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!AndBored Pandais all about learning randominteresting 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 ofinteresting factsfromthe TIL community!This post may includeaffiliate links.
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!
AndBored Pandais all about learning randominteresting 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 ofinteresting factsfromthe TIL community!
This post may includeaffiliate 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.
RELATED:
TIL When the Wii U failed miserably, the Nintendo CEO halved his own salary for half a year, instead of laying off his employees.
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.
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 dopuzzles, learn new languages, and even read books our brains create new neural pathways.Neuroplasticitymeansthat our brains can restructure and rewire themselves to adapt to changes. Physical exercise, traveling, learning new languages, reading books, playingvideo games, music or painting are all activities that can rewire our brains.
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 dopuzzles, learn new languages, and even read books our brains create new neural pathways.
Neuroplasticitymeansthat our brains can restructure and rewire themselves to adapt to changes. Physical exercise, traveling, learning new languages, reading books, playingvideo 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.
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.”
Like the fact that the law basically qualifiesConverse shoesas 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.
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 governmentthwarteda terrorist attack to blow up a U.S.-bound plane with liquid explosives.
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”.
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 creatorsannounceda 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.
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. Expertsspeculatethat 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.
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 lawdidn’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: 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.
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.
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 Agreementstatesthat 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.
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.
Legendary British physicistStephen Hawkingused a voice computer to communicate with the world, but his voice computer spoke with an American accent. The speech synthesizer Hawkingusedwas 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 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 thempasses 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 birdsto learnabout 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.
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.
Continue reading with Bored Panda PremiumUnlimited contentAd-free browsingDark modeSubscribe nowAlready a subscriber?Sign In
Continue reading with Bored Panda Premium
Unlimited contentAd-free browsingDark mode
Unlimited content
Ad-free browsing
Dark mode
Subscribe nowAlready a subscriber?Sign In
TIL at the 1952 Olympics Emil Zátopek won three gold medals - in the 5,000 metres and 10,000 metres runs, and at the last minute he decided to compete in the first marathon of his life - which he also won, making him the only runner ever to have won all these events in the same Olympics.
TIL that actor Raymond Burr (Perry Mason, Rear Window) refused to ever appear on The Tonight Show because Johnny Carson often told fat jokes about him, and Burr would feel compelled to confront Carson about “the bad jokes he does about everybody who can’t fight back because they aren’t there.”
TIL That King Baldwin IV was one of the most effective leaders and warriors on the battlefield during the crusades, putting a check on Saladin’s forces multiple times. This is despite being afflicted with leprosy and dying at age 24.
TIL Dogs have been banned from Antarctica since 1994 due to fears that they could spread diseases to the native seal population.
TIL when Guinness World Records stopped monitoring the record for the longest time to stay awake in 1997, the record holder at the time was Robert McDonald who went 453 hours 40 minutes (18 days 21 hours 40 minutes) without sleeping in 1986.
TIL that Bryan Cranston, who starred in Malcolm in the Middle, used to invite Erik Per Sullivan, who played Dewey, to spend weekends with the Cranston family.
TIL in 2005, Joaquin Phoenix flipped his car. He heard someone tell him to “just relax”. Phoenix replied, “I’m fine. I am relaxed.” The man replied, “No, you’re not.” The man then stopped Phoenix from lighting a cigarette while gasoline was leaking into the car cabin. The man was Werner Herzog.
TIL Converse sneakers have a thin layer of felt on the bottom so that they can legally be classified as slippers and be subjected to lower import costs.
TIL Alberta King, the mother of Martin Luther King Jr., was murdered six years after his assassination (1974). She was shot and killed while playing the organ in Ebenezer Baptist Church, where her husband and son both preached.
TIL Sir Paul Nurse, English geneticist and Nobel Prize winner, had his application for a US green card rejected due to the short-form UK birth certificate which he submitted not naming his parents. When he applied for a full birth certificate he discovered that his sister was actually his mother.
TIL Taco Bell has tried to enter the Mexican market two times - in 1992 and 2007. Failed both times. It was too expensive, people didn’t understand what they were ordering because the names of the food didn’t make sense to Mexicans and Taco Bell used frozen meat imported from the US.
