The world is more interesting than you think.
Unexpected facts, big ideas, and little discoveries. Find something that sparks your curiosity today.
A little more wonder
The cute e-card that could infect your computer
Your aunt sending you a sparkling, animated teddy bear used to be the greatest threat to cybersecurity. In the late 90s and early 2000s, malicious hackers…
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Why Monopoly takes forever under house rules
The reason you hate Monopoly is entirely your own fault. People complain that it takes six hours, but that's because nobody reads the manual. The official…
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Steve Jobs wouldn’t let his kids use an iPad
The ultimate tech hypocrisy lies in the hands of its greatest evangelist. Despite aggressively marketing the iPad as an essential educational tool for the…
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The camping fight that inspired Fight Club
Chuck Palahniuk got the idea for his iconic novel after getting brutally beaten up by strangers on a camping trip. When he returned to work with a visibly…
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Why honking can make a traffic jam worse
Because unleashing a sonic assault on the bumper ahead of you defies the actual mathematics of traffic flow. Studies show that aggressive honking triggers…
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Babylonian debtors could surrender wives or children
Talk about liquidating your domestic assets. Under the Code of Hammurabi, a man who fell severely into debt could literally hand over his wife or children to…
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Why gas stations make so little on fuel
Because the pump is really just a clever, high-stakes trap to get you inside to buy wildly overpriced beef jerky. The profit margins on raw fuel at the…
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Canada's 'longest street' claim had a catch
Urban planning often involves a staggering amount of geographical delusion. For decades, Canada proudly claimed Toronto's Yonge Street was the longest in the…
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Most car trips are shorter than three miles
Because humanity's sheer laziness has successfully engineered the act of walking right out of our daily routines. Despite owning two-ton, heavily armored…
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Why AI needs a little randomness
When an AI confidently tells you that Abraham Lincoln invented the Playstation, it's not totally a glitch; it's a feature called 'temperature.' Engineers add…
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Lord Byron brought a tame bear to live with him at Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1806 because the university's strict rules explicitly forbade students from keeping dogs.
Lord Byron brought a tame bear to live with him at Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1806 because the university's strict rules explicitly forbade students from…
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Ilha da Queimada Grande is an island off the coast of Brazil completely overrun by thousands of golden lancehead vipers, making it so dangerous that the Brazilian navy strictly forbids public access.
Ilha da Queimada Grande is an island off the coast of Brazil completely overrun by thousands of golden lancehead vipers, making it so dangerous that the…
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Saudi Arabia literally imports camels and millions of tons of sand from Australia because the local desert resources are unsuitable for construction and their native camel populations are dwindling.
Saudi Arabia literally imports camels and millions of tons of sand from Australia because the local desert resources are unsuitable for construction and their…
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Tianducheng is a luxury real estate development in China that was built as an exact, albeit scaled-down, replica of Paris, complete with a three-hundred-foot Eiffel Tower and Haussmann-style architecture.
Tianducheng is a luxury real estate development in China that was built as an exact, albeit scaled-down, replica of Paris, complete with a three-hundred-foot…
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France boasts the longest domestic flight in the world, covering over nine thousand kilometers from Paris to the island of Reunion in the Indian Ocean.
France boasts the longest domestic flight in the world, covering over nine thousand kilometers from Paris to the island of Reunion in the Indian Ocean.…
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Ralph Teetor invented modern automotive cruise control in 1948 despite being completely blind since the age of five.
Ralph Teetor invented modern automotive cruise control in 1948 despite being completely blind since the age of five. He came up with the idea because he was…
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Patients suffering from a rare neuropsychiatric condition known as Cotard's syndrome genuinely believe they are dead, missing internal organs, or entirely nonexistent; this…
Patients suffering from a rare neuropsychiatric condition known as Cotard's syndrome genuinely believe they are dead, missing internal organs, or entirely…
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Doctors stationed at Antarctic research bases are legally required to have their appendixes removed before deploying because medical evacuations during the brutal winter months…
Doctors stationed at Antarctic research bases are legally required to have their appendixes removed before deploying because medical evacuations during the…
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Video Killed the Radio Star by The Buggles was the very first music video broadcast on MTV when the network launched on August 1, 1981, but the network immediately followed it up…
Video Killed the Radio Star by The Buggles was the very first music video broadcast on MTV when the network launched on August 1, 1981, but the network…
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CBS executives originally designed the hit reality show Survivor to be a serious sociological experiment about group dynamics before realizing that watching desperate people…
CBS executives originally designed the hit reality show Survivor to be a serious sociological experiment about group dynamics before realizing that watching…
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Vatican City features an automated teller machine that offers Latin as a language option for conducting your banking transactions.
Vatican City features an automated teller machine that offers Latin as a language option for conducting your banking transactions. Supplied by the Vatican…
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Final Fantasy was originally given its dramatic title in 1987 simply because its creator, Hironobu Sakaguchi, was planning to quit the video game industry and go back to university if the game flopped.
Final Fantasy was originally given its dramatic title in 1987 simply because its creator, Hironobu Sakaguchi, was planning to quit the video game industry and…
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Levi Hutchins invented the very first mechanical alarm clock in 1787, but he engineered it with a rather severe limitation: it could only ring at exactly four in the morning.
Levi Hutchins invented the very first mechanical alarm clock in 1787, but he engineered it with a rather severe limitation: it could only ring at exactly four…
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Internal Revenue Service guidelines explicitly require US taxpayers to declare income generated from bribes, theft, and illegal drug sales on their annual tax returns.
Internal Revenue Service guidelines explicitly require US taxpayers to declare income generated from bribes, theft, and illegal drug sales on their annual tax…
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