Speaker 1: How do you everybody happy Saturday morning? I hope you
Speaker 1: have watched your cartoons and have a belly full of
Speaker 1: sugary cereal, because right now you're about to listen to
Speaker 1: our episode on afrods X from March twelve nine. That's right, everyone, Uh,
Speaker 1: lock the kids away, don't let him here because this
Speaker 1: one's all about food and drink. That makes you. Uh
Speaker 1: what the birds say, Randy, I believe so so please
Speaker 1: to enjoy everyone Affords X. Right now, welcome to Stuff
Speaker 1: you should know from house stuff Works dot com. Hey,
Speaker 1: and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Chuck Bryant.
Speaker 1: Welcome yourself, buddy. Welcome Josh, Thank you Chuck. Sure that
Speaker 1: felt pretty good? Actually did it? Just try it? Try it?
Speaker 1: Welcome yourself. Welcome Chuck. How do you feel relaxed? Good? Good? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it has a nice effect. It does you know what
Speaker 1: it doesn't have a nice effect. It depends what you're
Speaker 1: talking about. Okay, well, I'll just tell you Spanish fly.
Speaker 1: But it turns out I did a little research on this.
Speaker 1: Um I found out that Spanish flight is not even
Speaker 1: a fly. It's a type of beetle and the active ingredient.
Speaker 1: It's actually crushed up, dried and crushed up beetles powdered. Correct.
Speaker 1: And the reason they powder the beatles is because they're
Speaker 1: trying to get to this um, this acid that the
Speaker 1: beetle emits when it's um scared, when it's it's threatened.
Speaker 1: And this acid actually, you know, has long been thought
Speaker 1: to create amorousness in people. That's correct. I can tell
Speaker 1: you the reason they they they thought they were aroused,
Speaker 1: They were actually confusing euro genital tract irritation. This stuff
Speaker 1: actually burns from the inside out. Yeah, and it can
Speaker 1: actually cause kidney damage. And I think convulsion is death.
Speaker 1: No Spanish fly, you should never take this for any reason. No,
Speaker 1: so of course, you know, as as you know, I
Speaker 1: I'd like to do lots of research. It's like my thing,
Speaker 1: it is, right, Um. I started researching aphrodisiacs in general,
Speaker 1: and here we are at this podcast. Nice intro there,
Speaker 1: thank you. I believe the word comes from the Greek
Speaker 1: goddess of love, Aphrodite, Is that right? Yeah, that's what
Speaker 1: I hear. And an aphrodisiac, by definition, is an element
Speaker 1: that evokes or stimulates, uh, sexual desire. Yeah, we should
Speaker 1: probably make the distinction because I think a lot of
Speaker 1: people think aphrodisiacs um are our performance sexual performance enhancing
Speaker 1: compound or whatever, right, and not true at all, Like
Speaker 1: a viagra would definitely not be considered an aphrodisiac. No, no,
Speaker 1: so uh, but nor would Spanish fly right correct. Well,
Speaker 1: let's talk about sexual arousal, Chuck. Okay, all right, let's
Speaker 1: just keep it cool, Chuck. If I had a dime
Speaker 1: for every time you told me that I would keep
Speaker 1: it cooler, Let's talk about sexual arousal. Keeping cool okay, gotcha? Um? So,
Speaker 1: Medically speaking, sexual arous us all um begins when we
Speaker 1: take in something through one of our senses, um that
Speaker 1: that we find sexually stimulating, right, and then all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, the limbic globe kicks in, right, That's where
Speaker 1: it all starts. This is part of the brain's reward
Speaker 1: center and it's activated, and uh, it says, hey, I'm
Speaker 1: sexually stimulated. So I'm going to send a neurological signal
Speaker 1: through the nervous system down to the blood vessels in
Speaker 1: the pelvic area and it says open, sesame, and the
Speaker 1: blood vessels open and all this blood comes rushing in
Speaker 1: and even better because this wouldn't do a whole lot
Speaker 1: the blood vessels close behind this this influx of blood,
Speaker 1: so the door shuts essentially, yes, keeping the blood well,
Speaker 1: not trapped. But well, yeah, I say trapped is fine, Okay,
Speaker 1: I guess that just has a negative implication, right, Well,
Speaker 1: whether whether it's trapped or not, what you got is
Speaker 1: an erect penis an erection in women as well. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was surprised to find this as well. The clear
Speaker 1: is actually goes undergoes a very similar process. And there
Speaker 1: you have it. So all of a sudden you are
Speaker 1: turned on and basically ready for sex. But that's not it.
