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Countless new world records, scientific discoveries, and of course, Barbie. Here's everything we learned in 2023. Happy New Year! Don't miss a video! Subscribe NOW: https://www.youtube.com/@MentalFloss?sub_confirmation=1 About Mental Floss: Mental Floss is where curious people come for trivia-tastic information. Mental Floss produces lists of fun facts, debunks common misconceptions, and tells untold stories from history, science, culture and more. Website: http://www.mentalfloss.com Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/mental_floss Facebook: https://facebook.com/mentalflossmagazine Discord: https://discord.io/mentalfloss Copyright Notice: This video and YouTube channel contain dialog, music, and images that are property of Mental Floss. You are authorized to share the video link and channel, and embed this video in your website or others as long as a link back to this YouTube Channel is provided. 2025 Mental Floss 100 Interesting Facts We Learned in 2023 | Mental Floss https://www.youtube.com/@MentalFloss
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Picture an onion. Now double the size of it. And double it again. And maybe double it a few more
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times. Now you're picturing something closer to the world's biggest onion, which was grown and
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shown this year at the Harrogate Autumn Flower Show. This massive onion weighed just under 20
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pounds, and I mean, just look at the size of this monster. Imagine making a bloom an onion out of
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that. Hi, I'm Erin McCarthy, Editor-in-Chief of Mental Floss, and this is The List Show
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Every year, we collect our favorite stories, fun facts, and innovations from the previous
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12 months. This year, we have one giant onion, some amazing space discoveries, a few hardworking
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robots, and enough animal news to get you through the winter. Let's get started
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For just a few months in 2023, Jupiter held the title of having the most moons in our solar system
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with 95, following the verification of several new Jovian moons in February. But by May
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Saturn had knocked the bigger gas giant off its throne. The International Astronomical Union
1:01
the same folks who took Pluto down a peg back in 2006, recognized more than 60 new moons orbiting
1:06
Saturn, bringing its total to 146. In addition to having the greatest number of moons, Saturn's
1:12
lunar satellites are some of the most tantalizing to researchers hoping to discover more about Earth's
1:16
neighbors. For example, Enceladus. Enceladus is covered in ice, and in 2023 we saw new evidence
1:23
of its liquid interior. The James Webb Space Telescope recorded a geyser of water vapor
1:28
breaking through the frozen surface and erupting 6,000 miles into space. Its height was nearly
1:33
20 times greater than the moon's diameter. When Oumuamua suddenly appeared in the inner
1:38
solar system in 2017 and then left it just as rapidly, astronomers weren't sure what
1:44
to make of the cigar-shaped object. It moved a lot faster than a typical asteroid, and it
1:49
didn't leave a trail that would suggest it was a comet. Certain Harvard astrophysicists
1:53
even proposed it could be an alien probe. In March of 2023, however, two Oumuamua experts from
1:58
Cornell and UC Berkeley said they believe it's a comet after all, just one without a trail of gas
2:03
and dust. They theorized that the little interstellar visitor that could is powered by
2:07
bursts of hydrogen from its icy core, which are released from the ice by the sun's radiation
2:13
All right, let's come back to Earth. A lake in Canada beat out Australian coral reefs
2:17
a Polish peat bog, and the Antarctic sheet ice as the defining site of the Anthropocene
2:22
according to scientists tasked with pinpointing its start. Crawford Lake near Toronto is small
2:27
but deep, and the sediment that collects at its bottom stays put. Those layers of mud reveal
2:32
evidence of the dawn of a new geologic era characterized by human impact. Specifically
2:37
the sediments trapped fallout from nuclear tests in the 1950s, which the researchers say is the
2:42
dividing line between the earlier Holocene and the proposed epoch. In June, we learned that the
2:47
2022 volcanic eruption in Tonga was not only the strongest one on record, but it also produced the
2:53
most intense lightning ever observed. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, the Hunga Tonga
2:57
Hunga Ha'apai eruption set off a supercharged thunderstorm that sparked almost 200,000 lightning
3:03
flashes within its plume of smoke and ash. At the peak of the storm, there were more than 2,600
3:08
volts per minute, and some reached as high as 19 miles into Earth's atmosphere. If that wasn't
3:13
incredible enough, scientists have also suggested that it affected the ozone layer. According to
3:18
New Scientist, Australian researchers determined that the hole in the ozone layer was bigger in
3:22
August than it should have been, which they blamed on large amounts of water vapor turning
3:26
into clouds and providing a surface for CFCs to react with ozone on. This year, we discovered a
3:32
new extinct species of penguin. Yes, you heard that correctly. Known as Wilson's little penguin
3:37
Eudipchula wilsonae was described in a paper published in June. The animal's modern-day
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relatives, Korora, are an adorable species that live in New Zealand and other countries
3:46
According to Bob Yirka of phys.org, the newly discovered species is the oldest known extinct
3:52
little penguin. In the world of animals that are alive, Hank the Tank was finally caught
3:58
Starting in February 2022, Lake Tahoe, California has been terrorized by what authorities said was
4:03
a male black bear responsible for 28 break-ins. They named the bear Hank the Tank. This year
4:08
though, they discovered that the break-ins had actually been perpetrated by three black bears
4:12
with the largest number, 21, being attributed to a female officially known as 64F. Hank
4:18
who pulled off her capers with cubs in tow, was linked to her crimes via DNA. There are plans to relocate her to a sanctuary in Colorado. Parthenogenesis is the ability to
4:27
reproduce in the absence of sperm. It's been observed in a handful of species, including
4:32
some birds and reptiles. But in 2023, the first ever crocodile virgin birth was recorded. It
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actually happened back in 2018, when a croc in a Costa Rican zoo delivered 14 eggs despite not
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having been around other crocs for 16 years. They took seven promising eggs and artificially
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incubated them. And while none of them hatched, one egg did contain a non-viable fetus, making
