As we move through life, we consistently gather new knowledge to grow and learn as human beings. Although there may be a few specific areas we aim to know very well, building a broader understanding of the world is just as important. It allows us to put forward exciting ideas, connect the dots, and see new patterns we would have missed otherwise. And it’s plenty of fun too!
Thankfully, with the digital world at our fingertips, exploring delicious and intriguing bits of information has never been easier. So it’s time for the newest batch of facts from the well-known corner on Reddit, the 'Today I Learned' online group. Time and again, curious 28 million members of this community exceed everyone’s expectations by passing along the cool trivia they recently found out themselves.
To celebrate infinite knowledge and the never-ending desire to learn something new, we’ve gathered some of the most captivating facts the group has shared on the page. Continue scrolling and upvote the ones you may not have known about! And if you’re in the mood to expand your mental horizons even further, check out Bored Panda’s previous pieces filled with TIL goodness here, here, and right here.
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TIL of Mary Anning, who discovered, with her brother, the first ichthyosaur fossil at age 12. She would go on to discover many more fossils and revolutionize the science of paleontology. However, due to being a woman in the early 1800s, she rarely received full credit for her discoveries
At last she has a statue in Lyme Regis, Dorset (unveiled May 21 2022, her 222nd birthday): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statue_of_Mary_Anning
TIL fairy dust was not mentioned in the original version of Peter Pan, but the author added it as a neccessity to enable the children to fly because "so many children tried [to fly] from their beds and needed surgical attention."
TIL; In 1846, Joesph Leidy was the first person to solve a crime using a microscope. A famer claimed the blood on his clothes was chicken blood. Joseph Leidy showed that it was not chicken blood using a microscope
TIL that listening to your favorite music for just 15 minutes a day lowers stress levels, anxiety, sadness and a depressed mood
TIL Wells Fargo was forced by the feds to rehire a whistleblower employee that reported fraud, and pay him $5.4 million in damages
TIL in July of 2021 a British plane spotter noticed sparks coming off an F-15E Strike Eagle's engine after it took off from RAF Lakenheath. He called the base's switchboard to alert the base and the plane returned safely. The pilot publicly thanked him and gave him his insignia patch
TIL the design of a skyscraper in London was melting cars and setting buildings on fire. It’s curvilinear shape was causing the problem: The south-facing exterior wall was covered in reflective glass, and because it's concave, it focuses the sun's rays onto a small area
TIL of Jacklyn H. Lucas. 3 years after joining the Marines at age 14, he snuck onto a ship bound for Iwo Jima, stormed the beach without a rifle and threw himself on top of 2 grenades to protect his team. He survived and earned the Medal of Honor at age 17
My dad ran away from home at age 14 to join the army. His father went and made him come back home. Two years later he did it again, and this time was sent overseas. Did I mention it was 1944?!
I had an uncle who lied about his age to get in the army. He was 16, just a few weeks from turning 17, when he joined. He was just barely 18 when he died at Chosin Reservoir in North Korea. They identified his remains earlier this year, 71 years after his death, and he is now buried with his parents. They gave his purple heart to my mother (his sister). She was only six years old when he enlisted, and is the last of his siblings left alive. She used to send him letters written in her childish writing with misspelled words and crayon drawings of flowers & birds on it. One of these was returned with his belongings just after he and his unit were all declared MIA. I saw it once many years ago, but my mother lost it at some point. I've always remembered it, though. It was the sweetest, saddest thing I've ever seen. I imagine him feeling lonely and scared so far from home and pulling out one of her letters to distract him from it all. I hope they made him feel better.
He "unhesitatingly placing himself on one grenade, while in the next instant pulling the other grenade under him. The grenade he covered with his body exploded, and wounded him severely; the other grenade did not explode." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacklyn_H._Lucas
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A person like this on our side is a hero. On the enemy's side? A deranged extremist.
Yeah, there's a line between those two. Usually, that line is a border.
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When my grandfather joined the Navy, he lied and said he was 18 when really he was only 16.
Can we talk about the fact there are exactly 5 Black people in this image and like 20 White people?
TIL Robin Williams was offered, and accepted the role of The Joker in the 1989 film, "Batman." Warner Brothers had only made the offer to bait their first choice, Jack Nicholson, into signing on, which he eventually did. Williams was furious, and demanded an apology from the film studio
TIL that an FBI informant secretly wore a wire to breakfast with a city official suspected of bribery, and met the suspect at the WTC Marriott. In the middle of getting a confession, the informant ends up making what is believed to be the only uninterrupted audio recording of the Sept. 11 attack
TIL the asteroid impact that caused the dinosaur extinction set 70% of the world's forests on fire, caused tsunamis that rose to a height of 300ft (100m), and ejected 25 trillion metric tons of debris into the atmosphere that reduced sunlight by up to 90% for a decade
TIL that the most requested funeral song in England is by Monty Python
Apparently the song in question is "Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life".
TIL that the British had a POW camp called Trent park during WWII. They would take axis prisoners of war and let them live in luxury, while secretly bugging the house. The program gave the allies lots of intel, such as the location of a V2 rocket facility
A picture of the stately home would be more appropriate. Fine, let me dig it up. Trent_Park...0d0af2.jpg 
TIL Darius McCollum, a New Yorker diagnosed with Asperger syndrome, has been arrested over 30 times for impersonating transit employees, stealing trains and buses, and driving their routes - complete with making safety announcements and passenger stops
I wonder why he doesn't just apply for a job with them? Maybe he did and they didn't hire him so he figured he'd just go along with it anyway.
