Why We’re Drawn to Unexplainable Mysteries

There’s something oddly comforting about a question that refuses to bend to our neat, tidy explanations. Whether it’s the way a bike seems to defy gravity or the notion that the whole observable cosmos could be tucked inside a black hole, these puzzles keep us up at night – and that’s not a bad thing.

When the Vox podcast Unexplainable first rolled out in early 2021, the world was still gripped by a pandemic, and the usual scientific chatter felt… well, a bit sterile. Host Noam Hassenfeld wanted a different vibe: a show that didn’t pretend scientists were infallible, that admitted mistakes, and that celebrated the sheer joy of “I don’t know.” He often says the point isn’t to solve every grand cosmic riddle, but to pull back the curtain on the everyday mysteries we glide past.

Take bicycles, for example. It sounds almost comical – “we don’t really get how a bike stays up” – yet the physics is surprisingly knotty. Is it gyroscopic precession, trail geometry, rider input, or some messy combination? No single textbook gives a tidy answer, and that ambiguity makes the subject oddly thrilling. As Noam puts it, the question feels “technical enough to be serious, but simple enough to be everyday.”

That same blend of the profound and the prosaic runs through the rest of the podcast’s roster. One episode asks why humans cry – a tear‑filled mystery that blends biology, psychology, and culture. Another ponders whether yogurt deserves its own state of matter (yes, really). And then there’s the episode about people who can’t burp, a quirk that’s as relatable as it is puzzling.

These seemingly trivial enigmas sit shoulder‑to‑shoulder with the weightier ones: the origins of the universe, the emergence of life, the nature of consciousness. Noam argues that both ends of the spectrum serve a common purpose. “When we stare at a question we can’t answer, we’re forced to confront how little we actually know,” he says. It’s a humbling reminder that our knowledge is a candle flickering in an enormous dark room.

Some mysteries, however, feel almost unanswerable in principle. In a particularly mind‑bending episode, the show examined the hypothesis that our entire observable universe could be inside a black hole, which itself might sit inside a larger one, and so on ad infinitum. The problem? You can’t step outside a black hole to test the idea. One guest suggested building a particle accelerator that wrapped around the Moon – a suggestion that’s as audacious as it is technically insane. It’s a perfect illustration of a question that, for now, lives in the realm of speculation.

And then there are the ethical gray zones. Noam reflects on whether some answers should stay hidden because the path to them is dangerous. The development of the atomic bomb is the textbook example: a breakthrough that reshaped geopolitics and opened doors to nuclear power, yet also birthed a terrifying weapon. He also brings up modern dilemmas around reproductive technologies and genetic selection – questions that tiptoe into “how far is too far?” territory.

What surprises many listeners, according to Hassenfeld, is just how much of the world remains a blind spot. We have painstakingly mapped less than a third of the ocean floor, we still can’t fully explain the sense of smell, and 95 % of the cosmos is made up of dark matter and dark energy – stuff we can’t see or touch. Even the fossil record, the ultimate archive of life’s history, is embarrassingly sparse when you look for evidence of a pre‑human technological species.

All of this feeds into a simple, almost child‑like curiosity: “What don’t we know?” The answer, it turns out, is a lot. And that’s precisely why we keep asking. The unknown isn’t just a gap; it’s a space where imagination, creativity, and the very spirit of scientific inquiry converge.

So next time you watch a bike wobble through a pothole or stare up at the night sky and wonder if there’s a black hole beyond the stars, remember you’re participating in a tradition that’s as old as humanity itself. It’s a tradition that doesn’t demand immediate answers, only the willingness to sit with the mystery for a little while longer.