Wacky Facts

The Venus flytrap counts.

Its trap closes only when trigger hairs are touched twice within about 20 seconds, which avoids wasting energy on raindrops.

Excel stores every date as a number.

In the default Windows date system, 1 January 1900 is day 1 and each day adds 1, so dates are just formatted numbers. That is why you can subtract two dates to get the days between them, and why a date turns into something like 45,000 when formatting is lost.

Oxford University is older than the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan.

Short answer: Teaching existed at Oxford by 1096, while the conventional date for the founding of Mexico-Tenochtitlan is 1325. On those dates, Oxford’s teaching tradition is more than two centuries older.

How old is Oxford University?

The University of Oxford says it has no single, clear foundation date. Its historical record nevertheless shows teaching at Oxford in some form in 1096. The institution grew rapidly after 1167, when King Henry II stopped English students from attending the University of Paris. Colleges and formal university structures developed over time rather than appearing in one founding event.

When was Tenochtitlan founded?

Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History identifies the year 2 House—1325 CE—as the founding year of Mexico-Tenochtitlan. The settlement developed on islands in Lake Texcoco and became the capital of the Mexica state. By the early sixteenth century it was a large, complex city linked by causeways and supplied through sophisticated urban and agricultural systems.

What the comparison really shows

The fact is surprising because people often place a European medieval university and the Aztec capital in completely separate mental timelines. Comparing dates reveals that history does not progress in neat, isolated blocks. Oxford lecturers had been teaching for generations before Tenochtitlan’s traditional founding, while Tenochtitlan later grew into one of the world’s major cities during Oxford’s own medieval development.

Avoid the common exaggeration

This comparison does not mean Oxford was a modern university in 1096, nor that central Mexico lacked advanced cities before 1325. Mesoamerica had much older urban traditions, including Teotihuacan and earlier centres. It also does not eliminate uncertainty around Tenochtitlan’s precise founding day: historical and archaeological sources agree broadly on 1325, but later accounts blend political memory, calendrical records and origin narratives.

Evidence and limits

The safest wording is that evidence of teaching at Oxford predates the accepted founding year of Tenochtitlan. It avoids inventing an exact birthday for Oxford and respects the historical uncertainty recorded by both institutions.

Put the dates side by side

  • 1096: the earliest documented teaching at Oxford.
  • 1167: Oxford expands after English students are barred from studying in Paris.
  • 1325: the widely accepted founding year of Mexico-Tenochtitlan.
  • 1428: Tenochtitlan becomes the dominant partner in the Triple Alliance.
  • 1521: the city falls after the Spanish-led siege.

The comparison works because it uses documented milestones, not because either society appeared suddenly on one date. Both histories are long processes with earlier roots and later transformations.

Sources

Cashew nuts grow outside the fruit.

The cashew nut hangs below a fleshy “cashew apple”. The shell contains an irritating oil, which is why cashews are always sold shelled and processed.

The first spam email was sent in 1978.

Gary Thuerk, a marketer at Digital Equipment Corporation, sent an advertisement for new computers to a few hundred users on ARPANET, the forerunner of the internet. It caused complaints — and reportedly some sales.

Cleopatra was Greek by descent.

She belonged to the Ptolemaic dynasty descended from a general of Alexander the Great — and was the first of them to learn Egyptian.

1977The Voyager probes carry golden records.

Short answer: Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 each carry a Golden Record: a 12-inch gold-plated copper phonograph disc containing images, natural sounds, music and greetings intended to represent Earth to any finder in the distant future.

Why put a record on a spacecraft?

NASA launched the twin Voyager probes in 1977 to explore the outer planets. Their trajectories would eventually carry them beyond the planets and into interstellar space. The records were designed as symbolic time capsules—messages from humanity attached to machines likely to survive far longer than their radio transmitters.

What is actually on the Golden Record?

The disc contains 115 encoded images, greetings in 55 languages, a printed message from the United States president, and an audio essay made from Earth’s sounds. Listeners would hear surf, thunder, wind, birds, whales, human footsteps, laughter and a heartbeat. The musical selections span cultures and eras rather than presenting one country as the whole world.

