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Episode 139: Unequal cufflinks
Published 6th June, 2025
Transcription by Caption+
Tom:
Which sportsman has a son called Thunder and a daughter called Olympia Lightning?
The answer to that at the end of the show. My name's Tom Scott and this is Lateral.
Hello and welcome again to another 40 minutes or so of lateral-thinking questions based on fascinating facts and amazing stories. Please remember to have your bucket of water, box of candles, and Parmesan cheese on standby.
To our regular listeners, don't worry. I know that you don't actually need those things, but I really hope that for just a moment some new listener was confused.
However, none of our guests today are going to be confused because they are all returning players.
First of all, we have professional puzzle editor and writer for the quiz show Only Connect: Dan Peake. Welcome back.
Dan:
Hello!​ Thank you for having me again.
Tom:
Did you bring the Parmesan cheese?
Dan:
I brought cheddar. Is that going to be okay?
Tom:
In a sentence that will annoy every cook out there, it's gonna be close enough. You can just grate cheddar on everything. It'll be fine.
Dan:
I like that we're now going into pedantic cookery here. My job is sort of to be surrounded by pedants in terms of quiz questions and just— I get feedback sometimes and go, "I think you will find you were slightly incorrect."
Tom:
Oh yeah.
Dan:
And I love the feedback that I get. I once asked a question, "Hell's Kitchen is a suburb of which city?"
Tom:
Yep.
Dan:
The answer being?
Rowan:
New York.
Tom:
New York City, as far as I know.
Dan:
Good, but no. Because it's not really a suburb, is it?
Tom:
Ohh!
Dan:
I meant suburb as a sort of, you know, a part of the town, and I got an e-mail in saying, "I take issue with the word 'suburb'," and do you know what? I actually think they're right. I think they're right. Suburb is more on the outskirts of a town, slightly less dense. Hell's Kitchen is very much in the centre of New York City. It is not a suburb.
Tom:
Now, you write for Only Connect, where the biggest prize is a trophy and a lot of kudos. That's obviously a lot more important if there's money on the line for those questions.
Dan:
Oh, absolutely. It's why I try and deal with nothing to do with money. I try to stay far away from those quizzes.
Tom:
Likewi​se, we do not guarantee the accuracy of any of these questions. Very best of luck to the pedants out there.
SFX:
(group laughing)
Tom:
Also joining us today, we have from her own YouTube channel and the Queer Movie Podcast, Rowan Ellis.
Rowan:
Hell​o! Thanks for having me back again.
Tom:
Welcom​e back to the show. How much pedantry do you get (laughs) in the feedback for your shows and your video essays?
Rowan:
Not as much as I would have thought, to be honest. I feel like there— A lot of the stuff I talk about is kind of film and TV and movies and interpretation of it, and the author is dead, baby, so...
Tom:
(laughs heartily)
Rowan:
I feel like it's a lot less opportunity for pedantry than a quiz question writer would have.
Tom:
Well, very best of luck avoiding the pedants on the show today. We also have on the show someone who honestly must deal with more pedants than any of us. The host of Technology Connections on YouTube, Alec Watson. How are you doing?
Alec:
Hi. It's great to be here, and you're absolutely correct.
SFX:
(both laughing)
Tom:
How many follow-ups have you had to do? How many little... connection corrections have you had to make?
Alec:
(blurts chuckle) Well, these days, I'm better at just letting that sort of of stuff go, but it's great fodder for content.
Tom:
Oh, yes. It absolutely is. I've managed to get an entire video out of just things I messed up over the years.
Alec:
It's good stuff. Just a little irritating.
Tom:
Yeah, yeah. It really is.
Thank you very much to all of you for being here. Good luck today.
And if you are a new listener, now's the time to light the candle for question one.
Jordan is paid to make the numbers 1, 2, 3, and 4 four times each, the number 5 twice, and the number 0 a total of 18 times. What is his job?
I'll say that again.
Jordan is paid to make the numbers 1, 2, 3, and 4 four times each, the number 5 twice, and the number 0 a total of 18 times. What is his job?
Dan:
Is he a terrible sudoku creator?
Tom:
(laughing)
Dan:
Althou​gh these days they're very varied, so actually maybe it's a perfectly valid sudoku. You never know.
Tom:
I was about to pedant you, ironically, on your sudoku knowledge there.
Dan:
Ah, they're not all one to nine these days. No, no.
Rowan:
Oh, dang. Okay.
Dan:
Oh dear.
Tom:
People​ do get paid for making sudoku. Someone has to compile it in the first place.
Alec:
Yeah,​ that's true.
Tom:
Includ​ing, I believe, Producer David of this show. He's done quite a bit of sudoku work in his time.
Dan:
He knows his numbers from one all the way to nine. It's amazing.
Tom:
Yeah, yeah.
