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Episode 86: Tricycles that lean
Published 31st May, 2024
Ruth Amos & Shawn Brown ('Kids Invent Stuff') and Daniel Peake face questions about corporeal cells, tricksy tricycles and fantastic frying pans.
HOST: Tom Scott. QUESTION PRODUCER: David Bodycombe. RECORDED AT: The Podcast Studios, Dublin. EDITED BY: Julie Hassett. MUSIC: Karl-Ola Kjellholm ('Private Detective'/'Agrumes'), Laura Platt ('Initialise') courtesy of epidemicsound.com. ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS: Katherine Q., Alby, Rhett Buzon. FORMAT: Pad 26 Limited/Labyrinth Games Ltd. EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: David Bodycombe and Tom Scott.
Transcript
Transcription by Caption+
Tom:
Only 44% of the cells in your body are yours. How?
The answer to that at the end of the show. My name's Tom Scott, and this is Lateral.
SFX:
♫ (trailer music)
Tom:
(gruff voice) In a world where conformity reigns supreme, where minds are trapped in the ironclad shackles of conventional thinking, there's a clandestine movement, a rebellion against the status quo, a sanctuary for those who dare to think different.
Jason Statham. Charlize Theron. And Dwayne Johnson.
SFX:
(music stops)
Tom:
...are not here today.
But firstly, we do have: puzzle editor from The Telegraph, Dan Peake.
Daniel:
(meekly) Hello!
SFX:
(group laughing)
Tom:
Look...
Daniel:
Excellent work.
Tom:
The script just said: "in the voice of Redd Pepper, movie voiceover guy".
I do not have that voice, or that accent, or that anything!
Daniel:
You tried. This is the important thing. You tried.
Tom:
(laughs) I feel like that was the audio equivalent of just a pat on the head there. Thank you very much.
Daniel:
(giggles)
Tom:
How are you doing, Dan?
Daniel:
I'm very well, thank you. Thank you very much.
Tom:
Thank you very much for returning to the show.
You are making puzzles and clues for questions and things like that as part of your job.
Where do you go to find inspiration? And I'm asking that to you for a couple of reasons.
One, because it's an interesting question for a question editor.
And two, because frankly our question editors would also like to find some places to find questions.
Daniel:
(laughs)
I tell you, the best place to get inspiration for questions is literally the real world. I write a quiz for The Telegraph and also work on Only Connect.
So I have a big range of questions, some very straight, some very lateral. And literally I'll just be watching a show. Or maybe even the news. The news is really good for inspiring stuff.
But it's just, oh, I'll be walking down the street, or I'll be on holiday, and I'll sit down. This is a true story. I'll sit down next to the Metro stop in Valencia in Spain, and I'll go, "Huh, this is what the days of the week look like in Spanish. Instead of M-W— M-T-W-T, you know, this is what they look like in Spanish. I bet I could write a question about days of the week in other languages."
And from that, I wrote a question, then it got onto Only Connect, and it just... literally, the inspiration can strike anywhere.
So that's, the worst thing about being a puzzle editor is that you are always on. You can't turn it off.
When you write questions, you're going, "Oh, that's a really good idea. I need to write that down." All the time.
Tom:
That is the most wonderful way of telling our question writers to go outside. Brilliant. Thank you, Dan.
Also joining us today and returning to the show, we have the folks from Kids Invent Stuff.
I'm going to start with Shawn Brown and actually ask the same kind of question. Because you're getting your inspiration from a much more direct source.
Shawn:
Yeah, so... our gig is we build invention ideas that get sent to us from 4–11 year olds, and our challenge is to bring to life one of those inventions every single month. So yeah, our inspiration comes from the mind of 4–11 year olds.
And our puzzles to solve, I suppose, are like, how do you create some mad idea that no one's ever made before, and keep it true to the— and sort of faithful to the original idea that was put down on paper? So that's our puzzles.
Tom:
And Ruth Amos, the other half of Kids Invent Stuff, welcome back to the show.
We are recording this a little bit in advance, so I've got to ask what you're working on right now.
What's the project that's going to come out in the next couple of months that is going to make some kid's dream come true?
Ruth:
Well, the interesting thing is that actually we don't know.
So we have this thing where we set challenges, and we get sent in invention ideas, and we choose to build them. So currently, we are asking for invention ideas, and we're going to build one, and we're going to display it in the Eden Project. But I can't tell you what that is. And by the time this comes out, it will have been in the Eden Project. So past me can say what it is then.
But, yeah, so, so, you can't even write a risk assessment for something you've not built yet. I mean, yeah.
Tom:
(laughs heartily)
Oh, there's someone who's had to work with a lot of corporate places. That's the priority up there.
Ruth:
Well, this is usually, the joy of YouTube is we usually get to do all this ourselves. But when you're like, you've committed to something going on show, suddenly there are a few other boxes that maybe need ticking.
Tom:
Well, good luck to all three players today.
The trailers have finished. Grab your popcorn. Ensure your mobile phone is set to silent. Sit back and relax as I introduce you to our first blockbuster question:
George Pabst directed the 1933 film Don Quixote. In fact, he filmed three versions, each one with the same lead actor. Although there were some cast changes, this wasn't the main reason for this arrangement. What was the idea?
One more time.
