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Speaker 1: My welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how

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Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hey you welcome to Stuff to

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Speaker 1: Blow your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm

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Speaker 1: Joe McCormick, and it's time for August listener mail. That's right. Uh, yeah,

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Speaker 1: we almost forgot to do another one of these, but

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Speaker 1: we've been trying to do them more or less monthly

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Speaker 1: because that, I mean, that's how much cool listener mail

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Speaker 1: we get. I mean, we get a lot of just

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Speaker 1: nice personal comments about how much people enjoy the show.

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Speaker 1: And you know, sometimes we read one of those or

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Speaker 1: two of those just to give our you know, ourselves

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Speaker 1: a pat on the bat. But but we do receive

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Speaker 1: a lot of of of of really insightful emails about

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Speaker 1: content that we've covered, uh, you know, listeners sharing their

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Speaker 1: take on particular topics and occasionally pointing out something we missed.

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Speaker 1: Even Yeah, you can only patch your own back so

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Speaker 1: much before it starts to get sore. So maybe we

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Speaker 1: should just dive straight into some of the fascinating and

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Speaker 1: strange ideas that our listeners have sent us in reaction

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Speaker 1: to recent episodes. Let's do it. What do you think

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Speaker 1: about going back to the year old ashen light. Oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: the the strange light on the Dark Side of Venus.

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Speaker 1: You know, our mail bot Carney has has has seen

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Speaker 1: these lights in person. Oh really yeah, yeah, I didn't

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Speaker 1: hear this. So so he had a life before he

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Speaker 1: was a humble mail bot. I mean, he was a

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Speaker 1: space probe really. Yeah. Not many people realized this from

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Speaker 1: from which space program? American Soviet what was very hush

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Speaker 1: hush about that, especially given the current political climate. So

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Speaker 1: I'm not sure which side he was on. Was a

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Speaker 1: Bulgarian space probe that went to Venus, found the Action Light,

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Speaker 1: came back and it's been a cover up ever since. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: Like he doesn't say much, but I know he's seen

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Speaker 1: the claims to have seen the action line. So one

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Speaker 1: of the things we talked about in the Action Light

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Speaker 1: episode was, of course the possibility that seems like a

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Speaker 1: very strong possibility that the reports of the lights on

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Speaker 1: the Dark Side of Venus have just been observer error.

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Speaker 1: You know, that nobody, nobody is actually seeing anything, that

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Speaker 1: it was just imagination or artifacts of the technology used

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Speaker 1: at the time. And then it's kind of occurring at

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Speaker 1: like the cutting edge of perception without any kind of

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Speaker 1: way to like photograph or record what is being seen, right,

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Speaker 1: But of course part of the problem has been while

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Speaker 1: you've got all these sightings, if you are going to

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Speaker 1: assume people were really seeing something, what could it be?

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Speaker 1: What could it have been? And I offered a crazy

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Speaker 1: idea at the end of the episode, Well, what if

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Speaker 1: you actually do have organisms floating in the atmosphere of venus,

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Speaker 1: suspended in droplets in the atmosphere in the clouds, and

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Speaker 1: and they're actually bioluminescent or somehow reflecting or emitting light

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Speaker 1: at different frequencies, maybe at times when they bloom, and

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Speaker 1: this would explain the strange periodicity of the apparent ash

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Speaker 1: and light sightings. Well, we heard from our listener Michael,

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Speaker 1: who said, hello, my name is Michael, and I just

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Speaker 1: started listening to the podcast three episodes in, and I

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Speaker 1: definitely have more than I want to listen to. I

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Speaker 1: teach science in seventh and eighth grade, and I love

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Speaker 1: how much your podcast makes me explore different ideas. I'm

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Speaker 1: writing in about your most recent pod guests because you

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Speaker 1: said something right at the end that I thought was

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Speaker 1: so fascinating. You talked about what if the action light

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Speaker 1: was the result of micro organisms in the atmosphere. Now,

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Speaker 1: this is just total off the cuff thinking about what

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Speaker 1: could be possible, But I feel like that's kind of

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Speaker 1: exactly what your show is supposed to make you do. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I hope. So what if the light is a combination

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Speaker 1: of both the solar bombardment and the micro organisms. My

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Speaker 1: thought is this, organisms living up in the atmosphere like

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Speaker 1: that would obviously be exposed to more solar radiation. They

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Speaker 1: would need to have a way to deal with the

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Speaker 1: excess that they don't use. I'm assuming they would be

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Speaker 1: photo autotrophs of some kind. What if their way of

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Speaker 1: dealing with the excess energy would be to absorb it.

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Speaker 1: The electrons would become excited, and then they would admit

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Speaker 1: that light when the electrons went back to their ground state.

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Speaker 1: I have no idea if this is possible, because I'm

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Speaker 1: pretty sure this is not how bioluminescence occurs on our planet,

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Speaker 1: but let's assume that it is possible. If possible, then

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Speaker 1: the action light could be the interaction of exponential microorganism

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Speaker 1: growth that corresponds to extreme solar activity. The high amounts

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Speaker 1: of both microorganisms and solar activity, it may produce a

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Speaker 1: light strong enough to be faintly visible to us from Earth.

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Speaker 1: Having it be the interaction between two rare events would

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Speaker 1: explain why this only happens infrequently and does not happen

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Speaker 1: with any discernible pattern to us, because even if we

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Speaker 1: can analyze solar activity, we wouldn't know when that would

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Speaker 1: line up with exponential microorganism growth, and after exponential growth,

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Speaker 1: we have a period of severely decreased population since they

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Speaker 1: hit their carrying capacity, which would mean that even if

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Speaker 1: there was high solar radiation, it would not trigger the

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Speaker 1: ash and light. This would also explain why the light

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Speaker 1: does not appear to be green as is produced by

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Speaker 1: the oxygen reactions. Again, pure conjecture, almost certainly incorrect, But

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Speaker 1: wouldn't that be cool if astronomers had been seeing signs

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Speaker 1: of life on Venus for hundreds of years and did

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Speaker 1: not realize it. That would definitely blow my mind. Anyway,

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Speaker 1: I'm excited to join your audience and most likely will

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Speaker 1: write in every now and then since I'm a science

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Speaker 1: teacher and it looks like your podcast is right up

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Speaker 1: my alley now. Of what he said there, wouldn't it

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Speaker 1: be um? Wouldn't it be interesting if they were if

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Speaker 1: what they were looking at was really alien life and

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Speaker 1: they didn't realize it. Uh, you know, you could say that, well,

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Speaker 1: some of these individuals were saying it was alien life.

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Speaker 1: The the version of alien life they were imagining, uh,

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Speaker 1: was was certainly not correct, right, it was von groy

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Speaker 1: thousand right. He was saying, Well, what it is is

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Speaker 1: obviously the coronation of the new Venusian king. Yeah, it's

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Speaker 1: all those fireworks they're throwing up over this, uh, this

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Speaker 1: dynastic change that's occurring down there. But that certainly not

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Speaker 1: the case. But it would be interesting if in a way,

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Speaker 1: in a very small way, but a pivotal way, he

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Speaker 1: was actually right. That would be a great vindication for

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Speaker 1: for von groyth thousand. Also, Michael got back after I

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Speaker 1: responded and said he'd done a little more research on

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Speaker 1: this and realized, quote what I was talking about would

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Speaker 1: be not would not be biolumin essence, but actually biofluorescence,

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Speaker 1: the ability to absorb in then a midlight of different frequencies.

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Speaker 1: I wasn't positive if there were organisms on Earth that

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Speaker 1: could do this, but apparently there absolutely are, so yeah,

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Speaker 1: this seems theoretically possible. I even found a paper about

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Speaker 1: scientists looking into plants on Earth needing to protect themselves

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Speaker 1: from increased UV radiation because of the thinning ozone layer,

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Speaker 1: and it seemed like this is a possibility they were

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Speaker 1: looking into. Uh So, yeah, thanks again for getting in

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Speaker 1: touch Michael that that is a highly interesting speculative idea.

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Speaker 1: I wonder if we already know things that could bat

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Speaker 1: down this hypothesis, things already in evidence, or if somebody

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Speaker 1: would need to do any new observations or experiments to

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Speaker 1: see if this, uh this kind of thing were possible.

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Speaker 1: I don't know. Carney's very hushed hush on the whole

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Speaker 1: situation though. Also just another idea that came to us

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Speaker 1: from our listener Justin on Twitter. Justin wrote a thought

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Speaker 1: that came to his mind is what if the ashen

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Speaker 1: light is venus moving fast enough in relation to the

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Speaker 1: Earth to blue shift infra red light so heat into

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Speaker 1: the visible spectrum? And I thought that was an interesting question.

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Speaker 1: I don't have a way of evaluating that. My guests

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Speaker 1: would be that blue shifted light from the infra red

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Speaker 1: would still I mean, you could do that if it's

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Speaker 1: moving fast enough. That's possible from the shorter wavelengths of

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Speaker 1: thermal emission. But my guests would be probably just that

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Speaker 1: it wouldn't be bright enough to see from Earth even

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Speaker 1: if it shifted into the visible spectrum. But I don't

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Speaker 1: know for sure. That's that's another thing worth checking with

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Speaker 1: an expert about. All right, well, I'm gonna call Carney

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Speaker 1: over here. A is some some more listener mail here

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Speaker 1: for us, and it's relating to our recent episode on

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Speaker 1: drinking coffee, more importantly, brewing coffee in microgravity in orbit. Uh, specifically,

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Speaker 1: you know, aboard the the I S. S SO first

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Speaker 1: have to acknowledge, Nathaniel wrote in. Listener Nathaniel wrote in

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Speaker 1: and pointed out that I referred to the I S.

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Speaker 1: S Presso machine as being a four pound machine as

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Speaker 1: opposed to a forty pound machine. Okay, well that's an

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Speaker 1: order of magnitude of difference, yeah, but just about one zero.

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Speaker 1: It didn't really affect that the rest of the content

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Speaker 1: of the episode, but we did put we did tag

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Speaker 1: that old episode for people who are listening to it

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Speaker 1: for the first time. Um. We also heard from a

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Speaker 1: listener on Twitter. Uh this as Twitter listener r P

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Speaker 1: r P rode in and said, uh, listen this morning,

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Speaker 1: great show as always, I don't drink coffee, So my

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Speaker 1: question is can I have my mountain dew in space?

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Speaker 1: Apart from all the bad stuff, it does to me

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Speaker 1: curious about carbonated liquids in space, and so I thought

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Speaker 1: this was an interesting question. Uh, you know, not when

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Speaker 1: we could do a whole episode on But I looked

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Speaker 1: into it a little bit and I did find a

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Speaker 1: NASA re NASA page about this. Uh. If you look

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Speaker 1: up NASA carbonated beverages in space you'll find this as well.

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Speaker 1: But the basic answer breaks down to this. So the

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Speaker 1: bubbles of carbon dioxide and carbonated beverages, they aren't buoyant

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Speaker 1: in a witless environment, so they remain randomly distributed throughout

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Speaker 1: the fluid even after you swallow it. This means that

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Speaker 1: carbonated beverages, including soft drinks and of course beers, uh,

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Speaker 1: they they may become a foamy mess. Uh, NASA says

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Speaker 1: during space travel. WHOA, Now this makes me think, do

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Speaker 1: you burp in space? I've never thought about this for now.

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Speaker 1: Bubbles from your digestive system of gas would seem to

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Speaker 1: rise naturally through buoyancy so that you could burp. But

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Speaker 1: if you're in a microgravity environment or in zero G

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Speaker 1: would bubbles rise to the top four? Youtuberp this is

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Speaker 1: it's interesting. I don't know they've ever read anything about it,

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Speaker 1: or if I did, it was overshadowed by all the

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Speaker 1: content about pooping in space. Anyway, that the NASA piece continues.

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Speaker 1: It points out that the carbonation in the soda will

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Speaker 1: also not separate in micro gravity, and in the absence

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Speaker 1: of gravity, the carbon dioxide bubbles and carminated beverages go

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Speaker 1: through and astronauts digestive system rather than being yeah, rather

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Speaker 1: than being belched out as on Earth. So that seems

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Speaker 1: to lead that seems to lead some weight to the

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Speaker 1: idea that maybe as you're nuts, don't belch um. And anyway,

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Speaker 1: they point out that this could cause adverse side effects

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Speaker 1: as well. So if you're gonna have mountain dew in space,

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Speaker 1: um I would I would imagine it would have to

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Speaker 1: be flat mountain dew. Yeah. Wow, that that is a

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Speaker 1: horrible thing to imagine. But I guess it could still

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Speaker 1: be cold or hot. If you're a hot mountain dew enthusiasts,

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Speaker 1: a hot catheter of mountain dew just letting for you, nothing,

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Speaker 1: nothing gets you invigorated to to go fix that space

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Speaker 1: pro in your little urinal shaped cup. I think what

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Speaker 1: we need to design is a machine for astronauts to

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Speaker 1: burp with. It would somehow use momentum on the body.

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Speaker 1: Would be called like kinetic burp NG. It would be

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Speaker 1: kind of like that scene in Willy Wonka with the

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Speaker 1: fizzy lifting drink. Yeah, like centerfuge the burps out of here.

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Speaker 1: But it's just another example of all the various functions

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Speaker 1: we take for granted here on Earth, in our our

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Speaker 1: our one G of gravity. This comes to us from

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Speaker 1: our listener, Evan, and it's about space coffee. Evans says, recently,

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Speaker 1: I listened to Astronauts and Spaceships Getting Coffee, great episode,

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Speaker 1: and I thought i'd write in to share some experiences

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Speaker 1: that I had with an experiment testing as zero G

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Speaker 1: workaround designed for the I s S, particularly as it

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Speaker 1: involves the use of centripetal force to create artificial gravity

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Speaker 1: in ways that I don't think you've discussed before. Namely,

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Speaker 1: rather than creating gravity for the entire space station or

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Speaker 1: spacecraft by having the whole thing constantly revolved, instead, you

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Speaker 1: can create localized gravity within the station or craft by

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Speaker 1: spinning platforms etcetera for specific purposes such as exercise. Robert,

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Speaker 1: I think we did talk about that a little bit

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Speaker 1: in our Artificial Gravity episode, didn't Yeah, I think we did.

