Speaker 1: Welcome to Creature feature production of I Heart Radio. I'm
Speaker 1: your host of Many Parasites Katie Golden. I studied psychology
Speaker 1: and evolutionary biology, and today on the show, you can
Speaker 1: pick your nose, you can pick your friends, and your
Speaker 1: nose can pick your friends, Smell you later, can be
Speaker 1: literal in the animal Kingdom, and some secret handshakes. Make
Speaker 1: sure you're in the click. Joining me today is author
Speaker 1: of John Dyes at the End and the Zoe Ash series,
Speaker 1: as well as the new book. If this book exists,
Speaker 1: you're in the wrong universe. Jason Pargeon, Welcome once again.
Speaker 1: I have to remind myself this is a family friendly
Speaker 1: show that fans know. Uh. I go to strange and
Speaker 1: unusual places being a infamously dark and devious brain. It's
Speaker 1: there's the issue. I write different genres. This one's a
Speaker 1: horror novel, so I for the interviews, I have to
Speaker 1: be horror guy. Um, and then when the next book
Speaker 1: comes at its sci fi, then I'll be I'll just
Speaker 1: be a nerd again. But so right now I'm trying
Speaker 1: to really play up how dark and devious my mind is.
Speaker 1: I mean, this is the show where I talk about
Speaker 1: parasites that like crawl out of your skin. So I
Speaker 1: don't think that's so much of a problem. Although I
Speaker 1: guess this topic is somewhat toilet toilet based horror. Uh,
Speaker 1: that's perfect for anyone who's read any of my books.
Speaker 1: There's a I have to confess a lot of toilet
Speaker 1: stuff in there. I mean, you know, toilet. The toilet
Speaker 1: is such a siminal part of our existence. I don't
Speaker 1: know why it's so taboo to talk about it. You know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of a lot of seminal stuff in
Speaker 1: there too. Um. I apologize for that. Uh, but the
Speaker 1: to be serious for a second. One thing about horror
Speaker 1: is it relies very very heavily on our base kind
Speaker 1: of instincts for disgust, you know, because we we are
Speaker 1: instinctively afraid of certain things. And it's a lot of
Speaker 1: that is driven by evolution. Of course, things we are
Speaker 1: afraid of because we the ones who were not afraid
Speaker 1: of it did not live on to reproduce. Um. So
Speaker 1: a lot of it is just you know, we're for example, um,
Speaker 1: a lot of aliens in order to make us disgusted
Speaker 1: by them, the very slimy well why you know, we
Speaker 1: have a visceral reaction to slime. We we viscerally want
Speaker 1: to reject it. We are very scared of zombies, even
Speaker 1: though in the entire history of the planet no one
Speaker 1: has ever been injured or killed by a dead body.
Speaker 1: But we are viscerally disgusted by rott and rotting and
Speaker 1: rotting flesh. Because of course those sayings could make you
Speaker 1: sick if you were too close to them, or you know,
Speaker 1: you could be contaminated. So this fits right in because
Speaker 1: when you see anything about in the animal kingdom, the
Speaker 1: first thing you notice is they of course, even if
Speaker 1: you just have a pet, they are not disgusted by
Speaker 1: the same things we are. It is very hard to
Speaker 1: keep my dog from eating the pup it finds in
Speaker 1: the yard. Uh, and it seems to enjoy it very much. Yeah,
Speaker 1: my dog tried to eat a turd that had like
Speaker 1: a cigarette butt squished in the middle of it, like
Speaker 1: a candle on a little birthday cake. And she was
Speaker 1: very upset that I didn't let her just like, you know,
Speaker 1: eat that thing. And yeah, actually, you know, when you're
Speaker 1: bringing up the fear of like aliens and the fear
Speaker 1: of zombies, I think there was some I heard at
Speaker 1: least somewhere that like clown makeup can appear kind of
Speaker 1: scary or menacing because it looks somewhat similar potentially like
Speaker 1: a rotting corpse where the eyes are sunken and the
Speaker 1: mouth kind of uh discolors or something, and in the
Speaker 1: super pale white skin discoloration on a body or something,
Speaker 1: and so that can that the weird proportions of a
Speaker 1: clown and the weird facial coloration could like be reminiscent
Speaker 1: of this strange coloration and strange proportions of like a
Speaker 1: moldering corpse and equally weird. Um, when people have what
Speaker 1: you know, I assume like sleep paralysis episodes where they
Speaker 1: think they're being abducted by aliens and they imagine these
Speaker 1: alien faces with very pale gray skin, very big dark eyes,
Speaker 1: um that there's something in the side, because many different
Speaker 1: people have described the same faces all over the world,
Speaker 1: and UFO people say, well, see, that's evidence that the
Speaker 1: aliens are real, when in reality is that that is
Speaker 1: evidence of when your mind is in a certain state
Speaker 1: and you're imagining being assaulted by something, there's a certain
Speaker 1: type of face you put on it. When when you're
Speaker 1: in a position where you're very afraid or whatever, and
Speaker 1: for some reason we imprint like big emptied our guys.
Speaker 1: Uh and like a skin tone that's not healthy, right,
Speaker 1: like that's grayish or pale or something like. There's these
Speaker 1: visceral reactions where like it kind of doesn't make logical sense.
Speaker 1: It's like, well, why would you be afraid of a clown?
Speaker 1: It's like why would you be afraid of any of
Speaker 1: these things? It's like, well, there's some kind of primal thing.
Speaker 1: It taps into in the same way that there's all
Speaker 1: these series about why fingernails on a chalkboard, they care
Speaker 1: our hair stand up on end. I guess they're like,
Speaker 1: why would that tone, why would that specific you know,
Speaker 1: vibration or noise be so upsetting to us? Um And
Speaker 1: I don't know what they've ever landed on a theory,
Speaker 1: but it has something to do with that. If you
Speaker 1: go back a million years, you'll find a species that
Speaker 1: is equally upset by that noise. Yeah, I mean it
Speaker 1: does sound a little bit like a bird of praise
Speaker 1: call or something. I'm just speculating. I don't know, of course,
Speaker 1: but yeah, I mean it is interesting because the alteration
Speaker 1: of some of a face, like a face that's out
Speaker 1: of a portion, with eyes that are too big or
Speaker 1: too small, or a mouth that's too big. It's like that,
Speaker 1: I think when something deviates from our mental map of
Speaker 1: a face, which we actually when we're very very young infants,
Speaker 1: we already have kind of a schema of what a
Speaker 1: face should look like, and infants will look at things
Speaker 1: that represent like a human face and are much more
Speaker 1: concerned when the when the face is kind of out
Speaker 1: of proportion, and they don't really like that. And so yeah,
Speaker 1: I think like if something is sort of out of
Speaker 1: order or kind of off, we feel very unnerved and
Speaker 1: interestingly like this idea of being able to identify a friend,
Speaker 1: identify one of your species, but also identify someone you
Speaker 1: know is something that we share with animals. Like animals
Speaker 1: can identify individuals, they can get upset when something is
Speaker 1: bizarre about a situation when it comes to identifying individuals,
Speaker 1: and it can be pretty gross. Also, So I do
Speaker 1: want to talk about dolphins now. I feel like dolphins
Speaker 1: are interesting because they either get a really bad rap
Speaker 1: of people saying, well, don't you know that dolphins are evil?
Speaker 1: Or they're seen as this beautiful graceful, sort of philanthropic
Speaker 1: wonder animal of the sea. Well, yeah, and also I
Speaker 1: think the reason we have those attitudes towards them is
Speaker 1: because it's weird having a creature that is supposedly intelligent
Speaker 1: but doesn't express it in any of the same ways. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like like it's it's kind of similar to you know,
Speaker 1: how our attitude towards you know, primates um there when
Speaker 1: you see them doing something distinctly human, like their facial
Speaker 1: expressions or their gestures, you can either think that's cute
Speaker 1: or if, depending on how large and muscular the thing is,
Speaker 1: you can be find it terrifying because it's like the
Speaker 1: thing is too smart to not also know the rules
Speaker 1: of human behavior. So it's kind of the same thing.
Speaker 1: It's like dolphins, if you don't know anything about how
Speaker 1: they behave it's like, oh, they're just the humans of
Speaker 1: the sea. It's like, well, no, they they something can
Speaker 1: be very intelligent. Same thing with aliens, you know something,
Speaker 1: they can be very intelligent but have no knowledge of
Speaker 1: any of the things that we think of as universal
Speaker 1: laws of behavior. It's like, no, those are distinct to
Speaker 1: our time and place and in culture. That's dolphins would
Speaker 1: not would not understand any of that right, And like
Speaker 1: some of the things they do that seems cruel to us,
Speaker 1: like they will just smack the dickens out of octopuses.
