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SYSK Selects: Bioluminescence: A Bright and Shiny Fish · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, it's me Josh, your dear friend, and for
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Speaker 1: this week's s Y s K Selects, I've chosen How
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Speaker 1: Bioluminescence Works. We released it originally in September of two
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Speaker 1: thousand and twelve, and it's a straight ahead, super interesting
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Speaker 1: science E episode the best kind. And for some reason,
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Speaker 1: I sound so low key that it seems like I'm
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Speaker 1: going to mount into the floor at any moment. No
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Speaker 1: idea why. I hope you enjoy listening to it again
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Speaker 1: as much as I did. Welcome to Stuff you Should
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Speaker 1: Know from House Stuff Works dot com. Hey, and welcome
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Speaker 1: to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant,
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Speaker 1: and uh. You put us together and you get a
0:49
Speaker 1: little something called Stuff you Should Know. And that's what
0:51
Speaker 1: this is. Whether you like it or not, you have
0:54
Speaker 1: to listen to it. It's right, um, Actually, no one
0:57
Speaker 1: has to listen to this, Okay. It's part of both
1:02
Speaker 1: Obama's and Romney's platforms. Yeah, it's a part of Obamacare.
1:07
Speaker 1: You gotta listen to Stuff you Should Know, and you
1:09
Speaker 1: gotta get an RFD chip in your hand, and you
1:11
Speaker 1: have to give poor people all your money. None of
1:14
Speaker 1: that is true that you have to listen to the
1:16
Speaker 1: podcast and the Poor Pule party. Um chuck, Yes, how's
1:21
Speaker 1: it going? It's great. Are you feeling sick? Do you
1:24
Speaker 1: need any kind of care Obama or otherwise? Now? Are
1:27
Speaker 1: you feeling sick? I'm fine. Tents like my shoulder muscles
1:31
Speaker 1: are gonna pop right out of my skin. I went
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Speaker 1: to that foot massage place on Beauford Highway the other day.
1:35
Speaker 1: You ever been there? Mm hm? Treat your feet? Is
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Speaker 1: that what it's called. Yeah, that's a great name. They'll
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Speaker 1: they'll do an hour on your feet for bucks if
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Speaker 1: that's what you desire. Oh yeah, no, about a little
1:48
Speaker 1: bit bit into it, they'll ask you like, would you
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Speaker 1: want to go half and half like half body half
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Speaker 1: foot because basically they get you in there, they're going
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Speaker 1: at your feet and you're like, you know, I don't
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Speaker 1: know if I could do an hour on my feet.
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Speaker 1: Each time has gotten their own massage at this point,
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Speaker 1: right like they're just jelly cracked your toes. Yeah, so
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Speaker 1: that you think, yeah, you know, I'll pay another twenty
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Speaker 1: bucks for the body, right they give you t it's
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Speaker 1: really nice. You should go. It does sound nice, but
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Speaker 1: it's not like private, like you're in a big room
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Speaker 1: with like fifteen recliners. Everyone's just sitting around and well
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Speaker 1: we've gotten backrubs at the mall before. Yeah, that's true.
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Speaker 1: You remember, I don't know how I got on this.
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Speaker 1: Treat your feet Bufford Highway. Go eat some fun and
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Speaker 1: then go get your foot massage where it's good fun
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Speaker 1: around here. We're trying to figure that out. The Beauford Highway.
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Speaker 1: Yeah where uh if you are we going to do
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Speaker 1: this now? Okay? I like fun number two, um, which
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Speaker 1: is past Claremont. Um, it's in a little shopping center.
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Speaker 1: Just look it up, Okay, I mean it's it's all good,
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Speaker 1: all good fun. Um. Yeah, I don't know how we
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Speaker 1: got on there. But some places on Bufford Highway, oh
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Speaker 1: you use some money, seriously, at least some free fun. Um.
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Speaker 1: This is nothing to do with bioluminescence. No, it doesn't.
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Speaker 1: Although sometimes if you stir your foot around, chuck, you're
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Speaker 1: gonna see some um fungus possibly rise to the top
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Speaker 1: a couple of times. Yeah right, yeah, that's a good
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Speaker 1: one too. And um, were those things still alive and
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Speaker 1: not cooked, they possibly might glow. And where they glow,
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Speaker 1: you would say look at those things. They're bioluminescing. That's right,
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Speaker 1: because that's what they do. It is a life form
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Speaker 1: that generates their own glow inside their body, their own light. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: pretty awesome. Ye And um, you I read a different
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Speaker 1: um study. It was like, what what's the deal with this?
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Speaker 1: Because this is still very much a mystery. Um, we
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Speaker 1: have an idea of how this goes down, but not
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Speaker 1: in every case. We also don't understand why in a
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Speaker 1: lot of cases. Um. And and it's because we don't
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Speaker 1: understand how. And the thing is is, I don't think
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Speaker 1: it's that it's out of the grasp of science to
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Speaker 1: understand it. I think that when researchers are looking into this,
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Speaker 1: they just they become so transfixed on the beautiful glow
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Speaker 1: that they forget what they're doing and waste tons of time.
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Speaker 1: And then all of a sudden they're like, oh, I
4:18
Speaker 1: gotta publish our parish. And then it's just like they
4:21
Speaker 1: just write why on a piece of paper and send
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Speaker 1: it in, as Tracy Wilson of Pop Stuff Great Podcast
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Speaker 1: points out, and Tracy's articles are always awesome. Yeah, oh man,
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Speaker 1: they're comprehensive. You know, I never have to worry about it. Um. Sadly,
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Speaker 1: sometimes scientists can either harm the light making magic when
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Speaker 1: they try to study them it makes it hard to study,
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Speaker 1: or the animal will exhaust it's light making glow capabilities
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Speaker 1: out of like fear or defense or spite or spite,
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Speaker 1: which will also make it hard to study. So those
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Speaker 1: are a couple of reasons and the whole just why right, So, um,
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Speaker 1: we do have a pretty good handle to some extent.
