Do you really know?

Of all the involuntary spasms the human body has, hiccuping is one of the most peculiar. Sure, it’s funny at first, and in particular if it’s happening to someone else rather than you. But it quickly gets annoying if it doesn’t go away! There are two things to note when you have the hiccups. First, your respiratory muscles, and the diaphragm in particular, contract suddenly and push out air from w...

Getting babies to sleep is big business, and a major source of stress for parents. There are many theories and methods: rock them, sing, let them cry it out. But now science has come to the rescue and we can finally put this question to bed. Hopefully.    According to a study published in September 2022 in Current Biology, “approximately 20%–30% of infants cry excessively and exhibit sleep difficu...

The Suez Canal is 120 miles long, with 12% of global trade passing through. It is over 200 metres wide and 23 metres deep. It connects the Red Sea and Mediterranean Sea, starting at Port Said and ending at Suez Port. It’s by far the most direct shipping route between Asia and Europe. Prior to its existence, vessels had to travel around the south of Africa. 19,000 ships passed through the waterway...

Natural disasters lead to damaged property, loss of life, psychological trauma, displaced individuals and families, among other consequences. According to the World Meteorological Organisation, the number of natural disasters has increased five times since 1970. Researchers from all over the whole world have dedicated their careers to studying natural disasters. And they all agree on one thing. Th...

You may remember hearing about ancient Greek hero Ulysses in school lessons. He’s the central character in Homer’s Odyssey. As legend goes, after fighting for a decade in the Trojan war, Ulysses wandered the world for another 10 years to get back home to his wife and son. On his enforced travels, Ulysses suffered danger, adversity and loneliness throughout. Spanish psychiatrist Joseba Achotegui sa...

The Koh-i-noor is a diamond set in the crown which was made especially for the Queen mother’s  coronation in 1937.  It would traditionally be worn by Camilla, the new Queen consort, on the coronation of King Charles on the 6th of May 2023. However, the diamond, or rather how the diamond came to be gleaming out from a British crown is steeped in controversy. A spokesman for the Indian prime ministe...

The US midterm elections are held this Tuesday, 8th of November 2022. There have been many reports of political misinformation on social media in what's looking to be a contenious election. Listen to our rerun episode about Truth Social, the social media created by former president Donald Trump. On February 22nd, Trump Media & Technology Group launched its own social network called Truth Social, w...

American psychiatrist Stephen B. Karpman coined this social model of human interaction in 1968. It describes the roles that we take on in unbalanced social relations. Relations which lead us to take one of three roles within Karpman’s triangle. These are three roles in Karpman's triangle. These are the victim, the persecutor and the saviour. And the role we take on unconsciously leads someone else...

If you’re asking yourself whether cracking your knuckles is a bad thing, we'll take it as a given that you do crack your knuckles. You’ve probably also been told at some point that doing so will give you arthritis, most likely by someone already annoyed at you doing it! So, just how seriously should you be taking the know-it-alls? As you’re probably aware, many people find the noise pretty off-put...

The Japanese concept of Ikigai roughly translates as “reason for being”, like . The “Iki” part means life, while “gai” refers to value or worth. So it effectively means finding a purpose to life and the things we spend our time doing.  This philosophy dates back to the 12th century, but has been gaining in popularity among Westerners in recent years. That’s in particular thanks to the 2017 release...

The strange experience of deja vu sometimes lasts just a matter of milliseconds. Nonetheless it can still catch you off guard and be pretty unsettling. Deja vu means “already seen” in French. It refers to the sense of having already seen or experienced something you’re confronted with, even though you know that you have never actually seen it before. For example, you visit a new city for the first...

Following a bitter and highly divisive campaign, marked by fake news and attacks between the two leading candidates, Brazil has a new president. Well, maybe “new” isn’t exactly the right word. Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva already served two terms as president from 2003 to 2010. Now the man once referred to as “the most popular politician in the world” by Barack Obama has made a sensational comeback,...

