can, or that it would take more than 1,200,000 mosquitoes to completely drain the blood of an average human? Well, now you do!
In today’s technological age, we can access the world’s knowledge without having to leave the house. Having a working computer and the internet is enough to explore the depths of information flowing at the speed of light. All the new ideas, perspectives, and insights are at our fingertips. The only thing you have to do is want to learn something new. And if you do, “Einstein Fact” is here to help!
With more than 110 thousand followers on Instagram, “Einstein Fact” makes sure that our brains are fed with some fresh information about the world we live in. From random facts you didn’t even know you needed to really useful material, there’s tons of knowledge to impress others! Scroll down to add an extra wrinkle to your brain!
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Learning doesn’t stop at school or university. The key to remaining relevant, in sync with the latest trends, and able to adapt to the ever-changing world is to have an insatiable appetite for learning. We here at Bored Panda always want to learn something new, so we reached out to Nate Kornell, Ph. D., a professor of cognitive psychology at Williams College, to ask some questions about learning and memory. Scroll down to read the whole interview!
Nowadays, there’s an overabundance of information, easily accessible to anyone with an internet connection. It’s simply impossible to get a grip on all of the ‘flies on the web’. Even after filtering the information, it might be hard to remember all the interesting facts over the long term. Speaking about flies and memory, Nate Kornell shared that memories are kind of like flies in a web. “Sometimes flies escape, so it helps to connect them to the webbing as many times as you can. Similarly, you can make a new memory stick by thinking about how it connects to other things you know. (A great deal of research has demonstrated this finding.) It also helps to close your eyes and quiz yourself on what you learned, and to return to it after a significant interval of time.”
Radium stickers is just another name for the glow in the dark stickers. Like the stars that everyone used to have all over their bedroom ceiling and walls in the 90's that needed to absorb light and then they'd glow all night :)
In a world where vast amounts of information are available at our fingertips, you might be wondering if it is important to focus on improving our memory and learning techniques. According to Nate Kornell, remembering facts is less necessary now that we can just ask our devices. “But at a deeper level, it's never been more important. Creativity and innovation often take the form of noticing connections between different ideas, and you can't do that unless you have stored a lot of ideas in your memory. Personal growth and work productivity are all about developing and learning. I believe that successful people are often the ones who continue to learn and grow when others have reached a plateau.”
We asked Nate Kornell if there are certain types of information that are easier to remember than others. “There's a legend that Bill Russell, the great Boston Celtics basketball player, could remember an almost limitless number of specific plays from specific games that had happened many years earlier. This kind of memory is possible because he was such a basketball expert. Russell understood the game so well that to him, every play was vivid and unique and distinctive. In general: The more you know about X, the easier it is to encode new information about X. We're also highly attuned to human stories, and so they are far easier to remember than facts or statistics,” the professor answered.
Does anyone know if it counter acts the bromide? It would be awesome to eat without leaving my mouth raw
Learning allows us to acquire knowledge, make decisions, and adapt to our environments. However, not everyone learns and remembers information in the same way. Nate Kornell shared that memory abilities peak when a person is in their 20s. “The subsequent decline tends to be slight and imperceptible for a long time. There are also individual differences in memory ability; interestingly, though, having a powerful memory is not always helpful in life. Anecdotally, at least, people with truly exceptional memories have not found it to be much of an advantage in work or social situations (Alexander Luria wrote a case study about one such case in The Mind of a Mnemonist).”
This sucks. Is he the only person in this situation? There are many other actors who do all sorts of crazy action things.
They are very focussed on rehabilitation and reintegration in the scandinavian countries. There was a case where a Swedish prison forgot to lock the cells of 6 prisoners overnight, including 2 convicted murderers. Instead of breaking out, they broke into the prison kitchen to bake a cake, then watched tv in a blanket fort. The prison warden commended them for their calmness and cleanliness. (They tidied up after themselves in the kitchen).
