WEBVTT - Ig Nobel Prizes 2018: Part 1 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:05.840 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:05.840 --> 0:00:14.200 Works dot Com. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow 0:00:14.240 --> 0:00:17.360 your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, 0:00:17.440 --> 0:00:21.160 and our yearly tradition returns. We always end up covering 0:00:21.239 --> 0:00:23.880 the ig Nobel Prizes, and that's what we're gonna do 0:00:23.960 --> 0:00:27.720 today in part one of our ig No Bells series. 0:00:28.040 --> 0:00:30.760 That's right. We we generally pick up with the ig 0:00:30.760 --> 0:00:34.080 Noo Bells after October is finished because the Ignoble Prizes, 0:00:34.320 --> 0:00:37.200 it tends to happen, uh right at the end of September. 0:00:37.400 --> 0:00:40.199 Terrible timing for us, like we're just getting going for 0:00:40.320 --> 0:00:42.840 Monster season and then they throw these in our past. 0:00:43.000 --> 0:00:45.080 But I think it works out too because then for us, 0:00:45.159 --> 0:00:48.199 because everybody can sort of read the initial press releases 0:00:48.280 --> 0:00:50.720 if you know, if you're if you're paying attention to them, 0:00:50.760 --> 0:00:53.279 to the science to science media, you'll probably pick up 0:00:53.280 --> 0:00:56.560 on on what one and then you can eventually check 0:00:56.600 --> 0:00:58.840 back in with us and hear us chat about it 0:00:58.840 --> 0:01:01.680 as well. Now, these spirit of the Ignoble Prizes, if 0:01:01.720 --> 0:01:05.320 you're not familiar is they would say they follow the 0:01:05.319 --> 0:01:08.800 ethos of Professor Frank Right, Professor Frank, Professor Frank. He'll 0:01:08.800 --> 0:01:12.080 make you laugh, He'll make you think, Yeah, yeah, the Simpsons, Yeah, 0:01:12.200 --> 0:01:15.120 very very much. So, Uh, I have to we have 0:01:15.200 --> 0:01:17.640 to point out, as I think we usually do ignobles. 0:01:18.200 --> 0:01:21.399 In some cases, they rub some people the wrong way. 0:01:21.760 --> 0:01:23.520 Some people don't see the humor in it. They maybe 0:01:23.520 --> 0:01:27.320 think that science should, uh should be a humorist affair 0:01:27.440 --> 0:01:29.640 and that we and or they think that that in 0:01:29.680 --> 0:01:32.960 some cases, uh, the honorees are being made fun of. 0:01:33.040 --> 0:01:36.360 But I think for the vast majority of individuals honored 0:01:36.400 --> 0:01:39.440 by the ignobles, uh, they get it, They get the joke, 0:01:39.520 --> 0:01:42.200 they see the value of it, and they realize that, yes, 0:01:42.240 --> 0:01:46.399 it's about having fun, but it's also about honoring legitimate 0:01:46.440 --> 0:01:49.280 research as well. Yeah. I mean, so these are real studies, 0:01:49.320 --> 0:01:53.160 and it tends to focus on studies that are funny 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:55.920 when you first look at them, but they usually do 0:01:56.040 --> 0:01:59.320 reveal something at least pretty interesting. I mean not always. 0:01:59.400 --> 0:02:02.160 Sometimes I kindaman, well, that's just pretty silly, But most 0:02:02.160 --> 0:02:03.920 of the time there's at least some kind of really 0:02:03.960 --> 0:02:07.280 interesting tidbit in there. It either moves the field forward 0:02:07.360 --> 0:02:09.639 in some unexpected way, or it gives you something to 0:02:09.680 --> 0:02:13.200 think about. Uh, they do that, they Professor Frank. Professor Frank. 0:02:13.960 --> 0:02:16.760 So these have been awarded every year since by the 0:02:16.720 --> 0:02:22.000 Annals of Improbable Research, a humorous science publication that looks 0:02:22.040 --> 0:02:25.360 at various studies and whatnot. The purpose of this award, 0:02:25.360 --> 0:02:28.120 according to the editors of Improbable Research, is to quote 0:02:28.360 --> 0:02:30.840 honor achievements that first make people laugh and then make 0:02:30.919 --> 0:02:33.680 then make them think. Furthermore, they stressed that the ten 0:02:33.760 --> 0:02:36.919 prizes aren't necessarily meant to pass judgment on the winners. Instead, 0:02:37.600 --> 0:02:40.440 as they they tend to emphasize that the prizes quote 0:02:40.680 --> 0:02:44.799 celebrate