0:01

You're listening to a

0:03

complexly podcast. Hello and welcome

0:05

to dear Hank and John. Doris, I

0:08

prefer to think of it, dear John

0:10

and Hank. It's a podcast where two

0:12

brothers answer your questions give you

0:14

to be used advice and bring

0:16

you all the week's news from

0:18

both Mars and A. F. C. Wimbledon.

0:21

John, did you know what? What

0:23

the, uh, mermaid war to her

0:25

math class? No. I don't know

0:27

about this one, an Algebra. Oh.

0:29

Well, I find that problematic. Is it?

0:31

I don't know. I mean, just just... Well,

0:33

they wear a seashell bras, so that's normal.

0:36

They often wear bras made from sea

0:38

life. I'm not going to acknowledge anything

0:40

further about the joke, but I should

0:42

acknowledge that there's quite a lot of

0:44

work happening upstairs in my home. Some

0:47

banging may occur. You're going to hear

0:49

a lot of banging. Maybe. Or maybe

0:51

not. You never know. with these modern setups. That's

0:53

right. That's very true. That's very true. Let's answer

0:55

some questions from our listeners. We're going to get

0:58

right into it. We don't want to talk about

1:00

the state of things. I don't want to talk

1:02

about how I'm doing. I want to answer this

1:04

question for Mel. Okay. This first question comes

1:06

from Mel who writes, hi, is it

1:09

socially appropriate to cover my ears and

1:11

go, ah? Yes, Mel, it is. Next

1:13

question. In what circumstance? Does Mel have

1:15

any more information about this? Oh, yeah,

1:17

I just think in all circumstances, it's

1:20

currently allowable to cover your ears and

1:22

go, yeah, I do, this is, this

1:24

is the one I do, I go,

1:26

he does do that. He's not, he's,

1:28

he's not making that up. Yeah, that's

1:31

the sound I make. It's like almost

1:33

like a tick. It's usually as a

1:35

joke. You're like, I don't want to

1:37

hear about it. I don't want to

1:40

hear about it. I genuinely, and I

1:42

say this with love, can't take on

1:44

anything else right now. So I don't

1:46

want to hear about it. I was

1:49

writing an evil yesterday and I almost

1:51

put that at the end. I almost

1:53

was like, and by the way, if

1:55

you might be coming to me soon

1:58

with something, just don't, let's pause. That

2:00

one, we should pause. Yeah. Yeah.

2:02

But I did it, John. That

2:04

was heroic of you. That was

2:06

heroic of you not to confess

2:08

your current state of affairs. Let's

2:11

answer this next question from Michelle,

2:13

who writes, Dear John and Hank,

2:15

where did all the water on

2:17

Mars go and why did it

2:19

leave? Confused and a little bit

2:22

worried about Earth, Michelle. Where did

2:24

all the water on Mars go?

2:26

Well, Mars has a couple of

2:28

things not going for it. Earth

2:30

has a couple of things going

2:32

for it. We have a magnetic

2:35

field that protects us from the

2:37

radiation from the sun. We have

2:39

more gravity, which also matters. We're

2:41

closer to the sun, so the

2:43

water is more likely to be

2:45

doing all kinds of weird stuff,

2:48

though you might think that it

2:50

would evaporate more, but, and it

2:52

indeed does. But the water on

2:54

Mars, what we think happened, is

2:56

all the water on surface. on

2:58

the surface it was cold but

3:01

it can still sublime away because

3:03

there's no atmosphere there there's very

3:05

little stuff in the air and

3:07

so the that low pressure it

3:09

can just suck water vapor off

3:11

of ice and then that can

3:14

be I think over time ionized

3:16

and then basically blown away by

3:18

the solar wind wow so it

3:20

just got it got blown away

3:22

by the wind by the wind

3:24

well not the wind not like

3:27

normal wind I need you to

3:29

be clear that this is not

3:31

like I understand it's solar wind

3:33

it's solar wind Let me ask

3:35

you a question about our magnetic

3:37

field, since I just have learned

3:40

that it's extremely important to our

3:42

ability to continue being a going

3:44

concern. Yeah. Is that a forever

3:46

thing? Are we going to have

3:48

a magnetic field forever? Magnetic field

3:50

is a forever thing. There are

3:53

times when it destabilizes. We're never

3:55

going to die. We'll always be

3:57

here. When I say a forever

3:59

thing, there is an end to

4:01

the earth and you're well aware

4:03

of that. But there are also

4:06

times in the magnetic field. So

4:08

that's more of an internal experience

4:10

than an external one. Related question,

4:12

since you brought up gravity, has

4:14

gravity intensified lately because I've found

4:16

it harder and harder to get

4:19

out of bed? Feel an awful

4:21

heavy? No, gravity appears to be

4:23

the same. Really difficult to effect.

4:25

We do blast some earth off

4:27

of earth. at a very slow

4:29

rate. Also, there's always new Earth

4:32

coming to Earth, which is wild.

4:34

You know, we get meteorites and

4:36

space dust. And so that's cool.

4:38

There's more Earth being added. And

4:40

we lose Earth, mostly not by

4:42

launching it into space. We do

4:45

lose a little bit of Earth

4:47

that way. Mostly we lose Earth

4:49

by it being just like on

4:51

Mars, blown away a little bit.

4:53

But it's just much easier for

4:55

it to get stripped away on

4:58

Mars, which used to have a

5:00

magnetic field. But we won't lose

5:02

ours. No, I don't think that

5:04

there is a manageable timescale on

5:06

which our magnetic field will go

5:08

away. Our next question comes from

5:11

Madison who asks dear Hank and

5:13

John, a lot of my friends

5:15

dislike. Taylor Swift, and I'm a

5:17

huge swiftly. Sometimes they talk about

5:19

how annoying and terrible her songs

5:21

are. No. I still want to

5:24

be friends with these people, but

5:26

it's a little hard to listen

5:28

to them disrespect my favorite singer

5:30

ever. Please help. Not the capital

5:32

of Wisconsin. Madison, thanks for the

5:34

clarification. Yeah. Though I'm sure the

5:37

capital of Wisconsin is a big

5:39

swiftly. Yeah, and probably suffers from

5:41

other state capitals not getting it.

5:43

You know? On the list of

5:45

state capitals, that probably is like,

5:47

really with it. Despite the fact

5:50

that a lot of its peers

5:52

are not, I think Madison's pretty

5:54

up there. Oh yeah, let's talk

5:56

about the least hip state capital.

5:58

Hmm, got to be Tulsa. I

6:00

don't know. Could be Pierre, South

6:03

Dakota. Good point. What's Maine's? You

6:05

know, it's something weird. Maine, uh,

6:07

it's, it's, uh, not Montpelier, because

6:09

that's Vermont. I mean, Montpelier is...

6:11

is cool only because it's in,

6:14

only because it's in Vermont. Augusta,

6:16

Augusta, Maine, I bet is not

6:18

a swiftly with its 18,89 people.