George Pabst directed the 1933 film Don Quixote. In fact, he filmed three versions, each one with the same lead actor. Although there were some cast changes, this wasn't the main reason for this arrangement. What was the idea?
Ruth:
Was the film about donkeys?
SFX:
(Tom and Daniel laugh)
Tom:
And this is Don Quixote, and not—
Ruth:
Oh yeah, sorry. It sounded like 'donkey'.
SFX:
(others laughing)
Ruth:
Don-kee-ho-tee, I was like, "Wow, Don Quixote, what's that?"
Daniel:
I'd watch that.
Ruth:
Yeah, I was like, maybe it's a different donkey in each version. We should do that.
Tom:
I'm sure there has been a cartoon version of the Don Quixote story starring a donkey. Someone will have done that at some point.
Shawn:
You didn't clarify that that lead actor wasn't a donkey. So, you know, it's a good job Ruth asked the question.
Tom:
(laughs uproariously)
Daniel:
We've been burned before.
Tom:
We have. Everyone on the show learns to check whether we're actually talking about humans very early on. This is humans. I'll give you that one for free.
Daniel:
Ah, thank you.
Shawn:
Were they in three different languages?
Tom:
Yes.
Daniel:
Ooh.
Tom:
You have, in fact, just bulldozed your way directly to the end of the question, having cut a scythe through the entire maze of distractions we had there.
Shawn:
All we needed to know was it wasn't donkeys. That was all we needed to know.
SFX:
(group laughing)
Ruth:
If you'd not confirmed there were no donkeys, we'd have been sorted on the donkeys for a while. We could have had this go— We could have pulled this out for a long time.
Tom:
Yes. Yes, it was. This was filmed in English, French, and German, with the same lead actor, who could speak all three languages.
Ruth:
I mean, that's just showing off.
Tom:
This has happened in English and Welsh as well.
There was a series called Hinterland, which was filmed in both English and Welsh. They just did every scene twice.
Given we've got time, I'm gonna add a question here and ask:
What are some of the problems with that approach, particularly when you're working on television?
Ruth:
I mean, you get bored?
SFX:
(Tom and Daniel laugh)
Tom:
I mean, generally, working in television, there's a lot of hurry up and wait, but creatively.
Ruth:
But I mean, the amount of times you have to do a scene anyway, surely doubling that amount of times... I don't know, if there's some sort of prop that's needed or some sort of, I don't know.
Daniel:
Oh, yes.
Ruth:
Effect?
Daniel:
Yeah, if you have to destroy something, like tear up an envelope, you need a prop— second prop envelope. It's things like that. And also, because they take time, any external scenes or anything like that, the weather can change in between the one version and another. It's a logistical nightmare.
Ruth:
Has anyone ever taken all three and edited together the best version of each of the scenes? Because I feel like there probably is...
SFX:
(Tom and Daniel laugh)
Ruth:
Do you know what I mean? There's a director's cut where you take the best version of each of those.
Tom:
I mean people do compile those for YouTube, like all the Disney songs that are translated into 20 or 30 different languages. There are multi-language versions of all those songs faded between.
But specifically for Hinterland, there was something for television that makes filming two versions a problem.
Daniel:
Oh, is it going to be... release... squidgy bits, 4:3, 16:9?
Tom:
(laughs)
Daniel:
What's the—
Tom:
That's not going to change between languages.
Daniel:
Oh.
Ruth:
Is it the length of the words? Is it because some Welsh words are longer or shorter, and then you've got an hour's show, but actually in Welsh, it's 25 minutes or something?
Tom:
Yeah, they said that Welsh was a much more poetic language.
So yes, they can just translate it word for word, but then it will feel like an English show done in Welsh. There were some phrases in English that they said got replaced with just a look or a single word or something like that.
So they had to time the length to fit the broadcast slot for both English and Welsh.
Daniel:
So was the Welsh version actually much shorter?
Tom:
I think, if I remember the interview right, they said it could have been.
And in the end, obviously, television producers know how to stretch and squish any show to make it fit. But they did have the translation problem that, because Welsh has a very different feel to English, there was a lot that had to be different that wasn't just the words.
Shawn:
Welsh has this really interesting thing where they have... There's a few languages that have it, but they have these mutations where the first letter of a word will change based on what came before it. And that makes it flow really well. That's why it kind of sounds really lyrical and poetic when people speak it. Because yeah, it's unlike English, where yeah, tongue twisters in Welsh would be much easier than tongue twisters in English. Because English is kind of inherently, like, things butt up against each other in awkward ways, which they don't so much in Welsh.
Tom:
So, yes, you're absolutely right, very early.
Don Quixote was filmed three different times, because it was in three different languages.
We will go straight on to our guest questions then. Dan, kick us off.
Daniel:
Okie doke.
This question has been sent in by Alby. So thank you very much.
In April 1986, 4,000 members of the American Physical Society held their annual meeting. The event went to plan, with no major issues from members or organisers. Yet, both the hotel and the city asked them not to return. Why?
In April 1986, 4,000 members of the American Physical Society held their annual meeting. The event went to plan. There were no major issues from the members or organisers. Yet, both the hotel and the city politely asked them not to return. Why?
