WEBVTT - From the Vault: Strange Ice, Part 1 0:00:06.400 --> 0:00:09.360 Hello, and welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My 0:00:09.480 --> 0:00:12.239 name is Joe McCormick. Today is Saturday, so we are 0:00:12.240 --> 0:00:15.600 heading into the vault for an older episode of the podcast. 0:00:16.160 --> 0:00:18.279 This is part one of a two part series that 0:00:18.400 --> 0:00:23.640 we did called Strange Ice, originally published January thirtieth, twenty 0:00:23.680 --> 0:00:25.280 twenty four. Let's get right in. 0:00:28.840 --> 0:00:32.680 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:38.440 --> 0:00:40.520 Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My name 0:00:40.560 --> 0:00:41.600 is Robert Lamb. 0:00:41.560 --> 0:00:44.839 And I am Joe McCormick. And today on Stuff to 0:00:44.840 --> 0:00:48.680 Blow your Mind, we are going to be talking about ice. Now. 0:00:48.760 --> 0:00:51.640 This is relevant to us personally because down here in 0:00:51.680 --> 0:00:55.040 Atlanta we have just come out of a long stretch 0:00:55.080 --> 0:00:56.880 of very very cold weather. 0:00:57.800 --> 0:01:00.600 That's right. Yeah, we had quite a cold snow lingered 0:01:00.600 --> 0:01:04.679 around for many days there. We didn't get any of 0:01:04.720 --> 0:01:07.600 the snow. They got a lot of snow north of US, 0:01:07.640 --> 0:01:09.920 and you know, certainly in like Tennessee for example, and 0:01:09.959 --> 0:01:13.120 I think parts of northern Georgia, but down here we 0:01:13.160 --> 0:01:16.440 didn't see that. Instead, we just got cold temperatures and 0:01:16.520 --> 0:01:17.240 we got ice. 0:01:17.520 --> 0:01:20.399 I should's bestfy it was cold weather for Atlanta, because 0:01:20.640 --> 0:01:23.280 obviously we get sneered at by you know, people who 0:01:23.319 --> 0:01:27.080 live in they're really they're really freezing climbs, that's right. 0:01:27.200 --> 0:01:31.200 Yeah, so you know, like a lot of people, it was, 0:01:31.480 --> 0:01:33.880 you know, it was unseasonably cold. So I was noticing 0:01:33.959 --> 0:01:39.000 things that I hadn't noticed before in my immediate environment. 0:01:40.080 --> 0:01:43.880 And one of these things right outside of the window 0:01:44.720 --> 0:01:48.040 where we eat our breakfast, we have a bird bath, 0:01:48.520 --> 0:01:50.920 and the bird bath was full of water. I probably 0:01:50.920 --> 0:01:54.120 should have emptied it because anytime the water freezes in 0:01:54.160 --> 0:01:56.600 the bird bath, it like cracks the plastic at the bottom, 0:01:56.600 --> 0:02:00.240 and then once everything melts and dries out, I have 0:02:00.280 --> 0:02:02.880 to like superglue it again so that it will hold water. 0:02:04.480 --> 0:02:06.520 But you know, it's still it's amusing, especially for my 0:02:06.560 --> 0:02:10.280 son when all that freezes up. Except this time, there 0:02:10.360 --> 0:02:13.520 was a little something extra going on. And it's something 0:02:13.520 --> 0:02:15.240 that I know a number of you out there have 0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:18.119 experienced as well. And if you haven't experienced it, maybe 0:02:18.120 --> 0:02:21.040 you've seen pictures or footage of it from other people 0:02:21.600 --> 0:02:24.400 having this experience. But you go out to the bird bath, 0:02:24.639 --> 0:02:27.880 it is of course frozen solid, except there's this little 0:02:27.880 --> 0:02:32.280 extra bit. There's a spike emerging. And generally it's like 0:02:32.360 --> 0:02:36.200 diagonally from the bird bath, as if there's like some 0:02:36.240 --> 0:02:40.280 sort of sentient like death spike, or in some cases 0:02:40.360 --> 0:02:44.359 kind of a cone or pyramid or inverted pyramid emerging 0:02:44.520 --> 0:02:45.359 out of the ice. 0:02:46.240 --> 0:02:49.000 Yeah. I've seen this in different forms, often with like 0:02:49.040 --> 0:02:50.800 a bird bath. I feel like I've seen it in 0:02:50.840 --> 0:02:52.440 the form of something that looks like a like a 0:02:52.560 --> 0:02:55.960 vase or yeah, more like a cone. But I'm familiar 0:02:56.040 --> 0:02:58.960 with it also just in the freezer making ice cubes. 