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Selects: Rainbows: Delighting humanity since forever · Stuff You Should Know

0:01
Speaker 1: Hi, everybody. Not a double rainbow coming your way, just
0:04
Speaker 1: a single rainbow. In this Selects episode from February three,
0:09
Speaker 1: two thy fifteen, the Year of Our Lord. This one
0:14
Speaker 1: is Rainbow's colon Delighting Humanity since Forever. If I'm not mistaken,
0:20
Speaker 1: that was a Josh Clark title, and I love it.
0:23
Speaker 1: Good job, my friend. Check it out. We explain all
0:27
Speaker 1: about how rainbows work, and now you can know too. Enjoy.
0:34
Speaker 1: Welcome to stuff you should know, a production of iHeartRadio.
0:44
Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with
0:46
Speaker 2: Charles W. Chuck Bryant and Jerry Rowland. Have we ever
0:50
Speaker 2: said Jerry's last night don't mix? So? Well? We have.
0:53
Speaker 1: Now it's out there. It's on the internet. Even someone
0:56
Speaker 1: really updated our Wikipedia page. If you look lately, it's
1:00
Speaker 1: robust that even says they're producer Jerry Jerome Rowland. How
1:05
Speaker 1: do they know that? I guess I've said it on
1:07
Speaker 1: the podcast before.
1:08
Speaker 2: I am sure that you have. So how are you doing?
1:13
Speaker 1: I'm great man, Rainbow's As the author points out, they've
1:17
Speaker 1: inspired countless fairy tale songs and legends.
1:19
Speaker 2: Man, I love rainbows. I think rainbows are just fantastic
1:23
Speaker 2: They're probably the greatest graphic design of all time. I
1:26
Speaker 2: just think rainbows are great.
1:28
Speaker 1: Well, it is funny to when you read the different
1:30
Speaker 1: articles how people it's kind of corny when they talk
1:33
Speaker 1: about how they delight in astound. But darn it, when
1:37
Speaker 1: you see a rainbow, even as a jaded, cynical adult,
1:42
Speaker 1: there's no way you can't look and just go.
1:44
Speaker 2: Oh, that's pretty neat.
1:46
Speaker 1: Yeah, at the very least, you'll go, oh, a rainbow.
1:48
Speaker 2: If somebody says, hey, there's a rainbow over there, you're
1:51
Speaker 2: going to look up.
1:52
Speaker 1: I don't care.
1:53
Speaker 2: And if you doubt, if you doubt a rainbow's ability
1:56
Speaker 2: to astound adults, all you have to do is look
1:58
Speaker 2: up Yosembity Bears Double Rainbow video, which I watched today.
2:03
Speaker 2: It's pretty pretty great stuff.
2:05
Speaker 1: All Bear Vesquez. Yeah, yeah, that guy's what.
2:08
Speaker 2: Does it mean?
2:11
Speaker 1: I know what it means. You're on peyote. You know.
2:14
Speaker 1: Next time someone does see a rainbow and say that,
2:17
Speaker 1: I'm gonna test everything and just say so, and I'm
2:21
Speaker 1: gonna luck, all right, see if they just think I'm
2:23
Speaker 1: dead inside.
2:24
Speaker 2: Let's see what happens, all right. I'm curious to see
2:27
Speaker 2: whether you can not look, of course, I look so
2:32
Speaker 2: chuck that we're not the first to be delighted and
2:34
Speaker 2: amused by rainbows. It goes back several years, decades at least,
2:39
Speaker 2: they've been around forever. There There is a lot of
2:41
Speaker 2: mythology surrounding them, because you know, they're unusual. They don't
2:44
Speaker 2: happen every day, and well, I guess they depends on
2:48
Speaker 2: where you live, but it's not necessarily a normal occurrence.
2:53
Speaker 1: No. I found that the philosopher Descartes Rene Descartes was
2:57
Speaker 1: the first to describe kind of the modern accurate theory
3:01
Speaker 1: in sixteen thirty seven.
3:03
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, nice.
3:04
Speaker 1: He's the first one. And it's like, hey, wait a minute,
3:06
Speaker 1: there's some refraction and going on here.
3:10
Speaker 2: Right, Well, most people usually associate that with Newton.
3:13
Speaker 1: Yeah, well he's the first one to describe the spectrum.
3:16
Speaker 2: Right he was. And apparently I saw this cool video
3:20
Speaker 2: by Philip Ball on The Atlantic that basically it said
3:25
Speaker 2: that Newton just made up the ROYGBIV spectrum. What do
3:31
Speaker 2: you mean, so the red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet.
