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How Earthquakes Work · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you should know
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Speaker 1: from house Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to
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Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me is Charles W.
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Speaker 1: Chuck Chuckers. I love you, Bryant, you're saying that or
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Speaker 1: that's my middle name. I love everybody. Sure, I'm in
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Speaker 1: high spirit city, Chuck. Things are moving, stuff is taking place,
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Speaker 1: things are coming to. Fruition is out of nowhere because
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Speaker 1: you were not feeling this way, like literally seconds before
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Speaker 1: we recorded. I don't know what you're talking about. Wow,
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Speaker 1: I'm in brass, dude. You can turn it on. You
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Speaker 1: know why, Chuck? Why? I can tell because you're drinking
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Speaker 1: your little energy drinking. Yes, I would call it an
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Speaker 1: energy soda, be little dream sailor. That was Yeah, you
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Speaker 1: really like that podcast? Into it? I thought it was good.
0:55
Speaker 1: My favorite part was when we mentioned the doctor in Berkeley,
0:58
Speaker 1: when you said, um boom or around or something like that. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: that's funny. Yeah, thanks, I thought um. I liked all
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Speaker 1: the nose breathing I did in that podcast. For some reason,
1:08
Speaker 1: we just sit around talk about our whole podcast Hey, Chuck, Hey, Josh,
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Speaker 1: you did some time out in l A right. Yeah. So, um,
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Speaker 1: I know that you met Matthew McConaughey. You left that
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Speaker 1: story and uh keep for Sutherland's driver. Yeah, and him.
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Speaker 1: I saw him in the grocery store too, with his driver,
1:27
Speaker 1: No with How did you know it was him that
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Speaker 1: a bucks? Some blonde babe actually got you? Um it
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Speaker 1: was Keith for Southernlandon. I mean it's unmistakable got you.
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Speaker 1: Um he's breathing, mouth breathing behind me in line. We're
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Speaker 1: gonna get in trouble one day for that. I know
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Speaker 1: he's a hot head too. He just got suited. He
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Speaker 1: like hit a photographer somebody did he really? Yeah? So
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Speaker 1: watch watch your back. Plus he knows his way around
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Speaker 1: a gun, Yes he does, and he's ruthless, as I
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Speaker 1: understand it from what I've seen on TV. I know
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Speaker 1: what you're about to ask me about Los Angeles. I
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Speaker 1: know you do, because we're doing how earthquakes work. So Chuck,
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Speaker 1: let's just cut to the chase, shall we. I have
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Speaker 1: never felt an earthquake out there, nor have I. I
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Speaker 1: was out there for four years, dude, and I was
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Speaker 1: there when earthquakes happened, and I never realized it and
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Speaker 1: felt anything. Friends of mine will be like, dude, did
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Speaker 1: you feel that this morning? Yeah? No, I have no idea.
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Speaker 1: Did they use a lot of that um honey that
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Speaker 1: comes in the Little Bear? Yes? Did they? They did, dude,
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Speaker 1: that's what they say. And Kelly Chuck, I've never experienced
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Speaker 1: an earthquake either. The closest um thing to an earthquake
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Speaker 1: story I have involves earthquake proofing. Let's hear it. Remember
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Speaker 1: my friend Hippie Rob, Hippy Rob did a little time
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Speaker 1: out in Uh, I'm so a fan of the honey Bear. Yeah, yes,
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Speaker 1: oh yeah, Hippy Rob did a some time out in
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Speaker 1: San Quentin. Actually really yeah, here's the thing. He was
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Speaker 1: not looking forward to doing San Quentin, I imagine, um.
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Speaker 1: And he finds out that right when he gets there
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Speaker 1: that um, he and all the other relatively light off
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Speaker 1: enders are going to be moved to Fulsome prison, which
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Speaker 1: was undergoing earthquake proofing construction. Right, so they were going
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Speaker 1: to keep all the light offenders at Folsome and then
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Speaker 1: move all the light offenders at San Quentin over to Folsom.
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Speaker 1: And then they moved all like the murderers and rapists
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Speaker 1: and peder asks to uh that we're at San Quentin.
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Speaker 1: Fo over to San Quentin. Wow, that's my earthquake story.