TIL that in 2020, Pakistan International Airlines was banned from flying in Europe and the United States after an investigation found that at least a fourth of all pilots' licences issued in Pakistan were not genuine.
TIL about Lonnie Johnson, an American inventor who is most famously known for inventing the Super Soaker, which he initially developed while working with the U.S. Air Force. He later sued Hasbro for underpaid royalties, and was awarded nearly $73 million dollars.
TIL Traditionally, Scotch whisky is distilled twice and Irish whiskey three times. For this reason, the Irish claim their whiskey is a smoother and purer whiskey.
TIL obese drivers are 80 percent more likely to die in a car accident than drivers who are not overweight.
TIL that in 1995, Johnny Depp saved Courtney Love’s life after she overdosed outside The Viper Room in Los Angeles. Depp performed CPR until paramedics arrived, helping revive Love before she was rushed to the hospital.
TIL In 1999 a heat wave almost forced two nuclear power stations next to Lake Erie to shut down because the temperature of the water in the lake almost reached the 85 degree limit.
TIL that the the current Mexican ambassador to the United States, Esteban Moctezuma, is a direct descendant of Moctezuma II, the last emperor of the Aztecs.
TIL about the Texas two-step bankruptcy, which is when a parent company spins off liabilities into a new company. The new company then declares bankruptcy to avoid litigation. An example of this is when Johnson & Johnson transferred liability for selling talc powder with asbestos to a new company.
TIL that, early in the AIDS epidemic, an executive of the company that made a popular weight loss drug named ‘AYDS’ was quoted as saying “The product has been around for 45 years. Let the disease change its name.”
TIL how horrific the 1918 global flu pandemic was, lasting just 15 months but killing 50 to 100 million people worldwide. Many would die within hours. Horrible symptoms, not just aches & cyanosis but also a foamy blood coughed up from the lungs, & bleeding from the nose, ears & even eyes.
TIL that Egypt’s Suez Canal is nicknamed among seafarers as the ‘Marlboro Canal’ due to the corruption of some of its employees that ask for Marlboro cigarettes cartons as a bribe to make things go easier.
TIL that “Declinism,” the view that the world is going to hell in a hand basket and things were better in the good old days, goes back thousands of years.
TIL In the 80s, there was a panic over reports that 1.5 million children per year being abducted in the US, but it turned out to be just bad record keeping.
TIL when researchers removed eyebrows from pictures of familiar faces, it reduced the chances of recognition substantially, and significantly more than removing the eyes themselves.
See Also on Bored Panda
TIL about the case of Zhao Zuohai, a Chinese man convicted for murder after a dead body was found 18 months after a neighbour he had a fight with disappeared. However, Zhao was released 10 years later after his “victim” reappeared alive.
TIL that in the first Polish-language encyclopedia, the definition of Horse was: “Everyone can see what a Horse is”.
TIL 80% of the theatrical productions on Broadway lose money; a failure rate that has remained “unchanged for years.”
TIL: That Mark Chapman, killer of John Lennon, has been allowed regular conjugal visits since he accepted solitary confinement in 2014. He is allowed to spend 44 hours alone with his wife in a specially built prison home. He also gets occasional visits from his sister, clergy, and a few friends.
TIL of the 2013 Cannes heist, in which a solo thief managed to break into a poorly guarded room and snatched a suitcase containing 72 pieces of jewellry worth $136 million from a billionaire about to do a private exhibition of his jewel collection.
TIL that Switzerland doesnt have a head of state instead a council of 7 people.
TIL Harry Truman seriously considered running for a third consecutive presidential term in 1952. He was exempt from the 22nd amendment limiting every president to two terms because of a grandfather clause. However, a dismal loss in the New Hampshire primary convinced him not to.
TIL: Most “helium” balloons are filled with ”balloon gas”, which is recycled from the helium gas which is used in the medical industry and mixed with air.
TIL a violent Welsh Nationlist movement attempted to bomb Prince Charles in 1969, only for their bomb to accidentally detonate a day early, killing two of the bombers.
