Carl Sagan: “I promise to question everything my leaders tell me. I promise to use my critical faculties. I promise to develop my independence of thought. I promise to educate myself so I can make my own judgements.”
What would Carl Sagan say about the most asked questions in the world? Google has lots of them and lots of information about them.
Here are the top questions:
when are the nba playoffs – 5,000,000.
what is my ip address – 4,090,000.
where's my refund – 3,350,000.
what is love – 1,830,000.
how to draw – 1,500,000.
where am i – 1,220,000.
how many weeks in a year – 823,000.
when are the early signs of pregnancy – 673,000.
Google displays them equally - from the stupid to the sublime. Are the top 3 questions hilariously mundane? Can you imagine so many people wanting a refund? Or is it one persistent person/bot hitting the return key over and over?
Google has analysis on the "what", the "why", the "who", "when", "where", "how", and then also these: "does", "is", "can" and "are" questions.
The #1 "why" question is: "Why were cornflakes invented", followed by "why you so obsessed with me". Just to be clear, the full question is this:
"Why were Kellogg's Corn Flakes invented and was it to stop masturbation?"
Now that's quite a question! The top "who" question is: "Who do i look like?" followed by "who am i". The first may refer to look-alike celebrity apps, and the second could be a Casting Crowns video or life's unanswerable question.
There is a tie for "how" questions:
how to draw
how to make slime
how to screenshot on a mac
how to tie a tie
Aren't these such tidbits of entertainment, tumbling out in different shapes and sizes. Some the province of children learning about the world, and others the rants and rages of possibly immature adults.
Why scrutinize the questions? I keep thinking they point to the decline of basic faculties. I've been looking through Carl Sagan's words. He is quoted so much because he said so many profound things. In relation to our most asked questions, I think they reveal his "foreboding". A year before his death, in 1995, he wrote this:
I have a foreboding of an America in my children’s or grandchildren’s time — when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what’s true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness…
And our photos today? I had an enjoyable trip through the photo archives of St. Louis, 2010. I thought you might enjoy some of the model railroads.
