Nighttime is for horrors and discovering how frightening the world really is. We aren’t talking about ghosts and other paranormal phenomena. They haven’t YET been added to the library of proven scary facts. We are here to take a look at the scientifically proven horrors. The ones that we can’t deny or run away from. And unfortunately (or luckily for all you dark copers out there), there are many creepy facts about humans and the Earth we live on.
Human bodies might work in creepy ways, but they can’t beat the frightening things our minds have done. For example, one of the scariest facts on our list touches upon the horror movie Poltergeist . This might come as a shocker to you, but the corpses you saw in the movie — those were actual human remains. With this scary fact in mind, you might watch the movie from a different perspective. Or never watch it again.
However, to truly make your sleep feel more like a nightmare, you should know the dark facts about Earth and its inhabitants. Crows, for example, can remember and recognize human faces. On the other hand, some scary facts touch upon geography. Mount Everest, the highest mountain above sea level, is also the world’s highest graveyard. Approximately 150 bodies are resting on this giant of a mountain. All of whom will likely never be recovered.
Ready to get scared? If so, turn off the lights, cozy up in your bed, and delve into the scary and disturbing facts we have compiled below. Also, we advise you to stick till the end because, throughout the post, we explore how scary facts affect sleep and why the ocean might be the most terrifying place on Earth!
Crows can recognize and remember human faces.
onlinelibrary.wiley.com , Tom Swinnen Report
Tooth-in-the-Eye Surgery. Surgeons put a tooth in a blind person’s eye to restore their sight. It was pioneered in the 1960s, and it actually works and it’s still being done today.
eyewiki.aao.org , Lisa Fotios Report
Real corpses were used in the 1982 film Poltergeist.
snopes.com , imdb Report
There are bodies of over 150 dead hikers on Mount Everest, and they’are used as landmarks.
smithsonianmag.com , David Waschbüsch Report
The Turritopsis Dohrnii jellyfish is officially known as the only immortal creature in the world. It lives forever.
amnh.org , Pawel Kalisinski Report
Climate change is making spiders bigger.
royalsocietypublishing.org , Anthony Report
A haunted radio station from Russia has been broadcasting a dull monotonous tone for twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, for the last three-and-a-half decades. Every few seconds it’s joined by a second sound, like some ghostly ship sounding its foghorn.
bbc.com , Zeynep M Report
Dogs like squeaky toys because they mimic the screams of their prey.
sciencedirect.com Report
Spiders can survive in space.
nasa.gov , Pixabay Report
Two Scottish surgeons originally invented the chainsaw to assist childbirth.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov , Karolina Gabrowska Report
Locked-In Syndrome is a condition in which a patient is fully aware but is stuck in a coma-like state.
rarediseases.info.nih.gov , RDNE Stock Project Report
The film ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street’ is based on a real story reported in the LA Times. A boy was terrified to go to sleep, and when he did, he died while screaming about a nightmare.
latimes.com , imdb Report
While Ted Bundy was a psychology major at the University of Washington, he worked at Seattle’s Suicide Hotline Crisis Center.
distractify.com , bryce carithers Report
Ducklings can engage in cannibalistic behaviors when they’re bored.
dpi.nsw.gov.au , Pixabay Report
When you die the last sense to leave your body is the ability to hear.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov , Pavel Danilyuk Report
More than 80% of our ocean is unmapped, unobserved, and unexplored.
oceanservice.noaa.gov , Francesco Ungaro Report
Technically it’s not impossible to die from holding in a sneeze. Some injuries from holding in a sneeze can be very serious, such as ruptured brain aneurysms, ruptured throat, and collapsed lungs.
healthline.com , Andrea Piacquadio Report
Horned Lizards can defend themselves by squirting blood out of their eyes.
asknature.org , Room237 CC AS-A A 3.0 U Report
Alien hand syndrome is a phenomenon in which one hand is not under control of the mind. The person loses control of the hand, and it acts as if it has a mind of its own.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov , hansskuy Report
Mobile phones are 10 times dirtier than a toilet seat.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov , Teddy Yang Report
King Charles II drank alcohol mixed with pulverized human skulls.
smithsonianmag.com , Polina Tankilevitch Report
Some ants turn into zombies via parasitic fungus which manipulates their brains.
livescience.com , Egor Kamelev Report
250,000 deaths a year are due to medical errors.
npr.org , Dalila Dalprat Report
Arrhythmic death syndrome is a sudden condition where someone seemingly healthy dies suddenly with no apparent cause of death.
sads.org.uk , Brett Sayles Report
During the mummification process, Ancient Egyptians remove the brain through one of the nostrils.