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Speaker 1: We may not have. I don't think we discussed it

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Speaker 1: in the coffee episode, that's true, But the Artificial Gravity episode,

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Speaker 1: I think we explored that angle. But if I'm wrong,

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Speaker 1: maybe that's worth a look in the future. Anyway. Evan

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Speaker 1: continues quote. It was about twelve years ago when I

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Speaker 1: was a horrendously impoverished university student. I needed money pretty

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Speaker 1: desperately and didn't have much time or willingness to work

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Speaker 1: in those days. So a friend of mine in the

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Speaker 1: biology department mentioned to me that there was a bulletin

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Speaker 1: board for the biosy med School area of the campus

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Speaker 1: which listed opportunities for students to take part in faculty

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Speaker 1: members experiments as paid subjects. I found one that offered

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Speaker 1: decent pay, applied and was immediately accepted, all without inquiring

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Speaker 1: about or being informed of the nature of the experiment.

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Speaker 1: The money was decent, so it seemed too good to

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Speaker 1: be true. As it turns out, a professor of surgery,

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Speaker 1: I assume it was Dr Anton jessep Uh If I

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Speaker 1: recall correctly, had designed a machine to counter the deleterious

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Speaker 1: effects of zero G environments on the human body, and

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Speaker 1: was having it tested to see about trying to get

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Speaker 1: it on the I s S. It was basically a

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Speaker 1: pillar installed in a small, empty room, fastened at floor

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Speaker 1: and ceiling, and outfitted with two arms which ran horizontal

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Speaker 1: to the ground. The arms could spin. One of the

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Speaker 1: arms terminated in a bicycle and the other in a

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Speaker 1: small platform. The idea was for one astronaut to pedal

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Speaker 1: the bicycle, thus spinning the arms, while another astronaut would

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Speaker 1: stand on the platform and do exercises. Both astronauts would

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Speaker 1: thereby get in some crucial exercise at a measurable and

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Speaker 1: adjustable level of artificial gravity. There was a monitor on

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Speaker 1: the bike with a readout about the various relevant forces

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Speaker 1: at play, be approximate number of gees to which the

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Speaker 1: exercisers were subjected, et cetera. Uh something that's small, man,

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Speaker 1: I would worry about Coriola's forces on that. Yeah, I mean,

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Speaker 1: I'm getting a little dizzy and nauseous just imagining this

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Speaker 1: in my head. Yeah, so Evan continues. It sounds all

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Speaker 1: well and good, but for two facts that in order

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Speaker 1: to measure the effects, muscle biopsies were required before and

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Speaker 1: after each workout, and that I have a propensity for

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Speaker 1: horrible motion sickness. The first time I gave it a go,

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Speaker 1: I made it through a few sets of rapidly spinning

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Speaker 1: squats that higher than normal gravity. Then when the machine

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Speaker 1: began to slow its spin, I got horribly sick and

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Speaker 1: threw up everywhere. Vomits flattered on wide swaths of floor

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Speaker 1: and wall, of course, as I was still spinning fairly

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Speaker 1: quickly at that point. So I went into the control group. Uh,

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Speaker 1: he says, he went into the control group, quote, which

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Speaker 1: did just normal squats to provide some frame of reference

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Speaker 1: for the efficacy of the machine. Is that something you're

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Speaker 1: supposed to do, take somebody from your test group and

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Speaker 1: then put them in your control group. Or is he

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Speaker 1: just like wandering, uh like dizzally into the into the

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Speaker 1: control group. Oh maybe I don't know. I don't want

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Speaker 1: to be unfair. That seems like something that might not

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Speaker 1: be something you're supposed to do, But I don't know.

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Speaker 1: Evan continues. It still wasn't a great experience, though, as

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Speaker 1: the muscle biopsies were pretty rough, since we were testing

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Speaker 1: out the efficacy of squats. They had to cut into

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Speaker 1: the skin of my calf, then screw a kind of

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Speaker 1: small metal tube down into the muscle. It was a

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Speaker 1: fun feeling, even with local anesthetic. The tube would then

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Speaker 1: engage a bit of suction to get some of my

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Speaker 1: muscle into it and kind of cap itself with a razor,

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Speaker 1: thus trapping a small standardized amount of leg muscle inside,

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Speaker 1: about the size of one piece of Kicks Cereal my kicks.

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Speaker 1: It's just a standard measurement of muscle tissue. Right, car

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Speaker 1: gets forty kicks to the hogshead and um Evan writes,

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Speaker 1: it's strange to look at one's own leg muscle. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I bet it was much whiter than I expected, more

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Speaker 1: like chicken than pork or beef. So yeah, I would

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Speaker 1: get these muscle biopsies before and after the workout every

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Speaker 1: day for two weeks. If you think your legs are

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Speaker 1: sore after an ordinary workout, you get the idea. At

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Speaker 1: the end of two weeks, I got a check for

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Speaker 1: about four and fifty dollars. Not sure if it was

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Speaker 1: worth it. The money's long spin, but I still have

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Speaker 1: the little regularly spaced incision scars on my leg makes

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Speaker 1: a good story. Though. To sum it up, I don't

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Speaker 1: know if the machine made it to the I s S,

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Speaker 1: but from what the professor was saying, it seemed like

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Speaker 1: the results were looking pretty promising, at least as the

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Speaker 1: experiment was finishing up. Hope you found this interesting and

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Speaker 1: thanks for your podcast. It keeps me company in my

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Speaker 1: long idle evenings. More episodes per week. Please, As you're

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Speaker 1: stitching up your test subjects, it's probably a good idea

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Speaker 1: to tell them that this looks promising. I don't want

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Speaker 1: to say, like, yeah, I guess this is a loud

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Speaker 1: goose chase. Uh yeah. Thanks for the leg though, thanks

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Speaker 1: for the leg muscle kernels, Thanks for the vomit samples. Yeah, well,

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Speaker 1: this I have to say this is one of This

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Speaker 1: is a thoroughly enjoyable bit of listener mail, but also

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Speaker 1: one of the more um uh kind of nauseating list

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Speaker 1: your mails because we had the spinning contraption, the vomiting,

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Speaker 1: the the the leg muscle samples. There was a lot

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Speaker 1: of squeamish content. So you know, five stars, I'm gonna

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Speaker 1: go to six best new email. Oh yeah, okay was

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Speaker 1: our scale. We've we've not established the scale is Wait, no,

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Speaker 1: we got the Pitchfork scale, so I I'd say eight

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Speaker 1: point three best new email. Okay, we got a lot

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Speaker 1: of great emails on the way, so maybe it'll get beaten.

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Speaker 1: Who knows. Here's another one related to the coffee episode,

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Speaker 1: and this is just an answer to some of the

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Speaker 1: sci fi questions we had. This comes from Theodore. Theodore

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Speaker 1: says quote, I'm sitting here drinking a hot black cup

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Speaker 1: of coffee, listening to your most recent episode on coffee

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Speaker 1: and space. I just wanted to write in and include

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Speaker 1: some other books with space coffee. You missed Dune spice coffee. This,

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Speaker 1: of course, is a big one that I'm kind of

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Speaker 1: shocked that we didn't bring it up, given we've we've

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Speaker 1: done whole episodes on Dune. Now imagine we mentioned uh

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Speaker 1: spice coffee in those episodes. But in anyway, he says,

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Speaker 1: quotes said to be mixed with the spice milans, giving

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Speaker 1: it a cinnamon flavor. It has never made clear if

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Speaker 1: the coffee in question here is the same beverage we

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Speaker 1: drink now, or if the word has morph to refer

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Speaker 1: to other hot beverages. That's a good point Ring World,

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Speaker 1: a book I was going to write in about for

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Speaker 1: the summer reading episode, features basically a replicator on board

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Speaker 1: the ship that can produce coffee. I highly recommend this

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Speaker 1: book for you guys, not because of the coffee, but

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Speaker 1: the imaginative aliens and the artifacts left behind by ancient

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Speaker 1: super galactic civilizations. I do have to say, this is

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Speaker 1: a book that's long done on my reading list and

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Speaker 1: I've never picked it up. But it's it's a famous work.

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Speaker 1: This is one of the ones where I think we

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Speaker 1: must have had at least a half dozen listener males

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Speaker 1: tell us, we've got to read this one lately. I

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Speaker 1: don't know why. I must be good. It must be good. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean it is. It is a famous work. Like,

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Speaker 1: there's no reason for me to be I'm not, you know,

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Speaker 1: actively avoiding. Uh. The next one is Um Artemis and

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Speaker 1: it has lunar coffee. Says that this book was written

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Speaker 1: by Andy Weir, writer of The Martian. Both books are great,

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Speaker 1: but Artemis has better or more interesting coffee. In the

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Speaker 1: Lunar City, the primary industry is aluminum production. A waste

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Speaker 1: product of that is oxygen, and the city uses that.

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Speaker 1: The city uses to breathe. However, to replicate Earth's atmosphere,

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Speaker 1: they would need to bring tons of nitrogen up to

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Speaker 1: the Moon from Earth, too expensive. Instead, they have a

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Speaker 1: pure oxygen environment with of the air pressure of Earth.

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Speaker 1: This lowers the boiling coin of water to something like

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Speaker 1: sixty five degrees celsius, meaning that all coffee comes out

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Speaker 1: weak to earthling taste. That's a bummer. And then Hitchhiker's

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Speaker 1: Guide to the Galaxy something almost but not quite entirely

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Speaker 1: unlike tea. The replicator in h h G G is

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Speaker 1: unable to replicate Earth tea, and when Arthur finally gets

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Speaker 1: it to work, it shuts down the computer, nearly killing

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Speaker 1: everyone on the ship. You know, this is something that

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Speaker 1: I feel like doesn't get explored enough. Uh, The idea

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Speaker 1: of cooking and preparing food and everything in space. We've

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Speaker 1: talked about how foods and drinks don't necessarily taste the

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Speaker 1: same in space because if you're in a microgravity or

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Speaker 1: zero G environment, you're often congested and stuff like that,

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Speaker 1: Like it changes you. The environment changes your ability to

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Speaker 1: taste things. But if you are cooking in space or

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Speaker 1: preparing hot beverages, it also changes the fundamental properties of

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Speaker 1: chemical reactions. Things happen in different temperatures. You might not

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Speaker 1: be able to achieve the same tastes in prepared foods,

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Speaker 1: even if you could taste them the same way. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean it is ultimately a fool's errand to to

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Speaker 1: try and create good space food, Like space food is

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Speaker 1: always going to be space food, or maybe it's maybe

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Speaker 1: it's just a different kind of thing. I mean, who's

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Speaker 1: going to be the first great chef beyond Earth? It's

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Speaker 1: a great question, but there's gonna also going to be

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Speaker 1: a pretty low bar to set, right, Like the first

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Speaker 1: chef on Mars is going to be the greatest mart

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Speaker 1: and chef. Ever, what do you what do you think

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Speaker 1: the first restaurant beyond Earth? What is that going to be? Like?

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Speaker 1: What kind of food will it serve? Well, I would

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Speaker 1: hope it would be like a Taurus pizza. I'm thinking,

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Speaker 1: you know where it spends, because it has to spend

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Speaker 1: to keep the toppings on it. So the the like

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Speaker 1: the outside of the Taurus is just the bottom of

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Speaker 1: the crust. The inside of the Taurus is the surface

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Speaker 1: of the pizza, and so the toppings are held in

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Speaker 1: by what's the trifcal force I think it's gonna be

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Speaker 1: one of those irritating cute cie places that thinks it's

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Speaker 1: just a hilarious to put bacon and dishes where it

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Speaker 1: doesn't belong. Well, we'll see what would be real bacon

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Speaker 1: mill or it would it be like some sort of

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Speaker 1: like a that grown um pig it's grown on the ship,

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Speaker 1: or like a Martian pig variant. So many questions bacon

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Speaker 1: protein product. Okay, what's up next? Well, I think next

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Speaker 1: we should take a short break and when we come back,

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Speaker 1: we will lead some listener mail related to our episode

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Speaker 1: on the Trident. Thank alright, we're back. So the first

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Speaker 1: a bit of trident to email. We did this whole

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Speaker 1: episode about the about the trident, the mythical symbolic nature

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Speaker 1: of the trident, and I believe we we touched on

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Speaker 1: at one point the idea that you don't really see

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Speaker 1: you don't see a trident in nature, that a that

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Speaker 1: a trident is. Is this this human construction and therefore

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Speaker 1: has all of this human meaning associated with it. We

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Speaker 1: had one listener, Cindy Leu right to us on Twitter

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Speaker 1: and she shared a photograph with us of a of

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Speaker 1: a fossil or a reconstructed fossil and says she says, quote,

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Speaker 1: this trilobyte, while a syrops has a trident to pick

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Speaker 1: with you. Uh. And indeed, this particular trilobyte has a

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Speaker 1: trident formation, a trident apendage coming out of its head,

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Speaker 1: like it's a unicorn trilobyte with a trident instead of

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Speaker 1: a single horn. It's the straight up devil. Yeah, she says,

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Speaker 1: um And I wrote her back and said, oh, well

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Speaker 1: that this is wonderful the idea, And she says, thanks.

428
00:21:54,960 --> 00:21:57,480
Speaker 1: Trilobytes fascinating me. They have such a wide collection of

429
00:21:57,480 --> 00:22:00,240
Speaker 1: weird and wonderful apendages. Too bad all we have now

430
00:22:00,280 --> 00:22:02,840
Speaker 1: are their fossils. Or is she saying she wants to

431
00:22:02,840 --> 00:22:06,000
Speaker 1: live in a world where she's completely covered in triobytes? Well,

432
00:22:06,040 --> 00:22:09,520
Speaker 1: I mean it sounds kind of nice. But anyway, I

433
00:22:09,560 --> 00:22:11,720
Speaker 1: was looking into this a little bit, like why is

434
00:22:11,800 --> 00:22:14,800
Speaker 1: this trident there? Why why would the organism have this structure?

435
00:22:15,280 --> 00:22:17,200
Speaker 1: And it turns out there are a few different theories

436
00:22:17,240 --> 00:22:18,919
Speaker 1: as to why it's there. We don't know for certain.

437
00:22:18,960 --> 00:22:21,560
Speaker 1: No one is that it's a means of of of

438
00:22:21,960 --> 00:22:25,120
Speaker 1: of levitating itself above the sea floor, lifting up from

439
00:22:25,119 --> 00:22:28,600
Speaker 1: the sea floor. Essentially, you know, an appendage, or it's

440
00:22:28,600 --> 00:22:32,080
Speaker 1: some sort of a sophisticated sensory organ, or it's a

441
00:22:32,119 --> 00:22:35,800
Speaker 1: mechanism for hiding or defending, or that this is just

442
00:22:35,840 --> 00:22:39,000
Speaker 1: an example of sexual dimorphism and it's you know, somehow

443
00:22:39,080 --> 00:22:41,960
Speaker 1: play it would have played a role in mate selection,

444
00:22:42,600 --> 00:22:47,160
Speaker 1: or it's a sexual or cast polymorphism as in social insects.

