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http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/podcasts.howstuffworks.com/hsw/podcasts/sysk/2017-07-06-sysk-horror-movies-final.mp3	Josh and Chuck's List of Horror Movies that Changed the Genre	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/josh-and-chucks-list-of-horror-movies-that-changed	Once in a while a movie comes along that's so forward-thinking it changes the way that horror is done. A new subgenre is spawned, new tropes are established, and audiences are more terrified than ever.	Once in a while a movie comes along that's so forward-thinking it changes the way that horror is done. A new subgenre is spawned, new tropes are established, and audiences are more terrified than ever.	Thu, 06 Jul 2017 13:57:41 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2017, tm_mon=7, tm_mday=6, tm_hour=13, tm_min=57, tm_sec=41, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=187, tm_isdst=0)	57930927	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody. It's us, Josh and Chuck. And we want you to know we are coming somewhere near you, we're sure, if you live in North America this year. That's right. We're going on tour. And why don't we just rattle through these dates? Toronto, august 8 at the Dan Fourth Music Hall. Chicago, August 9. The next day at Harris Theatre. Then we are taking some time off to recover after that two day grind. We're hitting Vancouver. The Vogue Theater, September 26, followed by Minneapolis. We're going to be at the Pentagon Theater again on September 27. That is correct. Yes. And then Austin Chuck on October 10 at the Paramount Theater yes. And very special show in Lawrence, Kansas, at Liberty Hall on October 11. Yes. And then we're going to do a three night stay in October 22, 23rd and 24th at the Bellhouse in Brooklyn, New York. And then, Chuck, take it home. Well, take it home literally. Because we are finishing up November 4 right here in Atlanta, the Bucket Theater. And this is a very special benefit show. And all the proceeds will be going to Lifeline animal Project of Atlanta and the National Down Syndrome Society. Yes, and for more information and to buy tickets, just go to sysklive.com welcome to Stuff You Should Know from Housetopworks.com. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. Charles W, chuck Bryant Towdie. Middle name's, Wayne. Middle name is Malcolm. There we have it. Always forget about that. Malcolm. Yeah. Wayne named after Wayne Coyne, right? No, John Wayne. And you were named after Malcolm in the Middle. That's right. Frankie munich is my name. Safe. I hope he's okay. Early Brian Cranston, too. I used to love that show. Oh, it's a great show. I watched it, like, within the last couple of months, I was cleaning the house and put it on Netflix and still great. Yeah, it really is a good show. So you clean your house, you put on your VR goggles and just queue up Malcolm in the Middle. No, I do. You walk around and bump into things, right? Exactly. But I put on, like, a huge feather duster suit. Yeah. Cleaning and bumping into things. That's right. That's how I do it. Wow. Yeah, it works kind of well. Someone's going to take that idea. Like the sharknado. Yes. But they should sell that suit with a purple drink. I think you just get one spot on the floor. Really clean. What are you going to title this one, by the way? Because this was your pick. And we title our own shows episodes. Some horror films that changed the genre. All right. And you should add this, aka. How could you guys forget Blank? Yeah, we should say, like, first of all, this is a grabster article, so it's grabster's list. Sure. And he knows what he's talking about. If you look at some of the entries, some don't even have source tags. He's just like, I just know he should just grabs her. But we even took his list and carved some out and put some in. Sure. So how about this? This is Josh and Chuck's idea of some horror films that change the genre, featuring the mind of the Grabster. Yes. In other words, it is not a complete list of every horror film that changed the genre. Yes. Because I would argue that well, and actually, I see Grabster put Texas Chainsaw masker in there. He said that if this were a top 15 list, that would be in there. So would Alien. Yeah, he has that Alien ring Goo and the US remake ring. And I would lobby for well, Psycho didn't make it onto his list, but we're going to put that in. And there was one more, even though I didn't really think it was that great. The movie Saw, I think, kind of changed horror films. And that's what that list is. Not best horror films, but things that kind of changed the game. Yeah. It seems like Saw kind of kicked off that torture porn. Yeah. Didn't it? I can't remember if it was that or Hostile. One of the two. It was definitely one of the two for a subgenre. Well, it's pretty accurate, actually. It is. But most of these are movies that either were the first of its kind and maybe did start a sub genre, or movies that were so popular that they just kind of rewrote how people view horror movies. Some of them because of marketing, some because they were really good movies, some because of box office. But all of these, I don't think anyone could argue, did not change the genre. How about that? Sure. Yeah, I think that's well put, dude. And before we get started, speaking of horror, I want to give a plug to my friend Toby's movie that's coming out. He's a producer on a movie coming out called The Ghost Story. Yeah, Toby. When we met Toby well, you knew Toby before me, of course, because he's your friend and I know him through Yuumi, so really? But he was small time doing short films and stuff. And since that time, and this has been within the last like since we've been doing this podcast, he's now big time. Yeah. They did Pete's Dragon. Yes. And then they did An Body Saints, I think the one that they kind of broke out with, which I love that movie. And then this one, it definitely kind of falls into that same look and mood and feel. It's called A Ghost Story, and I think it comes out in July, and I think it's labeled a drama rather than horror or even supernatural or thriller. But the reason I tie it into horror is because a 24 is releasing it and a 24 is killing it with horror movies lately. Yeah, that's a good outfit. They did The Witch. They did. The black coat's daughter. Have you seen that? No. It's on Amazon Prime. It's on Amazon Prime right now. No, I didn't. Give a thumbs up, dude. It's one of the best four movies I've seen in a while. I think The Witch is probably my favorite right now. Yeah. Black coat store is a close second. And then last night I saw it comes at night in the theater and it comes at night. Actually upset my stomach, that ending. Did it? Was that rough? Yeah. I think we're at a place with horror movies that we haven't been in a long time. Like a really genuine good spot. Yeah. Like the whole torture porn sort of era is over. And the found footage thing is so played. Oh, man. But I think with movies like The Witch, I think there are some really creative it follows did you see that one? Yeah, like some just really creative ways of bringing scares that I haven't seen before. Get out. That was amazing. I could get out, man. I still haven't seen it. You're going to love it. I'm envious of you. It's a great movie. Chuck. You're going to love it. Well, I don't get to the movies much anymore and the only time I could was a couple of weeks ago and I elected to see Wonder Woman. Yeah, not a bad choice. So a long way of saying congratulations to Toby and his new film. Well, it's funny. We also need to congratulate Toby, too, because Toby just got married. Toby and Nell are now married. So congratulations to them as well. Is this new movie with his directing partner David Lowry? Yeah. And Rooney Mara. Man, they got everything going. Yeah, they definitely do. So it's going to be good. I'm looking forward to it. Awesome. Okay, so let's get started. Thanks for indulging that. Thank you, everybody. So the first movie on our list is what's widely considered the first horror movie. And it's a 1920 movie out of Germany that basically was the first film that undertook the artistic movement known as German expressionism called the Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Yeah. I mean, some say, like you said, it was the first horror movie. Some say it was the first cult film. Well, you may not be able to get through the whole thing if you're not into silent movies, but you should queue up a little bit of it and watch a little bit of it because it's hugely impactful and still to this day, like, very disconcerting to look at because of how ominous and weird it looked. Just physically looked. Yeah, like the sets that they built are constructed. Manufactured. They were not in any way share before. I'm going for realism. They were going for surrealism for sure. Yeah. And so, like, the staircases are at crazy weird curves and angles and everything from the house's rooftops to the blades of grass are super pointy and sharp. And the shadows that they employed were just perfect. You've never seen a better use of shadows than this. They didn't get in the way. They just created this mood. And it was the first movie to really kind of do that, to just use the camera for something other than capturing realism. And for that reason, it's considered the first horror movie because that's such a standard part of horror. Like, in large part, like in a Tim Burton movie, or in small part where you're using small spaces to create claustrophobia. The idea of using the set to mess with the viewers mind, I think, is born in Dr. Caligar's cabinet. Yeah. It's almost like they took a child and gave them construction paper and said, Cut out scary things. Right. Like that movie The Babadook. I think the actual book within The Babadook was hugely inspired by this. The actual movie itself. The plot is about the sideshow operator, a hypnotist who has a patient that he takes around to these side shows with sleep disorder. Supposedly, he's been asleep his entire life and he uses this patient to commit murder. Right. He's like a sleepwalker. Yeah. Somnambulist so that in itself is a pretty frightening plot. And to think about that being cooked up in 1920 when there weren't really not such things that you think of as horror movies is pretty impressive. And then some of the deeper critiques I've seen of it was, like, the explanation for why the filmmakers chose, like, these weird, odd angles to kind of depict insanity or that kind of thing was rooted in World War I. The horrors of World War One had just been seen and revealed and recently taken place, and it upended Europe in general, and especially Germany as well. The idea is that they might not have had this idea, they might not have had this desire, this drive to create this weird set and, in fact, this weird movie had World War One not happened. Yeah. There's this writer, Jeff separato, who kind of put it this way about German expressionism because I wasn't exactly sure how to define it, but you're kind of right on the money, he said. Germany was largely isolated from the rest of the world following World War I. Expressionism, therefore, became confined to the country, refers to a number of creative movements from World War I through the 1920s. Expressionist works examine the current and future state of the culture through bold and artistic creations of creativity, and often explore topics of madness, betrayal and other intellectual concepts. And nothing encapsulates these ideas more than the cabinet of Dr. Caligari. That's basically what I said. Yeah. Did you read that or were you just that? I don't know if I read that one or not. It sounded kind of familiar to see you came up with it. So the idea of the set is creating, like, a creepy tone and texture to everything that was Dr. Caligari. That's how it changed the genre. Tim Burton. Say thank you. Yeah. Have you seen Coraline? No, but I know it they did that to very good effect. I think Hodgman does a voice in that, didn't he? He does. He does. The dad he did a spectacular job because you actually forget it's Hodgman while you're watching it. That's impossible. All right, Chuck. Moving on. That was going to fast forward all the way to if you're talking about Blood Feast well, I wasn't, but what Simon Abrams of of Rogert.com says, this Blood Feast is a terrible film and a historically important one, too. And I think that's sort of the deal with Blood Feast. It is not good by any account. Did you watch any of it? Yeah, sure. It's not good. No, it's not good. It's terrible. It was written on basis on a 14 page outline. Didn't even have a script. It has the same cloying technicolor of, like, an early Hawaii 50 episode. Yeah, for sure. Directed by Herschel Gordon Lewis and producer David F. Friedman. And basically the idea was that these guys did not see films as art. They saw them as a business and thought you were foolish if you thought it was anything else. So they sat around, they brainstormed the movies that they thought no one else would make. Yeah. Because they started out making, like, Porkies esque type movies. Yeah. And they were doing fine with that. But apparently they were successful enough with it that they started to be imitators and the market was crowded. So where can we go make movies that no one else is going to make? Yeah, because we want to shock people, essentially. So a couple of ideas they had that did not make the list was Con Man Evangelist and Nazi Torture, which were later made. Exactly. And they finally said, you know, what no one's really done yet is hardcore gore. Everyone always cuts away when the knife comes. Like, what if we showed the grossest gorgeous stuff imaginable on screen? Yeah. And even still, they didn't show the first murder. A woman stabbed through the eye and then the murderer hacks her legs off of the machete. Right. And they didn't show the knife penetrate the eye. They didn't show the machete making contact with the skin. But what they did in Blood Feast and what made Blood Feast the first of its kind, was they would show what came after that. They would show the brains on the ground. They would show the entrails, like on the knife. They would show the leg that had been dismembered being put into a bag and, like, the wound that was left by yeah. No one had ever done anything like that on film before. No, it paid off. Depending on who you ask, the budget was anywhere from, like, 20 to 30 grand, and it made between seven and $30 million. Like I said, depending on where you get your info. But by all accounts, it was a huge financial success compared to what they paid to make it. Yeah. And they shot it in six days or something down in Miami. Yes. Based on a 14 page outline. There wasn't even a script that was an outline. Basically, it was like, murderer goes and kills this girl. Yeah. Next girl. Murderer comes in, kills girl, cuts off leg. That kind of thing. Right. Yeah. I mean, if it matters, the movie is about a serial killer caterer. Yeah, that's it. There's your plot right there. Yeah. But it was just such a revolutionary movie that the sensors at the time, there wasn't such a thing as the MPAA hadn't been formed yet, and there was basically no one except for local sensors overseeing movies. So you could be playing in one town to all audiences, and then the next town over, it could be banned. But the sensors had never seen anything like it and they didn't know what to do with it. So it was hugely successful commercially, too. Yeah. Another big impact it had was it inspired a generation of special effects, but basically, let's be honest, young boys who were doing this on their own super eight films. Right. And said, Wait, I can get a job doing this. Including Tom Savini, I think, was inspired by or was he inspired by yeah, I think he was inspired by Blood Feast. Oh, wow. And then we should also give a mention to the gran gun y'all. Is that how you think it's pronounced? Sure. Gran Guinyall. Sure. There was a theater in Paris, I believe, from the late 19th century on to, I think, 1962. So the year before Blood Feast came out, it had closed up, but it used to do this stuff on stage. It was like a gorefest. And there was lots of blood and sex and depraved themes in the plays that were put on at this theater. People loved it. They were crazy for it. And this was kind of like the grand Gonio tradition. Put on the film for the first time. And who write for that? You want to take a break? Yeah, let's do it. Hey, everyone. When you're running a small business, every second counts and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office when you could be using Stamps.com? Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses. Because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need. Right. From your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS rates and 86% off Ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money when you use Stamps.com to mail and ship. Sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page, and enter code stuff. All right, Charles. We're back. I've got 1968 in front of my face. Okay. And that could be no other movie. The Night of the Living Dead. Classic George Romero film. Romero was a TV director making TV commercials. Commercial director, rather. He was also making short films for Mr. Rogers Neighborhood at the time. Yeah. And he was young. Yeah. I don't know how old he was, but he was a pretty young guy still, I think when he made Shot not in the Living Dead, he was like 26 or 27. Wow. Yeah. By any standard, that's still pretty young, unless you're 23. So he and his buddies were like, let's make a horror movie, but let's not make a stupid horror movie. Let's take one like an actual plot that explores deep themes, too. Like a good movie. Let's make the first good horror movie. Well, yeah, we'll delve into that a little more, but that was definitely a different thing at the time. And the other different thing was that all the horror movies up to that point, they were called the Universal Monsters from Universal Studios, all the kind of the classic Frankenstein and Dracula and Creature from the Black Lagoon and the werewolf. And that was where that was mainstream horror. And George Romero comes along and says, how about zombies? And everyone said, what in the world is a zombie? And he said, well, let me define that for every future generation of movie and TV goers and lovers. Yeah. And there have been zombie movies before, but they had been things like Dr. Caligari's cabinet, somebody who was under the control of someone else or something like that. There was a hypnotist. This was the first time what we think of as zombies were ever introduced, like flesh eating ghouls who were dead and come back to life. Yeah, just what you think of as a zombie. This guy started that genre, like you said. Yeah. They shot it outside in Pittsburgh on about $115,000 budget, ended up grossing 12 million domestic. Not bad. And I think close to 20 worldwide, and was eventually selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Film Registry. It's a good movie. It's a very good movie. They shot it in black and white to save on costs, even though color was the standard by that point. And black and white is also a little more forgiving for rudimentary special effects. And one of the revolutionary things he did was cast a black actor as the lead, and for no other reason than, hey, this guy Dwayne Jones is really good. Exactly. Right. Like, he didn't go back and go, oh, well, our hero is black. So we need to make the whole thing of meditation on race and have them confront racism. Here's the script. And then the guy playing the lead just happens to be black. Right? And he was the best guy in the auditions. And in 68, this didn't really happen. You didn't just cast a black guy as a lead actor with no, like, ulterior motive, basically. Right. So I read this review from the time from 1969, a year after it came out. Young Roger Ebert went and watched it and wrote a review. And he wrote a pretty interesting review, which is basically it was about the reaction of the audience. And he went to a Saturday matinee that was populated almost entirely by 1011 year olds. Oh, wow. And they were used to seeing The Creature from the Black Lagoon or Frankenstein, or just movies that any kid could handle and could enjoy watching, and fun, scary kind of stuff. And he said that's how that was how the crowd reacted for the first half of the movie. But then about the point where and here comes spoilers everybody. If you haven't seen any of the living dead, just hit yourself in the knee with a hammer. The teenage couple go to get gas, and when their car blows up and is engulfed in flames, they die. They're burned to death. He said, right about that time, the tone, the mood of the theater changed, and there was no gleeful screaming anymore. Kids were starting to not move and were afraid to move in their seats, and some were quietly crying to themselves. And from the whole point on, it just got worse and worse for these little kids watching this movie. So it was a huge impact on horror movies. A like you said earlier, it was kind of the first one to really sort of delve into other issues. Like, if you look up, like, Significance of Night of the Living Dead or Meaning of Neither of the Living Dead or something like that. There are scores of articles that have been written over the years of how it was a metaphor for the Vietnam War, or an allegory about distrust of authority or the collapse of traditional family. And I think Romero said, I didn't necessarily mean all these things, but you can certainly find it in the movie that is art. One of the great revelations of my adult life is that the artist, the writer, the songwriter, the author rarely intends to imbue as much meaning into their works as people take from it. That's part of art as interpretation. Isn't that neat? If you're a writer? If you're a young writer right now who's just sitting there racking your brain for how to insert metaphor and meaning into this, just write your story, and people are going to find it for themselves. Yeah, agreed. I wish somebody had told me that when I was younger, I had teachers that said stuff like that. Oh, I didn't like good college professors in English when students would argue like, I think he means this, he would say, like, she may not have meant anything. Right. That's the revelation. I had teachers that would just go wrong. The other thing about naive Living Dead is it spawned, obviously, the zombie genre and sequels. Dawn of The Dead, day of The Dead return of The Living Dead the Walking Dead remakes yeah. Shout out Steven Yoon. Yeah, right. Yeah, why not? I'm still into The Walking Dead. You yeah, we talked about this. Yes. Okay, Steven, you listen. Anyway, zombies are, I think, still hot. And we can so hot. We owe that all to Mr. Romero, master of the genre. Yes. Took one more thing, too, that, naya, Living Dead did. They weren't the first, but very famously, Romero did was kill off his hero senselessly and shockingly at the end. Good point. Thanks, man. Okay, so let's move on. Like I said, yes. Day after Christmas. If you've ever been in Washington, DC at the end of M Street, you might have noticed very during the daytime ordinary set of stairs at nighttime, maybe they look creepy to you because those are The Exorcist stairs. Yeah. I'm trying to conjure the music in my head, but all I'm coming up with is the Unsolved Mysteries music. It wasn't quite right. So close. But I'm so unsatisfied right now. So The Exorcist was based on a book by William Peter Bladdy who wrote this in. And then in 73, the movie was made. And I think I referenced not too long ago, a great Mark Marin interview with William Friedkin where he talks about the audition process for Linda Blair. So you should go listen to that because it's pretty insightful. But The Exorcist really kind of changed the game in that it was a it spawned a bit of a subgenre of demonic movies. Sure. They were like religious base. Yeah. Even though I guess Rosemary's baby was before that. But The Exorcist was such a mega hit and it was nominated for Best Picture, the first horror movie to be nominated for that. So it was a big deal. It was. It sold 6 million tickets in about two months. Yeah. It's amazing. This is a horror movie, right? And it came out of nowhere. Apparently, the effect it had on audiences was extremely pronounced. There was a woman in Boston who had to be carried from the theater and she goes, It cost me $4, but I only lasted 20 minutes. The stories of that got around and people wanted to see this movie can't be that scary. And they went and they were like, oh, my God, that movie is that scary. Yeah, and it holds up too. I mean, special effects, they'd never quite hold up. But it's still a very creepy movie. Very famously, Linda Blair played the little girl who was possessed by demon and the heavy hitters were called in to exercise this demon, including a Max Van Sedow, who was only 44 when he played this guy, easily in his 70s. Yeah. Was he Benjamin Button? Well, no, they made him up. Wow. They did a great job. Yes. Which I don't see why they felt the need to do that. What else did they almost cast Brando. They almost cast Brando. But that would have been a colossal mistake. Well, Freedkin said you know what? As soon as you do that, it's a Marlin Brando movie. Yeah. And I think it's a picture. A Brando picture. Sure. That's what they said. And he didn't want it to be a Brando picture. He wanted to be the exorcist. So you said it was based on a book from two years before by William Peter Blatty. He apparently was known as a comedy writer, and he wanted to do something different. He said, hey, wouldn't it be funny if the little girl's head spun around and she screened Bile? What do you hear what I have to do with the crucifix? He actually wrote the book because he wanted to scare America back to church. That was his aim with the book. That may have worked. He believed that there was real evil going on in the world, and that part of it was because of a loss of faith or a loss of religion, I guess, and that's what he wanted to do with it. And when the movie came out, there was a huge pushback from religious authorities. Like Billy Graham said he believed the movie itself was possessed by a demon. I'm not sure how that would happen, but that was like a huge thing at the time. And a lot of other religious establishment types were like, don't go see that movie, it's evil. But there were some part of religion, major organized religion, who kind of saw through it and said, no, it's good that we're talking about this, that we're telling people, or people are seeing that there's such a thing as, like, good versus evil, literally combating on Earth, and people are talking about this and thinking about it. And so in that sense, The Exorcist really kind of went to bat for organized religion. Interesting. I saw another criticism of it, though, that said one of the themes of the movie that the book hadn't really intended, but the movie picked up on and expounded on was intergenerational conflict. That Reagan the child, represented the younger generation who was at war with the establishment, and that it even goes so far as to where her mother, the actress the movie that she's working on is about campus takeover by young radicals. So that's kind of a theme that was apparently part of the subtext, but was a major part of it in the movie, at least. Interesting. Yeah, I thought so, too, because apparently you think of intergenerational conflict now, apparently in the late sixty s. And early seventy s. It was sharper than it probably ever has been before or since. Yeah. The only other thing I got is that the green stuff that she projectiles was Anderson's pea soup and a little bit of oatmeal texture. Anderson's pea soup. I bet you can't get that anymore. Chuck. Let's do Jaws and then we'll take a break. I love talking about Jaws. Yeah. I mean, Jaws is on. I did my top favorite movies list at one point on our website, and I listed Jaws as my favorite movie favorite of all time. Yeah, I mean, that list changes, but Jaws is always in my top five. I can watch it anytime it's on. I've often said it's a perfect movie. And what I mean by that is there's just not a misstep. Like, the casting was perfect, the acting was great, the script was great. It played out just perfectly throughout the film. Spielberg was just a master storyteller with that movie. You were talking about how young George Romero was in Night of the Living Dead. Spielberg was 26 when he made Jaws. He was 13 years old, and he was apparently scared to death. When he finished filming, the schedule had been for 55 days. It went to $159. He had, I think, been allotted $4 million. You ended up spending 12 million on it? Yeah. Largely because A, shooting on water is notoriously difficult, and B, the shark, the mechanical shark they use was Legendarily wonky or Not Wonky, but wanky wonky. It didn't work. No, it rarely worked. So they spent a lot of time and burnt a lot of hours trying to get the shark to do its thing. And so much so that it didn't even make that many appearances in the movie. I think they even kind of scaled it back. And that ended up being better for the movie because you didn't get as much shark. I looked up the urban legend about the shark being named after Spielberg's lawyer, Bruce, and apparently it's true. Really? Yeah. Bruce Rainer was the name of Spielberg's lawyer, and that was the nickname for the mechanical shark on the set, was Bruce. That's pretty funny. So with Jaws, right, we're talking about horror movies that change the genre. Jaws not only changed the horror genre, it changed movie making to this day in multiple ways. Multiple, massive ways. It changed the entire film industry almost single handedly. Yeah. At the time, there was no such thing. You take it for granted now, but there was no such thing as a summer release. No. A lot of theaters closed down because AC wasn't in every theater and people didn't want to sit around in a hot movie theater for 2 hours. Yeah, a summer release or a tent pole film or a blockbuster feature. Jaws was the first one of all those. At the time. When Jaws came out, they used to release a movie on maybe one, two screens in, say, New York or La. For a week, and then it'd make its way to Atlanta, Minneapolis, Chicago for a few weeks, and then eventually it'd make it to your small town six, eight weeks later. That was how movies were released, not Jaws. Jaws was released on 435 screens across the country, which is huge. Which is part of the summer blockbuster release playbook now. Yeah. And it was also the first movie to spend lots and lots of money on marketing. And so I think the studios are like, wait a minute. If you spend some dough on marketing, you release this thing wide. You can make a ton of money in the first month that a movie is out, and you're kind of set like after that, it's anything else is gravy. And after the first week or two, probably. Yeah. The whole point of blockbuster now is to get that opening weekend to make all your money back in the opening weekend, and then everything else is gravy on top of it. Right. I don't know. Maybe it did make its money back in the first weekend because it hit $100 million in, like, 78 days or something incredible like that. Because it was the first movie to hit $100 million, and it did it in just a couple of months, even. Yeah. It eventually went on to make about $260,000,000 domestically, which is that's a great take now. Yeah. Much less the mid 1970s. Sure. For a $12 million spend. For sure. My only beef here is that I would not consider jaws a horror movie. Yeah. I think it's an adventure film. Yeah, I guess you're right. With a scary antagonist. Yeah. But it's amazing how much I quote that movie in my day to day life. Yes. Shark. That's a classic. All right, let's take a break. I'm going to meditate on that line and we'll talk about a few other scary movies, including one that was originally titled scary movie. Hey, everyone. When you're running a small business, every second counts and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office when you could be using stamps.com? Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses. Because stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and ups shipping services you need right from your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary. And you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a fourweek trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No longterm commitments or contracts just go to Stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. Okay. Moving on to Halloween. Halloween. Chuck, I believe. Halloween, yes. John Carpenter. The youngish John Carpenter, who originally titled this movie The Babysitter Murders. No. Little on the nose. Yeah. Pretty terrifying title, I guess. Young Jamie Lee Curtis. Her very first movie. Was it really? Yeah. Well, she went on to become known as the scream queen for all the horror movies she was in. Totally. And this was shot in 20 days in South Pasadena as the Midwest. And it's credited as being birthing the slasher genre. Yeah, it did. So there were slasher films before it. The town that dreaded sundown. It was, like, based on a true crime story, actually, in Texas. One called Black Christmas. The Grabster sites from I haven't heard of that one. But the idea of a faceless, almost like, non entity coming at you and relentlessly stalking you, being impervious to harm, as the Gapster puts it, and just coming at you again and again, trying to kill you, that was all established by Halloween. And it was done to great effect as well. Yeah. It holds up. It's still scary. Michael Myers, of course, was the killer. The music that John Carpenter score I mean, he scores most of his movies himself, but very iconic. Basic thing. I think he only took a couple of days to come up with it. But like, the Michael Myers character and the mask are so iconic. The music is so iconic. You know about the mask, right, Shatner? Yeah, go ahead. I went and checked that one out, too, to verify that it was true. And it definitely is true that Michael Myers mask is actually a Captain Kirk Star Trek mask painted white. Yes. That is history. Yes. In the script, when it came to the mask, it just said pale, neutral features of a man. Yeah. Which makes the whole thing even creepier. Because he's implaced. Or is that the right word? It's just almost like just an emotionless killer. Oh, yeah. It made the fact that he was merciless, ruthless, pitiless and arbitrarily, killing people almost all the more pronounced because this expression never changes. Well, to me, the two things that were creepiest about Halloween was the expression never changed because of that mask. And he did not run. Oh, yeah. He would just walk. And you still got the feeling like you can't outrun this guy even though he's walking. That was another creepy part about it follows with the walking aspect of it. Yeah, for sure. In the same way that 28 Days Later was freaky and that it took zombies and made them run. Yeah. Or I remember when I saw Friday the 13th I'm sorry, nightmare on Elm Street for the first time and Freddie Krueger was running around. I was like, that's not what scary dudes do. Yeah, scary dudes don't try. No, they walk very creepily towards you and still somehow gain speed on you even though you're running full speed. Freddy scared me to death the first time I saw that movie. Yeah, first one was a pretty good one. But Halloween established like you said, it established the slasher genre and everything about slasherfilms still today, all rooted in Halloween. John Carpenter's, Tropes yeah. And again, like you said, there were a couple of other slasher films before, but none of them grossed close to $50 million. Wow. Is that how much Halloween made? Yeah, 47 million domestic at about a $300,000 budget. So that's sort of like with The Exorcist. Like there were other movies that sort of did this thing before, but when you have a huge hit that does it is when it sort of redefines the genre because it makes money. Yeah. And that's all everyone starts paying attention after that. All right, what's next? What's next, my friend, is a movie that came out when I don't know. Were you still in college? No. You must have just been out then. I was out a few years. Okay. Well, regardless, around our college era, this movie came out because up to this point, everything's come out either when we were little or before we were born. This one was right in our wheelhouse. It was The Blair Witch Project, which came out in 1998. Yeah. And one of the big things that Blair Witch Project did well, two things, really. It established the found footage genre or subgenre. That is so overplayed now in the viral marketing campaign. And that's how I came upon it. I remember very specifically being in the apartment of Scotty Palito, who, you know sure. He shot our TV show, one of my oldest friends. And I was sitting in his apartment on Claremont Avenue Indicator, and I happened upon this. And this was prefaced I don't even know how I found it before things were being shared around. Right. And I happened upon this website, the very first Blair Witch Project website. And I was like, Dude, come over here and check this out. This is the scariest thing I've ever seen. Yeah. And I remember the website set it up as if it was real. And this found footage thing, it's so overdone now. It's hard to go back in time and remember when it was fresh. But I remember looking at and being like, did this happen? Did they really find this footage of this murder in the woods? Well, they got to see this. That was the rumor that this was actually real, man. Like you said, this is before the found footage genre. So people were being exposed to this concept for the first time, and we're kind of falling for it. I mean, first of all, you're either in college or you're just recently out of college, so you're maybe slightly more gullible than you are ten years on. I'm ready to believe it. You want to believe. Right. So yeah, the idea that this was actual found footage, it just made it all the more enjoyable. And people were buying into it. I think the other part of it, too, was that the filmmakers, partly because they didn't have the budget for actual effects, left a lot of the scariest parts to your imagination. Yeah. Nor did they have the talent to make a good narrative film. I mean, they worked on a 64 page script, which I was surprised that it was that big. But they shot it for eight days. And originally they were going to make it like a documentary about the found footage. Right. And then one of them had a flash of perspective. And I was like, wait, let's just release it like it's found footage. And the rest was history. Yeah. And I'm poking fun. That was not very nice at all. Eduardo Sanchez and Daniel Meyerk. Or Meyerk, the co directors. They should be credited with a truly ingenious campaign and invention. Well, they weren't the first to come up with found footage. Right. There were some films before I've never known how to pronounce it. Mondo Kane or Mondo Cain? I think Connee it's from 1962. And it was supposedly a documentary about, like, weird tribal rituals. I think there's head shrinking maybe involved. And it purported to be like real footage. Same with Cannibal Holocaust. Oh, man. If you've never seen Cannibal Holocaust, go out and watch it right now. Very disturbing. And it's so disturbing that the director of the movie was charged with murder because they believed that the actual murders depicted they were so realistic. They thought that it was a snuff film, basically. But it was supposed to be a documentary as well. So there was an idea of, like found footage or documentary style horror movies that had come before, but nothing like The Blair Witch, where it was just straight up. These people, we found their old camera and this is what was on it. Well, and they were smart enough to kind of dig up an old thing that never went huge. They were like, hey, man. Like these other movies, they never really hit it big. And it was a timing thing. Hats off for them. Good for them. Into them. Ice going good. All right, Chuck. Scream. Yeah, scream a tease that was originally titled Scary Movie. I'm glad it wasn't because Scary Movie is awesome. I don't know if it's Scary Movie ever would have been called maybe it would have never been made. Or maybe they would have called that Scream. Oh, yeah, I guess so. Scream was a very big deal when it came out. The writer, Kevin Williamson, and this is still the highest growing slasher film of all time, basically, Scream was like it was huge. I got Nev Campbell's haircut as a result of it. It was a big pop culture watermark. It was. And one of the big things about it, aside from the boatloads of money that it made was it spawned a subgenre called Metahorro, which is even though it had been done by no less than its own director, Wes Craven. With West Craven's new nightmare two years before Scream, it wasn't nearly as popular. But metahorro is this idea? If you ever seen Scream, you know they're constantly just referencing horror movies. Like, this is where you don't go out and make out in the car because that's where you get killed. And then they would do that and get killed. Right. Although I don't think that specific thing happened. Like, don't go back into the house. Yeah. Like, all the tropes of horror movies are addressed in the movie and they're talking about them as the horror movie tropes. Yes, exactly. Metahorro. Yeah. And there are plenty of other things that came along, metahor examples like, have you seen Tucker and Dale Versus Evil? No, it's a good oh, check it out, man. All right. That's a good movie. Zombie Land. Yeah, I did see that. Where he's rattling off all of these things that you need to know to survive a zombie apocalypse that he learned from zombie movies. Right. And then cabin in the woods. Did you see that one? Great movie. It was a great movie. I thought it was really good. I mean, from beginning to end, it was a great movie. Did you like Scream? Yes. Love screen. I liked all the screens. I only saw the first two. The second one, I think, might have been even better than the first. And the second one was shot emily worked on that. It was shot here at Agnescott College, partially. Oh, is that right? Yes. I go back and watch it, knowing that now I'll be like, oh, I've driven past that place. So I got a few tidbits, like I said. Initial title scary Movie Number Two. The Weinstein brothers initially offered it to George Romero and Sam Raimi. What else do I have here? Drew Barrymore was originally supposed to play Sydney, the lead character. And then she said, no, how about if I just play that girl at the beginning? Which kind of was a big thing because you see Drew Barrymore and it was a big shock when she died in the first scene. Right. You can't kill off your heroin right away. Yeah, I remember that first scene. Really scaring me when I saw it the first time in the theater. Yeah, it is. It's a scary gruesome gory heart. Yeah. Very well played. And then before he went to Nev Campbell, he went out to Alicia Wit, Brittany Murphy and Reese Witherspoon. Nev Campbell. Campbell. That was your first choice. Right. And then the mask, the iconic screen mask apparently was an off the shelf mask. Wow. That made that company's money. Yeah. And the wine scenes didn't like it. They were like, I hate that mask. Everything else is fine, but West Craven said, no, it's got to be that mask. Don't be stupid, Bob. All right, we're going to finish up with our own edition here. Finally. 19 cycle. I can't believe this wasn't on the list. I think Ed kept this off the list to toy with somebody he doesn't like specifically. That's the only explanation. Yeah, because psycho changed everything. Yeah, it really did. I mean, you could say that it was one of the first slasher flicks. It was an early psychological thriller based on the real life story of Edge. I mean, it doesn't exactly mirror Edge like, but the idea of being obsessed with your mother so much that you will commit murder is definitely rooted in Edgin's story. Yeah, if you're not familiar with Edge, I don't even know if he was a serial killer. I think he murdered one, maybe two people. But more than anything, he was a grave robber. But he likes to dress up in people's skin, women's skin, and pretend he was his own mother. Which, man, that's a lot of years on the couch working that one out. Yeah, or you can just die at the hands of cops. One of the two. And he also inspired Leather Face from Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Yeah. In Buffalo Bill, of course. Oh, yeah. One guy inspired all those guys. So I found this article. Psychoan the Horror Movie That Changed the Genre by Owen Gliberman. Or is it Gliberman? Gliber gleerman, I think he wrote for legendary critic, wrote for EW for years and years, and now writes for a Variety. Oh, he does? Yeah, but he put it best. He said. Well, you know, the iconic shower scene, first of all, is hugely important because Hitchcock really kind of ripped up the script. Not literally, but the horror movie script when he kills off Janet Lee halfway through the movie. You just didn't do that at the time? No, we got him nowhere. And we've seen that come up later on, like at the end of Night of Living Dead or Drew Barrymore and Scream. Hitchcock was the first one to do that. Yeah, and Lieberman puts it this way, he said he was also slicing through years, decades, centuries, even, of audience expectation that the hero or heroine of a fictional work would be shielded and protected or would at least die, usually the end, in a way that made some sort of moral, dramatic sense. Right. In Psycho, the murder made no sense at all. Right. And he really kind of hits it on the head there. It was like if you've never seen Psycho or heard of it, the movie is just going along about this woman who, like, steal some money from her work, and she's kind of on the lamb and checks into this hotel and you don't even know it's a horror movie. You're thinking it's a movie about a lady who steals money and is trying to get away from getting caught. Right. And then just out of nowhere, she's hacked up in a shower. And at the time, audiences and still, if you haven't seen it, it's shocking. The audiences were just like, they didn't know what they'd seen. Right, exactly. So not only is the hero no longer safe, that means maybe you're not either. Yeah. So it had a really huge unsettling effect. And then Owen Gleerman points out that Hitchcock was so smart that he even made a nod to the type of pat expected horror that the audience was used to. In the house that he used for Psycho, the Bates house, there was this huge, rambling Victorian mansion on a hill. There's lots of taxidermy, and it was over decorated and just creepy. But up to that point, like, that was horror. That was what a horror movie looked like and felt like. And this was kind of Hitchcock's homage to that. But at the same time, he was also putting the heel of his shoe on it as well. Yeah. And that house was almost a character in itself. Like, if you've ever seen the recreation of it in Los Angeles, I think it's universal. Did you see it? Oh, yeah. I never did. The closest I came was, I think, when Different Strokes went there. That's the closest you got to it. Yeah, man, if you've ever seen this thing in person, it sends a chill up your back just seeing this thing in, like, a sunny Los Angeles day still, that's awesome. It's such an iconic house. It's like, oh, man, there it is. That's where Norman Bates lives. He's the most disturbed human of all time. Right. So in the movie, of course, there was the mother character, who is sort of referenced throughout the movie, and it is not until the end that you realize that there is no Mother. Mother's dead. There's just Norman Bates and all his rage and hang ups. Yeah. So all the monster movies about giant ants or the Creature from the Black Lagoon, monsters, things that were in other than a normal person had to do battle with, that was gone. Now, the monster had been on screen the whole time, and you had noticed it. And now what do you think about your neighbor who has seemed a little weird from time to time before? Could he be a murderer who thinks he's his mother? Who knows? Yeah. This is what Hitchcock did to everybody back in 1960. And you almost get, like I think Owen Gliberman points it out. Yeah, he does. At the beginning, he basically says, like, we probably didn't see Psycho. If you're reading this, you're probably too young to have seen Psycho in 1960. And we should all feel sad that we didn't, because it changed everything, that we can't do anything but take it for granted now. And everything that's come since then has been trying to regain that shock and horror that it instills in audiences. And thus far, no one's actually been able to do it. Yeah. And the other thing I remember when I saw it when I was younger, I think I saw this when I was like 14 ish. And I think it had this impact on just about everyone. I don't think I took a shower for a month. I was straight up. Bathtub curtain open, doors open, windows open. Making your mom watch. She's keeping watch. No, that would have been full circle. Back to school. Yeah, I guess you didn't even want to have anything to do with your mom. No, man. It changed the shower curtain industry for a while after that. Yes, I bet. Very good movie. And there were a couple of Hitchcock movies in the last few years, two different ones. One with Anthony Hopkins and one with Toby Jones. They were both really good. And one was about the years that he was making Psycho. The other was about the years when he was making The Birds. And they were both really good movies. And you should check those out too. You should repeat that. We just got a introduction from Noel. So go ahead and say it again, Josh, in case it didn't come through. So Noel just said that the director of the Black Coat's daughter is Anthony Perkins, who played Norman Bates in Psycho's Son. Wow. He also did another movie now that Noel says that. Thanks, Noel. It's called the Pretty Little Thing That Lives in the House, which is another horror movie. A ghost story. I think that was his first one. And I think that might be on Netflix. It's great. It's a really great movie, too. Man, this has got me fired up to see some horror movies. It's a renaissance of horror. Yes. It's tough though, because Emily doesn't really dig it. So I have to just find alone time to do that. Watch it in the bathroom. All right, well, if you want to know more about horror movies, go watch horror movies. Go forth. Let us know what we missed, for God's sake. Yes. If you want to check out grabsters list, type in horror movies on the search barhouseofworks.com and it'll bring up this fine list that you'll disagree with. And since I said disagree, it's time for listener mail. This is from Eric and I'm going to call it what he called it schoolhouse Rock Nostalgia Theory. All right. I think he's pretty right on this just came in, actually. There's a hot take. Hey guys in Schoolhouse Rock. So Josh made the statement that Gen Xers are most nostalgic generation attributed to the success of Schoolhouse Rock. I'm going to offer my own theory. I propose that Gen X is nostalgic mostly for pop culture because of that word of child targeted advertisements and marketing in the definitely something we've talked about. This series got like while our little impressionable brains were developing. We're being taught by those who are steering pop culture to long for and find fulfillment in the toys and other products our cartoons were pushing on us. Now, as adults, those messages are still deep in our psyche, and we can't shake the idea that we still really need those Star Wars action figures to be happy. Not because the toys and the shows were so great, but because we had been tricked into believing we need them. I have nothing scientific to back this up. Just a hunch. Yeah. What you mean there hasn't been a study from MIT right, on Star Wars toys? I'm kind of surprised by that as well. I thought you were being facetious at first. I wanted to take a turn. Yeah, I don't know which way up at this point. Nothing scientific to back this up, but I'd love to hear what you all think, see if anyone out there is any respectable and informed input. Love what you. Love you, Eric. That is from Eric Lewin. And Eric, I think that's super valid. Yeah, I do too. Eric, I think you've really hit upon something here. And that's all I have to say about it. If you have a great theory, fan theory, real life theory, whatever, we want to hear them, especially if it's interesting. You can tweet to us at syskpodcast or Joshamclark. You can post it on Facebook at Charleswchuck Bryant or stuff you should know. You can send us an email the stuffpodcast@housetofworks.com. As always, join us at our home on the webstepyouw.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstopworks.com. Ah, summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's Criminal Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
4167e8f6-53a3-11e8-bdec-37b971285027	Desert Survival: Josh and Chuck Save Your Tookus	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/desert-survival-josh-and-chuck-save-your-tookus	The chances are pretty low that you’ll find yourself lost in the desert, but on the off chance you do you’ll thank yourself that you listened to this episode, where we guide you to safety.	The chances are pretty low that you’ll find yourself lost in the desert, but on the off chance you do you’ll thank yourself that you listened to this episode, where we guide you to safety.	Tue, 19 Mar 2019 13:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=3, tm_mday=19, tm_hour=13, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=78, tm_isdst=0)	43405161	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from howstuffworkscom? Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W, Chuck, Bryant, and there's Jerry over there. You put the three of us together and you've got stuff if you should know, just in case you ever get lost in the desert. What we're going to give is our gift to you addition. You know what's funny is I was reading a podcast newsletter today. Like an industry newsletter? Sure. You're not going to buzz market it? No. All right. There's probably more than one. There are several, are there? I think so. I should get on the other screen. At least two can be several, right? Sure. Isn't that the biblical unit? Several is two. I thought the biblical unit was qubit. Right. I'm glad we can laugh in this one. Sure. And it said there was an article specifically about podcaster burnout, and they interviewed someone that was like, she started podcasting in 2017 and blah, blah, blah and experience burn out. And I kind of laughed. I was like, I mean, I get it. Like, people burn out in different ways, and they may have a tougher workload than us, but I just sort of snickered that after eleven or going on eleven years very soon. Yeah. This April bite eleven years, we have moments of not burnout. We get a little warm, kind of like this again. But that quickly passes very quickly. I'm never burned out. I would say that to where I don't want to do this or anything. No, I know. I would say there's probably been like literally five times. Sorry to use the word literally, but I literally mean literally in this sense. Yes, because you've built a statue of paper mache after each time, representing each burnout. Right. And they're on my desk, so you can count them. There's five. But it comes in like just digging into a topic at a time when there's like a bunch of other stuff going on or whatever. It's just been a really long stretch where maybe we're recording more than usual, and then when we get in here to record, it's gone. Agreed. That's when it doesn't happen. I don't think I've ever been and let me knock on wood, I don't think I've ever been in a recording session with you and been like, not wanted to do it. I agreed, my friend. And weirdly, I'm more burned out with movie crush at times. It sounds trust me, I'm not seriously complaining. But ask Emily how many times I've been like, I got to watch this movie tonight and take notes on yeah, because it takes long. You're like, I have to pause to take the notes because I don't want to miss anything. Right. So it takes like three and a half hours to watch a movie and take notes. Plus, I guess you're fundamentally not able to enjoy the movie. It's not like enjoying a movie. Right. You're quite analyzing a movie dented a little bit. Sure. And it's at night, so I'm right, kind of. I guess. Yeah, you're right, kind of. And it's at night, so it's like I'm technically not at work. And sometimes it's just like I don't want to watch whatever. Point Break. Who's his Point Break? Jordan morris of bubble and Jordan Jesse go. Okay. Yeah, Point Break is a good not the rewrite, right? No. Okay. It was really kind of fun watching that, actually. I don't know why I pulled that one up. Okay, because it was the most recent one I watched. I got you. So it was in your work. But to take notes on Point Break, it can be a little tedious. Right? Bra. There's that one great part where they do the midnight surf and Keanu has just learned and you just hear this because it's obviously ADR, like, recorded afterwards. And you just hear him yell, I'm F in surfing. Man, this is such a great line. Does he say Effing or the F word? Well, he said the F word. It would have been better if he would have said F and maybe on TNT. That's how it sounds. Oh, boy. Have you seen that? Sorry. I know we haven't even started yet. Let me just file on here, get it out of the way. Have you seen that video of Keanu on the New York? I believe Subway giving a seat up to a lady who's standing. No, but he is a legendary good guy. Yes. He's been through some horrible stuff, and I just want to be his friend. Keanu Reeves, if you're listening yeah, be my friend. Be friends. Okay, well, he's your friend first, because you asked. Well, we can share them. Okay. All right. Tuesdays and Thursdays. That's fine. So we can learn this stuff you should know together. Okay. All right. That's a fair. We'll alternate weekends. Okay. Because, you know, canoe on the weekends. That's a party. You think he's a good guy monday through Thursday to see how many seats he gives up on a Saturday? All right. Wait, hold on. One more thing. Can you imagine Keena re listing this conversation at first? Kind of Chuckling himself, and it's getting weirder and weirder. Finally press stop and maybe he never listens again. It just blew our chance, Chuck. All right, one more thing, and then I swear I'm done. I meant to tell you that I did some La. Sessions recently for Movie Crush and the great show High Maintenance on HBO. It's one of my all time favorites. The dude on there, Ben Sinclair, as the guy, the weed delivery guy, is just like one of the main reasons I went there in person was just so I could meet him. I meet him, and the first thing he said was, hey, man, I used to listen to you and Josh when I was a shusher at this lesbian poetry bar. And I was like, what I was like, first of all, it's a shsher. He's like, it's a poetry bar. I sat there and shush people, and he's like, but I used to listen to you guys. I always wonder what you look like. Did Josh quit smoking? And I was like, Why don't you people ever reach out? Right. Do you know what that would have meant to me? Yeah. Which he was just a shusher at the time. Maybe I wouldn't have known. But now he's made it. Yeah. So, anyway, I told him that you quit smoking. You're doing great. Yeah. I don't think he's listening for a bit. Do you think he's listening now? I don't know if he got back on the train or not, but if he did, do you think he's friends with Kiana Reef? Maybe. But Ben Claire gives up his seat for no person. Got you. That's his and if you say, like, maybe you should stand up, he goes, no, he would give up his seat for sure. Okay. Anyway, let's talk about desert survival. Imagine Chuck Benson Claire is making his way through the desert in his car, prius, we'll say. And he runs out of not just gas, but electricity as well, which he might he has a big RV, actually, that's worked into the show. Okay. He's in his RV, so he just straight up runs out of gas. Sure. Which probably happens a couple of times a day in a big old RV, I would imagine. Okay, ben is in trouble because Ben was not expecting to have this extended stop and unexpected stop in the desert, so he did not bring a few things. Okay. If Ben were paying a little less attention to whether people were talking and need to be shushed or not and more attention to his desert survival, what would he have packed in that RV, Chuck? Well, Ben Sinclair would have had probably a pound of weed. Okay. So he's got a good start there because he could burn that for a signal fire or for comfort and warmth. Yeah, well, I mean, I wrote this dumb article. This is a great article. Did you notice my stupid thing I did with the music titles? Sure. The Oasis thing. And all of them are song titles. All the sidebars are song titles. And that was back when I was like, oh, man, I am the most clever person alive. So I got the wonderwall one, rescue Me. Okay, I got that rescue Me. But I was thinking more of the TV show than the song. So, everybody, if you go on to how stuff works.com right now and look up how desert survival works, almost every page has a sidebar, and the title of the sidebars are song titles. Rescue me. After all. You're my wonderwall. What could it be? It's a mirage. What could it be? It's a mirage. What is that? I'm telling you all, it's sabotage. Okay, that's a good one. And then finally, a little shout out to Annie. Food, glorious food. Okay, so that was what used to make me happy at work. Yeah, I remember those days. Yes, you, too. When you do, like, a clever photo caption and that would get you through the week, we would stand up and share it over the cubicle wall. Yeah, look at how many photo caption. Yeah, that's going to blow everybody's mind. All right, so you're in the desert. You want to have well, let's just talk about this stuff. Okay? Yeah. What should be in your kit? Water. A mirror. That's a big one. Way to start a fire. Yeah, that's a big one, too. Basically, just a lighter. Food, water. If you're going to cross the desert, have a lighter, which seems counterintuitive because it's hot in the desert. But no, trust us, you'll see, you want a lighter on you. A mirror, which you'll see, too. That's what we'll do. We'll see what's supposed to be in the pack in the RV, and then we'll go back and we'll okay, I'm suddenly burned out. Should we take a break? Yeah. All right, let's take a break and let's start the podcast in earnest. All right, everybody. Welcome to Stuffy Snow. I'm Josh. There's Chuck. There's Jerry over there. And we're talking desert survival. So let's get to it. Yeah, this is all due to the fact that we just recorded a very tough episode, so we're clearly just goofing off now. So we're talking about deserts, and we did a desert episode. Yeah, and a desertification episode, too, and I think one on the Dust Bowl. But something that all deserts have in common is not sand. It's not even heat. It's a lack of water. Yes. Technically, Antarctica is the largest desert in the world, and there's lots of water, but it's all locked up as ice. There's no available water in exactly the same way as there's basically no available water in Death Valley in California. Right. Deserts have the next thing that they have most frequently in common is, again, not sand, but exposed bedrock. All of those cool formations or whatever, that's actually the bottom of the earth you're seeing exposed. All the soil has been dried out for so long because there are lack of nickels down. Basically, it's been pants. We got some good pants stories, by the way, coming soon. Yeah. The soil is so dry that it can't be held in place, so wind is blowing it away. And so what you're seeing is the exposed bedrock. Sand only makes up something like 20% of the world's deserts. Yeah. I mean, you got pebbles, you have desert soil sometimes. Right. That bedrock you were talking about. We're going to talk about oasis. Yeah. So I think Survivor Antarctic survival, or even Arctic survival deserves its own episode. So we're just going to be talking about hot deserts and all of that sand and exposed bedrock and pebbles baked in the sun and shoots that heat back out and it's just super hot. Okay. Yeah. So water is obviously the biggest, biggest problem. If you get trapped in the desert on foot or in a car, and you think about, like, I never go desert hiking. I don't need to worry about this. But have you ever been like, I'm going to take the long route from Texas to California. Right, because it's more scenic, and then your car breaks down and you're in big trouble if you don't know what you're doing. That happened to a woman. I can't find her name right now, but she's a grandmother, I believe she's 72, who was driving in her Prius, and it ran out of gas and electricity on the way, I believe, to Phoenix. And she had an unexpected trip with her dog for nine days and survived. Amazing. Yeah. Did she eat her dog? No. Okay. Luckily, she did not have to eat her dog. Did she survive on the saliva of her dog? Yeah, well, they spit in one another's mouth, so it was kind of but they did that anyway. It was a wash. So dehydration is obviously the first kind of physical symptom you might experience if you run out of water. Decreased frequency of urine. Of course, if your urine is very smelly or very deep yellow, your mouth is going to be dry. As things increase, dehydration wise, you're going to get sunken eyes, your heartbeat is going to increase. And if you get to the stage where you literally have no urine, or if you're vomiting and have diarrhea, then you're in pretty bad shape. Yeah. So vomiting and diarrhea is like, the last thing you want to do while you're dehydrated, because all it is is just getting rid of any remaining hydration you have. Yeah. It's not good. That's a bad reaction to dehydration. And we'll talk about heat casualty coming up. I'm kind of psyched about that bit. Yeah. But when we talk about water and rationing water, there's an old saying, ration sweat, not water. Meaning don't, like, drink all your water at once, but ration your sweat. They say not to. If you are lost like this, don't go hiking to find civilization during the peak of day. You want to ration how much output and how much you're sweating, but you do have to take in that water. Yeah. So when you're in the desert, you recommend, or I should say the experts recommend, because it's obviously a very well researched article that somebody drink a gallon of water a day. Well, I mean, that's what they say. If you've got like, unlimited amounts of water a gallon a day, you need to ration it somewhat. If you have very limited water, obviously. Sure. But what you don't want to do, which happens a lot of times, is to be found dead with water in your canteen. Yeah. Which is haunting. Sure. And like you said, you want to ration your sweat, not your water, but you do kind of want to ration your water. You don't want to be a little water piggy right out of the gate. But you also recommend via the experts, that you don't just wait until you're thirsty. Right. Because you'll only get about two thirds of the amount of water you actually need just by going by thirst. You want to actually stop and drink more water than you think you need. Yeah. And if you're hiking around again, we talked about, morning and evenings are the best time to go look for help. If you see a trail, go down that trail, because you have a better chance of finding someone there. Follow the birds. Birds, generally, animals go toward water. Yeah. Apparently, if they're circling in the morning or the evening, they're probably circling around water, trying to get some groundwater going. But very wisely, you point out to the experts that if there's, like, a little small mountain in between you and those birds and a longer way around the mountain that's flat, take the longer way that's flat. Because even though you might cut off a couple of hours between you and the birds, you're going to really exert yourself going up that mountain. Yes. Whereas instead, you want to take the longer but slower, less exerting path to get to that water where the birds are circling. For sure. If you're with someone, don't talk. I mean, you can talk some, but don't just chat about your day. Try to conserve your words. Try and breathe through your nose. What do you think about Grace Jones? If you happen to see any wet sand or standing water anywhere, then you're in luck, because you can dig down in there, and you will probably find more water under, you know, this groundwater underneath it. Yeah. Which is that's a banana? Sure. If you find, like, groundwater in the desert, you're probably going to be okay. Yeah. If you don't find any water and you run out of water, you're probably not going to be okay. No. You also want a fire, which you said isn't very intuitive, but if you ever spent any time in the desert, the temperature swings are huge. It can get cold in the desert at night, and then fire allows you to purify water. There's that whole safety feeling. It keeps mountain lions away. Right. Sure. I would guess just about any critters don't go near fire because they associate it with wildfires in the desert. Brush fires, rescue signal. You can do that all trick. I think we even did a show on smoke signals early on. No, I don't think so. No, I keep forgetting the right. Are you sure? I'm pretty sure. It was like an early, early on to go listen to it. Yeah. Because I wanted to do that one. It's probably not very good, but your whole point of all this is to find people and to get rescued. Yeah, you make a great point about that. The point of being lost in the desert is to make yourself visible. Yeah. The point of not being lost, rather. Sure. Or being lost and finding rescue. The key to being found. How about that? Right. So if you are in a car, if your car is not working anymore, it's out of gas or whatever, flat tire, blow it up, basically. Stick a hanky in the gas tank and just blow it up. So you want to stick a hanky in the gas tank. You want to fashion a bow and arrow, light the arrow, stand back and shoot the car's gas tank. That's what you want to do? No, you want to open your hood and tie a rag to it or a bandana around your antenna or something. Anything like a typical sign of distress. Right. Anything to make it like something's up here. Sure. Yes. Even if the hood is fine, you raise a hood as an indicator. Yeah. Like if there's no engine trouble. Right. You can still raise the hood. It's all right. Nobody's going to arrest you when they rescue you. If you can spell out SOS or something like that with help clothing or help on the ground if a helicopter or plane is nearby. Yeah. The woman in Arizona was rescued by writing Help. I think that's actually how they found her. She wrote help in sticks. Oh, really? Yeah. Nice. Her dog told her to do it. That stuff works. Yeah. If you are in your car, you've got a leg up because you have your rear view mirror or your side view mirror that just go ahead and break that thing off and use it. Yeah. I think we said in the first few minutes that we're trying to forget about now, that you want to have a mirror in your survival pack no matter wherever you're going hiking. Yeah, but a lot of people don't have survival packs in their car. Like most people, I think. I don't know. I think about it. I've got like, jumper cables and some Renex. Does that count? You know, after that last stupid Atlanta ice storm a few years ago that stranded people? The snowpocalypse. Yeah. I think I had something in my car after that, but I have a different car now. It wasn't much, but it was like, some water and a blanket and some granola bars. I need to stock up mine and Emily's car with that stuff. Yeah, for sure. You never know, I think. Remember when we had some tornadoes in Atlanta a few years ago? You and I were like, we really need like a crank radio and like all this stuff we sort and then you're like, oh, I wonder what's on TV before you're watching the Japanese game shows. You'd forgotten like 8 hours go by. But a signal mirror is important. You just flash that thing. It says here to I was about to make fun of it, but I realized I wrote it. But practice on a nearby rock. I thought that was advice. Yeah, why not? I mean, you don't want your first attempt at signaling somebody with a mirror to be while you're trying to signal somebody in a passing aircraft, probably, so and I mean, like, if there's no cloud cover, you can get somebody at, like, 30,000ft if you do it right. Practice on a rock. What else are you going to do while you're sitting around in the shade? Nothing. Yes. There might be a Delta pilot up there that's like, oh, God, what is that? That's so annoying. You should have a whistle in your survival kit so you can blow it if you see someone from far away. And they recommend that if you honk your horn for help to be like, honk, honk, honk, and then wait and honk, honk, honk. Because if you just lay on it, like if you're in traffic, someone might hear that and just think, this car has his horn stuck. Yeah. They'll be like, that's so annoying. I'm going to continue on past this weird path in Death Valley that no one should be down. Everybody's hornet stuff. Let's say you are in your car. Your car is jacked up, and you're like, all right, I've exhausted my resources here. Screw this. I got to go take a hike. Leave a note on your car and say, like, hey, I'm broken down and I've gone northwest at 02:00 P.m. On Tuesday. Also, I'm Chuck Bryant, who, hopefully, you're looking for. You found him. Check out my podcast. Stuff You Should know. And Movie Crush. Yeah. Never miss an advertising opportunity. But if you do stay with your car, just don't sit around in your car, like, sit in the shade and even say to sit on a blanket. Yes. The reason being is because there can be something like a 30 deg Fahrenheit temperature difference between the ground and the air above the ground. That's nuts. That's how barren and hot the ground gets. Yeah. And it's not like the air above the ground is cool. It's still hot because the ground is heating it. But the ground itself is taking in all of that unbroken, unfiltered sunlight directly into it. Holding as much as it can and then shooting it back out is basically infrared heat back into space through you. And if your bud is touching the ground through conduction, it's going to transfer directly to you or is through the air. It would be going through convection from the air to your butt. Right. Which is not nearly as efficient as conduction. So don't sit directly on the ground. Even sitting on a rock is better than sitting on the ground. But ideally, you want to find the shade that your car is producing. Sure. Whether it's the hood that's up or just the car itself or whatever, and sit in that shade as best you can. Get your feet off the ground, like you said, I think, too. Yeah. And take off your shoes and socks, especially if you're hiking around during your breaks. They also say to not take off your clothes. Your instinct might be to take your clothes off, but those clothes, you want them soaking up sweat because that'll cool you down. Right. And also you don't want to take your shirt off and also have a third degree sunburn after day one, either. I thought about that, too. It's like a bad situation. Worse. Right. It's doing something to protect you from the UV. I think the average T shirt has like, an SPF of four or something like that. That's better than nothing. Better than nothing. Also, Chuck, if you are, and I guess if you're actually using this information we're giving you right now, first of all, good luck. We're pulling for you. Secondly, if you are going to take off your shoes, don't do it in the sun, because just that exposure of your bare feet to the sunlight for that short of a time can make your feet swell and you might not be able to get your shoes back on, which if you do end up having to hoof it out of there. You want your shoes? Yeah. You want your feet all swollen up? No. So take your shoes off and let your dogs air out in the shade. Only make a little hat if you don't have one out of whatever. You got something in your car or something? Whatever. Like if you have a piece of cardboard, put it on your head. This is the greatest sentence in this. God, I know. Jesus. No, I loved it. You didn't like this article? I don't know. It's just sort of a reminder of darker days at this job. So may I read this? Sure. If you don't have a hat to wear, fashion a head covering with what you have on hand. You may look silly wearing a cardboard hat, but your goal is to survive, not win a beauty contest. Drink a liter of water per hour to stay properly. I know we cut out that part earlier because that didn't sound right. I mean, maybe that's if you have all the water in the world. Yeah, but that just sounds like it's a lot of water. Yeah. You burn through your water. Sure. If your car is stuck. And this actually happened to me once. I got a car stuck in the desert one time in the middle of the night with my friend when I lived in Humor. Yeah. Wow. I got it out. That's scary. Without deflating my tires. But they say if you're stuck in the sand to deflate your tires just a little bit, don't, like, start goosing it because you're going to dig yourself in more and just apply, like, steady accelerator pressure and turn your wheels kind of back and forth a little bit, let out a little bit of air, and you might be able to get out of there. Yeah. Again, don't let a lot of air out, because if you do get out, you still need to drive back home. Sure. And you don't want to do that on overly deflated tires. No. Okay. Should we take a break now, you think? Why not? Okay, we're going to take a break, everybody. There's a lot more to come. You're not toast yet because we have more stuff to tell you how to survive in the desert right after this. I really do love that sentence. That was a great sentence. There's one more in here I can't wait to call out, though. I'm sure I know what it is. Should we talk about oasis? Sure. I mean, it depends on where you are, but an oasis is just when wind has blown away enough sand that you get down to that groundwater. That's all an oasis is. Yeah. You know, like an aquifer. Yeah. Imagine if there's nothing above the aquifer. Now you got a lake. Boom. That's an oasis. Yeah. But they can be big enough and exposed enough. You can have this, like, lush oasis in the middle of the desert. There's really no better word for it. Yeah. If you're in the Sahara Desert, the communities form around these oases. There's one very large one called the Cargo Oasis that is 100 miles long and depending on where you are, twelve to 50 miles wide. Yeah. There's plenty big to hold small towns. Plenty big. It is. It is. I'm just laughing at this article. I can't believe I wrote this thing. I really value this article. I think it's great. Well written, well researched approachable. This is when I was assigned your survival guy. You were fan, and I wrote a lot of these. We've covered a few of them on the show, but still plenty left. Those days are over. No. If you are hiking, the first thing they say is to walk slowly. Your instincts may be to get out of there fast and find help fast. Very good advice, but that's no good. No. Not only do you want to remind yourself to slow down because that's what it takes, you're not going to just walk slowly, automatically, you're going to be freaked out. Yeah. So you have to stay calm and say, I've got to walk slow, and just take breaks about ten minutes out of every hour, I think. But if you're with a group, you want to set your pace by the slowest and least fit person in the group. Just everybody walk that slow. That person will help pace everybody else, and it will keep that person from just dying, trying to keep up. Like literally dying, trying to keep up. I mean, everyone else has to be like, jeez, Big Larry in the back is really holding us back. But big Larry is probably. Walking at the right speed, right. Which is slow. Yeah, at least for you. He's walking slow enough for you to slow you down. That's right. That's not a T shirt, but it's still true. Should we get to your favorite part of this, which is heat casualty? Yes. I know you got some science on this, right? Yes. Well, the three major categories are heat cramps, heat exhaustion, and then heat stroke, in that order, and heat cramps. Or you can get those on a hot afternoon if you're out playing Frisbee. You can. And all of it comes down to it's just basically an escalating imbalance between water and salt loss. So, like, the electrical conduction in your muscles and all that, from your heart to your legs is out of whack because you have lost a lot of water and you still have a higher salt concentration or else you've lost a lot of salt and there's still enough water that your muscles aren't working quite right so they can cramp. Right. If that happens, you say drink like a power aid. If you got it, what are you sitting there holding on to it in the first place for? Yeah, if you're floss in the desert with a power aid, fire it down. It's like, I don't like blue, I like purple. That's true. So that's step one, if you have a power rate. If not, if you have some water, drink the water, the cramps are going to go away. You can overcome heat cramps pretty easily, it sounds like, but you want to stop rest, getting some shade, stop moving and attend to the heat cramps for sure. Yeah. That may lead to heat exhaustion if you don't have water and this, like you said, is just an escalation of that imbalance, you may be irritable or feel weak or have a headache, or if you're vomiting and have nausea or clammy skin, then that's like heat exhaustion is seriously setting in. It is. Again, salt and electrolytes are really important to the electrical conduction in your body. And your body moves through electrical conduction. It's a big component. So if that's off, your body's off. Yeah. But then if you're really in trouble, you enter into heat stroke. And this is the point where your body's system at getting rid of heat has been overwhelmed by the heat it's taking on, and you're in big trouble when that happens. Basically, on a cellular level, your body is failing systemically because proteins aren't folding correctly and proteins do just about everything there is to do in a cell. They're starting to clump up and get weird, and then cells are suddenly dying. One of your body's main tricks at getting rid of heat is through convection, sending your hot blood to the surface of your skin, which is why if you go into a sauna, your skin gets flushed. But also if you'll notice your heart is pumping, is beating really hard, even though you're just sitting there. You're in the heat. And the reason why is your heart is working overtime, shooting blood out to your skin to get rid of heat so that your body can cool down. It's using your blood as a heat transfer mechanism. Amazing. And your heart actually speeds up. You're actually pumping out up to eight liters a minute of blood more than your heart usually pumps out wow. When you're starting to enter heat stroke. So it's a big deal. Yeah. I would imagine that would put you in danger of cardiac arrest. Yes. I think that's one of the results of that whole thing of severe heat stroke. Yeah. So bad headaches, very dizzy, nausea, vomiting. Your muscles might be spasming. That heart rate, like you were talking about is way high. And you may be full on hallucinating at this point, or you may fall unconscious. Like, heatstroke is no joke. So you got to find shade fast, which is the biggest part of our biggest challenge in desert survival, is finding shade. There's just nowhere yeah, a big rock can be your shade. Exactly. Like, whatever, it doesn't matter. Just find shade. Because the difference between shade and sunlight in a desert is substantial. Yeah. And if you have any water, like, now is the time. This is when you're found dead with your canteen half full of water because you're like, no, I still am a day away from finding help. Right. You have no idea how far you are. Yeah. This is go time to save your life. Plus, also, if you have any cool compresses, put them in your armpits, put them in your groin. Do whatever you can to cool yourself down. If you have any cool compresses left over from the party around the campfire the night before, apparently. Yeah. You're like, If I could only pull down. Oh, wait a minute, I have a frozen compress I can put in my crutch. There are all kinds of animals in the desert that can be dangerous, whether it's spiders tarantulas are scary looking, but they're probably not going to kill you. Yeah. They don't really care about you. They don't want to bite you. And even if they do bite you, it's like stupid tarantula. Yeah. I mean, none of these things want to find you. Like, you will find these brown reclusives and black widows under rocks or under brush or something like that. So I go reaching in there. Don't go reaching in some hole like Timothy Dalton and Flash Gordon. What hole did he reach into? You saw Flash Gordon, right? No. The old one? No. You should probably enjoy that. I didn't realize it was Timothy Dalton in there. I thought it was a blonde guy. Well, he played Flash Gordon, but Timothy Dalton played the bad guy. One of the bad guys. I got you. There was a challenge where they had to stick their hand in this big hole, and there was a stinging creature inside this blob. It sounds like the Joe Rogan Show. What was it called? You mean the Joe Rogan podcast? No, Fear Factor. I remember Fear Factor. I used to like that show. That was a good show. I could never have done that show, though. Because of the stuff you eat. Yeah, there was some gross stuff. That's where I was like, I can do all that stuff, but I can't eat gross things. You could have done everything else, though. Well, I mean, to a certain degree, sure. Not I, but yeah, there's no way I could eat those nasty things. You probably have an easier time with that than me. I don't know, man. I think that would be pretty disgusting. On top of that, though, like doing things like sticking my hand in something or having, like, a box full of, like, spiders put over my head or scorpions or whatever, I could do that I would not like. For what? To be on TV. Well, exactly. It's all right. Being on TV isn't so great, everyone. No, it's cracked up to be certainly not. Where the box of scorpions on your head? Speaking of scorpions, there are 30 different types, more than 30 different types of scorpions. And just Arizona, and they're all over the place. They're in Georgia, in the mountains, in the woods of Georgia. Yeah. Very few of them are poisonous. No, not very many at all. I think a couple of them can actually kill a person with their venom by stinging you with that tail. They'll still hurt you, though. Just don't go near the scorpions. Yeah, I mean, you can get sick from any of these things. Like a black widow is probably not going to kill you either. No, but if you're already in danger of something like heat stroke exactly. A black widow bite is not going to help now, and it's going to be exacerbated tremendously. No, but if you do get stung or bitten by something like that, and if you don't have that cool compress in your crotch, use that cool compress around the biter sting. Don't let it elevate it. Yeah, that's a big one. Sure. You also want to put it kind of a loose tourniquet around it. You want to be able to fit one finger in the tourniquet so tightish, I guess, is the way to put it. Yeah. And again, get in the shade, wash it off with some soap and water, if you have it, and then just dump that water all over the ground. This is used up. And then we have snakes, rattlesnakes, and coral snakes are going to be your biggest danger. Okay. And remember, coral snakes are red, yellow, and black. And there's a very helpful saying, red touches yellow. It can harm a fellow. Red touches black, make it a snack. No, red touches black. It's okay for Jack. And this raises my second favorite sentence. Oh, I know. Just remember you're Jack. In this scenario. It's okay for Jack. No typo nail. And then finally I think we sound drunk. We're not. I have a kombucha earlier. There are lizards specifically, do you say hilar monster or Gila monster? I think it's HeLa. I think it's a British say Gila and the wrong right. They say aluminum. So the Gila monster and the Mexican beaded lizard. The beaded is only in Mexico and Guatemala. But you can find those Gilas in the US of A. Those are big daddies, though. Yeah. They get up to like 2ft, I think. And this is actually my favorite sentence. So I'm talking here about the Mexican beaded. White to yellow spots and stripes on their raised scales. It's about a foot long. I described the Gilo monster and they say, however, if you see a two foot long lizard coming in your direction, maybe you should just walk the other way. Sound advice. I thought you were joking when you picked this article. No, I think it's a good article. I don't understand why you're being so hard on yourself. Alright, this last part is legitimately interesting. I think the fact of the podcast is contained in here. Like the uncontained fact of the podcast. Sure, go ahead. No, it's your fact. It's not my fact. All right. Two other big dangers are sandstorms and flash floods. Sandstorms can be very fast or they can last for a long time. They can last weeks in the Middle East. Right. But if you're driving, you don't want to drive through a sandstorm to pull over and, like, put on your hazards. Roll up your windows. Yeah. Why did you say Turn off your headlights? Do you remember that? I get why you put on your hazards, but why turn off your headlights? Is it because you don't want to wear your battery out, maybe? I think so. Okay. Yeah, that would be my guess. Because I didn't know if maybe that created electric conductivity or something and led to lightning. Maybe if you're hiking around and there's a sandstorm, then try and tie something or pull your shirt up over your face. Put on those sunnies. They say if you have spare water, wet the cloth before you put it over your face. And then I'm granting you the fact that the pine all right, let's talk about flash flooding. Flash floods because the desert does not absorb water very easily because it's basically bedrock. And water doesn't go into bedrock easy. If it rains, it rains hard and it rains fast, and a substantial amount comes down and it collects very quickly because it has nowhere to go and can create what are known as flash floods. Because of this, more people drown in the desert than die of thirst. That's what they say. That is an amazing fact. That's one of the most amazing facts I've ever heard in my life. It really is. And then what was the James Franco movie, the True Story, where he was 127 Hours. Yeah. There was a flash flood in that, right? I don't remember. I think so. I feel like it rained. And he was like, oh, thank God it's raining. And then the water just started rising really fast around. Yeah, you're right, because he was in a gully. But don't camp out overnight in a dry creek bed, because it is no joke. It can happen really fast. And I was driving through New Mexico once on my big out west trip post college, and my friend and I drove through the most hellacious storm I've ever seen in my life. And we literally saw water running, flowing uphill. Wow. And I was like, Am I seeing things? And he's like, no, dude. He's like, that is definitely uphill. And water was flowing uphill somehow. I guess it was just so much of it. But we drove through it until we saw in front of us telephone poles, like, down on the highway, all in front of us. We're like, I think we should probably pull over at this point. Right? And we waited out, but they're usually pretty quick. It's not like it does this for days like it does in Atlanta. No, it's like 30 minutes of rain. Right. But it can be inches and inches of water. And again, how fast six inches can pick up a car and carry it away. It can certainly pick you up off of your feet. And there's plenty of stories about people being drowned in canyons in Petra, Jordan, the very famous archaeological site people like, every 1012 years, a couple of dozen people will suddenly drown in a flash flood because they were totally unprepared and in the wrong place when the sky just opened up on them. Crazy. So it definitely does happen. For sure. Yeah. The plus thing about the desert with Thunderstorms is you see it coming from a long way away. They happen fast. But it's just so wide open out there. Right. I remember driving for, like, an hour and a half toward the storm. I was like, man, that looks pretty bad up there. And the closer we got, then it was just like hell had been unleashed on this. Right. What did you do? Did you drive to higher ground? No, we just kind of just pulled off to the side of the road and waited, like, half an hour. Then it lightened up. Yeah, but it was crazy. Yeah, it was pretty scary not being in a car, but just seeing how it went from sand to feeling like we were in a river in, like, 20 minutes. That's crazy. Yes. Glad you made it, Chuck. I'm all right. You survived to write this article. That's right. Which was a good article. If you want to see this article yourself in person, go to housetofworks.com and type in Desert Survival by one Chuck Bryant. And you will agree with me. It's a good article since I said that. It's time for listener mail. Hey, guys. Listen to Central Park episode and really enjoyed it. The content was spot on, as always, but Josh made a comment about the podcast being too conversational. I think this is a really appropriate listener mail. How funny is that? I think the conversational aspect is one of the most special things about it. Guys. The banter between you two makes me pause for thought and oftentimes laugh. As an educational podcast, I think having dialogue and debate about these subjects is important. In my own household, stuff you should know is very important part of our lives. I introduced it to my boyfriend almost three years ago and has taken a special place in our relationship. For two years, we were long distance, myself in Canada and him in Sweden. Wow. And we would download episodes when traveling. It always gives us something to talk about and keep the conversation going. Makes us laugh together, and we even sing the jingles. My favorite is the opera version, much to his dismay. My favorite episode is The Golden Age of Grave Robbing, which makes me laugh so much that I had to put it on. But I still like to put it on when I'm having a bad day. That was great. I loved hearing that was the live one, right? From London. That's right. I once joked that I would sell my dog, my first dog, for a ticket to one of your live shows. You don't have to do that. You can exchange money instead. That's right. Or Stacey, if we're coming to a town near you, give us an email. Yeah, I'll put you on the old list. Just threaten to sell your dog and we'll get you in for free. That's all it takes. Guys, thanks so much for giving us a jumping off point. For more conversation and debate, please give a shout out to my boyfriend, Jeff. Wow. Sorry, Jeff, that I got a listener mail before you. Yeah, take that, Jeff. Yeah. That is Stacy Coombs. The only way that that could get any more appropriate is if this episode comes out and Jeff is lost in the desert. I hope that didn't happen. I hope so, too. But I mean, that would really round out this episode, don't you think? Yeah, but Jeff, if you're out there, look for an RV. Ben Sinclair might be inside. He'll probably give you some weeds. Thank you, Jeff. And Stacey. And Stacey's unnamed dog who is not for sale. If you want to get in touch with us, you can go to our website, stephensnow.com, and check out all of our social links there. And you can also send us an email to stuffpodcast@howstuffworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun shining, the daylight's longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing pool Site tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music My Favorite Murder from Exactly Right media, My Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarriff and Georgia Hardstarke, true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
3ff91628-121b-11eb-ba6a-d33af0fe272a	Short Stuff: Handwashing vs Dishwashers	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/short-stuff-handwashing-vs-dishwashers	Josh and Chuck finally put to rest the age old debate over which is better – and learn a little about themselves along the way.	Josh and Chuck finally put to rest the age old debate over which is better – and learn a little about themselves along the way.	Wed, 01 Sep 2021 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2021, tm_mon=9, tm_mday=1, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=2, tm_yday=244, tm_isdst=0)	15052018	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Are you looking for an escape? An immersive getaway experience? Well, there's a place for all your wildest dreams. Perhaps you enjoy wrapping along the paperboy, or you believe that blessed be the fruit. Or you dream of one day smashing a glass while stealing. Who's. Ah. Whether you're sworn to Team Kim or you just want a good old fashioned mysterious murder, there's a place that has it all. From Atlanta to only murders in the building, it's all on Hulu. So check into your obsessions. Hulu subscription is required. Terms apply. Visit hulu.com for plan details. Hey, and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh and there's Chuck over there. And this is Short Stuff and we're Shorting it up stuff person. Yeah, this one is amazing, especially when you are listening to the Judge John Hodgman episode from our old pal or old pals Jesse Thorn and John Hodgman. How many cases come through and not major cases. They do the smaller sort of just email cases at the end about couples fighting over dishwashing. Yeah, I can totally see that because this is one of those things where you're just like it's intuitively correct one way or another. But this is one of those beautiful and rare things where it's like no, the one is demonstrably correct the thing you should be doing. And even better, it's the thing that you wouldn't think would be the correct thing to do. It's a beautiful thing, Chuck, and I'm going to stop talking in vague terms and let's really drill into this. Yes. And beyond. What we're going to mainly talk about, which is is it better to hand wash dishes or use your dishwasher? The nitpicky how to load a dishwasher thing is the subject of it's just sort of one of the most age old arguments you can have in a marriage, because people come into the marriage or a relationship or partnership with very strong ideas on how to wash dishes. So how to load the dishwasher is in dispute. Should you hang from the ceiling or lay on the floor? Oh, sure. Like, should you do half of a dishwasher load? Do you load the silverware tines up or tines down or does it even matter? No, it times up. Unless you're like some sort of deranged criminal. Is it knives up or knives down? Knives up. Oh, so leave those stabby things just pointing up. Well, if it's an actual knife, you shouldn't be washing those in your dishwasher anyway. But I'm talking about like a dinner knife or a butter knife. Now, what do you mean you shouldn't be washing a steak knife? You don't want to run a good knife through a dishwasher, pal. I don't care what the energy, your water savings are not this is what I'm talking about. It wears them down. And also, usually if you have a good knife, you have probably a knife with a good handle on it. And they're not usually made to be run through the dishwasher, they start to crack, or if it's wood, it becomes problematic. And there's no faster way to dull a knife than to run it through the dishwasher. Is that true? Yeah. What dulls it? I believe particulate matter. Beating it, kind of sandblasting it, and then also just the water, the effect of the water over time. You don't want to do that. You don't want to do that. That people debate incessantly in marriages about dishwasher. Emily and I go back and forth about dishwasher stuff all the time because we both do it a little bit, and it seems like one of those things in a partnership where one person should just be in charge, and the other person should stay out of it. I see. Yeah. There are things like that. You mean? I have laundry. One she's like, I am doing the laundry. Yeah. Emily won't let me do laundry. Yeah, but dishwashing, we've never really had a problem with. Do you both load it? No, we both hand wash. No, you don't. No, it's true. We both hand wash. I've been researching this, and I noticed some cascade commercials and was like, is that true? And then that actually prompted me a cascade commercial prompted me to pick this one, and it was when I researched it, it was like, no, the cascade commercial tells the truth, and this is something I should not be doing anymore, which is hand washing dishes. So you have a dishwasher, and you would still hand wash all your dishes. Yeah, we have a nice dishwasher too. Why would you still hand wash? Well, one reason why is we thought that it uses less energy, water, all that stuff, which it turns out is just wrong. Okay. And then the other reason why is I remember seeing the guy who created the hygiene hypothesis. Or we talked about a study once where people who eat off of plates or use utensils that have been run through the dishwasher had higher incidences of allergies to food and other things than people who hand washed because they were exposed to slightly more germs. So we were hand washing because it's dirtier, basically, is how you can kind of boil it down. But now I'm kind of like, man, this seems like the wrong thing to do, hand washing dishes, and I did it all the wrong way. Water running the whole time, the whole shebang. All right, well, I think that actually turns out to be a set up. And we'll take a break, and we'll come back, and even though you kind of spoiled it, we'll reveal the real truth right after this. Hey, everyone. When you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office? And you could be using stamps.com. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right from your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer, no special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to Stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. All right, Chuck, reveal the truth. Well, it is a big misconception that using a dishwasher even, and they say you should really load that thing full. But I have seen statistics that even doing more half loads per week is still a lot less water than hand washing dishes. Yeah. Which is a real big surprise. I think one of the reasons why I didn't understand that is because you and I grew up with dishwashers that were terrible as far as efficiency and water use is concerned. But unbeknownst to us, even though I have a pretty new dishwasher, I'm guessing you probably do, too, that they have advanced by leaps and bounds in the last few years, and now they're actually like lean, mean energy and water saving machines. They are the Energy Star program in the United States. The government getting involved in regulating things. Nanny state, Nancy. It really worked across the board. The Energy Star program has been a massive success. And a certified Energy Star dishwasher in the US. Uses less than four gallons of water per cycle. The whole thing? The whole thing. And you can go through four gallons of water every two minutes if you're hand washing. Yeah, they have high efficiency faucets now that typically come in at about one and a half gallons per minute. And I don't think it's legal to have a faucet more than two and a half gallons in the United States, or 2.2 gallons per minute. But even still. I did a little math. And like you were saying. You'd seen before. Where even if you run half loads multiple times a week. If you're doing like a quarter of a load of dishes and you're using all four gallons. You're still probably using less water than you would to wash that quarter load by hand. Because it's probably going to take longer than two minutes to do all those dishes. So if you have the water running the whole time, even running a quarter load is still going to save more water than if you were doing the dishes by hand. Okay, but hey, you're not using anything on your power bill. You're not burning any coal or even using any solar to use your hands. So it's clearly better to use your hands and not that energy consuming dishwasher, right? No, because that hot water. Thank you for setting me up to look like the smart one here. I appreciate that. Because the hot water that's coming out of your tap comes from your hot water heater. If you're using a hot water heater, in fact, you're actually using a lot of energy to heat that water, and it's going on constantly. Whereas a high efficiency or just a regular new dishwasher uses kind of targeted hot water not throughout the whole time, so that water is not being heated the whole time while you're washing the dishes. If you use the dishwasher, it is while you're doing it by hand. That's right. With an Energy Star dishwasher, you can use that thing four times a week, and it will only cost you and run up about $130 worth of energy a year. Not bad. A year. And that's even assuming eleven cents a kilowatt hour I saw, which is a little less than average. Yeah. So dishwasher efficiency. This is where Emily and I really get into most of our scrapes. It's not tied up or tines down. I'm sort of the family packer. I'm the tetris master. So when I'm packing a car for a trip or packing when we've had to move and stuff like that, she leaves that stuff to me because I'm really good at making the most efficient use of a space, and I carry that over to the dishwasher. I can tetris that thing so it's so full, it can barely even hold the amount of stuff on a rack. And it just makes me so happy. Whereas Emily will get in there. She'll use the juicer in the morning and maybe the food processor that, you know, these things have large sort of multiple components. And that's it. You got, like, two glasses and then that stuff to run a dishwasher load. And it drives me crazy because then the stuff is stacking up in the sink, and I try to be like, you got to put more stuff in here. And she's like, no, it's better just to run it more. You just got to stay on it. One of the things that popped up to me is it's just you, me and Momo and I here. So we have a limited number of dishes that we use and that we even have in some cases, we kind of try to trim it down to whatever we need. Not like we each have one fork or anything like that, but, like, the number of cups and that kind of stuff that we have hanging around is limited to where we couldn't do the dishes just once a week. You know what I'm saying, guys? Like, you just can't. So that's kind of, like, will still run the dishwasher. No, you can't. Yeah, of course you can. You come over anytime you want. That's my dream, dude. If Emily wouldn't think I was crazy, I would assign each family member a cup, a fork, a spoon, a knife, and a plate and a bowl, and I would throw everything else out because she'll go through eight water glasses in a day because she just sits and down and then goes and gets another one and it drives me bonkers. So you're decorating. Inspiration is like reeducation camp, man. It makes me crazy. And then kids like, you'd be surprised at how many dishes the six year old will go through, too. Oh, yeah, no, you totally can. Especially if you have a lot of dishes you go through more. You know what I'm saying? Yes. And then they build up too. They just kind of accumulate. Dude, we've got like 25 coffee cups and I don't drink coffee. It's ridiculous. Oh my God. He only likes cute coffee cups, though. So what are you going to do, deny her collection? No, and I don't actually blame her because that is the thing that we have the most of, too. Yeah, because you can get cool stuff and we like our plates. We have lovely plates that we like, but we also get into it with the other things and the efficiencies, which is resisting the urge to pre rent. I'll do a scrape and throw it in the dishwasher and then it's like, no, man, you got to rinse that stuff off really good or it's not going to get clean. And they're saying not true. No. Emily is a demon from hell for even suggesting that. Apparently. I'll tell her that. Yeah, like you do not pre rinse the dishes. As one of the guys from the Natural Resources Defense Council, I think the senior scientist, his name is Noah Horowitz, says it is a complete waste of water and energy and that you're a demon from hell if you do it. That's what the dishwasher is for. That's what I always say. But there's another thing that comes from our upbringing and being eighty s and seventy s kids, too, is that did not used to be the case. Those things basically had to go in sparkling clean for them to come out sparkling clean. And now dishwashers are just that much better, where if you scrape the stuff off and you put them in there, they're going to come out clean. Remember that ad for either dishwashers or dishwashing detergent where they baked and frosted a cake and then put the whole thing with the plate on it into the dishwasher and ran it and it came out clean? I don't remember that one. It's gross. It's almost as bad as that Lysol commercial where the woman uses the raw chicken to wipe her counters down rather than I haven't seen that either. Oh, it's tough to watch. This one was not nearly as bad, but in the same ballpark for sure. Well, they say scrape it, fill it up as good as you can. Don't do the pre rents. And then if you can afford to upgrade from that 1990s model, that is using way more energy, because it's going to cost you in the long run with your water bill and with your power bill. So if you can scrape together the money to upgrade that to a better, more efficient, newer machine, then do so. Yeah, but it sounds like even those older machines, depending on how many dishes you have to do, they still save water compared to hand washing. Yeah, and I will admittedly hand wash, like, really big mixing bowls or salad bowls. I'll hand wash that stuff because going back to my pet peeve, that takes up 40% of a rack, right? It does. Which is kind of inefficient. And plus, also it's satisfying to wash and then dry that off and put it back quickly. Yeah, I kind of like that. You guys are neat like that, too. Yeah. You should come move in with us. Like, you're telling me. I'm really lobbying. You can. All right, we'll give it a trial run. Okay. So if you don't have a dishwasher and you're like, well, I'd like to save energy and water, you jerks, but I don't have a dishwasher. There are things you can do to save water and energy, and that is if you can manage a two tub sink. You know what I'm talking about? The one with the divider in the middle, split tub. Nice. You want to fill one up with warm, soapy water, let the dishes soak in that for a while, and then fill up the other one in clean water and rinse them off in there and just put them up. Don't run that water while you're doing it. That is good enough. And that should do the trick. That's the key. And don't run water while you're standing there brushing your teeth. No, I came up with the biggest waste of water that you can possibly do. It's where you dump ice out, so you're wasting water to begin with, and then you run warm water over that to make it melt faster. Oh, no, I've done that before, and I was like, this is the biggest waste of water you could possibly do. That's a great way to do it. There's a lot of stuff you can do just starting with the ice, but really trying to make it melt faster for zero reason whatsoever. Then it bothers you that there's ice in the sink. That's a big waste of water. I've learned my lesson. Okay, well, is that it? Yeah. I think we admitted some things that didn't make us proud of ourselves, but we can all move on now. Yeah. Well, thank you to everyone for listening. And short stuff is that stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts my Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app apple podcasts or wherever you listened your favorite shows."
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/podcasts.howstuffworks.com/hsw/podcasts/sysk/2016-09-22-sysk-zika-final.mp3	All we know about Zika so far...	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/all-we-know-about-zika-so-far	Zika is all over the news these days, yet in America, people don't seem to be too concerned just yet. Some say it's a case of the media crying wolf. Others say it's because the risk factors for zika are limited. Learn all about the latest virus to take ce	Zika is all over the news these days, yet in America, people don't seem to be too concerned just yet. Some say it's a case of the media crying wolf. Others say it's because the risk factors for zika are limited. Learn all about the latest virus to take ce	Thu, 22 Sep 2016 07:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2016, tm_mon=9, tm_mday=22, tm_hour=7, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=266, tm_isdst=0)	44567071	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. And there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. And there's Jerry over there. This is stuff you should know about. News. Colon Zika. Yes. We've had a bunch of people ask us to do this over the summer, basically, and I finally gave in. All right, now that the epidemic is starting to wane, we'll step in and start talking about it. Well, one of the reasons I'm always reticent to do something so on the forefront is like, this will be outdated by the time it's released in a couple of weeks. Yeah. I was looking at some of the dates on the material we used, and August 24 was the most recent data I could get on some stuff. I'm like, surely things have changed enough since then. I want the newest numbers. Give them to me. Who. And they're like, Let us go. And Roger Daltrey said no. That was a bad joke. Yeah. All over. So anyway, we're going to give you the overview of what we know. But Zica, or at least the current outbreak, is a pretty new thing, and they don't know a ton about it. No. So there's a lot of mystery involved, and a lot is changing on a daily basis. So just take it with a grain of salt. Yes. That's not medical advice, though. And some deep you said it's a fairly recent origin, and a lot of people say yeah. The weird stuff suddenly appearing around the world, like chicken goonya, which is related to Zika, and Zika has to have something to do with climate change. Definitely. Going chicken. I was about to say that's. Delicious. No, you're thinking of chicken tonight. Okay. Chicken goony is not delicious. It's very painful. Yes. Not making light of that. I was but you know what I mean. Yeah. You're Chuck. Yeah. But actually, it was back in, I think, 1000 1947 that some researchers from Europe and the United States working in Uganda discovered this in a Reese's monkey named Reese seven six Six. It was born to be an experimental lab animal because it was named that, and they were looking for yellow fever, and they found instead this brand new virus that they'd never seen before. So Risa seven six Six became the first known carrier of Zika. Yeah. And it's named after that forest in Uganda where they found this monkey. And they didn't find it in humans until 1952. And if you're thinking and at that point, it was Uganda United in Tanzania, where they found it in humans. Right. If you're thinking 1940, 719, 52. Guys, this is, like, breaking news. Well, this outbreak is breaking news. Zika had not been previously a very big problem. No. Pre 2007, it was very localized to tropical Africa. Yeah. And not a lot of cases even in fact, even in 2007, there were 14 cases documented, although they think it was probably more undocumented. And it wasn't until later in 2007, in Micronesia, that they had sort of the first large outbreak, which was 49 cases, which isn't even that much. And then in 2014, in French Polynesia, 19,000 suspected cases, a lot bigger. And then now this one is much bigger. Yeah, something like again, I was really pressed to find hard figures, but it looks like something like a million people have been infected with Zika worldwide since 2015 is when this outbreak officially started. Right. And it's shown up in 67 countries since 2015. Since the beginning of this outbreak. 67? Yeah. We need different numbers. I was counting too, and I came up with 58, but I was like, it's got to be more than that. I saw something in the 50s. Yeah, I saw 67, I think, on the World Health Organization website, which is why I was like, that's probably right. But while we are recording this, literally another country could pop up. Yeah. Actually, Singapore is in the midst of a new outbreak right now. As of September 20, they have 383 reported locally transmitted cases. Right. Which is pretty significant. But that's up from 54 on August 29. So less than a month, it's gone from 54 cases to 383. Wow. I read actually, I posted an article on our Facebook page yesterday about I think it may have been from Slate, but the author's suggestion was that there's a lot of apathy in the United States towards Zika right now. And then there were a bunch of I read the comments, and a lot of people had valid points. They're like sort of a crying wolf situation. Like, Ebola didn't turn out to be mad, cow didn't turn out to be none of these things turned out to be these devastating pandemics here in the US. Well, exactly. So the United States has a tendency to be a little US. Centric. Sure. So I think the comments I got from our listeners at least, were like, you know what? We've heard this before, and so maybe there is some apathy. There's a huge fear that that is going to prevent a vaccine from being developed. That's why there's not an Ebola vaccine, because the outbreak was contained. And everyone said, well, we don't need to start funneling emergency funds toward vaccination research. It's fine. It stayed basically in Africa, hit a couple of people in America and Europe, but for the most part, it's over there, so we don't have to worry about it. And they're worried that the same thing is going to happen, that the end of October, mosquito season is going to decline, and the outbreak is going to naturally in step decline as well. And the public will and public funding for vaccinations, emergency vaccinations against Zika is going to dry up. The big problem is we're eventually going to those dire public warnings could eventually come to pass. It might not have this past time with Ebola it might not this time with Zika, but there's a definite possibility that it could happen and we're going to be like, man, I really wish we would have stuck with it ten years ago when we had the chance to develop a Zika vaccine. Yes, it's a really narrow line, I think, that with media reporting on stuff like avian flu and mad cow and to get people fired up and scared and preach fear, or for people to know that there's a really good chance that this could be bad, if it's not, then great, but then turn around and say, well, you got us scared over nothing. Like people should say, well, that's wonderful news that it was smaller than we thought. Sure. But yes, you can lay a certain amount of the blame for this at the feet of the media for drumming up fear for ratings and we should say that not at all our intention with this. No, we're perfectly happy with our ratings. Normally, I think it goes to say there's most public health officials are not panicking right about this thing. And Zika itself is even like a pretty mild disease. The problem is, and the reason the World Health Organization created a global health emergency alert, they put everybody on high alert and started funneling money and attention towards Zika is because there is a cluster of microcephaly in Brazil which is basically ground zero for this most recent outbreak. And they're saying now there hasn't been any direct evidence, but there's so much correlation between being infected with the Zika virus while pregnant and having a baby with microcephaly afterward that they're like, yes, Zika causes microcephaly, basically is the point where at, yeah, well, let's jump back a little bit. So if you get Zika, only 20% of the people infected will show any symptoms at all. And these symptoms, just so you're looking out for them, which is always good to do, fever, red eyes, joint pain, bumpy rash, what else? You can have muscle pain and headache. Those apparently are less common symptoms. But that's about it. Like you said, I think four, five of people who have Zika are not going to show symptoms and the ones who do have symptoms, probably they're not going to be bad enough to even go to the doctor for, yeah, they only last a few days to a week and it's not something that will kill you. And I think that's another reason that a lot of people have apathy is because it has such a narrow focus of harm, which is specifically right now, at least largely pregnant women's babies. And then there's one other thing that has been linked to, although not quite as conclusively, is Gia Barre syndrome, which is a really bizarre and mysterious disorder that comes out of nowhere, where your immune system attacks the nerves in your body and can leave you paralyzed at worst. But even milder on the spectrum can leave you laid up bedridden on a ventilator. Yeah. And the idea that they don't have any idea where it comes from is very unsettling. Yeah. And right now, they've made a much stronger correlation with the microcephaly. They have the GBS, because I'm going to try and pronounce that again. Gabaray yeah. That sounds easy. I know that because there's a stuff you should know. Listen, remember the guy who's get well card we filled out? Yeah. And I tweeted there's like, I think a Go fund me to get a wheelchair access van is laid up. Wow. His name is John Say. He lives here in Atlanta. He's a great guy. That's right. You can chip in for John if you want to. You can search johnsay saye on gofundmecom or go to gofundmecom. Two J-H-X eight YK But I should say he didn't get it from Zika, but he has gabar and they have no idea where it came from. But all of a sudden, one day, your immune system just turns on your nerves, and you're in trouble. Amazing. All right, so let's talk a little bit about microcephaly. It is a birth defect. The characterization mainly is that your baby will have a very small head, and as a result, in underdeveloped brain or I don't know, as a result. But those two things happen. Well, they think what happens is that the virus attacks stem cells in the developing brain okay. And ends up preventing the brain from developing properly. And I think it's also possible it simultaneously attacks structural proteins in the brain, so the existing tissue that's already been developed can be destabilized, and then the stuff that's developing doesn't have a chance to develop correctly. In which case, you have babies born with a lot of parts of their brain missing. Right? Yeah. And I read this one interview on there's an NPR interview. Yeah, it was from NPR. And their health correspondent Rob Stein was talking about kind of like he went and visited Brazil and visited these babies, and he said it was devastating and that some of the new research, they published some brain scan images from a bunch of these Brazilian babies, and they found some really weird things. Entire portions of their nervous systems are missing, just not there, like, parts of the brain stem, parts of the spinal cord. And then sometimes in some cases, you think the baby is okay, and then they're born. And then you realize that parts of the brain are, like, full of fluid. So it has puffed up the brain so it looks like it's a normal size, unlike a scan or something. Right? Yeah. But there's severe brain damage going on. Right. And so this leads to things like seizures, developmental delay, intellectual disabilities, problems with moving around or balance, difficulty swallowing, hearing loss, vision problems. And typically this is irreversible once it happens. Yeah. And super sad. He talks about the cries of these babies. He said they cry more. And not only more, but he said it's a really if you have a baby, you know, there are different cries, mean different things, and one of the keys is to figure out what's what. And these cries, he said, are just abnormal and that they sound like anguishing, pain is going on, and they're much harder to soothe. So that's just like, heartbreaking stuff. It is. And so you can understand why couples who are planning on getting pregnant, women who are pregnant, are just scared to death of the idea of contracting Zika. Sure, at first they thought that the first trimester was the most dangerous point, but now, apparently, after further study, they're like, yeah, there's really no safe point in a pregnancy where you could get a Zika infection and probably be protected. Yeah. And I think they're airing on the side of caution because they're still so early in the game. They don't want to say, like, no, just the first trimester. They're kind of saying, we don't know, it could be anytime during the pregnancy. And the NPR correspondent, he couched the whole thing and saying he wasn't raising public fears. I think he did it the right way. He said, we don't know what this one's going to look like. He said, it could just die out again and be a medium size outbreak that goes away. He said, or it could be worse. We just got to be responsible and see what happens. Yeah. And they were saying also, Chuck, that the estimates of the incidence of microcephaly that come from Zika so far is between, like, one and 13%. Right. Which is an enormous increase in the incidence of microcephaly because it's apparently a fairly uncommon disorder. And something like two to twelve babies per 10,000 births in the United States are born with microcephaly. Normally. Normally between two and twelve per 10,000 birth. If 1%, just 1% of women who contract Zika give birth to a baby with microcephaly, that's like ten times the normal rate, and that's the low end of the estimate. So again, if you're just some dude, some bachelor who's, like, hanging around margaritaville at the shore and you get stung by a mosquito and you contract Zika and you don't even have symptoms, who cares? Yeah, well, the idea that somebody else could have a baby with microcephaly, that's who cares? That's making this a public health emergency. Sure. All right, well, let's take a quick break and we'll get back and talk a little bit about how it is spread. All right, josh, you mentioned mosquitoes. I did. We've kind of danced around it, or maybe we already said, but we'll go ahead and say it now. Yellow fever, mosquitoes, the ads, the gyptai. There you go. That's the little bugger responsible. Yeah, they're responsible not just for yellow fever and Zika, but also dengue and chicken goonya, too, which is delicious. Again, you're thinking of chicken tonight, and only certain chicken tonights, too. We did a really good podcast, I remember, on mosquitoes. It was great. But did we talk about I know we talked a little bit, but I can't remember we landed on the idea of eradicating them outright. Eradicate? Or are they one of those that we can get rid of and it doesn't have some big ripple effect? We can't say that we could get rid of any species of anything wholesale and not have really detrimental effects. But isn't the mosquito one of those that people, like, researchers think we might well get rid of without losing it's not like losing the honeybee. There are some serious proposals to get rid of mosquitoes as part of treating Zika. I just hope that's the case. I hate them. I hate them. I hate them. Oh, that we get rid of them. Yeah, I think it would be great. I mean, beyond the stupid nuisance that my privilege self feels at my house, I'm talking about in countries where they spread serious disease. Right. It's a real problem. It is a real problem. And so I guess we might as well talk about this. There's a couple of proposals that the World Health Organization who. Right. That was good, though. You almost got me. They're looking into and are planning on deploying. And actually, there's some pilot projects, one of them we talked about in the mosquito episode, which was releasing transgenic mosquitoes into the wild. Right. And so these things carry a genetic, artificially inserted genetic mutation that prevents their offspring from surviving to maturity, and therefore they're unable to reproduce. Right. So you release these genetically altered mosquitoes into the wild, and after several generations, the mosquito population starts to die off. Wonderful. There's a test pilot by this company called Oxitec, working out of England, I believe. I'm not quite sure exactly where, but they created a genetically modified mosquito back in 2002, and part of the project, part of the proving test experiment sure, that's what they call it. There's ellipses and everything to indicate the pauses. But they released some in Sao Paulo, Brazil, as part of a pilot project in April last year. In January of this year, there had been an 82% reduction in wild mosquito larvae. Let's do it. So it works. The problem is, I think that is the pinnacle of human hubris, the idea that we can just get rid of an entire species and there not be some sort of ripple effect that we couldn't foresee, that we're going to be like, we shouldn't have done that. There's an alternative one. So, yes, you're inconvenienced. Right. When you're stung by a mosquito and it sucks. See, that was an accident. All right, I'll buy that. But the bigger problem is for people who are, like, suffering and dying from diseases like malaria or dengue fever or something like that. Well, there's an alternative to getting rid of mosquitoes, and it's actually treating mosquitoes with something called Wabachia, which is a bacteria that infects the gut of a mosquito and actually prevents the Zika virus from living there. Okay, so you still got the mosquito. Yes. So you're not completely altering the ecosystem. I'm still inconvenient, but lives are being saved. But you're getting right. Which is what really matters. Exactly. Yeah. So that one seems to me, like, a little smarter, and they're working on that, too. They've released a bunch in Brazil, and so these artificially infected mosquitoes go out, and they infect other mosquitoes out in the wild, and pretty soon, all of a sudden, Zeke is like, oh, man, I remember the good times, and they're gone. Well, it seems like the mosquito is one that they could probably research enough to see if it would have an impact if it left us. Yeah, but off the top of my head, I'm thinking, well, bats eat mosquitoes, and all of a sudden, you're taking away a food source from an animal that we love that's just off the top of your head. But then you think, like, do they need mosquitoes? Or they'd be like, well, they're there, I'll eat them. Or would they just move on to something else? But then do they decimate some other thing that might be useful? I get the ripple. Start going after house cats while they already do that. Yes, there's a real possibility for a ripple effect that would have catastrophic unforeseen consequences. I am totally for getting rid of mosquitoes. If we know for certain that there wouldn't be that ripple effect, I'd be on board 100%. I go out there and start squashing them myself. Yeah, but I think what you're saying is that there's no way to know for certain. Right. Which is valid. So one thing about this mosquito and I know you know a bit more than me about how it's transmitted, but looking at this guy, this particular yellow fever mosquito, it has white markings on the leg, and like all mosquitoes, they're active in the morning and the evening tend to die down a bit in the heat of the day, and then at night go off and hide. Right. But how does it actually transmit beyond just sticking that needle in? So I guess some mosquito got a hold of Reese's 7661 Day or some other carrier like that, and the mosquito itself becomes infected. Although it doesn't have, as far as we know, any symptoms from Zika. Oh, interesting. So it's not just that it's carrying the infected blood. They're actually sick. Yeah, and that's a big point, because if a mosquito comes and sucks your blood, it's not transmitting any of its own blood in there. So when it sucks your blood and you have Zika right. The mosquito puts its thank you. Man. That deleterious always elude me. When it puts its proboscis in your skin to suck out your blood, it also salivates in there. Right. Which is like an anesthetizes. You yeah. And if you have Zika, that Zika goes from your blood into the mosquito's gut, where the Zika begins to colonize the mosquito infect the mosquito, and ultimately it makes it into its salivary glands. So when that mosquito inserts proboscis into the next person's arm, it uses the saliva, I should say she, because it's always a female mosquito that bites you. She uses saliva to anesthetize your arm, and that's where the Zika gets into you. Okay. Because they have found that the virus lives in saliva. Yeah, that's a big deal. But they're not you know, they're still trying to figure out, like, exactly all the ways it could be transmitted. They found it in saliva. They know it can be transmitted through sexy time. Right. It can live in semen for seemingly longer than in blood. Yeah. So when it's in your blood, it stays there for like a week, and then they're like, okay, where does it go? Obviously it stays in the body because they did find it. And some guys semen was it like ten weeks after he was infected with Zika? Yeah. And they know that you can get it sexually and through mosquitoes, but they've also found it in saliva. Vaginal secretions, I think urine and definitely breast milk, which is another fear among mothers, too. The one the sexual transmission, I think the first couple of cases, one was in Texas and a man was infected after having sex with someone who came back from Venezuela that was infected. So it's a little scary. Right. And here's one of the rubs is in 2011, as far as intercourse, there was a guy named a researcher named Brian Foy who published a paper this is five years ago in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases, which is great to read at a dinner party. Just pull that out, get the conversation going. Right. But he argued that there was evidence that you could transmit Zika sexually through intercourse. And he said, we need to study this more. And basically it was denied. And they said, you know what? This is too obscure disease to give funding, which may have been the case. It's sort of a tough thing. You can't throw money at everything. But it is frustrating when this guy was on this five years ago right. And could be a lot further along as far as learning more about the sexual transmission. Yeah, seek it just wasn't hot enough back then. So, Chuck, people are saying, like, how do we stop this? For love of God, think of the children. Yeah, well, the mosquito part is a big part of it, and we talked a little bit about eradicating mosquitoes, but all the normal, safe things, safe measures you can take with mosquitoes, you should obviously do if you're in a place where Zika might be more rampant. And listen to our mosquito podcast for that. But encropellant long sleeve shirts and pants. Try to not be outside during those times of day where they're around more. So all that stuff. But a vaccine is what we're really looking for. There's apparently a few companies who are really trying to raise vaccine to market and get fast tracked. I think a company in India is the top contender right now. And then you found one that seems pretty legit, too. So as best I can figure, the NIH has a division called the NIAID, right. The National Institute for Allergic and Infectious Diseases. I think that sounds right. But they are working on a vaccine and they're using a similar approach to what they have been successful with West Nile. And right now it is safe in the phase one of the clinical trials, and they're trying to push forward. And what they're doing is and I don't fully understand this, so I'm just going to kind of read this part. But they said their vaccine has a small circular piece of DNA called a plasmid that they've engineered to contain genes that code for the proteins of the virus. Then when you inject that, the cells read those genes and make those virus proteins, and then they selfassemble into the virus like particles. Then that gets that immune system kicked into gear. Right. So you're putting in basically an artificial version that's not infectious. Yeah, that's the key, I think. Yeah. Because you couldn't possibly transmit that artificial Zika virus to anybody else, but it will still get your body to mount an immune response. And that would mean that when you actually do come in contact with the actual Zika virus, it would be toast. Yes. And this is just one of the vaccines that they're continuing in a trial run. But I think there are several that, like you said, a couple in India they're trying to get through. A lot of people are hard at work trying to conquer this thing via vaccinations. Yeah. And again, there's a real tremendous fear that the public will and public funding will dry up when this makes it out of the news cycle, when it's dropped from the new cycle, you know? Yeah. And speaking of funding well, should we take a break? That's a good little tease. Speaking of funding speaking, the state coach is about to go off the cliff. All right, we'll be right back. Okay, we're back. And Chuck, we're talking about funding. Yes. And not only is funding possibly going to be a problem when the Zika outbreak goes away, which inevitably will, we hope. Yeah. There's actually a huge problem with funding right now. The CDC had Thomas friedon his name. Yeah, I think that's it. He took to the airwaves and said, guys, we're running out of money and we need Congress to come back in touch and give us some ASAP. Yeah. For Zika. Yeah. So the timeline on this is last year, early last year, President Obama said, congress, can we have 1.9 billion in emergency funds for Zika? To help fight Zika. And Congress said no. They said, Wait, obama? Are you asking? Well, yeah, I'm asking. They said no. Yeah, the controlling Republicans said that. They said, we want more accountability for the money, where it's going, and why don't you take some of the money left over from Ebola and other projects and use that instead? Or they said, or we could do this. We could take money away from Planned Parenthood if you want money for Zika. And then the Democrats are like, well, that's not very nice. I just have to go and bring them up. It turned political, no surprise. But CDC did in fact end up taking money from Ebola. I think how much was it? $38 million from Ebola funding and 44 million from emergency response funding. Which is really scary. Yeah. Because that means if something really big happened here in the US. In terms of Zika, they may not literally, may not have the money to send teams of people to wherever that is. Yeah. So they're making money from these other programs. They're saying, we really need this to be seriously funded. And right now, politics is getting in the way. Yes. Which is pretty sad, of course, because, again, think of the children. Yeah. And hopefully this will change and they'll get the funding they need. But right now, freedom. I don't know if he's crying wolf too much to try and get the public worked up, but he seems to think that it's pretty dire and that they need these resources. So I'm taking the man at his word at this point. He said that of the 220,000,000 that they had allocated for Zika, 20 million is already out the door. And if they've already used another 44 million from emergency response funding, 38 million from Ebola, I would guess that, yes, there's some problems coming. Speaking of the CDC, they actually did something as a result of the Zika outbreak that they've never done before. They issued a travel warning advisory against travel to a place in America. We've never done that before. It's always been somewhere else outside of the country. But I think in the beginning of August, when there was an outbreak of Zika, including a local transmission, which means that it wasn't up to that point. There were a couple of thousand cases of Zika in the United States, but all of them were people who went to the Caribbean or to Africa or to the Americas or to Southeast Asia, got bit by an Egyptian mosquito, and then came back and then were at risk of possibly transmitting it sexually or a mosquito biting them and spreading it. Well, that apparently finally happened because someone in Miami was bit by a mosquito and contracted Zika. Yeah. So that means that it had entered the mosquito, the wild mosquito population. That's what really started to get the CDC and others worried, because they said, Ford is tough right now. Yeah. I. Mean, it's not like rampant or anything, but the cases are accumulating to the point where people are getting a little worried. Yeah, and again, if you go to the Caribbean and come back with Zika, they weren't too worried about that. What was worrying is the idea of mosquitoes getting it because they said humans are not the vectors of transmission that we need to be worried about. It's the mosquitoes. Yeah. Well, in Puerto Rico is a big problem right now. In fact, the name of this article I got was puerto Rico is Ground Zero. It's not literally ground zero, but as far as the US. Is concerned, probably they are American citizens. And at this rate, 2000 people a week are getting infected in Puerto Rico. And they said if this holds, 25% of their entire population by the end of the year could be infected with Zika. More than 1300 pregnant women. I'm sorry, did you say 25%? Yeah, it says a quarter of their 3.5 million population could get it by the end of this year. And we're in almost September. Wow. So more than 1300 women, pregnant women have tested positive. Man, I feel so bad for those women. I'll bet they are losing their minds with just fear right now. Sure. That is so sad. As if pregnancy isn't enough. Right. And there are a lot of problems in Puerto Rico, or a lot of challenges. At least it rains a lot. There are a lot of puddles, a lot of mosquitoes. They're in a financial crisis and one of their main sources of income is tourism. And this is not helping their tourism in any way. So they need funding for real. And they were going to do some mass spraying, but the people said, no, it's dangerous. Well, apparently also mosquitoes have developed a lot of tolerance to that over the decades too. Well, yeah, they really effectively they found one certain insecticide that they said is working a lot better, but there's a lot of resistance to it. So right now the CDC says if you're pregnant, don't go to Puerto Rico and wait at least two months before trying to get pregnant after you come home. Right. If that's in your plans. And I've even seen some people say if you go to Puerto Rico, don't have sex or make sure you practice safe sex. But none of that bodes well for the tourism industry. No. Which is where a lot of their dough comes from. Come to Puerto Rico and don't have sex afterward. Yeah, that's not a good slogan. It's definitely not. So I want to specify, the CDC didn't say that you should not go to Florida. They said that you should not go to this particular spot in North Miami. Right. Or just north of downtown Miami. There's a neighborhood that was kind of ground zero for this outbreak. But Florida in and of itself is suffering as far as tourism goes. Sure. Or on the press piss of really suffering depending on how this outbreak goes down there. And as a result, like Walt Disney World and Universal Florida and SeaWorld all now are just kind of casually giving you a small aerosol can of complimentary mosquito spray whenever you come into the park. Yeah. And probably rightfully so. They're not putting up signs that say Zika because that would be a PR disaster. Right. But I think it's pretty clear what's going on. Yeah. Like, here's your ticket and here's your stub and here's your deep Mickey Mouse brand. Deep. Yeah. So, Chuck, how do you get diagnosed with Zika if you are worried about it? Well, like a lot of these diseases that you might catch abroad, one of the first things they do is say, where have you been lately? Have you traveled? And if you've been yeah. If you say well, I was in Brazil. Yeah, that's another thing, too. Let's have the Olympics. So the whole world comes together at ground zero for the current Zika outbreak. That was a big worry, but apparently no one associated with the Olympics has tested positive for Zika. I was wondering it's been over for a couple of weeks now. That's good. Sorry for interrupting. Oh, no, I was wondering about that because I knew it was a big fear going in. Sure. Yeah. So they're going to say, Where have you been traveling? Ask what kind of symptoms, and we already went over those. And then they're going to just basically give you blood and urine tests and that'll let them know pretty quick what's going on. Yeah. I think they can actually detect the virus itself in your blood, but again, it leaves the blood after a week and starts going other places. And once that's the case, I think they can do saliva tests and detect antibodies in your saliva and urine. They should just do all those tests. Don't even ask me where I've been. Just take some blood right now or maybe ask where I've been because that doesn't take long. Yeah, but do it as you're drawing my blood. Well, these days it doesn't really matter where you've been increasingly because it's starting to creep up. And Chuck, actually, we have to say this. This is really important before you take anything, if you think you have Zika, you have to be diagnosed with Zika before you can take NSAIDs. Right. Like advil or leave or motorin, something like that. Because it's possible you actually have dengue fever. Right. In which case because the symptoms are very similar. And if you do have dengue, you cannot take NSAIDs because dengue blocks the action of platelets, which are clotting. That will help with clotting. Right, right. And so too do NSAIDs. So you put NSAIDs and dengue together and you can hemorrhage pretty easily. Yeah. That's not good. Now, if you're worried about this and you're in Michigan, you probably don't need to unless you get it through sexual transmission or Canada. Totally out of the question. Again, except through sexual transmission, because this is very much out of the range of the ajita gypsypti mosquito. It's just parts of the south. The American South. Southeast a little bit. It creeps up a little bit into the Midwest and then all basically of South America, Africa, Southeast Asia, california. Yeah, parts of California. There's a really helpful map if you're just panicking right now on the World Health Organization website, which you shouldn't do. Don't panic. Yeah, don't panic. There's no cause to panic. No, please don't panic. No, I think the best practice is to educate yourself by listening to this and then spreading fear to everyone, you know. Just kidding. Great advice. That was a top notch way to end this one. Yeah. Be very calm and everything and just spread fear. Right. Like we just did. You got anything else? No. How much of this is out of date already, do you think? Probably 15%. That's not too bad. I can live with that. Yeah, we get 15%. Wrong. Anyway, if you want to know more about Zika, well, to surf the web, and there's plenty out there. And since I said surf the web, it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this bacon buddy. Remember we were talking about baconbuddy? Yeah, the B-U-T-T-Y Which I didn't know what it was. I didn't either. But now we do because our good friends in the United Kingdom have written us. Yes. I wish somebody would have brought this up before we went because I would have been on lookout for one of these. Well, I'll get to it. Hey, guys. Can't believe you have never heard of the Amazing Bacon Buddy. Just that name sounds great, my little bacon Buddy. Even though it's spelled differently. Especially if you've recently been to England, home of the buddy. The word buddy is a UK British shorthand for buttered sandwich or roll. Remember when I was saying chippy for fish and chips? Yes. These are cute ways of shortening things. So a bacon buddy is essentially a bacon sandwich or roll on a roll with a lovely helping of butter. Or if you're me, you load it with HP sauce. Yeah, that could be good, too. They love their HP sauce. HP? Is that what you say? Another cracking buddy you might have heard of in the past are chip buddies, as you call French fries. The next time you're in the UK, pop into any fish and chip shop, ask for a chip buddy. You get a crusty roll loaded with chips covered in vinegar and salt. So bad for you, but so tasty. On a slightly separate note, hearing Chuck's love for mayonnaise makes me so happy because I am also slightly addicted to the stuff. When I was younger, I would eat what I call the cheesy dunkers. I love this dude. This was essentially cheddar cheese cut into long, thick strips, which I would then dunk into my pot of helmet's mayonnaise. Man, cheesy. Dunk them all. Great show as usual, guys. Keep doing what you're doing. That's from Kyle Chandler from Kent, England. But right now in South Korea And two things I would add, I was totally wrong about Aioli. It is garlic based by definition. Yeah, that's what I thought. You know, that I didn't stand up for myself. No, you were fine. Okay. And two, I've had a bacon buddy. I didn't know it. No, I was in the Sky Lounge at Heathrow. Stop rubbing that in my face. What? The Sky Lounge membership you have, it can be yours, but I want it for free. Well, here's the thing, dude. You eat and drink well over $450 in a year worth of free stuff in these Sky Lounges. Oh, yeah. I could probably do that in a visit. I was at one the other day. I just went to Cleveland. I had two Bloody Marys and a buffet meal for free. It's like $35. Yeah, in an airport. Yeah. I'm telling you, I'm keeping tally. I need to get my money back on it. You have a little ledger. I do? Yeah, you put on your little bankers visor with the Greenville. One bacon buddy, one whiskey. How was the bacon, buddy? Well, it's delicious. And someone else wrote in, the bacon that they have over there is different than what we have over here. Yeah, it looks like it's a sat back or something. Yeah, they call it streaky bacon. This is big, wide hammy chunks. Oh, man. And it wasn't called a Bacon Buddy on the menu. It was just called Bacon on a Roll, because nobody would know what you're talking about. They call it bacon, buddy. Yeah. So I had a bacon buddy and I loaded it with butter. And see, in America, we have that with egg and cheese all wrapped up, but just the bacon is enough for them. Sure. It was delicious. Yeah. We call that the Enormous Sandwich Burger King. I haven't had that one. Oh, you haven't? It's basically everything you could possibly eat for breakfast on, like, a Hoagie Roll USA. Yes. If you want to get in touch with Chuck or me, you can hang out with us on Twitter at syskpodcast. You can look me up at Josh mclark. You can hang out with Chuck at Charlesw Chuck Bryant on Facebook, or our official page is facebook. Comsteffyto. Send us an email to stuff podcast athouseafworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the Web, the Slightly Klugeestuffyshto.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstofworks.com. Ah, summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon music that's so good it's Criminal Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…-01-sysk-pez.mp3	How PEZ Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-pez-works	PEZ began in Vienna as a mint meant to help people quit smoking. But once American kids got ahold of it, the candy took off and a symbol of childhood - and healthy secondary market among collectors - was born.	PEZ began in Vienna as a mint meant to help people quit smoking. But once American kids got ahold of it, the candy took off and a symbol of childhood - and healthy secondary market among collectors - was born.	Thu, 01 Oct 2015 13:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2015, tm_mon=10, tm_mday=1, tm_hour=13, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=274, tm_isdst=0)	40247862	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should Know from Housedaforkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clarke. There's. Charles, Debbie, chuck Bryant. There's guest producer Noel. And this is stuff you should know. Nice. I like that. Another knoll cast as well. Yeah. Pretty exciting. It's part of the null scent, the Noel scent, we're going to call it. Do you like pez? I like pez. Do you like the candy? I do. You like the taste? I like the taste of pez, yes. Describe to me what happens when you put a pet candy in your mouth. Well, I put a pez candy. I pull the head back. The kicker kicks it out. Pop. Yes. Nice lingo. And I take it from the pez dispenser with my tooth. Oh, you don't really you'd like, go mouth to mouth with it? Sure. Well, tooth to kicker. Okay. Yeah. What do you do, use your hand? Well, I don't eat pez, but back when I was eight, I would be delighted when I would pull the head back, the little candy would shoot out, and I'd pick it out with my hand, put it in my mouth. Yeah. I use my teeth. Interesting. I would feel like I was going in to make out with a Daffy Duck or something if I did that. Well, that's half the fun. Oh, boy. Anyway, I don't care for the candy, though. I wasn't done describing pez. Go ahead. Sorry. And then I take it onto my tongue, right. And I start to savor the flavor of it. Typically, I prefer maybe. Well, definitely one of the fruit flavors. I've never had a mint pez or a chocolate pez, which is new. I would try the chocolate one, but say, like orange. We'll just go with orange. Okay. I'm sitting there. I let it sit on my tongue for all of, like, six nanoseconds, and then I start to bite into it. Yeah. You chew it, and it's very much like this explains why I like pests, especially orange pests. I once ate almost an entire bottle of orange flavored, baby. Aspirin for the taste, that's why I like pests. How old were you then? Were you a kid? I was, like, 20 something. Yes, I was a kid. Okay. Well, did it hurt you? No, nothing happened to me. We talked about that before. Is that because it isn't even medicine. It's just a placebo. But how could you use a placebo on a little kid? I mean, I guess it worked, but certainly there's an age where they're just like I feel like half of parenting is probably placebo. Probably. Well, you would know now. Well, not yet. Well, let me know. She doesn't believe my lies yet. That will come later. Yeah, surely. Kids are pretty dumb, so you can get them to believe anything. Sure, but there seems like there would be an age where they wouldn't make that connection and a placebo wouldn't work. I don't think a placebo would work, like, say, from birth, and I don't remember what age. You can start giving kids baby aspirin. Just baby aspirin. I don't even children aspirin. Yeah. Anyway, I like Pez. I like how it tastes. I like the experience of eating at Pez, all right? I don't care for pez. I also like the shape, the brick. It helps with the taste. I saw we did the La podcast fest this last weekend, and I can't remember her name, but a very nice young lady brought us some different candies and things. The Lego candy. Well, you jumped on that bag. I was like, you want these Lego brick candies? And you're like, yeah, give me a second time, man, I love those things. Yeah. And that's sort of this I put those all in the same category, which is just like compressed sugar, right. In, like, a brick form. As a matter of fact, it turns out the Pez company to the state uses about \u00a350,000 of sugar every four days making its Pez candy. That's right. And here's a factoid for you, all right? It takes \u00a33000 of pressure to compress the Pez ingredients, which is not just sugar, into the delightful tiny, disgusting brick that you love. I don't think it's disgusting. I don't like candies. I have another one for you. Okay. They make 12 million tablets a day at their Orange, Connecticut facility, the headquarters of Pez. And 3 billion PES bricks are consumed in the US alone each year by people like me who like Pez. Yes. Roughly twelve at a time, because that's how much the standard dispenser holds. And if this kind of thing floats your boat right now, go check out how Stuff works. Brain Stuff series on YouTube. And specifically look up the one on Pop Rocks that I did a year or two ago. It was really interesting stuff. Candy manufacturing is fascinating. I don't care what you say. No, I like manufacturing processes. I just don't like to eat candy. I got you. You know what I mean? Yeah. You just go to the plant, watch it made, and then turn down the free samples. Like, no, thank you. I find that disgusting. Yes. They're like, now, would you like to try some? I don't do that on beer tours. I'll sample that. You mean I went to the Maker's Mark distillery. Did you dip your own bottle? Yes. No. Yes. We definitely have one, but I don't remember if we I guess we did dip it. Yeah, that's the thing. But it was like a mini, so maybe not. Maybe we bought a mini that was, like, just a mini to commemorate it. And they made you buy, like, a fifth or something and dip your own bottle. And we're like, got you. It's fine, because we'd be like, we wouldn't want to open it. Yeah, we didn't dip our own body. I forgot that was exactly the conversation we had. Wow. You guys put a lot of thought into that one. Anyway, it's a pretty cool tour, to tell you the truth. I strongly recommend you have never done a distillery. I'd like to do that. There's a new one here in Atlanta, in Avondale. Oh, really? Yeah. Whiskey distillery. Nice. Well, I can tell you go on any whiskey tour and you will find what Mila Kunis is talking about with the angel share stuff. It's a real thing. Yeah. The evaporating whiskey fills, whatever, the place where they're aging in barrels. And it's actually really dangerous. Like the place could blow up at any time because very much so. We're sugar factory. Right. But the smell is one of the most amazing smells I've ever experienced in my entire life. Like smell good or just weird good? Wow. Great. The half of a percent of whiskey. That is just glorious. It's in the air, right? It's amazing. Oh, man. Now I'm thirsty. All right, so let's talk pez in 2011. This is something I didn't know there was a wedding. Well, I did know this part in the United Kingdom between a guy named William and a little lady named Kate Wady. Katie. Do people call her that? Some people did. That she's overweight? No, that she waited around. Oh, okay. It's like, man, how mean can people get? Yeah, that would be even meaner. So they made specialty pez dispensers out of Prince William and Kate for that. And they were expensive. $13,360 at a charity auction. Clearly that's the most expensive pez dispenser ever sold. Not so, my friend. What supposedly that is the $32,000 in 2006 for an astronaut limited edition, astronaut themed. It was from the World's Fair. And there were two of them. Two in existence. Yeah, that's why it's expensive. And what's neat is that auction took place on ebay, which is very appropriate that pez dispenses are sold on ebay. Because the guy who founded Ebay what's his name? Pierre. Pierre OMAD. Right. He founded ebay in partner. He was inspired to found Ebay because his girlfriend at the time, I think his wife is his wife now, collected PES. And he thought, hey, this would be a really great we may not have ebay today if it weren't for pez pez dispensers. Collecting pez dispensers, which is a relatively new thing, it really took off in the 80s, late 80s, actually. It wasn't until the late eighty s that people really started collecting pest dispensers. And now the Tweety Bird episode, I had to go back and look it up, but once I did, I started to remember, yeah, I think Elaine and Jerry and George were at Georgia's girlfriend's piano recital, and Jerry put the tweedy bird pez dispenser on his lap or on Elaine's lap. And Elaine started laughing, ruined the performance. And then she was later outed when she laughed again in front of that lady. Right. And then the tweedy bird pez dispenser also factored into the plot because Jerry and his friends had an intervention for another friend who had a drug problem. Yes, and he was resisting. Resisting. And then for some reason, Jerry brought out the pez dispenser. And the wave of nostalgia that washed over this guy caused him to admit that he had a drug problem. But then he became hooked on pez. Well, and nostalgia figures in a lot. It really does. Well, kids of all ages grew up with pez. Kids of all ages? What am I, a circus announcer? Yeah, Step On Up. What do they call? I was going to say circus and Barker ringmaster your circus barker. Well, there's two different those are two different things, I think. Oh, really? Unless you're in, like, a low budget carnival, then it's maybe the same thing. Yeah, I would be, but the Barker's the one who's like, Step on up. Well, guess your way. He's trying to get people to come in. The ring master is the one who's running the show. Once the show starts, I feel like I'd be the Barker. You need to be the ring master. You'd have to wear a straw boater hat and, like, striped suits. Yeah, I'd be the Barker, and you'd be the guy that swings from things with his teeth. Do have strong teeth. As opposed to my riddle weak teeth when I fell off, and there's some of my teeth jammed into the trapeze bar still. You're like a Looney Tins cartoon now. Yeah, but imagine it in reality, even worse. It is. I feel like we should take a break and regain our composure. Okay. All right. We'll be back right after this. All right, we're back. And I think we should start in the traditional way when we handle our pop culture casts and talk about history, because I thought it was a pretty interesting history, actually. Yeah, I love this article. Edward Haas III. He was an Austrian. He made sweet. He was a confectioneer. Well, his family was in the grocery business, and he was successful in that. But yeah, his heart was in candy, like yours. His heart was in candy. It was also in hygiene. I get the impression that he was a very strong germophobe. Well, it's probably good when you're running a candy factory. Yes. He was also anti smoking, and he decided he went to a chemist pharmacist, and said, hey, give me some really strong peppermint essence. And he used that with some sugar and made mint, basically a protoaltoid, and put them in little tins and marketed them as quitting smoking or smoking cessation AIDS. Basically, if you're trying to quit, you needed something to put in your mouth. Just chew one of these pezmins. That's right. And he got the name Pez from the abbreviation, the German word for peppermint, which starts with three consonants, which is always fun. Come on. You took German. You know German. Well, I mean, I would just say feffaments. I would say I like that better. That sounds like the remix version, but it does start with two P's and an F, but shorten that and take out letters from the beginning, middle, and end, and you get pez, like you said. He said, you can either use this to try and quit smoking as a sort of an early version of nicorette gum right. Even though it had no nicotine in it that we know of. Or you can use it, if you do smoke to make your breath fresh because no one wants to smell you stinky smokers. Wrap them up in, like, a little candy bar at first. Right. And that's how we sold them for, like, a year. Well, yes. They were also sold in tens. Right. And he invented pez in 27. That's when they first hit the market. But again, I get the impression that he was a germaphobe and he didn't want everybody to put their grubby hands into the same pez tin and touch the other ones that other people were putting in their mouths. And he probably imagined all the poop and bacteria and who knows what on those people's hands? German sausage touching his beloved pez. So he thought, there has to be a better way to dispense pez. We need some sort of, I don't know, pez dispenser. That's right. And so there was an employee at his company, Oscar UXA, and you know what UXA does? He's a dispenser genius. Yeah. And he says, hey, how about this? Why don't we make a dispenser that looks like a cigarette lighter? Because this is for smoking cigarettes. And I'll have a little contraption on here, the kicker that'll spit out one at a time. And he said, that's genius. Right. Edward hass kicked the Kleenex boxes off of his feet and stood up and hugged Oscar Oopsa. Yeah. And by the way, they're selling them in ten s again now in Peppermint. Oh, yeah. With a little throwback, retro looking one of the pez ladies. Pez girls. Yeah, the pez girls. Right. Which were supposedly like this very sexy thing to sell. Pez. Did you see them? Yeah. They look like the bellhops. Yeah. They're basically drawn, like, pin up girls, except not nearly as racy. They have little bellboy hats. Sure. A lot of them did. And they went from the think all the way up until the early 80s. They used pez girls to market pez. Do you know what they reminded me of was back in the day, when you would have, like, be at a club and a woman would come around see us. Cigarettes. Yes. They would have a little tray that was hung around their neck with cigars and cigarettes and mints and who knows what else. Pez, I guess. Pez. I guarantee you pez was in there. You're probably right. So they were a hit among adults in Europe, big time. Yeah, they did the trick. Yeah. They were already pretty popular. But once they packaged them into these cigarette lighter dispensers. They really cemented themselves as like iconic candy. People say, look, you just pop it open and then candy comes out and you put your teeth on it. It's wonderful. It makes your monocle pop off. So they went nuts for the stuff. And then he said, you know what? Let me expand. The United States is where it's at. 1952, he found out that kids in America were delighted over this because I guess kids in America were like adults in Europe at the time, and they'd love the way these things popped out. Plus, it probably made them feel a lot like they were smoking. You think? Probably. I never got the tie to the lighter. It was completely lost on me. So you like, flick a lighter. I get it now, but I never had made that association until I knew that. Okay, so imagine a pez dispenser without the head. Oh, yeah, that's what the original I can imagine that because I used to take the heads off my okay. All right. So that's the original pet dispensers, which are called regulars now. The first ones, before they started adding heads, they're very much resembled like, a nice, slim lighter. So if you're a kid sure. Like this kind of thing. Like, there's the manual thing where you're flicking a lighter. Then there's the oral fixation that's satisfied by putting the mint into your mouth. And it's mimicking smoking, which is one of the reasons why it was one of the ways it was marketed. The idea was that it would alleviate that desire for those Freudian fixations that you had when you were a smoker. If you were trying to quit, if you're a little kid and you wanted to smoke but you just couldn't get your hands on cigarettes yet. In other words, a good way to do that. I didn't have arms in the 50s. Yeah, probably. I saw candy cigarettes the other day in a store. By the way, I thought those were I can't believe they make those. Yeah, I thought they were completely gone. Okay, if you want to know a candy that I think is abhorrent and disgusting, candy cigarettes, gum cigarettes are awesome. Do you remember those? The kind where you puff them? No, that's why we're talking about oh, those are great. The candy cigarettes. They're just like sticks of candy that are disgusting. No, I'm talking about the gum that would blow out face smoke. I love that they still make those. But the gum cigars, I think were gross. They had some weird chemical taste to them. I never saw that they were not wanting the same, which is surprising. And they still make those. And they still make big, leak chew. Yes. It's amazing that they can still, with good conscience, market tobacco products to children and that they're allowed to. I remember probably the greatest tasting gum of all time. Juicy Fruit, big Bread. No, it was a rainbow gum that was sold to commemorate Rambo Three. Tastes like sweat? Yes. No, it was marketed as, like, black raspberry or something like that, but it didn't taste like that at all. I've never tasted anything like it. Usually you run into a taste years later, like, there's only ten tastes or $0.10. I've never experienced it before after. And it was the best tasting gum ever, but it was in the Big League Chew pouch. Wow. And it was Big League Chew shreds. So clearly it was made by the same company for the makers of Rambo, but the flavor they used was perfect, like, sweat and gunpowder, and you could get it for, like, one summer. Did it have a cartoon version of Stallone on it? No, it was a photo of him with, like, the very famous rocket launcher. Okay. The rocket launcher. Yeah, from Rainbow Three. And it was just a picture of it on the big league two pouch. Wow. Yeah. I loved it. I guess they had to market it that way because first blood gum didn't go over so well. Exactly. It tastes just like blood, man, I'm learning all kinds of things. Well, hold on, hold on. We're getting ahead of ourselves, all right? No, we're getting super distracted. That's what it is. In the 50s, kids very surprisingly liked pez, but they were like, this is pretty strong mint, and I'm a little kid. I like fruity flavored stuff. Yeah, I like the dispenser, but going to get your game going with the candy. Exactly. Haas and company listen big time, so they kept mint pez still, but they started releasing lines of fruit flavored ones and cola. They had one called chlorophyll, a coffee flavored, a yogurt one that probably was just European. What is the chlorophyll? I couldn't get a read on what that was like, and I looked I think it's like it's a mint. It's a definite mint flavor. Did they just use the wrong word? There's a gum out there that has a similar sounding name. It's like a very bright, like, mint, not peppermint. It's not a sweet. It's mint here. Okay. But yeah, chlorophyll is interesting. Right. But they had other stuff, too, like orange and I think cherry, maybe something like that. Sure. Traditional flavors. Yeah. But not peach. This is fun. Trivia fact for you. They have had peach flavors, but it was never, at least in the US. Yeah, I'm a weirdo. I don't like peach flavors or peaches. So since they realize that kids are going bonkers for this candy with bonkers, that was another good candy, too. I don't know what that is. It came out in the 80s. It was great. Okay. They decided to try to make PEDs a little more parent friendly, because even back in the Think, parents were like, I don't want you teaching my kid to smoke with this candy. Right. So they said, well, let's change it from a cigarette lighter into something different, a toy. And we'll add, like, a beloved cartoon character on there. How about that? That's fine with me. It was genius. Yeah. Because what he did was he combined candy with a toy, and not only a toy, but a collectible. And it was genius for kids. It was all they needed. They were pretty cheap, and so kids could buy them. They could go around and probably find enough money on the ground in a given day to go buy a little pest dispenser right. Or build, like, a soapbox racer and sell it to the rich kids in the neighborhood and buy a bunch of pez. Did you see find it? Yeah. That's another thing, too. I didn't like the stick that you had to lick, but the sugar was just great. So the sugar stick that you dipped into the sugar the sugar stick didn't have enough flavor for me. Yeah. I was thinking about fun Dip the other day when I was driving. For some reason, it was just remarkable to me that they would just make a sugar stick that you dip in different flavors of sugar, and you would then eat the sugar off the stick and then eat the sugars. Right. Well, they didn't even try back then. Smax used to be called sugar snacks. Yeah. And then they changed it to Honey Smacks, and they're like, let's just go with snacks. How is it just called Smacks? I believe so it's not Sugar smax? No, it hasn't been Sugars Max for years. I don't need much cereal. They would get chased out of the grocery aisle whenever they tried to restock. That if they still call it Sugar Smacks. Just don't mess with Captain Crunch peanut butter. That's all I've got to say. Captain Crunch has one out now. I saw on the cereal aisle the other day it's sprinkled donuts captain Crunch. And it looks awesome. Yeah, the peanut butter is so good, even though it tears up the roof of your mouth, it's worth it. But that's a fatal flaw, don't you think? Not to me. I'll get a box of that, like, every three or four years. I'll get a box of that, like, when Emily's out of town dinner time. Because if she would come home and see that, she'd be like, what are you doing in our house? Are you a child? Yeah, I have to save those moments. All right. Haas is super rich because he's selling tons and tons of these dispensers. He sells the company, and they move well. The manufacturing of the dispensers is actually now in China and Hungary and, like, Slovenia, I think, to Central Europe and now Asia as well. But the actual candies are and have been for a very long time made, I believe you already said, at a plant in Orange, Connecticut. Yeah. And they kept it going. PES was always a privately owned company. I don't think it's ever been public but they kept the whole thing going even after Haas departed. And that was helped very much by this explosion and collecting that came from the mid eighty s, I would say. And as a result, PES itself added feet to the dispenser so that they can be displayed from that point on. And they realized like, oh wait, people are collecting these. There's like a secondary market that's generated will speed the addiction. Exactly. So they added feet to it. So now a PES dispenser can stand up. But that was introduced in 1987. So if you see feet on your pet dispenser, you know that it's at least 1987 on. All right, so let's take another quick break here and we will come back and talk a little bit more about the odd collecting of pez dispensers. So, Chuck, people started collecting pez dispensers partly because they came of age at a time about the mid eighties when they were high on cocaine and had a lot of disposable income and were nostalgic for their childhood. Yeah, I have a theory, and it's not like I'm sure everyone knows this, but I think pest dispensers became collectible because you couldn't throw it away like you would eat the candy. And what are you going to do as a kid? You can be like, let me throw away this Garfield toy now. Well, not only that, you put it on your chef, right? You're chef, you're like, stand still, chef, stop making that stew weird. So I can put this pesticides around on your Buoya bays. Can wait. But the whole thing is they're reloadable. You get the little packet of twelve, pop it in there and you want more. Like if it's one of those same deals, like collect all four. Right. But this is not all four. This is constantly new licensing deals being cooked up, everything from Looney Tunes to Star Wars to Hello Kitty, which was the other stroke of genius, was partnering up with these iconic brands and cultural icons to say, hey, a Chewbacca head on this thing. There are grown adults that will buy that. Right. The thing is, Lucasfilm definitely charges a pretty penny, or did before they sold to Disney, and now it's even more, I'm sure, to license anything from Star Wars, right? Sure. So pez also very frequently came up with their own stuff as well. There are the PES pals. There was a very famous misstep called make a face Pez, which is like a tiny Mister Potato head where you could put on different eyes and mouth and stuff. But of course, those things were a major choking hazard to say. And actually there's a lore among pez collectors who are called pez heads, that if you look at some of the Indian chiefs that were released, their headdresses are marbled. They have marbled color. Oh, wow. And they're saying that those are ground up make a face dispensers that they reused in the headdresses that sounds like a PES enthusiast conspiracy theory, but it's pretty cool, isn't it? That is pretty cool. Another one that they released was a series for the Bicentennial that includes the funniest character of all time, in my opinion, the colonial soldier with a head wound. Okay. I thought you can say the Paul Riviera. I think there is a Paul River. No, there is. Which I thought would be a pretty weird one. There's a Paul Revere Daniel Boone, who looks like he has a well formed beehive on his head rather than a coonskin cap, is an Uncle Sam. Yeah. There's a Betsy Ross. And then there's the head wound soldier. He's got, like, that white gauze on his head with a little blood dot coming through, and he looks just kind of out of it. It's a really weird pez dispenser. That one is probably my favorite, although I like a lot of the Halloween themed ones from the 70s. Yeah, some of those glow in the dark, which is pretty neat. Like Mr. Skull. Did you see him? Yeah. Or Dr. Skull, I think. I think he's probably my favorite. Or the pumpkin from the green stem is probably the best pez dispenser of all time. Well, there have been 400 more than 450 dispensers since 1955, including three different Santas. And the Santa is the best selling of all time, which makes sense, of course, especially the first one, because the dispenser wasn't just a little pet dispenser. It was like the whole body. Sure. But then they're like, this is way too expensive. Yes. They're like a bunch of people just buy it with the head. Yeah. And they did the Salvador dolly tribute. I don't know if it's a tribute. I bet it was is my favorite in 1968. The Psychedelic Hand. It was a hand with a green eyeball, and it's just very cool looking. Yes. I would want one of those. Of course, I wouldn't pay thousands of dollars for it. No. I'd like to just find one on the street. It is pretty neat, though. Yeah. Do all of them cost that much, that specific collectible? No, but, I mean, I would say they range in the hundreds and thousands. It's really rare. But what was interesting about this, I think Patrick Kyler pointed out, compared to a lot of other collecting hobbies, pet dispensers are relatively cheap. Yes. Not too bad. You can get into them pretty easily with a minimal amount of money. One of my favorite pez dispensers is the Pez Gun series. Oh, really? First it was a ray gun, and then they made it into a handgun. And then when Star Wars came out in 1980, they released another space gun that looked an awful lot like Han Solo's gun, but it wasn't really. We don't sue them, but the kid would put the gun in his mouth and pull the trigger to dispense the candy. Wow. Yeah. Really? Yeah. Unbelievable. They have had some. Kind of weird ones over the years, like the airline pilot and stewardess, which I don't know. Is that a big seller? I don't know. Well, this is back in the day, I think, when they were they were revered figures in culture. Yeah. The pilots weren't drunks and the flight attendants weren't flight attendants. They were stewardesses. They were fancy clothes, but they have, like, hard chiseled features. They look like real people. They look like pilots and flight attendants from the Mother Road during the Depression or something. Yeah, like really chiseled features. And actually, apparently the pet company says that they very infrequently do real life humans. Those bicentennial figures were the first humans they ever did, or real life humans, I should say. And they didn't even do fictitious ones very often, like a stewardess or the pilot, because they just found that the human face wasn't nearly as interesting as they. Like a bubble man. Yeah. In 2006, they issued the first ever Pez dispensers of living humans when they decided to pay tribute to the fellows from Orange County Chopper. It makes me so sad. That goes down in history. It's the worst one ever. But, I mean, those were the first guys to ever have living. Why? I don't know. A licensing deal. And it opened the floodgates after that. After that, it was on there's like a Kiss collector set. Well, of course, because Jean Simmons, he'll put his face on anything. What else? Well, people get turned down a lot. You said that other little fact sheet, kim Kardashian wanted a Pez dispenser. Yeah. They said no. Yeah, they turn down people all the time because apparently everybody wants one. I would suggest just go make your own bobble head, because you can get that done. It sounds the same. Well, you could just put candy in your bottle head. There are newsletters, there's a PES collectors news, there are conventions. And there is even a museum that a husband and wife started in California that started out weirdly as a museum for computers and pest dispensers. No, I think they were a computer sales company. Oh, I thought they displayed like vintage computers. Yeah, it was a computer dealer and they were selling computers. And just to kind of make the place look a little more interesting, they also displayed pez dispenser. Got you. And they found that people were way more interested in coming to see the PES dispensers and weren't buying computers. So they transitioned over to a straight up Pez museum. The Pez or the Museum of PES memorabilia in Burlingame, California. Yeah. And you can pay some money to go in there and look at all their rare and vintage pad dispensers. They have one. He paid three grand for the pineapple wearing sunglasses because in the early seventy s, I think. Yeah, it's nothing special to look at, but again, it's rarity. They didn't make many of them because it was ugly, probably. Yeah. I thought it was kind of did you like the California Raisins? Yes. Okay. There you go. That explains it. Have you seen? Straight out of Compton. No, not yet. Is it good? Oh, you haven't seen that yet? I haven't been to any movies. You should. The California Raisins appear by mention. Wow. They are mentioned in a surprising way. I look forward to seeing that on television. You should go see it, man. Yeah, all right. I'll go see the movie theater. What else? They tried vitamins for a little while. Yeah, I didn't think that was a bad idea. Put a little vitamin C in there. Parents might be more willing to throw up some money for the kid. But they said, no, we're not in the vitamin business. Let's just stick to the sugary pressed candy. No, the guy who said that was a guy named Scott McWinnie. Scott McWinnie was president. He started out, I think general Mills or something. Or General Foods. And he moved his way over to Pez in the 90s or the 80s? No, the 80s, because that quote was from he was president of Pez for a while, and he, much to his chagrin, got into a war, basically an economic war with the guy who is known as the Pez Outlaw. Yeah. You dug this up. This is really interesting. The article what was it called? It was a terrible title. Like Michigan farmer makes $4 million in pez dispensers in three years or something. It's a terrible title. It should have been called the Pez Outlaw. Yeah. But it was in Playboy, and it was pretty good. Long form reporting. Yeah. Basically what happened was in the dude named Steve Gleeu, G-L-E-W found out that, hey, over in Canada, they're selling different dispensers that you can't get here in the United States. So let me go over there, let me buy some of these and resell them to collectors. And it worked. And all of a sudden, the light bulb went off. And he said, I think I can actually make money getting pez dispensers from other countries. And he found a hook up, that mysterious woman who approached him from the Eastern Bloc, wherever she was from. Yes. And he ended up he and his son Joshua started making trips to Central Europe, oftentimes right along the border of, like, war torn Croatia, and found these factories where Pez is being made, and found very bribable factory workers who would take, like, molds and make new pez dispensers to his liking. And then he would sell them as basically, like, PES freaks or one offs or something and for hundreds and hundreds of dollars. But he would spend a quarter or maybe a dollar on each. Crazy. And he supposedly made quite a bit of money, he claims. 4 million. Yeah. I believe if they made the number of trips that they were making, I think that he did. His downfall was that he overextended himself. He took out a massive loan and basically hired a factory to make a bunch of misfit. Pez dispensers. Reed was his downfall, and Mark McGuinity took them on and started releasing basically Pez's own version of these counterfeit weirdo dispensers at a lower price and drove the dude out of business. This could be a little documentary. Easy. Also, that reminds me, have you ever seen the Jelly Belly documentary? No. Oh, it's so sad. But it's so good. What's it called? I don't remember. Just look up Jelly Belly documentary and weird owls in it. Oh, wow. Yeah. Well, then I definitely won't see it. No, you really should, man. It's a great documentary. It's very sad. And that one and the Show BZ pizza one documentary too. Yeah. I used to love showbiz. You'll love this documentary. I like showbiz more than Chuck E. Cheese, even. There's a huge backstory to it that you were unaware of. Can I read you this one excerpt? Yeah. This is from the story about the PES outlaw. A 1993 toy convention changed Steve's life forever. As he tells it, a mysterious woman opened her jacket and showed him a silver globes, a holy grail for Pez collectors. She whispered to him in broken English, there are many more where I come from. That's still great. Yeah, it is. Can you believe that? Yes. I get the feel she's like, two guys in overcoats and sunglasses came and hurried her away. Yes. What's your name? Or two centimetes came out of the woodwork and pulled her down to hell. Ivanka. Yeah, it's a pretty good article. Look up. Stupid title. Michigan farmer PES. Playboy. And it'll bring it up. I think long form had it at one point. Speaking of Ivanka, should I talk about Donald Trump? Probably not. All right. I was surprised when I found out. I found mention of, like, Pez Dispensers being nostalgic. I was like, Definitely not for me. Then I went to Pez.com and clicked on Collectors Corner giggles for the rest of the world. They have pictures of, like, every single one they've released over the years, year by year. And I definitely felt nostalgic. And I don't even think of Pez as factoring in largely into my childhood at all. Same here. But I was a little nostalgic looking at these. It's cute. So go to Pez.com and check out the Collectors Corner, and I think you will waste a lot of time there. Agreed. And I think that's it because Chuck just grabbed a listener mail email, which is usually a signal for me to shut up because it's mean to me after the mics aren't recording any load, please. Okay. And if you want to know more about Pez, type that word in the search bar athouseofworks.com and it's time for listener mail. You guys are right. Screw college. Remember when we had a little soapbox moment? Was this from the animator? Yeah. I thought, this is good. Hi, guys. I want to shoot you a quick email to thank you for mentioning the idea that you don't need to go to college for some professions on the how publishes work episode. It really struck a chord with me. I'm an animator and I desperately wish it would be treated as a trade, which it is, and not as a high art form that requires a fancy $100,000 degree. Most of what I learned, I actually learned on the job. Got almost nothing for my college classes, while the contacts I made in college were very valuable down the road. And nothing is quite as nice as moving out and being on your own in art school. It came with a hefty price. It is now ten years later. I've been working steadily this whole time and I'm still paying off my college student loans and I make a good amount of money. That's just sad. And I know so many people are in the same position, but without steady work. And she says that she worked at Adult Swim for a while too, by the way. Oh, yeah. There's a stigma about not going to college, and I think it's part of the reason so many people are being crushed by student loan debt now. It's a very American stigma too. It's not like that all around the world. I know. Stupid Americans. I think there's probably a lot of these kinds of jobs that don't need college degrees out there, like podcaster, and it might be cool to hear a podcast on that sometime. I'm not sure what you call it. Maybe how not going to college but landing a nice job and making a living anyway and sticking it to your parents works, maybe just do one on student loans or something. Anyway, thanks for keeping me company while I animate. Keep it up. You guys are top notch. And that is Margie. Thanks, Margie. That was a great email. Agreed. I appreciate that. And that's not the GV college altogether. Sometimes it's very useful. Yes. It's just not the end all, be all for everyone on the planet to have to go to college. No, it's true. It's true. And I think that there hopefully is a large awakening going on because a lot of people say that the current bubble, if you're looking around for the next bubble student loan. Yes, we should do something about that sometime. Let's do it. And actually, Marjie gave us the URL for her blog. It's Margibordner blogspot.com. I imagine you can go check out her stuff there, wouldn't you think? Yes, sir. Nice. So if you want to get in touch with Chuck or me or both of us, or even Noel, you can tweet to us at Syscap. You can join us on Facebook.com, you can send us an email to stuffpodcasthousepworks.com, and as always, join us at home on the web stuffyoushorenow.com. For more I'm this and thousands of other topics, visit howstepworks.com."
https://podcasts.howstuf…ysk-fracking.mp3	How the Frick Fracking Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-frick-fracking-works	Fracking, the process of breaking trapped resources like natural gas and oil from shale, has led to a revolution in energy production in the U.S. It's also given rise to increasing worries that the process can have sweeping environmental impacts.	Fracking, the process of breaking trapped resources like natural gas and oil from shale, has led to a revolution in energy production in the U.S. It's also given rise to increasing worries that the process can have sweeping environmental impacts.	Tue, 22 Jan 2013 19:11:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2013, tm_mon=1, tm_mday=22, tm_hour=19, tm_min=11, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=22, tm_isdst=0)	43717774	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, friends. You know, dating is a journey with ups and downs, for sure. But all the effort is worth it when you meet someone special, right? And when you decide it's time to find a meaningful relationship, eharmony is here for you. Eharmony is passionate about creating real love for all, rooted it in compatibility. Eharmony's process reveals truths about yourself, like, I don't know what you want in a relationship. And it helps you connect with a uniquely compatible partner who is right for you. Don't believe it? See for yourself. So start for free today, because every 14 minutes, someone finds love on Eharmony. This July, don't miss an entire summer of surprises on Disney Plus with Disney's High School Musical, the Musical, the series season three Zombies, three Doctor Strange in the multiverse of Madness, and the one wonderful summer of Mickey Mouse. Plus new episodes of Marvel Studios, ms. Marvel and National Geographics. America the Beautiful. From the award winning producers of Planet Earth, Frozen Planet, and the Disney nature films, america the Beautiful takes viewers on a tour of the most spectacular and visually arresting regions of our great nation. All these and more streaming this month on Disney Plus, brought to you by the 2012 Toyota Camry. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's charles W, chuck Bryant. And this is stuff you should know. Very serious addition that doesn't even last. Once we're out the whole episode, we're just a couple of fracking podcasters. We can't do that the whole time. I wasn't going to do it at all. Well, you know, I would I find it distasteful to fund something for the F word. Yeah, sure. Even the F word, I can barely get that out. Calling it the F word. Oh, yeah, right. You just want to say it. Yeah, don't say fudging. Right? I hate those people. Fudging midwesterners. Yeah, just don't even say anything at all. Yeah, just glower. Yeah. Or say something entirely unrelated. But all it does is make people think of the real F word, which is, like, loses the spirit of your intent, which is to not curse. Yeah, that's definitely a way to put it. That's one problem with it. All right, what's your intro? What's your fracking intro? Well, you know, we did that episode on peak oil. Yeah. And it was really funny that we recorded it when we did, because, like, two days after we're talking about the US. Running out of oil, a report was released that basically said the United States is predicted to be energy independent by like, 2030 at this rate. And we actually are we probably are never going to achieve true energy independence. 100% of our supplies of oil and fossil fuels and all that stuff created here. It's never going to happen. But we're going to get closer and closer and closer. And in fact, in 2010, John Kerry famous senator, possibly a future Secretary of State. Oh, yes. He being bandied about. Okay. He said that the United States is the Saudi Arabia of natural gas. And definitely natural gas is one of the reasons, one of the ways that US. Has suddenly experienced a huge boom in oil production. Oil production? Gas production, fuel production, clean burning natural gas. But we will learn that doesn't necessarily make it clean over its lifecycle. It's a big difference. Yes. Some say it's as dirty as coal over its life cycle, especially people who love coal. Yeah. That is one problem I had with this fracking article. And not just the article. The whole topic is everybody has a slant depending on who they're working for. Like, if you're an environmentalist, you're going to have your slant. If you're working with the big oil companies, you're going to have your slant. And they all say, like, these are the facts. Yeah, it's really annoying. Well, one of the reasons why everybody is able to get away with saying these are the facts is because this stuff is so new and so unstudied. I guess, to this point. Yes. As far as published peer reviewed studies are concerned, and as far as massive amounts of fracking, like, it's been around for a while, but not like it's going on today. Right, exactly. Apparently in some form or fashion, it's been around since the 19th century, the concepts of fracking. But the fracking, like you just described, massive fracking operations carried out by huge energy concerns that's couple of decades old. Yeah, I think Halliburton started it in 1949. They invented it. Did they? Yeah. Really? Dick Cheney. I don't think Dick Cheney invented it. He's like, give me that pipe, I'm going to try something new. Yeah, so they developed the process, at least, but it's really started to take off in the last few years, in the last decade or two, is when you started to see real concerns about what's going on here. Wait a minute, what are you guys doing? Right, and that's where this idea that, oh, it's perfectly safe, oh, it's going to cause a catastrophe, has come about. And that's why we should probably say, this isn't going to settle the issue, but you should keep your eyes I hope this raises people's awareness of this. Well, yeah. Just on that note, I saw a study today that 35% of Americans have never heard of fracking, and about 28% said they've heard of it, but don't know what it is. Yeah, so that's a lot. Well, let's teach a few people. Okay. Fracking, aka hydraulic fracturing, or if you're a total square, hydro fracking. That's the kid who thinks he's cool, but is really kind of out of the loop. So he's calling it hydro fracking still. We really just call it fracking. Sure. It's a technique that's used to get to incredibly deep deposits of fossil fuels. Yes. Not always natural gas, but most of our discussion will be on that. Right. And I shouldn't even say fossil fuels because you can use fracking to get to incredibly deep deposits of water. Sure, if you wanted to. But the one thing in common that all of these techniques have is that you go down in a vertical line and then all of a sudden you just cut to the right or cut to the left, anywhere between 6000 to 13,000ft down to get after shale, to get after it. And shale is this type of porous rock. Yeah, we did oil Shell, right. A long time ago, years ago, maybe like 2008, we did oil sale. And it's a type of rock. It may contain oil, it may contain gas, it can contain water. But this stuff is trapped in it because of the tremendous pressure at these depths. And with the fracking operation. You go down there, break it up, get it out, and it comes back up. Yes. And here in the US. We have a lot of the shales, specifically the Marcella Shale is one of the main fracking grounds in the country. And what does it cover? Pennsylvania, Ohio, parts of New York, Virginia, Maryland or West Virginia. Maryland. Yeah. It's huge. That's where a lot of this stuff is taking place right now. And many more states and Europe are hot on the scene here to get into fracking. Right. They think that there's about 2550 2 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in the United States. Wow. And about 500 trillion of that is in the Marcellus region alone. So it's a big deal. Yeah. New York just they were letting it through and then the governor kaibashed it for now and said, wait, maybe we should study this some more. Yeah. Because a lot of municipalities were taking it on their own to outlaw fracking in one form or fashion. And this has caused, like, a huge problem because there's a lot of people out there who are saying, well, wait a minute, I own land. Yeah. I'm kind of happy with this idea and I want to get incredibly rich overnight like Jed Clampet did. Where's my bubbling crude? Well, yeah, you do have two sides. You have some farmers that are like, this is contaminating our land. And you have some farmers saying, I haven't been able to farm and make money in years, so I would love to sell my land off or lease my land and make some serious money. So not like every farmers like, no, I don't want this. A lot of them do. No, it's very much divided and out in, like, town halls around New York and around the country, wherever fracking is possible, I guess. And it is definitely dividing communities. Yeah. All right, so let's go a little more in depth about the process of fracking. In depth? Yeah, it's really pretty simple. It starts off like a conventional well, so you drill deep, I think you said between six and 13. They said the average is about 7700ft down, I think Chesapeake Energy is wells. Okay. Well, they go to wherever the deposits are, right. So it just sort of depends. How do they find that out? I wonder what's a good site they detect. Radioactivity, I believe, because this stuff is slightly radioactive. We'll get to that too. But I think that's one of the techniques they use is they analyze the radioactivity and say, oh, there's a bunch right here. Interesting. Okay, so you got your regular well, and like you said, what's called the kick off point. It's going to take a left or right and become a horizontal line, and that can span anywhere from 1000 to 6000ft. Then they stick something called a wellbore. It's just basically a steel casing, like a big steel pipe. Right. They stick that down in there and then they shoot a bunch of cement down and it comes out the bottom and goes back and fills it up on the outside, further encasing it. And they clear it out of the middle of the wellbore. Then they clear that out. So you've got a pipeline, I guess. Right. And then the actual fracking part takes place. Right. So I'm setting you up for that part. Oh, you were? Sure. You'd think after all these years I would have noticed that you've got the well bore completely cemented and in place, and it's going down about a mile off from the kickoff point. And it's right there in the middle of the shale deposit. And they send down a little tool. It's like a little cable scrambler. You know what I'm talking about? It looks kind of like that. And it's an explosive device and it blows a hole into little holes, a bunch of little holes through the wellboard, through the cement and into the surrounding rock. Yes. Just a few inches. Each one will be two or three inches of a little mini shaft, I guess. Right, so you've got the horizontal wellbore and the cracks are then vertical perpendicular to it. Yes. Right. And then they plug that up and then move on and do it again all the way down the line of the horizontal kickoff point and the horizontal kick off point. And they blow them up and blow them up and blow them up. And you got all these perforations into the rock and then all of a sudden now you are prepared to frack. Yeah, and I was setting you up at this point. They pump water. Well, they pump a lot of stuff. It's mostly water, though. It's mostly water and sand and then what they call other chemicals. And although sometimes diesel fuel is a part of this, apparently they stopped doing that in 2003. That's not true. Well, they were supposed to stop it. The EPA came up with something that sounds like it has a lot of teeth. It's called a memorandum of agreement. And they asked the oil companies to sign it and say that they won't use diesel as part of their fracking fluid any longer. I didn't realize that people were still doing this. Yeah. A recent congressional investigation found that 32 million gallons of diesel fuel has been injected in 19 different states between 2005 and 2009. So it's still going on. Well, that flies in the face of the Memorandum of understanding. Yeah. The Memorandum of Understanding. Yes. It didn't have teeth in it, but you can get a permit to do it. That's messed up. Apparently you can get a permit, but there is no office to process the permit at the EPA. So it's an effective ban, but they're still doing it. Okay, so you've got your fracking ready. You start actually the process of fracking, what you've just done, everything we talked about up to the water is preparing for fracking. Once you start pumping this water down at an incredibly pressurized state yeah, like 9000 PSI. By contrast, an air compressor for your air tools in your garage, it's like 90 PSI. 9000 PSI is just an incredibly pressurized state. Yeah. The water rushes down, and when it hits those perforated areas, it cracks the shale even further. And eventually that particulate matter, sand or whatever else that they added goes into those cracks and then keeps it open. Keeps the cracks open. It happens. Tiny little cracks they are. But it's enough because what you're talking about is like you're getting gas out of rock rather than just a little bit. Yeah, sure. And then once you stop pumping the water, the pressure pushes it back up and eventually the water is done. The water that you sent back down there comes back up and then it's followed by gas or whatever else. Yeah. And that water is wastewater. And we will get into this is one of the controversies. How that wastewater is handled is kind of one of the things that the CenterPoint of the controversy. Yeah. So that's fracking. It's complex engineering wise, but it's actually kind of simple as a concept. And then the whole thing lasts from preparation, I guess the first drilling, to the end of fracking, about four months. But then this well that's just been developed can produce natural gas for decades, possibly. Years or decades. Yeah, it's all up to like 40 years even sometimes. Okay, so that's fracking. That's fracking. And that's where the story ends. That's where the story ends. So we're going to present both sides of the argument, like we try to do sometimes more successfully than others at other times. Yeah, because if you're an environmentalist, you probably just noticed eight things that we said that are driving you crazy right now. Because it's like, what about this? What about that? We're going to address that. Well, let's take the pro fracking side first of all, which right now includes President Obama. It's not like we're not dividing this politically as best we can he's in favor of it right now. And we also need to point out that we had a listener mail that point out that there's an EPA study that was commissioned in 2011. That's really the most comprehensive study ever and it will be done in 2014. And I think by the time this comes out, some preliminary notes should be in. Okay, so we'll learn a lot more soon and maybe the Obama administration will come out against it after that. But as of now, there's not a lot of hard science. Yeah. Which is problematic. It is problematic. So on the pro side you're going to say, you know what, these horizontal wells are really sort of efficient in that you're not going to have above ground hundreds and hundreds of wells. This one well can go horizontally for 6000ft and do most of the work out of sight. Yeah, of course counter that with there are like tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of these wells, fracking wells. And there's still a lot going on above ground. There is because the whole operation, once they finish drilling, they remove the drill rig. But now you have pump trucks coming in. Sure. It takes about 200 trucks to deliver a million gallons of water. Yeah. Man. I saw this one mini documentary on this small town in Pennsylvania. They're like on Main Street and the guy was like. Yeah. We used to sit out here at the sidewalk cafe and literally while they were filming this. It's like every third car that passed was a huge tanker truck right through the middle of this little quaint town carrying water to the site and removing wastewater and whatever else. So if it takes 200 trucks to carry 1 million gallons of water, some of these operations use 10 million gallons. So 2000 trucks just to carry it there, then you've got pump trucks. I mean, it is an operation. That's true. Even though compared to oil drilling above ground it's less innocuous. That's right. So another pro is that natural gas is pretty great and you're not going to find a lot of people to argue with that. It burns very cleanly. It's a good solution. But like we said over its lifetime, some contend that because of the practices, it's not any cleaner than coal in the end. Yeah, like if you burn it itself, in a perfect world, it emits one third of the nitrogen oxides of coal, half of the CO2 and just 1% of the sulfur oxides. So it is like a lot cleaner. But then again, as part of the fracking process, you have like all these trucks that are using all this diesel that are coming to and from the site. Right? Yes. Another problem with it is methane release associated with tapping natural gas. Apparently as much as 8% of the methane in a natural gas well is lost. And methane is bad. It's a really serious greenhouse gas. It's worse than CO2, as far as creating the greenhouse effect is concerned, it's just there's typically less of it, and we usually produce less than we produce CO2. So there's an air pollution factor to it as well. Yeah, that's true. We should probably point out if anyone's seen the documentary Gas Land from 2010. It was the famous scene where the guy likes his tap water on fire, very impactful. Did you see it? Yeah. And you can't see that and not go, holy crap. Yes. They're letting this happen. As it turns out, in fairness, the officials determined that it was a naturally occurring methane reserve at this particular homeowner's well and it was not due to fracking. Right. His well hit like a methane reserve. That would explain why his flaming water. Exactly. But before that came out, I think Truth Land, which was, I guess, an answer to Gas Land came out. Did you hear about that? No. Truth Land was released by Energy and Depth, which is a pro fracking group, which, if you go into Source Watch, is funded by oil companies. But they release this documentary that said nothing about oil companies funding it and called it Truthfully. And it was exposed to propaganda, like, right out of the gate. Right. But there's definitely this propaganda war going on between pro and consigns. Speaking of pro and cons, did you get any more pros? I do, but quickly. But just because that guy in Gasland, it turned out to be a different thing. The companies have been fined for negligence with methane reaching water supplies. Like that has happened. Right. Which is not supposed to happen, because if you're talking about the Marcellus region, that's the typically very deep, deep shale, like 7000, 10,000ft deep. That's how far you have to drill down before you hit that kick off point. Right. Your groundwater reserves, your aquifers are going to be a few hundred to 1000ft. So if you pass through them and then you use your steel wellboard and in case it cement correctly, you're not going to get any release into that groundwater. And the cracks that you're making, the fractures are so deep and small enough that they're not going to travel all the way up, thousands and thousands of feet up to the aquifer. Just the pressure won't allow it, supposedly. That's the logic behind it now. But there are things like coal bed methane fields that are typically much more shallow and are closer to aquifers. And those are the ones if you're tapping those using fracking, you run a tremendous risk of methane getting into the water supply big time. But if you're doing deep shell stuff as it stands now, all the evidence suggests that if you seal your wellboard correctly, you should be fine. Right. Well, the listener mail pointed out that most of the issues of the problems have been because of bad concrete or incorrect well, this and that. Not the fracking itself, but it's the same people doing that. So it still counts as part of the problem with fracking. Yeah, you can't say, like, oh, the fracking segment of this operation went well, but of course we had cracks all up and down that ruined everything. Sure. So, come on, that's semantics. Yeah. All right. Some of the more last couple of pro arguments here, Josh, are revenue. It's a big 117 thousand. 600 jobs would be created and $125,000,000 in tax revenue if New York state lifted their fracking ban. There are just two jobs. A lot of these are former farming communities that are somewhat depressed, and a lot of people want those jobs. And anytime you're reducing our dependence on foreign oil, that's a good thing and a world view. So those are some of the pro arguments. Sure. And they're good ones. And again, we should say, like, the jury is still very much out. But there is a lot of common sense criticism of fracking operations. Some have already been discarded, like a lot of people are worried about that radioactivity. And the wastewater that does come back up is slightly more radioactive than it was when it went down, but not any, as one professor put it, that's like the least of your worries with fracking is the radioactivity. Yeah. Another one is that it causes earthquakes, which is sensible. You're down there, you're drilling, you're blowing holes into the shale thousands of feet down. How can you not cause an earthquake? Apparently, earthquakes are associated with fracking, but it's not the actual fracking. It's when you store wastewater in a retention pond, reservoir induced seismicity. Oh, is that where it's coming from? Yeah. So there are a couple of earthquakes that were associated with fracking, but not from the fracking process of storing the wastewater. Again, semantics if you ask me, but the wastewater is probably the single most I guess if you're an environmentalist, that's the smoking gun. Like, that's the one that you can't get around if you're an energy company, because fracking uses tons of water, lots and lots of water, I mean, millions of gallons of water to get to these and recovers maybe between 15 and 50% of that water. And then the water that is recovered is now way more toxic than it was before. So you're taking water from a municipal water supply. Yeah. Drinking water people need, sending it down in the earth, and then getting maybe 15% to 50% back. And then the stuff you do get back is like, what are we going to do with this? Yeah, well, the oil companies will say that they dispose of it in ways that adequately match state regulations, which may or may not be adequate. Yeah. May or may not be in, depending on the state. The regulations are a little more lax than others. I know a lot of the wastewater from Pennsylvania is deposited in surrounding states because I think they have one of the more aggressive wastewater policies. They'll just say, ironically, New York, even though they ban fracking for now, allows Pennsylvania wastewater to be dumped there. Okay. So there's at least one municipality that has banned fracking fluids. Like you can't buy or sell them or possess them in the city, and you aren't allowed to introduce any used fracking fluid into their waste treatment plants. Like their city water isn't allowed to treat fracking fluid. Yeah. And some of this water, like the wastewater, some of it is reused for other fracking operations. Some of it is just treatment. Makes sense. Yes. Economically, it just makes sense to get as much back as you can and then use it again with the same water as much as possible. Yeah, that'd be a good idea. Some is treated, you're going to say, in like a wastewater plant. Sure. A lot of the stuff that comes back up includes like, ancient salt beds. Salt from ancient sea beds. Oh, really? Yeah, and they use those to clear off snow and ice on roadways, but they're starting to outlaw that as well. It's basically like the fracking industry went unregulated for a very long time. It was unregulated in that it was a drilling technique as far as the EPA was concerned. Right. And it wasn't until this environmental group, leaf sued, I guess, the EPA over some fracking techniques in the late nineties in Alabama before the EPA finally started to regulate fracking. Wow. I'm sorry, what? I got a little into it for a second. No, I love it. We were talking about wastewater. Some of that water also spills. In June 2011, there was a well blow out in Clearwater County, Pennsylvania. Oh, yeah. It's a gas explosion. 16 hours of uncontrolled spill, about a million gallons of toxic waste into a creek in Moshan and State Park. I saw this one documentary where they interviewed a guy that used to, one of the blue collar guys used to work at the operation, and he was like, yeah, some of them are heavily regulated and get visited by inspectors. And he went, but many thousands are not, right? And he said, I worked at one of those. And he said, at the frack pad, it was on top of a mountain area. That's where the bar is. Yeah, I guess so. But he said you would look at this mountain on the side of it and he said it looked like it was bleeding, like this red uzi water just tumbling down into the forest below. Right. And he said, but yeah, some of them are regulated, some of them are inspected. And I think it's probably one of the same issues as the mountaintop coal removal is that you've got a handful of inspectors for these, like thousands and thousands of operations. Right. Which is not good. No, wouldn't there a spill of just not even wastewater, but straight up fracking fluid, like all the additives, which by the way, for a very long time energy companies said that their fracking fluid mixtures were proprietary and they would reveal what was in there. PPA finally said, no, you have to we need 100% transparency. Well, not 100% though, because there's still some. That is true. And dude, I saw that too and I was like, great, finally release the chemicals that you're putting in there. And then they said that there's a bit of a loophole and that some of them can still be listed as trade secrets. Well, it's like trans fat. Like you can put trans fats in your food still, right, and say that has 0 gram of trans fat as long as it has half a gram or less per serving of trans fats. But you can still put that big zero on there. It's very tricky. So some of the states outlawed, or some of the states said, all right, you have to tell us at least what your little trade secrets are and we won't release them. And then some states, like Colorado, believe it or not, just say you don't even have to tell us. Is that right, what your trade secret is? Well, the ones that have been released, there's some unusual stuff in there. Walnut holes, table salt. Well, that doesn't sound harmless. Lemon juice. That sounds great. Laundry detergent, antifreeze. Okay, it's getting worse. Emulsifiers, apparently the price of this, what is it called? I want to say guar, but it's not guaranteed. But it's like guarantee like guar but instead of a w, it's just a single u. So an emulsifier using ice cream and apparently tracking operations have driven the price of this up. So much of the ice cream industry is like, what the heck, man? You just lowered our profit margin significantly. Is that why Ben and Jerry's is so expensive? No, Ben and Jerry's is expensive because so delicious. It is delicious. Hubby. That's a good one. It's my favorite one. New York super fudge chunk. That white chocolate in there. I like the offerings, the seasonal offerings too. Like, I had some pumpkin cheesecake the other day that was really good. I have not tried that one. It's delicious. You know what else is good? It's a blueberry Graham greek yogurt. And we had that as a good very good too. You know you're a pet mom when you growl back during playtime and you insist on feeding them the highest quality food you can find. Enter Halo Holistic, made with only whole meat, no meat meals, and probiotics. 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Stride Career Prep is backed by over 20 plus years of experience in online learning and education. Take charge at K twelve. Compodcast. That's K twelve.com podcast and start taking charge of your future today. We can drop it ahead. We've been doing good in this one. We've been talking about nothing but fracking. That's true. So depending on what website you go to, if you're worried about chemical additives, you will see stats from people like Halliburton. They say it only makes up like zero 5% of this mixture. But what they don't say is that can still equal like 300 tons of chemical additives. Is that for a single operation? That's for 4 million gallons of water used in a fracking operation would equal about 300 tons of these additives? Chemical additives. Yeah. So there's a lot of this stuff. It may be only zero 5% to 2%, but it's still a lot of many tons of harmful chemicals. And again, what are you doing with it? I mean, what do you do with it afterwards if you could reuse it? Awesome. I have very few problems with it, but it's taking water from a water supply. And in Texas, fracking operations have been shown to actually have exacerbated droughts. In the area around the Marcellus region, there's apparently plenty of water. For example, in Pennsylvania, in a single day, the whole state uses about 9.5 billion gallons of water every day. The natural gas development fracking uses about 1.9 million gallons of the 9.5 billion every day, 1.9 million to 9.5 billion. So it's insignificant. But in an area that's already water stressed, that's a problem. Taking all that water and using it for fracking, wasting it, and then what do you do with it afterwards? Yeah. Well, at least Texas has apparently that's like the leading state as far as having capabilities. They have many more disposal wells is what they're called there. But in places like Pennsylvania, where the Marcella Shale is, they don't have nearly the kind of disposal wells at this point yet, which leads to more retreatment or treatment of the water and dumping it in places like New York. I want to say they're dumping it. I mean, I don't think they're like putting a big tube out in the middle of the field in New York and just letting it run out everywhere. Right. They better not be doing that. They probably aren't. I saw one stat where there is one serious environmental concern for every 150 wells. Wow. Which if you multiply that over hundreds of thousands of wells, the reason a lot of people point out and say it's not so dangerous, is like, where's the hard science on the effect right now? And this guy was like, well, we're not seeing it quite yet. Come back in ten years the rate that we're going, and you'll see some problems. Sure. One for every 150 operations. One serious environmental concern. It could be spill, could be leaching into the soil. Kind of depends. Yeah. And my whole thing is, if it's really no big deal and it's totally safe and it's just not going to impact anyone in any way, then why do you exclude it from the Safe Water Drinking Act in 2005? Like, why do you take congressional measures to have the language of what a pollutant is changed, which is what happened in 2005? Tell me about it. Well, the Safe Water Drinking Act, the Energy Policy Act of 2005. And this is not political. This happened. You can go look it up. Settle down. Dick Cheney did push for these measures to go through. They went through the Cheney loophole, the Halliburton loophole is what it's called. And I'll even give you the section if you go to page 102, section 322. It covers hydraulic fracturing, and it excludes in the Safe Water Drinking Act, the underground injection of fluids or propping agents other than diesel fuels. That's the one that they still said you can't do, right? Pursuant to hydraulic fracturing related to oil, gas, or geothermal production activities. So basically, you need to keep your water safe unless it's hydraulic fracturing, fractaling, hydro fracking. Furthermore, in the Clean Water Act, they changed the definition of pollutant to not include water, gas or other material which is injected into a well to facilitate production of oil or gas. So if it's so clean and no big deal, why are they going in and changing the term for pollutant and saying, exclude fracking from Safe Water Drinking Act? Yeah, it's a great question. And why was the guy I was the guy behind pushing this, a former Halliburton executive? It's like, I'm the smart guy, but I'm no dummy either. Well, I think, Chuck, the jury is still out, as we said on this, and we're waiting for this hard science to come in. But I feel like you should always be wary of any group or industry or anyone on either side that engages in a disinformation campaign that tries to sway the public using underhanded tactics that should always raise red flags to you. And they're both doing it right now, which is what's maddening, for sure. And any time somebody's telling you something and you find out that they're being underhanded, you should wonder about everything they're doing across the board, like with Energy and Development, releasing Truth land, that was misinformation. That was a misinformation campaign. They didn't say who released it, and there's they called it Truthfully. Yeah, exactly. And if you go on to the Energy and Development website, in particular, it reads really defensive, real defensive, like the text of it does. I can't believe that they let whatever PR company put that together release it like that. Because why are you asking? I'll bet you didn't know that. You didn't know that natural gas could blow up your whole family if we wanted it to. Well, that did happen too. Well, tell them first about the studies. This month represents the third month in a row where a major public university has taken a real black eye from being exposed for being in bed with the fracking community. Yeah, University of Texas study said that fracking is safe and it's really no big deal. Well, I don't know if they said that. They said it was safe. I don't want to paraphrase. And then they got some independent reviews of Professor Grotes study and they said, oh, you know what? He's on the board of a natural gas drilling company and received more than a million and a half dollars in compensation. And he didn't mention that anywhere in his study. No way. But what he did do is quit his job at the University of Texas afterward and kind of retreat quietly into his corner full of money, and the department head over him was forced to resign too. But the thing was, it wasn't just that he didn't report that conflict of interest. He said that there was, like, flaws in the science. It was a bad article, it was a bad study, and they retracted it. And that's a big deal to retract the scientific study. They're saying, like, we want that back. Pretend we never said anything. Right. Penn State tried to open a shale development school, I guess, and they couldn't because all the professors wouldn't join. They couldn't get anybody to be a part of it. And then there was one more, I think that was part of this little three month sweep that our buddy Wade Goodwin over NPR was reporting. The Shale Resources Institute at the State University of New York at Buffalo was closed after people wanted to know who was funding its work and whether its work was truly independent into studying fracking. So they closed this whole school down because they found out that it was basically funded by energy companies and the people were working for them rather than the public. Good. Wow. So there are plenty more anecdotal stories that we could not get to. If you type in fracking timeline, there's a great timeline, oddly enough, of incidences and accidents. And I realized that there's no way to get oil and petroleum out of the earth without there being accidents at some point. Sure, it's just one of the dangers and unfortunate side effects. It's going to happen, but there are a lot of them out there. Wells Exploding 2009, a fracking wastewater impoundment caught fire exploded in Avila, Pennsylvania. Soil test conducted at the site found arsenic at 6000 times the permissible level November to December 2000 and 722 water wells in Bainbridge, Ohio contaminated with drilling chemicals. One explodes a lot of methane explosions. Yeah, one family was killed pretty flammable like when they let their pilot light in their house. Oh my gosh. Kill the family. And what was it doing to their brains leading up to that? Just huffing it all the time. Yeah, who knows? The levels were so high it blew up their house. I mean, how long was it accumulating? Well, anecdotally you'll see interviews with people talking, it's just like Aaron Brockovich. Like, I went to drink my water after they started this operation and it had a little petroleum like residue on top and it tasted awful. And they say, don't even bathe in it. And this is what I'm supposed to drink. I want to really make sure everyone gets this. If you ask me, natural gas is a really great fuel. Chuck, if we could convert the nation's transportation sector to natural gas only cars and trucks, we would reduce CO2 emissions by 90%. No, I'm sorry, we reduce Co carbon monoxide emissions, which makes smog by CO2 by 25% and nitrous oxide is by 60%. It really is a good idea. And it probably will be this excellent bridge fuel between coal and oil and whatever renewable we come up with wind, solar in the future. And we could become energy independent thanks to natural gas. And if fracking is the best way to do it, that's awesome. But we have to hold the people who are doing this feet to the fire to do it as safely as possible, to cut down on these incidents that you're talking about, to not pollute water, but to get it out as reasonably and efficiently as possible, but also as safely as possible. Because if we don't say you have to do this smartly and safely, they're going to do it as cheaply as possible because it's a mandate of their corporate charters. Maximize profits, not maximize public safety. Which is why it's important for people to be talking about this. Yeah, it's not inherently bad now. It just has to be done correctly, it seems like, to me, after researching this. Right, agreed. And didn't he find a new fracking method that does not use the chemicals at all? Yeah, it's called gelled fracking. It uses a liquid propane and when you pump it down in there, it doesn't come back up. It turns into vapor, which escapes back up as a vapor, which you can capture and reuse resell or burn as fuel to power the site. That sounds pretty good. No, wastewater gel fracking doesn't need water at all. And are people using this yet or is it they're patenting it. It's been used about 1000 times since 2008. Got you. I should probably say I invented it. So I have an enormous financial stake in this. See, I admit my financial interests. Yeah. Josh gel, that's all. But yes, I ran across that today, it seemed like a pretty good jam gelled fracking. Yeah, I bet. One of the issues with that, though, is like, it probably requires some sort of redoing of your current systems, which probably would incur costs that companies don't want. I'm just guessing, but plus you have to sacrifice like 8000 cats just to get the machine to start working. Who cares? This is inhabited by a god that loves cat sacrifice. Just leave my cats alone and you can have the rest. You know you're a pet mom when your camera roll is all picks of your pet. At Halo, we get it because we are pet moms too. And just like you, we know their nutrition is one of the most important decisions you'll make. Halo is natural, high quality pet food that's rooted in science and thoughtfully sourced. It's the world's best food for the world's best kids. Find Halo at specialty pet stores and online. Only 45% of high school students feel they are prepared for college or careers. Stride career prep is helping change that. Stride Career Prep lets students take charge of their education and their future. By combining real world skills training and traditional academics, students can earn college credit while in high school or get the training needed to land a job right after graduation. Stride Career Prep prepares your team for indemand careers in business, tech, health, science, criminal justice and more. Students can take courses developed by industry professionals, prepare for certifications, get hands on experience, network, and most importantly, gain the confidence they need to succeed. Stride Career Prep is backed by over 20 plus years of experience in online learning and education. Take charge at K twelve. Compodcast. That's K twelve. Compodcast and start taking charge of your future today. You got anything else? No, fracking has been done. Yeah, we've been asked about this one for a while. If you want to learn more about fracking, you can type that word F-R-A-C-K-I-N-G into the search bar athouseofworks.com and I said search bar. So it's time for listener mail. Josh, before we do listener mail yes, our TV show is going on, debuted last week. Hopefully it's a great numbers. And we would like to remind everyone to watch each and every week on Science Channel at 10:00 p.m.. Yeah. Following Idiot Abroad, which is our lead in, which is great. And it's on Science Channel on Saturdays, 10:00 p.m.. What else are you doing on Saturday night at 10:00 p.m.? Nothing. That's why you should watch our show. Because you like it. Yes. If you're out DVR it and if you don't have a DVR and you don't have TV or cable, you can get these on itunes for, I think, a buck 99. Yeah. Day after the premiere. So Sundays. That's right. So go to itunes and search for stuff you should know on the television side of things. And thank you for your support. Yes. That's off to you guys. All right, listen to me. Yes. I'm going to call this Caving sucks. This is from Michelle. Marianne guys. I'm a Canadian speech pathologist currently living in Manhattan. Last month I went on my honeymoon in Belize and decided to go on a guided cave tour. I imagine a large opening in a rock, beautiful sparkling waterfall, and lights and rainbows coming from the ceiling. Kind of like you were talking about Chuck. But what it really turned out to be was 5 hours of total darkness. Except for the headlight, of course. High pressure water rushing over jagged, moving rocks. I swam, stumbled, crabbed walked for two and a half hours to reach a series of seven waterfalls that I then climbed. Some day I looked back and laughed, but at the time I was screaming to Jesus to save me. Luckily, my group thought I was hilarious and enjoyed my jokes, but I kept my tears on the inside. The guys are very well trained, also very relaxed, and I never felt like we were in too much danger. At first. I tried really hard not to touch the precious centuries old stalag tights as I stumbled through, but by hour four, I was grabbing at anything I could as I was going down, trying not to have my eyes stabbed out by jagged rocks. I can't believe I at random. Tourists. Tourists in these caves with no special training or fitness test. Living in New York City, I've had some crazy experiences such as inadvertently get caught in the middle of a shootout and being quasi attacked by a gentleman on PCB. But Caving was the scariest thing that has ever happened to me and I listened to this podcast before my honeymoon. I never would have gone in. Disaster would have been avoided. Thank you for the delightful podcast. Much love, Michelle Marianne. Thanks a lot, Michelle. Talk about the PCP guy. That's really something. Maybe that requires its own email as well. It's always PCP. I wonder how many times it really is. Everyone's always like they were crazy out on PCB. Yeah, maybe it was just ambient. They were eating a stick of butter and coming for me. Let's see. If you have a commentary about how something that we thought was awesome actually sucks in real life, we want to hear about that. And if you have any kind of fracking operation in your neighborhood, we'd love to hear about that as well. Pro, con, whatever you can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can join us on facebook. Comstuffyshedo and you can send us an email to stuffpodcast@discovery.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Brought to you by the 2012 Toyota Camry. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime four days. That's where True crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. 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8a615b7c-4a58-11e8-a49f-ab66c54e9847	SYSK Selects: How Circumcision Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/sysk-selects-how-circumcision-works	Circumcision is a common practice in which the foreskin of a male's penis is removed, typically as a baby. In this classic episode, Josh and Chuck take a look at the origins, practices, and arguments for and against circumcision in this episode.	Circumcision is a common practice in which the foreskin of a male's penis is removed, typically as a baby. In this classic episode, Josh and Chuck take a look at the origins, practices, and arguments for and against circumcision in this episode.	Sat, 08 Sep 2018 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2018, tm_mon=9, tm_mday=8, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=251, tm_isdst=0)	40614435	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hi, everybody. It's November 30, 2010. What? No, it's not. But I'm going to bring you back in time. We're all getting in the way back machine for this Saturday. Select everyone. And we're going back to November 30, 2010, because we published How Circumcision Works that day, and this was a good one. It kind of tied up some medical science along with the controversies around circumcision. There's really no way around that. It's not an open and closed discussion. It's very much open for debate, and we get into it in this episode. It's a pretty good one. So if you think you can handle it, listen to How Circumcision Works right now. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Joshua M. Clark. With me is Charles W. Bryant that makes this stuff you shouldnizo, and that's that. Hi. Hey. Josh mclark. Joshua. Joshua McLaren Clark. Yes. You don't have a fancy setup today. I have an intro. Okay, let's hear it. Okay. Wow, Chuck, you really kind of hang up against the wall, aren't you, today? Are you waiting on me? A little bit. Okay. Are you ready? I'm ready, Chuck. Josh, have you ever heard of Lloyd Schofield? I have not. Yes, you have. You always do this. Who is he? He is a guy out in San Francisco who has proposed for next November. I guess referendum election wouldn't even be midterm. What do you call the elections between midterm and the big ones? Quarter term? I don't know. Okay, we'll call it that for next November's ballot in San Francisco. There may be a referendum if Lloyd Scofield has anything to do with it, that outright bands male circumcision in San Francisco. Well, yeah, obviously you got to start somewhere. Yeah. Scottfield needs 7100 signatures and basically read the provision. Check the wording of the proposed referendum. It would make it a misdemeanor to circumcise, excise, cut, or mutilate the genitals of a person under 18. Right. And he says it's genital mutilation. That's how he feels. And other people feel that way too. Yeah. He's definitely not on his own in that one. There's some people in this CBS AP article, they're like, it's a little too far. It should be the choice of the parents. Schofield's idea. And it kind of appears in the wording of the ballot measure that it's a parent's choice, but it's not the choice of most people who are circumcised because they're generally circumcised as newborn infants. Little boys are. And he liked tattooing because you're not allowed to tattoo a child. When did you start saying tattoo like that? What do you mean, tattoo? Is that weird? Yeah, it's a little weird. It's like humans. Well, that's what he says. He said to felony to tattoo a kid. Jerry's really laughing in there. To tattoo a child. And so he says it's the same thing. Yeah, he's actually saying it's way, way worse than exactly. But he is saying it's along the same lines as a choice by the parents that is possibly against the child's will later on. Sure. And that's that. So let's talk about circumcision, because that's an odd approach to me. The way I've always understood it is there's circumcision out there that's not weird, it's not odd. But as you kind of get older, you realize that there's two sides to this whole story. Yes. And it kind of is, actually. And you kind of come to realize, like, there's people out there who think that people who aren't circumcised or weird and people out there who think that people who are circumcised are weird. Right, exactly. Let's do some stats. Man well, I think the first stat we should open with, perhaps, is that if you are an American boy or man in the last 30 years, then there's about a three and five chance that you are circumcised here in this country over the past three decades, although that is falling big time. Yeah. What was it three and five chance now? In 2005, between 1980 and I think 2000, it was about three and five. Right. Yeah. And then by 2005, it had dropped to about 53%. Yeah. And Schofield says that in 2009, it fell to 33%. That's a huge drop. So in a decade, it fell 30%. And they actually think one of the reasons why is because there's been an increasing presence of Hispanics in the US. And Hispanics are much less likely than any other group to circumcise their male infants. And it's also lower out west, where there's a larger Hispanic population. Yeah. In the Midwest, there's about a 75% chance that you are going to circumcise your boy. In the south, there's half 15%, 50 50. Right. It's like Russian roulette with a two barrel, two chambered gun. Yeah, sure. And then out west, yet it's less than a quarter of the male infants are circumcised out there every year. But ultimately there's about 1.2 million circumcisions. Well, there were in 2005. Yes. So now we're down to less than that. But in 2005, there are about 1.2 million male boys born in the United States who were circumcised. Right. Yeah. And since you mentioned that at about $200 a pop, even though it's included in your birthing bill, it's about $240,000,000 that insurance companies would love to not have to pay. Exactly. So there's actually I don't know if it's overt support or maybe quiet financial support or whatever, but the insurance companies are very happy to side with the anti circumcision movement and Medicaid. Yes, of course. So, Chuck, let's talk about the penis. Let's talk about the foreskin. That's part of it. We're going to say the word penis a whole lot because you can't avoid it when you're talking about circumcision. That's right, because let's just go ahead and set up for our foreign friends who may not know what circumcision is, like roller derby. Circumcision is when the foreskin of the penis that's also called the prep use is removed simple as that so you got the prep use which is the foreskin yes it covers the tip of the penis which is also called the glands GL A-N-S right and then there's a piece of connective tissue that works much like the connective tissue that anchors the bottom of your tongue to the floor of your mouth called a frenulum and that keeps the prep use connected to the glands yeah and they also said the inner portion of the foreskin is also much like the inside of your mouth in that it has the natural moisture to lubricate the glands it's hot and moist in there that's what it says yes it provides lubrication which kind of keeps it safe and sheathed I guess right? Yeah from abrasion and like they mentioned. Cold and the dry winter air can be rough on a glands yeah and this is the Tom Sheave article and my hat is off to him for this one yes tom did a great job with this I like your first response thank you Chuck also contains the prep use also contains some nerve cells bundles special blood cells I had no idea it makes the penis that much more sensitive and the fact that it produces movement AIDS and stimulation and lubrication so there's a lot of people who are happy with their prep use or foreskin and are very glad that they are uncut as the anti circumcision groups would call it right. Right or natural is another one that's right and since we're talking about the foreskin it's not the same on all dudes it's like every human body part it varies from person to person and some men actually are sort of naturally circumcised because they're either born with very little foreskin or they have foreskins that actually retract during puberty they go or maybe sad trombone and they do serve a protective purpose and for people that are on both sides we're going to present both sides of the argument so don't say you guys are just talking about this one side we're going to talk about both sides sure. Of course but one camp believes that it can cause some problems well it can I think everybody agrees on these like these are the very rare problems that can come about from having four seats we should say that it's rare though because one of the big problems that the anti circumcision folks have is that these are overstated like when you say it's easier to get dirty and bacteria can build up and all these things can happen that is true but it's not like if you skip a shower this is going to happen well let's talk about this because there are some problems that can arise just from having a normal foreskin one of those problems because it is like the inside of your mouth in there warm. Moist. Got to keep it clean. You do have to keep it clean. And if you don't, a white buildup, a white soapy buildup, soupy. It says cheesy in the artifact. Cheesy. That's right. A white cheesy buildup called Smgmom can develop. And once you start developing a white cheesy buildup called Smgmom within your foreskin, you want to take a really hard, long look at your grooming habits. Yeah. Did you say smeg mum? Smigma. Okay. Smeg mum is maybe the plural. No, I want to make sure you were saying it right. Smigma. Because the last thing I want is listener mail on the pronunciation. Smigma. We get all these voice files, although I've always said schmegma, but I think smigma. Yeah, maybe. I've just said schmegma for humor's sake. Maybe. All right. That was around the time Wayne World was out, wasn't it? Probably. So that's probably a pretty minor thing. I'm sure that's easily corrected your four scheme. That can also be well, it can develop in two ways. Too tight or too loose. Right. And each other problems take it too tight, it can cause a condition known as fibrosis. It's like trying to put on a sweater that's way too small for you. That's a good way to look at it. And that's the main medical determinant for whether or not you should get a circumcision. Like, the main medical reason would be fibrosis. I think that's probably because it's the most frequent probably the most frequent problem. You think? I think. Okay. If it's too loose, then it's going to be called paraphymosis. And that's like wearing your dad's sweater. Yes. And it can cause swelling of the glands in the foreskin. And there's also something called balan prosthesis, which is swelling of the mucous surfaces of the foreskin. Right. And that can lead to skin disease, problems with the urethra pain, all sorts of things that you don't want to have going on in general. Like why, God, why? I would imagine so you can have your frenulum attached too tightly. That's the frenulum brevi, where it's just like that's, like trying to poke your head through that very, very tight sweater. That's a good way to look at it as well. Thank you, Chuck. Very evocative. Josh and circumcision can help correct all of these problems, but it is rarely medically necessary to get circumstanced. Right. And like we said, these problems do exist. They are serious problems. At the very least, uncomfortable, if not downright dangerous. Sure. And I think both sides agree that there are circumstances such as these that do warrant circumcision. The problem is most circumcision. I'm sure the vast majority of circumcisions are customary cultural preventative. Right? Yeah. Sociological in nature. Sure. Let's talk about the origins of circumcision. When did humans get the idea to cut the foreskin off of boys penises? Well, did it start with the Bible? This is where Tom started, but no, it didn't start with the Bible. Egypt, as far back as we can find the Egyptians. We're doing okay. That's what we understand. Okay. Do you want to talk about that? Well, let's talk about the Bible first, because in the Book of Genesis, god made a covenant with Abraham, and as we all know, Abraham was a Jewish patriarch and his descendants abraham was the patriarch of the houses of the Jews and the Muslims, dude. Oh, really? Yes. Isaac, his son, went on to found Judaism. He's the father of Judaism, ishmael the other son. He's a legitimate son. Right. He went on to found Islam. Yes. And Isaac, they said, basically, God's going to bless Jews with riches and success. The land will be fruitful if you get circumcised by your 8th day of life. And not just you, but your sons, any servants that you captured, any sons that those captured servants has, all boys have to be circumcised. And this has led to the fact that today, 98% of Jewish men are in fact circumcised. Right. And according to biblical tradition, ishmael was circumcised before he was basically run off from Abraham's family. Right. And so that kind of formed the basis of the Muslim tradition of circumcision, which continues today. If you look at Muslim texts, the Quran, apparently it doesn't have any endorsement or mention of circumcision. Right. But most Muslims today still do circumcise because Mohammed apparently was circumcised. So I guess it's a reverence for their profit. Yes. And today, about two thirds of every circumcised man on the planet are Muslim today. So 98% of Jewish men and two thirds of Muslim men circumcised? No, two thirds of all men on the planet are Muslim who are set aside. Exactly. That's a tough one. Exactly. It's kind of an odd qualifier. Christian sects don't really endorse one way or the other. They say, like, decide amongst yourselves. And Buddhism and Hinduism, they don't really have a stance one way or the other. Is that right? That's right. And we talked about the Egyptians probably being the earliest group as far as Western culture is concerned. Like with most things, the Egyptians came up with this idea not necessarily independently, or if they did independently, they weren't the only ones, but they apparently were the ones who exposed the early Israelites, the early Jews to this concept. Right, yeah. And then at about the same time, possibly even before, other groups, the Mayans and the Aztecs were both circumcising, their boys indigenous Australian, African, Asian and other American tribes. Right, yeah. And Georgians. Yeah. What is that? I've never heard of them. The Colchians. Yeah, I hadn't heard of them either, but their daughters described them. So they were ancient people that is now modern day Georgia. And they were into it? Well, they practiced it. And then so here in the West, I guess it was strictly religious until about the 19th century. Right. And then all of a sudden, medicine is like, we can do that. Well, yeah, but that's also around the same time that they were doing all sorts of things, saying that this could solve this and this like we can treat VD and we can cure homosexuality with circumcision and impotence is another one. Yeah. So they were a little bit off base, I would say. There, as in way off base. I would think so, yeah. But it did have a lasting impression. The circumcision did become associated with the medical establishment here in the west. And I think that's translated elsewhere in the Jewish faith. Mohel. Mohaw. Mole. Mole. Yeah, mole. Okay. They still perform the only thing I know about that is from Seinfeld. Yeah. When Jerry was supposed to perform the snip. Yes. They may still perform these procedures in the Arab world, in the Muslim world, that it's generally done in the medical realm. Right. And then that was taken away from barbers in ancient Turkey. Yeah, in Turkey. In the Middle East of the Middle Ages, barbers used to do amputations blood lettings and circumcisions blood letting, you know, bleeding and you'll be feeling better, get all the toxins out of your blood. Let's talk about it around the globe, how it actually goes down. Like today. Yeah. Jews still do it traditionally before the 8th day. They kind of stick to that. In Egypt, it's anywhere from birth to about eight years old. And in Malaysia and other places, it's like a rite of passage, like early adolescence. Yeah. In some Muslim cultures, once a boy can recite the Quran once, like all the way through. Right. Think about that and think about if you don't want to get circumcised. Once a boy can do that, that's associated with the time when he'll be circumcised after that. And you didn't see there's some really sad, cute pictures in this article. Yeah. There's a little boy who's clutching his genitalia under his hospital gown and crying because he's like second in line to be circumcised. There's a kid who's being circumcised on page zero. It's sad stuff. I'm glad I don't print the pictures out. I don't want to see that. In Africa, Josh, it is also in a lot of tribes coming of age type of thing. And here's the deal. In Africa, though, sometimes there's not in these remote areas, a trained professional with all the right equipment, and they do it anyway. And because of this, there's like a 35% increased risk of complications. 6%, like severe complications that possibly result in partial or full amputation of the penis. Yeah. But sometimes a traveling circumciser will roll through town and as a cream truck, and everybody comes out with boys of all ages because they know the safe, real doctor with the real clean equipment is there. They'll bring out boys of all ages to get circumcised when he rolls through. Yes. Which is a good thing that happened. Asia is extremely rare unless they have thriving Muslim populations. Right. But in Asia, among Asian cultures, it's pretty uncommon, except chuck, in South Korea, in the Philippines, circumcision is pretty common. Who knew? The American servicemen knew. Yeah. Is that the reason why? Korea? Yes. And the Philippines. American servicemen stationed there in the latter half, beginning in the latter half of the 20th century, apparently got the word leaked out that they were missing their prep use, and South Koreans and Filipinos started following suit. All right, well, that's circumcision around the globe today. If we forgot your country, then we apologize. Please write in. Shall we talk about the procedure itself? Yeah. As Tom put it, next up, the big show. Is that what he said? I didn't see that part. So you didn't see the pictures? I didn't see the illustrations. Like step by step illustration? Yeah. I didn't need it. Even, like, dotted lines, like, where you clip out a coupon, they have these I have a pretty good idea what's going on down there, so I was just fine with the words. So what happens, Josh, is if it's a baby in infant circumcision, then they strap the baby down, of course, arms and legs, which just seems like an awful thing. It's a bad start when you read it. They give either a topical anesthetic rubbed around the area or injected around the base of the penis to numb the area. There are a few different devices that the person performing the procedure can choose from. And I know you know a little bit about these. I do. Let's hear it. There's, like, three things. Well, there's the Gomco clamp, the mogan clamp, and the plaster bell device. Right? Yeah. So I didn't really look into the mogan clamp because it just well, but the Gomco clamp has been around for a while, and that sounds like something you would see on a late night TV ad. You can actually buy them on the Internet for $230. Yeah. Search. Comco clamp. It comes up and do not buy one and do this at home. That is in no way an endorsement clamp. Just stop right now. The gemco clamp involves a bell with an arm and a pendant that comes off the tip of the bell. Put that in, pull the foreskin up around the bell. So what you're doing is you're inserting this metal layer between the glands and the foreskin. Yeah. Like all these things, you're separating the foreskin from the glands. Exactly. Right. That's pretty much the key to circumcision. Sure. You pull it up around, you slide it through this hole. It has an arm attached to the top of the bell that's holding everything taut, and then you cut around it and remove the foreskin. The plastic bell device is similar. It doesn't have the arm and the clamp holding everything. But basically, you're putting a bell in between the glands and the foreskin, and then you basically tie off suture around the foreskin that's been pulled up. Right. And then you cut that, and then eventually, after a few days, the bell falls off and you're fine, supposedly. Well, and that's about the recovery period. If you're an infant is about three to four days, plan on having a grumpy little baby boy for those next few days and plan on keeping the area really clean and maybe you might even have to bandage it. And you got to make sure that you keep it separate from diaper poopoo because you don't want a fresh surgery. Being around fecal matter, not a good thing. No, you're looking at a pretty hefty little horrible infection there, too. And it takes about 30 minutes. Yeah. If you're an adult, you don't necessarily need to use any of these other bells or whistles, literally bells, but you can just pull the foreskin forward, make a couple of incisions, cut off the frenulum, stitch back. Basically, you're stitching this hanging loose skin to the corona, which is the strip just below the gland and bada bing, no sex for a couple of weeks. Which no one should have to tell you that, but we're telling you that. Yeah, that would be common sense if you ask me. Then it's done. So why are people doing this, Chuck? I mean, think about that, especially as an adult. Why are people circumcising both themselves and their infant sons? Why is it, like, all the rage? So this is the argument for and we will cover the argument against before you get upset by Brian. Mr. Schofield, the reason some of the reasons, Josh, are obviously, like we said, you're raised in a religion or a culture where that's the thing you do, then you would probably do that. Right? Some fathers think that their son's penis should kind of be like theirs and their little matches. Nine tenths of circumcised men opt to have their sons circumcised and about three quarters of uncircumcised men opt to have their sons not circumcised. Yeah. So about 15% remain natural. Interesting, some parents want their sons to just be like the rest of the little boys. If you live in the United States and most boys are like that, they don't want you to stand out in the locker room and potentially be teased, that kind of thing. This one, uncircumcised men are twice as likely to contract HPV and pass that along sort of here. And apparently circumcision also helps prevent or protect against chlamydia and syphilisis, they say. And this is from the Journal of American Medical Association, we should say. We should. Same goes with a study that found recently that areas that don't circumcise or where circumcision is uncommon tend to have higher prevalences of HIV. I don't know if those two are causal like HIV is more easily contracted because there's this maybe the blood vessels are closer to the surface when the foreskin is attached, or if it's just correlated. Like maybe they have maybe these areas have lesser health care, right, or less adequate healthcare. Well, at any rate, they put that number at 60% less likely. But it's not for male to male sex. It's only female to male transmission. Is that right? Of HIV is what it says. Some people think it's cleaner, but that's completely unsupported, from what I can tell medically. Right. That's just a perception, if I'm not mistaken. And then there are some who just think it's prettier. Yeah. Better looking, sleeker. All right, Josh, that's the case for generally. Let's talk about people who are against us, like Mr. Scofield. What are their arguments? Well, I get the impression that there's a lot of people who the people who are against it are violently against it. One of the biggest arguments is that it's mutilation. Yeah. Genital mutilation. It is genital mutilation. Female circumcision, which we'll talk a little bit more about in a minute, is basically considered now in the Western world, the developed world, female genital mutilation, not female circumcision any longer. Right. And one of the big points among anti circumcision people is that this is the same thing with men. It's just for some reason more accepted in the west than female circumcision is. Yeah. But if you're against it, you probably think it's old fashioned and unnecessary. Unnecessary is a big one. Yeah. The American Academy of Pediatrics considered this in 1999 and said, you know what? We're not going to endorse this, we're not going to come out against it. But we've looked at all of the information. We see no medical reason to do this and we're not going to endorse it. So that's a big one. That the anti circumcision lobby sites. Yeah. When I read that, that they didn't endorse it or they said that you shouldn't do it. This is such a tender subject that I kind of got the impression they were a little bit like, I ain't going there. Why don't you just decide? Right. We don't have a lot of data either way, so we're not going to say. I get the impression that it's a lot like the natural birth movement. There's a lot of probably similar sentiment, maybe a lot of crossover, actually, between the two. Josh their risks of scarring, their risks of infection. Yeah. This is a big one right here. It can go wrong. Yeah. And it does. Like, you can have your penis lopped off because of a bad circumcision. Yeah. That's a pretty good reason not to do it. I don't have a super common kid. It's very uncommon. Yeah. But when you're talking about maybe your only male son could only be a male son, but your only son, do you want to take that kind of risk? I don't know yet. Well, yeah, sure. I don't know. Stop pressuring me. No, I'm not pressuring you. I'm not asking you. I'm just asking theoretically. But I think that's probably the sentiment among a lot of first time parents now. Sure. Should we do this? I haven't really thought about it before, and like, Holy cow. Now we have to decide or do we? Another argument against is that you take away the child's right to choose. Yeah. There is a procedure called an epipasem, which there's actually a surgical procedure which is kind of a skin graft is not always desirable. Sometimes you get a different color, different texture, because someone else's foreskin, or else it's skin from elsewhere on your body. Probably from your body, I would say. And then there's nonsurgical things you can do, too, right, Chuck? To create a new foreskin, to recreate it. Yes, Josh. There are nonsurgical ways, and I have never heard of this at all. I hadn't either until I read this article. Over time and we're not recommending that you try this at home, by the way. This is something you really need to know a lot about. Over time, though, you can apparently stretch your foreskin using weights and straps, and it will eventually stretch to where it could cover your glands. That's what they say. There's another method that involves inflating little balloons under your skin, under your penile skin to prompt new skin cell growth, I guess, to fill in the void, I guess. And then when you deflate the balloons, you've got all that extra skin, right, and you go, TADA. So that's an epipacum. So yeah. The point is, one of the arguments against circumcision is that you take away a kid's right to choose, and if that kid turns like 1821, 35, 50 and goes, I really want a foreskin, basically, he doesn't have a lot of options available to him. Balloons and weights and straps and skin grafts. And skin grafts, yeah. So that's another reason. What are some more reasons, Chuckers? Well, like we said in the foreskin, there's a lot of sensitive areas for sexual stimulation, and once you lose that, it's gone. So theoretically, you're cutting down on the man's pleasure centers somewhat. Sure. And who wants to do that to your kid puritan? I don't know. Like, psychologists might say that a child might remember this somehow resulting in lingering psychological repercussions. It's very Freudian sentence. Some people think it's better looking to have the foreskin and prettier that way. Yes. I would like to conduct a poll. I don't know how we could do this conceivably, but there's no way I would like to I know. And not get in trouble. Right. But I am curious which one is considered more attractive? I have no idea. So I'm very curious. Do people think people who like foreskin think those people are weird or vice versa? I'm very curious. I'm curious. You've been fascinated by this whole thing. I have. From page zero. And there are a couple more reasons. Some men subconsciously might not feel complete, and then the big reason, you're born with it. So that might mean that you should keep it on your body. Yeah. Like, if we didn't need it, why would we have it? Whether you. Believe in creationism or evolution, both of those kind of touch upon that. We wouldn't have it if we didn't need it. It didn't serve some purpose. Did you already cover the language part? I think you'd mentioned that. Right. A little bit. If you are talking to somebody who is in the anti circumcision camp, you don't want to use the term uncircumcised because it implies that there is something wrong, that there's something missing, something hasn't been done yet. That's not the norm. Right. And so the people in the anti circumcision camp tend to prefer terms like natural, uncut, full length, intact. Yeah. We would be remiss. Josh, you did mention female genital mutilation. This is a big problem. Around the world, between 100 and 140,000,000 women have been victims of this a lot of times. All the time. There's no medical reason for doing this. They will remove the clitoris sometimes. Yeah. This actually was kind of it came about in the west, too. It's still a huge problem in Africa. Apparently, 92 million girls under the age of ten have undergone female genital mutilation. Awful. And that's just Africa alone. But in the west, it was popular. I had no idea. But here in the west, in the United States, really, until 1977, blue Cross covered it. That's nice. They coveredectomy that's awful clitoratectomy, which is the partial total removal of the clitoris. Right. And this fad of circumcision came about at about the same time in the 19th century, and for the same reasons as male circumcision, which is yet another argument against male circumcision, because we've come to see female circumcision as barbaric. Right. Even though they were both brought up for the same reasons, which was it's cleaner, it's more hygienic, it's healthier. And also with girls, they have the added bonus of it reduces their sexual pleasure from masturbation. Therefore, it's much more morally hygienic as well. Right. This is one of the reasons why it's come to be seen as barbaric, because it actually does reduce tremendously the sensitivity a woman can experience in sex. Sure. Right. There's a lot of other problems with it, too. There's a little procedure called infabulation that basically is you cut the inner outer labia so that it grows back to narrow or close the vagina. And what's the idea here? Is it a moral thing where they're trying to prevent their daughters from being tempted to have sex or having sex? Yes. Because to get this reversed, to have children, to have sex, to conceive, to do all these things, you basically have to have the procedure reversed. Wow. And then in some cultures that promote this, after childbirth, after the reproductive years, it's closed up again. So not only are you undergoing it the first time you're having a reverse, and then you're having it done again. So it is a huge problem, and it is viewed as barbaric in the west. And the World Health Organization has come out starting in 1997 against this, and then, I guess, over the ensuing decades, really lobbied the rest of the UN and got much wider support. In February 2008, pretty much the entire UN issued this statement saying, like, this has to stop. This is really bad. But it still continues. It happens in the US. It happens in Great Britain and a lot of the minority African populations that immigrate here. It's a problem. Yeah. Well, thank God for the who in groups like UNICEF and other human rights groups. We're trying to get the word out on that, too. Right. But, Chuck, we just arrived at a really kind of a hinky place. Like, everybody agrees this is barbaric. One of the reasons why is because it serves absolutely no medical reason whatsoever. There's no medical purpose to it. Right. It's all just basically chastity. Right. So we all agree that that's barbaric. If there's really no medical reason for male circumcision, is it the same thing? Is it barbaric? Yeah. Well, people against it sure say it is. People like Schofield. Yeah. And I'm not here to make a judgment either way, because I don't have a son at this point, but maybe that day will come when I'm going to have to make that decision, and hopefully we put out at least some facts and figures on both sides of the coin, some stats. Yeah. It's tricky if you want to know more about circumcision and you want to see probably more illustrations of the male reproductive organ than any other article on the site, including cut here, dots, cut along the dotted line, dots. You can type circumcision into the search bar@howstepworks.com, and that will bring all that stuff up. It's an interesting article, right? Yes, sir. Since I said handy search bar while I said search bar at least, right? Yeah. It's time for listener mail. Yes. Josh, I thought this might be appropriate. You asked for stories about people who had their fingers cut off and what podcast was that one of them? Yeah, one of the things we did. And so we got a bunch of stories of people who have lost fingers, and I picked out three fairly short ones to read. The first one comes from Melanie from Minnesota. She did not lose a finger, but her husband's uncle did. He was doing some woodworking in his garage, saw his thumb, index finger, and part of his middle finger clean off. His wife rushed him to the hospital. They were able to reattach the thumb, but not his index finger. They were never able to find the rest of his ring finger, and they suspect that the dog ate it. He now has a prosthetic index finger, which he likes to remove and toss to people just to freak them out. He was a musician before the accident. He's still able to play the piano with his faux finger. Wow, that's pretty cool. And he has a winter and summer version. One is tan. And one isn't. No way. Wow. This next one is from Abbey from Hampton, Connecticut. Guys, I thought you might find this interesting. I am, in fact, missing two fingers, but I still have five fingers on each hand. Awesome. This 1 may win the prize. The same is true for my mother and her grandmother. We all have a slight genetic disorder called polydactylism, which is when you're born with extra pinkies. The extra fingers were all cut off at birth because the bones in them were not fully formed. So now we all have little bumps on the sides of our hands that were once pinkies. That circumcision of fingers. It is. I kind of wish I had kept the little extra fingers and that they were fully functional because I would use them to play impossible pieces of music. I told my bio teacher about polydactylism in high school. She got very excited and gave me extra credit. She gave her extra credit for missing those fingers? It's pretty cool. Or she gave her extra credit for being born with two extra fingers. For being brave enough to admit it in a classroom setting. All right. And this last one is from James from Ohio. Guys, I have a missing finger story you might find disturbing or fascinating. In high school, my shop class teacher always had these crazy stories about his work in the industry field. In the industry field. It's a pretty wide field. It is. And one day, he had a story to tell us about a man who was unfortunate enough to lose some fingers. The story starts when my shop teacher worked at a metal sheet shaping factory. I bet you lose a lot of fingers in one of those places. Sure. They make impossible curves on metal that couldn't normally exist. Fellow worker decided to pull an all nighteur and attempt to work machinery with coherency. Unfortunately, the fingers of the worker were caught in the metal working machine. Pinched clean off. Not cut, pinched off. My teacher explained that it took about a half an hour to find all the missing fingers, keep them cool in a fridge until they were able to reattach them. It's like the machinist. Christian bail. Man, that movie was messed up. Yes, it was. So we got a lot more stories, and a lot were very detailed and more gruesome. So we went with these because they were short and a little lighter. Thank you for that. That's very good. That's all I got. If you have an email that has absolutely nothing to do with that, we want to hear about it. You should wrap it up, send it to us, spank it on the bottom and send it to stuffpodcast@housestepworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetepworks.com. To learn more about the podcast, click on the podcast icon in the upper right corner of our home page. Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's criminal. Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/podcasts.howstuffworks.com/hsw/podcasts/sysk/2018-01-04-sysk-impeachment-final.mp3	How Impeachment Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-impeachment-works	Impeachment is does not necessarily mean a president is removed from office. But it could. It's a fascinating procedure that has been crafted and shaped over the years because of a lack of detail in its initial definition. Listen in today to learn all abo	Impeachment is does not necessarily mean a president is removed from office. But it could. It's a fascinating procedure that has been crafted and shaped over the years because of a lack of detail in its initial definition. Listen in today to learn all abo	Thu, 04 Jan 2018 16:54:10 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2018, tm_mon=1, tm_mday=4, tm_hour=16, tm_min=54, tm_sec=10, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=4, tm_isdst=0)	49554567	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetuffworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, there's Jerry over there. And this is business, baby. The stuff you should know on impeachment. Yeah. Guilty. How are you doing? First, let's get the pleasantries out of the way. I'm doing well, and I want to give a shout out at the head here, because just yesterday, in real time, I went over to my in law's house for my grandmother in law's 97th birthday. Happy birthday, Mary. Happy birthday, Mary. The lead general. The stuff you should know. Army. I don't know. You're not on Facebook. So every year I put a Happy Birthday on the Stuff You Should Know page and have everyone chime in from where they are, because she literally sits there and reads through, like, 600 comments from all over the world. That's cool. And it is, like, one of the best things for us. That's really great. It's really neat. Anyway, we over there, and my father in law Steve, who is the best dude, comes up to me and says, how about a showing on Pitchman? And he didn't recommend he knows better. He doesn't recommend shows topics. And he went, how about one on impeachment? I went, wow, Steve, that's a great idea. I said, It is. Why haven't we done that yet? Because it's relevant. As we will see at the end of our show today. We'll talk about kind of what's going on in today's terms. And it's just a really weird, vaguely written, as it turns out, strange act, American style. I'm not exactly sure how they do it in other countries, but the way we do it is weird. I think it's just about as weird in other countries because it was adopted either from the British or from the Americans. And we adopted it from the British. Yeah. It seems to have, like, been understood in Great Britain, but the framers of the Constitution didn't bother to ask what anybody meant. They just kind of borrowed it. Anyway, big shout out to Steve. All right, Steve. Good idea for this idea. It's the summer of Steve. It's winter, although he's from Ohio, but now he's in Georgia, so it is like summer for him, I'm sure. All right, so, Chuck, let's get down to this. Let's get down to impeachment. Are we going in the wayback machine right off the bat here? Do you want to go back to 1868? You want to start there? Well, you know I do. Okay, well, let's get in the way back machine then. You know, I loved me the spring of 1868. It was a good one. It sure was. That's funny you say that. There's this really great short story from the 50s or sixty S, I think it's like a horror short story called The Vintage Season. It's about these future travelers who, like, in the future, you can travel through time and find like the perfect spring or the perfect whatever. Interesting. It's pretty good. Check it out. Okay. All right. Well, now let's get in the way back machine. All right, let's fire it up. Okay, so remember, we're invisible. We can do anything. I know. I just booped Edmund Ross on the nose. Yeah. I just took off my shoes. Everyone is like, what's that on my nose? And what's that in my nose? Right. So there's this dude, that dude you just popped on the nose, edmond Ross. He's a senator, actually, and he's kind of new. What is this? This is may of 1868. Just the previous July, he was appointed to his seat as the senator, the junior senator of Kansas. He had some experience in newspapers, and that was his jam. No real political experience. And now all of the entire senate is wondering, what is this guy going to do? We're right in the middle of an impeachment trial, actually, the impeachment hearing of president Andrew Johnson, who is the successor of Abraham Lincoln. Right. That's right. And so by December, after the assassination of Lincoln in April of 65, his own party was turning against him and saying, hey, we want to get this guy out of here. So we haven't tried this impeachment thing on a president yet, and we're kind of eager, too. Yeah. And you can make the case that he was kind of set up. His own party turned on him. Totally set up. But the republicans hated him out of the gate. The republicans were the ones who are pushing reconstruction and really wanted the south to pay for succeeding and for the civil war. And Johnson was from Tennessee and wasn't having that. He vetoed a bill that would have given basic civil rights to black Americans. He was against the 14th amendment. He decided it should be up to the states to figure out how they wanted to handle the post slavery laws, regardless of what effect that had on the former slaves. So it wasn't very well liked by the abolitionist republicans, and they wanted to get rid of them. And the way that they did was to set up this new law, which was patently unconstitutional. It was called the what was it called? The you can't fire that dude law. Yeah, that's basically the gist of it. The ten year act, I believe. The ten year of office act. So, you know, when a president comes in and they appoint, like, cabinet members or a supreme court judge or something, they can pick the person, but the senate has to either confirm them or say, no, not this one. Right, right. So the senate has confirmation powers and the president's ability to hire. The constitution even says it in there. The constitution doesn't say anything about firing those appointees. And so it has long been that the president could fire whoever of their appointees he wanted to. Right. Yeah. So what the radical republicans did was pass a bill that said if you hire somebody, if you appoint somebody, we get to confirm them. If you try to remove somebody, we have to approve that as well. And again, that's it just flew in the face of the Constitution as we know it. And right away, Andrew Johnson fired his secretary of War, Edwin Stanton, and he was impeached right out of the gate. That reminds me of earlier this year when Jared Kushner was taking his first big tour of the White House after the election. I remember when he met all the Obama employees and was like, oh, so how many of these people are going to be staying on? There are like, nobody this wasn't a corporate takeover. You realize it's not how government works. He's like, oh, yeah, sure. Well, yeah, no, I didn't hear about that. It was pretty funny. Like, he just bought a company. Like, how many people are going to be staying around? Oh, my, yeah. So now Andrew Johnson is impeached. He's broken a law that Congress had just passed, and they've impeached him. So what's going on? Well, here's the deal at the time, and it's kind of like this now to a certain degree, but everybody knew how everyone was going to vote ahead of time except for him. So basically Ross, right? Yeah, basically everybody knew what the outcome was going to be except for Ross, meaning that he was the deciding vote. Like it was that slim of a margin. And so that's why he was so nervous. He was just sitting there, apparently just shredding this paper up as they were going around the room, and everyone was saying, guilty or not guilty, because you need two thirds of the Senate vote or a super majority to enact this impeachment. So he was just sitting there and no one knew what was going to happen. He stood up. He said he thought later on that he were facing death, and he said, not guilty, and everyone sighed. And this article points out they don't know if it was a sigh of relief or upset. Probably both, depending on which side of the aisle you're on. Yeah, the whole thing is recounted really well in this book called Impeached by the historian David O. Stewart, which I think where this guy got this. But he does a good job of getting to the heart of the matter, which was this guy, edmund Ross was, from that moment on, celebrated as this constitutional hero. He stood up and said, you know what? I'm not going to let the Constitution be railroaded because you guys don't like Andrew Johnson. And he's been kind of honored as that since then. Yeah, I've read a couple of articles that are like, actually, he was just looking out for himself. Johnson was his benefactor, had basically appointed him, and he had a lot of favoritism with him and this new guy who would have come in, I think Benjamin Ward would not have carried on the same thing. But regardless, if you are a constitutionalist, this guy is your hero because he did save the Constitution with that one vote. That's right. So what took place was an impeachment proceeding and that one was awfully close. That was the first impeachment proceeding of US. President. But that would not be the last. There's been two more presidents, three total, that have faced down the impeachment gun and there have been varying results. But as yet there has never been a president that was successfully convicted once they've been impeached. Because impeachment is not conviction, it's a couple of different things. You want to take a break and then get into it? Yeah, because I don't want to confuse people right off the bat here any more than we need to. I think it's a little late for that. So we'll go gather our thoughts, take a little podcast or potty break. Be back right after this. If you want to know, then you're in luck. Just listen up to touch and talk stuff you should know. Stuff you should know all right. Should we talk about French and Latin real quick? Yes, because the roots of words are always fun to talk about. French word Mpecia means to prevent related to the English word impede and both originally derived from the Latin term impedicao. Man, your French is just so romantic and that means to fetter. So basically what impeachment rootwise means is to put a stop to movement of something. In this case, not always the President, as we'll see. Was it any elected official, any federal civil officers, what they finally landed on? Okay, but yeah, like a federal official, somebody who is appointed by the President, the President, the vice President, judges typically, but not senators or congress people, they can just be run out of town on a bale of hay. Yeah, basically. Yeah. Man, once you see that bale of hay coming and you know that it tolls for thee, you know the tar is right behind it, that's a bad day for you. All right, so the origins of impeachment though, pre United States, so we're talking British legal history here. There's a dude named TFT. Plunket. Interesting. Plucknet. He's in. I guess so. I could have sworn it was Plunket. So TFE. Plucknit says that 14th century parliament was the first time impeachment came about. And during that time there were a couple of different cases over like an eleven year period that had a pretty big shift from one to the next that would kind of frame how impeachment works. Right. So at the time back then in the 14th century right, yeah. The king could appoint they were all manner of positions that the king could appoint. And once you're appointed by the king, that was it. You only answered to the king. You could do anything you wanted and as long as you had the king's favor there was nothing anyone could do. So at one point, and I'm not sure how they took it upon themselves, but this article says that it grew out of a trial of Roger Mortimer, who was convicted and executed for arranging the murder of King Edward II. Yeah, that counts. And then Chief Justice Willoughby, who was accused of corruption and tried these two guys were like high appointed officials and they were removed from office. And the way that they were removed was basically Parliament got involved. So this idea of impeaching people grew out of the notion that, wait a minute, parliament and specifically the House of Commons, which is if you take Parliament and Congress in the United States, the House of Lords is like the Senate and the House of Commons is like the House of Representatives. Right? The House of Commons were the ones who would take it upon themselves to say, this person is bad and we're going to get rid of them, we're going to act as their jury and try them and remove them from their appointed position. And King, there's nothing you can do about it because we're the ones who hold the purse strings, really, so you better go along with this. And this idea of impeaching was huge. It was revolutionary in Great Britain and it was equally revolutionary in the founding of the United States, too, because, if you'll remember, the United States was founded at a time where Americans were very wary of kings pushing them around. And in the Constitution is this role, this office of the presidency, which is a very strong executive ruler, a king almost. And there's a legal scholar, Cass Sunstein, who wrote this great article about all this, about impeachment, and he says, a lot of historians agree that the Constitution probably wouldn't have been ratified if these few words about impeachment hadn't been added into the Constitution to give Americans the power to remove a corrupt president from office. Yeah, it ended up being very important, but it was almost an afterthought in how they went about it, because upfront they weren't saying, hey, we need to really make sure we include this impeachment thing in here. They're worried about framing the US. Constitution. And then at the end, Ben Franklin very famously said, hey, without impeachment, you know what the only other thing we can do is if we get a bad president, is shoot them in the head. And they went, oh, well, that won't do. Bully to that. So maybe we should write something down. I know we're all tired. We've been working on this document for 30, 45 minutes. They had fatigue, so they ended up saying over 180 words. I think it was actually less than that. I don't know if I came up with that. Yeah, all right, well, seven sentences. No, it's even less than that. Really? Yeah. Oh, good Lord. I kind of four run on sentences, two of which included colons but it's a sentence, four sentences and 103 words says Microsoft Word. Really? Yeah. Well, they didn't have Microsoft Word back then, so alright, so regardless of how long it was, it was short. And here's the thing. It was written in a very vague language, which ended up being very troublesome because they weren't quite sure. I think they didn't want to hem themselves in too much, which is my feeling on exactly what it would take to start this process. So initially they called it was a George Mason called it maladministration. Right. In other words, just being a bad president. Yeah. And they took that out. There was a couple of reasons why they said no, this is a little vague, but later, constitutional scholars have interpreted the fact that it was suggested and removed that the framers of the Constitution didn't consider not being a very good president as a reason to be removed from office. Right. James Madison at the very least said, this is just really unclear as to what this can even mean. Sure. So Mal administration comes out, they hit upon it, and I'm not sure if they hit upon it right out of the gate or if it came later, but they hit upon bribery and treason, which there's no issues with that. Everyone knows what bribery is. Everyone knows what treason is. It's pretty clear. But they're still like her saying no. It's still not quite there. James Mason spoke up again. He said, you can really screw with the democracy of America, even without taking bribes, even without committing statutory treasonous act. So maybe we need to add something. So that's when he came up with mal administration and said, no, that's stupid. But then they came up with something else. Yeah, he finally said, because again, they didn't want to be hidden too much, but they also didn't want to be so specific with just bribery and treason that that was the only thing that you could use impeachment for. So he finally said, all right, good God, it's late. What about high crimes and misdemeanors? Yeah, that's great. No one even knows what it means. It'll be perfect. What's funny is no one now knows what it means, but apparently it was quite clear what it meant at the time. Oh, really? Yeah. Supposedly high crime. It doesn't mean like, oh my God, that's such a huge crime. Right? Yeah. They did grow hemp, by the way. Yes, but a high crime or a high misdemeanor, it's a type of crime that can only be committed by a high person, aka an elected or federal official. Yeah, but that's what the high part means. It's still just a crime or a misdemeanor. I think it's still vague. Okay, so later scholars have interpreted high crimes and misdemeanors. It's a crime or a misdemeanor that is carried out and can only be carried out by somebody in an elected position. So it's a betrayal of the public trust. That an elected or federal official is given, okay? And that the crimes part that throws people off a high crime. It doesn't have to be an actual crime, okay? So you can be impeached for a high crime that, if you go and read the US. Code, is not actually a federal crime. Right. You're not breaking the law, but you could still be impeached for it even though it's not an actual crime. And then, conversely, an actual crime isn't necessarily an impeachable offense. That what the framers were trying to get at here was that the President or the vice President or whoever was being impeached had betrayed the public trust, had used their elected position, their high position, in a way that rendered them unfit to serve any longer. They could not be trusted any longer. They had proven themselves a ledge, a terrible person, and had discharged their duties as president in a maladrous way, said the guy whose shoes are off in Congress. They cleared the room, and pretty quick. Nice work. It's like Elizabeth Warren taking to the podium, right? When she takes her shoes off, people clear out of there. She's had, like, onions for lunch. That lady will just eat a whole onion raw. Have you ever seen it? It's amazing. Where did I see that recently? A whole onion raw? No, it's like a movie or something. Oh, I know what it was. The movie, though. The kid was hungover, and the parent comes in the next morning, and they're like, here, like, eat this onion. Trust me. And the kid starts to eat onion, and they're like, just kidding. I can't remember what movie it was. Back to the future, too. Yeah, that was it. Okay. When Marty's Hangover that was the full name. Back to the future, too. Marty's Hangover. So here's the deal, though. It's one of two things, though. When it comes to impeachment, it's either literally a crime, but it doesn't have to be. And if it's not a crime literally, then it's probably something political going on in that they feel that it is subverting the office of the president. Right. That's the general interpretation. But again, they didn't say high crimes and demeanor or high crimes and misdemeanors asterisk and then define that. So it's open to interpretation. Yes. And it still is today. Which is why, unless you are a president or vice president have been actually caught accepting bribes or committing treason, there's a lot of wiggle room for you to get out of this. Yeah. An impeachment doesn't send you to jail. Like, you can then be tried for treason, and that would continue to jail. Yeah. It specifically says in the Constitution that this is strictly to remove the person from office, possibly to prevent them from ever holding federal office again. Right. But that you have to leave it to the regular courts to try and punish them. If it's an actual crime separately, that's different. Right. But it's weird because the impeachment processes we'll see is very much like a trial, a kangaroo court trial, basically. Well, let's go and talk about it. Okay. So if you're impeached, if you're a president and you do something that enough people in the House of Representatives find unsavory, you may find yourself facing impeachment. Usually, that means the people in the House of Representative representatives are in a different political party than your own. Usually, yes. You would have to be pretty bad for your own party to be the ones who drew up the articles of impeachment, to start. Right? Correct. So with the articles of impeachment, it can be introduced typically these days, from what I understand, there's a Judiciary Committee in the House, and they will be responsible for drumming up the articles of impeachment and then introducing them to the House as a whole. But an individual representative can come up with articles of impeachment himself or herself and introduce it on the House floor to be voted one way or another. Which just happened, actually, at the beginning of December. Yes. A loan representative Al King, I think, from Texas, introduced articles of impeachment, and it got voted down. So you can do it yourself is just a loan, dude or dude s. But normally it's the Judiciary Committee, I think, because the parties tend to try to keep a stranglehold on stuff like that. Yeah. Even with this case, the Democrats were like, Easy, owl. Right, just settle down, we're going to get there. But Al was like, I hate him so much. It's too early. Too early. Al, stand down. So as Al stalks off but the process continues, apparently under more normal circumstances. But he was a great example that any representative can introduce articles of impeachment. And an article of impeachment, Chuck, is like, presidents who have been impeached have had, I believe, Johnson, too, but definitely Nixon and Clinton and now Trump. He wasn't impeached, but he's had articles of impeachment brought up against him, which is significant in and of itself, because what it's saying is, we are accusing this president of this crime. And each crime, or each betrayal of office, whatever you want to call it, each high crime and misdemeanor or each actual crime, it gets its own article of impeachment. So very frequently, a president will be impeached with multiple articles of impeachment, and the House is forced to vote on each one. Yes. If you have, like, five, that means there's five chances that that president can be impeached, depending on the evidence. And so each article of impeachment is going to say, this is what the President did. Here's all the evidence that backs up us saying this, and House, what do you think? And then the House will vote on it. That was Al Green, by the way, not Al King. Oh, sorry. It was legendary solsinger. Al Green. It was Al Green. It wasn't Al King. His name is Al Green. Yeah. But it wasn't legendary solsinger right, sure. Yeah. So if the vote gets the majority, then the President is officially impeached at that point, and it's just a simple majority 51% yeah. In the House. And that means that basically that means it's like a criminal indictment if we're going to be comparing it to, like, the civilian legal standard. So you're officially accused of this wrongdoing, which could mean you could be removed from office officially if the House is voted with a simple majority. But it's not over, because then what happens is it moves over to the Senate, and at that point, that's where you need the two thirds majority in order to finish the prosecution. And here's the thing is, like I said, it was a very kind of short insert as far as how to go about this. So there aren't any hard and fast rules. So whenever this has happened, they're kind of just like, all right, how do you want to do this? Right. We're not going to have prosecutors. We're going to have what we call managers, which is a weird word for sure, but they're going to act as prosecutors, and they're going to be called to argue the case before the Senate. And these are members of the House who are managing the impeachment proceedings in the Senate on behalf of the House. Correct. Because the House has said, we, the House, think this President should be removed, and now we're going to send some of our members to argue this case. Yes. And the Senate is essentially the jury at this point in the proceedings. Right. But they're the jury, and they're also the ones who are making up the rules. They're in charge of that as well, which is very strange. It is. You want to hear something kind of fun? Yeah. My uncle was a manager for Clinton's impeachment trial. No. Bob Barr is your uncle. No, not Bob Barr. There are several managers. My uncle, Ed Bryant. Really? Yeah. I talked about him before. He's a Republican Congressman from Tennessee, and he was one of the managers because he was an attorney and a former Army Judge Advocate General and judge Advocate General. Is that what he was? Jag. Was he a Jag? Oh, that's what it stands for. I know the abbreviation. I can't remember now. Maybe I'm just thinking of the TV show. But he held the legal position in the army and then was that would be Navy, I think, are the Jags, right? Oh, I don't know. He was in the army now. Okay, go ahead. But he was one of the managers in the Clinton impeachment. That is fascinating trial. And I got to say, like, Uncle Ed and I are politically divergent, but he's a good dude and an honest, kind man. I can say that for sure. So I was always proud of him as a person, even though he didn't, like, see eye to eye politically. But he's such a good guy that Monica Lewinsky requested him personally to depose her because he was just regarded as one of the good guys and one of the fair, decent humans. So he was the guy who deposed Monica Lewinsky for the Clinton impeachment trial. My father's brother, he needs a Tshirt that says that. Man you're right. That's crazy, isn't it? Wow. So how does he feel about it? Because I shouldn't say most a significant number of legal scholars and historians look back at that and the Andrew Johnson one and say those impeachment proceedings never should have happened, never should have passed the House, and that they were partisan proceedings. Yeah. I don't know. We're not super in touch anymore. But now that I'm older, I would love to pick his brain a little bit about this, and I know he would spill it. Conference me in. Yeah, I'll do that. Okay. Like, the next Christmas, I'll be like, yeah, Uncle Eddie, hold on a minute. I'm just going to put this phone down next to you. And don't pay attention to that picture of Josh. Right. As his avatar, I'll be like, did you get my T shirt I sent you? Yeah. Pretty interesting. Fascinating. I know, right? So at any rate, the managers are there arguing the case for the Senate who acts as jury that are also making up the rules as they go. And two thirds, like we said a couple of times, you need that two thirds Senate vote, and then at that point, if two thirds vote guilty, then that's it. Man the president, you're done. Yeah. And then the vice president takes over, and that's that. You probably can't hold a federal office again after that either, although I don't think it's automatic. Right. So should we take a break? Yeah. All right, let's take a break. And we've already talked about Johnson. We'll talk a little bit more about Mr. Bill Clinton and President Richard Millhouse Nixon? Write it for this if you want to know, then you're in luck. Just listen up to stuff you should know. Stuff you you should know. Okay. Chuck yes. So like you said, we talked about Johnson. He got off by one vote. Man that must have been so tense. Yeah. And then up next was President Wise. We'll find that there are plenty of other people who've been impeached, but in the United States, President Wise, the next president was Richard Millhouse Nixon. It was a long break in between. Yeah. Over 100 years. Like, 104 years, I think. Something like that. So Nixon is getting his own episode. We're doing a Watergate episode, hopefully in the not too distant future. For sure. Such a fascinating case. Yeah. Man so the whole premise of what Nixon was eventually moved out of office for, he didn't actually get impeached. He resigned. But he probably would have been removed from office. He probably would have been impeached. He probably would have. Been convicted and he would have been removed, but he didn't give him the satisfaction. He resigned. But this is just in a few weeks, he was out of office, and it was all because of that Watergate break in. And it wasn't even necessarily the break in, which was bad enough that some operatives from the White House broke into Democratic headquarters in the Watergate Hotel and were caught trying to replace the phone tap that they had on the phone. And it turned out that it was traced back to the White House. The president probably had involvement. That's bad enough. But the cover up is what ultimately led to Nixon being railroaded out of the White House. Yeah, for sure. But like you said, the writing was on the wall. And he said, well, you know what? I quit. I resigned. And everyone went, Man, I know we really wanted to impeach you. We brought the bale of hay and everything. I saw all the President's Men again the other day for some in a while. So great. Such a good movie. He's a pretty instructive example as well. He had multiple articles of impeachment against him. One was tax evasion. When he was president. He failed to pay like, 400 grand in taxes, which is like 2.6 million today, which that's a substantial amount of money. Plus, he was president when he failed to pay those taxes. Again, they didn't get to the point where they voted on the articles of impeachment, but that was one against him. Obstructing justice was one. Using the office to obstruct justice was a big one. He had, like, a hand picked CIA task force that was trying to keep the FBI from investigating Watergate. So he had a lot of different articles of impeachment against them, and surely one of them would have stuck and he would have been removed. But then after Nixon, it was 1972, up comes Clinton, about, I think, 26 years later, wasn't it? Okay, well, depends on, you know, the whole kitten caboodle was over a couple of years, for sure. Right. So Clinton was up next. Yes. And very famously, he did not get impeached because he did bad things in the White House with Monica Lewinsky. He was impeached because he perjured himself very famously said, I did not have sexual relations with that woman. That was good. Did, uncle. I'll bet Uncle Eddie does a good Clinton, too. I doubt it. Yeah, I mean, I remember in college, actually just post college, I remember Bill Clinton looking America in the eye on television and lying to all of us. Very disappointing. And he was a man in power who used that power to some people say take advantage of a younger coworker. Other people say it was consensual relationship. But he was the president and she was a political junkie. Sure. And he also was accused of trying to get her to she was a witness. Monica Lewinsky was a witness. In a sexual harassment case against him by Paula Jones, and he was accused of trying to get her to lie for him as a witness, which is big time obstructing justice, especially if you're president. And so if you look at it in that light, was he having that relationship with Lewinsky to influence her to lie to the jury? Right. Which makes it doubly worse somehow. Tripoli or Quadrupley. Worse even. So there was a lot of beef against them. I mean, distinct from that mess affected this most recent election. Oh, yeah, for sure. Definitely. The Clintons have a pretty bad rep still from that among certain parties. Pretty extensive parties, I would say, and earned. I remember being very upset that Bill Clinton lied to my face. Well, that's not why he didn't perjure to the American people. He lied to a grand jury as well, under oath. Oh, yeah, but he said the same thing to the grand juries. He said to their faces. Yeah, but I remember feeling especially let down because he looked me in the eye. You know, like when a president is facing camera and says something very seriously like that. They're talking to you, they're talking to their constituents. It's a personal relationship. I remember being just really upset about the whole thing. Okay. I don't think I felt quite like that. Oh, really? Yeah, I just assumed he was lying. Really? Yeah, he's president. Oh, man, I believed him. I was much more naive in my younger days. Well, I think it's sweet, Chuck. Yeah. That's Slick Willy. Always with the smooth talk. That's right. Tricky Dick and Slick Willy. We need to stop electing people with those nicknames. Right. No, we're just asking for it. What about Honorable Frank? Why does he ever get elected? He doesn't have any campaign money. Okay, so Clinton escaped the vote was 50 50 within the vote. Yeah. So he was actually impeached, like Andrew Johnson was. And it did come up to vote. The articles of impeachment came up to vote, and it was 50 50, which was pretty close to party lines, I think. Five Republicans five Democrats voted for impeachment, and ten Republicans voted against I can't remember, but it was very close to party lines. It was ten Republicans voted for Quiddle, two of which are still there. Susan Collins of Maine, she was a brand new either freshman or sophomore. And Richard Shelby of Alabama. Wow. Is still there. And they voted against Acquittal. They voted for they voted against impeachment, I should say. Yeah, they were convicted. Two of the ten Republicans clinton made it out. And I was reading this there's this really fascinating 538 blog about I think it's called Will Trump Be Impeached? And it's 538. So they've got all this data and everything to back up what they're saying. So they were saying one of the sure signs that an impeachment is probably not going to go through is, like, how divided the parties are if the parties are within themselves? No, between the two. Like if you're probably going to have a party line vote, it's probably people aren't going to defect enough to actually vote for impeachment. Or if they do, then I can defect enough to vote for conviction in the Senate. Right. And that was the case with Clinton. Right. But today it would take Republican senators to get together and say, hey, maybe we can get this guy out of here and get Pence in there and, like commit what's it called on a ship? Mutiny. Commit mutiny. Yeah. It almost I mean, with the introduction of Pence out of nowhere, it definitely seemed like that was plan B from the party all along. Right. I would not be at all surprised if that actually happened. I don't think very many people would be surprised if that happened. But I saw that in that same 538 blog there's like a betting odds website that they cited that gave even odds that Trump would not finish out his full four year term, which is pretty significant. 50 chance. Yeah. That's crazy. Yeah. My call from the beginning was that he would not finish out his four year term because he would not allow himself to be impeached. I don't think so either, is that he would resign and claim to be a victim of the political system and basically say, I told you all along it was the swamp. I couldn't drain it. Now I'm a victim of it. Man so PT. Barnum played by you, Jackman Jared from Subway, and then now this one. If this goes through, just call me Nostra Chuckis from now on. Oh, man, that's not bad. I have two t shirts to buy. There's a very interesting and the reason I said that this is right after he got elected was because I was like, I don't think he really wants to be president for four years. I read that in multiple places that he doesn't actually enjoy the actual presidency. Yeah. And from what I've heard, he gets very bored with doing the same thing, and politics is certainly not the way he's used to doing business. I was just like, man, the guy is going to get tired of this after a couple of years and just want to go back to his cushy civilian life and then be a martyr, a political martyr, and say, yeah, I couldn't do what I wanted to do, so I'm a victim. So that's Chuck's call. You heard it here first. So Trump hasn't been impeached yet, but they've already brought it up, it sounds like. Although it kind of waxed and waned in early December, especially the left leaning news outlets were like, impeachment. People are actually talking about impeachment. It's probably going to happen every year. And then if you look like a week later, all of those articles are gone. They just moved on to something else. Right. Which is pretty ridiculous, but the status quo these days. So who knows what's going to happen with Trump, but the chances of him actually being impeached and convicted are extraordinarily low because he's president. Right. That's just such an enormous thing to remove a president from office. What's not quite as enormous is to remove a federal judge, which is why, out of the 60 people in the United States who have ever been impeached, I think it's even more than 60 and convicted, which is down to 15. All of those, I believe, were federal judges. Correct. You name it, they were DUI drunks or drunk in court or tax evaders or accepted bribes or purging themselves. Federal judges have sort of carried the mantle for impeachment. Yeah. And in a really weird way, they are laying their impeachment trials have laid the groundwork for the big ones that you see the other precedent. Yeah. I'm sure if you ask your uncle, he would tell you that they went back and looked at impeachment trials for federal judges to see what procedures were used and followed and what the rules were. So the impeachment of federal judges who were drunk on the bench are paving the groundwork for presidents to be impeached with impeached by. And then there was a Senator William Blunt from North Carolina. He was the only senator to ever be impeached. And his trial actually established that senators and representatives couldn't be impeached. They were immune to impeachment because they weren't civil officers, but instead their own party could run them or their own body. I'm sorry. So if you were a senator, two thirds of the Senate could vote for you to get out of the Senate. If you were a representative, two thirds of the House could vote for you to get out of the House. And that's what they did to Blunt. They said, we can't impeach you, but we can use this other thing. Right. And it's basically like a vote of no confidence, which also comes from Parliament as well. Interesting. Yeah. Well, this week in real time, this will already have happened by the time this is released, but I think tomorrow there is a special election within the Democratic Party who will be the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee. This is going to happen in the midterms, but when Democratic Representative John Conyers stepped down over sexual harassment allegations a couple of weeks ago, they had to hold a special caucus for an election that's going to happen tomorrow. And it looks like two people, either Jerry Nadler of New York or Zoe Loftren of California, are the top two competing for this top spot. And they are both well aware that what that means in this article here. It's called the battle to lead Trump's potential impeachment. They know it says they're signing up to be Trump's chief antagonist, but they also said, hey, listen, we're not going to go in there and just start saying impeachment. Impeachment. Like, if this is ever going to happen, it's got to be the will. We have to feel like it's the will of the American people. We have to feel like there are enough Trump supporters out there that have turned on him because of something he's done. Well, yeah. It'll be like what you said, where you've just proven everything the guy said from the moment he started campaigning. Right. That you have to get them from the beginning, and that the elites have it so rigged that even if you do win, they'll just get rid of you. Yeah. I mean, one of them, Nadler, even said there's not much point in impeaching a president and having him acquitted in the Senate because that's what happened with Clinton. And like you said, even Republicans largely look back and say, of course, that was just a big, distracting waste of time. Yeah, that's what I've read as well, is that it's not looked upon as the finest moment in American legal history. Yeah. So we'll know the outcome tomorrow in real time, and both of them are kind of on the same page as far as that goes there. It needs to be something like legit worth impeaching a president for that most of the American people would agree with. We're not just out to get him, but if he does something, we're out to get him. Or if we find something that he's already done. Yeah, exactly. Well, there you have it. Yeah. If it turns out that he did obstruct anything, that would be a big deal. Two of the three presidents who have been impeached had at least articles of impeachment that included obstruction against them. Yeah, but his attorneys are saying have literally said the president can't be guilty of obstruction of justice because they are justice. That's the most ridiculous legal interpretation I've ever heard in my life. I'm going to go on record that saying they're above the law. I am the law. That's what it says. How can I obstruct the law? I'm the law. A crush. At any rate, you should probably stop now. Yes. All right. Well, if you want to know more about impeachment, you can type that word into the Internet and some really interesting stuff. I mean, a lot of it is bone dry, but people are really into the legal history and constitutional interpretation. Sure. You can find some pretty interesting articles all around the Internet on stuff like this. So just give it a shot, see if it's up your alley. Yeah. And at the very least, if this does happen to play out over the next couple of years, it's good to know how it all works. Exactly. You can impress your friends. Yeah. It could be like they're never going to get a super majority, and your friends will be like, what did you say? What magic word was, what does this have to do with comic books? So since Chuck said comic books. It's time for listener mail. This is follow up on cakes. Hey guys, listen to someone cakes. Thought you might like to know a little bit more about the color of Red Velvet Cakes. I'm an experienced amateur baker who has tested several Red Velvet recipes, and now I nailed them down to Josh and Chuck. That's right. It's true that Red Velvet Cake originally got their color from the chemical reaction of the cocoa, vinegar and buttermilk. That is no longer the case. The way cocoa was processed has changed since the recipe was invented. So if you rely on the chemical reaction for the color, you will be sorely disappointed. Your cake will simply be brown, but it will be nothing like the red we have come to expect from Red Velvet Cakes. Originally. Red Velvet Cakes are more of a rust color than the bright red we think of now. The cacao and the cake cocoa. The tattoo. The tattoo on the cake also is minimal in comparison to a chocolate cake. Cocoa was originally added to cut the flour, create a silkier, less glutinous texture, rather than create a chocolate cake. Velvet cakes using vinegar. I guess that's where the velvet comes from. Using vinegar as a rising agent has a long tradition in American baking and is not reserved only for Red Velvet cakes. Also, you mentioned banana bread with some confusion over age mushy bananas, and a lot of people wrote in about this. I'm just a dummy, I didn't get it. Bananas are softer. It cuts back on the work of the baker. Also, bananas naturally sweetened as they write. Yeah, I didn't think about that either. Yeah, I guess they're just so sugary and sweet. Once they get black like that, you get little fuzzy sweaters on your teeth when you bite into them, they're that sweet. I remember the first time I heard that expression sweaters on your teeth, and I was like, oh my God, that's it. Yeah, nailed it. Blah, blah, blah. Baking, baking, baking. Nice. Who is that from? Diana, by the way. She says if you're not adding chocolate chips your banana nut bread, then you're doing it wrong. And then she says, best wishes from Diana Garton. Thanks a lot, Diana. That's very nice of you. Please do send us some baked goods. Yes, not joking at all. If you want to send us some baked goods or just say hi or whatever, who cares? You can tweet to us at Joshua Clark or S-Y-S Kpodcast. You can hang out with us on Facebook. Comstennowcharleswchuckbryant. Send us an email to stuffpodcast@householdworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the web stuffyoushinenow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseworks.com. Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon music that's so good it's criminal morbid, part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…trade-center.mp3	How the World Trade Center Memorial Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-world-trade-center-memorial-works	The World Trade Center was once a global symbol of progress. Since the attacks of Sept. 11, the area has undergone a massive rebuilding process. Chuck and Josh take a look at the World Trade Center, its memorial and its symbolism in this special episode.	The World Trade Center was once a global symbol of progress. Since the attacks of Sept. 11, the area has undergone a massive rebuilding process. Chuck and Josh take a look at the World Trade Center, its memorial and its symbolism in this special episode.	Thu, 08 Sep 2011 14:16:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2011, tm_mon=9, tm_mday=8, tm_hour=14, tm_min=16, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=251, tm_isdst=0)	41369275	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me, as always, is Charles W Chuckers Bryant. And that makes us a very congested episode of Stuff You Should Know. Right? Yeah. We were just reminiscing about the what was it? Eight or nine? I don't remember. Probably nine. When Josh was sick for like I said, he was sick for a season, and that's really not too far off. Yeah, but you mean recently pointed out that I wasn't sick at all last year, and I don't think I've ever not been sick for a year. So it has to do probably with taking better care of myself, not smoking, probably. I get the stomach thing. I don't usually get regular sick. Yeah, you do get stomach things a year, man. It's not even like a bug. It's like a staph of infection or ebola of the stomach or something horrible like that. Yes, it is gross. So are you willing to muddle through this one with me sounding like this? I think people can forgive that. We needed to get this one out in time for the September 11 anniversary. Yeah, the 10th anniversary of the September 11 attack on the World Trade Center while the plane that went down flight 93 in Pennsylvania. Have you seen that movie? Yeah. And then the attack on the Pentagon. The 10th anniversary is going to be a big, sad, stolen occasion. It seems like the last couple of years, it's been September 11, and this is a time to stop and reflect for a moment, but I think it's all going to come barreling back on the 10th anniversary. Yes, I think people have been anticipating that. And the opening of the memorial, which we're going to talk about, has a lot to do with that. Obviously. It does. It's going to officially be dedicated and opened on September 11, 2011. Pretty good timing. Yeah. And then the museum, which we'll also talk about, will be open the following year, I think, on September 11, 2012. That thing sounds pretty amazing. Yeah. I'm very excited about going to this. Me too. Maybe excited is not the right word. No, I'm excited about it. I'm looking forward to it. Yeah. There's nothing it doesn't mean you're flippant about it. No, I'm excited to see them as well. Yeah, that's okay. Okay, good. Thanks. I get excited every time I go to those things. Yeah. It's a good place for remembrance, Josh. Yes. That's memorials make an excellent spot for remembrance. Let's talk about the spot where the memorial, the World Trade Center memorial, which is what we're talking about, is going to be situated the original spot where the World Trade Center complex was situated. Yes. Beginning work started in the was completed in, I think, 1973 on the towers, I think work for the whole World Trade Center complex wasn't completed until 1990. Yeah. 14 years. 14 years after the towers that were completed. So it was like, yeah, that's right. But tell me about the spot, the World Trade Center spot. It's a very ambitious project. It was. Josh seven buildings total, spanning 16 acres. It's a lot of room. And each tower itself, I think, had a footprint of an acre. Yeah. Right. They had office space to the tune of about 50,000 total workers, and about 35,000 of those were split among 430 companies in the buildings. It was 10 million office space. That's incredible. It was. It was originally speaking of ambition, I read an article called The Height of Ambition. It was a 2002 New York Times article, and it's required reading for anybody. It's really good. It's all about the construction, it's about the attachments. It's a really comprehensive gray article. Check that out. But they were saying that there was no way they were going to go any less than 10 million sqft when they decided to, they're like, that's it, we're doing 10 million. Wow. And it's such an enormous amount of office space that other real estate developers in the city were like, that's going to imbalance the market that's so much, it's going to flood this place all at once. Yeah. I remember at the time, in September 11, thinking that the death hole was going to be like 10, 20, 30,000 people, because I knew how many people work there. Right. And it would have been had the buildings not stayed up for an hour or so. Right. Or had it been an hour or so later. Right. Once people were all in there. Yeah, because you said there's about 50,000 people that worked at the World Trade Centers. And then there was another maybe 40,000 to 70,000 people who commuted through because there was a subway station underneath and the Path train station and the mall, and people coming to have lunch with their husband or wife or whatever. So 70,000 additional people pass through that complex every day. Indeed. Josh if we're talking size, we got a couple of stats. The North Tower, the original World Trade Center one, although there's a new one, which we're going to talk about, 1368ft, and then 1730ft with its large antenna. And then the South Tower was about 6ft shorter than the North Tower, which I thought found interesting. Yeah. I wonder why they did that. Maybe the bedrock was 6ft lower or something. It has to be something like that. I'm sure they got to the final measurement and we're like, you have to be kidding me. Right. Because they were both 110 stories. It's not like WCTC two was short changed the floor. Right, or a half floor. Yes. 288,100 metric tons. Yeah. Each one of them. It's tough to find comparisons for this, but a Ford Explorer, each one weighed about equivalent to 172,000 Ford Explorers. That's heavy. Yeah, that's a heavy building. And that's a lot of weight, and we'll get to that weight, and what happened to a lot of that weight coming up shortly, too. So one of the cool things that you found was originally when they planned the towers, they didn't know what kind of sway that a person could take. Let's say if you're working on story 90, like the towers swaying back and forth in the wind, what that would do to people. Yeah. No one that had ever these are, when they were built, the tallest structures in the world. You can't just have office space up there that people are getting sick on because they're dizzy. Right. Because no one would rent it out, but they didn't know. Well, maybe somebody could take 6ft of sway on either side. They had no idea. Maybe people can take, like, almost no sway. So they had a guy in Eugene, Oregon, who was a psychologist, basically purchased an office building, put parts of it up on jacks and test people. He had them come in for eye exams right. But was really testing them to see how much weight they could put up with and found not much like a couple of inches either way, after a couple of minutes of that, the people start freaking out, get dizzy, get nauseated. So they were like, you have to do something because your building is going to sway a lot more than this. That's right. And you can't have your tenants getting sick. So they built in shock absorbers that prevented the sway. So I think most people know by now, just from breakdown of what happened with the collapse, that it was an exoskeleton design and it was connected with a steel core. Connected with a hat truss at the top. Yes. So you had columns going out on the outside where they normally would have been put inside. So that opened up much more office space. So the columns are on the outside, and there's a steel core in the center, like you said, and it was connected by a hat truss that just fit over the top and connected everything to the center. So it just stabilized the whole thing. And it made it light, but very strong. Right. I think it was about 95% open air inside the building itself. Yeah, which has a lot to do with why it collapsed. There was a police station. Port Authority in New Jersey. New York and New Jersey had a police desk. They had their own zip code and eight dedicated mail carriers. Yeah, I'm sure it's still there. It still has its own zip code, right? Yeah, I looked it up. Actually, I think they held onto that zip code and to assign the new World Trade Center complex that same zip code, if I'm not mistaken. I would hope so. This is a couple of weeks ago. Yeah. But yeah, eight postal carriers just for the WTC complex. Well, like, they worked within, I guess it was 16 acres. But it's probably not as big as your usual beat in New York, I would say. No, I wouldn't think so. Or route. No, I think they call it beats. That's just cops, though, isn't it? No cops. Milk. Okay. Chuck also, just to give another idea of scale, there were each of the towers themselves. Just the towers had 99 elevators each. Each one had almost 22,000 windows. And apparently you could have built a sidewalk, a standard sidewalk, I take it, from New York to Washington, DC. With just the concrete used in just the towers. Wow. So these were massive, colossal structures, just the towers. The whole complex itself was colossal, but just the towers are enough to get the point across. Well, and all you ever really hear about still is usually the WTC one and two, but all of the buildings were eventually raised, the whole complex. Right. And we should also say that everybody kind of came on board. But in the beginning, there were very big detractors to the world trade center projects, including those real estate developers who were like, this is going to be a drain on the market. And one of the guys is named Lawrence Wayne, who was an empire state building co owner. Right. And he took out a full page ad in the New York Times that had a picture of one of the world trade center towers with a plane flying into it to basically suggest that this is a hazard to air traffic. Right, right. And it actually almost came true in 1981 when an Aerolinas flight just narrowly missed the north tower but made off okay. It was safe. That's right. Yeah. However, there was the first attack on the world trade center, and Islamist extremist group detonated about \u00a31000 of explosives in a rented truck underneath the world trade center and killed six people, injured thousands, and they are included, which I thought was a classy move in the world trade center memorial years later. I never really considered that, but I thought it was a pretty nice thing to do. The truck left half a football field sized crater and it apparently rocked the whole building like you think, well, six people died. It couldn't have been that big. It was a huge blast. It was just in the wrong place. Right. But they were trying to take the building down yeah. From below. So within a few days or weeks after the February 1993 check, things were back to business as usual. Governor Andrew Cuomo was the first to move back into the office building. Right. And things were just like I said, business as usual until the morning of September 11, 2001 came. Yeah. Peter, it's Don dearly. Downhill, four blocks north of the world trade center, the second building that was hit by the plane has just completely collapsed. The entire building has just collapsed, as if a demolition team set off. When you see the old demolitions of these old buildings. It down on itself and it is not there anymore. It should be. It has collapsed. The whole side has collapsed. The whole building has collapsed. So that pretty much speaks for itself, I think. Yeah. Where were you that morning? I had just gotten back from New York, actually. I was there for a vacation and a Radio head concert in New Jersey. Actually, it was Liberty State Park and flew home on September like the 7th or something. Actually, I was living in La. But I flew back to Atlanta and then got stuck in Atlanta. Oh, yeah. Or at least you got stuck in because everything was grounded. So I was in my friend Big John's warehouse and Big Country Boy, and he woke me up. Dude, get up here. Yeah, I remember going on. It was like, one of the towers has been hit. And I started watching CNN and figuring out what was going on. This is not an accident. Yeah, I think both of us kind of came to that conclusion pretty quick, too. So I hung out in his warehouse all day and we watched it on TV, basically, and mourned. Yeah. And I have to say it didn't sink in as hard then as it did when we were researching this for this podcast. Man, I was just finding that clip we just played. I watched about, like, an hour of having coverage, and it really drew me in and just depressed me like crazy. It got through to me finally, after ten years, it really hit me how huge this is. Yeah, I plowed through a bunch of video this week, too, and last week, because I hadn't researched it for a long time after probably since like, 2003. Right. There have been many years of not even really considering it much, and then all of a sudden it's all back on and coming up this September. And I think just being older too, especially for me, being an older ten years older, it's gotten through to me a lot more. Like yeah. God, how old were you? You were in your early 20s, mid twenty s I was like 25. God, that's crazy. Yeah, 24, 25, something like that. Long time ago. Just a little kid. So, Chuck, we mentioned how there could have been tens of thousands more people who could have died had the buildings not stayed up. There were a couple of big questions after the collapse of the World Trade Center towers. Number one, why did they fall? They didn't have to fall. And number two, why didn't they just fall over immediately? And the answer to the second question is the design that Exoskeleton connected to a central steel core by a hat truss, could have kept that thing up indefinitely. The reason they fell was a fatal flaw. Right. Those steel columns that make up the Exoskeleton tapered at the top because they had to support less weight making the whole structure lighter, requiring less steel. Right. So the planes, when they flew into the higher floors, they were flying into steel columns that were only as thin as, like, a quarter inch across. Right. So they just severed them. The problem is the true fatal flow is the heat from the fire, though. Yeah. I read a big article yesterday on this about this physicist, basically explained how they came down to sort of rebut the idiots who say that it was a controlled demolition by the US government and, like, steel can't get that hot and melt and blah, blah, blah. And he explained the difference between heat and temperature. And I wish I was smart enough to relay that now, but I would just advise just Google, like, why did they collapse? And there's a really good article on that. Right. So it's one of the first hits for our purposes. We're going to take it on face value that the heat from the raging fires created a high enough temperature that the thinning of steel melted and the weight distribution throughout the exoskeleton was even further compromised until these things started going from the connection to the hat truss was snapped and then that was that. There was no support any longer. So these floors obviously could support the weight of the floors on top of them because they had been up since 1973. They can support the static weight. When the floors start collapsing on one another, it becomes moving heavier weight, and it created a dominant effect, essentially. Right. It just plowed right into the floors beneath and picked up more and more steam as it went. Apparently, the material from the highest floors, by the time they reached the ground, we're traveling about 120 miles an hour. Yeah. And that could have been even faster, according to the physicist. And he said the fact that they fell straight down was sensible and fortunate because they could have swayed and toppled over which 110 stories falling to the left or to the right is going to take out do a lot more damage, obviously. Well, the South Tower did do some damage. The North Tower came down almost completely in its footprint, and it just compacted itself into this dense acre size square of debris that went from street level 70ft underground to the bedrock and just filled its own footprint almost completely. The other towers, three and seven, were completely trashed. Tower six was still intact, but it had a huge chunk of the North Tower against it. Right. And that the one they had to take out for those reasons. Yes. Like, otherwise it might have been okay. That one they actually did demolish. Right. The whole site kind of just became a loss, I guess. An estimated 300,000 tons of scrap metal were generated, most of it sold to India and China. Yeah. And there was a big hubbub. I didn't know this. Did you hear about this when it happened. Yeah. The Mafia diverted, like, 255 tons of scrap metal to its own junkyards for profit and got caught pretty quickly because the FBI was on that case. But after that, there were, I think, 100,000 truckloads of debris trucked out to the landfill in New Jersey. I believe it's called fresh Kale landfill. And those all got police escorts after the FBI found out the Mafia was diverting scrap metal. Right. Obviously. Yeah. That's a good move. The cleanup was very quick. I remember at the time thinking that it happened way quicker than I thought it would. Well, yeah, they were like, this is going to take a year, maybe two, maybe three. Exactly. Took like, eight or nine months. Yes. It also came in under budget. They thought it was going to cost a couple of billion dollars, and that was clearly over inflated because it only costs $650,000,000 to clean up, which is a lot of money, but nothing compared to two bill. No, a lot less. Yeah. They did get a little criticism because they thought they kind of hurried to clean up a little too much, considering the potential toxic materials found at the site. Yeah. A lot of people thought, maybe we should take our time here, study this a little more, see what we have to deal with before we start sending people down there. Well, one group called it the worst toxic site in our history. Did you mean nation's history? I don't know. That's a good question. Yeah, it could be nation, New York, World, I don't know. There is a lot of toxic stuff. For example, \u00a3200,000 of lead plus cadmium from the 50,000 PCs in the World Trade Center offices. Right. Mercury from the fluorescent lights. There are apparently about half a million fluorescent tube lights that all have mercury in them to work. Have you heard of polysistic aromatic hydrocarbons? I have not. They're apparently they cause laryngeal cancer and a couple of other cancers, and they come from partially burned fossil fuels. What else, Chuck? Asbestos. Lots of asbestos. Benzene dioxin from oil and fuel. So not the kind of stuff you want to be breathing in. And people found years afterward we're getting sick. A lot of the first responders getting sick and dying, even. Yeah. The bass player from TV on the Radio was the first responder. And he came down with cancer in his late 30s or something and died. That's right. Within the last year. Did I know that he was a first responder? As what was his what kind of responder was he, do you know? I don't remember, but he was a first responder to Ground zero. Wow. Yeah. So there was a combined payout of $625,000,000 to some of the first responders and clean up workers after a lawsuit was filed. And they came to that settlement within the last year or two, right? Yeah. They've been hammering that out forever. Yeah. And then there was the Zadroga bill, which is massive. $7.4 billion in compensation for everything from economic impact to health. But there's a big outcry because they didn't include cancer. Yeah. They couldn't find a definite link. This is one of those where I say throw it in there to cover everything. Right. Apparently that's not the case. Well, no, but it's left open so that it can be amended to include cancer later. Oh, really? Like, if somebody's like, here's your definitive study on it that shows the link. But apparently the link is enough for people who are engaged in personal litigation. They've been generally successful in just doing New York. Okay. Just not a class action kind of thing. Well, just not the droga bill. Got you. Yeah. Okay. Well, no one died during the clean up of the Ground Zero, which is pretty amazing considering what a dangerous place it was. There were huge voids that were covered up by things that big gaps and holes that you could easily fall into. Yeah. Like, you know the tiger traps. Yes. Where it's just kind of covered with a little bit of twigs or leaves. Yeah. They were like 70 foot drops that looked like they were stable solid rubble or whatever. But yeah, there's a picture of a huge earth mover, like, sliding down with a guy, and it's like, oh, my God. Yeah. I'm really surprised no one died during that cleanup. Yeah. 60 men died building the thing. Wow. That was the so that brings us, Josh, to ten years later, the 911 Memorial and Museum, which we both said we're excited to go see because it's a pretty amazing design to me. They hit all the right notes. A lot of people have complained about the actual building. The new World Trade Center One has been beaten up pretty badly in the press. A lot of people think they should have just mimicked the original Twin Towers, except maybe a little higher as like a show of our strength as Americans. Right. With a giant bird on the top. Exactly. With Donald Trump on top licking the bird. But Trump was one of the ones actually who hates the new WTC One. Well, originally it's called the Freedom Tower, which could not smack of the Bush era more. Yeah, they changed that. Or World War II when we started calling French fries freedom fries. Right. Was that? World War II. And that came about again after this. Yeah. And then also sauerkraut was called Liberty Cabbage. That's just crazy jingoistic. Yeah. So, like I said, Trump is not a big fan of the design or the architect who designed WTC One. The new one. What's his name? Daniel. Daniel Libeskind. Is that him? He's been much battered. Yeah. It's kind of feel bad for the guy. He's trying to do a good job. I'm sure. It is going to be the tallest building in the US after it's completed at a symbolic height of 776 ft. USA how do you mean? Go ahead. It's a very important date in our history. And all the buildings are going to be done between 2012 and 2016. And WTC one is right now at the 8th floor, which is they're close to done. How many floors is it going to be, did you say? I think well, part of what people are complaining about is the top third of this building is just hollow space. So a lot of people complained about that. So I don't know how many actual floors. They may be pretty close then if they're at the 80th floor now and I think they've concreted up to the 72nd floor glassed it up to the 53rd. So it's coming along. And then Seven World Trade Center was opened in 2006. That's already there. Really? Yeah. But the one that's being dedicated well, in a few days by the time this thing comes out is the World Trade Center Memorial. Right? Yes. There have been a couple of other memorials like the Sphere, which is Fritz Koenig sculpture that was just iconically associated with the World Trade Center was found in the rubble and basically dusted off and put in Battery Park with an eternal flame. Yes. And then there was Tribute and Lights, which are the two beams. Anybody who's ever seen Spike Lee's 25th Hour is familiar with those and those are brought out every year. That's really cool looking. It is very cool. It's like 44. Each tower is made up of 44 xenon searchlights focused into a single column. It just shoots right up into space. I wonder if they're going to do that still. Yeah, I wonder too. They should do that every year. I agree. Just for that one day. Yeah, I think it'd be cool. But to get a more permanent exhibit, a design competition was held in 2003 by the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation. Right? Yes. And it was international. So people from all over the world submitted designs. Like a ton of them. Yes. 63 countries in total. 5201 submissions. And the guy who won for the memorial went to Tech. That's right. Georgia Tech. That's right. Yeah. And he was working as a New York City Housing Authority architect until he won and then I imagine he's making a little bit more money now at Handel Architects as a partner. Yes. His name is Michael. Arid. That's how to get a job, a partnership pretty quick. As an architect, I think that's how to make your career. Look at like Maya Lynn, who did the Vietnam Memorial was the first thing she ever did. Oh, really? Yeo, I think. Oh wow. Yeah. Have you ever seen a documentary on her? Very neat. How did she come up with the idea? She talks all about the first third of the documentary is about that and what she went through. Right. Like there's a big problem that she was Asian. Sure. That kind of thing. But I don't remember I don't remember if it just came to her or what, but she talks about it. That was perfect in its simplicity. Totally. It is perfect. Yeah. But it was very much taken the wrong way, as I think there's always a group of people who take a memorial the wrong way. Although and I think Michael Aaron has been criticized, but I don't think anybody's like this is a smack in the face to the people who died. Yeah, I think it sounds pretty amazing. Tell them about it. Well, the centerpiece, the memorial itself, there's a museum underneath, underground, which will get to but the Memorial Plaza is about eight acres of what will be forest land with the two original footprints of the World Trade Center, towers are now intact as fountains. Waterfalls. Yeah, the world's largest waterfalls. 520 gallons of water, I think, per minute, flow through these things. And there are these huge, massive, almost acre size squares, like you said, that just fill in the footprints of the World Trade Centers, and they're just amazing. We can't really describe them any better than that because they're that simple, but unless you see a rendering of them or there's some really cool architectural animations of them, too, they just take your breath away. And the memorial that era designed is called Reflecting Absence. And the whole point is to just kind of show we're missing something here, and we're always going to be missing something here. Yeah. That's why I thought it was such a brilliant design. I don't know, it just made sense. Why build something up when you can say so much more by creating these two big voids and then the water flowing. It's all very symbolic, the recirculating water and living, breathing life into the city. And the trees are sweet gums and oaks. White oaks. Yes. Swamp white oaks. There's going to be, like, 400 of them on the plaza. Yeah. And the plaza was designed by Peter Walker and partners from Berkeley in conjunction with Michael Aired. I think that was the submission where these two people jointly coming up with this plan, and he was like, I am the landscape architect. Right. I need some help. Yes. Or vice versa. Yeah, maybe so. But Peter Walker came up with this idea to use suspended paving systems to support the white oaks, because an urban tree or a tree in urban forest like this, they don't live that long. Right. And the reason why is because the soil becomes too compacted. You have to have paving for people to walk around on. Right. So what they came up with was a suspended paving system which uses, like, columns and beams, a grid to create this hollow space that will support pavement, but will also allow roots to go through. So these trees, these swamp white oaks, should thrive and live, like, many decades longer than ones that are just planted wherever along the street. That's right. And they could. Potentially get up to about 60ft tall, kind of creating a canopy park. So that was one of the things they wanted was a quiet place, sort of a retreat from the city where you feel like you're sort of insulated from the rest of the city and the noises of the city and the swamp white oaks. Also, check are going to be brought in from all over the area of New York, but also from places around where 93 went down in Pennsylvania and in the DC area you're going to have trees from other 911 impacted areas brought. So that was cool. Yeah. I read an article on the family who supplied the trees basically for the project. Really? Yeah, it was pretty cool. And then also around the Reflecting Absence Memorial, they're going to have basically a bronze wall with the names of all nearly 3000 victims of the 1993 and 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center cut into them. Yeah. So you can do the little charcoal rubbing on paper if you want. They shine light through them at night. They're grouped together by either where they died or where they worked, or if there was a special request to group people with friends of theirs that worked in the building that they've done that too. That's cool. So that's kind of cool. Yeah. And then probably the most noticeable feature within this little urban forest is going to be a glass building that forms the atrium of the entryway to the Memorial Museum. That's right. And the most noticeable feature of that are going to be these two steel tridents which made up the exterior, the exoskeleton, they apparently went up and then at the 70 ft mark, the 7th story, they split into three and then they supported steel beams that went all the way up to the top of the building. Right. So those things were left standing, I think on the north tower. So they took those off to Kennedy with a bunch of other artifacts and kept them in a hangar and now they've been returned to the site and they built the atrium around these two things. Yeah. They used a lot of pieces of the World Trade Center in the museum itself to partially just remind people and then also to again show scale of I think the tridents themselves are close to 100ft tall. Yeah. I think 90 because they branch at the 70 foot mark and they go up to the 90 ft mark and then also check the museum itself is largely underground and they're in the footprints of the World Trade Center towers and parts around them. But basically the whole thing is set up to give you an underground view of how incredibly massive these buildings were by leaving the concrete footings and steel supports that they can intact and then just, I guess playing off the vastness of the space. Yeah. That had to do with the museum and the design up top, too. I think in the museum down below, you can stand in between the two footprints still. Yeah. And they've created a lot of just open space, it seems like. Right. But then there's also at the corners of the footprints, there's maybe like some I think there's an aluminum clad volumes to basically give this kind of ghost outline of the building to give you an even better idea of their scale. And all this is underground, like we said. The plaza actually above serves as a green roof to the museum. And you go through the atrium, and then to get to the museum itself underground, you go down a ramp, and that's very symbolic of the ramp that was used to clean out the Ground Zero site. It was used during construction of the original towers. So it's kind of like throwing you back in time during the construction and the cleanup, which really marks the history of the site. Those two things. Yeah. There's a couple of other notable aspects to the museum that they're going to have, are the survivor stairs, which, if you Google that, I mean, they're pretty famous. They were one of the sets of stairs that it said hundreds, but I would imagine maybe even thousands of people used to escape. It was like one of the only ways out. It was along World Trade Center Six, I think. So in 2008, it was lowered down into the site again for its final resting place there in the museum. Right. The other big thing is the last column in the west chamber of the museum. It's going to house this, and it was returned to the site. You might remember the last column where it was one of the last things standing, obviously, and that's where people decorated this column with memories of their loved ones. And have you seen this person? That kind of thing. Right. They're also going to have the slurry wall in there, which was surprisingly intact. It was an original huge wall that they built to keep the Hudson from flooding it. And after the attacks, after the collapse of the building, this wall was just standing there. It didn't have any support, but it was still keeping the Hudson out. So they reinforced it and rebuilt it. But they took a 62 x 64 foot section of the slurry wall, and it's going to make up a significant part of the museum itself. That's huge, man. This must be enormous under there, because beyond all these huge elements, they have all the void, open space. I'm very much looking forward to going to that. I think we skipped over the Memorial Glade. In the park above the museum, there is a section called the Memorial Glade, which is going to be an open area where they'll have, like, ceremonies and things like that. And I think that's surrounded by sweet gums, which should be autumn red on September 11, is what they say. They plan it that way. At least the museum itself, like the exhibits that they're going to have. They're going to have permanent exhibits of artifacts from the clean up, from the rescue, from the attacks, personal stories, pre attack, too. I think they're going to have obviously some I'm sure they're going to have some information on, like, the construction and all that. Yeah. And then probably the people who did it. Imagine there'll be some information there. Yeah. And also they're going to have some stuff on the DC and Pittsburgh losses, or not Pittsburgh, but Pennsylvania losses. But there's a very controversial exhibit that's going to be added. It looks like it's going to be added as recently as April. It's as far back as I can find any price. I found something more recently, I think it is. They're going forward with it. Yeah. Well, there are a lot of human remains found. Right. And a lot of them were put together and said, this is this person, this belonged to this person. But after a while, like, the matches ran out and the medical examiner still has over 9000 pieces of human remains, and the last match was made in 2009. So they're kind of losing hope that they're ever going to be able to identify who they belong to. Yeah. And a lot of people are unidentified at this point. Well, a lot of the families of the 41% of the victims who haven't been identified are saying, keep trying, don't stop. Right. Medical examiner and the people who are running the museum are saying, now we have a better place for them. Why don't we put them in the museum? Right. And they have it planned to put them behind a quote from Virgil that says, no day she'll erase you from the memory of time. And the letters themselves are going to be made of World Trade Center steel. A lot of people find this ghoulish and ghastly. Like, you can't put human remains on display. And in this article in the New York Times, they interviewed a lot of curators who are like, it depends. You can't just put human remains in a museum. You're not supposed to do that. But if it's a memorial on the site of an atrocity, like, Ashvitz has lots of human remains. Right. The Camaruge Museum has all sorts of human remains. So this is, museum wise speaking, appropriate, but really it's up to you what you think is morally acceptable or not. Yes. I think what I read, most of the upset comes from the fact that they were underground in the museum, and they were supposedly told that they were going to be kept in a tomb in the park above ground. Right, and away from tourists. This plan is to put them right in the exhibit, like, here's some of the remains of the victims. Right. But there would be tourists. I guess there will be tourists up top as well. But I see their difference, though. Yeah, there's a big difference, for sure. Yeah. But I think just about everybody agrees they should be kept on the site somewhere. In what capacity? Right, chuck, let's say I have $100 sitting around and I'm like, I want to contribute to this memorial. What can I do? You can buy a cobblestone. I can. I was a little disappointed to see that the cobblestones weren't engraved because that's usually what you do. Yeah. There's a website that links your cobblestone to your name, so it's not an actual engraved cobblestone, but you can still donate $100 that will get you a cobblestone on the path of the plaza itself. $500 will get you a cobblestone on the memorial. Glade that we told you about in. $1,000 will get you on a granite paper that will be a walkway to the memorial itself. And that is at nine one onememoorial orgdonations. And I imagine you can just donate, period, if you want. Sure, yeah. You'll get your cobblestones. But if that's not important to you, then it's probably a good cause, I would say. And if you're going to be in New York this September 11, the September 11 Memorial will officially open that day. And if you're going to be in New York September 11, 2012, the memorial museum is expected to be open then. Yeah, there are people like our shooting video of the waterfalls being tested and stuff out of their office window, and it's pretty amazing. So we've got a couple of articles on site. We have how the World Trade Center works. I guess the World Trade Center is what it's called, and it's very comprehensive. I think Tom Harris wrote it. So you can type in World Trade Center. And that should also bring up how the World Trade Center memorial works. Yes. Which is coming soon, right? It will be up by the time this comes out. I hope so. And again, if you want to learn more about the memorial, you can go to nine one onemomoorial.org and you can donate there too. Is that it? I think this is our 911 podcast. We've been asked by a bunch of people to do one, and unless we're inspired to actually go over the grisly details, I would say this will serve again, purpose. You concur? Yeah, I don't know if I want to do that one. Yeah, that's it. All right. Do you want to send us an email? We'd love to hear from you. Send it to stuffpodcast@housestepworks.com. Be sure to check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join House Defork staff as we explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 camry. It's ready. Are you? Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon music that's so good it's criminal morbid, part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…ator-zig-zag.mp3	Can you outrun an alligator in a zig-zag?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/can-you-outrun-an-alligator-in-a-zig-zag	You've heard the warning before: If you're being chased on land by an alligator, run in a zig-zag. Of course, the average person should be capable of outrunning an alligator. Josh and Chuck take the opportunity to explore alligator safety anyway.	You've heard the warning before: If you're being chased on land by an alligator, run in a zig-zag. Of course, the average person should be capable of outrunning an alligator. Josh and Chuck take the opportunity to explore alligator safety anyway.	Tue, 08 Jan 2013 21:50:04 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2013, tm_mon=1, tm_mday=8, tm_hour=21, tm_min=50, tm_sec=4, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=8, tm_isdst=0)	24713601	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the 2012 Toyota Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. It's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. And this is stuff you should know. Reptilian edition. That was not funny. It was. Really? Sure. I didn't expect it. I can't fake laugh. I got you yesterday, didn't I? Did a great fake laugh. That made me really laugh. Yeah. And that's ultimately what you want. Yeah. Josh and I were shooting TV promos, and he handed up a little at one time, which I never do. Sometimes you do. So I have a question for you. Yes. Do you know the difference between a crocodile and an alligator, Chuck? Yeah, sure. All right. Let's hear it, smart guy. Well, no, go ahead. I mean, I don't want to steal your thunder. Okay. Well, I mean, they don't live in the same places. No, that's a big one. Crocodile has a gland in its tongue that helps get rid of excess salt, which allows it to live in brackish water. Salt water? Yeah. Alligators don't have that. Right. That's why they are fresh water. Right. If you see an alligator in the ocean, you're on acid. Probably not. Crocodiles in the ocean are there. They could be in the ocean if they wanted to, is the point. They just don't want to. But you saw the high likelihood of being on acid if you see a crocodile in the ocean. Yeah. I would say yeah. You may want to rethink what you're seeing. Yes, that's one thing. Another one is the crocodile has a V shaped snout, whereas the alligator has more of a rounded u. Yes. And lastly, you can always tell a crocodile because its fourth front tooth on the bottom sticks up over its top lip. So when it's mouth closed, there's always one tooth sticking out. Little snaggle tooth. Yeah, it's a snaggle tooth. The crocodile is interesting. I remember learning most of this back in the schooling days, but I never heard about the tooth. Oh, what is this podcast if not a revisit to school? Yeah, and then some. Back to school without Rodney Dangerfield. Well, you know. So crocodiles and alligators diverged 65 million years ago. Yeah. They had a big falling out. Yeah. And carns or cairns. Are you familiar with these things? I've heard of that. What is that? C-A-I-R-N-S. For all intents and purposes, it's another either alligator. Okay. But all three of them, they went their own ways. They broke up, like the Eagles 65 million years ago. Yeah. They all went on to do their own thing. Yeah. The Eagles got back together, though. Oh, yeah. You said you've never seen the Ho. Yeah. I have to show that to you. I'll send you that link. Okay. Anyway, and I forgot what the point was. They split up many years ago. Oh, yeah. They broke up the band. I got you. The point of all this is you've heard that you can outrun an alligator in a zigzag. I have heard both alligator and crocodile. Okay. So it's maybe a shared commonality. Probably depending on where you live. The only shared commonality is that it's not really true with either one. I guess it is true, but it's just completely superfluous information. That's right. The Mythbusters busted this one wide open. Oh, they did? Yes. With crocodiles and alligators. With live crocodiles and alligators? Yeah, they had a live alligator with corks on its teeth. They stuff pantyhose with dead quail and attached it to the little dummy guy they always use and had a zigzag course. And then I think Kari really got in there. But basically they busted it because they couldn't even tempt them to come after them. Which is sort of the point. It is the point out running an alligator in a zigzag. Yes, you could outrun an alligator in a zigzag. You could also outrun an alligator in a straight line. And probably, like you say, the point is that an alligator is not really interested in you. Like almost all animals, we're way more afraid of them. I'm sorry? They're way more afraid of us than we are afraid of them. Yeah, I guess we're afraid of them. But you know what I'm saying. Sure. They don't want human interaction. No, we smell to them. Yeah. A bear didn't want to kill you. A shark doesn't want to kill you. An alligator doesn't want to kill you. No, I think a bear wants to kill you if you're wherever it doesn't think you should be. Now a bear wants to get into your state cooler in the campground. You've seen Grizzly, man, you should destroy this tape. All right. So you cannot run an alligator. Josh, you were right, because they top out at about 11 mph, which is nothing. It's actually pretty fast. Dude, 11 miles an hour. That's tough to keep up for a little while. Luckily, humans can sprint. It's called foot speed. From between twelve and 15 miles an hour, the average human can. And not only can we run faster, but we have more endurance. An alligator is not going to chase you down the street in your neighborhood in Pensacola. It will come up and growl at you on the porch, which apparently is defensive posturing, not aggression. Yeah, that's true. I actually did a canoeing trip down the Okifinoke many years ago. Not that many years ago. Two years ago. It's been the last, like twelve or 14 years. I wasn't like a little kid. I got you. There was booze involved. There were alligators there near our canoe. And then when you do a trip to the Oki phonogi, one of the coolest things is there are no campgrounds. It is just swampland. And you have to reserve these camping decks and you're the only person that can stay on the deck because it's like, whatever, 15 x 15ft. And so you reserve these things ahead of time and do your trip. You see no other human being once you set off in that canoe. That's neat. It's neat and kind of creepy. Do you have a gun with you? No. Sharp Rock I don't own a gun. Did you borrow a gun? No. We had a lot of boxed wine, though, and food, and it was me and my buddy Clay and Big John, and we all went and we got on our camping deck and by this place, right by this sort of open lakey area. Just gorgeous, man. One of the great trips of my life. And in the morning, we woke up surrounded by alligators. Wow. Like, we saw eyes everywhere, and we heard them growling and woke us up and they were just hanging out, letting us know they were there. Wow. And it was a little unsettling. Sure. I wasn't scared the whole time, but I was definitely aware when you look in this water, it looks like ice tea. They call it black water, but it's really brown. But you can't see like three inches down underneath the water, you can't see anything. So that's what's terrifying, is if I fell out of the canoe, I'd probably just get back in and be no big deal. But you think if I fall out of the canoe, I'm going to get eaten alive. Yeah. So it's a little intimidating. Yeah, because you say that alligators don't want to kill you or anything like that. They will eat you, though, if given the chance, if that's just how things end up. The problem is that you and me aren't going to run into too many alligators that could eat us now, which means that they would have to tear us into pieces, which an alligator tends not to like to do, because as I understand from reading this article, alligators are a little lazy. Yeah. They like to eat their meals in one big gulpy manner. Right. So, like, a normal size alligator, which would be about 5ft or so, is going to eat crayfish and turtles and snakes. Yeah. And things like that. And even a small dog is not really at threat by an alligator. I don't know if I'd throw my Chihuahua in the Oki FANOKI and say, go for a swim. Right. But you're right. At the very least, it's just dirty. It's not dirty. It's just different water. It's nice of you, Chuck. Yeah, all water is beautiful. It was. I mean, it's not like it looks gross. It's just brown. So you talk about small alligators, 5ft and under. That's the vast majority, as I understand. Apparently humans like ones that are even smaller. You've heard of having an alligator as a pet? Rex Band specifically advises against this. Who does? I think it's Rex Bannon from the beer bearing episode of The Simpsons. Right. I think Mose is a pet. Store all of a sudden. But that's how most alligator attacks happen, is when you try to basically adopt an alligator as a pet. Right. Because these things, even if they're small, like a three foot alligator, it's tiny and they make cute noises and they're weirdlooking, they will still take a bite out of you if they feel threatened. And even if you're not going to die, you still have to go to the hospital. Yes. And a mother alligator will certainly attack if you're trying to take one of her little babies as a pet. Not a good idea. And these things we mentioned, they're not super fast on land, but they can swim like, 20 miles an hour. Yeah, that's the big deal. You can outrun an alligator and you probably can't out swim an alligator. You definitely can't. So the ones that you and I would need to be afraid of would be a full grown one, maybe up to like, 11ft. Yeah, that's large. These are the ones that could look at us and be like, I might be able to get that down, my goal in one bite. Right. So let me try. Or at least a small kid. Yeah. The thing is that even these big ones, like you say, they're more scared of us than we are of them. Maybe at the very least, they don't want to be anywhere around us, typically. Yeah. And they don't want to be in a fight either. Like any kind of prey that's going to fight back, they're not interested in. You said they're lazy. They want something easy that they can just, hey, look at that turtle. Okay, I got one for you, smart guy. Yeah. How about whenever you're, like, paddling down the Okie Fenoki and there's an alligator on land and all of a sudden it comes into the water towards you? Is that not aggressive? That is not aggressive. You know what that is? What? It's the alligator feeling threatened and feeling way more at home in the water where they can hide except their little eyeballs that are on top of their head. Right. So they're not coming after you. You've just startled the alligator, and it just so happens to seem like it's coming towards you. It's just going back to its home. I get what you are. If you're in a canoe and you see 15 alligators on land, all of a sudden jump in the water toward you, you think they're coming to attack me and kill me and overturn my boat. I've seen Temple of Doom. I have too, and that's going to happen. Did that happen in Temple of Doom? There was a guy who got rolled. Oh, yes. Are you thinking of? Romancing the stone. I may be. Okay, you have a good memory, but tell them about rolling, the most terrifying thing that can no doubt happen to a human. Okay, so we said that alligators don't want to attack you. They don't want to eat you, they still will attack, and they still will eat you under certain circumstances, especially if you happen to be in pieces at the time. But the way that an alligator will attack you or its food or whatever prey it's going after, it clamps down with its jaws, which are substantial, and it does what's called the death roll, where it rolls over and over and over again, taking its prey with it on this little ride from hell. And typically, the alligator's prey dies from drowning, from being rolled. Because an alligator can hold its breath for up to an hour, it has no problem with death rolling for as long as it likes for kicks. It also has nostrils on its snout, so it can keep its jaws clamped and still breathe while it's death rolling as well. Yeah, you can't do any of those things. So if an alligator gets you in a death roll, you're in big trouble. Yes, agreed. But again, we should point out the numbers bear out the idea that alligators don't really want to have anything to do with us. Right. But they still call it a death role and not a severe injury role. Once you're in the death roll, it's your toast. Right? So, again, though, if you look at the numbers, there's, like, four alligator attacks in the United States a year since 1948. The Fish and Wildlife service reports 356 alligator attacks on humans since 19 48, 25 are fatal. Yeah, and they think nine of those, the victim was already dead. So I guess it just happened upon a dude that had a heart attack. This guy's in four pieces, too. It's my lucky day. Good eating. So the numbers are on your side, and this is not because they are not around, because they also point out that in Florida alone, they average about 12,000 complaints a year. And I mentioned Pensacola. My family cousins grew up there in Gulf Breeze, and they would go out for school one day, and there's an alligator in the front yard. Let's go out the side door. Right? And they would call. And that's one of the complaints, like, hey, I got an alligator in the front yard, and I guess someone come by and take care of it by shooting it probably back into the woods or replacing it. I don't think they would just, like, shoot to kill or anything like that. No, they usually take his head off with a shovel. They don't shoot. It the heel of a shoe. What is an alligator complaint? Sound like this alligator is looking at me. Just an alligator looking at me. Come do something about it. Yeah, that's an alligator complaint, pretty much. They're not they are where they should not be, which is on my property, or again, though, maybe where we should not be, which is in an alligator's house. It's a heck of a point. They lived right on the bay bam. All right, so if an alligator gets you in the mouth, or gets the prey in the mouth, they are going to let go at a certain point to get ready to swallow you. Well, it's in its death row. Yeah. This is like after the death roll, they juggle you around to get you in a good position to eat. They don't, like, just start chomping down. Right. Because they can't move those huge jaws very easily. No, but they're very strong. So you're not going to get out of an alligator's jaw. But they do recommend if you are attacked, this could be a very risky way to get away, is to play dead and wait for them to release you to try and swallow you. Yeah. That's your last ditch effort. And it's an extremely risky one, because once you're in the death roll, again, they don't call it the severe injury roll. Once you feel an alligator clamped down on you, you want to act immediately. And by acting, you want to just scream, you want to yell, you want to make as much noise as entirely possible, because, again, alligators are lazy. They go for low hanging fruit or low hanging crawfish meat. Yeah. And if you put up any resistance, they're going to be like, the heck with this, I'm going to go after something that doesn't yell. I don't like my dominant things to yell at me. It's just depressing. Yeah. And it's probably going to be your instinct, unless you go into, like, shock or something. Right. So do it comes naturally, which is flail and scream and hit them. And then if you can just like the old shark snout, if you can actually get your wits about you, try and jam a finger in their eyeball, which is a good method for stopping any kind of attack. I think it's like the eject button. Yeah. During an attack. Yeah. Humans, any kind of animal, you can gouge their eye, they're going to be like, dude, I've only got two of those. And owl. Yeah. And owl. Right. So that's how to get out. That's how to prevent the death roll. Right. Again, if you are in a death roll, pretty much try playing dead. Nice knowing you. Yeah. Because either you're going to play dead or you're going to be dead. One or the other. So crocodiles are a little more aggressive and that's probably why alligators get a little more of a bad rap. Crocodiles have been known to come after folks here and there. If you're hanging out fishing on the shoreline, especially if you're cleaning your fish on the shoreline, that's a bad move. It's a very bad move. And they are especially aggressive. Where? In Africa and South America or Australia. Australia. Of course they're aggressive in Australia. That's where Crocodile Dundee is from. That's right. So we've coached people on how to fight back. Yeah. And Chuck, let's take a step back. We're giving detailed instructions on what to do if you're attacked by an alligator. Crocodile. Does it ever occur to you that we do stuff like this sometimes? Sure. It's crazy. It is crazy. Go ahead. It's cray, as my wife says. All right, so the two reasons you might get attacked by an alligator or crocodile is, like we said earlier, if you're messing around with your family or you're just in their territory and it's feeding time and you're caught unaware mating season, which is early to mid summer. Yes. That's when the adult males will come after you. Sure. Be careful. Hey. I don't want you trying to hunt my lady. Smile. And that brings us Josh, to me, one of the best sentences on our website, which is miniature occur I'm sorry, two sentences? Yeah. Mini attacks occur as a result of people teasing or trying to capture alligators. Throwing sticks and rocks at alligators may seem harmless, but doing so creates a dangerous situation. Wow. Yeah, it may seem harmless. I read that. Who thinks throwing rocks at an alligator is a harmless act? What's this going to harm? Unless you're like damien from the omen. What kind of sick, twisted kid does this? Sick, twisted kid? Future serial killers. All right, so it's not harmless at all. It's very harmful. Yeah. It doesn't throw rocks at any living thing. Is it jerk? No. And you said when you were on your Oki phonoke canoe trip that you couldn't see very far down into the water. Typically, you want to avoid swimming in just that kind of water. Yes, if you want to avoid being an alligator encounter. Let's call it that. It's super PC. Okay. If you want to avoid an alligator encounter, you want to swim in areas where the water is pretty clear and you can see pretty deep into it and areas that are well groomed. Not a lot of shrubbery and grasses and muckiness for an alligator to hide him. Yeah, and don't send little Timmy down there with his beach ball to play along the shoreline of the grassy shoreline. If your dad, like we said, don't clean your fish out right there by the shoreline. Moms can clean fish, too. That's a good point. Thanks. In fact, in some families, dad catches the fish, mom cleans the fish. In some families, mom catches the fish and dad cleans the fish. Yea. And in some families, nobody fishes. You just buy a fish at the store. You just go to Arthur tree's? Emily would never clean a fish. Are you kidding me? Oh, yeah. Good Lord. Yummy said she loves cleaning fish. Really? Where she grew up. Yeah, I could see that. Because you mean that spunk Emily, if you handed her knife and she cut the fish's head off, she would be like, Are you kidding me? What kind of a joke is this? Let's just go to Arthur tree. Yeah, exactly. You got anything else? Yes, I do have something else. You said your cousins would call the Fish and Wildlife Service when they saw an alligator. If you see an alligator, no matter how small, you want to alert everybody else, too, that there's alligators. Because if you see a baby one, there might be a mom. Yeah. And also don't feed alligators. Oh, sure, yeah, that's good point. The reason why is you are basically writing their death sentence, which is a weird thing to write, but that's what you're doing. Yeah. Because alligators who are fed sometimes lose their fear of humans and may come close enough for a terrible alligator encounter. And any alligator that seemed approaching a human, not out of fear is going to be put down with a shovel. You shouldn't feed any wildlife like that. Really? Especially ones that can kill you, though. Yeah. They're pretty good at finding their own food, right? Until you start feeding them. Then they become less good at that and it just hurts everybody. Basically. You upset the circle of life. You turn it into a rhombus. Yes. If you want to know more about alligators and zigzags, and you want to see a photo of a person holding a detached human arm from an alligator attack, that's crazy. You can type in alligator zigzag in the search bar athouseupforce.com it'll. Bring up this article. And I said search bars means it's time for listener mail. But first, Chuck, it's getting to be about that time. We're like a week or so out from the premiere of our television show, stuff You Should Know on Science Channel. That's right. So it's quick plug time. Yes. As we like to call it. Saturday, January 19. Yeah. Science Channel 10:00 PM. Eastern and 1030. Because we're showing two episodes on premiere night, back to back after season three premiere of Idiot Abroad, which is great. Yeah. So watch it. And, hey, you can get on itunes the day following the show. Yeah. Sunday morning, wake up, have some brunch, a little Bloody Mary, download the show. That's right. And you know what? Science Channel is offering the premiere show for free. That's very nice of them. It is very nice. They take good care of us. They're like the corleone. I hope not. You end up dead. Not if we stand. Okay, so listen to me, right? Yeah. Okay, guys, I'm going to call this meth, another one about math. Meth mania. How about that? Just finished listening to the podcast and I thought I would share my experience. I've never used meth, but I do have bipolar disorder, and the manias I experience have some remarkable corollaries with being high on that. I know about these similarities from reading about people's experiences, tweaking shows like yours, and friends who have actually used math and some who still do during manias. I will stay up for long periods of time. I think 60 hours straight was the longest I've ever been without sleep. Well, I cannot eat I cannot even think about eating, talk a mile a minute, talk so fast in my head that I don't even realize I'm skipping sentences so people can't follow what I'm saying. I can focus on little weird tasks. Like you mentioned, I once decided to transcribe REM at the end of the world as we know it of a CD player, stopping it and starting it mania only time I drink, which is a bad thing because of my medications, I will walk for hours listening to my ipod because music is so amazingly rich and meaningful. During about a mania. Once I was pacing the halls of the hospital and I could feel every nerve firing, every muscle cell tightening and releasing to make me walk. Because of these feelings that happened during mania, there are many people with bipolar who will use meth to recapture that feeling, especially in the throes in the opposite pole of soul sucking depression. Once, my psychiatrist and I decided to take a very brief course of methylphenidate Ritalin. I guess it's a certain type of Ritalin. Okay. I had a paradoxical reaction by that time. By the time I had taken two doses, I slept for 28 hours. When I was awake, I was acutely intensely suicidal. So no amphetamines for me. That's probably a good idea. I wanted to emphasize that meth does play on the brain's existing systems, that the brain itself can even use itself under unusual circumstances. I think he just explained nothing. Maniac can be very destructive though, guys, but it does not affect your dentist bills. And that is from Serena. Bodine Clark. And she said go ahead and read my name. I think this is cool. That's awesome. Thanks a lot, Serena. Appreciate that. Agreed. Let's see. Alligator store? Yeah, why not? Did you got one? A good one. Not like you came up on my yard and yelled at me right now complaining bloodshed only, please. You can tweet to us, as always at SYSK podcast. You can send us a nice little note or missive on facebook. Comstuffyturnknow and you can send us a good old fashioned email to stuffpodcast@discovery.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstofworks.com. Brought to you by the 2012 Toyota Camry. It's ready are you? Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun's shining, the daylight's longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing pool site, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music my Favorite Murder from exactly right media, my Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarif and Georgiahardstarc, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/netstorage.discovery.com/DMC-FEEDS/MED/podcasts/2008/1228338675928hsw-sysk-5-day-weekend.mp3	How the Five Day Weekend Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-five-day-weekend-works	What if Congress passed a law mandating a two-day week work? The Friends of the Five Day Weekend want Congress to do just that -- sort of. Check out this podcast to find out if their proposal is feasible or just plain farfetched.	What if Congress passed a law mandating a two-day week work? The Friends of the Five Day Weekend want Congress to do just that -- sort of. Check out this podcast to find out if their proposal is feasible or just plain farfetched.	Tue, 09 Dec 2008 13:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2008, tm_mon=12, tm_mday=9, tm_hour=13, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=344, tm_isdst=0)	23651290	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from houseuffworkscom. Hey, and welcome to Stuff You Should Know. It's Josh and Chuck. Hi, Josh. Was you waiting on me? I was. I was staring right at you, Chuck. I didn't notice. I should have given you Chuck. I don't know if you've checked out the editorial department calendar recently of our editorial calendar. Sure. Yeah, sure. Not the article. Split it. But our actual calendar. Calendar. No. You haven't? No. Well, you will be pleasantly surprised to find that if you go into the week of Christmas this coming December, we work two days. That's nice. And I'm not working any. Are you taking those days off? Oh, yeah, I'm taking off a couple of weeks. Wow. I used up almost all my vacation time. Sure. I'm very grateful for this, but do you realize what that gives us? What it gives me? Well, it sounds like a two day work week. It sounds also like a five day weekend. One man's two day work week is another man's five day week. Yeah. It definitely depends on how you look at it. If you're a workaholic two day work week, if you're a slacker five day weekend. Right. That sounds great. It does. And actually, our HR department isn't the first to ever come up with this concept, is it? So it is. So there's actually a movement afoot Chuck, called the Friends of the Fiveday a weekend. There's actually a constitutional amendment, a proposal for one right. Which, last time I counted, had about 6500 signatures on it. I wasn't too impressed with that number, by the way. It could be better. Yeah. Basically petitioning Congress to say, all right, we're going to have a two day work week from now on, and the rest is the weekend. Right. Legally, if you work more than this, you have to pay you have to be paid overtime. Right. I love that. This group really went for it there. They didn't go with a three day weekend or even a fourth. They just said, screw it. Five days off, two days a week will work. Yes. And we should probably give a little background on this group. I got to tell you, it sounds very tongueincheek. It sounds almost satirical and a joke, and it almost completely is. The group behind it is the Asheville Convention and Visitors Bureau, I believe. Asheville, North Carolina. And this is an ad campaign, a marketing campaign to get people to Asheville to create this five day weekend so everybody could come to Asheville and spend their five day weekends there. Now, do you know how? Was the idea just to get press? I think so. I think that was part of it, but I think it was kind of like a whole campaign, and then the press aspect wrote itself, especially once they floated a constitutional amendment. So it was kind of a tongue in cheek thing. But actually people reacted to it. They responded to it. Hey, that sounds great kind of thing. Especially, I imagine, when there's, like they held rallies at festivals and stuff like that. I imagine the more beer there was there, the more of a response there was to it. Sure. Yeah. Five day weekend kind of thing. Well, we found out about it here at How Stuff Works. And of course, as is our way, we took a tongue in cheek idea to the nth degree, it's extreme conclusion and wanted to find out what the deal is. Could this work and what would happen if it did? So it's like, be careful making a joke around us because we'll investigate it and publish it, and if it's a stupid idea, we'll say so. Right. But frankly, these people, I think they have a good idea. I think the friends of the Five Day Weekend, they have a good idea, and they're actually pointing something out. What's that? They're pointing out that Americans work way too hard and have been far too serious. Right. Well, Donald Trump doesn't agree with you. No, he doesn't. But that's the Donald he said the idea was ridiculous. He did. He actually said it in his blog. Right. Which I'm sure it got to him in the first place. I'm impressed that he knows how to blog. Right, that's true. So, yeah, he didn't like that. But there's plenty of people who agree with the concept. And actually this idea that Americans are overworked we've got yards of figures here, Chuck. Chuck, how about some figures? I'm the statman. Yeah. In 2007, a survey was performed by the Conference Board, and they found that fewer than 50% of Americans were happy with their jobs, which is right. And that's pretty sad, though. In 1987, 61% had job satisfaction. That's a sharp decline, as you will know. Note that I think in 1987, that was the year that the Michael Keaton pro American movie GungHo came out and really kicked the American worker into overdrive. We're not going to get beaten by the Japanese. Let's get to work. Do you think it's lovable? Michael Keaton led the charge. I think that it's centered exclusively around the movie Gunhoo. Yeah. Wow. Pre Batman Michael Keaton. Right. Then there was another study in 2004 that one third of all Americans feel overworked, which I thought it might be a little higher than that, to be honest. I would, too, but I think we've also developed an endurance over time, too. Right. And fat, lazy, pregung ho days to kind of a lean, trim workforce that we have now. That's slightly evidenced by I know something else. You mentioned the article that a lot of Americans don't use all their vacation days. No. Ten of 14. Yeah, that's just that was in 2006. That added to 574,000,000 unused vacation days. Yeah. That is one thing you will never catch me with unused vacation days. That's great. Hats off to you, buddy. I don't get it. Yeah, time off is good. I'm not lazy. No, you definitely aren't lazy, but you know how to live. You know how to take care of yourself. Yes. And the value of time off, it's a value of Treasurer. But I think there's a lot of people, I think you could even say a majority of American workers don't know they don't know how to do that. So that's kind of the point of this five day weekend. It's like, wake up, man, settle down. Let's all just kind of chill out here there. Learn to live like Chuck. That kind of right. Well, I think I don't have any stats for this, but I bet a lot of these types are the men and women that are after the dollar and that they figure if they're snoozing, they're losing on money. People use acidine rhymes to describe, like, their motivation. Right. And we're not really like that. We're meager, livers. We know how to be happy and content. Yeah. Without making $300,000 a year. You're not making $300,000. Maybe I should renegotiate. So if you'll notice, Chuck, that the friends of the Five Day weekend, like I said, they proposed a constitutional amendment. Now, if Congress, for some weird reason, took this up, championed it and passed it, it actually wouldn't be the first time that they've done this. Right. Did you know that there wasn't any such thing as a weekend in the United States until 1938? I know. That's weird. And the weekend was actually created by a Congressional act. Yeah. That's so cool. Yeah. I bet no one that's your takeaway today, folks, if you want to amaze around the water cooler, that's a good fact. Yeah. The weekend was created by Congress. Right. And it was called the Fair Labor Standards Act. Correct. Yeah. We talked about the Labor Department in free market regulation podcast, if you'll remember, and they shouldn't exist in this free market, but really, the Fair Labor and Standards Act is one of these shining acts that really protects people. Right. It established a 44 hours workweek monday through Friday, about 8 hours a day. It also established a minimum wage, got rid of child labor across the board. It was a good act. Yeah. And it's still the test of time, clearly. Yeah. Because the 40 hours work week is still kind of between 40 and 50 is still the standard. Exactly. Okay, so what would happen if we did go to a two day a week work week? Well, you tell me. No, you tell me. Well, it depends. Are you talking about economically speaking? Yeah. I know people be a lot happier. Well, supposedly it depends. Can you really say that? Well, that's just my feeling. Okay, let me tell you about an unnatural law that you might be interested in. Right. Here's the first problem with the two day work week. How are you going to do five days worth of work in two days. Is it possible? Well, stay off Facebook. Exactly. A good start. There's this guy named, I believe, Alan Parkinson. No, that's Alan Parsons project. I'm thinking of C Northcoat parkinson. He created Parkinson's Law. It's like Murphy's Law. It's an unnatural law. Right. Kind of a rye observation. And Parkinson's Law says that work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. So if you have a one day job to do, but you're given a week to do it, it's going to take you pretty much all week to do that job right. No matter how hard you try. Yeah. So I guess if you put Parkinson's Law up to the five day weekend, you could probably trim several days off of your work week if you just went all out for those two days. Right. Probably not going to be able to finish everything in two days, but it is possible. Right? I would agree. Okay, so that's number one. And then number two. As far as the friends of the five day weekend, see, it basically we're not taking any time for ourselves as it is, even on the weekends. Right. Because there's a lot of times, so much time spent working that the weekends are often spent doing chores, housework, that kind of thing. And in a strict economic sense, in a strict economic definition, actually, leisure time is activities that give direct enjoyment. So just because you have time off doesn't mean you're engaging in leisure time, which is the whole point behind the five day weekend thing. We need more time to have leisure time because, like you said, we're vacuuming, we're running errands, that kind of thing. That's not leisure time. That's working but not being paid for it. So that's another aspect of the whole thing. And there's also a physical aspect to it. Our health could actually improve if we adopted a five day weekend. Case in point a 2000 study from the University of Pittsburgh and the State University of New York. Osuko they found that there is a direct correlation between middle aged men who are at risk for heart disease, suffering heart attacks, and a lack of vacation time. Right. I did a lot of articles recently on the heart and stresses, and it's there. It's not supposed those are direct links. Yeah, there's definitely a mind body link, and it appears to be stress is the most clear example of it. Right, right. Okay. So we would technically be able to do most of our work in two days that we're now taking five days to do. We would be able to actually engage in actual leisure time. Our health would benefit and even more. There's a model already in place for lots of time off, and that's in Europe. Correct. I went to Malta, remember, this summer. There's this guy who's a diplomat over in Croatia. He's an English diplomat, and he had, like, 86 paid days off per year. You're kidding. No, I'm not kidding at all. He hardly knew what to do with all the time off that he had. Wow. And it was fairly common, fairly standard. And I'm like, wow, I get two weeks off. Right. So, yeah, it was a rough thing to come face to face with. Right. I'm jealous of your we often talk about our weekend activities, and you really do it right at your house. Yeah. But you have a very improved house. Well, I'm renovating a house. Some of you may know this, some of you may not. So there's a lot of work to be done on the weekends. I do get pleasure out of that, though, so I guess technically that still counts as leisure time. As long as you're deriving. Pleasure is a direct pleasure. So, Chuck, let's look at it from an economic aspect. Now, we know what the Friends of the Five Day Weekend are saying, that it could be beneficial to us, but would it be beneficial to the economy? Well, this is where you need to school me, because I know economics is your one true love in life. I love economics, actually. It's so weird and nerdy, but I've become fascinated by it as I've grown older. And there's this guy who pertains to what we're talking about named John Maynard Keynes, right. And he, appropriately enough, came up with Keynesian economics and he wrote a paper basically, keynesian economics is a form of macroeconomics, right? So before people would say, okay, there's this much wealth in the world, or people sold this many goods, and there was this gross profit and then minus expenditures, and now you have net profit, and there's economics, and Queens is like, whoa, whoa, whoa, we're missing like, a lot of aspects here. So, like our really, I guess, granular view of economics now, where we're keeping track of office supply or indices, that's all Keynesian. He said we need to take into account debt and taxes and all this other stuff. Right, right. Makes sense. So by the time he writes this paper called Economic sorry, go ahead, go ahead. You economic possibilities for our grandchildren. Right. He writes that in 1930, and he'd already established himself as the economic genius of his age. So he writes this thing everybody's listening, right? And in it he says, okay, he took a very conservative growth rate of the economy and wealth, which he called capital equipment. Yes, thank you. He said 2% growth per year and seven and a half percent growth of the capital equipment, which is, I believe, all the money available in the world. Right. And within 100 years, we're going to basically be living in this leisure society that Friends of the Five Day Weekend came up with. Yeah, I love this theory right now. He actually took his estimates were pretty much spot on, and they were actually slightly more conservative. We've grown more than that. Right. And I believe, like, our capital equipment has grown much more than seven and a half. I think it's like 100 or 200 times or some really enormous amount. And yet we're still not in this leisure society that Keane's envisioned. Within 100 years, even though we far exceeded his predictions for growth, he was off the mark there. For sure. He was. So why? Well, I think you actually did an interview, correct? I did two interviews, and I've always kind of had this idea that, if you want to know a question, go to Harvard, right? They have some really good interview subjects. And actually, I also called a guy from Cornell, too, and both of them just turned out to be spot on. From Cornell, Robert Frank. And from Harvard, Richard Freeman. And the thing is, I called both of them out of the blue. Neither one of them had ever heard of the five day weekend before. And both of them just right off the cuff talk, just perfectly gave me all the information I needed. And as if that weren't enough, both of them had just submitted chapters for a book called Revisiting Keynes on the very question I called them about. And I had no idea that book was even coming out. So it was all just kind of going like, we're operating on all cylinders here. I can't sit down while I'm interviewing. I'm very excited. It's economics and all that. So, Robert Frank from Cornell, his theory was that we haven't reached this Keynesian Leisure Society because Keynes grossly underestimated relative needs. Right. So you've got basic needs, right, which are like food and water and, say, clothing. Right. And then there's relative needs as well, which can also be basic needs, like, for example, clothing. But instead of tattered rags that keep you warm, relative need would be a nice suit. Right. And what Frank was saying was that in our modern society, it's not enough to just have tattered rags that keep you warm. If you want to have a better life, if you want to provide for your children, you have to throw more into relative needs. So your suit has to be nicer so you can get a better job at an interview and then pay for your children. And it's become much more important. You can't walk into a place in an interview in rags, this basic need that's recovered and expect to advance in life. Sure. It was his opinion that that's why Keen missed the mark. Right. Freeman, I know you interviewed and this was from Harvard. Correct. And he just kind of flatly said that Keynes overestimated our desire for leisure. Yeah. And that it's a five day work week is pretty optimal. Yeah. He said that labor and management came to a perfect agreement, pretty much with a five day work week, eight hour day. Right. What do you think? I got to tell you, I had sensed before that I don't like too much time off. It's weird. I feel weird. I feel like I have to do something, I have to produce something. And, yeah, too much time off actually makes me a little edgy. I think a four day work week would be just about right for me. I think it'd be good to pepper it here or there. I don't think it has to be standard every time. It may be like twice a month, you get a day or two off or something like that. And we're not talking about telecommuting. That's a different deal. It totally is. This is actually a day off, right? Yeah. A day off where you're just not expected to do any work. Okay. So now the friends of the five day week or five day weekend, they're not the first to come up with it. Kings did. But I asked Freeman and Frank really, what would happen to the economy. Sure. Hypothetically, what would happen? Yeah. What you got? Well, I know the first thing that you would have to do is to convince your employers to pay you a full wage for two days work. So paying on production rather than time. Right. Which makes sense, but I don't think either of them assume that employers would be willing to do that. Right. So right there, you've got two fifths of the wages we have now. Exactly. Which is fine for domestic products. Right? Right. So anything that's produced domestically, it's going to fall down in step eventually to reflect these two fifths of wages that Americans are making. In theory, yes. Okay. But also, houses would get substantially smaller, cars would get substantially smaller, but we'd be able to survive. Basically, America would take a gigantic step backward out of the rat race as one collective hole. But then it would all kind of catch up with itself and adjust itself. It would everything would be fine. Right. I'd be much like it is now, except two fifths is valuable. Right. But for them produced goods in comparison to our lowered wages, the prices of those would skyrocket. Right. So long. Sony Plasma TV Right. Because it would be as out of balance as a $500 million home is for the average person. So you'd have that. But again, we'd still be fine. Our relative needs would lower to reflect that two fifth wage. But I think it was Freeman who predicted, sadly, that we would still compete with one another. Right. Like, we'd still want to get the best TV we could for two fifths of the wages we were getting, and we'd want it to be better than someone else. Yeah. The Jones. Yeah. It's kind of sad that even after taking a gigantic step backward, we would still compete with one another. Right. There's an interesting article. It will clearly never happen, but it's interesting to kind of think about what the what if? I think so, too. So there's actually quite a bit more to this article, right? You tell me, you wrote it. Well, let's just advise people to go onto our handy site, look into our handy search bar. Just type five day weekend into the search bar, how stuff works.com and stick around because it is listener mail time. Right, Chuck? Listener mail time. Listener mail time. Okay, so, Chuck, who is our listener mail from? Our listener is David, and we have no last name. We don't know where David's from, but David did not take kindly to our Delta Force podcast. Okay. But he was very constructive in his criticism. Okay, good. Enough slamming. David says hi, Chuck and Josh. I usually enjoy your podcast quite a bit, but your recent podcast on Delta Force was way over the line. While I appreciate the bone you through human rights activists at the end before suggesting that they may be killed for a policy disagreement, you're over the top adulation for all things military was disturbing. You seem to suggest that any action they took was justifiable saying how happy you were that they were taking care of business. Not every policy decision made by our government, particularly when using shadowy military groups, is for the best. I'm not going to read it because it's too long, but basically he thinks our opinion of Special Forces might change if some European or Arabian country special forces to tapped their way through the White House to arrest our president. So he was kind of just disagreeing with a little bit. And at the end there, David is referring to the colonel of Delta Force back with two tap method, which two shots is ahead of every terrorist? Which I have to say can we play a clip? Because we actually warned David and all the other listeners that it could devolve into something like this. Right? Sure, let's listen. Okay, it is yeah, we should probably warn the listeners right now. Chuck and I will most likely devolve into some sort of weird boyhood admiration of all the sick stuff Delta Force has done over the years. So just be forewarned, if we start tutoring or get really excited or one of us takes our shirt off, don't be offended. Okay. So David actually shamed us a bit. We did feel bad after this one, if I recall correctly, because we're not big. No, we're not. It's just this weird power that Delta has over us. Yes, we are odd. Yes, we got a little juvenile, sure. But yeah, David, generally we would agree with you. Right. We believe in human rights and diplomacy, not military action as much. But I think one point that we tried to make, and I don't know if we made it clear enough, is that if there is action to be taken, we would much prefer a small operation rather than some day 130,000 troops in Iraq. And just quickly before we go, we got a message from another Dave about the same podcast. Hi, I listened to your podcast from the UK and really liked the one about Delta Force. Would it be possible for you to do one on European special forces, like in Germany and France? Cheers. Yes, and cheers to you, Dave. We were not aware that France had a special force, so some guys liked it, some guys didn't. That's great. Oh, and don't forget our girlfriend in Sudan who started listening to it through her speakers and sent us an email saying that she felt uncomfortable doing so. Press pause. Right? But she was happy with it as well. Yeah. Great. So thank you to all three of you guys for sending email. And David, thank you very much for letting us know how you feel. We appreciate it. If you guys want to send us an email, let us know what's on your mind, whether you like what we said, whether you didn't. Either way, we're cool with it. Send it to Stuffpodcast at How Stuff workscom. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you?"
https://podcasts.howstuf…-inquisition.mp3	How the Spanish Inquisition Worked	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-spanish-inquisition-worked	The idea of pious monks imbued with unbridled power and with a penchant for dealing torture and death is a scary one indeed, and one both Spain and the Catholic Church have tried to reconcile since the Spanish Inquisition ended in the 19th century.	The idea of pious monks imbued with unbridled power and with a penchant for dealing torture and death is a scary one indeed, and one both Spain and the Catholic Church have tried to reconcile since the Spanish Inquisition ended in the 19th century.	Tue, 04 Mar 2014 15:37:04 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2014, tm_mon=3, tm_mday=4, tm_hour=15, tm_min=37, tm_sec=4, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=63, tm_isdst=0)	41606668	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Are you looking for? An escape? An immersive getaway experience? Well, there's a place for all your wildest dreams. Perhaps you enjoy wrapping along the paperboy or you believe that blessed be the fruit. Or you dream of one day smashing a glass while stealing who's. Ah. Whether you're sworn to Team Kim or you just want a good old fashioned mysterious murder, there's a place that has it all. From Atlanta to only murders in the building, it's all on Hulu so check into your obsessions. Hulu subscription is required, terms apply. Visit hulu.com for plan details. Welcome to stuff you should know from householdworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W, Chuck Bryant and Jerome Roland. Jerry. That's J-E-R-I. Yeah. For those who don't know we've ever said that. And we get many variations. Yeah. It's mind boggling to me that some people get it right. And Jerry's, a lady might as well just go ahead and get that out there. I think most people knew that, right? Most people. New listeners or producers. Jeri, the ladies. Nice. That's a T shirt right there. Yeah. Okay, well, we have that settled officially. If anybody ever asks, we can just send them the link to the Spanish Inquisition episode. Yeah. I've been singing the History of the World part One song all day. Yeah. I was going to ask, how shall we start this? With the song or with the nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition, so either Mel Brooks or Monty Python. Yeah, they're both great. You do one and I'll do the other at the same time. The Inquisition. No one expects the Spanish Inquisition. I watched that bit again today. I did, too, and I was like, that's good. It got me lol. Wow. Yeah. Flying Circuit is one of the great sketch shows of all time, I think. I'm curious, Chuck, what percentage of LOLs do you think are actually symbolic of a real laugh out loud? Like when people say that even if it's a chuckle? Yeah. I don't know. I never say lol, though. Always say habit. I've seen you type lol. No, I have two dude. I've never typed lol. That is not true for any Internet shorthand. That's not true. It is so true. Find the documentation. I will. Okay. I'm going to find it. I didn't expect the third degree. Nobody expects the third degree. That's what my family said. We said the third degree, not the Spanish Inquisition third degree. My family just left everybody alone. So, Chuck yes? You've heard of the Spanish Inquisition? Obviously I have, sir. Are you familiar with the actual thing? Like beyond the no with Monty Python and Mel Brooks. No, I didn't know a whole lot about it. This one was a delight to learn. Yeah. It was one of those things in history where you realize, man, it has it all. Frankly, there was more to it than just what we thought. Sure. And it's possibly misunderstood. Yeah. There's a lot of controversy surrounding how deep it went and how bloody it got, and a lot of people are still duking it out. Yeah, it makes sense. Pope John Paul put it very well when he said, and I'm paraphrasing here, that, yes, the Inquisition happened. Yes. It was super messed up. Let's find out exactly how messed up it is. So the Church can be fully penitent under being fully informed. Right. But it wasn't saying, like, stop making such a big deal about the Inquisition, because it was a big deal because it was using a court system, pretty much a perverted court system. And now the kind that's, like, rusty in Eugene, like perverted, meaning, like, twisted and grotesque, to root people out based on the idea that they weren't pious enough or pious in the right ways. And even that was disingenuous because ultimately it was used to consolidate power. Yeah. And I saw other remarks from historians that even more ultimately, perhaps, it was a way to get money. Yeah. So power and money. I think so. The whole thing is just disgusting at its core. Sure. And it's a real blemish on the history of both the Church and Europe. But it did happen. But it's also possible that just how bad it was, like you're saying was exaggerated right. Over the years. So let's talk about this. We're talking specifically about the Spanish Inquisition, but you can't really just talk about the Spanish Inquisition. It didn't happen in a vacuum. No, it was part of a larger thing, the Inquisition in general, which is basically a court system where the court is actually responsible for trying you rather than being an impartial spectator referee. Yeah. It's called the tribunal. Basically, there's no jury. The judge decides whether you're guilty or not and what your fate will be. Right. Which is kind of uneasy for the person who's being tried. Yeah. I think maybe a couple of inquisitors might have been at work at times, but it definitely wasn't like a jury system by any means. Not at all. There were also some other characteristics of an Inquisition. You were not allowed to know who is accusing you, and anyone could accuse you. You had to testify whether you wanted to or not, without any help. Yeah. And like you said, anybody could accuse you. Other criminals could accuse you, family members, other heretics. Yeah. That was the whole point of this, was to root out heretics people who held beliefs that flew in the face of Church orthodoxy. Yeah. And I think we should get into this a little bit, because there's a broad definition of heretic, like, what they could actually ring people up for was vast. Yeah. It wasn't like you're anti Catholic or you're a non Christian atheist. Most of these people were either converts to Catholicism, forced converts like Jews or Muslims, or it could have been anything from bigamy to quote superstitions was one of the things. Yeah. There are a lot of witches who are rooted out at that time. Solicitation and this is all, by the way, from the archive. They eventually opened up the Secret Archives the Catholic Church did about all this. Yeah. That's capitalized, by the way. Secret Archives. Yeah, it's a title. Yeah. And so they actually had percentages of what people were brought in for. And like I said, most of them was because you were a different faith, but one of them was miscellaneous. Two or 3000 people. Wow. Freemasonry. Sodomy bigamy, superstitions, basically anything that they could cook up, that they wanted to cook up. Okay. If they wanted to. And that was heresy. And that was the umbrella crime that was being investigated by the Inquisitions. Yeah. Supposedly, you had to be teaching these beliefs to other people, not just simply like a quiet believer of these heretic things. And you had to be doing it of your own free will and not be like if you were under the influence of Satan. Right. And you had to still hold this belief publicly, even after being corrected, even after it was pointed out that what you believe is heresy. So you want to correct yourself. Yeah. So if you didn't correct, then yeah, you're right. So let's take it back a little further. Back in the day, Christians were very much persecuted and were thrown to the lions, and they were very much mistreated. Sure. And apparently they kind of took that in a lot. The same way that maybe Pipsqueak, who's bullied and then bulk up over time, the 90 pound weakling. Yeah. Being bullied. The Christians did much the same thing. Either that or they had a very short memory, because after Constantine the Great converted to Christianity, he was the Roman Emperor. All of a sudden, the Church, the Catholic Church started to enjoy a lot of power. Sure. And that power grew and grew and grew. And then all of a sudden, there were monarchies all over Europe that were Catholic. They considered themselves Catholic. They associated with the Catholic Church. They were in cahoots with the Pope and they became very powerful. The Church became a very powerful institution. And one of the ways that it decided it was going to spread its power and maintain its power was to squash anything that was outside the purview of Catholic orthodoxy. Yeah. Anything that the Pope said was not kosher, was not okay. It was heresy. And this is at the same time, there are a lot of different sects of Christianity, of Catholicism even, that we're starting to gain in popularity. So things like the Illuminati came out of this era, and the Kaithars, like, very spiritual groups that were Christian and identified as Christian, but thought the Pope was corrupt. And the Pope said, we're coming after you guys. Yes. And this is the first Inquisition. Yeah. There were even persecution of fellow Christians. Protestant Christians, lutheran Christians. Right. So it wasn't necessarily just your Jew or your Muslim? No, they were Christians initially. It wasn't until the Spanish Inquisition that Jews were targeted. It was during the medieval or Papal Inquisition, starting, I think, 1231 under Pope Gregory the 9th. Yes. He issued a Papal bowl that said, we're going after heretics and we're going to use Inquisition. And that was the start. That's right, 1231. And he picked the what was known as the Dominican Order, which was not Dominican as in Dominican Republic, but founded by St. Dominic de Guzman. And they were apparently, like, super smart and really knowledgeable, and they were the people to, I guess, the A Team to go about conducting this first Inquisition. Right. So this was under King Ferdinand Two and Queen Isabella, and it says they were secular rulers. Do you know what that means? Did they not identify as Catholic or that wasn't there? No, they definitely did, but I think what they were saying was it wasn't like the Pope. Okay. They were the head of government. Okay, that makes sense. Yeah, I got you. But they did identify as Catholic, and they just recently united Spain under a Catholic monarchy. Right. And so they were saying, we need to make sure everybody else is Catholic, so let's start an inquisition here, too. Right. Plus, we can collect some money. Right. If they're found guilty, take their land, that kind of thing. So, like I said, Isabel and Ferdinand with Pope 60 the Fourth, and like you said, it was to create unity on the surface, but probably was more about power and money and kind of just squashing any alternative thought. Right, yeah. If you're consolidating two lands into a single kingdom, it's not like flipping a switch. There's a lot of people who have political ties and alliances on a more local level. There's, like, dynasties and clans. Sure. I guess Isabella and Ferdinand said a really good way to unite everybody is under the banner of Catholicism. But ultimately it was about them consolidating their power and breaking up these alliances and to gain money. Because part of the Inquisition was if you were accused of heresy, and if you were convicted of heresy, the Church and the government would take your land and split it with the person who accused you. So it ultimately became this very powerful political tool and almost a machine that raised a lot of money for Spain. Yes. We talked about Jews and Muslims. They were two of the bigger targets as far as it was just a bigoted culture. Basically, Jews were putting ghettos or killed, which is weird because Spain grew out of Jews, Christians and Muslims living together in this area. But then under Ferdinand and Isabella, it was just Catholicism. Yeah. They were officially banished with the Alhambra decree in 1492. And here's the rub. A lot of these Jews converted to Catholicism, but it wasn't like they were like, oh, cool. Well, that's great. You converted to our religion and that's all well and fine. They called them Pigs Moranos, which is derogatory, and said, we think you're probably still really practicing Judaism. Right. Which some of them might have been. So, yeah, it was like suddenly the power establishment was Catholic, and there were a lot of Jews who converted. They were called conversos, too, which was, I think, kind of a neutral term for them. But they were converted catholics. And, yes, there is a great deal of suspicion that they were Jewish in everything but name, and that they just converted to avoid persecution. Not even necessarily at first to avoid persecution, but just to be able to gain power. Right. Because the power establishment was Catholic. So I'll just go become Catholic, too, and I'm still really Jewish, but I can hang out and have communion with you guys who are running the show. And so it was the suspicion that they were what are called crypto Jews running around in Spain that initiated the first Spanish Inquisition. Yeah, and I guess the same is true with the Muslim Moors. They would convert to Catholicism, and that still didn't really count. They were known as Moriscos, which is Moorish, and it was basically the same thing as the Jewish community. They were still targets even though they converted. And like I said, it went all the way over to Protestants and fellow Christians. Right. So anything not Catholic? Basically. And not even not just not Catholic, but not Orthodox Catholic. Yeah. And it wasn't just in Europe either. It happened in the New World, in Mexico, basically anywhere Spain was setting up shop, there could be a mobile Inquisition unit. Right. So that was one of the even more despicable aspects of the Inquisition, was that they would go conquer a land and then set up an Inquisition to root out the nine Catholics and a land that was there were no Catholics. So, like, when Spain took over Granada, it was Moorish, it was Muslim, they set up the Inquisition there. Or the Portuguese also had an Inquisition, and when they went to India, they set up the Goa Inquisition and rooted out Hindus. Well, it's like, of course there's Hindus here. You guys came from over there to the land of Hindus. Yes, there's going to be Hindus here. This is awful. But yeah, they also did it in Mexico and other places, too. Yeah, like we said, this isn't the only Inquisition. There was one in Portugal. There was the Roman Inquisition in the 1540s. That's where Galileo was famously, I guess, tried. Yeah. And he was under house arrest, but apparently his arrest in his trial was more just like it just flew in the face of science. The way he was treated apparently wasn't so bad. Like, he had a pension from the Pope and I thought he was entirely fine. He died of natural causes. Yes, he was under house arrest, but he wasn't hurting. Apparently. It was more just like the fact that there was a trial of science by catholicism. Right. It doesn't get more literal than that. Exactly. So, like you're saying, it's exported everywhere. But let's get into the trials in a minute, right after these messages. Hey, everyone, when you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office? And you could be using stamps.com. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses, because stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and ups shipping services you need right. From your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to stamps.com. Click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. Okay. Welcome back. You want to talk about the trials, Chuck? Yeah. We mentioned earlier that you could be accused by anyone anonymously. You didn't have the assistance of a lawyer. You weren't necessarily even informed of your charges, and you had to testify on your own behalf, like you were forced to, basically, yeah. And on top of that, you didn't rarely have anyone coming to your defense. Oh, yeah. Because you would probably also be rung up as a heretic. You're kind of on your own. The witnesses, their defense. Yeah, I've got a character witness here, and the guy's going, no, not me. Yeah, I probably did see him flying around on a broom. Who knows? I didn't see anything about this, but it said that fellow heretics could write out other ones. But I wonder if there was a system of leniency if you sold people down the river. I think there definitely was. This is how it happened. From what I understand, there would be news that the parish priest would get that the inquisition was coming and some inquisitors would come, and I couldn't believe it, but this article failed to mention tomas de torquemada, the grand inquisitor. His name doesn't appear in this article. It's crazy, but for a while, torque mata took over from, I think, 1483 to 1498. And is he just like, the chief of the supreme court? He's the head guy. Okay. And he is extremely vilified in history. He was a very hated man because he was the face of the inquisition, of all this torture and burning at the stake and rooting people out. Just a literal witch hunt. Yeah. He's also somewhat defended by history a little bit, too, apparently, prior in the two years after the Spanish Inquisition started and when he took over in 1483, those two years were very bloody. There was a lot of torture. There were basically no rules. Torquemada came in and established rules. So there were things like you can't torture anybody for longer than 15 minutes. A doctor has to be present during torture. If the doctor says, call it off, you have to stop. True. But also, if you did do this stuff, you can also get off pretty easily. Right. Like, if you did torture and you weren't supposed to, it's really not that big of a deal. Like no one's going to do anything to you. Well, you could do torture because in twelve I can't remember, maybe 1283, one of the Pope issued another papal bull, saying in addition to being able to do an inquisition, you could torture, too. That was Pope Innocent the fourth in 1252. Very appropriate. Yeah. So you could torture somebody under the auspices of the Church, but you weren't supposed to mangle them or something like that. But yes. There wasn't any punishment for these inquisitors. Right. But Torque mod is the face of the Inquisition, but there are some people who say, well, he kind of brought a little bit of order to it, if you can look at it like that. Yeah. And other people say he may have even saved people from gang violence of people basically just running in your house and burning you at stake. Right. Or from the state. Because there were apparently some just common criminals who, upon being captured, would blast theme, and then they would be tried by the Inquisition, which is apparently a little more lenient and forgiving. Because consider this, Chuck. This was as gross as it is, as dark, as despicable as this whole Inquisition was, it was still, at its core, a religious exercise. And the whole point, from the inquisitor on down, especially these people who are true believers, the whole point was to extract a confession and save the heretic soul. Yeah. It was all about the confession. You couldn't just pronounce someone guilty. It was pulled out of them by any means necessary, basically. And not only that, you had to confess twice. If you confess under torture, you had to further confess under normal light of day that what you said was in fact true. Right. So the inquisitors would come to town, they would set up shop, they would establish, they would say mass, they would tell everybody what was going on, that they were here for an inquisition. Yeah. And they give them a chance right then. Yeah. There's a 40 day grace period. Yeah. And say, you can confess your heresy right here, and you won't be tortured, you won't be punished. You might have to do some penance, of course, but you can escape torture for sure, and you have to denounce other heretics. Right. So that was sort of the McCarthyism. If you name names, then we'll go easy on you. And so apparently some parish priests would find out that the Inquisition was coming and we'd gather their flock and say, everybody keep your mouth shut. Right. These guys will leave eventually. Just shut up. And a lot of times these were just like country peasants who had, like, they knew that they loved Jesus and the Pope was in charge of them, but they also knew that they needed to get back to their donkey because they hadn't fed it that day and they needed to plow the fields later that afternoon. Right. These weren't like, sophisticated people. No. And these were the most educated, scholarly people on the planet at the time. Yes. Coming to their town and interrogating these peasants as to the nuances of Catholic orthodoxy. Yeah. They were leading questions. They would confuse them, they would get them rattled. All just in the name of, I guess, taking land and money and assuming power. Right. And that was another thing, too, that I think we didn't mention the Jews in Spain prior to the consolidation of Spain into Spain. This is the merchant class. While there were plenty of peasants who were uneducated, there are also a lot of Jews who were very much educated, who were wealthy. So they did make even more desirable targets under that viewpoint that this is all about money and power and land. Like, what better group to target than the wealthy middle class, right. And they did. Yeah, that's a good point. Think about that. Thanks, man. So where were you? They weren't clever. They were being confused, basically, depending on where you were. This is the country parish that we're talking about right now. Yeah. Pumpkins. European pumpkins. They wear, like, sauce pants on their heads for hats and overalls with no shirts underneath. So the other thing is, they were imprisoned until they got a confession. So it's not like if they didn't get a confession, eventually they would just let them go and shun them. They would hold onto them until they confess, basically. Right. That was the only way to get out. And if you died in prison yes. Well, you'd be buried, but then your bones would be dug up and cremated and basically scattered. Right. Like as an insult after death and little known fact. But in the 19th century, somebody did this to Torque Mata's remains. Oh, really? They dug them up and incinerated what was left of them and scattered his ashes, which, I mean, if you're high up in the Dominican order, if somebody did that to your bones, it's an enormous spiritual stab in the neck. Okay, so we have the bull, the decree of torture issued. And so we've covered this in medieval torture devices, a lot of it, but they would do various things to extract whatever information they wanted. One was called the stripado. And this didn't sound too bad to me at first. What? Well, hold on. Let me explain. So, at first I read this as your hands, you're hung basically by your arms above your head, which is pretty bad in and of itself. Well, I mean, that and the rack both sound like early Chiropractic care, in a way. Like, it could really work some things out in the lower back. But then I realized that your hands are tied behind your back, and then you are hung from those hands. That's a way different thing than just being hung from your hands. Yeah. Because the chances of your arms coming out of your sockets yeah, pretty good. Very high. And there were also additions to this torture that could be added like heavy weights to your legs. Sure. You could be jerked downward yeah. Instead of just hanging there. Yeah. Just to really kind of help that dislocation along and make the stripado even more excruciating. They might burn you with hot pokers while you were hanging there. Yeah. Heavy boots. Yeah. The boot. You didn't want that. You didn't want the boot. We talked about the rack, which is when your hands and feet are tied and you're on these rollers and a metal frame, and they basically just turn those rollers and give you a good stretch, meaning your limbs would come out of socket. And if they did it too much, they might come completely away from your body. You know what crazy? I heard or read that there's something going on with a certain species of starfish right now that they appear to be committing suicide. Oh, no. They're getting some sort of infection. And to kill themselves, their arms crawl in different directions until the middle is ripped apart and they just eviscerate themselves. That's awful. But that's going on right now. And no one has any idea what the heck is going on with these Starfish, why they're getting this mysterious infection. And then no one knew that starfish committed suicide. And the fact that they know this is pretty remarkable, too, that somebody is studying Starfish that closely that they have realized this is going on. Well, you're probably watching the first starfish, the first time. You're like, this starfish is really confused. How cute. Oh, my God. And then another one does it, and another one you're like, we've got a problem. I need to go write a paper. Nothing's funny about that. I love Starfish. I don't know why I'm laughing. So, like you pointed out earlier, mutilation was prohibited, supposedly during the torture. But Alexander IV also decreed that you could clear anyone from wrongdoing, like we pointed out. So you're not going to go up on a tribunal for torturing someone as an inquisitor? No, that's not going to happen. I didn't see anything anywhere in the research where any inquisitor ever got in trouble for anything that was done during the Spanish Inquisition? I don't know. It may have happened, sure, but I didn't see anything. So let's recount real quick. Yeah. The Inquisition comes to town. It's made up of some inquisitors, their secretaries, their staff, and a banjo player. They set up shop, and there's a 40 day grace period where they're just hanging out. Anybody who wants to come confess can confess and be forgiven. I bet that was scary, though. Like, you don't want to be the first guy to trust that. Yeah, come on, confess. And people are like, you go do it. Right. I'm sure it'll be fine. Right? Well, apparently you would wear, like, a yellow cross on your clothes, much like a scarlet letter for a while as part of your penance. There are Benito, you were forgiven. And even after the grace period, if you confessed under torture, and then they made you confess again without being under torture, and they took it as a genuine one, you were forgiven. Well, tenants could be rough, though. It could be, but it could also not be. Yeah, but it was on the case, and it was left up to the inquisitors to use their judgment. True, but some of the tenants included, like taking all your land, like we said, paying additional signs of money to have hard labor for the rest of your life. Sometimes you're exiled completely from your county or from your country. Yes. So you've got all of this is going on in a little town on the countryside. Not necessarily a little town like Bologna, Toledo. They saw some pretty heavy action, and these weren't necessarily backwater burgs, but the Inquisition would come to town, set up a grace period, then the accusations would start to fly. There'd be torture, there'd be confessions, and then there was what are called the autos defay. And an auto defay was a religious ritual filled with a lot of pomp and circumstance, where the accused and convicted would walk around town in a big procession. Yes, they'd have mass. Of course. Of course. They have mass all the time. Sure. And everybody would come out for it. It was a huge thing, very much like a public execution in the United States or in other parts of Europe. But the huge difference was there was never an execution in an auto deface. Right. It was a religious ceremony, and it wouldn't have ended in execution. Even if the people who were in the procession, who had been convicted had been sentenced to death. It wouldn't take place during an auto defay. It would take place separately. And in most cases, the inquisitors gave that person over to the secular authorities to carry out the execution. Yeah, they didn't execute folks themselves, although they could just abandon you, is one way to look at it, where they would just kind of say, he's a heretic, turn him over to the public, and. That's where you would get burned at the stake. Yes. Especially if you're a repeat offender. You generally weren't forgiven for that. Right. If you messed up more than once and we talked before, I don't remember what it was in, but burning at the stake, we came across some documentation of what it would be. It took, like, 30 minutes to die from it at the earliest, up to a couple of hours, depending on if the wind was blowing too much. That would be a horrible way to go. Yeah. Was the worst way to die? No, it was more recent than that. Was it? I don't remember what it was, but we'll get to the fallout from all this stuff, because you can't do this to people and not expect it to be a fall out over the course of history. Sure. And the Inquisition wasn't just from the 1481 to 1492, when the Decree of Alambra was issued. It kept going on until the 19th century. Yeah. 1834 was when the last one in Spain occurred. There was a school teacher who was put to death in 1826 because he taught daism to his class. Wow. That's the 19th century. 1826. That's not the 15th century. The 19th century. No, it's not that long ago in the grand scheme of things. Yeah. And in 1858, there's a very famous case of a kid named Edgardo Mortar, and he was a Jewish kid raised in a Jewish family who was dying of a fever when he was, like, seven or something like that. And one of the domestic servants did an emergency baptism on the kid. The Church found out about it, came and took him from his family and raised him as a Catholic. Wow. When was that? 1858. Holy cow. Yes. So that was even after the last Inquisition, supposedly. Yes. So here's the thing. The Spain said no more Inquisition in 1834. The Catholic Church still actually has something called the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith and renamed it in the yeah. The concept of the Inquisition is part of the Holy See, which is the Pope's power. But obviously nothing like this is going on these days. So since the aftermath of the Inquisition is pretty controversial, because beginning in the 1500 with prostitute Reformation, you had a lot of anticatholic and antispanish sentiment, and a lot of people from the Catholic side these days are saying it was so exaggerated in the aftermath. That a very small percentage. When we look in our secret archives and our statistics were actually killed, I think it was zero 1%. I saw something different. I saw 1% of the 125,000 trials in Spain, Italy and Portugal. And here's the thing, man. I looked at, like, three or four different sets of numbers and they're all way different. So we're never going to know actual, like, solid numbers, because if you are anti Catholic, you probably have your own set of numbers. And if you're pro Catholic, you have your set of numbers, right. You know what I'm saying? But these numbers, the 1% of the 125,000 trials that's based on the Secret Archive that thank you. That the Vatican opened up in 1098 under Pope John Paul II and said, you know what? You guys come in here, these scholars root around and give us a full report on the Inquisition, and let's see what's what. And he apologized when he announced that, and then he apologized in 2004 when they issued the report, finally. And that's where that 1% of the 125,000 came from. Yes. And I saw blog opinion pieces from 2004 where some people were like, we shouldn't be apologizing for this again. It was, like, really inflated numbers, and it wasn't as bad as people say. Well, again, that's the pro Catholic side. Yeah, not pro Inquisition necessarily, but Catholic defenders, I think is a better way to say it. Yes. I think they're probably also pointing out, like, yeah, this is mostly Spain, and it was mostly the monarchy, and most of these executions were carried out by the Spanish state rather than the Inquisition. Yeah, it's kind of tricky wording, though. It is. I mean, the Pope was definitely involved. He gave his blessing at the time that Ferdinand and Isabella did carry this out, even though he came to regret it later. But they were saying that he came to regret it because he gave away so much power, because they said, can we have an Inquisition here in Spain? And he said, I don't know. And they said, hey, you know those Spanish troops that are protecting you from Turkey right now in Rome? How about we recall them home? And he said, yeah, why don't you have an Inquisition? And by the way, you don't have to answer to me. Just go ahead and have your Inquisition. And years later, it's like, man, that was probably not a good idea, because Pope John Paul II is going to have to apologize twice for this. Right. And plus, what's the difference in executing someone yourself at the end of a tribunal and saying, well, we're not going to do it, but if someone else happen to after we set them into the street, it's not on our way, and not even set them into the street, they're being killed because we tried them, because they weren't Catholic enough. But, yes, I think this is a really great illustration of that. History is never black and white. Right. And it can very easily become conflated. And even still today, we don't necessarily know what happened. And even if we do know what happened from the symposium on the Inquisition, not everybody believes it. Yeah, well, we got some good comedy out of it for Mel Brooks and Monty Python. Years later, we shared a tragedy plus time. Hey, everyone, when you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office? And you could be using Stamps.com. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses, because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right from your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary. And you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS rates and 86% off Ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to Stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. Let's see. You got anything else? I do not. Sure. If you want to learn more about the Inquisition, you can type that word and it's search barhowstepords.com, and it will bring up this article. And since you said search bar, get this, everybody, it's time for all right, so, as most of you know, this is a time when we thank people for sending us nice things, from records and books to Christmas cards and cookies. So let's get this going. Here, I've got some CDs for you. And vinyl albums even. Yeah, baby. And the nobody sent us shirts and CDs. Fan austrian. Our buddy Gentry Colello sent us a vinyl LP and some T shirts for her band, Land of Vandals. Nice. Yeah, we got those. It's good stuff. Matt Rob from the School on Wheels team sent us a nice Christmas card. Thank you for that. Yeah. And since we're on Christmas cards, amy, that is, with an Ie. Meyer from Sellersburg, Indiana, sent us a nice Christmas card. Yeah. And I was saying Matt rob or rob? Well, two A's. I call them Matt broccoli. Rob in mine. So I'm going to say Rob. Okay. Stacey Waybill sent us some children's books. Rudy's Incredible Kidney Machine. And Rudy gets a transplant, so there's a children's book for everything. And this one covers kidney transplants. Awesome. Our pals at Co ed, the Cooperative for Education, who helped fund education for kids in Guatemala who were very fond of they sent us a nice Christmas card. So thanks, guys. We got some knit socks from Jennifer Beaver that are very warm and colorful, which I know you like. Yes. We got a Christmas card from Heather from Montana. Thank you. Got a postcard from Susanna. Danner. Thank you for that. Lauren Coin also sent us a Christmas card. And you can watch my dessert junkie on YouTube. And that's her YouTube show. Yes. We got three, not one, not two, but three volumes of short documentaries from Robin Canfield from Actuality Media, which supports a documentary study abroad program, which is pretty awesome. So all of you documentarians out there, check that out. Actuality Media. Very cool. Thank you, Charles Shell, for sending us custom stuff you should know. Necklace, Ashley Murphy for the Japanese hero masks, and the nice letter that she sent. Yeah, that was nice. Those were great. Thank you very much to Mona Collantine and Grandma Collantine and the whole Collantine family for sending us the big old tin of Christmas cookies again this year. Thank you, Ramona. She's one of our local fans and she's awesome. Although her boyfriend, I don't think, helped. So, Nathan, unless you make cookies for us, I won't mention you again. Although he might have helped. Catherine Harmon. Courage sent us the book. Octopus. That's with an exclamation point because she knows that we love the octopus. Yes. And our buddy, Aaron AC, Zoo Cooper, who again, this year, took some of his best images of US. Photoshopped into weird situations and made hard posters for us, which are awesome. So, thanks, Coop. We appreciate them, as always, you're the best. Uncle John's Bathroom Reader. They always send us great stuff, our friends. They send us the books. Weird inventions in weird Canada. And if you're Canadian, you need to get weird. Canada. Yes. And if you're not Canadian, you should get it, too. They sent us a couple of other ones, too, that I got. Yeah, you can follow them on Twitter, go to their website. Uncle John's Bathroom Readers. They are wonderful. Mark Palm of Vancouver, BC. Sent us a seven inch of his band, Supercrush. It's pretty great. Seven inches of record, by the way, for those of you not in the know. Yeah, we got two albums from Ghosts of Sailors at Sea. We got the Skeleton Coast and a single, so thanks for that. Nicole Wingot sent us wristbands from her obstacle course racing team, the Corn Fed Spartans. Let's see, vivian Chen and Korea sent us Shawls'fantasy 2014 calendars. Some K Pop anime. Oh, yeah, I remember that stuff. Paul sent us a lot of German cookies, like, so many that the entire office couldn't eat them all. And the DVD. Michael Moore Hates America. We also got some sweet treats from Renee Chavez. Chavez. C-H-A-V-E-S. James. I'm going to say Chavez. All right. Rachel Ray Rose of Rose Sign Language Interpreting company sent us some homemade grape jelly and pence. Oh, yeah, I had some of that the other day. Delicious. Yes. Bob Partridge finished an Alan Turing postcard from the London Science Museum. Neat. So that was on point and pretty cool. Yeah, I got a couple more. You got some more? I have one more, so you go ahead. Hillary lozar superfan sent us flathead Lake cheese. Yeah, and by the way, I have since eaten all of it since the last time we mentioned it on the podcast. It was awesome. She also sent you, me and Emily some earrings, which is very nice. Yes, it was nice. And then Marcus, who sent us popping shots, thanks for those. Yeah, you can check those out online. And my last one, Debbie from Hammerpress, sent us a goodie bag. They are a letterpress and design company from Kansas City, Missouri. And she sent us all sorts of cool stuff like hand printed cards and cool pencils and erasers support, hammer, press and letterpress designers. It's a pretty cool thing for sure. So thanks everybody. Thanks everybody. We appreciate it. Merry Christmas, happy holidays to you and thanks the other 364 days of the year for all of the nice gifts. If you want to get in touch with me and Chuck to talk to us, to send us a gift for whatever reason, you can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can join us on facebook. Comstepieshadow, you can send us an email to stuffpodcast@discovery.com. And as always, you can hang out with us at our cute little home on the web stuffytoythnow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetofworks.com. With over 1000 titles to choose from, Audible.com is the leading provider of downloadable digital audiobooks and spoken word entertainment. Go to audiblepodcast.com nostuff K-N-O-W-S-T-U-F-F. You get a free audiobook download of your choice when you sign up today. Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's criminal. Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen. Today, you know you're a pet mom and you plan your vacation around your pet. At Halo, we get it because we're pet moms, too. We make natural, high quality pet food that's rooted in science. It's the world's best food for the world's best kids. Learn More@halopets.com."
https://podcasts.howstuf…sysk-voynich.mp3	How The Voynich Manuscript Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-voynich-manuscript-works	Since its re-discovery in the early 20th century, the Medieval codex the Voynich Manuscript has thoroughly puzzled anyone who has tried to unlock its secret language and bizarre drawings. Will it ever give up its secrets?	Since its re-discovery in the early 20th century, the Medieval codex the Voynich Manuscript has thoroughly puzzled anyone who has tried to unlock its secret language and bizarre drawings. Will it ever give up its secrets?	Thu, 12 Nov 2015 15:32:35 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2015, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=12, tm_hour=15, tm_min=32, tm_sec=35, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=316, tm_isdst=0)	39603046	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from Housetopworkscom. House? W chuck Bryant and Nolan's over there. And this is stuff you should know. Which episode? I'm not 100% sure yet. Do this one. Okay. How's it going? It's going pretty well, man. Yeah? How about with you? I'm pretty excited about both of the shows. Yeah. These are going to be blockbusters if we can get them, right? That's right. They're going to break the box office. Yeah. So, Chuck, have you ever heard of the Voyage Manuscript before? Prior to this? I had it's fairly famous. Yeah, but just a few years ago, like, through working here. Yeah. Thanks to the stuff they don't want you to know. Boys. I'm sure they covered this already. Certainly. Yeah. There's just no way it may have been their first episode. Do you know? You just say the words ancient codecs and these guys come flying? Yeah. They're like, what do you want? They open their trench coats and they've got ancient codices lining it. Well, for those of you who don't know what the Voyage Manuscript is, it is what appears to be a legitimate medieval codex, which is stuff that was formerly a loose leaf manuscript that has been bound later on. That's what a codex is. That is written in a language that no one has any idea how to read it. It's never been seen before. It doesn't appear in any other type of writing that's known to survive. And it's also illustrated with some really bizarre pictures, like otherworldly plants, women doing things that aren't readily identifiable. There appears to be a recipe section. Yes. Pharmacological section. Yeah. It's almost like a Farmer's Almanac of sorts from medieval times written in language and depicting plants and things that have never existed. Right. The reason why it seems legitimate is that it bears a striking resemblance to similar books at the time. But those books are written in things like Old English or Italian or things that people can read, and they have pictures of plants in them that you point to and say, oh, well, that's Holly Bush or something. Right. This is not the case. This thing is a mysterious otherworldly tome that clearly made an appearance. Somehow it crossed over from a parallel multiverse into this one. Accidentally. Yeah, I've got my theory, which I'll just go ahead and tease the listener with that I'll throw out later. Okay. That's it. That's your teeth? Yeah. Okay. You got a theory? I just laid mine on the table. Which is what? It's a book from a parallel multiverse to ours. Dude, I slipped into this. It's like that. Have you heard that? Baron Stein bears theory? Yeah, sure. I don't remember it as Beren Stein. I always remember as Baron Stane. Oh, really? You're the only one. No, that's not true. You're one of the few. I was really surprised to hear people thought it was Bernstein. But apparently, as far as that theory goes, if you don't know what I'm talking about. Just like a bear and Stein bears theory, I guess. Yeah. I mean, I was convinced that was Bernstein Berenstein. Yeah, but not a E. Instead, berenstein bears always berenstein. For me. It's so weird. And I'm one of those that was so convinced. I was like, no, this is clearly some weird hoax because it's the bear and steam bears. Everybody knows that. It's so funny. And I'm not alone. It seems like the majority of people are. Definitely you're one of the few, Baron Stainers. Well, supposedly, according to this hypothesis, I actually managed to slip over from a multiverse into this one without realizing it. From the Baron Stain Universe. I love it. Anyway, let's get back to the Voyage manuscript, shall we? Because it is a real deal thing, and apparently it has a certain amount of providence to it. We know about when it first popped up, thanks to a 17th century letter that identifies it as having been purchased by one Rudolf II, who was the Holy Roman emperor for a while. And Rudolph loved curious things, right? Yes, he collected little people. Apparently he had a cabinet of curiosities of sorts. And he was very interested in this Voyage manuscript, so much so that he paid $600 gold duke it's for it, which is apparently about the same as $90,000 today for this book because he liked it a lot. And he supposedly was the first owner of the Voyage manuscript. That's right. It has been dated with carbon dating to the early one thousand four hundred s and has a very strange it's not written on parchment or any kind of regular paper. It's written on calf skin, which is not a sort of somewhat of a giveaway or at least a big clue what, that it dates it, but that it's bona fide. Yeah, well, we'll talk about whether or not it's a hoax, okay? If someone found this vellum and that'd be very strange to create a hoax and dig up hundreds of year olds calf skin. Right. So it's not likely that it's a hoax. No, there's all sorts of reasons it's not a hoax, but that rumor still persists. So in 1639, this antique collector in Prague named George Baretch, he sent a letter to this dude, athenasius, I think so, athenas Kircher. He was a scholar in Rome, and he basically said, and this is so weird to me, he teases this guy, he's like, I've got this thing, it's really weird. It's got all these crazy symbols and images and this alphabet that is unknown to anyone. But I'm just not going to send it to you, I'm just going to tell you about it. Well, he loved it himself. He tried to crack the code himself, the guy who was the owner of it at the time. Yeah, but I send that letter just teasing the guy and be like, have a nice day, because he wanted him to crack it for him, but he didn't want to give up the book. Well, how can you crack it if you don't send it to him? You can send, like, facsimiles of it, that kind of stuff. Oh, you did that? I believe so. I know he was cracking it himself, but this guy, Anatheus Kurtzer, he was supposedly very well known at the time for having cracked Egyptian hieroglyphics, even though it later turned out he had gotten it wrong. Yeah, but that's why I wonder why I didn't send it to the guy. Well, the lesson is learned because what is the dude's name? Beresh the original guy who wrote the letter. Yeah, george Boresh. So he dies and he dedicated his life to cracking the Voyage manuscript which wasn't called The Voyage Manuscript by that point. No, I should point out I don't think it had a name at the time. I bet you they called it something. Well, they definitely didn't call it The Voicemail because we'll see in a minute. But George Buresh died, and he gave it to a friend of his, Jan Marik Marcy. And Marcy is pretty good reason or supports the idea that Borush didn't want to give up the book for good reason because he actually did contact the Jesuit living in Rome, Kercher, and said, hey, here's the book. Figure it out. Right. And the guy never got it back. So if Perez wanted to keep his book, he was very smart to not send it to Kercher. Well, and when Marcy sent it to Kercher, he said, by the way, I know a little bit about the background. It looks like it was the work of Roger Bacon. Yeah. Even though there was nothing to back that up. Well, there isn't anything to back it up. And that's actually it turns out that Rudolph II believed that it was a work of Roger Bacon when he bought it. That's right. Roger Bacon. He was basically a proto scientist from the 13th century in England. And we've talked about him before, I think in the Scientific Method episode. He really helped lay the groundwork for science in the Western world. Yeah, he's credited with a lot of things he didn't do too. Oh, is that right? Yeah. Well, anyway, this is possibly one of them. There's still a persistent legend that it was Roger Bacon's work that did come from England. But the prevailing ideas about the Voyage manuscript providence kind of drifted a little further east, as we'll see. But when Rudolf II bought the thing, he thought it was Francis Bacon. And all of this we know second hand. Chuck oh, yeah. There's no documents showing that Rudolph II purchased this book. There's not a sales receipt. No, but there's something close that does kind of back it up. Rudolph II had a dude named Jacobus de Turince, I believe is how you pronounce that. All right. And this was his court pharmacist, basically. His court botanist, and he was actually a really rich man. And Rudolph II, out of an appreciation to this guy for saving his life, gave him the Voyage manuscript as a gift. And this dude's watermark or seal or signature appears very faintly in the Voyage manuscript. So it definitely backs up the idea that Rudolf II owns this book at one point in time. Right. And it's entirely possible that he did think Roger Bacon created it, but that doesn't mean that Roger Bacon did create it. Right. So for a couple of hundred years, it kind of wasn't on the forefront of anyone's mind. Basically disappeared until 1912, when here we go. Wilfrid voyage bought it in Italy and said, I guess, let's name it after me. Yeah. Well, he and the manuscript became, like, very pretty famous because he was tireless in trying to get this thing cracked. Sure. This book has this really neat trait of, like, bringing people under its sway. Well, it's a mystery. It is. And everybody loves a mystery. It seems like it's possibly an impenetrable mystery, which I think makes people want to crack it even more. Sure. Because you get to be the one. Yeah. And you could change the name to the Josh Clarke manuscript right. And say voyage get bit. Who's that? If you remember, some companies, like, bought the Sears Tower and tried to change the name to their company's name for the Tower in Chicago. Do you remember that? A few years ago? Is it not in Sears Tower anymore. They tried to change everybody's. Like, no, we're still calling it the Sears Tower. Oh. Like, even if they did change it, people are still going to call it that. Yeah. Got you. So I think the same thing would happen with the Voyage manuscript even if I cracked it. Right. That's, like, with a lot of professional sports stadiums. I'll still refer to it as the original cool name and not the RCA Dome or whatever. I know what you mean. Although the new stadiums are they just don't even bother naming them. They just go ahead and say who's got the most money. So Voyage, this manuscript, he worked tirelessly, and it eventually ended up in modern times at Yale University in 1969, where it still resides today. Right. So that's just the story of and there's a lot more detail to who had their hands on this thing over the years. Yeah. We'll talk about that right after this break. Big announcement, folks. It's called a podcast event called The Message. That's right. Thanks to GE Podcast Theater and Panoplye, there is an eight part series out right now called The Message. And you can get it wherever you get your podcast. Yes. And you know what? It's going to blow your collective scientific minds because it's currently rocking our world. Yes. So the message follows the story of Nikki Tomlin, who's a PhD in linguistics. Right. That's right. At the University of Chicago. If I'm not mistaken. That's right. And she's following a team of cryptologists, which really if you say cryptology, you've really got me hooked already. Sure. They're research bank tank called Cipher, and they're trying to decode a message received from outer space from 70 years ago. Yeah, it's from outer space, we think. And if you're not familiar with the story, well, then I guess you better go listen to the message. You can get it on itunes. You can get it on any of your podcast apps. Just go search for the message and subscribe today. Thanks to GE Podcast Theater and Panoplye for pushing the boundaries of the medium. You guys are doing a great job. Go subscribe to the message and listen today. So, Chuck, you're saying that Voyage went from Voyage ultimately to Yale? Yes. But in between that, voyage really kind of brought this manuscript into the four. He identified people who are professionals at cracking codes and said, can you do this? The first guy he went to was a University of Pennsylvania philosopher, and he had a really weird idea of what the Voyage manuscript is really all about. Yeah. So if you look at the Voyage manuscript, the script is like this weird, really ornate lettering, right. And it's actually called Gallows because a lot of it looks a bit like a hangman's. Gallow. And this University of Pennsylvania professor, philosophy professor decided that it wasn't the text itself that mattered. It was the little tiny microscopic figures that the ink made inside each letter. That was the actual code. And I think Voyage just took his manuscript back and slowly backed out of the room when the guys told him that. Yeah, he said they corresponded to Greek letters. And he actually said, there's a message in here that confirms that it's Roger Bacon inside the ink with these Greek letters. And not only that, but Bacon. Well, just some other theories that's not even worth getting into. Other theories that Bacon hid in this ink. It was all untrue, though, right? Other people went back and said, well, let us look at these little weird letters, microscopic letters that you're seeing in the ink. Oh, well, that's just the ink cracking as it dries. So you're nuts. Yeah, he tried to decrypt some of it, and it held water for a little while, but it was only, like, a very small part that even matched what, his decryption theory. So, yeah, it didn't hold any water. No, it didn't. So that was the first guy who took a real crack at it. The second people who did were actually World War II code breakers. And the guy who founded the NSA, William Friedman, who gets a lot of the credit, but his wife is actually at least as equal, if not his better, in cryptography. His wife Elizabeth. And as World War II was waning, these people broke the Japanese code. Right. The purple code, I think, is what it was called. So they weren't like slouches as far as cryptography went, but they got together as the war was waning and winding down, and they weren't as needed any longer. They got a bunch of their fellow cryptographers together and said, let's work on the Voyage manuscript. And I guess they probably figured that they would have it handled in short order. That's not at all how it worked out. No, he did not figure anything out. No, he gave up. I think he spent like 30 years working on it and then finally declared that the thing was impossible, he couldn't do it, and surrendered. I think it's how it was put. And so after that, once this guy and his group said, we can't do this, it kind of got relegated to Yale for a while. And then the Internet came. That's right. So you want to talk about the book itself a little bit? Man, I would love to. The book itself is 246 pages, although they think it is missing up to 55 pages, 20 to 25. They don't know, but they're guessing. Right. It could have been up to 270 to 300 pages long. It's about nine inches tall by six inches wide. And like we said, it's on calf skin, which lends credence to the fact that it's from the 1400. It matches up with the carbon dating. Right. So that makes some sense. It does. They think that up to eight people worked on the writing itself, and it is written from left to right, which also lends credence to the fact that it could be European in nature. Makes sense, of course, although there are other theories that it is from the eastern side of the world, but I don't know what evidence they have on that. There's also the theories that is from the Far West as well, like Mexico or Central America. Some people say that's. Right. And then so with the actual words themselves, the letters there's, I think 40 to 40 characters in this weird alphabet that I want to understand. And that depends on who you ask. I've seen as low as 15. Really? Yeah. The highest I saw was 40, but the average I saw was 30 is what people typically cite. And these things, these letters, are put together to form what we would think of as words. And then the words are put together without any punctuation, and then occasionally are put into paragraphs. But for the most part, it's just like word, word, word. And then on almost every single page of the codex itself, there's an illustration of some sort or another. Yeah, about 220 illustrations. The fact that it didn't have punctuation isn't a big deal. Apparently that was pretty normal for the time. Yeah. So that doesn't really give anything away. And it's also not divided into chapters via text, but via illustrations. They believe it might be divided into six different chapters, which are botanical. This is where you're going to find your weird unknown plants, astronomical which zodiacal signs and celestial bodies, stuff like that. We should say the zodiac symbols and drawings of the zodiac are the only things that are unquestionably recognizable in the whole book. Right. Which makes it even stranger that it's not just completely fantastic. There's also some stuff that's recognizable. There's a bana logical chapter with naked ladies doing weird things and bathtubs or possibly water slides. It kind of looks like in at least one water slide. Yeah. I don't know what you would call it. A water slide? Maybe it would be. No, there's one. There's like a Roman equidct or something. There's another one, though, that's like it's vertical drawing straight up and down. And there's, like, three women that are clearly, like, together in the way that three people would go down a water slide at once. There's one a little further down, and she's, like, on her back going downward. And then there's another woman at the bottom who's basically splashed down. It's a spitting image of a water slide, a green water slide. There's cosmological with just these weird circular patterns. It almost looks like crop circles. Just weird designs that make no sense. And then pharmaceutical, this is where they have different parts of plants broken down and these, like, jars and things that doctors may have put things in. Right. Which they did at the time. In the medieval era. This is what a pharmacist or a doctor would have stored their pharmacological herbs in, which is why they're like this is the pharmacological section. Right. And then finally, no illustrations in the recipe section. Just nothing but deliciousness. I don't know how they know it was a recipe section. Even so, they divided the book up into these six chapters, and they actually think that remember, the book was loose pages at one point? Yes. What was it? I think 120 folded pages. And they think that whoever bound it because it was bound in goatskin of a younger age than the actual manuscript, that whoever bound it got the pages out of order here or there. So that there's some pages that are in the wrong chapter, but roughly it's in the right order. Yeah. Another reason it might be European is because the average length of a word is four or five letters, although there are no two letter words and nothing with more than ten characters, which is just more confounding. It is, because none of it is there's no consistency that points exactly in one direction, basically. Well, even more confounding is there are examples of the same word used in session two or three times here or there. Yeah. Up to five times. So that's very odd. You don't see that very often in, say, English. Maybe they were just trying to make a .5 times. Yeah. I like this recipe very much. Yeah. You never know. Yeah. It was written by Chainsaw and Dave from summer school. Who? You remember that movie? Summer school. Oh, yeah. They had to write, like, a 500 word essay, so they use, like, the last 40 words. Or they like Texas Chainsaw masker. Very old trick. Yeah. So check. We've laid out a lot of details here, and we're not the first people to notice these details, right? No, other people have. And they've really studied them, especially as the use of computing and linguistics has come together in the 21st century. And we will talk about all that jazz right after this. So, Chuck, there's weird things, like the same word being used up to five times in a row. There's no punctuation, which apparently is fairly normal. No word over ten letters, all of this stuff, it seems weird, but if you put that into a computer with what we know about language these days, you can spit out some pretty interesting conclusions about the Voyage manuscript. One of the things that people have long said, especially after William Friedman and his wife Elizabeth threw up their hands and said, we're done. After 30 years of studying this thing, a lot of people said, it's just a hoax. It doesn't mean anything. It's gibberish. The reason that no one will ever be able to crack it is because it doesn't mean anything. And that's still a longstanding theory. Like, you can find plenty of journal articles in respectable peer reviewed journals about how this thing is hoaxed. And in fact, there was one a few years back that said, we found a Renaissance cipher key which is used for encoding anything, but it was Renaissance error, and that if you took gibberish and put it into it, you could conceivably come up with what's in the Voyage manuscript. Right. And everybody said, that's great, you prove that it's possible, but you didn't actually show how they did that to produce the Voyage manuscript. So the thing is still a mystery. It doesn't really prove anything. Right. But it does support this idea that it's possible, and no one involved in looking at the Voyage manuscript will disagree. It is possible that it is just a hoax and that it is just gibberish. Yeah. So there's a hoax theory, right? Yeah. But there are plenty of other theories as to this thing, and a lot of them say, no, this thing is real. Yeah, well, one theory is that it's just a language that we don't know and haven't seen. Right. I don't buy that. No. I mean, how could this possibly be the only surviving evidence of that language? Exactly. I have more to you on that. Another theory is that it's just it's so well coded that it's impenetrable. But that raises a good question, too. So if you wanted to code something, especially if it were safer art or hoax, or to show what an incredible mind you had, why would you make it so impenetrable that no one could ever possibly crack it? Yeah, it seems like you would eventually be doing that for some sort of recognition. Sure. So that kind of a little bit kicks the legs out of that theory to me. Or that it's so important and secretive, like the meaning of life is contained herein. And it doesn't look like it. From the looks of the illustrations. It doesn't, because you're correct, the illustrations are kind of hokey. It's not the most gorgeous book you've ever seen. If it's the secrets of the universe, then I'm pretty disappointed. Depressing. Yeah. What's the third theory? There's another one that basically that it's a gobbledy cook, the hoax thing. There's two different parts. One, that it's just gobbledygook and it was someone having fun. And another one is that it was a hoax trying to fool people into thinking something. Right. So that's sort of split into two parts. Yeah. Mental illness is another theory. Yeah. A Franciscan monk locked away in a room with autism who just really went to town. That's actually a theory as well. Or that it might be religious, like speaking in tongues. Transcribed. Yeah. You want to hear my theory? Yeah. I think it's high time. You think it's drugs? Yeah, man. So kind of like where you'll find, like, the doodles in a college textbook margin. Yeah. I think someone got a hold of a lot of really good hallucinogenics and over the course of a few months did them and did this. Yeah. So I went on, like, a three month vendor and ended up spitting out the Voyage manuscript for a lifelong bender. And this is just one of the things they produced. I mean, that's pretty interesting, to tell you the truth. It's pretty druggy to me. It does also, again, the quality of the illustrations themselves kind of suggest, like, this is really awesome, but I don't have full control over my motor cortex right now. Yeah. Plus, it would solve the problem of, like, it has meeting or it can be transcribed or this person was trying to get famous. Yeah. They're just making it. So that's a pretty good theory. Let's go back to the hoax theory. Right? Yeah. There's a lot of people who shout down the hoax theory because they say, do you know how much time this thing took? Sure. That's one. So the hoax people would say back, well, people still made hoaxes in the Renaissance, which is the time this book first popped up. They made fraudulent medieval documents because that's when antiquarian book collecting really started and you could make some money from some suckers like Rudolph II. Right. Yeah. So, I mean, there's definitely teeth in both arguments as to whether it's a hoax or whether it's not. But as we've gotten a lot better with using computers to figure out things like statistical distribution and stuff like that. And have applied it to things like language. When looking at the Voyage manuscript. It actually follows a lot of the patterns that a natural language does. Which leads a lot of people to believe that. No. There's actually real meaning in the Voyage Manuscript that we just have an unlocked for example. The different sections have their own vocabulary. There's words that show up and say, like the pharmacological section, that do not appear anywhere in the cosmological section, which, again, is something that you would find in natural language. If you're reading a chapter of a textbook on cosmology and you pick up a book on pharmacology, there's going to be word in each one that would not appear in the other one. Right. And that's how the Voyage manuscript is. That's a big one. There's this thing called Zip's Law, which is probably a podcast episode in and of itself. But Zip's Law is this weird statistical law that says that the second most common word, the second most frequently used word, will be used twice as much as the third most frequently used word. Right. The third most frequently used word will be used three times as much as the fourth most frequently used word. It's a really weird thing and it appears to be a natural law. And apparently natural languages follow this kind of distribution. So does the Voyage Manuscript. So to come up with Zip's Law, which wasn't discovered until the 1930s, I think, so to create this text, understanding that Zip's Law was eventually going to be discovered, and then going to the trouble of predicting the frequency of these words that you're going to use and then spreading them out accordingly, again, it's not impossible, but it's mind boggling. The amount of work that would have been put into this being a hoax. Yeah. Here's my deal, too. Let's say it is a cipher from looking at the thing. It would just end up being this is this plant, this is this recipe. It just seems kind of boring to begin with. Right. And for that reason, a lot of people hope that the Voyager manuscript has never cracked. Yeah. They don't want to discover that. Yeah. Because ultimately it is there's pictures of plants there and they look weird and everything, but if we crack this code as this one guy what is his name? A dude named Reed Johnson wrote a New Yorker article on it. I don't think there's been a podcast this year where we didn't mention a New Yorker article. Yeah, that magazine is banging. It is banging. Reid Johnson said he put it that right now, the Voyage manuscript is in this quantum state where it's in all positions at once. But once we crack it, it'll be forced to take this collapse into this one single position and it'll lose all of its mystery or aura. It will just be the Farmer's Almanac. Yeah. And as it is right now, it's in basically it's perfect form to stop working people. Right. But that's not the case at all, because, as I said before, the internet is. On this, and there are a lot of people who think that they have cracked it but haven't necessarily. Yeah. There's this one guy, Steven Backs. He's a professor of applied linguistics at the university of Bedfordshire in England. And he said he claims he's deciphered 14 characters. The reason that this is somewhat believable because he's not saying, hey, I know what the whole thing means. He's being very modest and saying, I've deciphered only 14 characters based on what he thinks are matching plants, juniper, coriander. And helabore specifically antara us an illustration, basically the constellation taurus. So he thinks if you can identify those pictures, then you should be able to correspond the letters saying those names next to them. Right. He went on a hunt for proper nouns in the text. Yes. Which is a pretty good approach. Yeah. I think he said he identified 14. Right. 14 characters only. Oh, I thought it was 14 words. No. Ten words. I got you. And he's the first to say, like, I might be right, I might be wrong. This is certainly not a closed case, but here's my best crack at it. Well, there's a live science article on our podcast page for this episode that has kind of a rundown of his discovery. And I think embedded in it is a YouTube video that he made demonstrating how he found this. Yeah. And he's not a crack, but he seems like a good guy. Oh, he's at Bedford. Sure. There's another dude. The latest series is from a guy named Nick Pelling. Britain Nickpelling. I guess that's his name. It is. Nick. 2006, he came up with this theory that was an Italian architect named Antonio Avalano as the author, and he says, you know what? I think this guy tried to escape Istanbul around 1465, and before he left, recorded his knowledge of said place. But basically that's been shot down for various reasons. So a lot of people believe that northern Italy is where it was made, where it's from. So that part is not entirely, like, out of the realm of possibility. Yes. And the reason why they think it was actually in the Tyrolian Alps is the predominant view of where the codex was made. But if you look at some of the pictures just drawing on the margins of castles, the architecture depicted is peculiar to the northern Alps from that time. The northern Italian Alps from that time. Yeah. And usually right about and paint about what you know yes. Plus, around Trenta, I believe there are some healing waters, and I think possibly that's what's depicted with the women bathing and water sliding. And water sliding. So I think I do agree that let's keep on trying, but I don't think anyone's going to correct this thing. So I think the mystery will remain, which is kind of neat. But you do think that there's actual language encoded in it? No, I think it's drugs. Okay, so you think it's just total gibberish. Yeah. Or this dude and his drug friends made up a language that existed within their turret, but again, it's following almost unpredictable, just so unbelievably complex statistical distribution of words and letters that it's like the genius it would take to fake that or even accidentally make it up is no, I'm saying maybe they did have have their own little language. Well, there were some smart burnouts. Yeah, there were a lot of smart burnouts back then. I wonder if they would be blown away to know that people were still trying to crack that code that they made in high school, listening to Van Halen. Or maybe there's some other discovery yet to be made of another text, a legend, perhaps. A rosetta stone, as it were. Yeah, maybe they just haven't found it yet. And maybe there's a whole series of things. You would think it would have popped up by now, but you never know. Or maybe that has lost the time forever. I'm sticking with the multiverse idea. Yeah, it's fun to theorize if you want to fall down a rabbit hole. I also want to say before we sign off, go to Voyage NU. There is a dude named Renee Zanderbergen who is a preeminent Voyage scholar, and he actually discovered a letter. It was like only the second letter associated with the Voyage Manuscript ever discovered. The first one was discovered with the Voyage Manuscript. Right. So he's like, hardcore knows what he's doing when it comes to the Voyage Manuscript. And he's compiled this really amazing website where it's like, here's all the information we have. Here's what we know. Not slanted, not like I'm right or anything like that. Just a really interesting website to go check out. Does he have everything pasted on his wall with, like, yarn attaching scratched out on all the pictures? I think it's pretty neat. I mean, I just like things that are unknown and you can speculate all day and it's not one of these unknowns where skeptics can come in and say, this doesn't even exist. Like it's a real thing. Yeah, they're like, it's a hoax. They just got their hands on some Vellum. Oh, really? And they predicted that we would be carbon dating 50 years later. I don't think so, buddy. Nice. It's a genuine bona fide mystery. Residing in the Yale Library. Yes. If you want to know more about the Voyage Manuscript, like I said, go to voyage NU. You can also visit our website@householdworks.com by typing voyage in the search bar. And since I said NU, it's time for listenermail. Or go to the library. Is it on display or is it tucked away? Actually, I'm glad you brought that up. There is another the Yale Collection. They did high resolution scans of every single page. Yes. You can go on to the Yale Library site and basically browse the Voyage Manuscript. You have to have an appointment and get permission first, which I imagine would be the result of an extensive letter writing campaign. You have to make an appointment to go see the actual thing. Yes, but I mean, not just like I'll be there at five Tuesday. How's that work for you? You have to get permission and submit your credentials and all that stuff. Yeah, but you could conceivably see it. You have to be a friend of John Hodgman, right? He holds the keys. All right. Okay. So the answer is they don't have it on display prominently. Right. That's another way of saying what I said. All right, I'm going to call this my baby won't sleep. Hey, guys. I'm sure you get a handful of thanks every day. Actually, not as many as you think. But I just want to offer up my thanks for my daughter and I. My wife and I recently had a baby, Madeline. At times we find ourselves up all hours of the night attending to a sleepless baby. I think she was born on a twelve hour jet lag and for that we take the red eye every night until she adjusts. When we have tried every method in the book to try and get her to sleep, it just seems like nothing will do. However, we've come to find that she loves car rides. So whether it's 01:00 A.m. 02:00 A.m. Or four in the morning, there's a good chance we're in the car driving around the neighborhood listening to stuff you should know. That sounds really creepy. It does. Hearing our voices echo down empty streets yeah. While we're trying to get our daughter to fall asleep. And now it's cute again when I can assure you that I don't fall asleep in the car as being the one driving. I can't say the same for my daughter. It's not to say that you guys put her to sleep, but I think it's the combination of a car seat, a running engine, and the background noise of two podcasters. Thank you for keeping us up. Listening to your show at the same time putting my daughter to sleep. You may have the youngest Stuff You Should Know fan at only a month old, that is sleepless in hetfield PA. Wow. So we've been told by plenty of adults that we put them to sleep. So it's nice that there's just a little cute baby now. So our one month old fan is not our youngest. We have one that's even younger when born on October 25, we want to wish a huge hearty congratulations to our buddy Adam and Serena. Huge congrats couple. Cute baby. Yes. Right out of the womb cute. Which is not often the case. He really is. His name is Henry Hollis. So, you guys. Congratulations, Henry. Welcome to the stuffy Schneider family. And way to go, dude. Agreed. If you want to get in touch with us, you can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can join us on facebook. Comstuffynow you can send us an email to stuff podcast@houseworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the web stuffyoushaneknow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. 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https://podcasts.howstuf…terfly-wings.mp3	How do butterfly wings get their color?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-do-butterfly-wings-get-their-color	Butterflies' wings are colored as a result of iridescence; this fascinating optical phenomenon is the result of light refracting off transparent surfaces. Josh and Chuck reveal how pigmentation, iridescence, light and butterfly wings work in this episode.	Butterflies' wings are colored as a result of iridescence; this fascinating optical phenomenon is the result of light refracting off transparent surfaces. Josh and Chuck reveal how pigmentation, iridescence, light and butterfly wings work in this episode.	Thu, 08 Jul 2010 18:05:12 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2010, tm_mon=7, tm_mday=8, tm_hour=18, tm_min=5, tm_sec=12, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=189, tm_isdst=0)	25676995	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me is all, always is charles W. Chuckers Flutter by Bryant no, I'm a caterpillar. In one day, it might be a beautiful butterfly. You're a lump of coal. Yes. But you're going to be a diamond some day, chuck who sang that? David originally. It was one of those old guys. Good one. Widespread Panic. Did they cover that? Really? Yeah, they did pretty good. But it was like a 19 minutes version. Yeah, right. It went a little long, you could say. How are you doing, Chuck? I'm good. I have freshly shaved my head like you. No, mine's not fresh. Mine is shaggy. Well, yeah, but we're both kind of onion heads now. You look good where I'm usually not. You look pretty. Thank you. Do you take a series of pictures of yourself? No, not yet. Okay, that's later. So, Chuck, you've heard about this oil spill, right? Yeah. I had a feeling you might tie this in. Devastation, dead wildlife, injured economies. Obama's katrina. Yeah. There's one thing that has been conspicuously absent in my estimation. Beautiful. Nobody's talking about Irridescence. No one's talking about how pretty the oil slick is. Yeah, it's because it's horribly ugly. It is. Unless you stand at a certain angle and then you're like, oh, this is kind of nice, actually. Yeah, I know what you mean. Yeah, we see where you're headed. We're talking about iridescence in this one because the shimmery color changing quality called iridescence. Yes. That oil spills feature are in common with something called butterflies, the wings of butterflies. And I can tell you that 24 hours ago, I had no idea why the butterfly's wings were iridescent. Now I do. This is why I love episodes like this, because here is why there's no maybe it's kind of like this or we don't really know. So you and I get to conjecture, like jackasses all day long. Right? Right. Instead, science has figured out why this happens and you and I are going to explain it to people. So, Chuck, let's do that right now. Let's talk about why a butterflies wings are iridescent. Okay, well, there's a couple of reasons. They have their striking color. Iridescence is the main one. But we probably need to go ahead and get pigment and just ordinary color out of the way. What pigment, Josh, is coloring matter that you find in like, cells and tissues. And the deal with pigment is it is the same from every angle. You can get up under it, you can get on top of it, you can sneak up behind it, you can get all up on it, get all up in it, but it always looks the same. Right. That's what I call it, ordinary color. And the reason why is any given pigment will absorb all colors except one. Like chlorophyll. Sure. Chlorophyll absorbs all colors except green, which it reflects, which causes something to look green. Like a plant. A plant sure is one. Melanin tends to absorb everything but yellow, giving things a brownish color, right. Well, yeah, that's albinism. That means you have no melanin. Right. You're lacking a pigment. Same with paint. Right. These are all just pigments. These things don't inherently have a color. They just absorb certain colors and reflect others back. It's pretty standard stuff. Sure. Did you know, redheads, they think they have an additional iron based pigment. Really? Their color interesting. Yeah, they're freakish you. Yeah. Poor ginger kids, man. They are really taking I love redheads, though. Do you? Well, I mean okay. Yeah. Actually, I just like the red like, really red headed people is kind of cool looking at me. I'll just go on record with that. Like, red or orange? Because there is a big difference, man. I'm not talking strawberry blonde. I'm talking, like, really red heads. Shocking red, shocking ginger redheads. Okay. You like staring at them? I do. Okay. Don't stare too hard. It freaks people out. You'll go blind. All right. So that's pigments, they're pretty standard. One can argue boring stuff, right? Yes. Pigments don't give anything iridescence. No. They just reflect light. And that's that. Right. Iridescence is this kind of super spectacular reflection of color. Almost shimmery. Yes. That changes actually, the color changes if you move. So iridescence is generally relegated to the observer. Depending on where you're standing, that will change the color, how spectacular color is. Right. And again, we know why. Especially when it comes to butterfly wings. Right? Right. Or we should mention just a couple of others before we move on. Like the Japanese beetle that green on the wings. Yes. Iridescent. Yeah. Mother of pearl seashells, some fish scales and bubbles. Peacock feathers. Well, that's a huge one. Did I tell you that there's a peacock in our neighborhood? No. I was walking with Emily the other day, walking the dogs the other morning, and we looked up, we heard this weird sound. Yeah. It sounds like help. Very unsettling. Yeah. I thought someone was crying for help. And I looked up, and literally the apex of this roof of this house was a full on peacock standing there. Weird. Had it gotten loose, or did they keep it in the backyard? The guy yeah, the guy has two peacocks. The neighbor was out, and I was looking at it. Yeah, he's got peacocks. I was like, that's sort of odd. Were you staring at it like it was a full on redhead? I was. And I said, that's sort of weird, and he went, yeah, and loud. Yeah, but it was iridescent, and it was fascinating. They are. They're gorgeous. And actually, peacock feathers led to the investigation of iridescence, Newton and Newton. Eventually, Thomas Boyle was the one who went kaching. That's the way it happened. So we were talking about Robert Boyle. Sorry? Robert Boyle. Thanks. One of the Boyle brothers. Exactly. We were talking about how pigments reflect just one color, right? Transparent objects have the ability to reflect all colors, right. With a bubble, you have two surfaces. We'll talk about a bubble, we'll talk about the oil slick. Okay. The oil slick is oil floating on water, right? Yes. So you have the top film of the oil slick lights passing through it, although some bouncing back, right, which you will see right, with your eye. And some can make it to the water beneath the stuff that passes through the top film and then can be reflected back. Some can be reflected back. Right. Now, if the light that's reflected from the top is also reflected from the bottom, if they're in sync, if the phases match up, right. And the phase is the position of the trough and the crest. Because remember, light exists on a wavelength, right? So picture it is like a regular wave or like a roller coaster, if you're a little more simple. And like you said, if they match up as if they were on top of each other, then you're going to get Irridescence. Right. So, Chuck, follow me on this one, okay. To the ends of the earth. All right? So go beep. Okay? So the beep, that's a crest. And then the boo. That's a trough. An off key trough. Okay. Start going beep. You really want me to do that? This is Chuck being a wave of light, a wavelength of light. Right. Reflecting. He's just reflected the moment he starts, he's reflected off the surface of a transparent object. Right. Okay, so now I'm, like, coming in, and I'm going to come in and start after I've just reflected off the bottom surface of, say, an oil slick. Right. All right, so you want me to do this again. So Chuck has already reflected off the top service. I made it through the bottom surface, and now I'm reflecting off. Okay. Now, let's say I come in at, like, half time. It's all screwed up. That sounds awful. It does sound awful. And when you're speaking of light, it sounds like this, right? Nothing. They cancel each other out. But Chuck, if my phase is equal to yours, but say a full measure behind, right. Sounds like this. Go ahead. Right. So it sounded nice. It sounded louder. It didn't sound nice, but it sounded louder. It wasn't all discordant. Right. So what just happened was we amplified the beat boot, right? Yeah, exactly. This is called, what is it? Constructive interference. That's right. And I don't want to say good and bad because it's really scientists would say it is neither good nor bad. Right. But I'm going to say that's the good kind because that's what gives you iridescence. The bad kind would be destructive interference. And that like you said, that cancels each other out, making something like less iridescent. Not iridescent at all. Right. So that's it. Close. That's not entirely it. Right. Because consider this, Chuck. Light, as we see it exists on a spectrum, right? Sure. So on one hand, you have about a wavelength of 400 nm. Violet light. On the other end of the spectrum that we can see is red light, which has a wavelength of about 700 nm. Right? Right. Okay. If you go a little beyond the violet, you get bluer than blue, aka. Ultraviolet, which we all love. Right. If you go beyond the red, you have redder than red or infrared. Right? Right. We can't see either of those, but we can see within that spectrum from violet to red. Yes. And it's based on wavelength. If you take white light, like sunlight, and if you project it onto a transparent object, all of the colors remember the Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon album cover? Of course. It's white light going into a prism and then coming out in its separate forms in all its psychedelic glory. Right. Now imagine that, that's static. Like it's not changing position. If you are shooting a beam of white light onto a bubble, depending on where you stand, the angle of reflection of refraction I'm sorry. Depends on what color you're going to see. So if you move across your angle, you're going to see a different color, and hence this explains the color changing of iridescence. Right. So have you ever seen the big bubble wands where they can bow? The really huge bubbles? The huge bubbles, yeah. If you ever do that, do a little experiment and look at it from different angles, jump around, walk around, and you're going to see some color change. Right. Have you ever seen a bubble pop in slowmo? That super slowmo. No, but wasn't that an episode of that one show time work? Yeah, the Discovery show. It is super cool, dude. If you look at it in slow motion, you would pop the bubble, and when you see it in regular motion, it looks like it just pops in a big burst, but from where you touch, it spreads in an arc all around the whole thing, and you see it slowly popping as it goes around. It's really cool. Nice. That's neither here nor there, though. But it's still pretty cool. Like your descence, right? Yes. So what we have now is if light from white light hits a transparent object yes. And it's a multi layered transparent object, say, like oil on top of water or one side of a bubble and a bottom side of the bubble, some light is going to reflect off, some are going to make it through the bottom. Some of that will reflect off, most will go through. But if the light from the bottom and the top are in phase with one another, in an even phase separated by 12345 wavelengths rather than 1.35 wavelengths, they'll be in phase and they'll amplify each other. Yeah. That's your destiny. If it's white light, then we're going to see, depending on our angle, all the colors of the rainbow in this iridescent state. Right? Right. Okay. So what does it have to do with butterfly wings? I'll tell you, buddy. Okay. Butterfly wings are transparent, and the deal is why they look so striking compared to, let's say, a bubble, which is pretty, but not as striking as a butterfly. It's because there are many more layers stacked on top of each other that the light has to go through. When all those are in phase, you get like super iridescence. Right. So with the bubble, you have two chances, right. You have the top and the bottom two lousy chances. Right. With the butterfly wing, the cuticle of the scale of the butterfly wing, say, has maybe a dozen. So every beam of light, every wavelength of light has a dozen chances to reflect back. Right. Say half of those are in phase. Pretty cool. Yeah. And also, depending on how, because the surfaces, if you look at a butterfly cuticle, it looks kind of like a Christmas tree. Right. So there's like a it looks like a Christmas tree, basically, yeah. Like a Lego Christmas tree will say it's chitin, but the scales that just amount the scales. Yeah. Well, the cuticles that make up the scales yeah. That's chitin. That's the same thing we have in, like, our hair, it's protein. And our fingernails. Okay, nice. Go ahead. Okay. Sorry. So as it goes down the tree, they get wider, these surfaces get wider, and each one can bounce light back off, but they're spaced evenly. So let's say that the space in between is 200 nm, right. And blue light is 400 nm in wavelengths. Since the 200 is half of 400, it's going to give blue light a better chance to reflect back in phase, which is why, say, on, like, the blue morpho butterfly, which has a space of 200 nm between the scales, the space and the scales appears so blue because blue has a, likelier, chance of reflecting back in phase and being amplifying in this iridescent manner. Right. And the morpho, didn't that actually venture into the ultraviolet spectrum? Yeah. Remember the angle. Yeah. So if you're looking, let's say, at the right is red and at the left is violet. If you move too far to the left, everything's gone, because you've moved out of the visible spectrum of light and now all you're seeing is the brown pigment. But who can see it is the butterfly. Yeah. The monarchs are actually in their migration. They are huge migration every year. They use ultraviolet markings, ultraviolet light, for guide posts, basically. Right? Yes, they do. And also, the other effect, or the other reason that you have this iridescence on the scales is it soaks up heat, because butterflies are coal blooded, so they rely on the sun to be able to function so the fact that they're soaking up this heat from the sun allows them to fly. Right. Which is pretty cool. And we also remember, pigment, don't forget, still plays a role in this too. Right. So if you have a butterfly scale that's constructed, that contains chlorophyll, so you have a green pigment. Yes. Let's go with blue. Okay. Now let's go with yellow. Okay. Say it's a butterfly scale. It's constructive melanin. So you have yellow already, which it's reflecting back yellow and monochromatic blue light hits it. Right. It's going to appear to us as green because color mixing still it's has an effect. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So pigment, structural, color, green. Can we talk about the wings for a second, too? Yeah. Because I know people are going to write in and say, that's really cool, but is it true that butterflies will die if you touch their wings? Sort of. Not completely. You can touch a butterfly wing. Like if you've ever touched a butterfly wing, you'll notice you have like powder on your hands. Yeah. Those are the scales. Those are the scales. They are. That fine that they kind of disintegrate into powder. And in theory, you can touch a butterfly wing without killing them. But if you break it, they have little veins. They're all connected by little veins. So essentially, if you disconnect the veins from the fore wing and the hind wing, that's when the butterfly is going to die. And they're so tender that it's really easy to happen. So in effect, you probably will kill a butterfly if you mess with their wings. But if you just happen to graze against it, maybe not. No need to squish it after just such a slight intrusion. Right? Yeah. And moss, I think, get a bum wrap because they're not as pretty. Yeah, because they're mainly what is it? Melatonin. Melanin. Melanin, yes. Mainly like brown and yellow, black and white. And they also have a frenzy M, which is a spine. And butterflies don't have that. Right. Also, moths tend to be fatter and fly at dusk or night. Well, yeah, and that's why butterflies get all the credit, because you're out on a nice spring day in the garden and butterflies are everywhere. And then at night you're hanging out by the porch and you're freaked out by the moths everywhere, like going toward the light. Well, not only that, the structure of a moth's wing is very similar to the structure of butterfly. There's transparent filmy scales for some reason, I guess it's because they do fly at night. They are not iridescent or they don't appear iridescent, although they would sunlight. But they are part of the same family scientifically. Yeah. Big happy family. Yeah. What was the family? Lepidoptera. Was that Itoptera? Nice lipidopter tura. There's like 150,000 varieties within that family. Yeah. And lepidopter means scaled wings. Boom. Yeah. It's a great place to finish, don't you think? Sure. Can we recap? Oh, I don't think so. Recap explained. Well, I think so. All right. Because I feel more confused than I did before. Well, you brought sound into it, but I thought that was a very clever way to go about it. Well, thanks a lot. If you want to learn more about butterfly wings and their striking colors, type in Butterflies strikingcolors in the handychearchbot athousetofworks.com brings up a pretty cool article by Jennifer Horton. Hey, Chuck. Chuck, it's you and me from the future. Our idiot past sales have no idea we're doing this right now. Right. But we do, because we're from the future. Indeed. And you know what we're here to do, don't you? Yeah. We're interrupting our podcast for a reason. T shirt winners announced. Yes. If you are a winner, you were guaranteed a mention on the show, and this fulfills that application. Yes. We've got the lawyers behind us that they're briefcases in bull whips, right? Yes. And Chuck. We picked five. I'm glad we picked five because we had more than 70 entries. Right? I wanted to pick ten. I wanted to pick 23. Yeah. And we actually did have, like, a top 23 at one point. And finally whittled it down time and time again, and we came up with the five winners, and they're announced on the blog there's an image gallery on how stuff works. You can go onto our blogs@howstepworks.com and look for the blog post entitled we Got Your Stuff You Should Know t shirt contest winners right here. That's right. And that'll take you into the site to check them out. You can also get the shirts on the Discovery Channel store, right? Yeah. They're for sale. Yeah. You just go on to the, I think, store, discovery.com, and do a search for stuff You Should know. And it brings up all five of these magnificent T shirts, right? Heck, yes. So the names of the winning designers, the five brilliant individual human beings who created these amazing designs, right? Yes. Their names are. What? Chuck? Well, first, these are in no particular order, by the way. We have Peter Feek or Faith or Fayek. We've been debating endlessly. And he did a really cool design of this old school microphone, and it's sort of logo looking. It makes us look like we're really pros. Yes. I call it hot. Mike. Hot Mike. Yeah. I like it. And then, of course, there's Suki Anderson. Out of Kentucky, I believe. I think so. And she made what I think is the coolest picture I've ever seen in my life. Yeah. It's the baby with the fly on its forehead. Yes. And it says, don't worry, there is stuff you should know. Yeah. I said on the blog that it's unsettling and comforting at the same time, and that's very hard to achieve. Agreed. So that was one of our favorite ones. And then we went with Brad Wilson's brain design, which is awesome. Yes. We got a lot of brain designs. So you guys were thinking along the same lines, which means you're all smart and cool. Yeah. And that was the brain as a representation of our show is really, I think, pretty cool. And this was what we thought looks best on a T shirt. Brad nailed it. Yeah, he nailed it. Definitely. Matt Stevenson came up with what I've dubbed the Woodcut Parade. Right. Our fans are going to love this one. Yeah. It's a series of medieval characters. I would say skeleton, a bishop or a monk. A jester. Yeah. And they are carrying banners. That's a SYSK. They're leading the parade. The stuff you should know, parade from Medieval times. Yes. And I said on the site, it looks like a parade of one to hide behind a tree and watch. Right. It's awesome. It's very cool. And then lastly, Chuck, I'm going to leave this one to you because I can't pronounce this guy's last name. Yes. We have Scott. Y-A-C-Y-S-H-Y-N. I'm going to say Jackson. Jackson Yakushin. Yakushin. Scott, whatever your last name is pronounced, let's try that one too. Scott Yakishan. Yeah. If that is you, you are one heck of a designer, my friend. And you did the very cool caricature of Josh and I. And from our mouths and balloons, you have different caricatures of different episodes. And there's so much camaraderie between us. Oh, yeah. We just look like we are having a heck of a time getting the podcast as a 60s illustration. It's very cool. One of my favorite ones, too. Super awesome. So, Scott, Matt, Brad, Suki, Peter. Thank you very much to all of you guys. And thank you to everybody who sent in from something created in rich text format to something that was obviously made by a professional graphic designer. We appreciate all of you guys and thank you very much for taking the time to lend us your brains and creativity. That's awesome. We were blown away. It was very cool. You're all very talented. Okay, and now let's go back to our stupid cells from the past. I predict that I'm going to say some asinine thing about the handy search bar. Okay? That means I said handy search bar. Chuck, are you ready for this? Yeah. Listen or mail. Josh. I'm just going to call this stuff you should know. Educating Prisoners of America. Oh, I like this one. This is a good one. Well, prisoners of Virginia at least, right? Yeah. Which is in America, isn't it? Still, it's a commonwealth. I don't know if it counts. That's right. Weirdos. All right. This is from Maria in Amelia, Virginia. I guess they have a prison there. Hi, guys. I thought you might be interested to know that I use your podcast as a resource to teach writing to inmate students. I'm a GED teacher at a men's prison in Virginia. Writing is one of the weakest skills for my students and many of them never learn to write as far as secondary school, and they were afraid to write as adults, so they're sort of illiterate or completely illiterate in some cases. Well, I mean, think about it. Chuck Wood is writing, if not a series of choices, of what you're going to share with people. It can be very intimidating. I burn your podcast to a CD and replay one in class because we don't have Internet for obvious reasons. The men listen to your podcast, they take notes, and then they must write an article based on what we said. They practice writing sentences and paragraphs. In this way, the subject matter is of interest to them, some more than others. I'm afraid to play the moonshine one as much as I would like to. I know they would be interested even if I skip the parts where you make the still and give the general recipe. So she won't do that because they'll build the moonshine still. I'll bet they already know how to ferment orange. Yeah, I think so. Some of these guys have been down a long, long time, so they appreciate something to think about that isn't about sentencing and parole hearings. Thank you for your material. My family and I enjoy the podcast, and they do a real service to people, so we are actually educating prisoners of America. I know, that's awesome. So if you guys are in prison right now, if you're in the pokey, in the huskow, and you're listening now, we just want to say good luck. You can turn your life around, do your hard time, come out a better person, don't do crimes again. Get your GED and get a job. And good luck to you. That's what I say. And remember, when you make a decision writing, don't look back. Really? Is that your advice? Yeah, that is my advice. All right. You can always write something else. That's a good point. Yeah. If you want to let us know how we are changing the world for the better with this podcast, send us an email to stuffpodcasts@houseoffworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Want morehouse stuffworks? Check out our blogs on the housing.com homepage brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you?"