6:20

You know who I don't trust

6:22

at all is Tallahassee? Well, you

6:24

never know what they're gonna, you

6:27

never know what they're gonna do.

6:29

No, I mean, Hank and I,

6:31

I was just in Orlando giving

6:33

a speech and I got to

6:35

see my old friends who still

6:37

live in Orlando and it's such

6:40

a different city now. I still

6:42

hate it so much. It can't

6:44

help myself. I have heard that

6:46

it is almost like less fun.

6:48

No, no, no, it's really cool

6:50

actually. Like this, at least the

6:53

Performing Arts Center I was at

6:55

was very cool. I think there's

6:57

a lot to recommend Orlando. I

6:59

think it has an MLS team,

7:01

you know. Okay, yeah. Look, I

7:03

live in Indianapolis. I'm not in

7:06

a position to look down on

7:08

anybody, right? Like geographically. sometimes. Yeah.

7:10

I think that if I if

7:12

I was gonna have a state

7:14

capital watch my child. Yeah, like

7:16

as a like, you know, even

7:19

even for like a week. Not

7:21

Tallahassee, that's for sure. No, I

7:23

think I think Madison might be

7:25

up there. I know Helen or

7:27

wouldn't be. No, no, Helen, would

7:29

do like do a great job

7:32

until Helena fell asleep. I might

7:34

trust Indianapolis. Yeah, strong, steady. Is

7:36

Indianapolis the capital of Indiana? It

7:38

is. It is. It's a great

7:40

point of pride for us. They

7:42

drew a line down the vertical

7:45

of the state and the horizontal

7:47

of the state and looked for

7:49

a river. And there they made

7:51

Indianapolis. That's amazing. It is a

7:53

made from scratch city entirely because

7:55

it is in the center of

7:58

Indiana. Yeah, Missoula had a real

8:00

reason for being here. What is

8:02

Missoula's reason for being? It's like

8:04

where three rivers come together. Oh,

8:06

yeah, I mean, Indianapolis has a

8:08

river and everybody assumed it was

8:11

navigable, but it turns out it's

8:13

about six inches deep. So, yeah.

8:15

Well, none of our rivers are

8:17

navigable either, but they are useful

8:19

for various reasons. We used to

8:21

be the largest city in the

8:24

world, not on a navigable waterway.

8:26

And then, China happened. And Phoenix.

8:28

What was the question? Phoenix, is

8:31

Phoenix a capital? What's the capital

8:33

of Arizona? And they don't have

8:35

a capital. They've chosen to do

8:37

without. They really don't, like, they

8:39

were like, I don't, I don't

8:41

know. I don't know, is this

8:43

worth it? Don't, everybody, everybody wants

8:45

to do the same thing. Our

8:47

capital is the idea of dryness.

8:49

Our capital is the way your

8:51

nose feels. Yeah, yeah. You know

8:53

how you have to wake up

8:55

at four o'clock in the morning

8:58

in order to exercise outside here

9:00

in Arizona? That's our capital. The

9:02

capital of Arizona is sand. I

9:04

hate sand. It's coarse, gets everywhere.

9:06

Yeah. Sand is the most overrated

9:08

of the major rocks. I think,

9:10

I think, yeah, I think for

9:12

sure. I mean, people love a

9:14

sand. Yeah, it's like, it's like

9:16

one of the main attractions. They

9:18

talk about white sand beaches being

9:20

like above everything else, but I

9:22

mean, I'll tell you, how is

9:24

it walking on tiny rocks? We

9:27

have a lot of actual rock

9:29

beaches in Montana. Those are all

9:31

of our beaches are real rocks,

9:33

and I will say, it's terrible.

9:35

Let me push back against something

9:37

that you just said. What? Which

9:39

is that you have beaches. We

9:41

call them beaches. You don't have

9:43

a beechang. And sometimes they are

9:45

sandy, but they're always mixed together

9:47

with with large rocks. Yeah, now

9:49

that's worse than a regular than

9:51

a beautiful white sand beach and

9:53

say a cocoa beach Florida or

9:56

whatever. I'm trying to bring back

9:58

a level beach is famously a

10:00

pebble beach. Yeah, that's okay. A

10:02

pebble beach is all right. I'm

10:04

not saying you can't have a

10:06

rocky beach. You absolutely can't. I'm

10:08

just saying you can't have one

10:10

in Montana. Yeah, it's like the,

10:12

we have like river beaches and

10:14

lake beaches. Oh, okay, both the

10:16

major kinds. Madison. You have to

10:18

tell your friends not to yuck

10:20

on your yums, man. It's not,

10:22

it's not, it's not, it's not,

10:25

it's not, it's not their job

10:27

to tell you that the thing

10:29

you like sucks. But they're not

10:31

necessarily saying it to Madison, they're

10:33

saying it to each other. And

10:35

this is, and it's like a

10:37

strange cultural signifier too, it's like,

10:39

like a group of people who

10:41

likes to be mean about anything

10:43

about anything other than. It's not

10:45

like a danger or like cruelty.

10:47

It's Taylor Swift. She's just making

10:49

music. Yeah. She's a human being

10:52

with opinions, but she's not like

10:54

trying to, she's just trying to

10:56

bring people together, seems like. I

10:58

think that is certainly her intention,

11:00

but then also people are brought

11:02

together by like being in opposition

11:04

to stuff. I remember, look, I've

11:06

never been Taylor Swift, okay? Oh

11:08

yeah. But I do remember when

11:10

people. kind of define themselves either

11:12

by liking my books or by

11:14

disliking my books, especially young people.

11:16

You know, it's an important thing

11:18

when you're young to be able

11:21

to identify by what you like,

11:23

but also by what you don't

11:25

like. And this is something I

11:27

just had to get used to

11:29

that like they weren't thinking about

11:31

me as a person who wrote

11:33

books. They were thinking about me

11:35

as a social identifier that you

11:37

were either on this side of

11:39

the camp or you were on

11:41

that side of the camp. And

11:43

if you liked John Green books,

11:45

this meant X and Y and

11:47

Y and Y and Y and

11:50

Y and Y and Z. about

11:52

you and if you didn't like

11:54

them this meant A and B

11:56

and C about you. Exactly. And

11:58

like that's tricky if you're in

12:00

that social situation where that's it

12:02

because like it's an in-group out

12:04

group identifier and so if you

12:06

are one of the people who

12:08

like like you're just like I

12:10

don't feel like it can be

12:12

a part of this group so

12:14

what you got to do is

12:16

you got to do a conversion.

12:19

You gotta get in there, you

12:21

gotta get one of them, you

12:23

gotta get one of them, lock

12:25

them in a car with you.

12:27

Yeah. And play Tortured Poets Department,

12:29

start to finish. Just be like,

12:31

you're kind of like one of

12:33

these songs. Yeah. Or just like

12:35

one song over and over again.