0:02:58.960 --> 0:03:02.120 Occasionally I think, if you know, if conditions in the 0:03:02.120 --> 0:03:04.880 freezer are just right, you'll put in the tray of 0:03:04.919 --> 0:03:07.000 ice cubes and you'll pull them out and they'll have 0:03:07.120 --> 0:03:10.320 like what looks like, I don't know, the outline of 0:03:10.360 --> 0:03:13.400 a comet impact on the surface of the ice cube, 0:03:13.400 --> 0:03:16.200 frozen in time exactly. Yeah. 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:19.520 Yeah. So again, this is a fairly common occurrence, but 0:03:19.880 --> 0:03:22.400 it doesn't seem to take away from the novelty of 0:03:23.080 --> 0:03:26.440 ice spikes. And there are a lot of explainer articles 0:03:26.440 --> 0:03:29.639 concerning ice spikes out there, but one of the older 0:03:29.639 --> 0:03:32.760 ones I came across was a letter published in the 0:03:32.800 --> 0:03:36.840 journal Nature on March seventh, nineteen thirty one, and it 0:03:36.840 --> 0:03:39.960 was written by Arthur Morley, Davies, who lived eighteen sixty 0:03:40.040 --> 0:03:43.000 nine through nineteen fifty nine. He was a staunch critic 0:03:43.080 --> 0:03:45.560 of creationism and an author of the nineteen thirty seven 0:03:45.600 --> 0:03:47.880 book Evolution and Its Modern Critics. 0:03:49.640 --> 0:03:52.360 I'm picturing the Statler and Waldorf. 0:03:52.640 --> 0:03:56.280 So you know, learned man scientist and author. But in 0:03:56.320 --> 0:03:59.800 this article I was amused because he's doing just what 0:04:00.200 --> 0:04:01.800 I was doing and what many of us are still 0:04:01.840 --> 0:04:04.840 doing today, gazing at this sudden weird ice in a 0:04:04.880 --> 0:04:07.320 bird bath and just trying to figure out what's going on, 0:04:07.440 --> 0:04:10.160 kind of guessing at it, and also calling up friends 0:04:10.160 --> 0:04:12.600 and being like, hey, you'd never believe what I saw 0:04:12.640 --> 0:04:15.440 this morning is quite curious. Let's talk about what's going 0:04:15.480 --> 0:04:18.320 on here. So I'm going to read just a bit 0:04:18.320 --> 0:04:22.000 from it here, he says, quote. I am indebted to 0:04:22.040 --> 0:04:24.880 a number of my colleagues, and particularly to Professor Ao 0:04:25.360 --> 0:04:29.359 Rankin and doctor H. T Ellingham for a very interesting 0:04:29.360 --> 0:04:33.680 discussion of this phenomenon. The most feasible explanation appears to 0:04:33.680 --> 0:04:36.600 be that freezing began as usual at the margin of 0:04:36.640 --> 0:04:39.680 the surface of the water, and ice crystals grew inward 0:04:39.880 --> 0:04:43.080 until the surface was completely frozen except for a triangular 0:04:43.160 --> 0:04:46.280 area in the center. At this stage, there was a 0:04:46.360 --> 0:04:49.599 rapid fall of temperature, and the water below the surface 0:04:49.640 --> 0:04:54.280 began to freeze quickly. The expansion accompanying solidification caused the 0:04:54.320 --> 0:04:57.680 excess of volume to be forced through the triangular aperture, 0:04:58.080 --> 0:05:04.039 the water freezing as it rose. And that sounds pretty good, right, yeah, yeah, 0:05:04.279 --> 0:05:07.320 And this is roughly what I was thinking about as well. 0:05:07.560 --> 0:05:09.239 I think the morning that we saw the ice spike, 0:05:09.839 --> 0:05:12.760 we were going somewhere. I think it was like super cold, 0:05:12.760 --> 0:05:13.960 but we were like, Okay, I guess we're going to 0:05:14.040 --> 0:05:16.880 go to Ikia or something. So we looked at the 0:05:16.920 --> 0:05:18.480 ice spike and we got in the car, and then 0:05:18.520 --> 0:05:20.520 I was just kind of thinking about the ice spike, 0:05:20.560 --> 0:05:22.440 and I was like, well, I guess what's probably happening 0:05:22.480 --> 0:05:24.240 is such and such, And it sounds like I was 0:05:24.279 --> 0:05:30.000 mostly correct. The oldest writings on the formation of these 0:05:30.000 --> 0:05:32.760 ice spikes that I could come across they seem to 0:05:32.760 --> 0:05:35.760 go back a decade or so earlier to nineteen twenty one. 0:05:36.120 --> 0:05:39.520 This is when H. E. Dorsey wrote about it. Apparently, 0:05:39.520 --> 0:05:43.560 another author that is credited is O. Bali or Bally 0:05:44.120 --> 0:05:47.200 also wrote about it. Thus it is often referred to 0:05:47.320 --> 0:05:53.520 as the Bally Dorsey theory of spicule formation on sweet pellets. 