WEBVTT - Strange Ice, Part 1 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:06.920 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:12.640 --> 0:00:14.680 Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My name 0:00:14.720 --> 0:00:15.800 is Robert Lamb. 0:00:15.760 --> 0:00:19.040 And I am Joe McCormick. And today on Stuff to 0:00:19.040 --> 0:00:22.880 Blow Your Mind, we are going to be talking about ice. Now. 0:00:22.920 --> 0:00:25.840 This is relevant to us personally because down here in 0:00:25.840 --> 0:00:29.200 Atlanta we have just come out of a long stretch 0:00:29.240 --> 0:00:31.080 of very very cold weather. 0:00:31.960 --> 0:00:34.760 That's right. Yeah, we had quite a cold snap lingered 0:00:34.800 --> 0:00:38.839 around for many days there. We didn't get any of 0:00:38.880 --> 0:00:41.760 the snow. They got a lot of snow north of us, 0:00:41.800 --> 0:00:44.000 and you know, certainly in like Tennessee for example, and 0:00:44.120 --> 0:00:47.280 I think parts of northern Georgia, but down here we 0:00:47.320 --> 0:00:50.640 didn't see that. Instead, we just got cold temperatures and 0:00:50.680 --> 0:00:51.440 we got ice. 0:00:51.680 --> 0:00:54.600 I should bestfy it was cold weather for Atlanta, because 0:00:54.800 --> 0:00:57.400 obviously we get sneered at by you know, people who 0:00:57.480 --> 0:00:59.960 live in the really freezing click. 0:01:00.680 --> 0:01:04.440 That's right, yeah, So you know, like a lot of people, 0:01:05.120 --> 0:01:07.480 it was, you know, it was unseasonably cold. So I 0:01:07.520 --> 0:01:11.760 was noticing things that I hadn't noticed before in my 0:01:11.840 --> 0:01:16.360 immediate environment. And one of these things, right outside of 0:01:17.200 --> 0:01:21.640 the window where we eat our breakfast, we have a 0:01:21.640 --> 0:01:24.760 bird bath, and the bird bath was full of water. 0:01:24.800 --> 0:01:27.759 I probably should have emptied it because anytime the water 0:01:27.840 --> 0:01:30.160 freezes in the bird bath, it like cracks the plastic 0:01:30.200 --> 0:01:34.119 at the bottom, and then once everything melts and dries out, 0:01:34.200 --> 0:01:36.080 I have to like superglue it again so that it 0:01:36.080 --> 0:01:39.920 will hold water. But you know, it's still it's amusing, 0:01:40.080 --> 0:01:42.840 especially for my son when when all that freezes up. 0:01:43.120 --> 0:01:46.560 Except this time, there was a little something extra going on. 0:01:47.040 --> 0:01:48.760 And it's something that I know a number of you 0:01:48.920 --> 0:01:51.480 out there have experienced as well. And if you haven't 0:01:51.520 --> 0:01:54.400 experienced it, maybe you've seen pictures or footage of it 0:01:54.480 --> 0:01:57.840 from other people having this experience. But you go out 0:01:57.880 --> 0:01:59.960 to the bird bath, it is of course frozen saft, 0:02:01.000 --> 0:02:05.080 except there's this little extra bit. There's a spike emerging, 0:02:05.600 --> 0:02:09.239 and generally it's like diagonally from the bird bath, as 0:02:09.280 --> 0:02:12.720 if there's like some sort of sentient like death spike 0:02:13.400 --> 0:02:16.080 or in some cases kind of a cone or pyramid 0:02:16.200 --> 0:02:19.519 or inverted pyramid emerging out of the ice. 0:02:20.440 --> 0:02:23.200 Yeah. I've seen this in different forms, often with like 0:02:23.240 --> 0:02:25.000 a bird bath. I feel like I've seen it in 0:02:25.000 --> 0:02:26.600 the form of something that looks like a like a 0:02:26.760 --> 0:02:30.200 vase or Yeah, more like a cone, but I'm familiar 0:02:30.200 --> 0:02:33.120 with it also just in the freezer making ice cubes. 