Speaker 1: So they'll take an octopus and smash it against the
Speaker 1: water against rocks to like pulverize this poor octopus, and
Speaker 1: it seems like it's just an act of cruelty, like
Speaker 1: it already seems dead and they keep smacking it, and
Speaker 1: it seems like it is these dolphins being sadistic, But
Speaker 1: in reality, it's because they have to make sure that
Speaker 1: this octopus, if they swallow an octopus that's still a
Speaker 1: little bit alive, it's tentacles can like reach out and
Speaker 1: try to prevent itself from getting swallowed and choked the
Speaker 1: dolphin to death. So they've learned that they have to
Speaker 1: absolutely tenderized and pulverized and octopus before they can safely
Speaker 1: eat it. But to us it seems cruel like they're
Speaker 1: just torturing an octopus before eating it, and torturing a
Speaker 1: creature that is also shockingly intelligent for something that again
Speaker 1: does not look anything like people. But for example, they've
Speaker 1: recently started factory farming octopi as food and there's a
Speaker 1: big protest movement saying this is not a creature that
Speaker 1: should be herded into giant pins, you know, in closed
Speaker 1: spaces and made to breed. And because they're like to
Speaker 1: they're too smart for that. That is a whole other
Speaker 1: episode we could do about at what point does a
Speaker 1: creature become too intelligent to put it in a farm
Speaker 1: and turn it into just something that breeds to be
Speaker 1: to make food for us. Yeah, I mean I agree
Speaker 1: with that, and also that I mean it's like, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, with octopuses, it's just it seems very difficult
Speaker 1: to create a setting that they could live happily before
Speaker 1: being slaughtered. And you know, we could obviously the ethics
Speaker 1: of slaughter as a whole other beast, but like, it
Speaker 1: is feasible for some animals to like maybe not with
Speaker 1: factory farming or cafoe farming, but it is feasible to
Speaker 1: have an animal be able to live a relatively regular
Speaker 1: life on land before slaughter. But for something like an octopus,
Speaker 1: I'm not sure how you could do that. Like there
Speaker 1: pasture is like the open ocean, so that's a little strange. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they are very intelligent. There's some um, some researchers think
Speaker 1: they might be able to dream. They're really good problem solvers.
Speaker 1: And yeah, their lifespan is sad quite short, but the
Speaker 1: and it is, but it is really fascinating because they're
Speaker 1: very close to being aliens on Earth. They evolved completely
Speaker 1: independently from us since the time we were both like
Speaker 1: some kind of flatworms. So their brains, their eyes, all
Speaker 1: this stuff evolved independently, and yet they still have these
Speaker 1: recognizable intelligent behaviors. So that's it's very interesting. But you know,
Speaker 1: the dolphins when they're smacking these octopuses, they're not thinking
Speaker 1: about all these things, or so we think. Um. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, like they can be brutal, like a lot
Speaker 1: is made out of like that they kill other species
Speaker 1: of dolphins. Again, this is probably because they're like competing
Speaker 1: for food. Um. They'll sometimes ram sharks. Um. But I
Speaker 1: think it's a little bit reductive to see dolphins as evil.
Speaker 1: After all, like humans do a lot of messed up stuff.
Speaker 1: But I wouldn't write off on our entire species is
Speaker 1: being evil. Um. And in fact, dolphins have a sweet side.
Speaker 1: They can be very friendly with other species and they
Speaker 1: can be really friendly with each other. Um. Sometimes bottle
Speaker 1: nose dolphins will actually coexist and even form pods with
Speaker 1: other dolphins species or other cetaceans like the short finned
Speaker 1: pilot whales. So bottlenose dolphins aren't just all antisocial assholes
Speaker 1: as sometimes people say they are. Yeah, it's that's the
Speaker 1: thing is. It's kind of in the Internet era, I think,
Speaker 1: is when the whole thing spread around it because the
Speaker 1: whole thing was a lot of you know, young girls
Speaker 1: grow up with like dolphins stickers on their on their
Speaker 1: school supplies, or they you know, they get dolphins tattoos
Speaker 1: on their ankles. It's like they're beautiful. So I think
Speaker 1: people consider it very cool in the early Internet days
Speaker 1: to point out but yeah, it's silly to have that
Speaker 1: kind of binary for we were always projecting like human
Speaker 1: morality onto other creatures. It was a very silly thing
Speaker 1: to do. Yeah, I mean it's it's it's fun to
Speaker 1: like point out, like, dolphins are not the Lease of
Speaker 1: Frank version of the animal. But yeah, they're not. They're
Speaker 1: not I think seeing them as like secretly evil animals,
Speaker 1: they're they're they're just animals, you know, They're there. Some
Speaker 1: aspect of them are cruel, Some aspects of them are
Speaker 1: actually quite sweet. They can explain, you know, and it
Speaker 1: varies from individual to individual or from pod to pod.
Speaker 1: Uh And there are some examples of dolphins actually being
Speaker 1: extremely empathetic. In two thousand and eight, there was a
Speaker 1: bottle nose dolphin named Mocho who lived off the east
Speaker 1: coast of New Zealand and who saved a pygmy sperm
Speaker 1: whale in her calf who were stuck on a sandbar,
Speaker 1: reportedly by calling out for them and leading them to
Speaker 1: deeper water. Uh. And in twenty nineteen, it was observed
Speaker 1: that a female bottle nose dolphin had adopted a young
Speaker 1: melon headed whale and was caring for it as her
Speaker 1: own offspring. And in Laguna, South Brazil, fisherman and dolphins
Speaker 1: have actually been fishing together since the late eighteen hundreds,
Speaker 1: with dolphins driving fish into the nets of fishermen, which
Speaker 1: benefits both the dolphins and the fisherman. The dolphins even
Speaker 1: make specific body gestures to tell the fishermen to deploy
Speaker 1: their nets, and so, you know, all these cases, it's
Speaker 1: it's interesting because it shows that dolphins are quite capable
Speaker 1: of pro social behavior. Even with the fishing example. If
Speaker 1: you can see that as like, well, they're doing it
Speaker 1: because it also benefits themselves. I mean by it's basically
Speaker 1: this happens actually quite a bit with cooperation between two
Speaker 1: species and hunting. You're driving your prey into a bottle
Speaker 1: neck where either they escape towards one predator or towards
Speaker 1: the other. Actually, coyotes and badgers do this a little
Speaker 1: bit with groundhogs another burrowing prey, where there's a coyote
Speaker 1: at one entrance to the borrow and a badger digging
Speaker 1: out the other entrance of the borrow. So the the
Speaker 1: little burrowing animal has to either go towards the coyote
Speaker 1: or towards the badger. And so this is what's happening
Speaker 1: with the dolphins and the fisherman. The dolphins are driving
Speaker 1: the fish towards the net, and so the fish are
Speaker 1: kind of cornered between either the fisherman or the dolphins,
Speaker 1: and so it gives these fish less avenues for escape.
Speaker 1: It kind of balls them up into these clusters, and
Speaker 1: both the fisherman and the dolphins can just kind of
Speaker 1: scoop them out of the water. Interesting. Yeah, and so yeah,
Speaker 1: so you know they're they're very intelligent animals, but within
Speaker 1: their species, they are seemingly capable of sustaining friendships, and
Speaker 1: they can identify their friends through their unique whistles almost
Speaker 1: like these aren't names. But I did promise some gross
Speaker 1: stuff rather than all this cute, touchy feely stuff, because
Speaker 1: there is another way that they can identify their friends
Speaker 1: and leave a calling card, and that is ppe which,
Speaker 1: as we know, the ocean is one gigantic toilet. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and in fact that's what the word ocean means really
Speaker 1: in um in French means toilet, God's toilet, God's toilet
Speaker 1: in old um Latin will say uh so uh. Dolphins
Speaker 1: have been observed exploring the warm spots behind other dolphins,
Speaker 1: which is the p p plume um, you know, because
Speaker 1: they're they're they're down for pretty much anything, apparently, and
Speaker 1: so of course, whenever something gross is happening in nature,
Speaker 1: there's always a bunch of researchers clamoring to study it
Speaker 1: and investigate it more closely, because when it comes down
Speaker 1: to it, if you think the dolphins are freaky for
Speaker 1: sniffing each other's p or even freakier for being really
Speaker 1: voyeuristic and wanting to watch the dolphins sniffing each other's
Speaker 1: p So what do they get of that though? Is it?
