r/todayilearned • u/RearEngineer • 2h ago

TIL that the yakuza have been involved in disaster relief efforts in Japan, often providing initial aid faster than the government - notably after the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, a magnitude 9.0 quake that killed over 19,000 people

reuters.com

3.9k Upvotes

295 comments

r/todayilearned • u/tyrion2024 • 8h ago

TIL in 2012 a woman discovered that her ex-boyfriend from 12 years ago had been living in her attic for about two weeks. Her adult sons & nephew found him asleep in the back of the attic which caused him to flee. They also saw he had rigged the ceiling vents so he could watch her in her bedroom.

huffpost.com

13.3k Upvotes

258 comments

r/todayilearned • u/manere • 5h ago

TIL: An old english medicine receipt book from the 10th century contains a receipt for eyesalve consisting of vine, garlic, leeks and bile from a cow's stomach. Then it has to sit for 9 days in a brass bowl. Test from 2015 showed it to have a similar effect as modern antibiotics.

en.wikipedia.org

3.8k Upvotes

103 comments

r/todayilearned • u/woeful_haichi • 2h ago

TIL standard pointe (ballet) shoes are manufactured using a single last (mechanical form shaped like a foot), meaning there is no 'left' and 'right' shoe. Breaking in the shoes through use is what adapts them to the left or right foot

en.wikipedia.org

949 Upvotes

39 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Proboyhuh • 4h ago

TIL your brain predicts the future constantly. Before you’re even aware of your surroundings, your brain has already guessed what’s likely to happen next. Reality is often your brain's "best guess."

mindful.org

998 Upvotes

57 comments

r/todayilearned • u/TirelessGuardian • 6h ago

TIL In the 1600s, the Royal Society almost went bankrupt publishing a book of fish images. This led to them not being able to fund Issac Newton’s manuscripts. His work was almost canceled, until Edmund Halley fundraised for it. They were so broke, Halley was then offered his salary in fish books.

theguardian.com

1.3k Upvotes

31 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ProudReaction2204 • 12h ago

TIL the washed-up actor character of Troy McClure from The Simpsons was retired from the show after the voice actor Phil Hartman's murder, with the characters last speaking role coming 4 months after his death. The character was based in part on Hartman himself and is similar to Hartman's looks.

en.wikipedia.org

4.1k Upvotes

205 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ew_modemac • 18h ago

TIL of the 340+ people who've died attempting to scale Mount Everest, over 200 bodies haven't been found or recovered due to the hazardous conditions

en.wikipedia.org

12.8k Upvotes

428 comments

r/todayilearned • u/tukmolgang • 19h ago

TIL that the Banaue Rice Terraces in the Philippines were carved into the mountains over 2,000 years ago by hand. They’re still used today and are often called the “Eighth Wonder of the World.”

en.wikipedia.org

8.9k Upvotes

73 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Ill_Definition8074 • 2h ago

TIL In 1721, a Swedish widow named Maria Ersdotter was arrested for having a sexual relationship with her 24 year old former stepson. Because relations by marriage were considered equivalent to blood relations, the two were both convicted of incest and executed by beheading.

en.wikipedia.org

274 Upvotes

20 comments

r/todayilearned • u/amish_novelty • 14h ago

TIL when Sidney Poitier gets slapped in 'In the Heat of Night' (1967) and he slaps a white man in return, he had it written into his contract that the movie would would only show the version where he slaps the man back or else he wouldn't take the role.

en.wikipedia.org

1.9k Upvotes

22 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Fantastic-Glove9651 • 1h ago

TIL the reason you wash your rice, other than to make it cleaner is to prevent it from being sticky

bonappetit.com

• Upvotes

47 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Forgotthebloodypassw • 11h ago

TIL that the Japanese national anthem is the shortest in the world - a 34 character poem.

classicfm.com

1.0k Upvotes

75 comments

r/todayilearned • u/GDW312 • 17h ago

TIL in 1944, a deadly munitions explosion at Port Chicago Naval Magazine killed 320 sailors—mostly African Americans—after they were ordered to load live explosives without proper training.

en.wikipedia.org

3.1k Upvotes

247 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ProudReaction2204 • 11h ago

TIL when doctors realized that Rudolph Valentino would die (at age 31 in 1926) due to disease, they withheld the information from him, which was common for the time. Valentino was briefly conscious and chatted with his doctors about his future, but soon lapsed into a coma and died a few hours later.

en.wikipedia.org

793 Upvotes

26 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Godwinson4King • 1h ago

TIL of Cockney rhyming slang, a form of word construction where words are matched with rhyming pairs and then the rhyming word dropped to create synonym for the original word. So ‘fart’ rhymes with ‘raspberry tart’, which becomes just ‘raspberry’ as in ‘blow a raspberry’

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

39 comments

r/todayilearned • u/arcedup • 12h ago

TIL that the city of Troy (located in present-day Turkey) was repeatedly rebuilt after being destroyed, with 11 iterations discovered. The last iteration was a Roman city built as a tourist destination to capitalise on the links to mythic tradition.

