Many people might develop an aversion to learning while they're in school. But exercising our mind can actually improve our memory, attention span, people skills, and might stave off the onset of dementia. We just have to find a fun and engaging way to do it!
And Bored Panda is all about learning random interesting facts. If you're curious to know what really caused the international liquid ban on planes (it wasn't 9/11) and why the Swiss decided to abolish tipping, scroll down and see our newest collection of interesting facts from the TIL community!
This post may include affiliate links.
TIL tipping was abolished in Switzerland in 1974 after a dispute over taxes on tips. Service is now included in prices, with higher wages replacing tips.
Tipping is basically an insult. "Here peon" I gift you a token. MAN UP- pay people what they are worth, don't expect others to take on your responsibility as a charity
TIL When the Wii U failed miserably, the Nintendo CEO halved his own salary for half a year, instead of laying off his employees.
Big businesses take note. Also do not take bonuses if there are no profits, or if you have had to lay off sections of the workforce.
TIL that during the filming of the 2014 film Muppets Most Wanted Danny Trejo's mom passed away. Danny managed to keep it all together when people on set gave him their condolences, until Kermit offered his own, which caused him to run to the bathroom to bawl his eyes out.
Danny is a cool person. We all have a soft spot for the Muppets.
Our physical bodies aren't the only things we should be working out; our minds need just as much stimulation if we want to be happy and healthy well into our older age. Mental fitness develops our neuroplasticity. When we do puzzles, learn new languages, and even read books our brains create new neural pathways.
Neuroplasticity means that our brains can restructure and rewire themselves to adapt to changes. Physical exercise, traveling, learning new languages, reading books, playing video games, music or painting are all activities that can rewire our brains.
TIL when a crow die, other crows gather to investigate about what has happened and why the crow died.
TIL Quebec's ban on toy and fast food ads directed at children under 13 has contributed to a reduction in childhood obesity rates.
I completely get this and happy they don't advertise to kids under 13, but at some point the parent needs to be responsible too and encouraging healthy eating habits
TIL there is no official Calvin and Hobbes merchandise besides the compilation books. Bill Watterson was vehemently against merchandising his characters and even went as far as to say, "Only thieves and vandals have made money on Calvin and Hobbes merchandise."
We also exercise our brains by constantly learning new things. Just like these random facts you have a chance to learn about today! So, let's go through some of the facts people have shared on the TIL subreddit in a little bit more depth, shall we?
Like the fact that the law basically qualifies Converse shoes as slippers. Although the tax write-off is a good reason why the makers put felt into the sole of the shoe, there's a comfort reason as well. It also helps the shoe to retain its shape and grip and ensures every step is as quiet as possible.
TIL that the picture “The Scream” by Edvard Munch does not depict a person screaming, but rather someone reacting to hearing a scream.
TIL an off-duty nurse saved a boy's life by giving him CPR when his heart stopped after he was hit in the chest with a baseball bat during a Little League game. Seven years later that same boy saved the nurse's life by giving her the Heimlich maneuver after she started choking in a restaurant.
TIL Steven Spielberg beat James Cameron to the film rights of Jurassic Park by just a few hours. However after Cameron saw Spielberg's film, he realized that Spielberg was the right person for it because dinosaurs are for kids and he would've made "Aliens with dinosaurs."
Many of us can't imagine flying without Ziploc bags filled with our little toiletry bottles. But that was the reality once, and it wasn't 9/11 that forced airlines to ban liquids on planes. In 2006, the British government thwarted a terrorist attack to blow up a U.S.-bound plane with liquid explosives.
Interestingly, the liquid ban might soon be a thing of the past. We now have the technology for airport security to see if people have any dangerous liquids in their luggage by scanning it. Some UK airports are already more lax with their liquid policies, but the U.S. airports might be a bit slower in introducing changes.
TIL that in 2009, a campaign succeeded in making Rage Against the Machine's 'Killing in the Name' the Christmas number 1 best-selling single in the UK after the public grew tired of X Factor winners topping the chart every year.
I don't know about other countries, but the Christmas number 1 was (still is but not as much now) a big deal in the UK where bookmakers would take bets on it and people would eagerly listen to the radio the Sunday before Christmas to find out who the was going to be top of the charts on Christmas day. Usually they'd be a highly publicised battle for Christmas number one between 2-3 artists that got people talking. So it ruined it when whoever won the X factor consistently won for several years. The campaign to make Killing in the Name number one was about reclaiming a part of our Christmas tradition and sticking two fingers up at Simon Cowell. Thankfully the X factor is no more. This year Wham's Last Christmas has won it for the second year in a row.
TIL that although the location of the former base of MI6 from 1964 to 1994 was meant to be classified, The Daily Telegraph called it "London's worst-kept secret, known only to every taxi driver, tourist guide and KGB agent".