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Speaker 1: Good for Falsome. So Hippie Rob got off easy. He
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Speaker 1: was with light offenders in Falsome? Did he Did they
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Speaker 1: actually have to work on the earthquake proofing where they
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Speaker 1: put the work or was it just go? I don't
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Speaker 1: think so. Would you trust the guy named Hippie Rob
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Speaker 1: to earthquake proofs your prison? Would not? I wouldn't either.
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Speaker 1: So let's talk about earthquakes. Let's do it. Can I
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Speaker 1: you want a little history? I did some extra research.
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Speaker 1: Let's hear it. So before nineteen fifteen, we didn't really
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Speaker 1: have much of a conception of what was going on
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Speaker 1: geologically with with the continents, right? Was it just anyone's
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Speaker 1: gas at that point? Yeah? I think you or I
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Speaker 1: could have come up with adequate theory. We'd be like
4:01
Speaker 1: ghosts or something like that. Um, but the ghosts was
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Speaker 1: not an acceptable explanation for a guy named Alfred Wegner. Uh,
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Speaker 1: he's a German clearly because his last name because with
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Speaker 1: a W, but I pronounced it with a V, which
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Speaker 1: is a dead giveaway for a German is a German,
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Speaker 1: right um. So Wagner Um was actually an astronomer by training,
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Speaker 1: but he was fascinated with geology, and he became increasingly
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Speaker 1: fascinated when he found out that there had been fossils
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Speaker 1: identical plant in animal fossils found um on the let's see,
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Speaker 1: that would be the east coast of South America and
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Speaker 1: the west coast of Africa. And at the time, the
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Speaker 1: predominant theory was that there were land bridges that were
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Speaker 1: now under water and that's how these species would have
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Speaker 1: gotten together. Wegner he thought, I don't know that that's
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Speaker 1: entirely true, and he also noted that Africa kind of
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Speaker 1: looked like it could fit into South America. Interesting point.
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Speaker 1: So he started thinking about it and think about and
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Speaker 1: he realized that some he he postulated about three million
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Speaker 1: years ago, all of the continents were hooked together, which
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Speaker 1: he called one big, stinking massive land right in Greek,
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Speaker 1: that would be Pangaea. And uh so Pangea starts to
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Speaker 1: break apart, and basically Wevegner uh postulated that the the
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Speaker 1: continents were in fact still drifting. He thought that they
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Speaker 1: were basically plowing along the ocean, and it was due
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Speaker 1: to centrifugal force and title movement. And title movement, it
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Speaker 1: makes sense for the time. It's back in UM. He
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Speaker 1: was right about the continents drifting. We know that, but
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Speaker 1: not with the centrifugal force the title movement. One of
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Speaker 1: his rivals calculated that UM, for the tides to move
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Speaker 1: a continent, that that kind of force would actually stop
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Speaker 1: the rotation of the Earth in less than twelve months.
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Speaker 1: So that wasn't it. But he was right about the
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Speaker 1: continents drifting. UM. He was pretty much ridiculed during his lifetime.
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Speaker 1: But in the nineteen fifties and sixties, as we got
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Speaker 1: more and more acquainted with UM, the the actual ridges
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Speaker 1: along the plates, uh, they figured out that Vegner had
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Speaker 1: been right. The continents were in fact drifting, not in
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Speaker 1: the way he thought. Right, go, go Vegner, that's the
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Speaker 1: history lesson. That's good. And I didn't know that. I know,
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Speaker 1: I told you it was extra research. And that's continental
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Speaker 1: drift theory. Right. Once we figured this out that actually
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Speaker 1: the what is that the lithosphere, the surface of the
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Speaker 1: Earth which all these different plates make up, are actually
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Speaker 1: moving along the atheneos sphere, which is this layer of
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Speaker 1: rock that Actually it is a lubricantant behaves like a
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Speaker 1: liquid because of the heat and pressure, right, right, So
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Speaker 1: it's the goop in between the plates that's kind of
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Speaker 1: cushioning everything. Right. And we figured this out. I didn't,
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Speaker 1: You didn't, but you know, geologists did. Um and we
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Speaker 1: once we figured it out, we realized that that explains
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Speaker 1: all sorts of stuff like volcanoes, um, trenches, yes, mountains
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Speaker 1: under ocean, uh, bridges under the ocean. But most importantly
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Speaker 1: this podcast, it also explains Yeah, volcanoes, plate tectonics, earthquakes.
