1
00:00:03,360 --> 00:00:07,240
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

2
00:00:09,160 --> 00:00:11,880
Speaker 2: Hi, my name is Robert Lambin. This is the Monster Fact,

3
00:00:12,080 --> 00:00:14,200
Speaker 2: a short form series from Stuff to Blow Your Mind,

4
00:00:14,240 --> 00:00:17,320
Speaker 2: focusing in on mythical creatures, ideas and monsters in time.

5
00:00:17,920 --> 00:00:21,720
Speaker 2: And this is going to be yet another omnibus episode,

6
00:00:21,720 --> 00:00:26,960
Speaker 2: collecting four previous related Monster Fact entries. These are going

7
00:00:27,000 --> 00:00:31,240
Speaker 2: to cover my recent journey into the Star Trek universe,

8
00:00:31,720 --> 00:00:34,800
Speaker 2: so I hope you enjoy these. Let's go ahead and

9
00:00:34,880 --> 00:00:41,200
Speaker 2: kick things off with the Andrians. In this episode, I'd

10
00:00:41,200 --> 00:00:44,400
Speaker 2: like to begin a series on various aliens and creatures

11
00:00:44,440 --> 00:00:47,800
Speaker 2: from the Star Trek universe. Now, first of all, I

12
00:00:47,880 --> 00:00:49,600
Speaker 2: will be the first to admit that I am not

13
00:00:49,720 --> 00:00:53,199
Speaker 2: an expert in Trek lore, but I very fondly remember

14
00:00:53,320 --> 00:00:56,120
Speaker 2: as a kid in the nineties watching reruns of Star

15
00:00:56,160 --> 00:01:00,160
Speaker 2: Trek the Next Generation every weeknight at nine PM. So

16
00:01:00,240 --> 00:01:02,960
Speaker 2: fondly remember a book that I had to special order

17
00:01:03,000 --> 00:01:06,520
Speaker 2: from the local bookstore, Star Trek The Worlds of the Federation,

18
00:01:07,000 --> 00:01:11,759
Speaker 2: written and illustrated by Laura Johnson writing as Shane Johnson.

19
00:01:12,319 --> 00:01:16,840
Speaker 2: This was an encyclopedic collection of alien profiles. Think of

20
00:01:16,880 --> 00:01:19,120
Speaker 2: it as a monster manual. If you will, covering thirty

21
00:01:19,120 --> 00:01:22,480
Speaker 2: two different Federation member alien species, as well as a

22
00:01:22,560 --> 00:01:26,280
Speaker 2: number of neutral and hostile aliens. This was a nineteen

23
00:01:26,360 --> 00:01:29,440
Speaker 2: eighty nine publication, so it's far from current and is

24
00:01:29,520 --> 00:01:32,760
Speaker 2: not considered part of current Trek canon, and I'm to

25
00:01:32,800 --> 00:01:37,000
Speaker 2: understand some Trek writers took issue with some of the entries. Still,

26
00:01:37,040 --> 00:01:38,480
Speaker 2: it's a book that meant a lot to me as

27
00:01:38,520 --> 00:01:41,000
Speaker 2: a young Treky, and I suspect it meant a lot

28
00:01:41,040 --> 00:01:42,960
Speaker 2: to others from this time period as well, So I'm

29
00:01:43,000 --> 00:01:44,880
Speaker 2: going to go ahead and cite it along with some

30
00:01:44,920 --> 00:01:48,560
Speaker 2: other sources, with the caveat that again, it's not canon

31
00:01:48,840 --> 00:01:51,640
Speaker 2: much in the same way I cited the Dune Encyclopedia

32
00:01:51,920 --> 00:01:55,200
Speaker 2: in some of my Dune related entries. With all of

33
00:01:55,200 --> 00:01:59,880
Speaker 2: that in mind, let's turn to the Andrians. These blueskin,

34
00:02:00,280 --> 00:02:05,800
Speaker 2: white haired, antinny equipped aliens are iconic original series aliens,

35
00:02:06,120 --> 00:02:09,480
Speaker 2: but they were rather exotic for me, as they're virtually

36
00:02:09,520 --> 00:02:12,000
Speaker 2: absent from both Star Trek the Next Generation and Star

37
00:02:12,080 --> 00:02:15,680
Speaker 2: Trek Deep Space nine, which constituted my prime Trek viewing.

38
00:02:16,280 --> 00:02:20,560
Speaker 2: The reasoning for their absence, according to the excellent Memory Alpha,

39
00:02:21,120 --> 00:02:25,040
Speaker 2: was largely twofold. First of all, Trek creator Gene Roddenberry

40
00:02:25,120 --> 00:02:28,720
Speaker 2: preferred that many original series aliens be avoided in favor

41
00:02:28,760 --> 00:02:33,000
Speaker 2: of new ones on the next generation. Secondly, the makeup

42
00:02:33,080 --> 00:02:37,200
Speaker 2: was allegedly difficult to get right and avoid looking silly.

43
00:02:37,680 --> 00:02:40,400
Speaker 2: They overcame these hurdles and subsequent shows, and in the

44
00:02:40,440 --> 00:02:43,520
Speaker 2: current Star Trek Strange New World series, which I'm enjoying

45
00:02:43,560 --> 00:02:48,120
Speaker 2: quite a bit, we encounter an albinos subspecies of Andrians

46
00:02:48,160 --> 00:02:51,400
Speaker 2: known as the Nar, as well as an Andrian Special

47
00:02:51,440 --> 00:02:55,400
Speaker 2: Forces officer, and neither of these aliens looks remotely silly.

