WEBVTT - Ventriloquism: The Science of Dummies 0:00:03.080 --> 0:00:05.960 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:06.000 --> 0:00:14.239 Works dot Com. Hey, welcome to Stuff with all your Mind. 0:00:14.280 --> 0:00:17.239 My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Julie Douglas. Julie, 0:00:17.239 --> 0:00:20.280 what is your relationship with ventriloquism? How do you how 0:00:20.280 --> 0:00:23.279 think you view ventriloquisms and their dummies, their act the 0:00:23.520 --> 0:00:26.800 the art form of ventriloquism is kind of a subset 0:00:26.880 --> 0:00:30.960 of the puppetry storytelling medium. Well, I love puppetry, as 0:00:31.000 --> 0:00:33.239 you know, so I have a soft spot in my 0:00:33.320 --> 0:00:37.640 heart for ventriloquists and the dummies and the puppets. Um. 0:00:37.680 --> 0:00:41.239 I think it is a wonderful art form. However, I 0:00:41.280 --> 0:00:44.040 do recognize that a lot of people think it's creepy, 0:00:44.840 --> 0:00:47.720 uh for good reason, because you have this inanimate object 0:00:47.840 --> 0:00:51.200 that you're bringing to life. Yeah, but then, of course 0:00:51.280 --> 0:00:53.199 that's that's kind of all of puppetry. And granted you 0:00:53.240 --> 0:00:55.960 have individuals who claim to be creeped out by all puppets, 0:00:55.960 --> 0:00:58.400 which I find tends to be more of a like 0:00:58.440 --> 0:01:01.440 a frailty of the imagination because you're you're cutting out 0:01:01.440 --> 0:01:04.520 an entire storytelling medium that is that is, you know, 0:01:04.720 --> 0:01:07.679 almost as old as humanity. I've we've been telling stories, 0:01:08.240 --> 0:01:10.440 uh for so long, and a lot of the time 0:01:10.440 --> 0:01:14.480 we've been using inanimate objects to tell them it's true. Um. 0:01:14.520 --> 0:01:18.200 And actually this is really interesting. In ancient times, ventriloquists 0:01:18.200 --> 0:01:20.120 were actually thought to be able to speak to the 0:01:20.160 --> 0:01:24.319 dead and predict the future, and then the voices seemed 0:01:24.360 --> 0:01:26.959 to come from their stomachs, and that was the thought 0:01:27.000 --> 0:01:29.920 to be the voice of the dead. And this continues 0:01:30.000 --> 0:01:33.920 today with the work of Jeff Dunham. That's right, that's right. 0:01:34.120 --> 0:01:37.920 By the nineteenth century, ventriloquism became a form of entertainment 0:01:37.959 --> 0:01:40.120 and then people started to use dummies, but before that 0:01:40.160 --> 0:01:43.920 they were just throwing their voices. And in fact, in 0:01:44.040 --> 0:01:47.680 some parts of the world, such among the tribes of 0:01:47.720 --> 0:01:51.440 the Zulu, Inuit and Maori, ventriloquism is still used for 0:01:51.520 --> 0:01:55.800 religious in ritual purposes. So there you go, just in 0:01:55.840 --> 0:01:59.240 case you thought that ventriloquism was just a throwback to 0:01:59.720 --> 0:02:03.280 you know, of this early twentieth century art form, the 0:02:03.320 --> 0:02:05.280 creepy wooden doll head. No, it's been around for a 0:02:05.280 --> 0:02:07.280 long time now, that the creepy wooden doll head, and 0:02:07.280 --> 0:02:11.240 then the vaudevillian act of ventrol equism is probably what 0:02:11.360 --> 0:02:14.079 still resonates with most people, and probably not so much 0:02:14.120 --> 0:02:16.799 the actual acts. I think most people when you when 0:02:16.800 --> 0:02:21.680 people think of ventriloquism, they're not even necessarily remembering any 0:02:21.880 --> 0:02:24.639 kind of actual ventriloquistack that they've seen. And I've seen 0:02:24.680 --> 0:02:27.160 some some good ones here and there. I don't actually 0:02:27.200 --> 0:02:31.359 actively seek it out, but occasionally, yeah, and but occasionally, 0:02:31.360 --> 0:02:33.919 in the course of of just going about your day life, 0:02:33.960 --> 0:02:36.600 you're going to run into a ventriloqual stack. And and 0:02:37.000 --> 0:02:39.600 some artists make go at being lively with it and 0:02:39.840 --> 0:02:43.320 creative and doing something interesting. But over the years, of 0:02:43.360 --> 0:02:46.160 course