Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, Welcome to Creature feature, the show where we
Speaker 1: ask who are the real animals? Humans or animals? Join
Speaker 1: us today as we look at some of the most
Speaker 1: mind blowing, most important, and also weirdest scientific studies that
Speaker 1: have been done on rats. Discovered this and more as
Speaker 1: we answered the age old question is there eternal sunshine
Speaker 1: in the spotless rat mine? So rats, they've been long
Speaker 1: maligned by humans. They're synonymous with sneaky crooks and snitches.
Speaker 1: They're considered disgusting, little harbingers of plagues. But on September
Speaker 1: two thousand fifteen, something happened that caused a paradigm shift
Speaker 1: in public opinion. Pizza rat, Pizza rapp was that in
Speaker 1: trepid subway rat who dragged a huge slice of pizza
Speaker 1: down the stairs. This little hero captured our hearts. He's
Speaker 1: the classic American rags to riches or well rat to
Speaker 1: pizza's story. But rats are deeper and more complex than
Speaker 1: sewer nightmares or pizza entrepreneurs. They are wildly successful urban survivors,
Speaker 1: highly social, intelligent, and have been the backbone of huge
Speaker 1: wealth of scientific research. You've likely heard it in the news.
Speaker 1: Such and such news study has been conducted on rats,
Speaker 1: or some medication has been found to be effective in rats.
Speaker 1: It's a grim truth. In order for medicine to advance,
Speaker 1: rats are often on the front lines. It's a complex
Speaker 1: moral issue that can't be boiled down to a brief statement.
Speaker 1: But this is a podcast, so here here it goes.
Speaker 1: I love rats and mines and rodents in general, but
Speaker 1: I think they deserve respect. But I also super appreciate
Speaker 1: having modern medicine, and I think researchers are doing extremely
Speaker 1: important work. So today we're going to look at some
Speaker 1: of this rats science, both to appreciate it from a
Speaker 1: standpoint of immense scientific accomplishment, as well as taking the
Speaker 1: point of view of what it would be like to
Speaker 1: be a rat. Undergoing these studies with me today is
Speaker 1: Polo v Ganalan biomedical engineer and an amazingly funny and
Speaker 1: talented stand up comedian. Welcome, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: So just briefly, do you deal in your research? I'll
Speaker 1: kind of get into that more later on, but yeah, um,
Speaker 1: I'm currently a PhD student at the University of Southern
Speaker 1: California and Ted Burger's lab. He works on the hippocampus
Speaker 1: and Hippocampbell Studies and our lab is in the process
Speaker 1: of creating a computational model of the rat hippocampus UM,
Speaker 1: and we My work within that is very specific. UM.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to characterize the different neuron types within the
Speaker 1: rat hippocampus because there are a bunch of different kinds.
Speaker 1: And in order to do that, I'm working on using
Speaker 1: a genetic algorithm, which I don't know. Have you heard
Speaker 1: of genetic algorithms before? Not? Really, No, they're really interesting, UM.
Speaker 1: Evolutionary algorithms UM and genetic algorithms are based on how
Speaker 1: like populations work. So like in human populations, you have
Speaker 1: a parent generation and then they breed, they make children.
Speaker 1: Those breed they make children, you know, and as UM
Speaker 1: you go down the line, certain things are shifted and
Speaker 1: changed according to mutation and crossover with the genes. Right,
Speaker 1: So they use individuals in the population as they're actually
Speaker 1: computational models. So each individual is a computational model and
Speaker 1: the inputs changed based on which individual they are in
Speaker 1: the population. So you have a set of models at
Speaker 1: the top, and then you determine how far off you
Speaker 1: want their their inputs to be when they have children,
Speaker 1: and then the models, the computational models breed and have kids,
Speaker 1: so kind of like, uh, I mean probably this is
Speaker 1: very oversimplified, but there was that the Game of Life,
Speaker 1: kind of very early computer game where you would put
Speaker 1: in a bunch of parameters and then you have these
Speaker 1: these kind of competing pixel microbes out there and breeding
Speaker 1: and competing with each other, and it would run the
Speaker 1: program and you would see like the population density of
Speaker 1: these different sort of like programmed in organisms. Uh yeah,
Speaker 1: except so each UM, each program is actually like treated
Speaker 1: like an individual in the population. Yeah, So it's like
Speaker 1: it's just finding a way to explore different inputs and
Speaker 1: whether the outputs match what we want UM with through
Speaker 1: mimicking the diversity and in like a population of organisms. Right,
Speaker 1: that's super cool. Yeah, it's really fun. UM, but it
Speaker 1: is very uh you know deep. So with the with
Speaker 1: the whole like with all the rat experiments and stuff,
Speaker 1: I'm like very focused. Yeah, you're focused on this one
Speaker 1: specific yea thing, which I mean, that's that's kind of
Speaker 1: the reality of what you have to do when you're
Speaker 1: when you're doing these um more like the more precise
Speaker 1: as we'll see like in more historical route studies it's
Speaker 1: very sort of on the surface, like you put a
Speaker 1: rat in the maze and see what he does, which
Speaker 1: I've also done before. Yeah, I as biomedical engineering encompasses
Speaker 1: like any engineering applied to the healthcare field, which is
Speaker 1: a problem in getting jobs because people don't know what
Speaker 1: we do, what's that we have, because it can range
Speaker 1: from work with animals, working with cells and my crosscoppy
Speaker 1: to um, you know, more mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, to
Speaker 1: computational stuff. And so I've actually been through that whole process.
Speaker 1: So I've gone from you know, working with animals and cells,
Speaker 1: and then I worked on neural probes for a while,
Speaker 1: which was more mechanical electrical engineering, and now I'm doing
Speaker 1: computational UM. And part of the reason that I wanted
Speaker 1: to go to computational was because I was tired of
Speaker 1: being in a wet lab basically um, because I started
Speaker 1: in like middle school working in labs, so I was
Speaker 1: kind of over it. Yeah. Is it is it the
Speaker 1: smell or just the general environment, because I have worked
Speaker 1: in a monkey lab before, and for me, it was
Speaker 1: the smell that was like the worst. It was, um,
Speaker 1: you know, it's weird. Is I like when of a
Speaker 1: lab smells like mice really, yeah, because I'm used to
Speaker 1: and I'm like, ah, this smells like science. But no,
Speaker 1: it has to do with, um, just the type of work,
Speaker 1: because the behavioral experiments are take a long time. They're
Speaker 1: very precise. Same with you know, cells, it can take
Speaker 1: a while to get the results that you want. And
Speaker 1: I just felt, you know, I learned a lot in
Speaker 1: my time, and I felt like I wanted something more
Speaker 1: computationally challenging. I wanted to acquire those skills um. And
Speaker 1: before I, right before my PhD, I was working in
Speaker 1: a completely different field in infectious diseases, and I was
Speaker 1: like carrying around vials of HIV and like nine leaders
Speaker 1: of human plasma. And I was tired of the manual
Speaker 1: labor associated with it because I imagine that's a very
Speaker 1: like a lot of protocol must be involved. It was
Speaker 1: a lot of protocol. I was very happy to be
Speaker 1: in the biotech industry to learn all the protocol and
Speaker 1: like how sales works and stuff like that, because in
Speaker 1: academia you're just kind of you're in a lab, you're
Speaker 1: just you're very focused on yeah, UM, and so you
Speaker 1: don't really understand that like practical application of how this
Speaker 1: like impacts people and how it reaches the general public,
Speaker 1: the solutions that you find in lab um. So I'm
Speaker 1: glad I got that kind of gen all information. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I was done, Carrie, Like having to wash my clothes
Speaker 1: irrationally to feel clean at night. It was necessistant a
Speaker 1: labor um. This is nothing compared to having to carry
Speaker 1: infectious diseases. But it was a psychology study where we
Speaker 1: had to trick them into giving us like saliva samples,
Speaker 1: or not trick them into giving us saliva samples because
Speaker 1: that would be illegal. But we we took saliva samples
Speaker 1: for no reason because we wanted them to think we
Speaker 1: were studying their saliva. It's like, yeah, yeah, you lie
Speaker 1: a lot in like these behavioral studies. But like so
Speaker 1: I'd have to collect the saliva from them and immediately
Speaker 1: like throw it out, like wash it out, like we
Speaker 1: didn't need it. But and it just felt so it
Speaker 1: was so disheartening to be like, all right, here's this
Speaker 1: spin and it's like people, it's hard to fill a
Speaker 1: little wiless but you know, you think that it would
Speaker 1: be easy, but it's not, because then they had to
Speaker 1: fill it all the way up and then like you know,
Speaker 1: got the like spitty tube that it's like I don't
Speaker 1: need this, Yeah I don't. It's it's going directly in
Speaker 1: the trash. But you can tell they've worked very hard
Speaker 1: on giving you the a nice saliva sample and there.
Speaker 1: You know, it does feel like a lot of um
Speaker 1: that those physical like wet labbed experiments require a lot
Speaker 1: of things that are very like tedious and menial and
Speaker 1: like disheartening, um be, But it is necessary for the
Speaker 1: work to be done. Um so somebody has to do it,
Speaker 1: and a lot of times it's like grad students. But
Speaker 1: for Yeah, that's why with the computational stuff, I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm like I have a goal and I'm like trying
Speaker 1: all these things and it is really hard and it
Speaker 1: takes a lot longer than people think because computational stuff
Speaker 1: generally is faster because computers are faster than physical system.
Speaker 1: Takes time to run a program and then and then
Speaker 1: there's so many there's so much like debugging and troubleshooting
Speaker 1: and none of that matter. I can run it for
Speaker 1: hours and hours and hours and come back and it's
Speaker 1: like nope, yeah, which is what's happening right now. I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: but yeah, when you think rat studies, you probably picture
Speaker 1: a rat in a maze. Obviously, the wealth of research
Speaker 1: goes beyond this classic trope, but you're also not wrong.
