Someone Asked, ‘What’s A Cool Fun Fact That You Know?’, 40 People Delivered
As of January 2021, there were 4.66 billion active internet users worldwide, which makes 59.5% of the global population. Of this total, 92.6% (4.32 billion) accessed the internet via mobile devices, Statista estimates. So just imagine how much information there is online. In fact, it’s probably impossible to wrap your head around it.
Part of the appeal in going online is that you get to share things with others. From what you’ve been up to, to what’s on your mind. Quite literally. Like this recent thread on Reddit, where the user Mistik06 asked everyone “What’s a cool fun fact that you know?” and got people posting the craziest facts they know. 24k upvotes and 10.7k comments later, we have an amazing collection of trivia facts you probably haven't heard of before, so enjoy!
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Pufferfish contain a toxin in their spikes that kills predators. It has a slightly different effect on dolphins though, in that it gets them high. So teenage dolphins will pass around pufferfish and impale themselves off of them to get stoned.
Someone better let the pufferfish know. They could build a successful drug empire off it. Puff Cartel.
Apparently, studies show that Crows, Ravens and other Corvids are self aware and are able to ponder the content of their own minds.
Dragonflies are the predator with the highest success rate (over 90%), and are one of the few animals that are capable of plotting intercept courses rather than chasing their prey. They're basically mosquito murder drones.
Elephants think humans are cute in the same way we think puppies and kittens are cute.
Scientists speculated there are other planets orbiting distant stars, but haven't had a clear evidence of this fact up until the 1990's. And the majority of currently known exoplanets (almost 5000, as of now!) have been discovered well into 2000's, which means that humanity is at the very beginning of its discovery journey regarding other planetary systems.
With James Webb telescope being extremely close to finalizing its calibrations as we speak, we will be able to not only discover hundreds, if not thousands of new planets (and stars and galaxies), but also detect whether there are traces of alien civilizations on them. We should all be very excited about this, as this is unprecedented, and a HUGE deal for science and our species as a whole.
This is amazing. Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be born 100 years from now, how advanced would we be.
Ok, this fact has connected facts:
In late 1800s girl killed herself by jumping from bridge on Sienna river and she was known as The Unknown Woman of the Seine.
When the guy who worked in morgue saw her, he thought she was beautiful and ordered a plaster cast of her face.
Fast foward to 1960s, CPR was invented and they needed a doll to train people. So they partnered with Norwegian producer of medical devices. That guy decided to use the plaster cast of Unknown Woman of the Seine and named the doll Anne(Annie) because his doughter was named Anne(Annie).
While performing CPR, people were trained to talk to a doll(person) so there is that common phrase:"Annie! Annie are you ok?"
Fast foward to when Michael Jackson decided to put that phrase in his classic "Smooth Criminal".
When Thomas Edison was bound to a wheelchair, Henry Ford bought a wheelchair for himself so that he and Edison could race.
Steven Seagal once told Gene LeBell that he was immune to being choked out from doing so much martial arts training, so Gene choked him out and he sh*t his pants.
When sea otters find a rock they like to bust open clams, they will tuck it under a fold of skin in their armpit. They also hold each other’s paws while they’re sleeping so they don’t float away from each other. Baby otters aren’t buoyant enough to stay afloat so they will sleep on their mom’s tummies until they’re older.
The creator of the pop-up ad made a formal apology for his creation.
Dinosaurs existed for so long that there were still dinosaur fossils from previous eras while other dinosaurs from future eras were alive.
So basically, when T-Rex was still alive and well, Stegosaurs was nothing more than fossilized bones under their feet even back then.
You can fit the entire population of the human race inside the Grand Canyon. Not just the 7 billion alive now - the entire lot. From the very start. And still have plenty of room for those who are yet to be born.
If every person on earth fought 1v1 until there was only 1 winner, that person would only have to win 33 times.
The sound of an ATM drawing cash is a manufactured sound. It's just to let you know that the ATM is indeed working and that your money is coming up.
That if sound could be transmitted through space, the sun would be so loud on earth it would be the equivalent of standing next to a jet engine, even though it's 94 million miles away.
Sound in space travels along gravitational waves and can also be picked up via vibrations. Space agencies have been listening to the sun and planets for years (Jupiter and Saturn sound particularly scary).
Your nose is impacting your vision 100% of the time.
However, since your "picture" you see is just an interpretation by your brain, your brain erases your nose as useless information. You'll only see it, if you really concentrate on it, if you close one eye, or if you put your finger on the very tip of your nose.
It seems like a harmless fact until this thought enters your head...
"Your nose is real. Your brain removes it from your vision as useless, but it is very much there, and very much real. What other things is your brain removing from your vision?"
It's wild to think that your entire life experience is just your brain doing it's best to interpret your senses. And that it's definitely not a "perfect" system. It could be interpreting everything incorrectly, and we collectively wouldn't have any idea.
Now it will take me all morning to unsee my nose and eyeglasses again, thank you for this...