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this the first observable proof that the species is capable of an extraordinary evolutionary
4:57
ability. And since this ability can be found in crocodiles and birds, it might suggest that
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critters like non-avian dinosaurs might have been able to do this as well. No frog DNA needed
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I'll spare you my Jeff Goldblum impression. Speaking of crocs, if your infant falls into a crocodile-infested river, you better hope
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it doesn't cry. An August 2023 study found that crocodiles are attracted to the cries of human, bonobo
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and chimpanzee babies. It's thought the focalizations of the helpless infant in distress probably sound like an
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easy meal. Humans and horses have a long history. According to one March 2023 study, people may have been riding horses 5,000 years ago
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Horse-drawn chariots, meanwhile, didn't enter the archaeological record until about a thousand
5:38
years later. Researchers yzed human skeletal remains from various sites around southeastern
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Europe for telltale signs in legs, pelvis, and backbones, all areas known to show the physical
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toll of horseback riding. Some of the biggest aquatic attack stories in 2023 involved not
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sharks, but orcas. This year, we learned that pods of the black and white dolphins got too
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close for comfort with several boats off the coasts of Spain, Portugal, and France. They mainly
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Many swam around the vessels and booped the rudders. But according to records covering the past few years, there have been 250 cases of orcas
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causing damage to a boat, 60 cases of serious damage, and 4 sinkings
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For now, only the orcas living around the Iberian Peninsula have demonstrated this behavior
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but scientists still aren't sure why the animals are so keen on messing up people's
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booze cruises. Orcas aren't the only marine mammals who got aggressive in 2023
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Sea lions in California have also been acting out. But in this case, scientists think they know the reason
6:32
In 2023, a harmful algae bloom produced a ton of the potent norotoxin domoic acid in
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the waters. Fish ate smaller creatures that consumed the algae. Then the sea lions ate the fish
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Domoic acid poisoning can make a lot of animals behave unpredictably. A similar algae bloom off California in 1961 is thought to have caused flocks of seabirds
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to act erratically, which is thought to have influenced Alfred Hitchcock's film The Birds
6:56
Let's talk about the strangest animals for a bit. This seems impossible to me, frankly, but this year we learned about someone who seems
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to love the movie Titanic more than I do. A Florida-based editor named J.D. has set a goal of collecting 1 million copies of Titanic
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on VHS, which, I must remind you, consisted of two tapes because the movie clocks in at
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3 hours and 15 minutes. J.D., who apparently started collecting around a decade ago, has 2,477 copies of the VHS
7:23
as of this taping I only have one Daring pink to see Barbie in theaters was for rookies The real diehard Barbie heads are getting buried in Barbie coffins The Alpha and Omega funeral home in Agua Japan
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El Salvador started selling pink Barbie-themed coffins to capitalize on the Barbie craze
7:41
And as of early August 2023, 10 people had purchased them to be their future final resting
7:45
place. I guess she really is everything. How many Swifties does it take to generate the same
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seismic activity as a 2.3 magnitude earthquake. About 70,000, give or take. That's what happened
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to Taylor Swift's two back-to-back concerts in Seattle over the summer. It wasn't just the fans
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dancing that caused the ground shakes. The booming sound system itself played a role too. But still
8:07
it's probably best not to ever underestimate the power of Swifties. In order for libraries to work
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borrowers need to respect the window of time they have to read and return a book. And most do. But
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every now and again a title will disappear for, oh, 119 years. In 1904, someone checked out an
8:23
Elementary Treatise on Electricity by James Clerk Maxwell from the New Bedford Free Public Library
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in Boston. It wasn't returned until 2023, when it surfaced as part of a donation pile at West
8:33
Virginia University Libraries. No one knows where the book went in the interim, but now it's back
8:38
where it belongs. The Oxford English Dictionary added hundreds of new entries in 2023. Here are
8:44
a few of our favorites. Groomzilla, the male counterpart to Bridezilla, which made it into
8:48
the OED back in 2009. Comfortwear. While the meaning is pretty obvious, the OED traces it
8:53
back to at least 1903 to describe a woman in slippers and housecoat. Another addition are
8:58
both the phrases Spider Sense and Spidey Sense. While Spidey Sense is obviously Spider-Man related
9:03
Spider Sense predates our favorite web-slinger by nearly 50 years, and originally meant the
9:07
ability of certain people to sense nearby spiders. This year, a really important book was discovered
9:12
hiding in plain sight. Alison Palmer saw a 16th century prayer book, 1527's The Book of Hours
9:18
at the University of Cambridge, and it looked very familiar, just like a book featured in a
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circa 1533 Hans Holbein portrait of Thomas Cromwell, chief advisor to Henry VIII, who also
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sentenced him to death. A team of experts reviewed the evidence and concluded it was the same book
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in Cromwell's portrait. It was among the volumes left to Cromwell's secretary, Ralph Sadler
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and it came to Cambridge through the wife of the secretary's grandson. According to a press release
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the bejeweled tome is thought to be the only object from any Tudor portrait to survive to this day