Tom:
I saw this in a book somewhere. I'm gonna sit out of this one. Kids Invent Stuff, this one's on you.
Shawn:
Ruth, the Physical Society. Do you think we're talking physics or PE?
Ruth:
Ooh, I went down the physics route, but you're right, it could be. It could be 4,000 PE teachers descending. I mean, I would ask them to leave too.
SFX:
(both laughing)
Shawn:
Lab coats or biceps, yeah.
Daniel:
The whistles that you'd have. It'd be horrible.
Shawn:
Stopwatches.
Daniel:
(wheezes) We are dealing with physicists.
Ruth:
Okay. I mean, I would definitely not want 4,000 physicists either. So, you know.
Tom:
(laughs)
Shawn:
Were they just endlessly discussing... different bomb designs?
'Cause you know, were they kind of like, was it kind of, they're just constantly talking about the physics of the atomic bomb, or was it just, they're just not very fun to be around because of their chosen topics of conversation?
Ruth:
They all ended up on a watch list after this event.
SFX:
(guys laughing)
Daniel:
I have no idea what they were talking about.
Shawn:
Probably physics.
Daniel:
Well, probably. But let's not rule everything out. But what they were talking about is not relevant.
Ruth:
Did they make a giant Rube Goldberg machine? Did they set one up in the hotel, through the streets? Because, believe me. You would not want to be invited anywhere else again if that's what you did.
Daniel:
It would've been fantastic though, wouldn't it?
Tom:
Has anyone ever done a Rube Goldberg machine on that scale with the cooperation of the city? You'd have to build a giant one.
Ruth:
We once built part of a Rube Goldberg machine outside the BBC studios.
You know, if you've ever been to the bit in London, that's the weird horseshoe bit. The bit you walk through is like a wind tunnel outside of the window for the one show.
Tom:
Yes it is.
Ruth:
And we once built a section of Rube Goldberg machine. Bearing in mind, the full Rube Goldberg machine took a week to build. We built it from half-10 in the morning, and we had to have it ready by seven when it went live. (laughs)
So yeah, I wouldn't recommend, but it, you know.
Tom:
Did it work?
Ruth:
Well, it failed at every rehearsal. And the only time it worked was live.
SFX:
(Tom and Daniel groan)
Ruth:
And if you watch the show back, you see Shawn and I just looking absolutely shocked at each other. Just like, they were asking us questions afterwards. And me and Shawn are just like, "That works? That's crazy!"
SFX:
(group laughing)
Daniel:
No, they didn't build a Rube Goldberg machine. No, no.
Tom:
But that's the kind of thing that, you know, city conventions would frown on, presumably.
Daniel:
They would frown.
Shawn:
So, no one did anything untoward. Nothing went dramatically wrong, but they were told not to come back. Was it just simply that there were too many of them? 4,000 was just too big a number?
Daniel:
No, no. The hotels were very much able to cope with it. And it's not like they stiffed the hotel. They paid the hotel in full.
Ruth:
Did they have very raucous drinking parties? A lot of the physicists that I know... you know, wild.
Tom:
You know a different batch of physicists than I do.
Daniel:
(wheezes)
Tom:
You know a very different batch of physicists than I do right now. But you may know the ones I know from university.
Daniel:
So, where they were is useful to this question.
Ruth:
Just remind me where?
Daniel:
Oh, I didn't tell you, did I?
SFX:
(Tom and Ruth chuckle)
Ruth:
Oh, okay.
Daniel:
Right, let's play higher or lower.
Ruth:
Oh! Sorry, was it 1939?
Daniel:
1986.
Ruth:
Oh, rubbish. I was like—
Tom:
Why are you thinking they were in 1939?
Ruth:
I was just trying to work out if it was a war that had stopped them from going back or something. I was trying to think of history, which is not my strong point.
What was the year again? I forgot. What did you say?
Daniel:
1986.
Shawn:
'86.
Daniel:
So go on, name some places, and I'll get you closer and further away.
Tom:
Convention cities in particular, I'm guessing.
Ruth:
Birmingham, NEC.
Daniel:
Nope, not the UK. Because it was the American Physical Society.
Ruth:
Atlanta, Georgia.
Daniel:
Ehh, west.
Tom:
Oh, oh, we're playing hot and cold across the entire USA, amazing.
Shawn:
(giggles)
Ruth:
San Francisco.
Daniel:
Ooh, east.
Tom:
There are specific cities known for hosting conventions.
Daniel:
This city does a lot of conventions.
Shawn:
Vegas.
Daniel:
(snaps fingers) Hello, correct.
Ruth:
They weren't exciting enough.
Daniel:
What do you mean by that, Ruth?
Ruth:
I mean that as Vegas goes, maybe... 4,000 physicists was not on brand.
Daniel:
Well, I mean, you are getting there, amazingly. You say that. Keep thinking.
Shawn:
They didn't gamble.
Daniel:
Hello, yes.
Ruth:
I was going to go with strippers, but gambling is much more PC.
SFX:
(group laughing)
Ruth:
But yeah, cool.
Daniel:
So if they didn't gamble, why is that a bad thing?
Shawn:
They stayed in a casino hotel, and they were all physicists, and they were like, "Well, the odds are rubbish. So we're not going to waste all our money."