0:02:33.160 --> 0:02:36.320 Occasionally I think, if you know, if conditions in the 0:02:36.320 --> 0:02:39.000 freezer are just right, you'll you'll put in a tray 0:02:39.000 --> 0:02:41.040 of ice cubes and you'll pull them out and they'll 0:02:41.040 --> 0:02:43.840 have like what looks like, I don't know, the the 0:02:43.880 --> 0:02:46.600 outline of a comet impact on the surface of the 0:02:47.000 --> 0:02:50.400 ice cube, frozen in time exactly. Yeah. 0:02:50.520 --> 0:02:53.680 Yeah, So again, this is a fairly common occurrence, but 0:02:54.080 --> 0:02:56.600 it doesn't seem to take away from the novelty of 0:02:57.240 --> 0:03:00.640 ice spikes. And there are a lot of explained articles 0:03:00.639 --> 0:03:03.800 concerning ice spikes out there, But one of the older 0:03:03.840 --> 0:03:06.919 ones I came across was a letter published in the 0:03:07.000 --> 0:03:11.000 journal Nature on March seventh, nineteen thirty one, and it 0:03:11.040 --> 0:03:14.120 was written by Arthur Morley Davies who lived eighteen sixty 0:03:14.200 --> 0:03:17.200 nine through nineteen fifty nine. He was a staunch critic 0:03:17.240 --> 0:03:19.760 of creationism and an author of the nineteen thirty seven 0:03:19.800 --> 0:03:22.040 book Evolution and Its Modern Critics. 0:03:23.800 --> 0:03:26.519 I'm picturing the Statler and Waldorf. 0:03:26.840 --> 0:03:30.480 So you know, learned man scientist and author. But in 0:03:30.520 --> 0:03:34.119 this article I was amused because he's doing just what 0:03:34.360 --> 0:03:36.000 I was doing, and what many of us are still 0:03:36.000 --> 0:03:39.040 doing today, gazing at this sudden weird ice in a 0:03:39.040 --> 0:03:41.480 bird bath and just trying to figure out what's going on, 0:03:41.640 --> 0:03:44.280 kind of guessing at it, and also calling up friends 0:03:44.320 --> 0:03:46.800 and being like, Hey, you'd never believe what I saw 0:03:46.840 --> 0:03:49.640 this morning is quite curious. Let's talk about what's going 0:03:49.680 --> 0:03:52.480 on here. So I'm going to read just a bit 0:03:52.520 --> 0:03:56.160 from it here, he says, quote. I am indebted to 0:03:56.200 --> 0:03:59.040 a number of my colleagues, and particularly to Professor Ao 0:03:59.520 --> 0:04:03.520 Ramkin and doctor H. T Ellingham for a very interesting 0:04:03.560 --> 0:04:07.840 discussion of this phenomenon. The most feasible explanation appears to 0:04:07.880 --> 0:04:10.800 be that freezing began as usual at the margin of 0:04:10.840 --> 0:04:13.920 the surface of the water, and ice crystals grew inward 0:04:14.040 --> 0:04:17.279 until the surface was completely frozen except for a triangular 0:04:17.360 --> 0:04:20.440 area in the center. At this stage, there was a 0:04:20.560 --> 0:04:23.760 rapid fall of temperature, and the water below the surface 0:04:23.800 --> 0:04:28.440 began to freeze quickly. The expansion accompanying solidification caused the 0:04:28.520 --> 0:04:31.840 excess of volume to be forced through the triangular aperture, 0:04:32.279 --> 0:04:38.200 the water freezing as it rose. And that sounds pretty good, right, yeah, yeah, 0:04:38.440 --> 0:04:41.520 And this is roughly what I was thinking about as well. 0:04:41.760 --> 0:04:43.440 I think the morning that we saw the ice spike, 0:04:44.040 --> 0:04:46.920 we were going somewhere. I think it was like super cold, 0:04:46.920 --> 0:04:48.120 but we were like, Okay, I guess we're going to 0:04:48.200 --> 0:04:51.120 go to Ikia or something. So we looked at the 0:04:51.120 --> 0:04:52.680 ice spike and we got in the car, and then 0:04:52.680 --> 0:04:54.680 I was just kind of thinking about the ice spike, 0:04:54.720 --> 0:04:56.640 and I was like, well, I guess what's probably happening 0:04:56.680 --> 0:04:58.400 is such and such, And it sounds like I was 0:04:58.480 --> 0:05:04.160 mostly correct. The oldest writings on the formation of these 0:05:04.200 --> 0:05:06.919 ice spikes that I could come across, they seem to 0:05:06.960 --> 0:05:09.880 go back a decade or so earlier to nineteen twenty one. 0:05:10.320 --> 0:05:13.680 This is when H. E. Dorsey wrote about it. Apparently 0:05:13.720 --> 0:05:17.760 another author that is credited as O. Bali or Bally 0:05:18.279 --> 0:05:21.440 also wrote about it. Thus it is often referred to 0:05:21.480 --> 0:05:27.720 as the Bally Dorsey theory of spicule formation on sweet pellets. 