MI6 tried to stop the modern James Bond films from showing the building, giving away it's location. It went to court I believe and the Judge sided with the film company because the buildings location was so easy to find.
TIL in 1914, 4-year-old Charlotte May Pierstorff was shipped via parcel post. At 32 cents, her parents found it cheaper than a train ticket. Just under the 50lb limit, May rode in the train's mail compartment with a stamp on her jacket and was delivered to her grandmother by the mail clerk on duty.
According to other things I've read this wasn't uncommon, but I never fact checked it so it could be aa myth
If you grew up online in the 2010s, you must know Flappy Bird. The viral game was everywhere: people were playing it, reacting to it, and even hating it. But the iconic game is coming back in 2025: the creators announced a new version with new characters, new modes, and other new fun features. Let's hope they don't take it off all platforms after nine months for a second time!
TIL in Icelandic folklore there's a cat called Jólaköttur or Yule Cat. It lurks in the snowy countryside during the Christmas season and eats people who do not receive new clothing before Christmas Eve.
And for people who get clothing, I like imagine Yule Kitty sitting on my clothes and leaving some fur tidings
TIL about the oldest barrel of drinkable wine, made in 1472. It’s only been tasted 3 times - in 1576 to celebrate an alliance; in 1716 after a fire; and finally in 1944 when Strasbourg was liberated during World War II.
TIL in 1984, 13-year-old Andy Smith wrote to President Reagan asking for funds to clean his bedroom after his mom called it a “disaster area”. Raegan sent a tongue-in-cheek reply saying his funds were “dangerously low” and suggested he practice volunteerism instead to solve local problems.
We like to say that good things age like fine wine, but nobody really knows what the oldest drinkable wine from a barrel tastes like. Experts speculate that it might taste more like the barrel itself than anything else, since the longer the wine stays in a barrel, the more it absorbs oak flavors (vanilla, cloves, caramel, and such).
TIL: In 2009, two college students were jailed for refusing to pay a $16.35 mandatory tip at a Pennsylvania restaurant, citing poor service. After national attention, charges were dropped, and the case sparked widespread debate over tipping and whether it should depend on service quality.
It was not a mandatory tip, it was the service charge on their bill. They paid the rest of the bill but were charged with theft for refusing to pay the full amount. Here's the story: https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/theft-charges-dropped-against-no-tip-couple/1891608/
TIL about Philippine Airlines Flight 812. A passenger hijacked the plane and robbed the other passengers. He tried escaping using a homemade parachute, but he couldn't jump and needed a flight attendant to give him a push. He was killed after his parachute failed to open. Everyone else was unharmed.
Today I learned that sound can be minus decibels. The quietest place on Earth is Microsoft’s anechoic chamber in Redmond, WA, USA, at -20.6 decibels. These anechoic chambers are built out of heavy concrete and brick and are mounted on springs to stop vibrations from getting in through the floor.
If you've ever been to Switzerland (or even had a connecting flight through Zurich), you probably know that even a tiny bottle of water can be pretty expensive. The 1974 law didn't actually abolish tipping, it just required employers to pay a minimum salary and not count on tips to make up a part of it. The Swiss still tip their hospitality service providers: it's not obligatory, but leaving a tip is still a custom.
TIL the liquid ban on planes wasn’t caused by 9/11 but by British MI5, who foiled a 2006 terror plot involving liquid explosives disguised as soft drinks.
You can’t bring that bottle through security! It might be a liquid explosive!…So I shall take it, and throw it in a bin with 200 other bottles of possible explosive…surround by a few hundred people passing through security…because we are here to keep you safe!
TIL: Astronaut Anne McClain was the first person to be investigated for space crime in 2019, when her estranged wife accused her of accessing her bank account while in space. Fortunately, investigators found the accusations were false and her now ex was charged with making false statements.
That's crazy. Surely when she was in space and EVERYTHING SHE DID WAS BEING TRACKED was the worst possible time to level false accusations at her?
TIL the Amazon river dumps so much fresh water into the Atlantic that it is possible to drink from the surface for about 200 mile offshore.
That's what's been missing from my life. A tropical intestinal bug.
Astronaut Anne McClane's space crime might sound like a funny TIL fact, but, in reality, it was a real pain because of its jurisdictional challenges. Since she committed the crime aboard the ISS, it wasn't clear where she should be prosecuted. The 1998 ISS Intergovernmental Agreement states that astronauts should be prosecuted in the countries of their nationality.
TIL that Nickelodeon almost cancelled Hey Arnold’s Christmas episode because they thought kids wouldn't care about its portrayal of the Vietnam War. An executive revoked the decision when her nine-year-old son saw a rough cut of the episode and asked 'Mom, is that what Vietnam was all about?'.
