Misc. Mental Musings

Trivial Pursuits

S. G. Lacey

In his 1902 book of the same name, American-British author, a novel concept unto itself, Logan Pearsall Smith defined “trivia” as "bits of information of little consequence". This dismissive attitude hasn’t stopped folks, often inebriated, from challenging each other regarding commonplace minutia over the century since, and undoubtably well before.

With ubiquitous AI searching on any electronic device these days, it’s easier than ever to fact check your fibbing friend in real time, or conduct deep research on essentially any finite field. Just make sure to verify the details being electronically fed are accurate.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, there’s nothing better than getting a dozen teams of mixed size and skill together at the local brewery, with a shared social agreement to put technological devices away, and have a spirited yet civil debate on a broad range of obscure topics. Feel free to envision your favorite venue, crew, and libation; regardless of setting specifics, the air of exuberant excitement on trivia night is palpable.

But how does an individual gain the skills and confidence required to enter such an intimidating Thunderdome of mental banter?

There are innumerable activities that occurred on Planet Earth throughout its lengthy progression, like the foundational Big Bang, depending on your religious leanings, and the reign of the dinosaurs, as portrayed in now countless Jurassic Park films. But most events of memorable relevance have occurred relatively recently, during the period when homo sapiens emerged, developed, evolved, refined, and came to dominate the global stage.

Unable to find a suitable short summary for 14 billion years of constantly evolving history, the obvious solution was to create one. Which proved a more challenging project than initially anticipated. The result of this consolidated research is presented below.

The following tables, each 11 rows tall, are laid out in a somewhat unique, but chronologically logical, format, considering the prolonged maturation of the world we call home, and humanity’s short but influential appearance on this timeline. The data is displayed as a logarithmic representation of the modern Gregorian calendar, transitioning from eons, to millennia, to centuries, to decades, to years.

This compiled one-page document is not meant to be folded up for stashing in your wallet alongside money and credit cards, printed out then discretely taped to the brim of your baseball cap, or saved as a background image on your portable electronic device of choice. It’s a study guide, not a cheating tool.

For context, common bar trivia categories encompass the following fields: business, culture, entertainment, geography, history, literature, religion, science, and sports. Plus of course, the broad and classic miscellaneous, general, random, wildcard, or various other assorted terms.

While a few of these topics rely on monitoring the newest news, most of the questions in a typical game can be learned and memorized well in advance. This amassed collection of clues is meant as an evergreen summary of human’s historical reign, highlighting the key advancements we’ve made, specifically from a trivial facts lens.

It’s important to acknowledge a well-rounded quizard skill set also includes mastery of current popular culture. Considering how quickly the societal landscape is evolving these days, with technological advancements, weather predictions, streaming entertainment, political banter, and live sports, similar lists for 2025 and beyond will need to be formulated on a substantially more rapid cadence.

Modern information changes quickly, by the year, month, and day, and even hour, in this era of perpetually disseminated propagation. Thus, you’re on your own with regards to topical topics and timely truths.

Having access to the desirable details is just the start of the project. Committing the content to memory is the next important phase of the process.

Learning is about structure and repetition; we all have our middle school education experiences, ranging from brutal rote memorization, to reading lengthy tomes, to precise mathematical calculations, to artsy creative pursuits.

There’s a decided contradiction between engulfing and enjoying trivial content, differentiated by preparation and performance, as highlighted in the bulleted list below.

Gain broad knowledge, but don’t be afraid to focus on your areas of strength.
Be careful what content you consume, but feel free to binge documentaries and podcasts.
Harness the power of the internet, but double check anything posted online.
Leverage technology, but limit screen time.
Redundancy is key to memory, but keep learning fresh and fun.
Use mnemonics, but don’t get neurotic.
Don’t be that loser who practices at home, but feel free to watch Jeopardy on the couch.
Use trivia as a way to meet new people, but choose your teammates carefully.
Recruit others with ancillary knowledge, but don’t underestimate your own skill set.
A comfortable spot for thought works best, but try playing anywhere with a game and a bar.
Acknowledge the pressure, but stay relaxed.
Be confident in your answer, but don’t be afraid to guess.
Immediately forget any wrong responses, but log the learnings into your memory bank.
Keep trivia night casual, but feel free to be ultra-competitive.

Not surprisingly, there’s a wealth of tangential quotes relevant to trivia, beyond the line at the beginning of this piece. In fact, consuming famous written or spoken phrases from the past is an excellent way to learn about philosophers of note, and infer details regarding the era each proved influential. Here’s a few amusing and relevant examples.

“The only true wisdom is in knowing that you know nothing.” : Socrates – 400 BCE

“Burn old logs. Drink old wine. Read old books. Keep old friends.” : Alfonso X El Sabio – 13th Century

“I am an omnivorous reader with a strangely retentive memory for trifles.” : Arthur Conan Doyle – 1926

“Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.” : Aldous Huxley – 1927

“I wish I had an answer to that, because I’m tired of answering that question.” : Yogi Berra – 1950’s

There are some core tenants for getting better at trivia, especially in public games. Some are patently obvious, other supremely counterintuitive.

First and foremost, understand the question being asked. This is a seemingly simple task, but fundamental to success and speed in responding. Make sure to break the query into parts, obsessing every word, as there are often hints embedded within.

Try using specific elements to winnow the vast field of potential answer options: entity type, presumed timeline, part of speech, tangential facts. While this list reads like a word salad, such attention to detail is key for making tangential connections.