3:37
Speaker 2: Sure is Newton's interpretation of the rainbow. Before that, all
3:42
Speaker 2: sorts of different cultures had different ideas of what made
3:44
Speaker 2: up a rainbow, how many colors there were, what the
3:47
Speaker 2: colors were, and our interpretation of the rainbow spectrum is
3:53
Speaker 2: a Newtonian invention, and a lot of people say, it's
3:57
Speaker 2: not seven, it's actually six, Indigo, not really there Newton
4:02
Speaker 2: And apparently Newton was trying to shoehorn the rainbow spectrum
4:06
Speaker 2: into the musical octave. So he's he tried. He's trying
4:10
Speaker 2: to shoehorn music, which has sound wavelengths with light, which
4:17
Speaker 2: has wavelengths, and making them one and the same. But
4:20
Speaker 2: history has kind of shown like, no, there's six. Yeah,
4:23
Speaker 2: we'll go with six for the rainbow. So Roy GBIV,
4:26
Speaker 2: which we learned in school. Yeah, apparently I learned school.
4:28
Speaker 2: You did too, Oh yeah, yeah, sure, it's just Roy Gibb.
4:33
Speaker 2: There's no way to go.
4:35
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well he was busy making is h cookies from
4:38
Speaker 1: figs too, so he had lots of stuff going on.
4:41
Speaker 2: Those are good.
4:42
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I can mound some picnicts.
4:44
Speaker 2: Yeah, because they're good for you, so you can eat
4:47
Speaker 2: the whole bag one's sitting if you want.
4:49
Speaker 1: Yeah. I'd never buy them, but if I see them
4:52
Speaker 1: on like if you give blood or something, they're on
4:54
Speaker 1: a snack table. That's when I get my fig Newton on.
4:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, so Newton wasn't the only one. Before Newton, there
5:02
Speaker 2: was like a whole Celtic legend about the pot of
5:05
Speaker 2: gold at the end of the rainbow. There was God
5:07
Speaker 2: saying more bad after the Great Flood and promising it
5:11
Speaker 2: would never happen again by showing rainbows come out after rains,
5:15
Speaker 2: like it's fine, it's stopping, We're not going to flood
5:17
Speaker 2: the earth again.
5:20
Speaker 1: Of course, you can't find a pot of gold at
5:21
Speaker 1: the end of a rainbow because you cannot go to
5:23
Speaker 1: the end of a rainbow. Yes, you never. You can't
5:26
Speaker 1: go under a rainbow. You can't go over a rainbow.
5:29
Speaker 2: And we'll explain all this why in just a second. Sure,
5:33
Speaker 2: but first forget we have to talk about to get
5:35
Speaker 2: to the bottom of how rainbows work, which to me
5:37
Speaker 2: I think is awesome. It's one of those things where Okay,
5:39
Speaker 2: this is how it works, we understand it now. Yeah,
5:42
Speaker 2: I love science. Stuff like that, baked in science, yes,
5:46
Speaker 2: just done. It's not like scientists think this is what's happening,
5:51
Speaker 2: and it's probably true, but that remains to be seen.
5:54
Speaker 2: This is one of those ones where, like we know
5:55
Speaker 2: how rainbows work, and here's how. But to get to
5:58
Speaker 2: the bottom of rainbows, we have to understand how light
6:01
Speaker 2: works first.
6:03
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I thought this article, even though there was
6:05
Speaker 1: a lot more digging in to do, I thought the
6:08
Speaker 1: shopping cart explanation for the basically how light travels, yeah,
6:13
Speaker 1: was pretty pretty darn good, fantastic. You know. One reason
6:17
Speaker 1: they say visible spectrum is because the light is moving
6:19
Speaker 1: so fast that you can't see it. It's like and
6:23
Speaker 1: the combination of all those is white light, like the
6:26
Speaker 1: sun is white light, because all those colors are super
6:29
Speaker 1: imposed on one another. Yeah, But when it hits like
6:32
Speaker 1: a water droplet or something else, it's going to slow
6:34
Speaker 1: down enough, and we'll get to all this where you
6:37
Speaker 1: can see those individual parts of the spectrum.
6:41
Speaker 2: Right, And that shopping cart explanation, like you said, it
6:45
Speaker 2: definitely simplifies the whole thing, and it's not quite right,
6:48
Speaker 2: but it does a pretty good job of illustrating the
6:50
Speaker 2: principles that are going on, you know.
6:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, So basically light is moving at different speeds depending
6:56
Speaker 1: on what kind of medium it's traveling through. Right, So,
7:00
Speaker 1: like I said, when it hits water, it's going to
7:02
Speaker 1: slow down a lot. That's going to change its speed.
7:04
Speaker 1: If you're pushing a shopping cart, the asphalt is the medium.
7:09
Speaker 1: If you push it onto grass, it's going to slow down.
7:11
Speaker 1: That's a new medium. It's a new medium.
7:13
Speaker 2: It's gone. It's transitioned from one media to another.
