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SYSK Selects: How Mirrors Work · Stuff You Should Know

0:01
Speaker 1: Good afternoon, and welcome to Stuff you Should Know Selects.
0:04
Speaker 1: It is Charles W. Chuck Bryant here in. My pick
0:06
Speaker 1: for this week is How Mirrors Work from September fourteen,
0:10
Speaker 1: two thousand ten. And boy, this one was a tough one.
0:14
Speaker 1: I remember when we had the idea of doing a
0:16
Speaker 1: show on mirrors. I thought, well, that's going to be
0:18
Speaker 1: short and not so interesting. But then I thought, oh,
0:21
Speaker 1: wait a minute, how do mirrors work? How are those
0:24
Speaker 1: things made? Where did they come from? It's pretty amazing.
0:28
Speaker 1: So we get into all that and more, and it's
0:31
Speaker 1: a pretty fascinating episode. And this will be one where
0:34
Speaker 1: you can kind of whip out some of these facts
0:36
Speaker 1: at your next dinner party and amazing to light your
0:39
Speaker 1: friends and family. So enjoy How Mirrors Work right here,
0:42
Speaker 1: right now. Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from House
0:54
Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast.
1:03
Speaker 1: I'm Josh Clark, there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. We're about
1:07
Speaker 1: to talk about mirrors. I set up it's a sinct
1:11
Speaker 1: how are you were you in the mirrors growing up?
1:14
Speaker 1: Now that we said, you know, I did it scinctly,
1:16
Speaker 1: we're gonna just blow like three minutes right. No, I
1:21
Speaker 1: was asking you if you were into mirrors, in the
1:23
Speaker 1: mirrors growing up? Yeah, I mean that didn't every kid
1:25
Speaker 1: go through a phase where they're like very obsessed with
1:28
Speaker 1: their looks and mirrors and things. Oh yeah, I was
1:30
Speaker 1: into myself. I wasn't in the mirrors. They were just
1:33
Speaker 1: a means and end, you know. Yeah, But I like
1:36
Speaker 1: I was reading this and I kind of was just
1:37
Speaker 1: thinking myself and remembering laughing about I remember being like
1:40
Speaker 1: fifteen and like stopping to look at mirrors anytime there
1:43
Speaker 1: was one to what looked like Yeah, and now I
1:46
Speaker 1: just I break them. I'd forgotten all about that phase
1:49
Speaker 1: of my life though, until you just brought it up.
1:51
Speaker 1: Remember that. Yeah, it's nice to be able to not
1:54
Speaker 1: look at a mirror. Like some days I'll go out,
1:56
Speaker 1: you know, after getting ready in the morning, and I
1:59
Speaker 1: have no idea what I actually look like. But I'm
2:02
Speaker 1: so And this is um this cross pollination with an
2:04
Speaker 1: earlier podcast. I suffered from body dysmorphic disorder so badly
2:10
Speaker 1: that I don't really know what I look like anyway.
2:12
Speaker 1: What do you think you look like? I think I
2:14
Speaker 1: look a bit like the top from Taxidermia. I what's
2:19
Speaker 1: that it's not plusant? Okay, well you don't my friend.
2:24
Speaker 1: I don't even know what he looks like, but I
2:25
Speaker 1: can tell you don't look like him. I appreciate that, Chuck, Chuck,
2:29
Speaker 1: do you want to hear what I had in store? Like?
2:32
Speaker 1: I could not come up with an intro for this.
2:34
Speaker 1: Let's hear it. Websters defines mirror. I'm kidding. I always
2:40
Speaker 1: going to say something equally bad, though, It's going to
2:42
Speaker 1: be something along the lines with mirrors are ubiquitous. I've
2:46
Speaker 1: seen at least six of them today. They weren't always
2:50
Speaker 1: that way, though, Chuck. Well, it says in the article
2:53
Speaker 1: here the full length mirrors have only been around four years.