5:06
Speaker 1: But let's talk about what luminescence itself is, right with that.
5:12
Speaker 1: This light bulb right here in this ikea brand lamp. Um,
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Speaker 1: it's incandescent. It's an incandescent light bulb. Chuck, I think
5:21
Speaker 1: this is an edison bulb too, is taking? Oh? Is
5:24
Speaker 1: it like the real old timey looking one that sort of? Um?
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Speaker 1: So that is pretty simple. It has electricity that passes
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Speaker 1: through a filment, just a thin metal piece of something metal,
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Speaker 1: and that heats up, and it heats up so much
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Speaker 1: that it gives off light, which is incredibly inefficient. And
5:45
Speaker 1: if say a jellyfish for to do this, it would
5:47
Speaker 1: catch fire even though it's under water. Right. So what
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Speaker 1: um living organisms do when they want to give off
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Speaker 1: light is something called cold light or bioluminescence, which is
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Speaker 1: the combination of chemicals that produce light. It's like a
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Speaker 1: glow stick but no heat. But it is just like
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Speaker 1: a glow stick. You're combining two things that will make
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Speaker 1: a glow exactly, except you don't have to shake up
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Speaker 1: the jellyfish and they do not like that. Or it's
6:17
Speaker 1: like the glow sticks that I used to sell very
6:19
Speaker 1: uh often at Stone Mountain laser show. It's like the
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Speaker 1: glower three summer that I used to dance with at Raves.
6:27
Speaker 1: You were a Raves and I was selling these things
6:30
Speaker 1: during like Lee Greenwoods, Lee Greenwood, Lee Green Would you
6:35
Speaker 1: Proud to be an American? Yeah? Boy, I heard that
6:37
Speaker 1: song five thousand times. Anyone who's never been to Stone Mountain, Georgia.
6:43
Speaker 1: They have a big rock there and they have a
6:44
Speaker 1: laser show on it during the summer. It's a big
6:47
Speaker 1: rock that has a basically the Confederate heroes carved into
6:51
Speaker 1: the side of it by the guy who did Mount Rushmore.
6:54
Speaker 1: How is that the same guy? Yeah? And they show
6:56
Speaker 1: a very corny laser show every summer since like the
7:00
Speaker 1: early nineteen eighties, and not just once this summer, like
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Speaker 1: every night during the summer night. Yeah, that's why I've
7:05
Speaker 1: heard it ten thousand times. It's something and Chuck, you
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Speaker 1: still work there. I think you left that out selling
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Speaker 1: glow sticks. Glow sticks full circle. Yes, all right, let's
7:12
Speaker 1: quit stalling. Let's talk about bioluminescence. Okay, that's all over
7:16
Speaker 1: the place. Uh. Like you said, we don't know exactly
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Speaker 1: how it works in all cases, but we do know
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Speaker 1: that these animals do mix together different substances, just like
7:26
Speaker 1: a glow stick, wood and uh, to turn their little
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Speaker 1: glow on and off. Um, here on the planet, not
7:35
Speaker 1: in the ocean, because that's where most of the stuff
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Speaker 1: takes place here on planet Earth, on the dry land. Uh,
7:40
Speaker 1: you can have things glowing like fox fire, which is
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Speaker 1: this fungus that feeds on rotting wood. You look at
7:47
Speaker 1: pictures of fox fire. Pretty cool. Yeah, it's eerie, doesn't
7:50
Speaker 1: look real, but it's real. It's very real. Um. The
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Speaker 1: jack O lander mushroom you can google that as well.
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Speaker 1: That's my favorite bioluminescent organism. Why just because it's the
7:59
Speaker 1: sample things land on Terra Firma. Because it's a perfectly
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Speaker 1: named thing, the jack O lander and mushroom, Like it
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Speaker 1: has that glow coming through the gills um and just
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Speaker 1: the gills, so it looks like there's like this glow
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Speaker 1: coming inside and there's like holes where it's coming out of.
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Speaker 1: It's so neat. My favorite on Terra firma is the
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Speaker 1: lightning bug a k a. The firefly here in the South,
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Speaker 1: and I guess I'm not sure where else they calm
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Speaker 1: lightning bugs, but definitely in the South. You'll see them
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Speaker 1: come out every summer. And if you're a little kid,
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Speaker 1: you can go around and catch them and put them
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Speaker 1: in a jar and then and then release them. And
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Speaker 1: in fact, you may be harming them just by catching them.
8:39
Speaker 1: But but you don't want to do if you're a kid,
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Speaker 1: is like smash these things because it's just you know,
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Speaker 1: that means you're gonna end up being a serial killer
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Speaker 1: one day probably. Uh So the firefly is uh you know,
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Speaker 1: you generally think of them as the adults lying around,
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Speaker 1: but their little larva can glow as well on the ground,
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Speaker 1: and a lot of people call um firefly lava glow worms,
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Speaker 1: but glow worms are apparently another kind of fly. Larvae.
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Speaker 1: Fireflies are fireflies or lightning bugs. That's right. Um centipedes millipedes,
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Speaker 1: There's all all kinds of little things that can glow. Worms. Uh,
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Speaker 1: there's some worms that give off a bioluminescent sludge and
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Speaker 1: no one has any idea why is it their poop?
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Speaker 1: And I don't think so. Remember the the the secretion
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Speaker 1: they produce when they're mating and all that. It's probably
9:33
Speaker 1: like that. It probably comes from the ring. I can't
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Speaker 1: remember the name of the ring. So that's on Earth.