7:16
Speaker 1: That's right. And if you hit that grass at an angle,
7:20
Speaker 1: and we've probably done this if you had to, we're
7:22
Speaker 1: able to steal a shopping cart. As a kid, you're
7:24
Speaker 1: pushing your friends around in it, you're hauling through the neighborhood,
7:28
Speaker 1: and you hit that grass at an angle, and it's
7:31
Speaker 1: going to take a really sharp turn because that front
7:34
Speaker 1: right wheel, let's say, is going to hit the grass
7:36
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, really quickly, it's going to
7:38
Speaker 1: be traveling at a much slower speed than the rest
7:40
Speaker 1: of it, and your friend's going to tumble out, and
7:43
Speaker 1: everyone's going to have a good time.
7:44
Speaker 2: Exactly. Just wear your helmet so that imagine that the
7:47
Speaker 2: shopping cart is a photon of light or a beam
7:52
Speaker 2: of white visible sunlight, and the grass is a prism. Yeah,
7:59
Speaker 2: so the parking lot was air and it was moving through.
8:02
Speaker 2: Just find no problem. But when it hit that prism,
8:05
Speaker 2: it slowed down. Yes, And because it came at an angle.
8:08
Speaker 2: One side of the light hit sooner and it made
8:12
Speaker 2: it turn, and that is called refraction. The bending of
8:15
Speaker 2: light is refraction.
8:17
Speaker 1: Yeah. And in the case of a rainbow, that prism
8:19
Speaker 1: is a rain drop. So I mean this is the
8:22
Speaker 1: simple quick version. We'll get more detailed. But when it
8:24
Speaker 1: hits that rain drop, it's going to slow down and
8:27
Speaker 1: it's going to bend.
8:28
Speaker 2: Right. So depending on the reflective index, which is how
8:35
Speaker 2: much light bends, depending on the wavelength, the wavelength of light,
8:42
Speaker 2: which is another term for color, sure is going to
8:45
Speaker 2: bend at a different angle. So when that visible light,
8:48
Speaker 2: which is all the colors of the visible spectrum combined,
8:52
Speaker 2: hits a prism and it bends or a rain drop, right,
8:56
Speaker 2: it bends at different angles because the wavelengths are different,
9:00
Speaker 2: and so that visible light comes undone into its component wavelengths,
9:05
Speaker 2: which are all the colors of the rainbow, and they
9:08
Speaker 2: spread out.
9:09
Speaker 1: It's called dispersion, right, Yeah, And that's it really. But
9:15
Speaker 1: like I said, in this case, we're talking about rain
9:18
Speaker 1: and because rain is you know, rain drops are all
9:21
Speaker 1: different shapes and sizes, it's not going to be as
9:24
Speaker 1: consistent as like a prism might be but it's going
9:26
Speaker 1: to have the same effect. It's going to hit the
9:29
Speaker 1: rain drop, it's going to slow down like the wheel
9:33
Speaker 1: digging into the grass of the shopping cart, and it's
9:36
Speaker 1: going to refract, and some of it's going to keep going.
9:40
Speaker 1: Some of it's going to bounce back, but different the
9:43
Speaker 1: different color is going to bounce at a different angle.
9:45
Speaker 1: And it's all relative to where you are on the ground. Like,
9:49
Speaker 1: no person two people see the same rainbow, right, So
9:53
Speaker 1: we're all subjective.
9:54
Speaker 2: Right, So when light hits the prism and it bends,
9:58
Speaker 2: like you said, because the different lights have different wavelengths,
10:02
Speaker 2: different colors have different wavelengths. Red has the longest wavelength,
10:07
Speaker 2: so it bends the least. Yes, I believe violet has
10:11
Speaker 2: the shortest wavelength, so it bends the most. But because
10:16
Speaker 2: again because of these different wavelengths, they bend differently, so
10:20
Speaker 2: that the light spreads apart and when it exits the prism,
10:24
Speaker 2: it bends again and it forms that spectrum of separated
10:29
Speaker 2: light separated out.
10:31
Speaker 1: And this, if you notice we keep saying the word bend,
10:33
Speaker 1: That's why a rainbow is an arc instead of like
10:37
Speaker 1: a right angle, because the light is bending.
10:40
Speaker 2: So Chuck We've been kind of teasing this a little bit,
10:42
Speaker 2: but we'll get into exactly how you go from prism
10:46
Speaker 2: ter rain, drop and hence to rainbow right after this.
11:10
Speaker 1: All right, if you want to see a rainbow, or
11:12
Speaker 1: if you're gonna see a rainbow, there need to be
11:15
Speaker 1: three conditions. The sun's got to be behind you, big one.
11:19
Speaker 1: You're gonna have moisture in front of you, right, and
11:23
Speaker 1: you the sun must be shining that those sun's rays
11:27
Speaker 1: must be shining at forty two degrees of what's called
11:30
Speaker 1: the antisolar point, which is basically where the shadow of
11:33
Speaker 1: your head is on the ground. Okay, so if you
11:37
Speaker 1: can see the shadow of your head, that's gonna be
11:40
Speaker 1: that forty two degree antisolar point, right.
