Do Go On - 114 - The Mouse Universe Experiments

Episode Date: December 27, 2017

 In the 50s, 60s and 70s ethologist John B. Calhoun studied the behaviour of rodents in his custom built rat and mice utopias... the results were influential, controversial, fascinating AND a bit fucked! Support the show and get rewards like bonus episodes: www.patreon.com/DoGoOnPod Twitter: @DoGoOnPod Instagram: @DoGoOnPod Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DoGoOnPod/ Email us: [e-mail] Sources/Further Reading: Fredrik Knudsen's great doco called Down the Rabbit Hole - The Mouse Utopia Experiments: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgGLFozNM2o&feature=youtu.be Copy of John B. Calhoun's 'Population density and social pathology' article in Scientific American: http://www.culture-clash.net/pages/evolution/evol_articles/e5calhoun.htmlhttp://eprints.lse.ac.uk/22514/1/2308Ramadams.pdfhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_B._Calhounhttps://io9.gizmodo.com/how-rats-turned-their-private-paradise-into-a-terrifyin-1687584457?IR=Thttps://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/how-mouse-utopias-1960s-led-grim-predictions-humans-180954423/https://www.theguardian.com/science/the-h-word/2016/mar/23/science-ballard-high-rise-animal-research-pathological-overcrowding Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Melbourne and Canada, we got exciting news for you. And we should also say this is 2026. Jess, what year is it? 2026. Thank God you're here. Right now, I'm in Melbourne doing my show with Serenji Amarna, 630 each night at the Cooper's Inn Hotel, having so much fun. We'd love to see you there.

Canada, we are visiting you in September this year. If you've somehow missed the news, we are heading up Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal, and Toronto for shows. That's going to be so much fun. Tickets for all this stuff, I believe, are online. And I'm here too. This podcast is part of the Planet Broadcasting Network. Visit planetbcasting.com for more podcasts from our great mates.

Hello and welcome to another episode of Do Go On. My name is Dave Warnocky and I'm here with Matt Stewart and Jess Perkins. Hi Dave. Hi Dave. Hi, Jess. Hi Matt. Hello. Hello. Guys, how are we?

The last episode for 2017. And what are you, it's been? Yeah, and I'm disappointed that we're ending on a low because I am furious at both of you. What have we done? For two things, I made a great joke before, and you both ignored me. And then I said, really, I'm getting nothing for that?

And you continued to ignore me. I didn't want to have to. I've already forgotten what the joke was, but I'm still mad. It was about sucking in porn. Oh, yeah, it wasn't. Yeah. You're making like a suck pun sort of thing. Yeah.

I didn't even hear it. No, that's right. I didn't even hear you bring it up again. Oh my God. You say, I ignored you saying keep ignoring it. Yeah, I know. Because you're so good at just blocking me out. Which is what you wanted.

I thought it was really funny. No, you didn't. No, you didn't. You can also suck in porn. And also, I got a haircut and neither of you noticed. Fuck. You even warned us. You foreshadowed this hair out.

I told you, when I saw you three days ago, I was getting a haircut. And I've lopped half of it off. It's a significant change. Is it? Oh my God. I am furious. I mean, this is what you get for working with boys. Okay.

So, observation. But you've definitely had a haircut. I've had a haircut. Observation for me. It looks nice. Just like it did yesterday. But does it look that different? That's my question.

Oh, my God. If you were saying lopping off, I would have expected there to be like a visible change. There is a visible. It finishes here, which is at my shoulders. And it used to finish at my boobs. Okay. That is a significant change. Anyway, I mean, I don't mean to air our dirty laundry,

but I'm just saying that I will be a little hostile this episode, dear listener, and it is not my fault. It will be difficult for you to ride a clam now. It is going to be difficult for me to ride a clam, yes. That's why Matt's growing his beard out so he can do it. He's a long time before it covers your junk. You can only... Is that a rule?

You can only ride a clam topless? Yeah. You're not going to wear a top riding a clam, aren't you? Yeah, that's true. Can you one. Even like a, what, like a clam shell bikini? Oh, now you're on theme. Yeah, that's true.

Would that be inappropriate in front of on a clam? It can't have strings though. Oh, yeah, that's mean. Here you're going. I'm wearing your uncle. Yeah, it's it. It's like eating KFC in front of a pen of chickens. Is this mean?

That is mean. Especially if you're riding that pen of chickens. Yeah. All at once. All at once. And you're wearing that KFC on your nipples. Yeah. That's more.

offensive. Anyway. Chicks on your nips. That's my life story. That's my novel. Chicks on nips. Wow. I will definitely edit them.

Going strong at the final dash to the end of the year there. Yeah, Merry Christmas, everyone. I hope you have a very happy new year. Yeah, we do hope you had a Christmas. We hope you had a Christmas. And once you don't celebrate, in which case, I hope you didn't have a Christmas. And you had whatever you were. would like to do on that day?

Maybe a sausage. You have a sausage. You have a nap. I love naps. You don't have to go to work probably where you are, you know? Well, unless you're old St. John. Sinjin.

It's pronounced Sinjin. Sinjin. Delaney. Forwarding's at a funeral. Anyway. Very good. Thank you. Anyway, should we, let's do it then.

Let's fucking do it. Let's wrap up the year, bitches. Woo! Woo! Matt? Woo. Yeah, that's the tone we love. Now, for the final time in 2017, let me try and tell you what this show is.

If you have just tuned in for the end of the year, what happens here is one of us, is it going to report on a topic suggested by a listener, and this week, for the last time this year, it's going to be Matt Stewart. Matt, bloody Stewart. Hey, that's me. That's great, because I've got a report right here and a question to kick us off. Yes. To get us on a topic.

And this question is, the results of what animal experiment, of the 50s, 60s and 70s led to many people predicting the downfall of humankind. What? Animal experiments. Are they monkeys? Yeah, is the answer an animal? Rabbits.

Yeah, I'll take the animal. It's not monkeys or rabbits. Tigers. It's not tigers. Elephants. Dug. I'm thinking smaller than elephants. Rats.

It is rats. Yes. I mean, you really leapt small. I mean, nearly everything's smaller than elephants. Yeah, but. Rats are. Yeah, I'm not wrong. So this topic is sort of about John B. Calhoun's mouse and rat utopia experiments.

And this was suggested by a New Zealander. And Blake, didn't give a surname, Blake. What are you, bloody hiding? Who are you, Blake? Show yourself, you dog. Put your head up, put your hand up. But he did give us his Twitter handle, which is almost like the modern-day surname. And then you went there and had his full surname.

I didn't ever think of that. Hiding in plain sight, Blake. Yeah, very wily. At Cloudstrif's cat. That's a long surname. Which I don't know. If he's a cat man, maybe it makes sense that he's interested in rat and mice experiments. Or maybe he's a scat man.

Oh. I didn't think of that. Maybe it's Cloudstrif's scat. Yeah, it's probably it. Yuck. Bibidaboo. Oh, you think of that scat. Yeah, that's why I thought you said yuck.

I'm thinking of poo. You're always thinking of poo. Dave. Yeah, so who are we talking about again? It went off in one of my poo dreams. Pooh dreams. It's like a daydream, but I'm pooing. He also, on the new system of the hat, people can suggest like a thing.

A topic? A resource that you can check out. Like a link type thing. And he actually sent me through to a YouTube documentary, which is like a YouTube exclusive documentary on this channel by Frederick, I want to say Nudson. K-N-U-D-S-E-N. It was really good. It's called Down the Rabbit Hole, Knudson.

And he does a whole series about interesting topic. So I think it's the kind of stuff that our listeners probably would enjoy. I'll link to that in the description. This documentary I watched yesterday. It was really fascinating. It was like a full length? That's about half hour. Is it funded by YouTube?

Is that what you mean by exclusive to YouTube? Oh, no, it just, he uploads it to YouTube. It's not like a BBC that's been pirated on there. He's making them for YouTube. He's got a Patreon and stuff. So he's a legit biz, you know? Like all legit businesses get... So, hang on.

To qualify as a biz to you, Matt, all you have to do is upload some content to the internet and have a Patreon. Uh-huh. Are we a fucking biz? Yeah, we're the bloody biz. Yeah. We're a biz.

We're a global corporation, baby. Am I a CEO? Yeah, you're the co-director. Oh, my God. Matt's the co-director and I'm the... Waterboy. Junior vice. Regent,

Vice-Roy. Personal assistant. Yeah, personal assistant. Chief Secretary. Personal assistant shopper. To the co-directors. Yeah, that reminds me. Do you need some New Year's fashion items.

Yeah, and you did not pick up my dry cleaning. This is the third week in a row. Well, different department, but I can stretch. I keep shitting myself. I need a lot of things dry cleaned. Which obviously you enjoy, Dave. Well, I have been putting lactatives in your coffees. Get back at you for being prick bosses.

He's the scape man. Boob-B-Bap-Bap-Bap-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-com. Come on, Matt, come on, get on. Matt, come on. So, John B. Calhoun. I thought that's what you were saying. Cal-Poo. I was saying, come on, like, do the report.

No, I mean, like, come on and enjoy the reference. Come on. I'm going to take you out. It's so good every time. It's going to be cut. Look, listen, if that has been cut out, then please let me know because... Whenever Dave Celts, why don't I cut it out. John B. Calhoun was...

I won't let it happen because I don't want him to cut it. John B. Calhoun was an ethologist, which could be loosely defined as someone who scientifically studies animal behavior. So how does that spell, sorry? E-T-H-O-L-G-I-S-T. So just an ethologist, right? So I was in a true of you saying itologist or ethologist, so that's fun. So animal behavior.