12:37

You gotta get a good introduction

12:39

Taylor song. Yeah. And you gotta,

12:41

you just gotta force it. You

12:43

gotta make somebody love something they

12:46

don't love. That's how it works.

12:48

So here's my counter argument. I

12:50

don't actually think they don't love

12:52

Taylor Swift. Yeah. I think they

12:54

don't love the fan community around

12:56

Taylor Swift. I think they don't

12:58

love... They probably identify with the

13:00

vibes. They probably find aspects of

13:02

Taylor Swift's public presence annoying or

13:04

overbearing. There's an awful lot of

13:06

Taylor Swift to not like any

13:08

of it. But... That's what I

13:10

would say is that like... I

13:12

mean, Taylor Swift's a great songwriter

13:15

objectively. It's like you can not

13:17

like Billy Joel, but Billy Joel

13:19

is a great songwriter. Yeah. Anyway,

13:21

we're moving on. Madison, you have

13:23

our condolences. Yeah, I think that

13:25

that's the main thing. It just

13:27

sounds hard. Yeah, that doesn't sound,

13:29

easy. That doesn't sound easy. Sounds

13:31

annoying, honestly, is how it sounds

13:33

to me. Hank, I've got this

13:35

question from Vivian that's going to

13:37

absolutely blow your mind. Okay. I've

13:39

recently noticed that in the soap

13:41

dispensers at my school, all the

13:44

bubbles are the exact same size.

13:46

I'm not used to seeing uniform

13:48

bubbles, so I was wondering why

13:50

this happens, or for that matter,

13:52

why bubbles in other solutions are

13:54

often different sizes. I've attached a

13:56

soap bubble picture for your reference,

13:58

and this is a picture of

14:00

purell healthy soap, and if you

14:02

zoom in. all the bubbles are

14:04

the same dang size and I

14:06

don't mean like similar sized I

14:08

mean they look to be uniform

14:10

like bubble wrap oh I know

14:13

exactly why this is happening I

14:15

don't believe you I do so

14:17

this is not the bubbles that

14:19

are being formed as the soap

14:21

is being dispensed which is what

14:23

I thought this is bubbles that

14:25

have formed on the surface of

14:27

the purell dispenser and I you

14:29

know when I say I know

14:31

exactly why this happening of course

14:33

I do not know but I

14:35

have a strong theory and it

14:37

is that these bubbles are not

14:40

forming on the surface spontaneously there

14:42

is a leak in the soap

14:44

dispenser somewhere or when it is

14:46

used a little bit of air

14:48

gets let into the soap dispenser

14:50

and it's the same amount of

14:52

air every time. It's the same

14:54

amount of air every time. Yeah.

14:56

So there's like some way that

14:58

air is being introduced to the

15:00

soap bulb to the soap holder

15:02

that is above the soap dispenser

15:04

and that way that it's being

15:06

introduced is being introduced and you

15:09

know and I'm sure that there's

15:11

like a different amount of atoms

15:13

at each one but it's very

15:15

consistent. I just had a pretty

15:17

good idea I think for a

15:19

million dollar idea I think I

15:21

had a business idea. I had

15:23

like three today so hit me.

15:25

Oh my god. It's time for

15:27

a million dollar idea. Another million

15:29

dollar idea. Hey. Oh man, they

15:31

made us stop doing that because

15:33

people kept waking up. We had

15:35

a segment years ago where I'd

15:38

introduced a million dollar idea of

15:40

people didn't like it because it

15:42

was too obnoxious. No, people like

15:44

it when we're nice and calm,

15:46

but still funny, but like not

15:48

so funny that they can't fall

15:50

asleep. Yeah. This is basically one

15:52

of those weird sleep podcasts. Tell

15:54

me if you're a weird sleep

15:56

podcast listener. You can John adjiva.com.

15:58

When I said weird sleep podcast,

16:00

I didn't mean that disparagingly. I

16:02

am myself a weird sleep podcast

16:04

listener. But here's my million-dollar idea.

16:07

I think it's so beautiful the

16:09

idea that the same bubble is

16:11

made each time, that it's the

16:13

same size of a bubble. And

16:15

I love the idea of being

16:17

able to sell such bubbles that

16:19

are the exact same size as

16:21

all the other bubbles. But this

16:23

is why it's a million-dollar idea.

16:25

You sell the bubble, but you

16:27

don't actually send anybody a bubble,

16:29

because then it would burst, of

16:31

course, right? So you just, you

16:34

sell the concept of the bubble.

16:36

Like you, like almost like how

16:38

you buy a star, but you

16:40

didn't really buy a star, because

16:42

stars aren't for sale, like stars

16:44

don't know about private property. But

16:46

you can buy a star in

16:48

the Milky Way galaxy for like

16:50

50 bucks or whatever, and that's

16:52

a million-dollar idea. Why not be

16:54

able to buy a bubble that's

16:56

the same size as all the

16:58

other bubbles, and you own that's

17:00

like an NFT? But by the

17:03

time the bubble would get to

17:05

you, it would have disappeared anyway.

17:07

So you never actually get sent

17:09

to anything, but you still owned

17:11

the bubble. It's not quite an

17:13

NFT for the record. That's a

17:15

bad idea. Maybe it's non-fungible and

17:17

that every bubble is different, but

17:19

it's a non-fungible temporary token. But

17:21

you don't actually get a token.

17:23

It's a non-fungible ephemeral. Non-fungible ephemerality,

17:25

an NFE. Non-fungible ephemerality. Yeah. And

17:27

what do you think? I like

17:29

this. We should sound during the

17:32

Project for Awesome, which just happened.

17:34

I think the Project for Awesome

17:36

is over as it's being aired.

17:38

Yes, it is. Well, that was

17:40

great answer to the Pural question,

17:42

Hank. I was expecting that to

17:44

take longer. But it reminds me

17:46

that today's podcast is actually brought

17:48

to you by Purell Soap. Purell

17:50

Soap, when there's a slight leak

17:52

in the soap, it leads to,

17:54

yeah, it's a real sponsor. That's

17:56

a real company. Thanks for, uh,

17:58

thanks for all your financial support.

18:01

And you're, frankly, emotional support. A

18:03

big fan of your product. The

18:05

podcast is also brought to you

18:07

by that, that, that, that, that,

18:09

that, that, that, that, that, that,

18:11

that, that, that, that, that, that,

18:13

that, that, yeah, making you immune

18:15

to the noises that surround you

18:17

since time immemorial. And of course

18:19

today's podcast is brought to you

18:21

by Taylor Swift, who brings great

18:23

weather wherever she goes, and is

18:25

a fan of the pod, by

18:28

the pod. And this podcast is

18:30

brought to you by the A

18:32

in Arizona. It's the capital of

18:34

Arizona. Yeah. It's Phoenix. You know

18:36

what? I just realized. There's two

18:38

A's in Arizona. You don't know

18:40

which one. Oh, you can't find

18:42

out. They actually do it on

18:44

both sides, because it looks like

18:46

a valley between mountains. It's like

18:48

Schrodinger's capital, you know? Could be

18:50

either of them. Could be neither.