0:05:28.200 --> 0:05:32.080 So who's this Dorsey, gentleman, Well, this would be American engineer, 0:05:32.160 --> 0:05:35.640 inventor and physicist Herbert Grove Dorsey, who lived eighteen seventy 0:05:35.680 --> 0:05:39.080 six through nineteen sixty one, who invented and patented the 0:05:39.080 --> 0:05:44.200 first practical pathometer for phathometer. I suppose for determining water 0:05:44.320 --> 0:05:47.760 depth in nineteen twenty eight, along with many other inventions, 0:05:47.760 --> 0:05:50.640 though that might be the biggest one. He was principal 0:05:50.680 --> 0:05:54.840 engineer for the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey Radiosonic 0:05:54.920 --> 0:05:58.640 Laboratory in the nineteen thirties. He studied the formation of 0:05:58.680 --> 0:06:01.760 ice spikes in a laboratory setting, and he theorized that 0:06:01.839 --> 0:06:05.200 the increase in volume for the freezing ice forced water 0:06:05.320 --> 0:06:08.800 up through an opening in the ice covering, creating a 0:06:08.880 --> 0:06:12.719 tube that grows at the tip. And this does remain 0:06:12.839 --> 0:06:15.640 the most widely accepted theory of what's going on here. 0:06:16.160 --> 0:06:18.440 But from what I understand, the conditions have to be 0:06:18.600 --> 0:06:20.960 just right to form an ice spike, right, Like, if 0:06:21.000 --> 0:06:24.520 it's either too warm or too cold below freezing, either 0:06:24.560 --> 0:06:28.120 way it will it will inhibit the formation of the spike. 0:06:28.360 --> 0:06:31.279 That's right. Yeah. I was reading about the work of 0:06:31.640 --> 0:06:35.599 physicist Kenneth Librick, who conducted a study of ice spikes 0:06:35.640 --> 0:06:39.120 in two thousand and three and found that there's kind 0:06:39.160 --> 0:06:42.520 of like a Goldilocks zone for ice spike formation. You 0:06:42.560 --> 0:06:45.440 want it to be roughly twenty degrees fairnheigh. That's negative 0:06:45.440 --> 0:06:49.320 seven degrees celsius more or less colder than that, and 0:06:49.360 --> 0:06:52.240 spikes don't form hotter than that, and the ice doesn't 0:06:52.240 --> 0:06:56.320 form fast enough to generate a spike. Also, the quality 0:06:56.360 --> 0:07:00.560 of water plays apart, so pure water, according to this 0:07:00.640 --> 0:07:04.880 individual's experiments, seemed to be important. He found that with 0:07:05.040 --> 0:07:07.960 salt content he saw a reduction in a likelihood of 0:07:08.000 --> 0:07:11.440 ice spikes, and in his experiments, tap water didn't work 0:07:11.480 --> 0:07:13.960 at all. Now, granted, tap water is going to vary 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:18.080 from place to place, but yeah, it seems like pure 0:07:18.160 --> 0:07:20.680 water is going to be your best option here. 0:07:21.040 --> 0:07:24.560 I think it's interesting that the formation of spikes in 0:07:24.600 --> 0:07:30.400 freezing water, that process is dependent on the peculiar fact 0:07:30.520 --> 0:07:36.520 that water, unlike most substances, expands rather than contracts as 0:07:36.560 --> 0:07:39.800 it freezes. So and you know, a lot of things 0:07:39.840 --> 0:07:43.320 actually on Earth and in life in the universe are 0:07:43.360 --> 0:07:46.800 dependent on the fact that water expands instead of contracting 0:07:46.840 --> 0:07:50.080 as it freezes. So if water contracted and became more 0:07:50.120 --> 0:07:53.440 dense as it froze, water would sink to like ice 0:07:53.480 --> 0:07:56.240 would sink to the bottom of bodies of water instead 0:07:56.240 --> 0:07:59.559 of floating on top, which would you know, radically change 0:07:59.560 --> 0:08:01.920 the way life life works on Earth. I think I've 0:08:01.960 --> 0:08:04.480 read some arguments before that it like if that were 0:08:04.520 --> 0:08:06.520 physically the case, it would sort of make life on 0:08:06.600 --> 0:08:10.560 Earth near impossible because like, when water started freezing on top, 0:08:10.600 --> 0:08:13.840 it would essentially instead of insulating the water below with 0:08:13.920 --> 0:08:16.680 the ice layer on top, the ice would sink to 0:08:16.680 --> 0:08:19.240 the bottom, and then the whole column of water would freeze, 0:08:19.280 --> 0:08:21.440 and then you know, it would kill all the life 0:08:21.480 --> 0:08:24.160 forms in it, or at least freeze them. So that's 0:08:24.160 --> 0:08:27.160 