Speaker 1: My welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, you welcome
Speaker 1: to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My name is Robert
Speaker 1: Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and welcome to Boxing Day.
Speaker 1: It is traditionally Boxing day. Uh if if you've ever
Speaker 1: wondered about this one do we call it boxing Day?
Speaker 1: As as I was a kid, I remember it would
Speaker 1: always especially be featured on the Canadian calendar, and I
Speaker 1: always assumed, well, this is when I guess you box
Speaker 1: things back up. Maybe you're not supposed to have all
Speaker 1: these gifts. Um uh. My understanding though, is that it's
Speaker 1: tied in with the idea of this being a day
Speaker 1: when you would traditionally give a box. You would give
Speaker 1: a gift to um uh, you know, to to various
Speaker 1: UM delivery people and whatnot. So it's another day about giving.
Speaker 1: But you could also be inclined to make the mistake
Speaker 1: that our mail bought Carney has made. Uh. He knows
Speaker 1: that it is boxing day. He um. He knows that
Speaker 1: boxing is a physical combat sport in which humans punch
Speaker 1: each other, generally in the head region with with large
Speaker 1: gloves on. And then of course he has the rockham
Speaker 1: stock'em robot example to go by, and so so he's
Speaker 1: become incredibly aggressive, Yes, incredibly so, I mean lucky. He's
Speaker 1: wearing the gluckily, he's learning the gloves because otherwise Carnie's
Speaker 1: hands are metal. But that's what we're having to put
Speaker 1: up with today. Still, he has his primary programming is
Speaker 1: to deliver listener mail to us, and he is still
Speaker 1: doing it, granted with a little more punch than usual. Right,
Speaker 1: we'll just have to dodge the fists of fury every
Speaker 1: time we retrieve one. Right. Well, you know, since it's
Speaker 1: so close to Christmas, since Christmas is still in the air, uh,
Speaker 1: dissipating in the air around us, we should probably kick
Speaker 1: off with some Christmas holiday related listener mail before we
Speaker 1: get into more general listener mail. Okay, let's get ready
Speaker 1: to rumble. Here's the first message. This comes from Corbin.
Speaker 1: It's about our episode is Santa of God? Corbin said,
Speaker 1: is Hey, Robin Joe. Your discussion about minimally counterintuitive narratives
Speaker 1: brought to mind one of my all time favorite sci
Speaker 1: fi series, Dune. I haven't listened to all your podcasts.
Speaker 1: My sincerest apologies, but somehow, I feel like you're familiar
Speaker 1: with the books. How little you know Corbett? Yes? Um.
Speaker 1: I found it interesting that Frank Herbert, when depicting Leto
Speaker 1: the Second as a god emperor, began his transformation remaining
Speaker 1: primarily humanoid and gradually over time became more worm. So
Speaker 1: this is the transformation of a person into a giant sandworm. Right.
Speaker 1: If you only know Doune from the films, you haven't
Speaker 1: really seen this yet. I think the TV mini series
Speaker 1: is about as far into the books as as as
Speaker 1: anyone has visually dared go huh uh. Corbin continues, however,
Speaker 1: even till his last day r I P. He maintained
Speaker 1: his human face despite the fact that his brain was
Speaker 1: a distributed, collective nervous system. It's an interesting thought that
Speaker 1: Frank Herbert this as an illustration not only to the readers,
Speaker 1: but also to the characters in the universe that Letter
Speaker 1: the Second was at one point a human and therefore
Speaker 1: more easy to anthropomorphize. Leto's goal was, after all, who
Speaker 1: rapidly spread his religion across an entire universe, albeit through
Speaker 1: more nefarious means. I feel it's also easier to say, yeah,
Speaker 1: we worship a giant worm, but he used to be
Speaker 1: a human. He still has a human face. Then, yeah,
Speaker 1: we worship a giant worm with a gullet filled with
Speaker 1: rows upon rows of teeth. We won't get into the
Speaker 1: Fremen and how their worship of Shihlu differs fundamentally. Really
Speaker 1: enjoy listening and typing. This email really felt like a
Speaker 1: good way to create some discussion, even just with myself,
Speaker 1: about something I thought was a very interesting concept applied
Speaker 1: to someone fundamentally more badass than a fat man in
Speaker 1: Red Pj's regards. Corbin, Well, I mean you could combine
Speaker 1: them right and you have Santa Santa Leto arriving. But no.
Speaker 1: I yeah, obviously I love this email because it ties
Speaker 1: in with the episode but also drags Dune into the
Speaker 1: whole picture. I like how Corbyn is not sure whether
Speaker 1: we've read Dune or not. Things maybe we have, so
Speaker 1: we definitely we have, of course, uh, and we're we're fans.
Speaker 1: We did a couple of episodes years back about the
Speaker 1: science of done the technology of Dune. We didn't talk
Speaker 1: about everything in the first book or certainly the the series.
Speaker 1: We talked about a few things we talked about still
Speaker 1: suit we talked about sandworm biology. We even got into
Speaker 1: consideration of the the face dancers and how that might
Speaker 1: work based on some folks interpretations. Yeah, somebody was recently
Speaker 1: asking us to do an episode on Goala's Wait Wait
Speaker 1: is that the same as face dancers are different? Different
Speaker 1: difference I've made by the same people. Um, so yeah,
Speaker 1: maybe we could come back and do Dune Part three
Speaker 1: sometime in the future. I think so. I think basically
Speaker 1: we would want to We need to couch the first
Speaker 1: part of it in something familiar, something we would tie
Speaker 1: into the first movie, especially the first book in movie,
Speaker 1: especially since we're getting a new film adaptation coming up
Speaker 1: in So yeah, we definitely definitely need to do it,
Speaker 1: and there's plenty to talk about. Uh, do you want
Speaker 1: to do one more quick one about whether or not
Speaker 1: Santa counts as a god before we move on. This
Speaker 1: comes from Clarence. Clarence says, Hey, guys, my name is Clarence.
Speaker 1: Is my first time writing, although I've been listening for
Speaker 1: a few years now. Um, honestly hoping to get this
Speaker 1: read in the next Listener Mail episode. Well here you go, Clarence. Uh,
Speaker 1: Clara says, anyway, just listened to the episode entitled is
Speaker 1: Santa God? Part One? Interesting? And I oh and Clarence
Speaker 1: appreciated the warning we put in at the beginning of
Speaker 1: the episode. Maybe Clarence listens with some kids. Um, But
Speaker 1: as I was listening, I thought about something few people
Speaker 1: knew about, and even fewer still remember. Santa is actually
Speaker 1: one of the most powerful entities in the Marvel Comics universe.
Speaker 1: It has been alluded to in a few issues I've
Speaker 1: read over the years. Most recently I can remember in
Speaker 1: Spiderman Deadpool issue number twelve Food for thought. I'd like
Speaker 1: to know what you guys think of Santa as a
Speaker 1: Marvel character clearance. Well, obviously I'm in favor of this,
Speaker 1: and I think he absolutely needs to be incorporated into
Speaker 1: the Marvel Cinematic universe. It's a shame that he did.
Speaker 1: He wasn't in there in that big, you know, battle
Speaker 1: against Thanos. I think he'd be fighting on the side
Speaker 1: of Thanos. Right, is Thanos the one that wants everybody
Speaker 1: to be good boys and girls? He will? I think
Speaker 1: I haven't seen them. He's all about overpopulation. Really, really,
Speaker 1: I don't know the whole Thanos thing. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: that's basically it in the films, it's it's a little
Speaker 1: different in the comics. As I recall the comics is
Speaker 1: more about love, like he's in love with Death daughter
Speaker 1: or something, or Death herself. I'm a little he's trying
Speaker 1: to impress her by like killing everybody. Yeah, sort of thing.