445
00:22:48,119 --> 00:22:51,399
Speaker 1: So a few different possibilities there. But indeed, uh, nature

446
00:22:51,480 --> 00:22:53,960
Speaker 1: doesn't give us a lot of tridents, but nature gave

447
00:22:54,040 --> 00:22:56,359
Speaker 1: us at least one trident, and you'll find it on

448
00:22:56,560 --> 00:23:00,320
Speaker 1: a species of trilobyte. That's worthwhile. Trident. Yeah, all right,

449
00:23:00,320 --> 00:23:02,320
Speaker 1: Now Karnie is bringing me another bit of listener mail,

450
00:23:02,600 --> 00:23:05,719
Speaker 1: this one on his own tried and appendage, and this

451
00:23:05,720 --> 00:23:08,440
Speaker 1: one comes to us from Rob. Hey, Robert and Joe.

452
00:23:08,440 --> 00:23:10,159
Speaker 1: I just listened to your episode and tried its and

453
00:23:10,200 --> 00:23:11,880
Speaker 1: not only was it a great listen, but it really

454
00:23:11,880 --> 00:23:14,080
Speaker 1: got my brain grinding away on the magic of the

455
00:23:14,160 --> 00:23:16,440
Speaker 1: number three. That's part of what we talked about in

456
00:23:16,480 --> 00:23:20,000
Speaker 1: the episode is like why do we assigned three this

457
00:23:20,119 --> 00:23:24,560
Speaker 1: magical power? Rob says, quote, I have often bucked can

458
00:23:24,600 --> 00:23:27,879
Speaker 1: convention with my beliefs on two fundamental time measures. I

459
00:23:27,880 --> 00:23:30,879
Speaker 1: don't think of seasons in the term of spring, summer, autumn,

460
00:23:30,880 --> 00:23:34,720
Speaker 1: and winter, but more of extreme transition extreme. I also

461
00:23:34,760 --> 00:23:37,480
Speaker 1: don't think of the day in terms of morning, afternoon, evening,

462
00:23:37,520 --> 00:23:40,879
Speaker 1: and night, but like extreme transition extreme, I think of

463
00:23:40,920 --> 00:23:44,360
Speaker 1: it like the infinity symbol. To the early humans, there

464
00:23:44,400 --> 00:23:47,879
Speaker 1: was a cyclic pattern of time of light, a transition

465
00:23:47,880 --> 00:23:50,560
Speaker 1: of light, a time of dark, a time of transition

466
00:23:50,600 --> 00:23:53,720
Speaker 1: of light, a time of light, et cetera. Similarly, for

467
00:23:53,760 --> 00:23:57,480
Speaker 1: early humans living outside of equatorial areas, there was a

468
00:23:57,520 --> 00:24:00,280
Speaker 1: cyclic pattern of time of warmth and transition of Aren't

469
00:24:00,280 --> 00:24:02,240
Speaker 1: the time of cold, a transition of warmth, a time

470
00:24:02,280 --> 00:24:05,120
Speaker 1: of warmth, etcetera. Maybe that kind of perspective on cycles

471
00:24:05,119 --> 00:24:07,560
Speaker 1: of the day and seasons also led to the magic

472
00:24:07,720 --> 00:24:10,200
Speaker 1: attributed to three I guess the same could also be

473
00:24:10,200 --> 00:24:13,280
Speaker 1: said of lunar cycles full moon transition, new moon, transition,

474
00:24:13,320 --> 00:24:16,879
Speaker 1: full moon, etcetera. Additionally, there's the riddle of the sphinx. UH.

475
00:24:16,920 --> 00:24:20,400
Speaker 1: The answer speaks to three phases of life infant, adult,

476
00:24:20,480 --> 00:24:23,680
Speaker 1: old age UH. This holds true for plants and animals.

477
00:24:23,680 --> 00:24:26,680
Speaker 1: To the ancient paradigm is connected to the much more

478
00:24:26,760 --> 00:24:30,560
Speaker 1: modern maiden mother and chron aspects of the goddess and neopaganism,

479
00:24:30,760 --> 00:24:33,280
Speaker 1: which also helps keep the power of three alive. The

480
00:24:33,320 --> 00:24:35,720
Speaker 1: ancient Greeks had the three Fates, which were said to

481
00:24:35,720 --> 00:24:38,560
Speaker 1: tell the fate of a day of a day's old child.

482
00:24:38,880 --> 00:24:41,680
Speaker 1: Shakespeare had the three Weird Sisters in Macbeth, who also

483
00:24:41,760 --> 00:24:44,720
Speaker 1: prophesies the fate of Macbeth. Uh. There is a clear

484
00:24:44,800 --> 00:24:48,800
Speaker 1: multicultural attribution of magic and supernatural ability to the number three.

485
00:24:49,040 --> 00:24:51,400
Speaker 1: Pure speculation on my part, but I think the perspective

486
00:24:51,440 --> 00:24:54,480
Speaker 1: on days, season's life, human plant, animal cycles, and maybe

487
00:24:54,480 --> 00:24:57,280
Speaker 1: even lunar cycles that I mentioned earlier played a part

488
00:24:57,280 --> 00:25:00,159
Speaker 1: in this attribution. I think these are common experiences too

489
00:25:00,160 --> 00:25:03,480
Speaker 1: many early cultures that early humans would want to explain

490
00:25:03,480 --> 00:25:06,720
Speaker 1: and understand, defining them in a similar way three phases.

491
00:25:06,800 --> 00:25:09,760
Speaker 1: They could all be explained with a single answer, a

492
00:25:09,840 --> 00:25:13,160
Speaker 1: supernatural entity. Oh and then there's the triangle, a very

493
00:25:13,200 --> 00:25:16,840
Speaker 1: stable basic geometric shape with three corners. Three equals stable.

494
00:25:17,040 --> 00:25:19,080
Speaker 1: I remember back in high school one of the cool

495
00:25:19,119 --> 00:25:21,359
Speaker 1: English teachers I had told us to watch movies and

496
00:25:21,400 --> 00:25:24,439
Speaker 1: plays with an eye for people standing in triangles. He

497
00:25:24,520 --> 00:25:27,360
Speaker 1: said that pattern is often used to denote strength, especially

498
00:25:27,640 --> 00:25:30,159
Speaker 1: if there are two people standing in close proximity to

499
00:25:30,200 --> 00:25:34,359
Speaker 1: the camera and a third standing behind and slightly elevated.

500
00:25:34,400 --> 00:25:37,679
Speaker 1: That showed the third person was the leader and that

501
00:25:37,800 --> 00:25:40,359
Speaker 1: role was bestowed by the two others. The variation was

502
00:25:40,440 --> 00:25:43,480
Speaker 1: usually used when the people are moving. The leader is

503
00:25:43,520 --> 00:25:46,879
Speaker 1: in front of the triangle taking a leadership role, with

504
00:25:46,960 --> 00:25:50,120
Speaker 1: the other two falling in behind. He used a west

505
00:25:50,119 --> 00:25:51,919
Speaker 1: side story as an example. Not sure it holds one

506
00:25:52,600 --> 00:25:56,879
Speaker 1: of true at the time, but a fun visual exercise. Nonetheless,

507
00:25:57,280 --> 00:25:59,000
Speaker 1: it could be way off, but it has been a

508
00:25:59,000 --> 00:26:02,520
Speaker 1: fun thought exercise. Thanks for stirring the pot of my imagination.

509
00:26:02,640 --> 00:26:04,959
Speaker 1: Cheers Rock. Yeah. I think this is a bunch more

510
00:26:05,000 --> 00:26:11,000
Speaker 1: examples of the the seemingly um innate magical signaling of

511
00:26:11,080 --> 00:26:13,879
Speaker 1: the number three that it seems to tell us that

512
00:26:14,000 --> 00:26:17,080
Speaker 1: something important is going on, and when something important is

513
00:26:17,119 --> 00:26:19,400
Speaker 1: going on, of course something magical is going on. Yeah.

514
00:26:19,440 --> 00:26:23,200
Speaker 1: I like the point about the triangle structure and film. Uh.

515
00:26:23,240 --> 00:26:25,760
Speaker 1: I don't remember this coming up in film classes I had,

516
00:26:25,800 --> 00:26:29,000
Speaker 1: but I instantly think to say Conan the Barbarian because

517
00:26:29,000 --> 00:26:31,080
Speaker 1: you meet Falsa Doom. But it's not just Thosa Dom.

518
00:26:31,080 --> 00:26:33,680
Speaker 1: Thalsa Doom has got his to his two thugs there.

519
00:26:33,800 --> 00:26:36,920
Speaker 1: You wouldn't have a Thalsa Doom without a finely Thorsen, right.

520
00:26:37,000 --> 00:26:38,600
Speaker 1: And then the other guy whose name I forget that

521
00:26:38,640 --> 00:26:41,160
Speaker 1: was the football player. Yeah, he only has one line

522
00:26:41,160 --> 00:26:43,920
Speaker 1: in the whole movie, but it's the most perfect execution

523
00:26:44,359 --> 00:26:46,359
Speaker 1: of a one word line in a in a film

524
00:26:46,359 --> 00:26:48,720
Speaker 1: I've ever seen. What's the word? It's you. He just

525
00:26:48,720 --> 00:26:51,040
Speaker 1: says you like he sees and it it helps you

526
00:26:51,119 --> 00:26:53,760
Speaker 1: don't remember the dramatic music. But I was thinking it

527
00:26:53,760 --> 00:26:57,359
Speaker 1: would be great if the word is like carrots that

528
00:26:57,720 --> 00:27:00,399
Speaker 1: but that's just as hard, really, I feel. You know,

529
00:27:00,400 --> 00:27:03,040
Speaker 1: when a character has like a whole monologue to really

530
00:27:03,119 --> 00:27:05,879
Speaker 1: lay out how they feel about something, it's also Doom's

531
00:27:05,880 --> 00:27:08,400
Speaker 1: got great monologue. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's also Doom has

532
00:27:08,440 --> 00:27:12,840
Speaker 1: just got miles of of of of dialogue and monologues

533
00:27:12,920 --> 00:27:15,240
Speaker 1: to to just lay out whose character is and what

534
00:27:15,359 --> 00:27:17,880
Speaker 1: defines him. This character has just got that one word,

535
00:27:17,920 --> 00:27:20,080
Speaker 1: and yet he manages to do it, so it's it's

536
00:27:20,160 --> 00:27:24,399
Speaker 1: arguably a better performance. Nice job anyway you will contemplate

537
00:27:24,440 --> 00:27:26,800
Speaker 1: this on the Tree of Woe. Let's move on to

538
00:27:27,119 --> 00:27:30,160
Speaker 1: some emails in response to our episode about the ancient

539
00:27:30,240 --> 00:27:33,520
Speaker 1: aliens ideas, Oh yes, we got some good ones on this, Yeah,

540
00:27:33,520 --> 00:27:35,760
Speaker 1: a lot of good ones here. I was kind of surprised.

541
00:27:35,840 --> 00:27:38,640
Speaker 1: I don't think we heard from anybody who was like, hey,

542
00:27:38,760 --> 00:27:41,040
Speaker 1: I believe in ancient aliens and I'm mad that you

543
00:27:41,080 --> 00:27:43,879
Speaker 1: guys don't. Um. Yeah, I was, well, you know, I

544
00:27:43,880 --> 00:27:46,399
Speaker 1: guess I wasn't hoping for that, but I was thinking

545
00:27:46,400 --> 00:27:50,080
Speaker 1: we might hear from someone who would, maybe you know,

546
00:27:50,480 --> 00:27:52,840
Speaker 1: whould maybe be on towards that end of the spectrum

547
00:27:52,840 --> 00:27:56,440
Speaker 1: as opposed to the more purely skeptic, because we kind

548
00:27:56,440 --> 00:27:59,920
Speaker 1: of we we in that episode we engaged with the idea,

549
00:28:00,119 --> 00:28:03,200
Speaker 1: you know, as as much as we could while remaining

550
00:28:03,240 --> 00:28:05,840
Speaker 1: skeptical about it. We talked about the way Carl Sagan

551
00:28:05,880 --> 00:28:08,199
Speaker 1: engaged with it. Right, the idea is that so like

552
00:28:08,240 --> 00:28:11,680
Speaker 1: the Eric von Danecken approach is obviously you know, that's

553
00:28:11,680 --> 00:28:15,800
Speaker 1: a nonstarter, it's nonsense. But there could be an intelligent

554
00:28:15,840 --> 00:28:18,560
Speaker 1: way to approach this idea and look for evidence of it.

555
00:28:18,640 --> 00:28:21,000
Speaker 1: And Carl Sagan laid out some really good thoughts about

556
00:28:21,040 --> 00:28:23,280
Speaker 1: that and some stuff he wrote in the sixties and seventies. Yeah,

557
00:28:23,280 --> 00:28:26,320
Speaker 1: because while the while a lot of ridiculous stuff has

558
00:28:26,359 --> 00:28:30,160
Speaker 1: been done in the name of this hypothesis. The hypothesis

559
00:28:30,160 --> 00:28:35,240
Speaker 1: itself is is perfectly sensible. If there are aliens, then

560
00:28:35,280 --> 00:28:38,040
Speaker 1: they may have been here before. And that's there's there's

561
00:28:38,120 --> 00:28:41,640
Speaker 1: nothing so shameful about that sentence. What would evidence of

562
00:28:41,680 --> 00:28:43,800
Speaker 1: it look like if it were to exist, right, And

563
00:28:43,880 --> 00:28:46,640
Speaker 1: that's where we and that also is is a fair discussion.

564
00:28:46,680 --> 00:28:48,520
Speaker 1: But then when we look for that evidence, we just

565
00:28:48,560 --> 00:28:51,040
Speaker 1: do not find it. Right. But we did find a

566
00:28:51,080 --> 00:28:53,920
Speaker 1: lot of great listener response to this episode. We did,

567
00:28:54,200 --> 00:28:58,280
Speaker 1: so I am going to read our first one. Let's say,

568
00:28:58,400 --> 00:29:02,040
Speaker 1: let's let's look first at the one from Graham. Graham rights,

569
00:29:02,160 --> 00:29:04,600
Speaker 1: hi all, just now catching up on episodes of stuff

570
00:29:04,640 --> 00:29:06,520
Speaker 1: to blow your mind and just listen to the episode

571
00:29:06,560 --> 00:29:08,840
Speaker 1: on the Chariots of the Gods. The reason I have

572
00:29:08,880 --> 00:29:11,440
Speaker 1: to play catch up now is that I was leading

573
00:29:11,480 --> 00:29:13,920
Speaker 1: some trips of high school students for the New York

574
00:29:13,960 --> 00:29:17,240
Speaker 1: Times and nat GEO student Trips. One of those trips

575
00:29:17,360 --> 00:29:20,440
Speaker 1: was to Switzerland, where I had a chance to take

576
00:29:20,520 --> 00:29:24,440
Speaker 1: one of my students to the Young Frau Park in Interlochen. Yes,

577
00:29:24,640 --> 00:29:27,040
Speaker 1: I knew somebody out there had to have been there.