Speaker 1: Is it that every dolphin has distinct urine and that's
Speaker 1: how they like How does that determine whether or not
Speaker 1: they want to be friends with that dolphin? Yeah, so
Speaker 1: this is really interesting. Researchers put this to the test
Speaker 1: by dumping p into these pools with these dolphins that
Speaker 1: live at like these captive lagoon facilities in Hawaii and Bermuda. Basically,
Speaker 1: the researchers would put a test subject dolphin in a
Speaker 1: test pool and then dump either ice water, urine of
Speaker 1: one of their friends, like a dolphin that they're familiar with,
Speaker 1: or urine of a stranger into the pool, and the
Speaker 1: dolphin would investigate this this new liquid introduced to the pool,
Speaker 1: and they were super into tasting their friends urine, but
Speaker 1: not so much the ice water or the urine of
Speaker 1: the stranger dolphin, which means that they can recognize their
Speaker 1: friends urine by taste and they are really interested in
Speaker 1: invest to gating it. How did the researchers collect the
Speaker 1: friend here and from the friend dolphin? I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: that's a really good question. I don't know, but what
Speaker 1: I assume is they like waited for a dolphin a
Speaker 1: p Maybe they had like a thermal camera or something
Speaker 1: and then just scooped it out with a cup. I
Speaker 1: don't know, I am only guessing maybe there's like a
Speaker 1: little dolphin diaper you can put on and then kind
Speaker 1: of squeegee out. Yeah. I'm gonna search YouTube later to
Speaker 1: see how, because that sounds like by far the most
Speaker 1: difficult part of that experiment. Yeah, that's a safe thing
Speaker 1: to search how to collect dolphin p um you know,
Speaker 1: on the internet. Definitely recommend searching for that. But I
Speaker 1: feel like every listener right now is saying, well, now,
Speaker 1: hold on, my my dog does this? Like if my
Speaker 1: dog comes along and another dog is p there, my
Speaker 1: dog runs over and smells it intensely and maybe p's
Speaker 1: on top of it, or it runs over and smells
Speaker 1: at other dogs. But is this the same thing? Like
Speaker 1: is that are they getting the same thing out of
Speaker 1: it that my dog gets when it's trying to read it,
Speaker 1: Like when it meets a new dog, the first thing
Speaker 1: that wants to do is smell it's But yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it's probably very similar. The only differences are
Speaker 1: that the it's probably tasting the P the dolphin, not
Speaker 1: just smelling it. And also they're able to recognize the
Speaker 1: connection between the P and their dolphin friends whistle. So,
Speaker 1: like I mentioned earlier, every dolphin kind of has a
Speaker 1: unique whistle, which is kind of you could think of
Speaker 1: it as like the dolphins name. And dolphins are really
Speaker 1: interested when you present them both with the urine of
Speaker 1: a friend and the whistle of their friend, like they
Speaker 1: they taste even more P. I guess when they hear
Speaker 1: the whistle because they think that this really means that
Speaker 1: they're friend is nearby and they're they're really excited, um,
Speaker 1: and so you know, I think it is. But it
Speaker 1: is very similar to the whole dog butt sniffing dogs
Speaker 1: sniffing pea kind of phenomenon. I guess. The I think
Speaker 1: the issue is that we, because we're so humans, are
Speaker 1: so based on site. We are thinking, well, couldn't you
Speaker 1: just see that your friends, like if you're close enough
Speaker 1: to drink as urine, like clearly you can see he's
Speaker 1: right there. But I think and I think we may
Speaker 1: be overestimating how well dolfice can see each other at
Speaker 1: the depths they're at. Is that is that possible? I mean,
Speaker 1: I think that it's just the there their vision. They
Speaker 1: can use their vision, but I think like their sense
Speaker 1: of hearing and their sense of taste and smell are
Speaker 1: just much more um accurate and more um usable under
Speaker 1: the water than their vision. Like vision underwater is a
Speaker 1: little tricky with like how light reflects, Like see, creature
Speaker 1: can see underwater, but you can't see very far. So
Speaker 1: if your friend peas and then moves on kind of
Speaker 1: you know, just like a several meters away, it might
Speaker 1: be harder to see them because of how thick water
Speaker 1: is compared to air in terms of how light can
Speaker 1: pass through it. So making use of uh, taste and
Speaker 1: smell and sonar and you're hearing underwater can be really
Speaker 1: really useful compared to vision. And it's interesting because even
Speaker 1: uh some terrestrial animals really capitalize on smell over vision.
Speaker 1: Like dogs have decent vision, but they have incredible smell.
Speaker 1: And so when you take your dog on a walk,
Speaker 1: you might notice that they're much more interested in smelling
Speaker 1: things getting their nose around than just looking around. And
Speaker 1: that's because their perception is based on smell primarily and
Speaker 1: also hearing. And then you know they do have okay, vision,
Speaker 1: but they're less visual creatures than we are, and they're
Speaker 1: much more interested in the smells of things. That I
Speaker 1: think is secretly what this episode is going to be about,
Speaker 1: because I think as humans were so heavily like everything
Speaker 1: is by sight and then you know, second secondly by sound,
Speaker 1: and you know, as you're going to get into later,
Speaker 1: the concept of identifying your friends by smell is like
Speaker 1: serial killer stuff, like that's what Hannibal Lictor did, the
Speaker 1: idea that a dog's nose is so sensitive that can
Speaker 1: smell a spot and instantly know everything that happened in
Speaker 1: that spot over the last few days, like it's getting
Speaker 1: a news report on that spot we can't really comprehend
Speaker 1: because you know, we we can look and visually see,
Speaker 1: oh there was a rainstorm here, or oh there was
Speaker 1: you know, there's something there's this thing has been damaged
Speaker 1: or whatever, and you can kind of reconstruct what has
Speaker 1: occurred there. But whereas a dog can say, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: a pair of squirrels had sex on this spot seven
Speaker 1: two hours ago, where it's almost like a look into
Speaker 1: the past because all of these traces remain of everything
Speaker 1: that is urinated there. Stepped on that spot, you know,
Speaker 1: somebody dropped a hot dog here two days ago, but
Speaker 1: then they picked it up again. Um, and they can
Speaker 1: get there getting so much information out of smelling. And
Speaker 1: so when they do smell each other's butts or whatever,
Speaker 1: I always felt like they're getting like a version of
Speaker 1: that other dog's life story or that. You know, when
Speaker 1: the a dolphin, you know it gets when it ingests
Speaker 1: that urine. It's not just like m P like it
Speaker 1: presumably is sensitive enough and to be able to detect
Speaker 1: all sorts of things about hormone levels, you know, what
Speaker 1: state of fear is it in? What state of health
Speaker 1: is it in? It almost would I would assume that
Speaker 1: through those chemicals it can deduce not it's not conscious
Speaker 1: of all this. It's a form of communication. And since
Speaker 1: that it can get like an update on its status, right,
Speaker 1: because if it was unhealthy, if it was you know,
Speaker 1: if it's kidneys were failing or whatever, that would be apparent.
Speaker 1: And it's urine, it would be different. Yeah, that's super possible.
Speaker 1: In fact, researchers their next goal is to see like
Speaker 1: what compounds in the urine dolphins can detect and what
Speaker 1: they're using to identify their friends, so they may very
Speaker 1: well find that there's a lot of information these dolphins
Speaker 1: can use from from this sampling this year. And even
Speaker 1: though it sounds gross to us, it's like, we use
Speaker 1: that kind of system in zoos, like zookeepers will test
Speaker 1: the feces of animals to check on their health. And
Speaker 1: so you know the fact that dolphins maybe using urine
Speaker 1: to determine details about other dolphins. You know, it's it's
Speaker 1: it's gross, but it gets right to the point. Earlier
Speaker 1: we were talking about the kind of these uncanny valley
Speaker 1: situations for humans, like weird faces with clowns. One of
Speaker 1: the things for me is like when you think you
Speaker 1: see a friend, uh, and then but it's not that friend,
Speaker 1: where you think you see your own doppelganger, and it's
Speaker 1: it's not really them. Like those kinds of situations really
Speaker 1: like send a chill down my spine. And actually, with urine,
Speaker 1: we have created an uncanny valley situation for elephants uh
Speaker 1: in experiments. So there's this case of elephants where they
Speaker 1: they can identify their friends from smelling their urine um
Speaker 1: and they there was there are these researchers trying to
Speaker 1: see if this was the case. They would collect the
Speaker 1: urine from an elephant in like a group of elephants
Speaker 1: that were traveling together and put it in like a
Speaker 1: tupperware container and then later put it like in front
Speaker 1: of the group of elephants. And so for these elephants,
Speaker 1: sometimes they would smell these and it if it belonged
Speaker 1: to an elephant that was like at the back of
Speaker 1: the parade of elephants. They get really confused and stand
Speaker 1: there and smell and like kind of make a commotion
Speaker 1: because to them it seemed like that elephant just teleported.
Speaker 1: They're smelling this year and in front of them, and
Speaker 1: then they look behind them and they see, like George's
Speaker 1: urine is here, but then George's way back there. How
Speaker 1: did he get in front of them without them seeing
Speaker 1: him move in front of them and like p there,
Speaker 1: And so they get they freak out. They get really confused,
Speaker 1: which I think is Uh, It's interesting how that kind
Speaker 1: of sensation of like wait, this is not possible happens
Speaker 1: to elephants. And it makes me wonder sometimes like we
Speaker 1: mess with elephants like that. I wonder if aliens ever
Speaker 1: do weird experiments on us. And that's you know, when
Speaker 1: we were seeing a doppelganger or you know, weird unexplained occurrences,
Speaker 1: and it's just some kind of like alien researcher doing
Speaker 1: the equivalent of collecting elephant urine and tupperware and putting
Speaker 1: it somewhere doesn't belong. And I know, I'm sure some
Speaker 1: people get annoyed at the talk of like aliens because
Speaker 1: of course there's no evidence we've been visited by aliens
Speaker 1: or whatever. But I will say this, Uh, if they
Speaker 1: were as intelligent to us as we are to elephants,
Speaker 1: like if they were that far above us, they would
Speaker 1: find it just as easy to deceive us, Like like
Speaker 1: the elephant would never figure out, oh, they collected the
Speaker 1: yurine and a type of ware container and just put
Speaker 1: it here in the same thing like we are. We
Speaker 1: we kind of cannot comprehend the idea that a creature
Speaker 1: could be way more intelligent than we are, because how
Speaker 1: can you imagine something smarter than you? It just doesn't work.
Speaker 1: And we always assume, like, well, we figure it out,
Speaker 1: like we would notice, Like no, not really, because our
Speaker 1: thought patterns would be just as simplistic to them as
Speaker 1: the elephants are to us, like we would be mysterious
Speaker 1: to them in the same way that we don't completely
Speaker 1: know how dolphins work, but at the same time, it's
Speaker 1: not like a thing where we would for sure figure
Speaker 1: out what they were doing. That's one of the creepier
Speaker 1: concepts I know. Um. The second creepiest concept you mentioned,
Speaker 1: like when they saw the urine of the elephant is
Speaker 1: back there and they're like, hey, that's that's George's urine.