Rowan:
So, okay, I— Listen. We've all been on this show before. We know how your sick games work, Tom Scott.
SFX:
(group laughs uproariously)
Rowan:
And what I'm real—
Tom:
And yet I'm getting the blame for that, not David the producer!
Rowan:
Davi​d's innocent and has never done anything wrong in his life.
SFX:
(Tom and Alec laugh)
Rowan:
So I feel like it's— The way that that question reads, just and the—because of the way that human minds work, we do things in order from beginning to end so it's—it would be as if someone's writing one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, and then going— and then, like, 18 zeros at the end.
Tom:
Mhm.
Rowan:
But I think that that— We need to be thinking more complicated than that in terms of what possible order could someone be writing these in?
Is this telephone numbers? Is this— There's so many things where those numbers could be in different orders. Is this prices of stuff? Is this— There's lots of options, and I wanted to break myself out of assuming anything based on this question.
Tom:
(laughs)
Alec:
The..​. The first thing that came to mind was... like, someone writing numbers on a scoreboard?
Rowan:
Ooh.
Alec:
And..​. I dunno, I'm pulling on that because now you said 18 zeros, right?
Tom:
Yeah. You almost seemed guilty, the way you said that. I don't know why. There was some kind of, "Oh, I feel a little bit guilty for answering with a sports thing here."
Alec:
Yeah,​ well, I mean, yeah, that's just generally my character. But 18 zeros, there's nine innings in baseball. Two teams. I know a little bit of math.
Tom:
(laughs)
Dan:
What was the list of numbers, again? Was it 1 to 4 four times –
Tom:
Yep.
Dan:
a couple of fives –
Tom:
Yep.
Dan:
and then all zeros.
Tom:
And then 18 zeros, yes.
Dan:
Well, okay. So 1 to 4 four times, that's 16 numbers, and a couple of fives. That's 18 numbers.
Tom:
It is!
Dan:
So are we gonna be dealing with 01, 02, 03, 04, or are we gonna be dealing with 10, 20, 30, 40 four times, and then 50? It's gonna be two-digit numbers. Probably the tens, 'cause otherwise, why would you bother with the leading zeros?
Tom:
Yep.
Dan:
I don't know where we're going with that. But that's the facts.
Alec:
Hmm.
Tom:
Yeah. Excellent deduction.
Rowan:
Coul​d you... Could you read the question one more time, Tom?
Tom:
Jordan​ is paid to make the numbers 1, 2, 3, and 4 four times each, the number 5 twice, and the number 0 a total of 18 times. What is his job?
Rowan:
Did you— Did you say "paint" or "make"?
Tom:
Make.
Rowan:
Mm.
Dan:
Make the numbers. So not write them. Make them.
Tom:
Yes.
Rowan:
Okay​. So he's making it out of a material, or he's making up those numbers out of something else, or he's... Make—mm.
Dan:
What comes in 10, 20, 30, 40, 50? I'm currently thinking road limit sorts of signs or things like that, but it doesn't quite work.
Why that specific set as well? It's not like, "Oh, this was his... his set of roads today." There's not— There's gonna be a specific reason why it's this set of 18 numbers.
Alec:
Yeah,​ and I—the fact that there's nothing... Six, seven, eight, and nine are not mentioned as...
Dan:
Hmm.
Tom:
Rowan is actually right with paint. It is a type of paint. But we're describing this as "make". It's not like he's just kind of writing these down.
Dan:
Mhm. Okay. They're probably gonna be big or...
Tom:
Yes.
Rowan:
Hmm.
Tom:
Yep. Absolutely. And Alec was honestly quite close with scoreboard.
Alec:
Mm.
Dan:
Oh! Yeah.
Tom:
(laughs)
Dan:
Yeah. Yeah, I've got it.
Tom:
I thought it was gonna be Dan that got this. Knowing what you three know and what you've talked about in the past, I thought this was gonna be Dan. Bring it home.
Dan:
Well, I'm gonna guide Alec 'cause you're so close. It is sporting.
I think the sport – oh, Rowan might have got it – American football?
Tom:
It is American football, yes. Rowan, what do you think it is?
Rowan:
I don't know enough to know exactly, but is it the yard lines?
Alec:
Yeah.
Rowan:
The numbers to show where they are?
Tom:
Yes, it is.
Alec:
I should've pulled on that, 'cause it was— Yeah, they don't— 50 is the middle, and then they just go back down.
Tom:
Right,​ yep.
Jordan Achay is the groundskeeper of the LA Chargers' stadium, and part of his job involves respraying the field to mark the yardage numbers, and those numbers are 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 in the centre, and then 40, 30, 20, 10. Those are repeated on each side.
So that is 18 numbers, and in total: 1, 2, 3, and 4 four times, 5 twice, and the number zero 18 times.
Alec:
I love that I've tried baseball. (wheezes)
Tom:
How can we describe someone's job in the most awkward way possible? Each of our guests has brought a question along with them.