578
00:29:27,320 --> 00:29:30,120
Speaker 1: I'm an astrobiologist and someone with an interest in the

579
00:29:30,160 --> 00:29:33,160
Speaker 1: ancient aliens ideas. I thought i'd share my experience in

580
00:29:33,200 --> 00:29:35,960
Speaker 1: Young Frau Park. When you arrive at the park, it

581
00:29:36,000 --> 00:29:39,320
Speaker 1: has an eerie feeling of being a memorial to something dead.

582
00:29:40,000 --> 00:29:43,080
Speaker 1: While we were there, we saw only three employees and

583
00:29:43,080 --> 00:29:46,160
Speaker 1: the parking lot was almost entirely empty. There was a

584
00:29:46,240 --> 00:29:49,080
Speaker 1: small school group there when we arrived, but for most

585
00:29:49,120 --> 00:29:51,520
Speaker 1: of our several hours in the park, it was just

586
00:29:51,720 --> 00:29:54,920
Speaker 1: two of us and another pair of people. Since the

587
00:29:54,920 --> 00:29:57,880
Speaker 1: turnout is so low and there are only a few employees,

588
00:29:58,280 --> 00:30:01,040
Speaker 1: most of the exhibits are closed except for at two

589
00:30:01,080 --> 00:30:04,680
Speaker 1: specific times each day. This meant that one employee and

590
00:30:04,720 --> 00:30:07,440
Speaker 1: the other pair of people were with us in every

591
00:30:07,520 --> 00:30:11,280
Speaker 1: exhibit as we made our way around. The exhibits were beautiful,

592
00:30:11,320 --> 00:30:14,600
Speaker 1: with structures built to mimic pyramids of Egyptians and Mayans

593
00:30:14,960 --> 00:30:18,440
Speaker 1: or the vimana of ancient sanscrit stories. Most of the

594
00:30:18,480 --> 00:30:21,560
Speaker 1: exhibits have little pre show halls where you can walk

595
00:30:21,600 --> 00:30:24,000
Speaker 1: at your leisure and read about some of the artifacts

596
00:30:24,000 --> 00:30:27,040
Speaker 1: from ancient peoples that von Danikin and others think might

597
00:30:27,040 --> 00:30:30,280
Speaker 1: have come from alien influences. However, most of these pre

598
00:30:30,400 --> 00:30:33,080
Speaker 1: show areas can be explored in fifteen minutes or so.

599
00:30:33,520 --> 00:30:36,760
Speaker 1: Each exhibit is then really just a movie theater built

600
00:30:36,760 --> 00:30:40,080
Speaker 1: to resemble some facet of the ancient society in question.

601
00:30:40,520 --> 00:30:43,200
Speaker 1: The movies are fun to watch. The mostly seem low

602
00:30:43,240 --> 00:30:45,440
Speaker 1: budget and have c g I that feels like something

603
00:30:45,480 --> 00:30:48,320
Speaker 1: from the late nineties. Oh that's always that's the best.

604
00:30:49,360 --> 00:30:52,200
Speaker 1: Each of these movies presents that some topic related to

605
00:30:52,280 --> 00:30:57,200
Speaker 1: ancient people nasca lines, pyramids, vimana, etcetera, and then presents

606
00:30:57,240 --> 00:31:00,320
Speaker 1: the idea that maybe the constructions and no ledge of

607
00:31:00,320 --> 00:31:03,520
Speaker 1: the ancients came from aliens. There's even a video that

608
00:31:03,560 --> 00:31:07,400
Speaker 1: presents a giant alien space battle in Earth's orbit, although

609
00:31:07,440 --> 00:31:10,440
Speaker 1: the park does present the ideas as being merely possible.

610
00:31:10,800 --> 00:31:12,680
Speaker 1: One thing that I took away from the park is

611
00:31:12,720 --> 00:31:16,360
Speaker 1: that it feels like von Danikin's personal shrine to himself.

612
00:31:16,880 --> 00:31:19,520
Speaker 1: There are copies of his books all over the park.

613
00:31:19,880 --> 00:31:22,680
Speaker 1: There are pictures of him in various places. There are

614
00:31:22,680 --> 00:31:25,600
Speaker 1: even signs saying when he'll be in the park next

615
00:31:25,640 --> 00:31:27,800
Speaker 1: to give a lecture. Though I can't imagine a lot

616
00:31:27,840 --> 00:31:30,880
Speaker 1: of people are there for such events. I can't actually

617
00:31:30,880 --> 00:31:33,680
Speaker 1: see how the park even remains open. Maybe there are

618
00:31:33,680 --> 00:31:35,600
Speaker 1: some other days when they do more business, but I

619
00:31:35,680 --> 00:31:37,920
Speaker 1: doubt they see much more than a hundred people on

620
00:31:37,960 --> 00:31:42,560
Speaker 1: any given day. Cheers. Well, this is direct report from

621
00:31:42,600 --> 00:31:46,080
Speaker 1: the field. Amazing, this is great now. You know, one

622
00:31:46,160 --> 00:31:49,680
Speaker 1: might say, Graham, just because you you know, you didn't

623
00:31:49,720 --> 00:31:53,080
Speaker 1: see evidence for how humans are maintaining this magnificent creation.

624
00:31:53,480 --> 00:31:56,120
Speaker 1: Maybe it is because it is the work of alien

625
00:31:56,480 --> 00:31:59,080
Speaker 1: That is a great thing to point out. Yeah, how

626
00:31:59,120 --> 00:32:03,640
Speaker 1: could humans a loan have conceived such a wonder Another

627
00:32:03,720 --> 00:32:05,320
Speaker 1: thing this makes me think about, with all the like

628
00:32:05,400 --> 00:32:07,800
Speaker 1: pictures of him everywhere in the books, is it makes

629
00:32:07,800 --> 00:32:11,320
Speaker 1: me think about your comparison to l Ron Hubbard. Yeah,

630
00:32:11,360 --> 00:32:14,760
Speaker 1: I do get I did get a strong leron hubbard vibe,

631
00:32:15,440 --> 00:32:18,240
Speaker 1: But I mean still I am jealous that he got

632
00:32:18,280 --> 00:32:20,120
Speaker 1: to go there, because when I was reading about it

633
00:32:21,480 --> 00:32:24,360
Speaker 1: in UM, when we're researching that episode, I just I

634
00:32:24,440 --> 00:32:26,400
Speaker 1: really wanted to check it out for myself. You know

635
00:32:26,440 --> 00:32:29,160
Speaker 1: what this actually makes me think about is how I

636
00:32:29,200 --> 00:32:32,800
Speaker 1: would like to go to a place that's just take

637
00:32:32,840 --> 00:32:35,800
Speaker 1: out the ancient aliens aspect and just have an ancient

638
00:32:35,880 --> 00:32:40,160
Speaker 1: civilizations park that it's just like a giant imagine like

639
00:32:40,200 --> 00:32:45,400
Speaker 1: a Disney World, but it's all recreations of civilizations of

640
00:32:45,400 --> 00:32:47,880
Speaker 1: the ancient world, you know, trying to recreate what a

641
00:32:47,920 --> 00:32:51,360
Speaker 1: street would look like in their culture with original type architecture,

642
00:32:51,480 --> 00:32:55,520
Speaker 1: maybe re rebuildings or recreations of the wonders that they built.

643
00:32:56,320 --> 00:32:59,600
Speaker 1: That'd be awesome because they are truly wonders, and you

644
00:32:59,640 --> 00:33:02,080
Speaker 1: don't have too you don't have to see them through

645
00:33:02,160 --> 00:33:06,320
Speaker 1: the you know, the lens of ancient alien speculation to

646
00:33:06,320 --> 00:33:11,040
Speaker 1: to to give it that wonder Like the pyramids are amazing. Uh,

647
00:33:11,200 --> 00:33:14,640
Speaker 1: you know, these various other you know, architectural or cultural

648
00:33:15,440 --> 00:33:18,280
Speaker 1: creations are amazing and and and they are amazing just

649
00:33:18,400 --> 00:33:21,880
Speaker 1: as pure human creations. And of course you can actually

650
00:33:21,960 --> 00:33:24,600
Speaker 1: visit these the ones that still exist. You can't visit them.

651
00:33:24,600 --> 00:33:26,120
Speaker 1: You can't visit all of them because some of them

652
00:33:26,120 --> 00:33:29,520
Speaker 1: have been destroyed or inaccessible or whatever. But yeah, I

653
00:33:29,520 --> 00:33:31,120
Speaker 1: think it'd be great to build a place like this.

654
00:33:31,200 --> 00:33:33,000
Speaker 1: It's just easier for people to get to, you know.

655
00:33:33,080 --> 00:33:35,760
Speaker 1: We also heard from listener Kira who wrote in and

656
00:33:35,800 --> 00:33:38,160
Speaker 1: she said, hello, there, I was listening to your Chariots

657
00:33:38,160 --> 00:33:40,920
Speaker 1: of the God episode guest today, where you were discussing

658
00:33:40,960 --> 00:33:43,560
Speaker 1: the name of the uh name of the Young Frau

659
00:33:43,720 --> 00:33:47,240
Speaker 1: park in Switzerland. Young Frau actually means virgin in German,

660
00:33:47,880 --> 00:33:50,360
Speaker 1: which added to the weirdness of that park for me,

661
00:33:50,680 --> 00:33:53,520
Speaker 1: which might have been a loss to other listeners due

662
00:33:53,520 --> 00:33:56,840
Speaker 1: to the mistranslation. To young woman, that's what I guessed

663
00:33:56,840 --> 00:33:59,360
Speaker 1: it might have meant, So it's she says, it is

664
00:33:59,360 --> 00:34:01,960
Speaker 1: not that un com and to name mountain peaks young

665
00:34:02,000 --> 00:34:05,760
Speaker 1: Frau or version. But calling this park the Virgin park

666
00:34:06,120 --> 00:34:08,840
Speaker 1: made me chuckle a bit, since it promotes these bizarre

667
00:34:08,920 --> 00:34:12,840
Speaker 1: concepts of human kinds origins, whilst ancient aliens theory also

668
00:34:12,880 --> 00:34:16,279
Speaker 1: touches upon biblical stories where the virgin is obviously an

669
00:34:16,280 --> 00:34:18,880
Speaker 1: important symbol. So I thought it would be amusing to

670
00:34:18,880 --> 00:34:21,960
Speaker 1: point this out since this actually backs up your arguments

671
00:34:21,960 --> 00:34:24,200
Speaker 1: made at the end of the episode regarding the adaptation

672
00:34:24,239 --> 00:34:29,120
Speaker 1: of religious motifs for such pseudoscience alternative religion theories. Although

673
00:34:29,160 --> 00:34:31,080
Speaker 1: these are just my own musings about the name of

674
00:34:31,120 --> 00:34:33,480
Speaker 1: the park, keep out the good work, as your voices

675
00:34:33,480 --> 00:34:36,719
Speaker 1: helped me get through my insomnia and university stresses, So

676
00:34:36,800 --> 00:34:39,879
Speaker 1: please do not ever stop greeting from the Netherlands. Kira,

677
00:34:40,239 --> 00:34:43,000
Speaker 1: We all plan on stopping. Thanks a lot, Kira. Well, hey,

678
00:34:43,000 --> 00:34:45,440
Speaker 1: while we're talking about Young Frau Park, might as well.

679
00:34:45,840 --> 00:34:48,920
Speaker 1: Revisit our comments about Dollywood. We talked about Dollywood in

680
00:34:48,920 --> 00:34:50,920
Speaker 1: an episode for some reason. I guess it just came up,

681
00:34:50,960 --> 00:34:52,959
Speaker 1: and I was just talking about like the different types

682
00:34:52,960 --> 00:34:55,800
Speaker 1: of parks one comes to expect in the United States.

683
00:34:55,880 --> 00:34:58,320
Speaker 1: I think I think I admitted I'd never been to Dollywood,

684
00:34:58,360 --> 00:34:59,880
Speaker 1: so I didn't mean to judge it harshly, but I

685
00:35:00,040 --> 00:35:02,359
Speaker 1: is trying to imagine, if it's a Dolly Parton themed park,

686
00:35:02,440 --> 00:35:06,000
Speaker 1: what is it like Dolly Parton song themed rides? So

687
00:35:06,080 --> 00:35:10,160
Speaker 1: they have a Jolene roller coaster. I was confused, but

688
00:35:10,320 --> 00:35:13,880
Speaker 1: Amy enlightened us. So our listener Amy says, Hi, so

689
00:35:13,920 --> 00:35:17,480
Speaker 1: you guys were talking about Dollywood and implying it's not good.

690
00:35:18,160 --> 00:35:20,120
Speaker 1: I thought the same until I went with my family.

691
00:35:20,440 --> 00:35:23,040
Speaker 1: It is one of the coolest tourist places ever. When

692
00:35:23,120 --> 00:35:25,600
Speaker 1: we went it was International Week. They had acts and

693
00:35:25,680 --> 00:35:27,880
Speaker 1: vendors from all over the world. As part of the

694
00:35:27,920 --> 00:35:30,920
Speaker 1: regular permanent park. There are many local crafters who get

695
00:35:30,960 --> 00:35:34,160
Speaker 1: an excellent place to sell their crafts. They have glassblowing,

696
00:35:34,320 --> 00:35:38,640
Speaker 1: wrought iron, sculpture, yarn and sewing arts. They also have

697
00:35:38,719 --> 00:35:41,680
Speaker 1: a large area of free trade vendors. Next to this,

698
00:35:41,800 --> 00:35:44,800
Speaker 1: there is a bald eagle sanctuary. They have local folk

699
00:35:44,920 --> 00:35:49,680
Speaker 1: musicians and regular exhibits on conservation. Dolly's childhood home is there,

700
00:35:49,680 --> 00:35:51,760
Speaker 1: and it was about the size of a small hotel

701
00:35:51,880 --> 00:35:55,800
Speaker 1: room for her entire large family. They use newspaper ads

702
00:35:55,840 --> 00:35:59,800
Speaker 1: to decorate the walls. Severe Ville, Tennessee, which is basically,

703
00:35:59,800 --> 00:36:02,839
Speaker 1: if you're not familiar with East Tennessee geography, it's it's

704
00:36:02,920 --> 00:36:05,720
Speaker 1: like right next to Pigeon Forge where Dollywood is. Severe

705
00:36:05,800 --> 00:36:10,920
Speaker 1: Ville also or servier Ville is my Canadian UH College

706
00:36:10,960 --> 00:36:14,200
Speaker 1: instructors referred to it at the University of Tennessee Knoxville.