2:56
Speaker 1: That didn't seem right. That's not right. No, um full
3:00
Speaker 1: length mirrors. There is a type of full length mirror
3:03
Speaker 1: um that has been around for about four years. Full
3:07
Speaker 1: length mirrors, as far as I know, are mirrors capable
3:10
Speaker 1: of reflecting a full image of a person, have been
3:13
Speaker 1: around since about the first century A d actually um
3:16
Speaker 1: and mirrors us using surfaces polished surfaces to see our
3:23
Speaker 1: own reflection. Um has been around since about six thousand BC. Yeah,
3:29
Speaker 1: the earliest ones were found in Anatolia, Turkey and they're
3:33
Speaker 1: polished subsidian. Yeah, it's a volcanic glass. Yeah, so it's
3:37
Speaker 1: it's dark, this interesting, but it's still produced the best reflection,
3:40
Speaker 1: I guess at the time. At the time, yeah, I
3:42
Speaker 1: mean you gotta you gotta go with what you what
3:44
Speaker 1: we have to work with, right. Well yeah, but then
3:46
Speaker 1: after that they led them to um like silver and
3:50
Speaker 1: bronze and copper, polished polished reflections basically, And Chuck, I
3:54
Speaker 1: don't know if you've ever held a hunk of of
3:57
Speaker 1: copper or bronze I haven't, or silver I have. Okay,
4:02
Speaker 1: it's heavy, Yeah, it's real heavy. Right. So this actually
4:05
Speaker 1: limited the size of mirrors for centuries, right Yeah. And
4:10
Speaker 1: they were just kind of decorative at first, two right,
4:12
Speaker 1: I think so. And you also had to be extremely rich,
4:15
Speaker 1: um to own one of these, right, um. And then
4:19
Speaker 1: around I think the Middle Ages, we became capable of
4:23
Speaker 1: making glass, and all of a sudden, it was like
4:26
Speaker 1: mirror technology just takes a huge leap forward. Well true,
4:30
Speaker 1: but not not super uh forward, because the sand was
4:34
Speaker 1: pretty impure back then they used to make the glass.
4:37
Speaker 1: So I think they, um they said in the article,
4:40
Speaker 1: was until like the Renaissance that it kind of really
4:42
Speaker 1: started becoming a little more polished, if you will, terrible.
4:46
Speaker 1: And then the Venetians are who really you know with
4:49
Speaker 1: a glass and everything. They just they just took in
4:51
Speaker 1: ran with it. Well. Even still, if you successfully made
4:53
Speaker 1: a mirror UM, it was probably extremely expensive as well
4:59
Speaker 1: because they were so rare. The process of manufacturing a
5:02
Speaker 1: mirror UM very infrequently produced a usable mirror. That's what
5:07
Speaker 1: you're doing was adhering um melted molten metal onto glass,
5:15
Speaker 1: which almost always broke the glass. So when it didn't,
5:19
Speaker 1: I'm sure you're just like, oh my god's the first
5:21
Speaker 1: one in seven years? Right? Um? But that when I
5:26
Speaker 1: was reading this article, I didn't really think about it.
5:28
Speaker 1: That's what a mirror is, isn't it. I've even seen
5:30
Speaker 1: the back of mirrors and been like others like metal
5:34
Speaker 1: looks like spray painted on the back. That's exactly right.
5:37
Speaker 1: And that was a process um what's it called silver
5:39
Speaker 1: ring that was invented by a guy named Justice von
5:43
Speaker 1: Liebig and in eighteen thirty five, if he figured out
5:47
Speaker 1: how to spray very thin layer of silver um or
5:52
Speaker 1: aluminum on the back or on one side of a
5:55
Speaker 1: glass and they're my friend. You have the modern mirror. Yeah,
5:59
Speaker 1: and now that I think they make it now by
6:01
Speaker 1: heating aluminum in a vacuum in kind of much the
6:04
Speaker 1: same way or different methods, but the same same concept.
6:08
Speaker 1: Go ahead, Well, I wanted to say when when you
6:11
Speaker 1: were talking about the Renaissance, the Venetians were they, I
6:15
Speaker 1: guess they had the secret of mirrors under wraps like
6:19
Speaker 1: the Mason's very much so. Um. And if you were
6:24
Speaker 1: a mirror maker and it got out that you had
6:27
Speaker 1: told someone how to make mirrors, you were frequently killed, right, yeah,
6:32
Speaker 1: trade secret. But when mirrors were introduced, um, when good
6:36
Speaker 1: mirrors were introduced, not polished subsidian, things changed a little bit,
6:40
Speaker 1: especially with art. Right Yeah, I never really considered that,
6:43
Speaker 1: but that it spawned something that would become a hallmark
6:46
Speaker 1: of the art world, which is the self portrait. Right
6:49
Speaker 1: before that, you couldn't draw yourself because you could not
6:51
Speaker 1: see yourself. That's exactly right, And you could, but I
6:55
Speaker 1: mean you're gonna use like maybe a pond or well,
6:58
Speaker 1: piece of polished medal or something like that. Imagine like
7:01
Speaker 1: going out and looking at a pond and going back
7:03
Speaker 1: and sitting down that I was opposed to having a
7:04
Speaker 1: mirror there. Yes, really simplified it. It's also not coincidental
7:08
Speaker 1: that UM good mirrors came about at the same time
7:12
Speaker 1: that UM linear perspective was introduced into art. What. Yeah,
7:17
Speaker 1: there's a guy named um Filippo Brunus Bruno LLESHI nice, Chuck,
7:24
Speaker 1: thank you for doing that, UM, and he he I
7:27
Speaker 1: guess discovered linear perspective because I think it's one of
7:30
Speaker 1: the things that was always there. We just stumbled upon
7:33
Speaker 1: it through mirrors. That's how we figured it out. Yeah,
7:36
Speaker 1: because if you look at a mirror, all of a sudden,
7:38
Speaker 1: linear perspective really comes into focus, right you will. Well.