088a7844-9953-11ea-9884-9fea484506e1	Chuck Bryant's Speech from Commencement: Speeches for the Class of 2020	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/chuck-bryants-speech-from-commencement-speeches-fo	In this episode of Commencement: Speeches for the Class of 2020, Chuck Bryant, co-host of the Stuff You Should Know podcast, reminds graduates to not let this season define them, reminding them the world believes in their ability to craft a better future for themselves.	In this episode of Commencement: Speeches for the Class of 2020, Chuck Bryant, co-host of the Stuff You Should Know podcast, reminds graduates to not let this season define them, reminding them the world believes in their ability to craft a better future for themselves.	Mon, 18 May 2020 22:05:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2020, tm_mon=5, tm_mday=18, tm_hour=22, tm_min=5, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=0, tm_yday=139, tm_isdst=0)	8031248	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer, school's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime four days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon Music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or you're brave enough late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, My Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. Picture this, friends. You could be packing a carry on for a trip to Hawaii when you realize you're going to need a bigger bag. But it's cool because you booked your flight with your city Advantage Platinum Select Card. So you can check a bag for free on domestic travel and still have room for those souvenirs. And surprise, those souvenirs also earned you advantage miles. Actually, you earned advantage miles and loyalty points with each swipe. So let's start dreaming about your next next adventure. This could be you. And you could be anywhere with the Cityadvantage Platinum Select card. Learn more@city.com adventure and travel on with cityadvantage. You want your kid eating the best nutrition, right? And by that we mean your dog. Halo Elevate is natural science based nutrition guaranteed to support your dog's top five health needs. Better than leaving brands. Find Halo Elevate at petco pet supplies plus and select neighborhood pet stores at Metro. By TMobile, we're giving you more with the big 5G upgrade. Now choose from the largest selection of free 5G phones and prepaid like the Samsung Galaxy 5G. Just switch and trade in your old device. Plus enjoy 5G access on every planet at no extra cost. All powered by the TMobile 5G network only at Metro. Requires port in ID and eligible plan plus tax 5D coverage not available everywhere. See Store for details. The holidays are the most wonderful time of the year, but they can also be the most stressful. And with the threat of covid 19 still looming, emotions are high and can be overwhelming. Cal Hope can help with free emotional support for you and your loved ones this holiday season. Call 833-17-4673 or live chat@calhopeorg today. This episode is brought to you by DirecTV Stream. Introducing DirecTV Stream, the best of live TV and on demand. Which means you can watch your favorite sports, movies and shows all in one place. So whether you want to catch the game live or watch the latest blockbuster, they've got you covered and there's no annual contract. DirecTV Stream Get Your TV Together@directv.com requires high speed internet and compatible device content varies by package and location. Restrictions supply commencement Speeches for the Class of 2020 is a production of iHeartRadio Class of 2020. Parents, faculty, rising graduates, welcome to commencement. You made it. This year is a little different. A difficult time to graduate because the traditional graduation day has been put on hold. So we are bringing it to you wherever you are. Because this is still your day, your moment. And now put your hands together. It's time to be inspired this year's commencement speaker, the one and only Chuck Bryant. Hello, class of 2020. I am Charles W. Chuck Bryant from the Stuff You Should Know podcast. Over the past twelve years, I've had the privilege to do a show that has meant quite a bit to a lot of high school and college students. We have heard great things over that time from students who are smart and curious, funny and opinionated, the real seekers in life. And it's my honor to bring them and all of you this message here for your fake commencement class of 2020. I'm sorry. You worked really hard for twelve years and then maybe four more years in college and you were supposed to finish out your senior year with prom, graduation, senior Skip Day, and more than anything, walking out of your school knowing that it was for the very last time. But you aren't getting that privilege that you earned. And that really sucks. I'd like to sugarcoat it, but that's the gods honest truth. Now, with that out of the way, let me tell you why. One day you're going to look back on all of this time and actually smile. Because you will. You will forever be known as the Quarantine Class. Capital Q, capital C, trademark. Charles W. Bryant. You will go down as the most cheated group of seniors in high school and college history. And that's something you should embrace. Because all of this will only make you stronger, more resilient, and more prepared for the inevitable future disappointments. You will all suffer over and over again in life. You might think I'm kidding. And I kind of am. Because see, I use humor to help deflect my own pain. And we're all feeling that pain right now. You see, I have a niece in the Quarantine Class, and I have some close friends with kids in the Quarantine Class. And I have an almost five year old daughter who is part of the Quarantine Class of her preschool. She will never set foot again inside this little hippie dippy school where she made her very first friends and she will likely not see many of them ever again. I have seen, through my daughter and my niece and my friends firsthand, the pain and disappointment of what this dumb situation has caused. But back to the humor part, right? Because I am kidding in a way that life is a series of disappointments and you'll be better prepared because of this. But life really is a series of disappointments and also a series of sweet victories and wonderful friendships and bitter betrayals. It's true love and utter heartbreak. It's exciting and boring as hell. It's exhilarating and mundane. Your future will be filled with all that's amazing and terrible. The whole point of life is to experience the full range of emotions and experiences. You'd be short changed if everything was awesome because sadness and pain are valuable. Some of the best art in history came from sadness and pain. Most of it, actually. You know those songs about somebody who's really happy all the time? There are very few, and they suck. So what I'm getting at is that you have an opportunity to use this experience and use this time, one unlike any other in human history, to your best advantage. The world we live in has, by and large, simply stopped for a moment. Not your neighborhood or your city or state or even your country. The entire world. We're all at home. We're all granted so much time with our families and loved ones, and more importantly, with ourselves. Will you miss graduation? Yes. Does that suck again? Yes. But you know what? I honestly barely remember anything about my graduation, and I didn't even drink back then. But I know I'll remember these days and weeks and these months more clearly than any other time in my life. Now is the time to think about what you're going to do to make the world a better one. We shouldn't go back to normal because normal wasn't the best for the world. We can do better. We can slow down. We can be kinder to the Earth and to each other. We can share things and use less. We can forge a brighter path. But you see, there's a catch. Quarantine Class trademark. It's got to come from you guys. We can't do it. We've showed that we can't do it. Old people are the worst at making real change. People my age aren't so great at it either. But you know what? You guys are the best. Your spirit, your ingenuity, your passion. This is what we need if we're going to use this time to reboot humanity because we need to. It's a big job, but we have a little head start here, and we have all of you behind us, pushing this huge barge in the right direction just a few short inches at a time, so that it all ends up in a very different place years from now. So, in closing, yes, the country is all super sad for the Quarantine Class. You have all been cheated, and it really does suck. But it won't define you. I've heard from enough of you over the years to know that that's true. One day, you look back on this time, and it will 100% be up to you what that memory looks like. I believe in you. And the world believes in you. Congratulations on all you've achieved and all that you will achieve. Now go out there and crush it. You can find a collection of incredible commencement addresses from all all your favorite speakers at the commencement podcast on iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to podcasts."
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/podcasts.howstuffworks.com/hsw/podcasts/sysk/2016-12-29-sysk-human-blockhead.mp3	Human Blockheads: A Real Thing	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/human-blockheads-a-real-thing	Human blockheads are performers who hammer nails and things into their noses. Yup. That's a thing. And it isn't a trick either - anyone can do it. Just please don't try to.	Human blockheads are performers who hammer nails and things into their noses. Yup. That's a thing. And it isn't a trick either - anyone can do it. Just please don't try to.	Thu, 29 Dec 2016 08:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2016, tm_mon=12, tm_mday=29, tm_hour=8, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=364, tm_isdst=0)	44207206	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, San Francisco. We're coming back to see you. Yes. Our second year in a row, we're gonna be going to SF sketchfest. I like to think it's the premier comedy festival in the United States. Well, in the world. You think so? Yeah. What about Beijing? No, it's a close second, but a second. Well, we love San Francisco. We love performing there. Everyone is always so kind to us. And by San Francisco, we mean the entire Bay area. Of course. Yeah. So we will be there doing our thing for a one time only show on Sunday, January 15, at 01:00 p.m.. Yeah, it's the rare Sunday afternoon. We're like the NFL of podcasters. Yeah, exactly. That's what I've always thought. So all you have to do is go to the SF sketchfest site, look at the old calendar, and there are tons of great people performing. Oh, yeah. So I suggest just doubling down and getting tickets to all kinds of good shows, for sure. And hurry up and get tickets to ours because they've only been on sale for a week or so and they're already half sold out. That's right. So please hurry. San Francisco. Please hurry. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's charles W, Chuck Bryant, and it's just us chickens here in Studio one. A yeah, the blockhead is calling. Yeah, Terry the Blackhead. I'm just kidding. She's not a blockhead, she's a meathead. She is a meathead. This is fun. What else is she? She's not here. We can say whatever we want. She'll never hear this. That's true. Two things I've noticed today. We're both wearing blue hoodies. Oh, yeah. Yours is a recreation of the great sweater that Danny wore in The Shining, which I think I told you you love. Lee uncrick of. Pixar owns that real sweater. Oh, yeah, you did tell me that. Yeah. Like, if you're like, you got the sweatshirt version. He owns the sweater. It's the real thing. But unless he's the same size as, like, a little four, five, six year old boy, he put that he doesn't wear it or put it on his own kit. Yeah, that's probably why he had a kit. He wants to drive him to madness. Right. To model the sweater. Yeah. Okay. And I'm wearing my high school sweatshirt. Radan Raiders redan. Yeah. The other thing I noticed is that got new glasses or a new prescription. My eyes were clearly getting worse and you're fuzzy to me, but my papers are clear and I should have gotten the Bifocals, like you said. Bifocals cramps. I've been doing a lot of this. That really doesn't age you at all. Chuck just pulled his glasses down his nose and looked over him. Well, when you're at home and let's say you got the TV on, but you're working on your laptop, it's troublesome. Have you ever heard of that? I can't remember what it's called progressive lenses. No, it's like a type of basically training your eyes to get better by denying them corrective lenses. Well, I did that for 43 years and it didn't work. Well, I mean, or maybe it did work. Your eyes would have been way worse had you not done that. Here's what I know. I know that two weeks ago, like, I never wore my previous glasses prescription because it didn't look like they were doing anything, but things were getting harder to read. So I went back three years later and they were like, oh, yeah, things have changed. But I was reading two weeks ago, I was just sort of holding it back a little more, maybe. But now when I put these on, it's like someone turned on the lights. I was like, Holy cow, that's so clear. But is something changed in just the last few weeks? No, I think I was just used to getting by as clearly as I could have. I see I got you because once I put these on, I just couldn't believe the difference. Well, good for you for doing something. Yeah, but now I got to wear glasses all the time. Well, not all the time, but when I read, you remind me exactly of how I felt in fourth grade when I got glasses. They came in and they were like, okay, everybody's doing the eye test. And of course you just think it's cursory, like a lice check or something like that. Right. And you went and stood in the corner, and then the nurse or whoever it was is like, you need glasses. I was like, what? You're insane, woman? I think, is what I said. But it was a man. Right. So that's all they knew. I proved myself insane. Yeah. Right. So I ended up with glasses, and I remember feeling like, oh, man, I'm shackled for the rest of my life. Yeah, that's a tough age. I don't know if glasses still have the same stigma on young kids, but when we were kids, it was definitely like, four eyes and all that. Yeah, there was a bit of it. So I showed them. I went out and got the most Elton Johnny glasses I could find. I'd love to see a picture of that. Yeah, they were clear with, like, a thin blue wire running through the frames. Nice. They were pretty awesome. All right, so human blockhead. Yeah. So, Chuck, have you ever seen the human blockhead trick? Yeah, I should not call it a trick. You're right. I have. Like, in person? Yeah. I went to a Jim Rose circus once, and they had a blockhead. That when I went. I'm not sure if they still do. Was it Ryan Stock? I don't think so. This is a long time ago. Yeah. He seems a little young to have been in the original Jim Rose Show. Yeah, I mean, this was in like was it at La Lapalooza? Maybe because that was in the first part of the First Law of Palooza. They were part of that. Yeah. I was at that show. There you go. Maybe that's where it was. Maybe so. Well, I've never seen a human blockhead, so, I mean, I was aware of it. I'm sure I'd seen, like, references to it in cartoons or whatever. But I went online because I noticed as I was researching this, I was like, wow, I feel, like, fainting for some reason. I was like, this really makes me faint. And I went online and just exposed myself to it. And yeah, I didn't actually faint, but it's something well, we should go ahead and say, then. A human blockhead is a person, and we'll get into the history of it, where that name comes from. But it's a person, a performer who inserts a nail or a camping steak or a drill pair of scissors, something sharp that would make your stomach turn if you saw it jammed in a person's nose all the way. Right. And they do just that. Yes. And the reason I corrected myself earlier, I called it a trick. It's not a trick. The person who performs the human blockhead, or who is a human blockhead, would correct me and say, no, this is a stunt. A trick suggests that there's some sort of illusion. There's some sort of deception or stage magic going on. Yes. This is a stunt because it's exactly what you think it is. There's a nail going into the person's skull. Yeah. And if you don't know and you go to one of these, you probably think it's a trick. It's a fake nail. It's a collapsible telescoping nail or something. Maybe some sort of sleight of hand, like the old trick where you just turn to the side and act like you're pulling something out of your mouth. Yeah, that old bit. Yeah, I finally figured that one out in my 20s. Thanks to your glasses, probably. So, to the uninitiated, people probably leave these performances sometimes say, well, of course that wasn't real. There's no way. Right. It's true. That's what you think of the performers they play on that, right. It's part of the whole thing. But it's actually legitimately. The nail is not fake, and it actually is going into the person's head. But the further misconception is that, okay, if it is going into the person's head, that it's being driven into their skull, their bone. Right. Either through a new hole that they're making because they're crazy, or an established hole that they've used time and time again. Like an ear piercing that it's healed over. Not the case. Yeah. I was about to say the body doesn't need any new holes, but I forgot about piercing. Not that you need piercing, but that's the only thing I can think of where you would want a new hole. That's legitimate. Right. I don't know. Some doctors could want new holes for you depending, like, if you got a Colossal or a tracheotomy. I didn't even think about that. Medical reasons or Stellar put an ear on his arm. I was thinking about him. I can't believe you remember that guy's name. Yeah, man. Stellar. Wow. If he didn't listen years ago, we talked about him. He was a performance artist who molded and grafted an ear look alike onto his arm, survive some terrible infections. That was bluetooth compatible. So he could literally hear through it. Right. You know what I mean? Yeah. Probably not literally hear through it, but it had, like, a bluetooth mic in the ear, and then he had, like, a headphone in his own ear, so yeah, he could hear what was going on there. With assistance of technology, he could hear through it. He's a performance artist. What do you expect? But that technically wasn't a hole, though. No, it was just a fake ear on his arm. No, it was a real ear. Oh, was it a real ear? Whose was it? It was like a cloned ear grafted onto his arm. It was basically the cutting edge of performance art at the time. Yeah. I wonder what he's doing now. It looks like cat up. He's sitting around on people's couches going like, hey, remember that time I grabbed it in here on my arm? That was pretty great. And he says, hey, talk to the forearm. They say, Stellar. We never get tired of that joke. Right. So should we talk about the history first or the mechanism? Let's do history. I love this guy. Well, by guy, I know who you're talking about, because there can be only one Mr. Melvin Burkhart, who passed away 15 years ago in 2001 at the age of 94 years old. He was born in Atlanta yeah. In 19 seven. Grew up in New Orleans, mainly, and quit school at an early age and became a we worked a couple of odd jobs. He worked for Western Union, but then found his calling as a sideshow performer, which we've covered on the show. Yeah. Along with other circus arts. Yeah, you've got it. For circus arts? I think just about every circus art one we've ever done is your pick. Was it? But, man, we have an extensive library of circus arts. Yes. Sword swallowing, lion taming, fire eating. Fire eating. Do we have firewalking? No, I don't think so. All right, look for that one soon. Yeah. For real or tight ropeax? No, we didn't. Circus families. We did. He's exhausted this. I don't know, man. Fire walking or circuses. We should do the wheel. We talked about it. The wheel with the motorcycles in it. What's it called? Something of death. Wheel of Death. No. Globe of Death, maybe. Robbins. Maybe the globe of death around Clunky ride. Right. All right, so back to Mr. Burkhart. Yeah, he started performing inside Show. He did. So he kind of fell into performing. He used to go to the theater a lot, and one day when he was, I think, 14 or 15 or something, he jumped to his feet when the people on stage asked for volunteers to come on stage. And I guess he tripped or fell. I didn't know if it was purposeful or not, and drove a nail through us for her. Right. And everyone just laughed and laughed. He did get some laughs. Not for the nail yet. That came later. But he was invited back for the next show, and within a day or two, he found himself with a contract to do an amateur performance. So he started performing at a very early age. His thing initially was, and I think throughout his career, he was what was called a talker, a master of ceremonies at a sideshow. You might call them a barker or something like that, but they were the ones who kept the show going. They introduced the new sideshow performers as they came on and went off, and he did his own act in between the other acts, and part of his act ended up being the nail, the human blockhead trick, among a bunch of other stuff. Yeah. So one of these quotes I got is a New York Times obituary, which are always great, but one of the quotes from one of his counterparts and Coney Island was so funny, he said, this is from Dick Zeigan. He's a sideshow guy. And he said, anybody can insert objects in their nasal passage. Of their nasal passage. But Melbourne's patter and comedy made it an act. Right. And then the other guy, two great quotes. Todd Robbins is a magician who is also a blockhead at times. Says, anyone who has ever hammered a nail into his nose owes a large debt to Melvin Burkhart. Yeah, there's a little bit of tongue and cheek in that old bit that I'm sure Burkhart would have appreciated. I'm sure that Todd Robinson actually has traced it back to the Jadu Wallace, basically the Hindu performers, street performers, and they apparently did a human blockhead trick long ago. Right. And I don't know if it was just totally coincidental that Melvin Burkhart stumbled upon it himself or if he had heard about it or seen it himself. Right. But at any rate, as far as it goes in the west and the modern conception of the human blockhead, melvin Burkhart was the guy who invented it. Yeah, I'm sure there are probably people in India scoffing at that notion. Right. But he was soon discovered by none other than Mr. Ripley himself, and he took him on to his auditorium in Manhattan, had him performing, and supposedly is the one who came up with the name human blockhead for this act, me. And that Robert Ripley. He coined a lot of stuff. I don't get it, though. I still don't get why blockhead? It's a dumb name. I would have called it like I don't know what? I would have called it. Give me ten minutes, though, and I'll think of a better. Okay. Shout it out when you got it. All right. Well, I mean, like, you can hammer nails into a block of wood. I guess so. Is that what you were asking? It's a stupid name, but without it, we wouldn't have the Lucy from Peanuts favorite put down. Remember, she called everybody a blockhead. Yeah. What about the human pin cushion? That's not quite right, though. That's okay. It's actually a lot more accurate, but I think there are other human pin cushions. Aren't there people that do stuff that'd be very confusing? I'm the ping cushion. No, I'm the pincushion. You're a blockhead. So he actually ended up and this is where the story ties into fleet Circus is actually at Hubert's Museum on 42nd street, which I believe is where the hecklers had their flea circus for decades, and where it appeared in Easy Rider. That's right. Yeah. That's right. Boy, it's all coming together, isn't it? And he was what was known as, like, some people when we did our sideshow podcast, a lot of people were born with physical deformities. Some people say we're exploited, other people say championed. But he was not that. He was what was known as a working act. Right. So he just had some talent and fortitude to do some of these things. He wasn't necessarily born with any strange nasal passage, although he does say he was a boxer and broke his nose such that they removed nasal bones that he thinks created this passage to inserting a nail into your sinus cavity. Right. But it exists in everyone. Okay. So that, to me, is a great place to put a break. All right, you ready? Yes. Here we go. All right, Chuck, you may mention that Melvin Burkhart was a boxer, right? Yes, a pugilist. So apparently during his boxing career, he was getting some bone that had been shattered in his face, removed around his nose. Around his nasal cavity. Yeah. And the story goes that he noticed that the doctors were having a really easy time sticking, like, a scalpel or pincers or all sorts of little medical instruments in his nose. Yeah. Rubber chicken. Any young man was a doctor. Just look them up, everybody. Yeah. And he was like, well, jeez, if these guys can put the stuff in my nose, I'll bet I could too. And if I combine it with my pattern and comedy, I could really make a good show of this. And apparently that's where he was inspired to do the human blockhead trick. Yeah. He's like, I can make $50 a week. So he had something like a dozen pieces of bone removed from his nasal cavity area from his skull for medical reasons, right? Yeah. From his boxing career. Yeah. So he apparently had a larger than normal nasal cavity as a result. Okay, well, that makes sense, but it's like what you said, everybody has a hole in their face, and it can be exploited to do the human blockhead trick. We have a lot of holes in our face, so let's talk about the holes in our face. All right. Chuck just put his glasses on. Well, I'm tired of looking over you and feeling like I'm 70. So how do I look without, like I got to get a picture of this. How do you look when I'm looking at you through the glasses? Without the glasses, you look great. How do I look with the glasses on? Not so great. Larger and fuzzy. So look at me over there you go. Wow. All right, we'll put that up on Instagram. Okay. All right. The holes in our face. Let's talk about the skull. The skull, while it appears as if it's just one big, solid bowling ball with a face on the front of it, right? It is not. It is 22 bones and all. And if you've ever seen a human skull, you can see this because they have sutures where it's joined together. It's a big patchwork of goodness, protective goodness. And for the most part, when you look at someone's face and you say, hey, high cheekbones, prominent chin, look at the size of those teeth and how pointy they are. That's crazy. These are actually, like features of either the bone themselves or the bone underneath the skin. That's your facial features. Right? Right. But there is one very prominent exception to this rule, and that's your nose. Your nose is not the result of protrusion of bone with skin stretched over it. Most of your nose is made of cartilage. That's right. So there's actually very little bone involved in your skin just with your nose. Just on the bridge of the nose. That's right. Okay. So beneath the bridge of the nose, everybody, I want you to take your finger, put it between your eyes, and then just press down at the bridge of your nose. Not too hard. Not that hard. Okay. And then just go slide. Start to slide a little further down. That is not bone any longer. That's cartilage. And behind that cartilage, friends, there's a big old hole in the center of your face. Have you ever had your nose broken? Let me just knock on wood, like, 50 times. No. Have you ever been punched in the nose? Yes. But didn't break it? No. Okay. I've never had my nose broken. I've never been punched. You better knock on wood at all? Yeah, no, never been in a fight. That's great. It is, but I kind of feel like I should get in a fist fight club. Remember that there's this thing called bars? Yeah, right. And if you go out at certain times, you can get into a fight pretty easy. I was always the guy that was breaking it, like, oh, guys, it would be much more fun if we all just kept drinking and did not get in a fight. Right. Like there's nothing that will ruin a night more than a bar fight. It's all over. Bar fights suck. Yeah. Across the board. Plus, I never, always had a very strong inclination to not get punched in the face. I think that's a sensible inclination. Well, not really. You see how some people act and some dudes love to fight. Some ladies love to fight. Yeah. They go out looking for it. Sure. I don't know that that's to be admired or celebrated in any way. It's the worst. Sure. When I lived in Arizona that short year, I picked up just friends at my restaurant. And one of the friends of the dude that worked there was one of the most uncomfortable people to hang out with I've ever experienced. Oh, yeah. He was always looking to get in a fight everywhere we went. And it just I was so fraught with anxiety. Tons of anger inside. Is it just anger, though? Don't you wonder if stuff like that is hormonal? Like that guy's hormones are tuned a little out of I bet you there's a lot of factors hormones, upbringing, anger from childhood. But all I know is that I felt like I was going to have a heart attack every time I was near this dude. I was just waiting for the inevitable fist fight. Wouldn't it be neat if that guy listens? He doesn't listen. He's listening right now, knows what you're talking about, and it just started sobbing uncontrollably like he just had a breakthrough. That would be great because you mentioned his childhood. He's not listening. I can guarantee that. Oh, yeah, the nose. Yeah. So cartilage the nose is easy to break is kind of where I was getting but technically you're not really breaking it. Oh, really? Because it's Cartilage. I guess you can break cartilage. Don't listen to me. What you've also got in your face up front of that skull is there are all kinds of spaces. There are these little hollow places called sinuses. Right. You got your eye sockets, of course, and then the old reliable Foreman magnum, which is where the brainstem exits the skull. That really has nothing to do with this episode. It doesn't. This is just sort of a breakdown of what's going on in your face. Tracy, by the way, this is a Tracey Wilson joint. Sure. And she's just trying to prove her point that there's lots of holes in the skull. That's right. The only holes that matter for a blockhead are the nostrils, and I would say the nasal cavity. Right. And the nasal cavity is that hole in your skull, in the front of your skull where your nose goes. And it leads all the way back to your throat, actually. Yeah. Which is very important, actually, for other acts that we'll talk about. Yeah. So the area where it terminates at the throat is called the naso fairings. And all of this is just wide open. You can stick whatever you want in there. Please don't. And you can do it without nailing, without hammering, without anything like that. You can just slide it in. Right. Yeah. Physically speaking, we'll get into how all the reasons why that's very difficult, but just physiologically speaking, there's a big old hole in the front of your face. There's a lot of empty space behind it going all the way back to your throat. And so the human blockhead takes advantage of these holes. Right. But it wouldn't be so great if you could just look at somebody and say, hey, that's great. You're just sliding nail into hole in an open passage. That doesn't do anything. The trick, the illusion, is based on the natural formation of our nose and our nostrils, which appear to go upward. Yes. Which is not the case, actually. If you pull your nose back and look into a mirror, you see that the hole is behind them, not above them. Right. And that's the whole illusion. Yeah. You feel like when you blow your nose, that snot is coming down from the top of your head, and that's not the case. Now it's coming from the back. That's right. The ceiling is just about even with the top of the nose right below your eyes. The ceiling of the nasal cavity. Right. Yeah. The ceiling of your bedroom in the floor of the nasal cavity is about level with what's known as the allar cartilage. Alar. Yes. Which is where the nostrils are. Right. That's the bottom of your nostrils. Yeah. So when you see, like you said, when you see the trick, the fact that it's not going up and it's just going straight in makes people go, oh, my God, what is going on? He's driven a nail right into the bone of his skull. That's what it looks like. That's right. And by the way, if you want a good view of what all this looks like, I stumbled upon a horrific photo of somebody whose nostrils I guess the cartilage that separates their nostrils into two. Yeah. There's got to be a name for that. Right. It's gone. And the whole nose is the skin of the nose is being pulled back so you can see the skull behind it. So if you want to just type in all our cartilage and Google search, image search, and you'll be as unhappy as I am for having seen it, I'll just kind of go round there and look. Do you want to see it? No, it's pretty crazy. No, that's all right. Okay. I'll look at it later because I know I want to. I'll be lying in bed tonight thinking of it. I'm not going to do it. I'm not doing it. So to finish up, though, in the cavity, it is not just a smooth, straight thing either. There are these grooves called conchae, conchae on the walls and they hold on to the moisture when you exhale, and that's going to keep everything nice and lubricated, which is what you want in there, thanks to the mucous membrane that lines all these surfaces and keeps everything nice. And I'm not going to say the M word, but nice and moist. Yeah. Everybody hates that word, huh? Not everyone, but there's a great word. There's science behind it. Okay. I can't remember I posted an article for mental floss. Apparently there's some science behind why people don't like that word. Nice. So when you're doing the human blockhead trick I should change that. When you're seeing a professional do the human blockhead trick, what they're doing is they're sliding the nail let's just stick with the nail. Sure. The nail into their nasal cavity. They want to usually hug the allard, cartilage the floor of their nasal cavity, tried to avoid the concave, and that way you decided that it's pronounced. And they're pushing it all the way back into their nasal pharynx. Right. You got about six to eight inches of space to deal with. Is it that much? From your nostril back to the nasopharynx? Yeah. Wow. And the human blockhead to make it so it's not just sliding a nail into your nose, which is gross, but that's pretty playgroundy. They will take a hammer and they will hold on to the nail very tightly, and they will make it look like they're hammering the nail into their skull. And they'll go right. And there's the sound of the hammer against the nail. And it sounds really painful, where really you can just take the thing and slide it in. Easy peasy. Yeah. That's called stagecraft. Right. So all of this sounds extremely easy, and in a sense it is. But there are a lot of obstacles to performing this trick successfully, and we'll talk about those right after this. So I don't think we should go any further without a serious COA message. Yeah, it seems obvious, but do not try to stick a nail in your nose because Josh and Chuck said it was possible. Yeah. That's really good, Chuck. The human anatomy, the anatomy of a face and a skull makes it possible. We advise no one to ever try this unless you want to get into the circus arts legitimately and want to take the steps to really learn how to do this. Right. I actually ran across this Theory Eleven.com forum tutorial. The novice was asking how to do this, and this guy named William Draven replied, and I thought he had a pretty good COA himself. He said, like, if you do want to do this, I no way advocate learning from reading text on the Internet or even watching videos. Totally. Go find somebody who has successfully performed this trick numerous times and then learn from them directly. Yes. Don't learn from guys like us. Don't learn from reading William Raven's comments on the Internet. Don't read it from. Anybody. Go find somebody who knows this trick and learn it from them. Yeah. And where do you find that person? They're the guy in the corner of the bar with the nail in there now. Sure. It's pretty easy, right? Or they live in a town called Winter something in Florida. And I did look, we keep saying, dudes, I did try and find to see if there are any women out there who did this. I didn't find any, but I'm sure there are supposedly more than 100 human blockheads around the world. Go find one of them. I'm sure some women do this. I'm sure it's just not a prominent Google search to type in woman blockhead. Weirdo porn, too. I'm sure. I think every single time I've ever said, guys, I've been in it as a gender neutral. Yeah. So one thing Tracy points out is that all noses are different, and sometimes, to reach your nasal cavity, the lower edge of your nostril might be in the way. So sometimes it might just glide right in and you look the same. But sometimes, if you do it right, your nose will stick up like your snout will stick out like a pig because the nails holding it up, other noses, it might just look normal. Right. Except for the fact that there's a nail to it. A lot of people who do this most people, I should say, who do it, practice initially with the Q Tip. That's probably smart, right? Yeah, you want to practice with a Q Tip, and one reason why you want to practice with a Q Tip is, number one, I would guess it'd be harder to injure yourself with a Q Tip, although I'm sure it will still be quite easy. Sure. And then the Q Tips are kind of fuzzy, and so one of the hardest things to overcome doing the human blockhead trick or stunt is overcoming the sneezing reflex. That's the biggest one. I mean, there's all sorts of other problems. Like, if you use something that's not clean, you set yourself up for sinus infection because you're sticking foreign objects back there around your sinuses. Yeah. You can damage the very soft mucous membranes and tissue that are around that line your nose and nasal cavity and your sinuses and your nasal pharynx. But one of the biggest challenges is overcoming the sneezing reflex, which can combine all this stuff, all these dangers, and then increase them tenfold. Yeah. If you're trying to stick a nail in your head in the early stages and you sneeze, sneezing can be a very violent reaction. Let's talk about sneezing real quick. All right. So, Tracy, you went to the trouble of outlining how a sneeze works. Right. It's pretty neat. So you've got a sneeze has what's called a reflex arc. Any kind of reflex, as far as the human body is concerned, consists of a reflex arc, and it's made up of a receptor in this case we've got nerve endings in our noses. Those are the receptors. Yeah. And they're the things that say, I just snorted pepper at my nose, or this house is dusty, or whatever might cause you animal dander. Whatever. Hops and beer for me. Oh, yeah. So, like, if you literally smell like an IPA, I don't even have to smell it, I can just drinking it. Oh, really? Yeah, just like one good sneeze and then you're fine? No, about like 80. Really? Yeah. Wow. Hops gets me. Hops and peppermint. You've got the stimulus against the receptor. The receptors got the sensory nerve leading up to the integration center of your brain. Whatever center integrates all this information for that particular reflex. That's right. Your motor nerve, which says, hey, go do this. And then it's called an effector. And in the case of sneezing, an effector is the process, the physical process of sneezing. Right. Yeah. Which everyone sneezes. Sure. Let's get real. You know what was interesting to me, Chuck, is when you're researching yawning, you yawn. When you research itching. Did you sneeze? You scratch, didn't sneeze. Yeah, I thought the same thing. Really? I wonder if I'm going to start sneezing. And I did not. It's not suggestible. No. Totally reactive thing. So when you sneeze, you might start off with your eyes watering and you're going to secrete some fluid from your nasal passage. And then there's an abrupt, like Presley's breath that you draw in from your diaphragm. I don't think that has a name. Let's just call it the Priest and ease breath. Breath, sure. I think we just coined it like Robert Rickley. And then your diaphragm and muscles in your chest contract really quickly and the air leaves that nose and mouth really quickly. Do you have a sneeze pattern or is it random? No, I'm sure I follow a pattern. I almost always sneeze in threes. Yeah. Is yours three? Yeah. Oh, wow. But, I mean, it depends. I seriously will sneeze eight or nine times if you're drinking a poppy beer. Right? Yeah, I'm almost always three. And when it's not, it stands out to me as being unique or incomplete. Yes. Sometimes, or sometimes I'll sneeze later and think like, oh, yeah, there's the third. There it is. Which is silly. It's like Celebrity deaths. I meant to look that up, though. I wonder if there's any science to that sneezing pattern. Sure. There's science to everything. That's true. Science and magic. So you can put off a sneeze. You've probably done that before. That tickling sensation just goes away. Those are to me, the incomplete things. Because you felt like or I feel like so close and I clearly needed to sneeze. But you didn't. If your body doesn't sneeze and it warded itself off. Yeah. The point of all the sneezing talk is that part of mastering the human blockhead stunt is reducing your sneeze reflex. And apparently it can be done just by exposing yourself to a sneeze reflex over and over again. So you just stick that Q Tip in there. You sneeze, you do it again. You sneeze, you do it again. You sneeze. You go eat a TV dinner and take a little break because it's tough. Yes. And you're mad. You're really mad. Get really pissed off, and then you come back, and then you do it again. And then eventually, a few days later, a few weeks later, you've lost all your friends. But you don't sneeze when you stick something up your notes, right? Victory. Yes. I also saw that if you are a human blockhead, you want to basically scrub down any new stunt nail that you've got with steel wool and then soak it and rubbing alcohol for a while to prevent sinus infection. I'm picturing, like, a corny thriller where someone creeps in and switches out the nail. Some pathogen on the end of it. No, I'm dead. So, like I said, there are over 100 people doing this around the world. Supposedly, Ryan Stock, who you mentioned earlier, has become pretty famous because he's been on I think he had a TV show of his own. He was definitely on America's Got Talent. Yeah. And he does all sorts of things, he and his wife. Oh, is she in on the act? Yeah, she's definitely part of it. Amberlynn so, like I said, he does all kinds of things. But one of his most notable tricks is a spin on this called the human meat head, where just look it up. Ryan Stock, he puts a meat hook remember how he said it was connected to the throat? He will go all the way through his nose, out of his mouth with the end of the hook. Then he'll pull stuff around. He actually pulled almost a 1300 pound car. He holds the world's record, that's being the only person to ever do it. You got to hear the title of this world record. He has a world record for the heaviest vehicle pulled using a hook through the nasal cavity and out of the mouth. 1598.35 pound car. No idea how much that is in kilograms. Yeah, I remember my brother, he ate something when he was the first time I realized that was all connected. He laughed a lot when eating hamburger and coughed hamburger through his nose or milk through the nose when you made your friend laugh. That was always that's a classic bitch, man. You just were triumphant the rest of the day. I actually have found if I'm jogging, like, I always chew gum, and I break the gum slowly into small pieces, and I eventually eat it or whatever, really? But there's, like, a few moments where there's a small piece of gum separated from the rest of the gum. And I've noticed every once in a while, I don't know what sets it off, but I'll just snot it out like it'll shoot up my throat and then on my nose. And this happened more than once? Yeah. You're either not jogging right. You're not chewing gum right. There's something there's a breakdown. Yeah. I don't think you're supposed to do that. It's true. Weird. Does it hurt? No, it's just surprising. Sure. It's the gum. What do you mean? Pieces of brain. Did you ever hear about the woman who had, like, a runny nose for 20 years, and she finally went to the doctor and they're like, that's cerebrospinal fluid, your brain is leaking out of your nose. Is she okay? I guess. I mean, she lived with it for decades. That's crazy. And there's this other guy that I want to mention, too. The faith healer. Oh, yeah. John of God. And this made me want to do I'd love to do a show on face healing, period. And a show on psychic surgery. Okay, those are definitely on the list now. But he is a famous Brazilian faith healer. He's big. He's way more famous than I thought he was because I hadn't heard of him. Okay. But he's big time. And he does these he has a couple of kind of operations, one visible and one invisible. And one of the visible ones is he sticks forceps up the nose of people and to supposedly heal them of certain things. And apparently he was exposed by the great James Randy. The Amazing Randy, who we talked about. The great legendary skeptic ol sour puss. That's what I call him. Did you ever see the documentary? No, I haven't yet. It's really good. There's a great documentary called An Honest Liar about the amazing Randy. He's just so interesting. But I think ABC or CBS or someone got him involved. Yeah, ABC TV. To expose John of God. And he said, well, for sure. One of the things. I mean, he's exposed psychic surgeons before, right? But he said this forceps up the nose thing is nothing more than the blockhead trick. Sure. And that's all he's doing. Fraud. We'll do a human oh, no. A psychic surgery one, for sure. That sounds pretty interesting. I remember seeing that when I was a kid. I thought it was, like, the real deal. Apparently Andy Kaufman went to psychic surgery and then figured out the scam. So sad. So says Milash Foreman. At least. Yeah, he's like chickens in the hand. I see it. You got anything else? I do not. If you want to know more about human blockheads, you can type those words in the search BARHOW stuffworks.com. You can search human blockhead online. There's at least one good Melvin Burkhart performance on YouTube. Don't forget to look up Alar Cartilage. No Ryan Stock. And also shout out to Zenarts La for their article on blockheads. That was helpful as well. Since I said all that, it's time, friends, for listener mail. So, Chuck, I guess this is the last one of the year. Yeah. We should say before we do mail. Happy New Year, everybody. Yeah. Be safe. We want to see everyone in 2017, and we kind of said it in the Christmas episode, but thanks for everything over the years. Yeah, for real. It means a lot to us, and we just can't wait to get things going again. And by your calendar. Just a couple of days by your Earth calendar. Yeah. And also on a personal note, happy birthday to my darling wife Yumi. Happy birthday, Yumi. Okay, well, it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this banning Advertising the Kids. We heard from a lot of people on this. It's a hot topic. Hey, guys. Live in Northern Virginia. Just listened to your show on Advertising for children. Want to relay an experience we had with our 18 month old daughter. We were on vacation with her in Florida, had a day with nothing on our to do list, so we decided to take a drive to Walt Disney World. We also found a bag full of cash in our glove compartment. My husband was hesitant about going because of her young age and the fact that she had zero exposure to Disney at this point. I persuaded him by saying she would enjoy the parades and the characters, even if she didn't know who they were. The literally only television she had ever seen at that point was educational programming on PBS Kids, and that was even minimal. So as we turn on to the road trying to make our way to the Magic Kingdom, there was a water tower in the distance, decorated like Mickey Mouse ears and all. And my daughter immediately shouted, look, it's Mickey Mouse. But they were like, how do you know that? My husband and I were both completely surprised. We cannot believe that our daughter had been indoctrinated into recognizing that brand at only 18 months, especially since we hadn't taught her that most likely she was shown a toy or a book at daycare. It is not that we were against Disney or anything, obviously, because we were taking her there. It's just very shocking to see your young child parrot that information. This could also be evidence of reincarnation. Well, at least what if it was like a billboard and she's like, look, it's Newt Gingrich? That would be caused for alarm. I know this advertising is everywhere, and it's nearly impossible to avoid it. So we can eventually teach her to not be fooled and use critical thinking to make decisions rather than her emotions. Nice. Thanks for all you do to make my long commute so much more enjoyable. That is from Stacey. And she says, my daughter now is nearly five and gets annoyed by commercials, so she pauses television until she can fast forward through them all. One point for technology. Nice. Well, thanks a lot, Stacey. We appreciate that. It's a cool story. Hope you guys had a good time at Disney World. And that's it right yes. Well, if you want to get in touch with us, like Stacey did, you can tweet to us at joshmclark or s yskpodcast you can hang out with Chuck on Facebook.com. Charleswchuckbrytor facebook.com. Send us an email to stuffpodcast@houseofworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the Web stuffyteanow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseworks.com. 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c304acc4-5460-11e8-b38c-034ee3740eb8	SYSK Selects: Interpol: World Police	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/sysk-selects-interpol-world-police	Interpol is an international police agency that helps other law-enforcement agencies track criminals who operate across national borders -- but how does it work, exactly? Join the guys as they delve into the world of global law enforcement.	Interpol is an international police agency that helps other law-enforcement agencies track criminals who operate across national borders -- but how does it work, exactly? Join the guys as they delve into the world of global law enforcement.	Sat, 16 Feb 2019 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=2, tm_mday=16, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=47, tm_isdst=0)	31823082	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Good morning, everyone. I hope you've enjoyed your breakfast cereal, your Saturday morning cartoons, and now it's time for a little learning from May 15, 2012. My select pick for this week is Interpol World Police. Why not? I never knew much about Interpol at all, actually, before we did this podcast. And I learned quite a bit myself, and I think you will, too. So if you haven't listened to it, I hope you enjoy it. If you have, give it another whirl. Here we go with intra poll right now. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's charles W, Chuck Bryant. And since you put the two of us together with microphones, as we are now, and press record, you get Stuff you should Know. That's right. A little podcast. Just a little podcast with you. Little podcast made a silicon. How are you, sir? I'm pretty good. Your papers, please. No. What is that? Interpol. You sounded like the little Asian man who gives the box to Pinhead. The man who eventually becomes Pinhead watches y'all pleasure. Yeah, that's kind of who you want to be. Well, then that's what I was doing. Good one. My first good impression yet. The guy has Interpol written all over him. Oh, yeah. He's got an orange notice out on him. I'll bet you a green we'll get on that later, Chuck. Yes. I'm pretty much 100% sure you had nothing to do with this, so you may not have heard about it. Okay. Back in 2011, about this time, March 2011, interpol, the international police organization, cracked a child pedophile ring. Nice. The biggest one ever. Really? Centered on a website, I guess, appropriately enough, called boylover Net. Wow. Run out of Amsterdam. boylover. Net is just a straight up legitimate gay porn site. But there was a forum there with, like, 70,000 members, like said, well, hey, you're into this kind of thing, too. I got a video that you're going to love, and I also have a little boy that I'm going to mail to you. So this wasn't affiliated with the website? No, they're just using one of the forums as a meeting place for pedophiles. But Interpol busted these guys up, rescued 230 kids, arrested 184 suspects. Just in the first sweep. They sent William Neeson in pretty much in 30 countries. Wow. Yeah. Good for them. It is good for them. It's just one of the many victories and triumphs over pederasty that Interpol can boast. That's right. And not just Pederasty, like, all sorts of huge international crimes. Anytime there's a crime syndicate or a ring, you need to watch out, because Interpol is watching you. Interpol is right behind you. What is your pleasure, sir? And this is actually fan generated. This came on Facebook, like, three days ago. Oh, really? I wish I would have got the guy's name. Some kid was like, hey, can you do one of the interpol? And I went, yeah, sure. Are you sure he wasn't talking about the band? He might have been. Are they still around? Yeah, they're still around. Yeah. They are? Yes. I don't know what they're doing these days. I'm not a fan, so I don't know. How do you not like Interpol? I listen to their music and it didn't sit right in my ears. I'm surprised. I thought everybody liked Interpol. Yes, they're just good. Yeah, you think? All right. Interpol, the International Criminal Police Organization, or ICPO, or if you're in France, where they're headquartered, you might call it the organization International de Police Criminal. Very nice. Which is pretty much the same thing and different word order. I didn't know this, but criminal is feminine. Oh, yeah. I didn't realize that. They like the ladies. Yes. Alright, so as you said, Josh, they are an international, fully autonomous, not affiliated with any single country organization. I think they're 186 countries. 190 now. Oh, really? And they all contribute to the budget, to the kitty, based on their size and their GDP and some other factors like crime. It's very fair. Yeah, but it's very important, like you said, that they're not beholden to any one country and that they remain neutral and they don't engage in any investigations into political stuff, things contributing or being centered on race or religion. That's right. My brain is not working today. That's right. My brain is so what they do, Josh? You just said what they don't do. What they do do terrorism. Sexual abuse. Terrorism like nobody else. Sexual abuse, especially with children, which is what you just talked about. Organized crime, international fugitives, computer crime, stolen art, money laundering, human trafficking, illegal drugs, smuggling, environmental crime, anything that crosses international borders almost, you're going to find helping out with but you said the magic phrase, helping out. Like, Interpol doesn't have they don't run around like arresting guys, like freeze, bad guys. It is inner pole. And they don't have Interpol jail, as Grabanowski points out. But what they do is they serve as this international meeting point for already established national agencies. Right? Yeah. So let's do a little scenario, all right? I'm FBI Agent Todd Ridgeway of the Des Moines, Iowa field office. Okay. And your agent, Vinny Tusviri of the Polisia Distato in Italy. And I believe a terrorist is hiding out near your field office in Genoa. So I'm calling you up. I'm like. Hi. Ring. Ring. This is Todd Ridgeway. I'm with the FBI in Des Moines. Hey, Todd. This is veniteste verde, right? So, and see, what Chuck just demonstrated was how it doesn't work because Vinny Test of Verde doesn't speak a lick of English and Todd Ridgeway doesn't speak any Italian. Right. And not only that, he shouldn't have been calling Vinny Testaverde. He should have been calling Giuseppe de Bakono, who's with the local police, because that's what the Italian police bureaucracy protocol calls for this. He has no idea. No. So what does he do? He calls Intipor. That's right. And they step up and they're like, you know who you need to get in touch with? You need to get in touch with Vinitestaverti's Cousin, who works for the state police over there. The police, right. Because they are who is handling this case. Here's their number. In fact, let me go ahead and pat you through. But not only that, I'm going to pass an interpreter. I'm going to translate for you. Sure. Yeah. So the interpol has what are called National Central Bureaus. National Country Bureaus? No. National Central Bureaus, NCBS. And that's like an FBI field office, but they have them in different countries around the world, and they serve as liaisons for the local or state or national police with their counterparts in other countries. That's the big one. Yeah. It's complicated enough within the United States with jurisdictions and protocol, but when you open it up to the world, boy, it gets all kinds of crazy. So luckily, enthal is there. They do any peeing contests? Well, they probably try to, but I'm sure they exist. Sure. Their big deal is their databases, because the FBI and the CIA why, they might all have, like, in whatever your country's databases are, crime databases, they probably just extend to that country. Unless it's like some sort of database on terrorism. Right. Interpols databases are way extensive. They circle the globe and they can track criminals pretty much anywhere and everywhere. Fingerprints, mugshots, wanted people DNA, you name it. They have a database just of lost and stolen travel documents. It's got more than, like, 12 million files to it. Yeah, I think I saw somewhere today, too, that they said most people don't try and recover those, which I thought was interesting. Yeah. Well, I imagine, like, if you lose your passport, you're probably traveling abroad and you're not getting that back. You never know unless you go intoll yeah, they could have your stuff, because who knows? That could have been stolen to be used in some trafficking syndicates. It's true. And your name could be all drugged all through the mud on boylover. Net. That's right. The database. The database is that they maintain or their own, but they're open and they're accessed through this communications network called I 24/7. That's kind of cool sounding, because Interpol is open 24 7365. Even on Christmas, they're fully operational. Really? They don't close down like all the police do here on Christmas? No, because think about it, man. Well, yes, I get your joke, but think about the skeleton crews that go down. I think dinner poles open all the time because they cross all time zones sure. At all times. Yeah. So they kind of have to be ready to go all the time, because while one guy sleeping, the criminals in one country are sleeping. They're wide awake and carrying out bad activities in another. That's true. What else can they do, Josh, is also a place where you can access another country's databases. Right. So those nationally bound databases become international through this I 24/7 portal. And Interpol oversees all of that. Yes. So they know what's going on. Let's say there's an international disaster of some sort, like a terrorist attack, assassination. They can send an incident response team, generally coordinated through the UN. If there's some sort of actually a natural disaster like the tsunami efforts, they can send people down there to help identify people and look for missing persons, protect kids. Because I can guarantee you there are a lot of pedophiles who traveled to Indonesia after that tsunami. That's right. That's crazy, man. I know. That's awful. Imagine, like, losing your parents, being seven, suddenly an orphan, and then now there's some guy who's like, hey, you're coming to Holland with me, right? You're like. No, I'm not. He's like, yeah, you really are. But you understand what he's saying. He just offers you the lolly. Right. In a car ride. Yeah. Very sad. But thanks to Interpol, things like that are being thwarted. Right. I saw, there are two types of incident response teams. They have the criminal type and the disaster type, but they both serve in an advisory capacity and they show up with their database. I can get you into I need me. They can act as a central command, though, if local authorities say, hey, we need your help to act as central command, help us out with logistics. I think the grabster said in 2005. They did that twelve times. Yeah, once a month. Not bad. Dust off the old work and shoes. Yeah. Get out in the field. Yeah. Time to get out of bed. How's it structured, Josh? Well, I'll tell you. Interpol is made up of a General Assembly in which each of the member nations has one delegate and one vote. Makes a lot of sense. They meet once a year and they vote on all the big stuff, which kind of makes it a slow, lumbering bureaucracy. Unless they invest a lot of authority into the Executive Committee, which is a 13 member committee that basically carries out all the administrative functions of Interpol. And they are elected. Right. As is the secretary general, although it says in here pointed I saw elected. Oh, yeah. No, he's elected because I saw this guy. Ronald K. Noble. He got an overwhelming majority of the vote for his second re election. So he's in his third term. First time ever. Yes. Which is I think he's running from 2010 to 2015 under this current term. Yeah. And he is the first American secretary general, if I'm not mistaken. Right. Yeah. And he's the first three times secretary general, too. Been a lot of Frenchies. I think I saw one Englishman. Yeah. And there's definitely one German, because there was some controversy with that. I believe the president is Korean now. Oh, really? Okay. Not to be confused with the Secretary general. Right. The president is beneath him. Right. The secretary general is who actually runs the day to day show. Right. And he's headquartered in the General Secretariat, which is the main headquarters in Leon, France. That's right. And then there's regional offices. There's six of them, the 6th of which is in New York. And that's the special liaison to the UN. Because Interpol very wisely got in with the UN because they're like, this body has some staying power. That's right. We're going to become friendly with them. You can also find these place offices in Argentina, el Salvador, Thailand, Kenya, Zimbabwe and Cotijuar. Very nice. Thank you. Did you practice it? No. It's such a lovely name that I've said it many times. It just rolls over myself. It means the coast Dewair in French. Okay. You mentioned that all member countries chip in for the budget. The budget is not a lot, though, compared to any budget in the United States. I think in 2007, the grabster pointed it at roughly $61 million US. Or \u20ac44 million, which I wonder what that's equal to now. But it's a big change. I should have looked up the current budget, actually. Yes. I failed to. It's okay, Chuck, let's talk about the notices. So this is their other big thing. They don't just sit around and wait to be asked for help. They also disseminate information, and they do it through color coded notices. They've got let's see, what is the nine? Eight? I think seven. Okay, so they have eight now because they added another one after this. After this even? Yes. Oh, wow. And the different color codes mean different things. So you're going to get via teletype, possibly fax or maybe even email. You'll get some sort of maybe a PDF document of, say, orange basically says, like, hey, we have pretty good idea that there's an imminent threat, and it's this guy, and he's wearing this coat, and he's got a dirty thing. A bomb. Yes. So if you get an orange one, your head better perk up, and you need to look closely. That's right. Black is unidentified bodies. That's a sad one. That's the saddest of all notices. Yellow missing persons. Yeah, it's probably the second saddest. Green general information and warnings about major criminals. So this one is kind of that's pretty vague. Well, it highlights another function that they have that wasn't explicitly stated in this article, but I gleaned using my powers of deduction that they have analysts who crunch all this data, who pour through databases, look at crime trends, look at criminal trends, and then come up with basically just general notices. When they're sitting around with some time on their hands, they issue green notices that say, like, hey, here's another angle to a case that you might not have thought of. Interesting. Have you met this guy here's? All the bad stuff he's done. He may be in your neighborhood right. That kind of thing. And the local authorities say, yeah, interval. We know you got some time on your hand. Very nice. Thank you. The blue notice, Josh, is individuals of interest related to a crime, including possible witnesses or suspects or persons of interest is a good umbrella term for those kinds of people for a crime that's already been committed. People who ran with the wrong crowd, were at the wrong place in the wrong time, and didn't stick around on an international level. That's right. Recently, Mr. Julian Assange was issued the red notice, which means you are wanted. And it's sort of like a worldwide APB. You got to keep that. You print it out and put it on your wall. What a red Interpol notice on you? Oh, yeah. Got you. Although Assange wasn't too fond of his. I'll bet he kept his. I'll bet he's one of the few who did. With Photoshop, though. I mean, you can never tell if it's real or not. Sure. You or I could make our own. We should do that. Why not? I have a feeling when it's coming your way. Yeah. Interpol notice, it's not a color. That was scary to me because it was the only one that's not a color. Unless the new one you talked about is not a color. It's a color. Okay. The interval notice means it's a UN Security Council special notice, meaning groups of individuals involved with al Qaeda or the Taliban are at work. Yes. People who have UN sanctions on them. Then there's now the purple notice, which basically it's kind of like a green notice. It's like, hey, be aware of this kind of stuff that's going on, but it's about what people are doing. Like international criminal trends. Do you remember? I think they were like pen guns just a few years back. There was like a pen that could shoot, and it was very low powered. But I think Interpol sent out a notice on this, like, hey, you guys need to be aware that this thing's out there, I just saw it in a movie. Okay, well, Interpol probably inspired the writer. Interesting. It was a comedy, too. I guarantee Interpol inspired the writer. It was pretty funny. It was Fred Ward. Fred Ward or Fred Willard. Fred Ward. Okay. The Timewriter remo Williams. Yeah. Okay. He had a pen gun and shot a dude in the neck. It was kind of funny. What movie was it? 30 minutes or less with Danny McBride. And it was good. The guy who played Facebook. Mark Zuckerberg. Yeah. Jesse Eisenberg. They were both in that. It was sort of funny, but not highly recommended. But that scene was funny because Redwiller is like, you think it's a pin, and all of a sudden he just shoots the student, the neck with it. That's funny. Yeah. That's high comedy. Yeah, very much. I watched Inside Man again last night. That's such a good movie. Which one's. That Spike Lee. Heist movie with Clive Owens. I never saw that. Dude. Really? Yes. You may have not seen it either. I made her watch last night. She's like, this is a good movie. That's one of the few Spikely movies I have not seen. That all right. Have you seen 25th Hour? Yeah. That's a good one, too. Yeah, I think Inside Man hasn't beat all right, so, yes, purple is just basically like, information on new types of criminal activity that people need to be made aware of. Like pen guns. Got you. And Fred Ward. But the pen gun was a real warning. Or a real purple warning notice. I don't know. I'm just assuming. I'm using an example. Got you. So let's talk about the history of Interpol. Chuck has a strange tumultuous history that closely follows the tumulti of the 20th century, if you ask me. Yeah. And it kind of breezes right over the whole Nazi part of it. There's been a lot of controversy over that, actually. Oh, yeah? Why are they accused of colluding? Well, let's back up. 1923. They were formed in Vienna, Austria, during World War II. Ed says they were interrupted when the Nazis took control. Deposed as secretary general, moved to Berlin for a short time, but then after the war, everything was rebuilt. They moved to Paris, and that's kind of all he said. Right. I looked a little further into it, and it's pretty controversial. Those years when it was under Nazi rule, obviously they shared headquarters with the Gestapo. Officially operated as a division within the Nazi Security Police. And two Nazi war criminals were the agency's presidents during the wartime plus, they overspent on Christmas parties. And then this. I read a Times article and some of the comments back to the editorial said, you guys even kind of whitewashed it because after the war, they refused to take part in the in any of the Nazi war crime hunting, war criminal hunts. Crazy. Wow. I had no idea. Chuck, I'm really glad you did this. Really? Yeah. And then in 1968, their president to 72 was Paul Dickoff. And he was an SS officer. No, he was and remained president despite them finding out about this and knowing about this. And that was pretty controversial, too. Jeez, I'll bet. Yeah. You don't usually want Nazis leading your organization. Former Nazis either. No. You know what I'm saying? Once a Nazi, always a Nazi, in my opinion. Well, Dipkoff, he was the president for, whatever, 40 years. Wow. And a lot of people say Interpol is like run without oversight. And they have all this access, but no one has access to their real. Like how they do things. It's the opposite of how Greyofki tells it. Yeah, it's a little more controversial than I thought once they start poking around. Well, I guess it was probably the VHS tapes that started to bring them out of the dark and into I guess, a brighter role. Remember the Interpol warning on old video cassettes? No. Is that Interpol? Oh, yeah. Now it's like an FBI warning, but before and every once in a while, you'll still see it like Interpol warning. It's like copyright theft and piracy. Wow. But, yeah, apparently now they've shed themselves of Nazis and have a third term secretary General who's busting pedophiles in Amsterdam. I think that's good. I'm saying oh, no, of course. Yeah. They've apparently tried to clean up their image a lot since those days. That is crazy, man. And did you hear about the executive order Obama signed in? It was pretty controversial among conservatives because, little background. The International Organization and Immunities Act in 1945 was signed into law. And basically that meant the president could say, certain organizations, international organizations that worked in the US. Are exempted from certain things like taxes, search and seize, or laws. And pretty much every president has said, you can be a part of this, like the Red Cross. Reagan in 1983 included Interpol as part of that group songs like four different sections dealing with property taxes, Social Security, federal taxes, customs duties, and having property and assets searched and confiscated. Then Obama said those four things. Now you're immune from as well, so you have full immunity, interpol does in the United States from these things. And conservatives got up in arms about the fact that Obama had signed this. They tend to get up in arms about anything he signed. Like his dinner check. Sure. But then people rallied back and said, well, I thought you wanted someone tough on crime. And he's basically saying Interpol has more rights to do their thing in the United States, so which way do you want it? Or do you just want to complain about everything that he does? And the Obama administration said that, you know what? This really didn't give them any more free reign than Reagan had already given them in 83. It just sort of finished up what he started. So who knows? Regardless of which side you sit on on the political aisle, obama is the new Reagan. The end. You got any more some successes? You talked about tsunami in 2004. Yeah, that was one. Your pedophile scenario, it's pretty big. Not yours. 30 countries. That's pretty huge. They helped identify and capture a Serbian war criminal. Milan Lukak, Lucik Lucach. Lucas. I bet it's Lucach. Yeah. In Argentina, coordinating between Argentina and Chile and Bosnia Herzegovina. Nice. Yeah. And let's see. They also had one. Do you remember the Madrid train bombings? Yeah, man, I had forgotten about those. 2004 killed 190 people, and they managed to catch at least one guy. They found 21 guilty, but Interpol caught at least one guy through coordination between Belgrade, Baghdad, and Madrid offices. And did you know the 21 people who are found guilty of that got to combined 40,000 years in prison? Really? Yeah. He'll probably never get out no, I don't think they're going to get out. And then Grabstra pointed this one out. A response team obtained and disseminated fingerprints and photographs of Abu Musab al Zarkawi. Yeah, which sounds kind of whatever, but then you're like, oh, yeah, how would you get that guy's? I guess so. Yeah, I thought the same thing and then I thought twice. So it's like, no, I guess that is a pretty big deal. Yeah, it's worth mentioning. Yeah, sure. I didn't find a lot of stuff, though. I searched for more. Yeah, same here. And I think they're sort of behind the scenes. They're like, we're not going to have any big arrests because we don't do that. But we're involved in a lot of those on the back end on their website, which is a pretty cool, user friendly website. Agreed. It's like, here's a lot of information that's very vague. Yeah. Like, we have two kinds of response teams, criminal and disaster. And that's all we're going to say about that kind of thing. And, you know, I'm interested to hear if anyone knows any more about their controversies. I'm curious. Yeah. Does your dad work at Interpol? We want to know interpol. You got anything else? So if you want to learn more about Interpol and read a very glowing review of their life and work, very glossy whitewashed review, you can type in Interpol. Interpol. And did we say where they got the name? I don't think we did. I don't think so. With the advent of telegraph communication, they're like, man, we need to shorten this or else people aren't going to waste the money with Western Union talking about us. So they shorten their name to Interpol. Instead of the longer ICOP, they should just call ICOP. Yeah, I cop. Yeah, well, don't type. I guess you could type ICOP into the search box. Probably some Mac Apple app now that allows you to make citizens arrest, right? Exactly. That's a good one. Thanks. We should go make that type ICOP in the search barhousethworks.com. And I said, search bar. I just didn't you know it. Which means it's time for listener mail. Josh. I'm going to call this MC Brewer for Anheuser Busch. Wow, it's a big time. Hey, guys, just finished listening to the beer podcast and felt compelled to write, I used to live in Atlanta and missed the beer senior. I dream of the Brick store pub every third night. I'm a beer geek home brewer and also happened to now brew beer for Anheuser Bush, also now known as AB InBev. As was mentioned in the podcast, it's a pretty sweet gig. That all started for me by home brewing in my Atlanta apartment closet. Crazy. I enjoyed the podcast a lot and you were pretty spot on with the info on Brewing 101, except for the mention of forced carbonation. I have worked because I think we said that the big breweries like forced carbonate everything. Yeah, not so. I've worked in a couple of craft breweries aside from my current job at Anheuser Bush, and I had never seen this before. I can't speak for the other big guys, but our beer at Anheuser Bush is made pretty much the same way as other small craft beers. We just have much larger equipment and more automation. At Anheuser Busch, after primary fermentation, our beers are lagered in a tank for as long as 21 days. In the case of the famous Budweiser, I've heard of that 21 days. During the aging process, the beer is still fermenting slightly and builds up CO2 in the tank. This is how our beer is carbonated, all natural, similar to the priming home brew and bottles. And that's it. He says, have a 420 on me and I'll pick up the tab next time in Atlanta. Now you send us the money first and then we'll go have a 420 on you. That's what I say. David. Thanks, David. We appreciate in advance the money you'll send us for our 420. Yes, and also I wanted to point out when we were talking about our favorite beers, I was sort of snobby with all my IPAs and all that stuff. I do love all that. But the Triumvirate for me has been my staple since college, which is Budweiser, Miller, Highlight and Pepsi. I like all those. I'm fine with those. Yeah, and I don't drink those as much anymore because I love the taste of like a delicious IPA. But I certainly don't turn my nose up at a Budweiser. Okay, well, then you're definitely not a beer snack. No. You like the drink and poo. You remember those kids in college? Did you know anybody in college who could recite what it said on the next label of the Budweiser bottle? Like what it says? No, the writing. I didn't know anyone it's like that. This is Budweiser, the finest beer ever produced. Blah, blah, blah. I used to go to school with kids who could recite that, like by heart. And I always thought it was kind of sad. Yes. I didn't even know I've never even read the bottle. Yes, it's easier if you have a beach towel because the lettering is way bigger than you can see. And I also got called out by a fan for being a hipster, for drinking Pepsi. Was like, Dude, yeah, I've been drinking PBR since I know, like 1993. And it amused me when it became a hipster beer. I was like, really? It blows my mind how much we share ourselves and how much we have in the 400 plus episodes. And there are so many people out there who do not know us at all. Yeah. So I guess if you want to offer us money for beer, that's cool, or you can just send us beer. We're not done with that call out yet. I'm not ashamed. Or money. Sure you can tweet to us. To get in touch with us at syscapodcast Facebook.com stuffyoustoneworth. An email address is as follows colonstuffpodcast@howstuffworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstofworks.com. Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun is shining, the daylights longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music, My Favorite Murder from Exactly Right media, My Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarif and Georgia Hardstarks, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
438ede14-53a3-11e8-bdec-a7f29bb51afe	Heroin: The Drug	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/heroin-the-drug	We've covered a lot of drugs in our history, and today we tackle heroin, one of the most dangerous of all.	We've covered a lot of drugs in our history, and today we tackle heroin, one of the most dangerous of all.	Tue, 02 Jun 2020 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2020, tm_mon=6, tm_mday=2, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=154, tm_isdst=0)	50152662	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Ah, summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good, it's Criminal Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today, this July, don't miss an entire summer of surprises on Disney Plus with Disney's High School Musical, the Musical, the series season three Zombies, three Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, and the wonderful summer of Mickey Mouse. Plus new episodes of Marvel Studios, ms. Marvel and National Geographics. America the Beautiful. From the award winning producers of Planet Earth, Frozen Planet, and the Disney Nature films, america the Beautiful takes viewers on a tour of the most spectacular and visually arresting regions of our great nation. All these and more streaming this month on Disney Plus. Hey, everybody, it's Josh and Chuck, your friends. And we're here to tell you about our upcoming book that's coming out this fall. The first ever Stuff You Should Know book. Chuck that's right. What's the cool, super cool title we came up with? It's stuff you should know. Colon. An incomplete compendium of mostly interesting things. That's right. And it's coming along so great. We're super excited, you guys. The illustrations are amazing. And there's the look of the book. It's exactly what we hoped it would be, and we cannot wait for you to get your hands on it. Yes, we can. And you don't have to wait. Actually, well, you do have to wait, but you don't have to wait to order. You can go preorder the book right now, everywhere. You get books. And you will eventually get a special gift for pre ordering, which we're working on right now. That's right. So check it out soon, coming this fall. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryan over there. And it's just the two of us. We can make it if we try. Just the two of us, chuck and I. That's right. And we are stuck. You should know the heroin addition. Yeah, I haven't covered heroin yet. No, we haven't. And Ed helped us out with this. And I love how he just put it straight up, heroin is a demon. I'm like she's. Way to be objective. You know what occurred to me? Because I like to think of things to the lens of movies a lot of times. Pot movies. Rarely, if ever, any good. Have you ever seen Daisy? Confused, my friend? We talked about this on Movie Crush and Owl and I don't consider that a weed movie. Although it's featured heavily, I would call it one of the main characters. I don't call it a weed movie. I consider weed movies like Cheech and Chong movies. What about Half Baked? Half Baked, how high? Like movies where it's literally just about marijuana. Like they're confused about a bunch of friends in the 70s school. Fair enough. You won me over. Other people, though, said, no, you're wrong, days Confused is a weed movie. But let's say that is a weed movie. That's one good one. Okay. Like Chich and Chong movies are okay, but they're really not that good. Cocaine movies. Are there cocaine movies? Yeah, there's like Blow was a cocaine movie. Yeah. Dealing. Yeah, for sure. Blow is about as cocaine movie as they get. I can't think of one that's just straight up, like following some cocaine users. Yeah, because it's probably like no one wants to see that. Right. But heroin movies are great. Well, I mean, you got, what, train spotting? Panic and needle park train spotting tootsie. Even if it's not about heroin. Stuff like Pulp Fiction, I think heroin has been romanticized in film far more effectively and more often than any other drug. Right. Which is pretty messed up because if there is a drug out there where Nancy Reagan actually was right for once in her life and wasn't just lying through her teeth, it is definitely heroin. It is a genuinely bad drug and basically the last thing that should be romanticized. But you're right. I think they've made some pretty good movies about it. And I think people are like, wow, those jazz cats are really into that gag, man. I don't know. I mean, I can't imagine that there aren't people out there who haven't tried heroin because it was romanticized in the movies. I hate to say yes, and I think because in the movies it portrays it as it is, which is euphoric and relaxing. And every movie you see when someone does the heroine, what you see right afterward is a big wave of happiness wash over them. And that's why you don't see movies about people snorting cocaine, is because it's just not fun to see someone snort cocaine and then talk incessantly like a jerk for the next 4 hours right. Depending on how much you got. I've never done heroin, but I do know that its chemical name is diamorphine. Yeah. And we can't talk about heroin without talking about Morphine because it's kind of almost the same thing. Well, it's Morphine's Baby. Yeah. Basically, you can take Morphine great band name, run it through Morphine's Baby. Totally. It is kind of how I think about it. Remember the band Morphine? They were really good. I love Morphine. Yeah, they were great. What kind of music would they be classified as? They're not quite grunt, they're not quite metal. No, morphine was very chill. Okay. But they had like a real heavy guitar sound, right. Lots of feedback and distortion. No, I think you're thinking of a different band. Morphine had the saxophone as like one of the main interests. Unless I'm thinking of Chicago. Yeah. You're thinking of Chicago. At any rate, no, morphine is the parent of heroin. You take morphine and run it through a few hoops with some acids and all of a sudden you have heroin. And they apparently are so close together that the average user couldn't tell the difference between the two because your body basically takes heroin and turns it into morphine. The biggest differences are how long the high last. It's much shorter with heroin, but I think it sets on faster. And then the addictimus heroin is even more addictive than morphine, and morphine is awfully addictive itself. Heroin is apparently just in a whole different league as far as addictiveness goes. Yeah, that's what I've heard. And that's certainly how they portrayed in movies as well, to be fair. Right. Although there are movies that show like Pulp Fiction is a good example of a functioning heroin addict. But usually that's not the case in a movie. No, it's true. Yeah. They usually do show how just kind of gross it gets for heroin addicts. It's rare. It's rare. That part isn't included. Like, think about what was the name of that movie? It's Jared Leto and Jennifer Connor. Lord requirement for a dream. Yeah, that was harrowing. I always say I got pink eye from watching that movie. Oh, man. That's the perfect way to say it. Who can forget that one image when he injected into that festering sore? Yeah, the abscess of I think I came across something that I think is what it was. It's called Wound Botulism. And that's a side effect of risk of heroin. Which, I mean, if you think heroin is glamorous, just look up Wound Botulism or Gangrene or an abscess from injection site, or don't you mind. And also, as a matter of fact, if you're thinking about doing heroin, do look that up. Requiem for a Dream is also a good example of why they don't make movies about cocaine and speed. Because probably the most unsettling aspect of that movie is the subplot with the plot line. With Ellen Burston, it was hard to watch. It was very hard to watch. Although some parts of it were pretty funny. Like when the TV's just straight up talking to her that it was hysterical. That movie was nuts. Okay, so back to heroin. Apparently there is a very pure form of heroin, which makes sense. I mean, any kind of process drug like cocaine or something like that, there's going to be a purist form of it. But far and away, the vast majority of people who use that drug are never going to encounter that purist form. It gets cut and there's impurities that are introduced to make it less pure so you can sell more. And so the heroine goes from this off white, kind of slightly grayish color to everything from, like orange and brown to black. Like black tar heroin, like, one of the most famous heroin varieties ever, from what I've heard, comes from Mexico. And it's just really bottom of the barrel stuff. Imagine that the purest form is almost white powder, and you're shooting black tar. That kind of gives you an idea of how far from purity black tar heroin is. Yeah, I saw that. Black tar heroin is usually cut with either burned corn, starch, or lactose. Great. There's cheese heroin, too, which is supposedly pretty rough as well, as far as impurities go. But it also sounds gross. Like cheese heroin. Yeah. Why take a word that's great, like cheese? Attach it to heroin. That's right. The other ways it can be sold, which I didn't know. It can be sold as a salt, which, you know how in movies, if they're injecting it, they always cook it up in the spoon. And I think partially why movies glamorize it is because just cinematically to film someone cooking something in the spoon, and the whole process is just, you know, it's interesting looking. It looks good on screen, looks so glamorous. It does, in a little weird way. But when you sell it as a salt, it does not need to be heated and dissolved. I guess you can just dissolve it like salt will dissolve in water. Right. You can smoke it, you can snort it, you can put it in your butt. You sound like Chris Farley and Black Sheep. Never saw it. There's this part where he's, like, shooting, snorting, smoking, dropping. I've seen too much Chris Farley in my life. He's constantly in my head. Or you can eat heroin, apparently. Yeah, especially cheese heroin. Oh, really? Okay. There's like a bunch of different kinds of heroin you can get depending on where you are. It's going to come from different places in the world, which we'll talk about, and there's just no denying it gets you super duper high when you do heroin. The problem is that within a few hours of that, you start to enter heroin withdrawals and we'll talk about exactly what goes on in the brain a little more. But basically your brain is saying, oh, I need more of what you just gave me, because I adjusted to life with that level of dopamine release that it triggered. And now everything's just horrid and black. And again, this can start in just a few hours, depending on how many times you've shot heroin, how much of a dependence you've developed, how much tolerance you've developed, and all these factors come together to determine just how bad your withdrawal symptoms are. Yes, most movies glamorize heroin for a little while, but then we'll also show the dark side, like you said. And usually we'll include a kicking heroin scene very famously in Trainspotting when he rattles off that list, when he locks himself in his apartment, Ewan McGregor, and lists out all the things that he needs to successfully kick. What is the very funny I just pulled it up here. Music tamata soup, tint, indigo mushroom soup, eight ten s of a consumption cold ice cream, vanilla, one large tub of magnesia milk, one bottle. Paracetamol, mouthwash, vitamins, mineral water, lucas Aid, pornography. One mattress, one bucket for urine, one for feces and one for vomitus. Yes. Supposedly, after a while, the withdrawal get so bad that you just can't get out of bed to poop or pee or vomit, but you are still going to vomit and poop. Withdrawal symptoms kick in, terrible diarrhea, terrible vomiting. And the thing is, the withdrawal is almost never fatal, but it can be fatal and it's not from the withdrawal symptoms themselves. It's secondary to it like you're vomiting and peeing and pooping so much that you can become dehydrated, your electrolyte balances can go off and you can die of heart failure because the electrical impulses in your heart are no longer functioning correctly. But if you know what you're doing, and you especially do it under medical supervision, you can have a far easier and much less life threatening experience of kicking heroin. The good news is this even if you are the person who is most addicted to heroin in the world right now, if you decided to kick it, you have four to five or six really bad days ahead of you before you're free of your heroin addiction. It's that simple. Any heroin I want to keep saying heroin addict. We definitely don't say that anymore. But any person addicted to heroin walking around today, Chuck, is just a week away from being free of heroin. It's just that that would be the worst week of their entire lives. Yeah, but they can do it. Every single one of them can do it. And entire physicians practices and convalescent centers and rehabs have been set up to medically assist in making the withdrawal process easier and safer, so that it does increase the chance that they're not going to be like, forget this, I just need some heroin and everything will be fine again. Yeah, and you're probably going to get, if you're under medical supervision, some sort of sedative or a drug that mimics heroin most commonly, I think methadone. That's changed. Yeah, it's like, suboxone now. Oh, really? Yeah, it really binds tightly to your opioid receptors, so it blocks heroin when you're doing it. So you become less and less dependent on heroin and then Suboxone is just much less addictive or habit forming because it's just much less potent. So you can get off of the Suboxone after you're off of the heroin. So why heroin makes you feel so good? We don't fully understand the brain chemistry of exactly how that works, but we do know that the chemicals, once it gets in your brain, the brain breaks it down into other chemicals. And those chemicals sort of just close down the things that normally regulate your dopamine. And so your brain makes a bunch of dopamine, right? So you've got a bunch of dopamine going, but it also affects other parts of your brain, too. Basically. Imagine your brain chemistry normally is in this nice kind of harmony, and then heroin comes in and just totally overwhelms it with the tidal wave of dopamine. Well, your brain says, oh, geez, well, I need to up all of the production of all of these other neurochemicals so that I reach homeostasis again. So that jacks all the levels up. And then when the heroin dies back because your dose is wearing off, your dopamine levels drop. But then all these other levels are still up. And all of a sudden, it's like your brain is screaming in a crowded room where everybody just stops talking and it's just your brain screaming now, right? Or like the music cuts off and your brain is trying to talk loud over the music. It's very much like that. And so some of these other chemicals can produce some really unpleasant sensations. And the upshot of it is that dopamine, the one thing that's making you feel really good, is the one thing that's truly lacking then, because your brain isn't making it naturally, it's making all this other stuff that makes you feel quite uncomfortable in much higher amounts. And that's when you say, I need some more heroin. And the other thing is this as your brain starts making more and more of these other neurochemicals, you need more and more and more heroin to release increasingly larger amounts of dopamine just to get to normal. That's what they mean when they say, just to get to normal, I have to do this much heroin, and then I have to do even more to get high. And that is what's called tolerance. And the more tolerance you have, the worse your withdrawal symptoms are going to be. Because that means when you stop with the heroin, the levels of everything else are really high and the dopamine is way back down in the basement. And that's basically heroin in a nutshell. Yes. And tolerance. There's tolerance for every drug in the world cigarettes, alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, everything. But it feels like heroines. It's just such a dangerous game you're playing there with the tolerance levels and then getting off and getting back on a little, probably more so than other drugs even. Well, the other thing that makes it dangerous, too, is, again, withdrawal itself is very rarely fatal, especially when it's assisted medically. But heroin itself is extraordinarily dangerous too, because one of the big effects that it has on your body is lowered respiration. So you aren't taking very deep breaths any longer. You can actually die of, like, carbon monoxide poisoning because you're not exhaling enough carbon monoxide or you're not getting in enough oxygen, and you basically just stop breathing, or you die of hypoxia because the heroin overwhelmed your ability to breathe. Basically, when you've done too much, when you've done a fatal dose. Wow. Yeah. All right, let's take a break, and we will talk about the super interesting history of heroin right after this. Hey, everybody. If you want a great quality website, you want to do it yourself with no must and no fuss, then there's nowhere else to look. In Squarespace. That's right. Squarespace has every single thing that you need to put together an awesome website, everything from growing and engaging your audience with email campaigns, collecting donations for your cause through Apple, Pay, Stripe, Venmo, PayPal. Plus, you can also make your website optimized for mobile, which is great for your user on the go. That's right. And if you're into selling stuff, square space is everything to sell anything. They have all the tools you need to get your business off the ground. They have ecommerce templates, inventory management, really simple checkout process, and secure payment. So whatever you want to sell, you can sell it on Squarespace. Yeah, don't just take our word for it. Head to squarespace. Comsysk and start your free trial today. And then when you're ready to launch, use our offer code s YSK, and you'll get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. That's squarespace. comSK. Squarespace. What if you were a global bank who wanted to supercharge your audit system? So you tap IBM to UNSILO your data, and with the help of AI, start crunching a year's worth of transactions against thousands of compliance controls. Now you're making smarter decisions. Faster, operating costs are lower, and everyone from your auditors to your bankers feel like a million bucks. Let's create smarter ways of putting your data to work. IBM, let's create. Learn more@ibm.com. I think everyone sort of knows that heroin two sort of big facts about heroin that are super interesting, that everyone always says is that heroin is a brand name or a trade name, and that heroin used to be readily prescribed, kind of like cocaine was in this case, for pain is a pain medication. And we're talking about the opium poppy plant, the pepa. Somnopharone and since ancient Egypt is like 1500 BCE. At least, people have been using this to treat pain, this narcotic to treat pain. Yeah. So if we just held with opium, I mean, being addicted to opium is bad enough, but the world would definitely be a much different place if we just stayed with opium, just kept it natural, you know what I'm saying? But, no, that's all we do. We figure out ways to make things even more robust and more amazing. Oh, I'm not sure exactly when, but in the 18 hundreds, definitely before the 1860s, the German chemical company Merck isolated morphine from opium. So you didn't need all the other stuff anymore. You just had straight up morphine. And this is good in one respect, we now had a genuinely powerful anesthetic analgesic to where, when somebody was in a great deal of pain, say, having their leg amputated in a field hospital during the Civil War, you could give them morphine and they wouldn't suffer as much. So in that respect, it was really good. The problem is, we didn't understand addiction anywhere near like we do today. And so a lot of those people who got morphine when their leg was amputated came back from the war, like, where can I get some more morphine? I could really use some right now. And morphine addiction became really pronounced by the 1880s in the United States. Yeah. And there were a couple of big years after this. Big events happened in 1874 and 1898. In 1874, there was a chemist named Cr Alder Wright, and he wanted to transform morphine into something that wasn't as addictive. So he tried this process where it was called acetylation, where he basically tried to cause it to react with an acid to change the composition of it, to make it less addictive. He created diacetyl morphine, which is heroin, and he gave some to his dog, as you do, and his dog did not fare too well, did not die, but almost did. He stole a stereo later and he said, you know what? This stuff is dangerous. I'm going to put it away, I'm going to publish this paper. No one really paid much attention to this paper until a man named Einrich Dresser in 1898 for the Bear Company picked up this paper and said, Let me pick up where he left off. Yes. And he did, and he basically recreated that diamorphine concoction and heroin was born. He gave it to some test subjects. One of them said that it made him feel heroic. Is that how you would say it? Yeah, heroic. H-E-R-O-I almost there. S-C-H. Yeah, these are Germans we're talking about here. So they love the scoundrel, for sure. But because I think one thing we left off is not only does heroin gets you high, it also boosts your confidence tremendously as well. And that's what that guy was describing. He felt high, he felt confident, and he described it as heroic. And so that's where the trade name heroine came from, was from Dresser basically saying, that's a great name for this, so I'm going to call it heroin, and we will cure the world's morphine addicts of their morphine addiction. And funny enough, they did, because everybody was like, heroin is a great way to treat morphine addiction. The problem is, once they kicked morphine, they were super duper addicted to heroin and they were even worse off than they have been before. Yeah, it's funny, the word heroin is so commonplace now, you don't really think about it being a trade name, but it totally sounds like a trade name when you think about other drugs at the time. Right. Like it sounds like a modern sort of pharmaceutical. Well, actually, these days those names are just terrible. Like Dr. Pinkle white's fuelgood oil was next to it on the shelf. Yeah, but now, like pharmaceutical drug names, they all try and work in well, I guess they did that with heroin because it makes you feel heroic, but they try and work in how great it makes you feel into the name itself. Well, I don't know if I should name check any, but no, I can think of a few off the top of my head. Yeah. And they all have to work the letter X in. If X isn't in there, it's not going to sell. That's like the mantra of the pharmaceutical industry. It's really manipulative when you think about it. It's a tad. Did they teach you how to pronounce it to your doctor? So they did these human trials of heroin, which were about four weeks long of getting heroin as a patient. If you had a cough or sore throat, you felt pretty great, obviously. Can you imagine just going and getting like, some heroin lawsuits for a sore throat? Yes. I wonder if there's still exist anywhere. Probably not. I'm sure everybody took them. I bet you there's like buried in some attic drawer somewhere. Somebody has got some heroin. Loss of Jesus from back then. So Bear said the drug is safe, it's non habit forming. We'll even put that on the label. And here's the downside, is these analgesic effects last a few hours. So if you're sick and you've got a cough in a sore throat, you're going to be taking this stuff like four or five times a day for a couple of weeks because it makes you feel good every time you take it, a few hours later it wears off, you take some more and before you know it, you're addicted to heroin. Right. I mean, there's probably no drug in the world where you do it just once and you're automatically physically addicted or dependent on it. Right. Do people claim that to be true? Yeah, they claim that about acid, for goodness sake. Yes. They say that about every single drug, which is the problem, because if you are a brave soul and you say, well, it probably won't happen to me, and I'll see what it's like, and then you try it and you find you're not addicted, you're like, oh, well, they were lying, I'll just go do some more. But if you say something like, you're probably not going to get addicted the first time, but with a drug like heroin in particular, you're really playing with fire every time you do it because you come that much closer to being likely to be addicted to it. Right. I think it would make somebody maybe think twice before trying it even that first time, rather than just trying to scare them off, like, no, you're going to be addicted immediately and you're going to kill your parents kind of thing. Yeah, totally. Totally. Don't lie to people. So the next decade kind of comes and goes. Heroin, it becomes more obvious that it was dangerous and that it was addictive. Bear continued selling it until about 1913, but as early as 19 six, there was something called the Council of Pharmacy and Chemistry of the American Medical Association, and there were warnings saying, like, hey, heroin can get really addictive in 19 nine. And this is a full seven years before Bayer quit selling it. And then in 19 nine, there were people the lawmakers met in Shanghai with some doctors for the International Opium Commission, which I'm sure was quite a party. Oh, it was a rager. And they said that, you know what? OPM and all these drugs related to OPM are really dangerous. They're prone to abuse. And it's up to all of you countries to regulate this via the International Opium Convention at The Hague in 1912. But it's up to you how you want to do this in your country. Yeah, it was opium and coca leaves and their derivatives and salt, I think is how they put it. And they basically said, yeah, there's some real problems coming from these, and we need to do something about it. Go figure out how to do it. And so the United States said, oh, we've got this covered. We're going to pass the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act, which is now, these days is called the Harrison Act, and it basically established the war on drugs as we understand it today, way back in 1914. Yeah. Do you remember our CIA dosing LSD unsuspecting Americans with LSD episode? I do. I one of the best. Do you remember George White? Like, the guy who was actually running, like, the experiments? He was one of those early drug agents. Narcotics agents. Who was beating up addicts because of the Harrison Act that basically gave them permission to and one of the things about the Harrison Act that was so insidious. Aside from the fact that it kind of promoted this whole area of propaganda. Like lying to people. Like telling people that if your wife tries hair when she's going to run off with a black guy or something like that. Like. That level of propaganda of associating certain groups with certain drugs to scare other people from taking those drugs. Just horrific stuff that it also said almost explicitly. Addiction is not a disease. So you can no longer use these drugs to help somebody kick these drugs. So doctors started going to prison, like trying to help people kick heroin by giving them, like, a heroin regimen to help them ease off of it. You would land in prison for that kind of thing. And doctors did get thrown in prison for it. Yeah. And it made a really good point here, one that I'd never considered. Something else about the Harrison Act is you tend to think. Of like the old days as being super conservative about things like drug use, but before they were made illegal, the drugs were still there and people that were addicted to these drugs were still there, but there wasn't the same stigma. They were outcasts of society, but they weren't criminals yet. They were people that still needed help and that you could rehabilitate. And there was, I think, some more compassion even, but Harrison, that comes along and all of a sudden you're a criminal. And the only way to get these drugs is and keep doing these drugs that you're addicted to is by being a criminal. And that created, almost created this system that we're with today, this war on drugs, which has shown to not work right. It definitely did. And there are some reasons why heroin in particular will always be really hard to eradicate. And why the Harrison Act was kind of wrong headed and set everything out on the wrong foot was this idea that if you can just punish people into not using heroin any longer yeah, you can't do that. You can't. And there's some reasons why you can't do that. Because as long as heroin is around, there are going to be people who become addicted to heroin and who are addicted to heroin. And then if you couple that with the idea that addiction is not a disease, so you should not get any kind of medical treatment for it, and we're actually going to arrest doctors who try, then all you've just done is create like a huge legal and moral quagmire for your society. But that's what it did. But there are some reasons why heroin will probably always stick around. And that is, first of all, it's very easy to make right. Yeah. It's like with most drugs, you're in a lose lose situation if you're trying to eradicate it because you can't start at the user end. That has shown to not work, like you said. And in the case of most drugs, you can't start at the processing end either because like you said, it's easy to make. It's just a chemical process at work. It doesn't require super expensive equipment. That's why if you get busted, you can either just ditch your equipment or pack it up pretty quickly and take it with you. It's just difficult to disrupt the process of actually making the heroine. Yeah. Basically, if you could set up a still for whiskey out in the woods, you could probably make a heroin processing operation. The thing is, if you're in like the Smoky Mountains or something like that, you might set up your heroin processing operation and go, well, wait, I need some opium poppies. Those are kind of hard to come by in the smokies. And you're right, it's very hard to find opium poppies in the United States. That's one thing that the United States government and law enforcement has done, has basically eradicated opium producing poppy plants from the United States, except on the TV show Ozark. But I haven't gotten to the point yet to be quiet. Oh, really? No, I haven't. The point is because I ended up going on starting Better Call Saul, and now I'm super into that. Got you. But the problem with that is that, yes, we kept it out of the United States. It's not here. But poppies grow really well, just about everywhere. And as long as you have a country where officials who are supposed to be watching, whether people are cultivating poppies or not, can be bribed, poor people who can be forced into cultivating poppies, or farmers who can be bought off to cultivate poppies, poppies are going to grow. And over time, they have been eradicated from one place or another, but then they just kind of pop up somewhere else around the world. And that part of the world becomes the global supplier of opium for heroin processing. Yeah. For most of the 19th century, china was the big leader in opium exports, along with India. And then World War II comes along, the drug trade kind of shuts down because shipping is just super restricted. Communist Party takes over in China, and they said, no, we're not going to do this anymore. And they kind of stopped. It was really effective. And China isn't a big opium supplier ever since then. But then it moved to what's called the Golden Triangle, which is Laos, Myanmar and Thailand, as well as Golden Crescent, which is different parts of the Middle East. But mainly, if we're talking opium production, we're talking about Afghanistan. Yeah. And when the United States invaded Afghanistan, one of the sidelines it was doing was destroying opium fields. And I guess it worked for a little while, but not really. Like we were carrying out drone strikes on heroin processing facilities and basically did nothing to disrupt the heroin trade. And then as fewer and fewer US. Troops were in Afghanistan, the heroin just came back. Opium poppies came back, and heroin processing came back. And even more than the United States military was effective, the Taliban had been more effective. Before the United States went into Afghanistan. When the Taliban basically ruled Afghanistan, there was very little opium production going on, and it actually increased whether the United States was there. And then after the United States basically left Afghanistan, when the Taliban came back, Taliban free and easy, they started looking the other way on opium production to make money off. Exactly. So that's another thing that's actually used kind of frequently, like where if you are buying heroin, you are probably funding a terrorist group. It sounds ridiculous and made up, but it's actually probably true, depending on where you are in the world. If you're in the United States, you're probably funding a vicious drug cartel, because most of the opium that makes its way as heroin into the US comes from Mexico and Colombia. Which I didn't know. Right. Yeah. And the other 90% of the global heroin supply is coming from Afghanistan right now. But like we said, you squash it in one area, it's going to pop up in another. It's very simple supply and demand, and it's never going to change. Ed, in fact, he should totally trademark this line. He said, a war on drugs is like a war on water when you know it's going to rain tomorrow. Did he make that up? I don't know. I've never heard it before. He really crystallizes it. Yeah, it's a good writer for sure. Should we take our final break here? You bet. All right, we'll be back with more heroin right after this. Hey, everybody. 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And then when you're ready to launch, use our offer code s YSK, and you'll get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. That's Squarespace. Comsysk. Squarespace. What if you were a global energy company with operations in Scotland, technologists in India, and customers, all on different systems? You need to pull it together. So you call in IBM and Red Hat to create an open hybrid cloud platform. Now, data is available anywhere, securely, and your digital transformation is helping find new ways to unlock energy around the world. Let's create a hybrid cloud that can change in industry. IBM, let's create. Learn more@ibm.com. You mentioned World War II, Chuck, and it almost entirely shut down because shipping was so restricted during World War Two. Everybody was watching every ship, not just the United States, watching stuff that was coming into the country. People were watching it going from one place to another. It might get torpedo. It was just really tough to smuggle things during World War II. And I read that the same thing is going on now because of the coronavirus pandemic. Interesting. Because of things like shelter in place orders or restricted travel, that it's way harder to smuggle or even just go score than it was before the pandemic. And as a result, they think a heroin drought is coming on or has already started. So prices are going to rise, and probably more and more people who were addicted to heroin before the pandemic will come out of the pandemic. Not addicted to heroin anymore. But they gave meth a try, and now they're really into that. Have you ever heard the old Kamalanjiani bit about the heroin plus Tylenol cold medicine? Yeah. Refreshed my memory. It's been a while. Well, I can't remember. I think it has a name like a designer drug or whatever, which was basically heroin and Tylenol cold medicine mixed. And he just has this it was pretty early in his comedy career when he was just doing stand up, but he just has a very funny bit about the fact that you're already doing heroin. Right. And his voice and everything is just so perfect. You're already doing heroin. Yeah. I love that guy. He's one of my favorite people on the planet. He's great. He's a big movie star now. He is. Good for him. I'm glad for him. He's a good dude. He did one of our variety shows that time. He did killed it. Everybody killed it that night, if I remember correctly. Yeah, that was a really good show. That was a lot of fun. Josh Bearman and Nick Thun, maybe. Nick Thun performed. So did Hampton yacht did some killer stand up. That's right. Nongiani. We had Nate Demeo. Did a little memory palace live, too. Yes. And what was the UCB group? I want to say Rawhide, but it wasn't Rawhide. It wasn't Comanche. Oh, Convoy. Convoy. Did we have all of them on one stage? Yes, dude. One night in La. Yeah. That was a great show. That was a great show. They didn't even need us. We were barely there. We launched a million careers that night. All right, so we were talking about supply and demand. That is always going to be a problem with the war on drugs, because like you said, you can't arrest people into not wanting to do drugs. This just proven to not be a deterrent. When people want to do drugs, they're going to find them and they're going to do them. The supply is hard to eradicate because of all the things we mentioned. You can't just wipe out all the if the demand is there, then they're going to find places where the government is bribable or weak enough to plant those poppy fields. Right. And as long as there are desperate people and poor people or people that are addicts, then there will be drug mules and people that are willing to either willing to smuggle the drugs or a cartel who will hold your family hostage to force you to smuggle those drugs. Can you imagine that being your reality today? Like, right now, man. Like, you're running across like a desert right now with a bunch of heroin on you because your wife is being held hostage, your wife and kids. That's happening to you right this second that happens to people sometimes. It's so rare, and especially here, like, in the United States, it's just, like, such a remote worry that there's no reason to lose any sleep over for you. But don't forget about the person that's actually happening to right now and what they must be thinking during that run across the desert. How stressed out are they? Like, what's going through their head? I can't imagine what it would be like to actually be in that situation. Like, when I imagine it, I imagine it as you do, like, experience a movie. It's remote, it's fictitious, it's fantasy. These are characters. But when I can just get my brain just right, a little bit of it floods in, and it's just overwhelming how nuts and horrific that experience would be. Yeah. And I think that's something that well, I mean, I think if you have a problem with drug addiction, you're not considering a lot of things, but certainly one thing that's probably the last thing you're considering is how it got to you, how it got to your dealer and the devastation that it has wreaked along the way. Right, that's absolutely true. I think that's an excellent point for people to remember. So Ed wrapped up this research with something I'd never really thought about, about marijuana being a gateway drug. We've talked about that, and a lot of people scoff at that notion. But he makes a case here that kind of makes sense, that the system with marijuana in the 1940s and 50s, especially in urban areas, and with jazz clubs and jazz musicians, it kind of set up a system where heroin could find a pretty easy entry point. Yeah. Because it was coming in largely from in the beginning of the 20th century up to the first well, I guess the so at the beginning of the 20th century, it was interrupted by World War II, and then it came back with a vengeance in the was being imported largely by Asian people who didn't know people outside of their community. So they figured out how to connect with the jazz musicians who already had pot friends, and the jazz musicians started turning their pop friends on friends yeah. Onto heroin. And part of the reason why heroin was able to kind of make such entree into American culture, especially through this route, was that all these people, they weren't drug naive. They'd used pot before. They smoked pot all the time. They knew for a fact that it wasn't addictive. It didn't turn you into a theme, like, had been depicted hysterically in this government propaganda against pot. And so all of the warnings against heroin were probably just as full of hot air, too. And it just turns out that they happen to be wrong this time. Yeah. And, I mean, the jazz scene was rife with her own abuse. Miles Davis and Charlie Parker. Ray Charles. Yes. Ray Charles. Totally. It's kind of jazz, but, yeah, he counts. I remember when Philip Seymour Hoffman, when he died of a fatal overdose I know. They tried to pin it on a jazz guy as his dealer. Oh, really? Yeah. Super kind of throwback thing. But even still today, they're like, yeah, jazz people can't be trusted. They love heroin. Billie Holiday was fully addicted to heroin. It was all over the jazz community. Yeah. Because, again so this is one of those things where you try once, you try it twice, and all of a sudden you're doing it a lot more, and you have to do more and more. And if it's all around you and everybody seems to be having a good time despite puking their guts out first, you might give it a try. That's just super interesting. The idea that pot was connected is like this gateway for America to heroin because there's just such worlds apart. Yeah. And alcohol. I mean, if you look at the history of jazz, heroin and cirrhosis are, like, two of the biggest factors in killing off jazz musicians. Yeah, true. Damn interesting. One thing we didn't really touch on. Well, two things. One, the epidemic of fentanylaced heroin, which apparently, if you're buying that on purpose, it might be sold to you as magic or bud ice. God. But fentanyl is about 25 to 50 times stronger than heroin, so the fatal dose is much lower. It takes way less to kill you. But if you don't know that you're buying fentanyl based heroin, you're doing your regular dose of heroin, that fentanyl can very easily kill you. And that happens a lot. It's happening more and more. No idea who's doing it. They think it might be coming from China, but who knows what the deal is with that? But that's one big problem with heroin addiction is you might overdose. The likelihood of you overdosing with the introduction of fentanyl is way higher than it was before. I think the whole thing really started to pick up steam 2013. And then the whole reason there's a heroin epidemic right now in the United States, Chuck, is because a few pharma companies got America and a large part of the world hooked on opioid painkillers like OxyContin. And the government said, well, this is a real problem. We need to get everybody off of opioids. So, Purdue Pharma, you need to make this OxyContin impossible to inject or snort or whatever. And they did. They made OxyContin so that when you crushed it, it turned into a gel that you couldn't do anything with. And nobody could get high off of OxyContin anymore. You couldn't find it. It was too expensive. It was just impossible to get. But heroin suddenly made a huge appearance, and it was cheaper. It did the trick. You could find it just about everywhere. And now, all of a sudden, combined with the 2008 recession and all of the despair that that generated, there's a heroin epidemic in the United States that's still raging and going strong. And we have a lot of those pharmaceutical companies and the agencies that are supposed to regulate them more closely to blame for that. Yes, I remember in college there was one year, and it probably wouldn't even a year, but like one season where heroin kind of came through town. And in my crowd, not my close friends, none of them did it, but I knew a person, through a person who had known very loosely socially, that she owed and died from heroin during this several month period. But I just remember it was being talked about a lot and it was just around and people were doing it, and it never invaded my inner circle, but I just remember that was a kind of a scary time in college when it kind of blew through and then kind of blew back out again. I'm sure there are always people that were doing here when? At some point in Athens. But it was like a thing for a little while. Yeah, no, it was always very hard to find. Just basically nonexistent. That's what I get the feeling. And then it started to really pick up steam in like the mid 2000 watts, I think. Yeah, it's weird, but yeah. Heroin is a demon. Chuck. It is a demon. And this girl was she was looking back, probably 22 years old. What a waste, man. Yeah, that's sad. Well, that's heroin, everybody. Don't do it. Just don't just go your whole life saying, never done heroin, and I'm all good. You're not missing out on that much. Okay. Okay. And since I said that, it's time for listener mail. We heard a lot about peanut butter. That has proven to be quite a popular and somewhat divisive podcast episode. Yeah, we did hear from most people that said, yeah, outside of America, a lot of people think peanut butter is weird. We did hear from a few people in England and elsewhere. They were like, what are you talking about, Josh? I love peanut butter. Yeah, like, two people. Yeah, it felt fairly anecdotal, but this is about neither of those. So this is from Daniel Volts in Louisville. Did you say Danielson? Hey, guys, been listening for years to all the great podcasts recently listen to peanut butter and was greatly entertained. As a lifelong peanut butter lover, jeff is my brand of choice. He even convinced me to try peanut butter mayo sandwich, which was okay, definitely to put more mayo on there next time. Yes, you do. We heard from some peanut butter mayonnaise people who tried it, and we're like, I didn't really like it, or I didn't get it. Maybe it's just me. While listening, I couldn't help but think of the colorblindness podcast you did and how cool it was to hear something be explained to me, because, frankly, nobody ever cared to do so. And as much as I loved to learn. It never crossed my mind to learn about it. You may be wondering why a show about peanut butter triggered colorblindness. Turns out the rest of the world thinks peanut butter is brown. I cannot imagine opening a jar of delicious green peanut butter and seeing a nasty brown substance resembling something I don't want to think about eating sometimes. Somehow I thought this for 18 years, for anyone knew the true color of peanut butter was green before anyone told him. That right. I still get teased about thinking peanut butter is green, but to me, it's as green as green gets. Reality really is just perception. It's amazing to me that the world can be seen so differently through every single person's eyes. Who knows how many different colors of peanut butter there are out there? Thanks for the show, guys. You keep my days interesting and entertaining. Psy marathon podcast helped me know what to expect from my first marathon and scared me to death. But I did finish without the unfortunate issues that some people go through during a race. Congratulations. And that is Daniel Volts from Louisville, Kentucky. Nice work, Daniel. I don't know about green peanut butter. I think the weird orangey brown it is normally is my preference for sure, aka peanut colors. Right. Well, if you want to let us know how something we talked about triggered some interesting memory, that kind of thing really fascinates us, so we want to hear it. You can send it to us in an email, address it to stuffpodcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should know is production of iHeartRadio's how stuff works. For more podcasts, my heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime four days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon Music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. You know you're a pet mom when you plan your vacation around your pet. At Halo, we get it because we're pet moms, too. We make natural, high quality pet food that's rooted in science. It's the world's best food for the world's best kids. Learn more@halopets.com."
a630d0bc-5462-11e8-b449-5bc373589fa1	The Disappearance of the Yuba County Five	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/the-disappearance-of-the-yuba-county-five	In 1978, five friends set out for home from a basketball game. The next day, their car was discovered in a lonely mountain road. The next spring, their bodies began to turn up. What happened that night remains a mystery to this day.	In 1978, five friends set out for home from a basketball game. The next day, their car was discovered in a lonely mountain road. The next spring, their bodies began to turn up. What happened that night remains a mystery to this day.	Tue, 10 Jul 2018 15:17:30 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2018, tm_mon=7, tm_mday=10, tm_hour=15, tm_min=17, tm_sec=30, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=191, tm_isdst=0)	49909435	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"You want your kid eating the best nutrition, right? And by that we mean your dog. Halo Elevate is natural sciencebased nutrition guaranteed to support your dog's top five health needs better than leading brands. Find Halo Elevate at petco pet supplies plus and select neighborhood pet stores. US hey everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, My Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetuffworkscom. Hi and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. And there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. And there's Jerry over there. So this is stuff you should know. Yes. How are you doing, Chuck? Do I look tired? You seem a little logy tired, man. What's going on with you? I've just been waking up, like too early for no reason. Going to bed too late, though, because if you go to bed early and wake up early, you're fine. Well, going to bed late sometimes not getting enough sleep, then trying to go to bed super early to make up for it. But I don't know about this. Making up for a sleep deficit, I don't buy all that. I feel like we talked about it before. That doesn't actually work. Yeah, I'm just tired, that's all I can say. Sorry, man, I'll live. But hey, we're about to fly to Denver and that will correct all those ills. Yeah, that'll definitely make you catch up with your sleep. Yeah, immediately being in a different time zone 2 hours later for sure, but a quiet, cool hotel, that will help. It will help me. I'm glad it's going to be two good shows, Charles. Two good shows and three because I'm kicking one off the old bucket list venue wise and going to a show at Red Rocks on Friday. Who are you going to see? The AVAT Brothers. Oh, wow, that's really something. Don't they wear like pocket chains and stuff? I don't think so. Okay. No, I was trying to just go to any Red Rock show and if you look at the Red Rocks calendar, there's a lot of stuff on there that would not appeal to me at all. A lot of groove jam. Yeah, stuff. And then this aligned with Ava Brothers and it's like, yeah, that's great. I'll take it. That's great. Well, I'm glad it worked out for you, man. Yeah, it will be good. I'm on row 70 of 70. I'm on row 70 as well. Are you going? No, I'm just teasing. Yeah, I think if I don't have a heart attack on the way up to row 70, it should be okay. It's supposed to be a cool venue, I've always heard. Yeah, I've been enamored of it since the Sunday Bloody Sunday video when I was a kid. Oh, that's right. That was at Red Rocks, wasn't it? Absolutely. Nice. Well, here's to your bucket list, Charles. Thanks. And I could die on row 70 and at least one thing will have been accomplished. Right? You'll have your bucket list with you and just the one scratched off. I hate that term anyway. Yeah, it's pretty bad, but I know that's what the people understand. You could call it your death list. That's even better. It's more like I've got some music venues I'd like to see, and that's one of them. Okay. Some people do that with, like, baseball stadiums. They go to every baseball stadium before they die. I try to go to as many of those as I can when I'm in different towns, for sure. That's what I've been to you when I ask I'm sorry. Yeah. What was the best one you've been to, man? Pittsburgh. Oh, for Three Rivers. Is that one. Well, that was the old name. I think. It has a different name now. Was that the time when we went and shot those Toyota commercials that you went and that was the best baseball stadium you've ever been to? It's gorgeous. What was so great about it? It's just a position right there on the river, and if you have the right seat, you can look out over downtown and see, like, all those beautiful bridges. It's just lovely. Okay, cool. Yeah, I remember quite clearly. I stayed in my room and gorged myself on chicken, SOGG it was totally worth missing the Pittsburgh Base. Yeah, I remember that. It was funny. I hurt myself on that stuff. All right. I'm glad we killed some time before we got into this very mysterious, sad story. It's a good one, though, isn't it? It is extraordinarily sad. Probably the saddest true I don't know. It's up there as far as true life, true crime, disappearances go. Yeah. And it's the one about Gary Matthias. Well, that's what they call it. They call it the Gary Matthias disappearance. But that really doesn't do it much justice. It doesn't serve it well, because it was a lot more than Gary Matthias involved. Yeah, I've seen it more so called the Yuba County Five, but I guess it just depends on where you're looking. I had not run across that. Oh, yeah. Oh, God. That makes me wonder. What? All stuff I missed. Well, you know, there were five guys. What? No, there actually were five guys. There are five friends. Gary Matthias was one of them. And there were four others. There was Ted Weir, who was the oldest. He was 32. Correct. There was Jackie Hewitt. He was the youngest. He was 24. There was Jack Madruga. I'm not sure what age he was, but he was definitely between 24 and 32. I'll tell you that. He narrows it down. Bill Sterling and then again, Gary Matthias and those five guys were a set of friends and they met at the Yuba City Vocational Rehabilitation Center for what you would call today the cognitively impaired or cognitively challenged. Yeah, because three of these guys, of course this one article you have from 1978 doesn't use appropriate terms anymore, but three of these guys were intellectually disabled or developmentally disabled. Not an exact like it's kind of hard to get an exact diagnosis from these 1978 terms. But Madruga was undiagnosed. But according to his mom, he was generally thought of, as she said, as, quote, slow in, quote, and then Matthias was the only one not diagnosed with a developmental disability, but he was under drug treatment for schizophrenia. Right. So all five of these guys had some sort of challenge going on in their life. Right, exactly. So there's a lot of details you can kind of glean because you're absolutely right. Like reading the really great Washington Post article, which is basically the comprehensive document on the case from 1978. You can kind of glean an idea, a picture of these guys. So there's just five friends, thick as thieves. Even within this tight little group of friends, there's subgroups of even tighter friends. Like Ted Weir and Jackie Hewitt were particularly close. And Bill Sterling and Jack Madruga were particularly close. They were just these five guys known as the boys. Right. They all lived at home with their parents. They were always going to live at home with their parents. It was just what the plan was. Right. I think Ted Weir had a job as a janitor and then later on as a snack bar clerk. Bella basketball. Yeah, that was another one. And they actually all played together on the basketball team for the vocational rehab center, basically like their hangout, the place where they hung out. Right. They played basketball on that team. But Jack Madruga is worth saying, had a driver's license, whereas three of the other ones didn't, although Gary Matthias did as well. So these guys were friends. They had a tight kinship together. They had very normal, reliable lives that were basically home centric. And when they were out doing stuff, you could expect them home for dinner kind of thing. That was just a given. Yeah. I think that's super worth pointing out here early on is they sell in more than one place. They said they referred to their lives as very predictable and scheduled. Right. Which is why this interesting, the events that occurred on February 24, 1978, were very unusual. Right. So on February 24, 1978, the Boys, that's what their families all call them because apparently all their families were at least in touch, if not friendly with one another. Yeah. I think they kind of supported one another, it sounds like, as much as anyone did in 1978. Sure. So on this night, February 24, there was a Friday night, the boys left their homes around Maryville in Yuba City in California, and they traveled, I think about 50 miles north to Cal State Chico, which is now called Chico State University. And they went to go see their team, the Cal State La. Team beat up on Cal State. Chico And Cal State La actually won 86 to 84 which would have pleased the boys tremendously. Sure. So they went to the game. That much is known. And then they left the game. That much is known, too, because around 10:00 when they left the game, they went to a convenience store called Bears Market and they bought some stuff. Yeah. Apparently they were trying to kind of close up and so the clerk was a little bit annoyed that they showed up. And these are the kind of details that aren't so important, but it just shows that they really did their investigating pretty thoroughly, including well, we'll get to sort of the lead investigator in a minute. But yeah, they bought just a few things. They bought a Hostess Cherry Pie, a Langendorf lemon pie, snickers Bar, a Marathon Bar, a couple of Pepsi and a quarter and a half of milk. Which is to say, it's not like they were stocking up on food. They just got some snacks. Right, exactly. For the drive back home. 50 miles, about an hour. Yeah. The thing is, they would have been fully expected back home. Not just because it wasn't like any of them to spend the night away. Right. Except Matthias. He had friends and he would stay out with friends sometimes. But the other four, they slept in their bed at home every night. That's just what they did. So their families fully expected them to come back. And another reason why they expected them to come back was because the next day, Saturday, they had a basketball game for their vocational rehab team, the Gateway Gators. And they apparently were all extraordinarily excited about this game. Yeah. Which, again, is just another point being made that these guys had every intention on coming home. Super excited about the game. I think Matthias even was kind of driving his mom a little batty saying, don't let me oversleep. Got this big game. Apparently the guys had their clothes laid out and they were all super excited about this basketball game. And then they don't come home and these parents and grandparents start waking up at various points in the middle of the night or in the morning and start getting in touch with one another all verifying like, your kid's not there, your kid's not there. And they start to freak out. And by 08:00 that evening, I believe the mother of madruga actually finally called the cops. Yeah. And the cops were kind of I don't have the impression that they were like, well, I'm sure this is fine. I think they got involved pretty early on. But things really picked up when, I think on a Tuesday it was Saturday night, that they finally called the cops. And on Tuesday, Jack Madruga's car was discovered. And it was discovered in a very, very unusual place. Right? Yeah. What was this thing? An old Mercury Montago. 69 Montago. A land yacht is what it was. Exactly. And they found it. And this was, by the way, this is Jack Madruga's prized possession. Like, no one else drove the thing. He took pristine care of it. It was like his baby. His car was right. So to find it abandoned with the window, one of the windows rolled down up a mountain road, which was, I think, 70 miles away from the basketball game in a different direction, away from their house. Right. So the basketball game was north of their homes. This was southeast of the basketball game and up a mountain road. It was extremely bizarre and also, I'm sure, quite worrying when the families were already worried. I think finding this car like this probably really set them into panic mode. Well, yeah. And here's where in this article is very clear to say, from that point on, nothing made any kind of sense. So here's a few things about the car that definitely don't add up. You might think, all right, there's a snowstorm. So they drove up here and they got stuck. Apparently. That is not true. The car stopped at about the snow line, and they said they did confirm that the wheels had spun some, but the car wasn't stuck. And these five dudes could have pushed it free pretty easily, apparently. Right. That's thing number one. Thing number two is that it had a quarter tank of gas still, so they didn't run out of gas. Right. Then when the cops hot wired the car, the keys were gone, and when the cops hot wired, the cars started up immediately. There wasn't any engine trouble or anything like that. Yeah. The last thing they found were all these maps of California. So it's not like they had no way of knowing where they were. And then they found all the wrappers from the food items. The only thing, ironically, that wasn't fully eaten was the Marathon bar. Living up to its reputation, I guess. The toughest candy bar to get through. Yeah, that's how they build it. Some weird cartoon cowboy. Yeah. So that's the deal. The underside of the car wasn't damaged, which they say was pretty interesting, because on this road, apparently, there were a lot of deep, deep ruts. This thing kind of hangs low anyway. As a low hanging muffler has. These five dudes inside. These grown men. And there was no damage under the underside of his car. Which means a couple of things if you kind of are surmising. Which is that either the driver kind of knew where they were going and drove through the darkness with a lot of precision. Or they just maybe drove really slow. Yeah, I think it was the latter because I think Madruga probably would have been very unhappy that his car was on this road now. So just took it slow and took it super slow. I saw somewhere that there wasn't even a large mud spot on it. They had taken it that easy. Yeah. And apparently Madruga didn't like the cold. He didn't like camping, so he wouldn't have known that road. It's not like there's a lot else to do up there, but that right. And evidently none of the boys were big into outdoorsy type stuff. Oh, yeah, that's a really good point, Chuck. None of them had any connection to that area, and certainly not to that mountain. One of them, I think Bill Sterling, had gone camping with his family there eight years before. Yeah. And he didn't even like I think they went back again, and he was like, no, I don't want to go. Right. So he didn't like the outdoors, he didn't like the cold. And then I think Ted Weir had gone deer hunting or something once with friends way west of the area. But still, I mean, enough that it was a lead that the cops would have chased down. But then two, he didn't enjoy himself, and he didn't like the woods either. So there was no let's go hang out in the woods kind of thing going on here. Just everything about the fact that they found this car and where they found it and the state they found it in was really bizarre and really worrying. Should we take a break? I think we should, man all right. You and I are going to go hang out in the woods, and we'll be back right after this. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but we're pretty excited about summer. I mean, what's not to like? School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's right. And that's where True crime podcasts on Amazon Music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. Yeah. And with so many killer shows like Morbid, My Favorite, Murder, and Smalltown Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. Prepare to go deep and become your own detective in the world of serial crimes and unsolved mysteries. Get lost hearing spooky stories with a combination of detailed research and lighthearted analysis. 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Just remember, no one can prevent all identity theft or monitor all transactions at all businesses. But everyone can save up to 25% off their first year by going to Lifelock.com stuff. That's Lifelock.com stuff for 25% off your first year. LifeLock identity theft protection starts here. So I've never swept the woods before. That was really interesting. All right, speaking span out here, they find the car. And when they find the car, chuck I think it was the next night, after they had gone missing, a storm blew into the area, and it dumped, like, almost a foot of snow on the mountain. This is February in the mountains in California, I would guess. The Sierra is what it sounds like. Right? So, yeah, chico is in the Sierra Nevadas. I think it's north of Sacramento. So it would be very cold and the snow would be pretty tough to get through. But they still tried. They got guys on horseback, they got helicopters out. They looked for them, but they found nothing. They found one bit of not a single trace of these guys, just the car. And that was it. Yeah, the snow certainly didn't help anything. Right. Because it would not be until June. On June 4, after this thing, the mountain thaws out somewhat when these Sunday motorcycle bikers, they'll go right around the mountains. They went into an old Forest Service trailer camp at the end of a road and said, do you smell something that smells like perhaps a dead body? And sadly, it was Ted Weir. And this is where things get even stranger. Yeah. So I think the trailer caught their attention. But what caught their attention even further was that a window had been broken to get into the trailer. And then, like you said, what really caught their attention was the smell and the sight of Ted Weir's decomposing body. But what made it very weird is one he's wrapped in sheets tucked under his head in a way that he couldn't have possibly tucked himself. So somebody had tucked him in like that. And Ted We had been a portly fellow. Cynthia Gorney, who wrote the Washington Post article on this case in 1978, calls them beer belly handsome, which I've never heard those words put together in my entire life. Well, I think that's what I am sure I call you beer belly foxy. Okay. Okay. But he was beer belly handsome. He was a thick guy. He was, like, 510, \u00a3200. He had a few extra pounds on him. Right. When they found him, though, he weighed about 100 to \u00a3120, which means that between the time that they went missing and the time that he died, he lost anywhere between 80 and \u00a3100. Yes. A couple of more interesting tidbits. His leather shoes were gone and missing completely on the little night stand by his bed was his own ring because it had his name engraved on it. Ted. Yes, Ted. His gold necklace, his wallet with money, and then, weirdly, a watch that was not his. It was a gold Waltham watch that had a missing crystal. And all of the families said that none of our kids had this watch. Right. So that's one interesting tidbit. And the other is that he had a big, full beard that indicated that he lived in that cabin for anywhere from eight to 13 weeks. Right. And what's really, really unnerving about the 13 week, 113 week number is that if he survived 13 weeks, that means that he would have died just days before his body was found. Is that right? Yes. Did you do the math? I did the math. Because, think about it. So they disappeared on February 24, and he was found June 4. So you've got March, April, June. Wow. I really hope I call on the saints that that not to have been the case. Like, that he perhaps died a couple of days before. Yeah. That he would have expired weeks before that. There's just no chance for him if he was destined and doomed to die. I really hope it wasn't a couple of days before they found his body after starving for 13 weeks. Yeah. And to cap it off, I don't think we've mentioned yet this cabin was almost 20 miles from their car. Oh, yeah. So in the middle of the night, and at this point, this is all we know is about Ted in our story. He walked or ran almost 20 miles in four to six foot snowdrifts to go to this trailer, where he spent the next two to three months slowly dying. Yeah. Okay. That's pretty weird in and of itself. And they found that his feet were terribly frostbitten. Right. Which is why his shoes were off. But again, his shoes were missing. What gets even weirder, and this is just where the case truly turns bizarre, is one of the Yuba County sheriff's deputies, or under sheriff, called it bizarre as hell is like the quote of the story. The cabin was actually like a Forest Service trailer, and it was an emergency trailer, from what I understand, and it was fully stocked with a year's worth of food that would have kept all five of those boys alive for a year. It was built to keep you alive. Yes, exactly. And they found it, but they didn't put it to use. Now, let's not say that they didn't find the food. There were twelve rations, like sea rations, like army meals opened and eaten, but that was it. The other stuff wasn't touched. There was a whole locker of other dehydrated food and like fruit cups and stuff that hadn't been touched at all. Okay. And bear in mind, this is all right here while Ted Weir is starving to death. Yeah. So all this food is there. They found out. The investigators determined that there had not been a fire built, even though there were paperback novels, there was wood furniture, there were matches, like everything was there to build a fire. And not only that, but there was a propane tank. That all they had to do. It was in another shed outside. All they had to do was open this thing on and they would have actually had gas heat. Yes, heat. Right. They also didn't even cover up the broken window that they used to get into the trailer. It's just weird. Just bizarre decision after bizarre decision. Right? Yeah. So there's one other thing in the trailer that is pretty interesting. They find Gary Matthias tennis shoes. So Gary Matthias tennis shoes are there and Ted Weir's leather shoes are missing. And what they think possibly, is that Gary Matthias was in the trailer with Ted. Ted had terrible frostbite. Ted would have had bigger feet than Gary. Gary probably had frostbite, too. So he used Ted shoes to put them on and go back out into the wilderness. Yeah. They pretty much determine that. Probably all five of those guys were in here at one point. Okay. So I have to say I don't think that's true. Really? Because that's what I saw. So what I saw was that, okay, we should probably tell everybody that we should continue on Chuck. But I think a day after they found Ted Weir, they started looking around the area and they started finding the other boy's remains. Yes. And this is thanks to what I said would be sort of the lead investigator, yuba County Lieutenant Lance Ayers, who actually had gone to high school with Weir, didn't know him that well, but he was really consumed by this case and seemed sort of obsessed with trying to solve it to the point where he was chasing down leads from psychics. At one point. Yes. Apparently he met with a psychic who told him that the boys were in oroville or had been murdered in a red house, either brick or stained in oroville, with the house number either 4723 or 4753. And Lance Airs was so consumed with this that he actually drove every street of Oroville over a two day period trying to find that house based on the tip of a psychic. That's how obsessed he became with this case. Yeah. So we've put a pin were they all in the cabin debate? We're coming back to that, right? Right. All right, so now we pick up a story of a man named Joseph Jones. And this is where things get even more odd. So this guy was 55 years old. He got in touch with the cops because some strange things that had happened that night of the disappearance. He was going to go camping with his family up that road. And so he decided to take his little Volkswagen Beetle around 530 that evening just to check out the snow line to see if it was possible and if it was going to be safe to take his family camping that weekend. He found out it was not. Yeah. He got his car stuck right above the snow line, and this was to be about 50 yards further than where that Mercury would eventually be found. Right. So he gets out to push his Beetle right. And has a heart attack. He's 55, and this is 1978, which means he lived on nothing but Scotch and steak. You can imagine that that was the outcome. Right. When you have to push your Volkswagen Beetle and he's, like, in a bad spot right there. He's alone in the wilderness at the snow line of a mountain 8 miles away from Help, the place that he had stopped to actually get a drink, probably a Scotch on the way up the mountain to check out the snow line had been 8 miles back in the other direction. So he very wisely, like, leaves his car running with the heater on and just lays there and tries to collect himself and gather himself. Yeah. That's a mild heart attack, we should point out, but enough that if you just have shown, you are probably freaking out. Oh, yeah. I'm not trying to diminish, like, his danger level, but it wasn't like he was laying there near death. Like he would eventually hike 8 miles out after this heart attack. Yes. But while he was laying there trying to gather his strength again. Sure. So this happened about 530, and he said a couple hours after that, a car, at least one, but probably two cars, and one of them would have been a pickup truck, came up and had their lights on, and he saw the silhouettes of some men and a woman with a baby. And he said he called out to them and they ignored it and turned off the lights. And he got back in his car and he said he laid there for another few hours before he heard some whistling sounds and some flashlight beams a little further down the mountain, probably about 50 yards. And that would have been a couple of hours, probably about five or 6 hours after his heart attack. And they think that the second group at least was the five boys with Gary Matthias. Yeah. Well, I think at this point, they were right outside his car window. Yeah. So again, he gets out. Calls for help, and the whistling sound stop and the flashlights get turned off. And so he goes back in his car and lays back down, and he's like, two groups of people have come up this mountain. I'm having a heart attack here, and somehow calling for help us chase both of them off. Both groups off. Yeah. So that Volkswagen Beetle, I can tell you from experience, had like, an eight gallon gas tank, so it eventually runs out of gas. It also, now that I think about it, doesn't have a very efficient heating system. Like, my first Beetle didn't even have a fan. We just call it the ankle burner. Like, when you turned on the heat, it literally just opened vents in the floorboard that came straight off the engine. Well, that's sharp design. So you had to be moving for there to be actually hot air running through it. Man. But I do know that I had another Beetle that did have a little fan. So let's just presume that Sean had the fan. I'm not going to I'm going to presume the opposite. I'm going to presume that this was a hellish experience for him in every way. All right, so eventually the car runs out of gas. It's still dark, and he manages, after this heart attack, like I said earlier, to walk 8 miles to a lodge called the Mountain House. Is that where he had gotten the drink? Yeah. All right, so he comes back and they're like, shown, and he's like, don't Shones me. You have no idea what I've been through. It turns out it's pretty serious. And on the way out, he passes this Montego sitting empty in the middle of the road about 50 yards further down the mountain behind his car, where he stopped at the snow line. That's right. So Sean doesn't think much of this. He just was like, okay, well, there's a car in the middle of the road. The snow line is here. I'm not the only one who got stuck last night. Those guys are jerks for not coming to my aid when I shouted for help. And he doesn't think much of it until all of a sudden on the news, he starts seeing these reports of these five guys who went missing the same night that he had his heart attack on the same road, in the same mountain. And he came forward and the cops figured out that Joseph Jones was probably the last person to see those five guys alive. Well, yeah, they're silhouettes, at least. Yeah. Should we take a break? I think so, man. All right, we're going to take a break and get to some more sad discoveries right after this. Hey, summer is here, my friend, which means school is out, the sun is shining bright, the days are longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. Yeah. Whether you're road tripping or you're relaxing by the pool. You can tune into the podcast here. It's on Amazon Music. That's so good? It's criminal. Morbid. That's right. It's part true crime and part comedy. Morbid takes you on a journey through murderous mysteries and major laughs, all in the same week. Yeah. From the paranormal to the pretty spooky and everything in between. Hosts Selena Erkhart and Ash Kelly cover it all. And with two episodes released each week, you'll be hooked on this chart topping series before you know it. You can listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today. These days, you use your personal info to do just about everything, especially when you're online. And guess what? With all that info just floating around out there, it can make the Internet a practical gold mine for identity thieves. And stealing your identity, it turns out, can be dangerously easy. Which is not good. But now it's easy to protect yourself with LifeLock by Norton. Yes, LifeLock monitors your info and alerts you to potential identity threats. And if you are a victim of identity theft, a dedicated US based restoration specialist will work to fix it. Identity thieves have had it easy for far too long. Now, finally, it's your turn. Just remember, no one can prevent all identity theft or monitor all transactions at all businesses. But everyone can save up to 25% off their first year by going to Lifelock.com stuff. That's Lifelock.com stuff for 25% off your first year. LifeLock identity theft protection starts here. Okay, we're back, Chuck. We are. You promise more sad discoveries. Lay it on them. All right, so the next day, after Weir's body had been found, the search is really on at this point. They found a few things. They found the remains of Sterling and Madruga. They are on different sides of the road, that same road that led to the trailer, but about eleven and a half miles from the car. Right. So presumably another, what, 9 miles from the trailer. Yes. Which is why, I think that they never made it to the trailer. Put a pen in that. Okay. All right. Madruga had very gruesomely been partially eaten by animals, of course, up there in the mountains. Probably after he died, though. Yeah, I think it sounds like all of this was they succumbed to nature and then the animals kind of took it from there. Right. So they dragged his body to a stream. He's laying their face up, they said, with his hand curled around his watch. And then Sterling was in the woods, and very gruesomely, they said that his remains, or his bones, I guess, were scattered over about 50ft. Yes. And then I think a day or so after that, there was another search party that was launched, and Jackie Hewitt's father insisted on being a part of it. And Jackie Hewitt was still missing. And very sadly, his dad was the one who discovered his remains. He found his son's. I think spine is what he came upon. Yeah. The same road a lot closer to the trailer, though, right? Like just a quarter mile or something, right? Yeah, I think that's about right. Something very close to it. And they also found his clothes. They knew it was him because his Levi's and his shirt were also found nearby. And so he was wearing very stylish platform shoes called Get Theirs, which I had to look up, and they were actually pretty fresh. Yeah. Not the kind of shoes that you want to be hiking around the snowy woods in. No, definitely not. I mean, again, platform shoes, they're like, you know that rubbery sold things that you find in Clark wallabies? The thick rubbery sold, I think it's called crepe sold. They were like those, but platform shoes and like a Rippley bottom. Yeah. Look at these things. Yeah. They're probably the worst hiking shoes you could ever imagine. What these would be good for, actually catching ladies, probably, right? I guess they're pretty cool. That wavy sole, though, looks so strange. Well, I look that up. It's to keep your center of balance when you're way up there. Okay, well, that makes more sense then. Yeah. There was a lot of thought put into those shoes. And then finally the next day, there was a skull discovered about 100 yards downhill. And that was the final remains from Jackie Hewitt. Yeah. So they found everybody. That is, except for Gary Matthias. He was still missing. And he still is, actually. If you go on the Yuba County Sheriff's website, on their missing person's page, he's still listed there. Yeah. His shoes were inside again in that trailer, which, you know, they can't say anything for sure, though. But it suggests that he was in there at one point, and they surmised that he may have, like you said, taken them off to wear the leather shoes, I guess, presumably because they were warmer or his feet were frostbitten and had swollen, so he needed the bigger shoes to strike out back outside. He was like, I can't go out there barefoot and I can't get my tennis shoes on any longer. Yeah. The deal with Matthias, like we said, he was under treatment for schizophrenia. He was in the army in Germany and apparently had occasions post war where he had become violent. He was charged with assault a couple of times, but all accounts say that for at least the last two years, he had really been on his meds. He had been working in his stepdad's business. They called him one of our sterling success cases. His doctor did? Yeah. And he was really coming around and hadn't had any what is his dad he said he called them Haywire episodes. Hadn't had one of those in a couple of years. And the stepfather said that he had been taking his meds the week he disappeared. Right. And his stepfather would know because his stepfather owned a gardening business, and Gary Matthias had been working with them side by side for a couple of years by that time. He also didn't seem like one to really mince words or BS. Right. So I take him for his word that his son was fully medicated and his schizophrenia was under control, it sounds like. Yeah. So the problem is he hadn't taken his pills with him, so if he did survive, he had gone without him. He left him at home. And the reason why he left him at home is because he fully expected to be back home a couple hours after he left for the basketball game. Now more evidence that it's just really bizarre that they went anywhere but home, and that raised a lot of questions for the families back in the day. I think Madruga's mom, Mabel, was very vocal about her belief that somebody had either tricked or threatened her son and the other boys into going up that mountain or somebody else was responsible for this series of decisions. Yeah. So they learned a few things afterward that are sort of clues, but never ended up solving anything. One is that a snowcat, forest service snowcat had been up that road, I think, just the day before. Yeah, I think so. And packed in a path of snow. So it was walkable. So it led up to that trailer, and they surmised that the boys this might have been the only walkable path forward, so they might have followed that path to the trailer. They hired a water witcher at one point, and he was in paradise, California, and he said that he fixed his little is it divining or divining? Divining. Divining rod to pick up human minerals and traces of humans. That led them to another cabin where they found a disposable lighter. And this was about three quarters of a mile from the trailer where they found the body. And all the parents said, no, they didn't have a lighter like this. The guys didn't carry a lighter. Right. So there were a lot of dead ends like that. For example, that watch that had been found with Ted weir, that it was missing its crystal. All the family said that wasn't any of our boys watch. Right. I mean, it could be totally meaningless. It could have been a forest ranger who had left the watch behind because it had broken or something like that. But most of the evidence in this case are just those just little dead ends. Yeah. That gary Matthias apparently knew some people, and they're really just sort of reaching at this point, new people in Forbestown, which is about halfway between chico and yuba city, and apparently the turn is easy to miss. And there was some speculation, like maybe he was taking his buddies to go see this. People he knew got lost, but apparently those friends were like, we hadn't seen him in years, and it would be really unlikely that he just would have randomly come to visit. Yeah. I could also see the other boys not wanting to go along with that, too, because they had that basketball game in the morning that they all wanted to be fresh as a daisy for you, too. Yeah. Gary Matthias had been badgering his mom, I think, like you said, to make sure he didn't oversleep the next morning because he was excited about that basketball game, too. Yeah. So the thing is, though, Chuck, is even if let's say that is the case, let's say that they all got a wild hair and they decided to go see Gary Matthias friends and they started up this mountain because they got lost. They missed the turn off and ended up on a mountain road at the snow line, thought the car was stuck. Why would all of them, all of them collectively and individually say, well, let's go up rather than back down, let's go up into the snow. Supposedly, the snow drifts were six 8ft. Even if it was packed down with the snow cat, it doesn't make sense to go forward. No. Unless they thought, well, the last side of civilization behind us was too far. Maybe there's something up here, which is the thing that's an economic theory called sunk cost, where you're so invested in something you're so far along that you don't want to just stop and turn back or quit. So it's possible that aided in their decision making. But again, okay, so then let's say that they're like, okay, this snow cat track is going to lead us to safety or something. When they get to the trailer, like, why not eat the food? Why not make a fire? I can even see missing the propane tank, just not being just with it enough from the harrowing experience that you could just totally miss the propane tank and not even think that your trailer is going to have that kind of thing. But the food that you've already started to eat, that you already show you have a can opener and know how to use it, how do you just starve to death after that? Well, I mean, the other food was in a locker they never opened, apparently. But like, if you're there, especially for two to three months, you're turning over everything. You're lighting a fire with whatever you can get your hands on. There's plenty of stuff to make a fire. Yeah. What's up with the supposed woman and the baby? That could be chalked up, maybe pretty easily to what was his name? Snopes. Shoots Snopes. That would be Snoop Dogg. That could be chalked up to him in the state of a heart attack in the middle of the night, just sort of seeing things. Could have been or it could have just been an entirely different party of people who had nothing to do with it or anything to do with it. But they could have been there, too. I mean, it was a mountain. Some people lived on it. Some people apparently camped there, which is what Sean was scouting for, you know. How did Matthias never get found at all? I don't know. I think at the end of the WaPo article, cynthia Gorney, the journalist, says that probably he laid there on the snow somewhere that they just didn't find or overlooked or he got buried in the snow and then when the thaw came, he sunk down to the ground and was covered over by some mountain vines. I guess so. But it seems like after all these years, a bone or one of those leather shoes or something would have been found. Yeah. You'd think both of those would still be intact. Yeah. I mean, what I did not see was any sort of speculation that he had had any nefarious actions. No, but we did put a pin in something. I don't remember what it was. I saw a couple of theories that they speculate that all of these guys went to the cabin at one point and maybe Weir wasn't doing so well, so they all set out independently to go look for help, and each died or maybe in pairs, maybe, since the two guys were kind of found together. But I don't know. It's all just speculation. You saw that they don't think they were all there. Yeah, what I saw was that Jackie Hewitt and Bill Sterling and Jack Madruga had never made it to the trailer. So they would have split up on the way up. No, that they were that they had or died during that 20 miles hike. Yes. Interesting. And then Ted and Gary had continued on up and made it to the trailer. And then what I think happened after that was Gary. Gary had been in the army. And the can opener that was there was actually a very simple thing called a P 38. But you kind of had to have been in the army to know how to use it, and Ted wouldn't have been, and Gary would have been. So I think Gary may have stayed, probably fed both of them. And then, like you said, seeing Ted was not doing so well, set out again with Ted shoes and died going off to get help somehow. That's what I think happened. Yeah, I would have think they get split up on the way up, though? I just don't even know. Like these guys would have died that quickly on the way on this 20 miles hike. I mean, six to eight foot snowdrifts, that's cold. Yeah, but they're also on the snow packed trail, supposedly. Sure. But they also have, like they're dressed for mild weather. Like they didn't have jackets, sweaters. Their shoes were like Converse kind of things. Aside from the platform shoes, it's entirely possible that a 20 miles, hike up a mountain. They succumb to the weather. Yeah. And you also, like it was hard to determine what level of intellectual impairment these boys had, so I don't know how much that plays into it, if at all. Like, when they get to this cabin because he didn't have his meds after that, did he start kind of breaking down with some episodes of schizophrenia and leave? Yeah. Did the other guy not fully understand? I mean, at that point, he's exhausted and maybe hurt and scared. Was he not even able to figure out maybe to light a fire? Light a fire or how to use that can opener? Or maybe he felt he couldn't get out of bed because of his feet. Yeah. And he was just stuck there after Gary struck out to go get help, that there was nothing he could do, and the poor guy starved to death. But what were they doing up there to begin with? That's the basic root of this whole thing. Yeah, but that's why they call this the American diet. Love pass. We got to do an episode on that one, too. But because there's, like, a mystery within a mystery within a mystery, there are so many other mysteries that just kind of crescendo from the first mystery, which is what were they doing there? Yeah, true. Well, and like you said, some of the parents firmly believe, like, they witnessed something at this basketball game and were then chased up this mountain. I don't even know what that means. They witnessed a crime that came after him or something. That's what Ted Weir's sister in law always believed. And speaking of Ted Weir, you got anything else on this? No, except to only say if that was the case, then why was the car seemingly driven very slowly and carefully up this road if they were being chased? Okay, so you make a good point, and I think I saw that elsewhere, too. That virtually proves that they weren't chased. Yeah. If anything, it shows that something happened to them and somebody ditched their car. Who knew the area? I think more likely Jack Madrigo just would have driven extraordinarily slowly because this is his baby car. Yeah. It's very sad. I think it's just one of those it's probably like Occam's razor. It's probably the most simple explanation is maybe they just went on a little joyride, got a little lost, got turned around in the woods and succumbed to nature. Yeah. So I find this I said at the beginning, this is just a very sad story to me. Yes. And one of the things that got me was in that Washington Post article. It's called Five Boys Who Never Come Back by Cynthia Gordon from 1978. You can find it online, but she describes Ted are you ready for this? That Ted got a good chuckle out of phoning Bill Sterling and reading from newspaper items or oddball names from the telephone book. Like, that's what he was into. That's what made him happy. And I'm sure Bill Sterling thought it was hilarious, too, but they were just this group of friends. And can you just imagine, like, going through the phone book, looking for silly names and going and picking up the phone and calling his friend Bill Sterling and saying, bill, get a load of this one. And Bill is just laughing on the other end of the line. And such a pure life, almost like an enviable life in a lot of ways. And that they died so horribly is just bitterly sad to me. Yeah, I mean, they weren't troublemakers. And even the one who had gotten convicted of assault a couple of times. Yeah, Gary, it seems like all signs point to his mental illness is playing a big factor in that which he had gotten in check. Right, exactly. All very sad. It is very sad. Well, if you have any theories on the what do you call them? The UBA city. Six five yuba county or ubisoft five Yuba City? Five. Yeah, we want to hear them. You can find all of our social media connections on our website, stuffyoushouldnow.com. And if you like, you can also send us an email. Just shoot it off to stuffpodcast@howstepwarks.com. Wait, we haven't done listener mail, have we? No. You're just going to let me keep going, weren't you? All right, well, hold on, everybody. Hold on. Don't stop yet. Don't stop yet. Since I said some stuff I'm not supposed to say, it's time for listener mail. Yes, and speaking of which, this listener mail is rated R. Okay? That's all I'll say. Does it use the S word? No, but it didn't use curse words. It just talks very frankly about sex. And it's good PSA, though, so I know the same stuff. Yeah, for sure. And this is from Emily, not my wife. Hey, guys, listen to the select episode on condoms the other day. Thanks for all the great info. Appreciate you covering topics maybe slightly controversial or divisive and do so with such great I wanted to throw a little extra PSA in there, though, for your listeners. Most people are aware that you can and should use condoms to prevent pregnancy and or STIs when apnis is involved. But there's far less awareness about protection when you've only got vaginas in the mix, although you certainly can't get pregnant. It is possible to spread or contract an STI from sex between two women or other vagina having people. But you can greatly reduce your risk of this by using a dental dam. It's a sheet of latex placed over the bulba or anus for oral sex, and that's all there really is to it. If you don't have one on hand, you can safely DIY one by enrolling a regular condom, cutting off the clothes end, and bam, it's a dental dam. In the case of digital sex, not as in computers, as in fingers, latex gloves are perfect for the job. Of course, these can also be used by absolutely anyone. There's a lot more awareness of protection for heterosexual and male homosexual couples and not a lot for queer women. Well, that's my stuff you should know. And now you know it. Thanks for consistently great work and outstanding effort in educating and entertaining us every week. And happy Pride Month. And she wrote back, I just realized I gave an incomplete DIY instruction. You would cut off the close end of the condom and the ring on the open end, then cut down the middle, and now it's a flat sheet. Bam. So that is from Emily. Thanks a lot, Emily. Happy Pride Month indeed. Good info. Yeah, it was good info. And if you out there want to send us good info, I already said it. I said it once and I'll say it again. You can find all our social stuff on stuffyshireknow.com and you can send us an email to stuffpodcast@howstepworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetopworks.com. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer school's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. You know you're the best pet mom when you growl back during playtime, give epic belly rubs and feed them Halo holistic made with responsibly sourced ingredients plus probiotics for digestive health. Find us at chewy amazonandhalopets.com."
https://podcasts.howstuf…energy-final.mp3	The Future of Renewable Energy, Featuring Bill Gates	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/the-future-of-renewable-energy-featuring-bill-gate	Renewable energy could be the key to ensuring the future prosperity and health of Planet Earth and humankind. In this very special episode, we sit down and discuss the possibilities with Bill Gates.	Renewable energy could be the key to ensuring the future prosperity and health of Planet Earth and humankind. In this very special episode, we sit down and discuss the possibilities with Bill Gates.	Tue, 23 Feb 2016 15:18:01 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2016, tm_mon=2, tm_mday=23, tm_hour=15, tm_min=18, tm_sec=1, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=54, tm_isdst=0)	48590518	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"This episode is brought to you by Squarespace. Start building your website today@squarespace.com. Enter code stuff at checkout and get 10% off Squarespace build it beautiful. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clarke. There's Charles W, Chuck, Bryant, and there's Jerry over there. And this is stuff you should know. And this is, from my perspective, a pretty awesome special Stuff You Should Know. It is. We don't normally have guests on the show. No, we almost never do. It's a very select group. That's right. This may be the topper. Yeah. What happened last week? Well, last week I was in Hawaii and I got a text from you and it said, buddy, I'm sorry to bother you on vacation, but Bill Gates wants to be on Stuff You Should Know. You mean old Billy Gates from elementary school? Billy Bathgate. And I said, no, bill Gates, the entrepreneur, co founder of Microsoft and Philanthropist, wants to be on our show because his personal communications person got in touch and said, I know you don't normally do this, but would you consider making an exception for Mr. Gates? Right. And we were like, we really appreciate that you did the research to know that we don't normally have people on. That actually was very kind. We've had other people that just assume, like, well, you'd want to have this person on, right. You even listen to the show. Right. We don't have guests normally, so we're like Bill Gates. Bill Gates like played by Anthony Michael Hall once on a madeford TV movie on TNT. Bill Gates. And they said that Bill Gates. That's right. We said yes. Watch, we're going to show up for the interview and it's going to be Anthony Michael Hall. That would blow my mind. So we're recording this first portion of the podcast on renewable energy, which is a topic very dear to Mr. Gates's heart and something he knows way more about than we do. So we're recording this before we go talk to him in New York City next week. But through the magic of editing, it will be as if this is one seamless day. Seamless. Like, he's in the studio with us, right. So he wanted to talk about renewable energy. He's pretty jazzed about it. And you could say I'm pretty jazzed about renewable energy as well. It's amazing what's coming down the pike. Yes, coming down the pikes. Very important. Right. Because there's a lot of stuff that's going on right now in the 21st century and coming in the next couple of decades that mean that we could really use renewable energy sooner than later. One is that it's predicted that energy consumption worldwide is going to increase by 50% over 2010 levels 30 years from hence. 50%. There's a lot more energy consumption than we're doing right now. And we consume a lot of energy, right? Yeah. In 2015, the world as a whole emitted 36 billion tons of CO2. And that is 42% more than we did 42% more than we did in 1990. And the goal is 80% below 1990 levels. So that's 122. That's what I said. Yeah. You got it right. 122%. Swing in the wrong direction. Yeah. We need to get to and try and achieve. And this is not just the US, this is a world problem. It's global. Exactly. So you have two conflicting issues here. You have increasing energy demand, but you also have a desire to reduce CO2 emissions. Right. Then if you want to confound things further and this is where Bill Gates passions lie. You've got a lot of people out there, something like 1.3 billion people around the world who just don't have electricity at all. Yeah. 18% of the world's population without electricity at all. 70% of sub Saharan Africa, no electricity. 300 million people in India alone with no electricity. Right. And that's not just, oh, well, you don't have all the mod cons, you don't have light to read by and educate yourselves. Yes. Or to refrigerate your food and not catch foodborne diseases. Yeah. We could name out 100 reasons why you need electricity in the year 2016. Exactly. So you've got a growing energy demand, you have a need to reduce CO2 emissions, and then you have a whole segment of the human population that needs access to energy, which means that if you can come up with some good renewable technologies, you can actually make all these things work together. But the key is so if it's renewable, it's automatically basically clean. Yeah. And it has to come soon to offset that energy increase, energy consumption increase. But because we're factoring the developing low income world into this, it needs to also be cheap and easily accessible and reliable. Yes. And this is something that I'm sure Bill Gates hammers home every time he has a chance. It's got to be viable. And if it's not cheaper and better than fossil fuel consumption, then no one's ever going to jump on board in a big way. Yeah. And so from this point on, Chuck, because he is coming on as a personal guest to stuff you should know, I think we can just refer to him as Bill. Our friend Bill. Yeah. Bill our pal. Yeah. I can't wait to see a week from now, let's talk a little bit about who's contributing to the problem. China, they're the world's top CO2 emitter in 2014, at least for 27% of global emissions, with the US number two at 15.5, followed by the EU at 9.5 and India at 7.2. But everybody agrees that there's a problem and let's try and reverse it. So they had a summit in Paris at the end of this past year where they all got together, all these nations, said, you know what, let's set some goals here in the US. For their part, said, you know what, let's try and cut national emissions by up to 28% by the year 2025. So 28% from 2005 levels. Right. And this whole Paris accord, basically the Paris climate talks that came in November, 200 countries signed on to reduce their emissions. Yeah. And it was lauded as a huge breakthrough. You got all these people together and all these different countries, and they hammered out a document that's legally binding. But there's also criticism of the document in that the emissions reductions are just totally voluntary. There's no teeth in the document to say, well, here's the bad things that happen to you if you don't meet your reductions goals. Right. But as criticizes the document and the Paris climate talks, were there's also like a real sunny side to the whole thing? And that came in some kind of between the lines message that came out of it and that was developed industrialized nations are ready to put down some serious coin into renewable energy technology. Yeah. To the tune of the total \u20ac100 billion per year to low income economies to try and build them up and give them robust economies, which would help the world as a whole. Right. So this \u20ac100 billion a year, it's a sizable chunk, and it represents kind of a funnel through developing nations, from developed nations to developing nations, to renewable tech companies. So it's a roundabout investment in renewable tech. Yeah. And there's a lot of stuff that just went from pie in the sky to, oh, now you're throwing some real money at this. We can make this happen now. Yeah, because some stuff brand new, some stuff altering existing technologies, but it's all super exciting. Yeah. Should we talk about some of these? What the first one I have to say I love, if you remember in the State of the Union address in January, president Obama said something about turning sunlight into liquid fuel. I thought he was having an acid flashback right up and away in my beautiful balloon. But no, what he's talking about is a super promising process called artificial photosynthesis. And it's basically well, it's exactly what it sounds. It's building machines that take CO2 emissions and that contribute to climate change and using that actually and the sunlight to make fuel. Right. So you're using CO2 emissions as a raw material for fuel. Unbelievable. So basically, there's been a lot of stumbling blocks so far as far as the artificial photosynthesis industry is concerned. But they've also had some really good breakthroughs recently. One was, it came out of the Department of Energy's Berkeley lab, where basically they took nanowire arrays. They made what they call a synthetic forest of nanow wires. Right. These nano wires collect solar energy and they transfer it to bacteria. And this bacteria mixed in with carbon dioxide and water break down the CO2. So they catalyze it into other components. Right, okay. Then another bacteria takes those components and builds them up into a usable fuel like methanol. And all this happens in basically artificial photosynthetic fuel cell is what it is. Using sunlight to break CO2 emissions down into usable fuel. That's amazing. Amazing. It is. Something else I got going is actually taking water CO2 and splitting this stuff up into its individual elements and then essentially recombining them to form ch three oh, which is methanol, aka wood spirits. But you don't want to drink aka, what you would get. It's like the simplest form of alcohol and what you would get when you would burn wood. But it's the simplest usable form. Well, yeah, I guess the simplest form would be golden green. Right. Although you could probably put that in an engine. I wonder what would happen. I think it would work, probably so, yeah, if you're out of fuel in the hills of Georgia, it'll work. It'll do the trick. So methanol is the simplest that you can use in an engine, and it's already being used. China is blending it into gasoline for regular cars at about 15% or less right there at the pumps, and their taxis and buses are running on up to 85% blend of methanol and gasoline. Right. So it's a real thing. It definitely is a real thing. And one of the big problems with artificial photosynthesis has been that the catalyst to break the CO2 down into constituent components has required something like platinum. Platinum is a very efficient catalyst for that process. Right. Platinum also costs $1100 an ounce. And if you're coming up with tech that you can sell cheap to the developing world, platinum can't be a major component of the whole thing, which is why that Berkeley Labs breakthrough. Using bacteria to catalyze and synthesize this stuff is huge because one of the bacteria they're using, the synthetic bacteria, synthesizing bacteria, is E. Coli. You can find that anywhere, man. Just go grab a bunch of cilantro, throw it in there, you've got your synthesizing bacteria. Another big goal is to well, this is a goal for anyone making any sort of renewable energy machinery, is to make them last super long, because then you can amortize that cost over many years, thus driving the overall cost down. Right. And so long lasting is a big key. And then it's not just about building the machine. That will actually not in the case of the bacteria, that will actually split up in these elements. You also need other machines around it. You can't just do that and throw it in the gas. Right. It has to be recombined into something usable. Well, yeah. And not only that, but there's all kinds of ancillary equipment that needs to be used to make this whole thing work. Right. So I think the point is you can't have just this huge thing if you're going to try to sell it to the consumer. Right. No, it has to be in the pump of gas. But you could create a huge thing if you're going to basically create a fuel refinery and artificial photosynthesis fuel refinery and then you could just sell it to gas stations. That would work, too. Another problem here that you point out is they figured out how to split water and CO2 in separate processes, but not in one unit. Right. That's where that Berkeley breakthrough is such a big deal. See, I would say just bolt those two machines together and you got one machine. Right? Exactly. But they used two different kinds of bacteria to do two different jobs in the same machine. It's amazing. And one of the researchers points out that funding for this stuff is kind of a problem because funding doesn't you don't get the same amount of money every quarter. Right. Sometimes it's high, sometimes it's low, and that's really tough. And it's a big challenge when you're trying to figure out these things, because you might get a great idea one year where you need that dough and you don't have it. So it's just a lot harder to manage when the ebb and flow of funding comes and goes. But I think that's where this big thing that came out of the Paris climate talks come in. It's not like money is a thing of the past, but if you are creating something that really has legs as far as creating renewable energy is concerned, you're going to be able to find capital. Yeah. Right now the US. Energy Department is renewing a $7500000005 year grant to Caltech Center for artificial photosynthesis. So that's not pocket change. I'm sure it'll take more than that. You can do some research with that. So thumbs up to artificial photosynthesis. Thumbs up. We're both a little excited, so as is our customer. I think we should take a break. Agreed. So, Chuck, there's kind of this big issue, right, where we have wind power and we have solar power, and some places are sunnier than others in the United States, California or else in the world. Yeah. And some places are windier than others. Kansas. Okay. So like Kansas can get all the wind it needs from wind farms if they wanted to. Probably California, actually, I looked up Reno, Nevada, in Honolulu, about the same amount of sunlight every year. Oh, wow. Did you know that? Yeah, but very different places. Very different. So either one of them could insist on solar energy, technically. Right. But you've got a place like Seattle, it's not going to do very well for solar energy, or London not going to do really well with solar energy. But if you're talking about like. Say. A national grid in. Say. The United States. If you step back and look at it. Rather than like Kansas is one region in California is another. And say. Actually Kansas and California are parts of this larger grid. We just have to figure out how to get the wind power that's constantly in Kansas over to Seattle or the solar power that's in Reno over to Boston. How do you do that, and they figured out all they have to do is use existing technology, which is just basically a stepped up type of power line. Yeah. I think this is amazing. There was a guy named Alex McDonald from the NOAA, from Noah. That's right. And he kind of realized one day, hey, the wind is always blowing somewhere. Right. Like, we've got the wind, we got all these power lines. Why don't we do this? Let's think of things in a different way, and let's think of the US. As one big, all encompassing interconnected grid. Which it is. Yeah. But we kind of don't think of it that way. No, he did. Exactly. He said it's all connected, so why don't we do this? Let's switch over these power lines to direct current lines, which Edison apparently was right. So they suffer a lot less loss. I looked up supposedly from power station to customer, there's about an eight to 15% loss using current AC, what we have going now. Okay. And I believe if you switch over to the DC, it would cut that in about half. Not too bad. No. And beyond that, that means that you could transport electricity further than you can now, which means you can look at a regional national grid as something whole. Right? Yeah. But you also can take if you can connect these things better, if you can connect these regional grids into a comprehensive national grid, you can shuffle wind power from one region of the country to another, solar power from one region of the country to another. Yeah. So what they did was they made this really cool computer model, and they said, let's figure this out. Let's divide the United States up into 152,000 squares. All of these are connected already, unless input wind data from a couple of years, 2006 to 2008. Okay. Nationally, just to see where we're at. Why not? Let's see where the wind's blowing, let's see where these grids are, and let's figure out demand where you need it most. Less windy places, obviously. Less sunny places, maybe. And let's figure out what's the smartest way to lay this out and where the best places to invest in building these massive wind farms. Right. And they also were extremely cautious in their inputs into this model. Right. They excluded national parks and mountain slopes where you can't put windmills or solar arrays. Sure. They included anticipated electrical demands in the future. And they basically used all of the low end figures they could find. And even with those low end figures, Chuck, using these DC power lines and putting new windmill and solar array outfits around the country in the right places, they came up with the idea that we could cut CO2 emissions from power plants in the United States by 80% of those 1990 levels by 2020, and I think 2030. Yeah. That's insane. Which is the goal that we want exactly 80% less. And again, they point out. We were really cautious in our projections here. So this is the low end. This is the least we could do by doing this. And this is using technology that's all available right now. Yeah. You point out the one big caveat is that if electric cars really take off, like a lot of people hope they will, that they're going to have to ramp up production because they'll just be using a lot more power. Yeah. And they also said that in the United States, it's not necessarily a problem with even finances or certainly not technology that is usually just political will. Like, say, one part of the country doesn't want to depend on another for its power for some weird reason. I could totally see some Georgia senator being like, we're not going to depend on Kansas for our wind. Right. I could see that, too. I could totally see it. But if you're taking this concept of the high voltage grid right, and creating it from scratch in an area in the developing world that doesn't have a grid to speak of yeah. They could really benefit. Exactly. Just build it there, and that's just the way it is. Yeah. I'm hyped about that one. Which one is your favorite so far? Well, that one so far. Okay. This next one is neat, but I just can't even wrap my brain around what? Photovoltaic paint? Yeah. Basically, instead of a solar panel, how about solar paint jack? Right. How about painting your roof with paint? Right. Or with shingles that are made from this stuff. Yeah, which they already have, but they're clumsy and cumbersome, this stuff. If you're using photovoltaic paint, you're using paint that's mixed with colonial quantum dots. Yeah, that's where I get lost. Or some sort of nanoparticle. There are different types of nanoparticles that create an electrical charge when exposed to sunlight. Right? Yeah. Well, if you have paint that's got a bunch of these mixed in with it, and you have a way to jack your house's power lines into said paint, you can generate electricity just from painting your house. And it's super flexible. It's easily transported, which is a big deal. True. And if they can get costs down, which it looks like they're starting to do, and get efficiency up, I think that the record right now is somewhere around 8% efficiency. So 8% of the solar power that hits these things is converted into electricity. Still not enough. But it's substantial and it's growing. But if you can get these things up, this could be extremely helpful for not just people in developing countries, people in remote areas. Like, if you want to live off the grid, just paint your house with this stuff. Yeah. The whole side of your home, the roof of your home. You could paint your cell phone, in theory. You could paint your car, paint your dog. How are your dog? Don't paint your dog. You probably shouldn't paint this one is a bit mind blowing and it seems slightly more far fetched as far as making it the realistic way to go. Well, that's the thing. They found that it works. But can you make it like big and widespread and mass produced, right? I think so. Using colloidal quantum dots. I'm not quite sure how handy those are, how easy to find those are. There's another group that's working on making plastic ones? Yeah, not a bad idea. Plastic, solar cells, like nanoparticles, made out of plastic that react to solar energy and create electricity. And as we know, we love to mass produce things with plastic, and we can do it cheaply. So that could definitely have a huge impact on it. Once you start making something out of plastic, that automatically means it's available for cheap. Good point. We're masters of plastic. I think the world needs a T shirt that says that. Masters of Plastic. It's a good band name. Opening up for cloital quantum dots. Nice. Not bad. You got anything else on that? No, I think the high voltage power lines are my favorite so far. Yeah, I'm still going with that. And here's one thing that I know. We're going to talk with Bill about our friend Bill, because his people that we were talking to said bill gets really excited about batteries and the future of batteries. And I think everyone in renewable energy is excited about batteries because batteries are awesome and they can do a lot of things. They could potentially solve one of the big problems that if we don't get those power lines hooked up, you could at least generate a bunch of wind and store them in a huge battery array for future use, or a solar field and store that in batteries. Right. So theoretically, you could do all this now. But the problem is the costs are so monumental in creating batteries that are big enough to back up a power grid that you are actually, in some cases, doubling or tripling the cost of electricity. And Bill Gates actually wrote like this guy's no schlub, he wrote a paper on energy. Bill Gates is no schlub. He's no schlub. I don't know if you know it or not. But he wrote a paper on energy innovation and he points out that if batteries double or triple the cost of electricity. If you somehow figured out a way to generate electricity for free. It would still cost two to three times what it does now if you're backing up the grid with the battery. Which to him and a lot of other observers says. We need a better battery. And again, one alternative to that is to get around the idea of batteries at all by creating that high voltage power grid that can spread wind and solar energy throughout an entire nation. Yes, but just like the consumer level, I know that Mr. Elon Musk and other really smart people are trying to develop these batteries that can just do a better job for your home solar set up? Sure. Because there's still a long way to go even now. But if you can create a battery that can store wind power and solar power, then you don't have to have a fossil fuel plant to back up the solar wind power for cloudy days or at night, or days when the wind just won't blow. Exactly. No matter how hard you wish the saddest days. Yeah. So I believe Musk's, we're not really covering that, but weren't his lithium ion base the big announcement recently? Yeah, what's it called? The Tesla wall. The power wall powerwall. Tesla powerwall, yeah, they're lithiumion batteries that you can charge while you're hooked up to the grid or whatever, or if you got solar whatever, you're backing up your home's electricity. And I think each battery lasts for 8 hours. The point is, they're huge and they're expensive. And if you're extrapolating batteries onto helping the developing economies of the world, you need to have cheap and small and portable, right? Yes. The idea of coming up with a better battery is essentially the Holy Grail as far as renewable energy goes. It would solve a lot of problems. It underpins almost every renewable energy project in that wind and solar are ephemeral, they don't happen all the time. So you need to find a way to store the excess amounts that come to you when it is sunny and when the wind is blowing. So batteries are extremely important and there's a lot of people working on them right now. Yeah. The one that is super promising that we're covering here is called the flow battery. And forget what you thought about your mom and dad's and your grandpa's batteries. Just throw them in the trash. Well, don't do that. I think throw them in the ocean, not say throw it in the fire. No, definitely don't do that. Shoot it into space. The flow battery, my friend, is where it's at, I think, as far as the future is concerned. Well, there are many different versions of flow batteries, right? There's actually one that I saw as brand new that uses lithium ion technology along with the flow system, which we're going to talk about in a second, the one that's a lithium ion can actually store. The combo can actually store ten times what a regular flow battery can. Oh, nice. Which is great. The downside is there's always a downside. It's power delivery is 10,000 times slower than a conventional flow battery. It takes a while to charge a phone. It's like we got lots of power stored. They're like, what's the bad news? You can't use it. It's 10,000 times slower than what you're used to. But once you break down the standard flow battery, it's pretty ingenious. So with a flow battery, you have two receiving tanks and two holding tanks, right? Yes. And as the liquid inside the fluid inside is an electrolyte fluid, right? Yeah. So basically, Gatorade, it's a fluid that contains an electrical charge, and as it flows from receiving tank to holding tank, it actually creates a charge that transmits a charge and charges itself. Right. Or powers, whatever you want. The cool thing about flow batteries, we should say one of the drawbacks is that they're big. They need to be big. I think about the smallest you could come up with is, say, the size of an aquarium. Yeah. Well, it's also an advantage because they can be as big as you want. That is an advantage. You can create one literally the size of a football stadium if you want. Yeah. If you have enough Gatorade, they could store all the energy of an entire solar field. Solar panels. Right. The great thing about a flow battery is it will store this charge indefinitely. The electrolyte fluid is never going to lose its charge permanently. It can always be recharged by moving it from receiving tank to holding tank. Yeah. And I think the biggest advantage is it's instantly recharged when you replace that fluid. Yes. I don't think there's even any lag time. It's just boom. Right. Pretty neat. It's going again. So, Chuck, what we've been talking about so far, as far as batteries are concerned, is the way to store electricity. Yeah. But there's actually other stuff you can store, too, to generate electricity from. And heat is a big one. Yes. Because we've talked again and again about how just sort of archaic and weird it is that we still create heat to spin a turbine. To create steam to spin a turbine, just like we did in the Industrial Revolution. Yes. As fancy as you want to get using, you're still generating steam to spin a turbine. That's the whole point. That's the end result. Right. I love it. And if that floats your boat, if that makes your eyes just pop out of your head, go listen to our electricity episode, which is one of my all time favorites. Yeah, we did one on nuclear power, too, right? We did. After Fukushima. That's. Right. Yeah. So you can actually store that heat. Correct. In the future. Now, even there's condensing solar power plants, and they take the heat from the sun. So they're not storing the energy. There's no way they're not storing the energy. I looked and it seemed like everybody was just talking about the heat. But they also have to store the solar energy as well. What a waste. Right. So at the very least, they store the heat. And they usually store it as molten salt. But they found out that if you use a super critical fluid, which is a fluid that's heated to a point where it basically no longer recognizes the distinction between liquid or gaseous form, and it can do all sorts of crazy stuff. If you take a supercritical fluid, you can take the heat, the thermal. Heat from the sun and store that heat in there, and then use it later on by releasing that heat to heat water and generate steam to spin a turbine. Also, another great band name, spin a Turbine. No. Super Critical Fluid. I agree. I think if you want it to name your band, just look into renewable energy, because there's, like, cool names all over the place. Yeah, or just call your band Bill Gates. RPAL Bill. Yeah. Not bad. You got anything else for now? No. I mean, I could sit here and talk about this stuff forever, but let's talk to Bill Gates about it instead. Great idea. And, Chuck, we will do that right after this break. Okay, everyone, we are back. We are in a hotel room in New York City with Mr. Bill Gates, which is a little unusual for us, to say the least. It's an unusual Monday, for sure. It is. His folks reached out and asked if we would make an exception about having a guest on the show, and we thought about it for about 21 seconds and said, of course, we'd love to have Bill Gates on the show. So thank you, sir, for being here. And we already recorded the first part of the show on renewable energy, specifically a few different technologies in the future that are pretty exciting. And so I think Josh wanted to go ahead and kick it off with a relevant question. So we got kind of into the nuts and bolts of some of the tech, but one of the things we didn't cover, and we wanted to hear from you is, what are some of the obstacles that this renewable tech that's just right there on the horizon? What's keeping them from being deployed now, especially in the developing world? Well, when we think about energy, one of the key things is reliability. If you just have energy when the wind blows, when the sun shines, that's not very helpful. If somebody is freezing in their apartment on a winter night, they need energy. If you're going to build a factory, say, to build cars, because of your huge capital cost, needs to run 24 hours a day. And so it's got to have reliable energy. And so the market isn't just for energy. The market is for totally reliable energy. Right. Unfortunately, a lot of the breakthroughs we've had, wind and sun, we don't have those directly generate electricity. And storing electricity is very hard. All the batteries in the world today would not store every laptop, every car, everything would not store an hour's worth of global energy use. And batteries haven't improved much in the last 100 years. They're less than three times better than the battery that Edison, if he were revived, would recognize, which is a lead chemistry battery. It's really the lithium ion has given us an improvement. But in order to really work for the grid, you need a factor of ten, which, anyway, it's very tough to make that work. And so if we need to pursue breakthrough paths that don't assume a storage miracle, like if you could take the sun directly and make liquid fuels, just, say, gasoline. But any hydrocarbon that's liquid that's easy to store, you put it in a big metal tank, you put it in a pipe, and the whole infrastructure is geared towards the transport infrastructure is geared towards liquid hydrocarbons. And so if you could possibly do that, it would have a big advantage. And we talked about artificial photosynthesis technology, and it doesn't seem quite promising. Yeah, actually, that brings up something that we've done quite a few podcasts on different technologies in the future for renewable energy. And I feel like every time we cover one, we both end up thinking, this is the one. This is fantastic. And I guess my question is, while going down different paths is great for innovation, when should people start focusing on, all right, now this is the one that we should put our efforts into. Well, the capitalism is very good at this. At the start of the auto industry, if you'd really handicapped things and looked at the steam cars, the electric car, and the internal combustion engine, you probably would have guessed that the internal combustion would not succeed, because the mechanics of all that explosion and those metal parts fatiguing it just seems so dangerous and so hard to get right. And the thing that made it win is the energy density of gasoline. Gasoline. One of my favorite books on this is called Physics for Future Presidents that has some basic things that should be broadly known. Gasoline is ten times as energy dense as our best batteries are. When you switch from a gasoline car to an electric car, that's why your range goes down a lot. And yet the weight of those batteries is way more than your gasoline tank was before. So Henry Ford happened to bet on internal combustion. A few other people bet on those others, and they had companies that were pricing their products and talking about the maintainability of their products. And over time, the internal combustion went out so dramatically that it's hard to even remember that those things were there. Although if you go to the right museum, those are still there. This energy thing will be the same way. I mean, high wind sounds like the Jetstream. It sounds like a crazy idea. The solar fuels are what you're calling synthetic photosynthesis. If it doesn't work, people say, well, of course that was silly. And if it does work, people say, well, of course, that was brilliant. When nuclear energy came along, there was a quote from the head of the Atomic Energy Commission that electricity will be too cheap to meter. Now, unfortunately, he underestimated the complexities of radiation containment, all of the safety things, which in my view, means that we need a whole new generation of reactors whose safety characteristics are dramatically better and different than what we make today is called third generation. We need this fourth generation that will be like that. So I think we need to go down about a dozen different paths. And even one that is still worth exploring is called carbon capture and sequestration, where you still burn the hydrocarbon, but with a little bit of extra chemistry. You take that flu gas, which is about 12% CO2, and you convert it to liquids. And then, of course, you have to find some long term storage. Right. And you use that as a feedstock for artificial photosynthesis, I believe you can or they're working on it now. Right. Greenhouses have enhanced CO2, so plants love CO2. In fact, plants had a hard time CO2 got down to about 170 parts per million. And plants, you even saw a plant chemistry change because that's very tough. That's when total synthetic C four chemistry evolved, which may corn happen to use right now. Now we're up at 400 ppm. But in a greenhouse, if you run it up to 2000 ppm, then some plants actually go quite a bit faster. We've done some episodes before. We did one specifically on how the automobile became the dominant form of transportation in the US. Right. And from what I remember, it seemed like the answer was there was a lot of lobbying behind it and government got involved. And now we all drive cars, right. Gasoline powered cars. What's the role of government today in getting renewables out there, especially in developing countries? Yes. New York City actually couldn't figure out how they were going to deal with horse manure. Cars had to compete with horses. But horses did have some serious drawback. Right. Later we figured out that the nitrous oxides and things coming out of the tailpipe of the car were a problem. But at the time, it was a dramatic improvement on what came out of the previous tailpipe. Renewable energy. When you get to, say, India, which is paradigmatic, because they still are not giving their citizens even a 10th of the electricity per person that we provide. So the idea of lights at night or refrigerating food, or cooking with a stove that doesn't pollute your lungs, most of Indians don't have that. So on behalf of their citizens, they want to move to have what we have, which is an energy intense lifestyle. And if all Indians got everything we have, they wouldn't have admitted as much greenhouse gas per person as we have until well after the end of this century. So in a certain justice sense, that they're electrifying their society will save lives. And it's not a bad thing. Sure. And yet the world wants them to do it with a constraint that we didn't have, which is to not admit the greenhouse gasses. So if we can do the invention, we can fund the R and D and maybe even the first few pilot plans to get the economies of scale and learning curve benefits, then if we can offer to them a form of electrification that's non polluting, then you get the best of both worlds. If you can't do that, then they have a dilemma, which is the imperative of getting their citizens what we already have versus this global problem. And so that's why, if we didn't have innovation, I wouldn't be very optimistic that the climate change problem would get solved. In fact, some people think it's easy to solve and that could hold us back from making these long term investments, right? One thing we often hear from listeners when we podcast on stuff like this is what can I do just in my home? And I know that you made a point about just the light bulbs that people are using now, and little differences like that can help. But in a bigger picture, where does your average Joe fit in? Well, the United States uses twice as much energy per person as other rich countries do. So Europe and Japan would be less than half of us. Canada is a lot like us, and it's partly the way we built up our infrastructure. We live further away from our work generally. We have more lighting around our house, more air conditioning. My favorite energy author who lives up in Canada, voslav smile when he shows a picture of what houses look like in the 50s where there weren't many lights on at night and what they look like now. He looks at how big American cars are. So he would say, hey, the US. For a lot of reasons, should be more reasonable about resource usage. Now, the loan is not going to solve climate change. The idea of using as little as you can, it's smart, it's good discipline, it's good for the world, it allows those same resources to be used by other people, right? And remember, energy is still causing local pollution, coal plants, the understanding of what particulate does to health and how that's bad for health, that continues to increase. And so cutting down on energy usage is not just a good thing for global warming. And cutting down on water usage makes that water available for the ecosystem, for farming and lots of things. So being smart about, hey, how much energy do we use and why do we use so much? And did we pay attention to that funny label that thank goodness the government now requires that appliances have energy usage labeling because people were wasting a lot of money buying a cheap refrigerator who would increase their electricity bill dramatically over time. We still have that in terms of how we build houses, that it would be worth putting more into the original building to have less heat leakage in the winter or cooling benefits in the summer. We really should put more into that capital expense, which is easiest when you do the initial bill instead of the retrofit, but even the retrofit is sometimes worth doing. So there is still a role for the average person in fighting climate change, I guess, or being responsible with energy usage beyond forming like a human chain blocking off a fossil fuel power plant or something. Well, we're all complicit in using fossil fuels today. If there was a choice of going cold turkey, I don't think most people would choose that. The way people can contribute, they can set an example for their own, use their voice about, hey, we care about this issue and we want these long term investments to be made that is super important. And if they can go to Africa and see what it's like to live without energy once you visit, that will become part of your value system to think how can we treat those lives as having equal value, whether that's health or energy or all the things that we take for granted. So we got one last question. Yeah, just on a personal note, I was kind of wondering, I was thinking the other day, I'm in my mid 40s now and have my first baby. And I think that's the point, at least in my life, where I start sort of looking at where I am as I speed toward the grave and what have I done with my life? And I was wondering, was there a defining moment in your life where you kind of stopped and said, I'm Bill Gates, I've accomplished quite a bit and now I'm going to focus on the future of the world. And did having kids have something to do with that or what was that for you? Well, I've been super lucky in that my early exposure to computers and lots of great people around that. So the building Microsoft and being fanatical about that kept me busy and very happy. My twenty s, thirty s then in my forty s I had gotten married at 38. My first child was born. When I was 41. I started to gain more balance and I knew that somebody younger than me should eventually take over Microsoft. So I started broadening my learning. I've always liked science, but during the Microsoft days I couldn't keep track of the latest in math or biology because I was a fanatic about software and didn't believe in vacations. And that's why I even waited to start a family because I knew I wouldn't have enough time for it. So my forty s, I broadened my horizons a bit. And then when I was 45 was when Melinda and I started putting money into the foundation and say, okay, that would be the next career. And in the same way that I'd had two wonderful partners in Microsoft, paul Allen in the early days and then Steve Balmers, we built it to be a large company. Melinda would be an even more equal partner in this third partnership which was making the foundation go. And so that's been a learning journey. Every year we get smarter about, OK, what should the foundation do, bringing in great people to help us there. But it was traveling to Africa. It was learning that all these resources really should go back to society in some way. Meeting Melinda, some of the things Warren Buffett talked about were leaving lots of money to your kids is not a good thing. I particularly highlight Melinda and the time we spent in Africa, sort of opening my eyes that there were things that could have a dramatic effect if we were smart about giving back the money the right way. Well, Bill Gates, thank you very much for being on stuff you should know much appreciate. It quite an honor. Thank you for talking with us. Hey, I'm honored to be your first guest. Thanks. Can we get a picture? Sure. Okay. Wow, that is going to be tough to talk. Holy cow. Yes. What a guy. Yes. I was nervous. You were fine. Do you think he liked me? I think he loved you. When you let you sit on his lap and stroke your beard, that's a clear sign that he was fond of well, I thought he might get mad when I told him he had spinach in his teeth, but he seemed to take that well. He took it in stride. That was all off Mike. Yeah. That's behind the scenes stuff coming to him now. That was amazing. And thanks to them for reaching out. Yeah, big thanks. Yeah, best of luck. Obviously, that his efforts in the future. Yeah. Go renewable energy. Hoorah. If you want to get in touch with us, we'd love to hear from you. You can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can join us on facebook. Comstepychannel. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast@howstepworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the web stuffyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstepworks.com. Hey everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. 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3f484520-5461-11e8-b6d0-7f8f25e06c80	SYSK Selects: How Chaos Theory Changed the Universe	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/sysk-selects-how-chaos-theory-changed-the-universe	Since the age of Descartes, science has put all of its eggs in the basket of determinism, the idea that with accurate enough measurements any aspect of the universe could be predicted. But the universe, it turns out, is not so tidy. Explore the final frontier with Josh and Chuck in this classic episode.	Since the age of Descartes, science has put all of its eggs in the basket of determinism, the idea that with accurate enough measurements any aspect of the universe could be predicted. But the universe, it turns out, is not so tidy. Explore the final frontier with Josh and Chuck in this classic episode.	Sat, 05 Dec 2020 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2020, tm_mon=12, tm_mday=5, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=340, tm_isdst=0)	53341307	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody, it's me, Josh, your old pal. And for this week's, SYSK selects I've chosen how chaos theory changed the universe. First came out in July of 2016, and I have to say, I think it's one of the better or sciencey Stuff You Should Know episodes of all time. There's just something about this that grabbed me and Chuck by the callers and said, I'm interesting, aren't I? And we said, yes, you definitely are. And this one has everything. It has science, it has philosophy, it has our understanding of the universe. It's just an all round good episode, so I hope you enjoy it as much as I did listening to it again. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W, Chuck Bryant. And there's Jerry over there. So this is stuff you should know. The podcast about chaos theory. Have you ever seen Event Horizon? I did. Not bad. Great movie. Are you crazy? I think it was great. Oh, it's so imaginative. I thought it was okay. It was like a lovecraftian thing in our space. Yeah. Loved it. It was all right. I love crafted it. Yeah, I liked it. That's what I think of when I think of chaos. There's that one part where they kind of give you, like, a glimpse behind the dimension that this action is taking place in to see the chaos underneath. I should check that out again. Yeah. I think about Jurassic Park and Jeff goldblum as the creep. Dr. Malcolm explaining chaos in the little auto driving SUV or whatever that was. Right? Yeah. That's why I was calling the script the auto driving SUV scene. Yeah. And you know what? I actually rewatched that scene, and it confirmed two things. One is that he actually did a pretty decent job for a Hollywood movie with a very rudimentary explanation of chaos. Yeah. You watched it for this? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, just that scene. And then it also confirmed of what a creep that character was. Yeah. If you watch that scene, he was all gross and flirty with her right in front of her ex. Right. But he's talking to her. I didn't even notice this at first. He just, like, touches her hair out of nowhere for no reason. Really? He's just talking to her, and he just, like, grabs her hair and touches it. And I'm like, what a creep. I know. If you look closely, you can see the hormones emerging through his chest hair. Yeah. It's grody. And I love Jeff Goldblum. It's not a reflection on him. He was basically doing Jeff Goldblum. Well, that's what he yeah, sure, he's Jeff Goldblum, but I don't think that's how in the manner in which he speaks. But I don't think he's a creep. Do you? Wow. I've got nothing against Jeff Goldblum. Okay. I think he's doing jeff Goldblum. It was also a sign of the times. Like, if that movie were made today what was her name in the movie? Ellie Sattler, I think. Yeah. Dr. Satler would be like, it's very inappropriate to stroke my hair. Like, don't touch me. Right. But this was the freewheeling no, it was 90s. It was the early mid ninety s, I think. 92, 93, 94. The book came out in 1990. And in the book, Ian Malcolm, who's a creep chaotician. Right. He goes into even more depth about chaos. Sure. But that was the first time I ever heard of chaos theory, was from Jurassic Park. Yes, me too, probably. And it was really misleading. I think the entire term chaos is very misleading as far as the general public goes from what I researched for this article. Well, yeah. I mean, you hear the word chaos as an English speaker and you think frenetic and crazy, out of control. Yes. And that's not what it means in terms of science like this. Right. What it means, I guess we can say upfront is basically the idea that complex systems do not behave in very neat ways that we can easily grasp, understand or measure. Right. And not even simple systems don't sometimes it doesn't always have to be complex. But I want to give a shout out in addition to our own article. When it comes to stuff like this, the brain breaking stuff, for me, man, this is a brain breaker. You know how I always go to blank blank for kids? Because it always helps if there's a dinosaur mascot on the page. It's a sure thing. We can understand it. But the best explanation for all this stuff that I found on the Internet was from a website called Abarim A-B-A-R-I-M Publications, which turns out to be a website about biblical patterns and sandwiched in the middle there is a really great, easy to understand series of pages on chaos. There. Nice. So I was like, Man, I get it now in a rudimentary way. Right. Yeah. I think even a lot of people who deal with systems that display chaotic behavior which I guess is to say, basically all systems eventually, under the right conditions, don't necessarily understand chaos. Yeah. And they define a complex system specifically. It doesn't mean just like, oh, it's complex. I mean, it is. Right. But specifically, they define it in a way that helped me understand it's. A system that has so much motion, so many elements that are in motion moving parts yeah. That it takes, like, a computer to calculate all the possibilities of, like, what that could look like five minutes from now, ten years from now. Right. So before computers came around, before the quantum mechanical revolution, it was a lot more basic. It was like, what comes up must come down. Something like that. Let's talk about that, Chucker. Because when you're talking about chaos theory, it helps to understand how it revolutionized the universe by getting a clear picture of how we understood the universe leading up to the discovery of chaos. Right. Yeah. So prior to the scientific revolution, everybody was like, oh, well, it's God. The Earth is at the center of the universe and God is spinning everything around like a top. Right? Yeah. It was all a theistic explanation. The scientific revolution happens and people start applying things like math and making mathematical discoveries and figuring out that they're finding order in patterns and predictability to the universe. If you can apply mathematics to it. Yes. Specifically if you can apply mathematics to the starting point. Right. So if you can figure out how a system works, mathematically speaking right? Yes. You can go in and plug in whatever coordinates you want to and watch it go. You can predict what the outcome is going to be and what this is. That it's based on what at the time was a totally revolutionary idea. Initially, I think Descartes was the first one to kind of say cause and effect is a pretty big part of our universe. Right? Yeah. It was sort of like where this is 1600s, where early science met philosophy. They kind of complemented one another as far as something that we're talking about determinism. Right. So that was the kind of the seeds of determinism was the scientific revolution and like you said, where philosophy and science came together in the form of Descartes. Right. And then Newton came along and we did a whole episode on him. Yeah. January of this year. That was a good one. It was really good. I think you said in that episode that there's possibly no scientist that's changed the world more than Newton has. Maybe he's got legs. People shouted out others in email, but I'll just say he's near the top for sure with some other people. The cream. Yeah. So Newton came along and Newton said that was his name. Isaac The Cream Newton. Anytime he dunked, he'd be like, Cream? Yeah, you just got creamed. I thought he was a boxer. He's a basketball player. He was much more well known as a boxer, but he definitely could dunk as a b baller. Yeah, man, that threw me off a little bit. That's right. The Cream. Yeah. The Cream comes along and he basically says, watch this, dude. This cause and effect thing you're talking about, I can express it in quantifiable terms. And it comes up with all of these great laws and basically sets the stage, the foundation for science for the next three centuries or so. Yeah. These laws that were so rock solid and powerful that scientists kind of got ahead of themselves a little and said, we're done, like with Newton's laws, we can predict we can predict everything if we have a good enough beginning, accurate value to plug into his equations. And they weren't I think it was a little hubris and a little just excitement about, like, well, we figured it all out, right. You could take Newton's laws, and if you had accurate enough measurements, you could predict what the outcome would be of that system that you plug those measurements into using the formula. Right. And at the time, a lot of this was planetary like, well, we know that these planets are here and they're moving and they are orbiting. So if we know these things, we can plug it into an equation and we can figure out what it's going to be like in 100 years. Exactly. The basis of determinism is what we just said, that if you have accurate measurements, you can take those measurements and use them to predict how a system is going to change over time using differential equations. Right? Yeah. So this is what Newton comes along and figures out, that you can describe the universe in these mathematical terms using differential equations. And like you said, there was a tremendous amount of hubris. I think you said there are some hubris. I think there's a tremendous amount of hubris where science basically said, we've mastered the universe, we uncovered the blueprint of the universe, and now we understand everything. It's just a matter now of getting our scientific measurements more and more and more exact. Because, again, the hallmark of determinism is that if you have exact measurements, you can predict an outcome accurately, like the pool queue example or the pool table example. Right, right. So if you've got a pool table, let's say you're playing some nine ball, right? You have that beautiful little diamond set up. You got your cue ball, you put that cue ball and you crack it with the queue. And if you are super accurate with your initial measurements, you should be able to mathematically plot out the angles where the balls will end up. Right, exactly. Like, you can say, this is what the table will look like after the break. If you know the force, the angle, all those little variables, temperature, if there's wind in the room, like the felt on the table, like everything, the more specific you are, the more accurate your end result will be. Right. And then one of the other hallmarks of determinism is that if you take those exact same initial conditions and do them again, the pool table will look exactly the same after the break. Yeah. Which is pretty much impossible for a human to do with their hands. Sure. But the idea at the time of science was that if you could build a perfect machine that could recreate these conditions, it will happen the same way every time. Right. Yeah. This led to they had hubris, but you could understand it when, like, literally in 1846, two people predicted Neptune would exist yeah. Within months of that would exist, but does exist. Right. And this is not by looking up in the sky like they did it with math. Right. And they were right? Yeah. So imagine in 1846 when that happens, they're like, yeah, we've got the math done, so we're pretty much all knowing well, plus, also, for the most part, not just with Neptune, they were finding that this stuff really panned out. It held true for everything from the investigation into electricity to new chemical reactions and understanding those and the scientific revolution laid the basis for the industrial revolution and just the change that came out of the world like that. It is understandable how science kind of was like, we got it all figured out. Well, and like you said, even Galileo was smart enough to know there's uncertainty in these measurements. Like, the precision is key. So they spent what does the article say? A lot of the much of the 19th and 20th century just trying to build better instrumentation to get more and more smaller and smaller and more precise measurements. Right. That was, like, basically the goal of it. Right? Yeah. Which was the right direction. That's, like, exactly what they should have been doing. Yeah. The problem is, like you said, galileo knew that there was some sort of there are going to be some flaws and measurement that we just didn't have those great scientific instruments yet. Right. Yeah. It's called the uncertainty principle. Okay. Perhaps accuracy. Right. But the idea is that if you have a good enough instrument, you can overcome that, and that the more you shrink the error in measuring the initial conditions, the more you're going to shrink the error in the outcome. It would be proportionate. Right. They were correct. The thing is, they were also aware but ignoring in a lot of ways some outstanding problems, specifically something called the in body problem. Yeah. You know what? I'm so excited about this. I need to take a break. I think that's a good idea. I need to go check out my in body in the bathroom. Okay. And we'll be back. All right, Chuck, we're back. So there are some issues right, with determinism. There's some weird problems out there that are saying, like, hey, pay attention to me, because I'm not sure determinism works. Right. And one is the end body problem. Yeah. How this came about was in 1885, that was king Oscar no, two of Sweden and Norway. Yeah. Don't want to leave out Norway. Both he said, you know what? Let's offer a prize to anyone who can prove the stability of the solar system, something that has been stable for a long time before that. And a lot of the most brilliant minds on planet earth got together and tried to do this with mathematical proofs, and no one could do it. And then a dude named Henri you got to help me there with that last say the whole thing. Henri pon carre. Very nice. He was French, believe it or not, and he was a mathematician. And he said, you know what? I'm not going to look at this big picture of all the planets in the sun and all their orbits. You'd have to be a fool to try that. Sure. He said, I'm going to shrink this down like we talked about shrinking that initial value. Right. And that initial condition, he shrunk it down. He said, I'm going to look at just a couple of bodies orbiting one another with a common center of gravity, and I'm going to look at this. And this was called the in body problem. Yeah. Which was smart to do because the more variables you factor into a nonlinear equation like that, just the harder it's going to be. He shrunk it down. So the end body problem has to do with three or more celestial bodies orbiting one another. So Pon Cara said, I'll just start with three. Yeah. Smart. And what he found from doing his equations for this King Oscar the Sequel prize was that shrinking the initial conditions measurement or rate of error right. Yeah. Did not really shrink the error in the outcome, which flies in the face of determinism. What he found was that just very, very minute differences in the initial conditions fed into a system produced wildly different outcomes after a fairly short time. Yeah. Like, let me just round off the mass of this planet at the 8th decimal point. Right. Who cares? Who cares at that point? Yeah. Let me just round that one to a two. Right. And that would throw everything off at a pretty high rate. And he said, Wait a minute. I think this contest is in possibly. Right. He said, there is no way to prove the stability of the solar system because he just uncovered the idea that it's impossible for us to predict the rate of change among celestial bodies. Yeah. It's such a complex system. There are far too many variables that it's impossible to start with something so minute to get the equation or whatever the sum that you want at the end. Well, not only that sum, I guess, but the result. Not only that. And this is what really undermined determinism. Was that he figured out that you would have to have an infinitely precise measurement. Which even if you built a perfect machine that could take the infinitely machine that could take a measurement of the movement of a celestial body around another. It's literally impossible to get an infinitely precise measurement. Which means that we could never predict out to a certain degree. The movement of these celestial bodies. He was saying, like, no, you can't build a machine that gets measurements enough that we can overcome this. Determinism is wrong. You can't just say we have the understanding to predict everything. There's a lot of stuff out there that we're not able to predict. And he uncovered it trying to figure out this in body problem. Yeah. And King Oscar the Sequel said, you win. Yes. Bring me another rack of lamb. And here's your prize. And he won by proving that it was impossible, which is pretty interesting. And that utterly and completely changed not just math, but our understanding of the universe. And our understanding of our understanding of the universe, which is even more kind of Earth shaking. Yeah. He discovered dynamical instability or chaos, and they didn't have supercomputers at the time. So it would be a little while, about 70 years at MIT, until we could actually kind of feed these things into machines capable of plotting these things out in a way that we could see. Right. Which is really incredible. So there is this dude 70 years later named Edward Lawrence, or Lawrence. Yeah. Well, first of all, we should set the stage. The reason this guy, he was a meteorologist and scientist. Right. Those are not the same thing. He's a scientist who dabbled in meteorology. Right. He was a mathematician. Yeah. But he was really into meteorology because there was a weird juxtaposition at the time where we were sending people into outer space, but we couldn't predict the weather. Yeah. And it was definitely a blot on the field of meteorology. People were like, do you guys know what you're doing? Yes. And meteorologists are like, you have no idea how hard this is. Yeah. Yeah. We can predict it a couple of days out, but after that, it's totally unpredictable. It drives us mad. And it wasn't just their reputations that were at stake. People were losing their lives because of it. Right. Yeah. In 1962, there were two notorious storms, one on the East Coast and one on the west. The Ash Wind Stay Storm in the east and the Big Blow on the west that killed a lot of people, lost hundreds of millions of dollars in damage. Right. And people were like, we need to be able to see these things coming a little more. Right. Because it's a problem. And meteorologists were like, Why don't you do it, then? So they thought the key was these big supercomputers. Remember the supercomputers when they came out the big rooms full of hardware? It was amazing. And they were finally able to do these incredible calculations that we could never do before. I know. They were able to crunch 64 bytes a second. Yeah. We had the abacus and then the super computer. There's nothing in between. I looked up the computer that Lawrence was working with the Whopper, a Royal McBee. What was the whopper war games was it called? The Whopper? Yeah. W-O-P-R. Right. I can't believe they called it that's. Pretty stupid. So the guy just nicknamed it Joshua? No. Joshua was the software. Falcon was the old man who designed all this stuff, and his son was Joshua. And that was the password to get into. That was the password, yeah. I guess I was too young to understand what a password was. Yeah. Okay. There weren't passwords at the time. No, you just shouted it at the computer, and they're like, okay, access granted. Yeah, that movie holds up. Does it really? Oh, totally. You got to check it out. Yeah. Still very fun. Young Ally Sheeted. Boy, I had a crush on her from that movie. She was great. Yeah. What else is she in recently? Wasn't she in something? Well, she kind of went away for a while and then had her big comeback with that indie movie High Art. But that was a while ago. Has she been in anything else recently? Sure. I think I saw something in something recently, and I didn't realize that was her. Oh, really? She looks familiar. I was like, oh, that's Allie shitty. I don't know. All right, I could look it up, but I won't. It doesn't matter anyway. I still crush on her. So The Royal McBee was not quite the whopper you could actually sit down at it. The Royal McBee. That's the name of it. That sounds like a hamburger, too. It was by the Royal Typewriter Company, and they got into computers for a second, and this is the kind of computer that Lawrence was working with. And it was a huge deal. Like you were saying, Abacus supercomputer. But it was still pretty dumb as far as what we have today is concerned. But it was enough that Lauren's in his ilk were like, finally we can start running models and actually predict the weather. Yeah, he started doing just that. He did. So he started off with a computational model of twelve meteorological I liked how you said it. Calculations, which is very basic because they're infinite meteorological calculations, probably depending to say it wrong again. No, it sounds like you're about to say it wrong, and then you pull it out at the last second, maybe it's really impressive. So that's very basic. But he wanted to start out with something attainable. Right. So he narrowed it down to twelve conditions. Basically twelve calculations that had, you know, temperature, wind speed, pressure, stuff like that, started forecasting weather. And then he said, you know, it'd be great if you could see this. So I'm going to spit it into my wonder machine, the MC. Whopper? The Royal MCB. The Royal. And I'm going to get a print out so you can visualize what this looks like. Right. So things were going well, and he had this print out, and everyone was amazed because these calculations never seem to repeat themselves. He was making word art. Do you remember that? That was the first thing anybody did on a computer was to make word art. Like a butterfly or something. Right. You would print out. Yeah. I never could do that. I couldn't either. You have to be able to visualize things spatially. You have to have the right kind of brain for that. Right. Or you have to be following a guidebook that tells you how to do it. Sure. Have you ever seen me you and everyone we know. Yes. I love that movie. That's a great movie. Those little kids in there, they were doing that. Yeah. The forever back and forth. Poop. Well, I haven't seen that since it came out. It's been a while. Oh, you got to see it again. Yeah. Great movie. Good movie. Ally Sheet, he's not in it? No, it's Miranda July. Right. And she like wrote and directed too. Right. She did a great job. It's one of those rare movies where there's just the right amount of whimsy because whimsy so easily overpowers everything else and becomes like yeah, this is like the most perfectly balanced amount of whimsy I've ever seen in a movie. Yeah. If there's too much whimsy. Terrible. Garden State. I just want to punch it in the face. Terrible. Although I like Garden State, but I haven't seen it since it came out. It hasn't aged well. Yeah. When you look at it now, it's just so cutesy and whimsical. It's like, come on. Boy, we're getting to a lot of movies today. Oh, yeah, we're stalling. We haven't even talked about butterfly effect yet, which is coming. I'm dreading it. That's why I'm stalling. All right, so where were we? He was running his calculations, printing out his values so people could see it, and then he got a little lazy one day in 1961. This output he noticed was interesting, so he said, I'm going to repeat this calculation, see it again, but I'm going to save time. I'm just going to kind of pick up in the middle and I'm not going to input as many numbers, but I'm still using the same values, just I'm not going out to six decimal points. So the printout he had went to three decimal points. Yeah. So he was working from the printout and didn't take into account that the computer accepted six decimal points. He was just putting in three correct. And expecting that the outcome would be the same. Right. Yes. But the outcome was way different. Right. And he went, whoa, whoa. What? Yeah, he's like, what's going on here? It was a big deal. I mean, someone would have come up with this eventually. Probably. Yeah. They sort of accidentally came upon it. It's neat that this guy did this because it changed his career. I think he went from emphasis on meteorology to emphasis on Chaos Math to stud scientists. Basically, the guy got an attractor named after him. You know what I mean? Yeah. Well, let's get to that. So Lorenz starts looking at this and he's like, wait a minute, this is weird. This is worth investigating. And like, what was his name? Pon Carre. Yeah. He said, I need fewer variables. So I'm not going to try to predict whether with these twelve differential equations that you have to take into account. I'm just going to take one aspect of whether called a rolling convection current and I'm going to see how I can write it down in formula form. So rolling convection current, Chuck, is where, you know how the wind is created, where air at the surface is heated and starts to rise, and suddenly cool air from higher above comes in to fill that vacuum that's left. And that creates a rolling vertically based convection current. Yeah. Okay. I would describe it as oven. Oven, boiling water, cup of coffee. Sure. Wherever there's a temperature differential based on a vertical alignment, you're going to have a rolling convection current. Okay. Yeah. It sounds complex, but he just picked out one thing, basically one condition. Right. And this is the one he picked out. But had you seen my hands moving, listeners, you would be like, oh, yeah, I know. He made little rolly motions. So he's like, okay, I can figure this out. So he comes up with three formula that kind of describe a rolling convection current, and he starts trying to figure out how to describe this rolling convection current, right? Correct. And so, like I said, he got these three formula, which were basically three variables that he calculated over time, and he plugged them in, and he found three variables that changed over time. And he found that after a certain point, when you graph these things out, and since they're three, you graph them out on a three dimensional graph. So x y and z Again, he wanted to just be able to visualize this because it's easier for people to understand. He's a very visual guy. Totally. All of a sudden, it made this crazy graph. That where the line, as it progressed forward through time, went all over the place. It went from this axis to another axis to the other access, and it would spend some time over here, and then it would suddenly loop over to the other one, and it followed no rhyme or reason. It never retraced its path. And it was describing how a convection current changes over time. Right? Yeah. And Lorenzo is looking at this. He was expecting these three things to equalize and eventually form a line, because that's what determinism says. Things are going to fall into a certain amount of equilibrium and just even out over time. That is not what he found. No. And what he discovered was what Poncari discovered, which was that some systems, even relatively simple systems, exhibit very complex, unpredictable behavior, which you could call chaos. Yes. And when you say things were going all over, like, if you look at the graph, it's not just lines going in straight lines bouncing all over the place randomly, like there was an order to it, but the lines were not on top of one another. Like, let's say you draw a figure eight with your pencil, and then you continue drawing that figure eight. It's going to slip outside those curves every time. Unless you're a robot. Sure. And that's what it ended up looking like. Yeah. It never retraced the same path twice ever. It had a lot of really surprising properties and at the time it just felt completely outside the understanding of science. Right? Yeah. Luckily this happened to Lauren's who was curious enough to be like, what is going on here? And again he sat down and started to do the math and thinking about this and especially how it applied to the weather. Right? Yeah. And he came up with something very famous. Yes. The butterfly effect. Yes. A, this thing kind of looked like butterfly wings a little bit. Yeah. And B, when he went to present his findings, he basically had the notion he's like, I'm going to wow these people in the crowd in 1972. It's a conference that I'm going to and I'm going to say something like this. Seagull flaps the swings and it starts a small turbulence that can affect weather on the other side of the world. Right. The small little thing will just grow and grow and snowball and affect things. And he had a colleague, it was like seagull wings. That's nice. And he said, how about this? And this is the title they ended up with. Predictability, does the flap of a butterfly's wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas? And everyone was like, whoa, whoa, mine is blown. Yeah. Should we take a break? Yes. All right, we'll be right back. All right, so the Lauren's attractor is that picture that he ended up with. Right. That cost the Lauren's attractor. And this biblical pattern website that I found described attractors and strange attractors in a way that even dumb old me could understand. What you got? So if I may, he says, alright, here's the cycle of chaos. He said, actually, I don't know who wrote this. Could be a woman, could have been a small child, could have been Noah of undetermined gender. I have no idea the gender neutral narrator they said he's all right, think about a town that has like 10,000 people living in it. To make that town work you got to have like a gas station, a grocery store, a library, whatever you need to sustain that town. Okay, so all these things are built, everyone's happy, you have equilibrium. He said so that's great. Then let's say someone comes and builds a factory on the outskirts of that town and there's going to be 10,000 more people living there. Right. And they don't go to church maybe. So did I say church? They needed a church. No. Okay. I was just assuming this is what's called equilibrium. No, but you just have more people. So you need another gas station and another grocery store, let's say. So they build all these things and then you reach equilibrium again. It's maintained because you build all these other systems up. I see that. Equilibrium is called an attractor. Okay, so then he said it said the royal. He said, all right, now let's say instead of that factory being built, and you have those original 10,000, let's say 3000 of those people just up and leave one day, okay? And the grocery store guys says, well, there's only 7000 people here. We need 8000 people living here to make a profit, so I'm shutting down this grocery store. Then all of a sudden, you have demand for groceries. So things go on for a little while and someone comes in and say, hey, this town needs a grocery store. They build a grocery store, they can't sustain, they shut down. Someone else comes along because the demand, and it is this search for equilibrium. Well, you reach equilibrium here and there as the store opens. Periods of stability. Periods of stability. And that dynamic equilibrium is called a strange attractor. So an attractor is the state which the system settles on. Strange attractor is the trajectory on which it never settles down, but tries to reach the equilibrium with periods of stability. Does that make sense? That Bible based explanation was dynamite. I understand it better than I did before, and I understood it okay before. That's great. Surely can add. Yeah. Now you're going to add to it. No, that's it. No, I mean, a tractor is where if you grasp something and eventually it reaches equilibrium, it's a regular attractor. If it never reaches equilibrium, it's constantly trying to and has periods of stability. Strange attractor. I can't top that. All right. Grocery store, small town. That was great. So Lorenz's strange attractor was named lorenz Attractor. Named after him. Big deal. They weren't using the word chaos yet. No, but he published that paper about butterfly wings, right? Yeah, the Butterfly effect. And it coupled with his picture, the picture of a strange attractor, which is almost the aside from fractals, almost the emblem or the logo for chaos theory, the Lord, the tractors. It got attention off the bat. It wasn't like Pong Cara's findings where he got neglected for 70 years. Almost immediately, everybody was talking about this because, again, what Lorenza had uncovered, which is the same thing that Puancare had uncovered, is that determinism is possibly based on an illusion that the universe isn't stable, that the universe isn't predictable. And that what we are seeing as stable and predictable are these little periods, windows of stability that are found in strange attractor graphs. That that's what we think the order of the universe is. But that is actually the abnormal aspect of the universe. And that instability, unpredictability, as far as we're concerned, is the actual state of affairs in nature. And I think as far as we're concerned is a really important point too, Chuck, because it doesn't mean that nature is unstable and chaotic. It means that our picture of what we understand as order doesn't jibe with how the universe actually functions. It's just our understanding of it. And we're just so anthropocentric that we see it as chaos and disorder and something to be feared right. When really it's just complexity that we don't have the capability of predicting after a certain degree. Yeah, I think that makes me feel a little better, because when you read stuff like this, you start to feel like, well, the Earth could just throw us all off of its face at any moment because it starts spinning so fast that gravity becomes undone. And I know that's not right, by the way, I've always loved that kind of science that shows we don't know anything. Like Robert Hume, who I understand was a philosopher, but he was a philosopher scientist. Sure. His whole jam was like, cause and effect is an illusion. It's just an assumption. Like, that if you drop a pencil, it will always fall down. It's an illusion. And this is pre gravity, understanding gravity. But he makes a good point of gravity when everyone's just floating around yeah. Going, this pencil got me wacky. But the point was that a lot of our assumptions or a lot of stuff that we take as law are actually based on assumptions that are made from observations over time, and that we're just making predictions that cause and effect is an illusion. I love that guy. And this definitely supports that idea, for sure. Sorry. I'm excited about chaos theory. Can you believe it? Well, I mean, I like that I'm able to understand it in enough of a rudimentary way that I can talk about it at a dinner party. Well, thank your Bible website. Well, once you take the formulas out for people like us, we're like, oh, okay, we can understand chaos. Yeah. Then when somebody says, good, do a differential equation, you just like, what a different equation? Right. All right, so earlier I said that chaos had not been used, the word chaos, to describe all this junk. Right. And that didn't happen until later on. Well, actually later on, about ten years. Yes. But it was kind of at the same time this other stuff was going on with Lorenz. Yeah. Late sixties, early seventies. There was a guy named Steven Smell, fields medal recipient. So, you know, he's good at math, and he describes something that we now know as the Smell horseshoe. And it goes a little something like this. All right? Take a piece of dough, like bread dough, okay. And you smash it out into a big flat rectangle. Can do. So you're looking at that thing and you're like, boy, I hope this makes some good bread. This is going to be so good. With a little rosemary on it. Yeah. Maybe soil sea salt. Yeah. And then lick it before you bake it so you know it's yours. No one else can have it. You have that flat rectangle of dough. You roll it up into a tube, and then you smash that down kind of flat, and then you bend that down to where it eventually looks like a horseshoe. Okay, so now you take that horseshoe, you take another rectangle of dough, and you throw that horseshoe onto that. And then you do the same thing. The snail horseshoe basically says, you cannot predict where those two points of that horseshoe will end up. Yeah, you can roll it a million times and they'll end up in a million different places. Totally random. Different places, too. Totally random. You never know. It's like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're going to get. You have to say it. And that became known. You have to say it. Oh, what? Imitate force comes. Sure. And I can't do that. That's fine. He's not in my repertoire. That's fine. Although I did see that again, part of it recently. Does it hold up? Well, I mean, take out 40 minutes of it and it would have been a better movie. Like all of that coincidence stuff that, oh, I love that. And he also did that Smile T shirt. It was just too much. Like, he really hammered it too much. I liked it. That was the basis of the movie. I know, but see it again and I guarantee you, like an hour and a half into it, you'll be like, I get it. Jamaica. You know? It was a good Tom Hanks movie that was overlooked. Road to Perdition. Yeah, not bad. It was a good one. Great. Sam Mendez. Oh, man, that guy is awesome. What is he going to do? He might do something. He did the James Bond. He did Skyfall. Yes. That last one, that wasn't so great. He's got a potential project coming up and he would be amazing for it. I don't remember what it was. Did you see Revolutionary Road? Yes. God, it was just like yeah. You want to jump off a bridge to see that movie. It was like every five minutes during that movie. That was hardcore. It is. He did that one, too. Yeah. And don't see that if you're engaged to be married or thinking about it. Yeah. Or if you're blue already. Yeah. Just take a really good mood and be like, I'm sick of being in a good mood. Sit down and watch Revolutionary Road. Yeah. Watch Joe versus the Volcano instead. Great movie. Where was I? Smell Horseshoe is what that's called. And he was the first person to actually use the word chaos. Oh, he was? I think so. No. York was. Tom York's. Dad. Yeah, you're right. He wasn't the first person. You're correct. But Smells Horseshoe illustrates a really good point. Chuck. Is it tom York's? Dad. No. Okay. No, but they're both British. Sure. Yorkies. Actually, one is Australian. No, they're British. Right. So those two points which started out right by each other and then ended up in two totally different places, that applies not just to bread dough, but also to things like water molecules that are right next to each other at some point and then months later, they're in two different oceans, even though you would assume that they would go through all the same motions and everything. Oh, sure. But they're not. There's so many different variables with things like ocean currents that two water molecules that were once side by side end up in totally random different places. And that's part of chaos. It's basically chaos personified or chaos molecule fied. So we mentioned York. Where I was going with that was there was an Australian named Robert May, and he was a population biologist, so he was using math to model how animal populations would change over time, giving certain starting conditions. So he started using these equations, differential equations, and he came up with a formula known as the logistic difference equation that basically enabled him to predict these animal populations pretty well. Yeah, it was working pretty well for a while, but he noticed something really weird. Right? Yeah. He had this formula. The logistic difference equation is the name of it. Sure. Okay. So we had that formula, and he figured out that if you took R, which in this case was the reproductive rate of animal population, and you pushed it past three, the number three. So that meant that the average animal in this population of animals had three offspring in its lifetime or in a season, whatever. If you push the past three, all of a sudden the number of the population would diverge. Yeah, if you pushed it equal to three, actually, or more right. It would diverge. Which is weird, because a population of animals can't be two different numbers. Like that herd of antelope. There's not 30, but there's also 45 of them at the same time. That's called a superposition, and that has to do with quantum states, not herds of envelopes. Sure, that was kind of weird. And then he found if you pushed it a little further, if you made the reproductive rate like 3.57 or something like that, I think it was a different number. But you just tweaked it a little bit, not even to four. We're talking like millions of a degree. All of a sudden, it would turn into four. So there'd be four different numbers. That was the animal population and then would turn into 16. And then all of a sudden, after a certain point, it would turn into chaos. Yes. The number would be everything at once, all over the place, just totally random numbers that it oscillated between. Yeah, but in all that chaos, there would be periods of stability. Right. You push it a little further, and all of a sudden, it would just go to two again. But beyond that, it didn't go back to the original two numbers. It went to another two. So if you looked at it on a graph, it went line divided into two, divided into 4816, chaos, 2416 two, 4816 chaos. All before you even got to the number four of the reproductive rate. Yeah. And he was working with Mr. York because he was a little confounded. So he was a mathematician buddy of his, James York, from the University of Maryland. So they worked together on this, and in 1975, they co authored a paper called Period Three Implies Chaos and man. Finally, somebody said the word. I kept thinking it was all these other people. Yes. And this paper where they first debuted, the name Chaos, they based it tom Yorkstead based it on Edward Lauren's paper. He was like, you know what? I have a feeling this has something to do with the Lauren's attractor. So that provided chaos to the world. And it was basically the third time a scientist had said, we don't understand the universe like we think we do, and determinism is based on an illusion, don't you get it? Of order in a really chaotic universe. And this established chaos. It took off like a rocket in the as you know, from Jurassic Park, chaos was everything. Everybody's like, Chaos? This is totally awesome. It's the new frontier of science. And then it just went away. And a lot of people said, well, it was a little overhyped. But I think more than anything, and I think this is kind of the current understanding of chaos, because it didn't actually go away. It became a deeper and deeper feel as you'll see people mistook what chaos meant. It wasn't the new type of science. It was a new understanding of the universe. It was saying, like, yes, you can still use Newtonian physics. Yeah, like, don't throw everything out the window. No, you can still try and predict weather and still try and build more accurate instruments and get decent results, but you can't, with absolute perfection, 100% predict complex systems like determinism. The ultimate goal of determinism is false. It can never be done because we can't have an infinitely precise measurement for every variable or any variable. Therefore, we can't predict these outcomes. Right. So you would expect science to be like, what's the point? What's the point of anything? No, not science. Well, some chaos people have said, no, this is great. This is good. We'll take the universe as it is. Rather than trying to force it into our pretty little equation and saying. Like. If the ocean temperature is this at this time of year. And the fish population is this at that time. Then this is how many offspring this fish population is going to have. Say. Okay. Here is the fish population. Here is the ocean temperature. Here are all these other variables. Let's feed it into a model and see what happens. Not, this is going to happen. What happens instead? And this is kind of the understanding of chaos theory now. It's taking raw data, as much data as you can possibly get your hands on, as precise data as you could possibly get your hands on, and just feeding it into a model and seeing what patterns emerge rather than making assumptions, it's saying, what's the outcome? What comes out of this model? Yeah. And that's why when you see things like 50 years ago, they predicted this animal would be extinct, and it's not. Well, that's because the variations were too complex. Right. They tried to predict. And that's why if you look at a ten day forecast, you, sir, are a fool. It's true. Well, ten days from now says it's going to rain in the afternoon. Come on. But if you take if you took enough variables for weather for, like, a city and fed it into a model of the weather for that city, you could find a time when it was similar to what it is now. And you could conceivably make some assumptions based on that. You can say, well, actually, we can predict a little further out than we think. But it's based on this theory, this understanding of chaos, of unpredictability, of not just not forcing nature into our formulas, but putting data into a model and seeing what comes out of it. Yeah. And then at the end of that, you learn, like, when that animal is not extinct like you thought it would be, you go back and look at the original thing, and you have a more accurate picture of how the data could have been off slightly, this one value. Right? And then you have more buffalo than you think. Yeah, sure. You got buffaloed by chaos. And we're not even getting into fractals. It's a whole other thing. And we did a whole other podcast in June 2012 about fractals and the binoir mandel, Brett. And go listen to that one and hear me clinging to the edge of a cliff. Yeah, cliff man. We should end this. But first I want to say there is a really interesting article, it's pretty understandable, on Quanta magazine about a guy named George Sugihara, and he is a Chaos Theory dude who's got a whole lab and is applying it to real life. So it's a really good picture of Chaos theory in action. Go check it out. Okay. If you want to know more about chaos theory, hope your brain is not broken. Yeah, go take some LSD fractals. Don't do that. You can type those words into how stuff works in the search bar. Any of those fractals LSD chaos, it'll bring up some good stuff. And as I said, good stuff. It's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this rare shout out. Get requests all the time. I bet I know which one this is. Really? Yeah. Dude and his girlfriend. Yeah. No, so far, so good. Hey, guys, just wanted to say I think you're doing a wonderful job with the show to the state. My first time listening was during my first deployment. When I listened to your list on famous and influential films, I was hooked. After that, since I came back stateside, I spent many hours driving to and fro to see my girlfriend to my barracks, and I can happily say that they've been made all the more enjoyable by listening to you guys. That's great. Even my girlfriend Rachel has warmed up to you, dudes, which was a pleasant shock to me. She has told me repeatedly that she cannot listen to audiobooks because, quote, hearing people talk on the radio gives me a headache. Anyway, I hope you guys continue to make awesome podcasts as I'm headed out on my next appointment. And if you could give a shout out to Rachel, I'm sure would make her feel a little better that I got the pleasant people on the podcast to reaffirm how much I love her. That is John. Rachel. Hang in there, John. Be safe and thanks for listening. Yeah, man. Thank you. That was a great email. I love that one. Glad we don't give you a headache, Rachel. Yeah, for real. She listened to this song. She looked okay. Yeah, everybody's going to get a headache from this one. I came to hate the sound of my own voice from this one. You'll be right. If you want to get in touch with us, you can hang out with us on Twitter at syscape. Podcasting goes for Instagram. You can hang out with us on Facebook.com. Stuffycheanow. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast@housesupportss.com. And as always, join us at our home on the web. Stuffyoushow.com. Stuff you should know is production of iHeartRadio's how stuff works. For more podcasts, my heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio Apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
https://podcasts.howstuf…erial-killer.mp3	What makes a serial killer?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/what-makes-a-serial-killer	Serial killers are notorious for their grisly crimes and disturbing behavior, but what makes a serial killer a serial killer? Josh and Chuck discuss the history, psychology and methodology of serial killing and serial killers in this episode.	Serial killers are notorious for their grisly crimes and disturbing behavior, but what makes a serial killer a serial killer? Josh and Chuck discuss the history, psychology and methodology of serial killing and serial killers in this episode.	Tue, 25 May 2010 18:45:57 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2010, tm_mon=5, tm_mday=25, tm_hour=18, tm_min=45, tm_sec=57, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=145, tm_isdst=0)	43097674	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetofworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. Actually, I should probably try hey, and welcome to the podcast. This is about serial killers, right? Yeah. Actually, I'm glad you brought that up because I wanted to mention that we have a lot of fun in the show and we joke around, and we will probably do that in the serial killer podcast. You know, we will, and I find them fascinating, but we always remember that there are real victims here, and we don't want to make light of that or anything. Yeah, but the serial killers are so grisly and their acts are so monstrous that it almost is easy to just detach and be like, hey, what's your favorite serial killer? They actually have serial killer trading cards. Yeah, but we don't play that game. No, we don't. We play Old Made. I'm Josh Clark. The guy you just heard talking is Charles W. Chuck Bryant. If this is your first time to Stuff you Should Know, there is a goodie bag that we have for you. If you'll check under your seat, it should be taped under there. Everything will be send us an email, and we'll try to see what we can come up with as a replacement. Probably just a response saying sorry. You know what they get? They get 215 free podcasts. That's a good deal. Automatically. That is nice, Chuck. So what are we talking about today? Serial killers. Yeah, that's right, Chuck. Here's the intro. Yeah, if you can't tell, I'm a little twitchy, a little jumpy. You may even hear a little bit of gum in my mouth that I probably should take out being a professional podcast. He's shaking vehemently. He just spit out his gum. Okay, so my gum is out, but the reason I'm doing this and acting all twitchy is because I have quit smoking. For the first time in 20 years. I'm actually doing it. I've tried a couple of times, but we all know that it was half hearted at best. Right? But I'm actually quitting smoking. Very proud of you, buddy. Thank you. Like I told you in the email, you didn't reply to that's a very brave and terrifying thing you're doing. You have all my support. Thank you very much. I want to keep you around. And by proxy. I imagine I have jerry's support too. Yeah, she comes in. So if I do seem a little weird, it is because of that today, and I apologize. Plus, you're flying in Japan tomorrow, so you're all weird right now. Yeah, I am. Perfect time to do serial killers. Okay, so let's talk serial killers. Chuck, where in the name of God did the term serial killers come from, and the middle of what decade did it come from? Come in? It was coined, Josh, in the mid 70s by Robert Wrestler, and he was a former FBI director of the Violent Criminal Apprehensions Program, which I imagine is a pretty fun, laugh a minute job. Right. And apparently he chose serial because the English police called those kinds of crimes crimes in a series. Right. And we find in the article written by Shannon Freeman pretty good one, too. Yeah. That he was also a fan of serials like you would watch at the movies, like The Lone Ranger or something like that, just always a little weird. Like, I love The Lone Ranger, so I'm going to give a little shout out to them by coining this term. Yeah, they used to call them mass murders before that or my favorite, it sounds like a personal ad, stranger on stranger crime. Yes. I like that. Yeah. But it is true. I mean, it is stranger crime, and it kind of underlines. One of the, I guess, the riveting and most characteristic aspects of serial killers is that they lack what would appear to any of the rest of us a motive. They're not killing for money. They're not killing to get rid of a problem or because they're a jolted lover. Right. The key hallmark of a serial killer is that they kill for the pleasure of killing or for the sake of killing, and their subcategories will get into within that. But, yeah, totally right on the money. And there's a couple of other kinds of murderers that people often confuse serial killers with. So let's just clear the air right now. Let's start with mass murderers. Right? What do you have to do to become a mass murderer? You have to kill four or more people at the same time or roughly the same time in the same place. So, like, a school shooter would be a mass murderer, right, okay. And then, of course, you've got the spree killers. Those are like office shooters who go from their house, say, after killing their family, and they're like, I got one more problem place I want to take care of. They go to the office, shoot that place up, get some more people, and then drive off to a gas station and blow their heads off in the van, right? Yes. And a serial killer officially defined by the FBI means it has to be three or more victims. And like you said, the hallmark is there's got to be a cooling off period in between. So I killed somebody, and like in Jeffrey Dahmer's case, I think he waited years and years before he killed his second victim and then another long period between. He was, like, 18 when he started, something like that. And then he waited. And this is all from memory. It's not in the article. And then I think he waited a long time between second and third. And then, as usual, it starts picking up in succession the kind of off the cliff they go, the further off the cliff they go. And boy, did he go off the cliff? We're going to talk about some famous serial killers later. Yeah. Okay. We got to mention him. As a matter of fact, I think we would be professionally irresponsible if we didn't mention Jeffrey Dahmer in depth. I think you're right, chuck, there's, I think, been approximately 400 serial killers in the US. In the past century, by estimates. Right. And strangely, there's been, I think, an increase of some vast percentage, but 80% of those have come about since 1950. Yeah. And they actually think the earliest one, the most widely cited first serial killer in the US. Was a guy named HH. Holmes. Yeah. He's the homes Murder Castle in Chicago at the World's Fair. He built this hotel, basically, and it was literally like you check in, but you don't check out type of situation. Yeah. And remember on the urban planning podcast, we talked about the guy who came up with the City Beautiful movement? Right. And that's where he debuted. It was at that World Fair while people were getting off at a hotel nearby. Yeah. 1893. So he's the first one, they say, I think 27 confessions, but as always, almost with all these serial killers, they say, well, they tagged this many, but there may have been hundreds. Right. And then sometimes most of the time, they can get them for, like, two or three, which is really all you need. Sure. And then they'll confess to about X number more, and then people will suspect that they actually killed 100 or so people. Right. But in other cases, it's actually they'll confess to more than they actually did kill. Like Henry Lee Lucas has come into question over the years as to how many people he actually killed. They know he killed his mother, and they were pretty sure he killed at least one other person. But if he only killed two, he's technically not a serial killer. Yes, that's right. And then also the other thing. In the case of Wayne Williams, the Atlanta Child strangler, I don't think he strangled Atlanta Child killer. They kind of tacked on a bunch of murders onto his rap that they wanted to close cases on. Yes. Did you ever hear about the hinki case? Yeah, I remember it kind of came back around in, like, 2005 or something. He was up for parole or something. Yeah. It sounds like he's innocent. If you start investigating the case yeah, big time. It's really circumstantial. That's our opinion. So, Chuck, Josh, how do you classify a serial killer? Well, there's a couple of ways. You can classify them based on motive, or you can classify them based on social patterns, organizational patterns. Right. So if you're talking motive, you're talking about homes typology name for Ronald and Steven Holmes. Right. Not HH. Holmes. No. You become a serial killer, you're not allowed to actually classify any of your ill. Strangely enough, that's true. And they are authors of textbooks on violent crimes, and they came up with this from Anecdotal data. So a lot of people poopoo it, but when you're talking serial killers, a lot of times all you can do is interview these people and compile it and try and draw conclusions based on that. Right. So what they came up with was there's two kinds of, I guess, motive based. Sure. There's act focus and process focus. Focus. So act focus means, like, you're killing quickly and you're usually killing for a reason. There's a larger reason, and the killing is kind of a means to the end of achieving that reason. Right. Process focus that's the serial killer who enjoys killing, enjoys taking someone's life, will likely torture the person over a period of time, will kill them kind of brutally. It's not quick and it's messy. Yeah. And there's subcategories within each of those. The act focus killers are visionary, or missionary visionary means they hear voices and have, like, a vision saying, like, go kill. I think Son of Sam was one of those. Yeah. Then his neighbor is dog talented. Yeah. Quite a vision. And missionary murders believe they're on, like, a mission to get rid of, like, prostitutes, like the Green River Killer or Jack the Ripper. Right. And you could also make the case that John Wayne Gacy was a mission focused or a missionary act focused serial killer, because he had said after he got caught, like, they're going to give me an award for getting rid of these lousy bad kids that I killed. But there's also a distinction among serial killers that they often rationalize what they're doing by justifying it to a larger authority, like they were providing society of service. So depending on exactly how he was saying that, it could go either way. Did you hear what the Green River Killer said in his plea statement to the jury? I just hate prostitutes. I hate prostitutes. It's like, all right. Yeah. Remember Van Nostrin was reading a book about that? Oh, that's right. You remember. Yeah. So the subcategories for the processed focus slow killers are fall into three groups. Lust killers. That's pretty self explanatory, dahmer. For sure. But not Jack Thripper, right? Yeah. We'll get into him. I'm sorry. Thrill and gain killers. And that means they either get a kick out of killing or they think they're going to profit in some way. And then the power seeking killers, those are the guys who like to play God. And we say guys a lot because it's mostly white men. I think 80% more than 80% is what I said. Yeah. It's very infrequent that you have a serial killer who kills outside of his ethnic group, meaning that it's white on white crime. Very rarely do you have a female serial killer. Right. Although there's a pretty prominent one named Charlie Theron. Have you heard of her? Boy, they ugly her up for that movie. They did a good job there's. A picture of Eileen Warnos in this article, and by God, she doesn't look just like Charlie, staring and monster, but she was convicted of killing seven men and probably killed more, but she was one of the very few real female serial killers. Yeah, there's a couple. We have a list that you know how Josh loves this list. So we have a list later on. We like to get the ladies there, too, because we called the Task for not naming female geniuses. And, Chuck, there's another way to classify serial killers, and that's by their level of organization, right? Yeah. Organized or disorganized. Right. So organized, e G, dexter, you've got somebody who drives a flashy car. Smart. Smart. Actually, he would be considered non social, which we can't quite wrap our heads around that, but I think it's being excluded from society, but still being capable of existing or appearing to exist in society. Right. Got you. Sure. Okay. So they may also taunt the police. They're probably educated, right. And they follow the news right. To keep up with modern events. They have daytime habits, is interesting. They may show up as somebody who can help the police as a witness or a crime or something like that, just to kind of get a thrill out of that as well. And then, of course, you've got disorganized. Right. This is like Edge or Robert Pickton just basically like the guy you can look at and be like, you're a serial killer, aren't you? Yeah. And they're pretty much the opposite, like everything we said. And there's a list of, like, 25 things here for organized and disorganized, and they're all pretty much opposite. So disorganized means you live alone, you don't date, you have no interest in the news, you have nighttime habits. You aren't interested in the cops and police work. You're kind of dumb. You usually don't dismember, whereas an organized person dismembered, which is weird, because, again, Robert Pickton hung his victims on meat hooks in his barn and disemboweled them. Yeah, it was bad. But he had nighttime habits and was just a disorganized killer. Right. So it's kind of weird. I don't think anything is exactly cut and dry when it comes to serial killers. Yeah. Well, they said the majority of them are organized and non social, but they're, like we said, plenty of the others as well. Yeah. And the other thing I thought was interesting was the McDonald Triad. Have you ever heard of this? I had, but I'd never heard it called that. Yes, they said that serial killers often exhibit these three behaviors in childhood, and it's known as the McDonald Triad, formerly the Ray Croc Triad, bed, wedding, arson, and cruelty to animals. Yeah. And I surprised, Josh with the fact that I was nearly on the path myself, I guess, because famously, I was a late bedwetter, as I have admitted. Famously. Well, whoever listens to us and I was kind of into like fires. I wasn't an arsonist, but I love playing with fire. But I love animals like crazy. You had the McDonald died. Not crazy, but I love animals. That's funny that you bring that up, Chuckers, because a lot of people assume that serial killers are in fact crazy. Right. That's really far off base, at least legally speaking. Right. So there's a lot of debate now, actually, more than ever, between psychology and sociology. We'll get into that a little further, but let's talk about the kind of psychological motives, but as a little bit of foreshadowing, take it with a grain of salt because there's a whole school of thought out there that think psychology has totally dropped the ball on explaining criminal behavior, specifically serial killing. Right. So standard stuff that's been around for decades is that serial killers are the result of combination of neglect and abuse, right? Yes. They've done studies. FBI has done studies and interviewed dozens and dozens of killers, serial killers, all kinds of killers, and they found a similar pattern in most of them of childhood abuse and neglect. Yeah. And it makes sense because when you're a kid, you're growing up, you're developing as a normal child. There are very important periods when you learn about things like empathy and trust and love and being nice with your fellow man. Just very basic rules of humanity. And if you don't have those, then it's not imprinted on your little kid brain, and you may not be able to learn it later on in life. Right. Makes it a little tougher. Yeah. Which is really sad. It is sad. And actually, again, I think it's appropriate that Jeffrey Dahmer is off to the side in that little section, because it's really weird because I was thinking about it today, I've realized that I've always kind of felt bad for that guy because of the life that he had. Like he was abandoned by his family. It's not just like his parents. One parent left. I think his dad left, and then his mom was like, I'm going to go look for a boyfriend and take the younger ones with me. You stay here. And he was, like 17 and just left to live the rest of his life on his own. I think that played a huge factor in, I imagine, the neglect. Right. And then you have abuse. Right. So usually they're finding when they study serial killers, that there is that combination of neglect from the parents and abuse, either direct abuse, whether it's physical, emotional, sexual, or witnessing the abuse of others or siblings, or both, I imagine it's probably worse. Right. And they've actually seen in rats with neglect, not with the abuse part, but with neglect. Rats that are basically neglected or rejected by their parents, by their mother right. Actually show symptoms of rat sociopathy as they get older. I feel so bad for the rats. I know. Does someone actually abuse the rats to see how they react, kind of. Yeah, like flick them and stuff. If you put on a white lab coat, you can pretty much do whatever you want to rat in legitimate. Oh, the other thing that you mentioned, Dahmer, it was so disturbing and just, like, oddly fascinating was when he was a teenager, I think one of the first really odd acts he did was he saw a dead deer in the woods. Did you ever hear about that? And he laid down with the deer and cuddled with it. It's like Johnny Depp and dead man in the forest. You're right. And then before he killed I know. He knocked a jogger out cold in the woods and laid down with his unconscious body to try and stave off this desire to kill. Yeah. Well, I don't even know if it was to stave off the desire to kill as much as if he was tired of people leaving him alone. He wanted to be with people. One of the things that he was famous for was an attempt to make a zombie who would stay with them. Right. So he would lure, like, young prostitute boys back to his house or his apartment and then attack them. There was one kid that he drilled a hole in the guy's head and was able to pour drano into it. Right. And the guy stayed alive like that for a few days. And Domer, I guess, said I just didn't want him to leave. Yeah. He wanted companionship. Yeah. So he's trying to make a zombie using draino, and I think that probably also accounts for the cannibalism as well, trying to ingest something and keep it as a part of himself. This is all just armchair psychology. Yeah, sure. But we can pretty much charge for this with the level that psychology has contributed so far. I wonder if Match.com would have been around if he could have found, like, a mate, if that never would have happened. Maybe so. Or maybe he would have killed the mate and then used Match.com to find his victims. Oh, yeah. So, Chuck, we are talking about whether or not serial killers are insane. And if you look at the US. Code for the insanity defense, they don't fit the bill almost ever. Let me read the definition. Yeah. At the time of the commission of the acts constituting the offense, the defendant, as a result of a severe mental disease or defect, was unable to appreciate the nature and quality of the wrongfulness of his acts. Mental disease or defect does not otherwise constitute defense. Right. So you don't understand what you're doing. It's right and wrong and wrong, and you're not taking a life. That's not your goal. You're not thinking about that. Yeah. This flies in the face of serial killing. Well, that's why only two have only gotten off with that plea of insanity. Right. And one of them was Agin, and he wore people's skin. Yeah. He was the inspiration for Buffalo Bill and Leatherface. Yeah. And Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Yeah. Do the dance for me, baby. Was that a Texas Chainsaw Massacre summer school reference? When they were watching Texas Chainsaw Massacre. That was a reference. In a reference. I thought you were going to do the, like, will you help me with this couch? Get in the van. Are you side 14? You do a way better Buffalo Bill than me. I don't know. No way was she a big fat girl. That's so disturbing. It is. Great movie. Yeah. And we like that one picture. Yeah, sure. Did I ever tell you my Silence of the Lamb story? No. I went to in Athens in college. I went to see Dances with Wolves and they said, and if you want to stay after for a free screening of Silence of the Lambs, jody Foster and Anthony Hopkins. And I was like, I'll stay. And I heard Silence of the Lambs, jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins. I thought it was going to be like a Merchant Ivory thing. Like, cut to 30 minutes into the movie when I have my hair glued to the ceiling of the beer. I was like, Holy crap. Yeah, that was a good movie. It still is, too. When it came out, it was like, groundbreaking. Yeah, definitely. It's good stuff, but yeah. Buffalo Bob, Buffalo Bill, that one, and Leatherface are both based on aging. Who is one of, I think, two serial killers in the US. To ever get off on an insanity plea? Yeah, he was rough, dude. He was. And he looks like it, too. He's wearing, like, flannel, and he's just standing on his porch like, I'll kill you. Right? I'll kill you, and I will. And I think psycho Anthony Hopkins character is based on that gene as well. Yeah, he made a big splash when he came up because, again, I think he was in the 40s or early 50s. Yeah, he was early on. This is way before people before the term serial killer was ever around, for sure. So what serial killers have, as far as psychology can come up with, as far as the DSM Four, soon to be the DSM five, right. Which coincidentally, not coincidentally comes out in 2012 because it's going to be the end of the world, but they've come up with is that serial killers suffer from a personality disorder, antisocial personality disorder, aka psychopath. Right. And I have a buddy who's a sociologist at the University of Alberta that I first ran across, and I was writing an article on sociology and serial killing, and he says, of course they have a personality disorder. They're serial killers. Is that really the best you can come up with? After literally decades of intense research, people have pinned their entire careers onto the study of serial killers. From a psychological standpoint, the best you can come up with is a personality disorder. And that's sad, but true. When I interviewed this guy first, I imagined him. He was going to be like, well, you know what? We think we can kind of help psychology out, maybe to understand or hash it out. No, psychology is utterly and completely failed at this, and it's time to take another look at it. Interesting. Yeah. Well, you were talking about the APD, though, the anti social personality disorder. There are seven factors that determine that, and if you have three of them, if you're diagnosed with three of them, then I think you are considered technically, as having a PD. Okay, let's see what you I'm a little nervous right now. I know you playing at home. See, which applies to you. Number one, a failure to abide by the law or to conform to social norms. Number two, deceitfulness that is often found in the form of habitual lying or multiple aliases. Number three, your aliases, a failure to plan ahead or acting on impulse. Number four repeated physical fights or assaults that indicate irritability or aggressiveness. No, you're not a fighter. Number five, a reckless disregard for safety of others or self. I do love bumper cars, so we'll call that a thing. Okay. Number six, a repeated failure to sustain a job or an ability to honor financial obligations. Now, you got a good guess. I would give that maybe a third of a ding. Previous life, Josh, but current Josh is very responsible. That is true. And number seven, they are indifferent to suffering from suffering of another. So basically, you don't have the mirror neuron that gives you empathy, like we were talking about with synesthesia. Okay, so how many did you have to have to have APD? Three out of seven. Okay, I had five. Everybody, I have antisocial personality disorder. Yes. Thank you for that. The good news is, Josh, you are not insane. No, I know. I know it because I know right from wrong, right? And if I were a serial killer, I just really like to kill. Or like Gary Ridgeway. I just really hate prostitutes. You turned out to be a serial podcaster, thankfully, for all of us, because they occur in a series. Right. Chuck, can you tell a little bit of disdain here in my voice? Yes. I thought it was a smoking thing. No, it's part of it, for sure. But back to sociology, okay? Because it really makes sense to me. Right, but it's such a radical departure from how we've always viewed serial killers. You view them as crazy. There's some sort of psychological problem with them, right? Sociologists say, yeah, they have any social personality disorder, but it doesn't mean that that's a problem psychology has to tackle. It's not a mental flaw, it's a character flaw. And, yeah, I'm sure that the neglect by parents didn't help. I'm sure the abuse really made it worse. But people can go through that and never become a serial killer. Right. And it's actually the movement of this organism we call society and it's current mood that can produce serial killers. Right. And basically since 1950, there's a lot of people who point to this post 1950 era as a time when there's just been such social change that you could conceivably call it a societal breakdown, like degradation, morals, violent films, video games, where you kill people in the first person point of view. Right. And I didn't know this, but Kevin Hagerty told me this. Apparently in the late, early modern era, say like the 19th century, prostitutes were actually much more a part of the community than they are now. Right? Sure. We're actually more puritanical toward prostitution than we were like 100 or so years ago. Interesting. And he's saying that as a result of prostitutes becoming more and more outcast in society, they have become more and more of a target, favorite target of serial killers who love the act of killing. They don't hate the person that they're killing. Unless you're Gary Ridgeway. Right. But you're just looking for somebody you can kill and get away with because you're not crazy. You know what you're doing is wrong. Got you. Right. Yeah. And then that combined with society turning its back on prostitutes, making them basically live out these very dangerous lives, has allowed the rise of serial killing to come up. Right. Because of the changes like that. And that's just one of many changes. The really disturbing part of all this is that in sociologist view, we're all serial killers. Society hasn't changed quite enough to trigger that behavior in us. Well, let's hope that never happens. Yeah, let's hope indeed. Yeah. That's really interesting, isn't it? It's like a totally different way to look at it. Totally. And it makes a lot more sense to me, actually. Well, another way to look at it, a lot of people think that these serial killers are so far gone that something is up with their brain. They can't help it. They've got a brain malfunction going on and they've done a lot of studies on brain damage. And one I came across found that 20 or 30 confessed killers, not necessarily serial killers, on death row are mentally ill. And 64% of that 20 had frontal lobe abnormalities. Sure. No accident, I don't think. And 46% of all confessed serial killers have no brain damage, so 54% do. I mean, that's almost down the middle. So I think there's a variety of factors, one of which definitely could be brain injury. Sure. What was that one guy, Bobby Joe Long, he has the best quote in this whole article. You want to read it, but just read it like a hick. Okay. Bobby Joe Long, he's convicted of nine murders and he stated in his quote, after I'm dead, they're going to open up my head and find that, just like we've been saying, a part of my brain is black and dry and. Dead. So, yeah, that hits on the head, man. That's creepy. It is creepy. And that's basically him saying, something is wrong with my brain, dudes. And after I die, you're going to check it out and you're going to see that I'm right. And what's interesting is anytime you say a quote like that, you automatically attract people who are waiting for you to die now. Right. Because they're like, well, you just threw down the gauntlet. I want to see if part of your brain is black and dry and dead. Right. I personally want to know. Sure. So, Chuck, we've got not insane, possibly brain damaged, in my opinion. Definitely a product of society. Yes. Antisocial personality disorder. People abused and neglected. So how do you catch such a person? Especially if there's 400 of them over the last century in the United States. This is like a needle in a haystack, right? Yeah. Except a murderous needle. Yeah. Basically, what you do if you're a fed or a copper working the beat, searching out the serial killer, you want to get a signature. You want to get a modus operandi and Mo. And you want to combine those to come up with a profile. And a signature is like, if you pose your victims in a certain pose, or if you always dump them in a certain spot, that's a signature that you can look at to help profile or even the way you dispatch your victims. Yeah, well, that's part of the Mo. The way you kill them, certainly the ritual of it, that's a big time giveaway. But what I found interesting was that the Mo. Changes and evolves and actually grows more mature over time. Basically, it's the killer learning from past mistakes. Right. So your Mo. Is going to so if, like, your early Mo. Was luring somebody into a van in, like, a crowded area and you almost get caught a couple of times, then you may lure somebody into your van still, but it's not going to be in a crowded area anymore or something like that. That's an example of the Mo changing over here. Or lure them into your El Camino in a crowded area. Yeah. I think you can generally trust people who drive El Camino. Yeah. But the van, the abduction, man, if you've got a tiny round window on the back, rear side of your van and that's it, then you're in big trouble. You do not get in a van like that. I don't care if I just stay out of vans entirely. It almost always ends up badly for the person who is lured in there. Yeah, that's why they invented the minivan, actually. What? That's why they invented the minivan, because it just looks more family friendly and not like you're a serial killer. Yeah, that's what I heard. It makes sense. So Profiling. Josh started in the seventies with Ted Bundy was one of the first ones, actually. Yeah. And I guess they nailed him. They had him down cold. Yes. They said that his profile was almost perfect, right down to the point where they predicted that he would have a step brother. That's a pretty serious profiling if you're getting that detailed. Yeah. And they were right. Yeah. It makes you wonder, though, what all they missed, though. They got a step brother wrong, but right. But they got his address wrong. Right off by, like, a number. Right. And we thought he was Chinese, but he's not. He's dead. Bundy his was really we don't know what the whole Skydiving thing was. We just spitball in there. Yeah. Bundy like, he unraveled, man. He killed people for years. He's known for the University of Florida deal in the sorority house. But that was like, at the very end. He had killed people for years and years and years, and then all of a sudden just flipped and walked into a sorority house and started killing people. That's crazy. And then he got pulled over for a traffic ticket. That's how they caught him? Yeah. How did they catch him? Like, they knew who they were looking for? Not exactly sure. Did he have, like, a sorority girl in the back or what? I don't know. I think they had already had a profile or leads or something at that point, and they tripped him up and berkowitz son of sand they caught like, they actually apprehended him and then let him go. And he was going to be, like, a witness to one of the murders that he committed with the cops. And then they're like, Wait a minute. You said that you were just talking to your neighbor's dog. Yeah, exactly. He was like, well, yeah. And they're like, okay, well, he didn't talk back, man. That's what I would have said. Right. But he said, oh, yeah, and he talked back. Right. And he told me to kill people, or BTK. We talked about the Blind Tap Dance killer. Right? This guy is the saddest serial killer ever. He is terrible. He was terrible at it. He killed three people over the span of 26 years. And you know how he got caught, right? Yeah, I'm sure it was on Discovery, a fine parent corporation. Sure. They were interviewing one of the investigators who's working the BTK case and cracked it, and he was taunting the police. But he wasn't a really smart guy, so he sent a floppy disk to the cops, taunting them with a Microsoft Word document, and didn't understand that there's this thing called metadata, which has all sorts of very specific information about the computer that you use that on. And he used it at the church that he was a deacon at. And they got him, like, a couple of days later. But I remember one of the detectives going, like, we actually thought it was, like, somebody trying to frame somebody else. We couldn't believe that somebody would be that sloppy or that dumb. Right? And sure enough, he was I know, dummy. Yeah. And he wanted a position of authority, do anything for it. So he was like dog catcher for a while. Anything that had a uniform, he would do. I should go ahead and point out before we get assaulted with listener mail, I know he wasn't called the bind tap dance kill. That's an inside joke between us and a superfan. Yes, it is. It was. Try torture to figure that out. Bind, torture and kill. The one I was fascinated with was Peter Woodcock. Canadian serial killer. You wouldn't think there's a lot of Canadian serial killers pickedon was, I think, laid back to my opinion, the worst serial killer ever. Robert Pickton was Canadian. He's from Vancouver. Was he angry that he was an American farmer? He feeds, like, his victims to his pigs. Oh, that's right. Yeah, he was angry. I'm not American. I'm going to kill everybody that's American. Yes. We're just kidding. Canadians, we love you. But Peter Woodcock was a Canadian, and he spent 35 years in a psych hospital in Canada after he had killed three people. What they thought was rehabilitated, which is the point of this, is that you can't rehabilitate a serial killer. Pretty much they thought he was rehabilitated. They say, you know what? We're going to give you some leeway. We're going to let you out on some weekend passes. Now, he got his first weekend pass, and his supervisor for the weekend pass was a former patient who was also a former murderer. And within the first hour that they let him off on his weekend pass, his guy that was watching him killed a dude. Oh, really? With a hatchet and a knife. Within the first hour of his first weekend pass, he and his chaperone killed another patient. Wow, that's a bad guy. Yeah, that did not work out too well. So, Chuck, you got anybody else? Yeah, we're, like, coming up against it. I have a big list, and to keep Josh from eating it, I'll just go ahead and skip to the front of it. To Harold Frederick. Fred Shipman is supposedly the most prolific serial killer in known history. And he is positively linked to 250 murders. What? He was Doctor Death. You ever hear that guy? Doctor Death? No. Was he a doctor? Yeah, he was a general practitioner, and he targeted his female patients. And this was like 2004 was when he hung himself in jail. Well, he's supposedly the most prolific of all time. What about the Colombian guy? Louis Alfredo Gavrito cubillos. Otherwise known as the Beast or Labistia. He raped and murdered 140 boys, but they suspect as many as 300. And in Columbia, you can only go to jail for 30 years, but they reduce that to 22 years. So he is out. He is out. And his whereabouts, I believe, are unknown, if I'm not mistaken. Yeah. So he is out. Yeah. And as Chuck said, can't cure a serial killer. No, because they're not insane. Right. So, if you want to know more about serial killers, there's a pretty awesome article on the site called How Serial Killers Work. You can type that into the handy search bar@howstepworks.com, which, of course, leads us to listener mail. Hold on, partner. Okay, we have a little bit of admin work to get out of the way about our New York trip. Some announcements. Okay, let me shuffle some papers here. Well, T shirts first. Let's go. T shirts. The T shirt contest is on for real, son. And popping, popping and locking. The end of May at midnight is the deadline to get your submissions in. If you submitted resubmit within the window, if you're not American I'm really sorry. Are we excluding? Yeah, you have to, dude. Really? Yeah. So, wait, Canadians can't no, man, it stinks. But like I told everyone that wrote in, I can't win a contest in England, either. Every country has their own rules. What? And you got to be a citizen of this country. Wow. I had no idea. That's just the way it's got to be. I got to go back and read the fine print. I know. Okay. Well, yeah, sorry. To everybody who lives outside the US. I know it's a bummer, but that's another reason it sucks to be you. It's not our rules. Yes. No. We would never come up with something. It's the rules of the world. It's the planet Earth. The rules of the United States. Apparently. Yes. So, New York. Josh yeah. We are coming to New York, and we have two events pending. One for sure, ding. And one TBD. Monday night, June 7, we will be at the Knitting Factory in scenic Brooklyn, New York. Yeah. Super hipster, central Brooklyn. I don't know that I'm going to be able to I got skinny jeans for both of us. Yeah, I'm not wearing those. Yes. Skinny jeans in the eyesight. Oxford don't really go unless it's, like, three sizes too small, and it kind of is. Yeah. So we're going to be doing a little happy hour get together from 530 to 730. There will be a concert to follow that actually costs money, if you want to get into that. It's like $12, I think. Yeah. And the Onion is sponsoring that. And there will be folks from The Onion hanging out with us, too, so you can meet them. Yeah. Which will be super cool. I'm looking forward to meeting them in person. Yeah. So be there. Be square. And then Wednesday night, June 9, we are going to do an All Star Trivia challenge, and we are rounding out our All Star trivia team that Josh and I are on. And it's pretty exciting. Yes. All special mystery guests. Yes. I'll tell you what. Let's confirm one person. The editor in chief of The Onion newspaper is on our team. Jordanizo. Jordanzo. Is one of our buddies now. Yeah. And the other people we don't want to announce just yet because I'd hate to say that Mr. T's going to be there. If he's not going to be there, I can't believe he just gave it away. So that is going to be you come, you challenge us for bragging rights at Trivia, and it's going to be a lot of fun at Bar Trivia and location TBD. But that will be Wednesday, June 9. And coed. Yes, we can fill the beans, Josh. Okay. So if you have heard our two part Guatemala series, you're familiar with Coed. If not, they are a great organization that creates self sustaining textbook and computer centers. Right. And you can actually support these guys with a five dollar donation by texting the word stuff. S-T-U-F-F you'll get a text back saying you're sure about this? And all you do is text yes, and it'll charge you $5. And what did you say off, Mike? What? Apply text and data rates may apply. Okay. Very nice. And actually, this is another thing, only for Americans because it's different. So companies in different countries. So if you want to give and you live outside the United States, you can go to Coeduc.org, and they have a place where you can donate there, wherever you live, even if you live on Mars. Nice. Mars. All right. It's listening to meal time, huh? Indeed. Josh. We're short on time. I'm going to call this top ten reasons to hate stuff you should know. Oh, I love this one. That's good. Yeah. Number one, reason to hate us. Josh and Chuck frequently butcher names and words during the podcast and misuse I and me in a gross perversion of English language check. Number two, we cause ordinary people to become inebriated while listening by saying a few key words. Number three, it is not released frequently enough and causes addicted listeners to moan and pain between Tuesday and Thursday. I can see that. Number four, catchy theme music easily gets stuck in listeners heads. Number five chuck and Josh swear in the podcast and the beeps can cause hearing damage. Number six, jerry is seldom mentioned not true. And has never been heard live on the air. And some fans populate the Chuck and Josh keeper locked in a closet between podcasts. Number seven, stuff You Should Know, instructs on a wide variety of illegal topics, including nuclear weapons, money laundering, and the Ponzi schemes. Number eight, chuck and Josh use horrible plug similes. True. Number nine, the disillusioned listeners by stating that they record two every Friday when it's common knowledge that they recorded every Tuesday and Thursday instead. No, not true. And number ten, in addition to possibly keeping Jerry locked in the closet, we also torture her by going off on long winded introductions. True. It's a bad one to put on the end and at times getting completely off topic. Way way true. Always a huge fan, Noah. Thanks, Noah. We appreciate that. Top ten list. That's pretty awesome listener mail. Agreed. Yes. If you have awesome listener mail for us, we want to read it. And if you have any crazy serial killer stories, grisly or otherwise how about those? About those? Yeah, if you got some first hand experience. Obviously not if you're not a serial killer, but you know of someone who was, or like any cool link. If you have something to say about serial killers, put it in an email, send it to stuffpodcast@housestuffworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit HowStuffWorks.com. Want more housestaffworks? Check out our website. Blogs on the house of works.com homepage. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 camry. It's ready. Are you?"
a67a4a62-5462-11e8-b449-1b0240494658	What are think tanks all about?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/what-are-think-tanks-all-about	Think tanks? More like stink tanks! We're kidding. Think tanks do valuable work, when they operate in a non-partisan way of course. Learn all about the history of these heady institutions today.	Think tanks? More like stink tanks! We're kidding. Think tanks do valuable work, when they operate in a non-partisan way of course. Learn all about the history of these heady institutions today.	Thu, 13 Sep 2018 15:35:41 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2018, tm_mon=9, tm_mday=13, tm_hour=15, tm_min=35, tm_sec=41, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=256, tm_isdst=0)	43129709	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"This July, don't miss an entire summer of surprises on Disney Plus with Disney's High School Musical, the Musical, the Series season three Zombies, three Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and the wonderful summer of Mickey Mouse. Plus new episodes of Marvel Studios, ms. Marvel and National Geographics. America the Beautiful. From the award winning producers of Planet Earth, Frozen Planet and the Disney Nature films, america the Beautiful takes viewers on a tour of the most spectacular and visually arresting regions of our great nation. All these and more streaming this month on Disney Plus. Hey, friends. Dating is a journey with ups and downs, for sure, but all the effort is worth it when you meet someone special, right? And when you decide it's time to find a meaningful relationship, eharmony is here for you. Eharmony is passionate about creating real love for all. Rooted in compatibility, Eharmony's process reveals truths about yourself, like, I don't know what you want in a relationship. And it helps you connect with a uniquely compatible partner who is right for you. Don't believe it? See for yourself. So start for free today, because every 14 minutes, someone finds love on Eharmony. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W, Chuck Bryant and Jerry's over there actually sitting in today. And this is stuff you should know about think tanks. The thinking is kind of tanks. There are fish tanks. They don't think at all well. They barely think. They think, this water feels a little warm for me. And then they think, what's water? What's being wet? And then that's about it. And then they're like, how about some of those tasty flakes? Yeah, give me some. And that's it. Think tanks. Think tanks. There's a lot more thinking going on in these kind of tanks. More like stink tanks. It depends on your opinion. And that's everybody's opinion. So, yes, I guess they are more like stink tanks these days. This is one of those weird ones where for 47 years, I've just sort of had this I never dug in on what a think tank was. I hear it now. It kind of assumed I knew what it was. I was kind of right. Yeah, it's a good term for something. Yes. I was like, is this like a bunch of smart people sitting around thinking about smart stuff? Exactly. It's kind of right. That's exactly what it is. Ideally, it's like a place where people sit around and think about things that eventually, hopefully affects public policy in a positive way is what you're ultimately hoping for. Yeah. And by think, we don't mean if you went by a think tank, they would all just be sitting around going, I think it depends on the day of the week or if it's right after lunch. There's a ton of research and study. Oh, I see. Stuff like that. They're not just pulling stuff out of thin air. No, that's the point of think tanks is they are groups of people, nonprofit organizations in the US. We should say. Yeah. Which will get to the finer points of that who say, you know what? We see this problem in America or the world or wherever. Great Britain has plenty, china has a bunch. And they say, how can we solve this problem? Let's get to it. We're going to take this problem on and figure it out through pragmatic science and evidence based research. We're going to come up with a solution to this problem. And then the next step is to get it out there to the public, to policy makers, to get people talking about it. And then once enough people talk about it and there's a public debate over it, ideally, if it's a good idea, it will be adopted as public policy and that problem will be solved in a good way. Yeah. And that's the ideal function of an ideal think tank, which is to say, it is nonpartisan, it is fact based, and it doesn't have an agenda, necessarily. But things have changed over the years, as we will see fairly recently. Chuck, it seems like think tanks can be very much slanted, but we'll get into all that. That's just sort of a long winded set up. Okay. That was a good set up, though, man. Should we go back and check on our old buddy Plato? So crazy. Yeah. So plato his academy. The Academy was some people say it was sort of the world's first think tank. Which makes sense. Yeah. He would get dudes and they would sit around in the garden and I would imagine drink wine sure. And talk smarts and philosophy and kind of like it was highminded stuff for the day to sit around and think about sort of what was going on around them and how they could impact change. Yeah. Or thinking about the nature of reality or existence. They once decided that knowledge was uncertain and life is essentially a craps game based on probability rather than absolute truth. If you step back and think about it, that is the basis of quantum mechanics. Could you imagine if they had access to LSD back then? I know. I don't think it would have been too terribly different. They were sort of traveling down that road anyway. But that's pretty impressive. Some of the stuff they came up with again, we did a skeptics episode. Episode? No, I'm sorry, not skepticism. Stoicism. Remember, this is where this stuff was. All these different philosophies were all kind of grew from this academy. So you can make a pretty good case that it was the world's first think tank. It's not the first modern think tank, but it qualifies in a lot of ways. No, there was one in 1831, in Great Britain, the Duke of Wellington established what was called the Royal United Services Institution, which studied, like, military science. Yeah. And then here in the US. In 1910, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, which studied the result of military science. Right. And that's still around Carnegie, man. I mean, they still have endowed many things. Yeah, they're well in doubt. They are very well in doubt. And then, of course, the Brookings Institution, which may be the most famous modern American think tank to this day, this is the one you probably hear about the most. It was founded by Robert Brookings in 1916. And they had a lot of I mean, they still have a lot of influence, but they had a great deal of influence. Kind of post depression with FDR's. New Deal helped construct the new Deal helped construct the Marshall Plan after World War II that was huge. Yeah, very huge. So both were for sure. The new deal definitely was. But the Marshall Plan, there was a survey done of, I think, like, 450 historians. And the number one most important thing that any government has done since World War II, between World War II and the 21st century was the Marshall Plan. It not only brought Europe back from World War II, it set Europe on a path away from communism, where if you're not into Communism, that was a great positive benefit. Right. Yeah. And the way it did that was in two years, based on this economic plan, in two years, it got Europe. World War II ravaged Europe back to production levels 25% higher than the production levels it was at before World War II in two years. So it just went back to normal, plus 25% better. And Europe said, I kind of like this capitalism thing, and Western Europe went that way. I was kind of curious because the Brookings Institution gets a lot of left leaning criticism today. So I kind of wonder where that all came from. And the article I read said. That is a victory of the conservative side to have Brookings labeled liberal just from kind of pounding it in the press even though its history and its member board throughout the history has not been liberal at all and has been filled from the top down over the years with rank and file Republicans and conservatives from. Like. The Reagan era and through Bush one and two. Okay, so they've gotten it across as liberals so that liberals will swallow the stuff that Brookings is putting out there. No. Why would they undermine their own think tank? Well, I don't think it's not their own think tank. It's not a conservative think tank. Well, it's centrist, like, almost right down the middle. Right. But I think they want to advance their own with their conservative think tanks. They want to advance them so they label Brookings as super liberal. I got you. So anything centrist is liberal. I guess the way it's going down. That's what it is. Yeah. I can't remember who scored it, but somebody has a liberal score between zero and 100 for think tanks. And Brooking scored like a 53 right down the middle. Apparently, as far as think tanks go, it's about as centrist as you possibly can get. Yeah. And they've been around for a long time. Makes a lot of sense. Yeah. So it's not just Brookings? Brookings is definitely one of the most famous around the world and has done quite a bit of stuff, but there's plenty of others. The Rand Corporation is a very famous think tank, which, did you know, Rand is actually I don't know what you call it, but it started out as RN D, like Research and Development, Rand Corporation. And from what I understand, they've come up with the ideas for computers, the Internet, spy satellites, the space program, all that stuff that America did in the mid 20th century technologically. Yes. The Rand Corporation thinkers were the ones who came up with this stuff. Yeah, I think I knew some of that. And I don't think it fully hit home that they were a think tank with a name like the Rain Corporation sounds like just a corporation, but they're like a think tank that's really specifically it was specifically zoned into America's technology progression, I guess. Yeah. I mean, a lot of think tanks can be specialized like that. Some are very much just concentrated on economics, some concentrate on social issues, in that case, technology. And then I think some, like bookings, are sort of a little more broad. They'll take any case. Right. They'll take all commerce. Yeah. So after World War II, like, there were think tanks before, like you said. Brookings Carnegie, the Royal United Services Institute in the UK. They were think tanks prior to World War II, but after World War II, they really proliferated. And the reason they started was government was just kind of government in the early 20th century. It wasn't anything like you see it now. It wasn't this monolithic behemoth that has its tendrils in every aspect of people's lives or anything. It was a little too far the other way where it didn't quite know what it was doing. So some of those early philanthropists like Carnegie and Brookings, they endowed these think tanks to kind of help government out, to basically be like the research arm for government to help direct the best way for America to go. And that's how it started out. And then after World War Two, when America had, like, all this cash and all this forward momentum, think tanks really popped up and there were all these kind of competing and then sometimes harmonious voices from these think tanks to say, go this way, go this way, let's go this way. But they all had something in common, and that was that they were staffed by very smart people who did very deliberate, very good research, who produced policy positions that lawmakers could then take themselves and go out to the people and say, steve this is what I'm talking about. Here's the data, here's a sound bite for you to make you understand it. That's what thinks tanks did, and in a way, they very much were along the same track as Lobbyists, which we did an episode on that that was pretty good, too. But think tanks stopped short of lobbying, allegedly. Yeah, because they kind of had to. Starting in 1913, they were granted tax exempt status, which is a very big deal because there's a lot of money involved in many of these. I've been trying to get that for myself for years. And you're right, it is a very big deal. The Church of Josh, just get it going. So I'm wearing this rogue right now. In the 1950s, though, is when Congress really kind of because they were tax exempt, had to get involved and say, hey, listen, you got to walk a line here politically if you want to keep this tax exemption. Oh, yeah, we for sure do. They said you can't be partisan. It's got to be good information. You can't slant things a certain way or support, officially support or endorse candidates. You are here to educate with your objective work. And that went along for a while and then we started getting think tanks that set out to do just that, which they are called advocacy think tanks now, which I'm not sure how they managed to skirt unless they change the rules, skirt those rules and say, hey, we're going to be a conservative think tanker or liberal think tank and still be tax exempt. Do you know, the only thing that I can tell is that they are still technically producing a public good or if they believe that they're producing a public good, even if they have conservative alignment or liberal alignment, they're trying to move society along in a way that they think is good or for the betterment of society. That's what stuff you should know is dude, that's what I've been telling. I mean, could we be a think tank? No, absolutely not. I mean, think about it. I guess we could. Okay, let me take that back. No, we absolutely couldn't because we can't be brought to you by me and we don't have time. I don't know. That's a good question, but we don't have yeah, you couldn't advertise and have like you couldn't get advertiser money and be tax exempt. That's just yeah, like, I doubt if the Brookings Institutions papers have like, Burger King coupons on them. You never know. They should. So we'll get to why we can't be later on. Okay, but one of the things about think tanks is the reason they have a tax exempt status is what they're doing is producing work that furthers the public good. That's why they're supposed to have tax exempt status. What you're pointing out is a really good thing to point out. Like, wait a minute, there's a lot of stuff here that they could lose their tax exempt status for. And if we fast forward to three or five years from now, I think we're going to start seeing them lose tax exempt status. They just haven't yet, I think is what it is. Yeah, because some of them flat out it's so obvious when they come around. When the Democrats were beaten in 2000, they got together and they started left leaning thinkers got together and started the center for American Progress, which is an economic organization. It says it's nonpartisan, but it literally says, as a quote, their goal is to develop new policy ideas, critique the policy that stems from conservative values, raises the play, challenges the media to cover the issues that truly matter, and shape the national debate. Right. So they're kind of flat out saying, like, we're out to prove not just have an opinion about maybe that's a distinction out to prove that conservative economic values are bad for the country. Basically, yeah. Is that the difference? Maybe it's like, here's our data. I honestly don't know, dude, it's not a bunch of op eds thrown together. No, it's not supposed to just be op ed. It's supposed to be backed by data. Yeah, but I mean, like center for American Progress or like the Heritage Foundation or like Alec, the American Legislative Exchange Council, and we're going to do a whole episode just on Alec one day. Okay. Seriously? Yeah, but they're like little they're like Karima Abdul Jabar, like karate training islands for liberals or for conservatives or for rich billionaire followers. It doesn't matter. That's what they are. They come up with new ideas to push their agenda and then they train activists to go out and get that message out, to change people's minds, to get themselves on CNN or Fox News or whatever. Right. And to shape the public discussion on something. It has a lot of the contours of what think tanks used to have, but there's a whole other layer of sinew and gristle there that think tanks aren't supposed to have. Should we take a break? Sure. All right, we'll take a break and we'll talk a little bit more about the Heritage Foundation right after this. These days, you use your personal info to do just about everything, especially when you're online. And guess what? With all that info just floating around out there, it can make the Internet a practical gold mine for identity thieves. And stealing your identity, it turns out, can be dangerously easy, which is not good. But now it's easy to protect yourself with LifeLock by Norton. Yes, LifeLock monitors your info and alerts you to potential identity threats. And if you are a victim of identity theft, a dedicated US based restoration specialist will work to fix it. Identity thefts have had it easy for far too long. Now, finally, it's your turn. Just remember, no one can prevent all identity theft or monitor all transactions at all businesses. But everyone can save up to 25% off their first year by going to LifeLock. comStuff. That's Lifelock.com stuff for 25% off your first year. LifeLock identity theft protection starts here. Smartphones are getting smarter, faster, and that might freak some of you out. It's hard to keep up. Trust me. I'm lying when I say I know what LTE means. So let's simplify wireless together. Just fast, reliable, secure at and T 5G. Now, that's more surprising than making the league at 5ft. To reach new heights, you need the type of network that can keep up with you, with no hoops to jump through. Just fast 5G speeds for downloading and reduce lag. Plus 24/7 network protection with automatic fraud call blocking with at amp T active armor. So join at and T and discover the power of 5G through our 5G compatible devices. At and t download of apps required. Five G may not be available in your area. For coverage details, see att. Comfivegforyou. Visit www. Dot att. Comcallprotect for details. All right, the Heritage Foundation, which you briefly mentioned sure. That's the new mention before he broke. They came about. We broke a long time ago. They said, all right, it's 1980s. We got Ronald Reagan in there. He is watching movies or asleep most of the time, so we have a good opportunity. That's how they want you to think. Did you see the numbers about his movie watching? No. Oh, man. It's great. He's a movie fan. It's great. How many movies did he watch a day? He watched a lot of movies. And this is like back when they just had reels, right. Film strips, I guess they probably just cued the projector when he and Nancy wanted to watch a good old fashioned western starring me. Can you do the rest of the episode? Is Reagan? No. So they came along and they said, all right, Reagan is in office. Here are our recommendations. What up? I would call a blueprint for grabbing the government by its frayed New Deal lapels and shaking out 48 years of liberal policy. And it came by way of more than 2000 recommendations. Yeah. And they tried to institute about two thirds of them. Right? Yeah. Reagan was like, Great, bring them on. Thanks for the outline for what I should do. Right. My plan. Yeah. So two thirds, like he said during his two terms, is what he tried to implement. And then, of course, when Bill Clinton gets in there, the Progressive Policy Institute I don't know if it was 2000 plus, but they offered similar recommendations. And that's how it goes with think tanks right now. Yeah. Because if you're a lawmaker and again, we said this in the lobbying episode, too you're not necessarily like, some smart, whip, crack sharp person. No, I think we've seen that played out. You can just get people to vote for you. Yeah. On both sides of the aisle. It's not just a crack at, like, trump or anything? No, I mean, all up and down the House and Senate. I like to think they're all geniuses, but they're not. They're not. And you don't have to be smart to hold office. You just have to get people to vote for you again. Which is why think tanks have flourished for so long, why lobbyists have flourished for so long, because they're the ones who do the research and write the policy and say, here you go, you want to go look smart? Here you go, buddy. We even highlighted some sound bites for you to go say to people and get into the 24 hours news cycle. Yeah. And that's one of the big roles that think tanks play today, especially since World War II, is by going to policymakers and being like, here's your agenda, take or leave as much as you want. But all of this is backed by data. It dovetails with what you want to do with the country and it is just gangbusters stuff, high quality, well researched stuff. Yeah. It's really interesting because I think there are still think tanks that only do research and present it and say do what you will with it. But those seem to be more and more gone by the wayside. Yeah. 2010 was a real watershed year, it feels like, for think tanks. Yeah. You mentioned Alec, which we're going to cover in full, but they are a bill writing organization. They call them model bills. But when you hear a senator or something said, we crafted this legislation, well, that probably means is an organization like Alec handed them the legislation and said, here it is if you want to use it. Right. And you probably should want to use it. Alec, I think, does in many ways qualify as a think tank. They're not 100% standard think tank, but actually writing the law. Yeah. For the lawmaker to go and go into Congress and introduce it as their own bill right. That's a little beyond what think tanks do. Think tanks more like write a paper that says, here's this problem in America, here are some ideas to solve it. Here's this research to back up those ideas, go write a law based on it. What things like Alec does is take it a step further. But Alex still qualifies as a think tank and Alec is part of something called the State Policy Network, which apparently there's one in every state and Puerto Rico. And they're like a confederation of think tanks that basically sit around and figure out ways to sue local, state and federal lawmakers overlaws to try to get laws overturned. Like they use the courts rather than the legislation. But the stated goal is to affect public policy and turn it in one direction or another. Yeah. What was the website that you sent that had just source Watch. Yeah, Source Watch called them called Alec a corporate bill mail. Right. So they're just churning out hundreds of bills a year. Not all of them get used, but many of them do. And it's just, I don't know, I don't think a lot of Americans realize that a lot of actual legislative policy is being written by McDonald's. Yes, exactly. It's crazy. I can't wait to do the Alec one. We're both going to be well our cars are going to blow up right after, but by God, we're going to get that episode. Maybe we should make that our last episode in the year, whatever. 20 years from now. Yeah, that was 18 years ago. Okay. I used to love that bit though. Yeah. Alright, so we got to talk about money here. Got it. Because they are not the independent most times these days. They are not the independent organizations that you think they are. They used to be funded by these endowments and more and more it's corporations, large businesses, sometimes private individuals of course will give and sometimes it's a great workaround for campaign finance laws. Instead of directing tens of millions of dollars like you can't do to a campaign, you can throw it in a think tank that will probably get a better result. Anyway. That's new time was it used to be like in my day, right. A rich philanthropist would say I hate poverty and the effects it has on Americans. Go figure this out, I'm going to fund a think tank. And that's how you're dedicated to just go make that happen. And that's what think tanks were originally born from. And that's largely the only kind of oversight they worked under as they were trying to end poverty or they were trying to work against communism. Like these huge haughty goals. Now they're being micromanaged. That's one thing that's happening to them. Yeah. And the idea that these think tanks are not swayed or influenced or affected by their donors is not true. And sort of the biggest problem going is that now you have legislation being drawn up by think tanks because corporations are paying money to get research that looks like it's in their favor. Yeah. So one of the problems is there's not as many philanthropists who are just endowing think tanks with no strings attached anymore. There are plenty of philanthropists out there still that are funding think tanks but their donations are directed, they're resultsoriented. They're very technocratic. Right. They want to see bang for their buck. Whereas before it was just like to make America a better place and that was it. There wasn't a lot of like nobody's feet were being held to the fire. Now it's like we want you to further this specific agenda which is we want to make sure that St. Louis children, there's not a single one malnourished any longer. Right. Which is great. It's a great goal. There's nothing wrong with that goal. But it's just so very narrowed and tailored and there are ways that you can hold the think tank accountable, which is good on one hand, but it's also basically the introduction of, like, a corporate management to think tanks, which that's not really how they were originally formed, and it's having a weird effect on them. So think tanks are starting to say, all right, thank you for this money. We'll go save the children of St. Louis. And by the way, shout out to St. Louis. That was a great show that one time. What a cool down. So again, saving the children of St. Louis, good stuff. But we've got all this other stuff we want to do, too. So to keep that going, we're going to have to also go find sources elsewhere. Right. And again, you can find them from other people, but one of the places they're finding them from is corporations. And that is having a big negative impact on think tanks right now. Yeah, and it goes both ways. In the past eight or ten years, conservative billionaire says that here they funneled $120,000,000 to about 100 groups and think tanks to do things like discredit climate change science, which I mean, dude, I know the Koch brothers and Exxon Mobile specifically funded a couple of things. Tanks called Atlas Economic Research Foundation and the International Policy Network to basically question the science behind climate change to further fossil fuel interests, which is see you guys in hell for that one. Like, what a crummy legacy to leave on Earth just to make a few extra bucks. Forget future generations. They can all burn. Forget all the endangered species that are on the brink of extinction that are wait, now they're now extinct. It doesn't matter because we made a few extra billion dollars. Yeah, that's despicable. Well, it's funny. I just watched the movie Chinatown for a movie crush episode, and there's that. You ever seen that? Yeah. A lot of that movie is about it was originally titled Water and Power because it's about this weird political situation in Los Angeles in 1930s where they were diverting water to the valley. Which was a desert. And all these rich fat cats that were getting the water diverted there were buying up land in the valley. Like hundreds of thousands of acres. Because they knew it was going to be a lush green valley soon. Right. So all that really happened in La. Chinatown was based on that. But there's a great scene when Jack Nicholson confronts John Houston about he's the big bad guy, Noah Cross, and he says, how much money do you need? How many more things can you buy or this or that? And he says, what are you trying to secure? And he looked at him and he said, the future, Mr. Gittus. And that's what it is. They're not after more billions to buy more planes and a bigger house. They're trying to leave. That's what they want out of their legacy is they're trying to affect the future in their own specific way. Right? But they're affecting the future in the worst way possible, according to us. And the problem is, but not according to them. Sure, but if you pulled enough people and just ask them plainly, if you took money and billionaires and power and all that out of it, do you want a better future for humanity and for Earth 100 years from now? I would guess the majority of people would say yes. And if you can say, well, these guys are actually doing the opposite of insuring that right now. How do you feel about that? Most people would say, I don't feel so great about that. The problem is, most people would also follow up with, but what can we do? Right? They're rich. And that's a great point. What can you do? Let me hop back on Facebook and find a goat video. Right? That's when the hopelessness sets in, and that's what's causing the paralysis in our world right now, is hopelessness. That's not grim at all, is it? By the way, everybody, be sure to listen to my new podcast, the End of the World with Josh Clark. It's really uplifting. Coming very soon. Yes, coming this fall, sometime eventually, to stock up on your happy bills. So in 2013, however, on the other side, left leaning weekly magazine The Nation revealed the positions of the left leaning center for American Progress, and other think tanks in DC are shaped by interest of their donors. So it happens on both sides of the aisle, for sure. Yeah. No, it's an equal opportunity screwing that the world is getting from lobbying, from think tanks, from wealthy interests, both sides. So they're effectively unregistered lobbyist organizations now to a large degree. And because they're tax exempt, they're not obligated to release financial statements or reveal their donors. So I'm surprised it took that long for people to be like, wait a minute, we can really take advantage here, so let's take another break. And then it will spell out what the advantages are of hiring a think tank. These days, you use your personal info to do just about everything, especially when you're online. And guess what? With all that info just floating around out there, it can make the Internet a practical gold mine for identity thieves. And stealing your identity, it turns out, can be dangerously easy. Which is not good. But now it's easy to protect yourself with LifeLock by Norton. Yes, LifeLock monitors your info and alerts you to potential identity threats. And if you are a victim of identity theft, a dedicated USbased restoration specialist will work to fix it. Identity thefts have had it easy for far too long. Now, finally, it's your turn. Just remember, no one can prevent all identity theft or monitor all transactions at all businesses. But everyone can save up to 25% off their first year by going to LifeLock. comStuff that's Lifelock.com stuff for 25% off your first year. LifeLock identity theft protection starts here. Smartphones are getting smarter, faster, and that might freak some of you out. It's hard to keep up. Trust me. I'm lying when I say I know what LTE means. So let's simplify wireless together. Just fast, reliable, secure. At and T 5G. Now, that's more surprising than making the league at 5ft. To reach new heights, you need the type of network that can keep up with you with no hoops to jump through. Just fast 5G speeds for downloading and reduce lag. Plus 24/7 network protection with automatic fraud call blocking with at and T active armor. So join at and T and discover the power of 5G through our 5G compatible devices. At and T download an apps required. Five G may not be available in your area. For coverage details, see att. Comfiveg for you, visit www. Dot att. Comcallprotect for details. All right, Chuck, we're back. A little warm under the collar. I feel like we should mention this thing with the Walton Family Foundation quickly, because that's interesting. I think this is a great example of what a think tank can do these days. Yeah, it's obviously the Sam Walton family of Walmart fame. They fund a lot of conservative think tanks. I think most people know that. But then they also funded one and think tanks backed by Barack Obama when it came to the Affordable Health Care Act. And you're like, Wait a minute, why would they do something like that if they're a conservative family supporting conservative causes? Then you do a little poking around, and it turns out that critics would say that the health care bill that forced employers to pay for their employees healthcare tax. Walmart was like, this is great because we can afford to do this, but our mom and pop competitors can't. So we're actually going to try and get this pushed through, even though at its face, it doesn't quite make a lot of sense. It makes sense to them. Like, why would Walmart take on the cost of their employees health care? Because they know that they can go back to sleep. Everybody. Yeah. Stop asking questions. Really interesting. It is fascinating. But that's one thing you can do is donate to a think tank that's furthering your agenda. And because think tanks are now largely agenda driven, there's a lot of think tanks out there that can help you out. And there's a new thing that's happening with think tanks these days. They're starting to solicit corporate donations. And one of the saddest stories is the story of the Brookings Institution, the most centrist think tank that has put out the Marshall Plan that helped figure out the New Deal and how it addressed the Depression. Like, has done all this amazing stuff, is now they hired a lobbyist for their strategic development chief, and they're now soliciting corporate donations left and right. And they're basically, this is what you can get. Like, if you hire a think tanker. I'm sorry, you're not supposed to say hire. If you enter into a partnership or donate to a think tank and you're a corporation or a very wealthy person, what the think tank will do is they will basically get your ideas out there. They will deploy. So, first of all, let's say there's this really great New York Times article about the what was the name of that company? The Lenar Corporation. Okay. They wanted to build in San Francisco. They wanted to redevelop the site in San Francisco, which whatever, apparently there was pushback on it, or they were getting some sort of pushback from the residents in San Francisco. So I guess the Brookings Institution went to them and said, hey, we've got some ideas for you. We can support this as basically like a great idea for cities of the future, and we're going to lend the credibility of our experts in our think tank to your project and make it like a champion kind of thing, like a blue type, an archetype for how to further cities in America. Your development project, they're home builders. But with Brookings Institution behind it, there was a veneer of something bigger than building homes, bigger than redeveloping, something about the future and progress, and Brookings went to them in exchange for 400 grand. Brookings added this credibility to it, got talking heads out there on the news to talk up this development and what it meant for the future. And one of the other things they did and can do is they can set up summits conferences on cities of the future and get the home builders and lawmakers into the same room to hang out together. And so that's lobbying. Sure. There's no other way to put it. That is lobbying, and they were doing it on behalf of a specific corporation. There should be no tax exemption whatsoever any longer. It doesn't matter what side of the aisle you're on. If you're a taxpayer, you are funding that through these tax exemptions because we put the bill for tax deductions. Sure. So if a single corporation's interests are being served, even if society in general is benefiting in some way, that's too much of a slippery slope that breaks the tax exemption status and that should go away. And that, sadly, is apparently where the direction Brookings is going. And others too, I should say. Oh, sure. Even the ones that aren't maybe as outright or aren't as bald faced about this stuff, like a lot of scholars say that bought and paid for research is sort of the exception still. But even so, there are still places where you may not push out certain research if you think it might piss off your boss. Yeah, which is the same thing, or sort of self censor yourself if you think like, oh man, I don't know, we're getting donations now. This might not please them, it might make them look bad. So I probably should just avoid this conclusion. Yeah. So maybe not completely inventing a study or something, but being very selective in what you choose to research or how you research it or what you release. Sure. It's another version of the same thing. It totally is. And one of the other things that they've been found to do, a lot of think tanks, or one of the new things that think tanks do is they will circulate drafts before there's a final draft to donors. What do you think about this? And sometimes their opinions will be incorporated into the final draft. That is the antithesis of the spirit of think tanks and what they were originally meant to do. They were supposed to be like, here's the facts, here's the research to back it up. It is what it is. We think you can apply it to make the world better in this way. Not, what do you guys think does this job with the kind of sinks you selected for this redevelopment? Because we can change this part to jibe with the sinks you chose. Right. That's just not what it's supposed to be. And the reason that think tanks are doing this is they are in existential danger through the death of expertise that I remember I talked about in the elimination diet episode. Yeah. The problem is, it's not like America just said, we're sick of expertise. We're tired of you experts like, you're always right. We're tired of hearing you're always right. People got tired of being lied to and misled and misinformed and manipulated, and they finally said, you know what, experts, that's enough. Enough of you are full of it. Enough of you have let your credibility be co opted. We're just not going to listen to any of you anymore because we don't know who to trust. And the experts brought about the death of expertise themselves. In large part, yeah. And there was an article from the Washington Post called Our Think Tanks Obsolete, which sort of argues along those lines about, and also incorporates the Internet and the length of a research cycle, like with the Internet and Twitter and Facebook and things like Ted Talks. There's a guy, Donald Abelson, a professor at University of Western Ontario, wrote a book called The Think Tanks Matter, where his conclusion basically is that the marketplace of ideas, he says, has become congested, and you don't have time anymore to do a twelve month research proposal to come to the following conclusions when 100 Ted Talks over, that twelve months will be published. Not picking on ted talks are great. Yeah, it's a good example, though. But you can push out a Ted Talk, you can push out a Facebook Live video as an economist and have a lot of sway. They mentioned in here in the article about vaccines, for instance. As far as it goes with the vaccines, the rancorporation one of the largest think tanks that we already mentioned, they did like a very thorough deep dive in research debunking the notion that vaccines cause autism. And it took a long time, but you can get on Facebook and go to a group called Educate before you vaccinate and watch videos by nonexperts. And people are swayed these days by this stuff. Yeah, like, why wait? The news cycle is so shortened, right? You can't wait for a long deep dive research paper to come out with some abstract summary that no one reads anyway. And apparently now they're written in such a way where they will just say, abstract summary? This stinks, we shouldn't do it. They become so opinionated. I don't know, man. It's depressing to think that Facebook and Twitter have outsized a think tank as far as they definitely have influence. Yeah, and YouTube and basically anything that gives a voice to the average person, which on the one hand is really cool and great, sort of democratizes it in a way, but in the worst way at times. But it's tied into this death of expertise in a really toxic manner, you know what I'm saying? That democratization of giving everybody a mouthpiece is not in and of itself like a bad thing, but since it coincided with the loss and trust and experts and expertise, that's where the problem came from. And that was the reason why we couldn't be a think tank, sadly. We could be a think tank now, but we couldn't be a bona fide think tank because, Chuck, we don't have enough time in any given week to do so much thorough, primary source research into stuff. If we release one of these every couple of months, sure, we could be like a real think tank, but it wouldn't be nearly as fun. Six episodes a year. Yeah, people would love that. Yeah, they'd love it. You got anything else? No, I guess I don't either. Sorry for going off, everybody. Thanks for listening. I'm sure I'll get some email, but whatever is worth it. If you want to know more about think tanks, well, I don't know, go on the Internet and look up some think tanks and see if there's any that you agree with. A lot of them have daily interpretations of news that kind of go through their lens. It's a way to keep up with things. Sure. And you can also read this article on how stuff works. It's not a think tank called how think tanks work. Since I said that's, time for listener mail. I'm going to call this a ballpoint pin addiction. Or just pin addiction. Hey guys, been listening for a couple of months or so. New listener, you are my first foray into podcast. I just really enjoy listening to you too. Welcome. I saw the Ballpoint Penn podcast and I could not pass it up. I have a bit of a pin problem. You see, I own many pins, especially the gel type ink rollerball pins, where you go, you got taken to task by quite a few people who are just like Josh Clark Harrisy gel pens. Yeah. There are a lot of, I guess, traditionalists to poopoo that. I think they're great. I got a lot of support for that one, too. Agreed. We got a lot of pin recommendations. It was good to see. Yeah. And here's another one. I own many, many pins, especially the gel ink rollerball pins. I also own a collection of sharpies in various tip widths and colors. Wow. I probably have a couple of gallon size ziploc bags worth. You mentioned the way certain pins write on certain types of paper. I think it's probably the rollerball gel pins that work best on the thermal paper that they use in most restaurants. And I was talking about signing the check. I think it's what she's talking about. We still never found out what that thing is called. Thermal paper? No, the thing that the check comes out in the little portfolio. The clamshell. Someone actually said. Did you see that? Yes. This great couple sent in a picture of a clamshell check delivery system. What are they called? I don't know. Check caddy. We're going to name them Clamshells now. All right. That's the new name for them. So I have a favorite pin, though, guys. By them, by the box. It's the pilot. Vball B green pin. The zero five millimeter. Okay. I love the way they feel when they write. I can't go back to ballpoint pins. I use them at work. I carry at least three in my bag, and I draw and doodle with them. Using them on a newsprint pad is my favorite thing when doing word art. Nice. Sorry for the ramble, guys. Have a great day. That is from Devini Mbary. Devini Barry. Devini MBA. MBA. I wasn't going Berry. Okay, well, I didn't know if Devini's middle initial was M or if I was missing you and Davina and Barry. It's actually Davina. Excuse me? Davina. And if I would have said Davina and Barry, that would have been much more clear. Or embry. It might be Davina. Embry. Will it say davina or Davina? Oh, God. How about De? Thanks, De. It's D I Ma. At any rate, we're glad that you started listening to us. We appreciate it. And thanks for taking the time to let us know about your pen addiction. Totally fine with us. If you want to let us know about something you're super into, you can hang out with us on social media. You can go to stepieshopnow.com and find all of our social media links. You can also send us an email to stuffpodcast@housetofworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetopworks.com. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime four days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. Are you looking for an escape? An immersive getaway experience? Well, there's a place for all your wildest dreams. Perhaps you enjoy wrapping along the paper boy. Or you believe that blessed be the fruit. Or you dream of one day smashing a glass while stealing Hooza. Whether you're sworn to Team Kim or you just want a good old fashioned, mysterious murder, there's a place that has it all. From Atlanta to only murders in the building, it's all on Hulu. So check into your obsession. Hulu subscription. It's required. Terms apply. Visit Hulucom for plan details."
http://netstorage.discovery.com/DMC-FEEDS/MED/podcasts/2008/1215462300518sysk-evolve-in-isolation.mp3	How Evolution in Isolation Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-evolution-in-isolation-works	How does isolation spur evolution? Check out this HowStuffWorks podcast to learn more about speciation and evolution.	How does isolation spur evolution? Check out this HowStuffWorks podcast to learn more about speciation and evolution.	Thu, 15 May 2008 18:33:06 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2008, tm_mon=5, tm_mday=15, tm_hour=18, tm_min=33, tm_sec=6, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=136, tm_isdst=0)	4915017	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hey there. Welcome to the podcast. I'm Chris Paulette. I'm one of the editors here. And with me, as always, is staff writer Josh Clark. Hey, Josh. How's it going today? Doing okay. I thought we would talk about what happens when animals evolve in isolation. And basically it starts with the theory of evolution and how we're all related. Exactly, yeah. And like you said, you hit upon it's a theory. I think we should say that not everyone subscribes to evolution, but if you're a scientist, you most likely do. There are a few ways to go about evolving, and one of them is through evolution and isolation. For that to happen, you have to go through a speciation event. And what that is is just when one species becomes two or more species. For example, bears. You want to talk about bears? Sure, we could talk about bears. Okay. Well, the black bear is the parent species of the polar bear. It makes sense if you think about it. They're bears. Right. So surely all bears are related. But how do polar bears become white? Why are black bears still black? I think evolutionary biologists tend to believe that it was because of a parapetric speciation event. And parapetric speciation occurs when a species become so spread out geographically that members in different areas are living in different environments, undergoing different experiences. So the black bear up north had a fur coat that stood out like a sore thumb against the white landscape, the snow covered landscape. So they evolved to be white. That's not enough. That doesn't cover speciation entirely. For speciation to be complete, you have to go through reproductive isolation. And this just means where the members of the species no longer can produce offspring, it can be because they develop different genitalia. It can be because they've developed different times of the year to mate, different locations to mate. In either way, if reproductive isolation occurs, a speciation event has taken place. Okay. So basically they just have to be different enough where they're no longer able to reproduce with one another and then gradually become a different species altogether. That's exactly right. And there's also some other really interesting aspects to evolution. One of I know you know a lot about that's, the evolutionary bottleneck. Right? That's true. This is when a group gets completely, or I guess nearly completely cut off from the main group. So they are reproducing only with one another. It's like a bottleneck if you think like a soda bottle. But that can cause some problems, because if there's a genetic defect, it can be passed down from generation to generation. You mentioned in the article a group of Amish people in Pennsylvania who had a trait for smaller than normal brains, microencephaly. And that can be fatal. So obviously, in this case, this very small group of people having that trait be passed down was fatal to that group. Not a desired trait either. No, definitely not. But you know, Josh, one of the other examples that you used in the article that I thought was really cool was the Iguanas that were displaced by Hurricane Maryland. And that's sort of an evolutionary bottleneck. And it's also an example of a different kind of speciation aleppatrick, which is they're cut off by a geographical boundary. In this case, they're on an island separated by the main group by water, and the small group of Iguanas floated from Guadalupe to Anguilla. And I think that's really cool because it's a completely scientific study. There are no or there were no Iguanas on Anguilla before this happens. They're kind of completely natural experiment. Right. It wasn't forced. They just happened to notice that these Iguanas are going to go there and so we're going to find out if there'll be a bottleneck. And also the island rule, which is funny that this is an island, but yeah, the island Rule would give them a chance to see if these Iguanas will grow larger or smaller as a result of being cut off from the main genetic body of Iguanas. So it's going to give scientists a chance to see evolution up close and personal, as it were. Ironically, it was a gift from God to conduct a natural experiment on evolution. There you go. So you can read all about this and what happens when animals evolve in isolation. On howstephorcs.com for more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseupworks.com. Let us know what you think. Send an email to podcast@houseepworks.com brought to you by the Reinvent to 2012. Camry, it's ready. Are you? Yeah."
