WEBVTT - Why Have Rats Outsmarted Us For So Long? 0:00:00.240 --> 0:00:02.680 Guess what will what's that man go? So there's this 0:00:02.800 --> 0:00:05.800 fact you always hear about Pablo Escobar. At the height 0:00:05.840 --> 0:00:09.320 of his career, Pablo was bringing in eighteen billion dollars 0:00:09.360 --> 0:00:12.719 a year. That's all cash. It was so much money 0:00:12.720 --> 0:00:16.280 that he was spending a month just on rubber bands. 0:00:16.440 --> 0:00:19.680 Rubber bands, I know. But here's what's crazier. He and 0:00:19.720 --> 0:00:22.919 his accountant budgeted to lose ten percent of that. I mean, 0:00:23.400 --> 0:00:27.159 Escobar expected to lose one point eight billion dollars and 0:00:27.200 --> 0:00:31.840 the money was going to rats. Rats literal rats, Like 0:00:32.040 --> 0:00:34.080 there were so many of them scarring around his warehouse 0:00:34.120 --> 0:00:36.360 that he just accepted that the rodents were going to 0:00:36.520 --> 0:00:39.239 eat his profits. And you think about it, right, this 0:00:39.320 --> 0:00:42.400 is Pablo Escobar, the most ruthless kingpin in the world, 0:00:42.920 --> 0:00:46.120 and he's happy to kill judges and police officers and 0:00:46.360 --> 0:00:49.920 anyone that's threatening his business. But even he's like, there's 0:00:49.960 --> 0:00:52.800 no way to beat rats. Let's just give them the 0:00:52.840 --> 0:01:13.039 ten percent they deserve. That's how unstoppable rats are. I'd say, hey, there, 0:01:13.040 --> 0:01:15.640 podcast listeners, you're listening to Part Time Genius. I'm Will 0:01:15.720 --> 0:01:17.800 Pearson and I'm joined by my good friend Mangues show 0:01:17.840 --> 0:01:21.280 Ticketer and today we're asking why have rats out smart 0:01:21.319 --> 0:01:23.959 at us for so long? It's a good question, and listeners, 0:01:24.080 --> 0:01:27.120 I know it sounds disgusting, but I promise you this 0:01:27.200 --> 0:01:30.000 is going to be fascinating. We've packed this show with fun. 0:01:30.160 --> 0:01:32.319 We'll have writer A. J. Jacobs on in a little bit. 0:01:32.800 --> 0:01:34.960 We've got a part Time Genius quiz coming up where 0:01:34.959 --> 0:01:37.360 a couple of our listeners can win some very big 0:01:37.440 --> 0:01:39.920 and very important prizes. So who do we invite to 0:01:39.920 --> 0:01:42.520 play in this episode? Mango? Today we asked for librarians 0:01:42.520 --> 0:01:45.800 and only librarians, and I think next week we're looking 0:01:45.800 --> 0:01:47.880 for accountants. That sounds right, yeah, and then I think 0:01:47.920 --> 0:01:51.440 it's pastry Chef's name Kyle. And anyway, be sure to 0:01:51.480 --> 0:01:54.000 follow us part Time Genius on all the social media 0:01:54.080 --> 0:01:56.320 thing he's you know, Twitter, Facebook, if you want to 0:01:56.360 --> 0:02:00.320 come on and compete. So let's dive into today's question, Ango, 0:02:00.840 --> 0:02:03.760 what do you know about rats? Well, the first thing 0:02:03.800 --> 0:02:05.880 I learned is that there are some great titles out 0:02:05.880 --> 0:02:08.680 there about rats, including this book from the eighteen fifties 0:02:08.760 --> 0:02:12.600 called The Rat It's History and Destructive Character. I have 0:02:12.680 --> 0:02:15.120 to say that title does not sound pro rats. It 0:02:15.280 --> 0:02:18.200 isn't it's this famous book in rat studies, and it's 0:02:18.360 --> 0:02:20.919 great because you can tell that the author, James Rodwell, 0:02:21.200 --> 0:02:23.799 has zero love for rats. Like one of the things 0:02:23.880 --> 0:02:25.560 he does is to challenge the reader to say the 0:02:25.600 --> 0:02:30.080 word rat slowly, just to confirm how terrible the word sounds. 