Most of my questions are about death. Who killed JonBenét? Will we know? How was Hitler able to summon an army? Where to begin?
Eddie's End
Altered Carbon Surprise GIF by NETFLIXGiphy"Edgar Allen Poe's last days. Where did he disappear to? Was he kidnapped? Did he go on a bender? Why was he found in a delirious state? Drugs? Disease? Trauma?"
"I saw a show where they gave doctors a patient's symptoms without revealing who the patient was. Based on Poe's symptoms and behavior, the doctor thought he likely died of rabies. I thought that was an interesting theory."
And Silver?
"The Late Bronze Age Collapse."
"Even though there's simply not enough evidence left to find a clear answer, there's some pretty solid theories around. The videos from Extra Credits about the Bronze Age Collapse are pretty good for example. Not least of all, because they point to several factors and avoid easy if enticing answers like the mysterious so-called sea people."
- Fessir
Last Day on Earth
"On September 10, 2001, Mohamed Atta and Abdul-Azzia Al-Omari drive from Boston to Portland, Maine. They spent the afternoon at the Wadsworth-Longfellow House, the former home of author Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Al-Omari was apparently so taken with the young tour guide that he shook her hand for an uncomfortable amount of time and repeatedly thanked her."
"Why the two of the 9/11 hijackers took a tour of a 19th century New England author's home has never been explained. Maybe they were killing time. They certainly weren't hiding while in Portland as they are also spotted at a Walmart and a Pizza Hut."
"The FBI spent years reviewing possible leads in Portland to try to link any possible al Qaeda sympathizer who may have met with the two hijackers in Portland. They've never come up with anything. Their best explanation is that Atta believed security would be less stringent at a regional commuter airport. That, however, doesn't explain why two Islamist terrorists took time out of their last day on Earth to visit Henry Longfellow's home."
The Uncertain
Buy a Vowel.Giphy"The Great Vowel Shift. What happened is pretty well understood but not why it happened. There are some hypotheses but nothing is certain."
"I'm not English, but the same happened in German. what I knew so far is that the thesis is that the different local languages mixed as the people did and that is how the vowel shift happened."
Edgar Allen Poe was a genius. I've always wondered about his end. I'm glad I'm I'm alone. And will we ever reach a day when 9/11 isn't always a question?
A complete inventory...
sphinx cat GIFGiphy"How, when and why Gobekli Tepe was built, how old the Sphinx is and how it looked originally, whether there is a library underneath, and how massive stone structures across the planet were built with such precision. And exactly WHAT literature, documents, objects the Vatican holds, with a complete inventory?"
Dance Again
"The dancing plague."
"Ergot doesn't really explain it. People danced for days non-stop in multiple locations. Even if ergot intoxication was present, any psychoactive effect would have worn off within 24 hours. Ergot poisoning also causes physical symptoms (nausea, weakness) which would make it impossible to dance for that long, and it's implausible that every intoxicated person would behave in the same way."
"Upon encountering a group afflicted by the dancing plague, symptomless passers by would feel compelled to join in, and the whole event seems to have started when a single individual started dancing and others joined in. Some kind of collective/mass psychosis or hysteria seems more likely. There are lots of recorded instances of similar episodes."
People Share Which Social Norms Absolutely Baffle Them | George Takei’s Oh Myyy
Trade
"The Norse traveled to North America but they didn't stay, they didn't return back and they didn't tell anyone else, that, hey, there's a freakin' ton of good land over there. Maybe we should all join together and return to fight. Or at least start a trade route like we have with all the people on our side of the planet."
"Why? And if that event was so traumatizing how come we don't have Native American oral stories or at least legends of pale people arriving from the East in ships trying to mess everything and everyone up with weapons that no one has ever seen before."
Out to Swim
"The Australian Prime Minister that went for a swim and never returned."
"While we'll never know for sure what exactly happened, it also doesn't require too much guesswork. Harold Holt was a very competent swimmer and free-diver, and frequently went out ocean swimming and spear fishing. To the point one would argue to be too overconfident."
"The particular day he went out was rougher than normal, even his friends that were going decided to pull out and warned Holt against going as well. Holt was also a heavy smoker, very overweight, drank like a fish, and was also just old. Most likely explanation is that he was caught in a rip (very possible given the day's conditions), got carried out to sea and in his poor health got exhausted and drowned. Unfortunate, but very likely given all the circumstances."
Stories of LA
"The Battle of Los Angeles. One night 3 months after the USA entered WWII, there was an attack by the Japanese on Los Angeles. Except it wasn't the Japanese. After the war, Japan stated that they had flown no planes over Los Angeles in the entirety of the war. No one really knew what the anti-aircraft shells and machine bullets fired at, and there were many varying reports of what it was, from weather balloons to airplanes to a false alarm."
- Allorz
Google It
dance music rave GIF by Story Time with Fat JewGiphy"Who built Stonehenge?"
"And more importantly, what's the meaning of Stonehenge? (it's killing me that no one knows)."
- Ockniel
So much fascination yet to be discovered. And who and why when it comes to Stonehenge? Now I'm more inquisitive than before.
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