On Things Lost (and Found)

A secret rumour of a reclusive insect inspires Theopode onto the path untrodden as he (and his Electric Insect Detector) set off in hot pursuit of the Greater & Lesser Spotted Noctiluna Spectrum...

The Greater Spotted Noctiluna Spectrum is an extraordinarily rare creature. So seldom has it been observed in the wild, and never yet captured, that whether it exists at all has been fiercely debated within entomological circles. It is said that they emerge from secret nests on a few still moonlit nights in July and take to the wing only between the hours of midnight and two o’clock in the morning. So well hidden are these nests that one has never knowingly been found, nor has a Greater Spotted Noctiluna Spectrum ever been observed emerging from one. Yet there are those equally rare braggarts who, disdained by entomological purists, make wild and unlikely claims to know where these reclusive insects dwell. One or two have even claimed to have witnessed a member of the Greater Spotted Noctiluna Spectrum emerge and take flight. Students of entomology, typically cautious and not noted for being gregarious, pay little serious attention to such blowhards.

Rarer still than the Greater Spotted Noctiluna Spectrum is its cousin, the Lesser Spotted Noctiluna Spectrum. It is accepted by science that the Lesser Spotted is so extraordinarily vanishingly rare—and so exceedingly almost impossible to find—that if you do, by the most fortuitous of circumstances, happen to come across or glimpse one, it probably wasn’t one at all. Simple statistical odds do not favour these singular creatures being discovered, and on balance, it is more likely than not that they do not exist at all.

It is a fundamental truth of losing and finding things that, upon locating something which was lost until just that moment, we are inclined to declare that we ‘found it in the last place we would think to have looked’. Little contention arises from such an assertion, as most people have a tendency to cease their search the instant they finally succeed.

Those of a practical disposition would therefore be wise not to find things too quickly—they will likely claim it is better to look in one or more places where it will not be found first. For if one finds what is lost in the very place one had first thought to look, it may, to some minds, fail to qualify as the ‘last’ place. Searching several locations fruitlessly ensures that, when eventually found, the lost item is truly in the last place one had thought to seek it.

Law enforcement officials employ just this technique when hunting criminals. When one knows what a suspect looks like, it becomes necessary to inspect vast numbers of innocent people so they can be eliminated one by one—leaving the correct suspect to be caught. Seasoned officers recognise that if a culprit is identified too early, there remains a strong possibility they are not the culprit at all. This is because, much like lost objects, scoundrels also tend to be found in the last place one expects to find them. Something only becomes a reasonable proposition after one has searched unsuccessfully elsewhere.

Entomology aside, one question will no doubt spring to the mind of the astute reader: ‘Why should it be that we so often find the thing we are looking for?’ Some will argue that if we don’t know what we are searching for, then neither are we likely to find it nor recognise it when we do. Others will simply wonder why some people have spent a good deal of time looking for items they have already found—yet crucially fail to notice this fact.

Thus, the complexities of seeking and finding—be it elusive insects, errant miscreants, or the exciting but unfound item lurking down the back of the sofa—remain an enigma. Professor Theopode would frame it as being ‘perpetuated by our innate need for discovery and the inherent paradoxes within the very act of searching’, had he thought about it at all.

Being of insatiable curiosity, having invented The Electric Insect Detector (For Detecting and Inspecting the Unsuspecting Insect), and upon hearing ‘Lesser Spotted Noctiluna Spectrum’ discreetly mentioned in the Entomology Faculty Staff Room over tea, Theo embarked upon what was to be an energetic and enjoyable journey to disaster.