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How do butterfly wings get their color? · Stuff You Should Know

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  Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know
• 0:08
  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 as always as
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  Speaker 1: Charles W. Chucker's fluttered by Bryant. No, I'm a caterpillar
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  Speaker 1: and one day I might be a beautiful butterfly. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: you're you're an Olympic coal. Yes, but you're going to
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: be a diamond someday, Chuck. Who's saying that? Uh? Originally
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: it was one of those old guys. That's a good one.
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  Speaker 1: Widespread panic. Did they cover that really? Yeah? It was
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: like a nineteen minute version. Yeah, right, it went a
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  Speaker 1: little long. You could say, how you doing, Chuck? I'm good.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: I have freshly shaved my head like you. No, mind's
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  Speaker 1: not fresh minds shaggy. Well yeah, but we're both kind
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  Speaker 1: of onion heads. Now, you look good where I'm usually not.
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: You look pretty. Thank you? Did you take a series
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  Speaker 1: of pictures of yourself? No? Not yet? Okay, that's later. So, Chuck,
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: you've heard about this oil spill, right? Yeah? I had
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  Speaker 1: a feeling you might tie this in devastation, uh, dead wildlife, UM,
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  Speaker 1: injured economies, Obama's Katrina. Yeah, there's one thing that has
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  Speaker 1: been conspicuously absent in my um estimation. Beautiful. Nobody's talking
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  Speaker 1: about iridescence. No one's talking about how pretty the oil
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  Speaker 1: slick is. It's because it's horribly ugly. It is, unless
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  Speaker 1: you stay in at a certain angle and then you're like, oh,
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  Speaker 1: this is kind of nice. Actually, yeah, I know what
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  Speaker 1: you mean. Yeah, we're headed. We're talking about iridescence in
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  Speaker 1: this one because the shimmery color changing quality called iridescence
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  Speaker 1: that oils bills feature are in common with something called butterflies,
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  Speaker 1: the wings of butterflies. And I can tell you that, Um,
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  Speaker 1: twenty four hours ago, I had no idea why a butterfly,
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  Speaker 1: the butterfly's wings were iridescent. Now I do. This is
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  Speaker 1: why I love episodes like this, because it's here, is
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  Speaker 1: why there's no maybe it's kind of like this, or
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  Speaker 1: we don't really know, so you and I get the
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  Speaker 1: conjecture like jackasses all day long? Right, Um, Instead, it's
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  Speaker 1: science has figured out why this happens, and you and
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  Speaker 1: I are going to explain it to people. So Chuck,
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  Speaker 1: let's do that right. Now, let's talk about why a
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  Speaker 1: butterfly's wings are iridescent. Well, there's a couple of reasons
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  Speaker 1: they have their their striking color. Iridescence is the main one.
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  Speaker 1: But we probably need to go ahead and get pigment
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  Speaker 1: and just ordinary color out of the way. Let's pigment, Josh,
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  Speaker 1: is uh coloring matter do you find in like cells
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  Speaker 1: and tissues? And the deal with pigment is it is
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  Speaker 1: the same from every angle. You can get up under it,
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  Speaker 1: you can get on top of it and sneak it
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  Speaker 1: behind it, you can get all up on that, that
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  Speaker 1: all up in it, but it always looks the same. Right.
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  Speaker 1: That's just called that's what they call it ordinary color.
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  Speaker 1: And the reason why is any given pigment um will
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  Speaker 1: absorb all colors except one, say, right, like chlorophyll. Sure,
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  Speaker 1: chlorophyll absorbs all colors except green, which it reflects, which
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  Speaker 1: causes something to look green like a plant a plant,
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  Speaker 1: sure is one. Melanine tends to absorb everything but yellow,
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  Speaker 1: giving things a brownish color. Right. Well, yeah, and that's
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  Speaker 1: albine is um. That means you have no melanin, right,
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  Speaker 1: You're lacking a pigment. Same with paints, right. These are
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  Speaker 1: all just pigments. These things don't inherently have a color.
