Speaker 1: How did everybody Ugh Blair, Blair Blair blah. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think you know where this is headed. It's our episode
Speaker 1: on disgust. This is a Josh pic way back in
Speaker 1: the day. This is March twenty nineteen. And I thought, initially, well,
Speaker 1: what in the world are we going to talk about
Speaker 1: with disgust? I don't I'm not sure I get this one, Josh,
Speaker 1: but he knew, as he always does, that there was
Speaker 1: something more to it than meets the eye.
Speaker 2: And he was right.
Speaker 1: So check it out and learn all about disgust right here,
Speaker 1: right now.
Speaker 2: Blah.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 3: You and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and
Speaker 3: there's Charles w Chuck Bryan over there, and there's Jerry
Speaker 3: and this is discussed on Stuff you should Know about disgust.
Speaker 2: You gotta say it like that.
Speaker 3: I'm excited about this one, Chuck, And I don't know why.
Speaker 2: I have no idea.
Speaker 3: I think you do. If you stopped and really thought
Speaker 3: about it, that's fine, that's fine. But if you stopped
Speaker 3: and thought about it, you would say, yes, I know
Speaker 3: exactly why, Josh. And it is as follows Colon quotes
Speaker 3: because this is one of those things that science hasn't
Speaker 3: fully explained, which means there's a lot of interesting theories,
Speaker 3: which means we just get to like talk smack the
Speaker 3: whole time.
Speaker 1: It's interesting. This is one of those where I was
Speaker 1: reading it and I was I mean, it was sort
Speaker 1: of interesting. But then I was like, why would anyone
Speaker 1: even study this?
Speaker 3: I that's I mean, that's a good question. That's a
Speaker 3: good question. I think one of the reasons that I'm
Speaker 3: fascinated by it, And then I'm sure one of the
Speaker 3: reasons of these I mean, to dedicate your career to
Speaker 3: studying disgust. It is kind of a bizarre idea, but
Speaker 3: one of the main researchers in the study of disgust
Speaker 3: is a guy named Paul Rosen. He's kind of like
Speaker 3: the godfather, maybe even the father of the field. Yeah,
Speaker 3: he says, sure, but he's been doing it longer than anybody,
Speaker 3: so he's the He's the pappy as they say in
Speaker 3: the hills. He said that to him, discussed is the thing,
Speaker 3: the emotion, the experience that makes humans human, that that
Speaker 3: it is discussed that separates us from the other animals
Speaker 3: that we share the animal kingdom with so much so
Speaker 3: that we actually may use disgust to separate ourselves from
Speaker 3: the rest of the animals. Okay, that is pretty fascinating
Speaker 3: and it's worth exploring too, because I think it says
Speaker 3: a lot about us as as humans and as animals. Yeah,
Speaker 3: so that's why that's the answer to your question. How
Speaker 3: about that?
Speaker 2: All right?
Speaker 1: No, I get why somebody would want to say, I
Speaker 1: guess I'm talking about allocating funds.
Speaker 2: Just study it.
Speaker 3: Oh gotcha.
Speaker 1: It just seems like a strange thing to sink money into.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, if the humanities are going to sink
Speaker 3: money into anything, what makes us the most human would be?
Speaker 1: It makes it makes sense according to one guy, Right,
Speaker 1: I love it. Let's talk about gross things.
Speaker 3: Okay, so we're going to So so this, this whole
Speaker 3: idea of studying it, of studying disgust, is actually pretty new.
Speaker 3: Rosen didn't really start until like the seventies, and it
Speaker 3: wasn't until the nineties that it really got it really
Speaker 3: picked up, which we'll kind of get into. But prior
Speaker 3: to that, it was basically just philosophers who who were
Speaker 3: talking about disgust.
Speaker 1: Right, yes, I think, and I'm not sure about studying,
Speaker 1: But at least as far as I think, it seems
Speaker 1: to me like it was more of a like where's
Speaker 1: the boundary as far as what can we write about?
Speaker 1: What can we talk about, and what can we perform
Speaker 1: right and still sell books and tickets right?
Speaker 3: Like we want we want people to be tantalized at
Speaker 3: the thought of being grossed out or disgusted, but not
Speaker 3: actually be disgusted. It is a fine line that's walked, you.
Speaker 2: Know, no, of course, and it's subjective, it is.
Speaker 3: But the other thing about Discuss that's pretty interesting is
Speaker 3: it also appears to be universal. It's like it's a
Speaker 3: universal reaction. But what disgusts people is not universal. It's
Speaker 3: culturally bound I guess, right, maybe personal too, sure.
Speaker 2: I think totally personal.
Speaker 3: So the over time, like as you know, Discuss kind
Speaker 3: of moved out of the realm of philosophers and into science.
Speaker 3: There were a couple people who kind of made contributions
Speaker 3: early on in the field. When was Charles Darwin. He
Speaker 3: wrote a treatise on it, and his big thing was
Speaker 3: that disgust was related to taste, which is true to
Speaker 3: an extent, but that was Darwin's big thing, and then
Speaker 3: later on there was a guy, a psychoanalyst named andros angy'all,
Speaker 3: and Andres Angyall basically said that no, no, no, discuss
Speaker 3: is not really related to taste. It's the it comes
Speaker 3: from the idea or the thought of putting something horrific
Speaker 3: into the mouth, which again kind of makes sense to
Speaker 3: a certain extent. But then when Rosen and friends came along,
Speaker 3: it really started to take off and they actually managed
Speaker 3: to kind of categorize disgust into a few categories, which
Speaker 3: is what you do when you categorize things.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's the first one is core discussed, and that's
Speaker 1: what you think of if you like, you know, if
Speaker 1: poop or I mean, everyone has their own triggers, but
Speaker 1: if like vomit or feces or like a like entrails
Speaker 1: or something like that's cored discussed. That's an encounter with
Speaker 1: some sort of like physical contaminant that makes you, you know,
Speaker 1: make that face right, and.
Speaker 3: That face specifically, that's another universal thing too, apparently, the faces.
Speaker 3: It's called the gape, which is your mouth is open,
Speaker 3: your tongue may or may not be sticking out, your
Speaker 3: nose is wrinkled, and your upper lip is raised.
Speaker 2: Actually I don't do that with my mouth open, though,
Speaker 2: so you just.
Speaker 3: Kind of do the nose wrinkle in the upper lip.
Speaker 2: I guess like this, but I don't open my mouth.
Speaker 1: So that's why I sort of like, I don't know
Speaker 1: when it comes to stuff like this, I'm a little
Speaker 1: when they make these sweeping statements like everyone makes this face. Well,
Speaker 1: everyone may make a variation of a face of a.
Speaker 3: Like kind of a there's like a universal set of
Speaker 3: characteristics to the face that you could choose from that
Speaker 3: would fall into disgust like that.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you choose anything but maybe your
Speaker 1: natural reaction. But like I don't open my mouth, And
Speaker 1: when I read that, like everyone opens their mouth, like, no,
Speaker 1: that's not true.
