40 UNBELIEVABLE FACTS ABOUT LIFE

There are a lot, and I mean a lot, of facts all us need to know. Some basic knowledge, others a bit complex.

Here are 40 unbelievable, but true facts you should know:

1. If you trace your family tree back 25 generations, you will have 33,554,432 direct ancestors – assuming no incest was involved.

2. The average distance between the stars in the sky is 20 million miles.

3. If you dug a well to the centre of the Earth, and dropped a brick in it, it would take 45 minutes to get to the bottom – 4,000 miles down.

4. Your body sheds 10 billion flakes of skin every day.

5. Honey is the only food consumed by humans that doesn’t go off.

6. The Hawaiian alphabet has only 12 letters.

7. A donkey can sink into quicksand but a mule can’t 😕

8. Every time you sneeze your heart stops a second.

9. There are 22 miles more canals in Birmingham (UK) than in Venice.

10. Facetious and abstemious contain all the vowels in their correct order.

11. Eskimoes have hundreds of words for snow but none for hello.

12. The word “set” has the most definitions in the English language.

13. The only 15 letter word that can be spelled without repeating its letters is uncopyrightable.

14. Windmills always turn counter-clockwise.

15. The “Sixth Sick Sheik’s Sixth Sheep’s Sick” is the hardest tongue-twister.

16. The longest English word without a vowel is twyndyllyngs which means "twins".

17. 1 x 8 + 1 = 9; 12 x 8 + 2 = 98; 123 x 8 + 3 = 987; 1234 x 8 + 4 = 9876; 12345 x 8 + 5 = 98765; 123456 x 8 + 6 = 987654; 1234567 x 8 + 7 = 9876543; 12345678 x 8 + 8 = 98765432; 123456789 x 8 + 9 = 987654321

18. The word "dreamt" is the only common word in the English language that ends in "mt".

19. Albert Einstein never wore any socks.

20. The average human will eat 8 spiders while asleep in their lifetime.

21. In space, astronauts cannot cry because there is no gravity.

22. Hummingbirds are the only creatures that can fly backwards.

23. An ostrich’s eye is bigger than its brain.

24. Cockroaches can live 9 days without their heads before they starve to death.

25. A flamingo can eat only when its head is upside down.

26. The lighter was invented before the match.

27. It is physically impossible for pigs to look up at the sky.

28. The average person has over 1,460 dreams a year!

29. When Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone back in 1876, only six phones were sold in the first month.

30. In a study by the University of Chicago in 1907, it was concluded that the easiest colour to spot is yellow. This is why John Hertz, who is the founder of the Yellow Cab Company picked cabs to be yellow.

31. On average a business document is copied 19 times.

32. All babies are colour-blind when they are born.

33. Rolling Stones band member Bill Wyman married a 19 year-old model Mandy Smith in 1988. At the same time Wyman's son was engaged to Mandy Smith's mother. If his son had married Smith's mother, Wyman would have been the step grandfather to his own wife.

34. There are 158 verses in the Greek National Anthem.

35. There are about 6,800 languages in the world.

36. If you save one penny and double it every successive day, (day two you have 2 pennies and day three you have 4 pennies, and so on), by the end of 30 days you’ll have $5,368,708! (or £’s or whatever currency).

37. A dog can hear sounds that are 100 times fainter than the faintest sounds that a person can hear. If a person can just hear a noise that is coming from 10 feet away, a dog could hear that same noise from 100 feet away.

38. Of all the animals on earth, the mosquito has contributed to the deaths of more people than any other animal.

39. In the courts of the Roman Empire, instead of swearing an oath on a bible, men swore to the truth on their statements while holding their genitals. Hence the word 'testify', from 'testicles'.

40. An octopus has 3 hearts.

Certainly, there a lot other weird or amazing facts about life in general. Heard of any? I would love to hear from you in the comments below. Feel free to share with all of us.