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Speaker 1: Hey, you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My

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Speaker 1: name is Robert Lamb.

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Speaker 2: And I'm Joe McCormick, and it's Saturday. We're going on

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Speaker 2: into the vault. This episode originally aired August sixteenth, twenty

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Speaker 2: twenty two, and it's Part four of our series on whistling.

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Speaker 1: Enjoy the Whistling, Part four, The Final Conflict, Let's Do It.

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Speaker 3: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 1: Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My

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Speaker 1: name is Robert Lamb.

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Speaker 2: And I'm Joe McCormick, and we're back with part four

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Speaker 2: of our series about whistling. This episode's going to be

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Speaker 2: a little weird today because we literally already recorded this

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Speaker 2: episode and then lost the whole thing to a technical glitch. Rob,

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Speaker 2: I'm understand that as I was talking when we were

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Speaker 2: recording this episode the first time, it was just constantly

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Speaker 2: making the sounds of hell in your ears and can

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Speaker 2: you describe the terror and the anguish?

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Speaker 1: It was kind of like your dialogue was an Afix

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Speaker 1: twin remix the entire time, and so at first it

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Speaker 1: was I was like, Okay, I can I can put

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Speaker 1: up with this. This is fine. We've already gone so

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Speaker 1: far into the episode, we should just you know, finish

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Speaker 1: it out. By the end of it, it was kind

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Speaker 1: of headache and doucing. But I was like, well, at

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Speaker 1: least we got the episode. This is just audio distortion

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Speaker 1: that I'm hearing. It's not going to transfer over to

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Speaker 1: the recorded finished product. Sadly it did, and so here

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Speaker 1: we are.

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Speaker 2: It's the worst.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: We were like, well, at least it won't be on

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Speaker 2: the actual audio, and then it was, and so here

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Speaker 2: we are. Okay, so this is this is take two.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I could have been much worse, So no big deal. Hey,

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Speaker 1: looking on the bright side, we got a rehearsal in there.

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Speaker 1: How often do we have a rehearsal for a by

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Speaker 1: guest episodes? So I think it's going to be stronger

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Speaker 1: because of that.

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Speaker 2: Do you think?

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Speaker 1: So?

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Speaker 2: I was like, is it gonna make the episode better

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Speaker 2: or worse? I really don't know. We'll see.

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Speaker 1: We'll see out better better for sure.

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Speaker 2: All Right, So we're picking up in this series about whistling.

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Speaker 2: Let's see, what did we talk about in the previous episodes.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so we're picking up where we left off from

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Speaker 1: the last Whistling episode, which was Whistling, Part three regarding

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Speaker 1: superstitions and beliefs concerning whistling. We were talking about whistling

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Speaker 1: as an ill omen at sea, as a potential mark

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Speaker 1: of witchcraft, and women as bad theater luck in England

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Speaker 1: and much more. So we're going to continue this journey

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Speaker 1: through folklore and mythology concerning whistling, and we're going to

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Speaker 1: be referencing some of what we covered in another previous

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Speaker 1: episode about Chinese transcendental whistling, in which a specialized Taoist

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Speaker 1: form of whistling was almost like meditation, but was also

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Speaker 1: said to give one both insight and perhaps even power

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Speaker 1: over the energy of things in the world. So once

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Speaker 1: more I'm going to be referencing that excellent whistling and

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Speaker 1: Antiquity paper by AV Van Stakellenberg, but also some other sources. Now,

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Speaker 1: according to Ed Edwards, in the two thousand and nine

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Speaker 1: paper The Principles of Whistling, a ten dynasty text called

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Speaker 1: the shau Chi says that whistling simply calls out to

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Speaker 1: all spirits, good or bad, and sta Kellenberg summarizes this

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Speaker 1: as kind of a supernatural neutrality concerning whistling. So whistling

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Speaker 1: isn't something that is used by bad people or necessarily

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Speaker 1: use by good people. It's just it's this thing that

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Speaker 1: signals out into the world around us, into the unknown,

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Speaker 1: and you know, you could potentially attract the attention of

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Speaker 1: things you don't want to attract the attention of. But

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Speaker 1: it also could be basically harmless. It kind of depends

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Speaker 1: on the circumstances.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. The raps Un whistling, which was a text we

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Speaker 2: cited in a previous episode. It talks about whistling having

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Speaker 2: a kind of withdrawing or distancing power on the whistler.

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Speaker 2: It says, you know, like the whistling gentleman sort of

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Speaker 2: distances himself from the things of the world and lets

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Speaker 2: out a long drawn whistle.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's a thread we're going to definitely come

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Speaker 1: back to. But first I wanted to add another note

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Speaker 1: on whistling in Chinese history. So first of all, you know,

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Speaker 1: anytime we're talking about Chinese history, Chinese culture covers a

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Speaker 1: great deal of territory, both in terms of distance and

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Speaker 1: in terms of years, So you know, it's hard to

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Speaker 1: say with any certainty like this is the traditional Chinese

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Speaker 1: view of it versus another thing. But mainly, I don't

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Speaker 1: want to imply here that that whistling was just something

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Speaker 1: that Dallas sorcerers engaged in. I was looking at a

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Speaker 1: paper by Julungsu from two thousand and six titled Whistling

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Speaker 1: and its Magico Religious Tradition, A comparative Perspective, and at

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Speaker 1: this points out that there are Han Dynasty accounts of

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Speaker 1: women whistling for both sorrow and this seems in some

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Speaker 1: cases to tap into this idea of sighing as well. Again,

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Speaker 1: look thinking back to previous episodes where we've discussed whistling

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Speaker 1: and it's similarity to other non linguistic sounds that we make,

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Speaker 1: other breath based sounds that can be used to communicate

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Speaker 1: something or to get somebody's attention.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and we were talking about cases where sometimes it's

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Speaker 2: maybe difficult to precisely translate a word because a word

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Speaker 2: could be interpreted as meaning like whistling, or could mean

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Speaker 2: hissing or some other kind of controlled expulsion of breath.

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Speaker 2: There's sort of some blurriness in the breath based lexicon.

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Speaker 1: Now, according to Sue here, it's not just for sorrow.

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Speaker 1: There are also accounts of women whistling out of happiness

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Speaker 1: or joy. It does seem like it is linked to

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Speaker 1: traditions of wailing in some cases, and sort of wailing

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Speaker 1: one might might might engage in, say at a grave,

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Speaker 1: that sort of thing, but also not just women. In

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Speaker 1: other sources as well, even the Yellow Emperor is said

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Speaker 1: to whistle, but the terminology here might actually mean hiss,

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Speaker 1: or it might mean a sigh. And in the Classic

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Speaker 1: of Mountains and Seas, the Queen Mother uses a whistle

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Speaker 1: as a kind of battle cry to disply her ferocity.

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Speaker 1: So it's kind of a wide spectrum of possible uses

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Speaker 1: for the whistle even within Chinese tradition here now. Sue

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Speaker 1: also points out that while yes, in English customs and

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Speaker 1: Western customs there are a lot of these superstitions against

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Speaker 1: women whistling particularly, and we don't really see this in

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Speaker 1: Chinese traditions, though it is sometimes seen as ominous in

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Speaker 1: general whistling due to the connection between whistling and various

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Speaker 1: death rituals and you know, and attracting the spirits, but

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Speaker 1: it is more in inherently magical and not gendered. Sue

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Speaker 1: also shares some other examples from Western traditions to you know,

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Speaker 1: for a comparative experience here, but they point out here

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Speaker 1: quote the Germans believe that a woman's whistling will make

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Speaker 1: the angels weep and the devil's rejoice.

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Speaker 2: This is This would be a fantastic basis for a

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Speaker 2: German metal band, all female metal band that just employs

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Speaker 2: whistling instead of singing.

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Speaker 1: Oh, now, that's a question to what extent has whistling

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Speaker 1: been used in metal? The metal scene has come to

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Speaker 1: encompass a lot of different sounds and ideas, but I

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Speaker 1: don't know if they've gotten around a whistling have they?

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Speaker 2: Well, what's the metal version of the rule thirty four idea?

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Speaker 2: It's kind of like, if you can imagine it, there

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Speaker 2: is a metal a metal band of it, right.

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Speaker 1: I guess it depends on what you classifies metal too,

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Speaker 1: Like are the Scorpions metal? I don't know, probably not,

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Speaker 1: probably not now. Sue also shares that among various Chinese minorities,

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Speaker 1: whistling while you work, as in Snow White and the

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Speaker 1: song the Dwarfs Sing, whistling while you work, at least

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Speaker 1: in the field was thought to summon demons to damaged crops,

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Speaker 1: or it could summon demons to damage crops, so it

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Speaker 1: was discouraged. This Sioue Stresses does not seem to be

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Speaker 1: linked to say dallast ideas regarding whistling, but is instead

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Speaker 1: rooted in particular folk traditions. Now here's another really interesting

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Speaker 1: one that Sue brings up. Sue shares an example from Mythraism.

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Speaker 1: So Mythraism for sci fi fans out there, some of

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Speaker 1: you might be familiar with this religion because you may

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Speaker 1: have watched the really excellently weird HBO mac sci fi

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Speaker 1: series Raised by Wolves, in which one of the two

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Speaker 1: factions that's going out into space and colonizing other worlds

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Speaker 1: are are devoted Mithraists. And you might well think, oh,

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Speaker 1: this is some sort of cool religion they made up

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Speaker 1: for the show, but it is not. It is this

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Speaker 1: is a reference to the Roman street cult of mithras

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Speaker 1: and in there recorded rituals, and Joe, You're going to

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Speaker 1: get into this a little bit and talk about what

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Speaker 1: we mean when we when we bring out the idea

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Speaker 1: of recorded rituals of Mithraism. But supposedly there is a

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Speaker 1: system of whistling and tongue clicking that was used to

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Speaker 1: attract what Sue refers to as theeomorphic star deities.

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Speaker 2: Oh, theeomorphic meaning animal formed, so like beast beast forms

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Speaker 2: of star gods.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Now I haven't seen the show Raised by Wolves, but

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Speaker 2: I think i'm to understand you were saying that the

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Speaker 2: title there is a reference to like the myth about

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Speaker 2: the founding of Rome, the Romulus and Rima story.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right. That seems to be the direct reference

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Speaker 1: made there, and there are other references as well, and

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Speaker 1: just a lot of just sheer weirdness on top of it.

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Speaker 1: So if nothing else, it's a show that's going to

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Speaker 1: give you lots of strange imagery. It's kind of like

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Speaker 1: Ridley Scott's continuation of the android centered alien sequels or

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Speaker 1: prequels that he was working on.

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Speaker 2: Hmm, okay, so well anyway, I love the idea that

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Speaker 2: the show would incorporate actual things about Mithraism because I've

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Speaker 2: long thought we should do a series or at least

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Speaker 2: an episode on Mithraism because I find it really interesting

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Speaker 2: because it is a religion that clearly commanded an enormous

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Speaker 2: following and had huge cultural significance in the Roman Empire.