they they've also factored into a number of horror 0:02:46.200 --> 0:02:50.120 films and uh and and creepy interpretations. A few that 0:02:50.160 --> 0:02:52.360 come to mind. There was a nineteen sixty four film 0:02:52.400 --> 0:02:56.040 called Devil Doll, which is probably most known today as 0:02:56.120 --> 0:02:58.720 as having been used in an episode of Mystery Science 0:02:58.760 --> 0:03:02.040 Theater three thousand. But it is even even with the 0:03:02.080 --> 0:03:05.839 silhouetted figures at the bottom, with the with the mike 0:03:05.880 --> 0:03:08.360 and the bots riffing on it and making fun of it, 0:03:08.360 --> 0:03:11.079 it's like a legitimately creepy film. It's one of these 0:03:11.080 --> 0:03:13.480 where it's where there's magic and there's a there's this 0:03:13.760 --> 0:03:17.399 tug of war between ventrilo was Dummy and uh and 0:03:17.400 --> 0:03:20.360 and puppet Master about who's in charge of who. And 0:03:20.360 --> 0:03:22.960 it's one of those films where the film quality is 0:03:23.000 --> 0:03:27.079 so poor, the acting is so weird that it almost 0:03:27.120 --> 0:03:29.240 feels like some sort of a documentary. You almost get 0:03:29.280 --> 0:03:31.840 this this feel feeling like you're peeking through a keyhole 0:03:31.919 --> 0:03:34.640 and at something that's actually happened. And I find it 0:03:34.680 --> 0:03:37.480 to be a really unsettling film, despite it being kind 0:03:37.480 --> 0:03:40.600 of boring and and and despite always having seen it 0:03:40.920 --> 0:03:43.200 with people making fun of it. You know why I 0:03:43.240 --> 0:03:47.400 think that is because I think that even though there's 0:03:47.480 --> 0:03:52.480 all sorts of misdirection and illusion used in ventriloquism, there 0:03:52.560 --> 0:03:55.360 is a truth to it, meaning that there's a relationship 0:03:55.720 --> 0:04:00.360 between this puppet and the master, which means to say 0:04:00.400 --> 0:04:05.160 that that is a splintering of the ventriloquists personality. Yes, 0:04:05.280 --> 0:04:08.560 it's just another version of them. Yeah. So a lot 0:04:08.560 --> 0:04:11.000 of these these horror tales basically come down to this 0:04:11.040 --> 0:04:14.960 idea that there is some deeper connection between between puppet 0:04:15.040 --> 0:04:18.359 and puppet Master. You see that in the Dummy episode 0:04:18.400 --> 0:04:20.880 from UM the Twilight Zone. You see it in Magic, 0:04:21.839 --> 0:04:24.880 which started Anthony Hopkins to the Ventriloquist. Uh, you see 0:04:24.880 --> 0:04:27.320 it in the Batman Villain the Ventriloquist, where it's the 0:04:27.680 --> 0:04:31.279 ventriloquist dummy that's like a little mobster kind of character. Um. 0:04:31.400 --> 0:04:33.279 Then there was an episode of Tales from the Crypt 0:04:33.279 --> 0:04:36.839 that I strongly remember as well, called The Ventriloquists Dummy, 0:04:36.880 --> 0:04:40.719 in which this character is played by Bobcat Goldway, who 0:04:40.800 --> 0:04:42.720 is this up and coming ventrol aquist who wants to 0:04:42.760 --> 0:04:46.239 get some tips from this older master played by Don Rickles. 0:04:46.760 --> 0:04:50.440 And the big reveal here is that Don Rickles character 0:04:50.520 --> 0:04:54.600 it's not really a ventriloquist dummy. It's like a parasitic 0:04:54.640 --> 0:04:58.960 twin that's monsters little creature on the end of his 0:04:58.960 --> 0:05:01.159 his hand. What which that just wears a mask? What 0:05:01.240 --> 0:05:04.000 is the name of this film? This is the Ventriloquist Dummy. 