And that— they didn't turn— They probably had a discounted hotel rate. And they were like, "Oh, this is not worth our while."
Daniel:
Exactly.
And the way that the casinos made their money is not through the hotel rooms. It is from the gamblers. So if you've got a conference of people who aren't gambling...
Mm, they didn't like it.
Ruth:
They should've built them a Rube Goldberg machine. They'd have been much happier then.
Tom:
(chuckles) And then gambled on whether it was going to work or not.
Shawn:
(laughs)
Daniel:
So yes, several thousand physicists, scientific researchers, and students arrived at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas to be specific. And the physicists knew that the best way to avoid losing money in the casino was to not gamble.
And this caused a massive drop in takings for the MGM Grand, and the Society claims that they were asked not to return the following year.
And a newspaper headline afterwards read, 'Physicists in Town, Lowest Casino Take Ever'.
Shawn:
(snickers) That's amazing.
Tom:
Good luck with this one, folks!
In 2013, Chris was flying high over a city at night, with the road layout clearly visible. There was no doubt about which European capital it was, thanks to a noticeable difference. Which city, and what difference?
I'll say that again.
In 2013, Chris was flying high over a city at night, with the road layout clearly visible. There was no doubt about which European capital it was, thanks to a noticeable difference. Which city, and what difference?
Daniel:
I think I know. Over to you two again.
Tom:
Ohh!
Daniel:
(wheezes)
Tom:
Keep being dropped in it, Kids Invent Stuff.
Daniel:
(giggles profusely)
Tom:
Ruth, Shawn, good luck.
Shawn:
When you first read it, I didn't hear the 'capital' part. And my brain went, Milton Keynes. Because it's...
SFX:
(group laughs uproariously)
Shawn:
I was like, grid system, it's pretty obvious. It's going to stand out in the UK, but...
Tom:
If it was 'city' and not 'capital', that's actually a decent answer. There aren't many cities in Europe on a grid system, let alone one the size of Milton Keynes.
Ruth:
Is it something like, all roads lead to Rome or something? I haven't seen Rome from the air. Does that still exist? Is there like...
Tom:
I think most cities pretty much have that kind of layout of hub-and-spoke, and you know, it wasn't something like that.
Shawn:
It's not the Vatican.
Tom:
It's not the Vatican. That is true. (chuckles) You don't need any specific geography knowledge for this. There is a trivia fact, which I was hoping Dan was gonna bring in at some point, which would be useful. But unfortunately, he's got this one.
Ruth:
So it's a European city.
Shawn:
Capital city.
Tom:
Yep.
Ruth:
And there's something about it... from the air.
Tom:
You can look at this and immediately know which city it is.
Ruth:
Do the roads form a picture? Do they write— Have they written 'Reykjavík' in roads?
Tom:
(chuckles)
Daniel:
(giggles childishly)
Tom:
Oh, I wish there was a city that did that!
Shawn:
Is it like the lighting equivalent of Max Fosh and his Luton sign? The big sign that said "Welcome to Luton" that wasn't actually at Luton?
Ruth:
Oh, is it the colour of the lights?
Tom:
It is the colour of the lights. Yes.
Ruth:
Can you tell, I mean... Like Amsterdam? Can you tell the red lights from Amsterdam from the air?
SFX:
(group laughs uproariously)
Tom:
We've had both strippers and red light district from you here in this episode, Ruth.
Ruth:
We do really well.
Tom:
That is not exactly it, but you're right to zone in on the lighting. There's a difference that's noticeable there.
Daniel:
This is actually sort of the limit of my knowledge in this question. So I will sort of chip in here, but I assume... that there are different lights in different places
Tom:
Yes.
Daniel:
for a historical reason.
Tom:
Yes, and it's not the red light district in Amsterdam, Ruth, but it is... something noticeable.
Ruth:
Is it to do with, I don't know, a certain... I don't know, I can't think of an example about somewhere that has a lot of ruins, has to maybe use a different colour light to protect those artefacts or something like that, because light can be quite damaging, right, to things.
Tom:
It's not that this time, no.
Shawn:
So my brain went to Chicago, and where on St. Patrick's Day, they dye the river green.
Tom:
It is not really a deliberate thing, this.
Ruth:
Is it something like in Paris, you can see the Eiffel Tower or something like that? Is there a particular landmark that's a different colour?
'Cause, I don't know. I've never been somewhere that had street lights as a different colour. Is that a thing?
Daniel:
I think it is the street lights that are a different colour in a different bit.
Tom:
Yes.
Daniel:
I don't know why they are... but I do know that they're different. And I assume it's just because technologies evolved differently or something in these two places?
Tom:
Yes.
Ruth:
But they have to be quite bigger— like a big difference in colour, right? So, is it green in one section and yellow in another?
Daniel:
(laughs) They're not quite that different.
Tom:
There have been some changes in street lights recently. Talk me through the history of street lights from when we grew up to what you see now.
Ruth:
Orangey.
Shawn:
Incandescent bulbs.
Ruth:
Although it's interesting 'cause I actually once went 'round a street light factory. I feel like I should know more about this. I have a street light coffee book. (laughs)
Daniel:
Was it an illuminating trip?
Tom:
Eyyy!
Ruth:
It was very illuminating. Yep, yep. I appreciated street lights more, but I didn't necessarily look at the colours.