Speaker 1: There's there's other physiological responses going on when you're when
Speaker 1: you're sexually aroused, right, it's what I'm told. Can you
Speaker 1: fill me in on those? I certainly can. Well, your
Speaker 1: heart rate increases, UM, and pleasure producing chemicals like nora
Speaker 1: ep and ephron and dopamine are are suddenly released into
Speaker 1: the brain and it's it's go time, that's right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So that that's sexual arousal and UM. For an aphrodisiac
Speaker 1: to work, it would have to produce sexual arousal, right, right,
Speaker 1: and it could do this in one of two ways,
Speaker 1: correct through the mind, like basically recreating that or stimulating
Speaker 1: that right absolutely. For instance, something that might increase blood
Speaker 1: flow to your sex organs, it might simulate feelings of intercourse,
Speaker 1: so that has the effect of creating desire, right okay,
Speaker 1: or it can all so we just go straight to
Speaker 1: the horse's mouth, right so to speak. Go ahead, Well
Speaker 1: it can. It can create increased circulation, increased circulatory flow
Speaker 1: in the genitals, and that's actually chemical physical reaction that
Speaker 1: takes place. Right. The problem is is UM as far
Speaker 1: as our beloved f D A UM Food and Drug Administration. Sure, yeah,
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you for that. I was trying to
Speaker 1: come up with a peanut butter salmon ella joke but
Speaker 1: couldn't write. Maybe too soon. Actually, um, they they they
Speaker 1: don't recognize any compound, any UM, any chemical at all
Speaker 1: as an aphrodisiac, right, I mean, they've done studies over
Speaker 1: the year's plenty of them, but they can't absolutely say
Speaker 1: with certainty that one thing is an aphrodisiac or not
Speaker 1: because the libido is a hard to define and be
Speaker 1: even harder to study. Well, I was also interested to
Speaker 1: find out, um, we're not entirely certain how testosterone and
Speaker 1: estrogen factor into this. UM. It turns out that you know,
Speaker 1: we know at testosterone has an impact on sexual arousal
Speaker 1: because men who UM have trouble getting sexual or men
Speaker 1: who have low testosterone production have trouble getting sexually aroused.
Speaker 1: So we know what factors that we just don't quite
Speaker 1: know where UM and testosterone. You know, usually associate estrogen
Speaker 1: with women UM, but tests asterone has an effect on
Speaker 1: their sexual arousal as well. Women who participated in a
Speaker 1: two thousand study at the University of you trecked UM.
Speaker 1: They gave them a testosterone sublingually and they found that
Speaker 1: UM genital arousal UM increased dramatically in women with low libido. Yeah. Interesting,
Speaker 1: so they didn't they didn't report an increase in sexual arousal.
Speaker 1: But you know, by extension, you could say, you know, right, well,
Speaker 1: I do know that testosterone therapy is something that men
Speaker 1: undergo that have a low libido. Yes, whether it's a
Speaker 1: cream or I think they have injections, or if they
Speaker 1: like to get in bar fights, that's why they do
Speaker 1: that too. Yes, Okay, so the FDA doesn't recognize anything,
Speaker 1: but there's still plenty of people out there who think
Speaker 1: certain foods, certain extracts, plants um are aphrodisiacs. And this
Speaker 1: is this is nothing new, like some of these these
Speaker 1: ideas go really far back. How far back? Well, it
Speaker 1: turns out that the Persians were fairly randy folks. Um.
Speaker 1: And and we're talking ancient Persia. Um, I believe pre
Speaker 1: Kama Sutra, which came out in uh oh, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna go ahead and invite some viewer mail
Speaker 1: and say the sixth century a d r. So the
Speaker 1: Persians were. They had one um belief that honey it
Speaker 1: was an aphrodisiac. And apparently it has no no active
Speaker 1: ingredient in it whatsoever that could produce an aphrodisiac effect. Um.
Speaker 1: But there is an interesting little tidbit in there, isn't there.
Speaker 1: I think you're about the honeymoon. Yes, yes, they would
Speaker 1: drink honey for a month after they got married, and
Speaker 1: that was called the honeymoonth which later became honeymoon. Is
Speaker 1: that right? And if you go by the lunar calendars
Speaker 1: the ancient Persians did, then a moon from full moon
Speaker 1: to full moon is a month. So yeah, honeymoon. And
Speaker 1: even further back I think, um, ancient rome. Yeah, well
Speaker 1: that's not further back, it's about the same time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they were big into aphrodisiacs. Um. I think one of
Speaker 1: their favorites was oysters, right, Yeah. Oysters usually tops the lists.
