Up to date with new questions at 4:40 p.m. ET on November 4, 2025.
The 37-volume Naturalis Historia, written by the Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder, is the world’s earliest surviving encyclopedia. Within the first century C.E., Pliny got down to accumulate the breadth of human data, and millennia later, it’s nonetheless an excellent doc for studying a little bit bit about every part. It has chapters on sugar, Germany, the rainbow, Cesarean births, the artwork of portray, and hypothetical antipodes.
It additionally makes delightfully obvious the place Pliny’s most passionate pursuits lay: Take into account the chapters “Elephants (Their Capability),” “When Elephants Have been First Put Into Harness,” “The Docility of the Elephant,” and “Great Issues Which Have Been Executed by the Elephant.”
I hope you discover a matter you take pleasure in simply as a lot on this week’s trivia.
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Tuesday, November 4, 2025
- The ballooning of college GPAs as professors give larger and better marks is a phenomenon recognized by what title?
— From Ian Bogost’s “Why College students Are Obsessed With ‘Factors Taken Off’” - Some medical influencers recommend that irritation may be cured with what bitter herb used to taste absinthe and vermouth?
— From Jason Liebowitz’s “The Irritation Hole” - Yoknapatawpha County is the fictional Mississippi setting of all however a couple of of the novels by what American writer of the twentieth century?
— From Michael Gorra’s “The Man Who Rescued [REDACTED]”
And by the way in which, do you know that the explanation folks shout “Geronimo!” when leaping from an excellent peak is probably going as a result of one World Conflict II–period Military non-public occurred to see a film about Geronimo the night time earlier than his first check soar? His fellow troopers stated he’d be too scared the following day to even keep in mind his personal title; he did them one higher.
It’s a disgrace the troopers didn’t have the time to see one thing a little bit longer—one other hour or so within the theater, and we might have all been screaming “Scarlett O’Hara!” each time we skydive.
Till tomorrow!
Solutions:
- Grade inflation. Harvard not too long ago took a stab at fixing the spiraling disaster, however undergraduates’ catastrophizing response confirmed simply how intractable the battle between college students and professors is, Ian writes. Learn extra.
- Wormwood. There may be, it is not going to shock you to study, not a lot in the way in which of proof for this miracle remedy. However, as Liebowitz writes, the irritating, usually inexplicable nature of autoimmune illnesses and their accompanying irritation—all the time irritation—makes the straightforward solutions of other medication arduous to withstand. Learn extra.
- William Faulkner. We consider Faulkner now as a tentpole of the American literary custom; Gorra argues that the American literary custom exists because it does now solely because of the critic Malcolm Cowley, who fostered Faulkner, John Cheever, Jack Kerouac, and extra. Learn extra.
How did you do? Come again tomorrow for extra questions, or click on right here for final week’s. And for those who assume up an excellent query after studying an Atlantic story—or just need to share a wild truth—ship it my manner at [email protected].
Monday, November 3, 2025
- What president who assumed workplace after the 1901 assassination of William McKinley constructed the unique West Wing and East Wing of the White Home?
— From Neil Flanagan’s “White Home Structure Was an Honor System. Trump Observed.” - What poetic meter consisting of 10 syllables per line was possible launched to English drama by Christopher Marlowe after which extensively popularized by William Shakespeare?
— From Isaac Butler’s “The Cussed Delusion of the Literary Genius” - In baseball notation, a strikeout is represented by what letter—flipped backwards if the batter goes out with out swinging?
— From Steve Rushin’s “The Greatest Postseason in Baseball Historical past?”
And, by the way in which, do you know that the Athletics’ (previously of Oakland) mascot is—this one is for you, Pliny—an elephant? The origin of the mascot is a dig from a rival supervisor, who within the early twentieth century stated that the A’s had a “massive white elephant on their arms” within the type of a roster of pricy and ineffective gamers. These gamers and their followers took it in stride.
Solutions:
- Teddy Roosevelt. The low-slung annexes revered the design of the unique White Home architect, James Hoban, and the undertaking established a norm for shielding the historic character of the advanced. However, as Flanagan writes, norms can all the time be ignored. Learn extra.
- Iambic pentameter. Shakespeare will get quite a lot of credit score for inventiveness, however Marlowe was the extra daring cultural vanguard, particularly in the way in which he carried out his life—“in all probability homosexual, probably a spy, usually in hassle with the legislation,” Butler writes. It’s subsequently straightforward for histories of him to veer into fable. Learn extra.
- Ok. The Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Trey Yesavage notched 12 Ks in Sport 4 of this 12 months’s World Sequence—essentially the most ever by a rookie in collection historical past. Rushin writes that Yesavage was hardly the lone star in a postseason that proved baseball can nonetheless shock. Learn extra.