the unusual, honor the imaginative, and spur people's interests 0:02:44.800 --> 0:02:47.720 in science, medicine, and technology. And by the way, the 0:02:47.720 --> 0:02:51.880 principal individual here is editor Mark Abram's, editor of the 0:02:51.919 --> 0:02:56.440 Animals of Improbable Research. Um, and I think that's important 0:02:56.480 --> 0:02:58.880 to the idea about spurring people's interests, because a lot 0:02:58.880 --> 0:03:02.880 of times do manage to highlight studies and papers and 0:03:02.919 --> 0:03:06.960 achievements in science then otherwise don't really rise, uh, you know, 0:03:07.360 --> 0:03:11.000 up in the headlines, or if they do, they only 0:03:11.160 --> 0:03:13.960 rise in the headlines because they're funny. And so one 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:15.680 thing that we like to do when we look at 0:03:15.680 --> 0:03:18.880 the ignobles is find Okay, are are there some of 0:03:18.880 --> 0:03:21.040 these that are actually kind of interesting when you start 0:03:21.080 --> 0:03:24.120 thinking about them? Do they give you something to ponder? Yeah? 0:03:24.200 --> 0:03:27.320 And in always we ask the question why is it important? 0:03:27.480 --> 0:03:30.280 And why is it funny? The second question is generally 0:03:30.720 --> 0:03:33.800 just very obvious and the kid go except for the 0:03:33.800 --> 0:03:37.160 ones that aren't actually all that funny, which occasionally happens. Yeah, 0:03:37.600 --> 0:03:40.760 sometimes sometimes, but generally you're like, oh, yeah, I see 0:03:40.800 --> 0:03:43.160 why they honored that one. And in some cases I 0:03:43.160 --> 0:03:45.360 think we've mentioned on the show, a new study will 0:03:45.360 --> 0:03:48.000 come along and we'll realize, oh, that one that's going 0:03:48.080 --> 0:03:50.400 to get an ignoble at some point. Yeah, any study 0:03:50.440 --> 0:03:54.000 about like butts or bending over or something that's just 0:03:54.240 --> 0:03:58.000 it's just a shoe, and then it just naturally Nobell bait. Yes, exactly. 0:03:58.760 --> 0:04:01.800 All right. So, now that we've established the ig Nobel 0:04:01.880 --> 0:04:04.040 Prizes and what they are for anyone it wasn't familiar, 0:04:04.640 --> 0:04:07.200 let's let's start jumping into some of the winners for 0:04:07.240 --> 0:04:10.200 two thousand and eighteen. Okay, Now, obviously we're not going 0:04:10.240 --> 0:04:12.640 to cover all of the winners in the same depth. 0:04:12.680 --> 0:04:14.920 Some we're going to engage with pretty deeply. Some we'll 0:04:14.960 --> 0:04:17.720 just sort of talk about pretty quickly. But I think 0:04:17.760 --> 0:04:21.760 the first thing we should look at is maybe medicine prize. Yes, 0:04:21.839 --> 0:04:26.720 so this one honors Mark Mitchell and David Wartener for 0:04:26.720 --> 0:04:29.919 for using roller coaster rides to try to hasten the 0:04:29.960 --> 0:04:34.560 passage of kidney stones. Does this have practical utility? Well yeah, 0:04:34.640 --> 0:04:38.800 just just you wait. This was an October publication and uh, 0:04:39.000 --> 0:04:42.800 Dave Wardinger was the individual who accepted the honors at 0:04:42.800 --> 0:04:46.320 the ceremony. So this one obviously links into an episode 0:04:46.320 --> 0:04:48.720 that you and I recorded years back, The Stone of Madness, 0:04:49.400 --> 0:04:53.720 which my name is Lubert nas because the episode dealt 0:04:53.760 --> 0:04:56.480 in part with the passing of kidney stones and bladder 0:04:56.520 --> 0:04:59.359 stones and what wait is it the Bosch painting? Is 0:04:59.360 --> 0:05:02.279 it Bosch? Yes, the removing of the Stone of Madness 0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:06.280 not from the bowels but from the cranium. Right, But 0:05:06.400 --> 0:05:09.560 the the idea is that there was like a removal 0:05:09.600 --> 0:05:13.400 of stone surgeries in the early modern period. Was was 0:05:13.839 --> 0:05:17.640 kind of dicey, right, literally, like people were diced and 0:05:17.680 --> 0:05:20.359 sliced and then died horrible deaths on the operating table. 