0:02:30.400 --> 0:02:33.280 He calls it the foulest word in British zoology. You've 0:02:33.320 --> 0:02:37.840 got to try it. Um, yeah, it's it's not a 0:02:37.840 --> 0:02:40.320 pretty sounding word, I'll give you that. I know he's right, 0:02:40.760 --> 0:02:44.079 and it kind of sounds foul. So I got curious 0:02:44.120 --> 0:02:46.760 and started looking up synonyms in the thesaurus, and I 0:02:46.840 --> 0:02:50.600 realized there are no pleasant sounding alternatives for the word rat. 0:02:50.639 --> 0:02:53.960 All right, give me something like, you know, vermin is one, 0:02:54.639 --> 0:03:00.480 rodents nars. It doesn't even sound like a word, but 0:03:00.720 --> 0:03:03.480 that's it. That's where the list stops. The only pleasant 0:03:03.560 --> 0:03:08.000 term I could find for rats was track bunny. I know. 0:03:08.120 --> 0:03:10.600 That's what subway workers call them when they see a 0:03:10.639 --> 0:03:13.000 rat on the subway line. You know, treck bunnies is 0:03:13.040 --> 0:03:15.079 almost a little too cute, I think, though, But I 0:03:15.440 --> 0:03:18.280 I get what you're saying. Rats have a terrible reputation 0:03:18.360 --> 0:03:20.960 and could use some rebranding. I don't know, maybe like uh, 0:03:21.440 --> 0:03:25.360 like radio Shack rebranded itself the shack because shacks are 0:03:25.360 --> 0:03:28.360 in right now, I guess the shack. Uh Yeah. The 0:03:28.400 --> 0:03:31.800 fishing industry has done this with what they call trash fish, 0:03:31.919 --> 0:03:34.400 so instead of calling it the slime head, they renamed 0:03:34.440 --> 0:03:38.080 it the orange roughie. Or instead of the Patagonian toothfish, 0:03:38.280 --> 0:03:41.520 which just sounds disgusting, we've got the Chilean sea bass. Yeah, 0:03:41.560 --> 0:03:43.080 I mean they're there are tons of these. I think 0:03:43.120 --> 0:03:44.920 my favorite is how the pil short goes by the 0:03:45.000 --> 0:03:47.880 name cornish sardine. I'd never eat a pil shirt, but 0:03:47.920 --> 0:03:50.600 a cornish starting I kind of want some, now, I know. 0:03:50.680 --> 0:03:53.920 I just pictured it on like a tiny fork. So 0:03:53.960 --> 0:03:56.800 that's what I'd love to do. Listeners, if you're up 0:03:56.840 --> 0:03:58.600 for it, We're going to run a little contest to 0:03:58.640 --> 0:04:00.800 come up with a new name for rats, something that 0:04:01.000 --> 0:04:04.600 acknowledges the critters are gross but also deserving of admiration. 0:04:05.040 --> 0:04:06.920 And to the top five geniuses who come up with 0:04:06.960 --> 0:04:09.760 a rat replacement that's better than I don't know, uh, 0:04:10.040 --> 0:04:13.080 sewer kittens, We'll send you a tiny wheel of cheese. Alright, 0:04:13.120 --> 0:04:16.800 sewer kittens. Yes, Listeners, please write your suggestions for rebranding 0:04:16.800 --> 0:04:19.080 the rat and we'll honor you on our Facebook page. 0:04:19.400 --> 0:04:21.840 So just to get this out there, I'm totally creeped 0:04:21.839 --> 0:04:25.040 out by rats, and it's because their germ elevators. We 0:04:25.080 --> 0:04:27.720 all know that rats carry ticks and lice with them, 0:04:27.760 --> 0:04:31.200 and throughout history they've carried diseases into food sources and 0:04:31.240 --> 0:04:34.480 into people's homes. But they're also just creepy to me. 0:04:34.560 --> 0:04:36.280 I mean, have you ever seen these videos of how 0:04:36.400 --> 0:04:39.839 rats squeeze their bodies under door frames and through tiny 0:04:40.920 --> 0:04:44.479 It's so gross. I know, that gelatinous body thing is 0:04:44.560 --> 0:04:48.440 just so disgusting. Like octopuses can do that too. A 0:04:48.520 --> 0:04:51.000 good sized octopus can squeeze through a hole the size 0:04:51.000 --> 0:04:54.240 of a cherry tomato. And to be honest, as much 0:04:54.240 --> 0:04:57.040 as I hate rats, I would be so freaked out 0:04:57.080 --> 0:05:00.880 if my apartment had an octopus infestation, just a nest 0:05:00.920 --> 0:05:03.599 of baby octopus hanging out under the saints. Do you 0:05:03.600 --> 0:05:06.560 remember that Mitch Hedberg bit about how koalas would scatter 0:05:06.680 --> 0:05:08.640 whenever you turn on the lights in his apartment. That 0:05:08.640 --> 0:05:11.599 would be so much cuter than rats or octopus, I know, 0:05:11.760 --> 0:05:14.279 so much more adorable. Here's something I never thought about. 