Chewing gum boosts mental proficiency and is considered a better test aid than caffeine – but nobody knows why.
100 Mind-Blowing Better Facts
Females are better at distinguishing colours, while males excel at tracking fast-moving objects and discerning details from a distance.
People who eat breakfast feel better both mentally and physically throughout the day.
A study at Florida State University discovered that playing Portal 2 is better for your brain than brain-training games like Lumosity.
July 3rd is International Plastic Bag Free Day – it’s a day about making a little change to make a big impact (for the better) in the future.
World Kindness Day falls on November 13th and is a day to make the world a better place by showing just a little kindness to everybody.
The largest piece of fossilised dinosaur poo discovered is over 30cm long and over two litres in volume. Believed to be a Tyrannosaurus rex turd, the fossilised dung (also named a ‘coprolite’) is helping scientists better understand what the dinosaur ate.
Football teams wearing red kits play better. The colour of your clothes can affect how you’re perceived by others and change how you feel. A review of football matches in the last 55 years, for example, showed that teams wearing a red kit consistently played better in home matches than teams in any other colour.
LEGO bricks withstand compression better than concrete. An ordinary plastic LEGO brick can support the weight of 375,000 other bricks before it fails. This, theoretically, would let you build a tower nearing 3.5km in height. Scaling this up to house-size bricks, however, would cost far too much.
Dogs tilt their heads when you speak to them to better pinpoint familiar words. Your dog is tilting its head when you speak to it to pinpoint where noises are coming from more quickly. This is done to listen out more accurately for familiar words such as ‘walkies’ and helps them to better understand the tone of your voice. If a dog doesn’t tilt its head that often (as those with shorter muzzles might), it’s because it relies less on sound and more on sight.
Firefighters use wetting agents to make water wetter. The chemicals reduce the surface tension of plain water so it’s easier to spread and better soaks into objects, which is why it’s known as “water.”
Video games help surgeons perform better. According to a 2007 study, surgeons who play certain video games at least 3 hours a week performed 27% faster with 37% fewer errors during surgery.
Napoléon Bonaparte’s penis was stolen. Posthumously, if that makes it any better. The genitalia were removed from his body by his doctor during the autopsy. Allegedly, it was given to a priest in Corsica. However, his junk was not properly preserved, so now it has been compared to dried leather and beef jerky. It was first displayed in a museum in 1927. Currently, the daughter of a urologist (who bought it for US$3,000 to keep under his bed) keeps it. Bids for the shrivelled genitalia have reached US$100,000.
Michael Fassbender had makeup artists put alcohol on his moustache for a role. For 12 Years A Slave, Michael Fassbender had his makeup artist apply his moustache with alcohol. His reason? He wanted to better portray an alcoholic and wanted other actors to react naturally to the smell.
Incan people used knots to keep track of records. These knots were also tied to pendants and cords. The knots are better known as quipu and their meanings would depend on their position on the cord. Over 600 examples of quipu have been discovered already.
Some pandas fake a pregnancy to get better healthcare. An example would be a Chinese panda named Ai Hin who was believed to show signs of pregnancy. Zookeepers ensured that she was given better care for the upcoming baby that never arrived.
Technicoloured squirrels roam the lands of Southern India. They weigh around 4 pounds and measure up to 3 feet from tip to tail. The Malabar giant squirrel also blends better in the forest due to its multi-coloured fur.
Left-handed people are better at particular sports. Mainly those that involve spatial judgment and fast reactions. This was stated by a research study comparing the performance of left-handed and right-handed athletes.
A potato’s skin is much healthier than its core. To absorb all of the potato’s minerals and vitamins, the skin should also be consumed. It is better to leave the skin on potatoes while cooking because all its vitamins are in the skin.
Dogs can learn commands better with hand signals. This is also another way you can build communication and further develop trust with your pets. Professional trainers say that when a dog understands their tasks, they feel safer because they know what to do.
A newborn Chinese water deer fits in the palm of the average human hand. Also known as the hydropotes inermis, this species of deer is found worldwide. They are better known for their teddy bear-like appearance.
A total of 32 muscles can be found in one ear of a cat. These muscles allow cats to hear in multiple directions. They can also move each ear independently to detect sounds better.
Plastic bags are better for the environment rather than paper bags. Despite the common belief that recycled paper is better than plastic, it is not always the case. According to research, a paper bag produces 70% more pollution compared to plastic. It also uses 4 times the energy to produce and break down.
DUI offenders in Ohio are required to use yellow license plates. These special yellow plates were issued in 2004 to let officials know if a vehicle has had multiple DUI violations already. It also serves as a cone of shame for the owners of the vehicles to push them to be better drivers.