Dan, we're gonna start with you. Take it away.
Dan:
Okay, so this question has been written by a Dan Peake.
Tom:
Oh! Okay.
Dan:
Oh, yeah.
Tom:
We have a guest-written question.
Dan:
I have prepared it on a Lateral cue card and everything.
Tom:
From the live show! You took one of the cards from the live show!
Dan:
I did. (laughs)
Tom:
Wonder​ful.
Dan:
Going the whole hog here.
Tom:
Yeah, appreciate it.
Dan:
Alrigh​t, so good luck. So you're literally against me now.
Meteorologists measure cloud cover in 'oktas', ranging from 0 (clear sky) to 8 (fully overcast). So, 4 oktas means that half the sky is covered with cloud. However, sometimes a reading of 9 oktas is recorded. Why?
Meteorologists measure cloud cover in 'oktas', ranging from 0 (clear sky) to 8 (fully overcast). So, 4 oktas means that half the sky is covered with cloud. However, sometimes a reading of 9 oktas is recorded. Why?
Tom:
If I remember right, Dan, you've studied meteorology.
Dan:
I did.
Tom:
Yep, okay.
Dan:
(laughs) So this has come from that.
Tom:
The most personal question we've ever had that is about nothing in someone's personal life. It's great.
Dan:
That's​ true, 'cause I'm no longer a meteorologist. I abandoned it. I studied it for eight years at university, finally got a job in it, and then went, "I don't like it".
SFX:
(group laughing)
Dan:
Just, it had to change.
Rowan:
So, okay. So how would a meteorologist measure this? Is there an instrument that's used? Is it just, they look up at the sky and go, "It's pretty overcast. That seems pretty overcast to me"?
So I don't know if it's, like, at nine it's so foggy that you can't even see past the fog into the sky to know what the clouds are doing.
Alec:
Well,​ I was wondering if nine is just fog.
Tom:
Nine is just so much— I was thinking that nine was like, no data. We can't work this out.
Rowan:
Mm.
Tom:
But that feels like more of a computer science answer. There's better ways of doing it. You'd mark it as a dash or something like that.
Dan:
So you lot are getting very close to the answer very quickly, which is annoying me greatly.
SFX:
(guessers laughing)
Dan:
Why?
Alec:
Would​ it... 'Cause sometimes clouds layer themselves so you could have completely obscured vision of clouds above fog. Isn't the tool that is used to measure this, like— I feel like I've seen this. It's like there's a—you look at a slice of the sky.
Dan:
There are modern instruments now that can probably do it for you, but classically, it is a meteorologist going up there and having a look.
Tom:
Oh, wonderful.
Dan:
Having​ a look up there.
Rowan:
Is it, like, places where you are above the cloud cover? Like mountains or something if you were to take... So it's like there's something about, like, the type of place where a nine would happen?
Tom:
I fee​l like that would still be measured in – what was it? Oktas?
Dan:
Oktas,​ yeah.
Tom:
But you'd just have to put the height— they're like—the cloud base would be defined by a different number.
Alec:
Is this just, like, a Spinal Tap meteorologist?
SFX:
(others laughing)
Tom:
There'​s just really beautiful clouds up there. You know what? That's a nine.
Dan:
Yeah, we're not judging them on their looks, no. That's not what we're doing with clouds here. So we were close with fog, right? Extremely.
Tom:
The meteorologist did not bother to go outside because it was really cold.
Dan:
Oh, oh, there have been times when that's happened, I'm sure. Oh, just—ah, it looks clo— put—yeah, put an eight, you know. I'm sure that must have happened.
Tom:
I never filmed this but a couple of people suggested that I should go and visit the worst weather in the world... Which is I think the Mt. Washington Observatory somewhere in the northern US, has the highest wind speeds, the most frequent blizzards. They're just the worst everything.
Dan:
Yeah.
Tom:
And the trouble is that if I talk about that, I have to be there in one of those blizzards. And by definition, it's inaccessible. There is just a couple of meteorologists stuck at the top of a mountain.
Dan:
So let's go back to... you were saying... You were really close earlier. I want you to hammer it home. Really, really close earlier. There's one word that you said that was really important.
Alec:
Is it just, like, dense fog?
Dan:
Fog is the important word. So why might we record nine oktas?
Rowan:
Is it just like they can't see the clouds so they don't know how overcast it technically is at the cloud level?
Dan:
If you're in a fog... How do you see... the sky?
Tom:
Could not see clouds because clouds.
Dan:
Could not see sky.
Tom:
Could not see sky!
Dan:
Could not see sky. It's not only fog. There are other things that can obscure the sky. Can you think of any?
Alec:
Oh, like a dust cloud— or dust storm?
Dan:
Dust, smoke from any wildfires, that sort of thing.
