I was reading Wikipedia’s entry on Agrippa (Marcus Vipsanius), and one comment in particular stood out for me: “It is not known whether Agrippa fought against his brother in Africa”.

In all honesty, the question had never occurred to me before. In fact, I had come to Wikipedia looking for information about the occult philosopher Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa (von Nettesheim), and wasn’t aware that Marcus took precedence. Who knew?

(If you’re curious, this was all motivated by a recollection of one of Inigo’s lines in The Princess Bride during the great sword fight scene; “…Unless the enemy has a-studied his Agrippa - which I have!”

I had been wondering what Agrippa (the occultist) had to do with fencing. Now I realize that the reference may have been to the Roman Agrippa. Thus, my world-view is broadened. However, I digress…)

This whole business got me thinking. What else don’t I know? There are probably many things that I don’t know so thoroughly that I don’t even know enough to ask whether I know them or not. So off to Google I went, and entered in the phrase “it is not known whether…”.

I have gathered together some of the things that I didn’t know I didn’t know:

• If it is not known whether a person is a Muslim or a kaafir, can we say salaam to him?
• It is not known whether passports were demanded (when the Columbian Legation left Caracas).
• It is not known whether Disney knew or approved of the filming of the lemmings sequence in their 1958 film White Wilderness (where the principal photographer induced the creatures to venture off a cliff).
• At this point, it is unknown whether any employee’s personal information has been accessed or compromised in a possible breach of USDA computers holding personal employee information.
• It is unknown whether the mechanism by which people make choices is deterministic, non-deterministic, or mystically soul-controlled.
• It is unknown whether the company Recreational Aviation of Australia have any Drifter aircraft operating from floats in salt water conditions particularly (so they warn of a structural failure reported of an aircraft working in such conditions).
• It’s still unknown whether Admiral Ghirardi will be ordered to shore duty.
• It’s unknown whether liberated nanotubes could make it to groundwater after being crushed and disposed at a landfill.
• It is unknown whether the suspect on Flight 63 had functional explosives.
• It is not known why the aborigines attacked the weather station.
• It is unknown how Robert E. Lee day, officially still celebrated in Tennessee, can be both widely unknown and yet controversial (and why Ezra Maize, who isn’t exactly an authority on history, would be consulted about something he knows nothing about is also a mystery).
• It’s unknown whether alcohol was a factor in the knife fight, the victim of which was dating Van Bragt’s mother for about five years.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 23rd, 2008 at 9:12 am and is filed under Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.