Big Questions

Big Question

Why Do Baseball Managers Wear Uniforms?

© Chris Williams/Icon SMI/CorbisBasketball and hockey coaches wear business suits on the sidelines. Football coaches wear team-branded shirts and jackets and often ill-fitting pleated khakis. Why are baseball managers the only guys who wear the same outfit as their players?According to John Thorn, the official historian of Major League Baseball, it goes back to the earliest days of the... READ ON

Big Question

How Does Duty Free Work?

© Heiko Wolfraum/dpa/CorbisThe Spring Break season will be here before you know it, and if you’re traveling abroad for a vacation, you’ll get to enjoy the fun and excitement of passing through Customs on your way home. Let’s take a look at a few of the other rules regarding duties and declarations, and see what's up with the duty free shop.What am I supposed to declare to Customs officers?As a general rule, you’re supposed to declare anything you’re bringing back from your trip that... READ ON

Big Question

What's the Difference Between a Street and a Road?

Reader Brit asks: "Is there any rhyme or reason to calling a road an avenue, a boulevard, a street or a lane? Is it just at the discretion of whoever names the... READ ON

Big Question

What Makes a Grand Jury So Grand?

You hear the term all the time, but is there really anything special about grand juries? Not on the surface. Like a regular trial jury, a grand jury is selected and sworn in by a court, and are often, in fact, pulled from the same pool of people as trial jurors.The job of a grand jury is a little different,... READ ON

Big Question

If the Cops Mistakenly Kick Down Your Door, Who Pays for the Damage?

If the authorities knock down your door while following procedure to catch you in some nefarious act, you’ll be paying for your own door-fixing contractor. But if the cops burst in by mistake, it becomes a trickier... READ ON

Big Question

Why Are Unidentified People Called John or Jane Doe?

From the courts to the morgue, if the government doesn’t know someone’s name or wants to withhold it, they give them one of these as a placeholder.... READ ON

Big Question

Why Don't Valentine Hearts Look Like Real Hearts?

Heart image via ShutterstockLove is in the air today, and images of two-lobed hearts are all over everything: candy, cards, decorations, you name it. That the heart is symbolic of love and passion isn’t surprising. Ancient Greek and Roman thinkers, including Aristotle, thought the organ was the center of all emotions. Why the heart symbol you see everywhere in February doesn’t look anything like an actual human heart is a little less clear, though.The symbol goes at least as far back as the... READ ON

Big Question

What Makes Bloodhounds Such Great Tracking Dogs?

Reader rccola20 wrote in to ask, "Are bloodhounds really that much better at tracking than other dog... READ ON

Big Question

Which Came First: Orange the Color or Orange the Fruit?

Reader Erica wrote in with a question about oranges. Is the fruit named for its color, or is the color named for the... READ ON

Big Question

Is Flipping a Coin Really a 50-50 Proposition?

Flipping image via ShutterstockDon't bet on it. In 2004, three statisticians from Stanford and UC Santa Cruz set out to test the classic coin flip. Using a mechanical flipper to ensure identical tosses, they chucked thousands of coins into the air and landed on a surprising conclusion. For a hand-tossed coin, there's a slight bias toward the side it started on landing face up. While the bias only means the coin lands same-side-up 51 percent of the time, that's still a better bet than anything you'll... READ ON