Yes. He's like an animal sociologist. He's like a 1960s Dr. Doolittle. Yes. He likes to walk with the animals, talk with the animals, squawk, flap, sing with the animals if I am to miss quote the lyrics. Yeah, no, that's how he used to say it as well. So you're quoting him correctly.

How lovely, different Doolittle. Quick, Matt, do your favorite Doolittle. I'm a little do. Nice one. Should have said small. I'm a small piece of shit. Even better. He's a little nod.

Very cute. I got it. Finally got it. Calhoun rose to prominence in the 50s and 60s with his experiments on rats and mice. The topic of today. He was born in Elkton, Tennessee and also spent some time at school in Nashville. During his high school years, he took an interest in studying the habit of of birds and he published his first article in the journal of the Tennessee

Ornithological Society at the age of 15. You nailed ornithological there. Fucking yes. I saw you kind of build up to it too. Like you kind of got ready to say it and you fucking nailed it. Like you're about to jump in a cold pool. Yeah. That's it fucking.

I'm just going. Rip off the band-aid. Because it's a word you can say, but when you have to say it, it's stressful. Good job. Thank you very much. But also good job to John for getting published at 15. That is a big deal. It's a big deal.

After high school, Calhoun studied at the University of Virginia, America's original state, go Wahoos. We have not researched that fact. People just told us on Twitter. Go Wahoos. No, I did look that up. And Northwestern universities, go Wildcats. After graduating, he moved around a bit working at different colleges, including the Ohio State University, go Buckeyes. Johns Hopkins University, go Blue Jays.

And Emery University, go Eagles. which is a little bit dull after those other ones, to be honest. Emery, go Eagles. Yeah. The Emery Eagles, that's good. That's very nice. Alliteration's fun. Oh, sure.

No, you're right. And when you're bloody right, you're bloody right. But what about the Emery Eagle fuck-offs? You know, a little bit of pizzazz. The Eagle fuck-offs. Yeah. I love it. Thank you.

Oh, my God, I love it. Dave, do you love it? That was the best improv of stuff. seen from you. You loved it, right? You've waited to the last week of the year and you're firing on all one cylinder. Oh, the thousand noises are bad. Do you remember the time we made him do, like, he had to do nine different gun sounds? Is there any new ones with the collection?

Very fun. That one sounded new. Yeah, that was new. What was that to my one cylinder? The one cylinder gun. One cylinder gun. What a country. I assume it's American. At Northwestern Calhoun met his wife

Edith Gresley Go Grizzlies She was studying biology While John Hopkins He worked on the rodent Ecology project Go rodents See why don't they have the rodents

Rodents is great I love that as a team name The rats or something That'd be sick I don't want to play for the rats I don't know This is someone that I've been thinking about Rats are fucking adorable

Why have they got such a dodgy name? They do spread a lot of disease. Oh, okay. I mean, and if you overlook that. Yeah. But I mean, if you, like, they're very similar to a lot of what are seen as adorable Australian marsupials.

Yeah, like the small, like a tree hangaroo or something. Yeah, they're like, oh, God, cute that is. You shrink that down and it's like, get away from me. You disease filled prick. Yeah, I reckon they're real cute. My theory is one rat on its own, very cute. Like, especially if it's a pet. Oh, pack of rats.

But then, yeah, the rat king. But then if you have like dozens of rats, suddenly it's terrifying. And they're tangled by the tail. And then they're sort of like a heaving mass. You're a ball. Then rolling towards you. Stop.

I think that's what the rat king is. Isn't it? No, all right. The rat king is actually several hundred rats and a ball. I think that's right. I think that genuinely is right. Anyway, in 1947, he started working on a long, term study on a colony of Norway

rats. The year was 1947 colony rats. So these are Norwegian wats? Norwegian wats. Norwegian wats, sir. Is that the rat catcher? Oh no. Just dropping off fresh shipments, sir.

Two penny a dozen. And I've got six dozen. That's 12. Two penny. No, hang on. I don't do maths be all good. But do catch the rats. They know the rules.

So he's working on this new, well this, so he's working on this project with Norway rats. So is that legit, sorry, my question was legitimate. Are they Norwegian rats? That's just a breed of rat. Right. Norwegian rats. I want you a rat.

Or should I say that rat new. Get away rat How do you know my name? That rat just gets me The rat knows my social security number Oh the rat got me The perfect birthday present It knows me

Thanks Watt So He conducted this long-term study On a colony of the Norway rats In a massive thousand square meter Outdoor enclosure What? It was like

I think it was out the back of his property And he asked his neighbour if it was cool And his neighbour, I think Like this is what Calhoun later said was like, I think he probably pictured it like a little, you know, a little rat enclosure. But he just built like he knocked over trees and he built this massive thing. A square kilometre of rat, rat, rat. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's fine. You can have a little rat thing out the back of it.

Yeah, yeah. Rats a little? So like an open shed type thing, I'm imagining? It's enclosed, but yeah. Mm-mm. Okay. He started with five pregnant females in Rat City. Which meant...

Did he let it call it out? Take me down to the rarest city. Which meant that there was enough genetic diversity. And from his previous studies, he believed that the amount of time allowed in the study meant that somewhere in the vicinity of 5,000 babies could be produced over the few years of the study that he was taken out. Wow, I reckon there could be way more, right? At first, the population of rats grew exponentially. But then something unexpected happened.

the population leveled off at around 150 and never grew beyond 200. What? Why? He also noticed that the rats didn't spread sporadically across the large enclosure, remembering that the space was big enough for thousands of rats. Rather, they organise themselves into colonies of around a dozen rats each. This seemed to be their natural limit for like a rat crew to live harmoniously with each other. Rat squad. Rat squad.

Rat gang, rats, what do we reckon? Rat crew, rat squad. rat gang rat posse rat pack Oh it's definitely rat pack Yeah I'm embarrassed I'm glad you got there Because otherwise people would have been on the Twitter Oh they get on the Twitter

You missed a joke opportunity I know I miss hundreds every day And every night I go to bed and I think Fuck Fuck That's the worst when you listen back to an edit And there's something we all miss Yeah

You morons I don't know if you ever listen back to the show Especially one you haven't edited So you know I haven't heard it for maybe a week or two. You're listening to it in the car. And I think, that would be a funny joke right there. And then I say that.

Yes, I love that. Am I just the person that would always think of that possibly good or bad joke? Or do I remember me saying that? Yeah, maybe it's a bit of both. I'm just wondering. Or do I, every time in that scenario, 100 times out of 100, I'm going to be like, oh, wow, wow. That was your example of you making a joke.

Oh, wow, wow. Wow. It sounds like an ad for a 90s toy commercial. 130 episodes and you couldn't remember one joke that you've said. I'm really fascinated to hear what people think of Dave sitting in his car listening to his own podcast. I reckon some people are going to find that bloody adorable. And what are other people going to think?

You've got to listen back. Really fucking adorable. I must tell you, a lot of the times, I think I hate you so much, Dave. When I'm listening back. That's why I can't do it. You never listen back? I used to try to keep up with our show. Yeah, I try and keep up with it.

But now I'm way behind too. But if I listen to it, it's good to remember, I find you to remember jokes that people are tweeting in about. Yeah, otherwise sometimes you're like, what the fuck? Yeah, someone tweets are you like, who are you? Is this a threat? Oh, I see. I invited this threat.

That's why you tweeted me saying hashtag what, wow. It's because I said, can you please tweet me? Yeah. Hashtag what wow. Yeah. Please do it. At Dave, Wanky. He'd love to hear how you spell a whap.

So, so the rat, what are we calling? The rat pack. Rat pack. So, yeah, that 12 seemed to be the natural limit for a rat pack to live harmoniously. More than this, and the mini societies would break down. He finished up the experiment after just over two years. So it was a long-term experiment, almost two and a half years. It was somewhere between two and two and a half.

I didn't write down the exact time. The reason why the population never grew as high as it could have was high infant mortality. The reasons for this, why this was happening, weren't entirely clear, though. Calhoun later suggested that stress from social interaction led to such disruption of maternal behavior that few young survived.

That's what he posed. So such disruption living in Rat City as opposed to normal environment? Is that what you mean? Well, I think further, I'm going to go into some future ones in more depth and you can sort of hear

how things broke down in heartbreaking levels. Right. After the Christmas one, episode earlier in the month, I'm like, I'm going to put up happier suggestions. And the other two were just like

bios of celebrities. And I put this one in. I'm like, and I forgot that of course, a famous rat in my experiment isn't going to be like and everyone just had the best time yeah the results were everyone live forever all of those rats now have Ferraris and they're happy they're so happy turns out rats are really cool that's what they found in summary rats are quite cool yeah everyone should have one as a best brand in

1951 Calhoun and his wife Edith had their first child who they named who they named named Cat Calhoun. Really? Not rat Calhoun. No, but cat, the mortal enemy of the rat. What? Yeah, that's cruel. Was this some sort of experiment?

Over the next couple of years, Calhoun jumped around a few different places of employment, and in 1954, he landed at the National Institute of Mental Health, or Nim. That same year, Edith and Calhoun had their second child, Cheshire Calhoun. Another cat. Oh, my God. What is wrong with this guy? They're kooky. They are kooky.

The first one, you're like, oh, it could be a coincidence. The second one, you're like, they're fucking with these rats. Number three is hello kitty. Then top cat. Fat cat. Tom and Jerry, the one that is relevant to the cat. Jerry. Sylvester.

No, it's Tom, Tom Kat. Sylvester and Tweedy, the one that's relevant to the cat. Don't say that to me like I'm a fucking idiot. You know, Tomcat is a thing. You're a thing. It's true. The next child was called Dave. Dave Cat.