TIL: In 2016, a man stole $5 million from his workplace as an accounting department manager over the course of 7 years and spent $1 million of it on a single mobile video game, Game of War. Outside of that, he spent it on cars, furniture, and sports tickets.
TIL of the Red Ghost, a legend about a demonic figure roaming Arizona in the late 1800’s and once killed a woman. It turned out to be a feral camel with the decaying corpse of a man strapped on its back, likely a result of Jefferson Davis' attempt to create a camel division in the US army.
TIL that penis enlargement methods go back thousands of years. Ancient Greeks and Indians wrote about various dubious methods. The Topinamá tribe in Brazil in the 1500s let poisonous snakes bite their penises. Penis pumps are not a modern invention, either.
TIL of Thomas(ine) Hall; an intersex person for whom a Jamestown Court in 1629 could not determine their sex, and thus ruled they were both and ordered them to dress in men’s and women’s clothing at all times.
TIL Thanksgiving’s date wasn’t fixed until 1941. Before that, U.S. presidents chose the date, with George Washington declaring the first national Thanksgiving in 1789. Thomas Jefferson refused to observe it, calling it too religious.
TIL a town in Colorado had an unelected mayor serve for over 50 years. He was appointed mayor pro tem because the then-mayor didn’t want to sign liquor licenses, and inherited the post when the mayor died. The town considered doing an election in 1974, but it was too expensive.
TIL in 1828 two men from Edinburgh made a business out of killing people and selling their bodies to Robert Knox, an anatomist seeking bodies for dissection. They killed about 16 people and sold them for £7-£10 each. The suppliers were convicted, but despite public pressure, Knox wasn’t charged.
TIL FBI agent John O’Neill, who left his federal position because his attempts to warn of an imminent al-Qaeda attack on U.S. soil in early 2001 were ignored, got hired as the WTC chief of security three weeks before 9/11 and was killed in the attack.
TIL Jon Favreau, creator of The Book of Boba Fett, confirmed to Patton Oswalt that the scene of Fett’s hand reaching out of the sand to escape from the Sarlacc pit was cut to match Oswalt’s description of it in his improvised filibuster pitch for Star Wars: Episode VII on an episode of Parks & Rec.
TIL the most expensive fossil ever sold at auction is a mostly complete skeleton of a Stegosaurus known as Apex which sold for $44.6 million to billionaire Kenneth C. Griffin. It’s the largest and most complete known Stegosaurus skeleton, with 254 bones preserved out of approximately 319.
TIL There’s a parasite that affects salmon that is related to jellyfish and is the only multicellular animal that doesn’t need oxygen. It’s been hypothesized that they initially were jellyfish cancer that escaped their host and evolved separately.
TIL that actor Robert Reed hated playing Mike Brady on The Brady Bunch as he saw it as beneath his Shakespearean training. He often clashed with producers over the script. Despite this he got along very well with the rest of the cast and appeared in the show’s spinoffs and sequels.
TIL - About fluoroantimonic acid, it’s the world’s strongest acid and trillions of times more acidic than sulfuric acid.
TIL that Activision has a patent for manipulating multiplayer lobbies to increase exposure to people with paid skins and get players to spend more money on microtransactions this way.
TIL that Charlie Cox failed an audition for the Han Solo film because he got used to not making eye contact while playing Daredevil.
TIL CT scanners are being used to peek inside trading card packs without opening them to assess their value.
TIL of the most enigmatic structure in cell biology: the Vault. Often missing from science text books due to the mysterious nature of their existence, it has been 40 years since the discovery of these giant, half-empty structures, produced within nearly every cell, of every animals, on the planet.
TIL that powered flight has independently evolved four times in history: in bats, birds, pterosaurs, and insects.
TIL that until 1970, Royal Navy sailors were given daily rum rations - a tradition dating back to the 17th century to make life at sea bearable. On the final day before it was abolished, many unhappy sailors held mock funeral processions, drank their final rations and threw the rest overboard.
TIL that before modern safety regulations, the rule of thumb was that one person would die per $1M spent on a construction project.