18:52

It sure wasn't a good joke,

18:54

but I appreciate that I almost

18:57

took you out. Because it starts

18:59

with the same noise as cat.

19:01

This episode of Dear Hankajon is

19:03

brought to you by every plate.

19:05

What are you going to do

19:07

for dinner tonight? Are you thinking

19:09

you're going to have a great

19:11

idea and you're going to do

19:13

a whole thing and you're going

19:15

to be ready for it, but

19:17

then you're going to end up

19:19

doing delivery? You're going to end

19:21

up getting the private taxi for

19:23

your burrito. You know, you know,

19:25

you know, you know! What's gonna

19:27

happen? No judgment, of course. We're

19:29

all in the same world struggling

19:31

through the same situations. But what

19:34

if... Every plate could help you

19:36

dish up some better habits with

19:38

delicious easy recipes delivered to your

19:40

door including you get some calorie

19:42

smart options carb smart protein smart

19:44

all those types of things and

19:46

they have what's called smart swap

19:48

recipes where you can swap out

19:50

different things that you want or

19:52

don't want like you could swap

19:54

flour tortillas for lettuce wraps or

19:56

potatoes for sweet potatoes to make

19:58

better for you meals skip the

20:00

store and enjoy wholesome homemade meals

20:02

that costs less than gross Check

20:04

out the sound of this, crispy

20:06

chicken milanese, eh? Maybe with roasted

20:08

broccoli and honeydijean drizzle? Oh yeah!

20:10

That and so many other recipes

20:12

you can check out at Every

20:15

Plate. Start with 50% off your

20:17

first box with code Dear Hank

20:19

50 at everyplate.com/podcast, Every Plate Offer,

20:21

valid with auto renewing subscription. That's

20:23

Dear Hank 50 at Every plate.com/podcast.

20:25

All right. Let's get to this

20:27

question from Sarah, who says... Hello

20:29

brothers, this question has been weighing

20:31

on my mind off and on

20:33

for several years now. Why don't

20:35

people who are offered bribes just

20:37

take the bribe and not do

20:39

the corruption? I get it might

20:41

be a moral issue, but is

20:43

it illegal to just take a

20:45

bribe and not do the corruption?

20:47

I think it might be a

20:49

moral issue, but is it illegal

20:51

to just take a bribe and

20:53

not do the corruption? What's the

20:55

bribe we're going to do? Yeah,

20:58

boy, you know, I'm not I'm

21:00

not really sure how bribes were,

21:02

have you ever been bribed, John,

21:04

or attempted to be bribed? Have

21:06

you ever bribed? No, no, I've

21:08

never, well, I think the Russian

21:10

government technically attempted to bribe us,

21:12

but we didn't really get the

21:14

memo. Yeah, we missed out on

21:16

it. They might yet, come knocking.

21:18

They might, but they were more

21:20

trying to get us to be

21:22

quiet about certain issues. Yeah, it

21:24

was more of a threat than

21:26

a bribe. I've never been bribed

21:28

that I can think of. I

21:30

don't think I've ever been bribed.

21:32

But then again, would I confess

21:34

to it? Good point. You know?

21:36

Good point. So there's two reasons

21:39

you get bribed, right? One is

21:41

to do something. And then if

21:43

you don't do the thing, generally

21:45

the person who's bribed you has

21:47

some kind of power as well,

21:49

right? the power to shoot you

21:51

or the power to get you

21:53

in trouble or whatever. The other

21:55

thing is that like bribery... I

21:57

would argue they're always criminals. I

21:59

mean, yes. In some circumstances, in

22:01

some places in the world, bribery

22:03

is like part of the... structure

22:05

of some systems and so you

22:07

do in business you just do

22:09

it and like and oftentimes the

22:11

sort of bribe and the result

22:13

of the bribe happen very close

22:15

to each other so like yeah

22:17

kind of immediately it's like I

22:20

like I need to be able

22:22

to do this thing and they're

22:24

like okay yes and you can

22:26

not do this thing right there's

22:28

not just tend to be how

22:30

it works in the US there

22:32

there is an amount of like

22:34

uh no here the bribes are

22:36

at much larger scale they are

22:38

Many fewer but larger amounts. I

22:40

don't even know if they're that

22:42

many fewer. I don't know. I

22:44

had a friend from the Global

22:46

South tell me once that they

22:48

thought building permits were just like

22:50

very advanced forms of bribes. And

22:52

they, if you aren't careful. So

22:54

I imagine there's an amount of

22:56

like repeat business is valuable to

22:58

the bribe taker. Oh yeah, that's

23:01

good. If you don't, if you

23:03

don't actually do the thing, then

23:05

it's not going to come back.

23:07

Like maybe, you know, for like

23:09

a building permit being a good

23:11

example, like, you know, you're not

23:13

going to note a bribe the

23:15

guy unless he's taken some bribes

23:17

before. Right. You're not going to

23:19

do it if he didn't actually

23:21

make the building permit happen happen

23:23

faster. You're not going to go

23:25

in for your second bribe unless

23:27

the first bribe goes according to

23:29

plan. That's right. So if you're

23:31

like a corrupt inspector or whatever,

23:33

you've got to get a reputation

23:35

and part of how you get

23:37

the reputation is by doing the

23:39

corruption. You have to do the

23:42

yes. I like it. I like

23:44

it. We're really thinking this through.

23:46

Really thinking it through. It's a

23:48

capitalist enterprise bribes. And so if

23:50

the person doesn't make the money,

23:52

you didn't actually provide the value.

23:54

So you kind of have to

23:56

actually do the thing in order

23:58

to be. worth the bribe. What

24:00

would anyone even bribe me about?

24:02

You know, like I'm gonna bribe

24:04

you. I thought about like to

24:06

make you say, I'll give you

24:08

an example, I'm gonna bribe you

24:10

to make you say that you

24:12

like Carl's Junior Burgers even though

24:14

you don't. And that's called a

24:16

brand deal. That exists. Yeah, I

24:18

was thinking about people who have

24:20

like wanted me to promote them

24:23

as individuals before and and have.

24:25

Again, that's a brand deal. It's

24:27

a little different. I guess a

24:29

brand deal that isn't disclosed is

24:31

just a bribe. A brand deal

24:33

that isn't disclosed is just a

24:35

bribe. That's right. You take the

24:37

money, you do the corruption, and

24:39

you don't have reveal that you

24:41

did the corruption. Yeah. I mean,

24:43

especially with politics, like there are

24:45

brand deals, which we do not

24:47

for clarity take, nor has anyone

24:49

ever even offered us one, which

24:51

makes me think, oh, I've never

24:53

had one offered one offered to

24:55

me. Yeah, I was offered one.

