Which is why it is worrisome – but also a little bit exciting – to encounter questions seemingly quite basic, so fundamental to our day-to-day lives yet which leave even the brightest among us saying, “I dunno.” A sampling:

Why don’t we fly off into space? 

Yes, Newton got the ball rolling (as it were) back in the 1600s, and Einstein made some truly revolutionary observations early in the 20th Century, but the fact is, while we know that physical bodies tend to attract other physical bodies in proportion to their mass, we don’t know how – in part because we’re not even entirely sure where mass itself comes from. Is it a particle with weird properties? Does it employ tiny grappling hooks? Does it attract with suggestive texts or discount coupons? No idea. (Incidentally, this is one of the questions the Large Hadron Collider you may have heard about is attempting to shed light on.)

What does 3/4 of the planet look like?

In an age when you can hop on Google Earth and zoom in use a satellite to see what’s shakin’ on the streets of Paris, you could be forgiven for thinking there are no undiscovered countries left on Earth. Heck, why else would we be itching to go check out Mars? But according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, “more than 95 percent of the underwater world remains unexplored,” despite the fact that the ocean covers 71% of the planet. Beyond to those stark numbers, at least one leading theory proposes deep sea vents might hold the secret to the origins of life, and two dozen Japanese films suggest it might hold the key to mankind’s destruction. So maybe we should get some guys down there? (And while we’re at it, can we get somebody on Trash Island?)

Why do we need sleep?

Almost every living creature on the planet has been observed sleeping – and it seems to be not just a fun pastime for the lazy, but a thing without which you very well might die. But the actual reason why it’s necessary – or even, what, exactly, sleep does for us – is a mystery. From an evolutionary perspective, it doesn’t seem like having a regular period when you are extremely hard-pressed to respond to threats would be a winning horse, but there it is. And given that 1/3 of all the lives that have ever been lived have been spent doing this thing, it feels like we should have some sort of insight, doesn’t it?

Image by Brian Hillegas, used under a Creative Commons license.

Which is why we’re always excited to find cool attempts to give us mere mortals a chance to see the outlines of a previously unimaginable reality. Wired ran this article about a year ago, featuring entries into a competition sponsored by Science magazine and the National Science Foundation, but our favorite is below:  a crowd-sourced project to track the path of trash from Seattle to … well, you’ll see.

The nominees are:

• Prettiest Dogs: The Westminster Dog Show - “The Oscars of Dog Shows“
• Saltiest Dogs: The British Nautical Awards - “The Oscars of Boating“
• Most Pedantic: Milken Family Foundation National Educator Award - ”The Oscars of Teaching“
• Most Delicious: James Beard Awards - ”The Oscars of the Food World“
• Highest Protein Content: National Western Stock Show – “The Oscars of Livestock“
• Smallest Greenhouse Gas Footprint: Gigaton Awards - “The Oscars of Carbon Emission Reduction“
• Best Upscale Casual Dining in the Greater Charleston, NC Area – Oscar’s of Summerville – “The Oscar’s of Summerville“

The colors we see from Earth’s surface are the signs of an intense battle between the planet’s magnetosphere and the deadly radiation the sun routinely kicks our way – and we’re currently (yes, this very minute) feeling the effects of the largest solar storm since 2005.

At Marshall, we can’t help but note certain parallels to our favorite space opera – those flashing lights represent the plucky, ragtag electromagnetic field that’s fending off a planet-killing extraterrestrial threat to all mankind – a threat that hasn’t been seen in six years.

Look for us on the roof, celebrating our second victory over our very own Death Star.

Yub Yub.

Image from a Flickr user, used under Creative Commons license. 

It’s entirely possible that my entire body of work – as both a writer and a performer – is based around the premise that “funny” and “smart” are two great tastes that go great together. When paired with funny, smart loses its overbearing know-it-all-ness and gets a back door into your brain. Funny packs more of a punch when its got smart behind it, stacked with layers of meaning and a little ring of truth behind it. It’s a tricky balance, but the payoff is just … just great.

Two of my favorite travelers along of the smart/funny vector are Randall Munroe of xkcd and Zach Weiner of Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal. Often working with only a single frame and a few lines of text, they drive home a much bigger idea. Here are a couple of my favorites (PS – I also find the use of charts funny):

“Slides”- xkcd

“Tips for Living Together” – Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

For sports fans:

Name: Robin Khalil Dardai
Born: January 22nd 7:26pm CST
Weighing in at: 8 lbs, 7 oz
Height: 22 inches
Earned Run Average: 2.73

First round draft pick after a promising showing in the womb. Tough, athletic build may make him the first of his generation to do “The Full Sanders.”

For nerds:

Constitution: 18
Dexterity: 4 (will improve with age)
Charisma: 20
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Class: Valorous Bard
At Will Spell: Vicious Mockery
Encounter Spell: Fast Friends
Daily Spell: Stirring Shout

For fans of Downton Abbey:

Peerage: The Most Noble Robin Khalil Dardai, Duke of Sale and Marquess of Ormesby; Earl of Sale; Baron Ware of Thame; Prince of Maine; and King of New England.