Speaker 1: But no, I would love for SANTAA to pop up
Speaker 1: because there's so many. Every every matchup, every team up
Speaker 1: is great. Like you could have Santa team up with
Speaker 1: Blade to go after Christmas Ferrato's. That would be good.
Speaker 1: That would be good. Um, well, this fits into our
Speaker 1: discussion of is Santa more Superman or is he more Batman? Yeah?
Speaker 1: This this is a good question. I guess in the
Speaker 1: Marvel cinematic, in the Marvel universe, he is more Superman.
Speaker 1: It sounds like I wonder if it's different in d C.
Speaker 1: Does d C also have an incarnation of Santa, And
Speaker 1: if so, is it more Batman esque? I would love
Speaker 1: to know. All right, here is another holiday related bit,
Speaker 1: a bit of listener mail. This one comes to us
Speaker 1: from Martin Martin Wrightson and says, Dear Robert and Joe,
Speaker 1: thank you for the very interesting show on Crampus. Although
Speaker 1: I am from Austria. I've never given this tradition any
Speaker 1: second thought. Crampus was just a natural part of the
Speaker 1: folklore I was brought up with, same as Christmas. In
Speaker 1: the Easter Bunny. On St. Nicholas's Eve, our parents filled
Speaker 1: our stockings with sweets and my father rattled some iron
Speaker 1: chains pretending to chase away Crampus. It was exciting for
Speaker 1: us kids picturing my father Finn ending off some goat demon. Anyway,
Speaker 1: as I grew older, I realized that Crampus was not
Speaker 1: real and kept him as a childhood memory, again, same
Speaker 1: as the Easter penny. One thing that came to my
Speaker 1: mind while listening to your podcast is the role that
Speaker 1: the Crampus actors take on. You focused on the effects
Speaker 1: Crampus has on children, but I think it also has
Speaker 1: some effect on the Crampus impersonator. Not having any studies
Speaker 1: to back this up, I believe that Crampus also serves
Speaker 1: as some kind of outlet, a controlled and socially acceptable
Speaker 1: way for grown men to act out violent acts and
Speaker 1: let go of themselves in a cathartic way. I was
Speaker 1: wondering if you came across such an explanation while researching
Speaker 1: Thanks again for your wonderful show. Kind regards Martin, and
Speaker 1: he has a ps but let's talk about what he
Speaker 1: just said before you get to the PSU. Well, that
Speaker 1: didn't come up with respect to anything specifically about crampus,
Speaker 1: but we absolutely have looked at studies before that, at
Speaker 1: least in some cases show that people have UM reduced
Speaker 1: inhibitions when their identity is hidden. So there have been
Speaker 1: like studies, for example, finding that UM people are more
Speaker 1: willing to march around in public with a sign that
Speaker 1: says something embarrassing if their identity is hidden. That's obviously,
Speaker 1: you know, that's not very surprising. But I guess one
Speaker 1: thing that's interesting is they're more willing to do that
Speaker 1: even probably if they're around people that you know, might
Speaker 1: not recognize them personally. There's something about having your identity hidden,
Speaker 1: putting on the mask, putting on the costume that allows
Speaker 1: you to shed some of the normal barriers to behavior
Speaker 1: that that would be inhibiting you. Yeah, and I think
Speaker 1: there's also a link to animism because you see various
Speaker 1: examples of practices around the world in which someone wears
Speaker 1: the fur or the horn, or the skull of or
Speaker 1: even just the the painted or tattoo likeness of the beast,
Speaker 1: and then as a part of a ritual, becomes the
Speaker 1: beast to some extent, and it sort of enables a
Speaker 1: more you know, a wilder acting out. So I think
Speaker 1: there's there's definite connection to that as well in the
Speaker 1: crampus tradition. Yeah, oh yeah, that that putting on the costume.
Speaker 1: It removes, but it also adds, you know, it takes
Speaker 1: away some of your natural personality and inhibitions and it
Speaker 1: adds to you know, you get to take on the
Speaker 1: qualities of this character, right, And it's uh and certainly
Speaker 1: in terms of it being you know, this outlet and
Speaker 1: being a um me, this release valve and to a
Speaker 1: certain extent, well, I mean we also see examples from
Speaker 1: I think even this year there are a couple of
Speaker 1: news stories about some perhaps overly rowdy or even um
Speaker 1: offensive crampas impersonators in a few uh uh cities, and
Speaker 1: I mean that kind of goes, I think to the
Speaker 1: nature of what this is doing. It's it's like having
Speaker 1: an exhaust valve on say, you know, a boiler, right,
Speaker 1: if it's working properly, it's letting just enough steam out
Speaker 1: to keep the tank from exploding, right, But for some
Speaker 1: it could also be like an excuse to be bad, right,
Speaker 1: So it's uh, it's one of those those aspects of
Speaker 1: of culture that I guess you want the balance to
Speaker 1: be just right. You don't want your crampus is rampaging
Speaker 1: through the city actually terrorizing people. But on the other hand,
Speaker 1: if you have a culture without the cramps, if the
Speaker 1: cramp is cannot actually be unleashed at this part of
Speaker 1: the year, then what does that mean You get like
Speaker 1: a little more crampas in every day. That doesn't sound
Speaker 1: good either. Keep crampas and Christmas. There's your bumper sticker. Okay,
Speaker 1: I think maybe we're going to get away from Christmas. No,
Speaker 1: we have one more bit. We have the psorry. So
Speaker 1: Martin also shares this ps if you like weird traditions,
Speaker 1: I bet you're into shopping. That's s h A P
Speaker 1: P e N. It's a custom prevalent in the southern
Speaker 1: parts of Austria where small children go from door to
Speaker 1: door on the December and whip the grown ups buttocks
Speaker 1: with a rod. Good, very good, And he includes a
Speaker 1: link to a Wikipedia page about this, but it is
Speaker 1: a German only page, so it leads me to suspect
Speaker 1: that shopping is not proper really appreciated or known outside
Speaker 1: of uh, you know, German speaking cultures. Oh, this is
Speaker 1: like making the fool of the pope and like the
Speaker 1: boy king stuff, you know. Uh yeah, yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 1: like it. These kind of reversals are good. They should
Speaker 1: definitely involve children inflicting corporal punishment on adults. All right, Okay,
Speaker 1: so now we are going to get away from Christmas
Speaker 1: for a bit, but we'll come back to some holiday
Speaker 1: theme stuff I think later in the episode. So this
Speaker 1: one is in response to the episode we did uh
Speaker 1: I Drink Your Blood Type, where Robert and I were
Speaker 1: talking about uh, vampires and blood types, the real science
Speaker 1: of blood types and pseudoscience about blood types and personality
Speaker 1: and all that. And this comes from Maya. Maya says, hey, guys,
Speaker 1: I love your podcast. I've been listening to it for
Speaker 1: a while now. In October, I listened to your episode
Speaker 1: on vampires and blood types, and I remember you questioning
Speaker 1: why a vampire might ask about recent dental work. This
Speaker 1: came up on some TV show. Oh, this was an
Speaker 1: episode of Tales from the Cryptos. The start believe Malcolm
Speaker 1: McDowell or was it Roddy McDowell, one of the two McDowell's.