Speaker 1: When people are going to make a top ten list
Speaker 1: of aphrodisiacs, people always put oysters at the top. And
Speaker 1: one of the reasons, there's a few reasons. Um. One
Speaker 1: of the reasons is is loaded with zinc and zinc
Speaker 1: if you don't have enough zinc as a man, then
Speaker 1: your sperm can out in your fertility are affected. And
Speaker 1: it also has a bunch of iron, and an iron
Speaker 1: deficiency could lead you to be too tired, which doesn't
Speaker 1: usually lend itself to uh to love making as it were.
Speaker 1: And a final reason, and I think this might segue
Speaker 1: over to something else, is that a lot of aphrodisiacs
Speaker 1: are phallusis that is, they resemble a sex organ, which
Speaker 1: one well, an oyster is has been said that it
Speaker 1: resembles the female sex organ. Yeah. And I know another
Speaker 1: one on the list was avocados, or supposedly an afrodis
Speaker 1: favorite because they in fact, I think that's known as
Speaker 1: the testicle tree in ancient Rome because they resemble a
Speaker 1: man's testicles as tex Aztecs. Yeah, okay, yeah, they grow
Speaker 1: in pairs in their wrinkly and that people considered avocados
Speaker 1: um aphrodisiacs. Right, And that's a common theme, I know,
Speaker 1: you know, um it's something that just resembles a sex organ.
Speaker 1: Uh you know, carrots, cucumbers, annas, bananas, um figs. Figs
Speaker 1: are said to resemble the female genitalia. Interesting. Um, so yeah,
Speaker 1: all these things have long been considered across cultures sometimes
Speaker 1: to be aphrodisiacs. Right. It's hard for me to think
Speaker 1: that our ancient brothers and sisters were very smart when
Speaker 1: you hear about things like this. Now, they were fairly
Speaker 1: superstitious folks. Yeah, I mean it just sounds silly at
Speaker 1: this point. You know, avocados look like testicle, so if
Speaker 1: I eat them, that will make me virile. Well even
Speaker 1: even more direct than that, like not they they would
Speaker 1: also eat things that didn't just remind them of sex organs.
Speaker 1: They would actually eat sex organs of other animals. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the one I was a little blown away by. So,
Speaker 1: like it makes you wonder, like how many countless um
Speaker 1: and usually it was an animal that was known for
Speaker 1: its prolific um uh copulation, maybe um orrility or strength.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it makes you wonder how many um countless
Speaker 1: tiger and rabbit and bull penises were eating for the years,
Speaker 1: you know, and still it goes on today. Um there's
Speaker 1: actually again non FDA approved drugs outside of the US
Speaker 1: that still grind up these things. I don't think anybody's
Speaker 1: dining on them any longer. But um, yeah, I know
Speaker 1: jensing was one of your favorites, right yeah, Um there,
Speaker 1: I guess we should say that there are some things
Speaker 1: out there that could conceivably be aprodes acts. They could
Speaker 1: produce sexual arousal right, right, they actually affect affect you chemically,
Speaker 1: but yeah, they don't know if it's enough to Actually
Speaker 1: I think that's where the gray area is exactly like
Speaker 1: it's there, But could it really have any you know,
Speaker 1: noticeable effect. Um. And one of those is jen sing
Speaker 1: And there was a study that they they they I
Speaker 1: don't remember who conducted it, but they tested men, they
Speaker 1: gave them jensing and then they tested them, uh using
Speaker 1: the Mean International Index of erectile function, and uh it
Speaker 1: was shown to increase score. So enough said, jensing works.
Speaker 1: Do you have it? Yeah, it's always a mood booster
Speaker 1: two right, Yeah, I think it's an energy booster. Well, ye,
Speaker 1: stuff which is actually pretty tasty. Is it a lot
Speaker 1: of the aphrodisiacs They say. It may not be a
Speaker 1: direct like chemical correlation to your you know, pelvic region,
Speaker 1: but it'll do things like give you energy and a
Speaker 1: sort of a two B two. See. If it gives
Speaker 1: you energy, then you're more likely to be aroused and
Speaker 1: in the mood for intercourse, whereas if something SAPs your energy,
Speaker 1: you're going to be you know, like if you eat
Speaker 1: a a lasagna by yourself, it's probably not gonna inspire
Speaker 1: you to unless you're Henry the eighth or something. I guess, right, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: and you make a valid point. Um, it's just that
Speaker 1: science hates it when you jump from A to C exactly.