24:57

I was offered to do a

24:59

tick-tock for a candidate for high

25:01

office, not president, but significant office.

25:04

And it was a brand deal.

25:06

They were going to pay me.

25:08

And I was like, the vibes

25:10

deal off. Not only do I

25:12

not want you to give me

25:14

money for this, I would prefer

25:16

you just never do that ever.

25:18

Yeah. It feels so, it's not

25:20

illegal. It's like buying an advertisement.

25:22

It's the same thing as buying

25:24

an advertisement. I know. How did

25:26

we get into this business? I

25:28

don't know, man. I have a

25:30

lot of regrets. We should have

25:32

C.G.P. grade it and made like

25:34

one video every two years that

25:36

doesn't ever face in it about

25:38

postal codes. Oh God, I mean

25:40

some days, some days, but then

25:42

other days I'm glad that we

25:45

have the thing that we have.

25:47

I love my job and I

25:49

love our community, but I do

25:51

not love the broader like social

25:53

network of influencers. Yeah. Is that

25:55

fair? And it used to be

25:57

that like I liked most of

25:59

the people I met from the

26:01

this world. And now I'm like

26:03

Oh yeah, yeah. Well for one

26:05

thing, we're in our 40s and

26:07

they're all 12. So you shouldn't

26:09

like them. I can still, I

26:11

enjoy hanging out with all kinds

26:13

of different people. No, but like

26:15

I have different values from like

26:17

most 23 year olds. Of course

26:19

I do. Yes. Like I have

26:21

different values from my 23 year

26:23

old self. Very different values actually.

26:26

But there is something to be

26:28

said for the fact that like

26:30

early YouTube, it was just like

26:32

that the audience was different because

26:34

it was people who were like

26:36

early adopters of a technology, which

26:38

both selected for people who were

26:40

more likely to have like educated

26:42

parents because they had high speed

26:44

internet before anyone else. Right. And

26:46

also like we're more likely to

26:48

be like, I'd like to experience

26:50

a social situation in which I

26:52

am alone. Right. And

26:54

now there's just like a lot

26:56

of... Yeah, now it's everybody. But

26:58

what I'd say is that it's

27:00

very easy to nostalgia-size the early

27:02

internet. And like the early internet

27:05

had a lot of problems. Had

27:07

all the same problems that the

27:09

current internet does. It just had

27:11

a very different scale. It absolutely

27:13

had like, it absolutely had political,

27:15

I think that, I think that

27:17

extreme is a, extremeization and like,

27:19

polarization and all that stuff. But

27:21

at a point, a difference in

27:23

scale does become a different difference

27:25

in kind. Well, I mean, the

27:27

scale is very, very different, right?

27:29

Like, yeah. It used to be.

27:31

That there were 42 people who

27:33

worked at YouTube and I knew

27:35

all of them and there was

27:38

a zero percent chance that any

27:40

of them were going to be

27:42

in the Oval Office making policy

27:44

pronouncements, and that's no longer the

27:46

case Okay, there was a question

27:48

that was that touched on this.

27:50

Do you want to do that

27:52

one? Sure, if you want to.

27:54

It's from Nicole who asks hi

27:56

to both greens in light of

27:58

I'm really questioning the platforms I

28:00

use. I used to feel like

28:02

at the end of the day,

28:04

matters of social media weren't worth

28:06

stressing about on a personal level,

28:09

but... I was wrong. So my

28:11

question is, do we continue to

28:13

use platforms owned by oligarchs in

28:15

hopes of fighting misinformation? Or do

28:17

we take our, quote, liberal beliefs

28:19

to, quote, safer spaces like Blue

28:21

Sky? I found so many creators

28:23

and small businesses that I love

28:25

interacting through Instagram, but it doesn't

28:27

feel right to be there anymore.

28:29

Any and all thoughts appreciated, stressed

28:31

and depressed, Nicole. Yeah,

28:34

I mean there's two schools of thought

28:36

here or there's many schools of thought.

28:38

There's the Daniel Biss school of thought,

28:41

my friend, the mayor of Evanston, Illinois,

28:43

who maintains that when you bring your

28:45

bucket of clean water to the toxic

28:48

soup of the internet and you tell

28:50

yourself that you are going to make

28:52

the water less toxic with your bucket

28:54

of clean water, all you're actually doing

28:57

is raising the level of the toxic

28:59

soup. Yes. Because your water is getting

29:01

mixed in with the piss and vinegar

29:03

of... of the larger thing. I'm not

29:06

sure that I think, and I might

29:08

be wrong about this. Yeah. So I'm

29:10

not sure that I feel that way

29:13

necessarily about Instagram. Like there's, so like,

29:15

is Instagram a bad place to be

29:17

because it is, has a negative overall

29:19

effect on society? Or is Instagram a

29:22

bad place to be because I just

29:24

don't want to enrich the, like, the

29:26

people who own Instagram? And those are

29:29

like two, like very different questions to

29:31

me. I think it's pretty difficult. Look,

29:33

if you can go to Good Dot

29:35

Store right now, you can have the

29:38

rare commercial experience where you're not enriching

29:40

a billionaire. But that's a pretty rare

29:42

experience. Well, I don't think it's necessarily

29:44

that it's like humansos. I understand that

29:47

not all billionaires are the same. There

29:49

was a time when it felt like,

29:51

oh, Mark Zuckerberg does whatever he wants

29:54

to get. Well, he's just, he's a

29:56

moth that flies to the light of

29:58

power, which is the least interesting thing

30:00

that you can be in this world.

30:03

But boy is that all of them.

30:05

Yeah, well I don't think you can

30:07

get that much power unless you're a

30:09

moth that flies to the light of

30:12

power for the sake of itself rather

30:14

than considering why you would want power.

30:16

Because if you consider why you would

30:19

want power, it turns out you don't

30:21

want an infinite amount of it. Yep.

30:23

And so the people who accrue a

30:25

near infinite amount of it are the

30:28

people who don't think very hard about

30:30

why they want it so much, but

30:32

instead are too busy focused on trying

30:34

to get it. That's my theory anyway.

30:37

That's my theory anyway. I guess, like,

30:39

my counter argument to you, Hank, is

30:41

that, like, yes, there are big differences.

30:44

You know, there's a difference between somebody

30:46

who spends $100 billion trying to alleviate

30:48

poverty and somebody who spends $0 trying

30:50

to alleviate poverty, and there's a very

30:53

important difference. We should celebrate those differences

30:55

where we see them, I think. Yeah.

30:57

I just think that it's really hard,

30:59

like... I don't know who the owner

31:02

of Blue Sky is going to end

31:04

up being. I don't know what Blue

31:06

Sky is going to end up doing

31:09

in the world. Like I empowered Twitter

31:11

hugely at a time in my life

31:13

where I thought Twitter was basically a

31:15

net positive for humanity and I could

31:18

never have foreseen the Twitter of today,

31:20

which is a, in the best case

31:22

scenario, a toxic soup fueled entirely by...