0:05:14.400 --> 0:05:17.960 I was reading this book Rats by Robert Sullivan, and 0:05:18.000 --> 0:05:20.240 Sullivan makes this an analogy that if you see a 0:05:20.240 --> 0:05:23.039 grizzly bear, you know you're in the wilderness, right, like 0:05:23.200 --> 0:05:26.000 you never see a grizzly bear anywhere else. But what 0:05:26.080 --> 0:05:28.279 we don't often think about is that if you see 0:05:28.279 --> 0:05:31.720 a rat, it's also an indicator that humans are nearby, 0:05:31.960 --> 0:05:34.120 right right. I mean, it's no secret that rats thrive 0:05:34.200 --> 0:05:37.400 by following human populations around. I mean, if you think 0:05:37.440 --> 0:05:40.360 about it, there really aren't natural predators to pick them 0:05:40.360 --> 0:05:43.719 off in the city. It's basically just rats versus humans. 0:05:44.160 --> 0:05:46.039 And just to be clear, while there are plenty of 0:05:46.120 --> 0:05:49.240 rats out there today, we're really focusing on the Norway rat, 0:05:49.320 --> 0:05:51.320 also known as the brown rat. Yeah, I we should 0:05:51.320 --> 0:05:54.359 clarify why we're homing in on the Norway at well. 0:05:54.400 --> 0:05:56.520 I mean, there are black rats too, which are smaller 0:05:56.560 --> 0:05:58.839 and they tend to be located in warmer climates, But 0:05:58.880 --> 0:06:01.240 the brown rats are really the common ones most of 0:06:01.279 --> 0:06:03.040 us think about. I mean, you might have heard of 0:06:03.360 --> 0:06:06.240 warf rats or street rats, or barn rats or sewer rats, 0:06:06.320 --> 0:06:08.040 or even you've heard of all I've heard of all 0:06:08.080 --> 0:06:11.040 of them. Keep me keep a list. These are all 0:06:11.120 --> 0:06:13.560 just brown rats. I mean, the same rat goes by 0:06:13.560 --> 0:06:16.440 all these names because they're so adaptable. Yeah, that's right. 0:06:16.480 --> 0:06:19.840 I mean basically any rat you've been worried about, including 0:06:19.839 --> 0:06:24.120 the ones that swim out of toilets. I know you're 0:06:24.120 --> 0:06:27.080 looking at me skeptically, but every year there are ten 0:06:27.160 --> 0:06:30.360 to fifteen reports of this in Portland, Oregon alone, So 0:06:30.400 --> 0:06:32.120 you've got to imagine that a good number of rats 0:06:32.160 --> 0:06:35.240 creep out of toilets across the US. I mean, Norway 0:06:35.320 --> 0:06:37.839 rats are great swimmers, and of course they're not really 0:06:37.839 --> 0:06:39.760 from Norway. Yeah. I guess it's just one of those 0:06:39.760 --> 0:06:41.960 things where you want to blame another culture for the 0:06:42.040 --> 0:06:45.000 new type of grossness, like how the Germans called the 0:06:45.000 --> 0:06:48.440 German cockroach the Russian cockroach, and Russians call it the 0:06:48.480 --> 0:06:52.560 Prussian cockroach, and everyone's happy to blame it on somebody else. Which, 0:06:52.920 --> 0:06:54.839 by the way, the other part of that rats story 0:06:54.920 --> 0:06:58.200 is that the scientists in England name the rats Norway rats, 0:06:58.240 --> 0:07:01.000 even though they had come from Denmark, the Denmark part 0:07:01.040 --> 0:07:02.720 of Norway. That's right. I mean he might have been 0:07:02.760 --> 0:07:04.920 a little bit bad at geography, but at the time 0:07:05.000 --> 0:07:08.359 Norway rats had not even yet invaded Norway. That's so weird. 0:07:08.480 --> 0:07:10.840 The other thing Sullivan mentions is a rule of thumb 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:13.160 is that if you see a rat, it means there 0:07:13.160 --> 0:07:15.400 are ten more lurking nearby. And if you see a 0:07:15.480 --> 0:07:17.960 rat during the day, like on the subway tracks, then 0:07:18.120 --> 0:07:21.760 you're really in trouble because there's definitely a problem. Like 0:07:21.960 --> 0:07:24.560 rats love to roam at night. They don't want to 0:07:24.560 --> 0:07:27.200 be seen, but if they're out running around, it means 0:07:27.200 --> 0:07:30.200 the population is stressed because there's too much competition for food. 0:07:30.440 --> 0:07:32.640 I never thought about it that way. Well, let's get 0:07:32.640 --> 0:07:35.640 down to it. So we know people hate rats, and 0:07:35.680 --> 0:07:38.560 we know they're lurking in bigger quantities than anyone sees. 0:07:39.040 --> 0:07:41.400 But why are rats so hard to control? I mean, 0:07:41.400 --> 0:07:43.640 one of the biggest reasons