0:05:04.040 --> 0:05:05.680 And it was an episode of Tales from the Crypt 0:05:05.920 --> 0:05:07.800 that has everything I love in it. And I think 0:05:07.839 --> 0:05:11.800 I have mentioned before shamefully that I really really do 0:05:12.000 --> 0:05:15.640 like Don Rickles. His his humor. Oh well, he's an 0:05:15.640 --> 0:05:18.200 insult comic really yeah, yeah, And he's acting in this 0:05:18.240 --> 0:05:20.520 he's he's actually really good in this, and Bobcat's fun 0:05:20.560 --> 0:05:23.039 as well. It's it's one of those, uh, those episodes 0:05:23.080 --> 0:05:24.920 of Tales from the Crypt that is at once like 0:05:25.000 --> 0:05:27.320 Tales from the Crypt at its best and worst, depending 0:05:27.320 --> 0:05:31.440 on exactly what you're expecting from that show. So anyway, 0:05:31.640 --> 0:05:33.320 and then of course today we have Jeff done him, 0:05:33.320 --> 0:05:35.960 which which I find kind of frightening and horrifying as well. 0:05:36.600 --> 0:05:39.240 Um yeah, I mean he's incredibly popular, and the thing 0:05:39.360 --> 0:05:42.600 is is that he's not incredibly popular because ventriloquism is 0:05:42.720 --> 0:05:46.080 incredibly popular. He just uses it as a medium and 0:05:46.320 --> 0:05:48.800 has been successful at it. But I really wanted to 0:05:48.839 --> 0:05:53.080 bring up Nina Conti. She is a ventriloquist. She has 0:05:53.120 --> 0:05:57.240 a documentary called Her Master's Voice. It is wonderful. We'll 0:05:57.279 --> 0:05:59.400 talk a little bit more about that as we sort 0:05:59.440 --> 0:06:03.040 of unrolled this podcast and the science behind ventriloquism. But 0:06:03.720 --> 0:06:07.000 what I like about her act is that she she 0:06:07.040 --> 0:06:10.279 can do the sort of straight up um insult comic 0:06:10.400 --> 0:06:14.440 jokes visa be her her puppet Monk the Monkey. Yeah, 0:06:14.480 --> 0:06:17.800 because that's the that's like low level ventriloquism humor, the idea, 0:06:17.839 --> 0:06:20.200 it's not me. That's awful. It's this little guy. I 0:06:20.279 --> 0:06:23.360 can't well what he just said. And that's the other thing. 0:06:23.400 --> 0:06:24.839 They can really get away with saying a lot of 0:06:24.839 --> 0:06:26.920 things that they normally wouldn't be able to and there's 0:06:26.920 --> 0:06:29.120 a sort of power in that, right um. But she 0:06:29.240 --> 0:06:33.400 also has a very serebral part of her act in 0:06:33.400 --> 0:06:35.800 which she's sort of making a comment on the human condition, 0:06:36.320 --> 0:06:40.120 and in one of her bits, she pretends as though 0:06:40.200 --> 0:06:43.400 Monk has taken over her body and has possessed her, 0:06:43.640 --> 0:06:46.320 and Monk is very cute just to see just we're 0:06:46.320 --> 0:06:48.400 just just looking at a still image of in but 0:06:48.560 --> 0:06:51.480 menacing and see that's the interesting thing is she really 0:06:51.560 --> 0:06:55.480 does struggle with her relationship with this puppet and whether 0:06:55.560 --> 0:06:58.240 or not she should continue with it. So it's it's interesting. 0:06:58.320 --> 0:07:00.560 It's like something that she had gets a lot of 0:07:00.560 --> 0:07:03.400 pleasure out of, but also at the same time doesn't 0:07:03.640 --> 0:07:07.719 She feels completely nnacled to this as a profession. So 0:07:08.080 --> 0:07:10.720 in that context you see her being possessed by Monk, 0:07:10.880 --> 0:07:14.040 and there's some very dark undertones there that are expressed 0:07:14.120 --> 0:07:16.280 and that we all sort of feel, you know, we're 0:07:16.280 --> 0:07:18.760 tethered to something in our lives that we feel like, oh, 0:07:19.200 --> 0:07:21.440 I can't escape it, well, you know, and it also 0:07:21.520 --> 0:07:23.559 brings to mind some of the issues we talked about 0:07:23.560 --> 0:07:26.080 in the episode we did about the Shadows self and 0:07:26.120 --> 0:07:28.760 about uh and well we did the episode of two 0:07:28.760 --> 0:07:31.480 about pro wrestling where we talked talking both of them 0:07:31.480 --> 0:07:35.560 about what happens when we take on other personas in 0:07:35.560 --> 0:07:38.000 one way or another, be it as part of an act, 0:07:38.680 --> 0:07:41.680 if you're an actor, you know, a wrestling persona, or 0:07:41.840 --> 0:07:45.920 you're going undercover as a as a as a vice agent, um, 0:07:46.360 --> 0:07:48.600 all these these different roles we take on. What does 0:07:48.640 --> 0:07:50.520 that do to us? What does what does what happens 0:07:50.560 --> 0:07:53.600 to us when we sort of pour a portion of 0:07:53.600 --> 0:07:58.240 our soul or our mind into this artificial creation and 0:07:58.440 --> 0:08:00.640 and it sounds like this, uh, this, this uh, this 