A Problem Squared - 111 = Mnemonic Serenading and Mechanism Naming

Episode Date: June 10, 2025

🎶 Why are songs easier to remember than sentences?⚙️ Can we come up with new names (that meet strict criteria) for leader/follower motors?🌟 And it’s a glitzy, toothy, clackety AOB As discussed in the intro, here’s how to get involved with Matt’s Moon Pi Kickstarter: https://youtu.be/nGtVej1Qx5YAnd here's the link:https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/standupmaths/moon-pi-were-going-to-calculate-on-the-moonAnd head to our socials to see the Corris Railway Traverser! For tickets to Bec Hill’s Pick ‘n’ Mix at the Museum of Comedy, London on 19/06/2025, go here: https://museumofcomedy.ticketsolve.com/ticketbooth/shows/873654374  For some glittery further reading, here’s that NYT article https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/21/style/glitter-factory.html If you’re heading to the Edinburgh Fringe, you can get tickets to see Bec here: https://tickets.gildedballoon.co.uk/event/14:5884/ And you can get tickets to see Matt here:https://www.pleasance.co.uk/event/getting-triggy-it-matt-parker-does-maths If you’re on Patreon and have a creative Wizard offer to give Bec and Matt, please comment on our pinned post!   If you want to (we’re not forcing anyone) please do leave us a review, share the podcast with a friend, or give us a rating! Please do that. It really helps.  Finally, if you want even more from A Problem Squared you can connect with us and other listeners on BlueSky, Twitter, Instagram, and on Discord. 

Hello and welcome to a Problem Squared, the problem posing podcast, which for all you new listeners is a bit like glitter. And that you think, oh, that looks like fun and you open it and now you've suddenly got problems everywhere. I'm joined by Beck Hill, who's a lot like Glitter, in that she has a very sparkly personality and makes every situation more fun. And I'm Matt Parker, a bit like Glitter,

in that I'm based on a secret complicated formula. That's true, about Glitter. Okay, you're gonna have to- Yeah, it's closely guarded. People get real... What are you talking about? Glitter. No, you can't just keep... And on this episode... What? I look into why songs are more memorable than words. Oh, that's gonna continue to be the same amount of fun. I've tried to master some new words. And we'll have some any other show business.

Hey, good work. That's the closest I can get to a glitter. Beck, how are you? I'm great. I'm sorry. You're going to have to continue this glitter thing. There was like a big article a couple of years back. New York Times tried to get to the

bottom of how glitter is made and it's a closely guarded secret. Tell you what, we'll put the New York Times article in the show notes. Okay. People can check it out. And then explain it to me. This aside, Bec. How are you? I'm okay. So I managed to fit in two trips on two very different tiny trains. Right. In one month and I'm thrilled with myself.

Oh my goodness. Yeah. Most people do like no mo may. Yeah. You do miniature movement may. Yeah. So I think I maybe mentioned this on a previous episode. Maybe not. I did the MacCuntless Comedy Festival at the beginning of the month. The where?

Yeah. It's in Wales. I'm not going to say it again. Right. Do it again. You did it once with a rolling star and you're not going back. No. I was like, landed it. Don't try again. Nearby there's a place called Chorus. They've got a little railway that is a tiny steam engine. I was booked to do a gig. It was at like 10 AM and then the comics and the punters all get on a tiny steam train and it goes to the next, it goes to the train shed. And then we do this, do stand up in the train shed, sans microphone, sans any tech or anything, just yelling at

an audience. But I tell you what, the sorts of people who are willing to get up at 10 AM and ride a tiny train and go on a tiny steam train are exactly my audience. And I had a delightful, delightful gig. It was so much fun. I got very excited because they have a thing called, if I got footage of this, we'll put it up on, um, on socials. They were explaining to me that they don't have the, the turntable that they would normally use to rotate the train. And so they had a, what's called a traverser built, which I know that majority of the listeners of this will absolutely know what it is, but it's, uh, basically the train drives onto a little piece of track.

Yep. And that piece of track is on its own track at a 90 degree angle. So you drive the train onto the track and then they unlock it and then they push it, they physically push it. The track forks off before the station. And so you get two parallel tracks going in. So they do that. And then the train backs onto that track and then reverses until the tracks meet. And then they switch the track and then it comes in. So it's facing the rest of the carriages.

So when it goes in one direction, the train is essentially pulling it backwards. Oh, got it, got it, got it. So that's to get the train to the other end of the carriages. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's a reversible train. Yeah. So it, got it, got it. So that's to get the train to the other end of the carriages. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a reversible train. Yeah. So it can go the other way around.

So the engine itself can go forwards or backwards, but it has to be at the front. Classic steam. Got it. Yep. Yeah, yeah. So I got that on footage because it was very fun to watch them do that. So that was a really, really fun gig. And then-

That's one. One tiny train. That was one. My friend, Ben Clifford, friend of the show. By that, I mean listener of the show, friend of me. Yep. And by the transitive property. Yes, exactly.

He was visiting from Ireland and every time he's in London, we're like, we should go to the postal museum. And we finally went and we went on the tiny train. Yeah. The mail rail. Yes. Yeah. And it was great.

And I had a very fun time there as well. I've always wanted to do that. You recommend it? I do recommend it. I would do it again. Okay. We should do that. How about you, Matt? I'm good. I got some big news. I'm going to be the first person to calculate pi on the moon. Okay.

Yep. I'm going to need- Would you like to unpack that sentence a little? I'm guessing there is some robot probe thing that is going to be on the moon, running some calculations. And due to your connections within the spacefaring industry, You've somehow managed to wangle away. Buddy, you got it in one. Right. Please tell me it involves some terrible Python code. Now they're not letting me run terrible Python code on the lunar rover.

Yeah, that's smart. Yeah. Yeah. I've written the terrible Python code and my brother is helping me turn into good C code. It's a different language. I didn't know your brother was also maths adjacent. Yeah, he's got a physics PhD. How have we not to do this? He works as a software developer.