Speaker 3: So I think one of the reasons why there is
Speaker 3: like this idea of it being universal is because evolutionary
Speaker 3: psychology is we'll see has said like, yes, this is
Speaker 3: our realm, We've got this, we're gonna explain this one
Speaker 3: and two fully, it basically has to be universal. So
Speaker 3: I think that's another thing about the point where the
Speaker 3: study of disgust is right now, Like there's a lot
Speaker 3: of good ideas, some of which have kind of been
Speaker 3: shown to be probably true thanks to the Wonder Machine,
Speaker 3: but it's still it's not fully explained, and so there
Speaker 3: are some ideas and descriptions that make it seem kind
Speaker 3: of wacky too, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1: That second kind of discuss getting back to that, was
Speaker 1: animal nature discussed, which is apparently these are things that
Speaker 1: anything that reminds us that we're really animals, and that
Speaker 1: could there could be a wide range of things there,
Speaker 1: from like some people think people eating with their hands
Speaker 1: is disgusting, and I think that would qualify under animal
Speaker 1: nature because like you're eating like an animal.
Speaker 2: Let's say.
Speaker 1: Sex, and we'll get into that more later, but apparently
Speaker 1: there's a baseline discussed for sex, which I'm not so
Speaker 1: sure about that one either. And then hygiene is another one.
Speaker 1: Poor hygiene is the animal nature discussed.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And another one is the like like you said, entrails,
Speaker 3: something that's called the the body envelope, the ideal body
Speaker 3: envelope being violated, whether it's like there's a deformity or
Speaker 3: there is like some sort of like an open wound
Speaker 3: or something like that. They think that this whole animal
Speaker 3: nature thing, that all these things remind us that we
Speaker 3: are animals and that disgust can be triggered by that
Speaker 3: reminder that we are that we are in fact animals,
Speaker 3: which is kind of weird. But we'll get into explanations
Speaker 3: for that later. I can't wait.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: And the final one is moral discussed, which and this
Speaker 1: is one where you know, you can be disgusted with
Speaker 1: someone's behavior or you know, disgusted with like something a
Speaker 1: politician does, or disgusted with racism or bigotry something like that.
Speaker 3: Right, And that one makes like the least amount of
Speaker 3: sense if you think about it like that. Okay, the
Speaker 3: first two were just kind of like, all right, we're like,
Speaker 3: it's animal related. We might have issues with being animals,
Speaker 3: so we're kind of disgusted by ourselves at the thought
Speaker 3: that we're animals. Maybe it's a bit more of a
Speaker 3: stretch than that core discussed, Like core disgusted makes this
Speaker 3: most sense out of all of them. Agreed.
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, And I don't even think that the moral discussed.
Speaker 1: I think that's a different type of thing altogether.
Speaker 3: So that other people have proposed that that like they're
Speaker 3: like some people have said, well, English speakers are just
Speaker 3: misusing the word discussed. They're actually talking right, well, they've
Speaker 3: done They've done studies of people in the Wonder Machine
Speaker 3: that shows that the region of the brain, the anterior insula,
Speaker 3: that's usually that usually lights up when you're showing a
Speaker 3: picture of like dog poop and said you're gonna eat this,
Speaker 3: you know your your anterior insula lights up. That same
Speaker 3: region lights up when people are disgusted with other people morally.
Speaker 3: Remember the ultimatum game. I don't remember. It used to
Speaker 3: come up all the time back in the day in
Speaker 3: our episodes. Yeah, but so if somebody was given a
Speaker 3: really really low offer I take it or leave it
Speaker 3: offer that was so low and so unfair that the
Speaker 3: person said, I'm just leaving it. I actually don't want
Speaker 3: this free money because I find it insulting. That same
Speaker 3: part of the brain that is triggered by like fecal
Speaker 3: disgust is also triggered, which supports the idea that there
Speaker 3: actually is a moral dimension to disgust and that we
Speaker 3: experience it in the same way.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's interesting.
Speaker 3: It is interesting, But it is like the it's the
Speaker 3: most tenuous of those three, I think.
Speaker 1: So the way this all started out, there are a
Speaker 1: bunch of theories, but it makes sense that it might
Speaker 1: have been sort of an offshoot of distaste, which is,
Speaker 1: you know, your body is conditioned thanks to you know,
Speaker 1: evolution to if you eat something that's bitter or rotten,
Speaker 1: like your instinct, your taste instinct is to throw it
Speaker 1: out and get rid of it, and it's a defense
Speaker 1: mechanism to save your life. And so the ideas that
Speaker 1: discuss developed out of that and that it's just simply
Speaker 1: an evolutionary trait that could have you know, saved Tiktook's life,
Speaker 1: you know, however many years ago.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And there's evidence apparently that this distaste, which is
Speaker 3: basically is an involuntary reaction, is like dropping something that's hot,
Speaker 3: Like you don't stop and think like wow, this cooking
Speaker 3: pan is about five well and five hundred and fifty
Speaker 3: degrees fahrenheight, and then you drop it. I should probably
Speaker 3: drop it like you just dropped the pant. Distaste is
Speaker 3: the same exact thing, and they've actually seen it elsewhere
Speaker 3: in the animal kingdom. So we've probably experienced distaste since
Speaker 3: before we were humans, and it's just spitting something out
Speaker 3: that doesn't seem right in an effort to I guess,
Speaker 3: keep the body from becoming polluted with disease, right, and
Speaker 3: they think that distaste somehow became a behavior that was
Speaker 3: laid over this ex or I'm sorry, disgust as was
Speaker 3: a behavior that became laid over this existing structure of distaste.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And that's interesting to me because that means that
Speaker 1: it becomes all of a sudden. It's not like you
Speaker 1: have to eat poop to be disgusted, right, Like the
Speaker 1: mere sight of poop now can discuss somebody.
Speaker 2: Yes, uh, and that just happened over time, I think.
Speaker 3: So that is why Rosen says this is like disgust
Speaker 3: is the defining characteristic of humanity because they suspect that
Speaker 3: other animals, at the very least almost all other animals
Speaker 3: don't have the cognitive capacity to use their imagination to
Speaker 3: imagine themselves eating poop and see and being disgusted by
Speaker 3: it as a result. Right, So that's why they say
Speaker 3: disgust separates humans from animals because it requires imagination to
Speaker 3: go from an involuntary reaction of spitting out food to
Speaker 3: not even getting to the point where the food is
Speaker 3: in your mouth. You can imagine that you would have
Speaker 3: that reaction and experience the emotion of disgust. So you
Speaker 3: don't have to go through that process, that actually very
Speaker 3: dangerous process of eating something rotten to figure out that
Speaker 3: you shouldn't be eating it. You can imagine it beforehand.
Speaker 3: And that's the function that discussed at least core disgust
Speaker 3: provides humanity. It advances us. We don't have to learn
Speaker 3: through trial and error over and over again not to
Speaker 3: eat rotten meat. We just know on some very basic
Speaker 3: level that that is a disgusting thing to do, and
Speaker 3: we have a reaction to it.
Speaker 1: Or you want to take a break, Yeah, all right, everyone,
Speaker 1: we're going to be right back right after this with
Speaker 1: more disgust. So I think we should go back to
Speaker 1: Tiktook and just like how this actually may have worked
Speaker 1: back in the day, Let's say Tiktook and his buddy
Speaker 1: Mockmock are strolling along the tundra.