https://podcasts.howstuf…necronomicon.mp3	Is the Necronomicon real?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/is-the-necronomicon-real	H.P. Lovecraft's strange, elaborate stories and mythologies have inspired a devoted following. Join Josh and Chuck -- and a special guest -- as they discuss Lovecraft's most famous creation, the "Necronomicon," in this podcast from HowStuffWorks.com.	H.P. Lovecraft's strange, elaborate stories and mythologies have inspired a devoted following. Join Josh and Chuck -- and a special guest -- as they discuss Lovecraft's most famous creation, the "Necronomicon," in this podcast from HowStuffWorks.com.	Thu, 20 Aug 2009 14:30:17 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2009, tm_mon=8, tm_mday=20, tm_hour=14, tm_min=30, tm_sec=17, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=232, tm_isdst=0)	28945840	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from house to the works. Comment. Hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clarke. We just kicked off every HP. Lovecraft fan there is with that. That was so cheesy. This is stuff you should know. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Bryant. And who else is in here? I was going to wait a minute. Oh, okay. I was going to lead up to that. Well, there's no one else in here. No one. Today we are doing a special podcast on The Necronomicon. And for those of you who don't know what The Necronomicon is, it is arguably the most famous fictional text ever created in the history of American literature. It is an evil book. Yes. One might say created by probably my favorite author, H. P. Lovecraft. Yeah. I didn't realize this. He told me this. I didn't. I love Lovecraft. My favorite stories are dreams in the witch house where he basically equates physics to witchcraft. Like witches have an advanced grasp on physics. Really? It's awesome. It's so cool. I have a strange case of Charles Dexter Ward is probably the greatest one he's ever written. It's amazing. Really? Yeah, you got to read that. And these are short stories? Novellas. Well, the next one's in novellas at the Mountains of Madness. Excellent story. Actually, that one kind of factors into what we're going to be talking about today. I don't know if The Necronomicon makes an appearance, but what The Necronomicon deals with is all over the place there. So, Chuck, despite my love of lovecraft yes. It's painfully obvious to both of us that we're mere fleas compared to some other people out there who are Lovecraft fans. Right, the dogs. And we figured that we were going to get nothing but angry emails for this one. They take it pretty seriously. I would imagine that they don't want us to poop on their hero and their icon. No. And he's my hero, too. But I don't do it justice. You? No, I can't. So instead, we decided to bring in who will call the Shield. Who can take all of the angry emails, and that is our friend, colleague, and fellow podcaster Jonathan Strickland Terranor. Yes, we have a special guest today. Chuck wasn't lying. I was. Hey, Strick, how's it going? Hey there, guys. Going pretty well. Thanks for having me on. I really enjoyed writing both Cthulhu and the Necronomicon articles. So I'm supposed to be here. Very cool. You're kind of raised on these, weren't you? Doesn't your dad write weird fiction? Yeah. My father's name is Brad Strickland. So if you were to do a search for that on Amazon, you would see that he's written quite a few novels, several of which fall into the horror or weird fiction category. Yeah, I grew up around this stuff. This was your life. Pretty cool. And your dad predicted teddy Ruxpin. That's true, but has nothing to do with Lovecraft or Cthulhu or economical, right? No, it doesn't. My parents were school teachers, so not nearly as excited. I was a mechanical engineer. I didn't grow up with Cthulhu and strange beasts that would drag you insane just to look upon its face. Right. Lesson plans, which is something that's a point that you make in the articles you wrote, Strict, was that these creatures that the Necronomicon deals with, they'll drive you crazy just by looking at them or by interacting with them. Usually terrible, terrible things happen. Right. And at the center of the Necronomicon is Cthulhu katolu or there's a pronunciation that Lovecraft wrote in a letter to a fellow author, right? Yes. And how is that one pronounced? Why are you hitting me with that all of a sudden? Okay, let's be clear here. Lovecraft actually makes a point to say that these otherworldly creatures have their own language, which humans are incapable of repeating. I love that. That makes it very mysterious and creepy to me. Yeah. It's the same sort of nature as they have this appearance that we cannot comprehend. If we were to look upon it, as you say, we would go crazy. So it actually takes a lot of pressure off because you can name things whatever you like. You can put as many consonants and little apostrophes in there, so you can call it whatever you like. And when people say, how do you pronounce it? You just respond? You can't. But Cthulhu is one that I think most Lovecraft scholars would argue is the appropriate pronunciation. But the way I've always said it, and the way that most of the fans that I've talked to have always said it is Cthulhu. Right. Wasn't there a rumor early on that the Cloverfield movie was the Monster was the Cthulhu? Yeah, that was very early on when that preview first hit. And there was not even a title for the movie yet. In fact, there was no title internally for the movie. People could only get little glimpses of what was going on, and a lot of people said, hey, maybe this is the Cthulhu movie we've all been waiting for. This is actually the monster. I wonder if I haven't made that yet. Well, there have been several movies that have tried to tap into the Lovecraft universe, and only a few have been really successful. I think part of the problem is that how do you portray a monster that is so horrible that you'd go crazy looking? That was what I was thinking was it's probably pretty intimidating for a filmmaker to try and tackle this. Well, there are descriptions of Cthulhu. So basically he has wings. He resembles the same key just by looking at this. Yeah. Think about this. Do you think feminine when you hear this? Wings. Huge leathery wings? Yes. Part octopus, part dragon woman, part man? No, I wouldn't say it just seems like with Lovecraft thing, he would say it is agenda that cannot be defined. Yeah, I would agree. Unnamable. Okay. We'll call him. He. Okay, so we will call Cthulhuhi. Okay. So Cthulhu and the whole reason we're talking about him is he figures at the center of the Cthulhu mythos that Lovecraft created during the course of his writing and strickland. When was the most prolific? Was it during the we're talking about just right around that era, late 20s. Pretty much. What's really interesting to me is that Cthulhu became the central of the center figure of this mythos, but it's not the creature that Lovecraft wrote about the most. Cthulhu really only factors into a couple of stories and in fact, is described in some as being a priest kind of figure for the Old Ones, which is this race of creatures Lovecraft created. Yeah, but he never said whether he was a priest that led the worship of the Old Ones or whether he was the priest to the Old Ones. That's correct. I'm just going to leave the room. You guys are nerding out all this. Well, the point I'm trying to make here is that it's really the fans of Lovecraft who kind of latched onto Cthulhu and made it the central figure of his mythology. If you were to read all the stories, you would say, why, it is a very striking kind of image. But why this over? Any other particular? Like, why not? Is there a reason for that? I think it's mainly because when you do read the descriptions, they are very compelling. And I think it's also probably one of the ones that's easier to imagine than some of the other a lot of the other ones end up being shapeless. Well, that's kind of hard to imagine. That's fine. Or mindless being cosmic being who rules at the center of chaos. That's kind of difficult to conceive of. Yeah, I think so. It's very hard to make a plush toy of that. Right. A furby. I think the other reason that Cthulhu has become such a prominent figure in Lovecrafty and lore is that he's still here on Earth. He was one of the rulers of Earth along with the Great Old Ones, right? That's correct. And then he had a city that was called Real. Y actually still is that sunk under the waters. And what's interesting is that depending on which story you're reading, you can kind of locate where Realgate is. It's off the coast of South America, and there have been some interesting, weird things that have gone on in that general area that people jokingly attribute to Cthulhu saying, hey, it's Cthulhu. Snoring. Right. Like you put a little sidebar that was pretty interesting. That they detected with underwater microphones what a very loud, low repeating sound somewhere out in the middle of the ocean out there. Right. And that they said, oh, well, that's just a whale song. But then Marine biologists came in and say, oh, that's not a whale. Unless that's the biggest whale in the history of the universe. Right. It was such a loud and prolonged sound that it would have to be made by a creature larger than anything that we currently know of Cthulhu. Right. So, hey, Cthulhu, it's got to be him. It's interesting. If you listen to the sound unaltered, it's just this really low rumble, and it goes on for ages. But if you speed it up really fast, it goes bloop. Really? Which is why they call it the bloop. There you have it. Which is also why a lot of people thought the cloverfield monster was Cthulhu, because apparently on the official website, there was a blue. Right. Was there? Yeah. They tied it into a fictional slushy maker Japanese company, and so that had something to do with it as well. Once people started seeing the supplemental material, they started to draw their own conclusions, and of course, they turned out to be wrong. But it just shows how imaginative and passionate the Lovecraft yes. And it shows how smart JJ. Abrams is. The dude, marketing genius, master marketer. So let's talk a little bit more about the next phenomena. Sure. So, the text strickland is often considered a book of spells. Most of the people who get their hands on the nekronomicon in lovecraft stories end up using it to conjure some of the great old ones. Remember Cthulhu, the priests of the great old ones. Right. And terrible things happen. The skies open up. People tend to disappear under terrible circumstances. And the author, let's talk about the author of the nekronomicon. He himself the mad Arab Abdul l Azrad. That's correct. The mad Arab Abdul lhzred, aka opium fiend. Yes. The 8th century opium fiend from Yemen, supposedly a poet who at some point gets this well, I suppose he gets some strange inspiration, possibly fueled by drugs. Right. And it's a good way to say it writes down this book called the Necronomicon. Right. Originally called althief. Right? Right. And that refers to a sound made by night, insects in the desert, or demons howling, depending on who you ask. Correct? That's correct. And so we have this text that's supposed to be very rambling and crazy, and interesting thing is that Lovecraft never wrote the full Necronomicon. He actually wanted to create it. That's right. And dabbled on a shorter version at one point. Right. He wrote a couple of passages from the Abridged version, and there are a few passages that are fairly famous in Lovecraft lore, but he wanted to create this mythology where scholars in his world would have certain books they would refer to whenever they needed to study these creatures. Okay. And some of those books actually were real, right? That's correct. Some of the books were, in fact, real books that have a historical background. Most of them were just figments of his imagination. He created these LoveCrafts I should say. Sure. Lovecraft's imagination. Not the mad Arab. No, not the mad Arab. So, yeah, it's interesting. You're talking about an author, Lovecraft, who creates this fictional author, the mad Arab, who in turn creates a fictional book called Necronomicon, parts of which Lovecraft actually wrote out. Right. So that is the spoiler for those of you who weren't familiar with this at all. Necronomicon. Completely fictional. Mad Arab. Completely fictional. And actually what's cool about strictly in the article, you make the point that the Necronomicon has not only survived Lovecraft's death, it's thrived. You can find versions of it on Amazon. There's actual cults. Whether they realize that The Necronomicon or accepted the Necronomicon is fictitious, this philosophy of the Necronomicon still figures very much into their outlook. Then there's other, maybe I got the impression, slightly nuttier cults that actually don't believe the Necronomicon is fictional. Right. But it's pervaded into reality. Correct. Yeah, all of that is right. It is fascinating because since Lovecraft left such huge gaps with the Necronomicon, he only wrote little bits and pieces. It's allowed other people to swoop in and fill in those gaps. And make money. And make money, yeah. I'll never forget I was in a bookstore. I think it was South Carolina. I was in a bookstore. This is when I was a teenager. And I'm looking through the books. I'm just trying to find something to read, and I come across a copy of The Nekronomicon. And I had to stop and look again because I thought, wait a minute, why would I find a fictional book in a bookstore? And so I took it down and started reading it, and it was filled with lots of tortured kind of pros. Was it good? No, it was terrible. Did it bite your hand when you tried to grab it? It did not. Evil Dead reference will come back to that later. Yeah, no, it was a terrible book. It was a terrible attempt at trying to make a book sound really dangerous and spooky. But it was transparent. I mean, it was obvious that it was someone trying a big phony. Right? All right, you guys, this reality part is boring. Let's go back into the fictional world of Lovecraft and the Necronomicon. Okay. Where are we? Actually, we're in no particular place. We're just in this version of reality that Lovecraft created. How about that? Okay. All right. So within this world, you have various creatures, you have various books, all of which are bad. There are people who think they can take advantage of them and gain either power or knowledge or some combination thereof, but it always turns out badly for them. In fact, you kind of wonder why people keep bothering. Oh, really? Yeah. That's really what weird fiction is all about. You're talking. When you use the word weird, you don't just mean unusual, you mean incomprehensible to the human mind. Yeah, I think Josh told me off Mike that a lot of other authors kind of have said that's a bit of a cop out on Lovecraft's part, because a lot of times he doesn't have to end up being real creative with his descriptions of things, and he can just say, well, trust me, look upon it and you shall go insane. Or it's unnamable. Yes. Or unnamable. Yeah. I think it's brilliant. Yeah. There's definitely an argument on either side. You could argue that while the human imagination is so powerful that if you leave it up to the individual reader, that person is going to make his or her own most horrifying creature. And there's nothing that you, as the writer, could describe because you don't know that person. You don't know what would horrify that person. Exactly. But by leaving it up to the reader's imagination, suddenly you've made a much more effective monster. Right. Which is kind of what they did with Cloverfield, actually. They did kind of tap into that because they didn't show the monster very much at all, and I thought it was effective. I like the movie. No, I really enjoyed that as well. I haven't seen it yet. Both of you, shut up. Oh, sorry. Spoiler alert. There's a monster. It's Godzilla. Yeah. Another thing I thought was cool was that Lovecraft at one point said that there are only several official copies of the Necronomicon located in I think you listed five different libraries, and two of them don't even exist. Right. Yes. He dabbled so much between reality and fiction that I think it worked. It ended up being like, you don't know what's real and what is it? Dude, we're back in Lovecraft world. Okay. Sorry. So Strickland the Necronomicon was written by Al hasred, right? And I believe he died fairly horribly. Either he was swallowed up after conjuring somebody using the Necronomicon. I think I remember another story where Lovecraft writes about how he was beheaded, but his head was still able to speak. There's several different ways that he supposedly died, but either way, he died, but his book survived and it stayed in Arabic, which actually, I believe none of the Arabic original copies in Arabic exist today. But in 950, somebody else found it and it was translated into Greek, right? Yes, that's right. There are actually several different translations that are mentioned in Lovecraft stories. There's Greek, there's Hebrew, there's a few others. There's Latin, I think you said in 1228, alias Wormius was a priest that translated into Latin, and then it was banned by Pope Gregory Nine. But in reality, this is what I love the fiction. Again, you're not Catholic, are you? No. Is that not Pope Gregory nine the 9th? Okay. Yeah. Pope Gregory the 9th. In reality, Alias Warmius was actually a Dutch physician, so there was no tie there whatsoever. Yeah. That was the mixture of reality and fantasy. Now, the really cool stuff, as far as I'm concerned here, is that he's built up a believable enough base that if you were to just read the story without any other background information, you could totally buy into this mythology. Got you. He's really made it very rich and believable. He's anchored it in reality. And there are Lovecraftian scholars and fans who will talk of this as if it were all real, as if these Greek and other translations of the Necronomicon do in fact exist and are in fact in these libraries. Right. I know earlier we were talking and I thought it was odd that he would use people like Alius Warmy as their name, which was a physician. And then 1586, Doctor John D was an Englishman and a magician, when in fact he was really just an advisor to Queen Elizabeth. And I thought, well, how strange to use these real people. Wouldn't he be found out? But you said that this is the you couldn't go up on the internet and look up who John D was. Right now you had people who those names would sound familiar and they'd think, hey, that does lead some credence to that. And I also compared it to Bram Stoker, who did based Dracula off of a real person, Vlad Tepes. But if you were to look into Vlad Tepes'life, you would see that it doesn't really parallel Dracula at all. You could just see where the inspiration came from. But because you have Vlad Dracula, you have this whole persona there. It lends your story a stronger base in reality. Yeah, like you guys said, the Lovecraft was a master at mixing reality and fiction. Like with the libraries where you could supposedly find the Necronomicon, but also he would pepper some of the books, like on the shelves. I remember in the strange case of Charles Dexter Ward, his ancestor, what was his ancestors name? I don't remember either. But there were tons of books of magic and the occult and some of them were real, like the Rs, Magna at Ultima, and they would be sitting alongside the Necronomicon. So there were some that were real and some that weren't. And not only did Lovecraft write about that, he would use books that some of his contemporaries had made up in his books and they would do just the same. Right. They would mention the Necronomicon in their books. Yeah, there was a lot of cross pollination going on at this time where Lovecraft loved having friends who were also authors. He was a prolific letter writer and he encouraged his friends to write stories set in his mythology and then he would write stories set in theirs as well. So you start to get this really rich background that didn't exist in other authors works because in a way it's almost like writing fan fiction, except in this case the people who are writing fan fiction are really well known authors. Right, but that continues today. We still have people writing within Lovecraft's mythology and of course, it's expanded beyond just writing books. It's also in movies and television. Right. There's some pretty noteworthy cameos that The Necronomicon has made, most notably in the Evil Dead series. Yes. Was it an Evil Dead or just Evil Dead Two? No, it's in Evil Dead. Evil Dead Two and army of Darkness. Got you. Army of Darkness actually was my favorite scene with The Necronomicon because he has to approach it on the hill and repeat the clattu vorata, which I remember the last word. Isn't that from The Day the Earth Stood Still? Yeah, that was the one thing about Sam Raimi just loves to quote from other movies and science fiction, horror, everything. I mean, he's one of those guys who just has that huge lebrandian library of trivia instead. And so, yeah, he brought a lot of that out into those movies. But the interesting thing about The Necronomicon in those movies is that it doesn't really resemble the one in Lovecraft Story. Right. It's the book of the Dead, is what they call it. Evil Dead. And at least in Army Darkness, it was like this I had an evil face. It was, like, leather bound, but it had a mouth and eyes, and that's why it bit him when he tried to pick it up. Which is what I was referencing. Right. It's actually bound in flesh and written in blood. Yeah. And it's a little different from the necronomicon and lovecraft stories. But The Necronomicon, you got to admit, that's an awesome name for an evil book. Exactly. So it totally made sense to reference it. Sure. And a lot of people, I think, have sort of a passing familiarity with Lovecraft Stories stuff. So if you mention it, they get the idea, oh, that's an evil book. They don't need to have this wealth of information in their heads. Got you. So my favorite reference, and you actually pointed out in the article strict, is the appearance of The Necronomicon in The Simpsons. Did you guys see this one? I did. It was in the episode Brawl and the Family, where there's a meeting of the Republican Party, and Mr. Burns goes and now Bob Dole will read from The Necronomicon. Bob Dole comes to the podium. He's wearing, like, a black robe, and he starts chanting in Latin and reading from the book. It's perfect. Awesome. Yeah. I think my favorite is when it makes a very brief appearance in Friday the 13th Part Nine, jason goes to Hell. It's one of those things where the camera is just panning by and if you pay attention, you see, hey, that's The Necronomicon from the Evil Dead movies laying on a table or something. Yeah, it's just there in the shot. I mean, there's no reference to it. No one picks it up. Where was it? Was it like Jason's house? Yeah, it's towards the end of the movie. There's a few different references. I think you also, if you look you see a crate that's labeled Arctic Expedition. Nice. So fans of horror movies. You'll know what that's from too? Awesome. Jason Goes to Hell. That's it. Yeah, that was it. Also in Pumpkin Head Two. Also in Aquaticeen hunger force, which we love. Excellent. And the Real Ghostbusters the grim adventures of Billy and Mandy. And Metalocalypse. Thank you. You don't know Metal? What is that? That's the cartoon on Adult Swim that details the misadventures of a death metal band called Death Clock. You almost said adventures. Very nice catch. Misadventures much different. So this is actually in strict. Thank you so much for coming in. How do you say this? This is one of those every once in a while we'll do a podcast where, like, this is just the tip of the iceberg. Go read the article. You clearly should go read these articles if we picked your interest at all. First of all, go start reading Lovecraft. He's awesome. He was also an awesome person in real life. He had a woman that he lived with who was old enough to be his mother that he loved very much, but people posit that they never consummated their relationship. Is that correct? Yes. He was just an all around weird guy, but really sweet and cute and not really well. I think he does in that 1920 sort of eye. You're right. But he was an interesting character, an incredible writer, and strictly wrote two really good articles on them. So if you want to read more about it, you can go to housetofworks.com and type in Cthulhu. Cthulu. In the search bar. You could also type in necronomicon, which would be spelled N-E-C-R-O-N-O-M-I-C-O-N. Necronomicon. You can find both of those articles, and I think if you type either those words into Google in general, you're going to find a whole world await to you. Yes. Interesting stuff. Interesting way to waste some time, right? But you dare not speak it and look at it or you shall go insane. Clearly. And also, we can all look forward to the day the stars align and the stone city of Relay rises up out of the ocean, takes possession of the Earth again, and we are all screwed. Awesome. Or as we would say in Lovecraft Universe, ya, katolu fatigue. No better way to end than that. No better way to end than that. All right, well, since Strickland just said something that we can't pronounce ourselves, that means it's listener mail time. All right. So, Chuck, what do you have for us today? I'm just going to call this the saddest thing I've ever heard. Oh, no. This is from Vic in Lincolnshire, Illinois. It's a little lengthy, but I'm going to read it fast. Vic is a listener who has borrowed his daughter's ipod, and definitely he said it was kind of taking it over. It is the saddest thing I've ever heard. It is the end. And this came about as a suggestion that we do something on wrongful death lawsuits or just wrongful death, period. I don't like where this is going. Back in 1970, my dad had a heart attack and was hospitalized in the coronary care unit. They had trouble stabilizing his heart rhythm and decided to implant a temporary demand pacemaker. I guess in theory, when his heart needed to assist, the pacemaker would kick in and get things back on track. He went to visit him the next morning. We could tell that everything was kind of crazy in the CCU. People in a frenzy, all kinds of activity. And we stood beside my father talking to him. I was 16 years old, and I was fascinated with the oscilloscope on the shelf above his head, routinely drawing a regular pace heartbeat now familiar from all the medical shows in the last 40 years. Yes. Okay. The nurse on duty saw us at Dad's bed and quickly came over to clean them up for the visitors comas hair, shave them. She was running late and hurriedly plugged his electric shaver into the outlet, the same outlet as a temporary pacemaker power supply. Almost immediately, the heartbeat trace went wild on the monitor. I had my eyes on it the whole time. At first confused as to whether I was seeing electronic interference or actual interference with the beating of my dad's heart. It quickly became clear that it was the latter. My dad yelled, almost leaping out of bed, and fell back dead. Oh, my God. Right in front of his face at 16 in the hospital because the nurse plugged this thing in. Wow. Awful. No happy ending here. They tried in vain to revive my father, aged 59. A wrongful death lawsuit ensued, but my mother became too sick to go through with it. My understanding is that the pacemaker technology has vastly improved over the years. Not sure if there are other stories like mine. And here's a little interesting side note at the end in the CCU at 16, I noticed four little shelves about 7ft off the ground in the corners of the room. I asked the resident pastor what they were there for. He informed me that someone was doing an experiment with near death out of body experiences because of the high, quote, traffic in that room. Apparently there were cards with little shapes on them, one on top of the shelves. Had my dad been revived, they would have asked him if he recalled hovering above his bed and did he look down and see those shapes. Weird. So that is a side note. And Vic, it's a hell of a side note. This is a long time ago, and I wrote you back and said I was very sorry to hear about this, but it was a great story and thanks for sharing. And we will definitely add a wrongful death lawsuits to the suggestion box for sure. And. Thanks for sharing that. Yeah. Interesting and Awful Story if you have any interesting or awful stories, or you just want to say hi or what up or what does it mention? Unicorns, maybe? Sure, you can put it in email and send that to stuffpodcast@howtofworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Want more? HowStuffWorks? Check out our blogs on the Houseofworks.com homepage. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's criminal. Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you're you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…tial-debates.mp3	How Presidential Debates Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-presidential-debates-work	The first televised Presidential debate had some odd results: The radio audience tended to believe Nixon won, while television viewers supported Kennedy. Today, debates continue weld an enormous influence on public opinion. But how do they work?	The first televised Presidential debate had some odd results: The radio audience tended to believe Nixon won, while television viewers supported Kennedy. Today, debates continue weld an enormous influence on public opinion. But how do they work?	Thu, 10 Nov 2011 17:02:07 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2011, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=10, tm_hour=17, tm_min=2, tm_sec=7, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=314, tm_isdst=0)	33776198	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles. Www. You Chuck Bryant, one of the fanta girls, it turns out. What? Did you remember the fancy girl? Oh, don't you want that song? Yeah. Don't you want it? Don't you want something? And they were almost like the Fruit of the Loom guys. As a matter of fact, they possibly remarried. Yeah, that'd be an interesting offspring. That's what goes on in television in my head. Yeah. I'm drinking a fan of orange. This is why I brought it up. Yeah, I have one of these a couple of times a month. That's my indulgence. That's your indulgence? Well, that's my work indulgence. I got you. Okay, that's good. You got to separate work life from HomeLight. Checkers. Yes, you do. Are you happy? I am. Okay, are you ready to start? Yes. This can be a good one. And it's timely, which is always nice. Yeah, because the debates are going on right now. The presidential debates are going on right now? Yeah, the primary debates. The presidential debates. Yeah, but they're not official, are they? Well, we'll get to that. Well, that was my whole thing. Okay, so have you been watching them at all? I've watched a few of the Republican debates. I find it very entertaining and fun to watch. It is amazing how the horse race is just the best sports metaphor analogy for these debates overall. Yeah, but not just like a horse race. Like the kind like the tin horses, like at the carnival. Like that. Because Herman Cain alleged forward with his 999 plan and then MPR. Have you really heard about this 99 plan? Let's get into it. Herman Cain just kind of hangs his head and goes back a little bit. Mitt Romney is positioning forward and backward. Sure, but I was looking on Google News for something to open this up with. That's about all I came up with. But everywhere, everywhere you turn, everywhere you look, these are called presidential debates, Wayne. In fact, they are not presidential debates. True. They're GOP primary debates, and they are certainly not official presidential debates, which can only be carried out by one group called the Commission for Presidential Debates, which will get to the bottom of in this. Have you seen the Saturday Night Live sketch on the GOP debates thus far? No. It's pretty good. You know how I feel sorry for some of these candidates that just are clearly shoved to the outside by the rules, and they're ron Paul. Yeah, well, that was the joke. It showed Romney and Kane and Perry, and I think Bachmann was in there in the main room, and then it showed, like, a side room where they went to two other candidates. I can't remember. Santorum, maybe. So, yeah, Santorum. Santorum Huntsman. And actually it showed Santorum in a dance club. And then it showed Ron Paul and then it showed Ron Paul through a surveillance camera in the parking deck, and he was just standing there in the parking deck by himself. It's very representative of how these things kind of go down sometimes. It's clear that some of these candidates, just like you, might as well not even show up. Yeah, but good for Paul, because he does keep showing up no matter what. And they joke about it often. But the idea that a candidate cannot be treated fairly in these is just kind of mind blowing to me. But that's not even the official debates where it's pretty much like written down that you can mistreat candidates that aren't Republican or Democrat. Right, sure. So, Chuck, you're a big debater. You're in debate club. Are you familiar with that? You wear your blazer all the time. We didn't even have that at my school. I don't think we had it at my school either. But are you familiar with the history of debates in America? Presidential debates in America? I am now. Are you? Yeah. So what is it harken back to? Well, if you want to go back to the beginning, that seems to be where you were leading me. It all sort of started out in 1858 when a young buck named Abe Lincoln was running for senator against Stephen Douglas. And he had a little habit of following Douglas around on the campaign trail and during his speeches, which sort of heckle him from the audience. And they're like, well, we might as well debate since you're here, right? And he would also so Douglas is just like, I'm not talking to you. What are you talking about? So Lincoln would also just follow him step by step in Douglas'wake and be like, oh, you just heard from Douglas. Here's what I think about it. Sort of a rebuttal. So finally, Douglas agreed to it, which is pretty groundbreaking, and they had a series of, I think, like seven debates. It was about the existence of slavery. Douglas was pro devided country, slave states and free states. And Lincoln was like, this country can't survive like that. And Lincoln lost that election. And actually, when he ran for president in 1860, he didn't debate at all. But that was the beginning of presidential debates. There was no moderator. There was no format other than these two guys standing there debating one another for 3 hours. There was no TV, right? There was no Anderson Cooper. But that was the beginning of presidential debates in America. That's right. Out of a Senate race, no less. Out of a Senate race. And then it took a long hiatus, 15 election cycles until 1948, when there was an actual presidential debate on the radio between Republican primary conditioners Dewey and staffing. And that got big ratings. I think you have between 40 and 80 million people listen to this. Which was over a hot topic of the day, which was Communism. Outlawed Communism. Yeah. Certainly not endorsing it. No, it's like, how do you feel about Communism, presidential candidate? You like it? Yeah. And then four years later, there's a pretty groundbreaking debate hosted by the League of Women Voters, who have become huge in debates later on, but this is their first foray, and it was a big one. Yeah. I didn't realize how involved they were. It's pretty cool. Yeah, it is cool. The League of Women Voters in 1952 hosted a televised debate, the first televised debate ever, and it featured all of the candidates in both parties, in all parties for president. It's like what they call that in pro wrestling. Cage man. Battle Royale. Yeah. Which is in a cage, I think. Probably sometimes, not always. That's how I picture this debate, though. Yeah. And a lot of talking and murmuring. It was probably a very loud debate, but the League of Women Voters hosted this and then kind of went back out of the limelight again and debates it as well. Until the great debate. Right? Big B, big G, big G, big G, big D. Debate. Yeah. You're talking about kennedy Nixon in 1960. And this one was very famous because Nixon was in poor health, he had a staph infection. He's not feeling well, apparently. His gray suit blended into the background, making him look even more wan. And Kennedy rolled in there, like, all sunny California, handsome. I just met up with Marilyn Monroe look, and people are like, hey, this guy looks great. Yeah. And this is the first time the two party nominated candidates or nominees debated one another. Just the two? Yeah. And it was a televised debate. It basically established televised presidential debates as a force to be reckoned with in American politics, because a poll of radio listeners, they're just tens and tens of millions of people either listen to it on the radio or watch it on TV. And a poll of radio listeners found that a majority thought Nixon won. A poll of television viewers found that Kennedy won. In their opinion, that says it all. Yeah. And it was largely because now there were aesthetics involved. It wasn't just talkies squatting out of a box. Like you could see what the person looked like, and if you look terribly like Nixon did, you were going to lose. And this also led to what may be your best sentence in the history of your writing here. By the time the 21st century rolled around, they bore about the same resemblance to that first televised debate in 1960 as the game show in the movie The Running Man Bears. To you bet your life. Did you like that one? I did, yeah. I was delighted. I'm glad I read that. And I was like, choke. Like that sentence. It's fantastic. But you're right on the money with that. Yeah. 1960 changes everything. The great debate from that point on probably the thing that changed the most was the public came to expect debates. So now there is pressure on candidates, big time. Yeah. But there's this thing that candidates could use to their advantage from the Communications Act that established the FCC, and in that Communications Act was this thing called the equal time provision. And the equal time provision said, if you give me the exposure to a bona fide presidential candidate, you have to give the same amount of exposure to that same to his rivals in the election. Right. Yeah. And that meant that if you said, I'm not going to come to this debate, that pretty much canceled the debate. Yeah. Because you couldn't just let that person have the stage. It disqualified the equal time provision. Yeah. And it probably didn't look great to not debate, but it looked better than going on a debate and getting your butt handed to you on TV, as Nixon did again and again and lost that 1960 election largely because of that. There's debates with JFK, the televised versions of them at least. Right. And yeah, you get bad press for a news cycle or two in the newspaper that only hoarders keep, but on television that makes a really big impression. So yeah. Nixon himself used his presidential veto power to keep the FCC from repealing the equal time provision so that candidates couldn't do that any longer. Right. So he could keep dodging debates whenever he wanted to. Exactly. That's why they call him Tricky Dick. That is right. One reason. Yeah. So in the debates were in bad shape until the LWV League of Women Voters stepped back in and said, you know what, we need to clean up this thing and we are women here as Roar. Right. Let's give a little background on them. They were born out of the suffrage movement. That's right. The League of Women Voters was because prior to, I think, the 19th Amendment, which was passed in 20, you didn't have women voters. So right. When the 20th Amendment or the 19th Amendment passed in 1920, all of a sudden you did. So the suffrage movement translated to the League of Women Voters and said, okay, now go forth and start shaping public policy through your votes. That's right. So, yay, League of Women Voters stepping in to take care of business and make sure these things go off in a fair way. Yeah. Because they were just getting hammered anyway they could. But it wasn't just the League of Women Voters, it was the FCC had a ruling as well that allowed entree for the League of Women Voters to step in. Was that when they declared it a debate, a bona fide news event. Yeah. And so they said, there's a news event if you host a third party hosted, then we have an exemption for the equal time provision all of a sudden. Which means now you have to debate. The debate goes on without you. Well, yeah, you don't have to debate, but you look really bad if you're not showing up. Right. Like Carter did. Carter refused to debate Reagan, Anderson, and John Anderson, I think his name is, who is an independent candidate. And so Reagan was like, I'll do it. And Anderson was like, I'll do it. And they debated without Carter that perhaps lost the election for him. That was a contributing factor in the other thing. Contributing factor? Yeah. I would say the oil embargo, the loss of Delta Force, seeking out the Iran hostages. There are a lot of things going against Carter. He's done his best work since then. Oh, yeah. He's a statesman. So the LVW, they took the reins from 76 to 84 or 88 because they stepped in as a neutral party that was needed to fulfill that SEC ruling. So they said, we need a good format. We need to split these formats into categories based on the types of or not the types, but how the questions are asked. And they used an open format which allowed follow up questions among the candidates, which was really a big deal because you can't use your rehearsed. I mean, you can do it as much as you can, but you can also get caught off guard and get that great spontaneity that you're looking for out of your president or lack of. Right. Well, that was the thing. That's the big problem is, like, you've got your guy who now has to debate and who is debating on television, who can just blow it all after a debate or two. You can just completely blow everything. Or like Herman Cain came out of nowhere, just like a businessman from Georgia, millionaire, nine nine. Right. He came up with this plan and did really well in a couple of debates and just shot to the front. He passed Romney, I think, in poles for a little bit. So debates can really send you to the front of the pack or can just basically kill all of your chances. Political strategists don't like that at all. Campaign managers don't like that. They like to control everything. Well, this was the heyday, though, then, right? When the League of Women Voters were running the show. It was the heyday of presidential debates for sure. If you were a voter. Yeah. If you were a candidate, it was like hell on earth. It was terrifying. Yeah, but that's how it should be, right? Not hell on Earth, but at least like, spontaneous and real and not rehearsed. Right. So the League of Women Voters, they did not acquiesce to any demands of any candidates. They made very sure that all candidates who were qualified got equal time. Yeah, it was a really fair debate. And the Republicans and Democrats did not like this. They gave Ferrar a little more time, didn't they? They gave Geraldine Ferraro just a bit more time. Right? Yeah. What was that? 84 maybe so. Yeah. She's Mondale's. Yes. So the League of Women Voters kind of, I guess, made enemies out of the Democrats and Republicans who are like, Wait a minute, wait a minute. This is, in effect, a two party system, so we're pretty powerful, so let's get together. And they started in 1984. They said. You know what? We're going to veto 100 of the panelists you propose, and we're both going to do it. They basically shut it down. Yeah. They took control from the League of Women Voters, and the death knell came in the 1988 campaign between George H. W. Bush's campaign and Michael Du caucus campaign, which got together and created what's called a Memorandum of Understanding. Yeah. And they basically I loved it. It took political candidates don't want to look like Dummies to finally bring the two parties together on one thing. They're like, well, we can agree on this, right? Yeah. And they did. And the Memorandum of Understanding was a little secret document that said who could be in the audience in the 88 debates, who could be a panelist? No more follow up questions. And these are the terms. And the League of Women Voters said, that stinks because now we're just hosting this event, so screw you. Well, they said that they resigned as basically the hosts of presidential debates. Yes. I loved that they cited fraud on the American voter. That's pretty harsh. Yeah. And so the Democrats and the Republicans were like, well, okay, perfect. That's not bad. We got rid of the League of Women Voters, but we still need a neutral party. Who is a neutral party? Oh, I've got an idea. We'll create one from scratch. We'll create a neutral party together that we can control. Exactly. Another neutral called the Commission on Presidential Debates, which is a joint, nonprofit, bipartisan organization. And that is a very important word, not nonpartisan like the League of Women Voter. Sure. Bipartisan. Yeah. That means we represent two things, right? Republicans and Democrats. That's exactly right. So the CPD, the Commission on Presidential Debate, was established in 1088, took over hosting presidential debates. It became the only organization that could legitimately host an official presidential debate, scheduled four of them for a presidential election, one of which is always a vice presidential debate. Those are always fun. Yeah. And it does a lot for the Democrats and the Republicans, Chuck. Yeah. They have to obviously, it starts about a year out because it takes a lot of time to plan. They have to pick the location. They have to pick the moderators. The locations are it's a little tricky because you want a neutral site, and when you have a panel of candidates up there, they're from all over the country, a lot of times are at colleges. And so it obviously can't be tied to that candidate in any way. Right. It can't be there. Alma mater. Yeah. So it takes a while to get everything lined up and probably in the back room, secretly approved by everybody. Exactly. Because it's like, well, I want this podium to be this high because I can't look short on camera, and my candidate likes the debate hall temperature at this. Yeah. And what's the background look like? We don't want you fading away like Richard Nixon. Right. But even the CPD provides an even bigger function for Democrats and Republicans that acts as a shield. So it can issue some really unpopular decisions, but it's not beholden to the public at all. Sure. It answers only to the Democrats and Republicans. And since it acts as a shield, everybody gets mad at the Commission on Presidential Debates, when really it was the two campaigns that came up with that decision. Yeah, like Perot happened with Pero in 92. Everyone remembers Rothborough, and that was pretty bad. Perot, actually, and he was from the Reform Party, had just a 7% rating before the debates on Election Day. Got about 19% of the vote, which is a huge jump. The biggest ever. So in 1996, when he reared his little head again, dolan Clinton both said, we don't want to debate this guy. We don't want him around. And so essentially, the SEC changed the provision. Oh, I'm sorry, the CPD said you're not coming because of the Equal time provision had been canceled. Right. And that was the shield. So even though Clinton and Dole were behind it, it was really the CPD who put the press release out there. So they took the hit for it. Right. And some poll found that 6% of voters blame the Clinton campaign for it. 19% blame the Dole campaign, but 50% blame the Commission on Presidential Debates. So shield activated. Yes. And they also got rid of any kind of spontaneity where if you watch presidential debates now, they're basically like they're just press releases. Yeah. Campaigns. There's no follow up questions. There's just like, here's the question that you've known for three weeks we're going to ask you. Let's hear your answer. So it's just completely managed and massaged. And they were criticized, too. Yeah. John Kerry had a good criticism in 2000. He said, quote, you could have picked ten people off the street who didn't know Jerusalem from Georgia and they would have had better questions. So that's where we stand right now. The Commission on Presidential Debates still runs the show as much they play it a little looser, though. Like, these candidates sort of run over the rules. Like barring someone like Anderson Cooper coming out there and taping someone's mouth shut. You still see them, like, running over the time. And I remember when Bush and Gore debated one another. There's just so much sniping about what I was supposed to have my time, and he had his time, so I'm going to take extra time. And it sort of gets out of hand. Was it a presidential debate or primary debate? No. Bush and gore when it's a primary debate. Well, no, but was it like hosted by CNN or something like that, or was it official? You know, I don't remember. I mean, it was the famous one where they started showing reaction shots and it showed George Bush getting all perturbed each time. Gore, they had the split screen up, basically. So that one was 2004 between Kerry and Bush. Well, they did the same thing with Gore. Okay. I watched it earlier and George Bush's annoyed. Well, they just showed a split screen. So while Gore was talking, it showed Bush's reactions the whole time and then vice versa. Right. And apparently there is a memorandum of understanding that the networks were just like, no, we're not going to do that. We're going to film breakaway shots. That may have been a CNN thing, though. You're right, it may not have been official. Let's see what else. Chuck well, what makes an ideal debate? We've pooped it. What makes a good one? Well, a good one, like you said, it needs to be fair. So the CPD is doing some stuff fairly, like not holding a debate at the alma mater of one of the candidates or their home state or their hometown or anything like that. Yeah. And you also pointed out that it's usually a bigger city, too, because you have to have 3000 available hotel rooms and pay a $7,500 application fee. So that rules out anywhere in Kansas, right? Pretty much, yeah. There's also the division of time is very important. Sure. Most of the time, candidates will almost always get time at the beginning. Sure. And at the end, and then in the middle, that's where it kind of gets wild and crazy. Like, how are you going to divide the time? Is there going to be rebuttals? Are you going to allow cross examination? That's very rare. But ideally everybody has equal time in the middle. And then you usually have like a moderator. Yeah, there's three formats, basically. Well, there's moderator, panel, and town hall. And there's almost always a moderator no matter what. And all three of them. Yeah. And the panelists, like you said, there still could be a moderator, but you just have more than one person replacing so there's a moderator replacing the moderator with a panel, but you still have a moderator. Right. Sort of confusing. It is. And then town hall is usually the audience asking question. Yeah. Cost examining the candidate. That's a very rare one, too, because anything can happen. Somebody could go off script. Yeah, that's true. You have to actually qualify for debate. You can't just say, hi, I'm Joe Walsh, and I'm running for president. And I want to be on there singing Rocky Mountain Way. Yeah. The rules for qualifying for a debater that has to be statistically possible for you to win in the Electoral College. So your name has to appear on a certain amount of state ballots, right? Yeah. And you have to have a 15% voter support before the debate. Right. But if you qualify for that, and a lot of people do, then you can be in these debates. Supposedly, that was a League of Women Voters stuff. I wasn't so some of that still carried over. That's good. So these things are important, though, nonetheless, because nowadays you're influenced almost as much by what everyone says about the debate as the debate itself, because immediately after and actually even during sometimes the debates, the networks and the cable stations and the Internet will start saying, well, who won? This was strong. He was strong here, she was strong there. They pull people immediately afterward, either on the Internet or by telephone, and sort of say, well, this is who one, regardless of what you think. Well, yeah. And then once the polls released, it's like, yeah, your perception is affected. It's all about perception. If you were maybe on the fence before, it's like, oh, well, everybody else thinks they won, and then, heck yeah, they won. Of course, there are some classic examples of clear winners and losers in debates. Like, you mentioned George Bush, like, looking annoyed during breakaway shots that he won. He still won. I think his father was caught looking at his watch a bunch of times during the 1992 debate. Yeah. Clinton, that was pretty big. Dan Quayle, in the vice presidential debate, he compared himself do you remember this? Oh, yeah, man, big mistake. He compared himself to this is Dan Quayle. He compared himself to John F. Kennedy. Well, it was a loose comparison, though, and I don't remember the exact quote, but I think he was probably talking about his youth in vigor. Yeah. But I think I remember at the time feeling like he got shut down by Lloyd Benson. Lloyd Benson. I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. And you Senator. I know. Jack Kennedy. I remember feeling at times like he wasn't really saying he was like Jack Kennedy. Yeah, it felt sort of bad for him. But Benson pounced on him. He pounced on them just like Reagan did. And I watched that clip earlier, too. He got a good laugh in the Mondale debate when I can't remember the moderator. But he asked Reagan about his health and his age as the oldest candidate, and they said, you appeared tired recently after your meetings in Russia, and quite honestly, do you have what it takes health wise to be president or to remain president? I think it was reelection, wasn't it? Yeah, because it would be carter and he said, I'm not going to bring age into this equation. I don't want to exploit for political purposes the youth and inexperience of my candidate or my rival. And Mondale even busted out laughing. It was a very nice, light moment. Mondale was awesome. He loved a good joke, even when he was the butt of it. Yeah, he was that kind of guy. At least he was in that case. He was the 80s George McGovern. So, Chuck, we talked about the 1960, the great debate changing everything. Television changed everything. Sure. And then the two political parties wrestled that change and used it to their advantage. But now social media is starting to have that impact and it really kind of popped up most. For the first time in 2008, there was like, the CNN YouTube town halls, which are pretty cool, but people were allowed to submit questions on YouTube, and then the two campaigns got to choose what questions were answered or chose, which they were criticized for. Yeah, but MySpace and MTV held town halls. And what's MySpace? It's some social media site. I think it's like GetGlue or something like that. But it has cobwebs on it. Yeah, it's weird. I guess it's for Halloween, though. Got you. But the MySpace, MTV, town hall, I think they were town hall formats. The moderator chose questions as they came in live, so that was like a triumph. Yeah, tech geeks loved it. Yeah, but I mean, think about it. That's reinjecting spontaneity through social media. Yeah, true. I'm sure Facebook was involved in this last or not involved, but certainly lit up. Well, they picked who won. They did. Yeah. Okay. Mark Zuckerberg and Eric Schmidt decided who it was and that Twitter played a part too, right? Yeah. There was that debate between McCain and Barack Obama or their surrogates who knew how to use Twitter, and they were responding to questions from a moderator from time in 140 characters or less. I'm sure McCain had no idea what Twitter was at the time. Do you remember there was this one debate between it was an official debate between Obama and McCain, and McCain looked like he was just wandering around this set, like he didn't know where he was supposed to be. And then Obama seemed like a schoolboy. Like when the moderator was like, your time is up, he'd stop real quick and look at him like, Am I in trouble? Yeah. And I was like, These are the two guys. Huh. Well, that just proves, though, how, like, influence the perception in television, even from a silly, like, going to commercial break shot of like, McCain wandering around or something while Obama was answering, he's just wandering around. It was something, but yeah, influenced my perception yeah, but it influenced my perception of Obama, too, that he wasn't quite ready. Yeah, something else. That television, huh? Yeah. Let's go vote, Chuck. Let's go vote for something. Yeah, I'll vote. Did you feel like voting on something suffrage? That's already been done. Okay. If you want to read a really literary article on presidential debates written by me, chuck is not a big fan of it. I don't blame him. It's cool. That was good. You can type in presidential debates in the search bar@howstuffworks.com. Yeah. Yes. Which brings up listener. Mail Josh. Occasionally we like to shout out to our troops overseas. We're doing that right now. Okay. Hi, guys. Norm, who is Lizelle's husband, norm is currently stationed because we had converged back and forth. That's why it seems very casual here. Norm is currently stationed at Fob Solano in Afghanistan. What is that? Front Operating Base. Forward Operating Base. Sounds right in the 352nd Combat Support Hospital in the coast province. That is K-H-O-S-T cost Province. He is a trauma nurse working the evening shifts and will be there until the end of February 2012. Mini in his unit are working twelve hour shifts five to six days a week, providing medical care to both US troops and Afghan civilians. Right now, his family basically is the unit in Afghanistan. So I was wondering if you can give a shout out to him and his CSH or even do a show about how medical combat support hospitals work. That would really help make him and others in his unit happy. A lot of them are kind of blue right now, obviously, for being in the same place, doing the same thing day in and day out while handling the trauma there. North secretly wishes that you and Josh would be a part of the USO. And travel and share your show with folks abroad. I would go to Afghanistan. I would totally do that. I've listed a site which will give you more information on the people who have given a year or more to help our country. So if you guys want to go check out what combat support hospitals are like, you can go to Operationsupportsalerno.org, and that is Salerno.org soldiersupport, so operations in advance. And that is from Lizelleth. Nice. Lizelle. My brother in law is going back for a year. No way. Yeah. Where's he going? He's going Afghanistan. Oh, really? In January. Wow. What did he do there? He is a Marine colonel, helicopter pilot. And dude, he is in line to become a general. No way. Like, how cool is that? That's really cool. So we're all rooting for him for that. Yeah, I'll bet. Some sort of social media effort on his behalf. I don't think they could consider that. Are you sure? Yeah. It's quite a force to be reckoned with. He'll make it. He's always been in the head of the class. He's one of those guys. So also, if you want to know what a forward operating based hospital is like, you can just watch Mash. Sure. I'm sure it's a pretty accurate depiction. Yeah, they just sit around and drink homemade whisker on my gin. Thank you, Lucille. We appreciate that. And good luck to you and Norm. And good luck to your brother in law, Chuck. Stay safe, everybody. Yeah. If you want to let us know how your family's doing or interested, we want to hear. You can tweet to us at syskast. You can join us on Facebook. Big party over there. It's Facebook. Comstuckysheaknow. And you can send an email in support of Chuck's brother in law to Stuff podcast@howstuffworks.com. Be sure to check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join Housetopworks staff as we explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun's shining, the daylight's longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music. My favorite murder from exactly right media. My favorite murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilguera and Georgia Hardstark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before or you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/netstorage.discovery.com/DMC-FEEDS/MED/podcasts/2008/1224601081881hsw-sysk-govt-bailout.mp3	How the Bailout Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-bailout-works	The economy imploded as US banks reaped the consequences of subprime mortgage trades. Controversially, Congress has provided emergency funding for the banks. Learn more about the agreement between Washington and Wall Street in this HowStuffWorks podcast.	The economy imploded as US banks reaped the consequences of subprime mortgage trades. Controversially, Congress has provided emergency funding for the banks. Learn more about the agreement between Washington and Wall Street in this HowStuffWorks podcast.	Tue, 21 Oct 2008 15:38:38 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2008, tm_mon=10, tm_mday=21, tm_hour=15, tm_min=38, tm_sec=38, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=295, tm_isdst=0)	22029523	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Ah, summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good, it's Criminal Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should Know from Howstafworks.com. This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com, the Internet's leading provider of spoken word entertainment. Get a free audiobook download of your choice when you sign up today. Log on to audiblepodcast. Comstoday for details. Hey, welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh. This is Chuck. Nothing. I'm here. All right. Sorry. Chuck is here. I want to do it or not. Keep everyone in suspense. Is Chuck here? Well, we need to be the violin. Chuck, you watch Criminal Minds. I don't. Do you watch private practice? I don't. Biggest Loser? No. What about okay, this is the fourth and last network. What about Till Death? I never even heard of it. Okay. How much comedy? How much cartoons? Till death is a comedy. But sorry. Had you watched any of these shows, had you been a big fan on Wednesday, September 24, you would have been very upset because they were all preempted. I bet they were all preempted already. You're well aware the economy is in the toilet. It is. All you want to do is sit back and watch your favorite celebrities lose weight or watch Brad Garrett tussle verbally with his wife or whatever Private Practice does. I'm not fully aware. Practicing private things. Exactly. You want to escape through these and all of a sudden, here's George Bush laying it out there. This is a president who has avoided using the word recession in public, and all of a sudden he's basically white knuckling the podium with the presidential seal in front saying, we're all going to die. Maybe he just wanted to skip straight to depression just for kicks, I guess. Avoid recession, avoid recession, go right to depression. I don't know that he used the word depression. No, of course not, but he may as well have. It was bad. He said, our entire economy is in danger. It was one quote from that very great address. Unusual writer. He doesn't usually do this kind of thing. Right. I think he should have followed that sentence up immediately with good luck to whoever's coming next. Exactly. Yeah. So long and good luck or whatever. Right? Yeah. So this is kind of a big deal, and I think Bush addressing on a Thursday for no other reason than to tell Americans that the economy is in danger. It kind of really made it a bigger point. And the reason he went on was because he was trying to garner public opinion for the Paulson plan, also known as the 700 billion dollar bailout. Yeah. Aka just the bailout. I think people are calling it bailout. Yeah. That's the word on the street. It is. And it's not hyphenated for our listeners. It's not two words, it's one word. This is AP right here, okay? Not us. So he's on there, he's talking about the bail out. Why would he care? Why would he care what Americans think? I'll tell you why, Chuck. You didn't even let me answer. But yeah, sure. Earlier that week, it looked like Congress is going to pass it. Everybody was patting one another on the back for bipartisanship, you remember? Oh, yeah. Look how Senate, Democrat, Republican, the leaders are saying, we're passing this. Right? Yeah. And it starts to go into the House and they bring it to a vote, and all of a sudden, these rank and file Republicans, they just revolt and they're like, hey, how about this? We've got another plan, and it's nothing like yours. Right. So ultimately the House defeats the bill. Sure. Something like that. Yeah, I think it was exactly. That two are really good. It's right here in front of me. Memory like a bear trap there, Chuck. Okay, so the House defeats the bill. It looks like it's sunk. There's people screaming in terror, dogs and cats living together. Mass hysteria. Right. And Bush has already played his one ace in the hole by addressing the nation. The only thing next he could do would like to kneecap somebody, maybe a figure skater on public television to get our attention. Right. Who would do that, though? I don't know. Terrible. Terrible. So it looks like the bill is defeated and all of a sudden, here comes the Senate on the white horse. Exactly. Now, the House is usually kind of the congressional body that's known for shouting down things and trying things on the fly. The Senate supposed to be wise and sedate and calm, and all of a sudden they're taking up a failed House bill. Basically. Sweetening. It like they attached a very popular mental health bill. Did you know that? Now health care providers have to treat mental health like they treat physical maladies. Well, that's good. Yeah, it is good. Which is one of the reasons why they put it in this bill. So it passed. There's also a lot of pork in there, though. There is manufacturers of wooden arrows that I think Boy Scouts favor. Get some subsidies out of that. Yeah. And then there's the extension of expiring tax breaks for the wealthy. Right. Although there's also some tax relief for the middle class. New tax relief in there. Right. And I know one important thing they did was raise the FDIC's insurance coverage for people's banks accounts. Yeah. Which is huge because banks like Wachovia and Washington Mutual are going under. Right. And I mean, these are neighborhood branch commercial banks where you keep your money and all of a sudden way, the bank's front door is locked at 02:00 P.m. On a Tuesday. I was one of them. Really? Not one of the banks, but one of those institutions. I'm not going to divulge too much, but yeah, we're good for a little while. That's good. Well, I'm not going to name my bank either, but I'm very confident in it. Recently purchased Countrywide, among other things. So I'm feeling pretty good about my bank, which is under your mattress. Knock on wood there. I don't want to tempt the gods. Okay. The Senate takes up the bill and they add the sweeteners and they cough up Senate Amendment 56 85, which is the Paulson plan with the mental health bill, the FDIC increase Paulson Plan Plus is what I like to call it. It's a great name for it. We should have called it that. This is the same day they passed it, the same day that they took this up. Right. Congress never acts this fast. Even more amazing, two days later, the House gets it that day. They pass it. I think they passed it at like 1230 and they started deliberating on it at ten in the morning and passed it two and a half hours later. Yeah. I wondered when it happened, if no one really knows this, probably, but if it was the sweeteners, actually, or if the House kind of ended up with some egg on their face with the first vote and realized that everyone was really freaked out by the fact that they defeated it. Well, number one, I think Bush's address actually did have a real impact. I watched a lot of CNN I actually watched CNN live as the House was voting on this amendment. And there were a lot of Congressmen or Congress people who said that they switched their vote because the calls that they were getting from their office changed from, I don't like this bailout package, to you've got to vote for this bailout package. Right. And that actually changed votes. And you can probably directly link that to Bush looking very tired and haggard and scared on Wednesday, September 24. Right. So I think that's one of the reasons why the House actually passed. You know, my uncle is a former congressman. I should give him a call and see what he thinks about the whole thing. Where is he from? Yeah, he's a congressman in Tennessee. Two or three terms, I think. That's great. Yeah, good for him. Okay, so it passes. Right? Right. And it's actually no longer a 700 billion dollar bailout. The bailout is 700 billion, but this bill actually hiked it up to an $810,000,000,000 bill. Did you know that? I didn't know that. What's the extras? Yeah, like it matters. And the weird thing is taxes these days you don't really feel a pinch. Like you think about the government shelling out $700 billion. How are we going to feel that pinch? Right. And, you know, actually, for every American that's I think $2,300 a person, every American taxpayer non. So we're going to feel the pinch somewhere, right? Or are we? Let's get into this bill, Chuck. Okay. Let's get into the meat of it. Let's do it. So you want to lead off with what are some of the things that are inside I see by you bearing your teeth. Are you cool? Well, I know that one of the things they signed off on was an immediate 350,000,000,000. They kind of did it in stages, which yeah, I'm no economist, but it seems to be kind of the smarter way to go. 350,000,000,000 upfront and taxpayer money and then the newly created Office of Financial Stability, which we hope it ends up living up to its name. Another 350 I'm sorry, another 100 billion after that and then another 250 after that. But both of those needs approval by Congress. Yeah. And I think the first one, the 100 billion has to get approval from the House and the second 250,000,000,000 is contingent upon Senate approval, I think. But either way yeah. Congress has to approve these and they'll approve them if this whole thing is working right. I don't see them saying no, though. No, I don't either. I think in for 350,000,000,000 and for 350,000,000,000. Right. Plus it would kind of be a sign that, hey, we did the wrong thing by allowing this 1st 350,000,000,000. I don't think they would do that either. Yeah, I agree. Time will tell. I agree. So like you said, this bill establishes a brand new office. We're going to have a brand new office, like you said, the Office of Financial Stability. And this is led by the Treasury Secretary, not necessarily Henry Paulson, but whoever is the well, they just named, actually yesterday, the new bailout chief. Oh, really? Who? Yeah. You don't even know this? No. His name is Neil Kashkarai and this guy is 35 years old. Holy cow. Yes. And he's going to be in charge of doling out the cash. He's overseeing the Office of Financial Stability. He was previously a vice president at Goldman Sachs. And before his career in finance, he developed technology for NASA space missions. So this guy was clearly doing things in college that I wasn't doing. Yeah. At 35, that's not a very long existence. Now he seems to be sharp guy. Okay, so we have a brand new Czar of economic stability, I guess fresh meat. I'll bet you he ages 20 years over the next six months. Yeah. So basically what this guy is going to be in charge of, essentially, is buying up terrible investments that investment banks and other kinds of firms have on their hands. What a weird job. It is a weird job. It's never been done before, as far as I know, basically, there are certain types of investments that can be bought, and all of them are related to mortgages. You've got, like, mortgage backed securities. I think collateral debt obligations would be purchased under this and mortgages themselves, which I thought was kind of cool. Yeah. Because this is actually one way that it could directly benefit a homeowner. One of the provisions in this act is that when this guy what's his name again? Neil Kashkarai, or Kashkari, I'm not sure how you pronounce it. Let's call him Kashkari. Okay. When Kashkarai is negotiating with these investment banks and other people to purchase their bad securities, he's going to try to force down their throat restructuring of the mortgages. Right. The hope for homeowners act. Yeah. The big problem with that and what it is, is it's basically congressional support for restructuring loans sure. Knocking down the principal, which is pretty radical. You borrow $400,000 for a house, you can't afford it, and all of a sudden we're just going to pretend like you only borrowed $200,000. That's huge. The thing is, it's a voluntary program. I think you probably get, like, tax rebates or write offs if you're a company or a lender that engages in this. But you can't force anybody to do it. Right. If the US. Government actually owns your mortgage, chances are they're going to be very hesitant about foreclosing on you. Number one, that's just a huge pain. Right. But number two, they actually have a vested interest then to keep you in your house. Right. Okay. The reason being, if they can stem the tide of foreclosures, then the market starts to come back up and these mortgage backed securities and mortgages themselves increase in value, all of a sudden they're worth more and the plan works. Right. So if the government buys your mortgage, you should probably think you're lucky stars. Right. This is all theoretical. None of it has been put into practice yet. Right. Which is, I think, why a lot of people are kind of nervous about this bailout. Right, right. I know I am. I do know that foreclosures actually nobody wins in foreclosure because I did some research. Actually, I wrote an article on it last year, and it's not like banks foreclose on people and they're just we kick you out of the house. Banks lose money, too. Sure. But like we've mentioned before, the mortgage backed securities, sometimes the banks don't even own that house. They turn around and sell it to securities and it gets fractured often. So maybe that's kind of where the problem started. Well, you know who does win in a foreclosure? Someone who's renting right now. Right. If you are a renter and you don't buy in this climate, you're a total sucker. Yeah. It's probably a good time to buy. Oh, it's an excellent time to buy. It's like a fire sale out there. Said it before, I'll say it again. Right. Get your act together, buddy. Get in a house. Yeah. Thanks. Okay, so it's not the only thing that this Koshkari is going to be doing. This guy's got a lot of responsibility. I'm not sure he knows what he's getting into. And frankly, I have to say, I find it a little fishy that Henry Paulson is a former high level executive at Goldman Sachs, and he taps this guy from Goldman Sachs. Yeah. And you could say, well, he knows them, he's worked with them, he respects him. But I believe he already knows that I like one investment bank being so entrenched in this bailout. Actually, I think he actually worked in the office, in the treasury office. He was previously with Goldman Sachs. But I know what you mean. I got you. It's his influence. Is he, like, Paulson's protege or something? I don't know. Maybe kashkari? Yeah. Okay, so there's other things that Kashkari is going to be in charge of. Like when the government purchases $300 million or more of bad investments from a lender, whoever automatically, automatically take a warrant in your company. Right. This is a non voting block of shares. Just common stock shares. Right? Right. And this is actually really ingenious. Chuck, you want to tell everybody why? Well, I don't know why. Let me tell you why, all right? You're the econ master. This is straight from Kashkari to me to you. Okay. Actually, that's not true at all. We should probably cut that part out. The reason why it's such an ingenious provision is because no one has any idea how to value these mortgage backed securities. Right? I read an article with a guy who is, like, this expert at valuing a stock that you found in your grandfather's closet from 1923 or something. This guy could value it. This guy and everyone else is totally lost at properly valuing mortgage backed securities and CDOs and just all these other bad investments, right? So whatever price the government sets to buy these at, it could be way too low. Right. So if you are a company selling this to the government, and you end up experiencing a windfall profit from the sale, which you're not supposed to be, the government's covered on the backside because they own shares in your company now. Right? So if you experience a profit, your price per share rises and the government gets something out of it because they own those shares. Right. And in theory, ultimately, the taxpayer, it would come back to us. I'm not holding their breath, but what we want is for this bailout to work. Yeah. And technically, it could work. I mean, if you think about it, right? If the government buys up $700 billion worth of mortgage backed securities or mortgages or whatever, and all of a sudden, the market stabilizes because of it, and maybe over the course of a couple of years, maybe a decade, who knows? The market comes back into full swing. These things don't just disappear. They don't just vanish. The government's not going to take these securities and throw them in a furnace. They're going to sit on them. Basically. I think, as Bush put it there, the US. Government is the only institution large enough to buy these and sit on them for a while. Right. And then once the market rises, these things increase in value. When the government sells them, if they sell them well and not flood the market with these things, then we should, as taxpayers, see a windfall from that. Right. If the combined value of all these things doubled and not all of them are worthless, there are some good mortgage backed securities out there still, but they just have a bad name and no one wants them. Right. When they increase in value, I mean, even if they double that's $1.4 trillion from the sale and half of that being pure profit, that would be pretty good. It would. Whether that happens or not, it remains to be seen. Right. You know what I think would be interesting is if all of a sudden they put out this big plan. Bush says, we're the only people institution big enough to do this, and all of a sudden, like, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett stroll up behind him and say, not so fast. We've got our own plan, and they just bought up $800 billion worth of bad investment. Well, Warren Buffett has been on a buying spree right now. Well, of course, it's not just a good time to buy a house or foreclosed house. It's a good time to buy stocks again. It's like fire sale out there. Crazy, but, yeah. Apparently, from what I understand, from watching the recent second presidential debate, is that Obama may tap Warren Buffett for Treasury Secretary. I would be all for it. It makes a lot of sense. Sure. Yeah. So anything else in this provision may be of the golden parachute? Ill yeah, that's the one thing that I know probably made a lot of people feel a little bit better is the famous golden parachute. A lot of times when companies go under, like the big Enron thing you remember, the executives are the ones that come out on top and the investors lose all their money. These executives get these huge payouts at the end and just kind of sneak out the back door and buy their islands in Bermuda. And I know this calls for no golden parachutes. These big multi million dollar severance packages are not going to happen. No. And specifically, your top five executives, any salary over 500 grand can't be deducted as an expense. Right. So that, in theory, should limit companies from doing it. There are some problems with that, though. What's that? That's just your top five executives. Right, sure. Another problem with it is that the cap there's already a cap that exists, but it's at 1 million. You can't deduct any salary over 1 million. So really, for a major company, all it's going to be is 2.5 million in lost deductions, which is nothing. Right. The other problem, this is the biggest problem. There is no provision in the golden parachute clause of this law, the bailout bill, that says anything about stock options. Think about it. You let an outgoing CEO go. You're like, you did a terrible job managing, but here, take all these stock options, right? We're going to value them at today's terrible market price. Just hold off a couple of years, the market is going to come back and you cash in your options and you're just richer than an astronaut. Right. I'm glad you said that, because I didn't even know that. But that's what I was just about to say, is the way these guys operate, I had a feeling there's always some back door where they get theirs. Yeah, and they will. There's not going to be any way of going around it. The only thing I think that we can hope for is that there should be widespread investigation and probably criminal lawsuits against a lot of the people who are running the show. Yeah, I think this will be under the microscope more than other little quieter bills that go through. I think so, too. So if you want to know anything more about this, I would strongly recommend you exercise your civic duty and read how will the government spend the 700 billion dollar bailout funds on HowStuffWorks.com? And stick around to find out one more reason why you shouldn't wear a bluetooth headset. But first, chuck a message from our sponsor. Hey, everyone. When you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office? And you could be using Stamps.com. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses. Because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right from your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary. And you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to Stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. Josh, what's the first reason that you shouldn't wear a bluetooth headset? I know you don't like the way awkward fashion looks. It's my personal opinion. I know a lot of people like well, you're styled right out of The Preppy Handbook, if I may say so. I do my best, which is good. That's a good book. My sister used to have that when I was growing up. Yeah, me too. Did you really? Yes, I used to read it on the john. It's very cool. It's a cool book. If I remember correctly, she also had how to speak like a valley girl, I think. Yeah, I skipped that one, for sure. Yeah, that's probably for the best. So, yeah, the name of the article is How Bluetooth Surveillance Works. And apparently, if you wear these things, people know where you are, so how Chuck? Well, if you have a bluetooth headset and you have it turned on, from my understanding, you can get blue jacked. Is that right? Blue Jacking? Yeah, bluejacking is the term, and it emits a signal and other people bluetooth can actually tell where you are. If you're into privacy, if you're into privacy, make sure you read How Bluetooth Surveillance Works on howsteporks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseoffworks.com. Let us know what you think. Send an email to podcast@houseoffworks.com brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun is shining, the daylights longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music, My Favorite Murder from exactly right media, my Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarriff in Georgia Hardstark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
20f86990-121b-11eb-85ed-cf86b48b3b54	Short Stuff: Madam C.J. Walker	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/short-stuff-madam-c-j-walker	Join us today as we dive into the story of the first female self-made millionaire, Madam C.J. Walker.	Join us today as we dive into the story of the first female self-made millionaire, Madam C.J. Walker.	Wed, 21 Apr 2021 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2021, tm_mon=4, tm_mday=21, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=2, tm_yday=111, tm_isdst=0)	12531716	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh. There's Chuck. Dave's here in spirit. Jerry's here in spirit. Who else is here in spirit? We can't say because we can't see spirits because we're among the living. This is shorts stuff. Let's go. This is the story of Madam CJ. Walker, who Guinness Book of World's Record says is the first self made female millionaire in the world. Yeah. Not African American, female or woman millionaire. Straight up first woman in America to be a millionaire through her own work in hard labor. That's right. It's a more succinct way of putting she has a very cool story. She was the daughter of Sharecroppers and ended up building this huge brand which employed and empowered many hundreds of women. Octavia Spencer, I think, played her in selfmade. It was a miniseries on Netflix recently. And she was born Sarah Breedlove on a cotton plantation in 1867. One of five kids. It's a great name, too. I love that name. Breedlove. Sarah Breedlove in particular. Yeah. That's a nice ring, doesn't it? If you're wondering why she's CJ. Walker, we'll get to that. But at this point in Louisiana, she struggled in life. She was an orphan by the age of seven and then went to live with her older sister Luvinia, another very nice name. And they settled in Mississippi, in Vicksburg, Mississippi, where she did domestic work and worked in the cotton field. Yeah. She was born so close to slavery that she was the first child in her family who was born free. That's how recent slavery was a thing. So her lot in life wasn't particularly much better because it was just so close to the slave era. When she was 14, as a matter of fact, she got married to a man named Moses McWilliams, at least in part to escape her home life, basically. Yeah. Her brother in law apparently was not a very nice guy and mistreated her. So she got out of there with Moses and had a daughter named, I guess, Leia or Lealia. Very pretty name. L-E-L-I-A-I think. She later changed her name to put an A on the front of it and was Alya. And her husband, sadly, died in 1887. So she moved to St. Louis, where her brothers lived. There were barbers there and started earning a money doing laundry, making about a buck 50 a day. So you're like, okay, where are we going to get to the fact that she's a self made person? She's starting to get up there in years. She's, like, in her 20s now. She's making a dollar, $50 a day, which is enough to put her kid through school. But I looked, and as far as the west, inflation calculator says that's still only $43 a day in today's money. And I feel like we're missing something. Chuck. I think that that's not a full picture of what money was worth. I think things were just cheaper. I think life was just less expensive other times in American and probably world history than it is today. I think you're right. You want to take a break, regroup, and then talk about the real beginning of Madam CJ. Walker? Sure. Okay. Hey, everyone. When you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office? Then you could be using Stamps.com. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses, because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right from your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to stamps.com. Click the microphone at the top of the home page, and enter code stuff. All right, Chuck. So we said that madam, CJ. Walker was the first self made woman millionaire in the United States. She's an African American woman who was born almost into slavery in the south, but she became self made because she ran into a problem in the 1890s. Her hair started falling out, and I could not find what the cause of her hair loss was. I saw a scalp condition almost everywhere. That made me suspect that somebody said scalp condition, and everybody else found that same source, but I couldn't find an actual diagnosed medical condition. But she started losing her hair, and she found out in pretty quick order that there was not a lot of help out there for her to stop her hair loss or possibly regrow hair. So she tried to figure it out herself. Yeah, I mean, I think the reason her hair was falling out was because there were not products designed specifically for women's hair or hair of anyone from African descent. So it was a market catered to Caucasian styled hair, and so their hair would suffer as a result. So there were a few products out there. She went to one line, poor hair, P-O-R-O which is created by Annie Turnbo Malone, another black entrepreneur. And it helped some, and she even sold this stuff for about a year and a half. But the whole time, she was like, I need to come up with my own formula here to help myself and to help others. Yeah. So about a decade or so later, she got married. A second time to a man named Charles Joseph Walker, hence the CJ. Walker. And he was in sales. He was kind of a marketing whiz. And the two of them together became what you would probably refer to as an early power couple. Basically, they really complemented and rounded out one another's strengths. And they formed basically, this hair care empire at the very beginning of this haircare empire. And Sarah adopted the name Madam CJ. Walker. And that's where the whole thing began. Yeah. And it was called Madam CJ. Walker's Wonderful Hair Grower. Awesome. Right? I mean, talk about marketing with let's just call it what it is and what it does right out of the gate. It makes me want to throw my money at it, take my money. So she founded this company in, and there was no national distribution chain, so they hit the road. They traveled all around the south for about a year and a half. As Mark Cuban would say, just hustling, selling door to door, doing it the hard way, doing demos in front of people. So they knew what it did. A lot of times they would go to churches to do this. And she had these before and after photos. Again, great marketing. And these women started buying it up. It was fifty cents a ten. And they said, we love this stuff. We love that there's a product for us. And she used to say there would be no hair growing industry if I hadn't invented it. Right. The thing is, though, is she wasn't a huckster. She actually had a recipe that was lost in its exactness to time. But this stuff actually did apparently regrow hair, or at least halt hair loss. So I'm not sure where they found it, but somebody documented that the ingredients included coconut oil, beeswax, petrol, atom, which I guess is like petroleum jelly today, copper sulfate and precipitated sulfur. And it had a nice violet scent, which I like. I don't think it's used quite as often as it should be. But the key ingredient, the active ingredient in this thing was sulfur. That that was probably what was working and causing women to say, this stuff actually works. I want some more. Yeah. And she had a whole system. She had a vegetable based shampoo. She had something called glossine, which smoothed out hair that was pressed with a hot comb. And so she had a little hair care beauty line, basically going in the early 1900 to the tune of about $150,000 a year in today dollars by 19 eight, which is some pretty good money. Yeah. And we should say there's one thing that I think this House Works article just kind of walks right past, and that is that when you used her Walker system, you were an African American or black woman who was making your hair akin to a white woman's hairdo. And there was a period in time in black history, especially in the where Madame Walker was not particularly thought of that highly because she had made an empire built on emulating Caucasian beauty. And it wasn't until years later that she finally was seen for what she was, which was a downright radical feminist and civil rights activists who couldn't read or write from what I saw her entire life, and yet made a really amazing living for herself, but also empowered other black women to be more than just domestic help or laborers. Yeah, it's a great story. She divorced Walker in 1912, moved to Indianapolis, and then in the position she was in with that kind of money and that kind of, sort of growing fame, started kind of buddying up with some of the more well heeled activists in the country, like Mary McLeod Batun and Booker T. Washington. Moved to Harlem, which was where you wanted to be if you wanted to be at the center of black culture in the early nineteen hundred s. And she and her daughter opened up a salon. It was a very nice salon. Parquet floors and velvet seats and grand piano in the lobby. It was really kind of a fine place. Yeah. Apparently in the teens, the 19 teens, she had something like 20,000 to 40,000 women beauty culturists working for her, tens of thousands of women. That's amazing. And she held a convention, the first convention of her beauty culture, agents running around selling her stuff in Philadelphia, I believe. And one of the things that she was noted for was when she gave speeches, it was a lot more or about a lot more than just pumping them up to go sell their product. It was about them demanding better treatment, to be treated like human beings, to demand a better, more socially just world. Her speeches were peppered with that kind of empowerment, telling women, black women no less in the early 20th century, that they should expect to be treated better than they were by men of all races, and by the white race in particular, which is, again, it's just radical. There's no other way to put it. At the time, 1918, she moved to Villa Louie, a mansion in Irvington on the Hudson, about 45 minutes north of Manhattan. And this place was a legit mansion, like 34 rooms. It was huge and an amazing place. It was designed by an African American architect named Vertner Woodson Tandy. Great name. What's sad is she was able to enjoy her wealth for a while, but she died the next year after she moved into this incredible 20,000 square foot mansion with her daughter. But she left a really great legacy, apparently. She left two thirds of her estate to historically black universities, to the NAACP. She really put her money where her mouth was. She was a really benevolent benefactor to a lot of great civil rights causes and basically laid the foundation for black women entrepreneurs. Still to this day, as a matter of fact. Great story. Wonderful story. So hats off to madam. CJ. Walker, aka. Sarah Breedlove, aka. A genuinely admirable person. And that means everybody, that short stuff is out. Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts my HeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio App Apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
https://podcasts.howstuf…sk-bartering.mp3	How Bartering Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-bartering-works	Bartering is an ancient practice. With the emergence of money-based transactions, it's no wonder that people might think bartering is a thing of the past. Tune in to learn more about the bartering process -- and where it's still used today.	Bartering is an ancient practice. With the emergence of money-based transactions, it's no wonder that people might think bartering is a thing of the past. Tune in to learn more about the bartering process -- and where it's still used today.	Tue, 08 Feb 2011 21:09:22 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2011, tm_mon=2, tm_mday=8, tm_hour=21, tm_min=9, tm_sec=22, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=39, tm_isdst=0)	26188975	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun shining, the daylight's longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music, my Favorite Murder from Exactly Right media, my Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilguera and Georgia Hard Stark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today. You know you're a pet mom when you plan your vacation around your pet. At Halo, we get it because we're pet moms, too. We make natural, high quality pet food that's rooted in science. It's the world's best food for the world's best kids. Learn more@halopets.com. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from Housetopworks.com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with a barely awake Charles W. Chuck Bryant. Who's drowsy? I'm not Drowsy. You look drowsy. Really? Yeah, look old. It's totally different when you get to be 40. You just use Drowsy all the time. Are you rested? Yeah, I just woke up. Crud. Yeah. I got something to look forward to. All downhill, buddy. I'll tell you something that the prisoners in Florida's state penal system has something to look forward to in addition to that. Okay. Buying honey buns at the commissary. Is that the new guy on sublex C? You know what? I wrote about this, and somebody had a funny comment. Like that honey buns joke. Yeah. No. Which is really terrible joking to think about it, but no. Actual honey bun, like the pastry dessert is the best love it. Depends on which brand you're talking about. In my opinion. Krispy Kreme honey ones are pretty rocking. I've never tried one of those. Are they frosted? Oh, I've got to try one of those. I had no idea. Oh, yeah. Wow. Okay. Well, the ones I'm talking about coming cellophane, they're sold for about a buck or so in prison, so, you know, it's not the greatest brand on the planet. Probably not. And apparently in Florida, I think around the country, but in Florida in particular, they're like the new prison currency, honey buns are, because it's a new product that people just crave. No, it's just been kind of quietly building up over time, and everybody's been making the cigarette joke for decades. I didn't notice that. Actually, tobacco is outsold in the Florida state penal system by honey buns. Wow. Everybody loves a honey bun. Yeah. So our envelopes, they're, like, the number one seller, really, in state prisons in the county lock up, free dried coffee and ramen noodles still outsell honey buns. But if you're up the river in the state, honey buns are number one. Wow. And then envelopes. Because people clearly like to write their letters, right? Yes. Or they use envelopes as napkins for honey buns. It's just dumb if you ask me. It seems like they would give them envelopes. Come on. If these guys aren't going to take the time to write somebody right? Give them an envelope. No, you got to buy it. Yeah. Which you're $0.35 an hour making license plates anyway. Chuck prison's own fair. So these honey buns are used as bribes for protection? They're used in exchange for other food items. Sure. Maybe some envelopes if you're running low. They're used for bets as wagers. Really? Seriously. There's a really cool article in St. Petersburg Times that was really well written about it. Right. But what these people are doing, let's say, in the case of a bribe, let's say Todd, the white collar criminal who somehow ended up in a state prison, is paying Tiny, the ironically named Huge Guy for protection in honey buns. What's going on there is Bartering. Todd is Bartering a honey bun in exchange for a tiny service protection, beating the tar out of guys who want to take Todd's honey buns. Or he himself not doing that with his own cronies. No, that's a racket. That's not necessarily the same thing. Yeah. Still trading without money? I guess so. Okay, so we've finally reached the end of that God awful intro, and we're now talking about Bartering. Chuck yes. Bartering. New or old? Old as the hills. The earliest civilizations. Josh bartered for stuff, because there was no currency back in the day, so I mean, caveman tuktuk that we always talk about. Tuktuk trades animal pelt for spear made from rhino horn. Yeah. Because I've never seen one of those. But I've got all these great pelts, and you look a little cold, so let's work out a deal here. Right. Partnering it is. And you're absolutely right, it is pretty old. It really started to take off after we left our hunter gatherer routes, though. Yeah. Once we settled down into communities. Yeah. It made a lot more sense. You might be some sort of farmer and end up with a surplus. You got all of the grain you need, but you need some meat, too. Sure. And this guy over here has some pigs that have been looking pretty delicious lately. So you trade him some of your surplus grain for a pig, and the guy who has pigs get some of your grain, and he has pigs. You have pigs and grain, too. Everybody's happy. Yeah. Jerry thinks this whole thing is funny for some reason. Yeah. I mean, that's how it all started. I actually did a report in elementary school. We had to social studies report, where we had to devise a city of our own, like a town, and we had to construct how it all looked at and what they did. And I was the only kid who had a barter system instead of money. The teacher thought at the time that I was very smart kid for doing that because I was nine years old. Every once in a while, do you just kind of like drift off while you're taking a shower thinking about the congratulations the teacher gave you that day? That was my last one. Congratulations, Chuck. So it has stuck with me all these years, though, that it's funny that as a little kid I thought bartering was kind of a cool system. Yeah, it was, and it still is. We'll find out. Yeah, there's a lot of cool. Maybe cool is not the right word. I don't think cool is an economic term, but it has a lot of benefits in that bartering generally doesn't lead to surplus. Right. Basically, people just having what they need. Yeah. You're exchanging something you need or something you have that someone else needs for something that you need. Right. And in most cases, you don't want a whole lot of leftovers. You have something that you're willing to exchange for something else. Everybody's seeking an even trade, so nobody's giving anybody a lot more than they need. Or conversely, screwing the other person over and taking as much as possible. Sure. Because both parties have to be cool with it. Right. Or there's no trade. So there's not a lot of surplus. Not a lot of surplus. To anyone who has read Jared Diamonds, the greatest mistake in the history of the human race means that you don't necessarily have anybody who's in charge or has control over other people by controlling the surplus. Interesting. Very well. When bartering, Josh, everything's relative, obviously, because if you live someplace where it's cold and you need more shelter, blankets, let's say, or whatever, or let's modernize and say heater, then that's going to be pretty valuable to you. Right. What you're talking about is the relative value of an item. Right? Exactly. So, like in a money system, there's a fixed value to the dollar and it fluctuates. There's inflation and deflation and stagflation. But ultimately, when you're coming to somebody with $1, you both have an agreed upon awareness of what that dollar is worth, which is a dollar, like you were saying, with a heater, somebody who lives in a hot climate is going to value that thing less than somebody who lives in a cold climate. Absolutely. So the person in the cold climate would be willing to pay more or trade more for that relative value. The distinction between bartering and money. Yeah, one of them. But the main one, it's my favorite. Timing is another big deal when it comes to bartering because depending on when this is happening and what your situation is, things can have a different value. The article is an example of Richard III, my kingdom for a horse, when he was in a battle. I was on a hike in Utah one time where I would have paid $1,000 for a bottle of Gatorade. Right. Or lift down the hill. I wanted the Gatorade. I was that hot and dehydrated. Wow. Yeah, it was bad. Were you hospitalized? No, we hiked out and made it to the spot and bought, like, five Gatorades and drank them all. Your urine was just chunky style for a little bit. Yeah, it came out of little pebbles. Yeah. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but we're pretty excited about summer. I mean, what's not to like? School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's right. And that's where True crime podcasts on Amazon Music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. Yeah. And with so many killer shows like Morbid, My Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. Prepare to go deep and become your own detective in the world of serial crimes and unsolved mysteries. Get lost hearing spooky stories with a combination of detailed research and lighthearted analysis. Whether you're a lifetime fan of true crime or you just feel like being entertained while doing the dishes at night, there's a podcast out there for you to download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app. Today, Capital One offers commercial solutions you can bank on. Now more than ever, your business faces specific challenges and unique opportunities. That's why Capital One offers a comprehensive suite of financial services custom tailored to your short and long term goals. Backed by the expertise, strategy, and resources of a top ten commercial bank, a dedicated team works with you to support your success and help you achieve your goals. Explore the possibilities at Capital one. comCOMMERCIAL so, yeah, timing has a lot to do with the value of something as far as how much you might need that item. Yeah. And Jane McGrath wrote this one. Oh, Jane. She did a good job, too. Remember, Jane? Yeah. Let me ask you this. What about when it's not just a one to one deal? Like, you've got corn and your friend Ralph, next to your farm has cows, but Ralph doesn't want corn. He wants wheat. Corn. Yeah, your buddy Pete has wheat. So you can arrange a little three way trade there if you're an innovative guy. And that's called the triangular Barter. And NBA teams do this. Any sports team can, but it happens more in the NBA than anywhere else. Draft picks and stuff. Well, just trading players like, I want your center, but you don't want my point guard. You want their forward, but I'll take their forward and package it in such a way that it accommodates everybody. So that's a triangular barter. You are pointing something out. And that it's not necessarily the most common thing in a barter. Economy where you have something that I need and I have something that you need at that moment, too. Well, that's what works because you talked about timing and relative value. Right. That's one of the downsides of the barter. And it gets even more complex than a triangular barter. That's a lot of work. That's a lot of walking. If you find that third person. And so Ralph has that cow you want. Pete has wheat, you have corn. But Pete doesn't want your corn. You're going to have to go find somebody who wants your corn, who has something that Pete would want. Yeah. Or more, which is called a multilateral trade. You can see it gets kind of convoluted as well. Totally. And when it gets convoluted, there's a greater risk for making a bad deal just to get it over with, just because you really need that cal. Yeah. And that's one of the we'll talk about the downsides. It's certainly one of them. Yeah. Well, I think we kind of are we already there? Okay, well, that's one of the downsides, is that a lot of work goes into this, and in the end, you might settle for less than a great deal because there's so much work involved. There's some other factors that might force you to settle for poopoo deal, and that is time works against you. You remember we kind of use the example of you with the gatorade. Yeah, right. Were you somebody who had something to trade for that gatorade at that moment? And somebody came along with gatorade and gouged, you say you had tomatoes to trade. Right. You kind of need to trade your tomatoes because they're a perishable item. Yeah. So time is working against you. So you might take a bad trade just to get rid of these tomatoes. Right, right. Or in the article example is a great one. Let's say you're a craftsman. You build these great banquet tables. Banquet tables are big and heavy. You go to trade for tomatoes because you really need those tomatoes. And the guy's like, hey, I'll give you 15 tomatoes. The guy's like, no, this is worth, like, 300 tomatoes. But what are you going to do with 300 tomatoes? So when you don't have equal, you got a lot of small things. You have one large thing, you're kind of in trouble. I don't know if you picked the right business model yeah. As a craftsman, and even if you did take 300 tomatoes, you're going to run around trying to trade those surplus tomatoes for other stuff you may or may not need. When you could be building tables, you should be building tables. That's what you do. That's what you're good at. Yeah, exactly. Because bartering initially sounds like, oh, that's so great. You just trade things and there's no money, and money leads to badness. But it's not that simple. It's rare that you just find that perfect match and perfect timing to work out in a one to one trade. Right. And then establishing that value, considering that everything in a barter system has a relative value. As Jane put it, comparing apples to oranges is still comparing fruit of roughly the same shape and size. Yeah, that's a bad saying. Yeah. She points out that it's a terrible thing. It's like the low man on the totem pole. Yeah. I'm going to start saying that's. Like comparing cows to table legs. Exactly. People like, what the heck are you talking about? Just be like, listen to the podcast. Exactly. So, Chuck, because our ancestors are four, people ran into these problems where they couldn't figure out how many tomatoes equal the table. And when they did, it just was way too much. They got tired of lugging tables around. They came up with something that we call money currency. And it solved a lot of problems. For all of its drawbacks and ills and evils, money solved a lot of problems. It's easier to carry money around than a table for one. Yeah. Think about how much $100 bill weighs. Not much. Not very much. It sits heavy in my pocket though, my friend. It burns mine, it burns all. It can also be divided pretty easily. Sure. $101 bill still isn't as heavy as a table, right? Yeah, well, it levels the playing field, like you said. So then you don't have to compare tomatoes to tables. It's pretty easy to set your price if people want to buy it. Great. Then you got your dough and you can just buy your two tomatoes for dinner that night. Yeah, cool. That's money. I'm sensing something. Are you cool with this one or you like the barter system? No, it's fine. Which would you prefer, money or barter? Well, I mean, as a nine year old, I thought Bartering was kind of neat. Right. And I still like the concept of trading. Like the musical instrument section on Craigslist is lousy with dudes. Like ltre. Myles is Paul for your Martin acoustic. Right. So you've hit upon the modern revival of Bartering. It's all over the place, actually. Yeah. I think Craigslist has an entire section for each city dedicated to Bartering specifically. Right. Or is it sub sections in the I don't know this. I think Craigslist does have a section, but on like, the Music Instruments board, there's people trading just because that's where they see trades. Okay, but there's whole sites dedicated just to Bartering. Yeah. And bartering services that's got to be included. Yeah. Emily actually does that. I didn't know that. Yeah, she's been getting her hair done in exchange for soap. And actually the craft scene, the indie craft scene, that's all they do is trade. Right. I'll give you this kids jumper for a bottle of lotion. And this is bartering is pretty old, but a resurgence in Bartering isn't new. There was actually an explosion in the late seventy s of Barter clubs not to be confused with racquetball clubs or swingers clubs, which are both also huge. In the late 70s, these were barter clubs. Really? Yeah, they were around for a little while, so people meet and swap things. I think it was mail order. Yeah. Okay. But when you take a look at these clubs, then and today, what you described Emily doing is pure bartering. Right. But one of the big limitations of bartering well, two of the big limitations are geographic boundaries, which the internet overcomes because some guy in Tacoma has something you need and is willing to ship it and you have something he needs. Geographic boundaries. Gone. Right. Done. But the timing thing is still a problem. So what barter clubs and barter websites have come up with is if the person doesn't have anything to give you right. Then they can trade you in credits. Yeah. I didn't know that was going on. That's kind of cool. That's money. Yeah, in a way. No, that's currency. That's it. Think about a dollar bill. It's a credit. It's a promissory note. It doesn't hold any inherent value. Yes, but only within that network is a currency. It's not like you can take those credits out to McDonald's. They'll say, no, totally. You can't. But it's still currency. Yeah, sure. Right. So within that barter network, they're still using currency. It's just so difficult to get past the necessity for currency. Yeah, that's a good point. It's a big sham. Then you were talking about the craft scene being, like, huge and bartering. Right. They love it. Marketing is as well, like business barters. Way more than I ever realized. Yeah, sure. I have a stat for you, if I may. Oh, yeah. In 2008, North American companies, not even internationally, but North American companies bartered $12 billion in goods and services. Wow. Yeah. And apparently that was partially a result of the recession because in 2001 they did like, 7.75 billion. But still, it's a substantial amount of stuff that was traded either in the form of goods or services. Right. People striking a deal like Chico's Bail Bonds will sponsor your baseball team and they'll pay for your jerseys if you put Chico's Bail Bonds on the back. Yeah, they will eventually. In the case of the Yankees, do you remember who their sponsor was in bad newspapers? Denny's. Was it really? Yes. I just saw it the other day and I went, Denny's, they were a high profile team. Oh, well, they got a high profile sponsor. We were talking about the recession, accounting for an increase among businesses. One of the great things about partnering is it saves your cash to pay down debt or to keep workers on the payroll. Yeah. Cash flow is always good for business. Yeah. So that's why corporations do it. People do it in times of crisis. Which was the case. Well, it's part of the case right now. There's been a huge resurgence in consumer bartering, right? Because of the economy. Yes. But in Argentina, in, I think, 20 08 20 09 their economy was really in shambles and they were bartering clubs everywhere. Well, yeah, in places where there's natural disasters, a lot of times the first thing they will turn to is bartering, at least in a temporary sense, until they can kind of get things restored. Yeah, because I don't know, the end of the world. What's that dollar Bill going to do for you? You know, I read almost that same phrase on a post collapse blog, a survival blog, really, and the guy was rambling off items that will be good for bartering. That was me. Dollar Bill is not among them. No, of course not. Hey, summer is here, my friend. Which means school is out, the sun is shining bright, the days are longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. Yeah. Whether you're road tripping or you're relaxing by the pool, you can tune into the podcast here. It's on Amazon Music. That's so good, it's criminal. Morbid. That's right. It's part true crime and part comedy. Morbid takes you on a journey through murderous mysteries and major laughs, all in the same week. Yeah, from the paranormal to the pretty spooky and everything in between, host Selena Erkhart and Ash Kelly cover it all. And with two episodes released each week, you'll be hooked on this chart topping series before you know it. You can listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen. Today, Capital One offers commercial solutions you can bank on. Now more than ever, your business faces specific challenges and unique opportunities. That's why Capital One offers a comprehensive suite of financial services custom tailored to your short and long term goals. Backed by the expertise, strategy and resources of a top ten commercial bank, a dedicated team works with you to support your success and help you achieve your goals. Explore the possibilities at Capital One. comCOMMERCIAL IRS josh, let's talk about that, because if you think, hey, this is a great way to skirt taxes, I can trade my haircut for my homemade soap all day long. Am I outing myself now? Is Iris going to audit us now? Yeah, because you're supposed to report this stuff. Yeah, those barter clubs from the late 70s actually ruined it for everybody. Time was you could barter everything and not pay a cent of taxes on it. But the barter club, the artificial economy created by the barter clubs reached about an estimated $200 million in size, and the IRS went, we want some of that. Yes, of course they do. So they reformed the tax code in 1080 and came up with the 1099 B form. Proceeds from broker and barter exchange transactions. And if you're bartering, both parties have to fill one of these out, create, like, an estimated market value of the goods or services and pay it. I know when Emily first brought that form home, filled it out and went, what is this yet another form? She said, yeah, you can't trade. You got to pay the piper. Yeah. And the piper is the IRS. Yes, it certainly is, Josh, but that's not necessarily well, that's a bad thing. But the IRS, you can also write stuff off that you have traded. Yeah. So it goes the other way a little bit, too. And we would be remiss to not mention that. Yeah. You can write off as an expense something you trade because it's value and it's lost and you didn't get any money for it, which is how the tax system set up. If you're not getting any money for it, it's different than stuff that you're getting money for. Well, and they point out that if you get one of those trade credits, you could donate that trade credit to a charity and write that off if that charity will accept trade credit. I never heard these trade credits. I could look into that. It's money. Is it a point value they assigned, I wonder? Yeah, it's worth this many dollars. Well, one that I came across, dibba has something called divots and their trade credits. That's cute. Money. And one divide is worth a dollar. So it's money based on money in a bartering network. Well, money. Did we ever say that money inflation. That's one of the downsides of currency. We didn't say it, but go ahead. Well, yeah, I mean, that's the big deal. If you buy a peck a bushel of peaches one year for $10, and the next year, that might buy ten peaches. That's the downside of money. Although I suppose I could have been bartering, too. They could just say, rough peach crop this year. Now only trade you this money for your cow. Sure. Yeah. I would think relative value be affected by supply and demand. That makes sense. I would think it wouldn't happen on such a widespread level, though. I mean, think about how many people are affected by the dollar bill and its fluctuations. Right. Yeah. Think about how many people are affected by a local peach crop. True. And that's actually one of the things that barter systems are so appealing to people these days. There's such a movement toward local economies. A barter system can't be sustained by a country of 300 million people. So basically everybody has to split up. Yeah. I read an essay about how secessionism could save the US. And that if we don't break up, we're in big trouble. Really? Yeah. That any non authoritarian system of government can't be sustained or adequately administered in populations over, I think, either 3 million or 30 million. Wow. Yeah, it's pretty cool. It was in the Otney reader last month. I get that. I'll have to check that out. It was the one with Marge Simpson as rosie the river. Yeah, it's pretty cool. I'll check that out. So we done? I'm done. You got anything else? That's it for me. If you want to hear mention of Kyle McDonald, the kid we mentioned in the House Swapping podcast, a little prematurely, I guess. Who traded a paper clip for a house? Yeah. He had to pay taxes on that. He had to, I'm sure. I hope so. Maybe Corbin Bernstein paid one. If you want to see a picture of that kid, you can type in Barter at the search bar@housestepforce.com. And that brings up, of course, listener Josh. I'm going to call this one of two eventual Mafia letters that we got. We got very many. Who knew by letter. Took me. Broken phone. Yeah. Little boxes. Yeah. Who knew? So many people are connected to the Mafia. A lot of people have stories to tell. Yes. I think it's also like saying, who has Native American now? Yeah, I do a little bit, I think so we're going to read two of those. One of them right now, and one on the following episode. And this is from Calvin. This is pretty interesting. Calvin the Mafiasa. Yeah, calvin the Mafioso. I just listened to the episode about the Mafia and I have a couple of things to say. Firstly, I am grossly disappointed in both Josh and Chuck for talking about a Joe Valley she and not once mentioning the greatest Simpsons episode ever, homey the Clown. I was disappointed about the Simpson yeah. In which Homer disguises Crusty gets captured by Fat Tony in the Springfield family and tried to convince them that he is all different kinds of people, joe Valachi being one of them. I didn't make that connection. I remember. He's like, I'm not Homer. I'm Joe Velocity. Goes, Joe. Velocity the rat. And he's like, no, something like that. He said, if you did mention it, then shame on the editor, Jerry, for removing it. So let's just go with that. Yeah, let's go with that one. Shame on you, Jerry. Boom. Also, I thought you guys would be interested to hear some hypotheses about why it is called the Mafia. One says that during the war of the Sicilian Vespers, a woman found her daughter at the Vespers being raped by French soldiers and then ran through the streets shouting, Mafia. Mafia. Which is a dialectical translation of my daughter, my daughter Mafia. Did the Mafia come to her rescue or what? I don't know. It's just what he says. Sicilian. Okay, I don't think he's making this up. It's a theory. I'm sorry, hypothesis. The second hypothesis is also a remnant of the occupation of Sicily by the French. The word Mafia might be an anagram for Mortala francia Italia inneda. Which translates into something like, Italy longs for the death of France. Yeah. M-A-F-I-A-I don't know about that, but they both sound pretty plausible to me. So I guess the word. Mafia doesn't mean anything. It's not a family name or anything like that. I don't know. I never really thought about the original name. We didn't cover that. No. So these are two hypotheses from Calvin. He says both of these came from a book called the Secret Society's Handbook by Michael Bradley. It might be complete bologna because I'm not sure how reliable that book is, but it sure is interesting. I thought you might like it. Very cool. Thank you. Who was that? Calvin. Calvin the Mafiosa. Of course. Thank you, Calvin the Mafiosa, for writing in. And we want to hear from you guys, too. So we would urge you to send us an email. If you have something to trade, we want to hear about it. Wrap it up, spank it on the bottom and send it to stuffpodcast@howstuffworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit HowStuffWorks.com. 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http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/podcasts.howstuffworks.com/hsw/podcasts/sysk/2016-10-25-sysk-sleep-paralysis-final.mp3	How Sleep Paralysis Works, or The Worst Thing That Can Happen While You're Sleeping	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-sleep-paralysis-works-or-the-worst-thing-that	For as long as people have been sleeping, about half of us have probably suffered from sleep paralysis. Thanks to an unusual fluke in the sleep cycle, the sufferer feels paralyzed and consumed by fear as something on their chest tries to kill them.	For as long as people have been sleeping, about half of us have probably suffered from sleep paralysis. Thanks to an unusual fluke in the sleep cycle, the sufferer feels paralyzed and consumed by fear as something on their chest tries to kill them.	Tue, 25 Oct 2016 07:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2016, tm_mon=10, tm_mday=25, tm_hour=7, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=299, tm_isdst=0)	39484321	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Make your business official with Google and Squarespace. When you create a custom domain and a beautiful business website with Squarespace, you'll receive a free year of business email and professional tools from Google. It's the simplest way to look professional online. Visit squarespace.com. Google to start your free trial. Use the offer code work for 10% off your first purchase. Google and Squarespace. Make it professional. Make it beautiful. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W, Chuck Bryant, and Jerry is over there. This is stuff you should know. The podcast. Something large on my chest. It's the devil. It's the devil. Hey, Chuck. Okay. What happened? You were just having what's known as sleep paralysis, buddy. Whoa. It was close to it, but my touch, my gentle touch broke you out of it. That actually saved me. Yes. I'm just kidding, people. I was acting. That was stagecraft. Yeah, and we weren't debating, because I was wrong, but we were talking about whether or not we had done this yet. We have not. Like I said, I was wrong. We've bitten around the edges of it so much. I see how you would think. Yes. I feel like if you pulled every little bit of sleep paralysis out of all the episodes where we've looked at it, looked at it, we talked at it, not about it, you go away. Sleep paralysis. The most recent one was either Exploding Headway or Night Terrors, and we specifically stopped talking about sleep paralysis so that we could save it for the actual episode. Yeah, those are always good ones. So finally, here it is. We'll be on an interesting train of thought and say, no, stop. Stop. Yeah, that's exactly what we did too. I remember the first time this came up was in transmagnetic stimulation. The thinking cap one. Yeah, this has popped up a lot. Well, it's pretty interesting stuff. Agreed. And it's been around a while. You know the word nightmare? We use that to describe, like, bad dreams. It's actually incorrect usage. Nightmare was originally intended specifically to describe sleep paralysis because night means night. Sure, the mare or mayor, M-A-E-R-E that extra E in there really messes it up. But it's Old English, so I don't know if I pronounce it correctly or not. Neither is anyone else alive, so it doesn't matter. But that specifically means an incubus. And an incubus was a type of devil, like the one that was just sitting on your chest, a male a sex crazed male demon. To specify that. I'm just making assumptions here. Who would come to you while you were sleeping and sit on your chest and maybe kill you, try to kill you, and you couldn't do anything about it? Yeah, I'm into the succubus and the incubus. Okay, I'm open minded, but that's exactly right. The incubus is the male version of the succubus or the old sex crazed tag that sits on your chest. This whole idea of this has been around for a very long time. It's steeped in the supernatural. And we're only just now starting to figure out what sleep paralysis is. And to me, it's even more interesting now that we understand it a little more. Yeah, I did not know the exact definition of incubus until this research, and now I hate that band even more. Male Demon. I wonder if that's what they were going for, if they were just like, it sounds cool now, I'm sure they know. Yes. Well, I'm hats off to them for realizing that, making a medieval era nod. They might have just thought it sounded cool. Who knows? Who am I thinking? You're right. I clearly know nothing about good band names. This is true. I thought you always come up with good, bad names. I don't know if other people agree they're good to me. Has someone been no. Okay. No one's talking on Facebook. No. I should say about that. No. But my own band name is not I like it, but El Cheapo. We're named after a gas station where El chippos are. I know. In the south, like, South Carolina. And I've seen them in Savannah. Okay. Coastal Southeast. I thought that was a coincidence. Oh, no, it is. It is a coincidence. It is. But people send me pictures of El Cheapo gas stations with delight in so you're not named after a gas station because then we would be Exxon mobile. Because that's a great benefit for sure. Everybody loves Exxon. What have they ever done? Nothing. All right, so the strict definition, I guess it's not strict, but the definition we're going to give. And where did you get this article? This is good. Oh, yeah. We better shout this out. This is straight out of the British Psychological Society's journal. I could tell it was British. Yeah, because they say WiltsT and stuff like that. Yeah, way off. But it was written by Julia Santamaro and Christopher C. French, and I believe they're both sleep paralysis experts. But I know for sure Professor French is because I also saw a video of him on vimeo just basically talking about this. And he had a sweater on. This at Expert. Pretty much. So sleep paralysis, how they define it, and I agree, is it's a period of transient consciously experienced paralysis either when going to sleep or waking up. And I think I was under the misguided notion that it was almost always in the transition of waking up. And it sounds like it's even more common when you're going into sleep. And that is the hypnagogic stage as opposed to the hypnopomic stage coming out of sleep. Yeah. So I think I don't know why I got that impression, but I think I was wrong. I had the same impression. Yeah. It probably came from us each other. So have you ever had sleep paralysis? No, neither. But I did want to mention that I did tell you I had an exploding head syndrome experience after we did that show. Right. Like two or three nights later, it happened to me for the first time ever. Yeah. I was worried about getting this last night. I don't want this. Well, that's a bad way to go about it. Yeah. Because that would get it in your head. Yeah, we should say it's actually, like you said, it's kind of common. Right? Well, I mean, it depends on who you ask. I've seen everywhere from a third to half of people that might experience this at least once. But I think as far as chronic chronically, it's not nearly that common. No, it's something like do we have stats on that? Yeah, they're in here somewhere. Something like 3% to 6% of the general population experience what's called isolated sleep paralysis. And that's if you don't have narcolepsy. Yeah, that was the big thing I didn't realize is that sleep paralysis is a major symptom of narcolepsy, which we should do. That came up and I was like, well, let's just replace sleep paralysis is the show we got to do. Yeah. I had a great Aunt Laura from Mississippi that had narcolepsy. No. Really? Yeah. And I didn't get to see her a lot in life. This was my father's mother's, sister. But I remember very specifically my brother and I go in like one time to Jackson, Mississippi, or Tupolo, I think, where she lived when I was like twelve. And she would do that, she would not off while talking to us and wake back up and finish her sentence. So it was like she wasn't even aware that she nodded off. No. And of course I thought it was funny at the time, little kid, but I'm sure there's a lot more to it than that. Sure. It can probably be quite dangerous. I imagine so. Yeah. I would guess it's kind of hard to come by a driver's license if you are diagnosed with narcolepsy. I don't think Aunt Laura drove. Yeah, she was one of those that probably wouldn't have driven anyway. I got you. She's like a strickland type. I don't want to drive, come pick me up. Like we had to take the keys from my grandmother, that kind of thing. When she was drinking? No, when she got to an age where she drives safely, we were like, Grandma, you can't drive anymore. You know, in Japan they have these very prominent magnets or stickers that you put on a car. One is like a triangle. I can't remember what the other one is on board. One means kind of yeah, but no, not at all. Right. One means this is a new driver, like usually a teen driver, so everybody steer clear. And then the other means this is a very elderly driver, so everybody steer clear. I would love one of those in my car. I don't understand why this isn't universal. Yeah, it makes perfect sense. I would like one just to keep people away from me. Just to leave you alone? Yeah, like back off. What was the guy's name from Phantasm? I don't know. Angus something. Yeah. You put on a little wig like his little skullcap while you're driving just to really drive it home. That was an accidental pun just now. I didn't catch it. I said, you put it on while you're driving just to drive it home. To drive the point home. Yeah, and I made a really good accidental pun when we were talking about hunting, and I said, My dad didn't hunt. I said, it's not like he was trying to take a stand or he wasn't trying to take a stand. As in a deer stand. Yeah. Totally missed that. All right, so the deal with sleep paralysis is how you know that you're experiencing it is you can open your eyes, you're conscious, but you are aware that you can't move. You can't move your body. I mean, it kind of varies between severity and individual experience. Right. But the common thing is that you can't move. You feel paralyzed. Sometimes you can't even make a noise. It's that bad. And the problem with not being able to make a noise is that it particularly sucks in instances like this because you want to scream. Because most of the time when you are experiencing sleep paralysis, you are in the grips of terror like you wouldn't ever normally experience. You are scared out of your mind. You have an impending sense of death, and you have all sorts of hallucinations. Basically every sense could conceivably hallucinate, right? Yes. You have auditory hallucinations where you hear something in the room with you, I should say. There's also, like a sense of presence, I guess, of like another thing. Yeah, there's something in the room. Usually it's something that means you harm. So you sense its presence. You might also hear it. You probably also see it. And it can be anything from, like, that succubus or incubus sitting on your chest or both of things are getting a little kinky. Right? Like you're both here. Yeah. I didn't think you'd find out about each other. And you let me wake my wife, but I can't move. Right. So you just sitting there laying like, this is getting weird. She's going to be so mad. And then you can smell them, you can taste them. There's something called gustatory hallucinations. Yeah. And then also the sense of feeling, like moving and of pressure on your chest. Like you feel all this stuff, like you're experiencing it. Yeah. And I think pressure is one of the big ones, like someone sitting on you, not allowing you to move. So our own Robert Lam wrote an article about this on our site, too. Not about the full thing, but about like, why is it why are they demons? Usually. Okay. And that was kind of one of my questions. Why is it usually a malevolent spirit? And why isn't it whatever, some fantasy. Right. Which is like Arad saying, like, hey, you want to go play catch or something like that. That would be yours? No. Okay. Isn't he, like, the most hated man on the planet now for some reason? Oh. I mean, he kind of went into his career. He was not very well. Like, why? What did he do? I didn't pick up on it. He did a lot of steroids and lied about it for years. Got you. Yeah. He was like, a repeat offender that consistently was like, I'm not doing steroids. I see. I don't know why all these drug testers saying I did. They're like, you have a syringe in your arm. Robert said, and he didn't, like, make this up, but his research indicated that someone's beliefs going into it might conjure up these negative connotations. And when the experience itself is marked by, like, a pulse rate increase in labor breathing sometimes, and it doesn't lend itself to, like, a good experience. Right. Because Professor French concurs with Robert. Right. He was saying, like, the fear being usually a hallmark of the sleep paralysis experience is not just you're afraid because you can't move and there's something in the room with you. That's part of it, yeah. But he's saying your amygdala is also hyperactive. Right. Then. So you're experiencing fear on its own terms, like its own freestanding symptom. Even if it was lucky, the Leprechaun, you'd still be super afraid that he was in the room with you kind of thing, because that region of your brain that's delivering these jolts of fear to you is working overtime. Then it becomes that bad leprechaun movie. Yeah. The one Jennifer Aniston is she in that? Yeah. I never saw those. I never did either. Well, it also said, speaking of movies, that what kind of pop culture you're into. All this stuff can play into it because it's sort of like an extension of a dream. Right. So if it's agitated by labor breathing and rapid pulse rate and a nightmare, then it's not going to be arrived floating in onto your chest with a baseball. Unless you're super scared of them. Then it might be. So let's take a break, and then we'll come back and talk about some of the the cultural interpretations of what the heck is going on here. Okay. Sounds good. So, Chuck, remember we're talking about how nightmare is, like an old English term for sleep paralysis. Yeah. It's been around for a while, basically. It seems to be universal. And so since it's interpreted by the person based on what their culture believes in, there have been different interpretations of sleep paralysis throughout history and cultures around the world. And they're pretty interesting. Yeah. And most of them the common thread here is that even in modern terms, they're described this way sometimes, but definitely in the olden days, it's almost always some sort of supernatural thing, like a witch or I'm sorry, Newfoundland, they called it the old hag. Which is creepy just hearing that in China, the ghost oppression, because apparently the Chinese believe that you're very vulnerable. Your soul is when you're asleep. So I think that's sort of the common thread here in all these countries. I took an anthropology class and I can't remember what it was talking about in general, but one of the things that seemed to pop up around the world was something called spirit intrusion. Like when you're sleeping, your spirit got up and walked around, and if the tether between your spirit and your body was severed, like anybody could come and possess you. Wow. That was a big explanation for mental illness in cultures around the world. So I thought that was interesting. That was also an explanation for sleep paralysis too. Yeah, I think it kind of depends on whatever the leading goal is in your country and region, because in Europe, of course, in the 1500 through the 1700s, it's going to be witches. You were witch ridden. That was at one of the witch trials in 1747. This woman testified her about her husband in bed and he said he was laying there stiff, barely drawing breath, and he woke up and he said, my Lord Jesus, help me. Oh, fiery witches took me to Maramaros and they put 600 weight of salt on me. Which we're laughing at. But if you break it down, that has all the hallmarks of all the different hallucinations, whether it's traveling or the weight on your chest or all these tactic hallucinations, like wrapped up into one nightmare sure. With exclamation points. Yeah, there weren't there? I thought this is pretty interesting. In St. Lucia, the Caribbean island, they have a term called coca, and they think that it's little unbaptized babies who are haunting the area that are causing sleep paralysis or doing all sorts of horrible things to you while you're sleeping, but you're not sleeping. I want to restate this again because it's a little confusing. Yeah. When you're experiencing sleep paralysis, you're laying there and your eyes are open and you know that something is in the room with you. Maybe it comes over and climbs on your chest. When it does, you can feel its breath in your face. You can smell and taste its rank breath. You can feel the pressure of it laying on your chest. It's staring you in the eyes. And you cannot move. Not only can you not move, you can't make a sound as much as you're trying to scream your head off because you are scared out of your mind. And this experience can last from a few seconds to I've seen up to ten minutes, and from anecdotally each second of those ten minutes feels like a decade. Oh, I'm sure, because you're just so scared and it's just going on and on and on. Yeah. So it makes total sense that you would say there was a spirit in my room last night. Yeah. Because if not, you think I'm losing my mind. Right. So let's blame it on I mean, we'll get into some of the other reasons, but blame it on something else. Right. Like in Japan, Kana Shibari, now they believe that it's evil spirits messing with you. Same thing in Korea with Hawaii. Nalita. Nice. Yeah. I thought that was pretty good pronunciation. And like we said, that these are all sort of versions of the same thing, right. No matter where you go, which I always find interesting, these sort of universal regional things. And then most recently, though, and this is where I think we first came into sleep paralysis with the transcranial magnetic stimulation episode to blame for basically every UFO abduction account. Oh, yeah. Was that where we talked about it? For sure. They have done studies, and they found that I think if you believe in alien abductions, if that's part of your belief system, then you're more or did they do the study of people that experience sleep paralysis, and all of them believed maybe in UFOs? I think they did the reverse. People who report having been abducted by UFOs, they experienced sleep paralysis. Yeah. Okay. They have a higher frequency of experiencing sleep paralysis. Got you. So the people study this and they just fold their arms and go, okay. Right. Yeah. It was an alien land. Yeah. But apparently in the UFO lore, sleep paralysis has been accounted for. When you're abducted, you remember being paralyzed before and after, but they wipe your memory of the actual abduction out. But they leave the sleep paralysis. And I remember in X Files, I think when Fox Molder's sister was taken, like, she was levitated off the bed and just stiff as a board, floats out the window. That's classic sleep paralysis symptoms where you can't move, and yet you still feel like you're floating, you're moving, you're levitating. Or that there's 600 weight of salt being put on your chest. I love salt, so that might not be a bad thing. You'd be like, this is delicious and terrifying. Just inch it up toward my tongue. That'd be the part that was making you crazy. Yeah, I couldn't get to it. They say it usually occurs when you are lying on your back in bed, although it can occur in any position at all. Because one of the accounts this article is cool, because they have first hand accounts, one of the guys was laying on his stomach, and he felt the demon, the incubus, I think, on his back. Or maybe it was a succubus. I'm not sure. And you can break it. Sometimes it happens on its own. Sometimes you can break it on your own on purpose. Right. And this is a good idea. I think they recommend to try and like, instead of saying, I got to get up and run out of here, they say to try to, like, just blink or, like, lift your little finger or just any conscious movement that you can get can break that thing. Yeah. And apparently, the moment you do that, the spell is broken. It's how it's been put forever. Herman Melville was the first, I think, to write about this in Moby Dick ishmail recount sleep paralysis. That book again? Yeah. And then I think 25 or 50 years later, the first time it shows up in the medical literature, silas Weir Mitchell, who we know from the exploding head syndrome. Right. He also described that for the first time, too, this guy was knocking out the parasomni as left and right, but they both use this terminology that the spell is broken. All it takes is just the slightest stir, and the sleep paralysis is over with. But the problem is you can't move. You can't make a sound. They said to even try just clearing your throat. Yeah, but even that can be challenging. But supposedly, if you can even get just a little bit going, you wake yourself up a little bit, and then you can do it a little more and more and more, and then all of a sudden, you're screaming and you've woken yourself up. Or if you can make a sound or a signal or something to get your partner help, something to notice that you are in the midst of sleep paralysis, all they have to do is just, like, touch you, right. And it brings you back to reality. Or this reality. Yeah. And it's not one of those things where it's dangerous to wake someone up experiencing sleep paralysis. Right. Isn't it, like, totally fine? Yeah. That's the other thing about it is terrifying and horrifying and just what a horrible experience it is physiologically, it's harmless. Aside from raising your blood pressure. Yeah. I mean, I guess you could always trigger a cardiac arrest or something. Maybe, but right. But supposedly it mimics having a heart attack. That's fun in some ways. So you actually could be having a heart attack and think it was sleep paralysis. Or I think it also mimics epilepsy in some ways. Right. But if it is just actual sleep paralysis, it's harmless. Well, yes. And I know we did mention this, it might have been the transcranial magnetic yes. Simulation where they recommend one of the things is to just tell or it might have been night terrors. Tell people just to learn to embrace it and go with it, and then it doesn't because sometimes it can be a joyful experience. Right. It's not always terror. Yeah. And maybe if you roll with it, you can control it a little bit more. It was exploding head syndrome, just learning that it's actually harmless. Yeah. Same thing. Some people just got over it immediately. Right. And then other people with this have learned to actually enjoy, like the feeling of levitating or floating. I would. And it all comes down to hearing that it's harmless, and hearing that it's harmless relieves stress, and stress is actually what brings both of those things on. So they're related in some way. And we'll get down to the scientific nitty gritty after this break, huh, Chuck? Yes, sir. If you're trying to eat better. All right, dude, what's really going on here, old hags aside? Well, I guess we should talk about narcolepsy a little bit. Yes. Because this is one of the, I guess, side effects of narcolepsy. There are actually a couple of them, sleep paralysis, and then what's called vivid hypnagogic hallucinations, which is when you're falling asleep, like we talked about. And apparently if you're narcoleptic, about 17% to 40% of narcoleptic are people who have narcolepsy. Is it wrong to say narcoleptic? Probably, I think with any condition or disease, don't, like, identify the person. Yeah, that's the disease. Yeah. Right. It's somebody with it. That's right. So somebody with narcolepsy. Nice. I want to hear from you people, by the way. Some people who have narcolepsy will be like, hey, I'm a narcoleptic, I don't care. And other people say, like, kudos right. For staying. People with narcolepsy, 17% to 40% experience sleep paralysis. If you are stricken with narcolepsy, 20% to 40% experience those vivid hypnagogic hallucinations. And it pretty much is individual as far as how much you're going to have these, how much you experience it, whether you have narcolepsy or not. But if you are non narcoleptic in that population, which is most people, 20% to 60% of those folks apparently will experience it at least one pretty wide range. Some people experience it very frequently. And apparently if you have basically chronic yeah, I think it's called severe and chronic sleep paralysis. Right. So severe is where it happens like multiple times in a night, and then chronic is where that happens over a period of six months. If you're one of those poor Sobs who has chronic severe sleep paralysis, this can happen to you, like up to twelve times or more in a night. Yeah. Because when you go back to sleep, it will happen all over again. Right. Yeah. So that was one of the things, if you're moving a finger or blinking an eye or making a sound and you wake yourself up, you want to actually get out of bed and get up and move around, basically shake it off, because if you don't, you can fall back asleep and the same thing is going to happen again and again, then even more mind boggling. Is this one of the other traits of sleep paralysis or what are called false awakenings? Right, right. Which is some straight up Inception stuff. Yeah. Where you think you're awake and screaming, but you're not. Right. Then you wake up and realize, oh, I was dreaming that I was awake and experiencing sleep paralysis. So it's a bit of a mind bender. It is. Including that these false awakenings, according to Professor French in that video, can be several layers deep. So when you have about a sleep paralysis and you finally scream and wake up, you realize, oh, I was dreaming. Right. You might experience it again. Right. And then you do the same thing, and you go through this multiple times until you finally actually do wake up. But you can go through sleep paralysis over and over again in different layers of a dream. Yeah. And then you get up and you go to work at your stupid cubicle, and no one around you has any idea of the living hell that you're experiencing or just the amazing journey you've just been on with ARod. One thing that really stinks, as if to combat it, like you said, to get up and fully wake yourself up. That could screw you. If you have a hard time falling back asleep, you might be up for the night. Right. And this one person in here described the feedback loop of stress. A lot of times, stress is what brings it on. And then it becomes this self fulfilling prophecy that you're stressed out about what's going to happen, which makes it happen, and you're just thinking, not again, not again, not again. And of course, that's when it happens. Right. So the stress is messing up your sleep pattern, and that's where the whole thing comes from. Right. So the first two guys who were described in the medical literature of The Ils, we're Mitchell as having sleep paralysis, we're actually healthy. But it was people with narcolepsy who ultimately led to basically the solving of the mystery of what sleep paralysis is. And one of the characteristics of Narcolepsy is something called sleep onset REM periods. Yeah. They think that may be the key there. I think it's the key, yeah. So what that is we've talked a lot about REM sleep. That usually happens about at least an hour or more after you fallen asleep. And what's happening here is soremp. Can we call it that? Yes. Sleep onset REM periods is when you're experiencing this REM before that hour or so has passed. Like right as you're falling asleep, you go straight into that REM sleep. I think in my own private Idaho, either Keanu Reeves or River Phoenix when they fell asleep. Yeah. One of those said narcolepsy, right? Yeah, one of them. I think so. Like, their eyes kind of fluttered. I think it was river. Okay. So that was a perfect portrayal of Narcolepsy because your eyes would flutter during REM sleep and it would happen immediately if you had sudden onset REM periods. Right, right. So the idea that somebody can fall asleep and immediately go into REM sleep rather than go through the sleep cycles and stages like you're supposed to, that apparently is what accounts for or is associated very strongly with episodes of. Sleep paralysis with people with narcolepsy, with people who have soremps, because you don't have to have narcolepsy to have sleep onset REM periods. It's a trait of narcolepsy. But even people who don't have narcolepsy can experience that. And usually it's when you're very stressed and your sleep pattern is out of whack. Yes. I think what I was trying to say was that doesn't explain when you have a sleep paralysis episode coming out of sleep right. Which is the hip no pumpk. Right. But I think it was probably who is it? Professor French. Mr. French in the conservatory with the candlestick. Professor French, I think reasons that it doesn't fully explain it, but it could relate because it's a similar state of consciousness either way, falling asleep or waking up. Yeah. So basically exiting or entering REM sleep suddenly into this reality can be attended by an episode of sleep paralysis. Yeah. And they did some studies in Japan actually elicited that. SORM these are mean. Yes. Don't you think? I don't know how they would do that, but they elicited sore and participants, and they used sleep interruption, and 9.4% of the ones induced had an episode of sleep paralysis. Yeah, but that was going into sleep. Correct. They've not figured out how to, like you said, create it and bringing somebody out of REM sleep. But again, it's associated with it. And what they think is going on is basically when you suddenly go into REM sleep from waking life, your brain can get caught in this dual state of consciousness where your brain is consciously awake, but it's also in the exact same state it's in when you're dreaming, which your dreams take place in REM sleep. So you're in two states of consciousness at once. That's amazing to me. Yeah. That's sleep paralysis. And the paralysis is explained by the fact that another hallmark of REM sleep is that you can't move. Your muscles are paralyzed. It's cataplexy. Right. So that you don't act out your dreams. So you're dreaming while you're awake. That's sleep paralysis. Yeah. As Dr. French says, wakefulness has occurred, but the body and part of the brain are still in REM sleep. Nuts. It is. I want to have one of these. Yes, but it sounds so scary. I'm up for it. Panic. These are the words that are used for it. I know I want to have one, and I'm not taking it lightly for people that suffer from it. I know it can be awful, but I would like to like the exploding head thing. Now I know what that feels like. Yes. And I kind of like having these references in life. Okay. Like personal references. Sure. I remember we did the Slinky episode. You went out and bought a Slinky. That's not true. So, like we said, how you can break it is by trying to move small things, clear your throat, maybe. Aside from that, you can try and avoid it altogether. If you're able to have a really regular sleep schedule and stuff like that. But they make a good point if you're traveling, if you're in different time zones to work the night shift. Do you have a kid? Yeah, exactly. Waking up all night, you might kind of be at the mercy of the sleep paralysis gods. Yeah, I was glad that they put that in that realism because so many times whenever you're talking about a sleep disorder, it's like the CDC recommends eating an apple a day and it's just like, this is not helpful, this isn't real. But this guy's like, yeah, you're in trouble when your sleep is all jacked up and you have sleep paralysis a lot. Yeah. What else is there? With narcolepsy in particular? There are drugs that you can take, but they don't necessarily work with sleep paralysis. With narcolepsy, sodium oxidate is prescribed and I looked that up as GHB. Yeah, but that's just for narcolepsy, not for sleep paralysis. Right. With the idea that if you carry the narcolepsy, then you won't have the sleep paralysis. That I think is how you could cure it. But that's only if you have narcolepsy. Right. Not isolated sleep paralysis. I think the official recommendation, aside from all the little tricks that we mention, is like we said, hey, it's not going to hurt you. Try and reframe how this is in your brain and don't be afraid of it. Welcome to Incubus. What if the band Incubus was what showed up in your room while you had sleep paralysis? You know, another way to treat this is for everybody to be nice to everybody else and cut down on everyone's stress. You never know who has sleep paralysis. Yeah. They might think they're being abducted by UFOs and analypred every night and are too freaked out to even mention it. Yeah. Which is another thing that Professor French points out. Like, we need to let people know about this because the more people we know that this is actually harmless and fairly common, the less stressed they're going to be about it, actually when they go to bed. So go out there, you tell somebody about sleep paralysis and then also be nice to everyone you meet. Yeah, there's a documentary about it. I can't remember the name right now, but I posted this documentary trailer quite a while ago. It's on Netflix. Yeah, I can't remember what it's called, but I know what you're talking about. Like the Dream, maybe? Something like that. It's got a pillow, but I posted a logo on Facebook a while ago and a lot of people chimed in that had bouts of sleep paralysis. Yeah, apparently it's very common. Yes. I went and looked through the comments today. It was pretty interesting stuff and my heart goes out to everybody. Same here. And hopefully you've learned just to sort of live with it. Be a dream, sailor. You live with it and ride it out. That would be kind of cool, though. It would be like levitation on. Yeah. Control it. Incubus out. Succubus in. You got anything else? No. If you want to learn more about sleep paralysis, well, just type those words in the search bar. We have a very limited amount here on how stuff works. So after you read Robert Lamp great thing. Go check out stuff on the Internet, okay? Okay. And since I said whatever I just said, it's time for listener mail. Hey, guys. I've been a fan for years. I was introduced to you on a 24 hours road trip with my best friend when I picked him up from the naval base and delivered them home. Spent the weekend with his family. By the time we were halfway home, I'd been awake for almost 30 hours. We still had six to go. My friend put on the latest episode of Stuff You Should Know, and we reveled in the gloriousness all the way there. Anyway, I wanted to write and say thank you for saving my butt. I am a neuropsychology major studying in Melbourne, Australia. I was feeling very, very unprepared for an exam, but was reassured by mother that my knowledge base is much wider than what I was taught in class, thanks entirely to my beloved and off reference Stuff You Should Know. I laughed at the time, but did a little merry jig at my desk when I opened my paper to find questions and answers that I knew. Thanks to you guys. So thank you. And boy, he put seven exclamation points there. That translates into money in some parts of the world. Upon learning that I pass with flying colors with a U, my mother bought me a card on the front reads, I want to listen to all the podcasts you do. For a moment, I thought that maybe I talk about you guys too much, but promptly dismissed the idea. So thanks for the show, for the awesome podcast. Four exclamation points from one academic to several others. Three exclamation points. It's starting to dwindle. Many thanks. That is from Tegan. Thanks, Tegan. Who describes herself, I guess, Tegan's lady's name, right? Sure. As a nerdy neuroscience major from Melbourne. Thanks a lot, Tegan. We appreciate that big time. And all the exclamation points, those were very nice. Kind of lazy toward the end, but trying to trail off. Maybe she broke the key. Maybe she has narcolepsy. Good point. If you want to get in touch with us, like Tegan, you can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can join us on facebook. Comsteffyshow. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast@houseofworks.com. And as always, join us at home on the Web stuffyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun is shining, the daylights longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music, My Favorite Murder from Exactly Right media, My Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarra and Georgia Hardstark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…donner-party.mp3	How the Donner Party Worked	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-donner-party-worked	Did they or didn't they? There is plenty of written evidence that the ill-fated Donner Party resorted to cannibalism - except there are no bones. Learn the details of one of the worst disasters of the early West in this episode of Stuff You Should Know.	Did they or didn't they? There is plenty of written evidence that the ill-fated Donner Party resorted to cannibalism - except there are no bones. Learn the details of one of the worst disasters of the early West in this episode of Stuff You Should Know.	Thu, 15 Mar 2012 13:54:33 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2012, tm_mon=3, tm_mday=15, tm_hour=13, tm_min=54, tm_sec=33, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=75, tm_isdst=0)	35155461	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetopforkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me. As as always, it's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. And that makes this stuff you should know. How are you doing? I'm fine. Good. How are you doing? I'm great, dude. I watched PBS today at work, which is always fun when you get to watch TV via the computer at work. I paid for it. Yeah, man, I remember. I watched American Grindhouse once at work while we were doing the exploitation. Yeah, I did do, actually. It was awesome. I watched the PBS American Experience, which is an awesome show. Been around for years. Oh, yeah. And I watched there, obviously. I watched the one in the Donner Party. Oh, is that the one you watched? Yeah. Got you. I just saw there was one on the Johnstown flood, though. I wish I would have known. I would have watched it. Oh, yeah. I mean, I'll still watch it. I still want to learn. You only watch PBS at work for money. Yet you're right. I was doing a little research and I came across something called Hufu or Hoofu. A play on Hulu? No, a play on tofu that's designed to taste like human flesh. Oh, I was going in an entirely different direction. No, this is about Cannibalism now. Yeah, there's a big media push on it. It made the Daily Show. All sorts of articles came up about Hoofu. There was a spokesman, there was a website, and it was the Tofu that tastes like human. Gross. They were saying the reason why they're doing it so anthropologists could better understand their subjects when they were investigating Cannibalism. And there's plenty of people out there who just wanted to try it. Well, how did they know? How did they flavor it like human? Well, they didn't. It turns out the whole thing was total farce. Got you. But if you still look today, it was on the Snow Sport. It's not definitively false. Yes, but no one's ever had it. And apparently while you could access the website, you couldn't buy it. You got an error message whenever you tried to check out or whatever. But it was pretty funny that everybody got taken on that. Yeah, I thought I'd mention that. I just did. Yeah, I did, too. And if you look in Urban Dictionary, there's no mention of it being fake or fictitious. Oh, really? Yes. I'm loathe to say it, but it was Wikipedia that initially said it's fictitious to me. Right. I feel dirty. But, Chuck, we talk about Hoofu or Hufu, depending on what region of the country you live in, to talk about the Donner Party, which is one of those very rare instances in the history of humanity where we can say pretty much without doubt, people ate other people, and they did so under some of the most horrific circumstances that humans have ever endured. This group of people went through holy hell. Yeah, it was pretty rough. I just keep going for the rest of the episode, just really driving how bad it was. And I learned a lot from this article, a lot of new, surprising stuff. It's pretty cool. Did you know that it took two years when it should have taken six months? Not true. What are you talking about? It took one year. Okay. Yeah. Well, did you know that the Donner party was originally the Donner Reed Party? And the Reed party split off and made their way without event onto Fort Sutter, California? No problem. That's not true either. What are you talking about? Yes. This is not the best article on our site, I must say. And I read it and then I did my own research and was like, wow, how did you miss some of this stuff? We'll get to the bottom of that and we'll make sure it gets changed. Yes, I've already sent an email, actually, about that. Did you? An angry one. Well, just like, how could this be on our site? It's so wrong and it's so easily figured out. It's not like rocket science. It took two years. Now look at a calendar. It took one year. So a caddy one? Yes. Okay, well, let's talk about the Donner party. Let's talk about what's known, what's not known. So Donna Reid. Donna was a wealthy farmer in his 60s. Reed was Irish American businessman, had some dough as well. He financed the trip. Oh, did he? I believe so. Okay, but George Donner was the official guy in charge. Yeah, James Reed thought that he was going to be in charge and kind of was in a way, but they did elect donor the captain because Reed turned off people with his RV. Essentially. He had a MACD out wagon that everyone else is really pissed off about because it was double decker and it had a stove in it and it had bunk beds and it was like, apparently made a big commotion among the other people because they're like, who's this guy with his big wagon? And this was even before the Chuck wagon was invented by Charles Chuck Goodnight. You want to go ahead and tell that story? Well, there's not much to tell. Charles Chuck Goodnight was a cookie on the wagon trails, and after the Civil War, he had gotten very tired of not having a decent meal, so he bought an old government wagon and converted it into a kitchen, which became the first Chuck wagon named after him. Yeah. And from that, if you follow it further and further, you get diners and food trucks. Chuck wagon. Yeah. Very nice, Josh. Very slick. So the Donna Reed party, like a lot of people back then, said, you know what, you know where it's at? This place called California that I've heard so much about and this is prior to the gold rush. Yeah. There was a movement toward populating California, basically resting control of California away from the Spanish, just through sheer numbers by having a bunch of white folks show up and basically saying, mexico, you can't control this land anymore. It'll be too expensive and costly. We're taking over because we live here now. That's right. And Lansford Hastings was one of the main dudes behind this movement. He was an attorney from Ohio. He went to California, 1842 and dreamed of wrestling this land from Mexico and governing California himself. Well, he dreams. He did so with a guy named John Sutter, who was a German born Swiss immigrant who had taken Mexican citizenship, really, to get a charter, a land grant from the Mexican government. And he used it to form New Halvetia or New Switzerland. Aka. Fort Sutter, which is now Sacramento. German Swiss, born with Mexican citizenship. Yeah. I love it. Who is a trader. Only in the 1840s can you do stuff like that. Exactly. Only in California. But Hastings will come back up in a very big way because it's pretty much all his fault. Got you. So they basically set out for California in May while they set out from Springfield in April. But Missouri in May is when they had the whole gang together. Right. The big wagon train. We're going west. We're following the California Trail. Everyone goes that way. Everyone actually, that year made it except for the Donner party. Oh, yeah. All the immigrants going to California checked in okay. Except for these sad folks. And it was really all because of one fateful decision, to tell the truth. They were just like any other wagon train, just like any other pioneers. They weren't trailblazers. They were following trails that they'd learned of. And they were well equipped. They weren't stupid. No. But they did make one faithful decision, like you said. Hastings what is his first name? Lanford. Lanford Hastings comes up in a big way because a lot of people laid the disaster, the calamity of the Donner party at Hastings feet because he was also a trailblazer. And he came up with a fanciful thing called the Hastings Cut Off. That's right. A short cut, essentially. Yeah. He wrote a book called The Immigrant's Guide to Oregon and California, which Donner had on the seat of his wagon. And there was a very brief sentence about the shortcut the Hastings cut off that was supposedly going to cut off about 350 to 400 miles a full three weeks off of the trip, which is a big chunk for a six month trip. That's definitely worth the trip they cut off. The problem was Hastings had never taken this route himself and had certainly never taken a wagon over it. But that didn't stop him from claiming that all of the roads were high and hard and level, that there was plenty of water and grass for the livestock and that there were no aggressive Indian tribes in the area. Yeah. He basically painted it out like a pleasure cruise because he was trying to get as many people as possible to California. He actually would go and hang out on the way to Oregon on the Oregon Trail and be like, you don't want to go there. You want to come down to California. Yeah. You lead people. Yeah. So this is why he came up with the Hastings cut off. And it was a dangerous gamble. And the Donner Party said, well, we want to shave three weeks off of our trip. Well, yeah. Part of the Donner party went left. Part of them went right. The part that went right did just fine. And you don't hear about them. They're not the donner party any longer. I don't know what they called themselves, but it wasn't the Reeds got you. The Reed stayed with the Donners and they left. Went on to Fort Bridge, Wyoming. They were going to meet up with Hastings there, and they got there a little late, and Hastings was no longer there. But he sent a message. He left a note somewhere along the trail along the Hastings cut off saying, this may not be as good as I thought. You should probably turn back. Well, yes. And before that, this other dude named Climbing was headed east from California by way, the Hastings cut off. And he said, don't go this way. He said, you're never going to make it alive. Your wagons aren't going to make it, and you probably wouldn't even make it, so don't go that way. So they continued. They continued. They found the note. And when they found the note, reed spent five days looking for Hastings to kill him now to talk to him about what the deal was. He just said he wanted to talk to him. Yeah, he wanted to kill him. He did find him, actually, and he didn't kill him. And Hastings said, I'm not coming back with you to lead. Sorry. But, hey, I'm up on this high bluff, and there's another route, and that one looks a lot better. And so they went that way instead, which was still the southern route under the Great Salt Lake, but it was not a good move. And that's what started the beginning of the end for the Donner party. 2 miles a day. Yeah. At that point, in 36 days, they went 16 miles, which is horrible, considering that they averaged about 12 miles a day. Normally, they ended up going an extra 125 miles. And it added three weeks to the trip. Rather than subtracting three weeks to the trip, they also lost four wagons, which is a big deal in a wagon train. Yeah. They lost a lot of oxygen of their cattle as well. And that's where they lost some of their first members because essentially they were in the desert. Yes. 80 miles stretch of desert on the trail. Yes. The Salt desert. So you got the heat during the day, and then it was very cold at night. And this was in August. This was like they eventually met back up with the California trail, but they thought, oh, man, that was rough. But now we're all set because we're back on the original trail. So that time that it took them I mean, that extra three weeks, wasn't it? That wasn't what did them and they were going slower than they predicted. Yeah. And it's important to know right here during that Hastings cut off route where they started to encounter, like, a lot of hardships. They sent this dude named Stanton. He was a bachelor from New York, and he was one of the only single dudes there. They sent him out for provision. So he took off for a period of time and did come back with five mules loaded with food and two Indian guides, Lewis and Salvador, to help them out. So they weren't a part, like the article says, of the original wagon train either. He came back with the provisions with Stanton. During this time, Reid got in a fight. It was basically the first incident of road rage. His wagon became entangled. His big RV wagon became entangled with a guy named Snyder. They fought. Reed killed Snyder with a knife. They had a little kangaroo court first, said they should hang them, and they said, no, you know what? Just pack your stuff and get out of here. Well, there's the financier of the whole thing. Yeah. And so he did. The next day without his family. He left. He went crazy. There's two stories going on now. You've got the Donner party and the Reed family. Then you've got Reid, who goes on his own, makes it to California actually just fine. Well, he was no worse for the wear, at least, so wow. The drama is high already. Yeah, the drama is high. The amount of time, all the setbacks, all the problems that they encountered conspired to put them back on the California Trail after that disastrous Hastings cut off and right at the eastern edge. So that would be the Nevada side, maybe. Yes. Of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in November at the first snowstorm, and it was a pretty bad snowstorm, and they thought, we can't make it through these mountains in the middle of winter. It's November. Let's just hunker down here. And it would turn out to be one of the worst winters, one of the harshest winters on record that they were unknowingly hunkering down for. And they made camp, two very famous camps. There was the Donner Camp at the edge of a little lake in the area, truckee Lake. And then there was the Alder Creek Camp, which apparently was founded because of a broken wagon wheel 6 miles back. They're back along the trail. And that's where the two groups camped in the Donner Party. Yeah. If I may, a reading from the diary of one of the members of the Donner Party. Oh, wow. November 1. Act like you're surprised. November 1, 846. It was a raining then in the valleys and snowing in the mountains. So we went on that way three or four days till we came to the big mountain or the California mountain. The snow was in about 3ft deep there. There was some wagons there they said they had attempted to cross and could not. We set out the next morning to make a last struggle, but did not advance more than 2 miles before the road became so completely blocked that we were compelled to retrace our steps in despair. When we reached the lake, we lost our road and owing to the depth of the snow in the mountains, we're compelled to abandon our wagons and pack our goods upon oxen. So this is early November and they are in bad shape and basically the wagons can't even pass anymore. No, they set up these camps and, like, we got to hunker down for the winter. And ultimately they ended up in an area where there was, through the winter, 30ft of snow. Not over time. Like, that was the snow pack was 30ft deep. Yeah. I mean, it's still one of the worst winters on record, like today. Not just for the time. Right. And this group of fairly greenhornish people from back east are settled down in one of the most dangerous spots in the country at the time, at least climate wise. Yeah. Meteorologically dangerous. Provisions started to run out. Another diary entry november 6. We have now killed most of our cattle, having to stay here until next spring and live on poor beef without bread or salt. It snowed during the space of eight days with little intermission after our arrival, mr. Curtis remarked that in the oven was a piece of the dog and we could have it raising the lid of the oven. We found the dog well baked and having a fine, savory smell. I cut out a rib, smelling and tasting, found it to be good and handed the rib to Mr. McCutchen, who after smelling it sometime, tasted it and pronounced it a very good dog. Apparently that was Uno, the donors dog or the reed dog? It was one of the main fellows, Uno, who met that fate. Yeah. I didn't read that. He was delicious. Well, I imagine if you're dying of starvation, anything is going to be delicious. They ate their shoestrings. They ate the kids would sit in front of the fire and pick off pieces of the hide skin rug and eat that. And then they eventually ate the hide from their roofs of the cabins. Because there are actually cabins at the lake. Yes. There were no cabins at the creek. No. But they weren't much help against this kind of snow. In fact, apparently they were completely packed in at one point and couldn't even get out of the cabin. Wow. It was like the thing that happened to Mr. Burns and Homer Simpson camping trip. Or was it the ski trip? It was the corporate retreat. Right. Boy, that was a good one. They boiled their blankets into kind of a pasty glue, apparently. Yeah. You said they're shoelaces, right? They have their shoe laces, yeah, because I think they were made of, like, animal hide or something. Bark, twigs, anything they could get their hands on. Anything that might have any kind of protein they were eating. Yeah, they boiled the bones so much for soup that they became just brittle. So they ate the bones of the animals because they could bite into them. Wow. So it's pretty rough. Also, it should go without saying, they ate their pack animals. They managed to hunt for deer, which is pretty good in 30ft of snow. To hunt deer in the middle of winter successfully. Hats off to them for that. Yeah. They got other things. They got birds here and there, like ducks and owls. And I think they got wolf one time. So they were able to forage here and there. But it's a long winter. Everyone is clearly starving by this time. And the writing is on the wall to the parties at these camps. So they select a group of well, the strongest people, including the two Indian Guides and I think it was the strongest 15 people, equipped them with homemade snowshoes and set them out to walk across the Sierra Nevada mountains in the middle of winter with almost no food. They had six days starvation rations per person. And they were called the Forlorn Hope. That was the name of the group. Yeah. Or the snowshoe group. Yeah. And I just want to point out that this is some of the most beautiful land you'll ever see in your life. So it's not like they were in a gulag in Siberia. This was, like, gorgeous Sierra Nevada mountain range. And this lake, it's absolutely amazing. So it must have been a bitter pill to be that close. So they're only, like, 150 miles away at that point and just stuck in dying, I think even beyond the beauty, the fact that they were 150 miles from their destination, dying, like you said, that's rough. It was the Forlorn Hope group where cannibalism first came up because they all ran out of food very quickly and apparently six days in. A guy named Charles Stanton. You mentioned Stanton, didn't you? Yeah. He was a bachelor, one of the early heroes. He was saying, hey, you guys go on without me or Take me with you as provisions, maybe. And everybody said, no, we can't do that. It's crazy. Stop that. And they left him to die, right? Yeah. A couple of days after that, they thought, hey, maybe Stanton wasn't so crazy. Let's figure out let's explore the possibility of cannibalism. And they did they discussed it, and apparently at first they decided that they were going to draw lots, draw straws, and then whoever is, like the custom of the sea, whoever drew the shortest straw was going to die. And whoever drew the second shortest straw was the person who had to kill him. And this one guy I can't remember his name drew the straw, the shortest straw. But nobody had the heart to kill him. Yeah. So they kind of just waited instead for the next person to die. Yeah. They agree. They propose dueling, too, at one point. Like, let's do a shootout. Whoever dies, we'll just eat them. But it was very grim. Another reading, perhaps? Yes. This was in December, actually, right before Christmas, sadly. And this is from the snowshoe group. The fort. Lauren hope. In this melancholy situation, they consulted together and concluded they would go on trusting in Providence rather than return to the miserable cabins. They were also at this time out of provisions and partly agreed, with the exception of Mr. Foster, that in case of necessity, they would cast lots who should die to preserve the remainder. So it's coming. Yeah, they know it. So I think a couple of days after they started talking about cannibalism, the first guy died. His name was Antoine. Yeah. And Antoine was eaten by the Forlorn Hope group. He was the first one, but definitely not the last. Now, there was a guy named Jay Foster. Yes, he was the next. And the lady named Mrs. Foster cut the meat from his bones, boiled it, and served it to everybody, and everybody ate. But the one thing that was agreed upon was that relatives wouldn't eat relatives. Right. So there was a guy named Jay Foster who died next, and he was butchered and cooked and served by a lady named Mrs. Foster. One of the things they agreed upon was that relatives wouldn't eat relatives. Right? Yes. But apparently his father was part of the Forlorn Hope group, too. Yeah, he wasn't having it. And then things apparently started to turn on the two Indian guides who the group started discussing murdering and eating them. And one of the other Forlorn Hope group said, hey, we're talking about doing this. You guys might want to take off. So the Indians apparently had trouble believing it at first. They finally said, oh, wait, that's right. You guys are white men. I forgot you totally would do that. And they disappeared into the woods. Yes. But they were later found. They tracked them by their blood, so apparently they weren't in great shape. And they found them. This is where it gets a little hinky. Some accounts say they found them dead and ate them. Some accounts say they found them alive and passed out, basically, and they shot them both through the head and then ate them. Either way, they ate them, even though there's no anthropological proof. Yeah, we'll get to that. Yeah. So all these events take place over 33 days, the Forlorn Hope? Yeah. And I imagine the Cannibalism, it came in starting on day nine, day ten or eleven, and then after that, they had 22 more days of this, and they finally made it to Fort Sutter and said, hey, we got big problems. We need your help. Yes. Let's start sending out some rescue parties. How many was it? Seven of them? Yeah. Seven made it of the original 15? Yeah. All right, so that story is going on. You still got the Donner party back at the camp by the lake in the river, and you still got Reid, who made it to Sacramento to Sutter Fort. He tried to get supplies and men to take back to rescue his family, and the Mexican American War prevented that from happening. He was essentially forced to kind of join up that effort, and he couldn't get any of the men anyway because everybody was fighting in the war. So he would later go on to be part of the second relief party that went to go find them. So we'll pick that up when we get there. Right. Because meanwhile, while the Fort Lauren Hopes engaged in this horror in the woods, the same stuff is going on back at the camps on the eastern edge of the Sierra Nevada. It took a little longer, I believe, but eventually people started to eat the dead that had died of starvation. Right, that's true. So, like I mentioned, there were some rescue efforts. There were four groups that went from California because word got back and they even started writing about it in the paper in San Francisco that these people were stranded in this year in Nevada. So February 5, there was a quote. We concluded we could go or die trying, for not to make any attempt to save them would be a disgrace to us into California for as long as time lasted. And that was one of the members of the very first relief group. Of seven men, \u00a350 of provisions headed out. But Reed was a part of the second group. Right. The first group didn't leave for 13 days after the Fort Lauren Hope came to Fort Sutter. And then yeah, Read led the second group. So 21 survivors were brought back by the first group, 17 by the second group. The third group rescued four, and then they had to leave four people behind, including a guy named Lewis Keysberg. And when the fourth group came back, lewis Keith Berg was the only person alive. Suspiciously well, yeah. He was accused almost immediately of murdering the other three people and eating them. He was said to have been discovered surrounded by the disfigured and cannibalized corpses of the other three people in the frying pan. There was, like, lungs and livers, buckets of blood, basically. He was in this crazy place that he had created himself through cannibalism. Yes. They say it's completely off his rocker at that point. But the big kicker was that there were three uneaten oxen legs, and that when asked, he said that oxen didn't have a very good flavor. So he had resorted to eating the other people, but they had died of natural causes. He hadn't murdered them. So when the rescue party comes and gets them, keith Berg has kind of kept the arms length like no one's talking to them. They don't want to have anything to do with them. When they made camp one night, he apparently was looking at the snow and saw like a little piece of cloth and tug dad. It was in the snow, tug dad. A little harder, a little more. And all of a sudden, jars loose his dead daughter, the corpse, the frozen corpse of his dead daughter, who had last seen sending off with his wife on the third rescue party. So he had it pretty rough one way or another. Yes. He sued for defamation later on. Right when he got back. Yeah. The court awarded him one dollars and demanded that he pay the court costs on top of that. So he lived the rest of his life pretty much a hermit. Well, yeah, he was derided as a murdering cannibal who enjoyed it, but he denied that the rest of his life. And other people deny, too. Like, first they would say, like, yeah, we resorted to cannibalism here and here and here. Then later on some of them would say, no, we didn't, actually. That was just sensationalized. Well, yeah, there's a big question of whether there actually was cannibalism in the Donner Party or if it was all sensationalized and fabricated by the newspapers. The big question is, if the Donner Party hadn't resorted cannibalism, why would they lie? Well, the answer to that is they wouldn't lie about resorting to cannibalism. And the reports are probably true, but in the great tradition of William Errands, you need to see it to believe it. As far as cannibalism goes, sure, most people don't genuinely dispute that the Donner Party did engage in cannibalism, but the problem is there is a lack of forensic evidence. Like you said, they ate the bones. And bones of animals like the dog, uno horses, deer, foxes that wolf. All these bones have been found at the camp sites, but they haven't found any human bones. Right. So there's a lot of explanations for that. We know for a fact that some people who came upon these scenes after the Donner Party had left ordered, like, these things to be cleaned up and buried. Makes sense. Other people have suggested that the donors'didn't try to process the human cadavers like they did the animal bones, kind of very gently, so they wouldn't have left butcher marks on the bones. Right. And then others say that if they didn't cook the bones like they did the animal bones, and those bones would have disintegrated a. Long time ago. Right. Then, lastly, the argument against that is that these things of cannibalism, like you said, happened here and here and here and here. We only know of one legitimate Donner site that's been excavated. The others haven't been found. They can't find them. Oh, really? Yeah. So it's possible there is evidence out there and it just hasn't been discovered. But the point is, why would these people, if they did actually say this and these are their journal entries, why would they say that they engaged in cannibalism if they hadn't? Exactly. So Reed, in the meantime, made his way back with a second relief group, was convinced that his family was dead, but was very surprised and relieved to find that they were alive. So can you imagine this reunion that happens when his two year old son was still alive? Eight year old daughter? There were one of two families that didn't have any deaths. Yeah, the Reed suffered no deaths, and I believe the brains did not suffer deaths. All of the donors died. Every single one of them. Well, which is pretty sad. And out of the group, I think two thirds of the women and children survived. Two thirds of the men died, and everyone over 50 died. Yeah, 50 was pretty old back then. Sure. Especially for those kind of conditions. So there you have it, the Donner Party. Basically what that did was halted a lot of immigration to California for a while until word of gold came around, and then they said that was it, screw it. I'll take my chances. It was like a year before the first goal rush, and then there was the Movement of 1849, the big gold rush of 1849. And that was that. I think one of the Reed wife sent a letter out afterward that was like, don't be afraid to come out here. Just don't take any shortcuts and hurry. Basically don't listen to Hastings. And Hastings was like, the whole time, dude. He was being cursed. Like, on a daily basis, he was vilified and cursed, and that pretty much scrapped his reputation as a trailblazer and anyone to be trusted, and that was the end of him. I couldn't find anything up about the rest of his life, but I know that he was pretty well disgraced by that. He went on to be, like, a merchant, and he lived a life after that, but he apparently was remorseful for the rest of his life. I'm sure that's Langford Hastings, I guess if you want to know more about him, you can type his name. L-A-N-G-F-O-R-D-H-A-S-T-I-N-G-S in the search bar athouseofirstcom and it will, coincidentally enough, bring up this article on the Donner Party. And I said, search bar athousofirst.com. Right. This soon to be changed article on the Donner Party. And yeah, since it's going to be changed to maybe give us a minute. Yeah, but I said houserforks.com and search bar, which means it's time for listener mail. Yes. This is Back to the Future, Josh. Okay, Josh, chuck exclamation points. I just listened to the Zero podcast and heard your cries for help from across the ages. We all heard you guys go get into the Wayback Machine, but I think only few of us realize that you never came out. I could tell that something had gone wrong by the tone of your voice. As you near the end of the show, I know that you are trying to send us a message. You are stuck in fifth century India. I hope you have found somewhere safe to bunker down. Do not try to fix the Way Back Machine on your end. Jerry and I are working on a way to fix the broken flux capacitor remotely and bring you back. We hope to hear you return to us on a podcast soon. And one final warning do not, under any circumstances, use the Way Back Machine while you are still strapped inside the Way Back Machine. The last thing we need is an Inception style time travel within time travel scenario. And that says Maxprints Godspeed from Maxprints assistant to Dr. Emmettlathrop Brown. Nice. A little bit of fun there. I've been enjoying the heck out of the SOGG paneer that I've been eating morning, noon, and night. Yeah, man, I can't get enough of this lavage. Yeah. If you have a bit of amusement for us, I found that highly amusing. You can tweet to us at syskast. You can hit us up on Facebook@facebook.com, and you can send us an email to stuffpodcast@housetuffworks.com. Be sure to check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join housedefworks staff as we explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun's shining, the daylights longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music My Favorite Murder from Exactly Right media, My Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgueref and Georgia Hardstark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite favorite murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
314735de-e646-11ea-942d-d75567216c4c	Short Stuff: Carrots and Your Eyes	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/short-stuff-carrots-and-your-eyes	Join Chuck and Josh as they learn that one of the great childhood truths – that carrots help you see better in the dark was totally made up!	Join Chuck and Josh as they learn that one of the great childhood truths – that carrots help you see better in the dark was totally made up!	Wed, 26 Aug 2020 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2020, tm_mon=8, tm_mday=26, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=2, tm_yday=239, tm_isdst=0)	11951174	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh. There's, Chuck. And this is short stuff. It's the shortest of this stuff, I think. I believe I'm right. You ever heard the the old kid song, Carrots? Carrots good for your heart, the more you eat, the better your eyes? No. Who wrote that? I did, just now. Okay, that's fine then, if it was off the cuff. But I mean, man, if that went through like a focus group or something you like carrots? Oh, I love carrots. As a matter of fact, researching this, I ate two raw carrots while I was reading. I eat raw carrots all the time, like with the skins on and everything. Oh, you don't do a little peel, huh? No, wash them up sometimes. You should watch them, you know, they come out of the dirt. I know, but I've read, and I think we talked about there's this idea that vegetarians don't get some sort of beneficial bacteria because the vegetables are so well rinsed and washed in the United States, and there's something in the dirt that is helpful. But I mean, yeah, I mean, when I wash my potatoes and carrots and stuff, I don't do, like, the brush scrub or anything like that. I just give them a good sort of hand rinse. Right. So I'm sure I'm getting some good dirt in there. Yeah, you want to get it under your fingernails and then lick it out from under your fingernails. That's the healthiest way. So we're talking about carrots, though, because of the old adage that carrots are good for your eyes. And here's the deal, and we'll talk kind of all about this. Carrots are good for your eyes, but they're not like a cure if you have anything other than a vitamin A deficiency, which is why your eyes may be going bad. Right. And even if you already have a problem from vitamin A deficiency, they're not necessarily going to reverse the issue. But from what I can tell, carrots are really good preventative, total, or vitamin A deficiency related eye issues. And we'll talk about how that works in a second. But first, Chuck, I want to tell you, when I was younger, we used to have a great neighborhood for playing things like kick the can. Yes. And I remember specifically explaining to some of my friends that I was playing with that I was able to see them so clearly at night because I ate a bunch of carrots. I'm always eating carrots. And I meant that as sincerely as I've ever said anything in my life. And I just yesterday figured out that I was totally full of it and didn't realize it. And when one of the other boys shoved you, you said that your dad was going to sue their family for all the money they had. I don't think I've ever said that in my life. Thankfully. I always was like, that's lame. Yeah, you're the only eight year old going, well, that's called a frivolous lawsuit, my friend. Tort reform. Now that might have been a carryover for you from this story from world war II in the UK. Apparently the british royal air force had a story they published about the fighter pilot john catsize cunningham, who they could thank for his diet of carrots, for the fact that he was so good at night and these dog fights that he would get into at night. And so people drink it up, they grew carrots, and it turns out it was all sort of a false story cooked up for propaganda sake to cover up their radar technology. Yeah. They didn't want everybody to know that they were using radar, so they said, there's this guy who's eating so many carrots that he can see german bombers at night. You know what they really said? What? They said, hail, boy. What do you think about us dangling you as the old carrot, as it were? Oh, man, that was good. I think we should also specify his nickname wasn't cat size. It was cats eyes. He wasn't like the size of a cat. Yeah. C-A-T-S apostrophe E-Y-E not C-A-T-S-I-Z-E because that's what it sounded like at first. I got you, catsize. Cats eyes. He's the cutest, darn little slying pilot. Oh, boy, that's good. So that's totally made up. It's british propaganda, and you don't actually see better in the dark from eating carrots. They were just covering up radar use. That's one of the best things I've ever learned in my entire life. I love that fact. That's just wonderful. But it does not mean that carrots aren't good for your eyes. And we're going to describe how carrots are good for your eyes after a break. How about that, chuck? Sounds great. Much. Okay. Boy, that was a great first half if you ask me. Chuck yeah. And you know what? I want to applaud you for not eating baby carrots. Well, I hear they're bleached. They're bleached and they're also I think the story is it's a very wasteful thing, right? The process? Oh, I don't know. Is it? I mean, I think so. You can just look at a baby carrot and where does the rest of the stuff go? I thought that they were made from carrots that didn't pass muster to be sold normally, and then they just kind of whittled it down. But yeah, I guess that would be a waste because most of the produce that doesn't get sold is just cosmetic. I think we talked about food waste before like that, didn't we? Yeah. And you know what? I tried to buy one of those the other day. The grocer was laying out lemons and he had one that didn't look good. He said it to the side, and I said, can I have that one? And he said, no. He said, but it looks just like a Lincoln. He goes, I know, I'm going to sell it on ebay. All right, so I'm going to take issue with that guy and we should do a short stuff on what's the deal with baby carrots once we figure that out too. All right, for sure. But yeah, I don't eat baby carrots because I have heard their Bleach, although I must admit I've never done the actual research. It was enough of it. Yeah, that's true. I like man size stuff. So betacarotene is sort of the big ingredient that is the pigment, and not just in carrots, but in a lot of things, like sweet potatoes, a lot of orange things, I think. Isn't one of the melons rich with betacarantine canalupe? I've never heard of that one. That's funny. You're kidding, right? Yeah. Okay. But it could have been one of those things that you'd never seen written out before, like fastidious. I don't even know how to spell that. Facetious. And it looks like facetidious or something. Yeah, facetious or something or what's? The one I used to get wrong all the time? Deleterious. Delete. So betacarotene is this pigment. It's in a lot of orange, fruits and veggies and it is rich with vitamin A. We've already discussed vitamin A is in the developing world. Vitamin A, if you don't have enough of it, it is a leading cause of blindness. There are some other conditions that a lack of vitamin A can cause with the eyes, one called zero thalamia, where you don't produce tears, you have a lot of dryness, obviously your eyelids can swell and you can get ulcers in your cornea. Sounds awful. It does. And then also macular degeneration, which is a problem everywhere. It's like one of the main causes people lose their vision as they age. But from what I've read, it's not just a natural, normal outcome of aging. Like you can prevent it. And one of the ways that you can prevent it or stave it off is from eating plenty of carrots or eating plenty of foods that are rich in betacarotene. Because I don't think we've said it yet. Betacarotene is a precursor to vitamin A. We eat things like carrots that contain beta carotene and our bodies go and turn it into vitamin A and go, here you go. Eyes. Use some of this and your eyes pack it in the macula and it fortifies it against macular degeneration. That's right. And we mention sweet potatoes and cancel out A. But also, of course, mango. You've got your pumpkin, you got your apricot. Kind of most of those orange colored foods except for oranges. Yeah, they don't have beta guarantee. And I'm thinking that is just stupid. I know. What do you do in orange? Some milk apparently has it, so a lot of cheeses have it. Egg yolks have it. Liver has it. Liver has everything, I think, because everything gets stuck in the liver. So you're ingesting everything right then. I'm not a big liver fan, either. Although I do love it. I love a good patea. Okay. But I wouldn't eat, like, just a grilled liver or something like that. It would fall through the grates, I think, on a grill, wouldn't it? Yeah. I mean, that's where I go south with any survival competition. I love those shows. But I don't know, man. I mean, maybe if it was life and death, I could bring myself to it, but eating entrails and livers and brains and stuff just very tough for me. Not a sweet bread fan, huh, New? And that's a terrible name for that stuff. There's that footnote in our book about sweetbreads being, like, the greatest culinary euphemism of all time, because those things are not that's just about as great as it comes for that kind of thing, because, like, thalamus or something, or the thyroid gland and the pancreas, I think. I think you're referring to our book that you can preorder now, right? Yeah. Stuff You Should Know. Colon, an incomplete compendium of mostly interesting things, which can be preordered everywhere in the world right now. Yeah. Go read those footnotes. They're a lot of fun. Yeah, they are. Where are we? We are basically at the point where I think we kind of wrapped this up, Chuck, because we've talked about beta carotene being important. We've talked about vitamin A. And then I guess we should also mention lutein. Lutein is an antioxidant that's also found in carrots, which makes carrots even more potent. Health wise. That really kind of helped them prevent macular degeneration, too. Yeah, I think they increase your pigment density, and the macula is where that happens. In the macula. You always hear about macular degeneration, but that's the little oval yellow area near the retina. Yes. And when that goes, you can't see so well, so you want to keep that healthy. So basically, I think what we're trying to say is, go out, pre order our book, and then while you do, eat some raw carrots, but not the baby kind. Yeah. Eat raw carrots. And then if you want more lutein, you can also eat dark leafy greens and kale and Swiss shard and stuff like that. Sure. And don't forget our book. And since I said that, Chuck, I think short stuff is out, don't you? Yes, out. Stuff you should know is the production of iHeartRadio's how Stuff Works. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/podcasts.howstuffworks.com/hsw/podcasts/sysk/2017-01-05-sysk-feeding-babies-bottle-final.mp3	How Feeding Babies Works: The Bottle	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-feeding-babies-works-the-bottle	The decision to bottle feed a baby instead of breast-feeding is a weighty one these days, fraught with supposed developmental pitfalls and very real social implications. But is bottle feeding a bad thing? And are benefits of breast-feeding overestimated?	The decision to bottle feed a baby instead of breast-feeding is a weighty one these days, fraught with supposed developmental pitfalls and very real social implications. But is bottle feeding a bad thing? And are benefits of breast-feeding overestimated?	Thu, 05 Jan 2017 08:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2017, tm_mon=1, tm_mday=5, tm_hour=8, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=5, tm_isdst=0)	67308234	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, San Francisco, we're coming back to see you. Ah, yes. Our second year in a row, we're going to be going to SF Sketch Fest. I like to think it's the premiere comedy festival in the United States. Well, in the world. You think so? Yeah. What about Beijing? No, it's a close second, but a second. Well, we love San Francisco. We love performing there. Everyone is always so kind to us. And by San Francisco, we mean the entire Bay area. Of course. Yeah. So we will be there doing our thing for a one time only show on Sunday, January 15, at 01:00 p.m.. Yeah, it's the rare Sunday afternoon. We're like the NFL of podcasters. Yeah, exactly. That's what I've always thought. So all you have to do is go to the SF sketchfest site, look at the old calendar, and there are tons of great people performing. Oh, yeah. So I suggest just doubling down and getting tickets to all kinds of good shows, for sure. And hurry up and get tickets to ours because they've only been on sale for a week or so and they're already half sold out. That's right. So please hurry. San Francisco. Please hurry. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetuffworkscom. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W, Chuck Bryant. And we have guest producer Noel with us. And this is stuff you should know. Part two. That's right. Part two. Actually, things are going to get weird because Noah's about to leave, I think. And then that means we're alone again. You never know what's going to happen. The beating of our hearts is the only sound stuff You Should Know after Dark. It got weird pretty quick. So this is part two of how feeding Babies works, right? Are we on the same page? Oh, yeah. I hope so. Part one, I think, went down pretty well. It was a little nerve wracking being two dudes. Right. At the risk of doing it wrong, or like you said, mansplaining, which I even hate saying that term, but I think we did a pretty good job. Yeah. We didn't come across as we were hanging on by just our fingernails, like I felt for most of the time. I think we did all right, too. Yeah. And today we're going to focus a lot more on formula feeding, which I feel much more comfortable because it's something I know a lot about. Right? Yeah. I figured you could probably do a lot of heavy lifting on this one. Well, it's not that heavy. Just five or 6oz at a time. Terrible. Yeah. The first one is called the Breast. This one is called the Bottle. And yeah, the bottle is usually filled with formula, but there's plenty of other stuff you could fill with it, specifically breast milk. But a lot of women start using bottles fairly early on, sometimes from the outset. And there's a lot of reasons why there's a lot of reasons, I guess, in other words, why women either choose not to or ultimately have chosen for them not to breastfeed. And one of the big ones that's actually pretty common is a condition called mastitis. Yes. Mastitis is basically an extremely painful inflammation of the breast or breasts, I guess in the worst case, which can be brought on by like, sore cracked nipples or an infection in the breast blocked milk ducts. There's a lot of stuff that can bring it on. And as painful as breastfeeding can be, apparently the recommended treatment course of treatment for mastitis is to keep on breastfeeding. That actually the flow of milk through the breast clears up the inflammation and even the infection in some cases. And I was trying to figure that out, how would that work? But then I remember that breast milk is so chock full of antibodies that I guess it would deliver the antibodies to that site as well. Right. That was the only thing I could come up with. Yeah, that makes sense. Yes. Well, actually we did record we let the cat out of the bag. We're recording these on two separate days even. Yeah, we usually do the sweets in one day, but yeah, we decided to sleep on it. Right. I think that's probably a good move. But yesterday when I mentioned my mother did not breastfeed me and she had some problems with my brother, I think that was the deal. I think it was pain and stuff like that. Yeah. And I mean, from what I can gather, mastitis is not just pain. Like you feel very ill and run down and apparently you're supposed to get lots of bed rest and nutritious fluids and express your milk every 2 hours and express yourself, for that matter. Right. Which probably amounts to I'm in Hill right now. Yes, probably. But when you put all this stuff together on top of all of the normal things that you have to do under the best of circumstances when caring for a newborn, this very frequently represents the last straw for women who are like, on the fence about breastfeeding, the mastitis commonly leads them to say, we're done with that. I'm done with breastfeeding. Sure. That's one. Another one I came across that I hadn't really thought about. That kind of surprised me was boob jobs. Yeah. I never considered this until you did the research and I thought, oh, you know what? I never even thought about that. It's so out of my sphere of consciousness. That would be great. Yeah. I don't think I meant that to be a pun, was it? No, it wasn't. It's a great t shirt. Okay. Instead of talk to the hand, you are now out of my sphere of consciousness. Got you. So if you do get breast implants, it kind of depends on the reasons why, how it's done, where it's actually done, obviously in the breast area. But we haven't done one of breast implants, haven't we? Dude, one of our better episodes is on breast implants. Really? Yeah. Remember I said I wanted to see what a breast implant looks like on a dog? Because apparently they practice on dogs early on. I remember now. Yeah, that was a great episode from beginning to end. It was a long time ago though, right? So, getting back to it, the incisions, it depends on where they're made. If they go across the nipples, or are probably likely that your milk ducts and the nerves were cut, which means you probably can't breastfeed. Exactly. But if you had a good doctor and they went like, in your armpit or underneath your breast, they probably also specifically chose to save those nerves and go around them. So if your incisions are under your breast or under your armpit, you probably are able to breastfeed. I imagine that's a part of the conversation when you go in there, don't you think? Probably like, hey, do you want to have kids or do you have kids or do you want to breastfeed? Yeah, I don't know. I've never had a consultation. No. But it does seem reasonable that that would be part of it, for sure. I would think so, yeah. The other thing, if you still have feeling in your nipples, that's a good sign that the nerves are still intact. And sometimes that takes a little while to come back, though. Yeah. If you just had your breast augmentation surgery and the feeling isn't back, that doesn't mean it's not going to come back. So that's not a sign. But if it's been years now and you have feeling back in your nipples, you probably can breastfeed right where you got your implants counts too. If it's in the actual mammary tissue, that's going to be a problem. It's going to get in the way of milk production. But if they put it under your chest muscles, which is more involved, but it's basically out of the way of your actual breast. Probably breastfeeding. I feel like I should be finishing each one of these with you're. Probably a redneck. You probably can breastfeed if the implant is on the back of your neck. The good news is you can breastfeed, but you probably made a grave error in your choice of doctors. Then you might be a redneck. No, you'd be a boob neck. And then the reason for having it is another factor. If you just got the breast implants because you wanted larger breasts and it was purely cosmetic, then you probably are a better candidate for breastfeeding. Whereas if you got implants because the tissue was never developed, or there was maybe asymmetric problems, or if the breasts were far apart from one another, like, these are reasons that you may not be able to breastfeed. And again, I imagine in the consult, this will all be covered. Yeah. Like if you got breast augmentation because your memory tissue didn't develop properly or normally, then you might not be able to breastfeed. So those are a couple there's plenty of other reasons why a woman would choose not to breastfeed. In large part it's a matter of preference. Right. Some women just simply don't want to breastfeed. Some are afraid it's going to hurt, some are embarrassed by the idea. In some families, it's a family tradition that you're raised on formula. There's basically as many reasons for a woman to choose not to breastfeed as there are reasons. Probably even more, to tell you the truth. Let's dive back in history a bit. I guess we usually do history first, but this is sort of woven in sensibly, I think back in the day it's kind of interesting. I've heard wet nurse my whole life. I've known that was a term, but I literally never knew what that was. Really? No, I don't know why, it's just maybe I'm a big dummy, but I had no idea that a wet nurse is a woman who breastfeeds someone else's child. That's funny, I did not know that. Did you think it was something else or you just never stopped and thought about one? I never stopped and thought about it. I never needed one. So I was just like, put a wet nurse on it. Sure. That'll help. Right? That'll clear. That bum knee right up. It's better than a dry nurse. Right? Sure. Dry nurses are chapped and cracked, so yeah, that's what happens. And it was very common practice back in the day, especially before the feeding bottle was invented. And of course, as you would imagine, it was an alternative mainly for people of higher status. Yeah, that's actually kind of fascinating in that for a very long time, except for a period between about when breastfeeding was all their age in America, very much akin to the situation now, breastfeeding was seen as what the women of lower socioeconomic classes did. Like, they can't afford a wet nurse so they have to feed their baby. Exactly. Right, exactly. I would hire a woman of a lower socioeconomic class to feed my own baby. Right. Just because it just wasn't done. Women didn't do that kind of thing if you were well off or well to do. Yeah, which is terrible. But I never considered that a lot of mothers died during or not a lot, but plenty more mothers died during childbirth back then. Right. And so that's a chance to save these babies. Which is amazing. Sure. Truly. For sure. That's one way that wet nurses really did kind of keep things going. But for a large part for about 2000 years, breastfeeding or the use of wet nurses was basically what women of a higher status did. They hired wet nurses. Yeah. Which I had no idea. It's fascinating. It is. And even more to the point, it kind of formed the basis of this idea that not breastfeeding was preferable to breastfeeding that it was better to not breastfeed if you were able to. Right, right. It was the preference of the wealthier class, whereas the exact opposite is the position today. They've completely switched positions today. Yeah. And this author, Catherine Joyce, in The New Republic, basically said it's been a constant throughout history that whichever is in fashion, they think they're right. Like one is viewed as better than the other. It depends on where you are in history as to which that was. It's not equal, it's not different. One is clearly better in many cases, especially as the case is now concerning breastfeeding. It's morally better in the view of the people who champion it. That's right. So for a very long time, men have been extremely fascinated with breast milk or with feeding babies. Right. They've applied scientific inquiry to the whole thing because they can't do it. I think that is part of it, sure. Yeah. We covered that yesterday. We could try all we wanted to, it wouldn't work now. So maybe that is part of the reason I hadn't really considered that. But there has been a lot of scientific inquiry. Ironically, it hasn't really come up with any set stuff. But as far back as, I think, just the even the 1900 years before the 1990s, there is a guy named Serranos of Ephesius and he was an early physician who basically wrote a 23 chapter treatise on obstetrics and pediatrics and gynecology. And one of the things he focused on was breast milk. Yeah. And his big contribution well, one of the big contributions was a test for the consistency of breast milk that stood for about 1500 years, which is pretty amazing. Well, because it's clearly infallible. Yeah. So here's what you do is you take a fingernail, right? And you drop a drop of breast milk on the fingernail and I guess the fingernails facing up and you're flat with the finger when it's on the fingernail and you move the finger. The milk is not supposed to be so watered down that it runs all over the nail. And when you point your fingernail down, it's not so thick that it turns into a Transformer robot now it's not so thick that it clings to the nail and you're looking for somewhere in the middle, is what he says. And for 1500 years people said, yes, that's how you do it. Yeah. And so not only was that like, your breast milk is great, but also this wet nurse's breast milk is adequate for the contract you want to give her. Oh, sure, I never thought about that. Yeah, that probably has a lot to do with it, for sure. And people also use animal milk as well. Apparently for the last 2000 years there's evidence of people using animal milk but for the most part it was wet nurses and then formula. Artificial formula. Yes. Which came back, what, late 19th century? Yeah, in the 19th century, there was a guy named Eustace von Libig, and he said about trying to create a perfect infant food and artificial breast milk. Right. And in 1865, he kind of cracked it. He made a liquid form and then a powdered form, and it was made up of cow's milk, wheat and malt flour and potassium bicarbonate. And when he came up with this in, the was considered like the perfect infant food. Basically. Better than breast milk. Yeah. And by this point, this is about 15 years after the first feeding bottles were introduced in France. Right. So people were ready, like, we've got the bottle, we've worked out these very rudimentary, cork nipples, and we need something to put in it besides breast milk. One of the other things that came all this stuff kind of came together to form the basis of a successful formula feeding formula. Right. And one of those was things like sterilization pasteurization, germ theory, because in the early 19th century, they were trying out, like, bottles and stuff like that, but it was killing infants left and right, because they didn't know about sterilization. They didn't know about germ theory at the time. I think something like one third of non breastfed babies died from being fed artificial milk. That's staggering. It is. It's a lot. So there was a huge breakthrough in the late 19th century when they came up with a decent formula that wasn't just animal milk and that they could deliver it in some sort of feeding apparatus that wasn't going to ultimately kill the baby. Right. So that's a big deal. Yeah. And this is all, like I said, early 1850s is when the bottle comes. 1865 is when von Liebig developed his. And sort of a little before and a little after, you had people like Gail Borden, if that name rings a bell, eagle brand borden condensed milk. She came up with that added sugar. I'm pretty sure it could be a boy. It sounds like it. Just imagine him as a country western singer. No, Gail totally can be a guy's name. Sure. I defaulted to lady because I don't know, because it's about breastfeeding, I guess. So he, I guess, added sugar to evaporated milk, canned it, and that was condensed milk. And then about 30 years later, it became popular in infant food, obviously. Right. Have you ever had condensed milk in things? Not by itself. In things like cheesecakes and, like, the sweetest desserts you can ever have. Yeah. They were feeding that stuff straight up to infants as the infant food. Yeah. And about 30, 30 years later, another one, john B. Marling. Was that a man? It's possible. He developed an unsweetened condensed milk, called it evaporated milk, and this became a big thing to feed babies in. The stuff had a lot of fat. It would plump your baby up really well. But it was missing a lot of the things that babies need to thrive. Why does my baby have claws instead of fingernails and dark circles under his eyes? Nutrients. That's right. We need vitamins and stuff. Yeah. Which in the 1920s or so is when scientists started developing these formulas that didn't even have cow's milk at all. Right. For kids that had milk allergies, they started using, like, soy flour. Sure. Yeah. And so when they figured out that you could take this stuff and evaporate milk or evaporate soy protein and add this other stuff to it, like nutrients and vitamins and balance it all out, formula really took off. And it became almost a triumph of science in the popular culture. Right. So starting in the America, if you wanted formula, you basically had to go to your doctor for it. You didn't necessarily need a prescription, from what I saw, but the rule was that if you were a formula manufacturer, you could only advertise directly to doctors. So it gave formula this kind of error of medicine, like, it was medical in nature. It was like, sterile and high quality, and they had the stamp of science behind it, and it lionized the physicians who were now in between the mother and the baby's food. Right. Yes. The doctor needed to recommend it. And so it was a real way that science and medicine and parenting, especially early childhood parenting, came fused together. And so there was this idea that science had conquered nature and created this perfect infant food. Yes. So by the 1940s, and is when formula had really taken root in the United States, and I guess around the world, but definitely in the United States, and it definitely caused a decline in breastfeeding for about 30 years. Yeah. This is around the time the league started to organize in the 50s, as a direct result of this decline in breastfeeding. And it continued on even into the 70s, where our bodies, ourselves, people organized through that second wave of lactivism. Right. Yeah. And formula is like, flying high from the onto about the mid seventy s. And you can actually point to one specific scandal that basically led to a massive erosion of trust in formula, not just in the United States, but around the world. That's still around today, actually. Yeah. The Nestle Company, in the mid 1970s, they were sued because they were trying to really market formula to developing countries very aggressively. Yeah. They wanted to sell more formula, so they would do things like send sales women over dressed up in nurses uniforms who were not nurses right. Giving, obviously the indication, like, hey, this is a great thing, you should use it. And formula was a great thing that they developed it, for sure. But what they didn't say in Africa to these mothers is that, hey, you need really good clean water here for this to be a viable source of nutrition for your kid. They didn't know that they use the tainted water. And infants started dying. Yeah. And it was laid squarely at the feet of nestle formula and ultimately formula in general. And that was I think, that that happened. And a few years later, the world health organization came up with these guidelines for marketing formula around the world. It was such a huge scandal, and the US. Said, oh, wait, you know what? We just realized there's nobody overseeing our formula market. Maybe we should put the FDA on that. So it wasn't until 1980 that the United States tasked the FDA with overseeing the quality and purity of formula. Before then, it was apparently just totally unregulated. Yes. I can't believe 1980. That's really surprising. But the whole suspicion of formula and the whole idea that it's dangerous or that it's problematic, it all stems from that event, that scandal with nestle in Africa. Yeah. So about eight years later, in the late eighty s, the formula folks started. They could advertise directly to the public for the first time, got on TV, got in print ads, and said, hey, use our formula. It's good stuff. And apparently the American academy of pediatrics, though, still didn't like this kind of advertising and said, you should still go to your doctor and talk about all this stuff. Right. Which is a conundrum. It's like, well, wait a minute. Are you guys saying that the formula industry is being greedy and reckless by going around you, or are you just trying to preserve your own bank accounts by reinsinuating yourselves into this factor when you're not really necessary? It's like, just one more thing you have to figure out when you're trying to raise a newborn infant. That just stinks. All right, well, speaking of stinks, I need to take a break, and we'll come back in a minute and talk a little bit about milk banks and other cool things. Hey, everyone. When you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office? Then you could be using stamps.com. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses. Because stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and ups shipping services you need right from your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the homepage and enter code stuff. All right, Chuckers, we're back, right? We're at the milk bank. Yeah, milk bank is pretty neat. I hadn't heard of it before. Had you? Sure you have. I actually hadn't heard of any of this stuff. Oh, really? Okay, well, let's talk milk banks then, baby. All right, so let's say breastfeeding is not an option for any of the reasons we've talked about for mom. You can go to a milk bank where milk has been donated, breast milk, obviously from women, and you can pay a lot of money for banked milk that you know is very healthy, fully screened, just like going to a blood bank, basically, right, exactly. You need a doctor's prescription, and it is expensive, like $5 an hour. And that is a lot of money. It is, but it's good, high quality, disease free mother's milk, right? Yes. I've seen that some insurance companies, some insurance plans will either pay all or some of that cost, so it can drop dramatically. But because it's so expensive and because not all insurance covers it, other peripheral milk exchanges have grown up some alarming, some slightly less alarming. There's one called Only the Breast, which looks a lot like Craigslist for milk. Okay. Have you been on it? No, I actually didn't go to the website. So probably every third ad is like some sort of weird porno ad or something like that. Well, that's a good start. But the other two are legitimate. Like, I have milk, I'm healthy and I just have too much. So I'm selling it for a dollar an ounce or something like that. I got the best stuff out there. Well, no, I'm sure there are. I didn't run across any of that. But there's also something that you can also click that says, men need not contact me because apparently there's like a whole thing of weirdos out there who are like, hey, sell me your extra breast milk. I was going to make a joke a minute ago about milk banks being for mother suits, can't or won't breastfeed or creepy, weird wealthy guys. They go to only the breast, apparently. So is it a thing for men to drink breast milk? I guess so, because you can go on to Only the best. From what I saw, most of the legitimate ads were like, no, I don't want any man to contact me. But that means that there are some out there where if you are a man, you could buy breast milk. Which, I mean, I guess if you have that fetish and it's not hurting anybody, then still, I guess. So you've got only the breasts. The problem is this, right? And I don't mean to pick on only the breasts. There are other milk sharing sites like this. They definitely do serve a function where if you want to feed your baby mother's milk and you just can't afford $5 an ounce, but you can afford one dollars an ounce. And some women on there have it for free. They're just donating it. They aren't charging anything for it. Yeah. That's a viable place to go. The problem is the milk you're getting is not in any way screened. You have no idea whether the person you're getting it from, despite how great they look and how healthy they look, whether they're actually disease free, and hence whether their milk is disease free. Yeah. Which is very alarming. It is. There's also something called cross nursing, which seems like a reasonable alternative. And that's basically just when two women or four or five, just people who know each other, like neighbors or good friends that are pregnant at the same time, will cross nurse. And basically it's just milk sharing among a few people. Straight from the tap? Not straight from the tap. They'll bottle it up okay and go next door and say, I had this leftover milk. You're in need. Oh, I see. It's basically milk sharing, but not through, like, some big website. It's just among friends I got you just keep it between friends. There is a website called MilkShare that is along the lines of only the breast, but it's much more regimented. Yeah. It's all donated. It's all free or there's no charge. And there's, like, guidelines for storing and shipping and stuff like that that only the breasts didn't have. But again, still, as far as I know, it's not screened for anything. Yeah. And we're not disparaging anyone who wants to use services like this at all. Sure. I just want to make that clear. It's just we want people to be as safe as possible. Yeah. I mean, what's the alternative, though? Like, if you want to feed your child breast milk, you can't breastfeed and you just don't have the money. What do you do? It's a sticky situation. It is. It's very sad. We talked a little bit about the breast pump yesterday, but we'll really get into it here. It was invented in the early 19th. I don't know if it's early, but let's just say 19th century. It was about a time when formula is really starting to come into its own. All right, well, that kind of makes sense in a way. Everyone's, like, vying for that space in the industry, even back then. Right. And the earliest models are probably what you think. It's basically a cow milking machine that's been modified slightly, a vacuum and a hand pump. And this is something I had no idea as far as a consumer delivered at home product. It's only been around since about 1991, when modella introduced the first at home electric powered you can have it as a consumer use breast pump. Yeah. I had no idea it was that new. Right? Yeah. Since then, there's a really great Jill Lepore article from The New Yorker called Baby Food, where she kind of chronicles the rise of the breast pump. But she points out that since 1991 and 2009, sales of. Medella's model alone had quadrupled and they become ubiquitous. Then they started out as a medical device. Like if your baby couldn't nurse, you could still feed your baby breast milk by using these pumps. Right. And it was a medical intervention that became a consumer product. And the reason it spread in popularity like wildfire is because it makes breastfeeding moms life exponentially more awesome than if they're just nursing. Yeah. Obviously has the advantages of freeing mom up by being able to bank that milk on her own. Then dad can help feed babysitter daycare worker can help feed. Mom can sleep through the night. Maybe even if dad is a good dad and a good husband, she can go to the store by herself. Well, what do you mean? Well, I mean, rather than having to feed every 2 hours or to express milk every 2 hours, she can go, as far as I've seen, up to like 6 hours between expressions. Right. Got you. So you can fit a lot of time away by yourself in that 6 hours rather than two. Yeah, I hear you. It's another big one. It also made things way easier in the workforce. Obviously. We did touch on yesterday with as of 2010, here in the United States, employers are required to provide these break times and a private place. But it's not like we had a lovely lactation room in our last office. We actually recorded in there once. I think I actually was studying in there once, and I was like, lactation room. But it didn't occur to me like that was a lactation room at all times rather than just when somebody was in there pumping. So I was in there studying because it was very quiet and comfortable before I finally got kicked out. And it dawned on me that, oh, that's the lactation room all the time. I should probably steer clear of that place. You're in there smoking a cigarette, pretty much doing shots of whiskey. And you mentioned a second ago that the breast pump allowed women if their baby had trouble nursing. One of the issues that can happen is called nipple confusion. And it is not confusion, which is a little confusing. It is not the baby doesn't know whether or not it's mom's nipple or a bottle nipple. It's that the baby actually has a preference for the bottled nipple. Right. Yeah. The baby has been introduced to the bottle and is now that the mom's like, okay, don't forget about the boob. The baby's like, no, I'm pretty hip on the bottle. Instead, let's just stick with that. Yeah. I think it's a little easier supposedly, right, for a baby to feed from a bottle. Easier for the baby. That is right. It employs gravity more than the breast does, and the baby has to work less. And since babies are inherently lazy, they're like, I like the bottle more. I don't understand why it was ever called nipple confusion and I couldn't find the origin of it. Although I bet your nipple preference just sounded mean. I guess so, yeah. Like they were worried that the mom would take it as rejection. Sure. There you go. That's why. And so they say experts do that if you want to try and avoid that potential, at least that you want to at least try and breastfeed, if that's what you're going to do for two weeks before the baby sees any sort of bottled nipple. Yeah, right. You want them to get good at breastfeeding so they can remember how. Right. Seems smart. Yeah, your lazy little dumb baby is smarter and not as lazy as you think. No, we're confused. That's right. So if you are going with formula, there's a lot of different types available, as I'm sure you know. More than me, even. Sure. From what I found, though, that almost all of the milk based ones, which is the standard version, all of the milk based versions are almost exactly the same. Yeah. There are things that the FDA requires be present, so you're going to see a lot of the same stuff. Should we go through the list here? I love this list. Yes, go ahead. Protein. Yum. Fat, vitamin, cadekb, one. B two, B six and B twelve. Niacin. Delicious. Folic acid. Love it. Pantanach acid. Calcium. How do you feel about phosphorus? It's a little stinky. Magnesium, iron, zinc. Here's the best one. Manganese. It's like a mongoose and a mango mixed together. Copper, iodine, sodium, potassium, and chloride. Why do they always put potassium and chloride together? You ever noticed that? I don't know. One thing that you may not find in your formula, you probably won't, is a fluoride supplement. And the guy who wrote the House Stuff Works article is just cuckoo for fluoride. He wants to make sure that your baby has fluoride coming out of his or her ears. That would be bad, actually. Ambivalent on that. Well, they do say, I think the American Academy of Pediatrics says no fluoride supplements at all to babies six months or younger. Oh, is that right? Good to add that because fluorosis is a concern in that case. That's not what this guy is saying, so good catch. He clearly doesn't work for the American Academy of Pediatrics. The thing about formula, though, is like, you would like to think it's all pure and wonderful and like the best ingredients, and there are some out there and I'm sure they're mondo expensive, right? Yeah, I mean, the good organic formula is a little pricier, for sure, but there's also ones that are like they appear to be almost junk food for babies. Well, yeah, I mean, read those labels for sure, like corn syrup and artificial sweeteners and cornstarch sweeteners. Do what you want, but I would avoid that stuff. Sure. And I'm sure a lot of people aren't 100% aware that that stuff's in there, their baby food probably so. And I mean, a lot of it's disguised like maltodextrin sounds natural, but it's cornstarch sweetener. I don't think that sounds natural at all, but it sounds like a quarterback for a middling Midwest college or something like that. Maltodextrin takes the field. It just sounds like that cardi MidAmerica kind of thing. All right. It's not coastal at all. No, it's not coastal. If your little BB has intolerance to milk, like a milk, allergy, you can get those soy protein or coconut milk formulas still they're still out there, but they now have the proper extra nutrients added, which they did not used to have. Right. And you can also get did you say coconut, too? Yeah, I like the sound of that one. Coconut milk? Sure. Coconut anything is good. Yes. I tried the formula once. How is it? Is it sweet at all? Or are these sweeteners just strictly for carbohydrate sake? I don't remember how sweet it was. I don't think I got enough to really oh, I see. This is after a couple of Scotches. Let me see that. Bring me that bottle. Not that bottle. Speaking of sweeteners, though, if you want to get close to breast milk, the sweetener you want to look for, the main sweetening ingredient in your formula is lactose. Okay, lactose. But then, like you said, you may find out that your kid is lactose intolerant. Sure. In which case you have some alternatives, especially soy and coconut, which is my favorite. So formula. You're going to have a few choices you can have, like what they'll give you in the hospital a lot of times is just the bottles already prepackaged and pre made, which obviously it doesn't get any easier than that. You just pop the top and go at it pre measured and everything. And those are okay? Yeah, I mean, those come in a variety of kinds as well, from probably ones that aren't as great to the more expensive, better ones. Okay. It's basically just the pre made version of the powder that you might buy. Right. And the fact that they already measured out the precise amount and added the water and shook it all together already, that's what you're paying for the convenience, I guess, in other words. Yeah, but they're disposable. So you're recycling the bottles, hopefully, but it's still something that it's a one year thing I got you. Okay. So then you got your concentrates and your powders and price and convenience are kind of what play in here according to what you're going to go with, in addition to what little baby will want to eat. Right. Some babies are like, I don't like that, I reject your formula, give me another one, or this one makes me have reflux or makes me super gassy. Yeah, that was the thing that I saw to that. Even the formulas are virtually all the same. Your baby might have a strong preference for one over another. I think they're good to try them. Yeah, I think that the recipes are tweaked because some of them say for gas problems specifically and stuff like that. Got you. So there must be some either a little less of something or maybe a little more of something would be my guess. Got you. And I'm flying off the cuff here. So if I got that wrong, I'm sorry. One of the other things that formula requires is really good water. Yes. Which, again, the author of the House of Fox article, who apparently is unaware of fluorosis, says, just use tap water. You can totally use cold tap water. And he does say you never want to use hot tap water when you're creating formula, because if you do have lead plumbing anywhere, connecting to your house, hot water will leach it out more. When we covered that big time on one about Flint, Michigan. Remember that. Yeah. So you want to use cold tap water. I would say use filtered water. Yeah, that's what we have formula. Sure. But if you're just using it out of the tap and the rule of thumb is if you can drink the tap water safely, your baby should be able to as well. But just be sure to use cold water. Yeah. And in fact, I think for the first little while, we were even using spring water. Sure. Just to be like those first few weeks until you get a little more comfortable or a little bit like, all right. Am I doing everything right? Yeah, no, I don't blame you, man. And then you get a little more relaxed. You're like, oh, babies are pretty hardy little monsters. Right. And apparently, also, I was surprised that they'll take formula cold, but apparently they'll take a cold right out of the fridge. Well, it depends. It depends on the baby. Well, yeah, some babies are like, no, heat. Heat that stuff up. Right? Well, when you're heating it up, you only want to run it under hot tap water, in which case it's fine because you're not actually adding the hot tap water, you're just using it to run out on the outside of the bottle. Right. To heat it up. I'm going to advise against that. Okay. How do you heat it up, then? Because I saw don't use a microwave. Well, you can buy a bottle warmer, which is basically like just a little round thing that you have water in the bottom that boils it like a tea kettle. It's like a water bath. Yeah, it's a little water bath. But the reason I suggest that is it takes a long time to warm it up under tap water. And so you're literally just running water for like, 5 minutes. That's kind of wasteful. You're right. And at first, I was like, Bottle warmer? They tried to sell you all this junk. Literally, it was like that. And I tried. I was like, look, you can just put it in a coffee cup and put some hot water in there, but that cools off, like, really quick. Got you. And the bottle warmer was, like, $15. Then you're like, well, look, you can just put the coffee cup on the stove. Turn the stove off. Turn it on. Yeah. Emily was basically like, get the bottle warmer down, and it's infinitely easier. You just click it on. It's got a little timer for a couple of minutes or whatever, and it heats it up. And you're not wasting as much water. That's cool. But in a pinch, like, when you're out and about, you definitely, like, running it under tap water works. I think there's two things, then, that the federal government should give every new parent at least a year's supply of infant formula. Good stuff. And a bottle warmer. Okay. Just for being an American, you should get that. Yeah. What country is it? Sweden. Where they give them the box? Norway? Is it Norway? I don't know. I think it's one of those, I'm sure. Oh, I know what you're talking about. The box can be used as, like, a crib, even. Yeah. I think it is a Nordic country, and it's like this old tradition that they still do. And I think I posted something about it, and I was like, what in the world? And all these women are like, no, dude, it's the best. Like, they're doing it right. Yeah, but I can't remember it was some sort of baby box. Yeah, I know what you're talking about. And I think it came with stuff in it. But then you take the stuff out of it, and then you put your baby in it. Right. I have to look into that. I think I'm describing it correctly. And the baby's like, echo. Echo. So when you get your bottles and your nipples, when you decide on the ones, there are a bunch of them out there, but when you've decide on the one that you like, and that works for baby, you want to sterilize it right out of the package by boiling it. But then after that, you can just wash it in the dishwasher with hot water, supposedly, unless your house operates on well water, in which case you may want to be a little more sterilific. And in 2012, they banned BPA for baby bottles because BPA has been shown to leach from its plastic container the products when heated up. And so since 2012, anything you buy won't be BPA free. But if people I mean, that wasn't that long ago. So if people are like, Here, take my little bottles or have my handy downs, you got to look on the bottom. And if you see a number seven on the bottom, or PC yes. Then it might have BPA. So you should just try and get a new one. Yeah. And you don't be also lulled into complacency by things that say BPA free, because they may be certified, even BPA free. But two replacements that have come to stand in for BPA, bps and BPF are apparently just as bad endocrine disruptors as BPA. So what you really want to do is just avoid any clear plastic bottles. You want to use the opaque kind because they're usually made of polyethylene or polypropylene. And you want to go with ones that have the recycling symbol with the number two or the number five in them. Those are legitimately free of BPA or bisphenols of any kind. Yeah, they should put a little baby with the thumbs up. Yes. They should have taken this many years for the whole BPA thing really gets me going. Yeah, I totally agree. It's only four years ago they were like, oh, wait a minute. It's leaching when you heat it up into your baby's food. Yeah. Well, wait, we're making money off of it. You can get glass bottles now? Yes. Back in the day, that was all you would see, obviously. And they still make great glass bottles, and they're a bit heavier to hold. They obviously can break if you drop them. But you see in a lot of places, like the hazards of dropping and breaking a bottle, it's not that big of a hazard. Unless you don't have any glass in your house at all. Right. You could always drop a glass. Sure. Also, these things aren't the most fragile things you've ever encountered. Thick and heavy. Sure. Yeah. So they just crack the baby's face if you drop. I would guess that's a bigger hazard than it breaking, right? No, I mean, you should be holding that bottle. Sure. Which we're going to get into, right? Yeah. You want to take a break first? Yeah. Okay. Hey, everyone, when you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office, then? You could be using Stampscom. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses. Because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right from your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to Stamps.com. Click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. Hey, so, Chuck, I saw something I think I said, you don't want a microwave. Baby bottles did you know that? I didn't, but we don't really use the microwave at all, so not an issue. Well, the reason why you don't want to is because microwaves heat basically from the inside out. So when you grab the bottle and you're like, oh, it's lukewarm, the stuff that you're touching on the outside is lukewarm, but the stuff inside might be really hot, and you don't want to hurt baby. I guess we should also say anytime you give baby formula, unless it's directly out of the fridge, and even then, why not? You want to shake a little on the underside of your forearm, right? Because it's a very sensitive area in your skin, and you'll be able to tell whether it's hot or not. I would drop it in my eye. That's a good one. It's very sensitive. I bet that spring water doesn't hurt at all. All right. So like you said, some babies don't mind it cold, or after a while, they may be like, all right, cold is fine with me. But you still want to hold and feed your baby. You don't, like, set your baby down on a couch and hand your baby a bottle and walk away because a for a while, that's not even possible. Although I will say once the baby can hold the bottle, it's pretty neat. But you still want to be there but you want to still be there and provide eye contact and that closeness. That's a big part of it. Yeah, that's a huge part of it. Also, I mean, we talked about it in the breast episode. Skin on skin contact has a lot to do with social development and brain development with babies due to oxytocin release, but that doesn't just come from breastfeeding. So anytime you're feeding a baby, you basically should be shirtless from what I'm gathering. So that any way you hold a baby, whether you're bottle feeding it, whether you're breastfeeding it, whether you're the neighbor or the mailman who's been invited to come meet the baby and feed it, you want to take your shirt off first so that the baby's got some form of skin to skin contact while she's eating. I never did that. Well, I don't think it's ever too late. Yes. Now I'd be like, what are you doing? It's a new thing we're trying. So you don't want to have your baby laying down flat. You want your baby the head elevated a little bit or flat out sitting up. If they have reflux problems, you may have to experiment a little bit with that angle. But the one thing you definitely don't want to do is just prop the bottle, because that has four specific problems that can happen. Ear infections, perhaps. Yeah. Because the formula just flows right into the middle ear. Yeah. Feeding longer than they might normally, and then decreased emotional and physical satisfaction from being held. Right. And apparently also increases the potential for cavities too. Yeah. We're talking about you shouldn't put your baby down. Even if your baby can hold the bottle. You shouldn't let your baby down in a crib at, like, bedtime and say, here's your bottle to put you to sleep. Right. And then leave the room. Because this is a little bit different than just bottle propping. But there are a lot of dangers. There one tooth decay, of course, because the last thing that should happen is toothbrushing, ear infections, choking, and then just this sleep association. You don't want your baby to be dependent on having that bottle to fall asleep. Right. You're not doing yourself any favors there in sleep training. That's a good point. So that's in the crib, leaving the baby with the bottle slightly different than bottle property. Sure. When you are feeding an actual infant and you have to hold them up, basically, and feed them with the bottle. One of the things I think you said was that you have a lot of opportunity for eye contact, right? Yeah. It's one of the benefits of holding the baby while you're feeding. But you also want to be sure to hold the baby with your left arm one time and then the next time, hold the baby with your right arm and just keep going back and forth. Because apparently their eyes can develop. One can develop more strongly than the other if the baby's fed facing the same way all the time. Yeah. I never did that in the baby will look up. It's funny, it's intuitive, but I could totally see not even thinking about that. Yeah, never thought about it. You want to keep that nipple full of milk at all times, which means keeping it pointing down, because you want to decrease the amount of air, because that will make your baby gassy. The more air the baby drinks or swallows while eating the gaser, he's going to be right. And when you are feeding your baby, apparently it's good to burp him midway between the feeding. Definitely after each feeding. Yeah. Midway for a while and then eventually just after. And burping is there are different ways from over the shoulder, like the sort of classic over the shoulder. You want to go high, though, and make sure there's some pressure on the abdomen to putting just sitting a baby on your lap sideways and holding her under the chin and then patting the back or just across the lap. Again with the pressure on the abdomen. And people are a little timid, I think, at first, because little tiny babies seem so fragile. Yeah. But they are not as fragile as you think. And just tiny little soft pats is doing literally nothing to get that burp out. So if you've ever had a nurse do it for you and show you or your mom or someone who's had a few kids, you might be like, oh, my God, my baby. You're beating my baby. But that's what you want to do. Obviously, you don't want to strike them, but a good firm pat is what it takes to get that burp out. Don't be shy. And in my case, my daughter never really burped much from burping. I would try and try and then be like, all right, I guess she's good. And then she would, like, sit up and go on her own, and then she's, like, kind of smile and look at you like, what do you think of that one? Sort of whatever you can do to get that little burp out. And it burp doesn't always come out, so if you try it for a few minutes, it doesn't happen, then they might be good. Yeah. Which I'll bet is not intuitive, but some babies have just been pounded on for days because apparently why won't you burp? Yeah, burp. So, Chuck, you were saying before that one of the great things about bottle feeding is that it allows other people to share in some of the feeding as well. Right. It's not just mom who is responsible for feeding the baby. Dads can, too. And other people, like I said, the mail carrier or whoever. But the idea that it's not just sharing responsibility, but also an opportunity to get to get closer to your kid as a dad has got to be pretty appealing as far as the concept of bottle feeding goes, right, absolutely. When you're breastfeeding, apparently there is a phenomenon among some men where they actually become jealous of either their wife or their baby or both because of the bond that's being formed and the amount of attention and time that's being given to the baby through breastfeeding. Yeah, I've heard of that. You have heard of it? I hadn't heard of it until I ran into this. Yeah, I've heard of it. I'd say, Just get in there, dad, and you can still be a part of things. Yeah, you totally can't. Oh, you're breastfeeding. Well, I'll just go in the other room, then. Yeah, fine. Like, sit down with them. I say get your act together. Yeah. Getting jealous of your baby because it's being breastfed. As far as when there are a couple of methods of feedings. Demand feeding versus scheduled. I only have my own experience. Which was my daughter just fell into her own routine. Basically. And it worked out to be a scheduled routine that was pretty tight. Like. Down to the ten or 15 minutes apart on a daily basis when it was clear that so it ended up being scheduled. But she sort of set the schedule. If that makes sense. It's pretty cool. Right. But there are two different schools of thought. You can try and stick to that schedule, but you may be pushing that rock up the hill constantly, in which case you might want to think about demand feeding, which is I feed my baby when my baby says they're hungry. Yeah. And I was researching this and I was like, well, it seems like setting the schedule is the smartest thing to do. And then I thought, oh, well, the baby kind of let you know when he or she's hungry, and it doesn't necessarily stick to the schedule. So I'm sure the idea of setting a schedule goes right out the window when the baby is, like, screaming. Yeah. The problem with demand feeding, though, is that your baby might come to say, oh, this is enough. This will be enough for this hour. I'll see you in another hour, and do that like 15 times a day. Yeah. One thing I do recommend is to track it. We just got, like, a spiral notebook and track to the times and the amounts, because even though you think, like, no, I'm keeping up with it, it's really easy to forget how much they've had that day. And you don't want to overfeed them or under feed them. We just kept a little daily log, made it super easy. Did you get the spiral notebook warmer, too? I did, actually. It was very nice. It was good at first I was like, who needs it? But then every time I put it on my lap, it was all cold. Yeah, it was very nice. As a dad being able to feed your kid, that has to be pretty special, right? It's the best. Yeah. And that is one of the huge benefits of bottle feeding, that the dad gets to do that, too. And just kind of from the research, I got the impression that a lot of dads kind of take this hands off thing where it's like, that's your thing. You feed the baby. I'll go make some money outdoors, or something like that. Right. The idea of the dad being involved in the feeding, like, that's part of the thing about bottle feeding the kid is that the dad can be involved. So the dad should be involved probably in more ways than he even imagines in a lot of cases, too. Yeah. Not just actually feeding the baby, but actually knowing how much formula is needed to prepare and that kind of stuff. Yeah. Just like being involved is the best advice. And that's kind of what this article says that you sourced here. Don't be a cromagnin or a dad from the 1930s. Just be involved. If your wife is breastfeeding or bottle feeding and she wants to do it, and she likes a nice quiet scene and she doesn't want the dogs barking and stuff, like set up the bedroom and light a candle, take the dogs on a walk, put on some music, like run interference. If the phone rings, go get the phone. Just like, be involved. Right. And if your wife or if the mom does choose to breastfeed, if that is where you guys go with it, there's also other stuff you can do, too, that isn't just feeding. Like in the. Middle of the night, you can go get the baby, bring baby to mom. Sure. Take baby back to bed, hang out with baby for a little while while you're burping him or her. There's a lot of stuff you can do, including apparently unwavering support with whatever choice the mom makes as far as or you and the mom, I should say, make as far as feeding the baby goes, especially apparently, when it comes to breastfeeding. Because, again, I guess studies have shown that the dad's support, encouragement, and involvement in the choice to breastfeed has a huge impact on how long breastfeeding continues, too. Yeah, I imagine. But I would guess the same thing goes for formula, too. Like, if you're a mom who decided that you just want to feed your baby formula, you're going to catch a lot of static. So if you're the dad, you should be able to run interference for her as well, too, with friends, family, all that jazz. Yeah. Go fight somebody. Yeah. It's funny, all this stuff seems just intuitive to me. And guys like you who it's not like husband wife chores. It's like we just all support each other. But I have friends that I didn't wake up when my wife was, what could I do? Sure. And I'm like, what year is it? I don't have boobs, dude. Play a part. Get up, get out of bed. I mean, maybe not every time. Maybe you can work out the schedule and stuff. Or maybe your wife is like, no, you totally sleep through the night tonight. But offer. Sure. And I bet your wife might say, yeah, that'd be great. Go get the baby. Bring her to me. Yeah, I thought you'd never ask. Take her back, burp her. This kind of stuff reminds me of that parenting class that Marge and Homer Simpson had to go to once. And the instructors like, remember, place your milk in the refrigerator, or barring that in a cool wet sack. And Homer was just writing it all down. Get involved, guys. Get your head out of your keystroke. It's what I say. What else you got? I got nothing else. Oh, this article from House to Fork says, don't feed your baby junk food or alcohol, dads. Oh, yeah, we forgot about that part. I'm sure. I know. That was huge in the 70s. Like, you have a little beer, maybe baby dip. That pacifier and whiskey. Yes. They used to do stuff like that. I guess it was colic. That's the one where the baby is just crying nonstop, right? Yeah. Colic is supposed to be, not supposed to be. It's terrible. There was a colic remedy that was basically consisted of, like, these needles, and you just kind of scrape the baby's skin with it, and the active ingredient was morphine that trickled down the needles and entered the baby's bloodstream. And that's what cured the colic. Wow. Yeah, they used to do all sorts of crazy stuff up to again about the 70s. Actually, I do have one more thing. I would just offer the general advice to hang in there if you're a new parent. Emily and I got super lucky, with great sleep habits and great eating habits and just all this intuitive stuff that we had nothing to do with. You can try your best to do everything you can, and you may feel helpless because that little monster sunshine is ruining your household. And you might be trying your darndest for sleep or for eating and this and that, and nothing is working, and it's not your fault. Hang in there, because it will change. And that goes for good stuff. Just when you think everything's going great, something will change. And then you'll take two steps back. Just hang in there. It'll all work itself out. Yes. So the government should give every new parent the good formula. A bottle warmer and one of those warmer. Yeah. And one of those hang in there, Kitty posters. Absolutely inspirational posters. Yeah. If you want to know more about breastfeeding, well, brothers and sisters, there is plenty more to it. You can just start researching online. Talk to a doctor you trust, election consultant, friend who's breastfed, a friend who's used formula. Put it all together. Form your own opinion. And in the meantime, since I said form your own opinion, it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this a suggestion. We don't usually read suggestions, but I'd never heard of this dude, so I'm reading it. John Evans, a young man from North Wales, the very late 18th century, agreed to explore the American interior with his friend Yolo Morganwig. I think they specifically said it's not Yolo. I think you're right. It's like they said, the O is like octopus. You're right. People say yellow, but Welsh people don't care for that. Sorry about that. So they didn't say how to pronounce it, though. They just figure it out yourself. Jumps. No, it says you say the O like the first one, octopus and the L or I is a I'll. Try and be brief. He tried to discover a well speaking tribe in Middle America linked to the Mandin tribes. We're talking like Patagonia here, not Ohio. Okay. He went to London, sail to Boston. Well, maybe he's talking about Ohio, then just walked the land, worked for the Spanish, mapping out the land, which quickly become an auxiliary task, one that he was very good at. Lewis and Clarke actually used his maps for the majority of their own famous expedition. So, yeah, Ohio. Yeah. He was sort of a diplomat, securing passage up the Mississippi from the native tribes and then controlled it, then headed to New Orleans before realizing no such tribes existed. Apparently, he's like, well, it was worth a try. Apparently. The guy from Super Furry Animals. Griffriend griff Reese, by the way. Did you ever like them? Yeah. Did you? Oh, yeah, yeah, I was into them for a while. They're good. Like, they opened for Granddaddy one time and you won't find a bigger Granddaddy fan than me. It was one of the few times where the opening act blew the main act off the stage for me. Oh, yeah. That dude is a genius. Musically, intellectually, awesome. Yeah, I agree. And I like them as a band, but I was not expecting that out of the live show. Yeah, like, it blew my mind. Are they still around? I don't know. I don't think so. I know they had an album, like, in the last several years. Last few years? I need to get back into that anyway and not to not Granddaddy, of course. They were still great. He from Super Furry Animals, made a book, a film, an app, and an album about the story and retraced his journey in person. What? I believe he is actually distantly related. Oh, that's cool. We got to check that out. Yeah, for sure. So he said this would make a great podcast. Dudes, do yourselves a favor at least and look up the book. American Interior and the same title as the album and give it a read. So that is from David Evans, and I'm totally going to look that up. What's it called again? American Interior. Okay. And then the guy's name was John Evans. Nice. The explorer. Well, thanks a lot. Who wrote in? No. David Evans. Man alive. Lots of Evans going on. Thanks a lot, David. We appreciate that for giving us that heads up. We'll definitely check it out. If you want to get in touch with us, like David did, you can tweet to us at SYSK podcast. Or Josh Clark, you can hang out with Chuck on Facebook at charleswchuckbryant@facebook.com. You can hang out with us at facebook. Comstfyou know, too. You can send us an email stuffpodcast@howwefforks.com. And as always, join us at home on the Web stuffyouw.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseworks.com. Ah, summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's criminal morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
c3c9f7fe-5460-11e8-b38c-831114fb5b31	SYSK Selects: Fractals - Whoa	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/sysk-selects-fractals-whoa	In the 1980s, IBM mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot gazed for the first time upon his famous fractal. What resulted was a revolution in math and geometry and our understanding of the infinite, not to mention how we see Star Trek II. Get blown away by fractals in this classic episode.	In the 1980s, IBM mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot gazed for the first time upon his famous fractal. What resulted was a revolution in math and geometry and our understanding of the infinite, not to mention how we see Star Trek II. Get blown away by fractals in this classic episode.	Sat, 30 Nov 2019 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=30, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=334, tm_isdst=0)	34482131	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Howdy, folks. Charles W. Chuck Bryant here in the corral, and I'm going to lasso up a Stuff You Should Know select for you from June 7, 2012, fractals colon. Whoa. This is a tough one for me, I'm not going to lie. Fractals is one of the toughest episodes I've ever had to learn in research. And that's where we're going to revisit it, right here, right now. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hi and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, hanging on by my fingernails. With me, as always, is Charles W. Chuck Bryant doing much the same as we are about to start speaking on Stuff You Should Know about fractals. Yay. More math. Theoretical math, even. Yeah. A new branch of geometry. It's non Euclidean, since you brought it up. Okay. Very new. Euclidean geometry was like 300 BC. Yeah. And fractals are 1975. Yup. So there's a little bit of a gap there. There is a little bit of a gap and there's a lot of animosity among the Euclidean toward fractalians. They need to loosen up and look at some of those far out pictures. I know, it's funny. Did you watch that one dock on? Yeah. Okay. Did you see the Arthur C. Clark one? No. It was made in like, maybe 86, 87, and it had nothing but delicate sound of thunder rip off music going on the whole time. It was really trippy. Well, I posted a picture I don't know if you saw today on the Stuff You Should Know. All of the mandal brought set. It's beautiful. It is, and it's very cool. And I didn't even say what it was. I just posted it. And I'd say about half the people were like, very cool. Man, this is rad. I love the man who brought set like fractals. Talk about fractals. And then the other half were like, are you guys tripping out like Grateful Dead day? This is actually math, believe it or not, but it does look very it's very tiedye in nature. That's why the hippies like it. Plus, also, I mean, if you've ever seen a fractal play out on a computer screen, like, pretty tricky. So we are talking about fractals. I don't necessarily want to give a disclaimer. Chuck and I are not theoretical mathematicians. We're not even like, normal mathematicians. I balance my checkbook by hand just to keep that little part of my brain going so I don't forget how to add and subtract later on in life. I make myself do that and I don't let myself jump ahead. I show my work. Oh, really? Yeah, and that's about the extent of math in my life normally. See, I was the kid in math that when they said, you're not allowed to use calculators. I would go like, there are calculators in life, so why can't we use them? They made calculators so we didn't have to do math. Right. But at the same time I find that shoddy because it's like you're just circumventing learning something and it's like the calculator is there to support you after you know what you're doing. I disagree. Well, I think this is a pretty prime example of going around to get to the end. So when I was researching this, I was like, okay, well, they don't really know what they're doing with this stuff yet, so we can just totally be like, well, it's anything you want it to be and nothing at all. And then like, I started looking a little more deeply into. I'm like, oh no, they do kind of know what they're doing. We really do know what we're talking about. So I feel like I have just from researching this a little bit, something of a grasp of what fractals are. I need to a little bit for those of you who don't know what we're talking about, like, take a second to look up, just type in fractal and search images on your favorite search engine and you'll be like, oh yes, of course it's a fractal. And that's what we're going to talk about because fractals are a new field, like we said in geometry. And they do have use and they have usefulness that I think people haven't even considered yet. But the stuff that they have figured out how to use it for is pretty amazing stuff. Can I say what a fractal is? Yeah, at least so people know they should clear it all up. It is a geometric shape that is self similar through infinite iterations in a recursive pattern and through infinite detail. Exactly. So there you have it. Boom. Do we need to even continue? No, but that sounds like really that put me off. This article was pretty well done by a guy named Craig Hagett. I don't know who that is. Freelancer, I guess. Yeah, and it's a pretty well done article, but a sentence like that can put a person off pretty easy. Sure. And he even put it he made a joke about it like, oh, now that you get it, whatever. Right. But when you think about it, if you take that apart, one of the hallmarks of fractals is that they are a very complex result from a very simple system. And there's like basically three hallmarks to fractals that you just pointed out right there is selfsimilarity, which is if you cut a chunk like a microscopic piece of a fractal off and compare it to the whole fractal, it's going to be virtually the same. Yeah, like or a fern. And the cool thing about fractals is to me, the coolest thing is that fractals, the point they made in the Nova documentary is that all of our math up until they discovered fractals and described fractals was based on things that we basically created and built. Like all geometry, right? Euclidean geometry, you have length, width and height, which the three dimensions. Right, yes. For like pyramids and buildings, sidewalks, cubs and all those things. And it's extremely useful, and we've done quite a bit with this. But what Euclidean geometry, as far as the fractal geometry or geometers insist failed at, is when they said, okay, look at that mountain. That's a cone. It's an imperfect cone, it's a rough cone, but it's a cone shape. Right. So, yeah, the Euclidean geometry holds sway. What the fractal geometries say is, yes, you could say that it's a cone. But if you tried to measure and describe it as such, you're not going to come up with a very descriptive, very detailed description of that mountain. So what's the point? What fractal geometry does is it says we're going to describe that mountain in every little Craig and peak possible. Right. So what you have is the fractal dimension, which exists in conjunction with length, width and height. And what the fractal dimension describes is the complexity of the object that exists within those three dimensions as well. That's right. So finishing my point, the cool thing about fractals is that everything that we had done previously in geometry, because of things we built, fractals helped describe things that have been here since the beginning of time in nature. And one of the truest examples of that is the fern. Right. With self similarity, you take a little snippet off of a fern, although you shouldn't do that. Let's just look at it. It's going to look the same as the larger part of the fern, and then the whole fern itself, very self similar, but not necessarily exact. No, it can be. There is a form of self similarity that is exact and precise, but in nature that's rare, if not just completely not found. Right, that's right. So you've got selfsimilarity, which is the smaller part, is virtually the same, or looks the same or structured the same as the whole. And this process of self similarity going larger or smaller in scale is called recursiveness. Right, yeah. And recursiveness is like those paintings where it's like a guy, I think Steven Colbert, the one that he gave to the Smithsonian, has Recursiveness in it, where it's a man in a painting standing in front of, like, a mantle and above the mantle is the painting that you're looking at. And then it goes on and on and on and on and on. Yes. Anything that's infinitely repeating. Right. Same with if you're in a dressing room and there's a mirror on either side of the wall, you just keep going on infinitely. It's recursiveness. And with fractals, the recursiveness of selfsimilarity. Right. So there are two traits is produced through this thing called iteration. That's right. And that's where you say, here's the hole, I'm going to put it into this formula, and the formula has the output of the formula produces the input for the next round of that same formula. Yeah, it's a loop exactly. So it's self sustaining and it can go on infinitely recursion, right? That's right. So what we've just come up with is a fractal as anything that has a selfsimilar structure and it's recursive through iteration. That's right. Okay. So I came upon this kind of easy one easy explanation of a fractal from Ben Wall Mandelbrot site. He died, by the way, in 2010. Yes. He seemed like a pretty good guy. He was definitely thinking different. Yeah. And the way that Mandelbrot described a really easy way to think of a fractal is there's this thing called the serpentsky gasket, and you take a triangle and you can combine them into a bunch of little triangles and spaces, triangular spaces, that form a larger triangle. Right. So that one initial solid triangle is called the initiator. That's the original shape. Right. And then all those other triangles combined that form that larger triangle or a self similar version of that larger triangle or the original triangle, that's called Generator. Right. So the formula for creating a fractal would be to go into that Generator. The version that has all the little smaller triangles that make up a larger whole triangle. And. Say. All the ones that look like the initiator. The original just solid black triangle. Take that out and swap it with the Generator version. And all of a sudden you have one that's exponentially more detailed. There's more to it. And that's a fractal. That's all there is to it. You know what else is a fractal? What? The coastline. Yeah, that was a big one. Lewis Fry Richardson was an English mathematician, early 20th century, and he very brilliantly said, you know what? If you take a yardstick and you measure the coastline of England, you're going to get a number. If you take a 1ft ruler and measure the coastline, you're going to get a different number. If you take a one inch ruler and measure the coastline, you're going to get a different number. And it's basically infinite in that the smaller you go with your unit of measure or your tool is the larger number you're going to get, because the coastline is so infinitely varied in its little nooks and crannies. Right, exactly. It's a very cool way of thinking about it. There's a second part to that, too, Chuck, is that so, depending on what you're using to measure, the tool you're using to measure the perimeter of that coastline could go on infinitely, but it still contains the same finite amount of space within. It's a paradox. That is a big time paradox, because things aren't supposed to be infinite and finite at the same time. Right, right. And Louis Fry Richardson, he basically established in that, coming up with that paradox, this kind of revolution and thought that fractal geometry is based on, that you can have the infinite mixed with the finite, and you can get it from pretty simple formulas that create very increasingly complex systems. Right? Yeah. And Fry, he was the first guy to really kind of put forth this idea of thought, but he wasn't the first one to notice this paradox. Yeah. And before people even knew there were fractals, there were artists like DA Vinci that saw this pattern in tree branches. I know in the Nova documentary, in the article, they point out the Katsu Shika Hokusai, 1820 Japanese artist created the great wave off Kanagawa. And those are fractals. It's ocean waves breaking. And at the top of the crest of the waves are little self similar waves breaking off into smaller and smaller self similar versions. And it's a natural fractal. Or in this case, it's a depiction of one. So early African and Navajo artists are doing this and they didn't realize that they were fractals and there were fractals all around us. No, they just saw crystals and a snowflake or another good one. Yeah, exactly. They saw that what they were looking at was a repeating pattern that was selfsimilar and recursive. Right? Yeah. That's it. That's a fractal. Right? Yeah. Mandelbrot was the first one to say, you know what? We can use the math equations to actually apply to this. And he was a big star for a while, and then they sort of turned on him and said, you know what? This is all cool and trippy looking, but it's useless. Right? And he said, oh, yeah, screw you guys. Watch this. And he wrote another book, which started to give some practical applications, which are pretty exciting. Yeah. The whole thing, the whole principle of this is based on is that you can take a formula and plug in a very simple, relatively simple formula, like Mantle brought formula. We'll take that one, for example. His is z goes to Z squared plus C, right? That's what it's called if you're in England. Zed. We say Zed. Maybe Zed's dead. Anyway, Zed goes to which is the gospel is the key right here. This is what makes it fractal. Goes to means that it's an equal sign. It looks like an equal sign with part of an arrow pointing towards Z, the other pointing toward the rest of the formula. Which means that there's that feedback loop where it's like, okay, once you have the number that this punches out, you feed it back in and you'll get another number. And it will just keep going and going and going. And every time, remember, you're swapping out the original initiator for the detailed version, the generator, and it's just getting exponentially more complex with just that one iteration of that very simple formula. That's right. And Mandel brought set. This is the one that's, like it's probably the most famous one. That's the one that the deadheads like because it's like this crazy juxtaposition between black and different colors and everything. And with his formula, two things happen with a number that you put in. It either goes towards zero or it shoots off to the infinite. Yeah. And what they did for the Mandal Brush set fractals was they assigned a color to a number based on how quickly it goes off toward infinity, right? So let's say that you have like, four. If you plug four into this and in ten generations, it'll become an infinite number, right? Then say, that would be grouped into a blue color, like ten generations blue. Eight generations is red, 90 generations is orange. See what I'm saying? And then the other direction, like, say if you put in 4.2 or something like that, it'll go towards zero, right? And any number that eventually will go towards zero is represented as black. So what you have then is this really intricate depending on where you're zooming in or out on the fractal, this intricate change of colors. And what you're really just seeing are numbers that are plots on a plane, and that's your fractal. And then the black parts are numbers that will eventually be zero. Right. And most of the Mendel Brat set is black. Yeah, but if you zoom in, that's the whole point. You zoom in on one of those little what do we even call those little spikes? I guess you could call it a plot. A plot. And it's going to look like what you just saw. And the Nova documentary is very cool. When they zoom in on these, it's sort of mindblowing. Yeah, I strongly recommend watching that because they explain it way better than us. Well, it helps to see it, for sure. Oh, yeah, big time. Or draw it, as I have done off my base. I saw that. It's a pretty nice little fractal you have there. Yeah. So we've talked about fractals, we talked about the Mandal Bright set. We talked about where they started to come from. Remember Lewis Fry Richardson? He was talking about measuring the coastline and going off into the infinite, but still containing a finite amount. A guy came after him named Hail. Gavin Coke. He came up with a Coke snowflake, which is pretty cool. If you take a straight line or you take a triangle, and then on each side of the triangle in the middle, you bust out the middle into another triangular hump. You do that over and over and over again. It goes off into infinity. Although it contains a finite amount of space, the perimeter goes off to the infinite. A guy named Jewelry Canter came up with the Cancer set, which is you just take a straight line and you take the middle out of it. And then for each of those two lines that produces, you do the same thing. And it just keeps going on and on. And rather than going to nothingness, like you're like, well, if you take a six inch line, eventually you're going to bust it down to nothingness again. That doesn't happen. They found that it goes off to the infinite so they realize Ben Wall Mandelbrot was plugging all these into computers because that's what it took. Yeah, sure. People realize this like Jordan I hope that's how you say his first name. He was working in the 1880s. Gaston Julia came up with the Julia sets for producing a repeating pattern using feedback loop. All these guys were like 19th century, early 20th century mathematicians. And it was strictly theoretical until the late 70s when guys like Mandelbrot, who worked at IBM started feeding these things into these newfangled computers and seeing the results like this fractals, like the Mandelbrot set that he saw. Right, right. So almost immediately there was a practical use for fractals that came in the form of CGI. Yeah. They interviewed that one guy in the documentary who worked on the first CGI shot in Motion Picture History, which was Star Trek to The Wrath of Khan. And he was tasked with making a CGI land surface like mountain range. It was pretty mind blowing with it. Yeah. And he did. I mean, now you look back and it kind of looks silly, but at the time it was completely revolutionary. And once he learned about fractals and the geometry and the math of fractals, it was pretty easy for him. He made it seem like he was like, oh, well, this is the key. This is how you do it. Right. And it is kind of easy, especially if you know what you're doing with computer programming and math. Because what you're basically doing to create a fractal generator is teaching your computer to do something within a certain formula. That's your fractal formula. Right. And so what Lauren Carpenter, the guy who created the Star Trek two landscape for the first all CGI shot ever, what he basically did was create a computer program that said, hey, computer, I'm going to give you a bunch of triangles because I think that was the earliest stuff he was working with. Yeah, I'm going to give you a bunch of triangles and I want you to take those triangles and generate a new fractal set from it. Right. And then I want you to do it again and again and again. And then every third time I want you to start turning them 40 degrees so it's going to change the pattern slightly. And then all of a sudden you have these infinite variations. The reason why when you go back and look at that shot that it still looks kind of today is because the computer he was working at didn't have the computing power to do that many times. Now we have higher computer computing power. And so what we're doing is telling our computers to keep going and going and going, swapping out that initiator that one single black triangle everywhere, it can find it in this pattern of triangles in the fractal with a brand new fractal. So it's just creating more and more and more and more fractals, which creates a finer and finer and finer resolution, which makes something look all the more realistic. Yes. Like the part in the doc about the Star Wars when I was making the lava splashing. It's amazing. Yes, it was, because they showed the first one. They did. It looks kind of plain. Right. And then once you fed it through this infinite feedback loop, it just shattered and fractured. Not fractal. Although I want to say fractaled off and just looks more detailed. More detailed. More detailed. Until it looked like lava splashing. Right. Pretty amazing. Well, that's where the word fractal comes from. Mandel brought coined it in 1975 to indicate how things fracture off and they form a regular pattern. You can create a fractal that is regularly repeating, but it doesn't look as natural with, like, say, if you're creating lava, you've got to have that one rule that every third generation kicks 40 degrees or whatever the rule is that just kind of throws a little bit of dissimilarity into it, because if something's too selfsimilar, it's not going to look right. It's not going to look natural, it's not going to look real. Which kind of leads you to think, Chuck, then, that there is an application for studying natural phenomenon using fractals. Right. Well, there are, I guess so. All kinds. Well, this isn't so much natural, but the documentary interviewed Nathan Cohen, who was a ham radio operator, and his landlord said, dude, you can't have that huge antenna hanging out of your apartment. Right. So he started bending wires, a straight wire into essentially a fractal and found that on the very first go, it got better reception merely by the fact that it was bent in that way and it was self similar. So he eventually used that to, I hope, make a lot of money. I got the impression that I did okay by applying that technology to cell phones. And the way they describe it is all the different things the cell phone can do. If you were to have a different antenna for each one of those functions, it would be like carrying around a little porcupine. So what cell phones now are based on is a fractal design called Sponge minger sponge. Yeah, I think, manger, and it's basically a box fractal. And if you crack open your little cell phone, you're going to see it wired that way. Yeah. You're going to be looking at a fractal. It's a square. Right. And then within it are a bunch of little squares in a recursive, self similar pattern. And you, friend, are looking at a fractal. It's all around us. Yeah. It's also all around us in nature. In that same documentary, that Nova program, there was a team from, I think, University of Arizona. There was a team of academics yeah, that was pretty cool. Who were trying to figure out if you predict the amount of carbon capturing capacity an entire rainforest has just by measuring and figuring out the self similar system that a single tree in that rainforest has. That makes sense. Well, it does, but it's kind of a leap. It's like, okay, so is one tree does it follow the same system that the whole rainforest does? And they apparently found that yes, in fact, it does. Right. The same branching system found in that tree is similar to the growth of the trees in the rainforest as a whole. Pretty cool. Yes. Tumors in the human body. Yeah. One of the keys to getting rid of cancer or any kind of tumor is spotting these tumors early on. But with our ultrasound technology, you can only get so small and so detailed that you can't see some of these natural fractals, that your blood vessels are fractals, essentially, just like the branches of a tree are. So they are now using geometry to now, I'm not sure if I got this right, but I think it shows the flow of the blood because ultrasound can pick that up through these fractals when they can't even pick up the vessels themselves. Right. Is that right? Yeah. Early earlier tumor spotting. Right. Well, for all intents and purposes, they're looking at the vessels by finding the blood because they see where it's flowing. But yes, depending on the pattern that it follows, if it follows like a tree branching shape, it's healthy. Right? Yeah. And then the tumors, all the veins are all bent and crooking, going in all crazy directions. The readout of a heartbeat. Yeah. It's not consistent. It's a fractal. Yeah. So they use fractal analysis now to study your heart rate and use that to better understand how arrhythmia happens through math, especially with natural systems. That's kind of like the biggest contribution that fractal geometries produce so far, I think, aside from CGI, is what medical? Well, just that whole understanding that was first really kind of voiced by Lewis Fryer Richardson, with the coastline, that there are natural systems out there that we're not quite paying attention to, we don't really know how to deal with that. We're trying to apply something like Euclidean geometry to something that you can't really use that for. Right. That's what fractal geometry has really contributed so far. It's basically saying, hey, there's a lot of natural systems out here that are self similar and recursive. And now that we kind of see in the fractal world, we see them everywhere and we have a better understanding of them. One of the best examples of that, I thought, was figuring out how larger animals use less energy than smaller animals. They use energy more efficiently. And this is kind of a biological paradox for a really long time. And these guys figured it out using. I guess. Kind of the same kind of insight that fractal geometry has. That if you take genes and genes are the mathematical formula or the equivalent of a mathematical formula. And you feed in these genetic processes. What it's going to put out is this selfsimilar recursive pattern to where the bigger the organism is. The more this thing goes and goes and goes. The less energy it's going to use. Because there's more of it. And it doesn't require very much energy to produce past a certain point. So if you have a very small animal, it's using a lot of energy to do these things, to carry this out. But there's that economy of scale because you're still using a relatively simple formula, your genetic code right. To carry out a very complex, seemingly complex system, which is your organs or you as an organism. Right. So in the end, an elephant uses less energy than a mouse. Yes, because they're both using the same formula, the same input, and then eventually you reach a point where it just gets easier and easier and easier crazy to use something simple to create a complex system. I love it. I do, too. I got one more thing. You heard this guy, jason Padgett. This is pretty crazy. This guy, like, nine years ago, I think, was mugged in Tacoma, Washington, got hit in the back of the head really hard, knocked him out. And he acquired a form of synesthesia in which he sees fractals from being hit in the head. And basically, it's an acquired savantism, which is pretty rare to acquire this later on. And this guy hated math, and his family used to make fun of him, he said, because he was the worst at Pictionary. Couldn't draw a thing, couldn't draw a lick. Now, this guy can draw, reportedly, mathematically correct fractals by hand. Well, and he's the only person on Earth that can do this. Holy cow. And you should see these things. They're like a huge two by two fractal that looks like it was plotted by a supercomputer. And this guy does this by hand now out of nowhere, because he got hit on the head. That's pretty amazing. Yeah, it's crazy. He got hit in the fractal center. He did. That's strange that we would have, like, that ability latent in us, you know? Yeah. Well, they studied his brain, of course, and they found that the two areas that lit up in the left hemisphere were the areas that control exact math and mental imagery. He's fine with it, although he says that he's a bit obsessive about it because it's one of those deals where everywhere he looks now, he sees fractals. Oh, yeah. Well, I got the impression that people who are fractal geometers have the same thing. They're like, look at that cloud. I can figure out how to describe it completely. Yeah, with math. Yeah. It's crazy. And then it's everywhere. Canopies of the trees. I got that impression as well, that once you start seeing fractals in natural systems, then everything becomes fractals and a lot simpler to understand. I realized today that I have always doodled in fractals. Oh, yeah, yeah, because I can't really draw, so whenever I doodle, it's always been little fractal shapes. Like, I would draw some kind of geometric shape and split off from that and make it smaller. And in the end, they're sort of like fractals. Well, your fractal tree that you showed me is pretty awesome. So you got anything else? No. I would strongly urge you to read this article a few more times and then maybe go off and read some more about fractals because we definitely have not covered all of it. Watch that Nova documentary. It's good stuff. What is it? Chasing the Hidden Dimension? Yeah. Is that what it's called? You call it chasing the dragon. Well, there's a dragon curve fractal. It's pretty boss. That's right, it is boss. So you want to type fractals in the search barhowsupworks.com to start, and that will bring up this very good article. And I said search bar, which means it's time for listener mail. Josh, I'm going to call this don't eat your peanuts around me, jerk. Yeah. Remember when the air traffic control I remarked that I never heard the announcement that no one can eat peanuts on the plane? I've flown a lot in my life. I've never heard that before. Yeah. So Ian Hammer writes in on the air traffic control episode, you were talking about peanuts being completely absent on some flights. And as a person that is really allergic to peanuts, I can shed some light. My allergy is bad enough to wear the smell of peanuts, which is really just the presence of peanut molecules in the air will cause me to get itchy and swollen. In the case that I am in contact with a peanut, I have the superpower of becoming a balloon, and I'll swell up to the point where I will be dead in a matter of minutes. I can delay the anaphylactic shock for ten minutes, give or take, with an injection of epinephrine. And this will only work twice. Like twice in his life, I think. So, gee, if I do have a reaction, I have 20 minutes, plus the 15 minutes I have before. Normal anaphylactic shock would kill me. There really isn't a way to save me in that instance unless I can be administered to the proper treatment that you can get only at a hospital. As you can imagine, when a plane is at 30,000ft, there's not much can be done to get me to a hospital within that 35 minutes time frame. So flying can be a pretty scary thing when someone near you decides that they really want a peanut butter cup. People do this sometimes, and it's a real pain to have to deal with. I just wanted to give you guys an overview of peanut allergy suffers when it comes to flying. Keep up the incredible work. Look forward to seeing the TV pilot. Ian Hammer. Incredible is right. If we were insensitive to that, then all apologies. He didn't indicate that, but we weren't. I just remember being surprised. Yeah, I was surprised. And I knew Allergies could get bad, but man, but I think on the plane I was like, what? I've known about this since I saw an episode of Freaks and Geeks wherein one of the characters almost died because, like, some bully at school gave him some peanuts. Oh, yeah. It was the Martin Star character. The analog of Paul from Wonder Years. Okay. Which was yeah, let's see. Allergies. How about a fractal story? Yeah, if you know something about fractals that we don't or can correct us or explain it better than we did, which I'm not sure that that's much of a long shot. We want to hear about it. You can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can visit us on Facebook@facebook.com stuffychou. Or you can send us an email to stuffpodcasts@howstepworks.com. Stuff you should know is production of iHeartRadio's how stuff works. For more podcasts, my heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite show. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon Music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…nother-earth.mp3	How Earth-Like Planets Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-earth-like-planets-work	Since the Kepler telescope went online, astronomers have found there may be an estimate 40 billion planets like Earth in the Milky Way galaxy alone. What does it take for a planet to be considered Earth-like?	Since the Kepler telescope went online, astronomers have found there may be an estimate 40 billion planets like Earth in the Milky Way galaxy alone. What does it take for a planet to be considered Earth-like?	Tue, 04 Aug 2015 14:54:40 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2015, tm_mon=8, tm_mday=4, tm_hour=14, tm_min=54, tm_sec=40, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=216, tm_isdst=0)	30398744	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's charles W, Chuck Bryant. There's Jerry. And this is stuff you should know. Just just a few Gizas. What not. GEEZES, that was terrible is what it was. I read an article the other day on why people find puns so offensive. It's very interesting. Oh, yeah. Send it my way, will you? Sure. Thanks. You're welcome. Chuck? Yes. Have you ever heard of an exoplanet? Yes, you have. That's all I got. I'm down with Kepler. Kepler is pretty awesome, isn't it? Kepler is way awesome. Let's talk about Kepler. What is it? Well, Kepler is, I guess what you call it? A program. Sure. The Kepler project program. It's a mission. Yes, it's called a mission. And since 2009, their task has been to survey the sky. In fact, a small patch of sky right now. And it's an outer space telescope. Yeah, sure. It's spying on people in the city park. No, they shot it out in a space. It's dressed in like, a silver jumpsuit. So you can tell it's a space telescope and not just like a regular one. Yeah, it has a little twelve deg field of vision. And what it's doing is just looking out into the cosmos in the Milky Way still. Yeah. Specifically near the constellations Cygnus and Lyra. For now. For now. You got to start somewhere, right? You only have twelve deg. It's not the big ear. It's like a journey of 1000 miles. Starts with a single step. Basically, what they're trying to do is see I think the ultimate goal is just to see what's out there. But what they really secretly get giddy about and titter about late at night is finding exoplanets that are like our own Earth. No, I think the whole thing was a straight up planet hunting mission. Yeah, but like I said, they're not just like, we want to find another Earth. They're like, we want to see what's out there because we don't know what's out there. Yes. And they get really excited when it's not a big giant ball of gas. So the Kepler mission, actually the first Kepler mission ended this past May because the Kepler telescope, I think, ran out of battery power or something like that to turn itself. But they started or they're ramping up the K Two mission, which is actually this is so amazing to me. I love this stuff. They're going to use photons light from the sun to move it. Pretty amazing. Photons are going to move this thing. It's called solar power. To direct it and look in different directions. It is very much so amazing. So the whole point is to find planets. But really, like you say, what they're looking for are planets that fall within what's called the Goldilock zone or the habitable zone. And there's a couple of different types of zones. Yeah, if we're talking the Goldilock zone. What we mean is a planet where there is water that doesn't evaporate immediately or freeze. Well, yeah, that's one way to put it. You know, flowing water would be great, so CO2 that'd be awesome. So the whole Earth like planet, right? Earthlike is what it comes down to. Able to sustain life. Right. And the whole thing. I read this really interesting article, Chuck, and I think it was an Aon magazine, which is one of the greatest online magazines ever created. Sure. So interesting. Everything's so well written. It's just great a on magazine. Anyway, the person writing this article said, what if our conception of life is really limited? And when we think of life, we think of genetic molecules capable of selfreplicating. Right. Like us, like life. Like anything that can make new copies of itself. Yes. Cellular reproduction. Right. So what if life has evolved in many other ways, not just out in outer space, but here on this planet? Like we could be surrounded by life and not even be aware of it, because we're not thinking of it that way. We're strictly looking for evidence of DNA based life. What if life evolved in other ways and we're surrounded by it? That's pretty neat. That's one of those late night college conversations, if you know what I mean. It really is. But with Kepler too, it's looking for planets that could sustain a certain brand of life, which is the life that we know. And the whole thing is predicated on the idea that you need water in liquid form to be the foundation, the sustaining foundation of life. Got to have it. And so that's what this habitable zone is. It's a planet that is far enough away from the sun that surface water is not going to boil away and turn it into and just go into the atmosphere far away from its star. Right. Not necessarily the sun. Right. It's star is what I mean. Yeah. It's version of our sun. Yes. I just want to clear that up. But it's not so far away that it's not getting enough heat. So that it just freezes. Yes. So it's within what's called the circumstellar habitable zone, or it's in this little distance, like we are in our sun, our stars habitable zone. It's circumstellar habitable zone. That's right. And so it's looking for planets that are surrounding stars in that little band that's not so close that it's too hot and not so far away that it's too cold. It's just right. I love it. That's called the Goldilock zone. Yeah, that's the name for it. So the Kepler mission has returned a lot of startling information, like thousands, perhaps tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of planets maybe out there, in fact, probably are out there. I think it's 40 billion in the Milky Way alone, is what is that? The current estimates are it's unbelievable. In the Milky Way alone, 40 billion Earth sized planets not just all planets. 40 billion potentially Earth sized planets in the Milky Way alone. Yeah. So like I was saying, giant balls of gas are fun. Gas giants like Saturn and Jupiter. They're neato torpedo. But as far as science really getting their rocks off, these Earth sized planets are the ones that's where the money is, right? When I say money, I don't mean cash money. Although if we colonize them, I guess it could be cash money. Sure. But the smaller planets, what they call terrestrial planets, earthlike planets and terrestrial planets would be a great band name, by the way, because they have heavy metal cores and rocky mantle and they have smaller orbits, shorter years, they're close to the host star, all these things that are Earth like, which could mean potentially something there. Okay, so something living. You've got the circumstellar habitable zone, which is not too close to the sun or not too close to the star and not too far away from the star. But there's also a larger habitable zone, if you have that one. Great. But there's some other qualifications that a planet has to hit to be considered habitable. And these are galactic habitable zones. Right? Right. So part of that is that it has to have a heavy metal core, like you say. Yeah. It's got to be terrestrial. It can't be tidally locked. Right. We found actually some planets out there that fit the bill, except they are tidally locked with their star, which means only one side in the same side is always facing the sun, which means that that is a very hot body of water right there that's facing the sun. And then on the back side, the dark side, it's just completely frozen. And since it's not turning, the atmosphere is not being kept around the planet. It is able to migrate to, say, the dark side of the planet and just freeze there. That's a great example of how you can have all these other things. That planet might be in the habitable zone for its star, but it falls out of the category of a truly habitable planet because it's missing some other factors. For example, not being tidally locked. So that would be the case with Gleeza 581 G, right? I think so, yes. Okay, so that was discovered in 2010, and there's been a lot of back and forth between a lot of different countries and scientists saying, is it really there? Is it not there? I think where it lands now is they are pretty sure it's there. But with Lisa 581 G, it faces the star at all times. One side of it does. So it's tidally locked. Tidally locked. Although it does orbit once every 37 days, it keeps that Facebook ace. So basically what they think is if there could be life there, you have what they would call an eyeball Earth, with one part of this planet having been liquid water. Right. And the rest frozen. So like an eyeball in the middle. Yeah. Kind of neat. I think what keeps Gleeza 581 G in the news is the fact that it's only 20.5 light years away. Yeah. And we'll talk about some more of these, but a lot of them are, like, over 1000 light years away. So let's take a break real quick and we'll get back to exoplanets right after this. So, Chuck, you touched on something I think is very important before we go any further. People say, well, yeah, it exists, or no, it doesn't exist. And there's a lot of back and forth in the scientific community. And the reason is, as high powered and awesome as the Kepler telescope is, it doesn't look at a star and say, oh, look at that planet. That's a fine looking planet right there. Yeah. I can see water on there. And that waterfall is it like a giant pterodactyl. It's like a monkey head. Yes, it is. No, it can't see these kind of things. Right? Yeah. So there's different techniques that are used for hunting planets, exoplanets that use deduction in a lot of ways. Yeah. In concert with these telescopes right. To surmise the existence of planets. So there's three main techniques that even these telescopes use. Like the Kepler telescope uses a photometer which senses light. Right? Yeah. And it'll look at a star and it'll just keep looking at the star. Looking at the star. It's got a really good something weird just happened at the star, got dim and it went back to normal light. And what just happened was probably a planet orbited in between the telescope and the star which dimmed the light of the star. That's right. They call that a transit. And that technique is called the transit method. Like you said, they use that photometer and if they see that dim, that's a lead in the right direction. Yes. It doesn't prove anything. No. So that planet becomes a candidate planet. So they go back and they look at it. And if they, say, use a different technique or if they come up with the same data using that same technique again and again, then most likely that planet does exist. It becomes it becomes a confirmed planet. So it goes from a candidate planet to a confirmed planet. And there's a lot of criticism in the scientific community because when a candidate planet is found, it is far from being proven as existing. But it's very frequently rushed out to the media which treats it like a new planet has been discovered and we know all about it when we really don't even know for a fact it exists. And very infrequently. The science behind having to deduce its existence is explained in the articles that are written about them. So it just gets rushed to press a little too precious. You got to keep that public interest up. Yeah. But it wouldn't hurt to also educate the public at the same time. No. Agreed. So a lot of people say, oh, well, we just discovered a new planet. It's still a candidate planet, and we don't necessarily know it exists. Yeah, that's a good point. So that the transit method is the one where the light pulses, the star pulses. Well, it dims because the planet comes in between the telescope and the star. Then you have the Wobble method, which is pretty neat in itself. It looks for changes in relative velocity caused by the gravitational pull of another nearby planet. So basically what happens is they use the spectrum of light for this one, and they analyze that spectrum around what they think could be a planet. Planet. Planet. Nice. A planet. Great, Chuck. Thank you. So what happens is, if it is being pulled by another planet, when it surges toward Earth and then away, it causes variations in that light spectrum. So when it comes toward Earth, it shortens the wavelength, and you see a blue spectrum more. When it goes away from Earth, it lengthens, and you see red more. So it's almost like a color pulse. And that is the Wobble method. Right. So that's number two. And that's the doppler effect. Is it? Yeah. But with light. Yes. Instead of sound. Right. The Doppler effect is only sound. No, it is any kind of wavelength. Oh, I thought the Doppler effect was strictly sound. Nopper effect. I'm telling you. All right. It's the thing that links bats to Earth like planets to doppler to a passing ambulance. Right? Yes. I'm so psyched about the Doppler effect. And you want to go ahead and hit us up with that last one. Microlensing. That's pretty neat, too. Yeah. So when you have a star and another star passes, if you're looking at a star with, say, the Kepler telescope, which the Kepler telescope strictly uses the transit method, from what I understand. Really? Yeah. Close minded. Let's say you have another telescope that is more open minded. Yeah. And you're looking at a star and another star comes in between you and the star. You're looking at that star that's in the foreground. It's in between you and the original star. Yes. Actually takes the light and acts as a kind of a magnifying lens and intensifies the light of the star behind it, thanks to its gravity. This is called microlensing, right? Yes. If a planet falls into that, that's in orbit around that other star, falls in line with this, it takes that microlensing effect and amplifies it even further. And then you can calculate, based on the amplification of the microlensing effect, the mass of all of the stars and this new mystery planet that just came into line with this orbit. And they use that mind blowingly enough to deduce the presence of planets around stars, too. Amazing. So you've got these three methods, and all of them, though, again, it's really important to remember this. All of these use deduction. None of these planets have been visually observed. They are all deduced to exist based on the mathematical evidence that there's something going on here. Like that this light is dimming, this color is changing, or the light is being amplified by something. And it all has to do with mass and gravity. It's pretty amazing. Yeah. All right, so we'll take a little break here and come back and talk about some of these exoplanets. And if there are people living there, there aren't. So, Chuck, remember we mentioned the transit method. Yeah. You can also use these things to deduce even more stuff about these planets once you confirm they exist. Like personality. Right. It's sign kind of thing. There's something called transit spectroscopy which uses the apparently, the atmosphere of a planet leaves a certain kind of mark on the light that it messes with in the star that you're looking at. So not only are you deducing that a planet's there, you're deducing by the effect that that planet has on the light the type of atmosphere it has as well. Pretty amazing. Right. So once they figure out that, yes, the planet is likely there, they go back and look at it and the planet goes from a candidate to a confirmed planet. And Kepler came up with 1030 confirmed exoplanets, twelve of which are in a Goldilock Zone. They really start going to town studying this planet and figuring out what its atmosphere is like, where it is in relation to the star, what the temperature is. And they can tell some pretty amazing stuff about an exoplanet just from all of these deductions. Yeah, I guess let's just talk about a couple of these. I guess it's a group because there are several Gleezes. There's a Gleeza. So each one of these exoplanets is named after the star that it orbits. Yeah. Gleeza is a star. Yeah. And it has several potential habitable planets around it. Right. We already talked a little bit about 581 G, but there's also 581 C. It is 12,000 miles in diameter, which is not too much bigger than Earth and makes one complete revolution in 13 Earth days, which means it's too hot. But it balances that out because it has a surface temperature 150th of that of our sun, which means, potentially and again, this is all speculation potentially, the temperature range on the surface of 581 C could be 32 degrees to 102 degrees Fahrenheit. So it's in the wheelhouse. It is in the wheelhouse. I think further study has kind of discarded the idea that Gleeza 581 C is habitable already out. Yeah, it's pretty quick, right, as far as breaking news goes. But you raised a really good point that if this thing has a revolution a year that's 13 days long, there's no part of the planet that's going to get cool enough to even things out. It's going to just stay too hot. And conversely, if the thing has a year. That lasts too long. It's not going to get hot enough. It's going to stay cool. Yeah. So that's another galactic habitable zone factor. Well, I love them, man. Keep them coming. I know. I basically went and looked today. I was like, what are the most likely habitable exoplanets? And an article from a year ago has a top five. That's different from an article now. That's how quickly things change, right? Well, I mean, these things were all just basically theoretical. We assumed that a star would have planets orbiting it, but it wasn't until the Kepler mission within the last ten years or so I think it was 1992 from the Arecibo telescope was the first confirmed exoplanet to be detected, and that was like 1092. But once Kepler started going, they started to come, like, hard and fast. And once they started and people started rushing the press, then science is having to retract them now and things are going from there's. A new exoplanet that we could just travel to now if we wanted to, to this thing actually doesn't exist or it's not really habitable. Right. Mostly. Most recent one I found was from like, three months ago in May of this year, and they say I believe this was from space.com, said that Kepler 438 b is the most Earth like planet yet that we've discovered. It orbits a distant star in the constellation of Lyra, which is where Kepler's looking. Which one is this? 452 b. 438 b. Oh, it gets really confusing. You need to start naming these things. They do. So 438 b is a little bit bigger than Earth, 40% more heat than Earth than what we receive from the sun. Right. It's small, though, which means it is just because it's 12% larger means it has a 70% chance of being rocky like Earth. It is 470 light years away, which is not too bad considering some of these are thousands and thousands of light years away. Completes an orbit around its star every 35 days, which is about ten times as fast as Earth. And basically the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics said that they announced this one along with seven other planets in the same habitable zone. So decent chance. But like I said, by the time this comes out, this may be old news. Yes. And debunked. Who knows? There's another one that I think they discovered even more recently, which is Kepler 452 b and it's 1400 light years away. Okay. And it is an Earth like planet. I think it's like 60% larger in diameter than the Earth. Yeah, but it's earth like. It is a super earth. Yes. Or it could be no, that automatically qualifies it as a super Earth. So it's Earth size, but it's not so big that it's like a gas giant. It's terrestrial, likely got you. And it's in the Goldilock Zone for its star. And they're pretty excited about it, actually. I think it has a mass, it's five or six times Earth. And so you would feel about double your weight or you would weigh double what you do here. That's no fun. But they think that if we did send colonists there, their bodies would adapt. It'd be like working out all the time. Yeah. But you would become super strong, and if you came back to Earth, you could just beat everybody up. Interesting, because you'd be twice as strong. Pretty cool, huh? That'd be great. That's the point of space travel, is to find ways to just walk around and come back and beat everybody up on Earth. It's a bully program. That is a good question, though. What's the point of all this? If these things are 1400 light years away, what's the point? Jeez. Just to keep looking beyond isn't that exploration the whole point? I guess, because it's not like we could colonize any of these places. Well, not now, but I think that some people have an eye toward that. If we ever do figure out interstellar travel, it would be really good to know where we could go and take off our helmets and breathe. Yeah. I think of it more in the opposite way. Like, you can't stop doing stuff like this. No, I agree with you, because then I don't know, then you've given up. Yeah. You're an isolationist. Yeah. You're an adult living on Earth. Right. And oh, I don't care. I'm just going to die anyway. Well, the other thing that they're looking for that exoplanet searches bring into the fold is SETI the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, or just the search for life elsewhere. And again, if you're looking at planets that can sustain humans, they could conceivably sustain other types of life as well. So we're hedging our bets for the future. We're also looking to see if we're alone out there or not. I imagine there are people out there that think this is a big waste of time and money, though. Probably. Yeah. What EVs adults? The isolationist. Yeah. You got anything else right now? No, this is good stuff. It's all heady and it's such a rapidly changing thing. Yeah. We could revisit this easily. Yeah. I mean, this will be outdated in six months, but tops. Hey, we like to do these topical things every now and then. If you want to know more about Earth like planets, you can type that into the search bar@housetoforce.com. And since I said search bar, it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this no, not Road Rage citizens Arrest. Okay. There's kind of a difference. Yeah, big difference. Guys have a citizen's arrest story from 2001. I was a 19 year old behind the first car I ever bought myself when I was rear ended. It was 2001, so we didn't have cell phones, and there was no phone booth nearby, so we could not call the highway patrol or police. The other driver had insurance but did not have a valid driver's license, only an expired one. Later found out he obtained a license during a window time when the governor of California announced him to be issued to undocumented persons who had immigrated without completing all their legal steps yet. So basically, this guy got in a window, had his license. At one point, it was expired. I got my crunch car home that afternoon, and the suggestion of my parents called the local cops to file a police report, since we couldn't do one at the scene of the accident. The officer that came out to my home was the most militant, sour woman in law enforcement that I have ever had the pleasure or displeasure of encountering. She impatiently asked the questions and took notes, all while sneering at me. When I got to the part about the other driver having an expire license, she literally yelled at me for not placing him under citizen's arrest. Mind you, this was a car full of men. I was a 19 year old girl who weighed \u00a3100 and was four foot ten, and she chastised me for not placing an entire car full of grown men under citizen's arrest for driving on an expired license. She went on about how many undocumented persons have criminal records? It can be very dangerous, and this would have been a good opportunity to get them deported. Well, this is an explosive listener mail. Yeah, or a car full of potentially dangerous men. Maybe you should not try and place under citizens arrest would be my idea at this point. My father had enough of her shenanigans and asked her to leave. That was the end of that. But we still chuckled this day over the absurdity of her suggestion. And she goes on to say that the guy in the car and the dudes were very nice, and they exchanged insurance and it wasn't like a bad scene or anything. So it just sounds like this officer was not a very nice person. It sounds like it's a bit of a sourpuss. Yeah. And every couple that we heard from after citizen arrest said, don't do it. Yeah. And this lady is saying, no, try it, little four foot ten lady. Give it a shot on a car full of men. And I also want to point out that I forgot one of the most legendary remember, I was trying to think of famous citizens arrests. The most legendary of all time is the Nightstalker. Oh, yeah. He got arrested by a citizen. By citizens. Like he was checked the Night Stalker did. No, not him. Richard Ramirez. Richard Ramirez. He was recognized out because they eventually found out who he was and blasted his face out everywhere. And this group of Hispanic women saw him and started screaming in Spanish like, Nightstalker. Night Stalker. And he was gang piled by, like, 15 people. I did not know that. And cops had to pull people off. He was almost beaten to death. Wow. So I guess you would call that a citizens arrest. I would call that yes. Yes. Like a good one, an effective one. Yeah, well, they got a serial killer. You always got to feel good about that. Citizens arrest. Yeah, I fell down the rabbit hole of reading all about that guy recently. Yeah, man, what a crazy time to be living in La. I bet people were, because there was no rhyme or reason, and it was, like, one night, then two nights later, then three nights later, then two nights later, and just crazy, awful things. That was like the Zodiac. One of my favorite movies of all time is Zodiac. It's a great movie. That's a great one. But then you read Ramirez's background, and it's like, abusive father, this crazy uncle that was in Vietnam that showed him pictures of decapitated bodies, and he was dropped on his head, like, three times. What? He had a whole list of things that's, like, how to become a serial killer got you. Two times, you're fine. The third time you get dropped on your head. And it's not saying every head trauma leads to that, but they think it could have something to do with cases like that. It was very sad and fascinating. Yes. Do you have a particular article you recommend on the dude? No. Okay. We'll look them up. If you want to let us know about your personal story of something that has to do with what we've talked about in the past, how's that for call to action? That's good. You can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can join us on Facebook. Comstuffysheanow. You can send us an email to stuffpodcasterhouseofworks.com. And as always, join us at home on the Web stuffyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstofworks.com."
a6a9fc30-5462-11e8-b449-b3eacc8225a9	How Epilepsy Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-epilepsy-works	A seizure is like an electrical overload in the brain – when it gets overwhelmed, it just shuts down and resets itself. But imagine being susceptible to these overloads, where one could come at any time with little or no warning. That is epilepsy.	A seizure is like an electrical overload in the brain – when it gets overwhelmed, it just shuts down and resets itself. But imagine being susceptible to these overloads, where one could come at any time with little or no warning. That is epilepsy.	Tue, 23 Oct 2018 13:08:19 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2018, tm_mon=10, tm_mday=23, tm_hour=13, tm_min=8, tm_sec=19, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=296, tm_isdst=0)	51909764	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from howstuffworkscom? Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's charles W, Chuck Bryant. And there's guest producer Ramsay over there. Yay Ramsay, guest producer and stuff you should know. But straight up producer on movie crush. Yeah. Movie crushers might know Ramsay's name. Hey, Ramsay. He waved. He knows the drill. Well, the duct tape over his mouth helps, for sure. So, Chuck, today we were talking about epilepsy, and this has been a long time request. We've gotten requests for this one over the years. Oh, yeah. Plenty of times. And I don't know why it took us so long to do it, but I'm glad we finally did because it's something I didn't know about. I think it's one of those things like, you're aware of epilepsy and seizures and seizure disorders, but there's almost like this cartoonishly narrow version of what epilepsy is. Just a movie version. Yeah, exactly. Which actually is kind of accurate, depending on the type of epilepsy or the type of seizure you're having. But it's such a broad spectrum of really just kind of a physiological brain disorder that can happen in so many different ways that I had no idea. Yeah, the movie, while it's sort of like every square, is a rectangle type of thing, like movies only display seizures in one way, the Natalie Portman way? Sort of, yes. Is it kind of where you're like you're on your back convulsing wildly frothing at the mouth, there's some jerk nearby with a wooden spoon. You don't want to do that. We should go ahead and say that. Maybe more than one. Do not stick a spoon or your wallet or a credit card or anything else in somebody's mouth to keep them from swallowing their tongue. No, you can't swallow your tongue. No, because it's attached. I tried. Look, you all right? Stop. It's not working. I was just grabbing a wooden spoon. You don't want to do that. Keep that thing away from me. Yeah, but movies display them as one kind, and those definitely exist. But it's far more nuanced than that. Right. Leave it to movies to get rid of nuance. Yeah, but really, isn't that the audience's fault? Isn't it up to the audience whether there's nuance or not? Well, what, like during a seizure scene? Next time, we should all just stand up and shout, this isn't real. I think they would get the picture. All filmmakers would get the picture. How about some nuance? Well, and also, movies are all about drama, and a lot of seizures are not very dramatic. It's almost like in certain types of seizures, somebody just kind of zones out for a second and then comes back and says, so what were we just saying? Yeah. That constitutes a seizure, aka. Chuck, on any given evening. Sure. There's probably a big difference of what's going on in the brain. If somebody is actually enduring a seizure, right. Then you zoning out. Sure. To the observer, it would look very similar. All right, that's a nice intro. Let's talk a little history first, can we? Yeah. Okay. Well, I will say this. Ancient medicine has always been nutty as a fruitcake. But especially when it comes to seizures from how they're diagnosed and what people think is going on to the various treatments, it is wacky. Yeah. People with epilepsy have been stigmatized ever since there is civilization. Basically, the code of Hammurrabi, the first set of laws from Mesopotamia, 4000 years ago contains a law that says if you have epilepsy. They didn't call it that, but they were talking about people with epilepsy. You can't get married. Yeah. They called it, like, the devil shakes or something, basically. Yeah. And the idea was that you were infected with some sort of demon or the devil or something like that. And what's interesting is that by the time Hippocrates came around, he was like, no, you guys have it all wrong. This is just some sort of disorder in the brain you could probably treat with diet and exercise and that kind of stuff. Which is actually pretty good advice for somebody who was driving this, like, 2400 years ago. And then somehow they got lost and everybody was like, no, it's demons, unclean spirits, all that. And it went back to being a very stigmatized disease. Yeah, it was an unexplainable thing. And I think back then now we try to poke around and learn, like, the real reasons behind something even if it still remains unexplainable at the end. But back then they would just say they're possessed or they're a witch. Right. And that which thing it was in the Malificarum. Sure. The Witchfinder's Handbook. It was basically in there. And either if you had epilepsy, you were a witch or you were possessed by a demon or in some cases you could be possessed by an angel or something like that. But more often than not, it was like a negative thing. Like a negative spirit had possessed you or you were under the influence of a witch. So somebody in your village could be accused of witchcraft if you had epilepsy. Because they were like, this witch over here is giving this guy epilepsy burner. That was a thing. So epilepsy has always been tied to that. And that law about people with epilepsy not being able to marry there were laws on the books in the United States up until 1980 that said people with epilepsy can't get married. Really? Can't get married. Yes. But I'm sure those laws that aren't enforced right? Or are they literally enforcing those laws? I don't know that part. I'm sure they were back in, like, the during the eugenics movement. I don't know that they were up until 1980. That sounds like one of those laws were like you can't spit on the street after sundown. Can't put lipstick on a horse. Oh, you can't. And then ancient treatments are exactly what you would think. Like everything from drinking blood to killing a dog and drinking its bile. If someone's having seizure near you, pee in your shoe and give it to them to drink. Yeah. Like it's a jellyfish sting. Yeah. But in the shoe? I don't know. Is that just because they know that you have something that holds urine? That would be my guess. Okay. I didn't know if that was like you could also pee into, like, cupped hands, your cupped hands, and then just kind of like just drop it onto their mouth. Regardless. That's another thing. Don't put a wallet or a spoon or credit card in somebody's mouth. Don't put your urine in somebody who's having a seizure's mouth. It doesn't help. I also saw that it wasn't until the 18th century that people finally were like, I don't think this is actually infectious. Right. One of the reasons why people with epilepsy were so just shunned and stigmatized and just kept on the outskirts yeah, the outskirts of society, because people thought epilepsy was contagious and you could catch it from the breath of someone with epilepsy. People with epilepsy have been treated horribly for all the time, basically. So hopefully we can kind of dispel any of the last myths around it. That's my hope with this episode, Chuck. Let's see if we can do it. Okay, well, we like to start off every episode by stating our hopes and dreams. So what's going on in the brain? We'll get to that a little bit more in detail. But kind of the way this article on our own website puts it. Which this was so. Like. Ten years ago. Writing wise. But they basically talk about a kind of traffic jam in your brain when there's confusion. When there's too many neurons firing at once. And it can cause an overwhelming sensation that can eventually cause a seizure. Yeah, I've seen it. Compared to, like, electrical storms. Yeah. Where basically it's a sudden overload, an electrical overload in your brain, and your brain is like, I'm just shutting down here for a second and then it resets itself. Your brain sounds like Pop new heart. Yeah, mine does. Mine does. And you said from a bunch of neurons firing at once? Not just a bunch of neurons, but those neurons that are firing fire a lot more than usual. Right. Something like so they fire 80 times a second normally, where during a seizure they're going to fire like 500 times a second. Yeah. And we'll talk about the brain machines later. But one thing that's characteristic of seizures is when they look at your brain scan, there are big peaks and valleys. Yes. It's not a steady stream of no, I don't think it makes that noisy. Bob Newhart. Right. Who knew he was going to show up slow and steady? That's great, but let's talk about some of the types of seizures. There are a couple of broader categories focal seizures or generalized seizures. Focal seizures are just in one part of the brain were generalized and I think about 60% of people with epilepsy have the focal kind. And generalized are on both sides of the brain. Yeah. Like your whole brain is under attack whereas the focal seizures it could just be from like a lesion in a specific part or there's something that's hypersensitive that's just one tiny region of your brain but it's enough to do some wacky stuff to you. Yes. And within those groups there are further subgroups. For instance, simple focal seizure or a complex focal seizure. The two types of focal seizures. So a simple focal seizure is you just kind of have like a weird feeling like you're conscious the whole time. Yes. And it's also sometimes called an aura and an aura itself, it can just be a standalone seizure but it's kind of like seizure light. L-I-T-E right. But that same simple focal seizure can also be the beginning of a larger complex focal seizure or larger seizure of either type where it's just the or it's just the beginning symptoms of it. So it can be standalone or it can lead to a larger seizure. Yeah. And you send a really cool thing we'll get into in a second about exactly what a seizure is like. But quickly a complex focal seizure. The other type of focal seizure you do lose consciousness. And if you are around someone that has one of these you might see it's a little bit more like what you would think of as a movie seizure, for lack of a better term. It can be like twitching, blinking maybe someone just sort of seems dazed and sort of walking around. Well, that's the thing that got me. Like when I think of, well, they lost consciousness, it means they fainted or whatever. Right. That's not necessarily what that means. When you're having a seizure, lose consciousness means like you're not there, you blacked out, you're gone. Your awareness is no longer functioning in the here and now. Right. But to people standing around you, they might see you just kind of walking slowly around in a circle or something like that. Or sitting up right. And just kind of with the blank look on your face or something. It's not the traditional just falling over, fainting away loss of consciousness. Right. That was new info to me. Yeah. And this aura you were talking about, it's really interesting. That other document you sent was I had no idea that if you're a person with epilepsy sometimes and it's different for everyone but sometimes you can sense these seizures coming on days ahead of time. Yeah, I've never heard of that. Yeah. I think when you start having seizures if you actually have epilepsy you will start to notice patterns, I'm sure. Stereotypic, it means like it typically follows the same patterns, the same sensations and an aura can be anything from seeing blinking lights to hearing a humming sound, to suddenly inexplicably experiencing panic or joy or all number of things. But basically your brain is suddenly doing something. It's suddenly getting a jolt of electricity that's actually not being stimulated from anything outside. You're not actually seeing bright lights, but your brain is showing you bright lights because the impulse is actually starting from the inside rather than coming from the outside in. Yeah. That could be an or it could also be a weird taste. Yeah. I think a lot of times, too, it's people that experience the aura have a hard time describing it in a way that people that have never experienced the aura can understand. Right. That's sort of one of the hallmarks of it is people like us end up stammering out a bunch of things that we can relate to. But I think if you have had this sensation, it's sort of one of those things like you got to kind of have it to really understand what it feels like. Sure. The reason why is because probably different parts of your brain that don't normally co function are functioning together. And the information you're getting is being merged together into just a totally novel experience that no human has ever had before. Yeah. Which is pretty awesome if you think about it in that way. Yeah. So, preseason, a lot of different things can be happening. You can smell things, you can hear things, you could taste things, you might get blurry vision or you might have a visual loss briefly or momentarily, like you said. It might be a very pleasant feeling. It can be. I just wish it was like that for everybody. Sure. I wish everybody who had epilepsy just had nothing but pleasant brain attacks. Yeah, I totally agree. So that's at the onset, sort of preseasour activity when you start to recognize these symptoms. And that's when you might tell your friend or loved one or whoever you're with like, hey, I may have a seizure here soon, or maybe hours from now. Yeah. And I think this is from the Epilepsy Foundation. It's called what happens during a seizure. Really? Interesting. Yeah. But they say, like, every seizure has three stages to it. It's just some are really hard to discern, some appear to just be the first, some have clearly all three. But that beginning thing can technically stand alone. An aura can be its own, like, seizure light, like I was saying. Right. But more often than not, it will lead into the middle part of the seizure, which is called the ictic stage of the seizure. Yes. And that's from the first time symptoms or accounts as a symptom that's officially part of the seizure to the end of seizure activities. That middle section. Yeah. And the middle section is what you usually think of as a seizure. It can be the classic movie seizure where you can convulse, your muscles might tighten suddenly, and you might go rigid. You might actually lose muscle tension. Yeah. And either way, what those will result in is called a drop attack, where you are standing up and all of a sudden you tense up and fall over. Like, remember the fainting goats? Yeah, I knew I knew that word from something. myclonic goats. Or you can just lose muscle tone and fall over. But either way, it can be really bad news for you because you can hit your head and you can cut yourself. It's not good to fall over with zero control over your body. No. And then the final phase is post seizure, and that can be really rough, and it can take hours or days to kind of fully feel like yourself again. And we'll talk about what to do during a seizure. Of course, if you are around someone that's having one, don't put your wallet in their mouth. But post seizure is very important, too, because you need to be there and be very comforting and just sort of take things slow in general. Right. So that's called the postictic phase. And that can actually last a lot longer than either of the other two phases of a seizure. It can last 20 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour, who knows? Yeah. You could be sleepy or scared or anxious, have memory loss, difficulty talking. What it sounds like is your brain and your body has just undergone a traumatic experience. Right. And it's just rough. Yeah. And it had to reset itself. It was a hard reset, and now you're paying the price of it. Yeah. And that's not to even mention some of the physical things. That is one of the real dangers of having a seizure is if you fall on a glass coffee table or all the supplementary physical injuries that can occur. One of the things that stuck out to me from this Epilepsy Foundation article was that one of the signs and symptoms of the postictic phase is that the person may be frustrated, embarrassed or ashamed. I know. Man, that is so sad. Yeah, that's just so sad. And it comes up later on, too, in this article from How Stuff Works about, like, the challenges of living with epilepsy. One of them, I'm sure, is just feeling stigmatized for people. You want to take a break? Yeah, we'll take a break and we'll pick up with the different types of generalized seizures right after this, if you want to know. Just listening. All right, so generalized seizures, remember, we broke it down into the two broad categories focal, generalized. There are many kinds of generalized seizures. The words you won't hear anymore from a doctor are petite mall and grandma seizures. Those are outdated terms, but what they are now referred to as is formerly petite mall seizures are now known as absence seizures, and grandma are now known as tonic clonic seizures. Yes, they are outdated but they still kind of highlight the early contributions of some of the first French neurologists in the late 18th century. Dr. Grandma, who basically Stanley grandma, french neurologist. They helped pull this out of the realm of superstition. You can catch it from someone with epilepsy breathing on you. Right. So hats off to the early French neurologists for at least studying and identifying it. But that's why there were French terms that were applied to it previously. You just stopped your pork pie hat. I did, actually. A little chorus line thing. You can't see under the table, but my foot is kicking, too. Like I said, the absent seizure, formally petite mal seizure. This is usually in children, and I think overall, I don't know if we mention that children and people over 75 are most likely to have epilepsy, which is interesting. Yes. And you can grow out of it depending on the type of epilepsy. I think you can even grow back into it in your older age. Yes. If you're 75 or older, you're at the highest risk of developing epilepsy. So the absence seizures, like I said, are mostly in children. That's just like where they zone out. All yeah, exactly. You might see some eyelid fluttering or something like that, or a twitch or two, and it might just be a few seconds long and then it's over. Right. Very hard to spot what was just going on. Were you thinking about Barney or were you having seizures or just tired? Like it's tough to spot, I think. Yeah. Chronic seizures. You will have convulsions and jerking movements on both sides of your body. Myo clinic, like we talked about with the goats, and it's funny, I just was going through the archive today and I saw that was one of the best titles we've ever had. That dangle goat fell over on fainting goats. That was a good one. I think that was one of yours, maybe. I'm pretty sure. But myoclonic seizures, the upper body is mainly involved and it might look like someone has been shocked. Like a jerking of the upper body. Right. The tonic seizures is when you stiffen up like you were talking about. Yeah. Suddenly your muscles go fully tense and you just can't control them anymore. Atonic is the other one that you were talking about when you lose muscle control. Yeah. And then there's the big daddy. This is the movie seizure. The tonic clonic seizure. Yes. Just the name of it sounds menacing, you know. Tonic clonic. It sounds like a Star Wars character from the Dark Side or something. Tonic the Fallen. Yeah, grandma does, too. Well, I think it's the Darth Maul thing and Grandma Tarkin. It's a combination. Oh, okay. I don't know who that last guy is. Grandma Tarkin? Yeah. Which one is that? All right, we should just move past this. No, I need to know, especially if it's somebody from the original three. I think Grandma tarkin was the guy. Wasn't that Peter Cushing? Yes. Okay. Sure. They digitally recreated Peter Cushing instead of Fran Tarkenton. What are you talking about? So the tonic, clonic, movie style seizure, that's the one that you've probably seen on TV and films and after school specials, is when the body stiffens. You sort of pass out on the floor and your body is convulsing and jerking on the ground, your eyes roll back in your head, that kind of thing. I couldn't tell if it kind of alternates back between the two or if it follows that discernible pattern where it goes tonic. Like, your muscles tends to fall over, followed by clinic. So you're convulsing after that? Sounds like it. Or if you kind of bounce back and forth, which would be pretty awful, too. Yes, but like you said, that's the movie seizure that you see. It just occurred to me. I've never seen someone have a seizure that I could recognize. I have not, either. Yeah, you just knocked wood. I did? Was that someone trying to come in? No, this is like particle board, but I think it's still does that count? Yeah. Seizures generally are pretty brief. A few seconds, maybe a few minutes at the most in most cases. But like we said, they take a lot out of your brain and body. Yeah, it's rough stuff. Here's the thing. Tense all the muscles in your body for a second. I don't even know how to do that. Just doing it for a second. Sure. I'm like, oh, man, I'm sore already. I'm tired. Imagine doing that for, like, three minutes. Yeah, that's a long seizure. And really, like every muscle in your body's tense. Or imagine convulsing for a couple of minutes. Like, Heck, yeah, you're going to be physically tired. It's a violent reaction. It is. But also the normal processes of your body have just been totally thrown out of whack, and now they have to get back into whack. And one of your body's main things for telling you something's wrong is to feel nauseated. So you're going to probably feel nauseated. You're going to feel maybe perturbed. You're not going to feel very good, and it's going to last a while. Sometimes people will sleep, and maybe they'll sleep for a minute, maybe they'll sleep for an hour. There's a lot of different things that can happen in that post ichtel state, but the thing you want to look out for. So we've never seen anybody have a seizure before. Correct. But if you do see someone who is having a seizure, there are some very specific things that you should do and not do and not do. Yeah. One of the things you should not do is stick your dirty wallet in their mouth. I haven't heard nasty credit cards or a spoon. What are you carrying a spoon around with you for anyway? If it's to save somebody from swallowing their tongue, leave it at home. Because you don't need it anymore. Yeah. The main thing you want to do is make sure that they will not further injure themselves. Like, if you're in an apartment and they're on the couch, you may want to move the coffee table out away from the couch or something like that. Right. Turn them on their side if they have gone to the ground so they won't choke. That is a real thing, but the tongue has nothing to do with it. Right. I think it's throwing up or something like that. Yeah, sure. And just sort of try and ensure their safety. Don't try and hold them down. Don't try and get them to stop what they're doing. You can't I'm going to lay on you till the demons get out. Yeah. It's not a good idea. So basically, just try and make things as safe as possible. Like if they're around them, if they're closing. Right. Yeah. Keep sharp stuff away from and yeah. If they're sitting up or standing up or whatever. Yeah. Try to get them on to the lowest point as comfortably as a pillow under their head. Maybe if their clothes are, like, bunching up around their neck, like, try to loosen the clothing. Make it safe and comfortable for them, but stay with them. Yeah. Don't be like, all right, well, I'm going to go get my eyes checked, or go call the police or not the police, but 911. Right. That was a really surprising thing that this article said, was, don't leave, just hang out with them. That is more important than calling 911. There is a point where you should call 911, though. There's a type of seizure, or there's a mode that seizures can go into called status epileptus, which is like a really bad situation that's when it continues unabated, like five minutes. Yeah. It used to be, I think, 20 or 30 minutes, and then they said, that's way too long. If someone is having a seizure of any type for five minutes or longer, you want to call 911. Because what you're seeing is a medical emergency. Under almost every single case of a seizure, the brain can kind of reset itself and come out of the seizure within a five minute period. If it doesn't, it strongly suggests that it's not going to happen. And they may actually have to medically induce a coma to just stop the electrical activity in the brain and let it reset itself. So you've got a bona fide medical emergency on your hands. Or the other way it can happen is they can be having a seizure and then have another seizure and not regain consciousness in between. Right. That actually qualifies as a status epileptic seizure as well. And you want to call 911 for those. Yeah. Or if it's a pregnant woman, then you want to call 911. Sure. Because there can be further complications there, for sure. All right. So it looks like there's six different types of epilepsy. If I'm reading this right, we'll say at least six, starting with benign Rolandic epilepsy. This is the one that you would have in childhood and that you would probably outgrow. Hence the benign thing. Yeah, it's just kind of like, yeah, it's fine, don't even worry about it. It's just a phase the kids going through. Juvenile myoclonic epilepsy is actually one you wouldn't have it in early childhood, but it actually would come on around the same time as puberty. As if puberty is not tough enough right now with seizures. Yeah. I mean, I feel so bad for anyone that has this condition, but especially like, if it comes on at puberty, you don't know what's going on. Well, plus, also it's like the severe type of seizures, clonic seizures usually characterize it or myoclinic, and you don't outgrow it. It comes on in childhood, but yet you have it for life. Linux Guestot syndrome. I feel like I've heard of this one before. I have not. This one is very severe and there are many kinds of seizures that you can have. And I believe this one sticks around for life, too. It doesn't usually it comes after it's become apparent that there are cognitive impairments. There can be delayed motor skill development. It's kind of like comorbid with a type of cognitive impairment as well. Right. But it's characterized by drop attacks, too, where you can really injure yourself because you just fall over. Right. Because there's an impairment in the muscle or the motor cortex. Right. Look at you. I got it. Eventually, reflex epilepsy is the one that if you have ever gotten a strobe light warning or heard of that Pokemon thing, which that legend is actually true. Yeah. This is one that is triggered by something in the environment. In fact, remember I told you I went to that David I was going to that David Burn concert. Ticket holders got emails the day before the show that said, trigger warning. We use strobe lights in this show. Oh, wow. So I think for stuff like this, they kind of are sending that stuff out now. Go to them. Yeah. Because you can have a seizure even if you don't have epilepsy, you can have a seizure brought on by flashing lights fast enough to just basically get your brain going and it's off. Seizure? Not a seizure, but an intense strobe light situation, I think makes everyone feel a little off. It makes me dance. Yeah. Where are the bubbles? Give me my glow stick. Temporal. Oh, wait, hold on. Let me give you one more about so the reflex epilepsy, it doesn't have to just be from, like, flickering lights, like strobe lights. It can be sound, can be touch. Yeah. Basically, where you have reflex epilepsy, there's a part of your brain that receives sensory stimuli that is hypersensitive. So whether it's your eyes, whether it's your ears, whether it's your skin, and it. Will be like a very small region on your skin and it can be activated by tapping, scratching, rubbing and toothbrushing. Oh, interesting. Which, if you think about it, that is interesting, but also if you are going to trigger a seizure from brushing your own teeth, that would suck. Yeah, I bet there are some ways around that. Oh, surely there are. Like an electric toothbrush might have a different sensation or something. I hope so. Although I've been an electric toothbrush would set it off more than anything. I guess it depends. I don't know. Temporal lobe epilepsy. The most common kinds of seizure here are complex focal, although there are other seizures that can occur, too. And this is the one where I think it's like well, it takes place in the temporal lobe, which controls the motion and memory. But I think these are the ones that can be really interesting and hard to describe by someone that's had one. Yeah, like you'll have a bunch of memories, come back all of a sudden at once. That's another thing, another common device you'll see in movies, not necessarily with seizures, but when somebody's like their brains being taken over or something like that, just a bunch of different visualizations will flash or whatever, their life. Yeah. I think that's basically what happens with temporal lobe epilepsy. Interesting. Yeah. Or you can also just be overwhelmed by a bunch of weird emotions, good, bad, neutral that are not being brought on by anything but the seizure. Yeah. At that David Burn Show, I had a moment where I was so overwhelmed with the sound, the lights and the acid, the emotion of the moment and the art well, that I felt like I was on ecstasy at one point. What song was it? That specific moment was during Once in a Lifetime. Nice. So that was coming together with nostalgia to just suck me in the face. Sure. But it had to do with other things as well. So, I mean, while again, did not have a seizure, I have no idea what that's like. It's interesting to feel the brain sort of get rocked a little bit to where you can feel it, but with positive feelings. Sure. See, that's what epilepsy should be. It should be like jolt of ecstasy in your brain. Yeah. And then frontal lobe epilepsy is the final kind. And this is the one where you're more likely to have, like, your body hurting and jerking or really stiff on one side. Right. Yeah. So you got me with the hurricane and jerky. Always reminds me of the herky jerky dancer. Should we take a break? I think so. Mr. Show made an appearance. All right, we'll be right back. If you want to know, just listen up to Rush and Chuck. Stuff you should know. Stuff you should know. One of the things I saw I want to say that's not really apropos of what we're going to talk about next. But when someone is having a seizure, during the middle seizure part, they may start doing, like, involuntary movements, like everything from lip smacking to playing with their buttons to actually undressing and dressing. I thought that was really interesting. Yeah, that is interesting. Especially when you remember alien Han syndrome, and that was the corpus callosum. And I mean, parts of the corpus callosum are involved sometimes with epilepsy, too. One of the other things epilepsy bears a strong resemblance to, especially in the fact that it has an aura and an actual middle phase and then a recovery phase are migraines. Oh, yeah. Very much related to migraines. And actually, you can get migraines as a symptom of the recovery phase, of the postictile phase. Right. Which that would really suck, to have a huge seizure and then come out of it and have a migraine. Yes. That would not be good. It would not. The causes of epilepsy, it sort of depends. Sometimes you can have a brain injury. Sometimes, like, if you get hit in the head, sometimes you could have a tumor that's putting pressure on the brain. If you can determine the cause as a doctor, then it's called symptomatic epilepsy. If you're not quite sure what's going on, that's a head scratcher. Yeah. Or idiopathic epilepsy. It's so funny they have a name for it rather than I know. I don't know. Sure. I mean, I guess that makes sense, but I don't know is really what that means. And then there's even another category, cryptogenic epilepsy. And that's when the doctor is like, well, I kind of have some information, but I'm not quite sure if it's symptomatic or idiopathic. Right. It's really specific. It is. Unless it's idiopathic, then it's totally nonspecific. That's right. So I found this really interesting, the way that epilepsy is diagnosed, because just because you have one seizure doesn't mean you have epilepsy. If you have a seizure, you want to go to the doctor to find out if actually no, you actually do have epilepsy. Right. But there's a number of ways you can have a seizure. If you're an infant or a kid and your temperature gets to 100.4 degrees Fahrenheit or higher, I think 38 degrees Celsius, that's called a febrile seizure. Feverish seizure doesn't mean you have epilepsy. You may never have another seizure again. Supposedly, if you are withdrawing from alcohol or some types of drugs, you can suffer seizures. But I saw another research of the literature that said this is not true. Oh, really? It's just a legend, but like a medical legend, supposedly hypoglycemia, abnormal heart rhythm, panic attacks, all of those can bring on seizures or mimic seizures. And then there's something called a pseudo seizure, which to anybody witnessing it would be like, that's a seizure. That person must have epilepsy. But if you had that person undergoing an electroencephalogram at the time of brain scan, you would see that their brainwaves were not doing what somebody who has epilepsy's brain would be doing. And that's actually brought on by psychological distress. Yeah. Or like past abuse in your life or something like that. Which is bad enough. Yeah. So you mentioned the EEG, the electrocephalograph. At this point, if you're being hooked up to one of those machines, you've probably already gone to the doctor, had some blood tests done. It's interesting that the doctor is sort of like bringing your car in. You're like, well, it's not making that noise now. And the mechanics like, Well, I don't know what to do then. Right. Normally, mechanics like, let me take your car home for a week. Right. And you got to let them. Same thing with your doctor. You have to move into your doctor's house until you have a seizure in front of you. That's not true. But they can and will try and induce a seizure sometimes so they can really see what's going on. It's not so during an EEG, they will try and induce a seizure. They may put the strobe light in front of your face. It'll take you to a David Byrne show. Exactly. Which would be a great way to get treated. Or they'll tell you to come in and not having slept. Yeah. Fatigue is one thing. Lack of sleep, that can bring them on. Yeah. It's a common trigger. Yeah. So they will try and induce a seizure. A lot of times after an EEG, they will go whole hog with the CT scan or an MRI. And what is that funny? Just imagine you having to ride a hog while you have the EEG thing on your head CT or an MRI. Have you ever been to one of those parties where they have the whole hog cooked just like land there yes. Looking like a hog. Yes. And I shouldn't go into any more detail because they're vegetarian and vegan listeners would not be happy, but yes, I have. All right. I have not. It's something else. I bet I can't imagine just sticking a fork in something that looks like an animal. Yes. It says, Stick a fork in me, I'm done. All right. Yeah. We'll just move on. Okay. Yes. The CTR, what they're trying to do there is just get an inside peek at exactly what's going on in the brain like you were talking about. There could be a lesion or something that they don't see, and this will show all yeah. So, again, you come in, they say, So you had a seizure. Put this colander on your head and look into this light while I start flashing it and make sure you haven't slept in a day. Yeah. And they try to trigger a seizure, and then they look at the EEG, readout of what your brain's doing. Mics yeah. This is an epileptic seizure. This isn't just some other type of seizure. This is like epilepsy. And then they'll put you through the wonder machine or something like that and look for lesions, weird oxygen concentrations, whatever, to try to pinpoint where the problem is coming from. Because again, it can just be one specific region of your brain or it could be a generalized type of seizure in your whole brain. And then based on these clues, they start deducing what type of epilepsy you might have. Right. And then what you can do about it. Obviously you're not going to eat a pigeon these days or drink dog bile. Well, you could eat pigeon, don't drink the dog bile. No. There is medication that you can take, but from what I read, it can be pretty rough on you. Yeah. And a lot of bad side effects. So what you try to do, I think, with a lot of hardcore medications like this is find that balance of what do I need to try and control these seizures and still kind of be able to operate and have a good quality of life. Yeah. And I think a lot like if you've been diagnosed with say. Like bipolar or depressive disorder or something like that. Where there's a lot of different medications out there that do different things. And you're probably going to have to try different combinations until you find the one that works best for you. As this article put it. To balance quality of life and control of your seizures. Right. That's what you're looking for in a medication or combination of medications. Same thing with epilepsy. Yeah. I mean, you may not want the full dose and you may just want to limit your seizures and have an acceptable amount of seizures because the medication is so rough on you. Sure, yeah, that's the worst part. They've actually come up with a device called the vagus nerve stimulator. Remember the vagus nerve? I don't remember. Was it a female orgasm episode that it played such a role in? I think we've had a couple of them. We said God was either a woman or clearly favors women because women's orgasms are triggered by vagus nerves. And even if you become paralyzed, the vagus nerve is still intact. That's right. Only for women. Well, there's a device that's basically like a pacemaker for your brain is what they call it, and it stimulates that vagus nerve and it just sends a little electrical pulse on like a regular rhythm to your brain. And they're like, this really works. It doesn't necessarily get rid of all of your seizures, but it brings the frequency of them down so much that you could just get by with a low dosage of medication. But they have no idea how it works. Right. They think maybe it keeps the brain juiced on a normal basis. It's almost like a pacemaker. It is. Well, like I said, they call it the pacemaker. Oh, they did? Yeah. Okay. I said that it sounds crazy, but if it is isolated in one part of your brain, they can actually go in and just remove that part of your brain in many cases right. And solve the problem. And not only no side effects and they're not taking a stab in the dark, like they know what parts of the brain they can remove. Right. They're not like, well, let's try this. But sometimes you actually show intellectual improvements after the surgery. Like when they remove the crayon from Homer's brain. Remember that one? Yeah. That was one of the best ones ever. Yeah, that was a good one. There's also a corpus Callostomy. I'm saying it right. So remember there's a type of generalized seizures or the whole brain seizures. Well, the corpus callosum is the white matter that connects the two hemispheres of the brain. So they just go in there and go and no more generalized brain seizures. Right. Yeah. The thing is, I'm very curious what the side effects are of that, because we developed a corpus colossum over time, and there's this really interesting thing we got to do this someday on. A guy named Julian Jane came up with the Bicameral mind, and he had this theory that before we had a corpus colossal and the two hemispheres talk to one another. That was back when we used to think the gods were talking to us. One part of our brain was talking to us, and it seemed like it was coming from outside of our brain. Is it like the angel and the devil on your shoulder, basically, or literally the gods having a role in your daily life and guiding you through life? It was actually one side of your brain, but since it wasn't connected to the other side, it didn't seem like it was coming from you. And so to cut the corpus colossum, I wonder if it would have similar effects like that. Yeah. And I think that also was for alien hand syndrome. The corpus clossom had a lot to do with it because one side, like, a malfunction of it, because one side isn't talking to the other. Yeah. Interesting. There was also some types of epilepsy called intractable epilepsy where and this is really high 25% to 30% of people who have epilepsy have intractable epilepsy. Like it's not going away. Yeah. And it's really tough to control even when you're being treated. Yeah. And you can actually die, too. I get the feeling this is pretty rare, but sudden, unexplained death and epilepsy or suedep is something that can happen. Yeah. Again, they don't know how it works, but they think that maybe it has to do with irregular heartbeat that can result irregular breathing or that someone gets trapped face down in something like bedding and suffocating during a seizure. Well, because a lot of seizures a lot of types of seizures, especially tonic ones that you're having a night, happens while you're sleeping. And if you're sleeping on your stomach, you could conceivably choke or suffocate. They think maybe that has something to do with it, but they're just not sure. I saw an obituary the other day for someone that died in their sleep, and that really struck me for the first time. That's a really nice way to say someone died in bed. I don't think it ever happens where someone's just asleep and doesn't wake up. Right. I think you're just asleep in bed. You wake up and you're like, I'm dying, and then you die. And it just sounds like a really nice way to say they died in their sleep. We've talked about that before about somebody who can you really die while you're asleep and not wake up and be like, I'm dying. We're talking about someone who woke up to die in pain. I think that's probably how it always happens. Rather than just dying in their sleep. No, I think people might pass really sleep. I think you could. That's sweet. Especially if you're on the dope, like they got you doped up, like in hospice or something like that. You can very easily just die in your sleep while you're kind of out of it, but I don't know. I hope you're wrong. Yeah, me too. Living with epilepsy, it can be very tough. You have to think about everything from driving to going swimming by yourself, raising an infant if you're a woman or a man. Or a man, yeah. But yeah, this one specifically said epilepsy can be a challenge to women when they're deciding whether to have kids or not. Sure, that's just I hadn't even thought about that. But you can't have a seizure while you're breastfeeding or something. What happens after that? Yes. Or if you're just the lone caregiver to a child at home to an 18 month old, and all of a sudden you need treatment yourself. That's the scary thing. All the states in the United States have different rules as far as driving. Like sometimes you can't have had a seizure for the past twelve months or something. Yeah. You dated a guy who had a couple of seizures and he lost his license because of it. Really? Yeah, I think it was twelve months in Virginia or something. What else? Yes, I think that's it. Well, I did look up celebrities with epilepsy, of course, because that's all anyone cares about, right? Yes. Prince. I didn't know that. Adam Horowitz. I didn't know that. The BC boys. Mr. Danny Glover. I didn't know that. Lil Wayne, Big Wayne. Is there a big Wayne? Medium. Wayne you mean the rock? No, Little Wayne. Neil Young. Really? The great Harriet Tubman. I think we knew that. We covered that. And then the NFL former NFL Twins Tiki and Rhonda. Barber. And they were twins who both had it. Yeah. They think there might be a genetic basis to it, too. Yes. I don't think we even mentioned that they've identified something like 200 different gene deficiencies that could possibly lead to epilepsy. And interestingly if you are a child and you are diagnosed with epilepsy, your doctor may say, put that kid on Atkins. Oh, yeah. Ketonic diets might have something that helps. Yeah, they think. Well, like when you have kind of gone through your fat stores, you go to ketones in your brain and it's got to have something to do with that. Start burning ketones in your brain. That's got to have an impact on your electrical activity. Why it only works on kids rather than adults is a mystery to me. Yes. You got anything else? I got nothing else. Well, that's epilepsy, everybody. If you ever see somebody who's having a seizure, remember everything we told you and keep that spoon out of their mouth. Since I said that's, time for listener mail. We're going to call this boy marathoners. We heard from them. We probably should have thought that through where we did a marathon episode asking for people to email. Yes, I think we would have gotten the same amount of emails from marathon. I love marathon. People who marathon love to talk about marathon. Sure. So we were asking for it even without asking for it. Well, and we also asked about the marathon high versus a marijuana high. Yeah. And it turns out a lot of marathon or smoke weed, I bet. I can imagine which one you selected. Well, actually, I did not select one of those because they were kind of all the same. They were like one guy said it's not the same. One guy said he would get high and run. I saw that guy until the runners had kicked in and he said, so I would be high the entire marathon? Yeah. Like, you're insane. His friends thought he was how would you even start? He was probably, should I eat combos today or run a marathon today? I had a friend who used to get super high and go and work out and lift weight. Yeah, like Kevin Spacey. Oh, that's right. America. That always seems so bizarre to me. And look what happened to him. Yeah, you want to stay away from the weed and the weight lifting combo. All right, here we go. Been listening for almost two years, guys. Never missed an episode. I'm a former Ultramarathoner, typically in the 50K distance, so definitely on the shorter end. 5000 miles. Can you believe that? A short one, yes, 550 sure. And I can speak to experience in both the runners high and hitting the wall in the same race. Well, in 2013, I was competing in my last fifty K. And while I was toward the back of the pack in these events, always I was feeling great when I reached the four hour mark, laughing and joking with aid station volunteers and having a great time. I felt like I was on top of the world at mile 20. And then it happened. I hit the wall hard. I had been able to cover 20 miles of pretty rugged trail in 4 hours. Suddenly, my legs went from feeling amazing and feeling like sex of wet cement. That happens to me at like mile point 75. Yeah, it took me another 4 hours in the final 12 miles of the race. Oh, my God. Maybe it's time I start training for my next one. Guys, you're invited to join me. Maybe Chuck hates running because he hasn't found the right distance yet. Perhaps it's 32.5 miles. No, that is from Sean Riley in Columbia, South Carolina. Sean Riley, who is crazy? But thanks for writing in 50K short ones. Yeah, but we should say there is quite a difference apparently, between pot high and a runner's high. Yes. No one said that there were anything alike. No, most people said they were pretty different. Okay, cool. So we're done with marathon. No need to email us more about marathons. We're good. We got it. Okay. Yeah, if you do have epilepsy or you know someone who does so I would love to hear from you and let us know what it's like to live with that. Sure. If you want to get in touch with us, you can go to our website called stuffyshitnow.com and there you will find links to all of our social media accounts. Or you can send us a plain old fashioned email to stuffpodcast@howstoughworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetopworks.com. Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school is out, the sun shining, the daylight is longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music, My Favorite Murder from exactly right media, My Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarra and Georgia Hardstark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it's. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
428ea058-53a3-11e8-bdec-a3c2c1ff5888	Cockney Rhyming Slang: Beautiful Gibberish	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/cockney-rhyming-slang-beautiful-gibberish	What is Cockney Rhyming Slang? It's complicated and its origins are unclear. Learn everything we know about it today.	What is Cockney Rhyming Slang? It's complicated and its origins are unclear. Learn everything we know about it today.	Thu, 07 Nov 2019 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=7, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=311, tm_isdst=0)	41121008	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Attention Seattle in the Greater Pacific Northwest area. If you are in town on January 16, you are hereby commanded to go to the More Theater to see us, Stuff You Should Know. That's right. We are kicking off 2020 with Seattle all new material. We are super excited. You always turn out for us. Tickets go on sale tomorrow for the January 16 show. You can find out ticket info@sysklive.com. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles. There we took Bryant right there. There's Jerry Rowland right there. So that makes this stuff you should know. Right. Ink of day. That's it for me. Can't top that. I was trying to think of a way to say, welcome to the podcast in Cockney rhyming Slang. Can you make any sense? My brain is so broken right now, I can't even try. Okay, good. Well, welcome. It's a good time to record a show. Exactly. You're going to do some cockney in here, right? We want to offend as many Londoners as we can. I don't know, just channel little Dick Van Dyke, you know? Yes. The American doing a bag cockney accent. Well, I did recently. Re watch the limey. Yes. For Casey's benefit. Yes. The great movie from Steven Soderberg. Never seen it. It's awesome. Is it really? Yeah. I mean, I know it's like a classic and everybody loves it, but it's really that good. Yeah, because a lot of people like The Hangover. I like The Hangover. The limey and the hangover. Same level. Yeah, they're the same movie almost. All right. It's weird. Well, then I've seen The Hangover, so I don't need to see the lining. The Liamy's great. And Tarrant Stamp is awesome and uses some Cockney rhyming slang and one great scene, my big exposure to Cockney rhyming slang is Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels for Snatch, which I think are both directed by Guy Ritchie. Right. Wasn't Lockstock like his first attempt? And Snatch was the one that got him married to Madonna. You a fan of his? Yes. I mean, as much as I like his movies, I don't like him personally necessarily because he hunts boar like a jackass and stuff like that. Yeah. Drunk with his friends in the most, like, disrespectful way of murdering a pig. I meant his movies, but, yeah, I do like his movie. Sounds like he's a creep, though. I'm not going to go on record saying that. But, yeah, those movies are okay. And then I guess what's his name? Don cheadle a little bit in Ocean Eleven. Sure. He did a little bit of that. Right. And I mean it's. Code to Americans. There's like a criminal, a British criminal. Right. That's all that means these days. Yeah, I think so. In movies, it's definitely like all of those are criminal people in the movies, but they're like kind of slick, cool criminals that wear leather coats and stuff like that. Not dumb criminals that wear, like, football jerseys or anything like that. They're, like smooth criminals. That's, I think, what I was looking for. Yeah. But this idea of associating it with Cockney is not necessarily associating it with criminals. It's more associated with lower class, working class, less educated. Definitely not the aristocracy over in Britain. Yes. Or the upper class. Sure. And that by speaking with a Cockney accent, or more to the point, using Cockney rhyming slang, you could really differentiate yourself as a point of pride, like you were speaking like your group, you're in group, which was, at the time, Cockney. But the big surprise to all this is it's really possible and even probable that it wasn't the Cockney that came up with this rhyming slang, that it was somebody else altogether. Maybe. Who knows? Should we say what it is? No, not for the rest of the podcast. Cockney rhyming slang, it wasn't even very clearly defined in this piece. Okay. Do you think it was? It's in there. Okay. You got to just kind of separate the wheat from the chaff. So it is a two word phrase. It is a slang phrase consisting of two words. So far, so good. Where the last word of that phrase rhymes with the original word, and it can be and I think the best way to do this is just to throw out a few no, keep describing. Well, the two word phrase, it can be a lot of things. It can be a person's name. It can be just something random. It can be a place. It could be a lot of things. It can be anything. Yeah, sure, I guess it can be. But shall we illustrate it through? Well, there's a second part to it, too. Okay. The second part, and this is very important the two word phrase that you're using were the second word rhymes with the word you're actually saying. Yeah. The original word. The original word thank you. Usually has nothing to do with it. There's no metaphor. There's no connection. There's nothing. There's no context to it. It's supposed to just be random. Or in most cases, it is just random words. Right. One of which rhymes with the word you're replacing. And to further complicate things sure. In a lot of cases, and no one knows why, sometimes this happens and sometimes it doesn't. A lot of times that one of the words of the two word phrase is dropped, and then you're just left with the one word, which doesn't even rhyme with the original word anymore. Right. That's probably the best description of cockney rhyming slang anyone's ever given. I think we should illustrate it with a couple of examples. I pulled some from something called the Internet. Here's one. The tip and tat. That's how long it took me to come up with that tip and tet for the Internet. But in ten years, it will just be called the tip. I'm going to log on to the tip, governor. So let's say your word was, and this was in Oceans Eleven specifically, trouble is the word that you're trying to say. Cockney rhyming slang for trouble is Barney Rubble. Awesome. And so you would say you're making a bit of the Bonnie Rubble again. Right? That was kind of who was that making a bit of Bonnie Rubble? Not Vy. See, I already did it wrong. No, but I think you did that sound like a real person to an American. For sure. Yeah, I'll shout it out later. Oh, man, I finally did a good one. I just don't know who it was. No, but it wasn't a cockney person. Okay, another example for queen, they would use the term baked bean. Look who's on TV. It's the baked bean. And that's the queen. I like that one. Or in the case of one that's been dropped, what is Ed used here? Bees and honey. That one is not dropped for money. Okay, but which one was apples and pears? Right. So you would say, I'm going to go up the apples and pears to go get my wallet to pay for this pizza, or something to that effect. Okay. But then over time, people drop the pears. And so now the word for stairs in cockney rhyming slang is just apples. Which if you're just standing there on the outside like a normal American bloke. Sure. Which, by the way, means person. You have no idea why this person is called stairs apples. You got what they were saying because the context is there. You're going up the apples to get your wallet to pay for the pizza. But why would you just say that? Did you hit your head? Is there something wrong with you? What's the problem? Why would you just call that apples? That's why it's so confounding. But the great thing about cockney rhyming slang, and in particular, the great thing about researching cockney rhyming slang is you learn how you get from apples to stairs and then it makes sense sometimes. Yeah, that's true. It's not always. Yeah, sometimes it's not documented, which Ed points out as one of the problems. Sometimes you can draw the line, the through line, but because it's not documented. And sometimes these things take years and years to morph into its final version. Right. Unless you're on the what would you call streets? On the dole? No, on the streets, then you wouldn't know. But I don't know what streets is. You can't just make stuff up. Like there's real words on the drums and beats. So you're on the drums. Right, but they probably have a word for streets. Like, that's the whole point. You can't just make anything up. You could if it hasn't been taken yet. Sure, but also that's the other thing about cockney rhyming slang is it evolves. Right. So old celebrities that no one even knows about anymore followed to new celebrities whose name also rhyme with whatever word you're saying. Right. I thought you meant old celebrities who maybe used to talk this way, like Michael Cain. No, he's never seen any rhyming slang in his life. Of course, you got to see the movie Alfie. Maybe that's who it was. It might have been Michael Caine. I don't think that Michael Caine. I think it was, as a matter of fact, yes. Thank you. I'm glad you did it. Noel always says a good joke is to say Michael Caine in the correct accent. Say the words my cocaine and it sounds like Michael Caine saying it. And it sounds like the correct accent for Michael Caine. Right. Say it. My cocaine. Wow. You just blew that one out of the water. You got to set me up in the future because now you have to record me saying my cocaine. Well, I've got it two ways now, man. My cocaine. Here's the thing. My cocaine. That's my cocaine. Pretty good. My cocaine. It is good. You're right, Noel. You just got to say it the right way and not like a robot. Josh so here's one of the things that's sort of confounding. If you want to look up like a glossary and say, well, here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to learn cockney rhyming slang. So for my trip to England, I'm really in with everybody. First of all, bad idea. Yeah. Second of all, it can be very localized and the accents are all different. Yeah. So even people in London sure, people in London don't really do, but the people who use cockney rhyming slang in London might not even agree on what word means. What? I'm just picturing all the people walking around in them laughing their arses off. I can't wait to get to that one. It's a great one. As we stumble through this. Yeah. I had a really good example of why there's no codification of the cockney rhyming slang. He said that when people are creating a language, especially informal ones like slang, they don't write it all down. Quote, dear diary, referred to my house as a cat and mouse today because it rhyme. We all had a good laugh. Might try just calling it cat tomorrow and see how it goes. It sounds funny, but that's how it works. Can you imagine stumbling across a diary that says that? And here's the other thing, too, is there are cases where there is a little bit of a reflection of the original word in the example that it gives here is twist. Like to call a woman a twist, which I don't know if that's derogatory or not or just some weird slang that no one uses anymore. I don't think so. Although, I don't know, these are also the people who use the C word like it's nothing, but you can't bring yourself to say fanny. Oh, man. I can't wait to go back there. Which we're going to do soonish, right? I'd love to do in 2020, maybe. Yeah. All right, so Twist came from Twist and Twirl, which meant Girl, which is they were talking about, like, dancing with a girl, twisting and twirling in a nightclub, let's say. So there's some connection in that one. Yeah. So girl ended up becoming Twist. So that sort of makes sense. There's another one called On Your Todd after a guy named Todd Sloan, and it means on your own. Right. And the thing is, on your todd, it makes sense. Sloan rhymes with loan. It doesn't have to have any connection. But that one actually does. Yeah. Because Todd Sloan was a famous jockey in the 19th century. Like horse jockey. Yes. Okay. What other kind is there? Disc jockeys. Oh, yeah, sure. So his book, his memoir was called Todd Sloan by Himself. Which is weird to refer to yourself in third person for your memoir, but there was a line in it that apparently EastEnders in London really picked up. I was left alone by those I never ceased to grieve for. The idea of being alone or on your own became synonymous with Todd Sloan and things just happened to rhyme with that. So it's one of those rare ones where there is a connection to it, and also rare, Chuck, in that this is a 19th century horse jockey, and still today On Your Todd is recognized as on your own, whereas a lot of people probably have no idea exactly who he is. And when that happens, that frequently that person gets moved out for potentially another celebrity or another word that's a little more understandable and recognized. Another new jockey to people today, right? Yeah, exactly. Can you name one? No. All right, maybe we should take a break and we'll talk about some of the other examples after this message. Okay, we're back. Jerry just opened the loudest sandwich in the history of the world. She's like, Hold on a minute. And it sounded like I filled in his face blanket. It was like, Ernest opens a sandwich over here. That was a good one. Not as good as part two. I saw that first one in the theater. Yeah. So here are some other examples that have some of them have sort of stayed over in England, and some of them have found their way. Like, apparently the term put up your dukes. Oh, I didn't know that. Cockney rhymingslang. And I didn't write down where dukes came from. But that's where it was originally, a cockney rhyming slang term. Yeah, because you would think it had to do with fists or something. Yeah, dukes for fists. Why did not write that down? Okay, but that's another really important point to say about cockney rhyming slang. It's frequently rhyming slang based on slang. So the word it's replacing is slang. Slang word to begin with. So who knows what the Duke's actually rhymed with at any point? Yeah, that's a good point. First of all, I've never heard this blowing a raspberry. What have you heard of that? Yeah, that's tooting out of your what I just did is as much blowing a raspberry is actually farting. Oh, really? Yeah. Okay. Well, I've heard of giving someone a raspberry like that. Okay. That's the same thing. Yeah. Okay. Well, apparently that's derived from raspberry tart slang for fart. Isn't that amazing? It's pretty great. Yeah. So that one is one of the rare ones. I love talking about exceptions. Do you know that? Sure. That's one of the rare ones that made its way to America, because everyone but you know what blowing a raspberry is? I guess I'd never heard of the term blowing, but giving someone a raspberry, same thing. I found two more. One is controversial. It's not set in stone, but it's as good an explanation as any. Get down to brass tacks. I saw that one, too. That's a standing for fax. Let's get down to the bear facts. Possibly it's not done. One that is 100%, as far as I can tell, is bread. I saw that, too. For money? Yeah. In America, bread and honey became just bread. Right. And it caught on here and caught on again just now. Well, bees and honey, though, was also for money. Right. Is that just one of the local, like, depends on where you are things? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But in America, I mean, we use bread. Everybody calls it bread. Yeah. I didn't know that that would come back. Yeah, somebody wrote in to say it had come back. Let's get this bread. Right? I guess so. That sounds familiar. You need to spend more time on reddit. Here's another one. Dog and bone stands in for phone. Call me on the dog and bone. Sure. And then Ed says there may be some kind of correlation between one syllable words that lead off that phrase staying in the phrase, but there are some of the exceptions. I don't know if there is a rule. Exactly. And I think this is worth saying. We looked all over the place. I know. Ed did too. For straight up linguistic dissertations and papers on cockney rhymings language. Right. It's not there. No, it's just treated as fun and hilarious, even though it is its own made up language that's ever evolving, still Alive has been around. We'll talk about the history in a minute for 150 plus years, but apparently no linguist has ever thought enough of it to sit down and write a genuine paper about it. Right. So we couldn't find that. But the one thing that really occurred to me was in looking into it, I don't know if it could ever be explained. I think it's the result of so many individual decisions and then collective agreements to take up and go along with those decisions. And those agreements can be totally undermined by a new individual decision that catches on. How could you possibly map and even understand or explain all of that different stuff? But even though we can't explain it, once you start to learn how it works, it's understandable. But you can understand it. Yeah. And I always wonder with any kind of slang, who makes this stuff up, who sets the rules? It's probably just the kind of thing that just starts on a playground and spreads from there and gets codified unofficially, then everyone's using it. Sure. But I wonder if there I don't know, you can't trace this stuff, which is sort of frustrating as researchers. Right. Because I think we like to pinpoint things. Yeah. But people have tried to trace it and they've come awfully close. Well, we'll get to that in a minute. Okay. I want to go over some more of these. Alright. I want to get up on my plates and get out of here. Your plates of meat. Plates of meat, which is feet or between podcasts. You probably have to go take a rattle. Yes, rattle and hiss. Rattle and hiss. Like a snake. You got it. And that's beans peepee. Right. Exactly. And then I guess we should talk about ours. Yeah, sure. That's the one you were pretty excited about. Yes. Because it goes even so much further than ours, even. Yeah, it's pretty convoluted. Okay. Do you want to take it? No, go ahead. Okay. So ours is the very famous name for us in the UK. Everybody knows that. Sure. It's actually it comes from Aristotle, which you're like. Well, what does that have to do with ass? Let me tell you. Aristotle is cockney rhyming slang for a bottle. Again, the question is what does that have to do with ass? Right. Well, originally the cockney rhyming slang word forass was bottle and glass. Right. Became shortened to bottle. Somebody came along and rhymed Aristotle with it. That got shortened to arise and then to arse. Crazy. It goes even further than that. Yeah. I saw one plaster for arse, plaster of Paris. Aristotle, bottle. Bottle and glass. A. That's how deep the cockney rhyming slanging has covered up the collective ass of the UK. Yeah. And again, it's like why you can't put that in a book and explain it in any kind of way that makes sense. You got to do it on a podcast or a paper. Right. You just have to accept it. It's like that's how it happened on the street. I think that's a really good way to go. On the street to the East End. Right, right. On your cocaine. No, not your cocaine. They do have for all that we're saying about how don't look at glossaries and stuff like that, they do have dictionaries that you can buy if you're a total square, I would guess. It's probably not a cool thing to do. That's like saying, I want to become a rapper. So let me get a rhyming dictionary, although I did have a rhyming dictionary at one point. Well, rhyming it's not just limited to cockney. We love to rhyme. Yes. Which is one assertion it makes for why it's popular or so long lasting. Well, should we talk about some of the theories on where it originated? Because I looked at a bunch of places, and I think calling it theory is a little I think they kind of know where it came from. They just don't know exactly why they can't pinpoint it to, like, on this day in this place. Right. It's not a complete mystery, though. No. They've got it basically localized to about a one and a half mile area of London and basically down to the year. It's just exactly where and exactly who is and exactly why are the real outstanding questions, which is actually a lot of questions. Yeah. One of the whys was that in this one, I think, doesn't have as much credence now. No, but it's like the most common one right. Is that you will hear that it was coded language created by criminals to keep the cops confused as to what was going on. Right. Which makes sense in one way because it certainly could cause confusion. But it also I think it makes a pretty good point, that were cops just hanging around overhearing things? Why did they feel like they needed to create this whole language? And cops, if they were street cops, would have figured this stuff out as well, because it wouldn't have been that big of a secret. Yeah. There's this guy named Dick Sullivan who wrote an essay on the Victorian Web, which is actually kind of cool, and he said the street cops would have come from the same areas and families and neighborhoods that the criminals would have so they would have been raised on this rhyming slang anyway. Sure. So it doesn't really hold up to scrutiny when you look at it like that. It was an intentionally created, coded language meant to confuse the cops. Right. And that's not to say it nevertheless wasn't associated with some kind of criminal underworld, East London types. Yeah. And it almost certainly was taken up by the cockneys, but it wasn't necessarily cockney or criminals who came up with this rhyming slang to begin with. There's this guy named John Camden Hoten, and he wrote one of the better titled, or at least most directly titled books I've ever heard of. And there's no colon. No, there's not. There are a couple of commas, though. A Dictionary of Modern Slang, can't and Vulgar Words used at the present day in the streets of London. And he has a chapter on rhyming slang, and he basically says that it was two groups, shaunters and Patterner's, basically traveling salesmen who would stand on street corners and hawk their wares and maybe pick your pocket while you were trying to buy something from them. And that they came up with cockney rhyming slang. Yeah. And I saw that enough to think that that's probably true. Yeah. The Shaunters in particular spoke in, like, singing rhyming language, so it would have been pretty quick evolution. Yeah. I think this will make a lot of sense. Street criers I mean, England and London especially, has a long tradition of street corner barkers and things like this. I remember seeing one myself when I traveled there in the was like, they're still doing this stuff. Yeah, it was like a box in the park where you can go stand on it. So box maybe that's where I came from. Right, probably. And just shout your peace. Sure. And it's all guy doing it. And I thought, what year is this? This is wonderful. Right. It's fantastic. But in particular, the Shaunters, they sang and then sold penny ballads, sheet music of penny ballads that they would write real quick after somebody famous died or there was a train wreck or something. They'd write a ballad about it and then be out on the corner selling these things. But because they were singing in rhymes and singsong, it's a really good bet that these guys were the ones who originated rhyming slang, but not necessarily for any kind of intentionally coded language, because that same guy, Dick Sullivan, says there's no reason for patterers who sold their little gigaws or trinkets or whatever. I love that word. Or Shaunters who are selling these penny balls. They worked alone. There was no need for them to come up with a coded language to communicate with one another. Yeah. In front of a customer who they were ripping off because they didn't need to communicate with one another in front of customers. Well, I saw that maybe they could communicate with each other when customers were around or something. I don't know. Right. But the other part of that is that it supposedly flies in the face of how slang develops, that it's unintentional. Right. Like, you don't say, let's come up with a coded language, and here's how it works. Yes. Even like American teenagers when they have slang that their parents don't understand. You remember how that stuff went? It was something you just heard. You never sat around. Sure. I'm hip to that. And said, like, hey, let's use this other word that our parents won't know what it means. Right. We'll call it Pepsi when we're on the phone. There was also the Victorian backslang, which that was not cockney rhyming slang. That was just pronouncing words backwards, sort of simple, like yob for boy. Yes. But something interesting about that is that it's based on the spelling, not the pronunciation, which suggests a strong degree of literacy, which you would probably not have found among at least the patters. Right. Probably among the Shaunters, because they were writing songs and ballads. So it's possible they came up with that, too. But they think maybe it was butcher's and butcher's assistants who came up with backslang. Oh, really? Yeah. And actually two confused customers to be able to talk about what price they should charge a customer in front of the customer. Right. So there is like you take all these different pieces and you get the current idea and story for cockney rhymings lang, but it's actually a bunch of different stuff that wasn't really all connected until later on. Yeah. What it probably also was not was Irish stock workers. There was one theory being bandied about that Irish stock workers would come over and they would speak in this made up rhyming slang so they could just talk among their Irish peers and the people of London wouldn't understand them. Not much of this makes any sense at all because I think now you see it some in Ireland, but for all those years that it was prevalent in London, it was not in Ireland. Right. Unless they literally just made it up when they came over from Ireland. Right. Plus, why would they not just speak Irish in front of the English who might not speak it? Yeah. Or what would that be? Gaelic. Sure. I think so. We're getting so much of this wrong. Do you want to take a break and fact check everything and maybe just rewind and start over? Yeah, let's get our wait, what was Fax? Our brass tax. That's right. So we got to go get our brass straight. That's right. Okay, we're back. It's been about 30 minutes since we left. You guys, in fact, checked everything and so far so good. Yeah. This is a perfect podcast. So you said at the beginning you teased out that it might not even have been cockney to begin with. Everything I saw kind of placed it in that east, I think they call it Cheapside, really area. Well, where the cockneys were. But cockney was also I mean, it's also not necessarily specifically one place. Right. No, but if you're talking about cockney people, supposedly the definition of a cockney person is someone who is born within hearing distance of the bells of St Mary Le Beau in Cheapside, which was in London with this guy, John Camden Houghton, who was writing in placed the origin of rhyming slang twelve to 15 years before. So this guy was like on top of it as it was happening, he placed it at a place called Seven Dials, which is like a big marketplace, and I think it still is, which is a mile and a half away from Cheapside, which at the time was in Westminster at the time, a different town. Right. So you had City of London and then Westminster, which is where Seven Dials was. So if you believe hotten, then it wasn't the cockney at all who came up with that. It was just Patters and Shaunteurs. That's a different word. Then I said, no, Shaunteurs. Well, cockney what that is, though, is. Just sort of the working class, I think, used to be viewed as uneducated and sort of lower class. That may be a bit harsh, but if anything, it was not the upper crust of British society. Right. The hard drinking pub goers, the rub a dub dub goers. Is that pub? Yeah, which is another exception, because you go from one syllable pub to rub a dub dub, and it actually has three rhymes in there. Oh, interesting. But that is cockney rhyming slang for pub. Well, but the Cockneys were also known for a bit more of progressive politics, and I think nowadays there can be a bit more of a pride of like a working class pride associated with it. I think there was back then, too. Was there? But I think that's one reason also why the Cockney accent, and Cockney rhyming Slanging in particular, was just treated shabbily and looked down on by the rest of England. Right. Because it was supposedly associated with lower classes. Yeah. It also found its way to Australia, isn't that right? And then somehow on the west coast of America, where the Australian version came in yeah. In the prisons of the west coast in the US, it was called Australian rhyming Slang. So I guess some cool guy from Australia showed up and was speaking in gibberish that just made everyone think, I want to do this too. Right. It's kind of fun to go on YouTube, though, and see some of these, because it's such a big thing in England. It's been all over the BBC. I watched one episode of The Two Ronnies'where, this priest did a sermon in Cockney rhyming Slang. It was very funny. And one of those sort of guess it was 80s, early 80s. BBC comedies are always fun. Right. The production value is not all there. The laugh track is it had to have been a laugh track. I don't think it was a studio audience, although it may have been I don't know. It was hard to tell that's during the transition. But there were other shows, not On Your Nelly And The Sweeney, and the titles of both of those shows come from actual Cockney rhyming slang as well. Yeah, the Sweeney is particularly dense. It's short for Sweeney Todd, which was rhyming slang for Flying Squad, which is a particular branch of the Metropolitan Police, kind of like Major Case. Interesting. Sweeney was like the Major Case Division of Metropolitan Police. So nelly comes from the word nelly duff. The name Nelly Duff, which is apparently just a nonsense name, and that rhymes with puff, which means life. So not on your nelly means not on your life. Yeah, clearly. It's so dense. And then, of course, things like you mentioned, Guy Ritchie really brought it into the American consciousness in the nineties when he made those two movies. Right. He brought it into my consciousness, I'll tell you that. Yeah, sure. So there's a really good question chuck that I think we need to ask. How is it that in 2019, you and I are analyzing a hyper local slang that came out of the 1840s in some very specific part of London? How is cockney rhyming slang still around after all these years, when so much other slang has come and gone over the years that we have no idea ever even existed? What's the same power of cockney rhymings like? Do you expect me to have an answer? Yeah. I don't have one about why it's stuck around, other than if people don't still use it, then it would have fallen by the wayside. So clearly it's popular. Yeah. Maybe this is just my recognition of it, but it seems to have gotten more popular in the last 20 years. What I was reading is that especially in the UK, popularity is based on kitschiness, kind of like hipster irony. Like the cockney rhyming word for wife is trouble and strife. So I imagine that probably doesn't go over very well if you don't call your wife that with a smile, like you're joking, right. Kind of thing. So I think that's the current use of it. But, I mean, it was used and it's still in use, and there's still new words like posh and becks is the word for sex. Oh, really? That's pretty new. Apparently britney Spears. That can be used for beers, which is great. And I saw one Nelson Mandela. If you're getting a Stella, artois is a Nelson Mandela for Stella. So the fact that it's still evolving, still being contributed to these existing words, are being replaced with new ones, and the fact that it's 150 years old, I mean, there's got to be some thing to it that makes it more I think it's that it's just so hard to understand until someone explains it to you. I think it's fun. I think it's a few fold. It's fun. It's fun. There is a code to it. And part of the fun is that I think his friends may be trying to make something up and having it catch on. Sure. It's almost like a game. Like a word game. Yeah, a bit. Did you just go a bit? And then the unique Britishness of it all yeah. Has a lot to do with it, I think. Yeah. Because even though it got exported to Australia, no one associates it with Australia. Sorry, australia. But if it really took off in America, with hipsters, people in Britain would probably be like, Forget it. What is flown the coup? What could you say for Coop? It's on the gwyneth and the goop to the gwyneth. It's flown to gwyneth. Okay, that one might catch on. I can do this all day. Some of them aren't so good, but other ones are gems. The why of it all, though, to begin with, I thought was interesting. I asked you why and you said you don't know. You said, Why? Is it sticking around? I mean, why did it start to begin with? Okay. And I think that makes a pretty good point, that they're just rhyming, period has always been a thing, even in the States. And he uses examples like sea later, alligator after wild crocodile. I remember saying that when I was a kid. I just said that yesterday. Did you really? Yeah. See you later, alligator. There's just something about it. Maybe it's the childlike nature of it that's fun. It makes old people feel young again. Yes. It takes something boring and adds a little flair to it, you know, or like Yiddish, like a fancy schmancy. I love that people say that kind of stuff all the time. I never associated it with Yiddish. But it absolutely is, isn't it? I think so. I mean, not outright Yiddish, but Yiddish culture. I think so. But yes, it is strange. It is strange that it started to begin with. I wish there was a definite person zero that we could point to on the streets of London, and someone thought it was funny. And then they told two friends and so on and so on. Yup. Richie started it, and Posse and Ralph Mouth took it from there, and it just kept spreading like wildfire. You got anything else? Yes, I found a 2012 survey by the Museum of London, and it set off a bunch of articles about how cockney ryman slang is dying. But if you read the article, it says that 40% of respondents believe it was dying, which means 60% don't believe it's dying. Yeah. And then they go on to talk about how there's all these new words that are being replaced and added. So I don't think it's going anywhere. I think its usage has become more ironic and everything, but most Britons still understand porky pies means lies. Yeah, like, don't tell me any porkies. Give it to me straight. Well, I think it was good we were able to sit here and have a good rabbit and pork. Sure. Or pork. Apparently rabbit and pork is torque. But oh, that was one other thing, studying this. There's reasons people study this. It gives you a window into the past. For example, like pronunciations. Yes. So, Farthing used to be a Camden with farthings, like, a quarter penny that they don't use anymore. But it used to be called a Camden after Camden Gardens, which tells linguists if they would get off their desk and study this thing that they used to pronounce farthings as farings. Oh, interesting. Or at least it's something that rhymes closely to gardens. But that's why people study this. Allegedly. Amazing. Well, if you want to know more about cockney rhyming slang, get yourself a great cockney rhyming dictionary and go to England and just start talking up a storm. They love that stuff. They can't get enough. They'll treat you like one of their own. That's right. Since we said that, it's time for listener Mate Satanic Panic. We just rereleased that as a Saturday select. Was that one of your picks or one of mine? I don't know. I'm not sure. But it was a good pick for October 1 of our favorite episodes, I think of all time. And we got a lot of people emailing again about it after listening to it for the first time. Hey guys, listen to Satanic Panic and realize I had a story about that. I grew up in a suburb of California. By the teenage years, I'd become what you might call goth. We're black, spike jewelry, dark makeup and all that stuff. My town had a 10:00 p.m. Curfew and one night when I was 14, my friends and I were walking home after curfew got pulled over by the cops. They questioned and searched us, then called the parents, except for mine. I'm not sure why, but the officer insisted on driving me home. Once there, he also demanded to come inside my home. I was too scared to argue, so I let him in. He went to my bedroom. This is getting creepy. Yeah, I was really worried about where this was headed. He went to my bedroom, which is full of posters of Marilyn Manson and the crow and stuff like that. And he started going through my things. What? He told me he was concerned because Satanists are out there and that if I wasn't careful I'd find myself sacrificed. He told me there are rituals and barns that require virgins and I should rethink my lifestyle before I got raped or hurt. I thanked him for his concern and I quietly said everything nice that I could to get him out of my house before he woke up. My father the situation. This happened in 2000. After hearing your episode today, it's hard to believe that the residue of the Satanic Panic would still be around then, especially in the police force. Just to be clear, the suburb I lived in had very little crime. So the officer was very surprising indeed. My boys and I loved your show. I recommend it to everyone. Nice. That is from Lisa G. That's really something. Lisa. I know. Kind of disturbing. Yeah. I don't know if that cop was a good guy. I don't know. It started to go down a pretty creepy road there. It really did. Yeah. Maybe he was just looking for some pot or something. Coming up with a cover story. You've got to get in your room and go through your site. Exactly. You got any weed? Yes. Really? I was relieved to know that it just ended in the cop leaving. Agreed. They went above and beyond. Not in a good way. Right. Well, thanks a lot, Lisa. And glad that you made it through that and that you and your boys are listening to stuff you should know. Could you get any cooler? I don't think so. Well, if you want to be cool like Lisa and her boys, you can get in touch with us by going on to Stuff You Should Know, checking out our social links there. And as always, send us an email to stuff. Podcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should know is production of iHeartRadio's how stuff works. For more podcasts, my heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio App, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means schools out. The sun's shining, the daylight is longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music. My favorite murder from exactly right media. My favorite murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarriff and Georgia Hardstark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you're you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
41f310ca-53a3-11e8-bdec-cf97043d6664	Cleopatra: Ms. Understood	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/cleopatra-ms-understood	One of the great misunderstood figures in history was the last pharaoh of Egypt. Cleopatra’s story is almost always told along with the men in her life, and from the view of the Romans who were threatened by her. Unsurprisingly, there was lot more to her.	One of the great misunderstood figures in history was the last pharaoh of Egypt. Cleopatra’s story is almost always told along with the men in her life, and from the view of the Romans who were threatened by her. Unsurprisingly, there was lot more to her.	Tue, 09 Jul 2019 13:47:25 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=7, tm_mday=9, tm_hour=13, tm_min=47, tm_sec=25, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=190, tm_isdst=0)	48957307	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Attention, world. If you can make it to America, then come see us. We are going out on the road for SYSC Live again. And we are going to start the whole thing off in Chicago on July th. That's right. And if you can't make it to America, maybe make it to Canada, because we're going to be in Toronto. And the next night, the Fourth Music Hall. Then in August, we're going to do a couple of dates at the Wilbur and Boston, october 29 in Portland mains lovely State Theater on August 30. Yes. And then we're going to be heading down to Florida. We're going to be at Plaza Live on October 9. And then the next night we're going to be in New Orleans at the Civic Theater. That's right. And then we're going to round it out in Brooklyn. October 2324 and 25 at the Bellhouse. Yes. So come see us. You can get tickets and info@sysklive.com. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clarke. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. There's Jerry. Jerome Rowland over there sitting on Frank the chair is not very happy about that, but still, this is stuff you should know. I thought Jerry's entrance today was unique. Oh, yeah. Yeah, man. When Matt and Tyler brought her in, rolled up in a carpet on the studio floor. Yes. And she said, Fire me. We said, Jerry, we don't have that kind of power. It was amazing. It was almost like playing the whole thing in reverse. She rolled herself back up in the carpet in one swift motion. That's right. And if you are a Cleopatrate, then you got a little chuckle out of that joke. If not, you're probably thinking that we're on drugs or something. Yeah, I guess you could probably think both. But neither is true. What is true is that you're about to be confused for the next 45 to 55 minutes. That's a great set up, man. We're going to confuse everybody. Yeah. Boy, this is good. And there are a lot of names with numbers that follow. It not even regular numbers. Numbers that are actually letters. Yeah. Roman style. Yes. So here we go. This is going to be good, Chuck. Oh, by the way, if you live in Chicago or Toronto or Boston or Portland, Maine, or Orlando, Florida, or New Orleans or Brooklyn, New York. Okay. You should go to Sysclive.com yeah. And check out our tour dates. We're going to those cities and you can buy tickets@sysklive.com and get information about things like is it a 21 and up show? I don't think any of them are what Time or Doors? Probably seven, but you better check that kind of stuff. You can go find that info by visiting Sysklive and then following the hyperlinks out to other websites on the Internet. That's right. If you've never seen us live, come on out. It's a lot of fun. And if you have just come on back and get a second helping of us. Yes, second heap and helping of our hospitality. Now on to Cleopatra. Good call, by the way. Good call for saying all that. Great. So, Cleopatra, she's one of those historical figures that everybody knows about, but if you stop and ask yourself, what do you know about her, you realize you know next to nothing about her. She was amazingly beautiful. She looked like Liz Taylor. She loved Julius Caesar and maybe Mark Anthony, too. And wait a minute, how does she love both? What's going on here? You just realize you get confused pretty quickly. Was she a feminist icon? Was she actually just kind of a wily woman who used sexuality to get what she wants? Who knows? The problem is this. She's one of those historical figures that we know very little about because historians know very little about her. Like, she was not extensively documented. As famous as she is, she was not extensively documented by her own people, the Egyptians. Yeah, which is a little strange because she was beloved by the Egyptians. From what we can tell. Yeah, from what we can tell. But most of the information we have is very Grecoroman, especially this Plutarch jump. Well, Plutarch, actually. He was the first to show any sympathy whatsoever. The guys who came a little before him, they were just all out. Meaning because the Romans did not like Cleopatra in general. They found her. At the very least. Problematic in that she kept luring away some of their favorite sons and then usually to the detriment of Rome or symbolically. The idea. If she was a great ruler. As she seems to have been. At least above average. If not like one of the better rulers around. If there was this woman who was kind of in the public eye and basically in ancient old timey Roman news all the time. And she was a female who was really good at ruling. That was a threat to Rome's established patriarchy that wasn't supposed to be able to happen. And so Rome came up with all of these popular ideas for why she was able to do that. And usually it came down to sex and or magic. And that was how Cleopatra got through. And so over the last couple of thousand years, our idea or image of Cleopatra has kind of come up from this brew scene through Roman eyes. And it's only very recent that people have really kind of started to dig in and tried to examine her academically with what small meager first hand sources and accounts exist. Yeah. I mean, she ruled ancient Egypt. She was the last pharaoh, she was the first woman sovereignty who rule all by herself for more than a decade, which was quite an accomplishment. And how she got there is a very long and sort of convoluted story. Yeah. When you think of egypt. Chuck we think of, like, pharaohs and ISIS and Osiris and all of that. Sure. And we think of Cleopatra too, but Cleopatra was different. She was different from all the pharaohs that came before. She was different from most of the pharaohs that came before, and that she came from a family line that had been established only about 350 years before. When Alexander the great General Ptolemy said Alexander died. We're dividing up his kingdom. I'm taking Egypt. And he said, hey, Egyptians, you know how you had this line of pharaohs that ruled the country? Well, you got a new one, and it's me and my descendants. And I'm not Egyptian. I'm actually Macedonian. But I'm in charge here. And I'm naming myself Ptolemy. I Sutor. I believe it's S-U-T-O-R which means savior of Egypt. And he established the Ptolemaic line. And from that point on, all of the people who ruled as pharaohs over Egypt came from Ptolemy and his children. Yeah, I mean, that was a few hundred years worth. A pretty good run there. It was a pretty good run. But you don't think of that. You think of Cleopatra as a pharaoh, like any other pharaoh. She wasn't. She was different. She was probably of Macedonian descent because she was descended from Ptolemy, but they also are not sure. Was she Egyptian too? Like ethnic Egyptian? Some people believe that she was sub Saharan African descent. It's just totally up in the air of exactly what her ethnicity was. But she was definitely not descended from the pharaohs before. But in establishing this line, Tallamy said, well, I get that you guys are really big into the idea that kings or pharaohs and queens are divine. So we're going to say that that applies to my line, too. And what's this incest you guys are into? We'll give that a try too, in a bit. The Ptolemaic line carried on those customs as well. Yeah. So the Ptolemyse, Ptolemies, whatever you want to say, man they were Greek speakers and observed Greek customs, which, if you're living in Egypt, seems like a bit of a contradiction because people in Egypt weren't Greek and that kind of caused a separation. Cleopatrick was Cleopatric. Cleopatrick. Sounds like a new comedy coming this fall on NBC. It totally does. Oh, boy. Who rules? Like her local Brooklyn apartment building or something. And she comes in how they introduce her as a character is she comes and rolled up in a carpet sure. In the pilot that she made herself. Man missing rights itself. So Cleopatra distinguished herself by coming in, and we'll get to all this in more detail, but she was popular in Egypt because she came in and she was like, hey, what do you need, Egypt? I'm going to speak your languages. Right. I'm going to be patriotic for Egypt, and I'm going to speak a lot of languages because I'm super smart. In fact, I speak so many languages. When I go to meet with other leaders of other countries and kingdoms, I'm not even going to need my translators and I'm not even going to need my advisors around. I can make my own decisions because I'm speaking directly to them in their native tongue. Egyptians love that. But her officials and I guess her translators didn't really have a say, but her officials were like, this is upsetting. Oh, yeah. Because it diminished their power. They said, well, you're not consulting with us before you start speaking to these other foreign powers, these other leaders. And she's like, Well, I don't need to. I speak their language. I can ask them and decide for myself whether they're telling the truth or what they actually need or what they should get. So, yeah, the ascension of Cleopatra was different two ways. It diminished the power of the officials that had been established by the time her father died and left the place to her. And she was known as basically a very patriotic pharaoh in that she spoke Egyptian and followed Egyptian customs way more than any of the Ptolemies before her head. So she was different in that respect. Big time. Right out of the gate. Yeah. So she assumed the throne, I guess, even for the time. A young woman of 18 years old, along with her Brady little ten year old brother, told him, 13, that guy. There was a tradition there that basically said, if you're a woman, you need a male consort to rule. And by the way, marry him. Say what? And by the way, marry him. Yeah. Technically you have to get ceremonially married, but that's kind of where it ends. Unless you don't want it to end there because we're pretty liberal on that front. Sure. But the kingdom of Egypt that she inherited was not a healthy one. It had floods and famine, it had a bad economy, and it was really up to her to forge alliances with other places and other men in power to make Egypt what she thought it could be. Starting with Julius Caesar. Yeah. So at the time, her father had kind of mortgaged Egypt over to Rome to help bail the economy out because things are it was hard times even before Cleopatra rose power, and that's what she inherited. So Rome already had a pretty big interest in Egypt. Egypt was a client state of Rome rather than Rome officially ruling Egypt and saying, like, we install the governor, all that stuff. They said, you can exist and we're going to trade with you. But basically, if we tell you to do something, you do it. Yeah. And that was kind of the relationship between Rome and Egypt. So it makes sense that she would say, let me get even more cozy with Rome. But who's in power? That was a really big question at the time, because when she rose to power as co ruler with her little brother, who, by the way, she basically just wrote out a power immediately. Oh, yeah. That was not an easy question to answer, because at the time, Rome was racked by civil wars, and specifically, there was a triumvirate kind of a shaky power sharing agreement between Julius Caesar, Pompey and Krasas, I believe, right? That's right. And that is Pompey, how you pronounce it. We can't say Pompeii because that will get confusing. Yeah. I always said Pompey. It sounds so cute. But he was a murderous general. Give me a little pumpy. All right. Stick that knife in somebody. And also, by the way, later on, Octavian, when did he become Augustus? That's the big finish, man. We'll get to that eventually. Spoiler. Yeah, because that got a little confusing, too. All these different names. Yes, but you are correct. Octavian is Augustus. They're one in the same, right? Are they both joaquin? Phoenix. The Roman Senate was on the side of Pompey. So Julius Caesar, like you said, this sort of deal that they had going on was a really kind of unsteady day. Taunt between civil wars. And the Roman Senate supported Pompey and said, Caesar, you got to give up your army, man. He said, I'm not doing it. In fact, not only that, but I'm coming to Italy, guys. He leads his people into Italy across the Rubicon yeah. And declares war against Pompey and his forces, and he wins. He eventually won, quite surprisingly, because Pompey again had the Senate backing, and so he had the senatorial forces, which vastly outnumbered Caesar's forces, but they were just superior forces. And Caesar eventually defeated Pompey. Well, Pompey, being closely aligned with Egypt, fled to Egypt, which is pretty understandable. You can also understand why he would have fled to Egypt. He was the state designated guardian of Ptolemy the 12th Kids, which was Cleopatra, and pulmonary the 13th, among others. Here we go. So he went and thought, okay, this will be great. I'll just sit around and eat grapes for the rest of my days in Egypt. It's not a bad forced retirement. Sure, it was a nice place, but when he got there, he found that Cleopatra and her sister Arsenui Arcinui Hall, had been forced into exile and that Pompey the 13th was in or not. I'm sorry, toll me. The 13th, like it's not confusing enough already. Was in power. This little boy, king boy, Pharaoh, was in power. And Ptolemy thought Caesar just won. His vanquished enemy just showed up at my doorstep. I'm going to get killed for harboring this guy, so I'm going to have Pompy killed. And he did. He had Pompy killed and decapitated in an effort to curry favor with Caesar. It didn't work, though. No, it did not work, because Caesar said, hey, I was going to pardon that guy, you moron, and become beloved to the Roman citizens, and you just cut his head off. I'm coming for you. And so Caesar crossed into Egypt to invade and basically depose Ptolemy the 13th. That's right. So he gets to Egypt. Now, Caesar does. He declares martial law and basically moves into the royal palace and is like, this is my place now. This is my place. And so Cleopatra at this point is like, all right, here's the deal. I need Caesar support here if I'm going to get back on that throne, right? So I need to curry favor with him. And this is the big carpet scene that we're talking about. And every sort of pop culture retelling of Cleopatra's story, which means this is probably true. Cleopatra gets back in there by sneaking in, skirting the enemy lines and the Roman barricades coming in under the dead of night, rolled up in a carpet and is then presented to Caesar unrolled. And he's like, that was fantastic. He just stands up and claps. He's like, roller back up there and do it again. I've never seen anything like it. She begs Caesar for aid, and it really did apparently win him over. And he was like, I like the cut of her jib, right? So they became friends with benefits pretty quickly out of the gate, but from every account of this, and again, it was either carpet she was rolled up in a carpet, or in some sort of bag that you carry bed clothes in or whatever. She got Caesar on her side almost immediately. And so all of a sudden, Cleopatra, who had been forced out of rule by Ptolemy the 13th, was now aligned with the guy who had just invaded Egypt and taken over and declared martial law, which was bad news for Ptolemy. And it was also bad news for Arsenioi, who had left. She had come back with Cleopatra and then left to go have Ptolemy proclaim her queen of Egypt. So she traded sides. And so Cleopatra said, hey, Julius, just a couple of quick favors. I want to get rid of Ptolemy the 13th. Actually, they found out later that he drowned fleeing. He drowned in the Nile. So tell him the 13th is taken care of. The only person left out of all, I think, five or six kids in Cleopatra's family, there's one left, Arsenaui, her younger sister. She's like, I can't have her running around. She's already shown that she's duplicitous get rid of her. So Caesar, to kind of show off that he has taken over Egypt, parades our sinui through the town, expose Alexandria in chains, showing that he's vanquished her. And he, to his surprise, found that this aroused the sympathy of the people living in the town. And so he ends up sparing our sinui's life, which will come back into play later, and he vanquishes her in exile to the temple of Artemis at Ephesus, which we talked about in the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World episode. So just put a pin in that chuck that Arsenaoui is alive. She just lives in Turkey, in exile now. That's right. And she is the only person who can challenge Cleopatra's claim to the Egyptian throne. All right, let's take a break. Okay, let's get our ducks in a row. All right? We'll come back and talk more about that carpet trick. Okay, so Tolamie is dead little brother's dead, sister is vanquished. Yes. Caesar, at this point, he needs money. He needs to fund his return to Rome and return to power. And Cleopatra's dad incurred a lot of debts via Egypt, and he's like, hey, listen, I got to get this money back. And he said, you're pretty cool. That carpet trick was awesome. Just gangbusters, gangbusters. So it's fine. You can rule Egypt. The two of us here were great. I feel like we're on the same level, which was a very big deal for someone like Julie Caesar to say that about a female ruler. And he stayed there for a while, and they had a kid. His name was told me Caesar. He was later fully acknowledged from Caesar that he was his child, but it was kind of like the love child thing, right? He said, yeah, that's my kid, and he's great, good looking kid, but he is not my official heir. No, but his name, like I said, was told me Caesar. They called him Cesarion or Little Caesar or Pizza. Pizza. Right. I'm sure you saw that coming from a mile away. If you hadn't said it, I would have said it myself. So all of a sudden, Cleopatra is there. She's really sort of solidified her position on every front. Right. So she's got the backing of Julius Caesar, who has named himself dictator for life. By this time, she got her brother out of the way and sister out of the way for now. It's really tough to overstate this. She has born and heir. She's the pharaoh, she's the ruler of Egypt, and she's now born and heir, a male heir who is not only a male heir and going to be the next pharaoh, but he is the blood descendant of Julius Caesar himself. So Egypt is really happy with Cleopatra? At this moment, Rome is not so happy, but it doesn't matter because Caesar is like the top dog in charge of everything, and things are going well for a little while. So much so that Cleopatra and Little Caesar go visit Big Caesar in Rome for a little while and set up household right across the river from Caesar's house. And at Caesar's house, if you had happened to go across the way and peek in one of the windows, you'd find, oh, Caesar has another family. He's got a wife and kids, and they're not super happy with him for having run around on them and had another kid with Cleopatra. But what are you going to do? She's the ruler of Egypt, and by the way, she's spending the summer across the river from us. That's right. So as a ruler, things are going pretty great for Cleopatra. Like I mentioned earlier, they really liked her. She related to the people. They related to her. Like you said, she lived the Egyptian lifestyle. Whenever she had portraits drawn to herself, she was like, do the Egyptian thing right, because it's great and the people will love it. She was identified on a papyrus in 35 BC as she who loves her country. Yeah. Philo Patter in Greek. She who loves her country. That's right. But she was a fully Egyptian pharaoh and very patriotic. And that just further, like, cemented her position as someone beloved by the Egyptians. And it's at this point that it's pretty obvious that it's a real shame that you didn't get any writings from the Egyptians. Yeah. There were some busts, I believe, of her possibly that may have been lost. There is a coin that turned up, but for the most part, they didn't really document her rule, which, again, it's really, really weird. But there are some like, it was a massive bureaucracy that she operated. It was not just Egypt, but it was a huge chunk of northeast Africa and south West Mediterranean that she ruled over. And being in league with Caesar definitely didn't hurt things. Empire kept expanding, but on her own, this is the thing, like, it's not lost on us, everybody who's listening, that we're telling the story through the fact that Caesar is a huge part of her life, or that Rome, whatever Rome is doing. This is the documentary evidence we have. But there's also other evidence, too. Very sparse evidence. But there is evidence that with or without Caesar, she was afforded, like, a bigger opportunity by being in league with Caesar. But she took that and ran with it on her own, without the direct aid of Caesar. So she expanded her empire. She started trading to further and further areas like Arabia. There's potential evidence that they were trading as far away as India at the time. And she was really good, from what we could tell, at figuring out what somebody needed and making them dependent on her for it. One of the ways she would do that was like, she identified people who could help her, too. Later on, after Caesar died, there would be a general who was really important. He was stationed in Egypt, so it was really good for her to be on good terms with him. So she basically gave him a tax break that said, hey, you can bring in 5000 m, four of wine from Rome every year tax free. You can export 10,000 bags of wheat tax free. That must have been an enormous amount of money that this guy saved. And the way that she would do this in her own style was found later on on this royal decree saying that this is the case. In her handwriting, she wrote Guinnessoi, which is Greek for make it so and they found this. There's, like, a document out there that has Cleopatra's handwriting on it, but it was basically to make sure that this guy felt taken care of so he would remain an ally. And that's how she operated. She knew very clearly how to make people like her or how to make them dependent on her. And then under that, she signed her name and then put TCB with a lightning bolt through it. Right. You know what's cool is that document. They found it accidentally. It was used as lining for a sarcophagus that a mummy was found in. And somehow they found this thing and figured out this is Cleopatra's handwriting. Amazing. It is pretty amazing to have that relic exist in the world still. So later on 46 BCE, caesar returned to Rome, and then Cleopatra, like you said, went there at some point to visit. And this is where the big acknowledgment that little Caesar was his son, but not the heir, where that finally happened. And Caesar was murdered, very famously. I don't know if you people have heard about that, but he was stabbed in the back, quite literally. Yeah. On my birthday, Cleopatra goes back to Egypt. Ptolemy 14 dies soon after this, and that means little Caesar is all of a sudden co regent with Mommy. As Tolami 25 I'm sorry, 15. Right. Tolami 15. Right. So now little Caesar is officially the heir. I think by this time, he was like, 13 or 16 or something like that. He was getting up there in years. No, I'm sorry. That was later on. So yeah, he was a little kid still. He was three. He was three. Okay. So after Caesar dies, like, everything's kind of up in the air. This is a pretty big surprise to everybody. But Caesar had boys, right? He had people that loved him, one of which was Octavian, who was his grand nephew, I think, who Caesar allegedly adopted. There was also another one named Mark Antony, who was Caesar's kind of right hand man. And they said, hey, you know what? This is not cool. We're going to get Brutus and Cassius, who orchestrated this assassination. And another civil war erupted in Rome. Yeah, we can't leave out Lapitas because this was the official second triumvirate. Okay, you're right. And you can't be a triumvirate without Lapidus. No. Got to have that third guy in there. It's just a duumbrid. No one likes that. That's right. So, 42 BC. There was the Battle of Philippi and the forces of Mark Antony and Octavian defeated Brutus and Cassius. And then that means Mark Antony can emerge as ruler of the east, which included Egypt, very importantly. And Octavian held the west on the west side. All right. But both of them said, we need the support of Egypt, which is a very big deal. Cleopatra basically was summoned by Mark Anthony, and she was like, you know what? Summoned the Sicily? And she was like, Cleopatra, I'm going to come when I want to come. Right? Which was sort of a bold move at the time. Yeah. Because he was basically accusing her of potentially having given aid to Brutus and Cassius during the Civil War. She's saying, not only am I not even responding to the allegation, I'm not even going to show up to talk to you until I want to. But when she does show up, apparently she made another very grand entrance, and this one was memorialized by William Shakespeare and the play Mark Anthony and Cleopatra, appropriately. And she shows up in this town called Tarsus in modern day Turkey on a barge, a royal barge. And these barges, by the way, dude, this is not what you think of it like a barge. I guess it is kind of what you think of as a barge, but larger and more opulent. How about that? Yeah. She came in to make a statement. She was dressed as Aphrodite. There were purple sales, there were loots playing. She basically had a band. She was laying on a couch on clouds of incense. And Mark Anthony just like Julie Caesar was like, whoa. Wow. You really know how to make an entrance. Yeah. And he said, you know what? I'd like to dine with you. Can you come here and dine with me? And she said, no, why don't you come upon this ship and you dine with me? He very famously said, can you come here and dine with me? And he did get aboard that ship and he did dine with her. And he was very much taken with her, ultimately. I think she very much loved him in the end, but she, early on, at the very least, knew what she needed from him. Yeah. Because, again, this guy is the Roman ruler of Egypt, basically, and her job is to make it so Rome doesn't ever officially rule Egypt, so at the very least, it stays at arms length enough so Egypt can be a client state. But she also needs to make sure that she doesn't go to war with them, because they would probably crush Egypt. So she's dancing this real fine line. And again, just like with Caesar, she basically said, hey, guy, I like the cut of your gym. Let's figure out an alliance, and let's also do it a lot, too. And it's like you said, though, it's like you said, whether it was because she needed something from him, and he also was very much dazzled by her wealth as well, or her display of wealth, but there does seem to have been, unless it's just totally fabricated, a real love story between the two of them. Yeah, they had three kids together. Right. She goes back to Egypt and he's not too far behind at this point. He's like, all right, I got to get up there to Egypt and see him. A lady and his wife, Phobia said, Wait a minute, I'm your lady and we have kids together. And he says, yeah, but you know what? I'm going to go over there anyway, because that's just kind of how things worked back then. Sure. Before text. That's right. He spent the winter of 40, 41 there in Alexandria. They were getting along famously. They formed a drinking group called the inimitable Livers. They had these big, huge parties and feasts. And this is one of the very famous legends of Cleopatra came about when she took a pearl and dissolved it. It was a very expensive pearl, valued at 10 million simoleons, which was enough to maintain 10,000 Roman soldiers for a full year. That's a lot of dough. That's a lot of dough. And just to prove her wealth, she dissolves this thing in a cup of vinegar and drinks it. And Mark Antony was like, oh, my gosh, this lady spraying amazing. Did you see what you just did? She just drank a pearl. She just wasted so much money. I'm so turned on right now. So they have twins. Alexander, Helios and Cleopatra. Celine and this is kind of the boom time for Cleopatra and Egypt. She's really solidified her stronghold, and everything is sort of going her way at this point. Yeah. In part because Mark Anthony said, I got to get back to Rome. I'd like to show up really victorious. You know, one of those barges you've got. I'd love to have one of those. I need some money from you. And with Caesar before again, Cleopatra's father told me the 12th had kind of mortgaged Egypt to Rome. This had not happened. Egypt had kind of gotten out of that economic funk when Cleopatra had taken over, and she had started to steer it even better in better directions. So now this is just straight up Mark Anthony borrowing from Egypt, which helped put him in her pocket. And she said, I would like to expand my empire. He said, Done. So he gave to Cleopatra a lot of Roman holdings that Egypt had formerly held. And the empire just expanded by a pretty decent proportion overnight, just with the sweep of Mark Anthony's hand in exchange for her setting them up to go back to Roman style, which he did. All right, so let's take a break. Okay. And we're going to come back and talk about the cracks that start to form right after this. So, Chuck, no good time can go on forever, it turns out. And Cleopatra's story definitely brings that one home, too. That's right. You didn't like that set up? No, I thought it was great. It was like, I put the ball on the orange cone and it just kind of fell over. So Mark Anthony does a very controversial thing. He declares little Caesar rightful heir rather than octavian. Right. To Julius Caesar. That's correct. And he awarded land to each of his children. With Cleopatra. We mentioned the twins. We did not mention tolomi Philadelphos, who's the third kid, and this really upset Octavian, as it probably should. So he knew that the Roman people were kind of sick of hearing about Cleopatra. They were sick of hearing about all of these wars going on that these generals are carrying out. And he knew that it was sort of the perfect time to mount a propaganda campaign to turn everyone against them. Yeah. Because the Romans were like, had another civil war between two powerful generals that are co rule and come on. And Octavian had a really good idea of saying, okay, I can't turn everybody against Mark Anthony directly, but I can turn them against Cleopatra really easily. So I'll just start this propaganda campaign that says Cleopatra is a threat to Rome. She has, using her whiles or her magic or whatever, convinced Mark Anthony to give up chunks of Rome and to declare her son Caesar's rifle heir. We got to get rid of Cleopatra. Poor Mark Anthony is just her mesmerized puppet, basically. So we achieved the same end, turning people on Mark Anthony, but rather than doing it directly, he uses Cleopatra and their kind of suspicion of her being a foreign temptress as the crux through which she does it. Yeah, some of this stuff was true. Some of it was made up. Octavian said, hey, listen, I've got his will. And you know what he's done? He's turned over Roman possessions to Cleopatra. And you know what? He's going to make Alexandria in Egypt, the capital of Rome. You can just hear the gasp. Oh, yeah. And it was a big deal. So in 32 BC, the Roman Senate got involved. They stripped Mark Anthony of his titles, and Octavian says, all right, Cleopatra, it's time for us to go at it. We're going to war. Your charms will not work on me. And they had not worked. And I think Cleopatra knew this all along. So this all fed into the narrative that Cleopatra was from Egypt and from a different culture that they don't align with. She lives there and she's super wealthy and she's doing these dealings with the Far East in India. And at the time, those places were, I guess, in Rome scene is just very sort of controversial and weird, and they thought they practiced in the occult and alchemy and all these strange things, and she's doing business with them and she's a bad lady. Right. Yeah. It's just foreign and weird. It's basically how Rome viewed Egypt. Right. So the idea that was going to be their new seat of power did not sit very well with them. Whether that was true or not, I don't know, but it worked. It got the Roman Senate and the people turned against Mark Anthony, so much so that Octavian was able to launch an assault on Egypt and on Cleopatra and Mark Antony, which was successful. Right. This article makes it kind of sound like it happened almost overnight. I think it took place over the course of a year or so between when Rome turned on Mark Anthony and when Octavian was at Egypt store. But at some point, Mark Anthony, during the siege, during this war between Egypt and Rome, which is something Cleopatrade avoided the whole time, basically, her whole reign was about preventing this from happening. Mark Anthony decided that he had lost his place of honor in the world and that he should take his own life. He also, according to legend, heard that Cleopatra had taken her life. And so in response, and because he had lost his place of honor, he killed himself, basically through hari curry, which is like stabbing yourself with your sword, disemboweling yourself. That's what he did with his own sword. And I was at death's door, I guess, when he heard, oh, wait, that was just a rumor. Cleopatra didn't actually kill herself. Yeah, and supposedly, if you believe the legend, octavian did allow him to be brought to Cleopatra and he died in her arms and she tore at her clothes and smeared his blood all over her face and shrieked out, he's my master and husband and commander. And that's if you believe the legend, of course. Yeah, that sounds a little trumped up to me, but you never know. So Octavian at this point is in a pretty good position. He says he's got it right where he wants her and he knows it and she knows it. And he said, Listen, I want you to come back to Rome and you're going to be a captive, and I'm going to kind of prayed you through the streets as a symbol of our victory. And she knew that this would be like just the great humiliation of her life and career. So she said, all right, I need a little time to prepare myself, which the writing is on the wall here, that she is going to die a noble death by taking her own life. But she didn't do it right away. It took about a week because she was still trying to save things up until the very end, which is pretty remarkable. So on August 1230 BC, anthony is buried. Cleopatra meets with Octavian, she closes herself in a chamber with two of her servants. And we're not exactly sure how she got it. Depends on the legend that you choose to believe. But she got poisoned and committed suicide along with her servants. And apparently, and this is from PlutoX records, one of the Roman officers burst in as this was happening and yell to find this. And one of the servants was basically like, yeah, it is a fine thing because she went out on her own terms. Jerk. Yeah, basically that's, I guess, paraphrasing. Sure. She said, nothing could be finer for this lady, the descendant of so many kings. Right. That was charmian. And the other servant was Iris IRAs. And like you said, they're not quite sure how she got that poison. And so a legend grew up that she had used an ass but cobra, and it allowed it to bite her so that she could die. But if you kind of put two and two together supposedly she sent a note to Octavian to stall for time, but he figured out what she was doing fast enough that there was maybe a course of minutes that transpired that she would have had to have taken this poison and died. And it takes like an hour or something like that to die from a cobra bite. So people say probably not cobra, but where would she have gotten that poison since she was under such close guard? And one theory that's emerged is, do you remember when Caesar paraded arsenal's through the streets and ended up generating sympathy for her unintentionally? Yes. Supposedly Octavian remembered that and according to this theory, and didn't want to do the same thing by parading Cleopatra through the street. So he never had any intention of doing that and instead went to her and said, look, I can tell you, you can take your own life. You seem like the kind of lady who'd want to take her own life. If you do this, we'll celebrate it, that kind of thing. And that's why how she got the poison, because she was kind of allowed to be given that option. That's just a theory, but no one knows. All we know is that Cleopatra almost certainly did take her own life, most likely through poison of some sort. That's right. So she was buried next to Mark Anthony, which was according to her wishes, of course. And because we don't have writings from Egyptians, it's mainly like we said, from the Roman perspective. She's viewed through different lenses. Some people have betrayed her, like we said earlier, as super capable and dynamic and super smart. And other people have portrayed her as just like, leaning on her wiles as a woman and being more cunning than strategic. I think somewhere in the middle is probably the truth. She probably did what she had to do on certain occasions, but that certainly doesn't mean she also wasn't like a brilliant leader on her own terms. Right. And this article actually points out, it's pretty ironic that we're not for the propagandists who were working for Octavian, who were trying to basically disassemble any good memory of her and paint her as a terrible person who almost brought down Rome. Were it not for Octavian to save Rome itself, she would have were it not for those biographers, she may have been lost to history. Like, there's a lot of pharaohs in Egypt's history that we just don't know anything about, and she could have ended up being one of them. Even though she was a successful pharaoh for Egypt. We may never have known about her were it not for these guys like Lucan and Plutarch, who wrote about her and commemorated her and memorialized her. Yeah, I don't think there's any disputing the fact that she was at the very least, one of the more charming and intelligent rulers of the time. She just had sort of a way about her from all the readings where you couldn't help but be captivated by her when you're in her presence. Her speaking voice has always been written about, and I think she had that just certain indefinable quality. There's been a lot of debate on her looks over the years, but to me, that's I don't even know why people still talk about that stuff. It's funny because people do and both men and women do. Like, whenever somebody shows a picture of what she probably looked like in real life based on, like, a coin came out or came to light in 2007, and people were like, she's not pretty. How could she possibly have achieved all this if she wasn't pretty? There's just a bunch wrong with that. But this one historian put it really well. The impact she made on the ancient world is overlooked because the world has this obsession when it comes to women. People can only judge them on whether they were beautiful. Nobody ever said, Mark Anthony, how handsome was he? And that's really just really drives the point home really well. I think that people are obsessed with this idea that she was beautiful and it really does undermine, like, whatever she was capable of. And when people think like that, you're just carrying on a 2000 year old tradition that began in Rome around the time of Octavian. I'm not going to talk about it. So you asked about Octavian becoming Augustus, right? No, I didn't ask. Yes, you were setting me up for it. Tell that story. I want to tell the story. You don't mind? I don't. So Cleopatra killed herself on August 12 of 30 BCE. And Octavian decided to commemorate this extraordinary triumph over Cleopatra in Egypt and over Mark Antony and his ascension to full ruler of Rome by taking the name Augustus. So when we're marking the month of August, the 8th month of the year, we're actually commemorating the defeat and the death of Cleopatra. Amazing. It is amazing. You knew that all along. All I know is that we have four live shows in August to commemorate this event. Where would you get tickets if you were going to go Chuck s YSK live? If you lived in one particular city that you had to pick to go get tickets? As many people as possible, what would that city be? Poor Chicago and Portland, Maine. Okay, great. Well, you heard Chuck, everybody. Do it for Cleopatra. She wills it. That's right. If you want to know more about Cleopatra, just go start reading up. There's apparently a whole slate of really good biographies that have come out recently, so you got plenty of stuff to work with. And since I said that it's time for listener mail. Hey, guys, I want to reach out and let you know that my stepson loves listening to your show. We share custody with my husband's ex wife and not to go into those complicated details, but to be able to spend time spent as much time as I possibly can with them and drive them to school and pick them up from school can take anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes. Zach is ADHD and on an IEP, and the typical school environment can be challenging for him. He's worked really hard this year building skills and has come quite a long way in the fourth grade. Zach yes, man. But when we find an alternative way to foster this love of learning that he enjoys, we really embrace it. He really loves listening to stuff you should know during the long car rides. Way to go, Zach. Again, he is a super smart kiddo and is especially engaged in the topics you guys cover. His latest favorite was tinnish cases of really bad luck. So his dad and I strive to model our values. One of great importance is that time together and experiences trump material goods. With his ten year milestone birthday approaching, I've been thinking about this quite a bit and I thought maybe, just maybe, josh and Chuck could give him a shout out. Wow. It would be the highlight of his decade. And a killer birthday present from a killer stepmom to her beloved kiddo. That is for Mandy. So, Zach buddy, the happiest of birthdays to you as you turn ten, that is a very big deal because you are a double digit human being now and it sounds like you are doing great and sailing toward your teenage years with confidence and intelligence. Congratulations on your big one, Zach. It's a big one. Yes, it is. Happy birthday. Wow. That was a nice one, Chuck. Well done. Thanks. If you want to get in touch with us like Mandy did, that's pretty rare that we do that kind of thing, but you never know. I guess you could take a shot, right? Yes. Okay. You can go on to stuffyshaw.com and check out our social links. That's probably not going to help much. So if you really want to get something like this done, you should write us an email. You can wrap it up, spank it on the bottom and send it I'll us to stuff podcasts@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should know is production of iHeartRadio's how stuff works. For more podcasts my heartratio, visit the iHeartRadio app apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
https://podcasts.howstuf…-king-arthur.mp3	Was there a real King Arthur?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/was-there-a-real-king-arthur	The legend of King Arthur is very old and very established. By the time the king who saved Britain and united it was first written about, his story was already hundreds of years old. And while many of the details of his life and adventures, from the Lady	The legend of King Arthur is very old and very established. By the time the king who saved Britain and united it was first written about, his story was already hundreds of years old. And while many of the details of his life and adventures, from the Lady	Tue, 14 Jan 2014 14:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2014, tm_mon=1, tm_mday=14, tm_hour=14, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=14, tm_isdst=0)	40855173	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from howstuffworkscom? Hey, welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. And there's Charles. Debbie, Chuck Bryant. Jerry waved. Everybody quiet. Jerry. That's stuff you should know. Oh, yeah, that's us. That is us. The legend. It was impossible for me to research this without only thinking of two things. Two movies, five owned. No, I didn't see that one. That's good. Was that? The one called King Arthur? Okay. It was good. I thought so. I'll check it out. Because I did this character, and I've seen a lot of the movies that tackle Camelot, but Excalibur and Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Of course. I surely have seen Excalibur, because I had Showtime when I was a kid. It was a big, hot movie when you were twelve. Right. In the early 80s. Yeah. And then, of course, the Holy Grail. How do you not see that? It's the Holy Grail of comedy. Yeah, I could see that. You should check out a cabbler. It actually holds up pretty well. And it's somewhat notable for having a couple of early appearances by actors that went on to be much bigger. Yeah, I love movies like that. Yeah. Gabriel Byrne is in it, and just barely. And Liam Neeson. Oh, really? And I think both of them, it was their first roles. Wow. And they're, like, hardly in the movie. Who played King Arthur? Was it anybody? Like, I've heard of or they had to have been big at the time. Right. Who was it? Richard Burton. You know, when I was 13, I saw Richard Harris do Camelot. The Fox Cedar in Atlanta. So is that pretty neat? Is that based on the Arthurian legend? What the musical? Camelot. Yeah, sure. Okay. But I mean, it's a musical. Yeah. And it's from the 60s, so you can never tell. Like, it could have just been named Camelott. That's what I was asking. Oh, yeah. Now it's about the Arthurian legend, but out of all of them, I would say, hands down, monty Python and the Holy Grail is the best of the Arthurian Legend movie adaptations. Yes. I haven't seen it in years, but it's like one of those that I saw so many times, I can still quote most of it. It has it all. It has the killer rabbits, the killer bunnies. Yeah. It has the coconut carrying swallows. It has the nights who say knee. It has the black knight who merely has a flesh wound. Yeah. It has everything. It has singing, dancing. Yeah. The great Graham Chapman as Arthur yeah. And bring out your dead. Yeah. So many things that are in the lexicon all came from that movie. Yeah. Nigel Terry played Arthur in the Excalibur movie. I don't know who he is. You'd probably recognize him. Helen. Mirren was Morgana, though. Oh, wow. But yeah, small roles. Oh. Patrick Stewart was the other guy. Got you. He played was he bald like he always been? Bald one other. I'm sure he had hair at some point. I'll bet he looked weird with hair. I can't imagine him with hair. What if he was born with, like, a full head of hair and that was it? He started losing it after that. Right. For two days. And then it all came out all right. So, anyway, I started to disrupt this early on, but those two movies, every time I saw Utah Pendragon this is a cool name. That's a great name. I couldn't help but just kind of say those lines in my head. You raise a good point. There's so many Arthur movies out there. Sure. Arthur books. Sword in the Stone was pretty good, too. Yeah. Everybody has a kind of a basic idea of the King Arthur legend, the Arthurian myth or romance. It's sometimes called Too. Sure. But what I think probably a lot of people don't know is that it is a synchronized meaning. The Catholics got their mitts on it and threw a bunch of Christianity on top of something that was already accident. And in this case, what was accident was a group of myths that arose from the Celts, the Celtic people, which is pretty substantial that we have this, because the Celts never wrote anything down, mainly on account of the fact that they didn't have a written language. Their tradition was entirely oral, which is why we have very little of an understanding of the Celts. Most of our understanding of the Celts comes from outside observers, like Pliny the Elder. Thank God for Pliny, or else we might not even know the Celts ever existed. But the Arthurian legend is very clearly based on Celtic mythology. But even more enticing to me is the idea that it's possibly that Celtic legend, that Celtic mythology is rooted somewhat in fact. Like, Arthur may have been a real person. Yeah, that's sort of the age old question. Yeah, but I mean, I find that astoundingly fascinating. Like, there are places that are part of the Arthurian legend that do exist in real life, but whether or not they actually were a part of Arthur's life, if there was a real Arthur, I mean, each spot generates awesome debate for the anthropologist, the history major in me. I'm fascinated by the whole thing. Agreed, sir. So let's go over the basic legend of Arthur. Killer king, legendary hero. Saved Britain when Britain needed saving. Yeah, because the Roman Empire had crumbled and the Saxons were all over Britain, the Germanic tribes. And he defeated them. Yes. And brought great peace to the land and built a castle called a camelot, gathered up knights together around a round table, which we'll get into. There's a lot of ground to help bring peace to the land. And he did. And he did so very successfully. In fact, in 2002, the BBC voted king Arthur is number 51 in the poll of 100 Greatest Britons, even though he might not even be a real dude. And the Britons are smart folks and they still voted him that. They're pretty sharp. Yeah. So those are the broad strokes, but depending on what version you're reading, it's going to be different. Did he pull a sword from a stone? Was it Excalibur? Did he get it from the lady in the Water? Was his undoing Mordrid? Or was it Guinevere and Lancelot? Yeah, depends on which version you're reading. And we'll go over those versions. Right. You can kind of trace these back to you can see layer after layer being added. So when you look at the Arthurian legend as we understand it now, you can kind of peel back layer by layer and get to the original stuff, which is pretty old indeed. They think that we'll get to that. Let's talk about the Arthur story. Okay, so you've got Arthur, he comes along at a time when Britain is in its greatest need. There were some great kings, possibly relatives of Arthur, like Uther Pendragon. His father supposedly would have been one of the rulers. Right. But you're smiling because you like that name. All I can think of is, I am off the son of Utopian dragon. Okay, so you just say that anytime you want, man. But he arrives at a time when Britain is being overrun by the Saxons. It's being ruled by the Saxons like there's no British king on the throne. And there's a legend that comes up that there is a sword in a stone and only the rightful king, meaning only the line of Uther Pendragon yeah, I'm not going to say anything, will be able to remove the sword from the stone. And when that person comes, he will be dubbed the king of kings and will restore the rightful lineage to the British throne. Yes. Then in some stories, like I said, a young man, a young Arthur, pulls the sword. It's a sword from the Swan, and in other legends, it does come from the lady in the Lake. He rides out on a barge and the hand stretches up with the sword in it. All you see is the arm coming from the water and he gets the sword that away. Well, and then I think, a third way, he pulls the sword from the stone, proclaiming himself Arthur. Yeah. And everyone does. Not the ruler, Brit, everyone's like, he's the dude, right? Like we got one of our own back in power now. And then that sword breaks and that's when he gets Excalibur from the lady of the Lake. That's right. The most powerful magic sword in all the land. It's what you call a bitch and sword. This is a bitch and sword. Merlin, in some stories, comes around right about this time, and he appears when Arthur is a teen, generally associated with the lady of the Lake there in Avalon. They're both from the same neck of the woods. Avalon is a magical mystery place, even outside of the Arthurian legend. As far as the Celts go, it means Appleland. And I guess apples were super magical to the Celts, but Avalon itself is almost an otherworldly after life kind of area, even though it's a physical place you can go to in Britain. Right. Still interesting. It's interesting that the apple has always been a strange fruit. I know it probably wasn't apple and Eden, but it's all in. I wonder southern Baptist called it an apple. Yeah. And I wonder what it was originally in, like, Aramaic, and when it was converted to apple, where's the apple indigenous? I don't know. Or the apple in the what was the children's was it not Snow White? Was it Snow White? Yeah. With the poison apple. Poison apple again. I saw a video today that we've been eating apples wrong. Did you know that? I've seen that. I can't bring myself to eating an apple like that. There's a middle spindle, aka the core, that is not to be consumed. That is not true. I won't do it. It's just too weird. But you can eat the core. There is no core. There is a core. I create the core every time I show it. Just like a sculptor reveals the sculpture within a slab of stone, so too, do I reveal the core and an apple. Let me ask you this. If you cut the apple up into the eight pieces and get the seeds out, you can just eat that's. The whole apple, you have to shave off, like, the inner part, the core. For those of you who don't know, there's a video of a dude eating an apple from the bottom end forward, and he just eats the whole thing because he's like, okay, sorry to get sidetracked by the history of the apple. No, I think you do raise a really interesting point, Chuck. I wonder when the apple started getting a bad rep. When the apple stood in for other fruit. Yeah, I think that's an excellent thing to look up. Okay, so let me know what you find. All right. So, Arthur, like I said, he builds Camelot. That's his castle. Once he restores peace. Yeah. Well, no, no, I think that was he went out and got all the knights to help him restore peace. Okay, so he built Camelot in anticipation of restoring piece. Exactly. And recruited nights for the Round Table. And we might as well go ahead and leak that the Round Table was supposedly round because we're all equals and there's no head of a Round Table. Makes sense. Yeah. And it was either fashioned by Merlin or it was a gift from Guinevere, who we haven't gotten to yet. A wedding present from Guinevere's father, even though he got it from Arthur's father. Uther Pendragon. Yeah. And her father was King Leo De Grant. Who. I think that was Patrick Stewart. Got you. Phoenix caliber. So the Nights go out they defeat all the outsiders there. Peace reigns. And that is why Camelot to this day has the connotation of and especially with the Kennedys, like, this peaceful, idyllic situation. Right. That's Camelot. Although it was a place, you know what I'm saying? It sort of represents more than a place. It represents the piece that he brought with these nights. Okay. Then he meets Gwen of here, falls in love with this little hottie, and then, depending on what story you read, there might have been an affair with Lancelot or Mordred, who was either his nephew or depending on what you read, or his son, which technically, he could be both because supposedly yes. He had Mordred with his half sister, Morgana yeah, that makes sense. Who is translated into Morgan le Fay, who's like this kind of enchanting temptrous evil woman who helps Mordred try to take over Camelot, tries to take over the throne, and Arthur says nay to you. We will do battle at a place called Camlon. That's right. Mordra dies. That's where Mordor is killed and Arthur is wounded. And depending on the version of the story, arthur is either mortally wounded or just kind of wounded. But either way, he gives his sword, Excalibur, to bedavier and says, you need to return this to the lady in the lake after kind of waffling because better beer is like, I could use Excalibur. Yeah. He throws Excalibur to the lake, and his arm comes up and goes, Ching. And catches it and then goes back down and he's like, There was a lady of the lake. Yeah, that's the Excalibur movie version. Okay. They followed that version. Okay. Because I remember distinctly him chunking the sword out there and the arm coming up. That's cool. I have some vague mental memory of that as well. Sure. And then Arthur is taken to Avalon to either die and be buried or he recuperates and hangs out there to come back to reign over Britain. And it's next time of greatest need, which is why Arthur is frequently referred to. And there is a book titled The Once and Future King because he will return again when Britain needs him. Which makes him, like, kind of the British superman. Yes. Before we go any further, my friend, I think it's a good time for a message break. Hey, now we're back. So that's the basic legend. We just basically condensed thousands of pages of different books and thousands, not thousands, but hundreds of years of folklore into a few minutes. But you get the gist of it. Sure. You know the story, and if this ignited your fancy and you're like, I want to know more, man, you could dedicate the rest of your life to researching and reading Arthurian legends somehow, because there's tons of it. Like we said, it's a literary tradition, but it's rooted in an oral tradition among the Celts, the pagan Celts. But this literary tradition itself is really old the first mention of Arthur is from, I think, the fifth century. Right. The fifth century Welsh poem. 6th century Welsh poem. But when you're off by 100 years back then yeah, it's no big deal, especially with the man who may or may not have existed. Yeah, true. But Arthur pops up in one line in this Welsh poem called The Gododin. Godin. Godin, yeah. It's a great word. And this poem eulogizes the Welsh warriors may be Britain's oldest poem. Yeah. Because the Celts would have started to have become Christianized around this time, hence things would have started to have been written down. So this poem would have popped up really right around that cusp between the end of purely Celtic culture, because the British Isles were the last stronghold of the Celts, which swept all the way to Asia. They covered Europe, parts of North Africa. The Celts were everywhere. But it was the British Isles that were the last holdouts until about the fifth, 6th, 7th, 8th century, when they became Christianized. All right, so they're Christianized at this point. Yeah. By the time this poem came out, the very fact that there was a written poem shows you that made their way in this area in the Celt are just telling stories, looking their wounds and telling stories, still not writing stuff down. They're like, Are you familiar with mistleta? Yeah. Do you know about knocking on wood? Look at you utilizing all your information. Some other references in literature. The Historia Brittonum History of Britain, Ad. 800 and the analysis the Annals of Wales a few hundred years after that. They were basically history books, the main history books of Britain and Wales. Right. But they themselves were just compilations of other books and can't be, like, factually verified. Yeah. But nevertheless, they were used. And Arthur was mentioned in both the Arthur we know and love today. You can trace back to Jeffrey of Monmouth, and he was a priest who wrote Historia Regum Britannia, the History Of British Kings and the 1100s. But he based his stuff on the Historia Brittonum, but it just became really popular. Right. So he kind of base it on the other thing. Some people even say you plagiarize. But it became so popular, he was kind of golden. Right. Most histories are based on previous histories. Sure. So that in and of itself is not a bad thing. But yeah. I don't know what this article is implying. That he stole work or he fabricated it. Well, he was accused of fabricating some of it. Well, either way, he gave the world the Arthurian legend. That's right. Arthur existed before this, as we've seen, but he was the one that said, there's a great story here and I'm going to bulk this up. So he started neighbor places, he started contemporizing things. Like he took this legend and put it into a context that the people who lived in his time would understand and be fascinated by. Yeah. And he introduced Christianity for the first time to the story. The French got a hold of it, and then they're all about a good romance novel. So they sort of introduced the love elements or not introduced, but emphasized the love elements a little bit more. Yeah. About 50 years after Jeffrey of Monmouth made his history, crete in Detroit came up with some stories that added that romantic part and a lot like, I think the Grail stuff, too. Oh, yeah. Yeah. He was the one who came up with the romance between Lancelot and Guinevere and the Grail and Search for the Grail, which wasn't a part of the story up until the 12th century. And most of the stuff had been, like, history books and poems starting with the Vulgate Cycle or prose. Lancelot is when you started getting these great pro stories, and Christianity is woven in even more. And this is between 1210 and 1230. Right. Just to give you an idea of where we are. And they don't know if these stories were, like, maybe part of a popular literary trend at the time, where a bunch of people were writing about yeah. Like, silvery was a big thing to write about. Right. Or if it was one author writing a series of stuff. And they're not attributed to any single author, but they're collected together as a body of work the Vulgate Cycle. Yeah. And those ones focus a little more on Lancelot and the Chivalrous knights and all that. Yeah. And the Grail, too. Yeah. With Galahad. Yeah. They said that Joseph of Aramathea, in the Bible, he was the one who gave Jesus his tomb after Jesus was crucified and brought back. And he said no, he didn't say that, but they said Joseph Hermethea brought the Grail to Britain. But then Galahad, Shirlenslot's illegitimate son, was said in the Vulgate Cycle that he discovered the Grail because he was pure. Of course. Yes. Until he went to the castle. Anthrax. Remember that scene? And the Pure and Chase goes to the castle. There's all the ladies that are, like, tempting them. Michael Palin just, like, wide eyed. That's such a great movie, man. And then the big one that most of our modern stories are based on is Thomas Mallory's Lamonte Darth, the Death of Arthur. And I read this in college. Yeah. And it was tough. It was sort of like a bit of a modernized Middle English. Yeah. It wasn't quite chaucer. It wasn't that tough. But it was still a tough read. And I remember thinking at the time, can I just watch Excalibur? And it turns out I could, because that movie was specifically based on The Death of Arthur, right? Yeah. And so you're kind of seeing, like, each new century, each new author is adding their own thing to it. Yeah. He didn't actually write it. I should say that he compiled the stories together. Okay. Surely he cleaned them up. Well, yeah, but he didn't create a new work. It's known as a compilation. Well, he did add some new stories about some other nights, sir Gareth and Sir Tristan. And he also kind of took the focus off of the Celtic pagan mythology and really focused it onto the Christian mythology. And at this point, the idea that this whole thing is based on Celtic ideals and myths is lost largely to history. Yeah. At the very least, it doesn't become nearly as apparent. Was he the one that added The Lady in the Lake, though? Oh, no, that was the Volgate cycle. Yeah, which is surprising to me, because I would think that would be ancient Celtic mythology, but that wasn't added until the 13th century. Oh, yeah. The lady in the Lake and the idea of Mordred as Arthur's son by his sister. You think those two would be real old. Yeah. No, it was part of the preoccupation of the weirdos in the 13th century. Well, I think Mallory did add, after Guinevere and Lancelot are busted, they go their separate ways to become a nun and a monk. Oh, yeah. Respectively. Right. So after Mallory, you have Alfred Lord Tennyson, who wrote The Idols of the King. Yeah. That creepy looking dude. And great poet, though. Yeah, but scary looking. And I love his name, too. Yeah. And then T. H. White wrote the once in Future King, and that was the basis of the Sword and the Stone Disney action. That was a good movie, if I remember correctly. Merlin was kind of like a cookie. I mean, it was weird, right? In that story, yes. In the sword in the stone I don't remember that one that much. Was that the animated okay, yeah. Where he's like a young King Arthur, pulls the sword from the stone. I must have seen it, but I was all about The Jungle Book. This came out about the same time. I know, but I was probably so obsessed. Same exact animators and everything. Yeah. I can't pay attention to this. All right. Lend my fascination to all right. So we should talk a little bit about the real ties to real history and whether these people are real or these places are real. So let's get to that after this message break. Okay, buddy, so what's the deal? Was there a Camelot? Was there an Arthur? Were these nights real dudes? Probably. Well, take Marlin, for example, okay? He seems probably the least likely to have existed because he is a magician, a sorcerer, magical wizard. Yeah, a wizard. That's a great word. Is he a wizard or is he just a magician? Well, I mean, come on. The two are fairly interchangeable. Oh, you just wait, my friend. There'll be some larvae emailing. Right. That is not nearly the same. Sir, let me explain to you the difference between a cleric and mage. He was apparently based on one or two people that really did exist and both of them were holy men, they would have been Druids. At least one of them would have been Druids. Yeah. One was named Merdin Wilt, and another one was named Emeritwoldig. Yeah, that's a tough one. W-L-E-D-I-G. So there's two vowels in both of those names combined. Right. It's almost like Russian. It's tough to read. And both of them lived in the late 6th century, and one was the first one, Merton. He was this wild man who went into war and saw too much and went crazy and fled into the jungle. I've seen too much. Yeah. Wow. Apparently, he suffered from some sort of PTSD and went and fled into the jungle. Well, not the jungle, because this is a British Isles, but the woods will call them, and lived as a wild man for many years. And he was apparently a famous local, like magic wild man. The other one, Emirates, was like a full on, straight up Druid. He was a prophet and advisor, and he definitely lived. So they think that possibly one of them was Merlin, or folklore, combined the two together and made them Merlin. I think that's what most of this stuff is. Yeah. Possibly based on real people. Add a dash of this and a dash of that and mix it up and you come up with a literary figure. That's just my take. Camelot. Supposedly, if you read the Historia Regum Britannier, he wrote that it was Cornwall at Tintingale Castle, and they actually found a stone there in the with an inscription that said, descendant of Arthur, father of the descendant of Cole. And Monmouth, actually, the writer of that history book names King Cole, as in Mary old soul. Was he that same King Cole as one of Arthur's ancestors? But there's a little bit of a rub, because that castle was built in the early 1100s, many hundreds of years later, after Arthur was supposedly living. Right. And the author of this article accuses Joffrey of basically using Tidajill Castle as a way to please his patron, who had a cousin that lived there at the time. Yeah, but some archeological excavations have found that this Tinder Gel area was settled from at least 300 Ad and was definitely in full swing, was a trading post, basically, and a fortified castle around the time when Arthur would have been conceived. So it actually is archaeologically possible that this was a place where he was born, at the very least. If there was a real Arthur and he was born in the time frame that we're talking about, tim and Joe castle was settled and in full operation in that area. Oh, really? Yeah. So it wasn't built hundreds of years later. The castle, as it stands now, was okay. Settlement was built upon settlement upon settlement. And as they've excavated down where they found that at that time yes, there's plenty of so that stone could in fact be real. Wow. All right. Busted. Yeah. Thomas Mallory said Camelot was Winchester Castle, and for many hundreds of years, there was a wooden round table that hung on the wall with all the little names of the knights of the Round Table there. But Winchester Castle was built in the 11th century and they carbondated the table to 1340 and said it was probably painted during the 1500s under King Henry VII, because everyone was way into chivalry in medieval history at that point. Right. Are you going to bust that one or is that one? No, that one makes sense. That is busted. Unbust. I mean the Cadbury Castle fort that's in somerset. That's mentioned in here, too. That one. If anything was Camelot, it would have been that place. Oh, yeah. Is that Deleting? Yeah. But it wouldn't have been Arthur's. It would have been one of the rulers that basically handed over Britain to the Saxons that Arthur had to come in and whose mess he had to unmake. It would have been that rulers. And there's a 16 foot thick fortress made of timber and stone that is apparently unique to this castle that's from the fifth century that was written about from that time frame, from that period of time, was supposedly built around that period of time. So you have documentary evidence in the literature and then you also have the actual physical evidence of this castle that's built in a way that's just unique to it sure. That supposedly belong to this guy that Arthur may or may not have come in and taken over. If he were ruling in this area at the time, that would have been the castle that he would have taken over. Got you. Because they were most heavily fortified. Yeah. And it was just like a prime castle in the area that he would have been in. So if there was a Camelot, a castle that he ruled from, that probably would have been it. All right. So you're going josh boats for Cadbury Castle in Somerset. Yes. Okay. Avalon is supposedly Glastonbury, where they have the music festival now. Oh, yeah. I think they have a big music whistle there, my TV tells me. And here's the deal. There was the Glastonbury Tour, which is sort of, I guess, for that area. That's a mountain. It's like a hill. It's a little hill, yes. Like the Englishman who went up a hill and came down a mountain. Right. The Glastonbury Tour had the ruins of St Michael's, which was an abbey built in the 12th century, which replaced an earlier abbey that was burned down. And while they were building the newer abbey, these monks said, you know what? We found graves containing bones. Look at the bones. Man and a woman. And this is King Arthur, because there's a cross there. It's described in Latin, and it says it's King Arthur and Guinevier. So there's your proof. Even though the cross doesn't exist. Anymore. The bones don't exist anymore. They did read the inscription that was supposedly copied verbatim from the monks and they said some smart dudes said, no, that's twelve century Latin, my friend, not six century Latin. These silly people. Yeah, so I guess there's a difference. And they knew. So that was quashed. Or are you about to debust that? Debusting. That sweet. So Glastonbury tour, this conical hill, used to be an island, and at the top of it is Glastonbury Abbey, which was built in the 12th century, but was built on the ruins of an early one. So that thing actually did happen. It did burn down. Apparently in the 1980s, they excavated and found a pair of six century graves, stone line graves. The bones are gone. There's no markers or anything like that, but they would have been the kind of graves and they were dated to Arthur's era. Okay. Yes. Furthermore, there was evidence that these graves were disturbed in the 13th century, in the 1200s or is it the 12th century? Sorry? That they were disturbed in the 12th century. So there's evidence that these graves are from the 6th century and that these 12th century monks did find them and open them up. So whether or not they were Arthur and Guinevere, or if this crossover existed and what it said, it still remains to be proven true. But it's very possible that these monks were just trying to drum up patronage to rebuild their abbey. They're like, hey, we found Arthur. Yeah. So they may have forged the cross, but it's still entirely possible that that was Arthur. Right. And Guinevere. Just because they beefed up the story with the story of a cross doesn't mean that it wasn't truly their final resting place. Yes. At the very least, there were a pair of six century graves there with bones. No bones. Where did the bones go? I don't know if they moved them in the 12th century or if they just dissolved. Okay. We're talking a while. Yeah, sure. All right. So is that your vote? Yeah. All right. Josh votes for the Glastonbury tour. Right. Alright. Which I want to go to. All this makes me want to go to the English countryside and just find all this stuff. Yeah, it's pretty neat. Yeah. I like old things and it's hard to get anything super old in the country. 1600s, maybe 1500s, if you go down to St. Augustine let's go to Rome, see some old stuff. Go to Rome. I have. Yeah, I have too. Neat. It is neat. It's kind of neat to stand there in the Coliseum and think, holy cow. Yes. This is the oldest thing I've ever seen. That was the one that got me and Yuumi. Was the Coliseum. Yeah, me too. Everywhere else, we're like, this is pretty cool. Something about the Coliseum. Yeah, I was pretty blown away, too. And boy, the people, man. Good looking. The Romans. Yeah. Just all over Italy. The dudes, the chicks, they were all, like, models. Yeah, very stylish. Very stylish. And cats everywhere. Were there? Yes. Street cats in Rome. They're known for it. I don't remember seeing too many cats. Oh, you saw some cats. Don't they live in, like, all of the ruins and everything? They're everywhere. Yeah, I like the Trevy Fountain there. That was something else. That one kind of took my breath away. Yeah. We should start a travel show. I think we just did. And finally, maybe some of these knights were real dudes. Serbedavier, he was one of the earliest knights to appear in the Arthurian legends. And one of his right hand dudes. He has appeared in other writings, historical writings, that have nothing to do with the Arthurian legend. Exactly. And he was known as Betrayant, member of the Royal House of FindU, which rose to power in Wales in the 6th century. And then Cirque was also possibly a real dude. Yeah. Both of them appear in a Welsh collection of warrior poems called the Mabinogen. Take your pick. Yeah, I'm not Welsh. You're not Welsh. So either one we get crap for not pronouncing things. Right. But this stuff is tough when you've got, like, 13 letters and one vowel, what do you do with that? And, I mean, I'm looking at the alphabet that I recognize. My brain just won't put it together. Agreed. And finally, Arthur himself. My vote is on a compilation of real people. Like I said earlier, some folks say he might have been a Roman leader named Lucius Artorius Castus, or maybe a Roman named Aurelius Ambrosius. See, I saw that Aurelius Ambroscis was his uncle Pendragon's brother, and Utah and Aurelius had to seize power to start to restore their lineage, and Arthur followed after that. Okay, see, well, I guess it depends on who you're reading. Some folks say he was a British historian named Allen Wilson since he was a Welsh king. Arthur in the 7th century. I think everyone wants to claim a piece of it. I think that's what's going on here. I think they're saying, no, he was this Welsh king, or no, he was this Roman king when I think he might have been all of them. Well, the idea that he was sent by the Pope to basically restore order or take the British Isles back from the Saxons definitely is length credence by the idea that he kind of comes out of nowhere and pulls the sword from the stone is like, I'm arrived. I'm the king of kings now. So the idea that he came from somewhere else, that would suggest that he could have possibly been some Roman commander. And there were Roman commanders who did come to Britain and fight the sex and successfully. Was one named Arthur? Yes. One was named Artorius. Well, there you have it. Yeah. And then some people say that Arthur wasn't a name, but a title, arthur, which in Latin means bear. And if that's the case, it could just be like could be anybody. Yes. Could be short for Arthur, could be bear. So why does the story persist? Because it's got romance, it's got chivalry, it's got all the classic elements of drama and literature and fiction. So there you have it. Plus Monty Python's take on it doesn't hurt in perpetuating everything. What kind of a man can summon fire without Flint or Tinder man? You know that movie Inside now, don't you? I watched it a lot at one point in my life. I think that's my favorite part of the movie. The none shall pass when they have to pass. The guy that spits tells him about the rabbit. I remember the nutshell pass. I don't remember the spitting. Yes. When he's talking, he's got a listing all over everybody. You got anything else? I got nothing else. All right. If you want to learn more about King Arthur, you can type in King Arthur in the search bar. We also recommend you go just look up stuff about King Arthur. There's plenty of stuff out there. It's fascinating. Let's see. I said search bar, right? You did, sir. Okay, well, then that means it's time for list in the mail. I'm going to call this tribute to my father for Megan, Josh, Chuck and Jerry wanted to write to tell you thank you immensely for the show. My dad Howard, passed away nearly a year ago and while I don't think he listened before he passed, I think he would have really enjoyed it. He was a tinkerer and loved learning new things. In fact, when I was younger and visited him during the summers, I'd be alone most days at his apartment while he worked and he would encourage me to search random things on the internet and read about them to learn something new. He would even leave me lists like the planet Jupiter, the state of Wyoming or the year 1845. I thought at the time it was pretty silly and only did it a few times, but now as an adult, I've since found your podcast a few months ago and I find it really fascinating and it reminds me of my dad and has been really helpful to me. When I get down about him being gone, it makes me happy to know that he would probably think it's awesome that I spend my days learning about things now. So Megan from Plano, Texas. Thank you for that. In memory of your father, Howard, I think he would like the show, too. That's pretty cool. I'm sorry he's not around to hear it. No, but I mean, we're carrying on his legacy. Exactly. Nice. So I guess we need to do a show on the year 1845 over the state of Wyoming. Never. Not Wyoming. Thanks a lot for that, Megan. That was nice of you to share that. If you want to get in touch with me and Chuck to tell us anything you like. You can tweet to us at syskpodcast, you can join us on Facebook. Comstepyshow, you can send us an email to stuff podcast@discovery.com, and you can join us at our super dope home on the web stuffyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseoffworks.com. With over 1000 titles to choose from, Audible.com is a leading provider of downloadable digital audiobooks and spoken word entertainment. Go to audible Podcast.com no stuff. Kno stuff to get a free audiobook download of your choice when you sign up today."
d67303b4-3b0d-11eb-aa42-07a17a0b908f	How the Titanic Worked: Part One	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-titanic-worked-part-one	When the Titanic set sail on her maiden voyage in April 1912, the world was divided into two types of people: those who considered her unsinkable and those who weren’t so sure about that. Both types were aboard when she went down with 1500 souls.	When the Titanic set sail on her maiden voyage in April 1912, the world was divided into two types of people: those who considered her unsinkable and those who weren’t so sure about that. Both types were aboard when she went down with 1500 souls.	Tue, 30 Mar 2021 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2021, tm_mon=3, tm_mday=30, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=89, tm_isdst=0)	45388779	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"What if you were a major transit system with billions of passengers taking millions of trips every year? You weren't about to let any cyberattacks slow you down. So you partner with IBM to build a security architecture to keep your data network and applications protected. Now you can tackle threats so they don't bring you to a grinding halt and everyone's going places, including you. Let's create cybersecurity that keeps your business on track. IBM, let's create learn more@ibm.com. You want your kid eating the best nutrition, right? And by that we mean your dog. Halo Elevate is natural sciencebased nutrition guaranteed to support your dog's top five health needs. Better than leaving brands? Find Halo elevate at Petco Pep supplies plus and select neighborhood Pet stores. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio, Ohio. And welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, your captain there's Chuck, your other captain, and your third captain, Jerry. All of us equal captains here is out there hovering around silently like the creepiest captain of all. Even creepier than Captain Steaming. And that, of course, makes this stuff you should know. I always loved it when Captain Stubing would have the rare love storyline. Yeah. The bone every now and then. Yeah. So good. He's usually just overseeing the love of others, you know? Exactly. He was a father figure. So that's why it was offputting when he had his own love thing. Is it off putting for you? Yeah, but he wants to see Captain Steuben go all the way. We should mention, and I wish I knew her name, but for many years, one of our young listeners asked us to do Titanic at every turn. And I imagine that young girl is now a grown woman, probably, who doesn't listen anymore. But who knows? Who knows? Also, Chuck, I think most recently it was requested by our Scottish correspondent, Noah. Don't you remember when he said hi last time? Sure, I don't remember the Titanic part, but Noah I'm happy for Noah to take the place of this young girl who left us yesterday's news. Yes. Which I can't prove, used us up and just threw us away. Chuck. Yeah. I think we resisted for so long because the movie is so linked to this event. And the movie, despite its faults, did a really pretty accurate job. And I know that was important to James Cameron of kind of really telling the accurate story of exactly what happened. Like, why bother? Yeah, there's actually, from the filming of that movie, they may have settled at least one major mystery as to what happened when it sank. No, what happened to the Grand Staircase, which they found when they finally discovered the Titanic later on in the 80s, was just totally missing. It was now like a seven storey vertical, basically an elevator shaft, a huge hole, and none of the staircase remained. And when they filmed that movie, the Titanic, the grand staircase detached and started to float away. And James Cameron was like, I'll bet you that's exactly what happened to the real Titanic. And I have a feeling that Jewel of the Sea isn't even right. What was it called? It had a name, jim of the there's so many angry people right now. The heart of the jam of the honey. I think it was the Heart of the Sea, the Heart of the Ocean, something like that. The Jewel of the Wind. Did you like the movie? Yeah, it was fine. You remember Thomas Jefferson's Bible where he cut out all the magic momo jumbo and just had, like, the morality of the whole thing? If you could go through and cut out, like, the love story of that movie, I would probably like it much more. Well, I kind of disagree there because you got to frame it around something. Whoa. You got to frame it around some kind of story of people. Are you just saying you would have done another person's story? Yeah. Why not just throw Captain Stooping in there and have him have the love story? I thought the love story was good. I just think Jim Cameron is I think he can be a little ham fisted with his screenwriting sometimes. Yeah, for sure. And there was some stuff like that I remember even at the time, like Billy Zayn little pithy comments like that Picasso, who's ever heard of him? That will never be worth a thing, or something like that. I just remember at the time being like, come on, man. Billy Zane does what he's told on the Zane. There is another one. I'd forgotten about this line, but somebody else was basically saying the same thing that you are about that movie. Or James Cameron's writing that when Leo was running with Kate Winslet through First Class and the band is playing and he stops for a second and goes music to drown to. Now I know I'm in first class. Oh, boy. So, yeah, the whole thing is just rife with that kind of stuff. But overall, I mean, just the fact that they went to the extremes that they did to try to get it as accurate as possible and overlaid, like a romantic love story on it. It was a good movie in a lot of ways, in so many more ways than it was a bad movie that it's just overall a really good movie. Yeah, I think the most brilliant decision in that movie was to have that beginning bit where it's a little ham fisted, but the part where Bill Paxton and the sea nerds go over exactly how it sank. Yeah, I don't think a lot of people understood that. And understanding that as you're watching the movie is pretty critical. So I think that was pretty smart. Yes, indeed. And one other thing about that movie. We'll never mention it again for the rest of these two episodes, I'm sure, but it costs about almost exactly, half adjusted for inflation, to make the movie Titanic as it did to make the Titanic. Wow. Isn't that crazy? Yeah. And we just did an episode of Movie Crush, basically. There you go. That was a mini crush. Although Nate Demeo, this was actually his pick, our buddy Nate. Oh, there you go. He's a Titanic. He did? That's awesome, man. That doesn't surprise me at all. All right. He would love a movie like that. That's that really accurate historical fiction. That would be up his alley. Yeah. Okay, so we're talking believe it or not, everybody. I don't know if you figured this out yet. We're talking about the Titanic finally, at long last. And like we were saying, we kind of put this off because the movie had just become so widespread that we basically had to wait out its after effects. But I feel like we've finally kind of reached that. I've been interested in the Titanic since I was just a young kid. Oh, yeah. Yeah. When they found the Titanic in 1985, I was at just the right age to really get sucked into that. And I think the Titanic was probably the first thing that introduced me to just the fascinating creepiness of looking at things that aren't supposed to be underwater, but now it's just perfect for that kind of thing. Yeah, and it's still really cool. I was looking at pictures today of that Stern sitting there underwater, and it's still just like there's something about it that you can't not look at it and just stare at it. I know, and I'm, like, waiting for the day when things become when technology reaches to the point where we can just explore every square inch of the Titanic on the bottom. I'm really looking forward to that. But I knew a lot about the Titanic to begin with. But just researching this, it dawned on me, like, I mean, there's just so much I didn't know that I found in the time spent researching this. But it also dawned on me that there is just so much more. Like, some people dedicate, like this is their hobby, like learning and talking and researching and reading and thinking about the Titanic. Yeah. And there's going to be a two part episode, and we're going to do it stuff You Should Know style, and probably about 90 minutes. But I'm quite sure there are podcasts out there fully dedicated to the Titanic where it's like and now episode 120, The Cutlery, where people know, like you were saying, people are obsessed with it, and they know all the details. We're going to, I'm sure, get some stuff kind of wrong because we're not experts, but we're going to give it the old stuff you should know treatment. Yeah, for sure. So I knew a lot about the Titanic. There's plenty of people out there who dedicate themselves to it. But just learning about this, it's just such a huge, monumental thing. A lot of people divide, like the 19th century, the old era and the modern age upon the sinking of the Titanic. Like that's how colossal a thing it's become. But at the time, it was actually not that big of a deal. Like it was the maiden voyage of the Titanic but it's sister ship the Olympic had already sailed and that was actually kind of a big thing The Titanic wasn't even sold out when it underwent its voyage. Actually, in retrospect, that was a very good thing. But there's a lot to learn from the Titanic. Just researching it. Even if you do feel like you already know basically everything about it. Yeah. I mean, I learned a ton of stuff. And I saw that movie a bunch. So like I said, the Titanic had a sister ship, the Olympic. And it also had another sister ship which was originally dubbed the Gigantic. But after the Titanic sank, they went back and renamed the gigantic the Britannic. Because I think maybe they'd be like, well, we had enough hubris for to last a lifetime with the Titanic. But these three ships came out of a dinner, actually between a guy named Jay Bruce ISME, who is the chairman of the White Star Line, which owned those three ships, and another guy what was his name? Perry Lord, William Pierre and their wives Florence, who was married to Bruce and Margaret Montgomery originally. Carlyle. And that name will come back in just a second. So just put a pin and her so this dinner was basically about how to compete with the cunard lines. The Cunard people were eating WhiteStar's lunch to a degree because they had just released the Mauritania and the Lusitania, and I think the Mauritania set the speed record. These things could make it across the Atlantic in five days, which was very fast at the time, and whitestar couldn't keep up. So they Decided From This Dinner, what If Instead Of Trying To Make Faster And Faster Ships, we Just Kind Of Go With Our Thing and Make Them Bigger And More Luxurious? So People Want To Spend That Extra Day it Took Whitestar Six Days To Make It Across. People want to spend that extra day because the ship is so ridiculously luxurious that they choose ours instead. And not only was this the birth of the Titanic and the Olympic and the Britannic, it was basically the birth of the cruise industry as we understand it today. Just basically making these huge floating luxury hotels that kind of became born from this dinner as well. Yeah. And so they said, we want to make them about one and a half times the size of anything that Kunard is putting out there. And they started sketching around a little bit and they sketched up a couple of mast and four smokestacks. And I think by the time they got to the engineering phase, they said, by the way, we really only need three of these. And they said, no, we must have four. We want it to look symmetrical and we'll figure out something to do with that fourth one, which they did. It became a ventilation system, which is pretty smart. And initially, Alexander Montgomery Carlyle was the head designer. Who was Margaret Lord, william Pearly's wife's brother. Okay. So it was his brother in law that was the initial designer. And then that was eventually handed over to Perry's nephew, Thomas Andrews. And he was the guy played by Victor Garber in the movie the dude from Alias. The dad from Alias, is it? Yeah. I mean, I never saw Alias, but I know that when you're on TV, that's what you're most famous for. Yeah. Isn't that weird? Yeah. Except in our case right. Always going against the grain. Yes, for sure. So Thomas Andrews would become the chief designer of the ship. He did an amazing job of it. But the ship itself, the Titanic, was something like 882 ft long, which is a little longer than the Trans American pyramid in San Francisco is. The building in San Francisco is tall. Yeah. Imagine tipping that into the ocean. Yeah. And then you have like the Titanic was slightly longer than that. It was also 92 ft wide and it had a gross weight of 450 tons. It was just by far, the biggest ship that had ever been built. The idea of bigness and indestructibility kind of was part of the Titanic's whole jam from the outset. Yeah. And there was one sort of fateful mistake. And Titanic is one of those things where a lot of people have, in hindsight, said, well, there was, of course, the iceberg, but there were also this that happened that could have led to its ultimate demise. And one of those things was the rivets. On the Titanic, there were 3 million rot iron rivets that apparently, upon further examination, contained about three times the amount of flag residue as was allowable. And I think the result of that was when they're exposed to cold, they become more brittle. And so some people have posited that it was a well built ship for the most part, but those rivets could have been weaker than they should have been when push came to shove. Yeah. And I mean, if your rivets are the weak link in the chain, that's trouble, right there. Big trouble. But yeah, not all of them were raw iron, but enough of them were. And I also saw that they were double riveted, and they probably should have been triple riveted. From what I saw in some engineering blog. You got a triple rivet. Exactly. Everybody knows that. Sure. They also had two engines on board that were just enormous. Each one was about 30ft tall, and they were capable of producing 30,000 HP, which is about the same energy produced by ten diesel locomotives, just these two engines. And they could push the ship pretty fast. Something like, I think, 22 knots was the top speed it hit. And like I said, the Mauritania had set the speed record at something like 23.9, I think, as far as the record goes, and it lasted until 1929. So the Titanic wasn't setting speed records or anything like that, but it was still going awfully fast, especially considering the size it was. But it was thanks to those huge engines and the enormous propellers that they outfitted the ship with, too. Oh, man. If you're at home and you can access photographs safely, I strongly encourage you to look up some of these pictures. Just the pictures of the propellers are amazing. There are two three blade propellers that were about 23 and a half feet in diameter, and then one four blade propeller that was about 17ft in diameter. And just seeing a photograph of these things is unbelievable to behold. Like how big these things are. Yeah. Again, just bigness. It was just a common theme. One of the other things that the Titanic had that was pretty innovative was that underwater in the hole, what would be beneath the sea surface, as far as the boat was concerned, were 16 bulkhead compartments that had all sorts of things. Like one held the coal, or I think, multiple ones held all the coal that the Titanic consumed. Something like 600 tons a day to get that thing to move. And then there were just all sorts of other rooms that were beneath sea level, and each of these rooms had an automatic door that would shut it off and seal it. They were water tight. So if any of these compartments caught water, started taking on water, it could fill up. And as long as that door was shut, the Titanic would just be able to keep on keeping on, basically. So that was a real innovation. That, combined with its bigness and just the amount of steel that was put into it, combined to kind of create this idea that the Titanic was unsinkable. That's where that comes from. Largely from those compartments. Yeah. I think they said two of the four could flood. And they said, really, up to four of these could flood. Right. But no more than four. Yeah. Put a pin in that one. And on that coal, there were 29 steam boilers. And if you're thinking, like, how much coal? You said \u00a3600. I'm sorry, 600 tons a day. A day. That was 162 furnaces of 200 men shoveling coal basically nonstop. Yeah. There was actually a fire aboard the Titanic. Like, the Titanic was on fire when it was taking on passengers. Right. And it was because those coal deposits, one of them had caught fire. And when you have coal that's on fire in that situation, basically the only way to put it out is to use that coal that's on fire. So not only were they shoveling, like, under routine conditions, they were shoveling even more coal than normal to keep that fire from spreading. Yeah. And that's another one of those things that people have. Now, some people experts have gone back and said the fire could have started up to three weeks before they even set sale and that it could have weakened some of those holds. They found evidence of some burn marks and stuff like that, where they said it could have weakened some of that metal. And it sounds very strange to have a fire going for three weeks and say, here we go, everybody. Right, exactly. But that was the deal. Plus, it also just gets across how enormous Titanic was that it could have a fire and just be like, whatever, right. It's all good. We're the Titanic. But, yeah, they discovered a picture that shows some sort of, like, kind of a stripe across the whole of the ship that is about where the iceberg hit it. And they said that's from that coal fire, we think, which is surprising still after all this time. I think that's another reason why the Titanic story is so engrossing. There's just so much still that people are learning about it, even 109 years on. Oh, totally. You also have to remember, when you build something this big, you also have to build the things that help you build this thing, because they didn't exist. So they had to get a boat slip that could accommodate it. So they built this enormous white star dock and then something called the Great Gantry, which was it sort of looks like a big sort of like a skeleton of a big airplane hanger. You should look at these pictures, too. It's pretty remarkable. But it was a series of ten cranes, basically, that held this boat in place while it was being built. It could lift the people up to work on it, lift materials up to wherever they needed to go. And it's actually something to behold in itself, like seeing the Titanic suspended, like, above the ground like that. Yeah. And it took 11,000 people to build the ship. 11,000 people. And they built it. They built the actual ship itself and was launched into the water, I think, although it was basically always in the water because it was basically impossible to dry dock. Well, not when it was in the hangar. I was sitting up there. Okay, you're right. Sorry. But it was actually launching in the water then on May 31, 1911. But it didn't have any interior. It didn't have its engines yet. It was fully completed March 31, 1912. And it began its maiden voyage and started taking on passengers on April 10, 1912. And I propose, Chuck, that before we take on passengers, we take a break. Let's do it. These days, you use your personal info to do just about everything, especially when you're online. And guess what? With all that info just floating around out there, it can make the Internet a practical gold mine for identity thieves. And stealing your identity, it turns out, can be dangerously easy, which is not good. But now it's easy to protect yourself with LifeLock. By Norton yes, LifeLock monitors your info and alerts you to potential identity threats. And if you are a victim of identity theft, a dedicated US based restoration specialist will work to fix it. Identity thefts have had it easy for far too long. Now, finally, it's your turn. Just remember, no one can prevent all identity theft or monitor all transactions at all businesses. But everyone can save up to 25% off their first year by going to LifeLock.com stuff. That's LifeLock.com stuff for 25% off your first year. LifeLock identity theft protection starts here. What if you were a global energy company with operations in Scotland, technologists in India, and customers, all on different systems? You need to pull it together. So you call in IBM and Red Hat to create an open hybrid cloud platform. Now, data is available anywhere, securely, and your digital transformation is helping find new ways to unlock energy around the world. Let's create a hybrid cloud that can change an industry. IBM, let's create learn more@ibm.com. All right, so one thing I didn't realize about the Titanic was it had three little stops before it left the UK. For New York. I started out in Southampton in England, moved on to Shareborg, France, and then went on to Queenstown, Ireland, before leaving for New York. Did you know that? I didn't know that. That wasn't a movie. Right. So the Titanic cost about $400 million in $2,019 to make. That's actually less than Carnival cruise Line Splendor, which was launched in 2008 for, like, 450,000,000. So it's actually as luxurious as it was. It was a pretty good bargain, to tell you the truth. Yeah. And here's my deal with cruises. I think we've talked about cruise ships before. I'm not a fan. I've been on exactly one cruise and just not a fan. And a lot of it has to do with the decor, like shopping mall carpet and bowling alley carpet and gold railings and things like that, but not, like, cool looking. I think if they took a note from the and maybe they are building cruise ships like this now. But if they took a note from the Titanic and other ships of the day today and had that really nice wicker furniture. If not iron. Some stuff painted to look like iron and not so much of that shiny gold shopping mall garbage look. I think I would be more into it a little more classy. Refined thing. And I think they could go a long way toward getting people like me on cruise ships. There's some that are like that, like, kind of some throwback ones are there? I'm pretty sure. Yeah. But I get what you mean. All you had to say was shopping mall. You kind of nailed it right there. Like, when you look at the Titanic. It looks like something the Kellogg brothers would have been keen on. Well, it's funny you say that, because we mentioned this in the Kellogg brothers episode, but they had equipment on board the Titanic in the gym, and the gym happened to be located on the boat deck, which was the same place where the Captain's bridge was FYI, in case you talked about the various decks. Yeah, I think we should. There are a number of them, actually. And they lettered them by letter, appropriately enough. That's right. So there's that boat deck, like you said, where the bridge, the gym, and I think just sort of that nice, lovely pine open deck is you had the promenade deck, which is the first deck, deck A, and that had those two first class staircases that you were talking about. Had a lounge, had a reading and writing room, had the all male, first class smoking room. Yeah, a lot of all male places. Sure. They had the Heman Woman Haters Club. There was a Veranda cafe in Palm Court, which is really lovely. If you go look at pictures of this as well yes, that's up my alley as well. Yes, the Palm Court. It's nice, right? Yeah, I knew you'd love it, because I was like, look at all that wicker furniture. Chuck is going to go crazy for this. They would never allow that in a mall. What's on deck B? Deck B? Friend, I thought you'd never ask. Included the first class cabins and suites, the restaurant Cafe Parisian, which was an all male, second class smoking room, third class poop deck, which is where the third class people kind of strolled around like gerbils. And then they also kept some of the larger cargo equipment on the poop deck for the third class people that uses obstacles, maybe, to climb over and stay fit. Yeah, they tried to hide most of that stuff. They had great care in making sure that it looked just like a luxury kind of hotel. And that's one of the reasons why they didn't have as many lifeboats. But we'll get to that. Yeah, that was something that I also didn't know about the Titanic, is that the designers and builders really went to great lengths to make it as luxurious as possible for everybody from first class to third class, which is also called steerage. Over the years, it's been made into such a class conflict, social stratification, fable. It was. It definitely was. But really, it just kind of followed the conventions of the day. But because of the conventions of the day, a lot of people died who otherwise might not have, which we'll talk about. Believe me, people have kind of glomped onto that, and especially 100 years later, it just seems so bizarre and awful to us. But at the time, I mean, this is just the way things were. But because of that whole idea that it's like there's third class, and there's first class. You just kind of miss the point that they were, like, even in third class, this was incredible luxury compared to what they were used to for passages like this. And it was because the designers purposefully made it that way. Yeah, they were mostly immigrants coming to America for the first time. And like you said, it was appropriate luxury for third class. The rooms weren't these big open rooms with, like, 30 bunk beds and no door. They were private rooms. They had doors on the rooms. I think they were there six people per room down there. I saw four. I also saw six. Okay. Not too bad, though. They had little wash basins in each room, which was a really big deal and a big luxury. Although I do think they had only two bathtubs for third class to share among the 700 plus people, one for men and one for women, and I saw that explained away as third class passengers probably thought that you could develop respiratory illness by bathing too much, so they probably wouldn't have had much of an issue with that. It doesn't seem as bad as it does to us in retrospect. Yeah. I don't think I would have taken a bath. I would have just been I wouldn't take a poop on a bus trip. I'm with you, man. I hope I never, ever go to jail for any extended period of time, because I would have a big problem with the pooping thing. You mean when it's just a little silver thing in the corner with all the other people in there? Yes, I think that's a big problem. That would be a problem for me. I think that would be a problem for anybody. I feel bad. That's a terrible aspect, I think, of jail life, but yes, that's exactly right. All right, so where were we? Well, ironically, were on the poop deck. Right. Deck C was the shelter deck. I don't think we said deck B was the bridge deck, but deck C is the shelter deck. Purser's office. There third class smoking room, second class librarian lounge. Everything is very divided by class. Everyone needs their smoking rooms because everybody smoked, right? Yeah, for sure. Saloon deck, deck D. What do you get in there? First class reception room and the dining saloon. When you showed up for dinner, you would probably sit in the reception room and maybe, like, have a drink while you're waiting to be seated if you showed up a little early, from what I saw. Agreed. From what I saw, the dining saloon, the actual dining room, was large enough to seat all of the first class passengers at once. Oh, wow. And I think the second class one was just enormous. Second class is almost never talked about. When you just generally talk about the Titanic, it's always first or third. But there's a huge second class, huge space for second class. I. Think it sat a couple of thousand people at once. Third class, I think, was enough to serve the third class passengers over three settings, I believe maybe even more than that. Maybe four. All right. That's still a lot. It is still a lot. But, yeah, for first class, you probably had just one sitting. And I think when you mentioned deck B, that restaurant was an a la carte restaurant. So sort of like modern cruise ships. There's the big dining room. Right. But then there's also the pizza place and this and the that. And I think the little ala carte restaurant was one of those. It's like the mall food court. Probably not as good. Deck E was the second and third class cabins. It's called the upper deck. And then the middle deck. Deck F this is a little confusing, was the third class saloon, the Turkish bath, which they not too long ago, got some really good photos of lurking there at the bottom of the Atlantic. It's amazing, but the Turkish bath was kind of like what you call the spa aboard a ship today. Yeah, maybe some of the well, actually, I guess the Kellogg stuff was in the gym. Yeah, I believe it was all in the gym because it was like the shaky band. Oh, I can't remember what else. I think the thing where they would loosen up the poop with the suntan bed, I can't remember exactly, but there were definitely multiple pieces of Kellogg equipment. And it wasn't a gym. So then you've got the lower deck, the orlop deck. That's where you could play squash if you wanted to. They had a post office. There was a lot of people love to send posts when they're on an ocean voyage. I know, but I was thinking about that. You just show up at the post office and they're like, okay, thanks. We'll mail it when we get to the same place at the exact same time as you. Yeah, that's a good point. It seems so dumb, but I think it's being postmarked by the Titanic, which is what you okay. Got you. You're like, there's someone working in post offices. Literally turns everyone away. We'll just hang on to that and mail it when we get there. Yeah, you're probably better off just dropping it somewhere in New York. You're fine. There's the carpentry shop, the plumbing shop, electrical workshops. You got to have all that stuff. They had these enormous refrigerated rooms that were cooled by these copper pipes. Just like miles and miles of copper pipes in each area. You could do a whole episode on just the refrigeration of the Titanic and the cheeses and the flowers and the wines and the foods that they had to keep chilled. And they have pretty expensive they did it after the cutlery episode, probably. So we talked about how luxurious it was. It was just as luxurious as anything was in the world at the time, the Titanic. But there was also kind of like an airy kind of vibe to the whole thing, like the choices in colors and wallpapers and plants and all that. And the wicker furniture was all just kind of light and airy and cheery. So it had a really nice feel to it from first to third across the board. Yes. Stirring wasn't just a rat infested gross place to be. That's how it's always portrayed. Basically a floating tenement is how I've always seen it portrayed. And I think that's kind of how James Cameron did portrayed it too, which is I guess where I got my impression like you. I mean, the only thing I remember, I think they maybe showed them in their leo and their little room and then of course, there was the Irish jig that they danced down there when she decided to slum it with sewage. Right. And that did look a little like an old pub and it was a brand new boat. Right? That's what I'm saying. Yeah. So I think I said earlier that the Titanic wasn't full when she set sail again. This is her maiden voyage, which accounts for why J. Bruce is made the chairman of the White Star line, whose father was the founder, I believe, and why Thomas Andrews, the designer of the titanic and Olympic and Britannic were both aboard. It was just custom for those people who are in those positions to be aboard a ship for its maiden voyage. But it wasn't sold out. There was room for something like 3295 people total. Yeah, there was only 2229 people. So there was room for more than 1000 passengers, basically because the crew was virtually full. Like the room for the crew was virtually full, but the passengers that hadn't booked as much as it was expected. Should we take another break? Oh, boy. Yeah. All right, let's take another break and we'll talk about a couple more things here to round out part one of the Titanic right after this. These days, you use your personal info to do just about everything, especially when you're online. And guess what? 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Basically. Yeah. At least from being launched in Belfast, right? Yeah. So it started out in Belfast, went to Southampton on April 3, and then on the 10th it went and picked up a few people in Southampton, and then went to France and then to Queenstown, Ireland, to get some more people. Like I said, I never knew like you that this is what it was doing. Operating basically like an Uber share. Yes, I guess so. Have you ever done that by accident? No, I never have. I'm very careful. I did once and someone, they stopped and I was like, what's going on? Someone got in. I was like, really? What's going on? Is this Candid Camera? I made a new friend. Oh, that's nice. I thought it was in the cash cab. I don't think he stops to pick up other people. He just asked a lot of questions. Yeah, that's true. All right, so it's picked up all the folks at this point in the end. And there is some discrepancy about the final numbers because a lot of people sold their tickets, a lot of people switched tickets. A lot of people can't quite make it on time. In the case of Leonardo DiCaprio, he wins those tickets in a poker game right before it launches. No way they could have accounted for him. No, and actually that's not exactly that far off. And I suspect it's based loosely on the story of Thomas Hart, who was hired on as a fireman, but went off and got really drunk and lost his boarding papers while he was drunk and they were stolen by somebody else because Thomas Hart showed up and worked, as far as anyone was concerned, as far as the logs went. But it just clearly wasn't that Thomas Hart. Right. He just missed it like that. There was one group of wealthy industrialists, starting with Henry Clay, frick onto JPMorgan, and then J. Horace Harding, who transferred boarding papers for suites B 52 54 and 56, which ultimately were taken on by Jay Bruce's May. It just turns out all of them had a reason why they suddenly couldn't go towards the last minute. Yeah, I think the unsinkable Molly Brown's daughter. Molly Brown was portrayed by Kathy Bates. She was the hero of Lifeboat Six that really wanted to go and try and save people. I think her daughter was supposed to come, but she was studying at the Sarbone, so she did not. So there's a big list of people, they call it the Just Mystic Club. Yes. And apparently in 1912 the Milwaukee Journal put that number as high as 6000 people that were saved because they did not sell on the Titanic. Obviously, it couldn't have been that much. It's one of those things, I think, where, like, everyone was at the game where Michael Jordan scored whatever points. Right. It's one of those sort of things where history fudges itself a little bit. But in the end they put the number somewhere around 1001, 3000 hundred and 24 passengers. And those 884 officers, which is a very high ratio of crew members to passengers. Yeah, it really is. Speaking of crew, in addition to Thomas Hart, they were the Slade brothers who left Southampton after passing muster, went and got drunk and then came back and they wouldn't lower the gang plank for them again. So they got left behind. Good for them. But most of all, there was a guy named Davy Blair who was an up and coming officer for the White Star Line. And he was initially assigned the second officer position, which is huge for an up and coming guy. He was at the last minute, I think he sailed from Southampton to share Burg and then at Sherberg, basically as somebody who was a more senior officer than him was given that position. And he was moved off to the Olympic and he was really disappointed about this. There's like a surviving postcard that expresses how upset he was and saddened that he kind of lost that big opportunity. But even more important than that is David Blair was on there long enough to be entrusted with the key to the Crow's Nest locker which held the binoculars for the binocular locker. The binocular locker. It's great. Yeah. I think there's kind of long been a myth that there were not binoculars on board. But yeah, he walked with that key and that key and that postcard sold at auction for like 150 grand or something, didn't it? As far as I know. Yeah, it's amazing. But that's a big deal because later on they would say that had they had binoculars in the Crow's Nest they most definitely would have cited the icebergs in time to maneuver away from them. The lookout said that later on at an inquiry. Yeah. And of course, people debated that as well. Hindsight is 2020, but it certainly wouldn't have hurt. Yeah, no, definitely wouldn't have so I mentioned some wealthy industrialists that was mostly first class passengers were all extraordinarily well above average wealthy people. Like, even for wealthy people, they were above average wealthy. And that was reflected in the ticket prices that some of them paid for passage on the Titanic. Dude. Yeah. Big money in today dollars. Anywhere from 66 grand to 120 grand for passage. Yeah. I don't think that fully gets it across, because you're like, okay, I can see a billionaire selling something like that out. It's gaudy and gross. But what really drove it home to me was, at the time, so they were paying up to $4,500 in their dollars, and at the time, the average American made $800 a year. Wow. And these guys showed out $4,500 for a one way ticket. This was not round trip. This was one way from the UK. To America. That's great. $4,500. Isn't that nuts? Third class steerage, I think, even costs close to $1,000 in today dollars, which is a lot of money. I mean, $35 back then, but that's not cheap. No, but it was definitely a lot more affordable than $119,000. That's right. So I guess we should talk a little bit before we wrap up about kind of the controversy over the size of the ship. As we said at the beginning, they wanted it to be the biggest and the best all three of those sister ships, just to be the biggest thing ever to really rub it in the Cunard line's face. And that presented some problems, though, one of which was the Board of Trade didn't know how many lifeboats, or at least hadn't acted on it, and said how many life boats you should have. Because in the 1894 Merchant Shipping Act, they topped out at 10,000 tons and said, you need 16 lifeboats if you're 10,000 tons. Titanic was 35,000 tons, and they had 16 lifeboats because that's just where the Merchant Shipping Act ended. And they didn't like the unsightliness of them, so they weren't going to add any. It does not mean because it was three times the size, they needed 48 lifeboats. I think in retrospect, they said 26 would have done it. But as we'll get to the whole accident, the speed at which it sank, it may not have mattered anyway, but that was one of the big problems with its size. That was a very big problem. Yeah. Not adding enough lifeboats because they seem to unsightly is not a good move. Another one is that the Titanic only had, like, six or 7 hours of testing before it sailed, and that was mostly just to check its maneuverability. It was never sailed at full speed before it set sail for America, so the testing wasn't very good. And then, even more important, as far as lifeboats go, they never fully did like a fool drill to lower all the lifeboats aboard. And one of the reasons why people died was not just because there weren't that many lifeboats. That was a huge issue, but also because there just wasn't a lot of needed protocol in launching the lifeboats as far as the crew was concerned. A lot of them had come aboard basically the day before they were taking on passengers and didn't even have a post or position while they were passengers on that first day. Yeah, it was basically an HR nightmare with people showing up as the passengers are showing up, going, Where do I go? What do you want me to do? They're like, have you ever waited tables? Have you ever shovel goal? Right. And they were just kind of sticking people where they needed them. And like you said, I think they only were able to lower two of those 16 life boats. And in the end, what that also means is you don't know how long it's going to take to lower them all. So they were kind of just flying or sailing blind. Right, exactly. So those were just really big problems that would turn out to be extremely important when the ship started going down because any one of those things being slightly different or improved or not being a problem means that people's lives definitely would have been saved. You can debate, like, how many people would have been saved, but there was definitely room for more people to have survived the Titanic than did. Yeah. There was also a weird incident that happened on April 10 that possibly altered history. The Titanic was being pulled out by Tugboats, and I think, as the story goes, the captain kind of a little too early, said, go ahead and release this and we'll just fire this baby up. He's really itching to get those propellers spinning. And he said, and give me a toot toot while you're at it. And when he started turning those propellers, it was a big, violent section and it sucked this other steamer, the SS New York, into its wake. It was attached to the oceanic and it started pulling this boat over to it. I think it snapped away from the oceanic. It kind of ripped off the moorings. And if it weren't for quick action by Tugboats reattaching pulling the New York away and then the captain realizing what was going on and hitting the engine hard and turning out of the way, it shows pictures they miss hitting each other by just a few feet. That's crazy. And not only would that if it had actually hit it, that would have caused a delay that could have altered history, but there was a slight delay anyway just because of this incident. Oh, wow. That who knows if those events would have lined up with that iceberg in there at the exact moment it needed to be. Yeah. That's an amazing point, Chuck. I hadn't seen that one. So they leave Queenstown, Ireland, on April 11, 1912, I believe. Right? Yes. And start heading out to sea full speed ahead and we will stop here. What do you think, boy? What a cliffhanger. What's going to happen? I don't know. We'll find out in the next episode of Stuff You Should Know. Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts my Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. You want your kid eating the best nutrition, right? And by that we mean your dog. Halo Elevate is natural science based nutrition guaranteed to support your dog's top five health needs. Better than leaving brands. Find Halo Elevate at petco, petsupply plus and select Neighborhoods pet stores."