science.howstuffworks.com , Miguel Á. Padriñán Report
People with Cotard’s syndrome believe that parts of their body are missing, or that they are dying, dead, or don’t exist. They may think nothing exists.
webmd.com , cottonbro Report
Criminologists estimate that there’s a 1-in-3 chance police will never identify your killer if you’re murdered in the US.
npr.org , Tima Miroshnichenko Report
Fatal familial insomnia makes it impossible for someone to sleep for months.
rarediseases.org Report
You’re more likely to die on your birthday. The chance someone will die on their birthday is 6.7 percent, which is higher than any other day.
sciencedirect.com , Marina Utrabo Report
Some female spiders allow their young to eat them alive.
sciencedirect.com , Pixabay Report
Indian followers of the Zoroastrianism don’t bury or burn their dead. Instead, they leave the bodies exposed to the rays of the sun, and the corpse is consumed or devoured by birds of prey — vultures, kites, crows.
npr.org Report
In some European cultures it was customary to place the dried or desiccated body of a cat inside the walls of a newly built home to ward off evil spirits or as a good luck charm.
jstor.org Report
Despite making up close to 5% of the global population, the U.S. has more than 20% of the world’s prison population.
aclu.org Report
Decorations made from human bones adorn the interior of the Sedlec Ossuary. The “Bone Church” contains the bones of around 40,000 different people. These bones are all arranged in different forms, such as garlands, altars, and even a chandelier.
unesco.org Report
Humans produce about 1.5 quarts of mucus every day.
health.ucsd.edu Report
Based on a 2006 report by the National Academies of Science’s Institute of Medicine, in the U.S. alone poor handwriting on prescription notes leads to over 7,000 deaths and 1.5 million medical errors.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov Report
Over 20% of children report hearing voices.
rte.ie Report
An estimated 6.5 million people in the United States have an unruptured brain aneurysm, or 1 in 50 people.
bafound.org Report
The U.S. military is missing six nuclear weapons.
nationalinterest.org Report
A homicide archivist Thomas Hargrove estimates that there are over 2,000 serial killers at large right now.
newyorker.com Report
In the early-to-mid 1980s, years after AIDS was known to be in Canada (1982), the Canadian Red Cross wasn’t screening donated blood for HIV. About 2,000 Canadians were infected with HIV from tainted blood products.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov Report
The Pirates of The Caribbean ride at Disneyland used to have real skeletons as props. When it was first built in the 1960s, designers asked UCLA’s anatomy department for authentic materials. The real skeletons have since been given a proper burial.
atlasobscura.com Report
‘A Sense Of Impending Doom’ is frequently reported by patients as an early sign of mismatched blood type transfusion.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov Report
Many crocodile species can gallop, and they are fast.
sciencealert.com Report
At least 20 detached human feet have been found on the coasts of the Salish Sea since 2007.
nationalgeographic.com Report
In the 1920’s, the American domestic terror group the Ku Klux Klan had a youth chapter called the “Ku Klux Kiddies.”
history.com Report
A human head remains conscious for around 20 seconds after being decapitated.
sciencealert.com Report
When we die, the enzymes and bacteria that were so useful to us digest us from the inside out.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov Report
A chicken named Mike lived for 18 months after his head had been cut off.
miketheheadlesschicken.org Report
Depression-era craze of Dance Marathons in which couples would compete to see who could dance the longest, often for cash prizes, unfortunately led to some people dropping dead from exhaustion on the dance floor.
jstor.org Report
On average, a person can secrete 26 gallons of sweat into a bed per year.
researchgate.net Report
Harvard owns a book that’s bound in human skin.
bbc.com , blogs.law.harvard.edu Report
“Brain-eating” amoeba has infected at least 40 people in the U.S. over the past decade. The single-celled organisms go by the scientific name Naegleria folweri, and may infect people who swim in lakes or rivers.
cdc.gov Report
H. H. Holms, America’s first serial killer, constructed a “Murder Castle,” a hotel with secret compartments and gas chambers to murder unsuspecting visitors of the Chicago World Fair. He confessed to 27 murders.
crimemuseum.org Report
People used hollowed human skulls as bowls and cups back in ancient England.
journals.plos.org Report
More than 99% of the four billion species that have evolved on Earth are now gone.
ourworldindata.org Report
If the sun blew up right now, you wouldn’t know about it for another eight minutes.
scienceline.ucsb.edu Report
The last use of a guillotine in France was the same year the first Star Wars movie premiered. 1977
history.com Report
The average bed has between 100,000 and 10 million dust mites.
mayoclinic.org Report
Tarantulas have been found to “swim” in both the wild and in captivity.
animalhype.com Report
John Douglas, a former chief of the FBI’s Elite Serial Crime Unit and author of Mind Hunter notes that “A very conservative estimate is that there are between 25 and 50 active serial killers in the United States” at any given time.
books.google.com Report
Babies can grow mustaches in the womb that then spread to cover their entire body in hair called Lanugo. The body hair keeps them warm and helps regulate body temperature. Don’t worry, they shed it before birth.