At Nim, Calhoun continued with his rat studies with further experiments to try and figure out why there was such a high infant mortality rate at Rat City. This answer to everything, rats. Like this person is exhibiting mental issues and he comes in with a bunch of rats. Yeah, this will help. Rat therapy. He just mimed him throwing rats. Yeah.

I don't think that would help. And that's how the doctor and patients switch places that day. The doctor becomes the patient. These experiments were smaller in scope, which allowed for them to be more controlled. Again, the enclosures were stocked with unlimited food and no predators, obviously, because they're enclosed, right? He accidentally left six tigers in there.

Six tigers. He gets inside. He's like, well, dear, another experiment ready to go. Oh, six tigers. I got them about the tigers. No, again, with the tigers. Oh, no. I also sell tigers, sir.

Sorry, yeah, you come. The rat catcher comes in, like, out of his mind. It's like, I've given you the wrong package. I forgot you buy six rats. You get one tiger free. What a deal. So the only catch, with all these experiments, the only catch is, the only catch and wink, is that there's a,

a finite amount of space. So it's supposedly a utopia, but one big difference to a normal rat life is that they can normally leave, right? Sure. Hey, guys, there's only one slight downfall of you. Yeah, you're trapped in a small area. You will die at the age of three days. But apart from that, it's great. It's a good three days.

To be honest, they're going to be rough. They're going to be average of best. These new enclosures were described as rat utopias. He initially focused on experiments with a domesticated albano-Norway rat. In 1962, Calhoun published an article of his findings in scientific Americans titled Population Density and Social Pathology, which focused on the studies of six different populations. Each of the six experiments had a similar setup. They either started with 32 or 56 rats, so I think the first three were with 32, the following three was 56,

That doesn't seem to be super important, but anyway, and they're all 50-50 male to female ratio. And Calhoun believed they could comfortably house around 48 rats, though he did allow the populations to get up to 80, as he was kind of testing how overcrowding would affect them and stuff like that. But if it did get up to 80, he would like, he'd pull rats out. He'd kill a few. Yeah, I guess he would.

He'd step on 32 of them. At once. and then they'd carry him away Oh, this hasn't worked out well Feed him into his tiger pen Which he's had to hurriedly put together Oh shit There's not enough for him for all six of them in there

They are quite uncomfortable I forgot to tell him about the tigers The enclosures were rectangular in shape In shape there isn't really required is it Were rectangular Is there another thing But what shape were they They were rectangular in essence

in spirit spirit yeah and divided into four i think this is the part of the report where i still thought you know i got to get words in sure okay by the end i'm like quick it really this report got out of hand this is the longest one i've done in so long anyway the enclosures were rectangular in shape because that's my idea of utopia and spirit and divided into four equal pens yeah like with a cross you know like just straight down the middle a plus sign dividing them uh each pen included everything the rats needed, including a drinking fountain, a food dispenser, and an elevated nesting area, which could be reached by a circular staircase.

Stop it. They got a little spiral staircase. Oh, fuck off. Oh, that's great. I remember a girl that I went to primary school with had a spiral staircase in her house, and I was like, this is the epitome of wealth. Wow. Yeah, no doubt about it.

That is so cool. And then she pointed to a lift, and you went, I stand corrected. Well played. join me in the West Wing, won't you? I'm like, okay. Or the other one would be that one that goes, you know, that big one. You walk in and there's a big one and then it winds out to the left and right. Oh, with a grand piano at the bottom.

I think that's what they have, the Sheffield's residence in the nanny. No. They don't. They just got one that goes up. No, I'm thinking of Annie. Probably. Mr. Warbucks. Or are you thinking of Clueless?

Clueless. Shear Horowitz's house. Which was based on the novel. By that lady. Read that in a quiz yesterday. Thanks for sure. Lady, pride and prejudice lady. Jane Austen.

And Jane Austen novel, that's not that one. Sense and sensibility. Not that one. This doesn't matter. Regretting bringing it up. Emma. Bam. It's not based on Emma, is it?

Apparently, according to the ages, middle section. Man, I destroyed the beginners. Those five questions, those five on point of line. Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang. bang and then he got clueless and then I went clueless on clueless and from then on really was like I don't understand these

words sure let alone okay so at face value the four pens were equal they're in spiral staircase some of them spiral staircases were taller than others and those ones were trying there was just a little

he had all these little tweaks that were trying to like manipulate things so that the ones with the shorter spiral staircase would be, he's like it's a little incentive for the rats to go into that pen. But he said later that that didn't have a huge effect on things. Other biasing factors he brought in to encourage different use of the four pens, included the fences separating the pens were electrified so that the rats couldn't climb them. Utopia, obviously.

Obviously the walls are electric. as all utopias, I'll picture them. Is there a day spa? Yes, it's also electric. I would not go in there. Is there a pool? Yes. Full of piranhas.

Interesting. Utopia piranhas. So far, ticking all my boxes. So far, so good. So good. According to Carthune's report, ramps across three of the partitions enabled, like bridges, you know,

across three of the electric partitions, enabled the animals to get from one pen to another and so traverse the entire room. With no ramps to permit crossing of the fourth partition, however the pens on each side of it became the N pens. So it was sort of topologically a row of four. You know what I mean? It's like a U shape.

You can only go in one single line to get around. Right, got you. You can't get across that one last barrier. So you can basically get the two N ones, which was pen one and four, and then pen two and three of the middle ones that you would have to go through to get from one to four. Does that make sense?

And once you're in one or four, you can get back out? Sorry? You can get back out of one and four to go through the loop again? You can go on that semicircle as much as you like, theoretically. The rats had to make, this is still quoting from his report, the rats had to make a complete circuit of the room to go from the pen we designated one

to the pen we designated four. just sort of fucking said. On the other side of the partition separating the two, this arrangement of ramps immediately skewed the mathematical probabilities in favor of a higher population density in pens two and three than in pens one and four. Which I think, does that make sense? So two and three, the middle two pens,

probability is high that that's where people, rats will end up because they have to go through those. They're not at the end. They're in the middle. So anyone passing through? Yeah, yeah, sure. Yep. You're the maths, man.

You understand that makes sense. sense, right? He's the Skype man. Sorry, the Scatman. Yeah. Where do they shit? Basically, pens two and three could be reached by two ramps, whereas pens one and four could only be reached by one. Okay, now that makes mathematical sense. He went on to say that there was space for a colony of 12 adults in each of the four

pens, meaning that the setup should have been able to support 48 rats comfortably. At the stabilized population of 80, if the rats distributed themselves equally, Dave, How many would that be in each of each of the four? Six and a half. 20 adult rats in each pen. 80 divided by four. Oh, sorry, I thought you meant across all, isn't there 12? Isn't there three of?

You assumed I was asking a much more difficult question. Right. Which makes sense. Why would I have asked you that question? I thought I was just thrown out. I thought I was taking candy from a rat baby. So that's how you sort of would have almost expected it because of those tweaks and those other mathematical probabilities

and meant that that's not how it went. It didn't go 20 in each. The animals sort of ended up pretty lopsided across the four. Over time, the rats began distributing themselves unevenly across the pens, and as expected, the smaller groups established themselves in pens one and four, while the larger groups ended up in the middle pens. Interestingly, though, the female rats were relatively spread equally across the four pens, while the males were concentrated heavily in the middle pens.

So if there were 40 females, it was about 10 females in each of the four, but the males were really hanging out in those middle two pens. Calhoun noted in his article, one major factor in the creation of this state of affairs was the struggle for status that took place among the males. Shortly after male rats reached maturity, at about six months of age, they enter into a round robin of fights

that eventually fixes their position in the social hierarchy. That's a round robin, it's awesome. If I beat Matt, I'll fight you. Like an Australian Open tennis tournament style. Topman Cup. That's awesome. In our experiments, such fights took place among the males in all the pens, both middle and end.

In the end pens, however, it became possible for a single dominant male to take over the area as his territory. During the period... Just has a piss all over it. Yeah, I mean, easy done, mate. It's a similar way how you own this pod studio. Yeah. Pist in that corner.

Oh, it smells awful, but you win. You win again. I had a lot of asparagus. During the period when the social hierarchy was being established, the subordinate males in all pens adopted the habit of arising early. So these are the non-dominant males get up earlier than the dominant males. This enabled them to eat and drink in peace, right, before the big bully dudes got up. Since rats generally eat in the course of their normal wanderings,

the subordinate residents of the N-pens were likely to feed in one of the middle pens, you know, as they go for their morning stroll. Sure. Oh, that's kind of nice. So, you know, if you're on a stroll, likelihood is you're going to catch them in the... Stop for brunch? I am but over on toast. You're going to walk off your meal afterwards as well.

You do, you got to. When after feeding, though, they wanted to return to their original quarters. They would find it very difficult. By this time, the most... dominant male in the pen would probably have awakened and he would engage the subordinates in fights as they try to come down the one ramp into the pen if they're going back into one of the end pens one or four right because there's only one entry in so the dominant male could be waiting and they're going oh you think you come back in here oh good luck yeah put him up fuck head right

and he puts up his little rat dukes yep and it's on uh for a while the subordinate would continue its efforts to return to what has had been its home pen, but after a succession of defeats, it would become so conditioned that would not even make the attempt. You know, they'd just start going, all right. I don't live here anymore. I don't live here anymore. I get it.

I get it, big man. In essence, the dominant male establishes territorial dominion and is control over a harum of females, not by driving the other males out, but by preventing their return. This utopia sounds fantastic. Where do I sign? Yeah. Fantastic for one rat only. Even then. Electric expenses.