0:05:20.560 --> 0:05:23.160 But there's this painting by Herono Spash that makes fun 0:05:23.320 --> 0:05:25.479 of this guy who's going to try to get a 0:05:25.520 --> 0:05:28.440 stone and alleged stone cut out of his head, and 0:05:28.480 --> 0:05:31.320 he's like, please cut the stone. Master. My name is 0:05:31.440 --> 0:05:33.960 Lubert Doss, So I often think about that when I 0:05:33.960 --> 0:05:36.920 see somebody behaving foolishly in public. I'm just like, my 0:05:37.000 --> 0:05:41.160 name is Lupert Doss. All right, Well I've I I 0:05:41.200 --> 0:05:42.960 don't know about you, Joe, but I've been fortunate enough 0:05:43.080 --> 0:05:45.080 to avoid kidney stones thus far in my life. If 0:05:45.080 --> 0:05:49.000 you've ever had a kidney stone, now I have not. Okay, Well, basically, 0:05:49.080 --> 0:05:51.520 what we're we're talking about here are hard deposits made 0:05:51.520 --> 0:05:54.760 of minerals and salts. They form, They can form inside 0:05:54.760 --> 0:05:58.599 your kidneys, and they often form when the urine becomes concentrated, 0:05:59.000 --> 0:06:02.160 allowing the minerals to crystallized and stick together. Uh if 0:06:02.200 --> 0:06:05.000 they If they form, then your body tries to pass them, 0:06:05.120 --> 0:06:08.000 which can be painful. In some cases, doctors can simply 0:06:08.000 --> 0:06:09.720 give you a pain killer and instruct you to drink 0:06:09.720 --> 0:06:12.800 a lot of water to help pass it. But in 0:06:12.839 --> 0:06:16.040 other cases, especially if it becomes lodged in your urinary tract, 0:06:16.560 --> 0:06:21.440 surgery may be required to it. That's just I'm shivering 0:06:21.520 --> 0:06:24.479 over here. So there's no dud, you know, definite single 0:06:24.600 --> 0:06:28.560 cause for kidney stones, but dehydration can certainly lead to 0:06:28.600 --> 0:06:32.200 their formation. Again the concentration of urine. Remember now, as 0:06:32.240 --> 0:06:35.040 the authors of this paper point out, some three hundred 0:06:35.080 --> 0:06:39.320 thousand US patients seek emergency care for kidney stones each year. 0:06:39.839 --> 0:06:42.640 And in addition to hydration saying you know, drink a 0:06:42.640 --> 0:06:46.600 lot of water or the administration fluids to other things 0:06:46.600 --> 0:06:52.800 that are sometimes used are positional inversion and external application 0:06:52.839 --> 0:06:57.000 of force. WHOA, so what does that mean getting upside 0:06:57.040 --> 0:07:00.120 down or something getting upside down getting thrown around a 0:07:00.120 --> 0:07:02.560 little bit, And so I think everyone can can can 0:07:02.600 --> 0:07:05.160 realize here while why we're getting into the domain of 0:07:05.279 --> 0:07:08.480 roller coasters, uh, They point out that there have been 0:07:09.160 --> 0:07:14.280 reports of spontaneous kidney stone passage associated with both the 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:18.880 roller coaster riding and bungee cord jumping. So somebody had 0:07:18.960 --> 0:07:22.680 kidney stones and then they're like time to go bungee jumping. Well, 0:07:22.720 --> 0:07:24.440 and that was a little unclear the weather. It was 0:07:24.440 --> 0:07:27.400 a situation where if the individual knew they had the stones, 0:07:27.400 --> 0:07:31.320 I assume they knew, um, given the discomfort that is 0:07:31.360 --> 0:07:34.440 generally reported, but attached the bungee cords. My name is 0:07:34.520 --> 0:07:39.040 Lubert Dass. The problem though, is, they said, these these 0:07:39.200 --> 0:07:42.080 accounts they tend to be reported in like non peer 0:07:42.080 --> 0:07:46.440 reviewed publications or it's just kind of like word of mouth. 0:07:46.920 --> 0:07:50.640 And uh. In particular, uh, they noted that they had 0:07:50.840 --> 0:07:54.880 heard numerous stories about people passing kidney stones after riding 0:07:55.240 --> 0:07:58.320 Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, a roller coaster at Walt disney 0:07:58.320 --> 0:08:02.360 World's Magic Kingdom thing part in Orlando, Florida. Uh. Yeah, 0:08:02.360 --> 0:08:05.480 they they had turned apparently heard various accounts of folks 0:08:05.600 --> 0:08:09.120 spontaneously passing the stones after writing it, Have you ridden 0:08:09.120 --> 0:08:11.640 this roller coaster? Joe? No, I'm not really a roller 0:08:11.640 --> 0:08:14.960 coaster person, and I haven't wait. Which one