Load More Replies...Dutchie here too. It's actually true. Although it's missing some context and is slightly exaggerated. We don't "import" criminals, we rent out prisons and prison cells to surrounding countries because we have more prison cells than prisoners due to the shift from a punitive system to a reintegration system. For example, we rent out cells to Norway: https://www.ad.nl/binnenland/eerste-noorse-gevangenen-in-nederland~a53154a7/
Load More Replies...for some reason when i read "imports criminals to fill jails" i just thought they meant random people from other places were paid to be in jail and i thought "where do i sign up"
I'm actually quite surprised with the comments of my fellow Dutchies here calling BS on this (without any sources supporting their BS claims), because it is actually true (although I wouldn't say we import criminals, but rather rent out cells). https://www.ad.nl/binnenland/eerste-noorse-gevangenen-in-nederland~a53154a7/ https://www.volkskrant.nl/nieuws-achtergrond/misdaadcijfers-blijven-dalen-niet-alleen-vanwege-corona~b47ec8f7/#:~:text=De%20dalende%20misdaadcijfers%20passen%20in,tot%2076%20duizend%20in%202021.
Not wrong at all but neither right at all: 1. Yes, the crime rates are lowering, this is one reason for less prisoners. 2. But another reason is, that for more and more crimes, imprisonment is not anymore a common punishment. Rehabilitation has got a stronger focus. 3. It is right, that they have offered cells to foreign countries because they had more than needed. But usually they reduce capacities or close facilities. 4. The rate of prisoners in the Netherlands is low, but not the lowest in Europe. Finland or Sweden are even lower.
Is it truly more safe or are the laws more lenient, or are there other factors at work?
More save definately. For various reasons. Less poverty. Public healthcare helps. Rehabilitation instead of just punishment. Education. Different socyital standards and behaviour. Different lifestyle.
Load More Replies...NOTHING about the Nederlands surprises me!...with poverty so low, there is very little aquisitive crime!
As an American, I suspect importing 10 random inmates from Southern California would change that statistic.
As an American, you should see the difference privatized penal system has made in US.
Load More Replies...I don’t know that the low jail census is due to a lower crime rate or that their criminal justice system leans away from mass incarceration as a way to address crime.
Are they privately run? If not, why would the government be importing crooks? Wouldn't it be cheaper to shut them down?
Dutchy here. This was actually true between 2014 and 2016. We had 500 Belgium and a few hundred prisoners from Norway here. Not after that.
No wonder my Texan friend goes there all the time. She wants to move there but her hubby doesn’t want to.
it bothers me that the inmates seem to have a high number of people of color
In Holland, petty crime is sometimes not prosecuted. Correct me if I'm wrong.
I'm dutch as well. I know we import to fill jails. But low crime.. .. if only.. nope...
Safe? Meet my old friend that almost killed me with a rock (seriously) and we live in the Netherlands…
its not: https://www.ad.nl/binnenland/eerste-noorse-gevangenen-in-nederland~a53154a7/
Load More Replies...False : FIRST : " Slightly more than 20% of the prisoners in the Netherlands are foreigners " foreigners face deportation. SECOND : the system relies more on fines than prison sentences.
There is a vast difference between running prisons for profit, and renting out prison space to raise money to prevent prison staff from being made redundant.
Load More Replies...Every other color than brown has actually an increased risk for eye diseases and difficulty driving at night. People with blue eyes (includes gray and green) also have existed for only 10 000 years and they originated from Middle East
What a waste. All those materials could be recycled. Or the planes used for housing.
Note: this post originally had 33 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
someone needs to help that channel with their grammar. Sentences seem to be missing information in some cases.
Agreed. It's not an issue if individual people make mistakes but if you're a monetized channel that takes time to fact check you really should take time to grammar check too.
