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Your teacher, mom, and virtually any adult with a thoughtful mind would never approve of Twitter as a learning tool. And how would they with this whole infinite source of the not-very-serious side of the internet where memes, jokes, and burns are roaming free?
But people are proving them wrong by sharing incredible facts brought to them by Twitter that should have been put in the textbooks. From realizing the symbol “&” is a ligature for the word "et" to finding out that an 18-inch pizza has more of a good thing than two 12-inch pizzas, these are some of the facts that could have been part of my wisdom bank this whole time.
So scroll down, upvote your faves, and after you’re done with this post, check out our previous list of 30 random facts that will make you feel "today years old."
This post may include affiliate links.
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#2
hispanic! at the disco 5 years ago
And still today, Natives are being harassed by police for protesting there peacefully. Nothing much has changed..
Look, I am not saying we should believe all that Twitter has to offer. But it turns out, the things we were taught at school are not so innocent either. Some facts we still believe to this day are complete myths, and they had better be laid out bare before you become "today years old" to realize they aren’t true.
You probably would place a pretty high bid on the fact that Columbus discovered America. You’re not the only one. A 2005 survey showed that 85% of Americans believed Columbus discovered the continents and only 2% correctly answered that he couldn’t have discovered America because it was already inhabited by Native Americans.
#5
Gareth Graham 5 years ago
The London Underground maintain several stations that trains never use. They are reserved for TV and movie locations so as not to close down functioning stations
Another fact which turns out to be a myth is the tongue map idea, which suggests that different parts of our tongues identify different kinds of tastes. However, the University of Florida Center for Smell and Taste stated that “the locations of those taste buds aren't in accordance with the 'tongue map.'” And even if taste buds are indeed receptive to certain types of tastes, the difference in reality is tiny.
You've probably heard how Einstein failed math in school and was not an A student in general. It turns out, the only exam he failed was an entrance test to the Zurich Polytechnic he had to take in French, which he didn’t speak well at the time.
#8
#9
స్టీఫెన్ ఆండ్రూ 5 years ago (edited)
Let's just ignore the human rights abuses suffered by the Nepali minority group...
#13
chi-wei shen 5 years ago
A small group of wooly mammoth existed on Wrangel Island in the Arctic Ocean until about 2000 B.C.
#15
David Viesta 5 years ago
Oh yeah?, what about now... Dammit. Now!... NOW!!! Well, I really don't think I can process it.
Sergio Bicerra Descalzi 5 years ago
There is a Isaac Asimov story about a Chronoscope, a device to watch the past. The government had one and didn't want to lend it or give the secret to build one. They were afraid people would start to focus on the near past, the 1/100000000 sec that separated from the present and start to watch what basically is the present, and all secrets and privacy would be gone forever.
Craig Lee 5 years ago
Even if you're brain was fast enough, the light bouncing off of an object then into your eyes is still in the past. But these scales are so small it's almost pointless to even mention. I love science, but this is stretching a fact to scales that are so small, we don't really perceive them.
Analynsy Buck 5 years ago
I read this book called "the girl in the spider's web," (if you're reading this skip bc spoilers) and one of the main characters was an autistic boy and he was what you'd call a savant, which is basically when someone autistic or disabled has special abilities (in math and art and such) and anyway it made it seem like he was experiencing things in present form the way it put it it was kinda deep tbh
Sarah Blanche Brinsfield 5 years ago
I'm going to add this to my reading list. Thanks for the recommendation!
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Eva the Ravenclaw Bookworm📚💖 5 years ago (edited)
My brain just folded in half a couple thousand times.
TheHerplover 5 years ago
Except time is just a human construct and we could say that the "present" is when we perceive it.
TheHerplover 5 years ago
I'll say it right now I redid time BAM what r u gonna do about it.
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Dónal Ó Murchadha 5 years ago
If you take any number you can always add one to it. If you think about it, isn't it harder to imagine the highest number possible if we can always add one to it. Infinity should be easier a concept for us to imagine as every number we imagine can instantly change by adding one. It's head melting!
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Mildred Thompson 5 years ago
Good enough for me. At this present moment I am using the keyboard and I am experiencing it. ?????????????????????????
Dónal Ó Murchadha 5 years ago
Technically we are always in the present, we were always in the past and we will always be in future.