Tom:
Absolu​te pitch black night.
Dan:
No!
Tom:
No?
Dan:
You can measure zero to eight at night. That is not a problem, 'cause actually, clouds are quite visible at night, depending on the moon and things like that. So actually night time, not a problem.
But it's when you can't see the sky, that's when you get the nine.
Tom:
Thank you to Zach for this next question.
Romeo and Juliet meet an artist at a craft fair who sells upcycled cufflinks. When they inquire about the price, the artist says that Romeo's cufflinks will cost $5 whereas Juliet's will cost $25, even though they are made the same way and use the same materials. Why?
Rowan:
It's​ the Pink Tax.
Tom:
And one more time.
Romeo and Juliet meet an artist at a craft fair who sells upcycled cufflinks. When they inquire about the price, the artist says that Romeo's cufflinks will cost $5 whereas Juliet's will cost $25, even though they are made the same way and use the same materials. Why?
Dan:
Same way, same materials, but there's gotta be something functionally different.
Rowan:
I mean, the difference is one's for Romeo and one's for Juliet, but it's whether or not it's them— what part of those two figures makes a difference. So is it their name? Is it their gender? Is it their method of... murder-suicide? Is it their...
SFX:
(group laughing)
Rowan:
You know, does it matter anything about them in the Shakespeare context or is it entirely just, like, two ra—like, it could have been, like, Ben and John or something like that. I think it's interesting that there's— it's upcycled cufflinks.
Dan:
Ah yes.
Rowan:
I don't know if there's anything significant 'cause it feels like a random thing to just add in as, like, a fun, like, "Why not?" You know? "Support local artists."
But I wonder what the upcycling is from. Like, what are they making cufflinks from? Or is it, like, there are cufflinks that already exist and they're upcycling them by putting something, like stamping something into them or doing something with them that might make a change?
Alec:
Is the—Are both Romeo and Juliet getting the same number of cufflinks?
Tom:
They'r​e both getting a pair, yes.
Dan:
Does Juliet have extremely large wrists and thus has reinforced cufflinks? Because that's the only way you can get them to keep the shirt cuffs closed. Hmm.
Rowan:
I was try— I was thinking about if it was— if you stamped it, wanted to emboss... letters or something into it, but it feels like both of their names are pretty much the same including surnames if we're going with the Shakespeare so it kind of feels like that's— It's not really to do with that. Like, you know, sometimes it's pay by number, of number of letters or number of things done, so not that.
Tom:
You've​ correctly identified that these are personalised. It's something to do with their name, yes.
Rowan:
Oh. Interesting.
Dan:
Hmm. We're thinking Romeo and Juliet as a pair. What if it is just two entirely different people? It's just a Romeo and a Juliet. So entirely different, not connected people. 'Cause then you could have a... what was it, $5 and $25.
Tom:
Mhm.
Rowan:
Whic​h is five times as many, yeah.
Alec:
Is there some obscure tax scheme somewhere that some letters are more expensive than other letters?
Dan:
It's like Scrabble. Oh, what, you want a Z? That'll be 10.
Tom:
Uhm, keep thinking that way, Dan. 'Cause you'd think that Zara's cufflinks would be expensive but that's not the case.
Dan:
They'r​e— (laughs) Have I accidentally hit it? I think I might have done.
Tom:
Well, you've hit something, yes. The cufflinks are made from genuine Scrabble tiles.
Dan:
Yeah.
Tom:
You've​ absolutely hit that.
Dan:
Yeah.
Tom:
But why is Romeo cheap and Juliet expensive? And I'll say this, Rowan. Ben and John, same thing. Ben would be $5, John would be $25.
Dan:
Oh? It's not the total of their value in Scrabble.
Tom:
It's not.
Dan:
It's not that. But I will say I want me some of these cufflinks.
Tom:
Yep.
Rowan:
Mm.
Tom:
They'r​e monogrammed so it's just that first initial.
Dan:
Oh?
Rowan:
Oh, J and R.
Alec:
So is it just proportional to the number of tiles in a set of Scrabble?
Dan:
(chuckles) 'Cause, yeah, it's like rarity, isn't it? Or you—if you want a common letter, then... I'll sell that to you really cheaply, but an uncommon letter, you will pay for that, my friend.
Tom:
That is half of it. But Zara's cufflinks would not be expensive.
Alec:
Huh.
Tom:
There is one other connection here that you need to make. You're right, it is about Scrabble tiles as cufflinks. It is about the rarity of the tiles in part. But there's one other thing.
Alec:
Okay,​ so would they want the letter to be unobscured by whatever hardware has to be attached to the tile?
Tom:
No, it really is about the names and the letters.
Alec:
Okay.
Rowan:
Hmm.
Alec:
This is just discrimination.
SFX:
(group laughing)
Tom:
Discri​mination by first letter of name, it turns out, not a protected class.