0:05:54.040 --> 0:05:58.400 So who's this Dorsey, gentleman, Well, this would be American engineer, inventor, 0:05:58.440 --> 0:06:01.640 and physicist Herbert Grove Dorsey who lived eighteen seventy six 0:06:01.680 --> 0:06:05.200 through nineteen sixty one, who invented and patented the first 0:06:05.279 --> 0:06:10.440 practical pathometer for phathometer I suppose for determining water depth 0:06:10.560 --> 0:06:13.840 in nineteen twenty eight, along with many other inventions, though 0:06:13.880 --> 0:06:16.919 that might be the biggest one. He was principal engineer 0:06:17.000 --> 0:06:21.280 for the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey Radiosonic Laboratory 0:06:21.320 --> 0:06:24.680 in the nineteen thirties. He studied the formation of ice 0:06:24.720 --> 0:06:27.719 spikes in a laboratory setting, and he theorized that the 0:06:27.800 --> 0:06:31.280 increase in volume for the freezing ice forced water up 0:06:31.320 --> 0:06:35.120 through an opening in the ice covering, creating a tube 0:06:35.440 --> 0:06:38.719 that grows at the tip. And this does remain the 0:06:38.760 --> 0:06:41.440 most widely accepted theory of what's going on here. 0:06:41.960 --> 0:06:44.240 But from what I understand, the conditions have to be 0:06:44.440 --> 0:06:46.800 just right to form an ice spike, right, like, if 0:06:46.800 --> 0:06:50.360 it's either too warm or too cold below freezing, either 0:06:50.360 --> 0:06:53.960 way it will it will inhibit the formation of the spike. 0:06:54.200 --> 0:06:57.080 That's right. Yeah, I was reading about the work of 0:06:57.480 --> 0:07:01.440 physicist Kenneth Librecht, who conducted a study of ice spikes 0:07:01.440 --> 0:07:04.960 in two thousand and three and found that there's kind 0:07:04.960 --> 0:07:08.320 of like a Goldilock zone for ice spike formation. You 0:07:08.360 --> 0:07:11.240 want it to be roughly twenty degrees fairnheigh. That's negative 0:07:11.240 --> 0:07:15.120 seven degrees celsius, more or less colder than that, and 0:07:15.200 --> 0:07:18.040 spikes don't form hotter than that, and the ice doesn't 0:07:18.080 --> 0:07:22.160 form fast enough to generate a spike. Also, the quality 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:26.400 of water plays apart, so pure water, according to this 0:07:26.440 --> 0:07:30.720 individual's experiments, seemed to be important. He found that with 0:07:30.880 --> 0:07:33.800 salt content he saw a reduction in the likelihood of 0:07:33.800 --> 0:07:37.280 ice spikes, and in his experiments, tap water didn't work 0:07:37.280 --> 0:07:39.840 at all. Now, granted, tap water is going to vary 0:07:40.440 --> 0:07:43.920 from place to place, but yeah, it seems like pure 0:07:43.960 --> 0:07:46.520 water is going to be your best option here. 0:07:46.840 --> 0:07:50.360 I think it's interesting that the formation of spikes in 0:07:50.400 --> 0:07:56.160 freezing water, that process is dependent on the peculiar fact 0:07:56.320 --> 0:08:02.360 that water, unlike most substances, bands rather than contract as 0:08:02.360 --> 0:08:05.640 it freezes. So and you know, a lot of things 0:08:05.680 --> 0:08:09.120 actually on Earth and in life in the universe are 0:08:09.200 --> 0:08:12.600 dependent on the fact that water expands instead of contracting 0:08:12.640 --> 0:08:15.920 as it freezes. So if water contracted and became more 0:08:15.960 --> 0:08:19.280 dense as it froze, water would sink to like ice 0:08:19.320 --> 0:08:22.040 would sink to the bottom of bodies of water instead 0:08:22.080 --> 0:08:25.400 of floating on top, which would you know, radically change 0:08:25.440 --> 0:08:27.960 the way life works on Earth. I think I've read 0:08:27.960 --> 0:08:30.760 some arguments before that it like if that were physically 0:08:30.840 --> 0:08:32.640 the case, it would sort of