48
00:02:56,080 --> 00:02:59,040
Speaker 2: But let's come back to the biology of the Andorians

49
00:03:00,080 --> 00:03:03,040
Speaker 2: of the Federation describes them as a mix of mammalian

50
00:03:03,120 --> 00:03:07,280
Speaker 2: and reptilian features, with both an endoskeleton and a limited exoskeleton,

51
00:03:07,680 --> 00:03:11,400
Speaker 2: and the antennae are described as enhancing otherwise colorblind vision

52
00:03:11,520 --> 00:03:15,080
Speaker 2: with a quote complex matrix of light sensitive cones in

53
00:03:15,120 --> 00:03:18,639
Speaker 2: addition to auditory functions. All of this together would amount

54
00:03:18,680 --> 00:03:21,640
Speaker 2: to an enhanced sense of sight and smell. Fair enough

55
00:03:21,760 --> 00:03:27,000
Speaker 2: obvious sense organs do sense organ things. Antennay interrestrial organisms

56
00:03:27,000 --> 00:03:30,119
Speaker 2: remember very greatly, and depending on the species, may utilize

57
00:03:30,200 --> 00:03:35,840
Speaker 2: senses of touch, air, motion, heat, vibration, smell, or taste,

58
00:03:35,880 --> 00:03:38,640
Speaker 2: But again, the Worlds of the Federation came out in

59
00:03:38,720 --> 00:03:42,600
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty nine before A particular nineteen ninety three episode

60
00:03:42,640 --> 00:03:45,760
Speaker 2: of the Next Generation shed a great deal of canonical

61
00:03:45,840 --> 00:03:49,520
Speaker 2: light on the biology of Star Trek. The episode titled

62
00:03:49,560 --> 00:03:53,400
Speaker 2: The Chase, which I specifically remember from my childhood, revealed

63
00:03:53,480 --> 00:03:57,160
Speaker 2: the reason so many Star Trek alien species are humanoid

64
00:03:57,200 --> 00:04:00,960
Speaker 2: and resemble each other, often with minor alterations to facial

65
00:04:01,000 --> 00:04:05,000
Speaker 2: and cranial features. All of this via a revelation of

66
00:04:05,200 --> 00:04:11,160
Speaker 2: ancient intentional pan spermia via a single advanced progenitor humanoid species.

67
00:04:11,200 --> 00:04:14,240
Speaker 2: In other words, all of these Trek species look similar

68
00:04:14,320 --> 00:04:17,080
Speaker 2: not because they're all humans in makeup, but rather because

69
00:04:17,080 --> 00:04:21,120
Speaker 2: a single ancestor species spread their own DNA among the

70
00:04:21,200 --> 00:04:24,839
Speaker 2: various worlds to see them. I've always found this to

71
00:04:24,880 --> 00:04:27,159
Speaker 2: be a clever way of addressing the seeming lack of

72
00:04:27,160 --> 00:04:32,560
Speaker 2: biological diversity in many of the core Tract civilizations. Now

73
00:04:32,640 --> 00:04:37,880
Speaker 2: you might reasonably wonder, okay, fine, but realistically, would these

74
00:04:37,960 --> 00:04:42,120
Speaker 2: distantly related species still look so similar to each other? Well?

75
00:04:42,440 --> 00:04:45,440
Speaker 2: Susan and Robert Jenkins explore this question in their book

76
00:04:45,480 --> 00:04:48,400
Speaker 2: The Biology of Star Trek, published in nineteen ninety eight.

77
00:04:48,960 --> 00:04:51,560
Speaker 2: They point out that based on what we know about evolution,

78
00:04:51,760 --> 00:04:55,760
Speaker 2: it's not at all unreasonable. The evolutionary clock runs slowly,

79
00:04:55,839 --> 00:04:58,800
Speaker 2: they write, and it has a built in bias against

80
00:04:58,800 --> 00:05:03,279
Speaker 2: major overhauls. Because speciation is brought about by multiple random

81
00:05:03,360 --> 00:05:06,200
Speaker 2: changes in DNA, and the changes must allow the organism

82
00:05:06,279 --> 00:05:10,200
Speaker 2: to survive and reproduce, small changes are favored over large ones.

83
00:05:10,480 --> 00:05:14,160
Speaker 2: Small changes are less likely to compromise the tested survivability

84
00:05:14,200 --> 00:05:17,599
Speaker 2: of the original. Given this constraint, two species that start

85
00:05:17,600 --> 00:05:21,799
Speaker 2: out alike remain similar over a rather long time, even

86
00:05:21,960 --> 00:05:26,440
Speaker 2: under different sets of environmental pressures. They add that particular

87
00:05:26,520 --> 00:05:29,080
Speaker 2: environmental pressures would of course have their impact, and a

88
00:05:29,120 --> 00:05:32,840
Speaker 2: trend towards facial symmetry would likely stay in place. They

89
00:05:32,880 --> 00:05:36,080
Speaker 2: go into greater detail in this great book about not

90
00:05:36,120 --> 00:05:38,760
Speaker 2: only the speculative biology of all of this, but also

91
00:05:38,800 --> 00:05:41,280
Speaker 2: the connections between human facial cues and the way we

92
00:05:41,400 --> 00:05:45,160
Speaker 2: imagine the facial features of tracks aliens, and they do

93
00:05:45,240 --> 00:05:48,960
Speaker 2: get around to considering the andorians. They point out that