9:37
Speaker 1: But if you really want to get down to some
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Speaker 1: cool glowing creatures, you need to dive down into the
9:43
Speaker 1: ocean to the twilight zone, which I think we've talked
9:46
Speaker 1: about that, haven't we know we talked about it in
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Speaker 1: biospeleiolo in caves. Yeah, there's different zones of light penetration
9:53
Speaker 1: in caves and in the ocean too, that's right. Um,
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Speaker 1: the twilight zone is generally about six d and sixty
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Speaker 1: to feet deep on th six. It depends because obviously
10:07
Speaker 1: different kinds of ocean water are gonna allow different amounts
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Speaker 1: of light in. It depends on what the ocean floor
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Speaker 1: looks like. But it is um. It is the this
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Speaker 1: photic or poorly lit zone deeper than the eu photic
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Speaker 1: sunlit zone or good zone or shallower than the aphotic
10:27
Speaker 1: midnight zone, which is like scary no light. That's a
10:31
Speaker 1: scary time down there. Those are the things down there
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Speaker 1: that have like no eyes, right because there's no sam
10:38
Speaker 1: like with the caves. So um, yeah, I remember what
10:42
Speaker 1: was the Prometheus salaman? Yeah, just three ft long and
10:46
Speaker 1: doesn't have eyes. The scariest thing ever except for the
10:48
Speaker 1: cigar shark, which will actually get to in here. Okay,
10:51
Speaker 1: so is that the cookie cotter shark? Yeah? Man, the
10:53
Speaker 1: thing's frightening. Um. So in this uh, this twilight zone,
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Speaker 1: the sphotic zone or mezo pelagic zone, mesopelagic zone, stop
11:05
Speaker 1: laughing at me. Uh there, this is where most of
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Speaker 1: the bioluminescent organisms on Earth can be found. And the
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Speaker 1: light that penetrates this area um is a blue green
11:17
Speaker 1: color because the red, yellow, orange. Yeah, the red, yellow
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Speaker 1: and orange are absorbed by the seawater above and the
11:26
Speaker 1: violet is scattered, so the blue and the green are
11:28
Speaker 1: the ones that get through. So everything is just kind
11:31
Speaker 1: of color blue green, that's what the sunlight is. So
11:33
Speaker 1: most of the bioluminescent organisms in this um dysphotic zone
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Speaker 1: dysphotic zone have evolved to produce light at that same
11:43
Speaker 1: wavelength from something like four four hundred seventy nine nanometers,
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Speaker 1: which is like the blue green spectrum. That's right, So
11:51
Speaker 1: matches that sunlight, yeah, which is pretty cool. Yeah, well
11:55
Speaker 1: we'll get to it. But it can lead to some
11:57
Speaker 1: cool things like camouflage. So they but it also means
12:01
Speaker 1: that it travels farther light travels. That that type of
12:05
Speaker 1: light travels the farthest in water because it has a
12:07
Speaker 1: shorter wavelength than the other types. So an animal producing
12:11
Speaker 1: this could really cook down there. Basically, Uh, we're talking jellyfish, shrimp, krill, squid,
12:21
Speaker 1: other kinds of fish, marine worms, whatever the heck that is.
12:24
Speaker 1: They're exactly what you think it is. Yeah, what are
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Speaker 1: those one worms called? It like come up out of
12:29
Speaker 1: the little tubes tube worms? Oh yeah, yeah, I believe
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Speaker 1: that's what they're called. Um, either that or I just
12:37
Speaker 1: made some terrible like sixth grade joke, but um, they
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Speaker 1: they they are like on the ocean bottom and they
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Speaker 1: they have they just come out of these tubes and
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Speaker 1: grab stuff and go back in there like three ft long.
12:53
Speaker 1: You've not seen this sea snake to me? Yeah, but
12:56
Speaker 1: there I think they're attached, or they may be attached
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Speaker 1: to their tubes, or they just never come all the
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Speaker 1: way out. I'm gonna have to look into that. Yeah.
13:05
Speaker 1: Uh so you talked about the blue green light is
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Speaker 1: what they generally produce. Um. There is something called the
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Speaker 1: loose jawfish which actually can make red light very deep
13:15
Speaker 1: in the ocean. But that's really unusual that can make
13:17
Speaker 1: red light, and it's um. A lot of species can't
13:21
Speaker 1: even see the color red down there because I don't
13:23
Speaker 1: know if they're just their brains aren't used to it
13:25
Speaker 1: because they never see it. So the loose jaw uses
13:28
Speaker 1: this thing um to to basically sneak up on people. Um,
13:34
Speaker 1: it's like Jane Gum at the end of Silence of
13:36
Speaker 1: the Lambs, and and like the fish are like Jodie
13:39
Speaker 1: Foster and Jamee Gum is the loose jaw fish coming
13:44
Speaker 1: up behind her like I can see you, you can't
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Speaker 1: see me. So, like we said earlier, we don't know
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Speaker 1: for sure why all these uh bioluminescent forms of life
14:21
Speaker 1: are down there doing their thing. Um. You did mention
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Speaker 1: the earthworm that has the secretion. They don't know why
14:27
Speaker 1: they do that. The mushroom spores. They think that maybe
14:32
Speaker 1: it's um to attract insect to spread these spores. That's
14:35
Speaker 1: why the mushroom glows makes sense. Um. Sometimes and this
14:40
Speaker 1: one's kind of cute. Sometimes animals will light up when
14:44
Speaker 1: something nearby them lights up, which I think might just
14:47
Speaker 1: be a little like, hey, how you doing? I can
14:49
Speaker 1: glow too. Well, that's how fireflies are doing. Yeah, they're
14:52
Speaker 1: attracting mates right with a like a very specific pattern.