7:15
Speaker 1: It's good stuff. Earthquakes, no volcanoes, Okay, tsunami. Well so wait,
7:19
Speaker 1: we're gonna switch mid podcast and do how volcanoes work.
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Speaker 1: Let's just make it up. Yeah, it really does. It
7:25
Speaker 1: explains earthquakes, uh, and it all makes sense. And I
7:28
Speaker 1: love plate technico tectonics. Who doesn't, you know, just the
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Speaker 1: thought of our earth. I don't know. Stuff like this
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Speaker 1: makes me feel insignificant in a good way, that that
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Speaker 1: you know, we're kind of on this earth humans and
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Speaker 1: we think we're all that, but we're really pit the
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Speaker 1: whim of whatever the Earth decided to do. There was
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Speaker 1: something going on at the core that we didn't know
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Speaker 1: about right now, and all of a sudden everything started
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Speaker 1: going haywire. We'd be powerless. Oh yeah, so I kind
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Speaker 1: of like that insignificant feeling occasionally. I mean we're powerless
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Speaker 1: to you know, baseball size hail. Yeah exactly, you know,
7:58
Speaker 1: let alone the movement of continents. Yeah, you want some stats, Josh, Chuck,
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Speaker 1: I knew you'd bring those up. There are actually many, many,
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Speaker 1: many earthquakes all the time. Uh, you just don't feel
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Speaker 1: them all. They don't get attention if you don't feel them,
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Speaker 1: and they don't get attention if they're not where people are,
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Speaker 1: which a lot of them are as well or away
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Speaker 1: from people. Uh, there's one earthquake every eleven seconds, Josh.
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Speaker 1: That's eight thousand per day, about three million per year. Actually,
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Speaker 1: the U S Geological Survey maintains the site Chuck um
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Speaker 1: that has like updated earthquake activity around the world. Did
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Speaker 1: you know about, let's see, six hours ago, there was
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Speaker 1: a six point seven earthquake UM in Papua New Guinea. Dude, Really,
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Speaker 1: that's big. It's a pretty cool sit Anything over seven
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Speaker 1: is the major scale is a big time major. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: we'll get to the Richter scale and if you don't
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Speaker 1: give it away. So, yeah, that many earthquakes is a lot,
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Speaker 1: but you don't feel them if they're if they're must
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Speaker 1: them are deep underground, right or in uninhabited areas exactly,
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Speaker 1: And so unless it's in a may your city or
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Speaker 1: something and killing folks, it's not gonna make the news.
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Speaker 1: But speaking of killing folks, have got one more stat
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Speaker 1: I like this one. One point five million people have
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Speaker 1: died from earthquake related activity in the last hundred years alone.
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Speaker 1: And you know, earthquakes get a really bad rap, chuck,
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Speaker 1: because really most of those debts are attributed to you know,
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Speaker 1: collapse structures or tsunamis or mud slides generated by the
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Speaker 1: earthquake exactly. The earthquake just opens up, the earth opens up,
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Speaker 1: and he swallowed into it like the movies, except in Superman.
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Speaker 1: Yeah remember that. Yeah, he reversed it. That dude flying
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Speaker 1: very fast, and he liked the Lex Luthor's girlfriend doing
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Speaker 1: so too. He did crickets, Josh, I think we should
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Speaker 1: get back to tectonics. Okay, let's talk about plates under
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Speaker 1: the earth and what can happen. Basically when these things
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Speaker 1: meet up. The two plates meet up, right, which where
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Speaker 1: they where two plates meet is of it's a fault, right, right.
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Speaker 1: You probably heard of the San Andrea's fault line in California,
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Speaker 1: very famous. Fault faults are where most earthquake earthquakes happen.
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Speaker 1: I keep on say volcanoes, it's so weird. So, uh,
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Speaker 1: what happens when plates get together is they can do
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Speaker 1: a couple of things. They can move apart from each other. Uh.
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Speaker 1: In that case, the magma comes out, Magma turns into
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Speaker 1: lava that cools and hardens, and then it kind of
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Speaker 1: reforms as part of the structure. So we should he
10:27
Speaker 1: uses through and then makes it more solid, right, and
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Speaker 1: then it cools and you have a new land mass form.