Dan:
Hmm. You can... if you were cheeky... you could make a Z from an N, could you? Is that rotated n degrees, or is that flipped the wrong way around?
Tom:
No, the number would be in the wrong place for that.
Dan:
Good point. And also I think it is flipped the wrong way around.
Tom:
It's not just to do with the rarity of the Scrabble letters.
Rowan:
Depe​nding on the country you're in, if you've got a J in a country that has a lot of, like, Juans or something like that.
Tom:
Or just Johns.
Rowan:
It would kind of already be there. Or, yeah.
Tom:
Johns,​ Juliets, Jameses.
Alec:
So is this person charging for, like, every time they have to buy a new Scrabble set?
Tom:
Basica​lly, yes.
Alec:
Okay.
Tom:
J is the most difficult letter to do that for, because it begins a lot of common forenames but there is only one J in a Scrabble set.
Dan:
Ahh.
Rowan:
Ahh.
Dan:
It's the frequency of the names as well as the tiles.
Tom:
Yep.
Alec:
Okay.
Tom:
There are six Rs in a Scrabble set. So Romeo, easy, cheap. Q, X, and Z, yes, there's only one in a Scrabble set, but there aren't that many people whose names start with that letter.
J is particularly difficult, because there are a lot of names that start with it, and only one in a set.
This is actually a personal anecdote from Zach who sent this question in. He said, "I bought some Scrabble tile cufflinks from an Etsy seller once. It was $5 for any tile but $25 for a J."
Dan:
(laughs)
Rowan:
That​'s so funny.
Tom:
Rowan,​ it is over to you for the next question.
Rowan:
This​ question has been sent in by Duda.
One November in Brazil, a young woman walks into a room with 30 strangers. Instantly, she knows all their names. Why?
I'll read it again.
One November in Brazil, a young woman walks into a room with 30 strangers. Instantly, she knows all their names. Why?
Alec:
They'​re wearing name tags.
SFX:
(Tom and Dan laugh)
Dan:
Correc​t answer. Move on.
Rowan:
Yeah​, there we go. Next one. No, they're not.
Dan:
The details. This is all about the details. November, Brazil, room! It's all about the de—
SFX:
(Tom and Dan laugh)
Tom:
I love these short questions where it's just like, "Yeah, good luck. There's not much to hang on here." My first thought was 30 days has November. And this is November, and there are 30 people. So maybe this is some kind of weird local tradition for calendar days. They're all lined up or something like that.
Rowan:
No, but I'm obsessed with that. I wish. That would have been so smart. No. Sadly not.
Tom:
Some equivalent of the advent calendar that we have, where there's like, just for every day in November. Where there's an actual person.
Alec:
So you said strangers, right?
Rowan:
Yes.
Alec:
This can't be, like, "November is about how long it takes in the school year for a teacher to memorize all their students' names," 'cause they're not strangers.
Tom:
Right.
Rowan:
Exac​tly.
Alec:
Okay.
Tom:
That got a lot easier for me in university when Facebook came along. Facebook came along... a couple of years into my university life, and suddenly I was memorising names so much faster than I used to 'cause every time I went on there, little photo, little picture.
Should have just made note cards or something, but, you know.
Actually, that's literally what The Facebook was originally meant to be, wasn't it? That's literally why US universities used to make Facebooks.
Sorry, I've just realised that maybe 15 years too late. Carry on while I just deal with that!
Dan:
Did you say Brazil or—
Rowan:
Yes.
Dan:
Never been. Want to go. Want to go right now to escape this question.
SFX:
(Tom and Rowan laugh)
Rowan:
So interestingly, Alec... You weirdly stumbled not on what you were saying was the correct answer, but kind of the setting of it. Because I can tell you that all of these strangers are in their final year of high school.
Dan:
Oh?
Rowan:
They​ are all students.
Alec:
Hmm.
Dan:
I don't know when the school year runs in Brazil. I'm going to stab at November is towards the end of it and maybe that they're taking exams and she knows their names because maybe they've gotta sit in a particular arrangement or something based on their names so that they can take an exam?
Rowan:
Yes,​ keep going. That is—
Tom:
Oh, wow.
Rowan:
You'​re halfway through the answer to this question, Dan.
Dan:
And they're all called Cliff. Is that the other half? They all have the same name? Cliff? Roger? Romeo? Juliet? They're all Juliet.
Alec:
Is this just a standardized test where they're being given a packet based on where they sit, and so— or something like that?
Tom:
Or people are invited to the test based on their name alphabetically, and this is just a really common name, and we're at that day where there are 30 Cliffs— I don't know why we're stuck on Cliff, but I like it.
Dan:
(guffaws)
Tom:
This is just a room full of Cliffs, 'cause there's just 200 Cliffs to get through and today we're invigilating Cliffs.
Rowan:
Some​how together, all of you have gotten to the right answer.