11:43
Speaker 2: So what you do is you put your back directly
11:45
Speaker 2: to the sun, right, yeah, and then turn forty two degrees,
11:49
Speaker 2: which I guess if it were negative forty two degrees,
11:52
Speaker 2: you'd be turning to the left. So I guess you'd
11:54
Speaker 2: be turning to the right a little bit about forty
11:56
Speaker 2: two degrees, which you can kind of measure off in
11:59
Speaker 2: your head. It's not quite for forty five degrees. And
12:01
Speaker 2: if you're looking at rain and the sun's behind you.
12:05
Speaker 2: You're gonna see where that forty two degrees is because
12:07
Speaker 2: once you hit that point, there's your rainbow.
12:11
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I mean you can move your body around
12:12
Speaker 1: and still see the rainbow. I mean it's where the
12:15
Speaker 1: sun is hitting. The sun's got to be hitting it
12:17
Speaker 1: at forty two degrees.
12:18
Speaker 2: I see. Okay, so Chuck, it doesn't matter then where
12:23
Speaker 2: your head is. It's it's the rain drop's relation to
12:29
Speaker 2: the sun. This needs to be forty two degrees the
12:32
Speaker 2: producer rainbow.
12:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, the sunshine must be hitting it at forty two degrees.
12:36
Speaker 2: Okay, So let's let's get back to basics again for
12:39
Speaker 2: a second. When the sunlight hits the rain drop, each
12:44
Speaker 2: individual rain drop is acting like a prism, right, that's right.
12:47
Speaker 2: So that visible white light is hitting a rain drop, Yeah,
12:51
Speaker 2: it's hitting it at an angle. It's going kaboom into
12:55
Speaker 2: like a colored spectrum inside the rain drop, and then
12:59
Speaker 2: it's gonna flecked back again, refract again, exiting the rain drop,
13:04
Speaker 2: so it bends again and it comes back at you.
13:08
Speaker 2: The thing is is when you see a light colored
13:14
Speaker 2: light wavelength from a rain drop, you're not seeing the
13:17
Speaker 2: whole spectrum. You're not seeing millions of little rainbows. You're
13:20
Speaker 2: seeing one big rainbow. And the reason why is because
13:23
Speaker 2: each individual rain drop, depending on its relation to you
13:26
Speaker 2: and I guess to the sun, is shooting one color
13:30
Speaker 2: at you. It's shooting all colors at you, but you're
13:33
Speaker 2: only picking up on one color because there's only one
13:36
Speaker 2: color from a rain drop that is angled correctly to
13:41
Speaker 2: you and your line of sight so that it's the
13:45
Speaker 2: only one you're picking up on is red. And then
13:48
Speaker 2: all of the rain drops around that rain drop are
13:51
Speaker 2: doing the same thing. They're shooting about in relation to
13:55
Speaker 2: your line of sight, red towards you. But then the
13:58
Speaker 2: rain drops a little lower than that, right are shooting yellow,
14:02
Speaker 2: and then lower than that green, and so on and
14:04
Speaker 2: so on, and so you get to violet. And so
14:06
Speaker 2: these groups are rain these groups of rain drops are
14:09
Speaker 2: producing this rainbow cumulatively as far as your line of
14:15
Speaker 2: sight is concerned.
14:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, because the rain is just falling, so where it
14:18
Speaker 1: is in the sky, I mean, as it falls, it's
14:20
Speaker 1: going to be changing color.
14:22
Speaker 2: Right.
14:22
Speaker 1: You know, it's not like frozen in mid air or anything.
14:25
Speaker 2: But it seems like it.
14:26
Speaker 1: But it seems like it right exactly.
14:28
Speaker 2: Isn't that phenomenal.
14:30
Speaker 1: It really is.
14:31
Speaker 2: I just think that's just as cool as it gets.
14:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's super cool. And you'll always notice too, the
14:36
Speaker 1: sky under the rainbow is going to be brighter than out.
14:39
Speaker 1: And when you've got a double rainbow, which we'll get to,
14:43
Speaker 1: the area between those two is usually really dark, right,
14:48
Speaker 1: And that's.
14:49
Speaker 2: Called the Alexander's Dark Band.
14:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, Alexander's Band because he was Alexander Afrio Aphrodisius was
14:57
Speaker 1: the first dude, huh to describe that. That's a great name,
15:02
Speaker 1: Alexander Afrodisias. Yeah, it's pretty good.
15:04
Speaker 2: It sounds like a seventies exploitation movie or something totally.
15:09
Speaker 2: But yeah. So the reason why in between the double
15:11
Speaker 2: rainbows you have Alexander's Band is because the light there
15:17
Speaker 2: is reflecting away from you and it's so it's a
15:22
Speaker 2: dark area.
15:23
Speaker 1: Yeah.
