"Un
seen Cold Facts": An Article on Uncommon Knowledge In our fast-paced world, we sometimes overlook the smaller details or obscure facts that exist around us. It's these lesser-known facts that can be eye-opening and create a deeper understanding of the world we live in. Here are some of those lesser-known facts, which may just blow your mind. 1. The shortest war ever recorded lasted only 38 minutes. It was between the countries of Zanzibar and the United Kingdom in 1896. 2. The first recorded ransomware attack was in 1989, when a biologist sent 20,000 floppy disks infected with a virus to the World Health Organization, with the request for payment for an antidote. 3. The shortest reign of any monarch was that of King Louis XIX of France in 1830, who only held the throne for 20 minutes before abdicating. 4. If you shuffle a deck of cards, it is likely that the order of cards in that deck has never existed before in history. 5. The largest snowflake ever recorded was 15 inches wide and 8 inches thick. 6. The Vatican City is the only country in the world where it’s allowed to lock the front door of a church. Every other church must remain open. 7. The first known text message was sent in 1992, and it read, "Merry Christmas." 8. In 1983, a man called Joseph Jagger broke the bank at Monte Carlo - by discovering that a roulette wheel had a bias that caused certain numbers to come up more often than others. 9. It is estimated that a cicada's call can reach up to 120 decibels, making it as loud as a jet engine. 10 The tallest mountain on Earth (measured from the base to the summit) is actually not Mount Everest, but Mauna Kea in Hawaii. At its base, it sits 33,000 feet tall, compared to Everest's 29,029 feet. 11. The national symbol of Canada, the maple leaf, is 11 pointed. Its origins date back to the 18th century, when French Canadians used the leaves to symbolize their hope for peace and prosperity. 12. The term "octothorpe" is used to describe the "#" symbol on a keyboard. The origin of the word is unknown, but it is believed to have been coined by engineers at Bell Labs in the 1960s. 13. The longest English word is 189,819 letters long, and it’s the name for an enzyme, “methionylthreonylthreonylglutaminylarginyl isoleucine”. These are just a few of the many cold facts that exist around us, waiting to be discovered. They serve as a reminder that there's always something new to learn, something that we don't know about our world. It's only by looking past the surface that we can truly appreciate the complexity and wonder of the world we live in.