TIL that up to half of the current Cherokee nation can trace their lineage to a single Scottish fur trader who married into the tribe in the early 1700's.
Using US logic about ancestory, all those Cherokee can claim to be Scottish.
TIL in 2016, a man deleted his open-source Javascript package, which consisted of only 11 lines of code. Because this packaged turned out to be a dependency on major software projects, the deletion caused service disruptions across the internet.
Azer Koçulu. Was in dispute with Kik over the name, as he gave that name to one of his open source packages, so he removed all of his packages from NPM (Node Package Manager) after they backed Kik. One of those was left-pad, a piece of code that adds an extra space in text. A *lot* of software that was created from NPM packages used left-pad, so its removal broke a lot of stuff.
Legendary British physicist Stephen Hawking used a voice computer to communicate with the world, but his voice computer spoke with an American accent. The speech synthesizer Hawking used was called Speech Plus CallText 5010, and its male voice was that of Dennis H. Klatt's. Klatt recorded himself for 'Perfect Paul,' a program that Hawking used until the very end. Klatt himself lost his voice to thyroid cancer, but it lived on in 'Perfect Paul' as the iconic Stephen Hawking voice.
TIL a team of student volunteers on an archaeological dig at a site in northern France discovered a 200-year-old note left by an archaeologist who had performed an excavation of the site in 1825.
The note says, 'If you are reading this, you are already dead. The curse lives on'
TIL Alexander the Great had a Hindu Guru who accompanied his army on their return to Persia. After he died via self immolation the army held a drinking contest in his honor, resulting in 42 people dying from alcohol poisoning, including the winner, who drank 13 litres of unmixed wine.
TIL that in 1907 French waiters went on strike for better pay, more time off - and the right to grow mustaches. At the time, lower-class workers were forbidden to have facial hair.
Crows are the subject of many creations in the horror genre, but there is a morbid fact about how the birds conduct themselves after one of them passes away. When a crow comes upon a deceased one, they call all other crows in the area with an alarm call. Scientists call this behavior "funerals," and it's a way for the birds to learn about dangerous places, people, and even predators.
TIL a bank clerk dozed off with his finger on the keyboard and accidentally transferred 222,222,222.22 euros instead of 64.20 euros. His supervisor did not notice the error, approved the transaction, and was fired. The next year, a German labour court ruled the supervisor was unfairly dismissed.
TIL Stephen Hawking’s speech-generating device used a default American accent because he preferred it over a British one. Even when offered a modernized voice, he stuck with it, calling it his “trademark” and joking it made him sound more authoritative.
Not true. They were unable to do any other type of “accent”. I had to fact check myself on this one because I was pretty sure it was wrong as soon as I read it. Please do better BP. Between these type of “facts you might not know” that are wrong, the Reddit and Mumsnet posts it’s getting annoying. I miss funny animal pics and not the same ones we see a month later.
TIL Ghyslain Raza (the Star Wars Kid) began getting tutored at home because the school staff asked him not to return the following year after students started to tease or mock him which they saw as bad publicity. Although, he was able to move past it and now has a law degree & is working on his PHD.
This article should be titled "Random snippets of s**t with no context that may or may not even be true, go look it up yourself because I can't be bothered."
Click on the links to see the reddit posts, sometimes more info there.
Load More Replies...The most frustrating thing about premium existing isn't the lists that are cut off, but the ones that you have commented on but can no longer see replies to!
I don’t have the time to fact check all of these posts. The person who wrote this just grabbed things from Reddit and who knows where without research. After 2 of them I’m checking out. This is just misinformation.
Click the links below the posts. TIL rules have a requirement to post sources, so ALL are sourced from those links. The incorrect things in this post`were only two minor errors the redditors made from misreading their sources, but they are so minor that they don't make the fact incorrect (using a media created term that wasn't in the study and misidentifying Moctezuma II as the last Aztec Emperor).
Load More Replies...This article should be titled "Random snippets of s**t with no context that may or may not even be true, go look it up yourself because I can't be bothered."
Click on the links to see the reddit posts, sometimes more info there.
Load More Replies...The most frustrating thing about premium existing isn't the lists that are cut off, but the ones that you have commented on but can no longer see replies to!
I don’t have the time to fact check all of these posts. The person who wrote this just grabbed things from Reddit and who knows where without research. After 2 of them I’m checking out. This is just misinformation.
Click the links below the posts. TIL rules have a requirement to post sources, so ALL are sourced from those links. The incorrect things in this post`were only two minor errors the redditors made from misreading their sources, but they are so minor that they don't make the fact incorrect (using a media created term that wasn't in the study and misidentifying Moctezuma II as the last Aztec Emperor).
Load More Replies...