The best optometrist I ever had taught me about how so much of vision has to do with your brain and not your eyes. I was in a car crash in my early 20s and lost some of my peripheral vision -- which used to be ridiculously good. Now, it's just normal. The change in my vision freaked me out. Specislists ran all the tests and found nothing physically wrong. The doctor explained that sometimes your brain can edit out some of your senses to protect you. The accident was my fault. I didn't see the stop sign to my right, though I clearly remember seeing the tree and sidewalk even farther to my right. After the accident, apparently, my brain decided less peripheral vision would be safer for me. The doctor agrees that I see less peripherally than I did before the accident. He says there are ways to train your brain to recover that lost sight, but he's also said (and I agree with him) that my brain is probably right, and it is probably safer for it to edit out what I don't need.
Well, I really hope you're doing much better now and will stay safe.
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Your brain is amazing. I had a small brain tumour and consequently lost a portion of the vision in both eyes. I don't see a blank or black area. I see pretty normally. However, the bit that can't see if filled in by my brain, using information that was there the last time my eyes moved to cover that bit. Provided that I keep moving my eyes, this is fine, but when I am tired I move my eyes less and that part of the image gets "stale". Doesn't affect me too much apart from a slight tendancy to walk into doorframes at night! LOL
Another thing your brain removes: blood vessels. you would be able to see the blood vessels in your eyes as a web-like pattern, but your brain fills in the gaps. if you shine a light at an angle into the corner of your eye ( im not exactly sure what angle/direction), you can actually see them.
You also have two blindspots (one for each eye) which is where the back of the eye has the nerve endings sending the signal to the brain (which means there are no receptors). Give yourself a thumbs up at arm's length and look at your thumb. Without moving your eye, move your arm slowly to the side while keeping your thumb in focus (don't look at your thumb, be aware of it - your periferal vision). At some point your thumb will disappear! That's the blind spot - literally.
Does this mean that everything I see can be fake? Does this also mean that our science is wrong because we can’t see everything?
Not necessarily wrong, but perhaps incomplete. There might be a whole new branch of science waiting to be discovered because we can't perceive the information it uses yet.
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When I was 20yo, I was diagnosed with macular degeneration - which means I have blind 'spots' in my vision. At the time, I had always had better than 20/20 vision and could easily pass driving tests...so my doctors never banned me from driving (which was a necessary part of my job). One day, while taking a walk, I turned onto a street that dead-ended at the front door of a house. For one reason or another, I glanced to the left and - suddenly - saw an entire car parked in front of the house. When I looked directly at the house again, the car was gone. It was only after several attempts to focus that I realized I had to make myself 'see' the blind spot (a literal black spot in the direct center of my vision) and that my brain had edited the scene - the road, the lawn, even the front door of the house - but left out the car because it wasn't a 'predictable' part of the picture. I stopped driving that same day and fought for YEARS to have a doctor scknowledge this well-known phenomena (because heaven-forbid I be considered disabled just because I couldn't see). I can't believe they let me drive.
I was diagnosed with AMD some years ago. I don't yet have a blind spot. But, I do get migraine auras without getting the pain. It always starts with a centre vision blind spot then develops into what I call the sparkly zig zags. Can't read or do much until it passes, luckily doesn't last more than 30 minutes. I assume that's how the AMD will manifest eventually. Scary. I hope you are doing well.
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There is so much our brain decides is unnecessary info. The classic example is the video where you count how many passes of a basketball are done... in the end, they ask if you saw the gorilla...
There could be a literal other universe right in front of us, and we would all be oblivious because of our brain editing it out.
Some colours aren’t real! As in, visually impossible. So your brain just guesses and throws up what it thinks it should look like.
I think our brains may have extended the "useless invisible vision" favour to whoever in at no10 lately.... we know its there, we do not think about it anymore even if its right smack up in our faces, we can't do nothing g about it apparently so we just blank it out.
I have a pair of just cheap normal petrol station sunglasses and had them down my nose a little as in my mask it was fogging up so badly could not see anything. I was waiting to cross the road at the light and jut the right kind of early morning sunlight one day appeared and I got a shock. I could see the reflection of my eyes, lids, lashes etc "looking at me" close up and moving. I could still see beyond that and things round me but it was weird seeing the reflection in the inside of the sunnies at the same time
My peripheral vision is so crappy that I think I just don't see it anymore, my brain can't ignore it because it really can't see it.
Weirdly, I constantly see an outline of my nose. It's like double vision. Or maybe everyone sees this and I'm being stupid and not reading the fact correctly
Listen up, brain. Without nose, glasses would fall down and eyes couldn't see, which means feet would stumble, body would fall, and head would bang against the floor. You would not enjoy being shaken about so. Remember, brain, nose IS important.
And most of the times, we deem other animals' behaviour irrational or stupid, while their senses are actually better than ours and they react to things we can't perceive or even conceive.
Thus, the existential questions like, "What is reality?" Is there actually an absolute somewhere against which the interpretations of intelligent beings could be compared?
Oh great. That's another thing for me to sit up all night pondering when insomnia strikes. Thanks.
