Everyday Mysteries

37 questions

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why does work always expand to fill the time available?

Parkinson's Law has been a joke for seventy years. It is also a serious observation about how humans work, and why deadlines work differently from how we think they do.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why does saying sorry feel so hard — even when you know you are wrong?

The difficulty of apology is not stubbornness or pride in any simple sense. It is a genuine threat to something the brain is working hard to protect.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why do we find some animals cute and others frightening?

It is not about whether an animal is actually dangerous. Cute animals and frightening ones share a set of specific visual features that trigger responses your brain formed long before you encountered them.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why is space silent — and what would it sound like if it were not?

Every science fiction space battle you have ever watched is acoustically completely wrong. The silence of space is not an aesthetic choice. It is physics.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

How do salmon find their way back to the exact river where they were born?

Salmon cross thousands of miles of open ocean and then find the precise tributary where they hatched. The mechanism involves smell, magnetism, and one of the most impressive acts of memory in the animal kingdom.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why do dogs tilt their heads when you talk to them?

It looks like curiosity and it probably is. But the specific mechanism behind the head tilt turns out to involve muzzles, sound localisation, and thousands of years of selective pressure towards understanding humans.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why does food taste different on planes?

Airline food has a bad reputation, but the problem is not entirely the kitchen. At 35,000 feet, your taste buds are working against you.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why do cats knock things off tables?

It looks deliberate. It is deliberate. But not for the reasons you might think.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why do we say "bless you" when someone sneezes?

Multiple competing theories, one of which involves plague, one involves souls, and one involves the Pope. The actual origin is probably lost. What is interesting is why the practice survived long after any of the reasons stopped making sense.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why does expensive wine taste better — even when it is the same wine?

The brain does not just evaluate what you drink. It evaluates what you expect to taste. And expectations, it turns out, directly alter the experience.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why does fresh air make you tired?

You go for a walk outside and come back ready for a nap. The fresh air explanation sounds too simple, but the actual mechanisms are genuinely interesting.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why do we knock on wood?

You say something optimistic and immediately feel the need to touch a wooden surface. You almost certainly do not believe in what you are doing. You do it anyway. This is not as irrational as it seems.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why do we eat three meals a day — and who decided that?

Three meals a day is not a biological requirement. It is a scheduling convention that emerged from industrialisation, and it took a surprisingly long time to become the norm.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why do songs get stuck in your head — and how do you get them out?

Earworms are not random. There is a specific profile of song that gets stuck, a reason your brain keeps playing it, and a surprisingly effective way to stop it.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why do we get déjà vu — and what is actually happening in the brain?

Déjà vu is not a memory of a past life or evidence of a glitch in reality. It is a very specific misfiring of the systems your brain uses to evaluate whether something is familiar.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why does time feel like it speeds up as you get older?

It is not your imagination, and there are at least three decent explanations. Only one of them offers a way out.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Did you know clocks had no minute hand until the 1680s?

For most of recorded history, clocks only showed the hour. The minute hand arrived in the 1680s. Punctuality as a social expectation arrived shortly after, and has been causing anxiety ever since.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Did you know Shakespeare invented over 1,700 words we still use today?

Bedroom, lonely, eyeball, generous, gloomy, hint. Shakespeare introduced all of them to written English. The remarkable thing is not just the number, but how ordinary the words have become.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why can't you tickle yourself?

The answer involves your cerebellum, the philosophy of self-awareness, and one genuinely strange finding from schizophrenia research.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Did you know the word "salary" comes from salt?

The word salary comes from the Latin salarium, connected to salt. The exact mechanism is debated, but the reason salt was worth paying soldiers in is not: for most of human history, it was one of the most valuable substances on earth.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why does your voice sound wrong on a recording?

The recording is not lying. You have just been hearing a private version of your own voice your entire life, and everyone else has been hearing something different.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Did you know Oxford University is older than the Aztec Empire?

Teaching began at Oxford around 1096. The Aztec Empire was founded in 1428. This makes Oxford over 300 years older than the civilisation that built Tenochtitlan.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Did you know the colour blue barely existed in ancient language?