7:42
Speaker 1: And then scientists UM said hey, we could use these
7:45
Speaker 1: to make like reflecting telescopes, and that was what year
7:49
Speaker 1: was at. That was a long time ago. The first
7:51
Speaker 1: reflecting telescope was invented by a guy named James Bradley
7:56
Speaker 1: just off the top of my head. Very well done. Uh,
7:59
Speaker 1: And the mirrors were also used by a very very
8:03
Speaker 1: famous scientist early scientists named Archimedes. Supposedly, Yeah, I wrote
8:07
Speaker 1: an article on archimedes death. Ray. Oh did you write that? Yeah?
8:10
Speaker 1: Did you ever read it? I did back in a
8:12
Speaker 1: while ago. Just out of interest, how about that? Thanks
8:15
Speaker 1: a lot man. Sure did you see in it? Um?
8:17
Speaker 1: Some I can't remember. It was one of the Ivy
8:20
Speaker 1: League schools. They tried to set things on fire with
8:23
Speaker 1: this system of mirrors. That archie, that's who it was,
8:27
Speaker 1: and they succeeded. Yes, And the MythBusters claimed it was busted,
8:31
Speaker 1: like they set a small fire. But I think they
8:34
Speaker 1: busted it because they said it wasn't enough to like
8:37
Speaker 1: sink a ship. But m I T I mean, they
8:39
Speaker 1: caused quite a fire on that boat, and of course
8:42
Speaker 1: they had. I mean I saw this set up online today.
8:44
Speaker 1: It was pretty massive. I don't know if Archimedes had
8:47
Speaker 1: that kind of technology or at least that many mirrors
8:50
Speaker 1: at its disposal, or maybe he did, and plus they
8:52
Speaker 1: had I think they used pretty good mirrors too. Yeah,
8:55
Speaker 1: well it was legend though. They don't know if the
8:56
Speaker 1: Archimedes sing is true. Right. We know that he invented
8:59
Speaker 1: the water screw and let's save countless lives. What's that
9:03
Speaker 1: It's a way to deliver water from the ground top side.
9:07
Speaker 1: Oh really yeah cool? You have to check it out,
9:10
Speaker 1: smart dude. Um so chuck, We now know the comprehensive
9:15
Speaker 1: broad strokes of the history of mirrors. Right, Yes, let's
9:19
Speaker 1: talk about mirror physics. We work for how Stuff Works
9:22
Speaker 1: dot com, which means we're pretty much obligated to discuss
9:25
Speaker 1: the physics of whatever we're talking about any time it applies, right,
9:28
Speaker 1: And that's true, and mirrors are definitely one of those times. Yes,
9:33
Speaker 1: So Chuck take it away. Well, I can cover the
9:35
Speaker 1: first part because it makes sense to me. The law
9:37
Speaker 1: of reflection um Josh says that when you bounce array
9:40
Speaker 1: of light off the surface, it bounces back off in
9:43
Speaker 1: a certain way, and it is um the angle of
9:46
Speaker 1: incidences is when it comes in the angle of reflection.
9:50
Speaker 1: It when it bounces off, and it matches so that
9:53
Speaker 1: the way they pointed out in the article, which makes
9:55
Speaker 1: sense to me, is like at sunset, the sun is
9:57
Speaker 1: very low on the horizon, so it bounces off at
10:00
Speaker 1: a low angle, or approaches the water at a low angle,
10:03
Speaker 1: like at a lake. Let's say, then it bounces off
10:05
Speaker 1: of that lake at the same low angle, like right
10:07
Speaker 1: into your face. Right, But if it seems brighter, if
10:09
Speaker 1: the sun's overhead though, the sunlight is coming down under
10:13
Speaker 1: the lake and it's reflecting back up basically over your head.
10:17
Speaker 1: You're looking at a horizontal angle pretty much, and this
10:23
Speaker 1: is happening on a vertical angle. Yeah, that's why you'll
10:26
Speaker 1: get like more glare at a sunrise or a sunset scenario. Um.