0:08:00.680 --> 0:08:02.880 film explores some of that territory as well. Yeah, it 0:08:02.920 --> 0:08:05.200 absolutely does. And it's funny that you brought that up 0:08:05.200 --> 0:08:06.600 because I thought the same thing when I was watching 0:08:06.680 --> 0:08:09.000 enough that this is a lot about um, you know, 0:08:09.080 --> 0:08:11.680 what sort of personality you put out there. And then 0:08:11.920 --> 0:08:15.720 this Monk character is really fulfilling aspect of her personality 0:08:15.760 --> 0:08:18.120 because she says in the film, I feel kind of 0:08:18.200 --> 0:08:21.800 bland as a person, but Monk feels makes me feel 0:08:21.800 --> 0:08:24.360 as though I can express things that are hidden within me. 0:08:24.760 --> 0:08:28.360 It falls in nicely with the because on one hand, 0:08:28.400 --> 0:08:31.040 we have the more or less perceived reality of ventriloquism, 0:08:31.080 --> 0:08:32.800 where it's that's somebody in a puppet saying a bunch 0:08:32.800 --> 0:08:34.800 of awful stuff through it, and then we have this 0:08:34.880 --> 0:08:37.640 fictional interpretation of it where it's like, oh, what if 0:08:37.640 --> 0:08:41.199 there's something more significant it's taking place between puppet and 0:08:41.240 --> 0:08:44.640 puppet master, And then the closer you look, you realize that, yes, 0:08:44.640 --> 0:08:48.839 there is something more significant taking place In many cases. Yeah. 0:08:48.880 --> 0:08:52.360 Another aspect of this film that gives it another level 0:08:52.480 --> 0:08:55.719 of oddness is that um and I won't give it 0:08:55.760 --> 0:08:59.679 all away, but basically she has been bequeathed six puppets 0:09:00.240 --> 0:09:04.440 her ex lover, and these are bereaved puppets and she 0:09:04.480 --> 0:09:07.360 has to do something with them, and uh, one of 0:09:07.400 --> 0:09:10.400 them is based on her ex lover. It's it's the 0:09:10.559 --> 0:09:14.160 face and um and she can't quite make his voice work, 0:09:14.240 --> 0:09:17.000 and so it's weird because she's trying to sort of 0:09:17.040 --> 0:09:20.600 like resurrecting him and her relationship with him through this puppet, 0:09:20.640 --> 0:09:23.079 because in a way, these puppets were him. They were 0:09:23.120 --> 0:09:26.880 all pieces of him that that he brought to life 0:09:26.880 --> 0:09:29.920 with his own energy, and now he's gone, but these 0:09:29.920 --> 0:09:34.480 puppets remain, and with certain extent she can reanimate them 0:09:34.559 --> 0:09:37.800 and make them live again. But she also sort of 0:09:37.960 --> 0:09:39.959 is burdened by these puppets, and one of them is 0:09:39.960 --> 0:09:42.280 a grandmother puppet. And I won't go into it, but 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:46.280 there's a very creepy pool scene she takes the grandmother swimming. 0:09:46.360 --> 0:09:49.319 It's very nice, right you think, Um, so yeah, it 0:09:49.320 --> 0:09:52.240 does sort of uncover these these weird feelings that she 0:09:52.320 --> 0:09:56.800 has about maybe that she's been burdened with this. Um. 0:09:56.880 --> 0:10:00.559 But anyway, very interesting film. Let's get into the technical 0:10:00.640 --> 0:10:06.240 aspects here of how ventriloquists fool our brains. Okay, well 0:10:07.000 --> 0:10:09.160 this this is really interesting because it really comes into 0:10:09.160 --> 0:10:12.440 the way that we interpret what we're seeing, the way 0:10:12.520 --> 0:10:15.080 the way we the sense data enters our brain and 0:10:15.120 --> 0:10:18.839 it's turned into conscious thought. Um. And this applies when 0:10:18.920 --> 0:10:20.160 when you're when you're thinking of this, think of the 0:10:20.200 --> 0:10:22.560 ventriloquist and the dummy, but also think of your television 0:10:22.600 --> 0:10:25.160 set and it's speaker system, think of any kind of 0:10:25.200 --> 0:10:28.679 puppetry or just the ability like I have a dinosaur 0:10:28.800 --> 0:10:30.400 the stuff dinosaur on my desk. I can pick it 0:10:30.480 --> 0:10:31.840 up and I can kind of talk and go, like, 0:10:32.760 --> 0:10:34.760 got on with this podcast. It's going kind of along, 0:10:34.960 --> 0:10:36.800 and you kind of buy into I buy into the 0:10:36.800 --> 0:10:39.000 fact that he's talking even though I'm the one talking. 