Speaker 1: You know, even if there is a direct correlation or
Speaker 1: causation that they really like to get that be in
Speaker 1: place first, you know. Um. But yeah, so in Jensing
Speaker 1: is not the only one. There's a there's other. Like
Speaker 1: you said, oysters are full of zinc and iron and
Speaker 1: other stuff. Um, and chocolate actually, which is always associated
Speaker 1: with love and romance. Um that it actually has fennal
Speaker 1: ethel mean and uh serotonin. So these things are actually
Speaker 1: an abundance of ply And we can't ingest these things.
Speaker 1: Our body produces these naturally, but um, we can ingest
Speaker 1: them and react to them conceivably. It makes you wonder
Speaker 1: how much chocolate you'd have to eat to really get off,
Speaker 1: like perhaps like several goblets full. Josh, I think you're
Speaker 1: talking about Mona Zuma, who was the Aztec ruler who
Speaker 1: reportedly would drink like fifty goblets of chocolate a day
Speaker 1: to increase his sexual desire. I cannot believe he died
Speaker 1: from being murdered and beheaded right and exploding right. Definitely,
Speaker 1: chocolates nicely done. Should we talk about smell? I think
Speaker 1: we should because I gotta tell you, if I put
Speaker 1: stock into any um afrodisiac, it would have to be
Speaker 1: it would have to have something to do with smell. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's not always food, it's not always tastes. I know
Speaker 1: they say that like music and exercise can be afrodisacs. Sure, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: I can tell you um that swimming just the release
Speaker 1: of endorphins actually is it definitely increases um interest. Interesting,
Speaker 1: is that sterile enough of the word. It is very
Speaker 1: very well done there, josh uh. If we're talking smell
Speaker 1: um Dr Hirsch, Dr Alan Hirsch of the Smell and
Speaker 1: Taste Treatment and Research Center in Chicago. Yeah, that's a
Speaker 1: good center. Um. He did a study that looked at
Speaker 1: different smells and as we were talking about the other day,
Speaker 1: you like to say, he he spent a career wafting
Speaker 1: smells under men's noses to see what stimulated them and
Speaker 1: measuring their penises. That's right, at the same time, and
Speaker 1: he found some interesting things. Um, cheese pizza, for instance,
Speaker 1: increased blood flow to the penis by five, buttered popcorn
Speaker 1: by nine. And then the one that really shocked me, lavender,
Speaker 1: and then pumpkin pie actually increased blood flow by which
Speaker 1: that's pretty big. You could overcome a lot of sluggishness
Speaker 1: with with that much blood and fusion, right, But that
Speaker 1: kind of to me. And Thanksgiving was when you pumpkin pile.
Speaker 1: Lot of times that flies right in the face of
Speaker 1: eating turkey and watching football and stuff in your belly.
Speaker 1: And actually, pumpkin pie didn't just have an effect on men,
Speaker 1: had a big effect on women. But the top or
Speaker 1: the biggest. The biggest one actually is a combination of
Speaker 1: sense that aroused women is a combination of the horrid
Speaker 1: and discussing black licorice flavored good and plenty candies mixed
Speaker 1: with cucumber smell. It drives the women patty right, So,
Speaker 1: long story short, I keep those things in my glove compartment.
Speaker 1: A cucumber garden in your yard. Yes, actually it's growing
Speaker 1: in my back seat. Wow, that's I have nothing else
Speaker 1: to say. I don't think there's anything else say, but
Speaker 1: I do. Actually, I do have more to say. Let's
Speaker 1: hit pheromones up real quick. Oh yeah, this is you're
Speaker 1: all over this. So pheromones basically have long been identified
Speaker 1: as like a way that maybe we attract one another.
Speaker 1: Remember that awesome study you told me about. I can't
Speaker 1: remember what podcast it was, but they they had women
Speaker 1: um wearing shirts for like a week and then they
Speaker 1: had guys smell the shirts right to determine their level
Speaker 1: of attraction by smell. Right, Yeah, and it was right
Speaker 1: on the money. Yeah. Well, if if it was right
Speaker 1: on the money, then they really looked out. Because you
Speaker 1: need a U a a extrasensory organ that not all
Speaker 1: of us humans have. A vemarone nasal organ never heard
Speaker 1: of it? Okay, Well, basically it's like, uh, it's like
Speaker 1: an addition to our to our olfactory nerve our noses basically,
Speaker 1: and we can pick out packets of information from pheromones. Uh.
Speaker 1: I don't know if we can necessarily, that's never been proven,
Speaker 1: but in the animal kingdom it's very prevalent, uh so.