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Famous documents are occasionally found to be forgeries, but in 2023, the opposite occurred
9:56
Graduate student and mental floss contributor Vanessa Berganza was perusing Harvard University's
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Widener Library when she spotted a copy of The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia by Philip Sidney
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on the shelf. It was donated to Harvard in 1913 after businessman Harry Elkins Widener died on
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the Titanic and left behind his personal library. Elizabethan author and Philip Sidney's sister
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Mary Sidney Herbert, was thought to be the book's original owner. But in the 1940s
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Harvard's rare books librarian, William A. Jackson, claimed it was a forgery. Harvard accepted his
10:24
argument until this year, when Braganza proved it really was from the 16th century. The university
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was pleased to hear it had owned an authentic piece of rare literature all along
10:33
Rene Magritte's 1943 painting The Fifth Season isn't among his most lauded artworks
10:38
but as we discovered this year, it harbored a secret. Under the two men holding frames on a
10:43
street was the image of a woman, possibly the artist's wife. It was found by conservators at
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the Royal Museums of the Fine Arts of Belgium using infrared reflectography. Sometimes 2023
10:53
felt just like any other year, and other times it really did feel like the future
10:58
Last year, Chipotle introduced a chip-making robot named Chippy. This year, we learned Chippy
11:02
will have a friend. The company announced that they're currently testing a robot named
11:06
Autocado, which slices, cores, and peels avocados so human employees don't have to
11:12
We've all been there. You're on your iPhone, typing out a heated text complete with F-bomb
11:17
when that F-bomb morphs into the D-word. Duck. But this year, Appley finally got its shot
11:23
sorry, s***, together with an autocorrect update in iOS 17. As Apple's senior vice president of
11:29
software engineering put it, in those moments where you just want to type a ducking word
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well, the keyboard will learn it. It's about ducking time. We've been hearing about flying
11:38
cars since the Jetsons. Actually, well before that. But we hopefully got closer to that reality
11:44
when Aleph Aeronautics received permission from the FAA to test its Model A car, which is the
11:49
first flying automobile that can be parked on the ground in a conventional parking spot. Aleph
11:53
expects it to be available in 2025 for a bargain $300,000. But don't reserve it just yet. It has a
12:00
lot of testing to be done. This year, the New York Times reported that scientists had developed a
12:05
paint so white and reflective that 98% of the sun's rays just bounce right off of it. The coating was
12:11
developed by a team at Purdue University, led by mechanical engineering professor Shulin Ruan
12:16
The idea is to use the paint on rooftops, where it would do its ray-deflecting thing and keep
12:21
things cooler inside the buildings. According to the scientists, the paint is as much as
12:24
8 degrees Fahrenheit cooler than the air around it during the day, and at night that number
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drops to as much as 19 degrees cooler. Now for one of the most important developments in the pizza world. There's lots to love
12:35
about Wawa, from its incredible coffee and iced tea to its versatile build-your-own hoagies
12:40
and delicious mac and cheese. And this summer, the uber-popular convenience store added a
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new item to its menu—pizza. Like the hoagies, you choose between a couple of sizes and pile
12:50
in the toppings you prefer. The pizzas are served from 4 p.m. to 3 a.m. and are made fresh in
12:55
dedicated pizza ovens, which means around a 20-minute wait. Don't even ask what's in the sauce
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That's proprietary. According to scientists, July was most likely the hottest month ever recorded in
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human history, a fact that was declared on July 27th. We don't have to wait for the end of the
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month to know this, United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres said. Short of a mini
13:15
ice age over the next days, July 2023 will shatter records across the board. In Italy
13:21
the founder of a popular weather website has been naming heatwaves since 2012. This year
13:26
he picked names like Cerberus. Not ominous at all. According to the BBC, temperatures across
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Italy were well above 100 degrees. And while we're talking about signs of the apocalypse
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we might as well talk about Florida. Two diseases that are usually rarely a problem in the U.S
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made headlines in Florida in 2023. Leprosy cases have been increasing in the central part of the
13:46
state, and health experts fear the infectious disease could become endemic to Florida
13:50
meaning that it's permanently established in that area. Previously, most leprosy cases in the U.S
13:55
originated through carriers traveling from other parts of the world. Malaria is also on the rise in
14:00
the Sunshine State, as well as Texas and Maryland. Seven cases were recorded across the state, and
14:05
like the recent leprosy outbreak, they were locally acquired rather than imported from overseas
14:10
And one last bit of horrific news before we get back to some happy stuff. Those of you who were avidly playing video games in the early to mid-2010s may have felt the weight of this next one
14:19
In March of this year, Nintendo permanently closed down their 3DS and Wii U eShops
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While this does mean that no new software can be downloaded onto those consoles
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both the Wii U and the 3DS are still able to access the internet. It's a sad, sad moment in history
14:35
Greta Gerwig's Barbie opened with a bang, raking in an impressive $162 million in the U.S. during its opening weekend
14:41
The momentum didn't slow down from there. The Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling-led film has since earned more than $1.4 billion
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It's earned Greta Gerwig the title of history's highest-grossing woman director. Age is just a number
14:54
For Jim Arrington it 91 That might also be the number of reps he pumps out as part of a bodybuilding regimen Arrington was actually crowned the world oldest bodybuilder by Guinness World Records when he turned 83 Seven years later he still getting his swell on so Guinness declared him