Speaker 1: For sure. Um, I thought i'd let you know that
Speaker 1: recent dental work is a risk factor for infective indocarditis,
Speaker 1: where the heart valves become infected. When this happens, little
Speaker 1: flex of bacteria flick off the valves and through the
Speaker 1: blood circulation, which would probably make the blood taste pretty gross,
Speaker 1: even to a vampire. I'm a medical student and it's
Speaker 1: something we've been told in medical school a bunch of times.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much and love the podcast, Maya. That is interesting.
Speaker 1: That gives me a new respect for that episode. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I've I've heard of this before. Yeah, that like dental work.
Speaker 1: I think some stuff from the mouth, I think maybe
Speaker 1: you can get into the blood and then affects the heart.
Speaker 1: So definitely if you're looking for blood to drink, keep
Speaker 1: an eye out for the dental surgery. Alright. This next
Speaker 1: one comes to us from MICHAELA and it is in
Speaker 1: reference to our episode on prototax It t s Hello,
Speaker 1: just listen to your Prototaxid episode. And since you were
Speaker 1: talking about soil structure as well as fun Guy Algae
Speaker 1: Live rewards and liking. I was a little surprised not
Speaker 1: to hear the mention of biocruss. Biocruss being living soil
Speaker 1: aggregates of soil which host communities of mosses, fun guy
Speaker 1: like in ciano bacteria and other organisms, mainly in desert systems.
Speaker 1: They're their own amazing little ecosystems and keep ground from
Speaker 1: blowing away and by creating mats of filamentous ciano bacteria,
Speaker 1: so possibly the ancient world might have been a bit crusty.
Speaker 1: Biocross are super underappreciated except by the people who passionately
Speaker 1: study them, including my master's advisor, who is uh. And
Speaker 1: then there's a Twitter address here. It is at dry
Speaker 1: Land Algae. That's d r y l A n d
Speaker 1: A l g A on Twitter. I thought you guys
Speaker 1: might be interested anyway as a future astrobiologist and lover
Speaker 1: of all things strange. I adore the show Keep It Weird. Michael, Oh,
Speaker 1: that's great, that's in interesting. I didn't know much about that,
Speaker 1: so maybe we'll come back to that. Yeah, absolutely, all right.
Speaker 1: We got one message from Brett. It actually wasn't much
Speaker 1: of a message. It was it seemed to be in
Speaker 1: response to the Monstrosity Cuteness rerun we did and the
Speaker 1: Uncanny Valley rerun we did. Um, it was a link
Speaker 1: to stuff about the new Sonic movie Sonic the Hedgehog,
Speaker 1: where they had to redo the animation on Sonic the
Speaker 1: Hedgehog because when they first released the trailer, people were
Speaker 1: just horrified by the way Sonic looked. And I gotta admit,
Speaker 1: his eyes were small, and he had human teeth, and
Speaker 1: there's something wrong with human teeth on a non human animal.
Speaker 1: It's like that fish that's got teeth that look too human,
Speaker 1: you know, Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean, I, for one,
Speaker 1: I did I didn't really have a dog in this hunt. Um,
Speaker 1: I can't say it was particularly excited about a Sonic movie.
Speaker 1: I wasn't. I wasn't really turned off by this image.
Speaker 1: And even I will admit that the new version does
Speaker 1: look a lot more like Sonic character that I did
Speaker 1: enjoy playing the Guys Big Guys looks more like the character,
Speaker 1: and I enjoyed the character in the games back then.
Speaker 1: But um, you know, by and large, I feel like
Speaker 1: this is this was the Internet blowing things out of proportion.
Speaker 1: And uh, the Internet is of course the domain of
Speaker 1: dr robotnick. Uh. That is, it's exactly the kind of
Speaker 1: system he would inflict on the world. So, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: I have suspicions about the the ultimate motivations behind the outrage. Here.
Speaker 1: Wait a minute, I'm not sure I understand like you
Speaker 1: think people were not actually horrified by the appearance of
Speaker 1: the original Sonic. I just I don't know. I mean,
Speaker 1: he it doesn't look that weird. I mean, it looks
Speaker 1: like oh man, but the improvement just looks more like
Speaker 1: a cartoon. Uh. Well, I will say the original looks
Speaker 1: more unique. The new one just looks more like every
Speaker 1: other cartoon character. But I guess there's a reason cartoon
Speaker 1: characters look like that. You know, they're they're tailored to
Speaker 1: look kind of like cute and approachable instead of like
Speaker 1: strange and uh and unsettling. Why does it look like
Speaker 1: Sonic is holding the one ring in this photo here? Well,
Speaker 1: I think because Sonic the Hedgehog collects golden rings. Well,
Speaker 1: that's not the one ring. That's only going to get
Speaker 1: him into trouble if he winds up in Middle Earth. Okay,
Speaker 1: let's let's move on to the next thing. We got
Speaker 1: a couple of messages about our ship of theseus uh,
Speaker 1: of all episode. This comes from Brett. I don't think
Speaker 1: it's the same Brett as the other message. Somehow, this
Speaker 1: is Brett who's a chemist. Yeah, this is Brett who's
Speaker 1: a chemist. Brett says, Hello, gentlemen, great episode. Glad you
Speaker 1: looked at the premise from multiple directions. My two cents.
Speaker 1: Being a chemist, I work with very sensitive instrumentation like
Speaker 1: an hp LC. I'm sure you'll look it up if
Speaker 1: you've not heard of it before. Uh. Yeah, it's a
Speaker 1: high performance liquid chromatography machine. It's a method that's used
Speaker 1: to analyze the chemical constituents of a sample. So you
Speaker 1: put in a sample of something, it'll separate out the
Speaker 1: chemicals and tell you how much of each one there
Speaker 1: is and stuff. Uh So, Brett says, Uh. I also
Speaker 1: do maintenance on the instruments I use, being a GMP facility,
Speaker 1: and I think that's good manufacturing practice. Is just like
Speaker 1: having high standards. Uh. Any changes to the instrument must
Speaker 1: be documented and also validated. Well, what do I mean
Speaker 1: by this? We expect the instrument to reproduce the exact
Speaker 1: same results every time we use it. Therefore, any changes
Speaker 1: to the instrument must not affect the instruments performance. Now,
Speaker 1: over the life of an HPLC, capillaries, frits, pumps, etcetera
Speaker 1: do get changed. It is the same instrument, but if
Speaker 1: it does not produce the same results, we have to
Speaker 1: figure out why and make the proper adjustments in order
Speaker 1: to get it back to where it used to be.
Speaker 1: In this sense, the instrument is not the same anymore
Speaker 1: because of its sensitivity, which leads me to ask if
Speaker 1: a ship has been refurbished, So, if you know, you
Speaker 1: go with the original thought experiment and replace all the
Speaker 1: pieces of ship. Is it the idea of what the
Speaker 1: ship has accomplished that we humans hold onto. The ship
Speaker 1: still performs the same task as before, but what it
Speaker 1: has been through is in the mind of those who
Speaker 1: have used it. We could look at a replica of
Speaker 1: the ship, but it would not conjure up the same
Speaker 1: and thoughts and emotions as someone who used it at sea,
Speaker 1: for example. It seems a physical object can change, but
Speaker 1: the perception we cast upon an object can change, leading
Speaker 1: to how stories are told about it. Wondering what you
Speaker 1: think about this and how the human mind likes to
Speaker 1: cast its perceptions into this world to make us feel reality.
Speaker 1: Keep up the good work. Love thinking about new topics.