Speaker 1: The concept of animals having names, like you mentioned earlier
Speaker 1: that the that the dolphins had a distinct whistle that
Speaker 1: almost served as a name for them. That is a
Speaker 1: fascinating concept to me because when you're like training a dog,
Speaker 1: the first thing they tell you is that the name
Speaker 1: you gave the dog, the dog doesn't know that's their name.
Speaker 1: To the dog, that is a command that means look,
Speaker 1: attend to me, look at me, do what I'm asking
Speaker 1: you to do. So if you shout rufus, the dog
Speaker 1: does not think, oh, rufus, that's me. The dog thinks, oh,
Speaker 1: that's the noise the human makes to to make me
Speaker 1: return to them. So the idea of the dog having
Speaker 1: a a like, are they conscious enough to have a
Speaker 1: personal identity and no like I have I am a
Speaker 1: distinct individual and these other dogs are other distinct individuals,
Speaker 1: Like do they have a concept of the mind, like
Speaker 1: these are other dogs? So that is a whole rabbit
Speaker 1: hole you could go down and probably its own episode
Speaker 1: because when they smell the urine, like they know the
Speaker 1: concept of how many elephants are in the herd, they
Speaker 1: know which one is which. But in their minds whatever
Speaker 1: serves as an animal's mind, and they have something of
Speaker 1: a mind. We humans have names we assigned to people,
Speaker 1: but how would an animal who they don't have, you know,
Speaker 1: a verbal language, So how do they conceptualize? Are they
Speaker 1: just imagining a series? Is like? Is it literally in
Speaker 1: their head? As just a pie smell? You see what
Speaker 1: I'm saying. Like if you took the elephant we just
Speaker 1: called George and painted him a different color, but as
Speaker 1: Peace smelled the same, his roar from his trunk sounded
Speaker 1: the same, everything else was the same. Would they have
Speaker 1: no problem recognizing that as George because it's like the
Speaker 1: fact that he's a different colors is irrelevant because in
Speaker 1: their minds, elephant, in their minds, the name George is
Speaker 1: instead of in an elephants mind, it's just a series
Speaker 1: of sense or calls or noises or vibrations through the
Speaker 1: ground or however however else you know elephants do what
Speaker 1: they do. I mean, it's such an interesting question because
Speaker 1: I think that, like what you're talking about in terms
Speaker 1: of consciousness is like, I think something can be fully
Speaker 1: conscious but not have a meta cognition of thinking about itself.
Speaker 1: So I feel like a dog, it is very intelligent.
Speaker 1: I think it's conscious, like very conscious, very aware, but
Speaker 1: I don't think it has a meta cognition, or at
Speaker 1: least there's no evidence that it has a meta cognition
Speaker 1: about its own existence. So it like it just kind
Speaker 1: of exists and feels things, but doesn't necessarily think about
Speaker 1: itself as a unique individual. That doesn't mean it doesn't
Speaker 1: have uh emotions connecting to itself, Like it can want
Speaker 1: things and love things and dislike things. But that sense
Speaker 1: of self might be kind of unclear to them. It
Speaker 1: may it's like something they it doesn't even occur to
Speaker 1: them to really think about. And I think they recognize
Speaker 1: other individuals, like their owners or other dogs they like,
Speaker 1: or even other species that they recognize, again without thinking
Speaker 1: of this concept of self versus other However, we do
Speaker 1: know they understand things like visual perceptive fields. So there
Speaker 1: are these hilarious experiments with dogs where they have an
Speaker 1: experiment or in the room, and there are a few
Speaker 1: different types of situations. One in which they leave treats
Speaker 1: out and they order the dog to sit and to
Speaker 1: not take the treats. And so these are dogs that
Speaker 1: are trained, who know that, who know what these commands mean. Uh,
Speaker 1: And when the experiment er is looking at the dog
Speaker 1: and looking at the treats, the dog will often sit
Speaker 1: there and not try to steal the treat because it
Speaker 1: knows that supposed to do that to behave if the
Speaker 1: experiment or turns their back on the dog, and I'm
Speaker 1: sure dog owners kind of recognize this behavior, Like if
Speaker 1: you're not looking at your dog, and your dog can
Speaker 1: tell you're not looking at it, then it will often
Speaker 1: take the chance of being naughty, So then the dog
Speaker 1: might go for the treat sometimes. And like most of
Speaker 1: the cases of the dog that's experimented on, like if
Speaker 1: they if the owner gives the command and then leaves
Speaker 1: the room, almost all of them just immediately go and
Speaker 1: take the treat um, but some of them will even
Speaker 1: like try to be sneaky. So if the experimenters in
Speaker 1: the room but with their gaze not directly at the
Speaker 1: treat but sort of off to the side, the dog
Speaker 1: will take sort of the circuitous path, how ding behind
Speaker 1: things to try to get at the treat without the
Speaker 1: observer watching them. So they can have complex concepts like
Speaker 1: understanding that the observer can have it has a different
Speaker 1: visual field than they do and is observing things without
Speaker 1: necessarily conceptualizing the self and then the other person. So
Speaker 1: or you know, they may have some kind of rudimentary
Speaker 1: understanding of that. It's probably very different from our own,
Speaker 1: but that is one of the it's one of the
Speaker 1: key questions I think that animal behaviorists look at. It's like,
Speaker 1: to what degree does an animal have that concept of self?
Speaker 1: And there's some evidence that like dolphins may have that
Speaker 1: developed more. They're very interested in mirrors, you know, they're
Speaker 1: they're highly intelligent. There's also some research trying to find
Speaker 1: out if elephants have that concept of self like they
Speaker 1: sometimes like this. There's this famous thing known as the
Speaker 1: mirror test, where you do something to animals face or
Speaker 1: put a dot on them and you see if they like, uh,
Speaker 1: investigate that dot that's on themselves in the mirror, which
Speaker 1: would indicate that they understand that there's a connection between
Speaker 1: themselves and the thing in the mirror. And I think,
Speaker 1: if I remember correctly, elephants have on occasion done something
Speaker 1: that indicates that they make that connection to the mirror
Speaker 1: where they like ad just they have like a piece
Speaker 1: of hay on their head or something, and then they
Speaker 1: see that in the mirror and then they try to
Speaker 1: pull it off of themselves. But yeah, it is I
Speaker 1: don't think we have a definitive answer to that, and
Speaker 1: once we do, we're going to know way more about
Speaker 1: animal cognition and probably our own consciousness, which we barely
Speaker 1: understand us. It is well right because when we try
Speaker 1: to imagine being an animal, we imagine things like having
Speaker 1: an internal monologue, which is something that didn't develop in
Speaker 1: humans probably until we had language. Like you don't have
Speaker 1: to go back that far in our own evolutionary treat
Speaker 1: of find humans that don't have like this internal thought
Speaker 1: processed the way we the thing that we think of
Speaker 1: that that that like defines a human is a fairly
Speaker 1: recent development. As far as we know, no other creature
Speaker 1: has it. And you can function just fine without it.
Speaker 1: You can function just fine as an intelligent being without that,
Speaker 1: without having the internal you know, thoughts and all that.
Speaker 1: Um that because our thinking the way, you know, when
Speaker 1: we're trying to make a decision about what do we
Speaker 1: do this or do we do this, we're running through
Speaker 1: it in our head almost verbally or you know, and
Speaker 1: we think that's the only way to process thoughts or
Speaker 1: the process cognition, and of course it's it's not. Um
Speaker 1: you know, we have machines that can make those decisions now,
Speaker 1: and they're not They don't have an internal monologue or
Speaker 1: an identity. They just they can judge, you know, a
Speaker 1: self driving cars like do we turn here? Do we
Speaker 1: turn here? Do we have to do this to avoid
Speaker 1: this obstacle? But the car is not thinking to itself
Speaker 1: like okay, okay, Tesla, now this thing the things about
Speaker 1: to get into our way in the roads, we better
Speaker 1: slow down, Like it doesn't need to do that. It
Speaker 1: just does it. But it's still intelligent. It's still going
Speaker 1: through the you know, all of the steps of processing
Speaker 1: and information, but without anything like what we would call consciousness.
Speaker 1: And these are all things are going to come up
Speaker 1: as we make smarter and smarter machines, Like, again, at
Speaker 1: what point do they do? We have to treat it
Speaker 1: like a person, and that's going to be difficult because
Speaker 1: we will probably never have one that has like an
Speaker 1: internal monologue or thoughts the way we have. But the
Speaker 1: question is going to be, well, okay, but why is
Speaker 1: that the thing that defines whether or not we mistreat
Speaker 1: a creature or or an entity. I mean, it's interesting
Speaker 1: because even within humans, like that inner monomologue that you described,
Speaker 1: it doesn't describe every humans experience, like there are exactly
Speaker 1: there are you know, people who um function and like
Speaker 1: socially you know, totally socially acceptable ways where it's you
Speaker 1: wouldn't necessarily be able to tell this about them just
Speaker 1: from talking to them, But they report not having that
Speaker 1: inner monologue. They like don't talk to themselves in their head,
Speaker 1: even though they can speak perfectly well. Um, but they
Speaker 1: experience like images, emotions, sensations as sort of their inner thoughts.