0:10:39.160 --> 0:10:42.040 You know, just stop real quick. You just said something 0:10:42.120 --> 0:10:44.719 that maybe you wouldn't normally say. Right, this is going 0:10:44.720 --> 0:10:47.400 a little we're kind of going off the tracks here 0:10:48.280 --> 0:10:50.679 again the power of the puppet. Maybe that's why he's here. 0:10:50.720 --> 0:10:54.840 He's here to keep me on track. So he's looking 0:10:54.880 --> 0:10:57.840 at you meaningfully. But the older idea was that we 0:10:57.920 --> 0:11:01.080 have the five senses and is an actuality. There more 0:11:01.120 --> 0:11:04.240 than five senses, but but the five primary senses are 0:11:04.640 --> 0:11:06.600 entering our brain in a separate part of the brain 0:11:06.679 --> 0:11:10.360 is dealing with each so side hearing, smell, touch, taste, uh, 0:11:10.480 --> 0:11:12.439 the ideas. The old idea is that each part is 0:11:12.480 --> 0:11:15.640 governed by its own corresponding region of the brain, but 0:11:16.440 --> 0:11:19.040 not so. According to a two thousand seven Duke University 0:11:19.080 --> 0:11:22.440 Medical Center study. So they were studying monkeys and they 0:11:22.520 --> 0:11:27.840 found that auditory and visual information is processed together before 0:11:27.880 --> 0:11:31.240 the combined signals make it into the brain's cortex, where 0:11:31.280 --> 0:11:34.080 all the analytical stuff is going on. So, in other words, 0:11:34.280 --> 0:11:39.319 the sound the ventriloquist voice, and the image the ventriloquist 0:11:39.400 --> 0:11:43.160 with the moving mouth, and the and the mum mouthed puppeteer, 0:11:44.000 --> 0:11:47.880 the audio and the visual combine before it reaches the 0:11:47.880 --> 0:11:50.560 part of the mental factory where we have to make 0:11:50.720 --> 0:11:54.720 conscious reason, reason thought out of it. Yeah, certainly in 0:11:54.720 --> 0:11:58.319 instances where your brain sort of makes an assumption, right, 0:11:58.320 --> 0:12:02.120 because you have the um, the inferior colliquelus, the tiny 0:12:02.160 --> 0:12:04.880 round structure in their brain which is carrying visual and 0:12:05.000 --> 0:12:08.960 auditory signals, bungling them all together. So if you're watching TV, 0:12:09.000 --> 0:12:11.200 as you say, you're you're looking at the mouth and 0:12:11.240 --> 0:12:14.480 thinking that the voice is emanating from the mouth speakers. Yeah, 0:12:14.520 --> 0:12:17.000 and it's it's kind of it's handled in another department 0:12:17.000 --> 0:12:20.760 before it reaches the uh, the really analytical portion. In fact, 0:12:20.880 --> 0:12:23.760 according to the study they found it about six of 0:12:23.800 --> 0:12:27.720 the neurons in the inferior colliculus can carry visual as 0:12:27.760 --> 0:12:30.960 well as auditory signals. So again, visual and auditory information 0:12:30.960 --> 0:12:33.600 gets combined early before the brain can process it in 0:12:33.720 --> 0:12:37.199 the thought. Um, you know, it's like the brain is 0:12:37.200 --> 0:12:39.080 where the smart guys hanging out but he has all 0:12:39.080 --> 0:12:41.960 these underlings that are dealing with the actual sense data, 0:12:42.200 --> 0:12:44.360 and so the sense data guys out there and he's like, yeah, 0:12:44.440 --> 0:12:46.600 that's all this, uh, this little dummy made out of wood, 0:12:46.600 --> 0:12:48.240 and he was totally talking what do you make of that? 0:12:48.400 --> 0:12:50.240 And You're like, oh, okay, well what was he saying? 