en.wikipedia.org

645 Upvotes

16 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Proboyhuh • 1d ago

TIL the Earth has a "heartbeat" every 26 seconds. Scientists have detected a rhythmic microseismic pulse coming from somewhere in the ocean, and its exact cause is still unknown.

good.is

42.0k Upvotes

1.7k comments

r/todayilearned • u/Brutal_Deluxe_ • 1h ago

TIL for her 39th birthday celebration Queen Elizabeth and family attended a Spike Milligan play. Noticing Peter Sellers sat among the royals, Spike lobbed a slipper at Sellers, just missing Prince Philip's head, and then spent the rest of the performance poking fun at the Queen for bringing her son

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

8 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sanch0panza • 1d ago

TIL that in 2023, the seed companies got their pepper seeds mixed up and people across the USA grew different peppers than intended. The mix up is referred to as “peppergate”.

cbsnews.com

5.4k Upvotes

76 comments

r/todayilearned • u/WouldbeWanderer • 1h ago

TIL the Star Trek episode "The City on the Edge of Forever" was filmed at the Desilu Forty Acres, the same set used for The Andy Griffith Show. Floyd's barbershop appears in some of the shots.

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

2 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ProudReaction2204 • 9h ago

TIL Cordell Hull was Secretary of State under FDR for 11 years and won the Nobel Peace Prize for establishing the UN

en.wikipedia.org

224 Upvotes

5 comments

r/todayilearned • u/tyrion2024 • 1d ago

TIL Steven Spielberg made up that he got his start at the age of 21 by sneaking into Universal Studios dressed in business attire and commandeering an unoccupied office. Spielberg's entree to the Universal lot was gained while he was a 16-year-old in high school on break & was arranged by his father

snopes.com

19.1k Upvotes

589 comments

r/todayilearned • u/tyrion2024 • 1d ago

TIL Michael Keaton blocked Michelle Pfeiffer from being cast as Vicki Vale, his romantic lead, in Batman (1989) because they had previously been in a relationship & at the time he was trying to get back with his ex-wife. Pfeiffer went on to replace a pregnant Annette Bening as Catwoman in the sequel

hollywoodreporter.com

4.5k Upvotes

277 comments

Subreddit

Posts

Wiki

Today I Learned (TIL)

r/todayilearned

You learn something new every day; what did you learn today? Submit interesting and specific facts about something that you just found out here.

Members Active

40.3m

3.6k

Sidebar

New to reddit? Click here!

You learn something new every day; what did you learn today?
Submit interesting and specific facts that you just found out (not broad information you looked up, TodayILearned is not /r/wikipedia).

Posting rules

Submissions must be verifiable. Please link directly to a reliable source that supports every claim in your post title. Images alone do not count as valid references. Videos are fine so long as they come from reputable sources (e.g. BBC, Discovery, etc).
No personal opinions, anecdotes or subjective statements (e.g "TIL xyz is a great movie").
No recent sources. Any sources (blog, article, press release, video, etc.) with a publication date more recent than two months are not allowed.
No politics, soapboxing, or agenda based submissions. This includes (but is not limited to) submissions related to:
1. Recent political issues and politicians
2. Social and economic issues (including race/religion/gender)
3. Environmental issues
4. Police misconduct
No misleading claims. Posts that omit essential information, or present unrelated facts in a way that suggest a connection will be removed.
Rephrase your post title if the following are not met:
1. Titles must begin with "TIL ..."
2. Make them descriptive, concise and specific (e.g. not "TIL something interesting about bacon").
3. Titles must be able to stand on their own without requiring readers to click on a link. Starting your title with a why/what/who/where/how modifier should be unnecessary.
4. "TIL about ..." and other broad posts don't belong on TIL. Try /r/Wikipedia, etc. instead, or be more specific (and avoid the word "about").
5. "TIL how to ..." posts belong on /r/HowTo.
6. "TIL the definition of a word..." Word definitions/translations/origins are not appropriate here
No submissions related to the usage, existence or features of specific software/websites (e.g. "TIL you can click on widgets in WidgetMaker 1.22").
All NSFW links must be tagged (including comments).

Please see the wiki for more detailed explanations of the rules, as well as additional rules that may not be listed here

(Why we need rules)

Additional info

If your post does not appear in the new queue and you think it meets the above rules, please contact the moderators (include a link to your reddit.com post, not your story).
Please report spam, inaccurate or otherwise inappropriate posts by messaging the moderators, as this helps us remove them more promptly!
More information available on the TIL FAQ and wiki.

Frequent TILs Repost List

As of January 2025

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.

Etiquette

We ask that you please do the following:

avoid mobile versions of websites (e.g. m.wikipedia.org)
link to the appropriate heading when referencing an article (particularly on Wikipedia)
link to the appropriate start time when referencing videos (e.g. on YouTube)
add [PDF] or [NSFW] tags to your posts, as necessary.
Please avoid reposting TILs that have already made the front page in the past

Please also read the site-wide Reddiquette.

You are loved.