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  Speaker 1: They just absorb certain colors and reflect others back. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: it's pretty standard stuff. Did you know redheads um have
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  Speaker 1: they think they have an additional um iron based pigment
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  Speaker 1: their color. Interesting, they're freak issue poor ginger kids. Man,
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  Speaker 1: they are really taking I love redhead stuf, do you well?
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  Speaker 1: I mean, okay, yeah, Actually I just like the red,
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  Speaker 1: like really red headed people is kind of cool looking
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  Speaker 1: to me. I'll just go and go on record with that,
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  Speaker 1: like red or orange, because there's a big difference. Man,
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  Speaker 1: I'm not talking strawberry blond. I'm talking like really really redheads,
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  Speaker 1: shocking red, shocking ginger redheads. You like staring at them?
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  Speaker 1: I do? Okay, Um, don't stare too hard, okay. Freaks
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  Speaker 1: people blind? Alright. So that's that's pigments. They're pretty standard.
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  Speaker 1: One can argue boring stuff, right. Pigments don't give anything
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  Speaker 1: iridescence now, they just reflect light. And you know that's
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  Speaker 1: that iridescence is uh this kind of super spectacular um
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  Speaker 1: reflection of color, almost shimmery. Yes, that changes, Actually the
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  Speaker 1: color changes if you move, so your descence is generally
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  Speaker 1: relegated to the observer. Depending on where you're standing, that
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  Speaker 1: will change the color, how spectacular color is and um
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  Speaker 1: again we know why, especially when it comes to butterfly
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  Speaker 1: wings right, or you know we should mention just a
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  Speaker 1: couple of others before we move on, like the Japanese
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  Speaker 1: beetle that green on the wings, Yes, your descent, mother
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  Speaker 1: of pearl, seashells, some fish scales and like bubbles, peacock feathers. Pa,
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  Speaker 1: Well that's a huge one. Did I tell you that
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  Speaker 1: there's a peacock in our neighborhood. No. I was walking
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  Speaker 1: with Emily the other day walking the dogs the other
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  Speaker 1: morning and we looked up. We heard this weird sound.
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  Speaker 1: It sounds like hell yeah. I thought someone was crying
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  Speaker 1: for help. And I looked up and literally at the
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  Speaker 1: apex of this roof of this house was a full
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  Speaker 1: on peacock standing there weird loose or did they keep
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  Speaker 1: it in the backyard keep peak? Yeah, the guy has
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  Speaker 1: two peacocks because the neighbor. The neighbor was out and
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  Speaker 1: I was looking at Yeah, he's got peacocks. I was like,
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  Speaker 1: that's staring at it like it was a full on redhead.
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  Speaker 1: I was, and I said that's sort of weird, and
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  Speaker 1: he went yeah and loud yeah, but so hell yeah yeah.
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  Speaker 1: But it was iridescent and it was fascinating. They are
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  Speaker 1: they're gorgeous and actually peacock feathers led to um the
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  Speaker 1: investigation of iridescence and Newton. Eventually Thomas Boyle was the
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  Speaker 1: one who went catching that's the way it happens. So
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  Speaker 1: we were talking about Robert Boyle. Sorry, Robert Boyle, thanks,
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  Speaker 1: one of the Boil brothers exactly. Um. We were talking
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  Speaker 1: about how pigments reflect just one color, right, Transparent objects
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  Speaker 1: have the ability to reflect all colors, right, um. With
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: an oil slick with a bubble, you have two surfaces,
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  Speaker 1: right you have we'll talk about a bubble. We'll talk
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  Speaker 1: about the oil slick. The oil slick is oil floating
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  Speaker 1: on water, right, yes, um, you have. So you have
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  Speaker 1: the the top film of the oil slick. Lights passing
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  Speaker 1: through all the sums bouncing back, which you will see
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  Speaker 1: right with your um, and some can make it to
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  Speaker 1: the water beneath the stuff that passes through the top
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  Speaker 1: film and then can be reflected back and can be
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  Speaker 1: reflected back right now, if the light that's reflected from
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  Speaker 1: the top is also reflected from the bottom if they're
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  Speaker 1: in sync, if the phases match up, right, and it
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  Speaker 1: phases the position of the trough and the crest. Because
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  Speaker 1: remember light exists on a wavelength, right, so picture it
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  Speaker 1: is like a regular wave or like a roller coaster
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  Speaker 1: if you're a little more simple, and like you said,
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  Speaker 1: if they match up as if they were on top
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  Speaker 1: of each other, then you're gonna get your deskce right.