Speaker 1: Some of the most important studies on rat behavior have
Speaker 1: utilized a maze, and mazes are great for examining learning,
Speaker 1: spatial memory, and a baseline for measuring performance, cognition, and
Speaker 1: drug studies. But what would it be like to be
Speaker 1: a rat in a maze with no GPS to help you?
Speaker 1: The labyrinth is often used as a horror action device.
Speaker 1: The idea of being stuck in a maze winding up
Speaker 1: trapped is scary and disorienting. Let's talk about a real
Speaker 1: life labyrinth that is more bewildering and terrifying than any
Speaker 1: sort of laboratory maze. The miles and miles of catacombs
Speaker 1: that lurk underground. Last year, two teenagers got lost in
Speaker 1: the Paris Catacombs. This is no hokey corn maze. There
Speaker 1: are over two hundred miles of tunnels, some of which
Speaker 1: had been constructed as quarries during the time of the Romans.
Speaker 1: In the seventeen hundreds, tunnels were constructed as asco arresting
Speaker 1: place for human skeletal remains. Due to the crisis of
Speaker 1: overflowing cemeteries, these catacombs would come to hold the bones
Speaker 1: of over six million people. Only a small fraction of
Speaker 1: the tunnels are open to the public, but that doesn't
Speaker 1: keep people from venturing into the dark forbidden areas. Needless
Speaker 1: to say, this is a very bad idea. So imagine
Speaker 1: being those two lost teenagers in the catacombs. It's dark, dank, cold,
Speaker 1: and you're utterly lost. How would you get back to
Speaker 1: the entrance by memory? There's not enough light to see landmarks,
Speaker 1: and even if there were, there's no map to orient
Speaker 1: yourself to. How do you know which tunnel you've been down,
Speaker 1: which skull lined quarter you've already retraced. Humans, unlike butterflies
Speaker 1: or cows, don't have a built in compass. We don't
Speaker 1: have the echolocation of bats or the noses of moles,
Speaker 1: who can see the world through vibrations. Were pretty pathetic
Speaker 1: navigators when compared to the animal kingdom. The teenagers are
Speaker 1: lost for three days, although to them, who knows how
Speaker 1: long it felt. Without diurnal information from the light of
Speaker 1: the sun, it's very hard to keep track of the
Speaker 1: passage of time, and according to authorities, they were only
Speaker 1: found things to search and rescue dogs. The dog's ability
Speaker 1: to track scent was crucial. Without the help of other animals,
Speaker 1: humans are ill prepared to navigate dark, fractal like passageways.
Speaker 1: There have been urban myths of people dying in the catacombs.
Speaker 1: There's a story of Masha, a woman who allegedly ventured
Speaker 1: into the Odessa Catacombs, got lost, and died of thirst.
Speaker 1: There's no proof of this story being true or Masha
Speaker 1: even being a real person, so it's likely just a
Speaker 1: legend that taps into our fears. However, there was one
Speaker 1: life that may very likely have been claimed by the
Speaker 1: Paris Catacombs. In seventee, Philip bet as Bet, a Parisian man,
Speaker 1: descended into the catacombs and was never seen again until
Speaker 1: eighteen o four, when his body was discovered in the tunnels.
Speaker 1: So let's find out if rats fare better at mastering
Speaker 1: the maize than our poor friend Phillybert Aspare. So, I
Speaker 1: want to ask you to join me on an imagination journey,
Speaker 1: which I like to do on the podcast. We right
Speaker 1: on down to imagination station. Um, what would you do
Speaker 1: to survive being lost? In the catacombs. Oh man, I
Speaker 1: would die immediately where I'm so weak, I would I
Speaker 1: think the main thing is preserving oxygen and like bodily resources, right,
Speaker 1: so like water would probably water and oxygen. Um, I'd
Speaker 1: start collecting my P immediately. That's smart, yea, yeah, so
Speaker 1: how do you what? I feel like there are tricks
Speaker 1: to like, yeah, I mean I would I would stay Like,
Speaker 1: I would stop wandering around for one, because like, the
Speaker 1: more you wander, the more likely you're going to get
Speaker 1: disoriented and get further and further away. Like the minute
Speaker 1: you know you're lost, you stop. You do not keep
Speaker 1: moving unless you're pretty sure you know exactly like where
Speaker 1: the exit is, and you probably don't though there's a
Speaker 1: huge chance that you get disoriented again. Um so I
Speaker 1: would like probably just stay there and uh. Like the
Speaker 1: the main threats seemed to be dehydration and exposure to
Speaker 1: the cold of the catacombs, so starting to get um hypothermia.
Speaker 1: Um so I would try to keep warm again, immediately
Speaker 1: start saving my P, like you know, that's like the
Speaker 1: first thing you do. Um, hopefully you've got like a
Speaker 1: water bottle or something you could start. Uh, it's the
Speaker 1: first thing I done every morning, I know, like I
Speaker 1: just save my p just in case you never you
Speaker 1: never know, it's a waste to don't be wasteful. Um uh, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's scary. It's one of those scary things to
Speaker 1: me though, the idea of being in the dark and
Speaker 1: not being able to navigate, like not knowing where you
Speaker 1: are and just getting further and further into a maze. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's yeah, that's definitely terrifying. Do you do the thing
Speaker 1: like I grew up in Utah and they're like addicted
Speaker 1: to corn mazes? Do you do the thing where you
Speaker 1: put your right hand on the wall and you like
Speaker 1: go or do you Is that a thing? That's interesting?
Speaker 1: So the idea being if you put your right hand,
Speaker 1: you're not going to get turned around at least you'll yeah,
Speaker 1: you'll still it'll still be left right, you'll have down, yeah,
Speaker 1: or like you'll know where you've been, like you only
Speaker 1: go right so at some point you get out. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's interesting. I want I don't know, like I want
Speaker 1: if you did that in the catacombs, though, you're you'd
Speaker 1: just be like rubbing a bunch of skulls because they
Speaker 1: actually line the they line the corridors with human skulls,
Speaker 1: so you're just like I feel like maybe just like
Speaker 1: just as you're walking along, um yeah, or maybe you
Speaker 1: could just get to know some of the skulls really well,
Speaker 1: like really feel them, feel their facial structure, like, yeah,
Speaker 1: this is up the skull who's got a weird missing tooth?
Speaker 1: Or like count their teeth and that's how you like
Speaker 1: get a landmark? Yeah yeah yeah, Or can how many
Speaker 1: skulls are on each wall? Um, I feel like that
Speaker 1: you won't go insane a media, Yeah, yeah you will.
Speaker 1: That'll be okay, You'll be fine. Like it's just like, hey,
Speaker 1: it's just me and all my friends who are skulls
Speaker 1: several Wilson's Yeah, yeah, I don't know. I feel yeah,
Speaker 1: I feel like you have to preserve your energy, your
Speaker 1: p in your ox. Yeah, I keep saying oxygen. But
Speaker 1: I don't know how the catacombs are telling you. I
Speaker 1: think it's I think you would die from exposure. I
Speaker 1: don't think you would necessarily. I think there's enough in
Speaker 1: most of the I don't Yeah, I'm not sure if
Speaker 1: it's I think the air flow is is okay enough.
Speaker 1: It's not like the death Zone and like the upper
Speaker 1: Mount Everest where every because like there you will just eventually, yeah,
Speaker 1: die of airsickness and deprivation. But have you seen the
Speaker 1: new there's like these new photos of like the really
Speaker 1: long line to get to the peak of Mount Everest.
Speaker 1: A lot of those people died, right yeah, yeah, because
Speaker 1: they're just waiting and eventually you don't. You can't live there.
Speaker 1: Your body is not meant to live at that both
Speaker 1: the temperature and the main problem being like the lack
Speaker 1: of oxygen. So if you wait too long, you just
Speaker 1: you will die. Yeah, there were a lot of like
Speaker 1: dead bodies because there were too many people up there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's so creepy, like I can't imagine, just like
Speaker 1: because they're talking about people just stepping over dead bodies
Speaker 1: to get to the peak, and like the peak itself
Speaker 1: is the size of like two ping pong tables, and
Speaker 1: so everyone's like cramming into get their pictures and it's
Speaker 1: just what a statement on capitalism high, I know, I know,
Speaker 1: just uh it's and yeah, just like you just got
Speaker 1: to get that Instagram up, dead body. Did you see
Speaker 1: their taking pictures, like influencers are taking pictures at Chernol, Yes,
Speaker 1: I saw that. I saw that. That's uh one of
Speaker 1: them like popped a butt. That was Oh yeah, she
Speaker 1: was hella naked. Yeah, that place is still radioactive. Right. Well,
Speaker 1: So one of the most important earlier routes studies was
Speaker 1: in seven by pt Young. It's actually pretty have you
Speaker 1: heard of this one? It's uh, it's actually kind of
Speaker 1: not as well known because it's weirdly it didn't get
Speaker 1: as much attention. It didn't get as many publications. Um,
Speaker 1: but it's one of physicists Richard Feynman's favorite. That old
Speaker 1: creepy guy. He was huge in I went to cal
Speaker 1: Tech for undergrad and he was like a huge person
Speaker 1: at cal Tech. So we heard a lot of stories
Speaker 1: about him. But everybody like he was like a physics thod.
Speaker 1: He was like carouser, right, like kind of a womanizer.