31:24

obscene advertising, like literally obscene, you know,

31:27

yeah, that's that's what it's become. And

31:29

so, you know, that's not, that's not,

31:31

that's not what I thought I was

31:34

empowering when I empowered it. I think,

31:36

I mean, I go back and forth

31:38

on this, but I still, I still

31:40

think that there are benefits to being

31:43

in, in a space with like-minded people.

31:45

I do not think that the internet

31:47

exists to try to convince other people

31:50

that they're wrong. I just don't. I

31:52

don't think it works at that. I

31:54

don't think it's good at that. I

31:56

don't think in 280 character bits we

31:59

can argue our way into a more

32:01

just or equitable society. I just don't.

32:03

because I've been there for 20 years

32:05

and I've seen it get worse not

32:08

better. Yeah, like the question is would

32:10

it have just gotten, would it have

32:12

gotten worse faster if people weren't doing

32:15

the marketplace of ideas version of yelling

32:17

at each other and seeing what works?

32:19

But like, I don't know. The tools

32:21

are so powerful that I don't know

32:24

how to live in a world where

32:26

they become less powerful. They're just like

32:28

very, they're very, they're designed to. be

32:30

addictive and compelling. Whichever new one comes

32:33

out, whatever its ownership structure, it's only

32:35

going to work if it's addictive. Right,

32:37

yes. It cannot compete. Because we already

32:40

have really addictive ones. So it has

32:42

to be more addictive. More, yeah. It

32:44

has to be better at capturing and

32:46

fracturing your attention than whatever came before

32:49

it. Or our defense mechanism somehow have

32:51

to kick in and be like, ugh.

32:53

Like that's how I feel on threads

32:55

where I'm like this is like like

32:58

I just found myself watching a video

33:00

of a person like spinning a top

33:02

on a weird table for like a

33:05

long time and I don't like that

33:07

was not a bay blade Yeah, but

33:09

it was like a bay blade, but

33:11

it wasn't a bay blade. Okay, because

33:14

I'll watch competitive bay bleeding all day

33:16

and I know apologies no regrets And

33:18

almost like a lot of the content

33:20

is so intentionally trying to lead me

33:23

to keep watching for one more second.

33:25

Yeah. There's this guy who makes these

33:27

videos that are like, he like does

33:30

stencils on walls in his house. It's

33:32

like, you know, he makes cool stuff.

33:34

But the way that it works is

33:36

that he's always almost showing you what

33:39

it looks like, but stopping you from

33:41

seeing it. And I'm like, this is

33:43

manipulative. But the only reason it's on

33:45

my feed is because it's manipulative. So

33:48

ultimately, it's not his fault. It's the

33:50

fault of the algorithm that are incentivizing

33:52

him to make something that will keep.

33:55

me watching but not because I'm enjoying

33:57

it because I just want to just

33:59

show me the thing and and like

34:01

do eventually because this is how I

34:04

have felt like I'm on Blue Sky

34:06

and I'm like this feels a little

34:08

bit better because it doesn't feel as

34:11

much like something that is just trying

34:13

to suck me dry. It feels like

34:15

it has a lighter grip on me,

34:17

which makes me feel better using it.

34:20

And does that like, I will, I,

34:22

there's this great video that I watched

34:24

recently, I can't remember the name of

34:26

the creator. And she was talking about

34:29

how she broke her social media addiction.

34:31

And it was by just deciding to

34:33

never use anything that went on forever.

34:36

So anything that kept going forever was

34:38

not allowed. Yeah, and that's everything. Like

34:40

that's almost like there's that thing happened

34:42

where it used to be that like

34:45

your feed would eventually be at the

34:47

end of it. But like that's the

34:49

first thing they got rid of. Right.

34:51

And so that's the thing that she's

34:54

like, I will like, I've created a

34:56

bunch of systems so that I can

34:58

go to my favorite subredits without them

35:01

infinite scrolling and I can do like.

35:03

You know I go to Wikipedia and

35:05

I like read the top Wikipedia article

35:07

of the day I don't read anything

35:10

doesn't have a bottom the New York

35:12

Times is a bottom Mm-hmm That's a

35:14

great advice. I can't follow it because

35:16

I'm addicted to the internet It's also

35:19

yeah, at the moment. I'm addicted to

35:21

the scroll and addicted to the to

35:23

the swipe Yeah, but so there's I

35:26

mean there's so many different things to

35:28

consider. There's like the impact that the

35:30

actual value you bring you bring has

35:32

which is ultimately very small there's the

35:35

impact of like the cultural change which

35:37

is I think much bigger and something

35:39

I worry a lot about and then

35:41

there's the impact on you as a

35:44

person like and I think that if

35:46

there is that you have to consider

35:48

the value being brought to you as

35:51

well as the value that you individually

35:53

bring. Yeah, yeah, and a lot of

35:55

times if you consider the value brought

35:57

to you carefully, you come to the

36:00

conclusion that there's not that much value.

36:02

It actually can be negative, yeah. Technology

36:04

is really good at solving the problems

36:06

that technology creates, right? It's a little

36:09

bit like alcohol in that respect. And

36:11

the issue with that, in my experience,

36:13

is that like say you're lonely. Well,

36:16

there's like a solution to loneliness in

36:18

your pocket, or solution to boredom in

36:20

your pocket that is unbelievably good at

36:22

solving for boredom and loneliness, right? Like,

36:25

the best thing ever, the best invention

36:27

in the history of it, except that

36:29

it makes loneliness worse. Yeah, I mean,

36:31

people actually report less loneliness now, even

36:34

though they spend more time alone, which

36:36

is... And I think, like, experience... Amazing.

36:38

a deeper kind of loneliness that's much

36:41

more problematic for their overall mental health.

36:43

They do not experience less depression, they

36:45

experience less, they report less loneliness. Yeah,

36:47

and I'm sure, like, I always wanted

36:50

to write for the Anthropocene Review to

36:52

review of boredom that was going to

36:54

begin, boredom was, because boredom doesn't exist

36:57

anymore, unless you live in a world

36:59

without. social media like you do not

37:01

have to I don't have to be

37:03

bored walking up the stairs I can

37:06

load Instagram and like walk up the

37:08

stairs with entertainment at my in my

37:10

hand and then and that's in your

37:12

ankle pays the price my ankle pays

37:15

the price it's a beautiful metaphor that

37:17

I still haven't fully recovered from John

37:19

twisted his ankle going on the stairs

37:22

I don't look on the stairs actually

37:24

it was more humiliating and I was

37:26

harder my phone of course what else

37:28

you gonna look at The inside of

37:31

your own brain. I usually just put

37:33

a podcast on for the stairs. Yeah,

37:35

sometimes I'll listen to the rest of

37:37

history or something while walking up the

37:40

stairs, but I need something. Hank, I

37:42

can't like can't make it all the

37:44

way up the stairs with nothing. Yeah,

37:47

there's a whole stairs. All right, Hank,

37:49

we're going to transition into the week's

37:51

news from Mark. an AFC Wimbledon, but

37:53

we're going to transition with a question

37:56

from Shelby, who writes, Dear John, and

37:58

Hank. I know you sung the phrases

38:00

of the Wimbledon commentators in the past,

38:02

but today is my first day watching

38:05

a game on Don's TV, and I

38:07

must say I was not disappointed. They're

38:09

delightful, and made the viewing experience very

38:12

enjoyable. Now, Hank, one of the commentators,

38:14

this guy, Mikey T. He's one of

38:16

those people who has a perfect memory.