94
00:05:49,000 --> 00:05:51,680
Speaker 2: while nothing resembling a human with antennae exists in the

95
00:05:51,760 --> 00:05:54,760
Speaker 2: natural world, we of course do have mammalian species with

96
00:05:54,960 --> 00:05:57,720
Speaker 2: enhanced whiskers, and I would point out that we have

97
00:05:58,360 --> 00:06:01,400
Speaker 2: other things like the unique robosis of the star No's

98
00:06:01,480 --> 00:06:04,120
Speaker 2: mole and the twin feelers of the tentacled snake to

99
00:06:04,160 --> 00:06:07,360
Speaker 2: get into the reptile world. For the Andorians, however, they

100
00:06:07,360 --> 00:06:11,880
Speaker 2: propose an interesting notion. Perhaps the Andorian home world contains

101
00:06:12,000 --> 00:06:17,359
Speaker 2: multiple atmospheric variations, and this results in various microclimates, requiring

102
00:06:17,640 --> 00:06:22,200
Speaker 2: enhanced sensation of atmospheric content, temperature, and pressure for any

103
00:06:22,279 --> 00:06:27,320
Speaker 2: species that regularly travels outside of a narrow region or microclimate.

104
00:06:27,760 --> 00:06:30,160
Speaker 2: They even go so far as to discuss how tissues

105
00:06:30,200 --> 00:06:34,159
Speaker 2: in human embryos might develop into antennae under the right

106
00:06:34,200 --> 00:06:38,839
Speaker 2: survival pressures. Quote. Human embryos have several segments called embryonic

107
00:06:38,880 --> 00:06:42,200
Speaker 2: pharyngeal arches in what will become the head and the neck.

108
00:06:42,560 --> 00:06:46,360
Speaker 2: They supply the developing tissue for jaws and some neck organs.

109
00:06:46,880 --> 00:06:50,760
Speaker 2: In fish, However, the pharyngeal arches develop into gills because

110
00:06:50,800 --> 00:06:54,000
Speaker 2: these structures have been adapted for very different purposes. They

111
00:06:54,080 --> 00:06:56,760
Speaker 2: might evolve to provide the organ substrate for the nervous

112
00:06:56,800 --> 00:07:01,320
Speaker 2: tissue in an antenna like organ. More broadly, they point

113
00:07:01,320 --> 00:07:04,599
Speaker 2: out that added sense organs could potentially detect any number

114
00:07:04,640 --> 00:07:07,279
Speaker 2: of factors in a given environment, provided there was an

115
00:07:07,320 --> 00:07:11,880
Speaker 2: evolutionary incentive to do so. Memory Alpha provides little canonical

116
00:07:11,960 --> 00:07:13,760
Speaker 2: data on all of this, as far as I could tell,

117
00:07:14,520 --> 00:07:16,920
Speaker 2: but it does point out that we know that Andrian

118
00:07:17,000 --> 00:07:20,760
Speaker 2: an Kenny can be moved independently via voluntary muscle control,

119
00:07:21,120 --> 00:07:25,080
Speaker 2: that they regenerate if they are injured or blasted off,

120
00:07:25,720 --> 00:07:28,360
Speaker 2: and they also seem to play a role in balance

121
00:07:28,520 --> 00:07:32,960
Speaker 2: and gesticulation and of course therefore communication. I think all

122
00:07:33,080 --> 00:07:36,040
Speaker 2: this is quite reasonable. Now, coming back to Star Trek's

123
00:07:36,040 --> 00:07:39,679
Speaker 2: Strange New Worlds, the Enar character Himmer in that show

124
00:07:39,720 --> 00:07:42,920
Speaker 2: is depicted as having been born sightless, but is more

125
00:07:42,960 --> 00:07:45,120
Speaker 2: than able to make up for his lack of sight

126
00:07:45,440 --> 00:07:48,480
Speaker 2: in part due to his other senses as a member

127
00:07:48,720 --> 00:07:54,600
Speaker 2: of an antennae equipped and Dorian subspecies. All right, Next up,

128
00:07:55,240 --> 00:08:01,640
Speaker 2: The Trouble with Triples not discuss the various creatures of

129
00:08:01,680 --> 00:08:04,760
Speaker 2: the Star Trek universe, without of course considering the tribles

130
00:08:05,040 --> 00:08:09,760
Speaker 2: of Iota geminorum for a world home to an abundance

131
00:08:09,800 --> 00:08:14,440
Speaker 2: of carnivorous reptiles, in addition to the vaguely mammalian Trible,

132
00:08:14,800 --> 00:08:18,120
Speaker 2: which seems to serve as a basic prey species for

133
00:08:18,240 --> 00:08:21,320
Speaker 2: all the space lizards. The Triple is, of course, a

134
00:08:21,360 --> 00:08:25,040
Speaker 2: small furry creature with no discernible limbs or features. Really,

135
00:08:25,400 --> 00:08:28,600
Speaker 2: its only means of defending itself, at least against humanoids,

136
00:08:29,000 --> 00:08:34,160
Speaker 2: is to basically tranquilize the humanoid with a gentle cooing effect.

137
00:08:34,880 --> 00:08:38,560
Speaker 2: The trouble with Tribles, of course, is their incredible rate

138
00:08:38,600 --> 00:08:43,240
Speaker 2: of reproduction. They are even reportedly born already pregnant, and

139
00:08:43,320 --> 00:08:48,440
Speaker 2: can quickly overrun any given ecosystem or starship that they

140
00:08:48,480 --> 00:08:52,520
Speaker 2: are introduced into. In their natural habitat, they eat and

141
00:08:52,559 --> 00:08:55,440
Speaker 2: reproduce as quickly as possible, but their numbers are kept

142
00:08:55,480 --> 00:08:59,120
Speaker 2: in check, presumably by their many voracious predators. But on

143
00:08:59,160 --> 00:09:02,520
Speaker 2: a federation star, yes, this is where the trouble occurs.

