To start 2025, I’m going big. I’m consolidating the biggest mysteries of the universe into a blog post! These five top biggest mysteries in science remain unanswered science questions to date.
BIGGEST MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE
Louie thinks we should talk about using CRISPR to resurrect a mammoth. (For more on what CRISPR is, here’s a great resource)
While CRISPR is cool & amazing with fantastic potential applications to help man, & scientists reconstructed the 3D structure of all 28 of the mammoth’s chromosomes, that no longer qualifies as one of the top biggest mysteries in science.
Plus, I’m surprised that Louie wants to talk about mammoths, considering how large they are.
I have a topic that does qualify as one of the biggest mysteries of the universe.
Dark Matter & Dark Energy. What the heck are they?
Dark matter and dark energy are unsolved mysteries in science.
UNSOLVED MYSTERIES IN SCIENCE : DARK MATTER AND DARK ENERGY
Everything we can observe in the universe, from people to planets, is made of matter. “dark matter’ has matter in its name.
What is matter?
Matter is defined as any substance that has mass and occupies space.
Well, no.
We call it “dark” because we can’t see it.
Like ordinary matter, dark matter takes up space and holds mass. But it doesn’t reflect, absorb, or radiate light – at least not enough for us to detect yet.
Dark matter only interacts interacts with other matter through gravity.
We know where it should be, but nothing is there when we look. It’s like seeing ripples in a pond, but not being able to see what caused them.
There’s more to the universe than the matter we can see. This is why dark matter and dark energy qualify as unsolved mysteries in science.
Obviously, that isn’t going to work.
Dark matter and dark energy are puzzling substances that affect and shape the cosmos. Scientists are still trying to figure them out!
According to NASA scientists, normal matter comprises less than 5% of the total universe!
Scientists have measured that dark matter makes up about 27% of the cosmos....
But they’re not sure what dark matter even is!
Dark Matter for kidsAs of the writing on this post, scientists speculate that dark matter exists in a vast, web-like structure that winds through the whole universe – a gravitational scaffold that attracts most of the cosmos’ normal matter.
That sounds more like a spider’s web to me.
No wonder dark matter remains an unanswered science question!
They’ve determined that dark matter isn’t composed of known particles of matter because the universe would look very different if it were. The search for what makes up dark matter continues and qualifies as one of the biggest mysteries of the universe.
Yes! I’m getting to that.
Dark energy may compose roughly 68% of the universe, but scientists know even less about it than they do about dark matter.
We can wrap dark energy up with dark matter as one of the top biggest mysteries in science.
This 'something' pushes the universe apart instead of pulling it back together.
This phenomenon is called dark energy.
Where did this energy come from? And how did matter become life?
The origin of life on Earth stands as one of the biggest mysteries of the universe.
The origin of life on Earth ranks as one of the biggest mysteries of the universe
I did a deep dive into theories and came up with my own conclusion.
Scientists are clueless.
Okay, that’s a little harsh. But this is why the origin of life ranks as one of our still unanswered science questions.
And in the interest of trying to dip a toe into the mystery waters, various answers have been proposed, all of which remain unverified.
To find out if we are alone in the galaxy, we will need to better understand what geochemical conditions nurtured the first life forms.
To summarize:
The great unanswered science question about the origin of life is :
How did non-living chemical compounds transition into self-replicating, living organisms?
Today, life covers every inch of the planet, from the highest mountains to the deepest sea. How did our planet’s barren rocks, sand, and chemicals give rise to life?
Scientists disagree about which chemical components of life came first, which of life’s processes came first, and where on Earth life first arose.
Even the timing of life on earth is an unanswered science question.
Earth is about 4.5 billion years old. The oldest known fossils, however, are only 3.7 billion years old. So all we know for sure is that something happened during that 600-million-year window!
A few origin of life theories that do not yet solve this greatest unsolved mystery of the universe
Biomolecular condensates are the subject of intense interest in cell biology right now.
Not one of these ideas has gained widespread acceptance…yet. How can we know? There is no concrete evidence.
We weren’t even there!
Let’s move away from the vast unsolved mysteries of the universe yet stay with our top biggest mysteries in science, while focusing on …us!
The ‘Hard Problem’ of Consciousness
One of the intriguing and biggest mysteries of the universe is the problem of explaining the connection between the phenomena of subjective reality & brain processes.
This is called the “Hard Problem of Consciousness.”