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Speaker 2: Like you can find the ruins of their underground temples

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Speaker 2: called Mithrium, and they're all throughout Roman settlements, and yet

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Speaker 2: we know way less about this religion than one might assume.

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Speaker 2: And one of the big reasons for that is that,

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Speaker 2: as far as I understood, and I guess the text

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Speaker 2: that you just referred to maybe a counterexample to this,

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Speaker 2: but modern scholars generally thought, we have basically no access

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Speaker 2: to any primary literary sources about the religion. So if

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Speaker 2: it had religious texts, we don't have any of them,

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Speaker 2: and so what we know about it we've had to

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Speaker 2: try to piece together through detective work based on imagery

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Speaker 2: and simple inscriptions and archaeological clues and comments and references

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Speaker 2: made by external writers trying to say, hey, you know,

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Speaker 2: this is what's going on with Mithraism. So for a

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Speaker 2: kind of hopefully interesting analogy, imagine trying to understand what

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Speaker 2: Christianity was if it like mostly died out and disappeared

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Speaker 2: in the fourth century or so, and we did not

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Speaker 2: have any of the writings of the New Testament or

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Speaker 2: any other writings by Church fathers or any other early Christians,

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Speaker 2: and we were trying to reconstruct what Christianity was based

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Speaker 2: entirely on like imagery and artifacts and what other external

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Speaker 2: writers said about it. So it's a really fascinating problem,

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Speaker 2: and one of the most common images in Roman mythraism

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Speaker 2: is apparently important scene from their mythology of the god

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Speaker 2: Mithras slaughtering some kind of divine bull. But there's another

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Speaker 2: interesting complication here too, which is that there is a

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Speaker 2: pre Roman Persian cult of Mithras or Mitra, which is

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Speaker 2: a Zoroastrian or pre Zoroastrian god of the Persian people

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Speaker 2: who's kind of a solar deity of justice who I

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Speaker 2: think was associated with contracts and the honoring of bargains.

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Speaker 2: And then later you get this widespread Roman mystery cult

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Speaker 2: that seems to be based on an appropriated version of

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Speaker 2: that deity. And of course we know the Romans loved

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Speaker 2: absorbing and reprocessing other cultures gods, like the main Roman

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Speaker 2: pantheon is mostly a photocopy of the Greek. And then

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Speaker 2: you've got the Persian Mithras becoming the Roman savior god

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Speaker 2: of some kind, and even the way you can think

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Speaker 2: about a Jewish messianic figure in Jesus and the original

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Speaker 2: context of monotheistic Judaism rather quickly becomes a popular savior

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Speaker 2: god to people throughout the empire who had been Polytheists

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Speaker 2: up until the moment they converted to Christianity, So that

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Speaker 2: whole process is really interesting. But the idea of a

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Speaker 2: text of Mithraism was very interesting to me because I

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Speaker 2: didn't think we had one of these. But this is

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Speaker 2: referring to something called the mithras Liturgy, which I think

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Speaker 2: is commonly dated to roughly the fourth century. But there's

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Speaker 2: dispute about whether it actually reflects original Mithraic theology or

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Speaker 2: whether it's some kind of later synthesis.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, this is the quote from it that Sue shares

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Speaker 1: in the paper. Quote. But after you have said the

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Speaker 1: second prayer, where silence is twice commanded, then whistle twice

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Speaker 1: and click twice with the tongue, and immediately you will

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Speaker 1: see stars coming down from the disk of the sun,

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Speaker 1: five pointed in large numbers and filling the whole air.

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Speaker 1: But say once again, silence, silence.

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Speaker 2: Whistle twice, click twice, and then shut up. Here come

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Speaker 2: the gods.

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Speaker 1: Now, coming back to we were talking earlier about scholars

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Speaker 1: in the woods. In Chinese history, there is this idea

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Speaker 1: that comes up, Sue mentions, and we see this in

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Speaker 1: the Han dynasty, for example, where you would have Confucian scholars,

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Speaker 1: other reclusive scholars who would whistle as a means of

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Speaker 1: expressing disdain for the world and or their absolute freedom.

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Speaker 1: So this is an interesting concept, and it was also

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Speaker 1: done by other classes as well, Sue writes quote in general, poets, hermits,

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Speaker 1: and people of all types in the Six Dynasties utilized

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Speaker 1: whistling to express a sense of untrammeled individual freedom, or

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Speaker 1: an attitude of disobedience to authority or traditional ceremony, or

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Speaker 1: to dispel suppressed feelings and indignation. Whistling was not limited

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Speaker 1: to a certain class, but was practiced by men from

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Speaker 1: all walks of life.

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Speaker 2: This idea of whistling as a kind of like middle

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Speaker 2: finger to social customs and authority. So it's like you

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Speaker 2: might imagine the behavior of Diogenes the cynic, or something

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Speaker 2: just completely behaving in inappropriate ways in public as an

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Speaker 2: expression of contempt for norms and authority.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I whistle, I do what I want Now another

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Speaker 1: paper I look to when I was looking around for

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Speaker 1: various superstitions, we of course found superstitions regarding whistling at sea,

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Speaker 1: but we also find them in another interesting place below

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Speaker 1: the surface of the earth, in mines ooh, yeah, And

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Speaker 1: I hadn't really thought about this, but this is apparently

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Speaker 1: a big one paper I was looking as an older paper.

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Speaker 1: This is California Miners Folklore. This is from a nineteen

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Speaker 1: forty two edition of California Folklore Quarterly written by Waylan

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Speaker 1: d Hand. And yeah, it's a really interesting read. This

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Speaker 1: one's out there on the internet if anyone wants a

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Speaker 1: deeper dive into it. But for example, he goes into

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Speaker 1: the fear of the Tommy Knockers in the tunnels.

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Speaker 2: Now, Rob, I am only familiar with Tommy Knockers from

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Speaker 2: the Stephen King novel or actually I never read the novel.

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Speaker 2: I think I watched the made for TV movie adaptation

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Speaker 2: of it, which is quite bad, and I think Stephen

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Speaker 2: King himself regards that as a terrible book. But I

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Speaker 2: don't know what the original reference here is in the book.

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Speaker 2: I think it's aliens.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I can never get very far with the book, but.

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Speaker 2: Not aliens here.

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Speaker 1: No, but it apparently refers to a fair variety of things,

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Speaker 1: and they're very haunting and they kind of I feel

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Speaker 1: like they also kind of connect to perhaps older European

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Speaker 1: ideas of creatures that live in the Earth, getting into

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Speaker 1: various ideas of dwarfs and so forth. The Cobald, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: the Cobald. This is what Hand writes in the paper.

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Speaker 1: These daizens of the deep dark chambers of the Earth

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Speaker 1: are conceived in different forms as disembodied spirits of dead

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Speaker 1: miners hovering in a working as patrons, or as little

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Speaker 1: men elf like be whiskered and wizened. They are usually

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Speaker 1: thought of as benign, occasionally even assisting in the location

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Speaker 1: of ore bodies. If they are not so well disposed,

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Speaker 1: their conduct tends to be mischievous rather than malignant. Many

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Speaker 1: California miners, though not having themselves seen these creatures in person,

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Speaker 1: recall having seen small effigies of them made of clay

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Speaker 1: and set upon portal, sets to a tunnel or on

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Speaker 1: the lagging or elsewhere where their patronage is desired. So

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Speaker 1: I love that image of not only the idea that

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Speaker 1: there are these beings living elsewhere in the tunnels, but

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Speaker 1: there's this kind of we talked about a little, you know,

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Speaker 1: we were talking about when people set to sea, when

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Speaker 1: they return, when they're when seamen are out there on

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Speaker 1: the waters, there the newer religions that they have taken

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Speaker 1: to might be set aside for the older ways, the

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Speaker 1: older gods. And here we have this example of California

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Speaker 1: miners potentially having little altars to kind of dwarven elven

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Speaker 1: beings in the mines.

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Speaker 2: That's too good.

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Speaker 1: So Hand discusses some other ideas as well, you know,

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Speaker 1: the ghosts of dead miners working in the tunnels, also

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Speaker 1: phantom white mules, headless mules, and strange lights. Apparently he

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Speaker 1: said that there weren't really that many creature myths concerning

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Speaker 1: the minds, though occasionally you would have like a cat

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Speaker 1: come down into the mines and would just scare the

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Speaker 1: Bejesus out of everybody, because it would either way, I'm imagining,

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Speaker 1: you know, the cat would get down there, it would

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Speaker 1: be lurking about, its eyes gleaming and the light and

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Speaker 1: just give everyone the proper spooks. But there were also

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Speaker 1: these superstitions about the about bad luck concerning well, first

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Speaker 1: of all, bringing women anywhere near the cave, but also

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Speaker 1: there was a widespread superstition against anyone whistling down there,

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Speaker 1: and it seems to be sort of twofold. On one hand,

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Speaker 1: there was a real fear of vibrations in the caves

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Speaker 1: and So there's this idea that you shouldn't whistle because

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Speaker 1: you don't know what that's going to do. You're going

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Speaker 1: to set up vibrations that could potentially cause a cave in.

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Speaker 1: But it also seems linked to this older, wider idea

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Speaker 1: that if you're whistling, you could draw in spirits and

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Speaker 1: hand shares. A fun little rhyme here quote whistle by

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Speaker 1: night you'll bring the sprite. Whistle by day you'll drive

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Speaker 1: them away.

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Speaker 2: And this is not a sprite you want to bring.

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Speaker 1: Right, right, or certainly you don't want them. You don't

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Speaker 1: want anything going on down there in the mind. You

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Speaker 1: don't want you don't want any spirits bonking about. You

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Speaker 1: don't want any vibrations going wild. You want everything to

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Speaker 1: just be as safe and quiet as possible.

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Speaker 2: Right, Okay, so this is not like a friendly tinker bell.

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Speaker 2: This would be a sprite that's going to maybe pollute

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Speaker 2: your ore or make a rock fall on your head

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Speaker 2: or something.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I guess coming back to the idea of

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Speaker 1: the Tommy Knockers, it kind of comes back to the

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Speaker 1: sort of neutrality of spirits, right. It's the idea that well, there,

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Speaker 1: there are, or may be spirits around. They might do

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Speaker 1: some bad things, they might do some good things. We

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Speaker 1: probably shouldn't call them. We shouldn't call in extra spirits,

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Speaker 1: and we should try and be on the good side

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Speaker 1: of any spirits that are present.

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Speaker 2: Now, I think all of the examples we've talked about

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Speaker 2: so far are superstitions. That the way that whistling relates

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Speaker 2: to monsters or spirits or dangerous entities is that it's

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Speaker 2: something humans could do that might in some cases attract them.