Speaker 1: But it's not organized as like a voice or words. Um,
Speaker 1: which is it's I think it's a form of a
Speaker 1: fantasia where it is you you're when you are sort
Speaker 1: of in your mind, you're not thinking in sort of
Speaker 1: images um, like clear, clearly constructed images. That's like the
Speaker 1: typical sort of form of it. But I guess also
Speaker 1: not thinking in terms of words or a voice is
Speaker 1: a form of it. And it's interesting because people I've
Speaker 1: I've read experiences of people where they're shocked to find
Speaker 1: out that people you have like an inner voice, and
Speaker 1: that sounds weird to them. Um. And so this concept
Speaker 1: that you know, animals aren't aware because they don't have
Speaker 1: a language, it's like, well, no, I think they can
Speaker 1: definitely have coherent thought without a language. But it's just
Speaker 1: it's so once you have that inner monologue and that's
Speaker 1: how you think, it is really hard to conceptualize how
Speaker 1: someone thinks without it, even though it happens. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: so example, all these creatures, which is, you know, more
Speaker 1: than the creatures that are like us, the ones that
Speaker 1: base everything on smell, Like if they had a version
Speaker 1: of an internal monologue, it would be a series of smells.
Speaker 1: But that's that's almost incomprehensible like to a human because
Speaker 1: we we've devalued what our nose does to the point
Speaker 1: that you know, we still use it, but in terms
Speaker 1: of like how we socialize, we we don't ever again,
Speaker 1: think of it as being unless you're detecting how much
Speaker 1: someone has bathed or something obvious wearing much cologne. Um,
Speaker 1: the idea of interpreting the entire world through how it
Speaker 1: smells and how its smell has changed. You can try
Speaker 1: to imagine it, but you you know, you really can't.
Speaker 1: And on that note, we're going to take a quick
Speaker 1: break and then when we get back, we're gonna talk
Speaker 1: about whether your noves can pick your friends? So we uh,
Speaker 1: we're just talking about how for some animals, their sense
Speaker 1: of smell is integral to the way they think, the
Speaker 1: way they communicate, in the way that they identify their friends.
Speaker 1: But is this the case for humans at times? I
Speaker 1: mean consciously, um, you know no, unless by saying pick
Speaker 1: your friends it's like, well, I don't want to hang
Speaker 1: out with someone who's too stinky. But in terms of
Speaker 1: the more subtle things of like can you recognize your
Speaker 1: friend's smell? Um, and like can you tell anything really
Speaker 1: about a person based on their smell when it's a
Speaker 1: really subtle scent and it is not it's not something
Speaker 1: that has to do with their perfume or the soap
Speaker 1: that they're wearing. Because humans, we have a sense of smell,
Speaker 1: but it is not nearly as sensitive as a lot
Speaker 1: of other animals, and in social interactions were extremely visually
Speaker 1: um focused as well as audio focus, so we rely
Speaker 1: on hearing, sight, or touch, but we hardly use smell
Speaker 1: at all and social interactions, if anything, we kind of
Speaker 1: try to avoid smells human smells, or use like deodorant
Speaker 1: or artificial smells to cover up our natural body odors
Speaker 1: because we find them unappealing. So you know, our main
Speaker 1: way of communicating is not through smells, but through like
Speaker 1: facial expressions or language or sounds or touch. This is
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to send us on down too much
Speaker 1: of a rabbit hole here, but this is one of
Speaker 1: my i unpopular beliefs, truly unpopular, to the point wherever
Speaker 1: you expressed this in polite company or on the internet,
Speaker 1: people just pile pile on you. Which is that the
Speaker 1: our thing, our American Western thing, of showering every day
Speaker 1: and shampooing your hair every day and putting on delorant
Speaker 1: at least once a day, that is weird, Like through
Speaker 1: all of civilization, through all of the civilizations that have existed,
Speaker 1: the idea of bathing every single day and then like
Speaker 1: socially shunning anyone who doesn't because the completely normal smell
Speaker 1: of a human being that is functioning that we consider
Speaker 1: that disgusting. That is a curious and weird thing that
Speaker 1: I know dates back to living in cities and then
Speaker 1: and then being you know more, having to be more
Speaker 1: afraid of like disease outbreaks and germs, things like that,
Speaker 1: having to be obsessive about controlling like sanitation. All these
Speaker 1: are very recent inventions. And so as a result of this,
Speaker 1: being afraid of any kind of a foul smell, any
Speaker 1: kind of a hint of uncleanliness, it makes sense that
Speaker 1: in this era, this very recent era of our evolution,
Speaker 1: where we're living in close proximity two hundreds of thousands
Speaker 1: of other people, when you're sharing the subway with all
Speaker 1: these people, that it would make sense to develop a
Speaker 1: kind of superstition around anyone who doesn't smell like they
Speaker 1: just washed, which is but it is a superstition like that.
Speaker 1: That's not that's not the natural, healthy way to live.
Speaker 1: And in fact, we have shelves full of products that
Speaker 1: have to put like the moisture back in your skin
Speaker 1: because you're drying yourself out by constantly by bathing too much,
Speaker 1: or or this shampoo that restores the oils that you
Speaker 1: just washed out of your hair. Um. But and this
Speaker 1: the reason it's a source spot with me is because
Speaker 1: there are certainly some countries on Earth where people do
Speaker 1: not bathe that often, and when we visit there as tourists,
Speaker 1: we talk about what a filthy, terrible third world hellhole
Speaker 1: this is because the people stink. It's like, no, they
Speaker 1: smelled like people. It's a smell you're unfamiliar with because
Speaker 1: you're in a you're in a you're in one of
Speaker 1: the rare unique cultures that had the luxury of this
Speaker 1: much fresh water to just waste with relentless bathing. It
Speaker 1: would agree that it's almost like a religious thing with
Speaker 1: us to the like that we considered a moral failing
Speaker 1: if you don't bathe enough. Yeah, which you know, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of sociological problems too with that, where you know,
Speaker 1: it's like bathing is associated with being um more more
Speaker 1: well off financially, because you have access to a shower,
Speaker 1: you have the time to bathe. Um, you work in
Speaker 1: an in a sort of a field where you're not
Speaker 1: getting too stinky, and so we kind of associate it
Speaker 1: with like, oh, you're you're a well to do person
Speaker 1: and so this is a good thing. And yeah, but
Speaker 1: but you're right, like overwashing like our body Like I'm
Speaker 1: not saying you never should wash, but our bodies do
Speaker 1: produce a lot of natural oils um called like sebam
Speaker 1: that of course, it's like it gets a bad rap
Speaker 1: because an excess it can cause acne and it can
Speaker 1: get infected. But it uh is a protective, uh sort
Speaker 1: of greasy substance that is generally good for your your
Speaker 1: skin and your scalp. That's why we produce it, and
Speaker 1: so over washing can actually cause problems skin problems, scalp problems. UM.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it's sort of spirals into a vicious cycle. Like
Speaker 1: for me, I have to um shower almost every day
Speaker 1: or my scalp gets really itchy because I am like
Speaker 1: allergic to A. I think it's like a it's this
Speaker 1: common human sort of fungus that normally is fine, but
Speaker 1: some people are sort of allergic to it and it's
Speaker 1: got it's called support dermatitis UH, which is a fancy
Speaker 1: name for like you get an itchy scalp and dandruff,
Speaker 1: but probably you know part of that is you can
Speaker 1: dry out your scalp and that can leave you more
Speaker 1: vulnerable to things like that. And so, UM, now I'm
Speaker 1: I'm trapped in a cycle of needing to shampoo all
Speaker 1: the time. Uh, but you know, so, yeah, it is
Speaker 1: it is interesting that we we uh really are sort
Speaker 1: of an uh kind of an unusual animal because we
Speaker 1: reject so much our natural smell, but we also don't
Speaker 1: use it socially that much. Um. But there is research
Speaker 1: that suggests we have not completely ditched the smellier side
Speaker 1: of our evolutionary history and may subconsciously use odor as
Speaker 1: a way to determine who our friends are and what
Speaker 1: our compatibility is with people. And um, there there's been
Speaker 1: a lot of studies on this. Uh. Sometimes they're like,
Speaker 1: uh somewhat uh flimsy, like I think the uh there's
Speaker 1: like a body odor and like compatibility with like romantic
Speaker 1: partners study, but that it just had an extremely small
Speaker 1: sample size. Um. And and these studies as well, they're
Speaker 1: they're not concrete, but it isn't an interesting line of inquiries.
Speaker 1: So researchers conducted as study looking at people who described
Speaker 1: their friendships as instantly clicking, and they dragged them into
Speaker 1: an old factory lab harvested their body odor and compared
Speaker 1: them chemically, and they found that the body odor of
Speaker 1: these friends were more chemically similar than that of two
Speaker 1: random strangers. And in the second part of their study,
Speaker 1: they brought together groups of strangers and had them do
Speaker 1: bonding activities and then they observed these interactions and ranked
Speaker 1: the friendlyness of them. Which sounds like everyone who has
Speaker 1: social anxiety, that's like your worst nightmare that there's some
Speaker 1: observer watching you ranking how friendly you are. UM. But
Speaker 1: that's exactly what they did, and they found that in
Speaker 1: the pairs that were ranked as having more positive interactions
Speaker 1: also had more chemically similar body odors. Now here are
Speaker 1: the um issues with the study. Uh, it had a
Speaker 1: very narrow definition of friendship, and it had a very
Speaker 1: small sample size around like twenty people for each study. UM.