38:18

Okay. So he remembers, yeah, yeah, so

38:21

he remembers every game Wimbledon have ever

38:23

played, both Wimbledon FC going back to

38:25

1887 or whatever, and AFC Wimbledon starting

38:27

in 2002. And so he'll be like,

38:30

of course, on April 11th in 2004,

38:32

we were playing Charlton Town, and we

38:34

won four one with goals from this

38:37

person, this person, this person, and this

38:39

person, and he can do that for

38:41

any day, forever. Shelby also says, I

38:43

also must say, I was not disappointed

38:46

by Joe Lewis's thighs. One can only

38:48

wonder why he opts. One can only

38:50

wonder why he opts to wear his

38:52

shorts like that. What a guy. Although

38:55

if I had football or thighs, I

38:57

too would bear them more often. Question,

38:59

I understand why we don't like the

39:02

franchise currently applying its trade in Milton

39:04

Keynes, obviously, but what is their problem

39:06

with us? Their manager and players seem

39:08

filled with malice for AFC Wimbledon, but

39:11

like, why? It's not like we stole

39:13

their team. What a fantastic metaphor for

39:15

the whole situation! I know, I thought

39:18

you might like that. I thought you

39:20

might find that internet relevant. Yeah, you

39:22

do something mean to someone and then

39:24

it makes you hate them more because

39:27

they hate you for it. You're like,

39:29

I didn't even mean to make you

39:31

mad. Why are you so mad at

39:33

me? Yeah. Why are you being, all

39:36

I ever did was not want to

39:38

lose my football club? Yeah. Well, I

39:40

have the story, which is I once

39:43

watched, so I used to live in

39:45

a house that was like three houses

39:47

on one lot and we're all... ruined

39:49

by the same landlord. And my landlord

39:52

came over one day, was doing yard

39:54

work, and the guy who rid of

39:56

the back house, my landlord asked him,

39:58

he was like, hey, did you pull

40:01

up those flowers that were in the

40:03

back? And he was like, you mean

40:05

the weeds? And my landlord was like,

40:08

hey, did you pull up those flowers

40:10

that were in the back? And he

40:12

was like, you mean the weeds? And

40:14

my landlord said, well, those were the

40:17

flowers that my wife and I planted

40:19

from the seeds that were thrown at

40:21

our thrown at our wedding. And the

40:23

guy said, well now you're making me

40:26

feel bad. You've told me that story

40:28

so many times before, but it never

40:30

stops being good. It's so good. Because

40:33

the villain is of course perceives themselves

40:35

as the hero as one must yeah,

40:37

right? Like as one inevitably does and

40:39

so if you're in Milton Keynes You

40:42

see this football club that everybody has

40:44

a soft spot for that everybody's always

40:46

making fun of you about and you

40:48

hate them because you hate them because

40:51

they're so self-satisfied because they're Because honestly

40:53

probably partly because they've been so successful

40:55

and you haven't been you know like

40:58

when this all happened back in 2002

41:00

Milton Keynes were in the third-tier football

41:02

24 years later they're in the fourth

41:04

tier of English football like they haven't

41:07

had a good run we went from

41:09

the ninth tier to the fourth tier

41:11

so we've had a really good run

41:13

so maybe that's part of it but

41:16

I also think there's an element of

41:18

like my my enemy is my enemy

41:20

yeah of course if yeah if we're

41:23

in a if there's no such thing

41:25

as like a one-sided rivalry in sports

41:27

And if someone hates that, if someone

41:29

hates you, there's a little part of

41:32

you that hates them back, and you

41:34

don't even know why. Sure. Like, there

41:36

was a little part of me that

41:39

hated the kids on Tumblr in 2014

41:41

who hated me, even though, like, they

41:43

were just kids. Yeah. You know, they're

41:45

fine. Well, also a rivalry at some

41:48

point. Yeah. You want a rivalry. I

41:50

think you probably want it to be

41:52

slightly less intense than the rivalry between

41:54

Wimbledon and Milton Keynes. Yeah. I do.

41:57

I mean, I would like that. I

41:59

can't see how it can get less

42:01

intense because the feeling on our side

42:04

is that they shouldn't exist. Yeah. Well,

42:06

that's, yeah. Now we're getting into some

42:08

real, real, uh... Deep, high conflict territory.

42:10

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's hard. It's a

42:13

conflict that's hard to resolve. Anyway, Wimbledon

42:15

played yesterday, Hank, as we're recording this,

42:17

and they won three nil. Nice. Against

42:19

Crew Alexandria, which again, seems like a

42:22

made-up place. Yeah, well, and they're a

42:24

rowing team, so they're not very good.

42:26

Well, I felt I have to say

42:29

I felt a little bit bad for

42:31

crew Alexandria They got a red card

42:33

in like the 30th minute that was

42:35

also a penalty and it was maybe

42:38

the softest red card I've ever seen

42:40

and I'm saying that as a Wimbledon

42:42

fan That's how I felt in the

42:44

first half that like the first like

42:47

play of the Super Bowl was like

42:49

a total botched call and the Eagles

42:51

and I was like oh, come on

42:54

Like this is the Super Bowl and

42:56

the Eagles were like no, it's no

42:58

big deal. We'll figure it'll figure it

43:00

out Yeah, I was going to say

43:03

the Eagles turned out. They were able

43:05

to overcome that obstacle just fine. And

43:07

unfortunately for Crew, they were not able

43:09

to overcome the obstacle. And we scored

43:12

three goals, one from our captain, Jake

43:14

Reeves. And then a third goal from

43:16

the great Maddie Stevens, who's now scored

43:19

19 goals this season. So we had

43:21

a goal before the penalty? No, we

43:23

had the penalty, then another goal from

43:25

Maddie Stevens and a goal from Jake

43:28

Reeves. So it was a good performance,

43:30

but all three of those goals came

43:32

against 10 men. So maybe not that

43:34

impressive. However, Wimbledon are up to fourth

43:37

place in the league two table. I

43:39

got to see Wimbledon beat Bradford City

43:41

a couple of weeks ago. I was

43:44

in England with my friends. I wanted

43:46

to take my closest friends from Indianapolis

43:48

to England and show them the magic

43:50

of A. C. Wimbledon and they really

43:53

loved it. We got to hang out

43:55

with Marcus Brown, the guy we helped

43:57

sign, and also with Joe Lewis, another

44:00

guy I helped sign, and we got

44:02

to hang out with Jake Reeves, the

44:04

captain of the football club. So it

44:06

was a really fun time. I got

44:09

to meet with the manager and A.F.C.