10:31
Speaker 1: Exactly right. We should also probably point out here to
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Speaker 1: any um people who believe in the hollow earth theory
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Speaker 1: that we're discussing this based on the notion that the
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Speaker 1: Earth's core is molten. Okay, yeah, sure, so go ahead
10:45
Speaker 1: and chuck disclaimer there. What kind of fault was that
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Speaker 1: that you just described? Well, no, that wasn't a fault.
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Speaker 1: That's just what happens when the plates move apart. When
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Speaker 1: the plates pushed together one oftentimes one will go underneath
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Speaker 1: the other. Like they'll meet up and then one will
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Speaker 1: slide onto the other one and it dissolves basically at
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Speaker 1: that point. And the final thing josh Ish the plates
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Speaker 1: can slide against each other, so they just kind of
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Speaker 1: pass in the night, basically, just kind of moving by
11:09
Speaker 1: each other very slowly. And all these different things that
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Speaker 1: I'm talking about where these plates meet, that is where
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Speaker 1: we get to the faults. Right there, there's four kinds, right,
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Speaker 1: the S and D. There's four kinds that can they
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Speaker 1: either go vertically or horizontally. As far as the faults
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Speaker 1: are concerned, You've got the normal fault and the reverse fault.
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Speaker 1: Those are vertical faults, right, So the normal fault is
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Speaker 1: where the plates actually move away from one another. The
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Speaker 1: reverse fault is where they moved together, right, And then
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Speaker 1: you have ones that that move horizontally, which I think
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Speaker 1: the San Andrea's fault is is a horizontal fault. Is
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Speaker 1: it a thrust fault? I think it's either a thrust
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Speaker 1: fall or strike slip fault. Okay, so it's basically the
11:47
Speaker 1: same thing, except along along horizontal lines rather than vertical. Right,
11:51
Speaker 1: But no matter which way they're moving, they can be
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Speaker 1: moving apart, moving together horizontally or vertically. UM. All fault
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Speaker 1: lines are basically where plates are still pressing together very tightly, right,
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Speaker 1: and when when they pressed together, they're eventually going to
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Speaker 1: get locked because of friction, right, But the pressure is
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Speaker 1: still going. They still want to move. So all this
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Speaker 1: potential energy is being built up, and as it builds
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Speaker 1: and builds and builds, the pressure eventually overcomes the resistance
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Speaker 1: and all of a sudden you have a slip. It breaks,
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Speaker 1: it does, and that's that's actually the epicenter of the
12:25
Speaker 1: focus of the earthquake where that happens right there. That
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Speaker 1: is the key, that is what an earthquake is, Yes,
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Speaker 1: is when the initial fault break or more that happened
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Speaker 1: later on occur. We really paid that out in a
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Speaker 1: dramatic fashion, didn't we. Yeah, it didn't feel that dramatic
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Speaker 1: to me. It will when we listen to that, maybe
12:43
Speaker 1: because I know the ending, so chuck right, they can't
12:48
Speaker 1: believe you gave it away. So fault zones, that's that's
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Speaker 1: where there's lots of faults together connected, right. Yeah, So
12:55
Speaker 1: one of those one of those faults slipping one of
12:57
Speaker 1: that UM a place where the potential energy you turns
13:00
Speaker 1: kinectic all of a sudden can actually trigger um faults,
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Speaker 1: or it can actually trigger movement along other faults that
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Speaker 1: are connected those fault zones you mentioned, right, That's why
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Speaker 1: earthquakes often happen in a series. It's more than more
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Speaker 1: than one, right, and they almost always happened along the faults.
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Speaker 1: But I know that very uh one, very famous earthquake
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Speaker 1: in eighteen eleven and eighteen twelve, which I didn't Did
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Speaker 1: that happen in like December thirty one, in January one
13:28
Speaker 1: or what? I don't know. That's a good point twelve
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Speaker 1: one long earthquake. Yeah, it would be. We'll find out
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Speaker 1: about that. But that occurred in the middle of a plate,
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Speaker 1: in the middle of the North American continental Plate, which
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Speaker 1: is odd at the time, but it was They found
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Speaker 1: out later that deep beneath the earth that was in
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Speaker 1: fact a six hundred million year old fault zone. So yeah,
13:47
Speaker 1: there you have it. Yeah, so it's it's some way
13:50
Speaker 1: or another there's a fault zone involved. Indeed, so chuck um,
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Speaker 1: we actually have a way to measure earthquakes. We measure
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Speaker 1: them through their seismic waves, right, make waves, which seismic
14:03
Speaker 1: waves are the energy that radiates from their focus and
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Speaker 1: it it acts as a wave much like a wave
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Speaker 1: in water, right, like if you were to throw sound
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Speaker 1: waves rock and a pond, that kind of thing. There's
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Speaker 1: there's two different types of waves, two major types of waves.