Even then you still have to be a rat. Yeah. Yeah, you're still a rat. In a box. Electrocuted. But you've got six girlfriends. That's too many. Oh, God, they nag your ears off.

You've only got two? And then what? Fucking else. Fuck. Hell of you. Valentine's Day. A nightmare. Oh.

Six girlfriend. Two. Jesus. Ten girlfriends. God. Once a male had established his dominion over an N-pen and the harem it contained, he was usually able to maintain it. Although he slept a good deal of the time, pretty good.

He made his sleeping quarters at the base of the ramp, so he's basically on perpetual guard. Awakening as soon as another male appeared at the head of the ramp, he had to only open his eyes for the evader to wheel around. and return to the adjoining pan. Whoa, they're really scared of it. Yeah. And, you know, this is happening across a few different experiments.

It's not just happening in one. They're all sleeping at the bottom of the room. They're all got their little. It's actually just because their farts are really bad. So the others would get close and go, oh, God. Go back, go back. And as soon as they open their eyes, they're up in their ass. Yeah.

You see the eye open and you're like, oh, God! That's just biology. Eyes open, ass is open. We don't need the experiment. for this. Yeah, I know that. My eyes are wide open. I know, mate.

You're two brilliant, you one, brand. Something I found interesting was that Kelhoun noted when the dominant rat's female mates came and went, because they also went out and fed and went for a wonder. When they came back, the dominant male rat didn't even seem to notice. Like, he just kept sleeping. So he had some sort of sense. sense of when it was a male subordinate coming back that he knew to awake and to scare him off. But if it was the females, he just seemingly sleep, just sleep through it as they'd come and do.

Yeah, I guess it's some. Ferramones? I guess it's bloody pheromones. Maybe ferret moans. No, I'm editing that air. Two and a half beers, and I say ferret moan. This is why I should never drink. I've lost count of the amount of times I've heard you say that.

Ferret moans. Every time, two and a half drinks. It's always. This time of... Finally, this vaguely had context. And I say that very lightly. There's no ferrets. I know, but at least we're talking about pheromones.

That's true. It's very close to relevant, Matt. Very close. Halfway there. Ferrets are an animal. That's true. I didn't even consider that. The dominant male did tolerate some other males, though.

These were males that respected the dominant male status, right? So only ones who were like, you're the king. You're the boss, Johnny. I'm just coming in to give you a massage. What was that? Was that accent? You said the boss, Johnny, you started this. No, but you went, massage.

It was very confusing. No, when you said it, it sounded like something. When he said it, it didn't. My New York. Johnny, I'm just kind of give you a massage. I'm New York in here. Massage. No, I'm new joit.

From Joyce. I'm a joisty rat. Okay. You've heard of the Joyce boy. What are you going to give Johnny? I'm going to give him a massage. That's wrong. That's not right at all.

Yeah, it is. Where's that you sound coming from? Massage. What is that? Oh, your mouth makes weird shapes when you're doing. If Christopher Walken was raised in Jersey, that's what it is. Okay. A massage.

Okay. I kind of get the gold watch. Oh. You can't understand. Lost at the end there. Oh yeah, just at the end you lost. He had it. He had it that whole time until right at the end.

Just lost control. Got too big on you. I have not mentioned this again on the show, but unanimous support on Twitter for the way I say cartilage, unanimous. Yeah, I mean, that's people, you know, pity support. Yeah, they're very sweet out. That is sweet. They're kind people.

I don't think, because I don't think everyone else, you know, obviously there's going to be some people with your, you know, certain qualities. The majority of people are going, oh, everyone unanimously agreed on the podcast, no one's thinking we better tweet in and let Jess and Matt know as well as everyone else. Yeah.

Like, the job's been done. Queensland was definitely wrong. Okay, you're not taking away at all what Matt's saying. They're wrong. And now tweeted, would you say massage? Or do you say massage? You sound like, Bob from Becker.

Which one was Bob? He was the one who called himself Bob. He spoke in the third person and he was like... I think he was designed to be annoying. Yeah, he was really annoying. Well, not all my characters are endearing. Some of them are just real. Like Bob from Becker.

Yeah, I can bring a bit of truth to this podcast. God, you're such an artist. Yes. Yes. And the sink. Dave. Shut up. Matt, do go on.

So we're talking about. the subordinate males who were allowed to hang around with the dominant male. The muscles. Oh my God. These subordinate males were observed to inhabit the N pens in many of the experiments. These guys spent most of their time hidden in the nesting areas with the females. Yeah, with the ladies. They only left briefly to get food and water.

As they respected the dominant males position, they never attempted to bone any of the females. Oh, right. At a respect. The scientist somehow figured it out that it was out of respect. It's probably out of fear. Respect for Johnny. When they encountered the dominant male, though, they would often make repeated attempts to bone him,

and according to Calhoun, generally the dominant male tolerated these advances. So he started saying some... It's like prison. Yeah, it started saying some sort of like different sexual things going on. In pens, one and four, in pens one and four, where the populations were the lowest,

with one dominant male, the life expectancy was higher in the females and baby rats, whereas in the middle pens, it was much lower. According to Calhoun's article, in the second series of experiments, 80% of the infants born in the middle pens died before weaning. In the first series, 96% perished before this time in some cases. Wow.

Like, that's a pretty high percentage of not getting through infancy. Yeah. The way dominance in the males was established was through fights. The more fights they started and won, the more likely they were to become dominant. That makes sense. Calhoun noted that more than half the animals in each experiment gave up the struggle for status after a while, but among those that persisted, a clear-cut hierarchy developed. In the crowded middle pens, no one individual occupied the top position in this hierarchy permanently.

in every group A little burp there, Matt? No. We were not going to let that go. In every group of 12 or more males, one was the most aggressive and most often the victory in fights. Nevertheless, this rat was periodically ousted

from his position. At regular intervals, during the course of their waking hours, the top-ranking males engaged in free-for-alls that culminated in the transfer of dominance from one male to another. In between these, tumultuous

changings of the guard relatively calm relative calm provoked that's all direct from his scientific report

I love terms like free foralls yeah scientific free for all yeah did he use the term boning

no that was me right okay you were paraphrasing what term would he use he said dicking give the my preferred terminology give Johnny a good

sign I mean you know you're a sign a firm dicking A Charles Dickings Dickens Fuck Is that the author's name

Charles Dickings Oh boy Underneath the dominant males Calhoun broke the rest of the male population In a three groups Firstly, there were pansexuals Who didn't vie for status But would try to mate with any other rat

Regardless of sex and age And was usually, you know Was not fought off or whatever. Secondly, there was a group who was completely passive. They ignored all other rats, and the other rats ignored them, even in mating times. Calhoun said, to the casual observer, the passive animals would have appeared to be the healthiest and most attractive members of the community.

They were fat and sleek, and their fur showed none of the breaks and bare spots left by the fighting in which males usually engage, but their social disorientation was nearly complete. And finally, there were the probers, which Calhoun described as perhaps the... Aliens. Is it perhaps aliens and the strangest of all types that emerged among the males. The probers always lived in the middle pens and took no part in the status struggle, yet they were the most active of all the rats. They were hypersexual and also pansexual.

They bypassed the normal rat courtship ritual, which according to Calhoun goes like this. Oh my God. Yes. Yes, rat caught shit. I'm so excited. Yeah, this is something at... Bunch of flowers. Okay, yes, Jess, I love to hear.

Dinner and a movie. That's date, that's date number one. Dinner and a movie. That's phase one. Maybe a bit of a walk afterwards. Okay. Hold hands if you're feeling confident. Talk about what you've just seen.

Yep. Second date. Bone. Wow, nice. Classy. Classy. You're not that far off. Really?

And I mean, when I said classy, I meant that sincerely. Dave, I reckon, was saying it from like up on a moral high horse. Slot shaming. I think it was slut shaming. Oh, I'm in trouble for slut shaming a rat. Yeah. What is wrong with society?

Well, that's what we're trying to find out with these experiments. Sorry, Utopia. What's the rat courtship? So according to Calhoun, it goes like this. Phase one, the male pursues the female. She then retires in a where borough while the male patiently waits outside. So I guess this is like the movie. He pokes his head in occasionally, but never enters.

How you doing in there? How you doing it? Still good? Still in there? Still in there? Still don't want to... Start here. If you need.

If you need anything. If you need. Only if you want. He sounds like a creep. No, he's not... He's poking his head into the dressing room. Yeah, it's her call. That's nice.

This is across rats everywhere, apparently. Right. Well, what's phase two? So this phase may also involve a dance But that's normally That I think that's normally in the wild Populations, not in these Was this like Eumitham and John Travolta?

Yeah, real wild Do they put on a little bow tie and a dress And they go to a venue? Yeah, they go to a venue If you know what I mean Jack Rabbit sleeves? What do you mean? I mean like a, you know like a town hall

Oh, that's nice Maybe like a yeah A bit of music A bar Yeah. Finger food. Oh, fucking.

Classy. Classic. Stop, a slight shaming, Dave. Then the female emerges from the borough to accept the male's advances. If she wants to, I guess. How does she say no? Comes out and says, no thanks.

She just does that. One of those ain't happening. Yeah. Not on the cards. I'm using my hand to cut my neck. Yeah. One of those. Like, ah.

Uh-uh. Uh-uh. Uh-uh. by all other rats in the experiment, apart from these. They all did the same thing. They all did the same. So she emerges,

accepts, and then do they just go for it? Then they go, and then she brings them into the boudoir. Wow. I guess. Maybe just right there and then. Everywhere is a boudoir when you're a rat.