Speaker 3: You know, Chuck, after eleven years, I am surprised that
Speaker 3: we have a new character, and I am very pleased
Speaker 3: Mock Mock.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, don't get used to him, because Mack Mack
Speaker 1: is he's about to die for Mock Mak. So TikTok
Speaker 1: and Mackmacher walking along the tundra they find an old,
Speaker 1: dead antelope, and Mockmock is like, well, this doesn't smell great,
Speaker 1: but I tell you what, I'm going to eat this
Speaker 1: thing because I don't have this genetic trait because my
Speaker 1: mom ate this stuff, uh and it's fine, And Tooktooks like,
Speaker 1: I don't know, my friend, it looks and smells gross.
Speaker 1: I do have this genetic trait, so I'm going to
Speaker 1: pass on that. So Mockmock's like, you're a sucker. I'm
Speaker 1: going to chow down on this rotten antelope. And then
Speaker 1: Mockmock gets sick and dies before Mockmock can have any babies.
Speaker 1: And then if this happens thousands and tens of thousands
Speaker 1: of times over a huge population, you can see how
Speaker 1: over time it would be like any physical evolutionary trait
Speaker 1: that might evolve over time, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: Tuktook's family is thriving today in the United States, all
Speaker 1: healthy descendants of Tuktook and Mockmock is long gone.
Speaker 3: Right because Tuktook was able to pass along his genes
Speaker 3: of being disgusted by rotten meat, and Mockmock died before
Speaker 3: he could pass his genes of not being disgusted along.
Speaker 3: So nature or natural selection or revolutions selected for Tuktooks right.
Speaker 2: Right, And Tiktook was a prolific lover, as we all know.
Speaker 3: And I imagine Mockmock in his dying words gasping, I
Speaker 3: regret never having.
Speaker 2: Seen the ocean. Yeah. Probably, so.
Speaker 3: It's a good mockmch Everyone doesn't know, but it's true.
Speaker 3: That was a great so chuck. That's the that's the
Speaker 3: evolutionary psychology basis for explaining how disgust came along and
Speaker 3: was passed along, right, And it makes sense on a
Speaker 3: very basic level, but it starts to get less and
Speaker 3: less sensible, as you've already pointed out, as we start
Speaker 3: to add more and more inputs of disgust. Right, like, yes,
Speaker 3: it makes sense that either somehow the idea of not
Speaker 3: eating meat was passed along, either genetically or even you
Speaker 3: could say Tuktook went back to the hunter gatherer tribe
Speaker 3: and said, hey, let me tell you what happened to Mockmock.
Speaker 3: It was crazy. He ate some rancid antelope, which I
Speaker 3: guess we all kind of thought was okay up to
Speaker 3: this point. But let me tell you, steer clear of
Speaker 3: the rancid antelope. You don't want to have anything to
Speaker 3: do that because it just killed Mockmack, and everyone trusting
Speaker 3: tuktook in, not just assuming that he hit Mockmock with
Speaker 3: a rock or something out in the wilderness and left
Speaker 3: him to die, that he actually did die from eating antelope.
Speaker 3: This became passed along. This is another way it could
Speaker 3: have happened, and that this like ancient knowledge. We just
Speaker 3: lost where the ancient knowledge came from, that was actually
Speaker 3: TikTok seeing Mockmock die, and instead it just became something
Speaker 3: that we came to think of as like instinct over time,
Speaker 3: you just don't eat rancid meat. But really what it is,
Speaker 3: rather than being passed along genetically, it was a I guess,
Speaker 3: a meme, an idea that was passed along generation to generation,
Speaker 3: and it became so ingrained that we just confuse it
Speaker 3: for genes or instinct as well, which is another explanation
Speaker 3: of it. But both of them have like an evolutionary
Speaker 3: component to it for sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then over time that even changes to where
Speaker 1: like it's not like humans, like let's talk about a
Speaker 1: human body then like a dead a dead human body
Speaker 1: a corpse.
Speaker 3: Let me get my poking stick.
Speaker 2: Well, you probably.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't poke it because your evolutionary instinct is to probably
Speaker 1: just stay away.
Speaker 2: From that body.
Speaker 3: Well, that's what the stick is for.
Speaker 2: And it's not just because like, well.
Speaker 1: Maybe partially because a dead body just might creep someone out,
Speaker 1: but there's also an evolutionary basis to avoid that body,
Speaker 1: get it out of the house, and bury it because
Speaker 1: it may have been diseased.
Speaker 2: And they've even done studies.
Speaker 1: That was a study in two thousand and four in
Speaker 1: Biology Letters, just the greatest teen science mag out there.
Speaker 3: The Tiger Beat in Biological Science.
Speaker 1: So Biology Letters said that they didn't study where they
Speaker 1: found the images of objects that held what was called
Speaker 1: a potential disease threat, where rated is more disgusting. So
Speaker 1: this is just the idea that, again, because of evolution,
Speaker 1: we are have trained ourselves to avoid somebody who looks sick.
Speaker 3: Okay, now we get to another big chink in the armor.
Speaker 3: Ask me, where did we get the idea that a
Speaker 3: body caused disease and that you could become polluted by
Speaker 3: some weird magical transference of this disease by handling or
Speaker 3: coming in close contact with the body.
Speaker 2: Like pre germ theory.
Speaker 3: Pre germ theory, germ theory is very new, it's about
Speaker 3: one hundred and fifty years old. Almost on the nose.
Speaker 3: We're talking about people's aversion to dead bodies and corpses
Speaker 3: for eons before that, hundreds of years, if not thousands
Speaker 3: and thousands of years, right.
Speaker 2: Well, maybe even more like what if, like I mean,
Speaker 2: what if someone just going.
Speaker 1: Like back in the day where people like, oh, that's great,
Speaker 1: come here and give me, give me some sugar, right,
Speaker 1: or were people always sort of repulsed by that?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't know, and we don't we don't know.
Speaker 3: We can't say. We can only go as far back
Speaker 3: as any historical references we can find. But you can
Speaker 3: make a pretty good case that an aversion to something
Speaker 3: like that or a dead body goes back much further
Speaker 3: than germ theory. Yeah, so you come to that question,
Speaker 3: where did we get this idea? Where did we get
Speaker 3: this understanding on a very basic fundamental level that corpses
Speaker 3: are to be avoided so much so that we are
Speaker 3: disgusted by them. And even if you're not disgusted, like
Speaker 3: I want to wretch if I see a dead body
Speaker 3: in person, which you may be surprised. I think a
Speaker 3: lot of people would be very surprised that if they
Speaker 3: actually did see a dead body, they would be they
Speaker 3: would probably wretch.
Speaker 2: It depends on you know, what's going on the state
Speaker 2: it's in.
Speaker 3: Yeah, if it's a viscerated or something like that, or
Speaker 3: the smell I think also true. But the idea that
Speaker 3: there's something that is keeping you from avoiding it, whether
Speaker 3: it's the creeps, whether it's discussed, whether it's some form
Speaker 3: of a version that is that is acting to put
Speaker 3: distance between you and the polluting entity. This dead body.
Speaker 3: Where did that come from before germ theory? That's my
Speaker 3: big question that I haven't seen it answered anywhere. It's
Speaker 3: where did we get that? Again? Was it somebody handled
Speaker 3: the dead body and like became directly sick from it,
Speaker 3: so obviously that even like took Cook could say, yes,
Speaker 3: the dead body caused this, so we should steer clear
Speaker 3: of hanging out around dead bodies. Or was there some
Speaker 3: sort of awareness on a very basic level that we
Speaker 3: haven't figured out how to explain yet that that kept
Speaker 3: generations and generations of humans relatively healthy before the advent
Speaker 3: of germ theory and our understanding of it.
