On December 24, 2025 Fox News Opinion published “The Huge Mysteries We Still Can’t Explain” and it’s a humbling read. “From consciousness and memory to dark matter, we don’t know the answers to much of the universe,” it begins and then it plows through many of the big questions we’ve all contemplated but a few smaller ones I know I surely haven’t and it occurred to me you may not have either. Like, for instance:
“… Why when we find something funny do we physically express it by rhythmically expelling air?”
It never occurred to me to wonder about laughter. I’ve always just enjoyed it when I do it, never giving it a second thought.
“They [scientists] don’t know what causes aging at a fundamental level or if it can be reversed.”
It never occurred to me to wonder about why we age. Time, as we understand it, is linear, and as such, moves inexorably forward. We, being organic creatures, are not designed to last forever. I’ve always just accepted that, never questioned it, but my goodness, it’s a question worth answering, isn’t it? Why are we designed to slowly break down and die? Isn’t everything in nature here on Earth destined to fail, one way or another, sooner or later? But of course science should contemplate that, even if ordinary me never did.
“Scientists only partially understand what causes intelligence or consciousness. They have a limited understanding of why people sleepwalk, talk in their sleep, dream, often can’t remember dreams or sometimes get déjà vu. They don’t fully understand how memories are stored, retrieved, altered and erased, or how memory works at a molecular level. Scientists have many theories but aren’t completely sure why humans hiccup, yawn, blush, laugh or cry tears.”
These things seem to me to fall into the same category as why cats purr: science simply doesn’t know. They just know that they do. And we cat owners get to enjoy it!
“We haven’t ascertained …why we get songs stuck in our heads. And so much more.”
Hah! Again, it never occurred to me to wonder why we get a song stuck in our heads though our oldest daughter came up with a solution to it: sing, even if it’s only silently, a verse of “Yankee Doodle” and whatever song you are grappling with with disappear. Of course, you may end up trading one for the other, but at least for me, it does work as a kind of mental palate cleanser, so maybe it will work for you too.
Anyway, the whole piece is worth a read and you can find it here.