Small Talk - Micro Learning

A study found cats in the U.S. were more social than those in Japan, spending more time with owners and strangers; Americans also viewed cats more favourably as pets.

Learn more on your iPhone

Get the small talk app to receive words, facts, quotes and more each day

Previous facts of the day

Oyster mushrooms are carnivorous - they release a nerve toxin to paralyse worms, then grow into their bodies and digest them from the inside out.

‘Shrapnel’ is named after British officer Henry Shrapnel, who invented an exploding shell in the early 1800s.

According to studies, the average native English speaker knows about 42,000 words by age 20, with top speakers reaching around 50,000, and daily use under 1,000.

Gravity behaves differently around the world — a baseball hit the same way in Miami flies about a foot farther than in Seattle, thanks to weaker centrifugal pull near the equator.

Studies suggest around 30% of people are natural 'night owls', biologically tuned to perform best later in the day and slow to start in the morning.

Alfred Nobel’s 1895 bequest of $2.5 million has grown nearly 200× to over $540m, funding $12m a year in Nobel Prizes and costs entirely from investment returns.

Content

General

Copyright