Daniel:
I seem to remember sodium being important. Something to do with a lot of... That was the orangey colour.
Tom:
Yeah, sodium vapour lights.
Ruth:
And now they're much more like LED.
Tom:
Yes, which are much whiter. So, why might one European capital be split like that? Why might it have two different sections with two different sets of street lights?
Ruth:
Did they have a wall in it at some point?
Tom:
Yes, they did!
Ruth:
Ah, so one half very much down the line. One half is orange, and one half is white.
Tom:
Which means that the city is...? Tap it home, Shawn.
Shawn:
Berlin.
Tom:
It's Berlin. Yes, absolutely right.
This is West and East Berlin, which were unified in 1989 after the fall of the Wall, but which in 2013 still used different street lights.
The West had the colder, more modern ones. The East still had the orangey sodium vapour lamps.
Which actually leaves me with one more thing from this question.
Who was Chris in 2013?
Daniel:
Oh, he's not my friend, Chris. He's not a pilot, so if it was him, he's done some very naughty things.
Tom:
(laughs)
Daniel:
Chris— Oh, hang on.
Chris Hadfield?
Tom:
Chris Hadfield.
Who was flying high over Berlin on the International Space Station in 2013, yes, took a photo of the Berlin street lights.
Now, I assume that in the—
Ruth:
There's no way he could've seen the red light district from the space station. That was completely—
SFX:
(group laughing)
Tom:
He's got a very good telescope. Just able to track it as it goes by.
Yeah, I imagine that there has been more mixing of that in the ten years since.
But yes, in 2013, Chris Hadfield took a now-famous photo of Berlin from a long way above.
Shawn:
That's very cool.
Tom:
Shawn, over to you.
Shawn:
Okay, so this question is about ancient Rome.
So, in Ancient Rome, temples honouring a particular god were usually constructed outside of cities. Which god was it, and why did Rome have a shrine to that god anyway?
So, in Ancient Rome, temples honouring a particular god were usually constructed outside of cities. Which god was it, and why did Rome have a shrine to that god anyway?
Ruth:
Is it something you don't want in a city?
Tom:
God of travellers, the god of— That's, I'm thinking patron saints... not gods here.
Daniel:
(wheezes)
Tom:
That's a very different religion.
Shawn:
Yes, you're not far off with things you might not want. That's not a bad count.
Ruth:
Death.
Shawn:
Wasn't the god of death.
Daniel:
I was immediately thinking god of the countryside, because you would want the god of the countryside in the countryside. You wouldn't want them in the town, would you?
Tom:
I mean, I'm not being completely wrong with saying that ancient Greece had 'gods of', right? There were... I think I'm okay with my mythology there. There were gods of love, gods of war in a lot of the ancient religions.
Shawn:
So to clarify, it's ancient Rome, not ancient Greece.
Tom:
I mean, okay, so they definitely had... Mars is the god of war, right?
Daniel:
Yes.
Tom:
We named planets after specific Roman and Greek deities.
Daniel:
Jupiter, Saturn.
Tom:
Yeah.
Ruth:
I mean, you wouldn't want war in your city.
Tom:
That's true.
Daniel:
Yeah, it's gonna be something that you don't want in your city.
Tom:
War, pestilence, disease, fa— I'm going off the four horsemen of the apocalypse now, and that's again, the wrong...
SFX:
(guests laughing)
Tom:
religion, belief system, whatever. That's...
Daniel:
I can't think of anything that I don't want in a city now.
Tom:
(chuckles)
Shawn:
(snickers)
Tom:
But that you would still have a god of.
Daniel:
Yeah. So it's something bad that you still worship.
Ruth:
Or maybe you worship for it so it doesn't happen. People might still give offerings to stop that thing from happening. So like you might want to have... I suppose things like crops were important. So was there some ritual of... Oh, I don't know.
Shawn:
So you're very warm, Ruth, with this idea of... yeah, something you're perhaps wary of happening.
Ruth:
And it's not war.
Shawn:
It's not war.
Tom:
Fire. You don't want fire in a city. But sometimes you do want it outside, because it will help... the growing cycle, or something like that. Is there a god of fire?
Daniel:
Vulcan, I think.
Tom:
Vulcan.
Shawn:
Absolutely smashed it. Yes, it is indeed.
Daniel:
Oh, well done.
Shawn:
Vulcan, the god of fire.
Tom:
Oh, wow, okay.
Shawn:
You were like, yeah, absolutely smashed it.
Tom:
See, this is where the trivia brain from Dan comes in.
Because I'm like, "Is there a god of fire? I don't know."
And he's like, "Yeah, it's Vulcan."
SFX:
(guys laughing)
Shawn:
Yeah, so you've got kind of the first part of the question.
We are indeed talking about Vulcan, the god of fire.
There is a second part to this question.
Why did Rome have a shrine to that god anyway? And... yeah, when they were usually constructed outside of cities.
Daniel:
I mean, fire is needed for life, you know.
Tom:
Aqueducts.
Rome had aqueducts. Rome had a fire service.
Because they could bring enough water in to have a fire service.
I was really confident about that...
SFX:
(Daniel and Shawn giggle)
Tom:
and then everyone on the call is just kind of looking at me like I'm an idiot. So I'm probably wrong there.
