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“Today I Learned”: People Share 101 Fascinating Things They Didn’t Learn In School (New Pics)
Learning never stops. If you’re open and energetic, you can find opportunities to expand your mind with new knowledge every single day. Oh, and we mean that very literally. Every. Single. Day. It’s something that the members of the massively popular ‘Today I Learned’ online community know perfectly well.
They share the new things about history, science, and the world that they’ve learned that day, and the facts are eye-opening, to say the least. We’ve collected some of their freshest new insights to share with you, dear Pandas. Scroll down and check them out. Don't forget your thinking caps!
We got in touch with Lisa McLendon, Ph.D., with a few questions about how the news is changing as our attention spans are getting shorter, as well as what can help motivate journalists to dig deeper and stay curious as they're covering stories. McLendon is the William Allen White Professor of Journalism and Mass Communications and the Bremner Editing Center Coordinator at the University of Kansas. Read on for Bored Panda's interview with her.
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TIL a woman flying from Manchester to Florida had a heart attack during the flight and when the stewardess asked for help 15 cardiologists came to save her. They were flying to a cardiology conference.
Professor McLendon told us that the way that we consume the news, and how it's produced, is definitely changing.
"People consume news from a much broader variety of sources, on a much wider set of platforms. We are awash in information and we are used to seeing it in small chunks," she explained to Bored Panda.
Journalists and editors, in turn, are reacting to these changes in their audience's preferences. Some outlets, for instance, expand to social media platforms where they have to format things very differently. Brevity and engagement become more important than in-depth reporting. But that's not to say that the latter has lost its appeal!
TIL Missy, a 100lb injured dog abandoned by her owner on Mount Bierstadt in Clear Creek County as a storm closed in, found by hikers a few days later who treated her but couldn't rescue her, they posted her location on a climbers' forum and an epic rescue journey began to rescue a dog from a mountain.
I tell ya. If Spocks and I were out hiking and something happened, you'd find our skeletons together. I couldn't leave my sweet baby boy. 💔
TIL the Cherokee writing system was made by one man, Sequoyah. It's one of the only times in history that someone in a non-literate group invented an official script from scratch. Within 25 years, nearly 100% of Cherokee were literate, and it inspired dozens of indigenous scripts around the world.
"News outlets know this and have adapted headlines to catch people’s eyes and presentation to keep the audiences engaged. For example, if you look at how news is presented on a platform like Instagram, it’s presented visually in a short video or series of images so people can quickly get the main point. Most of these changes have happened to optimize speed and engagement, not depth," McLendon explained.
Meanwhile, we were also curious about what can help motivate someone who is completely new to journalism to delve deeper into the stories they cover, while researching and writing them up.
"Depth is crucial for certain types of news stories, ones that aren’t easily summarized in a quick-hit format but nonetheless have great impact on people’s lives. Questions and creativity can help journalists stay motivated to delve deeper on a longer, more time-consuming story," Professor McLendon, from the University of Kansas, explained.
TIL Saudi Arabia accidentally printed thousands of textbooks containing this image of Yoda sitting next to King Faisal while he signed the 1945 UN charter.
TIL in 1947, the Canadian town of Snag, Yukon, saw a temperature of -83F (-64C). It was so cold, you could hear people speaking 4 miles away, along with other phenomena such as people's breath turning to powder and falling straight to the ground and river ice booming like gu shots.
TIL Procrastination is not a result of laziness or poor time management. Scientific studies suggest procrastination is due to poor mood management.
Often when you dig a bit deeper there is a reason for procrastination, which in most cases are that the task is in fact harder than it might seem at first glance (e.g. cleaning your room requires you to sort things, which may again require that you set up a system for where to put things, and that you have to do some hard emotinal work and let go of something that you previously valued (e.g. a worn out T-shirt that reminds you of a concert you went to with your favorite band)). Other times procrastination is caused by a fear of what would actually happen if you achieved the result that you have been chasing for so long (it is often followed by a huge vacuum, e.g finishing your education), or a fear of the fall out of the process itself (What if I call him and that leads to him rejecting me).
"One way to stay motivated is to first find out all the ways something affects people, then anticipate their questions: What does this mean for your audience? How can you show them why they should care? What questions might they have that you can help answer?"
Something else that can help is to think about how you can present the information in the best possible way so that your audience understands the issues and stays engaged.
"Usually this is not one big, long block of text—it may include photos, videos, maps, graphics, even interactive elements like a quiz. Thinking creatively about how to present a story can help a reporter stay motivated," she shared some practical advice.