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Speaker 1: They use it to communicate like, hey, you're looking pretty good.
15:02
Speaker 1: Meet you by the fence post, right, yeah, um, let's
15:05
Speaker 1: go get some fun. So should we talk about the
15:10
Speaker 1: dino flagellates the dino flagellates, dina flagellates? Am I pronouncing
15:16
Speaker 1: it wrong? No? I think that was wrong? Okay? Uh?
15:19
Speaker 1: Well yeah, so have you ever seen Apollo thirteen? Yeah,
15:22
Speaker 1: you remember the part where um they had a problem.
15:25
Speaker 1: Is it Tom level? Gym level? Where gym level? And
15:30
Speaker 1: uh is hanging out with Bill Paxxton and they're talking
15:33
Speaker 1: about how they're just shooting the breeze while they're trying
15:37
Speaker 1: to stay alive, and um, he talks about how he
15:41
Speaker 1: was flying a mission, um coming in on an aircraft
15:45
Speaker 1: carrier and there was a blackout and he couldn't see
15:48
Speaker 1: where he was going. He couldn't find the aircraft carrier
15:51
Speaker 1: to land, and he's running low and fuel. Then all
15:53
Speaker 1: of a sudden he looks and he notices that there's
15:55
Speaker 1: a bunch of um. He calls it like glowing algae
15:58
Speaker 1: or whatever. But what he's talking about where dino flagelets
16:01
Speaker 1: that were kicked up by the wake of the aircraft carrier,
16:05
Speaker 1: and he used them as like a runway to guide
16:07
Speaker 1: him in. I remember that part. That's a great part,
16:09
Speaker 1: that whole movie from like start to finish with. But
16:13
Speaker 1: these dino flagelets create what's called the milky sea when
16:16
Speaker 1: you get enough of them together, when they're disturbed physically,
16:20
Speaker 1: they start to glow, and if you have a bunch
16:22
Speaker 1: of them, you can see him from space. Actually, in
16:24
Speaker 1: this article there's a picture of a pretty substantial milky
16:29
Speaker 1: sea off the coast of Africa. Pretty cool stuff. And
16:32
Speaker 1: if you google milky Sea two you can see some
16:35
Speaker 1: like that's cool looking. But I like the shots from
16:37
Speaker 1: like low flying planes, helicopters very cool looking and uh
16:42
Speaker 1: a little eerie, yeah, if that may say so. They
16:45
Speaker 1: have no idea again, why dino flage lates would glow
16:48
Speaker 1: when they're disturbed. Obviously they're like trying to register their complaint.
16:53
Speaker 1: They can't talk, you can't flip anyone off because they
16:57
Speaker 1: glow out of anger apparent. Um. They they there's a
17:02
Speaker 1: theory called the burglar alarm theory. I like this one.
17:05
Speaker 1: Or basically they think that, um, when dinoflage lets start
17:09
Speaker 1: to glow, it's because there's little fish eating on them, right,
17:13
Speaker 1: which is disturbing. They think that maybe they glow to
17:17
Speaker 1: basically alert larger fish that will come eat the smaller
17:20
Speaker 1: fish so they'll stop eating the dino flagelets, that there's
17:23
Speaker 1: little fish in the area. Pretty awesome, Like hey, help
17:28
Speaker 1: come eat this guy because you're bigger. Uh. Here's some
17:31
Speaker 1: other and you know, these are the ones that are
17:34
Speaker 1: the most understood because there is a lot of uncertainty.
17:37
Speaker 1: Like we said like ten times. Um, but here's here's
17:41
Speaker 1: some of the reasons that they think they're doing this communication,
17:43
Speaker 1: which we've mentioned with the firefly or the lightning bug. Uh,
17:47
Speaker 1: to locate food, maybe to use it as an actual
17:50
Speaker 1: light to see in the dark. Pretty cool, or a
17:52
Speaker 1: spotlight to catch prey. Oh like temporarily blind something gotcha
17:59
Speaker 1: or no, like go find it. It's very dark in here.
18:02
Speaker 1: I need to see what fish are to attract prey,
18:05
Speaker 1: like the anglerfish. Like look at this bright glow, come here, chomp. Yeah,
18:10
Speaker 1: I love that one. What was that in Finding Nemo Man?
18:13
Speaker 1: That thing was scary. I didn't see that movie was
18:15
Speaker 1: a good one. Yeah, Camouflage. I don't watch any of
18:18
Speaker 1: those anymore because Emily doesn't like them. Oh, yes, she
18:21
Speaker 1: doesn't like Disney movies. She doesn't like any of those
18:23
Speaker 1: Pixar movies because it's always like some tragedy, like someone
18:26
Speaker 1: dies in its heartbreak and keep her away from Toy
18:29
Speaker 1: Story three. Dude, I can't even watch that movie. I
18:32
Speaker 1: made her watch up and she was just like a
18:34
Speaker 1: like a little blob of play floor. The first ten
18:37
Speaker 1: minutes are just so sad. Yeah, my god. But I
18:39
Speaker 1: always explained to her, like this is why they make
18:41
Speaker 1: these movies, so kids can learn how to cope with death,
18:44
Speaker 1: and then they see like it's all happy afterwards, you know,
18:47
Speaker 1: all right, Camouflage, this is the coolest one. Yeah, and
18:51
Speaker 1: the it's pretty It makes sense too, if you're in
18:54
Speaker 1: the ocean, and if you've ever like swum down ten
18:56
Speaker 1: or fiftet and looked up, open your eyes in the ocean.