15:09
the reigning record holder. A group gift platform called GiveTastic crunched the numbers on 100,000
15:14
wedding-related Spotify playlists to determine the most popular wedding song. Whitney Houston's
15:19
I Wanna Dance With Somebody Who Loves Me took the blue ribbon, followed by Marry You by Bruno Mars
15:25
The Killer's Mr. Brideside also made the list. I guess it started out with a kiss, how could it end up like this, could technically be about marriage
15:33
This year, American Girl debuted two new dolls in its historical collection
15:37
Isabel and Nikki Hoffman, fraternal twins growing up in Seattle during the 1990s
15:42
Yeah, elder millennials, our childhood is now considered a historical era. If you want to eat the world's most expensive ice cream, which Guinness World Records crowned this year
15:51
you better have some seriously deep pockets. Japanese ice cream company Salado charges a whopping $6,696 for its decadent dessert
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Its ingredients include decorative gold leaf shavings, a rare white truffle, Parmigiano-Reggiano, and sake leaves
16:07
There was an important update to the Henrietta Lacks story this year. If you're not aware, Lacks, a black woman, visited Baltimore's John Hopkins Hospital in February 1951
16:15
where a piece of cancerous tissue was removed from her cervix. Those cancerous cells were cultured and labeled Gila
16:21
And in contrast to the other cells researchers had tried to culture, they didn't die
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Instead, they divided and divided and divided. These immortal cells were distributed, mass-produced, and commercialized
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all without the knowledge or permission of Lacks, who had died in October and was buried in an unmarked grave
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It's impossible to overstate the impact of Lacks' immortal cells. And many people, though not the Lacks family, made money off of those cells
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Some of Henrietta's heirs eventually sued Thermo Fisher Scientific, a biotech firm
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accusing them of profiting from the HeLa cell line without compensating her family
16:55
That lawsuit was settled in 2023. The amount wasn't disclosed. A statue of Lax went up in
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her hometown of Roanoke, Virginia in October 2023, replacing a statue of Confederate General
17:05
Robert E. Lee. The Food and Drug Administration approved the first new drug in 20 years to treat
17:10
Alzheimer's disease. Lakembi, its brand name, slowed the progression of the disease by about
17:15
five months in an 18-month clinical trial, but it comes with high risks for serious side effects
17:20
such as brain bleeding and death. It also can't stop disease progression completely
17:25
nor repair cognitive function. But it gives hope to Alzheimer's patients and their families
17:29
who still have very few therapeutic options. Archaeologists working in Jerusalem this year
17:34
pulled 2,500-year-old feces out of two ancient toilets and discovered evidence of Giardia
17:39
duodenalis, a parasite that can cause something akin to dysentery. It's the oldest evidence
17:45
of the protozoan discovered so far. In 2023, we learned about one of the world's earliest cases
17:49
of brain surgery. Archaeologists working in the ancient site of Tel Magido in northern Israel
17:54
discovered the graves of two high-status brothers who lived during the Late Bronze Age
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roughly 1550 to 1450 BCE. The skeleton showed signs of chronic disease, possibly leprosy
18:05
also known as Hansen's disease, which, given that they lived to their early 20s alongside
18:10
other lines of evidence, suggested that the brothers were elite individuals who had access
18:14
to quality food and medical care during their lives. The skull of the older brother, who
18:18
was between 20 and 40 when he died, also displayed a hole cut with a human-made beveled instrument
18:23
This type of cranial surgery, called trephination, was used in the ancient world to relieve sinus
18:28
pressure and other ailments, but evidence for it being performed in the Near East is rare
18:33
Okay, one more Titanic fact. Sorry, not sorry. I couldn't resist. The wreck of the Titanic has been disintegrating on the bottom of the North Atlantic for more
18:41
than a century, and its decay has accelerated in recent years. In May, the underwater mapping company Magellan Ltd and Atlantic Productions released a stunning
18:50
digital twin of the entire ship and its 15 square mile debris field to preserve them
18:56
for all time. The mapping team used robotic submersibles to scan the legendary ocean liner over the
19:00
course of six weeks with super high definition equipment. Then they knit the images together to create a 3D digital model
19:07
It is so detailed that you can even read part of the serial number on one of the ship's
19:11
3 propellers. As much as we love cats here at Mental Floss, we know that they can sometimes
19:16
be dangerous, especially if they're feral and they bite you. In August of this year
19:21
we learned that a man bitten by a stray cat contracted an unknown infection. His arm and
19:25
fingers became enlarged and swollen, but when doctors yzed the tissue samples from his
19:29
wounds, they found an organism they hadn't seen before. Researchers came in to sequence
19:34
the bacteria, and found that while it appeared to be a streptococcus-like organism giving
19:38
the man such a violent reaction, it was actually a never-before-documented Globicadella species
19:43
We already know that vaccines are beneficial to human health, but this year we found out they
19:48
could also improve bee health. American fowl brood, a destructive disease that affects honeybees
19:53
can now be prevented in the pre-pupil stage with a vaccine created by biotech company Dallin Animal
19:58
Health. It works by having worker bees ingest dead panobacillus larvae cells, the bacterium
20:04
responsible for American fowl brood, which they then pass on to their queen. While the vaccine is
20:09
under conditional approval, it'll hopefully be leagues better for both bees and beekeepers than
20:13
the previous alternative, burning the infected bees and hives. Did you know that there aren't
20:19
just land spiders? There are also sea spiders? And that we recently got our first look at one
20:24
type of them mating? The footage was captured in 2022 at a depth of 5,525 feet during an expedition
20:30
by the Ocean Exploration Trust. The researchers announced in a study released in June 2023 that
20:35
these particular sea spiders were from the genus Colosendias, which had a leg span of over a foot
20:41
ysis of the footage showed a pair of spiders, one on top of the other. Why is this important? In the words of lead study author George Brenes, University of Vienna
20:50
zoologist, this is the first time humans have ever witnessed this behavior. At this stage
20:54
people believed sea spiders of the Colosendidae group may have had a completely different
20:59
reproductive biology to their relatives. But this video unmistakably shows that at least their