make life on Earth 0:08:32.679 --> 0:08:36.400 near impossible because like when water started freezing on top, 0:08:36.440 --> 0:08:39.680 it would essentially instead of insulating the water below with 0:08:39.760 --> 0:08:42.480 the ice layer on top, the ice would sink to 0:08:42.520 --> 0:08:45.079 the bottom and then the whole column of water would freeze, 0:08:45.120 --> 0:08:47.320 and then you know, it would kill all the life 0:08:47.320 --> 0:08:49.960 forms in it, or at least freeze them. So that's 0:08:50.000 --> 0:08:52.960 an extremely consequential outcome of the fact that the water 0:08:53.040 --> 0:08:56.520 expands instead of contracting when it freezes. But also we 0:08:56.559 --> 0:08:59.000 get these ice bikes. So like, yeah, like you explained, rob, 0:08:59.040 --> 0:09:02.280 you've got to contain of water and it starts freezing 0:09:02.320 --> 0:09:04.520 from the outside in. You can imagine it sort of 0:09:04.520 --> 0:09:08.000 forms a shell of ice in a way around this 0:09:08.240 --> 0:09:10.800 mass of liquid water and this the liquid water in 0:09:10.840 --> 0:09:14.080 the middle. It starts to freeze, it needs somewhere to 0:09:14.240 --> 0:09:17.960 go because it's expanding in the freezing process. So if 0:09:17.960 --> 0:09:20.199 there's only like a hole left in the surface, it's 0:09:20.200 --> 0:09:22.840 going to start squeezing out through that hole and freezing 0:09:22.880 --> 0:09:25.760 as it squeezes out and just freezes taller and taller 0:09:25.800 --> 0:09:29.240 and taller. For liquids that shrink in volume as they freeze, 0:09:29.240 --> 0:09:31.559 this would never happen, right, right. 0:09:31.480 --> 0:09:33.880 So it's yeah, it's it's a fun little thing to 0:09:33.920 --> 0:09:38.440 observe at the at a frozen bird bath or inside 0:09:38.440 --> 0:09:41.320 of a freezer if conditions are right and there. So 0:09:41.679 --> 0:09:44.079 in this episode, as you've probably guessed, this is roughly 0:09:44.120 --> 0:09:46.240 what we're going to be talking about, various examples of 0:09:46.280 --> 0:09:50.440 what you might call strange eyes, strange water ice, and 0:09:50.480 --> 0:09:52.400 we have some some fun ones to discuss here. 0:09:52.720 --> 0:09:56.120 Okay, So I'm going to talk about a bizarre haunting 0:09:56.280 --> 0:10:00.600 genre of ice formation, referred to as nieves penet tents 0:10:00.840 --> 0:10:05.440 Spanish for penitent snows, or sometimes they're just called penitentes, 0:10:05.720 --> 0:10:10.199 meaning penitents, So depending on what you read, they're named 0:10:10.280 --> 0:10:14.240 after their resemblance either to maybe human figures kneeling in prayer, 0:10:14.480 --> 0:10:19.440 or more often to monks marching in religious processions, especially 0:10:19.440 --> 0:10:21.440 the kind you might see with like the pointed hoods 0:10:21.440 --> 0:10:25.559 worn in Spanish Catholic celebrations of Holy Week. These formations 0:10:25.559 --> 0:10:32.319 are sometimes described as standing blades, pinnacles, towers, or columns 0:10:32.320 --> 0:10:35.720 of ice. They can reach up to a maximum of 0:10:36.040 --> 0:10:38.520 four or five meters in height in the settings where 0:10:38.520 --> 0:10:41.800 they're most commonly found, though I found some claims of 0:10:42.200 --> 0:10:46.440 penitents or penitent like formations in other cases reaching even higher, 0:10:46.960 --> 0:10:49.719 But the numbers I've seen for the Andes where they're 0:10:49.760 --> 0:10:53.240 most often seen are four or five meters. They can 0:10:53.280 --> 0:10:56.200 be found in high mountain ranges, especially the Andes in 0:10:56.240 --> 0:11:00.960 South America, at elevations of about four thousand meters above 0:11:01.000 --> 0:11:05.040 sea level or more. They're generally oriented so that the 0:11:05.080 --> 0:11:09.120 blades point toward the path of the sun, point toward 0:11:09.200 --> 0:11:14.920 the noontime sun, and they can occupy whole fields or hillsides, which, 0:11:14.960 --> 0:11:18.000 if you go with the analogy of their namesake, forms 0:11:18.040 --> 0:11:22.640 the impression of a vast, uncountable crowd of worshippers or 0:11:22.920 --> 0:11:25.800 of maybe monks gathering at the end of a great 0:11:25.880 --> 0:11:27.439 procession or pilgrimage. 