an extremely consequential outcome of the fact that the water 0:08:27.240 --> 0:08:30.680 expands instead of contracting when it freezes. But also we 0:08:30.760 --> 0:08:33.160 get these ice bikes, So like, yeah, like you explained, Rob, 0:08:33.200 --> 0:08:36.440 you've got a container of water and it starts freezing 0:08:36.520 --> 0:08:38.679 from the outside in. You can imagine it sort of 0:08:38.720 --> 0:08:41.599 forms a shell of ice in a way around this 0:08:42.440 --> 0:08:44.960 mass of liquid water, and this the liquid water in 0:08:45.000 --> 0:08:48.280 the middle. It starts to freeze. It needs somewhere to 0:08:48.440 --> 0:08:52.120 go because it's expanding in the freezing process. So if 0:08:52.160 --> 0:08:54.360 there's only like a hole left in the surface, it's 0:08:54.400 --> 0:08:57.000 going to start squeezing out through that hole and freezing 0:08:57.040 --> 0:09:00.480 as it squeezes out and just freezes taller and taller, taller. 0:09:01.040 --> 0:09:03.439 For liquids, that shrink in volume as they freeze. 0:09:03.440 --> 0:09:07.000 This would never happen, right, right, So it's yeah, it's 0:09:07.240 --> 0:09:09.720 a fun little thing to observe at the at a 0:09:09.720 --> 0:09:13.760 frozen bird bath or inside of a freezer if conditions 0:09:13.760 --> 0:09:17.520 are right there. So in this episode, as you've probably guessed, 0:09:17.640 --> 0:09:19.280 this is roughly what we're going to be talking about, 0:09:19.360 --> 0:09:23.000 various examples of what you might call strange eyes, strange 0:09:23.040 --> 0:09:26.679 water eyes, and we have some fun ones to discuss here. 0:09:26.880 --> 0:09:30.280 Okay, So I'm going to talk about a bizarre, haunting 0:09:30.440 --> 0:09:35.480 genre of ice formation referred to as nieves penitentes Spanish 0:09:35.520 --> 0:09:40.760 for penitent snows, or sometimes they're just called penitentes, meaning penitents, 0:09:41.880 --> 0:09:45.000 So depending on what you read, they're named after their 0:09:45.040 --> 0:09:48.760 resemblance either to maybe human figures kneeling in prayer, or 0:09:48.800 --> 0:09:53.679 more often to monks marching in religious processions, especially the 0:09:53.720 --> 0:09:55.880 kind you might see with like the pointed hoods worn 0:09:55.920 --> 0:09:59.840 in Spanish Catholic celebrations of Holy Week. These formations are 0:09:59.840 --> 0:10:06.479 so sometimes described as standing blades, pinnacles, towers, or columns 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:09.880 of ice. They can reach up to a maximum of 0:10:10.240 --> 0:10:12.679 four or five meters in height in the settings where 0:10:12.679 --> 0:10:15.920 they're most commonly found, though I found some claims of 0:10:16.400 --> 0:10:20.640 penitents or penitent like formations in other cases reaching even higher. 0:10:21.120 --> 0:10:23.920 But the numbers I've seen for the Andes where they're 0:10:23.920 --> 0:10:27.440 most often seen are four or five meters. They can 0:10:27.480 --> 0:10:30.360 be found in high mountain ranges, especially the Andes in 0:10:30.400 --> 0:10:35.160 South America, at elevations of about four thousand meters above 0:10:35.160 --> 0:10:39.200 sea level or more. They're generally oriented so that the 0:10:39.240 --> 0:10:43.320 blades point toward the path of the sun, point toward 0:10:43.400 --> 0:10:49.080 the noontime sun, and they can occupy whole fields or hillsides, which, 0:10:49.120 --> 0:10:52.160 if you go with the analogy of their namesake, forms 0:10:52.200 --> 0:10:56.839 the impression of a vast, uncountable crowd of worshippers or 0:10:57.120 --> 0:10:59.920 of maybe monks gathering at the end of a great 0:11:00.080 --> 0:11:01.640 procession or pilgrimage. 0:11:02.400 --> 0:11:05.439 Yeah, there's some very evocative photos of these. You included 0:11:05.480 --> 0:11:08.800 some in the outline. Some of these are I feel 0:11:08.840 --> 0:11:11.360 like they're just the kind of thing that are just 0:11:11.520 --> 0:11:15.600 ripped from the sorts of wallpapers that come included with 0:11:15.679 --> 0:11:18.400 various Apple products, you know, like it's that kind of 0:11:18.440 --> 0:11:20.240 like stunning serene imagery. 