21:04
mating follows typical sea spider fashion. Apparently, these creatures aren't true spiders
21:09
and aren't even really all that closely related to spiders, but they look like spiders, so if you'll
21:14
excuse me, my spider sense is currently tingling out of control. This year, one Florida town was
21:19
absolutely overrun with the cutest infestation ever. Bunnies. Dozens and dozens of friendly
21:25
domesticated bunnies are populating the yards, driveways, and rows of Janata Isles. It's a pretty
21:31
adorable problem to have, but it's still a problem. The rabbits could dig holes in yards and chew on
21:35
wires, and the animals, which stem from a group illegally released by a breeder who moved out of
21:40
the area, could feel the ill effects of Florida's heat. One resident, Alicia Griggs, has started a
21:45
GoFundMe to capture and relocate the rabbits. Anyone who's seen the land before time remembers
21:49
that Tyrannosaurus rex are known for their sharp teeth, but those fatal pearly whites may not have
21:54
been as prominently displayed as we thought. New research has suggested T-Rex's teeth were
21:58
concealed by a fleshy, lip-like tissue. People tend to depict T-Rex in a crocodile-like way
22:04
It's why we popularly imagine them with a mouthful of protruding teeth. A 2023 study, however
22:09
showed that T-Rex chompers don't have the kind of outer tooth erosion crocodile teeth do
22:13
suggesting they were likely protected by lips. It seems only fitting for mysterious hijinks to
22:18
ensue during the production of the Beetlejuice sequel. Two props disappeared from set. A lamppost
22:23
with a pumpkin top and a 150 pound abstract sculpture designed by Katherine O character Delia Dietz in the original film Were they stolen or did they just come to life and decide to leave
22:35
This year, fans of Beyoncé and Jay-Z were given the opportunity to live like hip-hop royalty
22:40
An architectural salvager auctioned off many items from the superstar couple's rented
22:43
home, including their lights, sconces, and French doors. The reseller also offered Jay and Bey's bidet for an asking price of $2,400
22:52
Phew, halfway there. What's the most surprising thing you've learned so far
22:57
Drop it in the comments while I take a breather. I still can't stop thinking about that onion
23:01
It's just too big. 50 more. Nabisco famous chocolate wafers were all set to celebrate their 100th birthday in 2024
23:10
They hit the market way back in 1924. Sadly, the company decided to discontinue them instead
23:15
The crispy, slightly bittersweet wafers were the choice cookie for icebox cakes
23:19
where they softened to perfection between layers of whipped cream. Bakers have suggested using Oreo thins, Goya Maria chocolate cookies, or Dewey's hot cocoa cookies as replacements
23:28
Or you could skip the cookies altogether and just mainline whipped cream straight into your mouth
23:33
Rome is packed with ancient historical sites. But due to funding issues, not all of them have been open to the public
23:39
Take, for example, the square where Julius Caesar was stabbed. Caesar's heir, Augustus, declared the square a cursed place after the dictator's murder
23:47
Thousands of years later, the square was discovered after 20th century Italian dictator Benito Mussolini
23:51
had parts of Rome razed to search for ancient archaeological sites. The space wasn't open to
23:56
the public until June 2023. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X didn't always see eye to eye
24:02
MLK had even famously criticized Malcolm X to journalist Alex Haley, or so we thought. But it
24:08
turns out that Haley fabricated some of the quotes from that famous 1965 Playboy article
24:12
A journalist named Jonathan Eig made the discovery after finding what appears to be an
24:17
unedited transcript during his archival research. Based on what the unedited transcript shows
24:22
Haley took some of MLK's words out of context and also completely made up some of the quotes
24:27
In 2023, we found out that it's possible to live in the home of a former Queen of England
24:31
At least, if you have $2.9 million. In June, the former home of Anne of Cleves, Henry VIII's
24:37
fourth wife, went up for sale. Theirs wasn't exactly a love story for the ages. Henry
24:42
having split with one wife, beheaded another, and lost yet another after childbirth
24:46
agreed to wed the German-born Anne supposedly after seeing her portrait. When he got a look at her in person, though, he apparently yelled
24:53
I see nothing in this woman as men report of her. Was it because of the portrait
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Probably not. The better guess is that it was Henry's ministers. Regardless, he married her anyway
25:03
But their union lasted just six months before it was annulled. Anne might not have done it for Henry in the looks department
25:08
but they did get along and remained close. He also gifted her a lot of property, including a house called Wings Palace
25:15
After she died in 1557, its ownership reverted back to the crown before it became a private residence
25:20
The five-bedroom, three-bathroom house's history dates all the way back to 1095, but
25:25
it has the most modern amenities, included heated floors and an updated kitchen
25:30
Anne's wasn't the only home of a notable historical figure to go on sale this year
25:33
Henri Matisse's former apartment, a two-bedroom, four-bathroom abode spanning 1,700 square feet
25:39
that sits atop the iconic Regina Building on the French Riviera in Nice, hit the market
25:43
for $2.7 million in May. Matisse, who lived there for about 10 years, also used the apartment as a
25:49
studio, where he created cutouts after suffering some health issues. We know minstrels had some
25:53
jokes, but because a lot of their material was passed down via oral tradition, we didn't really
25:58
know what their jokes were. That's changed thanks to a comedy routine found within a 15th century
26:03
manuscript this year. The minstrel's comedy routine includes a bunch of acts, including a preacher's
26:08
satirical sermon about the virtues of drinking a lot. In 1983, Queen Elizabeth II visited the U.S
26:13
amidst the Troubles, a 30-year-long conflict between Protestants and Roman Catholics in
26:17
Northern Ireland over whether or not the country would become part of Ireland proper or remain
26:21
part of the UK. And papers released in May 2023 revealed that the FBI and Secret Service uncovered
26:27
a plot to assassinate the Queen while she traveled the country. William Camden wrote the official
26:32
history of Queen Elizabeth I's reign in the years after she died. His work was a foundational text
26:36
for historians of the period, but Camden didn't quite record an unbiased history. New transmitting
26:42
Light technology has revealed the contents of pages full of crossed-out or covered-up text
26:46
showing how Camden self-edited his version of history to curry favor with James VI and I
26:52
the king who reigned after Elizabeth I. He even included a fabricated bit about how the late
26:56
queen had declared James her heir before dying. This year, we found out what an original Bob Ross
27:01
painting will cost you, and it's not cheap. Most of Ross's paintings are owned by Bob Ross, Inc.