Mixing sperm and caffeine in a test tube makes them swim better. This resulted in a premature burn out which makes the sperm inactive enough to properly fertilize an egg.
Color-blind people have better night vision. Since colour-blind people perceive colours differently, they can see “camouflage” colours that can’t be detected by regular eyes.
The loudest burp in the world is louder than a chainsaw. Have you ever woken up annoyed at the construction ongoing near your flat, or your neighbour blasting music? If yes, then you’d better stay away from Paul Hunn – or at least be out of earshot. Hunn made the world record for the world’s loudest burp which clocked in at 109.9 decibels. If you have no idea how loud that is, an average chainsaw is 106 decibels loud, while a jackhammer is 130 decibels. That’s probably the loudest of these WTF facts.
Coca-Cola was originally green. This is a total myth as Coca-Cola has always been the same colour right from the start since its invention in 1886. You should try reading the Coca-Cola story of John S. Pemberton from Atlanta in 1886 for better clarification.
A dog’s hearing is 10 times better than a human’s.
Dogs can smell 100,000 times better than humans.
We are more creative in the shower. Here’s one of the most useful weird fun facts! If you’ve ever felt like you think better in a warm shower, you’re probably right! The warm water increases the flow of dopamine and makes us more creative.
LEGO bricks withstand compression better than concrete. Before you ask why the world isn’t just made of LEGO bricks, think about how much just one set costs!
You’ll more likely remember your dreams better after a bad sleep than a good one. If you sleep poorly and wake up throughout the night, you’re more likely to remember your dreams when you wake up.
Soccer teams that wear red tend to play better. The colour of your clothes affects how others see you and how you feel. Studies have shown that soccer teams played better in red in home matches.
Sloths see better at night than in the day and they have very poor hearing. They rely on their sense of smell to locate food and other sloths.
Three-toed sloths are better swimmers than their two-toed relatives.
Trees are breathers. Trees are one of the most effective tools we have to combat climate change. Forests are home to around 80% of biodiversity on land and tropical forests alone produce over 40% of the oxygen we breathe. Covering around 30% of Earth’s land surface, we depend on forests for our survival. Forests absorb around 8 Gigatonnes a year of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and play a crucial role in the carbon cycle and climate system. However, climate change, forest degradation and deforestation are causing much of this stored carbon to be released back into the atmosphere. Recent research found that recovering tropical forests was only successfully combating a quarter of the current carbon emissions which indicates the importance of preserving and restoring our tropical forests. To better understand the role of trees in regulating our planet’s carbon cycle, ESA’s upcoming mission called Biomass will use advanced radar technology to measure the amount of carbon stored in Earth’s forests and other biomass, providing a more accurate assessment of carbon storage and uptake than ever before. By monitoring changes in biomass over time, scientists will be able to assess the effectiveness of forest conservation efforts and better understand the impact of deforestation on our climate.
If you are having trouble finding motivation or lacking creativity, then consider taking a shower. In scientific studies, directors asked participants to solve hard problems. The participants did better after a relaxing activity, like showering.
A jaguar can see in the dark six times better than a human.
Pet owners usually have better self-esteem, are more in shape, and are less lonely than those who do not own pets.
A silverback gorilla could deadlift 1,800 lbs. That’s 815 kg for you metric maniacs. To give you a better idea, the deadlift world record is just over 1,100 pounds (500kg). This should come as no real surprise, as gorillas are the largest primates in existence.
According to research, starting school at 10 am is better for your health. This is particularly true for teenagers, whose growing bodies require more sleep than they’re able to get with conventionally early start times. Not only does starting a few hours later reduce illness by up to fifty per cent but it’s been found to boost students’ grades significantly!
Shrek originally had a thick Canadian accent. The titular character of the instant classic was voiced by Mike Myers, who spoke in an amped-up version of his Canadian accent. When Myers watched the first rough cut, he loved everything about it, except his voice! He thought that Shrek would be better off with a Scottish accent to counter the English-accented villain, Lord Farquaad – a change that ended up costing about $4 million!
A chimpanzee was once ranked as the 22nd most successful money manager in the US. In 2009 Raven the chimpanzee was listed in the Guinness World Records book as the most successful chimpanzee on Wall Street. Raven chose her stocks by throwing darts at a board with 133 different Internet companies listed on it and achieved a 233% gain in 1999. She was so good that she performed better than 6,000 professional Wall Street brokers!
As many as 80% of Hong Kong’s toilets are flushed with seawater. In the 1950s, Hong Kong found the perfect solution to an overall lack of freshwater and installed a separate water distribution and waste-water management system. This system has since been installed in many coastal communities such as the Marshall Islands. Not only does it save precious drinking water, but it’s also even been found to be better for marine ecosystems!
