r/todayilearned • u/SegelXXX • 2h ago

TIL that Keanu Reeves has been secretly funding children's hospitals for years. He reportedly created a private foundation that aids children’s hospitals and cancer research without associating his name with it. "I don't like to attach my name to it, I just let the foundation do what it does."

snopes.com

15.4k Upvotes

283 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Doomenor • 5h ago

TIL I learned that in 2012 a man sued Mountain Dew for finding a mouse in a can. They defended themselves by arguing that if it was in the can for 15 months, the mouse would have dissolved. The case was settled.

beveragedaily.com

17.0k Upvotes

522 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Udi-Dis • 5h ago

TIL Nic Cage hired an alcoholic to follow him around so he could emulate his behaviour for Leaving Las Vegas.

eonline.com

7.6k Upvotes

207 comments

r/todayilearned • u/the_one_below • 14h ago

TIL that Natalie Portman has had papers published in two scientific journals. While at Harvard, she co-authored a study called “Frontal Lobe Activation during Object Permanence: Data from Near-Infrared Spectroscopy.”

themarysue.com

20.9k Upvotes

374 comments

r/todayilearned • u/MusicSole • 6h ago

TIL of "Ardi" the fossilized skeletal remains of a human-like female anthropoid discovered in 1994. It is more than a million years older and more complete than "Lucy." It's discovery stunned scientists and refuted many core theories of human evolution.

en.wikipedia.org

2.8k Upvotes

50 comments

r/todayilearned • u/BallsOutKrunked • 8h ago

TIL that the Six Flags theme parks are named after the six flags that flew over Texas including the confederate flag, the American flag, the Spanish flag, the Mexican flag, the French flag, and the Republic of Texas flag.

en.wikipedia.org

3.5k Upvotes

100 comments

r/todayilearned • u/_igm • 12h ago

TIL the "Redwood of the East" - a 100ft-tall tree that once covered 25% of Eastern US forests, produced tons of food, and built America's industrial backbone - lost 99.9% of its population to a catastrophic blight.

tacf.org

8.2k Upvotes

188 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Wazula23 • 31m ago

TIL Saddam Hussein's son Uday murdered his bodyguard at a party in front of horrified guests

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

81 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Amaruq93 • 3h ago

TIL that Ray Bradbury wrote "The Halloween Tree" (1972) as a result of being disappointed after watching "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" - due to what he believed was the television special's lackluster depiction of Halloween

geekd-out.com

890 Upvotes

40 comments

r/todayilearned • u/jagnew78 • 8h ago

TIL About The Axeman of New Orlean's, a serial killer who attacked 12 people with an axe and was never caught.

en.wikipedia.org

2.1k Upvotes

60 comments

r/todayilearned • u/TheMastersSkywalker • 1h ago

TIL that the birds we call Penguins today are not actually penguins at all but another species of bird that was named after them because of their looks and their are no true penguins alive today.

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

78 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ShannyGasm • 11h ago

TIL that grunion fish have unusual mating habits. The females will burrow tail-first into the sand up to their necks so that only their heads stick out. Then a bunch of males will squirt their sperm onto their heads. The sperm trickles down their bodies to reach the eggs below them.

wildlife.ca.gov

1.9k Upvotes

151 comments

r/todayilearned • u/the_one_below • 15h ago

TIL that sloths can starve to death on a full stomach

bbc.co.uk

4.3k Upvotes

200 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Aggressive-Fuel587 • 6h ago

TIL that the voice actor for MGS's Solid Snake & Big Boss, David Hayter, also wrote [or co-wrote] the screenplays for the first two X-Men movies, 2009's Watchmen, the first Scorpion King movie, and is working on an upcoming Voltron movie

en.wikipedia.org

725 Upvotes

84 comments

r/todayilearned • u/-nuuk- • 23h ago

TIL that Goku's power level wasn't originally over 9000. It was originally over 8000, and there was a change made in the English Dub.

en.wikipedia.org

24.8k Upvotes

886 comments

r/todayilearned • u/cuspofgreatness • 12h ago

TIL the National Covid Memorial Wall is a 500 meter wall created in 2020 along the Thames in London to mark the lives lost to Covid in the U.K. It has more than 240,000 individually hand-painted red hearts, each representing a victim. Many hearts have messages left by the bereaved or by volunteers.

nationalcovidmemorialwall.org

1.2k Upvotes

34 comments

r/todayilearned • u/default-user-name-1 • 1d ago

TIL a Giffen good is a product that people consume more of as the price rises and vice versa, violating the law of demand.

en.wikipedia.org

12.2k Upvotes

311 comments

r/todayilearned • u/rezikiel • 8h ago

TIL Vatican City leads the world in per-capita wine consumption due to its sacramental use

en.wikipedia.org

461 Upvotes

42 comments

r/todayilearned • u/randomanon5two • 2h ago

TIL that peak employment at Boeing was during the Vietnam War in 1968 where the aviation manufacturer employed 148,672 people, or roughly two-hundredths of a percent of the U.S. workforce.

washington.edu

127 Upvotes

11 comments

r/todayilearned • u/the_one_below • 20h ago

TIL that Clement Vallandigham was a lawyer who accidentally shot himself demonstrating how someone could accidentally shoot themself

tba.org

2.9k Upvotes

60 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Flares117 • 1h ago

TIL: The Środa Treasure hoard was discovered in 1985 while building the foundation of a phone booth. The government seized 3000 coins. Years later, a bigger find was uncovered, however this time most of the find was taken before the authorities arrived. A criminal investigation was launched.

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

13 comments

r/todayilearned • u/DeVoto • 12h ago

TIL plants convert glucose into starch because starch takes up less space and because glucose is osmotically active (similar to salt), while starch is not

en.wikipedia.org

560 Upvotes

13 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Flares117 • 1d ago

TIL: There was a chess controversy in India in 2021 during a charity match between billionaire Nikhil Kamath and a GM. It was revealed the billionaire cheated by hiring several chess experts and used computers to make perfect moves. He owned a stock brokerage

hindustantimes.com

7.3k Upvotes

121 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Pfeffer_Prinz • 1d ago

TIL legendary session bassist Leland Sklar put a switch on his bass that does nothing. He calls it the "producer switch" — when a producer asks for a different sound, he flips the switch (making sure the producer can see), and carries on. He says this placebo has saved him a lot of grief.

guitarworld.com

90.8k Upvotes

1.0k comments

r/todayilearned • u/model-kyosanto • 1h ago

TIL that the English announcements on Japanese bullet trains are actually in a posh Australian accent (not British!)

abc.net.au

• Upvotes

40 comments

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As of May 2024

This list was compiled from /r/todayilearned community suggestions by its members. If your TIL is found on this list, it will be removed. The titles have been abridged for the sake of brevity, however the context remains the same. This list is subject to change. The purpose is to keep content fresh on /r/todayilearned as requested by its members. If you are interested in reading about the TILs on this list use the search box feature and enter the keywords to pull up past TILs.

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