An Assortment of Odd and Unusual Facts Quiz

Answer: An appearance of Halley's comet

The Bayeux Tapestry, which illustrates the Norman conquest, contains one scene in which the audience at King Harold's coronation are pointing at a comet in the sky, now known to be Halley's comet. This seems to have been a bad omen for poor Harold, who was killed at the Battle of Hastings, but a good one for William the Conqueror who defeated him and became the new King of England, and whose descendants still reign today.

The supernova that formed the Crab Nebula occurred in 1054, was observed by Chinese astronomers, remained visible in the daytime for 23 days, and is considered the most famous supernova of all time.

Answer: False

The claim that the Earth has more than one moon was popularized by the TV show "QI," in which the host delights in debunking commonly believed ideas. In the same vein, several websites refer to Cruithne as "Earth's second moon." However, contrary to these assertions, this is one of the times that common sense is correct! According to the International Astronomical Union, for something to be a moon, it must be in orbit around a body other than its star.

Although the orbit of Cruithne is influenced by the Earth, it actually orbits the Sun and is considered an asteroid.

The Earth only has one natural object in a regular orbit around it, and that is the Moon that we all know so well.

Answer: False

Although Facebook has been criticized for the way it handles people's private information, in 2014 they launched a site on the dark web that allows users to sign up using the Tor browser, although they still have to provide their real names, so they cannot use the site anonymously.

The purpose of the Tor service is to protect users' privacy from third parties who might be spying on them when they sign up. This can be an issue in countries where Facebook is censored or subject to government surveillance, such as China and Iran.

Answer: Luxembourg

Luxembourg is a constitutional monarchy whose nominal head of state is the Grand Duke. Luxembourg became a sovereign grand duchy in 1815, after becoming independent from Napoleonic France. Historically, a grand duchy was usually smaller than a kingdom but larger than a sovereign dukedom.

In the 19th century there were as many as 14 grand duchies at once, but the others were all eventually absorbed into other countries. Monaco and Liechtenstein are each ruled by a prince. San Marino is a republic with two elected heads of state called the Captains Regent.

Answer: Leonardo da Vinci

Some people have pointed out that the image on the shroud looks remarkably like a photographic negative. The authors of this book claim that this is what it actually is! Specifically, they argue that Leonardo da Vinci, genius that he was, secretly developed a process for making photographic images appear on cloth, centuries ahead of his time, and that he used this to forge the Turin shroud using his own face as a model.

They describe an experiment they performed in which they were able to replicate such a feat using materials that were available in Leonardo's time. Allen Nicholas, an art historian, has also claimed that the image on the shroud is a medieval photograph, and has performed similar experiments to Prince and Picknett to demonstrate that this is at least possible.

He has published his findings in scientific journals, although he has not gone so far as to speculate about who the photographer might be. Debate about the origin of the shroud continues.

Answer: The assassination of President Kennedy

President John F. Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, so when the first episode of "Doctor Who" was broadcast the next day, it went somewhat unnoticed. As a result, the BBC re-broadcast the episode the following week immediately before showing the second episode. One of the contributing factors to the show's longevity is that the producers found a way to replace the lead actor without writing the main character out of the show, based on the concept that the Doctor can "regenerate" and change his appearance when needed.

Hence, the main character has been played by many different actors.

Answer: Betting on a biased roulette wheel

Jaggers' exploits are described in a 1901 book called "Monte Carlo Anecdotes and Systems of Play" by Victor Bethell. Jaggers believed that a defective roulette wheel might be biased in such a way that certain numbers would win more often than would be expected by chance.

Therefore, he employed a group of clerks to record the winning numbers at the roulette tables at Monte Carlo and discovered that one of them did have such a bias! He then proceeded to bet on the affected wheel and proceeded to win a huge sum. Card counting at blackjack was developed much later and was made famous by the 1962 publication of "Beat the Dealer" by Edward Thorp, a mathematician who developed a surprisingly easy method of gaining the upper hand in this popular game.

Answer: Chinese giant salamander

The Chinese giant salamander has been known to grow up to 1.8 metres long and to weigh up to 64 kg. It is highly endangered as it considered a luxury food item in China and is threatened by habitat loss. The Chilean giant frog is one of the world's largest frogs at half a kilogram, but obviously does not even come close to the giant salamander. The other two answers I just made up!

Answer: True

This weird sport was described in a 1949 issue of "Mechanix Illustrated." It was highly popular into the 1960s and events could attract thousands of spectators. Teams of divers would descend into the sea, often without breathing apparatus, and try to capture a live octopus and drag it to the surface.

The team that captured the largest octopus would win. Eventually, interest in this risky and inhumane activity faded away, so now the octopuses can be left in peace.

Answer: The Earth is destroyed

Although these are all very different novels, the Earth comes to an end in all of them, although for different reasons in each case. In "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" and "The Forge of God" this is brought about by malevolent aliens hostile to humanity.

However, in "Childhood's End" the last generation of humans achieve some form of transcendence and willingly vaporise the Earth for their own mysterious reasons.