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  Speaker 1: So Chuck, follow me on this one to the ends
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  Speaker 1: of the Earth. Alright, So go beep boop beep. Okay.
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  Speaker 1: So the beep that's a crest, and then the boop
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  Speaker 1: that's a trough off trough. Okay, so start going beep
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  Speaker 1: boop beepoop. So and this is this is Chuck being
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  Speaker 1: a wave of light, a wavelength of light, right um reflecting.
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  Speaker 1: He's just reflected the moment he starts. He's reflected off
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  Speaker 1: the surface of a transparent object. Bee booepoo. Right. Okay.
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  Speaker 1: So now I'm like coming in and I'm going to
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  Speaker 1: come in and start after I've just reflected off the
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  Speaker 1: bottom surface of say an oil slick, right, all right,
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  Speaker 1: So you want me to do this again, So Chuck
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  Speaker 1: has already reflected off the top surface. I made it
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  Speaker 1: through the bottom surface, and now I'm reflecting awful. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: so boo boo. Now let's say I come in and
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  Speaker 1: like halftime beepoo beep beep. It's all screwed up. That
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  Speaker 1: sounds awful. It does sound awful, and in when you're
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  Speaker 1: speaking of light, it sounds like this, right, nothing, they
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  Speaker 1: cancel each other out. But if I can't, if if
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  Speaker 1: my phase is equal to yours, but say a full
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  Speaker 1: measure behind, it sounds like this, go ahead, bee boop
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  Speaker 1: bee boo bee boop beep boopy. Right, So it sounded nice.
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  Speaker 1: It sounded louder. It didn't sound nice, but it sounded louder.
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  Speaker 1: It wasn't all discordant, right, So what just happened was
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  Speaker 1: we amplified the beat boop right, right, yeah, yeah, exactly.
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  Speaker 1: This is called um what is it? Constructive interference? That's right,
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  Speaker 1: and that's I don't want to say good and bad,
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  Speaker 1: because it's really scientists would say it is neither good
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  Speaker 1: nor bad. But I'm gonna say that's the good kind
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  Speaker 1: because that's what gives you iridescence. The bad kind would
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  Speaker 1: be destructive interference, and that, like you said, that cancels
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  Speaker 1: each other out, making something like less not less iridescent,
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  Speaker 1: not iridescent at all. Right, So that's it close, that's
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  Speaker 1: not entirely it, right because consider this chuck light. Light
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  Speaker 1: as we see it exists on a spectrum. Right. So, Um,
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  Speaker 1: on one hand, you have about a wavelength of four
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  Speaker 1: nimes violet light. On the other end of the spectrum
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  Speaker 1: that we can see is red light, which is has
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  Speaker 1: a wavelength about seven nimes. Right, okay, Um, if you
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  Speaker 1: go a little beyond the violet, you get bluer than
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  Speaker 1: blue a k A ultra violet, which we all love. Right.
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  Speaker 1: If you go beyond the red, uh, you have redder
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  Speaker 1: than red or infrared. Right. We can't see either of those,
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  Speaker 1: but we can't see within that spectrum for violet to red.
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  Speaker 1: And it's based on wavelength, if we um, if you
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  Speaker 1: take white light right like sunlight, and you put it,
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  Speaker 1: if you projected onto a transparent object, all of the colors.
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  Speaker 1: Remember the Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon album cover.