18:59
Speaker 1: I've done it. Um. It's it's hard to see stuff
19:03
Speaker 1: below you, but it's easy to look up because you
19:05
Speaker 1: know the sunlight's penetrating down and see like the silhouette
19:08
Speaker 1: or in the case of Jaws, you see like the
19:09
Speaker 1: silhouette of the lady's legs on the raft. You know
19:12
Speaker 1: that's good eating. Um. If you have like in the
19:16
Speaker 1: case of what's it called counter elimination, you can actually
19:22
Speaker 1: produce spots on your underside to make it more difficult
19:25
Speaker 1: for a fish beneath you, a predator beneath you to
19:27
Speaker 1: look up and like make out what's going on. Like
19:30
Speaker 1: you won't have the the the perfect little silhouette outline
19:34
Speaker 1: of a yummy fish. It'll confuse it basically because you're
19:36
Speaker 1: cutting down in the contrast, pretty cool, like you're creating
19:40
Speaker 1: light that blends in with that same blue green light,
19:44
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden you disappear well or just
19:46
Speaker 1: breaks up your shape so you don't look like you should. Um.
19:50
Speaker 1: And then there's the opposite, the cookie cutter or cigar shark,
19:54
Speaker 1: which is the name I think you made up um no,
19:57
Speaker 1: that's real, which basically has the the reverse of that
20:01
Speaker 1: where the bottom, the underside of the cookie cutter shark
20:04
Speaker 1: glows except for this one spot in the middle that
20:08
Speaker 1: is dark that looks like a small fish, So of
20:13
Speaker 1: shark or some other animal looking up. We'll be like,
20:16
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go eat that fish, and then all of
20:18
Speaker 1: a sudden it's like, oh god, it's a cookie cutter
20:21
Speaker 1: slash cigar shark. And then the cookie cutter shark takes
20:24
Speaker 1: a bite out of them, the round bite. Yeah, that's
20:27
Speaker 1: why they call it the cookie cutter. It's like a
20:29
Speaker 1: little plug of flesh. And if you've ever seen google
20:33
Speaker 1: these dudes in their face, it's like the most frightening
20:36
Speaker 1: little thing you've ever seen in your life. Yeah, they're
20:38
Speaker 1: pretty terrifying. And you'll see pictures of like a shark
20:42
Speaker 1: or away all washed up on the shore with like
20:44
Speaker 1: hundreds of these little bite plugs taken out of them. Yeah,
20:47
Speaker 1: it's pretty awful. That's a that's a terrible way to go. Yeah,
20:50
Speaker 1: but good for you, cigar shark, because you're small and
20:53
Speaker 1: you're doing what you can. It's a tough world down there.
20:56
Speaker 1: It's wildy, you know, it's diphotic and then off defenses
21:00
Speaker 1: the last reason. Um And basically, like a squid may
21:04
Speaker 1: release inc to cloud your vision, some of these things
21:07
Speaker 1: can release a cloud of a glowing cloud two uh,
21:10
Speaker 1: basically make you sit back and put on pink floyd
21:13
Speaker 1: and like chill out for a little while. Yeah, I
21:15
Speaker 1: looked it up. There's a shrimp. There's a type of
21:17
Speaker 1: shrimp that releases a bioluminescent clown and I couldn't get
21:21
Speaker 1: the name. I saw both fire breathing and vomiting shrimp
21:26
Speaker 1: for the common names. But yeah, it just spits it out.
21:29
Speaker 1: That's not what I would want. Order on the menu,
21:33
Speaker 1: the fried vomiting shrimp. Uh, and make sure there's extra
21:37
Speaker 1: poop in the main vein crowds. Um, So what's going
21:41
Speaker 1: on here? How? How is this magic happening? Well, just
21:46
Speaker 1: like we've mentioned with a light stick and involves two
21:49
Speaker 1: different substances mixed together to produce this reaction. Um. And
21:54
Speaker 1: there can be all different kinds of kinds of chemicals,
21:56
Speaker 1: but depending on the on the fish or the being,
22:00
Speaker 1: the being, the life, uh, the God's gift. The one
22:07
Speaker 1: is a a lucifer in and that's the light producer
22:10
Speaker 1: and the other is a lucif phrase and that is
22:12
Speaker 1: the enzyme that catalyzes it. So and those aren't specific
22:17
Speaker 1: things like you you wouldn't look at the chemical composition
22:19
Speaker 1: of something and be like, oh, that's a lucifer in. Yeah,
22:22
Speaker 1: something can be a lucifer and it's a generic term
22:25
Speaker 1: for something that produces light or something that catalyzes the
22:29
Speaker 1: production of light, the lucifhrase. That is correct, and they
22:33
Speaker 1: will mix together and a lot of times the lucifer
22:38
Speaker 1: in is something called a photo protein and it needs
22:41
Speaker 1: an eye on a charged ion to get things going.
22:43
Speaker 1: That would be the lucifhrase. That's right. But in all
22:46
Speaker 1: cases there's some sort of trigger. Could be mechanical, could
22:49
Speaker 1: be chemical, could be neurological startle, Yeah, it could be
22:53
Speaker 1: something they don't understand yet, but something triggers these two
22:56
Speaker 1: things to get together and make this reaction. One thing
23:01
Speaker 1: that I didn't realize was the word lucifer means lightbringer. Yeah,
23:06
Speaker 1: I never knew that, you mean. I um went on
23:08
Speaker 1: a little side tear last night trying to figure out
23:11
Speaker 1: why the devil would be named the light bringer? Did
23:16
Speaker 1: you find out? It's a mystery it's um Latin and
23:19
Speaker 1: it came years like centuries after Um the Old Testament
23:24
Speaker 1: was originally written, and I can't remember what version, but
23:27
Speaker 1: it was basically like added on by thin. I guess
23:32
Speaker 1: the Romans maybe added it on, but it's because it's
23:36
Speaker 1: Latin and the original version was not written in Latin. Lightbringer,
23:41
Speaker 1: the Lightbringer, the morning Star, that's another way to put it.