15:23
Speaker 2: So the sunlight hitting those rain drops is going away
15:28
Speaker 2: like oh, it's dark inside the rainbow, all of that
15:31
Speaker 2: light is reflecting back to you and you're seeing all
15:35
Speaker 2: of the different colors come at you and they're recombining
15:38
Speaker 2: indivisible light, so there's no color, it's just bright sunlight
15:41
Speaker 2: in the middle.
15:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that you know, sunlight they also always describe
15:45
Speaker 1: it as white, I mean, sunlight as all the colors.
15:48
Speaker 1: We just you know, can't see it.
15:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, we should really do a whole How Color Works episode.
15:54
Speaker 2: It's fascinating stuff. But yeah, depending on whether you're a
15:57
Speaker 2: painter who's mixing chemical, whether you're a chemist or a physicist, Yeah,
16:03
Speaker 2: white is either the presence of all colors or the
16:06
Speaker 2: absence of color.
16:08
Speaker 1: Right, you know, it's kind of mind blowing.
16:10
Speaker 2: We should totally do how color Works.
16:13
Speaker 1: Well, I guess after this break we'll talk a little
16:15
Speaker 1: bit more about the double rainbow all the way and
16:18
Speaker 1: even well we'll just leave it at that.
16:21
Speaker 2: What does it mean? So, Chuck, you want to talk
16:44
Speaker 2: about double rainbows and what forms them?
16:46
Speaker 1: It's pretty much the same thing.
16:47
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, the lights refracted twice.
16:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just a double refraction.
16:53
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, what's cool is if you look at a
16:55
Speaker 2: double rainbow, the one on top, the higher one that's
16:58
Speaker 2: the second refraction, Yes, is reversed. So rather than red
17:04
Speaker 2: being on the top, yeah, it's on the bottom. Yeah,
17:08
Speaker 2: it's a reverse rainbow, is what a double rainbow is.
17:11
Speaker 1: And you can have a triple and even a quad. Nice,
17:14
Speaker 1: but it's rare. Yeah, like I've seen a little bit
17:17
Speaker 1: of a triple once. I think, to where you just
17:21
Speaker 1: see the faintest hint of that third one. And if
17:25
Speaker 1: you're seeing that, that means the niche I think it's
17:27
Speaker 1: called the primary and secondary. That means your primary is
17:30
Speaker 1: super super super sharp. Yeah, to where it looks like
17:34
Speaker 1: it's drawn on the sky, painted on the sky. Nice,
17:37
Speaker 1: and then your secondary is gonna be a little more
17:39
Speaker 1: faint than the third one because the triple refraction. You know,
17:42
Speaker 1: it's not the easiest thing to occur in nature.
17:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, And one of the things that makes the primary
17:48
Speaker 2: rainbow and then hence the secondary. And I guess tertiarian
17:51
Speaker 2: so on rainbows bright is the amount of sunlight and
17:55
Speaker 2: the number of rain drops because remember those rain drops
17:59
Speaker 2: that you're seeing that the spectrum is made up of
18:04
Speaker 2: light wavelengths that's coming at you from a bunch of
18:06
Speaker 2: different rain drops and they reinforce one another, and the
18:08
Speaker 2: more they reinforce one another, the brighter the rainbow is.
18:12
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you'll, I mean, I feel like I usually
18:14
Speaker 1: see rainbows when it's not raining where I'm standing, right,
18:17
Speaker 1: but that doesn't matter. It's you know, oh, you.
18:20
Speaker 2: Can be being rained on and still see the rainbow.
18:23
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, but it's like sometimes it's like a super
18:26
Speaker 1: light rain where it has just rained really hard. Maybe
18:28
Speaker 1: it's tapering off or maybe stopped altogether. But the point
18:31
Speaker 1: is where the rainbow is. It's not like they said earlier,
18:34
Speaker 1: you can't drive up to a rainbow. I'm going to
18:37
Speaker 1: go up and find that thing, because it's just a
18:40
Speaker 1: perspective trick basically. Right.
18:43
Speaker 2: The only apparently from this Scientific American article you sent,
18:47
Speaker 2: the only visual information we get from a rainbow is
18:50
Speaker 2: the band of its arc.
18:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, and everything else is what's around.
18:54
Speaker 2: It, right, right, So, like, if a rainbow seems really huge,
18:58
Speaker 2: it's because, say, the mountains in the background look small,
19:02
Speaker 2: which makes the rainbow, by contrast, look very big and majestic.
19:06
Speaker 2: If we're close to, say, like the mountains are like
19:08
Speaker 2: a cell phone tower or something like that, the rainbow
19:11
Speaker 2: may look very small by comparison.
19:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, And the way they liken it, and that I
19:15
Speaker 1: think in that article I think was like the human head,
19:20
Speaker 1: it's like roughly the same size, but if it was
19:23
Speaker 1: right in front of your face, it would block out
19:24
Speaker 1: a whole movie screen. But if it was further away,
19:27
Speaker 1: it would just be like, hey, there's that guy's head.