10:31
Speaker 1: And what you're saying, the angle of incidence equals the
10:33
Speaker 1: angle of reflection. Right. Indeed, if you take if a
10:37
Speaker 1: if a beam of light is shot at a ninety
10:40
Speaker 1: degree angle or no, let's say eighty degree angle, it's
10:43
Speaker 1: going to bounce off at an opposite eighty degree angle.
10:46
Speaker 1: So both are at eighty degrees. But if you look
10:48
Speaker 1: at the whole thing, the incidents and the reflection, it's
10:51
Speaker 1: going to cover a hundred and sixty degrees right right,
11:19
Speaker 1: all right, So that's the first part. That's that's how
11:21
Speaker 1: that explains how light reacts with with reflection, and that's
11:24
Speaker 1: where the smooth surface with with most things like say,
11:28
Speaker 1: look at my hand man, Take a look at these hands, um,
11:32
Speaker 1: the the light that's bouncing off of them. What's giving
11:35
Speaker 1: us the ability to see these huge, awesome hands, um,
11:41
Speaker 1: is they're not huge. Are they are smaller than average size? No,
11:46
Speaker 1: they're they're bigger than mine. I got small hands. I
11:48
Speaker 1: wouldn't see you have small hands. Let's see now those
11:51
Speaker 1: are like, those are totally normal. I don't have hair
11:53
Speaker 1: on the back of my hands either. I've got hair
11:55
Speaker 1: in my first knuckles. Yeah, Robin Williams. Um, what's allowing
12:00
Speaker 1: us to see our hands right now and judge their
12:03
Speaker 1: size and scale is, um, what's called diffuse reflection. Which
12:08
Speaker 1: the light that's coming off of all of these light
12:10
Speaker 1: bulbs right now are hitting all these different areas, these
12:13
Speaker 1: different services on my hands, and it's bouncing off, it's
12:17
Speaker 1: being scattered right the mirror with the highly reflective surface. Um,
12:22
Speaker 1: what we have is called specular reflection. And that is
12:26
Speaker 1: where it's pretty close to the law of reflection, where
12:30
Speaker 1: the angles coming in at one or the lights coming
12:33
Speaker 1: in at one angle and coming off the at the
12:36
Speaker 1: same degree in the opposite direction. Right, Um, Which is
12:41
Speaker 1: why we're allowed to see ourselves in a piece of
12:44
Speaker 1: glass with metal on the back. And what this creates
12:48
Speaker 1: when you're looking at yourself is called the virtual image. Right.
12:51
Speaker 1: I find it fascinating. Yeah, me too, And it's a
12:53
Speaker 1: little brain melty for me, of course. But at the
12:56
Speaker 1: same time you realize, like, well, you've grown up around
12:59
Speaker 1: mirrors the whole time, and no one has any real
13:03
Speaker 1: concept of of how they work. Right, We just take
13:07
Speaker 1: for granted that they do work, but you don't really
13:10
Speaker 1: give much thought to how they're working. Right, Like the
13:13
Speaker 1: Venus effect. Did you read about that? Yeah, that that's
13:16
Speaker 1: explained that because this is where when we talk about
13:20
Speaker 1: Actually the Venus effect is two different things, and both
13:22
Speaker 1: of them kind of melt my brain. That the left
13:24
Speaker 1: and right being reversed, which is not actually true, and
13:28
Speaker 1: then the venus effects. So let's talk about both of those. Okay, Well,
13:30
Speaker 1: the Venus effect is basically just shows how little we
13:33
Speaker 1: can grasp or how little we grasp mirrors and how
13:37
Speaker 1: they work. If you look at paintings of the Venus
13:40
Speaker 1: de Milo, Venus the goddess um almost always she's holding
13:45
Speaker 1: a hand mirror, and in the painting you can see
13:47
Speaker 1: her face in the mirror, but she's looking at herself
13:50
Speaker 1: in the mirror, and her face is painted in the
13:53
Speaker 1: mirror for the benefit of the viewer. But you take
13:55
Speaker 1: for granted that she's viewing herself, when in actuality, if
13:58
Speaker 1: you could see Venus is in the mirror, she wouldn't
14:01
Speaker 1: be able to see herself she'd see you in the
14:02
Speaker 1: mirror because of the angle or the law of reflection. Yeah,
14:07
Speaker 1: and that's the only way I finally understood that was
14:09
Speaker 1: when I remembered, like in my film set Days, when
14:12
Speaker 1: you shoot a person looking in a mirror, they aren't
14:16
Speaker 1: They don't see themselves in the mirror, clearly, because you
14:18
Speaker 1: would see the camera behind them so that the mirror
14:21
Speaker 1: is angled, and it looks like they're looking at themselves
14:23
Speaker 1: and primping, but they're not seeing themselves. Pretty cool, right,
14:26
Speaker 1: So that makes sense to me now it does, isn't it. Yeah? Okay,
14:29
Speaker 1: the other thing you were saying is left and right, Yeah,
14:32
Speaker 1: it's not actually left and right. Yeah, this one was
14:35
Speaker 1: a little brain melty, but I think I finally got
14:36
Speaker 1: it too. Okay, So consider that what you're not, what
14:40
Speaker 1: you're seeing isn't actually your reflection, but another version of
14:44
Speaker 1: yourself in the mirror world. Right. If you look at
14:47
Speaker 1: it that way, then the mirror represents the halfway point.