23:45
Speaker 1: They said maybe it had to do with Venus, because
23:48
Speaker 1: Venus is like a false star, and so maybe lucifer
23:53
Speaker 1: is a false angel, is what they were saying. But
23:57
Speaker 1: because the devil would always come in disguise. Maybe, Yeah,
24:00
Speaker 1: I think that's weak light Bringer. That's pretty specific, Like
24:04
Speaker 1: what is that? I bet there's some theologian that has
24:07
Speaker 1: the answer here. I want to hear it. Yeah, I
24:09
Speaker 1: was hard to find out about that one. So, Um,
24:37
Speaker 1: you've got lucifer in, you've got lucifhrase. Some of these
24:41
Speaker 1: chemical reactions require another substance, and a lot of times
24:44
Speaker 1: it's oxygen, right, So luciferen will come in in contact
24:50
Speaker 1: with an oxygen molecule and then the luciphrase comes along,
24:53
Speaker 1: and then you've got a bioluminescent glow, which is pretty cool. Yeah,
24:59
Speaker 1: But they also think that that's one of the reasons
25:02
Speaker 1: I should say that's one of the reasons why they
25:05
Speaker 1: think that bioluminescence is an accidental byproduct of regular old
25:11
Speaker 1: evolution and that originally, um, like there's a lucifering called
25:16
Speaker 1: um ceiling terrazine. I believe it's how you pronounce it, right, Uh.
25:22
Speaker 1: And it's an antioxidant. It goes around and tries to
25:25
Speaker 1: find like rogue, harmful free radicals, oxygen derivatives, right and
25:32
Speaker 1: get rid of them. Uh. And they think that this
25:36
Speaker 1: happened this was a process that was way way older
25:41
Speaker 1: than bioluminescence, and then along came some substance that became
25:47
Speaker 1: a lucifhrase, and then light was created, and then it
25:51
Speaker 1: was just a byproduct like heats, a byproduct of metabolism, right. Um.
25:57
Speaker 1: But they think also that over time this happened in
26:00
Speaker 1: like maybe it's going on inside of us right now
26:03
Speaker 1: if we're producing light but we just don't know it,
26:05
Speaker 1: or it's just so weak that we wouldn't even possibly
26:08
Speaker 1: be able to detect it. But this happened enough times
26:11
Speaker 1: in animals in the ocean where suddenly ones could catch
26:14
Speaker 1: prey more easily because they could see better than other
26:17
Speaker 1: animals that weren't bioluminescing, And so it was selected in
26:21
Speaker 1: these skies. And now bioluminescence is its own trait rather
26:24
Speaker 1: than a byproduct of the antioxidant process. I bet you're right. Oh,
26:30
Speaker 1: it's that's not me man. I think you just cooked
26:33
Speaker 1: this up. I wish that's better than why as far
26:37
Speaker 1: as research papers go, Yeah, throw a theory out there,
26:40
Speaker 1: see if it sticks. That's what I say. So the
26:43
Speaker 1: deal with these these animals is they either have all
26:45
Speaker 1: this stuff like in their body as part of them,
26:49
Speaker 1: or they have a little relationship with a bacteria like
26:52
Speaker 1: producing bacteria that live in a light organ And this
26:57
Speaker 1: is pretty cool, Like some of these animals can pull
26:59
Speaker 1: this organ back into their body like it's always on.
27:02
Speaker 1: Sometimes they don't want the light to be on, so
27:03
Speaker 1: they'll pull it back in the body. Or they have
27:06
Speaker 1: a little something like a light uh an eyelid that
27:09
Speaker 1: they can just kind of close over the light, which
27:11
Speaker 1: is pretty amazing. But it's always going. Yeah, And what
27:16
Speaker 1: the other thing with evolution is they think that because
27:19
Speaker 1: they don't see this as often in lakes, because lakes
27:21
Speaker 1: are younger, then they think it maybe happened independently at
27:25
Speaker 1: different parts in the ocean. So I talked to Tracey
27:27
Speaker 1: about this, and it was a little hinky. She wrote
27:29
Speaker 1: this a long time because she couldn't quite remember what
27:32
Speaker 1: the point was. But the point was that they think
27:34
Speaker 1: that because the process of antioxidation is a normal thing, um,
27:41
Speaker 1: that the the conditions were right for bioluminescence to be
27:47
Speaker 1: selected naturally in some places, but it wouldn't in like
27:50
Speaker 1: a lake. So the the idea that this happened independently
27:54
Speaker 1: and spontaneously when needed through evolution is kind of backed
28:00
Speaker 1: by the idea that you don't really see bioluminescence at
28:02
Speaker 1: the bottom of leaks because you don't need it. It
28:06
Speaker 1: all makes sense when you just peel the peel the
28:08
Speaker 1: little curtain back, doesn't it? When you peel the glowing
28:12
Speaker 1: skin bag? What else you got? Anything else you've seen
28:15
Speaker 1: glowing cats? Yeah? The Mayo Clinic likes to put jellyfish
28:20
Speaker 1: jeans in animals the most the biggest one so far
28:24
Speaker 1: as a cat, and make it glow because they're checking
28:28
Speaker 1: um disease. They're using it to mark the progression of diseases.
28:32
Speaker 1: But they made a glowing cat. It's pretty cool, now
28:35
Speaker 1: does the I gotta look at this. It glows under
28:38
Speaker 1: a blue light, but it glows green, and it's like
28:40
Speaker 1: the cat glows green like it. I guess it's the hair.