ALERT!!! SPOILERS BELOW!!!

- Last season’s intense “Google Calendar” storyline re-sparks after a seemingly innocent typo ends up scheduling Sandy and Brad for the same meeting…with the same client…in different rooms in the office! In the firestorm that follows, can either of them emerge unscathed?

- After months of missed signals and coy flirtation, Dan and WordPress 3.3.1 finally admit that they’ve always been right for each other. But what happens when Ruby on Rails swings back into town? And what about the plugin that was tossed aside in favor of the new, streamlined, integrated customer help app?

- Marni spent the latter half of the first season haunted by the death of the previous coffee machine. When she begins receiving encrypted emails warning her that the new coffee machine might also be in danger, she sees a chance for redemption. But are the mysterious tips coming from a concerned samaritan…or the murderous fiend attempting to claim another victim?

- The scandal that nearly took down Bilal‘s administration in the Content Coordination Division turned out to be nothing more than a cleverly tweeted ruse, and the resulting shakeup in the CCD creates a new paradigm that nobody knows how to handle. Sela Ward joins the team as Judge Advocate General Claudia St. Vincent, and an old ally from Alaska will run afoul of a new enemy from Brazil.

- Nick’s struggle with the Maledicta Rex virus continues…but this time, instead of battling it out in cyberspace, Nick will have to face the virus in the real world…of Victorian England! Marshall Creative ventures into the fourth dimension and beyond! With colleagues such as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Benjamin Disraeli at his side, will Nick finally manage to vanquish his clever, blue-screening nemesis?

It’s sure to be an exciting–and hilarious–new set of adventures for your favorite creative agency! You won’t want to miss it!

He burst through the door of our office with all the desperate oxygen of a hungry mutt outside a burning butcher shop. His raincoat was soaked through and his hat was a shambles. The scar at the side of his eye told a story in which nobody got what they wanted and the bruise that had started to form on his jaw was still trying to decide between tragedy and farce. He stared down the hallway, lost in the strange hell of his own little world.

“Can we help you?” I asked. His eyes darted to mine. They were bright, soap-stained glasses half-emptied of too much knowledge.

“I’m in Dutch, pal,” he said. “Just had an off-the-track dropper try to clip me down at the scatter, and that’s the third one in two days. I don’t know who’s got the curse on me, but if I don’t take a Mickey Finn fast, you’re gonna have to size me up for an overcoat.”

“What?” I said.

“Gotta think,” the man said, pacing the room. The carpet was gathering water like the blood from yet another anonymous sadsack. “It can’t be Lemmy the Giant, he’s under glass for a three-spot. And there’s no way he’d throw lead at me over that business with the Snowbird.”

“Can we get you some coffee or anything?” I offered.

“All the other Johnson brothers I know are either chilled off or too flat for a job like this. Which means it must be one of the bulls. Or one of the bulls on orders from one of the highbinders.”

“We’re a creative agency,” I informed him. “Are you interested in a website, perhaps, or a rebranding campaign?” He leaned over my desk and his mouth hung a sharp left from sneer into suspicion.

“Rebranding?” he spat. “Say, what’s the grift here? I’m not some mark you can fleece with all your dime-store promises of a better life. I know I got a mug like a penny bent on the tracks but as far as my brand is concerned I got no kick.”

“I’m just trying to see if there’s some way we can help you,” I said. “We also do marketing and promotions.” He lifted me up like I was nothing but a bag of feathers.

“Don’t be a bunny,” he growled in my face. “I got roscoes in the wind and I got just enough eel in me to maybe pull off a clean sneak. The last thing I need is to do any advertising.”

“Well…” I said. “It doesn’t look like we have anything you’d want. Perhaps you should leave.”

“Perhaps I should. You’re starting sound like that goofy twist I met in the skids who’d gone over the edge with the rams.”

“What?” I said.

He dropped me back in my chair, gave the room a look like a snap trap ten minutes from its last victim. Then he opened the door and took off down the hallway.

We never learned what became of him, whether he managed to elude his pursuers and strike back with force or if he ended up just another poor stiff staring at the fish in the river. We suspect we could have provided him with something of value from our catalog of creative products, but we’re also not sure how long it could have taken for us to speak the same language.

So we’re not going to pretend that we don’t think Science is Completely Awesome.

We understand that not everybody feels the same way we do about science, but respectfully, these people are just wrong. It’s more likely that these people were simply not introduced to science correctly. Perhaps their earliest teachers focused on the very important, yet relatively boring work that goes into science, without also taking the time to spotlight how this boring work helps to make science astounding.

Or perhaps they just didn’t use enough Auto-Tune. That’s why we present to you this funky video of scientists and science nuts such as Richard Dawkins and Bill Nye talking about how amazing science is, courtesy of John D. Boswell and Symphony of Science.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to see the photo!