People Share 40 Interesting "Today I Learned" Facts That Have Changed Everything For Them

We all love a good "today I learned" moment and here are 40 of them for you!

Daphnie

• Published in Interesting
• November 7, 2023

We're here with a fantastic list of "Today I learned" facts that you're going to want to hear. We've probably all heard that infamous phrasing "today I learned," followed by a crazy new thing that we've all been doing wrong or a fact that almost would have never surfaced if it wasn't for the post.

Usually, they are all things that we'd be generally surprised about, and in this case, they are things that we would be generally surprised about. As we get older, we're not in school anymore, so we wouldn't expect to learn as much as we do, but honestly, we probably learn even more now.

I'm someone who loves to learn new things, and if you are too, then you'll love this list of very interesting facts that people recently learned about. We're always interested in hearing what people have to say and what they're currently reading, researching, or just simply learning about.

So if you're interested in hearing these awesome 40 things that people just learned, then keep on reading as we show you all 40 facts coming straight from the source. You never know. You might actually learn a few things yourself as well that you didn't know.

This is pretty cute though.

TIL about a cat named Room 8 that lived in a public school for 16 years. During his time their he would disappear during the summer and return, like clockwork on the first day of school. He became so well known that poems and songs were sung about him.

This actually makes so much sense though.

TIL elderly pedestrians in Singapore get more time to cross the road at traffic lights. By taping their concession card on the crosswalk button, the green man stays lit for up to 13 seconds longer.

This is for all the gamers.

TIL Ubisoft offered to share their detailed 3D model of Notre Dame from Assassin's Creed: Unity, some 5,000 hours of research, with the French government reconstruction effort after the fire in 2019.

Now this is a good deed that goes unnoticed.

Here's another one for the gamers.

TIL : about the game "Foldit", a puzzle game about protein folding. In 2011, its gamers helped decipher a protein of a HIV-like virus, solving a scientific problem that went unsolved for 15 years in as little as 10 days.

I knnow myself and so many others that have done this.

TIL Highway hypnosis, also known as white line fever, is an altered mental state in which a person can drive a car, truck, or other automobile great distances, responding to external events in the expected, safe, and correct manner with no recollection of having consciously done so.

Wow this is really interesting.

TIL that sharks don’t make sounds. Across 400-500 species, no one has ever found an organ even capable of producing sound.

This is so sad honestly especially knowing that he knew it would happen.

TIL that just before Laika went into space, one of the scientists using her for testing brought her home to play with his children. Knowing that she would not survive her journey.

Well that's an interesting use for something that was supposed to be a toy.

TIL in 2001, Mattel made a vibrating Harry Potter broomstick that led to many questionable Amazon user reviews. They discontinued the toy after adult stores in Times Square started selling them for twice their original retail price.

Yeah, because that's believable.

TIL when Captain Francesco Schettino was asked why he abandoned the sinking Costa Concordia cruise ship in 2012 while the ship’s passengers were either dying or trying to escape, his excuse was that he accidentally fell into a lifeboat.

He received 16 years in prison for his role in the incident.

I would believe this.

This is insane.

TIL that three years after winning gold at the 2004 Olympics, wrestler Rulon Gardner and two friends’ plane crashed into Lake Powell Utah. The three men swam an hour to the shore through 44F (7C) degree water to the shore and waited all night without shelter for rescue. All three men survived.

What a wonderful gift.

It's crazy how things like this happen and then nobody really talks about it.

TIL about the "Tanganyika-Laughter Epidemic". A student in 1962 in Tanzania started laughing in a school in Kashasha. The laughter quickly spread to hundreds of people, causing schools to close for months.

Researchers believe it was caused by stress, social tensions. No official explanation was given.

We love a good history lesson.

TIL that, on 16 November, 1949, students in Ghent (Belgium) stormed the medieval castle, lowered the portcullis and threw fruit from the walls at the police to protest a new tax on beer. The event is still commemorated yearly by the city as the greatest student prank in its history.

This is why you can't believe everything proven or proven to be wrong by science.

TIL that when Johannes Rebmann, the first European to see Mount Kilimanjaro, published his discovery in 1849, it was dismissed as a malaria-induced hallucination because it was believed that snow at this latitude was impossible.

It took 12 more years for scholars to accept the mountain's existence.

Another science lesson for you today.

This is quite interesting just how things worked out.

TIL the Black Death contributed greatly to the rise of the British Pub and pub culture. Thanks to the plague, scarcity of labor greatly improved the standard of living for peasants, who in turn spent their extra money on beer.

I need more info on this.

TIL. MSG isn’t bad for you and it’s bad reputation stemmed from what’s called the Chinese Restaurant Syndrome.

Oof, well that was a mess up they had to quickly fix.

TIL: about Nebraska's "safe haven" law that didn't have an age limit to drop off unwanted babies. A wave of children, many teenagers with behavioral issues, were dropped off. It has since been amended.

It sounds like more Americans need to be taught more then.

I like to wonder how they named all these different things.

I wonder how many other animals will do this.

I believe this definitely too.

TIL birth rates in the U.S. have dropped more than 20% since 2007.

For all our sports fans out there.

TIL that when Zlatan Ibrahimovic signed for MLS club LA Galaxy, LeBron James sent him one of his Lakers jerseys as a "welcome to LA" gift. Zlatan's response was to sign it and send it back.

I didn't know about this so this is interesting.

TIL of "Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome" where the body doesn't respond to testosterone so they have the genetic makeup of a man while showing the physical traits of a woman.

They are called Spurdogs!

Good to know some scientist is spending their days trying to figure this out.

Wow that's pretty interesting.

That's actually insane though.

TIL: In 1880, the average ages of consent in the US were set at 10 or 12 years old in most states, with the exception of Delaware where it was 7.

This is actually so sad we can't imagine how they feel.

This proves just how special of a place it is.

TIL during its long history, Jerusalem has been destroyed twice, besieged 23 times, attacked 52 times, and captured and recaptured 44 times.

I mean well duh. Italy knows what they're doing.

I wouldn't want to be around for this one.

Well it just gives a real life feel to it all.

I'd say that many of us don't know this.

Okay then this is a weird way to get a singer's voice.

TIL: Castrati were singers who were castrated before puberty to develop a unique voice for singing. They were primarily in church choirs and operas. Italian operas without one would be doomed to fail. The Pope tried to ban them in 1748, but failed as it would drastically reduce church attendance.

I didn't even know this was a debate, but okay.

That's enough with the Kevinism.

This is actually pretty funny though.

TIL in 2012 in Cebu, Philippines, after a 6.9 earthquake struck the city, someone shouted while finding their daughter whose name is "Chona Mae". This was misheard as "Tsunami" and eventually caused a mass panic.

These "Today I learned" facts are so interesting and they really do show how much we don't know and it's always fun to learn new things. Did you learn anything new from this list?

Let us know because we want to see how many people can learn from this one post.

Daphnie