Contrary to popular belief, and frustrating experience, trivia questions are designed to be executed correctly. As a result, the reader, dubbed quizmaster, is incentivized to provide enough information that at least some people in the audience hit the mark.

It’s a pretty dull game if everyone ends up with no points in the finale. Trying interpreting and solving the original early 1980’s Trivial Pursuit cards in these modern times if you need a counterfactual.

Thus, absurd answers can be eliminated, narrowing down to the realm of generally knowable knowledge. If a surgeon’s photographic memory of interior organ placement is required, you’re probably headed off on the wrong train of thought. It’s easy to go completely down a rabbit hole of specificity, while ignoring the easy and obvious solution.

Typically, more clues are provided for more obscure target responses. Though these hidden hints can sometimes be misinterpreted, or cause misdirection, they are well worth analyzing.

Additionally, there are some basic facts so common in the trivia world that they must be instantly known by any dedicated practitioner. While presented in different ways, such core knowledge is as ubiquitous as the numerical values denoting the count of yellow stars on the modern Chinese flag, Jackie Robinson’s universally retired jersey number, the value of mathematical constant “Pi” to three digits, and even Taylor Swift’s birth year that’s also her popular album title.

Some items of great historical relevance can be repurposed into all manner of unique asks. Take the Gettysburg Address as an example. Who delivered it? How many words were spoken? During what year? As part of which war did this monologue occur? And even, where was the speech executed? Not in Washington D.C., an opponent’s response that makes for an easy remainder of the contest.

Regardless of one’s own knowledge set, there’s a decided element of luck in any mental challenge. Some questions are easy, and others hard, based on individual life experiences. Not every night can be your night in the trivia realm.

How about another counterintuitive take. Guessing is mandatory, especially if there’s no game penalty for being wrong. Furthermore, not every fact is knowable, so logical deduction can often be the correct play. This approach goes against the innate human survival instinct to stay safe and be sure in all decision making. Fortunately, the result of a trivia contest at the local pub isn’t a life-or-death experience.

There are a few other elements to consider in the communal trivia experience, which typically represents a vast departure from the modern knowledge curation process at work or home. With instinctive internet searching eliminated from the picture, it’s impressive how inept most folks are at even remembering their own name, let alone offering up any other information of value on the fly.

It’s amusing to watch Gen Z, and even some individuals of older ilk, being handed a slip of blank recycled paper and a sharpened graphite golf pencil. While cursive has long since, and for good reasons, exited the elementary school curriculum, it still helps to at least have some way to communicate with others in archaic written form. Remember, the quizmaster has to interpret and judge your hasty scrawl.

Another tip. Even if the lighting is dark in your chosen haunt, please refrain from pulling out a stashed cell and turning on the flashlight. This action alone can be misconstrued as cheating by trivia diehards.

Another difficulty of group settings is the decibel level. While each team thinks they are whispering, with a full room the low hum turns into a dull roar, especially in expansive indoor spaces with limited soundproofing.

There’s a fine line between deceitfulness and resourcefulness; at the end of a round if your squad doesn’t know the answer, one strategy is to simply listen to others yelling out their prognostications.

Regardless of venue, the real key to getting better at random meaningless queries is expanding knowledge; literary interpretation and educated guesses only get you so far. A much better strategy is to simply know the correct answer immediately.

Focus on the common stuff first, then branch out. Which is the fundamental goal of this segmented study sheet. While a lone sheet of paper may not have all the answers, this organized collection of truths can at least get you going in the right direction. These fundamental facts must be internalized, based on how often such topics materialize in gameplay, albeit in oft-modified form. Like any technical field, practice makes perfect.

These evergreen categories can be mastered with dedicated recall repetition. However, as noted previously, often trivia games are won and lost on modern insight, which can’t be habitually memorized, but instead requires consumption and comprehension in real time.

There are countless ways to collect content in this contemporary era, and stay abreast of the rampant news cycle. Celebrities. Fashion. Music. Politics. Technology. Granted, sitting on a couch with your eyes glued to a cellphone screen isn’t the best approach to get your mind right, and absorb meaningful mental material.

There are tons of trivia training modules online. Which all seem to completely defeat the point of engaging in conversations about minutia with others in a shared setting of glory and failure.

Try learning live, via museums and monuments, parks and podcasts, businesses and bibliographies. Sure, a healthy dose of neutral social media feeds helps to stay in the loop, if such bipartisan platforms can be found in this polarized societal era.

Whatever your preferred mode of education, feel free to use this boring spreadsheet, or any other curated, highlighted, modified, or recorded format as a motivator to cram the entire existence of Planet Earth into your brain. Don’t worry, not that much happened, until the recent past, at least in linear scale.

Keep building those “Huge Memory Glands”, which happens to be the team name of choice for my wife and I. While by no means classy, the trivia cohort as a collective is a very creative and punny group.

For Visual Learners:

From the Big Bang to modern humans, in one simple, spiral chart. [REF]
Ancient Mesopotamia B.C.E. developments leveraging a snaking visual trajectory. [REF]
The history of earth, Wikipedia style, with many linked tables and graphs. [REF]
Absurdly detailed timeline of civilization in the Common Era. [REF]
Unique visual timelines of relevant global peoples ebbing and flowing in both location and quantity. [REF]
Practical ways to get better at trivia, from a former Jeopardy contestant. [REF]
Expansive database of trivia questions across a wide range of categories with answers explained. [REF]
Wall posters of life throughout the 20th century, for your purchasing pleasure. [REF]
List of the current 25 most popular trivia podcasts. [REF]