Yeah, he's just, he's me. So yeah, so Steve is actually qualified to write industrial grade code, which I am obviously not. Wow. Yeah, he's a systems engineer. We've been doing this podcast. We're in our sixth year. And not once have you been like, by the way, I'm related to someone who could do what I do, but better. I'm married to someone who can do what I do, but better. I haven't heard Lucy talk about writing terrible Python. Oh, that's true. That's true. That's true. That's true. No, no, my brother writes good code. He balances out the family.

Yep. That's how we do it. So yeah, a company got in touch and said, look, we're launching a rover, a company called Astrobotic. They do botics in Astra and they're like, it's all Astro. They're like, hey, we're going to put a rover on the moon. It's going to wander around, do some science. We've got a little bit of spare computing power on this rover. Do you have any ideas of what you could do with that? And their goal was to try and get more people excited and interested in these missions. It was obviously very cool to go to the moon, but they were trying to think of ways they could use this spare computing power to raise the profile of the mission to do more kind of outreach and promotion of space science and engineering.

And so they're like, fans of this guy. So they're like, well, let's see what Matt- Matt just pointed to himself, by the way. He wasn't putting in a photo of his brother. That's what they should have done. So they got in touch and I'm like, yes, I want to be the first person to calculate pi on the moon. And they were like, this is why we came to you. Has anyone done the research to check that you are the first person to calculate pi on the moon? No. Right.

If anyone out there can find someone who calculated pi on the moon before me, let me know. But in my defense, why would someone? All I can think of is if, like, there was some system that required the calculation of pi. Nah. Nope. You just load pi, you had the value. Right.

Ironically, the rover will already know pi. Yeah. For everything else it's doing. It doesn't have to figure it out. No, we're just avoiding that. Yep. And I wanted the calculation to involve being on the moon, because I could just load an equation in that generates Pi, launch it to the moon, run the equation, get Pi.

I want it to use the lunar environment. So we're going to use, we're not allowed to drive the rover around. Okay. the lunar environment. Yep. So we're going to use, we're not allowed to drive the rover around. Okay. I'm very much, my code is not allowed anywhere near controlling or doing anything. A shame. It would do so many donuts. It would be great.

And then measure the circumference of the donut. I know. And then the distance across the donut. But it can get the data from some of the sensors. So we're going to use the data from the sensors on the moon as a source of randomness to generate random numbers, lunar random numbers from which we can calculate pi. That's fun. Very exciting. And people can get involved. You are going to call it moon pi. It's called moon pi, correct. Yeah, great. Yep. The only downside is it's expensive. So by adding on extra code to a lunar rover being used by major space agencies, I'm not

allowed to mention directly. There's a lot of additional engineering time and whatnot to make sure my code's not going to ruin the mission. And then there's the transmission costs. So it's like if you're going into Australia and someone was like, Oh, I've got some spare space in my suitcase. Do you want me to take anything with you? And you're like, yeah. But then they're like, I've just got to check though.

All of this stuff is legal for me to take you to Australia. This isn't going to affect the stuff in my bag or bring the ice. There's extra effort for me to go through it all. Yeah, exactly. So what they're doing is they're kind of saying to me, you got to pay for the luggage. Check in. Search to make sure it's all good. Oh, right. And then the data costs to get stuff back from the moon? It's not cheap. Getting transmission. Well, I'm not going to pay it. We're all going to pay it.

You'll pay. You'll pay. You'll pay. So I'm basically, I'm running a Kickstarter. So if people want their name to go to the moon, if they support the mission, your name will be loaded onto the rover, fly to the moon. Whenever there's downtime, they'll prompt my code to run, runs for a couple seconds and stops. And each of those like lunar PI observations, someone will get to have their names attached to one. So your name will get loaded up.

It'll run a whole, as many random numbers as it can in that loop. And then it'll text the results back to Earth with your name in it. And then we'll forward that onto whoever it is. Whoa. And depending on the tier, you'll get a science certificate from me.

You'll get your own value of pi from within that one loop that ran with your name. What? And then you'll get to contribute to the total mission. This is so much cooler than those like Namastar tins. Yeah, this is real too. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So you'll get a text message with your name in it from the moon with your personalized lunar value of pi.

Okay, I'm on board and I don't really understand or care. I know, that's what I'm hoping for. I want to see my name up in pi, baby. Yeah, I mean, as always, my rule of thumb is what made me excited and how can I use that to get other people's money. So, at this time, I was like, oh my goodness, I get to have my name, I get to run code on the moon and I get my own value of pie. And so I just wanted to break that up into little bits so everyone can have their own little slice.

Will the Kickstarter link be in the show notes? Oh my goodness, yes. It will be everywhere. Okay, brilliant. In fact, I imagine I will have made a video about this by now. Yep. So it'll be on my YouTube channel if you want more details, all linked to Kickstarter.

Come on. I'm on board. I really want to calculate Pine the Moon. Yeah. I don't have spare cash right now, but I look, I'm willing to make bad financial decisions based on this. I'm going to have a super cheap option where I can't post you a full on certificate or a mission patch, but I can email you that certificate and you'll be,

we don't know how many loops we're going to get through. So I think we're going to have like the main Mastronauts who are funding the mission. Thank you. And then we're going to have like flight support crew, everyone else coming along for the ride. And I'm hoping to get through everyone's names, but I can't guarantee how much compute time we're actually going to get overall. Sure. So if you want to be support crew, a little bit of money,

you'll definitely get an email to certificate. Hopefully you'll get to sponsor your own loop. That's the plan. I like this. Yeah. Yeah. I'm so excited. Okay.

Pie on the moon. Pie on the moon. I'm really hungry for graham crackers sandwiching a layer of marshmallow filling, all coated in a sweet flavored layer, usually chocolate, vanilla or banana. Yeah. It's an American snack. Well, let's get this episode recorded so I can go make one.

Yeah. First problem was sent in by Joram, who went to the problemposingpage at aproblemsquared.com and said that they've just realised it is way easier to remember music, or indeed melodies, compared to other things such as languages or images. They've noticed that for some songs you hear them once and you don't forget them for a really long time, which is not the case for things like sentences. And Joram would like to know, is that just certain songs or melodies? And I would like to know why is this?