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  Speaker 1: Of course, it's white light going into a prism and
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  Speaker 1: then coming out in its separate forms, in all its
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  Speaker 1: psychedelic glory. Right now, imagine that that's static, Like it's
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  Speaker 1: it's not changing position. If you are shooting a beam
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: of white light onto a bubble, depending on where you stand,
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  Speaker 1: the angle of reflection, right of refraction, I'm sorry, Um,
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  Speaker 1: depends on what color you're going to see. So if
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  Speaker 1: you move across your angle, you're going to see a
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  Speaker 1: different color. And hence this explains the color changing of iridescence. Right. So, like,
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  Speaker 1: you know, have you ever seen the big bubble wines
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: where they can both the really huge bubbles the huge bubbles. Uh,
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  Speaker 1: if you ever do that, do a little experiment and
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: look at it from different angles, jump around, walk around,
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  Speaker 1: and you're gonna see some color change. Have you ever
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  Speaker 1: seen a bubble pop in SloMo? That Super SloMo? No,
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: but isn't wasn't that an episode of that one show
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  Speaker 1: Time Work? Yeah? Yeah, the Discovery Show. It is super cool, dude.
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  Speaker 1: If you look at it in slow motion, you like
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  Speaker 1: would pop the bubble, and you know, when you see
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  Speaker 1: it in regular motion, it looks like it just pops
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  Speaker 1: in a big burst, But from where you touch it
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  Speaker 1: spreads and an arc all around the whole thing, and
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  Speaker 1: you see it slowly popping as it goes around. It's
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  Speaker 1: just really cool. Nice. It's neither here nor there though,
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  Speaker 1: but it's still pretty like you're a descence. Right. So
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  Speaker 1: what we have now is um if if that if
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  Speaker 1: light from white light uh hits a transparent object, and
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  Speaker 1: it's a multilayered transparent objects, say like oil on type
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  Speaker 1: of water, or one side of a bubble and the
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  Speaker 1: bottom side of the bubble, some light's gonna reflect off,
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  Speaker 1: some's gonna make it through the bottom. Some of that
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  Speaker 1: will reflect off, most will will go through. But if
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  Speaker 1: the light from the bottom and the top are in
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  Speaker 1: phase with one another, in an even phase, right, separated
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  Speaker 1: by one two, three four five wave links rather than
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  Speaker 1: you know, one point three five wavelengths, they'll be in
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  Speaker 1: phase and they'll amplify each other. If it's white light,
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  Speaker 1: then we're going to see, depending on our ang goal
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  Speaker 1: all the colors of the rainbow. You're in this iridescent state, right. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: So what does this have to do with butterfly wings?
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  Speaker 1: I'll tell you, buddy. Okay. Butterfly wings are transparent, and
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  Speaker 1: the deal is why they look so striking compared to
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  Speaker 1: let's say, a bubble, which is pretty but not as
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  Speaker 1: striking as a butterfly. It's because there are many, many
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  Speaker 1: more layers stacked on top of each other that the
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  Speaker 1: light has to go through. When all those are in phase,
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  Speaker 1: you get like super iridescence. Right. So with a with
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  Speaker 1: a bubble, you have two chances right at the top
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  Speaker 1: and the bottom two lousy chances. Right. With a butterfly wing,
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  Speaker 1: the the cuticle of the scale of a butterfly wing, say,
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  Speaker 1: has maybe a dozen So every every beam of light,
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  Speaker 1: every wavelength of light has you know, a dozen chances
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  Speaker 1: to reflect back, say half of those are in phase. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: and also depending on how because the surfaces. Um, if
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  Speaker 1: you look at a butterfly cuticle, it looks kind of
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  Speaker 1: like a Christmas tree, right, so there's like a it
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  Speaker 1: looks like a Christmas tree, basically like a lego Christmas tree.
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  Speaker 1: Will say, but the scales, actually I'm out the scales. Yeah, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: the scale cuticles that make up the scales. Yeah, that's kitan.