Load More Replies...BP needs to lean what the word 'facts' mean, some of these were not facts
I don't think they give a f**k tbh....it's not like any of these topics are moderated at all by visible 'mods' and most of the content is straight up nicked from other sites like reddit. The only 'moderation' they do to weed out spam posters for instance relies on enough people downvoting them to get an uncontestable ban which also captures and bans just those whose comments aren' t liked too. As far as I'm aware there is a near to zero chance of anyone in power on BP actually noticing feedback and responding to it. It's a bit of a shitshow... yet we're all still here. Maybe we shouldn't be :)
Load More Replies...Last week I discovered that when my dad was working on the restoration of a mansion for The National Trust, he used to talk with Sting from The Police and showed him the oak panelling he’d done. Sting owned the neighbouring estate. My dad worked there for months and Sting was a regular visitor who also asked my dad to do some work at his home. This was back in the late 90s and only finding this out last week has sent me a tad crazy. Sorry - just had to share cos there’s no one else to tell.
My brother-in-law once installed a snooker table for one of the Bee Gees. I'd love to say he asked for a reference and they spoke very highly...but that bit's not true :( .
Load More Replies...I stopped reading after #7. I can't stand the colors and every picture starting with "Did you know". It's annoying
Some of these facts were quite fun and quirky. I understand that these facts were likely not written by a native speaker, however, why didn’t BoredPanda at least correct some the grammar on a lot of these posts?
It's just fun to read something I had never heard of before. Fact or not!
I wish people would stop complaining about grammar. We are all aware that not everyone has the same language skills, due to being new to the language, or lack of education. Can't we just give people a break? Does it really matter that much?
When your actual gig is to communicate with a language, it doesn't seem like much to ask that you learn to use the primary tool of the gig, which in this case is English. In my experience, many ESL speakers can at least write English more correctly than some native English speakers because they've been exposed more to "correct" English as opposed to vernacular
Load More Replies...someone needs to help that channel with their grammar. Sentences seem to be missing information in some cases.
Agreed. It's not an issue if individual people make mistakes but if you're a monetized channel that takes time to fact check you really should take time to grammar check too.
Load More Replies...BP needs to lean what the word 'facts' mean, some of these were not facts
I don't think they give a f**k tbh....it's not like any of these topics are moderated at all by visible 'mods' and most of the content is straight up nicked from other sites like reddit. The only 'moderation' they do to weed out spam posters for instance relies on enough people downvoting them to get an uncontestable ban which also captures and bans just those whose comments aren' t liked too. As far as I'm aware there is a near to zero chance of anyone in power on BP actually noticing feedback and responding to it. It's a bit of a shitshow... yet we're all still here. Maybe we shouldn't be :)
Load More Replies...Last week I discovered that when my dad was working on the restoration of a mansion for The National Trust, he used to talk with Sting from The Police and showed him the oak panelling he’d done. Sting owned the neighbouring estate. My dad worked there for months and Sting was a regular visitor who also asked my dad to do some work at his home. This was back in the late 90s and only finding this out last week has sent me a tad crazy. Sorry - just had to share cos there’s no one else to tell.
My brother-in-law once installed a snooker table for one of the Bee Gees. I'd love to say he asked for a reference and they spoke very highly...but that bit's not true :( .
Load More Replies...I stopped reading after #7. I can't stand the colors and every picture starting with "Did you know". It's annoying
Some of these facts were quite fun and quirky. I understand that these facts were likely not written by a native speaker, however, why didn’t BoredPanda at least correct some the grammar on a lot of these posts?
It's just fun to read something I had never heard of before. Fact or not!
I wish people would stop complaining about grammar. We are all aware that not everyone has the same language skills, due to being new to the language, or lack of education. Can't we just give people a break? Does it really matter that much?
When your actual gig is to communicate with a language, it doesn't seem like much to ask that you learn to use the primary tool of the gig, which in this case is English. In my experience, many ESL speakers can at least write English more correctly than some native English speakers because they've been exposed more to "correct" English as opposed to vernacular
Load More Replies...