Speaker 1: Your show introduces Brett Chemist. Oh wow, well, I mean
Speaker 1: Brett really touches that a number of issues related to that.
Speaker 1: I mean, because yeah, the story changes what the thing is,
Speaker 1: and then the thing itself changes if you're refurbishing it.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess a lot of it kind of
Speaker 1: swirls around the idea that is, humans were often stuck
Speaker 1: on this idea of there being some level of permanency
Speaker 1: about anything like that there is a me that is me,
Speaker 1: and it's consistent. There's a the ship is a ship,
Speaker 1: and it's a constant that this story is constant. This
Speaker 1: belief for an idea that even the truth is a
Speaker 1: is a is a constant thing that does not change
Speaker 1: over time. Well, this is an interesting idea that's being
Speaker 1: introduced here about like the idea of whether something is
Speaker 1: the same instrument actually having like epistemic relevance, Like it
Speaker 1: matters whether or not it was the same instrument for
Speaker 1: whether or not you can count on it to be
Speaker 1: scientifically reliable. Yeah, And in this example, I mean, it's
Speaker 1: easy to make the case because there's a specific thing
Speaker 1: that needs to be done with this device and it's measurable.
Speaker 1: You can you can tell if it's out of whack, right,
Speaker 1: But with the ship, the experience of the ship, the
Speaker 1: thing that the ship does is kind of it's all
Speaker 1: over the place. Yeah. Is it how it makes me?
Speaker 1: It's about how it makes us think about the ship.
Speaker 1: Is it about the stories told about the ship, about
Speaker 1: thinking back about what the ship once did? Um, you
Speaker 1: can't reduce that to a numerical value. I will say
Speaker 1: that one idea that comes to mind here, and this
Speaker 1: is because you and I were talking about Star Wars
Speaker 1: before we came in here is the idea of the
Speaker 1: original Star Wars trilogy and the you know, of course,
Speaker 1: George Lucas famously came back and refurbished parts of it,
Speaker 1: the parts of the furbish. Yeah, as if they were
Speaker 1: you know, there's the ship of theseus and of the
Speaker 1: boards were a little, by some people's estimates, a little
Speaker 1: out of date and needed to be replaced, and thus
Speaker 1: we had c g I elements added in or other
Speaker 1: slight changes. And from their point of view at the time,
Speaker 1: you know, we're just we're making the ship seaworthy, we're
Speaker 1: keeping it from sinking. But for the most of the
Speaker 1: rest office. We're like, no, that is not that's not
Speaker 1: the ship we fell in love with. You're changing the ship.
Speaker 1: The problem is people have been enjoying this perfectly well
Speaker 1: the way it is. We've got to go in there
Speaker 1: and add a bunch of stuff for the new era. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So in that I think that example would be hold
Speaker 1: up to a certain extent with what he's talking about here.
Speaker 1: If you changed the ship in a way, you change
Speaker 1: the film in a way that it altered the effect
Speaker 1: of experiencing it, You altered the thing that it does. Yeah. Now, this,
Speaker 1: of course, when it comes to works of art like film,
Speaker 1: this becomes more difficult when you start thinking about like, uh,
Speaker 1: preservation type efforts, Like you know, say, if you've got
Speaker 1: like old or damaged pieces of film and that's the
Speaker 1: only copy you have, like, uh, you know, they're they're
Speaker 1: obviously big questions about that, like should you know, should
Speaker 1: you leave it as the damaged version, or like to
Speaker 1: what extents, to what lengths should you go in trying
Speaker 1: to quote restore it? I mean, what what is the
Speaker 1: film at this point? Is that the are you trying
Speaker 1: to get it too? As close to what the people
Speaker 1: at the premiere of the film saw as possible or
Speaker 1: something like that, or do you have another goal in mind? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean in many cases when you're when you're dealing
Speaker 1: with with folks who grew up in the age of VHS,
Speaker 1: that's where we saw the film for the first time.
Speaker 1: You know, maybe you saw it on the big screen,
Speaker 1: but in many cases you saw it on VHS format,
Speaker 1: on a on a TV that was maybe not all
Speaker 1: that great. And and I mean that's why so many
Speaker 1: people are nostalgic for the VHS era and for VHS effects,
Speaker 1: and why you still have hardcore VHS enthusiasts who still
Speaker 1: utilize VHS technology to watch their films. Why some releases
Speaker 1: will put it out on VHS as well to uh,
Speaker 1: you know, to to to meet that fan base. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm also thinking about special effects that don't stand up
Speaker 1: super well to high definition, but they look great on
Speaker 1: you know, the crappy old version of the movie. Alright,
Speaker 1: on that note, we're gonna take a quick break, but
Speaker 1: we'll be right back. Thank thank you, thank you. All Right,
Speaker 1: we're back. So this next one comes to us from
Speaker 1: Landon responding to our Cars, Bodies and Minds episode an
Speaker 1: Automotive episode that we put out in October, which we
Speaker 1: did try and tie in a little bit to Halloween.
Speaker 1: But but it was a really fun episode to do
Speaker 1: because we're talking about what is it what changes about
Speaker 1: the human experience when we're inside of a car, What
Speaker 1: is the psychological effect of driving? Um et cetera. So
Speaker 1: landon Riotson and says hello, I really enjoyed this episode
Speaker 1: as I have had a similar theory about riding lawnmowers.
Speaker 1: I worked at a landscaping and lawn maintenance company for
Speaker 1: many years. We use both walk behind lawnmowers as well
Speaker 1: as the ride on type. A couple of the ride
Speaker 1: on mowers are rather large. I started to notice that
Speaker 1: my fellow employees would drive them off of curbs and
Speaker 1: over trash, even run over rocks. They would not do
Speaker 1: this if they were pushing a mower. It made me
Speaker 1: think that when they are on the bigger machines, they
Speaker 1: feel bigger or maybe more powerful or entitled, as if
Speaker 1: it does not matter what is in the path of
Speaker 1: this giant mower because it's so powerful. I definitely think
Speaker 1: there is something to that. The bigger the vehicle, the
Speaker 1: bigger the bravado. If you can imagine us lowly lawn
Speaker 1: maintenance workers with bravado. Thanks as always, Landing. There's nothing
Speaker 1: lowly about lawn maintenance. I mean that's real work, that's essential.
Speaker 1: But I know what you mean about like like the
Speaker 1: size of the mower and all that, Like, um, I
Speaker 1: feel like the most attuned I've ever been to what's
Speaker 1: in front of my mower is when I was using
Speaker 1: a non motorized push mower. Do you ever use one
Speaker 1: of those? Are already just um my grandfather's at some point, Yeah,
Speaker 1: but I think that was the extent of it. I
Speaker 1: used one for a few years. It is not the easiest. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I want to say I wrote a house stuff Works
Speaker 1: article about the push lawn mower, But maybe I'm mistaking
Speaker 1: their neat gadgets, like there's something attractive about them. But
Speaker 1: I feel like it's a step up there to the
Speaker 1: push motorized one, where you're more indestructible, and then yeah,
Speaker 1: once you get on the seated one, you're just you know,
Speaker 1: you're you are a tank. I felt entirely destructible every
Speaker 1: time I used to push lawnmower, because generally all I
Speaker 1: could imagine is slipping on wet, freshly cut grass and
Speaker 1: going under it. Yeah, yeah, Like I was sure, like
Speaker 1: that's how I'm gonna go. I'm gonna That's how I'm
Speaker 1: gonna die out in the middle of of my parents yard.