030a4b1c-3b0e-11eb-947e-c7c7639a04a5	The Radium Girls	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/the-radium-girls	The Radium Girls painted watched with glow-in-the-dark radium in the 1920s and '30s. Most got sick, many died. This is their story.	The Radium Girls painted watched with glow-in-the-dark radium in the 1920s and '30s. Most got sick, many died. This is their story.	Tue, 13 Jul 2021 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2021, tm_mon=7, tm_mday=13, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=194, tm_isdst=0)	43750363	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clarke. There's charles W. Covette Bryant. What do you want me to to intro you like that, Chuck? Well, I guess the cat's out of the bag. Yeah. We wanted to start this episode off with the PSA. I've coveted, everybody. And the reason I'm making this so public is a couple of reasons. One, to remind everyone that we're not out of the woods yet. I'm vaccinated fully. This is almost 100% likely the delta variant. There's no way to prove that because I've done a lot of research. They're only testing for variants in specific places than using statistics to blow that out through the whole. But just like this week, it was breaking news that it dropped from about 90% the vaccine effective to 64% against the Delta variant. Yeah. That alone would make me suspect that's what it is. Yeah. And it's the most dominant strain. It's the most likely to bust the vaccine. I went out of town over the weekend with friends, and, like, 40% of that group have coveted now, and they were vaccined. Oh, my God. It is no joke, everyone. We're not out of the woods. Please keep taking it seriously. Please get vaccinated if you haven't. And if you can, use this. I know we're probably preaching to the choir mainly, but if you can use this example to try and convince someone you love to get vaccinated that is hesitant, then that's why I'm saying this. Well, Chuck, I know Jerry would never come on and say this, but we're very glad that you're doing okay, and we love you very much. We're very proud of you. Jerry doesn't express herself emotionally like that. No, she doesn't. Not like you do. No, I'm well known for that kind of thing. But the good news, and the final reason I mention it is also get vaccinated, because it is doing at least part of its job, in that I had a couple of days of feeling pretty bad with a cold and had four days now of feeling pretty good, and it is doing its job and keeping it very mild. And I took off a couple of categories where if I wasn't vaccinated, it may not be so mild. Yes. That's why you're L-U-C-K-Y-U-A got no alibi. You're lucky. All right, well, now we can talk about some not so lucky young women. That's true. I'm hats off to you for that PSA, too, by the way. Sure. Also, I never finished. I never finished, Chuck. There's jerry jerome Roland over there. Stuff you should know. That's right. So now you can take over my former duties of intro in the episode. Well, I mean, it's just funny. This is another not funny. But I feel like we are diving more and more into sort of the horrors of not only just the workplace. But I feel like we've covered a lot more over the past couple of years. These situations in America's history where corporations have tried to just bury things that made them look bad at the expense and the lives of people that work for them. Yeah. We've been examining how terrible life is without government regulations. That's right. Another PSA. It's true. And like you said, we're talking about some unfortunate women who were gravely mistreated in part because of the place and time that they occupied, but also because they were women and because there were, again, no workplace safety laws or anything like that. But despite everything that was stacked against them, including things like their gender, they basically rose up and established some of the first successful lawsuits against employers for basically workplace abuse, or at the very least, workplace dereliction of duty of the employer to look out for worker safety. I think that's the technical way to put it. Yeah. We're talking about The Radium Girls, and there was a movie about this. We loved the hundreds of emails about the ghost of how do you pronounce it again? The Brotherhood of the Beast. Brotherhood of the brotherhood of the Wolf That's right. Was the name of the movie. And apparently I'm the only one. Yeah, the only person who has never seen that movie. Yeah, same here. Same here. I think we are the only two. I can't remember getting more emails about a single thing than that one. Yeah, they're literally still coming in. And I do remember once I saw the trailer, I was like, oh, I know that movie a little bit, but I didn't know the story. But there was a Radium Girls movie from three years ago that I sort of half watched today. I don't want to disparage anyone because filmmakers tried to get the word out about an important event in history, but I'll just say that the RogerEbert.com website gave it one and a half stars, and that's the only thing I'll say. Out of how many stars? 100. Wow. It was not very good. You got a 1.5%. That is wow. Yeah. I did not watch that one. I haven't read the book yet either. But one of the problems with taking up something like this is like it was the same thing with Henry at Alex when we did our episode of Dealer Cells, where it's really hard to kind of dig past the wall of journalism surrounding, like, the release of a popular book and anything that is written in that book and that books take on the story. All of that stuff basically becomes it like, that's it. This person said this and this person played this role, and it just becomes like the story, I guess, is what I'm trying to say. Fortunately for Radium Girls, and I'm not taking away from Kate Moore's book at all, from everything I've seen, it was extremely well researched and it did a really great job of bringing this to the forefront here. But fortunately, there's also a lot of scholarship that was written and researched before that that still exists on the Internet, so you can kind of, like, get into some other details, too, besides well, the book said this and the book said that, and then also, fortunately, we had our buddy Dave Ruse help us out with some research, too. And Dave hates books. He does. He's always burning books. Now Dave, in fact, is the one that said we should definitely mention kate Moore's 2017 book, the Radium Girls colon. We should have a sound effect for colons. Now, what if we had, like, one of those in studio courses that go in? That'd be great. We need a barbershop quartet. Yeah, that'd be good. The Radium Girls insert sound effect. The dark story of America's shining Women. Yes. I'm not sure if I like that pun. Not one, but two puns. The dark story of America's shining Women. There it is. Yeah. So the whole thing about radium and the radium girls, and that's what the press dubbed them, they also, I believe, call themselves the Society of the living Dead, which is some pretty serious gallows humor considering, like, the state and shape that they were in. They kind of came out of this era where radium, like, the 19 teens, the early 1920s, the first radio girls are actually two sets, as we'll see. But they came out of this era where three was there three? Yeah. There was another factory that we're not even going to have time to talk about. Okay, well, let's say what decade was that one? I think it was the same decade. I think it was just another factory that we just can't do the two hour show I got you. Well, we're well on our way already. But they existed in an era where radium was seen as this thing that was just this amazing cure all tonic, a wonder of nature that was put in all sorts of different products from cigarettes to condoms. There's a water called RadiThor that was irradiated water, that radioactive water that you would drink to get the radioactivity in your body because it was thought to give you, like, health, energy, vitalization, cure, all sorts of diseases. It said that it bathed the stomach and liquid sunshine. And all of this was pretty new stuff because it wasn't more than two decades before that. Marie Curie and Pierre Curie discovered radium in the first place back in 1898. Yeah, they discovered it, and I think they even named it I think Latin radius means ray. And they knew that it emitted rays of energy even at that time. And very early on, they started using radiation to try and help treat cancer. Like, hey, let's put this in a lead box and cut a hole in it and then put that hole over the human body, like aiming it toward where a tumor might be like, very obviously rudimentary stuff and you have to make a sound the whole time. That was kind of one of the roles of the technician at the time. That's right. And you should have seen the audition tapes. Some people had zero rhythm. It'd be like pee pee. Sorry. You're well qualified. So curie actually she died in 1934 from aplastic anemia, which is a bone marrow disorder caused by radiation exposure. So they knew that it was dangerous, but it was still, like you said, it was known as a cure for the living dead in that radiator water and basically used for everything from gout to fatigue. And it was just one of those crazy times in american history where now we look back and we're like, this is just nuts. But back then, they didn't know well, so there were two tags from what I could tell. There was the beginnings of academic scholarship, and both of the cures had some sort of suspicion. And there was this idea that there was easily you could be exposed to too much. You didn't want to have too much radio, but a little bit was good for you. But then there was also this academic tack that was like, no, this stuff might not be good at all. We should really be careful with this. But the popular idea of it that you read in the newspapers or maybe even what your doctor thought about it all came from radium research that was almost exclusively underwritten and in a lot of cases carried out by companies that made their money off of radium. They were just touting this stuff as an amazing wonder element. Basically. There was like almost these two overlapping worlds that weren't connected at the time in our understanding of radium in like, the 19 teens and twenties. Right. So one of the other kind of cool and interesting things about radium is that it can make things glow in the dark. And glow in the dark is very sort of like, who cares now? Still kind of fun, but in the glow in the dark was a very big deal. It was basically the future and kind of space age. And if you had a glow in the dark watch or a glow in the dark clock, then you felt pretty cool, basically, because you could see that thing in the dark. And so, of course, these companies wanted to start painting watch faces and clocks with radium, and they've got young women and sometimes even girls as young as like 14 years old to do this stuff. Yeah, I think the first company at first, they were working on military clocks and military dials, like you might put in an airplane or something. And the first company I think that was established to do this was United States radium back in 1916 in new Jersey, orange, New Jersey, I think. And like you said, they hired young girls, very young girls, I think the oldest one I saw by far was 28, but for the most part, they were in their teens to early twenty s. And this is like a really big deal job that was very highly paying. I think the women who painted watch styles with radium paint were in the top 5% of earners in America at the time. This is a factory job. Yeah. And then also it's prestigious, too, from what I saw. Yeah. The movies and I don't know if it's accurate or not, I'm going to say what the movie said. The movie said that they were paid a penny per face and a high earner could crank out 200 a day. So that's about $2 a day. Okay. That's like a million dollars today. I think that's also what the movie said. Well, a million dollars double that. And that's about what a gram of radium cost in today's dollars. I think it's like 100 grams in the 1020s for a gram of radium. So they were themselves highly paid, but they also were working with what was at the time the most expensive material on earth. And it makes sense that it would be so expensive. Like, radium is really rare. It's super radioactive, but it occurs in very small amounts, which kind of lets you realize how radioactive it is. It's a daughter isotope of uranium, whereas uranium decays, one of the things that it becomes is radium. And in uranium ore, I think the curies, when they first discovered radium, they found that after they took uranium out of this ore pitch blend, which we talked about in the uranium mining episode, that the pitch blend was still radioactive. So what else is in here? And out of ten tons of uranium ore, they managed to extract 1 MG. So it would make sense, especially at the time, that it would cost a couple of million dollars for a single gram of that stuff. Yeah. And so these girls and young women were the stuff was getting in their hair, it was getting on their clothes. It was sort of a badge of honor, because you would go out that night dancing or something, and you would glow a little bit. They would even purposely put it on their teeth sometimes. They were called ghost girls. And it wasn't a fad in that it was widespread because only a select few had their hands on it. But I think that's one of the reasons the girls like these jobs, is because they could go out and attract attention, because they had this glow in their hair and on their dresses. Yeah. I think also people knew that they were working with radium. And radium at the time was like Missy Elliot mixed with ecstasy back in the late 90s. Like as cool as it got, you know what I mean? Goodness. Yeah. Thanks. I'm just trying out some new stuff. How's it going? It's good. In fact, I think maybe we should take a break. I need to reexamine that analogy so I can really fully grasp it. Alright, you just let it sink in, buddy. So Chuck, I gotta say before we start back again, you don't seem like you have covet. Are you faking? I'm not faking. I am. A little spacey though. You're doing great. You've researched an episode of Stuff You Should Know, probably the most challenging podcast on the planet for sure. And you're presenting it just like an ace. So hats off to you again. Well, thanks, man. You got it. So you were saying before that the radium girls were covered in radioactive dust. And they were because they would mix their own paint and they worked with a specific kind of paint called Undark. It was a proprietary blend where they would basically mix it with water and a little bit of solvent and create their own paint from this radium dust. So radium dust is like all over the place, which is bad enough, you can get pretty radioactive from being exposed to radium dust like that. But it was far worse in those working conditions because they were actually ingesting the radium through the paint as well. Yeah, I mean, this is where if you think this already sounds like a workplace violation, this is where it just gets bonkers. Because they would actually if you're painting a 1 mm wide number on a watch and I think the watch faces themselves were like three and a half centimeters, you have to have a tiny little point on the end of that paint brush. And painters know one way you can achieve this is something called lip pointing, which is when you dip the brush in the paint, in this case radium, and then you put it in your mouth and just sort of press it down with your lips to make that point finer. And they were doing this with radium. They were literally orally ingesting radium in their mouths. Which means orally inviting cancer into their bodies. Unknowingly. Yes. Which is some pretty I mean, that's not good. Like when you're ingesting the paint itself, apparently there was a guy who worked for Prudential, the insurance company, back in 1925, he published a paper, his name is Fred Hoffman, frederick Hoffman. And he calculated that the radium girls who painted these watch faces, because of that lip pointing technique, they were ingesting something like one in three quarter grams of this paint every day. It's a lot of money. They had to lip point so much. It is a lot of money. From the viewpoint of the factory owners, you'd think they would have been like, no, we've got to stop that because that is a lot of paint. But that's also a lot of radium that they were taking into. And the big problem with that is not just that it's getting inside of you now and it's burning a hole right through you. It's not really doing that. Radium is an alkali earth metal. And it just so happens that calcium is also an alkali earth metal into your bones. They're the same thing. Your body doesn't differentiate between the two. And our bodies are set up to divert calcium, basically from the bloodstream right to the bones to help build strong bones. And we do the same thing with radium too. Our bodies do. So when you ingest radium, it enters your bloodstream and it goes right to your bones and it sets about screwing you up big time from that point on. Yes. And apparently some of these young women were saying they were asking questions early on. They were saying, like, is this bad for you? Can I hurt you? And the US. Radio Corporation was I mean, they started covering up very early what was going on. They were doing their own research. And they said, of course, the people that were making that Radio Water did the same thing. They would hire out these private companies to do this research, basically, and say everything's fine. And they said, you know, ingesting a little bit is just fine. A little rose in your cheek, and it's great. And I guess they just sort of full stop there. They didn't talk much about how much ingesting a gram every time you did that over time would be like over a period of years, I think. In 1000 1916, they put out their own publication from the Radium Publishing Company that said the physiological action of Radium sounds not unlike a fairy tale. Right. Which is weird. And they said that the red blood cell count surges. So you will actually kind of seem a little healthier. I couldn't find that anywhere. From what I saw, it causes hemolysis, which is like the rupturing of red blood cells. But this is the kind of stuff that these publications were pedaling and doctors in the public were just taking it wholesale. And that was where the idea that radium was good for you came from, was from publications, from people like the Radium Publishing Company. There was just a lot of credulity at the time, I guess, which is weird because this is also one of the most avaricious periods in American history as well. What does that mean? It means that people were preying on other people for profit and money. You would do anything for a dollar average. Okay. Makes sense. Now, I'm a little take it easy on me. I will. I'll let that one slide. And I don't know if I said this or not. I know Jerry wouldn't, but we're really glad you're doing good. And it's funny, in that factory, they didn't say anything about the fact that, can this be dangerous? Because I've noticed all the men that are working around Radium are wearing these big lead smocks and aprons and they're handling this stuff with ivory tipped tongs. And we're putting this in our mouth and they're like, don't worry about that. Yeah. And it wasn't at us. Radio in Orange, New Jersey. It was part of the corporate culture to basically just treat it really cavalierly. Like, even the head chemist, Edwin Lehman, who would pay dearly for his cavalierness, was recorded by an investigator who we'll talk about in a little bit. It's basically just handling lumps of radium or radium powder without any kind of gloves, no protection, no lead acronym, and just kind of just scoffing at the idea that it was dangerous. So some people there knew that it was dangerous and treated it so. But the corporate culture in that company in particular was that, don't be ridiculous, who cares, stop talking, stop asking questions kind of thing. Yeah. So this next part, I'm going to issue a trigger warning because it certainly got me with my tooth fears. So if you have dental fears and tooth fears, just be warned. This is from Kate Moore's book, and it's about the very first, I think, the first young woman to fall ill at the USRC. Her name was Molly. I don't know if it's Magia or Maggia. And this is she was 24 years old. She said she felt like she was about 90. I mean, she ached all over, but she had this pain in her lower jaw, specifically, and then eventually went to the dentist, had these abscesses that were just oozing in her mouth. And her dentist tried to pull some of her teeth that were riding, and a part of her jaw literally came out. And it says in the book, he removed it not by an operation, but merely by putting his fingers in the mouth and lifting it out. And I think a few days later took out her entire lower jaw the same way. Just pulled it out of her mouth. Yes. That's horrifying. And if you have what's known as dentifhobia, you're probably on the floor right now and may never go see a dentist again. No one listened to that. It got me as well, man. I was just like, this is so wrong. The crazy thing is, Molly Maggia, she lived for, I believe, another year or so with this increasing abscess. And like, the radium was sitting in her bones, in this particular case, in her jaw, in her teeth, and just decaying the tissue around it, the bone around it, and she just basically rotted from radiation poisoning from the inside of her jaw out. She suffered from abscesses and eventually died from an abscess. This abscess, apparently the whole left side of her face, the different abscesses, grew into one mega abscess, and it finally reached her jugular vein and just ate away at her jugular vein, and she could no longer pump blood from her heart. Now I sound like I have coveted. I mean, that is horrific, as you can imagine. And it gets worse in that when her doctors were asked what their best guess was of the cause of death. They blamed it on syphilis. Right. The company jumps on this and says and this was a big part of the movie, they basically start saying that these girls are spreading syphilis around each other and that's what they're sick from. I think in the movie they called it VD, of course, but it was one part to sort of shame them into being quiet and to say that in another part to just obviously take the blame as far away from radium as possible. Men yeah, for real. Not to say in the doctor's defense, but no one knew what radium poisoning was at the time. Right. It's not like syphilis was an entirely just bonkers diagnosis. But there was another thing I saw that they considered. Too. That just didn't make sense. But had kind of come and gone before among match stick makers. Which was something called fosse jaw or phosphorus jaw. Where if you were exposed to white phosphorus. Which matchmakers were. When you're making the head of a match. It basically gets absorbed into your jaw and rot your jaw. So they had kind of seen something like this before, but not since like the early 19th century. It was much more prevalent in the 18th century and they didn't think that these women were working with phosphorus anyway, so it was kind of baffling. But yeah, the idea that even if the doctor did naively or innocently say it was syphilis or something like that, the company very much jumped on that kind of thing to use it to paint that unflattering picture of the women who would go on to litigate this company. And it was totally that kind of a company. And it was run by those kind of people, for sure. US dial was yes, up to this point. Twelve of them died, think about 50 of them were ill at this point and they are still full steam ahead. They don't haul production at all. They don't even call for an investigation until 1924 when it leaks out to the press a little bit and they start to get some sort of bad press about what might be going on. So they commissioned an independent investigation that found out that there was definitely connection going on and that their exposure to radium is leading to these illnesses and deaths. And they buried it and got their own not independent commission together they investigated and came back and said, oh no, these young ladies are suffering from a hysterical condition brought on by coincidence. Yeah. And that was actually not even like a panel's opinion. That was Arthur Roder, the president of US. Style. That was his opinion. Yeah, that was his opinion of the whole thing. And that independent investigation was a legitimately independent investigation. It was led by Dr. Cecil Drinker and his wife, Dr. Catherine Drinker, who are both Harvard public health professors. And when they came up with these findings, like, yeah, these women are all dying horrible deaths from radiation poisoning, from eating this paint because of this stupid lip pointing technique. And the company did bury it. Not only did they bury it, it's even worse than that. They took the drinkers report and altered it so that it said that every girl is in perfect condition, and then submitted it with the drinker's name on it to the New Jersey Labor Department. The drinkers had no idea. They also told the drinkers if they published their initial report, they would sue them, that they've been working confidentially. And like I was saying, it was just that kind of company. They would engage in dirty tricks. They would do some of the most underhanded stuff you can imagine. I've got one more anecdote, Chuck. This is going to knock your socks off. They hired an industrial toxicologist named Frederick Flynn from Columbia to basically pose as a doctor to examine one of the dial painters and basically tell her that her health was fine. She was in fine shape. And they had a VP from US dial sit in and make it seem like he was a colleague of this person who she thought was a doctor who emphatically agreed and backed up his position. That's the kind of stuff US dial did. Agreed, Chuck. Agreed. All right, so we should probably take another break, and we'll talk about how everything changed a little bit right after this. All right. So everything changed when a man got sick, and that's basically the way it went. In 1925, a 36 year old chemist at USRC died of anemia, and the Essex County health examiner guy that will figure in pretty prominently here going forward, dr. Harrison Martland got involved, and this is what it took. It took a man dying for them to sit up and pay attention. He launched an investigation. It was very sneaky, actually. He actually secretly recruited the technical director from USRC as a radiation expert. And his name was this is one of the best names we've ever said on the show, dr. Saban. A. Von Sakaki. And they took autopsy tissue from some of the bone from these young women who had died I'm sorry, from the original chemist. And they analyzed it, and they said, yeah, he is basically glowing with radiation. Yeah. I have to say also, Dr. Von So Chalky, he was even more than just the technical director. He was the co founder of US. Radio, and he actually created the radium paint on dark that the company used. So the idea of him basically turning on the company in order to get to the bottom of what was going on, I think that's pretty commendable in that sense. It is. He and Martin got a Geiger counter. I think it was sort of an early crewed version, basically. And they started going around to the houses and in the hospitals where some of these young women were, and. Everything was radioactive. They tested employees at the plant that even weren't sick. They were radioactive. Basically everyone that worked there was radioactive, including Von Sakaki himself. He breathed into the thing, and I think he registered the highest radioactive level of everybody and died within a few years. From jaw cancer? Yeah. At age 45. And from what I saw, also, if you took a Geiger counter to the gravesite of these people who worked at these factories still today, the Geiger counter would measure it would be set off by the radioactivity coming from 6ft of earth separating you and the remains. Isn't that nuts? Dude, it will do that for 1000 years. Wow. And supposedly the bodies are still glowing underground. I saw that one woman who worked at another one, we'll talk about Radium dial company. She was assumed to be examined for, I think, a lawsuit later on. And they found that she was so radioactive that when they reburied her, they buried her in a lead lined coffin. Yeah. I mean, this is super radioactive, right? I think we've established that. It's just hard to wrap your mind around how radioactive these people were. And it's crazy that they even live. Some of them live for a few more years. Like Molly Maggia. She died pretty quickly. The woman whose jaw came out, she died within a couple of years. Some women lasted four, five, six, I think even seven years, possibly. And the amount of radiation they're exposed to and the effects that it had on their body made from the time they got sick to the time they died, just basically like a living hell. And the fact that they're still radioactive today really kind of drives home, like, how painful that must have been for them. Because apparently bone pain is not like regular pain at all. Like, if your muscle hurts or joint hurts, you can just kind of, like, move your arm or something and it starts to feel a little bit better. With bone pain, you can't do that. Nothing makes it feel better. It's just like constant pain. And that's what you get when you have radium in your bones. So five of these women got together that were still living, obviously, and went to court, or they didn't go to court right away. It took a long time. It took a long time for them to get enough money together to hire attorneys, because there wasn't anyone initially who would take these cases pro bono. And so it took years to raise the money to do this. And one of the woman's name was Grace Friar. She was basically the leader of the factory workers. And she had to wear a back brace because her spine had basically rotted out from the inside and was crushed. She had at least 20 surgeries on her jaw. Another woman's name was Albina Larisse. She had two still bursts and couldn't walk. Another woman was Catherine Shaob. I think her cousin died was another fellow worker there. They were like, we have to do something. Here they have all these medical bills. They couldn't even basically pay rent. And finally, after a couple of years, managed to find an attorney who would take it on pro bono. And they knew they didn't have long to live at this point. And it's not like they wanted some windfall of money. They just wanted to get by until they died, and they wanted to make sure that this didn't happen again. Yeah. And again, this is like, new stuff, basically, where workers are like, these were unsafe working conditions. We're going to see our employer. This is pretty, like, groundbreaking. So initially, the women asked for, I think, $250,000 apiece each for all five of them. And their lawyer, Raymond Barry, he apparently was a really good lawyer and really kind of fought the good fight for him. And one of the ways that they were ultimately successful, because it's kind of an understatement to say that US radium fought this lawsuit rather than settling, was that they recruited the press, basically. And in particular, the editor of The New York World, a guy named Walter Lippman, took up this cause. At the time, the New York newspapers were, like, the most important media organizations in the world, and The New York World was one of the bigger ones. So it was having all of the 24 hours news networks on your side, drumming up public support for your cause, and that really helped them. But even in the end, they didn't get anything even remotely close to that quarter of a million they were asking for. So what the radio corporation did at first was, they said, in New Jersey, the law says that we only have to pay you anything if it's within the first two years of your exposure. And because it took so long for them to raise this money, it was beyond that point, which is just a pretty vile thing to do, obviously. Eventually, they settled for $10,000 each, plus $600 a year for when they were alive, which was only a few years for each of them. I think within five years, all of them had passed away. It was later exposed that the judge in the case was a stakeholder in USRC. I saw it, too, which is really pretty dirty, obviously. And then I think by 30 years later, 41 of those original painters had died from different cancers. Yeah. Not a single one of the original five litigants from the lawsuit made it past age 38. You have, by the way, a .1% lifetime risk of developing bone cancer. Bone cancer is really rare. You can get cancer in your bones if you have a different cancer that spreads to your bones. But to start out with bone cancer, like many of these women did, it's incredibly rare. So the idea of a cluster of them all happening in this one factory and the company having nothing to do with it was preposterous. So the fact that they just got to settle for $10,000 per woman was actually kind of a coup. But one of the things that the initial five Radium girls were fighting for was to create awareness. Like, this is dangerous, and there are other women out there in the country and in the world who are doing the same thing, eating radium pain every day, and we want this to stop. And it actually did have that effect, that knock on effect, and not one but Chuck, as you told me before, to my styleman, two other cases where companies were basically forced to settle and eventually radium paint was driven out of use. Yeah, the other one, or one of the other two was the radium doll factory that we mentioned earlier in Ottawa, Illinois. And I don't know if you can rank, like, which ones were more gross and dirty and awful, but radium Dial, they actually did know what was going on the whole time. For years, they had been testing their employees. They had doctors coming in and they were giving them annual physicals and they were recording radiation levels and they just never told them. Basically, I think before they went and filed that lawsuit, they were just suppressing information bearing everything they could. They even did autopsies and then tampered with those autopsies. I think that's what you were mentioning earlier was that the other company did that too. And they also lucked out by having an amazing lawyer, too. They were led by two women catherine Wolf Donahue and Charlotte Nevans. Purcell kind of took the lead for the lawsuit against radium Dial. And this is years after this had made, like, the national press, the US. Radio lawsuit. Everybody was talking about it, and for years some companies managed to avoid any kind of culpability. And finally, Donahue and Purcell, with the help of their lawyer Leonard Grossman, filed lawsuit against Radium Dial. They tried some underhanded stuff themselves in addition to the whole autopsy thing, but once they were found out, they decided to shut down and then reopen in New York as a different company. And they said, oh, yeah, that other company was terrible, but it doesn't exist anymore. We're a new company now, so forget that lawsuit. And they were ruled against and were held accountable still. Yeah. And obviously, like you mentioned, because of all of this, it was a very big deal for this country as far as workers rights, safety in the workplace. It kind of directly led it took a long time, but it kind of directly led to the forming of OSHA, which was a big deal. I think it directly led in to the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. And of course, this was for the public at large, so we weren't ingesting stuff like that in our cosmetics. But it also protected workers who are putting that stuff in the cosmetics years after the public was protected, for sure. But yeah, it definitely had a real impact and a real effect on the world. One of the things I saw, though, about Radium dial corporations headquarters, it was finally demolished in Ottawa, Illinois, and the town used the rubble as backfill and landfill around the town. So now there's 16 radioactive superfund sites around poor little Ottawa, Illinois, that the EPA is dealing with cleaning up, and it's causing all sorts of problems for the residents of the town. So it was like this one big problem, and then they spread it out all over town when they use the rubble. Yeah. Not super fun. Super fun. There's a really important D on the end of that, too. They really overpronounce that. D agreed. You got anything else about the Radium girls? I don't. The movies on Netflix. You can check it out. It's a little late to endorse it now. Well, I mean, it's not terrible. I think on Rotten Tomatoes it had like a 70 something, but it just critically wasn't well reviewed. And also not by me. I see. Well, since Chuck said, also not by me, of course. Everyone, that means it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this a Nashville's response to the Grand Opera show. Hey, guys. I just want to give you a shout out about how much this native Nashville enjoyed your episode about the grand old opera. I grew up hearing about the Ryman's perfect acoustics and stories of country stars drinking at Tootsie's bar behind the opera until it was time to go on stage and running through the aligning back doors. My first job was actually at Opera Land theme park. Oh, wow. I wonder if we met. It was at the water ride in the floom zoom. I think I do remember you, Camille. Immediately across us was the Porter Wagner stage. And Mr. Wagner himself performed every Friday. I now live in Chicago, and honestly, it's a little hard to visit Nashville since it's become a destination hotspot for bachelor and bachelorette parties. I didn't know that. Did you know that? I didn't either. No. It makes sense, though. I mean, I know that's where you had your bachelor party. I'll never forget that night. Sure, Nashville, it's crazy. Plus, skyrocketing rents and new developments have pushed out a lot of locals and mom and pop businesses. Future episode recommendation repercussions of being an it city. But listening to your episode reminded me of the quirky little city I grew up in. Plus, I learned some cool facts about the opera I didn't know. Longtime fan. That is Camille McCarthy. That's high praise coming from an OG Nashville. Yeah, and Camille also responded when I told her it was going to be a listener mail with a big woohoo. You guys are awesome. I just knocked out your Venus episode while grocery shopping. Fantastic. Well, thanks a lot, Camille. I appreciate that. I hope you got some good groceries, I hope you wore a mask while you went grocery shopping, and I hope you're vaccinated. Nice. Full circle there. Yeah. If you want to get in touch with me, Chuck jerry. Chuck Covet. Whatever. You can write us all an email to stuffpodcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts, my heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
https://podcasts.howstuf…-burns-final.mp3	What's the deal with controlled burns?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/whats-the-deal-with-controlled-burns	Starting a fire to prevent fire seems counterintuitive, but it makes a lot of sense once you understand it. But controlled burns aren't just to help prevent forest fires. They're also a vital part of keeping the local ecosystem healthy and thriving. Learn	Starting a fire to prevent fire seems counterintuitive, but it makes a lot of sense once you understand it. But controlled burns aren't just to help prevent forest fires. They're also a vital part of keeping the local ecosystem healthy and thriving. Learn	Thu, 09 Jun 2016 16:23:31 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2016, tm_mon=6, tm_mday=9, tm_hour=16, tm_min=23, tm_sec=31, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=161, tm_isdst=0)	38489951	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"This episode of Stuff You Should Know is sponsored by Squarespace. Whether you need a landing page, a beautiful gallery, a professional blog, or an online store, it's all possible with the Squarespace website. Go to squarespace.com and set your website upon heart. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W, Chuck, Bryant and Jerry's over there. And there's some coffee. See a few posters. There's a beesley brand storage thing. Are you getting some of that beasley catch coming your way? Maybe. What's that all about? I hope it's beasley. It could also be biasley. You know, I got a listener mail from someone who went to get a bonsai tree in Boston after they were inspired after our episode. And the dude, she's like, have you been busy? And the guy was like, this week we've been like, People want bonsai trees. The phone has been off the hook. No way. Yeah, we could be getting some of that bonds. I scratch. We definitely should be. We're getting nothing. Japan should be giving us money. What's their monetary unit? Yen. Is it still the end? The Japanese yen. We need mini yen coming our way. Yeah. Soon. Mini Yen. And they're going to try to flash some numbers at you. You'll be like, wow, that's a lot. Just remember it's about \u00a5100 to one dollars. I'll let you negotiate that one. I think it's ten now. Yeah, I don't remember. And the other night I turned on the television and Karate Kid was on. Oh, I saw that. Just moments before the wonderful bonsai scene. Yeah, I saw it. You took a picture of your television. Yeah, and I put it on Instagram. I saw our instagram SYSK podcast. Yeah. We're trying to take more pictures. Isn't that what you do? Share ourselves? Yeah, but this isn't about Monsieur. No. I've got one more shout out, though. There's a dude named Erin Sykes who remember when we had our horror fiction contest years back? Sure. And we said that anybody who was a part of it, if they ever published anything, we give them a shout out. In perpetuity. In perpetuity. And Aaron Sites published something. He published a short story collection called The Andrew Jackson Stories, and he says that it's published by Lockjaw Magazine. And he said they're about Andrew Jackson. About as much as Richard brought against trout fishing in America is about trout fishing. That means nothing to me. Well, it wasn't really about trout fishing, but it's a slim little book. He sent it to us. I haven't read it yet, but he swears up and down that it's awesome, so we're going to go ahead and take his word for it. But congratulations, Aaron Sites, and if you want to go get your hands on Andrew Jackson's Stories, go look it up. Go to the Lockjaw magazine site, I would imagine. Yeah. So that's done. And now we can talk about Controlled Burns. Yes. Good band name. Controlled Burn. Yes. Depending on, like, maybe if it was, like, a soft rock group. Yeah, they're like 80s wedding band. Controlled Burn. Oh, sure. Good evening. We are controlled burn. And this is by ELO, right? Or Logins and Messina. Yeah. I'm not dissing ELO, by the way. I love it. No, ELO is great. Did you see Kenny logging on documentary now? Yeah. Which episode was that? It was the two part one about the what was their thing? I don't know. They were a band. Oh, that's right. Yeah. That was, like, the greatest band name ever. I want to say California Chrome, but that was that racehorse. I don't remember what they were called. Was it Controlled Burn? No, but that was a good one. That two parter. Great show. Love that show. There's a new season coming out, right? They should. Okay, so again, we're talking about Controlled Burning, not a ban, an actual thing. Yeah. And this ties into our wildfires episode, which we did years back. Yeah, but, Chuck, I always loved the opportunity to talk about 1491. Here we go. And here's what now? All right, so it wasn't until about 1491 the book, by the way, right. If you're new to the show, which is Josh's Long stated favorite book. So long. And you've talked about it a lot. At least 50, 60 times. Yeah. And I would have read it by now if you hadn't talked about it so much. You don't even need to now you know, the whole book. So one of the premises of it is that our understanding of Native America in north and Meso and South America prior to Columbus coming over is, like, just totally wrong. There are way more people they were way more advanced than anthropology and archaeologies Long giving them credit for. Yeah. They have Internet cafes. Pretty much. They did. But it wasn't until, like, the early two thousand s that this idea of the noble savage who treaded lightly on the ecosystem, on the environment, started to crumble. Right. And we started to realize that a lot of the features, what the early explorers thought were natural features of north and south in Mesoamerica were actually really well managed ecosystems. Right. And one of the ways that Native Americans used or managed ecosystems was through fire. But again, there was this idea that Native Americans just had no idea what they were doing with anything. So whenever archaeologists up until about 2000, 2001 or two, the late 90s, maybe anytime, they came across evidence of, like, a fire and it seemed like the Native Americans had set it, they just assumed that either the Native Americans had set it to amuse themselves yeah. Because they're big dummies. Or because a campfire got out of control because they're big dummies. Right. Boy. But this is what they came up with. They're like, oh, well, they clearly wanted to set some fires for fun. Right. They couldn't have possibly had any point to it. Sure. But then more and more investigation has shown, like no, actually, not only did they know what they were doing, if you step back and look at North America, the whole continent was a managed set of ecosystems. And one of the ways they did it was through fire. The other thing that interested me, too, was, depending on the explorers and the Europeans and the settlers that came over to North America, some of them came, and that was not anything new to them. It turns out that using fire to manage ecosystems is almost universal. Yeah, basically. Yeah. I mean, some of the reasons they might have done it of course, these days one of the main reasons we do it is to prevent forest fires from spreading. Right. Which we'll get to. But back then they would use it to improve the foraging conditions for free ranging cattle, increased visibility, access. There were all kinds of great reasons to burn things in a controlled way. Yeah. Supposedly the early explorers didn't really think about it, but the historians went back and looked at it. The explorers who used to say that you can't get through the forests in North America. We're talking about swampland, like lands that wouldn't burn, but you could drive, like a car through a forest in, like, Ohio or something like that. Yeah. Although there are swamps in Ohio, a non swampy part of Ohio, because of the use of fire. Are there swamps in Ohio? Yeah, there were. They filled them in and built Toledo over it. So you were talking about when Europeans came upon the scene. It's really interesting. I read this article called the Historical Foundations of Prescribed Burning for Wildlife Colon a Southeastern Perspective Beautiful by Asidney Johnson and Philippi Hale, and I think it was an academic paper or something, but it started dawn on me when they were talking about the founding of America, why we ended up like we ended up. It just kind of all came together for me. I love reading stuff like that. It connects dots that weren't connected before. And this was a simple dot I should have connected before, but basically in the northeast of the United States, it was largely settled by people from the southern lowlands of England. People that lived in cities and people that had not, for the most part, lived on farms and didn't have a lot of experience with agriculture, and certainly not with prescribed burning, which is another name for a controlled burn. Right. And then in the south, particularly the Southeast, we were more populated by people from rural areas of the UK. In Scotland and Ireland and western England. They had a lot of experience with farming. Right. And then I started to think, oh, wait a minute, that all just makes total sense. That's why the North East became industrialized. It's why the south were a bunch of yokeles they were agrarian, and it was a very obvious thing, but it just sort of coalesced in my mind. Yeah. Anyway, I knew that part already, the industrialization aspects of it. But one of the things that coalesced for me was wondering how much of the Civil War was driven by rivalries that go back to England and Scotland and Ireland rather than just the context of North America in the US. Absolutely. Because I think for the most part, once people came over here, they did things like they did them over there, which makes sense. Like Scarlett O'Hara's father had the Irish brogue, remember? No. Yeah, her dad. I'm pretty sure he did. Unless I'm losing my mind right now. Well, it's been a while since I've seen that movie. I'm pretty sure. I believe it. Okay. But it makes sense. And like you said, maybe the attitudes came along with that. Maybe that carried over into how people felt about each other. Precisely. War. Yeah, I'll bet it did. But the point of all this is that up north, there was fire suppression. That was the key driver. Right. Like they would try to keep fires from breaking out under any circumstances. Yeah. And don't get confused, because a suppressing fire is a controlled burn. Fire suppression is putting out fires. So maybe we should just say up north, they didn't think that starting fires on purpose was smart. Yeah. They were like, no fires. And down south, they said, no, we've been doing it in England for years. They were like, fire. Yeah. Fire is a good way to manage things. Yeah. And that's how the nation was divided, at least at first. And then the Civil War happened. And interestingly, the Yankees came down and said, hey, this old plantation will make a really great hunting preserve, and I'm going to buy it now that I own this enormous tract of land in the south. I'm a Yankee, and we don't believe in fire, so I'm going to make sure no fire ever breaks out here, even though everybody's been using fire techniques for generations. Yeah. And interestingly, too, the fire techniques that the founders in the south use were the same kind that the Native Americans in that area used. Right. So they're on the same page thousands of miles apart and basically came and kind of started doing the same thing or kept doing the same thing that Native Americans were doing. And what makes it even more interesting is that using fire is not universal to ecosystems. Right. There's different techniques or not using it at all, depending on the type of ecosystem you're dealing with. Well, yeah, because in the southern lowlands, apparently the forests were like fire sensitive hardwoods and spruce trees. So it's sort of dependent on what kind of forest you had. Right. I guess there's weren't as flammable. Right. Or inflammable, which is a word I think we should just get rid of entirely inflammable. Yeah, it means the same thing as flammable, but it sounds like it means the opposite. It's just a stupid word. Really? Yeah. Inflammable. I've never heard of it. That's great. That's all the more reason to get rid of it. That's crazy. Inflammable means flammable. What's the point? Man, what a dumb language. The point of the whole thing is that fire is a natural feature of a living, thriving ecosystem. It's something humans are terrified of. But on the environmental level on the ecological level, it's a necessary component to keep any or most ecosystems healthy. Right? Yes. And some groups of people understood this. The people who ended up running the show after the Civil War did not believe this, and it actually has had a very large impact throughout the 20th century in the United States, which we're just now overcoming. We can actually thank one guy for changing the attitude toward fires and using them for wildfire management, and we'll talk about him right after this. All right, so you teased the name drop. I did. Right before the break in 1923. There was just one particular Northern landowner that came down south and bought up a bunch of plantations named Henry Bidell, and he hated fire. Fire had burned his favorite horse. Maybe. You never know. So he hated Fire. He was appalled at the idea of burning land, but other people, like we were saying in the south, said, no, it's a good thing. In 1923, they commissioned the US. Bureau of Biological Survey, which was precursor to the Fish and Wildlife Service, and it was headed up at the time by a guy named Herbert L. Stoddard, who was the name that you teased. Right. And Stoddard actually, the thing that kicked it off the most was that these guys who bought these huge plantations and turned them into preserves, they like to hunt quail. Yeah. Right. And they noticed that the Bob White quail population was declining every year, and they had no idea why, so they brought stattered in, and Stoddard became a Bob White quail expert. Well, he already was. Oh, he was already that's why they brought him in. Yeah, he wrote a book about it. And this guy was awesome. He literally helped found a profession of wildlife management. Right. The whole field is, like, basically this guy. Yes. He wrote, like, some legendary books that are still used today. He was, like, literally the first critic of industrialized agriculture. He's just this sort of champion and a Georgian. A transplant to Georgia. Yeah. I think he's from Chicago, but did a lot of work here, for sure. Yeah. So he starts looking into the quail situation down here, and he's like, well, you need to burn them. There's your problem. You guys have a woody undergrowth problem? I looked into this, and Bob White quail requires some of the most complex habitats you've ever heard of. Right. Yeah. So they thrive in areas where you've got what's called woody cover, which are dense shrubbery that's like mostly woody that they can use is what's called Kobe headquarters. It's like little escape patches and they need them all over the place. But in addition to this, they also need food sources. So they need like, crops of a certain variety, and then they also need some grassy areas and they need all this stuff in certain proportions. And if you have the proportions right, which apparently they did, the quail populations thrive. But if you have too much of one thing, then the coil population is diminished. And that one thing that had grown up was the woody undergrowth. And the reason the woody undergrowth was allowed to grow up was because the Yankees came in and stopped using fire. That's right. Isn't that interesting? So it was all because these rich guys, these rich industrialists who wanted to hunt whale, we're like, where's all the quail? Right? And they hired the government to come look into it. And this government guy came in and was like, oh, here's the problem. You guys need to set this on fire. But the thing is no one listened to him. Well, no, he had a few people that they hired him for his expertise. So he had a few people that got on board, but he fought for many years, like the history of control burning. It wasn't until post World War two is when it started to catch on a little bit and then in the became more commonplace. But it wasn't until 1971 that the US. Forest service had their very first symposium on prescribed burns. And that's what really turned the tide. But this was the 1920s, and it took all the way to the 1970s for it to become, like, completely accepted as the right way to do things. Yeah. And in the meantime, we had a lot of unnecessary wildfires. Well, and one of the reasons, too, was apparently all the forestry workers in the south were from the north, and so they had these bad experiences in England and elsewhere with devastating fires that kill people and wiped out villages. Right. And apparently they also had this German influence, like a protectionist influence from Germans in forestry school that was taught to them that way. Got you. So they were doing it all wrong. Well, one of the other explanations I saw for why the forestry service is like, no, you can't burn down here is because I guess one of the spoils of winning the Civil war was that the north came down and just clear cut the south of its pine. And they figured, well, the pine forests have been so devastated for what? For timber. Yeah. That we can't let any fire happen or else this pine is never going to recover. So we really can't do any burning now. So eventually everybody started listening to stoddard and now we use fire pretty much everywhere in the United States. And there's a couple of reasons to set fires on purpose. And the coolest one is that if you set fires on purpose, you actually prevent wildfires down the line. Yeah. We're not talking about completely burning down every tree in the forest. They're mainly burning the stuff that will catch everything on fire, like the understory, the underbrush, the dead leaves, dead branches, stuff on the ground. Right. And if you burn that on purpose, you burn out the fuel for, again, a future out of control wildfire. One of the other things you do is you open up the canopy, right? Yeah. So you're burning out some trees, but for the most part, the older, more established trees can survive. And since that canopy has opened up, more sunlight can come through. And when more sunlight can come through, you have smaller trees that can start to grow. So there's more reproduction, actually. Yeah. And if you're listening, thinking, well, this all sounds great, but that release a ton of carbon emissions in the air when you're burning things. And if you're burning thousands and tens of thousands of acres a year on purpose, aren't you just adding to the problem? No, I was being coy, but the answer is no. Well, it depends. It's a little bit of both. I thought this was a little strange for the way that this was parceled out. So on the one hand, in this article, it says no, actually, they've done studies, and the large established trees that can survive a controlled burn actually lock in more carbon. In the long run, the control burn releases less than, say, a wildfire that's burning out of control, that burns those trees and unlocks that carbon. Right? Yeah. And then later on in the last section of this article, the author's like, yeah, that really just depends on what kind of forest you're talking about. In some forests, it doesn't make a difference at all. And yes, then in that case, it's bad for the environment. I don't know about that last part. I'm just saying. I just think it was weird. Well, I think it's cool that like what you just said, that the large trees capture that carbon, and if you burn off the small stuff underneath what you said earlier, it's going to open up that canopy and let those big trees grow bigger. Yeah. And that's going to be good in the long run. Long term gain for short term carbon emission output. Right. And then also, in addition to opening up that canopy, allowing more sunlight so reproduction can happen. Actually, they found some species of trees that depend on fire to reproduce, and chief among them is the giant Sequoia, beautiful trees in Yosemite, and I think the 60s, they're, like the Sequoias aren't reproducing what's going on? And somebody, a guy named Doctor Richard Hartzfeld said, I think it has to do with fire. We stopped doing fire, and we want to do fire, so let's do some fire, and they're like, Shut up, Herzfeld. You can't even talk, right? And he's like, I'm going to go burn some stuff and prove you guys wrong. So he started doing some tests. He did fire tests, and he found that when fire was applied to a sequoia forest, the sequoia cones opened up and their seeds could germinate. Yeah, and the big daddies are very fire resistant, so they were like, I'm a little hot underneath in the undercarriage, but it feels nice, but it feels pretty good, and I'm going to stand strong. But what I'm going to do, as I said, is I'm going to open my cones. And the other thing it does is when you drop seeds, if you have a woody understory. And under story is another word for that. Under brush. Right? Under what did you call it? Under coverage. Woody cover for a bob white coil. That's what the bob white coils call it amongst themselves. All right, so imagine a seed dropping from a pine cone from 100ft up, right? And the ground is covered in leaves and sticks and things. That seed might fall on a pile of leaves six inches deep. And just sit there. Just sit there and be like, I'm unfulfilled. Aka. It never makes contact with the soil where it needs to be to establish roots. Right. Or even if it did, the sunlight is being blocked out by the understory. And fire solves all those problems. It does. Because fire pops that pine cone open, the seeds come out. They are in the newly burned ground, which has a lot of carbon fertilizer now in the form of ashes. Sure. And lots of sunlight coming through because the underscore has been burned away. So fire is the greatest thing ever. Pretty amazing. But again, we said before, it depends on the ecosystem. Right. So especially out in California, they got kind of burn happy. They're like, oh, wait, fire can actually suppress wildfires. We have tons of wildfires out here. We need to burn all the time. And they started burning and burning and burning in Southern California, and it had zero impact on diminishing wildfires, and they couldn't figure out why. And they finally said, well, maybe we should study the ecosystem we're setting on fire and see what's what. And they found that they really shouldn't be burning the Southern California ecosystem to prevent wildfires. So that actually makes it worse in this case. Yeah. In Southern California, they have what's called chaparral. And if you've ever been to Southern California, you know that it looks lovely now in the neighborhoods, because people planted stuff everywhere. But the hillsides are kind of gross. They're brown and they are thorny and they're shrubby. It's like all tumbleweeds. Yeah, it's just sort of gross in those canyons. Right. And that's just my opinion. Yes. Well, that's chaparral, right? Yeah. Okay. And that chaparral. Well, if you leave everything to itself there, apparently it's super fire resistant. Right. So if you left it naturally, it would only catch flame every 100 years or so. Right. But they were setting fire to this every few years in order to try to prevent wildfires. And what they were ultimately doing was burning the chaparral, which was naturally flame resistant, right? Yes. And in favor of the chaparral, what was since it took a long time to grow back, the stuff that was beating the chaparral out that could grow faster was actually very flammable. So they were promoting the growth of wildfire fuel in Southern California by burning the Chevrolet. Too much good stuff. It is really interesting. All right, well, let's take a break and we'll come back and talk a little bit about climate change and how that factors in and then how you can do your own controlled burn. All right. By the way, I was kidding. No one should try this ever. We should have probably not broken for a minute or so before you said that. I don't think anyone just paused and said, oh, my gosh, I'm going to run out, because we didn't teach them yet. Oh, that's a good point. You should never start a fire. You don't start fires. Okay. Got that out of the way. Climate change is having an impact on these wildfires. From between 1979, there's a season of wildfire season we talked about in our episode, when it's just more likely to happen. And between 1979 and 2013, the global fire season increased by almost 19%. Yeah. Which means, like, the fire season grew longer around the world by that much, which is bad. And at the rate of 864,000,000 acres worldwide of wildfire that burn every year, which is an amazing number, apparently, that emits more than half the amount of carbon that fossil fuels put out in the atmosphere. Yeah. So it's awful. That's a tremendous amount. Right? Yeah. And it's a feedback loop. It is. Because it contributes CO2 to the atmosphere, which promotes the greenhouse effect. Right. The greenhouse effect creates drought conditions. It heats things up, it lowers humidity, and it becomes a vicious cycle. Right. Because when you have drought conditions, you have more dead trees that provide more fuel for more wildfires, and more wildfires put more CO2 into the air, which promotes the greenhouse effect. And it gets worse and worse. More wind, too. Yeah. It's a big problem. Yeah. I was reading about the Fort McMurray wildfire up in Canada, and apparently they just had some freak weather. The Fred McMurray wildfire? Yeah. He was like, I got no Fred McMurray jokes. The city like a little outside town. They think the fire started somewhere out there. They're not sure what did it yet, but they had some freak weather where it was, like, 91 deg. They still have, like, frozen lakes up there right now, but the temperature was, like 91 deg. Humidity was at, like, 15%, and winds were at about 45 miles an hour. So it was just ripe for a wildfire, and now it's up to about 450,000 ha, which is exactly a ton of acres, I think. Yeah. Man. All right, so how do you start a controlled burn? How do you do this carefully? Well, first of all, you want to work for Forest Service or Fish and Game. Yeah. The author of this article says go to local authorities. I'm like, you can do this if you're not a local authority, but I guess you could like he also mentions the landowner in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey yeah. That does his own controlled burns. Right. Surely you got permitted if you're doing it yourself. Right. Well, yes, you're saying go to local authorities, but I was surprised that you can do it if you're not a local authority. Yeah, I didn't know that either. Right. In fact, I'm still not quite convinced. At the very least, you want to collaborate closely with local authorities if you're not one. That's right. Okay. Yeah. I mean, this beginning stuff is get your permits, find out what the best time of year and all that stuff. What you need to do is just leave it to the people who do it best. Right, but this is what they're going to do. But the first thing that you want to do after you've gotten all your equipment and all that good stuff is look at the weather and pick out a good time to do it. Yeah. You want it kind of damp. Sure. You want the humidity above 25%, ideally low winds. Yeah. Basically everything the opposite of the weather, like it was in Fort McMurray on May 1. Yeah. Less than 80 deg. And then once you've got everything all set up and you've got a great day picked out, you're going to start a tiny little test fire in a corner. First you want to wake up and have a complete breakfast. Then you can go start your test fire. Test fire. Basically, you just look at it and say, how are you going to behave today? Yeah. Well, even before you set the test fire, you want to plan out your area that you want to burn and in the area you want to identify natural fire breaks. These are things like roads, bodies of water, that kind of stuff. Things that the fire is not going to spread across. Right. Ideally. And then you want to create even more fire breaks around it where there aren't natural ones. You want to plow and dig and cut and basically create an area to where the fire can't spread outside of the place you want to contain it into. I wonder if dropping an atom bomb on a wildfire would work. Operation Plaster. Sure. I don't think so. Probably. I think that would make everything a lot worse. So once you've got all your fire breaks, both natural and the ones you've just made yourself with your hands. You want to start your first fire called the backfire. Yeah. And the backfire is downwind. Yeah. It's against that fire break, so you know it's only going to be going in one direction. It's against the wind, so it's not going to be super fast. Right. And you're going to be able to control it. Like you're kind of starting off nice and easy. Yeah. Just don't kill yourself out of the gate. Yeah. Just take it nice and easy like you said. Right. Then after you got the backfire going, you create flank fires, one on each side, right? Yeah. And they are not necessarily going against the wind, so they're going to burn a little bit faster. Yeah, they are right angles to the wind. Right. And one of the neat things about fire when you're creating a controlled burn is the places you're burning first actually create fire breaks themselves. Yes. They burn the fuel. Have you ever seen the gods? Must be crazy too. Didn't see the second one. There's like a bush fire and I can't remember the main guy's name is awesome. He saves his companions by setting fire to the grass around them so that the brush fire has nothing to burn when it gets to them. So he creates a fire break, basically by burning the area around them before the fire gets there. So he controlled it himself. Was that good? The sequel? Sure. Yeah, both of them are really good. I remember that when it came out, it was kind of one of the first foreign sort of indie movies that made a big dust up. I feel like they got a lot of attention to Be Crazy holds up, does it? Yeah. I have to check it out again. So where were we? We've got our flank fires, we got our backfires, we're creating larger fire breaks, and then you want to ignite the big daddy, the head fire, right? Yes, the head fire. It goes in the direction of the wind. It's upwind, so it blows very quickly downwind and spreads quick. That's right. But because you said it last, there's less fuel for it to burn. It's going to finish out the fire for you pretty quick, but it's not going to go beyond the areas that have already been burned because you just created those fire breaks by burning them on the backfire and the flank fires. Yeah. So after that happens, your fire should be done and you can go home. Just forget about it. After you set that head fire, just get in your truck and go home. No, there's a little bit more. You got to stay there, my friend, until afterward. And then they call it mop up duty when you obviously put out all the flames completely with water, cut down any little trees that are on fire and just extinguish everything and leave it a big, smoldering, nasty mess that is actually going to be good for the environment. Yeah. And you got to tell everybody who drives by and shouts at you for setting a fire that you're doing this because it's better off in the long run. Justifies the means. Pretty neat. Yeah. Another tip, don't wear rubber clothing when you're part of a fire setting crew because it can melt and stick to your skin. This is something I didn't look into. I wonder if the surely they're just wildfire fighting teams that are doing this, right? The same people, right? I would guess. I would hope. Because the thing is yes, you can be told how to set a fire. I think that's probably the easy part. Like figuring out how to adjust when it starts to get out of control or doesn't do what you think it's going to do or the weather conditions change or if it jumps that fire break that you think is big enough. Right. That's when I think you need somebody who's, like, experienced. Yeah, it's got to be somebody. There should be the same people doing this who know what they're doing. Yeah, I'm sure it is. And if that's what you do, we want to hear from you, so shout out to us. Well, yeah, I think we heard from some fire jumpers in the last episode we did from the wildfire one, and that was a good one, too. Go back and listen to that. Everybody do it now if you want to learn more about control. Burns, you can type those words in the search bar housetofworks.com because I said search bar. It's time for listener ma'am. I'm going to call this mind blown. Not my mind. Listener's mind. Hey, guys. I was listening to the landfills episode and the most important issue you brought up is the song Powerhouse by the Raymond Scott Quintet. Josh had hummed a snippet and Chuck said it was looney tunes. That was a moment of cognitive dissonance that rivaled almost anything I've suffered in my 41 years. Because Josh was actually humming a bit of La Villa or La Via Strangeato by Rush. Not some dumb 50s band. I know that song. So this caught my attention. Powerhouse is from the like an orchestral that's right. Not a 50s band. This guy is out of his mind. Well, yeah, maybe so. I couldn't believe you were singing a part of one of my favorite songs by one of my favorite bands and crediting someone else. As I watched the Raymond Scott video, though, the universe refocused. Like when the candle holder resolves into faces or the Canadian flag is irreversibly changed into two angry guys pressing their foreheads together, face closed. Have you ever seen that? The Canadian flag? No. I've seen one that says, like, Jesus loves you, or something like that. I never knew that. The Canadian flag, if you look at a certain way, looks like two guys. I went and looked and sort of what about the man on the moon? You ever seen that? I don't know. Well, then you haven't. Okay. You would know. Yeah, it's kind of like yeah, I guess I can see that. It's like the arrow in the FedEx logo. Like, once you see it, you can't unsee it unless you really want to, and then you can't okay. I don't see what this guy is talking about with the Canadian flag. Yeah, well, you have to type in Canadian flag faces and then someone will have it's. A bit of a stretch, if you ask me. Have you ever seen any Sister Wendy stuff? No. She is a nun who just understands art and art history like no one else on the planet. And she had like, a PBS show for a little while and she would just point out things in art that you would just never think to look for, like in the negative space sometimes, but also more like the shadows surrounding a family or something. It makes them look isolated. And you're like, oh, yeah, I didn't really put my finger on that, or whatever. Got you. She's just got this really great knack for explaining art in really interesting ways, and I think it's online for free. All right. Sorry about that. No, that's all right. So where are we? Canadian flag. Two angry guys. Thanks for broadening my understanding of one of the first Rush songs I learned to play on drums. Then I found this on Song facts.com, and it sounds credible. Apparently, this was an issue and Rush did not give credit to Scott for using Powerhouse. By the time Raymond Scott's publisher notified the band's management of the infringement, the statute of limitations had expired of the challenge. But Russia's management, out of deference to Mr. And Mrs. Scott and being the class act that they are, offered a one time payments payment, feeling it was the ethical thing to do. All involved were happy with the resolution and Rush has no further financial obligations. Wow. The story. I know under the settlement, they're not required to accord Raymond Scott partial songwriting credit on the piece. So apparently Powerhouse in Russia's, Laville strange were similar and they nicked it from there. Never knew. I didn't either. And that is from Ken Rinker in Colorado Springs. Thanks a lot, Ken. He says, Best to Jerry in the game. Jerry says thanks, I think. Yeah, ken, that was awesome. I take back that you're out of your mind. You're interesting instead. How about that? Yes. If you want to get in touch with us, you can tweet to us at SYSK podcast. You can join us on Instagram, at siskpodcast too. You can join us on Facebook.com stuffyshoodnow, you can send us an email to stuffpodcast@houseofworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the web stuffyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howtofworks.com hey, it's summer, everybody, which means schools out, the sun shining, the daylights longer. And best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon music my Favorite Murder from exactly right media. My Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarriff and Georgia Hardstarkk, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite murder. One week earlier on Amazon Music Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
6700e6a4-6e41-11e8-be11-3b98f3cf36ad	How The Pill Changed the World	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-pill-changed-the-world	When the birth control pill hit the market in 1960 it landed like a social bomb. Almost overnight, women gained the ability to separate sex from pregnancy and everything from feminism to patients’ rights centered on it.	When the birth control pill hit the market in 1960 it landed like a social bomb. Almost overnight, women gained the ability to separate sex from pregnancy and everything from feminism to patients’ rights centered on it.	Tue, 19 Jun 2018 13:30:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2018, tm_mon=6, tm_mday=19, tm_hour=13, tm_min=30, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=170, tm_isdst=0)	43520081	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime four days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon Music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. This July, don't miss an entire summer of surprises on Disney Plus with Disney's High School Musical, the Musical, the series, season three Zombies, three Doctor Strange in the multiverse of Madness and the wonderful summer of Mickey Mouse. Plus new episodes of Marvel Studios, ms. Marvel and National Geographics. America the Beautiful. From the award winning producers of Planet Earth, Frozen Planet and the Disney Nature films, america the Beautiful takes viewers on a tour of the most spectacular and visually arresting regions of our great nation. All these and more streaming this month on Disney Plus. Hey, everyone. We're coming to Salt Lake City, Utah and Phoenix, Arizona this fall. Yeah. October 23, we're going to be at Salt Lake City's. Grand Theater. And then the next night, October 24 will be in Phoenix. And we added a second show to our Melbourne show, right? That's right, a second earlier show in Melbourne. So you can get all the information for all of these shows@sysklive.com. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W, Chuck Bryant and there's the ghost of Jerry Rollins. The Empty chair. Thanks again. Thanks again to Ramsay. Yeah, thanks, Ramsay. How do I feel about this? I feel great. The pill is it has everything. I just love this episode already. I do too, but I kind of like when we did the female puberty episode. I just feel nervous. This can be fine. Female reproduction. I don't know. Hey, man, we're just explaining stuff. I know. It's not like we're just explaining stuff. Just be cool. Hey, before we get going, dude, do you mind if I do a little pluggage for my Movie Crush show? Do plug away. So everybody murder. Reno is out there. You know, I love my favorite murder of the podcast and just got back from La. And Karen and Georgia were kind enough to sit in and do a movie crush with me. That's awesome. And that's huge. It was huge because I'm such a fan. And they were great and merturino, as you should know. They are warm and friendly and lovely and generous. And I was a little nervous meeting them because I was like, what if it's gone to their heads and they are jerks? But they were great. They were so awesome and nice. And we had a blast. And of course, they let me pick the movie because it's a Murderino special. And we did The Silence of the Lambs. Oh, man, that's a great movie. Yeah. So, not only that, but we talk about their life and live shows and touring and their rise to podcast stardom about all the people they've kidnapped and killed. Yeah, it's great, man. It's an hour and 40 minutes long, so it's super sized, nice, and you're going to love it. And even if you don't like my favorite Murder, it might be a good chance for you to check out Movie Crush. Yeah. So go check it out, everybody. When's that one coming out, Chuck? It's already out. Just dropped this last Friday. Sweet. So you guys don't even have to wait. Listen to this episode first and then go listen to that Movie Crush. Actually, it doesn't matter. Just listen to them both. All right, you ready to get to this? Yes, ma'am. All right, so let's talk the pill. Yeah. The opposite of having kids. The pharmaceutical so famous that it's called the pill. It is. I read this New Yorker article about a book on the birth of the pill, and now I'm talking about it, so everything comes full circle. Yeah. And they were saying you don't call anything else the pill. Like Viagra is not the pill. Just a little blue pill. Antibiotics isn't the pill. You don't call it the vacuum or the meat grinder. Right. Like, there's really nothing like that. Nothing compares to it. And it's for good reason. I mean, the pill is monumentally huge as far as pharmaceuticals and medicine goes on the scale of antibiotics easily. Yeah. And it's the very first medication that was designed for a non therapeutic purpose, too. Yes. Very interesting. And so it's really difficult to overstate how much of an impact the pill had when they released it. History first. Yeah. All right, let's do that. So let me set the stage for you, please. You're bringing a couch out back in the day. I'm going to do my Charles Nelson Reilly one man show impression. Back in the day, if you were a woman and you didn't want to get pregnant, you had to coordinate with your husband that he wear a condom. Okay, sure. Or boyfriend. Well, that's like a whole other kettle of fish at this time. Supposedly, socially, that went on all the time. There's plenty of premarital sex, but socially speaking, only single men were allowed to have premarital sex, which is like, who are they having premarital sex with them. Right. If they're the only ones allowed to have premarital sex, considering everyone refused to officially recognize homosexuality even existed. I know what you're getting, okay? So there's a lot of double standards, a lot of repression going on. But if you're a woman and you want to have sex so whether it was with the guy you were having sex with, or your husband, you basically had to say, you got to wear a condom. And if you said no, well, you were sol one way or another. Either you weren't having sex or you're going to have sex without a condom. And if that happened, there is a really good chance that you are going to end up getting pregnant just from having sex. Yes. The ball was entirely in the man's court, and women did not have much say in the matter. No, they didn't. There were a couple of things on the market. So before the industrial revolution, there were, like folk remedies where you could use herbs and stuff like that. Basically, I think they're called herbal douches, where you're just like squeezing stuff in there and hoping for the best. Right. And then by the depression, there's something there's a whole line of stuff called gynecological AIDS or feminine hygiene, I think is what it's called. And some of them worked. Some of them kind of worked. Some of them didn't work. Some of them worked, but would kill you or give you chemical burns. There was a lot of problems. So you didn't have a lot of options. Right. And then along with the fact that you actually didn't have that many options socially in 30 states, and the federal government said you can't have anything that can be used as a contraceptive, and you can't even learn about it from your doctor or from school. 30 states and the federal government, this is ten years later, the pill comes out, and a couple of years after that, 5 million American women are using it as a contraception. And now it was in their hands. They had the ability to decide for themselves whether sex led to pregnancy or not. Well, and sort of even then, right. Because not all states allowed it, and not all doctors would give it out. Right. So it wasn't like, oh, the FDA said it's good to go, so we can all get it right. It was still a fight for years and years and decades. It really was. So I guess we should start with a woman named Margaret Sanger. She is a very controversial figure, founder of Planned parenthood, she's a nurse, and she wrote in 1912 about a magic pill that could prevent conception. Yes. Just a theoretical, hypothetical pill. Right. And she's controversial for many reasons, not the least uses, which is her. She was anti abortion kind of when she was most famous, she was anti abortion and kind of went all in on the pill and was like, this is the way to do it, is to prevent the pregnancy once you're pregnant. Sorry. Got you. And then there's the whole eugenics thing. We should do a podcast on her. Probably at some point we should, because that's a rabbit hole right there. Yeah. But she was the early champion of it. She coined the term birth control in 1912 as well. Yeah. So in 1914, she started a newsletter called The Woman Rebel. That's where birth control was first typed out and distributed the words, like you said. And then in the 1920s, some breakthroughs happen in science where they were able to identify progesterone and estrogen and realize kind of how it all worked. Yeah. So at first they were looking at this stuff as fertility drugs, and then they noticed that it actually could suppress fertility. And I think this was in the 40s when they were really starting in earnest. Or is it the 20s? Well, I mean, they were synthesizing it from animals, and it was in early 1941. I don't think they were even synthesizing. I think they were extracting it. And then that's what you got in your pill was animal hormones. Well, it says synthesize from animals, so maybe it was a process got you. But eventually, in 1941, doctor Marker, dr. Russell Marker just said it like James Bond. For some reason, he discovered how to synthesize the synthetic form of progesterone, which is called progestin. And this is from Wild Yams, believe it or not. So I did that, and that changed everything. It did. It made it cheaper. It made it easier to obtain. You could research all of a sudden, right? Yeah. But you still couldn't really research. Right. Because there were laws on even doing research on birth control. So the people who were doing this, it started out as market sanger. She hooked up with a doctor named Pincus and Gregory Pincus, who was a biologist, and he was interested in coming up with birth control as well. Mary McCormick, what is her first name? Mary Catherine. Catherine McCormick of the McCormick. I guess the spouse is right. Okay. She led a tremendous amount of her wealth to this research. And then a guy named John Rock, who was a doctor, who was also working on a birth control pill, they all joined forces in the 1950s and started working on this really hard. But they had a lot of roadblocks up against them and they cut a lot of corners and getting this thing out into market. Yeah, like going to Puerto Rico, because they had to for trials, right. This is not like Puerto Rico was like, we don't want this, but you're forcing it on us anyway. Puerto Rico had the exact opposite attitudes toward birth control that the United States did at the time. So it was a good place to do it. They just didn't inform anybody what was going on with this, that this was a clinical trial. They just gave them some pills and said, Here, take these. It'll keep you from getting pregnant. Yes. Which they kind of came about by accident. Some of the pills were contaminated with estrogen, and they use that in scare quotes, I guess, just because what they really mean is mixed by accident. And that reduced a lot of the side effects because that was one of the big problems at first and continued to be for a while, and eventually they landed on a drug company called Circle. There were two competing ones. The other one was Syntax, and Cyril is how you pronounce it, cyril Circle. That's what I'm going S-E-R-L-E cerule. I want to hear you say Cyril. They finally came up with a thought, was the right formulation. Syntax came out with their version, and then pretty soon, it was being marketed and distributed after FDA approval in 1961, cyril was the one who hooked up with Sanger in Rock, and they were the ones who provided the pills for the clinical trial in Puerto Rico. There was also a clinical trial at a women's mental asylum in Massachusetts. And the patients there didn't have any informed consent. And when they released this formula, first, it was for gynecological disorders, things like ovarian cysts. They knew it could be used to treat that. And Cyril at the time was like, they had no expectations for this whatsoever. And then within a year, there were half a million women in America who were suddenly using this for gynecological problems. And Searle figured out, well, they're actually using it for contraception. Right? And so when they went and saw an FDA approval and got it, that was when the floodgates opened. Like, there was now a pill on the market that could prevent contraception. That was the woman's to take. And all of a sudden, there was the first year, there was 1.2 million American women on the pill. And Cyril at first thought, they're not going to want this. Women aren't going to want to take a pill every day to keep from getting pregnant. And they couldn't even finish the name pregnant before. Like, the pills were being grabbed from their hands. It was a huge deal. It was and then these pills were not very safe. That's the upshot of this. The estrogen. There was way too much estrogen. It was dangerous. It was causing cancer. And in 1069, a very famous book came out called The Doctor's Case Against the Pill, written by a medical journalist named Barbara Seaman. And she got together with a bunch of doctors and researchers and women and made a case against the pill that it wasn't safe. It was a senator named Gaylord Nelson who read the book, took on birth control in Senate hearings. And in January 1970, in the Senate chamber, there was this testimony about the pill going on, of course, run only by men, all the witnesses, with only men testifying, providing witness testimony. But there was a woman there named Alice Wilson in her group, the DC women's liberation group. They were sitting there just getting more and more steamed. Yeah. In these hearings at this time. These hearings were kind of under the radar, right. Until Alice Wilson blew it up. The CSPAN wasn't a thing yet, right. So they were just getting more and more steamed watching all these men get up there and talking about women's reproductive health. But not only that, they were also these people were talking about how dangerous the side effects were with the pill. Sure. Hypertension, blood clots, heart attacks, high blood pressure, stroke, all of these things. And the women in the DC women's lib movement, including Alice Wilson, were like, we've never heard this before in our lives. How did our doctors not tell us this? Well, that was the back story, is that none of the doctors were sharing this information because they were getting and I think there's always been a problem, not across the board, but with doctors and pharmaceutical companies pushing certain drugs over others. But at the time, it was way worse. Yes. There was a mentality among male doctors who believe that a woman was better off not knowing. You didn't want to get her all upset by giving her all the information. They didn't even have side effects listed. Right. And if you did tell her, you ran the risk since women were so suggestible she might develop a stroke just by thinking about it so much. So it was better off just not telling her about it. Yeah, exactly. That was the entire medical establishment at the time. And so the pill went from this feminist icon in the by 1970s, becoming an icon for white male patriarchy, medical patriarchy, and how patients informed consent was a paramount issue now, and it just took on this other role. Well, informed consent was literally born that day. At that hearing, they finally heard an expert say estrogen is to cancer what fertilizer is to wheat. And Alice Wolfson stood up and started screaming. She was screaming, why are you using women as guinea pigs? Why are you letting drug companies murder us for profit and convenience? And it got a lot of media attention. And really the aftermath of those hearings is when this consumer health movement started and they started informed consent. They started having to list side effects on bottles. And it wasn't an overnight thing, but it really changed the pharmaceutical industry forever. Right. So the pill managed to accept this, I guess, iconography. Right. It became a symbol for this other thing, but still managed to keep on keeping on. 87% of women between 18 and 49 in the US. Followed those hearings once Alice Wolfson and the DC women's lib movement made it a national thing. And I think 18% of them stopped taking the pill as a result. But the pill really didn't fall out of popularity. It stood in as the icon for informed consent. And then just after that was established, it just went back to being the pill. I think that's amazing. It is, because it was this huge thing in 1960 for one thing, huge thing in 1970, for another thing. And now it's part of the cultural zeitgeist forever. Should we take a break? Yeah, all right, we're going to take a break. We're all excited about history, and now we're going to get into science. These days, you use your personal info to do just about everything, especially when you're online. And guess what? 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So you tap IBM to UNSILO your data and with the help of AI, start crunching a year's worth of transactions against thousands of compliance controls. Now you're making smarter decisions, faster operating costs are lower, and everyone from your auditors to your bankers feel like a million bucks. Let's create smarter ways of putting your data to work. IBM, let's create, learn more@ibm.com. Hey, let's talk menstrual cycles. All right? Let's, man, because that's all that's going on here is the pill manipulates the menstrual cycle by tricking the body with synthetic hormones. Yes, it tricks the body into thinking it's already released an egg. It's pretty brilliant. It is. But it's also kind of lo fi, if you think about it. It is very low. So we should kind of give you an idea of what the menstrual cycle is. Right. It's 28 days, generally. Yes, that's the rule of thumb. But yes, it's certainly different for everyone. Right. And I think it's also down to, like, hours and stuff like that, too. It's not just days, it's a human construct. But have you stopped and ever thought about how interesting it is that the cycle of the moon is like 28 days as well? No, I think it's fascinating. No, I didn't say it wasn't fascinating. I never stopped. Just in researching this, I was like, that's the cycle of the moon as well. That's interesting. So anyway, over the roughly 28 day period, the whole thing starts with the pituitary gland getting a little froggy and saying, hey, I'm going to release some follicle stimulating hormone, FSH. And that stuff floods the body and it makes its way down to the ovaries, and it stimulates follicles, hence the name. That's right. It makes these follicles in the ovaries grow good, and it just sets off a big series of events, basically estrogen triggers that pituitary gland again. Yeah. Because the follicles then in turn release estrogen. Right. Yeah. And so the pituitary gland is busy because then it secretes what's called gynetotropin releasing hormone. G, little N, big R, big H, one of the better abbreviations ever. Yeah. Because it looks sort of like guns and roses a little bit. Yeah. Oh, that is why I like that GNR. And that triggers a rise in luteinizing hormone LH. Right. And so luteinizing hormone goes back down to the ovarian follicles and it gets one of the follicles. So if you have a bunch of ovarian follicles growing, one of them is going to clearly it's the lead horse, right? Yes. It's going to develop into an egg. And as the luteinizing hormone stimulates it to develop into an egg, the egg pops off, the rest of the other follicles wither and die. And then the egg travels down the fallopian tube where it may or may not be fertilized. Yeah. This is called ovulation. And while this is going on in the background, the uterine lining, the endometrium is thickening up. Right. It's getting ready for business. And the reason that is because the estrogen and the luteinizing hormone are causing that to happen. Yeah. They're just rising and rising. So the mucus in the vagina, I'm saying even more than usual right now, but the mucus in the vagina also is it thicken? Yeah. So it thickens. Is that after the egg has been fertilized? Because I think it would become okay. So it defickens the uterine lining thickens. I think the vaginal mucus makes it easier for sperm to make its way. Yeah. Correct. Okay. Sorry about that. If all that goes according to the genetic plan, then those sperm are going to make their way to an egg. The egg is going to become fertilized, it's going to come down the fallopian tube attached to the uterus, and it's going to start to grow into a child. Correct. It might also not happen either. The woman involved might not have sex, so there might be no sperm. The sperm might not make it. There might be some sort of barrier method being made. Yeah. Or used. The dude may have bad sperm. Sure. Regardless of how this happens, if the egg is not fertilized, the egg eventually withers up itself and dissolves. And that thickened endometrium is shed, basically. Yeah. The uterine lining is shed. Yes. So, like kind of iron rich blood tissue. Right. Okay. That is menstruation. That is menstruation. But that's your period. The whole thing is menstruation. Yeah. Okay. It's like a 28 day cycle of menstruation, because I always think of like yeah, the period's menstruation. That's actually the end of menstruation. And then the whole cycle begins again. Right. After that time, the pituitary glands like, oh, all right, I'll release some follicle stimulating hormone, the whole thing begins again. The pill interrupts this by making the body think it's already released an egg. Like when the egg comes off of the follicle and makes its way down to the fallopian tube, the ovum makes its way down to the fallopian tube. That's when the estrogen and the progesterone levels are high. Okay. So the pill introduces progesterone and estrogen levels and keeps them high at all times. And therefore the body stops releasing eggs because it thinks it's already released an egg. Yeah. It just hijacks that whole process. Synthetically. The woman's body is amazing. It is. When you think about all that's going on. Yeah. Our body is not doing anything even remotely like that. It's making, like, farts. That's what I thought when I was researching this. I was like, man, I've never felt less important. And like, the insides of my body are just got some lungs doing some things. I got a heart, and then I guess I'm still making sperm. I don't even know. I've got like a wheezy old donkey running the show in there. Kind of dirty. Oh, goodness. So the endometrium still builds up in the uterus and is released, but it's known as a withdrawal period. So this is if you're on the bill, but that's why your period while on the bill is going to be generally lighter and shorter. Yeah. And so technically, the pill mimics the structure called the corpus luteum. Yes. Which is the thing that releases progesterone and estrogen once an egg is released. So the body is like, oh, the corpus lutum's got it going on. I don't need to release another egg. I also am not going to have a period because during this time after the Pill, those hormone levels start to become like a normal baseline in the woman's body. There's no endometrium that builds up and therefore there's no endometrium to shed. Right. And I don't think we mentioned this yet. Progestin, which is the synthetic progesterone, it's going to make that vaginal mucus thicker. So you're right earlier. It is thinner to make it excessive eggs easier. It will thicken up that mucus to make it harder for the sperm. I think it's just sort of like a onetwo punch to make it even harder to get pregnant. Although you can still get pregnant, usually due to misuse of the Pill, because what you do is you take the pill at the same time every day. It's all very synchronous and depends on that timing. And if you don't time it outright, your chances of getting pregnant or a little bit more. But apparently if you're taking it exactly right at the same time, then your failure rate is going to be zero 3%. Right. So it's still technically possible. Yes, it is zero 3% possible. Which offers up the question, like, why, when they were developing the pill, they had it completely in their control as to what they wanted to do with the menstrual cycle. And they decided and I never knew this very interesting they decided to keep it on that 28 day cycle because for a lot of reasons, they thought the Rock thought the Catholic Church, because he was a Catholic, they might be more willing to approve it if it seemed more natural, I guess. Right. He was way off there. They thought way off. He thought that women would be more apt to take it if it didn't seem like it was disrupting things too much. Like it's still on my regular cycle. Right. Because you do have that withdrawal period. It's not an actual real period, but it does come at the end of the pill cycle. Yeah, but they could have gotten rid of the period altogether. Right. And a lot of people are like, well, go do that. And there are pills on the market that we'll talk about that do take away women's periods. There's others that put them at different spaces amount four times a year or something like that. And people started looking into this, and they're like, oh, wait a minute, shouldn't women be having periods? And the answer is not necessarily. Right. Yeah. I mean, it's controversial. If you're not ovulating, you technically don't have to have a period. And Molly Edmunds wrote this really interesting pill. Molly article. Is a period necessary? I think is what it's called, because women today have many more periods than our ancestors, right. Something on the order of like, 450 periods over the average woman's lifetime. Yeah. About three times as many as our ancestors did. Yeah. So back in, like, huntergatherer pre, agricultural women had about 160 or something, right. And that was because they had more kids, they breastfed longer, they didn't live as long. And so some people make the point like, well, women are having more periods than ever before, and the body wasn't meant for this. It's actually kind of rough on the body to have a period. Like when the ovum pops off of the fallopian tube, it leaves a scar on the ovary, and that scar has to be repaired. And to repair, the cells in the ovary have to divide, and as long as they divide correctly, that damage will be repaired. If they divide incorrectly, that damage can turn into ovarian cancer. So that's a problem with it. There's also scarring with the shedding of the endometrium, like actually having your period itself can leave scarring. Same deal, right? Yeah. And I think does an iron deficiency come into play? So that's actually a benefit of having a period. You get rid of excess iron, which can lead to cardiovascular disease. Well, Anne, there are a couple of weeks during the menstrual cycle where women have a lot a significant reduction in blood pressure. So during the years they're reproductive years at least, they are at, I guess, a slightly lower risk of stroke and heart attack, I think, like 10% lower. Yeah. Well, that's not bad. No, not at all. So there's pros and there's cons to having a period. The thing is, and this is what Molly ultimately points out is we actually don't know if a period is necessary. The pill is still relatively new, and I think she quoted a doctor in their doctor, Susan Rothco, I think, or Roko, and she called the pill that does away with periods entirely the greatest unregulated medical experiment of all time. And she makes a chilling point, like, we don't really know what the side effects are yet because all of this is too new, especially the pill that does away with the period altogether. Well, yeah, and they haven't done there are no long term studies of menstrual suppression from oral contraceptives. At least they don't know about what that means for a woman. They don't know because most of this testing is done for women over 18. So they don't know what it means for women under 18 right. At all, because they're just not involved in the research, even though they do have research that shows about two thirds of women would get rid of their period if they could do so safely. Because we have you mentioned PMS or PPMD, which is just isn't that like a really severe form of PMS? Yes, it's like, much worse. PMS is not a picnic to begin with. Sure. This is like, go to the hospital bad, right? It can be, at least. Yeah. So yeah, that's really interesting to think about. It also treats ovarian CIS. There's other uses for birth control pills, too. Yeah. You want to take another break and get back to it? I think so. Okay. These days, you use your personal info to do just about everything, especially when you're online. And guess what? With all that info just floating around out there, it can make the Internet a practical gold mine for identity thieves. And stealing your identity, it turns out, can be dangerously easy, which is not good. But now it's easy to protect yourself with LifeLock by Norton. Yes, LifeLock monitors your info and alerts you to potential identity threats. And if you are a victim of identity theft, a dedicated US based restoration specialist will work to fix it. Identity thefts have had it easy for far too long. Now, finally, it's your turn. Just remember, no one can prevent all identity theft or monitor all transactions at all businesses. But everyone can save up to 25% off their first year by going to LifeLock. comStuff that's Lifelock.com stuff for 25% off your first year. LifeLock identity theft protection starts here. What if you were a global energy company with operations in Scotland, technologists in India, and customers, all on different systems? You need to pull it together. So you call in IBM and Red Hat to create an open hybrid cloud platform. Now, data is available anywhere, securely, and your digital transformation is helping find new ways to unlock energy around the world. Let's create a hybrid cloud that can change in industry. IBM let's create, learn more@ibm.com. Okay, Chuck, where are we? We were talking about I'm over here hanging about on the cliff by my fingernails. I think you're doing great. Isn't he doing great, everybody? Yes. No, remember, there are side effects, both positive and negative, to taking the pill. Right. There's some very common negative side effects. Like nausea is a big one, weight gain spotting, which is called breakthrough menstruation, which is where you have bleeding during the actual pill cycle, not the prescribed period cycle of the pill. Yeah, I don't think we mentioned yet either that in the pill prescription, in that monthly dose, there are seven not always, but the way they designed it was, there are seven placebo pills that are in there because you only take the pill for 21 days a month. But they put those extra seven pills in there to keep women on that. I guess the thinking was, if they're used to taking this bill every day, they need to keep doing it, right? To keep it as a habit. Yeah. If they don't for seven days, they might forget on the 8th day, and that's bad news. Yeah. So that's the most common way to do it. And that's a very easy type of pill to take. Right. Because all of them are the same level of hormone and the seven inert ones are usually a different color and they come at the end of the month. It's supposed to be easy. There's actually a recall right now of Tatula. Did you see that? No. Tetula is made up by allergan, I think. And they recalled a lot of their pills because they put the inert ones at the beginning of the cycle accidentally. Just bad packaging. Yes. Oh, my gosh. And if you look, you can clearly see that the first seven are different color, but where they're supposed to be at the end, they're at the beginning. And that is bad news if you're taking that pill. So if you have tattoos, go check it right now and go get some more. Yeah, but I think I interrupted you on the side effects. Nausea, headaches, breast soreness, acne, depression, moodiness, weight gain, decreased libido. And sometimes these can be like, if you start out on the pillow, can be worse. If you cycles in, it might get better. And if it doesn't, there are different pills out there. There are. So when those pills originally came out, that first formula, I think it was called, like, inovid that was the first one on the market. First one by Cyril. Cyril. Cyril. And they had ten milligrams of Progesterone or Progestin and 0 gram of estrogen, and that is like a nuclear bomb pill. Women had the worst side effects from it. Like, all these side effects, each of them is a Mac truck, and they were still willing to go through it to have control of their body as far as pregnancy went. But they very quickly figured out through further research, you can do the same. And the reason they selected that is like, they knew that there was not going to be any ovulation with ten milligrams of progesterone, so they figured out that you could formulate with a much lower amount of both progestin and estrogen and still get the job done. And they still do that today, I think the estrogen gets down into the micrograms and you can get like, 2.5 milligrams of progesterone in some forms of the pill. Yeah. So if the pill is mistreating you, what you're saying is there are options, right? Well, yes, there are three main types of oral did I say types? I think I did. You also said zero. There are three main types of the oral contraceptive pills now, combination pills, progestin only and extended release, which are the newest ones out there. The combination pill is the most common pill that you will get. The mini pill is the progestin only, and for some women, that's better. Like if you're breastfeeding and you can't have the estrogen because it's going to affect your milk, you'll probably be on the mini pill. And the mini pill peel, it works in a couple of different ways. It makes the endometrium too thin to accept that egg. Right. And it won't allow it to attach. And again, with the vaginal mucus, it makes it too thick to allow the sperm to reach the egg. But it is a little less effective. But still effective. But a little less than the combination pill, because it's almost like a different mechanisms. Yeah. Like it's 28 active pills for the mini pill. Right. But rather than tricking the body into thinking it's released an egg, this is just making it hard to get pregnant. Yes, right, exactly. It's almost like a different kind of pill. And then there's what's the other kind? Well, the combination pill the most common. There's a few subtypes of that pill as well. Right. So there's monophysic, which is what I was talking about, where you've got 21 pills and all of them are the same dose of progestin and estrogen, and then you've got the seven inert pills, and some women say, I'm not going to have a period this month, and then rather than taking those seven inert pills, you just move on to the next month's. 21 pills. Yes. And I believe with the monophysic, if you miss a day, you can double up the next day because it's the same amount of pills or the same level of hormones. Right. That's far and away the most common. There's biphasic, which has two different levels of hormones, and then tripasic has three different levels. And the point of biphasic and triphasic is they're designed to give you the absolute minimum amount of synthetic hormones that your body requires to keep from ovulating. Yes. Because the point is, the lower the amount of hormones you have in there, probably the better off you are. Whether it's cancer risk, moodiness, who knows? You're just better off with the least amount that does the trick. Yeah. And the kind of progestin in each of these is going to vary. But the type of synthetic estrogen is the same. Right. It's called ethanol estradiol. Eric Estrada estradiol. That's it. Ethanol estradiol. Yeah. But the progestin is the thing that differs sometimes, right? Correct. And depending if you're on a pill that uses one type of progestin, you can say, I want to try a different type of progestin. And they'll say, here you go. And then the extended cycle, which we talked about, this is the newest, the newest one on the market. And I believe isn't this the one that can reduce your period to like a few four times a year? Yeah. So there's a couple of different there's seasonal and Seasonique and they're called that because that four time of year period. You'll just be like, oh, it's fall, it's summer, not in that order, but you know what I'm saying. And then there's library and I'm sure there's other ones on the market too. We don't mean to buzz market or anything like that. So there's one that's like 365 days and then there's others that are 84 days. So that you have for either no periods at all or four periods a year. Right. There you go. So there's a couple of other things I want to hit on. The pill is so much larger than just birth control. Sure. I mean, just the fact that it's birth control is an enormous thing. Like you said, john Rock thought he was going to be able to convince the Catholic Church that this is an okay thing. That was not the case. No. In the late sixty s, the Black Power movement really zeroed in on the pill, especially the men of the Black Power movement, and said like, this is tantamount to black genocide. And they definitely had a case. Like there were plenty of cases of black women who went into hospitals and gave birth and then came out unknowingly sterilized. Like the doctor just taking it upon himself to sterilize her after delivering her baby. They had this evidence to back this up and it was never shown. Like, yes, there was a conspiracy to wipe out black power in America through the pill, but there were plenty of black women at the time who said, yeah, I can get birth control pills easier than anything down at corner clinic or something like that. And even with the early trials from John Rock and Gregory Pincus, like, one of the things that they zeroed in on Puerto Rico for was because they thought that if they could show that backwards, puerto Ricans of color could learn how to take the pill regularly, it would demonstrate that women in the inner cities could or women in developing countries could. So there was definitely like a mentality toward the white establishment being on board with the idea of at least providing the tools for minorities to control their rate of birth. Right. It's just pure and simple. That was a thought of it. It was. And it's had tremendous amount of benefits too. But there was some darkness in the place that it originally came from as well. Well, yeah. And of course, antiabortion groups think that the pill still to this day is an abortion causing agent, what they call in. Do you know how to pronounce that? Abortive fashion. Abortive fashion. I think so. Yeah. I think that's right. That's long been their argument. Well, their argument is that it makes the uterus hostile to a fertilized egg. Like prolonged use would prevent a fertilized egg that would otherwise attach from attaching. And so that's for all intents and purposes, abortion in their position. Right. And yeah, I don't think that one's settled by any stretch of the imagination. So you got anything else? I got nothing else, as I predicted, relief. This is a good one. Yeah, I think it was good. I think it was great. I hope we did all right. Yeah. Because we're not, like, patronizing. We've never been patronizing. No. Maybe be like white dudes, but we're very much aware that we're white dudes. And let me leave you with this white dude. If you're a white dude, whether it's in America or the west or anywhere your one job is to have some perspective. That's your first and foremost job. Take yourself out of your own shoes once in a while. Look around. Put yourself in other people's shoes. Your eyes will open widely and in a GOG, some say walk a mile. Sure, why not? Get a little weight off. Right? At least go check the mail. If you want to know more about the pill, just type in the pill. It'll bring up some cool stuff on how stuff works.com. There's also a really great American Experience site on PBS that had a bad oh, man, that was good. So good. And since I said American experience and Chuck said so good. It's time for listener mail. Oh, no, it's not. No listener mail today because we've had some milestones here lately. And as we sit here today in real time we as a company are celebrating the ten year anniversary of Stuff You Should Know. Again. But we're actually having the party today. Right. And on the same day Apple announced at their WDCC yeah. Their developers conference got up on stage. And this one kind of hit me. Like we had 1000 episodes. That was good. The ten years kind of hit me in a big way. But they got up on stage today and they said that Stuff You Should Know is now the first podcast in history. First and only to reach 500 million downloads and streams on their platform. Yeah. Which is I didn't know. Now it hit me too, somehow. Adam Corolla is in the Guinness book of world's records, right? But here we are as the only one. And that's because of you all out there. Yes, a gazillion times. But without you, there is no us. We would have been long gone if not for your support. So we continue to give thanks. Thank you again. And we'll continue to give thanks. And we will continue to podcast. Yes, we will, Chuck. Yes, we will. And that's all I got. If you want to get in touch with us, you can hang out with me. I'm on Twitter at Joshua Clarke. I'm on Instagram and Joshamclark two Chucks on facebookcom. Charleswchuckbriant and Moviecrust. Check mine at both. You can send us all an email, the stuffpodcast@housetepworks.com. And as always, join us at our extraordinarily grateful home on the Webstyteknow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseworks.com. Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good, it's criminal. Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. 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https://podcasts.howstuf…-and-emotion.mp3	Why does music provoke emotion?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/why-does-music-provoke-emotion	A well-crafted piece of music can bring us to incredible highs and crushing lows, sometimes within the same song. Why does music affect humans this way? Join Chuck, Josh and special guest cellist Ben Sollee as they get to the bottom of music and emotion.	A well-crafted piece of music can bring us to incredible highs and crushing lows, sometimes within the same song. Why does music affect humans this way? Join Chuck, Josh and special guest cellist Ben Sollee as they get to the bottom of music and emotion.	Thu, 20 Sep 2012 18:53:53 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2012, tm_mon=9, tm_mday=20, tm_hour=18, tm_min=53, tm_sec=53, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=264, tm_isdst=0)	62105891	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun shining, the daylight's longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music, My Favorite Murder from exactly right media, my Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilguera and Georgia Hard Stark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today. Picture this, friends. You could be packing a carry on for a trip to Hawaii when you realize you're going to need a bigger bag. But it's cool because you booked your flight with your City Advantage Platinum Select card. So you can check a bag for free on domestic travel and still have room for those souvenirs. And surprise, those souvenirs also earned you Advantage Miles. Actually, you earned Advantage Miles and loyalty points with each swipe. So let's start dreaming about your next next adventure. This could be you, and you could be anywhere with the City Advantageplatinum Select card. Learn more at City comAdventure and travel on with cityadvantage. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hi and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and with me, as always, is Charles W. Chuck Bryant. Yes. And this is stuff you should know. The podcast. The Audio Cheesecake podcast. So mad at that guy. Oh, really? Yeah. We'll talk about him in a minute. It will all become clear. Okay. I just took my tooth out for I'm getting a new one tomorrow. Finally. Congratulations. Thank God. Are you getting it after we record? Yeah. Cool. So two more episodes will feature Hillbilly Chuck. It's been a long arguing for you. It's been like over six or seven months now. I just look back at Christmas photos and I had that too. I didn't realize it was like, last year and it's almost August. Hill Village. All right. That's really derogatory. You realize? No. I love Hillbilly Chuck. Yes. I have a revelation for you. All right, let's hear it. So, you know when you hear music and you look at art, if you don't hate art and you look at it and you start to feel an emotion or maybe a memory is released or something happens to you, a change kind of comes over you? Sure. What you're doing is experiencing an emotion that was, I guess, created and encapsulated in a work of art, whether it's music or something visual. Sure. And it was put in there by the artist for you to come along and unlock and then bam, you're feeling some sort of emotion or whatever. Yeah. That is possibly the most astounding thing that humanity has ever figured out. How to do. Agreed. Think about it. It's like when you're interacting with art, you are, in a way, interacting with the artist, and the art is the intermediary. So you kind of understand it on that level. But imagine if you were an alien, an emotionless alien that came down and observed this just kind of off to the side. It makes no sense whatsoever. This painting is just a work on canvas. Yeah. It's color and brushstrokes. Yeah. But if you look at it on a much more important level, it is a capsule of emotion and memory. Agreed. And I agree that's, like, astounding when you think about musical notes, like there's a code inside them almost, that taps into these emotions. And I'm already upset because we don't quite know why and why it differs from person to person. And it's like I don't think we'll ever know. Yes. Some people can hear something and think something sounds like garbage. Someone else might hear, and it might make them weep. Okay. I think we do know you should have written this article. Well, think about this. I think that we have certain processes I did write this article. Smartypan. Well, one of them did. Yes, sir. I think that there's certain processes that our brains are capable of carrying out. And they're emotion based. Right. Yeah. Because think about what our emotions, chuck, that's one of those hard to define things. What is the definition? Well, it's some sort of no. Okay, let me rephrase. Okay, fine. Is Chuck yeah. What is the value of an emotion? What's the purpose that it serves? Well, some people think from early on, it was a means to help us survive. Like fear of the tiger or contentment with the sun on our faces. Right. Or like around a campfire. Okay. I need to stay warm. You don't even have to think that emotion is like your body thinking for itself in order to survive or achieve its goals. Right. Yeah. So our brains are capable of carrying out certain processes and using things like art. And music is almost like exercise for those emotional processes. Okay, that makes sense. And when we do this exercise, they kind of bulk up, but they bulk up differently for different people because we have different experiences. They're all along the same lines, where you're feeling, like, things that make you happy or things that make you sad or things that make you scared, but they're different subjective experiences. True. That's what I think is going on. I agree. Especially when you throw memory in there, which we'll get to. Right. Well, let's go ahead and hit this one study. Then Germans the Germans conducted they found the Mafa tribes, people in Cameroon who had not heard Western music before. No, not a second of it. And they thought, well, this is perfect. Let's play some Western music and see if they can match this music to an emotion like happy or sad. And they did. Right. And by Western music, we mean banjo music. There was another part of that study I thought was even more interesting, which is they played altered versions of music for them as well, through it, out of rhythm or made dissonant harmonies. And these people that had never heard Western music didn't appreciate that sound very much. Right. It innately triggered when they heard bad harmonies or off rhythm beat, like no. Right. Or whatever their word for no is. If there's not something universal going on, then they shouldn't have noticed. Yeah. Then I'll be a monkey's uncle. Exactly. So that means two things, that emotion encoded in music is universal and the ability to distinguish, like what's right and what's wrong in music is universal, too, then that's what it would suggest. Yeah, to a certain degree, though. But then you hear people that don't understand when they're singing off key, and I'm like, how can you not hear that? Remember the tone deafness one? Yeah, that was a good episode. Good overlooked episode. Anyway, I thought I think it's all very interesting. Okay, so we've got this idea that this is all universal. Sure. That still doesn't explain what's going on. And there's different schools of thought. Like, anytime there's just something really big out there that's not explained, a lot of people have some competing ideas. And one of the people with the competing idea, who you're apparently mad at, is Steven Pinker, who's a good guy. Good, great guy. He's a linguist, and yet he can rise above the fray of the sniping that is so characteristic of that field. Yeah, he's got a mullet. Really? Yeah, he's got a kind of a curly, perm mullet a little bit. He's a good guy. Okay. You'd like him. But I don't like what he says about music. He famously said music is auditory cheesecake. His contention is basically music is hollow compared to the language that it's based on. Right. Or hearing. Or hearing. And I just couldn't disagree more. Well, I think he's also saying there's different ways of interpreting what he was saying. It was an accident, an evolutionary accident, or it's something that's designed to exploit an existing sense. So like cheesecake exploit our sense of taste. It's like we don't really need cheesecake, but when you're eating it, you're like, this is really good, and it's designed to be like, I'm going to take your sense of taste and I'm going to blow the back of your head out. I think people need music and art, though. Okay, well, Pinker would probably contend that's not necessarily the case, that's the explanation is that he's saying if music is just designed to assault the sense of hearing, it triggers emotions because it's specifically targeted to do that. Yeah. Simple as that. All right, so the other guy there is another guy, mark Changzi, cognitive Scientist he thinks that music, we associate it with movement and we can pick up on movement and empathy, or we express and pick up on empathy and emotion through visual cues of movement from other people. Like, if somebody's kind of trudging along, you're like, oh, that person is sad. Yeah. And that makes sense because and this was, I thought, kind of neat. Was this the first article yours? Yeah. When you Google musical notes and hitting into Google Images, almost everything you see, it shows them, like, flowing and flying. Right. There's movement. Yeah. There's very few, like, just static shots of musical notes on a scale. And even if you looked at a musical scale, it has a flow and up and down, and it all is very movement based. Right. He also pointed out, too, that we use terms about movement to describe music, like a movement as a part of a smaller, larger composition, or we say, like, music moves us. So I think you did a good job in making the case that we associate movement and music, but I don't think that necessarily proves his point, his larger point. That's how it evokes emotion, because it's a stand in for human movement. Yeah, but I definitely thought it was worth note, for sure. It's one of the things it's like, that's kind of interesting. But what are we proven here? Right. Well, there's another camp, too, that kind of is the opposite of Pinker's assertion that they say that music and art are its own things. Yeah. It looks like this huge blur of stuff when you put it under an MRI, but that process is its own thing, and it's not just an offshoot of language or hearing. Yeah, I think I relate to that a little bit. I figured you would. All right, let's put music on the back burner for a second and talk about art, visual art. And I'll go ahead and say upfront that a painting or a photograph I can find extremely beautiful, but it doesn't move me emotionally. Like music or a moving image will. Like a movie or a TV show or whatever. Right. And then you put music in that moving image together. And for me, that's like the recipe. That's just when it goes Kablan. Right. So, like when at the beginning of Bonanza, you just start weeping on it. Exactly. But other people look at a painting and I'll find a painting gorgeous and beautiful, or a photograph, but other people look at a painting and weep, let's say. Sure. But not me. So it all varies from person to person. Right. The thing that kind of gets me is that because it varies from person to person, I think that explains why we have such a wide swath of what we consider art. Sure. Oh, yeah. Why there's so many genres of music. Because something that might get you might not get somebody else. Yeah. Like the very bare, stark art of the dot in the center of a blank canvas. Yeah. I don't get it. Well, the thing is, you can't poopoo it, though. No, I'm not pooping it. Because abstract art basically proves the idea that art is an encapsulation of emotion encoded for each viewer to unlock. And they may do nothing for you, but it may also trigger some sort of memory, like that someone's made. Right. Just the idea that something beyond, like, people moving and talking and saying lines and there being music in the background unlocking your emotions. Sure. The fact that just a dot in the middle of a white canvas can unlock emotions like that's. It at its most basic essential form, but it still does the trick. Or performance art. So one of the theories is that visual art basically simply just taps into these learned emotional cues. And whether it's a conscious thing or it's subconscious, like the color red or these weird lines that I see, or a polygamy, what that might evoke in different people. It says Franz Klein. For some reason, and I don't know why. I don't know. Hollywood would be the go to. But I like that you went somewhere else. Yeah. Lines in disarray. It's unnerving. See, one of the biggest things I have with visual art with, like, a painting is when I go see a Pollock, I'm more knocked out by being in the presence of the original work. Right. It looks cool and I love it and it's gorgeous, but I think about Pollock in his garage, drunk as a skunk, dribbling the paint everywhere. And if I could touch it, I would connect with that. If you touched it, you would get tackled by security or anytime I see the original stuff, I know exactly what you mean. Like, when I see the original handwritten lyrics at the Rock Arnold Hall of Fame to, like, a Jimi Hendrix song on a piece of notebook paper. Yeah. I'm like, man, his pencil touched that paper. Right. And wrote the wind cries Mary. Yeah. Wham. That's definitely an aspect of it as well. I agree. I wonder how that changes things, though. Does that add to it or is it distracting? Like, does fame and celebrity distract us from our emotions? That's a good question. I think it enhances it for me. Yeah. Yeah. Because when I had, like, this hero worship of an artist and then I meet them or I see their original work, that's what does it for me. But it could also be an unknown. Got you. That's funny, though, because I wanted to say that you probably wouldn't have been into disco then if you're all about the artist and seeing that something created by the individual. I wasn't in the disco. Right. But also when I was researching this and reading these articles, it made me wonder, like, is there a difference? There's a difference between experiencing live music and recorded music. Yeah. So was that a distinction between people who are into disco and people who weren't? An unconscious difference. Although I would argue that the basis in this article at least says that the live music thing is about being in the same room with people with similar likes, partially, not necessarily, because you can listen to a live recording of a song and it is like hearing that crowd cheer is totally different. So maybe it's evoking that, but I'm not friends with the people that I can't see on this recording. Yeah, it's a good point. All right, let's get back to it. Yeah, just real quickly. It's also culturally based because you make a great point that depending on where you're from, even color can mean something different. Like in Japan, the color white is associated with death, so melancholy will come out, whereas black supposedly is in the Western world, something we associate with that. Like a snow covered painting, like a Thomas Kinkade would maybe instill dread in a Japanese person. That's why he doesn't do very well in Japan. Oh, really? Yeah. But then one other thing, chuck the color, red those lines and disarray all that, those are called cognitive antecedents. Right, right. And you can also make the case that a change in harmony or pitch or drumming or whatever is a cognitive antecedent, too, in much the same way that the composer is changing, something is adding, something is taking something away, and that forms a cognitive antecedent. It's the thing that triggers the emotion. Awesome. So should we talk about the brain? Yeah, here's where it all comes down to science. Okay. I know we're going to get to there at some point you hear music and well, first of all, they say it's kind of impossible to say. Like we can say we have a language center and a center for movement and things like that, but we can't really pinpoint a dead center for music in our brain because it's sort of all over the place. Right, which is kind of awesome, I think. But when you first hear a song, let's say your frontal lobe is going to kick in and the temporal lobe and it's going to process things like rhythm, pitch and melody to kind of get the ball rolling. Right. They think it happens in the right hemisphere, but they aren't quite positive that that's the only place that happens. Personally, I think it probably hits the left and right. Yeah, it's firing all over the place. But it depends on a lot of things, like you said, whether it's live or recorded, probably whether or not you are a professional musician or not or have any kind of training. Like if you know how to read musical notes, when you hear musical note, you're probably going to visualize it. Whereas if I hear music like I do not do that. Maybe see colors or fractals or something, depending on whether I'm listening to Pink Floyd or not. And then whether or not music has lyrics. If it has lyrics and you can understand these lyrics, then you're going to be processing language through a broker. And wernicke's areas which we've talked about before. Those areas, two great areas. What was that? And we talked a lot about linguists in the two areas. There's so many shows. No, man, I have such a hard time. It didn't come out very long ago. I think it was in the one on prohibition. And it activates the visual cortex because when you close your eyes and listen to music, you're probably going to visualize something. Well, that would lend credence to the idea that music is associated with movement. Yeah, true. We check movement with our eyes. I see really high glossy music videos when I close my eyes. Do you really? No, I just see money for nothing. Over and over and over again. You see the day glow. Yeah. And the purple leopard print. And it can also trigger the motor cortex, of course, because that's when you start tapping the hand, tapping the beat. Bobbing the head. Like in the disco episode when he played some of that music. Even though I don't like that music, it still gets the head bobbing. Yeah, it's good music. So you say it activates your motor cortex. That's right. Whether you like it or not. And the cerebellum, I think, is the last one. And that's pretty interesting because that means you're following the music and trying to figure out where it's headed based on what you've heard before, which is cool. Yeah, because we love to keep ourselves occupied. Sure. That's not the last one. There's the medial prefrontal cortex. Yeah, you're right. And that word also is usually pronounced prefrontal. And that one is the one where that unlocks our memories. Like the music goes in there as a key and goes and then all of a sudden you're like, oh, yeah. What's one of your old ones? Hot Blooded. What does that give you? I think of myself as a little three year old in cowboy boots because that was like the first song I ever knew the lyrics to. So I walked around singing and hot blooded. Nice. How about that? That's pretty good. My big one is how Deep Is Your Love? By the Bee Gees. Oh, yeah. It makes me almost want to cry when I hear it because this one day when I was in the third grade, there was a bully that was not even picking on me, but he just scared the crap out of me on the bus one day with his bullying. And I was such a little wimpy kid, and I ran to my dad's office. He was principal, and he wasn't there. And she was just like, you can wait for him. And I was, like, crying. And how deep is your love on the hi fi? And to this day, it just makes me incredibly sad to hear that song. See, you like disco. It makes me cry right it moves you. Or like centerfold by Jake Owlsman that always takes me to, like, the skating rink. Yes. Immediately. Yeah, good one. What if you were a gigantic snack food maker and you had to wrestle a massively complex supply chain to satisfy cravings from Tokyo to Toledo? 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No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to Stamps.com. Click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. So if you want to talk about memory, you should go look up have you seen the video on YouTube I posted about the guy in the nursing home? I don't follow you on Facebook, jerk. It's pretty amazing. Just go to YouTube and put in man in nursing home reacts to music. And there was this old timer in a nursing home who it showed him before he listened to anything. And he was kind of shaky, had a hard time stringing together sentences. And then they put these headphones on and played like, cab callaway and stuff, and all of a sudden his speech is fluid. No way. Oh, dude. It's like remarkable and just gut wrenching to see this. Well, they're saying that the medial prefrontal cortex is one of the last areas to go with Alzheimer's. Exactly. So you may have trouble with just about everything else, but music can still unlock memories. That's pretty cool. Yeah, it's awesome. It's a cognitive antecedent. It is. And then there was another study. They studied this woman who had damaged to her temporal lobe, and she couldn't distinguish between, like, melodies and things, but she still had the in the MRI machine had the emotional reactions lighting up that you would anticipate with, quote, happy music or sad music. Yeah. Pretty amazing, right? Again, it's like the Mafa tribes people. So we have a pretty good idea that our brains are being activated. These certain regions are right. We've seen it in the MRI. That's right. Full of listen to music and MRIs. While scientists have studied them. They love that kind of stuff. And so from that and, like, the Alzheimer's revelation, we started to realize, like, okay, well, maybe we can, like, artists create music or art to get you with the emotions. Maybe we can kind of use this as, like, a prescription. And hence, music therapy has been born and it's actually been proven as what is the noun for efficacy? Efficacadic. Effective. No, wait, that's an effect. It's effective. Okay. Thanks, Chuck. Sure. Go ahead, man. Something bad has happened to me. Okay. Well, yeah. So music therapy has been born and it's effective. It's been shown effective. It is efficative. Exactly. For instance? Well, they think it grows as we grow. Like this tie to music and emotion intensifies as we grow than though they've seen it in little babies. Yeah. It starts early, right? Yeah. But fast tempo is in. A major key will tend to make someone happy, and you kind of take it for granted, but there's stuff going on there to make this happen. Oh, for sure. And, like, minor keys, d minor. The saddest of all keys, slow tempo is that the Devil's Key now is from Spinal Tap. Okay. But it is a very sad key. And minor keys, when you hear it, especially as a musician, it just lends itself to, like, darkness. Yeah. I wonder if that is the Devil's Key. There's something called, like, I think the Devil's Key. Oh, really? Yeah. I can't remember what it is. It's worth, like, maybe we'll do a smarter in 60 Seconds on it. I would love to. Okay. But as far as studies go with medical benefits, they have found that at Cal State University that hospitalized kids were happier doing music therapy when they could play something along with, like, a teacher on guitar, let's say, then even getting, like, toys and puzzles. Like, they valued and were happier during music time than playtime. Right. They're pretty remarkable. Just playing, doing their own plaything. Just stunk compared to playing a triangle. Yeah. I was always, like, put in a bad mood when I was given a triangle or a recorder. Do you remember recorder lessons? Yeah. Mandatory recorder left. Sure. Why was that the one? Probably because it's easy. Yes. I guess the recorder lobby was much stronger when we were kids than it is today because you don't see those any longer. Yeah, well, there was no read on it. It's just any kid could pick up a recorder and play. Right. You don't have to hit it just right with, like, the flute. And then what were those one sticks? They were like, ribbed sticks that you just zip along one another. And it was like wooden corduroy. Yeah, it's a percussive instrument. I don't know the name of it, though. It's boring. The augmented Fourth, my friend. The Devil's Key. Oh, really? I'll have to check that out. Maybe our guests can play it. Oh, yeah. Which is coming up soon, by the way, breakup songs. I was a little bit I couldn't quite figure out if they've proven that a breakup song it seemed like all anecdotal, like, of course I Will Survive is going to pump you up if you're going to show him right. Or She's Always a Woman will make you weep if you love Billy Joel and your girlfriend love Billy Joel and you just broke up well, it feels good to hear those songs and to cry it out because your medial prefrontal cortex is crying out for is that what it is? I guess, yeah. Because, I mean, like, you have a memory formed in relation to a song, right? Yeah, but no, I think the point that Congratulations trying to make is that there's not a study out there that showed that breakup songs have a certain effect. No one has done that yet, but she did lay out, like, a pretty good case for how it would work. Why people were walking around knowing that, yeah, this works. This has this effect. Right. Let's hear. Well, she's saying, like, there's this Rutgers University anthropologist named Helen Fisher who studies the effects of breakups. And basically she is the one who came up with the concept of the break up as going cold turkey on an addiction. Yeah. Like, you can compare it to cocaine. And the reason why is because when you're in love with somebody, your limbic system is stimulated. And then when that's taken away, all of a sudden this stimulation that you used to have is not there any longer. Your limbic system gets kind of irritated. What Congress is saying is that it makes sense that music, which has been shown to simulate the limbic system, probably does some sort of number on it to kind of wean you off that cold turkey person. You just oh, okay, got you. That makes more sense now. Yeah. There wasn't an actual study. You're right. Okay. But she also pointed out that music has been shown to be a pain reliever. Yeah. This one study from 2011 found that cancer patients undergoing mastectomies had lower blood pressure and lower anxiety when they played music pre op during the operation. Even in post op, not an enormous amount. It's not like a shot of morphine or anything like that. It's like half a point on a ten point scale. The pain scale, the line drawing of the person. Just like I never know what to say there. I always think I need to say a lot so I'll get a better pain pill. Well, they ask you, like, one to ten. I know, that's why I always say ten. Okay. But it's hard to qualify. You want to get the good pain pills, you have to say eleven. Oh, really? They think that's hilarious. Have you said that? No, this one goes to eleven. That's the second final tab reference. Yeah. And that's actual physical pain. It shows TVs a little bit, but where it really comes in handy is as like an anxiety reducer and as an emotional wooby. Yeah. They found that people who suffer from anxiety, they actually responded to music as an analgesic more than a pharmaceutical analysis. That's awesome. It is. And it's not just them, like you mentioned, like blood pressure lowering. Other studies have been conducted that showed that pregnant women were less stressed out than when they listen to music. Sure. People with cardiac patients, their blood pressure lowered, immune systems were boosted. In post surgery patients, it has this really great effect on us. It's pretty obvious why. It's the limbic system. It has a calming effect. I had that happened to me once, actually, to my detriment. I was living in New Jersey at the time. I was going to the bank and really stressed out about getting to the bank before it closed. And this song came on that I had never heard before. Like, halfway there, I get to the bank. It's like, literally like a minute and a half for this bank closes, and I could not get out of the car. I couldn't quit listening to the song. What song was? I can't remember now, but I literally remember watching the dude come up and lock the door in front of me and sitting there in my car and thinking, you know what? This is worth it, because this is amazing and I'm not stressed anymore. And who cares about the bank? That is quite a song. Yeah. And I think you probably bounced some checks because of it, but who cares? Did you go back and listen to the song after you're looking at your annual fees? I wish I could remember what it was. This is a long time ago. That really may have been like, a classical thing, because I broke down at Carnegie Hall and cried one time. Did you? Yeah. Beethoven's. I got in Beethoven's 9th owed to joy with, like, the full choir that thing pumped in. That's right. Those other lyrics I just activated. We're in Nikki's area. He activated another area. What else you got? Nothing, man. I've had plenty of those. A lot of times it's live music that gets me because of the shared experience. Sure. But it can happen in a movie or a television show. Yeah, like I said, you marry the moving picture and music together for me, and it's like it's all over. It's like chocolate and peanut butter. You got any good breakup songs? Any good sad songs that you like? No, but definitely, I think who doesn't do that when they go through a breakup to sit around and listen to like the most Moreaus stuff you can find, like put on the Smiths. The Smith's secure. One of my all time favorites was the Secret machine song called the Lone, jealous and stoned. Oh, really? God, it'll kill you. Really good. Yeah. Strangely, Genesis Ripples is really yeah, that's a great one to me. But that one is so magnificent because depending on my mood, it's either sad or very reflective. It's not ever, like, happy. Like, yeah, I feel like I'm going to go take on the world. It's not that kind of song. Right. But it's not necessarily, like, sad. It's just contemplative in a lot of ways, too. And there's a range, too, I think, with the breakup. Like, at first, you do want to just keep being bummed out until you've gotten it all out of your system, and then that's when you want to put on either tiger. Well, also, Molly pointed out she wrote the second article, I think she points out that if we are hitting our limbic system with music and we are, it's like a drug, we become addicted to it. Then there's a really good case for unplugging and not listening to music for a while. I don't know about that. Which kind of points out something that I've known for a very long time. Good. Listen to stuff you should know is very refreshing. That's true. We have a special treat here, Chuck. Yeah, we do. Okay, so we've been talking about the idea of experiencing music, unpacking it and experiencing music and art. Yeah. We should probably talk to somebody who packs that great way to say it. Thank you. We have you might remember him from the mountain top removal mining episode. Mr. Ben Soli is joining us again. That's right. And we're going to get his insights on music and emotion as an artist and then as a special treat, just like last time, he's going to play for us. Right. So our second musical guest is the same as our first musical guest. What if you were a global energy company with operations in Scotland, technologists in India, and customers all on different systems? You need to pull it together. So you call in IBM and Red Hat to create an open hybrid cloud platform. Now, data is available anywhere, securely, and your digital transformation is helping find new ways to unlock energy around the world. Let's create a hybrid cloud that can change in industry. IBM, let's create learn more@ibm.com. Hey, everyone. When you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office when you could be using stamps.com? Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right. From your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process. With Stamps.com easy to use software, all you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to Stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page, and enter code stuff. All right, so let's get Ben in here. It's like magic. Ben Tilly is in the studio. Wow. That was ben, thank you for coming. Oh, it's my pleasure. Say hello. Thanks, Ben. It's good to be here. It's good to be here. So we did things out of order, and Ben actually just played, although, through the magic of editing, you will hear that song or songs afterward. Okay. Do you have to give away all our secrets? I know, but I just wanted to say that I was super charged after doing this podcast on music and emotion, to experience that with you in a room all right. With just a few other people. Well, I can't wait to hear what you have been talking about, then. Well, that leads me nice segue, by the way, into my first question, which we talked a lot about in the podcast, about music and emotion and how it depends on whether or not it's live. Like, there's a difference emotionally whether or not it's live music or, like, on a CD. And as an artist, we got the scientist perspective. As an artist, what has been your experience with playing live and with how fans receive it live, as opposed to on a CD? Well, on recordings, there's a lot of room for the listener to place their own images and their own ideas into the music and everything, and there's certainly room for that in the live show as well. But they're also visually seeing what your body is doing when you say these words. And, of course, physical body language is a huge part of how we manipulate the meanings of things, and I think that has a huge amount of input. But I also think that sometimes it can confuse things. Sometimes people can be seeing you and kind of be so overwhelmed with what was happening and how it's happening visually on stage that it doesn't necessarily they don't get to focus on what might impact them as much musically. So I do think there's two music affects people differently in live and then recorded settings. That's pretty much what I said. I think he kind of just confirmed what he said to me. He we talked about there's a theory that one of the ways music moves us is because it's a stand in for human movement. So that would make a lot of sense that if you're also seeing movement while you're listening to music, you just have your mind blown. It's a stand in for movement, huh? What was his name? Mark Changzy? Something like that. Yeah, that's his theory. That's why our emotions are unlocked through music is because we visualize movement and we can feel empathy towards human movement. So the music just reminds us of that movement. It's a theory. I think he's working on it still. It'd be interesting to see how it gets to that part of the brain and what path it goes through because music kind of exists through this kind of back door in the brain. Maybe the place where speech began and then got its own apartment later on in life. We talked all about that. You're going to love this podcast. I can't wait to hear podcast. I've got a question. Okay, so one of the things we talked about, Ben, was when you're observing art or when you're listening to music, it's like you are unpacking what the artist put in there emotionally or the artist is using some sort of cues to trigger your own emotions as an artist on, say, the packing side of this whole equation. Do you ever just go like, this node is going to make everybody just weep on queue or this one's really going to get them? Do you think like that or is it more when you're creating something that you're kind of putting yourself in there and it's open for interpretation? There's generally two ways I go about it and both of them have their own dangers and pitfalls. When you try to think of a musical device that can and will affect people in a certain way, especially if you're talking about anything with words and music, there's a danger of kind of watering the emotion down to something that can affect people in a broad way. Not something on Broadway, just people being affected in kind of like for pop music, we'll just use that as an example. A lot of times when you're listening, you hear things and sounds and musical repetition that's used because people feel like it will be a hit or will affect a lot of people. Right. And of course, when I'm writing songs, sometimes I could think that I can be too personal with an idea. Like I can get something that's so personal I'm packing up that bag and I'm putting undies in and all this other stuff and like too specific and you lose people because they can't relate to that specific item. But if you talk about the gesture that's there and try to find the essential human expression that's in there, then you have a universal idea, even if it springs from a very personal experience. So if I was going to say that another way, I think I would say that when you're packing up the bags, you have to be careful not to be too personal, because otherwise you can lose people. People can almost feel like, not necessarily grossed out, but they're seeing something that they shouldn't see. Right. Or it's too private. Yeah. You're letting them pass the barrier. Yeah, exactly. What you need to do is figure out how your private things relate to their private things, and so create a personal experience that has some type of universal meaning or expression to it. Got you. So when you're packing the bags, you leave out, like the metaphorical leather hood with the zipper mouth. Yes, I leave that out. And nor do I make repetition of things that everybody knows is already there all the time. If everybody knows that the doors are closing and shutting all the time, you don't use that musical device, which is to say, for instance, in dubstep music, there's a very simple musical pattern that's happening. Basically. There's a big build, usually for about 32 bars, where it's just there's no low end or anything. There's just big bill built, and then there's something called the drop, where the base drops back in and it's like it's supposed to be like this quake of emotion that happens, and everybody's heads start just going up and down. Right. And you have to be careful because it's a pretty simple device and there's lots of different variations you can do on that. But if you do it too much or too similar each time, then people are just like, Eh, that's not for me. Is that just a crescendo? Basically? No, it's not a crescendo. It's an orchestration. It's an arrangement thing. So a crescendo is when things just kind of grow in volume. Okay. And this is much more of a ranging sound so that there's some that are absent and you know they're going to return. But how you bring them back in and create anticipation is the strength of your composition as a dubstep artist, I guess. Good stuff. We actually have an article on that and it's on my list. Dubstep. Robert Lamb will kill you if we record dubstep. So, Ben, as an artist, do you think, like, we talked a lot about the emotional kick, like the drug, and it releases dopamine and there's science behind it going on. As an artist, do you find it more difficult to still get that kick? Or when you hear a song, do you think more I was like, as a musician, like, oh, I hear what this person's doing there, or is it just still pure emotion going on, or does it vary? I think as an artist, once you start repetitively doing something, there is a tolerance that builds up, which is kind of a sad thing, and people kind of find ways to convey that they're still getting that stuff when they're really not. Does that make sense? Especially in a live show? Like, you'll see a rocker contorting themselves in all kinds of weird ways and then after the show, they act like you can tell that they're not completely high off of the show at least. They're just kind of like, yeah, thanks. As opposed to someone who you've just seen go through a pretty magical musical experience and you can tell that everything that they had just kind of came out of them and they're either bouncing around or they're just completely a puddle on the floor. I remember seeing Andrew Bird play a show like that once and he just gave everything to it. And you could tell he was having an overwhelming experience on stage and went to talk to him afterwards and he was basically a puddle. He was a human puddle at the end. He'd just kind of given everything and he talks about that in some of his songs as well. That actually was one of my other questions. As an artist on stage night after night, how do you draw that up and does the emotion of the audience, how much do you feed off that? And you probably just can't whip that up. So how does that all work? Yeah, that's something I probably have to think about how to answer just for a little bit. But I guess the basic question is what's the difference between a good show and a bad show? Yeah, to me, what was good and bad? Because sometimes when I'm playing a live show, I'll have what seems to be a fairly mundane night, like nothing really special instrumentally happened. I didn't shred really much on anything and I didn't really feel impact. And then people walk up to the show, walk up to me after the show and they'll be kind of having this intense emotional reaction to it. So there's all kinds of stories and networking going on. When you're playing live on stage, people are getting to know you, they spend 2 hours getting to know you, they're taking all kinds of visual cues from you and of course, you're actually talking to them and telling stories. They're taking cues from everybody else in the audience. Right. So there's kind of like a tribe build up mentality. So I think part of it is getting everybody to participate socially in the show. If you want to get to that energy place where something overwhelming happens to you and the audience and that usually starts with it's very much like a combustion. You have to ignite it in some way and you feel that coming on. Like have you been in a show where you feel like not so much is happening, then all of a sudden, all right, now it's going on. Yeah, you can definitely feel it when it turns on. There's a sort of friction in the room, if that's a good word. There's definitely some type of resistance that you can move with. Right. Does that make sense in dance? When you're doing a ballroom dance, even though the motion is very fluid, there's a lot of rigidity in it. Like between partners, you have to kind of push against your partner, and they have to be rigid to be able to communicate the movement to them, because you're not going to be. Okay, spin to the right 180 degrees. Now dip down 45. Right. You're not going to use language to them. You're touching and pulling, but you want to do it in a fluid, very connected way. And you have that same sort of push and pull with the audience where when you push against them, you can hear them, hear or feel them kind of get excited. And then when you pull back, you can hear them kind of breathing more. Right? And when I say pull back, I mean, that can be volume, that can be tempo, that can be frequency range that you're including in there. It can be a lot of things. And of course, as a cello player who did a lot of time sitting in the back of the orchestra, I got to spend time paying attention to that from an orchestral standpoint, where you're on stage with 80 people playing to an audience of however many people. And so that's an even trickier thing because you got to get the 80 people to create the spark before the audience can really start combusting. Like, you can really start feeling that energy. And that second chair clarinet is is always just messing it up and holding everybody back. Did you play clarinet? No. Okay. But sometimes the audience can walk in and create something that may not have been there otherwise. Yeah, I felt that, too, where maybe you had a really crappy day, or maybe you don't have any energy left after doing a bunch of media or traveling on the road, and the audience walks in and they've got an idea and an expectation that is just buzzing around the room, and suddenly you kind of get this encouragement or feeling that you're going to fill their cups. You're going to really have an emotional impact. But there's no one way that I get myself psyched up for it to generate that spark. There's not like one tool. There's no drug that I use. It's just kind of one of those things where from the very beginning, I try to write songs that have that personal experience in it. For me, that igniting artistic moment, whether it's a love song or whether it's a song about something stupid that happened between politicians or a belief in some type of social change or a war song or something like that, it can be any sort of thing. When I write it, I tried to be really honest and genuine about something that really moves me so that whenever I play it over and over and over again, the 300th time I play it, I can still look back into that song. And for me, it's very much like that. When I play a song, I'm remembering and kind of reliving a little bit of what happened in that song. Right, but not just what happened in that song. What happened when I played that song for the first time in front of a certain group of people, or when I played that song on Stuff You Should Know or whatever, it kind of accretes experiences in it. And so that keeps me getting excited about it, and I think that probably helps ignite things. Have you ever made a stranger leap with your music? And if so, how do you feel about that? Now, when you say stranger, you mean like an audience member, somebody who just is walking by, has no clue? No, not necessarily. Just somebody you didn't know. Like somebody who came to see one of your shows and you look down and you saw that they were crying and it was obvious it was because your music had brought something out in them? Yeah. What was that like? Besides amazing, man? What is it like when I'm playing a song that has a heavy emotion to me? Like, I've got this one song called Panning for Gold, and I wrote it about my grandparents who both had dementia, and as they slipped further and further into that, it's Alzheimer's which caused the situation of dementia, they kind of forgot all the good stuff that they've done in the world. And I use this character, this spiritual character of God forgetting all the stuff that he created in the song as a kind of like a lyrical device to show that it's our job to remind each other of how all the beautiful things that are in the world. And that was what the song meant to me. And that's when I first started explaining to people. But I quickly learned that people would leap to that song for all of their various reasons. The song was so sticky as an artistic idea, the idea of someone old for getting something that a young person was supposed to reconnect them with. Right. Or maybe it was about protecting or preserving something that the audience would all fill their own minds with ideas and they would just weep, and some of them would be leaving for joy, some of them would be missing somebody. And it was a real mix, and I had no control over it. That's the thing. That's how it feels. It feels like even though you feel like you've impacted somebody in a deep way, you don't feel like you've got any control over how it happens. So I guess that's kind of what I was asking was, do you feel responsible for putting that out there and the people are crying or like you're just playing and they're attaching their thing to it? Yeah, I mean, usually the thing that coordinates with it is I feel like I've had a really genuine expression in the song from a performance standpoint. I felt like it was a really honest performance at the time. I'll feel good about the performance, but I don't really feel like it's something that I did. I feel like if I'm being really honest, it can happen. It's something that I can create a situation for, but I don't feel like it's something that I do. I feel like that's kind of like the communal choice or that person's thing. Right. Earlier in the show, we talked about each other's. We talked about music and memory and how it's tied to memories and very evocative of a lot of times, songs from your childhood will get really specific with a certain memory. And one of mine was the BGS and a very specific memory. Josh, what was yours? Hot Blooded by Foreigner. But I think everyone wants to know. What's the first thing that comes to your head when you think about a song from your past, from your childhood, that really evokes a very specific memory? Like, when you hear it, you're just there. Yeah. Well, at this point I've got a bunch at this point in my career, since I've written a lot of music and experienced a lot of music, I've got a huge pile of them. This song. Wayfaring stranger. Traditional tune. When I play or sing or hear that song, I go immediately back to sitting behind my grandfather's house and hearing him play that on fiddle and sing. There's other weird songs like Tudy Fruity is the song that I got over stage fright for some reason. Yeah, I was in grade school choir and I had terrible stage fright at the time. It was like fifth grade or whatever, and I was playing cell at the time, but I was singing in the choir and I just couldn't get with it. I was like, I shouldn't be up here. I shouldn't be up here. And at some point I was kind of and I looked out and like, there was kids on roller skates and the hula hoops and the parents were all laughing and I was up on stage singing and I was like, Wait, this is affecting people. This is really fun. This is really affecting people. I can just see myself up there and just start shaking. It's like dude food, eh? I go straight back there whenever I hear that song. That's funny. Yes. And as a musician, what has been your best moment as a fan of music when you've been in the audience and feeling that spark and that fire in the room? It wasn't that long ago that I saw an artist named Anna Mitchell. Are you familiar with her at all? I think I know that name. It's really good. She did this kind of contemporary telling of the story of Eurydicy in Orpheus, but she is a folk opera with Audi DeFranco and Greg Brown and Gosh. What's? The guy from Bon Ivir. Justin. Yeah. Justin Vernon. Yeah. She put together all those different folks and created this modern contemporary telling of it, and it's so beautiful. But anyhow, I saw her performing live, and she's just got this way about how she just loses herself, and it's like she's trying to shake off these words that she just has to say. Yeah, that's the most recent I was in the audience. She's really breathtaking, the way she would just flip the words out and try to yeah, it was almost like she was trying to shake off the emotion, and when she shook it off, it ended up all over you in the audience. That's awesome. It's kind of like Gallagher. It's very much like Gallagher. I love hearing that as a music fan, to know that you can still go out there as a musician and you're not jaded or cynical, and you can still get lost like that. Oh, get super lost in it. Right now, the most overwhelming sound that I hear, of course, is an orchestra. I spent a lot of years playing in them, and then I also think they're so special now because we have so few of them that are playing at super high levels. Right. Because so many orchestras have closed down. And I think that's a really interesting thing, because orchestras ask you to change your social habit, at least for us young folks. When's the last time you went and saw an orchestra, either of you? Well, mine was actually one of my best stories from seeing Alive. I saw Beethoven's night at Carnegie Hall and the ODA joy thing. Literally, I was sitting there crying like a little baby. But I think that's probably the last one I saw when the dudes come in and go, Florian. Yeah. Actually, I saw the December a couple of years ago with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, which is pretty great. Yeah. A couple of years ago. And I was banned with the orchestra. What about the orchestra? It's been a while, and I love it, too. Yeah. And I think it's because orchestras ask us to change our social habits so much to come see them. You know what I mean? For us young folks, we don't see shows in concert halls and pay $60 to do it. Right. And we're a tie. And we're a tie and sit in seats. Sure. Don't have drinks. Even though it's one of the most incredible sounds that we create as humans. I mean, it's really powerful sound when you get a full orchestra there playing, as you know, from your experience. But we still don't do it because it's so outside of our zone. And I wonder what that means as we become more and more visually based. Like, what does music mean to us? Right. And how does it really affect us? And how, as musicians, can we still affect people in the same way regardless of an environment? Right. And that's the biggest challenge facing us right now, because most of our music is being consumed at MP3 quality through people's phones. Streaming or watching an MP3 video or YouTube video or something. So as a musician, I'm looking for the best way to affect people and the best way to convey my song or art or whatever you want to call it. And nowadays it just gets consumed so many different ways, you have no idea how people are going to resonate with it if they're going to resonate with it. So the best shot that you got at it is writing something that's really genuine to you as an artist and then performing it in a really passionate, genuine way. And in some ways that harkens back to how we got all started with this thing, which was a bunch of people sitting around playing music, right? Not professional musicians playing two audiences. That's what people originally were willing to start paying for. That emotion, that kind of those endorphins hitting you, all that stuff, that emotion, that physical effect on your body. Yeah, I've seen some of the best stuff I've seen. It's been like in the subways of New York. I saw a guy do Wild Horses by the Rolling Stones, just by himself, acoustically, and no one was paying attention. And it was one of the most awesome versions of that song I've ever heard in my life. Yeah. And no one was paying attention. Oh, for you. Yeah, I think a couple of people were, but yeah, well, I mean, that's just it. This kind of goes back to when we just first started talking is how do you get folks to pay attention and get them to realize that there's stuff here to be felt and had without whatever. Using musical devices that water everything down. Where you're trying to use repetition and loudness and big crazy sounds to get their attention. And you make sure not to leave any spaces in the song because heaven forbid you lose their attention or they not give it to you. So I think that's one of the challenges for us as musicians as we march on into this technology age, is not letting the huge pool that we're swimming in from an industry standpoint where we're trying to compete for attention or CD sales, whatever you want to call it, affect how we actually make our music. Right. You still need to make something that is genuine to yourself, otherwise you're not going to be happy playing it. And then if you're not happy playing it, you have got zero shot at affecting people emotionally, right? If you don't affect people emotionally, then they're not going to come to your shows. And that's really all that we got these days. If you're going to want to be in a professional musician, been solely doing things right. When's the album coming out? The new record halfway. Man's coming out September 25. September 25. Where's the best place to buy it? Itunes is a great place these days. You can get it pretty much anywhere. But itunes is a fine place. And you're on tour right now? Yeah, on tour. We're on tour in our suite. Tour van, Tammy, as well as on bicycle. All right. This will be coming out probably close to the release day, the CD. Are you going to be on tour this fall as well? Yeah, absolutely. I'll be all over the country riding your bike to shows at times. At times we'll be riding our bike. Most times we'll be in our tour van and we'll be hitting all the towns in this country. Bensoley.com, anything else? I'm good. Ben, thanks for coming. You were like, the best interview, literally. That was a little bit cyclical. I had to work my way around some of those answers. You elevate us, my friend. But that's the great thing about this show, is that you all let it come, not try to design its existence. Cool. We would fail. I appreciate that, but traditional wrap up. If you want to get in touch with me and Chuck and Ben Soli, we can pass things along to him. You can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can join us on facebook. Comsteffynow, and you can send us an email to stuffpodcast@discovery.com. Feeling young today? Flat out and feeling so don't tell me to slow down you see, I grew up this way TV shows and highlights don't plug in play by play. Now it's mine. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetofworks.com. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun shining, the daylight's longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing Poolsite, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music, My Favorite Murder from exactly right media, My Favorite Murder has something for everyone. 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https://podcasts.howstuf…k-brain-size.mp3	Is brain size related to intelligence?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/is-brain-size-related-to-intelligence	The idea that the larger the brain, the higher the intelligence is an old one, but it's pretty much utterly false. Modern investigation into how the brain works suggests there's a lot more to take into account when comparing brain biology to intellect.	The idea that the larger the brain, the higher the intelligence is an old one, but it's pretty much utterly false. Modern investigation into how the brain works suggests there's a lot more to take into account when comparing brain biology to intellect.	Tue, 08 Jul 2014 14:13:54 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2014, tm_mon=7, tm_mday=8, tm_hour=14, tm_min=13, tm_sec=54, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=189, tm_isdst=0)	31722356	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Are you looking for an escape? An immersive getaway experience? Well, there's a place for all your wildest dreams. Perhaps you enjoy wrapping along the paperboy, or you believe that blessed be the fruit. Or you dream of one day smashing a glass while stealing. Who's. Ah. Whether you're sworn to Team Kim or you just want a good old fashioned, mysterious murder, there's a place that has it all. From Atlanta to only murders in the building, it's all on Hulu. So check into your obsessions. Hulu subscription is required. Terms apply. Visit hulu.com for plan details. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetoporcecom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. And this is stuff you should know. Yes, I think this might complete our brain. I don't know about that, because we've done Einstein's brain, the difference between men and women's brain, and now we're tackling brain size, which is sort of on both of those a little bit. It does. But there's always new findings. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. If there's ever an ongoing suite, it's got to be the brain, man. All right. It's growing all the time. It's changing shape, changing size, changing connections. You could almost say that Sweet is plastic. Plasticity, baby. Yeah, that's right. You sent me something that I think we should talk about first, Chuck. Okay. This is just like a grab bag hodge podge of loosely related studies that I find that we don't really know the answer to the question, like, does a big brain mean a smarter person? Yeah, because there's a lot of different conflicting findings. Well, a few million years ago, our brain started growing a lot, and that kind of timed out with becoming smarter and using tools and things. Right. So, I mean, there's a little bit of you call it evidence. Well, yeah, there's definitely some plenty of evidence. I think that's the confounding part is that there's plenty of evidence that, yes, as a brain grows, it is correlated to intelligence. But then that's only holding true up to a point. Right. I sounded like a Soviet immigrant. That's only holding true up to a certain point. All right. Y'all gov. Right. He's in Branson, Missouri, though. Did you know that? Yeah, I think he's got, like, his own restaurant or something. Well, his own theater, and I think all the theaters are food. Buttery we should go to Branson, man. I want to see what that place is all about. Okay. Yeah. I mean, it's a parade of stars. It's 1973, right? Yeah. I bet your boy Ronnie Milsap is there. Yeah. If he doesn't have a place there, I'll bet he plays Branson fairly regularly. He sublets. He would play well there. Yeah, I bet. So, Branson. Yeah. How did we even get him? Oh, yeah. Brain size. So, brain size does correlate to intelligence to a certain extent, but you can point out, like, well, sperm whale has a 17 pound brain. Sure. Holy cow. It must be the smartest animal on the planet. Well, it's not. Right. I'm sorry to tell you, sperm whale fans, that it's not the smartest animal on the planet. Humans are the smartest animal on the planet, and don't you forget it. We don't have the largest brains, so you kind of take that idea of, okay, well, if it's not brain size, maybe it has to do with the size of your brain in relation to your body. Then we start to get a little closer to jackpot. But even still I want to spoil it for everybody. There's no definitive answer. Yeah. But sometimes those are the best ones because we get to explore all this stuff and we can't really get anything wrong because nobody knows what's right. I like this, then. Yeah. I've turned, you know, these yeah. Now I feel good about this because I can't be wrong. Right. Exactly. Well, I guess we should start off with a little bit about what determines what size brain you do have. And again, they don't know everything about it, but they think that genetics plays a part. They know this in part by studying twins. And identical twins have, of course, the same genes. Fraternal twins have about half the same genes. Right. And there's a greater correlation in brain size if you're identical than fraternal. Yeah. So genetics looks like it probably plays a role. Yeah. And they've done a lot of exploration into what genes in particular have to do with brain size. And they've isolated a few. One is called betacatenin. There's a hyphen in there, too. Yeah, it's pretty flashy. Gene, not betacarotene. No. Catanan. Yes. And who's coming up with the naming convention for genes? They are all over the place. You can't look at the name of the gene and be like, that's obviously a gene. Yes. Unless there's like a couple of weird consonants and a number and then another consonant. Then you're like, well, that's a gene. But you're right. Catsinine. Yeah. That's a gene. It is a gene. And it's a gene that they know controls brain growth because they've injected poor mice with this stuff until their heads exploded. Exactly. They fell short of exploding, but a lot of the mice died as a result of their heads growing too big. But their brains grew big, and as a result of their brains growing big, they exhibited more intelligence, higher cognitive function. Right. They injected these things with a gene. Yeah. Your brain. Yeah. That made them smarter. Yeah. But like Molly points out in this article, that doesn't mean we should start doing that because these mice are dying. So you can't play God, as they say. No, but it does make you wonder, like, okay, you don't want to shoot up betacaten. Right. Like before the SATS or anything like that. Right. But is there a way to kind of tamper a little less, but still tamper with that gene. Something put under your tongue and let it dissolve, maybe. Sure. Like epigenetically just a tad bit. Maybe amplify it just a tad and see what happens. But it would cause your brain to grow because that gene is partially responsible for the size that your brain gets to that's right. As far as large brains go, yes. Like it makes it larger. Yes. If you want to talk smaller brains, there's another gene. And boy, you're right. The names are all over the place. Yeah, just convention wise. It's not like they have different names. Some are numbers and dashes. Right. They get it together, people. ASPM, it's an abbreviation for abnormal spindle. Like microcephaly associated. That's the name of the gene. Yeah, it's just shameful. And they say microcephaly associated because that is a condition that you've probably seen before when you're born with a small head and small brain, which probably means you're going to have some cognitive impairment. Right. So right there, smaller brain is correlated to lesser or lower faculty or cognitive function. Yeah, we should look into that more for another podcast. I think it's from the images I saw, it looks like you remember, like, the movie Freaks. Yes, that guy. I think that's so cute. The deal, I think you have like normal size nose and ears and eyes, but your actual head and skull and brain are smaller. Right. You don't look like the African safari guy from Beetlejuice. Not proportionately shrunk. Right, yeah. How you get them down so small? Right. What was that guy's name from Freaks? I've read about him before. He was real name? No, he had his stage name. It was like Topsy or Flopsy or something like that. And he apparently something superstitious had like the greatest personality of all time. Just so lovable and was just exploited basically his whole life until that movie kind of got vengeance for him because he was a real life sideshow performer. Well, that's good. Yeah. Topsy. It wasn't Topsy. That was the elephant that Edison electrocuted. Yeah, I think you're right. But it was something along those lines. Just a fun name. So check. There's another gene. This is a little more genetically sounding. Em X Two. Yeah. That's sequel sure sounds like a dirt bike, right? Or a gene. Yeah. Hey, everyone, when you're running a small business, every second counts and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office? And you could be using Stamps.com. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right. From your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page, and enter code stuff. Yeah. Again, we're not saying like, well, these are the genes that provide you with your intellect. These are just genes that they are saying, these things have to do with the size of your brain. And we also have figured out that if you mess with these genes, you may also be messing with cognitive function. Right. So we're laying the groundwork here. Everybody just bear with us. The EMX Two gene apparently has to do with the growth of the functional subdivisions of the cortex. Okay. You have different cortices. Sure. They're responsible for different things. So, like in the New York Times article you sent me, the guy uses the visual cortex as an example, right. Where you get all your visual sensory input and your brain puts it all together. That cortex, that region of your brain, is responsible for a fairly specific, but also very complicated task. Now, this one functional cortex that the EMF Two gene is responsible for has to do with basically sensory input and motor output. So your behavior, like, if I came across this desk at you and pinched your cheeks, you'd like, jump back. I'd say, what is it, Wednesday? Right, yeah. You would make the connection that is Wednesday. Your behavior would occur. So this EMX Two gene has to do with that cortex and its size. What they found is that bigger is not necessarily better. Right. If you have a lower expression of it and you have a smaller subdivision of that cortex, you're not going to do very well. Behaviorally functionally, you won't be able to hit a baseball very well. Right. Got you. But if it's too big, if that gene over expresses you don't get better at hitting a baseball. With this in particular, it seems to be fine tuned. I got you. So if you're not hitting that sweet spot, you're never going to hit a baseball. Right. And there may be myriad other problems, but you're definitely not going to hit that baseball. So that means you're born with baseball talent. Pretty much, yeah. Because it's genetic. And there's some people who are so close to perfect that baseball just comes naturally to them. Right, like Robert Redford. Exactly. Yeah. He really gave those lights a wall. Yeah. He's the natural. So that's the genetic basis of it. Chuck yeah. And I guess we should talk something about size if it's important, because this is sort of the debate that keeps going on and on. Is brain size corollary to intelligence levels? Right. They have found links between if you have a lot of brain growth, if it's disproportionate early on, they've linked that early on. In the first twelve months, they've linked that to autism. So super rapid growth, what it may do is just prevent those neural connections from happening like they should. Right. And actually that kind of links into that tethering thing I sent you, too. It does. Which we will talk about later in biology, though, there's kind of this consensus that's not the only determinant, that it has a lot to do with environment as well. I think kind of as a whole, people who investigate correlations between brain size and intelligence have totally abandoned the idea that your brain is predetermined to grow a certain way and then that's that. Yeah. Well, size wise, they've also found that if you have ADHD, if you're an adolescent, your brain might be 3% smaller than your classmate who does not have ADHD. Yeah. And your brain shrinks as you get older, but doesn't necessarily lose functionality because of the shrinkage. It's not to say when you get older, you don't lose functionality, but it's not due to the size. Now they think that it's probably mostly due to planet build up. Really? Okay. Your synapses are just kind of built up with gunk remnant proteins from years and decades of firings. And you shake that off by continuing to use it. Yes, that's one thing. But also they've recently found that while you sleep, I think now the function of sleep, they didn't notice it before until I don't know what kind of new imaging technology they used, but they found out that there's this whole channel, like basically a sewage system that just clears out all the gunk from your brain while you're sleeping at night. That's why you are cognitively refreshed. That makes sense from sleep. We did one on why sleep is so important. Right. Yeah, I think that was in there. We've done a bunch. There's a whole sleep suite, too. All right. So one of the reasons why people are still debating whether or not brain size equals more intelligence or less intelligence is because there are a lot of different ways to measure the brain. Do you take a tape measure and go around it, or do you go from the middle out or do you do it proportion to your body size, which is a real measurement called encephalation quotient. Right. And if they're talking about your body size, what if you're super fat? Like there are all these different ways and knowing, I don't think has ever come to a consensus on the best way to actually do the measurement in the first place. No. And there's another really big outstanding question, is how do you measure intelligence? Like our IQ tests actually legitimate. Yeah. So when you have two parts of your equation that are both hinky, how can you come up with an answer? Well, it depends if you're comparing species to species, that encephalization quotient actually has been proven to be pretty effective. Okay. So the proportion of your brain to your body size is a pretty decent predictor of your EQ is what it's called as a mammal? Yes, as a mammal. When you go outside of mammals, it gets less and less effective. But with humans, for example, our brain is like \u00a32.7 on average. Yeah, it's something like around two to three. I've seen as much as five, but I think it's about 3% of our body weight. But it uses up about 20% of the energy, which is another measure. Yes. Like, how much energy does your brain require? The more energy your brain requires, in addition to things like EQ, you can get a pretty good idea of how intelligent that being is. Yeah. Well, Einstein's brain, remember, was the same size, but different parts were bigger than others. Right. So supposedly that's come under fire lately. Oh, really? Yeah, somebody was like, these studies are terrible. You can't make these huge leaps and bounds in conclusions just from a couple of strips of brain tissue. Right. But apparently most studies have. Well, I think that's sort of like a juicy thing that people like to talk about, Einstein's brain. I could see people making that leap. Right. And the idea that, like, oh, well, Einstein's brain is just like anybody else's, well, that means that anybody could be a genius. It really argues in favor of the nurture side of things. Right, but if his brain is structurally different, well, then genius is an inborn natural thing. It's just nature versus nurture. Played out on poor Einstein sliced up brain yeah. That lived in a garage for many years, like everyone's brain. So here's the most controversial thing. When you're comparing species to species, like you said, especially among mammals, Chuck, it's easier to say, like, yes, this EQ thing works, but within a single species, that's something start to fall apart. For instance, specifically among humans, men tend to have about 100 grams more mass to their brain than women. But if a bigger brain means that you are more intelligent, then does that mean that men are more intelligent than women? I think we all know that women are more intelligent than men. Okay. So the brain size really has nothing to do with it, at least intra species. That's what I'm saying. But there have been plenty of studies that I'm sure got a lot of people's hackles up. One guy named Michael McDaniel, who's a psychologist, basically entered the news cycle bursting onto the scene in 2005. Yes. Which is always a little bit like, who's this guy? Right? Yeah. But he came up with a study that was ready made for CNN. Yeah. I mean, he said flat out, the bigger brains means you're smarter. Yes. And Ie or eg, which one is it? Ie. In this case, men are smarter than women. Yeah, that's what he was saying. Yeah. Because he basically put brain imaging tests and IQ tests together and said, well, there's a direct correlation between the two. And again, with these tests they did, they converted Sat scores of 100,017 and 18 year olds to an ICQ score, and I don't see why they even had to do that. And they found that males average 3.63 IQ points higher. But I don't know, it just seems really hinky because, first of all, they use 10,000 more females than males, so that's going to skew things. Yeah. And then it's an sat. Right. What does that even mean? Yeah. Which has been proven time and time again to be biased. Yeah. And then they converted that to an IQ source with some machine. Seems like some things would be lost in translation. Yeah. I think it's a bunch of bunk. Yeah. I think you're not alone in the idea that it's a bunch of bunk. So a lot of scientists have said, okay, all right. This whole brain size correlating to intelligence stinks of phrenology. Yes. When you're talking about looking at it just in the human species. Right. Yeah. So what is it, though? I mean, surely there's got to be some biological part or aspect of the brain that correlates to intelligence. If it's not size, then maybe it's the number of neurons that you have. Yeah. Neural connections. A lot of people have thought that that was kind of the second to most recent wave in thinking about what brain structure correlates to intelligence. Yeah. Was this the New York Times one about the tether hypothesis? This is just December of last year, so it's pretty recent. And a couple of neuroscientists from COVID, you know, they're right. They had a pretty simple explanation when back in the day, when tuktuk had a little bitty tiny brain, their argument is that the neurons were tightly tethered in a pretty simple connection pattern, and that when our brain started getting bigger, those tethers were torn apart, and it enabled us to form a new neurons and new neural pathways and new circuits. Right. That makes a lot of sense to me. Yeah. It's like the brain size might have been about the same as it was, but the neural connections were still following the primal animal connectivity, where it's like they connect in a predictable way, whereas with this untethered idea, they just blossomed out into the idea of what neural connections look like today. Rather than following, like, straight, predictable lines, they were all over the place. And from these new connections, new associations arose and that gave rise to intellect, according to this. Yeah. It's pretty simple. Smart. Yeah. I like I think sometimes the simplest hypotheses might be on target with Occam's razor, my friend. Or maybe they just speak to me because I'm a dummy. Chuck, I got tether. I played tether ball. That is a competing explanation. Another one that I've seen says that it's not the neurons, not the number of neurons, not even the number of neural connections. It's the chemistry and the complexity of the neurotransmitters that are being conducted between these neurons. And from this has kind of come this new idea that it's folly to even say, well, humans are obviously smarter than a bottlenose dolphin, even though they're smart, because the bottlenose dolphins experience understanding of life is so radically different from humans. You can't compare intellectual intellect. Yeah. You can't say, well, a dolphin can't talk and speak, but I can't do things a dolphin can do. Right. Or maybe dolphins are speaking to one another. Yes. Just not to us. Right. It doesn't make them less intelligent. So long and thanks for all the fish. Yeah, that's a good one. Yeah. And we're not like anthropomorphizing here. Basically. There is very little point, I guess. Yeah, I don't get it. To comparing the two. There's tremendous point to getting to cracking this code and understanding dolphin intellect or bird intellect, the greed or octopus intellect and human intellect. But to compare them, it's an exercise in futility. There's no point to it. I don't get it. Hey, everyone, when you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office when you could be using stamps.com? Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses, because stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and ups shipping services you need right. From your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. I mean, compare dolphin a to dolphin b. 1 may be smarter. One might have a little patchy mustache and hang out at the gas station a lot. That's not the smart one. Yeah, I think people do this to either. I think they're trying to claim some either superiority of animals over humans or humans over animals. Right. And that's kind of a big issue these days. There are animal rights groups that are trying to further animal rights by getting them inalienable rights like humans have. Right. Which would really screw up the zoo system. Yeah, you can look for our podcasts on that too. We did. Yeah, that was a good one. I think we landed pretty heavily against Zeus. Yeah, we did, but to each their own. But I haven't been to a zoo since then. What is this project? Enigma. I thought that was pretty interesting. It was another genetic thing. It was neat, though, in that Australian researchers said, hey, we have something called Internet and MRIs, right? And willing participants. So everybody starts sending in your brain scans. Is that who proved that the complexity of the neural activity was the most important thing? Was that project that they've done? No, that was a different one. There was a new scientist, no Scientific American article that explored that idea as the synaptic proteins that create intellect or intelligence. But the project Enigma basically found that there is a single mutation on a specific gene where if you have a C instead of T, I think you have a bigger brain. And they correlated that's it more intelligence. Yeah, but again, using the IQ test. Well, what I'm tired of are the studies that throw out the results that don't make a fun headline. There was this one from Smithsonian magazine from December of last year that well, it wasn't from them, it was from the Proceedings of the Royal Society b and Smithsonian reported on it, but it was a study of country mice and city mice. No way. Well, a bunch of animals, but they found that city mice and voles. I don't even know what that is. V-O-L-E. Prairie voles. What is that like? They're little rose. Okay. They're very sweet. They are monogamous like a bowl. Weevil. No, that's a bug. A bowl is like a prairie dog. You should look at prairie bowls. Very cute. And the idea that they're very sweet is even better. You wouldn't like, shoot one for being on your property. No, I mean, some people would, but not good people. I know someone who does that kind of thing. She said Vols, not voles, but woodchucks with the air rifles. That's not nice. He knows who he is. But the study basically said that mice and city voles had larger brains than country mice. And of course that makes a big headline because people are going to try and make the point that people that live in urban environments are smarter and the hillbillies out in the country are dumber. They studied ten animals. Only two of them showed that and some of them showed the opposite. That the I think bats and trues. Actually, the country versions had larger brains. So they don't say any of that in the study because they just want a headline that says, if you live in a city, you're smarter. Yeah, and we've been addressing this lately. Like there is like a symbiotic collusion between bad science and bad science reporting that results and stuff like that, where it's just like city people are smarter than country people. Says this one study where the data was massaged. Right? Well, can you city person can you go make butter with your hands, I have to say. Can you farm land? No, of course not. But it is possible that there is a basis to this, whereas city people, their brains are more stimulated than country folk, perhaps, and so more neural connections, more plasticity takes place. I don't think that's true. I think there's just as much stimulation in nature as there is in a city full of people. Depends on what you're stimulated by. I look at Darwin. He spent his entire life living in the country. Yeah, for sure. But, I mean, we also have hundreds of thousands of years of latent inhibition built up against a lot of the stuff in nature, whereas the stuff in Times Square is relatively new, so our brain doesn't defend against it quite as easily. So hence we're possibly more stimulated. I think it depends on what you're doing with your time. Sure. If you're out in the country sitting around watching reality TV, if you're in the same place in your apartment watching reality TV. I found this other study today, too, from Germany about pornography may reduce your brain size. Another kind of sexy headline, right? Sample size of three. Yeah. And it's always self reported, too. And when you're dealing with porn and self reporting right. Look at porn. Check the box. Do you think your brain is small? Check the box. Boom. Yeah. How smart are you? Somebody called Newsweek, they cannot say that watching porn cause a decrease in brain matter, but they did say they found that the volume of Striatum, a brain region that's been associated with reward processing and motivated behavior, was smaller the more pornography you consumed. And basically where they're at is we don't know whether it's causing this or if people that yeah. They get struck dumb and they're like, yeah, they're just into watching porn. More like in Idiocracy again, that movie. There has probably been no other movie that's made more of a legitimate appearance in our episodes than that movie. Theocracy. Yeah, I think you're right. Mike judge. He's onto something. Yes. Do you watch Silicon Valley? I haven't. I know Kamal Nanjiani. Yeah. He's funny. Yes. Martin Star. Yeah, it's a good show. Nice. I think it was high time that someone took on the tech industry and like a comedy like that. Leave it to Mike Judge. I know. If there's any crusader satiric crusader. People feeling good about themselves, right? Yeah, it's Mike Judge. If you want to know more about brain size in relation to whatever, just type in brain in the search bar@housetofworks.com. Get lost. That's what I say. Yeah. Type in brain and just go on a trip, man. All right. That's right. Journey. I think that's the slogan for how stuff works. That's right. I said search bar is time for what? Listener mail. Yes. Okay, I'm going to call this help for a fan in need. Oh, that's nice. Hey, guys, I want some. Help, please. My wife and I are expecting our first kid this summer. And 13 days ago, we also found out that my wife has stage four breast cancer. So we are spending our third trimester getting chemo. My goodness. I know we're going to kick cancer in the butt, we have no doubt. But we're scared and overwhelmed. Obviously, we're doing chemo now. Then we'll have the baby get more chemo than bilateral mastectomy and radiation. We have great doctors and great friends and family. So even in the face of this, we feel very lucky. And by the way, I got a follow up more recently that says there is no gestational diabetes and the cancer is already shrinking. Oh, it's great. So things are going great so far. Thanks for not keeping us in suspense. I know I was going to wait till the end and he asked for a couple of favors. He said, first of all, if you want to follow and promote my tumblr to keep people updated, it is http galafrikadiki gallifreekydeeky tumbler.com he says we're huge nerds and Doctor Who fans, so that was lost on me. Some doctor who referenced, I guess. Apparently so. Does it have to do with the phone booth? Maybe that's the only thing you know about. Same here. Secondly, I'm biking 150 miles to raise money, and could you plug that? And you can go to Goo gljzxq. These people don't like normal words. Well, that's one of those shortened URLs. Oh, I see. It's a goo. Got you. And then third, how about a shout out? I think that's what we're doing here. My wife is a little shy, so just use her nickname, the Mayor. That's hilarious. She wears a sash during chemo and childbirth. I guess so. I mean, I call Emily the boss. The Mayor. Yeah, but the Mayor is like, the boss of several bosses, I would guess. Yeah. We used to call my friend Justin, who, you know, the Mayor of Atlanta, because everywhere he went, nobody knew him. He's a sociable fellow, but now we just call him the Manager of Atlanta, because everywhere you go, he has some improvement to that place. Okay. Like the lighting is not quite right, or the door should be over there. The kitchen is not located properly. It's bricks. Yeah. And then fourth, my wife works in public policy, specifically helping women and families get themselves out of poverty and advocating for low income workers. So there you have it. An awesome and incredible woman who dedicates her considerable talents to helping others, is pregnant and has breast cancer. Kind of hard to say no, right? I'm not above guilt tripping. So, Bob from Swatmore, Pennsylvania. There you go. People should go and check out that stuff and support your bike ride. And I hope things have continued to progress well for your wife and child and keep us updated. Yeah, and you keep me updated at the very least. If not everybody listening. I will. Okay, thanks a lot, Bob and the mayor. Good luck to you both. And let's see if you want to get in touch with us. Whether you're a mayor, a provincial governor, who knows, you can get in touch with us on Twitter at syskodcast. You can join us on facebookcom stuffychano. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast@howstoughfworks.com and join us at our home on the Web stuffyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstofworks.com. Ah, summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's criminal Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same a week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…rumple-zones.mp3	How Crumple Zones Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-crumple-zones-work	If you've ever been in a bad accident in a newer car, you probably have crumple zones to thank for your life. Much more interesting than you think, these zones are designed to break apart and absorb impact, so you don't have to.	If you've ever been in a bad accident in a newer car, you probably have crumple zones to thank for your life. Much more interesting than you think, these zones are designed to break apart and absorb impact, so you don't have to.	Wed, 25 May 2016 17:16:56 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2016, tm_mon=5, tm_mday=25, tm_hour=17, tm_min=16, tm_sec=56, tm_wday=2, tm_yday=146, tm_isdst=0)	32174571	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Chuck, aka Charles W. Chuck Bryant, aka Charles Wayne Bryant. Yeah. Named after Wayne Coin. No, thank you. Wait, I wasn't done. And then there's Jerry. Thank you, people who voted for us for the Webby Award. Yes, we won. We won the People's Voice award. Yeah. That's three of those for us. And a huge congratulations to another podcast that we admire for winning the Webb 99% Invisible. Yeah. If you heard our Ted Talks episode, we interviewed Roman Mars and he won the I guess, panel vote. Yeah. And then we won the People's Voice vote. He's the industry darling. We're the populist darlings. Yeah. When I put it on my personal Facebook page, attached roman and I said, we won the one for people's vote, and Roman won the one based on quality. And he said, no, they're both quality. He was very sweet about it. Yeah. I also want to say, give us special props to reply all who gave us a run for our money for quite a while there in the People's Voice Awards. So actually, check out all of the nominees. Nominees. Yeah. Because to get considered for a Webbie, I mean, there's a ton of podcasts out there, and to make it into basically what amounts to the top five, you got to be pretty good. So that's off to everybody, and thank you again for everyone who voted for us. And congratulations again to Roman and 99% Visible crew. Agreed. We're in good company, so thanks, everyone. So, crumple zones. I predict this is going to be a car wreck of an episode. Terrible. It is terrible. You know what I found out that this fascinates me way more than I thought it would. Dude. Totally with you. Because I'm not a car guy, as you know. No, but it's not just that. This is more the history of auto safety, but it also has more to it. There's some physics that we can grasp involved. Very simple. That makes it very attractive. It's kind of like big thing hit big thing. Right? Big boom. Right? That's exactly right. But all you have to do is switch out, like, force and acceleration. You sound smart. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. There's a lot to it that there's even some nefariousness, corporate nefariousness. So I'm like, yeah, this story is every you know what? This made me want to do episodes on Crash Test. Dummies for one, and then maybe even a couple of others. As far as Ralph Nader, we should do one on him. Yeah, maybe airbags. Just the whole car safety thing is way fascinating. It really is. And to top it all off, this article was a Grabster article, so well, that's why I picked it. Kaboom. At this point, I'm just searching for his articles. Yeah. Recommend some articles that you wrote that we should do. We've done most of them I know. That's the problem. He needs to come back into the fray. Yeah, agree. It's so sad. And we should also shout out our colleagues here at House of Work with car stuff. Scott and Ben, I'm sure, have covered this at some point. And if you're into this kind of thing, they have just a treasure trove of car. Very specific, detailed car podcast, emphasis on the treasure. Yeah. So that's couple zones. If you want to know more about it, go listen to car stuff. All right. Should we start with that little history bit? Yeah, why not, right? Yeah. So there's actually a lot of history too. I found this really cool museum of American History. A Smithsonian Museum. They had an exhibit years back. It looked like the late 90s, early two thousand s. And I just went through the page and there was this really interesting essay that had broken up over this website. There's a lot of weird history, but initially the idea of what caused Rex has changed dramatically over the years. Because at first it was strictly driver error. Sure. Because the paradigm people were looking through was before you had horses. And a horse could spook and bolt and run somebody down. And the horse did that. It wasn't the driver. The whole idea of a horseless carriage was that it was just a lump of metal that responded to the driver's commands. And so anything that went wrong, it was the driver's fault. Yeah. And it took many years for people to realize that actually no, there's some serious design flaws in cars. Right. We can actually make them safer. Right. And once people figured that out, they didn't realize that the auto manufacturers had known this for decades. And then after the public finally realized that it took a few more decades for people to finally implement it. Yeah, and I think the rationale for a while, and it was the style of the day as well, and the materials that were available at the time, but there was a notion of, well, let's build these things like Sherman tanks and it will make people safe. Right. And what crumple zones prove is the exact opposite. Is that true? Let's build something that crumbles and crushes in just the right way and that's actually much safer. You know, it's funny, I remember when this stuff kind of came up, what, probably mid to late 90s, when people really started to show up in normal cars. And I remember thinking, like, god, they make cars so cheaply compared to how they used to. They just come apart. Now I realize they're designed to come apart. Right. Because before it was like, the car is not going to do anything, but everybody inside is going to liquefy. Now it's like, how about we keep the people inside safe and just let the car take the brunt of the impact. Yeah. There are a lot of people that owe to this design over the years. But one person squarely in the center is a dude named Bella Bareny. That's a nice name. There's a couple of accents and everything. Yes. I'm not even sure if that's right, but he was a very famous engineer and inventor for Domino Benz. Holds more than 2500 patents like this guy. We all owe a debt to this dude. So many more patents than either of us. Yes, 2500. More than both of us put together. Do you hold a patent? Nay. No. Me neither. This is kind of shameful, really, at this point in our life. Do you want to hold a patent? Everybody should hold at least one patent. Well, if you could patent things, like stupid stuff that aren't like real, like Chuck's method for getting out of the grocery store in a hurry. Patent it. I might actually try that. What is it you say patent pending first before you describe it? I'll just hold on to that. Okay. Maybe I could trademark that. Not patent it? No, you can patent a process, can you? Okay. Or you can just type the little trademark symbol next to everything and it's like, back off everybody. So, Bella, mr. Bareny in 1952 had a patent. It's actually the very first one. One fintail you didn't say what the patent was for. I know, I was getting to it. Oh, sorry. Beautiful car. And it was the first car to have this patent pending. I guess it was patent holding by that point. Crunch zones on the front and rear of the car. Yeah. The whole reason was these current zones could be designed to absorb the impact from a crash. And if the car absorbed the impact, then the people were less likely to absorb the impact because the force of the impact has to go somewhere. Yeah. It ain't going nowhere. No. And if the car is built to be rigid, the car is not going to absorb it, it's going to transfer it. Yeah. Like a big Ford Edsall hitting a Ford Fairlane. It's a lot of pounds of metal smashing into one another. Yeah. And the people inside aren't going to fare too well. Especially back then when they're like, what's a seatbelt dude, not only what's a seat belt. The earlier cars had plate glass windows. Yeah. They were death machines. All of the knobs and stuff. Now that's like touch screen before they would stick out. So you just take one and go right through your forehead into your brain. Yeah. Just getting pale. Dashboards weren't even padded. It was a steel bar that would just take the top of your head clean off. Yeah. And then the cars ran on nuclear fuel, basically. They might as well. Yeah, it was amazing. I know that they've done side by side examples these days where they crashed an old car because people are like, oh, the old cars were built like tanks and so they would do the same miles per hour for, like, a Volvo compared to a 1957 Ford. And it's obvious what happens. There was a point in time where the common wisdom was you didn't wear a seatbelt even if you had it because you would prefer to be thrown from the car because it was so deadly inside the car. And there's actually a very famous ejector seat, pretty much. There's a famous Reader's Digest article that really captured public opinion back in 1935. It's called Eds and sudden death. And it's just like, really gory and gruesome, and it's talking about, like, these cars are death traps. We need to do better than this. Yeah. And they weren't even going that fast back then. All right. So these days, it's all proprietary, the exact features and specifics of crumple zones, because these car manufacturers, they have their own methods, and they don't want to share that with everyone. Makes sense. That's fine. As long as they're building it. That's right. But in general, what we're talking about are frame designs where certain parts of the frame of the car bend and collapse in such a way that it keeps the people and things like the gas tank safe. Right. Because you don't want that gas tank exploding either, which we'll get to. Right. So let's talk about what a crash is. Right? Yeah. A crash is where an object with mass traveling at a certain rate collides with another object with mass. Yes. And when that happens, force is created. Right? Yeah. Well, I was going to say, if people are saying, well, what if you don't hit a car? You're going to hit a street, you're going to tumble, you're going to hit a telephone pole. Right. Something is going to make impact. Right. Yeah. So what's happening when you have impact is technically you're accelerating, but logically, you should just call it decelerating in the case of a crash. But scientifically, it's still accelerating whenever you have a change in velocity. Right. Okay. So when you hit something in your car and you decelerate quickly, that force is transferred. The force is the mass times the rate of deceleration. Right. So another way to put it is how bad you're messed up equals how heavy the car is, and the object that hits times how quickly and suddenly it stops. Yeah. So you can actually take force in that equation and diminish it tremendously if you can diminish tremendously the rate of acceleration, if you can extend the time it takes to decelerate. And you can understand this a lot more easily if you think about when you come to a stop slowly at a stop sign, as opposed to when you have to slam on the brakes and you come to a stop. Now, the next degree above that is when you hit like a Pylon and come to a complete stop. So that's what an accident is. It's that transfer of force from one object to another through this deceleration, this rapid deceleration. Yes. And in the case of a crumple zone, there are two things that it's trying to do there. One is to reduce that initial force from that first point of contact when you hit that phone poll or that other car right. Or whatever, you want to drop that force and then redistribute that away from the people. Right. So the way you drop that force is to extend the rate of deceleration even by tenths of a second. Makes an enormous impact. Well, that's all you have in the case of a crash. Right. So, Ed points out that if you change the deceleration time from zero 2 seconds to zero 8 seconds, you reduce the total force by 75%. Huge difference. Yeah. Especially if you're in a car accident. Like 75% less force being transmitted through the car. That's preferable. Right. So, the whole point of crumple zones, the whole thinking behind them, is to basically build an area that can change this deceleration, lengthen it out some, and then also to kind of redistribute that force throughout the car away from the passengers. That's the whole thing behind it makes total sense. All right, let's take a quick break here, and we will come back and talk a little bit about how they're doing that stuff you should know. All right, so, a car is it can't be one big crumple zone. There are parts that need to be rigid. Like, if you picture a car, picture the four seats. Let's just talk about a four seater. Let's do it. I know people will be like, what about the third row? There's seven of us in here. Whatever the case, just picture a small box where the people are actually sitting. Yeah. That's called the passenger compartment. The passenger compartment. That is that box that needs to be rigid. You don't want that crumbling. You want everything before that and after that crumbling to reduce that force and that rate of deceleration. Right. You want that middle to be super strong and rigid. Exactly. You don't want delicate metal, because if that crumples, the people aren't protected any longer. They're exposed to all sorts of terrible stuff. Yes. So it does have to be rigid. But, again, before, the whole thinking was, well, just make the whole car super rigid. And the problem is, there has to be something that's absorbing and redistributing that force, and that's what the crumple zone does. So they took that tank of a car and rather, the whole car being that they shrunk it down to just the passenger compartment where it's really needed, and then made the rest of the car a big crumple zone. Yeah. And then surrounded that part with airbags side, curtain front and all that stuff. So that's what protects the people. But the way this article put it, man, Ed sure has a way with words. He really does. He talked about thinking of it in terms of a car crash in terms of a budget, like a monetary budget. And that's what that forces. And everything that happens is paying a little bit of that budget. It's spending some of it, yeah. Taking away from that budget, like on glass breaks when the door any kind of damage happens, that's spending a tiny little bit of that budget because that's energy. Right. And then eventually the budget is entirely spent and all the force has been distributed and the accidents over the crash is over. That's right. If you can get other parts besides the passenger compartment, and even more importantly, the passengers, to distribute that force, then 100% can be distributed before it gets to the passengers. Yeah. You want it to be paid down to almost nothing by the time it gets to you. I don't get the impression I don't think it's possible to distribute 100% of the force. No, probably not. Because in that case, you wouldn't feel anything. Right. But is that possible? I guess. Could you design something to where somebody could come to a complete and sudden stop in an impact and not experience any force whatsoever because all of it was distributed away from the person? Is that impossible? And that's the point the article makes. Probably not like a drivable manufacturable car, because that's the delicate balance they still have to drive and handle in a certain way. And that's what fascinates me about this car design. You have to take all these things that are knocking heads against one another into consideration. It's got a gas tank in there, things full of flammable fuel. Right. And it's crashing into things like it's amazing. It's really like that delicate balance they've walked these days to make cars as safe as they are is astounding to me. So there are some things that they have to trade off. Like, if you have a really good crumple zone, a big one in front, you're going to have to do something with your engine. And you can only put an engine so much on top of itself before it needs to just kind of go back toward the passenger. Right. Yeah. And you can only move it back so much. And the problem is with an engine, an engine is one of the few things in the car, aside from the passenger compartment, that is rigid and basically immovable. Like, an engine is not going to crumple and bend, it's going to transmit that force. And if that engine comes into the passenger compartment, it's going to say hello and transmit that force right into the people that it runs into. Yeah. I remember old car wrecks where the engine is like in the front seat, where the person used to be. That's not a good place for an engine. That's not a good place at all. No. So there are considerations you have to do in making a crumple zone. In that case, you would be like, well, it's likelier that the engine is going to kill the passenger by getting pushed into the passenger compartment. We're just going to have to make the compliment a little less. And then another thing, like you said, that they have to deal with is gas tanks. Yeah, I never thought about that. Most cars fuel tanks are in the back, and this is really cool. Most modern cars, when you get in a rear end collision, it's designed the rear crumple zone is designed to go up so that the gas tank is actually lifted up and away from the point of collision, which is usually the hood of a car behind it. Right. Yeah. Which happens in a fraction of a second. Right. So it's designed to do that. That's part of a crumple zone as well. That's a huge improvement from the 70s, specifically with the Ford Pinto. So the Ford Pinto. Ford Pinto. Man, this 1 may even deserve a podcast in and of itself, but I think in, like, 1970, definitely the 70s, people were dying in fairly low speed rear end collisions because the Pinto's fuel tank would break and catch flame and burn people alive. Yeah. These cars were exploding in minor collisions. And then the autopsy would show they had, like, basically not even a bumper, a bruise. They had just been burned to death because the Ford Pinto gas tank blew up. And Ford got caught very famously with some internal memos where they calculated the cost benefit of a recall as opposed to paying out lawsuits for human life. And they said, Human life, we're going to save about $500,000. So if X number of people sue us, we'll end up probably spending 49 million. But it cost us 137,000,000 to recall these things and actually make them safe to protect people. So they went with the just handling lawsuits, and it was a big deal. And finally enough of a public outcry came out about it that they finally did something. And I think they did recall some Pintos. And then they were like, oh, we'll just put the gas tank in front of the rear axle so it's not exposed during crashes. Right. And a couple of other improvements that cost, like, one dollars a piece. Yeah. At that point, it was kind of the Pinto. Pinto is dead. Yeah. They weren't selling like hotcakes any longer. No, I mean, you want to get a bad name for your car, fiery death is a good way to do it. There was a movie how was it? It was one of the spoof movies. Top secret. I was going to say top secret. Barely tap the tree. Yeah. It was a Pinto that exploded. Like it slowed down and went drink and then went boom. Yeah. I didn't think it was top secret, though. So in that World War II, it was in Anachronism. Okay, got you. I'm 99.9% sure that was my first thing, too. My first guess. All right, so not only gas tanks. But these days, with these fancy schmancy electric and hybrid cars, you got these big battery packs and you've got toxic chemicals, and you've got to protect that as well. In the case of a Tesla Roadster, if you get into an accident, elon Musk himself comes and pulls you to safety, sets the level of service. Did you get him out? Yeah. Oh, wow. That might be worth it if you need it. No. In the case of a Redsfer, though, it is pretty neat, though. It's got a safety mechanism. It shuts off the battery packs, drains all the electric energy from the cables the instant it senses an emergency. Pretty rad. It is pretty rad. What about if your car is tiny, though? It's pretty easy if you've got a stretch limo. Sure. You got plenty of things to crumple. Yeah, crumple away. What about, like, a Mini Cooper? What's this thing? Smart Car. Yeah, like a smart car. So the grabster says, well, let's use a Smart Two as an example. They came up with crumple zones that they call crash boxes, one in the front and one in the rear. But the problem is, these are extraordinarily small cars. You've seen smart cars before? Yeah. It's like the kind you could put, like, a giant penny in the back and pull it backward and it takes off. Yeah, it looks like a McDonald's Happy Meal. Very much. Except a very expensive one. Sure. But the Smart car is very small, and when it does get in a crash, it does have these crumple zones, and they do do something. But the engineers also had to get kind of clever, too. Like, for example, I think the transmission actually turns into its own crumple zone to redistribute the force. Right. Yeah, it's amazing. And they use the wheels and the tires. They were like, well, these things, they're going to be getting a lot of impact right away, so why not design the wheels, the suspension, the tires to deform and break away or even rebound and distribute that kinetic energy elsewhere? Which is pretty awesome. It's amazing. Yeah. And so, again, we should say this is proprietary stuff for the most part, but you can really let your imagination run with these things. All you have to do is say, like, really high end sports cars. They'll use, like, honeycombed structures, which give great, excellent strength under normal conditions. But when they're dented with enough force, they just completely give and crumple, and that force gets redistributed throughout the honeycomb. Imagine more lightweight, too. Yeah, I would guess so. No, you think? Yeah. Trains, even trains using technology, which is pretty smart, too. But they put them on the front and rear of each car compartment, right? Yeah, each passenger car. And then when the cars start stacking up, it just gets distributed throughout the train rather than into the people who are trying to eat their Salesberry steak. All right, well, let's take another break and we'll come back and finish up with a little bit on everyone's favorite topic of the Stuff You Should Know. Army NASCAR chuck stuff you should know. So Chuck the Grabster mentions that crash in this article. Michael Waltrips. Darryl Walt. Trip? No, Michael Waltrips. Michael crash at Bristol in 1990. Did you look it up? It's pretty bad. It's insane that he not only survived, they show him right after the crash, like, waving to the crowd like, hey, I'll be at the bar. Yeah, he probably was, too. Oh, I would have been like, Give me a flat right now. This is a 1990, and it was at the Bristol track in Tennessee. And Bristol, it's one of the slowest. Thankfully, it's not a super speedway. It's really small. But he was going fast. Well, you're still racing cars, right, but it's not like he wasn't going like 200 miles an hour or anything like that. How fast is he going, do you know? I don't know. Bristol, I'm going to get this wrong. I think the top speeds are in the lower one hundred twenty s and thirty s. He's still going over 100 miles an hour, maybe, which is several kilometers per hour. Yeah. And he just stopped all of a sudden because he hit a pylon. Concrete pylon. Yeah. He hit another car that will move with you or a fence that will break away. He hit something that had zero give. Now, something else that may have saved him, but it's so slight, it seems minimal. He actually hits the guardrail a fraction of a second before he hit the concrete. Yeah. And you see some stuff kind of come off. And again, when you look at that force of the collision as a budget that spent, some of that force, when it takes force for those things to be thrown clear, but it was probably just minuscule compared to the actual impact that came right after that when he hits the concrete and just the car just disintegrates. Well, and this was in 1990, before they had done a lot of the safety advances that they have today in NASCAR. And Ed point on this article, he got lucky. He shouldn't have survived that crash with the kind of cars they had in 1990. Right. He got super lucky. But even if you're not a car race fan and you see these wrecks on TV where the car just flies into a million pieces, that's exactly what it's supposed to be doing. Right. And every little piece of that car you see flying off is something that has kept that driver safe. It's so funny to think, like, before, they design cars to save you money in the shop after a wreck, but it didn't matter because it's really just saving your estate money because you're dead now. It's like, this is going to cost you a billion dollars to replace this car. It's basically just totaled. But you're fine, right? That's the thinking behind crumple zones. Basically. Yeah. That human life was more important than a bumper that you don't have to replace. Yeah. Good move. In the actually, all throughout NASCAR history, up until the idea was a little more of that old school approach. They wanted these cars to be rigid and stiff because they perform better and they were heavier and you could drive faster and hug the road and handle better. But then in 2001 and you know what? Well, it's not funny at all. I followed NASCAR one time for one season. Really? Because I had friends that did it, and I was like just driving a circle. No turning left. Just watch. Chuck. It's much more than that. Just watch. You're a smart guy. You'll get it. And so I was like, all right. I watched the daytime of 502,001. That's when Dale Earnhardt died. Yeah. That was the first race I ever watched. Wow. Like, all the way through. Like, does this happen a lot? Well, I was scared I had something to do with it. I don't know if you did. I don't think you're a jinx. No, but it was very sad because if you saw that wreck, it didn't appear to be that big of a deal because the car didn't fly into a million pieces. Yeah, he just kind of turned up into the wall and all of a sudden Daler and Hearts dead. Right. I think they even played like they played like a sound effect before they realized, like, oh, wait, he's dead. Yeah, it was awful. So what happened in that case is he had what's called a bachelor skull fracture. Did you look these up? Yeah. I mean, this is when you're going really fast and you stop immediately. And in the case of a race car driver, their bodies are completely strapped in, but their heads at the time weren't. And your head goes forward and your body doesn't. Yeah. And you get a fracture, a snap where your spinal column meets your skull. That's the basil or skull fracture. Did you look it up on Google Images? Yeah, it's awful, man. Did you see the raccoon eyes? If you're doing an autopsy or something, one way, if the person has, like, real dark circles around their eyes and especially under their eyes, that's called raccoon eyes, and it's a symptom of bazillar skull fracture. It's pretty crazy stuff. You probably shouldn't look that up because there's some really awful pictures of just dead people with raccoon eyes and the tops of their heads removed and stuff. Well, because Dale Earnhardt was such an icon of the sport. I mean, anytime someone dies, it's a tragedy. But he was, like, on the Mount Rushmore of race car drivers, so for him to die in a crash, they really started taking things seriously. And they created what's called the Car of Tomorrow, which is what they've been racing in, I think, since 2008. And that is well, it's essentially just a car. That's way safer. We won't get into a lot of the particulars, but there's more styrofoam involved. Better crumple zones. It was just a big one. I think it's called the Hans Device is what they started wearing after that, which keeps your head attached to the seat smart so it doesn't snap forward. The drivers didn't like it as much because they couldn't look around as easily. But it's like a give and take with safety. Sure you don't want to dial there either. Let's put some mirrors in there. I got rearview mirror. Sure. We'll put a bigger one up. I got nothing left. No, you got anything left? It's crumple zones, part of the growing auto safety suite. If you want to know more about crumple zones, type the word those words into the search barhouseofworks.com. And since I said search bar is time for listener mail. I'm going to call this Hundreds of Dollheads. Did you read this one? Yeah. Hey, guys. Love the show. The lead episode hit home. Because I work for a consumer product certification company, we test everything from guitars to pacifiers to chainsaws. And one of our responsibilities is certifying low lead content. Part of our federal code mandates that surface coatings, paint on children's products and furniture contain no more than 90 parts per million of lead. If this limit was originally 600 parts per million, but it was lowered after the Lead Toy Panic of 2007. Remember that one? The Great Lead Panic of 2007. I do. Do you? Yeah. Remember the Chinese toys turned up with lead in it and everybody's like, Get those things out of here. I think I slept through most of 2007. Yeah. Did you have mono? Sure. In our trace metals analytics lab, we test thousands of products every year for heavy metals, lead, mercury, arson, et cetera, and other restricted substances. My first job at the company was to use a razor blade and physically scraped surface coatings off toys for lead testing. This job was quite tedious due to the amount of scraped surface coding needed for acid, digestion and chemical analysis. The early days of your podcast definitely helped. In one instance, our lab, we asked to test only the painted eyebrows of a doll. You can imagine how little surface coding can be collected from one set of eyebrows. Due to this, I was surrounded by hundreds and hundreds of doll heads with scraped eyebrows. As you can imagine, the sights of hundreds of eyebrows of doll heads staring at you as you work is quite off putting. Is there dead eyes? Just want you to know there are thousands of people working hard every day to ensure the products are safe for you and your family. Thanks, guys. Keep up the great work. And that is Matt. Thank you. Matt hat is off to you for what you do for a living. Thanks for keeping us all safe. Tucking us all in at night. If you want to get in touch with us, you can tweet to us at SYSK podcast. You can join us on Facebook.com Stuffyshow, hang out with us on Instagram at SYSK podcast. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast@houseworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the web stuffyshoto.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com."
https://podcasts.howstuf…ffic-control.mp3	How Air Traffic Control Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-air-traffic-control-works	You know how when you fly in an airline you usually don't die? You can thank the battalion of air traffic control professionals who studiously track every moment of your flight to ensure its safety. Learn all about this unsung field with Chuck and Josh.	You know how when you fly in an airline you usually don't die? You can thank the battalion of air traffic control professionals who studiously track every moment of your flight to ensure its safety. Learn all about this unsung field with Chuck and Josh.	Tue, 24 Apr 2012 16:33:12 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2012, tm_mon=4, tm_mday=24, tm_hour=16, tm_min=33, tm_sec=12, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=115, tm_isdst=0)	37722569	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. This is Josh Clark Park. I'm with you. Alongside me is Charles W. Bryant. We're about to take this joint 33 0ft into the air. About to push some ten. Yeah, that's the lingo. It is. I've seen ten as well. Yeah, I saw that movie. I assume that's the lingo. Otherwise they probably would not have titled it Bestly you could also, there could be about like a car driving movie, too. Somebody who has a pretty good Radio Flyer wagon. It's a lot of things that they could apply for a recycling movie. Yeah. Pushing ten. Yes. We're speaking of the 1999 Mike Newell flick with Billy Bob Thornton and that's a good one. John Kusakuzak. Yeah. That's where John Cusack, Angelina Jolie met and ended up getting married. You mean Billy Buzzburt? No, I'm pretty sure it's John Cusack. Yeah. I didn't think it was very good. Are you kidding? Did you like it? Well, all right. I have to admit that movies that I thought were awesome in the late 90s, when I go back and watch them now, I'm usually like, not as great. Yeah, there's very few that hold up. I'm trying to think of one that I saw again recently that did hold up. I'm going to sit here for a while until I think of it. It wasn't pushington, though. I don't know. I haven't seen it for a while. Well, in the movie, they were air traffic controllers. Yes. And that's what we're going to talk about today. So that's how pushington relates to this one. Right. I thought it cleared that up in case people were like, what are they talking about again? You got any other good air traffic control movies? Well, Airplane. Yeah, of course. Classic Lloyd Bridges. Looks like I picked the wrong week to stop civic glue. Yeah. Other than that, I have nothing. What about all the real airport movies? Oh, sure, yes. Airport 70, airport 757-7839, four. The Grungiers. Yeah. Speaking of the grunge years, I've recently gotten into David Foster Wallace, and I am genuinely sad that he killed himself. He was a good guy. He's a good writer. Good guy. Like, from what he shared in his writing, he was pretty cool. Well, I think the late acknowledgement of feeling bad about that is better than nothing at all. Yeah. So welcome aboard that train. Thanks. Chuck? Yes. Have you ever been to Reagan National Airport? I know you have, because I've been there with you, my friend. The sickest I've ever seen another human being was you at Reagan National. Oh, my God. Stomach flu. People actually get green. I learned from looking at you. And hats off to me for pitching a television show to Science Channel in between vomiting episodes. That was rough. You had a staph infection in your stomach, like jumped up and after we pitched the show and ran to the bathroom and puked and then came back and was like, hey, thanks for the time. Yeah, it was something. So that was a bad flight home? Yes. Well, it could have been even worse, because have we been flying at night? About a year ago last March, sometime between midnight and six, we may have been forced to land at Reagan, DCA, we'll call it, without the help of any air traffic controller. That is because one night in March last year, 2011, the one guy who was controlling the tower for all flights at DCA fell asleep and could not be roused. Really? I mean, he was out. Was he drunk? No, because that happened in Colorado. Remember that? No. There was a drunk air traffic controller that they pulled from the job. That is so not cool. No, that is a job where it's like you drug test them every day. You smell their breath when they come in. Right. There's somebody whose job it should be to, like, clap next to their ears on the job. Yeah, but this guy no, this thing was this is his fourth consecutive overnight shift, and he couldn't stay awake. But apparently other control towers were calling him. Right. Couldn't wake him up. They were radioing him. Couldn't wake him up. And then they have this system called the Shout line where you can call somebody in and it goes through a PA system really loud. Wow. They were shouting to wake this guy up. And that's in place for that reason? Yeah. Jeez, that's scary. And nothing happened. So two different flights landed themselves, and I should say they didn't necessarily land themselves. The brave, valiant people at Trachon what is it? The terminal radar approach control. People who have nothing to do with landing. They took over and helped safely land two planes. Yeah, it was a scary night. Well, and what you're illustrating there, which is what we'll get into, is that there are a lot of people that get you from point A to point B when you're sitting there enjoying your vodka gimlet yes. But not complaining about the peanuts. God help you if you open peanuts on a plane these days. They will tackle you. Really? Oh, yeah. People have peanut allergies. Is that new? Yeah, it's very new because that happened on our flight. Seriously? Was it too Austin? Yeah, that's right. I had never heard of that before. That's happened to us before. Wow. Is this your first time? Yeah, I just got a text. Let's go ahead and leave that in. All right, I need to show her unprofessionalism. These are free for now. All right. I'm silent. Okay. All right. So you're back with me? Yes. I did not know about the peanut thing. I'd never heard of that before. On our flight to Austin, they said, we have someone who's allergic, and no one can eat peanuts on the whole flight. Like, don't even open them up. Yeah, and then they served as pretzels that it said on the label. These are processed in a plant that also processes peanuts and other nuts. Does it really? But that's happened to you, me and me before on flights where it's like, dude, there's somebody who is so violently allergic to peanuts, you can't even open them. Because my first reaction was kind of jerky. I was like, well, that's not fair to everyone else. And then I thought, Come on, I don't even care for the peanuts. Yeah, they're not even that good now. Who cares? People who really love peanuts, I'm sure. But I guess what I'm trying to drive at is that everything there is to know about air traffic controllers. The end. Josh, there are approximately 50,000 aircraft operating in US. Airspace every day. 50,000. So here's the thing. If there's 5000 in the sky every hour during peak hours did you do some math that didn't work out? I don't understand this because think about so let's say every hour was a peak hour. Well, they're not, otherwise it wouldn't be a peak hour. All right, I guess that's what it is then. But even still, that's crazy. It seems off, but whatever. I defer to Freud and Rick. He has a PhD. And I don't. Although I always wondered what it was in Who Craig? The author of this article's. PhD. Yeah, we can find that out. Okay. Maybe it's like a bill. Cosby doctorate. He's got, like, ten of them. I used to make fun of Bill Cosby because I think he's an old crank jerk. And I got called out once because I was making fun of his doctor. He apparently has at least one, I think, an education that he earned. Oh, really? Yeah. It wasn't just from a speaking engagement? Well, who am I? My dad has a PhD. We should probably start talking about air traffic control this time. Yes. Actually, I thought, this is very cool, how it works, and we're going to get into it pretty specifically from the time you are sitting on your plane to the time you land and are getting off your plane. And for those of you who like to fly between, say, DC. And Atlanta, this will last approximately about as long as your flight will. No, we'll go through it. All right, let's start out with airspace. There are 21 zones in the United States airspace, or centers. Each of those zones is divided into sectors, and within each of those zones, there are portions of airspace about 50 miles in diameter. Yeah. And that is called tricon Trayon. That is the terminal radar approach control that you talked about. Yeah. And within the trachon, there could be several airports, depending on where you are. Like, for example, if you're in the San Francisco area, you have not one, not two, but three international airports within that traycon, within just a few miles of each other. And each of those airports has their own five mile radius of their own airspace. But that can overlap, evidently. Are they within 5 miles? No. I'll bet you they don't build them within 5 miles of each other or 10 miles if it's a five mile radius. Yeah, that would overlap. But this map might not be the scale, because it looks kind of cartoony, but it looks like they're pretty close. It's confusing. At the very least. At the very least, there are three international airports within the same tray. Con. Right. All right, so, FAA, they run the traffic control system. It's a government body. They take care of it all. We'll get to the strike a bit later. You don't want to talk about it? No, I was excited about talking about it. We can talk now. No, it's okay. So there are several different divisions, and we'll go over there now, so you know what we're talking about here when you take off and you'll know who's handling you at any given moment. Yeah. And it's all pretty intuitive. Sure. It makes sense. Ford and ricky is a really good analogy, I thought. It just completely clears any misunderstanding whatsoever up. It's all very much like a zone defense. As your plane is moving, it gets handed off from one person to another person to another person as your plane crosses through the airspace. We could really stop there, but let's not. Okay. Division one air traffic control system command center ATCs. They oversee the whole ball of wax and manage control within the centers when there are problems. So I get the impression that these guys are, like, the cream of the crop. Yeah. You've got some pretty bad weather here. I'm just going to go ahead and take over your controls and handle this for you. Yeah, I got that idea. Next is the air route traffic control centers, and there is one art for each center, and they manage traffic within all sectors of that center. Except for that 50 miles trachon zone. Yes. Correct? Yes. Okay. These are the ones where it's kind of like you're on the boonies. Okay. I could get the impression that tree khan airspace is, like, a little urban. Yeah. Like, they're saying that there are actual airports here. This is just over the great plains. Okay. Are the air route traffic control centers. All right. Then you got your terminal radar approach control, which is what we've been talking about, the 50 miles of home that handles the flights leaving and coming into the airport, essentially. Then you have the air traffic control tower. You've all seen those. Yeah. And everyone probably thinks that's all there is going on. It's just the tower. That's just one little piece of the puzzle. That's exactly right. That's basically like it's almost like you can look at it as an expanded version. Right? Sure. So an airport has its own control tower, a few airports will share a tray con. And then if you expand out further geographically, you run into air route traffic control centers. And then if you look at the United States as a whole, you've got the air traffic control system command center. Well done. Thanks. It's like the power of ten. The Ames documentary. Yeah, exactly. And then finally you have the flight service station, the FSS, and that provides information for private pilots flying out of like, Charlie Brown Airport here into Cap County. Yeah. And if you're a small pilot, you're allowed to fly by visual flight rules, which means you use your peepers. Yes. And if you use your peepers to fly, you don't have to file a flight plan. And you are basically guided by a flight service station. Right. If you happened to fly a plane that has, I don't know, like 200 people in the back, you're flying what's called instrument flight rules, which means you can fly in any weather because you're using radar. There's usually a psychic aboard who is asked to give weather predictions, things like that. Right. And you are directed by this whole FAA run ball of wax, like you said, this whole quote unquote FAA. Yeah. Alright. So, yeah, I remember when Kennedy Jr. Died, he was not instrument rated. Wouldn't that the deal. Is that right? I think so. I think he was just visual VFR rated and they said that he shouldn't have been flying in that weather. He was instrument rated. Yeah. It's very sad. It was okay, so let's say you're flying Jacob this is Jacob Silverman, right? No, this is Ford and Rick. Oh, Silverman wrote the medical marijuana one. Okay, that's next or in three weeks, you never know. Let's say you're flying from New York to San Francisco. There going to be seven different portions of that flight, starting with pre flight and ending in your landing. True debt. What's in between? Well, you've got take off, you have departure, you have en route, which is synonymous pretty much with cruising. Sure. That's what everything else is here. Or vodka gimlet time for you. Then you have descent folks who have just made our initial descent, wake up, turn off your stuff. Yeah. Approach. And then you've got well, like you said, landing. Yeah. You know what else they called? The scent is sky. Mall time. Oh, yeah. Because you got to turn off all your stuff that you're passing time with and all of a sudden you're like, I guess I'll read the Sky Mall magazine. I make a second or third concerted effort to go back to sleep. It's like, hey, we're 500 miles out, we're making our initial sense we're not going to be there for another hour, but I want to talk to you. It's like, yes, we all sensed it in our inner ears. Just go back to flying the plane. Yeah. Emily gets annoyed with the descent that she can't get up and pee any longer. Yeah, well, you can really? Well, yeah, she did it in Austin. They always say, like, you should sit back down, and she's like, do you want me to peel over the plan? Exactly. You don't want that. Yeah, but they will not move. They can't move if you're stuck on the tarmac on a runway or something and you have to get up and go to use the bathroom. If you can go, the plane can't move because everybody has to have their seat belts buckled. And you must held a plane up for oh, really? Sometimes you just have to you got to go. You got to go, man. Luckily, I've never been in that situation where you hear people saying, like, I was on the tarmac for like 3 hours. Yeah, I would lose it, man. I couldn't knock on wood. I would get off. I would be like, they'd have to air marshal me out of there. Get off. Oh, you sure you can. All you got to do is say the right things, then all of a sudden you're being escorted off. Right. But then you're off and then off to jail. Not necessarily. No. I'm pretty sure, yes. At the very least, you're going to be detained for the rest of the day. I'd rather be in jail. See, that is jail. Sitting on a tarmac on a plane with all those people is jailed in Me. Jail does not have Go magazine. That's true. Okay, pre flight Josh, what's going to happen here? You're on your plane, you're feeling good, you've ordered your drink or taking your pill. You're trying to fall asleep. I don't take pills anymore. Are you good to go? I am. That's nice. Your pilot is going to be doing some important things, which don't include drinking. Hopefully, they're going to be checking over your plane. Right. They're going to file the flight plan 30 minutes prior. Yeah. So a flight plan. I always thought, like, I would never want to be a pilot. Filing a flight plan sounds terrible, right? Yeah. And then upon reading the Story club, that's the flight plan. Really? So basically, can I tell them what a flight plan? What do you think it was? Oh, I thought it was like this detailed chart route. Like, here we're going to just move to the left just slightly, and then we're going to go up over this mountain and then back down. No, a flight plan is the airline's name and flight number. Right. The kind of aircraft it is, what you intend to fly at altitude and speed wise. Sure. And then which way you're going? The route? Yes. Now I'm kind of like, sure, I'll be a pilot. Yeah, that's what you got to do. I don't think I'd want to log that kind of travel. Well, no, of course you wouldn't. And the reason that it is probably that minimalist, because they want the pilot to be flying the plane and concentrating on that while the men and women in the control centers handle all the other stuff. Right. Like we'll get into right now. Yeah. So you've got the flight data person who says, hey, this flight plan looks pretty good. I'm going to print out a strip that has to do with basically, I think, there's like 21 different little pieces of information really? Yeah. That any air traffic controller can look at and say, oh, based on this, this guy should be here right now. Okay. If anything happened. So the flight progress strip is what? When you have a flight, like, it stays with your flight the whole time, it gets passed off between person and person and changed as needed. Yes. And this is all, to begin with, filed with the FAA host computer. So before they can do anything, it's got to be in the mainframe. Well, the host computer is the one that gives that spits out the progress. Okay. So they filed a flight plan and then it spits out the route. Yeah. Probably like, oh, you're going this route. Well, then this weather is here and you got to look out for ducks over here and that kind of thing. Yeah, yeah. And another thing I learned, too, there are regular ascending and descending corridors that I think they just are typical for that airport. Not typical, but used for that airport. Yeah. So they're not just like, hey, why don't you fly out this way today? Yeah. It's really neat if you fly into Hartsfield here in Atlanta, world's busiest airport. When you're flying, when you're coming in for a landing, there's a whole row that stretches back for 10 miles of planes that are coming in right behind you. That's the corridor. But if you look over to your left or your right, there's like three or four of them. At any given time, three or four of these lines of planes all flying into Hartsfield. Yeah. I didn't realize they lined them up like that. But when they're coming, you got ten planes coming in, you're like, all right, get in line. Yeah. And there's a certain corridors you come in at a certain altitude, like a certain corridors, like, oh, you come in at this altitude, a different corridor comes in at a higher altitude. It's all very exact. Yes. Thank God. This is good. So you have your approved flight plan, you've got your little progress strip, and your flight data person is going to say, Clarence Delivery, and the pilot's going to finish up his drink or her drink. You think that's so funny, don't you? I do. And they're going to give that strip to the ground controller and the tower. So now the ground controller is in possession of your junk, because that's how they get pilots to land to ensure that they're going to come back, is by hanging under the junk while they're gone. That's right. They are responsible for the ground traffic, taxing, all that stuff, making sure planes in that huge parking lot down there aren't running into each other. Yeah, that seems like that's a big one. The ground controller might have the most frenetic job because everybody else is like, here's a plane that's landing and yes, you have to keep up with the distance between other planes and you're managing several planes, but you're managing them in a corridor. Right. This guy's got like all sorts of crazy stuff going on with planes trying to get out and get into the runway system, especially at a Hartsfield. Yeah. Like you can't just say, just go ahead and pull across runway ten there to runway twelve and you'll be fine. You got to make sure there's nothing taxing around or landing, obviously. And I believe the ground controller is one of only two air traffic controllers that are allowed to use binoculars. The local controller and the ground controller are the only ones that can use binoculars, which is pretty cool. Like, these guys strike me as like early NASA dudes who put men on the moon, you know what I mean? Yeah. Like they wear like short button down yellow shirts with brown ties and they have big forearms and maybe they have vaguely, like, military haircuts. They look like that Harris in Apollo 13. That's what I was describing. Yeah. Okay, sorry. So you're taxing to the runway, the ground controller is watching all this stuff. This is all transmitted by radio initially and as they say, all right, get on channel whatever, 13, mr. Pilot or Mrs. Pilot, and we will direct you to the or Ms. Pilot excuse me? And we will direct you to the correct runway. Right. And then I will pass that off to the local controller here. Now, the plane is yours and the local controller is the one who is keeping an eye on distances between planes and basically making sure that the sky is clear for takeoff. They're in the tower. Yes. And they're the ones who say, pilot, you are clear for takeoff. And the pilot says, okay, but I'm going to check myself first, look both ways and goes, okay. And when the pilot's ready, the pilot powers up and lifts off and you've got the local controller hanging onto that particular flight, while, of course, managing other flights as well for, I think, 5 miles out. But before they reach that five mile point, the local controller so we're leaving the control tower at the airport and we're expanding out to Trachon as they hand off to a radio controller at Trachon. The departure controller. That's right. All right, so now we're in the air, we are on route and you have to, if you're a pilot, activate your transponder, which will basically make you the little blip on the radar. Very important thing to do. Yeah. That's how they can follow you as you move across the country or around the world. We are covering all bases on this episode. Well, your little blip is going to obviously represent your plane and it's going to have your flight number, your altitude, your air speed and your destination. So where are we now? It's also how they find you if you go plummeting into the ocean or the earth. Sure. Is that the black box? I think that's probably a part of the transponder. Okay. Yeah. So the departure controllers at Trachon maybe handling a few different airports, many planes, and they also are the ones maintaining good, safe distances. It's very important. That's pretty much because of the increase in congestion and air traffic over the last 40 years. That's like job one of any air traffic controller is you have so many planes, basically you want to keep them evenly spaced following these prescribed corridors. And if you can do that, then you can do this safely. That's right. So what do we have? Are we on route yet? Yeah, once you leave the Trachean airspace, which is the 50 miles, and they pass you off to the center controller, which is ARTC, they're expanding out again, expanding out. And it's important to note, every time you get passed along, they're going to pass along an updated progress slip that says, yeah, we thought they were going to be actually about 50 miles further west, but because of bad weather or whatever, we altered their flight path. And so here's what you need to know. Right. Or they hit some headwind. So they're a little further back there's. Holland butt through the air. Yeah, which are my favorite flights. And so these guys in the radar associate controller and the radar controller at the Air Route Traffic Control Centers, the rural ones, the regional ones, they are the ones who say, well, they're just tracking your plane throughout its flight. Right. But then they're also directing it to say, like, there is some weather up ahead, there's some turbulence. We advise you to increase your altitude. And then as they pass through Air Route Traffic Control Center, after Air Route Traffic Control Center, your plane is just going to be passed off from one controller to another. Here you go, Bobby. Right, thanks, Jimmy. I wonder what they say. I think that's what they say. No, it's probably a little more technical than that. And then there's also a radar hand off controller and they assist the two other controllers. When there's a lot of heavy traffic, they'll come in and say, hey, let me lighten the load here a little bit, which is significant. So you've got three controllers all working together. Two of them are assisting the radar controller. You have the radar associate controller, who alerts the radar controller. They have new stuff. And then the radar hand off controller is basically just looking over both of their shoulders, like, don't forget that one. Right? That's a big one. Yeah, I like that one. That's red. Look how that one's going right towards that one. Right? Exactly. Yeah. Let's hope that doesn't happen very often. Remember. I was in pushington, though. Very tense. Well, because they were all flitter over Angelina Jolie. Is that what caused that? Yes. They weren't paying attention to their jobs. Got you. Because they were concentrating on that leg. It's like Bold Durham. Emily was just watching that today in her sick bed. Weird. Yeah, it's very weird. Good movie. All right, so this is all going on until you're about 150 miles out from your destination, and then the center controller will jump on board and do what you were talking about earlier and get everyone coming in in a nice, tidy little line for Landon, like, from 10 miles out, like when you were 10 miles away from the airport. No, this is 150 miles out. Okay. They start to get them in line. So then you haven't hit Trachon airspace yet, have you? No. Okay. That's the next step as you go back into someone else's trace following these prescribed quarters. And these things are not just like easy, straight lines. You know how when you fly up, you're like, what, we're going the wrong way? And then your pilot banks hard, and then you go back that's a corridor, and you're going yes, they curve like that corridor. It's really neat. And we should mention, too, if there's something wrong and that's too congested or your runway is not working, like the lights are off like an airplane, they will put you in the dreaded holding pattern, which is not, hey, just fly around up there for a while. It's specific to each airport. You know what the holding pattern is, and you stay there. And I think it's like a big circle. Or does it vary? Pretty much. All right, so now you are within 50 miles. Trachons got a hold of you again. They are advising the pilot on heading, speed, altitude. And then when you're 10 miles out, the approach controller passes you back to the local controller, and it's all just a big, glorious dance. Yeah. And then you land, and the local controller says, hey, go out this way. And you do, and the ground controller takes over. And then you're directed via the ground controller to your gate, and that's it. And then once you get to the gate, obviously you have the men and women with the orange flashlights. They are airline employees, not FAA. I did not realize that until I read this. Once I read it, I was like, oh, yeah, they're all wearing, like, Delta AirTrain or something like that. All right, so I know you want to be an air traffic controller, josh, how would you go about that? Well, I would go study very hard at school and earn a bachelor's degree, four year degree, which you don't need. Or you could work somewhere for three years. Yeah. It's actually one of the higher paying jobs you. Can get without a college degree, they say. Nice, Chuck. I would also probably focus on my spatial visualization skills so I could visualize things in three dimensions. Yeah. Work on your concentration. I'm doing it right now. Is that what you're doing? Yeah. Like we said, you were employed by the FAA and you have to apply through the federal civil service system. Pass a test, that is. I read an article from a guy that was on Wall Street, very stressful job, me, and decided I'm going to go be an air traffic controller because I just dig this stuff. And he said, the test is timed and very hard. They want to put the pressure on you. Oh, it should be. And the clock is ticking. Good. Yeah. 3d spatial visualization on the exam. Reasoning, abstract reasoning. It's like, it's tough stuff. Yeah. So they say, all right, you can be a trainee. You're going to move to Oklahoma City for seven months, and not many of you are going to make it through training. We're going to call the majority of you right. To know that going in, you might not get through. Right. Because they want the cream of the crop. But then let's say you did. And then what happens? Then you walk up in front of an airport with your resume I'm here. Kind of start landing flights. Yeah, pretty much. You start working. And then, I guess, to become certain kinds of air traffic controllers. Right. Like, I think Traycons or the air Route traffic control centers, the regional ones. You have to be certified yeah. For each little different job. Yeah. And then as you get better and better, you move up and up, and then all of a sudden you realize, like, you're the President of the United States. You can make the average starting pay $28 an hour. Is that right? Not bad. So it's not salaried, huh? Well, it gets to be salaried at a certain point. I think the average starting pay yeah. That's good money. Yeah, it is. And controllers can earn up to and over 100,000 per year after just a few years, they say, wow. But you're going to be working long shift duties. You're going to be working on Christmas, maybe working from midnight to 08:00, a.m. Sometimes midnight to six. It's intensely stressful. What do you mean? That's a shift? I thought they were eight hour shift. I think they're six hour shifts. Oh, they cut that back then. Which is good. Yeah. Because one of the things in 1981 when they went on strike, they were lobbying for was reduced shift hours. Well, what happened when they all went on strike? Do you know about this or are you being coy? I mean, vaguely. Well, they went on strike in August and they wanted better wages. They wanted a 32 hours work week because, remember, these are FAA employees. Yeah. So they're Federal civil service, which is a big problem because you're not allowed to go on strike if you're a federal union member. Is that right? Yeah. So they violated the law. Ronald Reagan. President Ronald Reagan ordered them back to work. Said, you got to go back to work right now. I didn't even try to do Reagan. They should try it again. No. Do Nixon doing Reagan. No, only 1300 of the 13,000 went back to work. He says, You've got 48 hours. Sounds much better. And then in 48 hours, they did not come back to work. And he says, you know what? All 11,000 plus of you are fired. 11,700 by me, the president. I'm firing all of you. So crazy. And he did. Yeah. And they had to cut the flights back to 50% for a while, and they were also banned from any federal service for life, but Clinton rescinded that. And then they say it took a full decade to restore the program back to its original staffing numbers. Wow. That's crazy. Although they got up and running and doing the best they can within a few years. Seems a little rash, but the giver sent us messages. That ain't what you want, striking man. No, I agree. But wow. Yeah. You're all fired. And I thought it was always one of the top stressful jobs, but the list of 2012 doesn't have it in the top ten. Really? Well, let's hear that list. You want to hear it? Yeah. Number ten cab driver. Wow. Yeah. Okay. Don't go this way. Go that way. Don't take third. Take fourth. What are you doing? Stupid cabby. Don't you take credit cards? That's more stressful than air traffic control. I don't know. Number nine, photo journalist. I guess. In war torn country, right? Sure. Or on safari. They're dangerous, too. That's true. Number eight, CEO. Like, big corporate exec. Number seven, PR executive. Double. Really? Yeah. Who made this list? It's the list. I don't know who makes it. All right. Number six, event coordinator. Like the wedding planners and stuff like that. Yeah, it's stressful. You got to deal with those crazy bridezillas. No jerry snicker to that. Okay. Number five, cop. Of course. Number four, army general or military? General. This thing was put together by a six year old boy and girl combination. I bet it was originally written in crane. Number three, cowboy. Number three is actually airline pilot. Number two is firefighter. And number one is enlisted soldier. So there you have it. No air traffic control, which I think is a bit hinky. I think that list is hinky. I do, too. Podcasters nowhere on there. Sure. I'm so stressed out right now. It's got to be top 15. You got anything else? I don't. We already talked about the movies, mentioned the articles author. Yes, I think we're good. If you want to know more about air traffic control, you can type that into the search bar athouseofworks.com. You can also listen to the companion piece to this episode how Air Traffic Control Works at Tech Stuff. Their episode is called How Traffic Control Works. Check it out. Oh, they did one. See who did it better? I'm sure they don't believe they did. Okay. And I think in there somewhere I said search bar handy search bar, the like. So it's time for listing the mail. I know this because Chuck has it in his own hand. Yeah, I'm going to call this one. Our listener ratted us out to Michael Moore. Did you see this? This just came in. Oh, no. Remember in the Tipping podcast we said Michael Moore reportedly was a bad tipper. Some people wrote in and verified with their own stories too. Not about Michael Moore. That didn't yes. Oh really? Oh yeah. Well, tell me that first. I didn't see that one. I'm not at liberty to bolts this, but I can tell you that at least two other people have said like, yeah, that guy is not only not a good tipper, he's not like he's not all that. Yes. Wow. All right, well, I felt bad for a half a second because Ian of Brooklyn, New York tweeted michael Moore asked about his tipping habits by saying this. Hey, did you know the guy from Stuff You Should Know called you out as a notoriously bad tipper last week? Say it ain't so. He totally write it down. And then Michael Moore direct messaged him back and said, haha, no. But I'll add that to all the great fiction I've collected about myself. For the record, I always leave between 25 and 33%. That is in the face of what we've been hearing. We got to clear this up somehow. I know, and then I felt bad because I didn't see those other emails and I said, hey, listen dude, tell Michael Moore that we were sort of suspicious about this and that we'll clear it all up on the show. But I guess we just did. We just muddied the water even further. And Ian of Brooklyn said, can I also hear Chuck reenact his exasperated what? It's had me cracking up all week. So there you have it. What? It was a pretty lame reenact. What's he looking for. Josh. What now? Something along the line. Which is what? Here it is. Okay, that's kind of yours to begin with, but actually it was Fred Williams. Oh, from Beston Chill? No, I got it from the Simpsons. Okay. Moses is really good at wow. So I guess that's it. Yes. Michael Moore good tipper or not, we shall never know. Yes, we'd like to hear from you if you happen to listen to this. If it's cool with you, we'll just show up and follow you around with the camera for a week and watch you tip. But don't try to put on a show for us. Okay. 33%. I thought that was a little Yankee. Chuck is mentioning our Twitter handle. That's why it's a podcast man, that was just grammatically all over the place, wasn't it? Sure. You can follow us on Twitter by following our Twitter handle S YSK Podcast. You can also check us out on Facebook@facebook.com. And if you know what I'm sure everybody has a crazy flight story, so just come up with something. Other than that, you can email us at stuffpodcast@discovery.com. Be sure to check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join House Deport staff as we explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow. Brought to you by The Reinvented 2012 camry, it's ready. Are you?"
https://podcasts.howstuf…s-discovered.mp3	Have all the good ideas already been discovered?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/have-all-the-good-ideas-already-been-discovered	It's no secret that human beings have an obsession with innovation -- but has our species already found every good idea? As Josh and Chuck break down the continuing search for the next great idea, they touch on everything from hand tools to cancer cures.	It's no secret that human beings have an obsession with innovation -- but has our species already found every good idea? As Josh and Chuck break down the continuing search for the next great idea, they touch on everything from hand tools to cancer cures.	Tue, 16 Nov 2010 21:22:23 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2010, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=16, tm_hour=21, tm_min=22, tm_sec=23, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=320, tm_isdst=0)	31579842	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Sharks, the most famous and majestic apex predators on Earth. Introducing Shark Week. The podcast. I'm Luke Tipple, the marine biologist and shark expert with over 20 years experience in the field. I'm gonna take you on a dive with to me, you are going to learn a lot about sharks. And you'll also hear exclusive interviews with the stars of Shark Week to get a behind the scenes look. Listen to Shark Week, the podcast on Apple Podcast spotify, or wherever you get your podcast. Picture this, friends. You could be packing a carry on for a trip to Hawaii when you realize you're going to need a bigger bag. But it's cool because you booked your flight with your city Advantage Platinum Select card, so you can check a bag for free on domestic travel and still have room for those souvenirs. And surprise, those souvenirs also earned you Advantage miles. Actually, you earned advantage miles and loyalty points with each swipe. So let's start dreaming about your next next adventure. This could be you, and you could be anywhere with the city Advantage Platinum Select card. Learn more@city.com adventure and travel on with cityadvantage. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me, as always. It's Charles w chuck Bryant. And that makes the stuff you should know that's right? Yes, it is. Not other imitators. I wonder how many times I've said that. That makes the stuff you should know no, just the whole spiel. The whole opening. Hey, welcome to the podcast. Well, you said it about 270 certain times, I think. Luckily, we have them all saved and we could count. We do. I don't know if it's lucky, though, Chuck. That's a lot of shows, dude. We should do something special for 300. That's a lot of shows. It is. That makes me proud. Okay, well, do you think maybe we could get some cake around here or something? A shrimp cocktail with the love of Pete. No, I'm allergic to shrimp now, remember? I know, but that's the way to throw it out there. Actually, I ate a shrimp wonton the other day, and nothing happened. Really? I ate a wonton with shrimp and nothing happened. So it was just like tiny little bits of shrimp, and I don't know, either that or I'm getting stronger, maybe. So superhuman, you might say transhuman. Speaking of human. Yes, Chuck. There is a recent study that came out in part from one of our universities here in the city, Emery, right down the street. Great school. There's been this problem that's been plaguing researchers for a really long time, and that is at the beginning of the Lower Paleolithic period, which is about 2.7 million years ago, we started using sharp rocks as bashing and cutting tools. Okay. So we figured that out. Okay. You can take a rock. That's technology sure that's not horse, that's technology. Yes. Okay. You can take this rock, and you can use it to open a coconut or the head of someone who's wrong to you using an implement to complete a task. Well, specifically sharp rocks. Okay. It took 2 million years, the end of the lower Paleolithic period, before we figured out that we could actually attach handles to these things and turn them into how long it took. Yes. Wow. And this is baffled scientists. Like, how could it possibly have taken 2 million years to go from using your hand to attaching a stick? Sure. This doesn't make any sense. Well, they were dumb back then. A dumb is close to it. They would literally were lacking the region of the brain needed, apparently, according to this new study. Basically, we developed a region in the right hemisphere, specifically the supra marginal gyrus wow. Which allowed us to go, hey, let's put a handle on this. And after we did that, we moved out of Africa and started colonizing the rest of the world. So they pinpointed the region of the brain that is specific to innovation, specific to stone tool making. Okay, I thought you meant innovation in general. No. That's where your ideas come from. No. Give me a second. I'll ramp. Shit. Did I ruin it? It's okay. Okay, so we go from can't figure out how to attach a handle to a sharp rock, 2 million years. We figure that out, we leave Africa, and we start colonizing the rest of the world, and all of a sudden, things start entering light speed. Right. And it seems like over the last couple of hundred years, especially since the Industrial Revolution, our ability to innovate, to grasp new ideas, to understand the world around us sure. Has just been hitting this hyper speed, and a lot of people wonder if we've reached a point where all the ideas, all the good ones at least, have already been discovered. We understand how everything works, and there's really just figuring out how to dot the I's and cross the T's. Right? Right. There was actually a guy who famously said in 1899, a guy named Charles Buell I love this quote. He was the commissioner of the patent's office. It's attributed to him, I should say. Yeah. But he said something like, everything that can be invented has already been invented. And he said this in a memo, basically saying that you should go ahead and shut down the patent office. He clearly had never considered the snuggie or anything that's been invented since 1900. So here's what I'm going to say. I'm going to go ahead and give you my summation early on. I think people think at various times in history that they've plateaued, and then I think things happen. People come along, innovators, and then they reach new heights, and they go, oh, well, we didn't know that. Right. And there are new ideas. Right. It almost displays a shameful lack of historic awareness to say we've reached the end of all of our good ideas. It's just silly. It's just asking to be made a fool of. Yeah. Or for people that maybe people do that on purpose, to go the innovators and say, oh, yeah, using reverse psychology. That's how innovation works. Yeah. You might as well just give up. Reverse psychology drives innovation. That's a good one. There are people, though, that say that real technological innovation has been stalled for quite a while. Yes. After the 90s computer revolution. Everything else since then has kind of been like packaging it in better looking cases and sleek or designs. And it's all, like design oriented. It is. Or marketing oriented oriented. These guys, Cedric Leguere and Eric Beardo, who are both with Schema Business School, basically say Smartphones. Yes. They seem incredibly new and cutting edge, but really they're just the packaging of several already extant technologies into a really sharp looking handheld device. But that's still a new idea. I would argue it is still a new idea. But I think what their point is saying, like, before the late 90s, before the 80s, let's say, with computers, but especially the tech boom of the telecom boom of the late nineties, this stuff wasn't around. It's not true innovation. Right? Yeah. It's kind of repurposing. And what you were saying, like the cosmetic changes to the computer, one of the reasons why they believe that this is going on is because we've come to a point in the computer revolution, I think, Chuck, where you can still make tons of cash just by changing the casing of a CPU. Yeah. There's like, no money in innovation, basically, is what I got from this one article. Right. Is that innovation cost more than it's worth when you can just repackage what you've got in a sleeker design and people buy it up. Exactly. These two authors of this article predict that we're going to have two trends that will drive innovation, I guess, currently. Right. Yes. That consolidation, especially with it I think they're talking just about computers. Oh, are they? Yeah, because they're saying the big hardware firms are going to all consolidate all of the smaller hardware firms to where they'll just basically be like the big three or five. And that will leave it to the software firms to compete and innovate. So we'll see more innovation in the software side rather than the hardware side. Right. And they're also saying that the green boom is going to drive innovation. That makes sense. Like coming up with sustainable packages or sustainable solutions. Yeah, totally makes sense. One of the other things I pointed out, I thought was interesting was the tech, they call it the tech refresh cycle is too small right now. Yeah. So what's happening is they'll say you like your CD. Well, you're going to love the Super Audio CD or bluray. You like your DVD, you're going to love Bluray. But guess what's? Coming up after Bluray, it's going to be like super Bluray. Right? It's happening so fast. People aren't abandoning their current systems. They're just like, you know what, I'm going to hold on because I don't want to be the guy stuck with the laser disc player in a couple of years. Right. So all of a sudden, the same thing happens. No one's buying it, so it's not worth as much money, which means that nobody's putting any effort into it and money into it. So innovation ceases. Right. And there's a guy named Edmund Felt who is a professor of political economy at Columbia University, right? Yes. And he's basically kind of saying the same thing. He's saying that there's not enough money going toward innovation. But rather than the onus being put on consumers not buying Blurays out of fear of looking like laser disc jerks, it's actually government and big business that's not pouring money into small innovators. Yeah, he said that the innovation is the only thing not subsidized by the United States government, which he says is actually a tax in a way because it's not being subsidized. Sort of a reach. I think a lot of these guys points are reached, but what he's suggesting is if the government isn't pouring money into big business so that they can pour money into, I guess, small venture firms, these people who are in their garages aren't going to take risks. They're not going to innovate. There's no incentive. I disagree with this. I dispute this. I do. He's saying, like, the people who do work in their garages and are the Steve Jobs and Bill Gates in the 70s, that they were driven by this lust for money. Exactly. And I think that's wrong. I think that people innovate first and foremost to get this idea out of their head and burst into reality. Right. I'm glad you said this because I completely agreed. Regardless of what you think of the Facebook, mark Zuckerberg didn't invent Facebook to make gobs of money. No, he invented it to make real friends. Yeah. To innovate. And that's my point that you made, is that these people in the garage, the true innovators, they don't care if they have two pennies to rub together, they're still going to be trying to innovate and make a name for themselves and come up with something awesome. Right now there are people out there who are trying to innovate for the Riches snuggie. I'm sure the guy who invented the Snuggie wasn't in his garage and just wanted to get this out or else I'm never going to sleep. Yeah, that's the people that are looking for the next get rich quick thing. But I think you can also make a point that when you introduce money to innovation, it leads to actual stagnation. Because when you introduce money, there's now something to lose and people are less willing to take risks. And risk is one of the willingness to take risk is one of the driving forces of innovation. Okay, friends. So imagine you're in an accident, and your injuries are extensive enough that not only do you have to spend time in the hospital, but you're going to need rehab, too. Well, you have insurance, so no problem, right? Well, not entirely. You get back from the hospital and notice there's a gap and that your insurance is only covering part of your bill. And it's a big bill. Yeah. And until you get back on your feet, you can't get to work. And now you have this financial burden hanging over your head like some dark rain cloud. So what do you do, Chuck? Well, if you have Affleck, you can worry less, knowing they can help with the expenses health insurance doesn't cover. Aflac pays cash, which can be put toward expenses, which may be impacted by a covered medical event. Things like your medical bill, copays, or even routine things like rent, groceries, childcare and more. Yeah, that's Aflac in a nutshell. They care about what health insurance doesn't cover, so those they insure can care about everything else. And care has always been part of Affleck's DNA. It's the foundation that the company was built on more than 65 years ago, and it's at the core of who they are still today. That's right. They believe the cost of health care shouldn't come at the expense of peace of mind, which is why they are on a mission to help close health and wealth gaps for Americans everywhere. So when the unexpected threatens your peace of mind, let Aflac stand in the gap to help you. To learn how Aflac can help with expenses health insurance doesn't cover, visit Aflac.com. That's Aflac.com. What if you were a global bank who wanted to supercharge your audit system so you tap IBM to UNSILO your data, and with the help of AI, start crunching a year's worth of transactions against thousands of compliance controls. Now you're making smarter decisions. Faster operating costs are lower, and everyone from your auditors to your bankers feels like a million bucks. Let's create smarter ways of putting your data to work. IBM, let's create. Learn more@ibm.com. Well, Phelps had a good idea, and this will never happen, of course, because it's a good idea to create the First National Bank of Innovation. All capitalized to capitalize. Not all caps, but each word is capitalized. He should do it all in all caps with exclamation points. But basically, it would be a bank that you could go and partner as a startup company and partner with this bank for financing and I would guess some sort of low interest loans to spur innovation. Right. That was a great idea. So it is a good idea, and this does happen in the real world, and the government does pour money into innovation. He's not exactly correct in that sense. I also kind of resented that he placed big business in between people in their garage, innovating and government subsidies. We have to have big business give them the money and then skim a little off the top and give it to this guy in the garage. He's drawn broad strokes here, for sure. There are government programs, and we'll talk about one from the National Institutes of Health where the government says, hey, you have a really good idea, mr. Or Ms. Research Scientist, and we're going to give you enough money to survive for three years. Yeah, because the deal is you can always get grants if you put together a nice package. But this program with the NIH, what's it called? The New Innovator Award. Directors new Innovator Award. Yeah. This is intended for people who have such a good idea, but it's so new that they don't have the data to write a grant where people would say, it looks like you're onto something here. So they're sort of throwing money at stuff that's like, you're the dude in the garage, and we believe in this idea. Go see what you can find out. Right. And we're keeping big business out of the way. Yes. But now that NIH owns you for the rest of your career, probably. So, yeah. So let's talk about there's three people at UCLA that got these grants recently, and they're up to some kind of some interesting, one could say innovative stuff. Right. They have some good ideas, hugely innovative about how to approach problems like the Professor Dino de Carlo. I think these people are younger than us, by the way. I'm sure they are. Dino de Carlo is working on ways to basically apply heat or pressure or chemicals to very specific sites and cells using nanoparticles and magnets, which is tough. Sounds like a winning idea to me. It is basically one of the big problems we have with getting cells, engineering cells to do specific things like, I don't know, attack other cells for fun. Tell me that wouldn't be like a big Christmas gift this year. If you could make sells fight with one another under a microscope, then you have to basically try to engineer the cell time after time after time and basically program it to do what you want it to do. What De Carlos coming up with is a way to use very tiny magnets and even tiny nanoparticles that can basically my brain is so small, when you move the magnet with a joystick, it attracts the nanoparticles in a certain direction or whatever. And you can have the nanoparticles apply heat or pressure or a specific chemical to a specific site on a cell and direct it to go attack another cell for your pleasure. That's awesome, your amusement. So 1.5 million goes to Carlo, and for a good reason. For a good reason. The other winner, one of the other winners was Hugh Wing. And you came up with basically I'm going to break this down easy. Instead of saying, let me come up with a cure for cancer, hugh Wang said, let me come up with a way to detect cancer so early, like, way earlier than we've ever detected it before, that we can stop it in this track, essentially curing cancer. Yes. And he's doing this actually, I don't know. I think it's a she's doing this through nanomaterial called graphene that is just one atom thick. Yes. Graphene is like the super clearly not of this world material. It's literally a carbon atom thick. That's it. It ends up a biological sensor to tell you when cells aren't doing the things they should be doing. So did you know a gram of this stuff flattened, covers a football field? A gram? Wow. It's ultralight. That is thin, my friend. It's one atom thin. So 1.5 military hung. Right. Well, did you explain how no. Let me try my hand at this. Okay. So basically what you do is you put a graphene conductor, a transistor in a cell, and when these biological markers, right, say, histones or something like that start to accumulate, they're attracted to the graphene. And by the way, these biological markers we found are correlated with the growth of cancer. The origin of cancer. Yes, that's where they're starting. And when some of these markers are attracted to the graphene, they create an electrical charge that we can sense. And the graphene is so thin but so highly conductive, that with just a couple of these molecules attaching to the graphene, we would be able to detect it and be like we'd be like, oh, crap, you have cancer, and we cure it right then. Wow. Yeah. That's awesome. And that's a good way to approach a cure for cancer, if you ask me. Did I explain that well? I think so. I think so. The last winter this year was Jin Hyung Lee, and Jin is trying to debug the brain circuit using we have the wonder machine, which is our favorite thing in the world, the fMRI, which measures measures it measures blood and oxygen levels in the brain. So it tells you these areas light up. They're called bold signals, blood and oxygen level dependent. They light up to correspond to certain brain. Right. And we've talked about this before. You're seeing that there's more oxygen that's going to that part of the brain. So we've assumed this is the basis of the fMRI. If it has more oxygen being delivered to it, that must mean that that region of the brain is active. When you show somebody a picture of their kid, like, being carried away into a van. Right. That's the fear region right there. That doesn't really say anything, though, and it doesn't implicate well, it's showing okay, well, there's more oxygen in this region. Right. What Jin Young li is looking at is what specifically on the neuronal level is being activated right. Using optogenetics. So it's going to be called the O F MRI, and that's beyond even what we thought was the Wonder Machine. So this is the super duper wonder machine. Right. And basically, he's using light to allow genetically specified neurons to be activated. Right. Do you know one of our listeners that Emery has been harping on us doing one on Optogenetics for a while. Oh, really? We should get this person in here. It's probably as close as we're ever going to come out. Okay, friends. So imagine you're in an accident and your injuries are extensive enough that not only do you have to spend time in the hospital, but you're going to need rehab, too. Well, you have insurance, so no problem, right? Well, not entirely. You get back from the hospital and notice there's a gap, and that your insurance is only covering part of your bill. And it's a big bill. Yeah. And until you get back on your feet, you can't get to work. And now you have this financial burden hanging over your head like some dark rain cloud. So what do you do, Chuck? Well, if you have Aflac, you can worry less, knowing they can help with the expenses health insurance doesn't cover. Aflac pays cash, which can be put toward expenses, which may be impacted by a covered medical event. Things like your medical bill, copays, or even routine things like rent, groceries, childcare, and more. Yeah, that's Afflac in a nutshell. They care about what health insurance doesn't cover, so those they insure can care about everything else. And care has always been part of Afflac's DNA. It's the foundation that the company was built on more than 65 years ago, and it's at the core of who they are still today. That's right. They believe the cost of health care shouldn't come at the expense of peace of mind, which is why they are on a mission to help close health and wealth gaps for Americans everywhere. So when the unexpected threatens your peace of mind, let Aflac stand in the gap to help you to learn how Aflac can help with expenses health insurance doesn't cover. Visit Aflac.com. That's AFLA. What if you were a major transit system with billions of passengers taking millions of trips every year? You weren't about to let any cyber attacks slow you down. So you partner with IBM to build a security architecture to keep your data network and applications protected. Now you can tackle threats so they don't bring you to a grinding halt and everyone's going places, including you. Let's create cybersecurity that keeps your business on track. IBM, let's create learn more@ibm.com. Well, it's a great idea, though, obviously, because Jin Young Lee won one of the innovator awards as well. Yes. And they give these out every year, so they clearly believe that we're not out of good ideas. No. Excellent point. The NIH no. And we're not out of good ideas, so yes. Chuck, you picked those out. You found those guys all right. Well, I didn't personally find them. You're like, These guys should get this. Found them. There are very good ideas out there. Right. But there is a debate that's raging in science about whether these ideas like optogenetics or using graphene or nanoparticles to cure detect cancer, are these variations on a theme? Are they applying cosmetic changes to a computer rather than really creating new parts to it? Right. And basically the question is, are there any more major discoveries for us to make or are these really just basically associations? Remember, I've always said we have the pieces on the table. Now we just have to put them together. Is that the point that we're at? Right. You said we were. I did. And then we started researching this and I'm like, I wonder. Right. I think I still do believe that. Sure. But within that, though, there's so much that it's to me a little bit like splitting hair. Well, you're absolutely right. Especially when you throw in the word discovered. Right. Yeah. Discovery indicates something that's already out there. We just figure it out or stumble upon it. Sure. An idea necessarily kind of an invention. Yeah, it leads to an invention. It's something we've created, like technology. So let's talk about discovery. Right. We have a lot of problems that are still facing us and how we understand the universe, like human consciousness. How do brain cells create our understanding of the world, like what we see as reality. Right. How is that possible and can we figure everything out? Well, that's the big question. Like I said, there's a lot of debate about whether or not we will ever be able to figure everything out or if the human brain just simply isn't programmed to understand the world fully. There's a guy who's a physicist, his name is Russell Standard, and he's written this book called The End of Discovery. And basically he says that we're in, quote, a transient age of human development. Right? Right. Where we're past the point where we figured out you can put a handle on a rock and make it an axe, but we're right before the point where we can no longer make discoveries. Not because we've understood everything or figured everything out, but because we've reached the limits of what is knowable for the human brain. Sure. But even that, look at that part of the right hemisphere that developed and allowed us to put the axe handle on. Right. Who's to say that our brain, that we won't reach that point? That's why I said where we can't know anything any longer, we can't know everything, and then we evolve even further and all of a sudden we're even better at understanding our world. Right. But will we end up eventually coming to a point where humans understand everything and there is no more discovery to make? I say no, because he points out in here and this is, I think, very valid from the midnight century, 19th century. I'm sorry they said that a lot of people in science said we've kind of debunked religion and philosophy and all these things with scientific discovery. But he points out, and I agree, that even if you figure out all the problems of science, which will never happen, there's still human life and consciousness and the subjectivity of what goes on inside a person's head, you're never going to solve. That's not solvable. Right. That's what I argue, that's subjectivism. Yeah. I think I believe in that. Well, I agree with you. There's this aspect of the universe that can't call the new Amanon, okay, that was specifically tailored for my thick tongue. But basically, the new Amena is the thing itself. Right? Yeah. Where it's just the objective universe and we don't interact with that. Everything we know and understand is subjective. Yes. And this is where subjectivism is based that, basically we can never fully know anything, and we certainly won't ever know everything, because one thing that will always be elusive is what you see. My reality is different than your reality. Exactly. And there's no difference. There's an extreme version of it called solipsism. Right? Yes. And solipsism is this extreme version of subjectivism that basically says, everything is so subjective that I can't fully verify that you exist. The only thing I know that exists is my reality. But all of you may be made up. I may be totally, completely out of my mind and actually in a padded cell right now. And none of you are really real. Well, that sort of touches on the whole quantum mechanics thing, right. Don't you think? Please. Well, I mean, I don't have a lot to say about it because we've covered it, but it definitely is along the same line. So you think well, yeah, there's an interpretation of quantum mechanics that basically says everything we know about the Universe, we know through observation. Right. But once you observe it, it changes that's part of it. And when we observe, we gain information. Right. But we can't observe everything at once, so all we know exists in our reality, for sure is what we're observing. So everything else, like what's going on out there in the office right now, doesn't exist because we're not there to observe. It mind blowing. Once again. It is mind blowing. But also, we say all this not just to rock out to Floyd, because this is what science is up against. This isn't just gibberish. This isn't just philosophical gibberish, as much as science would like it to be. There is a true problem with the fact that subjectivity, not objectivity, is how we interact with our universe, even though science is supposed to be based exclusively on objectivity. Right. Right. Well, Stephen Hawking, you might have heard of him, and another dude named Leonard Loadernew. Is that how I'm going to pronounce that? Sure. There's a silent image there somewhere. They have. A new book called The Grand Design. And they are now saying that I think scientists used to say we're going to find the theory of everything. Now they're saying, you know what? We're probably not going to find the theory of everything, but it's probably going to be more like what they call, quote, a family of interconnected theories which describe your reality under very specific conditions. And this is kind of huge for Stephen Hawking, because he's long been a big supporter of the theory of everything, which takes the standard model of physics, includes gravity, which has always been elusive right. And then marries it with quantum mechanics to explain everything. That's the theory of everything. It's one theory that explains everything. Right? Like that surfer guy. Exactly. Garrett. Lisa, I think his name is A long time ago it was and it's going to be years before he's shown to be correct or incorrect. Right, but Hawking saying it's probably not going to be the case. There's too many different variables that don't fit together. Right, but the thing that really scares a physicist, that will scare any physicist, is this sports. Are those models that we've come up with, are they how the universe actually works or how we look at the universe and see how it works? You see what I'm saying? There's that subjectivism again. It can't be whipped well. And all the things that we've said over the years that we have formed to be true, are those even true? Or the conclusions we're reaching just based on years of thought compiled that may not have been true to begin with? Like, we arrive at reality by consensus. Yeah, but is that consensus? Was that even accurate along the way? Not necessarily. It's been shown time and time again that it hasn't been accurate through these five revolutions, as VM. Rama Chandran put some copernicus. Copernicus is the first one who said that Earth is not the center of the universe. Darwinism. Very good. Chuck darwin says, like, hey, we're actually just a bunch of apes. DNA. Freud. Freud, yeah. Before Dwight saying, like, we actually are driven by desires that we can't control and aren't really aware of. DNA. DNA, which is saying I think James Watson, who found DNA along with Francis Crick, said, there are only molecules. Everything else is sociology. I love that quote, man. It's one of my favorites. And then the fifth revolution, the neuroscience revolution, that everything. All of our understanding movements and experiences are nothing but neuronal transmissions, electrochemical, impulses. Right. So there's not even sociology that even is just based on firing neurons. Right. That's where we're at right now. That's why I say, I think we have everything on the table. Just have them put it together. But it's entirely possible, historically speaking, to say, well, we thought that before. Right. And we didn't. And what revolution is next? Will the next revolution get us over the wall of subjectivism? Or will that be the wall that we always run into. This is a good one. I was worried about this one. It came out pretty good, didn't it? I think so, yeah. Don't you like it when we pat ourselves on the back of the show? I think this one deserves it, man. Well, we went from blue rays to neurons. At the end of the day, Josh and Chuck say we are not out of new ideas. Can I speak for you? Go ahead. We are not out of new ideas. And just when you think you're out of new ideas, just when you think you've plateaued, comes a wang along to say, no, there are new ideas. And here's one. Give me the catch. Exactly. If you want to learn more about innovation and new ideas, we have tons of stuff all over the site. Just type in innovation, type in discovery. I'm sure that'll bring up a ton of stuff. And type in neurons. That will bring up some pretty cool stuff, too. You can type all those words into the handy search bar@howstoughfworks.com, which means it's time for listener mail. Yes, Josh. I'm going to follow this very heady podcast with the opposite an email form. This is from our 13 year old fan Payton in California. Well, hello. I'm sending this from my eye touch while lying in bed. I'm supposed to be asleep. So, anyway, I just started listening to your podcast after my friend Claire yes, that's the Claire from California whose email you read on the air, who thinks Jerry looks like Tina Fey. Claire is Peyton's friend. Okay. So she said, oh, you got on the ear so I can start listening to you. Actually, I'm saying Payton is a girl. Maybe a boy. You never know. I'm a boy. Oh, really? Yeah, it's Androgynous, right? Yeah. Ambivalent. At least Claire posted on her Facebook page that said, listen to the most recent podcast because you guys read her letter or something. I thought it was so cool. Claire and I are really good friends. Anyways, I love this podcast. Gosh, I feel so boring because I keep saying podcast. Is there, like, another word for that? Anyways, and she does that thing like the kids do now where they put, like, eight S at the end of a word. Have you seen that? Yeah, I don't get that, either. We're getting old, I guess. So I most definitely enjoyed the podcast on the Octopi and stuff. Octopi? I thought it was informational and funny. By the way, this email doesn't make any sense. It's because my eye touch is dumb and autocorrects words that I've already spelled right. ERG, moving on. Your iPhone does that, too, and mine does. That what's the email written with one of those pens that has, like, four different color ink. You can select from what it feels like. But the reason I brought that up is I have an idea to start a website called my iPhones spelled What.com? Because you ever look at some of them you send and you're like, can you please make sure you take the sofa out of the oven when you get home? Yeah, when you meant to say sturgeon, let's say I would. Well, probably not. Surgeon. Okay. Take the surgeon out of the oven, which is, I think, so much better. I wish you would have planned this. It's okay, buddy. Anyway, it can make for a lot of fun, so that's my new idea. Okay? And that's lots of love from Payton, age 13, and Callie. Thanks a lot. Peyton, age 13. And Callie. Boy or girl? We're not exactly sure, but either way, we appreciate you taking the time to write in. And if you have a movie that Chuck and I have not seen you assume we haven't seen that you think we should see. Best overlooked movie of all time. We're always looking for good suggestions. 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c4d1ba7e-5460-11e8-b38c-8f9456d02230	SYSK Selects: Whatever happened to acid rain?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/sysk-selects-whatever-happened-to-acid-rain	Along with the hole in the ozone layer, acid rain was one of the first international environmental threats. It's fallen to the wayside in the face of climate change, but we have yet to lick it. Join Chuck and Josh as they revive the 80s drumbeat in this classic episode.	Along with the hole in the ozone layer, acid rain was one of the first international environmental threats. It's fallen to the wayside in the face of climate change, but we have yet to lick it. Join Chuck and Josh as they revive the 80s drumbeat in this classic episode.	Sat, 21 Nov 2020 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2020, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=21, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=326, tm_isdst=0)	28349014	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"With no fees or minimums on checking and savings accounts. Banking with Capital One is like the easiest decision in the history of decisions. Kind of like choosing to listen to another episode of your favorite podcast. And with their top rated app. You can deposit checks and transfer money anytime. Anywhere. Making Capital One an even easier decision that's banking reimagined what's in your wallet terms apply Capital One in a member FDIC this July. Don't miss an entire summer of surprises on Disney Plus with Disney's High School Musical. The Musical. The series season three Zombies. Three Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and the wonderful summer of Mickey Mouse. Plus new episodes of Marvel Studios, ms. Marvel and National Geographics. America the Beautiful. From the awardwinning producers of Planet Earth, Frozen Planet and the Disney nature films, america the Beautiful takes viewers on a tour of the most spectacular and visually arresting regions of our great nation. All these and more streaming this month on Disney Plus. Hey, everybody, it's me, Joshua. For this week's SYSK selects I've chosen whatever happened to acid rain? From back in 2012. It's the story of one of those really neat, rare times when humanity came together and said, no more. We're going to actually save the planet this time. Let's hope we can do this again. In the meantime, sit back and enjoy. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hi and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. It's charles W. Chuckle. Bryant and we're doing this again. We're bringing the science this time for once in our lives. Acid rain, yeah. Falling down from the acid clouds that's not how that song goes. That's not how. Acid Rain by Tejan Des that guy is so great. We watched it again the other day just by chance, and I hadn't seen it in a couple of years and it's still just hard. Like Chad said, a friend, it's hard to believe that voice comes out of that guy. Yeah, and he's got a new one, like, mother Economy. Really good. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah, he's a good guy. Don't know what chocolate rain is about, but there's a good call out. I would be very interested to hear everyone's interpretation of what chocolate rain means. Good, I'd love to hear that, too. Let's see, chuck, do you remember back in the 80s hearing about two things? Two terrifying environmental things. One, the ozone layer. Specifically the hole in the ozone layer. And two, acid rain throwing apartheid. And that is the 80s. Yeah. I'm not going to play Sun City. No. Yeah, that's pretty much also, don't forget cocaine, Ronald Reagan, jelly beans and the 18. Yes. And Magnum. Sure. But he kind of transcends the 80s, really? If you ask me. He's just a man of all time. Sayer yeah. Never gets old. The weird thing is, since I guess maybe the mid ninety s or whatever, you don't hear about any of those things, except for Magnum any longer. Yeah. Because of course, global warming took over and everyone's afraid we're going to melt now. And so they said, well, we don't need to worry about acid rain anymore. We fix that problem. Right. I think there's a perception that acid rain was fixed and taken care of. And astoundingly in a lot of ways, it has been. Yeah. They've come a long way, baby, those. Only, by the way, has not been. As a matter of fact, another one opened up in the Antarctic. Now we have two. But that's another topic of discussion. Acid rain. Let's get back to it, though. It's a nice success story in a lot of ways and it came from a comprehensive understanding of a problem and a comprehensive will to address it. That's right. That's how you take care of stuff. There is still a long way to go, though. You always bring me back down or trying to. Not completely fix, but it is good. It's heartwarming to know that you can see a problem and reduce something like acid rain. Precisely. So, Chuck, what is acid rain, then? Acid rain, Josh, is a transboundary issue, which means even though it just occurs in the north, mainly occurs in the Northern Hemisphere, it still is going to cross over and affect the rest of the world. And the reason that's worth mentioning is because for many years, up until the 1980s, they thought it was a very local problem and then they realized, oh, no, it's not, and everybody kind of got on board with fixing it. That's right. But like you said, northern Hemisphere, it occurs mostly there because we're the dirtiest, more industrial, most polluting. Yeah. So specifically what it is is rain with acid in it, literally emissions of sulfur dioxide. So two nitrogen oxides, no X from things like cars and factories, power plants, all those nasty things. Lightning strikes, volcanoes. Those are the natural ones. Yeah. They will actually react with water vapor in the atmosphere and turn into acid, sulfuric and nitric acids. And they can fall in the form of wet rain, snow, sleet, fog, or they can be deposited as particulates and gases. That's dry acid rain. Well, the whole drying is called acid deposition because it can be wet or dry. Right. And it's being deposited exactly on the earth. Yeah, that's what that word is. It's branch from deposit, isn't it? I think so, yeah. It didn't even occur to me. Bravo. unexplaining acid rain. And bravo, Sarah Dowdy, who wrote this yes, she did a very good job on this. And when you can't just be like, well, this rain seems a little hanky, so we're going to say that that's acid rain. They actually know there's a very strict definition of what constitutes acid rain and they use the PH scale to determine it. Good old PH scale. So the PH scale is the spectrum between highly acidic and highly basic. Right. And acid rain obviously falls toward the acidic side of the scale. And in the middle of the scale is pure water. And that's at a 7.0. It's not at zero. It's entirely neutral. It's neither basic nor acidic. Yes. I just find it interesting that it's a scale of zero to 14 with seven being in the middle. Seven is in the middle of zero to 14. Yeah, but just for me, I would say zero is neutral. And anything above would be I got you negative. But whatever. In the grand tradition of civilization established by the Romans, though, the PH scale starts at one rather than zero. Sure. But yeah, I see what you're saying. It says zero to 14 in here. I like the fact I think it goes from one to 14 more than Sarah got it wrong. The graph here says one to 14. I wonder. But back to it, seven is in the middle either way. Yeah. So it would start at zero, I guess. Okay, so the more acidic is the lower numbers, and the more basic is the higher numbers. Right? Yeah. The thing is, rain isn't neutral. Normal rain still is slightly acidic, and it hits about 5.6 on the PH scale. Right. Why? Well, it combines with carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to form a slightly acidic carbonic acid deposition, which branch from the root word deposit. That's right. So acid rain is something like five, three to 4.0 as far as acidity goes. Right. 4.3 to five. Okay. Yeah. That's a big difference. And it's something like, what the acidity between orange juice and black coffee? Yeah. Which Sarah is keen to point out, which is a bit of a misnomer. While that's true, you can't say, well, it's just like coffee, and that's not going to throw coffee on your grass, and it's not going to kill it. See, my hat was off to her for saying, like, don't just be like, orange juice is fine, or coffee is fine. Because if you think about it, if it rained orange juice all the time, it probably had the same impact. Hold the old cup out the window each morning. I'd be like, oh, it's with pulp today. The problem with acid rain, though, Josh, even though it has the acidity of a coffee or an orange juice, it can wreck small parts of an ecosystem. And as we all know, if you wreck small parts of an ecosystem, there's a domino effect that occurs that spreads throughout an ecosystem. One of the most valuable things on the planet is something like plankton. Yeah. Plankton is high currency. It's like honey buns in prison. But for me, yeah, you know, pretty much. And when plankton, which is very sensitive to changes in PH, especially when it becomes more acidic, when plankton dies and small invertebrates die, then yeah, it starves out the larger animals, fish and frogs, and then we start to get hungry, especially the french who eat frog legs. Eg. Acid rain is a huge problem in France. That's right. And eventually it's just mass hysteria. Pretty much. Cats and dogs living together. Kimberly from Different Strokes ends up with green hair. That's right. There are a couple of programs that monitor this in the US. The National Atmospheric Deposition Program. And they handled the Wet deposition and the Clean Air Status and Trends Network handled the dry. And what they're looking for is trying to determine the critical load, which is how much an ecosystem can take before it starts saying, man, I'm breaking down. You're killing me with this stuff. Right. And the PH scale is determined by the concentration of hydrogen ions. Right. In a substance. That's what makes it either acidic or basic. Right. Sure. So what these programs are doing is measuring the concentration of hydrogen ions to determine acidity. And they say, oh, well, this is too much science. I would just walk out and be like, look at this. Plankton is not looking very healthy. This is acidic. I don't even need to measure this stuff. You can just spot unhappy plankton. Pretty much. Nice. It's not hard once you know what to look for. Sure. I'll teach you sometime. Well, it's not hard. When you've met happy plankton, your life will never be the same. The difference is like night and day. So surface waters are where acid rain is going to hit you most initially, precipitation. And you don't really think about this. You think it well, it rains in a lake and in a river. What it does is it rains on the ground. And although sure it rains on the water surface, it's also going to run through soil to get to water. Right. One of the purposes of soil, one of the functions it provides is buffering water that percolates through it toward groundwater, toward bodies of water. And what's buffering mean? Well, it has the ability to neutralize acids. Yeah. And that's awesome. Yeah. I think it brings everything more toward purified water or neutral PH. Right. Yeah. But I think specifically with a lot of the minerals that are in the soil, like, say, calcium, they counteract acidic rain, acidic water to bring it more toward neutral. Right, right. The problem is, when the soil's buffering capacity is overloaded, there's just too much for it to handle. A lot of that unneutralized acid gets passed along into the body of water, and then you start to have those big problems with the little unhappy plankton. Yeah. It's almost like a water filter that's past its date. It just can't filter anymore. Nice analogy. Thank you. What if you were a global energy company with operations in Scotland, technologists in India, and customers, all on different systems? You need to pull it together. So you call in IBM and Red Hat to create an open hybrid cloud platform. Now, data is available anywhere, securely, and your digital transformation is helping find new ways to unlock energy around the world. Let's create a hybrid cloud that can change an industry. IBM, let's create learn more@ibm.com. Josh, my friend, do you know where your passport is right now? 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You can learn more at City comAdventure and travel on with cityadvantage. So we've talked about what happens where the French end up with a lot of big problems in coastal areas. Nitrogen. Remember we have what is it? Sulfuric acid. And what acid what, for acid rain? Yeah. Nitric acid. Yeah. Okay, so nitric acid is based on nitrogen. Nitrogen has a really interesting impact on coastal waters where, when it's deposited, it supports algae blooms. Yeah, lots, because algae love nitrogen. And when algae blooms take place, algae starts to die eventually, and they sustain bacteria, specifically aerobic bacteria that flourishes itself and sucks up all the oxygen in the water, starving fish, shellfish plants, and eventually leading to, at the very least, a strain, if not a collapse on coastal ecosystem. So too much acid rain will increase algae. Increased algae means increased dying algae, and increased dying algae means increased bacteria. And they rob fishies of their oxygen. Yeah, that's a domino effect. One of the things I love about acid rain is just how elegantly understandable it is. It is very basic and simple. I love it. It's not basic. Acidic. Yeah, very nice. So we're not done with the soil, too, by the way. No. In addition to, I guess, decreasing its buffering capacity or overloading its buffering capacity, acid rain has the terrible habit of drawing aluminum out of the soil. Yeah, it's normally locked in the soil. Acid rain draws it out, which means that tree roots can suck it up and that's poison to them. That's a toxin. Yeah, and Sarah makes a good point here. It's not like it's not a situation where you're going to find a rainforest that's leveled all of a sudden because of acid rain, or you're going to find a lake or a river that looks nasty and decaying and disgusting water might actually look cleaner. Yeah. Isn't it ironic? It is. It's ironic and beautiful. And what it's going to do to your forest is it's going to stunt its growth, and over time, it's going to have an effect. Yeah. Like, you're going to have bald trees because in addition to the toxins coming out in the soil on low lying areas from acid rain, and it also degrading helpful minerals, like we said, like calcium and other things that trees also use in higher elevations, that acid rain turns into an acid fog. That's crazy. To me. I'm going to say at this time, that is a great band name, acid fog. Yeah. Just imagine, like, trees bathing in that all the time. That strips their leaves and basically makes them chilly. Yeah. And that's why when you see mountains in the Appalachian Mountains that have bald peaks, it's not because trees can't grow up there. They could grow up there if they weren't sucking in and being surrounded by acid clouds. Acid fog, acid folk. Yeah. That's nuts. It doesn't have to be raining, right? Yeah. It's just in particulates in the air. Yeah. Crazy. And that kind of leads to how it affects us because we are not nearly as sensitive to these kind of changes with that acid rain brings right now. It's not going to burn you. No, you can swim in a lake. Sure. An acid lake, and you will be fine. But an acidic lake, let's say yes, because it's just above battery acid. So you couldn't swim in a battery acid, like, terrible, but you could swim in acidic lake. As far as acid rains concerned, the problem comes with that dry deposition. The sulfuric and nitric ox or nitric acids combine in lowlying areas with ozone yeah. VOC. And create smog, which is bad for your respiratory system. Ground level, baby. Yeah. It can also do things like if you've ever seen an old building or a monument that's got these little smooth grooves that could be acid corrosion for years and years, it will wear a stone. It's no friend to your car paint job, that's for sure. Which, I mean, if you're into your car, it's a big deal. Yeah. The tree SAP, pollen, bird droppings, and acid rain are the four enemies of your auto paint. They're considered Corrosive, environmental fallout, and friend of Mako. Yeah, mako loves that stuff. Yeah. So the idea about acid rain, consider this, that stone statue you're just describing, that takes a long time. Sure. A lot of orange juice rain has to fall on that thing for it to become pock marked and weathered prematurely. Right. And it's had actually plenty of time to do that. You'd be like, spitting image. So sorry, man. You got me with that, so I'm cool. The reason we've had a long time where that statue has weathered over a very long time is because we've had acid rain for quite some time, ever since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, I think. Yeah, pretty much, because remember, they thought it was a very localized problem, and the reason they thought it was local was because it had such quick, rapid effects. But the acid rain, I don't know who coined the term acid fog, but acid rain was coined by an Englishman named Robert Angus Smith back in 72. Yeah. And it was the monuments that made him say, what in the heck is going on here? Yes, there weren't a lot of people back then I was thinking when I read this, like, man, it would have been great if during this boom of ingenuity and industrial Revolution, there were just as many people concerned with the impact it might have, but it just couldn't have worked that way. It's almost like they just had to do their thing and then leave us to figure out how to fix it, how to clean up the mess, sort of. I don't know if those two things could have evolved simultaneously. No, I think you're on to something. I mean, maybe we wouldn't have I don't know, the iPhone, maybe. Who knows? Maybe we would I don't know, maybe we'd be better off, a lot better off. Maybe we would have more stuff. Maybe it would have changed the way of thinking rather than just get but also how's this going to affect other people? So Smith was a man alone. An early ecologist will say, yeah, so good for him. And you've been coming up with some great off the cuff creative solutions. Well, that's not a solution. If we had a time machine, it would be a solution. Okay. Yeah. The way back machines in the shop. What if you were a gigantic snack food maker and you had to wrestle a massively complex supply chain to satisfy cravings from Tokyo to Toledo? So you partner with IBM Consulting to bring together data and workflows so that every driver and merchandiser can serve up jalapeno, sesame and chocolate cover goodness with realtime datadriven precision. Let's create supply chains that have an appetite for performance. IBM, let's create. Learn more at IBM. Comconsulting josh, my friend, do you know where your passport is right now? 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LifeLock identity theft protection starts here. So scientists did determine by what the acid rain was a problem and it was trans boundary. It's not just local. And so then in 1980, thankfully, the Acid Deposition Act said, you know what? We're going to say this for ten years, and we're going to see what's going on. Ten years later, 1990, they said, yes, it's a big problem. Yeah. So we need to do something about it. And they did. Very quickly, congress took the already established Clean Air Act and added sulfur dioxide and nitrous oxide nitrogen oxide, right, yes. To the list of most wanted reduction people materials. Right. And this was in 1995 with the Clean Air Act and the acid rain program. Right. So 1995, this is when everything really starts to come into effect. Yes. All right. I guess at least as far as sulfur dioxide emissions went, it was wildly successful compared to 1980 levels. In 2010, the sulfur dioxide emissions have been reduced by 50%. That's good. That's astounding. That is astounding, because consider this. That's not from hitting this, since we already got it back down to 50%. Yeah. 1517 years. That's amazing. And the way they did that is through a cap and trade scheme. I kind of like the old cap and trade. It makes a lot of sense. Cap and trade, Josh. Basically, what they say is, we're going to set a cap for how much? So two that your power plant can create. It's a limit. But they set the cap and they said, you know what? You've got these allowances, though. If you come under, you get these credits, and you can actually sell those to other companies that are in need. And it just I don't know, something about it makes sense. To me, it makes a lot of sense. And then over time, you decrease the amount that people are allowed to admit. And when you're cutting it into these allowances, those allowances, by virtue of the scarcity of them, become more valuable. Yeah. It really incentivizes you to do something about it for your company. Exactly. So that worked really well for nitrous oxide or for sodium sulfur dioxide. Yeah. What are we even talking about here? That's why I just say so two and with nitrogen oxides, they didn't institute a cap and trade until, like, 2003, so it was lagging a little bit. But it, too, is something of a success story. They reduced it from 27 million tons in 1980 to 16.3 million tons in 2008. That's pretty good. Yeah. And so this has had a discernible effect on the environment. Sure. Apparently. Let's see. The acidic lakes. The number of acidic lakes throughout the country have reduced dramatically. There are 70% fewer acidic lakes and streams in Wisconsin and Michigan than there were in 1084. A third of the bodies of water that were acidic in the early 90s in the Adirondacks and the Northern Appalachians are now not considered acidic at all. That's awesome. So there have been, like, huge strides made other places there have not been. And also you found this really good little kind of overview about acid rain and what happened to it by Nina Restogi from Slate. Yeah, that's whose stuff I'm quoting right now. So there have been huge strides, but there's still, like you said, originally, a long way to go. Yeah. The National Acidic Precipitation Assessment Program said that another 40% to 80% is what we need to hit to really restore these ecosystems. Yeah. And I think we're headed there. It sounds like it. Yeah. We'll check in in ten years and follow up on this. Who am I kidding? We could we'll do it for ten years. No. It'll be our comeback special. Okay. Whatever happened to whatever happened to acid rain? Great. But, Chuck, I think that this is a really valuable lesson if you have a non polarized international initiative to take care of a problem and you can shout down business interests and just say, no, this is what you're doing, and here's how you're going to do it. Yeah. You can make things happen. Yeah. I guess no one was saying acid rain doesn't exist. Acid rain is really not bad. Right. It was pretty much non polarizing, except for big business. And also, were any jobs lost by this cap and trade scheme? Was industry hurt by this cap and trade scheme? I would wager probably not. Do you think I would wage or not? I bet they're still in business. They're just doing it with clean coal and wet scrubbers and all that good stuff. Yeah, it's interesting. And I'm not even an environmentalist. I hate the environment. I'm just fascinated by this stuff. It's not true. Well, if you want to learn more about acid rain or acid fog, you can type either of those words into the search bar@housetofworks.com. And that will bring up this very interesting article by Sarah Dowdy. And I said acid fog, which means it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this MIT Nerd alert. I got a very nerdy email from an MIT student, and I teased her and said, I'm going to read this on the air and make fun of you. Is that okay? And she went, oh, yeah, and here's some other stuff you can make fun of me about. Hi, Joshua. Chuck and Jerry. I love your recent episode on how language evolved, but as an MIT senior graduating in a month, which is probably, like, right now, actually, I felt it my duty to make a very important correction to your intro. We are called the MIT Engineers, not the MIT Eggheads. I think I called them eggheads. I'm sure you did indeed. Our unofficial school song is the MIT Engineers Drinking Song, which includes many nerdy jokes, some of the expense of that small liberal arts school up the river, Harvard. Additionally, our mascot is Tim the Beaver. Tim being MIT spelled backwards. So clever because beavers are nature's engineers. In fact, every class has a special ring called The Brass Rat, which depicts a beaver on a bezel. B-E-Z-E-L. What is that? See? I'm so dumb, I don't even know what a bezel is. We would not make it at MIT. Supposedly, it's one of the most recognizable rings in the world. Oh, man. I started listening to the podcast during long hours in Lab, and I'm grateful to you guys for entertaining me during my past four years at MIT. PS. At MIT, we refer to everything by number, including majors in buildings, linguistics. The field of Mr. Chomsky is called course 24. The inimitable Mr. Chomsky gnome, I believe. Oh, yeah. And is housed in a pretty crazy looking building 32, aka the Stata Center. Sorry to ramble on. I'm very proud of my soon to be alma mater. And, PPS, I thought of one more really geeky thing you might want to make fun of regarding MIT's mascot, the Humble Beaver. One of our cheers for football games is called the Beaver Cheer, and I will do that right now. I'm a beaver. You're a beaver. We are beavers all and when we get together, we do the Beaver call. E to the U-D-U DX E to the XD x cosine secant tangent sine 3.14,159 integral radical mudvis are smart things I don't understand slipstick, slide rule. MIT go tech. I feel like he's just issued some sort of orders that only, like, three people understand, and now they're carrying out some sort of terrible mission. Yeah, like the nuclear suitcase is, like, heating up right now. Yeah. I can't even say your beaver cheer. That's how dumb I am. It's okay, Chuck. Who's that from? Laura. Thanks a lot, Laura. That was a good one. So, let's see, Chuck, what were we going to ask for? Oh, what does chocolate rain mean? Yeah, we want to know what chocolate rain means. Also, if you're Tasende and you listen to this, if you tell us what it means, that would hold a lot of water. That'd be great. That'd be pretty special. You can tweet to us, Taylor or otherwise, at syskpodcast. You can also visit us on Facebook. Right? Facebook.com stuffyoushhno. Yes. Or you can send us an email to stuffpodcast@howstuffworks.com. Stuff you should know is the production of iHeartRadio's how stuff works. For more podcasts my heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows, you know you're the best pet mom. When you growl back during playtime, give epic belly rubs and feed them Halo listings made with responsibly sourced ingredients, plus probiotics. For Digestive Health, find us at chewy amazonandhalopets.com."
c49aa84a-5460-11e8-b38c-9ffb9a91c83a	SYSK Selects: How Police Chases Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/sysk-selects-how-police-chases-work	Entire TV shows are dedicated to them and Americans love to watch a live one, but police chases aren't as routine as they seem. While police assert chases are important tools, critics say cops engage in chases too often and too easily. Learn all about the what, how, and why in this classic episode.	Entire TV shows are dedicated to them and Americans love to watch a live one, but police chases aren't as routine as they seem. While police assert chases are important tools, critics say cops engage in chases too often and too easily. Learn all about the what, how, and why in this classic episode.	Sat, 05 Sep 2020 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2020, tm_mon=9, tm_mday=5, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=249, tm_isdst=0)	26176871	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody, it's me, Josh, your old pal, your old buddy. And I'm here with another SYSK select. This week it's all about police chases. We released this episode back in May of 2013 and it's one of those things where you think you have an idea about how something works or what something is, and the more you dig into it, the more you realize that, wow, we've all just kind of been going along with this thing that probably shouldn't exist. So it was a real eye opening experience to me. And I hope even if you've heard the episode before, that you find it an eye opening again. Let's all just watch our eyes open if you can do such a thing. I don't even know if that's possible. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W, Chuck Bryant, who know? Someone on Twitter said that every time Chuck Bryant giggles, a baby bunny is born. Oh, really? Yeah, they meant it too. Wow. I love being responsible for all that joy in the world. You're doing it, man. So I guess you just opened the show with you were being chased by a police car in Great Britain. You did a British siren, I guess it was. Yeah, I don't mean to do that. Here in the United States, we have different sounding sirens. Well, in these days it's all kinds of crazy, like beeps and what's like that's. Like an American police cruiser today. Wow. This one's getting off to a great start. Let's try to keep it on track. On the evoc track. Yeah. This is in our long running law enforcement series. It's unequal by any other topic except for death, I think. I think death might have it beat. Okay. Maybe not, though. We'll find out. Alright, I guess go count them after this. Okay. Okay. Chuck, have you ever been in a police chase? Have you ever been the object of pursuit in a police chase? Yeah, I was not driving. I was in a car one time when my friend decided to run from the cops. Wow, lay it on us. Well, it was just one of those things. We were in Athens and he made a very bad decision and we got away with it. No way. Yeah. Well, see, that's something that I find extremely interesting because I didn't realize until reading this article that there are very few circumstances where a cop should feel justified or would be justified in chasing you. Right, sure. But that said, there are almost no laws whatsoever restricting police chases. It's this weird gray area and I actually found there's activists online who are saying like, say no to police chases, like restrict police chases, like create laws against police chases because these things are deadly and dangerous. Yeah, I think what, about 140 innocent civilians were killed last year? Yes. About a person a day, on average, dies from a police chase, and about a third of those but 140 or just innocent bystanders. Yeah. I mean, that happened in Atlanta. That happened in Atlanta a couple of times recently. One time, the trainer for the Atlanta Braves, I think he lost his wife to a cop smashing into her jeez. And then again, more recently, there was another case. I think it was a kid or something, but it was like it was sort of in the news lately. Yeah. And you get the impression that and cops die, too. High speed pursue is their high speed pursuing. That's dangerous for everybody involved, including the cop. But you get the impression that whatever the circumstances is just not pulling over for a cop trying to pull you over is reason enough to get the cops hackles rates enough to chase you. Yeah. Right off the bat, I think that would be any cop's instinct. Is Gunned not like, well, let me check into his record and call my supervisor and see if they allow this, which a lot of times is policy. Now, as we'll see, there are procedures in place to kind of try to tamp down that emotion of the primary copy. Like departmental policy. Basically, though, like you said, not law. Right. So let's talk about this. Okay. When you go through the academy and you get all your training, your gun training, you're hanging out with tackleberry and you learn how to make cool sounds like machine gun settings, or like yeah. You spend about a week, probably a little less, learning how to drive the car. Sadly, only about two of those days are dedicated to high speed pursuit. Yeah. Which apparently is an improvement over zero days, which is how it used to be in the guess they just said Good luck. Right. You should know how to drive fast. Right. If you're an old country sheriff, you probably ran moonshine. Exactly. Or your cousin does, at least. But there's a lot to it. And Ed Grabanowski the Grabster points out that in a high speed pursuit, a cop's car can be just as deadly as a cop's gun, and they need to know how to use it just as well and just as accurately. Yeah. Because not only do you have to know how to drive, you have to know how to drive fast while you're also turning on the lights and the sirens and calling in something. And all that other stuff has to be second nature to you so that you can focus on the driving while using just a minimal amount of your brain power on the other stuff. Yeah. So part of the car training is just that how to run a police car stuff, because it's not like every other car. Right. And if you are being trained to drive in high speeds in pursuit of a suspect and they send you to Colorado, you can be reasonably assured that you're going to come back among the better trained police in the country because the Colorado State Police maintain a course, an emergency vehicles operation course that is the cream of the crop. Did you see the aerial view of it? Yeah. They cover all the scenarios, like on ramps and off ramps, high speed turns, intersections. They've really got all laid out there and put you in a scenario where as close as you could get to like an active street. Right. It's like there's skid plates yeah. Where the coefficient of friction is 00:15 compared chuck, to say I'm just saying this off the top of my head. A coefficient of friction of like, point 95 on a dry highway. So that's slick. Yeah, that's slick. They need to know how to not spin out, basically. Yeah. And I think the exception is a really elaborate course like this. I think a lot of local police still use the parking lot and the cones in the back, which is better than an orange cone. Your doctor day, you put an egg on it. Like a Brady Bunch. I remember that one. God, that was one of the greatest television shows of all time, the Brady Bunch. Yeah, absolutely. So let's talk about pursuit equipment. Basically, what we just said was pleas training. You get a couple of days. Maybe if you're lucky, you get a few days on like a really great course. Maybe out in Colorado for the most part. It's like, you know how to drive. Just drive really fast. Here's your Crown Vic. Yeah. The Ford. Crown Victoria is the most common police car, although they're using all sorts of different cars today. When you drive around, you'll see like, those Dodge Chargers, and the more souped up I know, I think in La, the state patrol had those Mustangs. Yeah. Like they really souped up sports cars. Apparently, they're getting away from Crown Victoria because that model of car had a big problem with it. Whereas if you were rear ended in a high speed collision, your car blew up. Yeah. Was that the Pacer that did that in the seventies? No, the Pinto. Pinto. The Ford Pinto. Again, the Ford had the opposite problem. If you collided with something on the front end, I thought it was the rear. I think it was the front. Well, let me tell you this either way. I learned about it from the movie Top Secret where Pinto just barely hits a tree in front and blows up. And Ford ambulances for a while, we're blown up, too. Oh, really? Yeah. So Ford, with the police inceptor, crown Vic created this chemical fire suppression system, right, where right when you're rear ended at a high enough impact or forceful enough impact, this fire suppression thing goes off. So even if there's not a fire, there's not going to be a fire anyway. Right. But apparently it's enough that some people are like, yeah, we're going to go with the intrepid. Right? Yeah. You see a lot of Crown Vicks in Atlanta, too. Like just regular people driving them. It's like sort of a thing now. Yeah, it is. Like a little spotlight. Yeah. It's like, man, don't mess with me like that on the highway. There are some differences, of course, between a police car if you think it's just a regular Crown Victoria. It is not. Or whatever it is. A lot of times it does have more horsepower in the engine because they need that kind of juice. And they weigh more obviously, than your standard car because there's more guns and things. You're going to have like metal reinforced seat backs and things. So like you can't get stabbed in the back from the back seat if you did shootings or anything, if you didn't do a good job of checking for weapons. What else? Extra transmission coolers and oil coolers. Yeah, because I mean, bigger radiators, they don't turn their car off ever. Like that heat. Heat builds up. So they have like, oil coolers and transmission fluid coolers. Bigger alternators to supply more power. Yep. Up to 130 amps, if that means anything to you. And lights. Well, and vinyl seats, though, in the rear. That's important. Yeah. You're never going to find cloth interior in the back of a police car because suspects are dirty. They're dirty. And oftentimes they will poop and vomit and bleed and just due whatever bodily fluid they can get out in that police car. They probably will. So they want to make it easily. Get out the 409 and the paper towels and just clean it right there. That's grody. Yeah. Lights. Apparently they used to have them on the fenders in the they said, you know what? This is visible, but it's not as visible as if it were on the roof. Right. So they created what's known as the light bar, which it was a little more recent than I thought. It was the seventies that these things made their debut. And I thought back, I was like, oh, yeah, you never see, like, cars in the sixties or even early seventies with that light bar. So I was born at about the time the light bar came along. Yeah, I think you remember seeing the single siren sometimes, or the double blue Dirty Harry would put on and do like a UI. Well, some were built in, but yeah, they also had the undercover cars. That was one of the great parts of any cop movie when they got out the sirens and put it on the roof. And now you can get them at Spencer's Gifts. Summer blue and summer red, though I've never known the distinction. I always thought ambulances were red and cops were blue, but in different cities. I've seen cops have red. Yes. I think it depends on what side of the force you're on. Oh, really? Yeah, like how you're a Jedi or a Sith. So one thing they can do to prevent the chase from happening altogether. You've seen the old spike strip? Yeah. They lay down these rubber mats with spikes all across the road. Or they have them like an accordion that you just kind of throw and hang on to one end and you throw the other. That's the quick version. Yeah. And so that will obviously disable the tires. The good old fashioned roadblock that you see in movies actually happens. Sure. They line up cars and except in this version, there's not a conveniently parked tow truck ramp right beside it for the criminal to jump over everybody or bust through, I guess. Well, you have to be careful setting those up because normally the criminal is not going to try to push through the car, but they may try to go around. So you have to make sure that if you set up this roadblock, it's not like going to funnel them into somebody's house. Yeah. I don't think you do that in, like, a neighborhood. Right, that would be a good idea. You want to do it on a country road. And then modern techniques, which I think if they bring this stuff along, that's really where it's at. Like microwave technology to disable the electrical system of a car or shooting a laser. High speed avoidance using laser technology. Halt system, of course. Halt. They left out a couple of letters there. Yeah. It should be swallowed. I hate that. Halt. It's not an acronym if you're leaving out words just to make it a cute word. Yeah, all right. It's like a Laotian last name, if they spelled it out correctly. So in that case, they're shooting a laser to cut off your fuel supply. But here's the rub. There is the vehicle that they're shooting it at has to have a special microchip in it. Yeah, I didn't look into that. Is it like, newer vehicles, all that's? My guess is that they're going to start putting these in all cars or something, like to make some deal. That would be fine with me. Better than pursuing somebody. Absolutely. And then, of course, you have air support either in the form of a police helicopter or like 50 news helicopters if there's a police chase out in California. Or the world's scariest police chase helicopter. Yeah. Whoever those guys are, I think they just get footage from news copters and copcopters. Do you watch the shows? I know I've talked about that. I've seen them before. They're just so I don't know. That's one of my guilty pleasures. Do you watch this still? Yeah. I mean, it's not appointment television. I never know when or where they come on. But if I'm flipping it around and I'll see a police chase I lived in La. It's sort of a thing. It really is a thing, isn't it? Yes. And apparently California has some of the most police protective laws as far as pursuits go. They happen a lot out there, and everybody just stops doing what they're doing and watches the live coverage of it, sort of. Do you remember the guy who killed himself on live television after a police pursuit and showed it on Fox? I guess I saw that when it happened live. Yeah, I remember very distinctly. It was not like a movie. No. If you've ever seen someone shoot their head off with a shotgun in real life, it's nothing like it's not some big dramatic movie thing. It's just sad. Yes, it really was. It was like he might have been, like, making origami or something. Like it was just that pedestrian. He just had the gun, and he pulled it up and shot himself, and he hunches over and just falls. It's weird. It was really weird to see. It was very sad. And, of course, all the kids that saw that, it's terrible. Yeah. So initially, if someone takes off, like you were talking about, the police officer that's on the scene has a decision to make to pursue or not to pursue. Lots of policies. One thing they want to do is run the tags. Is that a stolen vehicle? Were they just in an armed robbery, or is it just somebody who has a couple of traffic tickets out or nothing at all on their record? Apparently, the pursuit that enjoys the widest support around the country is if it's a violent criminal, someone who poses an imminent threat to somebody else, somebody who's just carried out a violent act and is escaping. Pretty much everybody says, Chase that guy. Right. Like, if you said the person has a couple of traffic tickets, or if they have nothing and the only reason to chase them is that they didn't pull over for you, that is not reason to pursue. And yet 43% of all pursuits, and I believe 2011, were for traffic violations. Yeah. I mean, I feel for the cops. It's got to be their instinct, like, go get that person. They're fleeing me for a good reason. I get it. But when people are innocent, people are dying, there needs to be some policy in place, for sure. And apparently, Chuck, 91.4% of chases were for nonviolent crimes. I believe that. So if the cop says, okay, this car just came back stolen, this guy just waved a gun. Yeah. And it's a very clear case that he should pursue. Go get them. There are other things to consider. Yeah. Don't go get them. What's traffic like? What are the road conditions like? Is it rainy? Is it dark in a neighborhood? Pedestrians everywhere. Yeah. You might want to just kind of slowly tail the guy. Well, the one in Atlanta where they killed the trainer's wife. I think it was sort of a busy afternoon in an urban area. They shouldn't have been pursuing anyone at this point. Do you know what they were pursuing the person for? No, I don't remember. If they decide to go ahead and pursue, then this series of procedures kind of come into place. They need to be radio and back into headquarters. Yeah. Like, immediately. Right. And apparently they're every step of the way, or they just kind of keep whoever they're talking to, their supervisor posted on what's going on. The supervisor's role is to keep a cool head because they're not the one who the person isn't pulling over for, so they're not mad. Sure. They don't want to crack heads. So their whole role is to say, you know what? You just told me that there's some pedestrians around. This guy's not a violent offender. Don't complete this pursuit, or we have chopper coverage, so back off with the cars, and we can still follow this car from above. We're still going to get our guy, right? Don't you worry about it. Yeah. One of my favorite things, if you watch the show Cops, you are well versed with the Pit maneuver. Police. I'm sorry, pursuit intervention technique, also called the Tactical Vehicle intervention. And that is the famous move. If a cop has you'll hear them, they have to get clearance for the Pit maneuver even. Yes. I would imagine they'll call it in and say, hey, I think I've got a chance for a Pit. Can I take it? And they'll say, if you feel like the streets are clear enough and you have to do it on a turn, you don't just run up beside someone and run them off the road. It's when they enter a turn, cop hits the gas and hits them on the left rear bumper and just basically spins them out. And it works if done correctly. And you get trained when you get the defensive driving on the Pit maneuver and they just spin out. Yeah. You can't come out of it. Can't come out of it. Your car spins. And that's generally on Cops, at least when the guys will jump out of the car with the car still rolling and take off on foot. Yeah. And then you hear these cops, they're Micked up. So all you hear is, like, running in the dark with all this gear on. You're like, man, what a crappy job. But you know, Chuck, your heavy breathing just reminded me of something. Is it that time? It's time for a message break. Sufficient. All right. Heavy breathing, indeed. So you're talking about the wildest police chases, that kind of show that you like, I don't know who would watch stuff like that? Well, grabster, takes the task, those kind of shows for presenting a very unbalanced picture of police chases. They don't show the cops backing off if a pursuit becomes too dangerous. They don't show the cops crashing into an instant bystanders car. Right. They never say, well, this cop probably shouldn't have pursued this person because this is a minor violation. Yeah. And they always kind of tend to present the police in a favorable light. Yeah. I don't know if they're out to make maybe they are. I just think it's better TV, obviously, like, you wouldn't want to show and they're like, oh, no, let's just back off and go back to the zone. I get that for sure. Plus, also, they want to maintain the kind of relationship with cops, police departments. That where they'll give them their footage. Absolutely. No, the shows are good for the cops, I'm sure. I don't know if you can hear this, people. Sounds like a police chase is going on outside right now. I think it is. This is really dramatic footage. Chuck, do you remember the OJ thing specifically? Yeah. Where were you then? I was in college. Were you in college? Yeah. Yeah, I remember, too. Of course, the chase wasn't I didn't watch much of the chase. I remember the verdict. Yeah. I remember the chase specifically because it was during the Nicks Rockets NBA playoffs, and my buddy Justin is a huge Nicks fan, and he was really upset, and he was just like, do you have to have it on every channel? And I agree with it. You're going to preempt the basketball game? It's on 100 channels. Isn't there one person out there that wants to watch the basketball game? Yeah. Really? But their ratings would have gone through the roof, and that was a low speed chase. That wasn't even that was just weird. Yeah, well, low speed chases are very weird. I'm AC. You know who I am? I'm not going to pull over. Yeah. So let's talk about the legalities of it. Right. Like we said, there's pretty much no laws that restrict police chases. They have the right to do that in all cases. Yeah. And as a matter of fact, they don't even have to have their lights and sirens running to engage in pursuit. Yeah, that's a fallacy. There are department procedures regarding police chases, though. Yeah, but the thing is, even if a cop violates department procedure and continues to pursue, they're still not breaking any laws. Right. So. For example, in Washington, DC. You can only pursue if the suspect has engaged in a violent act, or someone could be seriously hurt if the suspect were allowed to escape. Right. In Des Moines, Iowa, no more than three cars can engage in a pursuit. Yeah, that makes good sense. It's a good rule. And you have to take into account the time of day, road and weather conditions, the nature of the offense, and the supervisor has to approve the pursuit. Right. And then in Florida. Orange County, Florida. That's the Orlando area. Yeah. Are they the ones that have real restrictive policies? Yeah. And as a matter of fact, they found that in the year after they enacted their restrictive pursuit policy, felonies in Orlando declined. Yeah. What's up with that? I don't know. One of those weird things. There is also something called sovereign immunity, which is a government official is not liable for damages that occur while they're doing their job. Yeah, that's like old time common law. Yeah, old school. But these days there are a lot of municipalities that have overwritten that law with other laws. And like I think with the Georgia case, I think that cop was fired and brought up on charges and I think they could even sue the police station. Yes, an overriding the sovereign immunity laws. Most departments or communities protect the cops individually, financially. But the institution can still be sued. Right, but they're not protected criminally. Like they can still be brought up on charges. They can't be sued. I think. Got you. Because I'm pretty sure this Braves guy, I think he went up on trial. Well, apparently if I'm wrong, then I'm going to eat crow. But in California, you're basically out of luck. If the cops mess up your storefront with their cars during a pursuit, their laws very much protect the cops from that. Like liability insurance would help out, though. You would hope. But your rates are going to rise. What were you doing? Nothing. You just happened to have a store in the wrong place in La. So that's police chases. You got anything else? I got nothing else. They seem way more dangerous than I even thought. And I thought they were pretty dangerous before. Yeah, don't support those TV shows. People don't listen to me. Glorify Chuck. Yeah. Do as he says, not as he does. That's right. If you want to learn more about police chases, you can type those words into the search bar, how stuff works. And since I said search bar what is it, Chuck? Is it time for listener mail? It normally would be, but I do not have a listener mail prepared. Instead, we are going to have a call out, which we do every now and then. A couple of things that help us out. People in our job with your free podcast is if you go to itunes and you leave us a review and a rating, that helps us out. So we would invite people to do that. And I know we always mention our home on the web is STUFFYou shouldn't have come, but we really would like to send people there to check it out. And we've got like videos and blogs and image galleries and some really cool animated stuff. And I'm proud of this website. It's a great website, it really is. And I know some of you have supported it and we would like to ask others to go out there and check it out and leave us a review on itunes and check out the website check outstepytimer.com. And thank you and we'll be back with listener mail next time. And also, why don't we take a second to plug our Kiva team. Yeah@kiva.org, it's Kiva.org teamstepyshaw. You can join the Stuffyhean team and donate to entrepreneurs around the world in developing countries. Not donate. Lynn that's right. I'm sorry. Loaning money back if you want, in $25 increments. Yeah, and you can reload or you can get it back or whatever, but it's a really great program, and we're marching on toward the $2 million goal. Right? $2 million, we're hoping by August, I believe. Yeah. So that's kiva. Orgteamsstepysheaknow and stuffyeanow.com. And itunes. That's right. Thanks for the support. If you want to get in touch with us, you can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can join us on facebook. Comstepychildo. And if you want to send an email to Chuck, Jerry and me, you can address it to stuffpodcast@howstepworks.com. Stuffyheanow is production of Iheartradios Howe stuffworks. For more podcasts My Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio App, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite show."
428aaeda-53a3-11e8-bdec-27cad60cc3a1	How Ironman Triathlons Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-ironman-triathlons-work	Sure, you could train for months to finish a marathon, but why not make things interesting? Ironman triathlons add a 2-mile swim and a 118-mile bike race before the marathon leg. It’s as grueling as it sounds.	Sure, you could train for months to finish a marathon, but why not make things interesting? Ironman triathlons add a 2-mile swim and a 118-mile bike race before the marathon leg. It’s as grueling as it sounds.	Wed, 06 Nov 2019 18:29:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=6, tm_hour=18, tm_min=29, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=2, tm_yday=310, tm_isdst=0)	53535634	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hello, Seattle. We're coming to see you and Fraser. Yep, we're gonna come see you guys in Fraser on January 16. That's a Thursday night, which is the official beginning of the weekend in Seattle, as we all know. And we're going to be there at our beloved Levitt Morphed Theater, our home in Seattle for stuff you should know. That's right, everybody, january 16, come out and see us. Tickets go on sale this Friday, which is November 8, and you can get all the information about tickets@sysklive.com or just go to the Moore's website as well. We'll see you guys in January. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W, chuck Bryant. And there is Grandmaster Dave over there. Dave C. And coOsT. Wow. Yeah, he's getting all sorts of great nicknames. You got any more? No, that's it for now. Sorry, Dave, I think what was that, two or three? It was like two and a half at best. You know what I did this morning for a little while? Yes, I do. You trained hard. No, I went through and read some of our recent negative reviews on itunes. Oh, no, I hadn't done that in a while. Yeah, that's because it's mentally unhealthy. I don't mind. It's kind of good comedy for me because I'm fairly secure in year eleven that we're doing. Okay. But it is always funny. Like, most of them were had to do with politics. Yeah, but some of them were just like, these guys are so boring and stupid. I can't believe how boring and stupid they are. I mean, they kind of hit it on the head with Allen. Yeah, it was good. And then the ones that killed me are the ones that they're clearly reading Wikipedia and Reddit is their number one source. I'm like, I've literally never been to Reddit in my life. Yeah, and I like Reddit, but I don't get our ideas from it. Oh, man, it's always so fun. Sure. Well, I'm glad that you did that for both of us and you distilled it into like a friendly affable version. Yeah, sure. These guys are so dumb and boring. That was a refrain. Dumb and boring. Interesting. We're sort of known for being funny and smart, but I guess that's in the eye of the ear of the listener. It totally is. I mean, we've got some really hardcore fans, we have some casual fans. We have people that like us. We have people that are just like I like what they're doing. Don't necessarily like those. It doesn't matter. As long as there's people out there liking what we do, of course there's going to be people out there who dislike what we do. And because it's the Internet, they're going to vehemently dislike it. But it doesn't mean anything. It's fine. They don't have to listen. Yeah. Almost like any other piece of art or culture or media you would put out in the world. That's right. We're basically like an upside down urinal in a museum. Have you literally seen that? Yeah, that was like the first piece of data art, I believe. Yeah. What does that mean exactly? I think it was purposefully mean. Yeah, purposefully. That's right. That word, for a second, just suddenly didn't sound right. That's because you're dumb. Right. And boring. I think it's a purposefully unmeaningless word. Interesting. Yeah. I guess like a Toyota, that kind of thing. Other people might find that dumb and boring. Interesting. Yeah, it's a urinal that was upside down and then signed by the artist. I can't remember who it was. Was it signed in urine? No, I think it was signed in maybe paint or something like that. I can't remember. Well, now we're doing the third thing that people complain about, which is not getting to the point quickly enough. I think you could call it moseying. Although it's funny as well. And those reviews, people are like, they literally spend 20 minutes talking nonsense. I'm like, man, it's what the deal is. Five minutes seems like 20. Because we're dumb and boring. Sure. Right. But as anybody who really appreciates stuff you should know knows that it's a contest of endurance to see who will get to the topic first. Exactly. Or just to make it through an episode. It's very much Chuck, if you ask me. Like an ironman triathlon. You lose. Anybody who completes an episode, though, is an S-Y-S-K fan. Agree. Kind of how it works. And it's just like the way that it is with the Ironman Triathlon, too. If you complete it, you're an Ironman. If you complete it within the required amount of time. You're right. Yes. There are rules, there are limitations. Like, I guess the same thing goes with us. If you complete the episode within 17 hours of beginning it, then you win. Well, we did an episode on marathons almost one year ago. Oh, really? A little more. October 9, 2018. Okay. And we did a lot of joking about marathons and how we're not into running those. So we should define here in minute 21 what an Ironman race is. Because an Ironman race is a 2.4 miles swim. Okay. That's 3.9 km. It's a lot. And then that's a lot of swimming. Then they say, all right, get out of the water, everybody. Now go ride your bike. 112 miles. Right. Like, two days later, though, right? No, right afterward. What, 180.3? Then when you're done with that, they say, all right, who wants to run a marathon? And then people like us, or most people, I think, in the world, probably 99% of the people in the world think, what is wrong with you people? Yeah. Not a half marathon, quarter marathon, 10th of a marathon, a full 26.2 miles marathon, more than 42. All of this, by the way, if you're at the World Championships is taking place in the lava fields of Kona, Hawaii, where it's very hot. Yeah. Good coffee, too. It is. Okay. I guess I'm not a huge on cone of coffees. Oh, really? No. Okay. Did you hear there was once a coffee heist in Hawaii where somebody somehow stole something like $2 million worth of either a million or $2 million worth of kona coffee beans? That sounds like a short stuff. It does. Maybe we should do that someday. The great Kona coffee. Heist yes. There's your title of OT six. Is that what it was? I don't know, but it sounded pretty good. Okay, that's the other big complaint on itunes, is that we just make up facts. That's true. Right. So I think you kind of laid it out. There three big reasons why you and I will never do Iron Man triathlon. The swimming, the biking, and the running. That's right. But all of them combined, too. That's why if you put all of them together, you understand why the Iron Man has this kind of aura of just awe among athletes. Because the people who participate in these are the fittest of the fit. They have the greatest endurance of any other athlete around, especially ones who make it to the Championships in Hawaii. And it has, like, kind of a mystique. And here's the thing. The term iron man is gender neutral. So wherever you fall on the gender spectrum and you complete the race, that's an important part of this. Well, yeah. You will be called an iron man. And I guess if you are collective, you have a bunch of people who have completed an Ironman race that would be called Iron Men. But if you're talking about different Ironman races collectively, because they have them all over the world now, I believe they have 260 races a year in 44 different countries that are official Iron Man races. You would call those iron mans. That's right. I love the little glossary in this article. Up next, we'll talk about whether you call your desktop mouse a mice or me. So the Iron Man race is we're going to get into some of the history here. It's a triathlon. Right. And there were triathlons before the Ironman Competition. Yeah, I think starting a few years before the first Iron Man, so it actually kind of caught hold pretty quick. But technically, a triathlon can be any three sports. But when you say triathlon and then you followed that up with, yes, I'm going to play some basketball, toss the football around, and then maybe take a few swings with the tennis racket. Right. You'd be like, that's three disparate sports. What's wrong with you? People are going to say you're weird, because when you hear triathlon in this new not new, but I guess fairly new since the 70s, you're really talking about swimming, cycling, and running, right. Not necessarily in that order or whatever, but as long as those three are together, that's a triathlon. And the first triathlon, from what we understand, came out of San Diego, actually from the San Diego Track Club, who put the first one together in 1974. And it just so happened that in that first triathlon in 1974, there's a guy named John Collins who is an officer in the Navy who said, hey, this is kind of fun, and ended up being stationed from San Diego to Hawaii. Yeah, really? What a terrible life. He was just chasing UFOs in San Diego. Next thing he's sipping my ties on the beach in Honolulu. But we do thank him for his service. Sure. So John Collins ends up in Hawaii, like, hey, Rubes, you hicks, I've got a great idea. It's going to blow your heads off. You ready? A triathlon. And everyone said what's that? Yeah, because Hawaii already had it going. Except not all combined. It had endurance sports, so there was obviously always marathons. Honolulu Marathon. Sure. There was something called the Waikiki Rough Water Swim. Have you ever been to Waikiki? I've never been to Hawaii. Man. Oh, man, you got to go. It's really a wonderful place. Emily and I were talking about going away for her birthday weekend. And you can't do Hawaii in a weekend from Atlanta. No, it's a little too long. Yeah, Savannah is much more realistic. Sure. It's the Hawaii of the Southeast. That's right. Everyone in Savannah will tell you. And then they had something called the Around Oahu bike ride. And so, as endurance athletes like to do, and all athletes, I like to get together and tease each other about who's the best athlete. The NASCAR guys are always there saying, we're athletes, too. Sure. Right. And they always get tickled by the football guys like, Stop, you're not really athletes who drive a car. So I think my brother and I actually had one of our rare arguments about NASCAR guys being athletes. It's better than that stupid thing about a hot dog eating a sandwich or not. Well, and when I say argument as much as my brother and I get into arguments, which is me saying, hey, I'm not into NASCAR, but these guys are athletes, my brother saying, I'll buy it. And then we say, let's go play Ping pong. Yeah, you guys are like, well, this is getting out of hand. Peace, brother. Let's reconcile with some ping pong. So, Collins, all this arguing was going on about who was the most fit, and he said, you know what? Let's throw all these together like you said. We'll call it the Iron Man. And in 1978, there were twelve finishers. I'm not sure how many people entered that race, but twelve people finished it and were named Ironman. Right. And they all got little handmade iron statuettes or whatever. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It was kind of a thing. And that first Iron Man, it was really crazy. One guy ran out of water. So everybody had to have their own support staff with them, like supplying of water and stuff like that, before they had people along the route. Yes. And one guy named Dunbar I can't remember his first name, but he was in the first competition, they just called him Dunbar. Probably he ran out or his support staff ran out of water. So toward the end of the marathon, he had nothing to drink but Budweiser. Shut up. I'm not kidding. John Collins, who was the guy who brought it to Hawaii, he stopped for a bowl of chili at one point to refuel. Yes. It was nuts, but it was just basically like some crazy athletic military guys just having fun. A bowl of chili? A bowl of chili. Like, go ahead and draft behind me. I dare you. Right, exactly. I mean, you just eat it and it just passed right through your mouth and out of your rectum, right onto the street in Oahu. But this first one, it was fun. It was crazy. But there's this ongoing dispute to this day that I read, I think, in an article in The New York Times that said that in the rulebook, if you ran in that first or you participated in that first Ironman Competition, part of the entry fee was agreeing to sign on to be the organizing committee for the Ironman. And they put that in there to basically say, like, if you sue, you're actually suing yourself, too. So you probably don't want to sue if you get injured or fall over, drop dead or something. But some people, including Dunbar, have interpreted that to mean that they were part owners of Iron Man, which has now become like a billion dollar global franchise. Sure. And the people in charge are like, no, you don't have anything to do with that. You can get sued, but you can't reap the benefits. Right, exactly. But it was a pretty interesting article. I can't remember what it's called, but it's worth looking up. Wow, that is interesting. I thought so, too. So soon after this, it started to become a media event in that we've talked before about the greatest show sports show in the history of sports shows, which was ABC's Wide World of Sports. Fantastic. I never really watched it. I was always like, this means cartoons are over for this Saturday. Man, I loved it. That's where as a kid in the 80s, you got introduced to ski jumping and curling and Iron Manning. But that was sort of the deal. If you never watched that show, it was The Wide World of Sports, so that it was lumberjack competitions and all these sort of to the side sports that you had never heard of before. It was pretty cool. Fringe sports. Yeah. Sports Illustrated started covering it, which was a big deal. That really gave it a shot in the arm because that was the second one. And sports illustrated did, like, a ten page spread on it, basically, and really gathered attention for it. And they're still one of the top sports rags, but back then, they weren't the only one, but they were sort of the name in sports writing, for sure. So it was a big deal. I had a subscription for many, many years. And then came the swimsuit issue, and you were like, no, this has nothing to do with sports. I looked forward to that so often as a young church boy. Sure. Ladies in their bathing suits. What was better than that? As far as I know, it's sports. So I remember my first issue, too, still. It was Mohammed Ali was on the cover, believe it or not, of the swimsuit issue. Was it the one where he's standing over is it Joe Frazier? No, this was after that. This was in his sort of sad last comeback attempt. I'm not familiar with that. Yeah, when he was older, he kind of boxed beyond his prime. Oh, I didn't know that because I'm not 70 years old. He realized, sure. I just did the math, and I was like, oh, I hope Chuck likes this. 05:01. You mean Joe Frazier? That was before my time. But yeah, for some reason, that always sticks out is the cover said, look who's back, muhammad Ali, and then parentheses with mustache, I want to say here, everybody, chuck does not have this cover in front of him right now. From memory. Totally from memory. It's impressive. I saved all those for many years, and then I think my mom finally got rid of them. I had just an attic full of Sports Illustrated. Yeah, I know what you mean. But I saved the bathing suit issues. Sure. My mom never saw those. You had, like, an air vent cover that you could just pull off the wall. I had a false floor under my bed. Yeah. All right, so back to the event. It's being covered by the media, and within just a few years after that, people started entering the race. More and more people saw it on TV, and they're like, hey, I'm an extreme athlete. I'm going to get into this. And it grew to the point where they moved it finally, in 1981, to it's now forever home in Kona, Hawaii, if you're talking the world championship. Right. And can we talk for a second about Julie Moss here? Sure. Because she pretty much single handedly launched Iron Man into the status, the legendary status that it has today. Very soon after it was originated. She was a Kinesiology student at, I think, Cal Poly. San Luis Obispo. Did I say that right? I don't know. You just sound so sure of yourself. Well, you lived in California, so I didn't know if I just pictured it. San Luis Obispo. Sure, I said that. That's what I said. Yeah. Okay. Well, anyway, she was a kidney zoology student. That part is wrong. No, it's not. I'm just kidding. Okay. And her dissertation was participating in the Iron Man competition in Hawaii. And so she went and she ran, and she could not believe it, but all of a sudden, she's in front. She's an elite. She's barely trained for this thing. She'd done some running before, and now all of a sudden, she's winning the fourth ever Iron Man competition. And as she got, like, within something like 40 yards or some ridiculously short distance from the finish line, after she swam, biked, and run almost an entire marathon, her body gave out. Yeah, man, I remember this on the wide World Sports. It was being covered on the wide world of sports. 20 million people were watching, and Julie Moss collapsed and then crawled across the finish line to finish second. To finish second. She was lapped. And I think the winner her name was Kathleen McCartney. Kathleen McCartney had to be told that she just once she didn't realize what had just happened, she's like, you mean that person I just stepped on? Right? Was it Runner? My waffle print shoe mark is on their back. But Julie Moss just became an amazingly celebrated sports figure overnight from showing this kind of grit and determination. And it became, like, kind of a hallmark of the Ironman Competition that people would collapse and then crawl over the finish line because it required that much of the human body, but also because they were that determined to reach that goal. And that was it for the Iron Man. It just became hugely popular overnight. You're talking about how much participation grew. I saw that in 1000, 982, the year Julie Moss entered, there were 60,000 people who entered 400 Triathlons, not necessarily Iron Man competitions in three years. 1.1 million people competed in 2100 Triathlons by 1985. So she definitely boosted the popularity of Tad Bit. Well, why don't we take a break and we'll come back and talk a little bit about the science of why people other than Julie Moss pass out right when they get to the finish line. Does that sound good? Yeah. All right. So you sent me a little article why endurance athletes struggle there at the very end, aside from the obvious that what they're doing is super hard, but it turns out that it's overheating largely, isn't it? So there's a great debate. Either they run out of fuel, they basically just use up all of their stores of energy, and their body can't go on any longer, or they have overheated. This is what this article is basically saying in Outside magazine. The other big one is that the lactic acid, in particular the hydrogen ions, have built up in the muscle and are causing cramping and everything going haywire. But this guy, Brent Ruby, who's a physiologist at University of Montana, he's basically saying no. All of it comes down to overheating. And at this point, like, your body enters a shutdown mode where your brain is like, okay, lights out, I'm not going to let you lift your foot any longer. You physically can't do that with your muscle because I'm not allowing it. Yeah, because the brain, he says, is sending you these messages a lot before this happens, right? Like, stop doing what you're doing. You better stop. You better stop. If you don't stop, I'm going to stop for you. And this is not necessarily dehydration either. He said, you can be plenty hydrated and drinking tons of water, but the heat at some of these Ironmans is pretty punishing. And especially, he said, after you've done the swimming event, which can keep the temperature down, obviously, because of the water, and then the cycling, where you've got a lot more breeze, generally, especially coming out of swimming, so your perspiration is doing a better job of cooling you off. Yeah. But when you get to that marathon, that final leg, it can be pretty brutal. And eventually your body, after sending all those messages, just says, you're not listening to me. So we're going down, right, and your movements become uncoordinated. Your actual brain might start malfunctioning as well, where you're not thinking clearly any longer. You become distracted, like if you've ever watched it's really weird to watch these things. But there's plenty of finish line footage from Ironman competitions of some of the fittest athletes on the planet. Collapsing before the finish line. Collapsing after the finish line is one thing, collapsing before they get to the finish line because their bodies, their brains have said, this is it, I'm done. You haven't listened, so I'm just taking charge here and I'm not letting you move any longer because you need to cool down. Yeah. I wonder too, if anyone has explored the mental. Like, when you see the finish line, if something happens in your brain, like physically seeing it with your eyeballs, kind of like if you have to poop really bad, or that brain bladder connection we talked about. Well, yeah, exactly. Bladder or poop, you're holding it and then when your hand touches the doorknob to your house or your apartment, that is when some release happens in your brain or something. I wonder if that happens when you see that finish line. You know, Chuck, you're not supposed to poop your pants when you touch a door knob. It's unusual. Well, there have been triathletes, too, and endurance athletes that have pooped their pants near the finish line. It's very sad. Yeah, I think we talked about the marathons, but there's a lot of pants pooping going on. But, yeah, I'm sure that seeing that finish line has some sort of effect, because there's a documented effect called the post Iron Man blues, where they're not in. People will enter, like, a state of depression for a couple of weeks following completing an Ironman and they actually can't quite explain it. They think that it's probably related to having set such a lofty goal right. That once you achieve it, life kind of loses its luster for a little while. Other people think that your brain is sending you a depression so that you have no will to get out there and try that again anytime soon. Both of them make a lot of sense, and maybe it's a combination of the two. Interesting. Yeah. So iron man started growing and growing the world championship in Kona. And they have championships, we should point out, on most continents. They have their own championship, like the African championships, south America and European. Right. But the world championship is the Hawaii one. Yeah. That's still the one in Kona. And the entries there are limited. And generally, unless you win the lottery, which is only about 500 people, you have earned your way in by qualifying in another sanctioned ironman event. Right. And I actually saw that they did away with the lottery. Yeah. 2015 was last year they did it. And it was a really great thing because you could pay $50 to enter a lottery and to win a slot. There were 500 slots, like you said, because you might not qualify. Because to qualify for Hawaii, you literally have to be one of the most fittest, most well trained athletes on the planet. We're talking out of tens of thousands of people who are possibly able to reach the state. You're 1500 of those people. This lottery gave people who wanted to give it a try but weren't professional endurance athletes a chance to get in there. So it was a great program, but at the same time, the federal government said, actually, what you're doing is running an illegal gambling operation. We want you to shut it down. Interesting. So iron man had to stop doing the lottery. Now, they have something called a legacy program, which says that if you've completed, I believe in twelve ironman competitions that aren't the championship, you can apply to get a legacy slot where they're basically saying, like, this is what we're trying to encourage, so come on and try your hand at the world championships. So they renamed the lottery the legacy. But I think the difference is that you don't pay for that opportunity. Now I got you. I think in 1994, they eventually added triathlons to the Olympics, and we'll get to different distances. Certainly don't want to knock Olympic triathletes, but no, but I could complete one. It's nothing like the iron man. Let's just say that it's much shorter. It's smaller, for sure. But if you're talking iron man, it starts out with the swimming leg. And as we said earlier, that's the 2.4 miles swim. And how do you pronounce that? Well, Hawaiian, you say all of the vowels. Kaalua? I think so. Okay. Kayalua, kona. Bay. Yeah. I think you just nailed it, man. We'll see. Okay. And it depends on the water temperature, whether or not you're allowed to wear a wetsuit, but the wetsuit gives you a little bit of a buoyancy advantage. Well, I'm not going to get in the head of Triathletes, but if it was me, I would hope for a little bit colder water so I could wear my wetsuit. Plus it would keep you cooler, too. Right. But if the water is warmer, then you don't need the wetsuit. You know what I mean? Right. You can just swim naked, I think is what you're saying. That's exactly what I'm saying. So I was reading about injuries and deaths, which talked about a little more, but the swim leg sounds like it would be not the easiest, but maybe the most comfortable because you're in the water and yeah, you can sweat while you're swimming and all of that, but at least you're staying cool. But supposedly something like somebody did a study of deaths between, I think, 1985 and 2016 in Triathlons, not just Iron Man. And they found that of 135 deaths, sudden deaths and heart attacks and stuff, 90 of those took place in the swim leg. Wow. And they think possibly, possibly, that people are so amped up about participating in this Iron Man that once they start exercising in the water, they just have a heart attack. And these are people who are in the fittest possible state they can be in, and they're still dying of heart attacks at like age 40 or something like that. Well, they stagger the beginning, obviously, like most races and foot races, they stagger them in the water because you can't just throw all those people in the ocean at once. Your pros are going to start out first again, like most road races, foot races. But if you're non professional, I guess everyone in there is professional now then, is what you're basically saying, right? Almost everybody, yeah. Okay. And then you finish the swimming leg, hopefully, unless you die of a heart attack. Right. And then you go to what's called T one, the first transition area. And that's where you change your clothes and you put on your clothes for the next thing, which in this case is biking. They try to make it where it's a loop, so there's only one transition area. So you finish the bike race where you started, and that's where you will also start the run. Right, but I love this one line in the article here. I did, too. It just read out to me as well, how stuff works. Racers must find their bike in rows of racks with hundreds of other bikes. That sounds like part of the game, almost, the way it's written. Right. And they call the transition period the transition point, where if you can't find your bike, the TS point. No, they don't. No. Don't you remember where you put your bike? Or did they mix them up? Is that part of the fun? I don't know. I put it here, man. I put it here. I. Don't know. Surely somebody's accidentally taking somebody's bike. But how would you identify who took your bike so you could take their bike? I don't know how you would do that because it would be a bad jam if somebody took your bike because apparently the bike leg is where you're doing the most other stuff, like eating, refueling, that kind of stuff. Interesting. So you probably have a significant amount of calories that you're planning on consuming on your bike that you've been training to eat during this race all this time. So if somebody takes your bike, they're taking more than just your bike, they're taking your fuel. It'd be a big deal, I'm sure. So I don't know how they keep up with that kind of thing and prevent that from happening. And that's where you have your Netflix queued up on your phone that's mounted on the front of your bike. That's right. So you can watch a couple of movies. Yeah. That's a lot of miles. 100 plus miles. Yeah. And I thought it's something like the average completion time for this bike lake is something like 6 hours, although they give you ten. Yeah. That's the bulk of the Iron Man is the biking part. Yeah. Because it's 100 something miles. Yeah. What was it? 112? Yes, I'm fine with 100 something because I'll never come even remotely close to it. And depending on what ironman course you're on or what triathlon you're participating in, the train is going to be little worse or better, depending on where you are. Apparently in Kona, it's pretty rough because of the winds. Right. And they can just flat knock you off of a bike. Well, plus you're also going through active lava fields, so the winds are blowing like a furnace of hot air onto you while you're biking. Jeez. Yeah, it's brutal. It's a terrible thing to do. You have to be insane to try this kind of thing, especially the championships. Yeah. So as we mentioned, you do have 17 hours to finish, and after that, even if you finish, which is a great accomplishment, you're not dubbed an Iron Man, which is kind of sad. So there's something called the midnight finish, where people who have completed the run and started to feel sore and have eaten and started drinking beer and everything afterwards probably just make a little ultra, though I'm sure they will go around midnight to see the very last people coming through. That's great. And it's supposed to be super inspirational because these are people who, as far as the Iron Man describes it, just getting to the Ironman to compete has probably been a tremendous amount of has really been a struggle. And so these people are finishing one way or another. So I guess people who've already finished are there to kind of cheer them on. That's awesome. And we'll talk more about this later. But there are people with prosthetic limbs and wheelchair athletes that complete this stuff in this one. Well, we'll talk about the father and son team, which is just incredible, but we're going to save that. Right. So people stick around through the dumb and boring, right. And the moziing. That's right. You are not allowed to draft. Like in some bike races, drafting just like NASCAR, you can get behind another biker and cut down on wind resistance. But in most of the Ironman Man competitions, that is not allowed. And there was one case in 86 where a race winner, Patricia Puntaaus, was disqualified for drafting. Is that how you say your name? Puntos? I want to say, like, punctus. Like punctus pilot. But that's not right. P-U-N-T-O-U-S. Yeah, I think you got it. I'm just going to go with the standard punt house. I'm going to go with the Hawaiian pronunciation and say pantos. Maybe punch Juice. That's good. Punch juice. Punch juice. I like that the most so far. And then you can win money. I looked up the World Championships, and I think there's like $650,000 total purse. Right. And it looks like is it 150 grand for each male and female winner? Yes. Somewhere around there something like 115 or 150 or something like that. But if you are a high end elite triathlete ranking yeah. Yes. Whatever you want to call, if you're, like, the best of the best, you can make a decent living doing this. And this is, like, what you want to do anyway, so you can certainly make enough to make it from triathlon to triathlon. If you're not literally the best of the best, you're not ever going to get rich off of it. But if you are up there, and especially if you're visible and people like you, in addition to the purses that you'll win for winning these triathlons, you will also get sponsorships as well. So you can make a pretty decent living being an elite triathlete. But I saw, for example, there's this guy right now, Jan Frodeno. He is from Germany, and he is as good as they've ever come as far as male competitors go. And in 2015, from purses, from winning events, over five events, he made $213,000, which is a pretty decent living. We're competing in five ironman. It's not bad. Or Iron Man. The guy who made the most that year from winnings was a guy named Javier Gomez. He won 287,000, which is really even better. But he had to compete in 14 Iron Man to make that. So I think the real cheese is in the sponsorship. Yeah. And I think 14 I don't think they recommend you do that many. No more than one a month is not recommended. But we need to talk about this guy named James Lawrence then. If we're talking about doing that. You ready? How many has he done? In 2015? My friend James Lawrence, also known as the Iron Cowboy, 25 competed in 50 Iron Man in 50 states in 50 days. Wow. Over the course of 50 consecutive days, he competed in 50 Ironman an Iron Man a day for 50 days. They should just call him the ultimate Iron Man and just shut everything else down. They did. They're not going to shut it down because, again, it's pretty lucrative. But they did. They just basically said no one could ever top that. That's insane. Like, the fact that he's still alive is really impressive. That is amazing. Yeah. He was eating, like, six to 7000 calories I'm sorry, seven to 8000 calories a day every morning. He said his toenails are falling off. Yeah. It was impressive, to say the least, that he did that. Yeah. What's going on in his brain? Oh, no. He really doesn't like himself. Should we take another break? Sure. All right, let's take another break and then we will do the very unlikely thing where and Josh and I will talk about how to train for a triathlon right after this. Okay, Chuck, we should probably qualify this as saying, like, we're going to tell you how to train from stuff we've read about training, not from any life experience. No. If you're going to train and we did the same thing in the marathon podcast, we are not experts, but here's what they say experts to say. Sure. If you're going to train for a triathlon, especially in Iron Man, you're going to need to take your time. If you've never done it, it could be an entire year of training if you're new to this kind of stuff. Right. And they say generally, obviously, you need to really build your endurance up, not worry about your speed yet. Yes. Well, yes, that's just point one, is you're training for endurance. You're training to increase what's called your Vo two max. That's right. The amount of oxygen you can take in and your body used to burn fuel. Right. You're also going to need to rest, even though you really want to do this and you're super fired up to train if you don't, you got to rest and give your body a chance to recover. Right. That's a big one. I think that's just, like, your body is going to tell you to do that regardless. They say train to your weakness. That was surprising to me, but it makes sense when you think about it. Yeah. Like, if you run marathons or long distance bike races and you're used to that and you're good at that, and you think, hey, I want to add these other two things, then maybe work on those other two things a little bit more, at least in the earlier part of your training. Right. But as you get a little closer to time, you want to go back to your strength and remember to boost that up again. Yeah. You can't forget about running that 26 miles. Oh, I haven't done a marathon in over a year. I've just been biking and swimming, and now it's time to run a marathon after biking and swimming, that's not a situation you want to be in. That's right. And then these last ones are kind of dumb and boring. Well, no more dumb and boring than us. I guess this makes sense. Use the equipment that you're going to use at the event. So don't switch bikes before. No, for God's sake, don't switch out your Speedo. Right. You want to wear your lucky Speedo that you haven't washed all year. That's right. So that makes sense. Also, this is a grab store article, we should say, and Ed makes a pretty good point. You need to train just to be able to start training for the Ironman. It's not something you just start where you go from couch to Iron Man. That doesn't exist. There's no such thing. You want to start to get in shape first, and then you can start training for the Ironman. And he makes a pretty good point. And I think it's worth saying here, talk to a doctor first, especially if you're not in the best shape or, you know, you have an existing medical condition, because a lot of people don't realize this. Like, yes, it's crazy what the body goes through, and that these are amazing feats of endurance. But it's possible there is some biology or biological science that says, actually, if you're engaging in endurance sports, over time, you're actually more likely to do things like die of a heart attack or get pancreatic cancer than somebody who doesn't participate in endurance sports. And science is a little bit confounded by this. Yeah. There was one study out of the University of Toronto that said endurance athletes are three to five times likelier to experience atrial fibrillation. There was one out of Norway, which is probably what you were talking about, that says you're two times at the risk of developing pancreatic cancer. That's twice as likely. Yeah. They're saying they think what happens is and they did blood tests to people, like, at the beginnings and during the middle and at the end, and they said they think your body goes into sort of a temporary state of immunosuppression. Right. And that if you keep doing this over and over, it could have an overall cumulative effect. Yeah. Because your inflammation is so set off, because your body is like, what is going on? The inflammation markers from one test I saw are up, like 250% over just normal resting rate. And they think that your immune system stands back because if it tried to deal with all of the different inflammation going on, it would over exert itself and you'd be toast in a different way. So they think that all of this damage from inflammation and then a lowered immune response to the inflammation creates these prolonged problems that only endurance athletes can experience. Have you heard of doubling? No. So there are endurance athletes that practice doubling. And there are specifically people who it's called the Double Boston, which is they get up in the middle of the night and they run the Boston Marathon in reverse and then stop at the finish at the start line and then run the regular marathon. I actually have, and I think I ran across that as well. And I think we should do like an episode on Ultra Thorns or Ultra marathons because there are some crazy stuff that goes into that, too. Oh, yeah. Like, let's run 120 miles to the desert. Right. That's a terrible idea. But people do it. And I think it's worth talking about. Yeah, people used to do that in biblical days to deliver messages of war. Sure. Not for fun. Yeah, not for fun. And they would always drop dead upon delivering the message, it seems. Right. They'd go it and then fall over dead. And somebody else would say, Monty Python flying circuit. Message for you, sir. So there are no statistics from the USAT, but Ed picked out a 16 year old statistic from the Lake Placid Iron Man and said that this was a low number of injuries where they sent 14 people to the hospital. From everything from just standard injuries to your body to obviously, heat exhaustion and dehydration, stuff like that. And even when you complete this without injuries and without collapsing before the finish line or whatever, what you're putting your body through is just astounding you burn something like about 6000 calories throughout the day of competing in this Iron Man competition. And you'll replenish a lot of it from like, sports drinks and energy drinks and stuff. But you lose about \u00a320 of water weight wow. About 9 water weight during the course of running or competing in an Ironman. Amazing. It is literally amazing that that happens to the human body and that people do that on purpose. And that there are people out there who have trained at this so long and have built up their endurance so much that they can overcome their body's normal biological responses to slowing down, to sending cramps to the muscles to basically keep your motor functioning from going forward as much as you want it to. They can overcome this stuff, but sometimes to their own detriment, which results in collapsing and things like that. Well, we mentioned earlier the paltry little Olympic triathlon and we're kidding. But when you look at the distances, it is not close to an Ironman. It is a point 93 miles. Swim one and a half kilometers. Yes. Which is, I guess, why they settled on that. Because I was like, what a weird. Why not just go a mile? But there what's, this weird Imperial? Yeah, exactly. And then that's followed by a 24.86 miles, 40 kilometer bike ride. Okay. And then only a 6.21 or a ten kilometer run. Right. Which is again, I could do that. I think that's 20 miles shorter on the run side and close to 80 miles shorter, or a little more actually on the bike side, and then about a little less than half on the swim side. Right. Which, again, is why people say, like, the Ironman itself is just the endurance sport of endurance sports. And the Ironman in Hawaii in particular, is like the pinnacle of it. So if you complete the Iron Man, especially if you win the Ironman Championship in Hawaii, you're as bad as they come. Yeah. I like the sprint one, though. The sprint triathlon, depending on which one it is, either, like, anywhere from zero three to one miles in the water, eight to 25 miles on a bike, and then one and a half to 5 miles running. But you are all out 100% full tilt the whole time. Right. This is nice. Amazing. This is like something that an elementary school could do on field day or something. Remember that? Yeah, I love field day. But it definitely reeks of something like an eleven year old makes up. Right. But there's no tree climbing involved. Right. And if somebody touches you, you have to freeze until somebody else comes along and touches you again. Oh, I love field day. Yes. But looking back, I have no idea what that was for. Was it just a teacher free day or something? Or what was the point? No, it was, I think, your own little Olympics to celebrate sport and introduce kids to different sports. I got you. Okay. It was cool. I was like, what's your angle here? What's really going on? You had to sit in that day. Yeah, I did. I protested. You sat in your potato sack by yourself. That's right. Then my mom made me wear so we talked about Julie Moss. Like, over the years, there have been some people who have kind of risen to the cream of the crop from the Ironman triathlon, and Julie Moss was definitely the first. But there have been others, too. There was a pair of people, a man and a woman, who were kind of known as the best of the best for a while. The guy was named Luke Von Lerd, I believe. I think I said that right. He held the course record for a while at Kona at 8 hours, four minutes and 8 seconds, which he said in 1996. But that guy that I spoke about earlier, Jan Ferdano, he's as good as they come as far as male triathletes go. He currently holds the course record that I believe he just set a week ago in October 2019. 7 hours, 51 minutes and 13 seconds. Wow. So it's sub 8 hours. Yeah. There's another woman competing right now who is just the best of the best. I don't know if she's the all time best. I think that still is held by Paula Newbie Fraser, but her name is Daniella Liff. L-Y-F. She's a German too. She holds the kona course record now 8 hours, 26 minutes and 18 seconds. She said that in 2018. I can't even lay around and watch movies for 8 hours. Yeah. I think that's part of this, too, is having the mental stamina to stave off the voice in your head that's like, Stop. Go eat a hot dog. Stop. There's a gentleman named Mark with a C harriman. And he is a wheelchair athlete who has completed several Iron Man. There's a nun in her 70s, Sister Madonna Booter, who every year that she competes, they have to create a new age group, which is amazing. Did you look her up? No, I didn't. Oh, man, she's a total BA. Nice. So she's still competing because this is an old article. Well, I don't know. She is now, but I just looked up photos of her in competition. Yes. So she was competing at age 75, right? Yeah. But there's a man named Jim Ward who competed into his 80s well, and I think he was not finishing the races by that point, but he did complete the race at age 77. Man, that's crazy. Yeah. And you mentioned a father son team. Team Hood. Yeah, man, team Hood. So the dad, Dick Hoit, is charged with assisting his son, Rick Hood, who has cerebral palsy, through the Iron Man and has done this more than once. Yeah. So Rick was born with brain damage because of a problem at birth, and he can't walk or talk, but he has a communication device where he was able at one point to communicate that he loves sports. And a schoolmate of his was paralyzed in an accident. And Rick said, dad, can we run a five K benefit race for my friend? They did that with Dick pushing Rick in a wheelchair and then said, let's just keep the party going, and moved up to Marathons and eventually Triathlons. Yep. It's pretty impressive. You remember in our cerebral palsy episode, we talked about Kyle Peas? He's from Atlanta. He's one of our listeners and fan. He and his brother Brent have competed in Ironman competitions, too. I think they competed at the championship as well. Amazing. Yeah. Check out pictures of Tim Hoyt. Because the sun rides in a raft while dad tows him in the water and then rides a bike with the seat up front for Rick, and it's just amazing. And then pushes him in a wheelchair for the running leg. Yeah, pretty great stuff. I can't imagine doing it myself, but also doing it with your son who has cerebral palsy, that's just amazing. Although I'll bet you have just this built in source of inspiration every time you start to get tired, like, I better keep going. Totally. Yeah. Very inspiring. Which actually not mention it's kind of cheating. So I got a couple of other things. All right. Chris Lee, very famously, I think they made, like, a Gatorade commercial out of it in the 1997 Kona championship collapsed right before the finish line. Had to have emergency surgery to remove half of his colon because it had become so oxygen starved during the race that it died. Wow. Okay. That's a big deal to have happened to you while you're in the Ironman Race. And then there was also some other famous collapsing and crawling. You really into those. It's just amazing that people not only collapse, especially when you understand what's going on in their body, but then the fact that they pick themselves up and keep going or crawl. I think shannon or Sean Welch, S-I-A-N-I can't remember the Gaelic pronunciation, and Wendy Ingram were both women competing in the Ironman. I can't remember what year, but they came in fifth place and fourth place, respectively, and they crawled. They were crawling, like competing against one another, crawling over to the finish line. Wow. It's really something to see. As a matter of fact, let's all go watch those things now. You know, what I like is when you see those things where the person is, there's one person crawling and the person can win, but they go back and they pick that person up and they cross the finish line together. Yeah. Nothing better. No, there really isn't one other thing, Chuck. There's an ongoing dispute among marathon ers and Iron Man competitors over which is harder. And a lot of people say no, marathon is way harder because you're competing flat out the whole time. Ironman is more about endurance. And Iron Man like, you clearly have never been in an Ironman. So I looked, and I think I've settled this once and for all. The average finisher in a marathon, just a marathon in the United States, I think a year or two ago, was 4 hours and 35 minutes. Okay. Okay. So that's pretty good. It's a great time. I would love to have that in an Iron Man. The average time to finish the marathon section was 4 hours and 54 minutes, less than 20 minutes longer. And this is on top of already having done the swim leg and the bike ride leg. So I think that definitively proves that the Ironman is tougher because most people are still running flat out in the marathon portion on top of having already done the swimming and the biking. Yeah, I mean, it's not even a debate. I didn't even need those numbers. Well, some people did, and now they've been swayed, and they'll never open their mouths about it again. Good. If you want to know more about the Iron Man, go out and start training. You could also do worse than going and reading this article on how stuff works by our dear friend Ed Grabnowski. Agreed. Since I said grabbing a ski, it's time for listener mail. This is from our new friend Betty. Betty says this from the time I was introduced to your show, I've been listening and trying to catch up on as many of your previous shows as possible. I also make learning with personal connections, but hesitate to pest you about all of my thoughts. Recently, though, I completed a couple that convinced me it was time to write in specifically the Navajo Code Talkers. I wondered if you knew that another group contributed in a somewhat similar way. Louisiana Cajuns who, like the Navajo, were not allowed to speak French on school grounds, served in World War II as interpreters, some maybe even as spies. A friend of mine shared with me that his dad went ashore at Normandy acting as an interpreter, and this is the first time I had heard of that. Wow. Also, when you mentioned the Navajo influence at Guate Canal, I wondered if you had ever done a segment on the Battle of Sabo Sound, the first ever nighttime naval battle. In that battle, my father ship and many others went down because of a sly attack from the Japanese and a series of communication errors. It was quite a debacle. Keep up the great work, guys. My phone travels with me all day and I'll be listening almost all of my waking hours trying to catch up. And that is from Betty. Thanks a lot, Betty. Good luck with catching up. Thanks for that awesome email. One of the better stories I've heard that I didn't know about already. Yeah, we'll look into the cage and think for maybe a short stuff. Yes, if you want to suggest a short stuff or a topic idea or anything like that, you can go to STUFFYou Know.com and check out our social links and get in touch with us that way. Or you can send us an email like Betty did to Stuffpodcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should know is production of iHeartRadio's how stuff works. For more podcasts, My Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio App, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite show. Hey everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today."