Speaker 1: It is a bit of a mind experiment. It is like, uh,
Speaker 1: this perhaps the very sound of someone very ill and
Speaker 1: hawking up.
Speaker 2: You know, phlegm sounds.
Speaker 1: Gross, right, But like like you say, though, before germ theory,
Speaker 1: before they knew that that would make that was sickness
Speaker 1: or that made someone sick, maybe people were like, oh,
Speaker 1: come in here and do that in my face. I
Speaker 1: love that sound, right, but it just doesn't seem likely.
Speaker 3: It's like ASMR to me.
Speaker 1: I don't know, man, It's very hard to wrap your
Speaker 1: head around.
Speaker 3: And also, if you remember in our Great Stink episode,
Speaker 3: right prior to germ theory, there is miasma theory, which
Speaker 3: was the smell of something directly polluted you and made
Speaker 3: you sick. Well, okay, associated with it. But even that,
Speaker 3: it's like, so, okay, what made you think that the smell?
Speaker 3: What makes you think that a dead body, which in
Speaker 3: and of itself isn't giving off any actual signals that
Speaker 3: it will make you sick if it's decayed enough and
Speaker 3: you like interact with it. What about that made us
Speaker 3: associate sickness a transference of sickness. That transference is it's
Speaker 3: an invisible magical transference of pollution from the dead body
Speaker 3: to you, the person who's handling the dead body. That
Speaker 3: is significant and remarkable that we came up with that.
Speaker 3: That's what I think is just so fascinating about all this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think this thing about the contingencies plays
Speaker 1: into because and it's fun.
Speaker 2: I have to admit, when I.
Speaker 1: Read this the word contingencies in my head, I was
Speaker 1: adding a letter or something and I kept saying in
Speaker 1: my head as contingenesis, and I was like, what is
Speaker 1: that contingenesis? And finally I saw contingencies correctly. I was like, man,
Speaker 1: am I drunk? Like what's going on? So? Anyway, there
Speaker 1: are contingenesies.
Speaker 3: That's like a facetious I had that same Oh really, yeah,
Speaker 3: what'd you think it said? Or sounded like facetious or
Speaker 3: something like that, and I kept sounding it out and
Speaker 3: then finally I was like, oh, that's facetious.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but you were probably like twelve and not a
Speaker 1: professional broadcaster.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I stink you had something in your eye that
Speaker 3: was all So.
Speaker 1: These contingencies in humans at any time, there are many
Speaker 1: contingencies at work within us, competing against each other. So
Speaker 1: if you go back to tuktook and mockmock Mackmack died,
Speaker 1: or let's say he did feel some disgust, but it
Speaker 1: wasn't like but he was also hungry. So that's the
Speaker 1: competing contingenesis and his desire to eat and not desire
Speaker 1: his need to eat overcame his low level disgust of like, well,
Speaker 1: it doesn't taste great, but I have this other contingency
Speaker 1: that says I have to eat, so I'm going to
Speaker 1: eat the thing and he doesn't die, right, then it's
Speaker 1: a little more complicated.
Speaker 3: It is more complicated, and if you step back and
Speaker 3: think about it evolutionarily, it would make way more sense
Speaker 3: for us to not maintain a sense of disgust and
Speaker 3: be able to eat like rancid meat and then instead
Speaker 3: learn like basically develop a gut biome that will will
Speaker 3: kill any bacterial decay that could make us sick, so
Speaker 3: that we we could have like that many more things
Speaker 3: that are available for us to eat when we're hard up.
Speaker 3: That makes way more sense through natural selection and evolution
Speaker 3: than learning to not eat something.
Speaker 1: And you know what I mean, that's sort of the
Speaker 1: thing too, though, Like the the winning contingency is ultimately
Speaker 1: going to be the one that makes you more fit
Speaker 1: for you know, replication, right, right, So.
Speaker 3: You you for cloning self cloning, so the but yes,
Speaker 3: so if you have more available food that you can
Speaker 3: gain energy from in the environment, that would make more
Speaker 3: sense to adapt to that rather than to adapt and
Speaker 3: aversion to a potential food source. Right, So that's one question.
Speaker 3: And then you can also kind of lay that right
Speaker 3: over sex as well too, Right, So this this explanation
Speaker 3: of why we might be averse, why we have competing
Speaker 3: contingencies for sex, right, Like, you want to be attracted
Speaker 3: to your mate because you're a person you find attractive
Speaker 3: is probably going to be a good match for you
Speaker 3: reproductive wise.
Speaker 2: Right, especially if they smell good.
Speaker 3: Right, And then yes, and then if you if you
Speaker 3: are trying to reproduce with somebody you're disgusted by, they
Speaker 3: might not be a good match reproductive wiy was evolutionarily
Speaker 3: it makes sense, that's a that's a that's a mental
Speaker 3: gymnastics right there. To me, it makes more sense to
Speaker 3: just say, here's an example of evolution screwing us up,
Speaker 3: of natural selection screwing us up. We developed an ability
Speaker 3: to feel disgusted by sex because it reminds us that
Speaker 3: we're animals, and so we're missing out on sex or
Speaker 3: at least deriving pleasure from sex because we are possibly
Speaker 3: disgusted by the act of sex if we step back
Speaker 3: and think about it in the right way. Right, you
Speaker 3: see what I'm saying. Sure, So there's a lot of
Speaker 3: holes here, which is why I mean, I've got both
Speaker 3: of my six shooters. I'm about to start shoot them
Speaker 3: in the air out of glee because it's been a
Speaker 3: while since we had an episode like this.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Another thing that I found interesting too from this
Speaker 1: was the just the mere reaction. Apparently most people open
Speaker 1: their mouths I keep mind shut. But regardless, we all
Speaker 1: have the disgust reaction. I guess if you don't, then
Speaker 1: you're probably a serial killer. Like if you saw someone
Speaker 1: like open up and smell like rotten meat and literally
Speaker 1: just kept this stone face, We're like, hmm, that smells
Speaker 1: really bad. Like they're clearly sociopaths.
Speaker 3: Right, And that's what Rosen was saying. That's why disgust
Speaker 3: is it's the defining human characteristic because that person would
Speaker 3: seem non human in that sense, they'd be a robot
Speaker 3: kind of.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: But so if people make this face like that is
Speaker 1: the cue, Like you don't even need to smell the milk.
Speaker 1: If I walk in the kitchen and Emily pours some
Speaker 1: milk in it, well I was gonna say, I see
Speaker 1: it clump out of the the thing, but that wouldn't count.
Speaker 1: Like if I see Emily just smell the milk, she
Speaker 1: makes her disgust face, I don't need to smell it.
Speaker 3: No, but why is it that there is a one
Speaker 3: hundred percent chance that Emily or anyone else, yes, who
Speaker 3: will say, smell this?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: I never feel like, No, that's okay, thanks for the
Speaker 3: warning with the wrinkled nose and raised up her lip.
Speaker 1: I know, but when you're married, it's like no, true, Suly,
Speaker 1: I smelled it, like you have to smell it, right, No,
Speaker 1: I don't want to smell it.