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Speaker 1: You have body waves and you have surface waves. So
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Speaker 1: let's talk about body waves first. Yes, they move through
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Speaker 1: the inside of the earth, the inner part of the earth. Right.
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Speaker 1: And well there's two different kinds of it's primary and
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Speaker 1: secondary body waves waves, pea waves or s waves. It's
14:33
Speaker 1: easy to remember mnemonic induction and lucid dreaming, etcetera. Right.
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Speaker 1: They travel about one to five miles per second. The
14:42
Speaker 1: pea waves too. Yeah, and they're actually they can move
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Speaker 1: through solid liquid or gas. Yes, they cannot be stopped. No,
14:50
Speaker 1: so they can actually go from one end of the
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Speaker 1: Earth to the other. Well, they do too every time.
14:54
Speaker 1: Isn't that correct? I don't know. I think that's what
14:56
Speaker 1: it says. We'll find out. Uh. And these these the
15:00
Speaker 1: pea waves, actually they affect the stuff that they're moving,
15:03
Speaker 1: like say, rock horizontally, so it shakes back and forth
15:08
Speaker 1: on a horizontal plane. Okay, And like you said, they're
15:10
Speaker 1: the fastest, so they get there first. But I got
15:13
Speaker 1: the impression that they caused the least amount of damage.
15:16
Speaker 1: Then you have secondary waves, right, secondary body waves. Yeah,
15:19
Speaker 1: that's the problem. Well, they're the first problem because they
15:22
Speaker 1: displaced rock perpendicularly to the direction of the wave. Right.
15:28
Speaker 1: So you remember the movie Tremors, So you remember the
15:32
Speaker 1: worms going underground and it was displacing dirt up on
15:35
Speaker 1: the Earth's surface. Same thing. That's like, that's like a
15:39
Speaker 1: secondary wave and s wave. I love that you're quoting
15:41
Speaker 1: tremors are scientific? Backup. I love that one. You It's
15:48
Speaker 1: great spread ward classic. So so actually that was Kevin Bay. Yeah,
15:53
Speaker 1: that was such a good one. It's probably one of
15:55
Speaker 1: my top five. Yeah. Um, so let's let's talk about
15:59
Speaker 1: surface waves you want, Well you should actually just say
16:02
Speaker 1: real quick though, that they don't travel through solid material,
16:05
Speaker 1: the secondary so they stopped liquid the liquid Earth's core,
16:12
Speaker 1: or if you believe in hollow war theory, they would
16:14
Speaker 1: stop when it became hollow because it doesn't travel through
16:18
Speaker 1: gas apparently either, right, Yeah, they would stop at the
16:21
Speaker 1: temple of Doom. Yeah, according to dollarwar theory. Can we
16:24
Speaker 1: talk about surface waves yet? Yes, we're there. Let's see it.
16:28
Speaker 1: They're like more like the waves in a body of water, right,
16:31
Speaker 1: they move the earth up and down. Did you see
16:33
Speaker 1: some of the pictures in this article. This is a
16:36
Speaker 1: really cool article for pictures. There's actually a page, picture
16:39
Speaker 1: page of nothing but earthquake aftermath pictures and they're cool
16:44
Speaker 1: interactive things too. When you talk about the plate shifting,
16:48
Speaker 1: some animations you can click on. Did you see the
16:51
Speaker 1: one with the railroad tracks? What was that, Peru? I
16:54
Speaker 1: don't remember. There's a picture in this article of railroad
16:57
Speaker 1: tracks that um basically just make a perfect s because
17:02
Speaker 1: of the surface waves that hit it during an earthquake. Well,
17:05
Speaker 1: and the crops that shifted to that being in a
17:08
Speaker 1: straight line, they had the wave in them. Yeah, so
17:10
Speaker 1: that's all due to surface waves. Surface waves are the
17:12
Speaker 1: ones that caused the most damage as far as we're concerned.