27:06
but this one was donated by the artist, who hosted the Joy of Painting on PBS from 1983 to 1994
27:12
to the Virginia-based PBS studio where that particular episode had been filmed
27:16
A studio volunteer picked up the painting for $100 max at auction and held onto it before selling it to a gallery that sells a lot of Ross paintings
27:23
They're asking $9.8 million for it. On the topic of great artists
27:28
no one is totally sure what killed composer Ludwig van Beethoven at age 56 in 1827
27:33
but a new ysis of his hair has provided some answers. A total of around 10 feet of his hair was examined using DNA testing
27:40
Researchers found that Beethoven had a genetic predisposition to liver disease and also suffered
27:44
from hepatitis B. Scientists were also able to determine that he didn't suffer from lactose
27:49
intolerance or a gluten allergy, despite having stomach ailments. While the cause of death remains
27:54
ambiguous, it's pretty amazing what we can learn from his locks nearly 200 years later
27:58
In 2023, President Joe Biden created the Bajna Wavjo Itakukveni ancestral footprints of the Grand
28:04
Canyon National Monument in Arizona, which consists of 917,618 acres spread out over three
28:11
locations around the Grand Canyon that contain sites important to indigenous tribes in the area
28:16
including the Havasupai and the Hopi. The phrase Bajnawajo translates to where indigenous peoples roam, and Itakukveni means our ancestral footprints and Havasupai
28:26
and Hopi, respectively. Additionally, a proclamation was signed assuring Emmett Till will be receiving
28:31
national recognition. The horrific 1955 murder of the 14-year-old shocked communities across the
28:36
country and was a major event in the civil rights movement. Now, he and his mother will be recognized
28:41
at three sites across Mississippi and Illinois as the Emmett Till and Mamie Till Mobley National
28:46
Monument. This year, scientists in China grew part-human kidneys in pig embryos. To do it
28:52
the scientists switched off the cells that would have made the pig embryos develop their own kidneys
28:55
kidneys, then added modified human stem cells to nearly 200 embryos, which were then implanted
29:01
into pigs. When they checked in 28 days later, five of the embryos had grown kidneys composed of
29:06
up to 65% human cells. Getting to this point took five years, and there's still a long way to go
29:12
It's believed that any kidney that would potentially be implanted into a human could
29:15
not contain any pig cells at all because the organ would then be rejected by the body
29:20
And there are plenty of ethical issues too. That's not the only research that took place on the pig kidney front this year
29:25
On July 14th, 2023, surgeons at NYU Langone Health performed a xenotransplant, taking a
29:31
genetically modified kidney from a pig and transplanting it into a man on a ventilator
29:35
who had been declared brain dead. On August 16th, 32 days later, the kidney was still working
29:40
and the study continued until mid-September 2023. This could have huge implications. According to a
29:46
press release, there are more than 100,000 people in the U.S. on the transplant list
29:50
Move over, Audrey 2. There's a new monster plant in town, and while it doesn't want to
29:55
eat you, it could make you very very itchy. Paris, Ontario resident Robert Fedrock
29:59
was out for a walk on his property when he spotted a towering poison ivy plant that ultimately
30:04
measured a whopping 68 feet, as tall as two school buses stacked end-to-end. In June 2023
30:11
Guinness World Records named it the world's tallest poison ivy plant. Fedrock got a case
30:14
of poison ivy during his investigation, but presumably it was worth it. This year we met
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TJ, Sesame Street's first Filipino-American Muppet. TJ is a spirited four-year-old boy
30:24
who loves basketball, dancing, and making his baby sister laugh. He's also learning
30:29
Tagalog with his grandmother's help. His family moved to Sesame Street from California
30:33
so fingers crossed for a song about his newfound love of walkable cities
30:37
As a kid, you were probably one of three people. The older sibling who played as Mario, the
30:42
younger sibling who was forced to play Luigi, or the only child whose parents wouldn't
30:46
buy them a Nintendo console. Well, as of this past February, people in the US can heal their inner child by going
30:51
to Super Nintendo World at Universal Studios Hollywood. Highlights include dining at Toadstool
30:56
Cafe, riding in an augmented reality Mario Kart course, and playing challenges to win coins like
31:02
Mario Party without the danger of ending friendships. Maybe. The Mario movie came out in April of this
31:08
year, and the original voice actor for Mario, Charles Martinet, made a cameo appearance. However
31:13
in August, Martinet announced that he would be retiring from voicing the beloved red plumber
31:18
But Nintendo announced that Martinet would be granted the unique official title of Mario
31:22
ambassador. If you get nervous about going to the bathroom on long flights, the horror of walking
31:28
down the cramped aisle and finding the tiny toilet occupied, forced to stand there awkwardly as
31:32
flight attendants squeeze by you, I have good news for you. Earlier this year, a former flight
31:37
attendant gave her advice for the ideal times to plan your bathroom trip with no competition
31:42
She recommends going right when the pilot turns the seatbelt sign off, or right before the beverage
31:47
service starts. According to her, you'll be in the clear. And her second piece of advice
31:52
ask the flight attendants for a packet of coffee grounds. If you hang them up in the bathroom
31:57
they'll soak up any uncomfortable smells. If a tree doesn't fall in a forest and someone is
32:02
around to hear it, does it make a sound? Technically no, but a research published this
32:07
year suggests that our brains may perceive silence and sound the same way. For the study published in
32:12
the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers adapted common auditory
32:16
illusions to test how people reacted to stretches of silence. The quiet illusions had the same
32:21
effect as the noisy ones, which could mean the brain processes a lack of noise as if it were
32:25
sound. So maybe deafening silence isn't an oxymoron after all. Something that was not on my
32:32
2023 bingo card is researchers in Japan discovering the benefits of using disposable diapers in the
32:37
construction of concrete houses. Yep. Apparently, shredded diapers can replace a large chunk of the
32:42
sand used in concrete construction without reducing its strength. This actually has great
32:46
implications for the environment, including reducing the waste of non-recyclable diapers and hopefully cutting down on the carbon emissions from concrete construction
32:54
And another bizarre breakthrough this year. A recipe for space yeast was nearly perfected
32:59
In an attempt to solve the problem of supplying food for long-term space missions
33:03