0:11:20.640 --> 0:11:23.520 Yeah, exactly so, looking at the photos, I totally understand 0:11:23.520 --> 0:11:26.719 the comparison to kneeling or marching human bodies. But personally, 0:11:27.400 --> 0:11:30.840 I'm struck with how much they can sometimes look like 0:11:31.400 --> 0:11:37.320 a naturally occurring maize with chaotic corridors and pathways that 0:11:37.360 --> 0:11:40.720 are bounded by these thin, jagged ridges of ice. So 0:11:40.840 --> 0:11:44.079 to me, some of these landscapes and they can take 0:11:44.120 --> 0:11:46.760 you know, they have different sizes and orientations and stuff, 0:11:46.760 --> 0:11:48.880 so they don't all look the same. But some of 0:11:48.920 --> 0:11:53.520 the Penitente landscapes look like a frost magic variant of 0:11:53.559 --> 0:11:58.120 a xenomorph colony was using their structural mucous secretions to 0:11:58.240 --> 0:12:00.120 approximate a human hedge made. 0:12:00.160 --> 0:12:02.840 Is Yeah, Yeah, it does have that kind of feeling 0:12:02.840 --> 0:12:05.840 a very alien landscape, especially the case in these images 0:12:05.880 --> 0:12:09.000 you shared here where we see human beings standing amid 0:12:09.640 --> 0:12:10.320 these blades. 0:12:10.720 --> 0:12:13.720 Yeah, and that can create a very creepy feeling. You 0:12:13.800 --> 0:12:17.240 see people posing with them. Sometimes they're as tall as 0:12:17.240 --> 0:12:19.959 the person or taller, and it's as if either they're 0:12:20.000 --> 0:12:22.120 standing in a crowd or maybe standing in a kind 0:12:22.120 --> 0:12:26.120 of forest or maze. And the other objects here are 0:12:26.120 --> 0:12:28.560 not people or trees or hedges or whatever, but they 0:12:28.559 --> 0:12:33.439 are giant, rippling blade like shards of ice. Now, one 0:12:33.800 --> 0:12:37.679 famous historical description of these features can be found in 0:12:37.880 --> 0:12:41.760 Charles Darwin's Voyage of the Beagle. This is a work 0:12:41.800 --> 0:12:44.480 we've talked about on the show a number of times before, 0:12:44.480 --> 0:12:48.360 but it's the published memoir of Charles Darwin's five year 0:12:48.440 --> 0:12:51.840 journey around the world on the British Royal Navy survey ship, 0:12:51.920 --> 0:12:56.840 the HMS Beagle, during which journey Darwin made geological and 0:12:56.880 --> 0:13:01.280 biological observations which would later form the basis of his 0:13:01.400 --> 0:13:04.800 theory of evolution by natural selection. But this book was 0:13:04.840 --> 0:13:08.400 from before on the Origin of species. This book is 0:13:08.440 --> 0:13:11.959 just full of interesting observations about the world and about 0:13:12.040 --> 0:13:15.679 nature from Darwin's travels, and it helps for the reading 0:13:15.720 --> 0:13:17.880 that Darwin, I think is a very good writer of prose. 0:13:19.520 --> 0:13:22.319 So for context, the time of the entry where Darwin's 0:13:22.320 --> 0:13:27.040 going to talk about Penitentes is March eighteen, thirty thirty five. 0:13:27.480 --> 0:13:30.720 Darwin and his traveling party are in the middle of 0:13:30.800 --> 0:13:33.439 the Andes Mountains, so this is a part of the 0:13:33.520 --> 0:13:36.080 journey where he's off of the ship and he's traveling 0:13:36.080 --> 0:13:38.960 around in South America. They're in the middle of the 0:13:39.000 --> 0:13:42.599 Andes and they are making an overland journey from Santiago, 0:13:42.720 --> 0:13:46.760 Chile to the city of Mendoza in modern day Argentina, 0:13:47.520 --> 0:13:50.320 and on the course of this track, Darwin makes a 0:13:50.400 --> 0:13:54.600 number of very scientifically interesting observations, including coming across a 0:13:54.640 --> 0:13:58.720 petrified forest in the barren reaches of the High Desert, 0:13:59.080 --> 0:14:02.920 and also discover bring some fossil seashells embedded in rocks 0:14:02.960 --> 0:14:06.560 way up in the mountains. Darwin writes, quote shells which 0:14:06.600 --> 0:14:09.320 were once crawling on the bottom of the sea, now 0:14:09.400 --> 0:14:13.640 standing nearly fourteen thousand