144
00:09:02,559 --> 00:09:06,600
Speaker 2: With no predators, plentiful food, and a crew overcome by

145
00:09:06,640 --> 00:09:11,640
Speaker 2: their adorable cuteness, their population very quickly spirals out of control.

146
00:09:12,559 --> 00:09:15,120
Speaker 2: The creatures debuted in a nineteen sixty seven episode of

147
00:09:15,120 --> 00:09:18,200
Speaker 2: the original Star Trek series, but the Grimlins franchise of

148
00:09:18,200 --> 00:09:22,000
Speaker 2: the eighties and nineties treads on similar ground. Adorable fur

149
00:09:22,080 --> 00:09:24,280
Speaker 2: babies that get entirely out of hand due to a

150
00:09:24,360 --> 00:09:28,920
Speaker 2: mix of ineptitude, human vulnerability to cuteness, and a reproductive

151
00:09:28,960 --> 00:09:33,640
Speaker 2: system clearly evolve for different parameters. I've speculated elsewhere that

152
00:09:33,760 --> 00:09:37,600
Speaker 2: maguai might depend on a desert, if not an extraterrestrial

153
00:09:37,720 --> 00:09:42,760
Speaker 2: environment for their biology to make sense and likewise unsuftible

154
00:09:42,840 --> 00:09:46,280
Speaker 2: your mind. We've talked about the role of cuteness, both

155
00:09:46,400 --> 00:09:50,960
Speaker 2: among humans and cuteness between humans and non human animals.

156
00:09:51,080 --> 00:09:55,440
Speaker 2: It is a potent force that manipulates us. For the Triple,

157
00:09:55,720 --> 00:09:59,560
Speaker 2: the stabilizing factor is the severity of its ecosystem. On

158
00:09:59,600 --> 00:10:03,560
Speaker 2: the Triple home world, triples presumably die in vast numbers,

159
00:10:03,720 --> 00:10:07,280
Speaker 2: and their prolific reproduction rate merely allows them to keep up.

160
00:10:07,760 --> 00:10:10,520
Speaker 2: We see variations of this in the natural world here

161
00:10:10,559 --> 00:10:13,400
Speaker 2: on Earth as well. In general, we see the basic

162
00:10:13,520 --> 00:10:17,760
Speaker 2: quality quantity tradeoff. In practice, some organisms err on the

163
00:10:17,800 --> 00:10:22,040
Speaker 2: side of producing few high quality offspring, while others simply

164
00:10:22,080 --> 00:10:25,719
Speaker 2: produce offspring in vast numbers. The predators can't eat all

165
00:10:25,720 --> 00:10:29,560
Speaker 2: of them, and a select few survive to reproduce as adults.

166
00:10:30,040 --> 00:10:32,560
Speaker 2: In sea turtles, for example, somewhere on the order of

167
00:10:32,600 --> 00:10:35,840
Speaker 2: two out of a thousand eggs actually makes it to adulthood,

168
00:10:36,080 --> 00:10:40,000
Speaker 2: surviving the gamut of consumers along the way. We can

169
00:10:40,080 --> 00:10:42,640
Speaker 2: also think of the triple in terms of predator satiation,

170
00:10:43,040 --> 00:10:46,600
Speaker 2: by which prey briefly and periodically occur at such high

171
00:10:46,600 --> 00:10:51,160
Speaker 2: population densities that the predators can't possibly eat them all.

172
00:10:52,000 --> 00:10:55,719
Speaker 2: Periodical cicadas, which many of you will be experiencing yet

173
00:10:55,760 --> 00:10:58,720
Speaker 2: again this year, are an example of this. So it

174
00:10:58,720 --> 00:11:01,800
Speaker 2: would seem possible that might work in a similar manner,

175
00:11:01,960 --> 00:11:05,920
Speaker 2: periodically reproducing in such numbers that they simply overwhelm their

176
00:11:05,960 --> 00:11:10,200
Speaker 2: many reptilian predators. Now, given that tribles are vaguely mammals,

177
00:11:10,200 --> 00:11:13,400
Speaker 2: we might also compare them to such prolific terrestrial warm

178
00:11:13,440 --> 00:11:17,200
Speaker 2: bloods as the European rabbit, infamous for its own rapid

179
00:11:17,240 --> 00:11:21,720
Speaker 2: reproduction rate. According to the Texas Invasive Species Institute, an

180
00:11:21,800 --> 00:11:25,320
Speaker 2: eighteen fifty nine introduction of a mere twenty four European

181
00:11:25,400 --> 00:11:28,760
Speaker 2: rabbits into Australia led to a population of more than

182
00:11:28,880 --> 00:11:32,520
Speaker 2: six hundred million in less than a century. The tribles

183
00:11:32,720 --> 00:11:37,040
Speaker 2: ultimately are a fantastic commentary on what can happen when

184
00:11:37,040 --> 00:11:42,839
Speaker 2: a species is artificially transplanted from one ecosystem into another. Now,

185
00:11:42,840 --> 00:11:46,600
Speaker 2: how long would it take tribles to overrun the starship Enterprise. Well,

186
00:11:46,800 --> 00:11:48,960
Speaker 2: that is a question that you have to throw some

187
00:11:49,040 --> 00:11:52,360
Speaker 2: math at. And in twenty twenty student researchers at the

188
00:11:52,440 --> 00:11:55,760
Speaker 2: University of Leicester made science headlines with a paper in

189
00:11:55,800 --> 00:12:03,800
Speaker 2: the journal Physics Special Topics. Their answer four points five days.