Speaker 1: He was a womanizer. I hadn't heard anything inappropriate, right,
Speaker 1: not that he was like not m yeah, not non
Speaker 1: consensual crowsing, consensual crops. So yeah, that's why I want
Speaker 1: I won't call it creepy, but it was he was
Speaker 1: getting it. Uh. So he he loved this study, this
Speaker 1: seven routes study. Um. He described it like this, I'm
Speaker 1: just going to quote him because he puts it in
Speaker 1: it's a somewhat confusing study, and he phrased it as
Speaker 1: it in a way that is a lot clearer than
Speaker 1: I think I could do. So quote, Uh, this researcher,
Speaker 1: he had a long corridor with doors all along one
Speaker 1: side where the rats came in, and doors all along
Speaker 1: the other side where the food was. He wanted to
Speaker 1: see if he could train the rats to go in
Speaker 1: at the third door down from wherever he started them off.
Speaker 1: The question was how did the rats know because the
Speaker 1: corridor was so beautifully built in so uniform that this
Speaker 1: was the same door as before. So basically, you know,
Speaker 1: this researcher is saying, like, wherever door you come out of,
Speaker 1: the food reward is going to be three doors down
Speaker 1: to the left from where you started. But instead the rats,
Speaker 1: no matter where they were in the maze, wherever they
Speaker 1: were put like door number one, two, three, four, whatever,
Speaker 1: they would always go to the door where the food
Speaker 1: was last, and they knew where that was. And um,
Speaker 1: the research was trying to eliminate all of the clues
Speaker 1: of like where they were in the maze. So he
Speaker 1: repainted the doors so the texture of the paint strokes
Speaker 1: were the same, because he was like, maybe they can
Speaker 1: tell by the texture of the door, but that didn't work.
Speaker 1: The routes still found that original door. Um. He thought
Speaker 1: maybe they were smelling it. That's a pretty reasonable assumption.
Speaker 1: But he masked all the scent with these really powerful
Speaker 1: chemicals every time, so there was no way. Um. So
Speaker 1: that didn't change anything either. Um. And he also like
Speaker 1: covered the entire maze up because he was thinking, well,
Speaker 1: maybe they're orienting themselves, like to the lights in the lab,
Speaker 1: so the lights on the ceiling sort of like you know,
Speaker 1: with their little tiny rats sextants, like going like oh
Speaker 1: here and like um. But that didn't have any effect either.
Speaker 1: And finally he thought, well, maybe like the sound the
Speaker 1: floor makes, like they're they're using some kind of like
Speaker 1: they're hearing differences in the sound the floor makes. So
Speaker 1: he filled the entire um mazed with sand and that
Speaker 1: masked the sound that their footsteps made and that they
Speaker 1: couldn't find it anymore. And that was that was the thing. Um.
Speaker 1: And what's so important about that study besides the fact
Speaker 1: that you can't you can't trigger at like, it's so
Speaker 1: crazy that they're just like they could find it no
Speaker 1: matter what, and it was just this one slight like
Speaker 1: they could hear I guess, like some slight difference in
Speaker 1: the way their feet, like maybe it's more hollow there
Speaker 1: or something. Um. But Uh, it's so not just in
Speaker 1: terms of rat intelligence, but the crazy lengths you have
Speaker 1: to go to to eliminate all of these different outside
Speaker 1: environmental factors in a study, because that's the hardest thing
Speaker 1: about behavioral studies is that you don't know if what
Speaker 1: you're getting is accurate. You just have to say, like,
Speaker 1: to the best my knowledge, it is because these animals
Speaker 1: have there's so many variables. Like wasn't there recently um
Speaker 1: a study about how mice react differently to experimenters that
Speaker 1: are male versus female? Oh? Interesting? Yeah, there, I think
Speaker 1: there's that. There's also um they're like scared of men
Speaker 1: and so they act differently when they are And so
Speaker 1: if you ever have an experiment that requires multiple researchers,
Speaker 1: it has to be the same. Yeah. I think there
Speaker 1: was also um a recent uh finding about like gender
Speaker 1: bias in terms of the rats actual gender. So female
Speaker 1: rats are often not used in certain medical studies because
Speaker 1: of their um their minstrel cycles, uh are thought to like, well,
Speaker 1: that's an inconsistent influence, but there's some concern that you know,
Speaker 1: this may that kind of the same sort of differences
Speaker 1: in terms of their hormones. I mean human women have
Speaker 1: that too, so I know women are crazy what with
Speaker 1: their minstrel luninormal bodies. Yeah yeah yeah. And also the
Speaker 1: fact that everything is modeled after like male animals in
Speaker 1: every It's like, this is great. Even the rats have
Speaker 1: to be dudes. I just like how like the solution
Speaker 1: to um the fact that rats have pesky ovaries is
Speaker 1: just like, oh, we won't study yeah as much. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: did you? This is also like a really random like
Speaker 1: animal fact. But there was you know how they use
Speaker 1: like messenger messenger pigeons in like the wars and stuff.
Speaker 1: There was one I think in World War Two that
Speaker 1: like was given like this metal because it saved like
Speaker 1: two people and like it did all these like crazy things.
Speaker 1: And it's in the Spy Museum in d C. And
Speaker 1: they have a whole section on these pigeons and uh
Speaker 1: so it's just like Pigeon of Valor, right, and it's
Speaker 1: it's lauded for its work and they keep miss gendering
Speaker 1: it as male. Oh like indifferent interest pigeon. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: behind every great male pigeon is it's actually it is
Speaker 1: actually just a female pigeon though. That's that's inferior. That's
Speaker 1: always frustrating, the h the assumption of certain like the
Speaker 1: assumption that like the more um, I don't know, physically
Speaker 1: capable animals or males, it's often the females that are, uh,
Speaker 1: we just endure. I mean, I think what you're saying
Speaker 1: is we do need to bring feminism to pigeons. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I feel like we could learn a lot.
Speaker 1: We would, We could learn from each other. Who would
Speaker 1: learn the most? Humans are pigeons. Humans from pigeons, we'd
Speaker 1: learn more. I feel like we would, Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1: So So back to rats. Um, pigeons of the ground,
Speaker 1: the pigeons of the yes, the pigeons of the sewers,
Speaker 1: the pigeons of the feet, is what I was gonna say,
Speaker 1: but then I realized that doesn't really makes sense. Um.
Speaker 1: So in more contemporary science, our ability to be precise
Speaker 1: has gotten much more high tech. So um, as you
Speaker 1: well know, researchers can now use neurotechnology to record rat
Speaker 1: brains and give nearly real time read out where the
Speaker 1: rats think they are in a maze. So you know
Speaker 1: that the technology of being able to put a bunch
Speaker 1: of sensors like you kind of implanted into the rat
Speaker 1: brain and then it gives a feed out that's not
Speaker 1: super new, but the more real time aspect of it
Speaker 1: where you can it's instead of taking a lot of
Speaker 1: time for that data to be interpreted and processed, it's
Speaker 1: becoming more and more to the point where you can
Speaker 1: UM basically see where the rat thinks it is in
Speaker 1: the maze as it's in the maze at the same
Speaker 1: time as where it is in the maze. That's like, UM, like,
Speaker 1: have you heard of Karl Desroth and optogenetics. I have
Speaker 1: heard of opto genetics, but have not heard of this
Speaker 1: specific guy. He um figured out a way to use
Speaker 1: a light to control the brains. Yes, actually, actually maybe
Speaker 1: I say, I don't know who this guy is, but
Speaker 1: I may actually know. Yeah, he's at Stanford. He's That
Speaker 1: field became revolutionized because you could basically trigger different cells
Speaker 1: to activate using light in real time. UM and that
Speaker 1: was a huge breakthrough. And then he had another break
Speaker 1: through later UM with clear which was turning the brain clear.
Speaker 1: But but opti genetics was was very like vital to
Speaker 1: this field. And there you know, there are a lot
Speaker 1: of animal studies with that. We're actually going to talk
Speaker 1: about one. But no, no, that's it's good because like
Speaker 1: it is a uh when I when I was looking
Speaker 1: at it, is took a little while for it to
Speaker 1: think in what it actually was because it's you genetically
Speaker 1: modify the animal beforehand such that it's uh, neurons can
Speaker 1: be manipulated with light and then you get the study.
Speaker 1: But well, we have a pretty fun study that that
Speaker 1: uses that technique. Um. So, uh. One thing I wonder
Speaker 1: about when rats are running through maze is it's always
Speaker 1: like it's easy to anthropomorphies like that they feel frustration
Speaker 1: or um. But there is a there is a study
Speaker 1: that looks at whether they feel regret for bad choices. Um.
Speaker 1: And of course, with any of these behavioral studies, regrets
Speaker 1: a very um, you know, kind of uh amorphous concept.
Speaker 1: It's they probably look at like what lights up in
Speaker 1: the brain right exactly. So to say that it is
Speaker 1: exactly regret is that's a little subjective. But it's like,
Speaker 1: how do each of us see blue right exactly? Um?
Speaker 1: But you know, to the extent that we can figure
Speaker 1: that out. They've they did a study, a University of
Speaker 1: Minneapolis study that measured brain responses and rats as they
Speaker 1: navigated a prize maze. Um. The rats basically had to
Speaker 1: gamble which door to choose. Um. If the rats choose wrong, uh,
Speaker 1: they had to wait longer for the food food rewards.
Speaker 1: So and then they had like a audio cue that
Speaker 1: basically would tell them like they were trained to associate
Speaker 1: different audio cues with different lengths of waiting times. Like. Uh,
Speaker 1: I when I was reading this study, I just imagined
Speaker 1: the Jeopardy song like playing, and they're like, oh man,
Speaker 1: I have to wait like two minutes for my food.