feet above its level. So the 0:14:13.760 --> 0:14:15.280 entries of the journal I'm going to look at are 0:14:15.280 --> 0:14:19.200 from around March twenty first to March twenty second, and 0:14:19.400 --> 0:14:22.240 a Darwin's party they've just emerged from a mountain pass 0:14:22.320 --> 0:14:28.080 called Puquines and they are headed toward another mountain pass 0:14:28.200 --> 0:14:32.480 called the Portillo Pass. And so March late March I 0:14:32.520 --> 0:14:35.760 was thinking of winter transitioning to spring. But that's then 0:14:35.800 --> 0:14:38.920 I realized, oh, that's northern hemisphere brain talking. This is 0:14:38.960 --> 0:14:42.640 the southern hemisphere. So that's actually summer turning into autumn. 0:14:42.720 --> 0:14:44.760 So this is I think a late time of the 0:14:44.840 --> 0:14:48.600 year to be trying to make this journey. Now, it's 0:14:48.640 --> 0:14:51.040 an interesting note. Before we get to the ice formations, 0:14:51.080 --> 0:14:52.760 I did just want to mention something that caught my 0:14:52.800 --> 0:14:57.000 attention from the journal entry from March twenty first, Darwin 0:14:57.080 --> 0:14:59.440 says he and his companions have made their way into 0:14:59.520 --> 0:15:04.160 a high mountainous country between two mountain ranges, and again 0:15:04.200 --> 0:15:06.920 this is apparently late in the season for travel. Darwin 0:15:06.960 --> 0:15:09.640 fears what would happen if there's bad weather because there 0:15:09.800 --> 0:15:12.320 is not much there's not really anywhere for them to 0:15:12.360 --> 0:15:15.640 take shelter, and he says that they are able to 0:15:15.720 --> 0:15:18.960 build what he calls a miserable fire out of the 0:15:19.000 --> 0:15:22.880 only available fuel, which are the roots of an unspecified 0:15:22.920 --> 0:15:26.840 scrubby plant. And he says that the wind was piercingly cold. 0:15:27.560 --> 0:15:31.720 I'm getting shades of Bilbo. Is there about the journey 0:15:31.720 --> 0:15:32.800 through the misty mountains? Here? 0:15:32.920 --> 0:15:37.240 Oh that's funny, Yeah, No lyrics of songs are included. 0:15:37.440 --> 0:15:40.800 Unfortunately, here does he complain about the lack of food though. 0:15:40.760 --> 0:15:42.800 Oh you know, Darwin had to have second breakfast, and 0:15:42.840 --> 0:15:45.480 in fact there are complaints about food coming right up. 0:15:45.560 --> 0:15:48.680 So Darwin is about to explain troubles they had cooking 0:15:48.720 --> 0:15:51.920 their food, which connects to an interesting fact we've talked 0:15:51.920 --> 0:15:54.840 about in some of our episodes on high altitudes. In 0:15:54.880 --> 0:15:58.800 the past. So Darwin writes, quote, at the place where 0:15:58.800 --> 0:16:02.920 we slept, water necessarily boiled from the diminished pressure of 0:16:02.960 --> 0:16:06.160 the atmosphere at a lower temperature than it does in 0:16:06.200 --> 0:16:09.440 a less lofty country, the case being the converse of 0:16:09.480 --> 0:16:13.640 that of a Papan's digester. Now a quick note here. 0:16:13.680 --> 0:16:18.440 Papan's digester was basically a pressure cooker. It was an 0:16:18.480 --> 0:16:22.280 early pressure cooker invented in the seventeenth century by the 0:16:22.320 --> 0:16:26.960 French physicist Denis Papan. So Darwin is saying that the 0:16:27.040 --> 0:16:29.920 high elevation at his camp is functioning like a reverse 0:16:30.000 --> 0:16:33.360 pressure cooker. Inside a pressure cooker you increase the boiling 0:16:33.400 --> 0:16:36.080 point of water by closing it and having a higher pressure, 0:16:36.280 --> 0:16:39.240 allowing the food to cook faster. At his camp, and 0:16:39.320 --> 0:16:42.720 the low pressure up there, it lowers the boiling point 0:16:42.760 --> 0:16:45.760 of water instead of increasing it. So he goes on 0:16:45.800 --> 0:16:49.440 to say, quote, hence the potatoes, after remaining for some 0:16:49.720 --> 0:16:53.040 hours in the boiling water, were nearly as hard as ever. 0:16:53.360 --> 0:16:55.600 The pot was left on the fire all night, and 0:16:55.720 --> 0:16:58.880 next morning it was boiled again, But yet the potatoes 0:16:58.920 --> 0:17:02.280 were not cooked. I found out this by overhearing my 0:17:02.320 --> 0:17:05.359 two companions discussing the cause they had come to the 0:17:05.359 --> 0:17:08.840 simple conclusion quote that the cursed pot, which was a 0:17:08.880 --> 0:17:12.440 new one, did not choose to boil potatoes. Oh wow, 0:17:12.600 --> 0:17:16.520 this pot hates potatoes. So a couple of things here. 0:17:16.840 --> 0:17:19.000 First of all, what Darwin says about cooking at high 0:17:19.040 --> 0:17:22.639 elevation is absolutely true. We've discussed this on the show before. 