707
00:36:14,480 --> 00:36:17,000
Speaker 1: Um is it. Severeville is also the setting for Corman

708
00:36:17,040 --> 00:36:21,400
Speaker 1: McCarthy's fantastic novel Child of God. Oh yeah, yeah, it is,

709
00:36:21,840 --> 00:36:24,040
Speaker 1: which I do not think is reflected at all in

710
00:36:24,120 --> 00:36:26,359
Speaker 1: the Dollywood attractions. I don't think they have Child of God.

711
00:36:26,680 --> 00:36:29,319
Speaker 1: Have a Child of God ride The scene where he

712
00:36:29,320 --> 00:36:33,200
Speaker 1: goes to get the axe reforged, remember that one? Oh no,

713
00:36:33,280 --> 00:36:34,840
Speaker 1: I don't. I don't remember that scene. I think it

714
00:36:34,880 --> 00:36:37,360
Speaker 1: was more traumatized by other scenes in that time. Oh no,

715
00:36:37,680 --> 00:36:39,960
Speaker 1: that's a great scene. And like the murderer goes to

716
00:36:40,000 --> 00:36:42,400
Speaker 1: get his ax worked on at a forge somewhere, and

717
00:36:42,480 --> 00:36:44,920
Speaker 1: the smith or the forge worker whoever the guy is,

718
00:36:44,960 --> 00:36:47,200
Speaker 1: he like tells him everything he's doing as he does

719
00:36:47,239 --> 00:36:49,759
Speaker 1: it um and then at the end he is like,

720
00:36:49,920 --> 00:36:51,719
Speaker 1: think you could do that. And then the guy goes

721
00:36:51,800 --> 00:36:57,120
Speaker 1: do what Okay, it does ring a bell does ring?

722
00:36:57,560 --> 00:37:00,440
Speaker 1: But anyway, I started picking up. She just Amy continues

723
00:37:00,480 --> 00:37:03,680
Speaker 1: to talk about how Severeful in Tennessee, which is in

724
00:37:03,719 --> 00:37:06,840
Speaker 1: that area, was very poor. Uh and the Dolly Pardon

725
00:37:06,920 --> 00:37:09,560
Speaker 1: put the park there and employed a lot of people,

726
00:37:09,640 --> 00:37:12,960
Speaker 1: created a bustling commercial area. She says, quote, I think

727
00:37:13,000 --> 00:37:14,760
Speaker 1: you should have an episode on one of your sister

728
00:37:14,800 --> 00:37:17,880
Speaker 1: podcasts about it and her. She does many good works

729
00:37:17,880 --> 00:37:20,440
Speaker 1: and is an especially good friend to the drag queens

730
00:37:20,440 --> 00:37:23,279
Speaker 1: who portray her. Goes to show you can't judge a

731
00:37:23,360 --> 00:37:27,959
Speaker 1: theme park by I don't know, well, thanks to Amy,

732
00:37:28,040 --> 00:37:30,360
Speaker 1: I I did not in any way I mean to

733
00:37:30,600 --> 00:37:33,400
Speaker 1: impugne Dolly Pardon. I don't know a whole lot about her,

734
00:37:33,440 --> 00:37:35,359
Speaker 1: but from what I know, I think Dolly Pardon is great.

735
00:37:35,800 --> 00:37:37,879
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I agree. I did not. I certainly did

736
00:37:37,880 --> 00:37:41,319
Speaker 1: not mean to imply that Dollywood was not good. I

737
00:37:41,360 --> 00:37:43,640
Speaker 1: have heard nothing of good, great things about it from

738
00:37:44,000 --> 00:37:46,440
Speaker 1: family members who have gone there and uh, And I

739
00:37:46,480 --> 00:37:48,800
Speaker 1: am aware that that Dolly Parton has has done a

740
00:37:48,840 --> 00:37:50,799
Speaker 1: lot of good work in that area. Yeah, I didn't

741
00:37:50,800 --> 00:37:54,000
Speaker 1: know she did anything with like eagle conservation and all that.

742
00:37:54,680 --> 00:37:56,160
Speaker 1: I wasn't familiar with that. I knew about like the

743
00:37:56,600 --> 00:37:59,799
Speaker 1: job creation in the severe able Pigeon Forge area, but

744
00:38:00,239 --> 00:38:01,919
Speaker 1: but that was about the extent of it. Well, yeah,

745
00:38:01,960 --> 00:38:03,920
Speaker 1: good for Dolly. You know, I don't know if she

746
00:38:04,040 --> 00:38:06,640
Speaker 1: ever would have predicted that people would be out there

747
00:38:06,680 --> 00:38:10,160
Speaker 1: having a conversation about her in a podcast with reference

748
00:38:10,239 --> 00:38:14,399
Speaker 1: to a park in Switzerland about ancient aliens. But but

749
00:38:14,400 --> 00:38:16,960
Speaker 1: but great for Dolly. All right, here's another one from

750
00:38:17,239 --> 00:38:19,840
Speaker 1: that has to do with our our Ancient Aliens Chariot

751
00:38:19,880 --> 00:38:23,880
Speaker 1: of God's episode. This one's from Mike. Mike says, hey, guys,

752
00:38:23,920 --> 00:38:26,960
Speaker 1: listening to your recent discussion regarding ancient alien speculation and

753
00:38:26,960 --> 00:38:29,000
Speaker 1: its appearance in science fiction. I was struck by a

754
00:38:29,040 --> 00:38:32,840
Speaker 1: couple notable to me of missions uh in the in

755
00:38:32,880 --> 00:38:35,840
Speaker 1: the season two episode of the original Star Trek series

756
00:38:36,200 --> 00:38:40,600
Speaker 1: who mourns for an as. I won't summarize it here

757
00:38:40,920 --> 00:38:42,799
Speaker 1: other than to say that it is a It is

758
00:38:42,800 --> 00:38:46,200
Speaker 1: definitely a relevant example with Kirk at one point observing

759
00:38:46,239 --> 00:38:49,600
Speaker 1: that creatures such as he could have visited Earth informed

760
00:38:49,680 --> 00:38:52,799
Speaker 1: the basis of classical Greek mythology. The episode has a

761
00:38:52,880 --> 00:38:57,120
Speaker 1: thoughtful yet playful take on the idea, overlapping most with

762
00:38:57,200 --> 00:39:00,399
Speaker 1: the Carl Sagan school of thought on the topic. Star

763
00:39:00,480 --> 00:39:03,640
Speaker 1: Trek touches on the concept again in the Next Generation

764
00:39:03,680 --> 00:39:07,120
Speaker 1: episode The Chase. This time the speculation is presented in

765
00:39:07,160 --> 00:39:10,080
Speaker 1: a reversal at the end. No guilt for spoilers here.

766
00:39:10,080 --> 00:39:13,120
Speaker 1: The episode is not that strong and conforms more to

767
00:39:13,200 --> 00:39:16,759
Speaker 1: the species of ancient alien speculation we saw in Prometheus.

768
00:39:17,200 --> 00:39:19,600
Speaker 1: I don't know that I could claim either of these

769
00:39:19,640 --> 00:39:22,000
Speaker 1: as the greatest examples of the genre, but they were

770
00:39:22,000 --> 00:39:25,799
Speaker 1: both mainstream programs, and the original series episode would have

771
00:39:25,920 --> 00:39:29,400
Speaker 1: definitely left the nineteen seven viewer with something to think about.

772
00:39:29,600 --> 00:39:31,880
Speaker 1: Love the show, in my honest opinion, best pot on

773
00:39:31,880 --> 00:39:36,480
Speaker 1: the web. Keep it up, Mike, Yeah, and I I

774
00:39:36,560 --> 00:39:39,640
Speaker 1: appreciated this, you know, I um, I've never really watched

775
00:39:39,719 --> 00:39:42,480
Speaker 1: Classic Track. I don't know. I just I have a

776
00:39:42,520 --> 00:39:44,279
Speaker 1: certain aversion to it. I don't know, I just can't

777
00:39:44,280 --> 00:39:47,000
Speaker 1: get I didn't watch it when I was young enough

778
00:39:47,239 --> 00:39:50,040
Speaker 1: or whatever. But but I watched the heck out of

779
00:39:50,239 --> 00:39:52,799
Speaker 1: Star Trek the Next Generation, and I do find like

780
00:39:52,840 --> 00:39:55,440
Speaker 1: now that he mentioned, I do fondly remember the Chase episode,

781
00:39:55,440 --> 00:39:58,120
Speaker 1: and I do remember it feeling really amazing at the

782
00:39:58,160 --> 00:40:00,400
Speaker 1: time when I was watching it in like early junior

783
00:40:00,480 --> 00:40:03,120
Speaker 1: high or something. And that was probably my first encounter

784
00:40:03,160 --> 00:40:05,640
Speaker 1: with the concept of ancient aliens and like a purely

785
00:40:05,680 --> 00:40:08,160
Speaker 1: fictional work as opposed to the you know, sort of

786
00:40:08,200 --> 00:40:10,800
Speaker 1: the pseudoscience of In Search of which I think I

787
00:40:11,280 --> 00:40:15,080
Speaker 1: referenced in that episode. Well, speaking of that kind of amazement,

788
00:40:15,120 --> 00:40:17,560
Speaker 1: I should mention just one last listener mail we got

789
00:40:17,960 --> 00:40:22,799
Speaker 1: about ancient aliens from our listener Alexandra who she She

790
00:40:22,880 --> 00:40:24,600
Speaker 1: said that when she found out we were doing an

791
00:40:24,600 --> 00:40:27,439
Speaker 1: episode about chariots of the Gods, she lost her mind

792
00:40:27,480 --> 00:40:31,200
Speaker 1: a bit, and she said, quote that was one of

793
00:40:31,200 --> 00:40:34,759
Speaker 1: those self discovery, coming of age outlandish ideas books that

794
00:40:34,800 --> 00:40:37,920
Speaker 1: I found fascinating in college. You know, when your personal

795
00:40:37,960 --> 00:40:43,200
Speaker 1: reading list includes books like Celestine Prophecy and Ishmael. I

796
00:40:43,239 --> 00:40:45,719
Speaker 1: love Ishmael, by the way, I don't know. It was

797
00:40:45,760 --> 00:40:49,080
Speaker 1: a book by Daniel Quinn. It's essentially a conversation between

798
00:40:49,080 --> 00:40:52,839
Speaker 1: a human and talking gorilla covering you know, a lot

799
00:40:52,880 --> 00:40:56,960
Speaker 1: of topics about human nature and conservation, etcetera. It's I

800
00:40:57,040 --> 00:40:59,640
Speaker 1: recommend it, I recommend Ishmael. That sounds worth checking out,

801
00:40:59,680 --> 00:41:03,399
Speaker 1: but continues while you all were describing the passage about

802
00:41:03,440 --> 00:41:06,879
Speaker 1: Ezekiel's account of angels in the Bible, and absolutely Yen

803
00:41:07,000 --> 00:41:08,680
Speaker 1: came over me to hear a follow up to this

804
00:41:08,760 --> 00:41:12,000
Speaker 1: podcast on the book Food of the Gods. If it's

805
00:41:12,040 --> 00:41:14,960
Speaker 1: the theme, hear me out. This book explains the idea

806
00:41:15,000 --> 00:41:17,640
Speaker 1: of the forbidden fruit of the Western Adam and Eve

807
00:41:17,719 --> 00:41:21,400
Speaker 1: narrative as being the magic mushroom that when they the

808
00:41:21,480 --> 00:41:24,360
Speaker 1: fruit quote and their eyes were opened and they saw

809
00:41:24,440 --> 00:41:28,319
Speaker 1: the shame in their nakedness a k a. They developed consciousness.

810
00:41:28,360 --> 00:41:31,760
Speaker 1: This narrative explains the concept that psychedelics could have developed

811
00:41:31,760 --> 00:41:34,799
Speaker 1: our concept of God because we projected a creator through

812
00:41:34,840 --> 00:41:38,080
Speaker 1: hallucinations in our own image. It also has some other

813
00:41:38,120 --> 00:41:41,840
Speaker 1: noteworthy concepts regarding the development of language. YadA YadA. Anyway,

814
00:41:42,000 --> 00:41:44,200
Speaker 1: I'd love to hear your view on this book. It

815
00:41:44,239 --> 00:41:47,200
Speaker 1: could get met a real quick. Thanks guys. I love

816
00:41:47,239 --> 00:41:50,520
Speaker 1: your show. Well, we've actually been talking about doing an

817
00:41:50,520 --> 00:41:53,399
Speaker 1: episode on Food of the Gods by Terence McKenna. Yeah,

818
00:41:53,560 --> 00:41:57,240
Speaker 1: it's one of those that I, uh judge from a distance,

819
00:41:57,280 --> 00:41:59,719
Speaker 1: I have not yet been able to ascertain whether it's

820
00:41:59,760 --> 00:42:01,960
Speaker 1: just a bunch of pseudoscience or whether there's some good

821
00:42:01,960 --> 00:42:04,080
Speaker 1: stuff in it, so it might be worth a look

822
00:42:04,120 --> 00:42:07,440
Speaker 1: figure it out. Yeah, I'm I'm looking forward to looking

823
00:42:07,520 --> 00:42:09,520
Speaker 1: at it more closely. I picked up a copy of it.