Blocking the entrance to the borough. Everyone else is like, can I go to bed? Yeah. It's like, yeah, when your housemate has someone over or something, you're like, oh, I just like.

How long do I have to stay before? I need to pee, but I can, Can't really go out there. I need to take it shit. Skat man. Whoa, scat rat. So all other rats, apart from the probes, right?

Oh, they're the free spirits. Even the ones, well, yeah, they're the full-on ones. They're the most active of everyone in this experience. So even the other rats in the middle pens would follow that, even though it was overcrowing, that sort of stuff. But the probe is right. They wouldn't tolerate any period of waiting. When the female retired into the burrowed, a prober would,

would follow. Due to the state of the rat society, the probers would often find dead young ones in the nests, and over time, the probers would often become cannibalistic of these young dead babies. Oh, Probers. I mean, they were sounding like the best one to be until that moment. Is it because the name was Prober? And it made you think of Probe from NCIS? Yes, McGee.

What did you think was going to happen when I said they're the only ones who didn't follow the normal courtship? I just thought it meant that it was, they just had like, um, orgies. Like, like, you know, all in, like 12 rats at the time. But the probes were males only. Right. No lady probors. No, just lady victims of probes.

Right. I thought it was like, you know, there's six male probers, six female probers and everyone's just very organized. Together. It doesn't matter the numbers. Keys in the bowl. Because everyone's into everyone. That's true.

Orgy. But that's what I was thinking. But it doesn't sound like that's going to be the case. I didn't. foresee the cannibalism. No, that was a surprise. Am I naive? Am I?

Maybe. So naive. I mean, what are you thinking utopia's about? Yeah. That is utopia. Electric fences. Cannibalism. Yes.

Eating the young. There were two sets of experiments distinguished from each other with slight variations. In the first set of experiments, Calhoun noticed the development of a phenomenon, which he famously dubbed the behavioral sink. Have you heard of that term? Behavioral sink. I don't think. I haven't heard it, but apparently it was a very important part of this whole research.

It was an important discovery or suppose a discovery, whatever, you know, which he explained was the outcome of any behavioural process that collects animals together in unusually great numbers. Calhoun went on to explain that the emergence of a behavioural sink was fostered by the arrangements that were made for feeding the animals. In these experiments, the food consisted of small, hard pellets. This is in the first three. Small hard pellets that were kept in a circular hopper formed by wire mesh. This meant that it took quite a bit of effort for the rats to access their food.

And as such, Calhoun realized that the chances were good that while one rat was eating, another would join it at the hopper. Because it was taken so long that just the rats wandering past, as they normally do, we only eat when we're hungry. and when it's available normally by themselves and they wouldn't really associate it as a social thing. But that's what started to happen, right? They started eating together. Right, you see one rat eating. You're like, I want some of that.

Yeah, sort of like that, right? Because it was taken so long, they just started doing it. And they're like, oh, I'm eating. Other rats are eating at the same time. This is how we do it. So as the population grew, the rats began to associate eating with being in the presence of other rats.

Over time, the rats would rarely eat unless the feeders were already in use by other animals. Wow. And so that was a big change very quickly. And then after another sort of relatively short period of time, some of the rats would actually build little tables and put those lovely red and white checkered tablecloths over. Beautiful.

A bit of vino. And then they'd, you know, a few of the rats had little moustaches and they'd be like, oh. And do they return? the pellets into spaghetti bull and eat. Oh, that's nice. They'd start at one end of the pellet. The other end of the pellet.

And to be honest, the pellets are very small and that was it. The Lady and the Rat. Have you ever tried a lady in the rat with Lady and the Tramp with spaghetti? With a dog? No, with a person. No to the second one. But no, I haven't. I have not done.

Have you done it? I picture that we're going, have you ever tried a lady in the tramp with the dog? Is that you start at one end of the table? dog. And your date starts at the other end up. No. I'm misunderstood, which is embarrassing. A good time because you did not laugh when we had a bloody good time.

Get on board. Let's do it. And yeah, I have. Is it beautiful? So beautiful. I do like spaghetti. Matt, let's try it now. I feel spaghetti here.

I'd definitely fight you for it, which is how I understand that scene to play out. You're the big, big Johnny Rat. Johnny Rat Calhoun continued saying the process became a vicious cycle as more and more of the rats tended to collect at the hopper in one of the middle pens

the other hoppers became less desirable as eating places. Right, so places became trendy. Yeah, it's like, we want to eat where there's a queue, basically. No other place which has the exact same kind of food, no line.

It just doesn't have the same vibe. How do you say? Genesequire. Yeah, there is. Nailed it. Pastiche. I'm going to look up what that means one day. How would you type into Google, though?

Okay, Google. What the fuck does Genesee qua mean? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Siri told me to fuck off, all right? Rough. Burrotal. Burrotal, Siri.

The rats that were eating at these undesirable locations, finding themselves deserted by their groupmates, would transfer their feeding to the more. crowded pen. Oh, come on. By the time the three experiments in the first series drew to a close, half or more of the populations were sleeping as well as eating in that pen. Wow, they all went to that.

They went. So they not just started eating, but they just started ending up. Through all these things, you know, the dominant male pushing a lot of males in, but it just ended up meaning like they were all clumped into that one pen together. As a result, there was a decided increase in the number of social adjustments each rat had to make every day. Regardless of which pen a rat slept in, it would go to one particular middle pen several times a day to eat.

Therefore, it was compelled daily to make some sort of adjustment to virtually every other rat in the experimental population. So this is one thing that Calhian sort of talks about a lot is like people almost having people is when he was extrapolating, but having a limited amount of social interactions in them a day, which I think I feel like that sometimes. It does feel ring true a little bit. Yeah, I feel like we often see you at the end of that kind of day. Yeah, probably.

Where you have had enough. I've had enough of this. But we're forcing you to have another social interaction. And record it. Yeah. And pretend you're having fun. Look, guys, I love this. This is my favourite thing to do.

I genuinely look forward to it every time. I didn't believe a word of that. Did you, David? I zoned out. Because when I hear a lie, I don't want to hear a lie. I hear nothing. So why you zoned out when Jess was making a suck job joke? before.

I'm so sorry. You didn't feel the truth and the humor. Look, if you said the word suck job, I would have been there. Did you know, maybe you didn't say suck job. I didn't say suck job. No one says suck job. No, what is that? Don't answer that.

I think it is what you think it is. Okay, Google. What's a suck job? Oh, okay. A vacuum cleaner. Yeah, you're employed as a vacuum cleaner. Okay. I've got a Dyson.

Yeah, Dyson. How do I do it? In the second series of experiments, they did not observe behavioral sinks developing as they used a different feeder. That's the main change they did in the second set of experiments. On these experiments, they used a powdered food, which was much quicker and easier for the rats to eat. This lowered the probability that two rats would eat at the same time, so the vicious cycle never began. Right.

They did start, when they noticed that, Calhoun put in war. that the water fountains that were similar to the old pellet systems that took longer to drink and did find that that started having the effect of social drinking so that the rats would drink together. But it didn't have as big of an effect because rats didn't have a drink when they wake up in the morning. So it didn't affect their day as much. And it didn't lead to that vicious cycle that led to the behavioral sink. But when they started drinking together, was there a lot more like teen pregnancy and things like that? I mean, they reach, teen pregnancy, I mean, I'm telling you, they reach maturity at six months.

Right. Teen pregnancy would be a miracle. How long can a rat live? Okay, Google. Okay, Google. It's like how you're responding to Google now? Okay, Google. I think we've had it.

Okay, Google. It just won't turn off. That's enough social drinking. Okay. Okay. Okay, good, go. The middle pen females built less and less adequate nests and eventually stopped building nests at all.

This is another thing that was observed. On this Calhoun wrote, The first sign of disruption was a failure to build the nest to a normal specifications. These females simply piled the strips of paper in a heap. So this is how they built their necks. Lots of paper strips and they'd sort of functioned it into a, into like a sort of a cup-shaped nest, like a nest, cup. I don't know, what's something that could help you guys understand a nest?

Like a cup. Or a nest. Yeah, no, no, just was right there. You could also think of it as a nest. It's like a nest-shaped cup. If you can picture a nest, you're halfway there. You're halfway there. You fucking idiot.

So that's what they usually do. That's what they usually do. But they were just sort of piling the strips of paper in a heap. and sometimes trampling them into a pad that showed little signs of cup formation. Thank you. Thank you, Calhoun, coming in with the goods there. I knew I didn't come up with cup from nowhere.

Straight from bloody Calhoun's mouth. He's a rat mouth. Oh, he's a cup. Straight from his cup. The cupath overflow with knowledge from Calhoun. The cup is the overflow? That's something. That's Shakespeare right there.

Thank you. Later in the experiment, they would bring fewer and fewer strips to the nesting site. In the midst of transporting a bit of material, they would drop it to engage in some other activity occasioned by contact and interaction with other individuals they meant on the way. So they'd bump into someone and go, oh. Jenny! It is great to see you. I have not seen you in weeks.

And be very distracted, whereas in normal circumstances, that wouldn't happen. They'd be very focused on the task at hand. They'd be building the nest. Right. In the extreme disruption of their behavior during the later months of the population's history, they would build no nests at all, but would bear their litters on the sawdust in the burrow box, just as is, which is not ideal. He went on to say that the middle pen females similarly lost the ability to transport their litters from one place to another.

They would move only part of their litters and would scatter them by depositing the infants in different places or simply dropping them on the floor of the pen. The infants thus abandoned throughout the pen were seldom nursed. They would die where they were dropped and were thereupon generally eaten by the adults. Calhoun suggested that in time failures of reproductive function would have caused the colonies to die out entirely, which I guess is the silver lining there, this hell.

