27 Facts You've Definitely Never Learned Before That'll Make You Say "And Why The F*ck Do YOU Know That?"

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28-04-2025

I know I was born in the right century because I love scrolling on my little phone and learning weird and uncommon facts from strangers on the internet who know way more about them than I do. Knowing things is so cool!
So, naturally, when I saw a redditor post in r/AskReddit with the question, "What is that one fact you know that always makes people respond, 'And why the fuck do YOU know that?'" I clicked on that shit immediately. Absolutely, I needed to know all those things, now. And because you clicked on this post here, I'm willing to bet you're just as curious as I was, right?
Well, I perused that thread — as well as this similar one — for the very best, most unusual facts, then researched them myself (so you, like me, don't get too excited learning a fact that was fascinating as hell but, unfortunately, just a myth). Here are 27 fascinating facts I learned that I'm willing to bet the vast majority of people don't know:
1. "Don't ever bury a dead body in an area without any vegetation. The high nitrogen content in our bodies helps plants to grow, so there would be a weird grassy patch at the top of the burial site, and anyone would be able to spot it."
— None
2. "Pepsi once had the sixth largest military in the world."
— french_roast_coffee
For a brief moment in time, this was true. In the '60s, the Soviet Union wanted to permanently bring Pepsi products to their country, but their currency (the Soviet ruble) wasn't accepted globally and thus couldn't be used. Initially, they struck a deal using vodka as their payment, but it wasn't enough when it came time to renew their contract in the '80s. So...they traded"17 submarines, a cruiser, a frigate, and a destroyer" in return for three billion dollars of Pepsi products. Having this fleet briefly made Pepsi the sixth largest global military, before they sold the fleet for scrap recycling. You can read more about it here.
3. "There's a Russian woman who had a ton of triplets, twins, and quadruplets with the same man, totaling up to 69 children."
— x_Grasses_x
The woman's name is believed to be Valentina Vassilyev, and she holds the world record for being the woman who has given birth to the most children. According to the BBC, it's said that "between 1725 and 1765 Mrs Vassilyev popped out 16 pairs of twins, seven sets of triplets and four sets of quadruplets, over 27 separate labours."
4. "Tarantulas taste like shrimp."
— MrBulldops1738
When cooked, tarantulas have white meat that has been described as shrimp or crab-like. In Cambodia, for instance, fried tarantulas are a pricey, special occasion treat. They're seasoned with garlic and quickly fried in oil so they're crispy on the outside and soft inside.
5. "Most bank robberies in the US take place on Fridays."
— Munchynibbler
According to ASU's Center for Problem-Oriented Policing, Fridays are likely more popular due to increased foot traffic in the banks, thanks to it being payday. Further, winter is the optimal season for bank robberies, due to the early sunset making it easier to escape in the dark and the cold weather giving thieves an excuse to hide behind scarves, hats, or big coats. In general, though, a third of all robberies in the US occur between the hours of 9 a.m. and 11 a.m.. So...plan your next bank visit carefully!
6. "A human tooth is 36 calories."
7. "If you're allergic to chocolate, you're usually allergic to cockroaches."
— msbunsen
This isn't true of all chocolate allergies (and is debated), but it is true of some! According to NBC News, cockroaches are a natural contaminant that can be found in many different foods, from chocolate to peanut butter to wheat. According to the FDA, if chocolate has less than 60 insect fragments per 100 grams, it's accepted. So, eating chocolate can trigger symptoms for those with cockroach allergies or asthma.
8. "Ancient Egyptians used to shave off their eyebrows to mourn the death of their cats."
9. "There's a place in Yellowstone Park where you can murder someone but cannot be legally prosecuted."
— SentientPotato25
This 50-square-mile region of the national park is known as the "Zone of Death" and is located in Idaho. Here's why it's part of a legal loophole. If a crime — like a murder — were to be committed there, the District Court of Wyoming would have jurisdiction over it, as it has jurisdiction over all of the park, regardless of what state it's in. However, the person who committed the crime could use their Sixth Amendment right to "a trial by a jury of [their] peers," which would mean the jury would be made up of "those residing in the Idaho portion of the Wyoming District Court." Which...is nobody. You can read more about it here.
10. "The Manchineel Tree is the deadliest plant in human history."
— Salty818
This tree, which is native to the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico, is pretty much entirely poisonous. The fruit it bears can cause "burnlike blisters in the mouth and esophagus." The trunk and its leaves have a white, milky sap, which contains phorbol. In the best of circumstances, it can irritate and burn the skin or give you blisters from touching it. In the worst of circumstances, if you ingest it or it pierces your skin, it can kill you. It's so poisonous that simply passing under one of these trees when it's raining can burn you. You can read more about the tree here.
11. "A severed human head has a strange, uneven weight distribution. So, you had better hold it tight, or you'll be known as the guy who dropped the head."
"OK, story time. I'm not in forensics or a doctor (or a killer, I swear!). I have a friend who works in a university. He prepares corpses for anatomical studies for med students. I was always interested in this stuff, so one evening, over a beer, he asked if I wanted to watch. Of course, I agreed.
He's very enthusiastic in his field, so it was like, 'If you stick your finger in this (leg) vein, you'll feel the venous valve' all the time. Super interesting! His task was to get out individual parts and organs for use by the med students later, so he removed the heart, lungs, kidneys, intestines, etc.