824
00:42:09,560 --> 00:42:11,920
Speaker 1: I haven't started reading it yet, but uh, I believe

825
00:42:11,960 --> 00:42:15,280
Speaker 1: it was I think I read some some commentary from

826
00:42:15,320 --> 00:42:17,880
Speaker 1: I believe it was John Horrigan who who had some

827
00:42:17,960 --> 00:42:19,680
Speaker 1: nice things to say about Food of the Gods and

828
00:42:19,760 --> 00:42:24,080
Speaker 1: use it as a He was making the argument that

829
00:42:24,080 --> 00:42:27,800
Speaker 1: that this is an example of like the serious Terence mckenne,

830
00:42:27,920 --> 00:42:30,879
Speaker 1: or at least the the Terence McKenna that was that

831
00:42:30,880 --> 00:42:33,560
Speaker 1: that wanted to, you know, actually put on his academics

832
00:42:33,600 --> 00:42:37,760
Speaker 1: hat as opposed to his um shaman shaman hat. Yeah,

833
00:42:37,840 --> 00:42:40,080
Speaker 1: which are both were the hats. We need scientists and

834
00:42:40,120 --> 00:42:43,520
Speaker 1: we need shaman's um, you know, but you shouldn't confuse

835
00:42:43,600 --> 00:42:45,920
Speaker 1: the two. Yeah, we should not confuse the two. So

836
00:42:46,200 --> 00:42:48,400
Speaker 1: look for possibly look for an episode on that in

837
00:42:48,440 --> 00:42:50,239
Speaker 1: the future. We're gonna have We're gonna look, We'll look

838
00:42:50,280 --> 00:42:52,920
Speaker 1: at it and then proceed from there. If if it

839
00:42:52,960 --> 00:42:56,400
Speaker 1: looks like a good topic totally, Thanks Alexandra. So I

840
00:42:56,440 --> 00:42:58,000
Speaker 1: think we should take a look at maybe a few

841
00:42:58,000 --> 00:43:00,520
Speaker 1: short ones before we take another break. How about this

842
00:43:00,560 --> 00:43:03,640
Speaker 1: one from Heidi? I thought this was kind of interesting. Uh,

843
00:43:03,640 --> 00:43:07,000
Speaker 1: this was like some anthropology coming from the world of retail.

844
00:43:07,719 --> 00:43:11,960
Speaker 1: So Heidi says, Hey, guys, I've been in retail for

845
00:43:12,000 --> 00:43:14,719
Speaker 1: all of my working life and have noticed something pretty interesting.

846
00:43:14,840 --> 00:43:18,520
Speaker 1: Imagine a situation where two of the exact same items

847
00:43:18,840 --> 00:43:21,719
Speaker 1: are sitting next to each other on a shelf. This

848
00:43:21,800 --> 00:43:25,759
Speaker 1: happens a lot, especially with items that sell well. I've

849
00:43:25,800 --> 00:43:28,920
Speaker 1: noticed in an overwhelming number of cases, people choose the

850
00:43:29,040 --> 00:43:31,919
Speaker 1: item on the left over the item on the right,

851
00:43:32,320 --> 00:43:35,160
Speaker 1: despite those being the same item. I wonder if the

852
00:43:35,200 --> 00:43:38,200
Speaker 1: reason for this is that we as Americans read and

853
00:43:38,200 --> 00:43:40,839
Speaker 1: write starting on the left side of the paper. And

854
00:43:40,960 --> 00:43:43,640
Speaker 1: if that's the case, is it different in other countries

855
00:43:43,680 --> 00:43:45,480
Speaker 1: where they start on the right side of the paper.

856
00:43:45,800 --> 00:43:48,879
Speaker 1: Love your work, keep it up. That is first of all,

857
00:43:48,880 --> 00:43:51,960
Speaker 1: an interesting observation that I've never made. Yeah, And secondly

858
00:43:52,040 --> 00:43:54,160
Speaker 1: I think that is that sounds like a perfectly logical

859
00:43:54,239 --> 00:43:57,440
Speaker 1: hypothesis for what's going on there. Yeah, that that's worth investigating.

860
00:43:57,480 --> 00:43:59,439
Speaker 1: I wonder if anybody has ever looked in this into

861
00:43:59,440 --> 00:44:01,960
Speaker 1: this science quickly. I mean, if that is a real phenomenon,

862
00:44:02,040 --> 00:44:05,359
Speaker 1: which I trust your experience, it sounds like that very

863
00:44:05,400 --> 00:44:10,280
Speaker 1: well could be. Here's a variation I wonder about, Robert.

864
00:44:10,320 --> 00:44:14,600
Speaker 1: Do you find yourself not wanting to pick the first

865
00:44:14,640 --> 00:44:17,960
Speaker 1: item displayed on the shelf, but rather wanting to reach

866
00:44:18,120 --> 00:44:20,960
Speaker 1: behind it to take the second or third of the

867
00:44:21,040 --> 00:44:24,120
Speaker 1: same item from the shelf at the grocery store. Oh? Yes,

868
00:44:24,560 --> 00:44:27,440
Speaker 1: for two reasons, because the first one has probably been handled,

869
00:44:27,840 --> 00:44:30,040
Speaker 1: and I want something that's handled less, even if it's

870
00:44:30,040 --> 00:44:32,960
Speaker 1: in packaging for some reason. And then also there's this

871
00:44:33,160 --> 00:44:35,240
Speaker 1: perhaps wives tale. I don't know if this is true,

872
00:44:35,680 --> 00:44:38,880
Speaker 1: but somebody at some point told me that the fresher

873
00:44:38,920 --> 00:44:41,440
Speaker 1: items are in the back because they want, you like

874
00:44:41,480 --> 00:44:43,520
Speaker 1: if it's you know, some sort of produce, because they

875
00:44:43,560 --> 00:44:46,480
Speaker 1: want to sell off the older items which are upfront.

876
00:44:47,000 --> 00:44:50,200
Speaker 1: Again that this may be completely, uh, you know, just

877
00:44:50,239 --> 00:44:52,400
Speaker 1: a complete lives tale for all I know, Well, in

878
00:44:52,480 --> 00:44:55,680
Speaker 1: my experience, that is absolutely true. I've worked in groceries. Yeah,

879
00:44:55,719 --> 00:44:58,680
Speaker 1: so not plural. I have worked in a grocery store.

880
00:44:59,360 --> 00:45:02,239
Speaker 1: When I worked and grocery store, I did grocery stocking,

881
00:45:02,520 --> 00:45:06,120
Speaker 1: like dairy and stuff like that, and we absolutely tried

882
00:45:06,200 --> 00:45:08,920
Speaker 1: to order the items so that the freshest ones were

883
00:45:08,960 --> 00:45:10,960
Speaker 1: in the back and the oldest ones were in the

884
00:45:11,000 --> 00:45:14,080
Speaker 1: front because the oldest ones are expiring and you want

885
00:45:14,080 --> 00:45:15,840
Speaker 1: to give them out the door. But of course people

886
00:45:15,920 --> 00:45:17,920
Speaker 1: wise up to that, so they started digging through and

887
00:45:17,960 --> 00:45:21,680
Speaker 1: messing up all your stacks. Uh So, yeah, it's it's

888
00:45:21,680 --> 00:45:24,839
Speaker 1: a it's a foul game. It's a it's a real

889
00:45:24,920 --> 00:45:28,440
Speaker 1: knife in the ribs when you go shopping for dairy. Anyway,

890
00:45:28,440 --> 00:45:30,880
Speaker 1: Thanks Heidi. That that's interesting and maybe we'll return to

891
00:45:30,920 --> 00:45:33,080
Speaker 1: that in the future. All right, here's one This is

892
00:45:33,120 --> 00:45:37,200
Speaker 1: from This is a Facebook message that we've received from Tom. Hey, guys,

893
00:45:37,200 --> 00:45:39,200
Speaker 1: I just listened to your two part episode regarding your

894
00:45:39,200 --> 00:45:41,759
Speaker 1: summer reading list. I think it was Robert who brought

895
00:45:41,840 --> 00:45:44,880
Speaker 1: up Soma the video game and question whether or not

896
00:45:44,960 --> 00:45:48,439
Speaker 1: the game drew any inspiration from Starfish by Peter Watts. Sick.

897
00:45:48,480 --> 00:45:52,759
Speaker 1: That was actually me, but okay, so Tom continues. I

898
00:45:52,840 --> 00:45:58,080
Speaker 1: recently listened to an interview with Frictional Games developer Thomas Gripp,

899
00:45:58,280 --> 00:46:01,279
Speaker 1: who cited Peter Watts is one of the biggest inspirations

900
00:46:01,280 --> 00:46:04,799
Speaker 1: for their games after Lovecraft. Pretty cool, keep up the

901
00:46:04,800 --> 00:46:08,879
Speaker 1: great work, Tom. What do you know? Yeah? Well, I mean,

902
00:46:09,239 --> 00:46:11,200
Speaker 1: like I said, it makes sense when you're when when

903
00:46:11,239 --> 00:46:14,799
Speaker 1: you play Soma, which again is just a fabulous game. Um.

904
00:46:15,520 --> 00:46:17,800
Speaker 1: I mean you do see a lot of starfish DNA

905
00:46:17,880 --> 00:46:22,680
Speaker 1: in there. Definitely the most philosophically interesting video game I've played,

906
00:46:23,000 --> 00:46:25,920
Speaker 1: and with great undersea environments, and so that that's the

907
00:46:25,960 --> 00:46:29,080
Speaker 1: starfish thing the start, well, the undersea environments and the

908
00:46:29,160 --> 00:46:33,960
Speaker 1: creepy nihilism horror. Yeah, okay, one more uh. In our

909
00:46:34,000 --> 00:46:36,759
Speaker 1: summer reading episode, we had a brief discussion about the

910
00:46:36,760 --> 00:46:38,880
Speaker 1: idea of the word soul, which is a word that

911
00:46:38,920 --> 00:46:41,960
Speaker 1: I think is in a lot of ways really linguistically valuable.

912
00:46:42,000 --> 00:46:44,959
Speaker 1: It's like a really powerful good word, but it also

913
00:46:45,040 --> 00:46:48,960
Speaker 1: has all this supernatural baggage attached to it, and I

914
00:46:49,040 --> 00:46:51,920
Speaker 1: was wondering if the word could be rehabilitated for something

915
00:46:51,920 --> 00:46:54,680
Speaker 1: that doesn't have any supernatural meanings, or if there's a

916
00:46:54,719 --> 00:46:59,359
Speaker 1: good alternative word that's as powerful as soul is but

917
00:46:59,360 --> 00:47:03,720
Speaker 1: but doesn't mean like something ghostly or anything like that anywhere.

918
00:47:03,719 --> 00:47:06,640
Speaker 1: Our listener Vassilis got in touch to say, how about

919
00:47:06,640 --> 00:47:11,319
Speaker 1: the word see hey or psyche. It's free of religious connotations.

920
00:47:11,400 --> 00:47:14,000
Speaker 1: Also happens to be the Greek word for soul now

921
00:47:14,120 --> 00:47:17,440
Speaker 1: and three thousand years ago. Oh and it's science is,

922
00:47:17,520 --> 00:47:22,279
Speaker 1: of course psychology. Well that's pretty good psyche psyche. It

923
00:47:22,320 --> 00:47:24,680
Speaker 1: also makes me think of dungeons and dragons and psychic

924
00:47:24,760 --> 00:47:26,960
Speaker 1: damage they can be inflicted. So how do you get

925
00:47:27,000 --> 00:47:30,960
Speaker 1: psychic damage? Oh, you know, we've you know, various spells

926
00:47:31,000 --> 00:47:33,960
Speaker 1: and effects, or you know, gazing into a demon lord's

927
00:47:34,000 --> 00:47:36,640
Speaker 1: eyes too long, that sort of thing. They'll just snap

928
00:47:36,680 --> 00:47:39,839
Speaker 1: you mind flairs, messing with you. They're a whole host

929
00:47:39,920 --> 00:47:43,400
Speaker 1: of ways you can get some psychic damage. Let's do

930
00:47:43,440 --> 00:47:45,360
Speaker 1: one more for Michelle and then let's take a break.

931
00:47:45,840 --> 00:47:49,680
Speaker 1: Michelle also writes about our Summer Reading episodes. She says, Hello,

932
00:47:50,200 --> 00:47:52,680
Speaker 1: I've enjoyed your podcast for many years, from way back

933
00:47:52,680 --> 00:47:54,799
Speaker 1: in the Julie days. I wanted to let you know

934
00:47:54,840 --> 00:47:57,759
Speaker 1: your Summer Reading episode cracked me up and solved an

935
00:47:57,800 --> 00:48:01,080
Speaker 1: ongoing debate between my parents. My parents have a beach

936
00:48:01,120 --> 00:48:03,239
Speaker 1: house in a small town on the central coast of

937
00:48:03,280 --> 00:48:07,120
Speaker 1: California called Cambria, just down the highway from Hurstcastle, which

938
00:48:07,120 --> 00:48:08,719
Speaker 1: is worth a visit if you ever make it out

939
00:48:08,760 --> 00:48:11,120
Speaker 1: to this coast. When I was listening to the intro

940
00:48:11,239 --> 00:48:13,720
Speaker 1: to the first episode, all about the Tom Clancy books

941
00:48:13,719 --> 00:48:16,640
Speaker 1: at beach houses, I thought, how do they know they've

942
00:48:16,680 --> 00:48:19,280
Speaker 1: been to my parents house? My parents have two large

943
00:48:19,280 --> 00:48:22,400
Speaker 1: built in bookcases in their beach house, one whole shelf

944
00:48:22,400 --> 00:48:25,600
Speaker 1: of which is filled entirely with Clancy novels. I went

945
00:48:25,680 --> 00:48:28,239
Speaker 1: up this weekend for a family reunion. My dad asked

946
00:48:28,280 --> 00:48:30,920
Speaker 1: if I listened to your podcast, and started telling me

947
00:48:30,960 --> 00:48:33,440
Speaker 1: about the episode. We just stood there, looking at the

948
00:48:33,480 --> 00:48:36,840
Speaker 1: bookshelf and laughing. He now feels very self conscious about

949
00:48:36,840 --> 00:48:39,600
Speaker 1: his reading choices, but finally realized that he doesn't actually

950
00:48:39,680 --> 00:48:42,320
Speaker 1: plan to ever reread them, and is willing to finally

951
00:48:42,320 --> 00:48:44,320
Speaker 1: give in to my mom, who's been bugging him to

952
00:48:44,360 --> 00:48:47,160
Speaker 1: get rid of them for years. So thank you for

953
00:48:47,480 --> 00:48:50,799
Speaker 1: much entertainment and information, and for the extra two feet

954
00:48:50,840 --> 00:48:53,000
Speaker 1: of room on the bookshelf. I guess I'll just have

955
00:48:53,040 --> 00:48:55,520
Speaker 1: to go buy more books. Oh well, now I feel bad.

956
00:48:55,560 --> 00:48:57,960
Speaker 1: I did not at all mean to make you or

957
00:48:58,000 --> 00:49:00,319
Speaker 1: your dad feel bad about Tom Clancy books I read,

958
00:49:00,320 --> 00:49:02,560
Speaker 1: but you want to read? Yeah, yeah, no, no Clancy

959
00:49:02,600 --> 00:49:05,279
Speaker 1: shaming here. I I read well first of all, my

960
00:49:05,360 --> 00:49:07,680
Speaker 1: dad read a lot of them, uh, and I remember

961
00:49:08,200 --> 00:49:09,959
Speaker 1: like leafing through him. He had a bunch of old

962
00:49:09,960 --> 00:49:12,200
Speaker 1: spy and novels and read. He read a lot of

963
00:49:12,200 --> 00:49:15,960
Speaker 1: other stuff too, But I read I think Cardinal and

964
00:49:15,960 --> 00:49:18,000
Speaker 1: the Kremlin. I think that was the Clancy book I read.

