Things you never knew that nobody knows

Wendy Zukerman, Asia-Pacific reporter

Before Donald Rumsfeld talked about known unknowns, and Disney?s Pocahontas sang about the things you never knew you never knew, there was Confucius.

Quoting the ancient Chinese philosopher in his book Walden, Henry David Thoreau wrote ?To know that we know what we know and that we do not know what we do not know, that is true knowledge.?

Enter William Hartston, a British chess champion-cum-newspaper columnist, who highlights his own true knowledge in The Things that Nobody Knows: 501 Mysteries of Life, the Universe and Everything, a guide to today?s known unknowns. Written in alphabetical order, it begins with Aardvarks (are they the closest living relative of a creature from which all mammals evolved?) and ends in Zymology, the study of fermentation.

Each mystery is delightfully penned in bite sized chunks that often includes humorous repertoire. For example, Hartson writes that we may only ever know if the ancient Anasazi people of America?s South West were cannibals if we discover a recipe book of the period.

The book falls down, however, when the mysteries, while unknown, are also uninteresting. Case in point is Mystery 73: What colour was Christopher Smart?s cat Jeoffry? I betray my lackadaisical attitude here, but I care little about the 18th Century poet and even less about the shade of his feline, who stars in his poem Jubilate Agno. Another example is Mystery 166: What were the jokes that Einstein told his parrot?

Such entries are not only a trifle boring, they also debase the more relevant curiosities in Harston?s book such as dark matter, the origin of laughter and how are memories stored in the brain.

Harston also tends to get pernickety about some of life?s unknowns. Mystery 37, for example, questions what bees obtain from watching their infamous waggle dance. Discovered in 1946 by Karl von Frisch the waggle dance is a boogie that bees perform to inform their colleagues about the location of a potentially new hive. While scientists don?t know every intricate detail about the dance, they have a pretty good handle on the bizarre display.

Despite these gripes, the book is still highly enjoyable. Giggles and questioning sighs escaped from my mouth on many occasions while reading it. Indeed many a colleague in the New Scientist offices delighted in possible explanations for the inspiration behind the Mannekin Pis statuette in Brussels, Belgium (does it celebrate the tale of a little boy who put out a fire near the king?s castle by peeing on it?).

If only Harston whittled his book down to fewer mysteries, it would have been more captivating and inspiring. But for unknown number 502, I would suggest watching? Pocahontas: How high does the sycamore grow? Or for number 503: Why does the grinning bob cat grin?

Book information:
The Things that Nobody Knows: 501 Mysteries of Life, the Universe and Everything
by William Hartston
Publisher: Atlantic
?16.99/

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Source: http://feeds.newscientist.com/c/749/f/10897/s/1995484a/l/0L0Snewscientist0N0Cblogs0Cculturelab0C20A110C10A0Cthings0Eyou0Enever0Eknew0Ethat0Enobody0Eknows0Bhtml0DDCMP0FOTC0Erss0Gnsref0Fonline0Enews/story01.htm

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