0:11:28.200 --> 0:11:31.280 Yeah, there's some very evocative photos of these who included 0:11:31.280 --> 0:11:34.679 some in the outline. Some of these are I feel 0:11:34.679 --> 0:11:37.200 like they're just the kind of thing that are just 0:11:37.320 --> 0:11:41.440 ripped from the sorts of wallpapers that come included with 0:11:41.520 --> 0:11:44.240 various Apple products, you know, like it's that kind of 0:11:44.280 --> 0:11:46.080 like stunning, serene imagery. 0:11:46.480 --> 0:11:49.360 Yeah, exactly, So, looking at the photos, I totally understand 0:11:49.360 --> 0:11:52.559 the comparison to kneeling or marching human bodies, but personally, 0:11:53.200 --> 0:11:56.640 I'm struck with how much they can sometimes look like 0:11:57.200 --> 0:12:03.120 a naturally occurring maze with chaotic corridors and pathways that 0:12:03.160 --> 0:12:06.600 are bounded by these thin, jagged ridges of ice. So 0:12:06.679 --> 0:12:09.880 to me, some of these landscapes and they can take 0:12:09.920 --> 0:12:12.560 you know, they have different sizes and orientations and stuff, 0:12:12.600 --> 0:12:14.679 so they don't all look the same. But some of 0:12:14.760 --> 0:12:19.360 the Penitente landscapes look like a frost magic variant of 0:12:19.400 --> 0:12:23.920 a xenomorph colony was using their structural mucous secretions to 0:12:24.040 --> 0:12:26.199 approximate a human hedge maze. 0:12:26.760 --> 0:12:28.720 Yeah. Yeah, it does have that kind of feeling a 0:12:28.800 --> 0:12:31.760 very alien landscape, especially the case in these images you 0:12:31.840 --> 0:12:36.160 shared here where we see human beings standing amid these blades. 0:12:36.559 --> 0:12:39.520 Yeah, and that can create a very creepy feeling you 0:12:39.600 --> 0:12:42.559 see people posing with them. Sometimes they're you know, as 0:12:42.600 --> 0:12:45.280 tall as the person or taller, and it's as if 0:12:45.320 --> 0:12:47.600 either they're standing in a crowd or maybe standing in 0:12:47.640 --> 0:12:51.439 a kind of forest or maze. And the other objects 0:12:51.480 --> 0:12:54.120 here are not people or trees or hedges or whatever, 0:12:54.160 --> 0:12:58.840 but they are giant, rippling, blade like shards of ice. Now, 0:12:59.000 --> 0:13:03.199 one famous historical description of these features can be found 0:13:03.360 --> 0:13:07.360 in Charles Darwin's Voyage of the Beagle. This is a 0:13:07.400 --> 0:13:09.640 work we've talked about on the show a number of 0:13:09.679 --> 0:13:13.760 times before, but it's the published memoir of Charles Darwin's 0:13:13.760 --> 0:13:16.520 five year journey around the world on the British Royal 0:13:16.600 --> 0:13:21.480 Navy survey ship, the HMS Bagle, during which journey Darwin 0:13:21.520 --> 0:13:25.920 made geological and biological observations which would later form the 0:13:25.960 --> 0:13:29.960 basis of his theory of evolution by natural selection. But 0:13:30.040 --> 0:13:33.439 this book was from before on the origin of species. 0:13:33.640 --> 0:13:36.920 This book is just full of interesting observations about the 0:13:36.960 --> 0:13:40.960 world and about nature from Darwin's travels, and it helps 0:13:40.960 --> 0:13:42.640 for the reading that Darwin, I think is a very 0:13:42.679 --> 0:13:47.079 good writer of prose. So for context, the time of 0:13:47.120 --> 0:13:50.360 the entry where Darwin's going to talk about penitentes is 0:13:50.840 --> 0:13:55.080 March eighteen, thirty thirty five, Darwin and his traveling party 0:13:55.200 --> 0:13:58.160 are in the middle of the Andes Mountains. So this 0:13:58.240 --> 0:14:00.400 is a part of the journey where he's off the 0:14:00.440 --> 0:14:04.240 ship and he's traveling around in South America. They're in 0:14:04.280 --> 0:14:06.280 the middle of the Andes and they are making an 0:14:06.360 --> 0:14:10.800 overland journey from Santiago, Chile to the city of Mendoza 0:14:11.080 --> 0:14:15.079 in modern day Argentina. And on the course of this track, 0:14:15.320 --> 0:14:19.560 Darwin makes a number of very scientifically interesting observations, including 0:14:19.640 --> 0:14:23.720 coming across a petrified forest in the barren reaches of 0:14:23.720 --> 0:14:28.200 the High Desert, and also discovering some fossil seashells embedded 0:14:28.200 --> 0:14:31.360 in rocks way up in the mountains. Darwin writes quote 0:14:31.640 --> 0:14:34.200 shells which were once crawling on the bottom of the 0:14:34.240 --> 0:14:38.400 sea now standing nearly fourteen thousand feet above its level. 