Speaker 3: I've suffered.
Speaker 1: So that becomes like, all of a sudden, a something
Speaker 1: that like bonds communities together and cultures together even.
Speaker 3: Right, but which which is another? Okay? So this then
Speaker 3: we get to the explanation or the moral explanation of
Speaker 3: disgust of how seeing somebody involve in cheating or some
Speaker 3: sort of unfairness or racism or just something some really
Speaker 3: anti social violating behavior that you you experienced disgusted at
Speaker 3: the very least people say, use the word disgusted, I'm disgusted.
Speaker 2: It makes a face, I mean, is the same thing.
Speaker 3: So that's that's I mean, that's what that one Wonder
Speaker 3: Machine study said, and the other the other way that
Speaker 3: they backed it up. There's a really interesting article by
Speaker 3: Rosen Johnathan Height, who actually was a contributor in our
Speaker 3: super Stuff Guide to Happiness if you'll remember. And then
Speaker 3: a guy named Oh McCauley, what is Clark McCauley. They're
Speaker 3: kind of like this big three triad in the study
Speaker 3: of disgust.
Speaker 2: They're known as the only three.
Speaker 3: There's a couple others, but yeah, kind of. But they
Speaker 3: in this paper they basically say, okay, so you get
Speaker 3: the Wonder machine evidence suggesting that our actual brain, the
Speaker 3: part of our brain responsible for experiencing disgust, is lighting
Speaker 3: up when somebody gives us an unfair offer of money.
Speaker 3: That's one thing. But also they go around the world
Speaker 3: and say that in Japan, in in Spain and Portugal,
Speaker 3: all over the world, whatever that society or language is,
Speaker 3: culture's word is for disgust. They routinely use it to
Speaker 3: describe things like the experience of seeing somebody hold poop
Speaker 3: up to their mouth and the experience of being treated
Speaker 3: unfairly or seeing somebody racist. So it's not just people
Speaker 3: in English misusing an English word discuss, which means actually
Speaker 3: bad taste in Old or Middle English. It's it is
Speaker 3: there is some sort of moral component to disgust. It
Speaker 3: seems like.
Speaker 1: Well, even the word distasteful like is rooted in the
Speaker 1: word taste, right, and that's just a similar thing too.
Speaker 1: Like behavior can be distasteful and rotten. Analope can be
Speaker 1: distasteful exactly.
Speaker 2: Especially if he's a real jerk.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 1: The other interesting thing about the work that Jonathan Hate
Speaker 1: did was this tying it to political ideological ideal ideology.
Speaker 2: Geez, what is wrong with me today?
Speaker 1: I thought that was super interesting because they did research
Speaker 1: and they found that people who are more sensitive to
Speaker 1: disgust and tend to be more socially conservative, and that
Speaker 1: can be exploited. So when you go to a major
Speaker 1: news outlet that may be conservative, that is why you
Speaker 1: are more likely to see photos of unwashed or sick
Speaker 1: immigrants approaching the border, and not like pictures of like
Speaker 1: the handsomest, most fit immigrant approaching the border, because that will,
Speaker 1: at least according to this study, they have a higher,
Speaker 1: more powerful emotion of disgust.
Speaker 3: Right, it's hijacking your ability to experience moral disgust because
Speaker 3: apparently it's really really easy to come up and poke
Speaker 3: to push a person's disgust buttons. And from what the
Speaker 3: study says is that this happens a lot way more
Speaker 3: than we're cognizant of and that if we can make
Speaker 3: ourselves cognizant of it, we could actually defend against it
Speaker 3: a little more.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, they're not going to Fox News isn't
Speaker 1: going to put the guy that you said it, you
Speaker 1: said it. They're not going to put the guy that
Speaker 1: looks like Antonio Banderas in the immigrant caravan Hello as
Speaker 1: they're fron okay as their front page lead photo. You know,
Speaker 1: it's going to be the person that's on the in
Speaker 1: the on the stretcher that's sick and dying, and that's
Speaker 1: going to cause this reaction of disgust, like.
Speaker 3: The gi they cgi flies like flying around the person.
Speaker 3: Can't you see Antonio Banderas walking up in the video
Speaker 3: and going this wall is too sexy.
Speaker 1: And then the other interesting thing about that that whole
Speaker 1: study that he was doing, the hate was doing was
Speaker 1: they also found that people make harsher judgments when they're
Speaker 1: exposed to a disgusting stimulus sou and it usually was
Speaker 1: a smell like the smell of.
Speaker 2: A of a two dy booty, a shot duck.
Speaker 1: And if you smell this flatulence, you would react more
Speaker 1: harshly toward like a photo of something.
Speaker 2: Right now that I might discuss you just a little bit.
Speaker 3: I want to know the methodology of this study pretty badly,
Speaker 3: Like did they Was it just one of those things
Speaker 3: where they just kind of suddenly the area between you
Speaker 3: and the researcher filled with the fart smell?
Speaker 1: Well, where do you get the fart smell? Is there
Speaker 1: a synthetic or I think there is?
Speaker 3: You probably like a't some novelly joke shop they picked
Speaker 3: up like a spinning bow tie while they got the
Speaker 3: caned fart too.
Speaker 1: Right, They're like, thank you, here's for ten dollars and
Speaker 1: have a good day, and they shake their hand.
Speaker 2: There's a buzzer, right exactly.
Speaker 3: So, But I mean, like, is this so where they
Speaker 3: they were talking about something like you know how what
Speaker 3: kind of a prison sentence would you, Oh excuse me,
Speaker 3: what kind of a prison sentence would you give to somebody?
Speaker 3: And like this, this fart smell, this kind of comes up,
Speaker 3: but like they're just not talking about it. I would
Speaker 3: guess as how, you would have to do it right, dude.
Speaker 1: I had a stranger asked me the other night if
Speaker 1: I farted?
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, had you know?
Speaker 1: I was at the Fleetwood Mac concert standing in the
Speaker 1: beer line, and this guy in front of me turned
Speaker 1: around with his wife and fully just said did you fart?
Speaker 2: And I went nope, And I was like, I would
Speaker 2: tell you if I did.
Speaker 3: Did. He look to his wife and go, did you fart? No?
Speaker 1: But then we got to talking and I was like, guys,
Speaker 1: I hate to tell you. I said, I don't even
Speaker 1: smell anything, so I think you're looking in the wrong direction.
Speaker 1: And then he felt like I was a little drunk,
Speaker 1: so I didn't care. I was playing along. But then
Speaker 1: he felt like really bad and was over apologetic. I
Speaker 1: was like, dude, if you're going to ask someone if
Speaker 1: they farted, don't then turn around and be weirdly ashamed
Speaker 1: of that.
Speaker 3: All right, get all weepy, just own it. So Yeah,
Speaker 3: does the guy not know the whole he who smelt
Speaker 3: it delted.
Speaker 1: Idiom nor it was the first date and that was
Speaker 1: the deal.
Speaker 2: Maybe he did.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he really played it off well at sound we
Speaker 3: take a break, I think we should. All right, I'm
Speaker 3: gonna go fart in the whole way. We'll be right back.