965
00:49:18,000 --> 00:49:20,279
Speaker 1: In it, I remember it does have a very like

966
00:49:20,440 --> 00:49:25,040
Speaker 1: creepy scene towards the beginning where um, a spy has

967
00:49:25,040 --> 00:49:28,680
Speaker 1: been put in this uh uh, this state of sensory deprivation,

968
00:49:28,880 --> 00:49:30,839
Speaker 1: like in a tank in a close suit like kind

969
00:49:30,840 --> 00:49:35,240
Speaker 1: of the original like dark arts John C. Lily version

970
00:49:35,440 --> 00:49:39,319
Speaker 1: of sensory deprivation. Uh. So, I mean, yeah, there's a

971
00:49:39,360 --> 00:49:41,480
Speaker 1: there's a lot of good stuff in those books. I'm

972
00:49:41,480 --> 00:49:45,040
Speaker 1: sure beyond that. So yeah, read what what entertains you,

973
00:49:45,080 --> 00:49:47,560
Speaker 1: what makes you happy? Absolutely it is. It is not

974
00:49:47,680 --> 00:49:49,759
Speaker 1: at all our mission to make people feel bad about

975
00:49:49,800 --> 00:49:53,040
Speaker 1: their reading pleasures. You know, narrative is a sacred retreat,

976
00:49:53,080 --> 00:49:55,799
Speaker 1: and you make that retreat alone. So you know, it's

977
00:49:55,880 --> 00:49:57,400
Speaker 1: not up to us to tell you where you should go.

978
00:49:57,520 --> 00:50:00,800
Speaker 1: But we will tell you this. Uh, don't go away,

979
00:50:00,960 --> 00:50:03,399
Speaker 1: because we're gonna be right back after one more ad

980
00:50:03,440 --> 00:50:06,759
Speaker 1: break and we'll read some more. Listener mails all right,

981
00:50:07,280 --> 00:50:11,080
Speaker 1: thank alright, we're back. What does Carney have for us

982
00:50:11,120 --> 00:50:12,920
Speaker 1: next here? Joe, Well, here's the one that came in

983
00:50:12,960 --> 00:50:15,680
Speaker 1: with reference to our episode about the illusory truth effect.

984
00:50:15,680 --> 00:50:18,520
Speaker 1: I thought this was interesting. This comes from Chris, and

985
00:50:18,640 --> 00:50:21,719
Speaker 1: Chris says, Hi, Robin, Joe. When I was around four

986
00:50:21,800 --> 00:50:24,399
Speaker 1: years old, we visited a fair and my parents took

987
00:50:24,400 --> 00:50:27,480
Speaker 1: a photo of me holding a monkey. I have a

988
00:50:27,600 --> 00:50:30,640
Speaker 1: very vivid memory of the monkey biting me on the hand,

989
00:50:30,719 --> 00:50:33,520
Speaker 1: and remember the handler taking the monkey off of me.

990
00:50:33,920 --> 00:50:36,440
Speaker 1: I'm thirty six years old now and still remember this

991
00:50:36,480 --> 00:50:39,000
Speaker 1: event happening, and my parents still have the photo of

992
00:50:39,040 --> 00:50:41,840
Speaker 1: me and the monkey. The thing is, the monkey never

993
00:50:41,960 --> 00:50:45,320
Speaker 1: actually bit me. Apparently, while I was holding the monkey,

994
00:50:45,360 --> 00:50:47,840
Speaker 1: I was so scared that it would bite me that

995
00:50:47,920 --> 00:50:51,000
Speaker 1: my parents quickly took the photo and dragged me away

996
00:50:51,040 --> 00:50:53,640
Speaker 1: to do something else. Every time I saw this photo

997
00:50:53,719 --> 00:50:55,960
Speaker 1: as a child, I would say that the monkey bit me,

998
00:50:56,080 --> 00:50:58,920
Speaker 1: and my parents would always try and correct me. I

999
00:50:59,000 --> 00:51:01,920
Speaker 1: knew they were wrong. Is I distinctly remember the bite

1000
00:51:02,080 --> 00:51:04,319
Speaker 1: whereas my parents knew I was wrong as they were

1001
00:51:04,320 --> 00:51:06,800
Speaker 1: the ones who took the picture. It seems the fear

1002
00:51:06,840 --> 00:51:09,000
Speaker 1: of the bite as a child caused me to believe

1003
00:51:09,080 --> 00:51:12,799
Speaker 1: it actually did happen, and the repetition by myself of

1004
00:51:12,880 --> 00:51:16,200
Speaker 1: this lie instilled to false memory into my brain. It's

1005
00:51:16,239 --> 00:51:19,200
Speaker 1: bizarre how how over thirty years later, I can still

1006
00:51:19,239 --> 00:51:23,000
Speaker 1: remember this false event happening, even though as an adult,

1007
00:51:23,000 --> 00:51:27,919
Speaker 1: I've come to accept the fact it never actually did. Weird. Huh, Yeah, Chris,

1008
00:51:27,960 --> 00:51:31,719
Speaker 1: that that's that's fascinating, And I think that is absolutely

1009
00:51:31,800 --> 00:51:33,799
Speaker 1: in line with what the research tells us about what

1010
00:51:33,840 --> 00:51:36,400
Speaker 1: our brains are capable of. You. I mean, we we

1011
00:51:36,520 --> 00:51:39,239
Speaker 1: create false memories like this all the time. Maybe not

1012
00:51:39,280 --> 00:51:42,719
Speaker 1: always as vivid as that one, but tons of the

1013
00:51:42,760 --> 00:51:46,080
Speaker 1: stuff you remember doing in your life you almost definitely

1014
00:51:46,160 --> 00:51:49,160
Speaker 1: didn't do. Yeah, And childhood can be very confusing too,

1015
00:51:49,160 --> 00:51:51,480
Speaker 1: about it when it comes to this, because you know,

1016
00:51:51,520 --> 00:51:53,960
Speaker 1: as we discussed, as we kind of explored here, you

1017
00:51:54,000 --> 00:51:57,600
Speaker 1: have memories, kind of faint memories at times about what happened,

1018
00:51:57,600 --> 00:51:59,880
Speaker 1: and you have stories that are told about what happened.

1019
00:52:00,400 --> 00:52:04,040
Speaker 1: And between the two is you know, you you have this, uh,

1020
00:52:04,320 --> 00:52:06,759
Speaker 1: you have what's stored in your head. But anyway, Chris,

1021
00:52:06,800 --> 00:52:09,759
Speaker 1: thanks for sharing that. That is interesting. Here's a quick

1022
00:52:09,800 --> 00:52:13,319
Speaker 1: one that came to us from from Diane uh, and

1023
00:52:13,640 --> 00:52:15,879
Speaker 1: she says, Hi, Joe and Robert, I'm a huge fan

1024
00:52:15,960 --> 00:52:17,799
Speaker 1: of your podcast. I thought i'd send you a pick

1025
00:52:17,880 --> 00:52:20,680
Speaker 1: of what I found while looking through my husband's latest

1026
00:52:20,800 --> 00:52:23,880
Speaker 1: edition of the British science magazine New Scientists in the

1027
00:52:23,920 --> 00:52:27,640
Speaker 1: culture section. The articles are mostly over my artistic head

1028
00:52:27,840 --> 00:52:31,160
Speaker 1: and there's always something to glean. Keep up the fantastic work, Diane,

1029
00:52:31,200 --> 00:52:33,600
Speaker 1: and she sent us a picture where our podcast was

1030
00:52:33,640 --> 00:52:36,840
Speaker 1: mentioned in the pages of the British New Scientists magazine.

1031
00:52:37,360 --> 00:52:40,200
Speaker 1: Thanks New Scientists. Yeah, and and thanks Diane, because this

1032
00:52:40,239 --> 00:52:41,759
Speaker 1: is one of those cases where you know, some of

1033
00:52:41,800 --> 00:52:43,799
Speaker 1: you might if you see something as you might think, oh, well,

1034
00:52:43,800 --> 00:52:46,239
Speaker 1: they probably let Robert and Joe know that they were

1035
00:52:46,239 --> 00:52:48,360
Speaker 1: going to do this, or somebody else tells us know

1036
00:52:48,680 --> 00:52:50,840
Speaker 1: that Diane is the only person who's brought this to

1037
00:52:50,880 --> 00:52:54,200
Speaker 1: our attention. So we appreciate you guys looking out for

1038
00:52:54,280 --> 00:52:56,400
Speaker 1: us like that. Okay, This next one comes to us

1039
00:52:56,480 --> 00:53:01,719
Speaker 1: from Atata is also writing about Lou Sorry Truth Auto Rights. Hi.

1040
00:53:01,880 --> 00:53:05,200
Speaker 1: Agreeings from Helsinki, Finland. From a big fan of your show.

1041
00:53:05,480 --> 00:53:08,439
Speaker 1: I was listening to your latest episode, Illusory Truth Part one,

1042
00:53:09,160 --> 00:53:11,960
Speaker 1: where in the beginning you mentioned the study about scientific

1043
00:53:12,000 --> 00:53:14,239
Speaker 1: knowledge of the American public, and how people had a

1044
00:53:14,280 --> 00:53:18,120
Speaker 1: poor understanding of boiling water physics but a better understanding

1045
00:53:18,120 --> 00:53:21,000
Speaker 1: about the use of uranium. This brought one case of

1046
00:53:21,040 --> 00:53:25,080
Speaker 1: the illusory truth to my mind popular misconceptions about nuclear power.

1047
00:53:25,480 --> 00:53:28,560
Speaker 1: Working both as a researcher and local politician with climate

1048
00:53:28,560 --> 00:53:32,359
Speaker 1: and energy issues, I'd say misconceptions about nuclear energy are

1049
00:53:32,400 --> 00:53:35,960
Speaker 1: among the most popular and most harmful. Nuclear energy is

1050
00:53:35,960 --> 00:53:39,480
Speaker 1: widely thought as horrible for the environment and dangerous for people,

1051
00:53:39,760 --> 00:53:42,439
Speaker 1: Yet when compared to other energy sources and taking into

1052
00:53:42,480 --> 00:53:46,560
Speaker 1: account the scale of energy produced, this is simply not true. Popular,

1053
00:53:46,680 --> 00:53:51,080
Speaker 1: if not so widely spread, are also even more weird misconceptions,

1054
00:53:51,080 --> 00:53:53,520
Speaker 1: such as that nuclear power plants could blow up like

1055
00:53:53,560 --> 00:53:57,720
Speaker 1: a nuclear explosion, or that they emit nuclear radiation continuously

1056
00:53:57,800 --> 00:54:01,160
Speaker 1: in their environment. I suppose these mis conceptions result from

1057
00:54:01,200 --> 00:54:04,400
Speaker 1: the constant exposure to these ideas in popular culture, and

1058
00:54:04,480 --> 00:54:08,120
Speaker 1: also from the deliberate fearmongering by some organizations. Issues you

1059
00:54:08,200 --> 00:54:11,120
Speaker 1: also discussed in the episode. While nuclear power is by

1060
00:54:11,120 --> 00:54:14,640
Speaker 1: no means without challenges, it is a tried and true, scalable,

1061
00:54:14,719 --> 00:54:18,440
Speaker 1: low emission technology, without which our efforts to combat climate

1062
00:54:18,520 --> 00:54:22,080
Speaker 1: change and loss of biodiversity become greatly more difficult, if

1063
00:54:22,120 --> 00:54:24,880
Speaker 1: possible at all. In my work, it is frustrating to

1064
00:54:24,920 --> 00:54:28,799
Speaker 1: correct the widely spread misconceptions over and over again. Understanding

1065
00:54:28,800 --> 00:54:32,240
Speaker 1: the mechanisms of how such misconceptions are created and spread, however,

1066
00:54:32,320 --> 00:54:35,319
Speaker 1: makes it easier to fight ignorance with scientific knowledge. So

1067
00:54:35,360 --> 00:54:38,200
Speaker 1: thank you for discussing this interesting topic. Looking forward to

1068
00:54:38,239 --> 00:54:41,600
Speaker 1: more in part two. Thanks again for your great podcast. Well,

1069
00:54:41,640 --> 00:54:43,680
Speaker 1: thank you, Ata, and I hope part two is useful

1070
00:54:43,719 --> 00:54:46,719
Speaker 1: for you. I gotta say there there are true challenges

1071
00:54:47,080 --> 00:54:50,080
Speaker 1: about what to do about nuclear power and in terms

1072
00:54:50,080 --> 00:54:52,680
Speaker 1: of say, making sure that facilities are secure, and especially

1073
00:54:52,719 --> 00:54:55,160
Speaker 1: trying to figure out what to do with leftover high

1074
00:54:55,239 --> 00:54:57,439
Speaker 1: level waste and stuff like that. But but I agree

1075
00:54:57,480 --> 00:54:59,799
Speaker 1: with you. I mean, nuclear power has a lot of

1076
00:54:59,800 --> 00:55:03,120
Speaker 1: gre it advantages too, especially as a as a low

1077
00:55:03,160 --> 00:55:06,640
Speaker 1: emission alternative to fossil fuel based energy. Yeah, this might

1078
00:55:06,680 --> 00:55:08,080
Speaker 1: be something we might want to come back in and

1079
00:55:08,120 --> 00:55:10,359
Speaker 1: revisit for an episode in the future. All right, here's

1080
00:55:10,360 --> 00:55:15,080
Speaker 1: one from Nadine responding to our Proteus Effect episode. Hi, there,

1081
00:55:15,160 --> 00:55:17,239
Speaker 1: I'm a bit late to this party. That's all right,

1082
00:55:17,800 --> 00:55:21,040
Speaker 1: The party has always open um, she says, But I

1083
00:55:21,080 --> 00:55:23,720
Speaker 1: just listened today to the episode discussing the proteus effect.

