Skip to content
Search AI Powered

Latest Stories

People Share Their Absolute Favorite Random Fact

Make us preferred on Google

The world is a fascinating place. We should know-we live there.

In and above the world, we have so many exchanges of life; space; information; it feels impossible to ever fully grasp this incredible, strange thing called life that we live.


u/TheRebel2187 asked:

What's your favourite random fact?

Here were some of those answers.


It's Just A Dinosaur, NBD

In the production of the 2014 Godzilla movie the sound designers played Godzilla's roar through a whole lot of concert speakers and they got noise complaints from 3 miles away about people thinking there was an earthquake.

Neat-Guy

I'd Rather Watch Asparagus Grow

Asparagus grows so quickly during the spring (up to 10" in one 24 hour period, or almost half an inch per hour) that you could literally sit and watch it grow were you so inclined (or that bored).

panadolxtra1

Now I Can ALWAYS Get There

Alexander the great once built a permanent bridge to an island just because he was upset when they laughed at his offer for surrender on their part because he couldnt get there.

Zachfulger

Tried To Eat Some Bugs But Then I Got High

So certain millipedes secrete cyanide as a protective mechanism to kill predators. However lemurs are immune to this lethal effect and instead intentionally provoke millipedes to get them to excrete cyanide. The lemurs do this because instead of killing them, the cyanide produced by the millipedes gets them high (and I think they can also use it as insect repellent). TLDR: Lemurs eat millipedes cyanide to get high.

ChrisLetai

Bye Bye Miss Electron-Pie

Astronomer here! Magnetars are a type of neutron star (the core of a giant dead star where a ball of neutrons the mass of the sun are crammed into a 20km/12mi radius) that have the most extreme magnetic fields we know of in the universe. How extreme? Well if you got within a thousand kilometers/ 620 miles of one, the magnetic field itself would kill you, by basically pulling the electrons out of your very atoms.

Space is so cool!

Andromeda321

A Mysterious Spice

There used to be three staple seasonings for tables in ye olden days, salt, pepper and nobody knows, table sets from back then have been found with 3 containers consistently but no one ever bothered to write down what was in the 3rd one bc? Common knowledge right? What idiot wouldn't know what to put in the third container? Us apparently. Just another random bit of knowledge lost through the ages.

Taragharagharagh

That's What We Call COLD

During the Cold War, an American condom company was shipping, well, condoms to the USSR but they switched the sizes so that, for example, a XL size was labeled under medium on the box so that the Russians would think Americans had big d!cks.

_Oxygenstealer_

There And Back Again

There is approximately 2 meters of DNA packed into the average human cell. That means there is approximately 20,000,000,000 kilometers of DNA in the average adult human body, conservatively estimating 1013 cells in the body.

For reference, that is ~66 roundtrips between Earth and the Sun.

P0rtal2

Salt Fat Acid Heat

Tomato is a vegetable and a fruit. Vegetables is a culinary term while fruits are botanical.

The age-old question actually has an answer—it's both! Tomatoes are fruits that are considered vegetables by nutritionists. Botanically, a fruit is a ripened flower ovary and contains seeds. Tomatoes, plums, zucchinis, and melons are all edible fruits, but things like maple "helicopters" and floating dandelion puffs are fruits too. For some reason, people got hung up on tomatoes, but the "fruit or vegetable" question could also work for any vegetable with seeds.

Now, nutritionally, the term "fruit" is used to describe sweet and fleshy botanical fruits, and "vegetable" is used to indicate a wide variety of plant parts that are not so high in fructose. In many cultures, vegetables tend to be served as part of the main dish or side, whereas sweet fruits are typically snacks or desserts. Thus, roots, tubers, stems, flower buds, leaves, and certain botanical fruits, including green beans, pumpkins, and of course tomatoes, are all considered vegetables by nutritionists.

There is no hard-and-fast rule that clearly designates a botanical fruit as a vegetable, but, given that tomatoes are generally not used in desserts and are closely related to other fruit-vegetables (e.g., eggplants and peppers), it is not too counterintuitive for tomatoes to be classified as vegetables. So go ahead and call a tomato whatever you want—it's super tasty either way.

calitreexsweet

A Natural Radiation Site

There existed a natural nuclear reactor in Africa 2 billion years ago. And 30 km from the site of the reactor were find the oldest fossils of animals, also aged of 2 billion years ago. There doesn't appear to be any link though.

Dr_Peter_Venkman_84

More from Trending/best-of-reddit

'The Craft' cast, including Robin Tunney, Fairuza Balk, Rachel True and Neve Campbell
Columbia Pictures/Getty Images

'The Craft' Star Speaks Out After New Bratz Dolls Were Sent To Influencers But Not Original Cast

Bratz enthusiasts have a lot to be excited about right now, as a new collection of the dolls have rolled out, this time inspired specifically by the original cast of the 1996 horror film The Craft, from which Bratz dolls came to be.

But just because it's an exciting campaign doesn't mean it's perfect.

Keep Reading Show less
Trick-or-treating
The Boston Globe/Getty Images

HOA Sparks Debate After Sending Letter Telling People Not To Hand Out Full-Size Candy Bars On Halloween

Within our communities, it's important to make everyone feel welcome and included, and sometimes that means making changes so that everyone can afford to be included. But sometimes changes are made simply because someone with the power to change it doesn't want to do something.

The question is whether changes are being made for inclusivity or convenience.

Keep Reading Show less
Screenshots from @serena_loscalzo's TikTok
@serena_loscalzo/TikTok

College President Goes Above And Beyond To Help Student Prank Her Chronically Oversleeping Roommate

University of Vermont President Marlene Tromp and UVM student Hannah Lapier have gone viral after their fabulous wake-up call—and fortunately not the negative, reality-check kind!

Lapier opened up to her roommate, Serena LoScalzo, about struggling to get out of bed in the morning for her classes. Lapier prompted her friend to use any means necessary to help her make it to her morning classes on time, because she wanted to take school seriously.

Keep Reading Show less
Screenshots from @itsvictoriavega's TikTok
@itsvictoriavega/TikTok

Woman Sounds Off About 'Worst First Date Of My Life' After Guy Made Truly Unhinged Request

There are bad first dates, there are the worst first dates ever, and then there are the dates that are so terrible, you can't help but wonder how they occurred in the first place.

TikToker Victoria Vega, for example, went on a first date with a guy after what she thought was a promising start, but when she actually went on the date, it was nothing like she'd expected. In fact, she called it the worst first date of her life.

Keep Reading Show less
TikToker Kae; Walmart storefront
@lolxdlolxdlolxd23455/TikTok; Douglas Rissing/Getty Images

Fired TikToker Shares Bonkers Behind-The-Scene Stories About What It Was Like Working At Walmart

Whether or not we've ever worked there, we've all heard horror stories and seen internet memes about "people at Walmart" and the weird things that often happen within the oversized chain convenience store.

TikToker Kae, or @lolxdlolxdlolxd23455 on the platform, worked at Walmart for more than six months and ultimately was fired because he'd accidentally logged his PTO time incorrectly and also requested multiple days off,—but he'd intended to quit anyway given his unpleasant time working there.

Keep Reading Show less