Homer described the sea as wine-dark. The ancient Greeks had no word for blue. Neither did Sanskrit, Chinese, Japanese, or Hebrew. The explanation is not that they were colour-blind.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why do people who are wrong tend to be more confident than people who are right?

The Dunning-Kruger effect has been somewhat misrepresented. The underlying problem is real and worth understanding.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Is boredom underrated?

We've built an entire civilisation to eliminate it. That might have been a mistake.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why do we laugh at funerals, and should we feel bad about it?

Inappropriate laughter at the worst possible moment is more common than anyone admits. There are good reasons for it.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Is there any meaningful difference between a memory and a lie you've told yourself often enough?

Neuroscience has a fairly uncomfortable answer to this.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

How much of what we call personality is actually stable, and how much is just context?

You are not quite the same person in every room. The question is whether that means personality is an illusion — or something more interesting.

Everyday Mysteries5 May 2026

Why do we find it so hard to think about risk properly?

We are significantly more afraid of flying than driving, significantly less afraid of sugar than heroin, and significantly wrong about almost all of it.

Everyday Mysteries23 Apr 2026

Is there a meaningful difference between being happy and feeling happy?

If you feel happy but have reasons not to be, does that count? Philosophy and neuroscience have different answers.

Everyday Mysteries23 Apr 2026

Did you know that time has a direction, but the laws of physics don't require it?

Almost every fundamental law of physics works equally well forwards and backwards. The one exception might explain why you remember yesterday but not tomorrow.

Everyday Mysteries23 Apr 2026

Why do humans consistently overestimate dramatic risks and underestimate slow ones?

We are brilliant at fearing the wrong things and ignoring the right ones. This is not stupidity — it is a very old piece of software running in a world it was not designed for.

Everyday Mysteries23 Apr 2026

Why does Sunday evening feel different from every other evening?

Sunday night dread is nearly universal. It appears in people who love their jobs, people who hate them, retirees, and children on summer holidays. Which suggests the problem isn't the job.

Everyday Mysteries23 Apr 2026

Why does rejection hurt — literally, physically — and what does that tell us about how we're wired?

It isn't a metaphor. The same brain regions that process physical pain process social rejection.

Why does work always expand to fill the time available?

Why does a pay rise only make you happy for about three months?

If the Sun disappeared right now, how long before we noticed?

Why is it so much easier to spend money on a card than with cash?

Why does saying sorry feel so hard — even when you know you are wrong?

Why do we find some animals cute and others frightening?

Why is space silent — and what would it sound like if it were not?

How do salmon find their way back to the exact river where they were born?

Why do dogs tilt their heads when you talk to them?

Why does food taste different on planes?

Why do cats knock things off tables?

Why do we say "bless you" when someone sneezes?

Why does expensive wine taste better — even when it is the same wine?

Why does fresh air make you tired?

Why do we knock on wood?

Why do we eat three meals a day — and who decided that?

Why do songs get stuck in your head — and how do you get them out?

Why do we get déjà vu — and what is actually happening in the brain?

Why does time feel like it speeds up as you get older?

Did you know clocks had no minute hand until the 1680s?

Did you know Shakespeare invented over 1,700 words we still use today?

Why can't you tickle yourself?

Did you know the word "salary" comes from salt?

Why does your voice sound wrong on a recording?

Did you know Oxford University is older than the Aztec Empire?

Did you know the colour blue barely existed in ancient language?

Why do people who are wrong tend to be more confident than people who are right?

Is boredom underrated?

Why do we laugh at funerals, and should we feel bad about it?

Is there any meaningful difference between a memory and a lie you've told yourself often enough?

How much of what we call personality is actually stable, and how much is just context?

Why do we find it so hard to think about risk properly?

Is there a meaningful difference between being happy and feeling happy?

Did you know that time has a direction, but the laws of physics don't require it?

Why do humans consistently overestimate dramatic risks and underestimate slow ones?

Why does Sunday evening feel different from every other evening?

Why does rejection hurt — literally, physically — and what does that tell us about how we're wired?