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Speaker 2: So you know, be careful about whistling because you might

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Speaker 2: get a monster on your tail. But I was thinking

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Speaker 2: about are there stories of monsters that themselves whistle or

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Speaker 2: do some thing like whistling?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I was curious about this. So first of all,

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Speaker 1: I turned to Carol Rose, who has two Extraordinary volumes,

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Speaker 1: one about monsters and giants and so forth, and the

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Speaker 1: others more about fairies and sprites. And there's some overlap

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Speaker 1: between the two books, but there are also things in

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Speaker 1: each book that are not covered by the other, and

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Speaker 1: so there were at least a couple of examples that

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Speaker 1: stood out. One of them is an interesting monster of

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Speaker 1: the people of the Xingu River in Brazil, and this

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Speaker 1: creature is called midhata karaya, and these are said to

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Speaker 1: have been giants that were as tall as the trees,

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Speaker 1: with fruit growing out of their armpits, which the giants

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Speaker 1: then consume to sustain themselves. So it sounds like they

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Speaker 1: weren't themselves dangerous. They weren't like eating humans. But they're big,

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Speaker 1: tall giants. So if they're coming your way, you want

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Speaker 1: to know to get out of their way. And the

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Speaker 1: way you knew this is because the male giants had

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Speaker 1: a hole in the top of their head and it

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Speaker 1: emitted a high pitched whistle when they moved.

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Speaker 2: This is a good monster. Okay, so we got armpit autophagi.

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Speaker 2: They eat the fruit of their own armpits and their

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Speaker 2: heads whistle.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Now another monster that Rose shares Here is a

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Speaker 1: Russian creature that I think we might well describe as

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Speaker 1: a sort of a harpie, or at least a harpy

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Speaker 1: in them the way that modern people will think of

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Speaker 1: the harpy a kind of bird human hybrid, though in

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Speaker 1: this case I think they tend to be more male

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Speaker 1: than female. And its name is soleve Rachtmash, and in

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Speaker 1: Russian folklore it's said to give a piercing whistle, and

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Speaker 1: this whistle will kill anyone who hears it, and then

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Speaker 1: the monster will come and rob.

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Speaker 2: Your corpse, rob your corpse. So it's looking for money.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it's not here to eat you either. It's

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Speaker 1: interested in one thing, and it's whatever money you got on.

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Speaker 2: You checking your armpits for fruit.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. But and it's kind of an interesting thing because

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Speaker 1: the next monster I wanted to mention also is not

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Speaker 1: going to kill you. This one just wants to scare

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Speaker 1: you real bad. This is a yokai. I was looking

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Speaker 1: around in yokai traditions because I'm thinking, well, that's just

398
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Speaker 1: such a rich font of creatures and beings that it

399
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Speaker 1: makes sense that there'd be something out there that whistled.

400
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Speaker 1: And the one that I found, some descriptions of it

401
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Speaker 1: that I found translated, of course mentioned whistling as something

402
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Speaker 1: it does. Others don't mention it, so I can't be

403
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Speaker 1: one hundred persent certain if this is something that is

404
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Speaker 1: actually part of it or a lot of these yokaia too.

405
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Speaker 1: They and when you get into modern ghost stories as well,

406
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Speaker 1: like there's there's there's still kind of rich in alive,

407
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Speaker 1: so something's could add it and also somethings could added

408
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Speaker 1: in translation, but this one is called Oa Guru Batari

409
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Speaker 1: and its name apparently means nothing but blackened teeth, which

410
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Speaker 1: already sounds pretty pretty amazing. So this is the way

411
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Speaker 1: this okais encountered. She appears as a beautiful woman in

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Speaker 1: a traditional wedding kimono, and I guess you might see

413
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Speaker 1: her at a distance, and in some cases as you

414
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Speaker 1: get as you're interested and you move closer, she may

415
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Speaker 1: whistle to get the attention of single men. Other accounts

416
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Speaker 1: say that she may speak in the voice of a

417
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Speaker 1: loved one. Others don't seem to mention any kind of

418
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Speaker 1: real sound at all. But as you get closer, this

419
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Speaker 1: is the main thing that happens. She, like a lot

420
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Speaker 1: of these type creatures, will reveal her face. And when

421
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Speaker 1: she reveals her face, you find not a not a

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Speaker 1: beautiful humanoid face, but instead a face that is largely

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Speaker 1: blank except for a great, big, gaping mouth that's filled

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Speaker 1: with nothing but blackened teeth. And then she cackles, and

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Speaker 1: you just scream and run away terrified, And that's it.

426
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Speaker 1: She's not interested in hurting you. She's just here to

427
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Speaker 1: scare the Bejesus out of you.

428
00:24:52,960 --> 00:24:57,160
Speaker 2: No eyes, no nose, just the teeth. And but yeah,

429
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Speaker 2: so she doesn't bite your head off. It's just a

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Speaker 2: show you the teeth and get you upset.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, just a ghost. Now. I didn't look super

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Speaker 1: close at various pop culture and modern whistling entities, but

433
00:25:11,680 --> 00:25:14,160
Speaker 1: I thought I would mention briefly that there is something

434
00:25:14,160 --> 00:25:17,840
Speaker 1: called the whistling Fiend in Dungeons and Dragons raven Loft setting.

435
00:25:18,400 --> 00:25:22,240
Speaker 1: It's supposed to be just like this horrible monster, like

436
00:25:22,280 --> 00:25:25,880
Speaker 1: a fiend from the pits of Hell, but it will

437
00:25:25,920 --> 00:25:30,600
Speaker 1: whistle beautifully as it's approaching, so before anything goes terribly wrong,

438
00:25:30,840 --> 00:25:34,119
Speaker 1: you'll hear the whistling. And then if you happen to

439
00:25:34,240 --> 00:25:36,560
Speaker 1: witness what it does when it gets there, well it's

440
00:25:36,560 --> 00:25:39,639
Speaker 1: whistling the whole time as well as it's doing, you know, horrible,

441
00:25:39,680 --> 00:25:43,560
Speaker 1: gruesome things to people. Now I was I was interested

442
00:25:43,600 --> 00:25:45,920
Speaker 1: to run across this. I don't really know much about

443
00:25:45,920 --> 00:25:49,280
Speaker 1: old radio dramas, but there was also an old radio

444
00:25:49,359 --> 00:25:54,040
Speaker 1: drama about crime and fate titled The Whistler, And apparently

445
00:25:54,080 --> 00:25:58,520
Speaker 1: on this show, the titular whistler kind of emerges out

446
00:25:58,560 --> 00:26:01,240
Speaker 1: of the night. It's very much a kind of you know,

447
00:26:01,320 --> 00:26:05,080
Speaker 1: crime noir kind of a figure. You hear him whistling

448
00:26:05,080 --> 00:26:07,760
Speaker 1: a catchy tune, and then he serves as the narrator

449
00:26:08,040 --> 00:26:10,760
Speaker 1: and kind of host of the program. And there were

450
00:26:10,840 --> 00:26:15,359
Speaker 1: apparently eight different Whistler films during the nineteen forties, and

451
00:26:15,440 --> 00:26:18,800
Speaker 1: the first of them was nineteen forty four is the Whistler,

452
00:26:18,840 --> 00:26:20,840
Speaker 1: and it was directed by William Castle.

453
00:26:21,200 --> 00:26:24,320
Speaker 2: Uh, William Castle of the Tingler fame.

454
00:26:25,000 --> 00:26:26,480
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, so I.

455
00:26:26,440 --> 00:26:30,720
Speaker 2: Have to assume he installed special seats in the movie

456
00:26:30,760 --> 00:26:34,159
Speaker 2: theaters that what would the whistle into your bud or something.

457
00:26:35,320 --> 00:26:36,720
Speaker 1: I don't know, it sounds like the kind of thing

458
00:26:36,720 --> 00:26:39,560
Speaker 1: he would do. Yeah, I mean, he is perhaps best

459
00:26:39,600 --> 00:26:42,600
Speaker 1: remembered for figuring out what kind of gimmick would get

460
00:26:42,600 --> 00:26:45,000
Speaker 1: people into the theater. Maybe just the gimmick here was

461
00:26:45,040 --> 00:26:49,640
Speaker 1: just the existing ip. I don't know. But I don't

462
00:26:49,640 --> 00:26:52,200
Speaker 1: think you really hear about the Whistler much anymore. I

463
00:26:52,240 --> 00:26:54,600
Speaker 1: think there was a nineteen fifties TV series, and I

464
00:26:54,600 --> 00:26:56,760
Speaker 1: don't know that anyone's really gone back to this, but

465
00:26:57,080 --> 00:26:58,840
Speaker 1: I like this idea because it's essentially it's kind of

466
00:26:58,880 --> 00:27:03,080
Speaker 1: like a cripkeeper, you know, it's an anthology host and Apparently

467
00:27:03,119 --> 00:27:05,919
Speaker 1: the deal with the movies is you would have the

468
00:27:05,960 --> 00:27:10,320
Speaker 1: same star actor in each of them, not the Whistler

469
00:27:10,359 --> 00:27:13,080
Speaker 1: but somebody else, though each story is different, and so

470
00:27:13,119 --> 00:27:15,040
Speaker 1: he's playing a different character. So it's kind of like

471
00:27:15,080 --> 00:27:17,680
Speaker 1: the modern version would be. I don't know, Ryan Gosling

472
00:27:17,800 --> 00:27:21,080
Speaker 1: is in every Whistler movie, but Ryan Gosling plays a

473
00:27:21,119 --> 00:27:26,840
Speaker 1: different protagonist, a different character that's all wound up in

474
00:27:26,920 --> 00:27:28,800
Speaker 1: some sort of tale of crime and fate.

475
00:27:29,240 --> 00:27:31,560
Speaker 2: We just got a producer chime in from Seth who,

476
00:27:31,640 --> 00:27:35,400
Speaker 2: by the way, is actually a devoted listener to The Whistler.

477
00:27:35,440 --> 00:27:36,960
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't know if you can be devoted

478
00:27:36,960 --> 00:27:39,800
Speaker 2: to something that is not currently produced, but he's a fan.

479
00:27:39,960 --> 00:27:40,760
Speaker 2: He says, it's great.

480
00:27:41,040 --> 00:27:44,960
Speaker 1: You know this idea of the stranger who whistles, and

481
00:27:45,160 --> 00:27:48,960
Speaker 1: it's unknown exactly what their knowledge is, what their powers

482
00:27:49,040 --> 00:27:50,520
Speaker 1: may be. I guess you do see that in a

483
00:27:50,560 --> 00:27:53,719
Speaker 1: lot of a lot of cinema. It's often We've had

484
00:27:53,720 --> 00:27:56,240
Speaker 1: some listeners right in and mentioned that Westerns are a

485
00:27:56,240 --> 00:27:59,879
Speaker 1: place where we see a lot of such suspicious whistling.

