Things I Learned - June 2025

+ i graduated

Hello from New York! Here is June’s edition of Things I Learned.

Things I Learned

1. A little over 20% of people tip on Uber rides. (source)

2. The word “forte”, as in one’s strong suit, is supposed to be pronounced like “fort”, not “for-tay”. (source)

3. In South Korea, camera phones are legally required to emit a shutter sound when taking pictures, even when the phone is set to silent or vibrate mode. (source)

4. Mary is mentioned more times in the Quran than in the bible (and is the only woman mentioned by name in the Quran) (source).

5. The Quebec Maple Syrup Producers maintain the world's only strategic reserve of maple syrup. The reserve is designed to hold 133 million pounds of maple syrup, and acts as a buffer to stabilize prices. (source)

6. Half of American college students don’t earn a bachelor’s degree. (source)

7. Before he became a painter and television personality, Bob Ross served in the US Air Force for 20 years. (source)

8. Republicans are more likely to have tattoos than democrats. (source)

9. Since 1985, fully 28% of stocks have fallen at least 95% from peak to trough. Of these, 1/6 of them completely regained their peak value. (source)

10. Because MI6 is a secret organisation, the chief is the only member of staff who is “avowed”, or publicly named. (source)

11. James Madison was 5'4''. (source)

12. There are four countries with capitals that are not on their mainlands: Denmark, Gambia, Equatorial Guinea, and UAE. (source)

13. Dr. Seuss’s Green Eggs and Ham features only 50 unique words; he wrote it to win a $50 bet with his editor that he could not write an engaging children's book with a vocabulary of 50 words (it is now the all-time fourth best-selling hardcover children's book in the United States). (source)

14. In 1951, only one Italian child in nine attended school past the age of thirteen. (source)

15. First class men were more likely to die on the Titanic than third class women or children (source)

16. Marrying a first cousin is legal in Britain. (source)

17. The United States Postal Service creed — “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds” — is a direction translation from Herodotus’ Histories, referring to the courier service ("Chapar Khaneh”) of the ancient Persian Empire. (source)

18. In Italy, you need a doctor’s permission before joining a gym or running a marathon. (source)

19. It takes 12 minutes for a missile to pass between Iran and Israel. (source)

20. The word ‘bourse’ for stock exchange derives from from the Van der Beurze family that ran an inn in Brussels that hosted the world’s first commodity exchange (source)

Articles I Enjoyed

• Will Jesus Christ Return in an Election Year?

• I Was a Juror on a Murder Trial

• In Taxicab Geometry, Pi Equals 4 and Circles Aren’t Round

• 6 Reasons Service On US Airlines Is Inconsistent, Often Bad

• (So) What If You Miss the Market’s N Best Days?

Articles I Wrote

[N.B. if you want a “gift link” to any of these articles just reach out to me].

• Can Trump end America’s $1.8 trn student-debt nightmare?

  • ft. these graphs:

    

• The dream scenario for prediction markets

  • ft. this paragraph

    

• Who are the World’s Best Investors?

  • ft. this thing I learned: “Only 28 of Vanguard’s 267 mutual funds can trade both bonds and stocks”

Personal News

The highlight of my month was that I finally graduated from my PhD program at the University of Chicago. 6 years is quite a long journey, and I’ll do a follow-up post soon on this blog with my broader reflections on graduate school — apologies in advance for interrupting the regularly scheduled fact-listicles.

Getting hooded

Have a great second half of 2025.