Speaker 1: But it was like certain tones and then one tone
Speaker 1: would mean you have to wait forty five seconds. One
Speaker 1: tone me and you wait sixty seconds. So obviously they
Speaker 1: want the food now. So longer wait times equals sadder rat,
Speaker 1: just like me when I'm waiting for like uber eats too. Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: so that those the regret was more when they had
Speaker 1: to wait longer. Yes, So what would happen is they
Speaker 1: would go to a prize door and they weren't actual doors,
Speaker 1: but it's like the it's a little bit like weird
Speaker 1: to explain. They're like these like spokes in the maze
Speaker 1: where they like they activated it, then the waiting period
Speaker 1: would happen. But yeah, so they would approach one, they'd
Speaker 1: hear this tone where they'd have to wait like thirty seconds.
Speaker 1: They're like, oh, I don't want to wait thirty seconds.
Speaker 1: So they'd go to the next door and they're like, well, actually,
Speaker 1: at this door, you have to wait a full minute.
Speaker 1: And then they're like, ah, damn it, I should have
Speaker 1: stuck with that first door where I only had to
Speaker 1: wait thirty seconds. So they would look back at the
Speaker 1: first door and the um their brain pattern would light
Speaker 1: up with the same pattern that they had when they
Speaker 1: initially approached that first door and made the decision to
Speaker 1: leave that first door. UM. So what the researchers interpreted
Speaker 1: this as showing like they look back and consider this
Speaker 1: old choice and maybe as a form of regret of
Speaker 1: like oh I should have done that. Um. It's obviously
Speaker 1: it's hard to say what the rat feels in the
Speaker 1: moment if it is regret. Um, if they're you know
Speaker 1: what rat regret feels like, But I can I can
Speaker 1: buy it. I think they could in some you know,
Speaker 1: different way. Yeah, yeah, I feel like they could. Um. There,
Speaker 1: I will say like after having worked with rats, they're
Speaker 1: like really smart, and I like, really you love them
Speaker 1: as animals and they're very easy to work with. Um.
Speaker 1: And so you do when you're talking about like anthropomorphizing them,
Speaker 1: you totally do that. Yeah. There were so many rats
Speaker 1: named Pinky in the brain, like at the place that
Speaker 1: I was working, Like so many, even a couple of
Speaker 1: mine where it named that um. There is um. The
Speaker 1: second thing that there is. I remember when I was
Speaker 1: interviewing for Master's programs, there was a guy at RICE
Speaker 1: who was working on a really interesting study UM with
Speaker 1: with erasing their memories. We're going to talk about talking about.
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's the same one, but we'll
Speaker 1: talk about that. And if it's a different study, please
Speaker 1: tell me about that. Funny. This is great, This is great.
Speaker 1: So maybe rats can show regret, but can they show empathy?
Speaker 1: What a rat help you out in a dire maze
Speaker 1: situation or help you escape the catacombs? Well? I wouldn't
Speaker 1: bet my life on it, but there may be some
Speaker 1: hope in A pet rat named Fido reportedly saved a
Speaker 1: family from their burning home. As oakes started to fill
Speaker 1: their house, Fido escaped his cage, but instead of getting
Speaker 1: out of there, like well a rat office sinking ship,
Speaker 1: Fido went upstairs and scratched on the bedroom door. The
Speaker 1: scratching awoke the family and they managed to escape the kicker.
Speaker 1: The family had a dog who did absolutely nothing to help,
Speaker 1: so everyone survived and thanked fight of the rat for
Speaker 1: saving them. So I guess Fido kind of beats the
Speaker 1: dog in terms of the family's favorite pet now, But
Speaker 1: in fact, is this actually empathy? A study in looked
Speaker 1: at the rescue behavior in rats. When placed in a
Speaker 1: new environment, they'll often try to scratch it a tube
Speaker 1: in which another rat is trapped, in an apparent attempt
Speaker 1: to save them. However, the researchers concluded that the behavior
Speaker 1: may be motivated more by a desire for social contact
Speaker 1: and comfort rather than an actual attempt to quote rescue
Speaker 1: their companion. The rats seemed to touch the tube regardless
Speaker 1: of whether they're touching actually free the rat, seeming instead
Speaker 1: to be interested in interacting with the trapped raft. So
Speaker 1: maybe Fido's heroism was due to his desire to seek reassurance.
Speaker 1: And friendship. But that's almost even cuter. Well, rats, we're
Speaker 1: gonna have to take a quick break, but we'll be
Speaker 1: back soon with some more rat tails who getting hooked
Speaker 1: on co came? These are rat tails? Do do do?
Speaker 1: Rats and humans actually share a lot of qualities. Were
Speaker 1: both mammals highly intelligent and social. And here's another interesting quirk.
Speaker 1: Rats and humans tend to forget distracting memories. Scientific review
Speaker 1: discussed how rats and humans both have the ability to
Speaker 1: selectively forget information or memories that are distracting and perhaps
Speaker 1: non beneficial. A study found that the act of re
Speaker 1: calling certain memories and humans replaces related but tangential memories,
Speaker 1: actively destroying any memory that interviews with our recall of
Speaker 1: the search for memories, So basically, you have any memory
Speaker 1: that gets in the way of you trying to remember
Speaker 1: something related, those memories are destroyed. Bulldozered rats have this
Speaker 1: habit as well when introduced to new objects. If one
Speaker 1: object is given more importance, like they're trained to keep
Speaker 1: remembering it, they'll quickly forget about the other object, much
Speaker 1: more quickly than in control conditions where both objects are
Speaker 1: of equal importance. So in a sense, we're constantly doing
Speaker 1: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind on ourselves, erasing memories
Speaker 1: that are undesirable. But are there more extreme science fiction
Speaker 1: e things going on in RAT research? So back to
Speaker 1: your imagination station? Do you think you would all like,
Speaker 1: have you seen Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind? I
Speaker 1: actually tweeted a joke about it, like early day or
Speaker 1: the day before. I was like, crazy, how in how
Speaker 1: in that movie? Uh, they totally raised Jim Carrey's memories
Speaker 1: of how vaccines were weird, that is weird. Somehow germ
Speaker 1: theory got mixed up in his romance. Did you see
Speaker 1: Jessica Biel just came out as anti back. I think
Speaker 1: she's taking it back, but really I don't know pedaling
Speaker 1: on that, yeah, I think because she got a lot
Speaker 1: of backlash. Yeah, So she's introducing a sort of um
Speaker 1: something that will run that will run counter to the
Speaker 1: negativity that's coming in, that will sort of attach itself
Speaker 1: to the negativity and kind of destroy that negativity, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean? Yeah? Yeah, yeah, like trying to
Speaker 1: like detect it protect herself right exactly. So it's like good,
Speaker 1: it's like good to kind of train her PR team
Speaker 1: to basically know how to protect her against certain threats
Speaker 1: to her popularity, and then later when this happens again,
Speaker 1: they'll actually be really good at protecting her again. Another
Speaker 1: pr nightmare. Amazing how that? Yeah that was your vaccine joke. Guys,
Speaker 1: We're hip, We're hip, cool podcast. I was just like, normal, heaven,
Speaker 1: your children are going to heaven. I feel I don't know,
Speaker 1: I feel so bad for those kids. Now, those kids
Speaker 1: are eighteen and getting vaccinated themselves. They're rebelling by getting vaccinated. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's so cool. They're like talking about how stupid their
Speaker 1: parents are. They are correct. The fact that they survived
Speaker 1: is like crazy to me, I know, surviving all the
Speaker 1: way to eighteen with no vaccinations. Um, I mean yeah,
Speaker 1: it's I love that. It's like the rebellious thing to
Speaker 1: do now is to be healthy, go to the doctor,
Speaker 1: get your vaccines. Yeah, to like be be helly in
Speaker 1: that way. People are rebelling by going to therapy. People
Speaker 1: like kids are rebelling now by being politically active and
Speaker 1: like holding activist rallies and getting Yeah, I mean that's
Speaker 1: kind of case for a while. Yeah. That's the thing
Speaker 1: is I think young people are maligned, but I think
Speaker 1: they are. Also they've always been responsible young, good people.
Speaker 1: I mean there's always there's always the dabbing, you know, dabbing.
Speaker 1: There's some form of dabbing in every generation and that's
Speaker 1: fine as long as they're getting vaccinated. Um so uh so,
Speaker 1: would you do eternal sunshine of the spotless mind on yourself? Like? Like,
Speaker 1: would you ever um wanna like race um either bad
Speaker 1: habits or bad memories because it is a vaccination against
Speaker 1: future pain. That's a really good way of thinking of it.
Speaker 1: I've never thought of it that way. If I did
Speaker 1: not have the information I have now, I'd be making
Speaker 1: so many more mistakes. That is such a good point, Yeah,
Speaker 1: because it that is basically what memory is for, to
Speaker 1: train ourselves to be better at doing life in the future.
Speaker 1: That's why you remember um emotionally traumatic moments traumatic moments
Speaker 1: in general more than other moments, right, because like what's
Speaker 1: more important to remember eating a sandwich and everything was
Speaker 1: fine or that time you took a huge bite of
Speaker 1: a sandwich and you almost choked death alone in your
Speaker 1: own apartment. Yeah. I think I think also works the
Speaker 1: opposite way, where when it is too sad, you black out,
Speaker 1: and I think that that is also protective. Yes, that
Speaker 1: is true. Yeah, yeah, where where it's like if it's
Speaker 1: if it's just generally unhelpful, um, but it's like super unpleasant,
Speaker 1: we we kind of prune those memories as well. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like I just like I think of like extremely traumatic
Speaker 1: moments where people like forget, they'll they'll disassociate, disassociate, and
Speaker 1: it is like a survival technique because it's not not
Speaker 1: really helping. Like if you're just being tormented at some point,
Speaker 1: it's not you're not learning anything that's helpful. It's just
Speaker 1: hurting pain. Yeah. There's also that thing of where like
Speaker 1: children like toddlers and younger in emergencies, they fall asleep.