Who selected the contents?

NASA asked a committee led by astronomer and science communicator Carl Sagan of Cornell University to assemble the message. The team included Frank Drake, Ann Druyan, Timothy Ferris, Jon Lomberg and Linda Salzman Sagan. They had only a short period to choose material, obtain permissions and design a format that might remain interpretable without human instructions.

How would an unknown finder play it?

An aluminium cover protects each record. Etched diagrams show how to use the accompanying stylus, how the video signal is encoded and how to reconstruct the first image. A hydrogen-atom transition provides a fundamental time unit. A pulsar map attempts to locate the Sun by showing the directions and periods of distinctive pulsars.

Is it literally solid gold?

No. It is a copper disc plated with gold. The protective cover is aluminium and includes a small ultra-pure sample of uranium-238. Its radioactive decay could, in principle, help an advanced finder estimate how much time had passed since manufacture.

Will aliens ever find it?

Probably not. Space is extraordinarily empty, the probes are small and neither is aimed at a known inhabited world. The value of the records is therefore also human: they required people in 1977 to ask how one finite object could communicate Earth’s diversity, science and creativity.

Golden Record essentials

  • Copies: one on each Voyager probe.
  • Medium: 12-inch gold-plated copper disc.
  • Images: 115 encoded pictures.
  • Voices: greetings in 55 languages.
  • Purpose: time capsule and message from Earth.

Evidence and limits

The record cannot be a neutral or complete portrait of humanity. Its small committee, short schedule, 1970s technology and cultural choices inevitably shaped what was included and omitted. Calling it a “message to aliens” is accurate as an intention, but it was never an experiment expected to produce a reply. Its enduring power lies in the attempt.

Sources

Liechtenstein and Uzbekistan are doubly landlocked.

Short answer: Liechtenstein and Uzbekistan are the world’s only doubly landlocked countries. Reaching an open ocean from either country requires crossing at least two national borders.

What does doubly landlocked mean?

A landlocked country has no sovereign coastline on an open sea. A doubly landlocked country is surrounded entirely by other landlocked countries. Crossing one neighbour is therefore not enough: that neighbour also lacks ocean access, so at least one additional country must be crossed.

Why Liechtenstein qualifies

Liechtenstein lies in the Alps between Switzerland and Austria. Both neighbours are landlocked. Cargo heading to a major seaport must continue through another state—for example from Switzerland into Italy, France, Germany or the Netherlands, or from Austria through another coastal country.

Why Uzbekistan qualifies

Uzbekistan borders Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan. Every one of those neighbours is landlocked under the open-ocean definition. Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan touch the Caspian Sea, but the Caspian is an enclosed inland body of water without a natural connection to the world ocean.

Why does the geography matter?

International freight may encounter several customs systems, rail gauges, road permits and transit agreements before reaching a seaport. Extra borders can add cost, time and uncertainty. The condition does not mean isolation—both countries trade extensively—but dependable cooperation with transit states becomes especially important.

Routes remain possible

Liechtenstein sits within a dense European transport network and shares a customs and monetary relationship with Switzerland. Uzbekistan has rail and road corridors pointing toward ports in the Baltic, Black Sea, Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean regions. Regional infrastructure projects can reduce journey time without changing the country’s landlocked status.

A quick comparison

  • Liechtenstein: two neighbours, both landlocked.
  • Uzbekistan: five neighbours, all landlocked.
  • Minimum national borders to ocean access: two.
  • Main logistical issue: dependence on transit infrastructure and agreements.

What about rivers and inland seas?

The definition is about a sovereign coast on the open ocean. Navigable rivers can support trade, and the Caspian is economically important, but neither changes the political classification. A shipment can travel by water for part of its journey while still needing to cross foreign territory before reaching an ocean port.

Evidence and limits

This is a description of current political geography, so the list could change if borders or sovereign arrangements changed. The United Nations Office of the High Representative for Landlocked Developing Countries explicitly identifies Uzbekistan as one of only two doubly landlocked countries; the other is Liechtenstein.

Sources

Sharks are older than trees.

Sharks appeared more than 400 million years ago, before the first true trees evolved around 385 million years ago.