is that 0:08:15.040 --> 0:08:17.160 Magic Kingdom? Oh? Yeah, I've been to that one, but 0:08:17.200 --> 0:08:18.720 not since I was a kid. I was probably too 0:08:18.800 --> 0:08:20.520 short to ride to it. Anyway, when I was there, 0:08:20.640 --> 0:08:23.520 it's like it has like a mining theme. I wrote 0:08:23.520 --> 0:08:26.120 it just like what last year the year before. I 0:08:26.440 --> 0:08:30.080 wrote it with my son and my niece, and it's 0:08:30.080 --> 0:08:32.480 a fun roller coaster. I'm not really a roller coaster 0:08:33.040 --> 0:08:36.400 person myself, but I enjoyed some of the roller coasters 0:08:36.400 --> 0:08:39.520 at Disney because they're just like really phenomenal productions, especially 0:08:39.559 --> 0:08:41.000 the one that has a YETI in it. Did you 0:08:41.040 --> 0:08:43.719 get the black lung? The black light? The black long 0:08:43.840 --> 0:08:47.360 was not a featured add on when I was at Disney. 0:08:47.440 --> 0:08:49.600 But but this, this is a roller coaster that does 0:08:49.679 --> 0:08:52.080 move you around. It's it's not like one of those 0:08:52.080 --> 0:08:55.719 just crazy, um you know, one of those just insane 0:08:55.840 --> 0:08:58.520 rides that does that some people go for. It doesn't 0:08:58.559 --> 0:09:01.120 look like it's a design and to get a confession 0:09:01.160 --> 0:09:04.240 out of you, but it's still it takes you for 0:09:04.320 --> 0:09:08.000 a ride. So they wanted to test it out. They said, well, 0:09:08.120 --> 0:09:10.800 let's go there and let's see what happens to some 0:09:10.880 --> 0:09:16.280 kidney stones. Brilliant, I'm in now. They didn't take individuals 0:09:16.280 --> 0:09:19.040 with kidney stones on board, so there were no human 0:09:19.080 --> 0:09:21.079 test subjects here. What they did is they took three 0:09:21.160 --> 0:09:24.040 kidney stones of different sizes, suspended them in urine, and 0:09:24.080 --> 0:09:29.160 then placed them in adult uteroscopy and reino scopy simulators, 0:09:29.400 --> 0:09:31.560 and then they took them for twenty rides, so sixty 0:09:31.679 --> 0:09:34.640 rides in total. Okay, so they what basically got them 0:09:34.679 --> 0:09:38.800 in some kind of fake kidney kind of contraption. Yeah, 0:09:38.920 --> 0:09:40.920 there were some pictures of these in the paper and 0:09:40.960 --> 0:09:43.040 they one of them looks kind of like a prop 0:09:43.080 --> 0:09:46.000 from a David Cronenberg film, and the other looks like 0:09:46.120 --> 0:09:50.680 a it's like a crystal tree looking, you know device. 0:09:50.760 --> 0:09:52.240 It looks like it kind of looks like an award 0:09:52.320 --> 0:09:55.760 you might win for, you know, achievements in Kidney Stone, 0:09:55.800 --> 0:09:57.679 Remove Horse something. So do you know if they had 0:09:57.720 --> 0:10:01.320 to have any kind of arrangements to negotiate these organs 0:10:01.320 --> 0:10:04.280 onto the roller coaster, like are they arguing with the 0:10:04.320 --> 0:10:08.240 ticket guy or what? They pointed out specifically that that 0:10:08.440 --> 0:10:14.480 care was taken to preserve guests, employ entertainment, joinment. Um. So, 0:10:14.480 --> 0:10:16.679 so I believe they had them inside of something hidden 0:10:16.679 --> 0:10:19.839 out of the way because they also mentioned specifically, uh, 0:10:19.880 --> 0:10:22.920 and this is this is an exact quote. Uh. Bovine 0:10:22.960 --> 0:10:26.760 and poor sign renal models were deemed impractical as patients 0:10:26.800 --> 0:10:30.800 surrogates for study, owing to ambient temperature and the inappropriate 0:10:30.840 --> 0:10:34.400 display of such material in a family friendly amusement park. Okay, 0:10:34.440 --> 0:10:38.319 so you couldn't bring like pig kidneys onto the roller 0:10:38.320 --> 0:10:42.040 coaster because that might upset some people. Yeah, and Disney 0:10:42.080 --> 0:10:44.960 was apparently they were gracious hosts for this study, but 0:10:45.360 --> 0:10:47.080 they knew there were limits it's kind of a delicate 0:10:47.120 --> 0:10:50.480 situation when you're carrying out your kidney stone research on 0:10:50.559 --> 0:10:53.760 an active amusement park ride. But then again, you might 0:10:53.800 --> 0:10:56.120 have some science loving kids there. They get their you know, 0:10:56.240 --> 0:10:58.520 their picture hugging Mickey, and then they get their picture 0:10:58.600 --> 0:11:04.080 hugging some pig kidneyst opportunity. That's maybe, so maybe maybe 0:11:04.120 --> 0:11:06.280 for the next study. So what did they find out, Well, 0:11:06.320 --> 0:11:08.720 they found that it did seem to prove helpful, but 0:11:08.800 --> 0:11:12.200 mostly only if you're seated towards the back of the coaster. 