it was found that the secret ingredient for making yeast while in space is, wait for it, astronaut breath
33:09
Astronaut breath, water, yeast starter, electricity, and a rolling pin, and we can make it happen, Stafford Sheehan
33:15
a finalist in the NASA-sponsored Deep Space Food Challenge, told NPR. If you've ever wondered what seismic activity sounds like, you're in luck
33:24
A scientist and a musician teamed up to create music out of Yellowstone's seismic data
33:28
and now you can listen to it. The scientist, Domenico Vincennaza, is a particle physicist who developed a computer program
33:35
that takes data from seismic activity generated by the supervolcano and turns it into sheet music
33:40
And flautist and musicologist Alissa Schwartz plays that music Step aside John Williams there a new composer in town Utzi the Iceman a roughly 5 mummy found in the Utztal Alps in 1991
33:53
may have had more in common with many of today's middle-aged men than we thought
33:56
Researchers recently resequenced the ancient man's genome and discovered that he carried
34:00
gene variations for male pattern baldness. That doesn't prove that Utzi actually went
34:04
bald during his lifetime, but there is some compelling evidence to support the theory
34:08
Although his remains were in remarkably good condition when unearthed, There was barely any hair on his head. The Swedish warship Vasa would have been one of the most
34:16
beautifully constructed and powerful royal vessels in history, if it hadn't sunk before it even left
34:22
Stockholm Harbor in 1628. About 30 people died in the disaster. But just as the Vasa was being
34:28
raised from the water to become a popular tourist attraction, the face of one of its victims has
34:32
been recreated by artist Oscar Nielsen. DNA was sequenced from bones recovered from the shipwreck
34:37
to find clues to the person's appearance. The facial reconstruction reveals a pale-skinned
34:41
woman with blue eyes, blonde hair, and a strong jaw. And if you were wondering, the Vasa Museum team nicknamed her Gertrude. This year, scientists
34:49
found what may be evidence for ancient cannibalism. Fun! A 1.45 million year old shin bone of a Homo sapiens relative unearthed in northern Kenya
34:58
had nine cut marks on it that were confirmed to be from a handmade stone tool. The information
35:03
we have tells us that hominins were likely eating other hominins at least 1.45 million years ago
35:08
paleoanthropologist Brianna Pobner said. There are numerous other examples of species from the
35:13
human evolutionary tree consuming each other for nutrition, but this fossil suggests that our
35:18
species' relatives were eating each other to survive further into the past than we recognized
35:22
According to a press release about the discovery, the cuts alone aren't enough to declare this a
35:26
clear-cut case of cannibalism, but the researchers do think that's the most likely explanation
35:31
Also, it might not technically be cannibalism at all, because, as the press release notes
35:36
cannibalism requires that the eater and the eaten hail from the same species. And because the scientists can't determine which species of hominin this shin bone belongs to
35:45
it is also possible this was a case of one species chowing down on its evolutionary cousin
35:50
There are a few things Team Mental Floss loves more than shipwrecks. So 2023 was a very good year for us
35:57
In October 1973, Blythe Star, a coastal freighter en route to King Island from Hobart, Australia
36:03
began taking on water. The crew of ten abandoned ship and spent more than a week adrift in an
36:08
inflatable raft before the survivors landed on the Forestier Peninsula in Tasmania. Three of the
36:13
men wandered around in the jungle until they came across a person who was able to take them to a
36:17
nearby town. Seven of the crew members survived the ordeal, but the Blythe Star was lost without
36:21
a trace, until researchers studying underwater landslides confirmed the location of the wreck
36:26
off the coast of southwest Tasmania in April 2023. Just a couple of months later in July
36:31
researchers found an ancient Roman shipwreck near the port of Chivita Vecchia. The wreck dates back
36:36
to the 1st or 2nd century BCE, and its cargo hold is full of hundreds of sealed amphorae
36:41
The researchers think the ship might have originated in Spain, in which case those amphorae
36:45
might be full of things like olive and figs. They're currently making plans to conduct more
36:49
research. In June 2023, Dutch archaeologists announced that, over five years of digging in
36:55
a town called Thiel, they discovered what they dubbed Stonehenge of the Netherlands
36:59
a religious site created 4,000 years ago that included three burial mounds, the largest of
37:04
which measured 65 feet in diameter and served as a burial mound slash solar calendar. They also
37:09
found a single glass bead in one of the graves, which is a big deal. Glass wasn't made there at
37:14
the time, and further ysis showed that the bead had come all the way from Mesopotamia
37:18
According to a professor at the University of Groningen, things were already being exchanged
37:23
in those times. The bead may have been above ground for hundreds of years before it reached
37:27
teal We known that the ancient Romans wore phallic objects for good luck but this year we may have discovered the oldest known phallic object The 42 vaguely penis object was dug up in Mongolia back in 2016 But this year scientists finally examined it closely and noticed the specific
37:44
carvings and grooves that convinced some that it's supposed to represent a phallus. Others
37:48
think it's more of a… blob. Earlier this year, archaeologists working in historic St. Mary's
37:53
City, Maryland, opened the grave of one of the first Europeans to colonize the future state
37:58
a five-foot-tall boy, probably around 15 years old, with a broken leg. He may have come on the
38:02
Ark or the Dove, ships that came to the future Maryland in 1634. Finding the remains was a
38:08
pretty big deal, according to Travis Parno, director of research and collections, who told
38:12
the Washington Post that, this is someone who was here in the first years of the settlement
38:17
the vanguard of the colonial invasion. Someone nobody wrote about. It's a period that we have
38:22
such little documentation on. Few creepy crawlies can terrorize people as much as the humble tick
38:27
the tiny parasite that can transmit Lyme disease to humans. They can't jump or fly, so we thought that they were very limited in how they could find prey
38:35
But a new study published in Current Biology in July demonstrated that ticks can travel through the air via static electricity
38:42
meaning they can latch on without needing to crawl on us first. They can clear under an inch, which for a tick is like several flights of stairs for a human
38:51
Happy hiking! You probably spent time as a kid whirling around and around until you were too dizzy to walk
38:57
Turns out humans aren't the only ones to chase that head-spinning feeling
39:01
Great apes, such as chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans, also enjoy a good dizzy spell
39:06