TIL Officials went to congratulate Sogen Kato, the oldest living man in Tokyo, on his 111th birthday. Upon arriving to his house, a mummified body wearing underwear and pajamas was lying in his bed. He had been dead for 30 years but his family kept the secret to keep receiving his pension.
TIL the game Oregon Trail was developed by 3 college students trying to teach history creatively. The first version was coded in just 10 days in 1971 and played by middle schoolers for 5 days. The code was given to an educational nonprofit in 1974, and the creators never profited from the game.
TIL that since Brazil could not afford to send a team to the 1932 Olympics, they sent the athletes on a ship full of coffee. The athletes sold the coffee along the way to fund their journey.
The r/todayilearned subreddit is almost synonymous with Reddit, the front page of the internet, by now. Created all the way back in late 2008, the ‘Today I Learned’ community has grown by massive leaps and bounds since then. At the time of writing, there were a jaw-dropping 30.6 million TIL members. The sub is living, breathing proof of how much the internet loves education that’s presented in an entertaining way (aka ‘edutainment’).
Here at Bored Panda, we’re fascinated with the TIL community’s desire to learn and share new things with everyone who’ll listen. When you’re done reading our newest post about their fascinating facts, consider checking out our earlier features about them here, here, and here.
TIL The writer for "Die Hard with a Vengeance" was investigated by the FBI after they revealed that his story's plan of robbing the Federal Reserve through a breached subway wall would have worked.
TIL that when Californians wanted to name a new city after San Francisco businessman William Ralston, he declined and said he was not worthy of the honor. So instead they named the city in honor of his modesty: Modesto, California.
TIL that cats are more vocal with humans than with other cats.
Learning is far more than just getting good grades, being attentive in class, and doing everything that your teacher asks you to. True learning requires a lot of initiative and independence. It’s something that parents can encourage their kids to prioritize while growing up.
Recently, Bored Panda got in touch with Lenore Skenazy, the president of Let Grow, a nonprofit promoting childhood independence and resilience, and the founder of the Free-Range Kids movement. She explained to us that it’s becoming a problem that school keeps becoming a bigger part of kids’ lives. In the past, children had a lot more free time to do activities outside of school.
“Kids goofed around, played, explored. Now, with jam-packed schedules filled with adult-run activities, even those out-of-school hours are a lot LIKE school… except instead of learning fractions kids are learning lacrosse, or chess,” Skenazy said.
TIL the first known résumé was written by Leonardo da Vinci, when applying to be a military engineer for the Duke of Milan. It's mainly just a list of his designs for siege weapons (including trebuchets). He briefly mentions his art: "In painting, I can do everything possible." He got the job.
Well yeah he was awesome. Greatest painter of even our time I'd say myself no offense to anyone......but damn remarkable.
TIL the song Baby, It's Cold Outside was written by Frank Losser to sing with his wife, Lynn Garland, at parties to indicate to guests that it was time to leave.
They had agreed to never release the song to the public because they realized that it could come off a little creepy. (They meant it as a send up of such creepy behavior.) But when they divorced, Frank got ownership of the song, broke his promise, and reaped a fortune. His behavior surprised no one, since he himself admitted to being "the evil of two Loessers".
TIL that free divers' heart rates can drop as low as 11 beats per minute(as low as that of diving seals, whales and dolphins), in order to preserve blood-oxygen levels.
“Clever, normal kids turned into caged animals who despair they are no good, and their lives pointless. The answer? It’s so simple and so overlooked: Kids need more free time and free play—exactly what you loved most as a kid. Time spent making up games, practicing free throws, jumping rope, poking around in the woods—all of that is not wasted time. It’s a time when all of a kid’s senses are engaged and growing: Observation, participation, empathy, curiosity,” the childhood independence expert shared with us.
“It’s hard to see when you’re swimming in it, but kids learn so much from life, from friends, from siblings, from doing things on their own that they can NOT learn from an adult, even the most loving parent or gifted teacher. Give them back some free time, during the school day and after, and they will start to blossom,” Skenazy explained to Bored Panda.
TIL a school social worker noticed a young Jimi Hendrix's habit of emulating a guitar with a broom and attempted to get school funding to buy him a guitar. Her request was denied.
TIL more than 300 million people globally don’t have a single friend, according to Gallup data.
TIL the USA was supposed to adopt the metric system but the ship carrying the standardized meter and kilogram was hijacked by pirates in 1793 and the measurements never made it to the States.
Meanwhile, good grades aren’t the end-all, be-all indication that you’re doing well in life. “Quick! What was Einstein’s grade point average? How well did Dolly Parton score on her SATs? How many AP classes did Rachmaninoff take? Those questions are absurd. And so is the idea that a child is only as bright or talented as his grades and school performance,” Skenazy said.