Speaker 1: I know that feel like under a lawn Moore. But
Speaker 1: then yeah, I I only ever did the one type
Speaker 1: of of seated lawnmower, and you know, that did feel
Speaker 1: kind of powerful to a certain extent. You're roaring through
Speaker 1: the lawn, the grass is disappearing underneath you and being
Speaker 1: sliced away. You're leaving this nice slick path of clean
Speaker 1: grass behind you. It makes me wonder how different it
Speaker 1: is to use even like the next level up, like
Speaker 1: you're driving a big combine harvester, you know. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: this this also makes me wonder about even larger vehicle. Obviously,
Speaker 1: we have listeners out there who drive large trucks for
Speaker 1: a living. We've heard from some of you like like,
Speaker 1: what's that, Like, what's that experience? Do you feel like
Speaker 1: you're you have an enormous on unbeatable body. Has anyone
Speaker 1: out there ever uh driven a tank? Uh? Now, I
Speaker 1: want to know how the scales at every level. Likewise,
Speaker 1: maybe you're you're a shriner and you drive the little
Speaker 1: uh what is it the little tricycle thing in the
Speaker 1: parade or some of those like microcars or something. What's
Speaker 1: that like? A go kard enthusiasts, Let me know, I
Speaker 1: maybe you know. It's a different experience at every possible
Speaker 1: level up until the ultimate vehicle transcendence, which is driving
Speaker 1: the doofwagon of course. Alright, so we got a couple
Speaker 1: of messages related to our Devour of Memories podcasts that
Speaker 1: we did about a planaria and the research of James McConnell,
Speaker 1: the idea of memories existing outside the brain, whether or
Speaker 1: not there's anything to that, the recent research on that.
Speaker 1: First of all, so in that episode we talked about
Speaker 1: James McConnell, who was born in a town in Oklahoma,
Speaker 1: and then we heard from Jill, who lives in the
Speaker 1: same town where James McConnell was born. Uh, and she
Speaker 1: gently corrects our pronunciation of the town name. I think
Speaker 1: I said oak Mulji. It's apparently oak mule Gie with
Speaker 1: a hard g she said, she cringed. But a lot
Speaker 1: of other very nice things about the podcast. But we
Speaker 1: also heard from Jim who says, hi, guys, since discovering
Speaker 1: your podcast about a year ago, I've not only become
Speaker 1: a devout listener, but I've devoured your whole back catalog,
Speaker 1: mostly in the gym, the shower, and sometimes pretending to work.
Speaker 1: I typically try and then give up on several new
Speaker 1: podcasts per month, and I've found no other podcasts like
Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow Your Mind and Invention that combined scientific
Speaker 1: and philosophical inquiry with history and pop culture with an
Speaker 1: entertaining and comedic vibe. I especially love the science fiction
Speaker 1: tie ins. Based on his references, I suspect Robert and
Speaker 1: I were probably watching reruns of The Twilight Zone late
Speaker 1: night on uh FF and later cable with a bowl
Speaker 1: of Sereal simultaneously in different cities throughout the seventies and
Speaker 1: early eighties. Oh yeah, that would that would be. He
Speaker 1: was maybe a little bit ahead of me, but but
Speaker 1: very much on the same path. Anyway, I wanted to
Speaker 1: write here with some additional information regarding your recent Devour
Speaker 1: of Memories episode. As you discussed James McConnell and the
Speaker 1: unfortunate attack on him by the UNI bomber ted Kazinski,
Speaker 1: I was literally on the edge of my seat expecting
Speaker 1: you to mention another of the UNI bombers serendipitous brushes
Speaker 1: with history, one that may have originally led him down
Speaker 1: his path of violent rebellion against academia, psychology, and technology,
Speaker 1: as has been documented, and then he links to an
Speaker 1: article in the Atlantic. While a student at Harvard, Ted
Speaker 1: Kazinski was himself a victim of a series of brutal, cruel,
Speaker 1: and unethical psychological experiments conducted by Henry A. Murray on
Speaker 1: a group of twenty two undergraduates without their consent or knowledge.
Speaker 1: Murray's experiments used, in his own words, quote, vehemence, sweeping,
Speaker 1: and personally abusive attacks to study how people react under stress.
Speaker 1: In one particularly vile experiment, Murray asked students to write
Speaker 1: about their biggest fear or secret, assuring the students that
Speaker 1: their essays would be confidential, only to read them out
Speaker 1: in front of the entire class. Kazinski was one of
Speaker 1: the students thus humiliated. Well, no one can defend Kazinski's
Speaker 1: use of violence. It seems plausible that this experience at Harvard,
Speaker 1: in addition to the issues you highlighted in your podcast,
Speaker 1: contributed to his selection of a prominent behaviorist like James McConnell.
Speaker 1: Is a victim Anyway, that's it for now. Love the
Speaker 1: show and keep dropping those Twilight Zone references. Oh excellent. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: hopefully we'll we'll be back with more Twilight Zone related
Speaker 1: episodes when October comes around totally. Maybe we'll do only
Speaker 1: political Twilight Zone episodes. Oh no, what oh no over October. Wow,
Speaker 1: that's going to be a rough time. But anyway, back
Speaker 1: to Jim's main point here, Yeah, I I uh, I
Speaker 1: was not familiar with it, with that aspect of Kazenski's
Speaker 1: Kazinski's background. Um, but but that's that's worth thinking about. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and again just to echo what Jim saying here. Obviously,
Speaker 1: stuff like that, you know, doesn't excuse resorting to murder
Speaker 1: or everything like that, but yeah, it doesn't make you
Speaker 1: wonder about, you know, what kinds of stuff contributed to
Speaker 1: his mind state. Yeah, all right. We heard from some
Speaker 1: folks on our episode Psychology of Architecture, and this one
Speaker 1: comes to us from Jonas. Greetings, I really enjoyed your
Speaker 1: episode on architecture. I work in the trades and come
Speaker 1: in contact with a lot of different buildings and architecture styles.
Speaker 1: One thing I have noticed is the underlying feeling towards
Speaker 1: placement of various parts of buildings. For example, doors and
Speaker 1: windows are never placed close together nor close to the
Speaker 1: corner of a room or building, and doing so somehow
Speaker 1: feels looks wrong. This goes for many other things, light
Speaker 1: fixtures off center, and a ceiling a desk play strangely
Speaker 1: in an office, a certain amount of wall between the
Speaker 1: door and ceiling, etcetera. It is as though humans have
Speaker 1: a very strong subconscious preference for certain symmetries and ratios
Speaker 1: in their environment. This site coology seems to play out
Speaker 1: at both the micro and macro level, and things that
Speaker 1: do not abide this can result in cursed architecture. Many
Speaker 1: thanks for the excellent podcast, Jonas. Ps. After listening to
Speaker 1: the squirrel episodes, I have decided to include them in
Speaker 1: my next D and D campaign. Oh nice, Yeah, so
Speaker 1: I certainly love that. I mean so many directions you
Speaker 1: could go with that. You could basically take cranial rats
Speaker 1: and do cranial squirrels instead. What are cranial rats? Cranial
Speaker 1: rats are rats used by the elithid mind flairs, and
Speaker 1: so like one of these rats has the intellect and
Speaker 1: psychic ability of a normal rat, which of course is
Speaker 1: you know, rat like intelligence and no psychic ability, but
Speaker 1: too they have the combined intellect of the rats, and
Speaker 1: so you get a big pile of them, a big
Speaker 1: horde of them, and they have, you know, considerable intellect
Speaker 1: and considerable psionic power. So they they're pretty fun, pretty
Speaker 1: fun monster. How many cranial rats equal a demagargon in intelligence? Oh?