486
00:28:01,320 --> 00:28:05,479
Speaker 1: It brings to mind a nineteen ninety one TV movie

487
00:28:05,520 --> 00:28:09,880
Speaker 1: that I don't remember was especially good, but it was creepy,

488
00:28:10,359 --> 00:28:13,000
Speaker 1: and it was called Into the bad Lands, and it

489
00:28:13,080 --> 00:28:18,440
Speaker 1: starred Bruce Dern as this creepy old bounty hunter in black,

490
00:28:18,840 --> 00:28:23,080
Speaker 1: and if memory serves, he does various things. He cooks

491
00:28:23,080 --> 00:28:27,560
Speaker 1: some eggs, he shoots some outlaws, and drags him around

492
00:28:27,600 --> 00:28:31,000
Speaker 1: kind of rotting behind his cart. He smiles a big

493
00:28:31,080 --> 00:28:33,720
Speaker 1: creepy grin. But I think he also whistles in that one,

494
00:28:33,760 --> 00:28:38,120
Speaker 1: And there's a particular ditty that's reoccurring, So there is

495
00:28:38,160 --> 00:28:41,160
Speaker 1: something to this. The stranger who whistles, what is he

496
00:28:41,160 --> 00:28:43,959
Speaker 1: whistling about? He kind of ties into some of these

497
00:28:44,000 --> 00:28:48,240
Speaker 1: other ideas, like he's an outsider that is not tied

498
00:28:48,280 --> 00:28:50,760
Speaker 1: to the same rules as everything else. He may have

499
00:28:51,000 --> 00:28:55,040
Speaker 1: some sort of communication with knowledge beyond himself, with spirits,

500
00:28:55,080 --> 00:28:55,560
Speaker 1: et cetera.

501
00:28:56,000 --> 00:28:59,240
Speaker 2: Another producer, Chime ins Seth, had a great example of this,

502
00:28:59,400 --> 00:29:02,520
Speaker 2: and it's Earl Hannah and kill Bill, who does a

503
00:29:02,600 --> 00:29:06,440
Speaker 2: very creepy whistling while she is on the way to

504
00:29:06,520 --> 00:29:07,560
Speaker 2: kill the protagonist.

505
00:29:08,160 --> 00:29:10,560
Speaker 1: And that's a great example too, because this is this

506
00:29:10,640 --> 00:29:13,360
Speaker 1: is a female character whistling. So many of these examples,

507
00:29:13,400 --> 00:29:16,880
Speaker 1: even if we're touching on traditions where where whistling is

508
00:29:16,920 --> 00:29:19,000
Speaker 1: not gendered. It seems like a lot of them tend

509
00:29:19,080 --> 00:29:22,760
Speaker 1: to involve male figures that are whistling. So so yeah,

510
00:29:22,800 --> 00:29:25,239
Speaker 1: great example seth. All right, So that's all I have

511
00:29:25,920 --> 00:29:30,920
Speaker 1: for now anyway, concerning whistling superstitions and whistling monsters. Certainly

512
00:29:30,960 --> 00:29:32,840
Speaker 1: we'd love to hear from everyone out there who has

513
00:29:32,880 --> 00:29:35,160
Speaker 1: additional things they would like to bring up, be it

514
00:29:35,560 --> 00:29:39,760
Speaker 1: you know, folkloric creatures, strange traditions, and certainly any kind

515
00:29:39,760 --> 00:29:43,600
Speaker 1: of you know, movie tie in characters who whistle. I'd

516
00:29:43,600 --> 00:29:45,400
Speaker 1: love to hear about any of that. So yes, by

517
00:29:45,400 --> 00:29:46,120
Speaker 1: all means right in.

518
00:29:46,560 --> 00:29:48,320
Speaker 2: So, I guess the next thing we should look at

519
00:29:48,520 --> 00:29:52,640
Speaker 2: is some of the psychology research on whistling, which I

520
00:29:52,720 --> 00:29:56,560
Speaker 2: have to say, I was shocked how sparse this literature is.

521
00:29:56,680 --> 00:30:01,680
Speaker 2: There is, from what I could tell, very little psychological

522
00:30:01,720 --> 00:30:05,400
Speaker 2: research about when and why people whistle. One of the

523
00:30:05,440 --> 00:30:08,040
Speaker 2: only major papers I could find on it wasn't really

524
00:30:08,080 --> 00:30:12,280
Speaker 2: experimental in nature. It was very theoretical, and though it

525
00:30:12,320 --> 00:30:14,520
Speaker 2: had a few interesting ideas in it that I do

526
00:30:14,600 --> 00:30:17,360
Speaker 2: want to talk about, to the extent that it is theoretical,

527
00:30:17,360 --> 00:30:20,800
Speaker 2: it seems kind of based in Freudianism, So it's gonna

528
00:30:20,800 --> 00:30:23,080
Speaker 2: be a big caveat there. But before we get to that,

529
00:30:23,680 --> 00:30:27,600
Speaker 2: I did want to talk about a medical case report

530
00:30:27,680 --> 00:30:32,000
Speaker 2: I came across that had a title that really grabbed

531
00:30:32,040 --> 00:30:37,080
Speaker 2: my attention. So this is a paper by pallac at

532
00:30:37,080 --> 00:30:41,080
Speaker 2: All published in BMC Psychiatry in twenty twelve, and it's

533
00:30:41,120 --> 00:30:47,120
Speaker 2: called Compulsive Carnival Song Whistling following Cardiac arrest. A case

534
00:30:47,160 --> 00:30:50,480
Speaker 2: study Compulsive Carnival Song Whistling.

535
00:30:50,880 --> 00:30:55,880
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, So is it the pro is that

536
00:30:55,920 --> 00:30:57,080
Speaker 1: the music? You think that?

537
00:30:57,080 --> 00:31:00,240
Speaker 2: That's what I was assuming. Unfortunately, the case report is

538
00:31:00,280 --> 00:31:03,960
Speaker 2: not attached a recording or sheet music or anything. So,

539
00:31:04,200 --> 00:31:06,239
Speaker 2: and it doesn't name the tunes, so I don't know

540
00:31:06,280 --> 00:31:08,720
Speaker 2: what song it is. The most they say about it

541
00:31:08,760 --> 00:31:12,479
Speaker 2: is that it is a carnival song. All right, what

542
00:31:12,520 --> 00:31:14,920
Speaker 2: are the options? Yeah, so you got that one is

543
00:31:15,000 --> 00:31:17,440
Speaker 2: like the Binny Hill theme? Possible? I don't know.

544
00:31:17,920 --> 00:31:20,760
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I don't want to get too far

545
00:31:20,800 --> 00:31:22,520
Speaker 1: into this because this is like, this is a realm

546
00:31:22,560 --> 00:31:25,560
Speaker 1: I know virtually nothing about. But apparently there's a there's

547
00:31:25,560 --> 00:31:27,520
Speaker 1: a fair amount of what we might think of his

548
00:31:27,640 --> 00:31:31,840
Speaker 1: circus music that you know, we're talking about circus band stuff.

549
00:31:31,840 --> 00:31:36,000
Speaker 1: We're talking about waltzes and fox trots, so there there's

550
00:31:36,040 --> 00:31:40,560
Speaker 1: there's probably a lot there, but them is the thing

551
00:31:40,600 --> 00:31:44,200
Speaker 1: that that mostly comes to the surface for folks like me.

552
00:31:44,880 --> 00:31:48,920
Speaker 2: Okay, So in this case, report the medical history the patient.

553
00:31:48,960 --> 00:31:51,320
Speaker 2: In this case it's anonymous of course, so we don't

554
00:31:51,360 --> 00:31:53,960
Speaker 2: know their name. But it was a man who was

555
00:31:54,280 --> 00:31:57,600
Speaker 2: found unconscious in his car in February nineteen ninety two

556
00:31:58,120 --> 00:32:01,040
Speaker 2: at the age of forty eight, having so a heart attack.

557
00:32:01,960 --> 00:32:04,440
Speaker 2: He was in cardiac arrest for some period of time,

558
00:32:04,520 --> 00:32:08,160
Speaker 2: but he was reanimated successfully in the emergency room at

559
00:32:08,200 --> 00:32:12,120
Speaker 2: a nearby hospital, so he survived the heart attack he had.

560
00:32:12,760 --> 00:32:15,720
Speaker 2: His heart had stopped, there was reduced a supply of

561
00:32:15,720 --> 00:32:19,720
Speaker 2: oxygen to the brain, but they resuscitated him and he

562
00:32:19,840 --> 00:32:25,000
Speaker 2: was all right. But during rehabilitation he presented with some symptoms,

563
00:32:25,040 --> 00:32:29,200
Speaker 2: including neurological impairment, and so several of the things they

564
00:32:29,240 --> 00:32:35,320
Speaker 2: report are disorientation, apathy, what they call bradyphrenia meaning slowness

565
00:32:35,320 --> 00:32:38,640
Speaker 2: of thought, short term memory problems and things like that.

566
00:32:38,960 --> 00:32:44,400
Speaker 2: And imaging, particularly EEG showed decreased functioning in the brain,

567
00:32:44,520 --> 00:32:47,840
Speaker 2: especially in the bezo temporal areas, and he continued to

568
00:32:47,960 --> 00:32:51,720
Speaker 2: exhibit some neurological symptoms in the following years. And here's

569
00:32:51,720 --> 00:32:54,160
Speaker 2: where we get to the music. I'll read straight from

570
00:32:54,160 --> 00:32:57,680
Speaker 2: the case report quote. We were approached in May two

571
00:32:57,760 --> 00:33:00,480
Speaker 2: thousand and eight by the patient's wife, who got to

572
00:33:00,520 --> 00:33:03,800
Speaker 2: know our center of expertise through the internet. She was

573
00:33:03,840 --> 00:33:07,760
Speaker 2: close to desperation from listening to the whistling of the

574
00:33:07,840 --> 00:33:12,400
Speaker 2: same carnival song for nearly sixteen years. It would go

575
00:33:12,480 --> 00:33:15,840
Speaker 2: on for five to eight hours every day and got

576
00:33:15,880 --> 00:33:19,560
Speaker 2: worse when the patient was tired. Oh wow, so it's

577
00:33:19,600 --> 00:33:24,080
Speaker 2: a mix. Like obviously it's you know, I was snagged

578
00:33:24,080 --> 00:33:27,200
Speaker 2: by the idea of repetitive whistling of a carnival song,

579
00:33:27,200 --> 00:33:29,840
Speaker 2: but when you actually hear the details, it is I

580
00:33:29,840 --> 00:33:33,040
Speaker 2: don't know, it's a very unfortunate situation to imagine that,

581
00:33:33,400 --> 00:33:36,800
Speaker 2: like the whistling of the same song goes on for

582
00:33:36,960 --> 00:33:40,120
Speaker 2: five to eight hours a day for sixteen years.

583
00:33:40,680 --> 00:33:41,080
Speaker 1: Wow.