I've got answers for both of you. Correct. For some context, I have audio processing disorder, not to a dysfunctional degree, but it certainly is the reason that I miss hear a lot of lyrics and things like that. I thought I had a hearing problem for a really long time and I kept doing hearing tests and was fine. And then later discovered it's, it's not to do with my hearing rather the processing part.

Yep. And, uh, it just, it just takes extra processing power for my brain to separate the sounds and make sense of them. And sometimes depending on the sounds or depending on what else is happening at the same time, or just like how tired I am or whatever my brain is processing at the moment, it just, sometimes it just means I have to listen to something so many times before I can fully comprehend what is being said. And I found this interesting because I tend to be drawn to music far more because of the music rather than the lyrics. Right. Yep. So I don't tend to really hear or

understand the, I might know the lyrics, but I don't, I don't really think when people say, Oh, I love this song. It's so beautiful and poetic. I would have to have listened to it several times before I'm like, or someone has to point it out to me so that I'm very much concentrating on the words. It does also mean that sometimes I love songs where the lyrics might be incredibly problematic, like quite often. I really like music from not in English. Cause I don't have to understand to, I just listen, I get really a lot of joyment from the melody and the rhythm and everything like that.

I think I'm in a similar boat to you. I am. Yeah. Like music, but don't put any particular attention to the content of the lyrics. Yeah. And interestingly, just after coming across this problem, I had been listening to one of my playlists and had several French songs come up. And I realized that these are songs I have listened to again and again and again. I still don't know the lyrics and I can't really, I wouldn't necessarily be able to repeat them or even the sounds of them. And this comes from someone who has phonetically explained the lyrics to Non-Generic Gretrielle and I still can't remember them.

Yeah. So this is a side question. I listen to music when I'm writing. But then when I'm writing a book, if I'm in book writing mode, I'll have music on. I know other people who write books who say they cannot listen to music with lyrics in it. No, I'm one of those. Yeah. Whereas I can put music on with lyrics and still be right in my own sentences. Cause I don't think my brain is like paying any attention.

And sometimes I listen to music that's not in English, but that's no more or less distracting. It's just music in the background. Yeah. I think it's because, and this is just a wild guess for me, the part of my brain that is processing the lyrics is also the part of my brain that is processing the lyrics is also the part of my brain that produces my inner monologue. Right. So the words that I hear in my head as I'm writing, I would get mixed up with the words. Excuse me, coming through. Oh, sorry.

Yeah. Yeah. Like when people say, I can't hear myself think that is literally how I feel sometimes. Yeah. Yeah. Like when people say, I can't hear myself think that is literally how I feel sometimes. And so, and it's not all the time, but yeah, it's quite, uh, quite often. So I thought this was interesting because yes, there are certain words or sentences stuff that I do remember. Even if I don't really know what they mean or haven't paid attention to them, I know I remember them much more than I'll remember other stuff. And a lot of it comes down to the context of the thing you were trying to remember. So a lot of songs, the lyrics, if you are listening to them, have been written to create emotion or connection or to be relatable or tell a story, they have, they have that sort of meaning and context.

So first of all, it's something that you as a person relate to on a, on a very sort of specific level, whereas if you're trying to remember a specific sentence, it really comes down to like, is that sentence something you relate to? Is it something you find important? Is it does it evoke any emotions? If not, and I think this is my problem, because when it comes to things like maths or just blanket remembering dates, right? And information history, information like that, just raw information unfiltered. I find it really hard to remember because my brain is like, I, this doesn't apply to me. Like how I can't see how this applies to me in this moment. Your brain's just like blah, blah, blah, number, number, number. Yeah.

Which is why I appreciate this podcast so much because while you're trying to explain it to me, that's why I come up with so many analogies. Yes. Because I'm trying to understand how to make this maths relatable to me so that then I remember it and I remember the story. I remember the analogy, but I don't remember the maths. It's only until I'm explaining the analogy that I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's something like this. And so often we just happen to remember songs because of the fact that most songs are a type of art form and expression and communication of a universal experience. Whereas quite often other things that we need to memorize are sort of raw information and data

that don't necessarily relate to us as closely. Okay. Ignoring all this number slander. I agree with the general concept. But I would also argue that a lot of people who do want, who do remember all the numbers and everything like that do relate to it. Like there is a, there is an interest there. There's something that appeals to them. It's like, ah, 17. Yeah, it evokes it, but that's cause it's evoking something in you.

It's bringing about these, these, uh, feelings. And so, uh, it's partly due to that. Uh, that is because the hippocampus that is responsible for, um, a lot of long-term memory and things like that works very closely with the amygdala, which makes it sound like I know what I'm saying. It's spelled Amy G. Dala. That's the one.

So the amygdala is the part of your brain which processes emotion, essentially. So they tend to work hand in hand quite a lot. I mean, this is me just going out of limb, but I would also say it's probably why things like scent and smell will evoke certain feelings and memories with us. There's like a lot of crossover in that processing part. That reminds me of some advice.

I remember our year group being given when I was at high school coming into like end of high school exams. They're like, oh, wear the same like deodorant or scent when you're studying that then you wear when you do the exam. So that you kind of, I don't know if that's real or not, but at the time thinking, that's kind of clever.

Like you're trying to, what can you do to make your brain remember that? Yeah. Because when I had to do essays at university, because if you could plan out an essay in advance, I was like, how am I gonna remember all this? It's boring. And I may have mentioned this on the podcast before.

I would put it into a flow chart where each concept was in a different shape and color. Like, so then in the exam, you're like, what was in the third green triangle? And it would just, it would mean I could then easily call up a whole bunch of different essays and remember the structure and colors and shapes. Yes. Yeah, exactly. And actually that is something that I wanted to point out about what Doraam said.