is that they populate so 0:07:43.760 --> 0:07:46.400 darn't quickly. I heard this crazy thing that if you're 0:07:46.400 --> 0:07:48.960 in a city at any given moment, you're not that 0:07:49.080 --> 0:07:52.280 far from rats having sex. I can't even think. I'm 0:07:52.280 --> 0:07:54.080 not going to tell you where I heard it. I 0:07:54.120 --> 0:07:57.600 heard it somewhere. So but rats are really really good 0:07:57.600 --> 0:08:00.080 at mating. When rats aren't eating, all their due ing 0:08:00.200 --> 0:08:02.440 is having sex. I mean, there's there's no four play, 0:08:02.520 --> 0:08:05.600 no berry White. It's just business. In fact, it's one 0:08:05.640 --> 0:08:07.960 of the biggest reasons rats are so hard to defeat, 0:08:08.280 --> 0:08:10.800 because a male Norway rat can have sex with twenty 0:08:10.840 --> 0:08:15.800 different partners in six hours. And the math on it's baffling. 0:08:15.800 --> 0:08:17.720 I mean, think about this, alright. So one pair of 0:08:17.800 --> 0:08:21.080 rats can churn out fifteen thousand descendants within a year. 0:08:21.560 --> 0:08:24.360 Each letter then has eight to ten rats, and if 0:08:24.360 --> 0:08:27.720 the gestation period is only twenty one days, well that's 0:08:27.720 --> 0:08:30.040 a lot of rats that are then also eager to 0:08:30.120 --> 0:08:32.800 make this It's pretty gross, which makes you wonder why 0:08:32.840 --> 0:08:35.319 we aren't all in the rat catching business. I know. 0:08:35.920 --> 0:08:38.480 So while we're on the topic of rat sex, I've 0:08:38.480 --> 0:08:41.199 got to tell you about my favorite study on the subject. 0:08:41.520 --> 0:08:45.480 There's this well regarded scientists from Cairo, amd Chfique, who's 0:08:45.520 --> 0:08:49.080 been dead for a while now, but he published this 0:08:49.120 --> 0:08:52.440 experiment in European Neurology where he tested the effects of 0:08:52.559 --> 0:08:56.079 various pant materials on the sex drive of rats. Let 0:08:56.080 --> 0:08:58.760 me get this straight. He made tiny pants for rats. 0:08:58.920 --> 0:09:01.960 He did the rats went topless, of course, but he 0:09:02.000 --> 0:09:05.240 took seventy five million rats and had tiny trousers custom 0:09:05.240 --> 0:09:09.840 made for each of them. One group were a cotton pants, 0:09:09.880 --> 0:09:13.320 another war wool, another war a blend, and these rats 0:09:13.480 --> 0:09:16.360 they didn't get any less frisky. They just continued to 0:09:16.400 --> 0:09:19.959 get down. Except except for what, Except for the ones 0:09:20.040 --> 0:09:22.440 dressed in polyester. I mean, this is an amazing part. 0:09:22.480 --> 0:09:26.600 The ones outfitted in a polyester pants started losing their 0:09:26.640 --> 0:09:30.560 sex drive, or their confidences or something else. So I 0:09:30.559 --> 0:09:32.640 don't know. Maybe it's the chafing on their tiny rat 0:09:32.640 --> 0:09:35.760 bits that made them lose interests, or just being forced 0:09:35.760 --> 0:09:38.360 to wear polyester. But let me get this straight. What 0:09:38.440 --> 0:09:40.480 you're saying is all we have to do to end 0:09:40.520 --> 0:09:43.000 our war with rats and get them to stop reproducing 0:09:43.520 --> 0:09:46.920 is to hire an army of tailors, have the millions 0:09:46.920 --> 0:09:50.360 of brown rats fitted for polyester trousers, and then sit 0:09:50.400 --> 0:09:53.200 back and watch the population blendle. That simple. Yeah, I mean, 0:09:53.480 --> 0:09:56.320 Nicky Mouse doesn't have kids, and if Disney just switched 0:09:56.320 --> 0:09:58.920 out his fabric and let his boys breathe a little, 0:09:59.000 --> 0:10:01.079 maybe he could start the family. His mom is always 0:10:01.120 --> 0:10:07.400 naging him about. Brilliant And now it's time for a 0:10:07.480 --> 0:10:11.160 dramatic reading of America's foremost rat poet, Jack Handy, from 0:10:11.160 --> 0:10:17.880 his volume Squeaky Poems Rhymes about my rat. Look at 0:10:17.880 --> 0:10:22.720 her whiskers, look at her toes after you've rested, look 0:10:22.760 --> 0:10:35.600 at her nose. Thank you? So ango, who do we 0:10:35.600 --> 0:10:39.080 have on the line? So we have two librarians, Margaret 