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Not everything that you read on the internet is true. In a similar vein, far from everything that sounds made up is fake. Fact is often stranger than fiction, and some truly bizarre things about life on Planet Earth are closer to reality than myth.

Reddit user u/Mmemyo sparked an interesting discussion on r/AskReddit. They invited everyone to share the “stupid facts” they knew which might sound suspicious and weird but are actually correct. We’ve collected the most intriguing ones to share with you, Pandas. Scroll down to check them out! Hopefully, you'll learn something new.

#1

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real Cows have best friends and can become stressed when they're separated from them.

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#2

The Eiffel Tower can be 15 centimeters taller during the summer due to thermal expansion.

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#3

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real Pink is really just a light shade of red, but we think of it as a distinct color because we have a word for it that stuck. Not all languages have that. In Italian, they have a similar word for light blue, called “azzurro,” and it’s so common they actually think of it as a separate color from blue. We have the word “azure” in English, but it isn’t nearly as common, so we tend to think of that color as just a shade of blue.

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Nathaniel He/Him Cis-Het
Community Member
17 minutes ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Separate colours have more to do with language than our perception. We brits never used to have orange, until the fruit came along. Objects were either yellow or red.

#4

Pirates wear eye patches to see better in the dark (covered eye doesn't get used to sunlight and is more sensitive after uncovering).

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Nathaniel He/Him Cis-Het
Community Member
16 minutes ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Not true of the pirate One Eyed Willie from the Goonies. By the way, it took me years to get that joke.

#5

When basketball was first invented, at every game, they would have a man who would go up a ladder to retrieve the ball after every basket. It took them around 20 years to figure out maybe it would be a good idea to cut the bottom of the basket out to make retrieving the ball a lot easier. 20 years!!!

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#6

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real For every single human being on Earth, there are 2.5 MILLION ants.

Yes, this means that there are about 20 QUADRILLION ants on this planet.

If the ants decide to take over, are you strong enough to handle the 2.5 million that you'll be responsible for killing? If you've got kids, you might have to kill more because a 2 year old isn't going to accomplish a god damn thing if millions of ants are marching towards them.

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#7

Bald eagles are not actually bald. Balde is old english for white.

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#8

A man named Wilmer McLean owned a farm in Manassas, Virginia USA where the very first battle of the US Civil War was fought. After the battle he's like "I'm outta here" and bought a farm way out in the country at Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia...where Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered to Gen. Ulysses Grant in McLeans living room four years later.

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Ba-Na-Na
Community Member
34 minutes ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

So he can be all, “ It started with me and ended with me!”

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#9

-40C and -40F are the same temperature.

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#10

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real If you open your eyes in a completely dark room, the name of the color you will see is eigengrau, a kind of dark grey shade

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martymcmatrix
Community Member
1 hour ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I finally decided to translate it with »custom gray«...beside that, it's spelled correctly »Eigengrau«...🌫️

#11

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real A man named John Young brought a corned beef sandwich to space illegally and shared it with his colleague on board and he would have gotten away with it if it weren’t for the recording of them talking about the sandwich.

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#12

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real Someone named the fear of long words hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia.

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#13

You have to kill about 400 people to get enough iron from their blood to make a sword

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#14

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real There are clouds of alcohol floating around in space.

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martymcmatrix
Community Member
33 minutes ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Like the famous »Johnny Walker Nebula«...🌫️ 🥃 🌌

#15

The Atari 2600's release date and the last execution by guillotine happened less than 24 hours apart.

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#17

A species of frog, the African clawed frog, was the most reliable pregnancy test for a few decades before at-home tests were widely affordable and accessible.

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#18

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real The vikings, who came from Scandinavia, used iron as their main ingredient for forging weaponry, but it was also common practice to add the bones of dead animals to the mix. The belief was that it would infuse the weapon with the spirit of the creature, making it stronger, but they ended up making a primitive version of steel because of the carbon in the bones mixing with the iron making the weapon stronger, just as they thought it would. 

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Ace
Community Member
1 hour ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Pure speculation. There's every reason to believe that the vikings were borrowing technology from the Middle East and Asia to produce their steel, nothing to suggest that they just threw bones in at random. In any case their production, especially of the very special "Uthbert" swords, would require charcoal, so they must have known what they were doing, even if it was not fully understood.

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#19

Redheads require more anesthesia than non-redheads.

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#20

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real Honey never spoils

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#21

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real The original name for the color orange was "geoluhread," which means "yellow-red" in Old English

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#22

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real A lot of averages.

Example: The average number of legs humans have is less than 2.

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#23

Some invader (don't remember specifics) sent a letter to sparta saying that "If I invade Lakonia you will be destroyed, never to rise again" and the Spartans sent a letter back with a single word in it. "If" 

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#24

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real Bananas are berries, but strawberries are not true berries (in botanical terms berries are defined by their structure, and bananas fit the bill while strawberries don't)

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#25

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real Coffee is not a bean it is the pit of the coffee plant which is a fruit.

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#27

Our planet will exist long after humans go extinct

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#28

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real - [ ] Of the few people who have top secret clearance at the White House one of them is the person who writes all of the party invitations.

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#29

Crows can be trained to bring you money

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#31

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real There are 5.87 Popes per square mile in the Vatican City.

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Ms. Mack
Community Member
1 hour ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

??? Vatican City isn't even one square mile (.19). If someone else understands this, please explain.

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#32

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real The longest place name in the world is Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu

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Ms. Mack
Community Member
1 hour ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Not a single person with hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia lives there.

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#33

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real Im always seeing my nose ..its just that my brain ignores it

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#34

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real Cleopatra is closer to the invention of the iPhone than the building of the Giza pyramids.

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#35

The average number of skeletons in a human body is more than 1.

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#36

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real 18% of adult Americans claim they have seen or been in the presence of a ghost.

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Andy Pandy
Community Member
2 minutes ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

And they're all crazy, just like being abducted by aliens. Like they would really find intelligent life there!

#37

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real Sloths are most vulnerable to predators when pooping. They have to climb down to the trees to the floors floor, and it is a bit of a process for them to actually poop leaving them at risk of predators.

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#38

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real New Mexico (the state) got its name before Mexico (the country)

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#39

A bone “break” is the same as a “fracture.” Fracture is just the medical term. It does not have any correlation with the severity.

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Nathaniel He/Him Cis-Het
Community Member
2 minutes ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

People get confused over the paste tenses of break. The correct terminology is "I went and brocked my bone, the bone is now brockened."

#41

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real I’m closer to being a millionaire than Bill Gates is.

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#42

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real We thought to put wheels on luggage after we got to the moon.

The lighter the Roast the more caffeine coffee has.

A new car costs less than it's equal weight in Hamburgers.

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Nathaniel He/Him Cis-Het
Community Member
4 minutes ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Neil Armstrong struggled with his luggage, taking it up the gantry to Apollo 11 without wheels.

#43

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real There are more Hydrogen atoms in a single molecule of water than there are stars in the entire Solar System.

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#45

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real There are more planes in the ocean than boats in the sky

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#46

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real 6X9+6+9=69

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#47

50 “Stupid Facts” That Sound Fake But Are Genuinely Real Less than 40% of great white sharks have filed their 2022 tax returns

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#48

You are constantly clapping, but the claps are just spaced differently.

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#49

Chip Wilson, the founder of Lululemon

created the name (Lululemon) to have many L's so that it would sound western to Japanese buyers, who often have difficulty pronouncing the letter. He later remarked that he found it "funny to watch (Japanese speakers) try and say it" and that "it was the only reason behind the name"

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