17:15
Speaker 1: If you're like, you know, a mole man or something,
17:17
Speaker 1: you're probably going to be more afraid of secondary body
17:20
Speaker 1: waves up top side. We're afraid of, you know, the
17:24
Speaker 1: surface waves. The l waves are long waves is what
17:27
Speaker 1: they're called as well, top top dwellers that we are, right,
17:29
Speaker 1: so they caused the worst damage, and because they move
17:32
Speaker 1: the earth up and down, like you said, a wave,
17:34
Speaker 1: a water wave in the ocean, Yeah, exactly, which we don't.
17:37
Speaker 1: We don't build our buildings generally to withstand wave like motion. No. Well,
17:43
Speaker 1: they've done a lot of work though, to build buildings
17:45
Speaker 1: that can rock back and forth and move a little
17:47
Speaker 1: bit and have the foundation shift. It's called earthquake. What
17:51
Speaker 1: we were talking about reinforcement. Sure, some of my apartments
17:55
Speaker 1: in l A actually had were reinforced. You could tell,
17:58
Speaker 1: like in the walls they would have these bars running
17:59
Speaker 1: up in stuff. But yeah, as far as in the
18:02
Speaker 1: Japan's on like the cutting edge of of earthquake proofing
18:05
Speaker 1: of everything. Yeah, yeah, a lot of earthquakes in Japan.
18:08
Speaker 1: Huh Yeah, and robots and volcanoes. Where are we now, Josh?
18:16
Speaker 1: You want to talk about Richter scale yet or I
18:18
Speaker 1: think that's the inevitable conclusion. So, Josh, the Richter scale
18:21
Speaker 1: is uh, as most people know, records a magnitude of
18:24
Speaker 1: the earthquake. Um. It's logarithmic, so that means that the
18:29
Speaker 1: whole number jump means it increases tenfold. So a six
18:32
Speaker 1: on the Richer scale is actually ten times as powerful
18:34
Speaker 1: as the five, and the nine times as powerful as
18:37
Speaker 1: the seven. How about that. Yeah, that's serious business. And
18:41
Speaker 1: what the Richer scale does is it measures that that
18:43
Speaker 1: wave amplitude of the seismic energy of a quake. And um,
18:49
Speaker 1: so that's the one you always hear about, Like I
18:51
Speaker 1: talked about that one in Pepua, New Guinea was a
18:52
Speaker 1: six point seven, right, which is large. Anything below a
18:55
Speaker 1: three generally doesn't get much attention. This is just a
18:58
Speaker 1: little tremor my micro quake. It's kind of hard to say.
19:02
Speaker 1: And that's the that's the vast majority of earthquakes or
19:06
Speaker 1: three year less. Right. Yeah, you won't see anything below four.
19:08
Speaker 1: You won't see a lot of damage going on. But
19:10
Speaker 1: anything seven and above is a pretty serious business. And
19:13
Speaker 1: then the record is a nine point five. I looked
19:17
Speaker 1: this up nineteen sixty Chile. Right, you're ready for some
19:22
Speaker 1: stats of my own? Look at you. I mean, imagine
19:24
Speaker 1: at nine point five on the Richter's kill it's immense. Um,
19:29
Speaker 1: there were sixteen hundred and sixty five people killed, three
19:34
Speaker 1: thousand injured, in two hundred thousand homeless in Chile alone, um,
19:40
Speaker 1: along with five hundred and fifty million dollars in damage
19:44
Speaker 1: property damage nine sixty. So that's ninety that's the impression
19:49
Speaker 1: I have you. Um, it created a tsunami that killed
19:53
Speaker 1: sixty one people and caused seventy five million dollars with
19:56
Speaker 1: the damage all the way in Hawaii, you're kidding, And
19:59
Speaker 1: in Japan and there were a hundred and thirty eight
20:01
Speaker 1: deaths and fifty million dollars worth of damage. Yeah, and
20:05
Speaker 1: it just kind of goes on from there. You know,
20:07
Speaker 1: what they said about that eighteen ten slash eleven earthquake
20:10
Speaker 1: in Missouri was that they could the church bells in
20:14
Speaker 1: Boston rang from the from the reverberation. I know that's nuts. Yeah,
20:18
Speaker 1: I want to verify that. But big old earthquake right there.