Speaker 1: Oh that's so that's so weird because that's almost like,
Speaker 1: um the what's it called the catatonia and um like
Speaker 1: when you startle those goats of those cat kittens that
Speaker 1: have that disorder where um, I think it's like catatonia
Speaker 1: myopia or something like that. Um, we're like clap and
Speaker 1: then they fall over because like they're startled and somehow
Speaker 1: they don't actually I don't think they fall unconscious. It's
Speaker 1: just all their muscles like spasm and they fall over. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they yeah, so, but it is. I think it is
Speaker 1: like a protective thing for the parents because then the
Speaker 1: child won't cry. Interesting, So it is it is like
Speaker 1: the best state for a child to take a baby
Speaker 1: when something bad is happening is for them to sleep soundly. Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: so that their parents can be quiet and like take
Speaker 1: them and rescue them. Yeah. That is so interesting. It's
Speaker 1: like like they're going into sleep mode so they can
Speaker 1: be easily transported airplane mode. So I want to talk
Speaker 1: about eternal Sunshine of Spotless rat minds, um, just imagine
Speaker 1: Jim carrying that movie is a giant rat or do
Speaker 1: we have to imagine? I don't hate him that much.
Speaker 1: I do hate him for the anti vax. I don't
Speaker 1: like the anti vax stuff. But as a comedian, he's
Speaker 1: like such a hero. He's a great He's a great
Speaker 1: dramatic actor too. It's amazing. So rats who I'm starting
Speaker 1: to like them more and more the more more I
Speaker 1: learned about them. In some ways, they're better than people.
Speaker 1: But there's researchers at the University of Pittsburgh set up
Speaker 1: a Pavlovian experiment involving rats. Now I think most people
Speaker 1: kind of know what with the Pavlovian responses. But just
Speaker 1: a quick refreshers the study where you ring a bell,
Speaker 1: dog gets food. Now every time you ring the bell,
Speaker 1: the dog rules everyone. I think every pet owner knows
Speaker 1: what this is. You know, any like slight like package crinkling,
Speaker 1: like the quietest crinkling of any package in my dog
Speaker 1: just like well like she's there, suddenly there appears like magic. Um. So,
Speaker 1: in this study, researchers got rats addicted to cocaine, which
Speaker 1: happens a lot in uh in rat research. Um. But
Speaker 1: so they were given an audio visual cue that Harold
Speaker 1: Harold did their cocaine hit. Um. So, you know, a
Speaker 1: bell would ring and they'd get some cocaine. The start
Speaker 1: wearing leather jacket. Um. So, researchers found that there's increased
Speaker 1: activity between the thalamus and amygdala associated with the rats
Speaker 1: anticipation of the cocaine. Eventually, just seeing or hearing the
Speaker 1: queue made their brains go bonkers, like their brains are like, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's cocaine time. Um. And so the researchers used optogenetics
Speaker 1: to selectively turn off the neurons associated with their drug craving.
Speaker 1: So we talked about this a little bit earlier. It's
Speaker 1: the process of genetically modifying neurons so such that there's
Speaker 1: a sensitive delights. So they'll the lab will create this
Speaker 1: little rat baby that and their neurons have been modified
Speaker 1: such that you can kind of implant these these lights
Speaker 1: into their brains and then once you turn on the
Speaker 1: light or turn off a light, it affects the functioning
Speaker 1: of the neurons. UM. Uh do you know, like do
Speaker 1: you know anything about like how they how they found that,
Speaker 1: like they could do this, like how the genetics of Uh.
Speaker 1: I used to remember the history of it. But I
Speaker 1: mean a lot of these experiments that are run in general,
Speaker 1: are run on genetically modified animals. UM. So that part
Speaker 1: I think, like that's not unusual, that's not novel. UM.
Speaker 1: But I used to know the history of it because
Speaker 1: it was so captivating and it was. But it's been
Speaker 1: a while since I looked at it. UM. But they
Speaker 1: I guess they looked. I mean it had to be
Speaker 1: like a light sensitive UM mechanism UM, And so I
Speaker 1: think I forget how they attached it. Let me, I
Speaker 1: don't know, but uh, but yeah, it was like it
Speaker 1: was a huge discovery. Like everybody who is anywhere near
Speaker 1: biology knows Carl Desseron right, because you can then, um,
Speaker 1: do you sort of selective quote unquote brain damage that's
Speaker 1: actually not damaging the brain, Like you can turn it
Speaker 1: back off. It's not is that right? Like it's not
Speaker 1: a permanently UM. It's literally like you could shine a
Speaker 1: light and then it changes the activation of whatever the
Speaker 1: target is, yeah, like instantly, and and then it can
Speaker 1: also be turned back off. You can look at YouTube
Speaker 1: videos of this happening. Yeah, so they I mean channel
Speaker 1: rhodopsin and all these rhodopsin um proteins are have been
Speaker 1: known to be light sensitive UM, and so I think
Speaker 1: he knew that and then you know, like figured out
Speaker 1: a way to control UM these neurons and so like
Speaker 1: putting it together is uh. I think the key like
Speaker 1: the idea that he could use use proteins in that
Speaker 1: way was the big, big, big leap. That's so cool.
Speaker 1: So uh so they have these uh, these rats and
Speaker 1: they use the optogenetics to UM turn off the the
Speaker 1: um uh parts of the brain that that part like
Speaker 1: between the thalamus and the amygdala where that would show
Speaker 1: excitement every time that the Q would happen. So like
Speaker 1: they have the the like bell rings are like expecting cocaine.
Speaker 1: They get really excited. Then they turn a light on,
Speaker 1: you know, like like turn off those neurons. Uh. And
Speaker 1: then suddenly like they were able to completely remove the
Speaker 1: rats excitement for cocaine. So um just like no, except
Speaker 1: like they would play that like, hey, Cocaine's a come
Speaker 1: in bell and then the rats showed no response, like
Speaker 1: no response in the brain. Uh like because like beforehand,
Speaker 1: their brains were going absolutely crazy, like totally firing, like
Speaker 1: super excited for that head of cocaine and then now
Speaker 1: just like nothing, just like totally cool and fine. And
Speaker 1: it's really kind of a cool thing because um, especially
Speaker 1: like we're you know, as maybe we start to shift
Speaker 1: the paradigm of how we see addiction as like a
Speaker 1: medical issue and not like a moral failing. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: the research into how you treat addiction, it's really important.
Speaker 1: And this is I mean, it's way far away from
Speaker 1: ever being able to be applied to humans because we
Speaker 1: don't have like we haven't started like having um opt
Speaker 1: genetic babies that you know, where you can turn human
Speaker 1: brains off with lights, but it is, um it it
Speaker 1: does show that that's a black Marror episode. Oh they
Speaker 1: should do that. It's like, what if you turn your
Speaker 1: light off, the brain turned off, or if you turn
Speaker 1: a light, I mean your brain just turned off. That
Speaker 1: That show is really good and like coming from a
Speaker 1: person who worked on neural probes, like, it's so fun watch. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: So I can't get over the pig fucking episode though.
Speaker 1: That was the first one that was a rough one
Speaker 1: to start on Bold. I liked it. I was like,
Speaker 1: what but yeah, um so I think, like, uh, I
Speaker 1: feel like that could happen. It definitely feels like right now.
Speaker 1: So so, um, I look at it in terms of, like, um,
Speaker 1: the neural probe stuff, because that's what I'm more familiar with,
Speaker 1: Like with Parkinson's disease, there's deep brain stimulations, um there.
Speaker 1: You know, there's other ways of moving prosthetics and stuff.
Speaker 1: With neural probes electrodes, youre in certain to the brain
Speaker 1: and then you can use a computer to like translate,
Speaker 1: like there's an ex striking an external device that and
Speaker 1: like it it actually is it's using feedback from the
Speaker 1: brain and then it since adjusting. Yeah, but basically you
Speaker 1: think and you move a prosthetic, right and so so
Speaker 1: there are That's the whole point of like a lot
Speaker 1: of the field is to like figure out where things
Speaker 1: where neuron spiking causes an external reaction and and taking
Speaker 1: in a sensory information as well. UM so speaking, so
Speaker 1: talking about it in terms of that, like we have
Speaker 1: come a long way with figuring that out, Like there
Speaker 1: are people wearing those prosthetics and a fitting from it
Speaker 1: now and deep brain stimulation in Parkinson's disease has been
Speaker 1: proven to be Like there are videos of that too
Speaker 1: where people are shaking. You turn it on, they stop shaking. UM.
Speaker 1: What is so when when they turn on the stimulator stimulator?
Speaker 1: What is that is that? UM? Is that's using UM
Speaker 1: like an electrical pulse or yeah, so yeah, that's how
Speaker 1: UM neurons work is their electrochemical They send action potentials
Speaker 1: through like a singular cell UM and then between cells
Speaker 1: that can be like electric or electrical or chemical UM
Speaker 1: with the neurotransmitters that jump from cell to cell and
Speaker 1: activate the next cells UM electrical potential UM and so yeah,
Speaker 1: so it's all electrochemical UM. So you you can send
Speaker 1: and receive once you're able to like translate the signals, right,
Speaker 1: those neural signals um. And so it's like it's interesting.
Speaker 1: So with Parkinson's, like they just send like these signals
Speaker 1: out and they don't know exactly how it works, but
Speaker 1: they know that it does. Yes. And so there's that case.
Speaker 1: And then there's a case with the press aetics where
Speaker 1: it like it seems to be like a little bit
Speaker 1: better mapped out, um, but it's still like you know,
Speaker 1: they're still it's still rough around the edges. UM. So
Speaker 1: I do think like we're closer to this than people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think like we're closer to like some parts of
Speaker 1: Black Mirror, right. And also yeah, in in in talking
Speaker 1: about addiction, being able to find the areas of the
Speaker 1: brain that are responsible for addiction and responsible for finding
Speaker 1: or making the connection like um, because one of the
Speaker 1: things with addictions that makes it so hard for people too.