The silver lining said it will end. Yeah, it would have and it did. But one of his assistants publicly said it was hell. It was rat hell. Oh, that's so sad. Yeah, this is fucked. It's all fucked. But, sorry, spoiler alerts.

I mean, it's all equally fucked to that. It doesn't get much more fucked. At the end of the first series of experiments, he took the healthiest four male and four females and let them live in more normal circumstances, right? Just to see if there was ongoing, like, down a couple of generations, were they affected by... Right, because they learn how to do their normal stuff again.

Right, exactly. But he found that even though they were in the prime of their life and they no longer lived in overpopulated environments, they produced fewer litters in the next six months than would normally have been expected. And none of the offspring that were born survived to maturity. None of them? None of them.

Weird. Anyway, so yeah, it's all pretty fucked. The article that I've been quoted, writing from. So, you know, a lot of that stuff was direct from his report, which is there's no footage, there's very few photos, there's some illustrations, or not publicly available photos.

They're in crayon. And it's like a very poorly drawn big rat, and then some writing that's backwards, it says rat. Rat. And that little arrow. So that report is where it all is from. So most of that was direct from the horse's mouth. The cat's mouth.

And it, well, the cat's dad's mouth. Cat dad. Cat dad. Cat dad. Daddy cat. Matt, come on. That's funny. Go on.

Scooby-de-pap-bap. Skidly bimba. Oh, ah. A little apaca. I'm going to spend about 15 hours on this. We did shitting all over it. Speaking of which, Fights are very funny.

They're so funny. So anyway, this article that I've been quoting from got very popular. It blew up, right? At the time? At the time. People were super fascinated by the experiments and Calhoun's findings. He became somewhat of a celebrity. The rat celebrity.

In later years, he met the Pope. Wow. People started comparing the results to humans and drawing conclusions that the increasingly populated urban areas were heading for similarly disastrous ends. We're all going to eat our babies. There's going to be one big Johnny at the bottom of our ramps. And we're not going to have homes. We're just going to fucking...

Shit on the floor. Shit on the floor. I think they're right. I think they're right. We're doomed. They were genuinely worried about that back then because, you know, those urban areas were starting to explode in population. Population density was increasing at a pretty fast rate. And there was already that kind of worry about these things.

So this played right into that. They wanted to find out if the findings would transfer to humans, but results were inconclusive. This isn't him, this is others. It's sort of many other experiences were going on with humans themselves. They put humans in four quadrants. The same quadrant? They're built for rats.

They're wearing them as a belt, basically. There's four guys just standing. Looking right at each other going, yeah, this is no good. And one of them's going, all the women are mine. And one of them's going, I'm going to eat you. And all the fences are electric, so they're permanently. Touching a bird. Ah!

Ah! Ah! It's still utopia. This rat food tastes pretty good, huh? You got to try the Bolognais. Oh, so good. Luigi does it so well. Luigi.

Oh, God. What? That's a name, Matt. But results were inconclusive. Certainly nothing like the apocalyptic findings of the rat studies of Calhoun. No human behaviour sinks could be found in any of the studies that were taking out. Calhoun went back to conduct more experiments at NIM, back where he enjoyed it in the rodent world.

Of course it's not going to be the same sort of sink Because humans are already social animals Unlike the rats naturally Aren't rats So rats aren't social at all Didn't you say that before That usually they would not stop They'd eat in solitary

They wouldn't like stop to have a chat But humans are like hey how are you? Yeah there's a lot of things They're definitely rats and humans Are not exactly the same If that's what you mean Case closed Are they not

No no We don't have that I thought it was like yams and sweet potato. It was like, you know, same thing. No, it is. You're both right. Somehow. Somehow.

So we went back to NIM. This would prove to be his most famous mouse universe experiment. Oh my God, mouse universe. For a second, I thought you were going to say mouse university. And I was like, oh, that's fucking cute. Look at him in their little lectures. What do you learn about? Astrophysics.

Of course you are. You're a smart little mouse. He's got little glasses on. Fuck, that's cute. This episode called Mouse Universe, Matt? Could be. Oh, that's a good title. I've got it down as the Mouse Universe experiments, I think.

Oh, perfect. Oh, great. So he later published the findings of his article. So he did it again. On BuzzFeed. It was all sort of behind closed doors. I reckon that's what he'd do today. Real science.

He said a, what did he say, all in brawl or something? I love it. Free for all. He talks in very. Yeah, like very, very easily readable layman chat. The mouse uses its rat chumpers to eat the food. Do you mean teeth? Yeah, rat champers.

Again, what accent is that? Mouth champers! I got, I broke him. I broke him. It's okay, Dave. Dave, Dave, come back. Oh, fuck you. Come back, Dave.

Fuck you real good. See, now he's stuck in the character. I don't know how we're going to get Dave back. Dave. Dave. Dave. Dave. Have you with my rat chump.

This is a safe place. Dave. Yeah, chump out of every situation. Okay, Matt, you just keep going and Dave will come back eventually. So we're back at NIM, right? Mouse universe experiments going on. This is a big one. This is a big famous one.

And he, the findings he published in an article, titled Death Squared, the explosive growth and demise of a mouse population. Far out, that's cool. Death Squared. That was cool, but the rest of it wasn't. Dave, are you back? Oh, sorry, hello. Where'd I go? This article opens. I shall largely speak of mice, but my thoughts are on man, on healing, on life and its

evolution. Okay, all right. Threatening life and evolution of the two deaths, death of the spirit and death. And death of the body. Now he's a philosopher. Is this a scientist? No.

I don't, yeah, I guess not really. Sort of. I'm picturing him in a white coat. Yeah. I saw a video of him smoking a pipe. No, you did it. Yeah, so I did. That's cool.

I believe you. You know who else smokes a pipe? Stanton fried man. I remember the guy that was the UFO. It's got a little bit of that vibe about it. Like Stanton? Well, what is this going, an ethologist or something? What was the word again?

Yeah, that was right. Yeah. Same div. Uphologist. Upholist, ethologist. So in the article, he references the Bible a bit as well. Which is what you want in science. Science.

He includes mentions of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Science. Science, very science. One of the four horsemen is, of course, science. The four ratmen of the apocalypse. So the mouse universe experiment, so this one is also known as Universe 25. He's built many of these. things over the time, began in

1968. There were many similarities to the rat experiments as in there was plenty of food sources, nesting areas, all the bloody things they want in a utopia, water, unlimited supply of all these things. Again, the only obvious catch was that there was

a limit on space. There were some differences, though. Instead of Norway rats, Calhoun brought in albino house mice. This enclosure was different too. To suit mice better, it was more vertical,

with mesh tunnels leading up to housing areas which were referred to as walk-up apartments. Oh, a split level. Jess, this doesn't... This doesn't. This does strike me with the fact that it resembles the Sims a lot. Yeah, this guy's just playing Sims. It's just playing Sims before the Sims existed with mice.

I've never... Only real pain. Put my Sims. My Simms. Did you, so you actually played with mice sims? Wow. That is very, that's more similar than I think even Dave realized. I was just joking around, but apparently.

I don't understand what you mean. I don't get it. What do you mean? What do you get that? And tell me, Jess. Yes, Dave. You locked one of these mice sins, as you call them, in a bedroom without a door and a fireplace and set fire to the room.

Have you done this? I've never done that, David. I helped them achieve their dreams. Have you ever put a mice sim in the pool and taken away the pool? pool ladder so they swim around until they drown? Is this true? I put it to you, Miss Perkins. Bit of cat, mousy.

No comment. That always means, yes. Guilty. I think we got it right where we bloody want to. I mean, if you're a sim, even if you're a mouse sim, surely you don't need the ladder to get. Just use a bit like a little, just a little push-up. A bit of incentive. Bloody hell, you're dying and you can't find.

find the strength to pull yourself up out of a pool? Yeah. Or to go to the shallow end and just stand there. Stand there. No, they won't do it. I don't think there's shallow ends in their pools. Oh, that's a terrible design floor. Yeah, it's not safe for all.

And they are mice. So, I mean, obviously, they probably don't have human upper body strength. Probably. Can't guarantee it. I'm no Calhoun. You're no ethologist. Calhoun estimated that up to 3,800 mice could liver here. So a much bigger...

Could liver here? And dire here. Get busy livering or get busy dyeing. Dyerrearing? I do not like the poo. Finally a joke on this show. They got us all. That was the hardest I've ever made Dave laugh.

Wow. And it was by making a fart noise. Fun fact. better on my right hand. A well-timed fart noise. I'll put it to you. Thank you. You can't get out of lawyer mode.

I'll put it to you. I'll put it to you, my lady. Can you confirm your whereabout during the fart? I was right in front of you, Dave. Producing the fart. So 3,800 miles, right? That's way more than the old one.

Yeah, the old one of the rat. Of the rat. Of the rat. Of the rat. Of the rat. 80, yeah. Oh, yeah, rat city was, was bigger, but the ones beyond rats, rat city was the one in the big outdoor area of his name. Right, but still they only had, what, 200 or something?

Yeah, it only ever got up to 200. But that was, it was had the ability to go bigger, like 5,000, I think, that one. So this one isn't even quite as big as that one. But it's still, you know, big. But this time, unlike the rat ones where he said. said he would limit it to 80. He wasn't going to limit it at all. He was going to be hands off.

Whatever happens happens in terms of numbers, right? The experiment began with four pairs of mice introduced into the new habitat. The first 104 days were called by Calhoun, the adjustment phase, as the first eight mice figured out their surroundings and their new mice friends. Was that his words? That wasn't... No, that's, I mean, that's... That's adorable.