19:29
Speaker 2: It's the same thing, same thing. And then Phil Plait,
19:33
Speaker 2: who's who does the Bad Astronomer blog for Slate, he
19:39
Speaker 2: did a pretty good explanation of full circle rainbows.
19:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, I had never ever heard of that until you
19:46
Speaker 1: sent me that. So it makes sense though.
19:47
Speaker 2: It totally does. So remember we talked about a rainbow
19:50
Speaker 2: arcing over the sky and because the light is bent
19:53
Speaker 2: out of the prism.
19:55
Speaker 1: Well, no, it's because it starts on one part of
19:56
Speaker 1: the ground and ends on another part of the ground, right.
19:58
Speaker 2: Where the goal is. The reason why it has that
20:02
Speaker 2: arc is because what you're seeing is part of what
20:06
Speaker 2: really is a full circle, and it's depending on where
20:10
Speaker 2: you are. Now, you have a certain amount of rain
20:13
Speaker 2: drops available to reflect the light to you.
20:19
Speaker 1: Yeah.
20:19
Speaker 2: Right, So when you're on the ground and you're looking
20:22
Speaker 2: up or just over to the horizon, sure you have
20:24
Speaker 2: a certain amount of rain drops available to you to
20:26
Speaker 2: form a rainbow. If you were able to get away
20:30
Speaker 2: from the ground, you have even more rain drops not
20:33
Speaker 2: just above you, but now below you as well, and
20:37
Speaker 2: you can see a full circle. That is the actual
20:39
Speaker 2: real rainbow. Yeah, so a real rainbow depending on where
20:44
Speaker 2: you are in relation to the ground is either a
20:47
Speaker 2: part of a circle, an arc, or a full circle.
20:50
Speaker 1: Yeah, and there was a picture. I mean he said
20:52
Speaker 1: that pilots see him all the time, or I guess
20:55
Speaker 1: if you're in astute flyer, that's not just like a
20:58
Speaker 1: sleep with a black blankets, right, Yeah, you can look
21:02
Speaker 1: out a window of a plane and see one too,
21:04
Speaker 1: because you're above it. Right, It's pretty neat. I mean,
21:06
Speaker 1: there was a photo of one and it was like,
21:09
Speaker 1: oh wow, there's a full circle rainbow.
21:11
Speaker 2: Full circle rainbow. It looks it looks kind of like
21:13
Speaker 2: a lens flare a little bit, but yeah, to a
21:16
Speaker 2: rainbow lens flair and Phil Plate had in that same
21:21
Speaker 2: blog post a double circle rainbow, which was really neat.
21:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, so go check that out. I agree that was
21:29
Speaker 1: pretty cool. Yeah, you know that thing we were talking
21:33
Speaker 1: about earlier too, about the perspective. That's why the I
21:37
Speaker 1: think I thought you did it. Don't be dumb about
21:39
Speaker 1: why the moon looks bigger? Have you done that?
21:41
Speaker 2: No, it's so why can you see the moon during
21:44
Speaker 2: the day sometimes?
21:45
Speaker 1: Oh why is that?
21:47
Speaker 2: Well, I'll tell you why.
21:48
Speaker 1: Because I saw it like a one the other day
21:50
Speaker 1: that was like super late in the day.
21:52
Speaker 2: Well, the reason why. A better question is why can't
21:55
Speaker 2: you see the moon all the time, even during the day.
21:58
Speaker 2: So it's not the Moon's very bright. It's the brightest
22:01
Speaker 2: object in the sky, second only to the Sun. Sure,
22:04
Speaker 2: but it also gets its light from the Sun. So
22:06
Speaker 2: most of the time when you can't see the Moon
22:10
Speaker 2: during the day, it's because the moon is behind you, right,
22:15
Speaker 2: So the light that it's getting from the Sun is
22:17
Speaker 2: behind you. Now, if the moon is closer to the Sun,
22:21
Speaker 2: like depending on where the moon is in its lunar phase,
22:24
Speaker 2: then you can look up and see the Sun and
22:27
Speaker 2: the Moon at the same time. It's above the horizon.
22:30
Speaker 2: In other words, Oh okay, so if the moon were
22:33
Speaker 2: always visible above the horizon, you'd always be able to
22:35
Speaker 2: see it during the day, gotcha. And it just has
22:38
Speaker 2: to do with where it is in relation to the
22:40
Speaker 2: Sun in the lunar phase. Does that make sense?
22:43
Speaker 1: Yeah?
22:44
Speaker 2: If it's just go watch that, don't be dumb on it.
22:47
Speaker 1: Yeah, they call that a bonus, an impromptu bonus.
22:51
Speaker 2: Yeah.
22:51
Speaker 1: But the reason why the moon will look really huge
22:53
Speaker 1: in the sky is because the same thing we're talking
22:56
Speaker 1: about with the perspective, like the mountain is like when
22:59
Speaker 1: you're low on the horizon, and it's gonna look enormous.