Speaker 1: And this can be any kind of like drug addiction.
Speaker 1: It can be gambling or even food addictions, well especially
Speaker 1: food addictions where um, you'll be triggered by some um
Speaker 1: something in your environment that makes you, um want to
Speaker 1: go do the behavior. It can be emotional. It can
Speaker 1: be something like um, you know, depression or anxiety. It
Speaker 1: could be simply smelling food or being addict sino and
Speaker 1: like hearing the sounds of a casino and then that'll UM.
Speaker 1: And like obviously with with severe drug addictions, it's a
Speaker 1: much there's a stronger UM physiological physical feeling UM to
Speaker 1: the addiction. But it's I think like this rat study
Speaker 1: is showing us that we can interrupt that feedback loop
Speaker 1: of of UM, the the addictive nature of a substance
Speaker 1: and then the response to a stimulus relating to that
Speaker 1: addictive substance. Yeah, and I think what you said earlier
Speaker 1: about UM understanding that it is like a biological response
Speaker 1: is very It's a smart UM understanding of like the
Speaker 1: socio the sociological impact UM. It's kind of like when people,
Speaker 1: I mean this isn't as well known, but like when
Speaker 1: people found out like that there is like a gene
Speaker 1: that UH tends to occur more in people who are
Speaker 1: more violent. UM. And so then you you do realize
Speaker 1: that these a lot of these are like on and
Speaker 1: off switch. Is it's definitely more complex than that. There's
Speaker 1: like lot more going on, but once you have control
Speaker 1: over that, then you it's it's just how like pharmacological
Speaker 1: stuff works. Right, It's like you there are receptors things
Speaker 1: bind two and that causes this physical response that alleviates
Speaker 1: your headache, that does all these things right, so that
Speaker 1: it's the same way, but it's just like different techniques
Speaker 1: used to manipulate these cells. So it could be like
Speaker 1: you know, like pharmaceutical medicine that we are used to
Speaker 1: taking and comfortable with taking versus uh, you know, optogenizing
Speaker 1: stuff versus probes. Yeah, I mean it is. Yeah, pharmaceuticals
Speaker 1: do you literally interact with your cells, bind to them physically,
Speaker 1: you know, alter your in Pharmaceuticals that have to do
Speaker 1: with UM, you know, say like UM mental health will
Speaker 1: also like physically interact with your brain. So I know
Speaker 1: that certain certain things like UM, the the sort of
Speaker 1: cranial stimulation things where it's like the there's both, Like
Speaker 1: the magnetic stimulation in the can be kind of creepy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's transcarnial uh yeah, magnetic stimulationstics teams and then that's
Speaker 1: but that's not the one. There's also the uh, the
Speaker 1: electrical stimulation that's used for like depression, UM. And so
Speaker 1: it's like when you hear about those things, it seems
Speaker 1: kind of creepy because it's like this physics. You're like
Speaker 1: like it's all it's all physical. Yeah. Yeah, so it's
Speaker 1: all like that's what that's what I mean Like with
Speaker 1: the with taking drugs, that like is something that is
Speaker 1: ingested that then causes a series of events. But in
Speaker 1: the same way that those electrical triggers also caused those
Speaker 1: action potentials and the neurons. So it is it does
Speaker 1: have to do with like receptor binding in one case
Speaker 1: and the other case it's just like stimulating and also
Speaker 1: chemical and electrical or in terms of the brain just
Speaker 1: completely linked. It's like very closely because it's um the um.
Speaker 1: The neurotransmitter activity is what causes the electrical impulse impulse exactly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so that the neurotransmitters work between synapses or within a synapse,
Speaker 1: which is between cells, right, So one cell sends its
Speaker 1: its message along through its its own body, and then
Speaker 1: that causes neurotransmitters to be expelled from one cell, hit
Speaker 1: the other cell and then cause another impulse. Yeah. So
Speaker 1: it is all very closely linked. And everybody is very
Speaker 1: complex and all these things. Uh, each like disease disorder
Speaker 1: has like an optimal treatment and so it depends on
Speaker 1: the person in the disease, the disorder. But it's all
Speaker 1: it all is. It is like you know, turning switches.
Speaker 1: It's just I think it's just like a root Goldberg
Speaker 1: machine or I think and I think when people think
Speaker 1: about um like uh t mass or or or like
Speaker 1: quote unquote electrotherapy, it brings to mind sort of the
Speaker 1: requiem for a dream thing where someone's like in a
Speaker 1: lot of pain, or like the idea of because there
Speaker 1: used to be you know, psychology has gone under some
Speaker 1: pretty big changes in terms of being a lot more
Speaker 1: humane um and so there were there were like bad
Speaker 1: practices like using sort of but it was a version
Speaker 1: therapy that is like the bad one where it's like
Speaker 1: you you try to get someone to like stop someone
Speaker 1: from um, you know, being sexual by like shocking them,
Speaker 1: And that's not that's not really what we're like a punishment,
Speaker 1: that's that's yeah, that's not what we're talking about. What
Speaker 1: we're talking about is like literally like changing the way
Speaker 1: you think by causing these because that's that's also like
Speaker 1: that's how we learn. And we were talking earlier about memories.
Speaker 1: Synapses can be like weak or strong, and the balance
Speaker 1: of that is necessary. So you want some synapses too
Speaker 1: weak in in order for you to be able to
Speaker 1: learn other things. It's plasticity. It's like it's how learning
Speaker 1: learning works, and so like there's like the short term
Speaker 1: way of like you know, having these things triggered so
Speaker 1: that it changes like how you think like in the moment,
Speaker 1: but then that change that should affect a change longer
Speaker 1: term and how your brain functions. Right, It's like it's
Speaker 1: like a water channel. So like if you have sort
Speaker 1: of these different channels and you're trying to get water
Speaker 1: to flow through them, and that would be sort of
Speaker 1: a pattern of activation in the brain. If you have
Speaker 1: like one channel that's really bad, like say like a
Speaker 1: bad habit, like an addictive behavior or like um a
Speaker 1: sort of depressive mental mancher or something um that and
Speaker 1: it gets used a lot, and then that sort of
Speaker 1: channel is going to get really deep that groove, and
Speaker 1: then the water is gonna want to flow through there. Um.
Speaker 1: So if you can weaken that channel kind of like
Speaker 1: you know, block it off, then you can um strengthen
Speaker 1: the other uh neural networks, the other patterns of activation
Speaker 1: that are more desirable. Yeah, that's a really good way
Speaker 1: of putting it. Yeah, it's it's probably an over much
Speaker 1: overly simplified, but it's one way that helps me to
Speaker 1: think about it. If you're wondering if there's a real
Speaker 1: life example of an eternal sunshine situation, there is, and
Speaker 1: it's a bizarre, tragic tail. You may be familiar with
Speaker 1: retrograde amnesia. It it's often the subject of soap operas.
Speaker 1: You suffer a traumatic accident and forget everything before that accident,
Speaker 1: and tower a great amnesia is the flip side of that.
Speaker 1: After the traumatic event or brain injury, you are unable
Speaker 1: to form new memories. So you may have some memory
Speaker 1: of your past preserved from before the accident, but imagine
Speaker 1: what it's like to be unable to form new memories.
Speaker 1: Every day is the first day of your life, literally
Speaker 1: in a horrifying way. This is such a rare condition
Speaker 1: that each clinical case is notable. One such case is
Speaker 1: that of Clive Wearing. He was a brilliant musicologist and
Speaker 1: conductor before contracting a virus that attacked his central nervous system.
Speaker 1: The brain damage gave him enter a great amnesia. He
Speaker 1: was still able to remember certain things about his life,
Speaker 1: his love for his wife, certain old memories, and he
Speaker 1: could still play complex piano and organ pieces. However, his
Speaker 1: ability to form new memories last only about seven to
Speaker 1: thirty seconds, so he's living basically half a minute at
Speaker 1: a time. Every day, he wakes up every thirty seconds.
Speaker 1: His diary is a terrifying glimpse into his reality. Pages
Speaker 1: and pages of frantic writing about waking up for the
Speaker 1: first time, over and over. Use just a small sample. Am,
Speaker 1: now I am really completely awake. Nine oh six am.