0:17:22.680 --> 0:17:25.520 The higher you go above sea level, the less atmospheric 0:17:25.520 --> 0:17:28.320 pressure there is, so there's less atmosphere sitting on you. 0:17:29.160 --> 0:17:31.840 The lower the atmospheric pressure, the lower the boiling point 0:17:31.840 --> 0:17:35.160 of water at that elevation. I don't know exactly what 0:17:35.280 --> 0:17:38.640 elevation Darwin was at the point he was cooking here, 0:17:38.680 --> 0:17:41.719 but the highest elevation he mentions in the surrounding text 0:17:42.240 --> 0:17:45.600 is fourteen thousand feet, And according to a chart I 0:17:45.640 --> 0:17:48.639 found on the internet, at fourteen thousand feet, the boiling 0:17:48.680 --> 0:17:50.880 point of water is about one hundred and eighty six 0:17:50.920 --> 0:17:55.320 degrees fahrenheit or eighty six degrees See. Of course, in 0:17:55.359 --> 0:17:58.960 a regular pot, water cannot get hotter than its boiling point, 0:17:59.000 --> 0:18:01.360 which means there's a lit to how hot you can 0:18:01.400 --> 0:18:03.800 get the food you're trying to cook in the water. 0:18:04.359 --> 0:18:06.960 And as an experiment, I was like, well, I wonder 0:18:06.960 --> 0:18:09.080 what a potato cooked to one hundred and eighty six 0:18:09.119 --> 0:18:12.520 degrees fahrenheit is like. So I did this yesterday with 0:18:12.600 --> 0:18:16.359 the aid of a probe thermometer in my toaster oven. 0:18:16.440 --> 0:18:18.480 So it was a dry cooking method, not a wet one. 0:18:19.160 --> 0:18:22.840 Not not a perfect comparison, but the results were that, 0:18:23.280 --> 0:18:26.000 you know, the potato cooked to one eighty six fahrenheit 0:18:26.119 --> 0:18:29.439 was not good, but not inedible. I would say a 0:18:29.480 --> 0:18:33.480 potato definitely should be cooked to a higher temperature in 0:18:33.600 --> 0:18:35.840 order to be enjoyable. You know, if I was making 0:18:35.880 --> 0:18:38.879 a baked potato and doing an internal temperature, I would 0:18:38.880 --> 0:18:40.960 take it to like two oh eight fahrenheit. You need 0:18:41.000 --> 0:18:43.320 to take it to almost the boiling point of water. 0:18:44.280 --> 0:18:46.440 And this this potato I did to one eighty six 0:18:46.600 --> 0:18:49.920 was not fluffy. It was still kind of firm. But also, 0:18:51.040 --> 0:18:53.160 you know, it was cooked enough that I assumed somebody 0:18:53.240 --> 0:18:56.080 climbing through the mountains would settle for it. So I 0:18:56.119 --> 0:18:58.760 wonder if there were any other factors at play that 0:18:58.880 --> 0:19:02.160 made it even less well done than my one hundred 0:19:02.160 --> 0:19:05.760 and eighty six fahrenheit potato. I'm not sure, But potato 0:19:05.840 --> 0:19:08.080 thoughts aside. The other thing I wanted to come back 0:19:08.080 --> 0:19:11.920 to is an interesting case of connections in the Burkian sense. 0:19:11.960 --> 0:19:16.240 Here denis Papan's steam digestor, which again this is an 0:19:16.240 --> 0:19:21.200 early seventeenth century pressure cooker, was actually an important inspiration 0:19:21.560 --> 0:19:25.440 for Thomas Nukman and others in their work on developing 0:19:25.480 --> 0:19:29.040 the steam engine, showing that the expansion of trapped steam, 0:19:29.320 --> 0:19:32.159 you know it's expanding under heat, could be used to 0:19:32.160 --> 0:19:35.679 do work. For example, to drive a piston, which you know, 0:19:35.760 --> 0:19:38.720 from the right combination of gears and shafts and things, 0:19:38.760 --> 0:19:42.000 could you could apply that work of the driven piston 0:19:42.240 --> 0:19:45.200 to almost any task, from pumping water to turning the 0:19:45.200 --> 0:19:46.200 wheels of a railcar. 