Facts that sound false but are true — Page 24
Our highest surprise rating: the facts people most often refuse to believe until they read the explanation. Every one of them is documented.
627 facts
Some fungi can create zombie ants by taking over their nervous system.
The Cordyceps fungus infects the insect, multiplies inside it, and releases chemicals that control the ant's muscles…
Water can boil and freeze at the same time under specific conditions.
At the so-called triple point, the exact temperature and pressure allow the three phases of matter (liquid, solid…
Neutron stars can spin at a rate of over 700 rotations per second.
When a massive star explodes and its core collapses, the conservation of angular momentum causes the resulting…
There is a massive water vapor cloud around a quasar that holds 140 trillion times the water in Earth's oceans.
Astronomers observed the quasar APM 08279+5255, over 10 billion light-years away, and discovered this massive cloud…
GPS relies on Einstein's theory of relativity to stay accurate.
Since satellites move very fast and are in an area of weaker gravity, time passes differently for them compared to…
The total weight of all the gold ever mined in human history would fit into roughly three Olympic-sized swimming pools.
It is estimated that all mined gold would form a cube about twenty-two meters on each side, which corresponds to the…
The mantis shrimp can see circularly polarized light.
The vision of the mantis shrimp is the most complex in the animal kingdom, possessing twelve types of color receptors…
A teaspoon of soil contains more microorganisms than there are people on Earth.
Soil is one of the most complex ecosystems on the planet. A single teaspoon of healthy soil can contain billions of…
The jellyfish Turritopsis dohrnii can reverse its life cycle and become biologically immortal.
When facing physical stress or aging, this jellyfish can transform its adult cells back into the polyp stage, its…
Ketchup was sold in the 1830s as a medicine for diarrhea.
In 1834, a physician named John Cook Bennett declared that tomatoes could cure diarrhea, indigestion, and jaundice…
Fungi are evolutionarily closer to animals than to plants.
Genetic analyses show that fungi and animals share a more recent common ancestor than either does with plants. Both…
Giant sequoias depend on fire to reproduce.
The cones of giant sequoias need the intense heat of forest fires to open and release seeds. Fire also clears the…
Koalas have fingerprints so similar to human ones that they are hard to tell apart under a magnifying glass.
Although koalas are marsupials and humans are primates, both evolved to grip tree trunks and branches. That…
The original carrots were purple or white, not orange.
The carrot cultivated thousands of years ago in Central Asia was originally purple or white. The orange variety we…
The Aztecs used cocoa beans as currency, and there were counterfeiters who made beans out of clay.
In the Aztec Empire, cocoa was so valuable that it served as money. A rabbit cost about ten beans, and a slave could…
The deepest point in the ocean is deeper than Mount Everest is tall.
The Challenger Deep, in the Mariana Trench, reaches about 11,000 metres deep. Mount Everest is 8,849 metres high. If…
Cleopatra lived closer in time to the invention of the iPhone than to the construction of the Great Pyramid of Giza.
The Great Pyramid was built around 2560 BC. Cleopatra lived between 69 and 30 BC, about 2,500 years later. The first…
The wood frog can survive frozen for weeks.
During winter, up to 65 percent of the wood frogs body freezes. Its heart stops beating, breathing ceases and blood…
Dung beetles use the Milky Way to navigate at night.
When rolling a ball of dung, dung beetles need to travel in a straight line so they do not return to the starting…
Canada has more lakes than the rest of the world combined.
Canada holds about 62 percent of the worlds lakes, estimated at more than 3 million. Most are in the Canadian Shield…
The largest living organism in the world is an underground fungus in Oregon.
Known as Armillaria ostoyae, this fungus covers about 9.6 square kilometres in the Malheur National Forest, Oregon…
Helium cannot be solidified at normal pressure.
Helium is the only element that remains liquid down to absolute zero at normal atmospheric pressure. To solidify it…
The first webcam in the world was created to monitor a coffee pot at the University of Cambridge.
In 1991, scientists at the Cambridge Computer Laboratory connected a camera to the local network so they would not…
Wombat poop is cube-shaped, which prevents it from rolling away.
Wombats are the only known animals to produce cube-shaped feces. This unique shape is the result of varying…