0:14:39.200 --> 0:14:40.840 So the entries of the journal I'm going to look 0:14:40.880 --> 0:14:44.280 at are from around March twenty first to March twenty second, 0:14:44.800 --> 0:14:47.720 and a Darwin's party they've just emerged from a mountain 0:14:47.760 --> 0:14:53.520 pass called Puquines and they are headed toward another mountain 0:14:53.560 --> 0:14:58.120 pass called the Portillo Pass. And so March late March 0:14:58.160 --> 0:15:01.080 I was thinking of winter trans aditioning to spring. But 0:15:01.120 --> 0:15:04.080 that's then I realized, oh, that's northern hemisphere brain talking. 0:15:04.480 --> 0:15:07.760 This is the southern hemisphere, so that's actually summer turning 0:15:07.800 --> 0:15:10.320 into autumn. So this is I think a late time 0:15:10.400 --> 0:15:13.240 of the year to be trying to make this journey. 0:15:14.040 --> 0:15:16.080 Now is an interesting note before we get to the 0:15:16.080 --> 0:15:18.240 ice formations. I did just want to mention something that 0:15:18.240 --> 0:15:21.720 caught my attention from the journal entry from March twenty first. 0:15:22.480 --> 0:15:25.040 Darwin says he and his companions have made their way 0:15:25.080 --> 0:15:29.960 into a high mountainous country between two mountain ranges, and again, 0:15:30.000 --> 0:15:32.720 this is apparently late in the season for travel. Darwin 0:15:32.800 --> 0:15:35.480 fears what would happen if there's bad weather because there 0:15:35.640 --> 0:15:38.160 is not much there's not really anywhere for them to 0:15:38.200 --> 0:15:41.440 take shelter, and he says that they are able to 0:15:41.520 --> 0:15:44.800 build what he calls a miserable fire out of the 0:15:44.840 --> 0:15:48.680 only available fuel, which are the roots of an unspecified 0:15:48.720 --> 0:15:52.640 scrubby plant. And he says that the wind was piercingly cold. 0:15:53.400 --> 0:15:57.480 I'm getting shades of Bilbo is there about the journey 0:15:57.560 --> 0:15:58.600 through the misty mountains here? 0:15:58.760 --> 0:16:04.440 Oh that's funny. Yeah, No, lyrics of songs are included Unfortunately, here. 0:16:04.680 --> 0:16:06.640 Does he complain about the lack of food though. 0:16:06.560 --> 0:16:08.640 Oh you know, Darwin had to have second breakfast, and 0:16:08.640 --> 0:16:11.320 in fact there are complaints about food coming right up. 0:16:11.360 --> 0:16:14.520 So Darwin is about to explain troubles they had cooking 0:16:14.520 --> 0:16:17.760 their food, which connects to an interesting fact we've talked 0:16:17.760 --> 0:16:20.680 about in some of our episodes on high altitudes in 0:16:20.720 --> 0:16:24.600 the past. So Darwin writes, quote, at the place where 0:16:24.600 --> 0:16:28.720 we slept, water necessarily boiled from the diminished pressure of 0:16:28.800 --> 0:16:32.000 the atmosphere had a lower temperature than it does in 0:16:32.040 --> 0:16:35.240 a less lofty country, the case being the converse of 0:16:35.280 --> 0:16:39.440 that of a Papan's digester. Now a quick note here. 0:16:39.520 --> 0:16:44.240 Papan's digester was basically a pressure cooker. It was an 0:16:44.280 --> 0:16:48.120 early pressure cooker invented in the seventeenth century by the 0:16:48.120 --> 0:16:52.800 French physicist Denis Papan. So Darwin is saying that the 0:16:52.880 --> 0:16:55.760 high elevation at his camp is functioning like a reverse 0:16:55.800 --> 0:16:59.160 pressure cooker. Inside a pressure cooker, you increase the boiling 0:16:59.200 --> 0:17:01.920 point of water closing it and having a higher pressure, 0:17:02.120 --> 0:17:05.080 allowing the food to cook faster. At