0:12:50.800 --> 0:12:53.040 That's what I'm going to focus on, because I trust 0:12:53.080 --> 0:12:55.760 you to tell me when there's a piece of wood 0:12:55.760 --> 0:12:58.439 talking to me. You know, I was thinking about how 0:12:58.480 --> 0:13:02.840 ventriloquous and UM magicians are so similar because they're both 0:13:02.880 --> 0:13:06.520 relying on these little quick tricks to try to trick 0:13:06.600 --> 0:13:08.960 your brain right, And I was thinking about the vanishing 0:13:09.000 --> 0:13:11.840 coin trick, where you know, you see the coin in 0:13:11.880 --> 0:13:15.400 one hand, you see it disappear, But really what's happening 0:13:15.600 --> 0:13:18.920 is is this thing called persistence of vision. The audience 0:13:18.960 --> 0:13:20.800 well actually see the coin in the left palm for 0:13:20.920 --> 0:13:24.400 split second after the hands separate, for instance, And visual 0:13:24.440 --> 0:13:28.080 neurons don't stop firing once you have a stimuli like 0:13:28.160 --> 0:13:32.000 that UM, and it's no longer present. So our perception 0:13:32.000 --> 0:13:37.160 of reality lags behind reality about one one of a second, 0:13:37.559 --> 0:13:42.720 which is just enough for a magician to exploit. So again, 0:13:42.840 --> 0:13:46.120 this same idea that the way that you're processing you know, 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:49.080 auditory and visual signals could be bungled up, and and 0:13:49.320 --> 0:13:52.400 you know, puppeteer could take advantage of that same idea 0:13:52.520 --> 0:13:55.000 magician and a coin trick. Yeah, I mean, I hate 0:13:55.040 --> 0:13:59.120 to to in any way support the the idea that 0:13:59.280 --> 0:14:02.160 the mind body can action. Idea of the of of 0:14:02.200 --> 0:14:04.400 our brain is the is the rider on a horse. 0:14:04.920 --> 0:14:07.120 But it's kind of like the brain is in this 0:14:07.200 --> 0:14:10.719 dark box and uh, and then there's reality on the outside, 0:14:11.120 --> 0:14:13.920 and we are given, as you say, a perception of 0:14:13.960 --> 0:14:16.600 the reality. And and it is the fact that we're 0:14:16.640 --> 0:14:18.400 dealing with the perception of the reality rather than the 0:14:18.440 --> 0:14:20.200 reality that allows for a lot of these tricks to 0:14:20.240 --> 0:14:22.440 take place. I don't even get me started about how 0:14:22.480 --> 0:14:25.840 reality is just a three D computational model that we've 0:14:25.880 --> 0:14:28.240 constructed these blueprints in our brain. We're not even really 0:14:28.240 --> 0:14:31.160 paying attention. So much of what we're perceiving is an 0:14:31.160 --> 0:14:35.080 illusion anyway. Um, but in our ability to to look 0:14:35.080 --> 0:14:36.880 at a puppet and listen to a puppet and then 0:14:37.360 --> 0:14:40.440 really feel like that that creature is alive, like in 0:14:40.480 --> 0:14:42.200 a way, that's kind of a glitch in the system 0:14:42.280 --> 0:14:44.720 that could not have possibly. I mean, it's just it 0:14:44.840 --> 0:14:48.040 ends up becoming an artifact of our development. Well. And 0:14:48.080 --> 0:14:51.840 then of course, uh, the ventriloquists also directs your attention 0:14:51.880 --> 0:14:54.160 to the dummy, so that takes the attention away from 0:14:54.200 --> 0:14:57.640 their mouth or from seeing their vocal courts moving right. Um, 0:14:57.960 --> 0:15:00.400 And they are not, as we have learned, ruaring their 0:15:00.480 --> 0:15:05.200 voice at all. They're adjusting the volume. Uh, but they are. 0:15:05.240 --> 0:15:07.600 They are again just sort of adding to this idea 0:15:07.720 --> 0:15:10.400 that that's actually the puppet talking. Your brain knows puppets 0:15:10.440 --> 0:15:13.160 not talking, and yet it sort of accepts that. And 0:15:13.200 --> 0:15:15.600 plus we're going to buy into it because we want to. 0:15:15.800 --> 0:15:17.680 I mean, if you're going to a ventriloquist or a 0:15:17.680 --> 0:15:20.720 puppet show because you don't want to believe, then you're 0:15:20.760 --> 0:15:24.000 in the wrong. Uh, You're you're in the wrong place 0:15:24.040 --> 0:15:27.160 for your entertainment. It's true. And but even if you 0:15:27.200 --> 0:15:30.600 don't want to believe it, you end up to at 0:15:30.680 --> 0:15:34.520 least the subject matter. Right. Another thing that ventriloquists do 0:15:35.040 --> 0:15:37.760 to sort of perfect the art form is to make 0:15:37.840 --> 0:15:44.040 substitutions with certain letters. Because certain letters like B, F, M, P, 0:15:44.840 --> 0:15:48.600 the plosive P, V and W all rely on moving 0:15:48.600 --> 0:15:51.920 your lips. They're