190
00:12:12,960 --> 00:12:19,120
Speaker 2: All right. Next up the Seti Eels. In a rare

191
00:12:19,240 --> 00:12:22,160
Speaker 2: case of synchronicity with the news cycle, which is all

192
00:12:22,200 --> 00:12:25,600
Speaker 2: about brain worms of late, I decided to devote this

193
00:12:25,760 --> 00:12:29,959
Speaker 2: Trek themed episode to the dreaded Seti eels of Seti

194
00:12:30,000 --> 00:12:33,720
Speaker 2: Alpha five. You will, of course remember them from the

195
00:12:33,800 --> 00:12:37,280
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty two film Star Trek two, The Wrath of Khan,

196
00:12:37,640 --> 00:12:42,720
Speaker 2: in which thowd twentieth century eugenics war tyrant Khan Noonan Singh,

197
00:12:43,080 --> 00:12:47,480
Speaker 2: played by the superb Ricardo Montaban, uses larval Seti eels

198
00:12:47,520 --> 00:12:50,960
Speaker 2: to torture and control two Enterprise crew members in his

199
00:12:51,120 --> 00:12:55,400
Speaker 2: quest for vengeance. We also learned that Seti eels, native

200
00:12:55,440 --> 00:12:59,360
Speaker 2: to the harsh world sing was exiled to by Starfleet,

201
00:12:59,679 --> 00:13:05,120
Speaker 2: killed many of Khan's people, including his wife. The setiworm

202
00:13:05,200 --> 00:13:08,800
Speaker 2: is a burrowing desert creature, but its larva, we're told

203
00:13:08,800 --> 00:13:12,079
Speaker 2: by singh crawl in through the ear canals of host

204
00:13:12,120 --> 00:13:16,120
Speaker 2: creatures to wrap themselves around the cerebral cortex, rendering the

205
00:13:16,160 --> 00:13:21,840
Speaker 2: host organism highly susceptible to suggestion. Madness and death follow

206
00:13:22,120 --> 00:13:25,520
Speaker 2: as the eel grows, unless the eel is removed or

207
00:13:25,640 --> 00:13:29,120
Speaker 2: leaves of its own accord. The latter occurs with First

208
00:13:29,120 --> 00:13:33,280
Speaker 2: Officer Chekhov, though the reason is uncertain. Was it responding

209
00:13:33,320 --> 00:13:36,120
Speaker 2: to danger, had it lost control of its host? Was

210
00:13:36,160 --> 00:13:38,480
Speaker 2: it in fact leaving the host in order to continue

211
00:13:38,520 --> 00:13:41,200
Speaker 2: its life cycle. We don't know any of these answers,

212
00:13:41,240 --> 00:13:45,160
Speaker 2: in part because Captain Kirk instantly vaporizes the escaping eel,

213
00:13:46,200 --> 00:13:49,320
Speaker 2: turning once more to the non canonical Star Trek. The

214
00:13:49,320 --> 00:13:52,360
Speaker 2: Worlds of the Federation, written and illustrated by Laura Johnson

215
00:13:52,400 --> 00:13:56,080
Speaker 2: written as Shane Johnson back in nineteen eighty nine, the

216
00:13:56,120 --> 00:13:59,160
Speaker 2: author largely shares what we already know from the movie.

217
00:13:59,320 --> 00:14:02,440
Speaker 2: Adult Seti eels, one of the few native species to

218
00:14:02,520 --> 00:14:06,040
Speaker 2: survive on the planet, grow to lengths of fourteen inches

219
00:14:06,240 --> 00:14:08,640
Speaker 2: and carry their young in tissue or armor folds on

220
00:14:08,679 --> 00:14:12,080
Speaker 2: their backs until such time as they leave the parent

221
00:14:12,200 --> 00:14:15,800
Speaker 2: for a host organism. In life signs the biology of

222
00:14:15,840 --> 00:14:19,360
Speaker 2: Star Trek. Susan and Robert Jenkins briefly discuss the seti

223
00:14:19,400 --> 00:14:22,480
Speaker 2: eel in context with other neural parasites and symbians of

224
00:14:22,560 --> 00:14:26,240
Speaker 2: the Trek universe, and there are several classifying The possession

225
00:14:26,600 --> 00:14:29,080
Speaker 2: we see with the seti eel is a kind of

226
00:14:29,200 --> 00:14:34,400
Speaker 2: quote co conscious mind control, with the hosts made helpless

227
00:14:34,600 --> 00:14:38,840
Speaker 2: by the superseding power of the parasite. Presumably, the whole

228
00:14:38,880 --> 00:14:41,600
Speaker 2: reason for subduing the host organism is to keep it

229
00:14:41,640 --> 00:14:46,280
Speaker 2: from interfering with the larva's occupation of set organism, and

230
00:14:46,320 --> 00:14:48,800
Speaker 2: we might assume that the seti eel also eats the

231
00:14:48,840 --> 00:14:53,520
Speaker 2: tissue that it presumably burrows through to reach the cerebral cortex.