SFX:
(guessers laugh heartily)
Rowan:
In your own little bits. So, yeah, these are students taking a test, who have all been sorted by forename. In Brazil in particular, in November they take a standardised test when they're applying to college and test applicants are assigned to classrooms based on their names.
So if your name is common, then you might end up in a classroom filled with people with the exact same name as you, and this was— the person who submitted this actually— this is another personal anecdote, said, "In my case, I was in a school where two classrooms were filled with girls named Maria Edwarda. For many other common names – Anna, Maria, Pedro, for example – this happens as well."
Dan:
That's​ great.
Tom:
I'm not sure how to feel about suddenly being assigned to a room full of Toms.
Dan:
(giggles) And also if you needed to attract the attention of one in particular, what were their names, again?
Tom:
Cliff.
Rowan:
Uh, yeah.
SFX:
(guessers laughing)
Rowan:
Anna​, Maria, Pedro, Cliff. All of the classics.
Dan:
"Anna?​" And then everybody looks up, like, "No, no, no. Anna." And then everyone else but one just puts their head down.
Rowan:
Well​, I will—I just went on a little creative retreat. And for the first time really ever I was in a space with someone else called Rowan, and that is a real— I realise, Tom, and probably Dan as well, what your life is like, and I hate it because I was constantly looking up and they were not— simply not talking to me. It's really weird. I've literally never had that happen before.
Alec:
I get to experience both because my name is so close to Alex, I have to just answer to it.
Tom:
Yeah.
Alec:
But that's not my name. So I'm in a weird middle ground there.
Dan:
I get around this by just ignoring the people around me.
SFX:
(group laughing)
Rowan:
Good​ life hack.
Tom:
Thank you to Arys for this question.
On the island of Crete, a museum has a display that is labelled 'Hermes', 'Aphrodite', 'Gaia', and 'Ares'. Name one of the other labels you'd see on that exhibit, and explain why.
I'll say that again.
On the island of Crete, a museum has a display that is labelled 'Hermes', 'Aphrodite', 'Gaia', and 'Ares'. Name one of the other labels you'd see on that exhibit, and explain why.
Rowan:
Well​, I assume it can't be the obvious.
SFX:
(both snickering)
Tom:
What's​ the obvious, Rowan.
Rowan:
It's​—They're Greek gods, right? They're, like, Aphrodite of love—or Roman. I can't remember which one. They're... And Hermes is the messenger god, I wanna say. And Gaia's the goddess of the Earth, and I can't remember the other one you said.
Tom:
Ares.
Rowan:
Ares​ of war. They're Roman, though. I've just realised.
Tom:
Yes, and Dan is nodding, so I suspect he has indeed worked this one out correctly.
Dan:
Yeah, I think I've got this one, so I'll hang back.
Tom:
Rowan,​ you are right. These are Greek gods, and you have identified all those four correctly.
Rowan:
So I'm wondering if there's some connection between the— what they are they gods of. Like, there's a saying or something, or there's song lyrics, or something going on with what they are the gods of, that connect them in some way potentially.
Tom:
Yes. I'm gonna keep my mouth shut, 'cause you're doing very well here.
Alec:
I don't really want to throw this out there, because it's either... Well, I'll... Would Neptune be correct?
Tom:
Neptun​e would not be correct, because Neptune is a Roman god.
Alec:
Ah, okay.
Rowan:
So, Poseidon. Are they emojis or something? Is it, like... a heart for Aphrodite, or an— or apps that have— that use the symbols in their logos? Or companies with logos or something?
Tom:
The good news is, Rowan, you take the first part of the question here. Poseidon is one of the other possible answers, but I think that Alec has now also worked out why.
Alec:
Becau​se of the planets.
Tom:
'Cause​ of the planets. Yes. What is going on here?
Alec:
(blow​s air) Is this just what different language— 'cause not every spoken language necessarily uses the same names for the planets. Is that all that it is? So this is a planetarium?
Tom:
It is a planetarium. This is Planet Crete, in Crete, Greece. Dan, I think you've made the last connection here.
Dan:
So I think these are the Greek gods associated with those planets. Gaia is certainly Earth.
Tom:
Yes.
Dan:
And that doesn't really have a Roman equivalent, I don't think.
Tom:
Right.​ Yep. Earth is not named after a god.
Dan:
So that was the in for me.
Tom:
So, Rowan, run us through the gods. Hermes is...
Rowan:
The messenger god, I wanna say?
Tom:
Which translates to?
Rowan:
Merc​ury?
Tom:
Yep. Aphrodite?
Rowan:
Is love, which would be Venus, yeah. And then Mars is the god of war.
Tom:
Is Ares, the god of war. Yes. And you correctly got Poseidon which would be Neptune. Does anyone want to take a guess at Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus?
Rowan:
Jupi​ter is...