Shawn:
I think if Tom Scott says anything with conviction, you sort of believe it, don't you? It's sort of like, it's kind of like, you've got the voice for it.
Ruth:
I was going to tell my firefighter sister about the Roman firefighters that Tom Scott told me about.
SFX:
(group laughing)
Tom:
This was a problem in early episodes of Lateral. I kept making jokes in my authoritative voice, and I kind of trained myself out of that.
That wasn't a joke. That was just me going, "It's aqueducts!" They were made of lead. There were wild theories that that's why some of the Roman emperors went mad, because all their water was lead lined. It probably wasn't, but...
Daniel:
Well, Rome was famed for its baths, though. They definitely had, you know, hot baths and things like that. So they definitely had lots of heating.
Did they have a permanent fire, sort of in the middle of Rome, that they kept sort of feeding, so they could always have a hot bath in the middle of the city or something like that? So is that why they would also worship— why they would worship fire?
Shawn:
It's not a specific sort of fire related reason, but I will clarify that.
Tom:
Dan, was Vulcan the god of anything else?
Daniel:
Yes, the god of Mr. Spock.
Tom:
Yes, there we go. (chuckles)
Daniel:
(wheezes)
Tom:
What is "live long and prosper" in Latin? I don't know, but I guarantee nerds will.
Daniel:
Absolutely.
Ruth:
Is it to do with light or something? So you could see? At night?
Tom:
Did they have street lights back then?
Shawn:
It's not related to lighting. You were kind of hitting the nail on the head earlier on this idea of trying to avoid fire and being wary of fire.
Daniel:
So, ah, was it a negative worship? Was it a, "we are worshipping you so that you don't visit us"?
Tom:
So that you can control it, so that you can... pray that it goes somewhere else and damages your enemies instead.
Daniel:
Ooh.
Shawn:
Yeah, so these are all sort of reasons why they had the statue, but not reasons why the statue... was ended up in the city, not...
Daniel:
Oh! Is it that Rome grew? Is it that they built it outside of the city, but Rome eventually... You don't build it in a day, so I've heard.
SFX:
(group laughing)
Daniel:
But over a few decades, it slowly expands. And thus what was the city boundaries is now bigger and bigger and bigger, and now it's in the city.
Shawn:
So yes, it was absorbed into the city limits as Rome expanded.
Ruth:
I bet the house prices around there were very low.
SFX:
(Tom and Daniel laugh)
Shawn:
So yes, Vulcan was the god of fire.
So building his shrine away from the city's buildings was seen as a safe thing to do.
And in addition, the temples were often associated with forges and metalworking, sparks of which could set the city ablaze. And the shrine in Rome, called the Vulcanal... Or, Volca— Volcan—- Vol— Volcanel. It's another one of those squeezing two words together in my brain.
Tom:
And it sounds like you're swearing again, but never mind.
Shawn:
It does.
SFX:
(Shawn and Daniel laugh)
Shawn:
It was an open air altar on the Capitoline Hill, and this temple to Vulcan was originally constructed outside of the city. But as Rome expanded, it was absorbed into the city proper.
Tom:
Thank you to Rhett Buzon for sending this question in.
Tricycles are a common method of public transport in the Philippines. In Pagadian City, these tricycles consist of a motorcycle with a sidecar. Bizarrely, the sidecar is tilted upwards at an angle of around 30 degrees. Why?
And one more time.
Tricycles are a common method of public transport in the Philippines. In Pagadian City, these tricycles consist of a motorcycle with a sidecar. Bizarrely, the sidecar is tilted upwards at an angle of around 30 degrees. Why?
Daniel:
Gromit is very heavy.
Tom:
(laughs)
Daniel:
And he sits to one side.
Shawn:
What was the name of the city? I heard Pygmalion, but I'm sure it's not the Pygmalion.
Tom:
My pronunciation says 'pah-gah-dee-ahn'. I apologise to anyone in the Philippines if I'm getting that wrong.
Ruth:
Is there some particularly amazing stars or something? Something to look at in the sky?
Daniel:
Mobile astronomy. There's not a lot of call for that, doing astronomy at 60 miles an hour on the motorway, but I'd like to try it.
Ruth:
(gasps) Maybe it is a really scary place to be in one of these things. So being tilted back and not being able to— Maybe you're distracted by looking at the sky because it's so perilous and dangerous riding in one of these things.
Daniel:
(wheezes)
Shawn:
Maybe it's for children. It's like a, you know, an inclined baby seat in the car. Maybe it's a child's sidecar.
Daniel:
I'm trying to work out, what does it mean, inclined by 30 degrees... upwards? So that means it's sort of sloping up towards the front?
Tom:
Yep. So you are sitting, kind of reclined with the chair you're sitting on. It's as if you are rocking back on your chair in school, and the teacher is about to shout at you because you might damage the chair.
There's a memory that's resurfaced 30 something years later.
Daniel:
We had posters at our school: "Four legs, good. Two legs, bad."
SFX:
(Tom and Shawn laugh)
Daniel:
For that exact thing.
Tom:
I always thought that it was for the safety of the kids. It's not, it's just so the tiny, cheap chair legs don't buckle underneath, and they have to buy new ones.