232
00:14:54,280 --> 00:14:57,400
Speaker 2: The mind control aspect of this fictional parasitic scenario is,

233
00:14:57,440 --> 00:15:00,640
Speaker 2: of course vary, in keeping with numerous example from the

234
00:15:00,760 --> 00:15:08,400
Speaker 2: natural terrestrial world, including various parasitoid wasps, flatworms, hair worms, protozoans, fungi,

235
00:15:08,440 --> 00:15:12,480
Speaker 2: and more. In broad strokes, we see parasites that alter

236
00:15:12,640 --> 00:15:16,840
Speaker 2: host behavior to help complete their own life cycle. This

237
00:15:16,920 --> 00:15:20,800
Speaker 2: may mean mere survival or positioning of the host in

238
00:15:20,840 --> 00:15:24,400
Speaker 2: such a way that a desirable new host will consume

239
00:15:24,920 --> 00:15:28,280
Speaker 2: the current host. Now with the SETI eel. We certainly

240
00:15:28,280 --> 00:15:31,560
Speaker 2: see the former survival, but not so much the latter

241
00:15:32,200 --> 00:15:35,680
Speaker 2: eel controlled humans don't seem to do anything other than

242
00:15:35,720 --> 00:15:38,960
Speaker 2: obey fellow humans, though one could make a case that

243
00:15:39,160 --> 00:15:42,840
Speaker 2: this alone might lead to say, uninfected human being either

244
00:15:42,920 --> 00:15:47,400
Speaker 2: being expelled, which would at least be a choice. You

245
00:15:47,440 --> 00:15:50,360
Speaker 2: can imagine scenarios in which this would put the current

246
00:15:50,400 --> 00:15:53,960
Speaker 2: host organism in a position to, say, be near water,

247
00:15:54,240 --> 00:15:58,160
Speaker 2: or near another organism that it needs to enter, perhaps

248
00:15:58,160 --> 00:16:01,920
Speaker 2: some sort of a predator. Or you could also make

249
00:16:01,960 --> 00:16:04,520
Speaker 2: the argument that well, okay, a human that is so

250
00:16:04,640 --> 00:16:07,200
Speaker 2: easily controlled by fellow humans is going to remain in

251
00:16:07,240 --> 00:16:10,160
Speaker 2: close proximity with humans, and perhaps it just needs to

252
00:16:10,640 --> 00:16:14,440
Speaker 2: enter a new host organism once it's done munching and

253
00:16:14,520 --> 00:16:19,840
Speaker 2: constricting inside that individual skull. Either way, we also have

254
00:16:19,960 --> 00:16:23,000
Speaker 2: to acknowledge that humanoids, and remember in the Trek universe,

255
00:16:23,160 --> 00:16:27,520
Speaker 2: most or all humanoid species are very distantly related to

256
00:16:27,560 --> 00:16:31,000
Speaker 2: each other. Humanoids might not be the desired vector for

257
00:16:31,040 --> 00:16:36,600
Speaker 2: the parasite, and in the world of actual terrestrial parasite studies,

258
00:16:36,800 --> 00:16:41,080
Speaker 2: we do see dangerous results from parasites winding up either

259
00:16:41,120 --> 00:16:44,040
Speaker 2: in the wrong host or the wrong part of the

260
00:16:44,160 --> 00:16:47,440
Speaker 2: right host. Now, I've long found this one of the

261
00:16:47,480 --> 00:16:52,240
Speaker 2: more horrifying aspects of sci fi space horror, and particularly

262
00:16:52,320 --> 00:16:57,200
Speaker 2: sci fi space related body horror, human interactions with hostile

263
00:16:57,240 --> 00:17:01,080
Speaker 2: biology that simply didn't evolve to deal with human beings.

264
00:17:01,840 --> 00:17:04,960
Speaker 2: The xenomorphic threats of the Alien film franchise are great

265
00:17:05,000 --> 00:17:08,440
Speaker 2: examples of this. Of course, on one hand, the creatures

266
00:17:08,480 --> 00:17:10,640
Speaker 2: we see in the films are highly adaptive and make

267
00:17:10,800 --> 00:17:14,320
Speaker 2: use of host DNA in the acquisition of their adult forms.

268
00:17:14,920 --> 00:17:17,920
Speaker 2: They have evolved and or been engineered to make quick

269
00:17:17,960 --> 00:17:22,280
Speaker 2: study and use of new bodies. But the other horrifying

270
00:17:22,280 --> 00:17:24,600
Speaker 2: way to think about it is that here is a

271
00:17:24,680 --> 00:17:28,800
Speaker 2: creature that is truly an alien within the host body.

272
00:17:29,080 --> 00:17:31,800
Speaker 2: It doesn't know what it's doing in there, and much

273
00:17:31,880 --> 00:17:35,000
Speaker 2: like the scene in twenty twelve's Prometheus with the robotic

274
00:17:35,040 --> 00:17:39,560
Speaker 2: surgery pod, this combination of high skill and lower context

275
00:17:39,600 --> 00:17:42,840
Speaker 2: for the target body runs the risk of heading into

276
00:17:43,119 --> 00:17:47,760
Speaker 2: very grizzly territory. Still, we don't have to invoke Alien

277
00:17:48,119 --> 00:17:52,600
Speaker 2: to make the seti eel terrifying. The implantation scene in

278
00:17:52,680 --> 00:17:55,320
Speaker 2: Wrath of Khan remains one of the greatest moments of

279
00:17:55,359 --> 00:17:59,920
Speaker 2: space horror. In a franchise, we don't generally associate with it.

