People Are Revealing The Most Unbelievable Facts They've Ever Heard, And My Brain Seriously Can't Handle It
by Abby Zinman · BuzzFeedWe all know what it's like to hear a fact that just warps our perception of reality — that indescribable "aha moment." It's really quite a wild feeling.
So recently, Reddit user u/One-Reaction215 asked: "What's the most jaw dropping or mind blowing fact you've ever learned that still blows your mind every time you think about it?" Well, people delivered! Here are some of the highest-voted answers:
1. "There was more time between the Stegosaurus and T-Rex than there was between the T-Rex and humans."
2. "Mathematically speaking, it's more likely that we're living inside a computer simulation than otherwise."
"The (TLDR) logic goes that any society that develops technologically will eventually develop the means to create simulated universes, filled with fully sentient AI that don't know they're simulated — they go about their lives, fall in love, pay taxes, go to war, and eventually develop their own simulated universes filled with sentient AI that don't know they're simulated.
If we accept that as fact (or even a possibility) then we have to consider the fact that there's a potentially infinite chain of simulated universes, and potentially even branches of them (ie there's no reason at least one universe couldn't create two or more simulations themselves) - and only one real universe, so chances are we're not in that real one."
3. "Machu Pichu and the Sistine Chapel were built around the same time."
4. "By pure coincidence, the sun is about 400 times the size of our moon and about 400 times further away than Earth. It's why the sun and the moon appear to be the same size and why we are able to have total solar eclipses."
"And that the moon was previously closer and is moving further from the earth, so that coincidence didn’t always exist, and at some point will no longer exist, but our species happens to be alive on this earth at the same period in time as that coincidence, and has evolved at this same period of time a level of intellect capable of appreciating that coincidence."
5. "Shuffle a normal pack of 52 cards. Congratulations, that order of cards is likely to have never occurred before in history."
"Even if you shuffle cards every second for the rest of time before the heat death of the universe, that same order of cards is unlikely to every occur again."
6. "Looking out into space is looking back in time."
7. "The Pando Tree. One tree, 106 acres. Been self-replicating for at least 9000 years."
"After looking this up this one blows my mind the most. I had NO idea this existed."
8. And speaking of, "The 'tree' is just another case of convergent evolution. It's simply the most efficient form for their specific biological niche."
"How I explain it is: 'A tree is not something that a plant is, but it's something a plant does.'"
9. "A man who was in the theatre when Lincoln was shot appeared on a television game show."
10. "Sound doesn't propagate through space, of course... but if it did, the sun would be so loud here on Earth that it would have impacted evolution."
"The frequency would be very low but very loud (too low for humans to hear). Animals probably would not have evolved the ability to hear infra-sounds. We would sort of feel it (headaches, general malaise, discomfort), but not be able to hear it."
11. "John von Neumann. By 6 years old, he could converse in Ancient Greek and divide two 8-digit numbers in his head. For those unfamiliar with him, he was a Hungarian-born mathematician who emigrated to the US. His contributions to theoretical and applied mathematics are so extensive it is unlikely we'll ever have another like him."
"His eidetic memory was without parallel. At parties in different towns, he'd be given minutes to study a phone book and could recite page number, name, phone #, address — i.e. he merely had to 'see' the pages, he did not have to 'read' any of them — it was as if his mind photographed entire phone books.
He once was spontaneously asked if he could say how 'A Tale of Two Cities' began — he recited from memory and continued for over 10 minutes before being stopped. His recitation was flawless throughout.
Read up on John von Neumann, the smartest man of the 20th century. Yes, he was much smarter than Einstein. Don't just believe me, look him up. He was nothing short of amazing."
12. "That nobody actually knows what's after death."
13. "There were only 66 years between mankind successfully flying a plane and mankind landing on the moon."
14. "The brain is the only organ that named itself."
"I love this one! Also, the brain is the most important organ of the body (according to the brain)."
15. "You work 8 hours to afford a house, a vehicle and groceries, that come to a realistic 10 with the commute, sleep ideally another 8 and you're left with another 6 where you're supposed to do things that will make the other 18 hours worth it. Until you die."
"People always post this 'fact' like it's a modern-day phenomenon. If you didn't have all the modern conveniences that make everyday life so much easier (like people didn't in the past), you'd spend most of your day tending to your crops, washing all your clothes by hand or dealing with the myriad of other chores you'd need to do just to survive.
You're actually way better off now in your current work cycle than you ever would have been in the past."
16. "There were sharks swimming on Earth before there were rings on Saturn."
Also, "Sharks pre-date trees. Sharks have existed since before the evolution of trees."
17. "The universe began at the Big Bang, but nevertheless has neither a center nor an edge."
18. "Oxford University is older than the Aztec Empire."
19. "The difference between having a million dollars and a billion dollars. And although that thought just looks obvious and stupid on paper, I seriously believe that most people can’t readily comprehend those numbers."
"I think this is a fundamental reason that the 99.9% of us simply accept that roughly 800 billionaires own as much wealth as 50% of Americans combined."
"The difference between a million dollars and a billion dollars is about a billion dollars. To put it another way, a billionaire losing a million dollars is like a millionaire losing a thousand dollars."
"One of the things that gives this perspective is that one million seconds is about 11 days. One billion seconds is approximately 32 years."
20. "The egg used to create you was actually first grown inside your grandmother. When you get your head around this, it's actually wild."
21. "Matter has either always existed, or sprang forth from nothing. Both options break my brain."
"Or the option that matter doesn't exist at all. E=mc^2, after all, implies that mass is slow energy."
22. "Cleopatra lived closer in time to the moon landing than the construction of the pyramids."
"Egypt is so old that ancient Egyptian archaeologists were studying ancient Egypt."
23. "There are more potential games of chess than there are atoms in the observable universe."
24. "Electricity doesn't flow through the wires in power cords. The power travels as the magnetic field propagates outside of the wire."
"Veritasium has some videos on it. Still makes my brain hurt trying to understand it."
25. "In Greek mythology, Prometheus would have his liver partially eaten by an eagle, then it would grow back and the eagle would eat it again. The only organ in the human body that has the ability to regenerate if a part of it is lost, is indeed the liver. Lucky guess, or ancient knowledge?"
26. "Your eyes show you a still image for the time you move them to another spot. Otherwise you would see a blurry image that might confuse you."
"You can test it by quickly looking at the hands of a clock and on the wall next to them. When you look back and forth, a second seems longer because you see a still image for some time."
27. And finally: "The odds to be born are 1 in 400 trillion. Just being alive and being able to experience things is lucky."
Do you know any mind-blowing facts? Tell us in the comments below! Seriously, let's keep this discussion going — I'm genuinely SO interested.
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.