23:02
Speaker 2: Right if there's a lot less stuff, Yeah, near close
23:06
Speaker 2: to you, Yeah, it's gonna look very big.
23:09
Speaker 1: Yeah. And when I went to Montana years ago. My
23:13
Speaker 1: explanation I got because you step off the plane and
23:16
Speaker 1: you think, wow, the sky does look bigger, Like what's
23:19
Speaker 1: the deal? They call it Big Sky Country, and it
23:21
Speaker 1: really does look bigger. And the explanation I got from
23:24
Speaker 1: the locals, which it's because the clouds. So again it's
23:27
Speaker 1: just a perspective trick.
23:29
Speaker 2: So like the mountains are way over there.
23:31
Speaker 1: I think it's just the clouds that they typically get
23:33
Speaker 1: are the big, huge, puffy clouds.
23:37
Speaker 2: But they look big in relation to the mountains in
23:39
Speaker 2: the distance.
23:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's the deal. So it makes the
23:42
Speaker 1: sky appear to look larger.
23:43
Speaker 2: Plus I imagine also there's fewer obstacles and obstructions, so
23:47
Speaker 2: that it's just there's more sky to see and take
23:50
Speaker 2: in just looking around, right.
23:52
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, Like when I lived in Yuma and you
23:54
Speaker 1: go out in the desert and you can see like
23:56
Speaker 1: one hundred and degrees from horizon to horizon, right, But
24:00
Speaker 1: they don't have the cloud formations, So the sky looks
24:04
Speaker 1: bigger in Montana than it does like in the middle
24:05
Speaker 1: of the desert. Yeah, because most of the time in
24:08
Speaker 1: the desert you're going to see that, you know, just blue,
24:11
Speaker 1: nothing but blue. Yeah, so there's no perspective nice, you know,
24:15
Speaker 1: like when you take a picture of something to sell
24:17
Speaker 1: on eBay, you put your fist next to it so
24:20
Speaker 1: people know how big it is.
24:21
Speaker 2: Is that what people do?
24:23
Speaker 1: Oh?
24:23
Speaker 2: Sure, I've seen quarters and rulers. Never seen a fish.
24:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's quarters and rulers. That's probably a better rule
24:29
Speaker 1: of thumb.
24:29
Speaker 2: Yeah right, Yeah, so, Chuck, I got a couple other things. Apparently,
24:34
Speaker 2: when you look at a rainbow, it's not an even
24:37
Speaker 2: division or an even representation of all the colors. You
24:42
Speaker 2: see the most red, it's the most visible. Apparently, thirty
24:45
Speaker 2: eight percent of a rainbow is red and green is
24:48
Speaker 2: second at fifteen. Blue is the least with just eleven percent.
24:56
Speaker 1: What is green?
24:57
Speaker 2: Green is twenty two percent? Okay, twenty two percent of
25:01
Speaker 2: rainbow green?
25:02
Speaker 1: Interesting. I wonder what color blind we need to do
25:05
Speaker 1: on color blindness. But it's I looked into the article
25:09
Speaker 1: and it was just sort of started to melt my brain. Yeah,
25:12
Speaker 1: like all this stuff. So I just said, no, put
25:15
Speaker 1: that on the back burner.
25:15
Speaker 2: I think you did a great job with this.
25:17
Speaker 1: Well we'll see, I'm sure we'll get stuff wrong.
25:21
Speaker 2: And lastly, the LGBT rainbow flag designed in nineteen seventy
25:25
Speaker 2: eight by a guy named Gilbert Baker. Really and it
25:28
Speaker 2: used to have eight. It had turquoise and hot pink
25:30
Speaker 2: on it before. Yeah, but apparently they ran out of
25:33
Speaker 2: fabric for hot pink because the things like started to
25:36
Speaker 2: take off, so they discontinued that, and I think the
25:39
Speaker 2: same went for the turquoise one. Too interesting, we just
25:42
Speaker 2: went with six.
25:43
Speaker 1: And now is it a it's a shining monument for establishments,
25:49
Speaker 1: for people to say I want to go in there,
25:52
Speaker 1: and some people to say I don't want to go
25:54
Speaker 1: in there, sadly, right, you know.
25:56
Speaker 2: Yeah.
25:57
Speaker 1: We went to a gay bar in Philadelphia one afternoon,
26:03
Speaker 1: and I say, by accident, not like it was a
26:05
Speaker 1: big deal.
26:06
Speaker 2: Was it the Blue Oyster?
26:07
Speaker 1: No? No, And it was in the afternoon, so that
26:10
Speaker 1: was just you know, you know how it is in
26:12
Speaker 1: some bars in the afternoon. Yeah, like the the serious
26:15
Speaker 1: regulars are in there.
26:16
Speaker 2: Sure it doesn't matter gay, straight, whatever, and.
