The world is more interesting than you think.
Unexpected facts, big ideas, and little discoveries. Find something that sparks your curiosity today.
A little more wonder
Theatergoers once sat on the stage
Wealthy patrons paid to sit onstage, where everyone could see them—and where their chairs sometimes blocked the actors. Their conversations competed with the…
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Some lactose-free milk has its sugar split before you drink it
Added lactase breaks lactose into glucose and galactose, doing a step that many people's intestines struggle to complete. Those simpler sugars can make the…
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Your computer mouse takes thousands of tiny pictures
An optical mouse repeatedly photographs the surface beneath it and compares each image with the next. When the pattern shifts, the mouse calculates how far…
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Falling entirely down a magical rabbit hole
Alice’s rabbit hole is a fantasy passage that drops her into Wonderland, where ordinary rules stop being useful. The entrance looks like a burrow; the commute…
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Why the Cinnamon Challenge can send spice into your lungs
Dry cinnamon powder can coat the throat and trigger coughing or gasping, sending fine particles into the lungs and irritating the airways.
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San Pedro cacti hide potent mescaline directly in their skin
The highest concentration of mescaline sits just beneath the tough outer peel, only millimeters below the surface.
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Deep meditative states shrink your perception of room size
Practitioners report feeling enormous or tiny, as if the room has suddenly changed scale.
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Perfluorocarbons could let mammals breathe underwater
Perfluorocarbon liquids can carry enough dissolved oxygen for mice to breathe while submerged. Researchers have also explored liquid ventilation as a…
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Playground hopscotch forces chalk dust inhalation
The chalk is calcium sulfate, and shoes can kick some of it into the air as kids run and jump.
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The Statue of Liberty would need car-length shoes
A casual stroll would require footwear the length of a small vehicle.
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Doctors' white coats advertised a new scientific identity
As medicine increasingly associated itself with laboratory science in the late nineteenth century, white clothing helped symbolize cleanliness and a different…
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Chubby bunny game acts as a massive choking hazard
Packing too many marshmallows into your mouth can obstruct breathing. As they soften and stick together, the treats can become a serious choking hazard.
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Desalination forces seawater through microscopic membranes
The pressure pushes water through a semipermeable membrane while salt ions are left behind, separating fresh water from seawater.
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Craps has a much older dice game in its ancestry
Its ancestor, hazard, was played long before modern casinos existed. Success depends on the relationship between an opening roll and the rolls that follow,…
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Your body makes DMT in your lungs
The body can produce tiny amounts of DMT in the lungs and brain, but these amounts are not known to cause spontaneous psychedelic trips.
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Figure skating began with tracing patterns on ice
Early figure skating focused on tracing precise figure-eight patterns in the ice, which judges scrutinized for geometric accuracy—not jumps or spins.
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When Cabbage Patch Kids came with adoption papers
Buyers signed adoption oaths and received certificates and birth names, making a mass-produced doll feel like a new family member.
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Why melodrama villains twirled their mustaches
Onstage, the curled mustache was visual shorthand: audiences could spot the villain before he had to explain himself. In melodrama, even facial hair had a job…
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Instantly locating a dropped pin in the dark
A dropped pin gives off a brief sound, and your ears receive it at slightly different times and volumes. Your brain reads those differences to work out where…
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Valet parking sells the handoff as much as the parking space
Even when the car ends up nearby, someone else takes responsibility for finding a place, maneuvering into it, and bringing it back. The service removes…
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Going temporarily deaf from extremely loud noises
After an extremely loud blast, sounds can seem muffled because the hearing system has been pushed hard enough that its sensitivity temporarily drops. The…
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Why the Liberty Bell cracked so soon
The first casting was flawed, and the bell cracked soon after it reached Philadelphia. Local workers tried multiple recastings to repair it.
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Spacecraft can sail on sunlight
A solar sail moves because sunlight carries momentum. Photons bouncing off the broad sail give it tiny pushes; one nudge is small, but sunlight keeps…
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Cadillac Ranch lets visitors spray-paint buried cars
Visitors are invited to spray-paint the row of vintage cars buried nose-first in a field.
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