44:11

Wimbledon even brought me a bottle of

44:13

champagne, which I appreciated and drank. It's

44:15

within three for the top nine teams

44:18

except for the one except for Walsall

44:20

who's in the lead despite the fact

44:22

that they have not won a game

44:25

in the last five games. No Walsall

44:27

haven't been playing very well but they

44:29

had such a big lead that it

44:31

doesn't seem to matter much. Are they

44:34

a recent arrival into this this league?

44:36

They're a big club. There's no reason

44:38

why Walsall shouldn't be in league one

44:40

but we'll see. We still have a

44:43

game in hand over most of the

44:45

teams around us. feel really good about

44:47

this season. It feels special. This feels

44:50

like a special group of players. Most

44:52

of all, I'm relieved not to be

44:54

worrying about relegation. Yep. But yeah, we'll

44:56

see. I mean, there's 16 games left

44:59

to play. So that's a lot can

45:01

happen in 16 games, but I've definitely

45:03

got my tickets on April 18th in

45:05

case something special happens. John, you know

45:08

how you saw the rivalry with MK.

45:10

How? You just eliminate them. to the

45:12

point that they're not even within two

45:15

leagues of view. This is it. That

45:17

is the hope. And then you don't

45:19

have to worry about all that tension.

45:21

We don't have to ever have to

45:24

ever have to play them again. Wouldn't

45:26

that be lovely? Indeed, if we get

45:28

promoted this season, we won't have to

45:30

play them next season because they're not

45:33

going to get promoted because they aren't

45:35

having a very good season. So how

45:37

do they like them apples? In the

45:40

news from Mars, we're still, let's talk

45:42

about water as we discussed from a

45:44

question earlier. So two recent exciting results

45:46

about Mars's water. The first is that

45:49

science. found evidence for clay materials on

45:51

Mars's surface, clay, probably one of the

45:53

most underrated of the rocks. Scientists think

45:55

that there was once a large body

45:58

of water in the northern part of

46:00

Mars, which is now mostly eroded low-lying

46:02

plains. The top of like the top

46:05

half of Mars is like much lower

46:07

down than the... like in elevation. But

46:09

there are also like mounds in that

46:11

area and looking at data from different

46:14

orbiters. Scientists have been able to identify

46:16

these layers of clay materials which would

46:18

have formed when there was running water

46:21

mixing with the rocks. The second thing

46:23

comes from curiosity, which found this is

46:25

a rover. I feel like I had

46:27

to explain that, but maybe I did.

46:30

Which found two sets of ancient wave

46:32

ripples on Mars's surface in the gale

46:34

crater. The ripples are evidence that there

46:36

was some kind of standing water in

46:39

the area. And they're a bit under

46:41

two inches apart and around a quarter

46:43

inch high. And based on those measurements,

46:46

scientists can actually calculate that they are

46:48

the result of an ancient lake that

46:50

would have been about 6.5 feet deep

46:52

in that area. wouldn't have been able

46:55

to tell you that we can figure

46:57

that out by looking at ancient ripples

46:59

in sand. Does this mean potentially that

47:01

when we go to Mars, as we

47:04

inevitably will before 2028, does this mean

47:06

that when we go to Mars we

47:08

will potentially be able to throw pots

47:11

from Martian clay? I bet we could

47:13

not just throw pots. Like I think

47:15

that one of the things people really

47:17

want to do is like build buildings

47:20

with it. because you need to figure

47:22

that out. You need to be able

47:24

to have structures and you don't want

47:26

to have to bring them all with

47:29

you. Yeah. So we could build some

47:31

like clay homes that probably have pretty

47:33

good radiation protection. That is also important.

47:36

Yes. The thing about living on Mars

47:38

is that it's going to be very

47:40

underground probably. Yeah. Well, the other thing

47:42

about living on Mars is that it's

47:45

not going to be something I have

47:47

to worry about. So that's right. I

47:49

think that there's a couple of things

47:51

I know about Mars that I feel

47:54

like everyone ignores that just makes it

47:56

way way worse which are I think

47:58

the radiation people don't think a ton

48:01

about the radiation but then secondly the

48:03

the sort of chemical composition of the

48:05

dust which isn't just rock it also

48:07

has some stuff in it that is

48:10

biologically active in humans and can cause

48:12

all kinds of problems. And if you

48:14

can't keep the dust out and the

48:16

dust is poisonous, that's bad. Yeah, it

48:19

just, it feels like we've got a

48:21

great planet. Like, it's hard to overstate

48:23

how good Earth is for us, almost

48:26

as if we evolved for this air.

48:28

And if the trick, if what you

48:30

really want to do is find life,

48:32

Europe is probably a better bad anyway.

48:35

You really think so? Yeah. I mean,

48:37

certainly in terms of like currently existing

48:39

life, but like there's like active hydrothermal

48:41

vents in the liquid water ocean on

48:44

Europa as we believe. Wow. Well, Europa

48:46

is really far away to be fair.

48:48

And also that active hydrothermal vent is

48:51

under 30 kilometers of ice, which is

48:53

not easy to get through. But sometimes

48:55

it speeds itself up onto the surface

48:57

and then you can study that stuff.

49:00

Yeah. I'll tell you later about how

49:02

we think that maybe I'll do it

49:04

in the Patreon live stream we're about

49:07

to do about how we might be

49:09

able to discover signs of life, if

49:11

not life, quite soon actually on Europa.

49:13

But we need to go make that

49:16

Patreon live stream for our patrons, so

49:18

we've got to go. Thank you for

49:20

potting with me, Hank, and thanks to

49:22

everybody for listening. The capital of Arizona

49:25

is an A, but we can't say

49:27

witch A. That's right. Hey y'all, if

49:29

you want to email us your questions.

49:32

We don't have a podcast without that.

49:34

It's Hank and John at g-mail.com. Thank

49:36

you to everybody to send some in.

49:38

This podcast is edited by Linus Obenhouse.

49:41

It's mixed by Joseph Tuna Medish. Our

49:43

communications coordinator is Brooke Shotwell. It's produced

49:45

by Rosiana Halse Ro House and Hannah

49:47

West. Our executive producer is. Seth

49:50

our assistant, is Devoki

49:52

is Devoki The music

49:54

you're hearing now, and

49:57

at the beginning

49:59

of the podcast, is

50:01

at the beginning of the as

50:03

they say in

50:06

our the great Gunnarola. And to

50:08

be awesome. our hometown, don't

50:10

forget to be awesome.