0:11:12.800 --> 0:11:15.240 So for front coaster passage, right, we're talking four of 0:11:15.320 --> 0:11:19.440 twenty four. Rear coaster passage rate twenty three or thirty six. Hey, 0:11:19.520 --> 0:11:22.600 that's not bad. Yeah, I mean it's like, like everybody knows, 0:11:22.600 --> 0:11:24.160 you said at the back of the coaster, you're gonna 0:11:24.160 --> 0:11:27.360 get a bump, your more hillacious ride, and if you 0:11:27.360 --> 0:11:30.400 have a lacious kidney stone, well it's going this is 0:11:30.440 --> 0:11:32.920 going to help knock it out of you just a 0:11:32.960 --> 0:11:36.240 little bit easier. So the author is actually like suggesting 0:11:36.360 --> 0:11:39.640 people do this somehow, I would suspect not. No, no, 0:11:39.760 --> 0:11:43.559 I don't think anybody is saying go to to Disney 0:11:43.600 --> 0:11:47.280 World instead of a doctor kidney stone. Like, for one thing, 0:11:47.600 --> 0:11:51.640 the lines for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad are pretty long, 0:11:51.679 --> 0:11:54.840 and I cannot imagine standing in them with any kind 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:59.120 of like an abdominal discomfort going on, or you know, 0:11:59.160 --> 0:12:04.640 and enhanced necessity to urinate or anything. But how long 0:12:04.679 --> 0:12:07.360 they had the stand in lines total in order to 0:12:07.480 --> 0:12:10.240 run the ride the thirty six times or whatever that 0:12:10.280 --> 0:12:12.200 they were trying to pass the stone? Maybe there's some 0:12:12.240 --> 0:12:15.000 sort of a research based fast pass you can get. 0:12:15.760 --> 0:12:17.400 I'm not sure. I don't know that they mentioned that 0:12:17.480 --> 0:12:20.439 specifically in the study. And then they also point out 0:12:20.440 --> 0:12:22.760 that their other you know, their limitations on the study. 0:12:22.800 --> 0:12:26.160 Obviously they didn't get to use human patients. They use 0:12:26.240 --> 0:12:29.560 these models, But the study is important because kidney stones 0:12:30.240 --> 0:12:34.240 are a legitimate health concern, and I don't think, Yeah, 0:12:34.240 --> 0:12:38.640 even though we're not talking about installing roller coasters in hospitals, 0:12:39.440 --> 0:12:41.760 it does make one think what kind of what kind 0:12:41.760 --> 0:12:44.520 of an apparatus might be appropriate, right, Yeah, I mean 0:12:44.559 --> 0:12:47.400 you could probably just figure out what part of the 0:12:47.480 --> 0:12:50.400 roller coaster rides specifically is the most useful, like what 0:12:50.640 --> 0:12:52.920 you know, kinds of g forces on the body and 0:12:53.000 --> 0:12:55.280 how that's applied, and maybe just like make a chair 0:12:55.360 --> 0:12:57.280 that does it to you or something. Yeah, that's I 0:12:57.280 --> 0:13:01.959 think that's the most logical application that I can imagine, 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:05.560 short of just actually having a roller coaster at the hospital. 0:13:05.720 --> 0:13:09.319 That's also sounds kind of fun um. But anyway, that's 0:13:09.320 --> 0:13:12.560 why it's important, why it's funny. Obviously, it's science plus 0:13:12.679 --> 0:13:16.720 roller coasters. Anytime that combo was coming at you, it's 0:13:16.760 --> 0:13:19.839 going to elect a few giggles. I think that's a 0:13:19.840 --> 0:13:22.160 pretty good one. Okay, well let's take a quick break, 0:13:22.200 --> 0:13:25.319 and when we come back, we will have more ignobles. 