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  Speaker 1: That's the same thing we have in like our hair,
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  Speaker 1: it's protein in our fingernails. Nice okay, sorry, Um, So
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  Speaker 1: as it goes down the tree, you know, they get wider,
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  Speaker 1: These surfaces get wider, and each one can can bounce
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  Speaker 1: light back off, but they're spaced evenly. So let's say
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  Speaker 1: that the space in between is two d nanimeters and
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  Speaker 1: blue light is four hundred nanometers in wavelength. Since the
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  Speaker 1: two hundred is half of four hundred, it's going to
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  Speaker 1: give blue light a better chance to reflect back in phase,
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  Speaker 1: which is why I stay on like the blue morphoe butterfly,
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  Speaker 1: which has a space of two between the scales. The
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  Speaker 1: space and the scales appears so blue because blue has
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  Speaker 1: a likelier chance of reflecting back in phase and being
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  Speaker 1: amplifying in this iridescent manner, and the morpho doesn't that
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  Speaker 1: actually venture into ultra the ultra violet spectrum? Yeah, remember
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  Speaker 1: the angle. Yeah, so if you're looking, let's say, at
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  Speaker 1: the right is red and at the left is violet.
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  Speaker 1: If you move too far to the left, everything's gone
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  Speaker 1: because you've moved out of the visible spectrum of light.
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  Speaker 1: And now what you're seeing is the brown pigment, but
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: who can see it is the butterfly. Yeah, the monarchs
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  Speaker 1: are actually in their migration, their huge migration every year.
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  Speaker 1: They use ultra violet markings. Uh, ultra violet um light
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  Speaker 1: for guide posts basically, right, Yes, they do, and uh
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  Speaker 1: it Also the other effect or the other reason, um
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  Speaker 1: that you have this iridescence and on the scales is
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  Speaker 1: it soaks up heat because butterflies are cold blooded, so
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  Speaker 1: they rely on like the sun to be able to function.
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  Speaker 1: So the fact that they're soaking up this heat from
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  Speaker 1: the sun allows them to fly, right, which is pretty cool.
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  Speaker 1: And we also remember pigment, don't forget still plays a
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  Speaker 1: role in this too, right, So if you have if
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  Speaker 1: you have a butterfly scale that's um constructed, contains chlorophyll,
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  Speaker 1: so you have um a green pigment. Yes, let's go
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: with blue. Okay, Now let's go with yellow. Okay, say
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  Speaker 1: say it's a butterfly scale. It's constructive melanin. So you
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  Speaker 1: have yellow already, which it's reflecting back yellow and monochromatic
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  Speaker 1: blue light. It's going to it's going to appear to
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  Speaker 1: us as green because color mixing still has has an effect, right,
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: So pigment structural color green. Can we talk about the
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  Speaker 1: wings for a second too, because I know people are
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: going to write in and say that's really cool, but
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  Speaker 1: is it true that butterflies will die if you touch
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: their wings? Sort of not completely? You can touch a
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: butterfly wing. Like, if you've ever touched a butterfly wing,
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: you'll notice you have like powder on your hands. Yeah,
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: those are the scales. Those are the scales. They are
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: that fine that they kind of disintegrate into powder. And
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  Speaker 1: in theory, you can touch a butterfly wing without killing them,
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: but if you break it. They have little veins. They're
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: all connected by little veins, So essentially, if you disconnect
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  Speaker 1: the veins from the fore wing and the hind wing,
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  Speaker 1: that's when the butterfly is gonna die. And they're so
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: tender that it's really easy to happen. So in effect,
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: you probably will kill a butterfly if you mess with
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  Speaker 1: their wings, but if you just happen to graze against it,
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  Speaker 1: maybe not. No need to squish it after just such
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  Speaker 1: a slight intrusion, right, Yeah, And moss, I think get
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  Speaker 1: a bum wrap because they're not as pretty. Yeah, because
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  Speaker 1: they're mainly mel what what was it, melitan, melanin melanin
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  Speaker 1: mainly like brown and yellow, black and white. And they
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  Speaker 1: also have a frenulum, which is a spine, and butterflies
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  Speaker 1: don't have that. Right. Also, moths tend to be fatter
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  Speaker 1: and fly at dusk or at night. Well, yeah, and
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: that's why butterflies get all the credit, because you're out
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  Speaker 1: on a nice spring day in the garden and butterflies
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  Speaker 1: were everywhere, and then at night you're hanging out by
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  Speaker 1: the porch and you're freaked out by the moths everywhere,
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: like going towards the light. Well not only that, um,
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  Speaker 1: there's there. The structure of a moth's wing is very,
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: very similar to the structure of butterflies transparent filmy scales.