Speaker 1: I would I would have to do the math on that,
Speaker 1: but it would take a lot. All right. This next saidge,
Speaker 1: also about a psychology of architecture, comes from Bruce Breese says, Hello, mates,
Speaker 1: I'm a massive fan first of all, listening to the
Speaker 1: episode on psychology of architecture. Just a thought of a
Speaker 1: personal example. My wife and I first lived in a
Speaker 1: black and white ultra modern home, a home where a
Speaker 1: speck of dirt on the ground was almost blinder. We
Speaker 1: found ourselves vacuuming and mopping daily. For our second home,
Speaker 1: we moved into an older house, mostly timber. I immediately
Speaker 1: noticed we stopped cleaning as often, mostly because the house
Speaker 1: simply didn't look as dirty. This gave us more time
Speaker 1: to relax and spend with the family. Bruce, Wow, Uh, yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: I mean that's like they you know, they say don't
Speaker 1: get a black couch, right, because you'll see all of
Speaker 1: the stuff collecting on it. Yeah yeah, likewise a white couch,
Speaker 1: I guess right. Oh yeah, maybe I think you want
Speaker 1: you want like a textured gray or something and makes
Speaker 1: it nice for all the dirt to just hide in
Speaker 1: there and you don't need to worry about it. Or
Speaker 1: my own experience from a house I lived in growing up.
Speaker 1: Don't have wall to wall white carpeting in a bathroom?
Speaker 1: Oh did we talk about carpeted bathroom? I think this
Speaker 1: probably has come up anytime bad carpeting choices come up.
Speaker 1: I have to share this because it was wall to
Speaker 1: wall and like wall to toilet white carpet in a bathroom.
Speaker 1: It was. It was awful. It was also a rental alright.
Speaker 1: So we mentioned Twilight Zone earlier than had to do
Speaker 1: with our anthology of horror episodes. We've done three of
Speaker 1: them now, one the previous year and then two uh
Speaker 1: parts of two and three in so this one here's
Speaker 1: one in particular though this comes to us from Kelsey.
Speaker 1: Kelsey writes, I'm late to this party, but I just
Speaker 1: now listen to the horror anthology episodes of stuff to
Speaker 1: boil your mind. I foolishly had skipped them, Uh, skipped
Speaker 1: over them earlier in the month, in favor of topics
Speaker 1: more familiar to me. Very foolish. And I had a
Speaker 1: thought about your questions of the elf years on the
Speaker 1: large headed evolved human. Oh yeah, we were asking what
Speaker 1: could what could actually drive the evolution of elf shaped ears? Right,
Speaker 1: because in this it's the sixth finger is the title
Speaker 1: of the Outer Limits episode in question, And the individual
Speaker 1: has had his evolution advanced by some sci fi machinery,
Speaker 1: so he develops a sixth finger on each hand. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, I guess for improved typing, gets an enormous
Speaker 1: swollen brain, which is supposed to be there because he
Speaker 1: has enhanced brain power and like psychic abilities. But then
Speaker 1: he also has eleven ears, which we kind of dismissed
Speaker 1: as being, you know, purely aesthetic, essentially to create an
Speaker 1: Elvin maybe vulcan look right anyway. Kelsey has thoughts on
Speaker 1: this quote. Typically in animals, large ears are used for
Speaker 1: cooling the body and hot environments. Environment doesn't seem to
Speaker 1: be a factor here unless this evolved human also pressage
Speaker 1: global warming in its predetermined path of refinement. But Perhaps
Speaker 1: the issue is the oversized brain. Pumping so much blood
Speaker 1: upwards would be quite taxing and thus cause an elevated
Speaker 1: heart rate, which in urn would elevate body temperature, no
Speaker 1: good for optimal brain function. Also, the enlarged cranium would
Speaker 1: suffer from the issues associated with mass and surface area
Speaker 1: not increasing at the same rate, causing heat to be
Speaker 1: more and more difficult to disperse from the body. Thus,
Speaker 1: the elephant ears provide the extra surface area needed for
Speaker 1: optimal cooling in the human of the future. Yes, I'm
Speaker 1: aware that all of this is nonsense, but it was
Speaker 1: amusing to pseudoscience my way through that. On a more
Speaker 1: general note, just wanted to say that I'm a new
Speaker 1: listener to Stuff to Blow your mind by way of invention,
Speaker 1: and I really enjoy both podcasts. I can't tell you
Speaker 1: how much I appreciate the thoughtful and sensitive way you
Speaker 1: approach all of your subjects. Kind regards Kelsey, uh No,
Speaker 1: I love that this. I mean this, uh. This exercise
Speaker 1: is the same exercise we employ a lot of times
Speaker 1: when thinking about uh. Generally, you know of fantastic and
Speaker 1: mythical and science fiction creatures from cinema and books, and
Speaker 1: so forth so, um so, yeah, I love that interpretation.
Speaker 1: Um and it does also make me want to do
Speaker 1: We've never really done an episode on ears before. That
Speaker 1: could be quite interesting, just talk about like how hearing works,
Speaker 1: how you know, biological hearing, you know works itself. But
Speaker 1: then also get into the various forms of ear and
Speaker 1: even the human ear. Why does it look like that?
Speaker 1: Why why do we have this strange shape? What's the
Speaker 1: lobe for? What does that accomplish? And then why does
Speaker 1: ear why why do we have ear hair? Like? All
Speaker 1: of these are questions, many of them have answers. It
Speaker 1: would be exactly the kind of thing that would make
Speaker 1: sense to discuss here on the show. We have ear
Speaker 1: hair because it's awesome, and it all depends to what
Speaker 1: which which ear hair A you're talking about the inner
Speaker 1: ear hair or the hair growing on like the lobes
Speaker 1: itself like pokes out of the ears. Yeah. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: got to be sexual signaling to attract mates. Right, That's
Speaker 1: that's one theory. All Right, we need to take a
Speaker 1: quick break. We'll be right back with more. All right,
Speaker 1: we're back and uh and and Joe, is it is
Speaker 1: it just because we're just we're recording this the week
Speaker 1: before Christmas. But do I hear holiday music? Oh? You do?
Speaker 1: We got so much email about our Christmas music episode.
Speaker 1: People just want to talk about it. I guess the
Speaker 1: bells are ringing, the children are singing, and people are
Speaker 1: sending email. So this first one comes to us from Cecile.
Speaker 1: Cecil says good day, Robert and Joe. This is Cecil
Speaker 1: from Manila, the Philippines. Here in our country, the Christmas
Speaker 1: songs start playing and Christmas decorations start appearing as soon
Speaker 1: as the first dash b e er month arrives, which
Speaker 1: is September. No one knows when and how this tradition started,
Speaker 1: though Searching online brought up this article with some good insight,
Speaker 1: and she links to an NPR article called Love the Holidays.