Speaker 3: Thank you for that, Chuck, We'll be right back. All right,
Speaker 3: it's back. Chuck is back. Now, everything's fine in here,
Speaker 3: and we are still talking about disgust. Let me, let's
Speaker 3: let's let's just kind of go over this real quick
Speaker 3: one more time. Okay. So we started out with this
Speaker 3: this mechanisms of distaste where we like, involuntarily spit something
Speaker 3: out that's gross that occurs elsewhere in the animal kingdom.
Speaker 3: And then over time we figured out how to create
Speaker 3: a new adaptation, a new behavior that is overlaid over
Speaker 3: that same brain circuitry where we spit something out and
Speaker 3: we call that disgust. And it was it originally started
Speaker 3: out as an aversion to things like poop and vomit
Speaker 3: and that kind of stuff, and then that evolved even
Speaker 3: further because at some point we said we're better than animals,
Speaker 3: and I don't like to be reminded of an animal,
Speaker 3: and I guess that desire to not be reminded of
Speaker 3: an animal developed so much that it became overlaid over
Speaker 3: that disgusted emotion that had been that had hijacked the
Speaker 3: distaste emotion, and then at some point finally it reached
Speaker 3: the moral structure, and that hijacked the animal and the
Speaker 3: core and the distaste to where now just the idea
Speaker 3: of somebody behaving in a certain way can disgust us.
Speaker 3: And the whole thing that really kind of changed and
Speaker 3: made it human was the addition of imagination and symbolism
Speaker 3: to these ideas, so that we didn't even have to
Speaker 3: taste or smell or see anything anymore. Just thinking about
Speaker 3: this kind of stuff could disgust us. And that's where
Speaker 3: we're at discussed research, and that's where we're at in
Speaker 3: the podcast too.
Speaker 2: Frankly, Wow, that's a nice recap, Thank you, all right.
Speaker 1: So, culturally, you know, it depends on where you are
Speaker 1: in the world and what you might be disgusted by.
Speaker 1: So while while it is universal, it's not like every
Speaker 1: single thing is universal. People eat things in some parts
Speaker 1: of the world that other parts of the world might
Speaker 1: think are disgusting, and that again is a thing that
Speaker 1: basically says, I'm a part of this family, I'm a
Speaker 1: part of this culture.
Speaker 2: I'm a part of this group.
Speaker 1: The fact that like Elie eyeballs right out of a fish,
Speaker 1: right out of a fish, said, just scoop it out
Speaker 1: and eat it, right, I might think that's disgusting, but
Speaker 1: that's not like necessarily like taboos are not the same,
Speaker 1: and cultures all over the world.
Speaker 3: Yeah, whether it's food, apparently they think maybe even you know, well, cannibalism. Obviously,
Speaker 3: some cultures don't view incest as taboo as other cultures do.
Speaker 3: So some of the things that we would think would
Speaker 3: be universally disgusting aren't universally disgusting. And the whole idea
Speaker 3: of food too, shows that you can learn to not
Speaker 3: find something disgusting or never find it disgusting at all
Speaker 3: because you were just raised in a culture that eats
Speaker 3: this food and values it. But to somebody else from
Speaker 3: outside of the culture, when they see that food, they
Speaker 3: are disgusted by it. So, yeah, there's a lot of
Speaker 3: lack of universality in disgust that we might assume would
Speaker 3: be there that actually isn't.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean vegetarianism and veganism is a perfect example.
Speaker 1: Someone can eat meat until they're in their mid twenties
Speaker 1: and then all of a sudden switch to veganism, and
Speaker 1: a year later, the mere sight of meat might discuss them,
Speaker 1: whereas the year before they were challenged down on it.
Speaker 3: Which I would guess that's just like you were structuring
Speaker 3: your brain circuitry basically, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think so probably, I mean that would make sense.
Speaker 3: But so something that never disgusted you before can become
Speaker 3: guinely disgusted.
Speaker 2: Or the other way around, U I imagine.
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, I mean you can learn to eat other
Speaker 3: cultures foods that you were disgusted by previously. And I
Speaker 3: know you can learn to eat and eat meat now
Speaker 3: right right, Yeah, yeah, you can also learn to eat
Speaker 3: broccoli over time.
Speaker 1: BROCCOLI's good, it's it's not though it really is roasted
Speaker 1: in the oven the lish.
Speaker 3: Okay, I will give you that. Roasted broccoli is okay.
Speaker 3: But if it's steamed or just like floppy in any way,
Speaker 3: shape or form, I've had bad experiences with it over
Speaker 3: over the years.
Speaker 1: It sounds like someone's overcooking your broccoli.
Speaker 3: Not anymore. But yes, I think should Dad used to
Speaker 3: used to overcook it quite a bit.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I go for al dente when it comes to
Speaker 2: most of the vegetables.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but roast roasted is good.
Speaker 1: Mushy is is a food quality that kind of disgusts me.
Speaker 1: So food preparation is important. Like I know, we're just
Speaker 1: kind of kidding about the broccoli, but like, let's say
Speaker 1: an egg plant or a squash, If you cook that
Speaker 1: thing till it's really mushy, it's it's really gross to me.
Speaker 1: But I will totally eat an eggplant if it's nice
Speaker 1: and firm.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I mean yeah, texture is enormous with it.
Speaker 3: It also affects taste too, which doesn't make any sense
Speaker 3: except for like it's part of the experience of it, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but true disgust happens for me.
Speaker 1: I think it's not just like I don't I don't
Speaker 1: prefer that, like mushy food really really grosses me out.
Speaker 3: Well, there's something that that that Ed actually hit upon
Speaker 3: early on in this is that like disgust is it
Speaker 3: goes around our conscious thought, right, Yeah, like you're not like, hmm,
Speaker 3: this this broccoli is not to my preference. It is
Speaker 3: way too floppy and mushy, and i'd be I prefer
Speaker 3: to not have it in my mouth anymore so, and
Speaker 3: you spit it out and it just falls back onto
Speaker 3: your plate instead you put it in your mouth, especially
Speaker 3: if you're not expecting it to be mushy and you
Speaker 3: start chewing it like you expect it to be good.
Speaker 3: You're reaction without even thinking it's going to be spit
Speaker 3: it out probably, and you might you might not actually
Speaker 3: spit it out, but that will be your first reaction,
Speaker 3: and you might have to stop yourself, like bring your
Speaker 3: napkin up to your mouth or whatever. And that's one
Speaker 3: of the things that like really kind of is a
Speaker 3: hallmark characteristic of disgust. When it is experienced, it goes
Speaker 3: around our intellect and our conscious thought. It's a basic reaction.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it can also get out of hand as
Speaker 1: far as the if the idea is that at its root,
Speaker 1: we're trying to avoid disease and dying. We've all heard
Speaker 1: of cases phobia is really that developed and pathologies out
Speaker 1: of fear of germs or dirt or cleanliness. Anyone who's
Speaker 1: ever seen the great movie Safe by Todd Haynes. That
Speaker 1: was a movie about that where this woman sort of
Speaker 1: slowly unwinds and eventually ends up in a in a
Speaker 1: like a community where everyone is obsessed with this kind
Speaker 1: of compulsive cleanliness.
Speaker 3: Who's the woman.
Speaker 2: It's Julian Moore.
Speaker 3: I haven't seen that yet. Is it pretty good? It was?
Speaker 2: It was great. I mean it was.