0:10:39.080 --> 0:10:41.600 and Michael, going head to head in today's matchup. Now, 0:10:41.600 --> 0:10:45.719 we wanted librarians and only librarians today because librarians are 0:10:45.760 --> 0:10:48.120 known to be word people, and we will be playing 0:10:48.160 --> 0:10:51.200 a word game before we uh, before we get to 0:10:51.200 --> 0:10:54.080 that one, don't we introduce our two contestants. We have 0:10:55.000 --> 0:10:57.520 Margaret on the line. Margaret is a librarian at m 0:10:57.559 --> 0:11:01.840 I T. Margaret, welcome. You said that you actually appeared 0:11:01.960 --> 0:11:07.640 without your permission in a calendar of librarians, a calendar 0:11:07.720 --> 0:11:11.640 of fictional librarians. But you're not fictional. No, I'm real 0:11:11.679 --> 0:11:13.719 at as far as I can tell. Michael, you are 0:11:13.840 --> 0:11:15.960 second contestant, and I want you to tell us what 0:11:16.040 --> 0:11:21.000 calendars you've appeared in. I've never appeared on a calendar. Well, okay, 0:11:21.800 --> 0:11:26.160 librarian exactly, all right. Well Michael, you are in Brooklyn. 0:11:26.160 --> 0:11:28.240 Tell us a little bit about what you do. Okay. 0:11:28.280 --> 0:11:32.360 I'm a reference librarian of the Brooklyn Public Library. That's awesome. 0:11:32.400 --> 0:11:35.439 And you also have a really interesting story though as well. 0:11:35.480 --> 0:11:38.800 In addition to being a librarian, you've been an improv 0:11:38.880 --> 0:11:43.040 comic now for whatever a decade, yes, thirteen years. My 0:11:43.200 --> 0:11:46.800 specialty is working at the hospitals and nursing homes. I 0:11:46.880 --> 0:11:49.800 per form at hospitals and I hope run an improv 0:11:49.840 --> 0:11:53.120 workshop at a nursing home where the people themselves if 0:11:53.160 --> 0:11:59.040 you improv, anybody's interested in joining or contributing. It's www 0:11:59.120 --> 0:12:03.160 dot van ob doc work information. That's very very cool. 0:12:03.200 --> 0:12:05.280 And I see, actually you do. One of your characters 0:12:05.440 --> 0:12:08.200 is a librarian, so we are now speaking to people 0:12:08.480 --> 0:12:11.720 that play two fictional librarians. Do either of you have 0:12:12.440 --> 0:12:15.840 a favorite library in the world, I'm just supposed to 0:12:15.840 --> 0:12:18.880 pick one um in terms of just like Pure Knock, 0:12:18.960 --> 0:12:21.640 my soft soft best library experience I've ever had was 0:12:21.760 --> 0:12:26.360 visiting the British Library in London where they keep because 0:12:26.400 --> 0:12:29.760 they have like an enormous collection of historical manuscript and 0:12:29.840 --> 0:12:33.480 I remember I think I went from a letter uh 0:12:33.640 --> 0:12:36.560 signed by Queen Elizabeth, to a copy of the mc 0:12:36.640 --> 0:12:42.400 mccarta to the manuscript for Persuasion resting on Jane Austen's 0:12:42.440 --> 0:12:44.400 writing descument. It's just like I had to sit down 0:12:46.040 --> 0:12:49.560 minutes and collect myself. That's pretty great. All right, Well, Mango, 0:12:49.679 --> 0:12:52.440 what game are are two contestants going to be playing today? 0:12:52.520 --> 0:12:54.280 So we're going to play a game called rat in 0:12:54.320 --> 0:12:56.680 the middle, all right. So the rules of the game 0:12:56.760 --> 0:12:59.079 are simple. Every answer is going to have the word 0:12:59.200 --> 0:13:01.800 rat in it. So, for example, we could ask about 0:13:01.840 --> 0:13:04.920 the second Star Trek movie because the word wrath and 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:07.920 wrath of con has the letters rat in it. We 0:13:07.960 --> 0:13:10.520 thought it would be fun because your librarians and you're 0:13:10.600 --> 0:13:13.360 used to the world of having to be rather quiet 0:13:13.480 --> 0:13:15.959 in your spaces, we thought we could let you, guys 0:13:16.440 --> 0:13:22.000 maybe chime in with animal noises if that works for you. So, um, Margaret, 0:13:22.000 --> 0:13:24.040 you want to be our You want to be our Moor? 0:13:25.080 --> 0:13:27.960 All right? Michael, you want to uh what what animal 0:13:27.960 --> 0:13:29.319 would you like to pick? You want to you want 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:34.040 to coca? All right? There we go. Yeah, that and 0:13:34.040 --> 0:13:37.200 that's it. That's more like it. There we go. Alright, 0:13:37.240 --> 0:13:39.680 So we're gonna get started here. Remember you're playing for 0:13:39.760 --> 0:13:42.880 a big prize. Whoever wins, we'll get a handwritten note 0:13:42.920 --> 0:13:46.199 from us to your mom or your boss or someone 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:49.480 else who is important to you, uh, singing your praises. 