Brains don't interpret. Brains are made of tissue and cells. Tissue and cells don't think, therefore they don't interpret. Neurons and other electric signals interpret. We can see that happening on brain scans. We can see the neuron's fire. But we still don't see the nose. Or any other objects. So where do those objects cover from? How are they formed in our thoughts?
I think this is the same concept that makes a first trip to a new location take so much longer. You've never been there or that particular way so your brain is taking in all kinds of new, useful, information. As you travel that route more and more, your brain will quit taking in so much information. It's basically two sides of a survival mechanism. If it's new, take in as much info as possible. If it's old, disregard as much as possible to make room for the important stuff that may be happening.
For all we know ghosts are real but our minds thinl its useless n just says "nah its not real" Thats why kids have a higher chance seeing stuff. Or why we see unexplainable movements occasionally. 👀
I noticed this when I got a nose piercing. Then I noticed for the first time I could see my nose in the corner of my vision.
it also filters out my fringe. it goes way over my eyes and people constantly ask how i can see but this explains it!
But i can ALWAYS See a Part of my nose! The Most time with my right eye - the right side of my nose, maybe because i am righthanded? But if i Look to the right side of me i See the left side of my nose. So as i said, i always See my nose. Blurry but it is always there and bothers me 😅
It also "fills in blanks". The optic disk (which has no photoreceptors) would be a blank spot in our visual field if our brains didn't "fill in the blank".
Everything we see is a mental simulation of reality that our brain constantly checks and updates through touch smell etc. That's why your tongue can tell you the texture of anything. Just imagine licking something you have never tasted and you can picture it's texture.
If there's ever a time when this won't be inappropriate that time is now. darwins-fi...e7fd30.jpg 
Still inappropriate, maybe wait for a Nazi party conference.
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Moose are really good swimmer's and even swim from island to island to feed on the underwater vegetation
But orcas will occasionally stumble across then and hunt them down and moose haven't evolved far enough for them to know that orcas are predators
The difference between Million and Billion is more than we think.
To put it in perspective, 1 million seconds is about 12 days while 1 billion seconds is equivalent to 31.7 years.
Birds are classified as extant dinosaurs, not just descended from them. They are actual living, breathing dinosaurs.
Manatees regulate buoyancy by farting. They eat a ton of plants and accumulate a lot of methane. They then release gas when they want to sink and hold it in when they want to go to the surface or are being polite.
A single gram of DNA contains about 700 terabytes of information.
When they first measured the height of Mt. Everest it was exactly 29.000 feet, but as that sounds like a made-up number they declared it to be 29.002 feet.
Sharks like and get attracted to Heavy Metal music played underwater.
If you made $10,000 per day, every day since the pyramids were built around 4,500 years ago, you'd have 6% of Elon Musk's wealth.
You don't use shock paddles on a stopped heart.
Shock paddles simply put a heart back in to a natural rhythm, they will not restart a heart if it has stopped. That's what chest compressions are for.
And you actually have a very high mortality rate if you need chest compressions or a heart shock. The 5 year survival rate for both is very low.
Grass evolved 66 million years ago.
Dinosaurs went extinct 65 million years ago.
The vast majority of dinosaurs never existed at the same time as grass.
Cuttlefish can accurately match the color and texture of their environment despite the fact that they’re colorblind.
Koalas are literally smooth-brained, so much so that if you put a plate of eucalyptus leaves in front of them that have been taken off the branch, they won’t recognize them as food.
The Nazis planned to assassinate Winston Churchill with an explosive chocolate bar.
16⁰C and 28⁰C reversed are equal to their Fahrenheit value. So - 16 is 61f and 28 is 82f
Marlon Brando popularised wearing a T-shirt casually.
There are more plastic flamingo lawn ornaments in the US than there are wild flamingoes on the entire planet.
There is a plant called the California Corn Lilly that contains a drug called Cyclopamine. When animals eat it while pregnant, it can cause cyclopia (one eye). It inhibits a signaling pathway called the Sonic Hedgehog Pathway (yes, this pathway was actually named after the video game).
The sonic gene is a gene which determines how many digits/fingers a being has
The only artist to ever have five albums in the US Top 20 at the same time is Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass.
If you fold a regular piece of paper in half 104 (from memory) times, the paper will be as thick as the entire observable universe.
And if you fold a piece of paper more than 300 times you end up with a book that has more pages than atoms in the observable universe
Note: this post originally had 96 images. It’s been shortened to the top 40 images based on user votes.
There are so many apple varieties around the world, that if you were to eat a different apple variety every day, it would take you over 20 years to get through them.
Hooray for so many apples that are not red delicious!
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More things happened in the first second of the universe’s existance than the rest of the history and the future of the universe
Fun fact: Many people don't know that some plants are male plants and some are female plants.
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There are so many apple varieties around the world, that if you were to eat a different apple variety every day, it would take you over 20 years to get through them.
Hooray for so many apples that are not red delicious!
Load More Replies... More things happened in the first second of the universe’s existance than the rest of the history and the future of the universe
Fun fact: Many people don't know that some plants are male plants and some are female plants.
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