TIL the salary for Privates before the US entered WWII was only $0.70 per day ($15 in 2024).
TIL Paul McCartney’s voice was supposed to appear on Pink Floyd’s “The Dark Side Of The Moon” but Roger Waters cut them after he realized McCartney “thought it was necessary to perform” and wasn’t giving him his genuine thoughts.
TIL there is a belief amongst some Catholics known as ‘Benevacantism’; the belief that Pope Benedict XVI’s resignation was not valid, meaning that the current Pope Francis has been an ‘antipope’, or illegitimate pretender to the papacy, this entire time.
TIL that there’s a lake in Antarctica so salty it never freezes, even at -58°F.
TIL tiramisu, the Italian dessert of coffe-soaked ladyfingers, sweetened marscapone, and cocoa powder is only around fifty years old, having been invented somtime in the late 1960s or early 1970s.
TIL Scientists showed with study that 94% of their AI-generated exam answers remained unrecognized. The AI performed half a grade better than the students.
TIL of Universe 25, an experiment which involved creating a controlled environment Utopia for mice, that ended with abnormal behaviours ultimately leading to the colony’s extinction.
TIL in 2006, the football team now known as the Washington Commanders repurposed old bags of peanuts originally supplied to a defunct airline and sold them to attendees of their games. These bags of peanuts were at least 9 months old (they had a recommended shelf life of 3 months).
TIL that Matthew McConaughey has a brother named Rooster, who named his son Miller Lite and his daughter Margarita.
TIL about Dyers Burgers, who have been using the same grease to cook for over 100 years.
TIL that it used to be illegal to own gold as a private citizen. It was enacted in 1933 under the belief that the hoarding of gold was worsening the Great Depression. It was repealed in 1974.
TIL that many American Football Stadiums have Sniper Nests built into them for SWAT team members during games and events.
TIL the highest revenue Panda Express location in the world is located in a mall food court in Honolulu, Hawaii.
TIL that the first age restricted town in the US is named Youngtown.
Modal closeAdd Your Answer!Not your original work?Add sourcePublish
Modal close
Add Your Answer!Not your original work?Add sourcePublish
Not your original work?Add sourcePublish
Not your original work?Add source
Modal closeModal closeOoops! Your image is too large, maximum file size is 8 MB.UploadUploadError occurred when generating embed. Please check link and try again.TwitterRender conversationUse html versionGenerate not embedded versionAdd watermarkInstagramShow Image OnlyHide CaptionCropAdd watermarkFacebookShow Image OnlyAdd watermarkChangeSourceTitleUpdateAdd Image
Modal closeOoops! Your image is too large, maximum file size is 8 MB.UploadUploadError occurred when generating embed. Please check link and try again.TwitterRender conversationUse html versionGenerate not embedded versionAdd watermarkInstagramShow Image OnlyHide CaptionCropAdd watermarkFacebookShow Image OnlyAdd watermarkChangeSourceTitleUpdateAdd Image
Ooops! Your image is too large, maximum file size is 8 MB.
Upload
UploadError occurred when generating embed. Please check link and try again.TwitterRender conversationUse html versionGenerate not embedded versionAdd watermarkInstagramShow Image OnlyHide CaptionCropAdd watermarkFacebookShow Image OnlyAdd watermark
Error occurred when generating embed. Please check link and try again.
TwitterRender conversationUse html versionGenerate not embedded versionAdd watermark
InstagramShow Image OnlyHide CaptionCropAdd watermark
FacebookShow Image OnlyAdd watermark
ChangeSourceTitle
You May Like30 Facts That Made Someone Stop And Say, ‘I Can’t Believe I Didn’t Know That’ (New Facts)Evelina Šiukšterytė50 Weird Facts No One Really Asked For, But They’re Pretty Neat To Know (New Facts)Indrė Lukošiūtė30 Surprising Facts That Prove Our World Is Full Of Fascinating Secrets (New Pics)Greta Jaruševičiūtė
Evelina Šiukšterytė
Indrė Lukošiūtė
Greta Jaruševičiūtė
Facts