Speaker 1: It's a long time ago. So it's like in the
Speaker 1: early nineties, I think. Okay, like some of her earlier work.
Speaker 1: But that's just an example of how how that can
Speaker 1: happen and how it can get out of hand until
Speaker 1: basically you have a compulsive disorder that may have started
Speaker 1: out of a legit environmental like disgust reaction to disease.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, well that's what they think is the basis
Speaker 3: of possibly all of it that has to do with disgust,
Speaker 3: a like a drive to to feel clean or to
Speaker 3: get rid of germs or to be afraid of germs,
Speaker 3: that kind of thing. That it's it's your your the
Speaker 3: being indoctrinated into disgust went a little too far and
Speaker 3: your brain, your brain's disgust reaction just became too powerful,
Speaker 3: and now it has this kind of crippling effect on
Speaker 3: your life.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but it can also like it's oddly there are
Speaker 1: things that have nothing to do with disease and dying
Speaker 1: that have been kind of labeled as disgusting and Ed
Speaker 1: points out. Acne is one of them that might trigger
Speaker 1: a disgusted reaction in some people. And it's really completely harmless.
Speaker 3: It is, but it's playing upon in an inadvertent way,
Speaker 3: our predisposition to be grossed out by things like as yeah,
Speaker 3: a sore, a pox, a pustul It has nothing to
Speaker 3: do with that. It just kind of resembles it in
Speaker 3: the exact same way. People find slugs and snails disgusting,
Speaker 3: and they suggest that it's because they look like they're
Speaker 3: covered in mucus. Even though it's not actually mucus, it
Speaker 3: reminds us of mucus. So we're disgusted at the thought
Speaker 3: of touching one of those things. Same thing. They're not
Speaker 3: disease carriers, but they remind us of it. That's the key,
Speaker 3: because disgust works hand in hand with human imagination.
Speaker 1: I got Emily one of those poppet pals. Have you
Speaker 1: seen those?
Speaker 3: No? What is it?
Speaker 1: You know how she's pretty obsessed with with zip popping
Speaker 1: and she doesn't watch She's not one of those people
Speaker 1: who watches the stuff on YouTube, but it's just like
Speaker 1: a personal thing. But they I saw it on Shark Tank.
Speaker 1: There's this thing now looks it's about the size of
Speaker 1: a bar of soap okay, but it's made out of
Speaker 1: siliconus kind OF's this squishy rubber rectangular bar and you
Speaker 1: squirt this like I don't know what it's made of.
Speaker 2: It's it's almost like crisco or something.
Speaker 1: I think it's plant based, and you fill it up
Speaker 1: with that and the top of it is covered with
Speaker 1: all these little dimple holes and you pop them and
Speaker 1: it comes snaking out just like like the best pimple
Speaker 1: you've ever seen.
Speaker 3: That's amazing. So I kept like trying to imagine that,
Speaker 3: like this was going on the person's face. It's like
Speaker 3: just to basically like, here, keep busy with this and
Speaker 3: leave my face alone.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you just like whatever, you set it in your
Speaker 2: lap and just pop away.
Speaker 3: That's really awesome.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's It was.
Speaker 1: Really satisfying for it too. I thought she might be like, nah,
Speaker 1: this is not the same, but she was obsessed with
Speaker 1: it first.
Speaker 3: That's awesome. A couple of days that's is there any
Speaker 3: great human thing that shark tank hasn't give given us.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 3: I can't. I can't think of one you meet has
Speaker 3: a thing for cauliflower ear, and she'll sometimes watch videos
Speaker 3: of cauliflower ear being drained, and it's like, I can't,
Speaker 3: hang man.
Speaker 2: You ever date a wrestler?
Speaker 3: No, not that I know of.
Speaker 2: But she missed your chance. I guess right, she better
Speaker 2: have mister chance.
Speaker 1: By she comes in and she finds you like on
Speaker 1: the carpet, rolling your ear on the floor. Isn't that
Speaker 1: how wrestlers get it?
Speaker 3: I think they get it from like a trauma to
Speaker 3: the ear, like a punch of the ear, like an
Speaker 3: impact of the ear, and then like it swells up
Speaker 3: and then it turns into like scar tissue or like
Speaker 3: just pussy infected edema.
Speaker 2: Well, which is why they wear the ear covers.
Speaker 3: Yes, well that and to look cool.
Speaker 1: This do look kind of cool somehow, so it offsets
Speaker 1: the singlet, which is the least cool thing you can wear.
Speaker 3: It's pretty uncool. I have to say, sorry wrestlers, but
Speaker 3: the entire rest of the world thinks that the singlets
Speaker 3: look uncool. It's not just us. Oh boy, So let's
Speaker 3: talk about the discuss scale real quick, you have that?
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, I didn't even look at this because
Speaker 1: I thought it might be fun if you just went
Speaker 1: through a few of those with me.
Speaker 3: Oh okay, well this is a great idea, Chuck. Take
Speaker 3: it into a game still innovating after eleven years. I'm
Speaker 3: so proud of us. So Paul Rosen and John Height
Speaker 3: and a couple of other people came up with the
Speaker 3: sorry Clark McCauley and Clark McCauley. I'm just gonna say
Speaker 3: the third person. They came up with a discuss scale. Okay, yes, so, Chuck,
Speaker 3: between zero and four, zero being strongly disagree and four
Speaker 3: being strongly agree, meaning it's very untrue or very true
Speaker 3: about you. Please indicate how much you agree with each
Speaker 3: of the following statements, or how true it is.
Speaker 2: About between zero and what three? Four okay?
Speaker 3: Four zero strongly disagreed, it's very untrue about you. Four
Speaker 3: is strongly agree very true about you. You might be willing, sorry,
Speaker 3: I might be willing to try eating monkey meat under
Speaker 3: some circumstances.
Speaker 2: Strongly disagree. Four. That's a zero okay, zero okay.
Speaker 3: It would bother me to be in a science class
Speaker 3: and to see a human hand preserved in a jar.
Speaker 1: Obviously, that would not bother me, because when I saw
Speaker 1: the human head in a bucket, very famously, my reaction was, huh,
Speaker 1: there's a human head. Where's the person with me? Was
Speaker 1: really disgusted, right, yeah.
Speaker 3: And I think understandably, so I love that story. Okay,
Speaker 3: here's another one. I never let any part of my
Speaker 3: body touch the toilet seat in public restrooms. Agree or disagree,
Speaker 3: untrue or true.
Speaker 1: I'm just going to ditch the numbers because it's confusing me.
Speaker 1: That doesn't really bother me that much. I know that
Speaker 1: probably really discussed you.
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, I just have to go to another place.
Speaker 1: Oh see when I do that, I don't mind. Man,
Speaker 1: I know that's gross probably, but whatever.
Speaker 3: Okay, here's one more from this one. Then we're going
Speaker 3: to do another set. You're ready, Okay, I would rather
Speaker 3: eat a piece of fruit then a piece of paper.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, I'd rather eat a piece of fruit.
Speaker 3: Okay, Okay, I think that's just like a baseline one
Speaker 3: that they use. Okay, so then between zero and four
Speaker 3: rate these not disgusting? It all are extremely disgusting. Just
Speaker 3: say one of those two. Okay, you see maggots on
Speaker 3: a piece of meat in an outdoor garbage pail. Very disgusting, you,
Speaker 3: I agree, your friend's pet cat dies and you have
Speaker 3: to pick up the dead body with your bare hands.
