I crave mental lint. What are some interesting facts that the hivemind (you) have stored away?

About 360 million years ago, trees had evolved lignin and cellulose, allowing them to get big. However, no bacteria that could digest these woody substances had yet evolved. In fact, those bacteria would take another 60 million years to arrive. All this time huge trees kept growing, crashing into the swampy ground, and piling up on top of uncounted other trees, getting buried deeper and deeper into the ground. Over millions of years, subjected to the heat and pressure of deep burial, the carbon in these trees was converted into the fossil fuels we know and love today – coal, oil, and natural gas. All the fossil fuels we use were produced during this 60-million year period.
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That is my favorite way I have ever heard anyone express that wish.

Some lint for you (accuracy may vary):

Bee family trees, if you follow a queen down through drones and workers and other queens, follow the fibonacci sequence. The fibonacci sequence is also reflected in the structure of spiral seashells. Source: Some book I read about the fibonacci sequence many years ago.

Flamingoes are motherfucking TANKS. Seriously. Their ability to survive in absurdly harsh environments that would kill other animals is wild.

Only female reindeer lose their antlers in wintertime (disclaimer: this may depend on species of reindeer?)

Some guy (Russian I think?), when a computer informed him that nuclear missiles had been fired at his country and he was told to return fire, correctly believed the computer to be bugged and refused to fire the missiles. So uh. Thanks, guy. He went and lived out his life normally and never got appropriate thanks for saving a shitload of people, I think. Source: memory of wikipedia article, may be wrong on some details so really I should be double checking those before repeating them but here you go I'm too tired for that.

Some other guy survived BOTH the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs, and lived to old age afterwards. Somehow both the literal worst luck, and the best.

There is a parasite that latches on to ants' feet that does not harm the ant - in fact, it fully replaces the function of the ant's foot, including forming a claw to help the ant grab stuff like it would with its actual foot. There is also a similar parasite that replaces a fish's tongue (yeah I hate it too).

Octpuses only live for like 3 years max, and the females die after laying their eggs. Meanwhile, they are really, really, really smart, like dolphins and parrots and crows. Imagine being that aware and smart, but only living 3 years. It disturbs me.

Uranium glass, which is exactly what it says on the tin - glass made with a teensy bit of uranium in it - glows in the dark in (typically) bright, cartoon acid green.

Whales can and do communicate across vast distances because their calls carry much more easily in water than sound carries in air.

Hammerhead sharks' heads detect electrical fields, and they use these fields to locate their prey. Run.

The whole alpha/beta/omega wolf pack thing is complete bullshit, retracted even by the person who first popularized it, and he has spent years upon years trying to scrub out that idea he unleashed into pop culture but has been unable to.

Elephants' feet are very sensitive, able to feel minute vibrations from miles away, and they can communicate with them. Also they do NOT make the thumping sound that is foley'd into nature documentaries - they walk silently. Also, the bottom of their feet looks like swiss cheese and you should not google that if you have tryptophobia.

Edit 2: most bees are solitary bees, and many look nothing like a honey or bumble bee. Many "save the bees" efforts end up counterproductive because they just boost domestic honeybees where the honeybees are an invasive species, and where some native plants are exclusively pollinated by a specific species of native solitary bee.

Many Woodpecker species have long tongues, which they use to eat the bugs and such inside trees. When they aren't using them to eat, the tongue rests around their skulls to help cushion their brains from the impact of pecking trees! :)

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Adult wild cats do not meow except in the presence of humans. Even domesticated cats rarely do meow if no human is nearby. It seems cats figure out that we can't hear the frequencies they normally communicate with and purposefully make themselves heard.

I went down this rabbit hole a couple months ago: birds are classified as dinosaurs. Not “descended from dinosaurs”, actual dinosaurs. Sauce

A man named Dick Pick invented GIRLS.

Human rib bones can completely grow back if the tissue sheathing them (principally the perichondrium and periosteum) is left intact enough.

The FAA banned smoking on all domestic flights in 1990, but that did not stop some entrepreneurs. Twice in 1993 and in 2006, wealthy smoking enthusiasts tried to establish airlines to circumvent the rules using legal loopholes. Both of them, "Smokers Airways" & "SmintAir" (Smokers International Airlines) failed to raise enough capital to purchase an airplane and investors abandoned both projects.

Look at one thing, then quickly at another (only moving your eyes). You quite literally were blind for a moment there due to saccadic masking: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saccadic_masking

Crinoids.

They're marine animals that are related to starfish, sea urchins and sea cucumbers. They look like floating plants, but they can actually walk and swim through the ocean to find food (plankton).

got one from back when I was learning C - wanted to be a game developer but it never panned out, anyway, the compiler I was using was a Borland product and in the comments of one of the .h or .c files, I forget which, there was a comment that was... actually I went and looked it up just now so I could get it verbatim. always thought it was interesting:

" 7 Hz is the resonant frequency of a chicken's skull cavity. This was determined empirically in Australia, where a new factory generating 7-Hz tones was located too close to a chicken ranch: When the factory started up, all the chickens died. Your PC may not be able to emit a 7-Hz tone "

There is a certain type of CRT display that will vibrate and distort in your vision if you make a fart noise using your tongue and hold it for a few seconds.

I did this repeatedly in elementary school on old Macs.

Both the US and the UK issued silver "dollar" coins dated 1804.

The US ones weren't issued until 1834, and then sporadically in the 1850s. Originally they were made for presentation coin sets given to foreign dignitaries. Silver dollars hadn't been issued since 1804, but the ones issued back then were made with old dies and likely dated 1803. The later issues are likely the result of questionable dealings inside the mint of the time. Any real example is likely valued several hundred thousand USD or more. (https://www.coinworld.com/voices/gerald-tebben/u_s_mint_confiscate.html)

The UK ones were an emergency issue, considered a "token" issued by the Bank of England. They were made by taking widely available Spanish colonial 8-real coins and stamping a new design on to pass as 5 shillings (0.25 pound). These can be had for a couple hundred USD depending on condition. (http://www.coins-of-the-uk.co.uk/fives.html)

This is cited from https://www.worldcat.org/title/63136362. Norse people living around the north sea had really different clothing color habits.

• People from Scandinavia proper preferred blue and green
• People from Britain preferred red
• People from Ireland, Iceland, and other islands preferred purple

While most nuclear countries have their nuclear war doctrine stating that nuclear weapons are only to be used if under complete and existential threat, the French have a concept of a "nuclear warning shot".

You better believe it

Daddy longlegs are not "the deadliest spiders in the world." No it's not just because their fangs can't pierce human skin (they can), their actual venom is no deadlier to humans than a mild bee sting.

Mythbusters tested the myth on an episode. (Don't watch if you're even slightly arachnophobic)

My favorite patent law case is about two orange juice soda vending companies who both had fake juice displays fighting about whether the one fake juice display violated the patent of the other fake juice display company. The case name is quite literally the base case name in history: Juicy Whip vs Orange Bang. https://www.quimbee.com/cases/juicy-whip-inc-v-orange-bang-inc

It’s impossible to lick your own elbow.

spoiler

You just tried didn’t you?

The first man-made structure to surpass the height of the Pyramids of Giza was the Eiffel Tower, which was finished in 1889. For well over 3000 years they were the tallest structure that anybody had ever seen.

If you look at a clock face, and subtract the lower number from the higher number that's directly across from it on the dial (eg, take 6 o clock from 12 o clock or 4 o clock from 10 o clock) you always end up with 6.