584
00:33:41,360 --> 00:33:44,040
Speaker 2: Now, the authors here talk about treatments that were tried,

585
00:33:44,520 --> 00:33:49,760
Speaker 2: including a drug called clomipramine, which is a tricyclic antidepressant

586
00:33:49,880 --> 00:33:53,520
Speaker 2: that is sometimes used to treat obsessive compulsive disorder, which

587
00:33:53,600 --> 00:33:57,520
Speaker 2: obviously share some features with what's being described here. That

588
00:33:57,640 --> 00:34:02,160
Speaker 2: among other conditions. But basically this drug regimen did manage

589
00:34:02,200 --> 00:34:05,120
Speaker 2: to decrease the whistling by about half, but it also

590
00:34:05,200 --> 00:34:08,320
Speaker 2: came with some very difficult side effects in this man's case,

591
00:34:09,120 --> 00:34:12,200
Speaker 2: and the repetitive whistling of a carnival song non stop

592
00:34:12,280 --> 00:34:14,440
Speaker 2: for five to eight hours a day could be considered

593
00:34:14,480 --> 00:34:18,640
Speaker 2: an example of what psychiatrists would call compulsivity, which the

594
00:34:18,680 --> 00:34:23,120
Speaker 2: authors describe as quote, the repetitive, irresistible urge to perform

595
00:34:23,160 --> 00:34:27,200
Speaker 2: a behavior, the experience of loss of voluntary control over

596
00:34:27,239 --> 00:34:31,279
Speaker 2: this intense urge, and the tendency to perform repetitive acts

597
00:34:31,360 --> 00:34:35,040
Speaker 2: in a habitual or stereotyped manner. So they talk about

598
00:34:35,040 --> 00:34:38,520
Speaker 2: how the man would whistle the song on a loop

599
00:34:39,120 --> 00:34:42,040
Speaker 2: all day pretty much, and that at certain points they

600
00:34:42,040 --> 00:34:45,080
Speaker 2: could make him stop doing it, though he reported after

601
00:34:45,120 --> 00:34:50,080
Speaker 2: he stopped that he experienced anxiety. And in their discussion,

602
00:34:50,160 --> 00:34:53,680
Speaker 2: the authors explain how the man in this report showed

603
00:34:53,680 --> 00:34:57,560
Speaker 2: symptoms that could be consistent with three different interpretations of

604
00:34:57,600 --> 00:35:00,279
Speaker 2: his condition. So, first of all, they talk about the

605
00:35:00,320 --> 00:35:05,160
Speaker 2: idea of a frontal syndrome characterized by impulsivity and disinhibition.

606
00:35:05,840 --> 00:35:08,640
Speaker 2: I think frontal syndrome there because it's the frontal lobe

607
00:35:08,680 --> 00:35:11,560
Speaker 2: that is very important for inhibiting behavior that's your sort

608
00:35:11,560 --> 00:35:16,840
Speaker 2: of like self control mechanism. And then second a compulsivity

609
00:35:16,880 --> 00:35:20,799
Speaker 2: condition known as punding, which is characterized by quote purposeless

610
00:35:20,800 --> 00:35:25,800
Speaker 2: and repetitive behavior such as collecting or arranging things often

611
00:35:25,840 --> 00:35:29,920
Speaker 2: related to the patient's personal hobbies or occupation, and attributed

612
00:35:29,920 --> 00:35:33,080
Speaker 2: to alterations of the brain's reward and motor systems in

613
00:35:33,120 --> 00:35:35,840
Speaker 2: both the ventral and dorsal stra atom. And then the

614
00:35:35,840 --> 00:35:38,920
Speaker 2: final interpretation would be a sort of acquired form of

615
00:35:39,160 --> 00:35:43,960
Speaker 2: obsessive compulsive disorder or OCD. And there are other examples

616
00:35:44,000 --> 00:35:47,680
Speaker 2: of people acquiring OCD after a brain injury later in life.

617
00:35:47,760 --> 00:35:51,880
Speaker 2: The OCD is usually acquired gradually earlier on in life.

618
00:35:52,360 --> 00:35:55,720
Speaker 2: And they say all of these explanations match the observations

619
00:35:55,760 --> 00:35:59,399
Speaker 2: in some ways but not in others. But one thing

620
00:35:59,640 --> 00:36:02,160
Speaker 2: they got into that I thought was interesting here was

621
00:36:02,200 --> 00:36:07,160
Speaker 2: talking about the different characteristics of impulsivity versus compulsivity in

622
00:36:07,160 --> 00:36:10,600
Speaker 2: the brain. So they write, quote, one may conclude that

623
00:36:10,640 --> 00:36:15,160
Speaker 2: the whistling with its repetitions is primarily compulsive rather than

624
00:36:15,200 --> 00:36:19,640
Speaker 2: impulsive or disinhibitive, as the patient had a constant urge

625
00:36:19,680 --> 00:36:23,359
Speaker 2: to whistle and felt anxiety when asked to stop rather

626
00:36:23,440 --> 00:36:27,480
Speaker 2: than acting without foresight. The fact that anxiety was felt

627
00:36:27,600 --> 00:36:31,239
Speaker 2: is in line with compulsivity rather than impulsivity, assuming that

628
00:36:31,280 --> 00:36:36,440
Speaker 2: compulsive behaviors are performed to prevent perceived negative consequences from happening.

629
00:36:36,960 --> 00:36:40,160
Speaker 2: So this is a useful distinction for thinking about because

630
00:36:40,200 --> 00:36:42,759
Speaker 2: when we you know, outside of the medical context, when

631
00:36:42,800 --> 00:36:46,960
Speaker 2: we think about these words impulsive or compulsive, they both

632
00:36:47,080 --> 00:36:50,160
Speaker 2: I think usually refer to situations where a person seems

633
00:36:50,200 --> 00:36:53,720
Speaker 2: to lack executive control. They lack the ability to control

634
00:36:53,760 --> 00:36:57,920
Speaker 2: their own behavior or prevent themselves from doing something, but

635
00:36:58,040 --> 00:37:02,520
Speaker 2: in very different ways. So in impulsivity, you feel an

636
00:37:02,640 --> 00:37:06,160
Speaker 2: urge to do something, but some process taking place in

637
00:37:06,160 --> 00:37:09,600
Speaker 2: your frontal lobe tells you that's not appropriate and stops

638
00:37:09,640 --> 00:37:12,400
Speaker 2: you from doing it. But the urge itself might be

639
00:37:12,440 --> 00:37:16,000
Speaker 2: something normal that like we would all think of doing

640
00:37:16,080 --> 00:37:18,680
Speaker 2: for a second. It might cross our mind to do it,

641
00:37:18,760 --> 00:37:21,600
Speaker 2: but then we would turn away from actually doing it

642
00:37:21,640 --> 00:37:25,719
Speaker 2: because of some inhibition mechanism in the brain. Examples of

643
00:37:25,760 --> 00:37:28,480
Speaker 2: this include all kinds of stuff, spitting on the floor

644
00:37:28,960 --> 00:37:33,080
Speaker 2: or making a rude or inappropriate comment and conversation, or

645
00:37:33,200 --> 00:37:36,720
Speaker 2: jumping out of a moving car. They can vary wildly

646
00:37:36,800 --> 00:37:39,919
Speaker 2: from you know, minor things to extreme things. They would

647
00:37:39,920 --> 00:37:43,080
Speaker 2: all be things though, that even a person with typical

648
00:37:43,120 --> 00:37:46,759
Speaker 2: neuroanatomy might think for a second about doing, but then

649
00:37:46,800 --> 00:37:48,560
Speaker 2: they would be able to stop themselves.

650
00:37:48,760 --> 00:37:50,560
Speaker 1: All right. I think we can all think of examples

651
00:37:50,600 --> 00:37:53,040
Speaker 1: of this from our own life, where yeah, you're just

652
00:37:53,120 --> 00:37:55,760
Speaker 1: in a situation and you may think of like something

653
00:37:55,800 --> 00:37:59,480
Speaker 1: just ridiculous or absurd or antisocial that you theoretically could do,

654
00:38:00,440 --> 00:38:02,600
Speaker 1: and then you sort of but you recoil from it

655
00:38:02,960 --> 00:38:04,920
Speaker 1: and you realize, oh, well, of course I'm not going

656
00:38:05,000 --> 00:38:06,480
Speaker 1: to do that. And it can be a little shocking

657
00:38:06,480 --> 00:38:08,439
Speaker 1: to think that you even thought about doing that. Why

658
00:38:08,480 --> 00:38:11,240
Speaker 1: did I think that, hey, I could take my wallet

659
00:38:11,280 --> 00:38:13,440
Speaker 1: out and throw it off of this building or off

660
00:38:13,440 --> 00:38:15,239
Speaker 1: of this bridge that I'm on. Yeah.

661
00:38:15,320 --> 00:38:17,640
Speaker 2: Yeah. We did a whole episode one time called The

662
00:38:17,680 --> 00:38:20,839
Speaker 2: imp of the Perverse that was about this idea that

663
00:38:20,960 --> 00:38:23,239
Speaker 2: like that there is some kind of It was about

664
00:38:23,239 --> 00:38:25,680
Speaker 2: the first half before the inhibition comes in. It's like,

665
00:38:26,080 --> 00:38:28,879
Speaker 2: what is that urge to do things that are obviously

666
00:38:28,960 --> 00:38:31,799
Speaker 2: not in your best interests but you suddenly just feel like, ooh,

667
00:38:31,800 --> 00:38:33,759
Speaker 2: I should do that. But then you're able to put

668
00:38:33,760 --> 00:38:35,440
Speaker 2: the you know, put the lid on it and say no,

669
00:38:35,640 --> 00:38:38,440
Speaker 2: I shouldn't do that. People with a frontal syndrome often

670
00:38:38,520 --> 00:38:44,160
Speaker 2: have impulsivity problems because they whatever the normal disinhibition mechanism

671
00:38:44,160 --> 00:38:46,160
Speaker 2: in the brain is, that has been damaged in some

672
00:38:46,280 --> 00:38:50,480
Speaker 2: way by their injury. Right, So contrasts that that impulsivity

673
00:38:50,520 --> 00:38:54,040
Speaker 2: with compulsivity, where a person also lacks the ability to

674
00:38:54,040 --> 00:38:56,959
Speaker 2: stop themselves from performing an action, but it's an action

675
00:38:57,120 --> 00:39:01,680
Speaker 2: that they feel they must do repetitively in order to

676
00:39:01,760 --> 00:39:06,080
Speaker 2: prevent some kind of bad consequence from happening. So remember

677
00:39:06,120 --> 00:39:08,920
Speaker 2: it was said that the man here would whistle constantly,

678
00:39:09,480 --> 00:39:12,480
Speaker 2: but he felt the immediate onset of anxiety if he

679
00:39:12,600 --> 00:39:15,759
Speaker 2: stopped whistling the carnival song. So that makes it sound

680
00:39:15,840 --> 00:39:18,920
Speaker 2: more like it's compulsivity here, that it's something that he

681
00:39:19,080 --> 00:39:23,439
Speaker 2: felt he had to do repetitively or else negative consequences

682
00:39:23,480 --> 00:39:27,600
Speaker 2: would emerge. And the case history here mentions that the

683
00:39:27,600 --> 00:39:31,360
Speaker 2: man once worked as head of a carnival association, and

684
00:39:31,400 --> 00:39:33,360
Speaker 2: the authors don't say this, so we don't know this,

685
00:39:33,440 --> 00:39:36,719
Speaker 2: but it seems like a reasonable guess that the carnival

686
00:39:36,760 --> 00:39:39,239
Speaker 2: tune he was whistling was one he was familiar with

687
00:39:39,280 --> 00:39:42,200
Speaker 2: from his own past to working as the head of

688
00:39:42,239 --> 00:39:46,160
Speaker 2: a carnival association, maybe even one he associated with a

689
00:39:46,239 --> 00:39:48,200
Speaker 2: time when he was more in control.