Daniel:
Oh god, they were terrible, weren't they? (laughs)
Tom:
I mean, it's also presumably for the kids' safety, but you know.
Daniel:
Oh nyeah.
I mean... Do people like to recline and put their feet up on the dash, so they can waft their feet and have a nice cooling breeze around their feet as they go along?
Ruth:
I was just trying to work out if it was more streamlined when you're reclined. Like when you get into, I don't know, a racing car or the land speed record car, you're pretty much laid flat looking up. And I wonder if it's to make you go faster.
Shawn:
So I'm a renewable energy engineer originally by training, and my brain went to solar and going, is it an electric trike, and it's got a solar panel on the front? And that's 30 degrees isn't far off optimal for a solar panel.
So it's not about the person at all. It's about charging the trike up.
Tom:
You wouldn't have to tilt the whole sidecar for that.
Shawn:
No you wouldn't. (chuckles)
Daniel:
We've been assuming it's a person. What if it's a thing?
It's probably tilted for a thing, isn't it?
What do they have in the Philip— in the Philippines? They have... things. I don't— I can't think of a single thing in the Philippines that exists.
Coconuts? I don't know.
Tom:
There are passengers in the sidecar, and it is for their benefit, partly.
Daniel:
Oh, okay.
Tom:
Human passengers. Having established at the start of this episode that that's always a thing.
Ruth:
There's no donkeys.
Shawn:
There's no donkeys.
Ruth:
No donkeys.
Tom:
Human passengers.
Shawn:
Is it insects? Don't get insects in your mouth.
Daniel:
Oh, you'd just have a windshield, like a visor for that, wouldn't you, or...
Shawn:
Would make sense.
Daniel:
Are they facing forward?
Tom:
They are.
Daniel:
Are they facing backwards for some—
Tom:
They're facing forwards.
Daniel:
Yeah.
Tom:
This is a specific city. This isn't common across the Philippines. This is this specific city.
Daniel:
Is it a particularly hilly city?
Tom:
Yes.
Daniel:
Ah, okay. I think that must be why, then.
Tom:
Yeah, I need to hear a little bit more than that.
SFX:
(guests laughing)
Daniel:
The rest is left to the reader as an exercise.
SFX:
(guys laughing)
Daniel:
If they're constantly going up and down very steep hills, say maybe about 30 degrees...
Tom:
Mhm.
Daniel:
Then... this counteracts that... that angle. Unless, though, surely if you go the other way, won't you be at an angle of 60 degrees and basically falling off?
Shawn:
(snickers)
Daniel:
But basically, yeah. It's to counteract so that you are sitting roughly... flat, horizontal, going up and down these steep hills in the sidecar.
Tom:
Yes, Pagadian City has one long, straight, steep road that the trikes will go up and down several times a day.
So passenger comfort is one of the reasons, because being tilted forward at 30 degrees in a passenger seat is really unpleasant. If you're just reclining a long way... It's not great, but it's not that bad.
There is another benefit, though.
Daniel:
Mm?
Tom:
And that's a physics thing.
Shawn:
Like better weight distribution or better centre of mass.
Tom:
Yep. It puts a load of downforce on the back wheels, which in a trike, going down a hill at 30 degrees, is really important!
Shawn:
That's cool.
Tom:
So yes. This is Pagadian City in the Philippines.
The trike's passenger seat is tilted back, because the passengers can comfortably ride downhill. And it also helps the driver not go into a death spiral skid.
Our last guest question of the show, then, comes from Ruth. Whenever you're ready.
Ruth:
In Wilkerson, Washington State, there is a replica of a giant cast iron skillet pan, 60 feet in diameter, complete with two sunny-side-up eggs and a wavy rasher of bacon. Why?
So, in Wilkerson, Washington State, there is a replica of a giant cast iron skillet pan, 60 feet in diameter, complete with two sunny-side-up eggs and a wavy rasher of bacon. Why?
Tom:
Surely this has to be some pop culture reference. There's got to be some American pop culture thing that is... skillet and eggs and bacon. But I have no idea what it is.
Daniel:
I want to visit. I don't know the answer, but I definitely want to visit.
Tom:
(laughs)
Daniel:
I'm hungry now.
Shawn:
My brain's just going to the Looney Tunes and bashing people over the head with skillet pans.
Tom:
(laughs)
Shawn:
(bonk)
Tom:
Oh yeah, bash them in the head with it, and you get the two eyes as the eggs and the wavy rash of bacon as the mouth and...
Shawn:
(snickers)
Tom:
There's this (do-o-o-ong!) noise, and everyone walks away, and their head's in a weird shape.
Shawn:
Exactly that.
Daniel:
I'm one step ahead of you, because my head is already in a weird shape.
SFX:
(Tom and Shawn laugh)
Daniel:
But the eyes and mouth thing sounds very plausible, because otherwise why have we been told— why are there two— and there were, what type of eggs were they?
Tom:
Sunny-side-up, so fried.
Daniel:
So you can see the yolks, I think that means. So they will look more like eyes. And if it's a, it's not just a rasher of bacon. It's a wavy rasher of bacon. So I think it probably is a face. But that doesn't help with the question. Why do you want food?
Why have they got egg on their face?
Tom:
Eyyy!