26:19
Speaker 1: They were very cool guys, and they were like, uh,
26:21
Speaker 1: and it was a big group of us, and I
26:23
Speaker 1: think they were like, you know, you know you're in
26:25
Speaker 1: a gay bar, right, And they were kind of pointing
26:27
Speaker 1: that out. And I was like, oh, well, great, serve
26:31
Speaker 1: me a bloody Mary then, right exactly, Like I didn't
26:34
Speaker 1: know if he thought we were. I think he knew
26:35
Speaker 1: where from out of town. Sure, so he was just
26:38
Speaker 1: a letter yeah, yeah, like he didn't want any trouble.
26:42
Speaker 2: Oh gotcha, you know.
26:44
Speaker 1: I was like, we're not like that, my friend.
26:46
Speaker 2: That's good.
26:47
Speaker 1: Just a happy accident.
26:48
Speaker 2: Does a good ending to the rainbow episode. Yeah. Uh.
26:51
Speaker 2: If you want to know more about rainbows, go check
26:53
Speaker 2: out our article on the site rainbows. Just type that
26:57
Speaker 2: word into how stuff works. Go check out that Slate
27:00
Speaker 2: and Scientific American in the Atlantic. Some good stuff out there.
27:04
Speaker 2: And I said search bar. I think in there somewhere,
27:07
Speaker 2: which means it is time for listener mail.
27:11
Speaker 1: That's right. I'm gonna call this Pliny the Beer and
27:17
Speaker 1: this is from Cory and I think Corey's in San Francisco. Hey, guys,
27:24
Speaker 1: love the podcast. I was listening to Cinnamon today and
27:27
Speaker 1: there was an exchange about Pliny and a comment that
27:30
Speaker 1: there was one and only. I think anyone in the
27:33
Speaker 1: Bay Area would know that there are two Pliny's, the
27:36
Speaker 1: Elder and the Younger. That's because one of our local
27:39
Speaker 1: breweries has a beer called Pliny the Elder, which is
27:41
Speaker 1: known by beer ficionados as one of the best beers
27:45
Speaker 1: out there. In fact, it sells out weekly from local groceries.
27:48
Speaker 1: They also make a Pliny the Younger, which only comes
27:52
Speaker 1: out for two weeks a year, and people wait in
27:55
Speaker 1: line for hours just to get a pint. And there
27:58
Speaker 1: is also a real historical Pliny the Elder and Planty
28:00
Speaker 1: the Younger, who was his nephew.
28:03
Speaker 2: I didn't realize it was his nephew, and.
28:04
Speaker 1: That is from Corey. And I did look it up
28:07
Speaker 1: because the two weeks thing, I did not believe it,
28:10
Speaker 1: but I just, you know, sometimes you want to see
28:11
Speaker 1: it with your own eyes, huh. And yeah, Pliny the
28:14
Speaker 1: Younger is a triple IPA.
28:17
Speaker 2: Oh well, that sounds awesome.
28:18
Speaker 1: Named for the nephew and adopted son evidently, and it
28:23
Speaker 1: is pub draft only. They don't even bottle it, very
28:26
Speaker 1: limited distribution locally and it's seasonal, so for just two
28:31
Speaker 1: weeks a year in February at the Bay of Bengal.
28:36
Speaker 1: You can get it in a bar, I guess in
28:38
Speaker 1: San Francisco. Nice and it is a ten point twenty
28:42
Speaker 1: five percenter Wow, Yeah, as opposed to eight for the Elder.
28:50
Speaker 2: And they're both IPAs.
28:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, one's the double and the triple, so that's a
28:54
Speaker 1: live Yeah, and you can get to planey the Elder
28:57
Speaker 1: and the bottles. It's not quite as exclusive to try
29:00
Speaker 1: that on our tour. Yeah, I guess only the Elder
29:03
Speaker 1: and yes, someone.
29:04
Speaker 2: Unless we luck out and happen to be there during
29:06
Speaker 2: that two week period. Huh.
29:08
Speaker 1: Well, no, it's in February always that what you said.
29:10
Speaker 1: But if there's a bar out there that maybe wanted
29:13
Speaker 1: to just say we're out.
29:14
Speaker 2: Pint, put it under the bar, save it for a
29:16
Speaker 2: month for us, we'll be there.
29:17
Speaker 1: I don't think that's going to happen.
29:19
Speaker 2: If you want to correct us after we get something
29:23
Speaker 2: flagrantly wrong, like we did with the whole plainy thing,
29:27
Speaker 2: you can tweet to us at sysk podcast. You can
29:30
Speaker 2: post it on Facebook dot com slash stuff you should know.
29:32
Speaker 2: You can send us an email to Stuff Podcast at
29:35
Speaker 2: HowStuffWorks dot com, and as always, joined us at our
29:38
Speaker 2: home on the web, Stuff Youshould Know dot Com. Stuff
29:44
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29:46
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