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov Report
Fifteen percent of the air you breathe in a metro station is human skin.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov Report
Emperor Nero profited off of human urine. Emperor Nero imposed a urine tax, charging merchants who sold urine.
gutenberg.org Report
The Asian giant hornets have a bite that can leave craters in the skin or even cause death.
psu.edu Report
Vampire moths feed on the blood of mammals, including humans. They can suck blood for up to 50 minutes.
entomologytoday.org Report
Your pets might eat you when you die, and perhaps a bit sooner than is comfortable.
journals.lww.com Report
Your jaw is strong enough to crush your own teeth with its pressure.
royalsocietypublishing.org Report
Ancient Romans believed that drinking blood would let them absorb power.
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov Report
Rodents’ teeth grow continuously throughout their lives.
sciencedirect.com Report
Your skeleton is always wet.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov Report
NASA astronaut will consume about 730 liters of recycled urine and sweat during his yearlong mission.
nasa.gov Report
Women in the 18th century used lead as makeup. This makeup contains vinegar, water, and white lead, which was the pigment that gave the mixture its color.
theconversation.com Report
The “sleepwalking defense” has been used in order to have defendants acquitted for murder.
apa.org Report
Aztec priests believed that human sacrifices could stop droughts and famine.
history.com Report
For centuries, doctors thought that medicines made with human flesh, blood, or bone could be effective in curing all kinds of ailments, from epilepsy to headaches. This practice was called “corpse medicine.”
historyextra.com Report
Botflies are a type of insect whose larvae burrow under your skin.
sciencedirect.com Report
It’s very possible your office coffee mug has fecal matter on it.
agris.fao.org Report
About 40 supervolcanoes are dotted across the globe and we’re about 24,000 years overdue for an eruption.
bbc.co.uk Report
“The Devil’s Bible” is a real thing, and it’s a contract between a monk and Satan. Codex Gigas, “The Devil’s Bible” is the largest Latin manuscript known to the world. It contains a full-page portrait of Satan. People believe the manuscript contains the contract of a monk who sold his soul to Satan in the 13th century in order to escape execution.
loc.gov Report
In a month, we ingest the weight of a 4x2 Lego brick in microplastic.
news.trust.org Report
Lady Bugs larvae use cannibalism as a survival tactic. Lady Bugs are known to eat their own larvae to ensure the survival of the other larvae. Think of it as population control on a smaller scale.
biomedcentral.com Report
The Champawat Tiger was responsible for an estimated 436 deaths in Nepal and the Kumaon division of India, during the last years of the 19th century and the first years of the 20th century.
bbc.com Report
In the 1800s, dentures were made out of the real teeth of deceased people.
bda.org , bda.org Report
A person will shed around 40 pounds of skin in a single lifetime. Just like snakes, humans shed their skin too, but at a much slower pace. Accumulated, however, your shed skin will amount to almost half the average body weight.
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov Report
More than 80 million bacteria can be exchanged in one kiss.
microbiomejournal Report
The golden poison frog has enough poison to kill 10 to 15 people. Its skin is coated in a deadly poison called alkaloid toxin. One milligram of this poison can kill around 10 to 15 humans.
nationalgeographic.com Report
Some species of fish have human-like teeth.
Report
Microscopic mites can be found in bunches at the base of your eyelashes.
webmd.com Report
4,400 Unidentified bodies are recovered each year with approximately 1,000 of those bodies remaining unidentified after one year.
namus.nij.ojp.gov Report
‘Foot binding’ practice in China only started to decline in the 20th century.
historyofyesterday.com Report
The FDA allows up to 4% of a can of cherries to have maggots (and 5% if they are brined or Maraschino).
fda.gov Report
18th-century doctors believed that bloodletting was mandatory to “balance” patients’ health.
medicalnewstoday.com Report
Research has shown that after decapitation there is still activity in the brain for 4 to 30 seconds.
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov Report
The peanut butter contains an average of 1 or more rodent hairs per 100 grams.
fda.gov Report
Being buried alive accidentally occurred so often that people invented “safety coffins.” Doctors often misdiagnosed ill patients, and this was common in 17th century England.
smithsonianmag.com Report
Cosmologists theorize the constant expansion of the universe could cause it to tear apart. This theory is called The Big Rip.
americanscientist.org Report
Scientists say ‘black holes’ exist in the ocean.
cambridge.org Report
A body decomposes four times faster in water than on land.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov Report
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