I think his words were 104 days. The rest were mine. Little mice friends, they're having mixes. Barbecues. Just catching up. Playing some icebreaker games. Yeah. Hi, I'm Jess, 27, Virgo.

Virgo. Oh, the ice is broken, Jess. Yeah. Are we soulmates yet? Yes, of course. So during that time, that was just those original mice, right? No births happened at that point. How long's a rat pregnancy?

Gamble the months. Some amount of days. Wouldn't be that long. You wouldn't think. Not as long as, not as a human. I'll almost guarantee that. Galhoun called phase two, the exploitation phase. During this phase, the population grew quickly doubling around every two months.

So I guess that should help us understand that. A couple months, maybe, if it doubles every two months? No, it would be less than that then, right? Dave, do the math. Well, there's a lot of variables. There's lots. It's always variables with Dave. Okay, Google.

How long does Rat City take to double? Google? Google. She hung up. So it reached over 60. 600 mice by day 315. But from this point, the numbers grew much slower, doubling around every five months. This period was dubbed the stagnation phase.

On day 600, the final mouse that survived birth was born, bringing the population to 2,200 mice. The final... Mouse down. Can you say the final mouse that survived birth? Yes. So from then on, no mice survived. Wow, that's crazy. None.

Infancy, yeah. So it peaked at 2,200, which was about 1,600 less than the space allowed for. In the time, the population grew from 600 to 220, the mice societal structures broke down. It was noted that the mice grouped together in one area of the pen again, only this time without any trickery from Calhoun. So there was no food tricks. or ladder tricks or anything like that. Yeah. They could have gone.

It was pretty open for them to move around. But they didn't. They still sort of clumped in one area. During the stagnation phase, the mice mirrored many of the behaviors of the rats in the previous experiments. In the wild, mice who don't find a click, but I don't know if that's what they call them or whatever, they just go.

They leave that mice colony go elsewhere, right? But obviously in this case, they can't do that. So the mice who didn't find a spot in their little society just sort of withdrew and just sort of zombieed. They just sort of floated through life. The males ended up living on the ground of the enclosure and they would often fight with one another. Often one of these zombie sort of mice, that's not what he called them, that's what I'm going to call me, but they would just cop it.

They'd just take a beating, right? because they just sort of had no real will to live. They didn't have a purpose. With the females in a similar scenario where they didn't find a spot, they retreated to the highest part of the enclosure, and this is when the behaviour sync began. The following phase was the final phase, which Calhoun titled the death phase, which...

Sounds promising. It's ominous. Jess was quite closer to the... Prominus. Thank you. Thank you. The most No, thank you.

No, thank you. No, thank you. So the death phase. The most notable part of this phase was that there was a whole generation of young who were rejected by their mothers, meaning that they didn't know how to behave properly when they reached maturity. The females, so the rejected female rats grew up to have less offspring themselves,

and the offspring they did have, they showed, no maternal instinct towards it all. So they just didn't, they didn't. Didn't help with its homework. That's right. So they all started flanking out of math. Exactly. Oh, that's not on.

Because I mean, they, they never had it, they never had it shown to them. So they didn't know how to do it, I guess. The males, so, but no instinct is interesting. I thought some of that was just inborn. Inborn. In ingrained. Ingrained. Jason born.

That's a, who else? Quite different. Jason grain. Jason grain. My local butcher. Good on you, Jason. Geez, he would have, you know, everyone would have thought we know what Jason Greene is going to be a baker. But no.

He really went, fuck you, mom and dad. Yeah. I'm going to butcher. I want to butcher. I was born to butcher. Is that what they call it? As Johnny Grayne always used to say. Or whatever his name was moments ago.

Get busy butching. And so on and so forth. The males of this generation, so the lost males, the male babies that were booted out, grew up and ended up not being interested in boning at all, right? They never got into fights. They spent all their time sleeping, eating, drinking and grooming themselves. Sound familiar? Millennials?

No, they're very interested in boning. Yeah, sorry, it's that butt with boning. With added boning. They were soon dubbed by Calhoun in his team, The Beautiful Ones. Oh. He thinks he's God, doesn't he? Yeah. Yeah.

A little bit. So the beautiful ones ended up, like, because they didn't have any fight. So they just had this beautiful coat. They were grooming themselves all the time, very well fed and all that sort of stuff. So they were just, they were just hot mice. Hot mice with nothing to do with it. Was Colhoun attracted to these mice? Yeah.

Did he ever think about boning the mice? You're my beautiful ones. Who's my little beautiful mouse? Did he kiss the mice, Matt? Did he kiss the mice? Did he mention that in his report? He didn't mention that in his report, but he didn't mention that he didn't kiss the mice. He did describe in great detail what mouse kisses feel like.

He said, I don't know, I can't tell you how I got this information. But I have come across this information. That's all I can say. And, oh my. I've already said too much. Oh, me, oh my. Mouse kisses. Between the beautiful males and the non-maternal formal.

females, the demise of the population was sealed. Breeding would never resume, as these patterns of behavior were permanently changed. Conclusions were drawn at the time that the results were evidence of the dangers of an overpopulated world and that when all social roles are filled, competition and stress experience will lead to a total breakdown of social behaviors leading to the demise of the population. I think I got some of that sweetness from Wikipedia. That's a great line there, right?

That's good. Poetry. I just like the word demise, to be honest. Anytime. Demise is great. Love that word. Calhoun finished his article with a warning about how the fate of these mice may end up being the fate of humankind, saying, For an animal so complex as man, there is no logical reason why a comparable sequence of events should not also lead to species extinction.

What? Because it happened to an animal that's not as complex as man? There's no logical reason, Dave. Read and weep I'm weeping His work has been lauded and criticised over the years But there is no doubt

It's been very influential Still talked about Certainly back then It was seen as being super important According to the Smithsonian website The work tapped into the era's Feeling of dread That crowded urban areas

Heralded the risk of moral decay They also noted That a bunch of science fiction works Like Soylent Green Played on Kowlohoun's ideas Wow. So it's influential in artistic fields as well. Yes. Yeah, in the creative fields. I quite like this Masonian article a lot. It seemed to be like a pretty level-headed about it.

It was also quoting a lot from this article on I-09 Gizmodo by Esther Inglis Arkell. And they were sort of talking about how interpretations of his work has changed. and Inglis Arkell talks about how the enclosures he crowded weren't really overcrowded. Rather, it was isolation that enabled aggressive masters stakeout territory. It wasn't overcrowded, it was isolation. And also... Enclosures. Being an enclosure.

I mean, it's in the word, enclosed. Yeah, right. Enclosed. But because they can't, there's not enough, they can't get away. Can't get away. So normally, some of those ones that, you know, were starting to behave weird. you know, they would just move on. Right.

So they can't really find a normal level because the excess roles, you know, they don't create new roles for the bigger they get. Yeah. It's like prison, you know, it's not natural. I think that's why they actually, around that time, they figured out that prisons were the best place to do similar tests on humans. But they even found in that case, there's some similarities, but not really not enough that this.

is super important to, you know, to relate it all to humans. So in her article, English Arkell wrote, instead of a population problem, one could argue that Universe 25 had a fair distribution problem, which may be that you could relate to the world today. So that's the story, that's a report. I don't know. What do you get, do you feel like you guys learned anything from those studies? Yeah, I learned a lot about rats.

Right. I was listening. The mating. To the rat bit. Yeah. Which was the majority of it. Oh, good. You tuned out for the mice.

What's a mouse? I mean, you said it in a... Enclosure. No, I do... I thought that was really interesting. I've never heard of those experiments. No, me either. Those things...

With experiments like that, you feel like they probably have a lot of benefit that you don't know about, but then you also think, that's really fucked. Yes. Oh, yeah. It's so fucked to those... Of that stuff, you know, of science experiments over the last couple hundred years. I've had some horrible downsides, but then also we've learned a lot of good things. So it's difficult.

Yeah, war's brought technology on further. Yeah, that's right. Is it worth the cost of a war? But I'm just impressed when people can, like, stick to studies like that for long periods of time. Just anyone who can do anything for a long period of time. Slowly. I have commitment issues. Do you reckon you just put the mice in there and then walk away and forget about it?

I'd go on holiday. They had, like, they had viewing platforms. The rooms were built around so they could just watch them from angles. Oh, my God. So, like, they wouldn't see the humans that much. No, but they could. So it wasn't like they'd see the humans drop the food in. Like, there was machines to.

No, I don't know about it. I assume that may have been the humans getting right in there. I think that, yeah. I mean, there are all other things that, how do you factor that into your findings? Yeah, because aren't people, I don't know, do rats notice that the food's coming from? It's like these weird god, like creatures. There was also an interesting part that I read about

In one of these, I think one of the middle ones Are the rat things If you, when you first went in there, you couldn't breathe It took you quite a while to readjust to the stench Oh, really? Yeah, of course And that's where they're working every day You've just become used to it

Which doesn't feel like an ideal Quality of air We bloody put up with it in here, don't we? You're going to make that very hard to edit out all of that success jess success i do have a couple of quick fun facts which jess um you know it's they're both a roll of the darsis i will decide but that's i mean that's why i like to play the game uh jess tells me i'm an idiot aka i'm attempting fun facts okay fun fact fun fact number one of two rory calhoun so we're talking about today we're talking about another calhoun john b calhoun

Rory Calhoun was an American actor and name checked in the Simpsons episode two dozen and one grey hounds. Right, where they have... When he's standing up and he's having... And Burns and Smithers are talking. And Burns is going, look at him standing there. He reminds me of, oh, what's his name?