690
00:39:48,600 --> 00:39:51,239
Speaker 1: That's fascinating because it also this ties into sort of

691
00:39:51,280 --> 00:39:55,279
Speaker 1: the power of music, right. We all use music, I think,

692
00:39:55,280 --> 00:39:59,200
Speaker 1: at times to augment our current mental state, to draw

693
00:39:59,320 --> 00:40:08,120
Speaker 1: in mental feelings of power or assertiveness, but also sadness,

694
00:40:08,400 --> 00:40:10,560
Speaker 1: whatever the case might be, whatever we feel like we

695
00:40:10,640 --> 00:40:14,680
Speaker 1: need to connect with that is not our current state exactly.

696
00:40:14,719 --> 00:40:16,799
Speaker 2: But it also ties into something that came up in

697
00:40:16,880 --> 00:40:19,239
Speaker 2: previous episodes. So here again we have a case of

698
00:40:20,160 --> 00:40:23,000
Speaker 2: a man who suffers neurological damage after a period where

699
00:40:23,040 --> 00:40:26,359
Speaker 2: his brain isn't getting enough oxygen. He never had any

700
00:40:26,360 --> 00:40:29,759
Speaker 2: symptoms of obsessive compulsive disorder or anything before this, but

701
00:40:29,880 --> 00:40:33,560
Speaker 2: after this event he acquired this tendency to engage in

702
00:40:33,600 --> 00:40:37,600
Speaker 2: compulsive whistling. And I thought it was interesting that the whistling,

703
00:40:37,760 --> 00:40:40,560
Speaker 2: if it is best interpreted as a way of staving

704
00:40:40,600 --> 00:40:44,359
Speaker 2: off anxiety, which the authors here suggested, is it made

705
00:40:44,400 --> 00:40:47,759
Speaker 2: me think of our discussion about whistling past the graveyard

706
00:40:47,840 --> 00:40:52,040
Speaker 2: or whistling in the dark, other cases where it's commonly

707
00:40:52,080 --> 00:40:55,359
Speaker 2: observed that people whistle in order to push out a

708
00:40:55,440 --> 00:40:57,759
Speaker 2: fear or thoughts of danger.

709
00:40:58,040 --> 00:41:02,200
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, yeah, more whistling past the graveyard for sure.

710
00:41:08,840 --> 00:41:10,600
Speaker 2: Now, again, as I mentioned earlier, it seemed like the

711
00:41:10,600 --> 00:41:14,279
Speaker 2: psychological research on whistling was far less developed than I

712
00:41:14,280 --> 00:41:16,560
Speaker 2: would have expected. Maybe there are some great studies out

713
00:41:16,560 --> 00:41:19,440
Speaker 2: there that I just wasn't able to find, So if

714
00:41:19,480 --> 00:41:21,359
Speaker 2: you know of them, please send them into the show

715
00:41:21,400 --> 00:41:23,760
Speaker 2: account contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.

716
00:41:24,040 --> 00:41:26,319
Speaker 2: But the other major one I found, and this was

717
00:41:26,440 --> 00:41:30,320
Speaker 2: cited in some other papers, is a paper from nineteen

718
00:41:30,400 --> 00:41:33,720
Speaker 2: fifty nine published in the journal Language and Speech called

719
00:41:33,880 --> 00:41:37,840
Speaker 2: When People Whistle, and it's by the UC San Francisco

720
00:41:37,920 --> 00:41:42,240
Speaker 2: professor of psychiatry, Peter F. Austwald. As I said earlier,

721
00:41:42,480 --> 00:41:44,279
Speaker 2: I do want to mention this one because it has

722
00:41:44,360 --> 00:41:46,680
Speaker 2: some interesting ideas in it, but also it is an

723
00:41:46,680 --> 00:41:50,479
Speaker 2: older paper. It clearly is not constricted by empirical method.

724
00:41:50,560 --> 00:41:53,759
Speaker 2: This is not like reporting on original experiments. It's more

725
00:41:53,840 --> 00:41:58,760
Speaker 2: kind of theorizing about what whistling might mean and why

726
00:41:58,800 --> 00:42:03,600
Speaker 2: people whistle, based on models that seem at least influenced

727
00:42:03,600 --> 00:42:07,560
Speaker 2: by Freudianism. A lot of it's about fixations that are

728
00:42:08,080 --> 00:42:11,080
Speaker 2: sort of emerge from childhood development. But anyway, okay, so

729
00:42:11,120 --> 00:42:14,080
Speaker 2: who is this guy who wrote this? Ostwald? He seems

730
00:42:14,080 --> 00:42:16,000
Speaker 2: like a kind of interesting guy. So he lived from

731
00:42:16,120 --> 00:42:19,720
Speaker 2: nineteen twenty eight to nineteen ninety six, and his life

732
00:42:19,840 --> 00:42:23,320
Speaker 2: is sort of divided between an interest in psychiatry on

733
00:42:23,600 --> 00:42:26,839
Speaker 2: one hand, and music and music history on the other.

734
00:42:26,920 --> 00:42:31,120
Speaker 2: So he wrote biographies of musicians and composers like Schumann

735
00:42:31,160 --> 00:42:34,200
Speaker 2: and Glenn Gould. But also, to quote from his New

736
00:42:34,280 --> 00:42:38,040
Speaker 2: York Times obituary quote, in nineteen eighty six, he founded

737
00:42:38,080 --> 00:42:42,319
Speaker 2: the Health Program for Performing Artists, a voluntary group of

738
00:42:42,360 --> 00:42:46,640
Speaker 2: specialists engaged in research, education, and clinical care of the

739
00:42:46,719 --> 00:42:51,200
Speaker 2: particular mental and medical problems afflicting musicians, dancers, and other

740
00:42:51,280 --> 00:42:55,600
Speaker 2: performing artists, both professionals and students. And I thought that

741
00:42:55,680 --> 00:42:58,600
Speaker 2: was very interesting because now that I think about it,

742
00:42:58,600 --> 00:43:00,800
Speaker 2: it clearly makes sense that you could have medical center

743
00:43:01,400 --> 00:43:04,760
Speaker 2: focused on the mental and physical health needs of performing

744
00:43:04,840 --> 00:43:07,600
Speaker 2: artists in particular, because I'd imagine there would be patterns

745
00:43:07,680 --> 00:43:10,840
Speaker 2: in their needs. But it never occurred to me that

746
00:43:10,880 --> 00:43:11,880
Speaker 2: such a thing would exist.

747
00:43:12,239 --> 00:43:14,279
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it makes sense, right, because we have

748
00:43:14,320 --> 00:43:18,040
Speaker 1: sports medicine athletes do extreme things with their bodies. It

749
00:43:18,040 --> 00:43:20,799
Speaker 1: puts special types of wear and tear on them, and

750
00:43:20,840 --> 00:43:23,480
Speaker 1: you could I think you can very fairly say the

751
00:43:23,520 --> 00:43:26,600
Speaker 1: same thing for performers, especially when you're thinking about something

752
00:43:26,680 --> 00:43:28,960
Speaker 1: like dance or vocal performance.

753
00:43:29,320 --> 00:43:32,520
Speaker 2: Totally, but okay, what does ast Falds say in this

754
00:43:33,040 --> 00:43:37,200
Speaker 2: language psychology paper? Mainly this article is focused on questions

755
00:43:37,200 --> 00:43:41,120
Speaker 2: of why humans whistle, what purpose it serves, what whistling

756
00:43:41,160 --> 00:43:44,000
Speaker 2: tends to mean, and how it differs from other forms

757
00:43:44,000 --> 00:43:47,400
Speaker 2: of noise production. I'm not gonna get into everything he

758
00:43:47,440 --> 00:43:49,239
Speaker 2: theorizes about in this paper, but I did want to

759
00:43:49,239 --> 00:43:53,759
Speaker 2: focus on one part where he's sort of taking a

760
00:43:53,800 --> 00:43:56,520
Speaker 2: look at the phenomenology of whistling. What does it feel

761
00:43:56,600 --> 00:43:57,280
Speaker 2: like to whistle?

762
00:43:57,360 --> 00:43:57,440
Speaker 1: Like?

763
00:43:57,560 --> 00:44:00,520
Speaker 2: Is it pleasurable to people? And if it is, which

764
00:44:00,520 --> 00:44:03,840
Speaker 2: it often seems to be, why is it pleasurable? So

765
00:44:04,040 --> 00:44:07,560
Speaker 2: to check one of the very Freudian boxes, he argues that,

766
00:44:07,800 --> 00:44:11,200
Speaker 2: first of all, the act of whistling involves manipulation of

767
00:44:11,239 --> 00:44:13,640
Speaker 2: the muscles in the face and the mouth in a

768
00:44:13,640 --> 00:44:17,080
Speaker 2: way that may produce hedonic states feelings of comfort and

769
00:44:17,160 --> 00:44:21,360
Speaker 2: pleasure because of its similarity to the facial and mouth

770
00:44:21,440 --> 00:44:25,360
Speaker 2: movements of what he calls oral gratification, and so he

771
00:44:25,400 --> 00:44:28,239
Speaker 2: expands that to all kinds of things like eating and smoking,

772
00:44:28,719 --> 00:44:32,680
Speaker 2: but he specifically ties it into the facial and mouth

773
00:44:33,200 --> 00:44:36,319
Speaker 2: muscle movements of a feeding infant. So this is one

774
00:44:36,360 --> 00:44:38,799
Speaker 2: of those things that, well, it's hard to disprove that,

775
00:44:39,000 --> 00:44:41,920
Speaker 2: but I'm not convinced there's much evidence to establish that

776
00:44:42,040 --> 00:44:45,080
Speaker 2: exact causal chain that like doing the same thing with

777
00:44:45,120 --> 00:44:47,200
Speaker 2: your face muscles that you did when you were a

778
00:44:47,239 --> 00:44:50,319
Speaker 2: baby in your mother's arms produces comfort and for the

779
00:44:50,360 --> 00:44:55,600
Speaker 2: same reason. I don't know how you would show that, yeah, Yeah,

780
00:44:55,640 --> 00:44:58,920
Speaker 2: And also I'd be skeptical that there's a general principle

781
00:44:59,000 --> 00:45:02,880
Speaker 2: that doing something with the you know, the skeletal muscle

782
00:45:02,920 --> 00:45:05,360
Speaker 2: in your body that is similar to what that muscle

783
00:45:05,400 --> 00:45:09,520
Speaker 2: does in some other unrelated activity that is pleasurable in

784
00:45:09,520 --> 00:45:12,480
Speaker 2: some way gives you pleasure in the secondary activity just

785
00:45:12,480 --> 00:45:15,080
Speaker 2: because you're using the same muscles. I don't know. I mean,

786
00:45:15,120 --> 00:45:18,560
Speaker 2: you could think of ways that you would use the

787
00:45:18,560 --> 00:45:21,239
Speaker 2: same muscles you might use in some pleasurable activity, but

788
00:45:21,280 --> 00:45:24,719
Speaker 2: it doesn't bring pleasure. Does just like pretending to chew

789
00:45:25,120 --> 00:45:27,080
Speaker 2: bring you the same kind of pleasure you get from

790
00:45:27,080 --> 00:45:28,440
Speaker 2: eating and so forth?