Speaker 1: And Also, if you're thinking like, oh, this means that
Speaker 1: people who are like physiologically similar must also you know,
Speaker 1: be compatible be friends, I had don't think this study
Speaker 1: finds that body odor is not completely determined by like genetics.
Speaker 1: It's also determined by diet and lifestyle. So it's possible
Speaker 1: that like a similarity in lifestyle could predict both body
Speaker 1: odor similarity and also your personality being similar with other
Speaker 1: people and being able to click with them, um and
Speaker 1: actually have nothing to do with people subconsciously enjoying each
Speaker 1: other's smell. So I think, like, I would really like
Speaker 1: to see more research in this area. I don't think
Speaker 1: it's I don't think these studies are convincing to me
Speaker 1: that we like can smell out our friends, But I
Speaker 1: do think it is interesting that there may be some
Speaker 1: kind of link between body odor and compatibility and whether
Speaker 1: it and you know, like, I would like to see
Speaker 1: if there's like if you did a study and you
Speaker 1: blocked participants ability to smell each other, but you still
Speaker 1: found these results. I think that would be really interesting
Speaker 1: because it'd be indicating that somehow your body odor is
Speaker 1: linked to maybe lifestyle that signals compatibility rather than being
Speaker 1: able to smell each other. But I think those are
Speaker 1: I would guess, and I'm no expert in any subject.
Speaker 1: To be frank, I think that those aren't necessarily saying
Speaker 1: the things that if you said that in our early
Speaker 1: in our evolution, we used to back before we bathed,
Speaker 1: the way all of our natural oils and all the
Speaker 1: things that we secreted our hormones. All that that if
Speaker 1: you ran into another primitive human in the wild, that
Speaker 1: your that their scent would tell you this person eats
Speaker 1: a similar diet. They eat a lot of fish, means
Speaker 1: they live by the river. You know, um, all of
Speaker 1: the other things you can smell about a person that
Speaker 1: they are from a similar background to you. Oh, this
Speaker 1: is another of the river people, right, because they've got
Speaker 1: the smell of of the moss on them, or the
Speaker 1: smell of the there from the beach. They've got the
Speaker 1: smell of the salt water on them. These are the
Speaker 1: coast people. They've got Um that it doesn't necessarily have
Speaker 1: to be you know, you're a genetic scent that it's
Speaker 1: it's like genes identifying genes. That it could be like
Speaker 1: I'm identifying a lifestyle here, whereas if I smelled someone
Speaker 1: who smelled of a hunter, those are the hunting people.
Speaker 1: We hate them. He smells like animals, He smells like
Speaker 1: animal guts. He smells like you smell and you get
Speaker 1: an animal and you get there the bio and all
Speaker 1: the stuff in your hands, Like that's the scent of
Speaker 1: the hunter tribe, and I'm it seems it seems implausible
Speaker 1: that we wouldn't use all of our senses. Humans are
Speaker 1: social animals. We survived by being able to identify, that's
Speaker 1: why we're so tribal. We survived by being able to
Speaker 1: quickly decide who we wanted to be friends with, who
Speaker 1: we wanted to ally with. Things like that. It seems
Speaker 1: like it would be weird, especially in a pre language
Speaker 1: stage of our evolution, if we didn't use sent the
Speaker 1: way all of these other creatures do. Because you know,
Speaker 1: we have sent for many reasons. It's not just for
Speaker 1: finding food. It's for all sorts of things, you know,
Speaker 1: detecting when something is on fire. But I think my
Speaker 1: personal theory, again not a scientist, I think today when
Speaker 1: culturally we do everything we can to cover up our
Speaker 1: scent so that we try to use like we try
Speaker 1: to manipulate our sense to send signals Like I'm wearing
Speaker 1: an expensive perfume, I'm signaling that is a social signal.
Speaker 1: But I've chosen that rather than letting this the natural
Speaker 1: musk from my armpits signal to potential boyfriends. What that
Speaker 1: I'm that I'm ready to mate? Um that I would
Speaker 1: think that now and again, please This is me speculating now.
Speaker 1: A lot of times when we meet one and instantly
Speaker 1: decide we don't like their vibe. If and if it's
Speaker 1: not like, well he had a giant tattoo of a
Speaker 1: spider on his neck, I don't mean that, but when
Speaker 1: but go on right that, when you sense the you
Speaker 1: know that the you you sense that there's something off.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people credit it to like
Speaker 1: intuition or instinct that I think a lot of it
Speaker 1: is things like their scent, that it's subtle enough that
Speaker 1: it doesn't he you consciously like, oh, this person reads
Speaker 1: of alcohol, not like that, but enough that it's this
Speaker 1: is a person that drinks a lot, like they've not
Speaker 1: drink today, it's not on their breath. That there may
Speaker 1: be some subtle thing in there. And the thing about
Speaker 1: whether or not, like men can detect if a woman
Speaker 1: is ovulating stuff like that, I don't know at the experiments,
Speaker 1: And I know that the people who used to read
Speaker 1: Cracked probably are saying, well, didn't you guys post a
Speaker 1: out of articles on Cracked with that factory down it? Look,
Speaker 1: we didn't know that none of the stuff replicated. At
Speaker 1: the time, we thought if there was in a scientific
Speaker 1: American like, hey, they just didn't experiment women can detect,
Speaker 1: you know, different men by their their body odor, that
Speaker 1: by putting, and that we didn't know that. When you
Speaker 1: try to repeat those experiments, they fall through. It is
Speaker 1: extremely difficult to do those experiments because things like collecting
Speaker 1: sweat and then adding it with a dropper to a shirt, well,
Speaker 1: that's not exactly the same thing. And I don't think
Speaker 1: it's smelling the scent on a piece of clothing in
Speaker 1: a room. That doesn't. I think it's seeing the person
Speaker 1: face to face and getting the whole picture, all the
Speaker 1: little micro expressions on their face, all of their gestures,
Speaker 1: the way what they do with their hands, and you're
Speaker 1: seeing all these little signals about what type of person
Speaker 1: they are, with their fingernails look like, all the stuff
Speaker 1: that you're not consciously you're not like Sherrock Holmes, like
Speaker 1: going through is like, ah, he has plucked eyebrows. That
Speaker 1: means he's They that are the whole picture of the person,
Speaker 1: including their scent. I think that's the thing we call vibe.
Speaker 1: Before you've talked to them, before you've noticed what brands
Speaker 1: they're wearing, before you asked them what they do for
Speaker 1: a living. You see what kind of car they drive.
Speaker 1: I think that that sometimes when you instantly feel at
Speaker 1: ease around a person, I think some percentage of that
Speaker 1: is there is their scent. It's what it's what scientists
Speaker 1: refer to as the vibe check. Um. Yeah, no, I
Speaker 1: mean I I tend to agree, So I don't know, right,
Speaker 1: Like the research on our on humans ability to pick
Speaker 1: up these things from odor is a little bit fraught
Speaker 1: and definitely not complete, But just looking at the kind
Speaker 1: of more obvious behaviors of people, I do think smell
Speaker 1: plays quite a role in our society. I mean there's
Speaker 1: a lot of things where it's like the smells of um,
Speaker 1: of food that is unfamiliar to you, Like people will
Speaker 1: sometimes complain about food that's from another country, like the
Speaker 1: smell of it, and they will use that as sort
Speaker 1: of a way to be maybe like xenophobic or or
Speaker 1: complain about like this other group, whereas like it can
Speaker 1: also be something more positively social, like you, um, you
Speaker 1: kind of like identify certain smells and have a memory
Speaker 1: linked with them, Like there are certain smells that I
Speaker 1: whenever I smell them, I like remember something like my
Speaker 1: kindergarten class, Like smelling a glue stick brings me right
Speaker 1: back to kindergarten. And so I think that there's still
Speaker 1: a lot of things that smell do in terms of
Speaker 1: our socialization. Even though we have a much weaker sense
Speaker 1: of smell than say a dog or an elephant, we
Speaker 1: I think that it does make these highly emotional links
Speaker 1: and we can like, like everyone knows what the smell of,
Speaker 1: like say, fall is in their culture. Like for some
Speaker 1: people it's like, you know, the smell of cinnamon or something.