It's thought they could be chasing the high of an altered mental state. A sign of intelligence in animals is being able to learn from past experiences and change behavior
39:15
Generally, this requires a brain. Jellyfish with no central brain would seemingly not have this skill, but this year it was
39:22
discovered that they do, in fact, learn and adapt from past experiences
39:26
Caribbean box jellyfish had figured out how to avoid obstacles. Sounds like an iPhone app in the making
39:32
If you think that alligators who live in and around golf courses are the upper crust of
39:36
gators, you're sorely mistaken. A 2023 study from the University of North Florida found that alligators who live on
39:42
golf courses have very different eating habits than those in natural environments, and those
39:46
can negatively affect them. In addition to the main result, which was that the golf course juvenile gators were
39:51
eating more insects and arachnids, the gators living near golf courses were found to have
39:55
ingested things like canned corn and a cheeseburger with fries. All of that, while tasty, is probably
40:01
not great for gator health. Not to mention, the alligators living near golf courses are likely
40:06
exposed to way more man-made chemicals. AI had a heck of a year. ChatGPT, which stands for
40:12
Generative Pre-Trained Transformers, by the way, was technically launched in November 2022, but it
40:17
really took off in 2023. It also accelerated the development of other LLM, or Large Language
40:23
model-based AI tools, such as Google's Bard, Baidu's Ernie Bot, and Meta's Llama. Whether or
40:29
not it will replace all workers someday is still up for debate. In other AI news, researchers made
40:34
impressive progress in being able to translate brain signals into audible speech. Using implants
40:39
and AI, they were able to predict individual words a person was thinking and wanting to say
40:43
with near-perfect accuracy. In the future, they hope to be able to predict full sentences and
40:48
beyond. And a new innovation allows AI programs, like those used in robotics, not LLMs, to see in
40:54
the dark for some reason. HADAR, or heat-assisted detection and ranging, will allow machines to see
40:59
even in pitch-black conditions. So the next time you're playing hide-and-seek with a robot
41:04
just know that they might be cheating. This year it was found that the Earth tilted 31.5 inches to
41:09
the east between 1993 and 2010. Scientists believe the change in tilt was caused by pumping
41:14
groundwater from the soil Earth rotational pull actually changes a lot Chiwai and Saw a geophysicist at Seoul National University and study lead said in a statement Our study shows that among climate causes the redistribution of groundwater actually
41:28
has the largest impact on the drift of the rotational pole. We've all been there
41:32
You have to pen a handwritten letter, but you have no paper. Or pen for that matter, just… some water
41:38
Well, scientists discovered a very specific method of writing with ink in liquid
41:43
It involves a nearly microscopic bead that manipulates pH levels in order to successfully
41:48
write or draw in a liquid bath. Scientists really are just doing whatever they want, huh
41:53
Here's something that might break your brain. According to scientists at Oxford's Big Data Institute, it turns out that being inclined
41:59
to participate in genetic studies is a genetic quality. This inclination leaves visible footprints on the brain which can be passed down, leading
42:07
to generations of people who are genetically more likely to participate in genetic studies
42:12
I just… I can't. If you're worried about picking which island nation would be the best place to head during
42:18
the nuclear winter, the answer is New Zealand. Per a recent study, it's one of just a few island nations that could continue to produce
42:25
enough food to feed its residents while the sun is blotted out and temperatures creep
42:29
lower due to nuclear fallout. Vlad III, aka Vlad the Impaler, is often cited as the real-life inspiration for Dracula
42:36
I could launch into a mental-floss tangent here, but this video is already long enough
42:40
so that will have to wait for another day. new research into old Vlad's letters have revealed what health conditions might have led
42:45
to his vampire-esque manner. And they did it not by reading the letters, but by using special
42:50
chemicals to isolate proteins and peptides from Vlad's skin and blood. yzing those proteins
42:55
revealed that he could have been suffering from respiratory conditions and may have had hemolecria
43:00
which can make you cry literal tears of blood. If I saw someone named Vlad the Impaler with
43:05
blood streaming from their eyes, yeah, I would think he was a vampire too. While animal testing
43:10
often comes off as a pretty unethical practice, one study this year showed that it doesn't always
43:15
have to be. In order to study the part of the brain responsible for laughter and playfulness
43:20
scientists went to rats. What did they do, you ask? Oh, they simply tickled them. That's right
43:27
professional scientists, for science, tickled rats. According to Dr. Michael Brecht, professor
43:32
of systems neurobiology and neural computation at Berlin's Humboldt University, rats really love
43:38
to be tickled. United Airlines announced plans this year to be the first U.S. airline to offer
43:42
braille signs in their planes. This will hopefully help visually impaired travelers find their seat
43:47
much easier. Many world records were set this year, like that big beautiful onion, but one that
43:53
really stood out to me was the record announced in September in Fitzgerald, Georgia. The record
43:58
World's largest skeletal chicken. The huge metal chicken topiary stands 62 feet tall, and I'm sure
44:04
this is the pride and joy of Fitzgerald. Scientists discovered that our elbows and shoulders might
44:09
have developed as climbing tools for early apes. Research into the climbing habits of different
44:13
primates showed that chimpanzees with similar rounded shoulder joints and shortened elbow bones
44:18
as us were able to climb down without, you know, falling to death. They climb downwards like a
44:23
human descends a ladder, with their arm able to fully extend above their head. So now every time
44:28
you bang your funny bone, you can thank your ape ancestors. And finally, let's end with the most
44:33
important thing we learned in 2023. What makes Keanu Reeves happy? In an interview early in the
44:39
year, Reeves was asked what his last moment of bliss was. His answer was just precious
44:44
My last moment of bliss was a couple of days ago with my honey. We were in bed. We were connected
44:48
We were smiling and laughing and giggling, feeling great. It was just really nice to be together
44:53
I got my Titanic back, so I let Justin have this one. Thanks for watching this episode of The List Show, and thank you to everyone for watching and
45:00
engaging with our videos this whole year. We can't wait for another year of weird
45:05
interesting, and fun stories to share with you. We'll see you next time
#education