Mental Floss

BIG QUESTIONS

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Whenever I cry, my beagle, Sadie, jumps into my lap and nudges me with her nose. Is Sadie’s intuitiveness unique, or can dogs really understand human emotions?

Meghan Holohan
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When you get home, you cover those fancy patterns up with a sheet. But those graphics are there to catch your eye in the showroom, not at home. The mattress business is extremely competitive and very confusing for the average consumer.

Kara Kovalchik


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“I’ve only got 24 hours of living, and I ain’t gonna waste ‘em here!” groans a disgruntled housefly during a hilarious scene in Pixar’s A Bug’s Life. But do those pesky insects really brandish a day-long life expectancy?

Mark Mancini


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Reader Erica emailed to say, “I heard on Twitter, from one of those 'amazing facts' accounts, that cows moo in regional accents. Is that true?”

Matt Soniak


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Let’s part the underpants-shaped veil surrounding urination information. Let’s learn about peeing.

Kate Horowitz


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The generic name “Pol” for a parrot can be traced back to England since at least the early 1600s. In his 1606 comedy Volpone, Renaissance playwright—and close friend of William Shakespeare—Ben Jonson assigned many of the characters animal personas which r

Kara Kovalchik








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Furbys were all the rage in the late nineties—1998 alone saw the sale of a whopping 27 million units—and remain popular to this day. But did you know that they’ve actually been cited as a national security threat?

Mark Mancini
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Well-meaning geologists ended up confusing plenty of folks when they named stalactites and stalagmites. Both of these similar-sounding structures—typically formed in limestone caves—are capable of stretching over 27 feet in length. But what's the differen

Mark Mancini
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If you watch the speed skaters during this year’s Winter Olympics, you’ll certainly notice something strange about the footwear they’re sporting. With a hinged blade that moves independently from the boot, modern speed skates look nothing like hockey or f

William Herkewitz
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As any kid with a mason jar can tell you, the honeybee isn't the smartest animal on the planet. But oddly enough, a honeybee colony is actually pretty intelligent. How does the group make decisions when the individuals can't?

William Herkewitz




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Some people are like homing pigeons: Drop them off anywhere, and they’ll find their way around. Other people, though, can’t tell when they’re holding a map upside down. Are the directionally challenged just bad learners? Or are some of us just lucky to be

Lucas Reilly


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Before Sochi was selected as the host of the 2014 winter Olympics, not many people had heard of it, so it didn't have a widely known English pronunciation.

Arika Okrent


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Caffeine isn’t the kickstarting jitter-drug you think it is. If anything, it’s a sneaky imposter.

Lucas Reilly
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Super Bowl XLVIII is this weekend, and both teams have already selected their designated uniforms for the occasion. But have you ever wondered why we call these athletic garments “jerseys” in the first place?

Mark Mancini
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“Squatter’s rights” isn’t a list of specific rights, but refers to a specific form of adverse possession, a legal principle that we inherited from England and has been around, in one form or another, for ages.

Matt Soniak
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Leaving aside for now the few foreign loanwords (e.g., Qatar, Iraq) where Q shows up without a U, an English Q is the only letter that can't go anywhere without a partner. Why does a Q always need a U? We can blame it on a whole bunch of our alphabetic an

Arika Okrent