873863f6-3b0e-11eb-9699-c7bf858bce4e	The Apache Wars	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/the-apache-wars	America’s longest-running war was between the US government and the loosely-confederated groups we know as the Apache. As their lands were encroached upon, the Apache pushed back with disastrous consequences, nearly becoming exterminated.	America’s longest-running war was between the US government and the loosely-confederated groups we know as the Apache. As their lands were encroached upon, the Apache pushed back with disastrous consequences, nearly becoming exterminated.	Tue, 23 Nov 2021 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2021, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=23, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=327, tm_isdst=0)	48398068	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryan over there. And this is stuff you should know is celebrating Native American Heritage Month. Fantastic. Yeah. And we are talking about something we probably would have talked about, whether it was Native American Heritage Month or not, but we selected it for this month in particular. This is a nod shout out, but we're talking about one of those moments in history that probably most people are walking around and are like, oh, yeah, the Apache wars. I've heard of that. But no, almost nothing about even though, depending on how you look at it, it's actually still to this day, the longest war that the United States ever fought. Really? Yeah. And it produced some really famous, really interesting, really amazing characters on both sides, but in particular among the Apache. And we'll meet a lot of them in this episode. Yeah. And these are a series of skirmishes over time that it seems like there was often peace and then there were these inciting incidents that would happen. There were misunderstandings that happened, there were bungled negotiations that happened. And it feels like it could have gone a different way yeah. At so many points. And it continually just went south. Yeah. And I mean, speaking history is written by the victors. And so the idea of the Apache basically being bloodthirsty, cruel, merciless people who mutilated victims and would kill women and children, that paints the whole group with a much larger brush than you should. But it also leaves out the atrocities that were committed on the other side, too. Yeah. Their people were slaughtered as well. Exactly. So it's just one of those things where it was a war. Like, it was a genuine straight up war. But like you said, there are plenty of places where it could have been avoided, and we'll talk about those. But first, Chuck, I think we should talk about the Apache. And one of the first things that I learned when I started researching this is that the Apache are not a nation or tribe. They're a group of loosely affiliated tribes that all kind of come from the same area. And despite the fact that we tend to think of the Apache as totally tied to the southwestern United States, they actually arrived fairly recently from western Canada, like BC, I take it. That's right. And they eventually found their way to the American Southwest. We call them Apache. They do not call themselves that. They called themselves, I guess, end day, which means the people, which is pretty great and basic. Right. And they think the name Apache may have been given to them from the word Apache by the Zuni tribe, who battled with them many times. And that means Apache means enemy in Zuni. So I think that's where Apache came from. And you mentioned that they were a loose collection. I mean, there were never like hundreds of thousands of Apaches, right. I'm not sure where the numbers popped out, but they were spread over 15 million sq mi. Wow. So that's called a very thin distribution. So they were not to skip ahead too much, but they were rarely in groups more than like 25 or 30 at a time. Right. And so what you would call the Apache, we're actually kind of spread out among the Western Apache there's the Chiracawa Apache and then these larger groups were split into smaller bands even. And the Chiracowa are kind of like the central group that fought the Apache wars, although just about every Apache tribe was involved. But the Chiracawa were kind of like the central figures and the Chiracowa were broken into four different smaller bands. The Bedonkohi. Let's hear it, Badonkahe. Thank you, Chuck. The church. Chiconini Chaheni and the Nedny. Yeah, great. Okay, what was the first one again? Badanka? Hai Banka, hay. That's much better than mine. But all of these groups, these four bands that form the Chircawa Apache total maybe 1500 people at their largest population size. And despite that really small number, they produced some really famous people like Geronimo, Coaches, Victorio, all of them were cherokawa Apache. And again, they were the central group that fought the Apache wars. They were also the central group that could have stemmed off the Apache wars if some of the Union soldiers that they had to deal with had taken them a different way. That's right. And I mentioned that there were a lot of misunderstandings and mix ups along the way. And combine that with the fact that the settlers just thought they were all Apache and that they all were the same. They were misunderstandings like a raid would happen on a camp and this is one of the ways that the Apache got by. Is they would not because they didn't like somebody. Because they needed supplies and stuff. They would raid a camp. Take some stuff and the settlers would think. Well. This is the Apache. It's all of you doing this. Whereas it might be one very small group and the other groups will be like I don't even know what you're talking about. Right. And that's why I was saying you can't really paint the people we call the Apache with this very large brush because some of them worked very closely. And for the US. Military to go find other Apache, even within the Chiracowa, there were totally different ideas on how to approach and deal with the Americans. There was a big division that developed through the Apache wars among the Apache. Some of them were like look, we cannot defeat this enemy. The best thing we can do to hope to live peacefully is just settle down and start farming and live on these reservations that they're making us live on. And the other group said, no, we need to fight to the death for our ancestral land and our old ways of life. And so there's a lot of nuance, there's a lot of difference. There's a lot of disagreement among these people who are living and fighting during the Apache wars. And even some of the ones that wanted to live peacefully were frequently forced into fighting. That was their only choice. So it's just really important to keep in mind that just like you can't say Apache and that's just one nation, because it's not you also can't just say, well, all the Apache thought this way, or even all the Chiracowa thought this way. There was just a lot of difference. And there was also a lot of room for different opinions because like you said, the groups that they lived in really were usually no more than 25 or 30. A family or a couple of families. Exactly. And they were often related by blood and marriage. And it was a matrilineal society, too. So if you were a man and you married a woman, you joined your wife's family. From that point on, these bands, these four bands of the Chiracawa were very much related to one another because they would often swap members through marriage and alliances. That's right. So I mentioned the raids as a way of life for them. That is different than like there was no malice involved. That was different from an actual skirmish or a battle when the warriors would take center stage. And that was serious stuff. They were people that very much wanted revenge when they were wronged. And that's when those sort of really bloody skirmishes would take place, as opposed to the raids, which was them getting food and supplies and ammunition and stuff like that. Yeah. There was an author of a book called The Apache where it's a guy named Paul Andrew Hutton said that he likened them to the Vikings, that they just, like rating was out of economic necessity. The thing is, they were also, again, campaign them all with one brush. There are plenty of them that were raiders and all of them apparently engaged in rating, but some much more than others. And then the ones that didn't raid so much, they might farm a little more or they might engage in peaceful trade with their neighbors. But the one commonality that basically all groups labeled as Apache seem to have had was an enemy in Mexico. First the Spanish, and then later Mexico, where if you were caught by Mexican and you were in Apache or you were Mexican and you were caught by Apache, you were going to face a very brutal, unhappy end almost immediately. They weren't going to release you as a hostage or negotiate for your release. You were going to be killed horribly. Yeah. And they were united sometimes with the settlers against Mexico. So much so that I believe one of the chiefs told Kit Carson, who was an American scout in 1846 like, hey, we'll team up with you to fight Mexico. That's how much we hate Mexico. Yeah. That chief was Mangas, Colorado, and he was actually one of the first great leaders at this moment in history when the Americans first started showing up. And he was very much interested in peace with the Americans, not even necessarily out of necessity, but like you said, the common enemy was Mexico. And he thought Americans were great because they hated Mexico as much as the Apache did. That's right. The one problem with the Chiracawa is that they had a nice place where they lived. They were seasonal migrators, and so they would kind of move around. But one of the main places that they hung out was south of the Gila River in Arizona, and it was a really good place to be. So that means, of course, as westward expansion happens, or as we'll see later, as the Civil War happens, and then Union troops head west to try and keep it from falling into the hands of the Southerners, that's going to be a place where they're going to go. There are going to be wagon trains going through there. Eventually, there's going to be railroads going through there. And so there was basically no chance that the Chiracawa were just going to be left alone to do their thing. No, but this is their ancestral land, and they weren't exactly ones to leave other people alone through their rating and wars for revenge. Again, the stage was definitely set for Apache wars, but it's wrong to say that they were inevitable. And the reason why I was wrong to say that they were inevitable is because there was some early stuff that happened that didn't have to happen, that really kind of kicked this off. But I propose we take a break before we start talking about those things. Let's do it. Okay. We'll be right. Okay, Chuck. So one of the first things that was that a lot of people point to as the thing that kicked off the Apache war, or wars, I should say took place in 1861, and it came to be known as the Bascom Affair. And from what I saw, almost every site that writes about Lieutenant George Bascom wrote that he was young, inexperienced, over enthusiastic, over zealous, even, and pretty much incompetent when it came to something as tense and unsure as negotiating for the release of hostages. Yeah. And that's exactly what happened in 1861. This is when I didn't look up the Arab VAPA. I'm going with Araipa. Okay. They were yet another band of Apache that rated a farm of a settler named John Ward went off to the Chiracawa Mountains, which is where Cochise was. And they did the usual stuff. They took livestock, but they also made the mistake of kidnapping John Ward's stepson, Felix Ward, which is when Lieutenant Baskin was sent in to bring them to justice to negotiate something he invites coaches to a meeting, and again, they went to coaches territory. He was not behind this, right? And when he got in a tent with coaches and said, this is what you did. This is one of those things coachist was like, I don't know what you're talking about, man. We had nothing to do with this. But here's what I'll do. I'll try and I'll try and find out who was behind this, and I'll track them down and I'll bring him to you. And Baskin's said, which was a pretty good deal considering he didn't have anything to do with it. And Baskin said, no, and you know what? You're going to stay here as our hostage along with your family members. And coaches said, I don't think so. I'm going to cut a hole in this tent in the middle of the night and leave, right? They're like, how did he cut a hole in the tent? It doesn't make any sense. He disappeared, but he had to leave his family behind to make his escape. And Bascomb now had his family as hostages. So coaches went out and got his own hostages. They raided a wagon train and a stage coach and got both Mexican and American hostages. And the Mexicans they dispatched immediately in some really terrible way. They tied them to a wagon and then lit the wagon on fire. So the Mexican hostages had zero chance. But the Americans coaches kept alive to use as pawns in negotiating the release of his own family. And apparently Bascomb was unmoved. He said, no, we're not releasing your family until we get that livestock and that kid that was initially kidnapped back. That's how your family's going to get released. And so after a few days of trying to negotiate in exchange of hostages, ordered the American hostages killed. And then Bascom ordered coaches family killed, which is really something for a US Army officer to do. But that's what happened. They were executed. The women were let go. But coaches favorite brother was among the ones that were killed. And that did not sit very well with Cochise. A lot of people say the basketball affair is what kicked off the Apache wards. Not everyone agrees. Actually, there's other stuff that came later, just real quick. The death of Mangus Colorado, that really important. Early chief who wanted to ally with the Americans. In 1863, he was invited for peace talks and was held and executed. The peace talks were just a ruse and he was grossly mutilated. After he was murdered, they cut his head off, boiled the skin from his skull, send his skull off to a phrenologist in New York. And a lot of people say that's probably what started the Apache wars. Because not only was that a brutal way to treat Mangas Colorado as very respected chief, but it also showed that you couldn't trust the Union Army to engage in actual peace talks. They might just kill you they might just assume kill you. And also they killed a really big ally in steadying hand among the Chiracawa. All right. So I mentioned earlier the Civil War getting cranked up back east and Union soldiers coming out to kind of safeguard or at least protect Southerners from coming into the American Southwest and all of a sudden that you're a Kawa. Like. Hey. If we want to do some rating. This is pretty great because they've got all kinds of supplies. All kinds of munitions. And it's a pretty good group of people to try and raid. And how some of these rates went down as far as the military is concerned. There was a battle in 1862 that was pretty typical is that they would raid the military, but the military far more outguns them. And so the Apache retreat. But a retreat to the Apache was not some bad thing. It was actually a tactic because they could just sort of they were like, why just get slaughtered because of pride when we can retreat and really disappear into the desert and they will not find us? We know this land so well. We can really hide out here because we're few in number and we know this territory. And there are historians that basically agree that say if it wasn't for Apache that ended up working with the military to turn on their own people, they could have never been found if they didn't want to be. Yeah. And it wasn't even necessarily turning on their own people. Again, that's looking at it through the idea that all Apache were the same. But we're talking about, like, the White Mountain Apache or the Dark Rocks people. Apache like people that might as well have been enemies to the Chiracowa. So the idea of them working with the army as scouts to find these other Apache wasn't quite as much as being like a Benedict Arnold kind of thing. Yeah. Not turning on their own tribe. Right. So I found Chuck. There's actually a Confederate officer that's buried in Arizona because the Confederacy actually made its way, managed to get to Arizona and occupied it for a brief time and they themselves also got into skirmishes with the Apache there and one of them got killed. So there's a guy that's buried who is a Confederate soldier in Arizona. Wow. So we should probably talk about the Camp Grant massacre because this is a big turning point. We have lots of raids and skirmishes and battles and atrocities that have been going on during the first Apache War is generally how it's kind of loosely gathered together. But the Camp Grant massacre in 1871, it was a big turning point because the Arava APA Chief Eskiminson's people were camped out near Tucson at an army encampment, like, peacefully settling there. They were not scouting or doing anything like that, but the people of Tucson were worried that there were raiders among them. And so they preemptively massacred the Apache that were there. And I think all but eight of the 144 people that were killed in that massacre of the Apache were women and children. And I think something like 27 kids were kidnapped and sold into slavery and very soon came to work in some of the homes of Tucson's most affluent families. It was a huge atrocity that was carried out by the white settlers of Tucson and it had a huge effect on not just the era vaepa Apache but also the Chiracawa as well. And it also had a big effect on President Grant Ulysses as Grant, who was furious when he heard about this and he actually threatened to put Arizona under martial law unless this whole thing got sorted out. And he sent a peace delegation to speak with Co chiefs to see if they could keep this war from continuing on or breaking out further. That's right. So they offered a truce. They said, here's what we'll do. If you agreed to move to this reservation in San Carlos then we can have a peace treaty and a truce in line. San Carlos was not a good place to be. It was terrible. The settlers knew this, the Apache knew this. They all called it Hells 40 acres. And so it was not a place that they wanted to go. But coaches negotiated and said, you know what? We're not going there but if we can create our new reservation, it's just for us and we can come and go as we please then we'll get on board with this truce. And Grant said, okay. And they had a piece and it lasted about four years. Eventually Coach died of stomach cancer, though and that was one thing that kind of weakened the piece accord. There was also an incident where there were a couple of Chiracawa Apache who killed two white men who didn't give them whiskey. Fair enough. And both of these incidents basically just sort of chipped away and all of a sudden there was no more truce. No, because the people who lived in the area were like we don't like this idea that the Chiracowa gets to come and go off of their reservation as they please. And in fact, they were staging raids in Mexico which was not part of the treaty, but it was an oversight. And so all those things combined, especially with the death of Cochise, that treaty ended. And so I think it was a four year piece. And when that ended, the second Apache wars began. That's right. And coaches son Taza took his place. Basically that reservation was abolished that they were happy with and they said, well, great, that means we can just go back and live on wherever you want and migrate around. And they said, no, not really. We'd like you to go back to the San Carlos Reservation that we know you hate. And so they started negotiating. Taza had another Chiracawa chief name J-U-H. He was with badanka Hays, and he had a stutter, though. So he said, I don't like to negotiate in person with my stutter. I'm going to have a proxy. My brother in law Goyakla is going to speak for me. He's a medicine man, but you might know him by his other name, geronimo. Yeah. And everyone went, Whoa. Right. We've heard of him. Geronimo. By this time, it was already nicknamed as Geronimo because it was the Mexicans who gave Geronimo his nickname. And still to this day, no one knows what the heck they meant by that. It turns out that Geronimo is a really rare Italian version of the name Jerome, and we're talking about Mexican and Spanish people, not Italian. So it'd be weird for them to give him the name Jerome. And even if they had given him the name Jerome, it wouldn't make any sense because that means sacred name. And by the way, Heronimus sure, that's a version of Geronimo. Yeah. But it doesn't make any sense. So regardless, it's lost the history why they called Geronimo, but they would shout Geronimo during some raids that he staged into Mexico. And Geronimo went into Mexico because if there was anybody who hated among the Apache who hated Mexican people, it was Geronimo. He had watched them slaughter his family, including his mother and his wife and some children, and he never forgot it. He never forgave him. And every chance he had to kill a Mexican, he would take it gladly. That's right. I mean, he was genuinely scarred as a young man. So it wasn't just like, man hell bent on revenge. It was man who suffered, like, deep, deep traumas, losing his family like this. So that's where all that came from. But he was a complicated guy. If you talk to Americans, he was known as the worst Indian that ever lived in, quote, he had a bad temper. He was paranoid. He was a fierce fighter who would not hang back and shoot arrows from long distances. He would charge the enemy and run in a zigzag so he wouldn't get hit with a bullet. Although apparently he did get hit with a bullet quite a bit, as we'll find out later. And then he would knife people and take their guns, and he didn't even know how to use guns. He would take guns back to the other Apache. So he got this nickname, mexicans would shout it to warn each other, and then it became something that the Apache latched onto as, like, a chant of enthusiasm. Right. And so Geronimo was never a chief. He became a leader, but he was never a chief. And apparently he really didn't like people who accidentally confused him as a chief. But he had a lot of say being a medicine man for the badankahee, right, and being that proxy of the actual chief who. So he was part of these talks, and the idea was, or the decision was between who and Taza and Geronimo that the Apache could either move to the San Carlos Reservation, which had been designated for Apache, or they could live life on the run and basically be hunted and exterminated by the US. Army. That was their choice. And so Taza, who was the son of Cochise and his designated heir, said, my father knew there's no way to defeat these people. We need to just live in peace with them. And I guess it means we have to move to the Saint Carlos Reservation. Something like a third of the Apache followed him, but two thirds said, now we're going to go the way of Geronimo and who, and that is to just basically escape and start staging raids and fighting and living life on the run. Yeah. And Geronimo, this is really the point in time where his legend really began to grow as far as the Americans are concerned. And like I said, he was a complicated guy. He would get criticized by his own people for not giving up when he should, for being reckless in their eyes with some of these young soldiers who weren't as prepared as they need to be and was basically always just sort of like, at this point, at least go full bore and try and win these battles as brutally as possible. So this was happening. He was getting a reputation among his own people at some point. There was a point in where he staged a raid on that San Carlos Reservation, captured another Chiracowan leader named Chief Loco and 200 of his followers, and basically at gunpoint said, you're with me now and you got to help us fight. So he wasn't always looked upon the best by his own people, even because of stuff like that. Yeah, I mean, Chief Loco and his followers were like, no, we're just trying to live peacefully. Leave us alone. And Geronimo said, no. So they were kind of pressing the service. Other groups he and his band attracted just because they wanted to fight too. It was that division of no, we need to protect our ancestral lands and our old ways of living. And so we attracted like Chief Chihuahua, chief Nana, who is also a Chihani. Like Chief Loco. And that kind of shows that division of opinions and thoughts where Chief Loco is like, no, we need to live peacefully. And he was a chahaine. Chief Nana was also a chahene. And he was like, no. He was at Geronimo's side throughout this entire fight. A lot of people say that Chief Nana, he was very old even during this time, and he lived to be a very old man, but he also died fighting. They think that he probably killed more Americans than any Apache in history just because he fought so much and he lived for so long. He's apparently also a really brilliant strategist as well. All right, so should we take a break, or should we wait? We could take a break. Is this our second one? I've lost track because this is a thrilling story. All right, let's take our second break, and we'll pick back up right after this. Okay. All right. So at the same time, kind of concurrently to Geronimo and all his battling going on, the Chahane started to fight the Americans at the same time. And they did this because of another kind of a weird incident caused by Geronimo, almost an accident. He escaped. He had a knack for escaping. He was really good at that. And we'll see time and time again, if you had Geronimo, you didn't have them for very long. Yeah. So he escaped and snuck onto a reservation at Ojo Caliente. And this was kind of a big deal. Like, they weren't supposed to be there, the Chahini, they were supposed to be at San Carlos. They had set up this other reservation, and again, no one knew they were there because things were so spread out. They were living peacefully. But this Geronimo escaping and going to their encampment, they were like, hey, man, thanks a lot. Now everybody knows we're here. He brought the heat on them. Yeah. Put the serious heat on them to the point where they said, if you're off of this reservation, you're going to be shot on site. And this kind of launches another one of the Apache wars. Or another part. Yeah. The Warm Springs Band of the Chhanae were led by Chief Victoria. And they were forced now that they were found out that they were living on Ojo Caliente. Which I guess was a nicer reservation as far as reservations went. That they were supposed to be in San Carlos. They were faced with the same decision go live in this hell of San Carlos or live on the run. And so Chief Victoria said, all right, we've been living peacefully. We gave it a shot. The jig is up. Now we are going to go back to living on the run. And for two years, Chief Victoria and his band were staging their own Apache war concurrent with Geronimo and his band staging a different Apache war. And Chief Victoria's war and the band that followed him were so effective that Mexico and America, which hated each other, still had been engaged in the Mexican American War less than a decade before and were just not fast friends by any measure. Mexico allowed the US. To have its army into Mexico and chase Chief Victoria and his band. That's how much they were hated by both the Mexicans and the Americans. And that's the links that they went to. And apparently they were actually eventually found by a Mexican American joint expedition. The Mexican contingent said, Americans, you should probably leave. And that deep, deep, centuries old hatred between the Mexicans and the Apache was really kind of brought to the fore, and the Mexicans slaughtered. Victoria. Right up until this point, though, Victoria had a lot of success with only about 150 warriors to fight with. And one of the big reasons was this woman named Lozen. Lozen was pretty incredible and someone who, I mean, certainly not lost to history, but someone that you probably never learned about in high school history. So she was Victoria's sister, known as the Apache Joan of Arc. She was a Chahini chiracawa medicine woman. She was a great fighter. She was a great strategist. She was wise beyond her years. She would kind of do anything. I mean, there were great legends of her, like helping to give birth on the battlefield in the desert and then going right back to fighting and did a little Stevie Nicks kind of deal where apparently she would hold her hand out to the side and pray and lift her palms up and turn in a circle. She said, and of course, this is Lore, but she said that she would know the direction where the enemy was coming from from these tingles that she would get. And depending on how intense the tingles were, she could even tell how far away they were from them. Yeah. It's still Chiracow legend today that it was Lozen who allowed Victoria and a small band of 150 people to survive for two years as long as they did from this weird special talent she had of knowing where the enemy was coming from and how far away they were, sometimes how strong their troop numbers were, and then they would move and dictate, like, their raids. Based on basically her visions. The idea is kind of supported by the fact that Lozen wasn't there when Victoria and the last of his band met their end at the hand of the Mexicans. She was off smuggling a woman, a new mother, and her newborn infant back to the reservation so that the mom and the baby could live safely. And when she got to the reservation, she got news that her brother Victorio and the rest of the band that was fighting with him had all been slaughtered. And there's a discrepancy historically, about how Victorio died, right? Yeah. He either died fighting until his last breath, or he took his own life at the last minute. Yeah. So either way, all of that band fought to their death and Losen wasn't ready to give up fighting either. She was actually on the reservation and could have stayed there. Instead, she immediately made her way to go find Geronimo and his band, and she joined up with them. What if Lozen had just been stealing maps and plans from the other side, and she was like, Watch this. They love this stuff, right? She like, does the Stevie Nick right? The spin with the palms out kind of thing? She's likely yes. They eat this up. I'm going to be a legend. Watch this. Right? Pretty good stuff. So now we find ourselves kind of coming toward the end of the Apache wars where things get really interesting when a man named General George Crook arrived on the scene. They called him the Tan Wolf because he wore a khaki a lot, had a knack for khaki. They had a lot of respect for him. He had respect for them. He earned his name fighting against the sue with Custard years ago, but now he was back. I guess he was a really good tracker, too, because time and time again, as we'll see, he tracked down Geronimo. They were holding out in Mexico at this point and he wanted to negotiate, but things were pretty tense at the time, so there were still a couple of skirmishes and I think Geronimo and some of his guys were up on a cliff above Crook's company and they were kind of taunting Crooks Apache scouts. Right. Things were not going well, but it ended up in a very strange turn of events, working out because Crook was a hunter and was going off hunting the next day by himself and was tracking an animal and ended up tracking this animal. I don't know if he found the animal in the camp, but eventually made his way right up to Geronimo and where Geronimo was camped out and was like, oh, hi there. And Geronimo says, you know what I'm going to do? I'm not going to kill you. Which you totally could have. I mean, Crook was there with a single gun by himself, with no cover, and he just accidentally stumbled upon Geronimo and some of his warriors. I can imagine how tense that situation was, even crooked, knowing that they respected him and he respected them. It's still Geronimo again, what the Americans considered the worst Indian that ever lived. That's right. So the writing was kind of on the wall at this point with American encroachment. Geronimo was like, there are endless numbers of you guys. You have way more weapons, way more ammunition, way more supplies than we could ever get. And we've been on the run and I don't think it's going to work out for us in the end. So maybe it's finally time to not fight and to sit down at the negotiating table since you seem like someone who is at least honorable enough to negotiate something honest. And Geronimo was the last holdout to come to this conclusion. By this time it was just he and his band, the rest of the Apache or the rest of the Chiracowa had either concluded that it was best to just settle down and adapt to reservation life or they had been killed fighting. So for Geronimo to finally come to this conclusion, he had been worn out because he was the kind to just keep going and keep going and keep going and inspire others to keep going. So he decides to surrender to Crook. And apparently the surrender lasted a very short time. But one of the reasons why he did surrender was Crook said that they would create a new reservation near Turkey Creek, which is where Geronimo was born. And so they weren't going to move them to San Carlos. I don't know if you've noticed a pattern or not, everybody, but when the only option was moved to San Carlos or die, very frequently the Apache chose die or fight to the death, because that's how bad San Carlos was. Whenever there was another reservation put on the table, the Apache tended to say, okay, we'll go give that a shot. So it was really kind of points out. Like. How much of this could have been avoided. Not just from George Bass. Of never being involved. Or not just for them torturing and killing Mangas. Colorado. But if they had just improved the way of living at San Carlos or gotten rid of San Carlos and just created these other better reservations. The Apache wars might never have taken the effect that they had either. You know, it's like when Claire Starling offered Hannibal Lecter stay on Anthrax Island. Plum island. Plum island. If it had gone a different way, if they had offered him a real nice place, maybe no one else would have died. No, maybe they would have caught Buffalo Bill before. Well, wait a minute. They did. It all worked out just fine, thanks to Plumb Island. You know, someone a fan of the movie bought the Buffalo Bill house and has made it basically a Silence of the Lambs Museum. And I think he's building out the basement to where you can airbnb it and stay there. Oh, boy, that sounds awful. It's pretty great. And that's just like the story of Geronimo. Is it in Ohio for real? I don't remember where the real one is because very frequently they'll just be like, this house will work. No one will ever know it's in Ohio. No one will ever buy this house and turn into airbnb and publicize that it's actually in Colorado. I hope he makes money off of it. Geronimo surrenders a total chuck of four different types. Surrenders, escape, surrenders, escapes. And the reason he keeps escaping is because he was about as hated as anyone ever was in this stage of American history. Not just out west, but even back east. He was hated, mistrusted. And there were editorials that he would read written in the local paper of whatever reservation he was being held at that were calling for his immediate execution and murder, sometimes by mobs and vigilantes. So apparently he had a very large weakness for alcohol. And when he got drunk, you could really convince him that they were going to kill him if he didn't escape. So he surrendered and escaped four different times. And on the last time, Crook was sent in with different marching orders, this time by President Grover Cleveland, who said, there's no terms of surrender anymore. Geronimo surrenders unconditionally or he dies. And Crook said, that doesn't really sit well with me. Yeah, he resigned, and I think ever since then, or at least back then, of course, he was really looked down upon for doing that by his fellow American soldiers. I'm having integrity. Just want to be clear about that. There's a bounty on Geronimo's head at this point for 25 grand, a lot of money, and a new General takesover, named General Nelson Miles. He was sort of the opposite of Crook in that he had no respect for the Apache. They had no respect for him. He would do his leading from forts many miles away from the real action, and he kind of ruined things in the end. That we'll get to here in a second. But this last summer of freedom here in 1886 for the Chiracawa, I think Natchi was the chief at this point. Yeah. And he was Taza's brother, who was not bred to be chief, but Taza died on a trip to Washington, DC. So now you had a chief that was easily manipulated through Geronimo, just FYI. So there were only, like, 37 free Chiracaw at this point that were still down to battle. 18 of them were the warrior types. There were 13 women and six kids, including a couple of infants. And these 37 people were on the lamb for five full months with a total of about eight to 10,000 either US. Army or Mexican soldiers or volunteers trying to find them. It's crazy. Like, they could really blend into their territory. Yeah. They did so well at that. Chuck. There was only one death that entire summer of that band of 37, and Geronimo was loving it. He was like in retrospect, he was like, these were the salad days. I did some of my best fighting. There were a few of us. I knew when they were coming. I didn't do the Stevie Nicks, but I knew what was going to happen before it happened. I was so on my game. So that General Miles guy, he came up with a plan. Like, he knew that the Apache, the Chiracowa that were on San Carlos Reservation, we're still very closely tied to this band of 37 that were following Geronimo. And so he sent word through two Apache scouts that the family members, the 434 Cherokawa on the reservation, have been shipped to a prison in Florida and that if they ever wanted to see their family again, they needed to give up and surrender. And this proved to be the last straw for Geronimo. He said, okay, fine, I'm going to surrender. And he negotiated he managed to negotiate terms. He agreed to live in exile for two years as a prisoner of war, but it turned out that those terms were not honored. And he never was able to make his way back to his homeland, his ancestral land in South Arizona, New Mexico, again after he left. That's right. I believe that he was reunited with his family eventually in Alabama and then moved out to Oklahoma. Yes. Neither of which were his original. I think to the Americans back then, they were like, oh, look, we're sending you to Oklahoma where your people are from. So that's probably great, right? Yeah. So the problem was that the people who finally did make it to Indian Territory in Oklahoma and again, this is just a melting hodgepodge. They're like, if you're a Native American, this is where you live. Now, Oklahoma, it was 27 years before any Turkawa were allowed to move back to their ancestral land. And at the time, about a third of them said, no, this is our home now. Most of us were born here. A lot of us were born here. So there's a fortnile. Oklahoma contingent of Curacaoa. And then there's also the Mescalero reservation chiracowa that live. About two thirds of them moved to that southern Arizona area where they lived still today. And Geronimo, if you've ever seen there are quite a few famous portraits and photographs of Geronimo. And that's because Geronimo went on to be pretty famous. Yeah. He later on tour with Buffalo Bill in his sideshow. He would sell his little trinkets from his coat to people. He would pay top dollar like buttons and then he just replaced it with another button. Wait for the next person. That's right. And he wrote in Teddy Roosevelt's election parade. And as legend has it, a lot of people came to see Geronimo, more so than Teddy Roosevelt's even. He asked personally Teddy Roosevelt permission to go back to his ancestral lands. And Teddy Roosevelt refused, even though this is long past, the two years that he had negotiated in the terms of his surrender, teddy Roosevelt said, basically, you don't want to go back there. There's too many people that want to see you hang still. And so Geronimo actually died on the reservation at Fortville Oklahoma. He had been drinking pretty heavily that day, fell off his horse and laid in a ditch all night and apparently caught pneumonia. And as he was dying, he regretted not having fought to the death, even though he managed to live to be an old man. And in retrospect, the Apache wars were, again, depending on how you look at it, the longest lasting war in American history. And it was also extraordinarily bloody, especially for the Americans. Remember the Cherokee of the numbered maybe 1500, and they managed to engage in a 25 year war with the American army and the Mexican army simultaneously. And there's a famous quote from William to Compass Sherman who said, we had one war with Mexico to take Arizona and we should have another war to make them take it back. That's how devastating the Apache wars were for the Americans. Wow. So that's the Apache wars. Oh, one other thing, Chuck. So remember I said there was a division among the Shirakawa about ones who are like we just want to live in peace and will adapt to reservation life. And the other saying, no, we have to fight to the death for the old ways. Well, now if you look back and you go on to the Chiracowa tribe website and you look, they proclaim themselves to be a peaceful tribe. So it turns out that that faction ultimately won out in the end. Very cool. Do you have anything else? No. Okay, well, if you want to know more about the Shirakawa and other Apache groups, there is plenty of really interesting history out there for you on the Internet. And since I said that it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this reminder that we have a lot of episodes. Hello, Josh and Chuckle. I'm writing you today from Georgetown, Texas, while currently listening to How Kleptomaniacs Work from 2009. Recently discovered your podcast and love it. So I decided to start at the beginning. Do you all know you all have 1843 episodes? I don't think that's right. And Sarah says, holy hell, it's taking a while to get caught up. I really want to jump to new, but on the other hand, it's kind of fun and interesting to listen to past episodes. For example, will the world end in 2012? Dodge the bullet on that one. Anyway, I just want to send a quick hello. Love the show, love how you smart guys. That's in quotes, by the way, which means she doesn't really mean that. No deliver info. In a funny way, I also love that I get your random references to off the wall stuff. Simpsons episode, old school band names, etc. Eke up. Great work. Can't wait to hear what the future holds. I e. 2021 episodes. And that is from Sarah. A yes. Well, Chuck, think about how Red Sara's face is going to be when she finally gets to the episode where you suggest sandwiching episodes. I know. Well, I'm going to tell Sarah. We'll see what happens here. Okay. I'm going to tell her I'm reading this listener mail. We'll see if we can't tempt her. I won't even tell her which episode it's in. Okay, so she'll hear this in like, 27 years. No, I'm going to let her know and she may start listening. You know what I'm saying? Okay, well, I think we've reached the end of this episode, and if you want to be like Sarah and get in touch with us, you can send us an email to stuffpodcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts My Heartratio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
8a8559e6-4a58-11e8-a49f-f3c104259712	SYSK Selects: How Kleptomania Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/sysk-selects-how-kleptomania-works	In this episode of Stuff You Should Know, Josh and Chuck discuss kleptomania, a disorder in which people have an overwhelming impulse to steal unnecessary items.	In this episode of Stuff You Should Know, Josh and Chuck discuss kleptomania, a disorder in which people have an overwhelming impulse to steal unnecessary items.	Sat, 17 Nov 2018 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2018, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=17, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=321, tm_isdst=0)	25673229	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hello, everyone. Have you stolen anything today? Well, I hope not, because that's wrong. But there's a real condition called kleptomania, and on December 17, 2009, we were inspired to research and talk about it. And that's why I decided to go with this week for this study. If you should know, select the episode leftomania. Very fascinating condition. Don't steal, everyone. You can steal this podcast. That's what I say. It's free anyway. But just steal it. Take it home, put it in your pocket, and don't tell anybody. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. The Chuck. The Chuck. The chuck is on fire. How are you doing, Chuck? You've been sitting on that one for a while. Just since yesterday. We actually have not recorded in two weeks, and I have a feeling Josh has been planning that for two weeks. I just told you I came up with it yesterday. I was listening to your sweet voice while I sweat the floors in my house. Okay. When you think of dog hair or you think of me now, I thought it was your voice that made me think of you. Jeez, I thought, man, I've been opening up the show pretty boring wise lately. Well, I'm glad you're talking about this now, then. Yeah. Anyway, Chuck, how are you doing? Good, sir. It has been a long time, hasn't it? Okay, so you know it's stealing season, buddy. Is it? Yeah, it pretty much kicks off in November and really goes up through the roof on Black Friday. It's much more difficult to steal during Cyber Monday. But yeah, as the season comes around, people love to steal. People love to hold people up with guns, knives, threats of physical violence, that kind of thing. Wow, this is inspiring. Yes, it is. And actually, it turns out that this stealing season will probably be worse than usual because there was a report released called the Global Retail Theft Barometer. Okay. It was released mid November, a couple of weeks back. The GRTV. Yeah. I'm a fan. I know you are. And it said that this year businesses have lost retail businesses have lost $115,000,000,000 worldwide from stealing from theft. What's America do you have that 45 billion. Wow. Because in our article, it says 10 billion is like, an average. So that's a huge increase. It is, actually. I'll tell you what. Usually, I guess there's an increase every year, and usually worldwide, it increases by about 1.5%. I wonder if that's in direct relation to the cost of goods increasing. That actually does have something to do with it. In this Time article I read, this year 6% increase worldwide. Okay. And in North America, there's an 8.1% increase. Wow. So people are just stealing left and right. And the authors of this study, the center for Retail Research, apparently talked to cops, talked to shoplifters and said, what's going on? They talked to shoplifters, how so do you know people who've been busted for shoplift? Okay, I thought you meant that had not been caught. No, they just hang around Macy's and they're like, you look like a shoplifter, you scuz ball, or I saw what you did, and I won't report you if you answer these five questions exactly and give me a saw buck. What is that, a 20? I think we've gone over this before. I think it's a fiverr. Okay. No, it's a ten. I bet we get some Lister mail on this one. I bet it's either a five or ten. So, Chuck, what they found from talking to these people is that there is an increase in the perception that companies are making off with all this money while everybody else is having hard times, and so they kind of feel justified in stealing. Got you. And they're seeing a much rise in the middle class stealing people who can afford stuff and just aren't paying. Right. And apparently this victimless crime, that's kind of another perception since you're stealing from a giant corporation in the United States. We paid an extra $436 a household in consumer goods prices. Yeah, that's what happens. Yeah. Same with credit card fraud, with shrinkage along. Right. Yeah, same with credit card fraud. That's not all. Why? But one reason why the interest rates are so sky high. Because people say, I'll just charge a bunch of stuff and not pay. It insurance fraud. It's just that stupid credit card company is going to take the hit. But they don't. Although they should. They don't take a hit. They pass it all along. Of course they do. That's how it works. We're all slaves, Chuck. Suckers. Anyway, somewhere in those statistics I just spewed out, but there are a very tiny percentage of that population that are kleptomaniacs. I feel like I just gave birth to a watermelon. A square watermelon. Yeah. Yes. Josh, kleptomania is not exactly in fact, it's not at all shoplifting. Shoplifting is the means by which you would perform your kleptomania. That's an excellent definition, Chuck. And I've read this article, too, and I know that that was not in there. That was a CBD special. I just made it up. Yeah, good one. Although I would say you could steal from anyone, and that would be clepton. It doesn't have to be a store. Yeah, but apparently it is generally stores. Really? Or parties. But yeah, if you're going to steal from an individual, it's usually at a party, I think. Right. But it generally is retailers. What differentiates kleptomaniacs from shoplifters? Well, there's actually a definition, as outlined by the American Psychiatric Association's diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders that says that they outline this criteria. Josh, the individual repeatedly fails to resist the impulse to steal items that are not needed for personal use or monetary value. That's number one. Yeah. The individual experiences tension before stealing. The tension is relieved after stealing and the theft is not due to anger, revenge, delusions, hallucinations, or impaired judgment. Right. And I think there's one more psychological disorders can't account for the stealing behaviors. Different. Other psychological disorders. Let's do a little play acting, Chuck. Oh, I love this. Okay, I'm going to be a kleptomaniac. Okay. You are going to be a tube of lipstick. All right. Okay, hold on. Let me get into character, man. You are a master. Okay, I'm there. Okay. All right. So I'm walking into the store, and I'm looking for some sunglasses that I intend to purchase, and all of a sudden, I feel this horrible tension. My stomach is tight. I'm starting to sweat a little bit because I just spotted Chuck, the tube of lipstick, who is sitting there as an inanimate object, because if you talk and that's delusion, and it doesn't count as kleptomania. So I'm looking at Chuck. I'm feeling this horrible tension. I know that I'm going to steal. I don't want to steal, but I have to because it's the only way to relieve the tension. So I've just grabbed Chuck and put them in my pocket, and I don't even wear lipstick. There's no explanation for this. I make it out of the store, and as I enter into the rest of the mall and start to feel like I'm not about to be caught, that tension goes away, maybe replaced with a little bit of a thrill, a kick, right? And then, boom, I get hit by this crushing guilt I've just stolen again. Not only have I stolen from something, from somebody, I have failed to yet again resist this overwhelming urge. So I take the lipstick, and I go to my grandmother's house, who's now dead, but in the scenario, she's actually alive. And I just put it in with the rest of her lipstick, go about my business, feeling generally bad about myself. TADA, can I talk now? Yeah. First of all, it was a little weird being in your pocket. Let me say that I liked it. But, yeah, dude, you just hit on a lot of the major points tension, relief of tension, guilt, a rush, giving away what you stole, stealing something you don't need or hoarding. Sometimes hoarding. Yeah. A lot of times people will hoard it. I read a case of a woman in the early 20th century who was caught shoplifting, upper middle class. They caught her, went to her house, and found all this stuff that she'd stolen with the price tag clearly not used. They don't use the stuff that they steal. I've got a hoarder for you, buddy. Let's hear it. This dude, in April of this year in Israel, was busted. They went to his house, and they found motorcycle helmets, watches, Louis Vuitton handbags, 150 pair of shoes, 200 pair of sunglasses, olive oil, laundry detergent, all kinds of stuff unopened in this guy's house. Literally stacked in every corner of the house from room to room. And he admitted that he'd been shoplifting for a decade. Every time he went to a store, he shoplifted for a decade. And he clearly lived alone. No, he has a wife and son. Wow. He has a family now to keep their mouth shut. Well, this is the funny part. And of course, this is from an Israeli newspaper. It says his wife and son are suspected of knowing of his activity but doing nothing about it. I don't know if that's a formal charge, but he also was busted with a big roll of stickers that say, paid for, thank you for coming, that kind of thing. That was part of his deal. He would go in there and put that on his big TV box or whatever. I wonder if that disqualifies him as a kleptomaniac, though. I don't think so. Why? Because he pre planned it? Because one of the things Freud and Rich is that how we say his name, the author of this article, PhD. Noinlake, isn't it? No, I thought it was Craig French. Like no, there's no L. I totally invented that. Okay. I've been reading it that way for two and a half years. We're going to call him Dr. Freud. Okay. Okay. Dr. Freud pointed out that people who are kleptomaniacs, true Kleptomaniacs, from what I gather. We don't call them kleptomaniacs. We call them people with kleptomania. Right. Don't go into a store intending to steal. They don't go to steel. They're just overcome by the impulse when they're in a store. Yeah, that makes sense. The other thing that makes that guy Hanky as a candidate for a person with Kleptomania is that he's a man. Yeah. Women more often and this is a little Hanky, too, but women are more often diagnosed with Kleptomania. But that is slanted a little bit because I think it said that women are less likely to admit to it or to report it to, like, their psychiatrist, that kind of thing? No, men who still go to prison, women who still do psychiatric evaluations. Yeah. So that could definitely slam the population. But traditionally, people think that kleptomania is a feminine disorder. You ever seen the Ice Storm? No. I need to. Really? That's a great movie. You said that. Shamefully. I do feel kind of ashamed, actually. The mother and daughter, Joan Allen and Christina Reach, you both shoplift in that film at separate times. Heartbreakers. That's the grenade. Weaver and what's her name? Jennifer Love Hewitt. Yeah. No, I'm talking about the ice storm. I don't think so. I don't think so. In fact, I think Joan Allen actually steals lipstick. There you go. Maybe that was me. It is one of my favorite movies. Hey, everyone. When you're running a small business, every second counts and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office when you could be using stamps.com. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right. From your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to Stamps.com. Click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. Yes. Josh early teens and 20s, if we're talking more about the pattern, is usually when it begins. Yeah, but it can run up to I think they found Kleptomaniacs in their late seventy s. Yeah. Didn't we do a story about Japanese elderly that are stealing just so they'll get caught and, like, have a friend? Yeah, they're so lonely, they're trying to basically make friends with the police by being arrested. So that's not Kleptomania. That's just shocking. I don't know. I was thinking about when I saw that in the late seventy s, I thought of that Seinfeld episode where Jerry finds out that his parents steal batteries and in turn finds out that almost all elderly people steal batteries. Yeah, that's good for the tip. Calculators. Is that what it's the Willard I'm ruined. You know, another thing, Josh, is you hit on it again with your little play acting. They usually steal stuff they can afford and stuff like shampoo. It listed. And sunglasses are big. Famously. Winona Ryder. Winona Horowitz. Excuse me. No. Yes. Really? That's her name. I had no idea. She famously stole several thousand dollars from Sex Fifth Avenue. $5,000, I think. Yeah, she can definitely swing that. Yeah. And I don't know if it ever came out. Did they ever plead Kleptomania or anything with her? Did they? No, she quietly tried to pay their fine. Yeah. And that brings up a pretty good point, is a Kleptomania defense is really, really hard to prove or to successfully get off on. It is, you know why? Why? Well, your defense lawyer must argue when the argument that there was no reason for you to steal it, no financial gain, no revenge, they got to prove all those things beyond a reasonable doubt. First of all. Yeah, that's one. You want to follow up? Well, I know that the Justice Department doesn't recognize Kleptomania as a defense, so if you're up for federal charges, don't even try it. Yeah, exactly. And that's like the Americans with Disabilities Act. That's in legislation. Right. Good luck, Chuck. Kleptomania. What is it? Is it an actual disease? Should it be covered in the Americans with Disabilities Act? Should the DOJ finally open up their eyes and be like, okay, there's such a thing as Kleptomania? Well, we don't know for sure. Some people think it's, like, tagged on to other psychological disorders. Like what? Like obsessive compulsive or personality and mood disorders. Okay. Possibly it could be a symptom or a byproduct of a larger disorder. Right? Yes. Okay. But by and large, it's classified as an impulse control disorder, like gambling or pyromania firestarting. Awesome. Or trichotillomania. Yes. Trichotillomania. I've never heard of that. Yeah. Obsessive hair pulling. Yes. I wonder if that means pulling your own hair or other people's. Probably both. I don't know. That's an excellent question, actually. And it got our producer Jerry giggling, so, you know it's good. Yeah. So it's either a symptom of a larger disorder or it's its own impulse control disorder. One of the reasons we don't know is because treatments for Kleptomania are hit or miss. Yeah. And they haven't studied a lot. And the other thing is, it hit me. Like everything else with the brain, it's still sort of a mystery. It is. And one of the reasons why they have had trouble studying Kleptomania is finding Kleptomaniacs. I found a study from 2002 that was just getting off the ground at Stanford, and these people were looking for 24 Kleptomaniacs for their study. And we're having to go on TV, radio, everywhere to try to find, like, true Kleptomaniacs. And one of this guy who was quoted in this article on the study, a guy named Will Cupcake, which is a pretty cool name if you ask me. Agreed. He's a Toronto psychologist. He said in the 450 cases I've assessed, probably only one or two of the people were actual Kleptomaniacs. Really? We're talking about a very small, fascinating part of the larger population. I think I saw somewhere in the article they said maybe 5% of psychiatric patients admit to being or are diagnosed as Kleptomaniac. Right. And you revealed something else, too. I think a lot of it is admission. Remember when me, the play act, and Kleptomaniac left and went into the malls crushed by guilt? I remember that. I wanted to get the object away from me. You remember? The desire to keep this secret, I think, probably keeps a lot of people from coming forward. So we have no idea how large or small this population is. But I think from people who examine shoplifters, they find that the actual Kleptomaniacs among them are very small population. Right. You know who has studied it? The University of Minnesota School of Medicine. Yeah. Specifically, psychiatrist John Grant. And he studied the brain, and there are a few little he posits a few theories here. One is that a defect in a molecule that transports serotonin might be messed up. Well, not the defect is messed up. It would clearly be messed up if the defect is messed up, then you're okay. Potentially. Head trauma could cause something like this. It could damage the circuits in the frontal lobes. Right. That could maybe happen and decrease in the fine structure of white matter in the frontal lobe. But it's all in the frontal lobe. Right. And the limbic system, which, as of course, we know, is the brains reward center. That's in the front loop. Right. Which also controls impulse. Or the frontal lobe controls impulse. Mood. There you have it, dude. Yeah. So, clearly, it could be its own disorder in a lot going on up there. So, did we say that treatments don't work all that well? Like, sometimes SSRIs work, but not all the time. Cognitive therapy works sometimes. You want to talk about some of the cognitive therapy? Yeah, cognitive therapy cracks me up a little bit. Like snapping a rubber band on your wrist when you have, like, an impure thought. Right. Covert sensitization, Josh, is when a patient wants to steal, and then all of a sudden, you're trained to imagine the consequences, which, to me, that's, like, I thought that's what you're just supposed to teach people. No, it's like you'll get in trouble spraying a cat in the face, like, every time it does something you don't want with a little water bottle. Yeah. Aversion therapy. That is, if you feel the urge to steal, you will be told to do something, like holding your breath until it's literally painful. Oh, I'm sorry. That's the one that spray. Yes, you are right. With that covert sensitization, that is kind of what we as humans should be walking around doing at all times, right? Yeah. Thinking about the consequences of your actions. Sure. And then the last one they use is systematic desensitization, which is relaxation therapy and substituting relaxing feelings instead of the urge to steal. All of those are probably the most difficult thing Kleptomaniac will ever attempt, too. I found another little study, though. Let's hear it. Track. In April of this year, they started a test where they gave Kleptomaniacs, or Kleptomania what do we call them again? Those with Kleptomania. People with Kleptomania, I guess no one wants to be called a maniac in any way. They studied. They got 25 habitual thieves, men and women between 17 and 75. And they gave them the drug naltrexone, which is what they give alcoholics and drug addicts to curb their bad behavior. Is that the stuff that makes your hangover really bad? I think so. It's supposed to quell those impulses. And it kind of worked. After eight weeks, they found that two thirds of the people who had not given the placebo had no urge to steal, and only like 8% had placebo did. They also ate their vegetables and went to bed when they were told to be good drug. Yeah, we could use that. Chuck hey, everyone. When you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office, then? You could be using Stampscom. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses, because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right from your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No longterm commitments or contracts. Just go to Stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. Is that it? Almost. We're going to travel back to the beginning now. Or they should have been at the beginning. Okay, club domain. I think it first appears in literature in 397 Ce. Okay. St. Augustine admitted to lusting to thieves. Boy. St. Augustine was something else. He really was, if he existed at all. Sure. And then it ends up in the medical literature. In 1816, a Swiss physician by the name of Matthew wrote of a unique madness characterized by the tendency to steal without motive and without necessity. There you have it. Yes. And then Freud came in and said that had something to do with penis envy. No kidding. And now it's a $45 well, not just Kleptomania, but shoplifting is a $45 billion in this country. Yeah, took off from 1816 to 2009. Jeez, that's good stuff. All right. Well, that's Kleptomania. If you want to know any more, you can read the article by our own Doctor Freud by typing in Kleptomania. Remember, it begins with K and the handy search bar@housedefirst.com. And since I just said that, of course, to your friends, this means listener mail. Josh, I'm just going to call this hippie Rob. Followed up your old buddy hippie. Should you say something about hippie rob? Well, let's wait till after. Okay. Hi, Josh and Chuck. I like them when they start that way. I don't normally write into TV shows or radio shows, et cetera, but I've heard Josh talk about hippie rob, and at the end of The Hangover podcast, he mentioned that he wanted to hear from people who knew of his whereabouts. I do, in fact, know a hippie rob and wanted to offer my knowledge of this person to determine if it was the same hippie rob. And I've seen this email, and I know that it's a real hippie rob because we capitalize the H and the rob. The hippie rob I know is originally from Venil Haven, Maine, a medium size island off the coast of down east Maine. They say things weird up there. Down east. His full name? I didn't say his full name here, but it's Robert Blank and he has thick blonde dreadlocks. He's sure telltale sign of a hippie. Sure. He was about 510 and never talked about his age, but I would put him in the upper thirty s and possibly lower forty s and nineteen ninety eight. He loves coffee, hates alcohol, and he mentioned one of his other habits that he loves, which we're not going to mention on the air, but his name is Hippie Rob. So fill in the blanks. Right. He squatted at my apartment in Portland, Maine the summer of 1998. This is so close. At the time he was living off of Social Security from a quote, permanent work related accident. I think we've all known a Hippie Rob. Yeah. But something told me that his permanent disability was not physically related. I would see him every few summers in Maine and he would shoot the breeze. We would shoot the breeze while drinking coffee and doing other things. He was a terrible mooch. I know that he loved to travel to warm places in the winter with his favorite being Hawaii. And if you read this on the air, could you give a shout out to my girlfriend Kristen, who is an amazing sport about me listening to the podcast Galen from Portland, Maine. So, Josh, is it kept you rob? No, there's a couple of things missing here. It is so close. I mean, the age. One thing is no one knows the origin of the real hippie rock. No one knows where hippie rocks from dreadlocks. He does. And he's blonde. Although you would say more like strawberry blondish. Sure. Not true. Blonde, has a beard. Kind of a little guy. In 1998, he would have been late 30s or so. World class mooch. Oh man, big time. Yeah. We used to like we'd buy beer and we'd buy cera Nevada beer. And Rob didn't have any money for a while, and then he'd get paid and it'd be his turn to buy the beer and he'd buy like a twelve pack of Milwaukee Beast Ice and we'd be like, this is not the same Rob. Right. There's a dog missing. And this is a very key point. The dog Sedona, I'll have to tell you about him sometimes. Okay. He's a wolf dog named Sedona. Hippie Rob owned. Yes. Okay. No, they were best friends. There was no of course he has a wolf dog. Exactly. Appropriate. He's best friends with. And then the real giveaway was that Hippie Rob loved alcohol. Right. Even now he could have given up foods. No one would say Hippie Rob hates alcohol, he just doesn't drink it anymore. And he probably still has hippie Rob loves alcohol. So that was the one telltale giveaway. All right, so not hippy. Rob. Unfortunately. Yeah. And I guess if you know where Hippie Rob is, I've revealed some more clues here. Send us an email. We still want to know. We're looking for them. And is it Kristin or Kirsten? Chuck in the email? Galen's girlfriend, Kristin Kristen special thanks to you for letting Galen listen to us. We appreciate that. If you have any cool stories about your significant other letting you do something that you want to do, put it in an email. Also, if you know where Hippie Rob is, we want to hear that too. You can email Chuck and me at all times at stuffpodcast@howstuffworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetofworks.com. Want more? HowStuffWorks? Check out our blog on the Housedefworks.com homepage. Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's Criminal Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
41241360-53a3-11e8-bdec-b75d35ff2b0e	SYSK Live: The Kellogg Brothers’ Wacky World of Health	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/sysk-live-the-kellogg-brothers-wacky-world-of-heal	There’s no way you haven’t had one of their breakfast cereals, but we bet you don’t know the story behind the two brothers who brought the world corn flakes. Buckle in for a lot of talk about poop, religion and masturbation, live from Sydney, Australia.	There’s no way you haven’t had one of their breakfast cereals, but we bet you don’t know the story behind the two brothers who brought the world corn flakes. Buckle in for a lot of talk about poop, religion and masturbation, live from Sydney, Australia.	Tue, 22 Jan 2019 16:10:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=1, tm_mday=22, tm_hour=16, tm_min=10, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=22, tm_isdst=0)	68631095	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime four days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon Music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. This July, don't miss an entire summer of surprises on Disney Plus with Disney's High School Musical, the Musical, the Series season three Zombies, three Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and the wonderful summer of Mickey Mouse. Plus new episodes of Marvel Studios, ms. Marvel and National Geographics. America the Beautiful. From the award winning producers of Planet Earth, Frozen Planet and the Disney Nature films, america the Beautiful takes viewers on a tour of the most spectacular and visually arresting regions of our great nation. All these and more streaming this month on Disney Plus. Welcome to stuff you should know from houseteporkworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's charles W, Chuck Bryant. Jerry's not here, but who cares because we are at the beautiful end more theater. And get this. Sydney, australia. Wow. Holy cow. Pretty good. Not a bad start. See the hell out of Perth. Well, we got to cut that part out. No, they were very appreciative because they said people don't come here. They literally said that. Yes. So to start the show, usually with the live show, we like to go back in time because we like to treat the audience to a free ride on the way back machine. Right. Which unfortunately doesn't exist. It's imaginary. Be quiet. Come on. I just need you all to use your imagination, okay? Like put on your thinking caps or your imagination cap, some sort of cap that will help you get into the way back machine. Maybe close your eyes. Go like this. Get in the lotus pose. I don't care. But we're all on the way back machine. Now we're going to ironically go to America. We came to Australia to bring you back to America in 1876. So that's where we are right now. The funny thing is, we don't even rehearse this stuff. Can you tell? All right, so it's 1876 in America, where we come from. We're just eleven years removed from the Civil War. The American Civil War. Let's see, thomas Edison had just given us the oh, I'm sorry, alexander Grand Bell had given us the telephone. Thomas Edison was still just a big loser and he couldn't get the light bulb to light up. It would still be three years away from that. Jesse James is robbing Banks. This is old timey America, basically. Right. And the whole reason we're in 1876, because we want to point out just how terribly, horribly people ate back then. Well, you'll see, let me give you an example for breakfast. If you were sitting down for a normal breakfast, somebody would bring out a whole live pig and butcher it in front of you, salt it, and make you eat the whole thing in one sitting. That was just the first course, not too far out. The potatoes would be fried and the congealed fat from last night's pig. That actually sounds very nice. Well, I'll give you this breakfast, okay? Hasn't changed all that much. All right? There were eggs, that kind of thing, but this was what people ate every single day. There was no breakfast on the go. It was heavy breakfast every morning. Granted, they were all farming and stuff like that, but still, it was pretty heavy breakfast. Even if you lived actually out in the sticks, you may eat a little healthier things like gruel and mush, but number one, you were eating gruel and mush, which is terrible. And then secondly, it took you hours to prepare this gruel and mush. So either you were eating really unhealthy or you were eating food that took a very long time to prepare. Yeah. So that's breakfast. We don't even get into lunch, but it's probably more the same. But I found a dinner listed online from Delmonico's in New York City. And granted, this is a very fancy, sort of celebratory dinner that was planned out for a politician, but this is how that went down. First course of raw oysters, a choice of two soups, an orderve, and a fish course. That's the first course. There's a course in a course. There's four courses in the first course. The next course is saddle of lamb, which I don't even know what that is, but it makes me sad. Filet of beef. All right. Not bad. Followed by chicken wings and peas and also lamb chops with beans and artichokes, because you need some veggies in there, I guess, right? That makes it healthy. What came next? What came next was a casserole. Terrapin on casserole, all of Maryland, which is turtle. You guys eat turtle. And that's Australia saying this. I figured you guys would be like, yeah, we eat turtle all the time. So that's the next course. Then you have a sorbet, and you're like, okay, well, that's the end of the meal. No, that is to cleanse the palate before the roast course comes out, which was I'm not lying. Which was canvas back, duck and quail. And then finally you get your dessert. Heavy creamed, ice creams, whipped cream, jelly dishes, banana mousse, pastries, petit fours, liqueurs, and then a little fresh fruit at the very end. Right? Because why not? And in between courses, they would smoke cigarettes to keep from puking everywhere. And then they would finish the whole meal off with a big fat cigar, and then they would die. So there was actually Walt Whitman, the poet Walt Whitman called something called dyspepsia, which is constipation diarrhea. And by the way, settle in for a lot of poop talk in this episode. Constipation diarrhea. Somehow both at the same time, indigestion, just basically wanting to die because you ate so much. That was called the great American evil. This Pepsi was or the great American stomachache because everybody ate so terribly. Everyone just walks around going like, good to meet you. How is the stock market doing today? It was just like everyone felt terribly all the time. Yeah, but it wasn't unusual. It's just how people ate. Everyone just figured, this is how you eat. You eat nine courses of meat a meal, saddle of lamb. What is that? And you feel like crap afterward. So in the midst of all this flatulence in Michigan, a state in our country, there were two brothers born who would go on to revolutionize health and diet. Going to do a lot of weird stuff, too. But there were decades and decades ahead of their time in many ways, and their names were John Harvey and Will. Keith Kellogg for the Kellogg brothers. That's all. And if you're thinking, did these guys just fly across the world to talk about cereal? We did. But it's also about poop and masturbation, believe it or not, and religion. And somehow all the things coalesce in this kind of strange story. Yeah. And oddly, they coalesce around the 7th Day Adventist Church, too. Yeah. Do you guys have that here? Yeah. Are there any members here? All right. Probably we're going to make fun of it a little bit. I just wanted to make sure. Good natured ribbing tops, goonies level. So the brothers Kellogg, John Harvey and Will, they didn't like each other very much, even though they spent all of their life together, practically. John Harvey was the older one by eight years, and he was abusive to his younger brother in just about every way an older brother could be as they were growing up. And then once they became adults, john Harvey hired Will so that he could abuse them further into adulthood. Pretty much. And he did things like John Harvey would ride his bike, which is very unusual at the time, to ride a bike just for exercise, but he would make Will jog alongside him and take dictation, because that's what a jerk does. That's only half of it. He was obsessed with his poop, and he would go in to go number two, or I don't know what you call that here. Is it number two? Okay. Oh, really? The universal language. So comforting. Number two. You go in to take number two, have a little brother come in and take notes about his stools and keep a log. I didn't even mean that. Oh, boy. Keep a log. Log. A poop log. So they didn't get along. John harvey was a jerk and he was not paid well. Later on, when they actually worked together, his little brother never got a formal title. So it should come as no surprise that later in life, the two brothers would go on to countersue one another time and time again and basically not speak to each other. Right. It's very sad. Sad and interesting. Yes. That should be the name of our show. I like that. It's a good idea. Maybe they'll be the spin off. So John Harvey and Will Kellogg were raised in a little town called Battle Creek, Michigan. And Battle Creek, Michigan became the seat of the 7th day Adventist Church. And 7th day Adventism grew out of something called Millerism, which was a religious movement that was formed around a guy named William Miller, appropriately enough. And William Miller had a knack for incorrectly predicting the second coming of Christ. He was really good at that, not being accurate. So he had some followers and he said, Yay, brothers. On October 22 sorry. On October 22, 1844, God will come back again. The world is going to end and it's going to get real. It's good news level. He didn't say that, though. And October 22, 1844, came and went and nothing happened. And his followers went, you get one more chance, one more Miller. What's it going to be? And Miller said April 18. They said, all right, we'll give you till then. April 18 came away and they said, that's it, we're done. Millerism is done. We're going to name this April 18, 1840, fourth the great disappointment with the G and the D capital I, which I think they were trying to send William Miller a message about. So Millerism crumbles. However, Miller rights would go on to say, you know what? I like kind of the vibe of what we got going on. Miller's out. Why don't we just reform? Under the leadership of the Whites, ellen White and her husband sort of gathered everyone together and reformed as a new band to tour the world called the 7th day Adventist. They got the band back together. They did, in the but without the lead singer. I know. Which actually I was lead singer in a band like that one. No, they broke up and reformed without me is what I'm saying. It's not worth cheering. Don't cheer for that band. I was going to ask if you were going to clarify that, because you just had a little bit of glory there for a second. Right. I got a cheer after all these years. Yeah, but look at you now. That's right. Where are those guys? Take that, sarah's greatest fan. That was the name of this stupid fan. All right, what was it? I'm not connected. Okay, you can listen to the episode. So Ellen White, what she did was connected religion to personal health in a very kind of well, not weird, but no one else was quite doing what she was doing? No. She said, your body and your soul are intertwined. So if you really take care of your body, you're also taking care of your soul as well. And if you do that, then it will be easier for you to get into heaven. It's one thing we haven't told you about Seven Day Adventists. What they believe is that there's a finite number of slots in heaven. Basically, it's like a zero sum game. Getting in if you get in somebody else didn't kind of thing. Getting into heaven is obviously very important. So you can get into heaven more easily if you eat vegetarian, if you avoid vices. Like making the saints cry, I think is what you guys call it here. No, don't call it. What do they teach us in Wanking? Do you want to steer clear of wanking? Yeah, I mean, fried food, greasy food, winking, pickled foods, that's just crazy. Somebody spoke up and was like, Even olives? Are olives even pickles? And they're like, I think so. And she's like, yes, even olives, no pickled food. And they said, what does this have to do with God? Again? God hates pickles. That's what I heard. Ladies, you should not wear binding corsets you should not wear wigs. You should not wear tight dresses. Someone just went, woo wigs. Because that led to the physically destructive self vice of masturbation and the less lonely and more fun vice of excessive sexual intercourse, which is to say, any intercourse not for procreation. And that's it, right? Like, if you weren't making a baby, then you just don't do it, right? So this is the town, this is the community that the Kellogg brothers were raised in. And from a very early age, john Harvey kind of proved himself kind of a sharp Adventist. He caught the eye of the Whites, who hired him as a devil's apprentice, which is a printer's apprentice. I don't know why they call it that. And then, in very short order, he ended up becoming the editor of the monthly magazine in Battle Creek, Michigan. The Health Reformer, which under his editorship, came out strongly in favor of Olives and repealing the ban. But he caught their eye, is what I'm trying to say. They were actually followers of another guy named James Caleb Jackson. I don't believe he was actually a 7th day Adventist. He was into health himself. He was a health reformer. And he opened a spa, or what you would call like a health spa in New York in the 1850s. And Ellen White and her husband went and visited this place and they were just struck. They were like, this is it. This really dovetails in with this whole idea of treating yourself really well. We should open one of these in Bennel Creek. And they did. They opened the Western Health Reform Institute, and it was a total flop right out of the gate. Yeah, it was. They didn't do it right. They served it's basically where you would go to eat really cruddy tasting food and have quack doctors give lectures. And it was like you said it was not popular. People would go and check it out, but they wouldn't come back. But the important thing is they kind of sold that original idea from James Caleb Jackson, because he's going to come around later again. Yeah. So this is where John Harvey they were like, the writing is on the wall. If we want this thing to succeed, I think we need, like, a real doctor to actually run this thing. And so young John Harvey was there. The writing was on the wall. They saw how bright he was, and he was going places. He was interested in medicine and health. So they paid for him. Asked his parents, is it okay if we send your son to medical school? Your oldest son? And they said, yeah, just don't send Will. Will was kind of a jerk, too. Yeah. But John Harvey went to medical school for real, became a real doctor, and returned to Battle Creek, Michigan in 1876, and was appointed director of what would become the Battle Creek Sanitarium. They changed their name. Right. And they chose Sanitarium because at the time, sanitoriums were places where you went to die when you had tuberculosis. And they're like, well, we really want to distance ourselves from that. We're going to change the O to an A. And I think that'll really get our point of call, like scratching that out, writing it and being like yeah. As you will see, John Harvey Kellogg was not the best businessman ever, nor was he the best doctor ever, really? No. But it was important to him that he said, I'll come back and I'll run your joint here. But aside from the religious principles, which I'm down with, it needs to be a medical institution. I want the science to be good, and that's kind of one of my requirements. And then he went on to not follow good science for a lot of his career. Yeah. He also said, My younger brother Will has to come on for my own personal reasons. And Will came on as the head of HR, very quickly instituted olive Fridays at the sanitarium. I love that olive spit man doesn't do very well. However, this is when things started to flourish. They really did it right. This place was super luxe, very nice. They figured, hey, let's give them better food and make people want to come here and have marble floors and banana trees in the lobby and palm trees. It would be today what you would think of as like a super deluxe kind of health resort spa, right? Yeah. And like you said, it flourished. They went from this house, basically, to a four story structure in just a few years. And then a few years after that, they built it into like a 15 story. Huge, enormous structure. And at this time in the US, if you had, like, a ten story building in a major city that was the pride of your city, they built a 15 story, huge complex into a health spa in Battle Creek, Michigan, which would be like building the same thing in Gundawindi or something like that. Right. Is that a good example? We do our research here. Is anyone from Gundawindi? No. Gunda. Wendy. Sorry. I knew we'd mispronounce it. Yes, of course. And it's kind of like it would be today if you wanted people to really take note. It really helps if celebrities pay attention to it, and they did. People like Amelia Earhart went there. President William Howard Taft. Thomas Edison went there. I guess he was still working on the light bulb, but maybe he did that there. Who knows? Johnny Weissmiller, who played Tarzan in the movies, he had a knack for going into the dining room and doing his Tarzan call is sort of like ringing the dinner bell, I guess it was a big deal. Like, people took note, but middle America, they still weren't on board. They called them battle freaks. They thought it was completely weird because this was the after all, it was not the time to talk about soy milk and vegetarianism. That was the time to eat a saddle of lamb. Right. While you were riding a cow that you were then going to eat after you ate the lamb. Yeah, that was what was done. And wash it down with some turtle. So when you went there I got no problems with turtle. You would eat turtle? Sure. Don't judge me. Would you eat penguin? No. Someone just gasped out there, gasping. Yes. Nobody I wouldn't eat kangaroo. Once you've laid with a kangaroo, tough to imagine eating it. I found that out. Yeah. In either sense of the word, I think you couldn't eat the kangaroo after that. All right, where are we? I'm already lost. Well, then I got it. All right. So the sand. They called it the sand, the sanitarium, like you said, it was huge. There were more than 1000 employees there. They had physicians and nurses, masseuses, bakers, bellhops, waiters, orderly, attendants. It was like a really super deluxe place where you would be examined. I believe every patient, for a while at least, was treated personally by Dr. John Harvey Kellogg. Yeah. Each person who came through, and we're talking tens of thousands of people a year, was seen by John Harvey Kellogg. And he would give them each, like, a personalized regimen to follow. And a lot of this stuff was like real common sense things. That what we think of as common sense now. Like, go get some exercise. Ride a bike. Would it kill you to get on a bike? Fresh air, sunshine. That was one of the first lectures. Would it kill you to get on a bike? Right. 10:00 A.m. In the east lobby. Right. Quit. Quit smoking. Yeah. Stop drinking. Cut out the caffeine, which is mad. Just common sense stuff that we think of as health that really kind of originated out of this area. Out of this area, yeah. And area. So things are going pretty well. Common sense treatments and also really crazy gizmos and contraptions. You can look these up online when you get home. Do you have Google here? But we call it googly. Goo. You totally do, too, don't you? Love your accent so much. And you know what I even did? I changed my Map's voice to a female Australian to drive me around wine country. And it really was just a cherry on top. Sure. It's very lovely. I'm going to go home and Emily's going to be like, who's that? What happened down there? Get rid of her. Right. Put on the robot voice. That's Sheila. Good one. Thanks. Josh is in rare form tonight. Everybody. Look out. Sydney. All right. One was called the Kneading Machine, like, as in bread kneading. And they would treat you like a loaf of bread dough. You would lay down and it had these mallets that would grind into your body and people would turn cranks and things. And it was all in an effort to get you to poop. Right. That was everything. So we got to tell you a little something about John Harvey Kellogg and his medical views. He subscribed strongly to this idea and now discredited theory called auto intoxication. And auto intoxication says that, sure, you poop. We all poop. Like the book says, everybody poops, but none of us are really good at pooping. We don't poop quite enough. And a little bit gets left behind each time. And as it builds up, that left behind poop poisons the rest of your body. And this results in things like diabetes or high blood pressure or stroke or like getting hit by a bus, whatever. It all comes back to the poop. You're not getting out. So everything walking in the sunshine, riding a bike, would it kill you? Quitting smoking. The Kneading machine and all the other machines that he came up with, all of it was to get the extra little poop out of you and get the toxins associated from that. You better get used to me saying poop and getting the toxins associated with that poop out of your body. That's right. He also invented something called the electric light bath cabinet, which sounds like an Elton John album, but it's not. It was basically an early version of the tanning bed. If you look this thing up, it's a huge box that you would sit in that kind of came up to your neck, and it had a nice little seat inside. It was lined with mirrors. And the light bulb, remember, had just been invented. They had no idea about wattage, and there was just light bulbs everywhere. I think the quote is, it would boil the poisons out of the pores of the body. And he believed in light. Not only sunlight, which does make sense, but light bulbs curing you. So he would fire up light bulbs all over the place and said, it'll cure gout. It'll cure typhoid, scarlet fever, diabetes, obesity, scurvy gastritis and constipation. Because why not light bulbs? Sure. Some of these things, though, like, this guy must have made a mitt on these machines, because you could find them outside of the Sanitarium, too. There's actually a couple that were on the first class gymnasium on the Titanic, which means some of John Harvey Kellogg's weirdo contraptions are at the bottom of the sea in the Titanic with some skeleton on the kneading machine. Like, Please, can I just ride a bike? It's like your chance for riding a bike is long over. What else did he had? He had the electric bed, which sounds like a lot of fun, to be honest. The foot vibrator, which also sounds lovely. And then our favorite machine. Our favorite machine? Sure. The colonic machine. You guys are familiar with colonics? Has anyone ever had a colonic? Good one. I've actually had a couple of colonics before. Have you really? I have. And they're like, It's hit or miss, I can tell you. Sometimes you get off of the colonic machine, you feel like a million bucks. Other times you're like, you know what it means to feel grey? Miss. Yeah. When it's a miss, it's a bad mess. It's not fun. Yeah. And I don't think we mentioned this whole fort bowel movements a day thing that he had. He went to Africa on a safari. This is the level of science this guy was operating at. He went to Africa on safari and saw gorillas pooping four times a day. And he literally said, well, they seem happy we came from them. Actually, Pete probably didn't believe that at all, but we all know now that we did. And he said, So that's what we should all shoot for as humans. It's for a day. And if you need a little help and the kneading machine isn't doing it and the light isn't boiling it out of you, then just have a seat on the colonic machine and hook yourself up to the spigot. Yes. Turn on the water and see what happens. Water moves things along great. If not, it was followed by a yogurt treatment. You would eat half of the yogurt and the other half seriously? He would shoot yogurt up people's butts? I never did that. I have principles and rules. I draw lines, places. I drew a line right through the yogurt. The little fruit on the side, though, that's called the parfait machine. That's right. They're delicious. So he actually had a couple of patents for this thing, for the clotting machine. The first one, I don't know what that said, but we looked up the improved patent because we were like, sure, why not? See what he got wrong? He said for the improved version, he wanted an irrigating apparatus, particularly adaptable for colonic. Irrigating, sure, but also susceptible for other irrigation treatments. So I guess after the people got on, he was like, well, we could water the lawn while we're at it. If there's a fire in the kitchen, we use this cray water. It's just going away. You're in tonight, Sydney? I get you. I didn't realize it's such a classy city. And also, the improved patent called for one where you could actually measure the amount of liquid entering and exiting the body. So before that, it was just a wild ride. And one of these colonic machines had multiple spigots on it, which meant you could fit more than one person on at a time. And I got to tell you, having done colonics before, you do not want anyone anywhere near you or in the same room, even you do not want to look over while you're getting a colonic at somebody else getting a colonic, because you don't want to connect with another human being like that. Yeah. No. So it must have been melting, john. Right? Sounds like fun. So I don't know about you guys, but I think this is going pretty well. So far, so good. All right. Okay, good. Well, then we have bad news because that means we have to take a message break. But we also have good news because we're not reading an ad. We have something very special. Yes. We have a fellow, a local guy named Alex Septon, who you might recognize in a second, who's going to come on out and help us. And we will be right back right after these messages. My friends out there in podcast land, it's time for your favorite. Thank you, Alex. That does not happen everywhere. Everybody. 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He was one of the early jingle writers that sent one in. He was number seven. Yeah. And he wrote us and said, I live in Sydney. And how about if I come up on stage and do that in front of people? And we said, that's a great idea. Yeah, one of the greatest, wonderful I really classed to show up. Really. Anyway, they raised like eight poop jokes. Poop and wanking, everyone. Let's get back to it. So one of the things about John Harvey Kellogg is, yes, he had some weird contraptions, and yes, he did weird stuff with yogurt, but there were some things where he was actually pretty ahead of his time. Like we said, what we think of as health was cutting edge and was brought to America and the world by guys like this, and in particular, mostly by John Harvey Kellogg. One of his earliest books was called Tobaccoism, and in it he writes about how tobacco is really bad for you. And this is at a time when people didn't think that way. No. Doctors would literally smoke while they treated you. Right. They'd be like, I have good news. You're pregnant, so I'm going to need you to move to Camel Lights during the term. Let me look at your chart. All right. You have lung cancer. I don't know what to say. I do, too. Everyone does. Yeah. It was a crazy time when people just thought it was normal to do that. But he was on the anti tobacco train way early. He was one of the first doctors, especially in the United States, to champion probiotics. And obviously with the yogurt acidophilus, I'm eating the yogurt, that is, and gut flora. And people just didn't know about this stuff. Doctors at the time tried to treat disease, not prevent disease. It was just accepted that they didn't call it healthy eating, they just called it eating and dying. That was the progression. You get to your 50s, maybe your sixty S, and you get diabetes or heart disease or stroke, and you just kill over dead. And John Harvey really, to his credit, was like, wait a minute, I think if we take care of our bodies, you could live longer, right? And they said, who are you? Which confirmed him. So when you went to the Battle Creek Sanitarium, one of the things they had was food. And he actually came up with a substantial amount of food. He's one of three people listed as an inventor of peanut butter, which, I mean, you can die with that one and be pretty happy. He invented a lot of nut based meat substitutes, which today it's like, how many can you find to those at the grocery store? A lot. Like tofurkey. It's not nut based, but you get what I'm saying. What else did he come up with? Oh, I've got one. Remember how you weren't supposed to eat or drink caffeine? He had a coffee substitute that was made from toasted grains and molasses with no caffeine. So you wouldn't drink it. You would throw it in somebody's face when they served it to you, but that's what you would get for coffee in the mornings at the sand. You're having a great show. Thank you. So are you guys. All right, this next section we're going to call Sexy Time. Oh, no. It's really bad and awful. It's actually the antithesis of sexy. Yeah. And this next part is tough, everyone. But we all got to get through it together. Hold hands with your neighbor if you want. This is tough, but here it goes again. Not for wanking. Very much against it. Wrote about it a lot. He was obsessed with poop and masturbation. Wrote about it in a book called Plain Facts for the Old and Young, about half of which were facts, maybe. And this is one of the things he wrote about how to kick the habits. Okay, so before Chuck reads this, I wanted to point this out. This is coming from one of the most famous, most revered physicians in the world. Okay? Bear that in mind when you're listening to what he's about to prescribe. A remedy which is almost always successful in small boys is circumcision. The operation should be performed by a surgeon without administering an anesthetic. That's the correct response. You're right. They pass the test. You're all right, Sidney. As the brief pain attending the operation will have a salutory effect upon the mind, especially if it be connected with the idea of punishment, as it may well be in some cases. The sordeness, which continues for several weeks, interrupts the practice. And if it had not been previously become too firmly fixed, it may be forgotten and not resumed. So, if I can update this for a minute. If you catch your son wanking, I think, as you call it, you would take your son to the doctor to be circumcised without anesthetic as punishment. That's what he's just recommended in that past. So it's all been kind of fun, but this guy is a monster. Yeah. We forgot to tell you. This is where it takes a really dark turn. Another method of treatment consists in the application of one or more silver sutures in such a way as to prevent erection altogether. You're always correct. The foreskin is drawn forward over the glance of the needle to which the wires attaches, passed through from one side to the other. After drawing the wire through, the ends are twisted together and cut off close. It is now impossible for an erection to occur. You hold a book and the slight irritation thus produce acts as the most powerful means of overcoming the disposition to resort to the practice. Monster. Yeah, he was a monster, okay? And I know he was doing this in the back room. I disagree. We have an ongoing dispute about this. I swear I was wanking. I think he never did. I honestly think he never ever did in his entire life. I think he wanted to. I don't buy it, but I don't think he did. Women didn't get off the hook. He knew that they masturbated too. No. Get out of the way. Back machine. Ma'am. Come to the future. It's okay. Yeah. And if you were on the fence about John Harvey, prepare to tip over. He had an easy solution for that. Just throw some carbolic acid on the female genitalia or junk as a default. Think about that next time you eat cornflakes. Yeah. We'll get to the cereal. Trust me, that's coming. He had some other really stupid ones too, like tying your hands together. That's like the three stooges remedy. It actually makes it a little easier. To be honest. He was way off base. I don't know about you. More friction. You can still get the job done. What else? Oh, here's one. He built a sort of an underwear contraption with a cage on the front that went around your genitalia just in case you could not be stopped. He built a literal prison around your genitalia that John Harvey Kellogg invented the tanning bed, apparently peanut butter and the in the box Justin Timberlake was rolling over in his grave. In the future. Yeah, he's alive for now. He's doing quite well. He's the saddle of lamb a day. All right, so that's a bit of the dark side of John Harvey. It gets even darker because he was also a Eugenesis. Yeah, right. You've heard us talk about this song on the show. If you don't know what that is, it is sort of this insane belief of racial purity to like the instagram to where he thought, not only white is right, but we should have a pedigree system. And it was all tied into, like eating and health and stuff too. He actually had a version called Euthanx and eugenicist made fun of him behind his back. He was so out there. Yeah. His whole thing was eugenics plus, where you could actually be even more racially pure if you were a vegetarian or you sutured your foreskin for fun on a Thursday. And like Chuck was saying, even the eugenicists were like, this guy's mind, he heard what he thinks, which is really saying something coming from Eugenesis. Yeah. He never did it, but he proposed the eugenic registry where he created a pedigree of breeding between people like dogs to where you should only breed with certain types to make the uber race like dogs. Right. If that has ever taken whole, can you imagine what Tinder would be like? But apparently to John Harvey Kellogg, it went white people and cocker spaniels. All right, now we're going to get to cereal finally. Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you. You can like your neighbor's hand now. We all got through it. You can still hold hands if you want. That's nice. Sure. So as far as the Battle Creek Sanitarium goes in the medicine part, john Harvey had an iron grip on things as it was coming out of my mouth. Josh is like, he had an iron grip on nothing. I tell you, he didn't. He had a stranglehold on the medicine, but he was not a great businessman. He changed sanatorium to sanitarium. And I was like, hey, what do you think of that? Check me out. Luckily for him, he had a little brother around. I remember young Will, he's still around. He was actually a pretty good businessman and turns out a pretty good marketer. And when John Harvey was trying to search for a breakfast health food, which would later become cereal, as you will see, he hypothesized that, you know what? If we get the digestion going before you even eat it? That's even better for poop. Yeah, the poop comes out that much easier. So they started with double baked biscuits. They were basically these really hard crackers that they double baked. So they were already sort of digested. And I don't even think we mentioned that he believed you should chew everything 40 times. 40 times. Can you imagine 40 times chewing tofirky 40 times a bite? Not good. It's just be like ghost chews after, like, 20. It's, like, absorbed into my gums. So, as legend goes, at Battle Creek, a woman, an older lady, broke her dentures on one of these double baked biscuits. And he was like, this is not good, because I don't want to get sued by every old lady or young podcaster who breaks his teeth. Did you get that one? I got implants. All right, thanks. I appreciate that. And so they started to grind them up into little crumbs and break up these little biscuits. And that was sort of their first little version of what would become cereal, right? That's like the way Kellogg's tells it. The truer story is that they said, we need a breakfast cereal. That's easy on the stomach. What is James Caleb Jackson doing at his sanitarium? And they went and found out that he was making a cereal called Granula. And Granula was made from graham powder. And it's these little baked little nuggets that are not food. You had to soak them overnight in milk or water, your choice to be able to eat it the next morning, right? Yeah. Not good breakfast cereal. And they said, let's steal that recipe. And they took James Caleb Jackson's granula, and they called their version of it Granula, because, again, John Harvey was not a very good business fan. So James Caleb Jackson found out about this and sued them. And they were forced to come up with a new recipe and a new name, and they came up with Granola because, again, they had a real knack for switching a vowel out here or there. That's the old John Harvey Kellogg trick. Yeah. And they swapped out the graham flour for wheat flour, and they made something you guys have never been cursed with. We did our research, something called Grape Nuts. Has anyone ever heard of grapenuts? Yeah. They're like these cereals. Little tiny pebbles. Yeah. It's like a boy as a kid, if you ever made the mistake of thinking it tastes anything like grapes, you were wrong. They're even nuts. Yeah, you're right. It's like if you took a rock and a hammer and broke it up into the smallest things that you could and said, rocks, go have sex with a cardboard box. And then whatever that produces is grapenut cereal is disgusting. So that is still, like, a popular cereal around today. Yeah. In old folks homes. Yes. Every kid in America goes through this rite of passage where when you pour a big bowl of cereal, you're like, Hell yeah, honeycombs, I love these things. Or what do you call them? Like chocolate pops or something like that? Sugary cereal. So you pour, like, a big old bowl. You do not do that with Grape Nuts because they are denser than a neutron star. But you don't know that as the kid. And you pour a big old bowl, and by the time you realize you're a horrible mistake, your mom is like, you already put milk on that. You have to finish that whole thing. Finish all that Crepe Nuts, and you have to finish it, and you never make that mistake again. It's a bad day when that happens. They should call it large hadron Collider cereal. Right. But the thing about Grape Nuts is grapenuts came out of the Kellogg brothers stealing granula from Caleb Jackson. Grape Nuts is made by the CW. Post Company. And CW. Post was a patient at the Battle Creek Sanitarium, and he stole the recipe from Grave Nuts from the Kellogg brothers. What a time to be alive it really was. Just steal everything. It doesn't matter. Change a letter. It's fine. Yeah. All right. So they're experimenting they still didn't have these lovely little flakes that we know as Corn Flakes or Frosted Flakes. They were experimenting with flavor. They were experimenting with, like, grain flour, with wheat flour. Finally, they tried corn, and they thought they were onto something with corn. It depends on who you ask. But either John Harvey will, his little brother, or his wife Ella, john Harvey's wife found out that if you is that a subway? I think it's an earthquake. Okay. Are we good? Is this normal? Do you guys have earthquakes here? It's a rap parade, mate. Here they go. And as young as out in front. Yeah, they're all, like, doing their top. That leave that in. Yeah, Jerry, leave that in. Where was I? Okay, so either Ella Will or John Harvey realized that one of the key things was to roll it out really flat. So they were getting there, they were double baking it. They landed on corn. They were rolling it out flat, but it still wasn't quite right. No. So, John Harvey, there was something else we didn't mention. If you couldn't poop and the colonic machine wasn't working, he would just take out part of your colon. And surgery, that was another thing he could do, right? Maybe much tubage in there, sir. Maybe toss in a silver suture for free while he was at it, while you're under, right? So he was called away to surgery one day while he and Will were experimenting down in the basement in the Sanitarium. And Will was notoriously frugal. So rather than throw away the dough they've been working on, that hadn't worked, he just kind of set it off to the side for later. And when he came back, he found that something had happened, something called tempering, where the dough gets just a little bit moldy. Not like you gross moldy, but kind of like this is delicious moldy, right? Like the air in the water just kind of spreads evenly around it. And the upshot of all this is that when you bake mold or bake dough that's been tempered, it turns into perfect little flakes. So that's how the Flaked breakfast cereal was accidentally discovered in the Battle Creek Sanitarium by Will, who is too cheap to throw away the dough. That's right. So John Harvey was thrilled. Not because he wanted to become a cereal magnate. He was like, I'm a doctor. I want this for my patients. Now, we can just easily pour this breakfast cereal into a bowl, and for the first time, people can eat a very simple nutritious. What we think is at least is a nutritious breakfast. And Will was like, well, I don't know, big brother. He said in his head, because he dared not speak aloud, right? He said, the way I see it and this is all in his brain now, the way I see it, you don't have to be ill to eat breakfast cereal. I think healthy people might just like a special little simple breakfast that they can pour out of a bowl. And he was sitting over there going like this, and John Harvey said, what are you doing over there? He went nothing. Big brother. Nothing. Pay no attention. Are you thinking about wanking? No, but I'm a cake. Silver suture. So in the end, however, the patent for Flaked Cereals in Process of preparing same was issued on April 14, 1896, to John Harvey Kellogg alone. Not his wife nor his brother, just to him. Right. And it did pretty well for a little while. It did. They sold something like 180,000 cases. No, I'm sorry. They sold this stuff for about ten years, and they sold enough that they were making their money back. They were selling it outside of the Sanitarium, but not much. Not much. We'll figure it out that they would probably sell a lot more of the cereal if it didn't taste like so he said, I've got an idea. It's a radical idea, but I think this might just work. Let's add a little bit of salt and sugar to the cereal recipe. And John Harvey went. Get out. Demons. Salt and sugar are as bad as olives. And he had a change of heart about olives by this time, and Will said, no, really, I think this is a good idea. And if you stop and think about it, everyone's had, like, Kellogg's corn flakes, right? How much sugar do you have to put on those things to make them taste decent? Imagine what they must have tasted like before. What we're all eating is the improved taste version, right? I can't imagine how bland they were before. Yeah, no good. Try eating these things. So still better than grape nuts. Yeah, grapenuts are the worst. Captain Crunch peanut butter. Do you have that here? Captain Crunch. What? You've had it? Isn't it the best? It's the best sugary cereal. When my wife goes out of town, that's my vice. Some guys are like, I don't know what guys do when women go out of town. Their wives. I get cereal. He's like, oh, you'll never know. She comes back, she's like, do I smell breakfast cereal? How could you let me spell your spoon? This sounded dirty for some reason. Oh, where are we? Okay, I don't worry. I'm sorry. So John Harvey goes out of town. He goes to Europe to do some lecturing, and back then, I guess it takes, like, a month to go to Europe and a month to come back and a couple of months to go on tour and do his lecturing. He was gone long enough for a little brother to build a manufacturing plant. I hope he doesn't notice the mass production plant that I built while he was gone with big vats of sugar and salt. And John Harvey came back, and he was really pissed off. And he said, you're going to pay for this out of your own pocket, out of your allowance that I give you. Out of your chief allowance that I give you. And Will was done. He was like, I'm done. I'm tired of you, big brother. I've been working for you and getting abused for all these years. She said to everyone listening, please note I just made a friends reference. Do you have friends here? Sure. They called it mates, man, which apparently mate either means, like, I love you, or you're about to get your ass kicked. US. This whole time I've been like, all right, are we hugging? Are we fighting? Just hugging. Just hug. That's our motto. Will, it had enough. The sanitarium actually burned down in from an accidental furnace gone wrong. And Will was like, all right, I'll help you rebuild this, because we've all kind of put everything into it. And then after that, I'm really gone. Yeah, trust me, he was genuinely spineless. Yes, he was a spineless brother. I'm out of here after I help you rebuild the 15 story sanitarium. But John Harvey actually refused to get on that sugar train. He sold the sweetened version to his brother. He actually bought the patent from his brother of the decent tasting version. And on February 1919, six at the age of 46 years old. I'm a little older than that, even. I'm not. He's a late bloomer. Yeah, we get it. Will Kellogg founded the Battle Creek Toasted Cornflake Company and became a very rich man. So at this point, John Harvey and Will Kellogg have now gone their separate ways for basically the first time in their lives. And we're going to take a message break again right here. So, Alex, if you will come out one more time. Alex, Stephen, everybody. We will be right back right after this message. Learning stuff with Joshua. All together now, everyone. Nice work. Thank you, Alex. Wow. 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You guys are good. So Will struck out on his own with the recipe that he bought from his brother. And now he started selling 180,000 cases of cornflakes in the first year. First year after he separated from his brother, less than the first year because they separated in February. So in less than a year, he sold 180,000 cases. And there's like four or five boxes to a cake of cornflakes. Okay. There's like six or seven boxes to a cake because he put a little salt and a little sugar, and it started to take the world by swamp. But he realized he was never going to make it a national product unless he took New York, because if he could make it there, he could make it anywhere. So we started something. That's pretty good. Thank you. I just came up with that. I like that. That should be a Tshirt. It should be. We should totally license that and get our suit off for it. So he started an advertising campaign he threw me off. He started an advertising campaign specifically for New York called Wink Wednesday, which was pretty risque, actually, especially for Will Kellogg, but also for he might as well have been asking women to show a little ankle because he advertised in all the New York papers. On Wednesday, when you go shopping, ladies wink at your grocer, and your grocer will give you a free box of Corn Flakes. And obviously, people would do anything for free Corn Flakes, including winking at a strange man. Not winking, no. That was a different ad campaign. But it was a big deal to give away a free box of cereal. You didn't have to enter stuff as your code or anything like that. Just a wink and you get your free cereal. So it was a big deal. Another few dominoes started to fall to help this thing really explode. In the 1910s, pasteurization of milk finally happened. So it was no longer dangerous to eat cereal, I guess. What else did they come up with? Like, kids, like, cutting out box tops and mailing them in for sort of cruddy prizes. That was a big marketing thing in Battle Creek, Michigan. If you grow up, even at our age in the in America, you knew, like, Battle Creek, Michigan was an address where they would send you things. If you send in cereal. Right. I want a crappy whistle. It's going to break after three blows. But I got basically because they send in a box top. That was the whole thing. They started expanding into new markets in 1914, went to Canada. They started Bran Flakes in the they finally, in the 1920s, built a plant right here in Sydney, Australia. Right. Sexy. What else? They invented those awesome little single serving boxes that are still one of my favorite things because they're like small things, I think the little single serving cereal box that you can actually open up and eat out of, like the pinnacle of human technology. It's pretty good. I love it. Large Hadron Collider mini box that you can eat out of cereal. Who knew the Large Hadron Collider was going to make two appearances in the 19th century Kellogg's episode? The other thing we did was very revolutionary during the Great Depression when people were I mean, a lot of people were going out of business, businesses were not doing well, or they would just really kind of go down to bare bones. He doubled down on advertising because he thought, I'd actually got a pretty cheap, easy to eat food. And he made money during the Great Depression. It was remarkable. He was extraordinarily successful. He founded the Wk. Kellogg foundation. He endowed it with $50 million back in the 19th century. Just a tremendous amount of money. Now it's worth like 9 billion today. So he was extraordinarily wealthy. And all of this happened the moment he stepped out from his brother's shadow. And his brother didn't like that one bit. So John Harvey said, well, I don't care at all about cereal myself, but I really don't like my little brother being successful. So I'm going to make my own cereal. I'm going to make cornflakes. And I think I'll call them Kellogg's Cornflakes. Now, you said cornflakes with an M, right? And people are like, are you saying cornflakes or cornflakes? And he was like, yeah, you tell me, right? So he made these things, and Will was like, well, big brother, I'll see you in court. And he sued John Harvey. And John Harvey said, oh, yeah, well, I'm suing you back, because that's the American way. And they went to court with dueling lawsuits. And what was that issue was who had the right to use the Kellogg name? Yeah, I mean, what was really at heart was ego, to be honest. They were both named Kellogg. That's part of it. But also John Harvey was like, I'm the famous John Harvey Kellogg. I'm the Doctor Oz of my day. Everybody's like, who is that? He's like, Just wait, you'll see. It's a sensible reference. Do you know who Dr. Oz is? Okay. I was like, Wait a minute. Did they get that? Dr. Australia. I'd go to that guy, right? On the other hand, Will was like, oh, wait a minute, wait a minute. Yes, my brother is the most famous doctor in all the land, but I have built this Kellogg's brand over the last couple of decades, and I've actually eclipsed his fame. So there was, like you said, a lot of ego at the family name, but also which was the more famous Kellogg? And it turns out that the court said, Willis. He wasn't a good guy either, by the way. He did silver suture things. But yeah, no, he was a very unhappy, unfulfilled man. He would spend a lot of evenings at home kind of longingly, looking at the cage that his brother had built around his genitalia and just think, why did I let him talk me into that? And does anyone have any wire cutters? I don't know about that. So after these lawsuits, they rarely ever spoke again and was really sad. If you've ever had a good brother or good sibling, you know how wonderful that is. They were not tight at all. They didn't speak. If they ever did, will would make sure he had a witness there just to hear the conversation. You know, things are really bad when you have, like, a stenographer in the room at Thanksgiving. So today, most nutritionists agree and obesity experts agree that they actually had it kind of wrong as far as cornflakes go. Yeah, I mean, the whole reason they made cornflakes in the first place was to aid in digestion, because everybody showed up like, oh, I feel so terrible. And they would feed them corn flakes or Bram flakes or whatever. But in doing this and predigesting the food for the patient by baking it a couple of times, they actually stripped away a lot of the actual healthy stuff from the grain. Right. If you just strip away the outside. Of corn or wheat or something like that. That's the stuff that allows you to kind of slowly digest something and keeps your blood sugar from spiking. So back then and today, if you ate something like corn flakes or like any kind of breakfast cereal, your blood sugar would spike and it would crash, and you would get ravenously hungry very early. Whereas if you ate, like, whole grain, like gruel or mush, it might have sucked and taken 3 hours to make, but you would stay fuller longer. So, yeah, today breakfast cereal is poison. I guess it's the message of all of this, ironically. So the sanitarium in Battle Creek was driven out of business eventually for a few reasons. The Great Depression was a big one. When there's a recession or a depression in the country, the first thing to go still today are these sort of luxury items. And so this hippie dippie like Uber Lux helps spa. In the early 19, it was not like celebrities even stopped going there. That's how bad it got during the depression. Like, even Amelia Earhart stopped showing up after a while. Really? Is it too soon for Amelia Earhart jokes? Some people clapped at that awful, mean spirited joke. He had to lay off workers. Will was getting rich, and John Harvey was going broke. Well, not broke, but he was getting more poor. Eventually, he would have to sell off the building itself to the US. Government. They converted it into a military hospital. And Battle Creek, though, was somehow, because of the cereal boom, became the home of breakfast cereal around the world. So there were 100 different cereal companies. I guess they thought that's the only place you could make it, like, oh, I guess we got to go to Central Michigan to make cereal. Sorry, we want to make cereal. We got to move there. But, I mean, still today, it's still the cereal capital of the world. And in his twilight years, john Harvey became very much eccentric, even more eccentric than his younger days. Yeah, he would have, like, two hour long meals a couple of times a day, end up putting a lot of weight. And he was a vegetarian, bear in mind. But during these meals, he would have guests, and he would say, excuse me, guests, I'll be right back. He would pick up a pail on his way out, and he would come back with a pail filled with his own poop, and he would say, get a whiff of this. Seriously, that's not a joke. He says that his stools were as sweet as a nursing baby well, the nursing baby stools, I should say, or that they were no more offensive than warm biscuits, which, if that's true, that's actually kind of worth showing off at dinner, to tell you the truth. I might actually be like, seriously, smell it. Smells like warm biscuits. I'm throwing a lot of dinner parties, but no one like that. Not like that. So finally he approached death. And we have to point out these guys, I mean, they were kooky, but they lived into their late eighty s and ninety s at a time when people didn't generally live that long. So they were doing something right, diet wise. And in 1943, as John Harvey approached death in his late 80s, he started to feel a little bit bad about little brother Will after 88 years of being a dick. And he wrote a letter of apology, and part of it said this I earnestly desire brother to make amends for any wrong or injustice of any sort I've done to you. I'm sure you were quite white in regards sorry, Jerry, cut that part out. I realized it just said quite white, which he probably meant that, too. Probably. You're like such a cocker spaniel. Brother, I realize you were quite white and right in regards to the food business, your better balanced judgment has doubtless saved you from a vast number of mistakes of the sort I've made, and allowed you to achieve great success for which generations will come to owe you gratitude. PS. What's it like to have sex? I bet it's great, right? So he closed this letter and gave it to his secretary, and his secretary took it and read it and decided not to mail it. Secretary found it just too demeaning to John Harvey and decided, no, this isn't going anywhere. But John Harvey didn't realize this, so he just sat around waiting to hear back from Will and then died. While you feel bad for this guy, did you forget the carbolic acid and the white supremacy? No. That means you have feelings. We live in the future. It's fun to judge people who lived in the past. Will eventually did get that letter, though. Five years after John Harvey's death, when Will was 88 and he was getting on up there in age, he got that letter. And finally, at the end of his long career, he realized that he had gotten his brother's approval. Granted, he didn't get to say thank you or you're welcome back, but he got this letter. The Wk. Kellogg foundation that he started is now a $9 billion fund that guides the belief that all children have an equal opportunity to thrive. And they do really good work here, all over the world, actually, but especially in the United States. It's a good organization. Yeah. So Will Harvey died, and like Chuck kind of alluded to earlier, he wasn't the greatest guy ever. He had that little brother bitterness that only a little brother can have when they have an older brother that they've never resolved their issues with. And so that means that he took it out on everybody else except for John Harvey. So he was kind of overbearing father and husband, and when he died, his grandson oh, man. And this is his grandson. Right. Grandkids are supposed to just love their grandparents unconditionally. Not this one. Will's grandson wrote when he died at age 91 in 1951. Nobody really should a tear. Most felt a great sense of relief, as if a heavy weight had been lifted from them. Family. Am I right, Cornflakes? But the grandson was like, but I really appreciate the $10 billion inheritance, grandpa. He can rot in hell, but I really like the month. Thank you, grandpa. All right. Bring us home, brother. So if you go to Oak Hill Cemetery in Battle Creek, and a lot of people do, you've been on the tour before, haven't you? The serial tour? Seriously? People go to Battle Creek to tour cereal factories. But when you're there, when you're there, some people I don't know, you can go to Oak Hill Cemetery and you can visit Will Kellogg's massive burial plot. It's like made of blue slate. It's got black wrought iron fence around it with the iconic Kellogg's K on the yeah, that was his signature, by the way. The Kellogg that you see is Will signature, right? And it's a pretty big tourist stop in Battle Creek, because there's nothing to do in Battle Creek. But what most people don't realize is that years before Will Kellogg bought that burial plot, he and his brother had adjoining burial plots side by side with little simple tombstones, just enough for names and dates of birth and dates of death. It was weird for brothers to have adjoining plots. We have a joining plot, but we're friends, so it makes a little more sense. But when people are visiting Will Kellogg grave, what they don't realize is that just about ten spots away, his original grave site that he had moved from because he hated his brother so much, his brother John Harvey is still buried there. So when they're visiting Wills grave, just a few steps away, one of the most famous physicians who ever lived in America is buried there in a very simple little headstone. That's right. So even in death, little brother finally is giving his brother the finger. And that's the story of the Kellogg's brothers, everybody. Yes, it is. Thank you. All right, summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's Criminal Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today. 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https://podcasts.howstuf…sk-lotteries.mp3	How Lotteries Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-lotteries-work	In this episode, Josh and Chuck discuss the history, practices and controversies of lotteries.	In this episode, Josh and Chuck discuss the history, practices and controversies of lotteries.	Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:35:05 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2010, tm_mon=3, tm_mday=16, tm_hour=20, tm_min=35, tm_sec=5, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=75, tm_isdst=0)	24379211	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody. If you want a great website, you want to do it yourself. With no must, no fuss, turn to Squarespace. They have everything to sell anything. They have the tools that you need to get your business off the ground, including ecommerce templates, inventory management, simple checkout process, process, and secure payments. And if you're into analytics, hold on to your hats, because Squarespace has everything that you need. Just head to squarespace. comSK and you can get a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code s YSK to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Hey, friends. Dating is a journey with ups and downs, for sure, but all the effort is worth it when you meet someone special, right? And when you decide it's time to find a meaningful relationship, eharmony is here for you. Eharmony is passionate about creating real love for all. Rooted in compatibility, Eharmony's process reveals truths about yourself like, I don't know what you want in a relationship, and it helps you connect with a uniquely compatible partner who is right for you. Don't believe it? See for yourself. So start for free today, because every 14 minutes, someone finds love on Eharmony. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetuffworkscom. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. Josh Clark. Chuck Bryant. Stuff you should know. Good. It's not sound like A Current Affair or one of those tablet shows. Hard Copy. Remember that? Yeah. Are they still around? I think some of them are. Thankfully, I don't watch television at 04:30 p.m.. No. You have a job? I wouldn't know. Yeah. Here in Georgia, we have this thing called the Hope Grant. I think we still do. I think so. Where like, if you keep a B plus average or more in high school, if you graduate the B plus average and you can maintain it through college, you get a free ride to a state school. And that's funded by the lottery. Yeah, that came along after I was there. It started actually when I went to college, I think it was the first year. And there have been tons and tons of studies done on who's going to college. And it's generally white, upper middle class kids who are benefiting from the Hope Scholarship. Right. And then it's poor minorities who are playing the lotto and in effect, putting white kids through college whose parents could otherwise pay for it. Yeah. A lot of people have called a tax on the poor, the anti Robinhood take from the poor and give to the rich. Should we talk about some stats? Sure. Should we get that out of the way? Yes. I've got a few for you, Josh. There is one study in California where they have shown that the racial and household income lines match up with how California is divided. Sure. Has that been disputed at all? Yeah, people are saying they're cooking the books. Oh, really? They'll ask questions like, have you played the lottery in the last month? But they don't say, have you bought 15 scratch off tickets per day? Right. Yeah, that's a good point. So they don't really dive in there. I was reading a story, I think, from CBS News, Texas, in 2007. They found that blacks and Hispanics play the lottery twice as much as whites do, regardless of class. Yes. And scratch off tickets. Apparently the crack cocaine of lottery in Texas is the first state to offer a $50 scratch off ticket. Holy cow. You pay $50 to buy this thing? Have you ever gone on like, a little scratch off bender? No. I have before. And when you get into the grips of it, you might as well be huffing ether. There is no way out. Well, Massachusetts, one third of the calls to the gambling addiction hotline or from lottery players. Really? Yeah. I don't play it. I'm surprised. It's just a third, actually. Yeah, it's like alcoholism and beer. You can buy beer, you can buy liquor. And in a lot of states you have to buy it from a state store. This is the same thing. These are state run vice operations, basically. Yeah, pretty much. And people have a real problem with them, but the state is just making so much cash off of these things that they aren't really doing a whole lot about it. Yeah. And here's the other thing. Before we get on with just what the lottery is, we should talk about a little more. Malfeasance. Apparently not very much money at all is going to K through twelve education. Most lotteries go toward education. Right. That's how it is. College. Yeah, it's all going to college. They said that less than 1% in half of the states that played the lottery go to K to twelve. Really? And the other hinky thing is they sell it to you as a benefit for education, like all over the marketing. But the legislation now in many states are starting to kind of use it for whatever they want according to their budget. Like in Missouri, when it started, I think it was like 52% was supposed to go toward education, and now it's like 30%. And they use it for budget shortfalls and whatever they need, they'll just rewrite the law. How it's grim. I know. That's really grim. Especially when you consider all the people who are just blowing cash on scratch off tickets or lotto tickets and have like, real gambling problems. That's the controversy. And actually this problem goes back pretty far, right to the 16th century, I believe. Yeah. Florence Fernse. Oh, is it Italy? Yeah, that's where the lotto comes from. And I think the term lotto is based on lots, like drawing lots, game of chance, luck. Yeah. Right. And so the first lotto that anybody is aware of, where there was a cash prize given out was the lotto deference. You want to say it? Nice. Thank you. And that was again in the 16th century in Italy and in the US. We've always had something of a little bit of a fever for the lotto, haven't we? Yeah. Apparently the colony of Virginia was founded by raise money from lotteries. Nice. And there were 200 lotteries permitted between 1744 and the revolutionary war that funded roads, libraries, colleges, bridges, churches. Yeah. A lot of them were for civic projects, right? Yeah. And Princeton and Columbia universities were built on a lot of money. Did you know that? I did. In Latin. I can't remember what it is in Latin. But the crest for Princeton translates to, daddy needs a new pair of shoes. And there's some dice on this shield. I know if you have 15 grand, you can go to ebay and buy a lottery ticket with George Washington signature on it. Sweet. Pretty cool. Yeah. So I had no idea that lotteries were this entrenched in the founding of our country. Well, they kind of fell out of favor, I imagine probably in part because of the temperance movement in the 19th century. Temperance? And then in the 20th century, about the mid 20th century, lotto fever could not be suppressed. Right. Inoculations ran out, and everybody was like, give me some tickets. And New Hampshire led the way in 1964 with its first state run lottery of the 20th century. I don't play the lottery myself at all, but I definitely see the irresistible lure of a dollar winning you millions of dollars. I don't know, man. Let's just get this out of the way. Would you want to win the lottery, honestly? And if so, what's the minimum amount you would have to win to not just blow it? I'm going to say no. I wouldn't want to either, because stress and anxiety and complications. I want to make my life keep it as simple as possible. And that would just complicate everything. Oh, it definitely would. And all kinds of jerks coming out of the woodwork. Yeah. I think you're kind of like, I don't have an uncle from Venezuela or do I? Right. Exactly. Well, I guess it's possible this guy wouldn't be saying he was my uncle, so I could hear some money I should invest in his coffee beanfield. Right, exactly. Or get some Nigerian general out of trouble via email. Sure. So, Chuck, I would not necessarily want to win the lotto either, unless it was such a vast amount that I couldn't possibly run through it, and I'd probably go off and travel or do whatever. Yeah. I'm also one of those jerk offs who thinks that working for your money is kind of the thing to do. Chuck works hard for his money. I would feel like I think I'd be very unfulfilled if someone just gave me a pile of cash. Right. Yeah. And that's an excellent point, too, because if you think about it, let's say you did win a million dollars. Let's say you won $10 million, and we'll get into how that trickles down to almost nothing by the time it gets into your pocket. But let's say you won $10 million, and after a couple of years, you've blown through it, right? Yeah. You've done nothing to earn that money. Right. So therefore, you could never get it back. It was just blind luck. If you make $10 million writing a book or writing a movie or in business or in real estate, you can make that back again. Actually, if you blow it all because you've done something for it, you've used your own wits and skill. But with auto, no, it's just a trip to easy street that turns out to be hell. Well, that's why it appeals to so many people. Except for the hell part. Yeah. And that's why people see it as a tax on the poor, because it's like, here, even the scratch off tickets, just a chance to win, like, a couple of $100. Right. It's kind of sad. At the same time, though, you have to add a little perspective to it. You and I don't really play the louder. Like I said, I've done some scratch off benders here. There but nothing more than, like, five or $10. Right. I've got the occasional powerball. Occasional power. Okay. All right, I'll admit that, but rarely. But consider this. You and I are upper middle class white guys aged 18 to 49. Pretty much the entire country is based on whatever we want. All of the focus groups, all the studies, all the pharmaceutical tests, they're based on us. We have it so ridiculously easy that I think it's entirely possible that we're blinded to why people play the lottery. If you simply don't have a leg up, if there's nothing you can do, if you're being kept down economically, socially, or whatever, there is this promise of, I could really use a couple of extra million bucks, and I don't care if some jackass does come out of the woodwork and says he's my uncle. Like, I think it's easy to criticize people who play the lottery as stupid. Right. But at the same time, I think that reveals a misunderstanding of where somebody's coming from. Yeah. And then, of course, there are just some jackasses who play the lottery because they're bored or people who do have a gambling problem. Right. But I think that there is some promise of a lottery, and I think that the state preys upon that through their lotteries. Yeah. I mean, it's easy for us to sit here and say, well, if you spend $2,500 a year on scratch off tickets, if you had invested that in a Roth IRA, then you could potentially have a retirement account, and it's just shut up. Yeah. I've been poor, man, and I can tell you the poor mentality is tough to break out of yes. I was poor at one point myself. Yeah, it sucks. And I was a lottery scratch off fiend. Yeah, not true. Yeah. Objects carry a lot of power. They can tell a story about a person, a place, or a time in history, and sometimes they just look like household objects. On Mysteries at the museum. The podcast from Travel Channel Don Wildman travels across the US. To find the objects that tell shocking stories of American history. You'll hear about the plane beige uniforms that were at the center of the Stanford Prison Experiment or about the failed invention from World War II that became one of the most popular toys for kids. Uncover the secrets behind these incredible objects and learn about the history of war, science, crime, and everything in between. Listen to Mysteries at the Museum, on Apple podcasts Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, everybody, chuck here. Did you know there are millions of people around the world hosting on airbnb right now? Yeah. Which means that's a lot of amazing homes that are making people a lot of extra money. And it doesn't have to be an everyday thing. You can host when you want. Like, let's say you're taking a week's vacation. Why not host your home? Because that money could go towards paying for your current vacation or towards your retirement fund or even towards your kids college fund. Yeah. For anything. And listen, if you're worried about your stuff, don't be. Air Cover for Hosts. Let hosts welcome guests into their home without having to worry. You get $1 million in damage protection anytime you're hosting, plus pet damage protection and income loss protection, too. And are you ready for this? Air Cover for Host is completely free every time you host on airbnb. Free with a capital F. With Air Cover for Host, it makes hosting a no brainer, and the benefits really start adding up. So learn more and host with peace of mind at Airbnb Comaircoverforhosts. All right, dude. Usually our tirades come toward the end. For some reason. We front loaded this one with it. Let's talk about how lotteries work. Yes. Josh. If you are playing a game with 50 balls, let's say 50 ping pong balls, and each one that says the number, your odds of winning is about 16 million to one if they just add one ball to that. So 51 balls. 51 balls. It shoots up to about 76 million to one. Right. And that's the real reason I don't play. That is a fantastic calculation you just did there, and I don't mean to criticize you. A surprisingly simple one, actually. Right? Yes. So if you have six numbers that you have to pick out of 50 balls, your initial chance is 50 to six. Or it's like, I think, 8.3 to one. Right. And you can go on down the line after one ball is picked, you have a 49 to five chance, and so on and so on. So if you take each of these and multiply them, that's where you get that 16 million to one chance. Yeah, because they don't play lotteries with one ball. If they did, then what would that be? One to one chance. Especially if it was just one number and they told you ahead of time the winning number is going to be sick. I'd play that lottery. You also got powerballs, right, which is our multi state lotteries where everybody joins together. And the most common one is you have to pick five numbers from a set of 50 balls. So use that calculation I just said, but then you also have to pick one powerball number out of 36. Now you multiply the original calculation by 36 and you're up to 76.25 million to one chance. Yeah. And like I said, that's why I don't play the lottery for real. I would never, ever, ever win it. So I'd rather spend that dollar on whatever, cigarettes, vodka, beef jerky, anything. Sure. Yeah. Chuck josh, have you ever noticed that when you say win $10 million, what you actually end up with is like 2.5 million? Doesn't it just tick you off? Yeah, well, it depends you're talking about. You can choose either a lump sum payment or pay me out over the next, whatever, 25 years. I think it usually is. Yes. It looks like from this article, the best one to go with if you're patient is the series of annual payments or annuity. I disagree. Okay, explain. Well, I mean, I would think you could make you get about a interest return that way. And I think if you have half a brain, you can get a better return than that by investing that money. And also, I think if you die, it's not like they start paying your next to ken or anything, right? No, they do everywhere. Oh, yeah. A lot of windfall becomes part of your estate. Oh, it does. Okay. And actually, since you bring that up, there's a little bit of advice. If you ever do win a major lottery or any lotto, first thing you want to do is sign the ticket, because it's a bearer instrument and whoever has it turns it in as the winner. So you want to sign it. The next thing you want to do is go talk to a lawyer before you go in to turn in your ticket. Go get a lawyer. Yeah. You don't want to be standing on the stage with the big check without having an accountant and a lawyer by your side. Right. And a lawyer is going to set up a trust in a state, all sorts of other stuff. And then you go in and you claim your winning and the lawyer is going to take a chunk. The lawyer is going to take a chunk, but not as much as Uncle Sam, huh? Yeah, well, that's just the case with everything. Of course Uncle Sam is going to take a ton, about 28% in federal taxes, unless you win millions of dollars, and it's going to shoot up to 39%, which is the highest tax bracket. Yeah. And then add a state and locals, and you'll get about half of your money, and then if you choose a lump sum, you get less. Anyway, so like you said, a $10 million lump sum payment after taxes would be about two and a half million. Right. But you're done that's the way I would want to do it. You are done with the annuitized payment. Right. You're basically getting you start, I think, at what, 1%? Yeah. And it goes up a little bit each year. It goes up a 10th of a percent each year. Right. So you start off if you win $10 million, you start off with two hundred and fifty K, and then the last payment turns out to be 500 kwh. And you get this check every year. Yeah. And the way that this is paid for the lottery is not just like, oh, we're sitting on this pile of cash. No, they couldn't do that. What they do, actually, is they deal with bond agents. Bond brokers. Yeah. And they buy zero coupon bonds. Right. So, like, you have a set price that you're paying for them that day, and in one year or ten years or whatever, this thing is going to be worth a specified amount of money. Right. So, like, in ten years, if you bought a $260 bond I'm sorry, 25 years, that would be about $1,000. Right. That's how that works. And what the lotto does is they contact about usually seven bond dealers to find out who has the best rates, and they purchase a package of 25 bonds to cover your payout. Right. And then once the bond matures, they get the money, they transfer it to you, and you get a check done. Pretty interesting. And that usually ends up costing them this package of bonds, about half of the jackpot, which is about what you get when you get a lump sum. So it doesn't really matter to them either way. Yeah. I think they said about 80% of the people choose the lump sum. I'm not surprised by that at all. Yeah. And Georgia, actually, I know there are other states, too, has one of those win for life deals where there is no lump sum. You get like $50,000 a year for 30 years or something like that, and that's the price. There's no wiggle room. And how you accept it. Yes. Other states give you a choice. No, win for life is a specific game. Oh, it is? Okay. Yeah. So, like, if you play win for life, that's your prize. Well, some states don't give you a choice. They're like, we give out lump sum or we give out annuitized. Or you can choose. But when you choose, you have to choose when you buy the lotto ticket. Yeah. I think New York, you got to choose when you buy it. But most other states is like, once you've won it, they let you choose. Yeah. Pretty cool. Yeah. Chuck, did you know there are two types of auto machines? I do now. I didn't before. Yeah. I think all I've ever seen is the air mix machine. Same here. I think that's what they use on Channel Two Action News. I know that dude, by the way. What's his name? John Crow. Yes. He's an old friend of mine from TV production. Wow. And he was picked as the lottery guy. Wow. That looks really good in a dress. You mean dressed up? Sure. Yeah. He's a nice guy. Yeah, and he's a nice guy using air mix machine. Right. And that is the one where you see the Ping Pong balls floating around in the air. It's like magic. Yeah. And then they open the little door, and one at a time, the little Ping Pong ball slides up the chute. Always visible. It's key. You can never have a Ping pong ball go through a tube that you can't see through. That's bad news. It is. It doesn't inspire confidence. And you'll also notice that all auto drawings are live. Yeah, true. Which is kind of a big thing, too. Very important. I mean, you suspect they're live. I guess if you don't believe that the moon landing was real, you probably aren't buying that the Lotto drawings are live. Yeah. We should mention a couple of other security measures. In Oregon. It's actually overseen by the state police, and the detective attends each drawing. Right. I thought that was pretty cool. Balls are usually weighed ahead of time. Why? Before and after? Why? Are we going to talk about Pennsylvania? Let's do it. All right. The triple six six. Yeah. Is what it's called? John Travolta. And John Travolta. Was it a movie? I can't remember. I think it was. What you got to do with it then he was in a movie about it. Okay. But I think it was loosely based on that. I don't think it was like a depiction of that. Yeah. Famously, in 1980, the Pennsylvania Lottery was rigged by a masterminded not well, because he got caught by a guy named Nick Perry, who was the John Crow of Pennsylvania at the time. He was the announcer, and he got together with an art director and said, hey, dude, can you figure out a way to wait these balls, except for two of them, four and six? Right. And that way we know that only combinations of four six will come up. And I think there's eight combinations and a triple digit drawing. And they did it, but they got greedy and got caught. Was the art director named Phoebe Buffet. No. Was she in the Travolta movie? Yeah, his name was Joseph Bought, and he was pinched along with Perry and then some other people. They had in on the scam. Basically, they ended up the cops were alerted to the fact that there was a very skewed amount of numbers bought for six and four, and when it came up 666 and they had all these people clamoring for winnings, we should look into this. I think that just the fact that it came up six, six, six alone should have raised a few eyebrows, right? That's the number of the beast. Josh objects carry a lot of power. They can tell a story about a person, a place, or a time in history, and sometimes they just look like household objects. On Mysteries at the museum. The podcast from Travel Channel Don Wildman travels across the US. To find the objects that tell shocking stories of American history. You'll hear about the plane beige uniforms that were at the center of the Stanford Prison Experiment or about the failed invention from World War II that became one of the most popular toys for kids. Uncover the secrets behind these incredible objects and learn about the history of war, science, crime, and everything in between. Listen to Mysteries at the Museum, on Apple podcasts Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, everybody, chuck here. Did you know there are millions of people around the world hosting on airbnb right now? Yeah. Which means that's a lot of amazing homes that are making people a lot of extra money. And it doesn't have to be an everyday thing. You can host when you want. Like, let's say you're taking a week's vacation. Why not host your home? Because that money could go toward paying for your current vacation or towards your retirement fund or even towards your kids college fund. Yeah, for anything. And listen, if you're worried about your stuff, don't be. Air Cover for Hosts. Let hosts welcome guests into their home without having to worry. You get $1 million in damage protection anytime you're hosting, plus pet damage protection and income loss protection, too. And are you ready for this? Air Cover for Host is completely free every time you host on airbnb. Free with a capital F. With Air Cover for Host, it makes hosting a nobrainer, and the benefits really start adding up. So learn more and host with peace of mind at Airbnb Comaircoverforhosts. So they were tried and convicted. And Perry, I think some of the other guys, sold them out and he went to jail just for a couple of years, then the halfway house, and then he was on probation. So, yeah, not a very big deal for him, I guess. So did he get to keep the money? No, they got all that back. Okay. So, yeah, they were using an air mix machine, and since then, air mix machines are still used. Obviously they use them. Your buddy uses it on the news. But it's Grate machine. Oh, it isn't? No. Okay. He doesn't take it home and polish it at night before bed. No, but we could get a Scam together with them. We should try it. Oh. Did I blow it? Yeah. Anyway, the other type of auto machine that's generally used that's viewed as more secure, largely because of that 1980 Scam is the Gravity pick lotto machine. Right? Yeah. How's that thing work? Well, it uses, like, kind of rubbery balls that are heavy, right. With two paddles that spin in opposite directions that mix the balls. There's no air involved. There's no ping pong balls. There's no weighting the balls. And other than that, it's virtually the same thing as an air picked ball, which is an optical sensor. So it's high tech. Okay. And then, bam, six numbers, one after the other. And if you pick them, you won. I imagine, like I said, I don't even want to win, but I imagine that's a very surreal moment when you look down at your ticket because there's all those numbers. I bet it's really difficult for your brain to really see that and accept that that's what it's seeing. When I worked in New Jersey at the restaurant, that's really the only time I ever played that much. We'd pull our money, the waiters would, and we'd buy like, 100 tickets. You'd throw in $5 and now all agree to split it and buy the restaurant and burn it down if we want that kind of thing. Was that Mexico? No, this is in New Jersey at the store. Did it? Yeah, that's it. Well, if you want to read about lottos, and we also have an article called how to Play the Lottery tips and Guidelines. It's pretty in depth, isn't it? I didn't read that one. Did you read oh, it is in depth, dude. Are there tips? Yeah. What kind of tips could there be? There's like wheeling, tracking, like, basically paying attention to numbers. How different people do pooling is one thing. How many members there should be in a pool. If it's a private pool, no more than 15. If it's a large commercial pool, no more than 100. Make sure that the people who are organizing it are reputable, et cetera, et cetera. I bet that could get messy. Look at these spreadsheets. Holy cow. Yes. So if you are interested in playing the lotto and you want some tips and tricks, we won't judge you. Now, you can type in lotteries on how stuff works.com in the handy search bar. And there you will also find, in my experience, the first time I've ever seen the phrase hotter than a two dollar pistol used in an article on the site. You'll find that by typing lottery in the Handysearch barhousedupforks.com. Which brings us, of course, to listener mail. Yes, indeed. Here Clark. I'm just going to call this I can't believe this happened email. This is from Ben and Megan, and they said this my wife and I married in Las Vegas recently in one of those amazing Las Vegas chapels. It wasn't a tequila inspired, spur of the moment sort of thing. We planned it for several months. And you guys actually played a part in our evening? Oh, yeah. You remember this one? Yeah. To explain, before we left, I had crafted a perfect wedding night playlist of my ipod. I've also added several of your podcasts to listen to on the flight because he's a big, tall guy and he hates to fly, so apparently we help that after the ceremony. What? What does him being tall have to do with hating the fly? Well, he says he gets really uncomfortable in the seat and our pipeline got you, so he's not afraid of flying because he's tall or anything. So after the ceremony and dinner, we retreated to our lux suite in the Trump Hotel, ordered a bottle of champagne nice. Queued up the playlist on my iPad and plugged into the room cereal and slipped into the in room jacuzzi. First up, Al Green. Then Solomon Burke. Cat Power. Elvis Costello. And then Josh and Chuck. Introducing the stuff you should know podcast. It's not any worse than cat power. Yeah, that's true. I hadn't realized the shuffle feature would shuffle everything on the iPad. Not only the songs. Just in case you're wondering, we actually let it play. And that's the story of how you two took part in our wedding night. I believe that makes us your official Stuff You Should Know podcast newlyweds. PS. Was it good for you? It's awesome. The only way that it could be better is if they conceived during one of our podcasts, right? Yeah. And it was the show on, like lobotomies. Yeah, in Utah. We'd have legal claim on that, baby. Oh, really? Yeah. If you have an awesome wedding night no, actually, you guys just keep that to yourself. Agreed. Yes. If you have a story about winning the lottery and how it either uplifted your life, ruined your life, or made you cognizant of the phrase hotter than a two dollar pistol, put in an email and send it to Stuffpodcast at house. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstofworks.com. Want more Housetofworks? Check out our blog on the Houseofworks.com homepage, brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's criminal morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Erkart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today. You know you're the best pet mom. When you growl back during playtime, give epic belly rubs and feed them halo holistic made with responsibly sourced ingredients plus probiotics for digestive health. Find us at chewy amazonandalopeets.com."
43821c92-53a3-11e8-bdec-ff54715721bc	How Bras Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-bras-work	Bras are loved and hated, sometimes at the same time. But as difficult and restrictive as they can be, they rescued women from a much cruel contraption: corsets. The question remains, though, do women need bras at all? Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.	Bras are loved and hated, sometimes at the same time. But as difficult and restrictive as they can be, they rescued women from a much cruel contraption: corsets. The question remains, though, do women need bras at all? Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.	Thu, 21 May 2020 14:09:14 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2020, tm_mon=5, tm_mday=21, tm_hour=14, tm_min=9, tm_sec=14, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=142, tm_isdst=0)	50253387	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime four days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon Music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W, chuck Bryant. And it's just us again. We've lost Jerry I'm in the studio, like, I was on the last one, but it's still a ghost studio. There's no one here. Sure. Except for Tommy Chong and the radio. Or the record player. Right, sure. Good. We said that we have somebody poised to scratch the needle off the record several episodes ago. I remember that. And that it was Tommy Chong whose job it was to do that now. That's right. Good call back. Thank you. Can we talk bras? Yeah, we're talking bras, man. Which I appreciate it when we do stuff like this, episodes like this, because we have to try harder because we're men, you know? Sure. The usual. It's the only time we have to try harder in life. Sadly, it's kind of true. But we haven't shied away from topics that have very little to do with us. Like corsets. We did one on how corsets work. Do you remember? We totally did a whole episode on corsets. Jeez. We did one on female puberty. Yeah. Footbinding. Yeah, we've done a lot of them. So this is just three. One in the same three is a lot when it comes to this kind of stuff. Yeah. No, I'm just kidding. And we did mention doing one on menstruation not too long ago, and we got a bunch of supportive emails saying, like, yes, guys, please do that. There's no reason why you should. I've been menstruating for 50 years and I still don't understand it. Please explain. Yeah, exactly. So, actually, we have not gotten that email. Although we wouldn't know if we had, you know? Yeah, because our email servers down. Sorry. If you've been bounced, everyone. Yeah, we're working on it. Yes. So we're talking bras, which is short for brazier, which doesn't have a definite origin, as far as we know. We think that it came about in the 20th century, early 20th century. I think it first appeared in print or something like that. And that in French, it means one of two things. It means either arm covering, which is, I think, derived from, like, medieval armor, french medieval armor. And then the other thing, I saw was a child's vest, which that, to me, is just lovely, if that's what they're trying to say with the bra that it's like a child size vest that you wear over your breasts. I love that idea. You want to know something funny? Yes. For the first ten minutes researching this, this was put together by our pal Dave Rus. I kept thinking, Why does he keep talking about brasseries? Why does he keep talking about that's funny, quaint little French restaurant? That's funny. It's very close. It looks like brazier. It does? Well, yeah, it does. I think if that I was just a little further toward the end, we would be talking about casual French restaurants. The TGI Fridays of France. Well, that's better than my experience. For the first 30 minutes, I was researching nothing but car bras. Oh, God, the Lebra. Remember those? No, I remember. I think there was a Lebra, which was one of the big popular models at the time for, like, Porsches and stuff like that. I don't remember that at all. You know, my dad very stupidly bought a Porsche when I was in high school. Oh, no. With that food truck money? With that big public school teacher money, he went out and bought a Porsche. Wow. And surprised my mom and the rest of the family. Oh, my God. A sweet Porsche 911. Like a new one that no one was allowed to breathe on. No, it wasn't new. Doesn't matter. But he very quickly went out and this is very my dad. And the next week, he had the Porsche eyes odd. The Porsche glasses. The Porsche hat. And we didn't have that for very long. I think I drove it one time around the block, and he was like, they were not fun cars to drive. They were very difficult to drive. Yeah, they're all about being in as one with the road. And if the road's not so great, then it's not very fun. Yeah. But I will say piggybacking on this story. I've been watching the TV show Red Oaks. Have you ever seen it? I have never even heard of it. I hadn't either. It was an Amazon show that ran for three seasons about sort of like Caddy shacky. It's a kid who works at a tennis club in the very 80s show. And the drug dealer drives this really sweet Porsche 928. Remember those? Is that the pointy one? It looks like a lotus spree. Yeah, well, it's the risky business car. Okay. I never saw the movie. Oh, really? Yeah. Dude, you need to see Risky Business. Great movie. I've got a list going. It's really good. But anyway, like, the 911 gets all the headlines. But that 928 was so sweet. And I was like, man, I wonder what you could get an eighty s nine twenty eight for. I bet it's not that much. And I looked it up. How much? Well, there was a range like you can get one that's in not greater shape for like, $12,000 or up to 60 grand for a cherry low mileage one. Right. I think it's pretty much the same with all vintage cars. I was looking at Pinto station wagons. We're at different ends of the spectrum. There's about four or five mint condition Pinto station wagons in existence that are really expensive. The rest are exactly what you would expect. That's funny. So we're talking bras today, obviously. We just wanted to get rid of anybody who might benefit from listening to this. So we talked about Porsches and stuff. Yeah. So the modern bra has only been around for about 150 years. And Dave makes a really good point of the fact that this thing that's only been around for 150 years has been one of the most complicated garments in the history of the world, I think. Yeah. Not necessarily in its design or manufacturer, but in its relation to society as a whole. Totally. So you've got, apparently, a complete and utter lack of bras. But as women started to play sports a little more, it was okay for them to wear bras, I think, in the 20th century. And in fact, it was a woman who invented the sports bra. Two women, actually, I think in 9th, 77, they invented what was called the jog bra from two jock straps that they put together. But it's kind of a funny, cute little origin story. But they ended up, like, revolutionizing sports. Like, women were allowed to play sports. I think title nine have been passed a couple of years before this. But the fact is, you couldn't play sports because there wasn't much support out there for you. So to invent the sports bra was tantamount to introducing women in practice into sports. Pretty huge. Yeah, it is. And the history of the bra also incorporates fashion. It incorporates societal norms and how they change. So did the bra, how women changed over the years and their own rights, over their own comfort, in their own fashion, taking back and really kind of everything in between. The bra is a very complicated garment, and undergarment it is very complicated. What I was heartened to see, though, is that today, apparently, and for the last several years, it's been all about comfort and realness and finding, like, a bra that fits. And apparently, I was very surprised to find this that has not been the norm, especially in America, at least. Brawl makers have made, like, X number of sizes. And if your breast didn't happen to fit that bra that was on you, there's something wrong with your body because these are the standard sizes, and this is what we're selling. And so women have, for a very long time had a lot of women have had bras that just do not fit them because they just can't find them in America. And that's kind of led to this revolution in Bramaking and also bra sizing that has allowed for women to have much better, much more comfortable fits with bras. And I'm just glad for that. Yeah, me too. The average American woman supposedly owns six bras. Okay, officially, there are 20 different styles of bras that you can buy. And there's this great quote here. It's from a book called Uplift the Bra in America by Jane Ferrell, Beck and Colleen Gal. And this sort of really pinpoints what you're trying to do with a bra and why it's so tough to get a great fit and one that really works for everybody. Oh, wait. brassiers must do more than fit a multitude of bodies. They must accommodate the same body as it changes through the monthly cycle and the life cycle. They must provide for movement of the torso and arms in many directions without chafing or binding, without slipping out of position. And as if that were not enough, braziers must retain their own structure throughout multiple wearings and launderings, must not abrade in contact with clothing, must remain, as a rule, inconspicuous beneath the outer clothing while harmonizing with a desired silhouette, and must be priced to sell to many customers. It's no wonder that hundreds of attempts have been made to design the ideal breast supporter over the past 140 years. Yeah, that says it all. It really does. It is a lot more complicated than, say, boxer shorts. Yeah, those are easy. So there's also a lot of money to be made in it. I saw just the sports industry alone is worth, like, $7 billion a year. There's a lot of money made from bras, and so, as a result, about 600 million of them are made every year. There's about 26,000 different bra patterns in existence. When you said 20 different styles, that's like racer back or demi cup, like, large category of bras. As far as, like, different patterns and types of bras, there's tens of thousands of them. Oh, sure. And each one has a lot of different moving parts. I saw 40 different parts from straps, clasps, underwire, all that stuff. And then it takes months and months of dozens of people working together to create a new bra. It's not just, like, a new thing. So there's a lot of thought and time and effort and money going into bra production. And then from what I've seen, there's virtually an equal amount of time and effort and thought going into broad purchasing, too. From what I'm seeing, it's, like, not the easiest thing in the world to buy a bra if you want the bra to be one that is your new favorite. Yeah. Did you have any flashbacks of young Josh while you were researching this, like, Sears catalog type of stuff? Sure. Practicing unhooking bras by wearing them myself or simply the 80s was a generally more naive moment in time before the Internet. Seeing a lady in a bra leaning against a tree was a pretty big deal? Yes. Really? Should we take a break and then dive into the history? Yeah, I think it's a good idea. Okay. We'll be right back with a history of the brassery right after this. Well, now, when you're on the road driving in your truck, why not learn a thing or two from Josh and Chuck? It's tough. You should know. All right. Okay. So, as everybody knows, there was a battle between Otto Von Titzling and Philippe Brazier over who invented the bra. And as the great Bet Miller instructed all of us, we know who won that battle, because you wear a brazier, not a titling. Was that a bet? Miller bet. It's from Beaches. Oh, I saw that in the 80s when it came out, and not since then. I don't think I've seen it since the 80s, either, but I guess they stuck with you, billow Part really stuck with me. Yeah. So the real first patents for the bra was filed in brazier the word. It wasn't coined until the 20th century, but that wasn't the first bra. They've sent us even a photo with this research, which is pretty great, of a Sicilian mosaic called bikini girls. And if you look up bikini girls, well, you're going to get a lot of results. But if you look up Sicilian mosaic bikini girls, you will see a mosaic from about 400 to 300 BCE that shows these young, athletic women wearing bikinis, clearly wearing what looks like a bra or bikini top. It's basically exactly what pro beach volleyball players wear today. Like, no joke. It looks exactly like it, but strapless, right? Yeah, I think a lot of them were strapless stuff, too, and also very short shorts. Even with the butterfly cut, if you look closely, they have that cut on the side. They look exactly like pro volleyball players. And this is 2400 years ago, so it seems like they were wearing what's called an epidemic or stropium, depending on whether you speak the Greek or the Latin. But it's basically like a cloth wrapped around and then nodded in front to provide support during athletics. That's right. Boom. So, medieval times. Come along. There were European physicians who were writing about something called breast bags, and there was a medical text from 1300. The royal surgeon in France, Almarie de Mondeville, said, some women insert two bags in their dresses, adjusted to the breasts fitting tight, and they put them into them every morning and fastened them, when possible with a matching band. Not a marching band? No, that's sort of a bra. A built in bra. Sure. Or breast bag. I don't say that ever again. Okay, agreed. So that's from $1,300, right? And then you would think, okay, well, the things kind of started hard and fast from that point on, and as far as history is concerned no. About 100 years later, all bra technology was abandoned in favor of the corset. And that's what we thought for a very long time until there was a discovery in 2008, but it wasn't publicized until, I think, 2012 or 15. That an archaeologist from the University of Innsbrook, Beatrice Newt's, I guarantee that's how her name is spelled or said she was excavating an Austrian castle, Langburg castle, and she found four medieval bras that were 600 to 700 years old made of linen. Do you remember when this was news? This made the rounds? I do. When you looked at this garment, you're like, that is a bra. It doesn't matter what context you have. It doesn't matter. You just show somebody a picture of this without any prep or anything like that and say, what is this? They would say, well, that's a bra. You'd say, that's right. It's a 700 year old bra that we didn't know existed. Like that whole design. We had no idea that it existed because we thought everything had gone just basically from I'm sorry to say this one more time breast bags to corsets. And that there was no transition, but in fact, there was a transition to the modern bra that was abandoned in favor of the corset, quite unfortunately. Really? Yeah. And they even found a picture there of a 13 year old boy with a bra on his head saying he was Mickey Mouse. That's right. So that was proof. So we covered the corset, like you said, in our fulllength episode, so you can go listen to that. But very briefly, corset, the word means corpus in Latin for body. And women would wear these corsets that were they had wood or bone later on that had steel, and it would basically shape their torso. It would cinch that waist in, and it would flatten their breasts. And they were very restrictive, they were very painful, and they did actual real damage to their bodies at times. Oh, yeah, like they had trouble digesting, had trouble breathing. You remember you could train your waist to stay that small. We talked a lot about this in the corset episode, but the big problem with corsets, aside from all that, is that they supported the breasts from the bottom up. Yes. And the thing that really differentiated bras from everything else up to that point was that they went the other way. They harnessed the power of the shoulder to hold the breasts up from beneath. Not push them up, but hold them, suspend them, almost like a pair of breast bags hanging down over your shoulder. There you go again. I can't help myself now. I've been told not to do something. These are the great episodes where I just sometimes like to sit back and watch you dig into a big giant hole, turn into a 13 year old boy with a Sears catalog. So this was going on. The corsets were terrible. Women hated them. And by the mid 19th century, like you said, they said, you got these strong shoulders. Why don't we use those. That's right. And the first modern bra patent was filed in 1863 by a guy named Lumen Chapman. And he was living. At least in Camden. New Jersey. And he had this very first over the shoulder design and it was tightened in the back like a corset. But it was softer. It was made of stretchy fabric and it had these cups. They were called breast puffs in the patent for the extra support and comfort. I think that is radically better than breast bags. You said it again. So Lumen Chapman, strangely enough, his design did not take off, although he does have the first patent. But a woman named Hermannie Kadol, it's a great name. She created something that was basically like a corset, but it was a corset cut in two and the top half very strongly resembled a modern bra. And she called it the Lebiantra or well being. And her stuff still didn't quite take off, I think, because she was married to the corset still, or the general course of design, which made sense, because at the time, up until the early 20th century, if you didn't wear corset, you were basically advertising that you had loose morals. So the courses was just that. Whether you hated courses with all of your might and a lot of women did, you still had to wear them just to be socially acceptable. So it would take, as far as legend goes, a very free spirited, very wealthy socialite named Mary Phelps Jacobs to basically say, Nuts to that. I'm tired of these corsets. Those whale bone stays are protruding through this kind of sheer dress that I want to wear to this dance. Let me try something else. And she apparently instructed one of her maids, because, again, she was a wealthy socialite, to make what we would consider the first modern bra out of some silk handkerchiefs and ribbon. Yeah. She was only 19, we should point out. She moved to Paris later on and changed her name to is it Coresa Crosby? I think so. Or Caress? I'm not sure if you pronounce that last e. I'm not sure either. But that was her final name. So Crosby had this idea when she was 19, and it was before an event that she was going to a debutante ball and she called it the Backless Brazier. And people at the party loved it. I imagine women especially loved it. And she got a patent for this thing in 1914 and very unwisely sold the idea for a mere $1,500 to Warner Brothers Corset Company yeah. Who turned around in the next 30 years, made 10,000 times that amount from that patent. Oh, yeah. So it's about 38 grand that she was paid today for the patent. And they made about $225,000,000 in today's money off of it. But she was rich anyway, right? In Bet? Yeah, she was rich anyway. She was a super interesting person, from what I saw. Basically any famous author today that was writing in the twenties. She was like, real good friends with and she herself wrote to I think she had a publishing house called Black Sun, but she wrote for a while, pornography on commission from an Oklahoma oil man who couldn't get enough of her stuff. Sexy story. That was one of the many things that she did in her life. She wrote pornography. Amazing. So World War One turns out to be a good thing if you're a woman because steel is in short supply. The US joins the war and says, you know what? We got to have all the steel in this country go toward war. Munitions and battleships and stuff. And American women said, oh, great, because you know what has steel? My corset. Let's get rid of it and ditch these things for good. And elastic fabric started coming into the market latex came into the market. And so all of a sudden, American women could finally get rid of the corset in favor of this new invention called the brazier. And of course, we don't want you to be too comfortable, ladies. You might want to at least put a girdle on just to keep everything nice and cinched in, which is basically like Harmony Cadel's two piece corset. But whatever, patriotism freed them from that social expectation of having to wear a corset, which is pretty great. But I saw that the steel that the corsets freed up equal 28,000 tons, enough to make two battleships in World War I. Corset steel. Yeah. So this led to, like a complete revolution in undergarments for women, right? So in the bras was basically there was a company called Boisch Form, which held the breasts down and back into the left. Wait, what was it called? Boyish form. B-O-Y-S-H form. From what I can tell, they were basically saying Boyish Form. Okay, that's what I was about to say. But they shortened it by removing the eye and changed it to Boyish Form. Like, they'll never know, right? No one will ever get this trickery. But it was because of that flapper style, was very much slight and boyish. But then along came a company in the late 20s called Maiden Form, and they named themselves Maiden Form to kind of contradict Bullish Form, because one of their big things was, hey, man, let's not be ashamed of these boobs and try to hide them. Let's accentuate these things. And boy, did they ever. Yeah, in the World War II and the age of the big bucks in Hollywood bombshell era, people like Jane Russell then in the 50s with Marilyn Monroe. And it's all this sort of male ideal at the time is what we're getting at is the bras sort of followed suit. But when these women came on the scene, that's when if you look at TV shows from back then or advertisements, you see these bras that were very pointy and I think they even called them bullet bras or torpedo bras. Yeah. And that was sort of all the rage just because Hollywood is always sort of driving fashion in that way. And it certainly did back then because Twiggy coming along in the 60s. They're very sort of slim androgynous look, all of a sudden, in the 60s, bras were being thrown in the trash can. They're like, we don't need bras at all. Yeah. And then there was a guy, a designer who's an avant guard designer named Rudy Gernreich, and he came up with the no bra in 1964, which is basically like what you would consider a bra today. It's meant to just kind of be there and be supportive, but also kind of fade into the background like a quiet friend. Exactly. But that's like the antithesis of the torpedo or bullet brawl which would take your eye clean out if you got too close to it. But you can kind of see, like, we've gone from 20s, where boy form was or boyish form was all the rage, to the exact opposite to back to the it kind of swung back toward a large, busty, popping out kind of thing even more than before because now it's not covered by a sweater. For pedoes. It was all about accentuating the boobs upward and to the left. And then the Wonder Brain helped move that along. And what was really interesting is I remember when the Wonder Ball came out in America, it was in the 90s, but it turns out that in the far off land of Canada, it had been invented 30 years before. It just took 30 years to get down to America and become poverty. Pretty funny. Isn't that weird? Yeah, that is totally weird. And Canadians are too nice to insist, by the way, we have a better bra up here. Right. And then now things have swung back again to where they're like, do you even need a bra? And a lot of people are like, I don't think you do. It's kind of a personal preference. Yeah, it certainly can be. But also think there's still very much a stigma. Yeah, absolutely. It's true. There's just no arguing that right now. No, I mean, if you go if you're a woman and you go wallsing into a conference meeting at your business and you're not wearing a bra, then someone's going to say something, I guarantee you. Exactly. Yes. But I think also, even if somebody didn't say something or it was okay with everybody else, from what I can tell, there's a certain psychological security blanket aspect to wearing a bra, if that's what you've been raised to do, to wear a bra. Oh, for sure. And to not do that, we take a real psychological shift in how you feel and how secure you feel without it. And I was reading about training bras because I didn't feel like I was enough of a creep as it is. Oh, boy. But from what I was reading about training bras. Even if the girl doesn't need a bra yet for any real purpose. It provides some kind of psychological thing that they're like. Okay. I'm keeping up with my peers who actually do or I'm going to like the 8th grade dance or say 6th grade dance or something. And I want to wear this dress. But it's going to look weird if I'm not wearing a bra. So I need a bra. Right. And I think that kind of psychology continues on well into adulthood, too. So that it would be weird or feel weird to not wear a bra if that's what you've done your whole life. Yeah. And I think it also has to do with your comfort level, with your breast size. Sure. Not to get too personal, but if I had a dime for every time Emily was like, you got to go get the delivery food at the door because I'm not wearing a bra. Sure. And Emily has bigger boobs. So there. I said it. She might be more comfortable if she had smaller breasts, but I don't know. I'm going to go home and ask her, though. Okay. I feel like we should sit in silence for five minutes. So you mentioned maiden form. We'll get to this later. But they were founded in 1929 by William and IDA Rosenthal, who invented or introduced at least the letter based cup sizing system. But we'll get to that weird bit of voodoo in a minute because I still have no idea what's going on there. But actually it wasn't in a year. From 1949 to 1963, they had a very successful print ad campaign called Idream, which you can go look up online. And these ads, which were very racy at the time, of course, were women doing things topless with just their bra on. They would have on like a regular skirt that you would wear in that era, but no top, no blouse. And they were dreaming. One lady was dreaming of being a firefighter and she was fighting a fire with no shirt on. Or I dreamed I went back to school in my Maiden form bra and it's a woman in her bra at a grammar school desk. Or I dreamed I won the election in my maiden form. Bra. Me. And then she faced Palm. She's taking the stage on election night. And beyond these being an old advertisements are all funny and awful in every way, but beyond this being funny and awful, it truly is kind of gross that what they're showing are things that are dreams for these women, like having a regular job and things that they may not have been allowed to do at the time. Yeah, but at the time, yes, they were trying to sell their bras and yes, there was like a certain amount of sex appeal to the whole campaign. But in their defense, this. Is a very progressive liberating ad campaign. It was conceived by three women on one hand. And also, it's not like they were like, haha. You couldn't possibly hold public office because you're a woman. It was showing that women dream of this kind of stuff, that they want to do this kind of thing and that at least in their dreams, they're capable of doing this rather than we can't even talk about that. It's so preposterous. We couldn't even possibly create an ad campaign. So it was kind of like progressive in that sense. It's in retrospect that it's really cringy. But really what you're cringing. It's not like Maiden Form was making fun of women for not being able to do these things. It's more an indictment of society for them being restricted from these things at the time. Yeah, this is one of these, definitely, where you could come at it from a lot of angles sure. And have opinions about it. But we should read they had a contest in 1955 with the public about new dream ideas. And the winner from 1957 and Dave, God bless you for finding this was I dreamed I Danced the hornpipe with Sinbad the Sailor. Don't even know what that means. That's another thing you can approach from a bunch of different angles. I think we should approach a message break and then we'll talk about the wacky world of brasizing right after this. Well, now, when you're on the road driving in your truck, why not learn a thing or two from Josh and Chuck? All right, Chuck. So one thing that I've read is that American bras don't fit. And that there's a reason for that. Something like there's a statistic that 80% of American women at least are wearing bras that don't fit. And supposedly that's kind of made up and based on anecdotal evidence, but it's been bandied about for so long that people take it as gospel. But regardless of whatever the statistic may or may not be, american bras are known for not fitting. And it's because American bra manufacturers have basically said, we've created a standard measuring scale and it just is economically efficient for us to mass produce this size to this size. And if you happen to fall outside of that size, your sol and it's your fault there's something wrong with your body for not adhering to the standard norm. This is largely becoming a relic of the past. But it's still, from what I can tell, very much present when you go bra shopping. Yeah, I've heard this complaint from Emily over the years and a lot of women that, yeah, it's tough to find a bra that really fits well and feels good and does everything it's supposed to do. Then that's why when you find one, you order, like, six of them. But there are these days, before we get into the sizing that is changing some now with these more bespoke companies that have a more custom made, tailored to your size kind of things. And I wonder why it took that long for someone to think outside the box and challenge big brazier and say, hey, you're doing it wrong. I bet there's a lot of money to be made from bespoke brazieres. Yeah, from what I understand, there is. And although it's just now happening in the US. Apparently it happened, I believe, back in the UK, with a movement called brow fitting, one word where it's basically like, look, two measurements is not enough to create a perfect bra. You need a bunch of different measurements under different conditions. You need to take your shirt and bra all the way off. We need to get in there, but when we're done, you're going to have a well fitting bra. Yeah. And it's just now catching on in the United States, and what's surprising is that it's just now catching on. But this technique and the sizing standard that we use here in the United States goes back to, I think, the 20s, if not the 30s. Yeah. 1929 is when they found a maiden form and introduced this cup sizing. And I'm not going to pretend to fully understand this, but I can read. Oh, you got it. Yeah, you go ahead, though. I want to hear your attempt. No, because what will happen is I'll read and then you'll do it again in your own words. This episode is 15 minutes longer than it should be. All right, you got my number, and my number happens to be 34 C. So the cup system is what it's called. It consists of two measurements and the difference between them. So the first measurement is the overbust, which is the circumference of your chest all the way around your body, across the nipples. That's your overbus measurement. Right. Okay. Now, if you'll also measure right below the breasts all the way around your body, that's your underbust. And if you subtract those two, you're going to come up with a difference in inches or centimeters, depending on where you are in the world. And you can use that as part of a handy table to say, oh, there's a three inch difference. That means that I'm a C cup. Right? Right. That's where the lettering comes from. Right. The difference between your underbust and your overbus generates some knowledge about the volume that your breasts are going to take up, which is your cup size. Got it. It generates knowledge. Yeah, exactly. So that under bus measurement is also used, and that's the number that comes before it. So if you're a 34 C, that means your chest is 34 inches around at the ribcage under your breast. And then if you're a C, that means that there's a three inch difference. That means that you are 37 inches around your chest at the nipples, and so you'd be a 34 C. And that those two measurements are supposedly like all you need to come up with a fitting bra. But apparently that's just not true. Yeah, I mean, that all makes sense. I think the thing that confused me is the Sister Sizing I understand that too, thing. So if you have a 36 C and a 34 C brazier, that's not the same cup size, because a 34 C is the only true C. If you want to go up a band size but not the cup size, you buy a 36 B or 38 A. So the volume of the cup size is relative to the circumference of the band. Yeah, I mean, it's as simple as that. I think the problem, the breakdown, is that this Sister Sizing thing has not been widely publicized to women, and so that they think, like, well, if the band is a little tight and I'm a 36 C, then I need to go up to a 38 C, and that's just not the case. Yeah. In music, you want a tight band. In brazier's, you don't? Well, supposedly part of that brawl fitting trend that started in the UK is that suggest that a tight band is the key to a good fitting bra. That's where most of your support comes and that most women opt for a band size that's a little too loose. But the point is, your cup volume does not go up when you go up a band size. It doesn't have to. So that means that a 34 C, if you go down in bandsize, you would go up in cup size and your cup size would stay the same. So 34 C is the same as a 32 D, and then the other way, a 34 C is the same as a 36 B. And once you understand the Sister Sizing thing, then you can actually use this two measurement standard to find a bra that actually fits better. That's right. And if you're wondering how this all works, it works with bra fitting models. There are women that get paid money to go in and get fit for thousands and thousands of bras and to give feedback. And this all start well, it didn't completely start there, but in the 1970s, there was a singer named Dorothy Gallagher from New York answered an ad for a broad figured model and they said, you know what? I know this sounds sexist, and we probably, even though it's the 70, shouldn't be saying this in an office, but you have the perfect 34 B's and that's the standard size which we're designing our bras on. So for almost 20 years, Dorothy Gallaghan was the model in New York, in the lingerie district, that would work ten, 1112 hours, days, trying on thousands and thousands of bras and giving her feedback. So they could go back to the sewing machine and redo it. Yeah, because that's the other part of the problem with bras that don't necessarily fit. In addition to not making larger sizes in cup volumes and smaller sizes in cup volumes. They're based around one woman's pair of breasts. And her breasts became the standard for the bra industry in the 20th century. So that if you could create a bra that fit Dorothy Gallagher correctly as a 34 B, you could use that to basically grow out from either way. That's right. So that's a real problem for women who have different shapes and sizes. And it's really sad to me to think that they were told for decades that if your brain doesn't fit, something is wrong with your body. Not for us to quit. Exactly. Well, here's the thing, too. It's not just breast size. It's how big your back is and how, like, it holds the breast. The cups do. But it has to do with your shoulders and your back and your armpits and everything else. Like, there's so many nuances to everybody's body, men and women, that I mean, I think until recently, they were trying to do the best they could, but it was pretty narrow, the options that women had. Yes. I get the impression that they were not trying to do the best that they could, that they basically said, when we release a new bra, it comes in these sizes. Well, doing the best they could for a huge industry that had to satisfy tens of millions of different kinds of bodies. They were kind of hamstrung. You can't have 450 bra sizes and manufacturer on that scale. Yeah, you can't mass manufacturer. But I think that's what's being proven, like you're saying by this new bespoke revolution. And you can't get that big. Although now you can get that big because it's bespoke. And because you can say, hey, download our app and take these measurements using your phone and upload it, and then we'll just custom make some bras for you. And I also read that Poland makes really good fitting bras as well. I think it was a New York Times article about interesting, and the author traveled to Poland to verify this herself, and she said she didn't find the perfect bra, but she came away with, like, four or five bras that were awfully close, way closer than she'd ever had before. It's funny, after all these years, I still remember to not put a bra in a dryer because of the movie headbig and the angry inch. I don't remember that part. No, I never thought that's why I don't remember that part. Great. John Cameron Mitchell, who also friend of movie Crush, he's a friend of nole, he played Hedge and created the character and directed the film. But there's a scene where he's screaming, do not put a bra in a dryer. It's warps. And I guess that's true because ever since then, I've been like, I don't know if I'm doing laundry, I should not put a bra on a dryer. It does do some weird things to it. Although you can also put it in a laundry bag, and I think that keeps it from, like, wrapping around stuff, which makes it a lot less longer. You can't put it in a dryer. Oh, right, yeah. Like when a bra collects everything else in its wake. Exactly. Yeah. So I don't think we can not talk about Victoria's Secret. Man, if I had to die for every time you said that to me, or as many dumb dumb guys call it, Victoria's Secrets. Yeah. Dummies. So, Victoria's Secret actually started out a husband and wife founded it in the San Francisco area because the husband had gone to the department store to buy lingerie for his wife and was treated like a scale for it. Right. Even in San Francisco in the guess so all right. Department stores have always been a certain way, no matter where you are. I think. So he said, we need to create, like, a lingerie store that's made for men to go buy for women. And that's what they created, was Victoria's Secret, and it was semi successful. And then they sold to a guy named Leslie Wexman. I believe it was Wexman who had founded the Limited. And he took it I think he bought it for a million dollars, and within two decades, it was worth $2 billion. And the guy who founded it with his wife, they ended up getting divorced, and he died broke and jumped from the Golden Gate Bridge, sadly enough. Oh, wow. But Victoria's Secret dominated the bra industry in the United States for many decades, until very recently, when it was overthrown by women who said, enough. Yeah, well, it's funny. Roy Raymond said, you know, what we need is a store where men can go in and buy sexy lingerie for their wives. And what he failed to hear was the sound of tens of millions of women across the country saying, no, you don't. Right. Well, that's what Leslie I think it's Wexman. That's what he figured out, was that this thing was a good idea, but they had missed the mark and that they were marketing toward men, and they were completely isolating women. Because he said these Victoria's Secret stores were lit with, like, weird kind of reddish lighting, and there were velvet couches and Oriental rugs. And he said it wasn't I've walked by them in the mall. He very slowly this is like in the early 70s or late seventy s and early 80s. Yeah, that's what I'm talking okay. All right. So he said, Man, I would have loved it. He said they were Victorian, not like a Victorian foyer. They were like a Victorian brothel, basically. And it was like, just chasing women away, attracting men. But women buy underwear for themselves way more than their husbands do. And so he kind of revamped it a little bit and turned it into something that women felt comfortable and actually wanted to go into. Yeah. It's interesting. According to that book, Uplift, that we mentioned earlier, despite Victoria's Secret and its history, women have really been key to the development of bras in the United States. I think over 1200 us. Patents have been awarded for bras between 1863 and 1969, and half of those have been held by women. And in the industry, they have always held pretty important positions and been well regarded designers and managers, specialists, merchandising, promotional product managers. It is one industry where it seems that has not been here's. A product for women run entirely by men. Right. And rightfully so, I would say. Yeah, absolutely. So there is also a very famous legend as far as bras go, which is the burning of bras at demonstration. Yeah. No, it's a myth. There was, in fact, a demonstration outside of Miss America pageant in Atlantic City in 1968. It was the brainchild of Carol Hannah who helped basically, at this moment, give birth to second wave feminism. And they actually had a trash can that said Freedom trash can. And women threw stuff into it that they considered like shackles of the patriarchy. Like false eyelashes, bras, lingerie, that kind of stuff. But there was no burning. That came from a reporter who suggested that they burn it as a nod to the burning of draft cards. But no one actually burned this stuff. But it became kind of set in stone as true, even though it really wasn't. That's right. Big fat lie. And then lastly, Chuck, I've got one extra thing. You ready? Ready. Do you have anything else? I don't. Do you need to wear a bra? It's a long standing question, and apparently the answer is no. At least as far as a study in France, a 15 year study of 300 women, I think they are aged 18 to 35. And the study found that women who did not wear bras developed more muscle tissue in their breasts, ostensibly to provide support that the bra isn't there to provide. And that by proxy, if you did wear a bra, the muscles in your breasts were less prone to develop, and thus you would have more likely to have breasts that SAG or pendular breasts than you would have if you didn't wear a bra. Kind of like you're making your breasts sink or swim by not wearing a bra. That makes sense. It's just one study. But it is pretty surprising that they found basically the opposite of conventional wisdom, because most people say, oh, if you don't wear a bra, your breast will get saggy. And that's apparently not true. Interesting. And I also ran across a weird question on Google. It has, like, suggested searches. What happens if we squeeze breast? I don't know. I didn't even bother to look. Just the question itself was good enough. Oh, man. Got anything else? I got nothing else. What about the bro? Or the man's ear? Oh, yeah. Can't forget the bro. Well, since we said bro, it's time for listener mail. Everybody. I'm going to call this moron Bidets. Hey guys, love the show. Thanks for all you do. It's especially meaningful in these crazy times. I'm currently hanging out in northern Japan on a trip to change from a between job snowboarding sabbatical in December to well, I guess I live here for now. So you're not a bad place to be, I would imagine. Good for you, Adam. I'm sure you guys got a ton of similar emails to this, but in the Bidets episode, you mentioned the type of toilet with a sink sprayer attachment nearby. In my experience, this is a super common thing in households and many lower budget hotel accommodations in the Philippines and other Southeast Asian countries. It is awesome and commonly referred to as the bum gun by foreign travelers and expats. I don't know the etymology of bum gun, so I'm not sure if that term has been adopted domestically in various bumgun enthusiast countries. But like one ring or spidey's abilities, it has great power and must be wielded carefully. So bum gun wisely, my friends, that is from Adam. Thanks a lot, Adam, and best of luck to you and your new home. Hang tight, buddy. Things will pass eventually. If you want to get in touch with us like Adam did and talk about bum guns or bras or what have you, you can email. Send us an email to stuffpodcast@howstuffworks.com. Stuff you should know is production of iHeartRadio's how stuff works. For more podcasts, My Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite show."
https://podcasts.howstuf…ysk-marriage.mp3	How Marriage Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-marriage-works	You can tell a lot about a culture through marriage statistics: what age people get married, how many divorce, who is excluded from legal marriage. It forms a picture of how a society interacts with itself. Learn more about marriage in this episode.	You can tell a lot about a culture through marriage statistics: what age people get married, how many divorce, who is excluded from legal marriage. It forms a picture of how a society interacts with itself. Learn more about marriage in this episode.	Tue, 16 Apr 2013 15:14:22 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2013, tm_mon=4, tm_mday=16, tm_hour=15, tm_min=14, tm_sec=22, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=106, tm_isdst=0)	37831227	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's charles W, chuck Bryant. And this is stuff you should know. The podcast. Right. How are you doing, man? I'm good and well. How are you? The same. A little tired. Yeah. But other than that, I'm doing pretty good. There's a lot of stuff going on today with this topic. Yes. Marriage, Chuck. I am married. You are married? We're married, but not to one another. It's true. And in the state that we live in, we couldn't figure even if we wanted to. Yeah. And this is probably going to touch on same sex marriage a decent amount because it's in the news. Sure. And, hey, it's marriage, too. Right. So we're not going to ignore it. But it's not necessarily just about that. It's about just marriage as a whole. Right. We would call this one how same Sex Marriage Works. Yeah, exactly. But now maybe we cannot do that one if we cover it in this one. You know what I'm saying? How same sex marriage works. Yeah. I feel like we're going to cover it enough in this. Sure. It's pretty straightforward stuff. Well, let's talk about marriage. All right. Okay. Really, if you boil the whole thing down, it is as far as the government views, it very unromantically. It's basically a legal contract between two people, and therefore there are legalities that you have to go through. And as a result of going through this legal process, you are endowed with certain legal rights. That's marriage. That really is, though. And I draw a distinction. I don't think it's like, oh, it's unromantic to call it that, because that's what it is. It's a difference between a marriage and a lifelong relationship with somebody. No, that's romantic, Chuck. Yeah. I mean, that's where the romance is. Marriage is just some official way of recognizing that. Right. Okay. I would imagine it's not just the desire to have your relationship recognized in the same way that it's a lifelong commitment legally, but also to get the benefits as well, is one of the those are two probably very big reasons that same sex couples want to be legally married or allowed to legally marry. Right. Sure. So since it's a legal process checkers, all things start with an application. All legal processes start by filling out an application. And Mary is no different. Yes. You got to get that license. You got to apply to get that license. And here Emily. And I went to Decatur. It was the sign on the wall was marriage and gun licenses that we thought was kind of funny. You can get both in the same one stop shopping. But each state has its own laws regarding everything concerning marriage. Especially not especially, but the first of which is the license and application process, how old you got to be, all that stuff varies from state to state. It does and until very recently, Alabama allowed kids as young as 14. I believe they were the youngest eight. It says in this article that there was kids as young as age twelve, I think. Is that right? I think so. But I think that was like only with like a court order or a court permission, like pregnancy or something. I don't know. Well, that's one of the surprising things. In Georgia, if you're under 18, you have to present a birth certificate, and I think your parents have to be present, both of them, unless the bride to be is pregnant. And then all rules go out the window. Yes. Most states that allow it under 18, the parents have to sign off. Right. And there has to be, like, some reason. But like we said, it varies from state to state, and it would take 2 hours to go over all that. So if you're interested in getting hitched and you're 17, look it up on your state's website. You don't want to go over it state by state. Do you remember the dude from Lost? And then he was in one episode of X Files. I can't remember his name. Which guy from Lost? I don't remember. I didn't watch Lost. Okay. I just know he was on Lost and he's like pushing 50, 40 something, and he married a 16 year old girl. Yeah. And they were setting themselves up, I believe, to have a reality show or whatever, but her parents signed off on it. I remember. It was a big news story. Yes, I remember that too. They moved to Nevada, or they went to Nevada to get married, which is not uncommon, I understand. To move to a different state? No, to go to Las Vegas to get married. Oh, sure. Yeah. People do that. Yeah. So no matter where you are, you fill out this application, you pay a nominal fee, and then after your ceremony, you get a certificate that says you're married. Here's proof. Show it to whoever you like. Yeah. Sometimes you need a blood test. We did not need one here in Georgia. But that's what you always kind of hear, the old fashioned thing, like go down and get your blood test and get married. Yes. But make sure you are disease free and not cousins. That's right. Is that what it's for, too? To check DNA? No. Okay. I don't think they have the equipment to do that. I didn't think so either. And you can get married by varying, like, a bunch of different ways. You can get married by your best friend if you want to. As long as they get certified online as able to do that. Right. Which is what we did with our father in law, just to make him part of the experience. That's neat. Stepfather. And my stepfather, the one in Ohio. Yeah. They're all in Ohio, right? Yeah. So, Chuckers, now that you're married, according to federal law, you are eligible and open for, I think, 1138 federal benefits. Is that still correct? Yes, it's all over $1,100. Is that part of doma? I'm not sure if that's a specific part of Doma, but it's probably a part of many different laws if there's 1100 plus. But this is all specifically federal level. Yeah. So, for example and we'll talk about domain in a minute. Yeah, I believe we should. So, for example, if Emily is in the hospital, you have a legal right to go visit her. That's right. I can even make medical decisions on her behalf. That's right. Unless she has a living will. Right. Which we would do together anyway. You can get benefits if you're a federal employee. You can get inheritance rights, property rights sometimes, even if there's no will. Yes. Yuumi. Can take out a life insurance policy on me. Sure. And it's legal. Yeah. Tax benefits, of course, of being married. You can file that way you can receive Medicare, Social Security, disability, veterans benefits if you're a spouse. Legal spouse. Yes. You can immigrate your spouse to the United States more easily, at least. Yeah. If I killed somebody, Emily could visit me in jail. That's right. And then prison as my spouse. And I would imagine, depending on the state, there will be conjugal rights as well. Yeah, definitely. So those are just a handful of the 1000, 1000 entitlements that you gain. You don't want to go over all of them. If you have a list, I'll do it. Yeah. There are a lot of good reasons to be married. You can also file jointly, so you get a tax break there. And in addition to the legal benefits, there's been tons and tons and tons of studies on marriage that show that there's actually psychological, physiological benefits to marriage. Sure. People happily married, I should say not just married. There's a key to it. You have to be happily married. They tend to live longer lives. True. A married parent household tends to produce more stable, well adjusted kids that do better in school. Yeah, that's supposedly true. Yeah. Well, I mean, there's tons and tons of studies, but it doesn't necessarily relate to same sex or opposite sex. It's just married parents happen to do that statistically. That's right. So what else? Well, people are getting married later and later. I think everyone recognizes that. But to the tune of people born from 1935 to 1939, 21% of men and 51% of women were married by 20. And compare that to last year, where the average age of marriage was 28.6 for men and 26.6 for women. And basically there hasn't been a year since the 1950s where the median age has not gone up. But it's going up and up. Yeah. And you would assume that it would have continued to go up and up and up prior to the 1950s. But what's really interesting is in 1890, the average age that a man got married was 26 and it declined down to the 1950s and 60s when it reached its lowest level, lowest age, which is like 22 or something like that. And then it started to go back up, which is very odd. And it did it for men and women because you would think in olden times you get married at age twelve. So people were getting married at maybe 16 for a median age, but it was older than people were in the 50s when they were getting married. So the 50s might have just signified some marital boom. Maybe. I guess people decided that they were not interested in premarital sex. They just decided that. Yeah. Have we covered we did a full podcast on political podcast, barely even need to mention it. That's what I thought when I was reading this. I was like, wait a minute, this reeks of something familiar. But that is a type of marriage and I guess go listen to that podcast. Did we call it plural marriage or polygamy? I'm sure we talked about it as plural marriage, but we called it how polygamy works. Right. And I guess the very condensed form of this is that it is officially condemned by the Mormon Church these days, although an estimated 30 to 60,000 polygamists still well, I guess still practice polygamy. So there are other types of unions these days. There are civil unions, domestic partnerships, and regular old fashioned marriage. And a civil union entitles same sex couples the same legal rights as marriage and benefits. So that's like you said, after two things, the benefits and just the common recognition among their peers. Yeah, I'm just like you, and I'm married just like you. Or in this case, a civil union would only give you the rights and not the badge of marriage. Right. And there's nine states where civil unions are permitted for same sex couples. That's right. California, New York City, Maine and the District of Columbia, I believe allowed domestic partnerships for same sex couples. That's right. And actually, one of the big same sex marriage cases that's before the Supreme Court right now is a little old lady who lived with her partner for decades. And because she has a domestic partnership, under New York law, she didn't have to pay any tax. She didn't have to pay any inheritance tax, but she got slapped with like a $390,000 federal inheritance tax because the feds don't recognize their domestic partnership. And that's one of the cases that Supreme Court is hearing right now. Well, you can get full on same sex married as of December of 2012 in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, Vermont, New York, New Hampshire, Maine, Maryland, Washington State and the District of Columbia. And that is full same sex marriage, like outright. And at the same time, 38 states have laws banning outright same sex marriage. Yes. So people are really drawing the line on this issue in this country. Yeah, well, it's a pretty polarizing issue, to say the least. Like I have one stat. Things are changing. 68% of people in 1996 opposed same sex marriage and then 48% last year. So this is 20% drop in 14 years. You know, in researching this article yeah. I've really found out that in 1996 we were a radically different country than we are today. Yeah. Like, socially speaking, we are really different. There was a lot of stuff, a lot of laws that passed and a lot of mentalities that were supported legislatively that just don't make any sense today to a lot more people like Doma. Sure. The idea that that passed and just kind of the meanness behind it is well, I guess it's being picked apart right now. Right? Yeah. The Defensive Marriage Act defined marriage as only a legal union between one man and one woman, as husband and wife. And Bill Clinton famously signed that and has been sort of changing his story, like every four or five years since then on why he signed it, because people kind of pick on and out, like Billy Dude, of all presidents, why did you sign it? Yeah. In 96, he said, quote, I have long opposed governmental recognition of same gender marriages, and this legislation is consistent with that position. And then in 2008, he said, all it said was that Idaho did not have to recognize a marriage. Sanctified, Massachusetts, that's a pretty good clinic. So he basically was like, hey, listen, man, all I'm saying was it was left up to the states, which was a bit of a reversal. And then in 2009, he said, well, you know, the reason I signed it was I thought the question of whether gays should marry should be left up to states and to religious organizations and that if any church or other religious body wanted to recognize gay marriage, they ought to. So this is a bit of a he's saying it's being spun as him coming out as, like, antigay on certain levels. And he's saying, no, you're rewriting history in a different way. What it really meant was, let's just federally say this and let the states decide. But that's a pretty glib interpretation of Doma. From what I understand. It basically removes states rights. And that's one of the things that the Supreme Court is looking at now, too, is domain unconstitutional. Right. And one of the ways that the pro same sex marriage lobby could actually harm itself is if the Supreme Court decides to look at Doma as a state's rights issues and kicks it back to the states, then all of these bands will be upheld rather than just saying, no, it's unconstitutional because it bans marriage effectively between same sex people. Right. It is a state's rights issue in a way, but not in the way that Clinton's saying it. It doesn't allow states to kind of make up their own mind. Yeah, I think Clinton's trying to I don't think he's super proud of it now, and I think he's sort of been backtracking ever since and on reasons why he supported it at the time. A lot of Congress people have come out since then and reversed their statements on it, saying, I've evolved in my thinking to this point, and I now think we should look into it more at least, and not necessarily fully in support of it. But there are eleven countries, if you're wondering, around the world, like all across the country, you can get married if you are same sex. Like Argentina, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Iceland, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, south Africa, Sweden and Spain. It is a federal it's legally allowed federally. Yeah. So let's see what you will about that. If you want to get married, go to Spain. Sure. Move to Spain. You'd have to go live there because if you are the United States, it wouldn't be recognized. Yeah. Or Netherlands. That's a nice place. South Africa. We've talked about that. Yeah. But I think most people who want to get married who are of the same sex want to stay at home. Sure. They just want to get married at home. Right. And you're talking about, I guess, being allowed to be married in an entire country. There's been a couple of attempts to ban same sex marriage as an entire country in the US. But have been unsuccessful. Oh, like make it a constitutional amendment. Yeah. That has not happened. No. So in addition to domestic partnerships and civil unions, that's what I find interesting, the reciprocal beneficiary relationship, which is Hawaiian state law. Okay. And I guess it was kind of done away with in favor of civil unions in 2011 or twelve. But basically it grants you the rights of a married couple. But it doesn't necessarily mean you're a couple in the eyes of the law, unless you say we're a couple. So like brother and sister can be reciprocal beneficiaries. Right. An aunt and her nephew or whatever. It doesn't mean you're a couple. It means that you can make legal decisions for one another, and it's for people who are dependent on one another living situations, that kind of thing. So don't be super creeped out by that when you say like brother and sister and stuff like that. Right. You got anything else on same sex marriage? No, I guess that's it. I'm very interested to see what happens. It's the civil rights issue of our age, and that's what a lot of people are arguing. Like, dude, let's just learn from history. Do we have to go through the same steps every time we do this? With allowing people rights, finally giving them the rights that everyone will in the future eventually agree they should have and should have had all along. Right. But apparently we have to go through the same struggle every time for each group before they get their rights, their civil rights that are afforded to everybody. Sure. Whether it's African Americans sitting where they want on a bus or women voting, it seems like this pops up every now and then in this country where people say, hey, wait a minute, I don't have the same rights as that dude over there. Right. And why not? It's very interesting. It is. And I'm sure we're going to get a lot of listening about this. Yeah, well, we're just putting it out there. This is what some people think and that's what other people think. Yeah, I guess. And luckily, we live in a country where you can voice those opinions for sure. So before we move on to other parts of marriage, okay, let's take a quick little message break. Let's do it. And now we're back with more marriage. Yeah. Wow. So, Chuck, one of the ones that I've always heard of is common law marriage. And I was doing a little research on it, and it doesn't make much sense to me. I don't understand. Apparently it's origins where that's what marriage was. Like. Two people just kind of shacked up, right. And they were viewed by society and the law as married. And then the church insinuated itself by saying, no, there's no more plan to sign marriages anymore. You have to do this publicly and declare that you want to be married. And there's got to be a priest and maybe somebody's got to be there, so let's have a witness or whatever. Right. And that's kind of like the rival of common law marriage. And as it's become more and more prevalent, common law marriage is kind of falling to the wayside. Well, don't you just have to shack up for seven years? No, that is a myth. Yeah. Everyone always says, I always heard that. Yeah. And I think that's just a common misconception. If you want to be common law married, you actually have to present as a married couple. You have to change your last name, file joint tax returns, basically kind of really live as if you're married, not just live together and fight over where to go to dinner. Right. It probably wouldn't hurt to contact your local probate court and file something like saying, hey, we're married. Okay. Right. As far as you're concerned, we're married. We're common law married. Now, this only works if your state recognizes common law marriages. And again, fewer and fewer states do these days. In some states, if your common law marriage was around before the 90s, certain dates in the 90s, it would be grandfathered in. Yeah. Georgia being one of them. Right. Yeah. If you were common law married in Georgia before January 1, 1997, you're still common law married if you still are. Nice. And states also don't. We joked about the seven year thing, but there is no set time in any state that you have to live together to present yourself as common law man and wife. Yeah. Although I don't know that you would do that after you just moved in together. But hey, you can if you want. Well, you know, talking about moving in together, there's a study that recently found that more and more people are living together before marriage. Yeah. Or instead of marriage. Right. And also, apparently one of the reasons we were talking about the marriage age increasing, one of the reasons they think that people are putting it off more lately, especially millennials, is due to college debt. How sad is that? Really? Yeah. Okay. I'm broke, so I'm not going to get married. Yeah, like I can't afford to get married right now. That's terrible. So what does it cost you, though? I don't get that. Well, you got to get a ring and there's just certain things to it, I guess, that certain costs. Yeah, I guess it depends on what you're looking for out of your wedding and your rings and things. Sure. It doesn't have to be expensive. No, it doesn't have to. They're just these college kids these days. I don't have enough money to get married. Yes. There you go. Give them some advice. Just get married. Go get a cheap ring and get hitched at the courthouse. Okay. So as far as jacking up goes, more and more people are doing it. Apparently between 2006 and 2010, almost half of straight women ages 15 to 44 said that they have lived together with somebody who they weren't married to. And 100% of gay women. Yeah, I have another stat here that said from 1982, it is quadrupled the number of people, and this is people percentage of women choosing to not get married. And just cohabitate has gone from 3% to 11%. And what does this all mean to staying married or staying together? Not a lot. The divorce rate is hovered pretty close to 50% for quite a while. It goes up a little. Goes down a little? Yeah. I was going to say, hasn't it gone down some? It's gone down a little bit. But it's never like enough of a stat to rewrite the record books. It's always close to 50, it seems like. And then they found all sorts of interesting things among women. There was a 52% chance that the first marriage would survive for 20 years. And 56% of men, their first marriage would survive for 20 years. Another interesting thing, they found that your marriage is more likely to last if you went and graduated college. So 78% of women with at least a bachelor's degree made it to their 20th anniversary, as opposed to what was that? 52%. So that's pretty big. Yeah. I wonder what the explanation is for that. I don't know. Maybe it takes a certain amount of tenacity to go through college and maybe it takes a certain amount of tenacity to stay married. If you have kids going into the marriage with someone else, you have less of a chance to stay married. 37% of women marrying a man who already had kids made it 20 years. But if you have kids after you get married, you have a higher likelihood of staying together. Yeah. So having your own kids good. Marrying and two kids, bad. Yeah. Having your own kids is one of the leading reasons that people stay together. Apparently. There's also couples who drink together tend to stay together more. I belong to that. Especially if they drink about the same amount. Yes, that would make sense. Couples who have I ran across this 2008 study from the University of Denver, couples who have fun, which fun is defined as basically spending time together free of financial, family, or other stresses. Okay. They tend to stay together longer, which makes a lot of sense. Basically, if you go on dates with your spouse, you will stay together longer. And religion also plays a part. Percentage of married women who say religion is important, 60%. And percentage of married women who say religion is not important is 36%. And interestingly, it's about 10% less for men. On both saying religion is important, religion is not. I think women just care more. The number one, I guess, indicator that people will stay together, not necessarily in marriage, but that as a couple is shared curiosity. When we did how curiosity works years back, one of the indicators or predictors sorry, that a couple would stay together was that if both of them were curious people about the same things or just period, just in general. Right. And it, like, beat out religion. All these other shared things that you would think that would keep two people together, make them attracted to one another. But it was shared curiosity and love of just being curious. As long as it's not curious about, like, I wonder what it'd be like to have sex with that woman. Precisely. It's bad curiosity. Right. Since you brought that up, you sent another article on how stuff works that was pretty interesting that Molly Edmonds wrote about the seven year itch. Oh, yeah. Did you check that out? I did. So basically, the seven year itch is this idea that after seven years, people get bored with their marriage and they divorce or they stray or whatever. Right. And there have been studies that have found that seven years is actually like a significant moment in the average marriage, and that a lot of them do end up dissolving at this point. Right. Yeah. I think the median age in the US. Is just over seven years. So that would suggest that this old yarn is correct. Right. But it's actually possible that it's even less than seven years, that there's an indicator that at four years, marriages start to go, I guess, south. Right. And there's an anthropologist, an evolutionary anthropologist named Helen Fisher who had a pretty good idea of a pretty cool explanation. Yes. I thought it made sense. Go ahead, level it. Okay. Well, she said that basically back in our earlier evolutionary age tuktuk's era. Four years is about the time that a couple would spend together conceiving and raising a child, and then it was time to do it again. And they typically did it with other people. Right. Spread the seed. Fisher's basically pressing the point that we are evolutionarily hardwired to not last in a monogamous relationship longer than four years, which is a pretty depressing idea, especially if it makes sense. Yeah, but she also points out that being aware of this or understanding this possibility can let you guard against it. Oh, yeah, that makes sense. Like, keep your marriage exciting, have fun with your spouse. Go on dates with your spouse. Right. And you can beat that. Four year, seven year, or whatever. Yeah. Just don't, like, research that stuff. Come up with your own stuff, is what I say. There's gazillions of articles like how to Keep Your marriage spicy. I encourage you not to read those. If you want to spice up your marriage, just try some things on your own. Don't read Red Book. I don't know, man. If red book helps. Red book helps. I guess it's our motto. All right, so go ahead and read those articles. They'll tell you. What did they say? They all say things like, it's all, like, sex based, usually. That's not true, though. You're talking about Cosmopolitan, not read books. Be more active with your husband and get him out hiking and then dress up as a French maid every once in awhile. It's just like, I don't know. If those articles help you, then it's all well and good. Okay, I take it back, what you were saying what to do, like go out on a hike or something like that. This study from 2008 from the University of Denver pointed out that when you go out on a date, you should be aware that your spouse may not have the same idea of what a date is that you do, depending on your sex. That's true. Like, for women, going on a date is like a chance to have an intimate conversation, just basically friend time, close time, get to know someone. Whereas the dude is more prone to think a date is like going to a movie or going to a baseball game or something like that that you go do together and you're on a date and you're sitting next to another and, like, you lean over and kiss and everything. But you're both watching the game. You just watch the game. Right. So I guess, again, an awareness of that will probably get around any weird situations where you're just like, we went on a date. How are you not happy? Yeah, that's a good point. I found that sporting events I get kind of chatty, though. Well, you would be a perfect date, and we'll go to baseball games, but literally the only time I took her to a Falcons game, she brought magazines. And people around me were, like, so pissed. It's what? I wasted the ticket. You mean like a perfect woman and that will go into shows or something like that? She's not chatty during shows. Especially, like a concert. Yeah, like, you know when you're at a concert and it's like they're playing the music and then somebody just wants to talk to you the whole time? Yeah. You mean it's not like that. It's pretty awesome. Yeah. I'm always right next to that person. Whoever the most obnoxious person in any crowd is, I will be no more than 5ft away from them. You're a magnet. I feel like I am, yeah. But I've installed a new policy in my life. I used to just get upset, and because I'm non confrontational with strangers, I would just sit there and my blood would boil. Whereas there are three ways you can go about it. You can do that. You can confront the person, say, hey, would you mind keeping it down? I would never do that. But the third option I've discovered here in my 40s, just move. Yeah, that's a good one. Unless you're, like, in a reserved seat. I just go staying somewhere else. It's just not worth it for me. Yeah, that's good, Chuck. Yeah. And I find that all of a sudden, not obsessing over this loud person next to me while Steve Maltemis is telling a nice story on stage, and I just avoid the drunk as people in the room. That's good. It's always a good motto. There you go. Yeah. What else you got? I got nothing else. Cool. We did it. We did. How marriage works. Marriage good. Agreed. Yes. If you want to learn more about marriage, there's like a whole channel almost, or sub channel or something on the site. I believe if you want to learn more about marriage, get married, because you're going to learn everything you need. Yeah, it's like immersion. Learning through immersion. You can also type the word marriage into the search bar. Howstepworks.com? If you and your partner are curious types, and that would be probably a predictor of your long term success. And I think I said predictor in there. So it's time for listener mail. Not quite. It's time for a message break. Okay. And now it's time for listener mail. No, Josh, not Listener mail. We're going to continue, I believe, part two of what will be three of administrative details. Okay, well, I'm going to kick it off. Are you ready? Please. I want to give a big shout out to our buddy Ryan Flanders over at Mad magazine for sending us a ton of great stuff. Magazines, hats, pins, masks. Buttons. Masks. Yes. And beyond the coolness of that, it's just the fact that because of our careers, we've been able to talk to people at Mad magazine and Uncle John's Reader and Archie Comics, and they listen to the show. It's just like that just totally knocks us out. Yeah. We grew up on Mad and continue to read it today. Yeah. All right. What you got? No, just give me a few. Okay. We got a very delightful letter from a boy named Ethan L from Windmere, Florida, with a request for an episode on minecraft in the hopes that it will change his mom's opinion about him playing it. I don't know if we're going to do that, but thank you for the letter. Ethan Physique, body of tea in Boulder, Colorado, sent us tea. Yeah, it's delicious, right? It's weight loss tea. That's nice. Yeah. That's how you've been looking? More development than usual. Well, you know, we got a CD and vinyl of the album. We Built a Fortress on short notice by the band's self Evident. Awesome. Thank you very much, guys. Yeah. And on the music tip, the Lala band sent us their CD, moonshine still and the Death Billies. They sent us a packet. They do metal mashups of Jukebox country classics. It's pretty cool. I haven't listened yet. Yeah, they're intrigued. They're pretty cool. And they gave us cool buttons, too. Okay. So thank you, Dust. At least we got a nice letter written in cursive from Larry Nina. That's what he even spelled out how to say it. Nynus. Really? He lives in LaGrange, Georgia, and he was prompted by our episode on memory and possibly Synesthesia. He had some good theories. Nice. Katie Sinner sent us a nice handwriting letter, and she's doing something really cool called The Letter Project, where she sends a letter to someone who inspires her and asks, what are you pursuing in your life and how do you know when you've gotten there? And she sent us that letter. And, Katie, the answer is we're pursuing podcasting excellence and we're never going to rest like we've not gotten there because there are still many more things to explore. And the beat goes on here, so you should know it's the curse and the gift of perfectionism. That's right. Let's see. We got a wedding invitation from Savannah and Jonathan mausletov. Sarah Yakawanis sent us some cool graphic posters. I found those. We did get those. Okay. Yeah. And she has an etsy shop at Takawanisquilling etsy.com. And that is T-A-K-A-W-O-N-I sqilling eticom. And they're really neat. I like graphic posters. I like how you say her last name, too. Yes. We got a postcard from the Trinity nuclear testing site in New Mexico from our friend Billy Ray Cyrus, and another associated one from Van Nostrin. Really? Yeah. Send us a couple of postcards. Thank you, buddy. And we got a book from Thomas Trask. He sent his book. Prism. Shadow of the Fates. Nice. We get a lot of colons in our book titles here. Wow. That's the thing. I guess if you have a lot to say, I guess so. You throw the colon in there. So thanks to Thomas Traffic for that we got an anonymous note suggesting we do something on lactose intolerance. Thank you. Anonymous, right. Postcard from Antarctica from Liz and Dan from San Francisco, who went there on their honeymoon. Congratulations. Nice. What else we got? We got some postcards from Christina Bennett. Australia road signs. Operation Enduring Freedom, afghanistan postcards. Some odd postcards. Thank you. Cool. You want any more? Yeah, do a few more. I'm going to help. It okay. We got some picture links and a nice letter from Adam Pervez. He's the Chief Happiness Officer of Happinessplungecom. And go check it out. Do you remember when we talked about Gross National Happiness? When we asked about people who dropped out to just go pursue their own happiness? Is that the happiness plunge. Yeah. Happinessplunge.com. We got downloads of Jazz Animals and Independence, Louisiana by Burke and Grafia. You can check those out. Nice, those tracks. We got a Georgia Tech Club T shirt from Jtgetter. Yay. Do you remember him? Yeah. That was very nice. And we're just kidding about boo and Georgia Tech. Kind of kidding. And I'm going to do one more, and then we'll save the rest for next time. We got a letter suggesting meditation as a topic from Rob Haulerbach. Hollerback. I used to meditate. Yeah, I'd like to get back into it. It was nice. Okay. It was nice. Well, that's it. That's administrative details. Yeah. Part two of three will finish up. Yeah. I'll split things up between us next time. Great. Okay. So, if you want to send us something, you can get our address out of us by tweeting to Syskpodcast. You can join us on Facebook.com. Stuffychou can send us an email to stuffbodcast@discovery.com. And seriously, come check out our website. It's really neat. It's called Stuffyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstepworks.com."
https://podcasts.howstuf…-balls-final.mp3	How SuperBalls Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-superballs-work	You can thank Wham-O's SuperBall for inspiring the name of the NFL's Big Game (buh) and you can thank the fear and the Soviet launch of Sputnik aroused in America for the invention of SuperBall! Learn the history and physics of this bouncy legend.	You can thank Wham-O's SuperBall for inspiring the name of the NFL's Big Game (buh) and you can thank the fear and the Soviet launch of Sputnik aroused in America for the invention of SuperBall! Learn the history and physics of this bouncy legend.	Tue, 31 May 2016 12:52:09 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2016, tm_mon=5, tm_mday=31, tm_hour=12, tm_min=52, tm_sec=9, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=152, tm_isdst=0)	25221475	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W, Chuck, Bryant and Jerry's over there. We're just bouncing off the walls here. Sick. I'm not bouncing anywhere. I'm bouncing to the doctor. Are you? Right after this? You got the funk, I got the chests. I got the chests. Your kid is not even in preschool yet. I'm not sick because of her. Well, why did you get sick? People get sick from other things. I saw babies. I thought once you had a kid like that's the only way you got sick. No, I don't know what it is, man. Camping. The other night, it was cold. That's what it is. I don't know. You got a wood fungus. I didn't treat myself like I should have on that camping trip, either. Oh, yeah. You know what I'm saying? No, I wasn't going jogging and drinking juice. I got you. You're eating chocolate bars. No, no chocolate. I got into the whiskey, though. I didn't help things out. I see. Not on a cold night. It's been cold here recently. It's weird. Yeah. I mean, like, cold. And it's mid May. It's unusual. Yes. Global warming. So, Chuck, have you ever heard of the NFL's big game? Yeah. Can we even say that? I don't think so. All right, so the big game actually, it sounds a lot like Super Ball, which is what we're talking about. That's actually a thing. The reason why is because it's named after the Super Bowl. Did you know that? Yeah, I did not. And I thought this was a little dubious, and the story still seems Fitchy to me, but I'll buy it. So a guy named Lamar Hunt, right? Yeah. He founded the Dallas Texans, I think is what they originally called. But they went on to become the Kansas City Chiefs. And he founded this team because he couldn't get an NFL franchise in Dallas. So he just founded his own league as well. And he created the AFL, the American Football League. That's crazy, because Dallas is such a football town. Yeah. I don't think they had a problem with Dallas. I think they had just a problem, maybe with this guy. Who knows? Okay. But he was not the type to just take things lying down. Instead, he went and founded a different football league, rival one. Right. And so, as time progressed, they tried to get the NFL and the AFL integrated into smooth the transition. They decided that they would have a year end championship where the best team from the NFL would play the best team from the AFL, and they couldn't figure out what to call it. And apparently at one of the meetings, Lamar Hunt said, how about the big game? That's not what he said. He said, The SB. Right. Because my kids have been playing with this Super Ball at home. Yeah. And why not name the final football game of the season after this toy that has nothing to do with it. That's right. All the guys were like, well, we're ready to go to the gentleman's club and eat some steak, so fine, we'll go with that. And apparently later on, Lamar Hunt said he said in a quote in 1970, I guess it is a little corny, but it looks like we're stuck with it. Yeah. So no one really likes it. They didn't use it for the first big game? No. Didn't they call it the Ultimate Bowl or something? No, I think it was just the AFL NFL Championship or something. Okay. And then by year three, they said, I guess we need to have something more catchy. But all that because of the Super Ball, a little child's toy that everybody went crazy for, I think, starting in 1965. Yes. And we can just file this in the bucket with the Slinky and Silly Putty. Barbie. Barbie and Plato. Did we do that one? Yes. Or did we just sit around and eat it? I think we did both. Okay. Yeah. What are we going to call these pop culture of the 1950s? And so we did the Frisbee or the Hula Hoop. We did the hula hoop. Yeah, we did. And we did the boomerang. That's more a weapon than a toy. Yeah. Boy, it's getting harder and harder to remember which ones we've done. It's old age. Yeah. Well, it's our what's the word? Prolific nature. Right. Which is really not that much. It's just two a week over the years. Adds up. Well, that's prolific. Yes. But it's not like we're recording twelve episodes a week or anything. That's prolific. That's insane. This is just regular, like taxes and death. Do you know what would happen to us if we recorded twelve episodes a week? Well, I do. I would quit. It would be the final twelve. Yeah. All right, let's go back in time. Should we hop in the old way back machine? Yes. Go back to the Cold War and the space race, which we've talked about quite a lot. We had an episode of it. Yeah. And the United States feeling like Russia got up Sputnik and or I guess it was the Soviet Union got up Sputnik and we're in big trouble because they did this before us. And we're all scared in the United States that we're not competing like we should. Yeah, I was reading about it. It's really hard to overstate the effect that Sputnik had on the US. Because postwar America was all like, look at this gadget. Look at this toy. Make your life comfortable. Get fat and sit around in your Lazy Boy chair. Yeah. That little satellite came along and disrupted all that good stuff. Like, America woke up and Stephen King actually said that Sputnik instilled in him the dread that informed the work for the rest of his life. It was all based on Sputnik. Really? Yeah. Wow. Yeah. It had a lot of really far reaching effects, but one of them was that America said, scientists get you to work. Yeah. Get off your butts, because you're not doing anything. Yeah. You're sitting around playing pnuckle and saw a guy named well, they did a lot of work, actually, and they took it very seriously. And this one dude, his name was Norman Stingley. He worked for a company called Bettis Rubber in suburban La. In Whittier, California, and he was a scientist, and he said, you know what? Well, we should caveat this with if you work for a company like that as a scientist, you know, going in, you sign away your life rights and basically say that anything I create under your employee, and even if I'm at home tinkering around in my spare time yeah. With stuff that I, like, learned from work, then you well, it depends on your contract. You either own it, or you have first rider refusal for it. The company does. Yeah, right. I have the impression that with Betis, the company that Stingley worked for, they had first right of refusal. Absolutely. So he began working on some stuff on his own for fun. And in 1965, he compressed into a ball this GUI substance and said, hey, this is pretty neat. This little synthetic rubber ball actually bounces quite a bit more than any ball I've ever seen before, and I might be on to something. By Lord, it's still bouncing. That's right. And bouncing and bouncing. Unless they throw it too hard, and then it just comes apart. Yeah. Which is not good. No. The earliest incarnation of the Super Bowl would just disintegrate when it hit the ground too hard, and that's actually Stingley said, okay, I got to take this to my employer. You know what? I'll hand it to him. I would have totally tried to, like I would set up a shell company. I would create a false person with a fake Social Security number, like Jackie Chan. What? He's, like, the one person who's been outed so far in the Panama Papers. Oh, really? Jackie Chan? No way. What did he do? He hid money that he owed taxes in offshore shell companies. Wow. I haven't been keeping up with that lately. It's been a bit of a bus. But I also have the impression that a bunch more stuff is coming. Well, hey, if they got Jackie Chan, then it was all worthwhile. But that's what they got, was poor Jackie Chan. He's probably looking around like, really? Just me? Yeah. He's like, what about Wesley Snipes? Wesley Snipes is like, they already got me. Yes. I'm doing Samsung commercials now. Is he really? Yeah, there's a really great Samsung commercial that's got all these random stars, and he's one of them, and he's kind of making fun of himself a little bit. Boy, I bet he would love to hear that he's random star number four. Yeah. All right. So he went to bedis and like a good dude said, I've made this thing. Let me show it to you. You have first ride a refusal. And they said, that thing kind of stinks. It bounces, and it's kind of neat. But I threw it hard and it broke. Yeah. What kid is going to want this? No kid could love you. And they spit on it. I wonder what the rules are, though, with like, I wonder if you could take a cruddy version, a little bit of like a shell game, take a poor version and say, what do you want this? And then make it better afterward. After they refuse it, you see a whole episode in defrauding your employer. Well, I mean, that's sort of what ended up happening. Of course, it wasn't on purpose, but he then took it to the people that made the most sense in the world, the Chiefs at Whammo. Right. And where else would he take it? I mean, these dudes dick Ner and Arthur. Mellane Mellon. Arthur Spud Mellon. Often confused with Larry bud melman or spud Webb. Yeah, I still wanted to meet him when I was a kid. Bud Melvin? No, Spudweb. I could see that he was a big deal back then. I had a knack for standing in line for meet and greet, autograph sessions. Who else? Brett Butler, the baseball player? Bob Gibson, the baseball player? Butler, dominique. Okay. Yes, sir. And Cheap Trick. The baseball player. Yeah. I went to the record bar when I was like twelve and stood in line to get my album autographed. Yeah, like a twelve year old fanboy does. Nice. And congratulations to Cheap Trick, by the way, for finally being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this year. It just happened this year, huh? Just happened. Crazy. Yes. The rock and roll greatest tragedy that it took this long aging, long overdue. So where was I? So we took it to Ammo, and these dudes had made a mint selling the hula hoop. And they were the frisbee. Yeah. But not the Slinky. No, I think the Slinky was its own company. That's another one we did, too. Yeah, that's a good one. So they said, this is kind of neat, but it doesn't work so great, so get to work on it. And he did. You want to take a break and talk about it some more? That's a nice cliffhanger. All right, so the last thing you said was knockoff knock off. And that means that someone said, hey, this thing is neat. And while there's a patent on that particular process to create that particular ball, you can't stop me from creating a bouncy ball of my own. Right. Like MDMA is illegal, but MDMA plus CPT, there's no law against that same principle. I don't think that's true. I think it is. Yeah. All right. So it's like you can just take something and adjust like a covalent Bond or something like that, and it's still practically the same stuff, but on paper, it's not the same thing, because if you go look at the Zekron patent, you're going to see exactly the chemical description for it. And if you have something that's even just slightly different from it, it technically is not the same thing. It's like Vanilla Ice adding the extra bass note to under pressure. Did he add an extra note under pressure is I've never noticed that. Yeah, that was his whole deal. That's how he tried to get out of I thought it was all, like, music sampling was music sampling. He tried to pretend like it was different by adding a beat. Yes. And I don't remember the result that either got him off or people said, you jerk. I think people said, you jerk. Whether he was legally on the hook or not. We'll get 300 emails explaining it all to us. Maybe from vanilla ice himself. He has, like, a home renovation show now where he flips houses. I've seen it. Have you? I'm aware of it. No, I've never watched it. No, I've watched a couple of full episodes. What do you think? Well, I mean, I like the home reno shows, which is why I watched it. Not because I was a Vanilla Ice fan. Got you. So I was just curious. And it was kind of like all the rest. It was nothing different because it was him. So he's not like a larger than life personality or anything? It's not like a flavor flavour home runner? No, he was just sort of normal and they didn't make it super. He didn't, like, show up to this site and say, hey, stop, collaborate and listen, everyone nice. That would have been really cheesy. That is all I would say if I were him. But he was vanilla ice. He's like, we're going to make this pool so fly. Like, you're not going to believe it. It's going to be dope. All right, so let's get back to the knock off. Yeah, people started making these things. Obviously, it's going to put a dent because they were a little bit cheaper. Yeah. By like, 75%. Yeah. And you get out of a gum machine, like, super easily. And back in the 19th, 60s, if a parent could pay a quarter for something or a dollar for something, they would probably pick the cheaper one. Parents never change. My parents would have parents just don't understand. Yeah. I used to wear nights at the Round Table. Close. Do you remember those? The Polo knock off? Yeah. My mom would be like, you can't even tell it's a flag. I'd be like, Everybody can tell it's a flag. Instead of the solo club, I wore this. I had the knock off. That wasn't the eyes out alligator. It was a gecko. I remember that. Yeah. I'm just kidding. Well, you got me on that one. Oh, really? Maybe there was I don't know. Yes, there was definitely an Isoide knock off. Oh, yeah, there was. But I don't think it was a lizard. What was it? Was it a dragon? I do remember. I totally remember an Aiza knockoff. The dragon, though, I think was its own cool thing. Maybe. All I know is that I didn't buy those. What I would get was the polo, that the collar was sewn wrong or something. So you get like the real polo, but it was like, what are they called? Remnants or something. Like there's an factory defect. Yeah, factory defect. There was a place of store that sold them, and we were there a lot. I got ones that were just fine. They were just total knockoffs. Which is better? I wonder is it developed factory defected? Because what kids going to be like? Your caller is just slightly misditched. I think the factory defects out here. Right. Where kids like, Josh is poor. He's wearing a knights T shirt. Knights of the Round Table. But I could also be like, So are you. None of us were wearing Paula stuff. We're all wearing Knights of the Round table. I got you. So it didn't matter. So the super ball knock offs. Yeah. But a big dent. And they were, like I said, usually a little bit smaller. The regular Super Ball is 1.87 five inches. And if by comparison, you've ever held a racket ball, that's about 2.25 inches. Oh, yeah. Okay. Little smaller than a racket ball. You got it. I like the plumb comparison because it was also the color of a plum. Yeah, it's dark, like purple or black. Right, right. And it said made with amazing zektron. Yeah. Which was a big draw. Let's talk about how cool this thing was. It wasn't just a bouncy ball. We keep saying, was they're still around? Yeah, but I mean, at the time when people were all aware of Super Bowls, like, even Jerry was like, I don't know what that is. Do you know what it is yet? Does it ring a bell? Yeah. Made her fingers in the shape of a circle. A plum. Plum size. Little smaller than Racquet ball. The cool thing about these well, there's a lot of cool things, but one thing is how high it would bounce. All right. It would bounce back. They would claim a resilience of 90%. So if you just drop it from twelve inches onto something hard, like a desk, it would bounce back 10.8 inches. Then on the second bounce, 9.72, 3rd bounce, 8.75 on down. Which is remarkable. It is. It has a high coefficient of restitution. That's right. And it would conserve its elastic energy, which is basically like the amount of kinetic energy that's preserved once an object is deformed and then reforms back to its original shape. Yeah. Because when it hits that desk, if you took a snapshot of that or a slow motion high speed shot, it would flatten out, right? It does a little bit, sure. And when it flattens out, the reason it doesn't have 100% coefficient of restitution or what was it? Was it called resilience? Yeah. Or why it doesn't have 100%? Because when it drops, when it deforms and hits a surface, a little bit of heat energy is released. As it deforms, there's a little bit of energy loss, 10% energy loss every time it strikes a surface. Yeah. Like when we did this episode recently on Crumple zones, if something hits something else, there's going to be a loss of energy. And in this case it was lost as heat, like you said. But because it's so elastic, it retains a lot of its kinetic energy. Like a bowling ball when you drop it, it might bounce a little bit, it retains a tad bit of kinetic energy, but it displaces it pretty quickly. So it might bounce like just an inch and then now a quarter inch and then nothing. Yeah, like the one drunk guy at the bowling alley that throws it like 15ft down the lane before it hits the floor. It will usually bounce like one time. You can also do that if you're not drunk, I can tell you. Yeah. What's the purpose there? I don't get it. I've never got that. What? Swinging the bowling ball down that far. It's just totally accidental. Okay? For me it's always been accidental. Oh, I thought it was like, watch this. Well, yeah, then you're just a drunk guy. Okay, here's a jerk. You need to go home. Your thumb get stuck. Yeah, something like that. Or just forget to release at the right moment, that kind of thing. And it just goes up and then we're not good bowlers. I think that's a better way to put it. I've had a couple of good games in my life. I actually took a bowling class in 7th grade or 8th grade. Yes, I did too. That's when I got hooked on Starburst. Really? Yeah, there's a spending machine in it, like the starburst just look perfect in it. And every time I just buy starburst and then I go back and buy more starburst. You would go to the bowling alley for the class? Dude, our bowling class was in the gym. Oh, really? They would just set up bowling pins and put tape down on the floor. Everybody's bowling in their factory defect polo shirts, eyes knock off. And you had to take turns setting up the pins by hand? No, we went to like Southwick Lanes in Toledo. That's crazy. Had a vending machine with starburst. Kids sneaking beer and stuff. Nice. No, they didn't. We were good kids. That's good. At least at that age. Good toledo kids Toledans toledians Toledo whiteans. What? Ohio. Toledozoans. You're just making stuff up. Toledo ends I think is what they're called. They're going to take back your key to the city. I never got that. That guy gave up. I wonder how he's doing. There's a guy everybody I guess we can let you in on this private conversation right now. There is a guy who was an early fan of stuff you should know, who decided that it was his mission to see to it that I got the key to the city of Toledo. Wonderful. He really tried. Yeah, he was a nice guy, for sure. But he would harass the Congresswoman. Marcy Captain, who is a former Toledo mayor, and like everybody could he really tried. It didn't happen. You need someone higher up in the chain to be a fan. Yeah, but hats off to that guy. He was nice. I don't remember his name. He was a good guy. Heck, yeah. All right, so should we talk a little bit about the polybutade? How did you say it? polybutadine. polybutadine. So those are three things, the butte, but four part carbon chain ene double bond. But it's just a compound with four carbon chain double helix, two double bonds. Right. Do people care? Sure they do. There's some chemistry out there. He's like, yeah. No, I mean Super Bowls are all over science class. Oh, yeah, they really are. And not just because they are amazing chemically or their need, at least chemically. I don't know. I'm impressed by it. Right, sure. But also the physics of them, not just their coefficient of restitution and their elasticity, but also they have another coefficient of friction. Yeah, this is pretty cool. It's like totally different than their elasticity. They have a surface that basically grips whatever surface or object is thrown onto, and it grips it so hard that the surface can spin it a different way. So if you throw a super ball with some backspin at an angle, it will basically hit the ground and spin back toward you. It changes its spin because there's so much friction. Yeah. And if you get a Super Ball and you are in a room with nothing breakable and you start spinning and bouncing that thing, you never know where it's going to go. Never know. Because not only does it have a high horizontal or vertical bounce, it has an equally good horizontal bounce as well. It's just a neat little thing. That's it. That is it. I think that's it. You got anything else? No? You've seen one in physics class. If you have a fun professor, you probably bought a Super Bowl in there and taught you things, right? And if you don't, there's plenty of videos on YouTube that you can watch. So hats off to Norman stingley. Thank you, Norman, for the Super Bowl. If you want to know more about Super Bowls, you can type that word in the search bar@housedetforks.com. And since I said search bar, it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this darkmeat. Hey, guys, love the podcast. You probably got 100 emails about this. Actually, David Hill, we got one from you. I just finished listening to the true Stories of Survival Cannibalism and you guys explained the difference between dark and white meat is the amount of blood vessels. Not true. All muscles require the same blood supply for respiration and nutrition. Just so you know, the main reason for the color difference is in the content of myoglobin. Myoglobin is originally pigmented protein that is used to store oxygen in cells. The more myoglobin, the darker redder the meat will appear. Red meat is muscle fibers that are used or were used for long endurance activities and are classified as slow twitch muscle fibers. They need a constant supply of oxygen to keep up their constant activity so they have higher myoglobin concentration than white meat. White meat, on the other hand, is comprised of fast twitch fibers. These are used for quick bursts of energy followed by a moment of breath, like a flapping of a wing. Best to you, David Hill. Thanks a lot, David. That's how we like our corrections. Civil to the point. What did we get wrong? I don't remember. That was because of more blood vessels. Okay. In the meat and the muscle. I see. Well, thanks, David. If you want to correct us, you can send us an email. The Stuffpodcast@housedefworks.com you can also hang out with us on social media at Syskpodcast, on Twitter and SYSK podcast on Instagram. You can hang out with us at Facebook, facebook. Comstepyshow. And as always, hang out with us at our home, on the web stuffyoushouldnow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Hey everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…an-oil-spill.mp3	How do you clean up an oil spill?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-do-you-clean-up-an-oil-spill	The modern world runs on fossil fuel, and offshore oil drilling powers a large part of the global economy. But what do we do when disaster strikes? Join Josh and Chuck as they take a look at the techniques used to clean up oil spills in this podcast.	The modern world runs on fossil fuel, and offshore oil drilling powers a large part of the global economy. But what do we do when disaster strikes? Join Josh and Chuck as they take a look at the techniques used to clean up oil spills in this podcast.	Tue, 01 Jun 2010 18:44:30 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2010, tm_mon=6, tm_mday=1, tm_hour=18, tm_min=44, tm_sec=30, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=152, tm_isdst=0)	24298294	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetofworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. Charles W. You. Chuck Bryant is seated across from me, sorting through papers, taking a last second look at the information his sponge like brain is absorbing, like an absorbent might soak up oil floating on top of the Gulf of Mexico. Did you plan that? Wow. I know. I'm getting too good at Europe. I'm like the Robert Eurek of podcasting. I'm just an old pro by now. I think it's, like the third or fourth time we said Robert Eurick in the show. Has it ever been recorded before? What? Robert nation and Robert Europe. Oh, yeah. Okay. Recorded and released, my friend. This podcast is going to bump people out, especially if you have any Hartness for the environment. Pelicans, sand shrimpers. Yes. This is the local economy. We probably should have done this weeks ago, but we took our time getting around to it because Josh was up being all Japanese. So oil spills. It's high time we tackle this. It's high tide or oil spill clean up, rather. Yeah. I actually wrote an article about it back in 2006. There was a spill in San Francisco Bay, and our boss was like, hey, go write something on this right now. And I was like, okay. So I wrote it, and I was happy to see that pretty much nothing's changed since then. In four years, the technology hasn't advanced, and we're actually using some really primitive techniques. No kidding. But, Chuck, let's first start by talking about how the Gulf oil spill started in the first place. Right? Yeah. The Deepwater Horizon. An oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico. Yeah. Did they call this a spill? I guess they're calling a spill, aren't they? Yeah. I think anytime it's introduced oil and water to water, it's a spill, because I generally even think it has to be water. I think anytime oil gets out of whatever containment system is supposed to be holding it, it's a spill. So my old Plymouth Valiant that I had in Los Angeles oil spill. Yeah. All over my driveway. I got charged for that by my renter or by my land. Did you really? Yeah. Look at all these oil spots. That's, like, $10 apiece. It's a wear and tear. That's what I said. You know something cool. I just thought it, too. When you Google Earth my house, you could see my car in my driveway, my La. House. Really? And the oil spill. Can you really? That's crazy. Anyway, you can also Google Earth the oil spill in the Gulf right now, as far as I know. Yeah. All those pictures that are coming out are just awful. Yeah. We have a Facebook page, so if you should know page, and we posted and tweeted on her Twitter account to a link to this PDF blog that had a live feed video of the oil under the Gulf of Mexico. It was a mile down. Right. It was the most depressing thing I've ever seen. It's just shooting out plumes of oil. And there's a really big discussion. Anyway, the Deepwater Horizon exploded. The BT was capping a well to come back and drill later because they wanted to go start another drill or another well by March, and they were running behind. From what I understand, it's starting to emerge that there may have been something of a rush job in capping this well. Some gas built up in the well, it exploded in this pipe that went from the rig to the well cap, killed eleven people and sunk the rig, burst the pipe in at least three places. And now we have these plumes that are, plumes of oil that are being introduced into the Gulf of Mexico. Yeah. At first they thought it was, what? 1000 barrels a day, right? Well, yeah, 1000 barrels a day. BP's numbers aren't quite lining up with the numbers from the experts now. And the government said, well, we're going to figure this ourselves, but we're going to use an equation that is specifically recommended to not be used for calculating oil release underwater. Not recommended by oil companies or not recommended by experts. Okay, so they came up with 5000 barrels a day. Right. Some experts, like some people who know, have said it's probably about four to five times that. So what we're talking about is as much as 25,000 barrels. And there are 42 gallons in a barrel. 25,000 barrels a day. If that's the case, then as of this podcast recording the Gulf oil spill, the BP Gulf oil spill, it's going on right now, has released the amount that Exxon Valdez dropped eight times over. Wow. Yeah. Well, they just actually, on CNN just released like 2 hours ago. They're officially calling it the worst oil spill in US. History. In US. History. But it's not the worst ever, is it, Chuckers? No. I don't know if you have different info, but Persian Gulf War, 240,000,000 gallons off the coast of Saudi Arabia. Is that what you got? Yeah. And right now we've got about 88 million. If it's 25,000 barrels a day, we're at about 88 million. It's 240,000,000 barrels. 240,000,000 gallons? Yeah. That's enormous. I don't think we'll ever top that. Yeah. And the Valdez was 11 million gallons. Yeah. And the second worst spill also took place in the Gulf of Mexico. But it was off the coast of Mexico, right, right. That one was, I think, like 140,000,000 gallons, something like that? I think so. 140,000,000 gallons. It was the ishtalk one tok I know, X in Mexican dialect. Aztec maybe is WA. What are you talking about? Something like that. Like Wahaca. You're right. Yeah. There's an accident there. Yeah. So it's the italke one somebody will let us know, won't they? Yeah. That took place from june of 1979 to February of 1980. It just kept going. And that was 140,000,000 gallons. Right. I got three more stats. We're doing stats and people are taking shots every year. 100 million US gallons of oil spill every year? Yeah, is what they say. There's stat. Number one, the United States uses 710,000,000 gallons of oil per day. And in fact, every 22 minutes, Josh, the US. Uses up what was spilled in the Exxon Valledes bill every 22 minutes. I know. Isn't that weird? It's weird. It's disturbing. But that also accounts for why oil spills are so massive. It's actually kind of wondrous that more oil doesn't spill. Right. Apparently the US coast Guard reported that after the Exxon Valdez accident, there was a lot of tightening and restrictions. It was just such a very public accident, and it happened in the US. So it mattered. So all of a sudden there's all these restrictions on tanker design. Like you need to have double holes. Right. And then other regulations that made restrictions tighter. And I think spillage dropped by 58% between 1989 and 2004. Yeah. You know Maddie Frederick of coolest stuff on the planet? Have you ever seen his Facebook stuff? No. He's just like, you need a Facebook friend. Him personally, he's like the liberal crusader of all time. Okay. Like, four times a day he sends out I bet you didn't know this, right? That's hilarious. He came by the other day and told me about basically every country in the world that does offshore drilling has this process in place that when there's a situation like just happen, an implosion happens, is triggered immediately to implode and seal everything up at the source. And he said, the US. Is the only country that recently, several years ago said, oh, we don't need this because it costs a lot of money. Yeah, we're the only country. That's great. Pretty cool. Well, we're the only country with our Minerals Management Service, which apparently has had a pretty cozy relationship with energy companies. Right? Yeah. Think about that, though, Chuck. This oil spill in the Gulf coupled with the mine explosion in West Virginia, those two accidents coming that close together can actually completely change energy policy, and it probably will better, obviously. Pretty interesting. Yeah. All right, so, Chuck, let's say that you had just gotten your hair cut. I did, in fact. All right, let's say you said, you know what, I want my hair to go to matter of trust, because it's going to be used to clean up this oil spill. Right. Remember, we got a bunch of emails about this, like, you guys mentioned this, that if you send your hair to the Gulf, it will be used to claim the oil spill. Is that hair being used? No, that was the initial idea. And hair can be used, in fact, for smaller spills. For smaller spills. But they say I read the New York Times today. They said that there is not deemed feasible after a technical evaluation. No BP's. Like, hey, that's a really good idea, but we are actually going to use real sorbent, real stuff. Right. Like you said, hair can be used. It's used on a much smaller scale. But the people, I guess, who have really kind of started this initiative, I think it's a matter of trust. Out of San Francisco, they said, oh, yeah, well, you asked for it initially, so we're going to send it to you, and it's up to you to figure out what to do with it. And they sent the hair. All the hair is being sent to BP anyway, they're rolling it in a big hair ball from San Francisco, like the size of a car. So, Chuck, why would you use hair? Or a better question is how would you use hair to clean up oil? Well, I guess hair would be a sorbet, right? I think so. Basically, a sorbent is something that acts as a giant sponge. It's so primitive sounding, but it literally just soaks up the oil from the water. And it can do this because oil, it forms a layer on top of water, especially salt water, about a millimeter thick. Is that right? Sometimes a little more. It depends. Especially at first. Right. So it's thickest in the first couple of hours, which is when you really want to get to it. If you get to it initially, you can contain it by using these buoyant booms, and they float on the water, and there's a skirt that hangs down into the water, and it basically keeps it from spreading. Right. So that's exactly what you want to do. Oil pen. Yeah. And then you come along with some skimmers that may use centripetal, which is not centrifugal. Centripetal force is when you spin something, and it's the force that pulls you to the center. Right. So because oil is lighter than water, it will be pulled more easily. Right. Or the water will be pulled more easily. One of the two. But it separates them. You can also just scrape it up, and they also have conveyor belt systems shimmers where it just pulls the oil up right off of the water. Yeah. You know what I didn't find in any of this is if they can, because they soak up this oil and put it in a containment tanker, can they use this oil? Yes. Really? You knew this? I did. I actually ran across it in research. That when you soak it up and you use, say, hair or some other kind of sorbet, and you can use natural stuff like pine bark. Yeah. Banana fibers. Actually, I don't know if they still use that, but that was one for a while. Right. So there are some naturally occurring materials that will soak up oil more than it soaks up water. Right. But you can squeeze it out, and there's your oil, because really, nothing has happened to it. It hasn't had the chance to mix with water yet. Right. You just literally like they have a dude that got an oily rag and you just squeezed it into a little container. Here's your oil. So that's you that's your job. You can also burn it. And actually, this is the most efficient means of taking care of an oil slick. Yeah, because it sits on top. You can burn it away, but that's clearly not a very good thing to do, because when you burn oil, it creates some pretty obnoxious fumes for the environment. It does. It's about 95% to 98% efficient, though. Again, you want to do it away. It's called institute burning. You want to do it when the slick is away from the shore, from, say, coral colonies, that kind of stuff. If it's just out in the deep ocean and it hasn't gotten to be a big problem to where it has traveled towards civilization, then you can just burn it. Right. Yeah. The other weird thing I thought that you pointed out not weird, but I found it odd, was that sometimes if it's far enough out, they'll just leave it alone and oil eventually will evaporate because the sun and the waves and the weather, and they'll just say, Let the Earth take care of it. Right. The wave action. I can't remember what it's called when sunlight breaks something. A photo degradation, maybe. But you remember when we did the Great Pacific Garbage Patch? Yeah. We were talking about how the wave action and the sun breaks down plastic, even in the globules, same thing happens to oil, because plastic is petroleum based. Right. You can also hasten the breakdown by adding microbes to it. Right, yeah. The biological agents. Yeah. That's when, like a fertilizer, phosphorus and nitrogen, you'll spread it all over it and it'll actually foster the growth of microorganisms. And that will help break it down into fatty acids. Right. CO2, I think, right? Yes. You can actually foster the growth of these microbes by adding what did you say? Phosphorus and nitrogen. Right. And when you do add these things, there's a danger of actually going out to the open ocean and creating an algae bloom, which creates a dead zone, which is not good. So if you're going to use phosphorus and nitrogen to hasten the growth of microbes, you want to do it in, like, a marshland that's outside of the tidal movement. Got you. Yeah. Well, there's also disperses. You probably heard this on the news a lot with the BP accident, and in tropical areas, they handle it with dispersants, and these are chemicals that break the oil down into it basically breaks the oil slick apart into little oil droplets, which can be absorbed into the aquatic system quickly. Right. But this is not necessarily the best. No, it turns out, in 2007, an Israeli study found that the combination of chemical dispersants and partially broken down oil is actually more harmful to a coral ecosystem than just crude oil itself. Yeah. Actually, didn't the EPA get on BP and say, wait a minute, this dispersion you're using, you can't use. Go find another one, like now, probably. I could see that. I think that happens. I think everybody's taking a shot at BP so far. Seriously, they're kind of gentle as a lamb right now. Yeah, but Chuck, that study, that Israeli study, kind of reveals something that it's easy to forget because it's so gross looking. But oil is a naturally occurring substance. Yeah, true. Right. One of the big problems with it is when it becomes broken down, it enters the food cycle, the food chain. It equals the seafood chain, which enters our food chain because we eat seafood, which is why the shrimpers are out of business right now. And it also becomes adhere to sand, pebbles, that kind of stuff, and through wave action turns into little tarballs. Right. They're solid on the outside, but they're like, soft and gooey in the middle. Yeah. And things like to eat them and choke on them. They sink. You said you're the one that wrote it. You said that they're not as dangerous sometimes to the environment as a flat out oil problem. But it's still not great, obviously. Right. Because they're broken up and they're separated rather than this big, huge slick. But if a fish is eating a tarball and dies and it's not good, same with, like, a pelican or a bird. And then the other problem with an oil slick for wildlife is that it gets on, it breaks down the water resistance of mammal fur and birds, aquatic birds, which are end up getting gooped up with this stuff. Right. So neighbors and sea otters and pelicans, and they get soaked or they poison themselves by trying to lick themselves clean. I can't look at those pictures. This picture? Yeah. Notice I didn't print that out. I just can't even go there. Heartbreaking. There is also the beach clean up. Right. So we talked about marsh clean up. You can add nitrogen and phosphorus and bio remediate it. Right? Right. But you also have beaches. You got tarballs on beaches. You have pelicans walking around like, Why me? And you have to clean up this beach. And apparently on Prince William sound. Right. That was Valdezville in Alaska. Yes. They said, you know what, we want to make the beach look clean again, so we're going to use high pressure hoses, like spray everything off. It doesn't really do anything. It pushes the oil down and actually screws things up worse. Pushes it into the sand. Yeah, but the beach looks clean, at least. Right. And they've been doing that. They did that in Alaska, and I don't know if they have plans to do it in Louisiana or not, but it's going to be bad either way. The other thing you pointed out, which I thought was interesting because I had this thought, too, that all this just the cleanup act itself would probably be really bad for the wildlife. And you said that they use sort of like scarecrows and dummies and balloons to scare off animals that are near these boats that are trying to contain and clean up. Yeah, like, get out of here, we're coming through to try and help. Yeah. And again, another when you mentioned just leaving it, that's a viable option. Right. One of the reasons why is because within about 24 to 48 hours, most of the volatile organic compounds found in oil, the most toxic stuff evaporates. True. So when you have an oil spill, it loses its most toxicity within two days, which is good. It is good. But the problem is, with the spill like we have now, any oil that's losing its most toxic aspects are being replaced by new oil constantly. Right. So it's a big problem that's going on. I mean, you can just look at the underwater camera feed and tell it's a big problem, but once you have a few more of the facts, it's really big problem. Yeah. Actually, today is Thursday, May th, 27th, and I've been clicking literally by the minute to see if this topkill thing is where there would be latest effort to stop this five week old underwater geyser is working. And initial reports, I mean, this will clearly be known by Tuesday when this comes out, but they're saying, oh, we think it might be working, even though, like, shooting mud and cement down in there sound sort of weird. It might be working. And our big thing that we lowered down on top of the path yeah. That didn't work too good. And the idea to shoot golf balls into it didn't work too good. Junk shot. They don't even say work too well. Working good. Yeah. The top shot. Junk shot. Top kill. Junk shot. Top hat. Top hat. Top kill. Junk shot. Big mess. Yeah. That's what it equals, buddy. Yeah. If you want to know more about cleaning up oil spills, you can read my article on it. Yes, there's also articles on offshore drilling and oil spills, not just clean up. Right. So we should probably cover those at some point, too. So just type in oil Spill Drilling offshore. There you go. And the Handy search bar houseworks.com. Right, right. And since I had said handy search bar, it seems like that should trigger something it would normally trigger listener mail. Josh, what's going on? Well, this week we have a couple of thank yous quickly and then our New York announcements. So everyone knows where to meet up in New York. Quickly, though, I want to thank Steveclaytoncom. They do custom guitar picks. Brian, there's a fan of the show. He wrote in and said, dude, you're in a band. Your old man band cover band, El Cheapo. Do you want some custom guitar picks? You can design it. And I was like, yeah, let me think about that for a second. Yes. So I designed my little El Cheapo guitar pick, and they're pretty cool. It's way cool. And he sent me a huge bag of these things. And so I just wanted to say thank you to Steveclayton.com. And they're, like, big time. They do like the Foo Fighters and Tenacious D. Oh, yeah. And now El Ga was on their roster. That's really sweet. Are you on the website? Is your design on the website? Because I thought and it was very cool. No, it is actually going to be on the website at some point. Okay. So thanks to Brian, and thank you to Jacob Storm Deathridge, who they do these cool journals made from old library books. They'll take the front and back, cover an old library book, and bind it with some of the first few pages, and then the rest of it is blank, journal style. And they sent us some of these, and that was really nice. And they're at www.bookjournals.com out of Portland, Oregon. Super creative. Yeah. Very cool. Thank you to both of those guys. Right? Well, thanks to one for me. Thanks to two from Chuck. Yes. And Chuck, right? Yeah. New York City. Look out, New York City. We're coming to New York June 7. We are having a happy hour at the Knitting Factory. Yes. We'll be wearing nothing but chaps from 530 to 730. After that, we're going to put on our shirts and everything. And we are having a trivia night, a bar trivia night at the Bellhouse in Brooklyn on Wednesday, June 9. Doors open at 630. Coming. Rob Elbows trivia goes from seven to nine. You can challenge the All Star team consisting of me and Josh Joe Randazzo, editor of The Onion newspaper, and two or three unannounced mystery celebrity guests that will be on our team, unannounced and uncommitted. So the idea is you come and you challenge us. If you think you're smart, you get a trivia team together for Wednesday night, and we will smack you down in the name of smarts and how stuff works and our egos. Yes. So there's all that and then the Coed plug. Oh, yeah. Go ahead and hit that one. Well, as you may have heard, if you listen to the Guatemala podcast, part Uno and part Dos, we are raising some money, as we do from time to time, for noble causes like Coed Cooperative for Education, which provides textbooks and computer centers in a very sustainable manner very cool. To schools in need in Guatemala, which you could just say schools in Guatemala. And you can donate $5 by typing stuff. When you send a text to 20222, you're going to get a text back asking you if you're sure you text back. Yes. And you just donated $5 to Coed. If you want to learn more about Coed, or you live outside of the United states, you can go onto their website@www.coeduc Coeduc.org. If you live outside the US. You can donate there. If you live inside the US. But you need a little more incentive, go look at their website and see the work they do. And I'll bet you still donate the $5 afterward. Agreed? Yeah. And if you want to send us an email, shoot it to stuffpodcast@howstepworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetofworks.com. Want more housetofworks? Check out our blog on the Houseofworks.com homepage. Brought to you by The Reinvented thousand and twelve. Camry, it's ready. Are you."
https://podcasts.howstuf…al-selection.mp3	How Natural Selection Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-natural-selection-works	While evolution gets all the spotlight for moving species into better versions of themselves, but really it's natural selection that is the engine driving the process. Learn all about this elegant scientific observation that forms the basis of life.	While evolution gets all the spotlight for moving species into better versions of themselves, but really it's natural selection that is the engine driving the process. Learn all about this elegant scientific observation that forms the basis of life.	Thu, 10 Apr 2014 15:46:43 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2014, tm_mon=4, tm_mday=10, tm_hour=15, tm_min=46, tm_sec=43, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=100, tm_isdst=0)	53874181	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W, chuck Bryant, and there's Noel, which makes this a very special edition of stuff you should know. Now, hairier than Jerry. Yeah. Edition. Much hairier. No. Let's see your hair. Man. That has a lot of hair. Hair suit. He's like the original Kings of Leon all wrapped up in one. I used to love those guys back when they were like Tennessee Hillbillies, and then they got their Glam makeover, and I was like, well, that's like Metallica after the Black Album. Yeah. What happened? What happened? Metallica, Lars. I think they enjoyed making loads of money. Truckloads of money. More than being, like, heavy metal parking lot guys. Yeah, exactly. Hey, Chuck, before we get started, we want to tell everybody. You can follow us on Twitter at s y Skodcast. You can hang out with us on Facebook. Comsteffyshodo our YouTube Channel search. Josh and Chuck, it's pretty awesome. Yeah. And as always, we have a wonderful website, Stuffyshireknow.com. That's right. You can hang out with us outside of the podcast if you want. If you want. No pressure. So, how are you doing? I'm great. I'm super excited about this topic because, A, we're pairing it with our Charles Darwin show. Yes. Which I guess came out last episode. Right. Aren't we pairing the two? Yeah. I think we're doing Darwin first. Let's do Darwin first, because I think in the Darwin episode, we say we should do natural selection. Here we are. But I'm just excited because to me, and I gushed a little at Darwin's feet, this is my own personal statement. I think natural selection is the most exciting and, like, beautiful thing that exists. It just really turns my crank, you know? You're like an old timey car. Yeah. This is, again, my personal story. I grew up in church, as most listeners now, which was heavy doses of the creation story. And I remember as a kid, even fully involved in church, thinking, this doesn't make sense to me. It didn't add up. So natural selection, it just makes sense to you? Yeah. When I finally learned about natural selection, like, really understood it and learned it, it made total sense because I can see it. It was tangible. I could make sense of it. And again, that's my own story. We don't poopoo anyone. Oh, no. Or saying anyone should feel anyway. We just explain how things work. Exactly. But I have a personal attachment to this just because I think it's like the grooviest thing going. Yeah, I know what you mean. Like, it makes utter, incomplete sense. It's almost incapable of being appropriated to serve some agenda. It just is what it is. Right. It's just there. It's beautiful. I agree with you entirely. It's an elegant theory. It's super neat. Yeah. And the wonderful thing is, there's even squabbles in the scientific community over exactly how evolution works and processes and regardless, everyone's still like, yes, natural selection pretty much perfect. Yeah. It just makes sense. I'm going to have a T shirt. Natural selection. It just makes sense. Yeah. I have a feeling we'll be getting an email or something like that eventually. Good. So let's talk about natural selection. I think a lot of people, including myself, kind of had an idea of what it was. Pretty good idea, but not necessarily understanding the ins and outs of it. Well, that's what we're here for, is to explain the ins and outs of natural selection. Yes, sir. So basically, a lot of people interchange evolution and natural selection. Right. That's incorrect. Evolution is this huge process by which species adapt and change to survive in their environments. And the way that that moves along the mechanism that drives that is natural selection. So they're not one in the same. Natural selection drives evolution. Yeah. And who wrote this one was this Grabanowski The grabster, I Should Have known. Just very simply puts it very early on the article. Organisms best suited to survive in their particular circumstance have a greater chance of passing their traits on to the next generation. That's right. It just makes sense. Exactly. I'm going to try not to say that every ten minutes, but just know that that's going on in my head. Yeah. Do you want that on the T shirt? Sure. And natural selection is like it's this ongoing, basically never ending process, even when organisms really kind of seemingly stopped developing. Yeah. Like they figured it out. Yeah. But it doesn't have its own sentence, it isn't its own thing. Like, you can't attribute it to some sort of creator or creation, necessarily, unless you believe that kind of thing, but it's very easy to give it a personality. But it's not. It's the byproduct of how organisms exist and we exist by our genes and by the fact that those genes change frequently within the lifetime of a person, thanks to what we understand now, is epigenetics, but also through reproduction, these moments, these periods where genes are up for a change, they can completely or even just partially change part of an organism. And that change may or may not help the organism survive in the environment, like you just quoted grabbing Aki. And if it does, bam. Natural selection will root that out and it will propagate that. Yeah. And it also points out, Darwin, he did coin the term natural selection and survival of the fittest. And I do think that many people hear survival of the fittest and they think of the lion eating the gazelle. Right. But it's also, like he says, the tree that can disperse its seed where it needs to for those seeds to grow, or the bacteria that survives. It's not animal eating animal, although it can. Right. And so, since we're on a chuck, fitness is basically, like you say, a tree's ability to spread seeds and for those seeds to take root. Because, as Grabster points out, it's not enough for a tree to produce a bunch of seeds, which is its ability to reproduce. Yeah. And its ability to survive long enough to even get to the point to it where it reproduces. Right. That's step one is to live long enough to be able to reproduce. Yes. Step two, or the second part of it, is that reproduction is as successful as it possibly can be. Yeah. Like I said, not only do you have to do it, you got to do it well. So that tree that spreads tons and tons of seeds, if those seeds happen to catch fire and sunlight, it's not going to be a very good trait. But if they have, like, a really hard husk that can survive the elements, but then disintegrates when it's digested by a raccoon and then pooped out right. Yeah. Then all of a sudden you've got that step two covered. Yeah. Or if it's just dumb luck, if that tree exists in a place where it's super windy and can disperse the seeds better, then it will propagate. If not, then you may not even know that that tree existed. Exactly. Unless you consult the fossil record. That's right. Okay. So I guess the whole point to natural selection is that it is an agent of change, but it's also a byproduct of change, and we kind of have to take a step backward to figure out where this change is happening. I already said it a little bit, but it's in our DNA. It's in the DNA of all living things to change. Yeah. Well, traits. We're all born with traits, and we inherit those traits from who made us our folks. But that's not necessarily fairly natural selection at work over one generation to the next. Right. There can be differences in traits. Like, Darwin is will See points that out himself. He's like, let's just get it out of the way. Just because you have brown eyes and somebody else has blue eyes, that's not evolution. No. He uses a good example here of tall versus short folks. Tall people might be basketball players, people might be jockeys. Right. This is. The grabs are not Darwin. Yeah. Did they have basketball? When was that invented? When did naysmith invent basketball? I want to say 1848, but it's probably 1870. Not too far off. So he makes the point that if something happened to where, like, jockeys could reproduce better or basketball players could not reproduce anymore yes. I was trying to imagine what happened. Didn't make up anything. I know. I was trying to, and I couldn't come up with it. Well, just make up something like being able to dribble and dunk lowers your sperm count. Oh, that's a good one. I think my brain was in understand natural selection mode, so my imagination grew less fertile. Yeah. It didn't survive. No, it didn't. And over time. Basically, basketball players don't reproduce as much jockeys do, and over several generations, people are going to be shorter on average. Right. It sounds almost dumb, it's so simple, but that's really the basis of it. It is. And it's one of those things, it's like economics, where it's so simple that it's hard to wrap your mind around it because you make it more complex necessarily than it is. Sure. It's very similar for me. And with that basketball example, what just happened was humanity evolved to be shorter. That was the end result. And that evolution took place because there was a shift in the distribution of traits. So before lots of basketball players, lots of jockeys, tallness and shortness, which are traits or variations on the trait of height. Right. In humans, like, we have height. We're not two dimensional. Inherited by who bore you. Right. Not us, your parents. Yes. We bore you in a different way. So the variations on that tree eventually gave rise to evolution. So within just our generation, or even a couple of generations, the differences in eye color, height or something like that doesn't represent evolution. Right. But changes like that can lead to evolution over time. Yeah. If there are changes, that either aid or prevent your survival. Right. Like if something happens and all of a sudden human women were all like, we're not going to mate with anybody but blue eyes. You can bet your bippy that within two generations there's going to be nothing but blue eyed kids. Yeah. Or grown adults getting blue contacts. That's a good idea. Because they're tired of not having sex. But then maybe our eyes would adapt to the context and just absorb them. Something has to happen. Your imagination is plenty fertile, my friend. I guess so. And this all goes back if we can go back a little further to something called DNA. That is a chemical structure that is the basis for everything. That is, yes. Is that a good way to say it? It is. And within DNA are sequences of sets of traits, and those are the genes. And then there's something called the ll, which is really where it all comes together. Is it ll or allele? Does it say ll? Adele? No, adele de zine. Allele. Okay. Yeah, it's allele. So it's like a gene is like a specific sequence of DNA that produces some trait. So height, like, you have a height gene? Yes. And when that gene is working, you will grow. Yeah. The expression of the gene is the allele. Yeah. That's the variation of that trait. So imagine just a stretch of genes. It's like a few boxes, say five of them, and three are off the three that will encode to make brown eyes, and two are on the two that will encode to make blue eyes. So each one is an allele, but the one that's functioning gives you blue eyes. So an allele is just a variation on a trait. And a trait is produced by a gene, which is a sequence of DNA. Yeah. That variation is produced by an allele, which is a sequence of the gene. Yeah. And how often that allele shows up in a population is the allele frequency. And it's really simple. You hear allele frequency and it sounds like, oh, that's science, but it's really pretty easy. That's what they go to school for. So learning the jargon. Yeah. And we did a really good episode on population and we're going to be talking about it here again, though. So we should just say that a population is a group in one place that had sex with each other. Yeah. So like a zebra in Africa, he should have used real examples because he said, let's say there were zebras in South America. But I see his point. That would be a different population because they can't have sex with the zebras in Africa because zebras can't swim across the ocean. Right. And a lion in Africa is in a different population than a zebra in Africa because they don't do it right. They can't it's an abomination. You come up with a Zion, it'd be kind of cool. That'd be sort of like a tiger, probably. Maybe that's what a tiger is. We just figured it out. So you were talking about populations. Yeah. And allele frequency. So you could conceivably quantify the allele frequency of blue eyes in the human population. Because we transcended, like the difference between Africa and South America. We have planes now. Sure. So we all have access to sex with one another as a population. As long as you have a passport and some money for a plane ticket. Yeah. So speaking about allele frequency, the point of that whole thing is that with evolution, I guess another way to put it, the way that Grabster puts it is evolution is just a shift or a change in allele frequency. Yeah. And the reason that that change takes place is because those alleles that become more and more widespread and distributed across the population have made that organism more likely to survive to reproduce and more likely to successfully reproduce. Yeah. That's it. That's evolution driven by natural selection. Do you want to quit? I don't think we could top this point. Now it does get more interesting. Alleles create are created in a few different ways. One is called a mutation, which you've probably heard of. These are random changes. They are pretty rare. Like X Men. Yeah, very rare. Very rare. Mutants are that's why they got to hang out with the president a lot. Yes. But the president was also a mutant, wouldn't he? Oh, yeah. Eventually. Kelsey Grammar no, the President was the guy with his son with the wings. I thought Kelsey Grammar, maybe his son was mutant. And the president yeah, the President son. But I think Kelsey Grammar eventually was elected president. Blue president. Oh, really? Blue harry president so, to me, the cool thing about mutations is they can be completely new traits that are introduced that are completely different than anything you've ever seen in that species. It's pretty radical. Yeah. Another way is just like we've been talking about sex a lot, reproduction just with animals, humans. That is the way that allele can express itself. Right. It's the mixing together when your mom and your dad love each other very much, and they copy their sperm and egg mix together, break down their DNA in this glorious, fantastic little mini explosion inside the womb, and then it recombines into a totally new form that shares part of the dad's DNA and part of the mom's DNA to make a new human. Yeah. And you get all the bad traits from each of them, right. Hopefully, you get all the best traits. Yeah. But that's the point of sexual reproduction, which was itself naturally selected, because it increases the potential that you're going to inherit good traits that will let you survive that's. Right. There's just more traits out there. I think it was the sense of smell episode we did where we talked about pheromones, the idea that pheromones among humans, we can still detect them even though we don't know it. And the whole reason we can is to smell out other people's immune system. Yeah. And we want somebody with an opposite immune system of ours. So when you put the two together, it produces a little mini superhuman who can't be killed. There was an interesting study, I think, where they just had people smelling things, engaging attraction levels. Right. But it's based on the premise of sexual reproduction, which is combining as many good traits as possible. It makes somebody with a lot of them a lot of good traits. And then the final way that alleles are created is genetic recombination. And that would be in the case of, like, a bacteria who obviously don't go out and have sex with each other, but they do absorb DNA that they get from other bacteria and basically make it part of them themselves. Yeah. I think that's where the eukaryotes came from. Oh, really? Yes. The mitochondria was its own thing, and it became absorbed by some ancient cell to serve as, like, the power center of the cell. And from that gave rise to everything with the backbone, everything that's not a bacteria, basically. So fish at first, I guess. Yeah. But eventually it all just came to that, and it's still going on today. Wow. Just two organisms in one. That's neat. Yes, that's super neat. And then one other thing. There are three ways that this could happen, that new alleles could be introduced. But I wonder if epigenetics will eventually be added to that, you think, over time. Yeah, because think about it. I mean, it's a change in gene expression, right? So yeah, I could see that leading to, like, guess it could be classified as a spontaneous mutation. I guess it would fall under that umbrella. Yeah. But so much leads up to it. I don't know. I'm with you. What's out of fourth? Okay. Epigenetics is officially added as a change to alleles. I'm sure we'll get an email from someone that's super smart. They'll explain exactly why that won't happen. First of all, Chuck was right. It's allale. So, Chuck, we said that all of this starts at DNA and the fact that it changes. Yeah. We actually should go back even further than that, into the backdrop of nature, the environment. The reason that DNA changes, that traits change over time, is because of a little thing called death. Yeah. We all die and how to avoid it. Exactly. It's the combination of those two things. We're all going to die. And all organisms appear to be driven by a desire to put off that moment as long as possible. So we have an instinct to survive, right? Yeah. The problem is the processes of nature are trying to put us down all the time. So there is an inherent struggle to survive. So when you combine our desire to live with nature trying to kill us all the time, it forms that struggle. The struggle to survive gives rise to the changes in genes, which eventually are selected and convert to evolution. So it all begins with the struggle to survive and the desire to survive. Right. And this is spelled out by Darwin himself. Yeah. Should we read some of his quotes? Yeah, these are from The Origin of the Species, which, if you just listen to the Charles Darwin, you know, that was his most famous work that he put up, one of many. But that's his war and peace. Yeah. His close second was My Travels with Timmy about his pet rabbit. And he going around the county bothering neighbors. So here are a few of the basic tenants on The Origin of the Species and with some quotes from Darwin himself. One is the organism show variation of traits. Yeah, that's him just getting it out of the way. Like, don't be dumb. If you think that your dad's blue eyes and your brown eyes are evolution, you're wrong. Okay. I like that better than his quote, actually. Let's do that. Let's do Josh's take on his quote. I'll do what I can. All right. Number two is more organisms are born that could ever possibly be supported by the resources here on the planet. That's right. Stop being such an idiot. There's such a thing as scarcity. Don't you know that? Man, this is great. I feel the birth of a new podcast coming. Number three. Therefore, in conclusion, all organisms must struggle to live. You already kind of covered that. Okay. Number four, some traits offer advantages in the struggle. That's right. Those are mutations. And as Josh will eventually predict, epigenetics. Not always mutations, though. Right. Changes to alleles sure organisms that have those traits, the ones that will help you survive, are more likely to be successful and reproduce and pass them on. That's fitness. And then finally, successful variations, the ones that we've just talked about, that allow you to survive and reproduce more, they accumulate over the years and the generations as they are exposed to something we'll talk about in a minute called population pressure. Right. And he points out, too, that this is essentially specific and local. Like, if humans had a trait where you cooled extremely easily all the time under all conditions, it wouldn't play very well when you moved to the northern latitudes. Right. You die. So it would be selected out of populations in the northern latitudes. But if you lived in the tropics, it would probably be selected and propagated over time because you probably have a lot more energy. You wouldn't just be laying around fanning yourself with palm fronds. Well, you do that too. You wouldn't need to, though. Yeah, but it's a nice experience. So I mentioned population pressure, and that's a key here to understanding this whole bowl of soup. And we'll talk about that right after this message. All right, so here we are in the stew. I called it soup. It's really a stew of evolution and natural selection. Okay. So we need to talk about population pressure, which is basically anything in a population that makes it tough for your species, are you, as an individual plant or animal to survive it? Yeah. Again, because there's such thing as scarcity. That means you compete with people in your species or people outside of your species. Right. Like a lion wants to eat you. Yeah. It's always going on. Yes. And then even if you lived in total harmony with all the plants and animals around you and vice versa, nature is still shooting lightning bolts at you. Yes. Floods, droughts, famine, all that stuff. There is always, as Darwin put it, like every organism struggles to survive one way or another. Yeah. And that can really speed things up as far as allele frequency change. Like, if you flooded out an entire country, you're going to see some big changes within a generation or two. It's not necessarily over hundreds of years. That's right. And that's because when you have something especially like a flood or drought or just some severe sudden increase in population pressure, it goes from just background population pressure to something very acute and pronounced. A lot of the population dies off. Yeah. Like, his example is pretty great, actually, about the fire. Let's say a fire killed all the vegetation under 15ft and a population of giraffes, anything under 15ft is going to have a hard time reaching food, and so they're going to start reproducing and making taller giraffes pretty much as fast as they can. Right. The ones that can't reach food will die off a lot of them, before they can reproduce. The ones that can reach food, will live to reproduce, which will produce those taller giraffes. And what just happened then in that giraffe example is called a population bottleneck. Something happened that took a large population, reduced it down to a smaller amount, and then usually in that smaller group, there's going to be some traits or whatever that used to be evenly distributed among the population that are now really concentrated and clustered. It could be something super rare. That is now the trade. Right, exactly. So if you have a super rare trait spread out very evenly among a large population, that trait may or may not ever be selected. And if it is selected, it may take a very long time to be selected because there's so many other competing traits. Yeah. Well, when a lot of those other competing traits are weeded out and you have that population bottlenecked, those traits are going to be very pronounced and they're going to be selected very quickly. So you have a very quick change in evolution as a result of sudden acute population bottle bank. Yeah. It basically becomes the norm. So in that area of where the fire ended up killing shorter giraffes, the norm will now be super tall giraffes. Exactly. And don't say Chuck. All giraffes are super tall. Super, super tall. Super, super tall. And this apparently happened to humans. There was a population bottleneck, supposedly around 700 years ago, there was something called the Toba eruption. Huge supervolcano created like a six to ten year long winter and dropped the number of humans, Homo sapiens, down to something as low as possibly 3000 people wow. Yeah. On the whole planet. Well, and they're not quite sure what variations were selected out of that, but you can bet there was an enormous change within 20, 30, 40 years of that event. Well, I wonder what it was like before that. Right. It's pretty interesting. So let's say the giraffes, like everything was hunky dory. No fires, no nothing. But just some of them decided that they wanted to see if there really are no such thing as zebras in South America. So they hop on a boat and they sail to South America and they establish a new little giraffe colony there. What will result from that is called the Founder Effect. And there is a ban, by the way, I already looked. No. Yes. I thought it's got to be one. And it is. And I listen to their song. How is it? It was pretty good. What kind of music? Sort of indie giraffe shoegaze. Okay. Not bad. Cool. So anyway yeah, founder Effect is when you quite literally when a population founds a new area and don't have sex with that other population anymore. Right. So you can have very different traits, even if it's a giraffe from the ones in Africa, because they set up camp in a new place. Right. And it's almost like an unforced bottleneck. Yeah. Voluntary bottleneck. Yeah. Nature didn't kill off a bunch of the population. The population just broke off from a larger group to a smaller group. And that smaller group is probably going to have some weird trader, too, that are going to be selected and push evolution along faster than usual. Yeah. All right, let's talk about this then. Okay. Let me pose a question to you, sir, that I know the answer to. What about things that don't evolve anymore, buddy? What about, like, the shark that's been about the same for millions of years? Show me your natural selection there. I got this. Okay. So sharks are a great example. Yeah. Because they haven't changed in millions of years. Because they don't need to. Well, because basically, they became apex predators a long time ago in their environments, and their environments went unchanged enough so that sharks didn't need to change, basically, as far as natural selection goes, perfect. Yeah. They early on figured it out. It's like, all right, my teeth are great, my gills are working. I can send electrical impulses from, I can swim super fast. I can kill everything I see. As long as something doesn't punch me in the nose, I'm pretty much good. Yeah. Or kill me for my shark fin. Well, yeah, it makes you wonder how sharks are going to evolve now. Yeah, that's a good point, but let's say prehuman fishing. So 200 years ago, from several million, maybe ten, I don't remember how long sharks have been around virtually unchanged. A long time. Yeah. So let's say from millions and millions and millions and millions and millions and millions and millions of years ago, up to 200 years ago, sharks are virtually unchanged because they hit their peak and they're fine. But that doesn't mean that they have gone unchanged, that natural selection hasn't exerted an effect on them. Basically what happens is they're still undergoing mutations through reproduction. There's new alleles showing up, but none of them can hold a candle to the perfection that's been achieved by the shark. So they get selected out. They don't get a chance to reproduce in the population or become distributed amongst the population. So you still have natural selection weeding out. But rather than changing the shark population or the shark species family, you have natural selection as an agent of stability. Yeah. Or I guess let's do a hypothetical. If we were going to use shark finning as an example, let's say only sharks with perfectly triangular gray fins were selected out to be fed and cut off for shark fin soup. So that means sharks that have weird spots on their fence would not get killed. So theoretically, hypothetically, over generations, we might see sharks with only spotted fins, and that probably will happen because of the sudden and acute population pressure being exerted on sharks by humans. There has to be some sort of forced adaptation that's going to occur. Yes. I don't know what the criteria for. A good fit, though, is or if they just take them all, like, whatever they can catch. Right, but it could be as simple as something like figuring out that just swimming deeper and not coming up within the humans grass. Yes, we should say that it's a really good point. A trait isn't necessarily something that is visibly apparent, like height or something like that. It can be an ability or a proclivity. Like, Grabster uses the example of dogs have evolved, the trait of hanging out with humans. And Chuck, tell them about the elephants, because that's a pretty good example of what we're talking about. Sharks. Yeah. Well, elephants, as we know, are killed many times for their ivory tusks, and it's a good news bad news scenario. You would think, hey, good news, there are some elephants that were being born without tusks at all, so they're not being hunted. And over the years now, it went from like two or 3% 1% close to 40% now are not born with tusks. Right. So you think that's awesome because now they're not being hunted, but they need those tusks for digging and defense and things like that. So they're losing a valuable trait, which is going to put stress on the population as a whole, I would think, over time. But in the near term, it's been selected out because it's keeping the elephants alive, because the ones that were naturally without tusks weren't being killed by poachers, so they were allowed to reproduce more frequently than ones with tusks that were being killed. So yeah, within a human lifetime, within 70 years or so, the population has evolved. Yes, that's what I mean by like you can see it happening in front of us. Right. And this is where the debate comes from where I was saying, like, scientists even debate on how evolution changes or happens. And there's basically the difference between gradualism or punctuated equilibrium. And gradualism is just, over time, very slowly, new alleles appear, and some of them tend to make organisms fitter, and so they'll eventually, over very long stretches of time, be selected out. And then punctuated equilibrium is like we were talking about with the African elephants, where there's a sudden population pressure, and all of a sudden this organism or species is forced to evolve, and they do. And then after that, everything evens out for a little while and stays the same until the next catastrophic event. Yeah, this is there's an ongoing debate about that. Can't they both exist? I don't understand why they don't both exist. It seems like one is just constant background evolution, and the other one is evolution as a result of sudden, acute crises. Why wouldn't they both I don't know. I don't understand it either. I have to look into that. Okay, Chuck, so let's go a little further, and I guess we'll go back to jeans. But remember, you know a guy named Richard Dawkins, right? Yeah. He wrote a book in the 70s called The Selfish Gene, and basically we were talking about the debate between gradualism and equilibrium, punctuated equilibrium. Well, Dawkins came along and said, you guys shut up for a little bit. Let's talk about this. The selfish gene and he just basically reframed the entire way that people look at evolution. Yeah, I think it's pretty interesting. The essence of it is that as long as you reproduce, then natural selection doesn't care about you after that. Right after you've passed on your jeans. That's the important part in the case of spiders, is one great example. Sometimes the male gets eaten right afterward. Yeah, we're like praying manuses. Didn't the female eat the male's head? Do they, like, bite the male's head off? And we're talking about praying manuses. So it's okay to say female in that case, though? Both those cases. Natural selection doesn't care. The male has done his job. He has propagated and passed down the allele. And it doesn't matter if he dies or not right afterward. It doesn't put any stress on the population. No, that was a tricky thing before Dawkins came along. It was like, wait a minute. There's a real problem with natural selection. If the whole point is for something to be able to reproduce and reproduce successfully, why would there be adaptations that kills its own? Yeah. Where, like, the organism is killed as a result of reproduction. That doesn't make any sense. And dolphins came along and said, it does make sense if you stop looking at organism and start looking at the genes. Yeah. Basically, none of that matters. Right. So he made his point so well that it actually got a little bit out of hand. And it came to be known as well, it was the selfish Gene before, but basically he characterized it so well that it became a character. Genes became a character almost like they had hijacked organisms and we're using them as husks to pass along themselves, like a virus or something like that. And Dawkins came out a number of times and is like, no, that's the wrong interpretation. It's not what I mean. But it's still essentially the same thing. We're just vessels. Yeah, we are. We are a means of passing along our genes. And if you look at it through the lens of natural selection, as long as the genes are able to be passed along, the vessel is no longer necessary. So therefore the head can be bitten off by the woman. That's right. But like we said, this isn't widespread. But it does help explain things like spiders. Right. But there's a big flaw in this selfish gene theory. Right. Well, in Dawkins theories as a whole. Right. The flaw is that there's such a thing as altruism. Yes. And this is humans and animals that for no reasons based on natural selection, desire to help each other. It doesn't benefit you in the least at all. No. As a matter of fact, it can harm you before you're able to reproduce. So even from the genetic level of the selfish gene, it doesn't make any sense, because the genes are allowing the organism to be harmed before it could possibly reproduce. Why does someone have an instinct to jump in an icy river to save somebody? Right. And they have found that it is instinctual and that it happens in infants with, like, zero cultural training. It's like part of us. Yeah. And it's not just humans either. There are plenty of animals that display altruism as well, like meerkats are big on altruism. Yeah. And I like the explanation it makes, again, total sense to me something called kinship. If you've got a couple of different families, tuktuk's family and Bartok's family. Well, Bartok was a composer, but what's another good caveman name? Mongo. Yeah, that's a great one. So Mango's family is very selfish. They don't like to share their stuff. They're all competing for the same food. Right. Took family is very generous. They like to share things. So over time, they will be a more successful family, because they have been altruistic and shown that kinship. And they're improving their chances of success by combining their efforts into a group effort. Right. Which is kind of like that Paleolithic Warlessness we talked about in the cave dwellers episode, where everybody just kind of figured out that they could be more successful if they stopped fighting and started harvesting together. Yeah. And if you kind of look at it like that, like, everybody coming together as a group for a common goal, you're also looking at superorganisms. Yeah. Have we done one on ants specifically? No, I think we should. I agree, because they are about the best example of a superorganism. It's basically the little worker ants aren't doing the reproducing. They can't even reproduce. That goes to the top dogs. They only get to do that. So all those little worker ants aren't even passing on their genes, but they're still busting their little ant butts for the colony. Yeah. And a superorganism basically then, is to step back and say, let's not look at ants, but let's look at the ant colony as an organism. As one organism. And that explains the altruism in that ant sacrificing its own ability to pass along its genes in order to serve the colony as a whole. Then it makes sense. Like, papa ant is going to pass down the genes. I just need to make sure papa ant has food and water. Right. And you can also use that same argument to explain why, like, it would make sense if you jumped in to save your son from a river. That kinship explains that. But why would you jump into save someone else's son? Well, if you look at it like this kid is part of the same species and shares a lot of the same genes as you, you're ensuring that your species genes are passed along. Yeah, and you get to humble brag on Facebook. Yeah, I'll bet. Big time. Oh, pretty boring day. Just save the kid from the river and the icy river. No biggie. Just helped ensure his genes get passed along. I guess a humble brag, though would be well, it looks like my shoes are ruined that I just bought. Jumped into an icy river and saved a kid. Yeah, that would be good. We can start doing fake combo bags on Twitter, facebook. This brand new BMW I got has the windshield wipers are busted. Not a day for it. It's raining. That's just being a jerk. Okay. All right. So now we should talk about something that also excites me. Vestigial and atavistic traits. All organisms carry some trait that is really no benefit and really is no longer expressing itself as a means to help you survive. But it's not harming you either. So it hasn't been selected out. So it's just there. Yeah. And I've got some pretty good examples in the human body. One, some are behavioral, some are actual organs, like the appendix. Many people think the appendix is a vestigial organ. I heard that it might fight cancer. Well, now scientists are starting to say we think it might fight cancer or it might house like bacteria that helps you aid in digestion. So everybody who's a panicked, we took out. Get in line, we're going to put them back in. But for many years, and I think the debate is still out, whether or not it is a remnant from primate ancestors. When we had to digest like plants, like super rich in cellulose or something. Yeah, got you. But we don't anymore. So that's why the appendix really does nothing. Back when we were giant termite men, that was a scary time. Sinuses. That was what we were like on the other side of the population. Bottleneck giant termite people. Sinuses supposedly may it's also debated, but there are pockets of air in your face and no one really knows if they serve any kind of biological function or not. Yes, and they kind of suck too, because they get infected. They can get infected. The coccyx is pretty exciting because it's a tailbone that used to be a tail. And some people are still born with them. And the people who are born with tales are atavism. It's a vestigial remnant that expresses itself very closely to the way it actually used to be. It's not just a trace of it any longer. It's like that allele saying, hey, maybe we should go back to tails again. What do you think? Yeah, just so you don't picture like a human with a big four foot long monkey tail, it's usually like a bump or something. Didn't George Castanza have a tail? And what was that one? Jack black Farrelly brothersman. Oh, yeah, shallow hal. Yes, I think you're right. And you could wag it. I don't remember that. What else? Here's the behavior of this digital behavior. The Palmer grasp reflex. Oh, yeah. I thought, this is cool. It's pretty neat. When you go up to a little stinky, dirty human baby and you put your finger in their hand or their foot even, it's going to grab it like super hard and super strong. Yeah, like Popeye, basically. Or like a little baby monkey trying to hang on to mama cruising through the jungle through grabbing onto the coat. Their mom's coat. Yeah. So basically, that's the behavior. They think a human baby now doesn't need to grasp hold of something that hard at six weeks old. Yeah. So it's a behavior. Maybe we play tennis thanks to a vestigial behavior and ability. Oh, got it. Being able to grip that racket. Yeah. What article is this from? Was it? IO. Nine OD. Yes, I think so. I o nine. It was kind of silly, but these are some pretty decent examples. Yeah. We've talked about male nipples before. Yeah, we did. We did a whole episode on it. Goosebumps, the erector pilly. I've never heard of this. Oh, I did a Dumpy dumb on it. Yeah. You want to explain what it is real quick? No, you go ahead. Okay. Everyone has had goosebumps. The erector pyley are those muscle fibers that give you goosebumps when you don't even necessarily want them or need them. Right. There's little muscles that are attached to your hair follicles, whether you have hair there or not any longer. And they press it up so that your hair stands on end, either to make yourself look bigger so you're scary, or because you're cold to make your coat fluff out. As in when we used to have coats because we were animals. Another vestigial trait, and my favorite one, aside from tonsils, is the pica semilunaris. Did you like how you asked me if I wanted to do it? And I was like, no. And then I did it anyway? Yeah, I knew that was coming. If you look in your mirror and you look at your eyeball, and you look in the little inside corner of your eyeball, you're going to see a little fold of tissue. And it's not the little bump, but it's that little thing in the inside corner of your eye that is a remnant of a third eyelid. What's it called? What kind of eyelid? The plica or plica semilunaris. And apparently we had third eyelids that were clear, so you could wash your eye and still keep an eye out for predators. Right. And they would come from the sides rather than up and down. They moved horizontally. Exactly. Yeah. Like a snake or a reptile. Yeah. Or a bird. They still have them. We do not. But we still have that in the corner of our eye, even though it does nothing. So here's the thing. We have the genes then to make that yeah. If we needed it again, so that allele could possibly come back. Like, we could have people who were born with that, and if it ended up helping us, like, if we could sleep with our eyes open to watch the zombie invasion or to watch TV better 24 hours a day. Just the fact that we can wiggle our ears, that's the vestigial trait. There's no reason why we should be able to wiggle our ears. Watch this. I can wiggle mine. Can you do them one at a time? You're wiggling your eyebrows, I'm wiggling my whole face. I know. Can you do them one at a time like that's pretty impressive, actually. Well, that means, like, Yuumi is going bananas right now. That means that maybe Josh's ancestors were a little closer than mine. And as far as monkeys directing their ears to listen out for predators yeah. No, it means I'm less evolved as a human being. I have the ability to move ears so I can hear things that I don't need to anymore. And I'm fairly hairy. So this has been a depressing episode for me in that respect. I didn't want to mention any of that stuff. So, Chuck, we talked about African elephants. You want to give a couple more examples of natural selection in action? The ballworm. Sometimes it happens super fast. In the case of the bullworm, it's happening faster than we can create toxins to kill them. Like, they treat cotton now with no, they genetically engineered it. So cotton produces it itself. Yeah, I guess it's not treating it isn't a way originally treated cotton, but now cotton is growing with this toxin that is supposed to kill bullworms. But enough bullworms were immune to that, that they were the ones that went on to do the most reproducing to eat the cotton. I'm sure that first generation of bulworms were like, I'm so wasted off this cotton, but I'm alive. And then the clovers. Some species of clover have a mutation that made poison cyanide leak from its cells, causing it to be bitter. Therefore it wouldn't be eaten. Isn't that weird? Yeah, just that the clover is like, don't eat me. Yeah. I make cyanide somehow. Yeah. But unfortunately, when the temperature drops below freezing, the cells rupture, releases that cyanide into the plant, and it kills itself. However, in warm climates, that doesn't happen. So what you end up with is clover. In warmer climates, that's completely different structurally cellularly than the one in the colder climate. Yeah, the warmer ones produce cyanide. The ones in the colder climates don't. Same clover. It's very much like that example of the humans that can cool constantly playing well in the tropics, but not north. Pretty cool stuff. Yeah. Man, I love this. Me too. You got anything else? I got nothing else. Let's talk about ourselves a little bit real quick. Really? Yes. What's your sign on the PISCES? I can't wiggle my ears. No humans. Like I was saying, we have jets now. So we're one large population, right? Yeah. That's just one example of how we've essentially taken ourselves out of the evolution game. Even more to the point, we have such a thing as birth control, artificial birth control. We have a lot of different things that we do inadvertently or advertise to adapt, to change ourselves, to change our ability to reproduce, whatever. So I wonder then, are we out of the evolution game already, forever? Will we ever be able to if we're not getting out of the game? Yeah. Is that the case? I know that's the goal of transhumanism is to say, so long, suckers to evolution, and just be totally in charge. But I also wonder, like with birth control. Birth control is an artificial unnatural selection. Yeah. It's artificial blockade to reproducing. Right. Which flies in the face of natural selection. My question is, is natural selection enough of a powerful process that eventually women are going to start evolving? An immunity to birth control? Yeah. Or is human ingenuity so strong that it's like we've got natural selection beaten, it's just gone now. It's done for us. Aside from fires and floods and famines and droughts and all that. But I mean, like on that graduated or gradual background, natural selection. Right. Or have we taken ourselves out of that, I wonder? Or is it enough of a population pressure to have the effect to begin with? Yeah. Just from the fact that there's so many humans that there's scarcity exists. True. So I guess not. I guess we just answered my question. Man, I really didn't think it was going to get answered, but it just did. Wow. We are still under the effects and influence of natural selection. It's a podcast. Miracle bow before natural selection humans. I want to take a second to say hi to all the 6th through 9th grade science classes who are listening to this right now. I assume there's at least one or two. Hi, guys. Hi. Okay, so natural selection, right? Yes. All right. If you want to learn more about natural selection, you can type those words into the search bar athousofworks.com. It will bring up a world class article by the grab sir. And since I said search bar, it means it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this we're curing people of disease. Nice. Hi, guys. And Jerry, you have a very large in a very large way to help cure my six year old niece eva of Lyme disease. For several months, she experienced a series of strange symptoms that didn't seem to relate to one another, including infection, muscle weakness, double vision. After months of testing, her doctors were at a complete loss as to what to do and what was wrong. Because the once cheerful, enthusiastic little girl began to withdraw, she was unable to go to school for periods of time and quit all her beloved after school activities. One day, she said to my sister. Mami, there are two of you. One is up here, one is down there. Which one is the real you? Another alarming and creepy statement was, my legs don't work anymore. Enter Uncle Josh and Uncle Chuck. After listening to the podcast on how tics work, I encourage my sister to have my niece tested for Lyme disease. Despite not having any evidence of being bitten or being in a region known for deer ticks, she was tested and indeed did have Lyme disease. That is awesome. Uncle Josh and Uncle Chuck really saved the day on this one. Ava was in pain, confused, and very afraid because she didn't understand what was happening. None of the doctors suspected Lyme disease, and I never would have pushed for it without or even tested for it in the first place if your podcast hadn't tipped me off to the possibility. That is so cool. This girl owes, like her wellbeing, to us and to the doctors that have helped her to a lesser extent. After the treatment, she's back to her old, happy, studious and energetic self. She's a brilliant young girl and will have a bright future, thanks to you guys having her back and making her full recovery possible. Much love, Michelle Marianne. That's awesome. Thanks for letting us know. That, Michelle. Ava, right? Yeah. That's really neat. Way to go, Ava. Way to beat that. Lyme disease. Stupid ticks. Hate ticks. I even hate the tick episode. That's a great one. We need to do a Lyme disease episode, one that supposedly is very controversial and I've never really looked into it. Okay. I've heard you could make money selling your blood. I don't know if that's true. Okay. You have to do on the black market, though, because they don't pay on the regular market. Got you. It's all like, I'm a do gooder, right? So if you want to get in touch with Chuck and I to let us know how we helped you or a relative out, we love hearing that kind of stuff. Or you can just get in touch to say hi or whatever you want. You can tweet to us at SYSK podcast, hang out at our Happen in Facebook page, Facebook.com stuffychnow. Send us an email to stuffpodcast@discovery.com. Check out our YouTube channel. Look for Josh and Chuck. And as always, join us at our home on the web stuffyoushaneo.com. For more on this and thousands of other top six, visit houseoffworks.com."
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/podcasts.howstuffworks.com/hsw/podcasts/sysk/2017-09-17-sysk-frogs-final.mp3	How Frogs Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-frogs-work	They survived the extinction that wiped out the dinosaurs, but unfortunately frogs seem to be no match for humans and are losing species in droves. This is not good for anyone.	They survived the extinction that wiped out the dinosaurs, but unfortunately frogs seem to be no match for humans and are losing species in droves. This is not good for anyone.	Tue, 19 Sep 2017 15:01:49 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2017, tm_mon=9, tm_mday=19, tm_hour=15, tm_min=1, tm_sec=49, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=262, tm_isdst=0)	48638812	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from howstuffworkscom? Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W. Ribbott and Bryant. There's Jerry Bourke. Budweiser rolling. Oh, man, that's an old callback. The Budweiser frogs. Yes. Man. There were no spuds, McKenzie. I'll tell you that. I know them when they're on their lily pads going, Blazer app. Oh, yeah. I love that guy. Those guys, man, we've seen a lot of ads in our lifetime, haven't we? We've recorded a lot of ads in our lifetime. We have. We've really been contributing to the pile. How are you feeling? I'm feeling great. You're feeling froggy. I'm really sorry. I had no idea this is going to happen. I am feeling froggy. And right off the bat, we should go ahead and thank Tracy TV Wilson, tracy V. Wilson, the Stuff you missed in history class, because this is one of her great animal articles. Yes, she's written the best. She really has. This one doesn't contain the words mouth. What was it? Mouth. Mouth part. Mouth part. That's right. She tried to work it in. It got edited out, I think. So we're talking frogs today, Chuck. I can't believe we haven't talked about them before. I know. I love frogs. I love them, too. And it's sad for us, then, because it turns out that frogs apparently are going extinct at an alarming rate. Entire species just dropping off the face of the Earth. In fact, one species went extinct here in our fair city of Atlanta. Did you know that? Oh, really? Yeah. Last September of 2016. So about a year ago, the very last rab's fringe limbed tree frog died at the Atlanta Botanical Garden. Oh, wow. His name was Tough, and from what I understand, he didn't like to be handled. That was his choice. So he was the last of it. The species was found, I think, in the late eighty s or late ninety s, and we figured out pretty quickly that they were endangered. And the last one that was hurt in the wild was in, I think, 2005, and so they thought Tuffy was the last one. And so a frog species went extinct in Atlanta, and apparently that's just one domino out of many that's going on right now. There was a study from 2015 that concluded 3%, which is about 200 species of frog species, have gone extinct since the 1970s. Right. Which is like, wow, that seems like a lot. Prepare for it to seem like even more. Are you ready for this? Yes. So amphibians and reptiles have really high extinction rates as it is. They apparently have an extinction rate of about 10,000 times other animals. Wow. And frog's extinction rate is higher than most other amphibians and reptiles. So the frogs are going fast. And the reason why it matters, besides the fact that we love frogs, is that they're also known as an indicator species. They're particularly fragile. They're found all over the world, and they seem to be trying to tell us that the Earth is going lopsided as far as the global ecosystem goes. That's sad. Yeah. I remember we talked about those in. Was it charismatic megafauna? Yeah, I guess so. All right, so we might as well get into this. I almost said jump into this, but now I'm hyper aware of bad frog buns. Yeah. Sorry for everything. So Tracy makes a great point here talking about frogs. And if you just said there, what, 3% of different species is 200? So that shows you how many different species there are. Yeah. It's difficult to kind of talk about frogs in one big sweeping way because they differ so much species to species. They can be what is it? The gold frog is less than a centimeter. Right. Then you have goliath frogs that are over a foot. A foot? 32. Lot of them. A lot of them like to be out at night. Some of them are more active in the morning, in the afternoon. Sometimes they live for a couple of years. Sometimes they live well, not many, many years, but several years. Yeah. One of the main things that frogs are known for, which is croaking or riveting, it would seem like that's universal. It's not. There's plenty of species that don't make any noise. Yeah. You think of green or brown. There are pink frogs. Right. All kinds of colors. They're blue frogs. The difference between toads and frogs isn't we might as well just consider one thing, from what I can tell. Right? Yeah. Toads, true. Toads belong to the boof on a day family. Pretty sure there's a better way to say it, but it's a specific family that belongs to the order in Euro, which all frogs belong to the order and Euro. So toads are frogs, but even within that distinction, there are some things that they're like no, that's actually a toad like. Toads tend to have eyes that are lower on its head, more football shaped, whereas a frog has eyes higher up on its head, and they're usually quite round. Right. But there are certain toads that have those kind of eyes, and there are certain frogs that have toad like eyes. So, really, you can't pin frogs down unless you're in science class. Right. Even with their tails. That was great, man, by the way. But even with their tails. Right. So their order, like I just said, anura, means tailless, and it separates them from the other amphibians. The fact that frogs don't have tails across the board. Actually, no, there are two species that have tails. Yeah. They're very vexing. There's a coastal tailed frog and the mountain tailed frog, and I looked them up. They're little tiny tails, and they are the reproductive organs of those species. It's a penis, then I don't understand why they don't just call it like, the penis frog. There actually is a scrotum frog. There's a scrotum frog population at Lake Titicaca. I can't make this up. This is what frogs are here for. It's just to say amazing things. Here's one thing I didn't know, and we're going to be dropping in frogfacts throughout. They molt. I had no idea that frogs can mold. Every two days, they can mold. And they start out by eating their own skin around its mouth. They basically eat the skin around the mouth, then pull the rest of their skin over their head like a dirty T shirt. And then they eat that like a dirty T shirt. Right. Imagine that, man. When you get like a little your lip gets chopped, and you kind of bite it like a little piece and you pull it off. I'm doing that right now. Oh, man. It's a little raw. Yeah. Imagine if that piece is like your whole skin. Yeah. And then you'd be a frog or a toad, either one. I think I'm more down with the toads because frogs are generally the slicker skin. Toads are the ones that kind of have the bumpy, drier skin. And I think they're the ones, like when you pick them up and look at them, they like, stare into your soul right back at you, trying to talk. The toads do. I think so. Am I getting that confused with frogs? I don't know. Have you ever kissed a frog? No, but I would. Under what circumstances? I don't know. A couple of drinks. A frog or a toad. Or would you kiss either one? I would kiss a toad, but then I would be a little just because I love animals and think they all deserve affection, but I would think twice. And we're going to go over this later, but licking a frog for hallucinogenic, good times. Yeah. You might want to think even more than twice. Yeah, I would not want to go down that road. Right. But we'll get to that. I think you can kiss a frog and not necessarily hallucinate. You can. You just have to plant it right on its big old mouth. And if the frog really likes you will be like, here, take my skin. I was going to eat it myself, but you can have it. So the reason why I made that bad but good science joke about pinning frogs down is they are one of the go to animals that you will dissect in school. And the reason why they are one of the go to animals, it's not just because teachers hate frogs or that teachers love frogs, but it's that frogs, they're trying to teach kids about internal organs and not that of a frog. They're trying to teach them about themselves. Because it turns out when you cut open a frog, you might remember this. It's not a circuit board or a series of balloons or golf balls. When you cut open a frog, there are heart and lungs and a stomach and a pancreas and a gallbladder and intestines and a liver. Yeah. Largely connected in a way that's similar to humans. Yeah. Just all packed in that tiny little guy. Yeah. I mean, they're all tiny organs. Very cute. Too appropriately sized. Yeah, they are cute. Remember that smell, though? The formaldehyde the formaldehyde stink of death. And it was not a good smell. It's not good. Beyond just the internal organs. Too, chuck. Like, if you look at a frog skeleton, especially, like its arms, its extremities, it bears a resemblance to a human anatomy as well. Right, for sure. You've got humorous irradius. And the ulna, just like with your arm and then the frog's legs and back, they have a femur, a tibia and a fibula, just like your legs. Too. Yes. The only difference is the radius and ulnar are fused and the tibia and fibula are fused. Right. Whereas they're not in our bodies. And they have scapula and clavicles collarbones and shoulder blades. Too. Right. So there's just basically little people with big mouths, sort of well, there's actually some big differences, too. They have fingers and toes. They do. They have usually and again, it's tough to generalize here, but a lot of frogs have four fingers in the front on their front feet and five on their back. Yeah. And these little digits are going to be they're going to vary from species to species according to what the frog's locomotion needs are. So, like, it's a tree frog. They're going to be long and flexy, so they can grab stuff if they're swimmers. And all frogs and toads, we should point out, need water to live. Yeah, we really have to get into that part, which we will. But they have little web feet and toes, of course. Yeah. It makes it easier for them to swim. And what about the little burrowers? Yeah, some of them, I get the impression that they burrow to hibernate or estimate. Amelio. Estimate. We're feeling silly today, huh? I was watching Breakfast Club last night for the first time in years. How was it? It holds up. And I know that movie by heart. It's really remarkable how well I know that movie, but it does hold up. I think. So the only thing that it's not a very diverse movie no. Five white kids and white principal throwing a little bit of casual racism here there. Yeah. And John Hughes has been accused of that in recent years. Oh, really? Yeah, just sort of long duck dong was his, too. Yeah, of course. And like, the only time there were people of different ethnicities in his movies, they were kind of joked about or aped. Yeah, I'm sure. It's funny how history can just turn on you. He was probably like, Wait, no, everybody loves me. I'm John Hughes. What do you mean? We all thought this was great. Don't you remember? I'm John Hughes. Don't you know me? Yeah, it's very sad. He was gone too soon. Where were we? Emilio Estevez. Oh, yeah, the Emilio Estevee, which is like, hibernation in warm temperatures or hot temperatures, when it gets so hot out that for all intents and purposes, you can't go hunt. You're just like, It's too hot. I'm going to dig myself a little hole and lay here until it cools off a little bit. Yeah. And the whole point of that was that their feet and hands are shorter and wider, like shovels and like Amelia West of the ironically. Yeah. That guy can dig a hole faster than anyone you've ever seen. What are some of the different things? They don't have necks. He ever looked at a frog. He doesn't have a big long neck that turns around and looks at you. They're just sort of these little squat heads sitting directly on their bodies. Yeah. Like Fred Flintstone. Yeah. And as a result, they can't turn their heads. Right. You can't lift them up or down or turn them. If a frog ever turns his head and looks at you, then that is an evil, possessed frog. Right. Which, I mean, if a frog is sitting there staring at you, especially if they're suddenly joined by some companions, you should probably run away. There's just something super creepy about them. I can't remember the movie, chuck, what was the horror movie that features lots and lots of frogs? I don't know. It's like the point of them. I can't remember the name of it. No, it's in the don't know. I will happily respond to anybody who writes in. Was it the day the frogs took over? That's right, the day the frogs stood still. Frognato. Frogs with an exclamation point. What else? They don't have ribs. They have a pelvis that can slide up and down to help the jump. Pretty cool. Which one? The pelvis? Yeah. What, it has, like, a hole in it and it slides up and down the spine? I think so. So it can help it jump? Yeah. I think that's pretty cool. And what else? Eyes. Oh, yes. Like I said, frogs typically have eyes that sit on the top of their head and they can see quite well in a lot, like a very wide angle. They have a wide view. Vantage point could have put that better. But that helps compensate for the fact that they can't turn their heads. Right? Yeah. But apparently, as Tracy says, what one eye is getting in information is not really overlapping with the other eye. So they don't have binocular vision. They have vision from two different eyes. And that sounds like, okay, whatever, who cares? But if you think about the depth perception it would take to pick a fly out of the air with your tongue, it suddenly becomes quite impressive that they don't seem to have binocular vision. Totally. And did you do any research on their tongue? No. So Chuck, their tongue. Right. They don't have a tongue. That's anchored to the back of their mouth like we do. Sure. It's anchored to the front and they can throw it out. And there was this one researcher who I think is working out of Georgia Tech who filmed Leopard Frog, and the leopard frog can catch an insect with its tongue in .7 seconds wow. Which is five times faster than humans blink. Holy cow. Right. So researchers want to know, how are they doing that? If you're hitting a fly with your tongue, you're going to knock it away from you. How do they grab it? Sticky. Right? They figured that, yes, there was something sticky, and they determined that frog saliva is a nonnewtonian fluid, which, remember, we covered that in the Ketchup episode. And just like Ketchup, a frog saliva can turn sticky, or it can turn less sticky when you apply force to it. So when the tongue and the saliva on the tongue, more importantly, comes in contact forcefully with an insect, it thins out and it covers the insect. But the moment it starts coming back and the force reverses, and I'm sure I just got that wrong, I'm going to hear about physics from everybody. But once it stops being thin, it goes back to being viscous and so much sticky. And so now the fly or the insect has been covered in this sticky goo, and it's attached to the tongue, and it's being brought back into the frog's mouth. And all that happens in less than 800th of a second. That's crazy. Yeah. I'm sure they have some pretty super cool slow mo. Yeah, they do, for sure. Well, but since you mentioned the tongue, though, because it isn't anchored in the back of their mouth, they can't use the tongue to push food down. So when a frog eats, they also don't have, like, a jaw that they can chew, like you would think, like humans do. Right. So they just swallow it in a couple of gulps, and they actually, since they can't use their tongue, they use their eyeballs, their eyes sink into the skull to push food down. So I just have to ask, Chuck, where do frogs stand in relation to jellyfish and octopi now? Oh, wow. Not ahead of those two. Okay, so 3rd, 4th, 5th, 17th. Well, if we're talking all animals, I don't know where to rank them. But if we're talking crazy stuff, you should know animals. I would go with number three. Got you. For now. Okay. And on those eyes, they have what's called a nicotating. Is that right? Nictating membrane. So you've probably seen when frogs or toads go to dive underwater, they have a film like, what's the other animal that does that? Seems like we talked about that. We have. They have a film that covers the eye, I think alligators, probably. That sounds about right. Yeah, I think that's right. Which would make sense because alligators are reptiles. Yeah. And these guys are somewhat related to reptile. All right, so that's a lot of initial frog stuff, body frog body stuff. So let's take a break and let's talk a little bit more about frogbody stuff. Right? Dude. So we're back, we're about to talk about frogs getting it on. Well, quickly, though, we never mentioned the ears. Oh, yeah, that's a big one. You probably noticed that frogs don't have these big funny ears that stick off their head, right? They do have ears, they're just not external. That'd be hilarious. That would be funny. They just have the little tim pan and the little eardrum behind each eye. Yeah. And you can apparently, if you know what you're doing. And most frog species tell whether a frog is a male or a female based on the size of their tympanum to their eyeball. In a male, I think the tympanum is bigger than the eye, and in a female, it's either about the same size or smaller. Yeah. So there you go. Now you know frogs. And finally, we would be remiss without talking about the vocal sack because frogs and toads are most known, at least to me, for that great, great sound they make in the evening time in the American South and all over the world. Yeah, it's pretty awesome. You've seen pictures and video of a frog, like, the skin under their chin just suddenly turns into a huge bubble. Yeah. So what they're doing right then is they're taking in a tremendous amount of air and they're holding it in their vocal in their air sack. Right. And they're moving it keeping it in their air sac. They're not releasing it, but they're moving it around across their vocal cords. And that's what makes, like, the ribbon sound or the croaking or the trilling sound. And it's pretty awesome. One of the reasons why they're making those sounds, or at least one of the sounds, as they're attracting a mate, right? They're talking to one another. They're saying, hey, what do you think? Yeah. And that sound can be everything from a croak to a ribbon to, like, I don't know, there may be more than one species, but there's this one I've heard this summer that sounds, and I've heard people call the police because it sounds like a child that's in danger. Can you do an impression of it? No. I wish I could. It's just super loud and it sounds like a child that's hurt. It's like a screaming sound. I've not heard of that one. Oh, man, it's crazy sounding. Wow. Yeah. Well, I'll send you a link. I bet you there's a YouTube recording or something. It's like a peacock going, hell, it's off putting in it. I still say that to this day because of you. Because we got a neighborhood peacock that I've talked about. So, Chuck, when frogs are making these mating calls, right? Yes. They're saying, hey, baby, how's it going? And the frog might come over or the male frog might say, I like your look, I'm going to climb on top of you. How about that? And there's actually because frogs are, in a lot of cases, not sexually dimorphic, like, you can't visually tell the difference between a male and a female frog of that species. Yes. Apparently that extends not just to us humans, but the frogs as well, because there's something called a release call to where if a male frog has mounted another male frog, the mail frog that's been mounted will have a release call saying, like, I'm a dude, buddy, keep looking. Yes. They've actually recorded that sound in nature. Yeah. And I think it's something like you as a friend. So the frog will move on. It's funny that they get confused just from looking as well and that it takes like a reactive process to handle that. Yeah. It's called amplexis, which is the position that they're in. Yeah, that's the mounting position. Yeah. And the male literally gets on the back and clasps the fore legs around the lady frog's middle. And they can stay there for days like that, however long it takes. Pretty much. What's the sensual seduction? Basically just waiting for the female to release her eggs. And as far as reproduction goes and this is something that we all learned about when we were little kids with frogs, with the tadpoles, we'll get into that. But the general rule of thumb with most is that they're all sexual reproducers and all frogs and toads will be hatched from an egg. Right. Depending on how they come out, there's big differences, too. I don't even want to say most. I saw somewhere, like, half of frogs come out fully formed, just super small. That's adorable. I bet the other say half come out as tab holes and that's the one that every little kid knows about. It's frog reproductive biology. Right? Yeah. And depending on the species, they can do crazy adaptive things. Like, there's one species that incubates the female frog, clears out her belly and then incubates the eggs in its belly for the whole time. And the frog is born out of her mouth, essentially. Right. She's like, Go forth. There's another one. Because we always have been saying that moisture is super important to their survival. Right. There are some that if they're in very dry areas, the daddy frog will I think it's the daddy frog, or is either one of them it's the dad. From what I understand, the dad will pee on the eggs right. To keep them wet. That's the I think the strawberry poison dart frog does that. And after they hatch into tab holes, the mom apparently carries them on her back to little pools of water that are collected in, like, a plant. Right. And each one gets its own little pool of water. Isn't that cute? Yeah. I didn't know this, but they can hatch and grow in, like, a regular full body of water, like a lake. Yeah. But I think the process is just a lot slower there than it is the temporary pool. Yeah. So like a rain pool or something like that, or just a huge puddle that's developed. It's going to be much faster because they have less time to work with. Right, yeah. I couldn't figure it out. Is that the deal? Yeah, that's what I understand. Okay, so their developmental processes accelerated, but again, you can't just say this is how it is for all frogs. There are differences with all of them, but for the most part, ones that are hatched from eggs as tab poles will start to eat. And again, some are born with teeth, which I can't even imagine how small those teeth are, and might be herbivores, they might be omnivores, others are herbivores. But frogs grow up to be carnivores, I believe, right? Yes. But they start out as tabholes, as vegetarians in a lot of cases, yes. So they start eating a bit. The metaphor morphosis is taking shape, as we all saw on the film strip in elementary school. Little back legs start to grow, their little internal organs start to change. They get their tiny little lungs, they get their little digestive system going, and then that tail just shrinks and shrinks and eventually just is absorbed into the body. Yeah. And as their tail is shrinking, their front legs are growing and their digestive system is altering itself from a plantbased diet to a meat based diet. And then they leave land. And when they leave land, they're considered a frog lit, I guess, until their tail fully goes away. And then they're a frog and they say, Rip it. They do. And then they say, I'm hungry, I want to eat some insects and I want to try to avoid being eaten by something bigger than me. Yeah. So they eat a really surprising range of things. They'll eat insects, obviously, flying insects, mosquitoes, flies, grasshoppers. They also eat worms, snakes, mice, baby turtles, other frogs. They'll eat it all. They'll cannibalize one another, which if you think it's so wrong, cannibalism is so wrong. It's actually a pretty easy and low hanging fruit. Check on overpopulation. Yeah. Like if the species police itself or police its own population. That's actually pretty smart. Really? Yeah, it's true. It's still dreadful. Paulette over there had 24 little baby froglins. Right. I'm kind of hungry. Yeah. And apparently some tab pulls, the ones that will eat meat or vegetation, they'll eat other tab holes, too. Oh, really? That young. Yeah, man, I know they start them young. So I talked about avoid being eaten there. Frogs are very famous for having some pretty advanced defense mechanisms. A lot of times it's just all show, like they'll be super brightly colored or the fluoride frog, the well, I was going to say the scientific name, but why bother, right? I practiced. Okay. The fizzle amos nattery. Oh, very nice. It sounded much better when I practiced. Well, because what you do is you say it like that once, and then the second time you say it just like it's in your vocabulary four or five times. There you go. Yes, but you have to do it, like, right in a row, you know what I mean? Oh, I see. Like, say it again. Physiomis nadirary. I think you just do it with a little pizazz. Yeah. So anyway, that's the four eyed frog, and that's the dude that has spots on its back that look like eyes near the back legs. And to a predator, they're like, I don't like the look of that thing, even though it's just for show. Yeah. Which is kind of weird, because if you look at it, it just looks like a frog going one way or the other. I don't know what's intimidating about it. Maybe that's what's scary. I don't know which way that dude's going to jump, I guess. So he's just going forward. He's going backward. A lot of frogs will use color. Like, I was like, what is the evolutionary adaptation of bright, bright colors for frogs? It doesn't make any sense. Apparently they do that to basically advertise to predators. Hey, man, I'm super poisonous. You do not want to eat me, even though they may not be. Yeah, it could be a fluke or fake. I mean, I've heard enough about that, though, that if I was traveling in the Amazon and I saw a bright blue frog, I wouldn't kiss that guy. No, that's a poison dark tree frog. Well, that's the other thing I was talking about. The show. A lot is for show, but a lot of it isn't. Some frogs have very highly concentrated toxins, like the poison dart frog, like you said, and those dudes can be harmful to the touch, to a human. Yeah. You can absorb that toxin through your skin, and apparently they make this toxin by collecting it from ants that they eat. They eat like poisonous ants. Crazy. And the toxic alkaloids from the ants owned toxin accumulates in the storage glands in the frog, but doesn't affect the frog. But, brother, it's going to affect you. Yeah. So even that same if you have a poisoned dart frog that's been raised in captivity and not fed those ants, I think it might have a little toxicity, but nothing like the real deal. I think that's how they found out. They were like, wait a minute, this doesn't make any sense. Why would they become less toxic in California? I've been looking this guy in the cage, he was born right. So let's take a break. Our last break, Chuck. Okay. And then we're going to come back because we have more to say. So we talked briefly about you mentioned how they need water. Water is essential to frogs throughout their life process. Right? Yeah. This is one of the things that makes. Them really fragile. In some cases, they're fragile because there are places where they may run out of water, their water supply might dry up, and that would be really bad for a frog because not only does a frog get a lot of its water through its skin, it gets some of its oxygen and does carbon dioxide and oxygen exchange in large part through its skin as well. Right. So for all of this stuff to happen, it needs to be wet, which means that if the water that they're coming in contact with, since they're so permeable and they take in that water so readily, if there's stuff present in the water, like toxins or pollution or something like that, it's going to affect the frogs as well. And since the frog species are fairly fragile, as far as species go, they're kind of like the Glass Joe of the animal kingdom. Remember him from Mike Tyson's. Punchout? The first guy you'd fight. I never played that. What? I never played punch out. You never did? No. Man, that was a great game. Yeah. I'm not going to do my patented thing. What? Which is I can't believe you ever played that. Yes. I don't think I had that system. What system was that? On the original Nintendo. Yeah. I never owned one. I had various roommates with those, so I was sort of subject to whatever games they liked. Got you. I never played Zelda either. I was never into Zelda, either. I liked Metroid, though. Don't think I played that. All right. We played a lot of Super Mario Brothers. Yeah. That was so good. Last Joe. Yeah, that's right. That's what frogs are. They're basically like a really fragile group to begin with. But if you start contributing to their demise through pollution and stuff, it's going to pick up much more rapidly. And we're starting to see that. Right. Yeah. I mean, I often rant about not using chemicals in my yard, and that's not just because I have dogs, but it's runoff from that stuff affects everything around my house. Right. And that's just on a small level. Yeah, you see it in large scale with huge farms that use pesticides and insecticides, and that affects the local ecosystem as a whole. That's right. It kind of gets across. If you have, like, those sewers where they stencil spray paint, like a fish or something that says go to wetlands or stream or something like that, I think that's really effective. I think they should put that on all sewers, basically. Yeah. Or maybe even a sign so you don't have to be walking over it to see it. Yeah. There you go. Like when you're driving by. Or just make a common knowledge. I think people know that, but they need reminders. Yeah, I think they do, too. So that's one threat to frogs because of man. Another one is, well, people eating and hunting frogs to eat. Yes. They try and raise them on farms. But it's not the easiest thing to have a frog farm, apparently. No, they'll hop out of there. So hunting and capturing frogs to put on the menu in some parts of the world is a very big deal. So they're in steep decline in those places. Have you eaten frogs? I have had frog legs before, but it's been a long time and it won't happen again. I used to, as a kid, go to the dinner theater in Grand Rapids, Michigan is where it was, and on the buffet, they always had frogs legs. And I would eat piles of frogs legs as, like a seven, eight year old kid. It was really crazy how adventurous I was. Right. I would do anything to have a videotape of that. I got fat off of frogs legs. That's tough to do. Yeah. So I wonder now if I would like them. But that's not to be, because one of Yummy's greatest fears in the world is being anywhere near a frog. Oh, really? One of our top phobias is frogs. Just in general, everything about frogs. So there's zero chance, there's actually a negative chance that I will ever be able to eat a frog leg again. At least with her around, I'll have to fly up to Grand Rapids myself. That'll be your big, dirty marital secret. Where have you been shown? Detroit. Grand Rapids. We had a show in Detroit. I've heard of that before, I think. You haven't? No, I have. I'm sure every animal out there has someone who's afraid of it. Sure, but yeah, I didn't know that. Frogs. I like frogs. It's good to know. Yeah. Be like, Yummy, what do you think of this? Oh, I know not to do that. That's good if you chuck. I wish I'd thought of that before I'd done it. One of the other big threats to frogs is global warming. They are ectothermic animals. So that means they rely on the environment to control their body temperature. They don't have that internal regulation. So if it's hot outside, the frog gets hot, and if it's cold, they get cold. In the case of the wood frog, they live north of the Arctic Circle and they can freeze this is remarkable. They can freeze up to 45% of its body in the wintertime to protect itself from damage, and then they thaw themselves out again in the spring. Right, but that doesn't help you if it's too hot. Well, that's when you ameliativate when it's too hot. But this is just a few species that are capable of hibernating and excavating like this. For the most part, frogs need because they're ectothermic, they need a pretty stable temperature. And from what I saw, even worse than high temperatures for frogs that's associated with global warming are temperature swings. Like, big swings in temperature are really hard on frog populations, and they think that's one reason why frogs have been declining. But from that one study that really established, like, there are 200 species that we lost since the guy who led the study was like, I can't say why, I have no idea. He's like, it's probably this, it's probably this, it's probably this, it's all these different things. But he said the thing that really made him nervous was that it was happening all over the world, but he didn't think it was just climate change or just global warming that was doing it. Yeah. One of the other things that frogs face that they know all about, but are having a tough time dealing with is a kind of fungus called which one did you come up with, pronunciation wise? Kit Red. But it could be either, I guess C-H-Y TRID. And that's the fungus that feeds on keratin, which we've talked about before. What's, in our fingernails? Yeah. Or your hair. Yeah. Basically makes skin tough and sturdy, and little tadpoles just have a little bit of that stuff around their mouth. But when they grow, the parts that are most often in contact with the ground, like their little cute little soft bellies or the soles of their feet, they're delicious feet. Now I can just think of you me, just like her skin crawling, like, listening to this thing. Yeah. I don't know if I should have should have told everybody that one. That's like her Achilles heel. Yes. So as this stuff comes in contact with the groundMORE, they get that build up to where they need tougher skin down there. Yeah. And that's where this fungus will take root. Right. Because that tougher skin is made of keratin. Right. So since the fungus feeds on it, they're like, oh, well, it's going to kill a frog. But they don't actually know the mechanism by which the frog dies from the citrus. Is that what you said? That's what I said. They think that possibly it is that the fungus releases a toxin, maybe that the frog takes in through its skin, or that it inhibits that gas exchange of oxygen for carbon dioxide on the frog skin. But those are just a couple of hypotheses. They still have no idea. They just know it's killing frogs and it's killing them fast. And the reason why it's spreading so well, they've traced it back to the African Claude toad yeah. Which it doesn't have a poor effect on them, but they can spread it to other frogs. And it's those become an invasive species in a lot of areas. Yeah. Because they're pets, and people release frogs as pets when they're no longer puppies, which is something you should not do. No. The frogs take over really quickly. Remember we did an episode on Will Toads give you warts. Yes. And we talked about the cane toad and how it's just taken over Australia. Frog populations, as fragile as they are, can also, as an invasive species, just boom. Right? Yeah. They also were ubiquitous because for decades, starting in 1930, they were the fastest way to tell if you were pregnant. Oh, cane toads? No. The African. Claude toad. Oh, okay. Did you know about that? I don't think so. Oh, allow me. You ready? Yeah. Back in the day, if you were a woman who wanted to know you're pregnant, you would go to your doctor. Your doctor would take a urine sample and send it off. And at a lab, they would take a sample of your urine, inject it into a rabbit, and then they would kill the rabbit, cut the rabbit open and inspect its ovaries to see if it had reacted to a hormone that shows up only in pregnant women. Human chorionic. Gonadotropin. Right? Yeah, which I've heard of that. Okay. So I guess it would be HCG is present in the urine of pregnant women, and you can tell very early on if a woman is pregnant from the presence of it. But they have the most roundabout way of all time to find out, to detect the presence of it will enter the African clawed toad, where this researcher with the name of, get this, Lancelot Hogbin, thought to inject a toad with it, and the toad stays alive. It just releases eggs or sperm if there is HCG present in the woman's urine. Right. So that for decades, Chuck, was how you would tell if you were pregnant. Somebody in a lab somewhere would inject your urine into a frog to see if they release sperm or eggs. Crazy. And then they'd say Mazeltov. Yeah, that is nuts. You mentioned the cane toad in Australia, which we did talk about a little bit, but there's a great documentary, very classic documentary from the late eighty S, I think. I think it was. Cane toad, one of the all time classic docs. If you haven't seen it, you should check that out. But cane toads are very famously brought over and it just seems like it always goes this way when someone says, hey, let's bring in this to handle this, even though nature hasn't, it always goes wrong, it seems like. Yeah. So they brought these cane toads over to take care of the scarab beetle, but then once they got over here, the scarabs are eating the sugar cane crops. They realize that these big fat cane toads couldn't jump high enough to get to the beetles for the most part. And so they all of a sudden we're just there and they reproduce like bunny rabbits. And so before you know it, Australia very famously had a cane toe problem and I think still does, right? Oh, yeah, it's big. They were advancing toward Sydney or Perth or some large city, just ruining cropland on the way. They have a huge problem still, as far as I know. I just saw one recent thing. I don't know if it's still the case, but I think they found some ant that will kill these cane toads. They're called meat ants. Okay. It sounds like something out of a horror movie. Yes, that does sound pretty bad, but I don't know if that's still the case. But I do know that Australia has spent a lot of money over the years trying to control the cane toads. Yeah. As far as I know, they still have a huge problem with it. Maybe Josh, we will see some in 2018 when we, fingers crossed, visit Australia to do live shows. That'll be great. We're going to go catch a couple and at least get a couple out of Australia's hair while we're there. Yeah. So that is sort of a pre announcement. Hopefully, we're going to be hitting Australia in New Zealand next year. Oh, is that what you're doing? Yeah, if everything goes well, that is the plan. Okay. Yeah, I know. I'm pretty psyched about it. I just have to find some good pills to get me through that flight. So I'll tell you what you could do for the flight back. You could take one of those cane toads, squeeze it, and then lick the secretion. Yeah. So that's a real thing. If you've heard, hey, will licking frogs make me hallucinate? That is actually a real thing. And there are in the Australian government, and this doesn't just happen in Australia, they have outlawed cane toad secretion under the Drug Misuse Act. And there's another chemical called bufotinine that is in the US. A controlled substance yeah. From the Colorado River toad. And you can own a Colorado River toad, but, buddy, you better not lick it because that is illegal. Yeah. So what do you do? You squeeze the paratroid glands behind the eardrums. Yeah. There'll be an oozy milky substance that leaks out, and then you can either lick it right there, or you can collect it, dry it, and smoke it. And here's the thing. Don't do that. No, do not do that. Not just because it's illegal, it's a controlled substance, but because you have no idea how toxic that chemical is, how potent it is. You can't control the dosage. And so if you overdose, you will probably suffer cardiac arrest and die. And there's no way for you to know whether you're going to trip because this stuff has, like it's from the same family as DMT Dimethylaminethylanamine. I practice that one, too, but DMT, it's in the same family. So it will either make you trip or it will kill you. And there's no way for you to tell ahead of time. So there's really no reason whatsoever for you to be licking toads. No. Your Uncle Josh and your Uncle Chuck are telling you straight out, don't lick toads. Agreed. Yet people have been doing it since, at the very least, 1150 BC. They found archaeological evidence pointing to South American Indian tribes looking frogs. Yeah. Colorado river town. Of course it's in Colorado. Right? Exactly. Like, yeah, man, I'm going to christen these new hiking boots by looking at those new sweet basks. What else you got? I got nothing else. That's frogs. That was a long one. Yeah, we haven't done a good old fashioned animal episode in a long time. I know. I missed it. Well, if you want to know more about frogs and Toads TS because there's nothing more to know, but you can support Tracy V. Wilson by going and reading this article on how Stuff works.com. You can also go check out her work on Stuffymistonhistory class. That great podcast. Agreed. And since I said Stuffymistonhistory class, it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this the secondary follow up to the Satanist episode, and this will probably be the last one we read. Okay, just listen to your show on Anton LeVay and Satanism, guys. It's a former leader of a secular interest group. I'm embarrassed to say I'd never heard of them until your show. It's hard to believe. Yeah, it is. I've always believed that the best way to show how absurd religious endorsement is is taking it to its logical conclusion. Although the Flying Spaghetti Monster demonstrates this through parity, I have no idea there was a group who was demonstrating this through practice. I believe secularism is a good thing for everyone, including my Christian friends. Although I think Satan is a dubious hero to champion secularism for the mere reason of the knee jerk reaction to the name Satan, I am not at all opposed to the Church of Satan's idea to hold up a mirror. To those working on religious establishment, I want to say thank you for faithfully reporting on people like Satanist. It's hard to argue the position when you stand to gain something from your position. You guys have the advantage of reaching people while their guard is down, and you use it to challenge their views on something as unequivocally evil sounding as Satanist. I very well may become a secret Satanist after your podcast. Take the plunge with me, Chuck. And that is from Travis Romero. Well, thanks a lot, Travis. If you want to get in touch with us like Travis did, you can tweet to us at syskpodcast or join us on Facebook. Comsteno. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast athowstuffworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the Web@stuffychenknow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetopworks.com. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music you can access new episodes early. Download the app today."
