Mental Floss

BIG QUESTIONS

Perhaps a recall is in order.

A car accident in a movie usually ends in a huge fireball. But what really causes vehicle fires?

Jake Rossen












Nothing lasts forever, especially suds.

Common household cleaning products like dish soap and laundry detergent might get forgotten about for years before being found and used. Will they still be effective?

Jake Rossen


An illustration of the Man in the Moon.

People have been observing faces and figures on the moon for hundreds (if not thousands) of years. There’s a perfectly scientific explanation as to why.

Lorna Wallace


Skylab 2 commander Peter Conrad attempts to take a shower aboard the spacecraft in 1973.

Here on Earth, we tend to take showering for granted. But getting clean isn’t so easy without the force of gravity helping you out.

Tim Brinkhof








Several factors make people more susceptible to the flu in winter.

Like clockwork, flu viruses seem to strike more people in winter than in any other season—and there are several reasons for that.

Matt Soniak
Getting ready to catch some Zs.

How did we come to associate sleeping and snoring with the letter ‘Z’? The origins trace back farther than you might think but are tied to early 20th-century American comic strips.

Marla Mackoul