his camp, and 0:17:05.119 --> 0:17:08.560 the low pressure up there it lowers the boiling point 0:17:08.560 --> 0:17:11.560 of water instead of increasing it. So he goes on 0:17:11.640 --> 0:17:15.240 to say, quote, hence the potatoes, after remaining for some 0:17:15.520 --> 0:17:18.879 hours in the boiling water, were nearly as hard as ever. 0:17:19.200 --> 0:17:21.439 The pot was left on the fire all night, and 0:17:21.560 --> 0:17:24.679 next morning it was boiled again, But yet the potatoes 0:17:24.760 --> 0:17:28.119 were not cooked. I found out this by overhearing my 0:17:28.160 --> 0:17:31.159 two companions discussing the cause. They had come to the 0:17:31.200 --> 0:17:34.679 simple conclusion quote, that the cursed pot, which was a 0:17:34.680 --> 0:17:38.280 new one, did not choose to boil potatoes. Oh wow, 0:17:38.440 --> 0:17:42.360 this pot hates potatoes. So a couple of things here. 0:17:42.680 --> 0:17:44.800 First of all, what Darwin says about cooking at high 0:17:44.840 --> 0:17:48.480 elevation is absolutely true. We've discussed this on the show before. 0:17:48.520 --> 0:17:51.320 The higher you go above sea level, the less atmospheric 0:17:51.359 --> 0:17:54.159 pressure there is, so there's less atmosphere sitting on you. 0:17:55.000 --> 0:17:57.640 The lower the atmospheric pressure, the lower the boiling point 0:17:57.640 --> 0:18:01.000 of water at that elevation. I don't know exactly what 0:18:01.080 --> 0:18:04.440 elevation Darwin was at the point he was cooking here, 0:18:04.480 --> 0:18:07.520 but the highest elevation he mentions in the surrounding text 0:18:08.040 --> 0:18:11.439 is fourteen thousand feet, and according to a chart I 0:18:11.480 --> 0:18:14.480 found on the internet, at fourteen thousand feet, the boiling 0:18:14.520 --> 0:18:16.720 point of water is about one hundred and eighty six 0:18:16.760 --> 0:18:21.159 degrees fahrenheit or eighty six degrees c Of course, in 0:18:21.200 --> 0:18:24.760 a regular pot, water cannot get hotter than its boiling point, 0:18:24.800 --> 0:18:27.200 which means there's a limit to how hot you can 0:18:27.200 --> 0:18:29.600 get the food you're trying to cook in the water. 0:18:30.200 --> 0:18:32.760 And as an experiment, I was like, well, I wonder 0:18:32.800 --> 0:18:34.920 what a potato cook to one hundred and eighty six 0:18:34.960 --> 0:18:38.320 degrees fahrenheit is like. So I did this yesterday with 0:18:38.400 --> 0:18:42.200 the aid of a probe thermometer in my toaster oven. 0:18:42.280 --> 0:18:44.320 So it was a dry cooking method, not a wet one. 0:18:45.000 --> 0:18:48.640 Not not a perfect comparison, but the results were that, 0:18:49.080 --> 0:18:51.800 you know, the potato cook to one eighty six fahrenheit 0:18:51.920 --> 0:18:55.280 was not good, but not inedible. I would say a 0:18:55.280 --> 0:18:59.320 potato definitely should be cooked to a higher temperature in 0:18:59.400 --> 0:19:01.399 order to be in enjoyable. You know, if I was 0:19:01.440 --> 0:19:04.399 making a baked potato and doing an internal temperature, I 0:19:04.440 --> 0:19:06.600 would take it to like two oh eight fahrenheit. You 0:19:06.600 --> 0:19:09.080 need to take it to almost the boiling point of water. 0:19:10.119 --> 0:19:12.520 And this potato I did to one eighty six was 0:19:12.720 --> 0:19:15.800 not fluffy. It was still kind of firm, but also 0:19:16.840 --> 0:19:19.040 you know, it was cooked enough that I assumed somebody 0:19:19.040 --> 0:19:21.879 climbing through the mountains would settle for it. So I 0:19:21.920 --> 0:19:24.600 wonder if there were any other factors at play that 0:19:24.680 --> 0:19:28.000 made it even less well done than my one hundred 0:19:28.000 --> 0:19:31.560 and eighty six fahrenheit potato. I'm not sure, but potato 0:19:31.640 --> 0:19:33.880 thoughts aside. The other thing I wanted to come back 0:19:33.920 --> 0:19:37.760 to is an interesting case of connections in the Burkian sense. 