14:49
Speaker 1: It's always halfway between you and your virtual self, right, right,
14:54
Speaker 1: Because your virtual self, that image of yourself in the
14:57
Speaker 1: mirror is always twice as it's always two times away
15:01
Speaker 1: from you. With the mirror representing the halfway point right,
15:04
Speaker 1: So your two feet from the mirror, and your virtual
15:07
Speaker 1: self is another two feet away from you. Right, You
15:09
Speaker 1: see what I'm saying. Yeah, And the left and right
15:11
Speaker 1: thing isn't really left and right, it's really front and
15:13
Speaker 1: back that are reversed. You again, think of yourself as
15:17
Speaker 1: the virtual image you walk into the mirror world, you
15:21
Speaker 1: take you go another two feet away from where you're
15:23
Speaker 1: just standing, so you're now for your four feet away
15:26
Speaker 1: from where you're just standing and turn around right, Which
15:28
Speaker 1: is weird because it actually gives the virtual image something
15:32
Speaker 1: of its own identity, doesn't it does. It's a little creepy. Yeah,
15:35
Speaker 1: So when you're looking at a mirror, you're it's not
15:37
Speaker 1: a reflection of you from the mirrors perspective. It's like that.
15:41
Speaker 1: The one example they gave was if you wrote something
15:43
Speaker 1: on a piece of paper and then held that paper
15:45
Speaker 1: up to the light and looked at it from the back,
15:47
Speaker 1: it would appear backwards. But it's not right. You're just
15:50
Speaker 1: behind it, yes, man, isn't it. Yeah? It's pretty interesting stuff.
15:54
Speaker 1: And I gotta say when you two things, when you
15:56
Speaker 1: mentioned doing mirrors, I said to myself, really, And then
16:01
Speaker 1: when we told Jerry what we were doing this on.
16:03
Speaker 1: She was like, really, yeah, but it's I think it's
16:06
Speaker 1: much more interesting than I originally thought. Well again, it's
16:08
Speaker 1: like the butterfly swings, you know, like we just have
16:11
Speaker 1: to know that if we're gonna understand absolutely everything that's
16:14
Speaker 1: going on in the world, which is our mission. Yes. Uh,
16:17
Speaker 1: should we talk about curved mirrors now? Yeah, because we
16:20
Speaker 1: were talking about virtual images, there's actually a way to
16:23
Speaker 1: project a real image where this thing isn't in the mirror.
16:27
Speaker 1: It's outside of the mirror, but it's not really there.
16:29
Speaker 1: It's a projected image and that uses, um, concave mirrors.
16:33
Speaker 1: You might be familiar with holograms, right, is that the
16:38
Speaker 1: same concept there? He uses concave mirrors. And actually, if
16:42
Speaker 1: you want to see a really cool example of a
16:44
Speaker 1: hologram produced by a set of concave and flat mirrors, um,
16:49
Speaker 1: you should type in mirrage in YouTube and look for
16:53
Speaker 1: the one that's a lowercase just mirrage And it's a
16:55
Speaker 1: little piggy um And it's pretty cool the demonstration that
16:59
Speaker 1: this guy does. Yeah, I'll check that out. But Chuck,
17:02
Speaker 1: there's concave and convex, right, yeah, convex is the one
17:05
Speaker 1: that curves outward and it reflects at a wider angle
17:09
Speaker 1: near the edges in the center, So things are actually
17:12
Speaker 1: smaller and you can cover more areas. So that's why
17:14
Speaker 1: they'll use those. Uh, they'll stick them on like your
17:17
Speaker 1: passenger mirrors, so you can see more area around your car.
17:21
Speaker 1: And it also notes you know, objects are smaller than
17:23
Speaker 1: they appear or closer than they appear. Objects are smaller
17:26
Speaker 1: than the appear. But they are smaller than they than
17:29
Speaker 1: they appear. But that's not really that doesn't matter. It's
17:31
Speaker 1: whether they're like in your back seat or not. Yeah,
17:34
Speaker 1: and they actually um, there are have been rumors over
17:36
Speaker 1: the years at department stores put convex mirrors, slightly convex
17:40
Speaker 1: mirrors in their changing rooms to make you like a
17:42
Speaker 1: pear tallerant thinner in the clothing that you try on.