Then he cut into the skin of the head and removed the face and the hair part so he could saw the skull open for the brain. The head was loose by now (I can't remember if he cut it; it was 20 years ago), so he asked me to hold it. It was slippery AF, so it did not go the way we wanted, and it landed on the floor. When I picked it up, I noticed the uneven weight. As I said, it was a long time ago, but my friend still teases me about it."
— uselessInformation89
12. "A nursing sperm whale's milk comes out in the consistency of cottage cheese so the calf can 'eat it' in the water."
13. "The longest word in English. I have it memorized. It's Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis. It's some sort of lung disease if I'm not mistaken."
— A_J_H
The 45-letter word is, in fact, the name for a lung disease acquired by inhaling fine silica or quartz dust from a volcano. It's the longest word in most English dictionaries.
14. " Owls have tube-shaped eyes, rather than spherical ones. This makes it difficult to move the eyes in their sockets, but is counteracted by the ability to rotate their heads 270 degrees in either direction."
Their elongated eyes provide them with better vision in low light, but in turn, they are, for the most part, fixed straight ahead.
15. "The best way to clean up blood without leaving a smell is salt. Just put salt on it and scrub. The salt helps the blood clump into pieces, making it easier to clean, too."
"To get it off clothes, use baking soda. Mix one part baking soda with two parts cold water in a bowl and dab onto the stain using a cloth. Leave for thirty to forty minutes, then wipe off all remaining residue. To lighten dried-in blood, rub half a lemon over the stain and sprinkle some table salt on top. It can depend on the fabric, but I used that when I did RNA and got tired of purchasing new uniforms."
— max_imo
Salt works best to remove blood from clothes when it is fresh, but isn't recommended for more set-in stains.
16. Snakes have two penises, which are called hemipenes.
Suggested by: Ginger_Floydian
This is hypothesized to be because snake mating is highly competitive, occurring in a "mating ball" where numerous males — which can be anywhere from five to a hundred, according to National Geographic — compete to find the one female in the ball to mate with. So, having two penises increases their odds of doing so.
17. "If you're going to stab something, always make sure to stab and twist the knife. If you stab without twisting, it will just leave a slit that can easily be mended. If you twist, it leaves a hole that can't be so easily mended."
— Cannabilistichokie
18. "Pythagoras of the Pythagorean theorem ran a cult. Once, another group came to murder him by locking him inside a house and setting it on fire. Instead, he had his followers make a human ladder to escape the fire, but then he abandoned them, and they all died. He was murdered later that night, being chased by the group in a bean field."
— Chewbecca713
Pythagoras's followers were called the Divine Brotherhood of Pythagoras. There are many reports as to how he died, one of which follows the storyline above. The story goes that a nobleman wanted to join Pythagoras and his followers, but Pythagoras was very much opposed, as the nobleman was known for partying. So, in response, the noblemen got his people to ambush Pythagoras at the house of one of his disciples. The house was burned down, and most of Pythagoras's followers in the area died, but he reportedly escaped. In his escape, though, he was cornered towards a bean field, which he refused to cross because he believed (and taught)"that men's souls were inside the beans." So, he was killed there.
19. "Rat poison is actually an anticoagulant mixed with stuff like fiberglass. Because rats are always scraping and squeezing into stuff, they build up these minor injuries, and the anticoagulant stops their blood from clotting properly so they internally hemorrhage to death. Since a human being is a lot bigger than a rat, rat poison is much less effective on us."
— ArletApple
20. "Hershey's chocolate has the strong smell of vomit or feces to some people (me), and that's because of butyric acid. Butyric acid is the compound that makes vomit smell so bad."
— hefewiseman1
The chocolate company revealed to HuffPost that it doesn't add butyric acid as a preservative to its chocolate like many have hypothesized, so if that's the case, it's likely the acid is a result of the fresh milk they use in it, which naturally has butyric acid. This is likely where the flavor or smell some people note comes from.
If you're struggling to put your finger on what exactly that odor smells like aside from vomit, butyric acid is also in parmesan cheese.
21. "Killing someone by smothering them is not a foolproof way to commit murder, as smothering-caused asphyxiation damages a specific capillary in the eye. The pathologist will check the eye and immediately pronounce the corpse a murder victim, and there are many, many people in jail around the world who did not know this prior to their conviction."
— fearthe0cean
22. "Mushrooms are more genetically related to humans than they are to trees."
— Docter-Donut
One example of this is that mushrooms and humans both store their carbohydrate energy as glycogen, whereas plants store their carbohydrate energy as starch.
23. "If you plan on using a baseball bat as a weapon for self-defense during a home invasion, put a long sock over the end. When someone tries to grab the bat, you can rip it away with ease."
— RAK4N
25. "The terminal velocity of an ant is around 3.9 miles per hour. They generally can't be harmed by falling because they can't fall fast enough to hurt themselves."
26. "That you can disembowel yourself if you lift weights that are too heavy. It happened to my high school gym teacher. He said he's never felt anything quite like shitting out his intestines."
27. And finally, "Turmeric can be used as clothes dye. It is capable of permanently dyeing cotton cloth even after it has passed through the digestive tract of an adult male."
— SlefeMcDichael
"You shit your pants, didn't you?"
— PMmecrossstitch
"I would prefer not to answer that question."
— SlefeMcDichael