They said they find it easier to remember music or melodies compared to other things such as language or images. I personally disagree when it comes to images. And I don't know if that's a me thing, I'm quite visual-based, but I suspect, I think a lot of people evoke a lot of feeling from mental images or things. You couldn't necessarily, you might not necessarily have a photographic memory, a me thing, I'm quite visual-based, but I suspect, I think a lot of people evoke a lot of feeling from mental images or things.

You couldn't necessarily, you might not necessarily have a photographic memory, but actually I think we're quite good at taking in that information. It's how I still remember what my room looks like at home. I would say we're good at images we pay attention to, but if you were asked to describe any of the people you walk past

from the train station, stuff like that, your brain is just like visual input. Right. This actually segues very nicely into one of the other reasons, which is a lot of the time we are not aware of how many times we hear a song. That's pretty good. Like it's the repeatability of it. And I know that Jerome said some things you hear once and don't forget for a really long time. Yes, that is the case sometimes. But more often than not, the things we've really remembered are things that we have

heard again and again and again. And often not by choice. When you think about how much music is pumped out pretty much everywhere. You can't really go a day without hearing music. There are definitely songs that I know, which I have never actively put on or played myself. Yes. Yeah. Exactly.

Yeah. I'm always surprised at certain songs where I go, I know all the- How do I know this song? Yeah. Yeah. I went to the ABBA voyage show, which I think I maybe mentioned after I did it. I think we have talked about this. And just because I wanted to see what the projection, like how they do the projection stuff. You don't have to justify it. We're all friends here. Well, no, because I, because I don't, I wouldn't class myself as an ABBA fan,

but I was amazed at how many ABBA songs I knew back to front. And I was like, Oh, I don't own a single ABBA cassette, CD record, nothing. So it's just, yeah, it's interesting. You never in your life thought, Oh, time to put some ABBA on. Since then I do. And I think that's the thing is like you're exposed to music, the same songs, the same lyrics again and again, again. And so that if you were to expose yourself to the same sentence, if you're trying to remember specific sentence, if you were to say that again, again, again, or here again, again, again, it'll lock in. The other thing is rhyme. Rhyme is really useful. Rhyme and rhythm are very useful tools for

memorizing stuff. And that's because our brain is designed to look for patterns. We like patterns because it helps us understand things and try and plan. It's sort of a leftover survival technique. And so we're looking big fan of patterns. It's all maths. Everything's maths. So we're looking for patterns and stuff, which means when something has a rhythm and a rhyme and something that's familiar, our brain is like, Oh, I like this. This feels stable. Sure. You are more

inclined to remember songs than you are specific sentences. However, what about things like 30 days have September, April, June, and November, all the rest of 31, except for February, it's a different one. Put a little, um, little, June and November. All the rest of 31, except for February, it's a different one. You put a little poem. Yeah, weirdly, it's not a poem, but righty tighty lefty loosey because of the rhythm and the alliteration. I think it's a poem. There's some rhyme in there. It's real short.

Yep. And just things like that, little key things to help remind you of certain- Oh, I've never driven in a right-hand car without having to think tight to the right. Tight to the right? Tight to the right. Because that's when you hit an intersection. If you're turning right,

because by default, when we turn right on left drive, we would go all the way out to the far lane, whereas you don't with the right drive. So I always think tight to the right, cause that's the one where you stay tighter on the turn. Oh. And then loose to the left. Yeah.

Which is basically righty tighty, loosey lefty. Yeah, interesting. Yeah, so I would actually say that in many cases, we can remember sentences or specific phrases or things like that better if it is rhyming or has a particular rhythm to it. So you say that's what would make certain songs and melodies more memorable. The patterns, the patterns.

Exactly. Yeah. We do tend to memorize those things better. So I mean, hopefully that's answered both of your questions. I think so. If you like, would you like some bonus stuff, some bonus chat? Of course. Have you still got tabs open? Is would you like some bonus stuff, some bonus chat? Of course. Have you still got tabs open? Is that what's happening?

No, but these are things I've, I've, because I think about these things a lot. All right. I get very excited by it. So earworms, I wake up with earworms a lot. And the general consensus. How would you define an earworm? Oh, an earworm is a piece of music that you have stuck in your head on repeat. Like a fragment of a song on loop. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of the time it's because you heard a snippet of it. Right, not the whole thing.

Yeah, like when we walked in, when you walked in earlier, I just- there was a bit of silence and I suddenly went, well, you know, gangsters paradise. And I explained it's because there was, there was a busker with some puppets miming along to that on the tube yesterday. And part of that is because we like patterns, we like to solve problems. And so quite often what happens is if you hear a snippet, your brain. Keeps running it over in your head. Cause it's trying to remember what comes next. The rest of the snippet.

It's trying to solve the equation. And so often the best way to get rid of an earworm is to listen to the song all the way through. The whole thing. Yeah. Potentially even read the lyrics while you're doing that. Just so your brain gets closure. There, you happy brain. And it will let go of it. That's the whole while you're doing that. Right. Just so your brain gets closure. There, your happy brain.

And it will let go of it. That's the whole thing. Yeah. Yeah. There's some other exciting things that I like. I think I may have talked about some of these previously, but it's fun to lump them all together. And you may have forgotten them because I didn't say them rhythmically or rhyming. You should have stopped saying them halfway through. So then we're like, What comes next? you just stop saying them halfway through. So then we're like, what comes next?

So these are two of my favourite facts, uh, to do with memory and the way that our brain, well, I say facts, two of my favourite theories, one of them is to do with why we forget things when we walk through a door. Oh, right. Yeah. I think we threshold memory. Yeah. Yeah.

And that is partially when it comes to images, the way that we remember images and you said, oh, this is just visual data, right? Yep. As I said, I could remember, I could tell you what my room looks like at home because I see my room all the time. And I know that, but I might not be able to tell you if I was just walking down a couple of streets, I might remember some features that I saw, but I wouldn't remember all of it. And that's because our brain tries to take in all of our immediate environmental information again as a survival tactic. So it's like you walk into a room, your brain maps it out and

it's like, what is here? What is this story? What do I need to know to get my task done or whatever? What are obstacles that I might walk into? Also things like. Threats. Yeah. Yeah. Is a, can I escape the room if I need to?