0:13:26.280 --> 0:13:30.120 Thank thank Alright, we're back now. The next one I 0:13:30.120 --> 0:13:35.240 think we should go to is Nutrition Prize. And I 0:13:35.320 --> 0:13:38.960 know what you have all been thinking lately. You've been wondering, 0:13:39.440 --> 0:13:42.600 can I lose weight by converting to a diet consisting 0:13:42.679 --> 0:13:46.720 only of human flesh? The Hannibal diets, the new fad. 0:13:46.920 --> 0:13:49.160 Oh no, Hannibal eats all kinds of other stuff. He 0:13:49.160 --> 0:13:51.520 would have to go like super paleo Hannibal. Well, he 0:13:51.600 --> 0:13:54.880 supplements his diet with human flesh. That's how he stays 0:13:54.880 --> 0:13:58.720 so trim putting like a blueberry reduction balsamic glaze on 0:13:58.760 --> 0:14:01.080 this humane You know how unhealthy all that would be 0:14:01.160 --> 0:14:04.440 if he wasn't throwing in some some lean human flesh 0:14:04.480 --> 0:14:07.000 to just really balance everything out, all right. So this 0:14:07.080 --> 0:14:11.120 prize went to a researcher named James Cole for a 0:14:11.200 --> 0:14:16.200 paper published in Scientific Reports in called Assessing the Caloric 0:14:16.280 --> 0:14:20.400 Significance of Episodes of Human Cannibalism in the Paleolithic. Who 0:14:20.440 --> 0:14:23.360 attended the ceremony is James Cole, the author of this paper. 0:14:23.440 --> 0:14:27.680 So let's say you come across some evidence of humans 0:14:27.680 --> 0:14:31.600 eating other humans, it's reasonable to ask why are they 0:14:31.640 --> 0:14:34.120 doing this? Right? In fact, this is often a question 0:14:34.160 --> 0:14:37.160 we have to ask about the remains of Stone Age 0:14:37.240 --> 0:14:41.400 humans because they're Paleolithic sites, Stone Age sites that show 0:14:41.480 --> 0:14:44.920 clear evidence of human cannibalism at least as far back 0:14:44.960 --> 0:14:47.600 as our hominin relatives in the early place to see 0:14:47.600 --> 0:14:50.240 in roughly two point five million years ago. So I 0:14:50.240 --> 0:14:52.160 guess before we get to the y. Actually, a totally 0:14:52.160 --> 0:14:54.880 reasonable question you might have is, if we're talking about 0:14:55.000 --> 0:14:59.600 hominin remains that are thousands or even millions of years old, 0:14:59.760 --> 0:15:03.880 how can we tell cannibalism took place. It's just bones, right, Like, 0:15:03.920 --> 0:15:05.960 what would the evidence be? Well, there are a couple 0:15:05.960 --> 0:15:10.520 of lines of evidence for cannibalism in the Pleistocene. One 0:15:10.800 --> 0:15:15.080 is anthropogenic modification of human remains. That's the like polite 0:15:15.080 --> 0:15:19.680 sciencey way to talk about signs of butchering on human bones. 0:15:20.280 --> 0:15:23.720 So clear human made changes to the bones of other humans, 0:15:23.720 --> 0:15:25.920 and these would be the same kinds of physical marks 0:15:25.960 --> 0:15:28.520 that we would find left on the bones of what 0:15:28.600 --> 0:15:32.520 are considered prey animals. Signs of butchering, cooking, and eating. 0:15:32.560 --> 0:15:35.880 And examples would include cuts and chop marks in the 0:15:35.920 --> 0:15:38.200 bone from the butchering process, like they might have been 0:15:38.240 --> 0:15:42.320 made with sharp stone tools, breaks in the long bones, 0:15:42.360 --> 0:15:45.400 which would be presumably to access the marrow, because that's 0:15:45.440 --> 0:15:49.440 the good part. Evidence of cooking, such as burned ends 0:15:49.520 --> 0:15:53.240 of a bone, human tooth marks on a bone, quote, 0:15:53.640 --> 0:15:56.520 lack of a cranial base to get at the brain 0:15:57.040 --> 0:16:00.840 on otherwise complete or near complete skeleton. Well you gotta 0:16:00.880 --> 0:16:05.680 suck the head. I mean, anybody who's like crayfish or 0:16:05.920 --> 0:16:08.600 swamp bugs if you want to call them. So, I'm sorry, 0:16:08.640 --> 0:16:12.280 I said crayfish crawdads is the correct terms that I'm 0:16:12.320 --> 0:16:14.120 gonna go with. Crawdads. I have to admit I'm a 0:16:14.160 --> 0:16:18.200 little hazy. I do like swamp bugs as a as 0:16:18.240 --> 0:16:21.200 a kind of Cajun description though right, well, they're they 0:16:21.200 --> 0:16:23.600 are quite bug like, but they have delicious heads, and 0:16:23.640 --> 0:16:25.560 so a lot of people just eat the tails, but 0:16:25.640 --> 0:16:27.640 people who know what's up also take the what would 0:16:27.640 --> 0:16:29.680 you call it this guess this is the thoracic cavity 0:16:29.760 --> 0:16:31.800 with the