0:13:49.520 --> 0:13:51.480 So there's a lot on the line here. Okay, guys. 0:13:52.559 --> 0:13:55.640 Question number one, I don't forget your noises, and when 0:13:55.679 --> 0:13:58.120 we hear your noise, we will call on you and 0:13:58.160 --> 0:14:01.440 you'll have a chance to answer. While this dinosaur had 0:14:01.520 --> 0:14:04.840 over eight hundred teeth, it's more notable for the three 0:14:04.880 --> 0:14:11.160 horns protruding from its face. I believe that was Michael 0:14:11.240 --> 0:14:16.840 with the cauca. Alright, what's the answer? Michael? Well done? 0:14:16.880 --> 0:14:21.040 I love how you emphasize the rat there, so alright. 0:14:21.280 --> 0:14:24.320 Question number two? You ready to move, Margaret? I think 0:14:24.320 --> 0:14:27.360 this one might be yours. This is a good one. 0:14:27.640 --> 0:14:31.640 Elvis Presley was a practitioner of this martial art, and 0:14:31.720 --> 0:14:38.080 in fact, in nineteen alright, hold on, I'll finish the question, 0:14:38.080 --> 0:14:41.000 he shot a documentary called The New Gladiator, hoping it 0:14:41.040 --> 0:14:44.800 would propel it into the mainstream. What do you think, 0:14:44.840 --> 0:14:53.120 Michael Karate? Well done? All right? Answer answer? You're you're 0:14:53.160 --> 0:14:56.440 still not in a calendar, Michael? All right? Here we go. 0:14:57.800 --> 0:15:01.360 Number three. The b Boys and Markey Mark and the 0:15:01.400 --> 0:15:04.280 Funky Bunch both had a hit song with this rat 0:15:04.400 --> 0:15:09.280 word in its title? Was that a move I heard? 0:15:10.800 --> 0:15:15.440 What do you think? Michael? Vibrations? That's absolutely right. Okay, 0:15:15.680 --> 0:15:18.520 here we go. Alright, I'm going to skip to another 0:15:18.520 --> 0:15:24.320 one here. All right, it's okay, This is okay. This 0:15:24.440 --> 0:15:28.320 Sasha Baron Cohen character is known for being the sixth 0:15:29.240 --> 0:15:34.120 There we go. What do you say, Margaret? Y are 0:15:34.160 --> 0:15:38.160 well done? Alright? One more question here, question number five. 0:15:38.320 --> 0:15:41.280 Lisa and Bart are obsessed with this violent Tom and 0:15:41.360 --> 0:15:47.440 Jerry rip off on the Simpsons. Was that a sound? Okay? 0:15:47.480 --> 0:15:53.040 Here we go, go for it. Show well done? Alright, alright, 0:15:53.040 --> 0:15:55.040 man goes. So what's our final tally here? So we've 0:15:55.040 --> 0:15:57.120 got Michael in first place with three points and Margaret 0:15:57.160 --> 0:15:59.880 in second place with two points. Michael, our letter do 0:16:00.000 --> 0:16:02.480 your mom will be in the mail shortly, and because 0:16:02.480 --> 0:16:05.160 we don't want anyone's mailbox to feel too lonely, Margaret, 0:16:05.160 --> 0:16:08.040 we're gonna send you a potato from Potato Parcel, the 0:16:08.040 --> 0:16:10.760 world's premier site for sending a potato through the postal service. 0:16:11.000 --> 0:16:24.440 Thank you both for playing. So One thing I found 0:16:24.440 --> 0:16:27.320 surprising was just how new rat studies are. In fact, 0:16:27.400 --> 0:16:30.000 I was actually thrown off by how new rats are 0:16:30.040 --> 0:16:33.760 to the United States. Like historically they're documented in Southeast Asia, 0:16:33.800 --> 0:16:36.560 then they move up to China, they invade Siberia and 0:16:36.600 --> 0:16:39.920 they march into Russia and then they sneak onto ships 0:16:39.920 --> 0:16:42.880 and move across the water with people. But and this 0:16:42.960 --> 0:16:46.080 is hard to fathom, rats didn't even arrive in places 0:16:46.080 --> 