Exactly. And so what happens is our brain puts all of that information into short-term memory because it does it because the environment can change or we could leave it, etc. So it doesn't need to know long term necessarily, but it does. It does sort of hold onto that. And then what happens is you'll be doing a task and then something will remind you I need my glasses. Yeah, thanks. Yep.

So you walk from that room into the other room where your glasses are. And then suddenly you can't remember why you're in the other room. So you're like, Oh, why did I walk into this room? And that is because they think it's because when you leave an environment, your brain knows that it doesn't need the immediate information for that location. need the immediate information for that location, but it might need it soon. So instead of deleting it entirely, it zips it, it puts it into a zip folder. Right. So that you're not having to run all that process while you're in the new environment, cause it's trying to run all the processes for the new environment. Right, to package up the old memories. Yeah.

But quite often it zips up the thought that you had at the same time. Right. So you're walking and go, I can't remember why I'm in here. Cause your brain is now processing what's in this new environment. It's gotta go unpack the old environment. Yeah. Which is why when you walk back into the previous room, as it's unzipping all the information, you'll go, oh yeah, that's right.

Huh. Or sometimes it helps if you're trying to remember why you walked into a room, just picturing the room you were in before and what you were doing, and that will bring it back to you. Can I just have a little shout out for the scientists doing the research? Because I imagine getting someone in an MRI or whatever so they can look at the brain and then having to wheel the person and the machine into a new room. Oh my, wow, that's dedication. And I will say, I've not chosen the best example because there'll be people

listening who are going, well, no, cause if you need your glasses, you were doing something where you remembered you needed your glasses and then, you know, but, and that's the thing that will remind you. Sure. But there will certainly be moments where you're talking, like I walk around the house when I'm on the phone and quite often I'll be talking to someone about something. I will move rooms and halfway through saying what I'm saying, completely forget what I was saying.

Yeah. But I've seen you do that in the same room. Yeah. Well, like my brain is a toddler. My brain is an unruly toddler that I have a lot of difficulty looking after. So that's one of the things about forgetting stuff. So that's one of the things about, uh, forgetting stuff. The, the final thing that I love is the current theory of why deja vu occurs.

Oh, okay. Which is that your brain will be processing all of your short-term stuff, the information, locations, people, things, taking in all that information, processing it in real time. Well, as close to real time as we can experience. And sometimes as it's filing stuff into your short-term memory, it will, some signups or whatever will misfire and it will put it into long-term memory. Right. Oops. Yeah.

Wrong cupboard. It's like, Oh, it's gone to the upper campus. Like it suddenly goes into there, which is why you suddenly experience the feeling of remembering the thing while experiencing the thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But your brain will realize, Oh, hang on, that's not meant to be in there. And it will quickly grab the file. Get that out of there. Put it back into your short term, which is why then it sort of just fades away. That feeling. It doesn't last for that long, but you're like, Oh, why did that happen? Before they notice. Yeah. Yeah. Which I just think is really fascinating. I was telling a friend about this and she was like, what goes wrong though? Like, why would your brain do that? And I was like, because we're lumps of meat and electrons and things go wrong.

I remember reading ages ago about deja vu and I forget the exact mechanism, but the moral of the story was it happens when you're tired and your brain's not running at full capacity. Not firing on ulcers. And ever since then, every time I've had deja vu, I've gone, you know what, I am particularly exhausted at the moment. Interesting. That could be confirmation bias, I don't know, but that's definitely wrong

and true for me. Yeah. I'm back. You've answered my questions. You remembered to answer Joram's questions. If Joram does remember they asked the question and is listening to the podcast, they can go and let us know if they want to give you a ding for a problem solved. For me, I'd give you a ding. Thank you. It's very memorable. I repeat a repeating. Yeah, that would do that.

It's good enough. Yeah. And if you do want to remember anything, then, uh, attach some emotion to it. That's how I remember pie. Yeah, that's right. Get, have some story behind it. So beautiful. Make it, give it some sort of rhyme or rhythm and. Get, have some story behind it. So beautiful. Give it some

sort of rhyme or rhythm and, and yeah, Bob's your uncle. Our next problem is from Ryan. And I'm just going to preface this with the fact that when you said you were going to deal with this problem, Matt, I said that I tried to read it several times and never. Didn't make it all the way through. Yeah. I kept sort of losing concentration halfway through. Did you make it all the way through? I am an engineer who specializes in software development for industrial machines. Yes. Yeah, I think that's, I'm intrigued.

But yeah, no, I am. I guess, I don't know what, I think as soon as I read those words, I was like, well, this is not for me to answer. I think as soon as I read those words, I was like, well, this is not for me to answer. Ah, now that I think is interesting because this is probably one of the most Beck problems I've taken on in a while. Well, this is what I was saying. When you chose it, I thought, I remember saying, well, I really struggled to get through the actual question itself. Generally, whenever that has been the case in the past, it has been a problem I've loved hearing about. I've found really interesting in the end. This will be different. This is a word question.

Hmm. All right. I, and I've not written any terrible Python code. I've not done exhaustive searches. Careful. Do people going to switch off? No, no, no, no, no. I swear there'll be more code later.

I'm saving all my code for the moon, but this one, it did catch my interest. Okay. Um, now I had the opposite of your problem. I saw towards the end of the problem was a numbered list. And I was like, I'm really going to push onto that numbered list. And I love industrial machines. So the idea that someone making machines has given me a numbered list and a problem. I got excited.

Yep. Okay. Sorry. I started talking about this immediately before even reading it. I should say that Ryan says, hello from Canada, Beck and Matt. I'm a big, I'm a big fan of the show and I've been listening to pass the time during long drives between work sites in Northern Canada. That's good context.

Yeah. Some flavor. It is some flavor. That's nice. I hope you're listening to this right now on one of your long drives. Driving safely. Yes. Drive safely and efficiently.