2a6b3292-3b0f-11eb-a672-2b5f83ada4c0	What were the black codes?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/what-were-the-black-codes	The black codes were proposed laws that basically tried to keep a form of slavery alive and well after the end of the Civil War. It didn't last long but the shadow of those codes still exist today.	The black codes were proposed laws that basically tried to keep a form of slavery alive and well after the end of the Civil War. It didn't last long but the shadow of those codes still exist today.	Thu, 13 Jan 2022 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2022, tm_mon=1, tm_mday=13, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=13, tm_isdst=0)	45949674	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh and there's Chuck and Jerry's even here too. So this is a real deal winged stuff. You should know. Episode by goodness. By goodness. Yeah. I'm trying to toss the bone to the churchy types that listen to us. Sure. Not take the Lord's name in vain for no good reason, by God. Wait a minute. Sorry. I just messed it up. You undermined everything, and we have no way of getting rid of that now. That's right. No added function whatsoever. So this was your pick, the Black Codes, which I had heard the term before, but I did not know anything about. And as I was researching it good pick, by the way. I think this is something that everybody should know about, but as I was researching it, my brain kept trying to flush it out further, flesh it out further, and, like, expand it. And the Black Codes definitely touch a ton of other stuff, and you can make a lot of cases that they're still followed in some ways or at least mentally in America, but they existed historically in such a narrow period of time that they basically came and went in about a year, which makes it astounding the impact that they had, you know? Yeah. And this is our buddy Dave Ruse and how stuff works. And I got a lot of good information from the Constitutional Rights Foundation. Yeah, that's a robust website, as it turns out. Yes. The Mississippi Encyclopedia. Can't forget that it's made out of bark. That's right. But you're talking about the black codes. In short, I guess, as a precursor definition, these were a series of laws that, like you said, they kind of almost didn't even fully make it onto the books in some ways right before they were taken off the books. But they were laws that Southern white people, notably and especially plantation owners and people that owned enslaved people, came around and said, hey, you know what? Civil war is over. And I know this Emancipation Proclamation has been around for a little bit where it hasn't quite gotten around everyone down here about that, and maybe we should just devise a series of laws that essentially re enslave these people. And the only difference really will be that there will be some kind of wage involved. Yeah, that was it. They were trying to figure out how to regain their agricultural society, which had been built exclusively on the backs almost exclusively on the backs of enslaved people. Free labor that you just had to pay to buy a person and then feed them and clothe them and house them. But the labor was free. They had to figure out how to do that in the context of it being illegal to own people now. Yeah. They want to keep the status quo. Exactly. And it's worth pointing out that the Northern corporations were fully on board with this plan because they didn't want any disruption to their supply chain of certainly cotton or anything that was built on the back of the labor of enslaved people that was being sent up north for manufacturing and stuff like that. Right. So they didn't want any work disruptions, either. The Northern citizens, it was a bit of a different story in many cases, and we'll get into all that, but maybe we should start with the end of the Civil War. Okay. April 1865 civil War ends like we said before, the Emancipation Proclamation had been on the books for a couple of years, but certainly white Southern plantation owners were not doing their best to get the word out that everything was different now. Right. And that these people were now freed. They wanted to keep that as quiet as possible, which was pretty easy to do back then. Yeah. Because there were things called slave codes, and one of the big slave codes is that it was illegal to teach a slave to read or write. So, yeah, it was pretty easy to keep information out of the grapevine if you had a general population that couldn't pick up a newspaper and read it. That's right. So Lincoln and I never realized Lincoln was shot so soon after the war ended. Yeah. I don't think it hit me that it was just five days later. It makes you wonder what could have happened. But, yeah, it was really surprising that it happened that quick, too. Yeah. So five days later, Lincoln is gone, vice President Andrew Johnson takes over, and he is tasked with leading the reunification of these United States. He was a Southerner very important, and one of the first things he did was say, you know what? Why don't I just appoint a bunch of military governors for now and to these Confederate states so we can get everything kind of organized and get everything set up? And so one thing about Johnson is that he and actually Lincoln before him, favored kind of a forgiving plan for reentry of Southern states that had seceded back into the Union. And there was, like, a real kind of a light touch. I think one of the big factors was a 10% plan where only 10% of the population had to swear an oath of allegiance to the Union again. And that put the Johnson plan at odds with Congress. Right, sure. But one of the things that Johnson did take up was this idea of a freedman's bureau, which is basically this idea, okay, the south is ruined. We wrecked it. But it was already really backwards to begin with, and we want to modernize it. One of the things we have to do to modernize it is to take this group of new citizens that lived before, but they weren't considered citizens, and now we have to figure out a way to get them integrated into the society of the south, and we're going to set up the Freedmans Bureau to do that. Yeah. We're talking including women and children, like 4 million people. Yeah. So a lot of people to attempt to reintegrate into society. And the Freedman's Bureau did a few things. They worked on wages to try and make sure that wages were fair. They tried to make sure that these men, generally, men, could go find jobs if they wanted to and choose who they wanted to work for. They had courts that they set up. If you had a dispute with a white employer, supposedly these courts would be there to at least hear your case. And while this is going on, the white Southerners were not so happy. They didn't like the Freedman's Bureau. They didn't like these new rules. They didn't like these military governors from the Union that were set up, even if temporarily. And they were like, we got to get this back under our control quickly. Yeah. Because the Freeman's Bureau was operated by the military itself. So there was, like, no questioning this. It was an occupying force in the south, basically saying, this is how it's going to be, and we're here to make sure that that's how it goes down. The white Southerners were not happy about that at all. But part of Johnson's plan remember I said it had kind of a light touch and it was based on a lot more forgiveness than punishment? Was that once you hit that 10% mark where your population is taking a note to the Union again, you could ratify a new state constitution, basically start over, and by the way, we're just going to let white people be involved in these new states. That's what Johnson's take was. That's how it should be. And so that's kind of how he decreed. And that was kind of the beginning of Reconstruction. It's called the presidential reconstruction. And so some of these Southern states, or all the Southern states, set about in 1865, creating new state constitutions. Yeah. And they were starting to get it together again, so they could kind of take back the reins of control themselves. There was a provisional governor in South Carolina that literally said, this is a white man's government. And they held elections by the end of that year all over the south. And as you would expect, a lot of times, these Confederate leaders, former Confederate leaders, won positions of power, if not governorship, Congress people. And we'll talk about that a little bit more later. But they organized the state legislatures, and one of the things they did was said, all right, what we need to really pull the south out of despair is to set up free schools, but for white people only. We're not going to have black children in our schools, but we're going to have free public education for everyone else. Yeah. So that was just right off the bat the first time public education was introduced in the south, it was segregated, which set the stage for segregation throughout a lot of the 20th century, the rest of the 19th century, and a lot of the 20th century. Right. And you'll start to notice a lot of the stuff that the south dealt with and tried to saddle on its black citizenry finds its origins in the black codes that were written in the Southern state conventions of 1865. They just popped up everywhere. This is where it all began. Yeah. I mean, it's really pretty despicable. Like, the idea that these people were finally freed by law, and they said, well, let's just make a bunch of laws then. Like, remember the good old colonial times when we had all these laws? Let's just do that again so we can remain in power, we can keep our status quo going, and sure, we might have to pay some wages. Now, I tried to look and find what wages might have been. I'm sure it was a pittance, but that was kind of the only thing they would acquiesce to. Otherwise they wanted it to look and feel and smell exactly like it did during the enslaved period. Yeah, and they had to acquiesce to that because part of the requirements for returning to the union as a state was to have abolition of slavery and support abolition of slavery. And then also there was a constitutional law now with the 13th amendment said there's no more slavery in the United States. It doesn't matter where you are. You can't enslave anybody. So they had to do that. But it's like you said, they figured out every mental gymnastic they could make to recreate the slave economy. In this new context of people being free and you not being allowed to have slaves anymore. I think it's a good set up. Okay. Feels like a break time. I think so. Yeah, it does kind of feel that way. Do you feel that way? I feel it. I definitely feel it. Wait, I'm not feeling so much like a break now. All right, well, let's keep going then. No. Okay. I'm feeling like a break came back. Okay, it came back. All right, we're going to take a quick break. I wonder if we did that for, like, ten minutes, like a Family Guy episode, if people would just turn it off. Yes, I'm sure a lot of them have already anyway. All right, we'll be right back. Okay, so Christmas is approaching at the end of 1865, and there were a couple of rumors floating around these different communities. One was in the black community. They were like, hey, I here for Christmas. We're going to get 40 acres and a mule for every family on Christmas Day. And so let's not sign any work contracts or anything. Let's see what kind of happens here. We may be able to have our own farms and to work for ourselves and to be enterprising families on our own. And the other rumor that was going around was in the white community in the south, which was, hey, they all think that they're going to get 40 acres and a mule. This is not going to happen. They may be giving out a little bit of land here and there, but this is definitely not happening. And when this goes down on Christmas Day, there's going to be a huge rebellion, and it's going to be a big problem for us. Right. And I was looking into that 40 acres and a mule thing. Apparently it all came out of a William to come to Sherman Field order number 15, where he basically said everything from Jacksonville to Charleston, 30 miles inland, is going to be set aside for newly freed slaves to basically own and live and work. And it was just meant to be this little area. It never was fulfilled. But somehow that got turned into, among the black community in the south, 40 acres and a mule, which I had never heard before. I just thought the government had always promised everybody 40 acres in a mule. Yeah, I wasn't sure about the origins of that, and I knew that they were going to reappropriate some land, but yeah, I never knew that. It was not an earnest sort of offer. Well, it was based on the idea that the north had confiscated tons of land from the Confederacy, and so they did think that they were going to redistribute it to newly freed black Americans. But apparently part of the Johnson plan was to give that land back to the original owners. And so that's how it got scuttled. That's right. So all this stuff is going on. There's a lot of people scared on both sides. There's a lot of fear. And this is kind of the background that set up these black codes, mainly in Mississippi and South Carolina. So I saw there were black codes in other states. I know Texas had one. I believe North Carolina had one. I think a lot of the Southern states, if they didn't actually enact them, then they had written them or drafted them or trying to at least. But I think South Carolina and Mississippi were maybe the most heinous of all of them. Yeah, I mean, sure, that was my mississippi was supposed to be even worse than South Carolina. Yes, that was what I saw as well. Mississippi seems to be to have been the worst of the worst. But these codes fell into a sort of a group of four or five different ways that they could restrict someone's rights through law with technically skirting the abolition amendments. And basically what they did is they figured out that if you wanted black people to work, because there was this idea that among Southerners, among white Southerners, I should say that black people wouldn't work on their own. They had to be forced into work through, like, slavery or they had to be forced into work by some other new law, but if left of their own devices, they just wouldn't work and the economy would fall. So that was the idea, at least. I don't know if that was a pretext for just some deeply racist stuff or that was deeply racist, but if it was really just that was the kind of idea that was supporting the money class, and that idea trickled down into white society in the south. I'm not sure. But that was kind of like the premise that they were going on when they were writing these black codes, trying to figure out how to force black people into work agreements that benefited the white people they were working for. Yeah, and it's even a little more despicable than you might think, because they also dressed it up with a few basic rights that you read stories and you don't know how widespread it was. But even some of these basic rights, I think, many times weren't enacted. They may have been on the books, or at least offered on the books, but in order to be a person of color back then and to say, like, hey, wait a minute. It says here that I can sue somebody and I can acquire my own property, and I can enjoy the fruits of my own labor, they have to be able to hire out an attorney and get it in front of a judge. And all these things were next to impossible, basically. So even if they did dress it up a little bit with some basic rights, these weren't rights that were being enshrined. Right. Or even if they were, it's like, oh, wow, thanks a lot for some of the most basic human rights that should be afforded to anybody, like recognizing our marriages is legitimate. Right. Apparently, in the Annabelle south, black people were viewed as so subhuman that they couldn't possibly marry one another in any kind of context. That white people saw marriage and their children were all, by definition, then illegitimate. Well, in the super progressive, post civil war south, now their marriages were recognized as legal, and their children were recognized as legitimate. How far have we come? Basically, the white southerners were saying to themselves, as long as you married another black person. By the way, that was the other thing, too. You said, you can sue all that kind of stuff. You could sue another black person. You still could not sue a white person. You couldn't have anything to do with the arrested white person. The best you could hope for is to go down to a judge and fill out a complaint against a white person. Conversely, Chuck, at least I believe in it might have been South Carolina or Mississippi. If you are a white person, you could arrest any black person you wanted for even a misdemeanor. Like any white person could arrest any black person, but a black person could only fill out a complaint against a white person in front of a judge right where it went into the circular file. Yeah. And you probably were risking your health, well being and possibly life by filing a complaint or filling out a complaint against a white person as a black person in the post Civil War South, you know? Yeah, absolutely. We'll talk about other civil rights that were violated along the way, or at least limited. But another big way these black codes helped restrict their freedoms ultimately was through something, through these labor contracts. They basically said in South Carolina that if you want to work, then you will work as a servant. We're not going to call you a slave anymore. You'll be a servant, and we're still going to be called masters. And you have to sign this contract and we will pay you a wage. It will all be in writing. It has to be approved by and witnessed by a judge. But here's the deal. You have to live on our property. You have to stay quiet. You can't get in the way. You have to work from sunrise to sunset, except on Sunday. You can't leave. You can't go anywhere. You can't have visitors. Basically everyone looked around and said, well, what's the difference, this small wage that we're being paid? And they said yes, basically. They're like, yeah, that's everything. That's the whole thing right there. And I also saw chuck in one place that the wages that were paid to these new black servants who were formerly slaves were basically what the white plantation owners had been spending to feed and clothe and house their slaves. So for them, there was basically no change in net gain or net output. It was just now they were directing that toward the black workers as wages instead. That's it. That was the only difference. I wonder if they charge them rent. I don't know. I saw that in some cases they did have to house people who stayed on their land, but I think that they were allowed to charge them rent. They were also allowed to deduct from their wages for like I get the impression that there was a lot of ways that you could take back a lot of those wages that you paid somebody. One of the other ways that you could take back that money is through your local town store. Which set up a system of what's called debt pee and then which is kind of like the whole company store set up that miners in the north got into and like the early 1009 hundreds. 15 tons of coal. But you can't go to heaven because you owe your soul at the company store kind of thing that found its root in the south in around 1865. Where if you were in this labor contract. You could go to a local store and offer half of your crops as like. A capital and then start borrowing. And so all of a sudden, people who had been enslaved before and could have nothing now had free credit at the local store. And when the credit was called in at the end of the season, when they harvested their crops, they frequently found not only were all of their crops taken, but all the stuff they had bought was being called back in and was taken to cover their debts because of huge, crazy interest rates involved. So they were trapped in this cycle where once they entered and they had to chuck, you said it yourself, they had to engage in these labor contracts, once they entered them, they did not get back out. And all of the advantage was toward the white plantation owners and the white store owners. They're also allowed to whip anyone under 18, any servants under 18. And if it was someone over 18, you could get a judge's permission basically to whip somebody if it got just so bad that they said, I can't do this. I'm quitting this job. I'm breaking this contract, then they were basically like, all right, well, you're not going to get paid anything. Then they could take back their wages and they were essentially forfeited and they could be arrested, and the judge could say, no, you're going to rat back to where you came from because you broke a contract. And it's just reskinned as an enslaved person escaping and being returned to their master. Right. So you would say, okay, well, how about you just don't work? Like, there's your answer right there. They could just say, I'm not going to work. Maybe I'll just hang around and try my luck just hanging out. Like, it would make a lot more sense than ending up in debt and having to work for my former plantation owner. And they had that figured out, too, as part of the Black Codes. Chuck, if you were caught without a labor contract, you could be arrested, unemployed from the crime, to not have a job. That's exactly right. If you were black. Yes. They figured out how to force black people into work by saying it's illegal for you to not have a job. And the big horrible irony of the whole thing is if you were arrested for what they call vagrancy, you would go to jail. They would say, you owe us this huge exorbitant debt. Is there any white plantation owner who'd like to come pay this debt? The plantation owner would come along. Pay the debt. And say. You now belong to me because your debt was just transferred to me. And I'm going to put you to work until you pay off this high exorbitant debt. And you're going to be stuck in the same cycle as you would have been if you just engaged in the labor contract to begin with and not been arrested for vagrancy. Right. Or they could say, well, actually, Your Honor, I learned quite a bit about carpentry or smithing. I'm a great smithie. Didn't we learned that they were not called smithies, though? They have to be, though, forever. It's just too great a word. I'm a cobbler. I really have a lot of talent, so I'd like to open up my own shop and I think I can do this. I have a lot of driving initiative. And the judge would say, no, I'm sorry, I don't think you understand. You have to work. If you want to work, you have to sign a work contract and work for a white person. You can't open up your own business or you're vagrant. And then they would say, well, what about those white guys over there? They don't have jobs. And they said, well, but they're allowed to sign oaths of poverty to get out of jail. Well, can we do that? No, you can't do that. So it's essentially just two separate systems set up from the beginning with these black codes, two separate groups of laws depending on your skin color and chuck. One of the other owners parts about this is they're like, oh, if you're a minor, you don't escape this either. There's something now called apprenticeships, which is basically like vagrancy laws for kids. And you can be put to work as an apprentice and you don't even have to be paid if you're under 18 for a woman or under 21 for a man. You can be apprenticed out to somebody. An apprentice can be like, you're still a field worker. It doesn't mean you're actually learning a trade. Although some places did specify they did have to be taught to trade and fed and clothed and for all intents and purposes, you were an enslaved person just as much as you were before because you weren't being paid for the labor you were now being forced to do. Well, I think they could even take the kids and just say, I'm sorry, your parents are negligent, and so we're going to take you and put you in our apprenticeship. I don't know if I think they probably even call it a program that gives it a little too much value. But they said, sorry, your parents are negligent. We can take you. You have to work for me. If you're a young man until you're 21 or if you're a young woman until you're 18. And there's a man called I know his last name was Blackman, he wrote a book called Slavery by another Name that had a lot to do with this. And there was one story in here about a gentleman named Green Cottonhome. This is a this is way, way later he was arrested for vacancy in Alabama in 19 eight, auctioned off to US steel where they chained him up, put him in a coal mine in Birmingham, and said, all right, this is your new life. You have to do this until your fine is repaid. If he collapsed, he was whipped. If he died, he would be buried in a popper's grave with everyone else. And I think out of the 1000 black men who are working for US. Steel, in less than one year, 60 of them died from homicide, accidents, or disease. Yes, this is the north's. Hands aren't clean about this. And that was something that the north frequently gets a pass on, that especially among just kind of like the white view of history, that it was all the south's fault that Reconstruction failed, that the south was unwilling to kind of progress forward and accept black people into society. That was definitely true, but they were aided in some ways by the north, and the north definitely was engaged in some of these unsavory practices as well. I think that's definitely worth pointing out. So we talked a little bit about different laws depending on your skin color. This wasn't just like a subjective opinion. They literally did this with their courts. They did have technically certain new freedoms for court. Like, we talked about suing someone, but could only be another person of color. You could be appointed for a defendant, but only in cases well, I guess a plaintiff only in cases where there was another person of color involved. And the penalties were way different. I mean, a lot of the times, you get the death penalty if you were black for literally the same crime. You would not get that penalty if you were white. And even minor offenses, like the smallest things you could imagine that you would be brought in for, you would either be hired out and worked 1214 hours a day, or you were whipped. Right. And so the idea was that they were making it basically illegal to be black, and they made it illegal to be unemployed, and they set up a system so that everybody, all black people, newly freed black people in the south, were funneled into this economic system that favored white people and tried to recreate slavery as best as possible. Right? That's right. And one of the ways that they got away with this, one of the ways around this that really kind of brought jail into the forefront of this initiative to recreate the slave economy in the south was actually found, and is still found in the 13th amendment of the constitution, the amendment that abolished slavery. It said, you can't enslave anybody anywhere in the United States, except unless as a punishment for a crime, wherever the party shall have been duly convicted. There is a loophole in the amendment to the constitution that abolishes slavery and says that if you've been convicted of a crime, you can be used as a slave as punishment for that crime. And that really got the attention of the southern legislatures after the civil war. And they said, okay, all right, well, then how about we just start arresting black people en masse? And that's what drove that whole. Illegalization of being black in the south that was written into the Black Codes. Yeah, that's why they did the vagrancy laws. That's why they did the apprenticeship laws. It all was just sitting there in front of their face with this massive loophole, and it was still allowed to happen? Well, to a certain degree, which we'll get to in a SEC. Well, there's one good example. Let's give them the example of the pig laws real quick. Yeah, pig laws were certainly in other places, but definitely in Mississippi, I found, where they basically tried to make any crime that it might be more likely that a black person might commit way more prosecutable. Like grand larceny went from twenty five dollars to ten dollars. And the big one, which is why they call them pig laws, was any farm animal that was stolen and a farm animal could have a value of like a dollar or less. They said that is also grand larceny because they knew that formerly enslaved person might be more likely to steal a chicken for dinner so they could eat and survive and make that a literal Grand Larsony offense. Right, like Grand Larson punishable by five years in jail, during which time you could be leased out by the state to work for peanuts on a plantation for a white business owner. That was the set up. The sad thing is, a lot of people today, a lot of social and historical critics say, yeah, it's still going on. That loophole is still there, and there's still a lot of slave labor being used. And even if you're not being paid for that labor, you're being paid so little that you might as well be a slave. I think there was the most recent sentences. It was in 2005, the most recent prison labor census. They found 1.5 million prisoners were working, 600,000 of which were working in the manufacturing center. Most of them were making $2 or less a day, if they were being paid at all. Jeez and Chuck, I know you know, there's an awesome documentary on Netflix about the 13th Amendment and the implications it has. It's called 13th, and it's one of those documentaries. It's like life changing. After you watch it, I encourage everybody to go watch that documentary. It's just that good. Should we take a break? Yes. All right, we'll be right back. So, Chuck, after the Civil War ends, the Union says, OK, Southern states, come back, come back. Go write your new state constitutions. Show them to us and let's see what you got. And the Southern states went off in 1865 and held their all white conventions and wrote their new allwhite laws. Actually, they're all black laws, I should say. And they came back to the Congress of the United States and said, okay, first let us just explain before you make any judgments. And the Congress was not at all amused by this. It was not very surprising but there was a huge swath of Congress called the Radical Republicans who wanted the south punished. They were deeply offended that the south had taken up arms against the nation. They hated slavery. They thought it was disgusting. They thought the south was backwards, and it needed to be modernized. And they were not in any kind of particular mood for allowing concessions for racist slave owners trying to recreate the slave economy. And it brought Congress crashing down upon the south in the form of Reconstruction. Yeah. I mean, they basically said, you know what? We're not going to seat anyone you elect to Congress. We're going to invalidate any of these laws that you're putting on the books. And some of these southern states said to themselves, like, I think I see the writing on the wall. This is really bad. And if we want to have any kind of agency of self rule, we might need to walk back some of these black codes a little bit, because it's clear that they're not hip to what we're trying to do here at all. Right. They saw through it. I don't know how, but they saw through our motives. And so we're just trying to recreate slavery. Even though they had Johnson in office, they were like, we have one of our own. As president, he was vetoed by Congress, and it was essentially kind of a hostile Congress toward Johnson and the south. Yeah. Johnson was the first president to be impeached, and he was saved from conviction in the Senate by just one vote. And it wasn't over him being a racist, but he definitely was a racist. He even said he vetoed the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which basically said, black people are citizens now, and this is what they deserve, just like any other citizen. And Johnson said, we've never done anything even remotely like this for white citizens. Why should we do it for black citizens? And his veto even was racist. And basically everybody who wasn't on board with the Radical Republicans viewpoint missed the idea that the newly freed. Formerly enslaved black citizens that were now citizens of the United States needed a leg up to get on some sort of equal footing with white people. To be integrated in society. That it would be a good idea for everybody to be on fairly equal footing so that society can move forward faster. And to do that, the people who in the economy yes, exactly. And to do that, the people who used to be slaves needed a little bit of a leg up because they've been kind of held back for 400 years at that point, or a couple of hundred years at that point. So that was kind of the premise that the Radical Republicans were basing all this on, and all of the conservatives were saying, no, this is too much. It's too fast. It's too radical. This is a problem now. And the southern states started to kind of get the sympathy of some Northern conservatives. Yeah. It's not like they were talked into racist attitudes. But they were kind of talked into like. Hey. You know what's going to happen if these freedmen start holding office and they start getting in positions of power is their people don't want to work. So they're going to get laws passed that basically see to the fact that they don't have to work and they can just live off of us and we don't want them to get in. I think in 1867, a couple of years after the initial proposition of these Black Codes is the first time that these freed men actually participated and voted in elections. And these white Southerners essentially kind of put the fear of God into these Northerners saying, you see what's coming, right? And they kind of fell for it. They did fall for it. There's a really excellent article that I would encourage everybody to go read on Jacobin.com. It's called Killing Reconstruction by Heather Cox Richardson. And she basically lays out how the south said, okay, all of our racist views are following on deaf ears up north. They don't really like the racism thing. What else could we do? And somebody said, what about classism? They said, oh, yeah, there's a lot of rich people up in the north, they're going to love our classes argument. And so what they said is exactly what you were saying, that if you let these people who haven't ever earned anything in their life get elected to office, they're going to get a hold of all this taxpayer money and they're going to redistribute wealth. They're going to take hard earned white wealth and redistribute it to lazy, shiftless former black slaves. And do you really want that? And by the way, it has nothing to do with being black. If you let any worker do that, if you let any worker vote, any worker get into office, they're going to redistribute wealth. And even today, Heather Cox Richardson makes a really great connection to today, where if we talk about an activist government, a government that says we're here to really help raise the wellbeing of everybody, people say activist government, and they want to redistribute wealth, and it's probably either run by or being run for the benefit of people of color. That whole idea still goes on today, and it finds its roots in the post Civil War Reconstruction South, where the Southerners finally got the ear and the sympathies of the Northerners by shifting the focus from racism to classism. Well, they scared them financially. Their life is going to hit your pocketbook, right? And that really pricked up their ears at that point. It did. And so people say, Well, Reconstruction was abandoned. And that's exactly right. It was an astounding project from 1865 to 1873. Different constitutional amendments were introduced, passed and ratified that ended slavery, that created due process of law, and that gave black men the right to vote. Within five years, it was very promising. Black people were running and being elected to southern town councils, state legislators, judgeships. Things were happening. But then when the north kind of lost interest or lost its initiative to keep going, it just fell apart. And the north definitely turned its back on black Southern Americans and left them out high and dry and opened the door for Jim Crow laws. Yeah, I'm from the south, but you lived here quite a while. I feel like we're always saying, hey, listen, it was a problem all over the place, everybody, and it's true, but this is I don't know, it's hard to sort of break the I mean, the stereotype is there for a reason in the south, obviously, but definitely I think there were just so many complicit corporations and rich white northerners that we need to bring that up. Well, the KKK sucked a lot of the oxygen down toward the south as far as blame goes. Oh, sure, because they definitely did engage in a terror campaign to get black people out of politics and out of the idea that they should be participating in society. And then even when black people went ahead and did it and the KKK wasn't around, just normal white townspeople would riot and kill black office holders to keep the status quo going. When the north left, they just completely left black southerners out to dry, like in one of the biggest betrayals that's ever taken place in the history of this country. Yeah, definitely. I know that NIMBY is sort of a modern internet phrase. Have you heard of that? No, not in my backyard. Oh, yeah, I've heard that. I've never heard the acronym, though. Yeah. How it is these days, everything is just shortened. So now you just say NIMBY. Sure, on social media. But there's a lot of nimbiness going on back then, for sure. And the idea that, oh, it's not because they're black, it's because they're poor workers, we can't give poor workers rights, it made it a lot more palatable for Northerners to kind of take part and feel okay about themselves with that. That's right. So again, we just want to say what we were talking about, these black codes and the two types of reconstruction. We're talking about like a one to 15 year period in American history, but it's one of the periods that has some of the farthest reaching repercussions that are still around today. And it's just astounding to me like that. It went from slave codes to black codes to Jim Crow laws, and then finally the civil rights era got America to say, on paper, we're not racist any longer, which is where a lot of people end it. But those are the same people that points to the civil rights era and say, see, America is not racist anymore, which is probably the gaslighting is gaslighting. You could possibly experience in America today, if you ask me. That's right. And hey, if we're recommending documentaries along these lines, I'm going to recommend the HBO four part documentary Exterminate All the Brutes. Have you seen that one? No. It's great. It's made and narrated by Raul Peck, and it is a four part series that basically draws the line from the very beginning, like the very first efforts at colonization and genocide by the Spanish, however many hundreds of years ago that was. He basically kind of covers colonization and genocide over the years, throughout history. But the way he draws direct straight lines from then to now and what we're looking at now in America and all over the world is really impactful. It's hard to describe how, like, some of it is straight up documentary, some of it is recreation, but, like, really good historical recreations while he's narrating and he just uses amazing graphics to illustrate to really hit home a lot of stuff. It's like going to school. It is super dense and heavy. But I really recommend if you got 4 hours to kill exterminate all the Brutes is great. Yeah, that's what kept coming up for me when we were researching Black Codes. I was like, oh, that's still going on today. Oh, that's still how a lot of white people think about black people today. It's nuts. Like, how much of our society is still just kind of predicated on these terrible impressions that were created and perpetuated by the Southern Planner class. Yeah. And that's why it's super frustrating when anyone ever says, like, oh, this is America. Everyone just has an equal shot in this country. I don't want to hear anything else. Yeah, it's hard to even have a discussion with someone who says something like that. I know what you mean. Jim Crow was not that long ago. No, it wasn't. We'll keep chipping away at it, huh? Yeah, Jim Crow has sort of been something we wanted to cover for a long time. For sure. Okay, well, in the meantime, if you want to know more about Black Codes, there's a lot of ink that's been written about it and it is all really good and interesting and eye opening and you should probably spend a little more time researching it. And since I said that, it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this just a letter of thanks from one of our oldest, most longtime listeners. I think Ian Clarkson has been listening for a while. Yeah. Enjoyed into the World was a movie crusher when that was around. And this is from Ian. And Ian Legit freaked out that I'm reading this, so it always makes me happy. Yeah, for sure. Howdy from Dallas, guys. I wanted to reach out and just begin by saying thank you for all the joyful content you provide the world during the gloomy time of COVID and adolescents. I really needed a boost that you all provided. I've listened since I was 17. Now I'm 25 and have used Stuff You Should Know as my classroom long since I've exited school. Josh drove me to get my archaeology minor. Well, I know. How about that? And Chuck has given me and my family endless amounts of movies and nights of joy. We outsource a lot of our movie picking to Chuck. Actually, all of you are wonderful humans, and I just want to reach out and express my pure joy that I receive from Stuff You Should Know. I can't thank you all enough for being so insightful and kind. With what you create, I hope to one day be able to share your catalog with my kids. I've written in once before when I was in high school, too, but I thought I'd reach out again. Both of you remind my parents of click and clack. We've gotten that from a bunch of people. That's the highest praise you can get. It really is. Anyway, I hope all is all the Stuff You Should Know podcast Office and that you're all enjoying your descent into the holidays. Your loyal fan, ian Clarkson. Ian is a great dude. To hear from him. That was a fantastic email, Ian. Thanks a lot for that. And hello from us. Hardy hello? That's right. If you want to get in touch with us, like Ian did, you can send us an email to wrap it up, spank it on the bottom and send it off to Stuffpodcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more Podcasts My HeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio Apple podcast or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
7894d589-e3b1-4ec7-b078-ae680120747d	What’s NATO All About?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/what-s-nato-all-about	NATO formed at a time when Russia threatened Europe as a potential invader. Then the Soviet Union broke up and NATO lost its way for a bit. Now Russia’s back to business as usual and NATO has found its purpose again, protecting peace in Europe. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.	NATO formed at a time when Russia threatened Europe as a potential invader. Then the Soviet Union broke up and NATO lost its way for a bit. Now Russia’s back to business as usual and NATO has found its purpose again, protecting peace in Europe. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.	Thu, 31 Mar 2022 07:01:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2022, tm_mon=3, tm_mday=31, tm_hour=7, tm_min=1, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=90, tm_isdst=0)	47861418	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark and there's Charles W, Chuck Bryant and Jerry's here. And this is stuff you should know. The Triple Alliance coming at you, but not overstepping our bounce, being very delicate here. Correct? The Triple Alliance. Yeah, I think that was actually the proper name for the Aztecs. Oh, yeah. All right. I know that. No, but I like that. Hopefully this episode is coming out, and we're getting some guest listeners who are like, what is this NATO thing all about? Who are these dumb dumbs? They can explain it. I like you lobbying out in a little factoid for everyone. Oh, yeah. Well, that's how we do. We tread lightly, we don't overstep our bounds, and we lob out factoids. So welcome. This is stuff you should know. My name is Chuck, and I'm the co host along with Josh Clark. Yeah, hi. And we explain things in a semi humorous way over the course of a lot of podcasts do this every episode. They explain what their missions are. I would go berserk, man. I would have giant patches in my head where I just pulled hair clean out. But we like to explain things in an approachable way to the common person. That is to say, that is what we are. We don't have lofty goals. There you go. Why did you write that one down? That was amazing. Yeah, we should do this every time and just let me wing it every time. Okay, I think we just came up with a new format in 22. So, Chuck, we're talking about NATO, and if you didn't know, we're in trouble. But if you the listener, especially the new ones didn't know NATO stands for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which is the kind of name that you can make your eyes glaze over with just one pass. It's that boring sounding, right? Yeah, but it's a pretty I mean, I don't know, maybe this is an opinion of my own, but I think it's pretty fundamentally integral body to the world order. I mean, it's certainly proved itself as such. And we're Americans, we were kind of raised to think, like, NATO is fine and great, and it's a good thing. Don't even bother thinking about it unless we need you to. And if so, we'll alert you through the media, and then you can start thinking about it. But if you dig into it a little bit and you actually look at the stuff that it does, the stuff that it has done, the reasons it was founded and the reasons it's operating now, it actually does make a tremendous amount of sense. If you're a fan of democracy, even if you're not a fan of military operations, I would rather everything just be at peace. It would be great if we could do everything through diplomacy. Right, sure. So even if you're not like, yeah, we got to go get them. Let's just get over there and shoot everybody. You could still be, like, a supporter of NATO just because of the stability it does provide, like you were saying or has provided all this time. I mean, in recent stuff with Ukraine and Russia has definitely made me rethink it in a more positive light and that it's more essential than I thought it was. Yeah. And we'll get into that, obviously, along the way in this episode, and sort of explain what's going on in some detail. But also just the idea that NATO is outdated and of a bygone era and not useful and a waste of money is, I think, folly. And we're not going to go down that road too much. We're just going to probably explain how it works and hopefully through that display, why it's still necessary. The thing is, Chuck, is that particular opinion of NATO wasn't necessarily wrong a year ago, two years ago, five years ago. And it's not like you and I just woke up to the importance of NATO. Literally. The world has changed in the last two months since Russia invaded Ukraine, and NATO, which was struggling to find its way, its purpose, up until about 2014, when the last time Russia invaded Ukraine, suddenly became, like, important and had a reason to exist again. So things have changed that dramatically. That a 30 nation allegiance organization that had been kind of like, what are you guys doing? Again? What's the point of all this? Was now one of the most important organizations in the entire world again. Well, yeah, and I think there's a lesson in complacency there. It's like if you had this old panic room installed in your house in the 70s yeah. And here in 2022, you're like, you know what? This panic room, I think I'm just going to turn it into a bingo hall. It's getting kind of useless. And then all of a sudden, the purge happens. Right. And you remember why you needed that panic room. Yeah. So the purge happened to Ukraine in February of this year, but the purge was always just sitting out there, possibly could happen. And I guess that's the complacency I'm talking about. I think no one thought anything like, oh, everything's fine these days. Like, Europe is not going to be at war. We don't need this stuff. But that possibility is always out there. And I think just the mere and this isn't me, this is highly respected people say that just the mere mention of exiting NATO and dissolving NATO emboldened people like Putin. Yeah. So what sucks is the idea that we're living in a world where NATO is essential, where the purge is kind of always out there. It didn't necessarily be that way. And if you're uncomfortable living in that kind of reality, if you're like, this reality actually sucks that the purge is out there and we have to have NATO now we have to spend all this extra money on defense and all this stuff. And peace seems to be up in arms and in question. Again, blame the people who invade other countries. Don't blame the people who have allied to fight against that kind of thing in the name of democracy. Well said, sir. Should we go back to the beginning? Yeah. Let's talk about the history of NATO because it's a fairly young organization, comparatively speaking. Like if you compare it to systems of writing, it's very young. That's true. Or the sun. Sure, very young. So let's go back in time. I guess we should jump in the old wayback machine. Break it up. It's been a while. You're showing off for the new people. I know. We have a way back machine and we can go back in time to take that. April 4, 1949 is when the North Atlantic Treaty was signed initially by the original the OGS, the twelve founding member countries, which were ourselves here in the United States, canada or Hat to the north. Wait a minute, I like that. You're adding a little bit to each one. But can you sing it as a song? No, I can't shoot. I just did. Did you hear that? I did. Where else? The United Kingdom. Our friends across the pond. France. Those folks who make such good gravies. Italy, which is all about those pillowy. Beautiful. What are they called? Croissants. Well, sure, but I was thinking of the pasta. That's the noki. Oh, yeah. That's not pillowy. It's dense. It's denses. Not like a pillowy. Noki, I don't think that's no key. I think that's like no, a pillowy noki is delicious. Yeah, but the Nokia is too dense. Isn't Noki stuffed with something, though? No key. I'm thinking of pierogis. Portugal. Delicious wines. Sure. Norway, I hear they bike a lot over there. Denmark, they bike even more. Iceland is not Greenland. People get those confused. Belgium, I've been there. And that's where NATO is headquartered. We'll get to that. The Netherlands, they are largely below sea level. And then Luxembourg, I flew out of there once. It's very small. It is extremely small. And I've been to Belgium, too, by the way. Yeah, Belgium is nice. And then you got Greece and Turkey and 52 West Germany and 55 Spain and 82. And then in 1991, when the Soviet Union collapsed, it was like a free for all of people and countries going, oh, me, me. Over the next 18 years. Yeah. And NATO was saying, yes, come be friends, come become democracies. This is great for us. And that was we'll talk about it, kind of considered. There's a guy named James Stevritis. He was the supreme allied commander of NATO from 2009 to 2013. And he put it as that was kind of the beginning of NATO 20, but NATO 10. The original mission of NATO was very clear. It was very purposeful, it was very complicated. In execution and it required tons of money, especially considering there were only twelve to 16 members from 1949 to 1982. Right. And the mission was contain the Soviet Union because after World War II, europe was just toe up from the flow up and it was up for grabs. And one of the first things the Soviet Union did was start pouring all of its economy into its military and saying, okay, you're part of the Soviet Union now. You're part of the Soviet Union. You're part of the Soviet Union. And they drew whatever 80s kid knew was a line between Europe and the Eastern block called the Iron Curtain. That's right. And you did not penetrate the Iron Curtain. The Iron Curtain penetrated you. All right, yakov Smiranov, thank you. I'm glad you got that. That is true. And one of the biggest parts of NATO, that's sort of one of the most fundamental parts of it is Article Five, which we won't read in full. You should go look it up online, though, and read it. But it basically but we couldn't sing it. It basically says, you know what, these are all like NATO isn't a military force. It is a bunch of countries and their military forces. And it's really up to each member to decide what they want to do when it comes to supporting an allyou. Don't have to use military force. You can though, under international law, but basically it's up to each country. It's a weird organization and that they don't vote on things. It's all just sort of hammered out as a consensus, including who the NATO Secretary General is. They don't even vote on that. They just sort of agree to who's going to take that role, which will get to what they do later. But I did find it fascinating that they don't sit down. I mean, how many countries are there now? 30. 30. They don't sit down and have a 30 countries vote when it comes to anything. They just work it out. That means sometimes some countries are going to get more of what they want and some times they're going to have to acquiesce and get less. Yeah, which I find kind of neat. But overall, most of the countries are in favor of doing whatever NATO is doing or they're opposed to it and NATO doesn't do something. Right. So that Article Five. The basis of it is what's called collective defense. And the main tenant of this, and this is the thing that probably binds more than anything else the 30 countries that are members of NATO is that if you attack one NATO country, you are effectively attacking all 30 NATO countries. Yeah, right. Those 30 NATO countries will bring their substantial, significant military might onto you, the attacker who attacked that one country. That's ultimately the main and original purpose of NATO. Because when NATO was formed and Russia was consolidating its military, europe was not the countries of europe are in no shape to defend themselves. So they entered into this pact with the United States and Canada who said, we'll come over and help you guys. And by the way, I hope you're listening. If you attack any of these guys, if you try to expand beyond that Iron Curtain, we're coming in like it's an attack on us. That was the basis of NATO and it's been upheld ever since. Although it's only been invoked once in the history since 1949. Yes. And not only does that mean that these countries aren't getting attacked, which has been pretty ironclad, it means that other countries, like, obviously, like I said, with the fall of the Soviet Union over the next 18 years, are scrambling to be a part of it because a lot of these are smaller countries who no way could they stand up to a superpower like Russia. Right. So they want to be in NATO, and we'll talk about Ukraine and whether or not their desire was to be a part of NATO and where that kind of lies now with the current situation. But the point is, these countries like Slovenia and Albania and Croatia and Montenegro, they want to be a part of NATO because they need friends. Well, yeah, they do need friends because if there was Russian aggression against them, they would just completely they would have no choice. I don't even think they could fight back in the way that Ukraine did. Some of these countries are so small and have such small militaries. So yeah. So right now, as it stands, as far as Article Five is concerned, if any country attacks North Macedonia to the United States military, it is attacking the United States. That's just part of the NATO treaty. Right. That's a point of contention from what I saw, Chuck, that some people are like, okay, are we really going to send our troops over to die in North Macedonia if Russia attacks it? And as far as Article Five is concerned, yeah, you would like you would do that. That's part of the treaty. They are a NATO member nation and to some people, it doesn't make sense that you would sacrifice blood and treasure, as they say in North Macedonia, to other people. It's exactly sensible, because if North Macedonia is a NATO country, you can put whatever missiles you want in North Macedonia. They're a NATO country and so they're strategically located and their strategic location makes them extraordinarily valuable as a NATO member. So it makes sense in some ways, it doesn't make sense in other ways. But overall, the general idea is that the more NATO countries you have in Europe, the stronger the whole thing is. Even including the little countries, everybody has a role to play. Well, yeah. And not only that, the little countries, if you might think it's not worth expending all this kind of money to help and maybe American soldiers lives to protect them, the dominoes can fall very quickly when you have somebody like Putin in power and most of the world wants peace. And that can very easily be very tenuous if these little smaller countries start falling like dominoes and all of a sudden you look up and the world map is being redrawn. Right, exactly. So that's exactly what they're trying to prevent by stringing together this cohesive group of NATO countries. Right. On the other hand, if you are in Russia and you're in the Russian military, or say you're the head of Russia, when you see all these little countries that are along your border now suddenly saying, we're a democracy and we're now NATO members, and we can put missiles aimed at you, like, right along your border, that's a huge menace to you. And that in some ways explains the aggression that Putin carried out in Ukraine. Among some observers, that hasn't been necessarily the stated goal of the invasion of Ukraine, but a lot of Russian experts say this actually is a huge response to NATO. He doesn't want to bring Ukraine into the Russian Federation necessarily. Right. I remember when this started a few weeks ago. Emily, who was my wife, if you're new to the show, she gets mentioned occasionally. Josh is a wife named Yuumi. She gets mentioned occasionally. Hey, Yumi. We also have pets. I have a daughter. They might pop up as well, but I doubt it. My pet is my daughter. And Emily was just like, Why? She didn't really understand what was going on at first. She said, what does Russia want with Ukraine? And I just very simply because it's more complex than that. But I was basically like, it's like the oldest reason in world history. It's land, and it's a big chunk of land. And where it sits next to Russia strategically is like it's troublesome for them to have NATO interests there, and it's troublesome for NATO to have Russian interests there. So it's funny, like, when you look back and not funny, it's sad, but when you look back at, like, there are many reasons for war, but one of the biggest ones has always just been land acquisition and holdings. Yeah, totally. And usually along your border, and you just expand. It was like expanding the empire before for resources and stuff. And I think that still clearly goes on, but it also, in this case, is like, wanting a buffer between NATO and Russia on the one hand. Right. Should we take a break? Yeah, let's take a break. So we'll be right back, and we'll talk a little bit about some of the mess that NATO 2.0 was in, which led us to NATO 3.0. Okay, so we're back, and we're talking about what, again, Supreme Allied Commander James, the varieties called and I think Time magazine in 2018, NATO 2.0. NATO 2.0 came about because the whole purpose of NATO, which was to contain the Soviet Union out of europe became pointless because there was no Soviet Union anymore after 1991, I believe the USSR broke up. Right. And on the one hand, when it first happened, Chuck, it was like you were saying, all of these former Russian satellite states started scrambling to become part of NATO, and NATO was welcoming them with open arms. And that first part of that NATO two point out, that second general point of NATO made a lot of sense, and it was consolidating Europe into an even more peaceful, more democratic area. But then after that kind of stabilized and they got that process underway, it started to kind of like, lose its point or its purpose a little bit. Yeah, I mean, I think post Cold War, the complacency set in and people did start to think, like, what are we doing? And NATO 2.0 said, well, you know what? We can engage in counterterrorism campaigns. We don't like the piracy that's going around the world, so we can help to combat that, and we can get involved in these other in combating these other activities that are detrimental to world order and world peace. But this is kind of some of the stuff that not only did it caused some consternation in the citizens of the world, like, what are we doing here with NATO? It was also within NATO. There was a lot of infighting within the board of like, what the council should I say? What should we do? I don't think we should be doing this. We should be doing this. And since they have to hammer everything out and agree, even sometimes to disagree in order to do something, it was a little bit fractured on the interior. Yeah, big time. Because a lot of people are like, what the heck is combating piracy and the Gulf of Aden has to do with protecting Europe from the USSR. The Cold War is over. What are we doing? Like, yeah, let's keep NATO together, because who knows what's going to be needed, but do we need to engage in this adventure ism and then the Supreme Allied Commander position, which is the head of all NATO forces, that is like, by nature in the treaty, I think always an American. So the Americans always de facto, and also in a lot of different ways, really lead NATO. But in the early 2000s, America squandered a lot of its credibility, a lot of its legitimacy in adventureism, like invading Iraq unprovoked illegally, which, by the way, NATO had nothing to do with because the rest of the NATO nations or most of the other NATO nations were like, this is not right. We're not going anywhere near it. Which is a mark in NATO's favor, if you ask me, that they saw like, this is not a just just to, this is an invasion. But that kind of stuff really kind of made other member nations kind of question American leadership, whereas up to that point, or a little before that point, it was just like America was leading the way, NATO was following, and it was all good. And then after that, things started to really kind of fracture and crack. Right. So this is sort of when Ukraine comes into the picture, and that you don't have to be a NATO member to deal with NATO and to work with NATO and to reap a lot of the benefits of NATO so they can partner with non NATO countries. That started back in 91 with the dissolution of the Soviet Union. And the goal here is to basically to arm people, to train people to ensure their democracy stays stable. And when that started happening, nonnato countries got interested in this kind of partnership, specifically Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia and Ukraine. So all of a sudden, in the early 90s, these other countries are knocking on the door saying, hey, we don't want to be members, because they can. You can join any European country can join NATO as long as they do what's required, which we'll get to that in a minute. But Ukraine has been working with them through what's called the Comprehensive Assistance Package. They've been receiving NATO support. And this is the kind of thing that a lot of this quagmire that is happening now is russia was afraid that they were officially going to join NATO because Zelensky approved the National Security Strategy, which it was almost like they were seriously kicking the tires on one another. Finally. Yeah, I think he said in September of 2020 that Ukraine's aim was to become a full member of NATO after being a partner for three decades, basically, or at least two full decades. And even before that, the whole thing kind of kicked off. There was a summit in Bucharest called the Bucharest Summit in 2008. And at that meeting, Georgia and Ukraine declared that it was their aim to become NATO members. And that seems to be, at least geopolitically speaking, what kind of kicked the tensions off big time and led to the 2014 invasion of Ukraine and Crimea, and then also led to the 2022 invasion that's going on right now. That's right. A little more nuts and bolts about NATO itself. Like we said at the beginning, they're headquartered in Brussels, and everything is done by consensus. And you mentioned the military part of NATO. It's called the military committee. It's different than the actual North Atlantic Council that's headed by the NATO Secretary General, and it's not a figurehead position, but they're not in charge of, like, deciding anything. They're just sort of the Secretary General. They head up the meetings. They have historically always been European, and the head of the Military Committee has always been American, like you said. But there's nothing in the charter that says that has to be the case. It's just always been that way. So they're there in Belgium, and they're taking meetings every day and answering the Bat phone when it rings. And then you've got your military committee and then you've got your what's the other one? The Nuclear Planning Group. And I guess the military is sort of the link between all of these to make sure the military strategy is sound. Yeah, because Data likes to publicize itself as both a military and a political organization. And it definitely is like if you partner with NATO as a partner country, or if you're a member, you're engaged with them politically and they try to work things out diplomatically. Very famously, one of the first post Cold War missions that NATO embarked on was in the Balkans when war broke out there in the former Yugoslavian states, right back in the Wag the Dog era. Do you remember that? The wag the dog era. Of course, yeah. Okay. Do you remember in the movie Wag the Dog? Okay. That happened basically in real life. It was such a close resemblance to it. I remember a reporter asking Bill Clinton, like, have you ever seen the movie Wag the Dog? Because the Balkan NATO mission started right as the Monica Lewinsky scandal was heating up. And he said, It depends on what your definition of scene is. We're going to be able to tee off on that guy forever. Just got that great voice. NATO entered the Balkans and tried to work everything out. There was a peacekeeping mission, but there was also obviously a lot of military operations. That's how they kept the peace. But even still, there's an ongoing Balkan mission there and they're trying to sort out still the longstanding hostility and promote democracy in these groups. So they are a political organization, but they're also really, at the end of the day, they're military. Just the incredible unrivaled might of the military combined military powers of the 30 countries involved in NATO. You just can't really look at it too many other ways. It's a huge military. That's right. And as far as the main committee goes or the main council, it is headed. Each country has their own ambassador. I think we got a new one in 2021. Is that right? What's her name? Julianne Smith. Julian Smith. I want to say Julianne Moore just because, boy, she would be great at that. Sure. We need more actors in roles like this, right? For sure. Actors have proven to be amazing politicians over the years. That's right. An actor would never like to get up on stage with the actors and hit somebody. Man, I'm so disturbed and just unsettled by that. It's very surreal. I was actually not going to watch the Oscars this year because I'm kind of over it, but for some reason I watched, so I saw it live. Wow, that must have been surreal. I think, like everyone else thought it was a bit at first. And then here in the United States, the audio cut out and it was clear from Chris Rock when he came back. I was like, oh, boy. Did I just see what I think I saw? Yeah, that's crazy. I was telling you I couldn't find a clip with it, but I wanted to see, like, or hear the ham fisted way the conductor and the orchestra, like, trying to play everything back out from the weird, uncomfortable, awkward silence that just gripped the entire auditorium. I want to know how they got out of that awkward silence, because I'll bet it was equally awkward. Well, they didn't give out he was right in the middle of giving out an award. Oh. So he had to continue on after that. Yes, dude, that joke was before he even started giving out the award. When they go up there and just make jokes, man. So, I mean, that was one of the saddest things, is that he gave out the award for Best Documentary to Quest Love for his awesome documentary Summer of Seoul. Oh, man. So all of a sudden, his moment is overshadowed. It was, Jeez, what a train wreck. Anyway, off topic. Hey, that's something we do sometimes, folks. We take tangents. Should we talk a little bit about the funding of NATO? I don't think you can get around that, Chuck. Just try. Oh, wait, no, let's talk about one other thing. So where we are today before we hit funding. Okay. Okay. So we're at what? Supreme Allied Commander James De. And if you can't tell, I like saying Supreme Allied Commander, you're not paying close enough attention, but what he calls NATO 3.0, because he's in the cyber security Unity, I guess. And NATO 3.0 is where we are today. And as I was saying, there's been a lot of talk and movement toward NATO expansion. And some Russia experts are saying that's one of the main drivers or one of the big drivers for these invasions of Ukraine that have taken place over the last less than ten years, but that aggression in response to NATO expansion, or depending on how you take it, just straight up Russian aggression. It doesn't matter if NATO is talking about bringing Ukraine on and helping it become a democracy. You don't go waste a city. You don't waste a country. You don't gun down civilians. You don't bomb a theater where you know hundreds of civilians are hiding out. You don't do that. There's no justification for it. And you know, damn you to hell for doing it, whoever you are. So that kind of aggression has actually now, like we were saying at the beginning of the episode, changed the world order so dramatically that it revived NATO. Like, all of that bickering, all of the inner ally, dissent in troubles and what's our purpose, all of that has been just pushed right to the back. And all of a sudden, Europe and America are friends again. Europe is friends with one another again, and NATO is probably stronger than it has been in the last 30. Years. Thanks to ironically Vladimir Putin. Yeah, absolutely. I've read a lot about this. And that doesn't seem to be like a controversial hot take. No, it seems to be fairly indisputable that NATO as allied and as together it's been in decades. And it couldn't have come at a better time, because I don't know if you noticed or not, but democracy itself has been kind of under assault. And people were wondering, is the US. Up to the task of taking that on? Is Europe up to the task of taking that on? And one of the main tenets of NATO is promoting democracy not just around the world, but within its own countries, its own member nations. Since 1949, a lot of countries have had some kind of weird times that it's gone through where NATO has had to basically call those countries out. I think Turkey most recently, where it said, hey, you're a NATO member. We expect you to uphold democracy and democratic values. Right? Yes. So it promotes it not just around the world, but among member nations. And that's a huge important point. And so this strengthening of NATO, and thus the strengthening of belief and placing value in the idea of democracy and a willingness to defend democracy could not have come at a more vital time. So in that sense, thank you, Vladimir Putin. It's just a shame and very sad that had to come at the expense of the people of Ukraine. Agreed. So maybe we should take the break now and we'll come back and talk about that funding, previously mentioned funding right after this. All right, so the aforementioned NATO funding. And by the way, thanks to our former colleagues@houseofworks.com for the original NATO article that kind of started down this road. But there's a lot of misconceptions about NATO funding and how that works. The official guidelines say that member nations are expected to commit a minimum of 2% of their GDP, their gross domestic product, to spending on defense. But there's not a because like I said, NATO is not loosey goosey, but it's not like someone checks the books every year and then goes to Luxembourg and says, hi, you actually spent this and this is what you owe. So if you could just get the checkbook out right, and make that up right now, that would be fantastic. There's no penalty. No, there's no penalty. That's not how it works. I think in 2014, only three members spent 2% of their GDP or more on defense. I think the US. Spends about three and a half. Is that the most recent number? Yeah, as of 2021. Right. And everyone in NATO has basically said, though, all right, we get it. We'll try and up our spending, and we would like to meet that goal in the next couple of years here by 2024. Yeah, because, again, as NATO was like, what are we doing here? Again, that really led to a big decline in military spending. And that huge increase in military spending among European nations of recent years has largely been because of Vladimir Putin rattling his labor and then actually following through on it. But one thing, Chuck, that I think is really important, it's a misconception is we don't contribute three and a half percent of our GDP to NATO. Now, a lot of people think that the requirement is that you as a nation spend 2% on your own nation's defense, and then because you're all tethered together through this invisible alliance of NATO, NATO combined has access to those 30 member nations defense. What? The defense budgets by which, when you add it all up, is extremely substantial, both in amount spent, but also in what you get for that kind of money. Yeah, I do think that some people might think that everyone chips in this money to NATO and that there are NATO forces and stuff like that. That's not how it works. We do contribute to run NATO with their own budget, but that's about $2 billion. And that's just day to day operations and logistics and operations and keeping the headquarters nice, tidy, sure, clean. Someone's got to clean those bathrooms. That's not a lot of money, though. But that 2%. Right. Is spending on your own military it's actually apportioned out in the original, I guess, charters. Is that what you say? Or the original agreement? The treaty. The what? The treaty. Yes, the tree. It's right there. That's what I'm saying. It's so boring. It is hard to keep wanting to find a better name. A portion meant for the United States. Our cost share is 22% here in the US. If you look at our GDP, it's about the same size as the other 27 nations put together. So it's not based on how big in the economy you have, because then our portion would be about 50%. But it's 22%. Right. It does make sense that's just for chipping into that $2 billion, that keeps NATO operational ready at all times. Right. Dropping the bug in for us. It is. And so the US is far, in a way, we spend on defense, I think almost three times more than the other NATO nations combined. So we spent about $811,000,000,000 in 2021, and the rest of the NATO allies spent a combined 363,000,000,000 from, I think the UK's. 59.2 billion down to North Macedonia is 108,000,000. But if you look at proportion of GDP, there are plenty of nations who go beyond that 2%. Like, Greece actually spends more of its GDP by percentage on defense than the United States does. We spend 3.5%. Greece spends 3.82%, croatia's, 2.79%. The UK is 2.29%, poland is 2.1%. So plenty of nations have started topping that. But that is a fairly new thing. Yeah, you just can't look at NATO as a 30 item balance sheet and say, well, this is a bad deal because I'm looking at 30 different numbers of what these countries contribute. It's much more complex than that. You have to look at it relative to the size of the nation and their economies and overall spending. It's frustrating, for sure. No, it really is. But when you add it all up, what you have is a combined in $2,021.74 trillion among the NATO allies spent in total spending. That comes to three and a half million troops who are committed to NATO's alliance. Three and a half million troops, and just that dollar amount alone, by the way, 1.74 trillion. That's basically more than the rest of the world combined. And just the NATO allies, the non US. NATO allies spending is more than China and Russia's defense budgets combined. So it's substantial. Not to mention that three NATO members are nuclear powers allied together. So when you put all that stuff together, the idea of NATO being the stabilizing force in global security makes total sense. It doesn't even have to do anything. It just has to exist to keep things stable and to promote democracy around the world and to reach out to formerly non democratic countries and say, hey, here's how you become democratic. Here are the values. Let's see if you can stick to them. If you want to become a NATO member just from this kind of defense spending. It's kind of ingenious in a way. Well, it is. And I think it's part of just modern society to get complacent about. Our memories are so short these days, I think, and there's so little acknowledgement and realization of the history of the world. And not just like the last 30 to 50 years. There's been peace in Europe for about 70 years now, and that's all most people remember, unless you're like, in your 80s, probably. You know what I'm saying, right. That's how it's been. Previous to that, there were a couple of millennia of war in Europe. And like, the fact that NATO and I think not singly NATO, but I think NATO has been the biggest driver of ensuring that piece over the last seven decades. Yeah, I mean, you're not the only one. Pretty much global security experts will say, yes, NATO has kept the world order stable for that long, basically as long as it's been around. I think it's just sad that I think the short term memory of how people are today, it's like, the cold rules are over. Do we really need this stuff anymore? Yeah, but I mean, it's tough to blame people because, again, it's like the world you grew up in, it's the world you were born in, and then just the relief of, wow, democracy actually won. We actually did it. We can just relax for once, for a little while. I was thinking today there are plenty of people who I'm sure listen to our podcast, who've never lived under the threat of nuclear attack and are now for the first time in their life. And I've settled back into it like it's an old smoking jacket and some comfy slippers. This is just like normal stuff to me. And I realized, I wonder how many people out there are super anxious about that idea of dying in a nuclear attack. And all I can say is, you get used to it. You do. You get used to doing drills in school where you get under your desk duck, hallway duck and cover, because that would do a lot in the case of a nuclear bomb or watching Matthew Broderick bring us back from the brink of nuclear war. What a hero. What a movie. So. Chuck. We should probably before we finish. We should probably talk about the future of Ukraine and NATO. Because as we've said a few times here. Ukraine making moves toward becoming a NATO member and being. Like. In deep cahoots with NATO has created this situation. At least in part. Where Russia is feeling. Like. Emboldened about invading Ukraine to either put a stop to that or whatever Putin's saying he's doing. So if you've been paying attention to the news volumer, zelensky has been saying, like, okay, we're willing to maybe start talking about neutrality now, and what he's talking about has almost everything to do with NATO. Right? Yeah. Neutrality isn't just something like, just say, oh, we're neutral. We just don't feel that strongly about anything over here. Right. That's not what it means. Neutrality in terms of the world order, I believe it means you don't get involved in a third country's issue. Isn't that right? Totally, yeah. No matter what. So you wouldn't join NATO, you wouldn't send arms, you wouldn't do anything like that. Which, by the way, I mean, since we said Ukraine is a partner country, they're just getting a steady flow of arms through Poland from NATO allies. And it's been super effective from what I saw, because Russia is a tank based military, and the antitank weaponry that we've been sending Ukraine and Ukraine has been using the great effect has actually stalled. Stalled 1000 Russian troops from taking over Ukraine, which everybody thought was going to happen in a matter of days. Now they're finally backing off of Kiev. It's just insane to even say it out loud, but under neutrality, there would be no arms going from NATO to Ukraine. Russia would not be allowed to invade Ukraine. Ukraine would be what Finland is. Finland has a huge amount of border that it shares with Russia, and it serves as a buffer state between Europe and Russia. It's not allied with Russia. It's not alive with Europe. Finland is just its own jam. The proposal on the table now is that Ukraine become like the southern Finland. It'll be a neutral state. It'll be its own sovereign democracy. It can do whatever it wants, but it can't join NATO. And it's certainly not going to be allied with Russia, not after this invasion or ever, because of its neutrality status. Yeah, and I think the idea at first is that people thought, and it may have been the case that Russia wanted to absorb Ukraine as part of building back maybe not a new Soviet Union, but just expanding Russia. And that may have been the case, I don't know. But I think the last few weeks it's become clear that that's not possible and that occupation of Ukraine isn't possible. Like long term occupation. Yeah. So it seems like neutrality may be the only way forward here. Yeah, definitely. I can't imagine how difficult occupying Ukraine would be for Russia over any period of time. I don't think they have enough troops to do that. No. And I mean, the Ukrainians certainly have the will to resist for as long as they need to to get Russia out of there. I feel like now that seems to be I think we read an Al Jazeera article on it, right? Yeah, it was super interesting. They talked a lot about how not all pro Russian sentiment in Ukraine has been dissolved, because there was some, obviously, but this has done a lot of damage to that. Oh, yeah. I'm sure anybody who is on the fence before is like, okay, I'm not pro Russian or even considering pro Russian anymore. But it does seem to be that. And this is obviously up to Ukraine. But if Selinsky is making gestures and overtures saying, we're willing to talk about neutrality, it seems like that could be their decision. But again, global security experts, at least ones that were quoted in Al Jazeera, are saying, like, this is actually probably the most viable and quick short term at hand solution to ending this invasion and actually stabilizing things again for a while. That's right. The article, by the way, is Ukraine. What does neutrality mean? And could it lead to peace? From Thomas O Falk. And that was just from a few weeks ago. A couple of weeks ago, yeah. And in addition to how stuff works in the Al Jazeera article, we got stuff from Brookings, the Brennan Center, Time, BBC, and a bunch of other ones, too, and Sesame Street. This is definitely one of the you is for Up Yours. And this is one of those definite moments in history that it's worth paying attention to. So if this episode struck your fancy at all, go read up on it, because there's a lot of really interesting and important stuff to read. Literally, the world has changed in the last couple of months, more than it has in years. Since 2001, I would say. Since 2001. You got anything else? I don't think so. Okay, well, if you want to know more about NATO, you can go check that out online. And since I said, Check that out online, everybody, it's time for listener mail. That's right. I thought, why not? Let's read one from a brand new listener. This is the first episode they listen to, and I have foretold the future with this email. Wow. Just kidding. Hey, guys. Last week, though, I found out about your podcast, and I'm loving it. I've become tired of the radio, so I decided to start looking at podcasts for my work commute, and yours caught my eyes. That looked interesting without being too heavy. Educational, but not as depressing as the news. Perfect. Nice. Okay. I was waiting for a response. Well, I mean, yeah, nice was my response. I like it. I'll take it you two make a great pair and work off each other seamlessly. When I listen, I cannot help but think of you two as a mashup of Burton, Ernie, and SNL's, the delicious dish and a gas style Shannon. So I will respond to that part because that is probably the greatest description anyone has ever come up with for sweaty balls. I mean that in the most complimentary way, by the way. I love it, and it works so darn well, obviously, since the show is going strong for years now. Thank you for noticing. I just wanted to reach out and say thanks for saving me from boring radio and crazy news and helping my mind grow while being entertained. And that is from Samantha Burns. Maloney. Well, thanks, Samantha. We really appreciate that. That was a great email. Seriously. The best descriptor I've ever heard, for sure. Yeah. If you're new to the podcast or you're a long timer or you email every week, we want to hear from you. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts, I Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
https://podcasts.howstuf…host-prisons.mp3	How Ghost Prisons Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-ghost-prisons-work	In this episode, Josh and Chuck discuss the controversial "ghost prisons," covert prisons created by the CIA after September 11th, 2001 to secretly detain and interrogate terrorist suspects in various locations around the world, including the U.S.	In this episode, Josh and Chuck discuss the controversial "ghost prisons," covert prisons created by the CIA after September 11th, 2001 to secretly detain and interrogate terrorist suspects in various locations around the world, including the U.S.	Tue, 22 Jun 2010 18:01:55 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2010, tm_mon=6, tm_mday=22, tm_hour=18, tm_min=1, tm_sec=55, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=173, tm_isdst=0)	33358802	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Are you looking for? An escape? An immersive getaway experience? Well, there's a place for all your wildest dreams. Perhaps you enjoy wrapping along the paperboy, or you believe that blessed be the fruit. Or you dream of one day smashing a glass while stealing. Who's. Ah. Whether you're sworn to Team Kim or you just want a good old fashioned, mysterious murder, there's a place that has it all. From Atlanta to only murders in the building, it's all on Hulu. So check into your obsessions. Hulu subscription is required. Terms apply. Visit hulu.com for plan details. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. This episode of Stuff You Should Know is brought to you by GoToMeeting. We all have to meet, but the average cost of a single business trip is $1,000. With just one click, you can save time and money and have your meetings online with affordable and easy to use GoToMeeting. Use GoToMeeting for sales, presentations, product demos, training sessions, collaborating on documents, and more. And at $49 per month for unlimited meetings, it saves time, money, and travel. Try GoToMeeting free for 30 days. Visit gotomeeting.com stuff that's gottomeeting. comStuff. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. Across this vast gulf of a table in our brand new VOC heavy studio is Charles W. Chuck Bryant. Right? We're in, people. This is our brand new studio. This is our first time recording it, and now we got to get used to this weirdness all over again. I know. Things just can't be normal, can they? So now we're in weird chairs, and the table is huge. And Jerry I can't even talk about Jerry because she's not even in the room with us anymore. Wait, Chuck, did you just pronounce huge with the h being silent? Did you say huge? I've been saying human being and huge ever since it came back from New York. Huge. Yeah, huge. And Jerry isn't even in our vision line of vision, and I hate that. Yeah, it's odd. Things are odd. There's, like, a Burlet curtain. I'm wearing headphones made out of old potatoes. All right, Chuck, let's get this going. All right? Enough griping from us. I know. Seriously, nobody cares. No one cares. I had, like, a great intro to this one. Let's hear it. But I can't remember. Oh, yes. Chuck, you know that there's a lot of finger pointing about how 911 was allowed to happen, right? Is there? There has been. Okay, I don't know if there is any more. All right. But at first, there was a lot of finger pointing, and a lot of that fell on Clinton. Oh, yeah, sure. Because Bush is pretty new. He was a newbie still as far as presidents go. And Clinton had been president for two terms. Blame it on the previous guy. It's an American tradition. It really is. But the thing is, Clinton's administration, Clinton's CIA, had passed along a list of high valued targets of people in the Al Qaeda network before the September 11 attacks ever happened. And there was a lot of talk about what to do with this list of people after September 11, like, say, 11:00 a.m. On September 11, the talk started about what to do with this list as it became clear that this was Al Qaeda, that it carried out this heinous attack. Right. And one of the things that we did with it was to publish a deck of cards. I have that deck. Do you really? Yeah, a friend of mine gave me that deck. Yes. Do you remember that? You could get them, like, at convenience stores and American public be on the lookout for these guys and also enjoy some Texas hold them with them as well. Mine is Camo on the other side. Is it really? Yes, that's appropriate. So there's a lot of talk about what to do with this list of people. We had their names. In a lot of cases, we knew where they were. And one of the ideas that was suggested was to start assassinating all of them. And that one was, I think, probably fairly well entertained. But the CIA had been, as far as we know, out of practice with assassinations for a while. Yeah, sure they have. So instead, we decided to start stepping up a program called Extraordinary Rendition. Right. Which would be a great band name as soon as I heard it. You think everything's a great band name. No, everyone thinks everything is a good band name, but not me. Okay. You're the exception. Right. I'm the guy who named his band El Cheapo. I know. It's a good one. Yeah. What's the other one? Designer Kitty or what? There was another band name recently that you liked. Oh, I don't know. Okay. Well, anyway, this extraordinary rendition program actually dated back to the Bush Senior presidency. Right. In January 1992, George Herbert Walker Bush signed a presidential finding authorizing extraordinary rendition, which basically is kidnapping. Yeah. Finding it, we should say, is sort of like an executive order. Right. It's one of those things that a president can just say, make it happen, but it's pretty much a secret executive order. Right. I mean, like, its existence can be made public, but its contents aren't. Right. And actually, the executive order that Bush Senior signed allowing or authorizing extraordinary Rendition is still classified. Right, yeah. But what we know is that it was used a couple of dozen times, largely in the Clinton era, and for the most part, it was used to go into countries that harbored terrorists, kidnapped the terrorists, and then bring them to American courts for trial or other places. Well, that kind of stepped up after 2001. After Bush Jr. Came into power, the CIA stopped, I guess, kind of wanting to put their faith in American courts and risk the coin toss of an American jury going in favor of a terrorist. So they started using extraordinary rendition to third party nations. So now not only are we kidnapping foreign nationals, we're kidnapping foreign nationals and taking them to other countries that they don't have an affiliation with, so that we can basically outsource torture, interrogation, that kind of thing. Right. Yeah. And we should point out at this point that during this kind of rendition, this isn't the kind of rendition you want to hear if you're a detainee, because it basically means you don't have a lot of contact with the outside world, as in none. Right. You don't have rights to habeas corpus. You can't call your attorney and say, get me out of here on bail, that kind of thing. It's very secret. You're abducted I think one of the stories you listed was a guy that they set up a fake fundraiser and invited this guy to it in order to capture him. Yeah. After 911, the world stage turned into this plot exposition montage from a Mission Impossible movie. Right. Or a Simpsons episode. Sure. Yeah. People just started disappearing, actually. Yeah, pretty much. And by the very geopolitical definition of disappearing, they were kidnapped by a government entity and kept out of the purview of the courts and stripped of any kind of rights. Right. Right. So the problem is, we went from using a couple of extraordinary rendition on a couple of dozen people throughout the entire nineties right. To buy the New York Times estimate, at least 307 between late 2001 and 2005. That's probably a very low number. Right. So we go from a couple of dozen in a decade to 307 and more in about four years. And we don't exactly know where to put these people. The CIA didn't want to bring them to the US. Because they didn't want them to be prosecuted in American courts. They wanted these people to lose all their rights and to disappear so that they could be kept for as long as the CIA wanted them until they found out what they needed. So what they did was set up a network of secret prisons. Right. Ghost prisons, as they're called. Yes. And they are known as ghost prisoners. There you go. There's a podcast. Yes, if only. Human Rights Watch, you've heard of that group. They have a list on the Internet about a list of ghost prisoners, suspected ghost prisoners. And it's very long, and the CIA is always like, we don't comment on that kind of thing because those lists are probably not accurate. Right. They towed the company line there. Right. Because the CIA couldn't say, yeah, that list is really accurate. And we do this. The CIA, for years and years and years after their cover was blown, would never acknowledge that there were secret prisons. Right. Well, yeah, but GW had to come clean in, what, six in Atlanta? Oh. Was it in Atlanta? It was sunny produced, standing next to him. Really? Yeah. He acknowledged the existence of secret prisons, and it was probably after seeing W, right. It was probably just like a snafu or he didn't mean to say it. He was probably tricked into admitting it, but he did. And so it came out that, yes, these do exist, but we don't use them any longer. And then in January of 2009, obama first thing he does is shuts down the CIA secret prison network three years after they stopped using it, apparently. Well, that was on the second full day in office. He did that. But ProPublica, you've heard of them, too, right? Yes. They say that there are dozens of ghost prisoners still unaccounted for. He says he shut them down, but they say ProPublica, all these human rights groups say that they don't know where these dudes are. Well, the other possibility is that the secret prisons have been shut down, but those people are dead. That was par for the course in a lot of ways. For the CIA secret prisons, if you have no rights whatsoever, if you die in custody, nobody cares. Or I shouldn't say no one cares. There's no accountability for that. Right. So, for instance, let's say you died of a fixation because you were held in a shipping container. Yes. Have you seen the road to Guantanamo? No. It's a kind of, I guess, dock. Now I know about it. I just haven't seen it. It's worth seeing. Yes, but there's a scene in there that shows that these people being rounded up and shipped across Afghanistan in a huge shipping container. And when they open the doors the next day, like, most of them are dead. It's gross. It's really disturbing. Well, it's like when you get the pet turtle in the shoe box. Mom always says, remember the holes in the top. So apparently mom wasn't around to remind them of that. No, people weren't thinking like that. And the one dude froze to death. Yeah. And the secret prison, I have to say they had some pretty cool code names. One of the first things, and one of the largest was code named Salt Pit, and it was in a brick factory, an abandoned brick factory outside of Kabul. And a junior CIA officer who was kind of new on this kind of thing ordered a detainee strip naked and chained to the floor, and he was left overnight. And it can get pretty cold, apparently, in Kabul. I guess so. And the guy froze to death. So it's entirely possible that these two dozen people and I'm surprised it's not more, but these two dozen people who are unaccounted for are dead, right? That's probably the case. Yeah. You mentioned the names. I dug up a couple of more, and I would say these are probably top ten list of camps you don't want to go to. But Camp Dark Prison was the one that's a bad one. And my favorite was camp Bond steel. B-O-N-D-S-T-E-E-L. Nice. Camp Bond steel. And thank you for spelling it. Well, it's not steel as in take it's steel, as in this is metal that I will beat you with. Right? This is metal that you will live behind for the rest of your life. Well, let's talk about what you lose when you're in a CIA prison. The rights you lose traditionally. Do you remember a few years ago, what are the people in Guantanamo Bay? Are the enemy combatants or the noncombatants or the terrorists? Like, what kind of rights do they have? Do they fall under the Geneva Convention? And it was largely decided by the Bush administration that, no, these people didn't have Geneva Convention rights. Under the purview of the Geneva Convention, the Red Cross is charged with going to visit enemy combatants and prisoners of war on both sides and see how they're treated with the secret prisons. First of all, no one knew that these people had been kidnapped, but wouldn't be very good secret prison exactly. If the Red Cross knew about it, where they were. And they were denied cross even after the Red Cross found out that they were here. And I know you've got this guy here, and we want to visit them in the secret prison will be quiet. It's like, no, we're not letting you in. Right. That kind of shook things up. That's a big deal. There's no habeas corpus. No. And like you mentioned earlier, they would go to countries where they typically might torture people, and because the US. Isn't allowed to, obviously, to torture. Well, they weren't at the time. This is before we decided, yeah, we torture. Right. But we outsourced it, like you mentioned. So we would, let's say, set up. And I think you said the first one was in Thailand. Yes. So they were looking around. They're like, Where would I go if I want to set up a secret prison where you might be able to torture somebody in Thailand was like, Come on over. You can set up shop here, and they outsourced it. But from what I read in your article was you wrote this, right? Yeah. From what I read was the US. Could say, like, hey, ask him about the microfilm. Right. We would pass along question or direction or something like that. I wrote this thing in I can't remember, sometime in 2007, I think, late 2007. And at the time, the last report I'd had of somebody being held in a secret prison was in Africa, I believe. North Africa. Yeah. And some Americans and Canadians reported having contact with Americans in these, like, African prisons. Yes. Westerners being held captive secretly. Sure. And some guy behind the curtain saying, Use the dental drill. Exactly. And it sounds like he's from Omaha and he shouldn't because this is Africa and other places, other black site host countries. Yeah, that's what they're called, just like the black budgets and black ops. These are black sites. Right. Or ghost prisons. So you put black in front of it and if it's related to the government and there's no description, there's just like a huge budget on a line item yeah. With a sharpie that is exited out, that's a secret prison. Some of the other countries are Azerbaijan, Oman, Jordan, Morocco, Syria, Egypt, Algeria All of these places were receiving prisoners. Didn't necessarily have a black site. May have, but then most of the black site countries, host countries, were Eastern European, like Lithuania and Romania. Yeah, but once it came out, though, they would probably try to shut it down. Right. Because they didn't want us to get out to the press. Well, not only did they not want it to get out to the press, they didn't necessarily want it to get out to the president of that country. In a lot of cases, it was like the CIA, maybe the US Ambassador of that country, and a couple of, say, Bulgaria secret police, high commanders. Those are the only people on the planet who knew that there was a secret prison in Bulgaria. What are they getting in Romania? I wondered that myself, too. It's got to be money, right? Sure. It would have to be, because do you really think Bulgarians are quite as amped up about American patriotism as, say, the average American is? Yeah, I wouldn't think so. And especially a Bulgarian secret police officer. Oh, yeah. So, yeah, I would think money. Well, what I said, though, a second ago is they would close, like Thailand, when the word got out that they were doing this and now we should close this. But it seems like every time it happened, they would just find a different country and then go set up shop there. Right. And with Eastern Europe in particular, it was a little prickly or ticklish because well, when the Washington Post broke the story, they even said in the article, we're not going to reveal the names of the host countries because it's so sensitive that these countries governments are really going to have problems on their hands when it comes out. Indeed they did at first, but the reason why is because these were all post Soviet block countries that had adopted democracies after the fall of the Soviet Union. Right. And we're now involved in this horrible secret prison network. Right. You're talking about when word got out. Do you know how word got out? Well, is this the Thailand one? No. Word got out on what, then? Like the existence of the secret period? Yeah. Wasn't a canary singing? Singing like a canary? No, there was no pigeon. Basically, it was the CIA's fault. They didn't do their leg work, they didn't do their homework. Oh, with the manifest for the planes. Yes. So this is what cracks me up. The CIA, this is the funny part, is kidnapping people taking them to a secret prison network that they set up. And yet they're honest about flight manifests. Right, yeah, that's what I don't get. So there was a Swedish TV producer who basically did some hard hitting journalism. I think it was called cold. faxs was the translation of Swedish Spence fence. We'll call him Spence Fence. I think that's good. And if that's not his name, I'll bet Spence Fence is better than his real name. Sure. So Sven was, I guess investigating the extradition of two Swedish citizens to Egypt for questioning. They were suspected terrorists. So Sven starts looking into the plane that took them there and it was a Gulf Stream Five. Yeah. They charter these, right? Yeah, it was a Gulf Stream Five and it was registered to a company van, found out very quickly, called Premier Executive Transport Services and it was registered in Dead of Massachusetts. So then calls Premier Executive Transport Services, leaves a message, wants to know about why they would be transporting suspected terrorists to Egypt. Right. And 15 minutes later he gets a call from the Swedish intelligence service saying like, stop asking questions. And so then starts looking a little further and apparently finds out very quickly, in very short order, that there are 36 planes chartered by the CIAD. Stop making odd stops with the nationalities of the people on board. And they would go from like, say, Afghanistan yeah, this guy. To Egypt, to Morocco and then to Guantanamo. Yeah. They're flying from Afghanistan to Guantanamo, but somehow they can't get a direct flight and they stop off at like four places along the way. Right. And then at each stop there's somebody who's country of origin is Oman, but they get off in Cuba. Right. It's very flimsy. All of the companies were dummy corporations that had like PO boxes listed and yeah, the Swedish intelligence service basically tipped this guy off and he blew the whistle. I think 2004 was when it really started rolling. Yeah. Spence Fence and Rip. So these prisons, Josh, we're not saying that these are nice guys that shouldn't be picked on. These are big time. The one in Thailand, I think the first one, their first guest, their first overnight guest was Abu Zuba Zubaida. And he was a top Al Qaeda guy. He was captured in a shootout in Pakistan, was recovering in the hospital, and I think he probably knew what was going on. He's in the hospital saying, I'm still not feeling that great, maybe I should stay here a little longer. And then he recovers. And then they're like, well, why don't you come stay in our private hotel? Was he the one that they kidnapped out of his hospital in Somalia? No, they just stayed in Pakistan. Yeah, he was just recovering after a shootout and then they brought him to their little secret hotel. And you pointed out that he was treated well. He was tortured and treated well. You said they fed him breakfast, lunch and dinner. Yeah. And he loved KitKats, and they gave him Kit Kats all the time. Did he? I don't know. That's what I read. Well, it said they fed him he was treated well because they fed him baked chicken and candy bars. But what if, on his little questionnaire, he filled out, like, allergic to chocolate and I hate chicken. Maybe that was part of the entirely possible. I just wanted to bring that up. There's also chuck a list on Mother Jones, I think. Yeah. Of Music of Torture or something like that. Metallica's high up the list. I know that. Metallica rick Astley. Really? Yeah. Wow. Yeah. The Barney song at Guantanamo, very loudly, over and over and over again. And the meow mix commercial. Really? Yeah. I would do the cooks pest control here locally. Here comes Cookie. The guy mentioned, though, that's Abu Zu zubdaya. Zubaya, yeah. He was joined shortly thereafter by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who's a high value target, I'm sure. When he checked in to the secret hotel, the other guy was like, oh, crap. What's? Not good. What's odd is that it took us as many years as it did to start assassinating people. I think it was just in the last couple of months that news broke of some programs that the CIA was outsourcing to, like Z Worldwide, Blackwater and other contractors, ex Delta Force guys who were going into Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, and assassinating, like, al Qaeda leaders and other terrorist guys. Right. So I wonder why we didn't just do that at first. Instead, I guess we needed info, intelligence. We had none. So I guess it's probably why they were like, well, we can't kill them. Yeah. We want them to know what's going on so we can waterboard them. And then eight years later, we'll start assassinating and give them kid cats, right? Apparently so. Latest news on this. Yeah, there's some pretty recent stuff going on. Yeah. Did you read about the Physicians for Human Rights report? Yes. So basically, there were physicians present at a lot of these enhanced targetions, and not just in an observational manner. Well, that's what they were supposed to be there for, basically. Like, hey, you just almost drowned, so let me make sure you're still alive and breathing and in good health. Right? Yeah, that's okay. Actually. Apparently, as far as the American Medical Association and international treaties are concerned right. You're allowed to do that. You're still fulfilling your purpose as a physician. Right. They took it a step further. Right? Yes, they did. They have a report out, Josh, called Experiments and Torture. Evidence of human subject research and experimentation in the enhanced interrogation program. And from what I gather, the long and short of it is they were gathering information that could later be used to defend in court the torturers. Is that right? I think they were quantifying pain thresholds. Right. Like, if you waterboard this guy for this long, he'll experience the pain of eight. Right. So they were kind of writing an outline of what you can do and still get defended in a court of law. Right. Which transferred their position as physicians to researchers. Yeah. And it transferred the position of these detainees as patients to test subjects. Exactly. So they were engaging in human experimentation. Pretty much. And gathering data from torture, which is totally illegal. Yeah. But isn't everything about the Ghost Prison Network illegal? Yeah, pretty much everything that took place as far as the CIA was concerned after 2001 was illegal. And it's not like we're little babes in the woods. It's not like the CIA has just been on the up and up since then. But this is recent. This is going on now still, I imagine. Yeah. There was another joint study, a 226 page report published in January of this year, and it's a joint study by there's, like, four different groups. I won't read all of them. All human rights groups? Yeah. And they said, of a particular concern to the authors I'm going to read this verbatim. Beyond the overall illegality of the entire project conceived and executed by the Bush administration is the fate of dozens of men held in secret prisons run by the CIA or transferred to CIA prisons. So they estimate you said a couple of dozen. You said a couple of dozen, I thought. Did I? No. They're saying that 94 prisoners had been redacted and had enhanced interrogation techniques, to varying degrees, performed on 28 of the 94. So this was part of the whole torture memo thing. How is it that low? I would think it would be way more than that. Yes, I would, too. Well, that's what they found out, so who knows? It may have been more good times. Yeah, it's weird. America in the 21st century was a weird place. The first decade was odd, if you ask me. But Obama's trying to shut these down and I think has, for the most part, yes. I don't know, but I'm not saying that there's not hinky stuff going on there, too. Definitely not. Again, we're not little baths in the woods. This episode of Stuff You Should Know is brought to you by Go to Meeting, the affordable way to meet with clients and colleagues for your free 30 day trial visit. Gotomeeting.com stuff. You got anything else? No, I'm good. If you want to learn more, you can read my 2007 article, was There a Secret CIA Prison Network? Just type in Ciamprrison in the handysearchbarhouseupworks.com. And that takes us, of course, to listener mail. No, Josh. Oh, yeah. We're going to do just a little quickie New York recap for those of our friends who could not be there. Dude, New York was huge. It was odd and weird and surreal and awesome above all else. One of the things I learned about our fans, at least our fans in the Brooklyn area. Yeah, sure. They are very self aware and self conscious people, and that makes them highly relatable to us. So the biggest question I got was, this must be very weird for you. I didn't get that much. I got it every time. Every time I answer it's, like, actually, it's really weird. Maybe just because you were standing there, like, twitching. Yeah. But I got it a lot, and it was nice, actually. I found it disarming. Yeah, that's good. So everyone knows we went to New York. We had a few media opportunities, we did a few interviews. But Monday night was when we had our happy hour at the Knitting Factory in Brooklyn with The Onion. Which, dude, we couldn't have done any of this without The Onion. Thank you to Dan and Joe. Yes. For putting this stuff together. Just being our buds. Yeah, that was a real treat to get to know those guys. For sure. It was sincere sensation. I know. You sound like my dad. It was a real treat. Josh so we have our happy hour. We get there, tons of people show up. The fire department comes at one point because there were too many people there. I know. Which was so awesome. I know. I was like, Is there something on fire? And they weren't in a hurry. They were just kind of standing around talking to people, like, trying to gauge the amount of people, I think. Yeah. So we got to meet people. We got to hang out with people and drink adult beverage with people. We got to meet mark australian wagyu WAGA mack. Yes. Thanks for the coozy, bud. Yes, we got to meet a lot of people who and I remembered a lot of them, ninja showed up on Monday. The dude Chris and his wife, whose wife was car jack. Chris Witt. Yes. He was there with his wife. And they were super awesome. They were almost kind of working for us. They were helping with the T shirts and taking photographs. Yeah. And there was Greg, I believe he was kind of helping me, too. He was helping me move the line along and everything. Yeah. There are some really genuinely cool people here, everybody. There was super. Yes. As a matter of fact. And I need to say a special thanks to the banjo dude. Remember him? Yeah. The guy with the banjo and his girlfriend. Well, a lot of people brought gifts, and she made this really neat little egg where she had made a design of thread that was on the egg. It was really intricate and very cool. Very cool. And they also met my friend Justin and helped him out in some ways. And they were very cool kids. And I can't remember her name, but there's a fan that both of us met, but I talked to her for a while. Grundy. No, not Grundy. But hey, grundy. Yes. She gave us a molecular. Gastronomy book. Oh, yeah, she just wrote in. I can't remember her name, but thank you for it. Yeah, it was very awesome. So hopefully, possibly look for a Molecular Gastronomy podcast. Right. And I got CDs, and a lot of bands were like, hey, man, listen to this. Yes. And we have to go listen to the Large Hadron podcast. Yes, I have. Not yet, but we need to go check them out. So that was Monday. So then we had our Wednesday. Flash forward to Wednesday. And we had our allstar trivia night at the Bellhouse in Brooklyn. And this was nuts. Yes. We had probably 13 probably cobbled together. 500 people or so showed up, only for sure in this big room. It's a big venue. It's like a contravene. Yes, I could see sticks playing there, but, yeah, it was standing room only, I would say about 500 people. And we cobbled together this really awesome trivia team. Yeah, go ahead and lower the boom there. Okay. So we had Jackson Public, who creates this super cool cartoon called Adventure Brothers that you may be familiar with. He was one of the headwriters on the Tick. Yes. And he was brought along by our buddy John Hodgman. We can say our buddy. Yeah, we can. Now I feel like he's our friend. He is. You can feel that way. Right. And I'm really glad that John brought Jackson along, because he actually saved our butts, like, several times with questions. Yes. There would have been, like, five or six questions that we wouldn't have gotten had it not been for him. He's a very cool guy. Wyatt Cneck from The Daily Show came along. Another buddy. Super cool. We actually had lunch with Ian Hodgman one day. Yes, the esteemed Joe Randazzo, the editor in chief of The Onion. Who, again, we couldn't have done any of this without. Joe was awesome. Joe was there just looking pumped because he worked out instead of Smoke. Now he's very intimidating. And then I regard glass. Yes. I Reglass, the man that we stare up at in the itunes rankings every day, I Reglass was there on our team. Not there to berate him. No, he was there on our team. He was very cool. And I just need to say that he came up to me afterwards and was blown away. Do your impression check. Oh, I don't want to start pushing. Your fans are amazing. It was pretty good. That was close. He was blown away by the enthusiasm of the stuff. You should know. Army and Randazzo came up, too, and he's like, man, IRA doesn't get this sort of, like, rock star thing much. So he was tickled to be there, I think, and have people fawning over him and telling him how much they loved him, which is something he deserves. And Hodgman we mentioned John Hodgman was on our team, and he was one of the funniest, quickest witted, smartest guys I've ever met in my life. Agreed. I'm with you 100% on that one. Like, I told my buddy Scotty about that, and he said, you're really quick, though, man. I said, yeah, but wow. I know, dude. When I quickly make, like, a fart joke, hodgeman is that quick, but he references, like, an 18th century poet, right? And it fits and it's funny, right? It's like a drag racer and like a 15 year old donkey in competition in that one. Thank you. Yeah, same here, buddy. I've got, like, the twelve year old donkey thing going on. All right, thanks, everyone. Thank you very much, everybody who helped that. And it was such a success and we had such a good time that we're like, why would we spend any more time at the office? Let's go hit other cities. So look for other cities in the very near future and want to know where we should go next. So if you have a suggestion of what city, where we should go, that kind of thing. You want to play some trivia, let us know. Send us an email to stuffpodcasts@housetepworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetofworks.com. Want more houses? Stuffofworks? Check out our blog on the Houseofworks.com homepage. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good, it's Criminal Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
42c22202-53a3-11e8-bdec-cbe491210c61	Cave Diving: Totally Nuts	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/cave-diving-totally-nuts	There are extreme sports and then there is cave diving, the most extreme activity a person can engage in without leaving Earth. Cave divers stay underwater swimming miles into – that’s right – caves, where no human has ever been before. It’s pretty cool.	There are extreme sports and then there is cave diving, the most extreme activity a person can engage in without leaving Earth. Cave divers stay underwater swimming miles into – that’s right – caves, where no human has ever been before. It’s pretty cool.	Thu, 19 Dec 2019 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=12, tm_mday=19, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=353, tm_isdst=0)	49058872	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody, it's me, Josh, and there's Chuck over there. And we just wanted to drop in to tell you we're going on tour and you should come see us. That's right. We are going to be in Seattle. I think that show is close to sold out. Yes. But you can always poke around for tickets. Sometimes I'm say become available. Why not? And what date is that? That is Thursday, January 16. That's right. And then we're ticket Friday off to relax. That's what we do. And then we're going to San Francisco sketchfest on Saturday. That's right. We're going to be there on January 18 of the Castro theaters. And if you want to see us, well, then go to Sysklive.com or the Sfcatchfest.com website and you can get tickets to come see us on Saturday, January 18. That's right. And if you're still around on Sunday the 19th and you want to come see Movie Crush Live, you can do that as well. It will be intimate and fun. Nice. Get intimate with Chuck? Everybody. We'll see you in January. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. And there's Charles. W. Danger is his middle name, even though it begins with W. Bryant Wanger. And there's Jerry. Jerome Roll. We're going to stick with Jerome. Okay. It's a good cave divers name. Yeah. I have just my regular name because I would never in a million years cave dive same, but I've never even scuba dived. Yeah, I believe that open water stuff. Once I got really, like, I guess, sea sick right afterward, too. And I was convinced that it had to do with the arrow. I was breathing. I was like, yeah, I'm done. Which stinks because it was really cool. Breathing underwater is one of the neatest experiences you will ever have. Yeah, it's really cool. I bet not snorkeling you're underwater and you're breathing. Even if it's a pool, it doesn't matter. Just take like a scuba lesson once and there you go, you're done. I have dreams where I can breathe underwater a lot. Really? But it's not like, hey, I'm Aquaman and I'm just breathing like a fish or something. It's that I figured out how to very slowly draw in air very carefully from the water around me. It's really a strange dream, but I have it a lot. It's pretty cool. Yeah. I'm not sure what it means. I don't either. I can't even begin to guess. But what's more boring than talking about someone's dreams? They say that nothing is more boring than that. Yeah. I thought that was a pretty interesting one, though. Nice. If you're going to talk about your dream, that's a good one to go with. Yeah. We're not talking about your dreams today, though, Chuck. No, we're talking about cave diving. Right. Which is not a dream. Again, I'm with you. I don't think it's not for me. I couldn't even go, like, regular caving, which I did the one time right. I can't remember. Did you enjoy it? I did. It was a butt kicker. Physically, very hard work. But I remember describing the pancake thing that I went through where I was laying on my back, squirming through, and the rock face was three inches above my body and face. And you're getting nervous now. I don't even like hearing about it. Yeah, that was a little weird. And I'm not even a claustrophobic guy, but I was like, you could die in here. I read about a poor guy, maybe the poorest of all time, one of them who was caving with his family, friends and family and got stuck and ended up dying. They could get to him, they could move his foot, they could touch his legs, but he was just so stuck that they just couldn't do anything for him. So they decided to go home. No, they were there the whole time. Okay. But over, like, I think the course of 24 hours, he just died the slow, jeez, terrifying death. So they could reach his foot, but not his mouth, clearly. Yes. To give him nutrients. They tried to give him stuff through an IV, I think they tried to give him a sedative and it kept falling out of his leg. So they couldn't even do that. Gosh. Yes. It was bad. That's hard to even hear about. I know, man. But this is cave diving, which is even more dangerous than caving. Yeah. And there's a few types of diving. There's the open water diving that you were talking about. There's cavern diving. And open water diving just means if you get in trouble, go up and you'll reach the surface. Exactly. You're not going to get hit in the head by a cave ceiling right. Or pinned down through crevasse. No, cavern diving is a little different in that you're in a cavern, but you should be able to see sunlight above you. And if you go up, you can get your head out eventually. From what I saw, the definition is you're no more than 70ft deep. Okay. And you're within 130 linear feet of the cave mouth. Okay. Or more specifically, your surroundings are illuminated by daylight. That's really what separates cavern diving from cave diving. It's kind of like remember a Biospeleology episode? Oh, yeah. So this would be the twilight zone between the dark zone and the light zone. That would be kind of cavern diving. Diving in the twilight zone. Right. Then you get to cave diving, and that is serious business. This is not what's considered recreational diving. This is going deep and dark. Yeah. With David Reese. Going deep with David Reese. I haven't spoken to Reese in a while. Love that guy. He's a great guy. Yeah. So this is technical diving. Hold on. Can I give you another definition of you mean going deep? Wasn't on that wreath joke. Going deep wasn't good enough. Cave diving is diving with an overhead environment so that separates it from open water environment. Yeah. Like if you go and panic and swim straight up, you're going to bonk your head. Yeah. You might have gone underwater and you have no direct vertical access to open air, surface or light. This is extremely important. Basically a horror movie. Yes. A nightmare. A living nightmare that you're doing on purpose that you paid a lot of money to equip yourself for. Yeah. The light thing is a really big one, too. Here's the thing. It's really easy because you're thinking that this is cave diving and the word caves in there, and we're talking about caves, but it's scuba diving, really. But it's scuba diving inside a cave. This is a really important thing to not lose sight of. It's a cave. It's deep in the bowels of the earth. A cave filled with water. Yes. There is no light. The only light is the light that you have and you're moving through it underwater. This is cave diving. Yeah. I'm in awe of people who do this and I can watch videos of it all day long. Yeah, it's very cool to see. It's like scuba. Plus, as far as the creep factor goes, I read one article about a guy who is a cave diving researcher, and as we'll see, there's scientific discoveries that have been made in these caves because just like the deep dry caves, the things that live in there are remarkable. And this guy was 69 years old and still going strong and said his family always worries about him, but he super experienced, knows what he's doing, but it's still fraught with danger. Yes. I do have a few death stats if you want, lay them on me. I read a scientific presentation called 30 Years of American Cave Diving fidelities, 1985 to 2015. You got the same one? Yeah. This is by the Divers Alert Network. 161 divers had died over that. How long was that? 85 to 2015, 30 year period. 67 of them were trained. 87 were untrained, which is crazy. I don't know what they're doing down there to begin with. A fool if you just take up cave diving for the first time. Yeah, exactly. Because 67 trained cave divers perished. Yes. And how, Chuck, how? What was the vast majority most common cause was asphyxia due to drowning, preceded by running out of breathing gas, usually after getting lost because of a loss of visibility caused by suspended silt. And that's where most of these are in Florida. And that's where I learned about the silt out. Also from the article you sent about the cave rescue in Thailand, which was apparently very silty. And the silt out is when so much silt gets kicked up that it just blacks out. Even with your light source. Yeah. The guy that was in that, I think it was an article in Atlantic. The guy was named Robert Laird. I think he's a cave diving expert. And he said you can put your light up to your mask and you can kind of see your light, but that's it. And you're in a cave, so you don't know where to go. Even feeling your way around is not going to help you. And the problem with the silt out is they can last for so long in a bad case of a silt out that you will run out of air before the silk settles enough for you to see through. So it's a bad jam. Well, and then you probably read the same interviews, but there's panic is what this guy said is what usually happens even with an experienced diver, because there's no escape, there's no quick way out, and things tend to have a domino effect. So if you're in a silt out like you said, you try and stay as still as possible and it's still maybe not going to work. You're getting nervous. Yeah, I'm kind of fidgety now that you've pointed out it's panic inducing just to think about it. You have to remain perfectly still in the total darkness and that might not even be good enough to let that silt settle. A bigger estimate of the number of deaths from cave diving oh, yeah. From the National Speed Illogical Society's cave diving section. They estimated more than 400 deaths in the history of cave diving. But they said in America, in the world. Okay. The other one is just oh, was it just America? Yeah. Okay. They placed a lot of them toward the beginning of cave diving, which started in the hey, I wonder what's in their stage. Yes. Which is crazy, because scuba diving started in about the within a little while of somebody inventing scuba diving, some people were like, oh, let's go into caves with this stuff, and they started dying. And so they pointed out that these people didn't give their lives in vain. Each death was a lesson learned for everyone else who was yet to come. But a lot of people died early on and it's gotten much there are far fewer deaths from cave diving, but it's like you said, they typically are cave diving experts who are dying because they're pushing themselves further and further. If you have no one's cave dive before, every cave you dive into is a new exploration. And this is a huge driver for people who cave dive. This is why they do it. They're seeing something that no other human on Earth, in most cases, has ever seen in the history of humanity. They're the first human to be in this place. There's lots of stuff to discover for when humans were there, but now it's flooded. There's just a lot of discovery. But as it's been going on for decades now, every time somebody discovers a new thing, that's one thing that is not left to be discovered by everybody else. So they're pushing themselves further and further. When you cave dive, you might be 100ft under sea level, but you might be scuba diving for miles down through a cave system. Not downward, necessarily, but horizontally. Yeah. Horizontal miles. Round trip for this cave dive, which is nuts, but that's what they do. Yeah. I can't remember where I was going with that. I started to get panicked again. Have you seen Once Upon a Time in Hollywood? Yeah. You know the scene with Brad Pitt on the boat in that 60 scuba gear? Yeah. It's so cool looking at it. Before we say this, I come from the future to warn us in the past that we should add spoiler alert here. It's like when they used to call him skin divers. Yeah. Do you think he killed his wife? Well, I think that's what you were led to believe. Whether I felt like it was up in the air well, a little bit. Also could have been an accident, because he was clearly had that spear gun resting on his knee, pointing at her. Right. Yeah. The question is, did his neurons fire and make his finger move? Right. Okay, so we took care of the spoiler. That was like, five minutes ago. I know. Now we're back to cave diving, and we should talk a little bit about equipment. A lot of this came from one of our old house Stuff works colleagues from the website, our old buddy John Fuller, who looks like MC Escher. He's been mentioned twice. He's the tie that binds the Escher episode and the cave diving episode. Yeah. And some of this equipment thing isn't the most exciting stuff in the world, but we should talk about it. Anyway, I found it frankly. Arousing, you got your mask, and this is something I didn't know. They use sort of simple black masks because it absorbs light. Yeah. Which makes sense. Yeah. Because you're using your own light source, so it can get pretty bright. I saw a flashlight from Underwater Kinetics, maybe it's like 15,000 LM, some ridiculous amount of lumen. Just lots of lumens. A lot of lumens. And yeah, if you have that stuff bouncing all over the place, you don't want your light gold glitter diamond dusted mask reflecting it in your eyes. Cuts down invisibility. But I take issue with Fuller saying that they favor simple masks because these guys do, like, the full face, like, BA mask. Yeah. Not the Brad Pitt skin diver 60s mask. Right. Which I loved. Yeah, I think some of them might. But I also saw plenty of them have, like I'm trying to think of what they call it, but just a really cool full face mask. Yeah. It looks like something that you could dive in a cave in or go to outer space in, basically. Yeah. So then you've got your fins again, black rubber fins. But the difference here that I gather from this in open water is you don't want those super long, super bendy fins because you're trying to not kick up silt. So you want those shorter stiffer fins. And when you're down there swimming around you're using little short controlled kicks. Yes. No big sweeping leg movements. No. It's a huge difference between cave diving and open water diving. Open water diving, your legs are extended out behind you and you're fluttering those fins up and down and you're propelling yourself forward. In cave diving your legs are bent at the knees so your feet are up slightly above you and mostly you're making frog kicks which are all in the ankle and you're just kind of waddling yourself along with these little kicks. You see what I'm saying? I love for twelve years you've been doing little physical gestures of me like anyone else in the world can see them. Well who am I talking to? You. I know. That's the whole point. So the frog look chuck. I know, I see this is what they do, little frog kicks. But in doing that, that you cut down on the potential of coming in contact with the rest of the cave. There's a couple of reasons why you want to do that. One, you want to preserve the cave. If you break off a stalactite coming from the ceiling, that's nature's work that you just messed with. You don't want to do that, bro. And then secondly, a lot of caves, pretty much all of them have that silt sediment on the bottom. That's your enemy. If you kick it up, you've got a silt out. So you want to really be careful what kind of movement you're making with your fins and then just how big your fins are and how flexible they are. And then one other thing about that too. You also want to maintain basically perfect buoyancy where you're completely neutrally buoyant relative to the top and the bottom of the cave. Yeah. What do they call the movement? Dragon float. Pull and glide. Pull and glide float. Yeah. Sort of the same thing you do when you recover a body. Well, a lot of this is body recovery, very sadly. Well, not a lot of it, but part of search and rescue can very much involve going deep and getting very swollen waterlog bodies. Right. But yeah, you pull yourself along with your hand in a little groove by the rock and then just let yourself glide. It seems very relaxing considering you're doing the most horrifying thing on the planet. Yes. So you might do that even instead of kicking, depending on where the space is, how tight it is, that kind of thing. Also it depends on how solid the surroundings are. You wouldn't do that in the coral or anything like that. And then also apparently you only do that when you have a current. There's one thing we should say. There's two kinds of cave diving, spring diving and sump diving. And in spring diving, that's where you see the pictures in National Geographic magazine where it's just this beautiful cave and there's just two people in scuba gear floating in the middle of it. That's a spring fed cave where you've got water moving through it, keeping it very clear because there's no way for sediment to settle. Right. Because the current is moving too quickly and you use that current to pull and glide. That looks like something that has a little bit more appeal. Yeah, but I mean, it's just as dangerous as anything else. Like you said, most of the people who die cave diving die in Florida, and that's what they're doing and diving in those springs. That's true. And the other time, the sump kind, those are a little more scary to me. That's a cave system where if you imagine kind of like a zigzag, like Charlie Brown shirt, say, that's the cave system. Inside of the cave, half of the bottom half is covered with water that you have to scuba through, but you also have to climb over through dry parts and air and then get down to the water again. That's the sump kind and that's super sedimenting. And you really got to know what you're doing there. That's the most dangerous kind by far. Yeah. You have your suit that you're wearing, and you can wear a wetsuit, a standard wetsuit or a dry suit. These are not cheap. They cost several thousand dollars for a good one. All this equipment is not cheap. So it's not the kind of thing that you just sort of decide to try out. Right. So you have to be wealthy and totally out of your mind to cave dying. Dry suits are sealed off. So if you've ever put on a wetsuit, part of the process is getting in that cold water and letting it fill up your wetsuit, which will warm it up. That's the idea eventually, is that water warms. But that process isn't fun. Getting in and out of a wetsuit isn't fun either, to be honest. And it's not that flattering. No. God. Wetsuits at the work. You have to go with it. We had to wear them when we scuba dive with the whales. Right? Yeah, the whale sharks. 100 years ago. It was easily 100 years ago. The dry suits seal off that water so you are dry. That's why they call it a dry suit. Your body doesn't get wet. And the cool thing here is that you can layer up some clothing and then put on the suit so you can stay warmer. Right. It's much more pleasant, I imagine silkies or something. Yeah, I love the silkies. And then John makes a good point. You want to have extras of just about everything. Like you don't go down there with a flashlight. I'd have eight flashlights strapped to every single limb on my body. Sure. Like I'm sure they carry an extra I would have a bunch of extra light. Yeah. $150,000. You got your little knife. If you get snagged, you cut things. I would have nine knives, eight flashlights. Well, you do want a redundant amount of stuff, like you were saying, because if something goes wrong down there, you are toast. Yes. Unless you can slowly and deliberately get yourself back to the surface of the ocean. That's right. But the other thing you want to do, too, is you're in very cramped quarters here, so everything has to be strapped down pretty closely to your body or in, like, a pocket, because you can't have any stuff hanging down because you'll get tangled up. Don't want to get tangled up down there. I know this is kind of amateur hour stuff because we're not a good breaking point, but we should probably take an ad break right here. No, I think it's a great time. And we'll talk about how you breathe down there right after this. Sorry, everyone. I'm so sorry. So you need to breathe down there. Everyone has seen a scuba tank, but it's a little bit different. It's quite a bit different, in fact, than open water diving. You're going to need different things to go that deep, different kinds of air mixtures. Right. And there are a few different kinds that you can use. But we should probably talk a little bit about the bins and what happens to your body. I know we covered the bins in which one was it? What was the old time diving suit called? Diving Bell. Was it Diving Bell? I think we covered the bins. We must have, probably so. Yeah, because we've never done a scuba episode. So John from his original House of Works article, makes a very great point about pressure and talks about soda bottles. And obviously, if you shake up a soda bottle and then open it really quick, it's going to go everywhere. Right. Or if you're Josh and you've never in your life apparently opened a tonic bottle. Club soda. I thought it was tonic. Probably both. Really? Yeah. You got to open those very slowly every time, no matter if it's shaking or not. Yeah. I don't think any of those are my fault, but, like, every backstage we've ever been to has tonic and soda on the floor. I'm cursed with that. But if you do shake up a soda bottle, the difference between opening it quickly and very slowly can be related to how the human body reacts under the pressure of that water. Yeah. So in this case, when you're scuba diving, opening the cap is analogous to slowly making your way back up to the surface at a graduated set of time. They're both decompression, basically, is what it is. Right. And so you could have rapid decompression where your soda goes everywhere or your blood vessels burst. Or you can follow these timetables to get the nitrogen bubbles out of your blood and like you're saying. That's a big problem with scuba diving. Especially if you're down below 100ft for an extended period of time. The nitrogen can really build up in your blood. Which can give you the bends. You can also suffer from nitrogen narcosis, which is bad news, where you apparently feel like you're drunk because you're intoxicated on nitrogen. Yes. The same thing can happen with oxygen. Yeah, it's different, but you can have oxygen. What's it called? Oxygen toxicity. Yeah, right. So if you're just doing like a dive or whatever, and it's like 30ft of water and you're down for like a half an hour or something like that, you're just breathing compressed air. Like they just took air out of the air and put it into a tank, and that's what you're breathing and you're fine. They took air out of the air. Exactly. So if you're down for a while and you have this problem with too much oxygen or too much nitrogen, they've started to get kind of crafty with the stuff that they put into the tanks. There's something called nitrox, which deals with the problem of nitrogen narcosis by removing a certain amount of the nitrogen and replacing it with oxygen. So with compressed air, with regular air that we breathe here at sea level, it's something like 78% nitrogen. Yes. No, 21% oxygen. Is that right? I had them backwards. So 21. 22% oxygen, 78% nitrogen. In nitrox, you have something like 36% oxygen and the rest nitrogen. So because you have far less nitrogen there, you are susceptible to the bends and nitrogen narcosis less susceptible than you would be breathing compressed air. So you can go down further and you can stay down longer. But the problem is, like you were saying, that oxygen toxicity can be an issue, too, so they've come up with even other stuff. Yeah, you can breathe helium. There's something called Heliox, 79% helium, 21% oxygen. The weakness here is, or I guess the downside is that you lose body heat six times faster than with compressed air and nitrox. So then you got to think about hypothermia, because it's cold down there. It is cold. And then there's one called trimax, which is oxygen, nitrogen and helium. And apparently this is what you use for the deepest dives. Yes. And all of these things have their pluses and their minuses. There is no perfect gas, but people have figured out things like, if you want to use heliox, you can stay down longer, you're not going to get nitrogen narcosis. And your case of the benz is probably less susceptible to the bends because the nitrogen is not present. But you also can't breathe that up closer to the surface. There's not enough oxygen in it, so you have to carry an extra tank of oxygen or mixed air to switch to as you get closer to the surface. That's right. There's like a lot of different clever things you can do to make it safer for you to stay down longer and go further into a cave system when you're diving in it. Yeah. And the rule of thumb is they go by the rule of thirds, which I saw it described a little bit differently than the House of Works article describes it. The way I saw it was you want to make sure you always have two thirds of your tank left when you're at your deepest part of the dive. Yeah, I think that's what Fuller said. Maybe he just said it in a way that sounded a little backwards, but yeah, that's the rule, though, is if you know you're going to go to the very deepest spot you're going to you want to only use one third of your tank mixture to get that far. Right. Because sometimes it can take longer to get out than it did to get in. And you want to be back on the surface with a third left in your tank, basically. Right. Plus, don't forget, you're also going to have to slowly unscrew the cap on the soda bottle. It takes time, and therefore it takes some of your air, your gas in your tank to do the decompression schedule and slowly work your way up to keep those nitrogen bubbles from explosively producing in your blood. Now, how do those tables work? I have no idea. Do you just learn this stuff? You have it like on your it's a piece of paper. Yeah. I mean, obviously not just regular paper. It's laminated. It's laminated, basically. Yeah. But you're looking and I'm sure if you're an experienced diver, you know those things back and forth. Right. But because there's such a thing as nitrogen narcosis or hydrogen, you can breathe hydrogen, but apparently it has a trippy effect on you, too. You would want to be able to have something to look at. So you're not just relying on your brain, but they haven't printed out yet. So the idea is how much leeway is it? Like you can't go 10ft higher or you're in big trouble. It's not down to the inch or anything, right. I don't think it's that, although I suspect that as we advance, we'll have it down to the inch and like by different kinds of people and genetics and stuff like that. But right now, I think it is graduated in 10ft or maybe 10 meters, because that's an atmosphere. But it says stay at this depth for this amount of time before moving up 10 meters. So hang out for another minute. I think it's longer than that. Really? Yeah. And what you're doing is you're allowing the nitrogen that's dissolved in your blood to turn back into gas, go to your lungs and then be expirated to be breathed out by you slowly. That's what you're doing. And so they figured out that after, say, ten minutes at 30 meters, you have removed enough of that blood or that nitrogen from. Your blood that you can safely move up to the next 10 meters above, and you're neutral. At this point, you're just hanging out. Hanging out. You're not sinking and you're not rising unless you try to. No, you have a buoyancy vest that is keeping you neutral. You're just hanging out. You don't want to rise. Now, if you're in big trouble and like you're out of air, you want to make your way to the surface and just press your locks. Like, Ben's be darned. Right. Like, I'm either going to drown or have the bends, and maybe the Benz won't kill me, but drowning will definitely kill me. Even though we learn that drowning is not necessarily what you think it is. That's true. But if you aren't in any trouble, you want to go through the decompression schedule. Okay. You got it. Yeah. I mean, I knew about this stuff, but I've never really kind of thought about exactly how that worked. I wonder if we do need to do a scoop episode now. Maybe. Maybe not. I mean, what are you doing while you're waiting around? You're just waiting around. Looking at fish. Looking at fish. If you're with camp, you should be with a buddy. It's tough to communicate unless you have radio. Right. And in which case, if you do have radio, you probably listen to XM or something like that instead. But you can communicate with hand signals or us. Sure, yeah. You could listen to stuff you should know. That'd be nice. That's a great idea. So let's go back to traveling. We talked about the grab and pull, the pulling glide grab and float. You can also have one of those, and this is what I would totally have, one of those cool little DPVs driver propulsion vehicle. It's the little torpedo looking it's sort of like a boat propeller that's enclosed, and it just pulls you along. You just hang on to it, and it drags you behind it. Yeah. I always thought those are really cool. Yeah, they are cool. They're kind of James Bondi. Yeah, very much. But that's going to save you from breathing more, because you're exerting yourself, and it's going to save you from just exerting. You're not going to be as tired. I mean, think about it. Diving for miles under the Earth's surface, like 4 miles long. Even though you're floating, you're still working. Yeah. That little kick. Your ankles are going to get tired after a while. Your little ankles. Yeah, that would help a lot. But I would imagine you really want to practice on that thing, because if it got away from you, it's going to pull you into, like, a cave wall or something like that. You're in trouble. Kick up that silt. Yeah, I would think that little propeller will kick up silt. I guess, if you're not on the bottom. Yeah, I think you keep it away from the bottom. All right. I think we should take another break and we'll talk about what I think is one of the cooler parts about this whole thing. Are these guidelines, right? For this spoiler alert. Yellow. One word. All right? You're underwater. You're 100ft into a cave. It's pitch dark. Yeah. You got your little flashlight, but you need a little trail of breadcrumbs, right? Yeah. More than that, you can get disoriented down there even if you're super experienced. Right. So you need something that says, go this way to live. Right. So you have guidelines, like not written guidelines. No, an actual literal guideline. Right. And they were laid, however many years before by people who originally explored the cave. And the yellow lines, or gold lines, I'm sorry, are yellowish in color, and they use those as, like, the main line through the main parts of the cave. Yeah. And it's like, a little thinner than a rope, but it's basically a nylon string that is throughout the main tunnels. Like you said, these little side tunnels are going to have white lines if you branch off and you look at the color and you know where you are basically in a side tunnel or the main channel, and they end within about five to 10ft of the main line. That mainline, too, doesn't go right to the top of the entrance because apparently that is an invitation for dumb dumbs to say, like, hey, look, let me see where that leads. Right. So they don't even put them on the surface? No, 50ft from the entrance, like you said. Yeah. I saw a really interesting video from the 90s called A Deceptively Easy Way to Die, and it's like blood on the asphalt, but for cave diving, it's like an instructional video with recreations and crazy cameras shaking, like, oh, really? Out of control. Yeah. And the guy it's from the cave diving chapter of the National Spelunking Society. It really is meant to scare you. The guy who says, Am I scaring you? A little bit. Good. It's just like a car safety video, but it ended with the song Cave diving, don't do it. Is that a Heather's reference? I think so. Okay, now but he was saying this guy who was astounding, it was almost like he was a ventriloquist. He barely moved his mouth, and words were coming out. You got to go watch this. But he was saying, not only do they not put the lines near the mouths of caves to tempt people, they say if you're not an experienced cave diver going on a cave dive, but you're going to be diving somewhere in the area of a cave, don't even take a light with you just to keep yourself from being tempted, from being like, oh, I got a light. Let me go down in this. If you don't have a light, even the most foolish among us probably would not go into a cave. Right. But if you do have a light, you might try it even if it's not experienced. For sure, that makes sense. But you're still a dumb dumb to do it. Exactly. They do have entry lines, though, and that is if you go to an explorer in a cave, it's a temporary line that you do and this is the one that you do tie to a big rock on the surface and then you take that to the main line. That's 50 to 100ft inside and then everything's all connected. Because John makes a great point. You've got to be able to, in the worst case scenario, if it's dark down there, pull yourself along this line, give the OK sign to your buddy and you've got to maybe do this in total darkness. Right. With your eyes closed so your flashlights off where it's silky silt out. Yeah, the scary stuff. I have the impression that you're kind of supposed to be hanging on to this guideline basically all the time. Oh, really? Yes. Or like nearby, inches away from it at all times. I would want it within grabbing distance. For sure. Did you read up about the Dorf markers? I predicted that the Dorf markers existed because before I got to that part, I was like, surely they have thought of this like an arrow. Yeah, it's like a plastic, basically arrow on the line saying this way, not that way. Well, yes, because if you're in a case system and you turn around, you are like, wait a minute, it doesn't look anything like what I thought I just came through. Talk about panic. Luckily you have the guideline, but which way is the guideline leading you? So that's what these dork markers are. They're arrows pointing the way to the mouth of the cave, the way out, basically. Did you see the history of the dormarker? No, because immediately was like, why is it called a dorf marker? It was just such a weird name. And apparently I got this from a Brief History of the Cave Diving Line arrow by Alexander Cofield. Thief. And there was a death in 1976 at Peacock Springs in Florida where pre doorf marker and I guess this person died from the situation you just explained, like went deeper into the cave instead of on the planet. I know. And a man named Lewis Holzendorf invented this thing out of duct tape. So he made these duck tape arrows and they called them dwarf markers. But because they were tape and all dwarfed up, they would deteriorate or fold up and not work over time. So later on, flash forward a man named Forrest Wilson invents these modern dwarf markers. And one of the stipulations, he was like, we got to call them dwarf markers still, which is very cool. But these are finally made out of plastic. It's a plastic triangle. You fold it over the line and snap it shut, basically. Nice. So thanks to Forrest Wilson and Louis Holsendorf, the worst case scenario I'm getting out of here and you're just going deeper. That will never happen. Forrest Wilson told everybody we go out and call them dwarf markers. And they're like, after holson dorf. And he's like, who. Oh, man. That's a good dumb joke, too, though. I just used up a lot of our air. All right, so you've got these door markers. They're telling you where to go. You're diving. If it's just a regular sort of and I was about to call it a recreational dive, but technically it's a technical dive. But if you're just out there having a good time, you're probably down there for about an hour or so at least. But if you're really, like, doing scientific investigation or inquiry, or if you're after a body, then you can be down there for hours and hours doing your thing. Right. So some of these extraordinarily long cave dives can last into the double digits of hours, and they'll have tanks placed along the path, basically where Dorothy tanks may be. All right, the ghost of Dorf himself is handing these out. I don't know if he's dead or not yet. Tim Conway? No. Holtendorf? Yeah, I don't think he's with us. Okay. Yeah. So he's this friendly, patron spirit who hands out tanks, I think. Although, who knows? He may still be around. Well, why did you say that you didn't think he was? I got the idea because someone else developed it and named it after him, that it was in memorium. Oh, got you. I might have been wrong. No, it's a good point. At any rate, they'll leave tanks along the way so you can be like, well, here's my new fresh tank. It's pretty amazing. But yeah, the cave dives can last a very long time. And like you're saying, when they're doing this stuff, they probably are being employed by maybe the National Geographic Society, a museum, some university, and they're exploring the geology of these caves that no one has ever seen before. They're also conducting underwater archaeology, which is a huge new aspect for cave diving, because what they figured out is we've lost a lot of human settlement archeology when the sea levels rose after 11,000 years ago, and people were running around in America, on the coast, more than we realize. And we're starting to figure that out because of this cave diving archaeology that's become a thing. Yeah. The largest is in longest, not deepest underwater cave is in Tulum on the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico. And I think it was a few years ago discovered that two flooded caves actually connected, making it the longest. It's 215 miles. Wow. These things, if you go from end to end right. And in there are tons and tons of Mayan, like extinct animal stuff and Mayan artifacts. Like you were talking about the waters rose and that stuff just got sucked in. Yeah. They found the oldest, mostly intex skeleton in North America in one of those caves. The Hoya Negro. Oh, really? It was a woman named NAIA. N-A-I-A-I believe well, that's what they named her, and she was from something like 14, 500 years ago, which is way older than the Clovis people. Can you imagine coming up on that? It'd be pretty neat. Yeah. But this is what cave divers do. Yeah, it's one of the things. The deepest is pretty new, as far as findings go. Well, the deepest in America is Phantom Springs Cave in Texas, which is chump change at 462ft. The deepest. Now it passed. Italy's. Patzo del Mar. It is in the Czech Republic, in Patzo de Mars. This one, the Ranika Propost, is 1325ft deep. That's amazing. And I don't think they've gone to the bottom. I think they go as far as they can go, and then I think they drop a line and measure from there. Right, exactly. Yeah. And apparently GPS doesn't work at all in these cave systems. It's just impenetrable you're on your own. So they have to tie off ten foot increments on rope and just lower it down. That's how they figured out the one in the Czech Republic. And this is a big team. This isn't just like, all right, we got our buddy system. You've got a lot of people involved in something like this. For safety, obviously. Yeah. And for fellowship and for fun. Yeah. The reception afterwards is quite nice. Right. So how do you do this? How do you get certified? Oh, well, there's a lot of steps you want to take. You want to become basically a professional open water diver first with years and years of experience. Yeah. This one guy said at least 50 dives before you even think about a cave. Right. And then after that, you want to start training for cavern diving. You want to do that for a couple of years, get your toes wet. Right. And then you start doing cave diving. And one of the ways I didn't think about this, but it makes sense. One of the ways you train for cave diving is doing night diving. Taking a night diving course. Oh, yeah. Because there's no water. Yeah. There's no sunlight. There probably night diving in caverns or something like that. That's probably kind of creepy, too. Yeah. But once you are a certified cave diver, you are part of basically the top 1% of divers in the world. I saw an estimate of 75 professional cave diversity in the world. Holy cow. Yes. So you're part of a very elite group who are actually exploring, pushing the limits of human exploration on Earth right now. Yeah. And I saw the one guy I think it was the guy who helped out with the rescuing Thailand, which we got to talk about. Yeah. I mean, he was saying this stuff is tough to do because you think you just go in and retrieve a body, but it's a crime scene first of. All right. So you can't photograph it. So you have to go down there and first look around and make as many mental notes as you can to recreate this for an artist perhaps, or for at least note taking. Right. And he said it's really tough emotionally and physically to get the body out. You got to be made of tough stuff. Exactly. That's it. You didn't have anything else on it? Well, I wanted to talk about the Thai cave rescue. Yeah, that's what we're going on. But the thing is there weren't anybody. There was one former Thai Seal navy Seal who died. And because he died, the Thai Navy realized we don't have any professional cave divers on staff. We need to make this part of our formal training. So now they do have that. Oh really? Yeah. But in 2018, in the summer, the whole world was watching because these twelve soccer players and their coach were hiking along in a cave system that got flooded from a monsoon and they were trapped in what became a sump cave. And just from everything we learned about cave diving, the idea that they managed to get all twelve of those soccer players and their coach out to safety, amazing. In one of the most treacherous types of caves you can dive and no one died. Except for this one diver is astounding man. Yeah. And the one guy was talking about just how silty it was down there. So you're trying to rescue these people with as minimal movement as possible so you're not getting a sold out condition. Right. Where's that movie? It's got to be coming. Sure. Yeah. You got anything else? Hugh Jackman. Lead diver? Sure. Why not? I got nothing else. I guess this last part about regulations is it's not super highly regulated. You're sort of dealing with the local authorities and it sounds like hazardous or treacherous hiking. You got to check in with an office and usually say, this is what I'm doing. This is when I'm going in and when I'm coming out. And you got to sign that little piece of paper when you return, otherwise they're going to come looking for you. Yeah, but there's also places where you can cave dive all you want, where you just pay a fee. They just are like go with God, do your thing. There's a flooded mine I've talked about before. I don't remember. It must have been the abandoned mines in Bonter, Missouri. It's just a flooded 19th century mine that'd be pretty cool with like vodka, clear water, 100 foot visibility, and you just swim around the mine. Hey there's Rainbow. Was he in the mine? Yeah, he hit out in the mine and first blood. I'll bet we had the same conversation. The abandoned minds up. Probably because I don't recall it. You got anything else? No. Well, if you want to know more about abandoned minds almost said, if you want to know more about cave diving. Read about it. Probably don't do it. And since I said that's, time for listening. Oh, you can read about how stuff works. Even that's right? And since I said that, it's time for listening. I'm going to call this one of the follow ups from our conversion therapy podcast. We got a lot of really good responses on that and one bad one. Did you see that guy? I didn't see that one. Yeah, we had a guy who wrote that he was quitting us because of our liberal bias. But it was interesting because he says, while I don't think conversion therapy is something that works, I do think that homosexuality is a disease. He's one of those Cyanara. And, yes, I wrote him back, and I was very nice. I was like, you could probably find podcasts that are better suited for you. You didn't say Cyanara. No. Cultural appropriation. Yeah, I just said, Good luck to you, sir. That was very classy, Chuck. Yeah. I always think it's interesting when people write us to tell us they're quitting it. Right? Have you ever taken the time to do that? No, I have not. You just quit something, right? Yes. Keep it to yourself. Maybe, like, ran about it to friends for a little while to get it off your chest. But just so you know, person I've never met, this is from Jordan. He says, hey, guys, this is a Southern Baptist turned agnostic. I absolutely detest the acceptance of the garbage, psychotherapy pseudoscience of CT. Josh mentioned that if you've ever been an early teenager and late teenager, you know what it's like to be sexually confused or curious. When I was between the ages of 14 and 17, I was called gay, or the F word many times. I did have what some might consider telltale signs, stereotypically, at least, associated with being gay. The bullying and verbal abuse was so intense and frequent, I truly started to question my sexual preferences. That question was put to bed quite definitively one night when a very good male friend of mine and I decided to experiment some. I'll spare the specifics, but I realized that night this just was not doing it for me. But being the good Baptist boy that I was, I felt guilty about that night. And even though I was not aroused, it was still a homosexual act. I carried that guilt with me for many years and through college until I realized almost every other male friend of mine had some kind of experience that they could look back on and say, this is when I knew I was straight or gay or bi or trans or whatever. At that point, I was finally able to let go of that guilt and what a relief that was to my mental health. I wanted to thank both of you for making the point that an experience or a feeling you have in that time of your life should not be anything to feel guilty about. I didn't know that when I was mentally abusive to myself over a long time. What is shameful is how many people would use the knowledge of such an act as a weapon to abuse the person even more. Oh, boo. Hiss. Boo, hiss. So, to every teenager out there, please don't think there's something wrong with you because of your curiosity. Embrace yourself. Don't worry about what your peers or elders may think. You are perfect the way you are. Nice boom. That's from Jordan. Thanks, Jordan. Jordan wasn't even anonymous. Good for you, Jordan. Yeah, he even drew a little mic dropping. Right? That was a great email. Yeah, that's funny. If the guy who said he wrote in to say he was quitting us, he's like, okay, driving. I'll give him one more time. He gets to the listener mail, that's it. He's going to send us another email. He's like, oh, this next one's called the Gay Disease. Maybe I should listen. Well, that was very nice for Jordan to shout it out to everybody out there. Way to go. If you want to shout something out to support and encourage your fellow humans, we love that stuff. You can go on to Stuff You Shouldn't know.com and send us something on one of our social links or more. Better, you can go to your email client and send us an email to stuffpodcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should know is production of iHeartRadio's how stuff works. For more podcasts My Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good, it's criminal. Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
43e490d4-53a3-11e8-bdec-3b5be6348b58	How Miniature Golf Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-miniature-golf-works	Playing miniature golf is a very fun thing to do and, you’re about to find, learning about its origin and history is very fun as well. Join Josh and Chuck as they tee off on the mini golf story!	Playing miniature golf is a very fun thing to do and, you’re about to find, learning about its origin and history is very fun as well. Join Josh and Chuck as they tee off on the mini golf story!	Thu, 06 Aug 2020 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2020, tm_mon=8, tm_mday=6, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=219, tm_isdst=0)	46522276	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody. I don't know if you've heard, but we have a book coming out. Finally. Finally, after all these years. It's great. It's fun. You're going to love it. It's called stuff you should know. Colon. An incomplete compendium of mostly interesting things. Yes, and it's 26 jampacked chapters that we wrote with another guy named Nells Parker who's amazing and is illustrated amazingly by our illustrator, Carly Minnardo. And it's just an all around joy to pick up and read even though we haven't physically held in our hands yet. It's like we have Chuck in our dreams so far. I can't wait to actually see and hold this thing and smell it. And so should you. So pre order now. It means a lot to us. The support is a very big deal. So preorder anywhere books are sold. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryan over there. And there's Jerry there figuring out all the new contrivances of modern life. Yeah, I mean, we should tell people what's going on. I think it's interesting, right? No. Well, I'm going to tell them. Fine. So Jerry has figured out now how to operate the studio Macintosh recording system sure. And not be in the office. It's pretty great. It's covered river, actually. And so she was just up on our Skype on video, and she's still there. But when she switched it to mute, it went to that distressing picture. Do you see that thing? No, I just see Jr. Like the letter J and the letter R. Oh, see, there she is. She's back. Okay. When she turned it off, though, I get a photograph of Jerry that looks like she's sick in bed or something. It's weird. Well, that's just Jerry's. Look. Maybe so. I don't know. That's a diet of nothing but me. So for 1520 years, we'll do for you. The weirdest thing is, this is as close as we've come to normal in four months. I know. Not only is it like normal, it's almost like a throwback. Remember when we had the studio where we would look out the window when she was there? Yeah. Yeah. That was great. It's kind of like this again, she was a window creeper. Yes. Professionally and in her personal life, too. That's right. So this is stuff you should know. Everybody. I don't know if I said it. There are probably a few people who are confused and aren't anymore. But we haven't gotten started yet. So prepare to be confused again when we explain something in particular. Chuck? Miniature golf. I got to ask, are you a fan? This made me want to play again. I grew up playing putt putt and have very fond memories of all the different colored golf balls. And, like the water trap that was really just a stagnant little puddle of concrete. Papa was wonderful. And great. And there were arcades and birthday parties there that featured heavily with GI. Joe action figures and stuff like that. The good kind, the three and three quarter inch ones. Yes, I am a fan, if not just nostalgically in general, and which style? And as you as a listener will see soon, there are a couple of different things. But did you grow up playing just sort of the bare bones putt putt or the more miniature golf, clown's mouth, windmill, volcano? Well, Chuck, if you ask me if I had a rich childhood, I will always tell you, yes, sir. Yes, I did. And the reason why is because I grew up having puttputt close by in Toledo, and we played that a lot. And then when my family would vacation in the summers on Kataba Island on Lake Erie, and this is like pre cleaned up Lake Erie, there was like a rundown little mini golf with clowns mouths and windmills and all that stuff right by the place where we used to stay, like walking distance. And so we'd play there a lot, too. So I had the best of both worlds, a really great, just top notch childhood. So I grew up playing putt putt at Stone Mountain Park, which we went to a lot because it was near our church, and the youth group would go and do putt putt nights and stuff. So that was a lot of fun. And I was sort of partial to those. That the real putt putt, where it requires a little bit of skill. But I am also a sucker for the beach town, volcano, waterfall, gokart, bumper boat arcade scene. Yeah, don't forget laser tag. I never really did laser tag. I think that came around a little after I was in my prime years for this kind of thing. Got you. Yeah, same here. But I was looking up. Now they have laser tag at places, but I still love those go carts, man. When we go to Isle of Palms last year, I found a place nearby. I was like, we got to go. And everyone was kind of like, oh, I don't know. And the kids are sort of like, yeah, I guess I'll do it. And I was like, guys, we got to go. Right? What is wrong with all of you? Who are you vacationing with? Chuck, man, it was so much. There a carbon monoxide leak at the house. You rent? No, those go carts. I could do that all day long. Yeah, for sure. And of course, I got the guy, the teenager. Squeaky voice teenager. And I said, hey, man, which one which is the fast one? He's like, number eight. Really? Oh, yeah. And sure enough, it was really fast. You just ran circles around everybody. I did such that I even laid off on the gas a little bit just to catch up and let people act like they outraged me. What a sportsman. Well, we'll talk about gokarts one day more in depth, but today we're just going to focus on the miniature golf. Okay. Yeah. This is a pretty interesting history, I think. Yeah. I had no idea how far back it went until we started researching this. And actually it goes all the way back to the 19th century. And this is one of those rare things that's been around a while, but you can actually pinpoint like the first one. And the first miniature golf course in the world, as far as anybody knows, is that St. Andrews? It's the Ladies Putting Club of St. Andrews, and it was built in 1867 strictly for the women members of the Ladies Putting Club. Yeah, there's a couple of things that play here, actually. Really? Just one thing, which is not letting women do things. Yeah. Because there was a decree, basically that women shall not take the club back past their shoulder. 11th commandment. Yeah. Like a real golf swing, in other words, was, I guess, improper for a lady to do. The Victorian era was just so stupid when it came to social constraints. I'm trying to figure out why does that I don't know. Patriarchy, I would guess. Well, I just wonder why a full golf swing? Would it make their dress rate rise a little above the ankle, or I just wonder why. I think also women were expected to not overexert themselves physically, especially in public, too. Right. Kind of construe that as overexertion. Well, and then there's this, which is from an 1890 book by Scottish Baron Lord. Wellwood, talking about women and when they should golf and when they shouldn't golf, I was going to do a Scottish accent, but I'm just not feeling it. If they choose to play. At times when male golfers are feeding or resting, no one can object. But at other times must we say it? They are in the way. It was kind of snarky to add even the must we say it? Like, do I even need to write this next sentence? It's so just drippingly obvious. But the upshot of this is that's why they created the Ladies Putting Club is just to sort of get rid of them. Yeah, to get them out of the way of the men. But the joke was on the men, because this putting green, this first miniature golf course in the world, is still around, and it's still considered one of the finest. It's actually nicknamed the Himalayas because it has all these kind of mountains and hills and hillocks all built into it, and they really kind of stand out, from what I understand, against the Scottish seascape. And it's a really revered miniature golf course, but it is exactly what it sounds like it is a golf course in miniature. Like, you take a classic golf course of the variety that was born in Scotland, and you just kind of hit it with a shrink ray and then you have a genuine bona fide miniature golf course. And that's how the whole thing started out. Yeah. I mean, it's what we would call, like, a par three today, right? Kind of. It seems like par three courses are a little different. Yes, I think it does require more than just a putter. Right. And a par three would require more than a putter. But there seems to be a few different other kinds of golf courses aside from the miniature golf course. There's the par three, the pitch and putt, and executive courses all kind of qualify technically as miniature golf courses in different ways. Yeah. The executive course, they got the name because evidently an executive could go play a quick round during lunch. A lot of par threes. You might have, like, one par five and a couple of par fours. Is that right? On a par three? On an executive course. Okay. Yeah. That's really the only thing, from what I can tell, that differentiates it from a par three course. Yeah, it's a golf course. It's just shorter, and therefore it doesn't take as long. Yeah. And it's not like the hole is smaller and the ball is smaller and the clubs are smaller. Just get out of your fantasy land there instead. It's just that the distance from the T to the hole is shorter. There's fewer bends and stuff like that. So the actual experience takes less time and less energy, and you can just kind of fit it in a shorter amount of time. And I think that's the popularity of those things generally. Although pitch and putt courses, I also saw they usually consist of a wedge and iron and a putter, what you need to play on those, and they're all about the focus on the short game. And as a result, men and women, just average men and women who play golf can kind of compete pretty evenly because it's all about the short game. It's all about finesse rather than just cheer. Power of driving as far as you can on, like, a traditional golf course. Yeah, I love golf. I just don't play anymore. I grew up playing golf and was not good, but I wasn't terrible for as much as I played, and I still like it. I just don't have the time or the inclination anymore. But I like the big boy courses with the big par fives, but I also love a fun little par three. Like, Florida has a lot of these beautiful par threes, including some you can play at night that are all lit up. And that's always a lot of fun, too. Yeah. I tried to get acquainted with golf as a youngster. My family had, weirdly enough, because this is not like my family at all. Had a membership at Heather Downs Country Club. Oh, well, yeah, and I love the pool because they had tons of slush puppies and the best, like, nasty hot dogs you can imagine. And there is a pool and all that. I think I told you the story about Swim League, the swim team where I was the worst swimmer on it. But I also tried to golf for a couple of summers and it just didn't take it up. But I was back in Toledo a couple of years ago, I think right before our Cleveland show. And I visited the country called. I just drove by and I looked and the pool is now just like a green field. It's been filled in. Like the little snack shop has been torn down. I'm like something really bad must have happened there for them to do that to the pool, you know? Yeah. And I didn't get to go here much because it was private. But Hidden Hills was a big neighborhood near my house that had a country club that's still around, isn't it? Well, the neighborhood is there, but the neighborhood is seen as better days and the country club and golf courses completely just shut down and grown over. It is an abandoned place. That's so cool. It is kind of cool. And then I had the idea of a movie like an old school type thing where a bunch of middle aged men that grew up there go back and raise some money and try and clean the place up and get it going again. Yeah. To Hilarity there has to be like a greedy developer that they're battling, right? Yeah. So is that the neighborhood that we got kicked out of when we tried to go shoot without a license once around that area? Remember the security guard came up like, stop what you're doing. I don't remember that. Yeah, it happened one day. Was it on the TV show or a short gorilla? No, it was like when we were shooting shorts, I think. I don't remember that. Yeah, I'm pretty sure that was the one. Should we take a break already? Sure. Okay. Alright, we'll get back and we'll talk about where mini golf went from here right after this. All right. So we're back. Nothing we've talked about right now constitutes miniature golf in the mind of anybody who hears the words miniature golf. Right? Sure. Like, what comes to mind are things like putt putt or Goofy golf or windmills or clowns or Happy Gilmore or something like that. Right. Yeah. So that all started actually that didn't quite start yet. It was really leading up to that. And then I realized we had to keep going with regular miniature ball one more time because it has to spread to America. And it did. And we can actually trace that too to the house of a guy named James Barber who is an immigrant from England who was familiar with the course the Ladies Putting Club at St. Andrews. And he was rich enough that he said, I want a miniature golf course built on my estate at Pinehurst, North Carolina. And he did. He had, like, an 18 hole miniature course built right there in his formal gardens. And it's just absolutely beautiful. It is nice. And this was the first one in the United States, and it's called Thisldu Thistledhu. And supposedly, as legend goes, when he first saw it, he said, this will do. I guess he was not blown away. Maybe, I don't know, some underwhelming. He wasn't one of those spoiled Brad Robert barons and instead was like, this will do quite nicely. And they just left off the second part. Yeah, but it's called this'll do. And they started hosting competitions a couple of years later. And I think this is the first time miniature golf was ever used. Like those words were ever used to describe the pinehurst outlook. Was that the newspaper? I guess, yeah. It's their one claim to fame, you know. It's true, though. It's probably true. Yeah. But they were the one in an account of the competition, they coined the term miniature golf up to that point. A lot of people had called it lilapucian golf sure. After the little people in Gulliver's Travels. And that name actually stuck for quite a while. So we've got James Barber, who hosted or built the first miniature golf course in America. But still, this thing is, like, directly connected to the Ladies Putting Club of St. Andrews. It's a golf course in miniature. We still haven't quite reached what we would consider miniature golf. That wouldn't happen until 1926, which turned out to be a really big year for miniature golf in America. It was like there was something in the air and a few different people kind of tapped into it around the same time, and it suddenly just took off like a rocket. Yeah. Two of the guys were some entrepreneurs named Drake Delano, I guess. John Leadbetter. Another good name. It's okay. He sounds like he'll shoot you. Ledbetter. Yes, I can see that. They did a pretty cool thing, which is they opened up a course on top of a rooftop in the Financial District in New York, and that kicked off a trend. There were, I think, about 100 of those on top of roofs. I guess it's before the big rooftop bar hotel scene. They had golf courses up there. Yeah, miniature golf courses. But again, those were like, miniature golf courses. That was a big deal in New York. Just 100 rooftop golf. Miniature golf courses alone in the 20s. That's a tremendous amount. And I don't think there's a single one left, actually. So that kind of makes the whole you know, there's one on top of Pont City Market where the house the Forks office is. Is there a golf up there? There's a miniature golf course up there, and it makes a lot more sense now. Yeah, it's kind of like a whole mini Coney Island up there. Yeah, I think I've only been up there when we had work events and the only thing I did was the slide. I didn't know there was a slide. Yeah, there's, like you sit in a potato sack and go down. Okay. Yeah, I did that. That was fun. Yeah. There's a miniature golf course up there. We'll have to play some time when the whole pandemic passes. Totally. And then later that same year, you said it was kind of a boom year for mini golf. Lookout Mountain, Tennessee, in Chattanooga, which is a place where I think everybody should go to see Ruby Falls in Rock City. Oh, yes. It is a tourist trap, but it's actually kind of neat. I mean, the greatest of the great tourist traps. And it still holds up, too. Yeah. Get a pecan log. Oh, my God. Those are so good. They are so good. That also supports my theory that candy was perfected in the 19 century. Remember, you get honeycomb. Sure. Pecan logs. I didn't know if pecan logs were from way back then, but I believe it. Yeah, for sure. They're definitely old timing. So these people, Garnett and Freda Carter, they built a resort called Fairyland Club, and it was part of that whole sort of interconnected scene there with Rock City and Ruby Falls. And they built a miniature golf course, and they said, you know what? If you like golf, maybe you should try mini golf, because it doesn't take very long. It'll kind of scratch that itch if you're not able to play a real round. And that's sort of how they marketed it at first. And they were the first people, I think, to start adding the obstacles. Right? They did, yeah. And as they were building the inn and the resort complex, they used some of the construction materials, like drain pipes and barrels and things like that, and built them as hazards. And then, because they had this whole fairytale theme going up there, they also built Rock City. They were the ones who built Rock City. And that has, like, a cool little weird, but also very neat fairy tale theme kind of hidden throughout. They added that to their miniature golf course. They had these stationary obstacles and hazards that they added. And then they also added this statuary of cute little Mother Goose type stuff, and they actually called the whole thing Tom Thumb Golf. Tom Thumb, from what I understand, is the earliest recorded English fairytale character from back in 1621. And he was a little tiny guy the size of his father's thumb, which is where he got his name. So it was a pretty appropriate name. They must have really been pretty pleased with themselves when they decided to call it Tom Thumb Golf because it checked all the boxes. Yeah. And we should mention, too, we keep saying Rock City, and if you're not from the Southeast, you might think it's just some, like, redneck area with a bunch of rocks. It's actually a very sweet natural wonder. It's caves that you walk through caves. It's huge boulders being held up by much smaller boulders. It's really been that way for probably tens of thousands of years that you walk under. There's little cave areas that you kind of duck into, and they have little fairytale scenes with fluorescent. Fluorescent? Yeah, I guess. Kind of day glare. It's like glow in the dark weird, like, gnomes and fairy tale scenes. Like, that's the weird part. It's like if Carl's Bad Caverns had some corny fairy theme. And then Ruby Falls is really neat, too. So very cool, like, natural attraction that they've done a good job of underground water, making it easy to make your way to. Yes, the whole thing is definitely worth going to. And then, of course, they have the very famous, like, Sea Rock City barnsides that everybody's heard of. That was Garnett Carter, who painted one man to go around and offer to give a fresh coat of paint to barns all throughout the Southeast. It's great. In exchange for letting them paint Sea Rock City on the side. Yes. If you've ever driven around the North Carolina south Carolina area and south of the Border, you know what I'm talking about. South of the Mason Dixon line. No, south of the Border is the name of this sort of highway tourist trap. Oh, no, I haven't heard of that. Yeah, it's the same deal. I want to say it's North Carolina, but it's basically like a glorified rest stop that has a Mexican theme where you can go, like, I don't know, see mariachi band and eat good food and buy cheap. Jochkis the only mariachi band in all of North Carolina. But what made me think about it, it might be is that they have the same thing for, like, hundreds of miles in any direction for south of the Border and Rock City. They're very famous for these billboards that tell you, like, oh, it's coming. You're getting closer. You're getting closer. That's really strange that I've never heard of that, then. Yeah, south of the Border checking. I've not even been paying attention. So the cars built like, this Tom Thumb golf course. And again, originally they just did this as kind of an amenity at their fairyland club, but it was such a smash hit, and Garnett Carter was such a born businessman that they were like, I think there might be something to this. And either they saw it out or he sought them out. I'm not quite sure how it happened, but there was another guy who really factors Bigly into this whole story, but he's very frequently overlooked, and his name is Thomas McCullough, and he invented a really cheap and easy technique for creating artificial putting greens that could be used for miniature golf courses. Yeah, it was crushed cotton, seed holes, oil. You would die green, and they would come in these big rolls, and you just roll it over this foundation of sand and boom. You've got an easy way basically to sort of franchise these things with these prefab kits that they had. And people loved it because it was when it was they called it midget golf for a little while. Not a term we would use today, but it's what they called it in the 1920s. And this factors in to a lot of stuff we've been talking about the 1920s lately, just these weird fads that would pop up and Tom Thumb golf was one of them. It was. And part of the reason that it got out from Lookout Mountain is because the Carters and Fairburn kind of joined forces and used his technique for making these greens very cheaply and used their kind of like touch of whimsy. Packaged it together and started selling it prepackaged sets or prefabricated sets that could be franchised out to anybody who wanted to start their own Tom Thumb golf course. And so they spread really quickly and like you're saying, the 20s, they were just looking for whatever craze could come along. Crossword puzzles, dance marathons, flagpole sitting. Well, apparently miniature golf was the king of them all as far as the 20s crazes went. Yeah, this is a pretty startling statistic. In August of 1930, the Commerce Department said that there were, and apparently this could be low by even as much as half 25,000 mini golf courses in the US. Half of which were built in that previous six or eight months of the year. Yeah, that's a boom right there. Can you imagine like in twelve to 15,000 mini golf courses being built in the US. It's crazy. I can just imagine Garnet and Friday Carter just rolling around on a bed of money in their suite at the Ferry Land in yeah. In a legit like, job boosting market. Yeah. Well, that's another thing too, right? I mean, there was like flagpole sitting didn't make the transition to the Depression and dance marathons did, but they got kind of grim. Apparently miniature golf, and I've seen both, but miniature golf seems to have made the transition from 20s craze to kind of national past time. That made sense in the Depression because you could take your whole family out to play. Miniature golf are pretty cheap. So that was nickel or something. That was a big attraction. And then also if you were like a golf junkie but all of a sudden you didn't have the money to afford greens fees any longer, at the very least you could go play some miniature golf somewhere. So it kind of scratched that itch to a certain degree. So there was like a lot of popularity that even after the craze kind of crested and waned a little bit, it still carried on pretty thoroughly through the 1930s. And as a matter of fact, Chuck, some people were like Tom Thumbgolf, the official franchise. Tom Thumbgolf. It's a little rich for my blood. What else you got for me? Yeah. Why can't we just do this? Yeah, exactly. Local entrepreneurs are like, I got exactly the thing, buddy. You want to play half priced miniature golf? Come on in. Like, I've got a bunch of PVC pipe laying around. Yeah, just basically whatever found objects you could find. You could come across what we're called rinky dink miniature golf courses that were basically knock off Tom Thumb courses that used whatever found objects the person who built it had lying around. Yeah. New York had about 150 of them. Washington, DC. Had 31 of those is still around the East Potomac Park course. The whole family could get involved. And I think one of the keys then and now to many golf being popular and then Putt Putt, which we'll see here in a minute, is that you don't even have to like golf at all. You can hate golf and still go do putt putt and probably have a good time. Yeah, as long as you don't take it too seriously. Don't take it too seriously. Please don't. Just relax. Don't be that guy. That's what it's for. You want to take a break and talk Putt putt? Yes. Okay, let's do that. Everybody, are we there? Who, me? Are we there? Are we at? Putt. Putt. I thought you said, Are you there? I'm like, yeah, I'm here. We are there, Chuck, because let me set the table here. Are you ready? Yes. I'm hungry. America got a little burned out on miniature golf, especially the Tom Thumb and rinky ding varieties, and so a lot of it died out, but some remained. Some hopped along. Some are still around today, actually. And by the 1950s, there was a guy who was playing at one of these courses in Fayetteville, North Carolina, which remembers the home of miniature golf in the United States. North Carolina is and he happened to have just gotten a prescription from his doctor saying, you're about to have a nervous breakdown. I prescribed you a month's rest from work. And this guy Don Clayton said can do. And he started playing miniature golf, but he wasn't quite satisfied with it. Yeah, I imagine if you were on the verge of a nervous breakdown, then Tom found golf is a nice sav for that kind of experience. Sure, if you're charmed by all the Whimsical stuff and you don't take it too seriously. Right. From what I understand, though, don Clayton was like, this Whimsy sucks. We need something better than this. And I think I'm just the person to build it. Yeah. So he had the idea to basically make miniature golf, but without all the garbage, no clowns mounts, no windmills, and have a little skill involved. Like, you can go out there, and if you're like a good putter, you can actually compete and have a good time, and it's still for fun, but it's just not a silly kids game anymore. Yeah. Like anybody who has been to an. Actual putt putt course can tell you that there's a lot of obstacles and it's interesting and fun and there's some neat stuff, but it just does not have all of, like, the moving bells and whistles that you're going to see on other kinds of miniature golf. Like Goofy Golf. No. The obstacles are usually just like some blocks in the way and stuff like that. Yeah. Elevated Rhombuses or things like that, or like a labyrinth built into it. It's not like a clown's mouth or anything like that, which is kind of like the go to description for Goofy Golf, isn't it? Really? Yeah. And I think the craziest thing you'll see on a puppy course is where those that are like two levels and you can hit it into three different holes at the top and you kind of take a little bit of a gamble as to where it's going to come out on the bottom. Sure. It'll either come out close to the hole so you can get that part two and I think they're all part twos on a real putt putt course. Right. Or it'll spit you out way far away, but you still have a chance to hit that long putt for the two. Sure. There's always a chance for you. A second chance at putt putt. I think that was the motto. Yeah. So this was Don Clayton's vision. He was like, I want to make this a little less goofy. I want to make it a little more interesting and skillful. Less goofy, more golfy. Yeah. Chuck man, he just sat up from his grave going, I wish I'd thought of that. Is he dead? Yeah, he died in 1996. Okay. But he had a good run. I mean, this is 1954 when there was a 28 year old man that he decided to try this. So he went to his dad and said, hey, I've got this idea. Rather than basically, as a New York Times obituary put it, rather than basically making a human sized pinball machine for golf, we're going to make this a little more interesting. How about we cobble together 5200 bucks and we're going to build our own little miniature golf course? And he did in, like, a shaded little lot. And with that $5,200, they opened for business. And within 29 days, he and his father had made 100% of their investment back. And Don Clayton said, I think there might be something to this whole thing. Yeah. So he was initially going to call it he went to the bank to open a business account and he had to fill out the paperwork and he was going to call it the Shady Vale Golf Course. Yeah. This is hilarious. As the story goes, he didn't know how to spell vale, I guess if it was V-A-I-L or V-A-L-E. So he just said putt putt and wrote down putt putt. It wasn't something he brainstormed. Apparently, it was just sort of on a whim. Yeah. And it's a name that really stuck. It's kind of brilliant in its simplicity, I think. Divine inspiration. It almost feels like it just kind of happened on a win. That's absolutely great. But he started to kind of build the whole thing into, like, this enormous industry pretty quickly. Because he was right. I did the math. If they made their $5,200 back in 29 days, that means that over that month, they had 20,800 paying customers a quarter a game. Twenty five cents a game? Yeah. That's a lot of games. And so when they really got together and started puttingt putt, he was right. He was onto something. And it started to take off pretty quickly. Apparently, at its peak, when you and I were going to putt putt, they had something like 256 courses throughout the world, mostly in the US. And Canada. But also in Australia and South Africa and New Zealand. And it was definitely a thing, like you said, all of the holes were part two. Right? Yeah. And this was, just to be clear, 256 doesn't sound like a lot compared to the 50,000 that they had in the 1930s, but this was his own putt Putt golfing games franchise. There was plenty of more putt putt going on in the United States than that. Right? Yeah. Like knockoff putt putt, right? Yeah. Like the one in Stone Mountain Park wasn't a putt putt golfing games. It was just putt putt. But it was great. It was called tap tap. They also had trail skate across from the putt putt, which was a roller skating trail through the woods. What? Yes. It was like this two mile paved just basically like a big paved sidewalk through the woods. And they rented roller skates, and you would just skate through the woods. It was really cool. Man, that's awesome. Country folk just have some of the best ideas for businesses. You know what I mean? I didn't think of us as country folk, but I guess it kind of was roller skating through the woods. I guess it is. That's like Dolly Parton level country. So, yeah, they're all part twos. And it is tough. It's challenging. Apparently, in the 65 year history of Putt putt, there have only been three perfect games where you walk away with a score of 18, which is really tough to do. I mean, of the millions and millions of games of puttputt that people have played, only three people have ever gotten a perfect game, which kind of shows you how deceptively hard the putt putt courses each one of those courses is made of. I think they have something like 108 trademarked holes lanes, I think is what they're called a miniature golf, where you can just kind of take them and reconfigure them into different configurations. But they have 108 total, and I guess each one of them is very, very difficult. I don't ever remember getting a perfect game or even imagining that I was going to get a perfect game. No, you get two or three holes in one, and that's a good day for sure. So, 18. There's actually a short, I think, seven and a half minute Grant Land documentary on the most recent perfect game by a guy named Rick Bayard who had his perfect game in 2011. Can you imagine the tension on hole 18? They captured it really well in this documentary. It's really well done. They've got like a cartoon version of him putting and he's got, like, cartoon sweats running his face. Oh, man. Really great. Yeah, it was very nervous and he did it. And he's actually a miniature golf pro in his spare time, which we'll talk about later. So he's from Charlotte. Don Clayton was from Fayetteville, and then Joseph Barber was from Pinehurst. So it seems pretty clear that North Carolina is the ancestral home of miniature golf, or at least the spiritual home of miniature golf in the world. Frankly, I'm just going to say it. In the world. Yeah. And if you're looking for the creators of the kind of mechanized courses, you can go to Scranton, PA. With Ralph and Aloma. Previous to this, you had the putt putt, which just had those sort of regular obstacles. You had the Tom Thumb, which had kind of more outrageous whimsy, but still, things weren't moving. And these are the guys that brought in these rotating windmill, blades or ramps that move back and forth, and they really kind of kick that to the next level. And they went into business big time. They started mass producing these things, like the actual components and sold a ton of them all over the world. Yeah, I think like 5000 courses. Yeah, it's pretty impressive. They're the ones who came up with what we think of now as, like, miniature golf and goofy golf with the moving stuff. Not a fan. The clown mouth. Don't forget the clown mouth that opens and closes, like you say, a windmill. So it's kind of interesting that Don Clayton brought miniature golf back to its roots of being a lot more like regular golf and then very shortly after that, branched off the Lomas, who brought it back to their Tom Thumb routes. So that whole thing, the evolution of miniature golf, happened twice in just the same way. Isn't that interesting? Yeah. And it also came back full circle in the 90s with a return to sort of that original miniature golf because real golfers, people like Jack Nicholas, started to get involved. I'm sure there were dollar signs in his eyes. Sure. But he also probably loved it. I don't want to be cynical, but I'm sure he made some money. But they have competitions. There are actual prize purses. There is a US Pro Mini Golf Association. They have their own little US. Open. I don't think they call it the Little US. Open. They totally should. There's the World Mini Golf Sports Federation in Germany, and they sort of are the body that standardizes the obstacles and stuff like that on, I guess, what you can have and what you can't have, which is kind of funny when you think about it. It is. But it's a pretty interesting list. You're like, oh, that'd be tough. Oh, that's hard. The slope circle with a V obstacle. Yeah, that's just plain difficult. I think they should call it the Teenyweeny US. Open. Welcome back to the teenyweeny us Open. I was looking at the US. Pro Mini Golf Association's website. And there was a Tennessee State Open. And, man, the picture that they have of that course, it looks serious, dude. Yeah. So if you go to Puppy and you always were like, I love this. This is so challenging. I can score 16. I just don't play the last two holes when I'm on a streak like a 20 or 22 or something like that, you might actually have fun being a miniature golf pro. And there are some serious courses out there for you to play. There are a couple of notches above your average puttputt course. I'd like to play one of those. I don't know if I would have fun. I'd make a ride club. Should we talk about some of these famous courses? Yeah. So from what I can tell, the United States is the home of miniature golf. It's the capital of miniature golf. I don't believe there's any country like, I was looking I was like, maybe Thailand is, like, even more into it than the United States. I don't think so. I think the United States is the place that has the most miniature golf courses and has probably the most paying customers for miniature golf courses. I could see Japan. I could too see anything like that. Yeah, I didn't see anything like it. So the United States is the home of miniature golf in the world. Capital of miniature golf, then, is Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, which is ironic that it's not North Carolina, but it's not everybody. I'm sorry. Yeah, I mean, Myrtle Beach is sort of one of those classic old school beach towns that has all of the gokarts and the bumper boats and the mini golf. And they have one called Molten Mountain. That's pretty cool. Like, you should go check out pictures of some of these places. There are a lot of fun that has a volcano, a working volcano that erupts every half hour, and it's sort of an inside and out things. Like, I think it's both indoors and outdoors, right? It is. Yeah. It's a pretty great one. And the whole volcano thing, they're not the only one. That's how nuts. So Myrtle Beach is there's another one called Hawaiian Rumble that also has a functioning volcano, too. And, in fact, on highway 17, there's a 30 miles stretch of it that goes through Myrtle beach where there's more than 50 miniature golf courses in a 30 miles stretch through Myrtle Beach. And I'm sure a lot of opinions on which ones are good and which ones stink. Yeah, there's one I want to go to in Palantine, Illinois. I think it's a couple of these from Travel and Leisure. Maybe this one's called Algorithm Acres. A-L-G-H-R-I-M acres. It's in Palatine, Illinois. And it's a funeral home. Like for real? In real life? Yeah, they take care of dead bodies and you can also play nine holes on their death themed course in the basement. In the basement. First of all, the basement of a funeral home is just creepy on its own. But a death themed miniature golf course in a funeral home that actually functions? That's just downright interesting. Yeah. There's this one in Las Vegas to the Kiss themed one, which I checked out on YouTube. I would play this even though it goes against two things for me, which is not into indoor miniature golf. I really would like to be outside and I think Kiss sucks. What? I thought you were a Kiss fan. No. Oh, man. I thought you were a Kiss fan. No, not a Kiss fan. I get it. And I think it's kind of fun and funny. Sure. But I never thought Kiss played good rock and roll songs. Really? That's very surprising. I know Kiss fans are going to be so mad at me for saying their music is not good, but I mean, there's a reason they dressed up and spit blood and stuff, but it still would be worth playing. I agree. No, it looks like the one that I would actually travel to go play is called Parking. It's in Lincolnshire, Illinois. So I'd probably go there and then I dip down or dip up. I'm not sure. To Palantine to play Algorithm Acres. Okay. But Parking is like, exactly what it's the pinnacle of a miniature golf course, if you ask me. It's got it all. It's difficult, and it has all the amazing obstacles and weird traps and functioning problems to figure out that a miniature golf course should have. It looked pretty cool. I mean, I'm a putt putt guy, but I was checking out pictures and stuff. I would go to Parking with you for sure. Okay. We'll go. It's going to be a summer trip in 2022 or three. Fantastic. And then if you want to play so I think, Chuck, this one would be up your alley. It's called Golf Gardens on Catalina Island in SoCal. Yeah, right up my alley. This one is like, considered the hardest miniature golf course in the United States. Not just because it's difficulty laid out, but also because it's been played so much that it's got all sorts of weird notches and stuff that's not supposed to be there in the playing surface. So that makes it all the more difficult, which is kind of neat. I love that. And then if you want to go retro, I think that one's been around a while. You can go down to Florida and they have a historic mini golf trail that takes you from a miniature golf course. A miniature golf course, all of which have been around for at least 50 years. Amazing. And if you like weird old stuff that's not in use anymore, look up abandoned miniature golf courses. That's a fun thing to do. And since I said it's a fun thing to do, everybody, that means it's time for listener mail. All right, I'm going to call this dad mail. Got this very sweet email. I love it when the family's listening. Sure. Especially when they're not. I mean, I like families with young kids that listen, but I also like it when it's adults and then older parents that are listening. Hey, guys. Hope you're hanging in there. These are such tricky times. I know I'm not the only listener that turns to your show for a distraction or a soundtrack to washing dishes or background noise while trying to run, or just something that feels normal during these abnormal times. A couple of years ago, my now husband and I took a road trip with my parents to stay with my now in laws. As we pulled out of the driveway, we put on Stuff You Should Know and spent the entire journey sharing your catalog with them, and they were immediately hooked. My parents continue to love your podcast, but every time my dad refers to it, he mixes up the name. I love this stuff. So far. He's called you guys. You should know. Sure. Stuff you ought to know. Things you need to know and stuff. Guys. Stuff Guys. That's a good nickname. Lately, he's just been referring to you as the Guys podcast, which is close enough for me. Eventually, we're just going to get to the yeah, thanks for all the amazing work and the thoughtful approach. You have to podcasting. So grateful to have multiple episodes to listen to every week. That is from Maribeth. And she says, PS. I should add that the episode on Fractals is now infamously nap inducing in my family, but I blame the long stretch of highway on that. Thank you. That was very kind of you. Really pulled it out at the end. There was a Maribeth. Yes. Well, if you want to be like Mera Beth and get in touch with us, we would appreciate that right now. You can send it to us via email. That's the best way to reach us at stuffpodcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff You Should Know. It's production of iHeartRadio's how stuff works. For more podcasts, my heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite show."
411a99e8-53a3-11e8-bdec-df5a515db571	How Airbags Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-airbags-work	It turns out that the inflatable bag of air that shoots out of your steering wheel or dashboard is the result of a controlled explosion of solid fuel, just like in a rocket – aimed for your face.	It turns out that the inflatable bag of air that shoots out of your steering wheel or dashboard is the result of a controlled explosion of solid fuel, just like in a rocket – aimed for your face.	Tue, 15 Jan 2019 14:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=1, tm_mday=15, tm_hour=14, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=15, tm_isdst=0)	38251692	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant and there's Gerry. And this is airbags airbags edition. I'm surprised we haven't done this one yet. It seems. So stuff you should know. It does. And it's just been sitting out there ready to explode in your face. Yes. Hopefully in the best way possible. And I also had a bit of a hard time because this article we should mention is from Marshall Brain, who is the original inventor of the House of Works website 90 years ago. In his kitchen. Yeah. So he used to write everything and then, boy, it's been through so many changes since then. But this article, that was like he keeps talking about, like, looking forward to 1998 and what's in store for us. So it's kind of hard to find out what was still legit and what wasn't. But I got the nuts and bolts of it. I think what's weird is it seems like a lot of the regulation is exactly the same. Yeah, I ran into the same thing, too. I go look up stuff and I'd be like, well, wait, they're saying the same thing, but this says 2016 or 2018 or something. I don't think regulations have changed all that much. I think you're right. I got tripped up a little bit with the factory installed off switch for passenger side, and I finally figured all that out, I think. Oh, good. Save it. It's gold. So exciting. What's weird is this is a Stuff You Should Know topic, isn't it? Really is. I just realized how boring stuff you should know can be. Chuck, let's start with history, shall we? Yeah. So apparently when I think of airbags, I think of, like, the 90s. That's airbag era to me. No, there have been air bags and cars in the United States going back to the 70s as far as mass produced, commercially available airbags, especially driver side. And then I think even a little later, in the 70s, passenger side airbags came around. I had no idea. You know? Well, you hate Chevy Chase, right? Have you ever seen Vacation? The first one? Sure. There's an airbag in there. That was 1983. Oh, yeah. He jumps over the gulch and crashes his car. And as he's opening his door, the airbag goes off, which is clearly like a trash bag, and it's clearly coming from outside the car on the ground, because he opens the door and it comes up really quick. Like they couldn't figure out a way, even an 83, to make it look like it came out of the steering wheel. Right. The director was like, Is that what an airbag looks like? And the special effects guys like, do you know what an airbag looks like? No. Yeah. And do you have any more blow? I don't know if that was Chevy Chase base or just making movies in the 80s making movies in the cocaine reference. Oh, yeah. That was everything in the 80s. Okay. But apparently when was it that an engineering tech from Pennsylvania named John Hetrick put a patent on a design for what he called a safety cushion assembly for automotive vehicles? He said automotive. Maybe that's where he went wrong, because he took it to Ford and GM and Chrysler, and of course, they were all like, if you listen to our Pinto, they're like, we got cars that are burning people alive. Right. You think we care about your airbags? Yeah, he just got Crickets back. Yeah. He got nothing. And it stayed that way until another guy from the Pinto episode, ralph Nader, wrote in his book, Unsafe at Any Speed that airbags, along with seatbelts in conjunction with seatbelts, would save lives big time. And he was right, actually. Even still, to this day, the sweet spot for surviving a terrible crash is a seatbelt and an airbag, both working perfectly to save your life. That's right. But the idea behind airbags was, well, seatbelts, I think, became part of federal regulations in the United States, and I think as in installed. Yeah, but, like, no one wore them. Right. There was no law that said you had to wear them for many years, and so only about a quarter of Americans wore them. So people were still dying in car wrecks even though their cars had seatbelts because they weren't wearing them, because they were idiots. So people said, well, maybe we'll put in these airbags. These are passive safety features. A seatbelt is technically an active safety feature because unless you have one of those what was it? Prelude, where you'd open the door and the shoulder belt. Yeah. And then you close it and go over you forgot about those. Even still, you had to do the lap belt part yourself. So that's technically active. Right. You have to do something to put it on. An airbag is different, where you are just sitting there, and it does it whether you want it to or not. It's a passive safety feature. So they said, well, maybe if we put airbags in, it will save lives. And so they started putting airbags in. Yeah. And then, I'm sure even back then, there were people that, like, government regulating socialists trying to save me. Yeah. Can't even turn off this airbag. That's a good wayland, Jennings. I wish I could do a good waylon Jennings. I wouldn't be doing the show. Just be out on the road. Really? With my act. Oh, yeah, that hurts. I'd bring you along. Okay. You'd be little whaling. I'd say whaling. Jetting so I think starting in, what, 1998, like, they started putting them out finally in the but in 1988 is when they said 90, 88, 98 is when they said, finally, all new cars got to have these airbags. Yeah. For the frontal airbags, at least for the driver and the passenger side frontal airbag. Yeah. It was still a little bit before the side impact bags were mandatory. And they said, okay, well, everybody's saved. The world is saved because we have airbags now, so no one's ever going to die in a crash. And then people started saying, wait a minute, I just read about this person who was in a fender bender and their airbag went off and it killed them. What about that? And so they started looking into airbags a little bit and they said, oh, okay, well, maybe this is something that you call a work in progress. And still to this day, airbag technology, this passive safety technology, is a work in progress because part of airbag technology is also educating the public and how to use it correctly. Because an airbag is not a soft little pillow that you're like. Well, after this crash, I guess I'll just take a nap here. It's basically like a punch to your face that inflates very quickly and is meant to keep you from eating the steering column, which apparently you can do in a high enough speed crash. Your seat belt, even when you're wearing it correctly and you're sitting where you're supposed to be, you can still be forced into the steering column. The point of the airbag, especially for the driver, is that it provides a barrier between you and the steering column. It's not a comfortable barrier, but it's a barrier that will keep your chest from caving in. Yeah. And obviously, people are more at risk. Let's say you're a little short stuff and you got to hike that seat way forward in order to drive you're that much closer physically to the steering column. And so the airbag is meant to help everyone, but especially, like, people that are too close for comfort. Yes, but if you're sitting too close to the steering column, it can hurt you. Yeah, I think what do they say? Get yourself ten inches back at least. We're getting way ahead of ourselves here. All right, ten inches, everyone. It is ten inches. You're right. So let's talk about the original idea for the airbag. Okay? It was you take a thing of compressed gas and you have it attached to basically a balloon or bladder or something like that, or in vacation, a hefty bag. Yeah. And under the right circumstances, like maybe a crumple that compressed gas is triggered and it blows up the balloon and you're saved. The problem is there's a lot of issues with this set up. Number one, it doesn't work fast enough. The compressed gas still does not work fast enough. This is original technology, okay? Like the stuff they were working with in the 70s. They had an idea that they wanted an inflatable bag, but they didn't know how to do it quite yet. So the original idea was compressed gas. Right. Like a giant whippet. Like your whippet. Like what I've got in my desk a whip. It you do in between during advertise with your cracker. Imagine that. A cracker and a giant whippet in your steering column. Okay. That was basically the idea at first. And so one that whipped it wouldn't inflate the bag fast enough. That's a big problem, because if it doesn't inflate fast enough, not only does it not keep you from hitting the steering column, it can actually make it worse. I think it's like Ten Amazing Facts or something about airbags on gelopnik. And they have a video on there side by side. It is side by side of crash tests with the crash test dummies. You mean the band? Yeah. They were like, we're so tired of your music. Get in this car. So it's side by side with Crash Test Dummies, and one is an airbag that deploys in the right time. The other one is an airbag that deploys late. And the one that deploys late, the dummy's head goes forward, right? And then right when it's about to hit the steering wheel, the airbag Inflights, and it crushes the guy's head backwards at like, a 90 degree angle to where it's supposed to be. And you're just like, oh, that's what happens if the airbag deploys light. So the timing is really everything. The idea that it would deploy light or not fast enough was not only not good enough, it was actually dangerous. Yeah. Because the whole idea here and Sweet Marshall brain includes a whole bit on the physics of a car crash. But it's worth noting that when you're driving and you hit something with your car, like head on, let's say everything wants to come to a complete stop that's in that car, including your body and your face. So you've only got a certain very small amount of time to get that bag fully, safely inflated as your head is doing its final, like, all right, this is where I want to stop. Right? Exactly. It's final resting point. So let's take a break. Okay. And we'll talk more about the physics of the car crash after it's. All right. So, Chuck, you were saying, like in a car crash, the car stops almost instantly. From everything I've seen, it's so close to instantaneous that the shorthand is it stops instantly, but you're still moving forward. Yeah. That's the point of your seatbelt, is to hold you in place. But the seatbelt can cause all sorts of damage in and of itself. But it's still better than just flying unbuckled into the steering column. Yeah, but it takes time to stop everything. Right. It is not instantaneous. No, if it were instantaneous, you would crumple, like the car. Right. So you want to be slowed down in a way that's so fast that you don't hit the steering column, but is gentle enough that it doesn't just cut you in two. Basically. Okay. Very tricky. It is extremely tricky. So what they found out is that if you inflate an airbag, you have to first of all, the airbag is big enough that it basically has the distance between you and the steering column that it's trying to protect you from. Yes, which is good, but that also means your face is that much closer, which shortens that time even more, shortens the time that it can deploy in. And again, remember when you're talking about compressed gas, it just wasn't fast enough. So they figured out that you need to have an airbag, basically get the input that a crash is happening, and then deploy within about 30,000 of a second. So if you take 1 second, you chop it into 1000 equal parts, you would kick off 30 of them and still have 970 left in that second before the airbag is done deploying. That's how fast they have to deploy, which is astounding. It's amazing that they can do that, but they can do it. They finally figured it out. And the way that they figured it out was instead of using compressed gas, using basically the same thing that you used to power rockets, basically, solid rocket fuel. Yeah. Was that Vice you sent that one article? No, it's a scientific American. Yeah. Where they basically said, for all practical purposes, a small explosion goes off. Oh, that one was wired. Oh, yeah. Wired, yes. Like a small explosion goes off in your steering wheel, or I guess on the passenger side in the dashboard to make this happen. And that in and of itself can be dangerous. It definitely can be. And they've actually kind of got the chemistry down so that it's as nondangerous as possible when everything's working correctly. But they start with something called sodium azide, which is basically sodium and nitrogen compound. And when it's just sitting there in its powdered form, it's pretty stable, it's fine. But if you apply enough heat to it, I think 300 degrees Celsius, which is pretty hot, it breaks down, it decomposes. And when it decomposes, it breaks into two different things. One is nitrogen gas, and the other is sodium. Just plain old sodium metals. And the nitrogen gas gets way bigger than the little handful of sodium azide that it grew from. Yeah, the nitrogen is what is in that bag, essentially, like filling it up so quickly. Right. The nitrogen gas that grows. Yeah. But isn't sodium azide toxic? So they have to add other things in there. So the sodium azide itself isn't toxic, but these sodium metals, that is a byproduct, once it ignites, they're not actually toxic either. But when they combine with water, like water vapor in the air, it becomes sodium hydroxide, aka lye. Right. So you don't want lye flowing through the passenger compartment because you're going to get chemical burns right after your airbag goes off. So they add other stuff, like potassium nitrate, I believe, to combine with the salt, the sodium, to render it inert and then actually produce even more nitrogen. Right. So it's filling up a bag made of nylon fabric that is folded into that steering wheel. I think there's, like, talcum powder and stuff. You have to keep it supple. Yeah. I've never had an Airbag deployed, thankfully, while I was in a car, but I know that powder is, like, a big part of it, right? From what I hear, yeah, that's what I hear. And then there's a sensor. Here's the thing. Everything has to go perfectly because you don't want it to go off when it shouldn't, because that's no good. Is it still accurate to say it's ten to 15 miles an hour hitting a fixed, like wall? Essentially, that was I think that's 1998 rules. Right. They decompress that. Since then, they have it, it's much less rigid. Okay. So when your car hits something and stops suddenly, there's an accelerometer that's measuring the deceleration and, like, five different factors. Okay. Yeah. Like, you just went from 30 to zero so fast, we know that you've been in a wreck. And it's measuring not just this direction, but also that direction. And that direction to make sure that what's going on is an actual frontal crash. It sends this data, this raw data, to a microcontroller little tiny computer in your car. Actually, that's part of the airbag assembly. And the microprocessor runs this data through an algorithm. The algorithm decides whether it's a front end crash or not. And if it is, then it deploys the Airbag. What it does is it sets off an electric circuit, which goes and ignites a little charge, which blows up that sodium hazard, which then blows into nitrogen gas. It happens in 30,000 of a second. Yeah. We've certainly gone over enough amazing inventions of mankind through the show. But if you ever doubt just how brilliant humankind is, look at the Airbag, especially engineers. It's unbelievable to walk that line of doing this safely, because they could have given up and been like, geez, I don't think there's no way we can get it done that fast safely. Yeah. Like, let's think of another idea. But they were like, no, let's stick with the airbag. Naders on us. They said, Go get the engineers. So that's the new way of doing it, apparently. The old way. According to Canada's transportation website, there would be a little hollow tube with a ball bearing held in place at the end by a magnet. Really? And when the car was hit hard enough, the ball bearing would be jarred loose from its position 100%, roll down the tube, and then complete an electrical circuit that would send the ignite the ignition charge. Wow. That sounds too much like a Rube Goldberg machine. It definitely does. I think they're like, we can improve on this. Yeah. Jeez, that's scary. All right, so I guess we should talk a little bit about the ten inches and the safety concerns. Right. So apparently, placing yourself ten inches from the front of your steering wheel, the center, I guess, where that thing pops out is plenty of room because they say the risk zone is two to three inches. Right. So they say get back at least ten inches. And if you're like my mom, who is little short stuff, and every time I go to move her car, I'm just like, are you kidding me? And I'm not even big, and I'm like, I can't even get into things. But they say to scoot back as far as you can and still drive normally. And then if you need to even tilt that seat back a little bit just to get yourself in that sweet spot. Yeah. If your seat has to be as close as possible, at least tilt your chair back. And then if you can get it further back. But now you're too low. If you can raise your seat automatically, do that too. Marshall brain even says get a pad to sit on if you have to. And it's true. You also want to tilt your steering wheel so it's facing your chest rather than your head. Yeah. Which is I mean, surely you do that. Anyway. I actually went and double checked mine. I was like, okay, I do. Yeah, I'm a tilt down all the way just because it's more comfortable. Right. But some people, I think, have it upward and it's just sitting there blasting, like driving a button. Yeah, but it's like you're driving in front of a loaded gun with your face in front of a loaded gun. So you want to do it correctly because you kind of are for kids. There are a whole host of concerns for children, and airbags have killed children in the past. I mean, go and look up all the rules yourself. Don't base your life and your children's safety on anything we say. But I think the current laws or recommendations are if you're under twelve, you should be in the back seat, period. Yes. You shouldn't be riding in the front seat. Which is way different than when we were kids. Oh, yeah. You'd be like bouncing around, like with your hands on the dashboard as like a five year old. Right. Yeah. It's just crazy how it used to be. Yeah, man, it's unbelievable. It's unbelievable that any of us survive to this point. Yeah, that's true. But that's when I got a little bit confused about the passenger side on off switch. Because starting at a certain point, they said, all right, if you want to get an aftermarket switch built in to turn off your airbag or the passenger side, you have to fill out this application and have a specific qualifying, I guess. Would you call it a hardship? Hardship or just a reason? Yes, a reason. That's a good way to put it. And they range from like, medical conditions sure. Just to being too small, I think, too right. Or to having a car where the back seat was too small to put a rear facing kids seat. Yes. If your car was too small and you had to put your kids seat in the front passenger seat, it's actually preferable to not have the airbag there. Yeah. This is why I got confused, is because my pickup truck has that on off switch factory installed. And I was just like, no, it's just factory installed in my truck. That's 1998 talking. Well, what it is, is I think all pickup trucks had them. Even though I could fit a kid seat because I have the little back seat thing, I could fit a kid seat rear facing in my truck. Oh, wow. In the back seat. It's a giant truck. But yeah, my big dooley, Emily saw one of those on the road the other day. She's like, why does anyone need those extra tires in the back? Are those four fifty s. Four fifty s? I don't know. But the dooleys with the four wheels in the back and it's not for sure. I think that actually has a reason, I think, for, like, heavy towing or heavy hauling. Oh, I think it's for sure. Is it? No, I think there's a real reason. So you know how, like, no, that's not a Hummer has ever been offroad? Well, sure. I think it's a similar principle, really? All right, hold your emails. I realize that's been offroad. Do you know the Hummer I'm talking about? The H three S? Yeah, the bright yellow one. Exactly. That's never been off road, right? Unless you count, like, parking up on the curb off road because you can't fit it into a space. Out of my way nature. So in 95, I think manufacturers could actually were allowed to do this. It says 98 in here, but it was a 95 when a pickup truck could have the manufacturer put an on off switching. But here's the thing. So we might be confusing you at this point. Like, why would you want to turn your airbag off if it's safe? Again, it depends on the situation, whether your airbag is actually safe. If you have a child in a rear facing child seat that's in the front seat, it's better to not have your airbag on. Yes. And as a reminder, Operation Valkyrie was a larger plan. Sorry, you're never going to let me live that down, are you? From 45 minutes ago. Right. It is sometimes more dangerous. So that on off switch and the reason why I mean, like, there were people who were like, no, airbags kill more people than they saved. That's not true. But there was this one study that came out of the University of Georgia in 2005. The statistician, I can't remember her name, but she ran the numbers using the full data set. So, like, the numbers that showed that airbags save lives. Save lives if you use only crashes where there is a fatality involved. So a specific kind of crash, typically a high speed crash, and airbags probably going to save your life. What this statistician did was to take all crashes, I think it was called like crash worthy worthiness data, and it was all crashes, which includes low speed crashes, too, which includes low speed crashes where an airbag went off and the person would have otherwise survived, but they didn't because the airbag killed them. And she found that there was a slight increase in the risk of death from airbags overall. So there's a lot of competing information, but it seems like the general consensus is that under the right conditions, having an airbag in conjunction with the seatbelt yes. That's important. Yeah, it's very important when you're sitting back far enough, at least ten inches away and up high enough, that that is going to increase your risk or increase your chances of surviving an otherwise fatal crash. Right. But I think like 30% basically is the rule of thumb. Like it increases your chances of surviving by a third. Not bad. So let's take another break, Chuck, and then we'll come back and we'll talk more airbags. So we were talking about kids. If you do have a kid that's twelve and up or whatever the recommendation is, it's still important. Obviously, always wear that seatbelt, but also have them sitting properly. Right. They talk a lot about the fact that kids are smaller, so a lot of times they try to sit up in their seat more. A lot of times in a crash, the kid will go up toward the ceiling, the roof of the car, because of how small they are. And so it's really important to have your kid in that seatbelt with their butt all the way against the back of that seat and like, staying there right. And shutting up while they're at it. Yeah. And again, back far enough, at least ten inches away from the yeah, put that seat back all the way. And it might be like, I can't see as much, but again, just tell them to shut up. Yeah. You're looking after their safety. Yes. Actually, what I meant to say was if an airbag goes off, a child is so light that it could lift them up in their seat. Right. Yeah. If they're too close. Correct. And not positioning. Correct. That's right. Okay. I ran across something surprising. Did you know that it's not mandated for cars to have airbags in Canada? In Canada? Really? It is in the US. But not Canada. Doesn't that surprise you? That is surprising. So that's not a law for new cars, huh? It's like an option, I guess. Yeah. It's not mandated that new cars have airbags. Say I want a cigarette lighter and an ashtray. No airbag. Right. So if you paid attention to the news at all, you may have heard about airbag recalls, especially ones that were made by the Japanese firm Takata. Man, that's a big problem. I think something like 37 million cars have been recalled. Yeah. It said the NHS. I did this in the Pinto. The NHTSA said it's the largest and most complex safety recall in US history. Because Takata made airbags for everybody. Yeah. And they've made airbags that could possibly send metal shards flying into your face. Yeah. I was reading about a girl who was man, she was like a cheerleader from Oklahoma who just graduated. Was, like had her whole life ahead of her. She was just as sad as it gets. She went to go pick up her little brother. Her name was Ashley Param. She went to go pick up her little brother from football practice and I guess, like, got into a tiny fender bender and her airbag went off. Well, that shouldn't have killed her in and of itself. But it turns out that Takata airbags start to degrade over time. That sodium azide actually becomes explosive. So when it goes off after it's aged a certain amount of time, it becomes super explosive and it can actually blow the canister that holds the airbag. And that's the mouth part and it shoots shrapnel out. And apparently it got her in the neck. And it was such a traumatic injury that at first they thought she'd been shot. Wow. And she died there in her car from the airbag. There are millions of cars out there on the road right now with the same potential going on. Yeah. I saw 15 deaths and then I saw another said 20. I saw, like, 23, I think. Yeah. So somewhere in that range is the amount of people that have been killed just from the Takata airbags? Not airbags in general. Yeah, the recalled airbags and hundreds and hundreds of people injured. And like you said, they go across, I don't know, every manufacturer, but most, yes. And not just American automobiles or Japanese even. But there was an Australian one that I saw was being recalled. Everyone around the world use Takata airbags and they are faulty. Yeah. And you should have gotten a notice by now, but take it seriously. And I know that it's been slow with the fixing of it and the roll out of the ones that work. It's not like an instantaneous thing to fix 37 million cars. Right. But even if your airbag is working correctly remember I said that airbags are kind of a work in progress and part of is educating the public. Another part of it is just making airbags better at what they do. One of the major flaws of airbags is that the closer you get to a head on collision, to a 12:00 collision, the better they protect you. But the caveat to that is depending on how fast you're going. Right. So if you're going really slow, they can actually be really problematic, because you may not even have your seatbelt on, in which case you don't want to hit an. Airbag without a seatbelt on, especially at low speeds, it can mess you up pretty good. Yeah. Because what you're doing there, in case it doesn't make much sense, you are very quickly going well within that ten inch zone because of the notes belt keeping you back. And then remember, it's kind of like an airbag deploying too late. It can shoot your head backwards and just mess you up pretty good after that. When you have a seatbelt on, or if you have a seatbelt on, even if it's ten to 15 miles an hour up to a certain point, say, I think like 65 km/hour, I'm not sure what that is. Miles per hour. You are pretty good. You're pretty good with your airbag. And then after that, the crash becomes so forceful that it can actually mess with the airbag deployment system and the airbag might not even go off. Wow. So there's actually just a window that airbags work well in. And one of the big challenges in the industry now is figuring out how to make them work 100% of the time in really high speed crashes, too. Yeah, I mean, it's pretty cool. In a testament to where we are with safety in the world now, and especially in the United States, that they're not just like, yes, got the airbags figured out, let's move on along. Right. They're constantly working on it. Supposedly the National Transportation Safety Board really resisted putting on off switch on cars for a long time because they were afraid that it was just going to be an easy fix for problematic airbags where people just turn off the airbags rather than forcing the automotive industry to put more money in time and thought into making better airbags. Yes. Which is a risky gambling way of getting things done. But it's the way yeah. And they work best, like you said, head on. Because the bumper, if you listen to our was it crumple zones? Yes, I think so. Is that a whole podcast? I think so. They recall that front bumper and the engine and the whole front of your car takes so much of that impact that by the time it gets to you, it's really helping the airbag out. Side impact is I think there are more side impact accidents and more deadly ones because you get T boned and there is no engine, there is no bumper, just that thin door. It happens much faster. Yeah, super fast. So there are side curtain airbags now on virtually, I think, all new cars. Right. And depending on the manufacturer. When they were first trying to figure out how to implement these, they had some different strategies. I know. BMW, I think, actually put it in the door. Volvo, I think, put it in the back seat. In the back side of the back of the front seat, yeah, the driver's seat. And they've certainly helped a lot. And some cars these days there are airbags all up in them. Right? There's something called the front center airbag that comes up in between the front passengers so they don't like three stooge knock their heads together in the middle of this there's passenger knee airbags that blow up around the dashboard there's inflatable seatbelts they're working on, which is smart. There's a lot of airbags that they're basically just trying to turn it into one giant marshmallow, which is smart, but as long as the giant marshmallows don't also, like, knock your head off of your body accidentally. Right. That's kind of the big challenge right now. Drive safe, everyone. Where that seat belt? Yeah. Oh, and one more thing. You know how you always hear ten and two is how you're supposed to drive? Not anymore. I think I've said it before. You want to drive at nine and three. Oh, really? Because at ten and two, if the airbag goes off, that hot gas can deglove your hands. You love togloving. It's your favorite horrific accident. I'm a solid nooner with my left wrist. You're a dead man. Or a solid 06:00 with my thumb and my forefinger. You can't do that. You have to do better than that. I know it sucks to have like nine and three, but I'm telling you, you have much more control. Come on. No, I'm doing pretty good. I've never been in a bad wreck. It's good. Yes. Knocking on all kinds of wood. So if you want to know more about airbags, go read up on it. Don't try to deploy them yourselves. It's a terrible idea. And since I said that, it's time for listener mail. Actually, I was in a pretty decent rack when my brother was driving. I think I've detailed that in previous shows. Yeah, if you're out there typing. But what about the Jeep incident? Which, weirdly, my rental house right now that I'm in, while I'm working on my househouse is it Jeep? Yeah, it is. It's an old brown jeep. It's like several hundred yards from where that record took place. Oh, really? Yeah, and it was raining really bad the other day when I was going home and at that very same spot. It's just a wash. It's like a river running over the road. I'm like, that's where it happened. Wow. That's where you hydroplane. It's still dangerous over there. Do you like shake or anything as you go past it? No, I'm good. Okay. I said just send a picture to my brother and make fun of him. I'm going to call this I don't like Dr. Seuss. Okay, that's you speaking or the author? It's the author, because remember in the show we said, who doesn't like Dr. Seuss? Sophia Cook does not. Okay. She gives good reasons. I always hated those books as a kid. The pictures disturbed me. Like, what were those things? My mother hated them, which is why I never saw the books until I was at a friend's house. She refused to buy them. When I asked her later, she said the poetry was juvenile and unimaginative. She was an English major and racist. Well, that too. For example, Dr. Seuss would just add the same word multiple times just to meet the cadence. This is what fifth graders do when they can't keep up with more work, when they can't come up with more words. Wow, this is harsh, she said. I know, because I call poetry to fifth graders. She said, for example, from redfish bluefish, some come a long way, some are very, very bad. All he does is yell, yell, yell. He likes to drink and drink and drink. It's pretty juvenile when you think about it. Oh, is that an actual one? Red fish, blue fish. Okay, yeah. She's citing that as an example. Okay, she said. Then there's the lazy poetry method. If you can't find a word to rhyme, just make one up. Cans rhymes with Zands bumps. What are those? Bump? Well, of course, you have to make up a whomp. Black. What about black? No, she's saying black. I know. That's a made up word. I don't know. I'm feeling defensive right now for some weird stuff. I'm a book editor now, guys. I hate this stuff more now than when I was a kid and just felt disturbed by the strange drawings. Just thought I'd weigh in because not everyone likes Dr. Seuss. He happened to be in the right place at the right time. Book publishing is a fickle and strange business. Many fantastic writers never see the light of day, and some truly awful authors make it big. She's bagging on 50 shades of gray. Okay, I won't say what she said. Okay, thanks for listening, guys, and thanks for the stuff. I'll always keep coming back. That is from Sophia Cook, who read a book and all that. Cobbled good. Thanks a lot, Sophia. So her doctor's dose to her is like the way I was raised with Chevy Chase? I guess so. He just made another appearance in this episode. I know it well. If you want to get in touch with us to let us know about someone you were raised to dislike strongly by your parents, we don't use the H word here. No, you can visit stuffyshireo.com. Check out our social links on that site. You can check me out at the joechclarkway.com, and you can send Chuck, Jerry, and me an email to stuffpodcast@howstepworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseworks.com. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where True crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. There's a perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today."
8dbe6ede-ba8a-11e8-a624-bb264091322e	Short Stuff: Niagara Falls Dewatered	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/short-stuff-niagara-falls-dewatered	In 1969, the Army Corps of Engineers turned off one of the main waterfalls at Niagara Falls to see what could be done to preserve it. They found two corpses, one carcass and lots of pennies.	In 1969, the Army Corps of Engineers turned off one of the main waterfalls at Niagara Falls to see what could be done to preserve it. They found two corpses, one carcass and lots of pennies.	Wed, 27 Nov 2019 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=27, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=2, tm_yday=331, tm_isdst=0)	14475195	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, and welcome to the short stuff. There's Charles, there's Jerome. This is Joshua. This is short stuff. The legend. How are you doing? I'm doing good, man. I'm pretty excited about this one. Have you ever been to Niagara Falls? I have. What's it like? Watery, damp. It's very pretty. It's actually really neat. It's definitely worth seeing. Which falls did you see? We went on the American side, but then when we got to the Canadian side, we stopped and turned around and looked again. But it's really definitely a sight to see, for sure. Yeah. I mean, I guess we should point that out for people like me who have never been to Niagara Falls. But there are a few falls. If you're American and you don't want to leave the country, you can see the American side. Right. If you want to see something that, to my eye on images online, looks better. The Canadian Horseshoe falls are pretty nice. They're better, right? I don't want to say better because I'm American, but they are much larger. There's a much larger volume of water. It's much more graceful. Okay. And they're separated by Goat Island. And then there's cute little bridal veil fall separated from the American fall by Luna Island. Yeah. So there's technically three falls with Niagara Falls. And what's surprising to me, Chuck, is in researching this, like, that set up where you've got the American falls, bridal veil Falls, and then the Horseshoe Falls on the Canadian side. That's only, like, 500 to 800 years old. Yeah, that seems old, but I believe that. I don't know why that sounds reasonable to me. Okay, well, that's like I can't keep my socks on every time I hear that. Oh, really? Yeah, because you think of something like a geological feature, like a waterfall. It's got to be ancient. Right. But the idea that it's only been that way for 500 to 800 years is kind of surprising until, of course, then you look into a little further and you see, oh, well, this waterfall is just eroding the earth beneath it so quick that, of course, it's not always been this way. It just totally makes sense. Yeah. And that erosion the bottom of the falls is pretty intimidating. It's very rocky and jagged. Big boulders. That's why going over a barrel we did a podcast, I guess, if you want to call it that, many years ago in our early days, about going over the falls in a barrel, and it's incredibly dangerous. Yeah, it is very dangerous. And those rocks, though, haven't always been there. There were two rock falls in the 1930s and the 1950s, specifically under the American Falls, and that left a lot of boulders underneath. And some people said, well, that is just unsightly. And frankly, it's probably not very patriotic to let the Canadians best us with their much more beautiful waterfall now. So we got to figure out what to do about this, because we can't just let the American Falls go away. That's right. And who do you call when you need something like this done, you know that? You call the army corps of Engineers. And they said, well, really, the only way to find out what's going on is to dry up this waterfall. And everyone at the table spit out their coffee and they said, you're crazy. It's 1969. What are you talking about? And they said, It's really not that hard. Yeah, it really isn't. So they hired a construction company and they built a Coffer dam, which I believe we talked about in the Hoover Dam episode. It's just like a mound of earth that is holding water back that's not normally there. And they built that at the point like the fork where the American Falls began. And they diverted the Niagara River mostly over to the Horseshoe Falls, a little bit to the Bridal Falls. But then that was it. Like the water stopped flowing over the Niagara American Fall and it virtually dried everything up. It was kind of easy, if you think about it. I mean, it was a massive, huge project, but it wasn't technically that hard. Yeah, it was close to 28,000 tons of fill. So that's a lot of dirt and rock. That's a lot of fills. That's a lot of fills. But when you think about the fact that Horseshoe fall accounts for 90% of the dump anyway, like they couldn't damn a porch. You fall there's no way, right? I don't believe so, no. I don't think the American fall could take it. The other thing I wonder, too, is if when they did this, if you could tell a difference at horseshoe fall. Yes, I read that you could. Really? Most decidedly. They said it was 10% cooler. Right. I'm 10% more inspired. I love it. Yes, the rainbows around it were 10% brighter. You could really tell. Well, should we take a little break? Well, sure, man. All right. Let's take a break and find out exactly what they did once they had these dry falls. Right after this. So again, Chuck, they dried up Niagara fall because they wanted to figure out how to keep it from eroding and possibly how to clean it up. Like clean up all those boulders that tall us at the bottom from those rock falls because they're worried about it looking ugly. That's right. But here's the thing. And you should look up pictures of this if you're not driving your car because it's pretty remarkable. It really is, to see this thing dried up like that. I mean, it just looks like a really flat mountain, basically like a cliff, which is what it is. Right. But they couldn't keep it all dry, that face. They had to keep wet because it had never been dried out and exposed to the sun and the wind. And they were rightfully worried about what might happen. So they had to keep spraying that face kind of continually from June to November. Yeah. They installed the sprinkler system to do it. They didn't have just a bunch of people, right, just staying in their houses. This is the worst summer job of all time. That's right. But then they had to clean out the river bed. So they sandblasted out a bunch of stuff and they got the moss off and they sprayed all these rocks clean and got all the loose gravel out of there. And they really wanted to see what was going on geologically. So they injected blue dye. They drilled down into the riverbed, injected blue dye and they were like, let's see what happens. Let's sit back and have a tea and see where this blue comes out. And then some of the more excited workmen among them would be like, oh, there it is, there it is. When the blue dice started to emerge. And they clap and point and laugh. That's right. They also installed something called extenso meters, which are pretty interesting. They're little sound so made up. It does. It also sounds like something a mad villain would use. But it measures the movement of the rock in the foundation or the bed, or the river bed of the American falls to basically look out for any movement greater than 1100 of an inch, which is pretty specific. Very specific. And they also installed little metal posts called monuments, which they can use in the future and have used in the future to survey the area and see if they've moved at all. If the riverbed has moved at all, in the hopes that they will be able to catch a rock fall from happening or erosion from happening before it happens. That's right. And they did find a place where they thought it was pretty susceptible in the future to occur, and that was at Prospect Point. This had already been a place where they had a rock fall in, which is the one that kind of kick started this whole plan to begin with. So Prospect Point is a problem, quite frankly. Yes. Although this was 1954 is the last time it happened. It hasn't happened since. No, it hasn't. And I think some people might be a little surprised because this is 1969, where they're like, this is probably where it's going to happen next again. And it just still hasn't it was the Summer of Love. It was just so funny. Look, I have it written down here. The summer of love underneath it. Did you get that email? Yeah. Apparently we've been saying Summer of Love is anything but 1967. And that is officially the Summer of Love. I did not know that. So I always thought it was 68. For some reason, I always thought it was 69. All right, well, in show correction, short stuff style. Yes. So back to the dry bed. You would think, who would want to come see a dried up Niagara falls. I would. And it turns out a lot of people would. You not well, I mean, I don't know if that would want that to be my first trip. Right. Or you would definitely want to go back a second time when it's in full swing. Or maybe actually that would be the time to go, because you could see that and Horseshoe Falls, right, and get the best of both worlds. Yeah. So some people were thinking like that and thought like, this is amazing. There was one weekend in mid July where 90,000 people streamed through there to see because this is kind of a once in a lifetime thing to see niagara Falls dried up, or the American Falls at least. But overall, that tour season was pretty lame because a lot of people were like, well, I guess it's under construction. I'm not going to pay for that road trip to go see a lamo fall. Yeah. And the original plan was they were like, let's try this thing out and invite people out to walk around and do stuff. They kind of were like, It's a little too wet still, and it's probably still kind of dangerous. So it was in August, finally, that they deemed it dry enough for people to go out safely, I think. They never allowed people up on the cliff, did they? Well, they built a fence on the brink, so I don't know how close to the brink they were allowed to be, but I get the impression that all throughout the summer, whether they were allowed out there or not, people would go run out on the riverbed and just, like, hang out. Oh, yeah. And then they would be chased off by the Army Corps. They'd be like, we might not have guns, but we have sextants. Another thing they did, and I just consider this very bad luck, people would go out and collect wish coins. Isn't that bad luck? I don't know. These are people's wishes. We've seen The Goonies. Yeah, but the wishes have come and gone. I mean, come on. If they haven't been granted by now, they're not going to be granted. Let's give those coins another shot. I guess so. I don't know. It doesn't seem right. It's like that one part in The Simpsons, the beer bearing episode, where they're driving through the cemetery and Bart goes, dad, it's bad luck to run over gravestones. And Homer goes, really? I heard good luck. One thing they did find, and it's kind of amazing they didn't find more dead bodies, but they did find two. One of them was a pretty recent one that they were actually looking for this guy. Yeah, they saw this guy dive into the river about a week before, so they knew he would be in there. But what they didn't know is that they would find a very creepy find a woman in a red striped dress who had been down there for a long time. It says, lodged headfirst into the tales. Isn't that ghoulish? That's so ghoulish. And she had a gold ring inscribed with forget me not. Yeah. And then the irony of that is that she's never been identified. Yeah, that seems remarkable to me. It doesn't, man, I looked I was like, I don't know how else to word the search, but I didn't find anything about that woman being identified ever. Yeah. And I'm also not sure that the guy who jumped the week before they turned the water off was ever identified as well. Oh, really? They didn't know who it was? No. But yeah, he was mistaken for a worker by some people who saw him initially jump in. And then they were like, oh, wait, that guy. That's not good. Yeah, but yeah, a lot of people are surprised that they didn't find more bodies because there's a lot of people who die by suicide or just do something dumb and go over the falls in a barrel or whatever. It's a well known place to do that. And only two bodies is kind of strange. Yeah. They found one deer carcass, which that's kind of surprising. I just thought it would be littered with carcasses. I think that's kind of what they were half expecting too. It was probably a good they were delighted by that. I'm sure they were. Yeah. So by November, they're like, okay, we've figured out everything we can figure out. We've kind of shorted up as best we can. From what I read, the waterfall naturally eroded at, like, 5ft a year. And now they've got it down to one because of the stuff they did in 1969 and later in 1972. But they said, okay, it's time to turn the water back on. And they did get this november 25, 1969, which I believe was 50 years and two days ago. Oh, wow. Isn't that neat? Happy anniversary. Happy Water Day. Reintroduction of water to Fall Day. Yes. And of course, they had to do it slowly throughout the course of the day. They couldn't just make some big, magnificent scene and say, Watch this, everybody. I'm sure they wanted to, but hang on to your dust. Yeah, I'm sure they did some math to figure out just kind of how slow they needed to go with it. But it was still probably pretty cool to see. I'll bet it was. For sure. And so what was kind of heartening to me is they said, okay, we learned a lot, actually, and we can probably keep this thing from eroding, but should we? And this joint task force to kind of preserve Niagara Falls Joint Commission between Canada and the US. Said, well, what do the residents around here thing? So they sent out little mailers and asked, like, 200,000 residents in Canada and on the US. Side, what do you guys think we should do? And the majority of people said, hey, it's a natural formation just leave it to nature. Leave it be. So they did. Yeah. I thought that was kind of neat. I liked that. They asked locally, too. Right? They asked locally and acted locally. Exactly. There you go. They were going to turn it off one more time in 2019 to fix some bridges, and I believe time is basically run out on that project, so it might happen in 2020. Let's cross our fingers. Maybe we can do a podcast live from the brink. That's a really great idea, Chuck. Well, I guess that's the end of short stuff, Chuck, which means short stuff out. Stuff you should know is the production of I Heart Radio is how stuff works. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
446d1152-53a3-11e8-bdec-4fe103f85f79	Patty Hearst: Brainwashed or Bandit?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/patty-hearst-brainwashed-or-bandit	Patty Hearst was a young heiress living a quiet life studying art history at college when one Monday evening her home was invaded, she was kidnapped, and her life took a totally unforeseen turn that she would have trouble explaining for years to come.	Patty Hearst was a young heiress living a quiet life studying art history at college when one Monday evening her home was invaded, she was kidnapped, and her life took a totally unforeseen turn that she would have trouble explaining for years to come.	Tue, 24 Nov 2020 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2020, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=24, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=329, tm_isdst=0)	53177034	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryan over there. And this is stuff you should know. Just just the two of us. Me and Chuck are going to make it if we try just the two of us, he and I. Oh, man. Now I wish we were doing a show on Bill Withers. Is that a bill withers song? What? I mean, I guess I can hear his voice now that you say that, but that's not the song I think of when I think Bill Withers. What do you think? Lean on Me? No, the theme song to Annie. Oh, sure. Phone will come out tomorrow. Yeah, that's the one, right? Good song. I love that Annie soundtrack. So good, man. Hey, have I mentioned Enola homes? You have. Well, have you seen it yet? I haven't seen it yet. That's so good. Did you see the Challenger documentary? I have not seen that. It's hard to watch. Yeah, I've been watching horror movies because October is kind of the month where I get a pass to do that on my own. Yeah, october, more like shocktober. You know what I mean? Right. I finally watched a Rob zombie movie. Never seen any of those before. Which one? I started the beginning and did House of a Thousand Corpses. Okay. What do you think? It was good. It was just exactly what I thought it would be, which is sort of a Texas Chainsaw Massacre like story, but you could feel his enthusiasm for filmmaking. I liked it for sure. When's the last time you saw the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre? I saw it last year for the very first time, believe it or not. Oh, my. I think we talked about that. Finally, the pants off of me. And it's so good. It's weird because it keeps getting better. I remember being a teenager and the first time I saw it, and I was like, why? What is this? And then the next time I saw it, I was like, oh, this is actually pretty good. And then the last time I saw it, I was like, I just want to sit around and watch this all the time. Stone Cold classic. So speaking of stone cold classics, I got a Stone Cold classic, which a what? True crime question case for you, Chuck. What's the question? The question is this was Patty Hearst a brainwashed hostage who carried out violent crimes for fear of her life, or was she a spoiled rich kid who turned thrillseeker to the nth degree? You know what? I don't know. Part of me thinks that she did flip and was radicalized, but I don't know, man. I mean, I don't think it's super clear either way. No. What do you think? I'm in the same boat as you. I feel like I lean a little more toward radicalized and there's a couple of things that it's just like I can't get past that. Yeah, I think I know one of them. But I think that she became radicalized initially out of fear for her life, and it's really hard to discount what happened to her initially. Sure. That got her. Absolutely. And I think Jimmy Carter has the most sensible take on the whole thing. So we'll get into all this. For those of you who don't know what we're talking about, we're talking about Patty Hearst. And Patty Hirst was the granddaughter of William Randolph Hearst, whose name might sound familiar. He was the publishing magnet, I think a radio guy, too. Right. I think it was radio, but very much well known for his string of newspapers. And he was a bit of a politico, a king maker, incredibly mind bogglingly wealthy. He was the model for Citizen Kane, I believe. Right. And he had basically established this media empire in the first half of the 20th century. And he had a son. He had a son named Randy Hearst. No joke. Randall Hurst. Not William Randolph. Sorry. Randolph Hearst. And they called him Randy. And Randy had a daughter. He was brought up like a very wealthy guy, but he was also brought up to take over the family business. And he had, by 1954, I think, when a daughter arrived to Randy and his wife Catherine. And they named their kid Patty or Patricia Hurst. That's right, patricia Campbell. And she was what? You would think she was born into an heiress. She was born a rich kid. It's funny to think about, like, in today's terms, plenty of people to pick from. But if you could imagine Paris Hilton robbing a bank with a machine gun right. That's kind of a good analog to who Patricia Hurst was back then. Yeah, that's actually really good. Although you could say she's quite a bit more low key as she was at the time. Like, by the time she was 19, she was living in San Francisco or the Bay Area, I should say, attending UC Berkeley. So I guess she was living in Berkeley because it's not necessarily the Bay. She wasn't exactly Paris Hilton. Right. If we're being honest. But as far as the famous heiress in the United States yeah. But also living this quiet life. She was 19. She was engaged to a guy named Steven Weed, who is like a Catholic high school teacher. I think he was 26 or something, and studying art history and going to school and just kind of living life. She really missed his calling, especially in Berkeley in the settlement. Stevie Weed. But she was, like, mind boggling wealthy, and she was going to inherit all this. And she was famous for being an heiress. Right. And so just a few days before her 20th birthday, on February 4, I think right. 19th, there was a knock on her door, like 09:00 p.m.. It was a Monday night. And actually, I don't even know if they knocked or else if they just came bursting in. But three people who turned out to be members of what very few people had heard of at the time. But who had become very famous the Symbiones Liberation Army burst through their door. Beat up Steven Weed. Catholic high school teacher. And dragged Patty Hearst out of her apartment to their car. Where they shot off a few shots and drove off into the night with Patty Hearst. Kidnapped his hostage. Yeah, they threw in the trunk bound, and she was gone. And as far as the SLA goes, like you said, they were not very well known at the time. They were pretty new in an era of sort of I'm not going to say they were just American terrorist organizations all over the place in the United States, but it was a time in our country where there were a lot of bombings. A lot, yeah, it said about 1000 a year. That's a lot. Yeah, that's a lot compared to now where we don't have a lot of bombings. And we should thank Julia Layton for helping us put this together, but no one had heard of them much because, like I said, they were new. They formed a couple of months before her abduction, and it wasn't like there were 100 of these people. It kind of varied from depending on, like, I guess, who had the good drugs at the time, but there were never more than a dozen. It seems like it varied between, like seven and twelve right at a time. And their ideology was basically just like anti capitalist. That's kind of just it. It wasn't super inspiring. It wasn't well thought out. It was just, hey, we hate the rich. It was pretty how home? Not very inspiring, and I think that's why they never had that many members. But they were extremely militant, they were very paranoid, and they were willing to carry out violence. Like, they didn't have any qualms with violence. They used to practice with weapons and guns, and they had a lot of guns, a lot of ammunition. They knew how to make bombs. They weren't messing around in that sense. They were just kind of dolards when it came to political ideology. They were just following in everybody else's wake. But interestingly enough, Chuck, the whole Symbienese Liberation Army started out of a prison tutoring program where a bunch of white students from Berkeley went and tutored inmates on things like black history and political science and things like that. And that's where the SLA originally grew from. When one of those inmates, a guy named Donald de Fris, escaped from prison and showed up in San Francisco and said, let's get this thing started. Yeah. They all adopted different names when they joined the SLA. His name was General Field Marshall Sink. Is it mature? And it might be Chinkle. Oh, really? Yeah. Because they were super into Shegovara and the Cuban revolution. So anything that looks even remotely Spanish is probably pronounced like that. Okay, well, I don't know Spanish, so I'm going to pronounce it like, Spike Lee style. Okay. I think that's his sister's name. Is it? Yeah, cinque. I didn't know it. Cinque one of his sisters, I guess. It's great. So, yeah, he was in prison for while he did a bunch of stuff. He was well known to possess homemade bombs. He was arrested for kidnapping, possession of explosives. He was arrested for robbing a bank. And that's finally in 1969, what finally got him into prison. And this pops up sort of throughout the story, but it was way easier to get away with crime back then to escape from prison and then just say, I live in San Francisco and start a radical organization and kind of not get caught. Right. And that's what he did. And he ended up engineering the murder of a man named Marcus Foster. He was superintendent of the Oakland school system. And he didn't actually carry out the murder, but two SLA members shot him in one of their signature moves that would turn out to be cyanide tipped bullets, which I didn't look into that. I don't even know if that's a thing. If that helps kill somebody. I think it's overkill. Is what, like literal overkill or maybe just they thought it sounded intimidating or something to put in letters? I think. So they definitely did that. But they shot Foster to draw attention to something they saw, which was anti black schooling policies. Foster was a black man, one of the cruel ironies there. Well, not only that, he was also a respected black community organizer. And when they killed him, everybody else on the left in Berkeley was like, what are you doing? Are you guys morons? And the SLA was like, yeah, they were kind of morons. Yeah, they were a little bit more on as far as domestic terrorist groups go. So when the shooters were actually in prison, when they got Patty Hearst, and the first thought from the cops and the Feds was, here's what's going to happen is they kidnapped this rich girl and they're going to try to exchange giving her back to get these two guys out of prison. Right? But they're like, no, not exactly. We're actually going to keep her. No, but even before they had a chance to ask, and I guess they never did bring it up, ronald Reagan, who was governor at the time, said, no, we're not doing that. But they didn't go that way. Instead they said, hey, Willie Hurst. No, sorry, Randy Hurst. Willy randy was dead by this time. Randy Hearst. You're super rich. We want you to take some of those riches and we want you to feed the poor with it. That was their first demand. And they sent this demand first of all, they sent a communicate to a radio station in San Francisco. And I think that's who they basically corresponded with the public and the police through was this radio station. And they would send letters, and they would eventually send, like, voice recordings as well. But in this first one, they sent what was basically an arrest warrant for petty hurst patricia Campbell Hearst, daughter of Randolph, a. Hearst corporate enemy of the people, and they sent her credit card as proof that they had her, which, if you ask me, shows their hand right off the bat. They didn't send a finger. They didn't even send, like, a lock of hair. They sent a credit card that you could pick up off the ground. They could have just taken it off of her nightstand. They didn't send anything vicious. They just sent a credit card to prove that they had her, but they didn't make any ransom demand. And then six days later, after that, first communicate with the arrest warrant. That's when they said, the Hearst need to figure out how to feed any single person in California that can prove that they are not beneficiaries of the corporate capitalist state with at least $70 worth of high quality food per person. Yeah. And they were like, we're going to get it together and what not. We, but you need to arrange it through the grocery stores in California to distribute this stuff. They included an audio tape from Patty where she says, mom, dad, I'm okay. I'm with a combat unit with automatic weapons. And these people aren't just a bunch of nuts or morons like Josh and chuck will say in the future, I want to get out of here, but the only way I'm going to do it is if we do it their way. And I just hope that you'll do what they say, dad, and do it quickly. And Randy Hearst got this, and he was like, these people are morons. How do they expect me to give everyone in California that proves their in need $70 worth of high quality food? What is high quality food anyway? And they're like, that's what you need every day, sir. He's like, no, that's actually pretty good. Okay, I got you. And so he said, I don't even think I can pull this off, which followed another back and forth in which Patty said, hey, stop acting like I'm dead. He needs a good faith gesture from you. And so just a few days after that, the hearst foundation formed. I guess they looked, in probably the best way to get a tax benefit out of this informed an actual program called people in need, which would feed 100,000 people for a year $2 million worth of food, which sounds fairly high quality to me. Yes. And apparently they had a rough start at first because they didn't know what they were doing. There were food riots at the distribution site, and they finally managed to get it figured out. So in that sense and it's kind of overlooked, I think, in a lot of histories, because everything they did after that was just so stupid and terrible. But the SLA had a genuine impact right out of the gate that they use their hostage for, which was to feed poor and hungry people. So clearly they were at least partially dead. Dedicated to that. Is it Matume Donald de Frise, the Field Marshall, general Field Marshall, he had said in a statement, he said, mr. And Mrs. Hearst, I have no qualms about executing your daughter if it will save the lives of any starving poor people. So that was like a really big initial thing. Yeah. I was kind of surprised that they formed this program, People in need, which obviously was going to take a lot of work to make them sort of a legit charity. And they were like, just for one year, though after that, I'm surprised they didn't say, well, maybe this is worthwhile. I didn't get the impression they were those types. Well, it probably wasn't a great look to be inspired by these terrorists. That's true. That's true, too. But I just find it significant that was their first demand, was that and then it actually had a real effect. Yeah. They asked for more money, though. I think they said 2 million is not enough. Right. We want 8 million total. And the Hearst Randy said, no go. You got to release Patty Hearst if you want that extra six mil. Yeah. So this. I think. Is another kind of overlooked thing that when you look at what the process of changing her mind that Patty Hearst eventually is said to have gone through. I think that this is really where the seed started. Because she said later on that she felt like her parents were trying to they were debating how much I was worth. And they were focusing on dollars and cents in the balance of her daughter's life. And like she had said before, stop acting like I'm dead. She apparently felt very, if not left behind, definitely gambled with. Her life was gambled with by her parents, who were basically publicly negotiating the cost down for the release of their daughter. And I think that really may have set up a 19 year old to be more open to whatever the opposite of their parents thought processes and ideology might be. Yeah. There's another really good movie about the J. Paul Getty kidnapping called All The Money in the World, directed by Ridley Scott. And that's sort of one of the threads in that movie, is the granddad trying to negotiate down this money like somebody that's like, one of the richest human beings on the planet, trying to bargain with the life of a family member. Like, no genie, no money. Really interesting. Yeah. Nice. Fargo rough, by the way. Thank you. Should we take a break? Yeah, sure, why not? All right, we'll take a break, and we're going to come back right, for this and talk about what happens on April 3. So. Chuck. You mentioned April 3. And here is about the time when things really start to turn as far as the public's perception of what exactly is going on. Because 59 days earlier. Patty Hearst. Poor little Patty Hearst. Never harmed a flee. Just wanted to study art history and be super amazingly rich. Was abducted from her house and then forced into the public spotlight as a hostage who was used to negotiate between the SLA and her parents. The Hearst. But then that changed on April 3. Yeah. She sent another tape that said, I have been given the choice of, one, being released in a safe area, or two, joining the forces of the Symbionse liberation army and fighting for my freedom and the freedom of all oppressed people. I have chosen to stay and fight. And then she revealed that she had taken on an SLA name tania. Or is it Tania? I think I don't know. Let's go, Tanya. Okay. Tania. Tania. And they sent a little visual aid, too, and this became very famous picture. One of the most famous pictures of the 1970s was this photo, this Polaroid of Patty. We've all seen it holding that machine gun, wearing the beret in front of the SLA flag in their emblem, which was a seven headed cobra. Very famous picture. Extremely famous. And that beret was significant in that she adopted the nom de guerre Tanya from another woman who adopted the nom de gear of Tanya back in the 60s, about a decade earlier when she was fighting alongside Shea Gavara and Bolivia. Her name was Tamara Bunke, I believe she was Argentinian, and she was a revolutionary. And I guess Patty Hearst admired her and adopted that name. But imagine, put it yourself in the position of just the average public person in the public who's following this story. It's like poor little Patty Hearst. Poor little Patty hearse. And then, oh, my God, what is this? There's a picture of Patty Hearst looking like a total BA holding a machine gun and a beret. Yeah, a total BA baracus. Yeah. And they said that they would let me go and I could go free or I could stay and fight, and I'm choosing to fight. And not only that, I have a new name of war. Yeah, I think this started a lot of confusion. I don't think it was immediately everyone was like, oh, my God, the future Paris Hilton of our times is now radicalized and wants to kill people. That's true. I think it just really confused a lot of people that are like, wait a minute, what's going on here? Yeah, I thought she was kidnapped. And now she says she's not. And it really gripped the nation. I mean, obviously, I was just a wee toddler when this is going on, but I remember when I was a little kid, this sort of still reverberating in the public sphere a little bit. I remember hearing the name Patty Hearst when I was, like, six or seven. Well, she came out with their memoirs when you were probably ten, so I'm sure that that really brought her to your attention as well. We read that in, whatever, fifth grade, right? Yeah, you're right. That wasn't necessarily a turning point, because a picture like that, if you're somebody's hostage, your captors can dress you up however they want and take a picture of you and put it out there. It was still shocking, but it was confusing, like you said, too, and then people generally knew, like, if somebody had a gun to your head, you could say, like, yeah, I'm going to stay and fight, and here's my new name. The turning point. The real turning point. That came about two weeks after that, almost two weeks after that, and that is when Tanya made her real world debut. And at this point, there was very little question about whether she was actually involved in the SLA or just a hostage. In a lot of people's mind, this is where that turning point came. Yeah. So the Hyatt Bernia bank in San Francisco was robbed by the SLA, including Tanya, and they shot two people. Like we said earlier, it wasn't one of these things where they were just espousing radicalism and threatening violence. They killed people. They didn't kill these two people, but they did shoot them. They made off with about ten grand to help fund their group. On the surveillance footage, you see Patty right there pointing an assault rifle machine gun and screaming at people to get down on the floor announcing her, I am Tanya. And the footage played on the news, and this is when you said everyone was like, man, this is getting really interesting. I think the FBI wasn't fully convinced she still wasn't being forced to do this, though, because it's not like they didn't issue a warrant for her arrest for robbing a bank. Right. She was wanted as a material witness at this point. Still? Yeah, still. I mean, don't forget, she's white and she's rich, so you can't just go around saying that she's a bank robber just because she robbed a bank in plain view of everybody on security footage that's on TV. So she's a material witness. Another tape comes along, and this time she called her family the pig Hearst, and she said this was sort of the idea, like, has she been brain lost or not? And she said in no uncertain terms, as for being brainwashed, the idea is ridiculous beyond belief. I'm a soldier in the people's army. This is one of those things where people are like, if you had a time machine, what's something you would do? I would go back to the beginning of 1975 so that I could watch the whole thing unfold in real time, like on the nightly news and in the newspaper. It must have just been totally mind blowing because everything I have ever known about Patty hearse was all in retrospect. And I knew the whole story from beginning to end, all at once. To watch the Sunfold must have just been just nuts. You wouldn't go back and kill Hitler and his cradle. Fine. No, I just want to see what happens with Patty Herb. I want to sit on the couch in 1975 75. Well, I'd be a Woodstock. So what can I say? Okay? We could kill Hitler, too. That's fine. All right. Can we do that first and then go watch the petty hearse thing and go to Woodstock? Well, I think the order of operation is we kill Hitler, we go to Woodstock together. We avoid the purple acid. It's brown acid. Brown acid. And then we wind up in 1975 eating TV dinners, watching this on TV. Okay, that sounds pretty nice, actually. So Patty, her sister recap, has said that she is a member of the SLA by choice, that she has a new war name, that she is not brainwashed. And now she's been out in public, on video, caught on camera, holding a machine gun during a bank robbery, shouting at people to get on the floor. And witnesses are saying, like she shouted, I am Tanya. And apparently on her way out of the bank, she dropped the clip out of her submachine gun and m one carbine submachine gun, like an assault rifle, and the clip dropped out and it fell to the floor and two bullets were knocked out of the clip. She stopped and picked them up, put them back in the clip, and then jammed the clip back in her machine gun and strutted out the door. From witnesses accounts, she sounds like she was not some meek, timid thing who was taking orders that she seemed to be like a warrior princess. Yeah. And you got to go back in time to when we did a great episode on brainwashing. I encourage you to go back and listen to that. But briefly, we should just say that in 1974, stockholm syndrome and brainwashing, this stuff wasn't as part of just regular conversation like it is today. No, the bank that created the Stockholm syndrome idea had just taken place like a year or less before this. Yeah. So if someone would have said Stockholm syndrome on the news yeah. People might not know what they were talking about it. So it would have been not out of the realm for people to not even understand that someone could be brainwashed like this as far as just an average American goes. Yeah, but at the same time, there had been a real newsworthy and celebrated case of POWs taken in the Korean war 20 years before this that had said they signed confessions that they'd engaged in germ warfare when they hadn't. There was evidence that they colluded with the enemy. Some of them 21 Air Force officers that had been captured refused to return home when they had the ability to be returned home. And so the idea of brainwashing was out there, but it was nothing like our conception of it now. And it was still very much in the beginnings of being studied and understood. Yeah. So 1974, May 16 is when things really change. And this was the incident I don't know if you were referring to, but this is the one that really made me go, okay, I'm really not so sure about this being brainwashed or trying to save her own bacon thing. Right. It was Patty and then Bill and Emily Harris, a couple of other SLA members, went to bill and Emily went to a sporting goods store for some supplies. Bill shoplifted. Bullets got caught and then tried to bolt out of there, and an employee tackled them as he was leaving. They got Emily and captured her. And then Patti's across the street sort of waiting in the getaway car. She jumps out, she points that submachine gun at the store and empties the clip and then gets another rifle and keeps shooting. Fires about 30 shots total on a public street into a store, by the grace of God. Didn't hit anybody, which is just yeah, that's the most remarkable part of this whole thing. And the Harris got out of there. I mean, it worked. They got out of there, jumped in the van, and they all got away. And this is the point, and this is the one that would really haunt her in court later on, which we'll get to, but it's really hard to believe she could have left. She was out there by herself once the s went down. She could have left. But no, she jumped out and she fired 30 shots trying to help them get out of there. She was left alone in the van with the keys, reading a newspaper while they were there. And you don't even have to be a hostage. You could just be an accomplice. And there's a good chance that if somebody's getting busted inside, you might just drive off and save your own bacon, like you said. Such a great term. But, yeah, she did the opposite. She went and fought to free her comrades. That's definitely one of the things that basically anybody else familiar with the case points to, is like, this makes basically everything else questionable. Yeah. This is just not nice. So here's the thing. That was, I think, May 16, you said. Yeah. So Patty's been kidnapped for just a few months, from February 4 to May 16, and she's already engaged in a bank robbery and shot up in a Los Angeles street in storefront. And just the very next day, the SLA is all over the news like the cops are looking for them. They started out in Berkeley and they moved. Their way down to La at some point. But they are, again, moronic in a lot of their actions and a lot of their judgment is just really insensible. But one of the things they did was they, I guess, identified somebody's house in Compton. I don't know if somebody knew them or not or if it just looked like a good place to hide out in South Central Los Angeles. And they said, hey, can we give you a think? This is just some middle aged woman who is running a house. If we give you $100, can we all stay here? And she said, okay. I said, Great, let's go get all of our guns, like several dozen guns, 6000 rounds of ammunition, a few bombs and move them in. And that lady started to get freaked out and apparently her daughter went and flagged down a traffic cop and said, hey, are you looking for a bunch of white people who have a bunch of guns that seem to be hiding out? And that led to this convergence of the LAPD on this house in Compton and a firefight, a shoot out with most of the members of the SLA in this house. Yeah. So there is a firefight that goes down, they lobs and tear gas in there that starts a fire and it burns the house to the ground and kills all six of the SLA members inside. Right. Patty and the Harris's are not there. They were on the Lamb at this point, waiting it out in a hotel room after the shoplifting thing. And then three weeks after this, the few remaining, I mean, you got to think if they killed six, there were another three hiding out and there were never more than twelve. There could only be just a few more remaining. But the remaining members released another message that Patty had a real hard time with at the trial, explaining it away because she was clearly upset about these deaths. She talked about the fascist pig media and her brothers and sisters dying. And then talked about member Willie Wolf in particular as the gentlest, most beautiful man I've ever known. And said that neither she nor Wolf had ever loved an individual the way we loved each other. I read an interview with Willy Wolfe's father, who is a doctor back east. Willy Wolfe has just raised this upper middle class son of a doctor, pretty privileged, but also not spoiled, Brady, that kind of thing. I love the outdoors. And apparently his father still was just like, I don't get it at all. Like that guy. He really was just super gentle and sweet and kind and not very political. But something happened to him out in Berkeley and he became extremely concerned. I think a natural propensity toward caring about what happened to other people became radicalized by the SLA. He was a founding member of the SLA. It sound like he was some lamb led to the slaughter. One of the guys who founded the SLA with Donald de Frizz and I think the couple that were shoplifting the Harris's, but his father really struggled to explain it. But what was remarkable to me about the interview is his father wasn't over explaining. It wasn't like, me thinks he does protest too much, kind of thing. He just seemed genuinely baffled and he just didn't understand it. And I was reading an article in the La times on the 20th anniversary of that shootout in Compton. And the owner of the house that had been burned down that the SLA was in. He said that every year. Willie Wolfe's mother would come on the anniversary of her son's death and leave this wreath on a palm tree at the vacant lot where the burned out house had been and would just stand there in silence for hours. Just once a year. And said she was the only person who ever came. Wow. Yeah. Very sad. And I'm sure the parents of these kids were just sort of like being the parents of one of the Manson family or something, right? Yeah. And here's the other thing, too. This is a really complicated thing. Like Donald de Fresh, he was an escaped convict from prison. But I also read that his stepfather, on three different occasions, broke both of his arms to punish him. And then Willie Wolf was accused of raping Patty Hearst, too. So just how gentle and sweet could he be? It's a really murky, messy case, and appropriately so, because even still today, in 2020, we're trying to suss out exactly what happened with Patty Hurst in her mind back in 1974. Yeah. It's hard to figure out, and I think that's what makes this such an enduring case. Yeah. So that Eulogy tape was released while she was on the run with the Harris's, and they stayed on the run, driving across the country, sort of badland style. I don't think they were killing people. They were committing crimes. They were stealing stuff. And they did this for 18 months, which is another example of, like it was just a lot easier to get away with crimes back then before there were cameras everywhere and obviously camera phones everywhere and the Internet. They remained on the Lamb for 18 months. About a year into that, they robbed another bank in San Francisco and actually killed a customer in the process. Merna Oaksall. Yeah. And this would come up later at the trial. Patty Hearst was not the trigger person, but she was involved. She was one of the three, and the person lost their life. It's very sad. Yeah. She was apparently a church lady who was there depositing, like, that week's collection into the bank, the church's bank account, and she was in the wrong place at the wrong time and apparently made a fast move because she was freaked out and got shot and died pretty quickly, from what I understand. All right, should we take another break? Yeah, sure. All right, this is our last break, and then we'll talk about the arrest and the trial of Patty Hearst right after this. All right. So she gets arrested, and this is where things get really weird, because you've got two stories playing out in court. One is that I'm Patty Hearst and I was Brainwashed. I was kept in a closet for 57 days when they abducted me. I was blindfolded and bound. I was raped by Donald de Frase and Willie Wolfe. I was abused and lectured about how righteous they were. And then after 57 days, I was told, hey, you can either join up with us or we can kill you. And she said, I joined up. So story number one is that story number two is the other yeah. Story number two is we have video evidence of you robbing a bank. Witnesses say that you're involved in another bank robbery or a woman was killed. We have you on tape talking about how you're not brainwashed and how you joined this by your own free will and your parents are pigs. So it was a pretty airtight case as far as the prosecution goes, were it not, for one thing. And that is that she was initially kidnapped. She didn't run off and do this. She didn't get bored and go to a community center and end up falling in with the SLA like she was kidnapped. And our understanding of psychology was still kind of gelling around the idea of brainwashing, but it wasn't just completely unheard of. The thing is, it had never been tried in a criminal case before. And Hearst hired very famous I think already he was a very famous attorney, eflee bailey, who defended the Boston strangler, who's also an OJ's team. He was just a super famous lawyer, and he tried it. And I think in retrospect, that's the only thing he possibly could have tried was to say she was brainwashed, like you said. Yes. And they had psychiatrists that came in to back that up and say, this is very possible. That brought up the stuff about the POWs. They had multiple psychiatrists come in and kind of take their side. And then as far as the tapes go, patty said, you know what? Those were scripted. And I had no choice. I had to read them as they said. And if you think they're believable, it's because I believe that my life depended on how well of a job I did reading these things right. And those tapes were I mean, that was the big evidence in the trial, was how passionate she was and how she talked about her love of Willie Wolf and other psychiatrists for the prosecution came in and they were like, you know what? I've listened to these things over and over, and I don't know an actress on earth who could pull this off if she was reading scripted stuff. It surely doesn't sound that way to me. Right. And she literally did not help her case. When she was arrested. She put down as her occupation urban gorilla. She was, like, throwing, like, fight the power fists. Anytime somebody took a picture of her, she was very much like, not the oh, my God, I'm glad to be freed kind of thing that you would expect. And I think that the public wanted to see. And then also when she took the stand I can't believe I can't believe she did. I cannot believe it either. But she took the stand on cross examination, she played the Fifth 42 times. Yes. The public does not really trust people who plead the Fifth, especially 42 times, especially if they're supposed to be a kidnap victim. So there was a lot that the prosecution had going for them in that sense. And then the defense basically had brainwashed. She's brainwashed. One of the things they said was, like, she was raped. She was raped by these men. So of course she feared them. They threatened her life. Of course she feared them. And apparently, I guess the prosecution got her to say that, no, she didn't love Willie Wolf, by the way. She never saw Steven Wheat again, as far as I could tell. She didn't want to see him. She didn't get back together with him, and I don't think they ever saw each other again, even though he was speaking to the press the whole time and being very supportive. But she was like, Now I'm moving on. But the prosecution got her to say, you said you love Willie Wolf. Did you love him? She said no. I hated him. And then they produced this thing that is another mark that really stands against her in the mind of a lot of people with this little statue that she had gotten from Willy Wolf. Right? Yeah. They pulled us out, and they're like, Then what is this? Is this not, in fact, a gift from your supposed captor and supposed rapist, Willy Wolf? Why would you keep this gift still in? Her reply was the opposite of my famous saying. She said I like art. Yes. Instead of I hate Art. Yeah. And she said, I'm an art history student, and I like art. And if you're trying to move the needle for a jury, that's not the way to do it. Well, one of the women jurors on the case said no woman would carry around a love trinket from a man who raped her. And that that really ruined her credibility. At the same time, though, Jeffrey Tubin, who wrote a book on this American Heiress yes, but he still had a legitimate book, despite what he's done since then. I know. Sorry not to I know he made a really good point, though, that I think it is worth repeating here, and that is that regardless of maybe how she ended up feeling about Willy Wolf or anybody that were her captors. She was kept in a closet for 57 days, and anyone who had sex with her in that closet raped her. That there's no chance for that to have been consensual, no matter how she behaved during that was rape, and then she was raped, and that shouldn't be brushed aside, no matter how she came to feel about Willy Wolf. And I think that's definitely a good point to remember. Yeah. I mean, if that entire story is true about being kept in the closet and most of this testimony comes from her, and there are still people that think she cooked up this entire thing, and you know what? She just wanted to get out of her engagement to Steve Weed to begin with, and that's why she was right there. That's such a conspiracy theory. Are people saying that? I'm sure they are, but really you came. Okay. No, I was literally making a joke. If you see those, like, footage of Steve Lee, he's the kind that somebody would do that to get out of a nice guy. It'll only take a few years. Right? One person has to die. I'm sorry, but oh, boy. So she on March 20, 1970, 622 years old, by the way. I don't think that has really may have hit home to our listeners. She's still just a kid. She was sentenced to seven years in prison for robbing that bank. She served 22 months of that near San Francisco at Pleasant, in prison. And you mentioned Jimmy Carter earlier, and we put a pin in that. And I'm sure people are like, what does Jimmy Carter have to do with any of this? He commuted her sentence. It was very controversial at the time. He said that he fully believed her, that she was a victim and would not have done any of this had she not been brainwashed and kidnapped and brainwashed. And they said, what about Stevie Weed? And he was like, I don't know who that is. And he was just a big supporter of her. And he eventually actually helped persuade Bill Clinton to pardon her in 2001. He did. He commuted her sentence. So she was let out after 22 months. But it was Clinton who pardoned her. And I said earlier that, you know, Carter, I think, had the most sensible opinion of the whole thing, and it was simply that had she not been kidnapped by the SLA and forced into a life of crime, basically, she otherwise would never have engaged in any of those criminal acts. Like, her life was not in any way, shape or form on a trajectory to robbing banks. She was just going to end up being kind of a rich art history person. Yeah. She's going to collect and buy expensive art, probably. Yeah. Basically, that was going to be your contribution to the world. Have some kids and be very wealthy. She was not going to go rob banks, and the SLA forced her to do that, forced her into that life, even if they didn't force her to rob banks. The thing is, though, is that still leaves dangling there's a big blank space after that sentence, but she still robbed the banks, and it does seem like she did it from her own volition. And, I mean, anybody who was 19 can imagine what it must have been like to be a 19 or early 20 year old shooting up a storefront to free a couple of friends. As reckless, as dangerous, as murderous, as unjustifiable and indefensible as that is, it also must have been probably the most thrilling moment of Patty Hearst's entire life to this day. Well, of course it was, because, shockingly, she led a pretty low key life. For many years after this. She got out of prison. She married a former cop. His name was Bernard Shaw. Not the composer, but he was her bodyguard. He was moonlighting when she was out on bail as a bodyguard, had a couple of kids, raised their kids in Connecticut, and lived a really quiet life until 1981. A couple of years after that, she published her memoir, Like You said, which we read in our fifth grade reading class, mrs. Shaw every Secret Thing. And then she kind of was very public. But she was public in the way that I'm not saying she should have shame, but shamelessly public. Going on TV shows, plugging her book, talking about her memoirs, talking about what happened, buddying up with maybe the weirdest thing in this whole story. Buddying up with John Waters and starring in four of his movies, including Crybaby. Yeah, I mean, she was in a bunch of them. She was a serial mom. Yeah. I remember when I saw her in these movies thinking, is that Patty Hearst? Patty Hearst. And it totally was. I think this was before the Internet. When I saw these I read a newspaper article or something confirming that. I was like, all right, I guess that's what she's doing now. Were you in a van waiting for your accomplices while you read that newspaper article called no. It was a very strange time, though. And then there were a couple of more cases. In the late ninety s, the FBI captured this woman. She was a SLA fugitive named Kathleen Solia. She was living she managed to get out and live a very quiet life as Sarah Jane Olson. She's basically like Homer Simpsons. Mom. Yeah. Also a wife and mother in Connecticut, and she was arrested for a car bombing carried out in 75. Actually, I think the weirdest part of this story is that her daughter ended up being a contestant on American Idol. Is that right? Yes. That's a little weird. I don't know if that's starring in John Waters movies level weird, but it's definitely that's a great little land. Yeah, it's a nice little tidbit. Her daughters, though, when they were questioned about this, were like, this is Berkeley in the 70s. Everybody was blowing stuff up. That was kind of their attitude. That was interesting. It is interesting. I've got a little detail I turned up that I hadn't seen anywhere else, but it was from the recollections of one of the FBI agents who arrested Patty Hearst finally, and they said, Get this, man. She was on the run with another SLA member, Wendy Yoshimura. And when the agents came up these backstairs to this house where she and Wendy were hiding out, they were sitting at the kitchen table and agents came in with their guns drawn, and Wendy Yoshimura had both hands on the table and did everything those FBI agents said. Patty Hearst jumped up and ran to the front room, and apparently the FBI agents said, get back here, we're going to shoot Wendy, or something like that. They said that they couldn't guarantee Wendy's safety unless Patty came back. So Paddy reluctantly came back into the kitchen where she was arrested. But when they went back and searched the house in the front room, they found her M, one carbine and a twelve gauge shotgun. Wow. Which really it's very difficult not to imagine that she was jumping up to go get her gun to engage in a gun battle. Interesting. That's nuts, man. Wow. Well, Salia gets found out as Sarah Janelson. Like I said, that trial and then another one. Remember that bank robbery that we mentioned earlier when they were on the Lamb? That comes back to haunt her as well. And there are these two kind of trials popping up where she has immunity. If she's going to come in and testify and say who the shooter was, she was going to say it was Emily Harris. She was all prepared to testify against them, and everyone ended up pleading guilty and so she didn't have to go to court again. And she kind of just went back to her life as Patty Hearst, the mom in Connecticut. That's right. Very interesting story. And like we said, we look back now and I don't think anyone has the clearest picture still of exactly what happened. My guess is it might have been a little bit of both. Yeah. I think there was an initial brainwashing hostage thing, but William Harris later said, we inadvertently kidnapped a revolutionary freak. Like she was just she had a real propensity for it. Yeah. And they were astounded by how eagerly she took it on. Well, you got to remember, too, this is a 19 year old coming off the heels of being a middle schooler in the late 60s when all of that's going on, and that was in the public sphere in her whole life growing up really this radical, revolutionary kind of thing, growing up in Northern California, near San Francisco. So, yes, she may have been like, hey, this is my chance. Yeah. And she took it well. That's Patty Hearst, everybody. If you want to know more about it, there's a lot of ink that's been spilled on her story. And just go down that rabbit hole as deep as you like. And since I said that, it's time for listener. Ma'am. I'm curious to reread her memoir. I don't remember. Years, right? Yeah, it's been many years. Let me see here. I'm going to call this Bavarian Beavers. Hey, guys. I want to take the opportunity to talk about your recent show in Beavers to tell you what I have been doing for a few years now. Between finishing school and starting university, I did nine months of civil service in my regional environmental authority. My main focus, besides cleaning up local forest, was taking care of beavers. I basically had to maintain live traps and had to perform sabotage on dams of beavers, which flooded fields of local farmers. I did so on a daily basis since overnight the dams were of course restored by their respective constructors. This was done in order to softly force the beavers to find a new place to live, which mostly worked after a few months. Also, two beavers were caught alive during my period of service and were moved to the UK, as far as I know, in order to reintroduce them there. As far as I know, they went to go live on a farm in England. I learned a lot about these animals during this time and I was stoked when I saw this episode title pop up. As usual, he did a great job gathering and summarizing all the facts and interesting. Good to know. Including the weird classification as fish for religious reasons. Keep up the great work. This is from Bavaria, Germany. And that is from Nico. Thanks, Nico. Nico says Chuck. Hats off to you and your German skills. So Niko is being very kind. Yeah. What about me, Nico? What about Josh? Well, you own Japanese and Spanish. All right. But Nico didn't say anything about it. No, she did. That was the PSS. Okay, good. There you go. So thanks a lot, Nico, for complimenting both of us. I appreciate you finally getting to it. And if you want to be like Nico and compliment both of us, we love that kind of thing. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast at iheart heartradio.com. Stuff you should know is production of iHeartRadio's how stuff works. For more podcasts My Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite show."
https://podcasts.howstuf…-oxide-final.mp3	How Nitrous Oxide Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-nitrous-oxide-works	For about 175 years people have been huffing nitrous oxide for everything from vision quests to anesthetic to get plain old high. And after all that time we are only now beginning to understand how it works on our brains.	For about 175 years people have been huffing nitrous oxide for everything from vision quests to anesthetic to get plain old high. And after all that time we are only now beginning to understand how it works on our brains.	Thu, 18 Feb 2016 16:42:55 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2016, tm_mon=2, tm_mday=18, tm_hour=16, tm_min=42, tm_sec=55, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=49, tm_isdst=0)	51144904	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. Wan, wan, wan. There's charles W. Chuck Frank. Wan. There's Jerry. And this is stuff you should know. The podcast. I'm giggling like a schoolgirl. You're making I think I just topped you, schoolgirl. Echoey reverbi sound. So this could only be about one thing. Nitrous oxide. That's right. N 20. That's right. Hippie Crack, the Bitter Mistress Whippets Jazz Juice yeah, why not? Yeah, I mean, those are the street names that has medical applications. Some of those are made up. Yeah. We're going to cover the whole gamut here. Yeah. Medical use and recreational use dangers. Yeah. We're going to do an episode on nitrous oxide. That's right. So, Chuck, we should probably start not at the beginning, but not at the end, somewhere in the middle, because the history of nitrous oxide is extraordinarily interesting. Just the history. Yeah. We're going to tell it out of order. Like Pulp Fiction. That's right. See if you can recognize characters from other movies, like Vincent Vegas Brother. Yes. Michael Madsen was Vincent Vegas brother. Did you know that? Yeah. Oh, you knew that. I did. Well, I don't think that's not the most heavily guarded secret. Did you notice that Red Apple cigarettes make an appearance in more than just pulled faces? Yeah. All right, I'm done. Did you notice that Quentin Tarantino likes to write 275 page scripts? Yeah, but that's nothing compared to the 580 page tome that Humphrey Davy wrote on nitrous oxide. Very nice little segue. All right, so we're not even talking about Humphrey Davy yet. He's at the beginning. He's not even at the beginning, but he's toward the beginning. We're going to talk instead about the sad saga of one Doctor Horace Wells, DDS. Very sad. Yeah. So, Doctor Horace Wells was a dentist in New Haven, Connecticut, I believe, in the 1840s. What is DDS? Is that Dennis dentist c. Is that what that means? That's what I've always assumed it was. And at this point, everyone knows we just make most of the stuff. We stay up. That's right. So you're right, sir. He was a dentist in Hotwood, Connecticut. Oh, it was Hartford. I said New Haven. What's the difference as long as it's in Connecticut? This was in the 1830s. Oh, really? I said 1840s. Oh, man. Really? Yeah. Maybe we should start over. All right. He was a dentist in the 1830s, and he recognized something that all dentists of the day recognize, which is everyone hates your guts because you are causing excruciating amounts of pain on a daily basis to your patients. Yeah. It's like, here's some whiskey, maybe bite on this broomstick. Well, actually, you can't do that because you're doing dentistry. You can't even do that. Yeah. You ever heard the term? It's like pulling teeth? That's where it comes from. Right. Horace Wells, DDS, dentist. Dentist c. He felt pretty bad about this, and so that he went to a traveling exhibition once that came through town, and this was in the 1840s, and it was staged by a man named Gardener Colton. That's a great name. Gardener Quincy Colton. Yeah. He sounds like a rich kid from Texas. Yeah, or like a sideshow showman, which is what he was. Right. And he actually was in medical school for a little while, and while he was in med school, he was introduced to the wonders of huffing nitrous oxide. Yes. And he said, I'm not going to do medical school anymore. I'm just going to drop out and hit the road with a tank. The old hippie crack. Yeah, exactly. And show people what's what. And so at one of these demonstrations in Hartford sometime in the 1840s, he saw Colton give this demo, I guess right afterwards, saw a man run into the stage or fell off the stage and hurt his leg. And Wells went over it's like, Are you okay? And the guys like, what are you talking about? And he said, the bone is sticking out of your leg, sir. And he's like, what's? A bone? No, it wasn't that bad. But he did say, interesting. Yeah. Here's what I'll do. I'll get Colton to come into my office tomorrow, and my buddy colleague John Riggs, I'll get Colton to administer the gas, and I'll get Riggs to pull one of my teeth. And he did so, and he said, I did not feel so much as the prick of a pen. And he said, I think we're on to something here, something called pain free dentistry, aka please stop hating me. Right. And so Wells followed in this really great tradition that really stopped in, I guess, probably about the 20th century, mid to late 20th century, of where if you're a scientist, you were your own first human test subject. I bet people still do that. Yeah. Apparently in Marvel Comics they do. One of the greatest articles I've ever read in any magazine anywhere in all time throughout the universe. In perpetuity is called Blood spore, and it was about the murder of a mycologist, a scientist who studies mushrooms. Wow. And it's really interesting. There's all sorts of weird cold case stuff to it, but there's also, like, an underlying thread where if you're a mycologist and you discover a mushroom, you try it out on yourself. Right. Like, that's just what they do. Still today, I think that you try it on yourself after you fed it to your children, just to see what happens. Maybe your dog first, and then you try it on you. Man, I'll bet those mycologist dogs were bandanas and are super laid back. What's the name of the article? I want to check that out. Blood Spore in Harper's, which means it's behind a paywall, but it's almost worth a year subscription just for that one. Wow. And Harper's archives are definitely full of good articles. Agreed. So Wells was pretty happy because he knew he was onto something there. And he said he performed just dental procedures for the next few weeks and months on dozens of patients, and they were all like, this is great. Works great. Didn't feel a thing, Doc. And he said, I think I'm ready. I want to present this to some Harvard medical students in the establishment. And he got on stage, and he went to pull a tooth, and the guy started screaming. Yeah. So after all of these tests, successful tests, when he finally gets up the gumption to give a successful demonstration, it goes as bad as it could. And it's actually called the Humbug Affair because the medical student shouted, Humbug. And what was the other swindler? Adam? And he's like, no, I'm not. I swear this is for real. I really care about my patience. And the room started spinning, and he fell over, and when he came to, he was on skid row, hooked on chloroform and nitrous oxide. Yeah. He later went on to say that, although let me clarify you technically can't get hooked on nitrous oxide, but he was huffing a lot of nitrous oxide. Right. Well, although Davey well, we'll get to that. That could be a spoiler. He went on to say that he thought that he had probably withdrawn too much too soon from the guy, because as we'll go on to talk about here, in a little bit, when you stop breathing in nitrous, you go back to normal pretty quickly. Very quickly. So he kind of just aired. I don't know. I would have gone a little bit overboard for the demo. Sure. On the safe side, I would have been, like, 99 pal. But yeah. He became, well, like you said, not hooked, but a heavy user of ether and cloriform. Oh, yes, ether. On his 33rd birthday, he was, I think, a waiting arrival of his. He ended up living alone, moved, and was waiting on his wife and kid to come to London. But by this time, he'd sunk into, like, a terrible depression. Right. And he was alone because his family wasn't able to join him yet. And he flipped out on his 33rd birthday, went out on the street and through acid on these two women. Flipped out after going on, like, a chloroform bender. Yeah. And went to prison. And in prison, he kept doing chloroform and ether in prison because I guess he could get it and hit rock bottom and under an ether binge, slashed his femoral artery, and his thigh died. Well, yeah, he talked to the guard into escorting him home to get his shaving kit. And at home, it's like, I need a big razor, I think at home or maybe back, if he's getting chloroform in prison, it could have been there. He huffed a dose of chloroform to anesthetize himself, and then he cut his femoral artery to the end. He was a believer in anesthesia I guess so. However, years later, in 1864, he was recognized by the Ada, the American Dental Association, as a pioneer of using not ether. But what are we talking about in dentistry? N two o. Yeah. And do you know who got him to that point? Well, yeah. Gardner Colton. That's right. He set up practice as a dentist, after all, and it was his successful demonstrations that got the Ada on board. So now we need to go back in time. Yeah, even further back. That's sort of the middle. So we're in the way back machine. I guess we didn't point out we were in there already. I think everyone just assumed. And we go back 70 years previous to Horace Wells, to a guy named Jason Priestley. Yes. Dillon. Sorry. No, Brandon. Joseph Priestley. Oh, that guy. Jason Priestley's dad. Yeah. Or great grandfather. I don't think there was any relation, actually. You don't know. You're right. Joseph Priestley. He was an Englishman, and he began just like Jason Priestley. That's right. And he was an enlightened thinker, and he was a contemporary Ben Franklin, and he was a smart guy on a lot of different subjects. He was a polyglot. Yeah, that's a good word for it. Cool guy. No, I'm sorry. He's a polymath. A polymath. A polyglot is somebody who speaks a bunch of different languages. Polymath is somebody who's in a bunch of different fields. He may well be both. Yeah, probably right now he's an Enlightenment guy for sure. And in the 1770s, he was studying I think we should go back to using only old terminology, because what they called gases back then was the study of the airs, which is great. Totally makes sense. Yeah. Gases. He needs to shoot a duck. And he actually lived next to a brewery, so he had a lot of access to CO2 and very smartly created a device called the Pneumatic trough to isolate gases. Collect and isolate these gases. And he was good at it. Well, a guy named Steven Hales actually created the first pneumatic trough, which is actually pretty simple invention. It's neat, though. Like, you have a tube let's say you have a fire and you want to collect carbon monoxide from it. Yeah. You basically have a tube that collects it the smoke that's coming off of it, and the tube goes into a VAT of water and up into a glass bell jar that's upside down. It's converted so that there's a bong, there's air at the top. I think the principle is similar. The smoke goes into the water and then goes up and is filtered through the water. And what gas you have on the other end is whatever you're looking for. Yeah. Or a bunch of different guesses that you can study in pure form. Simplistically. Beautiful. It is. So Priestly had his own that he made the Pneumatic Trough, and this guy actually isolated eight different gasses, or airs for the first time, which apparently is a record still. Yeah, I don't know what the record is like. Most gas is discovered in a single lifetime. Okay. I guess. All right. That's good. It is. I don't know that there's any more gasses to discover. I wonder. And who studies that kind of thing? What do you call somebody who studies gases? An error. Well, if you do, that right into us, because I want to know all about that and if you guys think there's any gas left to be discovered here on Earth. Agreed. All right, let's take a break before we talk about Humphrey Davy, okay? Because this is where the story gets really good. That was quite a break. Yeah. I can't believe you broke that lamp. I was upset. All right. Humphrey Davy, he worked at a place called the Pneumatic Institute and they use gases for curative therapies. And he got into using them on himself, which, like you said, was sort of the thing to do at the time. You experiment on yourself. Right. Plus the author of this Rolling Stone article from 1975 that I read pointed out yeah, he was also like 20 at the time. So it totally makes sense that he would huff a bunch of nitrous oxide right, and then call it science. Right, but it really was science. So this guy apparently had tried it a few times before. But then his big experiment, his first huge experiment was on Boxing Day of 1799. Right. Which is December 26. It's very important that you remember December 26, 1799. Why is it important? Well, it was Boxing Day, but it was also literally box day because Humphrey David got into a box and had some guy pump in. Was it like 20 quarts? Yeah, he stepped into a seal box and he requested a physician, like a real doctor, to release 20 quarts, cause otherwise it just be crazy. Right. Release 20 quarts of nitrous oxide every five minutes as long as I'm conscious. That must have been the safe word. I'm passed out. And he went for an hour and 15 minutes like that in this box. Not bad. And then he stepped out and apparently grabbed some oil skins, or also called gas bags, and huffed another 20 quartz right afterwards. And they were like, how are you still standing? And he goes, I'm not. I'm flying. He basically did. He had a great disposition to laugh, which eventually is where laughing gas would come from. He talked about shining packets of light and energy. He talked about objects dazzling in their intensity and sounds amplified into a cacophony that echoed through infinite space and losing all connection to external things. It's pretty cool. So there's a really great article on the public domain review and it's called O Excellent gas Bag. Is it gas bag or airbag? Airbag. Airbag. I'm sorry. Which is a quote from a poet that was friends with Humphrey Davy who became the poet Laureate of Great Britain later on, and the author really does a good job of describing what nitrous oxide does to you. Almost suspiciously good. So they say that the first signature was a curiously benign, sweet taste, followed by a general pressure in the head as he continued to inhale. Within 30 seconds, the sensation of soft, probing pressure had extended to his chest and the tips of his fingers and toes. This was accompanied by a vibrant burst of pleasure and a gradual change in the world around him. Objects became brighter and clearer, and the space in the cramp box seemed to expand and take on unfamiliar dimensions. Now, under the influence of the largest dose of nitrous oxide anyone had ever taken, these effects were intensified to levels he could not have imagined. So keep going. Sure. Do you want to take over? No, go ahead. I think it's better when we break it down. Well, I'm going to read the southeast part. Okay. His hearing became fantastically acute, allowing him to distinguish every sound in the room, and seemingly from far beyond, a vast, distant wang wan. Wan wang. Perhaps the vibration of the universe itself. In his field of vision, the objects around him were teasing themselves apart into shining packets of light and energy. He was rising effortlessly in a new world whose existence he had never suspected. Somehow, the whole experience was irresistibly funny. So Robert Southey, his buddy you mentioned, the future poet laureate. Right. He brought him in afterward. He was like, I got to get some more people in on this. Fantastic. Right. I got to share this. Yeah, that's what you do. So he brought in Southie, got him high, and he wrote his brother Tom a letter that said, oh, Tom. Exclamation point. Such a gas as David discovered the gaseous Oxido, tom, again, exclamation point. I have had some. It made me laugh and singling in every toe and fingertip. Davy has actually invented a new pleasure for which language has no name. Oh, Tom. I am going for more this evening. It makes one strong and so happy, so gloriously happy. Oh, excellent airbag. Exclamation point. Pretty great stuff. No wonder he was the poet Laurie. So, in summer of 1799, after they closed the shop down the Pneumatic Institution, during the day, he would invite surgeons and playwrights and poets and chemists and anyone who is interested who we could get the word to, to come in there and huff nitrous. I was about to say under the guise of experimentation, but it really was because he learned that he was really finding that it was a language experiment, because no one could accurately describe what they were feeling with English words. Right, exactly. He found that very strange and insignificant, that people would just come out and just couldn't put it into words, their experience. Sure. It was a brand new sensation. There was one guy, James Thompson, said, we must either invent new terms to express these new and peculiar sensations or attach new ideas to old ones before we can communicate intelligently with each other. On the operation of this extraordinary gas. I think Samuel Taylor Collaridge, the great poet, put it best. He put it really succinctly. He basically said that it was like coming in from the snow into a warm room. Yeah. So what happened was he did these experiments with these people. They eventually got kind of tired of it. He experimented on himself, like not even in the room. He just would fill up a big balloon right. Or not a balloon, but a silk bag and just walk around England huffing. Right. And he found himself getting psychologically hooked, at least. Yeah. Because he said he confessed that the desire to breathe the gas is awakened in me by the sight of a person breathing. So he would just see someone walking and breathing and think, oh, man, I wish I had some gas. That's why they call it hippie crack. Yes, exactly. Sure. So everyone else fell away. He was only experimenting with himself for a little while. Then he brings in coleridge and they really buddied up. And I think they were just kind of saw eye to eye on the gas. Right. Neither of them wanted to cease using it. So again, though, you have to point out all this time, while he's just huffing nitrous basically constantly, humphrey Davy is still remaining a man of science. Right? Sure. So remember December 26, 1799 was the day that the Boxing Day experiment took place, right? Yeah. By Easter, just a few months later, he'd written a 580 page scientific treatise on nitrous oxide and its effects on humans and animals. Should I read the title? Yeah. Researches Chemical and Philosophical, chiefly concerning nitrous oxide or man what is that word? Deflogisticated nitrous air and it's respiration. Nice was the name of it. Yes. So in that book, he mentioned something kind of, I guess, offhandedly. He says that as nitrous oxide appears capable of destroying physical pain, it may probably be used with advantage during surgical operations in which no great effusion of blood takes place. Yeah. So not like open heart surgery, but maybe if you're going to set someone's broken arm. Right. So he says this, but it's another 40 years before Horace Wells starts trying to use nitrous oxide as an anesthetic. Up to that point, it's basically just a high society drug that people have, like, nitrous parties with. That was the fate of nitrous oxide from 1800 to about the 1840s. And then Horace Wells picks it up and it becomes brought into the medical field. Yeah. They finally start using it for its intended well, what would end up being its intended purpose? It's still used today. Right. In fact, nitrous oxide is the number one inhaled anesthetic in the medical profession. Ask for it by name. And here's the deal though. When you get it at the dentist. They can actually vary it, but it never goes more than a 70 30 mix. I saw that, too. This article says it's always a 50 50 mix. That's not right. So it's no more than 70% nitrous. Yeah. Which is very much key, as you'll learn, because one of the big dangers of doing it recreationally is not mixing it with oxygen. Right. If you mix it with oxygen, you're fine. You're totally fine. Right. So it's kind of nuts chuck that with nitrous oxide. We spent at least 150 years and still today we're not a million percent sure, but at least 150 years using it medically without understanding how it worked. Yeah. Like you said, though, it's still a little dicey. It is a little bit dicey. No, it makes you feel good. Right. It does the trick and it kicks in your dopamine and all the pleasure receptors. So it's classified as three things. It's an analgesic, which means that it kills pain. It's an anesthetic, but it's actually not a true anesthetic. And it's anxietytic, which means it diminishes anxiety. And so I found this 2006 paper and it basically says, here's what we think is going on. All right, hit me. So, within anxiety, it triggers the same response in the brain as a benzodiazepine, which is like Valium or Xanax or something like that. So it actually does cut down anxiety, which is why dentists will use it for little kids or patients who are nervous about going to the dentist. Right. Get a little gas, probably not a 70 30 concentration, just a little bit, and it will cut down on your anxiety and you're totally fine, doc, go ahead and do whatever you like. As far as the analysis is concerned, it actually does have a tremendous amount of ability to cut down on pain. And it does so by activating your opioids. Those are released, opioids are produced in the brain, and your opioid receptors are activated as well. And then it also goes to your spinal column and messes with its ability to process pain there, too. And they say that something like just a 30% concentration of nitrous oxide is equal to about ten to 15 milligrams of morphine. Yeah. And that's if it's 50 50 or below with oxygen. It's on the analgesic side. Right. I think up to the 70% is when it is known as an anesthetic. Right. So it's not technically an anesthetic in that if you huff that until you lost consciousness, you're probably in big trouble. You don't want to use nitrous oxide for that. And Nestor know that kind of thing, but it's used usually as an aid to a general anesthetic. Right? Right. And it does have anesthetic properties, but it's a dissociative anesthetic, kind of like ketamine, which means that it goes after your NMDA receptors, which have to do with memory formation and they control, like, neural firing. Right? Yeah. And it has a dissociative effect, which is why when you're on nitrous, you feel like you have left your body, you've gone back in time, you died and are being reborn. Yeah. We'll talk a little bit more about childbirth later, but one of the quotes I saw from a childbirth nurse, they said the mothers who use it during childbirth, sometimes they can still feel pain, they just don't care about it. Which would be the disassociated quality. Exactly. Because you said it was an analgesic. Yeah. Well, I guess maybe childbirth is so painful. Sure. You can't knock it out completely. And also, I mean, like with anesthetics of any kind, or even an aliensix, any person is going to have different reactions, varying reactions to different drugs. Sure. So that's kind of the current state of understanding with what nitrous does to the brain. Right, right. You can also find nitrous elsewhere outside of medical settings, too. Right, yeah, you can find it in a can of Ready Whip. Or a lot of chefs will have their own nitrous canister to put whatever they want in it to be used as a propellant. So it works really well with fatty liquids and heavy creams and things. So what happens is the gas is in there, compressed into a liquid and mixed with the cream. Because it's fat soluble. Yeah. It mixes really well, highly pressurized. But as soon as you open that thing up, it turns back into a gas and expands it like four times. So that's why the whipped cream will come shooting out. What's neat is you could buy Ready Whip 20 years hence after it sat in a garage in Tampa, Florida, say, somewhere hot and muggy. Sure. And you shake it up and pour it out, and that whipped cream will be totally fresh, not the least bit rancid. That's because nitrous oxide totally displaces air and oxygen, so no bacteria can form inside a can of Reddy Whip or any other instant whipped cream. Well, and that displacement of oxygen is also why you can die if you, let's say, put a bag over your head to intensify your high if you're using it recreationally. Well, we'll talk more about that later, right? Yes. Okay. Before we break, though, let's mention cars, because anyone who has ever seen Fasts and Furious or is it Sammy Hagar Solo fan, I Can't Drive 55. That's right. Does he talk about nitrous? No, but it's just assumed that there's nitrous involved. Well, you may have heard or seen on TV or movies about using nitrous in your car, like that little tank. Or you may see one of those cheesy cars in a parking lot with the little tank in there. And basically what it does is cars run, burn hotter, engines burn hotter and go faster with more oxygen. And if you crank in that nitrous oxide, it's just basically going to ramp up the oxygen levels going into the engine. Right. With more oxygen, more gas gets burned, right? More gas gets burned. More horsepower is produced because the gas is expanding. Pump those pitons even harder. Then you're too fast and too furious for the roads. Maybe even doing a little Tokyo drifting. Have you seen those? Any of them? No, but I believe they're the most lucrative movie franchise in the history of all movies. Oh, because I made seven of them. Yeah, but, like, the first one made a billion dollars first week. The last one made, like, a billion dollars. It's crazy how I think I saw the first one. I've never seen any of them, but that's about it's. Just not my bag, if you like that kind of thing. That's great. I've never been a car guy. I like my cars, but I've never been like, oh, man, look at that sports car. Sure. I sure would like to drive fast on that. Yeah. Well, remember when we hosted or judged that Red Bull thing? Oh, yeah. I was talking to young jock, and I was talking to him, and he started talking about cars, and I'm like, wow, we don't have anything in common, do we? Yeah. Josh and I judged the soapbox derby contest sponsored by Red Bull and young jock at Local Atlanta rapper who was super cool. He's a very nice guy, but he was a car dude, and I'm not a car dude. I know you're not a car dude, either. Well, I got my pickup truck. Yeah. I'm like look at those tires. Pretty neat. They really make contact with the asphalt, don't they? All right, well, let's take a break and go learn more about cars, and we'll come back and talk about some of the recreational use and dangers. But we're done talking about cars, right? Yes. By the way, if you want to know about cars, if you're into that kind of thing and you love us and you're not getting your fix from cars from us, go listen to car stuff. You're definitely not getting your fix about cars from us, I can tell you that. You can get it from car stuff. Ben and Scott have it locked down over there. Yeah, I bet you they've covered Nitrous. I'm sure in the automobile, they've covered everything. All right, so recreational use, it has its medical purposes and it's food and auto purposes, but nitrous is very famous for becoming especially at concerts, so they call it hippie crack. In the started being able to buy this stuff, like a big balloon full of it at, like, a concert festival or let's be honest, at a Grateful Dead show. All right, I'll post that Rolling Stone article on the podcast page for this. Really interesting. It is, but it's also what is that? Oh, it's called second hand embarrassment. Like what people get from watching the Jeb Bush campaign. Secondhand embarrassment? Yes. Somebody yes, exactly. You definitely get that from reading this, because the writer is very earnestly, super. Seventy s. Oh, really? Yeah. One of the people who is interviewed as an expert at source is the guy from High Times. Only in the mid 70s did you get away with calling up the High Times guy and just using him like a regular source. You'll see what I'm saying? Like, it sounds normal. Read the article and you'll be like, yeah, this is super 70s. Well, in the 70s is when it started becoming a big concert going activity. Wait, I know what it's going to say. College dorm rooms. In this Rolling Stone article, they were saying like, if you go to like a lot of it in Berkeley, California, and there are places all over, not just at concerts. Sure. It was everywhere in the 70s. Yeah, because a lot of people were like, acid is cool, but this stuff, like you can just stop and five minutes later you're back on your feet. Yeah, so it's like a big deal to them. Well, which is one reason they call it hippie crack. Because the high is short lived. And you want to do another one? Sure. And go listen to our crack episode. Should we talk about why the highest short lived? Well, let me finish my thought. Sorry. So earlier in the 19th and 20th century, though, like you said, when it was sort of the back room parlor game of the high society, it made its way into Hollywood and back in the days of making High Times and movies like or not High Times. What was the one? Casablanca? No, the famous pot movie. I'm totally blanking out on the pot movie. Reefer Madness. There were movies about huffing. There was charlie Chaplin was in one in 1914 where he played a dentist. Well, someone posing as a dentist who had huffed gas. Have you ever seen that Chaplin thing where he does coke in jail and ends up pulling the bars apart? It's pretty hilarious, actually. And there were several movies early on called Laughing Gas. Not just one. Right. And they weren't sequels, they were just multiple movies called Laughing Gas. Yeah. I'm sure you could get a decent amount of people into a theater to watch people doing Laughing gas. Sure. And then they thought, man, I could go for some laughing gas myself. Alright, so what were you going to say about why the high last such a short period of time? So it's constant while you're huffing it, right? Because you're huffing nitrogen oxide gas. Yeah. And it's displacing oxygen. I'm sorry, nitrous oxide gas. And it is displacing oxygen. But as long as you're huffing in a safe supply of oxygen as well, your brain is continuing to function. But your opioid receptors are also going crazy. And your dissociative NDMA receptors are going crazy too. So you're high, but you're staying alive because you're taking in enough oxygen. Right? Yeah. The thing is, your body doesn't metabolize almost any of that nitrous oxide. Something like zero 4% of nitrous oxide is metabolized for the most part. You huff it in, it's dissipated through your lungs into your bloodstream and then brought back out and you ex hail. It resembles almost exactly the same form that it went in. When it comes out, which means that there's no hangover and it's expelled from your body through breathing, just normal breathing after you take the nitrous away. Which is why so many people were like, you can have crazy visions on this. This is what the hippies were saying. Sure, you can have crazy visions on this and it takes you to other universes, and then five minutes later, you're fine. Sign me up. Let's call the High Times guy and see what he thinks about it. Let's get a quote from him. I did find a study, though, and I think it was last year, published in Clinical Neurophysiology, that they hooked people up to an EEG and had them huff nitrous. Really? Yeah. And the guy there said nitrous oxide has control over the brain in ways no other drug does. And what they found was it basically created slow delta waves for up to three minutes across the front of the brain every 10 seconds. I wonder if that's what makes the Wang Wah sound. Well, basically what they found is it lasted for three minutes after you think you're okay. Oh, yeah. So it's still doing damage even though you think you feel fine for three minutes, which completely surprised them. Oh, yeah, I could see that. Especially if the effects were off. You would think you would physiologically be back to normal too. Exactly. That is surprising. I found another study from I'm not sure when, some time in the last few years, where they studied the effects of it on rats and found that short term, low concentration exposure and low concentration, meaning like 50 years. Like what they used medically, the effects of it on the brain neural cells is reversible. But it is very true. And this is why everybody hears about nitrous oxide that when you huff it kills brain cells. That's absolutely true. Yeah. It creates apoptosis, which is pre programmed cellular death in your neurons. It causes your brain cells to die because of a lack of oxygen. Nitrogen or nitrous oxide displaces oxygen and your brain needs oxygen. And when your brain cells don't get oxygen, they die and your brain undergoes hypoxia. Right. Not good for you. No. Plus the fact that it goes after NDMA receptors, which are responsible for the myelin, which is the sheath that coats your nerves. Right. Yeah. That can lead to brain damage. That lasts too. The thing is, and this is a rat study, it seems like it's prolonged exposure or exposure of super high concentrations that create irreversible damage. Yeah, they've done a lot more studying about it in the UK than here because up until this year, it was legal. They outlook it. Yeah. So I guess the results of the study weren't promising. Well, I mean, this is only what is it now, mid February? Yeah. It's only like two weeks ago that literally came on the book. Oh, really? Is officially law. And there were big demonstrations in England, like massive huffing parties on the lawn of I don't know where they decide these things. Is it Parliament? Buckingham palace? Sure, Buckingham Palace. Because they're like, what are we going to do at Glastonbury Festival every year now? Sure. Nice buzz marketing, by the way. What, the Glastonbury Festival? Yeah. Well, we're not going to that. I know, I was saying nice. Okay. Well, they do it a lot there. That's why the festival people said it's like a big litter offender, because I could totally see that canisters and balloons are just everywhere and birds pick up the balloons. They tried to fly off of the canisters, but tear their legs off because they're not strong enough to lift them. So, worldwide, in 2014, it was the 14th most used drug in the world. Really? Yeah. 14th. Would you think it'd be higher or lower? I didn't even think about it. I think that stat just totally caught me by surprise. 14th. And the Independent said that the UK's largest drug and alcohol charity, Alistair Bomb, they said, you know what, we can't credibly deny that compared to other drugs, it's relatively low risk. The risk from taking it from balloons are quite low. And to back up what you said, he said, where there have been stories about death, they tend to be from people who are using canisters and masks. When you get into danger, it's stupid. Let me get out this World War II gas mask, or let me put a bag over my head, or let me get in a car. Right. And then you're not getting that mix of oxygen and then you die. First of all, kids, if you are putting a plastic bag over your head for any reason, you're a dummy. That's a dumb thing to do. Well, yeah, you're going down the wrong path in life. That's a great way to put it, because I don't want some kids to be like, I am a dummy and that's why I do these things. Yeah, that's self defeating. Come on. Come on, son. But there have been plenty of incidences of death. Joseph Bennett, a 17 year old from North London, died in 2012 after falling into a coma. And then just this year, a 21 year old student was found dead in his room with 200 spent cartridges. Chasing that high is no problem. Yes. I mean, you shouldn't try it at all, right. But you're going to die when you have those high concentrations. Yeah. That's the problem with nitrous. If you're being administered nitrous, even in a medical setting, you can have a bad reaction to it and it turns out you're allergic to nitrous and you're dead. Or you're in a coma, at least. Right. But even if you're in a medical setting, you're flirting with death. You're right there on the edge of death. And if you're doing it outside of a medical setting, your likelihood of dying or suffering some sort of horrible adverse reaction to it is even more through the roof. Right? Yes. Especially if you're taking hits straight out of a tank and you're not taking breaths of clean air in between. Yes. You very likely could die. And it's not just hypoxia that gets you or asphyxiation you can also die from passing out and hitting your head. Yeah. Or I saw this one sad case, I think it was in the United States. This lady's son wandered out into traffic and got hit by a car. From nitrous. Yeah. Because he did nitrous and was just, like, so spaced out, he just kind of walked out into traffic. Well, because you're not aware of what's going on at the time, and chasing that high like I was talking about, it would feel so good. You're like, but it's so fast. Like, well, how can I prolong that experience? I'll just stop breathing regular air in between. What a waste. Yeah. It's not smart. No, it doesn't. No, I think we got that across anyway. I think so. You know who doesn't do nitrous? No. How? No way. Who? Scientologists. Why? Elon Hubbard hated nitrous oxide. Really? So much so that he stopped going to the dentist. He had famously terrible teeth. He did have bad teeth. And he didn't go to the dentist. And in 1938, he did go to the dentist to have some work done, and they put him under with some nitrous, and he had a near death experience and came back and he wrote a manuscript called Excalibur, and it's unpublished. And in Excalibur, El Ron Hubbard claimed that anyone who read it either went insane or committed suicide. I remember reading about that. And all this knowledge was given to him from his nitrous oxide experience. So he determined that nitrous oxide is very bad. It's a hypnotic, it makes you too suggestible and you should avoid at all costs. Interesting. Yeah. He writes about it in Dianetics, saying it's bad jam. He's the only person to ever do it. And I'd say, this is great. You had a bad time on it. Well, let's talk about childbirth, unless you have anything else. No. So in Canada and Finland, australia and the United Kingdom, traditionally, women have used this and still do today during childbirth. Up to 60% in the UK. And about 50% in those other countries. But it's not in the US. In 2011, less than 1% of hospitals even offered it. I've never heard of that in the US. Well, that's all changing now. Basically. The medical establishment is basically saying there's really no good reason not to. It's just sort of stubbornness in our history and being fixed in our ways of offering the epidural and other kinds of drugs during childbirth. So there's been a big push lately to have it as an option, at least for women. Labor machines are only 50 50. You can't even alter the setting to go any higher than that. And it's selfadministered. Like, the woman has the mask and she breathes it when she feels like she needs it, and at any point she can be like, no, I want the epidural. The thing is, epidurals can be really expensive. Nitrous is super cheap. It is super cheap. And again, it's as effective as ten to 15 milligrams of morphine for taking care of pain. So they're basically saying women should have the option at least, right? If they want to try it out. It's a lot cheaper than an epidural. Safer. And they haven't epidural. I mean, they're narcotics and epidural. There are a lot of side effects and they really haven't found any side effects with that 50 50 mix under like a controlled, supervised setting. Well, the big fear though, is that aside from like, dizziness, the kid is going to absorb some of this and there's going to be neural cell death in the baby as it's delivered. Has it been proven wrong? They don't think there is any danger to the kid so far because they said it's filtered through the lungs and not like the narcotics that are filtered through the liver. Right. So they said so far they haven't found where it hurts the baby in any way. Plus they let you remember being born. I just think the self administration part is pretty interesting. Yeah, it lets the woman feel more in control, supposedly of their own comfort. Right. So I'm all for it. Why not? Well, yeah, I mean, if it doesn't have any adverse effects, why not is a pretty good question. You got anything else? I got nothing else. That's nitrous oxide. Nto. Humphrey Davy, the gas. If you want to know more about nitrous oxide, type those words in the search bar@housedefarks.com. And since I said search bar, it's time for listener mail. No, Chuck, no. What is it time for? It's time for administrative. So, Chuck, first and foremost, I really want to thank John Morgan over at queen Charlotte's pimento cheese royale. Oh yeah. He has hooked us up. Good stuff, wonderful stuff. Pimento cheese, like the best pimento cheese you can buy on the planet. Better than Palmetto cheese? I think so. Alright. It's good. And there's like some yeah, it's really good. Go try that stuff. Queen Charlotte, Pamela Cheese Royale. All right, we received Christmas cards from the Cavanaughs, the Lee's, the Lowses, and you know Hillary and Mike who we're talking to? They hook us up with the cheese? Yes. With a flathead lake or just flat head cheese? Flathead lake, I think. It is. It's delicious. Hillary, you're the best. Yeah, thank you. And the Nelsons. So thank you for those Christmas cards. Mike over at shaker and Spoon and the rest of the gang. I thank them before for sending the box. Go check out Shaker and Spoon. It's a great gift for yourself or somebody else where they send you all the ingredients you need to make cocktails, including recipes. You just add booze and wow your friends. And what better time to go off page and thank Crown Royal when we off handedly mentioned that the Crown Royal Ry Whiskey won the Whiskey of the year. Right? And I was like, Man, I'd love to try that. They sent us some somebody heard it and they sent us six bottles of booze. That's right. Nice guy. Holy cow. Did you try it? Not yet. I guess you just found it today in the office. If you tried it, that'd be 1955. We should mention Crown Royal basically every time, every episode. So. Crown Royal Ashley Miller, thank you for the wonderful Lego candy that you gave us in San Francisco. Yes, thank you for that. And I think in Los Angeles too. Remember, she just follows us around with Lego candy. Well, at least in California. Lucy Brooks sent us a nice letter. Good luck with the rest of the granny list. Lucy. Thank you. Congratulations. And best of luck to Allison and Chuck for their wedding in Cleveland. Yes, Connor and Beatrice marinen sent us our beautiful wine cork. Greek Chuck. Yeah, Jerry loves it, too. She won't set it down. Good luck with your alcoholism. You're right. Just kidding. Thanks to Eric Young from Squamishbc for the typewritten letter. Eric has a site called Pigeonsandinc.com where he offers the service of writing typewritten letters on others behalf. And he uses a Squarespace site. Pretty awesome. How about that, Kelly from the elephant's trunk? Send us some awesome toys. Thank you very much for those, Kelly. Thank you to M from Melbourne, Australia, via Knoxville, Tennessee, with a homemade sourdough hot cross bun. Yes, that was good. And then Elizabeth Henry sent us a signed copy of Who Killed Mr. Moonlight? By the one and only David J. Of Bauhaus. Oh, wow. And I made a joke about Bauhaus. And Elizabeth Henry said, oh, David Jay is my boyfriend's dad. I'll get him to sign a copy of his autobiography and mail it to the guy who was he in Bauhaus. He played bass. Wow. Yeah. He also had a good solo career, too. Yeah. Sean Irskin. Thank you for the stuff you should know. Bottle cap logo art. That was great. Yes. Jeremy and Irene Kamiya. K-A-M-I-Y-A. Send us glass on teak, which is amazing. Chuck, let me just describe it. They basically take an awesome piece of teak driftwood. Sure. And then blow a glass bowl so that it molds on the bottom to that specific piece of teak. And then, buddy, you've got yourself a beautiful place to house the goldfish. Used for hurricane lamp for candle. Keep your keys in there. Maybe hold those jelly bean counting contests with who knows? Sky's the limit. But it's awesome and attractive, and it looks really cool and mid century modern. So go check out kamiyacocom dorian Wilson, owner of Revival Ltd. They make cool shirts, and the proceeds of those shirts go to people in Brazil displaced by the World Cup. Is that right? Oh, yeah. Wow. And you can find that information@revivalglobal.com? Yes. Johnny Wood, who works for Yakima, the outfitter, the biking outfitter. Sure. You know what I'm talking about. Yeah, yakima and make, like, bike cracks. Thank you. Yeah, he sent us some swag. Yes. He travels around selling Yakima stuff, which probably sells itself, you know what I mean? Yeah. And he listens to us on the road, so thanks a lot, Johnny. This is one of my favorites of recent memory, robbie Zipta. He made the bullet pin man. And he sent us so long ago, and we've just been lack. So thank you for those. It's really neat. He has a series called he's an artist called the Mightier Than series, as in Pen is mightier than the sword. And he takes, like, bullet casings and makes these fountain pins from bullet casings. Yes. It's really neat. Makes a statement in school looking. Yeah. We got a nice letter from Jenny Cochrane. We want to thank Matt for the handmade hinge game henge, as in Stonehenge and Laurie Gush for the copy of her kids book, COPPERLIGHT. A really crappy story. Very nice. And she sent us some real copper lights, which is fossilized poop. Oh, that's right. I remember seeing that. I have more piece tucked in my cheek right now. Thanks to our buddy Gary for the homemade cookies. And then Beth Vanic Lopez sent us a copy of Unbound how Eight Technologies Made of Human Transformed Society and Brought the World to the Brink. By Richard L. Courier. Thank you very much for that hard copy, no less. In my final one, I had a bunch of people send very lovely gifts for Ruby. Oh, yeah. My baby when we got her. And I'm not going to read off all of their names, but you know who you are. And it was very nice. I've got the last one all right, which seems chompy following that heartfelt thing. But thanks a lot to Brett Goodson for sending us Pork Cloud stuff. Pork cloud, pork grind chips, soap and pork dust, if you're like. I'm not too big on breadcrumbs. I'd rather them be porky. Pork cloud has you covered. I think that was decidedly non chumpy. Thank you. Nice. Thank you, Brett Goodson. Thanks. All right, well, we're going to finish up. We have quite a few more, and we're going to finish up in the next episode, I think. Yes. And as always, thank you to those who send in good thoughts and letters and handmade fun gifts. Very nice. We really appreciate it. It's the best. Yeah. So if you want to get in touch with this, you can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can join us on Facebook. Comstenoe. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast@howstuffworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the web stuffyousteno.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstofworks.com. Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun is shining, the daylights longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music My Favorite Murder from Exactly Right Media, My Favorite Murder has something for to everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgueref and Georgia Hardstark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/podcasts.howstuffworks.com/hsw/podcasts/sysk/2017-03-07-sysk-trail-of-tears-part-one-final.mp3	History of the Trail of Tears, Part I	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/history-of-the-trail-of-tears-part-i	In this first of two episodes on the Trail of Tears, learn about the forces that converged to create the series of events that formed the basis of what may be the most brutal decade in American history.	In this first of two episodes on the Trail of Tears, learn about the forces that converged to create the series of events that formed the basis of what may be the most brutal decade in American history.	Tue, 07 Mar 2017 08:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2017, tm_mon=3, tm_mday=7, tm_hour=8, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=66, tm_isdst=0)	50489558	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Are you looking for an escape? An immersive getaway experience? Well, there's a place for all your wildest dreams. Perhaps you enjoy wrapping along the paperboy, or you believe that blessed be the fruit. Or you dream of one day smashing a glass while stealing. Who's. Ah. Whether you're sworn to Team Kim or you just want a good old fashioned mysterious murder, there's a place that has it all. From Atlanta to only murders in the building, it's all on Hulu. So check into your obsessions. Hulu subscription is required. Terms apply. Visit hulu.com for plan details. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetofworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W, Chuck Bryant and Jerry. And the air conditioner. It's stuff you should know. It is a little loud today, isn't it? From the Dank Bowels bar. Bowels. I'm glad you laughed because it's probably going to be the last one that you folks are going to hear. Yeah, this one's heavy. Over the next two episodes, not a lot of great ways to inject humor into the Trail of Tears. If it comes up and it's tasteful, we'll put it in there. Sure. Right. But, I mean, come on. Yeah, and I said two parter. You just spoiled it. Well, it's going to be a two parter for Thursday. This is a dense topic and yeah. So we'll do a Tuesday Thursday on this, right? Yeah, not a Thursday. Next Tuesday. That'd be weird because people would sit around all weekend without access to the Internet wondering how it all ended. It's funny. It is a very dense topic, chuck and I was a history major man, and I didn't realize how dense this topic was, what background there was, how many things that came together to lead up to it. Because everything I knew about the Trail of Tears was what I think most people know about the Trail of Tears. The Cherokee people were forced under this trail to move out west. And it wasn't fun. No. It was very sad. Yes. And one of the longstanding urban legends or myths or I don't know what you call it, but falsehoods that I always had heard was that it was called the Trail of Tears because despite all the hardships, the Indians were so stoic that it was the white settlers who came out to watch them leave that were crying. I don't think I ever heard that. I heard that for years. Starting in grade school, going up to college. Yeah. So it's not called an urban myth. It's called public school in America in the guess so. Yeah, but I mean, overall, though, aside from that big falsehood, my conception of the Trail of Tears was fairly correct, but it was limited and narrow. It was such a much bigger event. It wasn't just one migration. It was actually multiple migrations. It involved more than just the Cherokee. Sure. It involved even more than just the Southeastern tribes just about every tribe that was around west of the Mississippi was, in about the 1830s, forced east of the Mississippi. Yeah. Was forced west of the Mississippi against their will, which, as we'll see, there were other drives west of the Mississippi, were like, what's going on here? Yeah. Well, you didn't invite you. Yeah. And not just Native Americans were affected by this, but this forced migration had a huge impact on the African Americans who have been brought here as slaves and were being forced into slave labor on these lands that the Indians were forced to migrate from. Yes. Very dense, huge thing that happened. And it all happened in about a decade. Yeah. And I think this is one of those that you don't know your past, you don't know your future type of thing. That should be a song lyric. You look at stories like this and you can apply certain aspects of it to modern times, even. Sure. That's all I'm going to say. But no, it's true. It is true. There's probably a different it's its own reasoning. The Trail of Tears. What began and kicked off the Trail of Tears is its own thing that we don't really run into anymore. It's almost like inconceivable in the United States because we have so much land. But at the time, the United States was the 13 colonies, and it ran from Georgia up to basically Canada. What was the northernmost 13th colony or colony? Was it Massachusetts? Maine wasn't around, was it? Well, it existed. They were weird, Mainers, even back then, but it would have been under probably, like French control or something. And part of Canada, maybe, I would guess. I don't know. Well, at any rate, the colonial America was in the early United States. It was a strip of land along the eastern seaboard west of the Appalachians, basically. There were a lot of people, a lot of Native Americans. The French were running around. The British were out there as well. But for the most part, there was a lot of land elsewhere, but a lot of it was under Indian control, native American control. And so when the United States said, we want to push out, as a matter of fact, let's just take over the whole continent, what they ran into was that this land was already under Indian control, and they had two choices either say, okay, we're going to stay here or go to war with the Indians. And the United States chose the ladder at every turn. Yeah. And you put this one together. Very nice job. Thank you. But you astutely point out that by the late 18th century, white European settlers have been commingling for a couple of centuries. Right. This wasn't like a brand new thing, and there was a big push for more land, because ostensibly what would happen is white settlers would eventually say, we think that you people. It's very cute that you're not claiming ownership and you just kind of share and share alike, mostly. Right. You don't recognize property rights. Yeah. Louis C. K has a very funny old bit about that, by the way. You can look that up on YouTube. But we think we can use this better than you have been using it since the dawn of time. Right. Well, like you said, there's a couple of choices. You can stay here and become more like us, or you can get the heck out. Well, those are the two ways of dealing with what came to be termed as the Indian problem in the early United States. And from the beginning, there was this problem where white said, we need more land. Indians had the land, so the whites wanted it. And so there were those two ways of doing it. It was either you can stay and become one of us, or you can move. And George Washington was actually a proponent of the first one called Enculturation. Yeah. Which, depending on what tribe you are in, and even within the tribe, it varied greatly on how much you were encultured. But a lot of Native Americans really kind of jumped on board that this is something I didn't really know to what degree it got to, but some of them gained great wealth and changed their names to Anglo names and had kids and gave them Anglo names. Some of them married white settlers. They formed, I think was it the Cherokee who established their own alphabet and had a bilingual newspaper by 1828? Yeah. The Cherokee Phoenix. Yeah. They were slave owners. I didn't even know that. So a lot of them well, a portion of them really took to this Enculturation aspect and said, you know what? I'm on board this year. Beats the alternative, which is getting the heck out of Dodge. Right. Plus, check out the steamship I just bought. Yeah. And I guess I shouldn't say get the heck out of Dodge because that was for the means, Dodge City, right? I think so. Okay, so there was the Cherokee, the Choctaw, the Chickasaw, the Seminole and the Creek. And they were considered there were many more tribes, obviously, around the United States than that, but those five were considered what were known to white people as the Five Civilized Tribes. They were the ones who had inculturated the most. And from what I understand, out of all of them, the Cherokee was the most enculturated of even the Five Civilized Tribes. Right. Inculturated or encultured? I don't know. I've noticed people, instead of saying, like oriented yeah. They're adding like an aided there so orientated. Yeah. There's a lot of words like that. I've noticed lately. I don't know where this is coming from. Why it's oriented is fine. Yeah. Why you got to add a syllable? Yeah. It's not just oriented. We're losing our language. Well, that's prescriptivist thinking. No, I'm not like that. A long champion. The other, which is language evolves. That's prescriptivist. Yeah, but I also don't think you should say orientated. I agree. So that's just specific. That's just having something sticking your crawl. So what comes along with Enculturation is adopting this European materialism and said, hey, I like having this nice stuff. Right. And not only that, it shows other people that I'm wealthy, that I mean something yeah, I've got some status here. And once these Native Americans bought into that, these European settlers like, well, now we've got them. This is kind of just what we hope for. Not that it was some evil plan, but it kind of worked in their favor, basically. Yeah. Because if you were a leader in a Native American tribe, most of the Native American tribes, one way to consolidate your power and basically turn your position into an official chieftain, like become an actual chief of your tribe, was to basically be a patron to a large group of people. Right. And especially among the five Civilized tribes, the demand for white produced, European produced goods was pretty high. So if you get your hands on a lot of those and turn around and redistribute them like a patron to your folks yeah. They were going to say, hey, man, we'll follow you into battle. We'll go up against your political enemies on your side. You're our chief. And if you could do that with enough people, you could become chief of the whole tribe. Right, right. So early on, the Native Americans who were undertaking this process of becoming chief through distribution of wealth, they were just trading, like, pelts and stuff at trading posts. Yeah. It was supply and demand that the European settlers had these fancy new things that the Native Americans never seen. They wanted a piece of that. And the European settler said, boy, you folks are really good at hunting and skinning animals, and the fur trade is lucrative, and so why don't we scratch each other's backs here? We set up these officially sanctioned trading posts and you can come. I was about to say buy, but I guess it was swapping stuff, the swapping post. Right. And it sort of worked out for a little while until the fur trade started to decline. Because they wanted so much fur, this animal population started to dwindle a bit. Right. So the Europeans still had all the stuff that the Native Americans wanted. The Native Americans were having a harder and harder time getting their hands on pelts to trade. Yeah. What they found was that at the trading post, which, by the way, was the only place that they were legally allowed to trade, I think you have to say trading post, though. The trade and post, they found that they could be extended lines of credit there. Yeah. And that was kind of the beginning of the trouble. Right. So if you were a Native American leader who was trading at a trading post and you went into debt from the understanding, the customary understanding between Anglos and Native Americans was that you were in debt on behalf of your whole tribe. It wasn't just you. It wasn't just your family. Your whole tribe was the people who didn't like you. The people who would follow you into battle didn't matter. Everybody was in debt now because of you. So all of a sudden, the Native American leaders who had gotten into this credit trap would say, how can I repay you? And they tried every way they could. The first thing they didn't, they basically went to work, started growing crops, just did everything they could to pay it back. What they found was the government at the trading post said, we don't want any of that. We don't want any money. We don't want any pelts anymore. We want your land. That's how you repay this debt. That's the only way. Yeah. There was kind of a general thing I picked up on throughout this whole thing that there was either it was probably both a lack of understanding generally and lack of caring about how these tribes functioned and worked before they got there. Yeah. These tribes were huge groups of people over wide swaths of land. And they weren't all like one huge nation with one central leader. It was very regional many times. And like you said, when they went to make these trades, the Indian chief might have thought and by the way, I did look up like Indian, native American Indian. And in terms of discussing history, they say it's kind of okay to use all three. Yeah. So I just wanted to see away there. That's a good one. Thanks. But the Native American chief might come in and in his mind he's thinking, I'm just sort of making this deal for our little regional section of the Cherokee. But to the white settlers, they were like, I can't tell the difference. You're all one big tribe to me. Right. You all got feathers on. Yeah, exactly. That's sort of the attitude. Right. So when they went to debt and when they couldn't repay the debt, the tribe would be forced to seed land to the government to repay that debt. So that is one way that massive amounts of land were seated from Native Americans in the Southeast and the east seated land to the federal government. Because the government, again, was in the business of collecting land from Native Americans and redistributing it to white settlers. Yeah. And some of them kind of smartly and naively at the same time, said, you know what? They're coming for our land, so maybe we can give them some of this land in exchange to be able to keep some of it ourselves. Right. And so they tried this process at first and like accommodation, basically. Yeah. Like, you let us keep some, you can have this. We got some swampland we don't care about. We're not going to tell you that right, you can have the swampland. You got to protect this. And the settler said, sure, that sounds great. Well, the federal government would say that. But what the problem was is the settlers the settlers who would encroach on that land were like, we didn't sign any treaty with you, and who's going to stop us? The federal government? No. They're not going to lift a finger. They may tell you one thing, but nobody is stopping me from coming on your land and hunting, growing crops or building a barn, killing your livestock, maybe killing you. There were squatters. Yes, but with impunity. Yeah. And they either didn't get the message or they didn't care, or both. It was probably both. So then what happens, and throughout this whole process, it's very cyclical. It happens over and over again in regions all over the original well, basically everywhere east of the Mississippi River. So this would happen. These people would spot encroach, didn't care what deal they had made with the federal government, and so then there would be retaliation by the Native American tribes, and they would fight each other. They would go into battle. Not huge wars, yet these skirmishes basically would take place. Skirmishes and massacres on both sides, for sure. You have to say it like it was very bloody and very brutal on both sides. Yeah. So when white blood was spilled, the federal government would arrive and say, probably shouldn't have done that. Maybe there would be a battle with the tribe that was being subdued at the time. Maybe not. But either way, the treaty that the government hadn't been enforcing before now is officially out the door. A new treaty had to be established that would include ceding even more lands to the federal government, which would in turn be given to white settlers who would come in and would then further encroach on the Indian land, and the cycle would start over again. All right, so let's take a break. That was sort of the set up for inculturation. We're going to come back and talk about the other side of the coin separation proposed by one Thomas Jefferson right after this. 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Students can take courses developed by industry professionals, prepare for certifications, get hands on experience network, and most importantly, gain the confidence they need to succeed. Stride Career Prep is backed by over 20 plus years of experience in online learning and education. Take charge at K twelve. Compodcast. That's K Twelve compodcast. And start taking charge of your future today. All right, so you got George Washington saying assimilate into our society, maybe we can work this all out. It'll be great. There won't be any problems. You have Thomas Jefferson. George Washington was a used car salesman, by the way. He was. Then Thomas Jefferson comes along and says, you know what, here's what we should do. It's pretty clear that what will become our United States he didn't use those words. Is like, the western border is going to be the Mississippi River. Who needs anything west of the Mississippi, right? What's out there? So here we have this Louisiana Purchase. We just bought 827,000 sq mi. That's a lot of square miles. We should do one on that, by the way, at some point. Okay. We did one on the Lewis and Clark expedition. That had a lot to do with the Lewis. That was one of my favorites, too. So he said, here's what we'll do. Why don't we just relocate you folks west of the Mississippi? That way we've got our little country over here. You're out there where you won't be bothered by us anymore, trust me. I'm Thomas Jefferson. Yeah. And it'll work out for everyone. And then the planes innings were going, oh, what about us? We're already out here. Yeah. And they went, what? Yeah. Who are you? We don't recognize you. And like you point out, there were some real problems, one of which was it wasn't theirs to resettle or to resettle other people. Right. Because what would become in the American's mind, indian Territory was already Indian territory. It was just different Indians. But it displays not like a lack of comprehension on the part of the federal government. It displays a lack of caring about what happened. It was like, there's already Indians out here. There's not white people out here. We're probably never going to want to go out here, so get off of this land and go out here. And how about this? We'll say that the War Department will protect you. Yeah. And another big problem was these Eastern Native Americans were like, well, we don't want to go out there. We're here to the lush south, and I don't know how to succeed out there. Really? Yeah. Have you read our newspaper? We've been talking about this for years now. We don't want to move. What was it called? Cherokee Phoenix, which is kind of confusing. It wasn't at the time because Phoenix didn't exist yet, but now cherokee or Phoenix. Make up your mind what town? I don't think they meant the town I know because it didn't exist yet. Got you. I get the joke. And did Phoenix burn or something? Is that why it's called Phoenix? That I don't know. Someone will tell us from Phoenix. Okay. And then say, Why haven't you toured Phoenix yet? We'll come to Phoenix at some point, right? Probably. Or Tucson. That might be more far. Ali or Yuma. Didn't you used to do time in Yuma? Yeah, I did some hard time in Yuma. I don't know if we could fill a small restaurant in Yuma. Okay. It's just not a lot of people there. That's fine. Maybe. You never know. We'll do an intimate storyteller show an Evening with Josh and Charles at my former restaurant, Juliana's Patio Cafe. Nice. That's some buzz marketing right there. Yeah, I assume they're still around. So I think ultimately we were talking about far through us off track was the Plains tribes were like, we're here. Please don't send anyone out here. And the Eastern tribes were like, we don't want to move. What are you guys not getting about this? And so the federal government said, this is a real pickle. What are we going to do? Oh, we'll just ignore both. Well, yes. And also they were I don't know how aware they were of this, but what was going on, where these factions were being created. And within tribes, they were being split into people who wanted to kind of stay and defend their homeland and people that were like, oh, maybe we should just pack up and go and try and resettle somewhere else. Right. And this factionalism, it was kind of a recurring thing, part of this big cycle, and would end up in many ways being there undoing, I think. Yeah. And a lot of tribes basically split into like in 1817, a group of Cherokee said, you know what? Forget it. We're just going to move to Indian Territory. And they did. They were called the Old Settlers. We'll move from Indian Territory to Indian Territory. Right. And why are you calling us Indian? Right, exactly. They ended up in Arkansas and then Oklahoma. And basically the factionalism was already deep enough, but the separation then following that factionalism effectively split the Cherokee into two separate tribes, the Eastern and the Western. They were no longer like it wasn't like the Eastern was the satellite division or the Western was the satellite division of the whole tribe. They were like two different tribes as a result of that. And that happened with more than just a Cherokee as well. This whole idea of should we stay and fight or should we just say forget it and move, it was a big problem. It was a big discussion that had a tough solution, because if you said, we need to move, well, then you needed to negotiate a treaty so you could get as much land as possible out west. But if you wanted to stay, you need as many people as possible to stay because there's strength and safety in numbers. Yeah. So the fact that it was split was a real problem for the tribes themselves. I wonder if the tribes had not split up and in fact, if the tribes, all the different tribes, had banded together. Well, they tried that. Well, I guess what I'm asking is, what was the total population east of the Mississippi River of Native Americans compared to white people? I don't know, but I think it was significantly less. Okay, so it probably wouldn't have mattered. No. But if you want to get into alternate histories, if Native Americans had had an immunity to smallpox, there may not have been a United States. Right. Because many more people yes. Something like 100 million or something like that. As much as Europe. All of Europe, yeah. So had small bands of European colonists coming. Even if they'd sent, like, armies and stuff, they would have had a much harder time. But the fact that the North American continent had been effectively decimated by smallpox meant that there were far fewer people and that their cultures had been hit in large part already by the breaking up of these epidemics. All right. So I gave the world or Hollywood sharknado okay. A TV show on the alternate history where smallpox never happened and Native Americans ended up enslaving the white man. Make that into a show. Kind of like man in the High Castle. Right. But rewrite it for Native Americans coming out on that. Sure. That'd be pretty good. Yeah. The white sellers are like, well, okay, we get it. We've upset you. We're just going to leave. And the Native Americans are like, you're not going anywhere. You see that boat? It's on fire. That's our boat. We need that to escape. All right. So for the people that said we're going to stay here, we're going to resist one. There was a big thing that happened. Well, a couple of things that happened that kind of set the course of history in one direction that would never return. Yeah. Right here in Georgia, particularly North Georgia, particularly Delonica, Georgia and other places, there was gold discovered. And whenever there's gold discovered, it triggers the gold Rush. A lot of people move there, which means you need sort of supporting economy. You need guys named Cookie to come out and cook the beans. Sure. Right. So I knew there would be humor in this. Everyone likes a cookie. Poor Cookie. I know. That coupled with the invention and widespread availability of the cotton gin from one Eli Whitney, it lowered the barrier to getting into cotton farming. And so you have these people moving south to get in the gold Rush. Then you have people moving south for this land that was now super valuable. Right. Yeah. It went from just being coveted to being like, it's done. Like, play time is over. If you thought we were being nice before, we're going to war with you guys now. Yeah. And violence really kind of ramped up at this point because of the value of the land all of a sudden because of cotton. And white settlers were basically like, we're taking this land. Yeah. They were provoking the Native Americans, harassing them, just basically undertaking a terrorist campaign against the Native Americans on their land. And then the federal government was being called to task for not doing more about the Indian problem. So for a lot of the Native Americans east of the Mississippi, they basically saw this writing on the wall like, this is never going to stop. Right. And we're going to have to go to war or we're going to have to leave. And so that factionalism started to lean a lot more toward people who were prepared to leave. Right. There was still plenty who were prepared to stay as well. It just made that wedge even deeper, this understanding that whites were never going to let up. Yes. We give them some land and asked to keep some of it, and they say, sure, but then they don't let us keep that land. Right. So this is not going to end well for us. Yeah. I mean, plus, a lot of us are dying. They're killing our livestock. They're burning our farms and houses. It was just a pretty horrible situation. Yeah. I think early on in this piece you wrote, you called it possibly the darkest decade in American history. Yeah. Which is what, like, 1830 to 1840? Yeah. All right, so the federal government does get involved in their first go at this was saying in 1824, officially, like, how about we have this voluntary relocation thing and it's up to you. It's pretty nice out west. They're in Indian territory. And again they said, but we're in Indian territory. And they said, well, we don't know what you're talking about. It's pretty nice, so why don't you just pack your bags and get out there? And then along came a man who is fairly controversial through the lens of history still today. Yeah. More than ever, probably today. Named Andrew Jackson from South Carolina. Yes. He was born in South Carolina. He made his name as a frontiersman lawyer. What does that even mean? I defend people for squirrel related charges, I think. And he also is a wealthy planter slave owner. But more than anything, he was elected president because he was the people's candidate, and he was the people's candidate because he was a war hero and very famous Indian fighter is what he was known as. Yeah. And weirdly. An Indian fighter. But also, was it the Chalk Tall that fought with him alongside him at the Battle of New Orleans, which he kind of forgot or didn't forget, but didn't care much about. Right. The factionalism also resulted in tribes splitting. And actually going to civil war with one another. And so some that were in favor of accommodating the whites or the federal government would actually fight alongside them against the other members of their tribe. And some of them did fight directly under Jackson at the bell of new Orleans. So weird. Yeah. He was like that was years ago. Right. Who cares? So, he had a nickname, the sharp knife or the Longknife, because one of the things that he advocated for was genocide. Basically kill all the women and children once we're done and we've had our victory. And that will really kind of take care of this area. Yeah. Which is really surprising that I looked all over. I didn't find any specific, like, this incident really characterizes that mentality. He seemed to advocate it rhetorically. Okay. And he was a vicious military commander as far as fighting Indians went, but I didn't run across anything where he actually did just exterminate the whole village. Right. And he had plenty of opportunities, too, so I guess he thought it was a good idea, but never really pulled the trigger or something like that. But I was really surprised because I'd always heard he was basically genocidal, but I never found any specific instance, him carrying out what amounted to genocide. He just advocated it. Well, they didn't have cell phone cameras. That's true. Who knows what would have happened? You also bring up a good point, which is that this practice of massacre was happening on both sides. When the American indians would win a battle, many times, they would also have a massacre of women and children burned down an entire fort, perhaps what was it, the mascot at fort Mims in Alabama or what would be Alabama? 1813 is one of the prime examples. Yeah. So the creeks became a very deeply divided tribe with accommodationists, fighting with the federal government against the resistance groups, which basically came to be known as the red sticks. And the red sticks were basically an Indian army in the war of 1812. Prior to the war of 1812, some of the northern frontier tribes had kind of come down led by takumcei, I think, had come down and basically rallied everybody they could and said, we need to stop this white encroachment once and for all and go to war and all just come together, forget our differences and come together and beat back the federal government and these white settlers. And when the war of 1812 broke out, these groups sided with the British, and this gave the federal government license to basically declare war on the frontier tribes, including the red sticks. And at the battle of fort mims, the red sticks surrounded fort mims, and inside were a bunch of white settlers, some African American slaves, some accommodationist creeks, and then some federal troops, and they set the fort on fire and killed almost everybody, including women and children. Yeah. But interestingly, they spared the lives of most of the slaves and took them hostage. Right. So I like how you kind of brought in how slaves factored into this whole thing, because I think a lot of that is sort of brushed aside. Pretty interesting stuff. Yeah, it is. And then you said, Chuck, that Jackson kind of forgot any alliance with Indians that fought with them. This is a great example of that. After this war with the Creeks, there was a second war with the Creeks shortly after, and after that, the Creeks as a whole were forced to seed their land, and 15,000 of them were forced to move out west after this battle, despite the fact that that included plenty of them who had fought alongside Jackson's federal troops. No allotment whatsoever, from what I understand, to Jackson, you're an Indian. That was that it didn't matter what you did, you're an Indian. You needed to go. Yeah. And it's important to point out, like, you did hear that there were massacres on both sides. And while you can never justify the killing of families and women and children in such a vicious way, the white people were the invading force here. Right. That's kind of a pretty big factor here. It is. Yeah, I think it is. Yeah. All right, well, let's take another break, and we're going to come back and talk about Florida. What if you were a global energy company with operations in Scotland, technologists in India, and customers, all on different systems? You need to pull it together. So you call in IBM and Red Hat to create an open hybrid cloud platform. Now, data is available anywhere, securely, and your digital transformation is helping find new ways to unlock energy around the world. Let's create a hybrid cloud that can change in industry. I create learn More@ibm.com only 45% of high school students feel they are prepared for college or careers. Stride career prep is helping change that. Stride Career Prep lets students take charge of their education and their future. By combining real world skills training and traditional academics, students can earn college credit while in high school or get the training needed to land a job right after graduation. Stride Career Prep prepares your team for indemand careers in business, tech, health, science, criminal justice, and more. Students can take courses developed by industry professionals, prepare for certifications, get handson, experience network, and most importantly, gain the confidence they need to succeed. Stride Career Prep is backed by over 20 plus years of experience in online learning and education. Take charge at K twelve. Compodcast. That's K twelve. Compodcast. And start taking charge of your future today. All right. Florida 18, florida 17. The Sunshine State. Boy, I used to love when I would go to Florida as a kid. I imagine they still do this. You would get free orange juice at the state line. Did they still do that? Yeah. That's great. I just thought, like, oh, my gosh, like, anything free. Right. I still have that mentality. They have state prisoners lined up. They just pull over on the shoulder and they give you a cup of orange juice and you drive off. I used to love the official. I still do. I just don't take a ton of road trips. The official, like, rest stations. Instead of just hitting the gas station, go to, like, the official what are they called? Rest areas. Yeah, rest area. Oh, man. It's like a gas station without gas. Yeah. And I had no idea how many crimes are being committed. Sure. Like, behind the outhouse. Yeah. What was it? There's something about Mary. Oh, yeah. Where Ben Stiller was he went to take a leak in the woods, and he got caught up in some during a raid or something. Yeah, some sting operation. All right. So it's 1817, jackson says, you know what? Florida is kind of nice. I might like to take it for my own. Sure. Here they have orange juice on it. Yeah. The state line. But there was a problem. It was under Spanish rule at the time, and Florida was kind of a crazy place back then. It was a safe haven for militant Indians, runaway slaves, anyone who basically was an enemy of Americans. Yeah. The Seminole tribe was like, you hate America, too. Come join us. Right. And there were maroons, is what they were called, but runaway slaves who had found safety living amongst the Seminoles. Yeah. And Spain would arm them. Right. Because they would harass the United States and the federal army and the plantations along the border. Right. Yeah. So the fact that they were runaway slaves down there with the Seminoles gave Jackson just enough of a reason to invade. Not a legal reason. No. He basically waged an illegal guerrilla war in Florida, spanish Florida, against the Seminole. And then whenever he came across the Spanish fort, he'd just take that out and then he'd claim that land as American. Yeah. And this was under the order, the secret order of President James Monroe. Meaning Jackson went to Monroe and said, hey, we should stage a guerrilla war down there in Florida so we can grab some land. And Monroe said, Are you crazy? And he said, Crazy like a fox. And Monroe basically said, yeah, go do your thing. And it's illegal, but who cares? Right. Just don't implicate me if you get caught. Congress knew what was going on. There are people calling for him to be recalled to Jackson. That is right. Right. Yeah. No one. You still run across historical documents? Well, not first or primary sources or anything, but, like, analysis of this era. And Monroe does not get mentioned. I only find him, like, here or there interesting. So he kept his cover pretty well. But Jackson was more than happy to take the fall. And when he came back, finally, after the first seminal war, he came back a hero. He carved out large portions of Florida for the United States. He fought the Seminole. He'd lost, but he still had gained enough ground against the Spanish, at least that he was considered a hero. Yeah. Boy. This was the first Seminole we'll get to the others, but they were a tenacious group. Oh, yeah. You don't mess with the Seminole. I think that was her motto. I think so. Jackson was a hero such that he was elected president in 1828. How do you call his followers? You say backwoods frontiersman. That's a good way to say it. Yeah. But his inauguration party was so wild that these visitors that came to see the inauguration trashed the White House, and they said, Move this party outside. You folks are out of hand. Right. And so. Depending on who you read. Either it was great that Jackson opened the White House up to the American people for his inauguration party and the Washington elite got the vapors and fainted. Or it was just a bunch of brutes just trashing the White House who didn't know how to conduct themselves because they're all drunk on whiskey and wearing raccoons on their heads. Some of which were still alive. Really? So Jackson, needless to say, was a divisive figure in American history, so much so that his party was split during his candidacy in 1828. Yeah. Think about that. Yeah. The candidate for the Democrats was so divisive that the Democrats party split into during the election year. Imagine such a thing. That's crazy. It is. And this also made me want to do a show on the history of political parties in the United States and how they have which sides a lot. Yeah. Two major times a lot. Which is why when you I don't know if you do too much social media stuff at all. Yeah. And you see people harping about, like, oh, well, the Democrats were in favor of this, and the Republicans were in favor of this. It's like, we'll do a little research. These are names that can't be applied for 300 years as one single, solitary set of values. No, they switched sides a couple of times. Yeah. Switched hats. So what were the two? The Democrats and the Wigs. Yes, the Wigs bands. One of my favorites. Oh, yeah. Afghan Wigs. No, no. The wigs in spiral carpets. No. Primal scream is good, though. Primal scream is good, but the wigs athens own. Atlanta's own. Oh, hey. Wigs with an H? Yeah. The old man band covers a few other songs. Okay. Probably too many. Okay. I'd just be like, oh, I guess this is an original of El Chapo's if I heard it. Well, there are no originals. Well, then I'd have to correct myself. That's right. So Jackson had this belief, if you haven't picked up on it by now, that the right of discovery was more important than the right of Occupancy. Right. And by discovery, meaning oh, hey, look, there's some Indian land we would like get off. Yes. That was basically the view that Jackson helped. The thing was, it wasn't just Jackson again. He was a very popular, considered the people's president who came into power against the entrenched elite who were considered corrupt. And he had a lot of public support behind them. Yeah. Like we said earlier, we can use this land better than you can, and you're getting in the way of our ultimate prosperity. Right. So he gave the State of the Union address in 1830. That really sums that up, his views on that. He said, what good man would prefer a country covered with forests and range by a few thousand savages to our extensive republic, studied with cities, towns and prosperous farms embellished with all the improvements which art can devise, our industry execute, occupied by more than 12 million happy people and filled with all the blessings of liberty, civilization and religion. And every American Indian raised their hand, said, Me. And he went, well, not you. I mean, what white person would prefer a country I should have qualified that I see now. But like you said, that was sort of the popular opinion at the time as we came over here, fought for our independence, and let's really grow this country. Right. We've got technology. That's right. So let's put it to use, the land. It wasn't everyone, though. There was one. Henry Clay. Shout out to our old friends Joey and Andy sierra. That's a great band. To Henry Clay people, which is no more. They did a theme for the stuff you should know. TV show. That's right. So Henry Clay was a candidate for the National Democratic Party? They were the Wigs. Right. Just before they were called the Wigs. That's right. They said, what's a better name for a band? Actually, National Democratic Party. Pretty good band name. Okay. Not bad. There are quite a few good band names in here, but I didn't say any of them because it would just be a bunch of, like, white hipster dudes kind of ripping off some cool Native American name. Right. So I'm not even going to mention, ladies and gentlemen, Indian Territory. There probably is a band called that. Sure. So Henry Clay was running for the National Democratic Party of the Wigs. And in 1832 he said, a big part of my platform is to respect the Native American claim to their own land and to oppose Jackson's Indian removal policies. Yeah. And everyone. Well, not everyone. He lost pretty big. Bad. Yeah. But he basically dedicated his campaign to opposing Jackson. Yeah. So go Henry Clay. Yeah. There's a guy, a senator from New Jersey named Theodore Frailing, using Bradley. Wasn't a German immigrant at all, was he? He gave a six hour speech in opposition to Indian removal. He had a pretty good quote. You want to take that one? Yeah. No argument. Can shake the political maximum. That where the Indian always has been. He enjoys the absolute right to still be in the free exercise of his own modes of thought, government and conduct. Not bad. And the populace is like, no, screw that. We want to farm cotton and get gold. You ever been gold mining up there in Delanaga? No. But you know, that's where there's gold in them our hills. That's where it comes from. It's the Mayor of Delanaga. Oh, really? I should say gold panning. They don't let you do gold mining in there. No, but you can go up there and gold pan did cut your arms off if you tried to gold mine up there. They take it seriously. Another big critic of Indian removal, and we should totally do a podcast with Davy Crockett. We did. No. Yes, we did. Why was Davy Crockett king of the wild frontier? Wow. Remember he said he said, you may go to hell and I will go to Texas. Yes. Just in the last couple of years. No. Swear. All right, I'm going to look that up. I will. Right now. You keep talking. All right. So Davy Crockett, who I completely forgot was against his Indian removal, and he actually, like you said, he threatened to leave the US for Texas. Well, who's the first one to do that? If Martin Van Buren was elected and he was basically Jackson's successor, that was going to kind of keep up this notion that Indian removal was the best path forward. And Van Buren was elected. So Crockett said, all right, I'm going to Texas. And he did. So, yeah, he did. He lost his Senate bid, and he said, you may go to hell and I will go to Texas. Which is Tennessee. Correct. The Senate bid. Yeah. We did the episode on August 2013. Wow. Yeah, it's getting bad. Well, that was almost, like, ten years ago. Yeah. Big shout out to Jill Hurley, by the way, our official stat keeper. Yeah, thanks, Jill. She has really done a good job with a spreadsheet that keeps track of how many episodes we've done. She's basically the only person on the planet who knows for sure how many original episodes we've released. Yeah, we have her locked away the seed vault in Norway. It is Norway. Right. But Jill just wrote us, and she said that I believe this November november 2 will be somewhere. It will be 1000 episodes. Yes. Isn't it crazy? That is crazy. They won't let us leave. And all that is to say, please forgive me if I forget that we did Davy Crockett just three years ago. Yeah. If you said three months ago, I would have just got up and left this August. It will be four years ago. Okay, so you're fine. Yeah, because I don't remember anything after one year. So there are also a lot of missionaries who had worked with especially the Five Civilized Tribes. Yeah, very interesting story there. They sought to oppose in your removal as well. And they're like, we're trying to make these people Christians, right. You're messing up our bag. And the federal government is like, wow, that's a really great point, but we don't care. Yeah. And at first, we should say we keep saying the federal government. The federal government was trying to figure out the best way forward. What they finally settled on was Jefferson's plan for separation. But that separation should be through a voluntary, peaceful removal. Right. The white settlers and then the states themselves were harassing the Indians on the ground. Right. Whereas the federal government was like, hey, let's try this, or let's do that, or something like that. That wasn't the reality of what was really going on. No. And a good example of that is Georgia passed a law that said that if you are white, you have to apply for a license to live with Native American missionaries. And then if you were a missionary, they'd be like, approval denied. Right. Or application denied. Yes. Either way. Right. So things were kind of going along like this for a little while, and then finally, in 1830, the official stance was made into law with the Indian Removal Act. Right. And this is what really set into motion what would become known as the Trail of Tears. Right. And all that harassment, all of the illegal activity, all the encroachment and mistreatment by white settlers in the states was now enshrined in federal law. It was now official policy under the Jackson administration. Yeah. And that policy said broadly, that the President can come in, they can negotiate these treaties with tribes, these land deals, and we could grant land in the Indian territory west of the Mississippi and relocate you. We have legal claim to do so right now. If any of your people want to stay, they can stay. They will become citizens of the state they live in. Not full citizens, but kind of citizens, we'll call them. Yes, you can get a little bit of land, too. Yes, they'll be given a parcel of land, but it's not going to be their ancestral land. We'll decide what land it turns out to be. But they're basically just going to be acclimated and assimilated. And then, what's more, if you choose to move, the War Department will enforce the treaties that we have with you. They'll keep people off of your land, native white or otherwise. Yeah. And they'll also help you relocate to help you get settled out there on the Plains and make sure you're all taken care of. Right. So as we've seen, the Creeks and the Seminoles have both said, we're not leaving and we're going to fight you. Right. Yes. The Cherokee tried a different tack. They tried the courts, actually. It was very smart, actually. Yeah. Because what they did was they went back and used the federal government's own declaration against them. Right. Because they said, hey, you know, a while back, in order to make these deals, you had to official you made us sovereign people. We made our land sovereign land. The federal government recognized them as a sovereign nation in order to carry out these treaties where they seeded land of the federal government. Yeah. So you remember when you did that? Well, you said it yourself, we're sovereign people. Yeah. And we just drummed up this constitution. We're a sovereign nation with sovereign soil within the borders of the US. And the Supreme Court actually affirmed that and said, you know what, sorry guys, the Cherokees at least are a sovereign nation and you can't remove them. Yeah. They said you really didn't think this through. And in 1831, they ruled against Georgia in favor of that sovereignty. And you point out that's all well and fine, but that requires a president that says, oh well, the Supreme Court said so I guess that's the deal. Yeah. Andrew Jackson was not that way. There's actually a quote he was talking about justice John Marshall who wrote the majority opinion siding with the Cherokee. He said, Mr. Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it. So called judge. Right. So the idea that you have to have an executive branch willing to uphold or respect the decisions of the judicial branch in order for those judgments to be carried out, if you don't have that and you don't have a Congress that will check an executive that's not doing that or a public that will, then things like the Indian removal process are allowed to happen. And on paper, the Indian Removal Act was supposed to be beneficial to Native Americans. It was supposed to be something that could be carried out peacefully in actuality under the administration of Andrew Jackson. It was a humanitarian travesty. That's right. So that's the end of part one. I have no listener mail. In our tradition of two parties and in the tradition of those serious different stroke two, parters is where we got it. That's right. So, yeah, we'll hold off on listener mail, but you can send us out traditionally. Oh, yeah. Okay, well, stay tuned for part two coming out on Thursday. And in the meantime, if you want to get in touch with us, tweet to us at syskpodcast. Join us on facebook. Comstuffytechnow. It's all good again there. By the way, sorry about the hacking. And I know technically it's not hacking. Send us an email to wow, that is really somebody said that? Yeah. Send us an email to stuffpodcast@howstepforks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the web stuffyturenow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstofworks.com hey, it's summer, everybody, which means schools out, the sun's shining, the daylights longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon music my favorite Murder from exactly right media, my Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarref and Georgia Hardstark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. 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029101d0-3b0e-11eb-947e-1fa8c04fcd4d	Mechanical Bulls!	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/mechanical-bulls	Mechanical bulls are kind of weird, but they have certainly made a place in American pop culture over the years. Largely due to one movie, Urban Cowboy.	Mechanical bulls are kind of weird, but they have certainly made a place in American pop culture over the years. Largely due to one movie, Urban Cowboy.	Tue, 20 Apr 2021 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2021, tm_mon=4, tm_mday=20, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=110, tm_isdst=0)	43884529	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh and there's Chuck. Jerry is not here. She stepped away for a minute, digitally speaking, but she's still here in spirit. So this is stuff you should know. Jerry's looking for love in all the wrong places, right? That's right. And, Chuck, I was not really cognizant of what was going on when all of this was happening, but there's a period of time where country was just beyond cool in America. It was the popular culture. Yeah. I really remember it. And you're what, five years younger at least. Never gets old. It is a time that I remember well when the TV show Dallas and when country had these big crossover stars like Eddie Rabbit and Juice Newton and Mickey Gilly and Kenny Rogers. And Kenny Rogers was making These big Hollywood movies. And Dolly Parton was Making big Hollywood movies. It was an interesting time. And it was sort of the beginning of the change of country music from sort of more underground outlaw cowboy, johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, whalen Jenning stuff to the big AMAs country thing that we see today. And I think the transition was kind of happening back then in the late 70s, early 80s. That seems to be where it finds its roots in this area of this era where it turned into pop, basically. Yeah. And they transitioned from, like you were saying, that kind of outlaw, like, hardcore country to pop by way of easy listening, which is a pretty hard left turn, if you think about it. But that easy listening was featured prominently on the soundtrack for a movie called Urban Cowboy. You betcha. Which in one of the more surprising things I've ever come across in our research in the 13 years we've been doing this. Happy anniversary, by the way. Yeah. Like, right now is right, basically. Yeah. All right. Close enough that it's worth saying happy anniversary for. Thanks, man. You, too. One of the more surprising things ever come across is that since we're talking about mechanical bulls today, you can't tell the story of mechanical bulls without John Travolta. I know, right? Who knew? Not me. Did you know that was tied together intimately? Urban Cowboy and Mechanical Bowl 1000%. Well, it was a big surprise for me. And a pleasant one, too. I'm still on cloud nine after learning about that. Yeah, I guess I was a little kid, so you would have been just a baby at the time. So it makes sense that this is more cemented in my memory. But I remember Urban Cowboy. I just remember it all being a very big deal, like people like Olivia Newton John, where people were making country albums that normally didn't because it was just the hot ticket. It was a big deal. Yeah, it really was. I watch enough meetv and stuff to be able to recognize this era, and it not seem weird to me. I think it stands for Memorable Entertainment Television. It's all like old reruns from the 70s. Is it a channel or is it like a streaming app? It's a channel. We have one of those antennas. You can get a digital antenna. Yeah. And there's a lot of, like, really good rerun. Like, what's the word I'm looking for? I guess nostalgia TV out there. And meet. TV is one of them. But anyway, every once in a while, probably every 6th or 7th episode of Bionic Woman or $6 Million Man will suddenly have some weird country trucker lumberjack theme going on. Yeah. And you can tell it's like it's because that was the cool thing right then. It was. I mean, like I said, Dallas was a big TV show and the Dallas Cowboys and the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders was the biggest thing going. And BJ and the Bear and the Dukes of Hazard. And it was this weird time in America where, like, the Southern and western country, western culture was at the fore. It's very strange, and it coincided with punk and new wave and it's a very weird kind of cool time in this country, I think. But one of the things that came out of this, one of the things that was popular at the time that really tied into this country zeitgeist, that was like the basis of the pop culture at the time was mechanical bull riding. Right. That is something you would do if you were trying to show off at some bar. It doesn't matter where the bar was in the United States, and I suspect in other parts of the Western world as well, that you would ride a mechanical bull wearing a cowboy shirt and tight jeans, even though you were from Miami or something like that. Yeah, it's funny, when I was reading this and they were saying like, they have them in New York, and they had them in New York, in Los Angeles, and it's popular everywhere, the first thing I thought was, I bet they had them in Japan. Surely. I was looking I'm like, I wonder if it's just some throwback retro mechanical bull riding trend somewhere in the world. I couldn't find any mention of it anywhere, but surely it is somewhere. It seemed like a good fit. But the mechanical bull, if you don't know what one is, you're not under a rock. Everybody. You could be very much aware of many things in the world and not know what one is. Boy, Chuck, you've really softened and mellowed in your old age. I really have. It is a simulation of bull riding, the RodeoSport of bull riding. It is literally a mechanical bull. And we'll talk about how it's made and what it looks like. But go google a picture. You sit on it and someone is in control of it on the other end, and it mimics the bucking of a bull as if a human were riding on it. And they are very popular in bars, touristy bars, usually in Japan, maybe in Japan. There's one in New York City at Johnny, Utah's that I have some stories about later. But the mechanical bull basically can be used to train a rodeo rider, although it's usually just for entertainment purposes. Yeah. What's really interesting about what you just said that it's used for training is it's not entirely clear if the mechanical bull was used to train rodeo riders first or was used as an amusement at Honkytonk bars first and then became used to train rodeo riders. Right. It has a really hazy origin, and it's possible that it evolved in parallel in multiple places because there was a need for training rodeo riders on artificial bulls. Because part of rodeo that kind of grew out in the 19th century in America as rodeo writing developed, based on some of the Mexican blood sports with bulls as they made their way up north in the United States, the southwestern US. Bull riding just kind of came out of nowhere. Rather than Toyota, it got translated into bull riding. And if you want to train on riding a bowl, you're way better off finding something to simulate the bull than learning how to ride a bowl. By riding a bowl. Yeah. Although, you know what I did see somewhere, and I couldn't verify it in a lot of places, but I did see in the 16th century in Mexico, they were actually riding bulls. I mean, I believe it. Yeah. So that might have just been a part of the blood sport of bull fighting. If you're a tough guy and you see a bull, you say, I'm going to ride that bull. Watch this. Maybe. So in the 1930s, in the United States, the Rodeo Cowboy Association was formed. So it was a full deal by the 1930s. The one thing we do know is that the precursor to the mechanized or mechanical bowl was the bucking barrel, which, if you could just do an image search for bucking barrel, you've probably seen these at some point. It is a barrel like an oil barrel tipped on its side with a saddle on it, and it's suspended off the ground and tied at four corners with some pretty heavy duty tight rope. And you would go sit on that barrel, on that saddle, and you would have four ranch hands try and throw you off of it. I imagine that was a lot of fun. Yes. Which, I mean, it's dangerous in and of itself, especially if the ranch hands are jerks, but it's a lot safer than riding a bull when you're practicing to ride a bull. Yeah. I would ride a bucking barrel if I was at one of those city slickers like cattle rustling things, and they were like, you want to get on the bucking barrel, partner? I'd say, Heck, yeah. But you could not pay me to get on a real mechanical bowl? Oh, I don't know. I was watching some there's, like, mechanical bull throw compilations, people falling off mechanical bulls. I watched quite a bit of this. What's? The funniest ones are the ones that happen in slow motion. Yeah, like the camera's not in slow motion. It's just the person is sliding off in slow motion. Yeah, that's usually how it works. Instead of really being thrown. You're right. It seems like my legs on there pretty not dangerous. So I would ride a mechanical bull if I ever encountered one. Yeah, I'm not into it. That's fine. I won't yum your yuck. Well, I mean, we'll talk injuries later on. It can pretty badly. I think we should it's worth saying you can get injured on a mechanical bowl. Maybe not live bowl level, but don't ride live bulls anyway. Let's just put that one out there and then if you're going to ride a mechanical bowl, know that it's still very dangerous and can be. That's right. Should we take a break? Sure. Yeah, let's do it. We won't come to blows. It's fine, it's fine. I'll just go a long way. All right, we'll take a break and then we'll talk more about this funny thing right after this. Hey, everyone, when you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office? Then? You could be using stamps.com. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses. Because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right from your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to stamps.com. Click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. Learning stuff with your so, Chuck, I was saying, like, the origins of mechanical bulls are fairly hazy. We are pretty sure that they came from the bucking barrel that preceded them. But it's not entirely clear that the mechanical bull descended from the bucking barrel in the rodeo world or into the amusement world. First, ed put this together for us, and he looked high and low to find primary source, but couldn't find one. But he saw a lot of mentions of a place called Bertrand Island, an amusement park in New Jersey that supposedly had a mechanical bull back in the this was in New Jersey. And I think this is what the deal is. I saw this referenced a lot online, and there is a coffee table book about Bertrand Island Amusement Park. And I bet you dollars to donuts there's a picture of this ride on Cowboy ride in that book because they all reference this book. But I didn't have time nor the inclination to buy this book to prove it to myself. Okay, but I have a feeling that there was a picture of this rideam, cowboy ride in this coffee table book about Bertrand Island Amusement Park in the 1930s. Okay, I've got a great idea. Let's get in the way back machine and we'll go to the printing of that book, and we'll look through one of the books. Are you ready? Well, why don't we just go back to the Bertrand Island Amusement Park in the ride the thing I guess we could have done. Okay. All right, let's do that. Or we can go to a book printing shop. Okay, we'll go to Bertrand island. Are you ready? Yes. Let's do it. Okay, here we are. There it is. There it is. We have definitively proven it. There was a ride on Cowboy mechanical bowl. Bertrand, what year is it right now? Well, I'm looking at my Shark surf watch, and it says 1932. Okay. 1932. Mechanical bullet. Bertrand Island Amusement Park. All right, I guess we should just go back. All right. Well, it's weird that we went back and we didn't ride it or get any salt water taffy or hit the big strong man bell. Could you just go on to do the printing press place? I guess we should have we probably have a little candy dish with saltwater taffy there that we could have cramped. So if you talk mechanical bulls, you're going to hear the name Sherwood Crier come up a lot. Some people might mistakenly say he invented the mechanical bowl. Certainly could be looked at as the sort of grandfather of the mechanical bowl. But he owned a mechanical bowl in his saloon in the 70s that we'll get to later. But it was built by a man named actually, I don't know if he built it. Joe Turner built it, but Joe Turner in New Mexico at the very least, held a patent for this mechanical bowl. Right. I saw it with my own two eyes. But it's from 1976. Right. So Joe Turner definitely didn't invent the mechanical bull, although he was an inventor of the mechanical bull. But we can say definitively, since Sherwood Crier bought the patent from Joe Turner, that Sherwood Crier is not the inventor of the mechanical bull, even though I believe even Wikipedia sites him as the inventor. Really? Yeah. I was surprised to see that, but, yeah, he's very widely held to be the inventor. But he even said there was an interview with him in the Austin Chronicle in the late 90s where he said. He talks about how he bought it off of Joe Turner for $30,000 and it will become clear why he did that and why that was actually a really good move on his part later on. That's right. But if you want to talk about the mechanics of the mechanical bull, it is a hydraulic based machine that has a couple of motors on it. It's got a center shaft and a main gearbox that make up the spin motor. And that's the one that's going to spin it. It's going to turn it back and forth. When you see them operated, they usually rarely even go a full 360 before they turn back and go the other way because that's kind of the whole object is to keep this thing moving in different directions. Right. And it's turned back in the other direction is usually very sudden and harsh. It is abrupt. There's abrupt. Thank you, buddy. And then there's another motor, usually above the bottom motor. And that motor has to do with moving pistons up and down. Like, imagine a platform that the saddle sits on. The bowl is built around that. The rider actually sits on this platform. It moves from side to side and up and down and left and right. So you have a lot of yaw. Control is what you need when it comes to riding a mechanical bull because there's pitch yaw. And what's the third one? Roll. Roll. You got all three of those going on in this mechanical bowl, I believe. Right. If you see one of these in a bar or if you rent one, I love that. Ed did the research and Ed lives in Buffalo, New York, and said in Buffalo you can rent one for 3 hours for $900. And it comes with the operator and everything. I heard that. And then I thought that might have been a fun 50th birthday party. But unfortunately in quarantine to be like three or four people standing around. That's not true. You could ride it on zoom for all of your party guests. But it is mounted very securely to a big floor plate and it is surrounded. I think Sherwood Choir would drive around and collect mattresses at first, but now they have this big inflatable ring, basically that surrounds it. And it's got a saddle. It's usually the horse itself is fiberglass or it's metal, maybe, but it's covered in this sort of thick padding with leather and then a real deal saddle. Yeah. And the ones today, there were plenty built in the even in the 90s that look like old carnival funhouse rides. Basically. The controllers are real, like old and janky looking and colorful and kind of cool in retro. The ones today are touch screen. They have like speakers built into them. The padding around them isn't like a mattress. They're like blown air, like a bouncy castle kind of thing. So when you get thrown, it doesn't feel like anything is actually kind of pleasant. And the controllers are much more computerized and less mechanized than they used to be in times past. Yeah. These days, if you look at urban cowboy too, it is just sort of the body, if you would, of the bowl. Now, if you go to Johnny Utah's in New York or any kind of fun house, are you getting free drinks there or something? No, I just learned of it, and I didn't know that there was still an urban cowboy type place in New York that you could go. I think it's got to be close to Times Square. It's in Midtown, an urban cowboy bar that's referential to Point Break. That's like, man covering all the bases. Yeah. They have a little fake foam bull heads and horns, and apparently you can even find them with if you want to ride a bison or a ram, like a sheep, you can get a sheep's head put on or a ram's head put on. It goes even more than that. I looked it up. There's a hammerhead shark, camel, hot dog, banana. And then apparently there are, like, this tawdry thread of bull riding. There's a sexual element to it, I think. Yes. Sure. I mean, Ed found one of the settings is sexy. Right. On the actual operations of one machine, ed found it was, like, pro, intermediate, beginner, and sexy. So it's definitely fair to say. Okay. And also what I turned up goes way beyond a sexy setting. There's a penis one you can get. Sure. There's a woman called Horny Hannah, and there's a guy named Randy Roger. Oh, boy. So it gets pretty stupid. Sure. It gets pretty dark. Bachelorette party really quick. If you want it to go that way, apparently you can make it go that way. That's right. Just speaking of the settings, there are those automated settings usually that you can just hit pro or beginner or whatever, but you can also be in control. And I think the automated settings are much more common these days. I think back in the urban cowboy days, it was very much about a human operator trying to really simulate a rodeo for these sort of pseudo competitions. They were competitions in bars. Yeah. I mean, there would be, like you could win $100 or something like that. Probably that way. Okay. All right. So there was, like, a competition, but also, like, in Bars, it was just to show off, too. That was the whole reason. That's the entire reason for mechanical bulls. If you're sitting there wondering, like, why does anybody do this? It's basically to just show off, to stay on as long as you possibly can, basically. And so, like you're saying, with the original operator, the operator's job was to humiliate you. That was the whole dynamic. You showing off. The operator trying to throw you off in a very humiliating fashion. And so the more you could stay on, the longer you could stay on. Despite the operator's best efforts, the more of a show off you are, I guess. Yeah. I mean, it's not a far cry from any carnival game where it shows some sort of feat of strength, whether you're hitting the thing with a hammer to make the bell ring or the punching bag to see how hard you can punch a thing. Right. And the ones that you rent today for the parties, ed described as an allinone entertainment center. I mean, it's got a built in PA system with speakers and a microphone and an amplifier and an electric scoreboard and timer. It's just this big thing now, whereas it started out as just sort of this very rudimentary hydraulic thing. Yeah. Which makes sense, because, again, this is the kind of thing that you can rent like a bouncy house, but for grownups, although they have little kids ones, too. I heard about those. Something else I saw is there's, like, the riding the bowl version. There's also a surfboard version that you stand on. Okay. And I actually saw a video of a dude who combines those two look up on YouTube, man dances on mechanical bull wearing best Sunday suit. And this guy is in a bar wearing a tie, not just standing up dancing on a mechanical bull that's going at a pretty moderate rate. Wow. And it is one of the most astounding things I've ever seen in my life. Amazing. Yeah. But there's the version you can rent or buy, I guess, if you're into that kind of thing. That is like a surfboard and the bouncy area around you, the padding is like a wave kind of thing. It looks pretty cool. Well, that's fun. I thought so, too. It looks fun, at least. So if you're going to ride one of these things, I will say most of the videos I saw at Johnny Utah's, among others, is they keep it pretty tame, although we'll talk about the dark side of that in a bit, too. But if you're going to get, like, a real ride, then you want to go as forward on that thing toward the head of the bowl as much as you can. Right. You want to grip that bowl with your inner thighs and dig those heels in and keep your feet ahead of you and point those toes. Yeah. Apparently they have a strap that you put your hand in and then you put the other arm up. They say to hang on with your nondominant hand. That's all I've seen. That's all I've seen too. I don't know. I feel like I would be stronger with my dominant hand, but I don't know. I think you're using your nondominant hand because any stupid hand can hold on to a strap. Your dominant hand is balancing. You're holding up in the air to balance, and you need a little more finesse. Okay. All right. That's my guess. And it makes sense to me, because that's my guess. And what he wants to do is you want to go opposite. That's the whole idea. If the bull bucks forward, you want to lean back. If it goes back, you want to lean forward towards the snows. You want to keep those legs tightened down as much as you can, and you want to try and keep everything from the waist up as loose as possible. But again, if you've been throwing down cowboy boot mugs full of beer at the Roy Rogers, just do whatever you want and good luck. So this advice comes from a pro rider named Will Roberts, and he basically says that if you take each one of these movements as, like, a wave that you're riding, and think of them discreetly as discrete motions, and you're just handling each one at a time, you could stay on indefinitely. He didn't say the indefinite part and said in fact, he said you shouldn't stay on longer than 15 seconds or else you're going to get hurt at full bore. But I think you could stay on indefinitely. Well, one of those videos I saw was titled something about woman rides bull for so long that video cuts out or something like that. Is that right? Like, she never fell off. I mean, it was going really slow, but she hung in there. Hanging? Yeah. I don't know. I'm not sure. It depends on which one you rented. Well, like we said, the rental price, if you want to buy one of these systems, it's about 20 grand. I saw the two, but I also saw one on ebay for the suspiciously low price of 6800. And it's possible the whole thing was used. I think if trampolines are one of those things you buy and then end up just wanting to get rid of a mechanical bull is probably ten x that yeah. I don't know if I would get on a mechanical bull where someone's like, I got a really good deal on it. Right. It's basically free. All right, let's take another break and we'll talk about to me what is the most interesting part of this episode, which is sort of the history of gilly's saloon right after this. Hey, everyone. When you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office? And you could be using stamps.com. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses, because stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and ups shipping services you need right. From your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS rates. And 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code. Stuff your shoulders. Okay. Chuck, you promised to talk about Gilly's saloon. What is that? Well, we talked about Mr. Crier. He owned a saloon that was really kind of an oversized tent called Shelley's in Pasadena, Texas, outside of Houston. And this was in the early 70s, like 119 thousand, 71. And he would bring in country singers who weren't big national acts yet, but they were sort of known regionally. And it was a popular bar and it was getting bigger and bigger because that was oil country. People came in with some money and he said, you know what? I think this needs to not be attempt, but to be a real deal saloon. And he partnered up with a man named Mickey Gilly. Right. He gave him a pretty sweet deal. He said, look, I want to build this thing out. I'm going to build it out. We're going to make it a more permanent structure. And turned it eventually into like a 40,000 square foot bar, multiple bars, that was basically like a real deal Texas roadhouse. And Honkytonk, you Gilly, we're going to name it after you, and you and your house band are going to play basically every night. And Gilly. Did you say that that was Jerry Lee Lewis's cousin? No. But he was. Yes, he was Jerry Lee Lewis's cousin. Still is, possibly. Is he still alive? Yeah. Mickey Gilly is 85, and he had that big crossover hit with Looking for Love on the soundtrack, right? Yeah. Was it on the urban Cowboy sounds? I'm pretty sure it was on the urban Cowboy soundtrack, yeah. Or is buckwheat we call it book and Pinb. Wok and pin up Wilkin Panov. Okay. And he was no slouch, though. He had 42 top 40 country singles in his career. So what's funny is, I read an interview with him, I think, in Texas monthly on the 35th anniversary of Urban Cowboy, and he basically talks about how he was looking for love, but it was in all the wrong places. He was looking for stardom and he just could never quite get it. So I guess he was one of those unsung, like, highly successful people who never became a huge star. And apparently he was trading on being Jerry Lee Lewis's cousin, was doing like, tribute shows, cover shows, that kind of stuff. It was doing fine. But so when Sherwood Crier met up with them and formed a partnership with them, he became the namesake of Gillies, this incredibly popular honkytonk outside of Houston that became the setting for Urban Cowboy, thanks to randomly enough. An Esquire article. Yeah, this reminded me very much. And it's weird that they're both Travolta, but Saturday Night Fever, it's tied even more closely than that. The very editor who ran that Esquire article was the same Cofounder of New York Magazine, who ran tribal rights of the new Saturday night that gave rise. That was the basis of Saturday night fever all right, so it all comes full circle. I printed that out. The tribal rights of Saturday Night, back when we talked about it, have not read it yet, and now I'm going to print out the ballot of the Urban Cowboy in America's search for True Grit. Right. And I'm going to have just both those articles sitting on my desk forever, probably. But I want to read them both because they were both the basis of two sort of landmark 70s movies that became cultural touchstones, and John Travolta was in both of them. Yeah, it's really weird, but it's basically the same thing, except one is disco set at a disco nightclub, the other one is country music set at a country western bar. But it's the same exact thing, same format. Love fighting, rivalry, jealousy, competition, basically on a weekend night while everybody's getting trashed at a bar. And they were separated by two years. I think 76 was the Saturday night New York Magazine article, and 78 was the one that featured Gillies. Yeah, it's really pretty interesting time in our country's history that they're almost two sides of the same coin. And again, like I mentioned earlier, this is all going on at the same time that punk music is saying, I hate all of you people. Exactly. And for good reason. Look. That's right. So this guy I can't remember his name irving Some Berlin. No, he was one of the managers or promoters or he had a lot to do with the Eagles. He bought the rights to that article for, like, $200,000, which is a lot of money to spend on a magazine article option at the time. And he just knew that no matter what happened, he was going to have a huge soundtrack on his hands, just like Saturday Night Fever. And it worked twice. It did work. He apparently wanted it to be all Eagles, and the Eagles were like, no, that's okay. We suck so terribly, even we wouldn't want to do a whole sound. But it ended up being, like, a really great soundtrack. I've never heard it, but, I mean, just looking at the roster, kenny Rogers, Charlie Daniels, Bonnie Rayt and Micky Gilly had Looking for Love on it as well. Yeah, we could put up it was great. We had the record in our house. Like you said, they shot the movie. A lot of it was shot at Gillies. That was the bar scene that was predominant in the movie and the competition between Scott Glenn and John Travolta as they battled for bragging rights, cash money, and Deborah winger's heart and Glory, of course. The well, the glory man. Scott. Scott Glenn. Yes. I can't believe I just forgot his last name. I think he's one of the coolest actors ever. Yeah. Not a Caradine. No, he's a careerin plus. Yeah. I think Scott Glenn was one of those that was always I think he was always confused as a carrier with a lot of people because he has that look. Sure, sure. For so it was the big success of this movie that made Crier say, I need to secure this patent because this thing is about to explode. And I think by that point, the gentleman who held that patent, Joe Turner yeah, Joe Turner said, well, let's up the price a little bit to $30,000 inquire or. Still said, yeah, don't tell this guy, but that's still a pretty good deal. Yeah, because the mechanical bull is basically a third lead character in this movie. Deborah Winger, John Travolta, and this mechanical bull, El Toro, the real mechanical bull at Gillies and became a huge part of the pop culture. And Sherwood Crier was smart enough to realize how big of a deal it was going to be, bought the patent for it. And now if you wanted a mechanical bull for your bar that you just converted over to a honky tonk format, you had to go buy one from Sherwood Crier. And he made a lot of money off of those, from what I understand. He did. I think he even won lawsuits when people tried to dodge his license. And, yeah, he made a lot of money off of this fad. And it was indeed a fad, for sure. Yeah. But like I said, you go to Johnny Utah. There was one on the Sunset Strip, too. I don't know if it's still there. What was the name of that place? Johnny mnemonics. Another canoe Johnny movie. I can't remember. But there was a country western bar on the Sunset Strip that had a mechanical bowl as well. I can't remember either. I know exactly what you're talking about and I can't remember the name of it. It's super famous, right? It was for a while. And it wasn't even that long ago, I think when I lived there. It was still there. Super Cuts. No, not Hogs. And heifers that was in the meat packing district in New York. But this is what genuinely kicked off that whole movement that we talked about at the beginning with Southern culture and Western culture kind of being at the forefront and all these people doing crossover records and pop music and country sort of intertwining and the lines being blurred and the Dallas Cowboys and Jr. Ewing. This sort of all started with Urban Cowboy and this mechanical bull, El Toro. I would argue that it started before that and that Urban Cowboy was catching a wave that was developing. Yeah, it's credit, but I mean, like, if you look at Convoy, that chris Christopherson movie. I'll look at Convoy. So that was a couple of years before that. But it was the same year that article was published in Esquire. So it was all kind of coming together. Congealing. At the same time. Yeah, I reckon we didn't kick it off. It capitalized early on on what was coming, for sure. But it came in at a time when it could still be considered cool and a huge contributor to the spread of it. Right. Yeah. And this was like it's funny. Like, I kind of look back with some fondness even though it wasn't my scene. But if you talk to any of the old timers from back then, they called them Gilly rats, these local bar patrons that they were the real deal. They hated all this stuff, man. Yeah, because it brought in all the posters and the tourists and people on business trips passing through Houston had to go to Gillies. And I'm sure it just took something that was really sacred and special to them and commodified it in a really sad way. I'm sure it was terrible. Yeah. At least for a while. And then I'm sure it went back to normal again, generally. And they were still on that bar stool in the same place. Exactly. It just all kind of happened around them. But speaking of that kind of country chic trend that Urban Cowboy was a huge part of, I saw reference to a Fantasy Island episode from 1982 called Everybody Goes to Gillies. Mickey Gilly played himself awesome, and his fantasy was to make it big in the country music scene. And I think Full Circle may have gotten it. I think it was successful. I wonder if Tatsu got up on that thing. I don't know. I could not find the episode. I just was reading about it, which is kind of disappointing when it comes to Fantasy Island. I wanted to see that movie, the Airbag Village movie with Peter Dinklage, but I never got around to it. Did you see that? I forgot that they made that. No, I haven't seen it. So as far as Gillies goes, I wondered. I wasn't sure the deal. I was like, Surely you can still go to Gillies. But you can't because Gilly's burned to the ground. It did, suspiciously. Apparently it was ruled in arson. And this came after there was a dispute between Mickey Gilly and Sherwood Crier. And apparently Mickey Gilly, who had been approached by Sherwood Crier to basically come in as a partner on his bar, came out victorious, triumphant, and ended up on the winning end of this dispute and apparently walked away with most of the profits. And I guess Gilly said in at least one interview that he expected that it was Sherwood Crier who had burned Gilly's to the ground in 1989. That's quite an accusation. It really is. But I was reading again that Texas Monthly article, I think it's called Urban cowboy turns 35, and it's like an oral history, which is the laziest form of journalism, but it's still love oral histories. Do you? Yeah. Well, then that explains why they keep making them. I thought it was just like, I don't feel like actually writing today. I'm just going to transcribe. Oh, I think it's kind of cool. I like them. Well, you would like this. You should read it. It's very long, and it's really in depth. And they talked to some of the original gilly rats, and a couple of them who worked for Sherwood Crier have to say, like, this guy was an amazing human being, but he was also somebody who would beat someone with a pool cue if they were causing trouble at gillies and did do that. You did not want to run afoul of this guy, but was also, like, a really fascinating, interesting, smart human being, too. Yeah. Shout out to Texas Monthly too. That's a really good rag. Yeah, it really is. I read a couple of things from there for some podcasts we were developing a couple of years ago, and it was really good. They did these great deep dive. Not oral histories, but, like, real journalism. Long form. Yeah. There's a guy named Skip something. Oh, man. I can't remember Skip's name. I'll look it up. Everybody don't worry about it. But Skip Hollandsworth or something like that. He's one of their better journalists for long form at Texas Monthly. He's great. But there's a lot of them. They have a good stable there. Totally. And in 2019, they announced that there would be a new Gillies. But it's not just going to be a bar. It's going to be a 16 acre multi use development. And apparently El Toro survived the fire, and they're bringing the original El Toro back just to put on display. So I found one reference that El Toro survived the fire. It was in the Ocala Star banner. What does anybody in Ocala, Florida, know? I don't know, but they said that El Toro survived the 1989 fire and that it was moved to Cowboy Jacks in Woodbury, Minnesota. So I looked up Cowboy Jacks. There is a cowboy, right? I thought so, too. Cowboy Jacks makes no mention of having the original El Toro at any point. That's suspicious, because you would really lean into that. Oh, dude, it's all I would ever talk about to anybody. But that's what the Ocala Star banner says. Cowboy Jacks does not back it up. So who knows exactly what happened to El Toro? That's right. Don't get on that bullet, Johnny Utah. You're going to catch something. You come ride El Toro, you're going to catch some Johnny Mnemonic on that thing. There were some injuries, though, that we would be remiss without mentioning. There have been plenty of lawsuits over the years. There was a woman in Santa Barbara County that was left a quadriplegic when she landed on her neck oh, boy. So obviously, if you get thrown off something, if you land wrong, that can be bad news. A man in Bergenfield, New Jersey, in Bergen County was left with permanent injuries. And then at Johnny Utah's, a New York woman won $70,000 because she tore her ACL at Johnny Utah's and her lawyer said this they just kind of throw people around while they're drunk. I think that guy summed up the mechanical bowl about as good as anybody ever had. Yes, that was how he described the operators. He said they just kind of throw people around. And then I went to YouTube. Looked up Johnny Utah's. And if you want to spend some time looking at very bad camera phone videos of drunk friends filming drunk friends writing very slowly on these mechanical bowls to bad music. You can do it. But you can sort of see in a few of these videos there would be some drunk lady or a drunk guy who was just being kind of obnoxious. And you could tell that, but they weren't coming off. And you could tell that the operator would get sick of it and they were going real slow. Then there'd be like a right and just a really quick little flick of that switch and it would just like toss them off of there real fast. There is no way that there's not a term among mechanical bull operators for that move. For that move. Yes, there has to be. Oh, 1000%. I wonder what it is. If you know, please let us know because we have to know. We got Gillied. Yeah, that's right. You got anything else? Thankfully, no. Okay, well, that's it for mechanical bowls. If you want to know more about mechanical bulls, then start watching throwing off mechanical bulls videos. Like you said, a lot of them. And since I said throwing off mechanical bulls is time for listener mail. You know what I was just thinking? This could be the jackhammers of the next generation of stuff. You should know, listeners. Mechanical bolts. I don't know. I think Urban Cowboy saved it without Urban Cowboy. Absolutely. I think you're right. John Travolta saved the day again. And then it hit me. I was like the common denominator hydraulics. We got to avoid hydraulics from here on out. I think you might be right. All right, so where are we? Listener mail. Yes. I think Jerry already did the chime. All right, I'm going to call this CIA. Correction from Anonymous hey, guys, I've been a step, you should know, listener for years. I love the work you do. As someone who was formerly employed by the CIA, I particularly enjoyed the latest episode on Havana Syndrome. I've since left that job because of ethical concerns. But I have one knit to pick. And that's when you talk about people who work in the CIA, you call them agents, which is not right. They're actually officers. There is no such thing as the CIA agent. They say that this basically ruined the entire episode for them. That one thing. No, they're nice, but I mean, we always say CIA agent because we're children of television and film. I didn't know it wasn't even a thing. Everybody says that. They say this. I know the media gets this wrong a lot, so it's understandable. That's the terminology that folks use. But in the interest of always learning and improving, I thought I'd pass this along. Very nice. Josh actually did say officer a couple of times, somewhere in the middle, and that was the exception for you guys. Good. Other than this admittedly small quibble, I love everything you guys do and often use my favorite old episodes to calm my anxiety or to help as I fall asleep. Currently in heavy rotation in the Max Bedroom incident and Star Wars Holiday special episode, that will calm you down for sure. Yeah, thanks very much for reading the message. All the best, Anonymous. And initially, Anonymous said maybe use my initials because it might be a little paranoid about this being former CIA. But then they said how about just no initials? I think that's smart. Just go with Anonymous. Exactly. In fact, I made this whole thing up. There is no former officer that left for ethical concerns. This listener mail will self destruct in 3 seconds. Two, one. Well, if you want to get in touch with us and send us some trade secrets, we would love to hear that stuff. You can wrap it up, send it in an email. Off to stuffpodcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts my heartratio, visit the iHeartRadio Apple podcast or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
https://podcasts.howstuf…ysk-manhunts.mp3	How Manhunts Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-manhunts-work	When a suspect or prisoner goes on the lam there are plenty of ways to hide: in plain sight, in the mountains, in another country. There are as many types of ways law enforcement uses to track wanted people as their are ways to go on the lam, but there ar	When a suspect or prisoner goes on the lam there are plenty of ways to hide: in plain sight, in the mountains, in another country. There are as many types of ways law enforcement uses to track wanted people as their are ways to go on the lam, but there ar	Tue, 17 Dec 2013 18:01:17 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2013, tm_mon=12, tm_mday=17, tm_hour=18, tm_min=1, tm_sec=17, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=351, tm_isdst=0)	32697433	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the allnew 2014 Toyota Corolla. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's. Charles, Debbie, chuck Bryant. Guest producer. Noel is hanging out with us for today. No. And that makes the stuff. You should know the podcast. That's right. I got to come up with something different to call as soon as you know the podcast. Boring. The explanatory info cast. Right. I don't know. Podcast is what it is. Entertainment. Chuck. Yes. Do you know of a man named James Earl Ray? Yeah, he's a jerk. Yes. I saw him referred to as dim witted. Oh, really? Yeah, which makes his escape pretty thrilling and suspect. Really? Let me give you a little background. So James Earl Ray was a Missouri prison escapee when he rolled into Memphis to assassinate Martin Luther King Jr. Yes. Who was in Memphis to support the sanitation workers strike there in 1968. And James Earl Ray got a room across the street from the Lorraine Hotel where MLK was staying, apparently published in the papers not only where he was staying, but his room number, which I guess was custom at the time. Actually, from what I understand, it was customary. Okay. It wasn't unheard of. And James Roy got a room, found out that he had a decent shot at the balcony outside of King's room if he leaned out of the bathroom, the shared bathroom of his communal hotel. Shared bathroom, huh? Shared bathroom down. So somebody could have gone in and been like, oh, sorry, sir, pretty much. I didn't see you in here with that rifle, with that huge hunting rifle. Yeah. Well, he got a shot off, he killed MLK, and he ran out of this place. It was referred to as a flophouse, and he left behind valuable evidence with his print on it, namely the rifle bundle of his clothing and some other stuff that they used to create a trail for James Roy. Got a name, eventually got a picture, and James Roy made it out of Memphis, and he actually made it to Canada, and he made it to Portugal and then the UK. And the way he made it was under an assumed passport, which for a dimwitted Missouri prison escapee. Forged passport. That's pretty heavy stuff. Yeah. I think it was probably easier back then. Well, okay. He was traveling under the name George Ramon snead right. Yes. And they found out that he was traveling under that name because Canadian police, after being contacted by American authorities with a picture of James Roy, went through about 150,000 passports that they had accepted. I guess they had copies of them that I think about it, and then finally found one that looked like James Roy, found out that the person traveling under that passport was, in fact, at Heathrow Airport or in London. And when he went to Heathrow Airport, they apprehended him, and he said, you got me. I'm James Roy and I killed MLK. I imagine that was tough because everyone back then looked like James Roy. Yeah, pretty much. All those dudes look the same back in the 50s, although this is the 60s. But he still looked like that in the 50s. He looked 50s? He did. And he confessed and then later on of course, recanted and said no, I was part of a plot and a conspiracy. And they said TS. Well, actually the King family said you know what? We think this guy is telling the truth. Sure. And they got a new trial brought and he died in prison before he could be brought to trial again. Yeah, in the late ninety s. And then YouTube wrote a song about it. What song? It was the song Pride in the name of Love. Oh, yeah. Early morning, April 4. But that came before James Roy. Yeah. What do you mean? You said and then you too wrote it was just nothing. You confused me for a second. Yeah, and I don't know if it was early morning either. I think for some reason I always heard that Bono got that one wrong. Oh, really? Yes. I'll have to look that up. I'm not sure what time it was. Yeah, I'm sure we could find out. But Bond, I would then say that morning is like a state of mind or something. Right? Exactly. I'm cool. We got on blue sunglasses always so the Humphrey. James Roy is just one example. History is littered with manhunts. And what's strange about that is that no manhunt really resembles other manhunts. Yeah. I mean, it's weird. Like you can hole up in the woods for years and then eventually get caught. Or if you're Whitey Bulger, you can go out in your driveway in Santa Monica and get caught. I guess no manhunt is the same because no, going on the Lamb is the same. Some prefer hide in plain sight deal. Some prefer the middle of the woods. Some people prefer Bolivia. Sure. You know Nazis. What would you do? If I were on the run? Yeah. On the Lamb. I would probably be a woodland creature. I don't know. But even if I did know, I wouldn't say on the podcast because that'd be pretty dumb in case I ever do need to go on the Lamb in the future. Although the hide in plain sight thing, is there's something to be said for that? Sure, yeah. Well, I mean, you got to get some plastic surgery done in this day and age. Yeah, or just mess your face up a little bit. Well, actually with Whitey Bulger he was on the land with his longtime girlfriend Catherine Greg, I believe her name was, and she had extensive plastic surgery, which had nothing to do with being on the Lamb. She actually got them found. Oh, really? Yeah. So Why Boulder is on the line for 16 years, right? Yes. It was. He was up there with Osama bin Laden as one of America's most wanted fugitives. There was a million dollar bounty on it was big time. And whenever they found out that he had been somewhere, or they thought he was somewhere, the FBI would take out 32nd commercials on TV saying, have you seen this man? Have you seen this woman? This woman is known to frequent hair salons. This guy's, Whitey Bulger. Call the FBI if you see them in the area during times when his girlfriend's demographic would be watching TV. Sure. So this served to two full purpose. One, if she saw it and he saw it, then it would scare them and hopefully flush them out of hiding. Because it's a lot easier to get somebody out in the open. Yeah. Which is a common tactic. Right. Or two, the people that she might be friends with and associate with could be watching TV at the time and drop a dime on her. And in fact, that's what happened. Someone like some lady who gave her a pedicure at a hair salon really called and said, I think this woman that you're looking for is here, and this is her address. And the cops went to the apartment, said, sir, it looks like somebody broke into your storage unit here around the corner. And why do you bold your steps outside and they go clink? Why did they even say that? Could they not go inside or something? I guess they didn't have enough probable cause. They had to lure him outside. I love that. That's okay, right? It's not okay to come in, but it's okay to lie and say that your storage units busted into yeah. I'm surprised you fell for that, too. Yeah, I'm sure he is, too. He might have gotten lazy after 16 years? I don't think so, man. I think he was really wound up pretty tight. I read a long form article by a neighbor of his, young guy who, like, befriended him over the years, and he said he was wound up real tight. Always on the lookout. Did he write a book in cagey he will call like Neighbor to the Mob? I'm sure. Matthew Modine. Yeah. If I lived next to Whitey Baldred, that book would be on the shelves right now. Sure. And it would be called Neighbor to the Mob. I wonder what Aaron Cooper is going to make now. So who else we got? John Wilkes Booth. He famously went on the Lamb for a pretty short time after he shot Lincoln. Twelve days. And ended up in a farmhouse where there's all kinds of stories on how he might have died, whether he was burned alive, or whether he was truly rooted out by the fire and then shot. Did he die instantly? Did he linger? For a while. But either way, manhunts have been around as long as people have been killing people. Yeah. And there are some principles that do kind of hold true for all manhunts across the board, and pretty much one of them is get the public involved. Yeah. Because when you do that time and time again, manhunts have shown that somebody out there has seen this person recently and will call right. Especially these days with technology, with everyone having a camera in their pocket, basically, or sharing on social media or being up to the second with news reports. It's made manhunts easier. Yes. And then the other factor that makes for successful manhunt is having a lot of people doing a lot of grunt work. Like the Canadian officials going through all of those passports to try to find one that looked like James Ore. Yeah. I wonder how many people they visited before him. Like the other twelve guys that looked just like yeah, it's not me. All right, Chuck, so let's say that somebody is on the run in the United States, okay? And it's not a big deal. It's not necessarily a national manhunt, it's a regional manhunt. We'll say, okay, like someone knocked off the liquor store and shot somebody and was on the loose in a neighborhood. You want to find that guy, what do you do? Well, I'm glad you asked because I've done this with mirrored sunglasses on bloodhound. The first thing you got to do, my friend, is contain the area. It's called containment. And it sounds just like what it is. You are basically trying to seal off an area and watch all the possible exits from that area. If it's a neighborhood, I guess you're going to just pick out a certain amount of blockage and shut it down and have cops posted at each street exit. Right. And just know that we have at least this area completely contained if this dude is in here. And we're going to say guys, because how many times do women do stupid stuff like this and go on the Lamb? Not much. Sure. Have you not heard of fellman, Louise? It's like the one thing if you do have an area contained, what you want to do is not just not let anybody in or out without finding out if it's the person you're looking for. You also probably want to go door to door and say, hey, are you being held hostage right now? Did some guy with a gun come into your basement window recently? And that's what they did, actually, with a 20 square block area when they were searching for the Boston Marathon bombers. Yeah. Should we talk about those guys real quick? Sure. They were jerks, too. Yeah. The SAR Enough Brothers blew up a couple of pressure cookers fashioned into bombs at the finish line in the Boston Marathon. And FBI got on it pretty quick with getting photos released of who they thought these guys were, which turned out to be really key because after kind of a crazy scene where one of them was shot and killed by the police. Like throwing bombs at the cops. Yeah. Quite a scene run over by his brother. And then the one, I guess, is that Zocar the D is silent, right? Yeah. Joe Car or Jocar? Jocar. I think he is the one that ended up in a residential neighborhood hiding in a boat under a tarp, and they sniffed him off the case with some infrared imaging, and basically it was like Predator. They're like, there's a guy in that boat because I see his red body breathing. Right. So the reason that they found out that the dude was in the boat was because the person who owned the boat was in this area under the security lockdown in containment, and was well aware, thanks to the local news and social media and everything else, that they were looking for this guy. So when he saw that there was a dude in his boat, he called the cops. That's how the cops found suspect number two in the Boston bombing case. Right. I bet that was a rush for that guy. I read about what he said. I think he was kind of scared, I'm sure, because it's pretty obvious. You see a guy, there's a lock down your neighborhood, and you see a guy go climb under your boat, tarp in their backyard. Right. That's him. Yeah. Bleeding guy. I think he was bleeding at the time. Even more reason Boston is a great case, because it's recent, everybody knows about it, but because it has so many different points to it, that really kind of give you an idea of what a manhunt consists of. So you've got containment. You've got a door to door search. You've got the public transportation being shut down. Yeah, that was a big one. That's part of containment as well. Yeah. They set up a no fly zone. They closed the schools. They shuttered businesses. It was basically the biggest shutdown of a major US. City in history. Right. People who were in the containment area were asked to not leave their house. That horrid newspeak. Shelter in place. Term. That sounds like you should be in a corner, like, citizen shelter in place. I remember a tweet from Dr. Ruth while that was going on. She's saying, hey, if you're having the shelter in place, maybe now's a good time to turn off the TV and get intimate with your loved one. I couldn't believe it. Wow. Yeah. They say they're still counting up the money, but it's tallying up to over a billion dollars for that manhunt. What? Isn't that crazy? Somebody's milking that. You got to think billion dollars. I got a little sidebar. Not on a manhunt, but President Obama came through my neighborhood a few months ago, like, on his way to school in Decatur for something cool and literally drove, like, down the block from my house. The motorcade did. Did you run out to him? Well, no. You can't that's my point, my friend. You remember Chris Cox, his wife. We ended up being stuck at the same intersection, and her house was across the street, like 40ft away. She's like, sir, that is my house. I have a babysitter there. I'm paying. Like, can I just walk across the street? And he was like, no. He would not let her walk across the street and enter her own home. You have no rights. The president is on your street. Yeah. And he wasn't even it took, like, another half hour, and she's like, I really just need to walk right there. And he wouldn't allow it. So that's some serious lockdown. I guess the point is, when the government wants to lock you down, they can lock you down. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. So, Chuck, you do have rights, however. Well, yeah, it's a good segue, I guess. It was a great segue, buddy. Yeah. If you're being told not to leave your house, first of all, you can technically leave your house, can you? I think your risk of being shot at by the police go through the roof, maybe. So that's a pretty good reason not to leave your house, just out of common sense. You can be enraged all you want indoors. Well, just like any other night. And the police can't just come busting down your door saying, Is he in here? No. Okay, let's go kick down the next door. They can knock and say, can we come in and look? And you can say yay or nay. If they have probable cause, say one of them saw the suspect run into your house. They can go in after them without asking you. Yeah. Or if they're creeping around your backyard and peeking in your windows, which they can do legally. Yeah. The cops yeah. They could see somebody they think looks like the suspect, and that's probable cause. There's a loophole big enough to drive, like, an armored truck through if you're not picking up on that. Yes. If they need to provide emergency services, they can do that. Yeah. They can say, oh, we thought you needed CPR. We're glad to see you're okay. Now that we're in your house, we're looking around. Or another big loophole is the accident circumstances, which, I don't know, in the case of Boston, they could probably barge into anyone's home and be covered under that one. Yeah. That's basically, like, there's a state of emergency going on. Like, civil law is just out the window because the situation is so dire, and yeah. They argued that this guy was running around with explosives. That's an emergency. Sure. As far as I know, they didn't go into any houses. Unbidden, though. Yeah. And we're not trying to say, like, in a case like that, bust down some doors. I'm not saying cops shouldn't be doing this stuff. There are, like, two bombers on the loose, so I get it. Even still, the cops don't want to bust down a door because they're going to have to prove exigent circumstances. And if they can't, then any evidence that they got from an unlawful searches out the door. So their case could be as well. Yeah. You got to be careful with stuff like that. The last thing you want to do is have your walk. You like all this cops speak? Yeah. Walk. Yeah. If your perp walks because of bad evidence, then you're going to be what's it called when the cop gets 86? Suspended without pay. I'm feeling like we're channeling the TV show episode. We? Yeah. You're like, we had a TV show? Yeah, just found out about that. Okay, where are we then? Well, I was saying that one of the hallmarks of a good manhunt is having a lot of people doing a lot of work. And again, Boston was a good example of that. You had a lot of different law enforcement agencies, basically ones you hadn't even heard of, all ponying up personnel. Yeah. I mean, you're going to get state cops, local cops, sheriff's, FBI, and that's for a case like that. Or obviously if it's something like UBL, then everyone's seen Zero Dark 30. Or if you haven't, you should. You got, like, thousands of people over a decade all over the world working together. It was just that one lady. It's just the one lady, the pretty redhead. So the author of this article makes a pretty good point that during a manhunt there is such thing as what in police speak would be called collateral damage. I guess. Sure. Like, the LAPD search for Christopher Dorner is a very good example of this. Do you remember that case? Yeah. Man, that was freaky. Yeah. There's a Facebook page. It's 20,000 plus people strong. It's called We Stand With Christopher Dorner. Oh, really? Yeah, because he left behind so he was an LAPD officer who was fired for making a false accusation against another cop when he reported that a cop he was working with kicked a homeless man during an arrest. But that was false. It was found false, and he was fired as a result. Right. From his perspective, if you see it through his eyes, that was all just a huge cover up, and they got rid of the troublemaker who was not going with the flow on the force. The LAPD covering up Malfeasance. Right. That's weird. So he leaves this angry manifesto about how the LAPD is the most corrupt organization on the planet, and it's racist, and there's a lot of people out there who are like, I know this to be true because I've been on the wrong end of a nightstick with the LAPD. I've seen La confidential. Yeah, exactly. That's in the 40s. Yeah, I know they've cleaned it up a lot, but that is one department in this country that has been fraught with allegations. Yeah. And his point was they haven't cleaned it up a lot. They just got better at PR. So he takes the manifesto and ends up going on an assassination killing spree, killing cops. He killed the woman who represented him in his case, who was the daughter of a cop. And it was announced that's what's so scary about it was like he was like, hey, I'm coming to kill cops. Exactly. You're not going to see me coming either. He was on a rampage. Yes. It was scary stuff. So the LAPD is super jumpy at this point, and they fire on not one, but two cars that don't have Christopher Dorner in them. Killed two people. Unbelievable. As a result. And finally there's a standoff after they find them, thanks to some park rangers in Big Bear or Big Sir, one of the two Big Bear. And he ends up setting the cabin. He's been on fire and perishing in flames. That was crazy. But the fact is, two different cars were shot on by the LAPD during the search for this guy. So these aren't just necessarily clean affairs. Same with bin Laden. This is part of a campaign that took place over a very long time, and a lot of people were killed to weaken the structure that was hiding him still. Yeah, drone strikes out the wazoo. They use some pretty interesting tactics, too, that were not in the movie, even though I've heard the movie is pretty accurate. But they didn't include everything, obviously. They sent a doctor in, a CIA guy who conducted an immunization drive in the neighborhood where they believe his compound was there, and basically hoping to come across DNA from him or his family under the guise of a blood drive. Right. It was an immunization drive. Yeah. They didn't call it like, hey, it's a DNA collection drive. But there was a big public outcry, especially from the vaccine establishment, saying, like, dude, you can't do that because now our name is on that vaccine. Right. And the next time we want to have a real vaccine drive, no one's going to show up and our vaccination people are going to get killed because they're going to think they're CIA. Yeah, there's a big hubbub about that. That's legit these days. It's tough, especially if you're in a city like London, England, to do anything without being caught on a closed circuit camera. In fact, that's how they eventually identified with the help of actually one of the victims in Boston. They were on camera, too. But if you're in a big city, it's tough to get away with anything these days. Cameras are everywhere. They also have I mentioned the infrared device, the forward looking infrared device, night vision. You've got all sorts of tricks up your sleeve as law enforcement agencies. You think you're hiding in a boat under a tarp, it's pretty safe. You don't think about the dude with the Predator camera that can see you from 50ft away breathing heavily. Right. They also have, like, armored trucks. I think you mention those even not even about this. Like from Die Hard? Yeah. And you see those things roll in. Like I'm sure they love to play with those once a year again, those LAPD. Yes. But those are very expensive. But they do come in handy, I guess, about once a year, if you can afford it, if your town is large enough. We should say that there was facial recognition software that they had working on the video for the Boston bombing, and it did not work. Yeah, we have an article on that, by the way. I think we should cover that at some point. Facial recognition? Yeah. That's scary stuff. Apparently, Google has one that they won't release to the public. Oh, really? Because they're afraid of the use it will be put to it's. Like, that good. Wow. And that potentially bad, but the one the CIA has doesn't work that well. I can see Google having way better algorithms than the CIA. That's true. So, Chuck, another aspect of Boston search, the Boston Manhunt, was the use of social media for good and ill, or did good effect and bad, I should say. Yeah. Getting the word out on Facebook and Twitter is not a bad idea. Yeah, well, the Reddit was kind of the star of the show, or the scapegoat, I should say, for social media in the search for the Boston bombing suspects, because there were apparently, like, a couple of thousand video stills and photographs from the area around the time of the bombing posted on a subreddit. And all of these people were, like, combing through them like they were trying to crowdsource this manhunt. Yes. Which is a good intention. Yeah. They were looking for suspects. This is before anybody ever released any official photos. And that in and of itself is kind of a good idea. Sure. But it went a step further where the people on Reddit were saying, okay, I've got to figure it out, and it's this person, and they would name a suspect. And all of a sudden, there's a rumor out there that this person bombed the Boston Marathon even though they hadn't. So Reddit took a lot of heat for that. Apparently. They even took that forum down. But social media also helped in a lot of ways because everybody was totally connected to this manhunt and had completely up to the date information, up to the minute information from within that containment area, from everywhere. And I guess kind of helped a little more than just passively watching television during a manhunt. Yeah. That's the .1 of my favorite man hunts. And it is weird to say that, but actually, you know what? Let's take a break. I'm going to tease that, and I'm going to reveal my favorite manhunt after the break. So who is it? It's the uni bomber. Okay. Yeah. Kaczynski was on the Lamb for 18 years. One of the lengthiest manhunts in US. History. Not easy to hide out for that long. And he did it, which he did it in the wild of Montana. Just pretty good idea, I guess if you're going to hide out, just drop off the map. Yes. Type manifestos, actually. Montana. They should have been looking there. They should have been going there first. But he mailed 16 bombs over the course of quite a few years and ended up killing three people, wounding 23 more, and had a million dollar bounty on his head, was one of the most wanted. And eventually he was rooted out by his own brother, who read one of the manifestos and said, it sounds like Teddy, and went to the cops and said, hey, this guy might be my brother. The writing style, the things he's saying, it very well could be my brother. And it turned out that was him. Right. Which is another point for the case that for a manhunt to work, you have to get the public involved. And they did so by publishing these manifestos and said, anybody familiar with this? Yeah. And the guy's brother said, yeah, me. Yeah, same with Eric. Robert Rudolph. Yeah. His name I don't remember how they caught him. I believe it was hikers in the woods. Okay. Turned him in. I might be wrong, but he was definitely hiding out in the woods. And he was, of course, the olympic bomber, not the guy they originally pinned it on, which was pretty sad, right? What was his name? Richard Jewell. Yeah. Man, I felt so bad for that dude. Yeah. Can you imagine? Life ruined. Yeah. And they compensated him pretty handsomely afterward, but then he only lived a couple million. Oh, he died? Yeah, he died of a heart attack a few years after that. I don't think I knew that. Yeah, because he's like, I'm eating steak and lobster every night. That's me. The drawn book. Richard Jewell. Yeah. I didn't know he died. So back to online real quick. There's evidence that you can crowdsource a manhunt. There's a whole group of people that live online that are into true crime, that are that, like, used their interest in their online search skills to try to find the identities of long lost serial killers. And there's all sorts of online manhunts that amateurs take on. And apparently the state department held something called the tag challenge, where they had people hiding in cities around the world, and people had 12 hours online. Contestants had 12 hours to find them in, like, these five different cities. That's fun. Using just mug shots. And it worked. So they found that with a search, as time becomes more of an essence, as the pressure mounts, people stop just shooting the info out to wherever they can and start really targeting, focusing their search. And once you have a bunch of people doing that who are really focused on searching, but a lot of them. And sharing information like on social media. That's when a search, and not just a manhunt or search for a person, but a search for anything becomes most successful. I guess. Well, yeah, imagine in Boston, I bet every thousands of people in that 20 square block radius are looking out of their window. Oh yeah. For this dude, yeah. So you've got thousands and thousands of more eyeballs. That's two eyeballs per person in most cases. Unless you're one of those weird pirates. Boston pirates. That helps. As long as they're not out, don't grab their guns and get in position. Yeah, that's scary. Well, that's why they released the pictures of the suspects finally. Because they were trying to crack down on online vigilante that could lead to real life vigilanteism. Yeah. So hats off to the dude who saw the dude in the boat. You got anything else? I got nothing else. Alright, well if you want to learn more about man hunts, you can type that word in the search bar, how stuff works. And since I said search bar, that means it's time for listener mail. Yeah, I'm going to call this chess about chess. And I'm going to read a couple of them. Not here, but one now and one another episode because we got a lot of great feedback from chess enthusiasts. I noticed people dig this game. This is from David Wagner. Hi guys. While you were discussing the concept of casting, you all said you didn't quite understand the value or strategy behind it. You're right. It is all about protecting the king. Remember how you pointed out that you want to control the center of the board? Yes. That when your pieces are off to the side they're not as strong. Yes. Well that has a lot to do with why you want to castle. Basically, the king is more vulnerable, open to attacks, and has less protection when he remains in his original E or D square. So you want to castle him and get him away from those center squares. Got you. Also, you talk about the onpassant rule, which is one of my favorites and something almost never pass up. You sound like TV. Huh? Mostly because I rarely get a chance to implement it. It doesn't happen when a pond passes another pond though. On its first move out. It is when it lands next to another pond that the latter pond can capture it. So I think we screwed that up a little bit. Yeah, scoot it up big time. Not big time, we were close. No, I got that way wrong. One last thing and then I'll quit. Chess pieces. You're going to love this. Okay. And they're symbols on top. Many of the basic pieces themselves serve as visual reminders of how they can move. For example, the knight is L shaped, which is how it moves. The bishop's miter has a diagonal slit in it. They move diagonally. The rook, when seen from above can move in the basic cardinal directions forward, back, left, right. And on top of the rock, there are turrets pointing in all the cardinal directions. Nice. A queen has many points on her crown showing that she can go in any way, any direction. And that small little cross on top of the king lets you know how far he can go, although that doesn't include his diagonal moves, which he can move in because the whole theory kind of falls apart there a little bit. But that is from David Wagner in Columbia, South Carolina. Nice. Thanks a lot. David Wagner. That was a great email. Pleasant approachable, gentle with the correction. Just good stuff all around. You can dance to it. All right, man. Way to go, Wagner. If you want to send us an email or reach out to us digitally to say hello or whatever, you can tweet to us, join us on Twitter at siskpodcast. Join us on Facebook@facebook.com stuffyhoodnow, send us an email to stuffpodcast@discovery.com and hang out at our awesome website, it's calledstepyhealth.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetofworks.com. Brought to you by the allnew 2014 Toyota Corolla. Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out. The sun is shining, the daylights longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music, My Favorite Murder from exactly right media, My Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarif and Georgia Hardstarkk, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
a66cc9dc-5462-11e8-b449-874f7ed64bf6	How Elimination Diets Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-elimination-diets-work	Elimination diets are all about whittling down what you eat, then building it back up again in order to identify foods that don't work for your body. Is it safe? It can be. Learn all about this process in today's episode.	Elimination diets are all about whittling down what you eat, then building it back up again in order to identify foods that don't work for your body. Is it safe? It can be. Learn all about this process in today's episode.	Thu, 30 Aug 2018 13:30:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2018, tm_mon=8, tm_mday=30, tm_hour=13, tm_min=30, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=242, tm_isdst=0)	42075193	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from howstuffworkscom? Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W, Huggy, Bear, Bryant and Jerry's over there. Here. So this is the Mod squad. What? I'm just mixing metaphors. I can't remember who said it this way, but ever since I was researching this, I've been saying in my head, elimination. What is that from? Oh, man. Sounds like a mad doctor. Maybe a little bit of German and latke from Taxi. I have no idea. I don't know. Well, when I think elimination, I think that the term for pooping something out. So it makes me think that it's like a diet where you just poop everything out and you get skinny that way. Yeah, I know that's not what it is, but it's what I think about. Man, I feel bad for people with poop problems. Me, too. It's a tough thing. Me, too. Whether you can't or you do too much or it's just unpleasant one way or another. Yeah, for sure. It's bad stuff. Yeah. And it has to do with this, because IBS is certainly one condition where one might want and we should do a show on that, but where one might want to propose an elimination diet. Are you going to say it like that the whole time? No, because I was hoping you were. I'll do one more rule of threes. I'll do one more at some point, but just out of nowhere, huh. You're not going to know what's coming. You know, there's a 100% chance that you'll forget to do it again. Probably. Okay. That's the stuff you should know. Why? That's right under Deliver. So, Chuck, we're talking about elimination diets, man. Yes, we are. And that doesn't really mean that you poop your pounds away. It doesn't really have anything to do with losing weight, actually, to tell you the truth. And yet it is one of the hottest trends right now in America, at least, if not the west in general, where you cut out a bunch of foods and then you add them back to see if there's something behind whatever is bothering you. Whether it's irritable bowel syndrome, whether you get headaches, whether you get tired at 03:00 p.m.. Whatever it is, you change your lifestyle temporarily, slowly add back all of the components that made up your lifestyle and try to identify the thing that was messing with you. And that's an elimination diet. And it's all the rage right now. Yeah. I don't know if controversy is the right word. Sure. Let's say it can be controversial in that sometimes someone goes to a doctor or nutritionist or some kind of health professional for an assistance with something like this, but many times these days, people will just do it themselves. Yeah. Mostly, I would say. Yeah. Which isn't inherently bad. If you do it the right way, you can learn a lot about your body and what foods work best for you. But it can also go wrong in a lot of ways. So let's get into it. My little caveat, I guess. Well, we're going to talk more about that later, right? Yeah, for sure. Okay. All right. You kind of hit upon how some people go to see, like, a nutritionist or a doctor to do an elimination diet. That's originally where the whole thing started. This is an outgrowth of basically a medical procedure where if you say, I don't really feel very good, my poops are all over the place, I fall asleep while I'm talking to people. I get headaches. I'm feeling kind of anxious. There's a whole suite of things that I'm not sure what's wrong with me, but there's a lot of stuff that I feel like is wrong with me, and I'm starting to suspect that it might have something to do with my diet. So I'm here to see you, doctor, nutritionist, MD. And the nutritionist will say, what? Chuck? I don't know. What will they say? Maybe they'll say, elimination diet. Yeah, they'll say, I propose an elimination diet. And that is the sort of middle of the road, legit way to do this. Again, most people do this DIY style, and it's not necessarily a bad way to do it, but we're here to tell you how you should go about that. We're not doctors or nutritionists. Good point. But there are some pretty brainless steps that if you don't follow, you could end up making things worse. Right. Which is, again, why this is originally a medical procedure that was kind of hijacked and done, not that great all the time. But in addition to this elimination diet, which we'll go through in a second, the steps of it, you are probably also going to get a skin prick test, where they will well, they prick your skin to see if they get an allergic reaction from you and or a blood test. But here's part of the problem, and I suspect that this is why some people do this on their own. The skin prick test is not an infallible test. And even a blood test for things like food sensitivities and food allergies, I saw that they give false positives around, like, 75% of the time, which that's not a test. That's worse than chance. It sounds like that's terrible. That's a terrible track record if you'll remember back from our extremely confusing false positives episode. So I think that's probably why some people do it on their own. Is there, like, I don't need the blood test or the skin prick test. I can do this myself. That leads me into this stat. 30% of Americans think they have a food allergy when only 3% do. Right. But just because you don't have a food allergy, and we're going to talk about allergy sensitivities and tolerances, it doesn't mean that if you quit drinking and eating sugar and loading down with carbs, you might feel a lot better. Yes. And some people suspect that this is what's really behind an elimination diet, because just from the attention that you pay to what you're eating or not eating and to your health in general, that it forces you to adopt, I mean, that's going to have probably a positive beneficial effect in and of itself. But that's not to say that it doesn't actually do something more than that. And it has to do a lot with food allergies and sensitivities and stuff. And let's take a break and then we'll talk about all that. How about that? Great. So before we get going with allergies, I wish I could remember his name, but with that last story about the diabetes, I did have one listener right in after that episode and really kind of sent a very sweet and loving email about me and my health and I'm going to go back and find out who it was. But you know who you are if you sent that. And that did this is before even this weird false positive. But it meant a lot to me and kind of kicked me into gear even before that test. Oh, that's great, man. Yeah, it was very nice. So back to allergies. We did a pretty good episode on allergies. We know that allergies are a defense against what it thinks is a harmful invader, whether it's a virus or some other kind of sickness. But with allergies and food allergies especially, a lot of times it can get it wrong and your body can think it's wording off. An invader that's not really an invader, right? As far as you're concerned, it's the exact same thing. You can have an allergic reaction. Your body sends either T cells or immunoglobulin cells that go to the site and say, oh yeah, look, we've got a foreign invader. You inflame, you start a fever, you make this stuff, make everything itchy, and you have an immune response mounted. Now that's really good. Like you said, if there's like an actual pathogen or whatever, but an allergy, is that mistaken identity? Yes, strawberries, I'm just a strawberry. And they're like, that's what the last pathogen said. Yeah, exactly. I'm on to you, fraud. And then they beat up the poor strawberry and it's dead from that point on. But that's an allergy. It's just mistaken identity. That's the same body process. It's the thing that's kicking it off. Shouldn't really be kicking it off. It's not a threat. But again, to you, it doesn't matter if you want to stay away from stay away from strawberries or eggs or soy or peanuts because, yeah, it can kill you. And one of the hallmarks of a food allergy in particular is it doesn't matter if you have a peck of strawberries or a bushel or if you just have a little nibble of a strawberry, you're going to have that allergic reaction. And you need to stay away from strawberries altogether because like you said, it can be lifethreatening. Yeah. So that's an allergy. You can also be intolerant or sensitive. Like when we did our Gluten episode, a lot of people do not have celiac disease, but they may be intolerant of gluten. Yeah. A non celiac gluten sensitivity, I think is what it's called, which is also called gluten intolerance. Yeah. So that's a little bit different because an intolerance is triggered by your digestive system, not your immune system. Right. So what this usually means is you're lacking a certain enzyme, maybe that is required to digest whatever food that you're sensitive to or intolerant to, rather. Yeah, which doesn't sound like that would be really bad. Like, you're just like, okay, I'll just poop it out. But there's actually some compounds that are found in food that. If they enter your digestive tract because you can't break it down. It can wreak havoc on you and produce all sorts of horrible symptoms in you from pooping everywhere. Again. From horrible cramps. Bloating. And then things that have to do with your mood as well. Which sounds surprising at first until you remember that there's like a gut brain connection. Like, 90% of the serotonin in your brain is actually produced in your gut. So when your gut's going haywire because you've eaten something that you don't have an enzyme to metabolize, other things besides the serotonin production are happening, and you might have some sort of altered brain chemistry as a result. Yeah. And celiac disease, it does have a component of immune system response. Right. So that is not I mean, that is a legit. Allergy right, but gluten sensitivity, or gluten intolerance, is different. It doesn't have the immune system. But you're still hating life because you just ate a pizza crust that wasn't made from cauliflower. And again, now you're pooping everywhere. Right. Then you have the third bucket, which is the sensitivity. And this is not something they have studied much. It says in our own article, it's a bit of a mystery of medical science, but we just know that some people are like, MSG makes me feel bad and I'm sensitive to it. That's everybody right. Does that happen to you? I don't know, because I don't know. When I've had MSG always, I used to put straight up MSG on my popcorn. It's really tasty stuff, but it can give you headaches and make you feel like there's, like a shivering claw, grabbing the top of your stomach. Just all sorts of weird stuff. Yeah. I just remember for a while there, chinese food was the enemy of people. Yes. And I was always like, man, I love Chinese food. That Chinese food syndrome. Basically blaming it on MSG. Right? Yeah, I saw that. Basically accused of being kind of racist, actually, before that. Chinese food doesn't do that to anybody any more than other foods, especially other foods with MSG. But you're not going to attack a cheeseburger. A good american cheeseburger. Exactly. It's not like you have freedom fries syndrome or something. It's always Chinese food syndrome. Yeah. It's an eye opening to see that from that other perspective. Chinese food syndrome rolls off the tongue. Sure. I'm not going to give up my egg roll. So the other thing about sensitivity is that, like you said, it's understudied, not well understood, because you might eat some MSG one day and get terrible headaches and that claw on the top of your stomach, and the next day you might have some MSG and be fine. And so they have no idea what accounts for having the headache in the claw. And so it's something we'll probably know more about in the future, but for now, because we know so little about it, you'll often hear intolerance and sensitivity interchangeable. And this article is one of the few places where I saw them broken out as separate things, actually. Yeah. And I don't remember what our attitude was like when we did our gluten episode way back when. I'm sure it was inclusive and welcoming. I hope so, because since Emily has become gluten intolerant, there have been people that have, like, poo pooed. And I'm like, man, if somebody is eating something that even if it's just their perception that it makes them feel bad and they don't want to eat it, who cares? I saw this thing. I agree with you. No skin off your back. Right? I know. What is it that bugs people like that? I really wish we could get to the bottom of it, because I think it would clear up a lot of stuff if when you saw that, and I think everybody does it, you just get judgy and just irritated that somebody's bought into something that you don't believe in or whatever you want to say. If you could step back and be like, oh, I'm just being or this is my going off, I really think that would clear that up a lot. But it's just so easy to go with that. I know. Maybe for some of these people, it's just like not eating heavy breads and enriched flour and the stuff that gluten is in. Maybe it just makes you feel better to not eat that stuff. That's fine, too. I saw that the guy who basically proved that that non celiac gluten sensitivity was a thing back in 2011, it's an Australian doctor named Peter. We'll just call him Peter Gibson? Okay. Doctor Peter crocodile on the Barbie with the Foster slab as his full name. But he proved that there was a gluten intolerance that wasn't immune based. Right. He proved that this was around, and when he did follow ups, he found that actually, that doesn't seem to be the case because in these placebo groups, they still had the same kind of symptoms. And he now has taken it from gluten to something called FODMAPs. Have you heard of them? No. Fermentable ogleodie monosaccharides and polyols. Oh, wait, yes, we talk about that. I think. I don't remember ever talking about it before in my life. I just came across it in the last two days. I think we have okay, well, if my brain shot to hell. But these Fob maps, they are component. It's a type of carb, and it's found in gluten in some weed products, but it's also found in other stuff, too. And so this guy has said, I think these are the actual culprit, not necessarily gluten. Now, if you have celiacs, it's gluten, sure. But if you have gluten intolerance he's saying, I think it's these FODMAPs. That's great. If you could narrow it down even further. But from the looks of it, it sounds like that means you've got a lot of other food that you can't eat either, rather than just pizza crust. You poor bastard. Yeah. And then the people in the audience of the convention hall say, is he saying fog hat? Free ride. Should we take a break and then talk about how to do an elimination diet? Oh, wait, it's slow ride. Would you say freeride? Yes, I did. I confounded slow ride and free bird and just walked right past the third use of elimination. I'm going to sleep for the rest of this. Okay. All right, so we'll be back right after this to talk about how to do this. If you want to do this yourself, I think you kind of see Aid, right already. Yeah, let's do it again. I recommend that you go see a licensed nutritionist, do some research first, make sure you get somebody who's really good, maybe an MD, and say, I want to try this. Help me out, and they'll help you out. Or you can also go on the Internet and just find some schmo who's done it before, published a book about it, and is now a multi billionaire because they did their own elimination diet. And everybody's doing those, too. Yeah. If you go to do it on your own, though, take your time. This might take a month or two. Don't rush in there and be like, all right, I'm going to eat chicken broth for the next month. There are safe ways to do it, and they generally involve four steps, which is planning the eliminating round, the reintroducing, and then evaluating. Okay, so hold on. Before we go any further. Yes. I just pinpointed how legally exposed we are right now. This is what we're doing. We're saying, you were talking to somebody, like, we're encouraging it, so let's do this instead. Let's say Sally and Tom. Brenda and Eddie. Brenda and Eddie. They're going to do an elimination diet, and this is how they're going to do it. How about that? Great. That's genius, isn't it? So Brenda and Eddie are going to sit down. I thought it was Sally and Tom. They say, well, they live next door to each other, and they partner swap. So they're into it. They said, we got to plan this out first, honey. And she says, sure, dear, let's do this. Let's sit down and let's just write down a big list of our symptoms when we feel poopy butt or when we feel super tired or whatever. Yeah. When we feel constipated, maybe. And then let's list out what we think might be some of these problem foods. And what we're really going to do is start a journal before we do anything and start writing down what we're eating, maybe for a couple of weeks even, and how we feel after we eat stuff. And maybe we can sort of see a pattern start to emerge. Yeah. And you also want to write down the foods you're craving, foods you would feel like you would have the hardest time giving up. Apparently those are frequently the culprits. Yeah, I've heard of that. Even with kids. I didn't know that, actually. Yeah, like a kid who always wants to drink milk may end up having a dairy allergy. So it's basically just our tendency to punish ourselves. What's behind this stuff? Right? There's probably some evolutionary reason it makes zero sense, but okay, I don't know. Well, maybe it does make sense because maybe that could potentially be a dangerous thing and your body craves it, so it will then know that it's an allergen. I don't know. Could be population control, may be thinning the herd, maybe. That's it. All right, so if you made your list, you're keeping your journal and you're like, all right, here's what I think the deal is. I think for me, it's sugar and dairy. So I'm going to eliminate for two to three weeks all dairy and all sugar from my diet. I'm going to keep up with this journal. I might have some sugar withdrawal that will be all right after a few days, and I'm going to look in my food diary at the end of this, and I might have to start over from scratch. Or I might say, you know what? I eliminated dairy, and I feel great. Right, but since you eliminated, say, dairy and sugar and actually with a lot of elimination diets, you do a bunch of them at once, right? Yeah. But you don't want to do too many at once. That's true. That's true. You're right. So let's just keep it simple and sugar and dairy with the caveat that you frequently will need to do more than that. But as you cut them out for like, two weeks, you've given your body enough time to basically clear up any symptoms that you may have generated by eating this stuff. This is phase two, because you've journaled maybe done a little scrapbooking, but that's still part of the same phase, maybe a pinterest board. Phase two is the actual elimination diet. Part of the elimination diet, yeah. And if you're cutting out something like dairy, like all dairy, then you may need to. And this is where it really helps if you're working with a health professional. Right. You might need to supplement what you got from that dairy, whether it's calcium or vitamin D or whatever. This is one reason why we switched over to the Sally, Tom, Brenda Eddie scenario, because there's a lot of things that can go wrong that you can accidentally do to yourself with an elimination diet, which, again, is why you should go to a professional for it. But Sally and Tom are doing their elimination diet right now. They've cut out sugar and dairy, and they've made it to the two week line. And like you said, they feel great. Right. And now you get to phase three, which is what's called challenge. It's the challenge phase. And what you're doing is you're challenging your body with these foods that you've cut out to see if the symptoms will reproduce. Right. And the way that you do that I'm sorry, this is really tough to remember. The way that Sally and Tom do this is they wake up on the first day of phase three, and they have a little bit of milk cream in their coffee, and they drink it, and they sit around and they stare at each other, maybe take the day off of work, and then nothing happens. So they have a little more. They have maybe like a glass of milk with lunch, and then maybe they just drink straight from the cow for dinner, and they reintroduce dairy for that one day, and then they stop again. And then they spend two days back on the elimination diet like it was before and see what happens. And they say over two days, that's enough time for the symptoms to reappear. And then you do the second step of this phase, which is you go to the sugar now, right. You do the same thing. This is a big key that I hadn't thought about. If you don't produce those symptoms from the first part, where you do the dairy and everything's all good, and then you move on to the sugar, that doesn't mean you add dairy back in. You stay off of dairy for the rest of the diet. Everything that you quit as you challenge yourself, you still go back to staying off of it as you're doing new challenges, and you keep doing that until you've gone through all the foods that you cut out. And then you've entered the final phase, which is the done with the elimination diet part of the diet. Yeah. And, boy, it can get really confusing because you got to be really organized, brenda and Eddie do, right? Because it might be the coffee or the caffeine, and you put the cream in it and you think it's the cream, but it was really the coffee to begin with. So maybe you should have eliminated coffee as well at the beginning. But it also can be very broad. It's not like, well, this one vegetable is the cause of all my troubles, or milk is really what kills me. But I'm fine with cheese and every other form of dairy. It's probably a broader category, like dairy in general. Yeah, a food group is what they still call them, just like when we were kids. Yeah. So, yeah, you're going to cut out dairy, you're going to cut out carbs, or you're going to cut out certain kinds of vegetables or legumes or something like that, or maybe meat or wheat, whatever. But these are all considered food groups. So, yeah, you might have a little creamer in your coffee and then like cheese at dinner or something like that when you're reintroducing the dairy food group. But because it could be as specific as a type of cheese, there's a lot of difference between fresh cheese and cheese that's been cave aged for five years that could actually make a difference in your sensitivity to it. Yeah. Or is Chuck lactose intolerant? Or does he get poopy but when he eats a pint of sugary ice cream all in one sitting right. Which again, is another reason why you want to why a lot of people will cut out more than just a couple of food groups and then when they challenge, you got to keep it pure like that. I think that's what you're saying, right? You don't want to mix sugar and dairy together when you challenge your body again during the elimination diet. Correct? Yeah. I think maybe I was just trying to speak, too. If I eat half a pizza and a pint of ice cream, that doesn't necessarily mean I am dairy intolerant. That maybe means that you shouldn't eat four pieces of pizza and eat a big thing on ice cream. I got you. You know what I mean? That's an overdose of dairy, which is not the same thing as like, dairy really messes me up. I'm really glad you brought that up because that's actually, again, that's a distinction between an intolerance or a sensitivity and an allergy. Remember, with an allergy, it doesn't matter how much of the food you eat, you're going to have a reaction with the sensitivity and an intolerance. Too little amounts you can slide by with them. And that's actually one of the things that people find out with elimination diets, is, okay, I'm sensitive to dairy, but I found that I can actually have one slice of pizza when I have that second or third one that I begin to poop everywhere. Yeah. Or like alcohol, I can have a glass of wine and I'm fine. What I'm allergic to is nine gin and tonics. That's why I have poopy butt. Right? That's not why I have poopy, but I'm just saying in general, pooping everywhere. That was Eddie and Tom talking, right? Yeah. Here's another cool thing, though. If you already have other allergies have nothing to do with food, you kind of have a head start because a lot of times there I don't know if comorbid is a word, but like, if you have a latex allergy, you could also be allergic to certain vegetables or fruits. Right. And there are lists where people know, like doctors know, hey, latex is also sort of comorbid with apples, let's say. So do you eat apples? Are you allergic to latex? That might be a problem. Isn't that fascinating? I looked up, I was like, well, why do they I think it's called co. Yeah, it's not comorbid. What is it, cross reactive? Yeah, it's called a cross reactive food. And they don't know. They just know that if you have a latex if you have a latex allergy, you're probably very allergic to, say, bananas or something too. So that's wonderful. It's nice that there's still new mysteries out there that people are looking into. When you have a latex allergy and they ask you that at the dentist and doctor and you do have one, does that mean they dig into your mouth with their bare hands? No, I think there's non latex gloves. I think nitrile gloves is non latex. Why don't they just use those all the time, then? They probably do, just out of keeping it cheaper. Everyone always asks, though, still, do you have a latex allergy? Yeah, because I don't think it's just the gloves. It can be like an intubation tube or there's a lot of latex going on. And it has to do with an enzyme that's in natural rubber which makes its way into latex, which is what you're really allergic to. If you go to the proctologist and ask if you have a latex allergy and you say yes, then your doctor has another alternative. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. No, actually I don't. You know what a proctologist does? Oh, did you say proctologist? Yes, I do. Okay, shall we move on? That was rough. All right, let's talk about how this can go bad. It can go bad in a lot of ways. Like we said, if you eliminate something that your body needs, a certain vitamin or something, and you eliminate all that, then your body might become deficient if you don't add something back in that will help make up for that. Or you sent a very interesting article about something that I've never heard of called orthorexia or the thing that everybody we know has right now, do you think? Yeah, to some degree, yes, I totally do. So. Orthorexia this very brave woman wrote this article. Orthorexia colon how my clean eating turned into anorexia and orthorexia, even though it's not recognized by the DSM, but is recognized by the National Eating Disorders Association, is kind of taking label reading and nutritional label reading and thinking about what you're eating to the most obsessive level possible. Right. It's an eating disorder. But rather than being zoned in on calorie restriction like. Traditional anorexia and weight loss. It's an obsession with healthy or clean eating. And if you look around, if you realize that, you're like, this is all over the place. Like, look around on the Internet and see how many foods are labeled, like, toxic. This is a toxic food. Strawberries are toxic, smack your hand as you try to take a bite of it or something like that. Or there's something called the Plant Paradox diet, which is like, tomatoes are toxic, legumes are toxic. Just the way that people look at food now, it's either good or bad. It's pure or it's toxic. It's healthy, or it can kill you. This is very much where Orthorexia is rooted. Yeah. And with this woman in particular. She wrote about her journey through this and how it was getting worse and worse and how her friends started to notice. She said she spiraled into a total panic if she happened to eat something that was, quote, unquote, bad. And it was just completely compulsive, like reading and rereading these nutritional labels, feeling really anxious if you're not reading these things. And it actually led to anorexia. Her friend stepped in and said, hey, listen, I think you need to get some help here. Things are getting a little out of hand. And luckily, this woman, in this case at least, listened, went to a health professional, and they confirmed that she had morphed into anorexia. Right. The way that it had morphed into anorexia is because she had whittled down her list of acceptable foods to such a small degree that she was becoming malnourished because there were so few types of foods that she would allow herself to eat. And I guess a byproduct of that was just inadvertent calorie restriction and, like, major weight loss, too. But again, she wasn't obsessed with her weight. It was good food or bad food or pure food or toxic food. And that distinction and then becoming obsessed with it, like thinking about that kind of food and foods you should avoid. She points out, apparently one of the kind of accepted criteria is that you obsessively follow fitness or nutrition experts or self proclaimed experts on social media or something like that. And I think just in addition to obsessing about good food versus bad, it's just obsessing about food in general. It begins to take over your life and you change your life. Like she was saying, she just stopped going to parties because she knew that it would be weird if she didn't drink or she didn't eat a slice of birthday cake. So she just stopped going to those kind of social functions and eventually, after a while, stop getting invited to them too. So it had, like, a major effect on her life as well. Yeah. Really sad. It is extremely sad. And you're right. She was brave for writing that. Her name is Hannah Matthews and the article was orthorexia How My Clean Eating Turned into Anorexia and Self. I think it was right. I think so. Yeah. One of the other good things, though, about an elimination diet in our own article that they point out is one good side effect is it just makes you really pay attention to what you're eating. And that's always good if you're like keeping food journals and trying to clean up your diet. Even if for something that ends up being a psychosomatic food reaction, which is a thing, that's okay. And those psychosomatic food reactions are real. Just because it's not a physiological response doesn't mean your body doesn't go a certain direction. Because you think, I'm going to eat this slice of bread and it's going to make me feel like crap. Right? It's like a self fulfilling prophecy. Yeah, for sure. But paying attention to your diet in general can be a positive result of one of these. So Brenda and Eddie go with God, right? That's the thing. Yes, there are positive benefits. There are also pitfalls and pratfalls, and some of them can be substantial, like accidentally ending up malnourished or accidentally triggering an eating disorder in yourself. And so, again, this is why it's good to go see a professional. But I think the fact that there's just so many people who have just come up with their own elimination diet and blog about it and now have licensing agreements with hot dog companies because you're allowed to eat hot dogs on this elimination diet, which makes zero sense to me. It's a symptom of a larger death of expertise that we're going through. You don't have to be an expert at anything. You don't have to be actually, to know what you're talking about. It's a good way to say it. You can start a blog or a website or an Instagram, and people follow what you're saying even if you have no idea what you're doing. Yeah. And then the stuff you're saying isn't backed by any research or peer review or whatever. And I realize you can look at what we do from a certain perspective and be like, that's pretty rich that you're even bringing this up, pal. We're not experts, but we defer to experts. Typically, our research is based on stuff that experts have come up with or people who know what they're talking about have come up with. And this is very largely like some dude just came up with his elimination diet, and now 10% of the countries trying it themselves in the hopes that it will finally change their life in some positive way. And I don't know, Hannah Matthews orthorexia article really kind of was eye opening to how I view food, too. My attitude towards food has changed. There's definitely something you shouldn't eat that it's bad for you, that's terrible, and stay away from that. And I realized I think about food a lot, and it's not just I want to eat, but also I should stay away from this or whatever. I feel like a lot of people are kind of moving in that direction, just kind of developing an unhealthy relationship with food. But then I asked myself, so what? I just should stop paying attention to eat whatever? And I can tell you, based on history, when I do that, I tend to get a little tubby, a little unhealthy and unhappy. So I can buy a little unhappy? Yeah, a little. I mean, like, a lot. Right. So that points me to this direction that there's a third thing. There's some underlying thing that has to do with my relationship with food that I've not gotten to the bottom yet, but just obsessing over healthy food versus toxic food or whatever, it helps. I definitely eat better and I feel better in general. But if you're still thinking too much about something, if something that shouldn't be as big a component of your life is a big component, then it suggests that there's something else there that you haven't gotten to the bottom of. And I'm talking to you specifically, brenda and Eddie. Somewhere between you and me, there is a healthy middle ground. And that's probably Jerry. That's right. It always comes down to Jerry Chuck. That's right. You got anything else? No. I will say, though, that for all you Billy Joel fans, I very much purposely said Brenda and Eddie, so save your emails. Okay, well, also save your emails because now I know, even though I had no idea until just now, I said Sally and Tom because I have no imagination. Yes. Well, no, that great Springsteen song, sally and Tom ride west, man. That's pretty believable, Chuck. Is it a real song? No, Springsteen certainly sang about a lot of people, but that's what I mean. That was believable joke. Yeah. If you want to know more about elimination diets, man, they're out there. But go see your nutritionist. That's our advice. And since they said nutritionist, it's time for listening. May you? Yeah. And this is not so much a listener mail as it is a little shout out to our friends at Coed. That's right. So, everyone, if you are not hip to Coed, let us fill you in, because back in 2009 oh, man, it's been a while. Back in, I think, 2009, coed, which is the cooperative for education, said, hey, guys, we've got this cool NGO down in Guatemala where we see to it that as many indigenous Guatemalan kids get educations where otherwise they wouldn't. And we want to come show you what we got. So we ended up going down there and did a two part episode about what we saw. Yeah, it was really cool. And we've been kind of working with them off and on through the years to help raise awareness. And I think my favorite thing about their organization is how specific their mission is. They're literally trying to educate kids because they think that is the basis of pulling people out of the cycle of poverty. And they're right because it's working. And right now they have something going on called the 1000 Girls Initiative and they are trying to keep literally 1000 girls in Guatemala from dropping out of school because education is really what it takes to break the cycle of poverty everywhere, but especially in rural Guatemala. Yeah, from their research they found that something like twelve years of education is what it takes to break the cycle of poverty in Guatemala, but that the average rural Guatemala has about a one in 20 chance of getting twelve years of education. So what they do is they have several number of programs set up, but one of them is where you are sponsored and you're paying in as a kid, you're paying into this book fund and you get your books up front, but then as you're paying in overtime and it's enough that even like some of the poorest of the rural Guatemalan families can pay for this. When the books run out, you can replace them from this fund that you've been paying into over time. Or if the books stay good, you can buy more books that you didn't have before, or things like computers and all that stuff. And so kids who would have normally had to drop out of school and work in the fields with their families now have a chance to stay in because they're not costing their families as much by going to school, so their families can invest in their kids education. Yeah, you can sponsor one of these students for $80 a month, or if you want to only pay $40 a month, you can do that because they will pair you with another sponsor. And all you have to do is go to Thousandgirlsinitiative.org or just go to the Coed page. There's a lot of great ways you can take part. And it's one of these things where you are literally like I'm sponsoring this girl, that's her name, there is her picture and she's going to get to go to school now because I'm pairing up with someone else and throwing $40 a month their way and it's at once again thousandgirlsinitiative.org. It could be anything more worthwhile. Agreed. Man so go check them out. And if you want to get in touch with us in the meantime, you can hang out with us at our home, on the web, stuffyshko.com, where you'll find links to all of our social media accounts. And you can also send us an email, just send it off to stuff podcast. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetopworks.com. Ah, summer school's out. The sun is shining, the daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon music that's so good it's Criminal Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs. All in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
ab9c1344-3620-11ea-924d-7f0c56360ece	Short Stuff: Black Cowboys	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/short-stuff-black-cowboys	Most people don't realize that around a quarter of the cowboys found in the Old West during the golden age cattle driving were African American. Let's meet some of them, shall we?	Most people don't realize that around a quarter of the cowboys found in the Old West during the golden age cattle driving were African American. Let's meet some of them, shall we?	Wed, 16 Sep 2020 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2020, tm_mon=9, tm_mday=16, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=2, tm_yday=260, tm_isdst=0)	13294069	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck, who knows where Jerry is, but this is short stuff, so it doesn't matter because we can handle it ourselves with a little assist by our friend Dave Kustan. Yeah, I don't think we don't shout out Dave enough. Not nearly enough. As a matter of fact, let's just make this episode of us talking about how great David is, right. The original black cowboy. That's right, but totally wrong. But it was a decent attempt at a segue. Yeah, because we all know the original black cowboy was Sheriff Bart in placing Saddles. Oh, yeah, I forgot about that movie. Is that a good one? I mean, it's a classic. It couldn't be made today, sure, but written by Mel Brooks and the great Richard Pryor. And I think there was one other co writer. But, yeah, they played that for comedy in that movie. But as it turns out, there were a lot of black cowboys in the United States, and you just don't see a bunch of movies and TV shows where they're represented shock, shock. But there are some statistics that say 25% or more of all cowboys after the civil war in the wild west, where these black men out there like, doing cowboy stuff, working hard, roping cattle, doing all the things that you see in the movies. Yeah, the idea, from what I can tell from the research, is that the popular conception of cowboys and cowboy life and what cowboys did is fairly accurate, but the race of them is what was off. Just the fact that black people were not all represented among cowboys in the popularization of cowboy life back east. That's the historical misunderstanding. Apparently, even before the civil war, most black cowboys, according to one historian of the American west, most of them, most of the cowboys were black, and that it was a job that was open to enslaved people, basically, and that if you were white, you didn't want to be known as a cowboy. That job was potentially beneath you or whatever, even though it was all about bronco busting and herding cattle and lassoing and stuff like that. All the stuff we think of with cowboys today. But that transition between it being from something that may that was like beneath a white guy out west to something that was a coveted title among white guys was when back east, people started to hear about cowboys and say, that's cool. What a cool life. And then all of a sudden, white guys were like, oh, actually, I'm a cowboy now. You can count me in. Yeah, I think that name, at least according to this historian, is racist in nature because the white workers wanted to be called cow punches or cow hands, and the black men were called cowboys. And like you said, once Lore hit back east, they jumped on that cowboy train because I guess that word took. And it sounded cool. Yeah. The thing is, I went and tried to corroborate that elsewhere, because it makes sense, if you take it from that standpoint, that actually cowboy actually has a denigrating origin. But I did not see that anywhere else, and I couldn't find the difference between account hand and a cowboy. They are completely interchangeable from what I can tell, definition wise. But I don't know, maybe that just that etymology got lost to history, you know? Well, Larry callys runs the black cowboy museum in texas in rosenberg, and we want to credit him with saying that, since he's where we got it. Yeah. Here larry. Here's the limb go out on. So the idea of black cowboys and cowboys in general really kind of came out of this migration of southerners, especially southern whites, moving out west to texas for the chance for cheap land, wide open spaces, the promise of a new chance for a fortune, because the south had really become industrialized as far as agrarianism is concerned. And texas had a lot of opportunity, especially if you were willing to push Spanish settlers and indigenous people from mexico off of their land, you could really make a name for yourself in texas. And a lot of those white settlers brought enslaved people with them, and they were the earliest black cowboys out there. Yeah, because what happened was, you're in Texas, you get roped into the confederacy, and then these white people who moved out west coback east to fight in the civil war, they left the people that they enslaved behind to keep the ranch going, basically. And that was sort of the beginning of the black cowboy movement. It really was. What's interesting is that it was triggered by the civil war, that the civil war created that kind of need for cowboys of all stripes, but that typically fell to african Americans who were doing this work while the whites were off fighting the war. And then when the war was over, when the white confederates came back to texas, they were like, hey, I don't know if you heard or not, but we're free now, so you have to pay us for this work. And because a lot of herds had been broken up and lost, there was a lot of work to be done getting these herds back in order and getting texas Back up and running economy wise, especially with cattle herding. Yeah. So maybe let's take a break, and we'll talk about some of the more famous of these black cowboys right after this. All right. So if you look at the history books and TV shows and movies, you hear a lot about wild bill hickok and annie oakley and all these sort of legendary Wild west figures. You don't hear as much about the black cowboys who were also legendary figures just in the same way. Like, some of them were bad guys who would shoot up a saloon and have a gunfight in the middle of the street at high noon. Many of them, obviously, were just regular cowboys who did hard work day and night, wrestling cattle. Some of them also chuck, were even lawman, too. There was a guy named Bass Reeves who was the first African American marshall us. Marshall west of the Mississippi. And he had a 32 year career and apparently was so morally unimpeachable that some people insist he was the model for The Loan Ranger. I know, isn't that crazy? It is. And I have to tell you, I grew up on The Loan Ranger, the 1082 or three movie. Oh, the movie, okay. Yeah. It informed my childhood. I also watched the TV show, too, like a playset and everything. But I was a big time into the Loan Ranger. I watched that movie within the last couple of months. It is one of the most boring movies I have ever seen in my life. I was like, my parents must have been like, what is wrong with this kid? This movie is just like watching paint dry. There's like five parts that are interesting and the rest is like just slowly stringing together those parts. It's really weird. And the chemistry is like baking soda and more baking soda. Nobody has any chemistry. It means that there's nothing happening, there's no reaction. I'll tell you what I love, though, about that movie is that color blue of his outfit. It's the star of the movie, basically. Yeah. And the color of his hat, too, because it was white, but it wasn't stark white. It was sort of this creamy white. Yeah, he had a tinge of badness to him, maybe, when needed, but I guess not. Another famous black cowboy from back in the day was a man named Bose Icard. He is in the hall of Fame at the National Multicultural Western Heritage Museum and hall of Fame. God bless the people who founded that. I know. And he was the right hand man to one Colonel Charles Goodnight. He was a big, super successful cattle man in Texas. And apparently, if you've ever read or seen Lonesome Dove, larry McMurtry's sort of classic Western, I never have. The character of Joshua Deets was based on him, played by none other than Danny Glover, who was not too old for that s. Who is what? He was not too old for that s. That's the big one. I'm getting too old for this s. Oh, man, that was a great joke. I'm sorry I had you repeat it. That's all right. So there's another one named Bill Pickett, who was a very famous rodeo guy. He was one of the first African American rodeo man, I guess. And he invented the sport of steer wrestling, which is where you ride up alongside a steer and grab him by the horns and drag them to the ground. It's really awful, especially when you understand what he came up with was called Bulldogging, where it was a technique that he would overwhelm the steer with pain by biting its lip, and he was inspired by watching dogs herd cattle. So he tried it himself. He's like, this really works. But he was a genuine trailblazer in the rodeo world. And despite the fact that he was barred from competing in a lot of rodeos, even though he was among the best, that rodeos were segregated for a very long time. And if you were an African American rodeo cowboy, you had to compete either late at night or early in the morning before the actual rodeo started, or else you might have your own rodeo altogether. I mentioned outlaws. There was a man named iSIM or isom Dart. He was an enslaved person who went the other way, and he was a horse thief. Like so many other horse thiefs, he would steal horses and cattle in Mexico, drive them across that big old Rio Grande river, and sell them off in Texas. And like so many outlaws, he was shot down by a hired gun, in this case, Tom Horn. And I'm thinking of movies. I think there have been a couple of movies where they did represent these black cowboys, but it always seemed like these movies were sort of not a trick, but just kind of like a stunt casting, like, oh, we're going to make a movie with black cowboys. How different. Instead of, well, this is just a movie like any other western, because this is how it was. Exactly. And I'm sure that they were all just left out of the history books because of some oversight. But I'm glad we're here correcting it today. Oh, we're trying our best there's also we would be very terribly remiss if we didn't mention the most famous black cowboy of all time, one Nate Love, also known as deadwood Dick. He's nat. No, it's not. I specifically saw in a couple of places and verified it. Yeah, his name was he was born Nathaniel, and I guess they just didn't feel like adding the e, which is significant because he was taught to read and write despite being born enslaved. His father taught him to read and write, so he was educated enough that he actually wrote his own autobiography in I should have just kept it as sounded kind of old timey, but Chuck, I think you need to read everybody the title and note that there is not a single colon founded. Yeah, it's life and adventures of Natlove. And it's spelled nat in the autobiography title. I swear it's Nate. Well, I'm looking at the book cover. I know. I'm telling you, it's pronounced Nate. Okay. But there is no e. I just want to point out to people life and adventures of Blank Love, better known in the cattle country as deadwood Dick by himself colon a true history of slavery day life on the great cattle ranges and on the plains of the wild and wooly west based on facts and personal experiences by the altar, there is a colon. I thought that was a semicolon. There's always a colon, isn't there? It seems to be, but he was like you were describing, like he would get in shootouts, and he was kind of known as abandoned and outlawed in some circles. But from what I can tell, he was just a legitimate bona fide cowboy. And he led the cowboy life like any other cowboy would. Fantastic. It really is fantastic. Very big self promoter, like so many of those cowboys back then. Yeah, for sure. They say that they're not entirely certain where fact it departs from fiction in his autobiography, but it's apparently a heck of a read. So go check it out. And I guess I said check it out, which means that short stuff is out, huh? It's out. Stuff you should know is the production of Iheartradios how Stuff Works. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows, you."