280
00:18:01,920 --> 00:18:07,280
Speaker 2: And finally, we're going to learn about the Horta. In

281
00:18:07,320 --> 00:18:10,200
Speaker 2: today's episode. I'm going to round out this initial batch

282
00:18:10,359 --> 00:18:12,879
Speaker 2: of Star Trek selections, and I'm going to go with

283
00:18:12,920 --> 00:18:16,520
Speaker 2: a listener suggestion from one of our mini gems, the

284
00:18:16,600 --> 00:18:20,280
Speaker 2: Horta of Janus six. As we learn in the original

285
00:18:20,320 --> 00:18:23,399
Speaker 2: Trek episode The Devil in the Dark, the horta is

286
00:18:23,440 --> 00:18:29,200
Speaker 2: a large, subterranean heap shaped organism entirely silicone based rather

287
00:18:29,240 --> 00:18:32,800
Speaker 2: than carbon based. It tunnels through the rock via powerful

288
00:18:32,880 --> 00:18:39,119
Speaker 2: acidic secretions, which it can also use defensively. Exceedingly long lived,

289
00:18:39,200 --> 00:18:43,280
Speaker 2: the entire population of horta dies out every sixty thousand years,

290
00:18:43,560 --> 00:18:46,760
Speaker 2: with the exception of a single mother horta, which tends

291
00:18:46,800 --> 00:18:50,160
Speaker 2: to the spherical eggs that will produce the next generation

292
00:18:50,760 --> 00:18:55,760
Speaker 2: of this amazing species. While the Horta are reclusive and

293
00:18:55,840 --> 00:19:00,000
Speaker 2: ultimately peaceful, they can prove lethal in confrontations, such as

294
00:19:00,080 --> 00:19:02,760
Speaker 2: the one with a Federation mining colony in the Devil

295
00:19:02,800 --> 00:19:05,919
Speaker 2: in the Dark, which ultimately required the intervention of a

296
00:19:06,040 --> 00:19:10,040
Speaker 2: Vulcan mind meld. In the non canonical Star Trek, the

297
00:19:10,080 --> 00:19:12,879
Speaker 2: Worlds of the Federation by Laura Johnson written as Shane

298
00:19:12,920 --> 00:19:15,960
Speaker 2: Johnson from nineteen eighty nine. We learned that the miners

299
00:19:16,000 --> 00:19:20,440
Speaker 2: and Horta would eventually work together on Janus six following

300
00:19:20,640 --> 00:19:24,840
Speaker 2: this reconciliation. Now, I distinctly remember watching this episode of

301
00:19:24,880 --> 00:19:27,800
Speaker 2: the classic Star Trek as a kid, and I remember

302
00:19:27,880 --> 00:19:32,840
Speaker 2: enjoying the alien monster based suspense and its thought provoking

303
00:19:32,880 --> 00:19:37,879
Speaker 2: treatment of interaction between intelligent but radically different alien species,

304
00:19:38,520 --> 00:19:40,679
Speaker 2: and looking back on it now, it certainly has that

305
00:19:40,800 --> 00:19:44,080
Speaker 2: Star Trek optimism that is often lacking in our modern

306
00:19:44,200 --> 00:19:47,200
Speaker 2: sci fi. It's no surprise that this one is often

307
00:19:47,240 --> 00:19:50,399
Speaker 2: held up as one of the best original Star Trek episodes.

308
00:19:51,680 --> 00:19:54,960
Speaker 2: In Life Signs the Biology of Star Trek Susan and

309
00:19:55,040 --> 00:19:59,479
Speaker 2: Robert Jenkins, the authors here discuss the singular nature of

310
00:19:59,720 --> 00:20:03,679
Speaker 2: the Orta in Trek. The Federation was apparently not accustomed

311
00:20:03,720 --> 00:20:06,600
Speaker 2: to the presence of silicon based life, and had therefore

312
00:20:06,720 --> 00:20:10,639
Speaker 2: missed the Horta's presence on Jenus six in their scans.

313
00:20:10,840 --> 00:20:15,280
Speaker 2: Entirely later on in tracks, similar mistakes were made with

314
00:20:15,640 --> 00:20:21,280
Speaker 2: the microbrains of Vlara three and the space born crystalline entity.

315
00:20:22,040 --> 00:20:26,840
Speaker 2: This all underlies a known challenge in astrobiology, we ultimately

316
00:20:26,920 --> 00:20:30,440
Speaker 2: have only one model of life upon which to base

317
00:20:30,520 --> 00:20:35,400
Speaker 2: our observations, and it happens to be earthlife. We're told

318
00:20:35,440 --> 00:20:38,480
Speaker 2: that Janus six never developed carbon based life beyond a

319
00:20:38,480 --> 00:20:42,240
Speaker 2: few spore producing plants as well as some algae, but

320
00:20:42,359 --> 00:20:46,000
Speaker 2: it did boast minerals and heavy metals, and the authors

321
00:20:46,000 --> 00:20:51,040
Speaker 2: stress that while silicon based reactions occur much more slowly

322
00:20:51,160 --> 00:20:54,160
Speaker 2: compared to carbon based reactions, a planet like Janus six might,

323
00:20:54,200 --> 00:20:58,480
Speaker 2: in theory have the minerals to catalyze the chemical reactions

324
00:20:58,520 --> 00:21:03,000
Speaker 2: needed for a silicon based life. Now, in the larger

325
00:21:03,040 --> 00:21:06,639
Speaker 2: realm of science fiction, silicon based organisms are not uncommon.