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  Speaker 1: For some reason, I guess it's because they do fly
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  Speaker 1: at night. They are not iridescent. They don't appear iridescent,
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: although they would in sunlight. But they're part of the
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: same family scientifically, big happy family. Yeah, what was the family? Uh, Lepidoptera?
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: Was that lepidoptera? Lipidoptera. There's like a hundred and fifty
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: thousand varieties within that family and lepidoptera I means scaled
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: wings boom. Yeah, it's a great place to finish, don't
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: you think? Sure? You got to we recap Oh, I
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: don't think so. The party we explained it, well, I
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: think so, all right, because I feel more confused than
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: I did before. Well, you brought sound into it, but
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: I thought that was a very clever way to go
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: about it. Well, thanks a lot. If you want to
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: learn more about butterfly wings and they're striking colors, type
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: in butterflies striking colors in the handy search bar, how
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: stuff works dot Com brings up a pretty cool article
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: by Jennifer Horton. Hey, Chuck, chucks me from the future.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: The future are idiot. Past seals have no idea whe're
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: doing this right now, right, but we do because we're
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: from the future, indeed, and you know what we're here
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: to do, don't you. We're interrupting our podcast for a reason.
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: T Shirt Winners announced. This is one of the if
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: you were a winner that you were guaranteed I mentioned
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: on the show, and this fulfills that application. Yes, this
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: is um. We've got the lawyers behind us that their
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: briefcases in bullwhips, right, yes, and uh, Chuck, we picked five.
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: I'm glad we picked five because we had like more
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: than seventy jries, right. I wanted to pick ten. I
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: wanted to pick twenty three. Um, and we actually did
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: have like a top twenty three at one point and
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: finally whittled it down time and time again, and we
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: came up with the five winners and they're announced on
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: the blog. There's an image gallery on how Stuff Works.
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: You can go onto our blogs at how stuff works
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: dot com and look for the blog post entitled we
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: Got your T shirt. We got your stuff you should
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: Know T shirt contest winners right here, uh, and that'll
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: take you into the site to check them out. You
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: can also get the shirts on the Discovery channel store
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: right yeah, there for sale. Yeah. You just go onto
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: the I Think store dot Discovery dot com and do
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: a search for stuff you Should Know and it brings
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: up all five of these magnificent T shirts. Right. So,
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: the names of the winning designers, the five brilliant individual
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: human beings who created these amazing designs, right, Their names
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: are what chuck Well first, these are in no particular order.
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: By the way, Um, we have Peter Feek or fight
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: Or We've been debating endlessly and he did a really
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: cool design of this old school microphone and it's sort
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: of logo looking. It makes us look like we're really pros. Yeah,
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: I call it hot Mike Hot Mike, Yeah, I like it. Uh.
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: And then of course there's Suki Anderson. Yeah, out of Kentucky,
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: I believe, I think, and she made what I think
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: is the coolest picture I've ever seen in my life. Yeah,
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: it's the baby with the fly on its forehead. Yes,
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: and don't worry. Yeah. I said on the blog that
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: it's it's unsettling and comforting at the same time, and
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: it's very hard to achieve. Agreed. So that was one
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: of our favorite ones. And then we went with Brad
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: Wilson's brain design, which is awesome. Yeah, we got a
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: lot of brain designs, so you guys were thinking along
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: the same lines, which means you're all smart and cool.
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: And that was the brain as as a representation of
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: our show is really, I think, pretty cool, and this
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: was what we thought looked best on a T shirt.
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: Brad nailed it. Yeah, he nailed it definitely. Uh. Matt
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: Stevenson came up with what I've dubbed the wood cut
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: parade right right, Our fans are gonna love this one. Yeah.
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: It's a it's a series of medieval characters I would say, skeleton, bishop,
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: a monk, a jester, um and they are carrying banners
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: let's say s y s K. They're leading the parade.