head there, and they just suck all the 0:16:31.880 --> 0:16:34.840 fat and juices and guts out of it, get those 0:16:34.880 --> 0:16:39.680 good tasty brains and uh so, yeah, there apparently there's 0:16:39.680 --> 0:16:42.720 some nutritional value in the brains that some people might 0:16:42.760 --> 0:16:45.080 want to get. But there's also the idea and that 0:16:45.240 --> 0:16:49.760 sometimes modification of the skull is done for some kind 0:16:49.800 --> 0:16:53.360 of other purpose, not just purely accessing nutrition, but like 0:16:53.400 --> 0:16:58.400 the creation of skull cups, making skulls into like eating 0:16:58.480 --> 0:17:01.240 or drinking vessels. Yeah. I mean, we've we've seen more 0:17:01.280 --> 0:17:04.600 recent examples of this in Tibetan customs, for instance. Yeah. 0:17:05.119 --> 0:17:07.879 Uh So, another thing that Cole mentions is like a 0:17:07.880 --> 0:17:11.639 physical sign of cannibalism in ancient human rains or ancient 0:17:11.680 --> 0:17:15.280 hominin remains, not necessarily just holmo sapiens uh is quote, 0:17:15.280 --> 0:17:19.040 the virtual absence of vertebrae due to crushing or boiling 0:17:19.119 --> 0:17:21.560 to get it bone marrow and grease, so like maybe 0:17:21.560 --> 0:17:23.480 you want to get that good spinal cord, you're gonna 0:17:23.520 --> 0:17:25.920 have the vertebrae kind of coming apart. It's like eating 0:17:25.960 --> 0:17:30.760 crab legs. Yeah, and then tool scrapes on the bones, 0:17:30.880 --> 0:17:33.239 which there could be scrapes on the bones related to 0:17:33.520 --> 0:17:35.720 butchering and accessing of meat, but there could also be 0:17:35.760 --> 0:17:40.199 scrapes on the bones for ritualistic or symbolic purposes. On 0:17:40.280 --> 0:17:44.080 top of that, there's some interesting genetic evidence of cannibalism 0:17:44.240 --> 0:17:47.760 in the in the world. In the prehistoric world, for example, 0:17:47.800 --> 0:17:52.240 there are diseases known as transmissible sponge iform and cephalopath 0:17:52.240 --> 0:17:54.880 ease or t s S, and examples of this would 0:17:54.920 --> 0:17:58.480 include CURU or kreuz feld Yakob disease. And these are 0:17:58.800 --> 0:18:03.040 prion diseases or pre on diseases that cause degeneration of 0:18:03.160 --> 0:18:06.920 brain tissue and can be acquired often through cannibalism. When 0:18:06.920 --> 0:18:09.080 you might have heard of is kuru. The members of 0:18:09.119 --> 0:18:11.960 the for A linguistic group in Papua New Guinea have 0:18:12.080 --> 0:18:14.840 often been exposed to the t SC known as kuru 0:18:15.000 --> 0:18:18.560 because of their practice of ritual Indo cannibalism. For religious 0:18:18.560 --> 0:18:21.760 and cultural reasons. Yeah, and a lot of these ideas, um, 0:18:21.800 --> 0:18:24.800 you know, they have to do with the passing on 0:18:25.320 --> 0:18:29.199 of a departed individual, parted family member, like and you 0:18:29.280 --> 0:18:32.320 consume some of their flesh and it's like their spirit 0:18:32.359 --> 0:18:35.240 lives on through you, that sort of thing, exactly. H 0:18:35.320 --> 0:18:38.600 And So an interesting thing is that there are worldwide 0:18:38.640 --> 0:18:42.920 patterns of genes we find that seem to indicate our 0:18:43.040 --> 0:18:48.639 species genetic history sometimes favored in the past adaptation for 0:18:48.840 --> 0:18:52.560 resistance to T S S, for example meat at all. 0:18:52.680 --> 0:18:55.840 In a two thousand three paper, and Science wrote, quote 0:18:55.840 --> 0:19:00.640 heterozygosity for common polymorphism in the human pre on protein 0:19:00.720 --> 0:19:05.719 gene p r n P confers relative resistance to prion diseases, 0:19:05.800 --> 0:19:09.120 and then later they're write worldwide p r np haplotype 0:19:09.160 --> 0:19:13.840 diversity encoding alleal frequencies suggest the strong balancing selection at 0:19:13.840 --> 0:19:17.119 this locust occurred during the evolution of modern humans. So 0:19:17.200 --> 0:19:20.680 the authors argued that the patterns of genetic resistance to 0:19:20.800 --> 0:19:23.320 T S c S that we see in human populations 0:19:23.600 --> 0:19:27.680 indicate that something in our evolutionary history favored people who 0:19:27.680 --> 0:19:31.400 could cannibalize, who could eat human flesh without contracting fatal 0:19:31.520 --> 0:19:34.639 encephalopath ez, this is a fun paper thus far. This 0:19:34.760 --> 0:19:37.680 really it's kind of a nice follow up to our 0:19:37.720 --> 0:19:41.879 ghoul episode, the delta impart with you know, with the 0:19:42.000 --> 0:19:45.440 question you know what about the consumption of human corpses 0:19:45.480 --> 0:19:49.159 in in in our in our past, and in our biology. 