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Tor Rolf Strøm 5 years ago
Well.. who decided what is actually present? Isnt what you experience NOW your present?
Esca Sav 5 years ago
When you hear someone, it takes time for their voice to get to you. When you touch something, it takes time for the feeling to reach your brain. When you see something, it takes time for light to travel from your eye to an object and back. Everything is in the past, but the reaction is so quick we don't think about it. We presume it is the present.
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Tiny Dynamine 5 years ago
This isn't true. As long as we are here, we will always be experiencing the present, whether our brains can process quickly or not. It's not only our brains that experience something. Imagine playing a sport. You are acting based on what you have just seen, but that action still takes place in the present.
Dónal Ó Murchadha 5 years ago
The light from a star could take 100,000 years to travel across the galaxies and hit the back of your eye. Imagine that when the beam of light is half way across the galaxies to the back of your eye, the star explodes and disappears. Then 50,000 years later that beam of light final reaches the back of your eye, then a 1000th of a millisecond your brain forms an image of a that star. Forget the 1000th of a millisecond, your present, the image of the star is 100,000 years old and that star exploded and disappeared 50,000 years ago and yet you can see it now. You are technically never experiencing the present. Your present can be made up of things that happen a moment ago and 100,000 years ago similtaneously.
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#17
Mishte Tine 5 years ago
She’s also small and behind a ton of protection. She’s beyond amazing.
#20
Sergio Bicerra Descalzi 5 years ago
Read a funny story about him. He used to pay meals with checks. People didn't cash them cause Dali's signature was more worthy than the pay, so he got many free meals doing so. Not sure if its true, but like this story.
#21
Tiny Dynamine 5 years ago
Did you know you can get free extra pizza slices if you cut your pizza into 8 pieces instead of 6? ;)
#22
Aisha Boudy 5 years ago
Googol Plex (it's a number) is so large that if u wrote each of its zeros on separate atoms in the universe, there won't be enough space to finish writing all the zeros.
#23
Saurin Apriliawan 5 years ago
My identical twin cousin just told me that, although wearing exactly the same clothes and has quite similar voice, their toddlers can still tell them apart.
#26
#29
#31
CrunChewy McSandybutt 5 years ago
5th cousins is a really large gap as far as genetics is concerned.
#35
#38
littlesaresare 5 years ago
Penguins also release air trapped beneath their feathers to boost their speed while jumping out of water. It is a very cool thing to see in person.
#40
Martti Laurson 5 years ago (edited)
Not the other side of the galaxy, but opposite side of where earth is now. The whole galaxy turns, therefore could have not been on the other side of galaxy. All stars have rotated. If a cat sits on a roomba and that makes a half turn, the cat still sits on the same spot on a roomba, but in a different location in the room, not on the other side of the roomba.
#44
Foxxy (The Original) 5 years ago
I have a funny story about the little pocket. One day we were at a family BBQ, my younger brother who was around six went up to my mum and asked what the small pocket was for. She said go ask Poppa, big mistake. My Poppa said it is to put condoms in, in which my brother asked what a condom is for and my Poppa replied that it is to put your w***y in. My brother walked away looking puzzled until about 10 mins late he asks “But how do you get your w***y in there”. He thought he had to put his w***y in the actual pocket.
#47
Amanda Reicha 5 years ago
My dog must be an outlier. She sometimes faces the mountains, which are to the west of where I live and sometimes faces the valley, which is to the east.
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Steve Barnett 5 years ago
You know I was taught a bunch of stuff in school, but I kinda wish that I was taught life skills; how to deal with loss, a broken heart, finances, rudimentary DIY, etc. You know everything that actually happens to you after you leave school.
Anne 5 years ago
We have some schools now that do (Netherlands) including growing food, but yeah, those are important survival skills
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Tom Hardeveld 5 years ago
fun fact, if you would put all the bloodveins in your body in one straight line... you would die
Irina Rachow 5 years ago
I always felt there should be a Life101 course in high school to teach people lots of survival skills like: how marketing works on you, the banking system, credit card lures and traps, living within your means, how to shop and cook, negotiation skills, etc. etc.
Vernice Aure 5 years ago
In Middle School (US, grades 6-8), we had Home Economics (cooking, sewing, nutrition) and Industrial Education (basic tool use, fun industrial projects). In 10th grade we had General Business (letter writing, banking, budgeting, basic laws, comparison shopping).