So Ryan says, as you mentioned, Matt, that they work in software development for industrial machines. They said, think steel plants, factories, mines and the like. Yeah, big heavy machinery. So Ryan said, sometimes these machines have two motors attached to each other driving the same machine. The way you do this is usually by controlling the speed of one motor and having the second motor Copy the torque output of the first to equally share the work that makes sense because you've got two motors

Uh-huh, you want them to move in unison. Yeah now I don't know this kind of mechanical engineering But I imagine if you just sent the same signals to two motors Based on the environment they may end up giving out different amounts of force. Okay. So what you're basically doing is driving one motor, keeping a track of how much force it has to put out and then making the second motor match that. Right. So you don't end up doing a doughnut or anything.

Yeah. So it'd be like if you had synchronized swimmers, they're all sort of making sure that there's one person who knows the swim and they're all kind of making sure they match with that. Yeah. So telling all the swimmers go out there and spin at the speed, you're telling one of them to spin at a speed and everyone else just do whatever they're doing. Yeah. Yeah.

Got it. All right. Love this. Don't know why I went for synchronized swimming, but it worked. We'll stick with it. There are many places in the software and documentation where I have to differentiate between the two motors. Traditionally, they've been called the master for the first motor and the slave for the

second motor. Yeah. All right. Yep. Yep. Yeah. Okay. So due to the abhorrent history of the use of these terms, fair and the imagery they

evoke. Yep. It doesn't feel right to use them anymore. Agreed. All that we ever use them. Thank you, Ryan. My problem is I can't come up with any two terms to describe this leader slash follower arrangement.

I mean, leader follower. Yeah. That meet my criteria for good software naming conventions. Ah, here comes the list. Okay. Here's the list. My criteria are one, both terms must be six letters or less. All right.

So that's why follower can't go in there. Two, the one describing the leader must come alphabetically before the one describing the follower. Again, why you can't have leader follower. Right. So if you sort by alphabetical order, you get them in the right order. Got it. Okay. See, this is now I am on board. I just needed someone to explain why it's important. Three, they cannot share a first letter in common. So if you abbreviate them. Sure. Yep.

Four, they must accurately describe the roles of the motors. As in like there's the main one that's driving the second one. Yeah. You can't just call them like Keith and- Keith and, you know, Robert. Yeah. Yeah. Because you'd be like, well, which one?

Which one? What does that mean? The alphabetical, but- And when we all know that Keith's the alphast. We all know Keith's in charge. Five, they must be appropriate for use in professional documentation. Yeah. Again, nothing like butts and boobs.

You can't put one dick on one head. Do you know what? I think we can get away with that. I think we can get away with that. Yeah. Kids, that's not funny by the way. No. Jokes like that? No, not at all.

Carry on. Number six, can you please help me with my problem? That's not part of the list. I appreciate it very much and I like the manners. So already, sometimes I just need someone to make me sit down and focus on something for me to appreciate it. Yeah. And then I'm like, Oh yeah, you're right. I do like this. Thank you, Ryan. I'm sorry. I dismissed your question, but this is why we do this, Matt, because you read them properly.

And then I get on board. Oh, I, yeah, I believe Ryan from I'm an engineer, specializes in software development for industrial machines that that has bought me reading the whole problem. Yeah. Okay. Right. So we've got to name some motors. Alphabetical order, no more than six letters has to make sense.

Can't be rude. So I, uh, first step was I went to thesaurus.com to bring up all the synonyms for master. I thought if we lock in the primary one. Which is funny. Because in real estate, they no longer call it master bedroom because of where the term comes from. Primary. Oh. The primary bedroom was what they're supposed to call it master bedroom because of where the term comes from. Primary.

Oh. The primary bedroom was what they're supposed to call it. So if you're watching any like selling sunset or real estate, things like that. Yeah. They'll usually, or the below deck when they're talking about the primary chart or whatever. Yeah. So often they will refer to the bedrooms as the primary bedroom, as opposed to master bedroom. Oh yeah. Now very kindly, thethoris.com, not sponsoring this. For fairness sake, I would say word hippo is my favorite. A word hippo? Okay, let's

do word hippo a second. Top dog. I mean, it's six letters. Six letters. But it starts with a T and it gives that, really shortens the amount of options you have for the second one. And bottom dog is too long. Yeah. We're not calling them top and bottom. No, no. And not just for the alphabetical problems.

Yeah. Okay. Leader. Which is already, we had leader follower. Leader follower. Which is nice. Yeah, and alphabetical is not going to fly. Let's go up to strong. Chief.

Oh, Chief is fun. Chief motor. That could be fun. Yeah. And see, we're barely spending the alphabet. Yeah. That's okay. Should we write that on a post-it note?

Yeah. Okay. So we've got Chief. For me, I think it's going to come down to what the antonym is. Yeah. And how appropriate that feels. All right. Lord. I feel that one's too gendered. Yeah, I think you're right.

Yeah. Okay. We're going to go up to strongest. Boss. Boss is fun. I would have the boss motor. Yeah. And that We're going to go up to strongest. Boss. Boss is fun. I would have the boss motor. Yeah. And that describes what it's doing too,

because it's telling the other motor what to do. B is quite early on. Oh, there's so much alphabet left. I'm putting boss right before chief. What are you getting from a word hippo? Word hippo is, there's some fun ones here. Honcho. Honcho. Yeah.

Yes. How does that spell? H-O. H-O-N-C-H-O. Oh, honcho. Yep. In the list. This one didn't necessarily evoke the-

If you're about to say the word Beck. The image. The Beck and the Matt motor. Yeah. I mean now I think- Okay, it fulfills all the requirements. Other than explaining what's going on. Gaffer.

Gaffer? Hmm. G-A-F-F-E-R. So gaffer. That's gaffer me. According to dictionary.com. Also not a sponsor. An informal British term for a person in charge of others or a boss.

A boss. But I feel like I'm really enjoying boss. Boss motor. Yeah. And the other one I like is super. Super. Super. And I like the a boss. A boss. But I feel like I'm really enjoying boss. Boss motor. Yeah. And the other one I like is super.