28:45
Speaker 1: The cara tin it produces has some sort of fluorescent
28:48
Speaker 1: property to it, but it's it's not bioluminescent in it's fluorescent,
28:55
Speaker 1: and fluorescent is where you take light of on color
28:58
Speaker 1: and reflect it back, absorb it and reflected back of
29:01
Speaker 1: it as a different color. You're not actually producing light,
29:04
Speaker 1: all right. I just looked it up. Wow, it's a
29:07
Speaker 1: glowing cat, and I double check the date, double check
29:10
Speaker 1: the damn Like, this better not be in April Fools article,
29:15
Speaker 1: but it's not. Yeah, I want one of those this photo. Yeah, okay,
29:23
Speaker 1: so if you you're done, I'm done. Yeah. There's glowing
29:27
Speaker 1: rats too. Now these are baby cats. I think you
29:30
Speaker 1: should pulled kittens in some countries. Um if you if
29:34
Speaker 1: you want to learn more about bioluminescence, you should type
29:37
Speaker 1: that in to the search bar. And you want to
29:40
Speaker 1: type b I O l U M I N E
29:44
Speaker 1: S C E n CE mouthful in the search bar
29:50
Speaker 1: at how stuff works dot com and it'll bring up
29:52
Speaker 1: this very cool article with some pretty glowing pictures. UM,
29:57
Speaker 1: and I said, uh, search bar somewhere in there, which
29:59
Speaker 1: means it's time for listener mail. No, it's not Josh.
30:02
Speaker 1: Today is part two of you want to say it.
30:10
Speaker 1: For those of you don't know, this is a point
30:12
Speaker 1: at the show where we um thank people for little
30:15
Speaker 1: tokens and gifts and chatch keys and things that they
30:18
Speaker 1: have sent us. Foods sometimes foods, and um, it's a
30:21
Speaker 1: good chance to hear your name on the show as
30:23
Speaker 1: a as a thank you, and it's a good chance
30:25
Speaker 1: for some of you to find out where you can
30:28
Speaker 1: get some of these things, because a lot of times
30:29
Speaker 1: they're like really great creative crafty things. People write books,
30:33
Speaker 1: and like we want to support uh crafters and writers
30:37
Speaker 1: and bakers of cookies, and we want to support Bill Wagoner,
30:42
Speaker 1: who sent us a bumper sticker on how to pronounce
30:45
Speaker 1: Nevada Nevada. I'll never get used to that. It's not right.
30:50
Speaker 1: It is right, but I tell everyone that writes in
30:52
Speaker 1: only people from Nevada say it that way. Everyone else
30:55
Speaker 1: says Nevada Nevada. That's Nevada, all right, Lily her sister
31:01
Speaker 1: Toby and brother in law Danny start a company called
31:03
Speaker 1: Please Be Good Humans. Oh yeah, remem of these guys. Uh,
31:07
Speaker 1: they sent us some shirts. I think they sent some
31:08
Speaker 1: to stickers. They've got them. Know everybody has stickers. We
31:12
Speaker 1: passed them out. Oh well, Kristen Conger, I think that's
31:15
Speaker 1: a short too though. Oh she did. I think so.
31:16
Speaker 1: Oh that's great. Um. And basically everything is has the
31:20
Speaker 1: pbg H logo on it, which is like be good
31:26
Speaker 1: to each other, and of everything they sell goes to
31:29
Speaker 1: the charity of your choice. So if you go there
31:33
Speaker 1: Please Be Good Humans the Internet, you can actually get
31:36
Speaker 1: some of the stuff and choose your own charity that
31:40
Speaker 1: will go to. Very nice message, Very nice. Um. How
31:43
Speaker 1: about some Randy Carbonone action. Yeah, he sent us his
31:47
Speaker 1: Pirate Gags booklet, which is a tailor made for Pirate
31:52
Speaker 1: Day talking about tool and Pirate Day. If you want
31:55
Speaker 1: to learn more about that, you could go to Pirate
31:59
Speaker 1: Day I R A T E A D A Y
32:03
Speaker 1: dot blog spot dot com and hook up with Randy
32:06
Speaker 1: Carbonny Action. Christopher M. Roth with an E at the end,
32:12
Speaker 1: sent us a kindle version of his book Dirk Danger
32:15
Speaker 1: Loves Life. I don't have a kindle yet, and I'm
32:17
Speaker 1: dying to read this thing just sitting there. Um, Susannah
32:23
Speaker 1: from Archie the Archie Comics. Um, she sent us a
32:28
Speaker 1: bunch of stuff. She she she sends us stuff in
32:30
Speaker 1: like waves. I guess you could put it. But most recently, um,
32:34
Speaker 1: she sent us a Archie meets Kiss hardcover book of
32:38
Speaker 1: Kevin Keller book. Um, that's the first gay character. That's right,
32:42
Speaker 1: the first gay comic book character. This whole green Lantern hubbub.
32:46
Speaker 1: I haven't heard that. Oh yeah, there's apparently two Green
32:49
Speaker 1: Lanterns and one of them came out as gay and
32:51
Speaker 1: just a man in the comic that he came out.
32:54
Speaker 1: And yeah, but Archie's got a beat. It's right because
32:59
Speaker 1: of Kevin Kelly was the first gay character. Uh in
33:02
Speaker 1: the Jinx comics that Susannah is she draw right produced
33:06
Speaker 1: those which yeah, I mean that's her baby. So, um
33:08
Speaker 1: support the Jinx comics and archiees a hole. She sent
33:11
Speaker 1: his shirts and what we were supposed to meet at
33:13
Speaker 1: uh comic on but she said they were slammed in
33:16
Speaker 1: the booth and she was unable to get away. Oh
33:19
Speaker 1: I met Uncle John's reader people from reader people. They
33:22
Speaker 1: gave us shirts and t hats. Very nice, so thank
33:25
Speaker 1: you as well. We're from Mad Magazine too, which just
33:29
Speaker 1: like floored me. Did you write the guy back? I
33:32
Speaker 1: totally did you? Yeah, I finally did. Um. Daniel Mackenzie
33:36
Speaker 1: from Oakland, California, Sennison LP from his band shut I Unison,
33:42
Speaker 1: awesome music, indie rock, little noisy, little melodic, right up
33:47
Speaker 1: my alley, shut Out Unison. I didn't see that one.