We can define consciousness, or the nature of being aware. What consciousness is, how it arises, and why it exists, remains one of the most profound unsolved mysteries in science.
Louie wants me to add that this subjective experience is probably not limited to humans.
He’s correct. The evidence from neurobiology & behavior of animals and the famous mirror test implies that animals are aware of themselves.
Let’s stay with the human brain.
I find the placebo effect a puzzling phenomenon & to date, remains one of the unsolved mysteries in science.
Don’t stop reading, but below are a few scientifically proven articles to improve your brain health! (Plus I wanted to try this widget out…)
THE PLACEBO EFFECT
The placebo effect is a well-documented phenomenon and is defined as :
Improvement in the condition of a patient that occurs in response to treatment but cannot be considered due to the specific treatment used.
Patients experience real improvements in their health after receiving a treatment with no active ingredients, simply because they believe the treatment is effective.
Placebos actually change a patient’s brain chemistry!
My initial query on a science article website brought 110,430 results!
I did not read 100K articles, but after several, it is clear that our mind’s role in healing aka the placebo effect remains one of the greatest unsolved mysteries of the universe.
Desserts? That mystery has been solved!
Unraveling this top biggest mystery in science means deciphering the complex interplay between psychology, biology, biochemistry, & the power of belief.
Doing so could have profound implications for medicine and healthcare.
Within the realms of the fascinating psychological phenomenon called the placebo effect lies its darker counterpart.
The nocebo effect.
THE NOCEBO EFFECT
No, Louie. But the nocebo effect is just as vexing.
The placebo effect occurs when a substance that isn’t actual medicine makes you feel better or improves your symptoms.
The nocebo effect, on the other hand, happens when a placebo makes you feel worse.
Experts are looking at the nocebo effect and placebo effect to better understand how positive or negative thinking can impact a person’s physical health. Wrapped together, they remain among the top biggest mysteries in science.
The last of the unanswered science questions in this post today is the enigma of time.
THE ENIGMA OF TIME
Time is an interesting concept that we don’t completely understand. One of the most fascinating aspects of time is time dilation, which occurs when time passes at different rates in different places.
Yes, way!
Who was correct about time not being a constant?
FUN FACT:
Another enigma of time, making it one of the biggest mysteries in the universe, is that it only goes forwards, not backwards!
In summary, this is an unanswered science question : why does the universe exhibit such a profound asymmetry in time.
There you have it : Five of the biggest mysteries of the universe.
Which of these five unsolved science questions do you think will be solved first? Which one do you think will never be solved?
I don’t think they’ll ever figure out how life began. Even if it’s from comets, where did THAT life begin? It sounds impossible, and cool. Thanks for a great post. You consolidated a lot of info here.
The origin of life is a daunting science question! And cool, I agree, which is why I wanted to include it. Thanks so much for taking the time to comment.
I doubt they’ll ever really know how our minds can affect our physiology. But I find it endlessly amazing what our minds can do so I wish they’d figure it out. Great post, thanks, Sue and Louie.
This unsolved question is mind-blowing. If we could solve it, a lot of patients could help themselves heal! Thanks so much.
So much fascinating stuff here! “Another enigma of time, making it one of the biggest mysteries in the universe, is that it only goes forwards, not backwards!” Unless you write time travel stories.. 🙂 Thanks for a great mind-expanding post!
Good point about the time travel stories! (A link to Eileen’s time travel series here!) Thanks so much for stopping by.
A string of chemicals going from not being alive to being alive is one of the hardest things for everyday people to wrap their heads around. It also reminds me of the issue of whether viruses are alive or not. What exactly is life?
Not only that, but scientists haven’t been able to make life out of the strings of chemicals, either. Good analogy about viruses and the question of life. But since viruses can’t replicate on their own, most resources say they are not alive. Perhaps because they aren’t alive, they piggyback into living organisms and cause problems. Now viral vectors may be used to carry genes that can change cancer cells back to normal cells! Or they can replace a gene that isn’t working correctly with a working copy. Talk about turning lemons into lemonade.
Thanks so much!
There’s always new discovery every year, every decades. These mysteries made the world around us interesting. Thank you for sharing.
I find mysteries intriguing too! Thanks so much!
Great post! This was a fun read and covered SO much ground, and I loved getting sucked into theories and ideas. I also learned about the nocebo effect—so interesting! Thank you for sharing.
I love theories and details too, which is why my posts sometimes run a little long! I’m happy that you found it fun and interesting! Thanks so much.