1084
00:55:24,040 --> 00:55:26,719
Speaker 1: As part of the enormously fascinating discussion, you touch on

1085
00:55:26,760 --> 00:55:30,000
Speaker 1: the idea of RPG's specifically D and D characters, and

1086
00:55:30,040 --> 00:55:33,280
Speaker 1: how noticeably or not a player may emulate the character

1087
00:55:33,360 --> 00:55:36,360
Speaker 1: outside of the game's context. In particular, my interest was

1088
00:55:36,400 --> 00:55:38,839
Speaker 1: piqued by the discussion of whether or not one might

1089
00:55:38,840 --> 00:55:42,000
Speaker 1: deliberately make use of the proteus effect to consciously make

1090
00:55:42,080 --> 00:55:45,600
Speaker 1: changes to one's own personality based on those characters. I

1091
00:55:45,640 --> 00:55:48,040
Speaker 1: find this intriguing for a number of reasons, not least

1092
00:55:48,040 --> 00:55:51,080
Speaker 1: of which is that I've previously had similar conversations. We

1093
00:55:51,120 --> 00:55:54,279
Speaker 1: didn't specifically refer to proteus effect, of course, not being

1094
00:55:54,320 --> 00:55:56,520
Speaker 1: aware of it at the time, but there are significant

1095
00:55:56,520 --> 00:56:00,799
Speaker 1: parallels for context. I play tabletop RPGs which have been

1096
00:56:00,840 --> 00:56:04,239
Speaker 1: modified for use in an online text based platform. Old

1097
00:56:04,280 --> 00:56:06,920
Speaker 1: school nerds will probably know what I'm talking about. It's

1098
00:56:06,960 --> 00:56:11,280
Speaker 1: efectionally known as uh mushing, it's m U s H,

1099
00:56:11,360 --> 00:56:13,560
Speaker 1: and then I m G m U s H, standing

1100
00:56:13,600 --> 00:56:17,520
Speaker 1: for multi user shared hallucination. In this setting, I have

1101
00:56:17,560 --> 00:56:21,080
Speaker 1: played a minor multitude of character types and personalities. This

1102
00:56:21,120 --> 00:56:23,480
Speaker 1: includes villains by the way. As a writer, I find

1103
00:56:23,520 --> 00:56:26,279
Speaker 1: them fascinating, and because mushing is text based, playing them

1104
00:56:26,320 --> 00:56:30,040
Speaker 1: serves as an excellent exercise and characterization. More to the point,

1105
00:56:30,080 --> 00:56:32,399
Speaker 1: a couple of these characters have been stronger and more

1106
00:56:32,440 --> 00:56:36,320
Speaker 1: well rounded than others. Their personalities were nuanced and clearly developed,

1107
00:56:36,520 --> 00:56:39,959
Speaker 1: with distinctly defined characteristics, and through them I was able

1108
00:56:39,960 --> 00:56:43,360
Speaker 1: to more completely immerse myself in the role play experience.

1109
00:56:43,880 --> 00:56:47,240
Speaker 1: It was thoroughly enjoyable, and in the aftermath of that experience,

1110
00:56:47,280 --> 00:56:49,200
Speaker 1: outside of the context of the game, I discovered something

1111
00:56:49,239 --> 00:56:52,319
Speaker 1: unexpected I find myself. I found myself leaning into some

1112
00:56:52,400 --> 00:56:55,920
Speaker 1: of these characters quite heavily to borrow traits that were

1113
00:56:56,000 --> 00:56:58,719
Speaker 1: quite well developed in them, but which I felt a

1114
00:56:58,760 --> 00:57:01,440
Speaker 1: bit lacking in myself. For example, one of my favorite

1115
00:57:01,520 --> 00:57:05,040
Speaker 1: characters possessed an unflappable sense of self confidence, which was

1116
00:57:05,080 --> 00:57:08,640
Speaker 1: admittedly more than a little bit wish fulfillment on my part.

1117
00:57:08,840 --> 00:57:12,200
Speaker 1: Since playing her, I have frequently deliberately put myself back

1118
00:57:12,239 --> 00:57:14,839
Speaker 1: into the mindset I occupied while in character in the

1119
00:57:14,880 --> 00:57:17,440
Speaker 1: game in order to assume that quality for a while.

1120
00:57:17,520 --> 00:57:22,080
Speaker 1: For job interviews or difficult conversations, etcetera. Any situation in

1121
00:57:22,080 --> 00:57:24,200
Speaker 1: which I feel a little out of my depth and

1122
00:57:24,200 --> 00:57:27,320
Speaker 1: would like to borrow some confidence is fair game. I

1123
00:57:27,360 --> 00:57:29,880
Speaker 1: suppose in a way it's wearing the character like a

1124
00:57:29,920 --> 00:57:33,439
Speaker 1: mask in talking to other players in this hobby. I'm

1125
00:57:33,520 --> 00:57:36,920
Speaker 1: certainly not alone in that tendency. Phrases like Alice is

1126
00:57:37,040 --> 00:57:39,760
Speaker 1: very much in my head today, or o MG, Stephen

1127
00:57:39,880 --> 00:57:42,840
Speaker 1: is so mad at you right now I'm in response

1128
00:57:42,880 --> 00:57:46,120
Speaker 1: to something that the character would not have appreciated are

1129
00:57:46,200 --> 00:57:49,960
Speaker 1: fairly common parlance among my particular play group, and I've

1130
00:57:49,960 --> 00:57:53,400
Speaker 1: observed it in the wider hobby population as well. I

1131
00:57:53,440 --> 00:57:55,720
Speaker 1: don't know how well this experience fits into the overall

1132
00:57:55,760 --> 00:57:58,640
Speaker 1: framework of the proteus effect, is defined by various studies,

1133
00:57:58,800 --> 00:58:02,120
Speaker 1: but it seemed at lee peripherally related enough that I

1134
00:58:02,200 --> 00:58:05,520
Speaker 1: felt I should share it. I adore the podcast. I

1135
00:58:05,560 --> 00:58:07,960
Speaker 1: came to it late, but I'm catching up, and every

1136
00:58:07,960 --> 00:58:11,920
Speaker 1: episode feeds my brain and piques my curiosity. I'm grateful

1137
00:58:11,960 --> 00:58:15,080
Speaker 1: for the amazing content. It's engaging and insightful, and it's

1138
00:58:15,120 --> 00:58:17,880
Speaker 1: soul food for a poly math like me, looking impatiently

1139
00:58:17,920 --> 00:58:20,320
Speaker 1: forward to the next episode. Thank you so much for

1140
00:58:20,360 --> 00:58:23,640
Speaker 1: doing what you do, Nettie. Well, thanks Standin. This is

1141
00:58:23,680 --> 00:58:25,840
Speaker 1: not the only email we've gotten like this. We've heard

1142
00:58:25,840 --> 00:58:30,320
Speaker 1: from multiple people who talk about the idea of um

1143
00:58:30,320 --> 00:58:35,680
Speaker 1: of using some form of role playing outside the confines

1144
00:58:35,720 --> 00:58:38,000
Speaker 1: of the game to change the way they live their life,

1145
00:58:38,280 --> 00:58:42,439
Speaker 1: essentially to get in character to do things. And yeah,

1146
00:58:42,520 --> 00:58:45,040
Speaker 1: I wonder about that. I mean I wonder about how

1147
00:58:45,320 --> 00:58:48,480
Speaker 1: I mean, I know there are like role playing forms

1148
00:58:48,520 --> 00:58:52,440
Speaker 1: of therapy right there, they're like, I don't know all

1149
00:58:52,480 --> 00:58:54,840
Speaker 1: that much about them, but I wonder to what extent

1150
00:58:55,760 --> 00:58:58,000
Speaker 1: And people get kind of literal and deep with that,

1151
00:58:58,080 --> 00:59:00,760
Speaker 1: like going to role playing game for ms of therapy,

1152
00:59:00,840 --> 00:59:03,040
Speaker 1: where like if you lack confidence, they will give you

1153
00:59:03,080 --> 00:59:05,960
Speaker 1: a character to play. I think I've come across some

1154
00:59:06,080 --> 00:59:10,600
Speaker 1: examples of of this being used, um at least in

1155
00:59:10,680 --> 00:59:13,560
Speaker 1: some therapy environments where they're essentially using tinners and dragons

1156
00:59:13,640 --> 00:59:16,560
Speaker 1: or some uh you know, boiled down version of of

1157
00:59:16,640 --> 00:59:20,680
Speaker 1: role playing tabletop role playing now, Nadine and know you

1158
00:59:20,720 --> 00:59:24,360
Speaker 1: asked how that fits with the original produce effect, and

1159
00:59:24,400 --> 00:59:26,640
Speaker 1: I think it seems like a kind of elastic concept

1160
00:59:26,720 --> 00:59:30,800
Speaker 1: now because originally it was referring specifically to physical avatars.

1161
00:59:31,240 --> 00:59:34,160
Speaker 1: It was like, if you play as a character having

1162
00:59:34,160 --> 00:59:38,040
Speaker 1: certain physical attributes, UM. But I think, yeah, you can

1163
00:59:38,040 --> 00:59:40,640
Speaker 1: definitely expand the idea to at least a version of

1164
00:59:40,680 --> 00:59:44,680
Speaker 1: itself that is more all encompassing about playing characters and

1165
00:59:44,800 --> 00:59:48,920
Speaker 1: simulated environments and how those qualities come back to the

1166
00:59:48,960 --> 00:59:52,400
Speaker 1: person playing the character. I wonder about that. I mean it,

1167
00:59:53,560 --> 00:59:55,360
Speaker 1: I think I feel like part of the problem here

1168
00:59:55,400 --> 00:59:58,800
Speaker 1: is that people have different levels of tolerance for situations

1169
00:59:58,840 --> 01:00:02,600
Speaker 1: like role playing. You know, Robert, you probably don't have

1170
01:00:02,640 --> 01:00:05,200
Speaker 1: this because you actually do play D and D. But

1171
01:00:05,240 --> 01:00:07,360
Speaker 1: I know a lot of adults would probably be like, oh,

1172
01:00:07,400 --> 01:00:09,640
Speaker 1: that's silly. You know, I'd be too embarrassed to do

1173
01:00:09,720 --> 01:00:12,640
Speaker 1: something like that. But it seems like something that's worth

1174
01:00:12,680 --> 01:00:15,080
Speaker 1: giving a try, even if you feel like it might

1175
01:00:15,120 --> 01:00:17,320
Speaker 1: be embarrassing or like you don't know how to do it.

1176
01:00:18,440 --> 01:00:20,640
Speaker 1: I bet it's worth checking out for most people who

1177
01:00:20,720 --> 01:00:24,400
Speaker 1: feel some kind of character based inadequacy, or like there's

1178
01:00:24,440 --> 01:00:26,920
Speaker 1: something that you want to do but can't. Yeah, I

1179
01:00:27,000 --> 01:00:29,400
Speaker 1: mean to to to tie into another episode. I feel

1180
01:00:29,400 --> 01:00:31,440
Speaker 1: like this is one of the great appeals of Werewolf,

1181
01:00:31,880 --> 01:00:34,880
Speaker 1: which which if depending on how you play it, can

1182
01:00:35,040 --> 01:00:38,560
Speaker 1: incorporate at least some mild role playing elements or you know,

1183
01:00:38,720 --> 01:00:40,800
Speaker 1: or or you can get a little more robust with it,

1184
01:00:41,120 --> 01:00:46,120
Speaker 1: but it does have players engaging in these extremes of

1185
01:00:46,360 --> 01:00:48,920
Speaker 1: human behavior they don't necessarily get to, you know, employ

1186
01:00:48,920 --> 01:00:53,400
Speaker 1: on a regular basis, namely, um, actively deceiving your friends

1187
01:00:53,440 --> 01:00:58,680
Speaker 1: and or family, or persecuting your friends and family, um

1188
01:00:59,240 --> 01:01:03,600
Speaker 1: and ordering their execution for lecanthropy. Uh. You know, all

1189
01:01:03,600 --> 01:01:07,600
Speaker 1: these sort of you know, extreme modes of human social behavior. Yeah,

1190
01:01:07,600 --> 01:01:14,120
Speaker 1: except is it good to practice lying? I don't know, Uh, well, good, Uh,

1191
01:01:14,160 --> 01:01:16,080
Speaker 1: I don't know if good is the word. I don't know.

1192
01:01:16,120 --> 01:01:19,720
Speaker 1: That just sounds like we're wolf talk there, Joe. Is

1193
01:01:19,720 --> 01:01:23,000
Speaker 1: it good to practice persecuting? Yes? Or maybe it's an

1194
01:01:23,000 --> 01:01:25,160
Speaker 1: outlet for persecution. I don't know, you know, I mean,

1195
01:01:25,160 --> 01:01:27,600
Speaker 1: it's it's something humans are obviously good at. And if

1196
01:01:27,600 --> 01:01:29,400
Speaker 1: you're gonna do it, I would prefer it be the

1197
01:01:29,880 --> 01:01:33,120
Speaker 1: be fictional werewolves within a you know, a parlor game.

1198
01:01:33,680 --> 01:01:36,480
Speaker 1: They should be the ones to suffer. Yes, swing your

1199
01:01:36,480 --> 01:01:39,080
Speaker 1: silver sword at a werewolf, not at somebody who made

1200
01:01:39,120 --> 01:01:41,560
Speaker 1: you mad on the internet. Right, all right, So that

1201
01:01:41,640 --> 01:01:44,640
Speaker 1: you have it another installment of listener Mail. There were

1202
01:01:44,640 --> 01:01:46,440
Speaker 1: still a few great ones that we didn't get to

1203
01:01:46,560 --> 01:01:48,800
Speaker 1: that we had lined up. Maybe we'll get to those

1204
01:01:49,000 --> 01:01:51,520
Speaker 1: uh next month or so when we do another listener

1205
01:01:51,560 --> 01:01:54,600
Speaker 1: mail installment, and certainly uh feel free to write in

1206
01:01:54,800 --> 01:01:58,800
Speaker 1: with new comments about new episodes, new comments about old episodes,

1207
01:01:59,200 --> 01:02:01,800
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1208
01:02:01,840 --> 01:02:04,120
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1209
01:02:04,160 --> 01:02:07,800
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1210
01:02:08,200 --> 01:02:11,160
Speaker 1: respond to or read out every great message we get,

1211
01:02:11,200 --> 01:02:13,760
Speaker 1: but we we really do appreciate them, So keep them coming,

1212
01:02:14,080 --> 01:02:16,040
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1213
01:02:16,080 --> 01:02:17,960
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1214
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1215
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1216
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1221
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1222
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1223
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1224
01:02:47,440 --> 01:02:49,600
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1225
01:02:49,680 --> 01:02:51,800
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1226
01:02:51,880 --> 01:02:54,480
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1227
01:02:54,560 --> 01:02:56,840
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1228
01:02:56,880 --> 01:02:59,600
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1229
01:02:59,800 --> 01:03:02,400
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1230
01:03:02,440 --> 01:03:14,800
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1231
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1232
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