called labial sounds. So what you have 0:15:52.040 --> 0:15:56.280 to do, is a ventriloquist, is to then substitute other 0:15:56.400 --> 0:16:00.400 letters or sounds that don't rely on you moving your 0:16:00.440 --> 0:16:04.200 lips around. So something like an M you can substitute 0:16:04.200 --> 0:16:06.880 with the end, which is more like an. It makes 0:16:06.920 --> 0:16:09.600 more sense when you're the ventriloquist doing it. Um. So 0:16:09.720 --> 0:16:14.160 if I say, hikin, guy, guy, I'm really using an 0:16:14.240 --> 0:16:16.480 N in there, right Yeah. If I really listened closely 0:16:16.480 --> 0:16:23.880 to it, you're saying Donny okay, joy Johnny right um, 0:16:23.920 --> 0:16:27.680 so much creepier in person. By the way, well look 0:16:27.720 --> 0:16:30.800 for the video because you do. We have a video 0:16:30.800 --> 0:16:32.920 on the web Science on the Web episode coming up 0:16:33.000 --> 0:16:35.560 that explores some of this ventral equism stuff. Then you'll 0:16:35.560 --> 0:16:37.840 get to actually see clips of examples of it, and 0:16:37.920 --> 0:16:41.640 you'll get to see Julie's fabulous parlor trick that she does. 0:16:41.680 --> 0:16:43.600 Oh you've got a nice one to them, I do. 0:16:43.720 --> 0:16:45.800 Oh yeah, well that one involved a little bit of 0:16:46.040 --> 0:16:50.720 an additional cinematic magic, but still it's a wonderful ventriloquist voice. 0:16:50.800 --> 0:16:53.080 Kids love it, though, like they're at a certain age. 0:16:53.120 --> 0:16:55.800 I enjoy um pleating the two dots on my my 0:16:55.880 --> 0:16:58.000 hand and doing the hand puppet. The senior wins. This 0:16:58.040 --> 0:17:00.320 type guy. I tend to not have him talk though. 0:17:00.320 --> 0:17:02.920 I just have him chew and kind of like look 0:17:03.200 --> 0:17:05.800 at the kid and then eat things like, you know, 0:17:06.440 --> 0:17:10.400 whatever is around, actual food if possible. And then also 0:17:10.440 --> 0:17:12.720 I have him turned into a crab and crawl around 0:17:13.160 --> 0:17:16.919 on the table. That's always fun. Do you ever have 0:17:17.000 --> 0:17:20.439 him dipping tobacco? No, we can't really dip tobacco. He's 0:17:20.520 --> 0:17:22.440 kind of just all he can do is crawl around 0:17:22.480 --> 0:17:24.400 on the table like a crab and then ball back 0:17:24.480 --> 0:17:27.480 up into a talking fist. But kids at a certain 0:17:27.520 --> 0:17:30.080 age love it. So all right, well, let's take a 0:17:30.160 --> 0:17:32.880 quick break, and we are going to talk about an 0:17:32.880 --> 0:17:38.360 extreme example of this technique of letter substitution and muscle 0:17:38.720 --> 0:17:43.199 control of a mismatch between your face and your lips. 0:17:43.240 --> 0:17:46.119 Really amazing stuff. But let's take a quick break and 0:17:46.119 --> 0:17:55.720 we'll be right back. All right, we're back. We're talking 0:17:55.720 --> 0:18:00.200 about Vince Trilloquism. We've spoken about the creepies side of 0:18:00.240 --> 0:18:03.439 ventriloquis stomach the will, the fictional creepy side, and then 0:18:03.480 --> 0:18:07.440 the arguably creepy real life complications that occur when we 0:18:07.560 --> 0:18:13.160 breathe life into an unmoving object. It's true. And um, 0:18:13.200 --> 0:18:15.399 you know, we didn't really mention the etymology of the 0:18:15.440 --> 0:18:18.360 word ventriloquist, but it comes from the Latin words ventire 0:18:19.040 --> 0:18:22.000 stomach belliar womb. That's what that means, and low key 0:18:22.040 --> 0:18:24.400 to speak, so it means to speak from the stomach. 0:18:25.000 --> 0:18:28.080 But it's not necessarily the stomach here that that is 0:18:28.160 --> 0:18:32.959 the key. It is really the ventriloquist brain and specifically 0:18:33.359 --> 0:18:38.320 this act of bifurcation, of course, bifurcation meaning to split. 