17:45
Speaker 1: Remember that Seinfeld where Eline like buys that dress, figured
17:48
Speaker 1: that they had a skinny mirror, And I think Barneys
17:50
Speaker 1: are blooming deals. Yeah, forgot about that. Yeah, I don't know.
17:53
Speaker 1: I think that's probably urban legend, but who knows, um chuck.
17:56
Speaker 1: The other one, like we said, was concave convert jing.
18:00
Speaker 1: We use those for holograms. They also use that to
18:03
Speaker 1: light the Olympic torch. Yeah, I didn't realize that either.
18:06
Speaker 1: I think that's a nod to Archimedes too. Probably, so
18:09
Speaker 1: you're probably a little more um acquainted with convex mirrors.
18:15
Speaker 1: No concave mirrors for like shaving or No, those horrible
18:19
Speaker 1: mirrors that show your like hair and detail. Those are awful,
18:23
Speaker 1: they really are. Don't ever look in those nonreversing mirror,
18:27
Speaker 1: which really is pretty simple. It's just two mirrors perpendicular
18:31
Speaker 1: to each other, right, Yeah, And the deal is with
18:34
Speaker 1: that they meet at the angle and so you technically
18:38
Speaker 1: can see a non reverse image, but you've got that
18:40
Speaker 1: line running down the center of you. They don't make
18:43
Speaker 1: like a flat, single nonreversing mirror. No they don't. I
18:47
Speaker 1: think it's physically impossible. It's not like they don't make
18:49
Speaker 1: it like they're not interested. It's just can't be done.
18:51
Speaker 1: But what's funny is there's a guy named um John
18:54
Speaker 1: Derby who has a patent. In seven when he was alive,
18:58
Speaker 1: he had a patent for a nonreversing mirror. By sticking
19:02
Speaker 1: two mirrors together, I could get a patent for that.
19:05
Speaker 1: I could fill out the patent application for that you could. Yeah,
19:08
Speaker 1: it's like take mirror A and stick it perpendicular to
19:11
Speaker 1: mirror B. Right there, give me my patent. Well, but
19:14
Speaker 1: then John Derby's family would come after you. Hopefully it
19:17
Speaker 1: ran out by now. And just for simpleness, Josh, two
19:21
Speaker 1: way mirrors as seen in every cop shakedown movie ever made. Yes, now,
19:25
Speaker 1: this is fascinating, Chuck. How does the two way mirror work? Well,
19:28
Speaker 1: it's really pretty easy. It's just it's the same concept
19:31
Speaker 1: of the mirror, but it's a very thin. It's very
19:34
Speaker 1: much a lighter reflection the material they use and the
19:38
Speaker 1: coated side. When it faces the lit room, some of
19:41
Speaker 1: the light reflects and some goes into the dark room
19:43
Speaker 1: behind it. So basically like you know, you can't you
19:47
Speaker 1: can see only see one way right because of the
19:50
Speaker 1: light mainly. So it's just like very thin reflective surface
19:55
Speaker 1: where if you're not if you turn in, if you
19:58
Speaker 1: turn on lights in both rooms, you'd be we'll see
20:00
Speaker 1: through that reflective surface, right, Yeah, it's all about the lighting. Yeah,
20:03
Speaker 1: and that's a movie there. There's several movie mirror things
20:06
Speaker 1: that are done in like every movie, and that's one
20:08
Speaker 1: of them. With the cop movie and inevitably the person
20:11
Speaker 1: getting questioned will always walk right up and like be
20:14
Speaker 1: staring into the face of the person on the other
20:16
Speaker 1: side that they can't see. And then the other favorite
20:19
Speaker 1: of mine, which one of the SNL shorts aped, was
20:23
Speaker 1: um the classic horror movie scene where you where you
20:26
Speaker 1: look in the medicine cabinet and the mirror and then
20:28
Speaker 1: you open the medicine cabinet and then you close it
20:30
Speaker 1: and the dude is right behind you. That's a classic.
20:33
Speaker 1: It is there's um again on YouTube. I think there's
20:36
Speaker 1: a a montage, like a four minute montage of that
20:39
Speaker 1: being used over and times. Dude and it still gets people. Yeah,
20:43
Speaker 1: but now that the whole spin is to do that
20:45
Speaker 1: and then there's not someone there, and then they'll turn
20:47
Speaker 1: around and that's where they are something. Yeah, just jerking
20:50
Speaker 1: the audience around. That's in there too. Uh oh it
20:53
Speaker 1: is huh yeah. Yeah, it's not just people closing there
20:56
Speaker 1: someone saying there's ones where they're not standing there. Yeah.