Speaker 1: For other people it may be the smell of sort
Speaker 1: of wet dirt or something. But we have these kind
Speaker 1: of categories of smells, and so I do think it
Speaker 1: is it's very plausible that we do the same thing
Speaker 1: with people. And even if you know, I mean, I
Speaker 1: think it even counts when we're using like artificial smell,
Speaker 1: Like you may have a family member that always uses
Speaker 1: the same perfume or something, and then you associate that
Speaker 1: perfume with that family member, and then you have a
Speaker 1: positive or negative reaction to that perfume. So yeah, I think, um,
Speaker 1: I think it is. I think that smell is something
Speaker 1: that is it's so such an interesting sense right, because
Speaker 1: it's so it's very hard to describe a smell other
Speaker 1: than just like making the connection to that thing, like
Speaker 1: what is the smell of cinnamon? Well, it smells like cinnamon,
Speaker 1: but actually describing that smell kind of in detail is
Speaker 1: really difficult. Like, um, it's easier to describe taste, maybe
Speaker 1: even than smell because it's such a complex sensation, and
Speaker 1: so it's really hard to kind of incorporate that in
Speaker 1: our language. But there are all these subtle emotions that
Speaker 1: can come up with the smell that is really hard
Speaker 1: to describe in in our linguistic monologue. But I think
Speaker 1: it's still a very core part of the human experience.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's kind of everything. The fact that we
Speaker 1: don't have a lot of words that can convey to
Speaker 1: someone else a smell, or the fact that I can
Speaker 1: close my eyes in picture what my first car looked like,
Speaker 1: pretty almost exactly that nine blue Mustang. I cannot bring
Speaker 1: to mind its smell. I cannot make myself smell what
Speaker 1: it smelled like. I can't, you know, like if and
Speaker 1: if you try to tell me to imagine the smell
Speaker 1: of cinnamon, I can't bring that scent into my nose.
Speaker 1: But I can bring a picture of a cinnamon stick
Speaker 1: into my mind and can close my eyes and I
Speaker 1: can see it. I can generate a site, and I
Speaker 1: can hear a song if you ask me, you know,
Speaker 1: uh so, if you ask me to imagine the song
Speaker 1: Babies Got Back by Sir Mix a Lot, I can
Speaker 1: hear the whole song in my head, word for word
Speaker 1: right now, But I cannot remember the smell of that song. Um.
Speaker 1: And so there's some there's something weird about how our
Speaker 1: cognition and our our mental thought processes is more disconnected
Speaker 1: from our our sense of smell dan from almost anything else.
Speaker 1: Because like visually, we can describe things we see. We
Speaker 1: have a million different words for for color and contours
Speaker 1: and shapes. You know, all of our poetry is based
Speaker 1: about seeing things and feeling things. But trying to write
Speaker 1: a poem about how something smells, you're just like the smoke.
Speaker 1: It smells smoky. It smells like smoke, like it's You
Speaker 1: can throw words in there, like acrid or something, or
Speaker 1: stings in your nose or whatever, But in terms of
Speaker 1: trying to verbally recreate a smell for a person, the
Speaker 1: best you can do is say, well, it smells like
Speaker 1: frying onions. It's something you've smelled before. It smells like that.
Speaker 1: But like, well, yeah, but what what does frying onions
Speaker 1: smell like? It's like, well, it's kind of smoky. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And so this, this is the reason I bring this
Speaker 1: up is because I think that's why so much of
Speaker 1: if I'm looking at somebody and I'm judging them by
Speaker 1: the shirt they're wearing, by their grooming, by their haircut,
Speaker 1: all that stuff is visual. If they're saying a bunch
Speaker 1: of annoying pickup lines at me, that's that's all audible.
Speaker 1: I can you know, I can describe those words as
Speaker 1: being stupid or corny or creepy. But the sense stuff,
Speaker 1: because we don't connect it to our thoughts and our
Speaker 1: language and our internal monologue, that stuff almost just always
Speaker 1: plays as instinct. I think, for example, you said, what,
Speaker 1: why smell a glue stick that reminds me of kindergarten? Um.
Speaker 1: I think for every one time you smell a glue
Speaker 1: stick and you consciously think, oh, this reminds me of kindergarten,
Speaker 1: I think there are a hundred times when you have
Speaker 1: suddenly had your mood change because you smelled something that
Speaker 1: brought back a memory, but not consciously. It was just
Speaker 1: a smell that brought a sense of dread. And you
Speaker 1: don't remember necessarily that this is the same disinfectant they
Speaker 1: used in the hospital when my dad was in the
Speaker 1: hospital or whatever. But it's it's a subconscious thing. I
Speaker 1: think there are all these associations where you find yourself
Speaker 1: your mood shifting, or you find a certain house that
Speaker 1: you just like being in. It's just and again you
Speaker 1: would say it's just a vibe, and you can talk
Speaker 1: about what is the function is that the arrangement of
Speaker 1: the fur nature is this or that It's like, no,
Speaker 1: it's it's the smell. You just you're not conscious of
Speaker 1: it unless it's like an overwhelming like vanilla candle smell.
Speaker 1: But sometimes a house just smells welcoming, whereas no hospital
Speaker 1: smells that way. I think that's what they sometimes, like
Speaker 1: realtors will like bake cookies in a house, um, but
Speaker 1: like a few days before, so it's not super obvious,
Speaker 1: but it's just kind of like they're hanging in the air.
Speaker 1: You know that. It's interesting because you mentioned that you
Speaker 1: can't imagine smells like you can't conjure that smell sort
Speaker 1: of like to your you know, in a similar way
Speaker 1: that you can visualize like a car. For me, that's
Speaker 1: actually very different. I have an extremely sensitive sense of smell,
Speaker 1: which sounds cool, except like I can smell tuna from
Speaker 1: like five rooms away and it makes me want to
Speaker 1: like pass out, So I and I hate, Like, there
Speaker 1: are certain smells that I just like hate, Like I
Speaker 1: hate the smell of a banana, and I can smell
Speaker 1: it if someone's eating it across the room, and I
Speaker 1: absolutely hate it. But I think like I can sometimes
Speaker 1: in dreams, I can like taste or smell things, and
Speaker 1: that can be either great or terrible, depending on the
Speaker 1: context of the dream. But I can also like imagine smells,
Speaker 1: which I think that's It's just interesting because I kind
Speaker 1: of had assumed other people can also imagine taste or smells.
Speaker 1: Um am I the only one who can't. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I have to google it, I doubt well, let me, Yeah, like,
Speaker 1: who can people? Can you imagine smells? Like I've never
Speaker 1: had a taste or a smell in a dream in
Speaker 1: my life. I didn't. I didn't think that was possible. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, I've talked to other people who say they
Speaker 1: can't do that um as well as people who said
Speaker 1: they can. So I would assume it's something that is
Speaker 1: um that it is something that kind of just varies
Speaker 1: from her into person. Do you do you have like
Speaker 1: a very sensitive sense of smell or not? Not at all? No,
Speaker 1: not at all. I mean maybe that's the that is
Speaker 1: like the difference. Well, it's just like there's a specific
Speaker 1: region of the brain, right, like that's it's it's more developed.
Speaker 1: It seems like it's as simple as that, Like it's
Speaker 1: it has the horsepower to process that memory more vividly
Speaker 1: than like I don't completely forget what pizza tastes like
Speaker 1: like I'm not. I know exactly why I see a pizza.
Speaker 1: I know exactly what to expect. But I can't bring
Speaker 1: the taste of pepperoni into my mouth the way I
Speaker 1: can bring the song Babies Got back into my mind
Speaker 1: anytime I want. That's interesting because yeah, for me, it's
Speaker 1: like sometimes even not um intentional. I remember in high
Speaker 1: school we had to do dissections of like fetle pigs
Speaker 1: and frogs, and uh, the worst part for me was
Speaker 1: the smell of the formalde hyde, and I was imagining
Speaker 1: it was such a strong and unpleasant smell that for
Speaker 1: like a week after we had done it, I kept
Speaker 1: imagining that. It's like, my clothes smelled like it. Everything
Speaker 1: smelled like it. And you know, my poor mom like
Speaker 1: washed my clothes like twice and she's like, there's no
Speaker 1: smell of formalde hyde on these clothes. You're you're it's
Speaker 1: not there. But I could like still smell it, and
Speaker 1: it was psychological because it was such a strong smell.
Speaker 1: I think it just kind of like embedded itself in
Speaker 1: my old factory memory and I kept um sort of
Speaker 1: conjuring it up because it was probably like mildly traumatic
Speaker 1: to have to like smell such a strong, unpleasant thing
Speaker 1: while looking into the face of a dead baby pig. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean that that is I feel like we've just,
Speaker 1: like remember at the beginning, we were talking about some
Speaker 1: people don't think in an inner monologue and how shocking
Speaker 1: it is to like find out that other people think
Speaker 1: in a different way. I feel like we're experiencing that
Speaker 1: right now. But in terms of imagining smells or not
Speaker 1: imagining smells, and of course the mechanism what we know
Speaker 1: is there because there's the thing that people are about
Speaker 1: to have a stroke. They will smell like a burning smell,
Speaker 1: like burnt toast or something, and they'll ask if something
Speaker 1: is burning. Then they'll have a stroke a moment later
Speaker 1: because of some misfire in the part of the in
Speaker 1: that part of the brain. So it's certainly something that
Speaker 1: can happen. And also, I think every single person listening
Speaker 1: this has had some the exact thing that you just described,
Speaker 1: where their wife or their roommate is swears like something
Speaker 1: stinks in here, like there's something rotten in the refrigerator,
Speaker 1: the amouse's diet. I can smell. I can't smell anything,
Speaker 1: And no matter what you do, you open the windows,
Speaker 1: you lie at a candle, it's like I can't smell,
Speaker 1: And the other person will just insist, and it's like, well,
Speaker 1: is it something inside your nose? Is it? And it? Maybe?