0:18:39.000 --> 0:18:43.720 In the documentary Kevin Johnson A Wonderful, Wonderful Ventriloquist explains 0:18:43.800 --> 0:18:48.120 how uh you have to take command of your facial muscles, 0:18:48.160 --> 0:18:50.399 and he says that the ability to form words with 0:18:50.480 --> 0:18:54.399 your tongue and then restrain the muscles that correspond with 0:18:54.480 --> 0:18:58.919 the sound necessitates that the performer bifurcate their attention. So, 0:18:58.960 --> 0:19:01.959 in other words, the thinking really really hard about what 0:19:02.000 --> 0:19:03.879 they're saying. But at the same time they're trying to 0:19:04.000 --> 0:19:08.520 rain in the muscles around their their mouth that naturally 0:19:08.560 --> 0:19:10.720 want to move to the rhythm of speech. Of course, 0:19:11.280 --> 0:19:14.280 and then sometimes they have to do something completely contrary 0:19:14.359 --> 0:19:17.119 to what they're saying, right, they have to plaster this 0:19:17.240 --> 0:19:19.960 expression on their face. That's the opposite of the emotions 0:19:20.000 --> 0:19:22.720 that are being performed, because it really is like performing 0:19:22.880 --> 0:19:26.919 yourself yourself and then a version of yourself at the 0:19:26.920 --> 0:19:29.440 same time. And you might even be drinking water. That's 0:19:29.480 --> 0:19:32.000 a favorite trick of course, Yeah, drinking water. Um. He 0:19:32.040 --> 0:19:36.160 also has a beautiful opera voice is pretty amazing. Um. 0:19:36.200 --> 0:19:39.119 He gives an extreme example of this by talking to 0:19:39.160 --> 0:19:44.000 the camera and miss Matt purposely mismatching his mouth's movements 0:19:44.040 --> 0:19:47.320 to the words that are coming out. So it's probably 0:19:47.359 --> 0:19:50.760 one of the weird It looks like like the video 0:19:50.760 --> 0:19:52.320 and the audio have become out of sync, but he's 0:19:52.400 --> 0:19:57.600 creating the effect just completely organically by moving moving his 0:19:57.680 --> 0:20:01.600 lips at one speech and then speaking at another. It's 0:20:01.640 --> 0:20:03.879 it's amazing. Yeah, it's like there's a five second delay 0:20:03.920 --> 0:20:06.720 on it. And he did say to Nina Conti like, 0:20:06.800 --> 0:20:08.960 I can't look at you while I'm doing this because 0:20:08.960 --> 0:20:12.320 it takes so much concentration to try to pull this 0:20:12.560 --> 0:20:17.800 trick off on myself essentially. Um. But another expert that 0:20:17.840 --> 0:20:21.399 she interviewed that I thought gave a great example of 0:20:21.440 --> 0:20:26.880 how puppeteers are creating a solution. Is Nacho Estrata best 0:20:26.960 --> 0:20:30.680 name ever by the way, Um he's a distant voice expert, 0:20:31.720 --> 0:20:34.240 and he was showing Nina Conto how throwing your voice 0:20:34.320 --> 0:20:36.600 is really just a matter again of misdirection and then 0:20:36.600 --> 0:20:40.160 controlling that volume of the voice as well as the direction, 0:20:40.200 --> 0:20:42.840 so you can sort of speak in a direction to do, 0:20:42.880 --> 0:20:45.240 you know, trick the ear. Um. But I wanted to 0:20:45.280 --> 0:20:48.520 play this clip for for you guys out there because 0:20:48.800 --> 0:20:51.399 although you can't see it, you can hear the differences 0:20:51.520 --> 0:20:55.160 of when he's quote unquote throwing his voice. So let's 0:20:55.240 --> 0:20:59.320 check it out. As he uh describes someone being I 0:20:59.359 --> 0:21:02.400 believe they are stuck in a cup a teacup, they 0:21:02.400 --> 0:21:05.320 say through your voice. But I'm fooling your hearing. So 0:21:05.400 --> 0:21:08.680 I can do something like I throw my voice in here, 0:21:09.760 --> 0:21:13.600 but I'm not really throwing. It's a misdirection. So I said, hello, 0:21:13.840 --> 0:21:21.000 say so it things like it's nothing in there. But 0:21:21.119 --> 0:21:23.800 I'm just fully I'm using this to show you different 0:21:24.480 --> 0:21:27.520 you're directing your attention here. Yeah, I love that dead 0:21:27.600 --> 0:21:29.400 It's just you kind of have to see the video 0:21:29.440 --> 0:21:30.920 to get the full effect because he's doing the whole 0:21:30.920 --> 0:21:32.479 thing where he's putting it into the cup, and then 0:21:32.480 --> 0:21:34.399 he's covering the cup up and it's just kind of 0:21:34.440 --> 0:21:36.879 this kind of juggling of this sound and the and 0:21:37.160 --> 0:21:39.359