20:22
Speaker 1: So what you're talking about though, with the assessing the
20:24
Speaker 1: damage that is actually the Mercali scale, the damage done
20:28
Speaker 1: by the earthquake, which has figured out many days or
20:31
Speaker 1: weeks later, not like the Richter scale. I call that
20:34
Speaker 1: the y us God scale, right. Yeah, it's it's described
20:40
Speaker 1: in Roman numerals up to twelve, which you can also
20:43
Speaker 1: say is x I I and x i I is
20:47
Speaker 1: where there um is evident structural damage. The ground is
20:51
Speaker 1: opened up, sure like in the movies. Yeah. Um, and
20:55
Speaker 1: there's been at least the tsunami or mudslide or some
20:58
Speaker 1: other disaster. Yeah, my brother felt the earthquake when he
21:01
Speaker 1: was in l A. Did he look handsome and much
21:05
Speaker 1: more exciting things happen to him out there? His He
21:09
Speaker 1: he said it felt like a buzzing, like a real
21:10
Speaker 1: loud buzzing, and then he looked at his closet and
21:12
Speaker 1: the clothes were shaking, and you know it's over then,
21:15
Speaker 1: you know, as soon as you realize what's going on,
21:17
Speaker 1: it's over. Yeah. I read about the nineteen o six
21:19
Speaker 1: San Francisco earthquake. They said that the sensible duration of
21:23
Speaker 1: the earthquake it was a minute really, which I imagine
21:26
Speaker 1: probably felt like an hour, killed three thousand people. Well,
21:29
Speaker 1: that's that just goes to show you the kind of
21:31
Speaker 1: devastation if it only takes sixty seconds to wreak, that
21:34
Speaker 1: kind of havoc what's going on and fires that broke
21:37
Speaker 1: out after buildings collapsing, very scary stuff. So, Chuck, Well,
21:45
Speaker 1: we can't predict earthquakes. We do need to close with that.
21:48
Speaker 1: I think. Okay, they've come a long way and determining
21:52
Speaker 1: the the epicenter, and they can predict after shocks pretty
21:55
Speaker 1: well now, and they can say, hey, do you to history,
22:01
Speaker 1: you you're likely to have an earthquake because we think
22:03
Speaker 1: things are moving in your area. The plates may be moving,
22:06
Speaker 1: but they can't accurately say when it's gonna happen. Yeah.
22:08
Speaker 1: I remember being a little kid, and I think some
22:12
Speaker 1: scientists came out and said, there's going to be a
22:14
Speaker 1: massive earthquake and you know San Francisco or California that's
22:20
Speaker 1: going to basically cause the state to break off. That's
22:22
Speaker 1: a pretty fun thing. But they couldn't They couldn't say
22:25
Speaker 1: when it was gonna happen. They said within the next
22:26
Speaker 1: X number of decades. Scare a student day at your school. Yeah,
22:30
Speaker 1: so if you have any relatives in California, they will
22:32
Speaker 1: likely die. And I do have relatives in California too,
22:36
Speaker 1: you did at the time. I still do. Hey, Aunt Barbe, Okay, yeah,
22:40
Speaker 1: Aunt Barbe, Aunt Barbe, cousin just me and cousin Wolf
22:43
Speaker 1: along with cousin Peter, cousin John, and I think that's
22:47
Speaker 1: it out there. Oh and uh aunt Donna. Wow, yeah,
22:52
Speaker 1: well they live in California. Wolf he actually you want
22:56
Speaker 1: to know a wolf he story. This may or may
22:58
Speaker 1: not make it in the final version. But I'll tell you, Chuck,
23:00
Speaker 1: um cousin. Wolfe was born Eric Wolf right his first
23:05
Speaker 1: middle name. When he was like eleven or twelve, he
23:08
Speaker 1: decided he preferred the name wolf more. So he got
23:11
Speaker 1: his parents permission and went down to the Clerk of
23:13
Speaker 1: Courts and changed his name to Wolf Eric and he's
23:17
Speaker 1: been Wolfie ever since. That's pretty funny. What a guy. Uh.