791
00:45:29,000 --> 00:45:33,160
Speaker 1: Uh, yeah, generally not. Uh yeah, yeah, you can't. You

792
00:45:33,200 --> 00:45:36,840
Speaker 1: can't just say, pretend to be eating your favorite dish.

793
00:45:37,200 --> 00:45:39,680
Speaker 1: And I mean maybe if you're hungry enough, you can

794
00:45:39,840 --> 00:45:41,560
Speaker 1: you can lean into it a little bit. I don't know,

795
00:45:42,080 --> 00:45:44,680
Speaker 1: but yeah, for the most part, I don't really put

796
00:45:44,680 --> 00:45:46,200
Speaker 1: a lot of stock in this notion.

797
00:45:46,480 --> 00:45:48,239
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I got doubts about that. But then you

798
00:45:48,280 --> 00:45:50,360
Speaker 2: make some other points that I think are I don't know,

799
00:45:50,719 --> 00:45:54,480
Speaker 2: more worth considering. This next one is still sort of

800
00:45:54,480 --> 00:45:57,360
Speaker 2: along Freudian lines, but I think it's it's I don't know,

801
00:45:57,560 --> 00:45:59,279
Speaker 2: it feels different to me. So see what you think

802
00:45:59,280 --> 00:45:59,960
Speaker 2: about this, he says.

803
00:46:00,440 --> 00:46:00,800
Speaker 1: Quote.

804
00:46:00,880 --> 00:46:03,840
Speaker 2: In addition to the mouth and face, whistling involves the

805
00:46:03,960 --> 00:46:09,400
Speaker 2: respiratory structures. These structures chest, abdomen, lungs, wind pipes, and

806
00:46:09,520 --> 00:46:13,160
Speaker 2: throat move of their own accord, regulated by neuronal and

807
00:46:13,239 --> 00:46:18,200
Speaker 2: chemical processes beyond voluntary control. But the whistler in effect

808
00:46:18,320 --> 00:46:22,840
Speaker 2: willfully imposes his own rhythm, amplitude, and organization pattern on

809
00:46:23,000 --> 00:46:27,759
Speaker 2: these automatic movements. Psychological studies show that if the individual

810
00:46:27,880 --> 00:46:31,760
Speaker 2: is rewarded by attention or praise when he first gains

811
00:46:31,800 --> 00:46:36,120
Speaker 2: control over such automatic processes, he may continue to expect

812
00:46:36,120 --> 00:46:40,399
Speaker 2: satisfaction from this display of skill. As will be shown later,

813
00:46:40,440 --> 00:46:44,239
Speaker 2: whistling arouses the attention of listeners so that the whistler's

814
00:46:44,320 --> 00:46:49,239
Speaker 2: bodily mastery is almost universally rewarded in some way. And

815
00:46:49,520 --> 00:46:51,640
Speaker 2: I don't know, at a gut level, this seemed a

816
00:46:51,680 --> 00:46:53,880
Speaker 2: little more plausible to me that there could be like

817
00:46:53,960 --> 00:46:59,440
Speaker 2: a learned association of positive reinforcement upon gaining conscious control

818
00:46:59,600 --> 00:47:04,160
Speaker 2: over previously automatic or autonomic processes. And I think one

819
00:47:04,160 --> 00:47:06,200
Speaker 2: of the main ideas this ties into here is like

820
00:47:06,239 --> 00:47:08,719
Speaker 2: toilet training, that you know, there could be some kind

821
00:47:08,760 --> 00:47:12,959
Speaker 2: of bleed over with pleasure upon a general pleasure upon

822
00:47:13,000 --> 00:47:17,400
Speaker 2: taking conscious control of things like breath, and that would

823
00:47:17,400 --> 00:47:19,120
Speaker 2: sort of check out with other things. I mean, there

824
00:47:19,120 --> 00:47:22,560
Speaker 2: are a lot of things people do to seemingly bring

825
00:47:22,600 --> 00:47:27,000
Speaker 2: themselves pleasure and comfort just by taking conscious control of breath,

826
00:47:27,040 --> 00:47:28,400
Speaker 2: which is normally automatic.

827
00:47:28,800 --> 00:47:31,719
Speaker 1: Yeah, this does remind me of certain potty training techniques

828
00:47:31,800 --> 00:47:35,200
Speaker 1: for kids where they'll be for instance, if you're trying

829
00:47:35,239 --> 00:47:39,040
Speaker 1: to teach the very young child to have some degree

830
00:47:39,040 --> 00:47:43,359
Speaker 1: of control over when they defecate, that there's a there's

831
00:47:43,400 --> 00:47:45,720
Speaker 1: a like a technique where you're getting them to hum

832
00:47:45,800 --> 00:47:48,760
Speaker 1: while they do it. So it's yeah, I can see

833
00:47:48,880 --> 00:47:50,360
Speaker 1: where you can have a lot of connection between the

834
00:47:50,400 --> 00:47:50,839
Speaker 1: two here.

835
00:47:51,000 --> 00:47:52,839
Speaker 2: Oh and in the next section I want to talk

836
00:47:52,880 --> 00:47:57,280
Speaker 2: about he actually ties directly into that. So Ostwald writes, quote,

837
00:47:57,719 --> 00:48:00,440
Speaker 2: some of the emotions that accompany the act of whistling

838
00:48:00,440 --> 00:48:04,399
Speaker 2: would appear to result from wishful thoughts and magical fantasies

839
00:48:04,440 --> 00:48:07,960
Speaker 2: in the mind of the whistler. Whistling, because it involves

840
00:48:07,960 --> 00:48:11,839
Speaker 2: the production of wordless sounds, may bring back memories of

841
00:48:11,840 --> 00:48:14,600
Speaker 2: that very early period during which the child could not

842
00:48:14,760 --> 00:48:18,480
Speaker 2: distinguish between those sounds which came from the outside world

843
00:48:18,600 --> 00:48:21,759
Speaker 2: and those sounds which came from his own body. During

844
00:48:21,840 --> 00:48:25,239
Speaker 2: this phase of personality development, one is unsure of the

845
00:48:25,320 --> 00:48:29,680
Speaker 2: significance of sounds. One cannot tell whether a certain noise,

846
00:48:29,880 --> 00:48:33,920
Speaker 2: say one's footsteps, has personal meaning referable only to his

847
00:48:34,000 --> 00:48:37,560
Speaker 2: own body, or has a public meaning with some reference

848
00:48:37,600 --> 00:48:41,040
Speaker 2: to the world of other people. In this confused state,

849
00:48:41,160 --> 00:48:43,520
Speaker 2: the individual may come to believe that the sounds he

850
00:48:43,560 --> 00:48:48,759
Speaker 2: produces have some causal relationship to what he experiences. Whistling,

851
00:48:48,960 --> 00:48:52,640
Speaker 2: like other noises he makes, may thus be associated with

852
00:48:52,800 --> 00:48:58,080
Speaker 2: fantasies of omnipotence, which, unless corrected by reality can lead

853
00:48:58,120 --> 00:49:02,000
Speaker 2: to delusions of grandeur. This was really interesting to me

854
00:49:02,040 --> 00:49:04,319
Speaker 2: because think about how many things we've already looked at

855
00:49:04,360 --> 00:49:07,000
Speaker 2: where there's some belief that, like whistling gives you power

856
00:49:07,080 --> 00:49:09,600
Speaker 2: to like change the external world somehow.

857
00:49:09,840 --> 00:49:12,680
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, ties directly into the wind magic we've been

858
00:49:12,719 --> 00:49:16,640
Speaker 1: discussing in getting and even connects back to the Taoist

859
00:49:16,880 --> 00:49:18,279
Speaker 1: transcendental whistling as.

860
00:49:18,200 --> 00:49:22,760
Speaker 2: Well totally, or even the Terence McKinney thing. Yeah yes, yeah, yeah,

861
00:49:22,760 --> 00:49:26,440
Speaker 2: but okay, So coming back to this, Ostwald writes, quote

862
00:49:26,560 --> 00:49:31,279
Speaker 2: Occasionally parents or other adults inadvertently encourage magical behavior in

863
00:49:31,320 --> 00:49:35,160
Speaker 2: their children and thus reinforce fanciful thoughts about whistling and

864
00:49:35,200 --> 00:49:39,120
Speaker 2: other sounds. For example, nurses have been known to employ

865
00:49:39,200 --> 00:49:43,640
Speaker 2: whistles to quote make the child urinate and kindly. Grandparents

866
00:49:43,760 --> 00:49:47,960
Speaker 2: not infrequently whistle away the aches and bruises of a youngster.

867
00:49:48,880 --> 00:49:51,600
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, I can see the again whistling as the

868
00:49:52,000 --> 00:49:53,840
Speaker 1: as a sound of wind, but also the sound of

869
00:49:53,880 --> 00:49:56,920
Speaker 1: water moving water. We touched on that, and that's some

870
00:49:56,920 --> 00:49:58,680
Speaker 1: of these ideas that you can get an ox or

871
00:49:58,719 --> 00:50:03,600
Speaker 1: a horse to drink water by whistling at it, which

872
00:50:03,880 --> 00:50:06,319
Speaker 1: there may not be anything to that, but using it

873
00:50:06,360 --> 00:50:08,920
Speaker 1: as some sort of a potty training. Yeah, I can

874
00:50:08,960 --> 00:50:13,360
Speaker 1: imagine the humming sound being for the defecation though, the

875
00:50:13,360 --> 00:50:16,560
Speaker 1: whistling sound being for the you know, the creation of

876
00:50:16,600 --> 00:50:18,560
Speaker 1: water with one body, that sort of thing.

877
00:50:18,880 --> 00:50:21,640
Speaker 2: And that could actually have efficacy when you're whistling to

878
00:50:21,920 --> 00:50:24,640
Speaker 2: a person, right because they hear that that has some

879
00:50:24,760 --> 00:50:28,480
Speaker 2: associative significance for them that may actually help motivate, i

880
00:50:28,520 --> 00:50:30,560
Speaker 2: don't know, going to the bathroom, or may actually make

881
00:50:30,600 --> 00:50:34,359
Speaker 2: them feel subjectively less pain or something like that. But

882
00:50:34,400 --> 00:50:38,799
Speaker 2: that could lead to the erroneous assumption therefore, that you

883
00:50:38,880 --> 00:50:43,840
Speaker 2: can have physically implausible control over the external world with

884
00:50:43,880 --> 00:50:44,880
Speaker 2: whistling somehow.