“There are so many aspects to a person and yet so few are reflected in their report card. Creativity, kindness, a sense of humor, loyalty, wackiness—those aren’t measurable and so we forget they are even more valuable than an A+ on the spelling test.”
TIL about Ralph C Smith, the US' last surviving WWII General, who passed away in 1998 aged 104. Not only was he the 13th person to receive a pilot's license, he was also instructed by Orville Wright.
TIL that following the Black Death in England, peasants were able to negotiate better wages due to labour shortages. In response Parliament passed the Statute of Labourers 1351 which prohibited the soliciting of wages above pre-plague levels. This contributed to the English Peasant's Revolt of 1381.
The Black Death completely transformed everything. Social hierarchies in place since the Roman period began to collapose. Even the very landscape changed as farming patterns changed. Entire settlements were abandoned. Even architecture changed as the costs of stonemasonry rocketed. A highly decorated style of architecture gave way to a simpler 'perpendicular' style. It really was a HUGE event on every level.
TIL How toxic a polar bear liver actually is. The entire liver contains enough vitamin A to kill as many as 52 adults! If you spread it out and ate just enough to get your RDA every day, that liver would last you 143 years!
Raw IQ scores aren’t as strong an indicator of future success as many believe it is, but grades and doing well on school projects might just be. For instance, economist James Heckman’s found that someone’s IQ isn’t all that tightly correlated to how well you do financially when you’re all grown up. What’s far more important is your personality. Traits like diligence, perseverance, self-discipline, and conscientiousness are far more important than how smart you (think you) are.
You don’t get good grades just by having a high IQ score. You do so by having good study habits and being able to collaborate well with other students. In short, intelligence in the broad sense encompasses non-cognitive skills and traits which are far superior to scoring high on IQ tests. At least, as far as real-life success goes.
TIL movie theater sound quality was greatly improved thanks to Star Wars. Sound across movie theaters was generally inconsistent or low quality, George Lucas then co-created THX to fully project the audio quality of Return of the Jedi.
TIL The country of Kenya gets nearly one half of all it’s electricity from geothermal power plants.
TIL : the above. And it’s a resource that can’t be grabbed. Way to go Kenya
TIL in 1985, drug smugglers dropped 40 containers of cocaine from a plane above Tennessee because the plane was too heavy. 3 months later, investigators found the containers and a dead black bear that had consumed 75 pounds of the drug. It’s stomach was “literally packed to the brim with cocaine.”
TIL that in the Vietnam war the US conducted a psychological warfare operation which used loudspeakers to play eerie sounds and altered voices to represent the spirits of dead N. Vietnamese soldiers so as to undermine their morale. Operation Wandering Soul.
TIL that an audio recording of a lock being opened provides enough data to reproduce the key required to open that lock, even with a cell phone's microphone.
TIL that when bears hibernate, they "hold it in" for almost half a year. This is due to a fecal plug that forms in their lower intestine that prevents them from pooping while hibernating.
TIL In 1998 part of the hull of the Titanic was recovered and is displayed in a casino. Visitors are given a 'boarding pass' with the name of a passenger and find out the fate of their passenger at the end of the exhibition.
This is kinda neat but at the same time cringe because of the family of these people. However great historical involvement but just kinda.......😬
TIL that after Ayrton Senna's fatal crash, an Austrian flag was found in his race car. He had intended to raise it in honor of Roland Ratzenberger, who had died during qualification the previous day.
That was one of the saddest weekends I remember. Everyone was so quiet everywhere, it was quite eerie
TIL that the number of abs you have is genetic and varies from person to person. The number of abs you have depends on the number of rings of abdominal tissue that someone is born with, and some people can actually have 10-pack abs.
Note: this post originally had 101 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
Some of these made me roll my eyes. I dread reading BP in ten years: "TIL that USA has had one black american president and he served two terms!!!!"
Yeah, I thought TIL was for interesting trivia, not basic knowledge you just learned in your 8th grade history class.
Load More Replies...
I actually learned some things in this thread and it wasn't the same TILs posted ad nauseum on this site. Thank you! Based on the other comments, I best not click to read the original 101 images.
TIL that a full can of whipped cream is terrible for digestion. …I regret nothing.
Some of these made me roll my eyes. I dread reading BP in ten years: "TIL that USA has had one black american president and he served two terms!!!!"
Yeah, I thought TIL was for interesting trivia, not basic knowledge you just learned in your 8th grade history class.
Load More Replies... I actually learned some things in this thread and it wasn't the same TILs posted ad nauseum on this site. Thank you! Based on the other comments, I best not click to read the original 101 images.
TIL that a full can of whipped cream is terrible for digestion. …I regret nothing.