Speaker 1: And they pheromones are produced and emitted through urine. Right,
Speaker 1: So if your dog spray somewhere and then another dog
Speaker 1: comes along and just can't stop sniffing, what the other
Speaker 1: dogs doing is actually determining the health of the uh
Speaker 1: the urinating dogs um immune system and also determining if
Speaker 1: it would be a good match to produce offspring, because apparently,
Speaker 1: ultimately what you want when you mate with another persons
Speaker 1: as far as animalistically speaking, um, you are looking for
Speaker 1: somebody with a compatible but opposite immune system so that
Speaker 1: the offspring you produce has the resistance to the most
Speaker 1: disease as possible. Well in the same in humans. That's
Speaker 1: what the original smells from the other podcast, right, um.
Speaker 1: But yeah, the problem is is not all of us
Speaker 1: have that vemorone nasal oregan um, but There was a
Speaker 1: study that that what we emit pheromones in our sweat,
Speaker 1: by the way, are urine, which is good for us,
Speaker 1: because yeah, it'd be we'd have a different society if
Speaker 1: if that were the case. Well, there was a study.
Speaker 1: It was a kind of an informal study. Um and uh.
Speaker 1: These guys sprayed um pheromones on one member of a
Speaker 1: set of twin girls and popped the two of them
Speaker 1: side by side at a bar on a Saturday night
Speaker 1: and waited to see if there was a difference in
Speaker 1: which one was hit on more. The one that got
Speaker 1: the boost of pheromones was picked up three times more
Speaker 1: than are identical yet untreated twin sister. So the girl
Speaker 1: that was laced with pheromones very cool. So pheromones ephrodesiacs.
Speaker 1: I feel like I've gotten a lot off my chest, right.
Speaker 1: I know. They a lot of people believe in efforts X,
Speaker 1: but the scientific community, the FDA, as you said, does
Speaker 1: not support it. In the scientific community thinks there's also
Speaker 1: a likelihood that it just could be a placebo. If
Speaker 1: you if you think you eat an oyster and you're
Speaker 1: gonna feel a little more inspired, uh, sexually than you're
Speaker 1: gonna eat the oyster and feel inspired. And hey, you
Speaker 1: know what if that if even if you're just fooling
Speaker 1: yourself whatever, I say that and justifies the means in
Speaker 1: that case Placebo's work. Yeah, well good, okay, Now is
Speaker 1: a listener real time? Yes, let's get on with it, Josh.
Speaker 1: I think we're gonna pull the train into Limerick Junction. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I liked. I like this trend. We went from Haikus
Speaker 1: the Limericks. I don't know what's next. Uh, I don't
Speaker 1: know and uh an epic poem. Maybe. No, we're gonna
Speaker 1: get the iliad from some listener now, just a couple
Speaker 1: of limericks here. Ryan of Victoria, British Columbia, fine Canadian friend.
Speaker 1: Have you ever been there? Now? That's one of my
Speaker 1: favorite cities on the planet. I've heard it's awesome. It
Speaker 1: is awesome. Was very cool. Everybody's very friendly. It's like
Speaker 1: a tiny city with like many skyscrapers and everything. And
Speaker 1: this is awesome. It's Brittish Columbia too, so sure nice?
Speaker 1: All right? Ryan has this to say. As I wore
Speaker 1: an uncomfortable sweater, I sat down and wrote you this letter.
Speaker 1: Josh and Chuck love hikus, but hiku's make me snooze
Speaker 1: because we all know that limericks are better. Yes, that's
Speaker 1: a good one, Ryan. And the final limerick today is
Speaker 1: from Brendan Franklin of Tucson, Arizona, another cool town college town,
Speaker 1: the podcasting host Josh and Chuck and the cast that
Speaker 1: they host or don't suck. They tell me how stuff works,
Speaker 1: and as one of the perks, I'm no longer an
Speaker 1: ignorant schmuck. Nice and Brendan, we agree. You're not an
Speaker 1: ignoran schmuck. You're you also may be the first person
Speaker 1: on the plant ever you schmuck in Limerick? Oh, no way,
Speaker 1: huge and Limerick clan is it? I'm not very familiar
Speaker 1: with him. I guess I should say I'm surprised that
Speaker 1: we haven't gotten any dirty limericks yet, though, although now
Speaker 1: I think we could probably expect true. I'm just happy
Speaker 1: my name rhymes with schmuck. Yeah, well we knew that already. Yes, So,
Speaker 1: if you want to send Chuck and I a limerick
Speaker 1: not a Hi kup um, or if you just want
Speaker 1: to say hi, or if you'd like to just congratulate
Speaker 1: us on making it through, how aphrodisiacs work without humiliating
Speaker 1: ourselves by cracking up um. You can send us an
Speaker 1: email to Stuff Podcast at how stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: For more on this and thousands of other topics, is
Speaker 1: it how stuff works dot com