Alec:
Zeus?
Tom:
Zeus is right. Yes.
Rowan:
Yeah​.
Alec:
Ah, okay!
Tom:
And Poseidon is Neptune. The other two are much more obscure. Saturn would be Chronos, and Uranus would be Ouranos.
Rowan:
Make​s sense.
Tom:
These are the Greek gods for the planets because this is a planetarium in Greece.
Dan:
Of course. I hadn't made that final connection, that it was in Crete.
Tom:
Yes. (laughs)
Dan:
When you say that—!
Alec:
I should have said there's a south suburb of Chicago called Crete. And I was like, "Is it there?"
Tom:
(laughs)
Rowan:
That​'s why I was confused 'cause I was like, "Crete, okay, that's Greece." So then I was like, "Wait, is the—" Then I thought— 'cause what I— I started to gaslight myself that these were the Roman names, 'cause suddenly, I was like, "Oh, is this the thing that's significant, that they're Roman but in Crete?"
And it was like, "No, no, it's actually the exact opposite way around, Rowan."
Tom:
Alec, it is your question. Take it away.
Alec:
This question has been sent in by Andres DK.
One night, thieves broke into the office of Belgocontrol in Brussels. They stole a heavy, secure safe full of legally protected documents. When employees noticed the vault had been pinched, they were happy. Why did they have this reaction, and why weren't they found negligent?
One more time.
One night, thieves broke into the office of Belgocontrol in Brussels. They stole a heavy, secure safe full of legally protected documents. When employees noticed the vault had been pinched, they were happy. Why did they have this reaction, and why weren't they found negligent?
Rowan:
Is this company, like, a security company and this was an experiment using their competitor's security system or something?
Tom:
(laughs)
Rowan:
And the idea was like, "Yeah, we're gonna just put this safe here and we're gonna set it up and see if people are willing to try and steal from someone who uses our competitors and whether those systems are good enough," and so when it got stolen, they were like, "That's exactly what we wanted! We wanted someone to steal it!"
Tom:
I am pretty sure that Belgocontrol – or 'bell-jor control' – is the Belgian air traffic control systems. I think. And I'm— I don't know that. I just feel like that's the correct vibes for that name.
Dan:
For me the names feels like a transport company. It definitely feels in the world of transport. Dunno why.
Alec:
I'm not sure the specific thing this company or organization does is that important to the question.
Tom:
Alrigh​t.
Rowan:
Hmm.
Dan:
But the safe contained legally-protected documents. So that's got to be important as well. What was in the safe?
Rowan:
I guess it's like if it's in a safe, we're assuming that this is stuff that was— The logic of the question is, right, it's in a safe, and... the things we know about things that are in safes is that they are precious and we wanna keep them safe. Hence the name.
Tom:
Hence the name.
Rowan:
And someone's stolen them, but these people are both happy about it and they aren't found negligent, which is the weird stuff because normally it might be like, "They were devastated and it was a bad thing," but then it was fine 'cause they weren't found negligent 'cause of some other bit. I feel like every aspect of this question is tearing me in different directions.
Tom:
I thought it might be a listed building where they can't change it, they can't do anything to it, but it's a massive responsibility for them, and suddenly someone has stolen it.
"Oh, it's not our problem anymore. We no longer have to deal with this thing, and we—it's not our fault. We can't get done for it."
"Can't get done for it." Sorry. Am I a school child from the '90s?
SFX:
(guests giggling)
Alec:
Theyâ​€”That's along the right lines, as far as why... As far as the reaction.
Dan:
Mhm.
Rowan:
Mm.
Alec:
But you're not quite there as to... why specifically they were relieved.
Rowan:
Oh, is it, like, the documents are to do with... employee discipline or something like that? The records, they were written records of stuff that the employees were like, "And I don't want anyone to find out about this. Get rid of 'em."
Dan:
The people who are going to be fired next week are—
Tom:
(laughs)
Dan:
Oh, no one! No one now. It's all gone.
Tom:
Why did you say that in the manner of a reality TV elimination?
SFX:
(group laughing)
Tom:
In no particular order!
Dan:
Making​ their way through and staying employed with the company next week are... Should do that on every Friday evening, shouldn't they? Just as you go home for the weekend.
Tom:
Three employees are up for elimination tonight.
SFX:
(Dan and Rowan laugh)
Alec:
So, there really wasn't an intrinsic value to these paper documents.
Tom:
Huh.
Dan:
Old historical records, then?
Tom:
Oh, no, you'd be sad if you lost those, though, because that's, like— that's history.
Alec:
I'm gonna ask you to think, why wouldn't they have moved these documents somewhere else?
Dan:
Maybe they're difficult to move.
Rowan:
(gasps loudly)
Dan:
Maybe there's a lot of them or something.