Speaker 1: Now I am perfectly overwhelmingly awake. Four am. Now I
Speaker 1: am superlatively actually awake. We'll be right back after a
Speaker 1: few messages, so we're back, Uh, Paulo VI, I kind
Speaker 1: of want to talk to you a little bit more
Speaker 1: about your work. Um. What you do kind of goes
Speaker 1: over my head a little bit, admittedly, UM, but it
Speaker 1: is really cool. We talked a little bit about it earlier,
Speaker 1: where we established that UM using um uh, the genetic
Speaker 1: algorithms is it's not the genetics of an animal, it's
Speaker 1: that the algorithms themselves, these computer model models have sort
Speaker 1: of a um computational genome. UM. And Uh, you wrote
Speaker 1: to me, UM something that when I read it, UM,
Speaker 1: I think my ears just like started to implode, and
Speaker 1: my eyes kind of struveled, and like, as I was
Speaker 1: trying to understand, you say, you use evolutionary algorithm to
Speaker 1: constrain biophysical parameters of different cell types in this overall
Speaker 1: large scale model of the rat himp a campus UM,
Speaker 1: which it's I mean it's for I'm not trying to
Speaker 1: be glib here. That sounds insanely cool, and from what
Speaker 1: you've talked about, it is super cool. So you, like
Speaker 1: we talked about earlier, you're breeding these computational models and
Speaker 1: then you have this new model and you're trying to
Speaker 1: match it to seeing if this new new model with
Speaker 1: like the new you compare all of them at the
Speaker 1: same time. I see it. So you have a population
Speaker 1: and you're, um, you're like, I'm going to take the
Speaker 1: top Let's say you have a population of a hundred
Speaker 1: and you're like, I'm going to te d models And
Speaker 1: you're like, I'm going to take the ten best models,
Speaker 1: meaning the ten that most America's top models. I've been
Speaker 1: Katie Golden UM. And you take the top ten and
Speaker 1: you're like, I'm going to move that on to the
Speaker 1: next generation. UM and so, and then you have like
Speaker 1: random you can do it different ways, but basically, you
Speaker 1: evaluate how good a model is by how closely it's
Speaker 1: outputs match experimental values of these characteristics, which are UM,
Speaker 1: you know, input resistance, bike, frequency, adaptation, all these characteristics
Speaker 1: of neurons UM. And so you're you you match these
Speaker 1: outputs UM, the inputs change, that's what changes between each
Speaker 1: model UM and so you're just it's just a way
Speaker 1: of exploring tweaking the inputs in a more in a faster,
Speaker 1: more efficient way. So you're like, I'm going to take
Speaker 1: the best ones, some combination of that might be better
Speaker 1: than the parents, right, and so I'm not going to
Speaker 1: focus on the ones that aren't. Sort of like breeding
Speaker 1: dog breeds, yeah, but more morally, right, So you're not
Speaker 1: You're not taking a computer model and bringing it so
Speaker 1: that every time it sneezes, its eyeballs pop out of
Speaker 1: its school. I mean we could if if that what
Speaker 1: if that makes you feel powerful? Yeah, I mean it
Speaker 1: kind of. You do sort of sound like the progenitors
Speaker 1: of a new computer race, Like are you are you
Speaker 1: at all worried that they're going to start to like
Speaker 1: develop a consciousness rise up to you know that that
Speaker 1: whole no Okay, not at all where it is. It's
Speaker 1: literally like you have to manually program it's so tedious. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so it's like um and then yeah, so it's not
Speaker 1: I don't know and I didn't create it. It's a
Speaker 1: type of program that's been established that I'm just utilizing
Speaker 1: for my purposes. Um. But yeah, so I mean that's
Speaker 1: the basis of it. Um, And you can apply this.
Speaker 1: It's a it's a technique, it's a process. It's a
Speaker 1: way of getting closer to the output that we want, right. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's basically it. Um. So you're also a stand
Speaker 1: up comedian um. Um. And now this is a pretty
Speaker 1: hypocritical uh question coming from me, but um, you know
Speaker 1: it is kind of an interesting thing to me, like
Speaker 1: the like, UM, scientists getting into comedy and vice versa. UM,
Speaker 1: Like how do you feel like these two fields kind
Speaker 1: of influence each other? Like does your um, your your
Speaker 1: research influence your comedy? Do you kind of like to
Speaker 1: keep them separate, like you know, like uh, party upfront businesses? Yeah,
Speaker 1: kind of like that. Um. It definitely helps to have
Speaker 1: UM So I love both um and having like my
Speaker 1: school friends and having this more technical thing to focus
Speaker 1: on helps when I feel like to drowning in comedy. UM,
Speaker 1: but I absolutely love comedy, and I think I think
Speaker 1: in general, like my education and the way that I
Speaker 1: think has informed my voice, and my voice informs my comedy.
Speaker 1: Um and so like now I'm trying to utilize my
Speaker 1: expertise and use that in my comedy. So I have
Speaker 1: like the web series that I'm doing, um, Dirty Science,
Speaker 1: and it's like on my YouTube, my Instagram, and I'm
Speaker 1: using that to like kind of spread men like scientific
Speaker 1: information but through a comedic lens. And I think that
Speaker 1: helps me stand out. And so like people people like
Speaker 1: you have like asked me to do this, um, which
Speaker 1: is gonna like you know, like give me more opportunities.
Speaker 1: Um and uh. And I do get booked on certain
Speaker 1: things because of my scientific background, but they want my
Speaker 1: comedic voice. They just like want someone who can like
Speaker 1: navigate both realms. UM. I would say my research is
Speaker 1: not imformant, Like it's hard because like my comedy is
Speaker 1: like my personality. So it's like I get along with
Speaker 1: people because of like how I because of my chom
Speaker 1: like I don't know, So it's like it's weird to
Speaker 1: say that it influences. But actually I do think it
Speaker 1: does because like I kind of look at presentations like sets,
Speaker 1: and so I'm like, oh, like I've bomb this meeting.
Speaker 1: I killed that presentation after so like I kind of
Speaker 1: like look at it like that, and I actually, um, recently,
Speaker 1: it's really dumb because like I am not getting enough
Speaker 1: work done, which is another way my comedy influences my research.
Speaker 1: It's a it's a good procrastination tool. It's it's amazing,
Speaker 1: and it's also like it's ramping it's been ramping up
Speaker 1: for a while, and it's really hard to balance two
Speaker 1: full time careers UM, and so that's that's been really difficult.
Speaker 1: But it did help me, like when this post her award,
Speaker 1: because I helped in my communication skills and like feeling
Speaker 1: more confident when I like I wasn't assure of something
Speaker 1: or well, you know. It's interesting because one of my
Speaker 1: first ever improv classes it was at UCSD and most
Speaker 1: of the other students were grad students and uh either
Speaker 1: science or um a social science field UM or business
Speaker 1: not none of them like we're really interested in And
Speaker 1: at the time I was not thinking I was going
Speaker 1: into a comedy field. I was working doing pharmaceutical e learning.
Speaker 1: I wasn't like, I was just like I need I
Speaker 1: need a break from like talking about diabetes all days.
Speaker 1: Uh yeah it is. Um. I think like improv especially
Speaker 1: is like a little bit more inaccessible because it requires
Speaker 1: a lot of money to take classes. But there are
Speaker 1: certain areas I do think that we don't realize, Like
Speaker 1: there are a lot of comedians that come from privilege. Um,
Speaker 1: more so than I think anybody wants. My friend Chris Autums,
Speaker 1: who is really funny, I was talking about this, Um,
Speaker 1: it's more so than any of us are willing to
Speaker 1: admit because like we're allowed to have, like we have
Speaker 1: a safety network and so we're allowed to take career
Speaker 1: risks like this. Not saying that all comedians are. There
Speaker 1: are plenty of comedians that have come from like really difficult.
Speaker 1: Tiffany Hattish is like a prime example of someone who's
Speaker 1: like succeeded in the face of like all this, you know,
Speaker 1: all these obstacles. It's just like it's not comedy. Is
Speaker 1: not like you're not automatically going to get a payoff
Speaker 1: from it. So if you don't have like if you're
Speaker 1: if either you don't have your family as a safety
Speaker 1: net or like you know, or like a crude wealth
Speaker 1: or something you you know, I mean, you're gonna get
Speaker 1: punished for trying to pursue your dream because you don't
Speaker 1: have uh that kind of like backup in case. Like it. Also,
Speaker 1: it's like I know that a lot of my comedian
Speaker 1: friends are suffering, like they are like poor, um. But
Speaker 1: it's like if ship hit the fan, if they ended
Speaker 1: up in the hospital, like somebody would be there for
Speaker 1: them exactly, whereas I think that there are there are
Speaker 1: comedians who like there wouldn't be anybody for them, like
Speaker 1: they would be they would be totally truly fucked um.
Speaker 1: And it's interesting to see like in different places like
Speaker 1: in in the Bay Area, like a lot of improvisers
Speaker 1: they're all tech people. They have the time and the
Speaker 1: money to do it. In India they're all like tech
Speaker 1: and engineering people because they have the time and money
Speaker 1: and access to do it. Um. So it is like
Speaker 1: really interesting seeing like where people come from based on
Speaker 1: where they are and like, um, what what access they have? UM.
Speaker 1: I don't know why I'm saying all this, what I mean,
Speaker 1: I think it's a really interesting point because I think
Speaker 1: that um, it does kind of shape, uh what sort
Speaker 1: of the topics of what comedy is about. So we
Speaker 1: we have kind of a probably in more narrow scope
Speaker 1: of comedy that does come from like, um, you know
Speaker 1: a lot of people who went to uh like graduated
Speaker 1: from college and have this specific perspective. Yeah. Um, you
Speaker 1: know people talk about like SNL is like they have
Speaker 1: like the Harvard people and the other people. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's kind of like that, but like, yeah, I'm trying
Speaker 1: to in terms of how it is informing my comedy.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to incorporate more in my stand up, specifically
Speaker 1: more of my perspective with um science and engineering. And
Speaker 1: it's it's hard to find a way to like educate people.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I use as a decoy to like have a punchline.
Speaker 1: We like, look how smart I am? This pussy joke,
Speaker 1: like you know, like and then that let that pussy
Speaker 1: joke in. Yeah. I mean that's what I hope to
Speaker 1: do with this podcast is like we bait you in
Speaker 1: as it being a comedy pod or an educational We're
Speaker 1: like we're going to educate you and then just a
Speaker 1: pussy joke that right and there. Yeah, So that's kind
Speaker 1: of like kind of what I do, um, but I'm
Speaker 1: trying to do the opposite. Actually is just like because
Speaker 1: most of me is like the silly fun like we're
Speaker 1: just like a comedian. It's like that's me. And then
Speaker 1: I try but like what I'm interested in is like
Speaker 1: all of these things that sometimes are it's hard for
Speaker 1: people to hear um, and so then I try to
Speaker 1: like slip that in there. Um. I think comedy can
Speaker 1: definitely take the edge off serious topics like unvaccinated children,
Speaker 1: for example, and mental health issues like just all sorts
Speaker 1: of things um and so yes, and also like de stigmatized.