Speaker 1: The Philippines celebrates four months of Christmas. Uh. We have
Speaker 1: our own Christmas earworm in the song Christmas in Our
Speaker 1: Hearts by local artist jose Marie Chan. Imagine hearing a
Speaker 1: song played incessantly, if not in your own house, from
Speaker 1: a neighbor's house, in malls, restaurants, and even public transportation
Speaker 1: for around four months, as well as being a karaoke
Speaker 1: UH staple at Christmas parties. Here's the singer serenading mall
Speaker 1: goers last year, and then another link here. Luckily, I
Speaker 1: was able to convince my father to put up Christmas
Speaker 1: lights and play Christmas songs in our house only at
Speaker 1: the start of December. Wishing you a I apologize. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna try to say this Mala guyang pasco at Manigong
Speaker 1: Bagong Tawun or town, Merry Christmas and a prosperous New Year. Cecile. Well,
Speaker 1: that is interesting. It does make me wonder does that
Speaker 1: mean there's no Halloween in the Philippines. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I need a I mean, Hallow Halloween is obviously not worldwide. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's true, and I know it's you know, obviously it's
Speaker 1: celebrated to different extents in different parts of the world.
Speaker 1: And I seem to recall that um in Japanese culture,
Speaker 1: Halloween has been embraced to some extent, but I've never
Speaker 1: thought about to what extend it's uh practiced in the Philippines.
Speaker 1: I need it. I I have friends of Philippine descent.
Speaker 1: I need to ask them. Still, I would on the surface,
Speaker 1: I would agree that four months of Christmas does sound
Speaker 1: like a little much like I say, I'm trying to.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to lean into the holidays this year, but
Speaker 1: that's I don't know if I can lean in that far.
Speaker 1: You know, every culture has their own It's like, you know,
Speaker 1: some cultures are into into my Fiji and other people
Speaker 1: other cultures are not. You just gotta get used to it. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: uh well I'm either way. I'm excited to hear more about,
Speaker 1: you know, the varieties of of holiday experience around the world.
Speaker 1: All right, here's another Christmas music bit of listener mail
Speaker 1: Listen comes to us from Sarah, Dear, Robert, and Joe.
Speaker 1: First of all, this is one of my favorite podcasts,
Speaker 1: so thanks for making it. I just finished listening to
Speaker 1: your latest episode, and I thought there was an important
Speaker 1: perspective which was missing in the discussion. As a practicing Jew,
Speaker 1: being inundated with Christmas music serves to make me really
Speaker 1: feel my other us at this time of year, I
Speaker 1: and many of my friends find going to such places
Speaker 1: to be both unpleasant and depressing, and a few stores
Speaker 1: which throw in a token Hanukah song or two earn
Speaker 1: both my undying loyalty and my dollars. Not everyone celebrates Christmas,
Speaker 1: and I have often wondered at the blinders of marketers
Speaker 1: who think that all shoppers can be wooed this way,
Speaker 1: especially places like grocery stores, which are patronized by folks
Speaker 1: who are looking for normal fare rather than presents. Thanks
Speaker 1: again for your great show regards, Sarah. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: this is this is an excellent point to make, um
Speaker 1: one that at least I did try to touch on
Speaker 1: this a little bit. Uh. I thought it came up
Speaker 1: a little bit because we talked about the idea of
Speaker 1: like again not comparing like annoying Christmas music to actual
Speaker 1: torture in a significant way, but like, one of the
Speaker 1: things we talked about was like when detainees are blasted
Speaker 1: with music to kind of like break them for interrogation,
Speaker 1: it often intentionally is like culturally unfamiliar music. And so
Speaker 1: what could be geographically culturally unfamiliar could also just be
Speaker 1: like in terms of subculture or religious culture unfamiliar, you know,
Speaker 1: the the music of the other culture. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1: But I also I will admit that in discussing that
Speaker 1: particular episode especially, I did get an autobiographical a lot,
Speaker 1: and I guess I was considering sort of my own
Speaker 1: stare down with Christmas to a certain extent, which you know,
Speaker 1: for me, it's like Christmas is kind of like this, Um,
Speaker 1: it's like this. Uh it's what is the big tractor
Speaker 1: trailer rig from maximum Overdrive with the with the green
Speaker 1: goblin on the front. I don't know if I had
Speaker 1: a name, but it was it was a goblin like
Speaker 1: that's Christmas, just Christmas hat on it and it's coming
Speaker 1: at you and then you have to react and figure
Speaker 1: out how you're going to take it. Uh So yeah,
Speaker 1: I was probably I probably did lean a bit into
Speaker 1: just thinking about my own relationship with the holiday, with
Speaker 1: the various you know, biases they are going to be
Speaker 1: present to that, but it is it is essential to
Speaker 1: to realize, Yeah, not everybody has the same uh you know,
Speaker 1: cultural experience of the holidays, certainly of Christmas and uh
Speaker 1: and yeah, when you think of of the marketing techniques
Speaker 1: used by something like something like a grocery store, it
Speaker 1: does get get kind of weird, right. I Mean it's
Speaker 1: like people where they're just they want to buy bread,
Speaker 1: they want to buy rice, they want to buy vegetables,
Speaker 1: and they have to listen to jingle bells the whole time.
Speaker 1: I will say, ever, since we did this episode, I
Speaker 1: have actually noticed even more than usual when when in
Speaker 1: which stores are playing Christmas music. And yeah, I'm kind
Speaker 1: of surprised that it happens in grocery stores and stuff.
Speaker 1: I would expect it to be more common in stores
Speaker 1: where you might reasonably be expected to be buying something
Speaker 1: like Christmas gifts. It's strange to go into Kroger or
Speaker 1: Publix or whatever and hear the Christmas music playing. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess that's where we're at. But anyway, Yeah, very
Speaker 1: important perspective, Sarah, and thank you so much for sharing.
Speaker 1: All right, This message comes from Michelle. Michelle says, do
Speaker 1: Robert and Joe. I really enjoyed the recent episode on
Speaker 1: of hate relationship with Christmas music. I am an amateur
Speaker 1: classical bassist, and I've been playing in school or community
Speaker 1: orchestras for over thirty years. This means, subjectively, I believe
Speaker 1: I've played at least parts of The Nutcracker approximately eighteen
Speaker 1: million times. I'm sure the actual number is only in
Speaker 1: the hundreds, but it feels like much much more, and
Speaker 1: the hundreds is a lot. I find that my tolerance
Speaker 1: for this music depends largely on the context. I enjoy
Speaker 1: playing it. I love sitting in in a ballet with
Speaker 1: a live orchestra hearing it, but listening to it on
Speaker 1: commercials around the radio makes me in vision swatting the
Speaker 1: sugar plum ferry with a rolled up newspaper. To me,
Speaker 1: the greatest Christmas music offense on commercials is not playing
Speaker 1: the whole song, or at least whole versus so that
Speaker 1: I can mentally finish it and get it out of
Speaker 1: my head. There's currently a car commercial that plays the
Speaker 1: same two measures of a song over and over without
Speaker 1: finishing the phrase. He causes physical discomfort and anxiety, and
Speaker 1: I have to turn the channel or mute the TV.
Speaker 1: I also wanted to thank you fortifying my squirrel phobia.
Speaker 1: There used to be a squirrel near you. No, we're
Speaker 1: not trying to justify phobia. I hope we can do. Okay.
Speaker 1: We we seek to justify a healthy respect and and
Speaker 1: maybe to a certain extent, fear of close contact with
Speaker 1: the squirrel. Fear that is more like awe, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: the consideration of the squirrel as indeed a wild creature,
Speaker 1: the way you would react to a sandworm from dune. Uh.
Speaker 1: Michelle goes on there used to be a squirrel near
Speaker 1: my house that would come up to the window and
Speaker 1: torment my indoor cat, or would chase me when I
Speaker 1: walked to my car, and would dive bomb neighbors from trees. Wow,
Speaker 1: I'm glad I wasn't the only one seeing their true
Speaker 1: evil nature. Now again, they're not evil, They're just animals.