Super. Super. As in you get superintendent and you just get the top one. Supervisor. Yeah. Late in the alphabet, but there's still letters after S. S is merely the 19th letter. Now there was one alternate word I quite liked.

Surf. That one came up for me as well. Yeah. Yeah. Surf was like a, not a bonded servant, but someone who had to work a specific estate. Right. Like in the Middle Ages as a peasant. Yeah. Yep. So not a great life, but they're not being bought and sold. Yeah. That's endless. Oh, that's the only one you came up with? That's the only one that I thought was acceptable.

Oh, wow. Yeah. And even that's not falling that far from the original tree. Well, some that came up just for that, that I quite enjoyed. Lacky. Lacky. That's nice. How do you spell Lacky?

L-A-C-K-E-Y. I love it. Minion. I feel like Minion. That's nice. How do you spell lucky? L-A-C-K-E-Y. Love it. Minion? I feel like minion. Minion was a perfectly good word that was ruined. Yeah, and I think we need to take it back. Oh, you're taking minion back. Yeah.

Dang. I'm putting it down. Minion. It's not gonna fly though. All I'm getting for the opposite of boss is like worker or maybe staff. Meh. I mean, worker does work, boss and the worker. It does, but the boss engine still putting out the effort. It's just also, maybe that's a good boss. It leads, you know, by doing, by example.

Yeah. It puts the effort in and all it expects from the worker is the same level of effort. Yeah. Okay. I'm going to write worker down. Although I do feel like from an engineering point of view, it's a bit confusing because in you, I think that's the, like, you've got to control why that's not putting in work. And then the work and putting in the work. I'm adding it to the pile because it's very pleasing.

the work and putting in the work. But I'm adding it to the pile. Could be, yeah. Cause it's very pleasing. I don't think we should be revolutionising the notion of leadership in a corporate structure. One problem at a time. Yep. What about Cox?

Cox? Is it like when you're rowing? C-O-X. They set the pace? They set the pace. That's interesting. Cox and Rohr. Cox and Rohr.

Is there a name other than Rohr? Like what's there must be another technical name. The other one would be Crew. Cox and Crew. The Cox motor and the Crew motor. Which sounds quite fun. Oh, you've just got your alphabetical thing under the line. Same letter though.

Ah, same letter. That was denied. Nice try. Cox and Crew was a good one though. That's same letter. That was denied. Nice try. Cox and crew was a good one though. That's why we had the list. In the background, producer Loris has been double checking what we're doing. And she got quite attached to honcho and thought there might be like another Spanish-esque word to go with honcho.

Yeah. And what did you find? Loser. Loser. The honcho and Yeah. And what did you find? Loser. Loser. The honcho and the loser is quite fun. I would like a secondary word that doesn't imply it's terrible. Yeah. I really like, if I had to pick a pair right now, looking at these post-it notes, boss and lackey.

Lackey's fun. I find very pleasing. Lackey, because when you think of Lackey, well, also Goon. Goon? Yeah. It is my Goons. Hired Goons. Hired Goons. They're the muscle. Yeah. Right. Okay. Shall we lock in Lackey? Sorry, Surf. The Surf is no longer up.

And then I think, I think boss, come on. I mean, the, the obvious answer is if you want to keep the same initial letters, you just switch from master and slave to main and second. Yeah. That's boring, but a job done in a nice effective manner. Yes. And I now propose, if you want to have some more fun with it, it's Boss and Lackey. I like Boss and Lackey.

There's something fun and I don't know. It feels like they're real characters. It's got a touch of the sitcom about it. Yeah. Like, like the motors have accents. The odd couple of the, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I found one other word that I really like. You did motors have accents. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I found one other word

that I really like. Deputy. Deputy. Chief motor and deputy motor. That's really nice. Put it in the pile. Yeah. Chief and deputy. I think that's cute. We put a lot in the mix. Yes. I feel like Ryan can reach anywhere in the pool of post-its that were put forward. So if there's another one that Ryan wants to overrule us. Yeah. Ryan's the boss. We're just the lackeys. Yeah, I'm happy to give this more more time. Oh, yeah. You're lucky we're stopping now, if I'm being 100% honest.

Yeah. Pinky in the brain. What are we doing tonight, Ryan? The same thing we do every night. Driving and motor. Driving in a consistent talk. And now it's time for, I think we agreed, any other show business. Yeah. Glitter theme. Yeah. And Beck, you had something you wanted to add to any other business? I just wanted to give a little plug to a comedy club that I'm starting to run. It's called Beck Hills Pick and Mix.

It's a mix between a new material night and live workshopping with the other comedians who are on the bill. And if you had to describe it by naming one other performer you've booked for the first night, who would you name? Someone who you and I are a big fan of. Oh really? Yeah. Oh. Just a little known act called-

Up and coming. Matt Parker. Oh that guy. Yeah, yeah. Great, I'll be there. Yeah, it's really fun. It's very relaxed and very silly. And I think everyone really enjoy it. We'll pop a link to the in the show notes. Why don't you go check out that link?

Yeah, go go book. It's on at the Museum of Comedy in London on June 19th at 8.30pm. Everyone should also book tickets to see both of us at the Fringe. Yeah, links in the show notes. And Beck, we've got some other business pertaining to teeth. Yeah. So we heard from Paul, who said they have four wisdom teeth. Right. Two smashed up as they were drilled out of Paul's head and two intact. Oh, okay. And I'm more than willing to donate for free to Beck, as I don't even know why I kept them

in the first place. Oh, hang on. Is that within the rules? It's not. I do have to pay for them as a tooth fairy. That's what I thought. Otherwise I'm just a charity. You're just a tooth thief. Well, no, it's the war. I'm a tooth. It's more of a tooth collector. Yeah. The tooth fairy very much exchanges teeth. Definitely a commercial enterprise. What was the going rate for teeth? Going rate for wisdom teeth.