TIL The "alarm chemical" released by bees to make the hive attack (Isopropyl Acetate) is the same favouring we use to make banana flavoured sweets, meaning bees can become hostile around those sweets
TIL that Batman's suit, arsenal of awesome gadgets, and secret identity were not created by Bob Kane. Gotham City was not even created by him. All these creations belong to Bill Finger, who died penniless while Kane did everything he could to suppress Finger’s involvement in creating the character
TIL: A bonsaï tree is not a species of tree. It's just a regular tree. Bonsai is a method of growing trees which aims to create an image of a large mature tree but in miniature
TIL that Pythagoras of The Pythagoras Theorem was a cult leader who claimed he could speak with animals, time travel and had an extreme hatred for Fava Beans
TIL Tiger beetles run so fast they temporarily blind themselves. When moving at up to 120 body lengths per second, their environment becomes a blur as their eyes can't gather enough light to form an image
Oh I'm burnin' through the sky 200 degrees that's why they call me Mr Farenhight I'm travelling at the speed of light I wanna make a supersonic insect out of you ~
TIL that the disappearance of D. B. Cooper remains the only unsolved air piracy case in commerical aviation history
TIL the iconic Australian hat is bent up on one side to allow the armed forces maneuver rifles on and off their shoulders without hitting the brim
TIL after basketball player Zion Williamson's foot ripped through his Nike shoe during a game, causing him to slip and sprain his knee, Nike's stock valuation dropped $1.1 Billion the next day
TIL Arthur Wharton, born Ghana, 1865, became the 100 yard world record holder for 30 years, the world's first professional black soccer player, a cycling champion, a professional cricketer and then a professional rugby player. He died penniless in 1930 and was buried in an unmarked paupers grave
TIL In 1948 Ford Motor Company was offered to take over Volkswagen for free. They turned down the offer. Volkswagen is now the second largest car manufacturer in the world
TIL that Bermuda has no natural water source. Each house collects rainwater using white, stepped roofs
TIL Commercially produced Mayonnaise has a high enough acidity that bacteria growth associated with food-borne illnesses is slowed and the product doesn’t need to be refrigerated
TIL Disney World is legally allowed to build a nuclear plant in Florida under a 1960s law
TIL people downloaded computer games over the radio in the 80s
TIL that Ford's Theatre refuses to perform the play which Abraham Lincoln was watching when he was [taken away]
TIL 1941 after a meteor shower two Canadian Inuit announced they were Jesus and God and convinced people to kill their sled dogs since people will soon be able to fly. 9 people ended up losing their lives as a result of the community spread insanity
Note: this post originally had 53 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
That was an interesting read, but the censorship is getting more and more ridiculous. Why not just write "кill" for example? It would deter the bots while not looking completely silly.
I write "kiII", written with two capital "I" instead of "L". It looks exactly the same but the bots won't recognise it
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Long time reader, first time poster: it's not news that BP gets its content mainly from reddit-posts - which is fine with me and actually quite useful to get a Digest from the internet- and reddit-universe. But it really annoys me that BP apparently does not bother to get appropriate pictures, let alone to add sources to the TIL claims (though they are probably also lacking in the source "material" from reddit to begin with). I find this lack of references highly alarming - surely, taking 'knowledge' from a harmless TIL-post may make you just look like a wise-a*s in the worst case, but the underlying, tacit approval of unproven claims is a real problem possibly leading to misinformation and 'alternative facts'.
Unfortunately, most of their audience don't care. Some know the posts come from elsewhere, others not so much. You have to see this site for what it is, which you and a lot of others do, it's a great collation of time passing junk food like content. The site exists simply to gain ad revenue. Asking them to put more effort in would be unprofitable. Asking them to point out on every post that the post may be up to 10 years old and copied from another site would stop the site being as sticky and therefore unprofitable. Although I really do feel sorry for the people who reply to the Reddit posters here as if they will see them. It seems most people live their lives without paying any attention.
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That was an interesting read, but the censorship is getting more and more ridiculous. Why not just write "кill" for example? It would deter the bots while not looking completely silly.
I write "kiII", written with two capital "I" instead of "L". It looks exactly the same but the bots won't recognise it
Load More Replies... Long time reader, first time poster: it's not news that BP gets its content mainly from reddit-posts - which is fine with me and actually quite useful to get a Digest from the internet- and reddit-universe. But it really annoys me that BP apparently does not bother to get appropriate pictures, let alone to add sources to the TIL claims (though they are probably also lacking in the source "material" from reddit to begin with). I find this lack of references highly alarming - surely, taking 'knowledge' from a harmless TIL-post may make you just look like a wise-a*s in the worst case, but the underlying, tacit approval of unproven claims is a real problem possibly leading to misinformation and 'alternative facts'.
Unfortunately, most of their audience don't care. Some know the posts come from elsewhere, others not so much. You have to see this site for what it is, which you and a lot of others do, it's a great collation of time passing junk food like content. The site exists simply to gain ad revenue. Asking them to put more effort in would be unprofitable. Asking them to point out on every post that the post may be up to 10 years old and copied from another site would stop the site being as sticky and therefore unprofitable. Although I really do feel sorry for the people who reply to the Reddit posters here as if they will see them. It seems most people live their lives without paying any attention.
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