Remember, remember the 5th of November. Gunpowder treason and plot. On the 5th November there are fireworks displays all over England. In some places they still have a bonfire and will burn a guy on it. Listen to our episode to find out who this guy represents. This is an effigy of a human named after Guy Fawkes who, in the early hours of the 5th of November 1605, was arrested for the Gunpowder Pl...

What are you most attracted to when looking for someone to date? Social status? A sense of humour? Good looks? Those are all positive traits for sure, but for sapioseuxals there’s one quality which trumps all others, and that’s intelligence. The word comes from the Latin word “sapien”, which means wise. Sapiosexuals don’t fall in love at first sight or even through an emotional spark. Rather, they...

It’s been two years since we last discussed the Amazon on Do You Really Know, and even in that time, the outlook for the world’s largest tropical rainforest has worsened significantly. A report called “Amazonia against the Clock” was released in September, warning that the rainforest could reach a point of no return as soon as 2025. A study published in Nature Climate Change journal in March 2022...

Picture this. You’re in a fine art museum, admiring some of the greatest masterpieces of all time, and all of a sudden someone throws a can of soup over one of them. Sounds pretty surreal, right? Well that’s exactly the scene that visitors to London’s National Gallery found themselves confronted with on 14th October 2022. So what happened? Two young women threw tomato soup over Van Gogh’s Sunflowe...

Covid has swept the globe sparing very few, in fact some people have had covid multiple times. But then there are some lucky people who have never had it even if they work or live with infected people. According to research from the University of Oxford and University of California, this might be due to a particular gene mutation that effectively makes them immune. Well, sort of. It is a bit more...

Health professionals have warned against the dangers of puff bars on younger consumers for some time now. This recent phenomenon has become massively popular with young people, and especially on TikTok. Puff bars, also known as vape pens or pod mods, are flavoured electronic cigarettes designed for one-time use. Social networks have been flooded with puff bars of all different colours. From far aw...

Halloween is here and if you’re anything like us, you’ll be frantically doing some last-minute pumpkin carving or stocking up on sweets for trick-or-treaters. Maybe you’re going to a Halloween party dressed up as a ghost, witch or any other kind of spooky creature. But have you ever wondered where all these quirky customs came from? While Halloween seems like a very modern celebration, its origins...

“Spring forward, fall back” goes the saying; that’s right - today, Sunday the 30th of October 2022, saw the clocks go back an hour, meaning it gets dark earlier all of a sudden and winter is on its way! If there’s one day, or rather two days, of the year where you don’t want to schedule any important appointments, it’s on a day when the clock changes. Forgetting the time change is something that’s...

With Halloween right around the corner, find out about the not-so-spooky internet behavior we all hate: ghosting. Listen to our rerun episode! Ghosting is a modern slang term for ceasing all communication without any warning or explanation. It’s likely happened to you in the past at some point, and you may well have ghosted someone yourself! The term was first added to dating jargon in the 2000s,...

The nipples are an erogenous zone for many people. But as it turns out, having them touched can bring on a whole other kind of feeling for others. The so-called sad nipple syndrome has been discussed more openly on Reddit and Tiktok in the last few years, raising awareness. But it still remains somewhat of a mystery. It refers to a wave of negative emotions on a person when their nipples are touch...

You’ve no doubt heard references to the existence of body clocks, and it’s no surprise because all of our bodily functions are regulated by the circadian system. To put it simply, our circadian rhythms optimise bodily functions. In this episode, we explain why it is important. They are managed by a master clock known as the circadian pacemaker which is formed of around 20,000 neurons. It’s situate...

Ghost stories told around a camp fire, visiting a haunted house or watching a scary film are all common Halloween activities. We clearly enjoy scaring each-other and feeling scared, even though it seems completely counter intuitive. There are a number of reasons for this, which we'll explore in the episode. Fear is an emotional response to danger, both real or perceived. Our body releases a mixtur...

The energy crisis is still going on in all of Europe. The price of oil and gas is worrying governments as the cold winter months get closer. In this episode, we delve into the history of energy and explain what an oil shock is. For over a century, oil has been both a fuel and a barometer for the world economy. But it can also be a double-edged sword as Western countries found out in the 1970s. At...