Speaker 1: But they don't you know, don't underestimate them. That squirrel sound,
Speaker 1: that sounds excessive though, even what we're looking at, like,
Speaker 1: perhaps that's a squirrel that somebody was feeding, and you
Speaker 1: know that, because this is one of the dangers of
Speaker 1: feeding any wild animal is that it changes it's it's
Speaker 1: like natural inborn association of human beings and human habitats
Speaker 1: and so forth. It begins to associate them with food,
Speaker 1: and then it might be inclined to to violate the
Speaker 1: sort of predetermined safe space between you and itself. Uh So,
Speaker 1: I my, you know, just shooting from the hip here,
Speaker 1: But I wonder if that was a squirrel that had
Speaker 1: been essentially mistreated through feeding. That's a good point. Uh yeah,
Speaker 1: So just a good reminder for everyone out there, do
Speaker 1: not feed wild animals like that. I mean, I mean,
Speaker 1: you might not be able to stop them from getting
Speaker 1: into your meal worms or whatever. Right, Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: well feeding, it's one thing of the squirrel is eating
Speaker 1: from your bird feeder. If the squirrel is eating from
Speaker 1: your hand, then things have gone too far. Michelle goes
Speaker 1: on going back even further. I wanted to let you
Speaker 1: know how perfectly the timing of your January episode on
Speaker 1: creating the World's Most Unpleasant Room fit into my life.
Speaker 1: It was exactly the episode I needed at a very
Speaker 1: stressful time. I was listening to that episode along with
Speaker 1: several others. It was a long few days while trying
Speaker 1: to make my house as completely perfect as possible for
Speaker 1: my first social worker visit for my adoption home study.
Speaker 1: I know from experience that that can be very stressful. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it made me realize how ridiculous I was being in
Speaker 1: my cleaning frenzy. Your show has been a saving grace
Speaker 1: when I get too much in my own head with
Speaker 1: all the ups and downs that go along with the
Speaker 1: adoption process as I wait for a match. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much. Keep the great episodes coming, Michelle. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: thanks for writing in and best of luck with your
Speaker 1: adoption journey. Absolutely. Oh wait, no, I forgot. Michelle also
Speaker 1: has a ps oh, let's have it. I have had
Speaker 1: simply having a wonderful Christmas time stuck in my head
Speaker 1: all evening just that one line. Don't actually know the
Speaker 1: rest of the song. I'm off to listen to any
Speaker 1: other song to try to get that particular worm out
Speaker 1: of my ear. Well, best of luck with that too,
Speaker 1: I hope it worked out. Yeah, that's your favorite, right,
Speaker 1: That is the worst of all time. In addition to
Speaker 1: the cultural chauvinism of Christmas music, sometimes there is some
Speaker 1: geograph cold Christmas chauvinism as well. UH. That was mentioned
Speaker 1: by several listeners, Like we had several uh people from
Speaker 1: like Australia and New Zealand get in touch with us
Speaker 1: about Christmas music. About the fact that lots of Christmas
Speaker 1: music mentioned snow. It's all about winter time and stuff.
Speaker 1: But if you're in Australia, Christmas is in the middle
Speaker 1: of the summer because the seasons are inverted the southern hemisphere.
Speaker 1: That's right. We heard from an about this, She writes, High,
Speaker 1: Robert and Joe recently listened to your episode about Christmas music.
Speaker 1: You asked for emails from people from other countries and
Speaker 1: people who are subjected to Christmas music. I fit into
Speaker 1: both of these categories. I live in Australia and I
Speaker 1: work in a supermarket. The thing about in Australian Christmas
Speaker 1: is it is very hot right now. We're in the
Speaker 1: middle of a terrible drought and there are catastrophic fire conditions.
Speaker 1: Brush fires have devastated different parts of the country over
Speaker 1: the past few weeks. The annoying thing is retail stores
Speaker 1: will still play songs like Winter Wonderland or let It Snow.
Speaker 1: These seem highly inappropriate, but it is just all part
Speaker 1: of the tradition. In response to this, there there are
Speaker 1: some Awese Christmas songs. Most of them are really annoying
Speaker 1: Awese versions of Christmas carols, but there are a few exceptions.
Speaker 1: One of my favorite is how to Make Gravy by
Speaker 1: Paul Kelly. Okay, this is a song written as a
Speaker 1: man who is in jail at Christmas time. He is
Speaker 1: the one who usually makes the gravy. He is calling
Speaker 1: his brother to get advice on how to make it.
Speaker 1: What he is really calling about is to say how
Speaker 1: much he will miss his family and that he is sorry. Well,
Speaker 1: that makes me think of one of my favorite Christmas
Speaker 1: songs actually Christmas in Prison by John Priyan. It's beautiful. Oh,
Speaker 1: I remember phil Oaks had one called they Don't Have
Speaker 1: Christmas in Kentucky. It was about, you know, impoverished conditions
Speaker 1: and whatnot. Um. You know a good like a good
Speaker 1: sad Christmas song? That's a long way, doesn't it? Um? Anyway?
Speaker 1: Anna continues. Another Christmas song I like is by an
Speaker 1: artist called Darren Handlin. He has a song called The Loaf.
Speaker 1: This is about a family preparing for a Christmas. The
Speaker 1: eldest boy has just been dumped. He spends time crying
Speaker 1: and his family makes fun of him, saying tears will
Speaker 1: never bring her back. It's cold. Yeah. A loaf of
Speaker 1: bread has been put in the oven. During the night,
Speaker 1: the boy creeps in and throws all his love letters
Speaker 1: into the oven so they will all burn up in
Speaker 1: the morning. The loaf is huge, but when they pierce
Speaker 1: it with a knife, all his words explode out and
Speaker 1: the family is killed by exploding bread. What now? That
Speaker 1: is a song that you will never hear in any
Speaker 1: retail setting. It is really about the power of words.
Speaker 1: Thanks and Mary Xmas. Anna. I've never heard the Loaf,
Speaker 1: but I got to look that up right now? That
Speaker 1: is so good? Yeah? How long before that becomes a standard?
Speaker 1: Hopefully soon? In googling it, all I'm getting is meat
Speaker 1: Loaf singing Christmas Thilms songs. Oh, not quite the same thing, So,
Speaker 1: I though it depends. Um, did Jim work on those
Speaker 1: those songs? Stan, No, they're not. I mean they're Christmas songs?
Speaker 1: You mean, like where they Jim Steinman original that I into?
Speaker 1: You had that kind of like, uh, you know, the
Speaker 1: sort of gothic uh, sleazy biker vampire feel that a
Speaker 1: proper a song from that collaboration should have. Sorry, I'm
Speaker 1: trying to think of a good Jim Steinman type song title.
Speaker 1: It would be something like baby, it's not Christmas yet parentheses,
Speaker 1: but it's the New Year. Yeah, it makes you think, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I like it. I would be I would be into that.
Speaker 1: All right. When we're gonna go ahead and close up
Speaker 1: the bag there, we're gonna send Carney back on his
Speaker 1: his his his boxing way and we will uh yeah,
Speaker 1: we'll close out the episode here. In the meantime, if
Speaker 1: you want to check out other episodes of Stuff to
Speaker 1: Blow Your Mind, well, you can go to Stuff to
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Speaker 1: Maybe by the time you hear this, it will be out.
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Speaker 1: I said, it looks good, but could we make it
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Speaker 1: as always to our excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson.
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