Go Figure: Things You Didn't Know You Didn't Know (Economist Books) by The Economist -- Read -- Imperial Library of Trantor

Index

Title Page Copyright Contents Introduction: journey into the unknowns Mind-stretchers: things you didn’t know you didn’t know

How a tattoo affects your job prospects How a baby can have three parents How marriage makes people healthier How to get ahead under a dictatorship Why India and China face a marriage crisis Why Sweden has so few road deaths Constructive one-upmanship Why the first world war wasn’t, really The hidden cost of Gangnam Style Why the AK-47 rifle became so popular Why most death-row inmates will die of old age The seasonality and distribution of New York’s dog poo Why the world’s vultures are vanishing Why time could be running out for leap seconds

Cribsheets: things you’ve quietly always wondered

How a dialect differs from a language Why Islam prohibits images of Muhammad How America’s police became so well-armed Where are the world’s most “liveable” cities? What is El Niño? Grid of grievances The difference between “less” and “fewer” Who wants to live for ever? Why so many Koreans are called Kim Why you can’t get a signal on your phone How hurricanes get their names How people in different countries spend their money What defines a “frozen conflict”? How Shia and Sunni Muslims differ Which government asks for the most data from Facebook? The difference between comets, asteroids and meteors What Satanists actually believe

Global curiosities: things some countries do differently

Why the French are so strict about Islamic head-coverings Why Japan leads the world in high-speed trains More neighbours make more fences Why North Korea turned back its clocks Why so many American women die in childbirth Which countries lose the most on gambling? What China means by “democracy” Why some Indian castes are demanding lower status How Asians view each other Why Saudi Arabians love social media so much How Europeans view each other Where the Maltese language comes from Why the Japanese are having fewer babies The world’s most innovative countries Why pigs are so important to China Why are so many adults adopted in Japan?

By the numbers: economical with the truth

Health-care spending: America’s longevity gap Why lesbians earn more than straight women What will the world’s population look like in 2050? Why big banknotes may be on the way out Why prostitutes are lowering their prices The economics of Panini football stickers Do rent controls work? The economic case against minimum wages Who are the Pyongyangites of Pyonghattan? Why do so many Dutch people work part-time? The thinking behind feminist economics Why Swedish men take so much paternity leave Which countries’ citizens are best at managing their money? Why the UN doesn’t pay its interns Thomas Piketty’s Capital summarised in four paragraphs How airlines cut costs Why private schooling is on the decline in England

Also on the menu: leisure and pleasure

Why Guinness is less Irish than you think Booze, bonks and bodies Why people like pizza in hard times Why women’s sport is less popular than men’s Why eating insects makes sense A graphical history of Disney films How India Pale Ale conquered the world Why doping in sport is so hard to catch The careers of the original Star Wars cast How professional sportsmen observe Ramadan David Bowie’s genre-hopping career Why eating chocolate is good for you Shape shifter: Batman on film – how has his physique changed? Why Indians love cricket so much

Geek speak: technically speaking

How to trace a cyber-weapon How online advertisers read your mind The best time to post a selfie (or anything else) on Facebook Why video-games are expensive to make How virtual reality works How machine learning works Tech-tonic shifts How technology made fashion week passé What is code? Never gonna put you down The trouble with space junk How Bitcoin works

The life scientific

How to search for time travellers How to debunk a scientific study Why the Zika virus was ignored for so long Why cancer has not been cured From the depths How life on Earth began, probably Why salt may not be so bad for you after all Why there is weather in space Why homeopathy is nonsense Why there is a shortage of cadavers What’s behind the decline in bee populations? Noodles of longevity How astronomers know “dark matter” exists Why Pluto is no longer a planet Why the sky is blue How to make an invisibility cloak

Afterword: why explainer articles have become so popular Contributors Index About the Author