0:19:49.240 --> 0:19:51.240 It is an interesting subject. In fact, I'm not even 0:19:51.320 --> 0:19:53.280 really getting deep into the paper yet. I'm just I'm 0:19:53.320 --> 0:19:54.960 just setting it up, so it's going to really get 0:19:54.960 --> 0:19:57.440 going in a second, okay. Like, first of all, their 0:19:57.480 --> 0:20:01.080 disputes about whether individual sites actually do show evidence of 0:20:01.080 --> 0:20:04.879 cannibalism rather than some other form of manipulation of the dead, 0:20:04.960 --> 0:20:08.399 like you could have had maybe ritualistic de fleshing of 0:20:08.440 --> 0:20:10.840 the dead without eating. Maybe for some reason they wanted 0:20:10.920 --> 0:20:13.080 to get the meat off the bones of a dead person, 0:20:13.160 --> 0:20:15.560 but not not eat it. Well, like one example that 0:20:15.600 --> 0:20:17.760 comes to mind, to come back to Tibet, the practice 0:20:17.800 --> 0:20:20.320 of sky burial, the breaking down of a corpse so 0:20:20.400 --> 0:20:25.240 that they flesh may be consumed by sacred animals. Uh Like, 0:20:25.320 --> 0:20:27.760 if you were just looking at the forensic evidence of that, 0:20:27.840 --> 0:20:30.479 you might say, oh, well, clearly this person was butchered 0:20:30.480 --> 0:20:33.040 and eating, because essentially it is butchery, but it is 0:20:33.080 --> 0:20:36.920 not for cannibalism, but whether or not it happened in 0:20:36.920 --> 0:20:39.840 individual cases, it at least does appear to be something 0:20:39.880 --> 0:20:42.000 that happened enough for us to have records of it. 0:20:42.160 --> 0:20:46.840 Sometimes prehistoric humans and other related hominins were eating each 0:20:46.840 --> 0:20:49.040 other at least often enough for us to have some 0:20:49.160 --> 0:20:52.200 archaeological record of it. So back to the original question, 0:20:52.240 --> 0:20:55.480 the question of why why were these ancient humans and 0:20:55.520 --> 0:20:58.800 other hominin relatives eating each other? Coal notes that there 0:20:58.840 --> 0:21:02.800 are multiple document and motivations for human cannibalism. So several 0:21:02.840 --> 0:21:05.560 of these would be like survival cannibalism. That's when you're 0:21:05.560 --> 0:21:07.920 not normally a cannibal, but you're about to starve to death, 0:21:07.960 --> 0:21:10.399 so you eat somebody. Right. This is essentially with the 0:21:10.440 --> 0:21:14.680 touch of the wind to go in in the folklore 0:21:14.680 --> 0:21:17.320 of native people's in the America's gets that the idea 0:21:17.400 --> 0:21:20.240 that is forced to uh, you may have to enact 0:21:20.240 --> 0:21:23.560 cannibal cannibalism, right. And then there is of course psychotic 0:21:23.640 --> 0:21:26.920 or criminal cannibalism, and aggressive cannibalism. These would be various 0:21:26.960 --> 0:21:31.520 types of cannibalism that is some sort of like aggressive symbology, 0:21:31.720 --> 0:21:35.399 like warfare cannibalism. You you know, not only defeat your enemies, 0:21:35.400 --> 0:21:37.760 but you defeat them so totally that you feel you 0:21:37.760 --> 0:21:40.480 should eat them. There is, of course, as we've pointed out, 0:21:40.680 --> 0:21:45.040 spiritual a ritual cannibalism, and then there is gastronomic or 0:21:45.119 --> 0:21:49.480 dietary cannibalism, nutritional cannibalism. Basically like this is part of 0:21:49.480 --> 0:21:51.920 your diet and you're eating it because it's meat. Yeah, 0:21:51.960 --> 0:21:54.200 it's kind of like that list the old school cannibalism. 0:21:54.240 --> 0:21:56.920 This is more in line with the biological cannibalism that 0:21:56.960 --> 0:21:59.800 we've discussed in the show before, right, of other organisms. 0:22:00.040 --> 0:22:02.480 Uh uh, yeah, there's that. And then also he points 0:22:02.480 --> 0:22:04.720