It's the breakfast capital of America. It's the first Waffle House. It's the... agh.
It's a big thing to commemorate something.
Daniel:
You're right, there's got to be something pop culture going on here. What's associated with eggs and bacon? It's breakfasts, it's...
Tom:
This question was put in a show with all British people. This can't be something obscure in America. The question team wouldn't have put that in here.
Daniel:
I'm trying to work out, is the skillet pan lying down, and you sort of look down at it, or is it... vertical, and so you can see the eggs and bacon from far?
Tom:
So you can see it from the air. Because you've got a skillet pan with stuff in it, and it's 60 foot high. Either it's on the ground or in a pit.
I'm seeing it like those big things in Australia, where they've just got the Big Lobster and the Big Kangaroo and the Big Penguin that just sit on big sculptures.
But if you're doing that with a skillet pan with stuff in it, it either has to be vertical, or you can only see it from the air.
Ruth:
So, the pan is... as if it's laid on the ground.
Daniel:
Mm-kay.
Ruth:
And... the edge of the pan has a gap in it, so people can walk in.
Daniel:
Ooh.
Tom:
Oh, that's a brilliant skate park. No, that's a terrible skate park.
Daniel:
(wheezes)
Ruth:
Is it? Is it?
Daniel:
Oh, have you said something useful?
Tom:
Yeah, you could have the sides of the pan as a quarter pipe. You could have a wavy rasher of bacon as a grind rail or something like that. I don't know what the eggs are? I don't know how you could skate on the eggs.
Daniel:
A couple of bumps in the middle or something?
Ruth:
I mean, you're literally describing the picture in front of me. I think you've got it, Tom.
So this themed skate park was the idea of artist John Hillding.
And essentially, it's mainly used by younger members of the town. But the edge of the skillet is a natural skate bowl. The eggs are small humps, so that the yellow bits in it have a little hump in it. The wavy bacon are what are called speed bumps. And it's also possible to jump off the end as like a kicker into the pan's handle.
Tom:
That's lovely.
Daniel:
Wow.
Tom:
The last part of the show then. At the top of the episode, I asked:
Only 44% of the cells in your body are yours. How?
Daniel:
I'm always down the blood bank, asking for donations.
SFX:
(group laughing)
Daniel:
Oh yeah, I love that. That's why, that's why.
Ruth:
I think you're donating the wrong way 'round.
Daniel:
They haven't stopped me yet.
Ruth:
Is this something to do with... the fact... Is it the— Now let's see if I can get this right. That the eggs that you're made of is actually from your... grand...parent? Is that right? I'm trying to work out the generational gap in that. Is that something to do with—
Tom:
Not in this case, no. I'm just gonna cut that one off. It's not that. If you take a count of all the cells in your body, only 44—
Ruth:
Oh, cells, not DNA, sorry.
Tom:
Cells, not DNA.
Shawn:
Is this a question about the gut microbiome?
Tom:
Yeah, more or less.
Ruth:
Oh my gosh, this is Shawn's favourite topic. You should have known.
Daniel:
(laughs heartily)
Ruth:
This is literally all Shawn talks about, is his gut microbiome. This is the perfect question for him.
Tom:
Shawn, take it away.
Shawn:
We have, and I can't remember exactly what the statistic is, but we have some ridiculous number of kilos of bacteria, and actually some fungi and viruses in our microbiome. That, so we're basically just an ecosystem for these these little additional creatures that live inside us.
Tom:
Yeah, there's a 2016 study that says, you know, The average adult human has about 30 trillion cells that are theirs, that contain their DNA, but we also have about 38 trillion bacteria. And that's not just the gut. That is on us, around us, in us. But those bacteria are tiny.
So yes, by count, it's 56% is bacteria. By weight, there's actually only about 200 grams of them.
Ruth:
I think I need to go get a shower.
SFX:
(group laughing)
Tom:
Thank you very much to all of our players. What's going on in your lives? Where can people find you?
We will start with Kids Invent Stuff.
Ruth:
So we bring to life kids' invention ideas. So if you know anyone between the ages of 4 and 11, get them to check out Kids Invent Stuff and get them to send us a picture or a video of an invention they'd like to build, and we might build it.
Tom:
Shawn, what kind of inventions?
Shawn:
Crazy things like... custard firing superhero suits or... what else we made. We have made crazy vehicles. We've made bicycles that feed you cake as you ride them.
So anything that a 4 to 11 year old can come up with has a chance of being built on our YouTube channel.
Tom:
And Dan, I remember last time that I got you to follow that, and I really should have asked you to go first this time. Dan—
Daniel:
It's okay. I'm putting in an order for that cake and bike. I want one of those.
I'm quizzydan. You can find me on Twitch. I stream various quizzes, games, and puzzles a few nights a week.
Tom:
If you wanna know more about this show, you can do that at lateralcast.com, where you can also send in your ideas for guest questions. We are at @lateralcast pretty much everywhere and at youtube.com/lateralcast for video highlights several times a week.
Thank you very much to Daniel Peake.
Daniel:
Thank you very much.
Tom:
Ruth Amos.
Ruth:
Thanks for having me.
Tom:
Shawn Brown.
Shawn:
Great to be here.
Tom:
I've been Tom Scott, and that's been Lateral.
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