https://podcasts.howstuf…errors-final.mp3	How Night Terrors Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-night-terrors-work	Night terrors, an uncommon sleep disorder, happen when the brain doesn't transition correctly to deep sleep. The result is terrifying, with the sufferer genuinely terrified, swatting at invisible attackers, and screaming for help - all while sound asleep.	Night terrors, an uncommon sleep disorder, happen when the brain doesn't transition correctly to deep sleep. The result is terrifying, with the sufferer genuinely terrified, swatting at invisible attackers, and screaming for help - all while sound asleep.	Mon, 01 Aug 2016 19:59:55 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2016, tm_mon=8, tm_mday=1, tm_hour=19, tm_min=59, tm_sec=55, tm_wday=0, tm_yday=214, tm_isdst=0)	48135179	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"You know you're a pet mom when you plan your vacation around your pet. At Halo, we get it because we're pet moms, too. We make natural, high quality pet food that's rooted in science. It's the world's best food for the world's best kids. Learn more@halopets.com.com. Hey, friends. Dating is a journey with ups and downs, for sure. But all the effort is worth it when you meet someone special, right? And when you decide it's time to find a meaningful relationship, eharmony is here for you. Eharmony is passionate about creating real love for all. Rooted in compatibility, Eharmony's process reveals truths about yourself. Like, I don't know what you want in a relationship, and it helps you connect with a uniquely compatible partner who is right for you. Don't believe it? See for yourself. So start for free today, because every 14 minutes, someone finds love on Eharmony. This episode of Stuff You Should Know is sponsored by Squarespace. Whether you need a landing page, a beautiful gallery, a professional blog, or an online store, it's all possible with the Squarespace website. Go to Squarespace.com and set your website apart. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. There's Terry. This is stephanie should know the podcast. We are in our deep freeze chamber. Yeah, it's a little cold in here. It's freezing, and I'm never freezing. No, I don't know what's going on. Yeah, like this video producer Casey, just pushed a big rack of frozen beef carcasses by, so I think they're moonlighting as a beef carcass freezer butcher. When I said I don't know what's going on, I meant literally. I'm confused from hypothermia setting in, affecting my brain. You're just generally confused about everything. Yeah, well, it's cold as h. Cold as heck. Chuck? Yes? Have you, my friend, ever had what's commonly referred to as a night terror? Are you referring to a sleep terror or pavor nakatana or possession by demon? No, I don't think so. I haven't either. I would probably remember, I would think, as a child having these. Although not necessarily, unless your mom or dad said, hey, there's something really wrong with you, kid. Well, it would have been a thing, in other words. Right? Yeah, that's a good point. I was going to say thank goodness that we didn't have that, but really thank goodness for our family, because when you have a night terror or sleep tear, you typically aren't capable of forming any kind of memory of the event, certainly of anything that's driving you crazy with fear. Yeah, you wake up surrounded by your entire family who's, like, sweating bullets with lots of terror on their faces, shaking what's going on? Yeah, wear the pancakes. I was going to say Twinkies, but yeah, it works too. Did you eat Twinkies for breakfast as a child? Well, no. I kind of more imagine this happening at, like, two in the morning. Got you. Nobody wants to cook. Being grab a Twinkie pretty easy, I bet. What would be good, since I recently invented the Reese cat and people actually ate them, take a Twinkie, get a pan hot. Oh, yeah. Spray it with some. Or even better, get some get a stick of butter and run it over the pan. And then get one of those bacon grill presses, and then smash two Twinkies down. I don't know if you should do that last part and griddle them up nice and crispy. Okay. Wow. Yeah. Maybe you should do that where they're really golden brown and not this fake golden brown. Yeah, man, that'd be good. I quit ultra processed foods, but I might try that, actually. Yeah, I mean, I'm joking, of course. I would never do that. I haven't had a twinkie. I think I ate one for that episode, but that was a Twinkie. I don't think I've had too many since then either, but that sounds good, what you just said. A crisp, buttery Twinkie. It does sound kind of good. That's what stinks about having extra pounds is people probably say, yeah, Chuck just eats Twinkies all day. Well, they call you Twinkie behind your back. I don't. I eat fried chicken all day. That's my problem. Oh, yeah, fried chicken will do it, but, man, it can really be worth it. Depending on the fried chicken to be raised in the south. Where's the best place around here? Well, some of the grocery stores around here have great fried chicken in their deli. Really? Yeah. That's my like I don't go to fast food fried chicken. Oh, yeah. No, I'm not surprised about that. But I figured you'd say something like Mary Max or something like that. Oh, occasionally at a nice restaurant that has overpriced fried chicken. I'll try it. Mary Max is good. Pretty much across the board with everything. Yeah. Have you ever had their mint julep? No. Oh, it is so tasty. It's huge. Oh, is it? Yes. It's just great. Well, that's because they have to satisfy the aging alcoholics that go there for lunch drinks. Mary. Max tea room is in Atlanta, by the way. Yeah, everybody knows. And it's a classic old school Southern restaurant, but it's a tea room, so it's supposed to be a little night, sir. It's not like a meet and three. Right, exactly. But it is a meet and three. Mary Max is also very famous for Mary Mac having suffered night terrors as a child. See, people thought we were on a tangent. No, not true. No, that was all written out. So night terrors. I have never had them that I know of. I did recount my sleepwalking episode and our sleepwalking episode. Right. Well put. And by the way, we did sleepwalking. Is science phasing out sleep, October 2010. Is sleep that important? September 2008, a robust 13 minutes up and so sleepwalking, August 2010. Is there a disease that kills us by preventing sleep. October 2014. And that's it. What about lucid dreaming? Oh, okay. Yeah, sure. But I typed in sleep as the keyword, so it didn't come up. That would be more I think there's a couple more even better. You know what? Sleep related dreams would have brought up a few more then. You're right. Yeah. So anyway, if people want to hear everything we know about the sleep suite, that's it. But yeah, we haven't done oh, and then by this time we'll have done. What was the one we just recorded about sleep? Gettysburg Address? No, it was a Paris omni too. Oh, jeez, man. We just recorded it hasn't even been released at this moment. You know what I'm talking about. That right. Yeah. But you put me on the spot, so I can't think of anything. I can't either. I put both of us on the spot. It'll be added to the sleep suite eventually. And here's another contribution. So we're talking night teres, like you said. There's some other terms for it. Apparently, if you're serious about researching night terrors, you call them sleep tears. Because as was pointed out by a couple of pedantic sites, they can happen anytime you sleep. If you take a nap during the day, you can suffer one of them. So you really shouldn't call them night tears. That's true. Yeah. If you're one of those six year olds that works the late shift and he's sleep all day long, that is severely pedantic. But I was being unfair because adults can get them. Although it's much more common in children. Let's just say between four and twelve, the best number we have is about 6.5%. There is one, I don't even know about this one. One study said 40%, but I think we should just throw that out the door because nowhere else did I see that. Yeah. Oh, really? You didn't see that one? No. Did you? No, I didn't. I mostly saw about somewhere around 6% of kids from anywhere between two and a half to twelve years of age typically will suffer night terrors. And you're going to find out that there are very few things that are known about night terrors. Sleep tears. There's like tanalizing clues here. There but no one's ever sat down and really like connected the dots. There's nobody there is virtually no sleep terror researcher that I came across. Yeah, I came across a few academics talking about it and there have been like, apparently a few studies or whatever, but there doesn't seem to be anybody who's focused on night teres, which is really strange to me because if you do kind of start doing research about night tears, you find that there is a lot of anxiety among parents. Yeah, for sure. This would help a lot of people, a lot of families who are disturbed by this. Well, I can't imagine being a parent and having your kid. It's not a nightmare. We're going to make the distinction over and over. Right. It's different. It happens in a different time, which we'll get to during sleep. But it is terror, like hyperventilating. And your heart rate is increased, your eyes might be open even though you're still asleep. You talk about terrifying and your people will dilate. That's the stuff of nightmares. Like you got the fight or flight response going on while you're asleep and can't have your ox up. Could you imagine anything more creepy? Oh, no, that's very creepy. Well, that's part of the problem. I think that's one of the things not just being woken up by your kid having a nightmare. The fact that they're moving around like they're scared to death, but there's nothing. And they're like walking around, they're like pushing you out of the way. They're interacting with the world as if they're awake and scared out of their minds. But you can't connect with them, you can't console them because they're asleep. They're not actually interacting with you. They're not hearing your reassurances because they're not awake right now. They're in another world, the world of sleep. It's really bizarre. Are you sure they can't hear you? Yes. Okay. Yeah. You have to wake them up and you're not supposed to do that. Secondly, but they're not there. They're there physically. Got you. And they're acting like they're there. They're not there. So they're literally inconsolable at that point while they're having a night terror. So, yeah, for a parent and this is your little two or three year old kids suffering this, you can't do anything about it. You just have to wait for it to go away. And these things can last up to like 15 to 20 minutes and there's nothing you can do aside from keeping them from harming themselves. Yeah. Plus that means you're awake for 20 minutes when you should be sleeping, just pounding twinkies. Gender wise boys and girls get it about the same, so it's really no difference. It's not like menstruation. No, that's 100% gender specific. Gender specific. As far as I know. We haven't done an episode on that specifically though. We did female puberty. That's enough. Is that all? Yeah, we did male puberty and female puberty. No more. Don't. I shouldn't have even brought it up. So gender doesn't matter. And they typically tail off after you're a little kid, but you can get them as adults. And they say after 65 years old, you are almost certain to not have a sleep terror. And I just assume it's because nothing scares you at that point. You've seen it all except teenagers. Yeah. Except that you're impending death. Yeah. In teenagers, which probably reminds you of your impending death, really? Probably. The world changing and all that. Yeah, there's a clue right there. Over 65 night terrors are almost unheard of. Another little tranche of life where they're very much unheard of is adolescence. So you might have them when you're prepubescent and then they go away during adolescence and they might pick up again as an adult. Yeah. What's going on there? That seems to be as far as the very few people who are thinking about this stuff, there seems to be some sort of agreement that it has to do, especially in children, with developing central nervous system. Yeah, you know what? That's a great place for us to take a break so I can go look up what central nervous system means. Today's episode of Stephanie Shannon is brought to you by SimpliSafe home security. SimpliSafe believes that your home should be the safest place on earth for every family. So they offer advanced whole home security that puts you, your home, and your family safety first. With 24/7 professional monitoring, SimpliSafe's agents take action the moment a threat is detected, dispatching police or first responders in an emergency, even if you're not home. Yeah. And SimpliSafe uses proprietary video verification technology so that monitoring agents can visually confirm the threat in order to get higher priority. 911 dispatch and Simply Safe offers comprehensive protection not only against intruders and burglary, but against expensive home hazards. From flooding to fires. You can customize the perfect system for your home in just a few minutes at SimpliSafe. comStuff. 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That's Lifelock.com stuff for 25% off your first year. LifeLock identity theft protection starts here. Alright. You said central nervous system, and you know what I mean. I do. I went and looked it up. It's this descending string of nerves that goes down from your brain and hangs down over your body. That's right. I think like a marionette. Yeah, it is very much like that. Wow, that was a great analogy. Actually. It just blew my mind. Thank you. So you just teased before we left about having to do with the central nervous system. Apparently our CNS matures up until the age of about 25. Do you know what CNS means? Central nervous system. Right. But I was kind of surprised at 25. I was shocked that it was that late. Apparently it's a fairly recent finding relief among science that it used to be 18 1920. That's what I thought. End of puberty. Supposedly. Now they believe the CNS keeps going and developing until 25. Well, we should talk a little bit about sleep. I know. We covered this in that awesome 13 minutes episode, how Sleep works. Yeah, just the stages of sleep. Yeah. It seems like this is better explained than our entire 13 minutes episode. Yeah. And we talked about it in the Dreams episode, too. And we had a TV episode of our Science Channel show called Night Terror. Yeah. Poor Clinking beard slept walked. He had sleep apnea, all sorts of terrible stuff. That was a fun episode. It was. And there's even a continuity mistake in that episode, if you remember. Probably several. Did you know our first three episodes are up on YouTube in full? Oh, really? I think somebody actually sat there with their phone and recorded it on their computer and then posted it to YouTube. Now, is it the real first episode, meaning the pilot? No, that was the 11th episode. Was it the one that they aired first? It was actually episode two, but it was called episode one, wasn't it? All I know is I coffee bought. That was the first one, wasn't it? That was episode one. It wasn't episode two. Yeah, that was the pilot. The pilot was episode eleven. Different format. No, the pilot, remember it was broken up between body dysmorphic disorder and zombies. Oh, no, that's the pilot. No, that wasn't. Yes, it was. That was what we shot as proof of concept that they ended up airing as the pilot. They call it pila. I swear. But the pilot episode of the real show, when we actually were in a different location right. Was Coffee Bot, which they aired, I guess, 10th. Coffee Bought aired first. No, it didn't. Really? Yeah. That was the rub, man. It's like, why would you air the pilot last? Well, we aired the pilot last twice because they showed the proof of concept one at the end. Right? Yeah. They hated the show so much, they decided to air one extra episode. Oh, man. I know what a rabbit hole that was. Talked about it terror. Yeah. This article here says we spend about a third of our lives in deep sleep. Well, that's not true. Just sleeping. You think that's true? Well, it depends on the person, of course. Sure. Yeah, I guess that's true. I equate that with the sitting at red lights thing. I've always been suspicious of that. It depends on where you are spending, how much you drive, x number of days at a red light. Yeah, these are broad percentages, I think. I have a friend that is so like, I think started worrying about his death early on in life and trained himself to get as little sleep as possible so he could do more. Oh, that's neat. And dude, since I've known him in his early, been getting like 5 hours or less sleep a night. 5 hours? Lazy. Yeah, he's good with that too. He should listen to that is science phasing out sleep episode? Cause it was remember a lot about pills that help you stay up for 48 hours and then just sleep for normal, like eight. He didn't need pills. He just trained himself, huh? Yeah. That's pretty interesting. All right, so when we go to sweepy time, there's something called adenosine. Adenosine a chemical that starts to build up in your body and your brain. And your brain, right? Yeah. Well, it's a neurotransmitter. Okay. At the very least is present in your brain. I don't know if it's manufactured there. You know, a lot of your serotonin, like a tremendous amount of your serotonin is actually producing your gut. That doesn't surprise me. It was surprising to me the first time I heard it. Because you think it's a neurotransmitter. So obviously the brains can generate no, most of it is in your gut. No, I mean, I guess it doesn't surprise me. And that I know that a lot of healthy gut life a healthy gut can affect way more parts of your life than just, like, digestion. Yeah. So anyway, that builds up the adenosine and then serotonin, like you mentioned, that goes to the brain and says, all right, let's shut it down for the night. Shut it down, everybody. You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here. Exactly. Then they play Rick Astley on the loudspeaker. Is that what they do to get people out? Well, every bar has their own song. Okay. Is Rick astley a go to though. You think I could see it. Yeah. I used to play at Mexico Grill in college when we had the Greek fraternity, big groups on the deck. Late at night, I would play Public Enemy really loud. Yeah. And they didn't like it, I'm sure. And we loved it. Nice. It drove them out. They went back to the fraternity house and did whatever they do there. Watch. Dr. Quinn. Medicine Woman Is that what they're doing? There is a great Letterman top. I used to have this book of Letterman top ten lists from the probably a third of the jokes that I've said on the show really are rooted in that book. Yeah. And that was one of them. It was like top ten signs you're in a bad fraternity. It's like every Saturday night as Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman night, your secret fraternity handshake consists of quietly holding hands for long periods of time. Zima. Kaggers. I think Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman is probably top five least cool shows of all time. Yeah. Murder she Wrote is up there. Oh, okay, fine. It's uncool. Yeah, I watch that show at least once a week still. What? I love that show where do you find it on Netflix. Oh, really? Oh, yeah. I think it's probably on Amazon Prime, too. Do you really watch that? I really genuinely like, in a totally non ironic way. Well, Angela Lansbury is pretty sexy. I don't know about that. But it's a cozy little show. Especially she travels abroad and goes to Europe and New York a lot. Those episodes are like so so for me, the ones that are set in Cabot Cove and there's like a storm and a murderer. Where's? Cabot Cove, Maine, I think. Okay. So it's like a quiet little town and something happens and it's just like a cozy show. Yummy. Can't stand it. And it's not like she doesn't like the show itself. It's just like Angela Lansbury is such a a schoolmarm to her. She always feels like she's in trouble. Right. Just when she's in the background. Yeah, that's funny. So she's not a big Murder, She Wrote fan. Does she just walk through when it's on and be like, stop telling me what to do, Angela. No, I won't go to my room. All right, so where are we? We're falling asleep. Because Murder She Wrote on Because Murder She Wrote on and then we enter stage one of five. Four. Five. Well, technically five. Yeah. Okay. So there's four stages and then a fifth encore. I guess it isn't considered a stage, it's own thing. Well, stage one is when you're sort of in that place where if things are all good and you're not super anxious, don't have a lot of anxiety. It's nice and quiet. It's dark. That means you're heading into sleep. If things are not great or you're anxious or something's disturbing you, you could fall back awake from stage one. Right. It's a tenuous period. Yeah. That's stage one. Yeah. That is stage one. If you have a book, you're going to sleep in stage one. Yes, that's right. It was exploding head syndrome. That was the one. Oh, right, of course. So you go onto stage two, you start drifting off. And this is apparently where you spend a lot of your sleep time. Although I don't know that this is necessarily true. But your brainwaves start to take on a different form. I think they go from alpha to maybe beta. Okay. They're slowing down a little bit. You're calm down. You're not thinking quite as much. Your eye movement stops and you're just basically in that twilight period where you're basically sleepy. But you could be awakened fairly easily. Correct. Until you get to stage three. Yes. That's when things get real. There's something called delta waves, and they were discovered by a guy named W Gray Walter in the 1900s, who is very gracious not to insist that they're called Walter waves. I totally would have he's like, go with delta. They operate between zero and 4. Waves are what make they're responsible for the restorative aspect of sleep. Like when you wake up and you feel great and refreshed. Say thank you. Delta waves. And I guess he was a doctor, dr. Walter he was a student of Hanburger. Hansberger. Man, that's close. So much so you shouldn't name your kid Hansberger. No. Hansburger invented the EEG machine. And then Gray went on to make that machine a little bit better. He improved upon it, which is what allowed him to discover these knobs are ugly. I'm going to replace them with orange ones. It looks old. So that allowed him to discover the delta waves I got you, which are great. Those are my favorite brainwaves. Yeah. Even the name delta waves just sounds very soothing to me. Yeah. Delta. Right. So you're in did you say stage four or three? That's things get cranking up in three, and by the time you're at four, it's all delta waste. All delta. And like you said, it's where you get that restful sleep. Because this is where tissue regeneration and repair takes place. Your brain is shut down. Like your executive function is turned off. You're not thinking, you're not judging. You're not chewing over, like, all the stupid things that you said wrong and how you could have said them better that day. None of that's going on. You're just kind of out like a light. But your motor strip is still conceivably active. It can be. And your emotional centers are able to be activated as well. For the most part, they're not. You're just out. Right? Right. Then after stage four, you totally shift gears and you enter REM sleep. So the first four stages are nonREM sleep. Yeah. And then you enter REM sleep, rapid eye movement sleep. And it's called it because your eyes just go nuts all over the place. The rest of your body is paralyzed, and your brain turns back on and starts producing the same brain waves, alpha waves that you have when you're awake. So you're thinking, you're dreaming, you're doing all this stuff, but your body is paralyzed. Right. And then the whole thing starts over again. After about 90 minutes, you go back into stage one sleep. Okay. Yeah. And whatever you do during REM sleep, don't go back to rockville. It's terrible. What's funny is I think you make that joke every time we talk about the stages of sleep. Well, I do, but it's a different song every time. Oh, it is? Okay. Yeah. It's just a bad Remference, right? I just feel like I have to I'm with you. I wish someone would send us a list of my dumb REM jokes from all of our very people. Don't waste your lives. Yeah, sure. So go volunteer for a charity. Right. Instead. So that whole cycle between the four stages in REM sleep takes about 90 minutes. And then through about the first half of, say, you're getting a good 8 hours. First 4 hours. Those first four stages are going to take up most of that 98 minutes to 110 minutes and REM is going to be less. And then about halfway through, your REM is going to start getting longer and longer in the cycle. Right. So the second half of your sleep, you're dreaming more. But again, the important point here is during stage three and four, you're not dreaming, you're just out like a light. Yeah. And I guess what you just said before, that explains why I often feel like I remember my dreams or dream heavier toward my waking hours. Yeah. Well, plus also, if you are in REM sleep and you awaken from it, rather than awakening during one of your other sleep cycles, you're going to remember your dreams because you're regaining consciousness. You're awakening, but again, your brain has been on the whole time. You're just becoming aware of what you were just thinking. So you're going to be able to form those memories. When you're sleeping in stage three or four, as we'll see, you don't form memories because your brain is not working like that. Yeah. I probably ask you this in one of our Dreamcasts, but are you able to pick up a dream after you've woken up and it's something you want to resolve or not doing? No, not really. I've gotten pretty good at that. Have you? That's pretty neat. Yes. It's not quite dream sailing like we talked about, but I definitely like it happened this week. I was having a dream that was great, and I woke up, went and used the bathroom sitting down. So I don't wake up enough. Sure. And then was like, all right. And I just think about nothing but that as I go back to sleep. Okay, where was I? Yes. I got right back in it. That's awesome. Yeah, it's pretty neat. But I'm still not which is the one where you control the dream? Is that lucid? Lucid dreaming? Yeah. Dream sailing. I wouldn't say that. I'm that's where you're like, and now I'm going to fly. Watch this. And then you fly in your dream. You can't do that. All right. So those are the stages. Good extra info there, by the way. I didn't know that about the varying time cycle as you sleep. I thought it was sort of all equal. I bring it. You do bring it. So what they do know about night terrors, or sleep terrors, is between three and four. Stages three and four is when this is happening. Yes. In other words, part of it has to do with this transition that happens between the stages. They just don't know exactly why. No. And it doesn't really make sense because both stages three and four are considered deep sleep. It's just deep sleep and super deep sleep. It's something during that transition can cause nightmares. Yeah. And the nightmares I don't know if we fully said this, nightmares occur only during REM sleep. Right. But that's one distinguishing factor from night terrors. Yeah. And the fact that. You can remember a nightmare, right. Can't remember a night terror. No. You wake up and you might still feel fearful for some reason. Yeah. But you don't wake up and say, there was a beast in my room trying to kill me. Right. It's kind of like how when you're watching Law and Order and you're, like, super into it and you just hate the murderer in this episode, and then on comes like a charming ad and you're like, why do I feel so mad? And then you realize, oh, it's because I'm still keyed up from Law and Order. Same thing with the night, Terre. Like, you don't remember why you're fearful, you just feel fearful still. It hasn't subsided. Got you. I never seen that show, but I was hanging in there. You've never seen Law and Order? Huh? No. That is not possible. I don't watch many major network TV shows. Law and Order has been on for like, 20 years. And you've never seen a Law and Order? No. You're missing out. I've never seen CSI. I've never seen any of those shows. Yeah, that's fine. You're missing out a little bit with Law and Order. It's a really great procedural cop drama. Now that's the one with Lenny that had Jerry Orbach, right? Lenny who? I love that guy. He's great. But he's not the only one that's great. Virtually every single person who's been on this rotating cast has done a great job. Didn't Save by the Bell guy get on there? Or was that another one? Zack? Yeah. Didn't he eventually he was on one of those top procedurals. He was on a lawyer procedural with one of the guys from Clueless. Really? Yeah. The skateboarder from Clueless. What? Yes. They were like goofy lawyers. Oh, no, that's a different one. I know you're talking about I don't know if Zack was ever a cop. Oh, no. I'm thinking of Ricky Schroeder. Didn't he end up on Law and Order? Boy, this is one of those moments where people are screaming at the computer right now. I genuinely don't think it's Law and Order, but it was something like that. I know what you're talking about. All right, let's take a break and we'll figure out you can be Ricky Schroeder and I'll be Zach. All right, ready? Three, two, one, go. 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All right, so where we left off was that they're not sure why it happens between three and four. They think it has something to do with what they call a snag in this transition. It's pretty sciencey. Yeah, it's a snag. Again, they think it has to do with your central nervous system still growing. Right. But it's weird because it only happens in some kids, and like that exploding head syndrome, it happens in just the same way. So there's something amiss here. It's not just like a normal aspect of childhood, right? Sure. So that would mean that there's a snag in the development of central nervous system. That could happen in a certain way, a certain prescribed way. Yeah, I see what you're saying. Not at least one person does. It does run in the family, seemingly or often times. Stress and anxiety can be a big trigger. Sleep apnea, sleep deprivation. If you have migraines, thyroid hormones being produced, too much too much booze, maybe if you're sleeping out at summer camp or somewhere else you've never been. Yes. Apparently they have linked stress to it. I guess some parents have noticed that if the kid has a particularly stressful day, they may be predisposed to having a nightcare boy. Stress in kids? That's just heartbreaking. Well, it's also been to basically all forms of abuse. It leads to a higher risk of night terrors. And they have found that a small percentage of kids who experience night terrorists might go on to have psychosis later in life. I saw that too. So I saw, like that was widely reported. There was one study that found it, but it was a decent study. 6700 kids. It's not bad. And it found that kids who have night terrors are eight times, likelier, to experience psychosis later on in life, like I said. And they have found that it can develop along with anxiety, bipolar disorder and depression in adults. It can be comorbid with those. Correct. I hate that word, but it gets it across. It does. It's just comorbid just sounds they should have come up with a different word, like hygienic. Cohygenic that's the word you hate, right? Yeah. Morbid. I don't know, it's one of those words that means two completely different things. And why do that? Just have a different word? Well, let's come up with it right now. Give me some letters. No. Okay. I think that was a wise decision. Yeah. They used to give you meds. Nowadays they don't do that so much. So I saw that in this article, but I also saw elsewhere that they're like, no meds. Best thing to do if your kid has horrible nightmares, give them vacuum. Really? Yeah, like basically benzodiazepines, which are things like Valium. I think some antidepressants are benzodiazepines, but something that will just knock you out and you're not going to have a night there or any kind of interrupted sleep. Apparently. If it's bad enough, they will prescribe those. I'm sure. It's not like their go to like, here, give your kids these chemicals, pharmaceuticals. But I think it's still on the table. And I saw this report in a number of different places that there's a reported case of some kid who had 40 episodes of nightmares, as in a single night. Wow. Yeah. You would give that kid value. Holy cow. Yes. Poor kid. Yeah, because think about it, like even if the kid is not remembering what's going on, it's still having like the fight or flight effect 40 times in a single night on this little central nervous system. It's not good, man. So you'd be way better off just giving the kid volume then. Oh, for sure. One thing that they found is that a lot of times if you have the PPE that can bring on a night terror if your bladder is really full. So what they do in that case is they recommend you wake your kid up a couple of hours into sleep and go take the little boy or girl to the bathroom, put them back to sleep. The thing that I saw about that though, I'm sure that that has something to do with it, but I also think that they are inadvertently following what's called scheduled awakening. Right. Which is the go to treatment for night terrors. Yeah, it's exactly what it sounds like. Which is you try and I guess you have to time it out pretty well. Yeah. But they apparently are very predictable. If your kid suffers from night terrors on a regular basis, they're going to have them at about the same time every night. So you just wake your kid up like ten minutes before then? Yeah, like 5 seconds before that you wake them up just 1015 minutes, something like that, before they normally have a nightmare and give them some water or something like tuck them in a little bit. But you rouse them enough that you are preventing them from going into such deep sleep that they'll have a nightmare. So they kind of dip down towards sleep or toward that super deep sleep, but never so much that they experience a night terror. But they're still getting good sleep, better sleep, because they're not experiencing the fight or flight. Respect. Because I was wondering about that, about disrupting the sleep pattern. But yeah, that sounds like it's a win win. Yeah, allegedly. They're still getting great sleep. And I do want to mention, too, with the bladder problem, I've said this before on the show, and it is my duty, as always, say it again. I was a late bedwetter and I always like to say this on the show because kids out there that listen to this, if you're a late bed wetter, don't be ashamed. Nothing to be ashamed about. It happens. It's hereditary. I went to bed till I was twelve. Ish. Meaning 19. No, it was about twelve. That's fine. And it was a lot of anxiety for a little Chucky Man, spending that out and stuff. Totally can imagine. So if you're listening out there and you're a late bedweather, just hang in there, it will stop. And hopefully you have parents that are understanding and friends parents that are understanding. Yeah, that's a big one. That's nice, Chuck. Yeah. I'm not embarrassed anymore. I don't think you should be. I'll pee in front of anybody. Yes, go to sleep right now and pee. I'll do it. And then we're talking about this scheduled awakenings. There are devices, and I found one on a popular online retailer for $129. And what it is, it's just a little thing that loli well, I wasn't going to say the name, but sure, okay. It's probably lully. Yeah, you're right. It vibrates the mattress at intervals to wake your kid up gently. Yeah, well, supposedly it also learns when your kid has so you program in when your kid normally has a nightmare. Right. Through an app, I believe. Correct. And then it starts to pay attention and learn when your kid actually has them. And then, yeah, it vibrates and it does the same thing as a scheduled awakening device. So you don't have to be bothered. No, just let the robot take care of your kid. I looked at the reviews, though, and it got 81% either four or five star ratings, which means when it was something like this, that means it worked for them. How many ratings? I don't remember. I mean, several hundred, I think. Oh, it's not bad. And then 11% at one star. And again, that just means it didn't work for them. Like when you read it, people like, it was absolute garbage. It didn't work for myself, or some people are like, I would have given it five, but I thought the packaging came in was dumb looking. Some people do that? Yeah. Man, these people are the worst. So whether or not you're using a device or you're doing a scheduled awakening like Flatliners, it's all about the timing. You got to time it just right. Right. Or else point of no return to movie references. They're remaking Flatliners, by the way. Of course. Saw that. For the New Generation, starring Juno. Oh, really? Yeah. Who else? I can't remember. Keith for Sutherland just signed on, but one of those deals where they bring him back is probably the old the old weirdo who sits under the desk. That's my guess. And I wanted to talk to you about something I didn't know existed. Sheets that keep you cool at night. Apparently, sometimes they think it can be triggered by overheating. And people have found success with these wonder sheets that I didn't know existed, so I looked them up. They're sheets that keep you cooler. That's great. It's like a sheet that's a giant fan. Well, it's two to three degrees cooler to the touch. Nice. Wicks moisture away. Like our favorite undies. Prevents absorption of heat from light. So if your bed sits in the sun all day oh, yeah, and you sleep during the day, I guess you're a little kid on the late shift. It's three times more airflow, so you have to get some of those there you do. Give it a shot. Nice. One of the other things I saw that they think might trigger it as restless leg syndrome. Supposedly there's a link with those two, the jimmy legs that will keep you up. So there's a story. Should we talk about this guy in Phoenix? I feel like we talked about him in the sleepwalking episode. Oh, did we? Yes, we talked about people killing in sleepwalking episodes. Like, he's not the only one. Oh, I know. Let's talk about him again. Okay. Scott Falatter. I'll bet we said the same thing in the sleepwalking episode. Scott. His nickname is Saved Scott. Save it for later. Oh, man. Sorry. I shouldn't be joking. He's in prison for murder. Yes. This is a he stabbed his wife 44 times and then held her head underwater in a pool. Swimming pool. So what happened is this guy got up in the middle of the night, went out to fix his swimming pool with a hunting knife as a screwdriver. His wife wakes him up. And that's why we said not to wake someone up, because if someone's going to get violent during a sleep terror, it's because you are trying to wake them up. Yeah, you're supposed to just gently guide them back to bed. Yeah, she did not. She apparently startled them. He stabbed her 44 times and then tried to drown her. And his neighbor saw this. Call the cops. And that was his defense. That it. Was a sleep terror, which can occur with sleepwalking, and it didn't work. Basically, the prosecution said their marriage isn't some rosy thing. Like he said, they're Mormon. And she was trying to kind of leave the church behind a little bit, and he was upset about that. He wanted to have kids, more kids, and she didn't. Defense said all that stuff was true, but not really that big of a deal. Like it didn't lead him to snap and kill his wife. Right. But that was his defense, and it didn't work. He's now in prison for life with no parole, man. Can you imagine that? If he really was just totally sleepwalking, having a nightmare? Sad for everyone. Yeah, especially her. I saw a BuzzFeed article actually called can You Die from a Nightmare? And it was about this artist named Tobias Long hung himself in New York, and it's strongly suspected by people who know him that he did it in the midst of a night terror. Wow. So he killed himself? Yes, he hung himself. So you'll see during research for Sleep, Tear and night terror that it's harmless. And any website where the salt that's saying this will have an asterisk will say, but you can't actually die from it. People have fallen out of windows. People have hurt other family members because you can't have injurious episodes, is what they're called, of night terrors because you're sitting there flailing. You're like trying to fight something off you're, again, moving around, because remember, this comes during stage three and four of deep sleep where your brain is off, but your motor function can still work. So you can get up and walk around and feel fear and be fighting stuff off, but you're not having a nightmare, you're having a nightcare so you can harm yourself and others. It isn't just a totally harmless thing. Right. Which is usually what they say. Yeah. By the way, we're going to get emails because you said hung and not hanged. Yeah, hanged him out there. Thanks for that, Chuck. All right. What's going on in the brain, though, specifically? Like, they don't know what causes it, but they know what's lighting up, and it all kind of makes sense. Well, it's like I was saying, when you're in stage three or four, your executive function is off, but you can still experience emotions like fear and panic, and you can still move around, but you have delta brain waves, so you're not thinking, you're not dreaming. Your body is just doing something really bizarre that it's not normally supposed to do. Yeah. So that's what a night terror is. What's going on basically, is you can commit acts of violence because that's switched on, but you don't have that inhibition switched on. That's switched off. Right. So what they found is what is happening during a nightmare is it resembles exactly, or mirrors? Is it mirrors or is that opposite? Mirror would be opposite. It resembles what happens when someone is violent? When they're awake. Right. No inhibition going on. Executive functioning off. Off. Yeah. It's a really weird, dangerous thing. Luckily, it's mostly just in kids, but apparently in adults it can be really bad. Yes. Because adults can be muscular. They know their way around a knife. They can be little kid. It's just like you just hold them in place by putting pressure on their forehead. You're little kids that are more muscular than me. I remember when I used to lifeguard, I'd see like a little twelve year old boy and like that kid is naturally cut. More than I would ever hope to be. I hate those kids. Yeah. Lastly, there is an indiegogo for an augmented reality app called Night Terrors. That sounds pretty awesome. It's an app on your phone and it takes over the flashlight on your phone. So you turn out all the lights in your house and you walk through looking at your house, the camera on your phone, that's how you're looking at your house. And it's lit by the flashlight and everything. And all of a sudden a monster will pop up, like out from around the hall. Your hall. It's just a really neat concept, and apparently they're executing it very well. What is the whole point though? To scare the bejesus out of yourself. Okay, it's a horror game app. Got you. But it's not really a game. It's just you walk around your house and it scares you to death. It's like Pokemon go, but for creeps. Yeah. Although Pokemon goes for creeps too. There you go. I didn't even know that was until yesterday. It's pretty new. It's not that shameful. Give it another weekend. It would have been shameful. Right? That's it, huh? I got nothing else. Well, if you want to know more about Night Terrors, you can type those words in the search bar@howstepworks.com. It's a place to search bars. Time for listener mail. This is about Gettysburg Address. Hey, guys, thanks for the show. Not only do you all address cool and interesting topics in a meaningful way, but the dynamic between the two of you adds a layer of enjoyment that can't be duplicated. Thank you. Perfect mix of seriousness and humor. Perfect. This guy's right up our alley. Why I'm writing those. That said, however no, this is good. I listened to the podcast on the Gettysburg Address and that you mention all students across the country pointlessly memorize this and other speeches and never really get what it's even about. I can tell you I was one of those. Memorized passages. Memorizing passages never, ever helps anyone learn. Right. In high school, we not only had to memorize Gettysburg Address gettysburg but Mark Anthony speech, which is what I had to do. McBeth tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow soliloquy and in the month of April every year, we had to memorize a poem of our choice of at least ten lines for national poetry Month. They did it all the time. And you know how many of those things I remember now? Zero. Do you know how much I can tell you about the passages and their meaning? Nothing. I couldn't even tell you what poems I decided to memorize. Although I think one year I chose an EE. Cummings poem because it was technically ten lines, but maybe a total of 15 words. Yeah, Matt, he's doing it right. I like, EE coming. So good choice. So I'm with you all on how pointless this all is. Keep up the great work. You have a fan for life. And that is Matt from Richmond, Virginia. Matt Anderson. Thanks a lot, Matt. Much appreciated. We appreciate the support. You know what I remember from that age, or like, AdJingles, I feel like Chicken Ten Night. Like Chicken Ten night? Yeah, chicken Tennight. And you don't remember schooling, but you remember where's the beef? Yes. Chicken Tonight was good. I think I remember that it was just a jar of sauce, but it was like a whole gimmick around it. Just add chicken and you can have chicken Tonight. So in other words, cook a meal entirely made of ozzy as a sauce and pour this stuff on and your family will finally love you. They also had one called Beef Tonight. Pork Tonight? I don't think they did. I'm sure those were planned, but they never did it. They're like, we just can't get the sauce right. Who's ever created a good sauce for pork or beef? If you want to get in touch with me or Chuck, you can tweet to us at s yskpodcast. You can join us on Facebook. Comstuffychannel. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast@howstuffworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the webstepyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's criminal. Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. Listen to new episodes of Morbid one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today. You know you're a pet mom when you plan your vacation around your pet. At Halo, we get it because we're pet moms, too. We make natural, high quality pet food that's rooted in science. It's the world's best food for the world's best kids. Learn more@halopets.com."
c34a20d8-5460-11e8-b38c-2bdc904f27c9	SYSK Selects: How TV Ratings Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/sysk-selects-how-tv-ratings-work	Ever wonder why some great shows go off the air after a season or less? Blame it on the Nielsen company, which has for more than 60 years been the almost exclusive decider of what goes and what stays on TV.	Ever wonder why some great shows go off the air after a season or less? Blame it on the Nielsen company, which has for more than 60 years been the almost exclusive decider of what goes and what stays on TV.	Sat, 01 Jun 2019 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=6, tm_mday=1, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=152, tm_isdst=0)	40071503	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody, happy Saturday. It's. Chuck here with another stuff you should know. Select this week, everyone. I picked out an episode about TV ratings because, I don't know, I love TV and it's interesting. This is from September 2000 2014 and I hope you enjoyed. Welcome to Stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how Stuff works. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chucker's Bryant. And there's Jerry W. Jerry Rowland. Actually, Jerry's been canceled. Oh, okay. Due to low ratings. You know what's funny is Jerry has been portrayed on television in a TV show that was canceled due to poor rating. Poor rating. That was our show. That was our show. We had a television show once. It was called stuff you should know. It was a slightly fictionalized version of our life, our work life. We made a sitcom. Yeah, we did. It's pretty cool. And a lot of people loved it. And a lot of people are like, what in the world did you do it that way for? So that a lot. It's like basically ten and ten. Oh, yeah. You're referring to the 20 people who've seen the show. Yeah, actually, we'll get to that all. But we know a little bit about how TV ratings work because of that. And in some ways, I believe we're a victim of the antiquated system that is the Nielsen TV ratings. Okay? No, dude, it's antiquated. That's why it's changing. I do not disagree with the antiquated part. What I do disagree with is that had it been up to date, I think it would have had zero impact on our success. I don't know, man. I will say this to the people out there. What the network did was they looked only at one number, which is the amount of people that sat down in front of their television set on a Saturday Night Live at 10:00 P.m. To watch our show. Right. They did not count things that we'll talk about, like online streaming or DVR or anything like that, which is what makes it antiquated, because it's changing, man. People aren't watching TV like they used to, but they're basing a lot of these decisions on a system that was designed in the 1950s. So let's go back, man. It goes back even further than that. Back in 1923. The AC. Nielsen Company started. At the time, people who were broadcasting radio wanted to know what people were listening to. So there are a lot of companies that would telephone up family at random and say, fella, what are you listening to right now on the old Victorola the Amazing Adventure Hour? And he'd say, hey, thanks a lot, bub. Yeah, talk to you later. And they'd hang up. There's a nickel for you. Troubles if they wish, because we're talking depression at this time. Well, not 1923. Later on, they wish they had a nickel. Here's a chicken for your pot. Nice. Yeah, that's a Hoover reference. Man, you don't get those too often. I try to bust them out. So the Nielsen Company said, that's all fine and good. That's great that you guys are figuring out what people are listening to, but we have something even better, because we are a technological powerhouse. And what they did was they randomly picked some families around America and said, say, can we put this cool recording device in your home near your radio, and it will record what you're listening to at any given time? And then we'll send technicians out to pick it up from time to time, get the information off of it, and then bring it back so we can keep recording it. And family said, sure. And the Nielsen Company's domination of broadcast ratings was sealed after that point. Every competitor they had was just peanuts compared to the Nielsen Company. So much so that when you hear TV ratings, it's synonymous with nielsen ratings, very much like kleenex and facial tissue are one in the same thing, thanks to Nielsen's technological powerhouse. The irony of it, though, is that once they started installing those boxes in the then they moved on to television sets. The innovation, they innovated somewhat, but fundamentally, principally, it remained the same until a year or two ago. Yeah. And we'll get into all the hardware of the hardware side of how it works. But what they did in 1954 was send actual little diaries that you would fill out and pencil and send back. And they still do that today. Yes, in 2014, even though in 2006, they said they were going to stop, they still send those little diaries. And you get a little diary in the mail with five $1 bills really? In the envelope. No way. For your troubles. That's funny. But it's like the modern nickel. Yeah, exactly. And they rely on lazy, dishonest people to fill out this card and mail it back and then go spend that $5 on a grande latte. Yeah, it would have gotten a lot more than 1950. $4. Oh, man. You could have bought a car. But that is the diary version. And the networks and advertisers have never liked the diary version. They still don't. No, but it's what's called sweepsweek, which is hard to say. That's right. We'll get to sweeps in a second. But what they mainly like to rely on are two different electronic hardware methods. The set meters, as in TV set and people meters. And right now, by 2015, they plan to have more than 6200 TV set meters. And this is just for the US. And Canada, by the way, because everyone else's TV is weird. Yeah. Simon, you ever watch TV in different countries when you're traveling and stuff? Yes, and it is so much fun. It is fun, but after a while, you're like, I really miss American TV. Yeah, but I mean, if you're traveling abroad, you shouldn't be watching a whole lot of TV. It's like late night in the hotel, but it's one of the great pluses, is you're just like, I don't feel like watching this. I'll go out and see the sites instead. Yes, I think I was in Belgium watching TV with my buddy Brett years and years ago, and it was translated in English and subtitles, and one of the characters said something, and I guess I don't know if it was Flemish and the other guy just looked and said, ikuk, and it said, Me too. So we still say that today when we're responding me too, to each other. We'll go. IK. Ook nice. All those years later. So anyway, I said there were 6200 by 2015 and 31 markets, TV markets. And then there are about 35,000, I believe, now, people meters, I'm sorry, in about 200 homes. And those people meters are more specific because you can have three people meters in one house. We want to see what little Susie is watching. We want to see what her brother Randy's watching. And they won't see what her dad watches after everyone has gone to bed. Yeah. So each one of them will have their own little people meter that they'll turn on. And I always thought that these things were connected to your television, like your cable box, and it just kind of read the information, but they're actually listening devices. Isn't that weird? Totally blew my mind. So basically, back of the podcast, then, the way that Nielsen figures out what TV show you're talking to is because they have a device that's connected to the Internet that is eavesdropping on your TV. And they just, in 2006, finally got to the point where they perfected this technology, and they have codes that broadcasters, the networks, and the local affiliates have to put in to their audio stream. The audio video stream? Yeah. Not just the audio stream. Is it just audio? Yeah, but they're trying to come up with a video version. So basically there's a sound, there's a frequency that you can't hear. I don't even think your dog can hear it, but it comes through your TV and your Nielsenbox can hear it. And it's basically an audio fingerprint for a show. And when the Neilsonbox hears that audio, it can be like, oh, well, they're watching Good Times right now. That's funny. I was just thinking that. No way. Good Times? Yeah. And then I was like, no, it should say Three's Company instead. It depends. And then you said good times. Although if you watch Good Times long enough, there's an episode of Three Company coming on eventually on that channel. I think Good Times may be my favorite all time theme song. It's a good one. Oh, man, it's so good, it's ridiculous. Did I tell you, Henry? Mancini did. What's happening in theme song? Yes. What episode was that in? Just a few ago, numbers stations. Because the sound that the shortwave thing made so that's how Nielsen's been figuring out what people are watching, which is mind blowing. If it seems a little backwards. Yeah. It may be emblematic of a larger systematic resistance toward technological improvement. Yeah. Or if it seems a little small as far as the sample pool goes, which it is. It is. But what they do is they extrapolate that number just like pollsters do, and they say, well, these are average markets. These are average families. So if these eventually 6200 TV sets are watching this, we can pull that out and do some sort of they probably do it on a chalkboard in a room. There's this one guy who has a piece of chalk, and he extrapolates that out and says, well, this is what America is watching. Which always has bugged me, especially when you have a TV show that gets canceled. It is. Because it all comes down to just how representative is your sample. You said there's 6500 TV sets. They're 6200 by 2015 for the set meters. Right. Now, in 2014, May of 2014, there are 116.3 million TV sets in the US. Exactly. So this is a very small sample size. But if the guy with the chalk, Burt, can come up with a very good representative portion of the US. Like, there's this many divorced Hispanic families. There's this many gay Asian households. There's, like, this many Mitt Romney voters, and they take all these guys and put them together, and it's a clear cross section of America. That's America, baby. You should be able to extrapolate pretty well from that. That's true. It just all depends on how good their statisticians are. That's right. And they do audits over the years and quality checks, of course, and compare ratings from different samples. So it's not like they just said, I saw we're doing it, although they sort of do that. But they do quality checks, of course. Yeah. One of the problems is there's been so few challenges from outside competition that Nielsen can do whatever it wants, and it's so powerful that it literally has the entire television industry at its feet. It decides what rating a TV show gets. And ultimately, the whole point to all of this stuff, to TV ratings in general, is so that networks and their local affiliates can set advertising rates for advertisers. There's $78 billion at stake. That's the advertising spent in a year on television. And it all comes down to what? Rating nielsen, with their representative sample and their audio eavesdropping boxes and their $5 bills in a paper diary, decide that your TV show got that's right. That's the dirty little secret, is that they don't care how many people are watching that TV show. They care about how many people are watching the commercials. Yeah. That's really what they're looking at. And more specifically, what demographic? Which is why I don't think we mentioned why the people meters are so valuable. Right. Because they want to get that specific demo. So they can show advertisers 18 to 49 year olds. They spend a ton of money and they're watching Community, but no one else is. So we'll cancel Community, which is kind of crazy, as we'll see in a little while. Yes, but just quickly, let me go over I think most people know this, but if you've got a half hour TV show and you're going to have 22 minutes of TV show, then you're going to have eight minutes of commercials. Six of those are national ads sold by the network and then your local affiliate. That's where you're going to get your awesome commercials. Hey, Chance for the Wolf man. Yeah, two minutes worth. Or Crazy Eddie. I remember it was big up in the Northeast. And then so this is 2006. I couldn't find one recently. But back in 2006, if you're buying a commercial slot from a local affiliate, you're going to pay about one hundred dollars to two thousand dollars, depending on this is during the daytime. This isn't like 03:00 a.m., but depending on what show. So like back when Oprah was on, you could get a 32nd spot for $90. You could be a local affiliate. Yeah. You could also pay up to $2,000 for it, and then apparently you're going to double that for a national ad for a 32nd spot during the day. Wow. Which isn't outlandish. Well, that's how Crazy Eddie or the Wolf Man, they don't have a ton of money. No. Although I don't know, wolfman wore a lot of jewelry. Yes, that's true. For those of you who don't know who the Wolfman is, we understand because you probably didn't live in Atlanta in 1990. Yes. I bet it was Southeast. I bet it was on like WTVS and stuff. All you have to do is go type in Wolfman Donna gallery Furniture into the YouTubes and it will show you some classic gallery furniture ads. Or just type in, hey, ask for the Wolfman. No, ask for Donna. I don't remember that part. What? You don't remember Donna? His daughter with the hair? The whole premise of the ad, she was a Wolf Man, wanted you to come see him. And she'd say, hey, ask for the wolf, man. She'd go? No. Ask for Donna. All right, sweeps. Everyone's heard it. It is a bit. Yes, everyone hears about this is sweeps. We'll tell you what it is. This is the fact of the podcast to me, what sweet week. Yeah. Where it came from and why it exists. Well, in 1954 is when they started sending out those TV diaries and they made a geographic sweep starting in the Northeast, across the country from east to west, and they collected the little booklets. And those were our first recordings of TV ratings. So before they had the Eavesdropping boxes that they were using. But it was basically like these are, I think, maybe up to 20,000 households at one point. In the major markets. The great thing about the Paper Diaries is they could go into local markets, smaller markets, and find out not just what the people in New York or La or Chicago were watching, sure. But what the people in Santa Fe are watching, too. Or Fort Lauderdale. Yeah. There was a saying, how does it play in what she bought in or something? Probably. I can't remember. It may have been a movie thing, too, but there's an industry saying, how does it play in the city? It's got a rhyme because that's what matters. Of course, New York and La and the major markets are going to consume. They want to know what your average household wants to see. Right. And this is in 1954. This is the first time that anyone had ever taken a really comprehensive snapshot of what America was watching in a given week. And so they said, hey, this works really well. We're going to start doing this every year. We're going to have what's now called a sweepsweek, and it's going to be on this week. And so the TV executives said, well, wait a minute, wait a minute. Sweet Sweet. This is what we're going to start setting our advertising rates against, and it's going to be this week. And I'm going to do the craziest stuff I can think of to get ratings as big and wide as I possibly can grab on that week. And that is where sweeps week came from. And we've seen some pretty interesting things as a result of sweepsweek. Yeah, there's a great tradition of stunt casting during sweeps week. Justin Bieber will show up on CSI. I didn't see that one, did you? No, I don't watch that show. And if I did, I would have punched my TV if you showed up on it. If you're going to shoot Jr. You're going to do it during sweeps week. Oh, yeah. The late night talk shows are going to load up their biggest Alist guest during sweeps week. Er did a live show. Yes. I actually watched that one, and I wasn't an Er fan. I just wanted to see if they could pull it off. Yeah, right. It's pretty cool. Ellen used to have a sitcom based on her life, and she came out on that show during Sweet Sweet. Yeah, that's right. And very famously, there was a not one, not two, but Thrice Park Happy Days, where Fonzie jumps a shark on water skis. Was that sweeps that happened during sleep week. Wow. That's a sweep failure. Well, I'll know if people watched it. Yeah, I don't guess you can call it a failure because that's probably iconic. It's part of the lexicon now. Do you remember in the rest of development where Henry Winkler jumps over a shark? Yeah, classic. These days, sweeps week is actually 16 weeks because they have I don't know about narrowed it down. They broadened it out to four week periods. In November, February, May and July. And they still tried out special things for sweeps. But it definitely doesn't have the teeth that it used to, because the way that people consume media these days, which we're going to start getting into, it doesn't have the teeth that it used to. And as a result, a lot of networks have kind of stopped, like you said, doing the stunt casting and that kind of stuff, but it's still it's still basically holding broadcast TV hostage because that is still what advertisers want to see. What are your ratings during sweepsweek? And that's what they set their ad rates against. So the fact that there are these four month long sweeps weeks means that the broadcasters have to follow the normal fall to summer broadcast model with reruns in between. Yes. And this is for NBC, ABC, CBS, Fox, like the major broadcast networks, non cable networks. Right. Which is a completely dying beast. Yeah. Because they rely 100% exclusively on advertising. And cable has been eating their lunch because advertising has been going down. It looks like it's already peaked. It's still $78 million. Billion. Billion. Right. But cable takes a huge, substantial portion of that in advertising. But then, even when advertising rates go down, cable still survives because cable makes money off of subscriber fees and transmission fees, too. Yeah, exactly. Which is why cable has a big leg up. And also, they don't have a traditional television season. They can release stuff all year long. Right. You can binge watch it. Yes. Which is happening. That's the new model. So, like we said, for many years, Nielsen was just kind of as this one Wired article, the Nielsen Family is Dead put it, it was in a torpor. And the first thing that really worked, I do too. Perfect. The first thing that really roused Nielsen was DVRs. Because when DVRs came along, the advertising industry was like, oh, God, people can fast forward through ads now. Yes. Like they've always dreamed of doing. Exactly. Now they can. And it was basically the television apocalypse. And that didn't pan out because advertisers figured out that, yeah, people can fast forward through ads, but there's ways to still get your message across at 16 times speed. You can do things called popbusters, where you use the actors or the look or the set of the TV show that you're advertising within to make them think like the show just came back on and you caught them, because it's really an ad. I know. There's all sorts of stuff you can do. So it hasn't been an advertising apocalypse. And as a result, because DVRs are clearly here to stay, and have been since the early 2000s, nielsen has had to kind of finally be like, okay, we need to innovate a little bit and figure out how to include DVR, because not everybody's sitting down at 08:00 on a Monday night and watching Murder, She Wrote. Nobody is man, I watched a couple of episodes the other night. I love that show. I've never seen one episode. What? I know, man, it is good. It's good. Another thing too, just to backtrack, I've noticed lately is you're on demand watching, which a lot of cable companies I'm a comcast person because I'm forced to be. Yeah, really, a lot of the on demand shows now, within the first couple of weeks that they're available, you can't fast forward through like you hit the fast forward button and a little null sign comes up and says, sorry, you're going to have to sit through this. So I guess the fact that the DVR is connected to the Internet, and because it's getting show information, the actual show is being recorded on your physical hard drive. I'm sure there's cloud DVR recorders or whatever, but for the most part there's a hard drive that's recording shows onto your DVR. And then the other capability is that it's connected to the Internet, which is where it gets show information and all that stuff to present to you. Exactly. But the Internet, as you may have figured out by now, is a two way street. Not only can information be downloaded to your home, it can be uploaded. And that includes your preferences, what shows you watch, how often you watch them, when you watch them. And so all of a sudden, the DVR companies are like, hey, Nielsen is giving you guys like 08:00 P.m. On NBC ratings. We've got all of these other ratings that they're not taking into account that you can get from us. Not only that, but they can actually tell when you're pausing your TV because the infamous nip slip. I hate even saying those words. Yes, really? And the 2004 Super Bowl with Janet Jackson. TiVo the popular DVR company. Although the people still use TiVo. They probably do. I don't know. It's like every local cable company has their own DVR now. It seems like it. But they were able to say that was the most replayed clip in the history of TiVo up until that point, was people pausing and rewinding that stupid, stupid stunt. Right. But like you were saying, they've now decided, at least some networks have decided they're going to start counting what's called the DVR. I'm so bitter. The DVR plus system, which is live plus same day. Yeah, that's the Nielsen method. Live plus three days or live plus three and then live plus seven, which is obviously live plus same days. If you just watch it later that night. Plus three is three days within three days, and then seven is within that week. And I'm seeing like, conflicting information out there. Seems like either they now have basically just live plus three, which is like their main measurement. Well, what matters is what the advertisers say is what we care about. Like, you can have live plus 20, but if the advertisers are like, we don't care about Live Plus 20. That doesn't do anything for us. Exactly. It's true. But it sounds like you're right. Like at one point they tried to say that Live plus same day is basically the same thing Nielsen did. Right. And the advertising and they wanted to lump it together with Live and the advertisers like, no, it's really not the same. No. Because of the fast forwarding thing. Yeah. So let's at least separate these numbers out so we can look at it all individually. Yeah. The thing is, the people who are watching TV, ie. You and I, we don't care what the advertisers think, and they basically just need to keep up with our viewing habits, which are changing radically. The broadcast networks have lost 17% of the most coveted demographic, 18 to 49 year olds between 2012 and 2013. 17% just gone. Yeah. Part of that is because the networks put out terrible stuff. Although so do the cable networks these days, too. Yeah, sure. But another part of it is because broadcast is stuck in this sweeps week certain time on a certain day format that it's been in forever since the they're being basically held hostage by Nielsen's ratings. So there's been a real push to advance technologically and to start taking into account these other myriad ways that people consume television and getting a clear picture of what an audience is doing and the fact that it's now computer based and we have ways of tracking computers. Yeah. Really? Broadcasters are as excited as ever and we just have to figure out how to do it. And we'll talk about how they're trying to figure out how to do it right after this. Well, one thing before we get to the internet that we haven't mentioned yet is you might hear in TV parlance, the word share as opposed to rating. And what that is. A share is how many people are watching a certain TV show that are actually watching TV. A rating is just how many people are watching it. But the share is how many people what share of people are watching a show that are watching something other people. Like if your TV is off, it doesn't count. No. Then your share number is always going to be higher. Yeah, it is. But the rating is the number of people watching it compared to the entire population of America. Right, exactly. Or Canada. Yeah, I keep forgetting about Canada. They steal our shows. So now we're on to the newest development, DVRs kind of through a wrench in the plans, but they're trying to take those into account. And they've been pretty successful, it seems like, with that. Yeah. Once they settle on what they all agree is a valid thing. Measurement. Yeah, valid measurement. But now, of course, people are consuming TV online more than ever on their laptops, on their tablets, on their mobile devices. Can I throw out some figures for you real quick, Chuck? Please consider this. 116,000,000 television sets in the United States. Yeah. There's 113,000,000 tablets. What? Yeah. 166,000,000 smartphones and 243,000,000 Internet connected computers, double the amount of televisions in the US. And people are watching stuff whenever they want, however they want on this. And as it stands right now, nielsen is still trying to figure out how the heck they can most effectively track these people. Yeah, well, this is the first year. This fall TV season will be the very first year that they're going to supposedly have a across the board measurement system with TV ratings. It'll include viewership on everything, including your mobile device. And it's for some innovation, too, because Nielsen can't just say, oh, well, we'll add like an eavesdropper onto your tablet or your smartphone because it'll drain your battery. Yeah. What it will probably be is a third party app or piece of software. And it makes sense. It seems like it would be easier than ever to track watching habits in the near future. Okay. It is. If you're Googling, if you're Nielsen and you've been basically caught off guard by this since you maybe started thinking about this in 2011, then you're in deep trouble. Old man Nielsen. There's a very effective way of tracking computer use, Chuck, and it's called cookies. And cookies have been around forever, and they've gotten to the point now where they can plant cookies on your tablet or smartphone or computer, all these things you use. And after a while, just from paying attention to the data, the algorithm will basically say, I think these three cookies over here are the same person. And they'll put them together and all of a sudden, what was once three users is now one. And the picture is that much clearer of who binge watched season two of True Blood this week. Right. So there's cookies out there, and they've been around for a while, and they're very easy to get and very easy to use. And this is what Nielsen is up against. Yeah. And you may be saying to yourself, well, who cares how people are watching it if it's online or on TV? But what matters is advertisers. If you've noticed, if you watch shows online, like with Hulu or something, they're different commercials. You're not seeing the same stuff. And they still can't even decide now what to count because they don't want to. If Brad Pitt does a Pepsi commercial, he probably has it in his contract. Well, this can only run on air. On network, on air TV in Thailand only. Don't show me on hulu. I don't want my commercial running online. If I show up in South Korea, you owe me $10 million. That's right. So they have a lot of control on how their images are seen. Or maybe there's an awesome commercial that licensed the who's won't get Fooled again. It's only licensed for television. They can't show that same commercial online. Right. So you're going to. Have to show what some advertisers or networks might consider a substandard ad. I don't even want to count that as a view. Yeah, and the same applies to TV shows too. There might be actors, writers that are just for on air and not for video distribution or just like with the ads. So it seems to me like it's not just Neilson, he's up against this. The networks are still trying to figure out things like TV everywhere. They want you to be able to watch TV everywhere you are at all times, because then they can serve you ads everywhere at all times, and they can charge for those kinds of things, but they can't say how to track this yet. One. And then not everything's cleared for all forms of media too. The other problem with online viewing is they don't have that all important demographic detail. Okay. Again, though, or they could though, if they start using cookies, then they've got it right there. Sure. This is what advertisers are salivating over, like hyper targeted ads. So imagine if you and I are watching the same classic episode of Saturday Night Live, and I'm watching on my computer. You're watching on your computer. We're sitting right next to each other. We press play at the same time. The ad break gets to the same spot at the same time, and then boom, two different ads come up. Yeah, I get oval team because I'm in my forty s. And you get a Ferrari ad because you're five or six years younger than me. Exactly. That's exactly what would happen too. So this is what advertisers want. Like, that level is targeted, but the Nielsen Company is still dominating. If they can catch up, the Nielsen Company will be around for another 5000 years. But again, they're up against cookie tracking right now. And if somebody can come along and be like, hey man, we've got all of your second screen data you could ever want, then again, Nielsen is in big trouble. Well, there are companies trying to do that. There's one called.com Score that says they can offer a single metric that shows who's watching television across every single platform you can think of. Time shifted, on demand, streaming, live, whatever.com scores, they can do it. NBC has signed up with them, and they haven't dropped Nielsen. They're just spending more money to try and get better tracking. There's another company, they did that in the 2014 Sochi Olympics, right? Was that the trial? Yeah, I think that's when they rolled it out, supposedly it was super successful. Yeah, that's what they said. And then there's another one called Rentrack, that their origins were just a video cassette distributor, but they realized that that was going nowhere. What, in 2014? Even worse, they were beta. Yes. They diversified into TV ratings and they use cable set top boxes, and right now have deals with 70 networks and 300 TV stations. And basically the competition david Poltrack, he's a chief research officer for CVS Corporation, said that the competition on the research front is the most intense it's ever been. It's a pretty exciting time. Yeah. And Nielsen, actually there was FTC Antitrust Settlement, where I think the way I understand it is that Nielsen was using they acquired a company called Arbitran, which is a specialist in radio and out of home measurement. And I think there was an antitrust suit saying, like, you can't be the only people using this. So they've now licensed that out. We're forced, I think, to license it out to.com score, who is now using that portable people meter. Not purple people eater. No, man. But that's off to you for getting ready. I think I'm understanding that correctly. But the long and the short of it is, unless they get this right, they think they are missing out on as much as 15% of TV viewing is going unaccounted for at this point. So if you're like, you're a network or something like that, that's ad revenue. Right? That's an ad rate hike that you aren't getting if you're an advertiser, that's like a whole ghost group that you may or may not be getting your product in front of. But you can't say either way, having ten or 15% of the advertising or viewing audience unaccounted for is not acceptable to me. Not in modern America, buddy. This is what I think is going to happen. I think they're going to get their jazz together and be able to track who watches the show down to 100%. And the people who make the shows will sell a package to an advertiser, and the advertiser spot runs in that show no matter where it's consumed. So it's like a 360 deal, basically. Like, this show is going to be broadcast live or broadcast on the Nets. It's going to be up on our player. You're going to be able to watch it on tablet. But in all these, it's going to be when you buy an ad spot, it goes with the show no matter where the show goes. Right. I could see that. And then there's another happy aspect of tracking viewing down to this granular detail. Your shows are more likely to be saved. Our show, again, I say, would not have been helped by any of this. But the whole reason the community was online are still on air was because the NBC was smart enough to be like, oh, well, wait a minute. Yeah, its ratings are abysmal, traditionally speaking. But on Twitter, it actually trends. It's like a worldwide trend that's valuable. And they figured out that this is something you have to take into account. Nielsen has as well. They launched a partnership with Twitter, who in turn bought like, basically a TV trend tracking service. So now Nielsen is going to start taking Twitter trending into account, into its ratings. Yeah, and I think Nielsen has to deal with Facebook too, right? I believe so. Yeah. To try and see again what's trending, I guess. Yeah. And so now it's not just going to be how many people are watching it, how many people are talking about it, how many people dress up like that character that night, that kind of thing. So really neat inventive shows that don't get a huge national audience. Sure will. Maybe have a longer life. We might still have Freaks and Geeks. Yes, that would be nice. Although that was a perfect run encapsulated in one season. Yeah, it's pretty great. And everyone on that show went on to be huge movie stars. Almost. Not everyone, but a lot of them did. Most of them. And if we would have had time, who we should have talked to about this was Luke Ryan. Oh, yeah. Our buddy Luke is he's movies, though, right? Well, now he knows all about the stuff. He does TV as well, but he's just talking to him is like he's always one step ahead. He's very forward thinking, smart guy. Yes. I bet he would verify your theory on where we're headed. Maybe tweak it. Well, Luke, if you're out there listening, let us know. You better be listening. And also, I'm eternally grateful to Luke Ryan for my Billy Zabka signed hot Tub time machine poster. That's right. That's how we first met him, right? Yeah, that's pretty cool. If you want to know more about Luke Ryan or TV ratings, you can type either of those two into the search bar at How Stuff Works.com. And since I said Luke Ryan, not Luke Bryan. Yeah, that's different. I don't even know who Luke Bryan is. He's a huge, big time country star. That's why I don't know who he is. You know, he sold out like two shows at Madison Square Gardens, and apparently he's the only one to ever do that. He's huge. People sell out multiple shows at Madison Square Garden all the time. Bruce sells out like six, eight in a row. He's one of them. Okay, maybe he broke the time record or something. He's a good guy, too, though. If his name isn't Willie Nelson, then I don't know him. Well. Anyway, it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this train conductor. I love that job. We had one that wrote in. Awesome. Hey, guys. Been wanting to write in for a while now. Been waiting until I could think of something interesting to relate to you. I found your podcast a while back in February. Is looking for something to listen to while I commute to work. Working on a Penn station for the Long Island Railroad as a train conductor means my hours tend to have me driving home anywhere from midnight to 03:00. A.m. Prior to finding your show, all I listened to her audiobooks or the radio. But I got bored with all that after a while and I noticed my eyelids were getting heavier and heavier, which is about 70 miles. Door to door trip. Yeah, it's no good. Enter stuff you should know, from the first time I listened to you guys have been wide awake, amused, and attended the whole drive. That's why I want to thank you guys for keeping me alive, because if not for your show, I'm sure I would have fallen asleep and driven off the road. Ever since childhood, I've always been fascinated about history and learning how things work and was evident by me dismantling my toys and attempting to put them back together. Although it's funny, in the end, I always had extra parts. So, again, thank you for accompanying me on my drive home every night. It's been nice having three friends in the car. Although one of you is extremely silent. That's Jerry. And by the way, Jerry didn't get canceled. We were just joking. Yeah. All right. She's on the air. And that is from Angel Cartagena in Bethel, Connecticut. Or on Hill. I wondered about that. He says PS, if it becomes listener mail. I know you both try so hard to pronounce things. My last name is Cartagena, like the city in Romancing the stone. But he didn't say if it was angel or angel. If his last name is Cartagena, it's an Hill, I would think. But we'll see. We will see. Let us know on Hill. That's what I'm going with. All right. If you want to let us know how to pronounce your name, we're always happy to hear from buddies out there who listen. And listening land. You can tweet to us at SYSK podcast. You can post the pronunciation of your name on Facebook. Comstepyshow. You can send us an email to stuff podcast@howstuffworks.com. And as always, hang out with us at our home on the web. Stuffyoushouldnow.com. Stuffyheno is the production of Iheartradios how stuff works. For more podcasts my heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio App, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out. The sun is shining, the daylights longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music my Favorite Murder from Exactly Right media, my Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarref and Georgia Hardstarkk, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder. One week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…-umami-final.mp3	How Umami Works!	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-umami-works	For millennia humans have recognized four tastes, but in the 1980s a fifth taste first isolated in Japan gained worldwide acceptance - and took off like a rocket! Learn about meaty, musty, savory umami in this episode.	For millennia humans have recognized four tastes, but in the 1980s a fifth taste first isolated in Japan gained worldwide acceptance - and took off like a rocket! Learn about meaty, musty, savory umami in this episode.	Thu, 20 Aug 2015 12:59:26 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2015, tm_mon=8, tm_mday=20, tm_hour=12, tm_min=59, tm_sec=26, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=232, tm_isdst=0)	34307829	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"This July, don't miss an entire summer of surprises on Disney Plus with Disney's High School Musical, the series season three Zombies, three Doctor Strange in the multiverse of Madness, and the wonderful summer of Mickey Mouse. Plus new episodes of Marvel Studios, ms. Marvel and National Geographics. America the Beautiful. From the award winning producers of Planet Earth, Frozen Planet, and the Disney nature films, america the Beautiful takes viewers on a tour of the most spectacular and visually arresting regions of our great nation. All these and more streaming this month on Disney Plus. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, Charles W, Chuck Bryant and Jerry. This is stuff you should know. Well, you'd have to change the name of the show. Right there. No. On a Whim. No. All right. That's very meaty and savory of you. Can you smell my juices? I'm cooking in them. Smell like fish stock. Oh, yeah. You know, I did a dumpy dumb on ketchup. The Origin of Ketchup. That was a good one. Oh, you saw that? Sure. You watch this? Of course I do. I had no idea. I'm your biggest fan. You're one of the 100. I'm one of those people. It's like, this guy is so dumb. What kind of I don't get it. I can't get through the woods. I don't like that. But I just keep watching them. I can't help it. So you saw the one about ketchup and you know about ketchia? Yes. The Vietnamese fish sauce that actually serves as the basis for ketchup, the American condiment, which is not the number one selling condiment in America. Is it salsa? No. What is it? Mayonnaise. Oh, yes. Did you know that? No. Well, I love mayonnaise. Clearly you didn't. What kind? Dukes is your brand, right? Well, I'm Dukes, but I find myself a defender of mayonnaise because my whole life, people have just thought it was gross. Not everyone. You would do well in, like, France or Belgium, buddy. Yeah. Like on a hamburger and a hot dog, people are like, because I don't like ketchup and people think I'm weird. Oh, no. You need some ketchup, too. Not that much. I've also found recently, as a grown up adult, a real live one, that you can replace ketchup with tomatoes, and it tastes even better depending on the ketchup. You mean on a burger? Yes. Instead of both. Right. You just mean no ketchup. Yeah, I could put in both. I'm not opposed to it. No. I found and it was a big surprise to me a really big surprise. Yes. That if you just put tomatoes, a good tomato, on and no ketchup, you're actually creating the taste that you're looking for with ketchup that just misses it slightly. Right. Because it's got more than tomatoes in it. Right. It's really, again, very surprising to me, even though I realize, of course, that tomato is made from or ketchup is made from tomatoes? Partially, sure. Like, I haven't made that connection. I just didn't realize how good just tomatoes were on a burger without ketchup. Yeah, I don't like raw tomatoes either, so I wouldn't do that. And you can't dip a French fry in a tomato. Well, no, I'm not opposed to ketchup. I'll still use ketchup, especially for dipping fries. I'm cool with that. I'm not down in ketchup. Here is what I'm trying to say. I just think that tomatoes are great on a burger, but I also like mayo, too, I think is ultimately the point that started me off on this. Yeah, I like tomato sauce, like red sauce, but I don't like raw tomatoes or just whole tomatoes. They're slimy. I'm not supposed to eat them like an apple or anything. If you've been doing that, I can understand why you don't like raw tomatoes. Some people do. Some people just slice them and put them on a plate. Right. They're not just holding in your hand and eating it like an apple. What kind of monster does that? That's what I'm saying. A monster. Kaiser Wilhelm the second. Yeah, he's known. All right, so all of that to say, umami. O, mama. This one's about umami, the fifth flavor. The fifth beetle out of what they now say is six fat, or carbon dioxide is also one, too. Oh, really? We supposedly they found receptors that are tailored specifically to sensing carbon dioxide on the tongue, and that ultimately, that makes it qualified as a taste. So they're going to be seven now, I think there's way more. I don't know why science has been so stingy or so reluctant to accept the idea that we have more than four flavor receptors or more four taste receptors. But umami was isolated in the beginning of the 20th century, and it wasn't for almost 80 years before the west finally accepted it. Yeah. Part of the reason, because the research was written in Japanese, okay. That's maybe had something to do with it. And part of the issue was that umami is very mild and taste, and when you have high concentrations of it to increase that flavor, you've got salty and sour mixed in. So I think it just confounded. The west, we get sour, we get salty, we get sweet, for sure. Why, we even get bitter. But we don't get this other thing. No. And we're not going over five, so you better make the sumi stuff good. That's what the west said. Dumb Western scientists and food scientists. So, Chuck, I think we let the cat out of the bag a little bit. The Japanese are the ones who first discovered Umami. Right. It comes from the word umai, roughly translated as delicious chefs. If you talk to a chef whom he's a big hot thing right now. Really? They'll say maybe it's like a mushroomy thing. It's like a earthy. It is very subtle. Like I said it's musty. Yeah, musty. Which doesn't sound appealing. No. But it also makes sweet different. That's, umami's big, great quality. And I think that's probably one of the reasons why it was hard for the west to accept it is Umami's big thing is synergizing. Yeah. It's a supporting cast member, almost. Yes, it is. It's like bud bundy. Okay. Not a leading guy, but you put him in an ensemble, he's going to bring everybody else up. It's what he's known for. I would give a million American dollars to be inside your brain during that five ish seconds of you spinning around, searching for a supporting cast member and ending up at bud Bundy. Will you come back in 20 years and give me a million dollars? And I will let you. And that would be amazing. So with, like, salty sour again, we get those things. They stand on their own. Umami actually has a very mild and not necessarily, like, pleasurable flavor on its own. Yeah. You don't want something that's like, oh, this is just umami flavored. Right. But it is almost like it's designed to interact with other flavors, especially salty and especially sweet. Agreed. And Umami can even interact with itself. And all of a sudden, it takes what was just like a hom day and turns it into the greatest day of your life. With one bite of shiitake mushrooms, with some hot umami on Umami action. So it is nothing new, obviously. It's not like you can just identify a new taste. It's been around the Romans and the Greeks before them enjoyed something called garum, and that is a sauce that, boy, you want to talk about how you find something weird food wise. Yeah. They were gutting fish, and they said, let's take this fish guts and blood and let's salt it and leave it out in the sun for three months and see what happens. And then you have to eat it. No, you eat it. No, you and someone eventually ate it. They strained the liquid from the top of it, and they said, boy, this is garam sauce. This is good stuff. It's delicious. Garam means delicious in ancient Roman. I think so. And that was Umami personified because how Umami was discovered in there was a brilliant chemist named Kikunae Aikida. Is that right? Kikunae. It's got an extra little pop to it. Got you. But yeah, you did it. Thank you. So he was a chemist, and he worked at the imperial university. I'm sorry. Yeah, he was a professor at the imperial university of Tokyo. And he was perplexed that he tasted something one day and said, this is not any of those four flavors. No, I know. This is different. He was all about the dashi. Dashi is the basis of miso soups, lots of other stuff. But basically, it's a fish stock made from, I think, tuna flakes and kombu, which is dried kelp. Yes. And there are all kinds of recipes for adaji base, and it's in a lot of things, from sauces and soba. Noodle sauces. To, like you said, miso. Yeah. Really big ingredient in Japanese cuisine. Right. And this guy was like, this little boy loves his dashi, and I want to know exactly what is making it so wonderful. So since he was a chemist, he took, I think, something like 12 dashi and boiled it down. Ten of them isolated some stuff. The first thing that came out were some obvious ones that he clearly discarded is not responsible for umami, because there were salts. He's like, no, it's not that. It's not salt. We understand salt. It's not salt. I know for a fact it's not salt. What else is in here? He starts sorting through it. Right. Well, didn't he separate the dashi into its parts and then break those down? Yeah. Okay. I just jumped ahead a step. Got you. I just make a terrible chemist. He's on kelp at this .1 of the ingredients. Okay. And so with the kelp is where he found those two salts. And you're right, he was like, well, I know these flavors, and they're not what I've been experiencing on my tongue. No, they're old news. Old news. So he looked a little further, and he found well, wait a minute. What is this? It's glutamic acid. Yeah. And he's like, maybe, but glutamic acid has a sour taste, and that's weird. Like, it can't be glutamic acid. It doesn't quite make sense. So he added some more stuff, came up with a chemical reaction, and what popped out on the other end is what you and I call monosodium glutamate MSG. And he figured out that it's not glutamic acid. It's not the salt, but it's actually glutamate. But then he figured out even further, it's like glutamate. That doesn't make any sense. Like glutamate. Glutamate doesn't work. Then he realized it's not the protein that's giving it the taste. It's the amino acids that actually make up proteins that give Umami its taste. Boom. So glutamate, I'm sorry, is an amino acid, right? Right. And that's one of the things that gives Umami taste. This is the first thing that was discovered to give umami its taste. Yeah. And that was the kelp. Dashi has his different components. So he had a student, he said, you know what? Let me get that. The dried tuna flakes. Bonito flakes. Yes, bonita. Delicious. There's different kinds, but bonita is definitely one of them. And he says, let me identify these components. And what he found was something called you want to try that one in ay eight? Is that right? Yes, I think that is right, man. It's a nucleic acid, like you say. Yes. So he's like, boom. I've got number two. And then in 1960, another scientist named Akira Kunanaka nice. He worked for Yamasa, the famous soy saucy. And now you're just showing off. He was. And he went on to work in pharmaceuticals. It was interesting. Oh, he's a chemist. Yes. But it's like you work for soy sauce, and then you go to work for a pharmaceutical company. Right. I'm good at both things, but you're right. It's all just chemistry. Sure. So he said, you know what? I can identify a third thing called guanylate. It's another nucleotide in those shiitake mushrooms you were talking about. Yeah. And it's not like just bonito flakes, kombu and shiitake mushrooms are the only things that produce, umami, taste. These are just the three things that those guys went to town and isolated different stuff out of, right? Yeah. I always want to see Bonita apple bomb. When you say Bonita triple Quest after all these years. They keep making appearances in episodes lately. Oh, yeah, they have been. Huh. You mentioned them in hula Hoops. Yeah. This one I can't remember which one. We talked about the scenario. Oh, whatso? What's the scenario? Right. You know what? My friend Justin, whom you also know, his mother actually left her wallet in El Segundo. No way. And he even called me. He was like, dude, guess what happened? My mother left her wallet in El Segundo. That's crazy. Yeah, it was pretty remarkable. We should probably take a break. Yeah. And then we'll talk a little bit more about the science of taste right after this. So we have done an episode on taste that was great. It was great. Taste and how it works from July 2010. I highly recommend it. Yeah. But we're going to go over it a little bit more here. But yes, I think if we're going to talk about, umami, we'd be big jerks if we just assumed, you know, everything there is to know about. Yeah. We got to talk about what's called the Gustatory system. Okay. So when we're talking about taste specifically, that's separate from flavor, which we'll get to but taste begins on the tongue, right. And on the tongue, you're going to find what we like to call taste buds, or pepper. The papier have taste buds on them, right? Yes. There are three main types of papa. You have the fungi form. Yeah. Mushroom shaped. Sure. The foliate. Those are the ridges and grooves at the back of the tongue and the circumphilate. And those are circular at the front end of the tongue. Right. And then some papa have a couple of taste buds. Some have hundreds of taste buds. And then when you look into the taste buds themselves, they have receptor cells. And what's interesting is when you think about a taste buds, you'd be like, oh, well, there's a salty taste bud. Sweet taste bud. Umami, umami, sweet, sour, bitter fat. Right. Carbon dioxide. So that's not the case. As a matter of fact, taste bud has different receptor cells, and these different receptor cells can be tuned to accept or sense different types of taste. Yet wasn't it the shape, if I remember correctly? Well, that was with smell. Smell and taste are closely related. And we should say that the spoiler alert for the taste episode. We're not 100% sure how we sense taste or smell, but yes, the predominant theory is that a specific type of odorant or taste molecule will interact with a specific type of receptor. And when it does, the chemical in that molecule, that food molecule, unlocks that receptor. And by doing that, it's translated into an electrical impulse. Boom. So you chew your food up, gets spitty and saliva covered, and it breaks it down, coat your tongue. And that's when that transduction. Those electrical impulses are sent to the NST. The solitary tract of the brain. Sorry, the nucleus of the solitary tract of the brain. Yeah, that's what all happens. That's when it puts all these different tastes together and says, delicious, I like this. Or more to the point, that's probably going to kill you, so stop eating that. Yeah. And like we said, taste is different than flavor. Taste is just one aspect of flavor. For a food item or really anything to have a flavor, it includes not just the taste, but also the smell, the sight of it, the temperature of it, how it feels. Is it firm, is it a little too gelatinous? These are all things that your brain takes into account, including things like memories that you've formed from having it before. Yeah. Cotton candy when I was a kid gives me great memories. So that plays a part in flavor. Exactly. It releases some different aspect of it that only you can experience that flavor. Yeah. Like if you had a cotton candy jelly bean, it would conjure up that memory and that would be part of the flavor experience. Yes. Or if it's one of your past lives. So that's kind of the science of taste. And with Umami specifically, again, one of the things that the west was having trouble with accepting that Umami was a real thing was that there wasn't any what's called psychophysical evidence that Umami was its own taste. That's right. For a long time, they thought it was just a component of salty taste. Because monosodium glutamate is a type of salt, right? Yeah. It's a salt protein combination that makes MSG. And for many, many years, this is the only source of Umami taste. But finally, in the 80s, once they had the first international symposium on Umami. Is it the real thing? I bet that was a party. I'll bet it was, too, because it was in Hawaii. Sure. And the Japanese and Americans love Hawaii, so I bet everybody was partying down there. They started to do studies in the early eighty s, and they found, oh, actually no, there are specific receptor cells on the human tongue. And it turns out not just in human tongues, but mostly human tongues that are designed or geared toward accepting or sensing Umami taste. That's right. Those are the g protein coupled receptors, GPCRs, and that is for sweet, bitter, and umami, and sour and salty. Those a little different. Those sort of flow through ion channels, which is way over my head, to be honest. Well, it's just like if a molecule is a positive charge or a negative charge, if it's a positive ion, it has positive charge. It's not going to make it through all sorts of the channels. It's only going to make it through positive channels. It's simple. I know, but as far as relating that to a taste, it's just sort of I can think of as managed. Well, that's the whole thing. It's like you said, your brain transduction is taking an chemical and turning it into an electrical charge. Yeah. I just think that's endlessly fascinating. Oh, sure. The senses and how they work, it's amazing. But not just that. Electricity and electrical generation. Do you remember that episode? Electricity may be one of our best, if you ask me. Agreed. All right, so what we have here are three kinds of receptor cells that they know that respond to this combination that makes up what MSG is. I'm sorry. What, umami, is it's that enocynate the guanylate and the MSG? And what they think is that they actually hold on to these compounds, hold on longer, which is why you get these interesting combinations when you have, like, cheese with an apple or cheese on an apple pie. Right. It takes sweet and doesn't just make it sweeter. It makes it, like, sweet in a different way. Right? Yeah, exactly. And the same thing again, when you mix together different types of either amino acids or nucleic acids that create an umami, taste, they magnify this umaminess, of this meatiness, of the whole thing. And also with, I believe, salty, too. Umami, and salty mixed together, the fact that it hangs on to that molecule longer and it just leaves that charge going, then that sweet can come and go, but it's affected by it. Food science is so interesting. It is. And we're going to talk a little more about food science and evolution right after this. All right, so here's one thing I didn't get, and I reread this a few times. I get the first part of this, which is as follows. Is that people have long thought that tastes had a part in evolution and that we were just wired to know that something sweet is probably okay to eat, and that will give us nutrition. Something really bitter may be dangerous to eat, that might be poisonous. And of course, there's exceptions to all of this. Those are pretty good general rules when it comes to evolution. Right. That was the evolution explanation for the sense of taste. Right? Yeah. But what I don't get is where in here does it explain the evolutionary method of, umami, like, what role it played? I got this. You ready? Well, is it this part about cooking? Yes. Oh, it was very poorly stated. It really was. But it's really interesting once you realize this, that so you said that Umami me is, like, one of the newer tastes or something like that. It actually is. Yeah. They couldn't figure out what part. Did this have an evolution? No, but even before that, if you look at it, evolutionarily speaking, it's actually very old. Supposedly, the receptors are very old, like 400 million years old or something like that. But the idea that we can taste Umami or us tasting umami is very actually fairly recent, because Umami is released by cooking food. Like, if you eat a bunch of raw hamburger, it's not going to be Umami tasting. It's not going to taste very good. But you cook that hamburger, and you have molecularly changed its composition. You've unlocked some of the proteins into its constituent amino acids, and all of a sudden, you've got an Umami taste. Yes. It's like caramelizing. An onion is completely different than the taste of a raw onion or even a just regular grilled onion. Yeah. And the big mystery of all this, evolutionarily speaking, is that what you're gaining or one of the biggest sources of Umami taste is glutamate. Well, that's great, but the human body produces tons of glutamate, so it wouldn't make sense that we would have a taste receptor to find it in nature. Right, because we got enough in our body. Well, you need other essential amino acids, and it figures that the best way to get amino acids is to cook or ferment food. Yeah, you need fire, because amino acids can be bound to proteins, and we don't absorb them as well, or our body spends a lot more energy breaking them down and digesting them than if we cook them or if we ferment them. So man advanced fire. Man starts to cook food. Man advances more rapidly. Yes, that's one of the ideas. That why our brain developed as well as it did, or we'd be came as intelligent as we did was from cooking food. So we were able to break down our food a lot more easily and gain from it, absorb it, and basically grow huge brains. That's awesome that it came from cooking. And where do we get Omami taste from cooked or fermented food? Where these proteins have been broken down into much more easily absorbed amino acid constituents. Man. I like that. I agree. I just made it confusing, though. Did it come across no, it totally makes sense. We learned how to cook food, and that put us at the head of the evolutionary ladder. Right. And Umami taste comes from cooked or fermented food. Yeah, very clear. What is not clear, or maybe it is clear, is MSG bad for you? A lot of people say it makes me dizzy, or it makes my heart flutter, or the MSG crash after you go to the Chinese food buffet. Well, there's actually something called Chinese food syndrome. Not true. Apparently it's a myth, supposedly culturally bound syndrome, where, like very few other cultures outside of the United States or the west even think of the idea that MSG can make you sick and that it's apparently a psychosomatic reaction where you expect MSG is going to make you sick, so you get sick. Yes. That's one explanation. Maybe your body or our bodies are just different in how we process and metabolize MSG. Or maybe you have odd a little bit too much of anything can be a bad thing, right? Could be all these things. But what science is saying is there is no evidence that MSG is bad for you, quote unquote. Right. And apparently study after study found that people that MSG doesn't cause these things. Yeah. It's weird. So get off the couch, lazy. You're just looking for an excuse to not cut the grass. MSG, again, has kind of a bad rap here in the US. But it's everywhere. And it was actually one of the first things that Akita yeah, Professor Akita did was he figured out a way to patent extracting monosodium glutamate from wheat, which is where it's much more abundantly than in kelp, and package it into a seasoning. And he had no ill will. He's like, this is great. This can make that boring dish, like, taste better. Right? That healthy, boring dish tastes better. Exactly. So it's ironic then that people think it's bad for you. And in fact, when he packaged it, he was like, this is going to be good for you. Yeah. It's going to make this thing that's good for you taste even better, and our country is going to be very healthy. Right? Yeah. But it's hard to find. You said it was and everything, but it's disguised ingredients. Again, stealthily, because MSG has a bad rap here in the west. Yes. They should just put MSG, right? They do sometimes. For the most part, though, they will call it something like hydrolyzed wheat protein, because remember, it can be extracted from wheat. Sometimes they'll call it just natural flavors. Yeah. Because all these things are natural. Exactly. What else? Texturized vegetable protein, autolized yeast extract. Right? Yeah. Or just natural flavors. So if you see that can be a lot of things, though, but just natural flavors. Sure. Yeah. You don't know what you're eating now, but there are some upsides to using this MSG. It actually can be used in the way that Professor Aka envisioned it, which is taking stuff and making it slightly healthier. Actually, when you use potassium chloride rather than sodium chloride to make MSG, you can actually replace the sodium in a dish. So if you have a sodium problem, you can use some of this stuff. Yeah. Or, hey, how about that low fat food that doesn't taste so good? Add a little MSG, it tastes better. Right. Although recent medical research suggests that you should be not eating low fat food that regular fat food is not bad for you or, hey, old person, you don't taste so good anymore, and you take medication that even dampens. That right. Why don't you throw some MSG on there? Why don't you bring our taste buds back to life? Right. Whether MSG is a bad rap or not, it's definitely all over the place, and it is making things taste good. In my opinion, Umami is here to stay. It is. But there's other ways to get an Umami flavor out of food, and this article actually has some helpful tips for your cooking if you want to go and cook and get an Umami taste. You ever been to, umami, Burger? No, I haven't. It sounds awesome. It's good. I like it. It sounds like in La. You can make one at home with some mushrooms. Yeah. Umami burger is a chain. I don't know where they have them, but I had it in Los Angeles. And they add powdered mushroom and seaweed to the beef with little soy sauce. You don't even know what you're eating except that it tastes good. Right. You're not like, I can detect the mushroom and seaweed in this burger. Right. It's just Umami flavored. Umami. And, you know, it's interesting. I think it's called, like, Umamiinformation.com or something like that. Really interesting site. But they point out that while you associate Umami with Asian cooking, it's actually found all over the world. Sure. Like, in Italy with tomato sauces and ketchup in the United States, in cheeses in Europe. In West Africa, they have something called what is it called? Sambara. I think it's kind of like a miso in West Africa. That sounds kind of delicious. Yeah, Sombala that sounds good. I just like the sounds of it. Exactly. So it's interesting that people have been cooking with Umami stuff long before we ever knew the word umami. And it's been around the world too. Caramelizing onions we mentioned in, like, butter, right? Nothing better. What else? You can put parmesan cheese rinds into a super stew, and it'll umami that thing up. That's a good one. If you're making a stock, use bones of an animal. And suppose you're not against that kind of thing. The guy who invented veal stock is reputed to have believed that there was a fifth taste that had yet been unidentified back in the 19th century. He's like, I just boiled this calf. He's like, there's something going on here besides the big four. Wow. Nobody believes him. If you're cooking with mushrooms and I recommend this with all vegetables, roast those things a little bit first. It brings out all kinds of flavors, and it makes your brain bigger. Like, if you go to make an omelet, don't just throw raw peppers and stuff in there. Cook that stuff up a little bit on the side, then add that to the egg mixture. It makes the world a difference. Omelet. Everybody should watch internet roundup. Just to get an idea of what our little gesticulations are like. When you're talking about cooking peppers on the side and throw them in there, you're making very cute little hand gestures over there. Well, I always joke with Emily, I'm going to open an omelette stand on the beach one day. It's my retirement job. She's like, why an omelet stand on the beach? I was like, Because no one's ever done it. No, they really haven't. You ever go to the beach. You're laying there in the hot sun, you're like, I could use an omelette. Yeah, every time I think I just want my retirement job to be very slow paced and not busy. Right. That's what it's and you'll get to eat omelets. You got anything else? Cooking with wine is a good one, too. Yeah, that's umami city. No, just go forth and try umamiing, up your dishes and you will be happy. Say us. It'll be an indefinable quality, but you'll know, it's umami yes, it should be something about it. Can't put my finger on it. You'll see, this stuff is umai, which again means delicious, roughly in Japanese. Umai, if you want to know more about umami, you can type that word in the search bar athowsteffworks.com and since I said umami, it's time again for listener mail. I'm just going to call this a nice simple thank you from the listener. Those are nice. Sometimes it is nice. It's from Meredith from Granite Falls, Minnesota. And she's just thanking us because she has a boring summer job. She said, I work at a hospital, and I scan a bunch of old files into an external hard drive. So what I do is I remove a lot of staples, stare at the scanner, and I wait for it to be done over and over. Oh, man. You imagine that? It's like, oh, we need to digitize all these records. Let's hire someone to do that. We're job creators. Yeah. So God bless you, Mary, for doing that. I found listening to 8 hours of music just wasn't doing the trick anymore. Then I discovered the wonderful world of podcasts. You guys are my all time favorites. You guys are so funny, and I love all the dumb jokes you make. I don't know if they're dumb. I think, like, groundbreaking is a better way. Yeah, they really make my day, guys. And even if I don't understand all the tangents you go off on, because I'm only 21 and don't understand most of these references you make the movies or pop culture things from decades gone by, I still enjoy that the podcast is more of a conversation between you guys than just strictly reading from a script. Oh, yeah. We don't even have a script. Clearly. That would be the worst script ever. One of these days, I have a real story to share directly related to a recent show. But for now, I just want to say thank you so much and keep up the amazing work that is. Best wishes from Meredith. Meredith thank you. And she has a post script that says, I absolutely love it when Josh calls. Chuckers don't even know why. I just made some smile on Weekly. Nice. It just has a ring, chuckers it's a fun word. It is. It's like, umami, we said, umami a lot. I wonder how many times. I don't know. We should have an umami counter. Yeah, that would be cool. I don't know if we are familiar with the technology that could do that, though. And at the end it just turns into a big pile of salty, dried fish guts. I seriously am making some top notch miso soup. I've been inspired to everything. Yeah, I've gotten pretty good at hot and sour soup, but I make it from a mix and just add some stuff to it. This I'm going to make from dashi and miso from scratch. Well, I'm not going to ferment the soybeans or anything like that. You're going to make your own dashi? No, I'm going to buy dashi. You should make your own daughter. I'm not going to make my own dashi. Do you know how bad my apartment would smell if I like fermented and then boiled down fish just to make the stock? You need a spice kitchen. I do need a spice kitchen. Now that you mentioned it, yeah. No. But I will let you know how the miso soup turned out. Okay. If you want to get in touch with us, you can tweet to us at sisk podcast. You can join us on Facebook.com stuffyshow. You can send us an email to stuffpokastohouse.com. And as always, join us at our home on the Web stuffyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit HowStuffWorks.com. Ah, summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's criminal Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. 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https://podcasts.howstuf…ear-meltdown.mp3	How a Nuclear Meltdown Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-a-nuclear-meltdown-works	The recent disaster in Japan has caused massive damage and killed thousands -- but that's not all: The Fukushima nuclear plant may possibly be on the verge of a meltdown. Tune in to learn how meltdowns work, and what a meltdown would mean for Japan.	The recent disaster in Japan has caused massive damage and killed thousands -- but that's not all: The Fukushima nuclear plant may possibly be on the verge of a meltdown. Tune in to learn how meltdowns work, and what a meltdown would mean for Japan.	Tue, 22 Mar 2011 18:44:34 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2011, tm_mon=3, tm_mday=22, tm_hour=18, tm_min=44, tm_sec=34, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=81, tm_isdst=0)	34356324	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetop workscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me. As always. Always is. Charles W. Chuck Bryant. And that makes this Stuff You Should Know kind of a special edition. Really. We don't usually like hop on news stories. Yeah, you can't ignore this stuff and I guess probably releasing something like a full week after it happens and it's not hopping on. But still now people have concerns, and there's a lot of information flying around. Everyone's trying to explain this thing in the simplest terms. And since that's what we do for a living yeah. We figured we should do it. Yes. So that's what we're doing today. We're going to talk about nuclear meltdowns and how it pertains to the crisis in Japan, right? Yeah. And it's a lot more basic and simple than I thought. I was intimidated going into this, and then I was like, oh, well, that's not too hard to understand. Yeah, it is nuclear science, but it's kind of approachable nuclear science. I agree. So, Chuck, let's talk about catastrophe modeling. Okay. It's a type of risk modeling that insurance companies love. It's how they figure out why your insurance should be less than, say, somebody else of the same age, weight, height, that kind of thing, who lives in California. Right, right. My former self. Yeah. So you can actually take a catastrophe model right. And plug in every variable you can think of. And what you'll spit out is basically a curve, a graph of probability of an accident happening, and then, say, the level of damage that will happen. Okay. Okay. So if you do this over, like, say, a 10,000 year catalog, you can figure out how often, say, 9.0 earthquake is going to hit Japan. Got you. And you can figure that out by choosing a probability. Let's say there's 4% probability of a 9.0 happening. You can find that that pops up maybe 40 times over a 10,000 year scale. And what you have then is that that's a one in 250 year probability. Okay. That's where they get the predictor. Yeah, exactly. And that's why power plants are how they're built. To withstand something like a once in a 250 year quake, saying it could happen in this area. So we need to account for it. Right. And it's based on the dynamics, the geophysical dynamics of an earthquake of a 9.0 magnitude. Right. Because you've got all that plugged into the model, you figure out how bad it's going to be, how often it's going to happen, and then you build accordingly. And the plants on the north coast of Japan. The TEPCO's Tokyo Electric Power Company, right? They're Daiichi and Daenery plants, number one and number two plants in Fukushima were built to withstand a 250 year quake, which is exactly what they got on March 11. Yeah. And they withstood it. They did. Everything went fine. They shut down the reactors, which is what's supposed to happen, toot. Sweet. But the problem was it was stood an earthquake, a huge earthquake, possibly the most massive earthquake that's ever hit Japan. But it didn't withstand the tsunami. This model, whatever the model it was built for, did not predict the tsunami. It didn't take it into account. And that's why we have this crisis right now. Right? Yeah. So we should probably also mention that the focus right now is on this potential nuclear meltdown. But the tsunami is up to, like, I think, 15,000 dead and missing. Now, just from the tsunami alone. Are they calculating the tsunami different from the earthquake, as far as that goes? I read tsunami. Okay, so possibly because I read 7000, but that might just be maybe there's different numbers. No, I think that's just dead. This is like 15,000 dead and missing. Okay. Yeah. But now you've got an earthquake that just knocked down a bunch of stuff. You have a tsunami that took out entire towns, and then you have this nuclear crisis that's unfolding, and this is going to release in a few days. So we'll have to make do with the information that we have. Right? Yeah. Unless something, like, really big happens between today, which is Thursday and Tuesday, we might have to come back in and, like, doctor it up a bit. Right. This is what we're going with for now. Yes. So, Chuck, let's talk a little bit about how if you walk around a nuclear power plant, what are you going to find? What's going on there? Well, it's pretty easy, actually, and this is something that I didn't know, because I didn't know a whole lot about nuclear power at all until this happened. And basically what a nuclear power plant does is it creates one of the oldest models for creating energy, which is steam powered turbines. Right. And how they do that, they basically use nuclear fuel, which these days is enriched uranium. The uranium atom split, creates a lot of heat. Neutrons flying around also is created by that process. Right. And this heat boils water. In the case of these reactors, these are water boiling reactors. And we'll talk about more of the Mark One here in a minute. And it produces basically, it boils this water produces steam. That steam drives a turbine, generates power about a gigawatt of electricity at full power, which is a lot. Right. And that is a tremendous amount. And that full power, the heat that's being put out. Marshall, who wrote a really cool he's the founder of the site, still got it. Yes, he does. He wrote a very incredible article in record time called How Japan's Nuclear Crisis Works. But he said that this puts out the heat that's akin to about a billion watt bulb with that full power. The thing is, obviously, you don't always need your nuclear reactors to be running at full power. So what you do is you modulate how much heat is being put out by using what are called control rods. Yeah. Sort of like the throttle on your gas. Right. But the control rod is basically something like maybe a boron enriched length of metal that is inserted into the fuel rod core. Right. And if you pull it out a little bit, then it heats up. If you push it in a little bit, it heats down by heat, I guess I could say. It powers up and it powers down. Right. Yeah. Because it's attracting the neutrons. Right. Then the neutrons are what basically make the splitting of the atom happen. And the problem there is it's self sustaining. So if you didn't have these control rods, it becomes its own living reaction. Well, it would just keep going. Right? It will keep going as long as you can keep it cool. It'll just be running at max power all the time. Right. Now, when an earthquake hits, one of the failsafes designed into any nuclear reactor is that the control rods are going to get jammed in all the way, which is called scrambling. And when the reactor is scrammed, all the control rods are shut down. All the fuel rods are shut down because there's these control rods just accepting all the neutrons. And like you said, the neutrons are the active ingredient in nuclear fission because they're just making all the atoms in the surrounding area unstable. Right, yeah. But it's important to point out that even when they're fully inserted and it's shut down, it's still creating heat. And here's the problem. Small amount of heat, but it's enough heat, if left unchecked, to potentially cause what's called a meltdown. Right. So this heat that you're talking about, Chuck, is called decay heat. Yeah. And I've read places where it lasts a week. I've read that it lasts for a year, and I think it actually lasts for a year. It takes a year for a fuel rod to actually shut down, to go to a cold shutdown state where it doesn't need to be cooled any longer with water. Right. So when you scram something like they did on March 11, it's not just going to cool down right away. And that's the problem that we're dealing with right now, is this decay heat, which, like you said, it's a ridiculous amount of heat and it requires tons of cooling. Right. Which normally should be fine because the Daiichi plant with reactors one to four have cooling systems and lots of them, right? Yeah. It's a closed loop. So what happens is the water boils and creates a lot of pressure. The pressure is released via steam and the steam actually gets cooled, condensed and reused, like a closed loop air conditioning system, not a whole lot different. And the water is recirculated. That water is recirculated back through the system with these electric pumps. Right. And those electric pumps are the key to keeping everything cool. And the problem well, we'll get to the problem. They have a lot of failsafes in place because they don't just plug the pump into the wall and say, all right, we're good to go, because that would be bad if the power went down. There are backup electric pumps. If the power goes down, you can actually because I believe it's using its own nuclear power to operate these pumps. This is an electricity generating nuclear power plant, so it's running itself. But once the plant shuts down, which is what they did, they say, okay, we can grab electricity from the grid. Right, but the grid shut down. Yes, shut the grid down, too. Pretty much right after the control rods were scrammed into the reactors so they have another backup, they were like, all right, we got the diesel generators, which are diesel generators are great. They do a great job. Tsunami comes in, water on top of electrical or I'm sorry, diesel generators, makes them to not operate. Yeah, they were submerged. They weren't designed to operate in submerged no condition. And then they said, all right, we've got all these backups in place. The final backup we have is a battery system. Battery system kicked in. It worked great. But the problem is it only works for a little bit of, like, how many hours? I don't know if it's a few, several hours. Yeah, because the idea is that the battery system is in dire emergency until you get the grid back going, which shouldn't take that long right now. Also, transportation was knocked out. Supply routes are knocked out. There's no power. They tried to get more diesel generators there, but they just couldn't get them in time. Right. So we have a nuclear power plant without power to run these cooling systems, and these are boiled water reactors, which means that the water, like you said, Chuck, it gets its energy or it creates electricity by boiling water. Now, these fuel rods are so hot, even with this decay heat, that the moment water hits them, even boiling water, the boiled water is keeping them cool. They're so hot, they just have to remain underwater. Let's just keep them underwater. That's the key. The problem is they create tons of steam, and that steam is what is what runs the turbine. And then after it exits the turbine, like you said, it's condensed and then reused as coolant. Right, right. But if those pumps aren't working, all it's doing is producing steam, boiling off water, and basically getting rid of the only coolant source they have. Yeah. And if water gets hot enough, actually, something called thermolysis takes place, and that's when it breaks down into constituent hydrogen and oxygen atoms, or in this case, hydrogen gas, which is really explosive. And that's actually a pretty normal byproduct of even, like, the proper functioning of a boiled water reactor plant. So they have procedures in place to vent steam normally, but they burn the hydrogen off in a slow control burn when they're venting it to reduce radioactivity and to keep explosions from happening. Sure. Now, you may be wondering, why would they design a system that uses water to cool and nothing else? Right. The whole reason that somebody ever designed the Mark One or boiled water reactor is that it actually has a failsafe built in the fact that it uses water as a coolant and what's called a neutron modulator, which keeps that thing from going, like, out of control past just to sustain max power. Nuclear fission is whatever you're using as a neutron modulator or moderator. I'm sorry. So as long as the neutron moderator there, you can have fission, nuclear fission, but if you can't get the control rods in in time and the coolant goes away, the fuel actually won't be able to continue in a fission state because the neutron moderator is not there. So you don't have the coolant, but at least you don't have a meltdown from nuclear fission, which is really horrible. Right. So that's why they have this boiled water reactor. But the problem is this water served as a fail safe and it's Achilles heel. And in this case, Josh, the hydrogen gas we were talking about, the normal reaction got worse because the water boil away. These fuel tubes were now exposed to air. They got really hot and started cracking. And the little uranium fuel pellets, I think they're the size of a Tootsie Roll, is that right? They overheated and cracked and allowed water to get in there, and water is not supposed to be in there. And that's where you had this massive hydrogen gas explosion. Right. And I think was it one of them? Yeah, reactor two of them. I think it was several different reactors had this explosion within the reactor building itself. It wasn't like the whole thing exploded. It was contained within the building, they hope. They think. Not really. Exactly. So we're still getting news at this point because there's a small number of people on the ground, right. And they're not all like, on the phone with Anderson Cooper. Right. So the information on the inside isn't that readily available right now. So there were several explosions, Chuck. I think it was like reactors one and three had explosions from this hydrogen gas. They were venting it, they didn't burn it off properly. Right. And the hydrogen built up and up and up. Remember, you need to keep these things wet. You have to keep them underwater under any circumstances whatsoever. They have to be cooled constantly. They have to remain underwater. So without these backup generators, without the battery power generators, without their normal electricity, without anything, they finally decide we need to flood these things with seawater, boron enriched seawater. And it was a chemical reaction between the seawater and the hydrogen that caused these explosions. Oh, it was, yeah, which we should say this is very important. That was a conventional chemical explosion, right? Yeah. It was not a nuclear bomb. Right. It's not possible for a nuclear reactor to blow up. Like in a nuclear explosion. It's not possible. The danger, like, with Chernobyl and anything, is leaking radiation. It's not like a Hiroshima type of event. Right. So that happens to create a nuclear bomb, what you have to do is take radioactive material in a sub critical state, which is like what you might have in your front pocket right now, Chuck. Right. It's just plain old lump of uranium. Who cares? Right. And you have to explode it so fast to create a chain reaction that uses up all of that subcritical material that it skips over the critical stage and goes right into super critical. The precision that that requires makes it that there's probably, like, five people on the planet right now that know how to build a nuclear bomb like that. Right. You can't just do that with fuel. The big threat is the melting of the fuel. Right, right. And so they flooded it with seawater, which ruins the reactors forever, by the way, we should mention, but that's a better scenario. And apparently these are 40 year old reactors that were not on its last legs as far as they're about to break, but they were near the end of their operating lifespan. Do you want to hear something horrible? No. Reactor number one went online on March 25, 1971, so it should have been decommissioned on March 25, 2011. Oh, really? There was actually a date? There should have been, but apparently TEPCO applied for and received a ten year extension on its operating licenses for those. Interesting. Yeah. So we have some information here. What does this all mean, the world at large? Well, here's the big problem. Like we said, the fuel isn't going to explode, but it's going to melt. Right. And you said, Chuck, that these little fuel pellets in the fuel rods are like the size of a Tootsie Roll and about the shape. Right. If it melts, when this stuff hits air, it begins to melt, and if it melts, it will no longer be able to be cooled because it's going to be a big, flat, dense glob of nuclear fuel that's melting and collecting inside of this containment vessel. Right. So the operative word is containment vessel. This extremely hot nuclear fuel that's forming a pool can conceivably melt through the containment vessel. And once that happens, when it encounters the concrete barrier, which is like the fail safe or failsafe, it should not be able to melt through that. It's possible. It could. And if it does, then you have nuclear fuel in the environment, and that's when it's beyond catastrophe level. Yeah. And that's a containment vessel that's completely functional and intact. And we don't know what kind of damage these explosions have caused. They might be compromised from the inside to make containment even more difficult. Right. Who knows at this point? So the explosions were kind of jarring, you could say, right? The explosions at reactors one and three. Yes, there was a fire at reactor four, but apparently one of the big problems is a bunch of spent fuel that's no longer being cooled at reactor too. And when this fuel melts, it can catch on fire. So vapor is bad enough. Right. But if it catches fire, smoke is what's really going to get you. It will create and carry further radioactive particles that has a much longer half life than the stuff that's going to come out in the vapor. Right. That's the threat. That's a big threat. It is a big threat. So we mentioned that it was the Mark One boiling water reactor that was over there. GE made these General Electric in the 1960s. They went online and I think 71, you said. Yes, which is a long time ago. The United States has 23 of these reactors right now at 16 locations, including Oyster Creek in New Jersey, dresden near Chicago, Monticello near Minneapolis. No reason to freak out right now because well, here's the deal. These Mark One boilers are under scrutiny right now. The New York Times ran a piece about these. Apparently in 1972, right after they built these things, they identified weaknesses and said, hey, we should discontinue this because there are some safety risks. One of the safety risks was a smaller containment design, which they said in 1972 might be more susceptible to explosion and rupture from a build up of hydrogen. Wow. So that seems to be what happened here in Japan. Obviously GE is not on the hook or anything. Once you take control of your nuclear power plant as a nation, it's yours. And it's not like you can call up GE and say, hey jerks, what about all this? So Japan was responsible for care and upkeep of their own thing. And apparently the Mark Ones in the United States have undergone a lot of modifications over the years, one of which is a change to the Taurus, which is a water filled vessel that encircles the primary containment vessel. So there's all these things in place in the that the US. Put in place at our Mark Ones that they say will prevent something like this. I don't know what was going on in Japan. If they were modified at all over the years, I'm sure that will all come out. Well, apparently starting to. Apparently at least one GE engineer for the Mark One resigned because he thought the Mark One was so flawed, and apparently GE wasn't doing anything about it. This was in the early seventy s. Yeah, but some GE whistle blowers blew the whistle on the Fukushima plant because apparently they falsified records before. Really? They used dishonest practices in monitoring their own radioactive output. Right. And there is a lack safety culture, basically, by the company's own admission. This is interesting to see. What? Ramifications is going to have a nuclear power, because there was a pretty good track record for a couple of decades and a lot of people it's starting to come around again. Well, yeah. And saying this is actually a green fuel producing technology because it doesn't produce carbon, and we got a good track record and it's pretty safe now. And these things are like super safe. They can withstand all these different things. What they couldn't withstand was a combination in Japan's case of these things like earthquakes and tsunamis. Well, Chuck, it had a good 20 year run where it was starting to gain traction. Nuclear power was because it was trying to emerge from the shadow of Three Mile Island. Right. The partial fuel melt, which is the correct term meltdown is not actually used in the industry, we should say. Oh, really? Yeah. But partial fuel melt in 1979 in Pennsylvania. That's right. And that was, like you said, Three Mile Island, which is categorized as a level five disaster, which had local consequences. It was like the fuel melted and pooled. Right. But it didn't escape the containment vessel. But some radioactive material was released into the surrounding area. Right. But it scared the tar out of everybody. Yeah. Well, China Syndrome didn't help much. Yeah, that's true, too. And so this disaster in Japan right now is categorized I've seen it as a six. I've seen it as a five, depending on who you ask. But either way, it's not a good situation, obviously. So what we do know is that as it stands right now, at least it's not a Chernobyl. And Chernobyl was a level seven, which is as bad as it can get. Yeah. Chernobyl was a different scenario as well. Definitely. So there were a lot of differences. Remember we talked about water being a neutron modulator? Yeah. Well, Chernobyl's design used water as a coolant, but had graphite as a neutron modulator. When their system failed, graphite caught fire and spewed radioactive smoke, which you'll remember is the worst stuff to have into the atmosphere for ten days before they got a hold of it. Yeah. And they also tried to keep it quiet, which isn't a wise move when you're talking nuclear meltdown. No, it's not. And by all indications, Japan has been very forthcoming here and there, trying to get good information. Really? They kept the fire at reactor four quiet for enough hours that it ruined their credibility, basically. Oh, really? Yeah. So no one's quite sure. Plus, Japan is like, we just need a twelve mile radius between 12 miles, get out of there. Twelve and 19 miles, seal up your home. And the US is like, we say, 50 miles, and any American that shows up at Narita Airport gets a free flight out of here. Really? Yeah. So the Japanese are probably saying, listen to the guys in America? No, they're not broadcasting it. Well, no Americans getting broadcast over there. Well, the citizens, if they knew this right. What about Facebook and social media? I'm sure it's getting out like that, but apparently, like, the Japanese media, they're known to not really criticize the government. It's just not their culture. Yeah. I got a really good friend in Tokyo, and he's gone to Osaka right now with his family, two small kids. He's not trying to be panicky, but he's also got two small kids and he's just kind of playing it safe right now. Right. We should talk about radiation, I guess. Yeah. It's actually small kids that are at the biggest risk about this. Always are. How do you measure radiation, Chuck? You measure it, Josh, with a unit called a millisevert, and it measures the absorption into the human body, specifically, not like how much is an air, this is how much you are absorbing, how much is dangerous to you. So you can measure it in midsevert or microsevert. But the one that's like when you get to one sea vert, which would be 1000 milliseverts or a million microceverts, that's when you are in big trouble. Yes. 1000 micro receivers and a middle receiver. And then how many milliseverts and a Severt? 1000. Yeah. Okay. So one sea vert, I think, gives you a 10% chance of dying in 30 days. And that's just bad. That's ridiculous exposure. I don't think anybody's recorded any levels like that. Right. Yeah. But let's put this into perspective. Right now, they're saying, and you're probably hearing on the news, like 167 times the average annual dose that a human gets because we get radiation. I think Americans get 6.2 milliseverts a year through medical diagnostic procedures, dental X rays, flights flying and airplane smoking. Yeah. Going through those full body scanners, smoking one and a half packs of cigarettes a day, 13 milliseconds per year. I am radioactive. Yeah. Well, you're getting it out of your system, buddy. Yes, I am, but I still probably am because radioactivity is cumulative, which is why they break it up into milliseverts per hour or military per year. Right. Because after a little bit of time, your body can process this stuff or the half life of it is spent, and it's not deadly any longer. Right, right. But the big problem is when it is still in full bore, a radioactive material, and it's absorbed through your skin, you can breathe it in. You can get it in through your tongue, your ears, your eyes, your hair, everywhere. You can absorb this radioactive material. And apparently, one of the biggest threats, or the biggest known threat is, like I said earlier, iodide 131. Right, iodine. Right. Iodine 131. So that's important because iodide is actually counteracts the effects of radiation. And people are snapping this up. Apparently, drugstore.com is sold out of iodide right now. Right. Fake iodide is even being sold. There are warnings now about buying fake iodide. I know. And people are eating iodide salt, and I think the Salt Council came out and said, that's not going to do anything for you. The reason people are eating iodide and buying iodide salt tablets, which they should, frankly, be selling or sending them. Not selling them, sending them to Japan. You don't need them here in the US. They actually do need them in Japan with iodine 131, it's a radioactive byproduct of nuclear fission right. Or uranium, specifically. And when you absorb that, your thyroid get this big, fat, heavy dose of it, and the thyroid is responsible for some very fast dividing cells. So once the cell is compromised in your thyroid, that radioactivity is going to spread like gangbusters through your body, especially if you're a kid, because you have faster than normal dividing cells anyway, right? Yeah. So that's why thyroid cancer tends to go up in cases of radioactive exposure. Right. If you take iodide, your thyroid actually is going to get as much iodide as it can, but it has a saturation level. Right. So if you expose it to iodide before your exposed radioactive iodine 131, your thyroid is going to be full up and be like, sorry, no more room for iodine here, radioactive or otherwise. And even better, iodine 131 has a half life of eight days. So all you have to do is basically make sure your thyroid is full of iodide for eight days and you're set. Right. And if you're worried here in the US, there's been stuff on the news about the radioactive plume crossing the ocean. Apparently, the nuclear submarine, the Ronald Reagan cruise right on through it the other day, and the material was removed with soap and water, and it's contamination free. And they said, basically, the steam that's coming across the ocean is less dangerous than living in Denver, Colorado for a year, because when you live at high altitudes, you have less atmosphere to block radiation. And just living in Denver, Colorado means you have more radiation than the average American. Right. Plus, it's still a very small amount. So I'm not saying people in Denver should be like, oh, I need to move. Right, exactly. It's not factoring in crime, even. You get hit by a bus, you can get shot in Denver. Or if you're a smoker, if you go to the dentist and get your head Xrayed, it's like you get radioactivity as a human being and a little more so as an American. Yeah. I think the media is fanning the flames of us losing our perspective as far as radiation hysteria goes. Absolutely. Yeah. What else is there, Chuckers? Well, this was just off the news wire about 20 minutes ago. They said that they have picked up some small amounts of radioactive material in Sacramento, but it was minuscule, is what they're saying, not harmful to human health. And so people on the West Coast don't need to be. Freaking out at this point, from what we can tell. So people in Japan should be worried. But they're even saying in Japan, like, let's see what we can do here. You don't need to be leaving the country on mass. Yes. If you hear a report that there is radiation coming our way, ask, what's the level? If it's in microserviced, I would advise you not to worry. If it's in milliseberg, start to wonder exactly how many milliseverts. If it's 100 or less, then you are within EPA standards for radiation exposure. But you should probably consider maybe getting out of town for a little while. But I think maybe keeping a calm head and not buying up all the iodide tablets in the world is probably a good idea at this point. Yeah. I got one more little factoid that's interesting for all the news agencies that are fanning the flames. Apparently, Grand Central Station, New York City, the granite there and the uranium lay stone used at the US capitol building supposedly give off enough radiation that they would not pass a nuclear power plant licensing test. So they're pretty strict with the licensing. People walking around Grand Central Station aren't in danger of dying from nuclear radiation. So that just kind of puts it into perspective. Or are they? I wish we had the law and order duty that was appropriate. Well, I guess that's about it. Do you own anything else, Chuck? No. Okay. Hopefully you guys have a better understanding of what's going on there. I know I do. Our hearts and minds are with everybody in Japan. Keep thinking of them. Maybe spend some money. Maybe send some iodine, send some life straws. Apparently life straws are being sent over there in some of these rescue boxes. Yes. Cool. I saw that, too. There's always Red Cross, right? Yes. And I guess since that's about it, if you want to learn more, type in Japan's Nuclear crisis in the Handy Search Bar@householdforce.com. It will bring up just a really great overview of what's going on over there. And since I said handy search bar, it's time for listener mail. Yeah, Josh, I thought it would be appropriate today. You asked a few weeks ago about if you're involved in a program that's helping the world out. Send it in. We got a few of these and we're reading them periodically, and this seemed like an appropriate podcast to do so. This is from Paul C in Canada, and he's involved in a program in Northern Canada helping to start up a project with a group of First Nation folks who are being super proactive about reclaiming and protecting their culture and language. And it's spelled T-L-I-C-H-O. I'm going to go with Joe. I think that's good. You're probably wrong. Are concerned that their traditional knowledge and ways of life are not being passed on to their young people who are leaving to find jobs and go to college. In response, they are creating a program to hire some of their dedicated young people for the summer to learn their traditional ways of life. We are looking for some funding to get the program off the ground. We have applied to an organization called Small Change Fund. Struck me that you folks have a sizable Canadian brigade in your stuff you should know army and I'm hoping that you can help me spread the word about the Small Change Fund. I'm, of course, biased toward my program, which is the Lichco Summer Culture Education program. That sounds like a good program, but the Small Change Fund website as a whole is really full of great worthwhile, social and environmental programs, all looking for small amounts of startup funding, less than five grand. If you could mention the Small Change Fund website that is smallchangefund.org to your Canadian fans and everyone. Actually. I will gladly take you guys fishing and give you all big high fives when you come up to Yellowknife NWT. Which I think is Northwest Territory. I think it is it's my guess and do a podcast on the Northern lights or work how caribou migration works or how to survive in negative 40 degrees or some other such northern thing. So that is from policy and that is the smallchangefund.org and his program is the TLI Cho Summer Culture Education Program. So stop by and visit. Sounds like a good program. Thank you. That's Paul Culse. Thanks Paul. Good idea. If you have a good idea or you have a good idea on how to help Japan, how about that? Yeah. Specifically, go on our Facebook.com STUFFYou know, tweet it to us, podcast or send us plain old email to stuffpodcast@howstuffworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetofworks.com. Want more housestuffworks? Check out our blogs on the Housetofworks.com homepage. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you?"
c38e867e-5460-11e8-b38c-0f95bfe9e99b	SYSK Selects: How Ouija Boards Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/sysk-selects-how-ouija-boards-work	Although most people who've used Ouija boards don't think they're communicating with the beyond, there is something mysterious about how it works. Learn the ins and outs of the popular parlor game that sprang directly from the 19th-century spiritualism movement in this classic episode.	Although most people who've used Ouija boards don't think they're communicating with the beyond, there is something mysterious about how it works. Learn the ins and outs of the popular parlor game that sprang directly from the 19th-century spiritualism movement in this classic episode.	Sat, 07 Sep 2019 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=9, tm_mday=7, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=250, tm_isdst=0)	32652312	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, friends. 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From Atlanta to only murders in the building, it's all on Hulu. So check into your obsessions. Hulu subscription is required. Terms apply. Visit hulu.com for plan details. Hello, friends. I hope you're having a creepy Saturday afternoon or morning or night. I would recommend saving this stuff you should know select episode until tonight when you can break out your Ouija board and learn about Ouija as you play Ouija and realize that Ouija is just bunk and completely made up from October 2013. How Ouija Boards Work. Right here, right now. Welcome to stuff. You should know a production of Iheartradios how stuff works. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's charles W, Chuck Bryant. Jerry is kind of here. And this is Stephanie Chanel. Yeah, this is the last podcast these two today that we're recording in the infamous Murderroom. Oh, yeah, it's right. Yeah. So long, Murder Room. Yeah, we're moving offices. And what better thing to do than to have a seance, which we're going to conduct after this episode. Records. You didn't talk to me about this first. Yeah, we're having a seance, buddy. I don't know about that. We're going to get down to brass tacks and answer all the unknown questions. Well, you know what? I'll tell you what. I will have a seance with you using a Ouija board, because now I know how they work and I'm not quite as scared of them as I used to be. Say after I saw the exorcist. Yeah. Do you say ouija or ouija? I say Ouija. Yeah, I kind of do, too. Although I think it's probably Ouija. Right? Not to be confused with the crime scene photographer ouija. We're talking about the Ouija board. Although, yeah, I think some people say Ouija. Yeah, I just think it's interesting. I said Ouija since I was a kid. Yeah, me too. But I also say Reese cup instead of Reese's Cup. Yumi. Does too yummy and resist do. Yeah. I'm like. No, it's Reese's. They're like, no, it's Reese. Yeah. I don't say Reese. I'd just say a Reese cup. I think they do, too. People in their quirks. Yeah. Foibles. I say Foibles. Yeah. You should hear him sing that potato potato song, everybody. Yeah. Which apparently I got snookered on that, by the way. That's an old bit. So I was snookered by an urban legend. What? The whole potato potato song where I was like, yeah, a friend of mine's friend auditioned with this piece and sang it wrong. You thought it was for real? Yeah, of course I did. I'd never heard that before. That's very funny. Yes. Have you heard that? No. Because you would have stopped me. No, I have heard it before, but it wasn't too long ago, was it? For my mouth, maybe, but it didn't think that it actually happened, I think. Okay. Anyway, ouija suckers born every day ouija board. Yes. And I mentioned exorcist already. You saw that, right? Of course. A bunch of times. Enough. Here's a trivia question for you. What is the name of the spirit Reagan communicates with? I didn't even have to look this up through her Ouija board. Jeez, I don't remember. Captain Howdy. Shut up. No. Do you remember now? No. Captain Howdy was who she's talking with? Who is the devil? I guess that was one of his aliases. I wonder if he has, like, a devil passport that says Captain Howdy. Devil, Satan, lucifer. Captain Howdy. Yeah. I didn't know that. Yeah, it's true. That makes it a little less frightening. So what was that, the early seventy s? The exorcist came out, right? I think so. Okay. The Ouija board, the one she was playing with, I believe was a Parker brothers Ouija board. Was it now? Hasbro, yes. And there was this mass manufactured, mass marketed toy game, but it was actually based on, like, a real phenomenon that we've talked about here on this show before the spiritualism movement of the 19th century. The Ouija board first made its appearance around then. Supposedly they claimed providence for this way further back than that. But there's no real evidence that the Ouija board itself is any older than the mid 19th century and that it's American in origin. Yeah. The actual Ouija brand board is what you're talking about. Right, right. Or talking boards in general, which is another name for like a Ouija board is a talking board. But not all talking boards are Ouija boards. That's right. So you're saying there's no evidence that they existed before, like in the 1800? Before that. Before that. No. People did use divination. There is a pretty good source, a fourth century E. C. Greek scholar who wrote a history, who talks about a pair of men who were killed for using divination. But they used a pendulum and a disk with the alphabet around it. Got to spell out a message so there were divinations. People did use, like, an alphabet style. I don't know if they use planchet, but the Ouija board itself, despite being marketed for many years as something from Egyptian antiquity, is probably something that was created earlier in the mid 19th century in the States. All right, well, 1891 is an attorney named Elijah Bond. Patton did what was called the Wija Egyptian luck board. And it's important to point out, when these things are marketed, when you read the fine print, they never claim to be able to talk with the spirits. It's a game. Right. It's a game now. And it was once it became mass marketed. Yeah. But in 1891, it was part of this larger offshoot of spiritualism. Yeah. And we talked a bit about Egyptology, and it sort of all ties in seances were big. You remember they cracked the hieroglyphic code from the Rosetta Stone just a couple of decades before. So Egypt was like this weird place with all sorts of strange cults and rituals. Yeah. And it's strange to me that something like the occult, even on a minor level, sort of took hold on the United States at one point. And I don't know if it was accepted by the masses, but, like, you know, regular people and noteworthy people would hold seances and try to communicate with their dead relatives, usually through a medium who is usually female. Right. There weren't a lot of dudes doing it. No, there are a lot of dudes who were involved in it, but the mediums were typically female, and a lot of them use things that were like the Ouija board. Talking boards. Yeah. You mentioned the dial plate, which was a spinning wheel with letters and numbers, and the alphabet board, which was sort of like a Ouija board, but you just pointed to different letters and waited for a response from the great beyond. Some had a little pencil that would actually write things out. Right. They used a planchette, which is French for a little plank, which is a little board or something, maybe like a circular disk on three legs. And then one of the legs for a writing planchette was basically a hole with a pencil going through it. So that when the planchette moved, using the medium's hands. But the spirit was really in control. The pencil would write something, hopefully. So back to the Ouija board, the official game version. Over about 70 years, it changed ownership a few times, eventually landing at Parker Brothers, which is now hasbro, like you pointed out. Right. Elijah Bond, the guy who he didn't come up with the first Ouija board, but he was the first one to make an improvement on an existing patent. Right. And the Ouija board, as we understand it, that was his how we see it now. Yeah. And he actually went off after he sold the rights to it, to a guy named Charles Canard. Elijah Bondwin often created a rival version that had a huge swastika on it didn't perform so well. No, it did at first, because we're talking that association is still like a mystical symbol. Yeah. But it was made by the Swastika Novelty Company in West Virginia that he founded to produce this rival board. And it's considered his other Ouija board. That's pretty funny. Isn't that weird? Yeah. My friend Jesse Char the other day tweeted something funny about design. I think it was something like 15% of design is trying to make something not look like a swastika or a penis. Although that was pretty good. Did she make that up or have you heard that? I've not heard of that. All right, so I'm giving credit to Jesse Charr. So, Chuck, the point is, the Ouija board took this thing that was being used by mediums as part of a very serious spiritualism movement and said, hey, you don't need this crazy old lady to contact your dead uncle right now. You can buy one and do it in your own home over cocktails. Exactly. And a lot of people took it like that from the get go. I think some people probably purchased Ouija boards. Seriously? Sure. But I think from the outset, it was a part of a party. It was a conversation starter. Something that you just did socially, too, for fun. For sure. I think that there was always a large segment of the Ouija board buying population that just took it as entertainment. Yeah, exactly. Which is probably how you should take it. Right. From Canard, he had an employee named William Fold, F-U-L-D who basically took it over to the point where he even stamped his name inventor on the back of it, even though he wasn't. And he's credited as being sort of the father of the Ouija board because he's the one that really ran with it in a marketing sense and brought it to the masses and would do all the press for it. He claimed that the French and German words for yes, we and yah is where the name comes from, even though that's not true. Well, even before that, Charles Canard said that he came up with the name by asking the board itself what it was called and it spelled out nonja. And he asked him what it meant and the board told him it was Egyptian for good luck. So that was the story. And then, yeah, I guess Fold was like means yes and yes. Yes and yes. Pretty much in French and German. It's pretty good. So like we said, Fold sold it to Parker Brothers, who turned into Hasbro. And now when you buy a Ouija brand Ouija board, it's from Hasbro. Yeah. And the article here makes a point to call out the Catholics for basically saying that it could be an evil thing and not to use it. But as a little Baptist boy, we were very much told not to use a Ouija board. I remember specifically my uncle burning his Ouija board. Did he go out and buy it just so he could burn it? No, he's like, Friday we got a party going to my house. Yeah, it's pretty funny to look back when I was a kid, I was like, yes, get rid of that evil thing. Were you there when he burned it? No, I wasn't there, but I heard about it and I was just like, Good for him. That's cool. Throw in candyland while you're at it, because that game stinks. What was the Sheets and Ladders? I never played that. I was big into frustrating. Sorry. Remember that one? Yes. That one made you hate the other people you played with, though, right? Couldn't you, like, get ahead by screwing over your fellow players? I think that's why it was called Sorry. Yeah, I think, like, if you landed on someone, you send them back the beginning and then he goes, Sorry. Yeah, maybe I just play with jerks. Who knows? Maybe. So check the Ouija board from the original Bond creation to the one you get today from Parker Brothers. The design of it has changed very little. Yeah, I guess we should describe it. I mean, I assume most people have seen one, although I've never used one. Have you? When I was younger, but, yes, I'd totally be into trying it out. It's neat for fun. It's very neat because the thing is just moving around the board by itself. All right, so we will describe the board if you have not seen it. It has the alphabet and two different arcs. It has numbers below the alphabets. It has a yes in one corner with, I think, a moon and a no in one corner with a sun. Right. And therein lies the answers, my friend. Oh, don't forget the most important part. Basically what amounts to the off button. It's goodbye written at the bottom of the numbers. Yeah, it's sort of like a Satanic magic eight ball, kind of, except this really works and it's not Satanic. Right. So the way that you use this talking board, which, again, if you're interested in this and you want to see some pretty cool old Ouija boards and the Swastika board as well. And another one called the Sphinx board, which I think is the coolest one, it's from the there's this awesome online museum called the Museum of Talking Boards. And they have histories of all this. The history of the Ouija board, history of talking boards. Just some really great articles and images on there. So go check that out because it's a pretty cool website. But when you're using this well, the instructions have stayed the same, too. Not only the design, but the gameplay itself is just about the same as it was way back in the 19th century. Right. And when you use this, they say you want to have two or more people. Yeah. With their fingers lightly resting, just your fingertips lightly resting on the planchette. And we should say the planchette like the other planet that used a pencil to write it's. Just a little plastic heart shape board, I guess, with three small legs and then a circular plastic covered disk in the middle, clear plastic disk that you look through and the disc shows you the letter number or word that the spirit is communicating. That's right. When you look down through the planchet, that's the letter word in question. That's right. So you sit there, you ask a question aloud. Everyone concentrates. No joking around, going on. No. Even Fold himself said, you want to make sure that the people who are at the table are taking this seriously or else it's not going to work. Right. Well, even though it was advertised for mirth making, you got to cut the mirth down when you're actually operating the board. Yeah. The guy who has the lampshade on his head yeah. He's got to get out of that room. So then you ask the question and then everyone watches and the planchette, as if by magic or Satan's dark powers, moves along and either answers yes or no questions or spells things out. You want somebody to jot down the letters or numbers as they are read out. And in the article it says ideally they spell out words or sentences the players can understand. Right. If it spelled out a nonsense word like Weeja, you would probably just say it's malfunctioning. Or you would say what does that mean? And then it would spell out its Egyptian for good luck. Yeah. Or German and French for yes. I wonder if Ouija boards always answer the same when you ask them what Ouija means. I don't know. I started saying it differently all of a sudden. Nonsense. Ouija just auija a couple of times. Interesting. How do you pronounce the thing that you clean your windshield with? Is that a squeegee? Evidently it can take up to five minutes for the planchette to start moving, which I don't know if I would have the patience for that. I know I might start moving it on my own. Oh yeah, you know. Well then you'll be the life of the party. Especially if you said like I'm being contacted by the spirits. Right. If after five minutes you don't get any movement from the plane yet, you want to either ask the question again or ask another question. Sure. And there's some tips for using your Ouija board to maximum capacity. Yeah. One of them is concentration again, to do with the lambshade needs to go sit in the living room, watch TV or something while everybody else is doing this. Yeah. You want to turn down the lights, maybe burn some candles, burn some incense. Yeah. Turn off that smartphone and the TV maybe. Yeah. And you really want to concentrate. And when you ask questions, you want to ask them slowly, clearly, simple questions. Yeah. And you want to ask them one at a time and wait for the answer, the response, before you ask the next question. Yeah. And they also recommend that you avoid scary questions, because that could lead you down a dark path, my friend, and always, above all else in the game, by saying goodbye. Because if you leave that portal open to the great beyond, the bad people might come in through that portal and find you and kill you. Ask Reagan from the exorcist. Right. Things can go pretty badly. So you want to end each session with the planchette over goodbye. Yeah. And then breathe a sigh of relief. Exactly. And apparently, if this doesn't work the first time you do it, you shouldn't be frustrated. In fact, the Museum of Talking Boards has a regimen that they prescribe 30 minutes of practice every day for two weeks, and apparently you'll open your chakras or something really? And all of a sudden, you will be speaking through the Ouija board, or the spirits will be speaking through you. Got you. Through the Ouija board. Is that before or after the opium regimen that they advise? Right. I think the Museum of Talking Boards is they're more historical. They're more interested in the history, background of the whole thing. Yeah. So let's talk about this for a minute. People sit down, they put their fingertips on this thing. The planchette moves. I mean, it moves like we're not making this up. Like, if you've never messed with a Ouija board before, give it a shot with another friend, and the chances are the things are going to just start moving by itself. It's eerie, especially when you're younger. Now, see, I've never done it. Explain this to me. What do you mean by itself? I will show you. I get it. But the thing this planchette is very light plastic. The feet might even have felt on them or something like that. It's designed to move very easily. Not tiny little casters or anything. No, I think original planters had casters. Okay. But basically, you're being pulled around the table. So you actually want to be in a comfortable position because your fingertips are just sitting on this thing. Right. And then when you ask a question, after a while, it will move. I've never seen one move fast, but it just moves kind of slow. But, I mean, there's no question about you're not thinking, is it moving? Like it's moving over to a letter and then it's moving over to another letter and then it's spelling something out? Yeah. But you are moving it. No, you're not in your head. Here's the thing. Let's get to the science of this. You are, in fact, moving it, but you are not conscious of moving it, which is the awesome part of it. It's this thing called idio motion. Yeah. Which someone pronounced IDEO. And I didn't know if they were just being fancy or not. It can go either way. Okay. IDEO. Idio motion. Okay. But it is an actual involuntary motion. It's one of the types of involuntary motion in which human beings are capable thanks to our muscles and neurons. Yeah. It was coined by a dude named William Carpenter in 1882 to explain dowsing rods, which is the same kind of, you know, thing, basically. Yeah. Dowsing rods, pendulums, idiomtion is where thought precedes movement and the other part of it is that we're unaware of that movement. Yeah. It's movement without owning that, basically. So when you apply that to Ouija board, you have what's called the IDEO motor effect where your thought is placed in the form of a question to the Ouija board and then the movement, the unconscious movement you're not aware that you're moving right moves to answer that question. So if you're thinking yes. Am I speaking with Great uncle Charlie? Yes. And you really want to and you're thinking, yeah, man, I hope he's there. Right. So you're unconscious or subconscious, which is it? I would guess unconscious. I think it's unfashionable to use subconscious. Okay. It's very Freudian. They would move it to the yes, but you wouldn't realize you would think it was just moving. And that's where the Ouija board fund comes from, Chuck. You don't realize you're moving it. You have no sensation of movement. And like you said, this idea motion is we've understood it for a while, since the early 18 hundreds and even fold himself in. One of his patents said, I think 1920 explained that it was moved by unconscious muscular movement of the back in the guy named Anton chevrolet. Chevrolet. Chevrolet. He basically proved this using a pendulum on a string. Yeah. And you've probably long heard about the old wives tale if you want to find out what your baby's gender. Right. You hold like a ring on a string over the belly and wait for it to move. And if it moves back and forth, it's a boy if it's circular, it's a girl and it's the same basic thing as the Chevrolet pendulum, basically it's just ideal motion. In effect, you are unconsciously swinging the string whichever way you probably desire. Exactly that's what makes it so fascinating is what you're really seeing is the unconscious telegraphing supposedly of the mother's wishes of what gender she would like because she's in fact controlling it but her muscles are moving so minutely that she's not aware of the movement. But since the pendulum is on the string, it really kind of really telegraphs these very, very tiny movements and then inertia takes over and it really starts going. So it just seems amazing because the hand is not moving right but the ring is going crazy. It's going crazy. Did it? This is the same have you ever heard of facilitated communication? It's pretty controversial. You've probably seen on the news it's when basically a caregiver will guide the fingers of someone who's severely disabled over a typewriter typewriter a typing machine, over a keyboard to a computer to supposedly get answers or communicate. And it's very controversial. It started out in 1977 in Australia, this lady named Rosemary Crossley, but the American Psychology Association basically says it's not scientifically valid. These are people that are just what facilitated communication. Yeah. The caregiver is really guiding this conversation, and it's really not coming from the person that's disabled. Right. The thing is, what makes this so tragic and sad is that the caregiver isn't aware that they're actually making these movements. Again, all of this is unconscious. You can't tell you're making this movement. And so since the profoundly handicapped person is moving their hand, the caregiver thinks that it's them. It's the handicap person. It's not like they're trying to snow somebody. Exactly. And they may even really want this person to communicate and say these things. Yeah. They're still studying it. Syracuse University actually has since 1992, it was the FC Institute. Now it's the Institute on Communication and Inclusion are still studying it. And the controversy, as usual, is between the skeptics and the believers. Yeah. Well, that's the thing. If you want to see who believes in idea motor effect, type it into Google. It's all like Skeptics dictionary. Skeptics. Skeptic. Every entry is skeptic. But if you type in idea motion, you get peer reviewed scientific literature on that. It's just the ideal motor effect is basically taking the proven IDEO motion and applying it to debunk things like Ouija boards. Right. They did a study in the University of British Columbia just last year in 2012, and basically they said it's strongest when there are multiple people on the planet. And they tested this by blindfolding people saying, you got someone else on the board with you. And when in fact there was no one else on the board, the person would still say it was the other person moving it, and they would say there was no other person. Right. And then they'd say, well, then it was the spirit moving it, I guess. Right. That's funny that no one says it's the spirits moving into that. It's always the other person who's moving it. Right. That's a pretty common trade of any Ouija board game, that you're sitting there going like, you're moving it. No, you're moving it. No, I'm really not moving it. That's how it goes. Yeah. And then with two people working in tandem, you have two sets of muscles moving unconsciously, but making a movement. You have one person relinquishing responsibility because they think it's the other person, which they think frees the muscles to move even more strongly. Because you're saying, It's not me, it's the other person. Yeah. And if they both have a common goal, then the planchette will move even more briskly. I guess if both girls are like, it's going to move to B-R-A-D then that planchette is going to move to those letters in that order, but they're both going to be like, I'm not moving it. Well, hold on. Before we get into any real life stories, do you want to do a message break? Yes. Okay. And we're back. So, should we talk about a couple of these stories? Ouija. Are they real? Are they not stories? Sure. The Herds of Kansas City. This is pretty crazy. Herbert Heard killed his wife Nelly, shot her in the back four times. And you would think, what a jerk. But what happened was they were elderly, they were in their 70s. They played with the Ouija board one night. And Nellie claimed that she received a message saying her husband was stepping out on her and gave, like, $1,500 to the other lady. $15,000 even. Wow, 1935. That's probably, like, their life savings. True. What happened was Nellie tortured him, tied him to a bedpost, whipped him with a knotted rope, burned him with a red hot poker, stabbed the knife into his shins, and forced a confession by holding a gun to his head. And eventually she left the gun on the bedside table there. Herbert got a hold of it and killed her. I can't really blame Herbert. And apparently the courts did not. What else you got in the other ones? Yeah. There's an Italian enclave in El Cerrito, California. The Italian community there apparently experienced a wave of mass hysteria that landed several people in asylum because of Ouija board use. The town went ouija crazy. Yeah. One policeman tore off his clothes and ran into a bank. And there's a lot of craziness that happened. It was just masses, areas of, I guess. And the town was like, you know what? No more. We two boards. And finally, in 1913, British author Sax Roamer supposedly came up with his villain, Dr. Fu Manchu, when his Ouija board spelled out Chinaman. So his Ouija board was racist? Yeah, and he says that's where it came from. So here's the thing. If you ever want to test whether Ouija boards are the result of idea motion and the players actually moving it or not, go to Goodwill and buy one for $3. Right. And then do this very simple test. You blindfold the players, you turn the board 90 degrees so that anybody who's memorized the layout of a Ouija board can't cheat it. Right. And then ask them some questions. And you're not going to get any kind of sensible answer. And if you do, then you need to trade carefully because you've just unlocked the gate to the spirit world. Don't forget to sell it. Goodbye. To seal off the gate, always remember, put it on. Goodbye, folks. So, you got anything else? I got nothing else. I feel like here in my 40s, after knowing now that they're not evil tools of Satan, then I would like to try it out sometime on a Friday night with good friends. Yeah, we'll play a little cards against humanity. We'll play some Ouija, and then Risk and risk to wind it all out with a big bang. Yeah, invite me over. Okay. So if you want to learn more about Ouija, that kind of thing, you can again go check out the Museum of Talking boards. It's pretty sweet. And also you should read this article on how stuff works.com. Type Ouija into the handy search bar and it will bring up this article. And since I said search bar in there somewhere, I think it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this crack baby. Jeez, we got some good response on the old crack episode, which is a good one. Yeah, I thought so, too. We've been killing it lately. Hey, guys. Just finished listening to the story on crack cocaine, and it reminded me of a story of a crack baby from many years ago. Around 2001, I was doing volunteer work at the local children's hospital in the neonatal ICU, holding babies. I came in one day and one of the nurses told me to go hold this one particular baby. She told me it was a crack baby that had been crying non stop for three days and hadn't slept. So I washed up, went to go hold this baby, held the baby in my arms and just looked at the baby. And the baby was crying, eyes closed non stop, just crying, crying, crying, crying. After several minutes, the baby's eyes opened a little bit and then closed again, would keep crying. Tears are flowing the whole time. After several minutes of that, her eyes would remain open longer and longer, but the baby was still crying and the tears were still flowing. After several more minutes, the baby's eyes stayed open, looking at me, crying a little bit less, the baby started crying less and less and less. Then after several minutes, was smiling, giggling and cooing and making all those nice happy baby noises. After several more minutes of that, the baby's eyes started to close, and soon she was asleep, sleeping for the first time in three days. It was a wonderful experience that I will remember forever. Jim from Austin, Texas. That's pretty neat. Pretty cool. Yeah. He cooed a crack baby to sleep. He's a sooth. Sayer he's a sooth. Cooper there you go, Jim. Yeah. And now he brings it Christmas presents every year. That would be a great story. Do it. Jim, if you have something to tell us that you've done based on something we talked about, I would say that Jim story falls under that umbrella, wouldn't you? Yeah. We want to hear about it. Basically, just let us have it on Twitter, at Syskpodcast, on Facebook.com, stuffychildnow. Or you can send us an email to stuff. Podcast@howtofworks.com. Stuff you should know is production of iHeartRadio's How Stuff Works. For more podcasts, my Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite show. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my favorite Murder, and Smalltown Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. 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https://podcasts.howstuf…utive-orders.mp3	What's the deal with Executive Orders?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/whats-the-deal-with-executive-orders	Depending on who's in office, they're either a presidential tradition or the acts of a despot. Executive orders are not spelled out in the Constitution, yet every president has issued them. Learn about these controversial edicts with Josh and Chuck.	Depending on who's in office, they're either a presidential tradition or the acts of a despot. Executive orders are not spelled out in the Constitution, yet every president has issued them. Learn about these controversial edicts with Josh and Chuck.	Thu, 28 Jun 2012 18:04:30 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2012, tm_mon=6, tm_mday=28, tm_hour=18, tm_min=4, tm_sec=30, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=180, tm_isdst=0)	32827440	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"What if you were a global bank who wanted to supercharge your audit system? So you tap IBM to UNSILO your data and with the help of AI, start crunching a year's worth of transactions against thousands of compliance controls. Now you're making small, smarter decisions. Faster operating costs are lower, and everyone from your auditors to your bankers feel like a million bucks. Let's create smarter ways of putting your data to work. IBM. Let's create. Learn more@ibm.com. Hey, everybody. If you want a great website, you want to do it yourself with no must, no fuss. Turn to Squarespace. They have everything to sell anything. They have the tools that you need to get your business off the ground, including ecommerce templates, inventory management, simple checkout process, and secure payments. And if you're into analytics, hold on to your hats, because Squarespace has everything that you need. Just head to squarespace. Comcysk, and you can get a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code s YSK to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from houseteporkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. Charles W. Chuck Bryant. Warming up, getting ready to carry this jam out to its conclusion. I was literally stretching. I know. As if I was telling everyone else, not you people out there in podcast land. Yeah. Who I was just speaking to. Yeah. How is everybody? Great. How is it? Fan. I need to get used to this. It's been a while. It has been. But it feels good to be back in the saddle. Yeah. My saddle still smells like me. Gross. Yeah, it's pretty gross. Like leather and jeez. Yeah. But I found it has staying power. Nice. So you're doing good? Yes. In the last six months, nothing big has changed. Two weeks? It's been longer than that, hasn't it? A little vacation. Yeah, we don't need to talk about that now. It was great fun. California all the way to go california, california. Isn't that Uber? Olivia Ford to death. Bands song. I don't know. Jason Schwartzman. Oh, yeah, sure. Was it Coconut Records? Yeah, he's had a couple of bands. I didn't recognize it when he called Board to Death. Well, that's his new name. Sure, that's bored. Death with the haircut. All right, we should get going. Here. A chuck? Yes? Did you know that President Barack Obama is planning to take over virtually the entire US. Economy and infrastructure? No, I did not know that. Yeah, well, were you? Jim Powell, Kato, senior fellow and author of the book FDR's Folly Wilson's, Bully Boy the Triumph of Liberty? Well, those are other books. Sure, those are books, not just the book. You would have known this already because Jim Powell sent out the alert via the Cato Institute and Forbes magazine. I think that Barack Obama had created this plan a ten page blueprint for seasoned control of the economy of things like water, usable water, civil transportation, all forms of energy, all commodities and products, health resources like drugs, biological products, et cetera, under the auspices. Says there's an extra is in there of Executive Order 13603. Is that the we can't wait thing? It's part of it. Okay. Now that you bring it up, the we can't wait thing is basically this idea that Obama is saying, I can't deal with you, Congress, any longer, so I'm just going to start issuing proclamations like that. Sure. So I get the impression from Jim Powell that he is against executive orders in general. I can't say that that's necessarily the case, because he could be a conservative pundit, and if he is, he may just be against Obama's executive orders. True. One of the keys to executive orders is that you're cool with them if you guys in the White House, but the moment another guy is in the White House and starts issuing them, oh, like, the sky is falling. Naziism is rising again, and it's just bad. But it is true. Obama did issue this very sweeping proclamation. Now, this isn't just on a Tuesday. It's supposedly a preparedness plan. It's called the National Defense Resources Preparedness Executive Order. So there's an emergency that has to trigger this, and it doesn't even necessarily won't be triggered. But the point is, Obama can issue a proclamation like that. And as it stands right now, it is law because it's an executive order, and we're about to talk about those. So this whole mystery, this whole mystery intro is going to be explained in the next 2030 minutes. Stroke of the pen, law of the land. Kind of cool. Paul paul Bagala yeah. Said that he was a Clinton adviser. He was. And that pretty much sums up, in a broad stroke, what an executive order? Is. It's a directive. Miriam Webster defines it. It's not true. Whoever wrote this article defines it as a directive from David. Yes. Dave's. Good. It's fresh, too, man. It's pretty new. Oh, he's citing stuff from, like, March. It is fresh. Wow. Yeah. Directive handed down directly from a president or governor because this can happen on the state level without input from the legislative or judicial branches. And that's basically it. It's like, I'm the president, and for whatever reason, I want to sign something into law and not ask anybody else. Right. And usually the reason why is because either there's an emergency and Congress is out of not in session, or Congress would not necessarily agree with it. Yeah. Or just is taking an action, period. Sure. Right. But that's where we get to the ticklish. Part about executive orders is there is a very clear flow of responsibility in the federal government. Congress is elected to make the laws, and the executive branch is there to carry out the laws. That's right. With an executive order the executive branch is making the law. Yeah. And presidents do this even though the constitution doesn't say you can, which makes it even more ticklish. Well, yeah, but they sort of hide behind the constitution. Under the following statements from article two, executive power shall be vested in the president of the United states. Okay, so they're saying, like, hey, dude, can't say in the constitution, I got power, he's got power. I don't have power. He or she, depending on when you're listening to this podcast, this could be the future. The president shall be commander in chief of the army and navy of the United States. He or she could say, well, how am I supposed to do anything as commander in chief of the army and navy? Can't even sign the law. Right. Well, plus, also you use that because they use executive orders to direct the movements of the military sometimes. Yeah, well, times of war, it's when it's heavily used. Okay. And then finally, he shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed. Obviously, that should be he or she. Well, it is under our ideas. Yeah, but we didn't write the constitution. No, we wrote a constitution. Somebody needs to get in there and just do one of those little arrows. So that's pretty much the long and short of it. And that's why it's allowed to go on since george washington, since numero uno. Every single president. That's the thing with executive orders. You don't like executive orders, just wait, because eventually a president that you like is going to start issuing them. Every single president that we've ever had has issued executive orders. I think george washington's, I think he issued eight total. So it started out slow. Now we're up like presidents issued the thousands FDR who had the three term presidency. He issued, like, 3000, some 3200, 3600, 352-2352, two. That's a lot. But every single president has issued them. Yeah. I guess in washington's case, if we want to go over a little history here, in April 1793, that would have been a pretty hip George washington. There would have been nixon. Yes. Which was a very hip George. Well, everybody referred to nixon as, like, the direct heir of george washington. They, too, were tied for first as our greatest president. Nixon says that at least. Yeah. He instructed officers, federal officers, to prosecute anyone getting in the way of the war with france. He's like, you can't do that if you're getting in the way. Congress is out of session. Let me just go ahead and make this a law. Well, that was the war between england and france. He was saying, do not get involved. What is the US. And france? Well, just the war with France. Yeah, but yeah, it was between england and france. And like, hey, america is not getting involved, and if you do go to jail, it's on your head. Yeah, exactly. And then lincoln followed. Congress is out of session again. So it sounds like it began early on in a more like legitimate form. Yeah. It was also a time where Congress got to the job behind a horse. Right. So things took time. Congress isn't here yet. Right? Exactly. Congress is on the way. But there's a big problem. Right. And in Lincoln's case, one of his problems was on the eve of the Civil War, these militias were getting out of control. One of them was run by a guy named John Merriman, and he said, you know what? Block that guy up, he's dangerous. Right. They were state militias. Well, militias that were supposedly like, well, we're from the Carolina, so we're the Carolina militias. But really they were militias. Sure. Generally, Confederate militias were attacking federal troops. And Merriman was probably the biggest rebel leader at the time. Yeah. So he locked him up and Maryman's lawyers were like, hey, dude, have you ever heard of habeas corpus? And Lincoln goes, you know what? That's sticky. How can I get around that? Oh, yeah. I'm suspending John Merriman's. Right. To habeas corpus. And I'm Abraham Lincoln, if you haven't noticed. Yeah, check out the beard. I'm a vampire hunter. I'm Daniel Day Lewis. I can't wait to see that movie. Yeah, me too. It was funny. The preview came on the other night and Emily thought it was the Daniel Day Lewis Spielberg project. And then it started breaking out into vampire stuff. She's like, what is going on here? Take a really strange turn. Which is the idea, I think. Yeah. So he suspended habeas corpus, explained it to Congress, and they said, you know what, that's probably a pretty good idea in certain cases, so let's pass the Habeas Corpus Act to allow you to do this. Yes. Which is a big deal. And it took years and years before anybody ever went back and repealed it. Right. I don't know. It seemed like it was a while. We talked about it before in our Habes Scorpus podcast. Yeah. I can't remember which one it was. Maybe pardons. Presidential pardons. That was not the first executive order, but that is executive order one. Oh, really? Yeah, in the State Department started numbering them retroactively and they went back to Lincoln tabius corpus. I didn't think it was the Washington. I don't know if they knew it was the first one. I don't know. But then I think in the these things started being published in the Federal Register, the daily publication of new laws and office goings on sure. Around Washington. And now it's like once it's published in the Federal Register, it's law got you. And they're numbered teddy Roosevelt, he was big on them. He was the first one that really kind of went haywire. He's the first one to crack a thousand. That's right. Those Roosevelt loved big government. They did. They weren't related, though. Yeah, they were. Were they? They were like eight cousins. Oh. I don't think I knew that. Wow, look at you teaching me presidential history. It's like my forte. Is it okay, because it's certainly not mine. Teddy Roosevelt, he wielded a heavy stick, and then FDR just went berserker in World War I and two. Yeah, Teddy spoke softly but carried a big stick. Yeah, that's the term. It was the FDR that said that. I didn't mean a heavy stick was the term. I was just saying I was making a play on that. No, I know. Okay. But I can't remember if it was Teddy or FDR that said that. I think it was Teddy. Okay. Yeah. Walk tall and carry a big stick. Speak softly. You're thinking of Jodon Baker. What if you were a global energy company with operations in Scotland, technologists in India, and customers, all on different systems? You need to pull it together. So you call in IBM and Red Hat to create an open hybrid cloud platform. Now, data is available anywhere, securely, and your digital transformation is helping find new ways to unlock energy around the world. Let's create a hybrid cloud that can change in industry. IBM. Let's create learn more@ibm.com. Hey, everybody. If you want a great quality website, you want to do it yourself with no must and no fuss. Then there's nowhere else to look than Squarespace. That's right. Squarespace has every single thing that you need to put together an awesome website. Everything from growing and engaging your audience with email campaigns, collecting donations for your cause through Apple, Pay, Stripe, Venmo, PayPal. Plus, you can also make your website optimized for mobile, which is great for your user on the go. That's right. And if you're into selling stuff, squarespace is everything to sell anything. They have all the tools you need to get your business off the ground. They have ecommerce templates, inventory management, really simple checkout process, and secure payment. So whatever you want to sell, you can sell it on Squarespace. Yeah, don't just take our word for it. Head to Squarespace.com SYSK and start your free trial today. And then when you're ready to launch, use our offer code, SYSK, and you'll get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. That's Squarespace.com SYSK. Squarespace. All right, moving on. Yeah. Where are we now? We are in World War One and World War Two when Congress said, you know what? It's okay, FDR, because there's a lot going on. Well, not just that. From World War I, the Depression and World War II. It was like boogie fever on executive orders. Yeah, I had no idea. On his first day in office, he closed the banks for four days. Yeah, which is actually pretty cool considering that he performed on this new deal, and the first thing he did was issue an executive order starting the new deal. It's like hitting the ground running for three terms. Yeah, that's true. Hats off to him. Agreed. So that was the first of 3635, 52, you said? Yeah. And the reason why FDR was able to issue so many well, there's several reasons. He was popular. He had a lot of crises to deal with. Sure. Well, that's pretty much it. Yeah. So he was definitely a believer in centralized power. But again, that kind of flies in the face of the division of power in federal government as sketched out by the Constitution. Right, yes. So not all executive orders are happily received or even grudgingly received. Some are just outright rejected. Well, and some presidents weren't as popular, which might have a little something to do with that. Exactly. So you've got Roosevelt setting as president 35, 52 executive orders. He was doing things like seizing control of mines, of industries. He set up like, cartels for everything from like garment industries to the theater industry. He created the Works Projects Administration, which is like, we have 2500 murals around the country and a bunch of orchestras and a lot of parks and everything. Because he put people to work in the Depression through government spending. Right. Interesting. Like straight up Keynesian economics. Yeah. But he did all of this through executive orders. I wonder if the national park stuff was executive orders from Teddy. I wonder, too. I bet that went through Congress. Maybe. I don't think Teddy liked talking to Congress. He just liked that big stick. But the point is, Roosevelt II, FDR, set this huge precedent that made it look like, okay, well, presidents have a lot more power. Apparently America is cool with this. So Harry Truman comes along and finds out the hard way that that's not necessarily the case. Yeah. He sort of pulled a similar move to FDR as far as wanting to take control of the steel industry during the Korean War, they regulated the price of steel and fixed it at, I guess, a cheap rate to help out Uncle Sam McDonald and McDonald Douglas. And then that was great, except for the workers all of a sudden weren't getting paid like they normally do now because they said we're going to go on strike. Exactly. And Truman was like, hey, we're in the middle of a war. And they said, we don't care. And he goes, oh, yeah. Well, let me send in some ringers to see what happens. That's right. And they said, you know what? Talk to these guys. The Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, maybe you can strike up a bargain. And they went, Screw you guys. All right? And they said, all right, we'll talk to these guys. The Federal Wage Stabilization Board. And they went, Screw you guys. And he went, well, if you're going to go on strike, why don't I just seize control of your factories on the night before? Yeah, here's the thing, though. There is a provision in. I guess. Federal law called the Taft Hartley Act that says if there's a big strike that's going to affect national security. The nation has interest in the strike not happening. The president and or congress can call I think maybe just the president can call upon theft Hartley act. And invoke the 60 day cooling off period where it's like. No. You have to go to work. You guys have to go back to the table for 60 days and figure this out, or give us 60 days to get our ducks in a row. He didn't do that. He just sees control. And that being combined with the fact that he wasn't very popular, it led to this executive order of his being overturned by the supreme court. Yes. The steel mills basically sued in the famous case, youngstown sheet and tube, the Sawyer, the youngest town ruling, and supreme court said, yeah, you know what? You should have done this 60 day cooling off period. That's why it's there, dummy. Right. I don't have to call him dummy. He didn't. But Hugo Black, who is the chief justice at the time, was apparently worried that he defended Truman, so we invited him over for dinner. Interesting. And Truman said, quote, hugo, I don't care for that law of yours, but by golly, this bourbon is good. Did he really say that? Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah, by golly, I wonder what they were drinking. Bourbon. Yeah, but I wonder which bourbon? I wondered that myself. Yeah. What do you guess? I don't know. OK. I don't know what they drank back then, bourbon wise. So Youngstown was huge, though, because it established some standards as far as the powers of authority that the president and they kind of broke it down into three, right? Yeah. They didn't just say no, they said, here's some guidelines for you and future presidents as far as the supreme court is concerned. Right. You have the most authority, mr. President or Mrs. President, when you have the express or implied consent of congress. You know what I think also, I feel like if this thing sticks around, if this digital recording can stick around long enough, maybe we should include gender neutral president as well. Okay. Okay, go ahead. Number two, mrs. Or gender neutral president. Start over with number one, okay. Just to make sure that there's an inclusion. Number one, mr. President or Mrs. President or gender neutral president. Yeah. You have the most authority. When congress has expressed or implied consent, they've given that to you. Right. They're saying, lead away, we're following you. Number two, you have a little less authority. We'll call it uncertain authority. When congress has not imposed the authority because they're indifferent or they're just not doing anything, and they call it a zone of twilight that the president takes advantage of. Yeah. It's like congress is waffling. The president knows what he, she, or whatever gender neutral assignment that the president has picked once. And I think isn't this probably when they sneak them in at the end? It depends. I think it's also more just like you guys had your chance to act. Right. I acted because you missed your opportunity. Right. So sit down and shut up. And Congress basically says, all right, fine. So we can't wait thing. Would that fall under that, do you think? It depends. So I think the way that this justice put this, that this is the authority, the division, the levels of authority yes. The President has supreme authority to issue an executive order. Whether or not it stands up is based on the test of time. Because you can repeal it. Right. It just takes a little time. Right. Well, there are some different ways to do it. The first we just saw not the first, but one of them we just saw was a clear example of judicial review. Right. That's what the Supreme Court does. They're like supposedly an unbiased neutral group of referees where the federal or the legislative branch or the people say, hey, can we get a judgment call on this law? This seems wrong. Right. And then the Supreme Court says yay or nay? And then what they say basically is like the final ruling on a law. Okay. Executive order. Since they have the force of law or the effect of law, they're subject to the same scrutiny. Judicial review. Well, in Youngstown, the Supreme Court said, truman, you can't do that. So that's one way that an executive order can be overturned. Another way is Congress can say, you know what? We just really disagree with you and we're going to rewrite the legislation that you're talking about. But it has to be ratified by Congress, which means the President has a chance to veto it. Got you. So if you have a really angry Congress and a really angry President, really polarized, sure, they may go at it, and the President may be able to override this with the veto. That seems like that's all we have lately. Yeah, very polarized. So, like, what Obama's doing now? It's like we can't wait. He's trying to frame it like it's Congress's fault. And then if Congress is feeling froggy, they may issue legislation that says it. Right. So there's this one where George Bush set up an executive order about fetal tissue stem cell banks. I don't remember exactly what it was, but Congress, they basically said, quote, the provisions of Executive Order 12806 will not have any legal effects. And that was it. Wow. But since there's no rules for this chuck right. This is all interpretation. The balls is back in Bush's court. So all it is is legislative tennis between the executive branch and the legislative branch. Ping pong. How far do you want to take it? Yeah, ping pong. And then also one more thing. The legislative branch, congress can just say, well, that's fine. Use your executive order to create this new position we have appropriation, so we're just not going to give any money to it. See if you can find somebody who will do that position. Right. You still got to get the funding if it requires funding. So this is the way you get around executive orders or a future president can turn around and revoke it. Yeah. Which happens all the time or pretty much every time a new president takes office. Yeah. Thank you for that. Of course, the discourse. By the way, you forgot the one court above the Supreme Court. What? The Star Chamber. What is that? You never saw that movie? No, what is that? It was Michael Douglas. There was a secret group of judges that would get together called the Star Chamber that would carry out vigilante justice. What movie was that? The Star Chamber. Oh, no, I heard that. It sounds like 81, 82. I'd say maybe 83. All right, so the final way is the least authority, and the President acts on lease authority when he has an executive order that is just incompatible with what Congress wants. Right. Which happens all the time as well. But again, ultimately, how powerful does Congress feel? Like, say, Congress really hates that, but the people are really in favor of it. Right. Will Congres act? Who knows? I've lost a lot of faith in the political system, my friend. Yeah. I think they kind of authorized political time, what they want to do and not necessarily what the people want. Yeah. Behind the banner of this is what the people want. It's a pretty 21st century view of American politics. It feels, like, sad. Too much money going on. We're going to do it. One on campaign finance. I said it. We're going to do it. Okay. And that'll really tell you how kind of dirty it is these days. Okay, so let's talk about some controversies in modern day executive orders. Right. For instance, Ronald Reagan. If you were a fan of President Reagan, you don't think it's controversial that he really took hold of the economic situation and stripped a lot of the government regulation that he thought was hampering growth? People that didn't like President Reagan, I didn't think that was such a good move. No. You know what he did? It was pretty smart and broad. He purposefully slowed down the federal agencies by making them go through all this, like, cost benefit analysis, figuring out how their decisions would impact people and just kind of hamstrung them. Yeah. Interesting. He was like, oh, you have it pretty easy. No, you don't. Now you have, like, 80 extra things that you have to do before you can make any rules. Yeah. Here's some forms exactly. In a number two pencil. Yeah. Interesting. It was kind of ingenious, really, to fight what he considered an entrenched bureaucracy by adding more bureaucracy. That's pretty funny. Adding red tape. President George W. Bush, with a lot of controversy said, NSA, you can wiretap private American citizens, telephones in America without them knowing about it. And that wasn't even published. That was a secret one. Yeah, super secret. Yeah. Only the Star chamber saw that. That's right. And a lot of people that are fond of civil rights and rights of private citizens said, that's not very nice. It's not a cool thing to do. Yeah. And then his supporters said, dude, the 911 hijackers. Spend a lot of time in the US on a lot of phones. That's a tough one, man. You want to be able to thwart those terrorist plots. Yeah, you do. That's a quagmire. It is a quagmire. And then what else? Obama is basically, on day one, famously said, I'm closing Guantanamo. No more waterboarding or any of this enhanced interrogation stuff. Right. And then what was the third one? Let's create a task force for detention policies. Right. And then he signed another executive order two years later saying, like, okay, Guantanamo can stay open indefinitely. That was probably not a good idea. Apparently they're sinking, like, a significant amount of money into the facilities. They're adding a soccer or as the really? Yeah, football field. They are adding programs like life education programs, like balancing your checkbook or getting a hold of your finances or getting your GED. They're turning it into what resembles a very much a state prison, which basically says you're here for a while. Yeah, I guess that part is good. I don't know that I care that these people can play soccer, though. Oh, yeah. I'm sure there's a lot of people who are like, they don't need to play soccer. Yeah, sure. I don't know, though. What if you were a major transit system with billions of passengers taking millions of trips every year? You aren't about to let any cyberattacks slow you down. So you partner with IBM to build a security architecture to keep your data network and applications protected. Now you can tackle threats so they don't bring you to a grinding halt and everyone's going places, including you. Let's create cybersecurity that keeps your business on track. IBM, let's create. Learn more@ibm.com. Hey, everybody. If you want a great quality website, you want to do it yourself with no must and no fuss. Then there's nowhere else to look than Squarespace. That's right. Squarespace has every single thing that you need to put together an awesome website. Everything from growing and engaging your audience with email campaigns, collecting donations for your cause through Apple, Pay, Stripe, Venmo, PayPal. Plus, you can also make your website optimized for mobile, which is great for your user on the go. That's right. And if you're into selling stuff, square space is everything to sell anything. They have all the tools you need to get your business off the ground. They have ecommerce templates, inventory management, really simple checkout process, and secure payment. So whatever you want to sell, you can sell it on Squarespace. Yeah. Don't just take our word for it. Head to squarespace. Comssk and start your free trial today. And then when you're ready to. Launch, use our offer code SYSK, and you'll get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. That's squarespace.com, SYSK. Squarespace. Play a little soccer. I would be such a bad president. The waffler. Oh, dude, I just waffle all over the place. That's a bad idea. Maybe it's a good idea. Well, that's funny that you say that, because one of the president's most known for waffling, especially in his first year, bill Clinton, was also very famous for his executive orders. Apparently. It was like, a president would issue executive orders, and it was like one of these things, and everybody would grumble. But Clinton made an art out of it. He waged a war through executive order. Like, you remember the Balkan war, too. Yeah. The US. Internet with no declaration of war from Congress. As a matter of fact, Congress had that before them, and they voted, no, we're not going to declare war. So Clinton just did it himself. He didn't officially declare war, but through an executive order. He told the air force to go join NATO air strikes in the Balkans. He committed ground troops through executive order to NATO, and he froze the assets of a bunch of Yugoslavian leaders in the US. Which were like, three acts of war that he carried out through executive order. No one noticed that stuff, though. No, they did. It was huge at the time. We were just too young. No, I mean, people noticed, but it wasn't like when times are great economically, a lot of this stuff is way more apt to slide by, I think. Well, I think also we're looking at it, like, 1015 years on. Yeah, that's true. To where it's, like, total hindsight. Clinton's, like an older statesman now. He's not like the sleazy scumbag that he used to be or that's his appearance, at least he looks all old now. He does. But he still does that too thing. I saw an interview with him that was recorded five days ago, and he still got it. It's thinking. And then he gave this brilliant answer. But, yeah, he was big on he was big on those things as well. And his advisor is the one who said, stroke of the pen, law of the land. Right. What were the last minute ones called? The midnight midnight regulations. Yeah. Okay. That was the one that we talked about. I think we've been around the block at this point. We've done some political stuff. So that's executive orders. Yeah. Look for one coming to a piece of paper near you. Yeah. Especially if Romney wins. I mean, that's like the first day executive orders traditionally now a political way of saying, I am totally different from this guy right here, and here three examples. Yeah. And they'll trumpet that in the campaigns. Here's what I'll do right away. Yeah. I declare craft cheese. Awesome. So that's it. If you want to learn more about executive orders, type executive in orders for the handy search bar@housetheforts.com, and that will bring up this pretty cool article. And I said search bar is time for listener mail. I'm sorry to do this, Chuck. I know I just said it's time for me. It's actually time for plug fest real quick because it's going to be like the fastest plug fest ever. You ready? Okay. So we have a horror fiction contest, and we're hoping our listeners will write horror fiction that we can read on the Halloween episode. Yes. Go to the blogs@howestofworks.com, find the post stuff you should know. Horror fiction contest. Get your official rules right here. Read that and then act accordingly. Yeah. Really follow the rules closely because we want you to, if you've worked hard for this, to be able to win. Yeah. And look for other mentions in social media and stuff like that. Like Facebook and Twitter. But yeah, go check it out and go write something. It'll be cool. And then also ComicCon, right? Yes. We are going to San Diego's Comic Con this year for the first time ever, and we're pretty excited about it. Yeah. Check out Shamoo. That's right. And we are going as stuff you should Know withScience channel people. Yeah. Exciting. We're crossover hybrid people. That's right. Like the Toyota Prius. Exactly. Or the pre eye of the podcasting world. Yes. So, Thursday, July 12, we will be podcasting live. We don't have the time just yet, but we will announce that on Facebook and Twitter. And there will be special guests, there will be dancing, there will be singing, there will be gnashing of teeth and wailing and perhaps even vomiting live on stage. Yeah. By me. That's right at the very beginning. I won't be able to see straight. I'll be so nervous. Yes. Cool. Okay. That was a quick plug test. Not bad. We're getting good at this. We should do it every time. No. Okay, listen. Or mail. Josh, I'm going to call this from a pastor to us. Nice. Complimenting us. Oh, good. Not from the usual hate mail. Hey, guys. Jerry. I'm a United Methodist pastor and started listening to the podcast a few years ago to pass the time in the long ride between the church. I was ministering in Duke Divinity School, where I was finishing up seminary. Learning about things like cannibalism and Delta Force really helped break up the constant stream of theology and philosophy I was studying. I bet. Yeah. I really enjoyed the most recent one on whether or not it was possible to rain frogs. A lot of people that I talked to in religious settings that don't shy away from hearing scientific explanations about biblical material. There are plenty of us out there who love science and aren't afraid of it. Debunking scripture. It actually excites me to hear those sorts of explanations. You've probably been referred to a time or two in the classes I teach in my current ministry setting. No, he talked about some class. No. Couple of heathens like that. Mainly, I'm writing to thank you for a few things. First, thanks for handling matters of faith with Tact. Whether you're talking about voodoo or karma, you always handle the subject matter in a gracious way. See, I like this guy's views. I like him a lot. I would argue that we're not always gracious, but I appreciate the compliment. Second, I remember back in the Brainwashing episode, chuck said something along the lines of, I'm going to try really hard not to comment about my Baptist upbringing. Pastors and religious people in general can be pushy. Chuck, your passing comment has been a constant reminder to me to not be that guy. And third, you guys are the ones who introduced me to Kiva, and I now make regular loans and have even gotten some members of the congregation on board. Awesome. It's been great to be a part of it. Keep up. Good work, Jeff. And Jeff. Dude. Pastor Jeff. Pastor Jeff, I would go to your church. Yeah. Thank you for the email. That was awesome. Please keep in touch. We want to know how your religious career goes. Yeah. And if you think Chuck and I are awesome and gracious and we take criticism well and we get things generally right? Say puppies. Yeah. And we do it all without messing up our hair, we want to hear from you. Right, Chuck? Yes. We want you to tweet to us immediately. Go compose a tweet and send it to Syskodcast. You can join us on Facebook at facebook. Comstuffyshknow. Or you can send us an email to stuffpodcast@discovery.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer school's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. You know you're the best pet mom when you growl back during playtime, give epic belly rub and feed them halo holistic made with responsibly sourced ingredients, plus probiotics for digestive health. 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a694ccd4-5462-11e8-b449-6ff9a77c59c5	Algae: Food, Fuel, What?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/algae-food-fuel-what	Just a couple years ago, algae was touted as the green, plentiful biofuel of the future. But that didn’t pan out. Why? And is algae down for the count? Don’t bet on it. Only a fool would bet against green water.	Just a couple years ago, algae was touted as the green, plentiful biofuel of the future. But that didn’t pan out. Why? And is algae down for the count? Don’t bet on it. Only a fool would bet against green water.	Thu, 04 Oct 2018 13:30:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2018, tm_mon=10, tm_mday=4, tm_hour=13, tm_min=30, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=277, tm_isdst=0)	49862606	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody, it's me, Josh, and I just want to remind you that we are releasing a brand new podcast called Short Stuff. It's got its own feed and everything, but it's still the same great kind of Stuff you Should Know that you look love. It's got me and Chuck and Jerry, but the topics are briefer and the episodes are shorter, and we hope you like it. It's its own thing. It comes out every Wednesday, and you can find it by going to Apple podcasts spotify or wherever you get your podcasts and searching for Short Stuff. Enjoy. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetofworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's charles W, Chuck Bryant. Jerry's over there. And Jerry said go. So this is stuff you should know, which America loves because it rhymes. What rhymes? Jerry said go. So it's stuff you should know. And Americans love rhymes. Isn't that the new reality show America Loves Rhyming? That'd be cool. It'd be like a hip hop kind of talent show. Yeah, I think that'd be neat. America's got rhymes. Yeah. How's it going? Pretty good. How about you? Man, I'm good. I'm finally all cleared up for my weird Australian cold. Oh, that's good. You sound much better. You look good. Just loving life again. Well, not that, but I feel physically able. I got you life and stuff right now, but it is. You're, like, in the grips of it. Jerry is all strung out. I'm a little tired. What's going on? I keep saying if you see me live in November, then that means all as well. Yeah. Almost there, Chuck. Just another month ish. Yeah. Yeah. What stinks is October is my favorite month generally, but this October is the suck. Yeah, Halloween is your favorite holiday kind of person. I love it. Just Halloween. Football's cranking up that first fall breeze blows in the whole thing of October. But of course, it's Atlanta, so it's still in the 90s. It's weirdly hot. It's ridiculous. Atlanta's got some odd weather, I'll give you that, my friend. I was telling Jerry the other day that I saw a thing, I believe it was the New York Times had this interactive feature where you could see how many days above 90 degrees where you lived was when you were born compared to now. And in 1971, Atlanta had 55 days above 90. Now it has 77. And in another, like, ten years, I think it'll be 90 days above 90 deg. Wow. Because of climate change? Or is that just the New York Times editorial opinion? No, I mean, these are the facts. They didn't say why. We could debate that if you want. Because it sounds fake to me. No, I mean, that's just the reality of the temperature. They weren't saying. I think let's just draw our own conclusions. Sure, I know. Point is, it's hot. It is hot. And you know what happens when it's hot? Chuck. I love this segue. Algae blooms. Yes. Do you know what happens when algae blooms? Fuel is born. All kinds of things potentially are born. Cosmetics, mayonnaise, food, livestock, sushi. Sushi. Sushi. All that stuff. All of it is born when algae bloom. Sushi sandwiches. Sushi. Sushi sandwich. Oh, Steve bruce, you have our heart. Yes. I had a very flirted with Greatness when a publicist for John C. Reilly said that he might be on Movie Crush and it did not happen. Oh, I'm sorry about that. That would have been pretty exciting. You're broken up for a little while there, weren't you? Yeah, I'm right, though. Yeah, you recovered just like it was an Australian cold. Nothing. All right, so let's talk algae. This is pretty remarkable. Yes. So we should kind of set the stage here because just in the last couple of years, the bottom is kind of dropped out on the algae's biofuel push among venture capitalists and oil companies. Dropped out as in not happening? Did not happening. At least not right now. There was this moment in time about 2011, it's 2015 where it looked like at least as far as money and attention and media exposure that was being thrown at algae was that it was the next great biofuel and that it was going to happen really soon. But the thing that I was learning about venture capital is they don't like soon. They like right now. And so as it became very clear that a lot of the early preliminary results from the lab were not necessarily translating into the real world, a lot of people walked away. But in doing that, that's not to say that algae as a biofuel isn't going to be a viable fuel of the future. It's just going to take a lot more money and a lot more time than everybody at first was kind of hyped up for over the last couple of years. So it's still there. The promise is still there. It's just not happening tomorrow. Some people predict it might not even happen this century, but I take issue with that. I think it'll happen in the 21st century. Well, it's funny because I did occasionally for stuff like this. I will search just news on the old Google, and today they popped up an article about a company in Hawaii that is in fact pushing forward. After all their testing and everything, they're pushing forward with the plant, with a biodiesel production plant from algae. That's awesome. At least one place is doing it in Hawaii. Yeah, I think there are a few companies that are like, we're staying the course, we're going to figure this out. But from what I saw, in the parlance of venture capitalists, the industry has pivoted to food production more than food, and additive production more than fuel. But from the research, there learning how to grow more algae faster and better and harvesting it more cheaply and processing it more cheaply. All of those lessons can be extrapolated over to the fuel industry as well. So as long as people are messing around with algae, there's a lot of good stuff that's going to come from it. And I can understand, after researching this article, where all that hype came from, because it's just like beautiful stuff. Yeah, it really is. And we should specify here, and we're talking algae, there's something like 100,000 or more different genetically diverse strains of algae. But typically you can kind of divide it into two categories. There's microalgae, which is what makes water green, and it's a microscopic single cell plant. And then there's macroalgae, which is like you think of with seaweed or kelp or sea lettuce or something like that. Yeah. And for this show, we're talking about alga culture. And this is not any I mean, it's new in the sense that we are ramping up efforts into studying, like, biofuels and stuff like that. But the Japanese have been cultivating algae for a long time. Like 1200 years or more. Yeah, exactly. So it's always been a big thing there. In the British Isles, like in 16th century Mexico with the Aztecs, people have been eating algae, using algae. We're going to talk a lot about spirulina, which has been consumed and harvested for thousands of years. And so we've been eating it we're using it for fertilizers thickening agents, for food, like you said, with mayonnaise and things like toothpaste. It's a big, big business, I believe about a $6 billion worldwide business. A couple of billion of which is for seaweed paper alone. For nory? Yeah, just for the stuff they wrap sushi. And it's $2 billion. $2 billion for those delicious green sheets that look like paper that you eat. Yeah. So as it stands, even without the idea of it being like the next alternative energy, it's still a $6 billion business, right? Yeah. There's a lot of reason for people to keep paying attention. There's money to be made in algae, in other words. Right, yeah. But like we said, with the biofuel and we'll get into this more. One of the cool things about algae is how versatile it is, beyond the fact that you can eat it and we'll talk about all the myriad things you can do with it, but you can squeeze oil out of that stuff that can be turned into gasoline or jet fuel, which is amazing. Yeah. You can replace kerosene with biofuel from algae and you can use the waste product that you get as a result. It's really sort of a wonderful thing. And here it goes. Sound like a big, long set up. So it was a beautiful one man way to go. So with algae, with either type, what we're talking about are plants, right? Yes. And just like any other plants, they produce their own food through photosynthesis. Yeah. Green plants. They use chlorophyll and sunlight and they convert. They also use carbon dioxide, and they convert all that into energy stores, and they give off as a byproduct, oxygen. So you can start to see why algae is a bit of a darling of the environmentalist set, because first of all, it's drawing CO2 from the air and it's putting out oxygen as a byproduct. And then it's a darling of the energy set. These are two different sets that sometimes overlap because you can actually take the energy store, which is stored largely in the form of oil, but we'll see other kinds and unlock it, like you said, in different types of fuel. That's easier said than done. But you can also do a lot of this stuff with land based plants, too, right. And there actually was a big push. Algae represents the third generation of biofuels. The first generation was basically like cellulosic ethanol using corn to turn into fuel, which a lot of people were like, this is really great. And then if you'll remember those food riots in Egypt and Haiti and I think 2008, diverting corn from the food supply over to the energy sector is really bad. So people said, okay, we don't want to mess with our food supply. We can't use food for energy, but we can use waste from that stuff. So, like, you can take the corn stalks that nobody's eating and turn them into a biofuel, which is great, but it requires several extra expensive steps, so it's just not cost efficient. Now, algae came along, and it has a lot of things going for it compared to land based plants that made it really attractive for a number of reasons. Well, yeah, for sure. When we say something is fast growing algae, we need a new word for how fast algae can grow. Ultra fast growing. Yeah, I like that. Turbo growth. That's good. Land plants like you were talking about, sometimes it takes years or months maybe, to reach maturity. Algae can do this. That can complete a life cycle, sometimes in a day. Yeah, algae can. Well, some algae, because I think they're more than 70,000 species. I saw 100,000. Oh, really? They probably found 30,000 this morning. Hopefully some algae, though, can double their biomass in an hour. Right. Super efficient. As far as converting solar energy to biomass, I believe land plants use like, 95% of their energy just building the structure, like root structures and stems and things needed to support the plant itself. Right. You don't need this with algae. It's just floating out there. Right. So if you're using 95% of that sunlight and carbon dioxide nutrients just to build the structure, you need to keep doing that just to be a dumb plant. That's extraordinarily inefficient, at least compared to algae, which it just floats in the water. It doesn't need roots, it doesn't need much structure. It's a single cell plant. So basically all it is is a little solar powered, energy producing factory. And that's what it does so it's extraordinarily efficient compared to land plants, for sure. Compared to land plants, you can grow algae in very tight, concentrated spaces. I have here that they produce up to a hundred times more oil per acre. 100 times than land plants. Yeah. That's remarkable. Yeah, that's pretty substantial, too. Plus, there's different types of algae that produce oils or edible for food. I don't think they very frequently overlap, but from all these different types of algae, you can say, well, all I have is the salt marsh pond to grow algae in. Great. What kind of algae can I have? God. And God goes. Here, take this algae. It's pretty great. It'll give you a pretty good buzz, too, if you dry it out. And the guy takes it from God, puts it in a salt marsh pond, harvests it, saves a little bit for his head stash, and then sells the rest to Rex Tillerson. That's right. And that's the end of the Bible. The other cool thing is algae doesn't compete. It's not like an either or with land plants. It grows in the water. So it's not like, oh, I need all this land that you need for corn to grow my algae. It's a big one. Don't even need fresh water. It can grow in gross water, dirty water, polluted water, salt water, and not all algae, but certain kinds of algae. So it's not like they can coexist. They can all just be friendly. You can still have your corn fields and your algae ponds. Yeah. And again, it's unlike the first generation of biofuels, it's not competing directly with the food supply. It's not saying, well, we need this land to grow algae so we can't grow corn on it. We've got all this land to grow corn, and we've got this stupid pond that's not doing anything for anybody. Let's grow algae in there, too, baby. And then you've got a farmer that's growing. But one of the other things about algae, too, Chuck, is that a lot of those things overlap. Right. You can actually set up a kind of algae that is not only like producing oil, you can use the leftover stuff after you've extracted the oil to feed your cows on your land or to feed the corn that's going to feed the cows. And then all the while, you're also drawing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. So it's pretty great. It's pretty versatile, and there's a lot of reasons people like it. So on all that, I think we set it up pretty well. You want to take a break? Yeah. You know how excited I get when we talk about efficient systems. I know you do. You get jazz. I need to go calm down. All right, so we set up that algae is basically the miracle of miracles here on planet Earth. If you've got water, you've got the sun in the sky and some nutrients, then you can harvest. You can harvest algae. But algae, it'll grow on its own, right? Oh, yeah, it grows naturally. It's not like we created this stuff, but you can grow it on your own. You can. I think what you're saying was there's techniques you can do to improve the growth of algae, right? Yeah. Or like you can harvest this stuff from the ocean. But there are many ways to actually have your own little algae farm, right? Especially if you're doing microalgae, like the tiny single cell stuff that you actually can't see. It's just, you know, when water turns green, that's algae in it. It's not like you can see it or anything. The stuff you can see, that's considered macroalgae. Microalgae is, again, single celled, microscopic individual plants. There's so many of them, they just tint the water green. So if you want to grow those, there are a few different techniques available to actually farming algae. Again, it's called alga culture, which is not a beautiful word, but I like it. It works. Do you? I like how it looks more than I like how it sounds. Alga culture. I like it. Yeah, it's like you choked on something in the middle of the word algae culture. All right, so we have the three methods. Like you're saying you have your standard open pond, your standard closed pond and your standard bio photo reactor. An open pond is exactly what you think. That's the cheapest way to do it. Obviously, the simplest way, the sort of old fashioned way, is in a big, shallow pond. And it's not just Willynilly. They will usually divide this thing up into almost like I mean, they say raceways, which is really kind of dumb in this article. I would say it's more like lines of, like planted rows of corn, let's say. Yeah, kind of, except it's algae. And the thing is, sunlight is great for algae, but once you get a lot of algae going, it only penetrates so far into the water. So what you need to do is you need to agitate it and stir that algae up to make sure everything gets a little taste of that sweet, sweet sunlight. And in the case of an open pond, you have a system, like a paddle wheel system, agitating yourself, exposing everything to the light. All the while, it's almost like composting in a way. You're mixing in nutrients and CO2 into the liquid. It's a great system, but it's the one that produces the least biomass. It loses water to evaporation. So you continually need to add water. And this is the one where contamination or predators can come in and pee or eat. Yeah, I guess either one would be a problem. Yeah. You got a wolf peeing in your algae pond or eating the algae. You don't want either one of those. Yeah, so that's the open pond. Closed pond is about the same, but you've covered it up sort of like a greenhouse. Right. Which means a little more cost, but you have a lot more control. You do. And the cost would be mostly upfront if you build the greenhouse correctly. It's not too expensive to build a greenhouse, although if you're doing it on a very large scale, you either need a lot of ponds with a lot of greenhouses, or one big pond with a massive greenhouse over it. Either way, the point is you're exerting your human right to control nature over the pond that you're growing algae and your wolf friend can't get in. It's not going to get contaminated by other algae. It's just a lot easier to control and I would guess not too terribly. Much more expensive than the open pond method. Yeah, if money is no object, if you are a person of means and you want to wow your friends yeah. And you really want to show off and annoy your neighbor. Although I think these things look really cool, actually. I do, too. It looks like something that the ghostbusters would have trapped some ectoplasm in here. It looks like ectoplasm. It does. Very bright green. The Bio photoreactor method. This is completely closed. Basically, you're growing algae in these tubes. I say artificial, it's not artificial because it's still water, but you're completely manipulating what's going on with pumps and nutrients and water and light in these clear tubes. Sometimes it's like an automatic system that's all completely set up. It's a lot of money, but it's the most efficient way to do it, even though it's the most expensive. It is. But I mean, if you're growing algae for commercial purposes and you got a little sweet VC money, sure, you might as well set up a bio photoreactor because you've got light coming from all directions, right. And you have a controlled closed system, because one of the things about algae is it grows and it grows really fast, but if you make sure it has nutrients it needs, the PH is just right. Like it like slightly alkaline water of a PH between seven and nine, I believe, with a temperature of 60 to 80 deg Fahrenheit. You can control all this stuff very easily with the Bio photoreactor. Again, the problem is the upfront cost. Yeah, for sure. But the thing is, with these three methods, you can grow algae. Some methods are better than others, but you know that you can grow algae in here. The problem really comes in, in getting the algae out of the water and then getting the oil or whatever you're trying to get from the algae out of the algae. There's a lot of steps you need to take. And the more steps you add, the more involved each step becomes, the more expensive the process is. And when the process gets expensive, those VC guys start to walk away. So you have to figure out this process. And that's kind of where it's at right now. In part, that's kind of where the at least algae biofuel industry is stalled out right now. Yeah. So those three methods, that's for cultivating the microalgae, the macroalgae that we talked about, which is kelp and sea lettuce, and the stuff that like, when you're in the ocean, like, oh, get that stuff away from me. I don't want the miracle plant on my leg. That stuff has been cultivated for centuries, thousands and thousands of years in the open sea, the ocean, the sunlight, everything that it needs is in there, and it grows like crazy. It's great. Harvesting this stuff is a little tough. They've been doing it, like I said, for thousands of years in coastal areas all over the place, all over the world. But they begin to think, like, hey, we maybe want to cultivate this stuff, so what do we do? Maybe it'll attach to a rope, like the spore attaches to a rope, and it grows on that. So let's just throw these rope lines down on anchors, and it's basically a vertical growth rope. The same, like, with a large net. It grows on that rope, and they basically can just, like, anchor this stuff down, have it grow along these rope lines, and then pull those in when you want to harvest it. Right, exactly. That's a traditional way of cultivating it. If you're Japanese, you think, well, I guess I'll just invent a really awesome machine that mows the lawn of a kelp forest underwater and just harvest it like that. So there's that technique as well. Pretty cool. And then there's just walking out into the water and grabbing whether it's kelp or floating kind of mucky algae, you can just harvest it as simply as that. The difference is you're talking about macroalgae, something you can put your hands on and just kind of put into, like, a bucket or a bag or a basket or something, some receptacle of some type. Whereas with microalgae, if you try to do that, you got a bucket full of water. You still have this harvesting technique that makes microalgae so much more difficult that you can't just use traditional techniques to harvest it. You have to basically set up some big time machines. Yeah. So let's talk about the harvesting and processing a little bit. Like you said, with the microalgae, you're just pulling this stuff off, but ultimately, what you want to do is end up with a paste, with an algae paste. Yeah, that's the good stuff. That's the real good stuff. So in order to do that, obviously, you need to remove the moisture, and that will leave you with this dense biomassic paste. Microalgae presents a unique problem, like you said, because it looks like a bucket of water, green water. So it makes sense that one of the methods is filtration. You just feed it through a filter, and it's got the tiniest little membrane that these pores won't fit through these algae cells, and so it just filters it out. And the problem with that is probably what you would think is it's really easy for that stuff to become clogged up. Right. I don't even know why they would try this. It would just clog immediately. Yeah. But I'm sure it takes that into consideration with its design. Sure. I guess you want to talk about fluctuations, flock relation. That sounds dirty. It really does. It's not, though. It's just basically clumping algae. Like some algae naturally clumps, but not necessarily the algae you want. So if you throw in the algae that clumps with the algae you want, it can make the other algae clump. There's also chemicals that will make algae clump. And then you're basically taking microalgae and converting it into something you can manipulate, like a macroalgae. So that helps. That's good. But then now you have microalgae that has some sort of clumping chemicals or algae that you don't really want mixed in with it. It's not 100% foolproof method. Right. And the other problem with floculation is if you do it too much, you will grow hair on your pump. It's true. It makes the saints cry when you floculate. Flotation is another method. So this is when you use compressed air and you put it in the water and you bubble it up, and that makes the microalgae kind of go to the surface where you can just sort of skim it off like foam grit chaff. What is grit chaff? Like when you make slow cooked Southern style grits. You do that? Yeah, you got to rinse it. Same with, like, sushi rice. You rinse it in cold water and the husk I guess it is I guess it's the husk kind of floats on the top that's starch, and you get a little strainer and skim that stuff off. You can end up with good soft grits or good soft rice. What do you do with the stuff you skim off? You throw it away. Yeah. I wonder if there's a use for that. Surely. I'll bet people feed it to their pigs or something like that. Well, that'd be a lot of grits that you're cooking. Well, no, it's not like you're making the grits to feed the pigs, but rather than just throwing it out, you can feed it to the pig. You know what I mean? All right. There's also chuck. I love this one. There's also the centrifuge method. Yeah, that makes sense. Where you get that bucket, but your bucket spins around and has tiny holes in it, and it's basically do you remember the salad spinner? Remember? I've got one. Okay, so it's a salad spinner for your microalgae. Basically, yeah, it just flings it all to the outside. The thing is that unlike your salad spinner, you can't get it at a discount at Marshall's or TJ. Maxx. You probably have to bill it yourself or buy one that's very expensive. When you start adding the word centrifuge rather than salad spinner, the price just automatically goes up. Yeah. And here's the thing. The cool thing is you don't have to do just one of these. A lot of times they might be like, well, let's flockulate for a little while, but I don't want my palms to grow hairy, so I will then throw it in a centrifuge because I'm drowning in VC juice and they bought me one. So they can combine methods. Yeah, a lot of people will combine methods, and I'm sure they combine methods out of necessity because none of the methods work by themselves. Yeah, for macro, you'd really just need to dry this stuff out. And I get the sense that a lot of it is sort of the old fashioned way, just by kind of laying it out or hanging it out in the sun. Is that about right? I would guess, yeah. Surely that's the traditional method. What was the one that we did? Oh, coffee. Coffee beans. Right. Did they just lay those out in the sun? Yes, I think we did a show on that. And the traditional method is just like just beans just laid out. Baking. Got you. Am I wrong? Do you remember that? I don't remember at this point. I just remember that goats eat them and some people pick them out of the goats poop and then sell them for a million dollars a pound. Should we take a break? I think so. Charles all right, well, let's do that, and then we'll talk about some of the many uses of algae right after this. All right, dude, we're back. Chuck and I have to say, I'm a fan of algae now. Yeah, me too. So there's a lot of different things you can use it for. We'll talk first about the ways you can use algae for fuel. And you might think at first, like, whoa, how are you going to use algae for fuel? Again? That energy store that some types of algae not all algae, but some types and then other types, even more than others, take the energy that they're converting sunlight, CO2, and other nutrients into these energy sources. They converted as an oil within their tiny little single cell body. It's great. And if you get enough of these single cell bodies together in the form of these algae that you've gotten the water out of, you can extract that oil out of it. And there's a lot of different ways to do it. You can break the cell walls, basically. Is what you're trying to do either chemically or shaking or physically. Yeah. Yeah, physically. You could also hit it with some sound waves. There's a lot of things you can do. You can some Ted nugent yeah. I think really causes them to split open, and then you get the oil. So when you take that oil, you then have to refine it, depending on what you want to do with it. There's different techniques. Yeah, for sure. I mean, we've been championing the biodiesel. Well, that's really not true. We've been saying it would be great if they could figure this out. Right. And the key to all this stuff, anytime we've done anything, we've done other episodes on other biofuels, it would be the one of choice if you could figure out a way to do it and make the most money. That's the only stumbling block ever is when are you going to get the big companies involved? It's when you can say, hey, we've really figured out such that it's a genuine threat to whatever crude oil. Well, what's crazy is, up until very recently, exxon Mobil and Chevron were both invested in so, I mean, the big companies were involved, and they all just kind of walked away because it wasn't happening, like, in the next ten or 20 years. Yeah. I mean, you get that in a certain way because they're there to make money. But I don't know, sometimes it'd be nice if someone sort of went out on a limb, and maybe that's how it ends up happening. Well, they are. It's the little guys in Hawaii who are doing it, I guess so who deserve to be billionaires after this for trying to save the Earth. So we talked a little bit about biodiesel. It can also be refined as an additive right. For gasoline and jet fuel. Yeah. The cool thing about that is if you're going to convert it into jet fuel, you can actually use existing refineries, and that does something very important. It cuts down on cost. Yeah, big time. Right. When cellulose, the ethanol was huge in, like, 2007 eight 2009, there was one huge problem with it where if you were just pumping pure ethanol through existing pipelines, they were going to wear down in just a few years. Yeah, that is not true, apparently, with refined biodiesel from algae or jet fuel from algae, because it does not corrode the pipes and it doesn't corrode the systems that you use to refine it. So you don't have to build entire new pipelines or entire new refineries. You can just switch over to algae at some point. Yeah. That's awesome. That's a huge mark in its favor. And I think, like seven years ago, they actually there was a flight from Houston to Chicago, an entire commercial jet powered by algal oil. Algal I hate this. I guess algae algal oil. Yeah. Okay. I would say that they delivered the Rangers to get beat by the Cubs, but it's not algebra culture, though it could be if we make it, we have a lot of listeners. All right. By the way, Houston is the Astros, not the Rangers. Oh, where do the Rangers play? Are they out of Dallas? I know it's the Texas Rangers, but where are they? Yes. They're like dallas metropolitan team. Yeah. Well, sorry, Astros fans. I should know that, too, because I think they have the greatest uniform of all time. The orange stripes, man. Beautiful. It was pretty good. Okay, so you can turn a jet fuel ethanol. I don't think we've talked about ethanol really, have we? No. So ethanol again, it's basically just breaking down the cellulose. Remember how you said plants, like, spend 95% of their energy building the structures that support them and let them live? If you take those structures that support them and let them live and break them down, you can turn that. That's what cellulosic ethanol is. So it's basically plant material that those carbohydrates are what they use to build those walls, and you can break them down and use them for energy. And you can do the same thing with algae too. Yeah. And the great size the great thing is, aside from the oil, because algae is made up from carbohydrates and cellulose, you can actually ferment this stuff into grain alcohol. Yeah. What would that taste like? I don't know. Like seaweed that gets you wasted. I don't know. I would try it. Sure. You mean I were coming back from Hilton Head this past weekend, and there was a billboard for a liquor store outside of Savannah, and it's a corn whiskey, but in the coca Cola font for some inexplicable reason. Oh, really? Yeah, it's really weird to see. How was Hilton Heads? Was it storm ravaged or not bad. It must have hit above it because it was totally fine, beautiful, not a leaf out of place. And, you know, because of your Hilton head leaf journal, I counted them before you, me, they're all here. They're all president accounted for. All right. Be back in six months. Right. No one move. And then methane, I think, is one of the final uses. Everyone knows we talked about methane plenty. That's one of the main ingredients in natural gas. And it's what cows make when they have a 2D booty. It is. And it says here that it's a clean fuel. I don't understand that at all. Methane is like one of the worst greenhouse gases there are. It's worse than carbon dioxide. As far as trapping heat, there's less of it than carbon dioxide. I just thought that was really weird. But the thing I love about producing methane through algae is that you're not actually using the algae. You are using the algae. You're using the algae as a feedstock for bacteria, because when bacteria consume algae, they produce methane. So you're taking the algae and feeding it to bacteria, which seems pretty cold and calculating. Perfect for an oil company. Yeah, that's a good point. We also talked earlier, I think I teased out that algae even loves really gross polluted water. It thrives in polluted water. So they could use it potentially. And I think they may be or are they they are they're using it for wastewater treatment? In certain places, yes. You can use it for wastewater treatment. They're using it. I think there's an experiment in an old tin mine in Cornwall in the UK. Where they've added some algae to see if they can bio remediate the cadmium and the arsenic and the water that flooded the mine. And the great thing about algae is some of it just absorbs heavy metals and pollutants it, just absorbs it and hangs onto it, and then you go just put it away for a billion years or something like that. It just kind of sucks it up. Others actually use this stuff for metabolism, so it will break down a heavy metal like cadmium that's toxic to us into something that's totally inert to us, which is just mind bogglingly wonderful. So they're starting to really kind of look into the idea of using again, there's like 100,000 different strains of algae to using some of them for bioremediation, which is a huge plus because right now we use chemicals to SOP up chemicals. Another thing you can use algae for is for oil spills. Yeah. And there's something called herder chemicals, which if you add to an oil spill, it actually moves them together and turns it from this little thin sheen on the ocean into a much more concentrated, thicker sheen that you can actually skim off or burn or something. Well, there's types of algae that do that too. But the plus of algae is that it's not some chemical that stays in the environment like the stuff we currently use, the chemicals we currently use that we're not quite sure what the long term effects are. Right. Like, okay, no more oil. But now we've got this unknown or not unknown, but a chemical with unknown damage down the line. Exactly. Just replacing the oil right. With algae. That's not the case. We know what algae will do. We're pretty much I mean, I'm sure there's invasive species situations that we could accidentally get ourselves into, but that's the last thing you're thinking of when you're cleaning up an oil spill. You know what I'm saying? And that baby penguin comes over, it's like, help me, please. And then earlier in the show, I talked about the unquote waste product. We're talking about if you're extracting that oil, what you have left over after you've squeezed all that oil out of it, you can use that as fertilizer or as a supplement for animal feed. And that's the leftover. Even if you're not using it for biofuels, it's really good for you. Like, humans eat it, cattle eats it. Marine like. Shrimp and shellfish love the stuff. It is chocked. Like, if you're talking about spirulina, yes, it is chock full of protein, omega three fatty acids, vitamins, iron, beta carotene. I think it's got more protein than meat. So for 100 grams, spirulina has 57 grams of protein, steak has 25 grams of protein. Amazing. And Spirulina has 158% of your daily iron. Steak has 13% of it. Steak's like a high iron food. I believe Spirulina has far more iron than spinach, even. It also has tons of calcium, like you said, omega three S. And like, I think in the UN called it a superfood of the future, and it is extremely good for you. But again, the idea of calling it a superfood of the future is kind of ironic, because in the 16th century, the Aztecs were eating it as little cakes of spirulina. The Welsh have been eating something called lava bread, which is just basically spirulina algae on toast. That tastes so good. I want to try it. It looks like overcooked massive spinach, but they say you can tell the different terroirs depending on where it was harvested. But I would love to try that. Yeah. And you mentioned very early on the reason that I guess people like Exxon had put it on hold. You sent this great article where I would figure the limitation would be like, well, it's in the processing, it's too expensive, or we haven't figured it out yet. Apparently, what's sort of the big hold up is in the biology itself. I think you need too much of it to go to scale. Is that about right? Yeah, because here's the problem. This stuff, if you're growing it in a flask, in a lab, it really does, like, all this amazing stuff that people are saying. The problem is when you extrapolate that into the real world, real world conditions kind of start to take over, and it doesn't necessarily translate like it should. And one of the big things they ran into is when you start getting algae on a massive scale, when you start growing it on an industrial scale, the algae starts to compete with other algae for things like sunlight and nutrients. So you're left with well, then that means, let's say that's having the amount of algae I'm trying to grow, or the amount of oil I'm trying to harvest, that means I have to double the surface area of the pond. I have to grow twice as much algae as I thought. And there was some prediction, I think, a few years ago, that biodiesel from algae or biofuel, will be running about 10% of the EU's transportation sector, which is just an enormous amount. That would be amazing if it could do that. But they found that for that to happen, you would need a pond basically about three times the size of Belgium to grow that much algae as it stands right now. So, again, it's not to say that it's just never going to happen. It's just well, here's a really big wall that we've hit. Now, let's figure out how to get over it, because LG really could do this. Yeah, for sure. You just need upon three times the size of Belgium. But here's the thing, is maybe don't like baby step. It like, what about upon the size of just one Belgium and not three Belgiums? Now, we said Belgium so many times, it sounds funny. Well, we could just flood Belgium. Oh, man, that would be so mean. Belgium is lovely. They've been asking for it for years, though. What's this other one here? In 2010, a scientist based at university, I bet they don't have the mascot, the Flying Tongue Twisters. They publish findings that suggested an area about the size of the state of Maryland. If it was sea lettuce, you could provide enough protein to feed the entire human population. Yeah, that's pretty impressive. But it's seed lettuce. Yeah, I would try I've never had sea lettuce, as far as I know. No, I would try it, too. It's just the article does say that part of the problem then is, like, convincing everyone to eat sea lettuce all the time. And that's absolutely true. I mean, it'd be foolish to think otherwise, but if you're trying to solve world hunger well, that's the thing. You could also and a lot of people use spirulina powder as, like, a dietary supplement because it's so good for you and it's so energy dense. But there's a couple of other things I wanted to mention, though, before we leave, about the kind of greenness of algae. One, it's carbon neutral. Yeah, I don't think we said that. But the CO2 that algae uses to produce to do its thing, and it's actually sucking it right out of the air. So it releases CO2 when it's burned as biofuel. But that CO2 was just in the air, like, a month ago. So it's not like it's coming from a sequestered sink of CO2, like fossil fuels that we dig up that are not part of the carbon cycle right then, that we're actually adding to there. So it would make it a carbon neutral thing. And then the other thing, if we replaced soy with algae, livestock and fish feed, we would no longer have to do any wild caught fish because apparently they go out and catch wild fish, grind them up and feed them to farmed fish as feed to get the omega three S. If we just supplemented that with algae, we wouldn't have to catch any wild fish whatsoever. And then if we replaced cattle feed made of soy with algae, we wouldn't have to cut down forests to grow soy to feed the cattle on. So it could be I mean, if we really just keep looking at algae and don't walk away from it, don't walk away from algae, there's a bright future ahead of us with it. There's so much promise analogy, baby. Yeah. There's a lake in Georgia that I go to a lot, and there has been I'm a member of the Facebook page where people complain about stuff, basically. Sure, yeah. That's what most of those are for. That's what they're for. And a lot of people are complaining about these grasses in the lake now and algae blooms, and they're spraying chemicals in the lake to get rid of this stuff. No, you're kidding. No, it's a Georgia Power lake, so they have an approved list of vendors that will do this. And my whole thought is, like, if there's an algae bloom, it's like, isn't that nature trying to work something out? I think that nature trying to work out fertilizer runoff. So the problem isn't in the lake. It's up on land somewhere in some farm that's just using too much fertilizer. But I mean, that's my whole point, though, is, like, the algae is there for a reason. Yes. Right. It's not just there to tick off a jet skier. Right. It's kind of like if you've hit your knee on something, just cutting your leg off so you don't have any more knee pain. That's basically what the people at that lake are doing. Yeah. It's not the best analogy ever, but I'm all right with it. I like it. You got anything else? No. Up with algae. Up with algae. I like ones like this because we're basically just like, what about this? Oh, yeah. What about this? What about that? Yeah. And we always have the rosiest colored glasses, which, if that's our fault, I'll take it. Yes. I'm with you, ma'am. If you want to know more about algae, go swimming. Since I said that, it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this flying by the seat of my pants and just pulling up an email. Oh, that's good stuff. This is on color blindness, though. It's a good one. And it has a picture of a cat. Hi, guys. My dad has colorblindness, and it has led to a few embarrassing mishaps in his life. This past weekend, my brother got married. Congratulations. Peter and Jackie and all the men were supposed to wear blue suits. However, my dad couldn't tell the difference between the colors, and he packed his black suit. I wonder why your dad didn't get help at this point with something this big. Because dad doesn't care that much. I think you're right. Nor should he. Not a huge deal, but he definitely stands out in the pictures. The story that cracks me up the most, though, is that I have an orange cat with matching amber eyes. My dad likes to say how he has the most beautiful green eyes. And I really want to ask if he thinks my cat looks like the Grinch. So I attached a picture of Raja so you can see how his eyes match his fur. And that is one cute cat. Look at that. Sure. Little fake mouse in his mouth. Little cutie. Nothing green about it. No. And she also finishes with, like you mentioned, my mom has always done the grilling because my dad says he can't tell when it's done or burning. So there's a mum around mom. Or maybe she knew about the suit color and just didn't want to embarrass her husband. I think so. Or just didn't really like the groom or the bride. I don't know somebody did not like somebody else in this wedding, I think is what happened here. Well, that cat doesn't like that fake mouse, I'll tell you that. It's funny. The cat is like holding a fake mouse, but it looks like it's looking at a real mouse off camera. It's a good picture. Got a cat condo and everything. And she finishes. Thanks for the relatable episode. That is from Andy. That's from Andy. All right, Andy. Thanks a lot for that. We appreciate you writing in. Good luck with your family. Yes. And Peter and Jackie. Once again, congratulations. Where to go and get Married if you want to get in touch with us to let us know. Hilarious family story. We love those. You can go to our website, www.stuffyshaw.com, and find all the links to our social media accounts. You can find us there or you can send us an email to stuffpodcast Howvestepworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstepworks.com. Hey everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. There's a perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks or if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my favorite Murder and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music you can access new episodes early. Download the app today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…efault-swaps.mp3	How do credit default swaps work?	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-do-credit-default-swaps-work	In theory, credit default swaps are simply insurance against failed investments. In reality, these swaps can quickly get complicated. Tune in to this podcast from HowStuffWorks.com to hear Josh and Chuck demystify credit default swaps.	In theory, credit default swaps are simply insurance against failed investments. In reality, these swaps can quickly get complicated. Tune in to this podcast from HowStuffWorks.com to hear Josh and Chuck demystify credit default swaps.	Thu, 30 Apr 2009 11:31:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2009, tm_mon=4, tm_mday=30, tm_hour=11, tm_min=31, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=120, tm_isdst=0)	20672312	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetofworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and guess who's with me? Ronald McDonald. Yes, I bet. Ronald McDonald at my cousin's 15th birthday party. Really? Yeah. It's pretty cool. That's the first thing that came into my head. I guess that means I'm hungry. I guess so. Are you hungry? Did you eat today? No. This is going to be a fun one. Chuck, we're talking about credit default swaps. I know. We're going to try to make it sexy. Yes. Should I go ahead and give the caveat here? If you want. Go ahead. I just want folks to know we usually Josh and I do a lot of prep work and both have a pretty good understanding, but I'm not ashamed to admit that I didn't quite understand this one. It's pretty thick. Yeah. It might be a little different today. Josh is going to be teaching me along with you. Okay. Are you prepared? As prepared as I can. I appreciate you dressing like a little schoolgirl today to really kind of complete everything, round it out. Yeah. Okay, so let me give you an analogy, all right? Okay. So, Chuck, imagine if I went to your health insurance provider, right, and said, hey, I want to buy Chuck's policy, okay? And they said okay, and they sold it to me. And you would be in charge of that policy. I would own the policy. So I'd be accepting monthly payments from you. Everything would be fine. I'd be probably running around trying to keep you out of accidents, that kind of thing. Right. But if you did get into an accident, I would be on the hook to pay your medical expenses, right? You bet you would be. You and I are both fully aware that I don't have the money to pay your medical expenses. No. So basically, what would happen is I pay as much as I could until I bankrupted myself. Right, and then you'd be on the hook to pay your medical expenses. Right. Okay, I get that. So you'd be in trouble, it'd bankrupt you, and we'd both be up the creek. I understand. So are you with me so far? Yes. That makes sense. Now, imagine if you owned two other people's health insurance policies, okay? Just like I owned yours. Okay? Sure. Now, let's say that accident you got into was a three car pile up, just in a mind boggling coincidence with the other two people whose health insurance policies you owned. Okay, I'm with you. So now all of a sudden, you guys are all in an accident, all need health care, and nobody has the money to pay out. I can't pay yours, and you have your own problems, so you can't pay the other two people. So imagine if this just keeps going on and on and on in this infinite car pile up and everybody owns everybody else's insurance policy, but nobody can pay. Okay. Okay. That's awful. It is awful. It's kind of nightmarish, right? It is. So the good thing is this can't happen because health insurance is a heavily regulated industry, right. So you have federal inspectors who can go to a health insurer and say, let me see your books. I want to make sure you can cover every policy that you have. Right. Do they do that? Yes. And what's more, they can't sell your insurance policy to anybody. Right, okay. Right. With credit default swaps, all the good things that keep health insurance from going pear shapes are not present, although they are pretty much insurance policies on debt. Okay. Okay. This is where I start to get a little fuzzy. I understand it does get a little fuzzy at this point. It's a bit of an abstract. It's a bit abstract for me. It is. It's insane. You have to be a genuinely savvy person and possibly a bit evil to be able to really accurately trade or make money in credit default swaps. Okay. But you don't have to be evil to describe them to people in podcast land. No, you just have to read the article several times and write it too. It doesn't hurt to write it. I read it several times and it was still a little bit maybe you have to write it. Writing it out. Okay, so let me give you a little bit of background. Credit default swaps are these financial instruments that came out of the late 90s, right. It's a derivative. It is a derivative. And a derivative is a derivative. I do know this. It's a financial instrument that has a value based on the value of another financial instrument. Right. So let's say you're trading in oil futures, right? Actually, the value of that future is based on the value of oil. Sure. It has an actual value. Right. With this, this would be based on future and oil future. Right. So it doesn't have its own value. Its value is based on the value of something else. So let's say you bought a bunch of oil futures and you were worried that the price of oil was going to go down, right? Sure. So you'd be getting the oil cheaper oil than what you paid for. You would lose money. Right. I'm not sure if you could or not, but let's say theoretically you could buy a credit default swap to cover that eventuality. Okay, so it's like insurance. That's exactly what it is. Okay. So in the nineties, they started issuing these things on municipal bonds, which were about as safe as it gets. Almost every city, except for probably Detroit, has AAA credit rating, right? Right. So a municipal bond is a loan made to a city to finance a project. That's why it's a little more stable than your average situation. Right. And the city can tax its citizens to pay off its debts. They do. Which is one of the reasons why they're so stable and reliable and credit worthy. Right, got you. So the thing is, all these banks that are issuing these policies are saying, you know what, we're making just tons of extra income because they're selling these credit default swaps to people who are loaning money to cities. The cities are definitely paying it back so there's no default on the loan. Right. And so the banks are just raking in extra money. So these things started to take off like a rocket. Who's the they? That's what I'm confused about. That's the bank. They actually issue these. Okay, so let's say that I have a bunch of money and Atlanta needs to repay $400, okay? So I buy a bunch of city bonds, a bunch of municipal bonds which are basically issuing debt. I give them a bunch of money and they give me a bond in return to hang on to and I'll earn slow, steady, small interest. Right. I would buy a credit default swap from a bank. Right, okay. To say if the city doesn't pay me back, then I can cash in this credit default swap, this insurance policy against the loan I gave the city. Okay? Okay. And then I'll actually make more money because like a life insurance policy, it's worth more than, say, the actual loan. Okay. So coming into focus. Okay. Yeah. Okay, good. We should talk together before we do these. It ruined everything. Yeah, I guess you're right. Okay. It made a huge source of extra income for the banks that were issuing these insurance policies. Right. Because no municipality was defaulting on their loan. Right, yeah. So they started to look for other places where they could sell these things or people they could sell them to. Of course. Essentially, you can cover any debt whatsoever with a credit default swap. Well, that's amazing to me. And I think one of the reasons why it was able to take off like this is because they are unregulated. It seems like greed, as always, kind of takes hold and they're like, hey, if we do it for this, we can do it for this. Is that how it works? They're wholly and completely, to this day, unregulated. It's amazing. Which is why that scenario that I gave you at the beginning about your health insurance policy right? That's dead on with credit default swaps. So think about this. Say a bank issues a credit default obligation to somebody who has created debt, right? Right. That guy who loaned money to the city for that road project. Sure. Okay, so he buys a credit default. Now there's two players in this one, really, as far as the insurance policy goes. You got the bank who has the issuers side of it. Right, and then you've got me, the guy who made the loan to the city who has the buyer's side of it. Right. And do you pay a premium? Yeah, like a monthly premium. Right. And then both of these sides of this policy can be sold to anybody at any time who wants to buy them, and neither side needs to notify the other person. Really? What's more, because it's unregulated if the bank sells it to you. Right. So now you own the issuer portion of my credit default swap, so I'm now making payments to you. You don't have to prove to them at all whether you have the money to cover it if the city defaults on the loan. This sounds two things that strikes me. It sounds like Lala land, and it sounds like a really bad idea. It is, because, Chuck, here's the problem, right. If we haven't come up with enough problems yet, also, since it's unregulated, the way that a credit default swap can be called in, if I'm, the buyer, is through a credit event, and there are certain credit events, one of the big ones is bankruptcy. One of them is if the city just says, we're not repaying your loan, that would be a credit event. Right. And then that triggers payment. Problem is, since they're unregulated, anybody can dispute whether or not a credit event actually took place, whether the event that the buyer is saying, give me my money over actually was a credit event. So there's mediation, there's lawsuits. Well, who do they dispute it to, though? Since there's no body, they take the other person to court. So they just start suing each other. Yes. More litigation. That's exactly what we need. Right. The thing is still, like I said to the state, unregulated, there is actually an independent body of banks and investment houses and other investors and securities analysts, I believe, who have come together to form an arbitrating panel for credit default swaps. That's a good thing, right? It is a good thing, but again, it exists outside of the government. Right. So everybody who is involved in the credit default market had to agree. Yes, we'll listen to these people. Their decision is binding. But existing outside the government isn't necessarily a bad thing. No, it isn't, but I think to me, it's just kind of one more point, like, where's the SEC, right. And I actually read that the SEC and the Treasury Department were encouraging this panel to form, like, please go handle this for us, because we don't have any teeth whatsoever. That's the problem with it being unregulated. Right. Well, it sounds like it's right for a nightmare scenario, too. Like, first we're talking about yeah. Let me set the stage for you. Okay. Okay. In July 2007, do you remember the good heady days of the bubble before it pursed? Yeah. The subprime mortgage market was valued at, let's see, I think $7 trillion wow. In the US. In the US. Alone. Okay. In the US. But the US. Is, I think, the biggest player in the subprime mortgage market, right? Sure. And this is when the subprime mortgage market was still valuable. So 7 trillion. Do you know in July 2007 what the credit default swaps market was valued at? I do, but I'm going to let you say it. Are you ready? Yeah. $62 trillion. That's unbelievable. Do you know what the global GDP was for 2008? I do, but I'm going to let you say it. You're ready? Yeah. $69 trillion. Wow. So it's just short of the global GDP. So basically, if every country in the entire world could suddenly sell off everything, every good and service it produced in a year to say, some aliens right. We'd have like $5 trillion left over for the year. It sounds like this is the biggest market of anything in the world, almost. Yes, I think so. I can't think of anything that's valued at more than that. And think about it, this is the late 90s, so in a decade, this unregulated market went from zero to 62 trillion. Well, what's amazing is, like, you references the mortgage crisis in that scenario, you can track it down to a house eventually, like a physical property, but this is sort of like exists in the ether. So there's no end of the line. No, it seems like. No, there isn't. Which is why you can say, no credit event didn't occur, or, no, I'm not going to pay up, or I don't have the money to pay up. I'm sorry. I was enjoying the monthly payments you're paying me, and I really thought you were going to be okay, but now that you've gone under, I can't pay you. I can't pay you the money that I owe you. Right. So what does this lead us? Well, hold on, let me say one more thing. The whole reason this market blew up was because it's actually a way to bet on the health of a company. Right? Right. So if you have a bunch of investors who have buyers, shares of credit default swaps, then they're saying they think that the company is going to go under because they're paying monthly premiums. But it's on the premise that the company is going to go under and there will be a much bigger payout. Right. You can do that with stocks, too. Yes, even more. You can actually short sell a company, driving its value down if you own enough shares, or you can borrow enough shares and sell them on margin. If you have credit default swaps, it'll actually be a bigger payout if you can drive that company into bankruptcy because you've just created a credit event. That seems unbelievable. Okay, so this is where the world was teetering right now, in 20 07 20 08, Lehman Brothers actually went down, not because of subprime mortgage securities, but because of all the credit default swaps. Really? This huge domino effect was triggered. A bunch of people had credit default swaps on the subprime mortgage securities that they owned. Right? Oops, indeed. So when the subprime mortgage securities went south, everybody turned to their credit default swaps and went, I'm glad I have these. Now wait a minute. Who owns my policy? Because there's no paper trail whatsoever. You have to track down who owns it and then hope that they have the money to pay you. All these banks were finding out the people that own their insurance policy didn't have the money to pay them. The problem is when you're writing your balance sheet, if you have a major loss but you have a credit default swap that covers it and it pays out, you're fine. You're staying in the red and you probably actually made a little bit of money. Right. If you have a major loss and there's no credit default swap to cover or can't be covered, then that's when your balance sheet goes into the red. Right. Which is the bad one. Right, yeah, I get that part. Okay, so that's what happened with Lehman Brothers. That's why AIG got all of that bailout money, right, because they had a bunch of credit default swaps. And now there's this panel that I talked about, the independent panel, that's actually gotten the value of the market down to about 25 trillion. I wonder how independent they are. Well, yes, I think it's probably a revolving door stuff. If they haven't held public office in the last couple of years, they will work for Goldman Sachs. I think Goldman Sachs is a major player in that panel. Yeah. Well, this sounds like I get it now. Do you really? Yeah. All right, so thanks for that, but thank you. Where does this lead? I mean, something's got to happen at some point, it seems like, or else it's setting us up for even more failure economically, right? No, most definitely. I think it seems like the credit default swaps market is being tamed. Like I said, we've gone from 62 trillion to 25 trillion in just like, two years. Okay, that's good, but I think it's symptomatic of the lack of regulation and oversight that we've had. We have the SEC, but they don't have any teeth. And the teeth that they do have are dull and can basically just gum butter. Right. And then the fact that there are whole over the counter markets that are allowed to get this big without any regulation whatsoever. I think there seems to be a pattern, Chuck. Like the Great Depression was the result of complete and total lack of oversight and regulation mixed with unbridled greed. Right. So then we come up with things like the SEC, the FDA, all these things, all these regulatory bodies that came out of the Greek Depression in the crash to prevent it from happening again. Then we got lazy, so then this happened again. There's going to be more regulation. The problem is people always say pro business. People always say regulations strangles business. I disagree. I think the whole point to capitalism is to make as much money as you can, as fast as you can. Right. Yeah. Which means that no matter how many roadblocks the government throws up, all it's doing is presenting challenges for very clever, greedy people, and they'll always find a loophole. Oh, yeah. Always. Very interesting. I think that's where it's leading us to more regulation, but I don't think there's ever going to be a saving grace where nothing like this ever happens again. Right. Well, when you're talking now, $25 trillion, that's still such a massive amount that it's kind of frightening to think about. It is, but it's doable. I think if the US Japan and the UK got together and sold everything off in a fire sale, we could cover it. Right. All right. Well, I get it. Thanks. Good. I'm feeling pretty good about myself. Credit default swaps a hoy. Yeah. This is sort of like some math kind of just goes so far above my head, I can read it and read it and read it, and it still just doesn't sink in. Yes. I'm like that with algebra. Really? I get geometry, but not algebra. We should do a podcast on it and fumble our way through that. There you have it. Awesome. All right. Are we still plugging things anymore? Sure, Josh. We'll just give a quickie plug to the blog. All right. Blog Stuff You Should Know blog that we write once a day each and it's on the right side of the homepage. Very nice. And it's been enjoyable. And that's all we need to say. Yes, that is it. So then what does that mean? Chucky flipping her mail? It is indeed, Josh. This one I'm really looking forward to reading. Which one is it? This is the I me incident. We get a lot of these for those of you obviously you don't know because you don't get a list of mail. We have a lot of people that take us to task on the use of I and me. Josh and I, josh and me. Me and Josh. I and Josh. I seem to get it a lot more than you, though. We both do. We yeah. So people take us to task and tell us that we're not being responsible with our grammar. And I got this email from Keith in Alton, Illinois, and Keith says, I just want to let you know that as a student of linguistics, I like to tell you that in a compound object, e g send listener mail to Chuck ni me. It is totally fine to use whichever pronoun you think sounds better. I've read a lengthy explanation that justifies the use of I in a compound object, but I won't bore you with it. My main point is this talk in whatever way sounds right to you, while keeping in mind that certain nonstandard usage of words might put off some snooty pedants. Awesome, Keith. And he did actually send a link. I'm not going to bore you either, but there was a book by Stephen Pinker called The Language Instinct, and he sent me a whole page where the guy basically breaks it down, and in the end, I'll just read the one sentence. Steven Pinker. Really? Yes. Okay. Do you know him? I just heard of him last night for the first time. Really? Yeah. It's odd. How about that? So the last sentence of his thing says, by the logic of grammar, the pronoun is free to have any case at once. I agree. I think the point of communication is to get your idea across to somebody. Exactly. And I think interchanging iron me so gets the point across. I think if you can get your point across with grunts and hand gestures, that's proper communication. Right. And when it comes down to it, the name of this show is not Grammar you should know. Right. And we're always the first ones to say we're not perfect. So layoff. Yeah. As a matter of fact, Keith, go ahead and send us your address because we're going to send you a t shirt. My man. That was cool. Thanks for coming to the rescue. Yes. Keith's shirt size and address. And, well, thank you for having our backs on this. Right on. So if you want to have our backs, if you want to take us to task, if you're a grammar Nazi or a whatever, how about we recorded that part? Okay. So if you want to have our backs or you want to take us to task, like the grammar Nazis that rode in, just go ahead and send us an email to stuffpodcast at housestuff householdworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you?"
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/podcasts.howstuffworks.com/hsw/podcasts/sysk/2017-04-25-sysk-national-security-council-final.mp3	How the National Security Council Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-national-security-council-works	Until recently, most people probably never paid much attention to the National Security Council. It's been around a long time though, and the president has quite a bit of leeway as to who sits at the table. Learn all about this important group of individu	Until recently, most people probably never paid much attention to the National Security Council. It's been around a long time though, and the president has quite a bit of leeway as to who sits at the table. Learn all about this important group of individu	Tue, 25 Apr 2017 07:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2017, tm_mon=4, tm_mday=25, tm_hour=7, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=115, tm_isdst=0)	51595062	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"With no fees or minimums on checking and savings accounts. Banking with Capital One is like the easiest decision in the history of decisions. Kind of like choosing to listen to another episode of your favorite podcast. And with Capital One's top rated app, you can deposit checks and transfer money anytime, time, anywhere, making Capital One an even easier decision that's banking reimagined what's in your wallet terms apply. Capital One NA member. FDIC hey, everybody. If you want a great website, you want to do it yourself with no must, no fuss, turn to Squarespace. They have everything to sell anything. They have the tools that you need to get your business off the ground, including ecommerce templates, inventory management, a simple checkout process, and secure payments. And if you're into analytics, hold on to your hats, because Squarespace has everything that you need. Just head to squarespace. Comsysk and you can get a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code s YSK to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's. Charles W, cloak and dagger. Debbie Coleman Bryant. You remember that movie? Yeah, that was so good. That was a good movie for boys our age, I think. Yeah, it was so good. It managed to make the San Antonio Riverwalk look interesting. Man, you've been begging on that since you walked it. Well, I think it was built up in my mind by that movie. You know what I mean? Yeah, I don't remember that being in the movie, but I don't think I've seen that since I was 13. There's a big chase scene that involved the river walk. Well, maybe that was a problem. And also there is Jerry Leslie Nielsen Rowland. Yes. From Spyhard. And this is stuff you should know. Yes. This could be a good one. It could also be extraordinarily confusing, maybe a little dry, maybe. But, brother, if you love bureaucracies, you are going to love this one. Yeah. Boy, that really came through, huh? Yeah. If you're into orgs and flowcharts and directors, but not directorates, you're going to just love this kind of stuff. Yeah. And I apologize about my squinting. I lost my glasses. Oh, no. And it had grown to depend on them, to be honest. You're like velma? I am. That's terrible. I mean, like, lost them lost them or they're just like, on your bedside, you forgot them? You want to know what happened? Yeah. I was in my bed on my laptop, wearing my glasses last week. I said, I got to go get something out of the car. I put the laptop down and the glasses down on the bed and went and got something out of my car, came back, and they were gone. Wow, that's bizarre. And I think my new puppy grabbed them and did something with them. Oh, that's going to be a treat to find later on. I mean, dude, I've looked everywhere and it literally vanished. But the puppy left your laptop. Wow, that's weird. I know. Well, anyway, I'm waiting you're getting some new ones to Eckerd or CVS or Duane Reed or whatever. I probably should have just gotten some little cheapy readers because that's kind of all I need them for, right? Or did you use your monocle? Oh, man, I should have brought my monocle. That's a great idea. All right. I'm full of them. I did not. So I'm just waiting for new glasses, and they don't have the frames that I had, so I had to pick up new ones, which always stinks. Yeah, because none of them look good. Well, if you can kind of recreate the last ones, they look good. Well, I'm trying. Well, I guess one more quick question on this. How is driving here reckless dangerous? Oh, no, I just need them for reading. Okay, I got you. Okay, good. I don't read while I drive anymore. That's smart, too. Even though you could with your glasses. That's correct. So, Chuck, we're talking today about the National Security Council. And up until I started researching this, I thought that was specifically an American thing. But it turns out most countries have their own National Security Council, and they fairly closely resemble this kind of thing. Sure. I would guess that. But I also realized I really had no idea what the National Security Council did. Yeah, but it's a pretty genius idea, and it was one that was implemented by the US. Congress, I should say the American one was back in 1947, and it was basically like, hey, you've got competing groups here that are all trying to shape American foreign policy, whether it's through diplomacy with the State Department or through military with the Department of Defense or the military itself. Or by CIA. Yeah, the CIA, by snooping, or even groups as disparate as, like, the Department of Energy or the Department of the treasury. All of these groups have their own objectives in shaping policy or responding to a crisis as far as foreign policy goes. Right? For sure. And if you take all these people and put them in a room together and say, fight it out, and the President gets to watch and laugh and then pick what he or eventually she thinks is the best option, then you have basically the best ideal version of hashing something out through a group that you could possibly hope for. And that's the point of the National Security Council. Yes, but one thing and we're going to talk about the Situation Room specifically, but one thing I learned in researching that part of it was this kind of well, not chilling quote, very sensible quote, but still a little chilling is there's always more intelligence information available then there is time for senior decision makers to read, right? Yeah. So basically there's more than they even have so that you need committees and staffs of people that can distill the most important stuff down to its most important core. Right. The way to do this, the way that it has generally been done through the National Security Council, is by decentralizing responsibility for watching over these different things. Whether it be a specific policy like energy policy and the way it relates to foreign countries. Right. Like territories like say some groups responsible for the Middle East. You have all these different groups that are responsible for keeping an eye on this stuff. Thinking about American policy, thinking about how state and American policy is changing or evolving as say, a situation or a new leader emerges in a different area. And then as crises or needs for decisions arise, then the need to talk about this policy bubbles up and up and up through the hierarchy until finally it gets to the point where there's cabinet level secretaries who are saying Mr again or eventually Madam President, we need a decision on this. Here are our options. Yeah. It is incredibly complex, like you said. It's not just like what bad leader in the world is doing something today. It's that plus about 1000 other things from like you said, it could be something as simple as or not as simple but as nonthreatening is an energy policy with a country, with a new leader. Like you said, there's something that needs attention outside of our borders. Right. And by making it bubble up through these levels of hierarchy you have people who have increasing levels of responsibility and as each level of responsibility starts saying, yeah, this is worth kicking up to the next higher level because we really do need some sort of decision on this, it takes on further and further credence right. Yeah. Until it reaches that highest level, what's actually called the National Security Council. And when it reaches that level, hopefully a decision will be made. But that's not necessarily the cases we'll see. Should we talk about history? Let's talk history, man. You know, I love to. So our article on this was okay, and once supplemented with others supplemented, I like that. I like it too. You're going to keep that once supplemented with other things. I had a friend growing up who said that and it was one of those things where I would say spaghetti and he would say spaghetti. I would say spaghetti and he'd say Pascal. Yeah. He'd just like pinch the bridge of your nose and shake your head, basically. As a four year old. No, this is like early teens. It's not good. All right, so throughout history we had not, not historically had the National Security Council because I think in the earlier days residents had their sort of inner circle that kind of acted like what eventually the National Security Council how they would cancel and advise but they were just known as sort of like the bros of the president? Pretty much, yeah. It was like, who do you trust? Or specifically who has the expertise needed to help guide your decision on this? Right. Right. And I think one of the reasons why there wasn't a National Security Council for most of history is because most presidents kind of bristle at the idea of having a bureaucracy hoisted or foisted on them right. Where they're just like, no, I got this. I need to ask who I need to ask at any given point in time. And some presidents were historically known for even the people that they ask advice from. They'd be like, thank you for your advice. I'm rejecting it outright. Right. Like, Lincoln was apparently famous for that. Yeah. I mean, Lincoln was a smart fellow. He probably had good ideas on his own. Well, he did. He was famous for having that team of rivals. Right. Where not only were people in his cabinet rivals with one another, they were rivals with him as well. Right. And it really challenged him to keep people in check, like his Secretary of State Steward, William Seward. Sure. He was big time against the Civil War from happening. He didn't want to happen. He was just like, okay, South Sea. It was nice, you guys being a part of the Union, but we'll figure it out. We shouldn't go to war. And he was like, opening lines of communication with the Confederacy, going around Lincoln and trying to subvert. Lincoln's basically wishes that the south not succeed. And Lincoln said, you better watch your step. And that was a good danger. It wasn't at all. No, but you're right. He famously kind of would listen to a device, even if Seward and say, no, I'm the president. This is my choice. Yeah. He said, quote, if this must be done, I must do it. And that was kind of the way that the president I mean, it takes a certain kind of person to be president, right? Sure. And usually, if you are elected president, you're not the kind of person who's like, what do you guys think? Hey, over there, what's your opinion? What should I do? It's like, go do this. I'm the president. The end. Do it. Right. But as the United States grew and the world grew, a little more complexities were brought out, obviously, especially in terms of foreign policy. Right. And especially after World War II, congress was not thrilled with the way FDR kind of ran things. And they said, you know what I think we need? And the president needs help in the form of an official body sanctioned body surrounding him to help him make decisions. Right. And so eventually, in 1947, is when the National Security Act was passed and this council was created to, quote, advise the president with respect to the integration of domestic, foreign, and military policies relating to national security and other stuff. And again, this is a significant act because it's saying, mr. President, here is a bureaucracy that you didn't ask for and you don't want, but we're putting on you on your shoulders because this stuff is just too big now. We're a superpower, and we can't just leave it up to you and your informal management style of ad hoc working groups that you just pull into the Oval Office whenever you need some advice. We need something far more structured than that. So we're going to pass a congressional act that we're going to force you to sign into law. And Truman actually signed it into law in 1947. And from that point on, there was a structure that the President was expected to use when making foreign policy decisions so that he would have all of the options, all of the opinions, all of the varying factors in any given situation before him so that he can say option D. I like it. Yeah. And like you said before, different presidents over the years have had different there's a lot of leeway within how you want to run your National Security Council, how it's structured. It's not completely set in stone, as we've seen recently, and we'll talk a little bit about what's going on now, but throughout since 1947, basically, each president has sort of had their own reasons for leaning on it a lot or not leaning on it that much initially. Truman, right after it was passed through, was kind of he didn't go to meetings a lot until after the Korean War. And then he was like, oh, wait a minute, I think there's a lot of value here. Eisenhower, being former military, was sort of used to that system of committees and bureaucracy. He kind of took to it right away and was like, oh, this is great. I'm going to even kind of expand the NSC and create these special boards, and I'm actually going to create someone called the National Security Adviser. Yes, which is a huge thing, huge contribution to the National Security Council that Eisenhower made. And yes, since he was used to the military, let's make this even more regimented than Congress wanted and he put it to good work. But since then it's been typically more pared down than what Eisenhower had. I think he had probably the most hierarchical and decentralized and spread out National Security Council of any president more than Obama even. Yeah, obama had, I think, a huge bloated one, but I think it didn't have as many, say, like departments or committees or that kind of thing as Eisenhower got you because Obama received a lot of criticism for that. And from what I read rightly. So basically it was a huge stalling mechanism that Obama used to put off foreign policy decisions or to make them outside of his own Cabinet. Well, and even if it wasn't purposeful, you know how it is with bureaucracy. The more bloated an organization gets, just the slower everything is going to move and the harder it's going to be to get anything done. Yeah, this is kind of how it works. So Kennedy comes along and had a kind of a disaster on his hands with the Bay of Pigs, which we should do a show on at some point. So he looked to his national Security Adviser, Mcgendy, the man with two last names, and said, we need a chill room to hang out and make decisions. Chill room? How about the bowling alley? Yeah, it was FDR's bowling alley. And FDR signed up from his grave and said, not my bowling alley. Right. And that's when The Situation Room was created, which I thought this was really neat. I didn't know much about the Situation room. I thought it was the Room. I didn't know that it was 5000 rooms on the ground floor of the West Wing. The Woodshed. Yeah, that's the nickname for it. Which, I didn't get why they call it that. Because here in the States, the Woodshed is typically used and take them out behind the Woodshed. Usually that means getting a spanking. Well, maybe that's bad. You know what happens in the woods? In The Situation Room? They watch people get spanked, I guess, on closed circuit TV. I guarantee they do. Should we take a break and then talk about The Situation Room a little more? Yeah, let's. What if you were a global bank who wanted to supercharge your audit system so you tap IBM to UNSILO your data and with the help of AI, start crunching a year's worth of transactions against thousands of compliance controls. Now you're making smarter decisions, faster operating costs are lower, and everyone from your auditors to your bankers feel like a million bucks. Let's create smarter ways of putting your data to work. IBM, let's create. Learn more@ibm.com. Hey, everybody. If you want a great quality website, you want to do it yourself with no must and no fuss. Then there's nowhere else to look. In Squarespace. That's right. Squarespace has every single thing that you need to put together an awesome website. Everything from growing and engaging your audience with email campaigns, collecting donations for your cause through Apple, Pay, Stripe, Venmo, PayPal. Plus, you can also make your website optimized for mobile, which is great for your user on the go. That's right. And if you're into selling stuff, square space is everything to sell anything. They have all the tools you need to get your business off the ground. They have ecommerce templates, inventory management, really simple checkout process and secure payment. So whatever you want to sell, you can sell it on Squarespace. Yeah, don't just take our word for it. Head to squarespace. Comssk and start your free trial today. And then when you're ready to launch, use our offer code s YSK, and you'll get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. That's Squarespace. Comcysk. Squarespace. So, Chuck, we're talking about Situation Room, not with Will splitzer. No, never. And it was started with Kennedy. Right. And did you see the picture in one of the articles you sent me of the situation? I think it was the woodshed one. One of them had like dozens and dozens of pictures, which kind of surprised me, that one. But there was a picture in there, and I think it was the original situation room that Kennedy had set up. And basically it was a bunch of chairs and like a huge map of the world on the wall. That was some situation. Like the war room from Strange Love. They call in like a 98 year old civil servant to come in and move attack from Ecuador to Guatemala. Right. And then he just shuffled back out. This thing apparently used to be it went under a big renovation in 2006, and apparently before that was I don't get the idea that it was necessarily antiquated, but it wasn't certainly up to the kind of modern technological level that it needed to be. Let's just say that. Yeah. I also have the impression that it was a lot more luxurious originally, but that things like the mahogany paneling actually made it hard to hear people on speakerphone. Right. So they kind of just updated it to probably much more in line with what people thought it looked like all along. Right. That's what it looks like now. Yeah. That main room, where you've probably seen the most photos of, has six flat screens, very secure, obviously, for video conferencing with whoever you want around the world. It links directly to Air Force One, which is kind of neat. They have private meeting rooms, private phone booth rooms, secure video rooms. It's kind of like what you would expect. You can't text from there. They don't want things leaking out of there. It is not a bunker, like a lot of people might think, but yeah, there's some windows to the exterior of the White House. Yeah, but it feels like a bunker in that. All these kind of very private and secure areas. But it's not like deep underground or anything like that. Right. Yeah. I think the room where there's that famous photo of everybody in the Obama National Security Council watching the bin Laden raid the bin Laden spanking. Yeah. Behind the woodshed. I think that it's an enclosed windowless room that is cut off. It has kind of bunker like qualities, but the whole interior itself is not a bunker. It's not underground, like you said. Correct. They have a staff. The situation room staff is about 30 people in general, and they are organized into what's called watch teams. And these watch teams do well, they don't take the night off. There's 24/7 monitoring of everything, basically. And it says there's usually three duty officers, a communications assistant and an intelligence analyst on each watch team. Right. Presidents throughout the years have used the situation room sparingly. Sometimes, I think in the case of Kennedy, he liked to be in the Oval Office a little more. And they say Lyndon Johnson was in the Situation Room so much that he even moved his Oval Office chair down there. Oh, really? Yeah. Nixon and Ford apparently never used a room. HW. Bush and Clinton used it a lot. And in that 2006 expansion, they included offices for Homeland Security Council now. And the White House Chief of Staff's office is down there now. Right. Which is pretty interesting. But apparently you get nominated to be part of the personnel. Oh, yeah. I'm quite sure it is a highly prestigious tour. They're two year tours, and I'm sure it's just absolutely grueling because basically they make you watch cable news from around the world all day long. There's also tons of cables coming in from various embassies around the country. All of the intelligence, raw intelligence is coming through this room. Right. So apparently after the Bay of Pigs, kennedy was like I think he felt cut off from actual raw intelligence. He hadn't been presented with the correct actual intelligence. So he created this Situation Room to basically circumvent the intelligence community and to have his hands on raw intelligence. Right. So you've got intelligence coming from around the world going to the various intelligence agencies, but each intelligence agency is also commanded to send their raw intelligence to the Situation Room. And then it's up to the Situation Room staff to say, this seems important. This isn't important. This is pretty important. And then they compile it all into different briefings that the President gets daily, usually in the morning and in the evening as well. Yeah. And if you're part of this staff, like we said, hand picked for that two year thing, and they said, it's a very big deal. You have to have an even temperament. You have to be cool under pressure. You have to be able to have these spur of the moment, coherent, intelligent conversations, like with the President on a moment's notice. You can't be like, President, I can't believe it's you. And apparently this article said, I think this from the CIA. It said, you need to check your ego at the door at this job. One director, Situation Room director said to an incoming duty officer, just remember, there are many important people who work in the White House, and you're not one of them. I love that quote. I do, too. It varies with the President's, but basically every day, the watch team puts together something called the Morning Book for the President, the Vice President, and whoever on the White House staff is, I guess, authorized to get this right. And in this Morning Book is the well, it's a daily affirmation. It's the first thing you're worth. It. The National Intelligence Daily is in there. The State Department's morning summary is in there. Any kind of intelligence reports. And then I think a Family Circus cartoon, right? Just to keep things light. Right. And in it, PJ says Pascali. And then the morning book is this is in the card, the National Security Adviser when they're picked up, and they also have the President's daily brief that's the CIA's daily prepared briefing, basically. And like, this is every day. These are these briefs and reports that these senior people and staff get every single morning of every single day of every year. Right. Just to give you kind of an idea of how much information is coming into these poor SAPS 24 hours a day, if something does happen, right. If there's like, a crisis somewhere around the world, there's like a revolution breaking out, you would have all of the people who are involved in that crisis say that area or it's related to, again, energy, or say it's like an Ebola outbreak that suddenly sweeping. So you'd have all the people involved in that coming into the Situation Room, right, and just being like, give us all the information you got, keep us updated, tell us what's going on, like, every 5 seconds. But if you're the Situation Room staff, you're like, that's great. I understand you're having a crisis right now, but we're still trying to pay attention to the rest of the world, too. Right. Obviously, it's not meaningless to these people, but it's all relative because they can't just stop paying attention to China because there's an Ebola outbreak in Africa. Correct. Yeah. My hats off to them for being able to keep up with all of this stuff. Yeah. And obviously, certain times are a little more calm, relatively speaking, than others. Yeah. I don't think I'd be very good at this, but there's never a day where there's not something going on in the world that at least whoever in that region is going to feel is super important to catch the President's eye. Right. You got to put something in those intelligence briefings. Like there's a Russian plane in this airspace and we don't know why. Right. There's one thing I've learned from researching this episode, Chuck, is that the United States is very nosy. Yeah. So that's the situation, Chuck, and it's almost kind of like its own thing, right? It's like one of those old timey tenement clothes lines directly between it and the President, if the President so chooses, or at least the National Security Council staff, which makes the National Security Council kind of its own thing. Yeah. You know what I mean? It definitely is its own agency. But if you look back at the original congressional mandate, the point of it was it was supposed to be a forum, a place where the different heads of departments and cabinet members came together and said, this is what we need to do. No, this is what we need to do, Mr. President. Choose. Right. But with the addition of the Situation Room and some other moves that presidents have made, like creating the position of the national Security Adviser. It has become its own party, its own thing, to where, yes, it's responsible for coordinating policy and calling meetings and getting everybody to the table, but it's bringing its own views and policies on policies. Now, whereas before it was just supposed to be a place where the existing Cabinet members came and talked about policy. So that was a big change, I think, that took place beginning with Eisenhower and the creation of the National Security Adviser, but definitely also the creation of The Situation Room and this direct pipeline to the President for raw intelligence as well. Yeah. And like we said earlier, each president can kind of organize things how they prefer to have things organized. And Johnson, he would have lyndon Johnson apparently had regular Tuesday working lunches where he brought together the CIA Director, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, secretary of State and Defense, and they all had salad wraps every Tuesday and chatted about what was going on. Ty basil was Johnson's favorite under Nixon. Apparently. He obviously worked so closely with Kissinger that I get the feeling that he didn't like meetings with a large amount of people. I don't think he trusted very many people that Nixon that's probably a good way to say it. And then, of course, Ford did exactly what Nixon did. Big surprise. And then I think you said Carter didn't use it very much. Well, our article at least says that Carter said that he kind of had his own ideas and the NSC was not as much of behind the scenes managers, what they call it, as maybe with other administrations. Yeah, he used the National Security adviser as kind of a policy mouthpiece to the country. This is the way the President feels. He's like a spokesperson. And that kind of made the National Security Advisor a lot more prominent. Which is actually something that had been started under the Nixon administration when he appointed Henry Kissinger or when he had Henry Kissinger as his National Security Adviser. Because Kissinger buck the trend in that the National Security Adviser went from somebody who's in charge of coordinating policy. Getting everybody to the table. Figuring out what the President needed to know to actually formulating foreign policy. Right. Which I think is another thing that some presidents have tasked or have not tasked successive national security advisers with. But that was a big change because Kissinger was saying, this is how the US. Needs to respond to this kind of thing, or this is the way our energy policy should be. I keep going back to that. Well, but it's a great well, yeah. Reagan comes along and after Carter and really changes things with Ensc to the point where we decided just to do an entirely new podcast and not talk about this much on Iran Contra. But to say that there was overreach going on under his NSE is probably a bit of an understatement. Yeah, he turned. It into, like, a clandestine covert operations agency. It's nuts what he did with it. It is. HW. Bush came along and kind of restored order a bit and apparently set up a really good system, like a working system with his flow chart and all these committees that were going on. And apparently he was so successful in sort of just kind of making it a truly functioning body that Bill Clinton, his little buddy, almost said little buddy? George W. Bush. Sure, I guess his son, I guess they were buddies. They're buddies at Davos and stuff like that. And then Obama, they all kind of followed suit, following HW. Bush's sort of organizational flow because it works so well. Yeah. And it's basically well, I guess we should talk about it. You want to take a break first? Yeah. And talk about these committees? Yeah. Word charts coming up right after this. What if you were a gigantic snack food maker and you had to wrestle a massively complex supply chain to satisfy cravings from Tokyo to Toledo? So you partner with IBM Consulting to bring together data and workflow so that every driver and merchandiser can serve up jalapeno, sesame and chocolate cover goodness with real time, data driven precision. Let's create supply chains that have an appetite for performance. IBM let's create. Learn more at IBM. Comconsulting. Hey, everybody. If you want a great quality website, you want to do it yourself with no must and no fuss, then there's nowhere else to look than Squarespace. That's right. Squarespace has every single thing that you need to put together an awesome website. Everything from growing and engaging your audience with email campaigns, collecting donations for your cause through Apple, Pay, Stripe, Venmo, PayPal. Plus, you can also make your website optimized for mobile, which is great for your user on the go. That's right. And if you're into selling stuff, square space is everything to sell anything. They have all the tools you need to get your business off the ground. They have ecommerce templates, inventory management, really simple checkout process, and secure payment. So whatever you want to sell, you can sell it on Squarespace. Yeah, don't just take our word for it. Head to Squarespace.com SYSK and start your free trial today. And then when you're ready to launch, use our offer code s y SK, and you'll get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. That's Squarespace. Comsysk. So, Chuck, let's break down the National Security Council. All right, let's break it down for them, fella. They're committees now within the NSC. Are we going from bottom to top? Sure. Okay, go ahead. Start at the bottom. Okay, fine. So you've got policy coordinating committees, the PCC. So the policy coordinating committees, right. They basically have a focus, a specific focus, whether it's on a region, a particular interest, maybe energy. And these committees are made up of people from different agencies, whether it's the intelligence community or the department of Energy or whoever has a stake in that region or that particular policy. Right. And they're made up of experts on them, but I don't want to say they're low level within their actual agency. They're probably pretty high up. Sure. And they come together and they're keeping an eye on stuff. Right. They're monitoring changes. They're maybe saying, we're bored. We need to come up with a brand new policy for America to undertake in this regard or in this region. Right. Yes. And let's say a crisis comes along and let's say that this is the Middle East Policy Coordinating Committee, something happens oh, I don't know, there's a gas attack in Syria. Right, right. This Policy Committee is obviously there will be some other parallel thing from the raw intelligence going through the Situation Room. But this Committee would also spring into action and it would start bubbling up. It would start writing policy papers. They would dust off old theories and hypotheses, and they would go to the people directly above them, the Deputies Committee, and they would say, we need to get the President moving on this, whatever this is. Yeah. And the Deputies Committee is headed by the Deputy National Security Adviser. And things are getting kind of serious at this point. All the deputy heads of the Departments are included on this Committee and get the feeling that this is just the next level of weeding out things. Right, exactly. And eventually, if it makes it way to the Principals Committee, that's just below the actual NSC. And that is headed by the national or I guess convened, is what they say, by the National Security Adviser, him or herself. And the National Security Council is actually made up of the president, the vice president, the secretary of state, secretary of defense, secretary of energy, I believe, and the national security Adviser. And then there's other what are called observers or advisors, specifically the Director of National Intelligence, who is the person who is in charge of the entire intelligence community from the NSA and the CIA to Coast Guard Intelligence, everybody who's snooping on behalf of the United States. This person is the top of that whole community and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who is the representative of the all armed forces of the military. So it's the military's voice in the National Security Council. And once these people are talking about an issue or a policy that's about as high level as it gets, the point of it reaching this Committee is that these people are all saying this is the best option. No, this is the best option. We need to talk some more. No, we need to shoot some missiles off and then the President has to decide. Yeah. And like we said, it can be organized within certain bounds of the law as the presidency fit. And anyone who follows the news in the United States or abroad about the United States there was quite a shake up earlier this year when our current president excluded the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Director of National Intelligence. They weren't, like, banned from the NSC, but they weren't on the list of like, hey, you need to be at all these meetings all the time. It was more like I think the direct quote was, you shall attend where issues pertaining to your responsibilities and expertise to be discussed. Right. And there was a big uproar in the press, and the White House downplayed it and said, this is not a real change. Like in past administrations. The Chairman, the Joint Chief of Staff and Director of National Intelligence aren't at all the meetings either. They're usually at the ones that pertain to them. What gives? What's the deal? Yeah, like, quit making a big deal about this. And also this guy, Steve Bannon, my political strategist, is a full fledged member. That was a big deal for a little while, right? Because just this week, as we're recording in real time, mr. Bannon has been excused. And of course, the White House and Bannon tried to play it up. Like, you know what? He was never going to be on there permanently. He was in there to undo the work of Susan Rice, who was Obama's National Security Adviser, is what Bannon said. And then officials said, no. He was actually there to monitor Michael Flynn, the first National Security Adviser, who is already gone. And now that he's gone, we don't really need Bannon. His work is done. That's really all we kind of wanted him in there for to begin with. That's just crazy to watch this. Yeah, I don't think anyone bought that. I don't even think Republicans bought that spin. And currently, clearly, there's an internal struggle going on with apparently Steve Bannon and the president son in law, Jared Kushner, and to the point where the president was like, you guys work this stuff out or I'm going to solve it. And family matters to Donald Trump. And I think Bannon understands that. Yeah, it definitely looks like the knives are out for Bannon. He doesn't have a lot of friends elsewhere in the White House. So if the president is turning on them, then that's not good news for Steve Bannon. Yeah, I mean, we'll see how this plays out. But just today, Donald Trump was quoted as kind of the quotes were very cool on his support for Banning today. Cool as in he was kind of like, hey, I think the quote was something like, he's a good guy, but he didn't hook up with me until kind of recently. Yeah, I saw that. That's not a ringing endorsement. When he put Bannon on, like, he gave him a permanent seat on the National Security Council, that was a big deal because presidents have had political advisors on their National Security Council. That's been done before, but never like a permanent reserve seat at all the meetings, and it sent like a really big message. And the message was the political ramifications of a decision or a policy outcome are just as important as, say, like, the military or diplomatic ramifications up there. It's going to be taken into account just as much. I think that's why a lot of people were chilled by that, because you don't want it to be political. You don't want your decisions to be, well, how will this affect my vote? Or something like that down the road. That's how a lot of people took Bannon's appointment to the National Security Council. This new guy who came in after Flynn, HR. McMaster, has apparently alleviated a lot of worry by a lot of people. He's a three star general. He's only one of three active duty military to serve as National Security Adviser. So he's an active duty military guy, and he's apparently well respected inside and outside of the military. Yes, I think he restored the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Director of National Intelligence. Yes, he did. The reason why that was a bizarre move, and apparently George W. Bush did the same thing. But since 2001, there's not any American foreign policy issue or crisis that doesn't involve the intelligence community and the military. It's just the direction America's gone. That kind of falls in line with Trump stated policy of isolationism, just kind of saying, no, we're going to rein that back in. I think that's probably what he was doing. But I don't know that a lot of elites in Washington have faith that he has an actual plan rather than was just sending a message. You know what I mean? Right. Well, it was short lived. Yeah. So this McMaster guy, though, he actually made his name by writing a dissertation criticizing Lyndon Johnson's military advisers on the National Security Council during Vietnam. He wrote his thesis, and it got turned into a best selling book called Dereliction of Duty. Wow, that's right. And a lot of people are like, man, this guy is great. He's all about being open and upfront and honest with the President. And then other people read the book and said, oh, this guy is a military guy who's saying that you shouldn't listen to the President's wishes and the military should just act on its own. So I think most people subscribe to the former reading of it that he actually is a pretty smart guy and is not calling for the military to act independently of the President's wishes more. That he was indicting the President's advisers for not being forthright and upfront and clear and was just kind of going along with Johnson and telling him what he wanted to hear as far as Vietnam went. It's interesting stuff. That guy's an interesting dude. McMaster is. Yeah, it really is. The NSC themselves, obviously, we've kind of talked to Edna about the meetings and the bureaucracy, but aside from this. One of the other things that they do is if the President has a call with a foreign leader, there's going to be a senior staff member from the NSC. They're with them. They're going to brief him beforehand and say, hey, you're about to get on a call with, let's say, the leader of North Korea. And those calls happen all the time, and they will probably want to talk about this, and this is sort of the important things that we need to cover. And they may mention this, and you may want to respond this way. Don't talk about how much you like that Seth Rogen movie The Interview. Avoid that at all costs, avoid that. Did you see that? Yes. Was it any good? Oh, you didn't see it? No. That's pretty good. It was pretty funny. Yeah. It's a Seth Rogen James Franco taking on a really pronounced opinion on a specific policy matter, but it was pretty funny. I liked it. I was about to say maybe I'll see it, but I know I won't. I would recommend it if you're ever sitting around watch it. All right. Yeah. So this phone call will take place, and that NSC staffer is generally there through the call and taking notes. And then that then is super useful information to take back down to their committee or subcommittee. So that's just like another one of their duties, basically, is making sure the president has all the information on basically any meeting or call that they're going to take with any foreign leader. Yeah. I think you can sum up the National Security Council like this, right? Somebody has an idea. Let's say that they decided that it would be great for America's position in the world if we dedicated June 1 as National Flower Power Day. That comes up from a committee and keeps bubbling up and bubbling up and bubbling up, and each time that passes from one committee to another, somebody saying, yes, I think this is a good idea, and we're going to put my reputation on the line by saying it should be taken to the president. And finally it goes all the way to the national security Adviser, who is the gatekeeper to the President on all matters of foreign policy and national security, and he or she decides what's worth taking to the President and specifically what's worth waking the President up. At 03:00 A.m.? Yes. Have you ever heard that story about Carter? Jimmy Carter's, national security adviser? No. Are you ready to hear me drone on? Sure. Okay. So back in November of 1079. At 03:00 A.m.. Around then big new Brzenski. Who is the national security Adviser to Carter. Got a call from NORAD that showed that the Soviet Union had launched 2200 nuclear missiles at the United States and they were on their way. And it was up to Brazevsky to decide whether this was a fluke and a glitch in Nord system or if there was just a teenager in the Pacific Northwest exactly. Trying to change his grades. Right? So this guy in the middle of the night had the terrible job of, do I kick this up to the President and let the person who could launch a nuclear counter attack on the Soviet Union make that decision? Or do I sit on this and say, this is not real, this is a fluke. This is a NORAD glitch and he had to decide it. And he decided, no, it's a glitch. And he was right. It was a glitch. And apparently that happened a number of times. We came very close to launching a counterattack against a phantom strike that hadn't actually been launched during the Cold War. And Brzezinsky apparently had nerves of steel when it came to stuff like that. But that's a pretty good example of what a national security adviser is meant to do. You're the person the last person to decide whether to take it to the president and escalate it or not. Wow. I say wow as well. Well, because I know people of keen eye of pop culture history will point this out. I will beat it to the punch and note that that is the second Daphne Coleman reference in the show. Oh, yeah. Nice. Was not expecting that. I forgot he was great in both movies. Yeah. So if we can just work in a nine to five reference before it's all out. I think he just did. Man, he was great. I really loved Daphne Coleman. Is he still around? I think he's still alive and doesn't act much. Oh, well, good for him. He's enjoying life. Unless he's recently passed on. Yeah, I don't know. I could be thinking of that movie Short Time where he was dying and tried to get himself killed so his family could get his pension. That was a good movie too. Which one short Time. I don't think I've seen that one either. Oh, check it out. You need to do a double feature short Time in the interview. Hey, he's still alive. Confront. Hey, Daphne Coleman. You got anything else? I don't think so. I have one more movie recommendation. It's a documentary called The Fog of War. Oh, yeah, sure. That's all in the theater. That was a good one. Oh, and I have a reading recommendation too, of course. But have you ever read have you seen Zero Dark 30? Oh, yeah. Okay, so apparently as far as Seymour Hirsch, the great investigative journalist says, that is all BS. It's government propaganda. And that whole official Mark Bowden Zero Dark 30 account of how bin Laden was found, not necessarily the rate itself, but how he was found. And everything leading up to the rate, it's just spinning that it actually was much simpler and less glamorous than that. And he wrote a series of essays for the London Review of Books, specifically The Killing of Osama bin Laden that one kind of lays out the whole thing behind it. It's pretty interesting. So how it really went down was they were like, we need to find where Osama bin Laden is. And someone called in and said, he's right over there. I see him. He's in a McDonald's. It went almost like that, except the first part where they said, we need to find out where he is. Didn't happen. Somebody just walked in and then said, hey, he's a McDonald's, and they said, we should spank him. Yeah. Remember the time I saw John Cryer at McDonald's in Los Angeles? I do remember that. The day after the Charlie Sheen freak out was going on. Yeah. Man, what a day to see John Cryer. Yeah. Was he elated or was he no, he was stress eating McDonald's breakfast. Yes. Because his $100000 Mercedes. Yeah. His cash cow of a TV show was being threatened by his kooky costar. Didn't you pay money to go see Charlie Sheen? Did I? Yeah. No. Mike Tyson. Okay. No, I've never seen Charlie Sheen. I remember when he went on tour. For some reason, I thought you went to that. No, but I have more respect for you than to think that you actually would have paid money for that. Right. Gotten in free, maybe. Right? If you want to know more about the National Security Council, just go to the White House and knock on the front door and ask them to give you a tour. Right? Yes. In the meantime, actually, you probably shouldn't do that. You just type National Security Council in the search bar how Stuff works. And it will bring up this article. And since I said that, it's time for listening, mate. My friend Tracy called Steve Anna. She said he looks like a beach bar drunk. Yeah, I can see that, actually. Yeah, he looks like he should be wearing flipflops in every photo. Well, he used to. And then somebody said, you need to start wearing suits. Right. All right, I'm going to call this empathy response. Hey, guys, listen to empathy. Today I had a good laugh at Chuck's impression of a doctor falling to pieces, because something similar happened to me when I was 14. I was a junior in high school. Summer between junior and senior year, my parents sent me to scout camp a few days in the trip when the other kids cast a fishing line without any bait, and I walked right behind them and the hook lodged right into my eyeball. Not the skin around my eye, the eyeball. A few hours later, I was at Valley Children's near Fresno and for emergency surgery, waiting for them to prepare an operating room. And the anesthesiologist came in and looked at my eye and shouted, oh, my God, his eye is going to collapse. I'm transgender, so calling me he made sense at the time, by the way, hearing a doctor say something like that about my eyeball would probably have freaked me out in any other circumstance, but they had me drugged up pretty good at the time. Still, I remember thinking the reaction was probably not how a doctor should react to things that they want to keep their patients calm. Fortunately, I had a happy ending. The talented surgeon who took care of me got the hook out without any damage to my side, and we only married ever since. The only evidence that ever happened is a very faint scar on the white of my eye and pupil that doesn't close quite as much as the one in the other eye. Aren't your mirror neurons is going berserk right now in the worst way. Well, it's funny because she said I didn't read that part, but she said, get ready for your mirror neurons to fire. Yes. At the beginning. Anyhow, thanks for all the laughs and knowledge you guys dropped on me during my commute started my job, new job as a science writer for Caltech last week. This week. And I've been recommending stuff you should know to my very smart new coworkers. And that is from Emily Velasco. Thanks a lot, Emily. Great one. That was terrible and horrible, but great. Yes. I'm glad it all worked out for you. And good luck as a science writer. Send us all of your interesting articles, please. If you have some interesting articles you want us to read, maybe we'll turn it into a Stuff You Should Know episode. Who knows? You can tweet them to us at xysk podcast. You can also hang out with me on Twitter at Josh Clark. You can hang out with Chuck on Facebook at Charles W. Chuck Bryant? Or you can hang out with us at Stuff You Should Know on Facebook too. You can send us both and Jerry an email to stuffpodcast@housetofworks.com. And as always, you can come hang out with us at a luxurious home on the web stuffy. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer school's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, My Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. You know you're a pet mom when you plan your vacation around your pet halo. We get it, because we're pet moms, too. We make natural, high quality pet food that's rooted in science. It's the world's best food for the world's best kids. Learn more@halopets.com."
https://podcasts.howstuf…sk-taxidermy.mp3	How Taxidermy Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-taxidermy-works	Josh and Chuck tackle taxidermy, the practice of preserving and mounting dead animal skins for display, in this episode.	Josh and Chuck tackle taxidermy, the practice of preserving and mounting dead animal skins for display, in this episode.	Thu, 25 Mar 2010 19:18:01 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2010, tm_mon=3, tm_mday=25, tm_hour=19, tm_min=18, tm_sec=1, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=84, tm_isdst=0)	29359347	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles. Www. Chuck Bryant that would make this stuff? You should know. Hello. Hey, Chuck. Hi. Hey, what's going on? I tossed and turned last night. I'm like, I have to come up with a good intro for this. I kept waking up in the middle and I had cold sweat. Right. I got nothing. Everybody sweats. Yeah. Nice. Thanks, Chuck. You want to know what I came up with? I think it would be appropriate. Chuck, what is your favorite use of Texider Me in a movie? That's what I got. I got to go with psycho. Psycho. Yeah. That's the one I mentioned in the article because Norman Bates had that creepy office full of foul and mounted beast. Yes. We're talking about Texas. Jeremy And I think one of the themes that will keep coming up is that depending on how you pose an animal, it can either be very cute or very menacing. Right. And if you fill an office, as Norman Bates did, with a bunch of menacing looking stuffed dead animals, it's going to be creepy. It's curtains for you. Yeah, it is. Shower curtains. Nice. That's awful. Yeah. This is a listener request. Yeah. And it's a Chuck Bryant article. It is. I'm just going to kick back and go. Yeah. Right. Yeah. But thank you, Scott in Los Angeles, who was inspired by this query when he visited the Bass Pro Shop in Rancho Cucamanga and he was a little taken aback by all the stuffed and mounted I'm sorry, mounted animals? Yeah. And you're welcome best pro shops for that free plug. Yeah, we have one here. You know? I know nothing. Gwen at I'm hoping they'll send us some free polls or something. So, Chuck, when you wrote this article, did you know much about taxes? Me already? Or was it just pretty much relegated to psycho? Psycho. Although my dad is an enthusiast. Holy cow. I can't believe this. I do have a great intro. Okay, let's hear it. I totally forgot. All right, let's try it again, then. No, I think we should keep the first one, too. Yeah, let's do both about, I don't know, three, four months ago, you and I were coming home and she went around the front to get the mail. And I was coming in the back, and as I was unlocking the back door, I heard, Baby, no. And I stopped. She thought somebody had broken in because the window was broken. Front window. So we go and investigate, right? Bird. There is a huge hawk. I actually measured it from tail to head. It was 15 inches. You're kidding. An enormous hawk. Dead as a doorknob, dead as disco. Right. How did this not come to you when you're thinking of an interest? I don't know. I mean, that's just crazy. That's weird. So it was beautiful. Its neck was broken, but that was it. It was still warm. It was clearly in good shape aside from being dead. And our first thought was, we need to stop this. Hawk came to us, gave it to life so it could sit in our study. Yeah. And we looked into it and found that we would have been arrested had we tried to really? Yeah. Apparently, in Georgia, hawks are protected. Sure. And we definitely had a hawk. It was a chicken hawk. You know, like the little chicken hawk and the Foghorn Leghorn thing. You're a chicken hawk and I'm a chicken. Right, exactly. Except this one is chicken. It could have taken a chicken pretty easy. Yeah. But apparently they're protected, and it'll raise a whole can of worms if you try to get these things stuff. Interesting. Which actually goes into a point that you make in this article, that if you have a hawk or a deer or a beaver or any combination of those, and you take them to a Texas nervous and you expect some, as you put it, hillbilly mad scientist with a thirst for blood, you're going to be disappointed because most of them are very gentle, kind, loving, crotchety artists. Yes. Right? Yes, for sure. Let's talk about taxidermy. Where did it come from? Now, see, man, what a great intro. Thank you. Taxidermy. Josh began as out of practicality in England because of the need for leather, usable leather. So tanning hides is where it all started. Yeah. I'll tan your hide. I know. Did you ever get told that? No, my parents were educated. Yeah. I think my grandmother might have said that. I should have said, do you want to make my butt into usable leather? She would have smacked me. Yeah, she would have tanned your high. She would have. So it was kind of born out of that. And then also, once the naturalist like James Cook and Darwin started collecting odd animals, they were some of the most the earliest Texadermis. Right. Because if you're Darwin and you're like, look at this new species of turtle I found and killed on Galapagos. It's right. Like, six months ago, and sure. Yeah. It's not going to work. So yeah, you said that they started it for leather and to preserve specimens. Right, yeah. Which makes sense. Sure. Okay. So Texas dermy has legitimate origins. Right. And it was crude back in those days. They literally, like, gutted and removed the organs and stuffed it with, like, straw. But it didn't work too well because they didn't preserve the animal. And, like, the eyes and the nose, the teeth would rot, of course. So it would be like this turtle, and people would be like you. Yeah, exactly. I don't know what a turtle is, but I don't like it. So, yeah, that's how it started. Nice. And it's kind of stayed well, it stayed the same from what is that, the 18th, 19th century? Yeah. James Cook, he was 18th century. Right. Got. I hope so. It stayed pretty much the same as far as what they would do to the specimen. They would stuff it. Yeah, the process. Right. It became a little more refined as they figured out how they got to preserve the tongue somehow. Sure. Let's get rid of it altogether. Yeah, that's what I would have done. Yeah. With the advent of plastics. That's what plastic was really created for. Plastics and rubber tongue removal. Well, to create substitute tongues for taxidermy. Interesting little known fact that I just made it. Is that true? Okay. Got me. You're like a sucker. Yeah, dude. It stayed the same till the 19th 70s. Just kind of a long time, and then again using they quit stuffing, basically, and started using molds. Right. The Taxidermy revolution, as it's called. Yes. The great taxidermy revolution of the think. Hendrix wrote about that. Yeah, he did. So that's why they actually if you don't say stuffed anymore, you say mounted. Right. Because they don't stuff. They use what you say, a polyurethane mold, generally. Yeah. A lot of times it's a foam carved mold. Which actually brings up a good point. Taxidermists are artists, they are sculptors, they are craftsmen, they are carpenters. It's a mix of a lot of different disciplines. Artistic discipline or industrial arts, you could say. Sure. Absolutely. And Chuck, actually, I don't know if it's a dying art. I don't get the impression from the article, but it seems like the taxidermists are few and far between, especially really skilled ones. Yeah. It's not the most common. It's not like a Starbucks, let's say. Right. You don't see a taxidermy shop on every corner. And I also got the impression, although you're kind enough to not say this explicitly, that texture me exists in sort of a graduated level. So you've got the guy who started out as a hobbyist, maybe, who's starting to make money on the side doing taxidermy for local hunters or fishermen. Right. And then you go all the way up to the people who are just at the peak of their craft, and they're working for natural history museums and the Ottoman Society and all that. Right, yeah, exactly. And that's a good point, too, because a lot of taxidermists are big time animal lovers, and some of them don't even work with hunted animals. So they'll do, like, roadkill or, like you said, work for Fern Bank Science Center. Right. Because they need their red fox, not the comedians. That would be kind of cool, though. He's stuffed, too. Is he? What museum is he in? He's in the Museum of Dirty Old Man. That's good. My mom would never let me watch Sanford and sun because she thought red fox is a dirty old man. Well, his stand up was very dirty. Yeah, sanford and Son wasn't very dirty, of course. It was mainly just him faking heart attacks, right? Yeah. Wheezy. So where are we? Elizabeth. Elizabeth, I'm coming to join you. You're right. Where did I get wheezy? Jefferson. Oh, okay. God, it's awful. So where are we? We are all over the map, Chuck. We are. You said it's a slow process. That's true. And that's for a couple of reasons. Mainly, like you said, because there's not a lot of taxiderma, so it's not like it takes a year to necessarily mount your red fox, but it's going to take a year for you to get it. Probably, yeah. Sometimes because they have a freezer full of dead animals. And then another reason is because a lot of these guys, especially, I imagine, with deer and other larger animals, they send the skin off to be commercially tanned. Right. Yeah. Just because it takes up a lot of space. And I imagine that in and of itself is a whole other art and science. Oh, yeah, definitely. Right? Yeah. We won't get into tanning a whole lot because I don't know a whole lot about it, to be honest. I don't either. We could do that for a podcast. We could. That's coming up. Text it every part two tanning. We should talk about cost a little bit before we get into the nuts and bolts of the process. If you want a bear skin rug, let's say if you shot a bear and you're a bad person and shot a bear, you can have a bear skin rug for about a grand, which is not bad. No. Have you ever laid naked on bear skin? It's worth a grand. My dad has a bear skin rock. So I imagine you have laid naked on bare skin. No, I haven't, actually. I tried to walk around it as much as possible. If you want that bear standing up, and I would guess in a pose like, I'm going to butcher you. Sure. That would be about two grand, which I found surprising. I mean, going from bearskin rug for a grand, which seems reasonable to me sure. To a full bear standing menacingly for just an extra grand, I think that's worth saving up for, don't you? Yeah. It takes up a lot more room now. Well, not necessarily. I mean, if you have high ceilings, you're set that's true. In that empty corner. Yeah. These are ballpark figures. So if you're a taxidermist or an enthusiast and you say no, actually, that would cost this. We did our best here with the numbers. Chuck did his best here with the numbers. And bravo, Chuck. The thing that surprised me, everything else sounded pretty standard, like a mounted deer from the shoulders of antlers is about five to six, 5500 to 650. The thing that surprised me was that a fish cost about $18 an inch, they sounded like, in this article, the hardest thing to mount. Yeah, it is. But it's also small. Okay. So I don't think it takes quite as much time, even though it is artistically harder. I think it sounds like it, yeah. Let's get into this. Why chuck our fish is so hard to mount? Well, one reason, my friend, is that a fish loses its color as it dries out. So the whole thing, it's not like when they wrap a deer carcass I'm sorry, a deer skin around the mold. That's pretty much it. But you have to literally paint the fish all those little scales. Right. That's a lot of scales. Yes, that's a lot of scales. It's a lot of time and work for $18 an inch. Yeah. I don't think so. Yeah. I would think they cost, like, standing bear type prices. And there are different processes depending on the kind of fish. Right. Yes. Warm water fish like bass is going to be largely what you bring in as far as the reality of it goes. Right. The bass you bring in and then the bass you get mounted are going to be pretty much the same thing. Yeah. But with a saltwater fish, these things are basically the texture of it takes a photo of the fish you brought in and then completely remakes it out of synthetic material so the fish you brought in is no longer with us. Yeah. Like, if you see the Marlin and TGI Fridays on the wall, that's almost 100% chance that that's not a real marlin at all. Right. And the cool thing about this is, since it's all the same anyway, like, you're not actually going to get the fish you catch, you're going to basically get a life size replica of it. Right. This is really popular among catch and release sport fishermen. Yeah. Right. Or guys who want to eat their fish. Sure. I didn't mention that. Why wouldn't you eat a marlin that you caught with your bare hands through? Noodling. Oh, man. Could you imagine? So should we talk a little bit about the fish process? Yeah. What you do if you've got the skin mount is what it's called, which is what you do with the bass. You remove the inside of the fish, all the meat and bones that you can and except for the head, you cannot get certain meat out of the head and tail area. You don't want to eat meat head or head meat. Meat. And what you do then is you inject, like, borax and salt preservatives into the meat that you can't get out to keep it from spoiling. Right. And again, with the I think the cold water fish, the skin will actually be the same that you brought in. Right. But they can't stuff it. It's not possible for them to stuff it. Like, they could have warm water fish, like with maybe hard packed sawdust with cold water fish, like salmon. Sure. It's so thin that you'll be able to see the sawdust. Like, why does your salmon have sawdust in it? And I would say, well, because it's mounted. My impression is too, with the sawdust, I might be wrong here, but is that you might use sawdust if it's just the straight fish on a plaque. But if you want to show your bass with the curved tail leaping from the water in midfight, then that's when you're going to have to make the polyurethane mold. Got you and carved into whatever shape that you want. And those molds in and of themselves are a work of art, especially with deer. Oh, yeah, right, sure. So like, if you actually pulled the skin off of a stuffed deer, you're going to find intricately carved muscles, bone mass, veins. Yeah. That's pretty serious stuff, right? Yeah. That's like big time sculpting. Yeah. And so did you like that transition to deer? I did. Are you done with fish? We're done with fish, I think. Well, we should just say you also have to salt the fish skin on the inside because if it dries out too quick, it will shrink, which you don't want. And as we said earlier, you need to paint the fish at the end, pop out the eyeballs because they will rot. And insert your little glass eyeballs that you stick in with a little pin on the back. Well, that's the real common theme of this podcast. The last step is taking out the eyeballs and putting in fake ones. Right. And just about every single one of these. Pretty much, yeah. Same with deer. Yeah. Much worse transition. So we're at the deer, and I should say, too, this is a broad overview. They write like volumes of books on how to do deer taxidermy. So we're not going to sum that up in four and a half minutes. Right. The one thing that you're going to find in every taxidermy book on stuffing deer is the first thing you have to do is skin it. Yes. You want to skin that deer, and what you have after you skin the deer is a cape. That's what it's called, right. Mystically. Sure. I look at my deer cape, I wonder how many Texader Mist have that joke. I bet a lot of them do, yes. Josh and the goal here, when you're skinning the deer, if you're a taxidermist, you want to make as few cuts as possible that still allow you to get the organs and the carcass and everything out. Because let's say you can't get your deer to the taxidermist in a few days. You have to do it yourself as a hunter. And if you're not very good at it and you make too many cuts and you mangle the deer, then you're going to make it really hard for the taxidermis. Right. The more incisions you have, the more sowing the taxidermis has to do and the angry of the taxidermis is going to be. Right. And like you said, they're crotchety. So salt comes into play here, too. I guess they use salt to preserve just about everything. Right. And like you said, it's not table salt. It's like borax. Yeah. So they use salt to preserve the areas around, like, the mucous membranes that they can't really cut out without making the deer look ghoulish. Right. And it also tightens up the skin and the hair follicles, which is a good thing because you don't want the hair to fall out. And where else? Around the nose, in between the toes, or I guess the hooves. Yeah, I saw that. You said toes, and I was like, did you have toes? I did say toes, didn't I? You did. I think that should probably be changed. I don't know. I think that should be like a little Easter egg that only stuff you should know is cute little cute little deer toes. Yeah. So once the skin dries out, you've got to prepare your mold, or while it's drying out, you're carving your mold, which, like we said, is very, like, intricate sculpting. These are true artists at work. Right. And remember, the skin might not even be in the same place. The Texdermis may have sent it off to a commercial. Tannery so what comes into play, first and foremost is taking incredibly precise measurements. Yeah. Because imagine making a mold just based on measurements you took while the skin is not even there. So you can't just throw it over to have a rough estimate of how you're doing. Sure. And as you put it, if you missed the mark by a couple of inches, you're going to have a saggy deer. Yeah. That would be no good. So yeah, you're right. Accurate measuring is really the first step. Then they remove the skull and discard it. And discard it because you don't need the skull anymore. You remove the antlers, but you hang on to the antlers, obviously, because you need to screw those back onto your foam head, which sounds really gross. It does. Yeah. I mean, if you really look too deeply into this, it's kind of ghastly. Yeah, it is. I wouldn't want to see it in practice. Yeah. But it's fun to talk about. So at that point, Josh, let's say you've got your skin back, you've got your mold done, and you kind of slip it on over the mold as if you would be putting on a sweatshirt, make sure it's all nice and tight, sew it up. Skin sweatshirt. Like Buffalo Bill. Yeah, exactly. You pop in the eyes, the glass eyes, which, as we say, is usually the last thing you do. Then once it's all set up and everything, you mount it on a plaque like you said, from about the shoulder, and give it back to your customer and bing, bang, boom. Bing, bang, boom. Get your what, $650. Yeah, not bad. And go back to work on another one. It's never ending. Like a bird, let's say. Yeah, nice. Should we talk about foul? Yes. Foul is the last broad category of things that are generally stuffed. Sorry. Mounted. Don't look at me like that. All right. I'll go to my dad's house. He'd be surprised. What did he have? He's got raccoons and the bear thing. Hawk in flight. I think he's got he has a hawk. How does he have a hawk? Okay. Yeah, he has a hawk in flight. Or maybe it's a falcon. See, I couldn't find any underground taxidermut. Yeah, he's got a guy. I can't find those in the phone book. He's got a bobcat. Nice. Of course, the bobcat is they are so cute. Teeth bear. This one's not. Does your dead hunt? No, he just hits things with his car a lot. No, he's an animal lover. And when he'll see some roadkill, he would clean up the roadkill and then get the taxidermist. And it's just a theme in his house. He's a country guy. That's cool. Yeah. Or is it? Well, as long as he's not killing them. No, of course not. There's nothing wrong with that. Now, like we said, you go to a natural history museum and you're not going to say, these people are awful for mounting the spot. Some people would you forget we exist pretty close to the center. Yeah, that's true. On a lot of stuff. All right, so we're at Foul. Josh, the first thing you do with Foul, like with the rest, is skin. It take out all the meat and bones, but you leave the feet and talons because you don't want to recreate those. Right. And then I actually saw video, and this is literally what they do. They wash just like a tub with dishwater. They wash the feathers in the skin. Yeah. Because it's greasy and they don't want that. No. Although if it's a duck, you better be keeping that fat. Sure. For cooking purposes. Yeah, man. There's nothing better than duck fat. That's true. You dry it with a hair dryer, which will fluff up the feathers again, and then you salt the remaining moisture, like with everything else, because the salt will dry it out really good. You turn it inside out. Right. You stuff the head with a non shrinking clay. And so you've got a little hard headed bird now with a clay head. Then you make your neck and body again with the urethane foam. You stretch it over. You put wires under the wings, under the skin of the wings tied off with dental floss. Because you want to keep the wings stiff, I guess. Sure. Actually, we should have said that with the fish fins. Yeah. They spread those out and tack them to a cardboard backer. Because you want your fish fins to be all spread out and cool looking, too. Right. When they're dried and preserved with salt, can you take the tax out? Oh, yeah. But then that's when you put the resin over it, which is the final step. And that keeps everything she'll accept it. Yeah, that's why it's shiny. Where are we here with the foul? I think you just sew the little sucker up. Once everything's in place, don't forget the last step. What's that? IVIS. And put in fake ones. And then you shape it. Once everything's in there, you kind of shape it. If you want bird in flight or bird pecking it at seed. Imagine they have little titles like that. Then that's what you do. And then you get your, what, like two hundred and fifty dollars to four hundred dollars, I think. And then you go work on the next one. Because you might think that chuck just gave you everything you need to know about texas dermy. You're wrong. You're wrong. You can actually go to school for this, right? Two to four grand for taxidermy school. Yeah, right. There's a lot more to know about this. As chuck said about with just deer alone. The entire books are written on the subject of how to mount them properly, right? Yeah. And I also make the point if you're interested in having if you see some roadkill and you're like, wow, I would love that. Muskrat in my office. Do your homework and go visit the taxidermist and check out their work. Like with anything, you get what you pay for. And there are a lot of bad taxidermy jobs out there. I saw some photos. Doing the research is pretty funny. And don't just carry it around in your pocket. Until you go to the taxidermist showing it to people. People don't like that. That's no good. There are some things that you will want to do. If you do come across some roadkill. Or however you come upon a dead animal that you want to stuff. Right. Mount. Mount. Like, for example, if you have a bird. I thought this was very clever, and it makes a lot of sense saying that I would have been able to have that hawk mounted. Right. I should have put it in a stocking like pantyhose. And keeps the feathers from moving about. Plus it's sexy. If you have a deer, you don't want to drag your deer through the woods if you can help it. Because a lot of the hair will fall off and it'll mess that up. You want to do that. But unfortunately, most motorists who pick up roadkill aren't familiar with how to field dress a deer. Yeah, that's true. But if you're a hunter, you're probably pretty good at it. Sure. Unless you're a lousy hunter. Sure. Like you're new, but if you're a lousy hunter, you probably wouldn't hit the deer anyway. That's true. They say not to wrap a fish in newspaper because it'll soak up the moisture and you want to wrap it in a wet towel with the fins very smooth and in place. We need to talk about the jackalope. Yeah. Rogue taxidermy, right? Yeah. Well, go ahead and tell what a jackalope is some people might not have seen these. Really? Do you think everyone has seen one by one? I think everybody has seen a jack loop, but okay. All right. Right. Jackalope is a shoulder mounted rabbit. Shoulder to head with antlers attached. Yes. That's a jackalope. And it came about in the 1930s by a couple of amateur taxidermists in Wyoming. Right. Brothers. Right. Yeah, that's the story. It may be legend, but apparently the Merrick brothers, legend has it, they went hunting, came home with a rabbit, threw it onto a table, and it slid over to where it's had met two antlers that were laying on the table, and they went, hey, man, we should do that. Like it's a real thing. And they did, and they did and called it the jackalope. And it took off from there. And as I said, it gave birth to a type of textadermy called rogue textdermy. Right. Yeah. Also called carcassert carcass art. I have a website to mention. What's that? It's called crappytextadermy.com. Oh, is that what I was talking about with the bad taxidermy jobs? No, actually, it's a terrible name for it. I don't know if they originally started out with just terrible taxidermy or whatever, but the images are showing on the site are, like, incredible taxidermy, but it's all carcass art. It's all rogue taxidermy. Oh, that's where you can see, like, a goat with wings. Yeah, definitely stuff like that. A woman was wearing a hat, and I don't know how they did it, but it had three birds, like, pulling out her hat, hovering above the hat. Wait, the hat was the art or they stuffed a woman? The hat was the art. Okay. It was a live woman wearing it, presumably. Unless this was some sort of snuff picture. Sure. But the birds were off of the hat, hovering over it, pulling at the hat, and it was just amazing. Wow. I don't know how long this would have taken somebody, but my favorite is this one. It is a bull calf standing on top of a puma. Standing on top of a falcon. Really? For some reason, that reminds me of a turduckin. I don't know why. Yeah, interesting. With the turduckin, they take it and just smush it all together. Why didn't you send me a picture of this? I don't know. We should have one in this office right now. Framed. I agree. So is that it texted hermie? It seems like it. That's the broad scope. There's a lot more details in that. And we'd like to hear from taxidermis if you're out there. Nice article, by the way, Chuck. Oh, one more tip. Don't bug your taxidermis. Oh, this is where the crotchety part comes in. Yeah, they're notorious for, like if you call and say, is my bobcat ready, sir? They don't take kindly to that, apparently. No, they don't, because they're stuffing things all day. Where do the wise? Chuck Bryant. Nicely done. Would you. Want to pick up a phone? If you're like inserting an eyeball from some yokel that's like do you have my red fox ready, sir? What is it with you and red foxes? I don't know. I guess because my dad has one. Well, if you want to learn more about taxidermy, right, and you want to see some pretty cool photos with the hilarious captions underneath, you can type taxidermy in the handystarchbar@houseworks.com, which means that it is time for listener mail. Yes, indeed. Josh. I'm going to call this the Sorority thief, all right? And I did get permission to read this because I was not sure if they wanted this out there. Josh and Chuck, I have recently become a huge fan of the podcast. Or huge if you're from New York. I have a story about kleptomania. I'm currently an executive member for a sorority at my university. Recently, girls have been getting their things stolen in their rooms in the sorority house. A few thousand dollars was stolen from the philanthropy account. That's just awful. Designer dress was stolen out of a girl's closet. Not as bad. And a girl's eye touch was stolen. 20 capsules of a girl's Ad D, prescription meds, and the list goes on. Anyways, the other day, a girl left a note on another girl's door calling her a klepto. Can you see the sorority drama unfolding and some questionable names causing a rather large uproar in the house? We had an emergency executive meeting, and everyone kept on labeling this thief as a klepto. I finally sat everyone down and made them listen to a portion of your podcast in order for them to quit using this term in the wrong context and implement some comic relief in the midst of this feminine chaos. Could you imagine? Yeah. We ended up listening to the whole podcast, and afterwards we were able to lessen some of the drama. Although the identity of the culprit has not yet been revealed, we have started implementing your podcast to bring us together. This may be a little weird, but you all have helped us come back together and stop being so catty. Welcome to living in a house of 80 girls. That is so sweet. Yeah. Anyways, you guys teach us new things all the time. You make us laugh, you make us think. Thank you for all you share, and you all are awesome. Make more than just two a week from Julia V. Thank you, Julia. Think your sorority. Which one can we say? No, she didn't actually say or the university. And I did tell her to keep in touch, though, because I wanted to know who this evening sorority member was. So many I know. If you have a standard plain email that you'd like to send us, you can shoot it to stuffpodcast@howstuffs.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseofworks.com. Want morehoustuffworks? Check out our blog on thehousedofworks.com homepage brought to you by the reinvented, 2012. Camry, it's ready. Are you?"
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/podcasts.howstuffworks.com/hsw/podcasts/sysk/2017-12-16-sysk-how-population-works.mp3	SYSK Selects: How Population Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/sysk-selects-how-population-works	Population may not seem like the most scintillating topic in the world, but Josh and Chuck beg to differ. Join them as they explore how population works, from demographics to population control, in this episode.	Population may not seem like the most scintillating topic in the world, but Josh and Chuck beg to differ. Join them as they explore how population works, from demographics to population control, in this episode.	Sat, 16 Dec 2017 11:00:04 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2017, tm_mon=12, tm_mday=16, tm_hour=11, tm_min=0, tm_sec=4, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=350, tm_isdst=0)	28356108	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hi everybody. It's Chuck. And I am introducing this week's stuff you should know selects episode this is from the vault from 2009, 2009, November 12. And it's called How Popular Population Works. And I picked this one because I remember this being a super cool episode because it was one of those where I thought, population? What does that even mean? And how can we make a show out, a full show about this? And it turned out to be great, Josh. I think it was his pick initially, and it's just really cool. So if you don't even know what how population works might mean, give it a listen. I think you'll be pretty intrigued. Welcome to stuff you should know from HowStuffWorks combat the jacket. That's right, Chuck Hay, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. Clearly Chuck Bryant's here, and let's talk about pumpkin chunkin. I guess you just kind of forced our hand, Chuck. Yes. The road to punk and chunkin. And punkin chunkin. So that's on Science Channel 08:00 PM. Eastern time on Thanksgiving night. Yeah. You can see some pumpkins get chunk. Pumpkins get chunk pumpkins. Yeah. Okay again. Science Channel. The road to Pumpkin chunkin starts at 08:00 PM. Eastern Time. Pumpkin chunkin itself starts at nine. Great. Thanksgiving night. Yes. Science Channel on with the show. Yeah. Chuck, have you ever belonged to a population? No, man. I'm like I'm totally independent. Screw population. You're like that guy who lives on the commune, right? Right. Yeah. Well, the joke is on him because a commune constitutes a population. That's right. This sounds kind of boring. And you would think it is. What about how population works? It actually started to pick up. Actually didn't know what it was even going to be. When I saw how population works, I was like, what? You know, it's awesome. This is my idea. This article was I pinched it. Oh, really? Why didn't they let you write it? I don't know. Jerks. I know, but The Grabster did a good job with it. Oh, yeah, the Grabster is always good. Yeah, classic Ed grabanowski, by the way. Right. Human beings tend to congregate. Yes, we segregate. Interestingly. That is an excellent you just blew my mind. Good Lord, Chuck. Well, let's get back to what I was saying. Right. Unless you want to go on the segregation. Right, we'll get on that later. Humans congregate and segregate. But let's talk about congregation. Most of the time, I would say our early ancestors and probably even other species congregate because there's safety in numbers. Sure. And it helps, like with farming, collecting water and food, power numbers. But even before farming, 100 gatherers lived in bands. I think 30 was about tops. They figured out somewhere along the way that groups of more than 30, there tended to be a lot more hostility and inner group problems. Have you ever tried to kill a mastodon by yourself? That's another good point, too. There's cooperation sure. Let's say if you are farming and your crop fails, well, you're not standing there like, Well, I'm in trouble. You can say, hey, neighbor, I'll totally give you favors of some variety, if you will let me have some of your grain. Right. I'll give you a chicken, let's say, sure, you can trade, yeah. Barter there's a lot of reasons people live together. So it's my theory that people aggregate together naturally. Yes. And then there are people out there who get their jollies by studying these groups of people. They're called demographers. So we have populations, natural or otherwise, and let's say a natural population today are people who live in a certain state. Georgians. Right, that's where we are. So that you have natural populations and demographers study them, right, sure, and they look at things like, say, how many people in this natural population are Republicans or Democrat, or how many are Caucasian? Right. How many live below the poverty line? All kinds of things you can study right. By looking at a population, are these groups segregated like you brought up? Like, if you study where different races are living, are they living mingling? If so, then that's probably a fairly harmonious place, hopefully. If not, why are they living apart? How do we fix this? Because it's probably a problem. Sure, who knows? But yes. So demographers study populations, natural or otherwise, right? Yes. The problem is very few people have the ability to hover over the earth and use super binocular vision to study populations by sight. Very few people? Yeah, like three or four, I think, tops. Does that count as a statistic? I think so. Okay, Richard, so measuring populations, is that you're going to talk about how do we actually determine this kind of thing? Yeah, that was my city quit. That was a good segue. There's a couple of ways, Josh. One is by counting them, literally counting them, like I said, counting every single person, right, and that is called complete enumeration, yeah, remember we talked about that poor guy who was killed or possibly killed himself in Kentucky, the census taker, right, oh, I didn't know that suicide was a possibility there. I got a cryptic email from somebody I never followed up on that said that he identified himself as a doctor and I think said that he was part of the group that was the medical examination team and said that they strongly suspected suicide. Really? My problem with it is how do you bind yourself in duct tape? How do you bind your own wrists in duct tape? I'll show you later. Okay, my point is wow, he threw me off of that one, my point is that he was called in a numerator. Yes. Literally counter, and that's the people who work for the census, whenever they have their drive and they count. Right, and that's one way to determine it, well, let's talk about the senses. It's gone on every ten years since 1790, right? Yes. And the reason they do it every ten years is because it's a real pain in the ass to count every person in America. Yeah. The real reason they do it is so they can well, there's a lot of reasons. No review, taxes. That is the reason why anyone's ever conducted a census. Yeah, well, plus they determine the number of House Representatives for your state based on population, stuff like that. Oh, yeah, there's that, too. But come on. Taxes. Did you know that the census information is kept secret for 72 years? Yeah. Aside from the numbers, I believe. Right. The public cannot see that information for 72 years. Right. When am I 72? That's odd. It is odd. I wonder if that was the average lifespan at the time or something. Dude, that's got to be it. I'll bet you're right. Okay. The other way, Josh, is to do something called sampling, and that is when statisticians use a mathematical formula to determine the minimum number of people that must be counted, and then they multiply that out and basically end up getting a full population. And sometimes I didn't know this. That's even more accurate than an actual head count. Right. You see that margin, of error. It's like plus or -4% yeah. You got to have a margin, of error. There whenever you're sampling, right? Because you're not actually going around asking every single person in America, are you left handed? To determine how many people are left handed. But let's say you have a population of 1000, and some statisticians been like, you need 100. Do it. But do your egg head voice. Yeah. You need 150 people, the 150 people that are left handed. And you can just multiply that out to determine that there are, in fact, how many people? Let's say 10% of the population. 10% of the population. Right. But, hey, your sample is perfect. Your sample has to be a random sample to be an effective sample. Yeah. And you know how they used to do that? They used to just pick it out of the phone book oh, I know. And call people I know. That makes sense to a certain extent. No, well, back then, it made a little more sense. I would think it made less sense, especially if you're talking, like, 1950. Well, it depends on what year. I'd say in the 1980s, it was probably a good way, but now there are cell phones. People in college probably don't have a phone. Poor people who don't have phones at all. People who don't have phones. Sure. So that's not a very good way. What about freight train riders of America? What's that? They don't have phones. Oh, yeah, good point. Yeah, they're not allowed. I don't think they want them. So sampling is a little harder than it seems. Yeah. Right. Especially coming up with a random population. Random sample of the population. So far, we've talked about people and where they live. Right. There are other ways to define a population. There's other attributes that people have that we use to lump in the population. Yes. It's not just a geography when people think populations, it's not just a city, population or state. Yes. Or nation. Age. You have a population of age or continent, a demographic. Right. What else? Location, of course. Socioeconomic population. Let's talk about age. Why would you even want to know age? Who cares? People are old, people are young, whatever. Right. Well, there's a lot of factors. Like take the baby boom, for instance. After World War II, all these babies were born, so there was a bulge in the population. Just like saying the word bulge. What that will show them then is, wow, we got a bulge here. So that means probably in 25 to 60 years, there's going to be some serious buying power. Right. Let's start borrowing as much money as we can right now. Right. But it also means in 70 plus years that they may be a medical burden and a burden on Social Security and that kind of thing. So let's start borrowing as much money as we can right now. Yeah. Same result there. I like that. And we'll get to bulges again in a little bit. Yes. But let's move on. Like you said, socioeconomic data, right? Yeah. Why would they want to do this job? This one, I find this the most interesting of all data. Okay. You can look at a bunch of people who are maybe related geographically right. But other than that, aren't related in any other way. Sure. And all of them suddenly have this horrible cancer, and there just so happens to be some package manufacturer nearby what did you say? High tension wires. Sure. Which has been proven, I think, to not actually have any effect on people. Not in my buddy. So now all of a sudden you have this information, thanks to your demographer friend who went and collected it, and you can say, okay, paint factory, you guys better start giving away some free paint or we're going to sue you. Yeah, true race. Yeah. That's a little more hanky, because technically there is no such thing as any difference in different races. I remember watching MTV years and years and years ago, and the VJ was interviewing the BC boys, and he was like, Mike Dee, I hear you're dating a black girl. What's it like dating somebody from a different race? Which is just an asinine question to begin with. But I remember Mike D going, there's only one race, the human race. And I was like, he's right. That was clearly before he was down with the Ioni. That was Ad Rock. Sorry. Yeah. Ad rock is down with the Ioni. Yeah. They're divorced, though, so he's not down with her anymore. Poor Ione. So, yeah, race is a little hinky, but you can't actually determine some useful things when you study populations of race, because it's important for people to be involved in their culture. Yeah. And to hang on to that. For sure. I guess racial profiling. Again, I don't know if I should say again or not, but it's such a hot button issue, right? Yeah. I don't know. We need to talk about it collectively. That's my answer for everything. Everybody needs to get together and decide what we want to do. Okay. Well, the other thing with race, though, is if there's a medical problem that's specific to that race, that can help out. Exactly. Sure. All right. So, Chuck, we've got all these different factors. Yes. Attributes, variables. We've used the word demographer several times, so we know that people study populations. One of the reasons why we studied populations is to see how big it's getting. And I got to tell you, buddy, the human population is kind of exploded on this planet in the last several thousand years. Yeah. But you know what? They're reading these stats. There were a lot more people here way back when. Then, I thought. Yeah. Again, favorite book of all time, 1491. Charles C. Mann. He basically points out that there is probably 100 million people in the Americas in 1491. That's awesome. Yeah. Which is a fifth of the world population is way more than anyone thought. And the reason why is because 1492 Columbus shows up. Smallpox just ravages both continents, and by the time the European settlers start coming for real, the place is decimated. It seems like there's nobody there. Right. Well, he had the whole genocide, too thing. Did you ever know about that? Columbus? I hear his men used to sharpen their knives on the skulls of live natives. Well, there's the genocide we talk about later on in the article, but there's speculation that Columbus may have been responsible for the worst mass genocide in human history wow. By completely wiping out the Tano Taino Indian people. Really? And that was in his spaniela, which is modern day, I think, Haiti and Dominican Republic. And some people say there were only like, 500,000 of them, and some people say there were as many as 15 million at the time that were decimated to about 2000. Decimated through violence or through disease? Yeah, well, through violence, because Columbus came over, set up a camp in Hispaniologo for about 40 people, and then left, came back on trip number two, and found that the Indian tribe there had killed all those people. So he went on to kill crazy rampage, basically, and completely wiped out the population. And they're saying it may have been, like, double the size of the Holocaust. Wow. So happy Columbus Day, everybody. Seriously. But we do mention that because genocide is a way that a population can change rapidly. Well, let's talk about population growth. Yes. All right, so I guess about 10,000 BC. They estimate that there is between one and 10 million humans. So we're starting to slowly grow because by 1000 BC, there's 50 million, and then by 600 Ce, we're at 200 million. See, that's a lot more than I thought there would be at the time. Yeah, I think there was about 500 million in the mid 15th century. Crazy. So let's say there's 500 million in the mid 15th century. The 20th century, the Industrial revolutions happen. There's been great leaps in science and medicine. That's when populations really grow, is during those big booms. Yeah. Because it lends itself to fertility, higher fertility and longer lifespans. Good times breed kids. So the 20th century hits, we're at 1.5 billion people. Indeed. And then this century, the population of the world has quadrupled. I know that it sounded like there should have been a drum roll there, but maybe there was. Jerry might have put one in there. Our producer, Jerry, we'll find out later. And Josh, you're projecting the US. Census Bureau projects that by the year 2050, there will be 10 billion people. Right. So the reason for this is what we call the Malthusian growth model views. Malthus was a 18th century clergyman. Yes. Thomas. He actually, I guess, inadvertently became one of the great economic theorists, and he figured out that population grows exponentially. Right. So if you have 1 million people and they have enough kids to double the population, but the next generation, you have 4 million people. So in one full generation, you've gone from 1 million to 4 million people. Right. Yeah. That's big. It is. Especially when the planet is finite in size. Right. And we don't have the ability to go colonize other planets yet. Right. But it's not necessarily that incremental and steady because of what we talked about, which are bulges or spikes and bottlenecks. Like genocide. Right. Yeah. So it doesn't always grow steadily. And actually, Chuck, have you heard of the replacement rate? No. The replacement rate is how many kids a woman has to have to have a high statistical probability of having a daughter so that she, in essence, replaces herself. Got you. And right now, it's 2.33 is the replacement rate worldwide. And the point of it is to trend toward zero population growth. Right. So for every woman who dies, she has a daughter that can reproduce and continue on and continue on and continue on. So you have, overall, as many people dying as are being born. So there's no strain. Right. And there's also no dearth. Well, it's equilibrium. Reading this reminded me of when we did our big econ audiobook. It's kind of population kind of wants to seek equilibrium, I think, just like economics does. And it doesn't always happen organically, I should say. It probably rarely happens organically. Let's think about, like you said, the baby boom. Post war success in Europe and the US. And Canada, I guess, led to a huge boom in the population. Nobody went to war to grow the population. It was just an indirect effect. So all of a sudden we had a population spike that created a bulge, a bulge, if you will. Things can go the other way, too. Right. Which is a bottleneck. Right? Yeah. God, if I say genocide one more time, we should do a podcast on genocide. I wonder if there's a drinking game where every time you say genocide, that's great. Genocide, drink, famine, disease, something called the plague, I think, wiped out like, half the world population at one point, or half the population of Europe. They suspect that in the fifth century that would be ce. The plague of Justinian may have killed as many as half the world's population. 100 million people. Unbelievable. Can you imagine walking around at that time like, holy crap, the entire half the world is dead, just died in the last couple of years. It's crazy. Well, and the Black Death killed 20 to 30 million Europeans. Can happen. I was talking to an evolutionary geneticist. This is my way. Sure. Today, recently. And he was talking about a study he authored where they found two evolutionary bottlenecks, one coming out of Africa, they suggested 50,000 years ago, and another one that happened along the Bering Land Bridge. Right. And he wasn't saying like, all of a sudden a bunch of people died. But these bottlenecks turned up because big groups of people separated smaller groups of people, which accounts for a loss of genetic diversity. Got you. So you have the founder's effect, because, as he put it, if you go into a town and grab the first 15 people you meet and say, let's go found a new town, that new town isn't going to have a representative sample of all the surnames in that town. Sure. If you do, that enough time, some surnames are going to be lost because people didn't reproduce or whatever. Same thing happens with genes. Genetic diversity. Look at you. Good stuff. Thanks. Can I mention this place in Hong Kong? Yeah. We're talking about well, we should mention population density is the number of humans per unit, area, whatever unit you choose to call it. And the highest ever is believed to have been place called Kowloon walled City in Hong Kong. And at one point, evidently, there were 50,000 people in a megablock, which is 500 by 650ft, 50,000 people stuffed in there. And apparently it was a lawless district. The grabster said, are you kidding me? 50,000 people could conceivably get along. Yeah. Hands Across America style. Did you know that in Athens, when Widespread Panic played that free show, there was an estimated 100,000 people there, not one fight? Really? Yeah. That's because they were all on dope. The dope. I wasn't there. Were you there? Huh? Yeah. I never got into them. Although I did hang out with that guy, the bass player. Day schools. Yeah. I hung out with him a couple of times, just through friends. Sure. Anyway, that park is no, I'm sorry. It is now a park where the walled city used to be. Yeah. Which is the opposite of the highest population density. Exactly. Yeah. Ironically, the highest population of grass, but that's it. So what do we got here, Josh? We got population control is something that we've referenced before with our China one child policy. Yeah. And we talked about why you would want to control the population. A huge group of people put a strain on resources. Sure. When resources go away, you have resource conflicts, like in Darfur. Again, genocide. Right. Sadly, there's all sorts of problems that come from too many people living in one place because of the strain it puts on resources and resource allocation. Right. And yeah, you can control the population. State mandated reproduction. Right. And that actually works as China shows, although much to the detriment of some people. Thank you, Chuck, for that. Look, not everyone thinks some people think we should add more people, though. Well, yeah. They're in Japan. In other countries, there's a problem of population decline. So we talked about the strain people put on an area that's carrying capacity, which we've talked about before that's also from Malthus. Right. That eventually human population is going to outstrip advances in technology or our resources, and we're screwed. Right. On the other side is shrinking, population shrinking. And what's the problem with that? Well, you don't want the population to shrink too much because you need those hands to go to work and to contribute to the economy and to grow the grain with a flower and all that good stuff. And apparently in Russia, Japan, and Australia, they all have, like, little incentive programs to make little babies. Sure. How about that? Which is the way to go. Remember John Fuller's famous quote when he was pitching an article about that program in Russia, and he's talking about Putin giving away a TV? Yeah, that's right. That's really funny. Yeah. Have a baby, get a TV. I think you had to be there and check the reason why some of these places are seeing a population shrink and are having to, I guess, give incentives to reproduce. Started in about 1960. Birth control. That's so crazy that it had an effect that much of an effect. That pronounced of an effect. Yeah. Well, it would seem like it would, though. I guess so, because it's called birth control. Sure. Before that, it was called have as many babies as you possibly can. Right. It was called no control. Right. All right. So clearly there's a lot of reasons to study people. Yeah, it's way more than I thought it would be. There's a lot of stuff to study, too. Indeed. You can find out whether or not we're going to kill the planet or whether people need to stop using contraceptives or what your chances are of Putin giving you a free TV. Right. It's all in there. Demographers know everything all there for the taken. So when your friendly enumerator comes knocking on your door, don't chase them off your land with your dog or a gun. Right? Let them in. Give them some laminate, maybe some cookies. Yeah, well, check their laminate first. Oh, yeah, before you let them in. COA, Chuck. Good going. And if you want to know more about population, you can read grab Annowsky's. Great article on the site. Just type in population in the handy search bar at how stuff works.com, which of course leads us to listener mail. Josh, I'm just going to call this your turn at listenermail because I think you have to talk about money. Yeah, I don't necessarily have too much listener mail per se, but I just wanted to give a shout out to a couple of fellow Toledo ones. One who is a longtime resident, one who's a recent transplant. Christopher is holding the fort down in Toledo for me, keeping it real. He has officially lobbied the congresswoman from Toledo to get me the key to the city. How awesome would that be? Yeah. So Marcy kept her. If you're listening, I would like to if you get a key to the city, we got to go for a ceremony and I at least want to get like, a key chain to the city. Okay. And you can have the key chain. We'll see what we can do. All right, so, yes, Christopher has officially petitioned her. He suggested that I'm the third most famous Toledo in of all time after Jamie Farr. Jamie Farr? Danny Thomas. Oh, yeah, the great entertainer. Sure. And then me and I was like, I think you're forgetting Katie home. She's from Toledo. Is she? And he's like, no, you got her b. Yeah. No. Kate Cruz. You mean. Oh, is it Kate Cruz now? Yeah, give me a break. So anyway, thanks a lot for the effort, Christopher, even if it doesn't come to fruition. If it does, you will get a firm handshake and a free friendly Sunday of your choosing for me. I love friendly. Yeah, we'll be going to friendly's if we go to Toledo. For sure. And then I also want to say hi to Colin, who is a recent transplant, as I said, from Colorado, I believe, who moves from Colorado to Toledo. He moved to Toledo to attend Bowling Green State University at Chau Falcon. My brother went there and Colin did so in an 88 Dodge Colt that's having a couple of problems. One, the rear struts are completely detached and the axle is holding on by a tread, he says. And the mechanics didn't want him to leave when he took it in for service. They're like, you're going to die in this thing. And the other problem is it has ants. He said, I've never heard of a car having ants. I had ants in a car when really you can't get rid of them when they well, that's probably when you were living in the car, which was probably always parked on the anthill. This is actually prior to that when I lived in the car. But yeah, no, it's a real problem. And Collins basically just put the bullet and said, well, I have ants in my car now. He loves his 88. Dutch Colt He said he loves Toledo. He's enjoying? He went to Tony Packos as I suggested. I got to try that one day. I also told him to go to a rusty jazz cafe. It's authentic as it comes often, so hey, Christopher. Hey, Colin. You guys enjoy yourself. Be safe in Toledo. Heck yeah. Go muddown for the winter. Go Mud Hens. And thanks for writing in. And if you want to say hi to me or Chuck or both of us, chuckers or Jerry. Right? Chuckers. Jerry. Chucker. I mean Chucker. Me. Chuck and me. Right? You can put that in an email to stuffpodcast@howstepporks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetofworks.com. Want more? HowStuffWorks? Check out our blog on the Housethefworks.com homepage. Hey everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music you can access new episodes early. Download the app today."