885
00:50:45,400 --> 00:50:46,480
Speaker 1: Yeah, anyway.

886
00:50:46,680 --> 00:50:49,879
Speaker 2: Ostwald then relates this to reports tying directly back into

887
00:50:49,920 --> 00:50:54,200
Speaker 2: our previous episode about sailors who have intense superstitions about

888
00:50:54,239 --> 00:50:58,520
Speaker 2: whistling and believe that it contains powerful and dangerous magic,

889
00:50:58,600 --> 00:51:01,720
Speaker 2: you know, again whistling for the wind. And he also

890
00:51:01,800 --> 00:51:05,560
Speaker 2: discusses magical beliefs about whistling to summon birds and Celtic

891
00:51:05,680 --> 00:51:10,640
Speaker 2: tales and this involves a mediating technology. Plenty of stories

892
00:51:10,640 --> 00:51:14,000
Speaker 2: about beasts and magical creatures that are commanded by a flute.

893
00:51:14,120 --> 00:51:17,680
Speaker 2: You know, think of the god pan and the magical

894
00:51:17,760 --> 00:51:19,799
Speaker 2: syringx and so forth, but.

895
00:51:20,440 --> 00:51:25,920
Speaker 1: Also the piper, pied piper. Yes, yeah, yeah.

896
00:51:25,960 --> 00:51:28,200
Speaker 2: But the interesting observation that sort of puts a bow

897
00:51:28,280 --> 00:51:31,120
Speaker 2: on this whole thing is he ends up talking about

898
00:51:31,160 --> 00:51:35,200
Speaker 2: whistling as a form of non verbal signaling. So here

899
00:51:35,239 --> 00:51:39,799
Speaker 2: he would specifically not be talking about actual languages that

900
00:51:39,920 --> 00:51:42,440
Speaker 2: use whistles, where there's a full language and the whistles

901
00:51:42,480 --> 00:51:46,680
Speaker 2: actually mean words, So you know, he's not talking about

902
00:51:46,719 --> 00:51:51,160
Speaker 2: whistling with precise informational content, but rather the more informal

903
00:51:51,239 --> 00:51:56,720
Speaker 2: type of communication done via whistling in other contexts, He writes, quote,

904
00:51:56,719 --> 00:52:00,560
Speaker 2: wordless signals usually have a vague and imprecise meaning. They

905
00:52:00,600 --> 00:52:05,600
Speaker 2: do not usually communicate ideas, but serve rather to attract attention.

906
00:52:06,280 --> 00:52:08,760
Speaker 2: And he described some of the same research we've already

907
00:52:08,800 --> 00:52:11,520
Speaker 2: talked about, for example, that whistling is a type of

908
00:52:11,560 --> 00:52:15,160
Speaker 2: noise making that travels especially well by concentrating energy in

909
00:52:15,200 --> 00:52:17,759
Speaker 2: the one to four kilohertz range, which is the best

910
00:52:17,800 --> 00:52:20,960
Speaker 2: window for humans to hear. It's sort of a perfect

911
00:52:21,040 --> 00:52:25,040
Speaker 2: attention getter. But in the context of most cultures, cultures

912
00:52:25,080 --> 00:52:28,240
Speaker 2: where whistling does not constitute a language. It doesn't contain

913
00:52:28,800 --> 00:52:32,399
Speaker 2: words or precise information. Again, its meaning is vague. It's

914
00:52:32,480 --> 00:52:36,680
Speaker 2: just an attention getter. And personally, I think maybe it's

915
00:52:36,800 --> 00:52:40,120
Speaker 2: in this vagueness that a lot of the superstitions and

916
00:52:40,200 --> 00:52:44,840
Speaker 2: ideas about the magical danger of whistling could emerge, because

917
00:52:44,880 --> 00:52:47,400
Speaker 2: it's sort of a one to two punch. It's this paradox.

918
00:52:47,440 --> 00:52:51,439
Speaker 2: Whistling is like the most powerful signal you can make

919
00:52:51,480 --> 00:52:54,880
Speaker 2: with your body to attract attention, the most powerful sound

920
00:52:55,040 --> 00:52:58,000
Speaker 2: signal you can make. Right, it's this piercing sound. It

921
00:52:58,120 --> 00:53:01,439
Speaker 2: travels far, it it makes people turn their heads. It's

922
00:53:01,480 --> 00:53:05,280
Speaker 2: like a beacon, and yet in most cases it doesn't

923
00:53:05,280 --> 00:53:09,360
Speaker 2: form precise words or phrases, so you can't be sure

924
00:53:09,440 --> 00:53:12,759
Speaker 2: what kind of attention you are attracting. It's just a

925
00:53:12,840 --> 00:53:16,120
Speaker 2: general beacon. It could attract a friend, or if you're

926
00:53:16,120 --> 00:53:18,360
Speaker 2: in a dangerous place, maybe you're on the sea and

927
00:53:18,400 --> 00:53:21,400
Speaker 2: there are all kinds of forces at work, it could

928
00:53:21,440 --> 00:53:25,080
Speaker 2: just as likely attract unwanted attention, a dangerous enemy of

929
00:53:25,120 --> 00:53:28,839
Speaker 2: some kind. And because you can't form precise words with it,

930
00:53:28,960 --> 00:53:31,919
Speaker 2: you also don't know what you're saying or what you're

931
00:53:31,960 --> 00:53:34,719
Speaker 2: asking for. It's like the scene in the movie where

932
00:53:34,760 --> 00:53:38,320
Speaker 2: you know, you like read a spell from an ancient

933
00:53:38,400 --> 00:53:40,360
Speaker 2: book in another language and you don't know what the

934
00:53:40,400 --> 00:53:43,000
Speaker 2: words are, so you don't know what kind of spell

935
00:53:43,040 --> 00:53:45,440
Speaker 2: you're enacting or what kind of trouble you're getting into.

936
00:53:45,880 --> 00:53:50,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, or thinking about the transmissions that we send into

937
00:53:50,520 --> 00:53:53,040
Speaker 1: outer space, or that are sent from somewhere else in

938
00:53:53,080 --> 00:53:56,399
Speaker 1: outer space by some you know, presumably intelligent or ones

939
00:53:56,440 --> 00:54:01,000
Speaker 1: intelligent species, like the potential danger or of just of

940
00:54:01,120 --> 00:54:05,359
Speaker 1: whistling into the cosmic darkness, and you don't know who

941
00:54:05,400 --> 00:54:07,480
Speaker 1: is going to receive the signal and what they'll make

942
00:54:07,520 --> 00:54:08,160
Speaker 1: of the signal.

943
00:54:08,640 --> 00:54:12,560
Speaker 2: I think that's a perfect analogy. Yeah, It's like I

944
00:54:12,600 --> 00:54:15,200
Speaker 2: think a lot of these fears and superstitions about the

945
00:54:15,239 --> 00:54:18,560
Speaker 2: magical power of whistling would be like if somebody in

946
00:54:18,600 --> 00:54:21,160
Speaker 2: the real context said, I have created the most powerful

947
00:54:21,280 --> 00:54:26,560
Speaker 2: radio transmitter that will omni directionally broadcast an incredibly clear,

948
00:54:26,800 --> 00:54:30,360
Speaker 2: powerful signal that any other intelligence out there could detect.

949
00:54:31,000 --> 00:54:32,840
Speaker 2: We don't know what they'll make of it, but let's

950
00:54:32,880 --> 00:54:37,920
Speaker 2: just start transmitting. There would obviously be some real concerns

951
00:54:37,920 --> 00:54:42,920
Speaker 2: about that from some of the less sanguine of extraterrestrial theorists.

952
00:54:43,440 --> 00:54:46,480
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean imagine if we just piped circus music out,

953
00:54:46,760 --> 00:54:49,399
Speaker 1: like just non stop circus music, what would they make

954
00:54:49,440 --> 00:54:51,919
Speaker 1: of it? Maybe the killer clowns from out of space

955
00:54:51,920 --> 00:54:53,280
Speaker 1: show up. That's the problem.

956
00:54:53,480 --> 00:54:54,239
Speaker 2: God help us.

957
00:54:55,000 --> 00:54:57,000
Speaker 1: All right, Well, we're gonna go ahead and wrap up

958
00:54:57,040 --> 00:55:00,520
Speaker 1: this four part Whistling series here, but we'd love to

959
00:55:00,560 --> 00:55:03,319
Speaker 1: hear from everyone out there, because whistling is something that

960
00:55:03,360 --> 00:55:05,799
Speaker 1: I think all of us have some connection to. You

961
00:55:05,840 --> 00:55:07,839
Speaker 1: can whistle, or you can't whistle, or you can sort

962
00:55:07,880 --> 00:55:11,280
Speaker 1: of whistle where there's some sort of cultural ideas about whistling.

963
00:55:11,280 --> 00:55:13,560
Speaker 1: There's something about whistling in the way you were brought up.

964
00:55:14,160 --> 00:55:17,759
Speaker 1: There's whistling in various pieces of media, So all of

965
00:55:17,800 --> 00:55:19,920
Speaker 1: this is fair game. Writ in. We would love to

966
00:55:19,960 --> 00:55:22,600
Speaker 1: hear from you. In the meantime, you can always find

967
00:55:22,600 --> 00:55:24,640
Speaker 1: core episodes of Stuff to Blow your Mind on Tuesdays

968
00:55:24,680 --> 00:55:27,400
Speaker 1: and Thursdays in these Stuff to Blow your Mind podcast feed.

969
00:55:27,960 --> 00:55:30,319
Speaker 1: On Mondays we do listener mail, on Wednesdays we do

970
00:55:30,360 --> 00:55:33,359
Speaker 1: a short form artifact or monster fact episode, and on

971
00:55:33,400 --> 00:55:35,520
Speaker 1: Fridays we do Weird House Cinema. That's our time to

972
00:55:35,520 --> 00:55:37,759
Speaker 1: set aside most serious concerns and just talk about a

973
00:55:37,800 --> 00:55:38,520
Speaker 1: strange film.

974
00:55:38,800 --> 00:55:42,080
Speaker 2: Huge thanks, as always to our excellent audio producer Seth

975
00:55:42,160 --> 00:55:45,160
Speaker 2: Nicholas Johnson. If you would like to get in touch

976
00:55:45,160 --> 00:55:47,560
Speaker 2: with us with feedback on this episode or any other,

977
00:55:47,920 --> 00:55:50,000
Speaker 2: to suggest a topic for the future, or just to

978
00:55:50,000 --> 00:55:52,840
Speaker 2: say hello, you can email us at contact Stuff to

979
00:55:52,880 --> 00:56:02,000
Speaker 2: Blow your Mind dot com.

980
00:56:02,080 --> 00:56:05,040
Speaker 3: Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For

981
00:56:05,120 --> 00:56:08,960
Speaker 3: more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

982
00:56:09,040 --> 00:56:24,280
Speaker 3: or wherever you're listening to your favorite shows.

983
00:56:29,480 --> 00:56:29,520
Speaker 1: H