Smith's like, oh, he's having some guesses. No, the one, you know, the one he stands. Rory Calhoun was an old American actor, which I never knew, but I just couldn't stop thinking about Calhoun. Anyway, he was not related to John B. Calhoun. It wasn't even his wasn't even in a Rory Kahn's birth name. Matt, look at my face.

Do you think that was a fun fact? I personally do. Anytime you can bring up The Simpsons. Yeah, I mean, I was probably aiming out of the wrong judge. No, I'm guessing that is not a fun fact. Pandering it at me. Come on, fact number two. Two of two.

Bring it home strong. Number two. You always have your strongest one. All right. It really gets him. Fun fact two. Say number two. Fun fact number two.

Have you guys heard of Rory Calhoun? Considered what the B and John B Calhoun stands for. Oh, I don't know. Buchanan. No. You're not going to get it. I've never heard of this name. Bump ass.

Say it again? Bump ass. Spell that. B-U-M-P-A-D-S. Oh my gosh. But we've just discovered the best name ever. Bumpass. We've had some great names on this show.

We've had so many good names. But Bumpass. John Bumpass Calhoun. Immediately eclipsed every other name. Can't even think of any other funny ones now. Matt, that is a fun fact. Yes. Yes.

50%. Hey, that's a pass. Matt's a pass. P's get degrees. Matt Bumpass Stewart. And that is Maripool. That's good stuff. Good stuff, Maddie.

of course was voted for by some of our Patreon listeners. Yeah, that's right. You said two other topics are a bit more lighthearted. Yeah, the other two were about Stephen Segal and Weird Al Yankovic. Hang on, I love Steven Segal's early movies. I don't love him as a person. I probably should clarify that. I thought, yeah, I thought he was going to be fascinating.

Weird Al Yankovic. Or Yankovic. Yankovic. Oh, he's cool. But yeah, today's topic, which I did, I enjoyed on some levels. It was fascinating, but also real sad. It's been a dark time. I'm looking forward to hugging some people.

I enjoy it. It's fascinating, definitely. Yes. Which I think is exactly the word that Blake used when he suggested it. Blake, aka Cloudstraf's cat. I wonder if he's Calhoun's daughter. Oh. I wonder if he's Calhoun's daughter.

I mean, Blake lively is a woman. Covering all bases there, though. I appreciate that. Well, I mean two bases. It's all you need. I've never gotten past second base. Flatten it there, Jess. You'll bloody love it.

I don't know what that means. I don't know what that means. I don't think about it any further. So we thank Blake for the suggestion. Thanks, Blake. And we also think the people on Patreon that voted for it. And we also would like to tell you that if you like the show, you can support the show through patreon.com slash do go on pod.

And in exchange, we'll give you some rewards and extra bonus stuff, including a bonus episode. Just before Christmas, we released the Kishmish bonus special. Kishmish. Kishmish, which is about the Yule Lads. That's right. We cover the Yulads for the Patreon-only feed. So if you support us and subscribe at patreon.com slash do go on pod, you get a chance to listen to that. And we answered a bunch of questions from some patrons about Christmas and stuff.

That was good fun. And also, we'd like to thank people. that support us through Patreon and Matt, you got a couple of names there. Would you mind at all if I thanked from Suffolk? This is a great name. Lizzie Phillips. That is a good name.

She sounds like an Olympian. Oh, okay, rockstar Olympian. Yeah. That's an overachie Phillips. She's Olympian first, because I feel like you retire from that earlier, you know. You can rock right into your 60s. Oh. So she's an Olympic...

I saw Paul McCartney early in the month. He was rocking into his 70s, baby. Olympic swimmer turned... guitarist. Shredder. Yeah, she shreds. Oh, Lizzie Phil. Yeah. On your Lizzie Phillips. Yeah, she plays covers. Do you know Lizzie Phillips album?

Yeah. Oh, good. Good improv. I was just trying to figure out that riff that you were doing. I think it was... Oh, you're going to go my way. She shreds. She's the That Guy cover act. The guy with a dick coming out of his pants.

Lenny Kravitz. Lenny Kravitz. The dick coming out of his pants. Remember that time we just did come out his pants? He flashed it by accident. What a moment. In a way, don't we all have a dick coming out of our pants? I sure as hell do.

I don't. Oh my God. I do. Everyone look away. I'd also love to think. Dave, you're going to do something rat related to our patrons today? Give Lizzie her rat name. I mean, we gave her a rock star slash Olympian job type of.

I think that's even better. In their utopia. Jobs in the rat society. Okay, great. She's the patron Olympian slash guitarist. Perfect. Good on you, Lizzie. I'd also love to thank Mike Bryson.

That's another rock sign. This guy's a boxer, I reckon. Oh. No, I think it's just Mike Tyson. Mike Tyson? My brain's very complicated. Yeah, I think I was thinking Mike Tyson. Yeah, no, he's a sports, another sports star there.

He's from Phoenixville, Pennsylvania. Go Penns. Go Penguins. Is that right? Yeah. Well, yeah, they're from. Yeah, they are from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Thank you, Mike.

May I thank some people also? I would love it if you could. Thank you. So I would like to thank from Essex, Charlotte Morrison. Another good name, but that's more like an author name, I think. Yes, a bestseller. Oh, fuck yeah.

She's a lot. Yeah, not like a self-published. Like every rat in the society owns a copy. Of Charlotte Morrison. Rat finkion. Rat fink. What you have bat fink? Yep.

Okay. And Thank you, Charlotte. Another good one. Yeah, thank you, Charlotte. From Brooklyn, I would like to thank Adam King. Oh, I think he's a masseuse. Keep giving him a mousseau.

No, Adam King. He's the rat king. Adam King, no, he's a rapper. He's in the Beastie Boys from New York. They had, one of them is the King Ad Rock. Oh, yeah. Brooklyn, Bronx, Queens, and Staten. From the something, something to the,

top of Manhattan, Asia, Middle East, something and Latin, black, white, New York. You make it happen. Thank you. You make it, Adam. You make it Adam. Adam King. We did it. I would like to thank, not one, but two people at once here.

We have one of our first Patreon power couples. Wow. Oh, wow. Also from New York, from Belfast, New York. Huh. Didn't realize that there was a... city, town, suburb in New York State called Belfast, but it is, and it is home to our patron power couple.

Kendra and Eric Mickelis. They need a power... They fell off the chair. They need a power couple name. Kendrick. Oh, that's good. Kendrick. What is Kendrick?

Lamar. No, sorry, I was going to say, what do they do in the rat world? Oh, they're Insta celebs. Oh, yeah, I would have thought they'd be. They'd be pen one to themselves. Oh yeah, big time. Oh, yeah. Velvet rope at the door.

Oh, yeah, yeah. And if you try and go through the rope, Eric just opens his eyes. Yeah, he opens his eyes unless. You're a beautiful one. Then, little wink. Come on in. Thank you.

Thank you to our beautiful ones, Kendra and Eric. I would like to finally thank from Bradford on Aven. Near Shakespeare. Near Shakespeare. Near Shakespeare. Stratford upon Aven, I assume so. I would like to thank Jack Lusheur. Jack, oh, he's...

Jack Luschur. He's a monsieur. Oh, here. Jack! Oh, my God, stop. I want a myself. Oh, I hate that so much. Shut up.

Shut up. Yuck. That is so accurate. If you've ever watched the team queens, if you ever watch the TV show, The Real Housewives of New Jersey, which I have sat through a few episodes with my girlfriend, and they speak like that.

We get it. You're not lonely like the rats. Jack! Can you hear how annoying that is? Oh my God, watch the show and you're, you're, oh, it's hard to watch. I won't. It's hard to watch. Jack Lassir, the Missur.

Yes, Jack Lassur, the Merser. Thank you so much. We Mishir. We, we. And thanks to everyone that supports the show. Pippoo. If you cannot afford at this time of your life to chip into the Patreon, and that is totally fine,

but what you could do for free is tell a friend about the show. That would really help us out. Oh, I read some, sporadically, I go in and read some of the iTunes reviews, and they're so nice. I just read a bunch of them the other day. So good. Yeah, it is very nice. Niceest listeners.

Love you guys so much. Except you. No, even you. You know who you are. You know what you did. Especially you. Especially you. You get out of here.

You get it. out of here. You get it out of here. But yeah, that is legit, very nice for us to read. And only takes a minute or so for you to write out a couple of sentences and tell other people that might be perusing the charts as to why they should check it out. And then we get more listeners, and we become the happiest rats in rat world.

Happy rats, rat worlds. Rady rat, happy. I'm dying. Please help me. All right, Jess, I'll cut you off there. And I will tell you that's one of the last things you'll say on this podcast. for 2017. Great.

We will not be taking any time off. We'll be back next week with another episode and it will be... OGS. Yep. See you next year. What do you mean? Oh, very good. Thank you.

My dad legit used to make that joke every year and it's never not funny. It's an anti-donner sketch. That is... Is it? Oh, that's why he did the Broden voice. That's why he did the Broden voice. Right. Because Broden is the person at work going,

I'll see you next year, but... It tickles me that joke. I look forward to it a few days time from my dad. In text form these days. But you can get in contact with us anytime via Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, at do go on pod. Email do go on pod.gumptu.com. And we'll be back next year. Have a fun and safe new year.

And until then, I will say thank you. And goodbye. Bye. Later. This podcast is part of the Planet Broadcasting Network. Visit PlanetBcasting.com for more podcasts from our growth. mate mates. I mean, if you want, it's up to you. Should old acquaintance be forgot and never brought to mine?

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