Speaker 1: Are they just more sensitive? Are they picking up little
Speaker 1: scores of oils or whatever that's embedded in the fabric
Speaker 1: of the curtains that it's just too subtle for the
Speaker 1: other person. That's the weird thing about being a human
Speaker 1: being is you just don't know what it's like to
Speaker 1: live inside someone else's audi and brighten and senses I
Speaker 1: think it would be shocking to the point of if
Speaker 1: you could Freaky Friday somebody else and feel like impulses
Speaker 1: the way they feel them, and perceptions the way they
Speaker 1: perceive them. I think it would you. You would faint
Speaker 1: from from the shock of it. I think how different
Speaker 1: other people, how much more tired some people are, how
Speaker 1: much more energy some people have. I'm always fantasizing about,
Speaker 1: like whether everyone else has more energy than I do,
Speaker 1: because I feel sleepy all the time. Um. But I
Speaker 1: think we can sum up this episode by saying I
Speaker 1: smell good and you smell bad apparently so um. Before
Speaker 1: we go, I want to play a quick game called
Speaker 1: guests Who's Squawk and the Mystery Animal Sound Game. Every
Speaker 1: week I play a mry animal sound and you the listener,
Speaker 1: and you the guests, try to guess who is making
Speaker 1: that sound. It can be any animal in the world.
Speaker 1: Last week's Mystery Animals sound hint was this. In the
Speaker 1: winter they wear white, in the summer they wear brown,
Speaker 1: but all year round they sound like dinghis is oh?
Speaker 1: I mean it clearly. I'm trying to think of the
Speaker 1: because it sounds to me like some sort of a
Speaker 1: frog or something. But they the whole clue with them
Speaker 1: wearing white in the winter and brown in the summer
Speaker 1: um and I'm not sure. Gosh, dude, I can't. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm not picturing there's some sort of a bird or
Speaker 1: a gull or something. But no, I that that didn't
Speaker 1: sound like anything. I'm familiar it there or would want
Speaker 1: to be familiar with. Well, you are correct that it
Speaker 1: is some kind of bird. It is a rock ptarmigan,
Speaker 1: and it is a ground dwelling bird found all over
Speaker 1: the world in arctic and subarctic regions. And even though
Speaker 1: it sounds like some kind of like weird alien that
Speaker 1: has a tentacle that like goes up your eye and
Speaker 1: reads your brain, it's actually just a little fluffy bird.
Speaker 1: They go from brown to white from summer to winter,
Speaker 1: so they they molt and their brown feathers are replaced
Speaker 1: by white feathers for the purpose of camouflage. They're actually
Speaker 1: pretty cute. Their feet are fluffy and covered in feathers
Speaker 1: then look like little bunny paws, and that works as
Speaker 1: snowshoes in the winter, and they like to live inside
Speaker 1: snow caves that form around trees and rocks. And what
Speaker 1: you heard is their mating call. And remember that birds
Speaker 1: are just modern day dinosaurs, So I love to imagine
Speaker 1: that back in dinosaur times there are a bunch of
Speaker 1: you know, big scary looking dinosaurs making just a weird
Speaker 1: giggling sounds like this bird. Congratulations to Joey Pete, Bob,
Speaker 1: whichever bob that was. I mean, if you're that bob,
Speaker 1: you probably know which bob you are. And Emily am Yeah.
Speaker 1: And again, anybody who successfully guesses these you win a
Speaker 1: gift card to Hooters for ten thousand dollars. And you
Speaker 1: might think that it is to the restaurant with problematic themes,
Speaker 1: but no, it is actually an owl um sanctuary that
Speaker 1: he is talking about. This Hooters, the restaurant still exists.
Speaker 1: Is that still a thing? Oh? I think it does. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's inspirational. They're still hanging in there. I yeah. I
Speaker 1: feel like they could definitely rebrand though, and make it
Speaker 1: completely owl themed. Oh so um, are you ready for
Speaker 1: this week's mystery animalsound? Yeah? And again if I if
Speaker 1: I do successfully guess that, you just bleep it so
Speaker 1: it doesn't ruin the whole thing. That's exactly right. All right,
Speaker 1: here we go. So here is the hint, you've been
Speaker 1: lied to. These guys don't have wings al right, so
Speaker 1: can you guess who is squawking? Like? You are absolutely
Speaker 1: correct and therefore you you you will be bleeped out, um,
Speaker 1: although the listener will know that you're victorious, so you know,
Speaker 1: oh yes, uh. And if you think you know who
Speaker 1: is squalking right to me a creature feature pod at
Speaker 1: gmail dot com. Also, hey, you know what right to me?
Speaker 1: About whether you can imagine smells and taste or if
Speaker 1: you don't imagine smells or taste, or if you have
Speaker 1: a fantasia or if you don't think in a monologue.
Speaker 1: I am curious to know. Um. And hey, Jason, thank
Speaker 1: you so much for coming on. Where can people find you?
Speaker 1: And when? When? And where can people get your book?
Speaker 1: The book For those of you who know me from
Speaker 1: before this show, it's UM in the John Dies at
Speaker 1: the End series of adult horror sci fi novels. The
Speaker 1: title of this one is if this book exists, you're
Speaker 1: in the wrong universe. You can get it anywhere. It's
Speaker 1: got a big, lime green cover. It's available on audiobook
Speaker 1: anything like that. UM in any format out October eighteenth.
Speaker 1: I don't know exactly when this episode airs. But either
Speaker 1: way it's close enough that it's either out or it
Speaker 1: will be within days. Otherwise, I'm on all of the
Speaker 1: social media's that just that name, Jason Pargeon p A
Speaker 1: r G. I n searched that name on Twitter or TikTok,
Speaker 1: sadly or Instagram, any of them. I'm on their Facebook.
Speaker 1: I'm on all of them. I'm not on Snapchat. That's
Speaker 1: one that I'm not on. You on TikTok, That's well,
Speaker 1: that's not something we like to adi. That's not something
Speaker 1: we like to admit in public. But yes, we have
Speaker 1: become I have gone viral on on TikTok. I have
Speaker 1: a lot of I've now more followers there than I
Speaker 1: have on Facebook, even though I've had that Facebook account
Speaker 1: for like twenty years. TikTok, I've been on there for
Speaker 1: two months. I've got like twenty thou followers and like
Speaker 1: one of their own. Yeah, um and anybody have there.
Speaker 1: Was worried about because a lot of people in my age,
Speaker 1: you know, because I'm seven, ask how do you get
Speaker 1: into TikTok. Because the thing is if you go to
Speaker 1: best Buy and you get like they have like the
Speaker 1: TikTok vlogger kits. Now for the kids. It's like in
Speaker 1: a little pink box but like a little ring light
Speaker 1: in a little camera and stuff. It's like to get
Speaker 1: you set up on TikTok And it's like, well, how
Speaker 1: can I purchase that with? Like won't they call the
Speaker 1: cops or something if I try to buy something like that?
Speaker 1: But again, you can tell them it's for somebody else.
Speaker 1: I can say it's my niece's birthday. You know, I'm
Speaker 1: getting it. She's twelve and you know she wants to
Speaker 1: be an influencer. I'm getting it for her. You don't
Speaker 1: have to admit that you're using this equipment for yourself. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean it's like Lego Land and Chuck E Cheese
Speaker 1: rules like you cannot purchase a TikTok kit as an adult,
Speaker 1: but if you have a child with you, then you
Speaker 1: can buy it. And you just have to say it
Speaker 1: is for that child, yeah. Or like the guy who
Speaker 1: goes to the dog park but without her dog. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, I just like to sit here in commune
Speaker 1: with the dogs. That happened to me once and it
Speaker 1: was a magician also, and that was interested, to say
Speaker 1: the least. Did you say he was a magician? Yeah?
Speaker 1: He literally, this is not a joke. He had cards
Speaker 1: in his pocket and like a little piece of string
Speaker 1: for his tricks, and it it was scary. Did I
Speaker 1: wish the whole episode had been about this? Did this
Speaker 1: happen in America? Or did this happen where happen in America?
Speaker 1: Good old American magician? All right, yeah, no dog either.
Speaker 1: I guess he made the dog disappear and probably me
Speaker 1: too if I hadn't gotten away from that park. If
Speaker 1: any of you out there are amateur magicians, we are
Speaker 1: not trying to cast us persions on the type of
Speaker 1: there's just certain there's certain pastimes, like the like minds,
Speaker 1: like they've gotten a certain reputation. Yeah no, I I um,
Speaker 1: you know fully support the magician profession, just not at
Speaker 1: dog parks when you don't have a dog. That's when,
Speaker 1: uh it drives terror into my heart. Well, thank you
Speaker 1: so much for joining me, and thanks to you the listener. Uh,
Speaker 1: if you're enjoying the show, and you know you do
Speaker 1: those things that people are always demanding you do, like
Speaker 1: leave reviews, and you're probably sick of it, like stop
Speaker 1: at asking me for my opinion. Well, I'm going to
Speaker 1: do it one more time. If you have an opinion
Speaker 1: on the podcast and you want to say it, especially
Speaker 1: if it's a nice one, I'm not gonna lie. Like
Speaker 1: those the best. I appreciate them and I read all
Speaker 1: of them. And hey, thank you to the Space Classics
Speaker 1: for their super awesome song. Ex Alumina Creature Feature is
Speaker 1: a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts like
Speaker 1: the one you just heard, visit the I heart Radio
Speaker 1: app Apple Podcasts, or Hey, guess what where avery he
Speaker 1: listen your favorite shows? I genuinely don't care. See you
Speaker 1: next Wednesday.