Oh, it varies. It does. So, baby teeth, because some people have held onto their baby teeth. Our producer, Laura. Oh yes, this came up in conversation when we weren't recording. Found her baby teeth while cleaning through her mum's place. And I've now said that I would buy them from her. You. Close the deal I saw it happen live in the. Did my rate for baby teeth they have to be yours that's the thing I'm not going to buy someone else's baby teeth from you. Yeah otherwise I feel like then anyone hard up for cash would just go around stealing children's teeth.

You want to look someone right in their adult teeth. It's right. By their baby teeth. So it's two it's two pounds per baby tooth. My going rate for wisdom teeth is five pounds. Oh, surcharge. But two of these are broken. Oh yeah.

I don't think you want the, the tooth dust. I don't mind tooth dust. I still think there's something interesting about that. But I might revert to my baby teeth. Gotcha. I'm out for that. Okay. So Paul, I can either pay you money or I can pay a charity of your choice.

Oh, that's reasonable. Yeah. So get in touch again. And this goes out to anyone else listening. Here we go. Yep. If anyone wants to sell their own teeth to Beck. Yep.

Get a problem posing page. Oh, you definitely come via the podcast. Choose solution from the drop down. Yeah, do that. And then put- I know, one that says teeth. Use the phrase Beck and teeth in there so we can find it. Great, so you can just search and find it.

Great. And I can filter them out. And let me know where you are and how we would do this exchange. I don't want, if you're in another country and there's a thing about posting teeth, I don't want either of us to get in trouble. If anyone's wondering what's the problem Beck's trying to solve by buying teeth, we're all wondering that.

Yeah. And one day Beck will work it out. Watch this space in my face. We also had a lot of people come up with modern words to replace the antiquated word paperwork. And a lot of them suggested data work. Yes. Just by vote, very popular suggestion.

Very popular suggestion. I'm not saying you can't use it. For me, it makes me think too much of like data entry. I think data work is its own separate thing. Yeah. And I, I don't know. It doesn't excite, not that paperwork excites me, but. No, I felt like a lot of people suggested vapor work. To me, that sounds like something you do instead of smoke work.

Yeah, that's so true. Vaporware used to be where you had fake software. So if you had to show some software you're working on to the boss, instead of writing the actual code, you just mock it up in a way that looks like... So you'd often use it to like steal the big deal to get more funding. You'd have a vaporware version. It's a prototype. Yeah, exactly. It's a prototype, but does nothing. Yeah.

So I see where vapor work's coming from, but I'm not sold. I did like Ligma Stigma420, who said clackety. Clackety. Or clacketing. Who said key work? Key work, I think sounds too much like key worker. Oh yeah. Whereas clackety is-

The sound that you make when you're typing. Yeah, it's great. Okay. Five, five, five. I'm just going to do some clackety. I think for me, I want a word that's fun to say so that it takes away some of the unfundness of what I have to do. How do you feel about Ash and Maple who said click work?

Click work is fun. Click work. There's something tasty about that. Click work. We had all sorts of variations on things like file work. Interesting underscore most 6549 suggested duty work. Duty work. Because it's a duty to do the work and sometimes it's a bit

Duty yeah got it. Well done duty work duty work. I'm off to do some duty work Yeah, I can't see me using it a lot of these I'm like, oh, it's very clever And I'm like, I'm never gonna use that you and I did both comment on no iPhones ear. Yes. This is the one I would use if it was answering a different question. Yeah. Which was tab men. Tab men.

Tab men. For closing all your tabs. That is left open. Yeah. I actually do tab men. Yeah. Tab men is much closer to what I do. I'm going to go for a vote for tab men.

Click work. Click work. Is another one. Yeah. And just because it's really fun to say Clackity. And someone has anonymously reached out to us responding to when we were talking about advice for people who wish to drink less alcohol. And they actually say they're a long time listener, but they wanted to anonymously say

thanks to Beck in episode 108 about how to tell a friend they've had too much to drink, particularly because you made the point and they're quoting you, so I'm quoting Anonymous quoting back. I've never regretted not drinking, but I have regretted drinking. Apparently that really resonated with them at a suitable time. So they just want to say thanks and pass on much love. You're welcome. There you go. Yeah. That makes me feel that I now don't regret not drinking even more.

Yeah. You're now, you're you not drinking is benefiting other people who are not you. Thank you so much to everyone for listening to this episode of A Problem Squared and huge thanks to our Patreon supporters who fund this entire enterprise. You may have noticed we haven't got ads or sponsorships or anything and we really appreciate the many people who give us their hard earned money so we can work hard on a podcast. Yeah. Now we like to pick three of their names completely at random via a spreadsheet and the random function in Excel, to thank by mispronouncing their names, which this episode shall include... Yami Swill Kinn Sun.

Udard Mongros. And do you know what? I'm going to say this last one as I think it's meant to be said. Are you going to pronounce the old caps? Yeah I'll say it with the caps as well. Please do. Eric Hermansdads! So thank you Patreon supporters both randomly selected and not and thank you of course everyone who just shares this and tells other people to listen to the podcast and Finally, thank you to Beck Hill for bringing the glitter and thank you to Laura Grimshaw who is much like glitter the plastic substrate

That holds the whole thing together Because glitter is I look this up aluminium metallized polyethylene terephthal, something like that. That's you. That's Laura. Pointing a producer, Laura. And she's everywhere.

She's everywhere. She gets in all the nooks and crannies. Honestly, I invite her into the studio once and never goes away. Okay, back. Yes. What would you like? Ooh, okay. I feel like you're going to get lucky this time. I'm trying to remember what we got up to. That's the only thing is I can't remember what I guessed last time, but looking at this, I'm gonna guess... F5. Is that because you previously had a hit on F4, and you've missed in all three other possible directions? Correct.

Well, would you believe, hit? Whaaat? You mean I didn't sink your one ship? It's not the two by one, that's what you've learnt. It's not sunk. E7. E7? E7. Matthew Parker? Mm-hmm.

You've sunk my battleship. Ah! I found the sideways three by one. I mean they're all by one, I don't know why I keep saying that.