Mystery Hour: The Unanswered Question Archive

Can You Answer Our Unanswered Questions?

Every Thursday from midday, James O'Brien enlists the help of LBC listeners to solve the questions you've always wondered the answer to.

It's all about shared human knowledge. Call up with a question and then another listener around the country will know the answer.

The show's motto is: You will know more at one o'clock than you know now.

But just occasionally, there are some questions that manage to beat the audience. So we're putting them here in the hope that you will be able to help us out.

 

Browse the archive by subject:
Animals & Nature	Culture	Human Body	Science & Technology
Sport & Games	Words	Random

 

• Why is a Pound in Weight Lbs?

  

  A pound in weight is abbreviated to lbs - when kilograms is kg, centimetres is cm - why?

• Why Are Main Roads Called High Streets?

  

  Why is a High Street called a High Street? In America it is a Main Street - which makes more sense.

• Why Are More People Righthanded Than Left?

  

  Why are most people right-handed? Why isn't it 50-50?

• Where Does The Sky Begin and End?

  

  Where does the sky begin and end? When does it become Space?

• How high can wasps fly?

  

  How high can a wasp fly? Can they get as high as birds?

• Why does your bottom lip spasm when you drop something?

  

  If you drop something, your bottom lip has a single spasm. Why does that happen?

• Why does soap stop a mirror steaming up?

  

  if I put a coating of soap on a mirror, it doesn't steam up. Why?

• How do anti-static cloths work?

  

  I got an anti-static cloth with my TV. So how does an anti-static cloth work and does it keep on going forever?

• We use french scoring for tennis, so why don't they?

  

  Watching the French Open tennis, they don't use the love and deuce we use, which are French in origin anyway. Why not?

• Where does the word 'Ninny' come from?

  

  When I was silly as a boy, my dad called me a "ninny" – probably short for nincompoop. Where do those two words come from?

• If you commit a crime in space, would you get arrested?

  

  Can you commit an offence in space? If you do, who would prosecute you?

• Why do words have silent letters?

  

  Why do words have silent letters in front of them - like knife or gnat? What is the point of them?

• Do you weigh the same holding food as after eating it?

  

  If you hold a sandwich and weigh yourself, then eat the sandwich and weigh yourself, would you weigh the same?

• What speed do a bee's wings go?

  

  When a bumble bee flies, what speed does his wings go? They say it breaks the laws of physics for a bee to fly.

• What are beauty spots?

  

  Why do you get beauty spots? They look different to moles.