Speaker 1: Not disgusted, just sad. Okay, I mean I've done that
Speaker 1: with all of my animals that have passed. I took
Speaker 1: care of the bodies, right.
Speaker 3: I think this leaves out that it was hit by
Speaker 3: a car and is now part of the road.
Speaker 1: Basically, Uh, yeah, that's a medium disgusting and sad.
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, well, yeah, it's sad. You're about to drink
Speaker 3: a glass of milk when you smell it is spoiled,
Speaker 3: and then in parentheses, weirdly enough, it says because Emily
Speaker 3: just changed it under your nose and said, smell this.
Speaker 2: That's weird.
Speaker 1: M Yeah, the smell of turned food, ude, it grosses
Speaker 1: me out a lot.
Speaker 3: Okay, while you're walking through a tunnel under a railroad track,
Speaker 3: you smell urine.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've been to New York enough times. It's not
Speaker 1: that big of a deal.
Speaker 3: It still gets me. Man, I think smelling urine is
Speaker 3: worse than smelling poop for some reason. Oh really, yeah?
Speaker 2: Interesting?
Speaker 3: Okay, two more, you see a man with his intestines
Speaker 3: exposed after an accident.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's pretty high up there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I think so too. And then last chuck,
Speaker 3: you see someone put ketchup on vanilla ice cream and
Speaker 3: eat it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's gross.
Speaker 1: Okay, although it's interesting though, when I thought about the
Speaker 1: body's entrails, like, I don't love it, but I can
Speaker 1: watch like a surgery. It's not my favorite thing, but
Speaker 1: I'm not like fully disgusted. But if it's an accident,
Speaker 1: I think that so it might be a contextual thing
Speaker 1: as well.
Speaker 3: So one of the things that I experience when I
Speaker 3: see like something in surgery, and I think, yeah, contact
Speaker 3: definitely has a lot to do with it in that
Speaker 3: case too. But if I see like a surgery, like
Speaker 3: remember there used to be that TV network that was
Speaker 3: nothing but surgery. You remember, remember it was in like
Speaker 3: the late eighties, early nineties, I think, but to see that,
Speaker 3: I'll get like faint, right, And it's not necessarily the
Speaker 3: sight of blood, it's like the sight of viscera. I
Speaker 3: get a little faint, and it never made sense to me.
Speaker 3: I think definitely is part of it too. But I
Speaker 3: think also part of the disgust reaction is that your
Speaker 3: heart rate and blood pressure lower would explain why you
Speaker 3: start to feel faint, like I don't feel queasy or
Speaker 3: nauseated or like I'm gonna writch. I feel like I
Speaker 3: need to sit down for a second, which is, I
Speaker 3: guess is still part of the disgust reaction. It just
Speaker 3: isn't the the the nausea version of it. But it's
Speaker 3: still revulsion, but a weird, fainty version.
Speaker 1: So in the med school sitcom that we star in,
Speaker 1: when they pull the sheet back, you start saying I
Speaker 1: don't feel too good, guys, and you're like, yeah, you're
Speaker 1: so funny, and then all of a sudden you.
Speaker 2: Hit the deck.
Speaker 3: I think the way I would play it is even
Speaker 3: more straightforward, where my eyes just go up in the
Speaker 3: back of my head and I fall backward in response
Speaker 3: to the sheep being pulled.
Speaker 2: It's a good move.
Speaker 3: I can't wait for that movie to come out. Yeah,
Speaker 3: you got anything else?
Speaker 2: I don't think so.
Speaker 3: I'd be surprised if you did. We've gone on for
Speaker 3: a good six to seven minutes beyond when we should
Speaker 3: have stopped.
Speaker 2: I think I like that game aspect of that one
Speaker 2: that was fun.
Speaker 3: Oh your score, by the way, indicates that you do
Speaker 3: experience disgust from time to time.
Speaker 2: I'm not a serial killer.
Speaker 3: No no, And I don't know if you guys heard
Speaker 3: her enough, but Jerry also gave her answers as well.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 3: If you want to know more about disgust, you can
Speaker 3: just go look at some weird stuff on the internet.
Speaker 3: It's out there for you. And since I said that
Speaker 3: it's time for listener mail, I'm.
Speaker 1: Going to call this one of the many dyslexia emails
Speaker 1: we got. Those are really rolling in people who have
Speaker 1: overcome dyslexia and adults living with dyslexia. So this one
Speaker 1: is from a fellow Atlanta I'm Audrey Short. She says this,
Speaker 1: Hey guys, I have dyslexia, and I was so happy
Speaker 1: to hear you talking about my learning disability.
Speaker 2: To diagnosed when I was about ten and went to.
Speaker 1: The Shank School in Atlanta, which is specifically four children
Speaker 1: with dyslexia.
Speaker 2: In fact, she sent in a.
Speaker 1: Following follow up email used to clarify that we learned
Speaker 1: how to read and write using a technique called ortually gilling.
Speaker 2: Now when I left after fourth grade, I could.
Speaker 1: Actually read more importantly, I'd love to read and devoured
Speaker 1: every book I could get my hands on. While I
Speaker 1: graduated top of my class, I had to work twice
Speaker 1: as hard as my classmates to keep up with who
Speaker 1: requires readings and homework. My peers seem to think that
Speaker 1: my extra time I received for exams was the reason
Speaker 1: I did so well, of the countless hours and late nights.
Speaker 3: I spent.
Speaker 2: Learning material following This bullying did affect.
Speaker 1: Me, did not discourage me from pursuing my education of college.
Speaker 1: I attend to Miami University in Ohio, graduating this May
Speaker 1: with a two point nine to nine GPA Biochemistry and
Speaker 1: physics Wow. I plan to attend a PhD program at
Speaker 1: Harvard or U SEE Berkeley. I'm not saying this to brag,
Speaker 1: but to tell other children with dyslexia to keep trying.
Speaker 1: I know so many students are afraid to ask for
Speaker 1: extra time or accommodations because they don't want to be
Speaker 1: bullieders stand out. I'm proud of my dyslexia because it
Speaker 1: has forced me to learn how to stand up for
Speaker 1: my student rights. I've made it to where I am
Speaker 1: today by utilizing the tools given to me, like extra time,
Speaker 1: and I want to encourage all people with learning disabilities
Speaker 1: to seek help because you are intelligent and your unique
Speaker 1: perspective just might change your field entirely.
Speaker 3: Nice Audrey, Audrey Short, great and Audrey that is great emails,
Speaker 3: so that kind of replaces that whole Look, look, this
Speaker 3: famous person made it. You can just tell people, let
Speaker 3: me tell you about Audrey Short.
Speaker 2: Yeah, agreed, Okay.
Speaker 3: Way to go, Audrey. That's fantastic. Congratulations early on graduating
Speaker 3: with a three point nine to nine. Man, that's impressive.
Speaker 3: And good luck in grad school too. If you want
Speaker 3: to get in touch with us, like Audrey did, you
Speaker 3: can go on to stuff youshould Know dot com and
Speaker 3: check out the social links there. You can also send
Speaker 3: us an email send it off to stuff podcast at
Speaker 3: HowStuffWorks dot com.
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
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