0:16:48.920 like Spain until eighteen hundred. That is pretty crazy. I mean, 0:16:48.920 --> 0:16:51.640 you imagine rats have just always been around and part 0:16:51.640 --> 0:16:54.080 of the cultural fabric. But it's true they only invaded 0:16:54.120 --> 0:16:57.560 states like Montana and the nineties or yeah. And and 0:16:57.680 --> 0:17:00.400 just to drive that point home, you know, j Otto 0:17:00.440 --> 0:17:03.160 Been the dudes who studied birds. Of course, he also 0:17:03.200 --> 0:17:06.400 studied rats and did rat paintings. And according to Sullivan, 0:17:06.400 --> 0:17:08.840 when oddo Been showed his paintings to members of Congress 0:17:08.880 --> 0:17:11.199 and we're talking about the early eighteen hundreds here, a 0:17:11.280 --> 0:17:14.560 number of them mistook the rats for squirrels. Like these 0:17:14.600 --> 0:17:17.359 were educated men, many who worked farms, and they couldn't 0:17:17.359 --> 0:17:20.280 tell the rats from squirrel. It can be tough sometimes 0:17:20.480 --> 0:17:22.800 you have to admit that. I mean, it's a little odd, 0:17:22.800 --> 0:17:25.320 but but you're right. The government only started studying the 0:17:25.359 --> 0:17:27.760 animals during World War two, back when we thought the 0:17:27.880 --> 0:17:31.479 Nazis might harness rodents to spread disease all across Europe. 0:17:31.880 --> 0:17:34.880 In fact, people who wanted to study rats before, they 0:17:34.880 --> 0:17:37.440 had to do it on the sly. So take Elmer McCollum, 0:17:37.520 --> 0:17:40.200 for instance. He was one of the pioneers at Johns 0:17:40.200 --> 0:17:43.199 Hopkins in the early nineteen hundreds, but he started his 0:17:43.280 --> 0:17:46.600 research with rats at the University of Wisconsin. But the 0:17:46.600 --> 0:17:49.120 thing is he had to do it in secret because 0:17:49.240 --> 0:17:53.240 and I'm quoting, the Wisconsin state legislature would not support 0:17:53.280 --> 0:17:56.400 public expenditures on room and board of rats. A pest 0:17:56.480 --> 0:17:58.719 to the Wisconsin I guess they paid tuition. I don't know, 0:17:59.160 --> 0:18:01.399 but I thought it was a weird. That's so weird. 0:18:01.760 --> 0:18:04.040 But what we've learned about rats in the last seventy 0:18:04.119 --> 0:18:08.119 years is incredible, and it's basically that they're little geniuses. 0:18:08.359 --> 0:18:11.800 Like they followed us across continents. They have this extraordinary 0:18:11.840 --> 0:18:14.920 sense of smell their home bodies, like they really don't 0:18:14.960 --> 0:18:18.159 travel more than sixty from their nest unless they have to, 0:18:18.240 --> 0:18:21.000 in which they can travel great distances and tread water 0:18:21.119 --> 0:18:23.480 for like three days at a time. They can be 0:18:23.600 --> 0:18:27.000 dropped from heights of fifty feet without injuring themselves. I 0:18:27.000 --> 0:18:31.680 mean that's five stories off the ground. And they're really adaptable. 0:18:31.800 --> 0:18:33.840 Like if rats have been born in an alley that 0:18:33.960 --> 0:18:37.080 serves Indian food, they'll have a preference for samosas and 0:18:37.119 --> 0:18:40.520 curries and spicy foods. And they don't even eat that 0:18:40.600 --> 0:18:43.480 much food, only like three to four ounces a day. 0:18:43.520 --> 0:18:47.840 That's pretty adaptable. They're also super cooperative, like in one 0:18:47.880 --> 0:18:51.600 study from two thousand, twelve rats were offered a chocolate 0:18:51.640 --> 0:18:54.840 chip treat or the opportunity to free a fellow rat, 0:18:55.200 --> 0:18:57.639 and over and over they freed the rat first, and 0:18:57.640 --> 0:19:00.280 then they shared the treat. And in studies where two 0:19:00.359 --> 0:19:02.160 rats had to press their own buttons at the same 0:19:02.200 --> 0:19:06.000 time to release treats, they quickly learned to cooperate. And 0:19:06.240 --> 0:19:09.760 this was the craziest to me. They're really sensitive, kind 0:19:09.800 --> 0:19:12.480 of like humans. Like if one of them get stressed, 0:19:12.760 --> 0:19:15.040 they bring that energy back to the nest and all 0:19:15.080 --> 0:19:17.760 of the rats get stressed. That's