Recent comments in /f/todayilearned

snow_michael t1_jdswnf3 wrote

Reply to comment by boomstickbutcher in TIL the US federal government captures and sells excess wild horses to the public by MoistCoyote

If that's how it came across, dismissive of the peoples themselves, as opposed to calling something depending upon an animal introduced only 400 years ago not culturally traditional, then I am in the wrong for using those quotes, and I accept that I have offended those who saw it as dismissive of them. And I apologise for that

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DiscretePoop t1_jdswl12 wrote

Reply to comment by nrkbarnetv in TIL Early Superman comics taught kids how to achieve super-strength through exercises in lifting armchairs, getting a super-grip, and achieving super-vision by glancing at distant and near objects repeatedly by Ok_Copy5217

Myopia probably has more to do with not enough sunlight. children are spending more time indoors. normally, sunlight is supposed to trigger a dopamine response in the retina which triggers normal eye development. With insufficient sunlight stimulation, the eye develops poorly and becomes elongated. You can't fix that by doing eye exercises.

https://www.nature.com/articles/519276a

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Roman_____Holiday t1_jdsweuh wrote

Reply to comment by PyrrhoTheSkeptic in TIL Australian band, Men At Work were sued over their song "Down Under" for similarities to an Australian nursery rhyme "Kookaburra". by El-Hairy

The difference between inspired by and ripping off is thinner than anyone likes to admit. Almost all music written is derivative, truly original music is honored and admired specifically because it defies that standard. It is horrible that artists that create original work are set upon by over-zealous content owners and their lawyers but it is worth mentioning that digital music and the widely available technology for sampling has made "legit" infringement super easy and so likely super common.

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wolfie379 t1_jdsvwcl wrote

Reply to TIL Jimmy Carter signed the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, the single largest expansion of protected lands in history which more than doubled the size of the National Parks System by Guardax

When Yellowstone was set aside as a National Park, there were people complaining about it being too big. Now, scientists are saying it’s too small - because areas critical to the continued functioning of the geysers are outside the park boundaries.

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WilliamMorris420 t1_jdsv468 wrote

Reply to TIL that seagulls not only eat other birds and animals, but are cannibals and often eat seagull chicks, even their own. by TrolleyMcTrollerson1

>5. Seagulls will explode if they eat Alka-Seltzer

>There’s a long-held belief that if you feed a seagull an indigestion tablet, they will violently explode in a ball of feathers. The alleged science behind this theory is that seagulls are unable to pass wind, and the indigestion remedy therefore causes a volatile build-up of gases in the seagull’s stomach.

>However, there’s a major flaw in this pseudo-science. A bird’s diet may not require them to pass wind, but this doesn’t mean they aren’t equipped to do so. Also, gulls are experts at regurgitating their food, and could easily evict an Alka-Seltzer from the stomach if they found themselves in discomfort.

>Consider this myth well and truly busted.

But has anybody actually fed them one, especially when it starts fizzying up inside of their stomachs?

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PyrrhoTheSkeptic t1_jdstrs5 wrote

Reply to TIL Australian band, Men At Work were sued over their song "Down Under" for similarities to an Australian nursery rhyme "Kookaburra". by El-Hairy

I think if I were writing music, I would willfully "steal" from composers who are in the public domain from being old, like Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, etc., so that no one could claim a copyright violation, since no one can copyright those works. I would, of course, give them credit in the song, say it was composed by Bach and me, or Mozart, Beethoven, and me, or whatever.

And I would keep track of what bits I took from which pieces of music, so I could prove it in court that it originated in something that cannot be under copyright, in case someone else is claiming a copyright on a similar piece of music.

It must be very annoying to write a song and find out there is something that is similar that someone else wrote, so that one can get sued over it.

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FriendlyAndHelpfulP t1_jdstrdr wrote

Reply to comment by [deleted] in TIL Jimmy Carter signed the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, the single largest expansion of protected lands in history which more than doubled the size of the National Parks System by Guardax

It was actually under the Nixon administration that the relevant law was passed and ratified.

Nixon was the one who signed The Clean Air Act, the law that gave the EPA the right to regulate and limit the amount of lead in gasoline.

It was also under the Nixon administration that the plans for the lead phase-out were set into place. It was a gradual process, and the phase-out wouldn’t actually finish until 1996, fifteen years after Carter was out of office.

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