23:21
Speaker 1: And then, um, I guess we already kind of talked
23:24
Speaker 1: about building construction. Is when the uniform building putt came about,
23:28
Speaker 1: and it's it's a set of standards basically two people
23:31
Speaker 1: have to follow now, right, whether you're in fulsome prison
23:35
Speaker 1: San Quentin, Japan, you gotta follow certain standards. Sure, oh yeah,
23:40
Speaker 1: especially Chile. So that's earthquakes in a nutshell. And we're
23:44
Speaker 1: not doing this one again unless they figure out that
23:47
Speaker 1: the continental drift theory was complete rubbish, right yeah. Oh,
23:52
Speaker 1: and also we should probably tell people, Chuck, there's an
23:54
Speaker 1: article on how to survive an earthquake at how stuff
23:57
Speaker 1: works dot com. You can type of five earthquake in
24:00
Speaker 1: the handy search parts, save yourself a few keystrokes and
24:03
Speaker 1: that will bring that right up. Good idea. And also
24:05
Speaker 1: you can just type in earthquakes and I will also
24:08
Speaker 1: bring up the how earthquakes work article with all those
24:10
Speaker 1: super cool pictures. Right, yeah too, listener mail buddy, Okay, Josh,
24:19
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna call this sleep paralysis deluge. It was
24:24
Speaker 1: a deluge, wasn't it. Yeah, last well, it will be
24:27
Speaker 1: last week now, a couple of weeks ago, probably when
24:29
Speaker 1: this is released. We had a listener bail from drowsy
24:32
Speaker 1: Dug in Oregon who had the pick suit man. He
24:36
Speaker 1: was awake but couldn't move and very frightened and apparently
24:40
Speaker 1: everyone on the face of the earth, and this is
24:42
Speaker 1: sleep paralysis. But us and I had heard of sleep paralysis, uh,
24:47
Speaker 1: never done a whole lot of research on it, but
24:49
Speaker 1: rest assured we will do an episode on this now.
24:52
Speaker 1: So here's the delusion of paper cup chuck. Yeah. Well,
24:55
Speaker 1: I also want to say I did not respond to
24:57
Speaker 1: any of those emails, and I am very sorry, but
25:00
Speaker 1: we got literally over a hundred of them and I
25:02
Speaker 1: just didn't have time. But it did read them, so
25:05
Speaker 1: no offense people. And out of all the emails we
25:08
Speaker 1: got about that one from medical and psychological professionals, I
25:12
Speaker 1: went with Madeleine, our new thirteen year old fan because
25:16
Speaker 1: hers was so good. Hey, guys that just listen to
25:18
Speaker 1: your podcast with Drowsy Doug. It sounds like what happens
25:21
Speaker 1: to me. I would be laying in bed and wake up.
25:23
Speaker 1: Unfortunately I'm too lazy and tired to get up. But
25:26
Speaker 1: then I would see things out of this world. Like
25:29
Speaker 1: one time I woke up and I was too tired
25:32
Speaker 1: to get up, and I saw it seems to be
25:34
Speaker 1: a common thing, And I saw in my huge half
25:37
Speaker 1: a sofa sized mirror my sister. Half her body was
25:42
Speaker 1: in the mirror, frozen while the rest of her was
25:44
Speaker 1: bending and moving around on my dresser. Awesome. Another time
25:48
Speaker 1: I saw army guys getting pulled onto my roof. Please
25:52
Speaker 1: don't give me any cures for this, because I like
25:54
Speaker 1: seeing Navy seal guys climbing to my roof. So that's
25:57
Speaker 1: from Madeleine, and Madeleine sounds like you my have a
26:00
Speaker 1: little case of sleep paralysis. But as long as there's
26:03
Speaker 1: no pig suited people or don't worry faces, we'll follow
26:06
Speaker 1: up with the podcast on this and condition. And a
26:09
Speaker 1: lot of people sounds like they have it. Actually a
26:11
Speaker 1: lot of people that run in Yeah, they're right there
26:13
Speaker 1: with Doug. Keep making these promises, don't you. Yeah, we'll
26:17
Speaker 1: do it all right. Well, if you want to basically
26:20
Speaker 1: boss chucking me around and get us to do a podcast,
26:23
Speaker 1: send us your ideas to stuff podcast at how stuff
26:27
Speaker 1: works dot com. For more on this and thousands of
26:34
Speaker 1: other topics, is it how stuff works dot com. Want
26:37
Speaker 1: more how stuff works, check out our blogs on the house.
26:40
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