33:50
Speaker 1: It's good stuff. Um, Andy Parr Sentison edition of Games
33:54
Speaker 1: Magazine's World of Puzzles. Is that the one that had
33:58
Speaker 1: us as a I believe so yeah, stuff you should
34:02
Speaker 1: know was a clue in a word search. I believe
34:05
Speaker 1: nobody got it. I don't get this one. That's cool,
34:08
Speaker 1: but it was very nice that he uh he did.
34:11
Speaker 1: He went to that trouble. Uh. Suki s u k
34:14
Speaker 1: I Design Laboratory sentis some hankies and that this was
34:17
Speaker 1: the lady who designed the baby head T shirt with
34:22
Speaker 1: the fly. Yeah, our favorite T shirt of the submissions,
34:25
Speaker 1: the most disturbing one. It was one of my five favorites.
34:29
Speaker 1: It was my favorite, I think, yeah, but um, she
34:32
Speaker 1: designed that and she sent us some hankies with like
34:34
Speaker 1: these hankies have like sleeping sickness and hepatitis and like
34:39
Speaker 1: the chemical combinations of these on the hanky. Yeah, it's
34:43
Speaker 1: pretty funny. That's what's contained within. Yeah, that's pretty awesome.
34:47
Speaker 1: Um yeah, thank you for those. Duff Man sent it's
34:50
Speaker 1: the Springfield Isotopes couzy. Yeah from deaf Man himself. Yeah, uh,
34:55
Speaker 1: we appreciate that, sir. Uh. Silver Fox broad Band sent
34:59
Speaker 1: a Silver Fox T shirts and at first I was all,
35:02
Speaker 1: what did this broadband company sending his shirts? Then I
35:04
Speaker 1: looked up they supply internet for senior homes, So I
35:09
Speaker 1: was all of a sudden wark with pride. Everyone at
35:12
Speaker 1: my gym thinks that I'm a Silver Foxes. They wear
35:16
Speaker 1: that shirt a lot. It's always comfortable. Let's see. The
35:19
Speaker 1: guys from rock tail Ours send us a T shirt
35:22
Speaker 1: a podcast about rock music. Um, that's rock and then
35:26
Speaker 1: tail t a l e our check them out. Bike
35:30
Speaker 1: rappers dot com uh with w R A p B
35:34
Speaker 1: are not rapping like music. They sent us some reflective
35:37
Speaker 1: bike rappers and dog collars basically just these little bell
35:41
Speaker 1: grow thinks such an easy invention, but but necessary, and
35:45
Speaker 1: you wrap them on the frame of your bike to
35:47
Speaker 1: make your bike more reflective. And they have a little
35:50
Speaker 1: reflective dog collars too. It's pretty cool. Um. We've got
35:54
Speaker 1: Christmas cards from a bunch of people. Thank you very much.
35:56
Speaker 1: From this is how far behind we are. It's Christmas
36:00
Speaker 1: July everybody, Nick and Lindsay Devon, b Becca Evans, Andrew
36:04
Speaker 1: and Janelle Thomas. So thank you very much. Merry Christmas
36:08
Speaker 1: all your people, and happy Halloween. M oh and I've
36:11
Speaker 1: got one more. Send us a Halloween card. Oh, thanks,
36:14
Speaker 1: Happy Halloween, am uh. And then again from Nick and Lindsay.
36:17
Speaker 1: They sent us Valentine state cards. Yeah, they're They're pretty sweet.
36:20
Speaker 1: They send us stuff. Are you done because I got
36:22
Speaker 1: two more in this one ahead, let's go for it, dude.
36:25
Speaker 1: David Beaver's family has been making a magnetic calendar for
36:28
Speaker 1: fifty years, and not just one. They've been making the
36:32
Speaker 1: magnetic calendars for fifty years. Uh. The Magnetic Calendar dot
36:37
Speaker 1: com owned, operated, made and sourced in the Midwest. It's
36:41
Speaker 1: a selling point family business. They've been doing this for
36:43
Speaker 1: how long fifty years? Fifty years? Uh? And then Jill
36:47
Speaker 1: Swing sent us a Twinkie the kid t shirts, so
36:49
Speaker 1: thank you very much. Yeah, I believe it was how
36:51
Speaker 1: made design to write. I don't know, I think it is,
36:54
Speaker 1: was it? Yeah? Well, thank you everybody that was very
36:56
Speaker 1: kind of you. Yeah, we have one more installment fell
37:00
Speaker 1: here soon and then I have to do it because
37:02
Speaker 1: these are all the ones that Chuck compiled. I think
37:04
Speaker 1: it's most of them that you have a lot. I've
37:06
Speaker 1: got a decent amount. All right, Well then there'll be
37:08
Speaker 1: a part four, okay, and then we'll start all over
37:10
Speaker 1: all right, all right? If you want to send us something,
37:14
Speaker 1: even something is innocuous, is just a hello, You can
37:18
Speaker 1: tweet to us at s y s K podcast. You
37:20
Speaker 1: can join us on Facebook dot com, uh slash stuff
37:23
Speaker 1: you should know, and you can send us an email
37:27
Speaker 1: to Stuff Podcast at how stuff works dot com for
37:35
Speaker 1: more on this and thousands of other topics. VI is
37:38
Speaker 1: it how stuff works dot com