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Jennie-Lind Normand 5 years ago
So as a Canadian I wonder why we weren't taught that a Canadian invented peanut butter, we were taught about insulin and basketball being Canadian (among other things), but not peanut butter (I find that weird)
Dianna Siever 5 years ago
Americans are taught that it was George Washington Carver, one of the first and most prominent black American Scientist, who invented peanut butter.
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Lea S. 5 years ago (edited)
These are all interesting facts - I love lists like this. But on another note...poor teachers. They barely make a living, they're constantly disrespected and defunded, they are now looking at going back to school at the height of this pandemic. There's also lists everywhere of things you should've been taught in school. Are we incapable of learning ANYTHING ourselves? What makes this a list of things I should've learned in school? They are supposed to teach us this ever-evolving list of 'life skills' everything from cars and appliance repair to cooking, planting a garden, etc. Forget that necessary life skills are relative to who/where/what you do/want to do. The history of every civilization where everyone used to live, everyone's different points of views about history, every important historical figure (good or bad) AND all the different diseases/conditions/disabilities a person has. Where does it end? WHY the things on this list - please someone give me some insight.
Tracy 5 years ago
There are several here that I wouldn't expect to learn in school, like the cost of movie theater popcorn vs filet mignon, who designed chupa chups, and how many faces a chicken can recognize.
Lea S. 5 years ago
I swear it's in vogue right now to lament all the things you weren't taught in school. As if once you graduate that's it, you're done. You can't learn anything at all now - just have to go through the rest of your life confused.
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Theron Roberts 5 years ago
oops. accidentally pressed enter. meant to say that some of these are cool but aren't really necessary to learn in school.
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Steve Barnett 5 years ago
You know I was taught a bunch of stuff in school, but I kinda wish that I was taught life skills; how to deal with loss, a broken heart, finances, rudimentary DIY, etc. You know everything that actually happens to you after you leave school.
Anne 5 years ago
We have some schools now that do (Netherlands) including growing food, but yeah, those are important survival skills
Load More Replies... Tom Hardeveld 5 years ago
fun fact, if you would put all the bloodveins in your body in one straight line... you would die
Irina Rachow 5 years ago
I always felt there should be a Life101 course in high school to teach people lots of survival skills like: how marketing works on you, the banking system, credit card lures and traps, living within your means, how to shop and cook, negotiation skills, etc. etc.
Vernice Aure 5 years ago
In Middle School (US, grades 6-8), we had Home Economics (cooking, sewing, nutrition) and Industrial Education (basic tool use, fun industrial projects). In 10th grade we had General Business (letter writing, banking, budgeting, basic laws, comparison shopping).
Load More Replies... Jennie-Lind Normand 5 years ago
So as a Canadian I wonder why we weren't taught that a Canadian invented peanut butter, we were taught about insulin and basketball being Canadian (among other things), but not peanut butter (I find that weird)
Dianna Siever 5 years ago
Americans are taught that it was George Washington Carver, one of the first and most prominent black American Scientist, who invented peanut butter.
Load More Replies... Lea S. 5 years ago (edited)
These are all interesting facts - I love lists like this. But on another note...poor teachers. They barely make a living, they're constantly disrespected and defunded, they are now looking at going back to school at the height of this pandemic. There's also lists everywhere of things you should've been taught in school. Are we incapable of learning ANYTHING ourselves? What makes this a list of things I should've learned in school? They are supposed to teach us this ever-evolving list of 'life skills' everything from cars and appliance repair to cooking, planting a garden, etc. Forget that necessary life skills are relative to who/where/what you do/want to do. The history of every civilization where everyone used to live, everyone's different points of views about history, every important historical figure (good or bad) AND all the different diseases/conditions/disabilities a person has. Where does it end? WHY the things on this list - please someone give me some insight.
Tracy 5 years ago
There are several here that I wouldn't expect to learn in school, like the cost of movie theater popcorn vs filet mignon, who designed chupa chups, and how many faces a chicken can recognize.
Lea S. 5 years ago
I swear it's in vogue right now to lament all the things you weren't taught in school. As if once you graduate that's it, you're done. You can't learn anything at all now - just have to go through the rest of your life confused.
Load More Replies... Theron Roberts 5 years ago
oops. accidentally pressed enter. meant to say that some of these are cool but aren't really necessary to learn in school.
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