The inventor of the USB originally designed it to be plugged in either way up. One of the most frustrating things to do with technology has got to be the fact that, try as hard as you will; whenever you go to plug a USB in, it’s the wrong way up. The original design would have been much better but ended up being canned as it would have cost twice the price to make it flippable. The inventor of the USB has since agreed that they made the mistake of not going ahead with the original idea.
The more money people spend on their weddings, the more likely they are to get divorced. Maybe it’s time to ditch those plans of a fairytale wedding. It’s not just how much you spend on your wedding, but the engagement and wedding ring too, with bigger spenders finding themselves more likely to be looking for love again sooner than more frugal fiancés. Instead of splashing out on your wedding, it’s better to go all out on the trip of a lifetime!
LEGO bricks withstand compression better than concrete.
The name Google was supposed to be called Googol, but when searching if the domain was taken, the creators accidentally searched “Google.com” instead of “googol.com” and liked it better.
Amazon Alexa stores your conversations with the device. By now, millions of households feature an Amazon Echo device or other Amazon smart devices based on Alexa. These smart assistants provide convenience and functionality in countless ways. Not everyone realizes these devices store conversations with the device in the cloud, though. After each interaction, Amazon stores these conversations in the cloud indefinitely. An Echo device doesn’t record every conversation in the Ether. Each Echo relies on a wake word, like “Alexa”, to start recording conversations. Only the commands spoken to the device are stored by Amazon and are used purely to make the AI better. Users can and should delete these conversations in their device settings from time to time. Doing so provides added security and protection from data hackers.
The First Television Station. General Electric broadcast the first television station from a building in Schenectady, NY. Viewers watched W2XB, better known as WGY Television, in amazement. During each broadcast, various forms of content were played over the airwaves. The televisions and television stations of 1928 looked and worked quite differently than they do nowadays.
“123456” is the most used password in the world!! NordPass released the list of the most common passwords of 2020. Over 2.5 million users decided to use the password “123456”. Unsurprisingly, that’s a weak password that nobody should ever use. It was cracked over 23.5 million times in 2020. Hackers can crack the password in less than a second due to its sequential and common nature. For better or worse, NordPass lists “12345” as the most common password from 2019. That password fell to number eight on the company’s list for 2020. The most secure passwords include letters, numbers, and symbols. Also, a longer password is always more difficult to crack than a shorter one.
The majority of people plug in their USB wrong. 86% of people try to plug in their USB devices upside down. That makes me feel a lot better about getting it wrong every time!
Finding a security bug in Facebook’s code will pay off. To be exact, Facebook pays $500 for reporting any vulnerability in its security. Even better, $500 is just the minimum that it starts at, so you could potentially earn more!
According to a Finances Online article, 72% of U.S. consumers credit AR with better collaboration at work, 69% report increased efficiency at work and 61% credit AR with better marketing.
Lego toys are a better investment than stocks, bonds, or gold.
Since 2014 the Welsh government has donated a fruit tree to families in Uganda for every child born or adopted in Wales. In 2008 the “Plant!” scheme was announced, which would celebrate the birth or adoption of a child in Wales by planting a tree. Creating new woodlands for future generations, was already a magnificent scheme, but it became even better with the changes in April 2014. In Uganda, fruit trees are planted because they can provide vital fruit and timber in a region which has been decimated by deforestation.
Early Linux development took place on the MINIX operating system, leading Linus to adopt a file system layout similar to Minix for his fledgling project. It didn’t last; proving inefficient, Linus later replaced it with the ‘Extended file system’, better known as ext, versions of which are still in use today.
Research shows that millionaires enjoy better and more adventurous sex with more partners. Studies also show that women enjoy sex more if their partner has more money.
Most Consumers Think That AI Will Improve Their Lives: According to a survey by Strategy Analytics, 41 per cent of the respondents in India, China, Western Europe, and the United States feel that emerging AI technologies will create a better life for them.
Only one of the top 10 Internet companies in 2022 is from Europe – and that’s Booking.com. Still, this is better than the previous years when none of the top 10 came from this continent. The 10 biggest are (in order of size): Amazon, Alphabet Inc., Meta (formerly Facebook), Tencent Holdings, Alibaba, Netflix, Salesforce.com, JD.com, Booking.com, and Baidu.
To better address various AI problems – including fairness – researchers are suggesting a probabilistic programming language system.
AI has shown to be better at detecting breast cancer than individual doctors, and just as good as double-reading – a diagnosis confirmed by two doctors.