Rowan:
The gasping wasn't helpful. I always seem to gasp when—
SFX:
(guys laughing)
Rowan:
Is it that they... No, this is so stupid. But that sometimes is how you get the correct answer on Lateral.
Tom:
It often is. It often is.
Rowan:
Is it that they... This safe is—They can't open the safe for some reason. And the thieves are able— They have the tools or the capabilities in their stealing of it or in their going into it to open that safe, so there is either something else in there that they can now get access to or because the actual documents aren't useful to anyone but the company, they can get them back in some way. Like, there's—
Tom:
Hear me out. Hear me out. How many Fast & Furious movies have you seen?
SFX:
(guests laughing)
Tom:
Becaus​e there is at least one where there is a bank heist caused by just getting a very powerful car and pulling a safe out of a bank. Just pull the entire thing out. Did they just move the whole thing and that suddenly gained them access to something?
Dan:
Ooh.
Alec:
You'r​e really, really close. I think you're gonna be infuriated by this question.
SFX:
(group laughing)
Dan:
Always​, always.
Tom:
We already are.
Alec:
Rowan​, you said they couldn't get to the things in the safe.
Rowan:
Mm.
Alec:
So pull on that a little more. They're responsible for these documents, but they can't get to them. And everybody knows they can't get to them.
Dan:
That does make the documents extremely safe.
Tom:
It does.
Alec:
Yeah.​ In a way they were kept safe from everyone.
Dan:
But someone will probably want them. As in someone legitimately wants them but now can't access them.
Tom:
Maybe they don't. Maybe the thieves just saw, "Oh, massive safe. That must have the valuables inside."
Rowan:
Mm.
Alec:
Thatâ​€”I think you're basically there, but...
Tom:
The thieves think there's valuables inside the safe. There is not. There's just a lot of paperwork... that... Wait, you said no one had access to it.
Alec:
Corre​ct. But they were legally responsible for protecting it.
Rowan:
So did they not know that what they were protecting was nonsense and they were— and it was, like, the actual valuables were somewhere else?
So that there was a sense of, like, they weren't seen as negligent because it didn't matter that this... that this had happened? Because actually the valuables were in the toilet system this entire time?
Tom:
(chuckles)
Dan:
Have they lost the combination to the safe? Is that what's gone on here?
They've got a safe, they've been protecting documents, but now they've lost the combination for whatever reason. So that's the problem. And then someone nicks the stuff and then—
Tom:
And so they don't care anymore. They don't have to deal with opening the safe because the safe has vanished.
Alec:
Corre​ct.
The thing about this question is that... what's in the safe isn't actually important, but it was filled with... Well, it both is and isn't important.
The safe was filled with archive documents that were potentially so important that legally they could not be thrown away. However, nobody could remember how to open this vault. So the documents weren't able to be moved somewhere else and as such the safe sat in the office as a large, useless metal box.
And so when thieves stole it thinking it has valuables in there, the employees reported it stolen and were no longer responsible for them.
Rowan:
Amaz​ing.
Tom:
Which means there is just the question I asked at the start of the show.
Which sportsman has a son called Thunder and a daughter called Olympia Lightning?
Before I give the answer to the audience, anyone wanna call it?
Dan:
If there's thunder and lightning, is it going to be bolts? Is it Usain Bolt?
Tom:
It is indeed Usain Bolt. He named his kids Thunder and Olympia Lightning. Thunder also has a twin called Saint Leo,
Dan:
but that's just after Usain's middle name.
Rowan:
Icon​ic.
Tom:
Congra​tulations to all three of you for running the gauntlet one more time.
Let's find out, what's going on in your lives? Where can people find you?
We will start with Alec.
Alec:
Well,​ what's going on right now is I'm fussing with a pinball machine because it's not working correctly. But as far as, you know, internet stuff, making videos on YouTube. Channel's called Technology Connections, and I'm also hanging out on Bluesky these days. You can check me out there.
Tom:
Rowan.
Rowan:
I mean, what I'm literally doing is working on a video essay about the insanity that is the 2000s makeover shows like Marry—- Snog Marry Avoid? and The Biggest Loser, and one from Canada called Bulging Brides which is truly dystopian. And that will probably be out by the time this episode goes up, so you can check that out. Other than that, yeah, just doing more research into various bits of history and life and culture and things like that, for YouTube.
Tom:
And Dan.
Dan:
You can find me online. Search for @quizzydan. You'll find me everywhere.
Tom:
And if you wanna know more about this show, you can do that at lateralcast.com where you can also send in your own ideas for questions. We are @lateralcast basically everywhere, and there are regular video highlights at youtube.com/lateralc​ast. Thank you very much to Dan Peake.
Dan:
Thank you very much.
Tom:
Rowan Ellis.
Rowan:
Than​ks!
Tom:
Alec Watson.
Alec:
Bye.
Tom:
I've been Tom Scott, and that's been Lateral.
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