so sweet. The other 0:19:17.760 --> 0:19:19.919 thing I was reading about was just how suspicious they 0:19:19.920 --> 0:19:22.680 are of anything new, which of course is why pest 0:19:22.680 --> 0:19:25.480 control is so hard. Right, So we've established they're really 0:19:25.480 --> 0:19:30.439 reproductive unless they're sporting polyester, and they're really smart, but 0:19:31.600 --> 0:19:33.760 why haven't humans figured out a way to keep them 0:19:33.760 --> 0:19:36.040 in check? Yeah? Well, one of the funny things that 0:19:36.119 --> 0:19:38.320 keeps coming up in history is that we kind of 0:19:38.400 --> 0:19:41.639 keep forgetting about rats until we're actually confronted with them again. 0:19:41.720 --> 0:19:43.560 So it's kind of an out of sight, out of 0:19:43.600 --> 0:19:45.880 mind thing. But as soon as we do see them, 0:19:45.920 --> 0:19:48.920 we move super quickly. Right. So, in the nineteen sixties, 0:19:49.240 --> 0:19:52.119 Ebony magazine did this spread of housing projects in New 0:19:52.200 --> 0:19:55.679 York where the apartments were so dilapidated and drafty that 0:19:55.760 --> 0:19:58.959 children were under thick blankets trying to protect themselves from 0:19:59.000 --> 0:20:02.000 the cold. This wasn't at night, this was during the day, 0:20:02.040 --> 0:20:04.879 and the public was largely unmoved by the scene. But 0:20:04.920 --> 0:20:08.159 then people from the buildings started catching rats and bringing 0:20:08.160 --> 0:20:10.439 them into courts and showing the rats to the press. 0:20:11.000 --> 0:20:13.879 That's when the public opinion shifted. So and the odd 0:20:13.880 --> 0:20:16.320 part is that this happens over and over. Like in 0:20:16.359 --> 0:20:18.920 the nineteen thirties, the New York Times had stories about 0:20:18.960 --> 0:20:22.480 the atrocious rat infestation on Rikers Island. You know, this 0:20:22.520 --> 0:20:25.600 is the prison island between Queens and the Bronx. Well, 0:20:25.600 --> 0:20:28.120 the rat problem was so bad that the guards bought 0:20:28.160 --> 0:20:30.359 a dog to control the rats. You know what the 0:20:30.440 --> 0:20:33.320 rats did, They actually killed the dogs. So it was 0:20:33.840 --> 0:20:36.760 it was that bad, and pretty soon the officers on 0:20:36.800 --> 0:20:40.000 the island were dumping poison and discussing bringing snakes onto 0:20:40.000 --> 0:20:42.320 the island to deal with the rats. But New York 0:20:42.400 --> 0:20:45.959 totally ignored the situation until the rats swam from the 0:20:46.000 --> 0:20:50.200 island to this super exclusive summer community on Long Island Sound. 0:20:50.640 --> 0:20:52.720 And you know, when these ultra rich beach goers saw 0:20:52.800 --> 0:20:55.919 rats on their beach, they weren't having it. Yeah, that 0:20:56.000 --> 0:20:59.760 makes sense, but let's get zen for a second. This 0:20:59.840 --> 0:21:01.800 is actually one of the themes that keeps coming up 0:21:01.840 --> 0:21:05.120 in Sullivan's book, and it's that exterminators have the cisphius 0:21:05.240 --> 0:21:08.000 like task. They're given this enormous job of trying to 0:21:08.040 --> 0:21:11.080 control the rodent population, but as soon as they stop 0:21:11.160 --> 0:21:14.920 seeing rats, their budgets get cut, so no one wants 0:21:14.920 --> 0:21:17.880 to admit they exist. And it's crazy because, like past, 0:21:17.920 --> 0:21:21.080 controllers will work at five star hotels, and when they 0:21:21.119 --> 0:21:22.880 do that, they have to work in disguise, or when 0:21:22.880 --> 0:21:25.160 they introduce themselves at parties are on the first date, 0:21:25.400 --> 0:21:28.240 they kind of have to tread carefully, and so you 0:21:28.240 --> 0:21:30.080 you kind of come away feeling sorry for them, but 0:21:30.240 --> 0:21:34.680 also with this tremendous sense of respect. Like the best exterminators. 0:21:34.720 --> 0:21:39.480 They actually work as rats ares, and they're essentially archaeologists. Archaeologists, 0:21:39.480 --> 0:21:41.000 What what do you mean by that? Like, the rats 0:21:41.040 --> 0:21:43.480 won't travel far from home, but they will travel deep. 0:21:43.560 --> 0:21:46.600