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: The stuff you should know parade from medieval times. Yeah,
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: and I said on the site it looks like a
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: paraded one to hide behind a tree and watch. It's awesome.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: It's very cool. And then lastly, Chuck, I'm going to
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: leave this one to you because I can't pronounce this
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: guy's last name. Yes, we have Scott y A C
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: y s h Y, and I'm gonna say, yeah, yeah,
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: yakin ya kishin, Scott, whatever your last name, let's try
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: that one to Scott Yukishan if that is you. You
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: are one heck of a designer, my friend. And you
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: did the very cool caricature of Josh and I and
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: from our mouths and balloons. You have different caricatures of
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: different episodes and so much camaraderie between us. You know,
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: we just look like we are having a heck of
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: a time gaining the podcast as a sixties illustration. It's
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: very cool. One of my favorite ones to super awesome.
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: So Scott, Matt, Brad, Suky, Peter, thank you very much
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: to all of you guys, uh and thank you to
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: everybody who sent in. From something created in rich text
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: format to something that was obviously made by a professional
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: graphic designer, we appreciate all of you, guys, and thank
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: you very much for taking the time to lend us
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: your brains and creativity. That's awesome that we were blown away.
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: It was very cool. You're all very talented. Okay, and
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: now let's go back to our stupid um selves from
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: the past. I predict that it's going I'm gonna say
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: some assin I thing about the handy search bar. Watched.
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: Uh that means since I said handy searchbar, Chuck, are
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: you ready for this? Listener mail, Josh, I'm just gonna
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: call this, uh stuff you should know educating prisoner of America.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: I like this one. This is a good one. Well,
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: prisoners of Virginia. At least, right which is in America?
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: Isn't it still it's a commonwealth. I don't know if
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: it counts. Oh, that's right, weirdos. All right, This from
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: Maria in Amelia, Virginia. I guess you have a prison there. Hi, guys,
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: I thought you might be interested to know that I
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: use your podcasts as a resource to teach writing to
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: inmate students. I'm a G. E. D. Teacher at a
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: men's president in Virginia. Writing is one of the weakest
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: skills for my students, and many of them never learned
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: to write as far as secondary school. Uh, and they
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: were afraid to write as adults, so they're sort of
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: illiterate or completely illiterate in some cases. Well, I mean,
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: think about it, Chuck, WoT is writing if not a
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: series of choices of what you're going to share with people,
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: it can be very intimidating. I burned your podcast to
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: a c D and replay one in class because we
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: don't have internet for obvious reasons. The men listen to
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: your podcast, they take notes, and then they must write
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: an article based on what we said. They practice writing
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: sentence is and paragraphs in this way. The subject matter
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: is of interest to them, some more than others. I'm
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: afraid to play the moonshine one as much as I
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: would like to. I know they would be interested even
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: if I skipped the parts where you make the still
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: and give the general recipe. So she won't do that,
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: because you know they'll build a moonshine still. I'll bet
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: they already know how the menhorns. Yeah, I think so. Uh.
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: Some of these guys have been down a long long time,
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: so they appreciate something to think about that isn't about
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: sentencing and parole hearings. Thank you for your material. My
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: family and I enjoy the podcast and they do a
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: real service to people. So we are actually educating prisoners
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: of a mayor. I know. That's awesome. So if you
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: guys are in prison right now, if you're in the
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: in the pokey in the who scale and you're listening now,
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: we just want to say good luck. You can turn
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: your life around, do your hard time, come out a
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: better person, don't do crimes again, and get your g
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: E D. And you know, get a get a job,
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: and and good luck to you. That's what I say.
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: And remember when you make a decision writing, don't look back.
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: Really such your advice. Yeah, that is my advice. Actually,
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: all right, you can always write something else. That's a
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: good point. Yeah, if you want to let us know
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: how we are changing the world for the better with
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: this podcast, and it's an email to stuff podcast at
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: how stuff works dot com for more on this and
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: thousands of other topics, does it how stuff works dot com.
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: Want more how stuff works, check out our blogs on
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: the house stuff works dot com home page. Brought to
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: you by the Reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: Are you