So many questions never get answered. Not that one is incurious but life is too short or the answer is not readily available. Whatever the reason, one never finds out. Instead of the usual canon of photographs of stunning sunsets or virgin African bush populated with grazing animals, this is an unusual collection of eclectic photographs. Take time to ponder on each.

For instance I have always been fascinated with Mount Everest. For me it defies belief that people would want to climb it knowing that the risk of dying is 1 in 10 and that the risk of losing a digit or a limb is even higher at between 2 to 3 in 10. Yet, for all that, men in the hundreds will not be dissuaded by the deprivations of freezing cold, oxygen sparse altitude and precipitous climbs in order to satisfy an inner yearning, a life-long desire to conquer their fears and the mountain.

Main picture: Climbers ascending the highest mountain in the world and the greatest challenge in their lives

What is so amazing about this photograph of Mount Everest is that it brings into sharp focus the hordes of climbers who now attempt the climb. Much like rush hour traffic, they are trapped in a single file up the incline with the guide rope being the “single track lane”.

Imagine – when viewing this photograph – that this one two month adventure will be the high water mark in these climbers’ lives defining their life’s narrative forever. Like a Band of Brothers – as Shakespeare invoked in his chronicle on Agincourt in the play Henry V – they will forever regale others about their experiences.

X-rays showing before and after treatment of scoliosis

So it is with many of these photographs. Saviour them, reflect on what they mean for they will surely enrich your life.

A cross-section of an undersea cable

A geyser just barely before it erupted

A huge dust storm just before it hit Australia in 2013

A zoomed in view of the human tongue

A 360 degree rainbow which was captured from an airplane

A watch belonging to Akito Kawagoe which stopped at 8 15, the exact time of the Hiroshima bombing in 1945

An aerial view of a tyre dump

Bagger 288, the largest land vehicle in the world

Cancer cells under a microscope

This is Daytona Beach in 1957

This is the desk of Albert Einstein just a few hours after his death

A comparison showing fat versus muscle

A enormous statue of Genghis Khan in Mongolia

These are the teeth of George Washington

Inside Hitler’s Office

Inside one of Google’s data centres

This is a view from Mars

This is an illustrated grocery list Michelangelo would create for his illiterate servants

Bavarian town of Nordlingen built in a 14 million year old meteor impact crater

What the Northern Lights look like from space

These cylindrical objects are octopus eggs

When a prison is overcrowded in El Salvador, this is what it looks like

This is the clearest photograph of Mercury that has ever been taken

A FedEx Boeing 757 without any cargo

The lava lake of the continuously active volcano Erta Ale, Ethiopia

This is what a pug looked like before selective breeding. Quite a difference.

This is where the Great Wall of China ends