21:00
Speaker 1: I love those movie conventions that are The other one too,
21:03
Speaker 1: is it doesn't even do with mirrors, but the scene
21:05
Speaker 1: where you're where someone is searching for the files and
21:08
Speaker 1: then the person's office after dark, and you know they're
21:11
Speaker 1: coming up the steps and they opened the door and
21:13
Speaker 1: you're like they're pinched. And then they opened the door
21:15
Speaker 1: and the person is gone, and there's like a window open, right,
21:18
Speaker 1: and it's just like the curtains. Hundreds and hundreds of
21:21
Speaker 1: time is still done yet I'm still like, oh my gosh,
21:23
Speaker 1: here they come. What about Poultergeist, the great classic mirror
21:28
Speaker 1: scene where the guys like picking at that little blister
21:31
Speaker 1: and ends up pulling his whole face off. Yeah, that's
21:33
Speaker 1: pretty creepy. Yeah, classic, Thank you Toby Hooper? Did he
21:37
Speaker 1: make that? Yeah? I like got this right? He produced it, right,
21:40
Speaker 1: that's right. I always think he directed that. What else, Chuck, Well,
22:07
Speaker 1: there's some superstitions around mirrors in folklore, um summoning Bloody
22:12
Speaker 1: Mary by saying her names three times in a mirror,
22:14
Speaker 1: or candy Man, if you're a little more recent, that's
22:19
Speaker 1: a good one. Breaking a mirror supposedly bad luck because
22:22
Speaker 1: um for seven years, because they believe that the soul
22:26
Speaker 1: regenerates every seven years. Yeah, that explains it, doesn't it. Yeah,
22:29
Speaker 1: And that's why vampires have no soul. That's why they
22:31
Speaker 1: can't see themselves in mirrors, and a couple of them
22:34
Speaker 1: I haven't heard of are if you give birth and
22:38
Speaker 1: look in a mirror too soon afterward, you will see
22:40
Speaker 1: ghostly faces peek out from behind the reflection. I've never
22:44
Speaker 1: heard that one in you know, I had heard of
22:46
Speaker 1: sitting shiver though. Yeah, what's the deal with that one? Well,
22:49
Speaker 1: if you're Jewish and somebody dies, part of the morning
22:51
Speaker 1: process is to cover all the mirrors in the house.
22:55
Speaker 1: Uh to say that in the Talmud? Shut up, chuck. Also,
23:00
Speaker 1: we have gotten conflicting um information about whether or not
23:04
Speaker 1: it is taboo among Judaism to be cremated, did you notice? Yeah?
23:10
Speaker 1: And what we and I'll stand behind what we found,
23:13
Speaker 1: which was that reform Jews will do it, but they
23:17
Speaker 1: it's still not like encouraged. And then but it is
23:20
Speaker 1: actually forbidden in the actual Jewish text. So there, fine,
23:25
Speaker 1: is that it? I think that's about it? Um? Oh,
23:28
Speaker 1: New Year's Eve, right, Yeah, I hadn't heard of this
23:31
Speaker 1: one either. If you go up to a mirror on
23:33
Speaker 1: New Year's Eve with a candle in your hand, and
23:35
Speaker 1: you say the name of a dead person, probably a
23:38
Speaker 1: dead loved one, um, in a loud voice, their face
23:42
Speaker 1: should appear in the mirror. Never heard that. And this
23:45
Speaker 1: is my favorite one, the ancient Chinese mythology. Um, you
23:49
Speaker 1: know how you see weird movement in like the corner
23:52
Speaker 1: of a mirror every once in a while. Have you
23:54
Speaker 1: ever noticed that? Uh? Sure, I just figured it was
23:57
Speaker 1: like your mind playing tricks on you. I'm sure it
23:59
Speaker 1: is on the through Chinese pal Then what it is are, um,
24:03
Speaker 1: the mirror people the mere Kingdom. There's a group of
24:07
Speaker 1: opposites who live in the mirror Kingdom, and they are
24:10
Speaker 1: sworn to do battle with us. Yeah, and if this
24:13
Speaker 1: were North mythology, we'd lose, and we may lose in
24:17
Speaker 1: this case too. But they are in a I guess
24:19
Speaker 1: a magical slumber. Um. But when we catch a little weird,
24:24
Speaker 1: unexplained movement in the corners of mirrors, Um, this is
24:28
Speaker 1: these people stirring in their sleep, waiting to wake up
24:32
Speaker 1: and kill us all in our sleep. I'll remember that
24:35
Speaker 1: next time I see something in the corner of my eye.