326
00:21:07,080 --> 00:21:10,800
Speaker 2: The alien Xenomorpho is sometimes described as silicone based, or

327
00:21:10,840 --> 00:21:14,160
Speaker 2: at least partially silicone based, and there are numerous ways

328
00:21:14,359 --> 00:21:18,280
Speaker 2: this is explained to factor in with their carbon based bodies.

329
00:21:18,800 --> 00:21:22,840
Speaker 2: Other examples include the Kaiju of Pacific Rim, the Exogoths

330
00:21:22,840 --> 00:21:27,960
Speaker 2: of Star Wars, and the Easter Island headed Lithodia Rexians

331
00:21:28,080 --> 00:21:32,960
Speaker 2: of Marvel Comics. However, as outlined by Charles Q. Choi

332
00:21:33,359 --> 00:21:36,399
Speaker 2: in the space dot Com article, silicon based life may

333
00:21:36,440 --> 00:21:39,720
Speaker 2: be more than just science fiction from twenty seventeen, various

334
00:21:39,720 --> 00:21:43,960
Speaker 2: experts speculate that silicon based or silicone encompassing life is

335
00:21:44,119 --> 00:21:47,680
Speaker 2: very possible. Silicone and carbon are similar in many ways.

336
00:21:47,920 --> 00:21:50,960
Speaker 2: Silicon is one of the most common elements in the universe,

337
00:21:51,000 --> 00:21:56,720
Speaker 2: and chemist have artificially synthesized organosilicone molecules composed of both

338
00:21:56,760 --> 00:22:01,280
Speaker 2: silicone and carbon, so by some estimations, silicon based life

339
00:22:01,600 --> 00:22:05,600
Speaker 2: of some sort may be out there somewhere, whether we

340
00:22:05,720 --> 00:22:09,440
Speaker 2: know of it or not. Back to Trek, the Jinkins

341
00:22:09,480 --> 00:22:13,000
Speaker 2: stress that the Horta might actually reproduce and reason too

342
00:22:13,160 --> 00:22:17,040
Speaker 2: much like a carbon based organism in this episode of Anything.

343
00:22:17,480 --> 00:22:21,160
Speaker 2: But then again, this is where science and philosophy butt heads.

344
00:22:21,440 --> 00:22:26,040
Speaker 2: Star Trek is ultimately about the hope, if not the reality,

345
00:22:26,400 --> 00:22:30,679
Speaker 2: of making contact, settling differences, and figuring out how to

346
00:22:30,840 --> 00:22:34,760
Speaker 2: move forward, both as an interstellar community within the fiction

347
00:22:35,320 --> 00:22:39,000
Speaker 2: and as a terrestrial species here on Earth in reality.

348
00:22:39,560 --> 00:22:42,840
Speaker 2: As much as I love my various nihilistic sci fi

349
00:22:43,040 --> 00:22:47,200
Speaker 2: visions and various examples of space horror, I feel more

350
00:22:47,240 --> 00:22:49,800
Speaker 2: and more like I need the Star Trek vision in

351
00:22:49,840 --> 00:22:53,240
Speaker 2: my life. As in aside, I'll mention that there's actually

352
00:22:53,280 --> 00:22:57,840
Speaker 2: an underground geographic positioning technology here on Earth. Named after

353
00:22:57,880 --> 00:23:00,840
Speaker 2: the Star Trek Horta. It is, of course, say backronym,

354
00:23:01,040 --> 00:23:06,920
Speaker 2: which stands for Honeywell or Retrieval and Tunneling AID. All right,

355
00:23:06,960 --> 00:23:08,719
Speaker 2: there you have it. I hope you enjoy this, so

356
00:23:09,000 --> 00:23:12,600
Speaker 2: I keep doing these omnibus episodes because it's a better

357
00:23:12,640 --> 00:23:16,040
Speaker 2: way to do like a rerun essentially on a Wednesday.

358
00:23:16,280 --> 00:23:19,000
Speaker 2: And I've also heard from some listeners that they prefer

359
00:23:19,119 --> 00:23:22,600
Speaker 2: to listen to these short form episodes batched together into

360
00:23:22,640 --> 00:23:25,920
Speaker 2: a longer omnibus series. So I'm going to keep doing

361
00:23:25,920 --> 00:23:27,840
Speaker 2: this as long as it remains popular. As long as

362
00:23:27,880 --> 00:23:31,040
Speaker 2: the folks seem to enjoy them, I enjoy putting them together.

363
00:23:31,480 --> 00:23:34,800
Speaker 2: If you have recommendations for other Star Trek creatures you'd

364
00:23:34,840 --> 00:23:36,919
Speaker 2: like for me to cover in a future series of

365
00:23:36,920 --> 00:23:40,080
Speaker 2: Star Trek episodes, or if you have suggestions related to

366
00:23:40,280 --> 00:23:47,760
Speaker 2: other you know franchises, comic books, movies, literary settings of

367
00:23:48,240 --> 00:23:51,840
Speaker 2: folkloric traditions, mythologies, and more, write in I would love

368
00:23:51,920 --> 00:23:54,480
Speaker 2: to hear from you. As always, you can email us

369
00:23:54,560 --> 00:24:05,480
Speaker 2: at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.

370
00:24:06,040 --> 00:24:09,000
Speaker 1: Stuffed Blow your Mind is a production of iHeartRadio. For

371
00:24:09,080 --> 00:24:12,919
Speaker 1: more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio, app, Apple podcasts,

372
00:24:13,000 --> 00:24:14,760
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.