Speaker 1: So like, because I feel like one of the one
Speaker 1: of the cool things about comedy is like it seems
Speaker 1: like most or at least many comedians have had to
Speaker 1: deal with some kind of mental health issues, and so
Speaker 1: that it's, uh, it's really destigmatizing because it's just talking
Speaker 1: about it, like hey, look, you know, I am just
Speaker 1: a person and then I have this thing, and like,
Speaker 1: you know, by kind of making it where you can
Speaker 1: you can sort of do a set on it or
Speaker 1: have some humor about it, it's really kind of and
Speaker 1: I think it makes it a lot easier for other
Speaker 1: people to go like, hey, know, it's like I have O. C.
Speaker 1: D two Like, hey, yeah, I've done like I've done
Speaker 1: those weird things too. Yeah. And it's also like finding
Speaker 1: the funny like makes people like, yeah, it definitely finds
Speaker 1: the community within it and like makes them relating stuff.
Speaker 1: And it is like interesting especially being um, like Indian American,
Speaker 1: like having family who's like more conservative or whatever, like
Speaker 1: be accepting of it. It's just so much more validating
Speaker 1: because you're like, oh, like they can't it's hard for
Speaker 1: them to reject like the truth. They can tell you
Speaker 1: not to talk about it, but they can't deny it,
Speaker 1: so it's it's hard. It's it's interesting seeing people come
Speaker 1: out of the woodworks and support you when you expect
Speaker 1: when like your whole life people have been telling you
Speaker 1: to stop talking about it, you know what I mean, Like,
Speaker 1: but through a comedic lens, they're like, oh, like this
Speaker 1: is like your truth. It is funny, Like I feel
Speaker 1: this way too, um and finally like it's channeled somewhere,
Speaker 1: but yeah, yeah, I think it kind of. Um, it's
Speaker 1: a it's it's such a disarming kind of medium that
Speaker 1: it's both good for like like educating on like scientific
Speaker 1: topics but also social issues like kind of like you know,
Speaker 1: you you're sort of it's people are um, they're they're disarmed,
Speaker 1: They're not they're dukes, aren't up. They're not like prepared
Speaker 1: to like sort of reject what you're saying off the bat,
Speaker 1: because you know, you're you're kind of like, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm going to tell you a joke, like this is
Speaker 1: a this is a positive interaction already and there, and
Speaker 1: you're you're acknowledging your behavior, yes, and you're not just
Speaker 1: you know, lashing out at other people. You're like, I'm
Speaker 1: this Like Billboard does a really good job of like
Speaker 1: like I like him a lot um. He does a
Speaker 1: really good job of Like he's like I'm like in
Speaker 1: my head, I'm like angry and like racist and all
Speaker 1: these things. But that doesn't mean that you have to
Speaker 1: continue to be that way. And like he's like like
Speaker 1: I always say, like whenever I think like a racist
Speaker 1: thought or like you know, because we all have that
Speaker 1: programming in us, it's like just on learning everything. I'm
Speaker 1: like my brain's dump Like I'm just like, oh my
Speaker 1: brain did that stupid thing. I gotta got a thing
Speaker 1: about that. And I learned that um. So it's like
Speaker 1: it's a fun way of like acknowledging all these flaws
Speaker 1: that we all have and like not ostracizing people for it.
Speaker 1: That's a really good way to put it. It's it's
Speaker 1: like you're you're introspecting in a way that's safe because
Speaker 1: like in comedy, you can make fun of yourself and
Speaker 1: think about all of your flaws without it feeling really
Speaker 1: sort of like self loathing or judgmental. It's more it's like,
Speaker 1: you know, hey, I'm I do you know, like uh,
Speaker 1: every time I go to bed, I like stare at
Speaker 1: the stove for five minutes because I'm worried for some
Speaker 1: reason the nons are going to be on suddenly, Can
Speaker 1: I have O C D? And it's like, you know,
Speaker 1: instead of like being like oh, that's that makes me
Speaker 1: weird or like crazy, it's like it's it's actually really
Speaker 1: funny when you think about it, like like when you
Speaker 1: talk like using humor to be like yeah, like no,
Speaker 1: I just did a really Dirk Gass thing the other day,
Speaker 1: or I did like like I think my thinking is
Speaker 1: like really weird in this way, and then it's I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: the key thing um for any progress in any society,
Speaker 1: it's like observing and acknowledging what's happening. And I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: doing that on an individual level means that your heart
Speaker 1: is in the right place, even if your mind sometimes isn't. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I hope. I also hope that um comedy can you know,
Speaker 1: because we were talking about the the anti vaccine movement
Speaker 1: and sort of these almost like and it's the same
Speaker 1: thing with climate denial or in just like generally denying
Speaker 1: science exists, that maybe comedy is a way too, because
Speaker 1: I think people have this perception of science being this
Speaker 1: like very sort of like just a bunch of like um,
Speaker 1: you know, stodgy old men in lab coats, and you know,
Speaker 1: they're totally serious, and some of them are, of course, yes,
Speaker 1: plenty of them are, but kidding this is hot mic
Speaker 1: mic um. But yeah, And and this idea that it's
Speaker 1: this like really snotty, snobby kind of in flirt well,
Speaker 1: and again that is sometimes true. But I think that
Speaker 1: having that outreach of comedy of researcher, you know, it's like,
Speaker 1: it's so cool to me that you're researcher and you're
Speaker 1: doing comedy, because that makes it I mean, like I'm
Speaker 1: a dumbass, just like I just studied this one thing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're a dumbass who studies computational models that of the round,
Speaker 1: hippcap real dumbass with ship. I don't know what I'm doing.
Speaker 1: Just do the next thing. I try different things. I
Speaker 1: don't know. Well, thank you so much for coming on.
Speaker 1: This has been really really incredible, and it's so uh
Speaker 1: it's really an honor to meet you and to talk
Speaker 1: to you because let's just start laughing. Yeah, that's to
Speaker 1: meet you. You're lovely. Thank you. I've literally done nothing
Speaker 1: for science. Uh, but you're a wonderful person. Than what
Speaker 1: are you talking about? This whole thing is what do
Speaker 1: you mean you're on? That's what the funk are you
Speaker 1: talking about. I've collected people's spit for science. There you go,
Speaker 1: and you're doing this and and a diarrhea monkey, a
Speaker 1: contentent Tamarin that had diarrhea had to take care of it.
Speaker 1: A noble act a noble act um. So, but I
Speaker 1: do think outreach is the most important thing, because none
Speaker 1: of our ship will work if or get to people,
Speaker 1: and none of it will matter if policy doesn't change,
Speaker 1: and policy is influenced by people who don't know about something, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and so we need people to influence it in a
Speaker 1: possible way. Yeah, it's a great point. Um, so you
Speaker 1: got anything to plug? You mentioned some of your cool stuff.
Speaker 1: You're in the thing. Um. I have Dirty Science, which
Speaker 1: is my web series and you can find that on YouTube,
Speaker 1: YouTube dot com, slash Paula Vigan all In comedy and
Speaker 1: spell my name p A l l A v I
Speaker 1: g U n A l A n And I'm at
Speaker 1: Paula Vigan al In on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, um, and
Speaker 1: that's my website as well. I also run a couple
Speaker 1: of comedy shows and have my own podcast. Um So
Speaker 1: I run a facial recognition comedy and oversharing comedy and
Speaker 1: then Facial Recognition Comedy has its own podcast, Ed's whale.
Speaker 1: So don't do a thing and you'll also do research? How? What? How? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I imagine so. Well. You can follow us on Twitter
Speaker 1: at Creature feet Pod. Not like feet doesn't gross feet
Speaker 1: but feet f e T. Really didn't think that went
Speaker 1: through when I was making that Twitter handle. Uh, there's
Speaker 1: Creature feature Pod dot com at Creature feet Pod, Instagrams.
Speaker 1: It's you know, it's all out there. I'm Katie Golden
Speaker 1: at Katie Golden on Twitter, I'm also propered rights um
Speaker 1: or vice versa. Who's who's to say who's controlling whom
Speaker 1: in that situation? It's I pretend to be a bird
Speaker 1: on Twitter. Um uh and wait your bird right? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I know that thing. Wait that's like a famous one.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. Yes, I've definitely like responded to your ship.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, I love this. Uh this Jerry Springer
Speaker 1: twist at the end. I've been the bird the whole time,
Speaker 1: pro bird right. Yes, it's uh, that's actually how I
Speaker 1: got into comedy. It's through through the so many people.
Speaker 1: Are you kidding me? This is you? Yes, Holy sh it,
Speaker 1: forget everything I've said. She has four followers and it
Speaker 1: is hilarious. What's funny is that bird personality of made
Speaker 1: will always overshadow me as a huge like it. I'll
Speaker 1: never come close to that bird fame like nobody nobody
Speaker 1: gives a ship who like Katie Golden has nobody cares.
Speaker 1: My god, I cannot believe that is totally changing my
Speaker 1: view of you entirely. And you thought I was a
Speaker 1: serious person. Oh my goodness. Well, thank you guys so
Speaker 1: much for listening. I feel truly privileged to have been
Speaker 1: allowed in your ear holes. But really, seriously, I'm thankful
Speaker 1: for everyone who listens to the show. UM. Combining comedy
Speaker 1: and evolutionary biology is kind of a weird, nerdy idea,
Speaker 1: and I'm super lucky to have listeners like you. UM.
Speaker 1: If you're enjoying the pod and want to help me out,
Speaker 1: please please please leave a writing or review and subscribe.
Speaker 1: It really does help out immensely. Thank you, Thank you
Speaker 1: so much, you guys. I'll be back in your ear
Speaker 1: holes again next Wednesday. I'm still reading these tweets, and
Speaker 1: thanks to the Space Classics for their awesome song Exo Lumina.