24:37
Speaker 1: So that's it for mirrors. Um, that's it, I mean,
24:40
Speaker 1: that is it? Nothing else? There is literally nothing else
24:43
Speaker 1: to say about mirrors. Nope. And uh, if you think
24:47
Speaker 1: that there is we defy you to go to how
24:50
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com and type mirrors into the search bar.
24:54
Speaker 1: Pale listener, mail time listener, Maile John, this is a little,
25:01
Speaker 1: uh cool organization that we want to support here And
25:06
Speaker 1: how long you've been smoked free, buddy? It's over four
25:09
Speaker 1: months now? Crazy so proud, Hi Chucking Josh. I travel
25:13
Speaker 1: outside the city every weekend listen to your podcast, and
25:15
Speaker 1: I always share my new knowledge with friends. Needless to say,
25:19
Speaker 1: I'm the Friday Night's smarty pants and I rather like it.
25:21
Speaker 1: Why I'm writing, I want to promote the New York
25:24
Speaker 1: City Walk to Beat Lung Cancer. I'm one of the
25:27
Speaker 1: head chair persons. At twenty years old. I never thought
25:29
Speaker 1: I would share anything, but I love my new responsibility
25:33
Speaker 1: as I am making a huge difference to an underdog
25:36
Speaker 1: cause how could cancer be an underdog? Josh? Is the question?
25:40
Speaker 1: I don't know. I think it's pretty bad. When you
25:42
Speaker 1: hear someone has lung cancer, the first thing that comes
25:44
Speaker 1: to your mind is, probably did hear she smoked? It
25:46
Speaker 1: never fails. It is a valid question. Uh. Funding for
25:50
Speaker 1: lung cancers completely dwarfed by other cancers that are nearly
25:52
Speaker 1: as fatal and is completely due to the stigma of
25:55
Speaker 1: a smoker's disease. I get turned away by sponsors and
25:59
Speaker 1: media all the time him because no one wants to
26:01
Speaker 1: support a disease that is so preventable. But the thing is,
26:04
Speaker 1: it isn't people who get LC second hand for no
26:09
Speaker 1: reason at all happens all the time. Why don't people
26:12
Speaker 1: ask those with skin cancer if they wore sunscreen, or
26:16
Speaker 1: people who have heart attacks if they ate. Well, it's
26:18
Speaker 1: just silly. But looking at the numbers, it just doesn't
26:20
Speaker 1: add up. Um. So here's what we're gonna do, Jess,
26:23
Speaker 1: since you were the chair, there's an event in New
26:25
Speaker 1: York City, New York City. It's called the Walk to
26:29
Speaker 1: Prevent I'm sorry, the Walk to Beat Lung Cancer Lung Cancer,
26:32
Speaker 1: and it is October two thousand ten in Battery Park.
26:37
Speaker 1: And if you would like to take part in this
26:39
Speaker 1: Walk to Beat Lung Cancer, Jess would really appreciate it.
26:42
Speaker 1: You can go to a website www. Dot longevity see
26:47
Speaker 1: what they did there, dot org slash NYC walk, so
26:51
Speaker 1: that is l U n G E v I T
26:54
Speaker 1: Y dot org slash NYC Walk, or Twitter. You can
26:59
Speaker 1: follow this and get information at Walk number four lung
27:03
Speaker 1: cancer all one word or Facebook at Walk to Beat
27:06
Speaker 1: Lung Cancer and Jess would appreciate your participations. Are New
27:10
Speaker 1: York City buddies that we met while we were there,
27:13
Speaker 1: spread the word and get out and walk. Yeah that's awesome.
27:16
Speaker 1: And if you're one of those people who poo poo's
27:18
Speaker 1: lung cancer or helping battle lung cancer, yeah, maybe it's
27:23
Speaker 1: time you took a long look in the mirror because
27:26
Speaker 1: you could be a jerk. If you have any kind
27:29
Speaker 1: of organization like chucking out and give a shout out
27:32
Speaker 1: to we consider those on a case by case basis.
27:35
Speaker 1: Don't we chuck We sure you? Um, it definitely doesn't
27:38
Speaker 1: help or it definitely doesn't hurt to uh grease the wheels,
27:43
Speaker 1: if you know what I mean. And we're not talking
27:45
Speaker 1: about cash prizes now, we can't legally do that, can't
27:48
Speaker 1: we know? Uh. You can tell us about your organization
27:52
Speaker 1: in an email to send it to stuff podcast at
27:57
Speaker 1: how stuff works dot com. For more on this and
28:03
Speaker 1: thousands of other topics, visit how staff works dot com.
28:07
Speaker 1: Want more how stuff works, check out our blogs on
28:10
Speaker 1: the how stuff works dot com home page