0:19:46.640 --> 0:19:47.200 Fascinating. 0:19:47.280 --> 0:19:49.800 Yeah, may you never look at your instant pot the 0:19:49.840 --> 0:20:02.359 same again. But anyway, we got to come back to 0:20:02.480 --> 0:20:05.159 the ice formation. So we were moving on to the 0:20:05.240 --> 0:20:09.200 journal entry of March twenty second, where Darwin says, after 0:20:09.240 --> 0:20:13.520 eating our potato less breakfast, we traveled across the intermediate 0:20:13.600 --> 0:20:16.560 tract to the foot of the Portillo range. In the 0:20:16.560 --> 0:20:19.560 middle of summer, cattle are brought up here to graze, 0:20:19.600 --> 0:20:22.720 but they had now all been removed. Even the greater 0:20:22.840 --> 0:20:26.159 number of the Guanacos had decamped, Knowing well that if 0:20:26.200 --> 0:20:28.840 overtaken here by a snowstorm, they would be caught in 0:20:28.880 --> 0:20:31.680 a trap. And I had to look this up. Guanacos 0:20:31.760 --> 0:20:35.080 or a type of South American camelid closely related to 0:20:35.119 --> 0:20:35.639 the lama. 0:20:36.400 --> 0:20:38.679 Yeah, they're really cool. I've never seen them in person, 0:20:38.720 --> 0:20:41.800 but I've seen some nature documentaries that feature them, and yeah, 0:20:41.800 --> 0:20:46.080 they're like they're a wild species, and yeah, they have 0:20:46.080 --> 0:20:48.520 a quite noble air to them. Based on the footage 0:20:48.560 --> 0:20:49.720 i've scene. 0:20:49.400 --> 0:20:52.040 I thought they were cute. Darwin goes on. We had 0:20:52.080 --> 0:20:56.199 a fine view of a massive mountains called Tupungato, the 0:20:56.280 --> 0:20:59.639 whole clothed with the unbroken snow in the midst of 0:20:59.680 --> 0:21:02.360 which there was a blue patch, no doubt a glacier. 0:21:02.760 --> 0:21:06.879 A circumstance of rare occurrence in these mountains now commenced 0:21:06.920 --> 0:21:10.680 a heavy and long climb, similar to that of the Puquenes. 0:21:11.320 --> 0:21:15.200 Bold conical hills of red granite rose on each hand. 0:21:15.680 --> 0:21:19.679 In the valleys there were several broad fields of perpetual snow. 0:21:20.400 --> 0:21:23.879 These frozen masses, during the process of thawing, had in 0:21:23.960 --> 0:21:28.600 some parts been converted into pinnacles or columns, which, as 0:21:28.640 --> 0:21:31.840 they were high and close together, made it difficult for 0:21:31.880 --> 0:21:35.280 our cargo mules to pass on one of these columns 0:21:35.280 --> 0:21:40.320 of ice, a frozen horse was sticking as on a pedestal, 0:21:40.600 --> 0:21:44.159 but with its hind legs straight up in the air. 0:21:44.800 --> 0:21:47.879 The animal, i suppose, must have fallen with its head 0:21:48.119 --> 0:21:52.159 downward into a hole when the snow was continuous, and 0:21:52.359 --> 0:21:56.560 afterwards the surrounding parts must have been removed by the thall. 0:21:57.240 --> 0:22:01.360 Oh wow, so it's a shocking and vocative scene Darwin 0:22:01.560 --> 0:22:05.520 is describing. So again, these are valleys in between the 0:22:05.600 --> 0:22:10.240 granite hills. The valleys are covered in perpetual snow, so 0:22:10.760 --> 0:22:13.720 you know this is the end of summer in the 0:22:13.760 --> 0:22:16.879 region and the snow is still not fully melted. And 0:22:17.000 --> 0:22:20.879 Darwin says that this snow, while partially thawing in the summer, 0:22:20.920 --> 0:22:26.480 had somehow been converted into a field of pinnacles or columns. Again, 0:22:26.520 --> 0:22:28.960 he says it was difficult for the mules loaded with 0:22:29.000 --> 0:22:32.880 cargo to pass between these pinnacles, and in one pinnacle 0:22:32.960 --> 0:22:37.600 formation they found a dead horse, frozen solid, face down 0:22:37.760 --> 0:22:40.359 with its hind parts pointing straight up to the sky. 0:22:40.960 --> 0:22:43.400 Darwin says in a footnote he believes this is the 0:22:43.440 --> 0:22:47.560 same phenomenon that has been observed by other authors, including 0:22:47.600 --> 0:22:51.359