0:19:37.800 --> 0:19:42.040 Here Denis Papan's steam digest, which, again this is an 0:19:42.080 --> 0:19:47.000 early seventeenth century pressure cooker, was actually an important inspiration 0:19:47.359 --> 0:19:51.280 for Thomas Nukman and others in their work on developing 0:19:51.280 --> 0:19:54.840 the steam engine, showing that the expansion of trapped steam, 0:19:55.160 --> 0:19:57.959 you know, it's expanding under heat, could be used to 0:19:58.000 --> 0:20:01.520 do work, For example, to drive a pit, which you know, 0:20:01.600 --> 0:20:04.520 from the right combination of gears and shafts and things, 0:20:04.560 --> 0:20:07.800 could you could apply that work of the driven piston 0:20:08.080 --> 0:20:11.040 to almost any task, from pumping water to turning the 0:20:11.040 --> 0:20:12.040 wheels of a railcar. 0:20:12.440 --> 0:20:13.040 Fascinating. 0:20:13.119 --> 0:20:15.639 Yeah, may you never look at your instant pot the 0:20:15.640 --> 0:20:28.199 same again. But anyway, we got to come back to 0:20:28.280 --> 0:20:31.000 the ice formation. So we were moving on to the 0:20:31.080 --> 0:20:35.000 Journal entry of March twenty second, where Darwin says, after 0:20:35.080 --> 0:20:39.320 eating our potato less breakfast, we traveled across the Intermediate 0:20:39.440 --> 0:20:42.359 tract to the foot of the Portillo Range. In the 0:20:42.400 --> 0:20:45.360 middle of summer, cattle are brought up here to graze, 0:20:45.400 --> 0:20:48.520 but they had now all been removed. Even the greater 0:20:48.640 --> 0:20:52.000 number of the Guanacos had decamped, knowing well that if 0:20:52.040 --> 0:20:54.639 overtaken here by a snowstorm, they would be caught in 0:20:54.720 --> 0:20:57.480 a trap. And I had to look this up. Guanacos 0:20:57.560 --> 0:21:01.480 or a type of South American camelidly related to the lama. 0:21:02.200 --> 0:21:04.480 Yeah, they're really cool. I've never seen them in person, 0:21:04.520 --> 0:21:07.640 but I've seen some nature documentaries that feature them, and yeah, 0:21:07.640 --> 0:21:11.919 they're like they're a wild species, and yeah, they have 0:21:11.920 --> 0:21:14.320 a quite noble air to them. Based on the footage 0:21:14.359 --> 0:21:14.960 I've seen. 0:21:15.200 --> 0:21:17.880 I thought they were cute. Darwin goes on. We had 0:21:17.880 --> 0:21:22.040 a fine view of a massive mountains called Tupungato, the 0:21:22.080 --> 0:21:25.800 whole clothed with unbroken snow, in the midst of which 0:21:25.840 --> 0:21:28.679 there was a blue patch, no doubt a glacier. A 0:21:28.680 --> 0:21:32.840 circumstance of rare occurrence in these mountains now commenced A 0:21:32.920 --> 0:21:36.480 heavy and long climb similar to that of the puquines, 0:21:37.119 --> 0:21:41.040 bold conical hills of red granite rose on each hand. 0:21:41.480 --> 0:21:45.520 In the valleys there were several broad fields of perpetual snow. 0:21:46.200 --> 0:21:49.719 These frozen masses, during the process of thawing, had in 0:21:49.800 --> 0:21:54.440 some parts been converted into pinnacles or columns, which, as 0:21:54.440 --> 0:21:57.639 they were high and close together, made it difficult for 0:21:57.720 --> 0:22:00.680 our cargo mules to pass on. In one of these 0:22:00.680 --> 0:22:05.320 columns of ice, a frozen horse was sticking as on 0:22:05.400 --> 0:22:09.440 a pedestal, but with its hind legs straight up in 0:22:09.520 --> 0:22:13.040 the air. The animal, i suppose, must have fallen with 0:22:13.119 --> 0:22:17.720 its head downward into a hole when the snow was continuous, 0:22:17.880 --> 0:22:21.880 and afterwards the surrounding parts must have been removed by 0:22:21.880 --> 0:22:26.320 the thall. Oh wow, So it's a shocking and evocative 0:22:26.359 --> 0:22:30.679 scene Darwin is describing. So again, these are valleys in 0:22:30.800 --> 0:22:35.800 between the granite hills. The valleys are covered in perpetual snow. 0:22:35.960 --> 0:22:39.359 So you know, this is the end of summer in 0:22:39.440 --> 0:22:42.280 the region and the snow is still not fully melted. 0:22:42.600 --> 0:22:46.240 And Darwin says that this snow, while partially thawing in 0:22:46.280 --> 0:22:49.760 the summer, had somehow been converted into a field of 0:22:49.840 --> 0:22:53.639 pinnacles or columns. Again, He says it was difficult for 0:22:53.680 --> 0:22:57.159