17271488-d168-4b59-b80c-aeb600f4a2c0	Selects: How Steadicams Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/selects-how-steadicams-work	There have been many inventions that have advanced filmmaking, but maybe none as important as the steadicam. Invented in the mid-70s, it literally changed the way movie making happened, and made the impossible possible. Learn about the fascinating history behind this amazing technology, in this classic episode. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.	There have been many inventions that have advanced filmmaking, but maybe none as important as the steadicam. Invented in the mid-70s, it literally changed the way movie making happened, and made the impossible possible. Learn about the fascinating history behind this amazing technology, in this classic episode. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.	Sat, 18 Jun 2022 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2022, tm_mon=6, tm_mday=18, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=169, tm_isdst=0)	33221147	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"This episode is brought to you by Simple Mobile. Tired of being tied down with a wireless contract? Switch to Simple Mobile and stay connected on a powerful nationwide 5G network. Unlimited talk, text, and data starts at $30 a month with no contracts at activation fees, or credit checks. Visit Simple Mobile.com today. Out with the old, in with the simple compatible 5G. Capable device and SIM require actual availability. Coverage and speed may vary. 5g network not available in all areas. One month equals 30 days. See terms and conditions@simplemobile.com. Hey, everybody. It's your silly pal Josh. And for this week's select, I've chosen our episode on steady cams. What with it being the beginning of the summer blockbuster movie season, I figure that the chances you want to know how movies are made have gone through the roof. So I'm here to satisfy your curiosity with, like I said, our steadicams episode. Enjoy. Welcome to stuff you should know a production of. iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's charles W, Chuck Bryant. Jerry's over there. Chuck's wearing a hat, so, yeah. Still pretty sad. Yeah. Are you really sure? All right, Pete, you know what I'm getting the josh is referencing my Last Chance garage at that I've talked way too much about. I'm getting the patch remade as we speak. Whoa. Actually found one on ebay that had been sold three months ago, and it's all a big conspiracy. Is that right? No. Okay. But I found a picture of the patch that I sent to a patch maker who can digitally reproduce this thing. Nice, man. Then I got to find the right hat coming back home. Well, that's step one. That's a big step one. Yeah. I'm getting a few patches and a few hats this time. I think that's a good idea. You can name them one through eight. That's right. Let's see. Chuck, you worked in the film industry previously? Yeah. So did you, technically, yeah. You did more than I did, by far. You worked in front of and behind the camera. That's right. Did you ever work with a steady cam at all? Yeah. So you've seen these things up close? Yes. I don't recall Scott or anybody using one. We did not have one on our show. Okay. They're expensive. Okay. But, I mean, there is some pretty good equipment on set, it seemed like. But there was no steadicam. Right? No, because I was trying to recall, and I could not for the life of me remember a moment when there was an awesome extendo arm camera with all of the components exploded out into different parts of the pole. That didn't happen, because he would have walked in and said, what's? That right. And everyone would have laughed, and you would have been like, why does everyone make fun of me? I would have been all this stuff up in my dressing room. No, we never use one on our TV show. For Science Channel, because, like I said, it's pricey to rent, and this is a bit of a giveaway, but a person steady cam operator comes with the package, with all the equipment. It's a lot of times their own, and it's pricey to pay for that lady or that dude. Right, but the reason it is price is because it has a really good effect. Yeah. And the person who's doing it really knows what they're doing. Yeah. I don't know, but just from researching this, it seems like they were probably the most skilled trades person on the set at any given time when they were on the set. Is that right? Well, I think it's just a matter of what skill. It's just a different skill. Are they, like, the highest echelon of camera operators? No, it's just different. Okay. Like a top nine. Yeah. Okay, I got it. But you don't just wade into steadicam and start getting work the next day. It does take a lot of work to master, but, like, a good dolly grip is just as skilled at just pushing that thing around. But that takes a very non herky jerky. Well, it's not going to be herky jerky anyway, but just to hit the marks. Right. Oh, I see. Yeah. I mean, all that stuff takes a great amount of skill. Well, let's talk about this, because steady cam, when I came of age, was already invented. It was basically became commercially available the year I was born. So I don't really know a world prior to Steadicamp. I've never seen a movie that came out before. I'm just used to it. Right, yeah. But it's interesting to look back and see that there actually is a point in time where this one dude who was actually kind of an outsider of the movie business, basically changed it permanently, forever, for sure. Yeah. His name was Garrett Brown. Brown? Yeah. He's still around, right? Yeah. And he was working for well, he was working in TV commercials on Sesame Street in Philadelphia. And he got a little frustrated as camera people do pre steady cam with not being able to accomplish certain shots. Yeah. There's supposedly there are 30 impossible shots that just based on the equipment of the day, you just couldn't do. Right. Yes. And a lot of it had to do with rough terrain. Sure. Staircases were a big one. Yeah. And the reason these shots were impossible, it's not like you couldn't lug a camera around up and down the stairs, but the movement that the camera recorded would be so jarring that it would render the film like it would be unusable. Yeah. And this was in a day before. I mean, there were shaky cam shots, and Casa Vettes and all these early indie filmmakers did a lot of avantgarde handheld stuff. But it was known as Avantgarde. Right. Because it looked different. And people were used to kind of smoother looking things in mainstream movies at the time. Yeah. It had like a real phonetic energy to it. Yeah. Which you see all the time now. It's like a bona fide thing. But it wasn't just like picking up the movements of the camera. It was like telegraphing them as far as the human brain is concerned, because we take it for granted. But we have in our own brains a pretty complex system that involves the inner ear coordinating with the movement of the retina so that it offsets the movement and the motion and the jarring impact of just walking. Like, if we didn't have that, we wouldn't be able to focus on anything while we were moving around. Yeah. People wouldn't jog. They would get sick and vomit every time they jog. Exactly right. You certainly wouldn't be able to read US magazine while you were jogging or something like that. The fact that you can, it really shows how incredibly complex and well developed the system is. Right? Yes. That's what the Steadicam that Garrett Brown created sought to recreate. And he did it. He nailed it, like, on the first time out, basically. Yeah. Because we mentioned a dolly. People that know film know this stuff is like pretty rudimentary information. But a lot of people don't know what a dolly is. And they see the word dolly grip in a movie. They just think it sounds funny. But the dolly is how you typically would get a smooth shot. It's just a big super heavy sled with wheels that the camera sits on and the camera operator sits on. And it's either on a very smooth floor, it's on a piece of track, like a little railroad car, and it pushes along. And that's how you get those nice smooth shots. Right. So that's a dolly. The problem with the dolly is you can't really lay that track over a rocky terrain if you're filming on Mars or something like that now. And like you said, you can't push it up and downstairs. It just had its limitations. Right? It did. So Garrett Brown said. I'm sick of these limitations. I'm so tired of being limited by dolly. Stupid dolly. I'm going to invent something better. And so he tinkered around with what was called the Brown Stabilizer at first, which he later renamed it the Steadicam. And to show off at first, he was just using them in commercials. And he was like, this is way bigger than just commercials. Yeah, I'm going to make a sizzle reel. And he made a sizzle reel of the 30 impossible shots that you just couldn't do before. And he did it with the Steadicam, but he didn't show how it was done. Yeah, he was able to save ten of those shots and digitize them. And a couple of years ago, he finally released online ten of those. So you can actually go see this original real. Yeah, it's pretty cool. His wife and his best friend, like, just doing stuff while he's doing stuff. One of them was swimming. You can't run alongside somebody. Swimming, apparently, was an impossible shot. I'm not quite sure why. Well, you just couldn't run alongside someone doing anything. Oh, okay. That's what it was. Even with a dolly? Well, no, you could have laid dolly track down the length of a swimming pool shirt. Right. That's why I didn't understand that one was an impossible shot. But to show off, he goes around a slide just to kind of show the impossibility of it. But then his buddy gets out of the pool and he pivots around them. And I'm sure when he put this real together and he sent it out, the directors are like, this is magic. Sorcery well, it was mind blowing. And some people say it was the first viral video because it was shared around Hollywood. Literally. In a matter of days, everybody in Hollywood was saying, what in the world? Like you said, what is this, Sorcery that Garrett Brown has bestowed upon us? Yeah, it was a bit of a mic drop, as far as that real goes. And Stanley Kubrick. Being Stanley Kubrick. Sent a message to Garrett Brown that said. If you are really concerned about protecting its design before you fully patent it. I suggest you delete the two occasions on the reel where the shadow on the ground gives the skilled counterintelligence photo interpreter a fairly clear representation of a man holding a pole with one hand with something or other at the bottom of the pole. Which appears to be slowly moving. All of that is Stanley Kubrickian for hey, there's a shadow in one of your shots, right. Of the steady cam up. Yes. Which is pretty cool of them to do. Sure. Because I'm sure there were plenty of people in Hollywood who would have been like, okay, I think I kind of get the idea of what this was, because there was no suggestion whatsoever of what Garrett Brown had used to get these shots except in those shadows. So he went and immediately cut those, I think, 14 seconds out of his reel and then released the second edition. And it looked pretty good. I mean, it's rough compared to today's standard, sure. But at the time, it was unbelievable. Right. It changed everything. And one of the shots that he got was his wife, Ellen. He said, Dear, why don't you put on your most 70s bell bottoms you can find, and I'm going to run up behind you as you run up the steps to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. And maybe when you get to the top, you can raise your hands in triumph and I will spin around you. And if that shot sounds familiar, it actually attracted a guy, a director named John what is it? Avelson? Yeah. John Gavieldon. Who said I like this? I'm going to use it in this little film I'm directing called Rocky. And I didn't get whether or not this was the case, but did they locate Rocky in Philadelphia because of those steps? No, because he said, how did you do that and where are those steps? I don't think so, man. Because I wondered that too. Did he not have a scene written where Rocky just runs up those steps? Right. I mean, Stallone wrote it, right? I think they have to ask him. Okay. Hey, Sly, I was wondering if you could do that was pretty good. I answered, in that little moment, someone will have to interpret that. Great movie, man. I rewatched that. Rocky. Yes. Like, this year, from beginning to end. Just phenomenal movie. Yeah. I'm trying to get Emily to watch it. Has she never seen the original? No, it's its own thing, for sure. Really? It's a love story. For the most part. It's a love story. And like, the triumph of the little guy story, for sure. Yeah. Featuring boxing, right? That's exactly right. Yeah. But two and three onward, it's like a totally different thing. Yes, but those are good, too. Yeah. They said, let's take your story, take out the heart and insert cocaine today. Insert, Mr. T. I don't get the cocaine reference. It's just the Hollywood got hands on it. Sure. You know what I mean? I got you. Yeah, that's good question, though. I wonder about that. Surely they didn't remake it for Philadelphia just for that. Well, but the point is, Garrett Brown created on this sizzle reel, one of the most iconic spots in filmmaking history. For sure. And he sent that real out. And within that year, I believe, 1976, three major motion pictures hired him to operate his steadicam for it. There was Rocky. What was the one about Woody Guthrie? Bound for Glory? Yeah, I think that one came out first. So that was the first, actually. And that one, the steady came up was Garrett Brown, I think, for all these because he was the only guy that knew he got a lot of work early on. Yes. And I think he operated. I think the patent was still pending until 1977. So I'm sure he closed your eyes while I shoot this. But on Bound for Glory, he was on a crane. Even that lowered down, stepped off the crane. So people had seen crane shots, but then for the crane to go down, down, and then all of a sudden start following this guy. Everyone was like, what in the world? Right? There would have been a cut after the crane stopped, and then before, they would have cut, and he would have gotten in position and then started up again. This is one smooth shot. One smooth shot, yeah. And then the other one was Marathon Man. Another great movie. Right out of the blue, this guy, who is a commercial director and made short films for Sesame Street, changed filmmaking, like, single handedly. Yeah. And won an Academy Award, 1978, for technical achievement. Got that patent in 77, and, well, that's it. That's the history of the steadicam. That's it, everybody. Can I but we're going to should we take a break and tell everyone how this thing works? Let's do it. Man this episode is brought to you by Simple Mobile. Tired of being tied down with a wireless contract? Switch to Simple Mobile and stay connected on a powerful nationwide 5G network. Unlimited talk, text, and data starts at $30 a month with no contracts, activation fees, or credit checks. Visit Simplemobile.com today. Out with the old, in with the simple compatible 5G capable device and SIM require actual availability. Coverage and speed may vary. 5g network not available in all areas. One month equals 30 days. See terms and conditions@simplemobile.com. All right, chuck so the study camp. Do you remember when we did our episode on Breathalyzers? Oh, boy. That was a long time ago. And we found out that the Breathalyzer is one of the most complicated machines on the planet. I kind of hated that one. Like, there were crystals involved somehow. I hated that one, too. Dark crystals. This is a bit like that. Like if you really dive into steady camps. Like this article on how stuff works. Does it's? Labyrinthine. Talking about the dark crystal. Yeah, we're talking labyrinth instead. Yeah, but we're going to simplify it because you don't need to break this thing apart and look at every component like this article does. I mean, it really gets involved. What you should do is look at a picture of someone operating one, because when you look at it, it all makes a lot more sense. Right. And there's really just three main parts to the whole thing. There's a vest, there's an arm that's attached to the vest, and then the other end of the arm is attached to what's called the sled, which is what the camera and its components are mounted on. Right? Yeah. And that arm, I mean, just picture yourself wearing, like, a Baby Bjorn baby carrier, except for instead of the baby at your sternum, there's a mechanical arm coming out. Like a spring arm lamp. Yeah, like accordion arm or a spring arm lamp. Right. And it's virtually the same thing. Well, yeah. And guess who made one of these by himself before they started making them for at home people? Who? Casey? No. Who? My brother, of course. Oh, did he really? Yeah. Yeah. My brother made one of these in, like, the early 90s. Did he really? Out of door hinges and rubber bands and springs. Does he still have it? Is it in the Smithsonian? I don't know. It's in the Scottsonian. Nice. Which is where all his early tens with all his pinball machines. Yeah, but he made one. He basically did the same thing. He looked at it and looked at these swing arm lamps and accordion arm lamps, and it's like, well, it's the same thing. I'll just make a version of that, and it worked pretty good. It's virtually the same thing. Yes. So the whole point of steadicam is that it basically simulates, or the arm at least simulates a human arm right. To where it can move around very easily. Yeah. And it redistributes the weight of the camera, which can be up to, like, \u00a370, I imagine. Probably more. Yeah. The whole unit is pretty heavy, and it's not easy to operate, but it'll wear you out. It holds it effortlessly, and it holds it in place. This arm does, and it does it by using springs. And you can adjust the tension of the springs by using a cable and pulley system so that it offsets the balance of the camera and holds it in space in front of the camera operator, basically, so that they can move it effortlessly up, down to the side. You can put the camera on top of the Sled so that you get high shots. You can switch it so it goes on the bottom, so you can get low angle shots. Yeah. The traditional it's called high mode and low mode and high mode, it doesn't mean it's high. It just means it's on the top of the unit, and then low mode is when it's on the bottom. So if you wanted to film a mouse running across the floor, you would put it in low mode. Right. If you want to film human, you put it in high mode. Yeah. And the camera itself is broken out into pieces, which is kind of an ingenious trick that I guess, Garrett Brown came up with himself. I think he did. And this is the third part, the camera Sled, right? Yes. The sled is what holds all the equipment. Right. And it's basically a pole with a little bit at the top called the stage. Yeah. And that's where the camera goes. Or it could be at the bottom. Wherever the camera is, the camera is mounted to the stage. Then you get the pole itself. And then, I guess, the arm is connected to the pole by a gimbal. A gimbal? A gimbal. That's right. And that's like an old technology. It's basically something that uses, basically, a gyroscopic action to take the movement of whatever is seeking to move, whatever you want to hold still and getting rid of it. Like everything around it moves except for the thing that you want to hold still. Yeah, it's pretty neat. It's super neat. And that's just the one arm that's connected to the pole. Yes. So you can see how complicated this thing is that this guy sat back, and I think in a hotel room somewhere, he put it together. Garrett Brown. The first one. There's just the ingenuity it took to put this together. It's pretty in depth as far as inventions go. Yeah. And there's a little science to it. There's something called moment of inertia. It's basically how much that camera is resistant to rotation. So if you want the camera to be still, you want to increase that resistance to the rotation. And this is determined by a couple of different things how much mass there is to the object and how far that mass is from its own axis of rotation. So by spreading the camera out, he basically took the little cameras come with a monitor now so you can see what's going on, and a big heavy battery. He took the monitor off of the camera. He took the battery off of the camera and redistributed that up and down the pole. So what he ended up doing was spreading out that mass, which takes away the center of gravity from the camera itself. Yeah, because, like with a regular camera, where all the components are in one single unit, that center of gravity is inside the camera. So it's easy to rotate. But since he exploded it out into its various components, he made that center of gravity land somewhere on the pole. Right. And the gimbal attaches to the pole just above the center of gravity so that the camera operator holds the pole and manipulates the camera at the center of gravity, which makes it very easy to balance, keep balanced. Yeah. And they do a good job in this article, if you like, just take a broomstick and you find that center of gravity with your finger. You can hold it with your finger and lift it up and down. Right. And it's balanced on your finger because you're hitting that center of balance. That's right. It's the same principle. And in fact, if you took that same broomstick and cut it off and you just had 3ft of broomstick and just took your SLR camera and screwed that broomstick into the bottom of your camera instead of a tripod that would function, you could walk around with that, and it would be steadier than if you just had it in your hand. I could see that because of the change of the center of gravity. Change at the center of gravity. And if you put a little counterweight at the bottom, it would make it even more steady. And that's the whole concept of the steady camp sled. Then attach that to an arm, that accordion arm, and you're cooking with gas. Yes. Because you were saying, like, if you walk around with just the pole holding or the broomstick cut off broomstick, and you're holding it just with your hand, it's steady. The point of the arm is it's taking your hand out of the equation and replacing it with something that can isolate movement even more, so that your movement of you walking just gets lost within the arm before it ever gets to the camera and could shake it. Yeah. Like if you did it with a broomstick, your arm is the same thing as the steady cam arm. Right. Except it's better. The steady cam arm is better. Than your human arm, right? Yes, exactly. Pretty neat stuff. It is neat stuff. And I think that's it for the science, man. We made it through it. Yeah. I mean, it's all going to be very precisely balanced. You don't just throw the stuff on the pole, Willynilly. No. And they point out that the balance of the camera can actually change during filming just from the film moving from one end of the camera to the other as it records. Right. Well, yes. In the old days when they used film, for sure. Nowadays, it's just that digital card. Yeah. Well, not always. Quentin Tarantino's, camera operator, has to deal with this. Yeah. And if you've ever been on a job with a steadicam, there's a lot of breaks where you can adjust them on the fly more now. But I remember there just being a lot of breaks with the steadicam. App would say, hold on, I need five minutes. And they go over and they have a little stand that they put it on because it takes the weight off to a certain degree. But it's still a lot of weight to be carrying on a vest on your chest. Yeah. And running and moving and doing all sorts of stuff. Yeah. It's a tough gig. There's a pretty amazing video. Did you watch it? Of that Eurovision shot? No. There's a guy from Think, Belarus, singing and they showed him. I didn't see that. They showed the shot and then they showed what? Somebody filming the shot being done, and the guy with the steady cam wearing the vest rides down the aisle on a segway. Is that what he's on? Yeah. Pops off, runs up this ramp and then starts circling around the guy who's singing. And it's a pretty amazing thing. It's a great shot, but then when you see how it's done, wow, that guy deserved a standing ovation. It would have been more impressive. Not like the subject matter been more interested in the video quality, but better. Pretty bad. Like, if it was a scorsese movie, you would be like, wow, sure. But it was just kind of corny. It looked like American idol or something. It was. But it was American Idol. If you took American Idol at its peak and then spread it out over Eurasia, it was popular over that large of a population. That's what Eurovision is. That's right. So you want to talk about some of the shots when we come back after a break, please. Okay. This episode is brought to you by Ashley. From spooky stories by the campfire to raging backyard barbecues, this summer is going to be wild, and Ashley is ready to help you embrace whatever adventures come your way. With biophilic designs, eclectic patterns and plenty of decor, ashley can help you transform your office, your patio, or whatever shop in store or online@ashley.com. All right, so, Chuck, in addition to that rocky shot and that Eurovision shot, there are some other very famous shots, classic shots of all time. Yeah. That had to do with steadicam. They couldn't have been done without steadicam. Well, The Shining is the first one that pops into most people's minds because, like we said, Kubrick was a big fan of this invention and immediately started talks with Garrett Brown on how to help him out with this movie The Shining that he was making. Right. And apparently they kind of battled one another quite a bit on the set of The Shining. And Garrett Brown later admitted he said a lot of that was probably, what do you call it? Like inventors pride or something kind of getting in the way of this brilliant altour. So Kubrick already had his own ideas on how to best use this thing that this other guy invented. Right. And the Shining is a classic example. The tricycle shots, the famous maze chase at the end. Very iconic in motion picture history. Yeah. And do you know how they did that shot behind Danny on his little big wheel? They probably just went to low mode and, like, walked behind him. Yeah. Ran down the hall after him. That's really impressive. Yeah. So the shining is a big one. Sure. Rocky is a big one. Goodfellas is another classic example, too. Classic, where Ray Liotta and Lorraine Broccoli are going into the COPAC Cabana, but they go through the back and they're followed throughout the back stairs into the kitchen, and then they finally come out into their table and it's like one uninterrupted five minute shot or something. It's amazing. I think when you see this, you might see it and not be a discerning film viewer and just say, Well, I didn't notice anything, which is probably good. Or you might be a fan of Steadicam and say, man, that was amazing. Then you have to step back and look at lighting and realize that how incredibly hard it is to light a shot like that that takes place over I don't know how many hundreds of feet without seeing the lights in the shot. Well, that or just consistent lighting and having it look good. That's just usually you light for, like, a room or something. Or a hallway. Right, yeah. But to light all those different rooms and hallways and just incredibly I can't imagine how long it took to set that shot. It was like, Wait, what do you want to do? Yes, it will be great. Don't worry about it. Stay with me. You know he's making another gangster movie. No, I didn't know that. Yeah. And it may be like some folks are saying it's like his last big gangster movie. Yeah, but it's got De Niro again. Okay. He hadn't worked with them in a long time. Pacino nice. And Joe Pesci is coming out of retirement. I didn't even know he was retired. I just thought he wasn't doing stuff anymore, man. He retired. I didn't know. That. Yeah. So he's got the three heavyweights and supposedly Harvey Cocktail. Of course, you got to throw him in there. Sure. But I'm just like Giddy thinking about this. Yeah. I'm glad he is, because his last one was The Departed. Right. Now, he's made movies since then, like Wolf of Wall Street. Gangster movie. Yeah. Which I thought was great. I know you didn't love it. I just didn't. I thought it was awesome. I thought everything but what Jack Nicholson did was pretty good. Yeah. Like his performance. No, I really didn't. Well, sorry, Jack. He'll forgive that. All right. Because you like him as an actor, right? Yeah. Okay. As soon as it gets come on. Return of the Jedi. The famous speeder bike chase scene on the indoor yeah. California's Redwood National Park doubled as indoor. And that was Garrett Brown walking. And they sped it up. Yeah. But you're just like, wow. Who cares? The reason why it's such an iconic steady cam shot is because he walked very slowly. And when you speed film up, the tiny movements involved are telegraph. They just become much more exaggerated. So without a ceticam, when they sped the film up again, it would have been just so blurry and just jarring. It would have been unusable, the fact that you can see the trees and stuff. And even at that high speed, it's all steady cam. Yeah. And people I think it's just so easy to take it for granted now in movies when you see these shots. But to pioneer these things and this equipment was remarkable. And nowadays they're all manner of at home steadicam. You don't have to do like my brother and build one out of spare parts and door hinges. Yeah. You can buy one for not too much. You spend $100 on a decent enough little home steadicam. This article says that the Steadicam Curve, which is made for GoPros, is, like, $100. Yeah. Well, those are teeny tiny. There's one for the iPhone called what's it called? The Smoothie. That one is like it's like, I think, even less than $100. And it's just like a handheld camera stabilizer that works pretty well from what I can gather. Yeah. We should have had Casey, our video producer Casey, he's in France right now, though, living the high life. Right. We should have had Casey in here just given thumbs up or thumbs down to each one of these brands that I mentioned. And I would trust that as, like, the gospel truth. Right. But Casey is not here. So we're just going to say read online reviews. I also saw that there's, like, a lot of Gimbal based, drone steady camps that are just not that expensive. They're changing the game again. Sure. Because then you can do a shot where you follow someone by the swimming pool and then fly up into outer space with them if you want. And one continuous motion. Yeah. Like the crisp monster the what? The Crisp monster. You remember the alien from Crisp Cereal? Do you remember Crisp? Remember the weird alien? Sort of I didn't eat quisp. Wasn't that a Captain Crunch knock off or was it different? It was different because they were saucer shaped rather than square waffle cut. Got you. Same thing, though. Yeah, same thing. It was good. It didn't cut the tongue like Cap and Crunch did. Yeah, the roof of the mouth. I'll suffer through that still. And then, of course, Seticam is a name brand. Right. We should mention who makes it. Tiffan. Tiffan now? Yeah, I think Tiffan does. They have a pretty good site, like, if you are at all interested in this, like, they've got a great site and they have all of their Steadicam models with a real indepth overview of them. And I think it's got all their manuals and everything just right there for you to read. Yeah. There's other companies making them. There's one called Glidecam emberzoom. Yeah. But Steadicam is still probably the giant. It's like Dolly. There's only two dolly makers, or there may be more now, but it's like Chapman and Fisher. And every dolly grip has the dolly makers. Yeah. Chapman dollies or Fisher dollies? Kind of like hold me or Bush Mills advisor, or course neither. And then Garrett Brown. As if the Steadicam wasn't enough as far as revolutionizing filming goes, he later on invented something called the sky cam. Yeah. Which, like, if you watch any kind of sporting event now, it's especially useful for football and football where there's just cables above the field and there are cameras hanging down that are just like doing overhead shots, following the action like nothing. It's pretty neat. Garrett Brown invented that, too. I got one more little thing for you. There are two positions. Not high mode. Low mode positions are like how you're operating the camera, but if you are pointing forward as the operator and your camera is pointing forward, you're just walking. It's called missionary no? And then if the operator is forward and the camera is backward, they call that Don Juan. So leave it to film Set goons to think of sexual names for sex. It up. Camera positions. Don Juan. Yeah. I never heard of that one. I hadn't either. Well, if you want to know more about Steadicams, including a really fine grain involved, look at the physics of how the steadicam arm works, you should go type steadicam into the search barhowstephorse.com. Since I said search bar, it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this encouragement for McDonald. Hey, guys. I was listening to the Easter show and was compelled to write in. As a Christian, I've always appreciated how you make a solid effort to not rail on the church too hard. I found it humorous and simultaneously sad when you felt you had to tiptoe around the pagan traditions that have been integrated with the resurrection. I find it disheartening to think that other believers can't find anything better to do than wait to be offended by something, then jump all over you for it. But based on your years of experience and careful treatment of the subject, it must be the case a lot of the time. Personally, I just want to say I can't think of anything you've ever said to offend me. I think you've done a stand up job with sensitive subjects like Satanic panic in particular. It's also nice just to hear you talk about things directly related to my beliefs without sneering, like many others will. That's nice. Dane in Minnesota. Yeah, for real, Dane. If you want to get in touch with us like Dane did and be a super cool person, lay it on us. Send us an email. Stuff, podcast@iheartradiocom stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts My Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
45a7852c-ba8a-11e8-9ed2-fbcead67af72	Short Stuff: Prison Food	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/short-stuff-prison-food	Prison food is kind of a joke, like airplane food. But there are real consequences involved. Let's get into it in today's short stuff.	Prison food is kind of a joke, like airplane food. But there are real consequences involved. Let's get into it in today's short stuff.	Wed, 26 Jun 2019 13:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2019, tm_mon=6, tm_mday=26, tm_hour=13, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=2, tm_yday=177, tm_isdst=0)	11007412	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hello, and welcome to Short Stuff, the shortest stuff around. I'm Josh. There's Chuck. There's Jerry over there. And this is Short Stuff, in case you didn't catch it the first time around. Right, right. Let's talk about prison food. Yeah, let's. So prison food saying prison food is sort of like a joke, like an airplane meal that someone might use casually to represent really bad food. I think prisoners would literally kill for an airplane food meal once in a while. Yeah. But there are more than 2 million people incarcerated in the United States, and that's a lot of people to feed, and we're not feeding them very well. And there are groups out there that advocates for prisoners who are on the case and have been for a while trying to get better food to prisoners. And this woman, Loretta Rafael, who works for she's a researcher for Prison Voice Washington, she makes a good point. She's saying, listen, we're not saying prisoners don't want filet mignon. They don't want luxury foods. They just want food. That's food, real food. Real food. And that also isn't like, nutritionally deficient. And let's get something out of the way if you're like. Well, they're prisoners. Who cares if they have tasty food or something like that or something that's not as high in sodium? Who cares? They're imprisoned and they're not supposed to be coddled. There's actually a really good answer to that, and that is that if we are taking care of prisoners in a certain way in prison and again, there's 2 million of them in the United States alone. If they're eating terribly over the course of years, they're also developing the kinds of chronic illnesses that come with eating terribly for years, like heart disease and COPD and just about everything you can think of, diabetes. And then when they get out, they need health care. Or they need health care while they're in there, too. Sure. And so whether they're on government assisted health care on the outside or prison healthcare on the inside, you the guy who doesn't care whether they get good food or not on the inside, is paying for that. And a really easy way to get around that is for them to just be served nutritious food to begin with. It's way cheaper than paying for health care on the back end. Yeah. There was a study done in 2012 that reported that 74% of inmates in state and federal prisons and jails are overweight obese or morbidly obese. And I guess it is easy to say, like, why give them good food? They are in prison. We should give them gross tasting food. But like you said, it's not it's one of these things like, if you think about the big picture, if one of your arguments is tax dollars, tax dollars, why am I paying for this? You're going to be paying for more down the line. So maybe give them some fruits and vegetables every now and then or on a daily basis, even, like, human beings. And I mean, if you're talking tax dollars and you're paying for their food, the amount of money that's spent on prisoners, if you look at it overall for the entire nation, I can't find that data, by the way. There's no data that says this is how much the US. Spends on food for prisoners every year. There's nothing like that. It's more by state, even by jurisdiction. But I've seen something between one dollars, $20 a day to about $3 a day per prisoner. The average American eats on about eight point twelve cents a day. So there is a very small amount of money being spent on prisoner food, which is one problem. But then the second problem that seems to be evolving over the years or has evolved recently, is there used to be prison kitchens. Like, the food was prepared there in the prison, and so that meant that the prison could kind of cater more toward inmates than they can now, where the food preparation is almost exclusively outsourced to companies like Eramark or in Washington, there's one called Corrections Institutions Food, and that's just a food service. So it's prepared off site, and it's just gotten really bad. Like, there's no such thing as fresh food anymore. It's all reheated in like a tray, basically. All right, well, let's come back in a minute. We'll talk a little bit more about that and some of the other complications of feeding 2 million incarcerated individuals right after this. All right, so it is tough to feed that many people and keep expenses in check. I think anyone will admit you can't just have an open checkbook and just say it's been whatever it takes. There are budgets to keep in mind. And it's complicated. When you think about and this is something I don't think many people think about, but dietary needs, dietary restrictions based on your own body or religious grounds, whether it's kosher or halal or gluten free, like, I never thought about what if you're gluten or dairy free and you're in prison? You probably just go hungry a lot or live with consistent intestinal distress, which would really suck. I saw a quote. It's like, prison's punishment enough. This doesn't need to be heaped on top of it. Something like persistent intestinal distress. Yeah, you're certainly not making for more obedient prisoners if someone is always sick. No, but I did look up I wondered if there was a reason that prisons deprived inmates nutritionally to keep them, like, docile, or if it has the opposite effect. But apparently one of the big problems, at least in Washington, but I would suspect it's probably nationwide, is a deficiency of protein. There's just not enough protein, and protein is pretty important. It's one of the big ones that you really need. So there's less protein. The protein that is typically served as prisoners is hyper processed. There's no fresh vegetables or anything like that. It's all pre canned or cooked or frozen or something like that. And it's heavy in salt and sometimes sugar, too. Just basically the worst food you could possibly eat. Like junk food made from filler. Yeah. And if you do have dietary restrictions and that have health implications, like, let's say you are gluten free or have celiac, they will just take whatever has gluten off of your tray. They don't say like, well, how would you like this instead? Right? And you just get less food. That sucks, man. Yeah, it does. And you talked about how much they're spending. Maricopa County, Arizona is very famous for sheriff Joe and all the news he makes and apparently their Thanksgiving meal. There's a nonprofit journalism group called the Marshall Project that works on criminal justice issues. They did some investigating and found that the Thanksgiving meal in Maricopa county cost 56 per person. It was a cup of carrots, a cup of mashed potatoes, and then 5oz of turkey soy casserole, turkey soil probably not too far off. I agree. One of the people who are with one of the prison projects said if you look at a can of organic cat food and the label of the ingredients and you compare it to a lot of the food that's served in prisons, the organic cat food is preferable to the prison food. Yeah, which is fairly shameful. But what about the honey buns? There's the honey buns. I also saw a recent one about a type of potato chip that is apparently so good that prisoners go crazy after they get out of prison because they can't find it outside of prison. It's made specifically for prisons. It's called the whole shebangs. And this company has caught on recently that people really want this outside of prison, so now they sell it on their website as well. But it's really expensive on their website. But it's just supposedly the greatest potato chips you can ever have. It's a combination of salt and vinegar and barbecue flavor. Well, but again, if you haven't heard our prisons episode, that's the reference to honey buns. Apparently that's have a lot of trade value. But jokes aside, honey buns and even the greatest potato chips ever still junk food, right? Yeah. Honey buns and greatest potato chips ever definitely still do qualify as junk food. Agreed. And again, I know this is a divisive topic about how people treat prisoners. There are a lot of people think that they are pampered and they should all be in hard labor camps eating junk food. But again, if you really look at the big picture and if you're worried about your tax dollars and where they're going, you're spending a lot more on healthcare by feeding them bad food than just giving them some. And again, they're not asking for filet mignon, but fruits and vegetables, real proteins that isn't just like a heaping of beans. Yeah, just to put it in real numbers. The Prison Policy Initiative, which is a watchdog group, they did a study and they found that correctional facilities spend about six times more on health care than they do on food. And again, if you just raise the quality of food up, it would definitely not be six times more. I do know. You got anything else for this episode of Short Stuff? Chuck? I got nothing else. I'm just going to go sit down and have some turkey ends and soil. Turkey soil protein. Yeah, turkey ends was one of the ingredients in Turkey Ala King, which I tried to look up what that was, and the only thing I could find that wasn't the country of turkey ends blank was that the ends of a turkey roll, which in and of itself doesn't sound like much of a turkey anyway. Although I can tell you a turkey roll is really good. Is it? Oh, yeah. I've never had one. They come, they're super frozen solid as a brick in a foil pan, and you put the whole thing in the oven for like 3 hours, but when it comes out, buddy, salty. Oh, I bet it's tasty, though. You shouldn't need them very often. As a matter of fact, I should probably not endorse at all. Well, at any rate, that's the end of this short stuff. Hope it changed your mind about things. Until next time. Short stuff out. Stuff you should know is production of Iheartra how stuff works. For more podcasts, my heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
https://podcasts.howstuf…arrest-final.mp3	How Citizen's Arrests Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-citizens-arrests-work	In some states, it is not only your right but your duty to arrest someone you see committing a crime. Learn all about why you should basically never do that in this episode.	In some states, it is not only your right but your duty to arrest someone you see committing a crime. Learn all about why you should basically never do that in this episode.	Tue, 21 Jul 2015 21:24:41 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2015, tm_mon=7, tm_mday=21, tm_hour=21, tm_min=24, tm_sec=41, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=202, tm_isdst=0)	36751646	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer, school's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime four days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, My Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. You do it all without breaking a sweat. And you do it all in style. That's why Infinity fully reimagined the QX 60 to help you take on everything with ease. A luxury SUV as functional as it is stylish, as versatile as it is serene. Available features like a panoramic moonroof, ample cargo space and massaging front seats. Introducing the Allnew 2022 Infinity QX 60, designed to help you take on life in style. Visit infinityusacom to learn more. Now, with extremely limited availability, contact your local retailer for inventory information. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. This is Charles W. Chuck Bryant, you're under arrest. I didn't do anything. Yeah, I saw it with my own two eyes. You're coming with me. You didn't see Jack? Is it ansing or NC? How many times you could say that? Yeah, so that was my rendition of how citizens arrested go. We've been asked to do this for a while. Yeah, we finally did. We're doing it now. Did you know that on June 9 a man in Australia died while being citizens arrested? No. He was being detained by like five or six guys and held down for eight minutes and zip tied and he died. You know, I feel like we talked about once when some people sat on a guy to detain him. Yeah, we did. In London or something and he died. It happens. It does happen. I totally remember that. Yeah, it was guys busted in on a diamond shop, right? One got away, one got sat on until he died. Yes. That was scary. Even though people are going to get off of me dying. Right. So that reveals one of the many things that can go wrong during a citizen's arrest. Which is why we wanted to stay at the top of this, and probably will many times. You should not perform citizens arrest even though it is conceivably your right if you're here in America to do so. And all over the world. Not necessarily, no. I mean, almost every single country has a citizens or else law. Even ones that are not touched by the long arm of the British Empire all over the place. I got the impression that it was basically an English common law concept. Maybe it's been co opted then because I saw like, Turkey, Hong Kong, all over the world. Okay, wherever you are, you probably should not try to perform as soon as the rest there's all sorts of other stuff you can do, especially in the day of, like a smartphone. You can cops, call the cops, take video pictures. Take video, take pictures. The one time when a lot of citizens arrest laws do say you probably should do something is when you see somebody being hurt, injured, or their life is in danger. Yes. For the most part, though, especially if no one is being hurt, you should not perform a citizen's arrest. That's your advice to the general public? Yes. Do you not agree? I don't know. Depends. I think it's situational okay. Depends on who they are, who you are and what's going down. Well, the problem is, a lot of people say citizens arrest. You do that for, like, if somebody won't turn down their stereo at night, stuff like that easily turns into, like, a fight. Yeah, that's not you should just have a little dummy fine book, and if it makes you feel better, write somebody a citation, do it. And as a result, a lot of states, I think, recognize the fact that if you just say yes, you can do citizens arrest for anything. It will start out as somebody trying to arrest you for playing your stereo too loud, too late, and then turn into a fight and then somebody dies. That kind of thing. So a lot of states say it has to be a felony, and there's all sorts of other stipulations and details. But the whole thing, like I said, Chuck, is rooted, at least in the United States, in English, common law, specifically the Posse Comitatus. Yeah. Dating back to medieval England. That was a time when they needed that. And the sheriff of the land counted on citizens because they didn't have a police force of hundreds of dudes. Right. And they needed citizens to help them out, basically. Yeah. And possibly comatatus is Latin for force of the county or force of the community. And basically in English, common law was the ability of the sheriff to say, you 15 year old boy and up, you're able bodied. I need help arresting this guy. You are obligated to help me to sit on him. To sit on him, yeah, but get off them when I tell you to. Yes. And in the United States, it was, I think in 1898, which is not that long ago, I mean, just the turn of the 1900, philadelphia big city only had 15 detectives, so they counted on people to help out. And the infamous mass murderer HH Homes was tracked and caught by a private citizen. Is that right? Yeah, he was a private detective, but he's not a cop. Okay. Because I was trying to find like, famous have there ever been any noteworthy citizens arrest? That's pretty noteworthy. That was the only one I could find. HH homes. But America's first serial killer was brought down by Citizens Arrest. It's tough to get good information on this, though, because, as you'll see, every state has their own law, and within states, each municipality has different versions of the law. Right. So it's all over the place. The rule of thumb that I ran across in researching this is if the site or the text from the site seemed huffy and indignant and just fed up, then you should really take that stuff as a grain of salt. Yeah. And I also found a lot of cases, too, these days where it's become kind of a tool for activism, where somebody like an environmentalist will try to arrest the mayor in front of everyone at a town meeting. There's a site called Arrestblair.org, I believe, and it's a site dedicated to placing Tony Blair, prime minister, under arrest for war crimes. And like five or six people have done it so far. And it's all just totally symbolic. Yeah, exactly. But there's a lot of steps that they suggest you follow and don't seem like you're trying to carry out any violent act or anything like that. It's all symbolic. But if you could get Tony Blair to come with you to, I don't know, jail, sure. They're like, go for it. He's not going to. Now, I've also seen people try to arrest, like, oil company executives and stuff like that. Again, just a statement. So let's talk about let's break it down into federal law and state law. Federal law. And you this is a blog post of yours, right? And that's where this came from. How about that? How about it? It's our first one based on a blog post, which is sort of just a version of an article. No, we did registration was a blog post. Oh, yeah, that's right. Good point. So if you're talking federal law, it has to be interpreted as such. It doesn't clearly say in federal law, like, you can do this. No, there's some pinky language. There's real fancy footwork in interpreting this. And there's a group called what do they call crime fighters. Yeah, I looked when I wrote this blog post originally. There's no website for crime fighters. They have a newsletter that should say a lot. But there's this long document, and you can find it on the post for this episode on our website that has, like, I mean, just every detail you could possibly think of. Some of it good advice, some of it contradictory advice, some advice not good. Like, for example, there's sentences like, when in doubt, check first. If you're not sure if a crime that you're arresting somebody for is a misdemeanor or felony, check first. So apparently, when in doubt, you should have already checked beforehand as their guys got you. Or zip ties make handy handcuffs. They do. You should not be using handcuffs. Cops even use zip ties. Cops do. This is a theme we're going to keep running into. Chuck. Cops who are sworn law enforcement officers. That's their career. Yeah. And there's plenty of cops that are like bad apples. I'm not talking about that at this point. What I'm saying is, if you're a citizens arrest person and you're carrying around zip ties to use his handcuffs, you are going to get in trouble, because the same protections that are afforded to cops who use zip ties are not afforded to you necessarily. No. It's a different deal. So if you look at Title 18, Section 2236, when talking federal law, we should probably just read this because the wording is important. Whoever being an officer. Agent or employee of the United States or any department of agency thereof. Engaged in the enforcement of any law of the United States. Searches. Any private dwelling used and occupied as such dwelling. Without a warrant directing such search or maliciously and without reasonable costs. Such as any other building or property without a search warrant. Shall be fined under this title for a first offense and for a subsequent offense shall be fined under this title and imprisoned not more than one year or both. Right. So basically what that's saying is the federal government is aware that there are bad apples who are sworn officers of the law, and anybody who conducts a search without a warrant or without probable cause is in trouble. Yes. Here's the thing. They're like, there's a couple of exceptions, and we want to make plane. Right? Yes. And they say that this section shall not apply to any person, which is huge, as we'll see in a second. A serving a warrant of arrest, b arresting or attempting to arrest a person committing or attempting to commit an offense in his presence or who has committed or is suspected on reasonable grounds of having committed a felony or making a search at the request or invitation or with the consent of the occupant of the premises. So they're saying if you're a law enforcement officer, you don't have to have a warrant if one of those three A, B or C is fulfilled. But the thing that crime stoppers crime fighters, the thing that crimefighters says is, well, wait, they switch language. The first part has to do with the law enforcement officer. In the second part, they use the word person. Yeah. Any person. And any person is a citizen. Right? That's right. So technically, under federal law, if you interpret it this way, you have the right to commit, I guess, to carry out a citizen's arrest if there's a felony. Right. Or if you could get your hands on a warrant, which you can't, unless you're like a bounty hunter or private detective. Yeah. Which, by the way, bounty hunters. February 2010. Okay. Do you want to go listen to that one? Yeah, it's a good one. Yeah, we did that one. And bail, right? Bail and bounty hunters. It's like a dual. That's right. And then since most people most citizens can't get their hands on a warrant, that part B kicks in, where if you see somebody committing a felony, you can arrest them. That's right. So that's what crime fighters and a lot of other people say. This is federal justification for citizens arrest. That's right. But the state loves citizens arrest. Yes. And we'll talk about those states laws right after this. Hey, summer is here, my friend, which means school is out, the sun is shining bright, the days are longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. Yeah. Whether you're road tripping or you're relaxing by the pool, you can tune into the podcast here. It's on Amazon Music. That's so good? It's criminal. Morbid. That's right. It's part true crime and part comedy. Morbid takes you on a journey through murderous mysteries and major laughs, all in the same week. Yeah. From the paranormal to the pretty spooky and everything in between, hosts Selena Erkhart and Ash Kelly cover it all. And with two episodes released each week, you'll be hooked on this chart topping series before you know it. 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Compodcast. And start taking charge of your future today. So, Josh, you mentioned that states love citizens arrest. Love them. Not exactly the case, but they definitely open things up quite a bit. Depending on what state and what municipality you live in, you may be able to perform citizens arrests on misdemeanors that you actually witness felonies. You don't even witness anything that could cause a breach of peace. Whether you witness it or not, it all depends on the state. Yeah. Or in the case of Kentucky, you are called upon to do so. There's a they say you must do so. Right. There's a case in the 30s that has been interpreted in Kentucky to mean that if you see a crime in action, like, you have to do something. Yeah. Or a felony. The quote is, you must take affirmative steps is what it says in the law. Yeah. I don't think obviously they're not going to charge someone with not doing something, although you never know. But they do charge you in Kentucky with like, hey, this is your obligation. Right. You got to do something. I mean, the last episode of Seinfeld, it's basically the same thing. They saw a man being harassed on the street and laughed instead of helping them. They were prosecuted under the Good Samaritan law. That's right. So instead of see something, say something, it sees something sit on them. That's exactly right. That's the law. So that's Kentucky. There are other states that say you have to see a felony in progress to make a citizen's arrest. Right? Yeah. And then other states are saying, you better know what you're talking about if you arrest the system. Because if a conviction doesn't happen, that guy can turn around and sue you. You can be charged with all sorts of things. Sure. So you better get that conviction, you better know what you're talking about. It better be a cut and dry case if you're going to make a citizen's arrest. Yeah. And then there are all manner of rules and regulations depending on your state. Like for instance, in Utah, they will let you arrest somebody for misdemeanor or felony, but you're not allowed to use deadly force. Other states say you can use what they call reasonable force, but that's highly subjective and I guess would be determined in a court. Right. Some states say you should not or not allow to question or search. Only thing you can do is detain them. And this is in different countries, too. They have similar laws. I looked at, like, Canada and England and Finland and Norway. I mean, it's all over the place. And they're all kind of similar. Although in some states they will let you seize a weapon or evidence if it is in plain view or if you're under an immediate threat. Like you can take a gun from a guy. Right. Or see if the kilo of cocaine spills out onto the street. You can brush that aside and say, dear, would you put that in the car so the cops get here. Right, that'd be funny if you don't realize that you're in a state where you're not allowed to take a gun. So you take a guy's gun and he's like his citizens arrests you back for taking his gun and he just keeps going back and forth like that. Exactly. And then there's something also called some states allow merchant searches. Oh, like a security guard at a department store or something. Yeah. Or even just a shop owner. Like, I saw you put that thing in your pocket and go digging through the pockets. Right. So, yeah, if you're a shopkeeper, you have certain rights as well. So if you are one of those people who likes to do citizens arrest or is interested by that kind of thing, which means you couldn't make it as a cop. Crime fighters. Do you remember that one, King of the Hill, where the security guard, I think he dropped Bobby off or something like that, and the security guard tells Hanky issues with them a warning that he's parked more than 3ft away from the curb. And Hank goes, you're not a cop. And the guy goes, that's why it's only a warning. Pretty great stuff. I heard an interview, a great interview with Mike Judge recently. He's awesome. He is. And super smart. Idiocracy, he was a physicist and engineer. Really? Before he got into the animation game. Before he did beat us in butthead. Right. Wow. Which is really kind of funny. Nice. Yeah. Didn't know that. Yes. He's not a big fan of Idiocracy himself, actually. Man, what is wrong with him? He basically was like his I think general take was it was okay, but it was sort of which was kind of my problem with, like, a one joke thing that very well over and over again. Loved it. All right. I appreciate hearing that. I think. Loved it. Mike Judge. Yes. So if you are going to do this kind of stuff, you better know your state laws in and out. Yeah. First of all, you better know whether it has to be a felony for you to carry out a citizen's arrest sure. In which case, you better know the difference between a misdemeanor and a felony and different classes of felonies so you know when to intervene and when not, too. You also need to know whether you can use handcuffs or try to restrain somebody right. What force you can use. Right. What escalation of force means. Which typically is if the guy is coming at you with a baseball bat, you could conceivably come at him back with your own blunt object. But if the guy's got a he brought a baseball bat to a macefight. Right. Yeah. Which I mean, they're both blunt objects. Right. I would take a spiked ball over a baseball bat. But if that guy comes at you with, like, just his fists, you knife them a bunch of times, you've escalated the violence, and you're probably going to be in trouble across the board, though, no matter what state you're in. If it allows for citizen's arrest, which I didn't see a state that didn't have some sort of provision. Are there did you run across any I think pretty much everywhere. You can I mean, if you can arrest someone in Massachusetts, then you can arrest someone anywhere. You do not have to read a suspect his or her rights. Yeah. That makes sense, though, now that I think about it, because you're not an officer of the law. Right. And the Miranda rights specifically gives the right to remain silent around officers of the law. Yeah. But if that person seems like a canary, I think you can go and testify later if you want. You are a witness. You're not an officer of the law, and therefore that person has no right to remain silent. I mean, they cannot talk to you. Right. But the stuff that right against self incrimination that the Miranda rights give them does not apply to somebody telling a citizen that kind of thing. If the citizen wants to be a state witness, which you probably do, if you're sure, you're probably like, double whammy citizens arrest and state witness. And now I have to go on to witness identity protection for the rest of my life. We did an episode on that, too. Yeah. This is all part of our crime and punishment series, I guess. So the other thing that I saw almost across the board, I think, is that if you commit, or if you keep saying commit, it sounds like a crime. If you take part in the citizens arrest, you have to make your intention known and tell them what you are doing. Right. You can't just jump on someone and smash their face in the ground. You have to advertise. I am making a citizen's arrest. Now, according to crime fighters, there are some exceptions to that rule. Oh, really? If this is the commission of the crime, like, if that guy is sitting there and has shown at the shop owner and is like robbing somebody, you can jump on them then without saying that if they're fleeing the commission of the crime, supposedly you can jump on them without saying you're under arrest. And then apparently before the arrest was considered part and parcel to detainment. So, again, according to crime fighters, which again, I suspect is dubious, in a lot of cases before, you had to at least lightly touch the person while telling them that you were performing a citizen's arrest. Wow. And then apparently it was later on interpreted to not be the case. You could just inform somebody. So, Josh, we mentioned the one thing you have to do in almost all cases, unless you're literally breaking up a crime, that you have to tell them what you're doing. The other thing across the board is, as quickly as possible, you have to try and get the real police there very important, chuck, you can't just go, like, get your eyes examined yeah. Or hold someone for questioning. Like, don't start playing cop because you're not one. You need to immediately get a cop on the scene as fast as possible, and they recommend don't do that by putting them in your car and driving them down to the station. No, there's a couple of reasons for that. One is that your car is your own property, and you could conceivably be considered to be imprisoning those people in your car, like you're kidnapping. Whereas with a taxi, that's a public vehicle. And that kind of I would guess you could argue that that was a public vehicle. That these people got into you with. And then secondly, the other reason why you want to use a taxi is because if you're driving your own car, it's just the two of you and you're driving, whereas with a taxi, you're being driven around by somebody. But I wouldn't recommend a taxi either. In today's cell phone land, just get a cop there or just call Uber, which is funny. There's a guy who in Sydney, Australia, I think, where we're huge. I saw that he has been calling Uber cars, hiring Uber cars, and then citizens arresting the drivers because they're breaking the law by not being licensed taxi drivers. Yeah, it sounds like he's a lot of fun. Apart, when you Google citizens arrest and click on News, that was the first thing that comes up. It's like some Australian uber vigilante. Yeah. Wow. Hey, everybody. I don't know about you, but we're pretty excited about Summer. What's not to like? School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's right. And that's where True crime podcasts on Amazon Music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. Yeah, and with so many killer shows like Morbid, My Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. Prepare to go deep and become your own detective in the world of serial crimes and unsolved mysteries. Get lost hearing spooky stories with a combination of detailed research and lighthearted analysis. Whether you're a lifetime fan of True crime or you just feel like being entertained while doing the dishes at night, there's a podcast out there for you. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today. Only 45% of high school students feel they are prepared for college or careers. Stride career prep is helping change that. Stride Career Prep lets students take charge of their education and their future. By combining real world skills training and traditional academics. Students can earn college credit while in high school or get the training needed to land a job right after graduation. Stride Career Prep prepares your team for in demand careers in business, tech, health, science, criminal justice, and more. Students can take courses developed by industry professionals, prepare for certifications, get hands on experience, network, and most importantly, gain the confidence they need to succeed. Stride Career Prep is backed by over 20 plus years of experience in online learning and education. Take charge at K twelve. Compodcast that's K twelve.com podcast and start taking charge of your future today. All right, so your contention? Bad idea always just because there's too many X factors. I mean, when pro cops are on the scene bystanders get shot yeah. We're talking about people who are, for all intents and purposes, active vigilantes. I would guess that that would increase the not necessarily. I mean, an active vigilante is someone who prowls the streets, playing crime fighter. I would guess that most of the citizens arrests carried out in this country are by people like that. You think? People who are the head of neighborhood patrols, people who are yes. Prowling the streets. Well, there are a lot of George Zimmerman out there, for sure. Exactly. But I would be curious about statistics on people who are witnessing a crime and jump in and help. Okay. So to me, there's just too many X factors. Sure. And there's a lot of things that can go wrong, right? Yes. So, for example, when you walk up to somebody and say, I am performing at citizens arrest, touch them lightly. Right. Yeah. Or you don't have to do that anymore because I am charging you with snatching that purse. I just saw you do it, that person is probably going to be like, you're not a cop. Yeah. I doubt if they would say, well, you got me, you got me here's where you got zip ties on you, because I've got some if you don't. Right, exactly. Go ahead. That is probably not going to happen right now. If that doesn't happen and you say, I want to warn you, you're not coming with me, can lead to charges of resisting arrest, even though it's citizens arrested, which is true in a lot of cases. Yeah. That person say, well, why don't you grab me and see what happens? And when you do that, because you're a literalist, you grab them to see what happens and they stab you, which happens. It actually happened to four guardian angels. You know those guys, right. They're the professional citizens arrests. Exactly. They really are as close as you can come to being a pro. That is the Guardian angels. Yeah. And if it can go south on them, it can go south on you. Yeah. I read this really interesting article about them. They were formed in 1979 in New York, right? Yeah. We should do a show on them. That'd be great. Okay. But in the meantime, everybody should go read The Twilight of the Guardian Angels and I think narratively on that site. But it was really interesting. It started out as a McDonald's manager who's sick of crime in his neighborhood and recruited some of his other employees. I remember that guy. Like, I can still picture the main dude in my head. He's still around. Yeah. Because when we were kids, it was a big deal. Sure. Guardian angels. He's heard about it a lot. They're on talk show circuits. Right. It was a necessary thing in New York City. Yeah. They were on Sally, they were on Donahue. Yeah, they were on all of them. But as recently as 2012 in Chicago, four of them got stabbed when they were trying to arrest a person at your another guy came up and just. Started stabbing them. One of the guardian angels got stabbed in the head, another one in the ribs, and both suspects got away. Wow. So if the guardian angels as a group are getting stabbed, what do you think is going to happen to you when you walk up and say, I'm placing you under arrest? Come with me? Yeah, that's a good point. Okay, so there's .1 of why this is a bad idea. Well, .2 is kind of included in there. This person, you have no idea what kind of weapon they might have. You might see the weapon, and if it's like someone holding up a store or something, like Fast Times at Ridgemont High, which case you distract them, throw coffee on them. Oh, gnarly yeah. And you get away scot free. Right. I think you hire Van Halen to play your birthday party. Was it Van Halen? Yeah. But all kidding aside, very dangerous. Even if you don't see a weapon doesn't mean that you're scot free. And if you're one of those people who's like, I'm Dabney Coleman. I have, like, 24 hours to live, so I don't care if I die. Yeah. What about bystanders innocent bystanders on you? What if it's not a knife? What if it's a gun? Sure. A lot of moving parts that you have to take into account. And Even Crime Fighter says if you are thinking of performing a citizen's arrest, and there's a lot of people around, don't, because you have no idea how south it can go. You don't know if the person has a gun, and if so, if they're willing to shoot at you or anybody else who gets in their way. Again, unless you're seeing somebody in trouble, in real physical danger. Even Crime Fighters is like, maybe drop back and write their license plate number down or just call the cops. Right? Exactly. This is even crimefighters saying that. I know. And they're like those real life superheroes that prowl the streets at night with capes and masks. Oh, they're coming up in a minute. So another great reason to not do so is a little something we touched on earlier, which is you open yourself up to all manner of lawsuits. If you are mistaken, if things don't go well, if you end up injuring this person and they are innocent false imprisonment charges. Yeah. Kidnapping. You name it, man, you can be in big, big trouble pat down somebody the wrong way. Sexual assault. Yeah. Or just assault and battery, even your part. Right. Even verbal threats can lead to charges of assault and battery. That's right. Civil suits. You could be not only arrested, but you could have the pants suit off of you. Exactly. So that would be reason enough for me. Aside from the fact that I'm a pan. Anyways. Pacifist. And then lastly, Chuck. Yes. The whole thing opens you up to a possibility that is way more possible than the average time when you're just walking around the street, minding your own business of actually killing somebody. Yeah. George Zimmerman. Yes. And it's not just George Zimmerman. It happens with citizens arrests. Where there's a guy in San Jose in 2013, Ricardo Hernandez, he was trying to citizens arrest a suspected burglar named Christopher Soriano. They got into a fight over a gun that Hernandez had on him, and soriano died. So now Hernandez is going to prison for four years and has a head on him. Has a what on him? A head. He killed somebody. Oh, I've never heard that term. Sure. So that's a great point. Might end up killing someone. Do you really want to do that? Right, exactly. You got to think these things through. Yeah. There are very few people that I would entrust to perform a citizen's arrest in the right way. How about Phoenix Jones and his sidekick and wife, purple Rainbow, seattle real life superheroes. Oh, well, that's always a bad idea. They dress up and patrol the streets. He has his own YouTube channel. Yeah. There's dark guardian in New York City who hangs around Washington Square Park at night, where we did a live podcast. Yeah, there's a great documentary on the relocation superheroes Fraser Hawk in Minneapolis. Yes. They're all over, and they can be a problem. Sometimes it's just for fun, but it's not like the movie Kick Ass. It doesn't go down that way. Well, yeah. And even cops are like, do not do this. That's not a good idea. Yeah, we don't need your help, is what they're saying. Exactly. So crazy. Yeah. I wonder what happens when you try to perform a citizens arrest on a cop. I imagine that doesn't go well these days. I would guess it doesn't go well either. Yeah, I wouldn't advise that. No. Finally we come to this type of citizens. The rest that you advise not to do. No, I don't advise anyone to do it. Like I said, my brother in laws, I would entrust him to do a citizens arrest. Oh, yeah, I've met him. Yeah, I could see him doing a citizen's arrest. He's a marine, following books. Or when it goes south, like putting you, like, twisting your arm behind your back or your screaming uncle. Yeah, but even in his case, it can go south, you know? Yeah. It can go south in anybody's got a gun? He didn't see it, and then it's like it's all over for him. That's no good. No one wants that. That's right. See something, say something, not see something. Sit on them. Man, this episode is so fraught, it's crazy. I think the message is clear. Okay? If you want to know more about citizens arrest, you can go read the blog posts on it on STUFFYou knows.com. You can also just search citizens arrest and have hours of entertainment about and learn why you shouldn't do this kind of thing. As I said, you shouldn't do this. It's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this the film vault. Our buddy, Brian Bishop of The Adam Corolla Show? Yes. I emailed him back from this and said, this is just the worst kind of buzz marketing. Well, I'm going to take him to task on air. Brian, he works on The Adam Crowler Show, and he also has a podcast of his own called The Film Vault, which is great, and we'll give him a little plug, too. He also wrote a great book called Shrinkage Manhood, Marriage and the Tumor That Tried to Kill Me about his battle with cancer. That's right. Great book. So Brian took us to task, and he said, hey, guys, I was listening to a recent episode, and the subject of Hollywood remakes came up. You guys are correct in this because we bagged on pretty much all remakes. Or you did. Yes, you guys are correct in the sense that the vast majority are terrible. There are a few good, dare I say, great ones. However, we did an entire Film Vault episode on top five remakes, and here's my list with some honorable mentions. And I told them we will just take them to task right here. So number one on his list is what? I have a problem with Vanilla Sky. Yes. I didn't think that was a very good movie. When did they make that? Originally? It was a Spanish language movie, just like the year before. I can't remember the name of it. Dream. Open your eyes. I think in Spanish, whatever that is. Cameron Crow remakes, Vanilla Sky, and I didn't think it was that good. Got you. That was his number one. Have you seen Cameron Crow's latest movie? Aloha no, I don't want to, either. I used to love that. He was my hero. He's great. My filmmaking hero. I read this article. There was a poll of just like, a straw poll of movie critics around the Internet. Like, what? Directors let you down the most. Yes. And he was one of them that was listed because he was so great, and it's just gone so downhill, far and away. The guy with the most votes is M. Night Shyamalan. Yeah. One good movie, which we found out you like, they still love them in Philadelphia, we found out. That's right. All right. Number two, The Departed. I'm going to say yes for that. For sure. That was a think I Japanese movie okay. Called Infernal Affairs. That Square Saves You. Oh, yeah. Okay. A little shop of horrors. Honestly, I've never seen it, so I have no opinion. I didn't know they remade it. Casino Royale. Technically, I guess you could call that a remake. Yeah. Really? But, no, I guess it was it was the same plot. Was it the same plot? Yeah, for the most part. Oceans Eleven. I'll hand it to him there. I thought Oceans Eleven was a really good movie and a great remake. Okay. Yeah. And then, as honorable, mention the Italian job. I never saw it. You never saw the remake? No, I didn't either. No, I saw the remake. I never saw the original. Okay. It was not great. He was stretching with that one, the Fly. I didn't know the Fly had an original, so I'm going to go ahead and say great then, because cronenberg's, the Fly awesome. Yeah, man. The original Fly has Vincent Price in it, and it ends with the switch. That's the thing, right? So there's a human with a fly head freaky, and then there's a fly with a human head, and that fly gets trapped in the spider's web at the end, and it's got the most unsettling sound where it's like, hell me. Wow. It's really disconcerting. I just got, like, chill bumps. Very well done. I feel like we've done that before. And people wrote in were like, don't do the Fly impression. It's really unsettling. The Brindle Fly? No, the original or the original Fly? He has the Ring, of course. The original Japanese version. Ringgu, I believe. I wasn't a big fan of the Ring. It was fine. 310 to yuma. Pretty good Western. Pretty good remake, I'll give him that. Did you ever see the original for The Garage? I think it's called like Juan. No, dude. Good. Probably the best Japanese horror film of all time. Which is saying something. Yes, it is. It was so good. Prove me wrong, people. I'm always looking for a good horror movie. And if you have one that really topped you on not a different one, but one that is actually better than Juan, I want to know about it. All right. And then he finishes up the honorable mention list with Scarface, which just put that instead of Vanilla Sky and you've got a pretty decent top five. The Scarface is great. Sure. Brian De Palma's remake of I think that's been done a couple of times, if I'm not mistaken. Yeah. Jimmy Cagney was the first one, right? I think so. Jimmy Cagney and then Jimmy Stewart. Oh, yeah, fred McMurray. Brian goes to say this was back in 2010, so it may have been some good ones since then, actually. But just so you don't lose all hope that a remake can't be anything but awful, that is from our buddy Brian Bishop. Thanks, Brian. Who just recently threw out the first pitch professional baseball game way, and so did our friend Nick Thun. And I'm like, what are you going to do? I want to throw out a first pitch. What team? The Giants. It wasn't the Giants. Nick did it in Seattle, where he's from. So he got the field and he wore a full uniform and did the full wind up and look good. Brian did it at a Padres game, even though he's a Giants fan, and I think he said it went pretty well as well. He tells a story on the Adam Corolla show. That is awesome, man. Congratulations. I want to do that. Yes. I wonder if they let us do it together. Yeah, they've done it. Like the thing with two heads. No, they do that. They lined up like the Stanley Cup winners. Like five or six of those guys. And they all did it through at once. Or they all took turnstring. Or they had one to throw. They had five catchers and five hockey players. Cool. And they all threw it out at once. All right. So there's hope for us. Yeah. Just don't look like 50 Cent or Carl Lewis and you're all set. What do you mean? Those are two of the worst first pitches ever. Really happy. We would probably practice for a while. I would practice a lot. Yeah. Okay. Well, if you want to get in touch with us, to have us throw out the first pitch of your professional MLB teams game not minor league. Not interested. No. We are happy to do so. You can tweet to us at syskrodcast. You can join us on Facebook.com stuffyshonow. You can send us an email to stuff podcast@howstuffworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the Wizab stuffysheno.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstofworks.com. Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out. The sun is shining, the daylights longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. 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https://podcasts.howstuf…k-lobotomies.mp3	How Lobotomies Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-lobotomies-work	Lobotomies -- brain surgeries to relieve psychiatric problems -- are rarely performed today, but they were once fairly common. Tune in to learn more about the controversial history and practice of lobotomies in this podcast from HowStuffWorks.com.	Lobotomies -- brain surgeries to relieve psychiatric problems -- are rarely performed today, but they were once fairly common. Tune in to learn more about the controversial history and practice of lobotomies in this podcast from HowStuffWorks.com.	Tue, 19 May 2009 16:03:33 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2009, tm_mon=5, tm_mday=19, tm_hour=16, tm_min=3, tm_sec=33, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=139, tm_isdst=0)	30901047	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. It's called stuff you should know. It's Josh and Chuck Compton in Long Beach together. Now you know you're in trouble. What's up, Chuck? How long you been sitting on that one? That's good. Thanks, chuck, how are you doing? I'm well, sir. You? Pretty good. I'm feeling great, actually. Chuck. I am glad to be alive. Yes. So, Chuck yes. I think this could arguably pan out to be our greatest podcast ever. You just jinxed us. No, I really don't think so. Chuck did the cheek thing twice before this one. Just kind of not to do it a second time. And I don't think we've ever had a topic that Chuck and I were more intensely interested in than this one. I know. It kind of just came out of nowhere. And it's really well, not out of nowhere because it's historical, but in our eyes, out of nowhere. Funny, I say in our eyes. Yeah. Little foreshadowing from Charles Bryant. Nice one. Shock, if you will. Get off of lol catch for a second and go check your itunes. You'll find that the title of this one is How Lobotomies Work. Yes. And that's what we're going to be talking about. Or Lobotomy. So fascinating. It really is. Lobotomies kind of exist in this little segment of 20th century culture. Medical madness, I guess you could say. Right, right. And pop culture, because you still hear it being thrown around like boys lobotomize me. Scrambled my brain, but it's kind of exactly the way it happened. Yeah. So, Chuck, you're a lover of great cinema, right? Of course, of course. You've seen one flew over the cuckoo's nest, right? I have a poster. You do? Yeah. Good one. Yeah. The one of Jack Nicholson laughing with the watch cap on. Yeah, it's a good one. So, of course, you remember the pivotal scene in the movie where McMurphy is lobotomized for being unruly. He tries to kill Nurse Hatchet because Nurse Ratchet Hatchet that was a Freudian slip right there. It was. She was a hatchet. Yeah, she was mean. Oh, I'm totally with you. It was a Freudian slip part that got me. I had, like, eight jokes going in my head at once, and I was like, can't say that. Can't say that. I can't say that. Like the terminator scanning for possibly that's exactly right. Yeah. So he tries to kill Nurse Ratchet because she was a terrible nurse and kind of evil. Very evil. And so he gets lobotomized and they don't show the procedure. Don't worry. If you ever want to know what one was like, we're going to go into grizzly detail in a minute. And he comes out just kind of this drooling, imbecile awful. Which I have to remind everybody, was actually a medical term before it was imbecile, moron and idiot. Were all degrees of mental retardation. Wow. Isn't that weird? Yeah. Of course. At the same time that people were performing lobotomy. So it seems like very archaic, even though it wasn't that long ago. Yeah. Well, let's set the scene. Okay. Okay. All right. So we're talking the 1930s, right? And the 1930s were a terrible time to be nuts. Basically, you got locked up in a straight jacket to keep you from eating your own feces or throwing it at order leaves or doing anything really crazy, and that was about it. Right. They had certain techniques like shock therapy. Right. What did they use? They still use shock therapy here and there, actually. Well, you have, like, electroconvulsive therapy. Right. And apparently they also used to use insulin. Okay. Insulin, right. We know how bad that is from I can't remember one of our aging podcasts. Right, right. And they would basically inject a hefty dose of insulin into a patient to be okay. Chuck. Yeah. Okay. My paper wrestling was going to get the rapid jerry, they know we use crib sheets, buddy. Sure. So they inject a patient with a hefty dose of insulin and would basically shock their system, possibly causing convulsions. There was another drug was this just to subdue them? Hold on, I'm getting to that. This is the craziest part. This was the grasp that medical science had on mental illness at the time. Right. There's another drug called Metrozol, which was a respiratory and circulatory stimulant, and in hefty doses it to produce shock and convulsions. Wow. So if you'll notice, all three of these produce convulsions shock therapy. And the reason that they did that was because there was a suspicion that there was a link between epilepsy convulsions and mental illness, and that if you had one, you couldn't have the other. So by producing convulsions, they thought that they were treating mental illness. Wow. Unbelievable. Yeah. So you could have just had epilepsy and that they would sit you in the electrode, convulsive, shock therapy chair, and to treat you yeah. They'd stick a little paddle in your mouth and turn on the juice. Tell you what, man, like, I sometimes look back and say, boy, the 1950s, that would have been cool to look back then. But then you hear stories like this and you kind of forget about the downside. Yeah. ECT is definitely one of the downsides of this era. Right. So another problem with this is that the mental care wow. Have you had a lobotomy? I had a little bit of one, yeah. No, I had some metrosal earlier. I'm all jacked up the state of mental hospitals in the US in the that they were overcrowded. Right. Because if you can't treat anybody, really, you can't treat their mental illness. Once they come in, they're in. Yeah. They wanted docile patients. They wanted people that didn't cause trouble, and really, any way that they could get there was kind of okay, at the time. Right. And this was also before drug therapy was created. Right. So in the this new procedure comes about. Right. Well, 1935, I thought it was 36 in Portugal. Sorry about that. That's was Doctor Antonio Agas Monice. Nice. And Dr. Almida Lima in Portugal performed the first lobotomies by drilling holes into the skull on either side of the prefrontal cortex and injecting alcohol in there to destroy the fibers. Okay. Disconnected it. And this was actually based on an earlier study from 1933 by a couple of Yale researchers who removed the prefrontal cortexes from a pair of monkeys. Yeah. Lucian was the other one. Binky will say. Okay. Lucy's and Binkie. Yeah. These two monkeys had their prefrontal core Texas removed. And the researchers found that they still had intellect, but they were lacking the emotion that led to violent outbursts when they didn't get their way. Yeah. Becky, by the way, I like Binkie better. Can we stay with Binky? Sure. Okay. So the doctor fulton carlyle oh, no. You're going back to Portugal. Yeah. Dr. Monise? Yes. Saw Fulton present one of the Yale researchers saw Fulton present his findings, and he thought, my mental patients act like monkeys in a violent outburst when they see things that aren't really there. Right. So let me get my hands on a cadaver and see what I can work out with the brain. So this early, that was called the prefrontal lobotomy. Right. Started out, like you said, by drilling holes in the skull and adding alcohol. And the whole reason why Chuck, the prefrontal cortex, why the funnel lobe? What's so important about that? Well, the prefrontal lobe cortex, Josh, has a number of complex functions called executive functions is what they're known as. We're talking high level decision making, planning, reasoning, understanding, personality, personal expression, that kind of thing. So basically, your personality, the way you create things, the way you see the world and how you react to the world, the emotions. Right. This is all generated here. It originates in the prefrontal cord. And you are stabbing the front of your head right now. Thanks. And so as we all know that the brain is connected. It's all connected together, sending and receiving signals like mass, email. And so what you have here, you got two types of matter, gray and white matter. Gray matter includes neurons and brain cells and blood vessels and things like that. White matter is axons and nerve fibers, and they connect the gray matter and carry messages with electric impulses. When gray matter is where these impulses are generated, the white matter translates them or transfers them. Yeah. Transmits. It transmits, sure. One of the trans. So, lobotomy, what that does is it's intended to sever the white matter between the different areas of gray matter, thus interrupting the transmission, essentially. Right. And the problem with Dr. Monise's technique, the early technique using alcohol is, like you said, the brain is all connected and alcohol being a liquid is kind of hard to keep in one place. So it started to go and destroy other areas of the brain. Right. Not a very good idea. But he was onto something. He was onto something by destroying the white matter. Right. Yes. So instead he decided to be a little more precise, and he kept with the hole drilling method, which is actually based on ancient, ancient method of brain surgery called trepination. Right. Which actually I'm going to be in trouble here. We had a fan right in and suggest trepination. And that's what got me on lobotomies in the first place, and I apologize. So if you're out there listening oh, you don't remember the fan name. Thank you. Nameless fan. We love you, Binky. Thanks. Binky. Yes. Or Becky. Yeah. And actually, in the article How Lobotomies Work, there's a cool relief from a Haronomous Bach painting of some early physician trapanning a patient, and he's got like a little segment of the skull lifted off and the brain is exposed and he's just poking around in there, but okay. So Doctor Monice is still using the drilling method, but now he's inserting instruments in there. He inserted this one that sounded like it's a handle with a little loopy wire that comes out, but it attracts Luca Tom. Yeah. So when you push down the back of it, the loop extends out, and then you can pull it in and just basically remove hunks of prefrontal cortex of white matter. Right. And that's exactly what hopefully white matter. Yeah. You would say. And it was successful, right? Well, yeah, sure. Again, to varying degrees. And maybe not again, because I think that's the first time we said that. But yeah, the lobotomy was successful to varying degrees. Very varying degrees. But there was this guy who went and saw Dr. Monise perform one of these. Yeah, this work gets good. And this guy was named Dr. Walter Freeman. And for probably about 50,000 people in the US. Alone, this meeting between these two men was the worst thing that ever happened in the history of humanity. Right. Because it's about how many people were lobotomized for over about a seven year period in the US. Was it just seven years? Yeah. Wow. Okay. Heavy work. So then there was many, many more, actually. But yeah, dr. Walter Freeman became an immediate evangelist. He was called for lobotomy. Right. He tried Monise's technique with a partner and did it successfully for a while. But the problem is it was still surgery. It required a surgeon to do it operating room. Right. And Freeman was actually not a neurosurgeon. He was a neurologist. It required anesthetic. Yeah. So there were some drawbacks to it, in Freeman's opinion. Right. Expense being one of them. Time and resources. So he created something that was a lot handier, a lot easier and a lot quicker. And that is what we call the trans orbital or ice pick lobotomy. Right. Got you. Can I say what this is? Yes. He determined that if you took something which is technically called an orbitoclast, but it really looks sort of like an ice pick. You said it yesterday on our webcast. It's an ice pick. Yes. Call it a rose by any other name. Exactly. So you put this ice pick over the eyeball, but under the bone there, what's that called? Between the eyeball and the eyelid? The eyeball. Until the back of the orbital bone. Right. So once you get to the back of the orbital bone, there's a little resistance there because it's bone. So enter a little silver hammer and so he just pinks on that thing until it cracks through. And then he's got a pretty clean passageway to the frontal cortex. And so you've got an ice pick sticking out of your eye. He scrambles it up a little bit once it's in there, and then he does the same thing on the other side. Yes. Ten minutes later, you're lobotomized, literally. So he do both sides. Right? Right. He got kind of good at this. Doctor Freeman got really, I guess you could say, good at this, or at least very fast. In one two week period in West Virginia, he performed lobotomies on 228 people. And in one day, he performed lobotomies on 25 patients. Right. In one day. In one day. So he's just basically bringing them in and sending them out. He's exactly doing that. Actually. I read an interview with one of his assistants at the time, and he said he would literally not take breaks as the patient left. Another one would be brought in ten minutes later. Boom. And I don't think we mentioned yet, before he does this, he doesn't use anesthetic, he knocks him out with electroshock. Right. So it's making use of two extremely primitive and violent techniques right. Every time. And the result was, like we said, varied. I mean, it ranged anywhere from people being satisfied and seemingly successful, like highly emotional people, suicidal, all of a sudden being more docile and not so worried to death. And people rendered vegetables literally. Follow the map. Dr. Freeman actually referred to lobotomies informally as soul surgery. Yeah. I hate that. The reason why is because he was basically removing what makes us human. People could still function under a successful autumn. People could still function. They could still talk. Right. They weren't doing anything. They weren't bringing anything to the table. There was no reason for them to exist so much anymore. For the personality surgery. Exactly. Right. And he did it again so fast, so often. And he had a touch of a showman to him that he basically did. He had a bottomobile in which he performed demonstrations. Right. He toured the country, went all over the place. I think he ended up doing estimates run from 2000 to 5000. Between 1946 and 1967, trans orbital lobotomies in 23 states in the US. Right. Right. He'd perform with both hands. He would stick the ice picks in with both hands at once to add a little flare. Showmanship. Yeah. So he was basically performing shows, lobotomy shows. And not everybody reacted well to these. Right. Seasoned surgeons who had seen tons of gore and blood and horrible things in their lifetimes would vomit watching these things. Some had to leave. There was a nurse whose account I read of watching a lobotomy, said when he moved the ice picks back and forth, it made the sound of tearing cloth later on in the USSR, which actually banned lobotomies. And I think before we did, which was embarrassing. Yeah. Well, 14 years before we did. Right? Yeah. A Physician Named Nikolai or Seriesky or Cereski. Thanks, dude. O cereski. O sireski. He said that lobotomies violate the principles of humanity and change an insane person into an idiot. Again. Remember a medical term at the time? Sure. I imagine that there was something that affected you. Were you a human being? Like a real human being. Right. Seeing this this rough, violent, misguided, or unguided procedure being performed, that it would affect you in some way, like some very primal part of you would say, that's not supposed to happen. Right. Plus, there was no official scientific basis for this. It was basically, hey, look at the result in some cases. Right. That is what they were kind of basing this whole thing on. And also, as we were saying about Freeman being a showman and doing it so fast, there was one visit to a mental institution in Iowa. I don't remember what year it was, but Freeman killed three people in one visit. And one of the people this is so awful. He was doing his little show off thing with the two picks at once instead of as his own procedure dictated one. And then the other side, he was doing two picks at once. So the patient's on the table with two ice picks sticking out of his eyes, and Freeman says, I'm going to take a photo of this, steps back to take a photo, one of the ice pick slips and kills the patient instantly. Right. So apparently, Freeman was said to have basically just packed up right then and moved on to the next place without missing a beat or saying, geez, that's thing packed up the lobotomobile. Yeah. And hit the button. You know, one person he lobotomized, Josh. I know you do. He lobotomized. John F. Kennedy's, sister Rosemary dr. Freeman did in 1941. Rosemary was 23 years old, and early on in her childhood, she was shy and easy going, they say. But as a teenager, shocker. She became rebellious and moody. And that's what struck me in a lot of these cases, is so many of them were just normal human emotions, like anything from postpartum depression to an overactive child. It's just unbelievable. Right. So she was lobotomized and afterward was rendered. Basically, she couldn't speak. She had the mental capacity of an infant, couldn't control her bodily functions. And the Kennedy family, basically, from that point on, said that she was mentally retarded, which they claim that she may have been before, but who knows? You want to talk about another guy? Howie Chuck and I have a shared hero. He is an indomitable, 350 pound, six foot three bus driver who has this gentle, tender personality. Right. His name is Howard Doley. And at the age of twelve, Howard Doley met Doctor Freeman under unfortunate circumstances. Meaning Doctor Freeman had a couple of ice picks on them when they met. Right. And Howard ended up under Freeman's care because of his stepmother. Right. Chuck? Yeah. It was kind of the classic story. The father gets remarried to a stepmother who is not very patient and understanding with her son. That sounds like he may have been a little Ryan Bunker, but what twelve year old boy isn't? And I think you have some good notes, actual notes. Yeah. Well, in Freeman's notes that Dolby turned up later, and we should say Howard Doley created this great radio piece that saw an MPR you can actually find by typing in my lobotomy and Google. I think it's the first thing that comes up. Right. It's one of the most amazing things you've ever heard, where he just goes and retraces the steps of his lobotomy that he got when he was twelve and tries to get to the bottom of what happened. We typically don't recommend people go listen to other things. That's not us. But that's how good it is. Right? Yeah, exactly. It is that good. It's way better than us, actually. But he finds Dr. Freeman's notes on his case, and apparently his stepmother played her case to get him lobotomized by pointing out that he daydreams a lot. And when you ask him what he's daydreaming about, he says, I don't know. Right. He doesn't want to go to bed. And when he does, he sleeps well. And my personal favorite, he turns on the lights in rooms when there's broad daylight streaming in. Unbelievable. I know. That kid deserves a lobotomy. Yes. But one of the things, I think one of the reasons why you and I both look up to Howard Daley was because he has wondered his whole life how different would he be? Right. I lived hard and fast as a younger man. Right. And I've also had calm days now right here, old days, actually way harder and faster. But I've often wondered how much sharper would I be had I not lived like that? Right. This is my own doing. It was my own choosing. Sure. Howard Dolby had to think that same thing, like, is there something wrong with me? Is there a part of me missing through no choice or fault of his own? We should also say that when Howard's stepmother found that he was not a vegetable. She just got him out of the house and he became a ward of the state. Yeah. So he went to an all around lady again. In the end, he finds there really isn't something wrong with him. He's a pretty terrific person, as it turned out, lobotomy or not. Right. It took him a long time, though. I mean, he battled addiction and various forms of mental illness his whole life after this, and I think going this special that aired. And he wrote a book and went and talked to his father. After 40 years, he actually finally spoke to his dad about it. And that seems to have been the thing to get him over the edge, to not feeling like a freak anymore, as he called it. Yeah, you can actually hear him working it out in my lobotomy. Yeah. A big, deep voice. Yeah. He sounds kind of like not Sam Shepard. What's the guy? Big Lebowski. Sam Elliot. Sam Elliot. Yeah. That's what it reminded me of. The dude. Yes. He also had that big mustache, too. Sort of like family. Yeah. That handlebar biker mustache. Right. So, Chuck, whatever happened to lobotomies? Why did they go the way of the dinosaur disco? Well, a couple of reasons. I mean, one, there was a lot of gaining steam with the criticism of it because they found that they were lobotomizing criminals. They were lobotomizing soldiers from World War II because criminals against their will sometimes. Right. But they lobotomize soldiers because hospitals were overcrowded veterans. Unbelievable. And so that was kind of gaining steam. And then the introduction of Thorazine basically was kind of Thorazine at all. Everything, I believe that somebody said that Thorazine was to the treatment of schizophrenia. That insulin, I'm sorry, that penicillin was to the treatment of infectious diseases. Which is a pretty big comparison. Yeah, big time. So Thorazine was developed in 1950, and as it began to fall into widespread use, lobotomies kind of fell out of widespread use. And Dr. Freeman himself, he had one last lobotomy in 1967, right? Yeah. He killed a woman with a brain hemorrhage after the third try. I think this is her third lobotomy. And she wasn't just some mental patient in Iowa. This is a housewife. And when she died of, I believe, hemorrhage, after the procedure, that third procedure, that was it. He was banned from surgery, performing any kind of surgery from that point on, and actually spent the rest of his days until he died in 1972, traveling the country in a camper with a wonderful if it was his lobotomobile. Yes. I don't know. He wasn't pitching it. He was actually going around trying to find he was visiting old patients to prove that he had done good. And he had done some good in a couple of cases. In several cases. I imagine his first one was a woman. I can't remember first name, but it was inevitable. And she was violently suicidal, as described by her daughter, and afterwards she went on to live a happy, fulfilled life. Yeah, but every successful case I read about, they would say things like they weren't violently suicidal anymore and they were just kind of happy. But it still seemed to be that lights are on, but no one's home thing. Like the couple I got. Robert Palmer, of you. Yeah, the married couple. The husband had his wife lobotomized because she was so emotional. She was suicidal as well. Yeah. And she says that she is happy as a clam. And he was satisfied. He said that she came home and she never caused any more trouble and she was just happy. And she could still back talk. Yeah. She could still cook and clean and do all the things she could do before, and she agreed. I just haven't been worried about things since then. And she was in her 80s. But you read that emotions are normal, mood swings are normal. Agreed. But I do think that there is a certain threshold and if you're violently suicidal, maybe a lobotomy was a better option. Yeah. But I also want to know what the criteria for all this was back then. There wasn't any. Put that in your pipe and smoke. One of the most unsettling things that I found from this article is that lobotomies are still performed today in England. Right. The UK is one of the few countries where it's no longer called lobotomies because lobotomy has such a horrible stigma attached to it. For good reason. Neurosurgery for a mental disorder, NMD. And today, apparently, they use MRIs as guides, to be more precise. But pretty much this type of surgery, psychosurgery as it's called, is pretty much the same thing. It's destroying white matter connections and you're removing people's emotional selves. Right. I mean, there may be something to that, but certainly it was so non specific and non technical to jam ice picks and just blindly move them back and forth. But no wonder there was all kinds of results. Yeah. So, Chuck, we are both kind of nuts, and I'm really glad it's not like 1946, because we are in big trouble. Yes. My wife Emily and I would both be on the lobotomy table. I think I drive you to the Freeman. Thanks. Sure. I appreciate that. Yeah. Well, that's it. That's it for lobotomies, buddy. Yeah, I encourage people to go out and listen to Howard Dulley's radio show there. It's really great. Okay, hopefully you guys enjoyed this one. You can read all about lobotomies on how stuff works.com. You know what to do, handy search, bar, et cetera. And Chuck, let's talk some audible stuff. Our sponsor, Audible.com. Hit it. Okay, so if everyone goes to www. Dot. Audiblepocast. comStuff and sign up to get one free download from Audible.com. 50,000 plus titles of audiobooks, stand up comedy, spoken word speeches. Pretty much anything you can listen to is right there. Yeah. And I was on there browsing just this morning and I found one of my all time favorite books, 1491 by Charles Man. Good one. Great one. Man runs around the Americas, basically to archeological sites and gets the scoop on the most recent findings and finds that there were way more people in the Americas before Columbus showed up than we realized. Really? And, yeah, there's a lag between the arrival of Columbus to hispaniola and the second wave that followed within the next 50 years, the second wave found that was virgin territory. There's almost no one there. Turns out it's because about 100 million people died of smallpox from Columbus first arrival. Wow. Between then and the second wave, it's fascinating. That's a mini so right there. You just did one. Maybe we'll do a bigger sewed on it. A bigger sod, yeah. What about you? You've been on yes. I'm going to recommend, just quickly, steven Colbert of the Colbert Rapport. Nice. Oh, I saw his portrait. His National Gallery portrait. Sony. Recently. It was awesome. With his familiar scowl. Yeah, I love that guy. So, yeah, he has a very popular book that he reads himself called I'm an American and So Can You. And that's all I need to say about that. It's hysterical. Nice to check. So you can get either one of those titles for free by going to www. Dot. Audiblepocast. Comstining up. And that is audible right there, baby. Let's do a listener mail. Let's do it. Josh, I'm just going to call this we got a lot of great feedback for the high fructose corn syrup. Yeah, we're going to have probably like three podcasts in a row. We're going to be reading some of the mail. Really? We should I can bring back Tycoons. Okay. All right. So I'm just going to call the intelligent listener mail because Max is a smart guy and I like these most of all. I'm a graduating senior in the business college, but when I'm not in class or listening to podcasts, I almost always enjoy listening to philosophy. It's more or less my passion. More specifically, I'm interested in world religion, metaphysical theory, and man's relationship to nature in the universe. So this guy is obviously smarter than we are. Heavy to say that fructose corn syrup or any other man made chemical compound does not occur naturally. You're speaking with a basic assumption that man is something different than nature. Unfortunately, for those who can find themselves above nature and importance or authority, this is not the case. It's our Western culture and religion that strengthens his point of view. Man didn't plop into nature as a separate and flawed phenomenon in a stupid natural universe. Man came out of nature. Man is nature. Man is the universe. To borrow a quote from my favorite philosopher, Alan Watts, and you're seeing, you're hearing, you're talking, you're thinking, you're moving, you express that which it is, which moves the. Sun and other stars. So to perceive yourself as something different is only an inability to identify yourself with the cosmos. So, Josh Man's manipulation of compounds is really the world's manipulation of itself, or perhaps the universe manipulating itself. And that is certainly a natural occurrence. Boom. And that is what happens when I out handedly. Say something is handmade, right? Nice. Well, what's the guy's name? Max. And I did my philosophy, too, so I thought it was kind of cool. We dig you, Max. And we really dig anybody who sends us something, especially if it's as intelligent as that. If you want to show off your ginormous brain, send us an email to stuffpodcast@howstepws.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseworks.com. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out. The sun is shining, the daylights longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music, My Favorite Murder from Exactly Right media, My Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgueref and Georgia Hardstark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to news. Two episodes of my favorite murder one week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…29-sysk-aclu.mp3	How the ACLU Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-aclu-works	Being a card-carrying member of the ACLU is tantamount to being a super liberal to some, but the ACLU ultimately displays no allegiance to any political philosophy, only to whomever's Constitutional rights are being infringed upon, from Nazis to the NAACP	Being a card-carrying member of the ACLU is tantamount to being a super liberal to some, but the ACLU ultimately displays no allegiance to any political philosophy, only to whomever's Constitutional rights are being infringed upon, from Nazis to the NAACP	Tue, 29 Apr 2014 13:18:29 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2014, tm_mon=4, tm_mday=29, tm_hour=13, tm_min=18, tm_sec=29, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=119, tm_isdst=0)	41910091	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clarke. There's Charles Derby. Chuck Bryant. Jerry's there. She just yawned. Yeah. This is stuff you should know. Yea. If you like this, you can hang out with us on social media, too, Chuck. They can. Yeah. We're on Instagram now, which is exciting. Yes. And we are on Pinterest now, which is exciting. We have our Twitter account, of course. Our venerable Facebook page. Yeah. And our home on the web, stuffysheno.com, where we have all sorts of cool content. Yeah. And you can find all that stuff by typing in SYSK or Josh and Chuck or stuff you should know. And it'll bring up all that stuff. Fun stuff. It is fun. You know what else is fun? What? Freedom of expression. That's right, buddy. Yeah. You know why? Because freedom can't protect itself. Is that right? I think that was the slogan at one point. It may still be American civil liberties. Union. I thought it was. Get bent. That's funny. It is a controversial organization. Yeah. My heart goes out to them. I love them in the same way that I love the inflammation from a laceration. Like, I'm healing. I know it's good for me, but it burns and hurts and it's bright red and raised. Right. I know what you mean. Like, sure. Defend the Ku Klux Klan because they're Americans too. Yeah. What age did you realize it wasn't Ku Klux Klan? I think I was 37. Really? No, but I did used to think it was Ku Klux. Everybody did. It just rolls off the tongue more. Yeah, but then you turn like, ten or eleven or whatever, and finally your dad is like, It's Ku Klux Klan. And then shortly after that, you realize they're just a bunch of rednecks with too much time on their hands. Oh, yeah. I can't remember what episode we talked about, but we're like, Everybody hates the clan here in America, just to let you guys who are listening internationally know. You remember that? Yeah. That's one of the ones I feel safe about. Like, no one's going to write it and say, well, I don't want to hear your opinions about the clan. You know who may who the ACLU. That's good point. Yeah. No, they will defend my right to say that actually. Right. But they'll also defend the clan's right to rally against you saying that they've actually done it before. What's? The famous Onion headline. ACLU defends clans right to burn down ACLU building. Yeah, it's pretty funny. That's great stuff. All right, the Onion. I looked to see if that was a Joe Randazzo joint, and, unfortunate, came about three years before Joe got there. Still good. So, Chuck, you sent me a pretty interesting little article that I think kind of illustrates the bipolarity, maybe as the ACLU, but as we'll find they're really unipolar, although they seem too faced. Yes. We're going to get to the bottom of all this. Yes. And again, I like the ACLU, all right? I don't care what anybody says, all right? So there's a little boy in Cannon County, Tennessee, and he was part of the Reach after school program rech. It's an acronym that I didn't bother to look up, so I'm kind of slack. It starts with reading. I bet. I'll bet it does, too. And it's an after school program. Yeah. And this little boy was reading at this probably reading based after school program, and he's reading his Bible. And one of the staff workers said, you can't read that here. You can read anything else in the world that you want. You can't read your Bible. Right. She said, or I was assuming it's she, but he maybe said, our program can be shut down because this is a state run program, state funded, and we can't have this intermingling between church and state. First of all, this is Tennessee. That somebody's saying that. Secondly, they tried to take the boy's Bible away because he refused to put it up. He said, no, I'm reading this. This is what I want to read. And there is a big kerfuffle and the ACLU stepped in and is defending this boy's right to read his Bible in church because it's in school, because it's freedom of expression. Yes. The same ACLU who has long fought to not have state and school sponsored religious readings, even saying, like, God bless this class of 2014 ACLU would say, I'd be like, yeah, give us some money. So, like you said, it seems like a contradiction is actually not a contradiction, because they were doing the same thing. They were fighting for someone's right. To express something or read something on their own. Right. Because it's guaranteed by the Constitution. Yes. It doesn't matter if it's unpopular. No, they're going to defend you. Right. As a minority of sorts, or a single individual or a large group. It doesn't matter. As long as somebody's saying like, no, you're not allowed to assemble, you're not allowed to say that. You're not allowed to think that you're not allowed to do anything guaranteed by the Constitution or the Bill of Rights. The ACLU, by their charter, will step in and defend you in your rights, whether they think you're the vilest person on the planet or not. Yes. Hold on, I want to defend myself. I wasn't saying bipolar in the sense of the mental disorder. Right? Bipolarity can refer to all sorts of stuff. Sure. I didn't mean it in that sense at all. Okay, that's good to point out. They are all over the map. But generally they handle cases of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, privacy rights. But again, they will take up and we'll see what kind of cases, like how you can get your case taken up by the ACLU later on. Right. But they handle about 6000 court cases a year they are a nonprofit. They provide legal aid, and there are about 500,000 members, card carrying members, and about 200 full time staff attorneys. Not bad at this point. And there's a national chapter, and then there's state chapters. It's not state and local. It's the state. Right. Yeah. Each state has its own organization, and they don't often always agree with the national chapters, and they have to work it out. And the states are given rights to work it out. Yeah. So, Chuck, let's talk about this. Why, if the ACLU is defending people's rights that are guaranteed by the Constitution, everybody loves the Founding Fathers. Democrats, Republicans, Commies. Everybody loves the Founding Fathers. Right. And the Founding Fathers created this great Constitution and then further created this wonderful Bill of Rights, and everybody's happy about it. Yeah. Why would everybody hate the ACLU if they're just defending people's rights as guaranteed by the Constitution? Well, because their view is we have to defend everyone, not just pick and choose. So they end up having to defend neo Nazis and Klansmen and religious zealots and pornographers. Yeah. Like, people on the extreme fringes, they still have rights in this country, as unpopular as it may be. And the ACLU fights for those rights, and a lot of people hate them because of it. Yeah, it's true. But as we'll see, some people who hate them also love them when the ACLU comes around to their side to defend them when they get screwed over. Yeah. They're very polarizing. Again, my hat is off to this organization. It's hard to do something unpopular and to say you feel like it's right to walk a line, too, which walk this line, and it's this line that it adheres. It's like, oh, man. What is the guy the safety crusader? Nader. Yeah, Nader. He's like, the ACLU. He was like, this is right. This is the right course. And if we veer off of it, then we're wrong. If you're not on this line, you're wrong. And he used that kind of thinking to get seatbelts instituted and all this stuff, but he was very unpopular. Many times, people who used to be colleagues and cohorts with him, like, when they stopped seeing eye to eye with them, he would speak out publicly against them. And the ACLU is very much like that. It's like this is right. It's black and white. You are allowed to say this, and if somebody tells you you can't, then we intervene on your behalf. Yeah. With the idea that if the government is allowed to restrict the rights of some group that they don't like, that could lead down the rabbit hole to restricting other groups. And you just can't allow that in a free country. That's precisely right. So I think we've gotten the point across about the ACLU this third time out. Yeah. Let's talk about the history of this organization. Yeah, it's pretty cool. It started during World War One. There was a group in New York called the Henry Street Peace Committee in 1915, and they were little sissy pacifists who didn't want to go to war, and they spoke out against it and formed the American Communion Against Militarism. And we're talking newsletters, magazine ads, leaflets. Leaflets and newsletters. Yeah. But that wasn't a popular thing back then, nor is it today. If you don't support wars generally in certain circles, you are thought of to be unpatriotic. Yeah. It's a lot different today, though, than it was before. Like those people that protest at Peach Tree 14th. That's like calling square every Friday. Like one of the Indigo Girls shows up once in a while, the people are honking their support. They're not going to jail. Yeah. It is different in this era. These people who are sending out leaflets, it sounds so innocuous. They went to jail. Yeah. The Palmer Raids in the United States less than 100 years ago, if you said anything that was considered anti government or anti war, you went to jail for up to maybe 20 years sometimes. Yeah. Attorney General Mitchell Palmer conducted the Palmer Raids, which basically rounded up and deported whoever they thought was a radical. Thousands of people, no warrants, no due process. It was just sort of like, you're coming with me, you anti war pacifist. Kami in waiting. Yeah, and that's a good point, too. There was a lot of socialists, there were a lot of communists, there were a lot of anarchists, a lot of Marxists, a lot of people who were advocating and advocating, too, for other economic and government models. Right. The pacifists weren't necessarily I mean, they may have had something in common with those people, and some of the pacifists might have been marched and vice versa. But the pacifists were just anti war. Some of them were like, the US has no business intervening in what amounts to a European war. Other people say war is a terrible thing and I object to it outright on its basis. They're pacifists. And the pacifists, too, would get rounded up and taken to jail. Yeah. And like you said, without due process, without any kind of their rights were taken away. And then the Sedition Act in 1918, where the US passed a law that said if you speak out against the government, against the war effort, if you say we shouldn't be producing as much rubber, well, we need rubber for the war effort, so we can throw you in jail for up to 20 years, man. And in 20 years, that's 20 years is different back then, in 20 years, in 2012 years, because that's like in 19, 98, 20 years for the average lifespan, it was 27% of your life. In 1918, that was 55% of your life, thanks to the flu epidemic. So that was a lot of years to go to prison. Sure. I mean, that's still a lot of years to go to prison. But I see what you mean, but it's in the context of this that these people were organizing and saying, no, we're not just going to shut up. We're going to keep doing what we're doing, and we're going to come after you. Government that's using repression. So if you admire the ACLU today for any sort of bravery, if you take it back to the original organization, these were genuinely brave people who are willing to face not just being unpopular, but going to prison for 20 years for fighting for freedoms that are guaranteed in the Constitution. Yeah. And fighting against war in general. Yes. A couple of those people are the founders, crystal Eastman and Roger Baldwin. There are social workers and big supporters of the labor movement. And they founded the A UAM. Like I said, the American Union against Militarism. And they started assisting legally with some of these cases, which was kind of the first steps of what would later become the ACLU was legal support right there, which is the key. The Civil Liberties Bureau. Yes. Which is like a subset of the A UAM, where basically it was like if you got sent to jail for handing out leaflets or something, they would come and assist you with your court case. Yeah, well, that wasn't alongside that followed the A UAM split, and then the NCLB rose in its place. I got you, which was good. Baldwin went to jail for a year for not complying with his draft notice, got released, set up a different NCLB, now called the American Civil Liberties Union. So in Ernest, it was born on January 19, 1920. Is it like the day he got out or something? I don't know if it's the day he got out, but it was basically just the restructured version of the National Civil Liberties Bureau. Yeah. And initially they were thinking, well, we'll just keep up with the leaflets. They seem to be working. Right. How about a newsletter, too? Leaflets never worked, by the way. Right. But also, like, staging protest strikes, just getting publicity to try to have an impact on the prevailing American sympathies towards the idea of pacifism or whatever. Yes. They weren't just suing people out of the gate. No. And the reason why they stayed out of the courts in general is because at the time, the courts were overtly hostile to the idea of freedom of speech, especially, but other constitutionally guaranteed protections. The Supreme Court would just say, no, we don't like what you have to say, and the rest of America doesn't, so we're upholding your conviction for saying that the war is bad. Yeah, it was weird. Like, literally up until the 1920s, most of the civil liberties granted us to us were not tested even because the Supreme Court would shoot it down. Right. Like, whenever they tried, they would just say, no, you don't have those rights after all. You know something that I'm curious about? I wonder if there's a correlation because this is also like the end of the Gilded Age, but there was also a lot of very wealthy, powerful interests and the income gap was pretty substantial back then. And I wonder if, like it is now, with the income gap growing, if there's a correlation between income and inequality and a repression of freedom of speech and privacy and things like that. I wonder if the two are related. Sounds like a book in the making, my friend. No question. Too much work. All right, well, I guess we should talk about some of their most famous early cases. Let's do that. Let's take a little break first. Okay. All right. So early on, like we said, the Supreme Court hadn't been challenged that much in cases like these. And when they did, they weren't too kind to free speech. That's so crazy. It is weird to think of now, for sure. But in the 1930s is when the ACLU began to kind of make a little headway kind of against the Supreme Court. Yes. Well, they started to win smaller cases that didn't have to go to the Supreme Court. And it was kind of like death of repression by 1000 paper cuts, you know what I mean? Yeah. So, like, all those little cases started to add up where it was like some change to the law in Louisville, Kentucky didn't really have much effect in Missouri, but then they won a case in Missouri. And then if you started to step back and look at it on a map, you're like, oh, all of a sudden, the balance is swinging the other direction. Yeah, but when they did win big Supreme Court cases, they were huge Supreme Court cases. I mean, like some of the most important cases of the 20th century, the ACLU has either been directly or indirectly involved in, like, the Scopes Bunkee trial. That was a big one. Yeah. And we've talked a lot about evolution lately and we didn't cover Scopes at all. But in Tennessee, there was a law banning teaching evolution in 1925. And so the ACLU went out and found a biology teacher named John Scopes, said, hey, we would like you to teach evolution, and let's see what happens. And he was prosecuted. And the ACLU got together with the famous attorney Clarence Darrow to defend him. And he was still found guilty even though that verdict was overturned later because of a sentencing error. So the ACLU lost. They lost. But it made big headlines and was really sort of one of the turning points in establishing academic freedom in this country. Yeah. And I think not just as far as the ACLU goes, but anyone who's kind of trying to make a change in the nation. I think one way to do that is to just get people talking about it. Because I think a lot of people, especially if they're in the majority or they hold the majority view make the oftentimes incorrect assumption that everybody else holds the same view too. And I think just if you're just confronted by an opposing point of view, just knowing that it's out there, whether you agree with it or not, can kind of make you reflect and think about the views you hold too, and why you hold them and whether they're good views or not. Right. The impression I have of the case is that it got people talking. Right. And it made people who agreed with not teaching evolution realize like, whoa, not everybody thinks the same way I do. Yeah, ideally. So your proponents are going to say that they feel you're defending their watchdog, protecting everyone's civil liberties, whereas people who poopoo it say they're really a left wing organization and they subvert the Constitution and they protect criminals and they attack religion and they have an extremist agenda. So those are sort of the two sides of the argument. The thing is though, is like if you go back over their history, okay, this article points out the perfect example. Which one? The one where in the ACLU defended both the NAACP and blacks rights to enfranchisement and just equal treatment and basically civil rights. And while at the same time, during these same years, the ACLU is also defending the Ku Klix clan and its right to assemble and speak out against black rights. Yeah, that was the skokie. No, this was long before Skokie. This is like the Skokie was the Nazis. That was another big one. Yeah, well, I guess we can go ahead and talk about that. The Scoki free speech controversy. In the late seventy s, a group of neonazis in Chicago wanted to have permission to go to Skokie, Illinois and not form a barbershop cortex, but hold a demonstration. And that was a Scoke was famous for being the center of Chicago's Jewish community post holocaust. A bunch of Jewish people settled there and so of course the neonazis wanted to go to the heart of it all in protest. They asked the ACLU for help and they got it. And we're granted permission even though they didn't use it. Yeah, because when the neo Nazis applied for a permit to assemble or have a parade, a Nazi parade, basically, Skokie city council said, well, you have to post a $350,000 bond which is going to cost you about a grand. I want to let you know about that first. And then you Nazi said, you are trampling our rights. And that's when they got in touch with the ACLU, and the ACLU said, yeah, they're trampling your rights, it sounds like. And they fought for the Nazis right to assemble based on the idea that $1,000, basically fee to assemble was prohibitive and that anybody who wanted to hold a parade or a protest or anything like that in Skokie wouldn't necessarily be able to afford that. So protests shouldn't just be open to the people who can afford that $1,000 bond and therefore skokie, I guess. Relented. But the Nazis never even came. No, they never even held their protest. Yeah. And that's going to make you unpopular as an organization if you are campaigning for the rights of neonazis. But the ACLU bites their tongue and say, no, we have to. Well, you remember the part in the Blues Brothers? This is all very famously dramatized. Remember the Illinois Nazis? Oh, yeah. I hate Illinois Nazis. And they drive past them and make them jump into the river. Yeah. I guarantee that was because of the Skokie Nazi thing. It was all around the same time. Yeah. And they were Chicago as well. Yeah. And Chuck, have you ever seen the mall part where they drive through the mall? I made the slideshow. Nine abandoned malls around America. And that mall is in there. It's like, abandoned in the total state of decay. The Dixie Mall, I believe is what it's called. Dixie Square. It's pretty cool. Well, the other one you have in there was Avondale Mall, close to where I grew up, and that famously had the chase scene from Invasion USA. Oh, yeah. Chuck Norris drove a truck through that mall. I did not know that. And the mall, it was kind of crappy. I was a kid. I remember when it shot there. And then they got a full makeover because of the movie, and now it's a Walmart. They tore it down. Sad. Yeah. That's kind of a crappy mall. Well, it looked pretty cool. Abandoned. Yeah, it looked very cool. Another case back to the ACLU. West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnett. In 1943, school board expelled 2000 students, Jehovah's Witness students, because they refused to recite the Pledge of Allegiance because their religion forbade worshiping images, including the US. Flag. And they won the case. The Supreme Court said that you can't force someone to declare your belief in any religion or nation, which goes back to maybe unpopular in certain circles, but you can't say you're a free country and then you can practice any religion you want, but then force people to contradict that religion. Right. If this is the land of the free, you have to allow it. You may not like it. I'm not saying everyone has to like this stuff, but it's a slippery slope if you start restricting these freedoms. Yeah. Can you imagine telling some little Jehovah's Witness kid like, well, then you can't go to school here if you're not going to say the Pledge of Allegiance, you have no right to educate this country's. Code in nut. So, history. What else? Joseph Burston Inc. Versus Wilson is one of my favorites. All right, let's hear it. Well, basically, there's this movie released here in the US. As the Miracle, but it was titled in Europe, Amore, with an E on the end. So maybe Amore. Yeah. You know what the deal with the movie was? Yeah. A lady who she had a mental illness and thought she was the Virgin Mary. Well, she had too much to drink. Oh, I read mental illness. Well, she was plied with drink and then had sex with a vagabond she thought was St. Joseph. Right. It was played by Federico Felini, who co wrote it, I believe. Yeah. But did not direct it and got pregnant and believed that was an immaculate conception. Right. So the Catholics in the don't like this movie. They did not like the movie. And they had a lot of clout in New York at the time. And in New York, if you were a movie theater and you're planning on showing The Miracle, the city said, well, we're just going to take your license to show movies in general, if you do that, do not show this movie. Some places in New York where, like, this movie is banned. You can't even carry it into our city borders if you want to. And they took it the ACLU stepped in and they took it to the Supreme Court. And the Supreme Court said, the state has no legitimate interest in protecting any or all religions from views distasteful of them. So they said, you're right. ACLU, that was a big deal because at the time, religion was basically this kind of infallible institution that took precedent over everything else. It was the moral attitude of the country where it was like, no religion is offended by it. It's bad. Sorry. Whatever laws you've got that protect this stupid little movie, who cares? We're banning it because it offends a religion. And because of that and many other things, that Catholic League and its leader Bill Donoho are huge critics of the ACLU, although he's also praised the ACLU when they've defended Catholic rights, too. Yeah. Well, Larry Flint, remember, he fought some of these same battles, and his attorney famously was like, I think he's kind of a scumbag, too, and I think he's a smart peddler and this stuff is disgusting. Edward Norton yeah, but you can't say he can't do it. Yeah, that's a great movie. Except for Courtney Love. Everything but Corny Love was great in that movie, although I did like her, a man on the moon for some reason. I don't like her much, period. Not a fan. Really? No. You like Courtney Love? No. Okay. No, but if I did the ACL, you would defend my right to like Courtney Love despite it being really unpopular. That is true. The ACLU, basically what was going on there was they had what were called white primaries, the Democratic Party for their elections, and it was illegal because it denied blacks a chance to vote and to participate. That's exactly what it sounds like. And previous to this court, said Long said, political parties are private organizations. They are not subject to these anti discrimination laws. But the Supreme Court did the right thing and said, you know what? Being able to participate in the voting primary is important in this country. And if we want to remain a democracy, we need to not have things like white primaries. So we're going to reach into your protected enclave and say, you can't do that anymore. Yeah, because voting is just that important, which is kind of a radical view in and of itself, because they overturned a precedent and custom. Yeah, I think we should do some more. When I was in New York, I saw that play, cranston plays LBJ and all the Way, and it covers the eleven months post Kennedy assassination to his reelection bid, where he got the Civil Rights Act passed. And it was fascinating and did all kinds of research about it. Was Cranston good? He's great. Like, completely became the character. Wow. I forgot it was cranston. And then after the play, he becomes Bryan Cranston again to thank everyone. And it's just like it's weird just seeing an actor in front of your eyes morph back into the real person. It's pretty cool. But I want to definitely tackle some more civil rights issues because probably the darkest spot in our nation's history. There's been plenty of one not long ago, either. I can't remember who the person's name, but remember, we're talking about Kent State and how that was the darkest spot on our nation's history. And somebody wrote in was like, that was pretty bad. But don't forget all of the strikes where National Guard troops fired on and killed, like, 100 striking workers just for striking in the whatever. Yeah. So whoever that was, thanks for taking me to task, because that's absolutely correct. There are a lot of dark spots. A lot of bright spots, too. Sure. Man and with that cheery idea, let's take one more break. Sunshine. Okay, Sunshine, what do you got next? Well, I guess you talked about the Scopes trial, where we did, for a second some of the other most famous cases in this country's history. Like, I know people that listen to our podcast on the Japanese internment camps. Yeah. And if you can't find it, just go to our archive page. We have an archive page now that has every single one of the 600 plus stuff you should know episodes ever made. All in one place. Yeah, it took six years to make that happen, but we're very proud of that. It's STUFFYou know. Compodcastarchive. So you'll find that one in there. Was it Japanese stragglers or do we do one on internment camp? We did one on internment, too. Okay. That was when FDR rounded up or ordered the government to round up people of Japanese descent, even some of whom were Americans. Like, most of them were, yeah, like natural born American, genuine citizens to the relocation camps in the ACLU jumped on this, and they were one of the only groups kind of standing up and saying, this isn't right at the time. Yeah. They also. Had this whole campaign against calling French fries freedom fries. Like, you can't call it that. And everybody's like, Boo, sit down. Did they say that? No. And then other famous cases, like Brown v. Board of Education and Roe v. Wade and Dovey Bolton, the ACLU was instrumental in all of these. Again, even though it's unpopular to some people, fighting for the freedoms of the minorities. Yeah. Also recently, the Communications Decency Act, which basically made it a crime to knowingly send pornography to minors or something like that, from 1996. I said, no, you can't tell people they can't do that. Freedom of speech. Yeah. There's like a Janet Reno idea, and it got smacked down. It's, like, overturned, basically, by the Supreme Court. Again, unpopular moves. They're not out to make friends, though. No. And the one that I've got this is, to me, the most despicable case the ACLU has ever taken. But take it however you want. Have you heard of NAMBLA? The National Man Boy? The North American Man Boy Love Association? I have. So Enamla is exactly what you think. It's basically a club for petter ass. And their website is apparently a tutorial, training ground, forum, chat room, place to get tips on how to be a more effective Petra or Pedophile. That's so disturbing. And these two guys, they are named Charles James and Salvatore. Sakari? They were convicted of murdering a couple son, Jeffrey, in 1997. And they basically said, everything we needed to know, we learned from NAMBLA, from the Namba website. And so the Curly, the couple whose son was murdered by these child murders, went after NAMBLA, and the ACLU intervened and said, namba is actually an unincorporated association, not a corporation. So it's allowed to extol illegal acts as long as it's not inciting people telling people to go do these illegal acts, it can still appreciate these illegal acts. And if you look at their website, that's all they're doing. And the suit against Nambler is dismissed. Again, not popular. No. ACLU has to, you know, that they feel forced into some of these situations. Probably. Well, there's often times been a lot of shake ups internally where people at the ACLU are saying, no, this is beyond the line. Right. This is just too wrong. What these people are saying is too despicable, and maybe we shouldn't be maybe they shouldn't be allowed to say it. And the ACLU, as an organization has walked that line, lost a lot of members and a lot of supporters and a lot of employees. But it stayed true to its vision, and it's still around today. Yeah. All right, let's say you want the ACLU to take up your cause. Okay? You have to write them a letter. You have to outline your problem, maybe provide a little evidence, build your case with them. If it's not in Modern Language Association accepted outline form, then they just won't even look at it, probably. So. And they basically determine, is it a civil liberties case that we should get involved with and how should we get involved? They don't just go out and sue everyone. Most times they try to resolve the cases just by getting in touch with whoever, the government agency, and saying, hey, you might want to check out the Constitution, because it seems like what you're doing now isn't so great. And it might not even be Constitution. We understand what you're saying, but recently there was some legislation passed by law, and here's the code if you want to go look it up. But you can stop trampling this person's rights. Now, like, the staff member at the Reach program in Tennessee probably got a letter from the ACLU, the director did, saying, actually it's within this child's First Amendment rights to read this Bible, so just let them read the Bible. And they were probably like, we're more than happy to let them read the Bible. It's Tennessee. Right. And there you go. And it was settled. Yes. Another way of looking at it, though, is the ACLU can just strongarm people into doing what it wants by simply writing a letter. Yeah. Or if they don't get anywhere with a letter, that is when they either have a staff attorney or one of their pro bono volunteers take up the case. Right. They are headquartered in New York City, but like we said, every state has their own chapter, and they do operate autonomously. And like we said earlier, they don't always agree with the federal chapter. And federal chapter generally leaves it up to the state to decide their own, like, how they're going to raise their money, what cases are going to take. But if it becomes clearly a national issue, that's when the national organization steps in and get your celebrity attorney to work pro bono. Right. Scott Bayo. Yeah. Dershowitz scott Bayo. Blah, blah, blah. I guess we should talk about how they're funded. Yeah. Because they are a nonprofit, they are generally funded by donations. The ACLU Foundation is tax deductible, and that is the group that actually they're sort of split down the middle between the foundation and just the ACLU. The foundation is who litigates. The ACLU focuses on political lobbying. And that is not tax deductible. No. When you become an ACLU member, you're actually contributing dues to the ACLU, and your dues are not tax deductible because you're contributing to their lobbying arm. If you contribute to the ACLU Foundation, then that is tax deductible. Yeah. And like, supporting actual court cases. Right. They also maintain an endowment, so they have investments. And most controversially, they are also supported through attorneys fees. Yeah. That's one of the big controversies, for sure. Yeah. So the ACLU has a tactic where if they win a case, they sue to recover fees. Yeah. Like, many do not ACLU, but when the ACLU does that, often these fees can run into six figures fairly easily. Depending on the case. And so if you're like a little town in Cannon County, Tennessee, if you want to send it to the ACLU, it could very easily mean the difference between being in the red and being in the black. And if you are, you very well may just say, like, forget it. It's not worth it. We can't afford to fight this. So, yes, we'll turn our back on our convictions because we want to still have a town after the ACLU comes through here. Yeah. And that's what critics will point to, is that they use that card as a form of intimidation. Right. They can just say that in that letter. First of all, here's the legislation that proves our client is right. Secondly, if you want to take this to court, our estimate is that it's going to cost you $600,000 if we win. Do you really want to spend $600,000 finding this? Yeah. Think about it. Yeah. Get back to me. I've left three boxes. Yes, no, or maybe. Please check one by EOD tomorrow. Well, and then the other criticism there, of course, is that is government money. It's your tax bang dollars indirectly funding the ACLU through these cases. So if you hate the ACLU, you're going to probably bang that drum. I mean, imagine if your town says, yeah, we're going to fight you, and then they lose, and they have to pay the ACLU's fees. It's not coming out of the mayor, like, savings. That's like your tax money. So you just paid this organization that you now probably despise. Yeah. That's the ACLU, man. That's classic ACLU right there. So where did this whole card carrying member insult come from? Michael Dukakis, of course. Yeah. From what? The articles that he was the first person to proudly proclaim to be a card carrying member. Yeah. And it happened just perfectly. It was dukakis. In an interview in The New Yorker talking about the ACLU. Yeah. Come on. So he's a card carrying member. He said proudly that he was a card carrying member of the ACLU, basically to get across his liberal bona fides. Yes. And conservatives said, hey, that's a great insult that we can use in the future. Yeah. George H. W. Bush in particular, he basically said he's a card carrying member of the ACLU. Everybody hates the ACLU. They defend Nazis, and that was it. He's right. Yeah. They do defend Nazis. Yes. Or they have. And they will in the future if some Nazis need help. Yes. To the rescue. But they're also defending the little boy in Tennessee who wants to read his Bible. That's right. It's all over the map. Yeah. And that is called divisive. You got anything else? I got nothing else. I love this one. If you want to learn more about the ACLU, you can type that word in the search barhowstepworks.com. I said search bar. So it's time for the listener mail. I'm going to call this converted fiance. And this is a gentleman from England whose wife I'm sorry, fiance cathy did not want to listen. They're getting married in May, so he talks a little bit about how much he likes the show, and I will skip that part and get right to the meat. Okay. I tried to get my fiance converted. It started with the JFK podcast. With no luck. She moaned and said it was weird, which I thought it was a very straight ahead podcast, actually not being one to quit, I tried a few weeks later on Living Without a Fridge. As soon as the intro began, she groaned. Wow, she's moaning and groaning. Has she ever heard us before? No, this is brand new to her. What's your deal, Cathy? She hates it. Well, let me get to it. Okay. This time halfway through, though, she began commenting on some of the content, such as placing your onions in the fridge against all odds and X podcasts saved on the playlist was manhunt. As soon as she heard the topic, she shut me up from talking and listened intently. Wow. Not bad, I thought. I didn't even think that was one of our better ones. Well, she liked it. This morning, though, was the breakthrough. We were in the supermarket and wanted to purchase some avocados. None were right, and Kathy said we could do that thing that Bloke suggested and put the avocados in a paper bag and a banana to help it ripen. I'm that bloke. She took your advice and it worked, so wow, I thought. Later in the morning, she was reading about how time was running out to find the signal for the missing black box from Flight 370. She turned to me and asked why they couldn't find the signal. And I said, you know what? Stuff you should know has a podcast on that. The next day, on the car ride to the cinema, which is what they call movies in England, which apparently are 40 minutes drive away, she said she requested to actually play the black box episode. Success. Wow. This guy really knows how to manipulate his fiance. He does. So he says, if any of your listeners have had trouble getting their partners into it, I would suggest you keep trying. Eventually you'll find an episode or two that will capture their interest and they'll be hooked. And that is from Guy Benvenista in Horsham, UK. Nice name and city name, Guy. So thanks, Cathy, for joining up to the club. Cathy, soon to be Benveniste. Welcome to the party. Yes, I think Cathy is going to keep her on man. Well, okay, Cathy. Either way, as long as you're listening to stuff you should know, we don't care if you want to let us know how you turn somebody converted them, or if you just can't convert them. We'd be very interested to find out why. Agreed. Why don't they like us? It's not like we care or anything, but we just want to know. Again, as I said, you can hang out with us on social media, Pinterest, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook. Just search your favorite web browser for stuff you should know. S-Y-S-K Josh and Chuck, something like that, and it should all come up. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast@discovery.com. And as always, hang out with us at our home on the web stuffyoushanenow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housetepworks.com. Hey everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer. School's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime for days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or, if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, my Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never, never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music, you can access new episodes early. Download the app today."
https://podcasts.howstuf…-26-sysk-cpr.mp3	How CPR Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-cpr-works	You have a golden opportunity to make yourself into a worthwhile human being simply by learning how to perform CPR. The chances are you'll never need to use it, but knowing how just in case never hurts. Listen to this episode to get you primed to take a c	You have a golden opportunity to make yourself into a worthwhile human being simply by learning how to perform CPR. The chances are you'll never need to use it, but knowing how just in case never hurts. Listen to this episode to get you primed to take a c	Tue, 26 Feb 2013 16:48:50 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2013, tm_mon=2, tm_mday=26, tm_hour=16, tm_min=48, tm_sec=50, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=57, tm_isdst=0)	28455144	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetoporkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W, Chuck Bryant, and and you put the two of us together, it doesn't matter what, you're still going to come up with stuff you should know. That's right. Better or for worse. That's right, man. Yes. You are stuck with me. How are you, sir? Tickled. Good. How are you? I'm great. I'm ready to save some lives. If it's your podcast today, it's entirely possible that we could you never know. Like, we could tell somebody how to do the basics of CPR and we should see away. I see you even have it written down. If you are interested in being an above average human being by taking the time to be taught how to save someone's life using cardiopulmonary resuscitation, you should do that. Totally. Genuinely, you are a better person for that. You can go to heartorg. The American Heart Association's website. Type in your zip code and it will bring up tons of free classes that you can go to at your convenience and become certified in CPR. Yeah, you should do that, because not only could you maybe be a hero and save some strangers life, but if you care about the people around you, wouldn't you love to be able to save their life exactly. At a moment's notice? Exactly. To me, it's like giving blood. It's almost a human requirement in this day and age. You give blood? Of course I do. I keep my blood. Yummy give blood. She's always like, don't you want to, too? Yeah. You should get blood. I know I should. Yes. I don't even know what my blood type is. There's a pretty good reason to give blood just to find out. Yeah. Can you test that, too? Yeah. How am I doing? And where's the Nutter Butters? Yeah, that's a bonus, too. I always feel guilty when Yummy shares her Nutter Butters with her. Like I didn't earn these. These are yours. Does she bring them home or do you, like, go and drop her off and then sit with your arms crossed while she gives blood? All right, you ready? Yeah, man. CPR. Oh. So we're still in the middle of the COA. This is in no way intended to replace one of those classes. You listen to this podcast. You're not certified, pal. No. You're possibly a bigger danger than before. You're certifiable, but you're not certified. Right? Yeah. So this is intended to, I guess, maybe just kind of go over the absolute basics of CPR and hopefully pick your interest enough to get you to go out and take a real class. That's what we're doing here today. Yeah. When I lifeguarded, I obviously took CPR then, but it's been a while. I was, like, 20 years old. So why are you always walking around in nothing but a bathing suit? I don't know, man. Put the lanyard in the whistle. Yeah. I thought you still were. What are you doing then? I don't know. I just like to keep it skin. Malibu style. Malibu style? Skin to win. Is, my friend says. Are you ready? Yeah. Okay. So, are you familiar with the heart? I am. Okay. Well, then this won't come as any surprise. The heart has a little part of it that's called the pacemaking area, the sinoatrial node. The SA node. Yes. And the SA node produces a burst of electricity that stimulates the muscles in the heart. It causes pump, usually about on the low side, once a second. Okay. That would mean that you have a heartbeat of about 60 beats per minute yes. Which is low. That's good for resting. If you're active, it's a little low. But you have this thing, this SA note that produces electricity, and it produces it in a reliable rhythm. But certain conditions, say, like dehydration, stress, all sorts of things, can cause your essay node to go a little haywire. And all of a sudden, it's shooting out bursts of electricity in a really weird pattern. No pattern at all. And when that happens, usually your heart the pump weakens. The pump mechanism weakens. Right. So it's going and it's not really beating at all. I mean, it's beating, but it's not really pumping any blood. What you're in the middle of is called sudden cardiac arrest. Yes. And that is different, this article points out, than a heart attack. Right. If you have a heart attack, that is something that happens very slowly over time, and then you will eventually have the heart attack. That's sort of the end result of that slow build. And usually your heart is not pumping blood because it's backed up with the sudden cardiac arrest, your heart is going haywire. It's trying to pump blood, but it doesn't have the strength to anymore because the electrical current is being distributed incorrectly. That's right. Are you familiar with defibrillators? I am. You know, they have one here in the office. They save lives. Sure. If you hit somebody with an AED with a defibrillator, which is another thing you need to be trained on before you really try using it clear. That's all I can do. Right. And you want to be clear, too. You don't want to be touching the body when it goes off, but you put one paddle over the heart and one paddle over the other side. So the middle of the chest and then on the left side of the person, and you shoot the charge through. What you're doing is not starting the heart. You're actually turning the heart off. Yeah. I think everybody that doesn't know about the defibrillators, I know it's going to have trouble with that. It's a tough word, I think most people think that your heart stopped and it kick starts it back up. Right. Not true. No, it turns it off in the hopes that it will start back up at a normal rhythm. Yeah. Like it resets the pace. Right. And it frequently works. But that's just so surprising to me. It's such a gamble. It's like, well, the heart is not doing very well right now, so we're just going to shut it off and see what happens. Yeah. That is weird. Sadly, if you have sudden cardiac arrest, you have about a 5% chance of surviving. Because it is out of the blue, it can occur to a very healthy person. It can occur with young people, old people, any kind of person. Yeah. It's not just like heart disease. It's a part of heart disease frequently, but like I said, it can result from dehydration when your electrolytes are off. Yeah. The good news, if you have a heart attack or a myocardial infarction, is that you have a pretty good chance of surviving that, actually, and turning your life around with diet and maybe get some stents thrown in there and teaching English to prisoners. Yeah, maybe so. But all of this is leading up to the fact that CPR is something that you can increase someone's chances who have sudden cardiac arrest. Right. Here's the whole point of CPR. The moment somebody drops dead in front of you or you come across somebody who's dying or dead or unconscious, I guess, is a better way to put it. Yes. Time is of the essence. Their blood is no longer pumping through their body. Their brain is becoming starved. They are at risk of becoming brain damage. And usually you hear there's like a five minute window where you really have the opportunity to save someone's life. Right? Yeah. So whether it's running, somebody's running to get the defibrillator or waiting for 911 one to arrive, waiting for the paramedics to arrive. The whole point of CPR is to pump blood through the body to keep this person in this basic, minimal artificial state of life so that real medical help can be administered. Yeah. You're just trying to stave off death, basically for as long as you can until you can get some help. And this is nothing new, right? No, it's not. There's a little bit of history I dug up. Apparently the prophet Elisha in the Bible is described as performing mouth to mouth on a child. Neat. Who knows what that meant? In 1740, the Paris Academy of Sciences, like the Bible that said he placed his mouth upon the child's mouth and stuff like that. But who knows if it was? Did they describe what was wrong with the child? I don't know. I'm sure child was not doing well. I got you. In the 1740, the Paris Academy of Sciences first recommended mouth to mouth for drowning victims. Yeah. Because apparently up to that point, I was like, oh, you're drowned, so that's it for you. Yeah. We're not even going to try anything. Maybe we'll hit you with some sticks. 1891, Dr. Frederick Moss performed the first documented chest compressions on a human, and sadly, it was 23 years later. 24 years later, dr. George Cryle first reported a successful resuscitation from chest compression. Oh, yeah. It was a work in progress. It was very much was because it wasn't until 1956, even though mouth to mouth was a thing that Peter Safar and James Elam are credited with inventing it as modern CPR in the is where they really perfected. It like 1960s is when CPR was officially named and developed. Right. And then shortly after that came Rossa Annie yeah. And the little kid with the jumpsuit. That's right. All right, so that's just a little background. Right. So it's been around for a little while. Yes. But the points always been the same. It's like somebody's in an emergency situation and you need to basically stave off death. That's right. So, Chuck, let's say that you come into the podcast recording booth and you see me just laying on the floor. What are you going to do? Well, I would scream and cry out in agony and shock, firstly. Okay? I'd be very upset. And then the first thing I would do would say would be to say, jerry, for God's sakes, put down the beer and call 911 right. Immediately. See, I would suspect that Jerry would have known I was in here unconscious. The whole well, that's why she's drinking the beer, but she's just celebrating. She got it from my desk. Yeah. So, yeah, first thing you want to do is call 911 and get some experience some experience help there from a well that's after you've poked me in the face and said, Josh, Josh, and looked at my chest, seemed that it's not rising or falling, and noted that I'm a little more blue than usual. Yeah, I would yell the call 911 first. Okay. But yeah, you're supposed to check the person if it's a child or a baby. They say never ever shake them. Right. Just stroke them and see if they respond and go meet baby. Yeah. Do something like that. See if you get a response. And if it is clear that this person is not breathing and don't look like their heart is beating, another big one is that chest rising and falling. Because if you come across somebody and they're just dead drunk, that's different from dead. Yeah, that's true. And I've seen that, too. Not from you, but no, not in the podcast. There's a couple of different types of or there's different types of CPR and depending on how trained you are, which one you would undertake. Right. So you've determined. I'm unconscious. You don't know what's wrong with me, but I'm blue. Jerry is off dialing nine one, finishing her beer. And let's say that you have never done anything but heard of CPR, right. What kind of CPR should you employ? That means and this is from the Mayo Clinic. They know a thing or two about this. Sure. That would be what's known as an untrained person, and I would only perform the hands only resuscitation, which will describe in detail. That's right. And then let's say that you've had some training before, but it's been a while. Well, that's me. Okay. I'm trained. But Rusty right. And they say, still, just use the hands only. Don't get cocky. Yeah. Don't think you remember all that lifeguarding stuff. Let's say you had just gotten out of a CPR class and this happened. You would be trained but confident. That is right. And that means that you can perform full CPR with rescue breathing. And that's great. That means you're 100% confident and you're delivering 100% of your knowledge. Right. And then if you have access to an AED, where is the one in this office? Well, I know where it used to be until we redid the kitchen. Was it in there? It used to be in the right side. Right by the don't massage your coworker poster. What's that called? The warning, basically. Oh, yeah. The drawings and all that inappropriate touching. My attention was always gotten by the labor laws for some reason. I don't know why. Maybe. Yeah, that's where it was. I don't know where it is now. It's probably in our new, smaller break room. Yeah, you're right. So if you have access to an Ad, you want to actually deliver one shock and then start CPR, and that's if you know absolutely. You're trained. You know what you're doing, right? Yeah. But you don't want to waste time looking for a pulse. They used to always say, Check for a pulse. Don't bother. No, because they found out that people were spending a lot more time than they should trying to find a pulse and just basically wasting time. I think basically, if you can look at somebody, see their chest isn't moving, you don't need to look for a pulse. Yeah. I mean, if I was on the ground, the last thing I would want to hear as I'm fading out is I can't quite tell. Is that a pulse? Right. Come here. What does that feel like? A pulse? Would you call us pulse thready? Yeah. And then you're down there just going, just please start compressions. Right. So the American Heart Association said you know what? Let's just go around this and really focus on the chest compressions. Over time, in 2010, they really changed everything they did. And so just do chest compressions. Anything else is, like, additional, but just do chest compressions. Yeah, let's talk about chest compressions. Well, before we do the chest compressions, if I came in here, luckily, we have a nice, flat, first grade carpet type of scene in here, so I would not have to move you. But I do want to get you on your back on a flat, hard surface. If you're faced down, then that's sad for you, and I would gently roll you. Actually, I'd probably do it, like, quicker. Well, you want to really be careful to support the neck, because if somebody already has a neck injury, you can make it way worse if you just flop them around. Yeah. Or if they have a piece of steak stuck in their throat, you don't want to get it lodged further. So you want to support the head and neck as you pull the person toward you. Yeah. So that they're on their back now. That's right. All right. And since 2010, it used to be the ABC method, airway, breathing, circulation. They have now revised that to the cab method. Yeah. And airway meant that you would stick your finger down the person's throat to see if there was anything you could dislodge, like they'd passed out from choking. Now it's just basically chest compressions and the ability scraping out the airway and then breathing. Rescue breathing. You don't even do those if you don't know what you're doing. It's all chest compression. That's right. But the new order, once again, just remember, think cab. I got to call a cab. ABC don't call a cab. They will just waste time. They won't know what you're talking about. That's right. So with chest compressions, we talked a lot about it. What you want to do is you want to kneel near the neck and shoulders. You've probably seen this on TV. It's pretty accurate. Usually put the heel of your hands on top of one another in the center of the chest, midway between the nipples. So one palm down the heel of your hand in the middle of the chest, your other hand over it. So it's really forming this really solid piece of hand. That's right. You want to keep your elbows straight, like they do on TV. So you're not using all of your arms, you're actually using your body weight to compress the chest, I think. How many inches? One to two inches. For an adult. You want to compress it down one to two inches? That's right. That's going to seem like a lot. What if you're the person on the ground? No, if you're making a compression, like pushing somebody's chest in two inches, that's significant. Yes. And that's why you got to put all your body into it. Keep those arms, elbows locked and nice and rigid. Oh, and if you're in Canada or the UK, you want to compress someone's chest 2.54. That's what we're saying when we're saying one to two inches. Yeah. In this case, it's much easier to learn inches, I think. So you want to make these chest compressions about 100 times a minute, which is not we have a what, a base? 60 minutes, 62nd minute. So 100 seems weird to us, right? Yeah. How do you keep that rhythm in your head? It sounds unbelievable, but you want to the song in your head, staying Alive by the Beaches. Right. It actually is 103 beats per minute. So if you can hit that song staying Alive. Staying alive not that fast. Don't hold that pump on the alive. You want to keep it going, keep it going. You're going to hit 100 and 103 chest compressions a minute. Yeah. It's so awesome that it's staying alive. I know they chose a great song because most people know that song, and they say most people can remember the pace of that song. And it's kind of right at the 100 to 103 beats per minute. You're doing pretty well there. Right. And if you have a baby on your hands, you want to do chest compressions using the same techniques, but you only want to compress the chest about one inch, I believe. One and a half inch. One and a half. And you're using your middle finger and your index finger rather than the heels of your hands. Yeah. But you're still doing it in the middle of the chest, in between the nipples. One and a half inch compressions, 100 a minute. Yeah. And just less aggressive. And you want to support the baby's head while you're doing it, too. Basically, you want to lay them across, like, the length of your forearm with their head in your hand. I cannot imagine anything more horrifying than performing CPR on a baby. No. But it's good to know for sure. What you're doing here is you are basically squeezing the heart between the breast bone and the backbone to artificially get blood out of it. Moving through the body. That oxygenated blood. Are you literally trying to get the heart going again or just deliver oxygen until someone gets there? Defibrillation is what gets the heart going. All you're doing is distributing oxygenated blood through the body. Okay. Like when the heart pumps, it doesn't make a whole circuit through your body. It just pumps the blood a little bit, and then eventually this little segment of blood with each pump will follow the course through the body. So you're pumping oxygenated blood through the body. Yeah. And you can go to Handsonlycpr.org. It's a good website to reinforce this. But again, American Red Cross is where you want to go to get a regular class. Right. Get certified. And they will teach you also rescue breathing, too. Yeah. Because I guess then oxygenating the blood, you're allowing the blood to be oxygenated by introducing air into the lungs. That is very true. So, yeah, all you're doing is just keeping the body, like, probably specifically the brain fed with blood, CPR. That's what you're doing. So why wouldn't somebody want to do this? Well, one of the first things I looked up was lawsuits, because I never knew if it was true or not. But you always hear about people like, I don't want to get sued. I don't want to perform CPR on that person. There's something called Good Samaritan laws. Yeah. Have you heard of these? Remember the last episode of seinfeld. They all got convicted on Good Samaritan law. Yeah. There's various incarnations of Good Samaritan laws, but in the case of CPR, it protects people that perform CPR if they are generally if they are medically trained. So, like, if you have a CPR certification, you'd be protected. You would be protected. And it must be like, if you try to save me, it's got to be your idea. Like, hey, I'm just going to go save this guy. And someone didn't drag you over there and say he's a doctor and you can't actually be a doctor and still be protected. Like in the hospital. It doesn't cover hospitals and stuff, obviously, because that's their job. They're not just being a good Samaritan. Yeah. It's got to be entirely voluntary. And certain states this is a state thing, obviously, certain states are now enacting laws that protect anyone. I know Pennsylvania passed one last year that even if you're not certified, if you give it the old college try, then you can't be sued. That's good. Which is great. You want people diving in there. Can you imagine, like, you saved my life, but I didn't ask you to, so I'm suing you. Yeah. I also went to the free economic site because you know how they always break things down in interesting ways racially, as far as income goes? And out of 14,225 cardiac arrest patients, by standard initiated CPR was provided 28.6% of the time. Wow. That's it? Yes. And in low income black neighborhoods, low income white neighborhoods, in low income integrated neighborhoods, and high income black neighborhoods, your odds of getting CPR performed were way less than high income white neighborhoods and high income integrated neighborhoods. I wonder why. I don't know. But economics is always studying all that stuff and how it affects the United States, like, economically and racially. So I thought that was kind of interesting. There's a lot of people who also for a long time worried about catching a disease from mouth to mouth. Yes. Which is another reason, apparently the heart association said, let's just do chest compressions only. Like, you're not going to catch anything. But supposedly there's no documented case of anyone catching anything serious from giving mouth to mouth or rescue breathing, so nothing to worry about there either. That's good. Although I think if you do that to a drowning victim and near drowning victim, like, they often spit up stuff, so you might get a face full of seawater, but frankly, it's a small price to pay for being a hero. Exactly. Have you ever seen this go down or CPR or anything yet? No, not in person. I haven't either. I can't imagine that would be and I have friends who have seen stuff like this in restaurants or I think I had one friend that saw some guy, like, drop dead on the beach and some guy brought him back to life. Neat. Yeah, I would love to be there. I'd love to do it, but we can start looking for situations. Would you jump in there? Oh, yeah, I like to think I would. Sure I would. I think if someone else was really confident ahead of me, I wouldn't like shove them aside. Step aside. Right. I'm going to try my hand at this, but I would sure, I would definitely get in there. Right on. Well, we should also say this probably accounts for a lot of the reasons why people don't do it is because they think they would and then it happens and they are frozen in panic or terror or whatever. Yeah. So that's apparently one of the things this article says. That's another reason why people aren't thinking. Like you said it yourself when you came into the podcast, but you screamed. Luckily, I screamed for Jerry. Right. But yeah, you shook it off and started to think, but you screamed. If you want to learn more about CPR yeah. You can go to HowStuffWorks.com and type that word in the search bar. We strongly urge you instead, or in addition to go to WWW.HEART.ORG. Look for a CPR course near you and take it. And I said.org so that means it's time for listener. Yeah. Josh, this is perfect timing for this email and it just came in actually a couple of days ago and it is sad, but this guy wanted to get the message out. This is from Dan in Austin. Guys have been meaning to write for ages with little bits and pieces that have picked up from working as a travel photographer in Indonesia for almost 20 years. However, events this past summer made these seem like trivialities. It's taken this long to complete the email. In July of last year, while playing with friends in the backyard, my 16 year old daughter suffered sudden cardiac arrest and collapse. Oh my God. Despite the best efforts of those around her, they were not able to recover her pulse and she passed on. We would never know the exact nature of the attack, but as since discovered, such attacks which can be do. A number of causes are alarmingly and tragically frequent in healthy young adults. Although broadly defined by either structural defects or faults within the electrical circuits that coordinate the heart's muscles essential beats, sudden cardiac arrest, which we've been talking about here, strikes down between 4007 thousand children every year in the US alone. Like we said, this guy's daughter was totally healthy 16 year old. Unlike many of the diseases and conditions that you have covered on the show with SCA, the first symptoms of a lifethreatening condition may be at the time of death. Even equipped with resuscitation equipment, survival rates are terrifyingly small and without any equipment they are almost nonexistent. There are tests, however, that can be done once kids reach a certain age, about 14, when the heart has reached its adult size. But as individuals walking in off the street, the cost of these tests may seem prohibitively expensive for parents who are not adequately informed of the hidden dangers that their children face. There are, however, incredible organizations out there that are working to change both the public awareness and the risks of SCA and are also conducting screening programs to get as many children as possible. Check for no cost. All right, so one of these, coincidentally, is in Austin where he lives, and he came out to our variety show, by the way. Oh, yeah. It's called the Championshiphearts Foundation, and that is championshipsheartsfoundation.org. That's hearts, plural. And they have the express purpose of making cardiac screening affordable and accessible to as many families as possible, and frequently conducts community screenings around Central Texas, where they see like 500 kids a day. When I can tell you that they can find the presence of some form of potentially fatal cardiac condition, and one out of every 200 kids or less can appreciate the value of their mission. For all these kids and their families, this means the saving of a life. With proper diagnosis and treatment, many children identify going to live healthy lives and active lives. So had I been better informed, guys, of this potentially fatal yet silent dangers that Lord can see, I would have made sure to have my daughter scanned, just as I will have my son scanned when they're old enough. I hope that every parent listening does the same. That is Dan. Thanks, Dan. And that is championshipheartsfoundation.org. And he said there's lots of good organizations and I didn't know about that. And if I ever have kids, that's something that I am going to have done when they reach the right age. Yeah, maybe we should just start grabbing random kids off the street and having them screen. Have you been checked? No, I've had a lot of parents have no idea about this. It's very sad. Yeah. Well, thank you very much, Dan, for letting everybody know. That was a great letter. Yeah, we correspondent a couple of times over the past few days and just unbelievable. We went through. Very good guy. Yeah. Well, cool. Thank you for writing in. If you have a story that you think everybody needs to know about that no one does, we want to help you get the word out. You can tweet to us at FYs k podcast. You can join us on Facebook.com stuffysheanow, send us an email to stuffpodcast@discovery.com, and you can always find us on the Web@stuffyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit HowStuffWorks.com. Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go. Places. Pieces."
c5f72664-5460-11e8-b38c-d78cbde7b873	Selects: How SETI Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/selects-how-seti-works	SETI stands for 'search for extraterrestrial intelligence,' and the term is used to describe both the SETI institute and the search for alien life in general. In this classic spaced-out episode, Josh and Chuck explore the origin, aims and challenges facing SETI.	SETI stands for 'search for extraterrestrial intelligence,' and the term is used to describe both the SETI institute and the search for alien life in general. In this classic spaced-out episode, Josh and Chuck explore the origin, aims and challenges facing SETI.	Sat, 22 Jan 2022 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2022, tm_mon=1, tm_mday=22, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=5, tm_yday=22, tm_isdst=0)	34176179	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody, Chuck here. I saw a UFO last night. Actually, that's not true, but it would be a great story if I were setting up this episode from March 1, 2012. How said he works search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. Welcome to stuff you should know a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me, as always, it's Charles W, Chuck Bryant, and the stuff you should know the podcast. Don't get it confused. What is that? What was that? That was my first Burgess Meredith. Okay, thank you. That's pretty good. Thanks. It was a good burges, Meredith. Chuck? Yeah. You in the mood for alien talk? Sure. This is the second time we've done something like this. Almost a year later. Yeah. Right at it. We did. How UFOs work? Live in Austin. Yes. Last March. I guess once a year we do aliens. We'll talk aliens. Hey, before we get started, may I take a second? Yes. I wanted to say a special hi to my wife Yumi right. Who made me the happiest guy in the world. Just call her, dude. On February 13. Yeah, I could just call her on February 13 when we got married. Indeed. Yeah. Any deeds or you just going to no, that's all right. I wanted to share my happiness with everybody out there. Very well done. Thank you very much. Hey, Yummy. So let's get back to aliens. Okay? Yes. Okay, so we are doing this in honor of Are We Alone? Month on Science Channel, right? Yes. So the month of March is are we alone? Month. And Science Channel, every Tuesday, I believe, at ten, is having a premiere of some new show that has something to do with the search for extraterrestrial life. Cool stuff. Yeah, it's going to be very cool. And, I mean, there's some like all shows are going to be awesome. Sure. But there are some that are clearly going to be really awesome. Like through the wormhole with Morgan Freeman. With Morgan Freeman. I mean, that in the context of an are we alone month. Yeah, that's big news. Also, the alien encounters with Nick Sagan got to be related to Carl. Carl Pilkington. Yeah. And then if you're in the mood for a contest, what would a month be without one? There is a Setty live contest where the prize is to go visit SETI. No way. Go to the California, to the institute. Yes. Wow. Pretty sweet. Yes. So this is all going on on Science Channel all month long. And if you want more details, watch Science Channel, pal. Yeah, we're hit them up on Facebook. I bet they have info there. Yeah. And in honor of this month, it's a very special month, we are doing How Setti Works, which is an acronym SETI if you don't know for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. Yes. And I joked before we did this, are we alone month will be followed by yes. We're alone day. Sort of a joke, but they haven't really found a lot of stuff yet. Well, I don't know. Let me give you an example of something. The wow. Have you heard of the wow signal? Yeah, we talked about this before. We did? When I think it might have been one of the webcasts. Okay. It definitely rang a bell that had your Stank on it. No, we talked about the Yosemite Sam signal. Oh, I know, but I think we talked about a couple of years ago. Okay, well, old webcast. Let me tell you again. Let me refresh your memory because you clearly don't remember clearly. August 15, 1977. A guy who's now known as Doctor Jerry Aiman. E-H-M-A-N-I keep wanting to call him erman he was manning the Big Year radio telescope at Ohio State University and was analyzing some data from it and basically saw this is what it looks like. It's a bunch of numbers and letters. It looks like the Matrix scroll. Very much so. Captured. Yes. But what that is is a burst of radioactivity transmitted on the frequency for 72 seconds. Waln and it was basically the closest thing we've ever gotten to hard evidence of a radio transmission from an alien civilization. Right. It meant, like, all of the criteria that said he follows, which we'll talk about later for radio transmissions from intelligent life. Right? Yes. The problem is, after searching for it for like, 50 times, specifically, it's never been found again. Right. And the reason it's called the wow. Transmission is because Jerry Ayman circled it and wrote wow. With an exclamation point, and that's why it's called that. So although since that time, nothing else has come up in that same area and we haven't had anything even remotely close to it, SETI still continues. Right. Yeah. And SETI is both a movement and a group of people. It's an institute. Yeah. Well, there's the SETI Institute and there's just independent SETI operations. Yeah. I mean, you can use SETI as a would that be a noun? Because it is a search. Yeah, you're right. Just a funky noun. Right. But let's talk about it, Chuck. Let's talk about SETI, the challenges that has well, first of all, have you seen the movie Contact? I have. Apparently it's not too inaccurate from the writer of this article who was Frozen Lake, wouldn't it? He said that that movie, if you want to watch that one, is fairly accurate and on track. Well, it was based on a book written by Carl Sagan, and he definitely knew his stuff. Yeah. The Segan Institute is one of the parts of SETI Institute. Very nice. Or the Sage Research Center, I think. Got you. So go ahead. You were saying? Oh, well, let's talk a little bit about the origin of it. SETI came about in a time when there was a large intellectual push towards searching for alien life. A lot of very smart people suddenly started postulating that there's probably other people out there. There's got to be two guys. Philip Morrison and Joseph. Joseph wrote a paper in Nature, and they basically said, look, if we look, we may very well not find anything. Right. But if we don't look, we're definitely not going to find anything. It's a good point. And that came at a time when a guy named Frank Drake, an astrophysicist and astronomer, was trying to start his own search, and he eventually founded SETI, I think, in 1960. Founded the SETI Institute or just SETI? SETI. Well, he conducted the first SETI search. The Drake did. Yeah, Frank Drake did. Got you. And it was based on something called the Drake Equation, which I find is utterly fascinating and refreshingly understandable as far as, like, theoretical math equations go. Yeah. N is the number of civilizations in the Milky Way whose electromagnetic emissions are detectable. So N equals R times FP times Ne times FL times F, I times FC times L. And then there's the R is the rate of formation of stars over the lifetime of the galaxy, and that's anywhere from, like, ten to 40 a year. Yeah. Star suitable for development of intelligent life. So that narrows it down. Then there's the fraction of the stars with planets. Then there's the average number of those planets that are Earth type, meaning suitable for life as we understand it. Yeah, that's the Ne. That's about 50% of the 50% of stars with planets. We're starting to whittle down pretty quickly. And then there's a fraction of those planets where life develops. That's estimated at as much as 100%. And then there's the fraction of life that develops intelligence. So it's not just enough to be an Amoeba, you have to be an Amoeba capable of creating a radio. Right. That's pretty low as well. About 10%. And then another 10% is the fraction of planets where intelligent life develops technology. Such as radio. Yeah. Okay, so you've got life and then L, intelligent life and then technology. Yeah. And then you have the lifetime of that communicative civilization in years. So, boom, multiply that on out. You got your Drake Equation, and you have as little as one as much as billions. Well, plus it's as little as one or billions, because those are it depends on what value put in there, and everyone's going to put in different values. So the Drake Equation is going to have a wide swath. Yes. Makes sense. Yeah. So you've got this. This is the framework. The Drake equation, created by Frank Drake, the founder of SETI. This is the framework that SETI conducts its research with. Like, one of the things they do is try to figure out exactly how many stars out there have planets that are suitable for life, to really kind of plug in the best possible data into the Drake Equation and to help them figure out where to look, because there's three main challenges for SETI that they face just as a concept and an organization. You have a really big sky out there, right? Yeah. You have a lot of frequencies, you have a lot of radio frequencies, and you have a limited amount of telescopes. Not much equipment. No, because it's very expensive. Exactly. And while Setting is funded to a large degree, it's not funded to a large degree compared to like when it was part of NASA, I think it was only like 1% of their budget. Even still, that was like the most money cities ever had. Yeah, but they're pretty well funded, the SETI Institute is. So as far as private funding goes, they're doing okay. Yeah. They're nonprofit, obviously, so they're not getting rich, you know what I mean? No, they're kind of hurting right now. Oh, are they? I thought they were doing all right. They also received federal funds, and that's all but dried up right now because of the economic downturn. You said he's the first to go. Yeah. All right. So you proposed the three problems. Here are a couple of approaches for the large sky problem. A lot of area out there. So they have two approaches. There the wide field search, basically casting a wide nonspecific net over a low resolution over a short period of time over a wide area. Could get you some nibbles if you were fishing, let's say. But it's going to be difficult to find out exactly like where this stuff is coming from or a targeted search, which is what my money would be on, which are limited to sunlight, stars. They basically factor in more of Drake's equation in this one. So let's look at places where we might find target these things, where we might find ETS. Right. And they do both of those depending they have various projects going on ongoing, and some are targeted, some are wide field search, so they're kind of covering their bases as much as possible. The next challenge was what frequency to listen for. To listen to? It's not a radio dial. No, but even with a radio dial, even with like a walkie talkie, like if you've ever used one of those, if you're not on the right frequency, you are going to miss everything that's being told to you. So like you said, it's not a radio dial. It doesn't go from like 88.5 all the way to 107.5. They're billions from alternative to country. Exactly. There are billions of radio frequencies and I mean, which one are you going to listen to? You can listen to them all, but again, you're cycling through them, you're not able to spend a lot of time. It's much like the same dilemma with the sky you have with the radio frequencies. Plus they're full of noise. Yeah, that's another problem. Big problem. Natural occurring stuff. Right. But there is a window in the radio frequency that's called the water hole. Which is pretty cool. It's a natural place in the radio frequency spectrum. And by the way, radio, they're light waves. It's a type of lightweight, but they're very specific. They exist on a specific frequency. But in the spectrum, the band, there's this thing called the water hole, which goes from the one to 10 GHz range. Yes. And it has very little natural background noise, like very few things broadcast in this frequency. And the reason being, these frequencies are caused by hydrogen f and hydroxyl ions, both of which are constituents of water, which is why it's called the water hole. And they suspect that for a couple of reasons, alien civilizations would be aware of this one, that it's just so profoundly unique in the radio spectrum that if you had any kind of awareness of the radio spectrum, you would stumble upon us. Yeah. And that you would intentionally broadcast in a low noise frequency exactly. Because you want to be heard. Sure. Yeah. I mean, anybody who broadcasts on the radio wants to be heard. Right, sure. And then the other reason they think that alien civilizations would know about it is because water, with which it's associated is considered an essential to life and therefore universal among intelligent life. It's not geocentric. The concept of water is. So aliens would be familiar with water and would thus be familiar with the water hole in the frequency spectrum as well. So this is probably where they're putting most of their research or their effort into this waterhole band of frequencies. Yeah, they search all over, but pretty much all SETI operations will search the water hole as part of their ops. Then there's magical frequencies, too. Basically, they're saying, like, where on this band of billions of frequencies is there some sort of universal pattern? And one of the things that they figured out is prime numbers might be a good place to look, because prime numbers are part of math, and they're universal constant. Right. So an advanced civilization might be aware of prime numbers, and if they're trying to communicate to another advanced civilization, they may be broadcasting on prime number channels. Crazy. That's a magical frequency. I wonder if they've searched the Pie station. So far, we've got two of the big problems tackled. Yes. Generally. The third one is the most down to earth problems. Yeah. No equipment. Basically, these radio telescopes are expensive to build, and so there's not a whole lot of them. So they said, there's a few ways we can handle this. We can conduct limited runs on ones that are already out there, basically rent space from other dudes. We can conduct analysis of data already acquired by other dudes. So, like, hey, you've been listening in on all these frequencies. Let us see your data. And we'll just work from that. Or we can build steady, dedicated radio telescopes, which is clearly the least popular because it's so expensive. Right. It's the most popular but least feasible. Yeah. And, like, the projects that they have ongoing for wide target search or wide field search or targeted search, they have different projects dedicated, different types of radio use. Like, Project Phoenix rents time at some of the better radio telescopes around the world. Australia arrived. And in Puerto Rico, the one in West Virginia. Green Bank, West Virginia has a huge radio telescope. And that's where the first city conference was held. 60, I believe. Yeah. And then there's the Serendip project, which piggyback cracks me up for some reason. Why Serendip? I don't know. Just because it's short for Serendipity. It sounds like your friend Adam that shortens everything. Oh, yeah. Like, he would say, yeah, we met up. It was a bit of Serendip. Yeah, he would say that tote Serendip. Yeah. They piggyback by basically saying, like, hey, like you said, let me see your dad, and once you're done with it, we want to go over it, too. Yeah. Hey, man, that's like the hippie Rob version exactly. Of astronomy. Well, he hadn't made an appearance in a while. He just did. I didn't expect him to pop up in SETI if he didn't pop up in magic mushrooms. So Project Serendip, like you said, it takes advantage of a lot of telescope time, but they don't have the control to say, hey, pointed over there. Right. So they have a lot of hours, but they're just basically that's the wide search being cast. And then you said the most desirable one was having their own telescope. Well, yeah, that'd be great. Sunny figured out something. Rather than making a huge they're paying for a huge radio telescope, they figured out that they can take a bunch of backyard satellite dishes, which I'm sure are really easy to come by these days. The kind like, from the 80s. Yeah. Put a bunch of those together, they're like 8ft wide, right? Yeah. You put a bunch of those together and connect their signals using a process called interferometry. Nice. Thank you, dude. Well done. First try, and you can basically simulate a huge, large telescope for a fraction of the cost. Yeah. It's like linking a network of computers, which is actually something also being done. We might as well get into that. The SETI at Symbol at Home project. And that's actually the SETI Institute, isn't it? Yeah. So they decided that, hey, instead of building a couple of supercomputers to analyze this data, because that's one of the big problems, is there's so much data. It's not like you can just plug it into your laptop. Right. But you can plug a tiny chunk into a laptop and network a bunch of laptops together to do the power of these supercomputers, and that is what they've done. And you can participate. Yeah. It's pretty ingenious. And there's other things that I think SETI at Home started it. Now there's things like folding at home, which you simulate protein folding for cancer research. Same thing. And I'm sure there are other ones that I didn't get a chance to look, but SETI at home started it where it's a screen saver, but it's also a program. And while it's running, it downloads a chunk of data from the Arecibo radio telescope. Yeah, and that's like your little assignment. And it's like 102nd chunk, maybe, something like that. It doesn't seem like much, but it takes like ten to 20 hours for the normal computer to process it. But like you said, if you have thousands of computers doing this, you have 1000 times the processing power all of a sudden for free. Pretty cool. And while your computer is analyzing it, it's making notes of all this stuff using SETI's algorithms, and then it uploads the results to settle and then downloads another chunk for analysis. And dude, I bet this is a very popular thing to do for Stargazers. For Stargazing, nerds of the world. There's a guy I remember who was in Arizona, I think, and he was fired from his job as the It head for the Department of Education in this one community because he booted said he at home onto all the computers without asking. But I mean, it's not a big deal. It doesn't take that much processing power and it just kind of runs in the background. Yeah, who cares? Well, he was made a mockery of by the local news. Like he was fired because of his search for aliens. Right. They made him out to be some crack. Yeah, it was pretty bad. But yeah, some poor guy got fired for that. Setti at Home got him fired. I said, I bet he got a job with Settee or something, though. I don't bet that. You don't think so he just said, Sorry, thanks anyway. Pretty much. Well, you talked about building your own and the alien telescope array. I'm sorry? The Allen Telescope Array. Yes. I kept taking it like that until I found out it's named after Paul Allen, the Cofounder of Microsoft, who donated all of the money for it. Well, that is still underway. As far as its construction, I think they were down for a little while because of a lack of funding and it's a $26 million deal. But I think as of 2011, they were up and running again. And part of it is complete to the extent, I think, where they can use it for things. Right. But they're still not finished with that. No, they're not. They have enough money to construct it, but they didn't have enough money to run it. So they have like a skeleton crew on it right now. Got you. But it is operational, I think. It is. They're hoping that they're going to be able to fund it by leasing some time on it to the Air Force who is interested in using it. They should try bake sale. I know it will be a great day. When schools have all the funding they need and the Air Force has to hold a bake sale to buy a Stealth bomber, that will be the day. Somebody should put that on, like a bumper sticker or something. We could shorten it, but yes, agreed. Should we mention the fermi paradox? Yes, as good a time as any. I mean, one of the things that happens to settle is that they're constantly pummeled by critics, and a lot of them cite the Fermi Paradox, too. Well, here's what SETI Institute says, because I dug into their FAQ a little bit. One of the questions was, why do we think that there might be life out there? Quote and Setti said, you should keep in mind that we are one planet around a very ordinary star, and there are roughly 400 billion other stars and nearly 100 billion other galaxies. And they think it would be extraordinary if we were the only thinking beings in all these enormous realms. Fermi Enrico said that if it takes life billions of years to develop intelligence and signal or travel to the stars, and there are billions of the worlds in the universe and the universe is 13 billion years old plus, then why haven't we been visited yet? Yes. When you look at it like that, the odds makes sense. They just increase exponentially. It's kind of like a perverted version of the Drake equation used to disprove the existence of life. The anti Drake. Yeah. Interesting. So what happens if we get a signal? What happens if they're sitting around one day and they hear phone home, come over the radio waves? Well, they have a strict set of protocols that start with the first person who finds it to the who gets told first what agencies learn of it. It's pretty cool. Apparently, contact follows the course of it pretty accurately. Yeah. But so a signal is detected, right? And the first thing they do is they move the radio telescope away from the signal and then they move it back. I bet that's nerve racking. I'll bet too, because you probably just want to stay locked on it, right? You're going to lose your signal. But you can't do that because you got to prove that it's genuinely coming from there. Right. So if you move it and then move it back and the signal wanes and then comes back, you know that you have an extraterrestrial signal, right? It's a big one. The next step then is to figure out whether you're getting it from a satellite or from elsewhere on Earth, right? After that, you're starting to shake, your palms are sweaty, and you start to rule out extraterrestrial sources like pulsars, quasars, other things that broadcast radio frequencies. By this time, you may have tinkled a little bit in your pants and you are on the phone with another radio telescope, hopefully one on another continent, saying, hey, can you go check these coordinates and see if you're getting this frequency, point your little machine that way, what do you see? Or here? And if they come back and say yes, you say, well, it's time to announce it to the world. Now I got to get out my book. The SETI Institute. The Declaration of Principles concerning Activities following the Detection of extraterrestrial Intelligence. Yeah. And SETI Institute says no one is keeping anything a secret. No, they want it disseminated quickly and widely. Yeah, but they want you to follow the proper channels first. And all the astronomical community gets first dibs on learning of it. Sure. Then after that you go to the UN. Oh, really? Oh, yeah. The UN, a lot of other international bodies. And you say, hey guys, we have confirmed extraterrestrial contact. And they say, awesome. And the astronomer goes along and says, okay, we're moving on to the next people. Eventually you get to the public and the person who discovered it is meant to have the honor of announcing it to the world. Yes. According to the protocols. Jodie Foster and SETI is on record, by the way. The SETI Institute is saying that they don't think that there are aliens that we've been hiding in Roswell, New Mexico. They said that, you know, the presence that would be like the biggest discovery in the history of science. And A, you wouldn't want to keep it a secret and B, there would be thousands and thousands of people working on it, and they said it would just be impossible. So they're not, you know, these crackpots that think, oh, we've got aliens hidden away, working on a farm in the desert of New Mexico, harvesting on water farms. That's where we got our microwaves from. Exactly. And I also looked at their FAQ under the are we sending signals? Because I thought that was kind of interesting because obviously Close Encounters, they sent messages out and they said they are completely passive experiment. They're only looking. They are not sending. However, we have been sending signals unintentionally for 50 years or more. Yes. Since the 30. Since we started broadcasting on the radio. Yes, on television. This is the early TV broadcast reached out about to about 1000 nearby stars. But they said it's very unlikely that any alien civilization could have picked up on that. But we are inadvertently broadcasting probably in the water hole too, I would think. And the other reason we don't send out signals is because if the nearest civilization they said is 100 lightyears away, it would be 200 years to get a reply. And it's just not a very good way to spend your time. Well, plus also it's in the protocols that we decide through like the UN and other international bodies whether or not to respond to a signal. Right. That's like one of the last steps. Well, they said that we've sent symbolic messages before, like, hey, here's what our solar system is like. Here are the compounds important for life here's the structure of our DNA in the form of a human. They say it's symbolic, but I think they're like, oh, you never know, right? So they're liars then, when they say they're passive. Well, they are passive. They have done that in the past. They said it was like the 70s. They're passive as far as astronomy goes. Active. As far as lying on their FAQ goes. No, I think it was 1974 was the last time they sent out a message. There was what? The Viking or something. I can't remember. The spaceship we sent into orbit or into outer space that had gold records containing all sorts of information, like the world's great information and knowledge on them. Do you remember that sort of Viking? Yeah, I think that was Viking. I probably got that wrong then. So what's in the future for SETI right now? Well, the future with the programs like SETI at Home could get more people active that they're interested in. Their home future could be good there. They said they might be sending or looking for light at some point, because it may not come via radio, it may come via light. You never know. Yeah, Frank Drake is all about that one now. He says that this is like the hot new field for SETI is optical astronomy. And of course, finishing up things like the Allen Telescope Array is important. And then there's SETI at home. If you want to go do that, it's pretty easy to go download. I had folding at home. I've never had City at home. You did folding. Cool. And then my computer crashed, and I was just like, oh, really? Maybe that crashed it. I don't know. Maybe I could tell the difference when it was processing. Betty. So if this kind of piqued your interest, there's plenty more information out there. You can also check out SETI's stuff on Science Channel during our week alone month in March premieres. Come on. I think Tuesdays at ten, starting March 6. Every Tuesday. Like Moonlighting. Was that on Tuesday? I think so. I seem to remember being drawn to the television on Tuesdays. I think it was Moonlighting and 18. Nice. Or was it moonlighting in Love Boat? No, it was Love Boat. Fantasy island. Yes. Those two are definitely together. Yeah. Let's see. Recapping what else is at the beginning. I'm married you. Me and I are married. And I guess that's it. If you want to read SETI, you can type that word into the search bar athousedofworks.com SETI. And that will bring up this very nice article, including cool graphs and screenshots from SETI at Home for some reason. And since I said search bar, I think I said handy search bar, even. It's time for a listing or mail. All right, Josh, I'm going to call this lucha libra Americanwestling from Zach. That's a given. Chuck, you suggested that wrestlers carry fake blood packs. Not quite. True, or at least usually not true. Instead, most wrestlers carry a razor blade in order to blade their foreheads. I've heard this, actually. I knew that they'll make a little cut and bleed right around the hairline after being hit in the head with a chair or a cage or another hard weapon. We're also talking about the big companies in America. The WWE is the biggest right now, with TNA is the second biggest, and Ring of Honor is the third. WWE and TNA are on big TV networks, while the Ring of Honor is only on the air in certain markets. And there are many independent leagues, including Smashing Pumpkins, billy Corgan's, resistance pro. Do you know that? No. I guess so. Dude, he's got his own wrestling league. I wonder if he's still on the dope. I don't think so. I saw him one day. He's really tall, which surprised me for some reason. I think I noticed that when the Cubs were in the World Series and he sang the national anthem. No, he's saying that taking out of the ballgame oh, really? Didn't stretch it. So Zach says, when talking about the rules, you're saying that weapons are not allowed, and I think I might have said that it's different with American wrestling, but not true. He said the chair was just really popular in the late 90s because they booked matches specifically to be more violent. So they would knock the ref down and people would use the chair when the ref wasn't watching. But you would still get DQD if the ref was to see that. And he also said, Raymond, you would get Dairy Queen. Oh, man, that'd be great. And then he said, Rey Mysterio is out with injury, but there's a good chance he will be back soon that he's still kicking it. That was a heck of a dispatch from the wrestling world. Yes. And dude, I redacted about half of it. Thanks, Zack. That is Zack from I don't know where he's from. He's from Billy Corgan's basement. Well, wow. If you have some supplementary information, not even necessarily correction, I think Zach handles that very well. Sure, we like to hear that stuff all the time, and we frequently read them as listener mail. So please feel free to go ahead and send us something you can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can send us a note or a message on Facebook@facebook.com stuffychnow. Or you can send us an email to stuffpodcast@housestepworks.com. Stuffysheno is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts My Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
https://podcasts.howstuf…-kickstarter.mp3	How Kickstarter Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-kickstarter-works	With billions of dollars raised, Kickstarter has singled itself out as the go-to site for creative crowdfunding. But not without some controversy along the way. Learn all about how this artistic business model operates in today's episode.	With billions of dollars raised, Kickstarter has singled itself out as the go-to site for creative crowdfunding. But not without some controversy along the way. Learn all about how this artistic business model operates in today's episode.	Tue, 25 Nov 2014 15:16:18 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2014, tm_mon=11, tm_mday=25, tm_hour=15, tm_min=16, tm_sec=18, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=329, tm_isdst=0)	35147096	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Hey, everybody. If you want a great website, you want to do it yourself. With no must, no fuss, turn to Squarespace. They have everything to sell anything. They have the tools that you need to get your business off the ground, including ecommerce templates, inventory management, simple checkout process, process, and secure payments. And if you're into analytics, hold on to your hats, because Squarespace has everything that you need. Just head to squarespace. comSK and you can get a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code SYSK to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. This July, don't miss an entire summer of surprises on Disney Plus with Disney's High School Musical, the Musical, the series, season three Zombies, three Doctor Strange in the multiverse of Madness, and the wonderful summer of Mickey Mouse. Plus new episodes of Marvel Studios, ms. Marvel and National Geographics. America the Beautiful. From the award winning producers of Planet Earth, Frozen Planet, and the Disney Nature films, america the Beautiful takes viewers on a tour of the most spectacular and visually arresting regions of our great nation. All these and more streaming this month on Disney Plus. Welcome to stuff you should know from housetuffworkscom. Hi and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuck Bryant. Jerry's over there. And we're ready to kick this episode off. For just $1, you can contribute to stuff you should know. Yeah, can they? No, we're a free podcast. That's why I get less patient with complaints. Yeah, right. It's a trade off. Yes, it's free. Get some ads here and there, live with it. Yes. No, but I'm just kidding. We don't fundraise or crowdsource or crowdfund. No, we just put stuff out. We have corporate sponsorship. That's right. Not everybody does, though. No, not all creatives do have corporate sponsorship. And so, luckily, since 2009, there's been something to help people like that out. Artists creatives who want to get a project underway but can't do it. It's called Kickstarter. They don't have the funds. I'm a big fan of Kickstarter. Yeah, it's pretty cool. I remember when it came out, I was like, this is going to revolutionize independent artists. Because one of the problems if you're an independent artist and you don't want to cow tow to the man, is to just do your own thing. Because the future is now as far as accessibility to equipment. And you can make a movie right there in your own neighborhood and home. Right. Easily. There's been a DIY a DIY spirit. Yes. If you have the skills, it's important. Well, there's always been a DIY spirit, but it's just the accessibility. This equipment is like never before. Right. They've caught up to one another. Yeah, it's cheaper. You don't have to get film developed. You can edit off your laptop. It's all there for the taking. Except it still costs money. Yeah. Actors didn't come free. No, that's one thing. Occupations right? Exactly. Wardrobe like an old craft services. Sure. You got to have some peanuts and coffee, and that's just for a movie. There's also, like, theaters. Sure. There's music. Yeah. I want to travel the world and photograph all the remaining rhinoceros. Rhinoceros? Rhinoceros. I don't know, I think it's rhinocerosis. It's a photo book. It's a photo project about the rhinoceros in Felt, and I want to do that. You can do that. That's an art project. You can get funded. You can if everybody thinks that that's a good idea, which is the cool thing about Kickstarter. That's right. So, Chuck, let's talk a little bit about this. Right. Kickstarter is Crowdfunding, which is a play on crowdsourcing, which is originally basically just tapping into the hive mind. Yeah. Thanks to the Internet. Right. There's a lot of people out there. If you take their collective brains or talents or thoughts or efforts together, put them together through the Internet, you can do massive awesome things. Like, Wikipedia is an original great example of crowdsourcing. That's right. Now, if you take all those people and say, hey, just hold on to your time, hold on to your volunteering, hold onto your effort, just give me money instead. That's Crowdfunding and Kickstarter is one of the better examples of it. But it's not the first. No, it's called Micro Patronage, if you want to get specific. And it's been around since the mid ninety s kiva. Org. We've done a podcast on Microlending and we have our own Kiva team. We've got a killer Kiva team that just surpassed 100,000 loans, and we're coming up on $3 million in loans made. That's right. So if you're interested in helping out I know we talk about it a lot, but it's been a little while. If you're interested in helping out a business owner, either in the United States or abroad, you can do so@kiva.org teamsteffysto. That's right. And you can do it as a team. It's just fun. So keep as one great example, donors choose.org I remember when that started, when teachers started posting projects for their school. Right. Because schools are ridiculously underfunded and teachers had to ask the public to help pay for a field trip or something. I've seen Waiting For Superman, man. I saw that. Seen that. It's been on my list for years. Very rarely have I seen a documentary that just got my hackles up like that one. It's really well done. Well, that's because can anyone make an argument that education isn't worth funding and supporting? No, but this does just a great job of, like, getting all sides of the issue out. It's one of the best documentaries ever made. I need to see that. And that wasn't on my top documentary list because I haven't seen it. Got to see it. Any feedback on that? I want to say thank you very much to all the people who wrote in with suggestions in answer to my complaint that I've seen all the good horror movies. Oh, yeah. Apparently I was wrong. Boy, we got a lot of good suggestions there. Yeah, I can't wait to see some of them. Yeah, most of them are foreign, it seems like. Hey, they're making the whole world. It takes a global village to scare Josh. It does. Indiegogo and Sell Abandoned were a couple of other early crowdfunding sites for music and movie making. I think Indiegogo does lots of projects now though, right? It's not just movies anymore. Yeah, but Kickstarter has emerged as like the go to site for what's supposed to be creative projects. Yeah. Well, let's talk about this. In 2002, co founder Perry Chen said, I want to do this concert here in New Orleans, but it costs a lot of money to throw a big concert. And let me talk to my partners Nancy Strickler and Charles Adler and see if we could figure out a way how to do this. And they said, you know what, we know we can get people to donate a little bit of money to this thing. A lot of people. But how can we do that? You know, I think they met Perry Chan, was waiting tables and was one of the other guys waiter and they struck up a conversation about it. I believe that's how Kickstarter got started. That's pretty cool. Yeah. So they had the idea, obviously based on, like we said, indiegogo and some other crowdfunding sites out there to start Kickstarter in 2009. But they said, you know what, we're going to do exclusively creative projects. You can't raise money to pay your rent or pay off your house or anything weird like that. And you can't just do like a vague plan or something like that. It had to be, here is what I'm going to accomplish. Here's my project. Here is the end result. This is what it's going to be. Here's the timeline. I want to get this done within. And this is my Kickstarter project. This is what I'm going to hopefully go get funded my campaign. Yeah, but it's creative. Yes, that's right. And they wanted to differentiate themselves and be unique. And being creative only was one of the ways that they did that. Another way they did so was to and I thought this was a stroke of genius. It's all or nothing. Yeah, this makes sense now. Unless you get 100% of your funding, you're not going to get any funding and Kickstarter is only going to collect. Of course they make money by collecting a little piece of it. 5% commission. Only if you reach that funding goal though, right. Which sets it apart from the crowd. And I think it's pretty genius. The whole reason it's genius is this. If you are a creator and you have a project and you get halfway to your goal, your monetary goal, and you take that money, you are obligated still to those people who gave you just half of the money you needed to create something. But what you're going to create is inherently inferior to what you would have created had you had all the money you figured out you needed for this project. If you can take less than all, you're going to set yourself up to make something that you're not proud of. Yeah. Or if you don't get funded, you might think, all right, well, maybe that wasn't the best idea. Or maybe go another route. Or say, maybe that wasn't the best idea. Let me try something else, which is like a crowdsourcing aspect of Kickstarter. You're also saying to the hive mind, is this a good idea? Yes. And the other cool thing about the 100% or nothing is as a donor or an investor, you know, that what you're going to end up with is this finished movie or this finished record album or this finished photo project. It's not just going to be like, well, I just lost that $5 to something that was 30% funded, and I don't even know what I'm going to get out of it now. Right, you just basically, like, threw a $5 bill into a busker's guitar case or something. Yeah. Which is something you should do, too. Yeah. There's nothing inherently wrong with that. But the point of Kickstarter is there is a project that this person has approached you on and you have said, that is worth $25 of my money, even if I don't get anything back. Sure. I feel good about this project. Not the fact that you're an artist in general or you're a musician in general. This is this project that I'm investing in. That's right. Another interesting facet to Kickstarter is that they do offer rewards as a backer. They require people to offer rewards. So it's not just, hey, you're going to feel good about yourself for supporting the arts. In my finished movie, you're going to get a copy of the DVD or the CD, maybe signed by the artist. Maybe it's a poster. Maybe it's a pin or a button for a two dollar donation. Right. Or maybe it's lunch with me if you kick in $100,000. Or maybe the executive producer if you kick in all the money. Right, or not all the money. But they have different tiers set up and different rewards that align with those tiers. Yeah. The thing is, there's rules with this. Like, you can't offer a financial stake in the project or equity. No. You can't say, you kick in $25 now you'll get $50 back when I sell this thing to Carol Co film. Where did you come up with that? That's a go to mine. Carroll go? Yeah. Haven't they been out of business for like, 20 years? They had a good logo. Good. Glowed, I believe. And then the other so when this stuff is all done and up on Kickstarter, basically the creative has said, I'm responsible for two things one, I will complete this project if I get funded fully. That means this project has to be done. Sure. I can't just take the money and run. No, legally, I think they can. Oh, really? Yes. But I think the public shaming that would ensue it would just not be worth it. That would be your only Kickstarter project. Exactly. Yeah. And then, secondly, you have to fulfill whatever your rewards were. Right. And we'll get into the nuts and bolts about actually creating a Kickstarter project right after this. Hey, everyone, when you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office? Then you could be using Stamps.com. Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses. Because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right from your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps.com easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to Stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. Okay. So we said it has to be a creative project. What does that mean? Josh? I think if I fought The Star Spangled Banner on YouTube, that's a very creative project. I can't believe you just use the F word. You know what? You probably could get that funded pretty easily. I totally could. And the key is that Cooper would pay for that by himself. By himself. He would liquidate everything he has just as long as you did that. You're right. The thing is, to get on the Kickstarter site, you have to get past the Kickstarter staff. And it's actually not just any Joe Schmoe can come along and be like, I define creativity. Right. As a matter of fact, there are definitions for what makes a creative project. And then on the other end of that is the staff that has to look over a proposal and say, yeah, this meets our standards. Yeah. They define it on their website as art, comics, dance, Design, fashion, film, food, games, music, photography, publishing, technology, and theater. And they admit that it is an ever evolving definition because creative people are kind of wacky, and they'll submit things that walk the line that they'll have to decide, hey, this Chuck Bryant guy, he's kind of a big podcaster. He wants to fart the Star Spangled banner on the front lawn of the White House. Oh, man, that sounds pretty good to me. You could very easily get onto the front lawn of the White House these days, too. Yeah, you just jump the fence. How nice. And start farting. So the thing is, I think in that sense, on that end of the spectrum, they're a lot more liberal. I don't think the Kickstarter staff is interested in saying that's art or I don't agree with that art. So that's not really sure. What they're more concerned with is having basically becoming an as seen on TV website. Right. So the author of this article is Dave Ruse. He puts it like it's a proposal for a project, not for a finished product. So it's not, hey, buy my DVD. It's, hey, invest in this project and you'll get a DVD when it's finished. Yeah, that's a huge distinction. Sure. Because if not, it would just be an online marketplace. And Kickstarter suffers a lot of criticism because it's evolved in that way. But apparently they are cool with that to a certain degree. Yeah. There was one case, I think it was a couple of years ago, for a watch band that held the ipod Nano. I remember when that came out, they wanted to raise $15,000 and they raised a million dollars. That's the other cool thing about Kickstarter. I don't think we mentioned. If you go over, then great. Yeah, good for you. But basically what happened was your $25 donation got you that watch band that you can now get online or Apple stores for $40. Right. And they took some flak for that. Isn't this just a way to buy something before it comes out? Yeah, because for cheaper pre order. Yeah, pre order. Is that what it's called? Yeah, pre order, this thing. Yeah, I know. Right now, I think the biggest success they've had is that cooler. The coolest cooler. Have you seen that thing? $13.33 million. And I think their original goal was like $50,000. Yeah, I mean, I remember when I first saw the little ad for this thing on Facebook, it was awesome. I was like, man, that is one cool cooler. Yeah, it has bluetooth waterproof, bluetooth speaker, it has ice crushing blender built in. It is a cooler, too. Yeah. And again, like we said, this is the crowdsourcing aspect of it. These people came up with the coolest cooler and the world said, yes, that product needs to come into existence. And they voted by saying, here is way more money than you need. And now, yes, it's basically a pre order. Not only that, this company now can sell out to whoever they want to and sell coolest coolers for the rest of eternity. Yeah. License it to Igloo or somebody. Right. Because it's not a gamble at all. It's already proven itself in the retail market, so there's no gamble whatsoever. So they can just keep making them themselves or they can expand and attract outside capital. And it's all because Perry Chen and his fellow co conspirators created this website that has all these dimensions to it, even though it's so simple. Sure. When placed into the context of the internet, it has complications, but also expansions. Yeah, for sure. It's pretty cool. Even though there are products like that. 60% over 60% of products that are successfully funded are music, film and video. So that's a little I mean that's true, but it's flip flop some, apparently. So this article I think was 2011. Yeah. From what I saw, the most popular by far as far as funded projects go as film and video, then music, then publishing, then art, and then games. Got you. Like what was games mean? There's a lot of role playing games really, that get created on Kickstarter. It's another thing too. It's a great marketplace for nontraditional stuff. Yeah, you'd probably think of going on to Amazon to look for that and you might find something too, but you're not going to find a game that doesn't exist yet on Amazon. Wow. I don't know, he just blew my mind. Thanks. I got a few more stats for you. These are current as of today. 1.38. Is that a billion billion dollars pledge to projects. Almost 73,000 successfully funded projects. By the time it comes out, it will probably be past that 18.5 million total pledges. I'm having trouble with my commas today. But that's basically the public saying we believe in donating small amounts of money to projects that we believe in. And I think that's great. I do too. I think it's a pretty neat concept. So we were talking about how odd Kickstarter can get sometimes. There's like no dearth whatsoever of very weird Kickstarters that have resulted in some pretty cool stuff. Like Zach Danger brown's potato salad. Oh, that guy. He was looking for some money to just make potato salad one day and got wildly funded, well past his goal and ended up holding potato stock in his town of Columbus, Ohio. And he made something like 350 or \u00a3450 of potato salad. So like if you donated, you could come and eat this potato salad. Yeah, that was it. That was the Kickstarter. If that's not conceptual art, I don't know what is. That how he categorize it. That's how I categorize it because food is a category too. Maybe it was both a straddle of the line, a food art project. There are some tips we can give you though. Kickstarter, successful Kickstarter. Kickstarters. What do they call themselves? Kickstarters. Kickstarters. Kickstart People. Kickstart People. They say that obviously you have to start with a very catchy, unique, fun and or inspiring idea. Potato salad is pretty inspiring. Well, that could be fun or catchy at least. They say you should have a good story because what you're going to do is you don't have to, but you're encouraged to make a video pitching your idea. Right. And if you've watched some of these, they're all usually just kind of off the cuff and tongue in cheek and fun and low budge. You don't want to look like you have a lot of money probably, right, by making some big production and you want to appeal to someone. If you got a great story about why you're doing your project, then that's certainly going to help you get funded. Yeah. And that's one of the things about Kickstarter too, is that you hear about the potato salad thing that became basically an Internet meme. Sure. It became so popular. The coolest cooler you could find out about on Good Morning America. You can really count the number of Kickstarters on both hands. Maybe if you had a third hand, that would be helpful. Sure. That you've heard about if you're not like a Kickstarter donor, don't really go to Kickstarter, right? Yeah, but that leaves 70,000 and change that you've never heard of. Yeah. And that's the thing with Kickstarter. You create your Kickstarter projects page and the first thing you do is send it to family and friends, say, hey, you want to invest in this? And then you take it out to your social media context. And then if it is a really good idea, theoretically it should take off on its own. It should just spread by word of mouth. Somebody should say, this is really cool and I'm going to share. And Kickstarter makes it easier for you to share. Wow. I just sounded like I was pitching kickstarter. I was just thinking, man, they should like get in touch with us. But that video aspect, that in and of itself is very sharp. So if you can come up with a cool video to put on your Kickstarter page, then that could easily be shared. And that's a really good way to make the rounds on social media, too. Yeah. They say that every successful campaign begins with an anchor audience, is what they call it. It doesn't necessarily mean you have to have a popular podcast, although we could probably get something funded if we wanted to. Especially your idea. Yeah, exactly. The F word. Your anchor audience could be just your social circle, your friends and your family. Your rich uncle. Yeah, you're rich uncle. I just got him first before I even went to Kickstarter to see what happens. But you should have a good anchor audience if you're not on social media. If you don't have a solid support group in life, then unless you really catch on somehow, you're probably not going to get funded. Yeah. You should be relying on your idea and the catchiness of your pitch anyway. But the fact that you have access to social media is probably a pretty big leg up over somebody who doesn't know how to use Twitter or Facebook at least. Sure. You're not going to be left alone in your experience though, because once you do get approved, you will be working with Kickstarter. They're going to have a representative get in touch with you, and they're going to work with you and say, you know what? You might want to think about these rewards, or your rewards aren't great, or maybe you should have these price points to tie into these rewards. They want you to succeed because they make their 5% if you succeed. Exactly. And I'm sure they want to encourage the arts, too. That's how it started. But we're going to talk a little bit more about those reward levels and a little bit of math and some more controversies. Ready for this break? Hey, everyone. When you're running a small business, every second counts, and you can't afford to waste a single moment. So why are you still taking time out of your day to go to the post office when you could be using Stamps.com? Yeah. For more than 20 years, stamps.com has been indispensable for over 1 million businesses, because Stamps.com gives you access to all the post office and Ups shipping services you need right. From your computer. That's right. You can streamline your shipping process with Stamps. Com's, easy to use software. All you need is your regular computer and printer. No special supplies or equipment necessary, and you can get discounts you can't find anywhere else, like up to 30% off USPS. Rates and 86% off ups. So stop wasting time and start saving money. When you use Stamps.com to mail and ship, sign up with promo code stuff for a special offer that includes a four week trial, plus free postage and a digital scale. No long term commitments or contracts. Just go to Stamps.com, click the microphone at the top of the home page and enter code stuff. Yeah, and we used to say it here, too. Oh, really? Until, I think, the 19th century. And then we started saying, why are we saying it like that? When you say math? Hodgman Hodgeman always says Math. Yes. He's got a little bit of the British in him. He likes to think so. All right. So the math of rewards levels, they've done a little bit of tinkering just to kind of find out what succeeds and what doesn't. The $25 pledge is the most popular. Sure. About 18.4% of pledges are in the $25 range. $50 is the next most at close to 14%. And you set your levels. Like, you can have a dollar, be your lowest donation level if you want, but you're going to count on you have to think about your audience. If you think, I've got lots and lots of people, but they may not want to throw up a bunch of money or throw in a bunch of money, then maybe I should do the dollar level. Well, plus also you should sit down and think about exactly how much you need to achieve your project. Yeah. The minimum amount that you need. Right. And you really need to sit down and crunch the numbers, say $20,000. You need to crunch the numbers, know the minimum amount you need, because even if you threw a number out, you might find down the road like, oh, man, this isn't actually enough. Yeah. So you want to take that number and then add they suggest at least the 5% commission that they're going to take from it. Oh, yeah, I never thought about that. Right. But say your project is to eat a chipotle burrito, a chicken burrito, and then describe its deliciousness on a graph. You need $8 for that. And some guy did that. He said his goal for $8. He made way more than that. I think he exceeded his funding by 1300%, which is the record holder. Still. Come on. And he created a graph of the deliciousness of chipotle chicken burritos and sent them out to all 270 donors. Yes. Naysayers will say that's just a waste of everyone's time and money, sexual art, and you should donate that to some important cause. But you know what? It's their money. If people want to donate a dollar for that, then that's their right. You know what I'm saying? That's true, man. $100 pledges have the biggest impact on total dollars raised, but they make up less than 10% of pledges, and they recommend you get super creative with your prizes, make them really personalized. If you're a filmmaker or any kind of creative artist, like a musician, it would really help if you personally were offering something like a signed copy or maybe a phone call leaving your voicemail, outgoing message or something silly like that a lot of people would donate to. Right. And you put that as like the highest possible goal. And they say that you're probably not going to get one of those, but why not put it out there in case somebody does want to shell out like 50 grand or something on something silly like that. Yeah. And a good idea is a good idea because 94% of successfully funded projects exceed their goals. So that means if you're onto something, then you're going to get that money plus some but there have been some controversies, right? There have. So Veronica Mars was canceled. It was a TV show that was canceled with stuff you should know. The street, kristen Bell. Right. And they brought it back. They said everybody wanted a movie and what's his name? Rob Thomas. Yeah. The guy from what, matchbox? No, a different guy. No. The Great Rob Thomas. He did the TV show Party Down, which is my got you. Okay. Top five all time favorite. Sure. Cool dude, then. Yes. So he basically said, we're going to make a movie and we're going to use this Kickstarter thing to do it. And they did. They raised like five and a half million dollars for the movie just from Kickstarter. And I think it's the fifth most funded project in Kickstarter. History. Oh, yeah. But there was some controversy with the way that they offered downloads. Right. Apparently they use Flixer, which a lot of people were like, I don't use Flixer. I use itunes or I use Amazon. Just give it to me through that. I gave you guys money to go make this movie. Give me the download the way I want to. So apparently he got in touch with the studio, warner Brothers, I think, and they said, okay, we'll make this right. Right. Because he was saying they offered refunds, I believe, because the idea was if you donated a certain amount, you got the movie within days of its theatrical release on your device of choice. Yeah. And he had a pretty good blog post. And this is actually kind of a good indicator of what you're supposed to do on Kickstarter. You're supposed to post updates yeah, sure. After you reach your goal. That's not that you don't walk away and then come back when it's done. Like you want to post updates about production, just keep people involved. He had a blog post when all of this hubbub was going on. He said, you know what? I'm really sorry. More than anything else, I want this day to be perfect for you guys, because this is the day the Veronica Mars movie that we've all wanted so long gets released. So it's supposed to be a great day. So whatever you guys need, just get in touch with Warner Brothers customer service and they'll set it right. Nice. So it's a good example of handling controversy through Kickstarter, but it also kind of underscores the ownership that people who invest in Kickstarter projects feel in the final product, too. Yeah, for sure. Like, they're like, hey, man, I'm an investor in your movie. I should be treated better than this. Yeah. And along with Zack Braff, who raised about more than $2 million for his most recent film, which I was here, he got a lot of flak because he raised, like I said, over a couple of million bucks and then got another, like 8 million or so from Worldview Entertainment, a film financier. And a lot of people said, hey, man, that ain't cool. Like, you basically said, you don't have the money to do this yourself, so you're going to raise the money via Kickstarter because you don't want to give up your final cut or your casting decisions to some film financing. Right. We understand that you're avoiding the man and doing it all yourself, so here's some money. And then you go to a film financer, and they give you completion funds or finishing funds, because all these people have already proven they're willing to pay money for it to see this made. And he basically said, you know what? I'm not making some different movie. I still have final cut. I never said that wouldn't happen. And so he defended himself, I think fairly successfully, but a lot of people on the independent creation level hear about Zach Braff making a movie and they're just ticked off about the whole situation. They're like, Kickstarter should be for the really starving artist, not the guy who made a ton of money on scrubs, who could either throw in his own money or get financing. And he already had financing lined up, he said, and he bailed on it because they did want final cut. Right. So I kind of get both sides on this one. Yeah. Good for Zach Braff if he can find a way to do it without giving up final cut. Yeah, but I mean, he does serve as a cautionary tale. Like you don't change the terms after the Kickstarter is funded. Yeah, and he says that he did and he said the whole time he said that he was going to take the Kickstarter fund some of his own money and then get foreign distribution money to fill out the rest. And apparently that's what he said he did. Yeah. And again, though, if people wanted to donate to see another Zach Braff written and directed film, then great. But that's a separate issue. Like if he wants to come to Kickstarter and use it, then yeah, if he shouldn't be or if people disagree with that, they're not going to fund it. If people do fund it, then it has nothing to do with you. Exactly. I found an interesting thing here from Cambridge University. They have some computer scientists that say they have found a way, they may have found a way to direct your Kickstarter project to the right audience. They basically examined three months worth of data from Kickstarter a researcher named Jisun on, and then plugged it into an algorithm after they found two categories, basically frequent investors and occasional investors. Occasional funders built an algorithm to say which projects attracted which type of funder. And what they came up with was the following. If you are a frequent funder, you are more likely to fund projects where it displays good management. Like you said, if you're frequently updating the page, if it's really well designed, it makes sense. Kind of like someone who would invest in a company. If they really look like they're buttoned up, they're more frequently going to invest high stakes. They said frequent Kickstarter investors are more likely to invest in something with a high fundraising goal, not the $8 chipotle graph, which makes sense as universal appeal. They said the local projects are more likely to get funded by infrequent investors. Long term investors are more likely to fund something with universal appeal. And if it's fast growing, if they see a lot of people are investing, the more frequent and most heavily heavy investors. Sure, everybody wants to get in on that. Exactly. But they did say in the end, it's really all about the quality. That's the one caveat of the project. At the end of the day, it still has to be a quality project or catch fire in a mean sort of way. Right. Like meat soap. Exactly. Have you heard of that one? I already know what it is. And then there's one, the Grizzly coat. Well, what is meat soap? It's soap made from fat rendered from meats. It smells like meat. Okay. It's basically bathing in meat. Yeah. And then there's the Grizzly coat, which is a coat with a hood that looks like a grizzly bear's head. It's pretty cool. Nice. There's a lot of weirdness out there on Kickstarter. It's wonderful. Little marketplace of idea exchange. Yeah. I mean, if I didn't have my job doing what we do with our great companies that we work for, like paying the bills and keeping the lights on, I would definitely go this route. Like if it was around in the early ninety s, I would have been all over this junk because I was out there on the streets making films, panhandling for nothing. Yeah. And the result was indicative of that. You got anything else? No, sir. If you want to know more about Kickstarter, go to kickstarter and follow all the rules. You will be funded. You can also learn some more about it by typing Kickstarter into the search bar@housetepworks.com. And that will bring up this article. And I said article. So it's listener mail time. Yeah. I'm going to call this that won't play in Peoria. Remember during our NPA podcast, I don't think I could remember the name of the city. I think we said she bought again. Yeah. Wherewella? Or something like that. So we had quite a few follow ups. And this one is from Nate Malore. And Nate said, Nate works in a temp as a temp at a greenhouse, which is interesting. And he said he's falling behind lately, but wanted to reply about the MPA podcast. Chuck was struggling to remember the phrase that will or won't play in Peoria. Someone has probably let you know this, but if no one has enlightened you as to the origins, I will. I'm told it was in a book at some point in the late 18 hundreds, but even before that, theater groups, burlesque and vaudeville would use Peoria to workshop shows on the way to Chicago, as it is a fairly large city on the Illinois River. When I was a kid, it was a test market even. Have you ever had a McDonald's pizza? I remember the MC Pizza. He says no. If no, then you're lucky because they're terrible. It supposedly is representative of the Midwest, and according to my father, it was one of the most economically diverse cities in the Midwest. So Peoria, I guess, was just kind of every place near Chicago. Which explains the phrase. Exactly. Anyway, I love the show and your sister show stuff you missed in history class, which we also recommend, by the way. Listen to every episode, even the pre Chuck era, except the ten or so I have to catch up with. So that is from Nate Malore. And Nate says PS. Every time you enter commercial and say go to the search bar and type in stuff to get your whatever, it makes me want to go to whichever site you're plugging, type a bunch of random keys into the search bar and send you an email calling you jerks in my head using Josh's voice. I'm not sure what that means. I think it's at face value. Well, Nate, I think you've been in the tempting in that greenhouse for too long. What kind of greenhouse are you in there, Nate? Yeah. Is it in Humboldt County, California. Yeah. Thanks a lot, Nate. That was very nice of you indeed. If you want to get in touch with us, you can tweet to us at yskpodcast. You can join us on Facebook.com stuffychnow, you can send us an email to stuffpodcast@housetofworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the web stuff you should. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit housestepworks.com. Summer school's out. The sun is shining. The daylight is longer. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music that's so good it's Criminal Morbid. Part true crime and part comedy, Morbid takes you on a journey from murderous mysteries to major laughs, all in the same week. Hosted by autopsy technician Elena Ercart and hairstylist Ash Kelly, this chart topping series will have you hooked before you know it. New episodes of Morbid, one week early, only on Amazon Music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
2a82cba0-3b0f-11eb-a672-e3622af005cd	How the Nobel Peace Prize Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-the-nobel-peace-prize-works	The Nobel Peace Prize is perhaps the most prestigious award in the world, yet there are plenty of other similar awards. What is it about this one that makes it so honored? And how did the guy who invented dynamite end up creating a peace award? Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.	The Nobel Peace Prize is perhaps the most prestigious award in the world, yet there are plenty of other similar awards. What is it about this one that makes it so honored? And how did the guy who invented dynamite end up creating a peace award? Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.	Thu, 03 Feb 2022 14:28:26 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2022, tm_mon=2, tm_mday=3, tm_hour=14, tm_min=28, tm_sec=26, tm_wday=3, tm_yday=34, tm_isdst=0)	48506336	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know a production of iHeartRadio. Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. Charles W. Chuck. Brian is with me, as always. Jerry's here too. And if you you put the three of us together, stir us around, shake us up a little bit, put in a raw egg white, shake us again, add some ice, shake it a third time until your hand can't stand the outside of the shaker any longer. Pour us into a coupe or Cooper, depending on where you are in the world. Put a real deal marshino cherry, not the kind you buy at the grocery store in US. And a nice little sweet little stick. You've got stuff you should know. I just added a little egg white tomato. My Chuck B drink. What's your Chuck B drink? It's my spin on a bee's knees. It's the Chuck B. As in B-E-E. Yeah, sure. Neat. So there's honey in it. Whiskey and creme dement. Right? No, I do a shot of gin out of lawn dart. You got londard at your house? No. You want to send me some? Sure. It's from old Forth Ward distillery. It's a ginger lemon liqueur. That's pretty cool. And then I add a little pineapple gum syrup. Just a little bit, because that goes a long way. I can imagine. And then what else do I add? Ginger bitters. You got to have lemon juice. What about honey? Honey syrup. OK, right. Like I make my own honey syrup. Sure. Because then it just sits at the bottom like a dumb biscuit thing. Right. Don't look at me. And then I shake the credit out of it. Got these beautiful vintage 70 scoops. Then I add a little lemon twist. But I've added the egg white this last time and it just gives you that lovely little foam on top. It really does. Do you add the egg white first and then shake for a few seconds and then add the ice? No, I add everything together and I just shake till my arms fall off and it foams up. Really lovely. Got you. You don't have to shake his heart. If you shake for a little bit first without ice and then add the ice, it's way faster and your arms will thank you. I shake for the temperature, not so much as for the foam. Got you. Yeah, I like it to be and I freeze my glass like ten minutes ahead of time because I like it to be so cold. It's like that's the key to the Chuck B. Yeah, I'm with you, man. I want one right now. Now? Yeah, for real. Right now? Now. So I think, Chuck, you deserve a Nobel Prize and awesomeness for coming up with the Chuck B and naming it Too. That's a great name. Thanks. Okay. You couldn't get a Nobel Prize and awesomeness if you wanted to because it doesn't exist. Although something similar does. It's called the Nobel Peace Prize. Really? Yeah, and that's the focus of this one. I mean, we could probably put out a four part series on the entire Nobel slate. We're not going to do that. But we're not going to do that. This is mainly about the Peace Prize because Piece is where it's at. Ask anybody. Anybody. Ask Bono. Sure. He'll say, I hate the name you Too and Pieces where it's at. He doesn't like the name you too. Yeah, that just came out this week. He said he's never really liked the name. Who came up with it? The Edge? I think so. No, I think it was maybe a manager at the time suggested it and they went with it and he didn't love it and now he says he doesn't like it. I don't know. Come on, Bono. Shut up. It's a great name. I haven't been in the press for a while. What can I do? Yeah, exactly. That's probably about right. I haven't been on the cover of Catholic magazine in months. He's probably won a Nobel Peace Prize. He has not. Oh, okay. No, but I'm sure he's won some other humanitarian awards. I'll bet he has too. Because anyone can be nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. There's no great honor in that. I mean, there is some, especially if the person nominating, you like genuinely means it and you're actually nominated by more than one person. But as far as the Nobel Prize Peace Prize Committee is concerned, group of Norwegian people who take this very seriously, there's no real honor in that. You have to really win the prize or at least make it on to the actual short list to really kind of be significantly within the warm glow of the Nobel Peace Prize. Yes. I mean, we'll get into nominations later, but several hundred people are nominated and people like Mussolini and Stalin and Hitler have been nominated. Yeah, I'm going to nominate us one day. I'm going to become a political science professor. I'm going to nominate us for a joint award. And how about this? We'll throw out a bit of mystery here that we'll explain later. Maybe we'll find out if Bono was nominated in 50 or so years. That's great, Chuck. Good foreshadowing there. So I'm pretty sure everybody who has ever heard of the Nobel Peace Prize is aware that it's named after Alfred Nobel. And I would say that a significant portion of those people probably know that Alfred Nobel is one of the same as the Alfred Nobel who invented dynamite, wouldn't you say? Yeah, that's one of those, I think, early cocktail party facts that people like to throw around. Yeah, because it kind of stands out. Alfred Nobel created an explosive that was probably killed a lot of people in his lifetime, but then upon his death bestowed or endowed a prize that was dedicated to promoting peace and humanitarian issues and keeping things nice and chill I think is how he put it in his will. Yeah. Although the one New York Times article you sent said that during his lifetime, dynamite wasn't really used for war yet more Operation Plow share type purposes. Blast digging tunnels. John Henry style. Right. Okay. All right. But he was an industrialist. And there is at least a story that we'll get to that suggests that he was equated with warfare. Sure. At the very least, he was following in a family legacy of creating things that, if weren't directly used for warfare, certainly could be his father, Emmanuel, kind of kicked the whole thing off when he moved the family to Russia and started creating weaponry for the Russians at the time, I think, in the late 19th century. Yeah. He was kind of Tony Stark in a way. And his dad was no, I can't think of who is dad? Tony Stark's dad. Oscar from the Odd Couple picture. The actor. I can't think of the elder Stark, anyway. Felix from the odd couple. Sure. Felix Odd Couple. Stark was his name. But the point is, his dad made a lot of money in the sort of munitions business, in the arms business, like, a ton of money and moved his family from Sweden to Russia where his children were raised with a silver Russian sport moon in their mouth, had private tutors. And it was a little bit of a Tony Stark thing. Like, the kids ended up brilliant because they had the money to sort of pay for that. Just as a little side note, Chuck, I read an article recently. I cannot remember where I read it, but it was basically like critiquing the Iron Man franchise yeah. Yeah. For promoting the military industrial complex. Because they really glorified him as this kind of, like, weaponry, industrialist, advanced weaponry kind of guy. And, like, that's his whole jam. And I thought that was a pretty interesting take because I'm sure there's plenty of people out there who are Iron Man fans who hadn't really stopped to think about that. It's just, like, part and parcel with it. Well, I mean, that's a major plot point. In the very first one was him going back against all that and realizing that he had led to so much war and devastation. And now that's why he kind of changed his tune and started the Avengers and started blowing things up in a very private way. Oh, really? Okay. I wonder if the person who wrote the article like me hadn't seen the first one. Maybe. I don't know. Interesting. So Alfred was following his father's footsteps, right? Eventually, yeah. He was a very worldly, very well educated person. He was tutored by the best tutors that St. Petersburg, Russia had to offer. He spoke five languages. He was very well versed in literature and chemistry, apparently. He said once that he could digest philosophy as well as he could digest a meal, maybe even better. But he was also farted. Yeah. But he didn't really fart. He made the arm farting noise, because that's physics. Right. So he was an odd duck in a lot of ways. He lived too long ago to pin down in today's terms, but you could call him that. He kicked around Europe. He was a very wealthy person. Kicked around Europe, kind of was a dilettante and stuff he was interested in, but he was also very brilliant, but apparently described himself as a missing throat and a bit of a loner, I think. Yeah. He never got married, never had kids. I think when he described himself as having a pitiful half life, the quote in full is pretty sad because he basically says, the doctor should have killed me right after I was born. I know. It's very hard on himself. Yeah. Despite being a brilliant guy, he eventually started to work in Nitroglycerin, along with his brother Emil. And there was a tragic accident in 1864 where Emil and I think four other people died in an explosion. And for a while there, in fact, in Sweden, you could not work with nitrogen for a while and experiment with it because of that. Yeah. Because I think his family was Swedish. In Background so they must have moved back to Sweden at this time, or else the people in Russia had been like, Why did you that was a weird law, Sweden. Just mind your own business. But I guess Alfred was living in Sweden at the time because in response to that law, he moved his lab offshore. So think about this. His brother and other people, who is probably new sure. All died in an explosion. That's a grisly death, at the very least, for the survivors who have to clean up afterwards. Right. That's a big deal. And he still was like, I'm going to keep pursuing Nitroglycerin studies, and did so by moving his lab out under a barge on a lake somewhere in Sweden. Yeah. I'm not going to pronounce that lake because then I'm going to do it wrong. Muellerin there you go. Muellerin yeah. Because there's an UML out. That's right. But he eventually came up with dynamite because it was a bit more stable of a form of explosive and sold a lot of it, made a ton of money selling it to Australia and the States and all around Europe, western Europe. And I think he ended up with more than 350 patents to his name. So he was a consummate inventor inventing all kinds of things and making tons and tons of money along the way. I think in the end, he died with and this is very important we'll get to his will and how it was used, but he died with close to $10 million, which for back then was like 300 and changed today. Yeah. Like a lot of million. 300 million. Yeah. Not $300. Inflation doesn't go backwards. It didn't deflate. Yes, he subscribed to that Garfield poster from the 80s where Garfield standing in front of a mansion, in front of a lamborghini, et cetera. It says, he who dies with the most toys wins. Do you remember that poster? Yeah, I was in the Garfield. I was, too, but even at the time, I was like, this poster is wrong. Yes. I don't know about that message. And what's the deal with Lasagna? It's strange. Plus, also, it was all live action, too, like it was a real photograph, and then they just drew Garfield over it, which is not a good combination. That never looks good. So here's where we reached this point where that I referred to earlier, where there's a kind of a lower legend around Alfred Dobell and why he went from inventing stuff that make things go boom to bestowing or endowing a major award, the Nobel Prizes, in particular, the Nobel Peace Prize. And there's a really great story that may or may not be true about an obituary that was accidentally printed about him before he died. And how about this cliffhanger style? We'll get to that story right after a break. Yes, this is quite a cliffhanger. All right. I'm on the cliff. I'm hanging there like Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible. Whatever. As the story goes, some people say it's myth. I think it's a pretty good story either way. Is that when Alfred's brother Ludwig died in 1888, a French newspaper got it all wrong and thought that Alfred had died? Which is a very interesting experiment to think about. If you could read your obituary while still alive, what would that look like? I thought about that a little bit. Then I was like, no. One didn't even write it? No. For me, that would be the saddest thing in New York Times, would be like, Poo, but at any rate, or maybe a French newspaper would get it wrong. But they called him the Merchant of Death. And that said, his wealth came from the invention of new ways to mutilate and kill. The fact that they may not have used dynamite specifically for war during his lifetime. If the New York Times is correct, he still had his hand in many kinds of munitions, at the very least. So the reason that people are suspect about this maybe being apocryphal is that historians have been unable to actually locate an original copy of that article. Yeah, just not to say it did not exist. But even if it didn't, it's definitely a story worth relating, because at some point, Alfred Nobel definitely did go from misanthrope, who was a loner who just like to kick around Europe, to dying, and in a very big shock, to everybody, in particular his heirs, who were expecting to inherit that $350,000,000, saying, this is what I want you to do with my vast wealth. I want you to set up a prize that promotes the arts, the sciences and peace and here's how we're going to do it. That's right. Other people say and this was a pretty pivotal relationship in his life, but at one point he hired a woman named Bertha von Suttner to work for him. I guess it would be sort of like an executive assistant these days. And that was for a misanthrope. Ended up being one of his closest friends, work for him until she got married. And she was a peace activist writing a book called Lay Down Your Arms. And some people say that he may have been not trying to curry favor, but just influenced by her. Yes. And she actually won the Nobel Peace Prize in 19 five, in part because of her influence on the Nobel Peace Prize even being created. So I think they definitely even thought contemporaneously that she definitely had a huge hand in his change of heart because apparently before, he was one of those mutual assured destruction types where he's like, no, no, if you could use dynamite to blow everybody up at once, and everybody realizes that you can blow everybody up at once, they're just going to stop fighting, which kind of works. But that's not really a very peaceful stance. And apparently he changed his team before he died and there were many more weapons to come. He didn't know that at the time, but he didn't think about like, oh, wait a minute, but what if they made something worse than dynamite? No escalate to nuclear arms one day. So he passed away in 1898. I think so. Right, sure, let's go with that. It's definitely December 10. Yeah, I think it was 1898 because it took a few years to get to the very first prize in one, because he had lived sort of all over, like you were talking about when he was young and even when he was older, he had a place in France, he lived in Sweden, some he spent time in Russia, he spent time in Italy. So there was a lot of legal wrangling to do when he changed his will toward the end. I don't know if it was haphazard, but it definitely had some holes in it, enough that his family could complain about it and sort of tie it up legally for a few years, which they definitely tried to. And there's another great story, too, that his executor, the executor of his estate, was very worried that some of the French were going to try to put a claim on his fortune. And so we actually gathered his money, millions of dollars. So this is about $350,000,000 today in cash, put it on a stagecoach and drove it through the streets of Paris to the Swedish embassy to deliver it safely, to make sure it made it to Sweden with a revolver on his lap. Because apparently people would crash into you at the time with their carriages, like a bump and run kind of thing, right, in a carriage. And they would have had quite a payday had they realized that this guy had $350,000,000 inside. Heck, yeah. And word gets out and all of a sudden it's crash city. That's right. So the first prize finally gets awarded. They figured this out. One of the other reasons that it took so long too choke was not just the legal wrangling by the heirs, but the fact that Nobel basically said, here's what I want you to do with the money. You go figure it out. Yeah. And so it took a little while to figure it out. I saw it put that he endowed an institution that didn't exist yet and that he left it to his heirs to create it. And there was actually a potential that it just wasn't going to be followed through, that it was going to be too much of a headache, or that his heirs really should have the money. But finally they got it worked out and they started releasing the first or giving out the first Nobel Peace Prize in 19 one. And apparently from the outset, it was a very well known prize. It didn't start quietly and then build over the years. From the get go, people knew about the Nobel Peace Prize. Yes. I mean, from what I saw, just doing something like this, a large cash prize was very unique for the time now, to give out a big prize with an award, like a cash award attached to it, you see that a lot these days. But back then, it was just the fact that it was a cash prize was a big deal. And coupled that with the fact that this, along with the other Nobel Prizes, this was a peace Award, and it was the creator of dynamite, and we make a big hay about that now. But they also did the same back then. Yeah. And it was a huge cash prize, too. I mean, even out of the gate, it was worth about a million dollars. It was a lot of money that was suddenly given for people promoting peace. So, yeah, I think it was innovative. And then it was a big cash prize. And then the inventor of dynamite is the one who did it, who was already a very well known figure internationally, too. So the way he went about funding it, too, is interesting. He didn't just assume that $9 million would be forever money, so he said, here's what we're going to do. I want you to invest this money, and then the prize money will be doled out from the money that money makes from the interest. And so over the years, it's not like a set amount. It's sort of varied over the years depending on how his investments went. But like you said, in today's dollars, it started off at about a million. And usually, I think since, like, the 80s, it's been about that every year. Yeah. And so I think one of the original intent, possibly, was that it was kind of like a genius grant where you get a million dollars for your work and you're meant to continue on with this work. You don't have to worry about running around getting cranks or you can just focus on the work part because you're doing such a good job. And I think that some people keep the money with the other Nobel Prizes, the ones for like, literature and physics. But I do know for a fact that for the Peace Prize, it is customary and traditional, though you're not obligated to, but it's customary to donate that money. Which is pretty cool, right? I mean, wouldn't you just immediately question your decision as the Nobel Committee? If the recipient just kept the money, he's like, thanks for the money. This is going to go a long way to paying off that RV I crashed. They would question that. But as one of the rules will probably pepper in rules there there are no taxis back seats. No. No matter what you do, you could get the Nobel Priest Peace Prize. And some people have gone on to do some not so peaceful things and they're sort of admonished. But no taxis back seats. No. And there's no appealing it like if you knew that you were nominated and you think, this is BS. Nobel Committee, he has totally passed me over. I was the right one. They won't even hear it. Like, there's no process for you to appeal it. It's just not they would do that. There are people out there who would do that. I should have won. Forget Malala, right? What do you do? No way. So one of the other things, there was like a positive feedback loop that happened too, between the awards and the people that received the awards over time, is that the awards started to become associated with some towering figures on the international stage, heads of state, people who essentially founded modern, humanitarian, secular religions, like just really important people. So, on the one hand, the Nobel Peace Prize, being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize just puts a huge glow over you for the rest of your life. Olivia helped us with this one, and she put it like having been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize is usually in the first line of a famous person's obituary who received it. Right. They don't save that for the middle or the end. It's like the first thing. It's that important. But at the same time, as you're kind of bestowing this honor on the huge figures that go on, ideally to become even bigger figures, they kind of in turn reflect that glow back onto the Nobel. So it's this positive feedback loop where it just keeps becoming more and more important, which is really saying something, because there's a lot that has been criticized over the years, and rightfully so, into the Nobel Committee's peace Prize committee's credit. They've accepted this criticism and publicly wrestled with it from time to time. But despite some really big stumbles, that prize is not diminished in stature one bit in the general public's eyes. No. And they've even said that they hope that it will continue to inspire people to do well. Like you can't win the Nobel Peace Prize. There's a lot of pressure on you after that to keep that train rolling. Yes. And one of the reasons that they're doing that too, I should say that's one of the reasons they have the rule that it can only go to living people, because the hope is that you're going to take this prize and do even bigger stuff, which there's a critic, I can't remember his name who basically said, that's great, and that's a really good thing to do. But it's also very risky business because people don't always grow into the expectations of the Nobel Committee. As far as the Nobel Prize being bestowed on somebody earlier in their career goes, come on, I know who that was. That was J Alfred Poofypants. What a disappointment. But out of left field too, everybody had such high hopes for him. So as far as the process goes, the technical definition is that you go to the person who has done the most or best work for a fraternity among nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies, and for the holding and promotion of peace congress. And it is decided upon by what's known as the Norwegian Nobel Committee, which in itself is five people appointed by Distorting, which is Norway's legislative body. And this is just one way that it differs from the other awards. The other awards, they are Swedish committees. They're given out in Sweden. He went all Norway with the Peace Award and all Sweden with the others. Yeah, and he never explained why. But historians, including people on the permanent Nobel Peace Prize staff, have kind of suggested that at the time there was a union between Sweden and Norway and they were starting to split. And apparently to Nobel and probably a lot of other people, norway seemed to be the more democratic, the more peaceful and peace oriented of the two nations. So he just kind of either trusted them more or maybe wanted to shine a spotlight on that, or maybe in that way he was trying to create public expectations for Norway to continue along that way. Maybe so. That's a good point. If you are selected as a committee member, you're there for six years, unless, I guess you quit, but you have a six year term. You can come back for another term and get reelected. And so far everyone has been a Norwegian national on the committee, even though you don't have to be. No, it's not a rule. There's also assistance, lots and lots of research assistance. There are some that are appointed. There are some permanent ones too. And you need assistance and advisors because there's a lot of people that get nominated every year, I think on the order of usually 300 something, people get nominated. And as part of the process, you have to research those people. You can't just be like, Well, I've heard some good things about that guy. I heard that guy doesn't tip very well, so we're not going to give it to him and just leave it at that. Like, there is thorough research. The recipients are thoroughly vetted, not just to make sure that they are worthy of the prize, but I think also because the Nobel Committee wants to protect its reputation, too. They don't want to miss anything. So there's a lot of research that goes into investigating the nominees who make that shortlist. Yeah, I actually got my hands on Malala's case file. Oh, no. There are pages and pages and pages, and at the very end it just said, also, great tipper. That put her over the edge. I believe it, too. I didn't get my hands on that case file, by the way. Thank you. Who is on this committee? Used to be there could be real deal politicians, but eventually they said, you know what, that may be a conflict of interest to have active politicians and political leaders. So you can't be an active government leader at this point. So they're mainly retired politicians now, right, which is a little better. But it makes sense, too, because you'd think they'd be like, well, hey, actually, Norway really needs a lot from Brazil right now, so make sure that the president of Brazil gets it. You don't want that. And you would hope that retired politicians are a little less like that. But again, these are the committees that have the final say, but they rely heavily on the reports written up by the advisers. Yeah, that happens. I think the nominations are due by the end of January. Then in February, March is when all this research is going on, to where this initial research and they whittle it down to 20 or 30. They can also nominate their own people if they want as a committee. And then through March and August, the big time research happens. And this is when they're actually deciding the winner from that whittle down list of 20 to 30 from 300 plus. Yeah, and I guess they announced in October, and then finally on December 10, the actual ceremony where the winner is bestowed. The Nobel Peace Prize happened in Oslo, I believe. That's right on the anniversary of his death. Also, just little housekeeping here can't have more than three laureates win the award in any given year, but you can be an organization. So Doctors Without Borders has won the Red Cross, has won three times, plus the very first one, which went to Henri DEU Nant, who started the Red Cross. So technically they've gotten four awards. So you can get more than one award. Yes. The only other. Thing, the only other rule well, there's plenty of other rules, but one of the other big rules is, like we said, you cannot get the award posthumously. It happened one time to Dog Hammerscard. I mean, that's a tough word, dog Hammerscould. He was the guy who oversaw the true creation and expansion and I guess the guy who really set the tone for the United Nations as ostensibly a peace seeking body. Yeah, and he played Black Metal, too, which was weird. Yeah. He always wore the heavy, heavy mascara triangles under his eyes. It was a cool look, but really surprising for you. Look at that name. That's black metal all the way. Hamars jord. Yeah, I don't know. I'm sure we're pronouncing that wrong, too. Hammersgood. There's a lot of I think I nailed it. I think you did, too. That's not a very good hotel check in name. It draws too much attention to it because they say, how do you spell that? And go, can you pronounce that again? No, I can't say it any way you want. Oh, goodness. So I guess we'll talk a little bit about nominations because we keep saying things like, hundreds of people are nominated and it really isn't even an honor. We're not saying it's not an honor, but we're saying that there have been a lot of dicey nominations over the years. So much so that the Nobel Committee actually says, hey, just because you get nominated doesn't mean you can imply that you're affiliated with us in any way at all. And there's this weird I don't know if it's weird, but there's a 50 year rule that we alluded to earlier about finding out if Bono had been elected in 50 years. Supposedly that is under lock and key for 50 years by the person nominated and by the nominator, they're not supposed to say anything either. But you sent those articles that there was a bit of a conflict there. Like, one said that if word gets out, it's been leaked, but other people said, no, it doesn't even get leaked. It's purely speculation. So I'm not sure how it works. But you're not supposed to reveal it for 50 years. No, but there are probably people who qualify as nominators who could care less what the Nobel Peace Prize Committee thinks of them, especially if they're one currying favor with whoever that they've nominated for the Peace Prize. They're going to send an email saying, like, hey, I nominated you for a Peace Prize. Like, that could happen. I wonder if you can get that revoked, though. I don't know. As a nominator, that should be the punishment. Like, keep your mouth shut or you can't vote next year. Yes. What is that? Omarita what's that? Isn't that the mobs, like vowels? Silence? Is it? I think it is. I don't remember. Was that for the mock? There's a room loud in there somewhere. Your own life? No, it's a little bit of both. Okay, so we talked about nominators. Chuck, there's a lot of people out there who are qualified to nominate somebody for the Nobel Peace Prize. So, again, anybody can be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, but a small fraction of humanity can actually do the nominating. If you are an elected official at the national level of any government in the world, you can. So if you're a congressperson or president or vice President, or Secretary of the treasury or Secretary of commerce, who cares? You can nominate somebody for the Nobel Peace Prize. Right? Now, what I didn't get is that automatic? Like, if you hold an office like that, it's automatic. Yeah. Well, what about other ones? Because I know that some professors can are they invited to be a nominator? No, apparently for the other Nobels, the Swedish Nobels for, like, literature and physics and all that, they actually actively seek people out. They recruit people to do the nominations. This is more like I think you or I could send in a nominating letter. They just wouldn't take it into consideration because we're not qualified with our credentials. So I think part of accepting a nomination is verifying that the person doing the nominating is credentialed qualified to make that nomination. Okay, fair enough. That's my take on it. That's great. I love it. You should be able to lose those credentials, though. I think I think you're right. I think you should be stripped of them. They should take your sabre and break it over their knee, send you out to the frontier to live as a scorned coward. That's right. Revenant style. Now, have you ever seen that show Branded? No. Oh, that's what I was referring to. There's a great 50s black and white western TV show called Branded. I think it was Chuck Connors who there was an attack on a fort and something happened, but he was mistaken as, like, a deserter. So he was kicked out of the cavalry, and he's basically spending the entire show clearing his name and helping people along the way. But he had this, like, half saber that they left him with the handle in the first half that he used. I think he sharpened into, like, a short sabre. It was pretty cool show, if I remember correctly. And now that I'm saying it, I haven't seen it since I was, like, ten. So if it's, like, super racist and I just haven't seen it in a while, please forgive me in advance. Yeah, it probably is. Josh likes racist shows, right? He admitted it. Young Josh the medal itself is worth talking about. They were, until 1980, made from 23 karat gold. Now it is 18 karat green gold, which is a gold silver alloy plated with 24 karat gold. This is another way that differs from the Swedish metals in that this one is designed differently. It's designed by a sculptor named Gustav Vigilant. And on the front has alfred Nobel's image, which again is different from the Swedish one. I keep going to say Swiss. And I think there are three men with some Latin on the back for the peace and brotherhood of men in Latin that would be propace at fraternity, at gentlemen. Patche. Patch. Pro pache. Did you take Latin? No, that's somebody I picked that up somewhere along the way and for some reason always stuck with me. Pro pache. Alright, well now I know, I'll know it forever. What, patch or just the whole thing? Just the patch part. Oh, sure, yeah. And then you get your name engraved, of course, so it doesn't get mixed up with in customs or whatever. Right, okay, so I think we've reached the point. Oh, you want to take a break before we go on? Yeah. Okay, we're going to take a break everybody, and then we're going to come back with some more great stuff. So don't go anywhere because you're going to love it. Okay, so we kind of alluded earlier to the idea that the Nobel Peace Prize committee is like when they give a prize, it's not just like, hey, good work, it's, hey, keep doing good work, the world's watching you. So there's actually been, since there are different people who have served on the committee over the years, the committee as a whole has kind of taken different routes to deciding who should get what award. And there's a legal scholar named Roger P. Alfred out of Notre Dame and he says that you can pretty much divide the era or the history of the Nobel Peace Prize into different eras depending on the committee. And that basically leading up to World War II, it was mostly like pacifist committees or peace committees, peace congresses like Nobel specifically called out in his will. And that after World War Two and then into the Cold War, it started to kind of shift a little. Yeah, people who put democracy forward, a lot of humanitarian and human rights individuals and groups, people like Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela and Malala. Jimmy Carter got one in the early 2000s for his post presidency work that he's done. Yeah, people like that I think that they can give it to, and many times have given it to, and sometimes to some controversy, people on different sides of an issue. Like in 93. Nelson Mandela got it along with FW. De Klerk, you might remember from our apartheid episode, he was the South African president who negotiated to end apartheid with Mandela and other black leaders. So sometimes they'll do something like that, mix it up and say, these two people brokered this even though they're on different sides of the issue. Initially, yes. So they've tried that. It was successful with Mandela and de Klerk at the same time. They had tried it 20 years earlier for the 1073 award. They tried to give it to Henry Kissinger and Le duque Tow, who was north Vietnamese politician and he helped broker the end of the Vietnam War between Vietnam and the United States, although the Vietnam War continued on and Ley Duke Toe actually was the only person in the history of the Nobel Peace Prize to turn it down because he had to share it with Kissinger. And he said that the award put the invader and the invaded as equal. And I mean, even taking the idea that it was a joint award between Kissinger and Leidu Tow, a lot of people have said that you can't give a Nobel Peace Prize to Kissinger. Yeah, he's a warhawk, he was a war criminal. A lot of people think like he did some really awful stuff, carpet bombings, hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths, escalation of the war, like a secret war in Cambodia, all sorts of terrible stuff. We'll have to do episode on Henry Kissinger one day, but that's a good example of a controversial winner and also a split Nobel Prize winner and also somebody turning down the Nobel. Yeah, a lot of times they will admonish people in retrospect, even though there are no taxis back seats like we mentioned, they will say, hey, we give you a Nobel Peace Prize. And then you went on to do some not so peaceful things, even admonished Barack Obama who won in his first year presidency for things like drone strikes and overthrowing Qaddafi so you can get your hands spanked afterward again, they can't really do anything, but they can say you're very publicly, you're not living up to this prize that you earned. And that's the expectation. Yeah, I mean, and that's a problem with that's part of that thing of like giving out awards to people who are still alive and still in their careers. An Sang Tsuki from Myanmar was like this huge democratic activist and I guess everybody just presumed that she was also a peace activist too. And when she finally came to power, she actually oversaw a lot of basically war crimes carried out by her troops against minorities within her country, which really surprised a lot of people and I think it surprised the Nobel Committee. There's an Ethiopian prime minister named Abi Ahmed, he won in 2019 because he helped finally end the civil war between Ethiopia and Eritrea, which is a big deal. That civil war has been going on since the believe, but a short time after that he also oversaw ethnic cleansing in a region where minorities lived in his own country as well. So it seems dicey to give it to a head of state because there's so much dirty business involved in just being ahead of state in the 20th and 21st century that I can't imagine giving it to it. I can't see them giving it to another head of state again, especially after Obama too. They got swept up in the whole 2008 Hope campaign and gave it to him within a few months of him becoming president in 2009. It was premature. Yeah, it was. And they even said it was premature. And even at the time, people, democrats and Republicans alike, thought it was a premature kind of a missed step, really. So I'll bet they don't give it to another head of state again. And anytime you and I are still alive, I could see that for sure. They do their own thing, because they can, but they certainly don't love these controversies. The fact that Gandhi never got one is sort of a big stain on the committee. He was nominated either five or six times over the years and never got it. Some people say that Gandhi was too India centric and he was a nationalist. Other people say that there were violent protests that he certainly didn't call for, but we're done because of the things he was doing. Other people say, well, that's just a symptom of this Eurocentrism that the Nobel Committee has, which is like up until 1960, I think it was almost exclusively Americans and Europeans that got it. And then since then, there's been quite a few non Europeans and Americans. But people will still criticize and say, yeah, but even when it goes to a non European or American, it's someone that's probably aligned with their interest in some way. Yeah, because we said earlier that some people divide the eras of the Nobel Prize up in one of those areas is pro democracy. And the Nobel Prize Committee has definitely cast their lot among the democratic part of the world order, like their pro democracy, which doesn't account for communism and other political ideas that would have them turn a blind eye, I guess, to people who are doing good, peaceful work but aren't necessarily pro democracy, I think is one of the big criticisms. Yeah, that's a slippery slope. It really is. And I hate even saying those two words. Yeah, no, it definitely is. And I don't think anybody's saying, like, hey, you should turn your back on democracy. I think what they're saying is, like, hey, just because somebody's pro communist, if they're doing more activist peace work than anybody else on the planet, don't overlook them, I think is the point. Yeah. Like get Putin his day. Right. I wonder how many times he's been nominated. Oh, I'm sure there have been some interest that have nominated him, don't you think? Sure, definitely. Yeah. Or they got the poison right. I probably shouldn't even say that out loud. Oh, that's the other thing. You can't nominate yourself. Yeah, that seems obvious, but yeah, that's a rule. Yeah. I mean, imagine the Peace Prize winner who nominated himself or herself. Yes. You couldn't do that. There is an alternative award that some people say we should look to, which is the right livelihood award known as the alternative Nobel. Swedish German writer Jacob van Oxkul created this in after he went to the Nobel Committee and the foundation said, hey, why don't we add prizes for the environment and one that promotes perspectives from other people that aren't necessarily European or American. And they went, Nah. And he said, all right, so I'll create my own prize. And they'll say, Great, no one cares. I don't think they said that. They said, Get out. Well. Yeah, I saw that. They politely turned it down. Yeah, I'm sure it was all above board, but the Right Livelihood Award is what some people say we should look to. Yeah, but I'd never heard of it, so they're not certainly not marketed well. So apparently he funded it. And he also offered to fund those two additional Nobel Prizes by selling his stamp collection. Oh, really? Isn't that cute? How much money do you get for that? He had a million dollar stamp collection, apparently, at the time. Hey, not bad. So that's it? That's the final word on Nobel Peace prizes. What do you think? I think it was pretty good. Yeah, same here. And if you think it was pretty good, then stick around for some pretty good listener mail. Because Chuck said pretty good. I said pretty good, then I said listener mail, which of course means it's time for listener mail. Hey, guys, I have to push back a little here on something you said in your cookie podcast. The point was made that brownies are technically cookies. Bar cookies. Chuck wasn't on board, but Josh was. And I just can't let it go. You guys, I turned over all night over this one. How can a brownie be a cookie? Cookies are made from dough brownies. Like Josh said, you can't be a batter like cake, but brownies are definitely batter. Cookies can be made into a large pan sized treat. Brownies have to be made that way. You can't make individual brownies on the pan. Because of the nature of the batter, they have to be cut into pieces like cake. Lemon bars are brought up as another example of a bar cookie. But lemon bars have a bottom crust and filling more like a pie, and can't be baked individually either. I have to think that the ability to make individual items on a pan and the classification of the pre baked components, dough versus batter versus filling, are crucial parts of what separates these desserts. Maybe there's something I'm missing in the bar cookie designation that makes it appropriate, but otherwise I just can't get on board with calling brownies cookies. If anything, I think they belong in the cake family and lemon bars in the pie family. I love you guys. My family and I will continue to enjoy your work. Danielle from Anaheim, California. I'm sorry. This is Daniel. Okay, let me just say it in the French way. Yeah, exactly. Sorry, Daniel. Sorry. I don't know if it's going to make you feel better or worse that I've actually come around to the idea that brownies are not cookies. Hey, look, at there, everybody. It's true. The batter fact just completely undermines the idea that they're cookies if they're made from batter, so they can't be cookies. I agree. And I think the idea that lemon bar is actually more related to pie, as Daniel put it, is pretty persuasive too. So just forget I ever said the whole thing about brownies being cookies. Throw some meringue on a lemon bar. That's a piece of pie. Yes, it totally is. Especially if you cut it in like a little triangle wedge. That's right. Well, if you have been tossing and turning all night and have to get something off your chest to us, we want to hear it. You can send it in an email to stuffpodcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should Know is a production of iheartrad Radio. For more podcasts My Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
https://podcasts.howstuf…sysk-viruses.mp3	Virus Talk with Josh and Chuck	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/virus-talk-with-josh-and-chuck	Viruses are big jerks that invade regular cells and hold them hostage, making you sick while they're doing it. Learn everything you ever needed to know about viruses, including how the common cold works.	Viruses are big jerks that invade regular cells and hold them hostage, making you sick while they're doing it. Learn everything you ever needed to know about viruses, including how the common cold works.	Tue, 14 Oct 2014 13:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2014, tm_mon=10, tm_mday=14, tm_hour=13, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=287, tm_isdst=0)	31166880	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetepworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's charles W, Chuck Bryant. There's Jerry. And this is Stuff You Should Know featuring my enormous stopped up nose. And how appropriate. Yeah. Well, that was one of the reasons why I wanted to do this one. I figured I'm a little sick right now. Yeah. Still. And I wanted to know more about the monster inside of it. That's right. I'm not feeling great. And knowledge is power, like we always say. Exactly. Just from researching this, I was, like, starting to break a sweat and tremble, and I was like, I'm getting better. And then I passed out and hit my head. Yeah. And I didn't have enough time to finish studying. Good. I'm going to have to make a lot of this up, Chuck. Cool. Yeah, we covered Ebola recently, and we are definitely going to cover HIV at some point. We just haven't gotten around to it. Yeah, but both of those are viruses. There's another one we talked about that seemed to come up in this I don't remember what it was, but the herpes. Nope. No, we never talked about herpes. Well, not mixed company. What was it? I don't remember. But there was definitely microbiome, maybe. Yeah, no, I don't remember what it was. But we've talked about viruses and viral infections. But to me, I think viruses are one of the most fascinating things on the entire planet. They are jerks. Like, we don't know where they came from. We don't quite know how to classify them because they really kind of operate on the line between a living and a non living thing. Yeah. This article said, like most scientists agree, but I found a lot of people that said that they're not living things, too. Yeah, but who cares, really? They still definitely have an effect. The weird thing is about a virus is why some people say it's living and some people say it's not living. Is that to be a living thing, you have to have something like arms. Yeah, you have to have arms. Rocks don't have arms. No, point proven. You have to be able to carry out the processes that keep you alive. Like self sustaining. Yeah. A cell is the smallest living organism. It's the smallest possible living organism because you get lower than that and you have maybe the things that make up a cell, but they can't sustain themselves. A cell can sustain itself. And things can be made up of cells like us. And therefore we are a living organism. The cells that make us up are living organisms. Plants are living organisms. But viruses, they don't have any means of carrying out the processes that keep them alive. Which doesn't matter, because they're not alive. But more important, they don't have any processes that allow them to reproduce. Yeah, they're just like, by themselves that they're not worth very much. They need to glam on. They're always glamming on to everyone else's junk. Exactly. Which is basically what a virus does. But for something as simple as a virus is, and we'll talk about how simple they are in a second, they have devastating effects when they do start to really get busy. Sure. Chuck, I was saying they don't know exactly where viruses came from, they know they're very old. But there are a couple of theories. My favorite one, probably the one that's right, is that they were former bits of cells that basically evolved into freelance renegades. Really? Yeah. Which explains why certain viruses fit with certain cells. Well, that makes sense. So they could have just been basically like drifting genetic material that evolved enough to say, I'm going to learn to reproduce by hijacking renegade drifters. Yeah. So are you saying that viruses are John Rambo? Pretty much. So let's talk about what makes a virus. Yeah, well, like you said, a cell is on its own, it can do its own thing. Viruses cannot. Viruses are super tiny, about 1,000,000th of an inch long, which is 1000 times smaller than bacteria, which are smaller than human cells, most of them. There are some viruses that are actually larger than the average sized bacteria. Before the most part they are smaller, which is still super tiny. Sure it is like you need an electron microscope to view these bad boys. Right. And they can infect just about any living thing. As a matter of fact, any living thing could be theoretically infected by a virus. Like a bacteria can get a viral infection. Man, that's crazy. Isn't that crazy? I don't even know what that means. Seaweed can get viruses. Yeah. Donkeys. Yeah, all sorts of stuff. The whole gamut from seaweed to donkeys. The virus itself, if you just want to look at what that little tiny particle is virion. Is that how we're going to say that? Virion? Yeah. Why didn't they just leave the second eye out? In VIRIN? It's so much better. Basically what it is, it's a set of genetic instructions. It can be either DNA or RNA, it can't be both. And it's just instructions. That's all it is. Well, that's the nucleic acid that is part of a virion. Like a virion is like a particle. It's like an individual viral particle. Yeah. And part of that is the nucleic acid. Yeah. And that's surrounded by capsid, which is just a protein coating to protect it. And then sometimes if it's an envelope virus, it will also have an envelope around that capsid. If it's naked, it doesn't need or because it just doesn't have that other protein code. Right. And the enveloped ones are enveloped with this lipid, a fat of some sort. But for a naked virus, it's made up of two things. It's got its nucleic acid and it's protein coating that protects the nucleic acid. So it's not just nucleic acid floating around. That's right. And the nucleic acid is, like you said, it's basically just a blueprint for how to make more viruses. Because speaking teleologically a virus, its whole purpose is to make more viruses. That's all it cares about. And you can say, well, that applies to just about any living organism. If you get down to the bare bones, just to put the gate yeah. With the virus, it's like that's it man, it's not doing anything else. It doesn't care about playing cards. It doesn't want to do anything but reproduce and make you sick. Yeah, pretty much. Their shape varies a lot, but there are basically three types. Helical or helicopter. It's like a tube. You got your polyhedrals, it's sort of like a soccer ball. And then you have your complex shapes. And they are complex. They can look crazy, they can have tails, they can have crazy looking spider legs. They have both. Which one looks like the Apollo lunar lander? I'm going to go with complex. I don't know that's for sure, but I don't think it could be polyhedral. It's startling how much it looks like that. Yeah, it looks like it was made to look like a cool little lunar lander. Or that the lunar lander was modeled after the virus, maybe. Which didn't make sense because they wanted to infect the moon, which we may have astronaut jokes. So unlike cells that can do their own thing, viruses don't have enzymes like cells do that basically allow it to operate independently as their own little units. Some do. Some viruses contain just enough enzymes to take their DNA or their RNA and do something with it to basically prime it to be transcribed or something like that. Or they have enzymes that go hijack the enzymes in the cell. Yeah. So some do, most don't. Right. But yeah, that's the whole point of infecting a host cell. If all the virus wants to do is reproduce, but it can't reproduce, that's where the host cell comes in. That's right. They basically move into the factory and say, we're going to use your equipment. Right. They're like, if you don't mind, there's going to be some big changes around here because there's a new sheriff in town and it may kill you. The virus? Yes. Although all riders don't kill people. We should point that out. No, it's depending on what kind of virus it is, whether it's naked or enveloped. Yes. It will attach itself to the host cell and either inject it if it's naked, it has to stay outside of the host cell. And it basically injects its genetic material into the host cell. Or if it's enveloped, that fat lipid coding that makes it an enveloped virus basically connects to the host cell's own fat lipid coating. And that protein coded virus can basically slip through, just absorb right into the cell and say TADA when it makes it on the inside. Yeah. Is that what an antigen is? I think that's the protein that has to match like the antigen looks for another like protein so it can get that tight bond. And if they're not similar enough, they can't bond. And infect that cell, I'd be wrong. Is that right? I don't know if that's the it sounds right. And the reason it sounds right is because I saw elsewhere in the research that that's why viruses go after specific kinds of cells. Okay. They recognize the type of cells that they're capable of infecting. Right. And say, I can bind to you very tightly, my friend. Exactly. Let's watch. So let's dance. Exactly. Alright. Right after this message, we are going to get down to the nitty gritty on what happens once they have bound themselves to that cell. All right, Josh. They moved into the cell. They like the looks of it. It's a nice open concept floor plan, which everyone loves these days. What happens from there? Well, it depends on the virus. So let's say it was one that injected it. It's got its genetic material floating around. Maybe there's an enzyme that's assisting the genetic material. Or if the virus itself showed up, it's releasing its genetic material all over the place. But basically what happens is that sounds pretty gross. Yeah, well, it is pretty gross, teenage boy. It happens exactly like you think. Yeah. But once inside the cell, you'll see a lot that the virus hijacks the cells processes. Yeah. Like, hey, we need to use your deal because we don't have our own. Exactly. The reason people use the word hijack is because it really gets the point across. But it's also because science isn't 100% on how viruses do it. What they think basically is that if there's an accompanying enzyme or something, the enzymes basically wait for a line of other enzymes, the cells and enzymes to go past and then it grabs the last one in the line. That old trick hits it over the head. Yeah. Hypnotizes it and Blazing Saddles, basically. And then sends it back out to go recruit other enzymes. And then all of a sudden the cell is enzymes. It's workers. If you think of the enzymes as like the workers in the cell yeah. They're all working for this virus. Sure. And the cells like, what the heck is going on? It's too late. The enzymes are focused on transcribing the DNA, which ultimately just makes more DNA or RNA for the virus and then assembling it with proteins that the enzymes are now making. So they're now making more and more and more viruses. It's a hostile takeover. It is very much a hostile takeover. That's one way to go. There's another thing called a retrovirus, which I'm a huge fan of. Some of the worst viruses around are retroviruses, which is ironic because they actually have the softest impact on the host cell. But a retrovirus goes in very quietly, hangs around with clothing. Right? Yeah. Because HIV is a retrovirus. Sure. I think flu is a retrovirus, too, I think. But it goes in and it just inserts its DNA into the cells. DNA. All right. So it's like, hey, go about your business or whatever. But now there's this extra sequence that when you go over it and you transcribe it and you do what this DNA or this genetic material is telling you to do and to make you're going to also, as a byproduct spit out viruses. So it's just duplicating itself. It is. So there's a lot of different things that can go on, but it's like you said, there's a hostile takeover or the cell is tricked into making more viruses. But what happens is more and more and more viruses are being made within the host cell, which can be pretty bad for the host cell, ultimately. Well, yeah, because eventually the virus is going to leave and they can either. If it's a naked virus, it'll bust out and just destroy the wholesale and be like, hey, I'm tired of your little apartment. I'm just going to burn it down because I'm my own thing now, right, and I can live on my own. Or if it's an envelope virus, then it'll just kind of pinch away and keep that protective cell membrane and just be like, well, fine, I'll just take my stuff and then leave and you're free to do what you want. Right. Well, that's another reason why retroviruses are easy on the host cell is because all retroviruses are enveloped viruses. So these newly made viruses just move to the outside membrane and bud off. And then what happens when they bud off or when the cell breaks open? Because there's so many new viruses that ruptures the cell, which is pretty horrific if you think about it. I know. All of a sudden you're contagious. Yeah. And it's duplicating and spreading all throughout your body at a pretty rapid rate. Lots of these guys. So let's look at you, for instance. Okay. What have you got right now? I got something some sort of viral infection. Cold? Not the flu, probably. Yeah. Are you achy fevery? No feverish. I mean so what do I have, Doc? Well, I would say you have a cold. Okay. But I had a cold that turned into a sinus infection. I may have one of those. From the color of the stuff that's coming out of my nose, I would say I probably have a sinus infection, yes. Would you describe it as Khaki? I would describe it as a Drab. Olive. Oh, man. Way worse than khaki. When I was sick a couple of weeks ago, I had some serious bright, bright, almost fluorescent yellow coming out, which is all very gratifying to get rid of, either with your netdy pot or just blowing your nose or whatever. Yeah, I've been netdy potting like a madman. Yeah. You can overdo that when you're sick, apparently. Yeah. I can imagine because just the salt. There's too much salt up there. And I think just fluid, like, unless you really get it all out, it's better. Like you need to dry out completely in between. Yeah, I definitely am. All right, we'll just take two of these and come back and see me next week. Well, you're diagnosing me. What was going on? Well, you've got a cold, I think, but let's say you're in the office. I think we should make this as real as possible. Let's say that I'm hanging out with my sweet little four year old niece who herself has a cold. Is she the person? I don't want to name names, but I think she's entirely possible. She's on your list now. All right. So your little niece probably sneezed or something or just put her dirty little hands all over your face because she loves Uncle Josh. Her dad would not allow her to have dirty hands. Okay. I think she's probably already coughing around me. Okay. Yeah. And what you probably did was inhaled a virus particle, and that probably attached to the linings of your nasal passages and sinuses, because apparently there's basically only three ways that a virus gets into your body. You inhale, it attaches to your mucous membranes, like your nose or your gums. Yeah. Or it enters through a break in the skin. That's right. So your whole cell is going to break open. Your virus is going to move in there and say, I'm going to use your equipment like we talked about, then maybe travel to your bloodstream, travel to your lungs, and you're going to end up getting, let's say maybe one of the first signs is a runny nose because you're losing cells in your sinuses. And now that fluid is going to be loosened up as a result. Yeah. The literal cellular lining of my sinuses is rupturing. It's under attack. Because here's the thing. When you go through and look at what a virus does, you're looking at what one individual Virian is doing. Yeah. You don't necessarily just pick up one individual virus. You can be exposed to many variants, and they are each reproducing, producing thousands more just in one cell. So all this is going on. It can have a pronounced effect. Like if you just lost one cell in your nasal lining, it's not going to do much. You're probably never, ever going to notice. But if you lose a ton of the cells at the same time, you're going to have a runny nose. Yeah. Or if it happens in your throat, you're going to have a sore throat. That's right. That's just fluid. It's attacking those cells in your throat, in the lining, and it's dripping and just causing, like, usually some sort of inflammation. Yeah. And because those ruptured cells are being carried down by your nose juice to the back of your throat, which in turn that's what I was raised on, mucus, which in turn nose juice. Okay. Which in turn they attach and attack to the cells lining your throat. And then this whole thing is just going on and on and on again. Yeah. If you've ever had aches and pains because of maybe a flu, that's because your muscle cells are being attacked. And it sucks because you don't know that this is going on at first. Like, it's just there's war being waged inside your body. And you're like, hey, I'm just going to the grocery store and I'm feeling pretty good. Exactly. And by the time you start to feel, it's too late. It is too late. I'm glad you brought that up because I did a don't be dumb on when you're actually contagious. Yeah. What's the final on that? So it depends on does it vary how long you're contagious? Varies, but when you start is about a day before you start showing symptoms. Okay. So remember how I said if you have one cell burst and you're not going to notice it, it's going to take many cells to burst before you finally have a sore throat. Well, while those things are bursting after that first one bursts, you're contagious, buddy. So for a day before you even know you're sick, you're walking around infecting other people right. With a cold, you go from the day before symptoms to about four days after. All right. And with the flu, you go from the day before symptoms to five to seven days after. Got you. So you can still be it is true. And people are like, I'm not contagious anymore. They're usually probably totally wrong, but say their flu lasts eight days. If they say that on day eight, they're actually right. Most people say it by day three or four or whatever. It's all right. Well, they need to watch. Don't be dumb. Josh's award winning web series. So many awards, man. I think the next award it's going to win is the most divisive web series because more than half of them are like, man, this is the best thing ever. Half of people are like, I don't get it. Why is Josh acting so weird? Yeah. And I'll just respond with, yeah, you don't get it. Yeah. It's definitely not for everybody. I've learned. Well, it's very funny, I think. Checkers. Sure. All right. And we mentioned fever. We're going to talk about what that is actually doing inside your body right after this break. So, Chuck, it turns out you ask me if I feel feverish, and I don't. Yeah. Apparently my body is slacking on the immune response. Well, I think you don't always get the fever, but fever is a good thing because your body is wired to operate optimally at 98.6, even though I heard that was 98.7 now. Is that right? Yeah, I heard that they kind of abandoned that as an average body temperature because it varies enough between human beings that they're like, now it's just between this, right. Rather than 98.6. And if you don't have that, you're sick. So somewhere in that range, let's say, chemical reactions, and basically anything going on in your body, that's the temperature it likes. So when you get a fever, it's actually slowing all those processes down, including the viruses spread. Yeah, because it's like, oh, man, it's hot, I can't work as much. That's right. Which is kind of a weird indirect round about way of slowing a fever down or slowing an infection down, I guess, if it works. So it's good to have a fever. It is good to have a fever. And it actually makes sense in a strange way, because some infections, some viruses attack the very cells that are meant to mount the immune response. Like, remember Ebola? Yeah. It goes right after every immune response, so it can find HIV goes after T cells, which attack and destroy foreign bodies. So to slow them down and to slow the spread so that the immune response can continue and mount a full attack is kind of clever. Yes. And since you mentioned HIV, it's another scary one because it's one of those viruses that can just lay in wait, and they even call it sleeping at some sometimes it's not obvious. You could have HIV and be spreading HIV without ever feeling any kind of sick or any kind of symptoms. And basically, eventually, that virus is going to do its thing. It could lay in wait for years, even without acting. Right. And it depends on the virus, but they figure that there's some sort of environmental trigger. One I saw was like, exposure to UV Blight or something like that, but it's the same thing. Herpes is a virus like that. It sleeps, which is why people who have, like, say Herpes simplex sure don't always have cold sores. It will just flare up. Right. It will flare up. And they often say, like in times of stress or something like that, well, the virus isn't like, oh, this person is stressed out, let's go there's. Probably cortisol triggers the virus to start reproducing. But one of the devious aspects of this is when that virus sneaks in and inserts its DNA or RNA into the DNA of the cell and just hangs back and waits. Well, that cell is dividing like normal again. The virus unwittingly right. Without the virus even being reproduced. Now set up to be reproduced rather than in just one cell now four or eight or 16 or 32, and then all hell breaks loose when all of them start going at the same time because they were all exposed to cortisol. Wow. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. Viruses are amazingly interesting and wicked, wicked things. They are. So here are some tips. If your office is sick or you're around your four year old niece, here's some tips from your buddies here to keep you from getting sick. You know that there are carrier organisms like mosquitoes and fleas, they can spread viruses. We know it can be airborne. We already talked about bodily fluids. Whether that's nose juice or saliva or blood or semen or vaginal secretions is one way you can get a direct transfer. True surfaces on which bodily fluids have dried, which is kind of scary to think about. Yeah. You want to keep all those secretions, like, off of surfaces, because the virus can live outside of the body for a while, apparently. Flu virus can live for seven days just on the surface. Yeah. That's why, like, you sneeze in your hand and you open the door to your office, then there could be a little virus on that doorknob. And that's why they super advice. And one of the things that we're advising now is to wash your hands a lot if you're sick or if you know that there is sickness around you. Right. I wouldn't be in Howard Hughes about it, but I wash my hands a lot when I know that there are viruses going around. I started washing my hands a lot more once I found out, I was told what you're actually doing when you're washing your hand, you're not actually killing anything on your hands any germs. What you're doing by introducing soap is you're creating something that will basically go and cling to germs on your hands. And then when you wash off the soap, you're washing off the germs. So you're not like waging war or anything like that. You're basically just rinsing your hands clean, literally. Yeah. So once I realized that, I was like, oh, yeah, washing hands makes a lot of sense because before that I was like, soap doesn't do anything. Really? Yeah. And I don't even use antibacterial soap as a rule, so I was like, it's definitely not doing anything now. I'm like, it is doing something. So let's wash our hands as often as possible. That's a good idea. And a really long T shirt. If you are sick, you're going to want to cover your mouth when you sneeze and cough, because that's just common decency. You want to avoid contact with anyone else's bodily fluids, whether you're sick or not. And whether they're sick or not, it's just you don't want to have anyone else's bodily fluids on you or in you. Yeah. Unless you're, like, married or something. Unless you really love that person, then fluids are welcome. And antibiotics, this thing has gotten blue a few times. It's a very sexy show. Yeah. Sexy virus. Antibiotics aren't going to help with a viral infection. That is obviously for bacterial infections only. Yes. But it occurred to me, Chuck, that if you could cure a viral infection in a bacteria with antibiotics, it would be kind of like euthanasia, right? But it would cure the viral infection. That's a good point. A bacteria infected with the virus, that's how tough viruses are. And we have no idea how they originated or where they came from. We don't. That's true. We just know they're super old, and the ones that are the oldest are the ones that kill the least. Oh, really? Yeah. If you think about it, a virus would just by rite of Natural selection, evolve to be able to reproduce without killing the host, because if the host survives, then that just increases the chances of the virus to be spread from host to host. Right. So a really deadly virus is probably newer as far as humanity is concerned, and a virus that can infect more organisms, more types of organisms, like one that could make grass sick but also make a human sick. That's probably a pretty old virus. Yeah, old virus just sounds intimidating. Well, we have, like, basically what amounts to fossilized viruses in our DNA from all those viruses, those retroviruses that came in, inserted as genetic material, and our body learned to mount a defense against them. But that stuff is still in the human genome. Crazy viruses. They're also immunizations, of course. And you know how they work. They preinfect your body so it knows how to mount the fight against it. Right. To make sure it has all the right equipment. It's like putting up wanted posters in your body. Yeah, but those viruses changed slightly, ever so slightly, enough to where you have to keep updating these vaccines. So it keeps working. Yeah, they evolved fairly quickly. Lastly, Chuck, I want to address something. There is a, I guess a misconception or urban legend or whatever, that you can tell whether you have a viral infection or a bacterial infection or what kind of virus you have based on the color of your mucus. We talked about fluorescent or something like that. They don't in and of themselves relate to a specific type of virus or bacterial or viral infection or anything like that. It's not true. So it's viruses. Yes. I got nothing else. It is good to know how this stuff works, though, because when you get sick, you understand it a little better. Maybe you can mentally fight the stuff more effectively. I'm doing it right now. Do you see how I'm bleeding for my scalp? Oh, my God. I'm using a lot of mental power. It's amazing. If you want to know more about viruses, you can start by typing that word into the search bar, howstep works.com, and it will bring up this cool article. And I said how stuff works. So it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this headstones. My name is Georgia Gilbert. I'm a new but enthusiastic fan from the University of Washington. I was listening to your tombstones podcast, and I want to say that the move to churchyard burials is a bit more complicated than you applied. If I remember correctly, burials and churchyards began mostly as a common practice. Because of the plague, churches would sell spots for burial within the church itself. In. The walls and the floors, etc. E b there was a common belief during the Middle Ages that being buried in a church was being very closer to God. And if you're very closer to God, the better off you're going to be in the afterlife. The reasoning goes, many people would actually get spots within their local church to be buried, or at least very close to the walls outside during the play gears. However, the amount of bodies accumulated to be buried became too much and they began to bury people further outside the church, even if they had paid for a spot inside. I read a great book on death in London through the ages that talked about it. That was called Necropolis. I highly recommend it. So thanks for teaching me such awesome stuff, guys. I can now ask my mother in law intelligent questions about growing up in Germany during the Cold War, thanks to your Berlin Wall program. Nice. And that is from Georgia. That was fascinating. The plague, by the way, was bacterial, not viral, in case anybody was wondering. Like me. Yeah, we did one on the plague, right? We did Black Death or Black Plague? Yeah. Anyway, who is that again? Georgia. Thanks a lot, Georgia. We appreciate that. That was a great email. If you have a great email, you can try to tweet it to us. If it's short at fyskpodcast, you can post it on Facebook, if you like, at facebook. Comstuffychnalle. Or you can send us an email like a normal person to stuffpodcast@howstuffworks.com. And as always, in the meantime, hang out with us at our home on the web stuffyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit HowStuffWorks.com. Hey, it's summer, everybody, which means school's out, the sun is shining, the daylights longer, and best of all, there's plenty of time to get lost in a good, thrilling story. So whether you're road tripping or relaxing poolside, tune into the podcast series on Amazon Music, My Favorite Murder from Exactly Right media, My Favorite Murder has something for everyone. Hosted by Karen Kilgarriff and Georgia Hardstark, this true crime comedy podcast will share stories that will have you wanting more before you know it. Listen to new episodes of my favorite Murder One a week early on Amazon music. Download the free Amazon Music app and listen today."
d65810a4-3b0d-11eb-aa42-b783f3f1cdef	Dragons: As Real as Mermaids	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/dragons-as-real-as-mermaids	Dragons are like mermaids in that they're not real. And that's about where the comparison ends. Learn all about dragons today.	Dragons are like mermaids in that they're not real. And that's about where the comparison ends. Learn all about dragons today.	Tue, 09 Mar 2021 10:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2021, tm_mon=3, tm_mday=9, tm_hour=10, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=68, tm_isdst=0)	38160589	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know a production of. iHeartRadio hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh. There's Chuck. Dragon slayer Bryant. And welcome. That's it. It's just the two of us. We can make it if we try. Chuck just the two of us, dragons and us and the great Bill Withers. We just had the same conversation like two months ago. I'm not doing it again. Oh, about Bill Withers? Yeah. I didn't realize that that was a Bill Withers song. It was a good song. Lean on me, though, man, is just I cannot take it. Grandma's bed. What is that? Is that a bill witherson I did not know that. It's good. He's great. And we probably had this exact same conversation. I don't know if we have that one or not, but you know who else I like who's a little bit like Bill Weather, is not quite as cool, I guess, if you're like, a cool person. But George Benson was amazing and still is. I think he's still around. You ever listen to his stuff? Yeah, but now I'm realizing maybe I should just not correct myself and let people be sending a bunch of emails. Oh, I love that, when we get a million of the same emails. It's Grandma's hands I was getting it John Denver's grandma's feather bed kind of just was in the ether. Got you. Because we just talked about John Denver, about Karaoke grandma's bed, the follow up to Use me up. So dragons. Yeah, let's talk about dragons. Let's have a pleasant conversation about dragons, shall we, Chuck? Yeah. Dragons aren't real. And you'll notice by the title of this episode, which is Dragons Colon as Real as Mermaids. Yeah, and it's funny because I think the week before this comes out, mermaids is our pick for the select the select episode. So it aligns perfectly. That is perfect. The dragons aren't real. Okay, please stop saying that because you're crushing my dreams. Sorry. So when we talk about dragons, we have to say right here at the outset that there's a lot of different kinds of dragons. And typically when you think of like, the flying winged, usually long, maybe scalything, fire breathing dragon, often with a long kind of serpentine tail, sometimes it's even pointy like the devil. Sure. Which we'll see why that's considered a Western dragon. And that is its own thing that kind of evolved from a number of different traditions. But there's also the Asian dragon, which has variations among different Asian countries, but it generally seems to be kind of the same ancient Chinese thing. That's a totally different thing, and it evolves on its own in isolation as well. And so because you've got these different traditions of dragons that seem fairly similar in a lot of ways, there's a lot of people out there who say, wow, this is astounding. Every culture in the world has some sort of tradition of dragons. And that's kind of true. But throughout this episode, we'll see that's not really accurate. Nowadays. It seems that way because we have overlaid the idea of dragons over everything. But if you really kind of dig into the past and look into the nuance of some of these things that we term dragons, they're very different. So it's a lot more accurate to say that every culture in the world has mythical beasts, some of which share a lot in common with our modern conception of dragons. And that's probably where our modern conception of dragons came from, was all these different ideas of it in the ancient past. Yeah, there's a book called An Instinct for Dragons written by an anthropologist named David E. Jones about dragons and dragons throughout cultures and across cultures. And there's a theory he's got going which is humans evolved and primates evolved with a fear of three predators, basically snakes, cats, which are big cats, house cats, and eagles and a dragon. It sort of makes sense that every culture sort of has something like a dragon, because in folklore and myth and in storytelling, you might combine the three scariest things into one super scary thing, and that is a dragon. Right. And you might say, like, well, wait a minute, I think eagles are kind of cool. I'm not at all scared. Number one, have you ever been around an eagle when it was loose? I bet you'd be kind of scared of it because those talons are serious. Or one that dive bombed you. I see, exactly. More to the point, though, or more, I should say, David Jones's point, this would be this fear, this innate fear that humans have will be based much more deeply in our evolutionary past when we were monkeys. And you actually could be killed by certain kinds of eagles, like the harpy eagle. Remember we talked about the harpy eagle in the Sloth episode because they can mess the sloth up. They can mess a monkey up, too. So this guy's premise is, like, we have these ancient fears of these things, and as we evolved and became humans and started telling each other stories, these things combined, like you were saying, into this one fierce mythological monster, which was basically the sum of all of our most primal fears. Yeah. And then, of course, if you look at ancient cultures, they always had sort of mythical stories in folklore to explain everything from weather phenomenon to things like volcanoes. And if they happened upon maybe dinosaur bones or whale bones, then a story might go along with that to explain it away. Like, this was clearly some huge lizardlike creature or maybe a snake like creature. And there was probably a story around it and why they should fear it, or usually some sort of a sacrifice that they needed to make, sort of in lockstep with those stories. But that's just sort of another theory on maybe how the dragon might have come about as far as folklore goes, one of the most interesting theories that I saw, and we should say no one has a widely accepted answer for this, which I love, as always. Sure. But it was the b, the description often in ancient cultures, they used to use, like, riddles and exaggeration and metaphor to discuss and talk about and describe actual things, and that the b. A description of a b, or I should say a swarm of a b, is what actually became the dragon in mythology. And at first, it doesn't make any sense at all. But some of the points that these people made, there was a journal article in it, I think, like a journal on Tolkien studies or something like that. But they say that a b swarm moving together, it doesn't necessarily resemble a dragon, but it makes a lot more sense along those lines than it does when you're talking about an individual b. It does in a cartoon. Exactly. It can make an arrow to point a direction where somebody's hiding that kind of thing. And then another one is that the idea of dragon breathing fire is a metaphor for the feeling of, like, your skin burning from a bee sting or the intense pain. And then lastly, in the Western tradition, a lot of dragons protect, like, mounds of gold or treasure, and that this is a metaphor for honey and gold, like the honeycombs that ancient people would have basically considered gold. Not just food, but also it was used as medicine as well. So if you kind of put all that together, it seems like a pretty interesting theory. At least it makes a lot more sense than a b when you really kind of dig into it. Yeah, totally. The word itself is well, you can look back to the Iliad when Homer wrote about the drakon. The drakon, which supposedly is the first known use of the word in ancient Greek, sort of has some confusing etymology behind it. But basically, Homer uses that word to describe snakes. Like unequivocally. Yeah. And not huge, flying, fire breathing snakes, but just snakes. Yeah. He even says no, I'm just talking about snakes. Everybody not dragons. Get ahead of yourself. These are snakes. And, I mean, they say that like, he points out that he's talking about snakes because he even says a chimera, which is, I think, the head of a lion, the goat body, a serpent tail and bat swings. He even says the serpent tail, the back portion of the chimera is a dragon. So he's talking about just regular old snakes for sure. Yeah. And other writers and other classical stories did the same thing, whether it was Draconus or Draconus, using all these words sort of interchangeably with other words for snake. But then we go to the history of not the history, but just the history of animals. And that's the first sort of scientific take on the Dracone, which is an enemy of the eagle, because an eagle as a bird of prey would eat snakes, obviously. And different people got a little more specific in later writings as to what kind of snake, but it's still just snakes. Yeah. So over time, that's where the word dragon came from. It was a word for snake. That's it. And then over time, as people started to exaggerate here or there complaint, different types of snakes and different behaviors that aren't found in snakes, but saying that they were. And they all kind of put that under the umbrella word for snakes, dragon. It seems like the legend or the myth, the mythical version of dragons, started to kind of plump up and grow. Yeah. And this is the point. The Grabster put this together for us. But Ed points out something I kind of never really considered back in the day in the classical period, writers were writers. They weren't like, hey, I'm going to write only about natural history and I'm only going to write fiction and myth and storytelling like writers just wrote. So there were people that wrote natural history tomes and also myth and storytelling legends. And so a lot of this stuff could get kind of mixed up and confused. Exaggerated mistranslation is a huge deal. Yeah, a lot of this is sort of where the sort of myth of the dragon came from. I just think of some writer getting confused what they were working on that day. And now we have the myth of dragons. Right. It's like, is this real or not? I can't remember. Who cares? So, yeah, like you said, you really hit upon something really important. Mistranslations are a different way to put his lazy translation have really kind of changed our idea of what people were talking about in the ancient world. And I can't imagine how much nuance and understanding has been lost, how probably dumb. In a lot of ways, ancient people seem compared to how they actually were because of this tradition of, like, people translation that was passed down over the year. People. Yeah. That's very cute. The reason why it's kind of lazy translation is it seems like anybody who came across an ancient text or a text in another language who is translating something into English, and they seem to be describing anything even remotely dragonlike, any mythical beast, anything that might have wings, anything with a serpent tail, anything that breathes fire. Boop. Dragon. It's a dragon. And then now those of us who have a certain compartmentalized idea of what a dragon is, everything was a dragon. Now we reach that point where it's like, this is how we got this idea that every culture has dragons. Now we just kind of lazily translated what other cultures were talking about into dragons along the way. Right. I think that is a great first act. Thank you. Thank you. I'm bowing. I'm throwing roses at your feet. Thank you. And we're going to take a little break of Rooney and be right back. So the rose petals I sent you arrived in time. Just in time. Thank you for throwing them and not saving them for something else. I also realized it just went on Ned Flanders with the breaker Rooney. I've never said that before in my life. I liked it, though. It was refreshing. We need that kind of wet behind the ears wholesomeness right now. Chuck yeah. And you're 14. No, not just us. I mean the world. Okay. Yeah. Up with Flanders. Yeah, up with Flanders. That's right. So my favorite thing always about Flanders is when he would be really buff, like every time he stupid, sexy Flanders. I know, it's hilarious. He ascribed it to a healthy dose of vitamin. Church. Right. Oh, man. I love it. Yeah. All right, where were we here? Giant snakes. Yeah, we talked about them. We're talking about mistranslations were a big problem. And I think a good place to start with that is back in Sumeria. Yeah. The Sumerian legends wrote about something called the Usum. US, um, also called dragons, or at least referred to as dragons now. And these were kind of like you said at the beginning, these were just sometimes just large monsters, large scary things, and not necessarily a dragon, but was sort of just translated as dragon. Yeah. And I should say sumer. Not sumeria. But these were like the gods that they were talking about. These were the goddess of water who gave birth to the world. They had this incredibly detailed cosmology that explained where they came from, where the world came from, where the sun came from. And we along the way translated that to dragons. Right. So luckily, there are scholars who have learned to speak AKADIAN, I guess, the world's oldest spoken language, A-K-A-D-I-A-N. Not the Canadian group that the cajuns come from. This is different. So we understand now that there's much more nuance, much more detail to it. But I think the upshot of this is that there were conceptions of fire breathing and flying serpents and potentially malicious malevolent, evil, mythical beasts that would resemble kind of what we would understand as a dragon dating back thousands of years. Yeah. And this course goes straight to the Bible as well. In Revelations, there's a lot of talk about the archangels battling a great dragon. In this case, the dragon is Satan. But again, this is sort of a translation. Like Satan was always sort of the serpent. At least in Genesis, it first appeared as a serpent. And so in the end, Satan is also a serpent, but spelled with the D-R-A-K-O-N like the ancient Greek. Is that right? Yeah, not in the King James version and stuff like that, obviously. Sure. But again, pretranslation. And they were sort of renderings of this, of the big war for heaven. And this is when we see kind of what we would see later on, which is metaphor for good versus evil in a big battle. So that's what William Blake's Paradise Lost is about, right? I've never read it. I haven't either. I'm just familiar with it from that movie Red Dragon. Okay. About the Silence of the Lamb's prequel, I think. Oh, sure, yeah. He's like, do you see you remember when Ray Finds has got poor Philip Seymour Hoffman strapped to that wheelchair? Oh, man. Showing him, like, crime scene photos. I had spoiler coming. Didn't love that movie. It was okay. But that shot of that burning wheelchair and body going down the parking deck is one of the most sort of chilling images I've seen in movies. I know. The thing that chills me about it, though, is it's an antique Wicker wheelchair, which is the scariest thing I've ever seen in my life. I hate those. You don't like those, huh? No, I think we just talked about it recently, and for the rest of my life, I will be creeped out by those things. I'm going to get you in slide with the wickest Christmas. Next Christmas, you're just going to get an ancient Wicker wheelchair. I don't want to be wasteful, so I won't throw it away. And I'll just have to live among and it's going to be terrible. Like, I'll never get used to it either. You could make a life size Chuck dummy, put it in there and set it on fire and roll it down to parking. Oh, I wouldn't do that. I'd make a life sized version of Chuck and just talk to you, be like, listen, I got a lot of stuff to say to you that's even creepier, buddy. You're going to sit there and listen to it? I'll be wearing nothing but an apron, just like a real doll with a big fake beard. Oh, man. Okay. Yeah. Good versus evil is sort of how a lot of these tales and folklore play out and also incorporating stuff that you would see time and time again in literature later on. Like, there's a dragon that lives out by itself near a village, and it's a greedy, vengeful dragon. We need to appeal this dragon with sacrifice once a year, or else it will come down and, like, rain fire upon everyone. Yeah. So all of this stuff, like this idea, this Western dragon that you're describing, that's taken from Bao Wolf, I believe the dragon that killed Bao Wolf in the I always thought it was a Norse legend, but apparently it's English, old English. It's just set in the Netherlands or in Scandinavia, in the north. I don't remember exactly where it's just set there. It's not written by them. But that dragon was malevolent, and I believe it was guarding treasure. I think the reason it went berserk and Bayoufl had to kill it was because somebody stole one of its golden goblets, aka honey, because they're really talking about a b UT. So you have an idea of a greedy, murderous dragon that protects treasure. Like that comes from an ancient tradition, but that's a pretty standard feature of dragons, like you were saying. Yeah. So all this is going on for many years. Finally, the rubber kind of meets the road as far as western dragons are concerned, with the legend of St. George, who is a Christian saint. A real Christian saint may be a real person who may have been a Roman soldier who was tortured and killed for converting pagans to Christianity. This is circa fourth century Ad. And because of stories getting passed around like a game of telephone, the actual first name of that story when it was sold was St. Theodore, but it was really St. George. So I saw that they're both possibly known as dragon slaying saints. Okay. It's not necessarily like George took that from Theodore. They're both known for having slaying a dragon. But what's interesting is, if you see St. Theodore depicted with his dragon, it's very clearly a crocodile. And the origin story of either one, but particularly St. George, is that there is a town in modern day Turkey, or possibly Palestine, I'm not 100% sure, but in what would have been called Anatolia back then, where they had the spring, like, this town got their water from the spring and it was guarded by a giant massive crocodile. And that the townspeople would sacrifice sheep, tooth, sometimes two a day, basically to distract the crocodile so they could go get the water and then get out of there. And then they ran out of sheep, so they told what comes after sheep? How about maidens? So they started throwing maidens, sacrificing maidens, literally throwing them to the crocodile to distract it so they could get the water. And eventually they came upon the king's daughter. They drew straws to see what maiden would go next. And St. George apparently arrived just in time to slay the dragon, aka the crocodile. But this idea that that's where this story of somebody slaying a dragon could have been rooted in reality, that over the years, this massive crocodile, which was so fearsome and so murderous and killed so many people, was converted into a dragon over the years. And so St. George slew the dragon, and that's where that came from. And there was a real crocodile that lived by a real spring. Right. That's pretty cool. Yeah, I thought so, too. I love it when something that seems totally legendary, rooted in some sort of fact, it's just people embellished or exaggerated over time. Totally. If you want to go with the sort of real great first image of what we think of as a western dragon, you can go to 1060 Ad. In an illustration in a medieval beastie area called ms. Harley 32 44. Great title. I think Ed said it was probably a catalog designation. Yeah, I think the real title is Peril. This is Theological Miscellaney. Yeah, that's an actual great title. Yeah. I like Ms. Harley 32 44. It's cool looking, though. If you're near a laptop or something, you can look this thing up and you look at it. And this is exactly what you think of as something from, like, Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones or whatever. Yes, it's a dragon. It's how a scene starts, you know? Yeah, sorry, I see what you're saying. Like the dragon that shows up in there, specifically the red one. Well, no, I just mean sort of the dragon that we all think of in sort of literature and folklore. Right. This is clearly that. Yeah. And supposedly it's the first one from around 1260. Did you say that? Yeah. When you see it, you're like, yes, this is probably the basis of the Western dragon as we understand it. And it would have spread to Europe, which it did. I think that was English. It was by a guy named William Perrault, and I believe he was English. So it would have spread from England to the rest of Europe. And that that kind of set the stage for at least the visual version of the Western dragon from that point on. Thanks to England Dan. Right. I think we said English, Dan. It's England Dan. Oh, English dan makes way more sense. Yes. England Dan is a little weird. Yeah. But hey, England Dan was a little weird. But your nickname is America Josh. Sure. How about all America? Josh should we take a break now and talk about Asian dragons? Yeah. What? All right. We'll be right back with a kinder, Gentler Dragon right after this. Okay. So, Chuck, you mentioned something you said kinder, gentler dragon. It's true. Like, Western dragons are generally, in the tradition, murderous, greedy, wealthhording jerks who may be pure evil personified. An Asian dragon, which everybody has seen, at the very least in, like, a photo of a street parade or in some sort of, like, a Chinese silk screen or something like that. An Asian dragon is typically much more benevolent than that and usually is associated with rain water, that kind of thing. And so when you see a dragon being paraded around where it's a bunch of people under, like, a dragon costume that's actually based on a very ancient rain dance, essentially a ceremony to invoke rain because these dragons were associated with that. Yeah. And this is far older than in the West, I think in about 6000 BC. There were people in China that were carving little dragon jade figurines. And there was art back then, I think as far back as 400 BC. Where it's clearly some kind of dragon, but again, supposedly independent from the sort of evolution of the Western dragon. Yeah. And so all of this was based on some of the early, like, Chinese religion was based on animism and not just Chinese, but a lot of ancient religions are based on animism where an inanimate object is symbolic of a larger thing, like the god of wind or the god of rain. And so these ancient dragons were considered gods of rain. And there's different types. There's different kinds. But again, the fact that they are generally beneficial to humankind kind rather than harmful, I think it's interesting. I wonder what that says about the two different cultures, if anything, that dragons are harmful and they're going to kill you and they're going to steal all your gold or they're going to bring the rain that's going to grow the food that saves your family, where does that diverge? Or they just don't have anything to do with one another. Yeah, that's interesting. Sort of a side note, I've been playing video games some during the pandemic, which I'm usually not a big gamer, but I've been playing a game lately called Ghost of Sushima which is you play a samurai warrior that's sort of traveling through Japan in ancient times. Right. And it's really interesting to compare that to like the analog for the west would be like Red Dead redemption in the old west with gunslingers and it's just such a different game design and everything. The one in Japan, the Ghost of Sashima is so peaceful. It's one of the most beautiful games I've ever seen. And instead of like a map telling you where to go, you press a button and the wind guides you. And if you see a fox, you follow the fox up to a shrine and you pay your respects to the shrine. And it doesn't really get you much other than it's not like you get like a million points or something for doing that. It seems like they really tried to honor Japanese traditions and so much of this game and the motivations are always pure. Like even when you're slicing guys up with your katana, it's because you're rescuing some old lady in a village. Whereas the other game it's just like, hey, just go and just pillage and murder and do awful things. Shoot them up. Yeah, it's really interesting. I'm much more enjoying this game. Well, you said something that struck a memory in me about dragons. There's a commonality between Asian dragons, particularly Chinese dragons which are called long or long lung and Western dragons. And typically they live in isolated areas away from everybody. And in Asia the Chinese dragons usually live in old ruined temples. That's where you'll find them dwelling. Oh, interesting. There are plenty of those in that game. Exactly. So are there dragons in that game? Not yet, but now I'm kind of wondering. Oh yeah, look at it. It's pretty early because I did run across a Japanese type of dragon that is malevolent, not very nice. I don't remember the name of it. So I guess be on the lookout for all of them. Interesting. Yeah. So far there's nothing supernatural. It's Mongols that are the bad guys. I got you. And then there's another type of Japanese dragon I ran across called Ryu. And this one actually bears a lot in common to the intelligent Western dragon and that it writes poetry. Yeah. It uses shed scales from its belly as paper. I don't know what it uses for ink, but I think it uses its tail as a pen, a quill, the blood of a virgin. Poetry. Yeah. There you go. Super nice. Except for that one thing. Yeah, we could just get it some ink. There's something else I think people should look up here. If you're looking up images, which is an artist name, cheng. C-H-E-N-R-O-N-G. Yeah. Very famous painter in Asia of dragons. And this was, like, 13th century Ad. And if you look up some of the stuff, it's really neat looking. Yeah. About the same time as Peraldes'theological Miscellaney was done with that first Western dragon, chenrong was making these just amazing works of art. I think one of them is in the Boston Museum of Fine Art. Okay, cool. It's called, like, nine Dragons or something. But it reminded me of the artwork in the original Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark series. I never read that. Dude, the artwork in there is just amazing, but it has, like, all these weird kind of splotchy clouds of ink. And Chinrong makes use of that as well. It's really kind of startling how closely the two resemble. I wonder if the artist from Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark was inspired by that in some way, I bet. Yeah. Nothing wrong with that. No, it's not ripping off at all. I don't know why you'd even say that. Why would you even bring Ripping off up? Yeah. So we should probably talk about famous dragons at this point because we've thrown a couple out, like the one from Beowulf who apparently doesn't even have a name. Yeah. There are so many stories in literature and movies, obviously, that have had dragons throughout the years. Certainly Tolkien in the mid 1930s when he wrote The Hobbit. This was a really evil dragon and drawn from that Western sort of influence of evil dragons. Small, right? Yeah. SMA U g. Dungeons and Dragons in the 70s was a very big how much dragons had fallen out of the sort of pop culture eye. But it really brought it back in if it did fall out, because in the game, there were different kinds of dragons. There were a couple of different sets who were indicated by different colors. Red, green, black, white, and blue, I think were evil. And then there were the bronze, brass, silver, and gold, which were, for the most part, good. And they all had different things they could do and different temperaments. And something that we talked a little bit about is the fire breathing thing. There are lots of different theories as to. How that came about. Maybe the tide of Satan with fire early on when they were just serpents, perhaps they were drawn spitting venom and that could have looked like fire. Yeah, that makes sense. But there's always some sort of breath emitting weapon going on, it seems like. Yeah. Over time, it's translated into, I think, like, the white dragon in Dungeons and Dragons blew, like, basically ice, like cold. Some dragons blew out electricity, which you would think would be kind of new. But apparently the Leviathan, which is mentioned in the Bible, is a sea dragon basically supposedly spit electricity out. But there's something weird coming out of the dragon's mouth that's probably going to kill you. Yeah. You don't want to test that. No. We were saying also that the first visual depiction of dragon shows up in Harley 32 44. The first mention of the dragon in a story, like a fictitious story, supposedly comes in Spencer Edmunds, the Fairy Queen. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And then it shows up after that, a little while later, and Marie Catherine Dole Noise, the Green Serpent. And then it just kind of takes off from there, you know? You have a connection to Pete's Dragon, right? I do. My friend Toby was a producer on Pete's Dragon. Yeah. For the remake, obviously. Yes. Which was really good and touching and tear jerking a little bit. I never saw the remake. I need to check that out. It's very good. They did a really good job with it. But if you haven't seen the movie Reign of Fire, just stop what you're doing and watch that because that is the kingdom of the old dragon movies. I have not seen that. Should we pause? Come back and finish the episode after. It's great. It's one of those movies that I don't know how well it did at the box office, I don't think super well, but it's one of those that has really become sort of a cult classic since then with McConaughey and Christian Bale. It's so over the top and just so fun. It's really good. So it's kind of like the Pacific Rim of dragon movies. Yeah. Or Starship Troopers of Dragon movies. Oh, man, that's another great movie. There's also Puff the Magic Dragon. Don't forget him. God, the saddest song of all Time. My mom taught my daughter that. It's the worst. Yes. It has nothing to do with pot, so just forget that hippie. It's just sad. It is a very sad one. And then also, I think our younger listeners would be really mad if we didn't mention Dragon Ball Z. Right. I didn't watch Game of Thrones, but I know there were little strange dragons in that one that grew. Yeah. And Chuck, it's just so satisfying to look over all of the different depictions of dragons that you see and all the differences and all the similarities and realize that all of them are talking about bees. Yeah, totally. Yeah. You got anything else? I got nothing else. There's dragons. Well, if you want to know more about dragons, head out to a ruined temple. Or maybe go search for gold in a cave and you might encounter one yourself. And since I said that, it's time for listener mail. This is a story about corn and poop. Oh, God. Hey, guys, here's my corn story, one I've repeated often throughout my lengthy life. I just turned 70. Woohoo. Nice. It is for Mary. Mary 70. Well, not happy birthday, but happy decade turning. Okay, what is that? I think birthday still works. No, but it wasn't her birthday, necessarily, but happy decade turning. Yes. Like when you hit 70 or 60 or 50. Sure. No, I know exactly you're talking about. It's a rich history of saying happy the song. Happy decade turning. What song is that? Happy, happy decade turning. Is that a bill withers song? You made it another ten years. Lean on me. It's good. You guys see Jays hands there? Man? I think I awkwardly got my way out of that really awkward sentence. You did. It was really good. I grew up in Houston, Texas. Guys. One blazing hot summer day when I was about three or four, out in the driveway, standing around, kind of checking out the neighbor kid who was in her driveway. He was about two. It's hotter than the blazes. Her name was Bianca. She was younger than me and still in the diaper phase of life, but it was so hot, she wasn't wearing a diaper or anything else. Nature called to Bianca, and voila, a couple of little poos were deposited on the cement, being a curious child, and went over to check it out, and lo and behold, they are in the poop, embedded securely but definitely visible, were corn kernels unmasked yellow against the brown corn kernels. Right, yeah, no, we got it. Just the corn kernels suslie. I've never been able to look at corn, nor, God forbid, eat corn literally in any form ever since. I could see that happening. If it hits you in just the right way, especially at a certain age, yes. She says, not even corn pone, which I had to look up. I didn't even know what corn pone was. It's like cornbread, I think. Yeah, not even corn pone. My God, how have you lived 70 years without corn pone? A great emotional scar was born that day. The only benefit of that experience is that whenever I want to cross I'm sorry, gross anyone out, I just pull out the corn and the poop story. All adults hate it. All children are gleefully grossed out by it. Love your show, guys. Especially when you all wander off topic and then wander back. I think in the chili pepper episode, y'all wandered over to Yoko Ono, which was interesting. And that is from Mary Foy in Isaqua Washington. Well, thanks, I guess. Thanks in quotes, Mary, for that one. But thank you also for listening to us. If you want to write in and kind of gross us out like Mary did, we're always up for that kind of thing. You can take your best shot. Send it off to stuffpodcast@iheartradiocom. Stuff you should Know is production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts My Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
https://podcasts.howstuf…05-sysk-moss.mp3	How Moss Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-moss-works	Think you have moss figured out? You probably don't. Join Josh and Chuck as they explore some of the surprising aspects of these most ancient and important plants on the planet.	Think you have moss figured out? You probably don't. Join Josh and Chuck as they explore some of the surprising aspects of these most ancient and important plants on the planet.	Tue, 05 Jun 2012 18:30:56 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2012, tm_mon=6, tm_mday=5, tm_hour=18, tm_min=30, tm_sec=56, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=157, tm_isdst=0)	31120888	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 camry. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know from housetopworks.com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles of you, Chuck Bryant, who now refuses to do the cheeks, everyone. So I can't vouch for how good the episodes will be from this point on. Cheeks are done. I don't care about them anymore. We'll see. Okay. I mean, if we started nosedive you're doing the cheeks again. No. I will speak to it that you do the cheeks. Can't do it. I will stand on your chest. Ben will grab one cheek. Jerry will grab the other, and the cheeks will be done. For people that don't know what we're talking about, this sounds like really gross. Everybody knows what we're talking about. Chuck does a little cheek pull to start off each episode. It's a little good luck charm. And now he's suddenly decided he's not going to do that anymore. I have a new good luck charm. What is it? It's called not doing cheeks. It's a bad luck. So I've got a joke for you to open this one up. Do you really? And I made it up today. The made up joke I don't want to hear. What do you call a reproducing? Randy Moss. That's pretty good. Not bad. No, that's into the realm of pretty good. Yeah, that's good. I think if I was a tour guide at like a nature, like, firm bank science or something, that would be my go to for the kids. That would be a good one to try and identify with them. I don't think the kids would like it as much as maybe the teacher. Yeah, that's true. The teacher would be like, that's pretty funny. And by the way, those brown knee high socks you're wearing are great. Right, well, I'm going to give an intro in addition to the intro joke. Maybe that should be your new good luck thing. You tell jokes, you make a joke, make up a joke for everybody. That would be welcome back, Cotter. Did they have a joke for everyone? Yeah, he introwed every show by or maybe it was outRoad by telling a joke to his wife. Oh, yeah. I hadn't picked up on that. I only saw like, maybe two episodes of that show. Well, then you heard two jokes. Yeah, plus all the other jokes. Was his wife one and the same with Bailey from WKRP. Didn't they look alike? Were they the same person? I don't know if they were the same person, but they definitely seem the same. Gotcha. And they both wore glasses that had the feather sort of long, feathered haired seventies ladies. Yeah. I don't think they're the same, though. But they're both probably in the love Boat. Yes. Within five years as like a way to revitalize their career. That's right. Chuck, I was going to talk about the ice age, the beginning of the ice age of ice ages. Glacial periods. Remember, right now we're in the midst of an interglacial period. Right. I want you to think back way back, 470,000,000 years ago, okay? There was no such thing as a glacial period. And by proxy, there was no such thing as an interglacial period. All we had was one hot, soupy, barren mess of land and ocean, and that was it. That's right. This is what's called the ordovician period. Ordovician period, depending on where you come from. Okay. And the beginning of this period is characterized by ice ages and Paleo geologists. I guess you could just call them geologists, really? Because nobody is studying, like, present stuff very much. It's mostly Paleo geology. Right? Sure. They were like, where did this ice age come from? When did this start? And they figured out that what triggered this was the arrival of the very first basic land plants, eg. Mosses. That's right. And they recently figured out that mosses came about about 470,000,000 years ago. And they triggered these ice ages by latching onto rocks. So these were a certain type of moss, as you and I know, called granite mosses. And they would actually leach materials from these rocks to use as nutrients and minerals. Right. These are like weedies for moss, early moths. Well, the moss started releasing stuff, releasing no, sucking in carbon dioxide from the atmosphere enough to reduce the global temperature, mean temperature, by eight degrees centigrade. Wow. Which led to the beginning of ice ages and the ice age periods that we know and love. You can thank mossy. Moss, you go outside, you find a little bit of moss, you grab a little piece of it gently and then shake it. Shake its little say thanks for the ice ages baby stem. Yeah. Well, we needed ice ages. That remains to be seen. It's all part of the big soup. We've had some people might have doubt it. We've had some chilly, windy weather lately, and it has been getting to me. Just seeing the trees getting whipped outside makes me feel chilly. And then in turn, I feel socially isolated and mad. Wow. Yeah. It's been really windy. Yeah. Crazy. So we're talking about moss. This is no joke. April is over by now. We're in it right now. But by the time this comes out, this is no April Fool's joke. We're talking about moss and how it works because it's part of our long parade of explaining absolutely everything in the known universe. Attractive. Moss is part of that. So let's talk about moss. Well, moss is pretty fun and unique in some ways, if you ask me. Because unlike most flowering plants and trees or let me go ahead and say it all flowering plants and trees, they don't have roots like traditional root systems. Moss doesn't. No, mosses don't. They do not. They don't germinate from seeds. Pretty weird. And they don't gush water around through internal systems. Internal systems and that's weird. It is. Especially if you're familiar with plants, then you're like, wow, of moss is strange. Exactly. For somebody an average by standard like me, I'm like, okay, well, moss doesn't do that and plants do. It doesn't seem particularly weird to me, but I do find it intriguing. It makes me want to know more about moss. Well, you got about 15,000 species if you want to talk about moss. Right. Traditionally, you are probably going to think of moss as the true moss. Well, let's back up a little bit. Okay. They're related to liverworth and hornworth. Yeah. I saw other articles on moss, and everybody points that out for some reason. I'm not sure if they're like, I got to put ten things in about moss. I got nine, so let's put that in. They are in the phylum briofida, and they're in three groups. You got the granite mosses, the peat mosses, and true mosses. True mosses are probably what we're going to think of. When you think of the little green carpet, like padding that you see everywhere. A fallen tree in a forest or something. Yeah. And they're true moss. Tons of true moss. Like 14,000 species. Yeah. Granite mosses are blackish, small growing arctic regions in the mountains. Yes. Grow on rocks. They're the most ancient moss, apparently. That's right. And there are only about 100 species of that. And then the final subgroup is the peat moss grows in bogs. Have you ever been in a bog? Then you've probably seen some peat moss or sphagnum moss. Right. And that's the money moss, because you can burn it and convert it to electricity and charge money for it. That's why sphagnum is the money moss. Not oddly, but remarkably, the sphagnum moss do you use as a soil conditioner? We do that in our garden because some of it can hold 20 times its dry weight and water. It's pretty amazing. That's very amazing. That's some strong moths. You're going to find moths all over the place, including places where you won't find any other living plants, like the bottom of an Arctic or Antarctic lake. That is pretty impressive. Like the only multicellular plant growing down there is moss. Right. And it grows really slow, I think as little as 1 year, this aquatic moss at the bottom of these frozen lakes. And that is the slowest growing and longest living freshwater plant ever recorded. I would guess. So it's kind of like putting somebody on ice. Right. Slowing down the cellular processes. But they're still active. So you could by, in theory, extend their lifespan. Right? That's right. Same thing with moss. Yeah. It's probably even easier with moss. Yeah. And by that same token, the zombie moss I thought was pretty cool. Yeah. You could dry some mosses out for 19 years without water, and if you add water to it, it'll resuscitate itself. It'll turn into a big dinosaur. It's pretty cool, though. They can go dormant for that long. Yeah, it's amazing. And all losses can go dormant. It's like one of their defense mechanisms. They'll just turn brown and dry out state. Unfortunately, you can't really tell what the difference is between dead and dormant until you add water and see if it comes back. Right. That's the only way to determine the length of a moss dormancy. So if you add water and it just stays dead, then it is dead. That's sad. So you said there's like 15,000 species and they kind of range in size and shape and texture, color. Some of the I think the peat mosses grow different colors, like rose. Yeah, very pretty. Some go black like the granite moss. You said some are silver, which is amazing. Yeah. And then there's the smallest moss is the Ephemera, which is a half a millimeter tall. That's crazy. It's adult size. Yeah. And then there's the Dawsonia, which is up to almost 30 inches, 70 CM in height, which that's a pretty wide variety. Okay. Some of this fairly interesting so far. Let's talk about the individual plants because when you look at moss and you think about moss, you're thinking of a carpet of plants. Yeah, right. Those are actually like a bunch of little plants put together. Correct? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, sure. That's one way to think of it. So when you're talking about moss, when you're talking about the individual parts or the individual plants, they're pretty simple, they're pretty basic. You have something called the gametophyte, which is the stem and the leaves. Right? That's right. The leaves are generally arranged in a spiral pattern and the leaves are usually a lance shaped with like a point. Right? Yeah. That's where you're going to find your reproductive parts. Right. At the bottom there's rhizoids instead of roots. Remember, these are not roots. They don't anchor themselves to anything necessarily. Well, they anchor themselves to maybe organic material or something, but it's not into the dirt. Right. And they don't suck up water in the same way that roots do, but they do use rhizoids. A lot of it's kind of academic, the differences really between rhizoids and roots. Oh, yes. In my opinion, sure. I'm going to get some mail about that. But I think that they're very similar. Yeah. But the fact that it can grow on a rock kind of instead of soil kind of says it all. Excellent. Okay. So in the gametophyte you're going to have, like I said, your reproductive parts, both male and female. And then we'll mention this because it comes around later on when we talk about the reproduction. Emerging from the top of the female gametophyte is the sporophyte and a thin stalk called aceta and a little brown ball on top of that known as the capsule. Right. And then on top of that is the perculum. And it's like a little hat that the capsule wears. Right. And that comes into play. Well, let's talk about how it gets nutrients. Then we'll talk about the dirty stuff. The randy moss. Yeah, exactly. That was a pretty funny joke. That was silly. Okay, so a moss needs a few things to live, and one of those is water, of course. Possibly one of the most important ingredients because it AIDS in not just photosynthesis sure. But also in reproduction, which we'll see. Yeah. I don't want to get ahead of ourselves. We've really built up this sexy monster. Not as interesting as we're making it. Yeah. There's no, like, riding crops involved or anything like that. No. But there are parts. Yeah. All right. Okay. Yeah. And I was surprised by the number of parts. I didn't realize they were that involved. I thought it was like, here's a spore and go forth and reproduce. Sure. Anyway, with that water that moss needs, because moss need pretty much across the board, one of their great characteristics is a moist environment. Right. Yeah. And they need this water or they get this water, since they lack roots in a number of different ways. Some have very absorbent leaf surfaces where you can pour a drop of water out of leaf and go, it's just gone. It's a pretty amazing thing to watch. Yeah. Spongy. Sure. And then another way is the rhizoids, which, although they aren't roots, still manage to suck up water. And they do this through capillary action in the same way. That like a paper towel. If you put a drop of water on your kitchen counter, ask your mom first before doing this because some moms will freak out on you if you do something like this. Right. Put a drop of water on your kitchen counter and take a single thing of paper towel, set it next to it, just barely touching, and the paper towel go suck it up. It's amazing. That's capillary action. And it's the result of the adhesion in this case, let's say with rhizomes, the adhesion of a water molecule to the rhizome. Rhizoid. Yeah. Rhyzoid is greater than the cohesion between that water molecule and all the other water molecules as part of yeah. It's a quicker picker upper. So once you've got a little water in there, the water is going to be moved between cells or transported through cells, depending on the moss. And then you're going to get your photosynthesis, which is part of being a plant. She liked this analogy. I didn't find it apt, necessarily. I just ignored it. Okay. So at the end of photosynthesis, you're going to have sugar and oxygen as a byproduct. Releases the oxygen like a good little plant right. And eats the sugar, basically. Yeah. And says, Give me more. Yes. So it converts the sugar into energy to break down minerals, say that it's leaks from rocks or a tree stump or whatever it's attached to, to grow and to reproduce. That's right. I think we're at the sexy moss point. Reproduction occurs can occur in a couple of ways. And the first way is for the reproduction to begin, we're going to have to get a vase shaped archaegonia. It's getting all like a Georgia O'Keefe painting in here. It is. And that's going to produce the eggs. It develops at the tip of the gametophyte, which we talked about. And then on the male side, you've got the antheridia and that produces the sperm. Right. And the sperm swims through, basically fertilizes the eggs, which is why they need to be moist. Like you said, the sperm swims through nearby water to get to the egg. It's pretty remarkable. Yeah. It's almost like a fish. Yeah. But it's a sperm. That's right. So it's more like a tadpole. Yeah, I see what you mean. And then the eggs fertilize. You're going to get a sporophyte. We already talked about the sporophyte. That's the tall thin stalk with a little perculum at the top. A perculum is going to open up at a certain point. That's the hat, the tip of the hat happens, releases the spores, which are basically like seeds. And there you have it. Well, yes. And then the spore goes and germinates like a seed. I'm saying rhizoid root, spore seed. I mean, I know that there's some differences here, but they're not that great. Anyway, this Ford goes, lodges itself into a but it's different than every other plant, millions of plants. Okay, I understand. I get it. I know that there are differences. I'm just saying, like, the difference between the two is not like a wow kind of thing for me. I get you. I wish it was. I understand. I'm not fighting it. So the spore germinates into another plant and the whole thing happens again. Hopefully not with any plant that it's related to. That. That's correct. So the other way it can reproduce is asexually, which is pretty cool. Yeah. And basically if you've got enough moisture and a piece of moss breaks off and floats downstream or get caught up in the wind and it roots down at a nice and moist place, it'll just start growing again. Yeah, it's pretty amazing. But it doesn't root rhizomes. Rhythoids. I think I'm confusing riboflavin with something else to get rhizomes. Okay. So we have healthy, sexually active moths everywhere, all over the place. We understand them. We understand them. Now, like that's moth right there, we left out one interesting fact. I thought they're leaves. The tiny little leaves are so small, they're very rarely one cell thick. Yeah, that's tiny. Yeah, it's neat. It is neat. Okay, so now that we understand moss, if you have said, I like moss a lot. I've seen moss before. I want to bring more moss into my life. I happen to have a yard, so I'm going to introduce moss to it. We now can say yes, here's how you do it, because we understand moss. And here is how you do it. Yeah. And I like the look of moss. It's nice to go between plants or like in Japanese gardens, moss is like big. Yeah. Crazy big. So if you want to grow some moss, one thing you can do sometimes is just transplant it. Like gently scrape it off that rock and sort of like a big chunk of carpet, square as you can get, and just throw it on the ground and water it. Water. And sometimes that'll be very important. It is, yeah. Not always. If you put it in the right kind of place. Mosses require low sunlight. Sure. Basically shade. In fact, if you have low sunlight and you have trouble growing grass, moss is a great alternative. It is, very much so. You said they want low sunlight or shade, and they also prefer low acidity. Lower acidity than turf grass prefers. So yeah, if you have a patchy piece of yard, moss might grow there very well. So in just transplanting it like that could work. Especially if you keep it water. You can also try propagating it using a pretty ingenious little method of taking a clump, a whole bunch of moss, throwing it in a blender with some buttermilk, and then taking that mixture with the paintbrush and painting it wherever you want. Yeah. Very cool. Yeah. Buttermilk just must be the one thing for the moss. Yes. It's like it loves packed with nutrients. You also want to take care of your moth. Sure. As low maintenance as it seems like, there are some things you have to do, like leaves, twigs, that kind of stuff. Since it's in a shady area, it's usually subject to those things falling on top of it, and that actually will burn it like acid. There won't be a lot of growth in that area of your moss. Sure. Because the leaf is preventing it from doing its thing. Yes. You want to clean it off like you would your carpet. Yes. Maybe with a very light broom. Very light. A leaf blower on a low setting, which you hate. Yeah, I just don't like the noise. But in this case, it makes sense. Sure. Unless you have a very light broom. Or you could just pick these things off individually. That's right. If it's got weeds, you don't want to yank the weeds out because it can yank up moss. You don't want to do that. So you just want to snip it with scissors. And it's no wonder this is popular in Japan, because they're always more like tender and caring with their gardens. Anyone who has the patience for bonsai and origami and things like that will snip weeds with scissors. You mean. I were in Kyoto and witnessed a man cutting the grass at a park with scissors? Yes. My neighbor used to do that in my old house. Man, but his lawn was awesome. I bet you. Yeah. I don't have time for that crap. No one has time for that. So yeah, keep it well fed, as in once a year, aside from the water, you're going to want to, in mid spring, get out your buttermilk again. So basically, like right now or like last week? Yeah, true. Get about a quarter of buttermilk, mix it with a couple of gallons of water and spray it all over. And mist your moss. They love mist. They do. They drink it up. Yeah. Literally. Yeah. Well, they use capillary action to drink it up. That's right. No roots involved. Let's say you want to kill moss. Yeah, I thought that this is very interesting in this article. It's like all promos and then all of a sudden it takes a really dark turn with the subject heading how to kill moss. Well, some people don't want it. Like they don't want ivy taking over their yard. They don't want moss taking over their yard. That's true. Although they point out in the article it's not going to take over your lawn because it's not going to grow where your lawn would grow. Right. So lighten up is what I say. But if you're one of those people who are prone to slipping things, you may not want that on your sidewalk. You definitely don't want moss on your roof. There's a sign that you have a big problem if you have moss on your roof. Unless you are doing that on purpose. Like a green roof. Sure. Well, then you're not going to have the kind of roof that you have to worry about. Exactly. If you have a traditional shingled roof and you have moss, you need to do something about it for a couple of reasons. One, the presence of moss traps moisture. Moss is designed to do that if you're into intelligent design theory. And that means that it's going to foster things like fungus that will decay the wood beneath. Meaning you'll have a hole in your roof. Yeah, at some point. The rhizomes. Right. Rhizoids. What is wrong with me? I don't know. The Rhizoids also like to get in between shingles and loosen them. That's right. And what else? Well, I mean, you don't want it on your roof and so one thing you can do to kill it is use pesticides and chemicals. Not pesticide. I guess it would be a herbicide. Yeah. They say pesticide in here. That wouldn't be right then. No, it's an herbicide. Yeah. Like roundup. Sure. Which if you're into spring, that kind of junk on your lawn, feel free. I advise not to, but that's just how I play in my yard. So you don't use scissors but you don't use pesticides, huh? No. You just kick back and you're like grow, baby? No, I take care of things, but I just don't like spraying chemicals all over there. What do you use as herbicides and pesticides? White vinegar. Like as a spray. What does that work for? Anything like pesticide and herbicide? I don't know. About pesticide, but herbicide, like, it'll kill weeds. Really? That's interesting. You put it in the Hudson sprayer. Got you. Or just live with it. Yeah, I guess it depends on the weed, for sure. But if you have animals, you don't want to be spraying your yard with chemicals. Even though they say, like, once it dries, it's fine. I don't buy that. I don't buy that either. But if you do want to get rid of it, they say the best way to get rid of it naturally is to make it a not moss friendly environment. So, like, cut back some shade, cover, maybe make it sunnier. That'll help get rid of them off. Yeah, just make it so it wouldn't want to live there even if it could. Yeah, or scrape it off if it's, like, on a sidewalk or something. Yeah, that could lead to so it may come back. Don't be surprised. But yeah, just the flat shovel or a hoe will take care of moss usually, too. That's right. It says here zinc. Yeah. I didn't know about this. Strip up on your roof and it'll keep mosses away up on there heat, that stuff. That's right. And then the last moss fact of the podcast, if you're ever lost in the woods, you need to get your bearings, start looking around and see what side of the trees and, well, pretty much an upright growing tree, what side moss is growing on. And you probably have found something like north. Yeah. Because moss is going to grow on the side that gets the least exposure to sunlight, which would be north. So just follow that and you'll end up in Canada every time, even if you start out in Australia. Hey, Australia. All right. Well, that's moss, huh? You got anything else? No, I'm going to grow a little moss garden in my front yard. Are you going to? Yeah. Well, I was going to zero escape it anyway, so I might as well get some moss going. I wrote an article on that. Zero escaping. Yeah, but the problem is this isn't zero escaping because that's dry landscaping. This requires water, but it'd still be pretty low maintenance. Yeah. And my front yard doesn't get very much sun. Like, I failed miserably at trying to grow grass, so I'm just going to mulch and moss and put plants and stuff. I'd like to see that. Yes. One day, if you want to know more about moss, including seeing some very pretty pictures of moss, and to get to the bottom of what Chuck and I decided was an inapprop analogy between photosynthesis and cookie baking, you can type in moss in the search barhouseofworks.com, and it'll bring this up, and you will be very happy. And you should also be happy because I said search bars means it's time for listener mail. Josh, I'm going to call this the nicest Irishman on Earth. Wow, this guy is super nice. Okay, Josh, Chuck and Jerry. My name is John Keating and I'm writing from Dublin, Ireland. I've been a reasonably long time listener. I started listening to the show over a year ago when I started studying for my leaving Cert, the Irish University entry exam. On a number of occasions during my exams, I was able to recall a topic you guys covered during the series, especially in English and history. Due to this, I feel I owe you a great deal of thanks as I was accepted to the College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Queen Elizabeth near Dublin, better known as Trinity College. Nice. And it's go Thunderbolts in case you're curious. Nice. During the year in Trinity, it was announced that a fraternity is to be established within the college in Ireland as well as in the UK. Society and clubs take up the role of frats that frats have in the US. However, one exception is normally these clubs societies do not have a particular house associated with them. Okay. Like we do here. Right. This house concept is something I'll have to deal with in the near future, as I shall be staying in the Beta Theta Pi branch of the University of Toronto on in the city in search of work this summer on this side of the Atlantic. The frat concept is mainly centered around their depiction in such movies as Animal House or how the Winklevoss twins were portrayed in The Social Network. Sure. Did you see those guys that are in a commercial for like, Pistachios? I did. It's awful. Hey man, you got to make that dollar some way. Yeah, the multimillion dollar payout wasn't enough. They were wealthy already. Yeah, exactly. They seem like nice enough guy. Oh, they seem like great guys in such we see them as being an alcohol fuelled rich boys club. Yes, except for the College of Pharmacy fraternity. What are they like? It's a pill fueled club. I know that both of you weren't associated with the frat when you were in college, so maybe I'm right on the button there. Also, I'm curious as to why the idea hasn't successfully been exported to Ireland and the UK and further afield. And what exactly is the association with the Greek alphabet and why did they develop in the US in the first place? So he wants us to do a podcast. Oh, I thought he wanted us to answer now as this email has already exceeded the limit, I felt it would, so I shall end it on this note. I just want to further emphasize my gratitude and respect I have for the SYSK team and all the individuals involved in how stuff works. Here's hoping for a successful venture on the TV. Best of luck and slan. What's the Irish thing? Ever heard of that? Is it like an acronym for something or? No, it just says Best of luck and Slam. So we'll probably hear about that. And that. Is from John Keating. Thank you, John. That is very nice of you. That was a very nice email, wasn't it? Do you want to do Fred's? Yeah, I think we should at some point. Well, I guess we have to explain everything. If we did Moss, we have to do France, right? Yeah, sure. Let's see. What should we call for Chuck? I don't believe anybody could possibly have a moth story, which makes me want to hear one. Well, that means people go, oh, boy, you didn't think you'd get a moth story. Listen to this. Okay, so we might as well ask for it. I once laid so still for a year I had moths going on my side. That would be pretty cool. That would be cool. And then there's the tree man, who I think some people call the mothman. I don't think I know him. Oh, you do. There's a video on how stuff works with this man who has some sort of HPV, and he's growing like bark. Bark like skin. Yeah, I've seen that. Yeah. I think he's called the tree man, though. It's not the mothman, is it? I don't know. It's sad. So we've already heard about that guy. Don't send us any links to that video. Seen it. But if you do have an interesting ma story, we want to hear it. Not only that, if it's interesting enough, we'll promote it on the show via listener mail. You can tweet at least the first 140 characters of your Moss story to us at syskpodcast. You can post a bunch of it on Facebook at facebook. Comstuffynow. And you can send us the whole shabang at stuffpodcast@discovery.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstopworks.com. Brought to you by the Reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you?"
91719023-bb9f-4b87-8103-aead001e3143	How Freedom of the Press Works	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/2022-06-07-sysk-freedom-of-press-final	Countries around the world – capitalist democracies to communist unitary states – guarantee a free press in their constitutions. It turns out, though, that there is a galaxy of methods for subverting a free press. Find out why that matters in this episode. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.	Countries around the world – capitalist democracies to communist unitary states – guarantee a free press in their constitutions. It turns out, though, that there is a galaxy of methods for subverting a free press. Find out why that matters in this episode. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.	Tue, 07 Jun 2022 09:00:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2022, tm_mon=6, tm_mday=7, tm_hour=9, tm_min=0, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=158, tm_isdst=0)	46882563	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh and there's Chuck. And Jerry's here too. And this is stuff you should know. Constitutional Professor's Edition. All right. It was the best I could come up with on such short notice. I only had a couple of days to think of it. Yeah, this one was sort of depressing for me. Yeah, totally. Yeah. Because we're talking about freedom of the press. And while we have that in the United States, I guess we can go ahead and spoil a little bit. If you look at rankings of freedoms of the presses worldwide, we are not near the top of that list, my friend. No. The Reporters Without Borders is a French organization. They basically rate the press freedoms, I guess, in 180 different countries. Yeah. The freeness is either hot or not to worry about. Right. So that's basically the state of the press anyway. The United States is number 44 in 2021. It's actually down two slots. It used to be 42 for a few years before that. So if you want to know more about that, check out the World Press Freedom Index because it goes into a lot more detail. And who's number one? Of course, number one is Finland, right? Yeah. The top five is riddled with countries in that area, as always. Finland, Sweden, Denmark. They got Costa Rica. I get it. All right. Costa Rica. That was a wild card, but good for them. Yeah, but it's nice to see heads off Costa Rica, but yeah, it's like you said, in the United States, we absolutely, without question, have guaranteed freedom of the press. But in practice, it's a much, much different thing altogether. There's a lot of different ways that the press can be limited in what it says, for good or bad. I mean, there are definitely times where it's like, yeah, that's not really anything anyone needs to know about, necessarily. Especially, like, say, reporting on the failings of a private citizen or something like that. But overall, the idea of press reporting, of journalism that is, like, just able to really get to the heart of a matter and explain it without restriction on what it says or how it explains it or what it talks about, it's really important, and we definitely equate it with democracy. It's like one of the pillars of a free society is a free press. And we also kind of trace the Chuck back to the First Amendment, and it definitely was enshrined there. But even after the First Amendment was created in the Bill of Rights in 1787, america was like, okay, we put that in there. Let's just forget about it for a century or so. Yeah. It's been what Paul McCartney would call a long and winding road. That's a song by The Beatles, by the way. I Got you. I figured that from context. They've never heard of it. I also figured from context that I probably wouldn't like that song. It's a great song. So should we go back in time and sort of poke around in the beginnings? Yeah, because it's not like America came up with that. Right? No, of course not. What I love kind of one of my favorite things every time we talk about the beginnings of the printed word is the fact that and this was starting in the 15th century, when the printing press became a big thing. Like, one of the reasons for creating the printing press, like, some of the very first things were people writing about and writers were usually also printers, but people writing about criticisms of either the Church or the government, a lot of times, those were kind of one and the same, and it's kind of cool to look back and think all the way back then. One of the big reasons the printed word existed and became so widespread was so people could talk to one another when they had sometimes despotic government looming over them. Yeah. So if you were the head of a despotic government with a suddenly printing press in your country, you wanted to try to limit that as much as you can. You wanted to destroy that printing press. Wrong. Right. Exactly. So you would have laws that basically said, no one can release a book until the government has read it and signed off on it. Laws like that. There are also criminal laws, I believe. In England, there was seditious libel and blasphemous libel. And libel was basically not exactly liable, as we understand it today. If you say anything mean or bad or critical of either the government or the Church, even if it's true, you can go to jail for that. Even if it's true. Yeah. Printing factual things. Yeah. Which is so contrary to the concept of any kind of freedom, especially freedom of speech or freedom of the press as we understand it today. But that was just kind of how things were for a good century or so after the printing press was created. Yes. And one of the big turning points and these guys really it's amazing how hard they nailed it so long ago. But there were these essays named John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon, who wrote for the American colonies, britain's American colonies between the 17 early 1720s I guess it was all in the early 1720s, and they wrote under a pseudonym what was called the Katos Letters and named after, obviously, the Roman statesman. But they really nailed the fact right out of the gate that free speech is an essential thing and citizens being able to communicate with one another. And of course, back then, it was like a letter that you would print up and nail up on a wall, or you would have chain letters that people would forward to one another. It was sort of like they're forwarding an email back then, but people. The citizenry of the world needed to be able to speak to one another about their grievances and not have their voices squashed. I think they talked about libel. They said it's wrong to criticize private and personal failings, even to public figures. And citizens must be free to discuss officials actions when they affect people. And this wasn't a notion like, I think you sent me that extra thing that said prior to this, the notion of free speech wasn't even like a political rallying cry. No, it just wasn't a thing. Like, you can basically say that Trenchford and Gordon essentially made it up or put better. They discovered it. The importance of it and the importance that they placed on it was twofold. One, they said people need information because the more information you give the general public, the better the decisions that they're going to make are. And in a democracy, if you're letting the general public vote on stuff, they need to be informed. You just can't keep a lid on facts. And then the other thing that they said, too, that was really important is they said free speech is so important that even the person whose opinions you disagree with should have freedom of speech. And that was a mind blowing new concept because in the colonies, prior to that, it was a lot like it is today. I should have free speech. But if I don't agree with you, you shouldn't. Yes. And I feel like this stuff really hits home for me and for us as a show, because even though we're not journalists and we never claim to be, we're not a new show. I feel like we've always championed the idea of, like, knowledge is power, kind of going back to the kids. What was that? Was that kids in the hall? Dunies? Scooby Doo? No, I feel like it was a kid's educational. Knowledge is power. It saved by the bell. That's what it was. Screech said that at the end of every episode. Oh, you're talking about the more you know. No, I'm talking about the literally, knowledge is power. It might have been Schoolhouse Rock, it might have been one of their things, but anyway, this just hit home for me because I feel like we've always tried to be a show that we get stuff wrong here and there, but we try to spread facts about things, and it's not newsy related always. Sometimes it is, but just about the world. The more you know, the better off you are as a human. Yeah, like I said, the more you know. With a star overhead. A big early victory, legally speaking, came in 1735. There was again a journalist who was also a printer named John Peter Zinger. He's really good with a joke at a cocktail party. That's where that comes from. Hey, that was his catchphrase. So he was printing attacks on, believe it or not, William Cosby was the guy's name. Cosby's are always up to something. Yes. I don't think he went by Bill, but this was the colonies governor, new York's governor at the time, and he was arrested, jailed for libel for about ten months and managed to beat the rap at the trial even though he was acquitted. It's kind of confusing because he was acquitted on the grounds that he was printing factual things. But as we said before, even if you were printing factual things, that didn't matter. This particular jury just chose to ignore that. Yeah, jury nullification. They said, we think this law is wrong. They were convinced of it by a guy named Andrew Hamilton, who became Zenger's lawyer after his first two lawyers were disbarred by the judge in the case for questioning the judge's conflict of interest. And it was like, quite a conflict of interest. Chuck the whole thing was over the removal of a judge that Governor Cosby found troublesome. And his replacement was the judge that was hearing this case, trying the guy who printed stuff about how corrupt that removal of the judge was. That's how screwed up this case was. Andrew Hamilton still managed to get the jury to ignore the law and to quit Zengar, which was a huge deal. It didn't immediately open the floodgates. And now all of a sudden, there was just press freedom everywhere. Right. But it definitely laid a foundation, or helped build on the foundation that Trenchard and Gordon had first elucidated just a few decades before. And it's just a few years after that. Chuck sweden, I guess, heard about all of the hubbub going on in the American colonies and said, we want to be 1st. 1st. Sweden likes to do that. And comments on the Internet, they just write first everywhere. Yeah. They said, yeah, sure. That's not wrong to say. Surely the Swedes have a good sense of humor about that. Right. We'll find out, maybe. Do we have listeners there? Sure. All right. I don't know if we've ever I don't remember any emails from Sweden. We call them the Dozen. Yes, The Dozen. The Dirty Dozen. Although they're very clean people. That's right. That's the city of the dozen. So, yes, this was in December 1766. They were the first country to pass the Freedom of Press Act. But it wasn't all it was cracked up to be. They still censor things. They basically put the onus on the publishers instead of the government to censor things. So good for you, in a way, Sweden, but this is just part of that long and winding road. But one thing that that act also did was say, if you're a citizen of Sweden, you have a right to access government documents to see what your government is doing. So in one way, it was not at all helpful. In another way, it was pretty sweeping. Yeah, sure. And then Virginia said, all right, well, Sweden was first in the world. We want to be first in the colonies, I guess the states, because they know I guess it would have been the colonies still, because they came up with part of their charter or they made an amendment to their charter that said, we really like what Trenchard and Gordon came up with. We like what Zinger stood for. And we're going to include the idea that, quote, freedom of the press is one of the greatest bulwarks for liberty, and that can never be restrained, but by despotic governments. So they're saying, like, if you have freedom of the press, freedom of speech, that will actually defend liberty by holding despotism at bay. Because if people know and this is the basis of all this, Chuck if people know what's going on, they will hold people to account. If people don't know what's going on, people who are attracted to power tend to go toward the dark side. Yeah. I mean, that's really it. Again, knowledge is power. We'll get to all that because there are certain nations of the world that don't do that, and we see it playing out all the time. Right. The USA. You think when we got the First Amendment going on, that, hey, it's all great now, but as you hinted at earlier, it would be 100 plus years until they were truly sort of like protections for the press. Seven years after the First Amendment was born, it was just a little baby in first or second grade, congress passed the Sedition Act of 1098 and said, we can deport you, we can find you, we can imprison you if you publish false scandalous or malicious writing. And scandalous and malicious are very broad terms to use when you're saying, if you print that against the federal government, then that's something we can do bad things to you for. Right. And it just lasted a few years, that particular act, but it would come up again later on in a different form. Right. And also just a little tidbit on that. That act was passed by the Federalists who were in power. They had the White House and Congress, and they passed that act in part to hold that power, to maintain that power, to keep from being criticized in the press. And apparently the early Americans found out about this, what was going on, and they disliked that law so much that they actually voted the Federalists out of office. And that's how Jefferson became president. That's right. That's a nice little story. Yeah. And it backfired. That's what happens when you try to put a stranglehold on the power. People say nay. People say nay. And I say let's take a break. Okay, let's get those dinner party invitations going and get Zinger on the list, and we'll be right back. All right, we need to talk a little bit about the Supreme Court of the United States, because here's where it all really begins. Yeah. They factor in, obviously pretty large here. Well, I mentioned this addition act. There was another Sedition Act that came along in 1918 which again criminalized a lot of political speech. And this is pretty broad as well. It was a crime to willfully utter, print, write, or publish disloyal, very vague profane, not as vague, scurrilous, super vague or abusive language, a little bit vague about the form of government of the United States or to speak out against war. And they went after people. They prosecuted close to 2000 people under the Sedition Act and the Espionage Act. And the Supreme Court upheld some of these, but it at least got them talking. Yeah. So that's a really critical thing, is the Supreme Court at the time was like, we generally agree with that law, but all these cases that were reaching the Supreme Court at the time about freedom of speech yeah, like you said, it got them talking. And in particular, Justice Oliver Wendell Homes and Justice Lewis Brandeis kind of banded together and brought their rather considerable juristic minds to bear on the idea of free speech and freedom of the press and what that meant and what protections it should have. And they used their tenure on the Supreme Court to basically establish precedent in the United States. That said, everything you understand about freedom of speech and freedom of the press, we're going to basically enshrined together through some basically opinions, not even necessarily like dissenting opinions. Sometimes they appended their support for upholding somebody being convicted under the Sedition Act or Espionage Act, but they would say things like, if you put people out there and let them talk, you're going to have like an exchange of ideas and the best ideas are going to bubble to the top. And so this whole idea of freedom of speech that led up to Oliver Wendell Homes, that it was a personal liberty that you were guaranteed in a democracy, they said. Yeah, true. In addition to that, it's actually a common good if you have free speech because the best idea can be compared and compete against rival ideas. And the one that suits society best can win the day because it's been debated and hashed out in the marketplace of ideas. Right. And Homes champion the marketplace of ideas. Idea that was originally uttered by another justice, right? Yeah, William Odglas back in the 50th, about 40 years after that. But a lot of people credit Oliver Wendell Holmes for coming up with that. No, he just like to wear it on his robe. On the back of his robe in rhinestone. Oh man, that'd be nice. So 1964 comes another big milestone. Supreme Court heard New York Times v. Sullivan, and this was pretty interesting and this was a big one because this is where we finally got the idea that libel isn't just a word that means you said something mean. Libel means that you had actual malice behind it. And that is still the standard by which we judge libel. This was an ad in 60 in the New York Times. It was run by civil rights advocates, and it was criticizing officials in the south for violating civil rights. But it had a few factual inaccuracies in there, one of which was how many times Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Had been arrested. So they didn't take kindly to that down there. There was a police commissioner in Alabama that filed a defamation lawsuit. Alabama supreme Court agreed with him. But then the US. Supreme Court went on to overturn that ruling with just a milestone majority opinion, which was actual malice has to be proven, and it's on you to prove that they meant to have malice. And that was a huge, huge and continues to be a huge deal. Yeah. Because prior to that, up to this decision, if you said anything wrong and there was any kind of factual error in it, you were at fault. And that would have an enormous chilling effect on the press. Sure. Yeah. And that's a huge deal. That's like part and parcel with protecting press freedom is to also guard against a chilling effect that can happen where that kind of comes about, when things are unclear, when you're not quite certain of where the line is or anything like that, people start to kind of see away. Yeah. And so they prevented that by saying no. Now it's on the person who has supposedly been defamed to prove that that person willfully reported facts that they knew were wrong. Then you've got slander, then you've got liable. But up to that point, if you can't prove that, then you're in the clear press. Yeah. And here's the thing. This is a big deal because humans make mistakes. I think there's been no, I think it's pretty clear over the past, I don't know, five years or so, there's been this notion that the press purposefully gets things wrong to back up whatever opinion they have on something. And by and large, journalists in the United States do have integrity, and they want true journalists, not entertainment journalism, but true journalists want to get things right because their reputation is at stake. And the publications they work for, their reputation is at stake. And you are a journalist for a while. I was a journalist for a while. You want to get this stuff right, and if you don't, you can't have a law hanging above you. What you do is you make it right and you print retractions and say, I goofed up, but it's just, yeah, I can't stay on the soapbox because onion juice will start squirting out of my pores. Yes. I'm not sure what that means. Wow. That was really gross. I was trying to think of something disgusting. Yeah, well, you nailed it on the head, Charles. That was really good work. Yes. The problem with that, though, the last part that you hit upon is the retraction and saying you goofed up. Those are few and far between. And when they are done, they are. Yeah. So there's like not enough effort to restore someone's good name if it's been besmerged to get all 19th century on us, on you, right. Through retractions, through things like that, and like making an effort to say, hey, we actually really got this wrong. I think it's gotten better with the internet because it's printed below the article that got it wrong. Initially they'll say that this was incorrect, so it's gotten way better. But back in the days of print only, or even network TV, those retractions were just so far separated from the actual error that they might as well just not connected them at all. So let's talk a little bit about the Pentagon Papers, because that was another I felt like I had an extra P in there. I didn't say panic on, did I? No. Okay. I can't get past onion juice. Why did that come out of my mouth? It was so weird. It came out of your mouth, your pores, your ears. Oh my God. Your anus. Oh, boy. Yeah. Let's talk about the Pentagon Papers in 71. What was that all about? Well so what was his name, the Ford exec? Who was McNamara? He was the Fog of War guy, right? Yeah. He ordered like basically a 47 volume exhaustive investigation and history of the United States involvement in Vietnam from World War II onward. I think this was the 60s up to the late 60s, early seventy s. And there was this researcher who worked on it for the Pentagon, his name is Daniel Ellsberg. He was super into the idea that the United States was fighting the good fight in Vietnam. But the more he helped compile this and the more of the horrors and the atrocities that he saw, he became a conscientious objector in a way, and turned into a whistleblower and handed over this super secret, classified 47 volume document to The New York Times. We started publishing articles on it. That's right. And the US Department of justice originally got a temporary restraining order saying, you can't do this. It boils down to national security, basically, and then we get the case. The New York Times Company. The United States quite a foe. And the Supreme Court said in a six three ruling, United States, you didn't prove that these articles harm national security, and these are in fact, protected under the First Amendment. And not only that, Justice Potter Stewart wrote these very wise words the only effective restraint upon executive policy and power in the areas of national defense and international affairs may lie in, again, an enlightened citizenry and an informed and critical public opinion which alone can hear protect the values of democratic government. Right. And so you can see from Justice Potter Stewart's little note, basically his opinion. When the government brings cases like these, it really opens itself up for the Supreme Court to tee off on free speech and freedom of the press. And there's a good example of the government not doing that to not set itself up so that it can keep that line blurry, so that it can create a chilling effect with journalists, and that's with the fact that they've never prosecuted a journalist for publishing leaked information. By not doing that, they've never set themselves up for the Supreme Court to say, irrefutably, yes, journalists can do this. Journalists don't worry about that anymore. You can't be prosecuted for that. Right. The fact that no one ever has means that there's still a possibility that with the right case, the government could get you you could go to prison, even though generally the way that things go is you're not even prosecuted. It's not viewed as illegal. But there's no precedent. So by not setting a precedent either way, the government has that threat of prosecuting you hanging over journalists heads, and it makes some journalists think twice before accepting leaked and classified materials. Right. I guess we kind of teased earlier that some nations are, I guess you could say, a bit more threatening than others or controlling. China, obviously, is a country that in their Constitution, they technically include the right to freedom of the press. But it is a country that is so highly regulated under the thumb of their Communist Party that they just squash reports. They stop things from running. Everything to them, it seems like, falls under the banner that it would harm the country. And the Great Firewall, while we've talked about before, I don't even think our podcast is available there, if I'm not mistaken. Right. At one point, it wasn't. I don't know. Probably won't be after today. And some have argued that there is now a PC. A nation of young people. Not all of them. But a lot of them. That have bought into this and that this has had the exact effect that China wants to have and that they believe the Communist Party's propaganda machine. And they'll report their professors. They'll report on their friends or family if they deviate from that party line. And it's scary. Man yeah. And Livia helps us with this. And she cited a researcher from China, Yakui Wang, who just a good decade before today, was studying in China and was free on the Internet and social media to criticize the government, to trade ideas, that kind of thing. And because of activities like hers, the Communist Party said, no, we cannot allow that. And in just a decade, they've managed to completely transform the minds of the younger generation in China, from what our media tells us. Yeah. And obviously the same thing has gone on and is currently going on in Russia, notably with the invasion of Ukraine. If you ask the Russian staterun, media is basically saying, this is just a limited military operation. We're trying to get the Nazis out of ukraine, and a lot of people buy that. We're a handful of independent news sources. But because of murder, which happens, I think the UN says between 2006 and 2020, more than 1200 journalists all over the world have been killed and murdered for their reporting. 90% of those crimes went unpunished. So with that threat hanging over Russia, the same effect has happened over there. There are a lot of young people in Russia that believe that what's going on in Ukraine is no big deal and fully justified. Well, that's what happens when you have a government that has a stranglehold on media and can just control what you see or hear. There's just no other ideas that can make their way in. It's really staggering. It also makes you wonder, like, gosh, you know, what all don't we know? Yeah, for sure. And this is not me just going off on an opinion I have, but in 2019, we had a President of the United States that publicly announced and floated the idea of a state run media here. So the thing is, Chuck, if you look at the Chinese constitution, you'll see that there is a right to a free press that is in there. But they use the Great Firewall of China called the Golden Shield there. They use propaganda, they use lawsuits, things like that. I think you said to basically reverse that. Not on paper, just in practice, right? Yeah. In the United States, we have a very robust guarantee that's been supported time and time and time and time again by the Supreme Court, by laws that protect people and their right to speak. And we're still hashing it out, but generally we have a very free press in the United States. The thing is, that's not to say that we have a truly opaque and impartial press in the United States. The press can still be limited in a number of different ways, even without direct government intervention in their activities and what they report on. All right, I think it's a great cliffhanger. People are probably wondering what the heck is going on here, and we'll let you know right after this. Okay, so that was a pretty big cliffhanger. The horse went over the cliff with us on it. How will we land? Chuck? How will we land? Hopefully safely. All right, well, how about this parachutes for both? What about the horse? Yeah, for both the horse and us. Oh, we're sharing a parachute. No, you and I are on a horse. Right? We have two parachutes. The horse has one. Okay, so parachutes for all? Yes, all three of us are landing safely. Originally, in my mind, we were each on our own horse, but then I thought it'd be fun to share horse. Yeah, it's like an oversized horse. Yeah. And I get to ride them back. I want to hug you around the waist. No, that's totally fine. The parachute, though, for the horse, has. To be much larger than either of our parachutes is it larger size? It's larger. And obviously it's attached between us because we don't want to tip off even though we have our own parachute, we want to go down as a nice little threesome. So the horses parachutes connected around like maybe like a girdle or something like that, and then our parachutes are connected to the horse's parachute. No, no. I think how it works is I've seen this before. The horse's parachute is integrated into the saddle. Okay. Sort of between you and I, it's a two person saddle, and then you and I have just regular parachutes, but we are then also strapped to the horse and saddle. So we're being supported by the horse's parachute in addition to our own parachutes. Yeah, we're kind of like the backup. Okay, I got you. So now that we've landed safely and the horse is trotting us along again, a really good example of indirect government intervention and self censorship of the press comes at times when there's like a war or something. And a good example of that came after 911, where basically the entire United States media said, just tell us what to do. What do you want from US. Government? We're going to completely just listen because we're feeling particularly patriotic right now. Yeah, it's sort of easy to forget that. But from University of Pittsburgh, there was a scholar there named Gordon R. Mitchell who described that reporting as a spiral of self censorship. And I guess I just didn't remember it that way. But when you look back at things like Dan Rather being on David Letterman, dan Rather and saying, George Bush is the President. Wherever he wants me to line up, just tell me where, and he'll make the call. We'll do whatever is our patriotic duty. It's easy to kind of forget that was a sentiment at the time, and everybody was lining up to say, hey, you got it. What do you want us to say? Yeah. I remember there was. Like a benefit concert in a few days of 911 for the first responders. And Richard Gear came out on stage and he asked everyone to please he knows that we're hurting and he knows that we're angry. But he's asking us to channel all of this into love. Into peace rather than hatred. And he got booed off the stage by everybody in New York at the time. And that was totally sentiment. People like Richard Gear didn't say things like that or nobody else after Richard Gear did, except for apparently Bill Maher, who said something about he said that, say what you will about it, but if you're on the plane still when it hits the building, that's not cowardly. And he had compared shooting cruise missiles into another country as cowardly, and that was basically it for Bill Maher's politically Incorrect Show after that. And it wasn't like the government was saying, bill Maher you're off the air. Richard Gear go make a terrible string of movies for a while as your punishment. That's not what happened. People saw that and they were kind of repelled by it. It was so far against the groupthink at the time. So outside of the general mood of vengeance and hurt that America was going through in the immediate wake of 911, that people just kind of were compelled to fall in line by themselves. That's just how you were at the time. Yeah. Of course, when companies pull ad dollars, something like Politically Incorrect can go away very fast, or at least give a TV network another reason to say, oh, we cancel them because we couldn't get any ads on it. Right. So that's one example. But then also there's a really good chiller, I guess, something that has a chilling effect because remember, it's a really important aspect in a country that has a nominally free press, but the press is still controlled and you hit upon it. Advertisers and ad dollars, they really have a genuine impact on what reporters and journalists feel free to say, either directly, like they're muzzled by their editors or their publishers, or they just know, if I report this fact about my parent company, it's going to look bad for the parent company. I'm just going to leave this fact out in the article. That's self censoring and that's something that the American press does. Yeah, there was a survey in 2000, and Livia does point out it's an old survey, but it's probably no different and maybe even worse 20 years on. But 31% of journalists avoided stories that could hurt their news organization or its parent company, and 29% said the same if it could hurt the advertisers. So it's just this notion that I get a paycheck from someone, and I know that ultimately that paycheck comes from either selling newspapers or selling ads in those newspapers. And of course, that was a long time ago when the newspaper was still in print, like a big deal. But this all comes down to the fact that these are for profit businesses, and it's pretty easy to lose your objectivity when you're keeping that in mind. Yeah. And also it bears pointing out that a very small group of people, either individual wealthy billionaires in the case of just bezos with the Washington Post, or giant conglomerate companies like GE owning, I think NBC maybe, and all of them have a lot of interest in common, which is protecting the bottom line. So it's really easy to get everybody to kind of report generally the same thing and not report on generally the same thing. We talked about it before, but that robert Smiggle must See TV funhouse conspiracy Theory Rock does a really great job of explaining how the whole thing works, and it's a good 15 years old by now, but it's just as correct as ever. Boy. Smiggle. What a genius. He really was a genius. And there's one other thing I would advise people to do at this point. When you're thinking about just how free the American press is and how constrained it is by dollars, core is a really good place to go, like read intelligent people's opinions on things presented as opinions, not as fact or anything. Yes. And if you look up does America have a free press? I found the answers on that question really enlightening nothing new. I didn't hear anything new, but it was just to see over and over again, yes, there's a free press. Not really though, because it's all constrained by dollars and it's all owned by corporations. It really kind of makes you understand where our place is in the world and why we're number 44 in the way of free press around the world. Yes, and we have to talk about social media too because that is, in the scope of the history of the press, a very new kind of media and it has not figured out yet. I guess it's the kindest way to say it because what you have with social media, I mean, it really giveth and it takes away. On one hand you have more access than ever for someone to be able to truly get out reporting or something like that, that's factual and would be maybe squashed by a parent company or by a traditional media company. But you've also got a situation where you can kind of say whatever you want under the guise of like this is just my opinion. And people in today's America, a lot of people take things that are completely made up and completely false as true and factual. And it's scary. Yeah, it's super scary. It's a really uncomfortable time to be living because we're like, when are we going to figure this out? How are we going to figure this out? Are we ever going to figure this out? Or is it going to be one of those things where things are going to get a lot worse before they get better? Who knows? We just don't know because we're living in the midst of it right now. Yeah, and as Libya points out, it's a situation where they are like traditional media companies in some ways because they can juice an algorithm to get something more seen than something else. Right, but then it's not like a company like Facebook doesn't have or any social media company doesn't have the same or at least legally right now, they don't have the same ethical standards of a traditional media company. Right. So it's like this new animal that kind of looks a lot like the old animal but is like, no, you can't treat me like the old animal, I'm something different. And that's kind of what we're figuring out, is it's like you said, they have different ethical standards. And that's really found in the case of Gawker, which was a gossipy news site that saw fit to publish Hulk Hogan's sex tape that got leaked to them. Where Hulk Hogan? Yeah. Everything about this case is gross. Hulk Hogan was cheating on his wife with his best friend's wife, made a sex tape of it. Gawker saw fit to publish it. Like, that's just news that people need to know about, right? And got sued by Hulk Hogan. Sued out of existence by Hulk Hogan. And that's another aspect of this case that was gross. Peter Thiel, a billionaire who was one of the founders of PayPal, secretly financed the case because he hated Gawker, because Gawker had outed him as gay back in 2007. So he financed Hulk Hogan's case and basically drove Gawker into bankruptcy. And that's not supposed to be okay. Like, even if you hate somebody's free speech, a billionaire shouldn't be able to decide who says what or who doesn't say what. So that's another gross part holcogan won because he managed to position himself as, like, an everyday guy who was up against this elite, snobby New York media. Right. That's pretty gross, too. And then ultimately, the worst part of it is that this dumb move by Gawker to publish Hulk Hogan's sex tape opened up a really terrible can of worms that just did not need to be opened, which basically says, hey, remember that idea that truth can never be considered liable. That has been a foundation of American law of free speech and free press. Let's turn that on its head. Let's test that by publishing this whole cogan sex tape. And so they lost their lawsuit. Even though it was true, this Hulk Hogan didn't dispute that that was him and that was his sex tape, and Gawker published it, and that was it. He still won $140,000,000 lawsuit against them, and Gawker went out of business. And whatever you think of gawker, they were still technically media. They were still technically the press. And so now you've got billionaires who can run press out of existence if they don't like what they have to say. That's where we are right now. We're still figuring this out. And it's a scary time. Yeah, because most companies of that size don't have the money, and that's what happened to Gawker. They don't have the money to hang in there unless another billionaire is financing theirs. And then we're in real trouble when it's just billionaires secretly suing one another behind the guise of another case. Right. That would not be fun. It would not be fun. So, like we said, the United States press is number 44 out of 180. That's a solid b, I would say. But you would expect, really, the first country to truly enshrined free speech into its constitutional amendments to be a lot higher than 44, but it's not. So if you want to know more about that, you can go check out reporters without borders 2021 world press freedom index. But basically. The upshot of it is that there is a tremendous amount of mistrust in journalists in the United States and in media in general. And a lot of false information that's easily passed around and that's kind of setting the stage for a really disrupted press or purpose of the press. Which is. Again. To tell people like you and me what the people running the show are doing so we can decide whether we want them to continue running the show or not. That's right. We should mention, if you're wondering what the bottom of that list looks like, the bottom five, there are a couple of African nations, Djibouti and Eritrea, and then of course, China, Turkmenistan, and then obviously North Korea. Yes, obviously. Sorry, Kim Jong UN, you're going to get us off the air there. Yeah, there's no way we're on the air there. We're too free, baby. That's right. Well, since Chuck said that's right, of course, everybody, that means it's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this rhinoplasty follow up. Very nice. I'll save that part. Hey, guys, keep doing the great work. Really enjoy the lighthearted approach to presenting information from the interesting minutiae of unimportant topics to the deeply important, even politically charged topics. Like today as a person who has had to have three separate rhinoplasty surgeries and he says, parenthetically, I've got some ridiculously troublesome, sinuses, septum and other miscellaneous issues I had. One other point to add, something I had never heard of was the terminates mine were apparently huge. These are little finger like folds of skin that run along the interior of your nostrils. They swell and destell alternately and are the reason when you have a bad cold, one side is totally plugged, but you can breathe through the other one. Anyway, part of my surgery was trimming those down because they were causing me breathing problems. The med student who was helping me mention after the surgery in horror that he had no idea so much stuff could come out of a person's head. Oh, wow. It's always fun when you hear something like that in post office. I've never seen a blank that big. Sir? Yeah. You got a picture. That is from John B. Parks husband father Nerdfighter Hufflepuff. Let's go. Royals, chiefs, SKC and coy's. And then he has a Gandhi quote. This is all in his email signature, so I always like to read that stuff. Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever. Mahatma Gandhi. Very nice. And then below that, it says that he might get revenue from any links you click that take you to Amazon. I never had an email signature that said things like quotes and stuff. I kind of like that. Yeah. Okay, Chuck, today is your day to start. All right. That was John. That was John. Thanks a lot, John. I appreciate that. I may actually be getting that done, too. They mentioned that for me and I was like, I don't know. This sounds like an upsell, so maybe not. I might have convinced me upsell. If you want to get in touch with us, like John did, we love to hear from you. You can send us an email and send it to specifically stuffpodcast@iheartradio.com. Stuff you should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts My Heart radio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows."
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/podcasts.howstuffworks.com/hsw/podcasts/sysk/2018-01-02-sysk-orchids-final.mp3	How Orchids Work	https://omny.fm/shows/stuff-you-should-know-1/how-orchids-work	Ever since Victorian orchid hunters ravaged the tropics in search of unique specimens to sell for ludicrous amounts of money, the West has been gripped by orchidelirium. Small wonder since orchids are not only beautiful, they’re among the most interesting	Ever since Victorian orchid hunters ravaged the tropics in search of unique specimens to sell for ludicrous amounts of money, the West has been gripped by orchidelirium. Small wonder since orchids are not only beautiful, they’re among the most interesting	Tue, 02 Jan 2018 14:25:00 +0000	time.struct_time(tm_year=2018, tm_mon=1, tm_mday=2, tm_hour=14, tm_min=25, tm_sec=0, tm_wday=1, tm_yday=2, tm_isdst=0)	48665563	audio/mpeg	https://chtbl.com/track/…3c7-ae270180c33e	"Welcome to stuff you should know from housetuffworkscom. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry Rowland back again with us. And everything is back to normal. I can stop trembling and foaming at the mouth like little Danny in The Shining when he was all freaked out. What are you talking about? You know what I'm talking about. Remember when Danny's, like, just in there zoned out? Like seeing, I think, the blood coming out of the elevator? Well, no, I'm not the lobby. Why are you doing that right now? Because Jerry wasn't around for a while. Okay. Remember we had guest producer know who's great, but he's not Jerry. No. I mean, Jerry is a lovely person inside and out. And Noel looks like somebody that might be following you around a parking lot in a trenchcoat sometimes does, but it's beautiful inside. Yeah. And under the trench coat. I'm just kidding, though. So orchids is what we're talking about today. Chuck? Yeah. How are you doing? I'm doing good. I'm feeling, like, nice and mellow because I research orchids all morning. You huff some orchids. I snorted the orchids this in real time, just so that people know is our last recording of the year. How's that for brain buster? Because it's coming out in the new year. Yeah, because we like to take it easy in December. That's annual stuff you should know. Tradition is mellow. December 1 month, Chuck. Or 1 December. We closed down almost for the entire month. Do you remember? It was great. I think we recorded on December 2 or third and then that was it until, like, the beginning of January. Yeah. We love doing this, and we love our job. But like any job, it is also very nice to not do it for a few weeks. It's like those cocktail weenies you might encounter at a Christmas party or holiday party. This year you eat, like, a pound and a half of them. You're doing fine. You have \u00a32 of them. You're like, I need to take a break for a couple of minutes. Just like that. I just made those for my holiday party. I love those. Chuck. I did the Martha Stewart recipe. No way. It's slightly fancier than your run of the mill recipe. What does she do to those to make them fancy? Well, use, like, a philosophy puff pastry dough instead of your steak. Okay, yeah, that's a little different than what I'm talking about. But what else? Well, nothing. You know, you roll up the little smokeys, you brush the inside with a little ICONI mustard. Roll up the little smokies and then you brush the top with egg because that's how you get a scrambled eggs. That's how you get that good golden brown. And then I dusted mine with a little rosemary, sea salt and sesame seed. Wow. And then you bake them up, cut them into thirds and throw them in. I bought my first chafing dish of my life. Do you have a chafing dish? No. You got me beat. I have a cockpit that doubles as a chafing dish. That's the best I can come up with. Poor man's chafing dish. Yeah, I guess so. I was way more excited than a middle aged man should be about his first taping dish, I got to say that. No, it is pretty impressive. Is it scalloped, like the edges and all that? Is it ornate or is it, like, modern and clean? No, it's like the stainless steel oval. It's not square or it's not a two banger. I threw my sausage balls and my pigs in a blanket both in there together, because it's all pork. Actually, I think the little smokies were beef, now that I think about it. Oh, God. But it kept it hot all night long. That's great. Well, that's what the chafing dish is supposed to do. I know, but in years past, I would just put out the hot stuff and say, well, eat it now, or in 30 minutes. You can eat it cold when you're good and drunk, and if you got any complaints, get out. That's what you're famous for saying at your Christmas party. I know. So, Chuck, what you've just described is delicious. I'm talking about, you know, if you just took those smokies and put them in, like, a delicious sauce. Oh, that old trick? Yeah. I'll eat what you're making every day of the week. That's like mana from heaven. That tangy. What is it? It's not just barbecue sauce. Sort of like, I don't know, some mystery gravy. It's got a little something extra in it. Martha Stewart probably knows. Well, I did sort of the dry version because there's also the sausage balls that you can have floating in that stuff, too. I'll eat those, too. That's fine with me. I think it's mostly the sauce. You can put anything in there and I'll eat it. Yeah, I did the dry pig in a blanket and then the dry kind of the biscuit cheddar country sauce. Man, Chuck, you are killing it this year, which, by the way, are good for breakfast with eggs for the next three days. I know. That's one of the great things about throwing a holiday party, or really any party, but a holiday party, because there's usually a great spread, is the next day you get to just chow down. Yeah, but it's weird because literally for dinner, I've been eating, like, blue cheese and prosciutto nice. And sugar cookies and bourbon. Man, that's what they call the holidays. Anyway, so orchids. Orchids. Hey, do you have any orchids? No, but I am a big orchid fan. Okay. I don't own them because I don't want to kill them. How much I love orchids is I don't want them in my home cause I will kill them dead. You're going to love this episode. Then because, my friend, I was once where you are, and now I am an orchid raising fool. Oh, really? Yeah. I've got six orchids, and I'm not kidding, four of them right now. Have you fired stem shooting up. Wow. Yes. Did you raise them from pups? No. I mean, they were, like, cuttings. So here's the thing. When I bought them, they were in bloom. Like when everyone buys an orchid. Well, they should be. It's in bloom, right? Yeah. And that's actually a good rule of thumb, as we'll find out. But everyone buys an orchid in bloom, and then the orchid goes out of bloom, the flower dies away, and you're like, well, that's it for the orchid. And you throw it into the trash. No, but I mean, have you ever heard of anybody getting it to flower again? I hadn't, and now I'm one of those people who has done that. I don't know much about them. I just know that I go to every orchid show or exhibit in a city, if they have one, and I'm there. Okay, so listen to this. It's really simple. You go out and buy an orchid, bring it home. Wait. Yeah, you want it in bloom. And then once it stops blooming again, you're going to be tempted to just throw it away. You'll say, what use are you to anyone now? But it's still a live plant. So at this point, you're going to commit to repotting it, and you can probably reuse the pot. It came in a nice plastic pot that has lots of holes in it. And you're going to pull off that moss that it came with. It probably came with phagnum moss. You're going to pull it off because it's really tough to work with if you're a novice. And then you're going to put that just the roots of the orchid back into the pot with nothing in it. And then you're going to fill it in with wood chips, orchid potting mix, wood chips. And you're going to put enough in there to stabilize the orchid, and it'll grow more and more stable as it gets back used to its pot again. But that's what you want to switch out the moss for the wood chips. You want to water them once a week, and you want to fertilize them about once a week, too. Okay, so on, say, Saturday, you water them, and then on Sunday, you water them with a little fertilizer. You do that once a week while they're in their growth pattern or they're growing and they're not dormant. And you will have happy orchids, I promise you. It's way easier than you think. Well, I didn't think it was not easy. An orchid, once it loses its leaves or its flower, is just a sad vine twisty tied to a chopstick. Right? You want to get rid of the chopstick because it's a depressing reminder of what it was, it's true. But you want to hang on to it, because you're going to get that thing to flower again. If you take it like the orchid just challenged you to see if you could get it to flower, it makes it a fun little game. Right. Look at your nemesis. Yeah, that's one way to look at it. Your nemesis or like a friend in need? One of the two. Yes. But an orchid should not pick a fight with me, because I could choke the life out of that skinny little thing so fast. All right, so this whole discussion about orchids, right, and the fact that you can go buy them anywhere you want, from one big box store to another big box store. Take your picture, you can find them at every single nursery just about anywhere in the world. They live in nature on six continents, but the fact that they're so ubiquitous and they're so cheap has to do with, basically, England's entrance into an orchid craze in the Victorian era. Yeah. Orchid mania. In the mid 19th century, England would send orchid hunters all over the world to plunder these exotic flowers from Central and South America. That sounds like 19th century England. Yes. To the point where a lot of these were named after these plunderers or orchid hunters, which is kind of stinks when you think about it, because I'm sure they already had great names in South America. They didn't just say, hey, future to be named, flower to be named later after English white man. They had great names. I bet. So they went down there and they would brag about this one guy, frederick Sanders. Frederick Sanders, he was the royal orchid grower of Queen Victoria's, England, and he would bright home and brag like, trust me, there's no more orchids left. I got them all. Yeah, but he was actually probably not too far off, because there's a lot of different orchid varieties. I think there's, like, something I saw 20,000, I saw 25,000. I've seen as high as 30,000 species of orchids around the world. There are 200,000 hybrid versions since humans came into the picture, but there's not necessarily that many orchids for each species. So these orchid hunters were going and finding these things that were basically considered one of a kind flowers. As far as anyone back in England was concerned, there was no other flower that anybody they knew had ever seen that looked like this. Right. So these were enormous status symbols, and they fetched tens of thousands of dollars, sometimes in mid 19th century British money, not today's money. So they were basically like you had to be royalty to own orchids at first when they first started bringing them back to the UK. Yeah. And how crappy is it that they wouldn't go down there and be like, boy, these are beautiful and amazing, like, here, we're going to take some and learn how to propagate these, and you keep the rest. You're like, okay. We're taking all these. Thank you. Yeah. Let me just set your village on fire for good measure on my way out of town. So that's how the orchid crate started out. And there's this pretty good article by Michael Pollan, the famous Omnivore's Dilemma author. He wrote this back in 2009 called Love and Lies. It's just basically him just waxing flowery about how great orchids are and how deceptive they are and all the different ways they have of tricking other animals into pollinating them. But one of the points he makes, which is actually kind of legitimate, that not only have, like, all these bees and wasps and other animals that are tricked into pollinating orchids for various reasons yeah. Not only have they fallen under the orchid spell, probably the most successful thing orchids ever did was to manage to beguile humans, because we've taken them and propagated them all over the world. And now they've come down from tens of thousands of dollars or tens of thousands of pounds, I should say in mid 19th century pounds, to $1020, depending on the size of the orchid. And you can get it just about anywhere. That's all because of humans. You can get orchid out of a bubblegum machine these days. You can. Specialized one, but you can. Well, let's take a break here because I'm pretty excited and I need to settle down. Okay. And then we'll come back and talk about why we love these things so much right after this. All right. So Why Humans Love Orchids part One Besides the fact that they look just amazing to the eye and they're so delicate, but also very hearty, they are symmetrical. They have bilateral symmetry. And science has proven that symmetry is attractive in humans. I know we've talked before about the fact that people whose faces are more symmetrical or biologically more attractive than people like me, which have my faces all over the place. One side doesn't know what the other side is doing at any time. Sure, yeah. With bilateral symmetry, it's like one half as mirror image of the other half. And there's not that many flowers in nature that have bilateral symmetry. Right. So that's a pretty good initial theory. Yeah. I don't think people even realize that maybe what's going on subconsciously when they look at an orchid and revel in its beauty. That's one of the things you're not even maybe noticing. You know what I'm saying? Sure. It's subliminal or subconscious. Yeah, closer enough. So another theory is that they look quite vaginal in nature. A lot of them do. Especially some of the most common ones, like Fallenopsis have this well, at the very least, you can say Georgia O'Keefe definitely saw it. Right. Yeah. And clearly, throughout history, the Greeks and you're not the first one to say that they have often been thought of as aphrodisiacs. And part of that reason is from the way they look. Right. And actually, it's just so plainly obvious that during that orchid craze in Victorian England, which is also called orchid delirium orchid delirium, I think it doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, but there were people who were roundly opposed to that whole craze because of the overt sexuality that orchid flowers broadcast. The most lurid flower. Yeah, because you'd catch, like, the town weirdo in, like, your greenhouse. Hey, that's all you need to say, right? Get out of there now. They're knoll. Exactly. You turn the pump hose on them. There's another whole kind of overt sexuality to the whole thing, too. And just the name of orchids is, I think, Latin or Greek. Do you remember which one? I don't remember. It's either Latin or Greek for it's Greek for testicle orchid the word, and it refers to the shape of the bulb, the orchid bulb. So people have been looking at orchids and thinking very impure thoughts about flowers for a very long time. So this isn't just me, this isn't just Uncle Josh getting weird on you. I'm following in a long tradition and actually, I'm not even doing anything myself. I'm just recounting. I'm reporting what other people have said before. Yeah, you just have a large collection of orchids and Georgia O'Keefe paintings and a trench coat. It's a very normal habit for a middle aged man to suddenly get into. It's actually really relaxing, though. It's cool just to care for him. Oh, yeah. Well, like I said, they're very delicate, but they're incredibly hearty, which is kind of one of the cool things. And they come in you can't just describe an orchid like this article says, that's like trying to describe what's normal about any human being. There are so many varieties and they all look so different, and they're all manner of shapes and sizes and colors, even though supposedly not a true black or true blue, even though you will see some that you will say, well, that's blue or black. It's really not right. Whatever true means. Which means that there's some orchid fans out there who are trying to propagate through black and true blue orchids right now. Yeah, they're really like deep purples, usually variations of purple, which is fine. They look great. I'm not knocking it. Thanks for coming out. So the fact that despite the fact that there are so many different shapes, sizes, colors, they do all sorts of different stuff, they live in different places. People have attempted to kind of broadly classify orchids. Sure. One of the first ways they do it is from their growth habit. And you can divide orchids into two types from there monopodial, which is if you're at one of those big box home stores yes. I'm not buzz marketing man, I'm not going to do it. You're probably going to find Fallenopsis, because they're the easiest ones to care for, they're the least fussy, they're the ones that most people are familiar with, but apparently they're the least common out in the wild, but they have like an upright growth pattern where they have a single stem with leaves on either side of the stem growing opposite one another. And they shoot out a flower stem from the top part of the bottom pair of leaves. Correct. And then on the other side you have the more common one, which is the sympodial. And these are beautiful. These are the ones that grow horizontally and they send out their shoots to the old rhizome. And the leaves and flowerscapes at that point form at the top of the new chutes. Right. So one that grows from a horizontal rhizome to one that grows upright vertically, like you would think of a typical plant. That's basically the two ways that an orchid is going to grow as a plant. Another way that they classify them, too, is where they live, because there are some types of orchids that grow like what you would consider a normal plant out of soil. Some grow out of leaf litter. Those are called terrestrial orchids. Yeah. Then there's the kind that you typically think of grow on like trees or on plants or where a branch meets like a tree around the actual trunk, the bark of a tree. Those are called epiphytes. And then lastly, there's lithophytes, which grow on rocks, but basically do the same thing that the ones that grow on trees do, which is they're harvesting nutrients from the decomposing litter that accumulates in the grooves of the tree bark or where the elbow of the branch hits the tree trunk. All the stuff that accumulates there, the roots of the orchid are just sucking that stuff up. Yeah. So it's not like stealing nutrients from the thing that it grows on. Yeah, they're not parasitic. And I thought it was great that this article went to the trouble of making that point. So they don't have a parasitic relationship with trees. They do have a symbiotic relationship with fungus, actually. So much so that they can't survive the first few stages of their life cycle without a specific type of fungus. Basically acting as a nursemaid for the seed and the young plant as it's growing. Yes, if you have a lot of time and a lot of patience and a lot of orchid wherewithal you can try to grow these from seed, but it can take a decade to get a flower from seed. That's if the thing lives. Orchid seeds are so tiny, they're called dust seeds. And how they propagate is there need to be millions of these dispersed in order to get orchids to grow at all. Right, and so if it's like an epiphyte that grows, it's a variety that grows on tree bark. This seed has to get carried away from the mother plant all the way over to some other tree land in just the right place on that tree bark. And then there has to be this certain type of fungus that it has the symbiotic relationship with, that it can grow into the seed and feed it nutrients while the seed is developing and germinating. That has to happen. It doesn't happen very often, which is why orchids are known for sending, like you said, millions and millions of seeds just out there into the ether and hoping that something sticks. It's like the Orchest way of throwing spaghetti at the wall. Yeah. I mean, it's amazing that they did not go by and that they've been around for 80 million years. I know, and one of the things is that Michael Polen article is so great about this. It's saying they're so maladapted in some ways that they've had to get really creative in other ways to ensure their survival. Like, for example, in orchid, they have pollen. Right. They're pollinating flowering plants. Right. But when you normally think of pollen, you think of the yellow stuff, that powdery spores that just hit the wind, and they just cover everything. Like everything everything's covered in yellow. Plant sperm, basically, is what it is. Right, but it's true. So with an orchid, they have something called polynesia. And polynesia are their sacks of pollen, but they're not like the powdery kind. They're like about the size of a little grain of wheat. And in an orchid flower, you have the reproductive column. It has the female reproductive parts and the male reproductive parts all in the same place. Right. It's a party. Somewhere in there, there's that polynia. And one way or another, which we'll get into that, polenia has to get out of that orchid through no mechanism of its own and go way far away to another orchid and pollinate with an orchid that is in no way related to that orchid so that you can have it's just more fitness, basically, for the offspring. Right? Yeah. And then that Polyne has to go pollinate that reproductive column of that other one, and then the seeds start to grow, and then you have to broadcast the seeds. And so to do this, because they don't have pollen that is easily transmitted, they've figured out how to trick bugs, usually into pollinating for them or spreading their pollen forum. Yeah. So, like, for example, the bees are amazing. Oprah epiphra. Yeah, you take that one, the prostitute orchid or the b orchid. This one is all these are amazing. Like, how they have adapted to ensure their survival is just really something else. So this one copies the scent and the looks of female bee reproductive parts from behind. Yeah, that's the cleanest way we can say it in order to attract the males. Like, it looks and smells like a lady bee vagina. Yes. There's a female bee in the flower already, and the male bees like, oh, okay. Hey, how's it going? I'm going to go see how you are. Exactly. Well, I guess assault is the best way to put it. The female bee who he thinks is already in the flower, but it turns out actually is the flower. Yes. And while he's getting increasingly frustrated but trying to do his thing, the Polinea detaches from the flowers reproductive column onto the bee. The bee flies off. Finally he's like, Forget it. I'm out of here. It goes and finds another flower eventually and is duped and does the same thing. And when he does, that polynea is then transferred to that flowers reproductive column and pollination takes place. Amazing. It is amazing because not only does it look exactly like that bee, but it also puts out the same pheromones as the female of that bee. It's natural selection at its finest. All right, here's one. The dendrobium Senise, not the gary senize. Maybe gary Senice is like, great gray great uncle was an orchid hunter. Maybe in China. Yeah, maybe. It's possible because this is a Chinese orchid, and this one is pollinated by hornets, very specifically. And hornets like bees. Bees do not like hornets. So this flower imitates the pheromones of beef fear. And so the hornet's like, hey, I think there's a bee over there that's scared of me. Let me go kill it. Let me go do whatever hornets do to be what do they do? They kill them. I think they sting them. Do they sting them or the hornets bite. Now, hornets sting, and so it lures it over there because they think there's a scared bee, and in fact, there is nothing there but the orchid going, welcome, hornet. Leave your junk here. Right. And he does or he picks up the Polyne, does the same thing to another flower. That's right. And then one of the things that Pollen pointed out, michael Pollan pointed out was you said Poland early, and I was saying pollen. Which one is it? Well, subliminally you're thinking B polin. Yes, but which one is it? Do you know how to pronounce his name correctly? No, Poland. We'll just say that just to keep it from getting confusing. Okay. So what Michael Poland pointed out was that if you look at the types of orchids, like the Orphus epiphara, if you look at the same orchids from the same variety, they're slightly different. So it's clearly it looks like the beef from behind. And the pheromones that they're putting out are the same as well, but they're slightly different. And they're just different enough so that bees don't learn to just avoid those flowers because they're being tricked every time. It's just different enough so that the bees can't learn that. I think that's fascinating. Well, here. Did you read that Darwin article I sent you? Did you send me one? I didn't get it. Maybe I didn't send this one. Sorry. Yeah, you didn't send it. It's okay. But tell me about it. It's called moth tongues. Orchids and Darwin. The predictive power of evolution. And basically, back in the day, 1862, a British orchid grower sent darwin some orchids from Madagascar, and said, look at these things. Aren't they amazing? They have a nectary which is like a foot long. And Darwin's like he writes back, he wrote to a friend at Q Gardens, K-E-W which is wonderful, wonderful public garden in London, which I went to with Emily, and they had quite an orchid collection there. Of course, they had raided the world for years. And he wrote and said, in Madagascar, there must be moths with a proboscis capable of extension to a length between ten and eleven inches, because that's the only explanation here. Well, yeah, and he was defending his new theory of natural selection. Well, in co evolution specifically. So he posited these things are co evolving. And not only that, he literally predicted this new species that no one had ever seen before. As it turns out, there is a moth. In 20 years after Darwin died, a subspecies of the gigantic Congo moth from Madagascar was identified that had this long proboscis, like twelve inches long, and they were like, hey, this has got to be the thing. I think Darwin was right. But it wasn't until 1992, about 100 years later, that they finally literally observed on camera this moth feeding the flower. And Darwin was like, from his grave, told you so. Yeah, he said, Booyah. How about that? Like 130 years after he first suggested this, it was all proved out. That is pretty cool. It's awesome. That's Darwin, he was a heck of a guy. He's kind of smart, you know. Yeah, he was a little smart. I've got one more, and this is just so remember we said there's 25,000 species? Yeah. We're not going to go to them all. No, I want to go over one more, though, called bulba phylum bakari, and its pollination is aided by flies and carrying beetles. And what attracts carrying beetles and flies? Well, rotting flesh, because it's where flies feed and that's where they lay their eggs that turn into maggots. Right. So the flower puts out the smell of rotting meat how about that? To attract the specific type of pollinator so that it can be pollinated. That's just insane. All right, you want to take another break? Yeah. All right, we're going to take another break and come back and talk a little bit about the fact that vanilla is an orchid and other amazing facts. All right, so vanilla is an orchid. Moving on. That's an amazing fact. It is an amazing fact. Like, who knew? I mean, a lot of people know, but I didn't know. The flavoring is the seeds. Yeah, it's the vanilla bean, obviously. It's not like they grind up those sweet petals of the flower. Yeah, but it's not even the outside of the bean. It's the little tiny seeds inside. That's where the vanilla flavor comes from. Yeah. There's this fascinating anecdote. I can't remember the gist of it, but it's in the book. The. Dorito effect that I talked about before, where he was talking about the origin of vanilla, imitation vanilla, and how they just changed the world. Basically. Apparently the vanilla market was crashing and somebody came in at just the right time, propped it up. Yeah, propped it up with the invitation, vanilla. But go again. Go check that book out. It's amazing. I will. Are you talking to me or everyone else? Both. So let's talk about how to care for an orchid just in case anybody said, you know what, I'm going to go to my local big box retailer. Even better, I'm going to go to my locally owned mom and pop nursery and buy an orchid two day. My local orchidary. Yeah. This is what you want to look for. Okay, well, first of all, when you look at the orchid itself, it might give you a few clues as to what it needs, care wise, right off the bat. If you're an expert, obviously you know a lot about it, but these are just some kind of broad things to look for. If it doesn't have many leaves or if the leaves are kind of leathery, then it probably needs more light than maybe another variety. Yes. And if the leaves are limp and soft, it probably maybe is a little light sensitive and maybe you don't throw it on your sun deck. Yeah. And you should probably ask the person you're buying the orchid from. Yeah. Do all that. Don't listen to us and expect to walk away with complete knowledge. Yeah. So again, you're probably going to find if you look in the potting medium, there are terrestrial orchids, but I've never seen one in real life. I've only read about them on the Internet. Have you ever seen an orchid in soil and dirt? I've just read about it in Legendary. Same here. I've always seen them in like sphagnum moss or something like that. You can also find it in like, coconut husk fiber. Apparently styrofoam beads work just fine. Because the point is the orchid isn't getting any of its nutrients or getting very little of its nutrients from the growing medium, which is why you need to fertilize it basically weekly because that's where it's going to get its nutrients from. So the growing medium matters. And that what you're doing is providing a lot of aeration for the roots of the orchid. Yeah. Which don't since they don't grow underground, they're exposed to air and light and all that stuff, which is totally fine. But that means you don't want to cover them up too much with the growing medium. You want to let them run free. And so that's the purpose of the growing medium itself. Yeah. You don't want to grow an orchid in a rubber bladder full of red clay. That's a dead orchid, man. Those fleshy roots that you see, they have these white cells that they're covered with called velamin, and they're just sponges that absorb all the nutrients and all the water. And it's also a coating that helps protect moisture loss from heat. Even though they generally like light and they like warm environments, they are sort of delicate. You don't want to bake them in the hot Georgia sun all day. No, there are very few orchids, and you're probably going to be like an orchid enthusiast by the time you really come across an orchid that likes lots of intense sun. Most of them, for the most part, they like sun, but it's going to best be indirect, like maybe in a window that gets a little bit of sun. And then the high humidity, I think, is not across the board because there's orchids that live in mountainous areas where it's kind of rocky in desert and arid. But most of the orchids you find that you're going to find at the store in the United States or the UK, they're probably tropical. So they want high humidity on the order of like 60% to 80%. And they want temperatures, daytime temperatures, of at least 80 deg Fahrenheit. God knows what that is in Celsius. And then they want like twelve to 14 hours of daylight and 20% chance of rain. Yeah, like I mentioned, they need to be watered. But like you said, the way to kill an orchid is to overwater it or to not have your drainage. Right. A water logged orchid is no good. No, apparently they can tolerate drought better than over water. Much better. So again, you want to water it weekly. You want to wait until the growing medium dries out again and then water it. And since you're fertilizing it, it's damaging to put fertilizer onto dry orchid roots. Right. Apparently. Right. Which is why you only want to use liquid fertilizer with orchids. But you also want to pre water it. You want the orchids to be already wet when you use the fertilizer the next day. Right. Dilute that liquid fertilizer, too. Right? Yeah. The rule of thumb that I was told was you want to fertilize weekly. Weekly. So W-E-A-K-L-Y-I got you. Okay. I don't even need to finish it. So I use a 20 2020 orchid fertilizer, which smells so bad, it smells like concentrated rodent pea. And it kind of looks like it too, actually, like dried out concentrated rodent p, if this it could be. But apparently that's what orchestlike because it's keep in mind going, but it says to use like a teaspoon for a gallon of water. So I use like three quarters of a teaspoon for a gallon of water and it seems to work pretty well. And you use that gallon for all your orchids? Or you just keep that stored? No, I'll water them until they're nice. The growing medium is nice and wet. And then I'll come the next day and they'll just kind of like give it a couple of turns. Couple of gloves on each orchid just to get it around there. I don't soak them with it. So it depends on how heavy handed I am from week to week. And they don't seem to mind one way or another. Sometimes I'll use the whole gallon, but most of the time it's like half to two thirds of the gallon I'll use to fertilize it. Do you talk to them? I don't think so. I'm not conscious of it if I do, but I might. Who knows? I'm pretty insane. It's possible I talk to them and don't realize it. You know what I mean? Not like I'm talking to them and they're talking back, but it's entirely possible I say things to them and I'm not aware. Okay, but you haven't named them and make an effort to speak to them? Oh, no. Okay. What am I, crackpot? Come on. I don't know. I don't mind that. You want to hear something weirder than that, though. Some ridiculously high percentage of dog owners don't talk to their dogs. What do you mean? Like something like, I want to say 60%. We'll have to look it up. But some more than half of dog owners don't talk to their dogs. Like, they don't give them orders or they don't say, you should just sweet face. So they might give them orders like, sit or Come on, let's go, or something like that. But they're not also like, all right, we're almost there. Yeah, whatever's in between those two things, they're not doing that. They're not talking to their dog. I just find that bizarre. Yeah. I mean, I'm yelling at my dogs half the time. The other half, I'm talking the stupid voice. You don't yell at your dogs. Are you kidding me? You yell at your dogs? Yeah. I didn't know that. Yeah, of course. What do you say? You yell like, I love you so much. No, I yelled, Nico, get off of me. Good God. Stop it. Okay. That's pretty cute. Yeah, I mean, it's not cute. Like, what do you do when a dog is in your face? Like, chewing your hair and scraping scratching your chest? He's threatening with a BB gun. Yes. That's like the puppy pounder. No, I never hit my dogs. But, man, I yell them all the time. Nico is just so needy. Is that your Shelty? No, Charlie is great. She never needs to get yelled at. Okay. Nico is just needy and jumps on people, and there's no way a dog can jump on someone and you're like, Would you please get off of that person? Oh, sure, yeah, you go get down. Yeah, I got you. I see what you're saying. That kind of stuff, not yelling, like, I hate you because I'm upset at my own life. Right. Yeah, that's what I was after. Like I hate my job. It's all your fault. Hey, did I tell you that we did a DNA test on Lil momo? And she's like, 10% shelter. Oh, really? Yeah, we were like, well, that explains her hurting us toward the door. If one of us is getting ready to go out, she'll go and get the other one, just kind of, like, push them toward the door. Is she also just very aware of where everyone is at all times, like, checks on everything? Yeah. If I go to bed first, Momo will go to bed with me. And then if Momo decides that you meet stood up long enough, she'll come out in the doorway and kind of look at her, like, all right, time to go to bed. She'll come and get Yuumi. Yeah. And does she sit in the window and bark at everything? If she had a window to bark out of, yes. Okay, but we live in a windowless box. Right. So that's Charlie's main job, is she just sits on the sunroom sofa looking out the window as if it is her post. Yeah. And anyone that goes by, she'll bark at? Yes. Does Charlie bark at birds? No, just, like, people and other dogs. And literally, like, it's her job. You can tell she's not a jerk. She's just like, I'm on duty, is what we call it. Right, understood. Yeah. Tell her to clock out. Clock out, Charlie. Does she listen? Come to bed. Have you tried yelling at her? No, she doesn't need yelling. Like I said. I said clock out, Charlie. All right, so back to orchids potting and repotting orchids generally, unless you have to repot an orchid, don't repot an orchid just because you're like, yeah, I'm kind of sick of that pot. Let me put it in a new one. Right. Because they say, oh, yeah, I'm not very happy with that. I'm not going to send up another flower for at least a year. Yeah, they don't like getting repotted. But if you have to repot, I mean, what's your advice? I've not had that much trouble reposting. I guess they don't immediately. That actually, to tell you the truth, now that you asked me that, that explains why some of them haven't flowered for so long, because I have repotted them here, there. But I was overwatering them, and it was kind of vital that I did repot them because their roots were decaying. Got you. So if you have an orchid that you realize you've overwatered. And this is when I learned not to use phagnum moss any longer, because it really holds in water. And that's the great thing about the pine bark, is that it just lets the water go right through. It, hangs on to some of it. But the point is to just water and orchid as frequently as it needs it, rather than watering it and letting the soil hold the water in for it. Right. So the sphagnum moss was holding that water in, and the roots were rotting, so I had to repot it. I had to trim off some of the old roots, and then I learned this trick somewhere on the Internet, but I dusted the roots that were rotted with cinnamon, and I think cinnamon might be an antimicrobial or something like that, but, brother, my orchid loved me for that. Really? Thank you so much. It started growing almost immediately, even though I just repotted it and cut off a significant number of its roots. Yeah, so it's vital to repot it sometimes, but, yeah, like you said, you don't want to just be like, I think I'll switch it to this pot for this month because I like yellow in the spring. Yeah, exactly. What else you got anything else? No, I think you said that growing it from seed is next to impossible, so just go buy one. Yeah, I'd like to hear from themed. Yeah, I'm sure there are some horticulturists who have done that. I'd like to hear about that experience. Yes, I'd like to hear all the things I got wrong. You're like Chuck doing it with your dog, right? I think we kind of touched on it at the very beginning, but got to give a shout out to the article The Orchid Thief and the movie that was based on it. Adaptation. Yeah, I don't think we can like in our stupid article, it says, orchids and pop culture. The movie Wild Orchid with Mickey Rourke and Carrie Otis. I'm like, Are you kidding me? That was it like, there was an entire movie written about orchid hunting and the super rare ghost orchid that John Larouche hunts in the wild swamps of Florida by the great writer Susan Orlean. And it was not even mentioned. No, I got a story about that. My friend Stacey works as a costumer in the film industry, and she worked on Adaptation. And about a year before she started work, I was just into reading any and all scripts I could read at the time, and she said, I got a new script. It's called The Orchid Thief by some dude named Charlie Kaufman. He's like, all right. And I read it in a night. I couldn't put it down. And I called her up the next day and was like, I've never read anything like this in my life. There hasn't been anything like that. This is unlike any movie I've ever heard of, and I have no idea what I just read. I know. And then they changed the name from Orca Deep to Adaptation, and it's one of my favorites of all. It's great. Yeah. Charlie Kaufman needs to get back to work. Oh, he's working? What's he doing now? Did you see? And I'm Elisa yeah, that was, like, three years ago. That's what I'm saying. Get to work, Kaufman. Make sure he's working on something. I hope so. Yeah. I love that notation. Chris Cooper that performance is one of my favorite acting roles of all time. Yeah, they couldn't have cast it better than that. God, he was great. Yeah, well, that's adaptation, as was Nic Cage. Don't want to short change him. No. And, of course, Meryl Streep. I mean, does it even need to be said? Yeah, but in the cage, he gets a lot of crap. Well, that Jewel Roll was really a terrible role. Oh, sure, yeah. The Wicker Man remake. That was not the least of them. If you go on to Netflix, he's on, like, every third movie on Netflix. Yeah, he's making bank, brother. I don't know if you maybe he's definitely keeping his head above water. Well, he's fendi. Is that what it is? Yeah. Apparently he has quite a reputation for buying ridiculous things that cost a lot of dough. Well, you got anything else? No, I got nothing else. All right, well, welcome, I'm sorry, to all of the new people who've never heard this podcast before but are into orchids and thought they give it a try. And if you want to know more about orchids, you could type that word in the search barhouseforks.com. Since I said that, it's time for listener mail. Speaking of all the things you just said in listener mail, did you see that one from the guy? He said that we were just dilettante and kind of laid into us. Yeah, you got your dilettante, and all you do is just talk to, like, 40 minutes about an overview about things and email them back. You got it, buddy. Yes, that's exactly what we are. His complaint was that each episode is about a different topic. Yeah, and then we just give the broadest of overviews over 45 minutes. I was like, that is our show to a T. Yeah, you should write our bio. Keep looking, buddy. I wish them well. That was nice of you. That's world class, Chuck. All right, I'm going to call this flight attendant response. Surprisingly, that show kind of blew up. We got a lot of responses from airline workers and flight attendants and passengers. Most of them weren't angry either. No, I think we did good on that one. So here we go. Flight attendant here. Thank you for the awesome podcast. It was really on point. I was impressed with the amount of research and how much you got it right. You both asked for someone to weigh on and whether we paid for delays. The cabin door closed. The answer is yes. We can even be paid a percentage for delays with the cabin door open, but it has to be over a certain amount of time with customers on board, and we have to file the request ourselves. Most people don't because it's not much money and not worth it. Secondly, and this is with this person's airline, right? So I don't know if that's true across the board. Is it a major airline? Well, just funny fish. Okay. Secondly, there was some debate over whether we needed to score an 80 or 90 in training actually, you're both right. We have to score at least an 80 on the first take. If we fail, we have to score a 90 on the retake. Thank you for doing an episode on our profession, but things could be better. We love our jobs and have a great time. Hope to see you all on a flight some time soon. And Chuck, the whiskey will be on me. Sorry, Josh, no peanuts. That is from Daniel, flight attendant, major airline. Everything is always coming up Chuck. I bet you kitchen whiskey to my friend. That'd be great. Well, thanks a lot, Daniel. I'll be sure to go check the email out and figure out what email or what airline you work for and then start flying it and hope we cross paths so I can get some free whiskey too. If you want to offer us free whiskey, we are all ears. You can tweet to us. I'm at Josh Clark on Twitter and there's also an official SYSK podcast page. I also have a website, by the way, Russeriusclark.com, you can find Chuck on Facebook at charlesw chuckbryant. And at the official Stuff You Should Know Facebook page, you can send all of us, including Jerry and email, to stuffpodcast@howstoughfworks.com. And as always, join us at our home on the web stuffyshow.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit houseworks.com. Hey everybody. I don't know about you, but I am excited that it's summer school's out, the sun is shining, and best of all, there's downtime four days. That's where true crime podcasts on Amazon music come in. They're the perfect activity for last minute road trips, long walks, or if you're brave enough, late nights. With so many killer shows like Morbid, My Favorite Murder, and Small Town Murder, you'll never be bored to death again. So download the free Amazon Music app to start listening to all your favorite true crime podcasts. Plus, with Amazon Music you can access new episodes early. Download the app today."

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