Every time I think I have a good understanding of the world, I find out a new fact that flips my whole perception of knowledge on its back.
For instance, do you have any idea why the coldest places on Earth still have to use refrigerators? How about how many hearts an octopus has? Yeah, me either…but you’re about to find out.
Be sure to memorize a few of these answers to impress your friends and family at your next gathering!
1. Betty White is literally older than sliced bread. She was born in 1922, six years before the first loaf of prepackaged sliced bread was sold.
2. As a society, we take more pictures in two minutes today than were taken in the entire 19th century.
3. Strawberries are not technically berries — but bananas are. Other odd members of the berry family include kiwis, pomegranates, and tomatoes.
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4. The University of Oxford in England is older than the Aztec Empire.
5. Anne Frank was born in 1929, the same year as Martin Luther King Jr. If they were still alive today, they’d be 87 years old.
6. Eskimos keep their food in refrigerators to keep it from freezing.
7. For every human on earth, there are roughly 1.6 million ants. However, the total weight of the ants is equal to the weight of the humans.
8. The nursery rhyme “Humpty Dumpty” never says that he’s an egg. Go ahead, sing it!
9. On Jupiter and Saturn, it rains diamonds.
10. Cleopatra was born closer to Steve Jobs’ invention of the iPhone than the construction of the Great Pyramid.
11. There are more fake flamingos in the world than real ones.
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12. More beachgoers are killed by falling coconuts than shark attacks each year.
13. Shakespeare invented the name Jessica for his play, “The Merchant of Venice.”
14. Speaking of Shakespeare, did you know that he lived during the same time as Pocahontas?
15. Octopuses have three hearts.
16. Sean Connery turned down the role of Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings trilogy because he “didn’t understand the part.”
17. Lobster was considered poor people’s food until it came into fashion, so to speak, after World War II.
18. When “Star Wars: A New Hope” hit theaters in 1977, France was still executing people with a guillotine. The practice continued until 1981, when the country abolished the death penalty.
19. Scotland’s national animal is the unicorn.
20. The chances of you drinking a drop of water that passed through a dinosaur’s body is nearly 100 percent.
21. Last but not least, the 1990s are further away than 2030. Where did the time go?!
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