Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - Questions and Answers: Volume 11

Starting point is 00:00:00 In his 1979 book, Hitchhiker's Guide of the Galaxy, Douglas Adams tells the tale of an ancient race that builds a computer to answer the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything. The computer took 7.5 million years to come up with an answer. Well, they could have saved a lot of time and money if they'd just waited a month. Stay tuned for questions and answers volume 11 on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. What if your perceptions about the past were wrong? ThruLine is a podcast that takes you back in time to us. uncover the parts of the story that may have gone unnoticed.

Starting point is 00:00:46 It effectively turned day into night. And how it shaped the world now. Time travel with us every week on the Thuline podcast from NPR. Let's start things off with the first question. Nick Cap asks, if you could time travel to witness an event, what would it be? If I could go back in time and pick an event, I would have to pick something that has some sort of controversy around it, something where there is doubt as something. to actually what happened. And so with that in mind, I would select the assassination of John F. Kennedy.

Starting point is 00:01:22 I know that sounds kind of morbid, but I wouldn't actually be there to witness the assassination. What I would do is have a good pair of binoculars and be looking at all of the buildings in the area around Daly Plaza. I would be looking at the Texas School Book Depository. I'd be looking at the grassy knoll. I'd be looking at other things in other buildings. Basically paying attention to the stuff that nobody else was paying attention to. Everybody was focused on the president. I would be focused not on the president, but rather on the buildings, to try to resolve actually what happened that day, simply because there's been so much debate and controversy around it. Megan Hill asks, Gary, I'm sure you may have seen this current trend, but have you been asked

Starting point is 00:02:00 how often you think about the Roman Empire? And a follow-up question, if you have the time, do you have a brief explanation of why you think so many people are disposed to learn about it exclusively? So just in case you're not aware, let me explain why Megan is asking this question. There's been a meme that started to appear on TikTok just a few weeks ago where wives would ask their husbands how recently they thought about the Roman Empire. And they would say within the last day or the last week or something like that. This is not the result of any sort of formal survey or study that anyone has done. It's just something that appeared on TikTok. So, no, I don't think about the Roman Empire every day.

Starting point is 00:02:34 But because I have a history podcast, obviously, it'll come up every week or so. So I think the real question is, why 2,000 years after the fact are people still interested in? in the Roman Empire. For starters, I think it should be noted that this is not something that is uniquely modern. People have been obsessed about the Roman Empire pretty much ever since it fell. There are Roman ruins located all around the Mediterranean. Many of these ruins are far grander than anything which came after it by other civilizations. And as a result, people who lived in the shadows of these ruins thought of it as some grander time, some golden era where they were able to build such structures. The other thing is that we simply know more of

Starting point is 00:03:14 about this era than we do about other ancient cultures. Even though 99% of everything that was written during the Roman period eventually disappeared, the 1% that we do have is really powerful and tells us quite a bit about that era. Enough has survived that we know all about the political mechanations that occurred, we know about all the rivalries, all the jealousies, and everything that happened between statesmen during that time. We don't have any of this information for ancient Egypt or ancient Babylon, for example. The reason we know about the stories of Julius Caesar and Anthony and Cleopatra is because those stories have been passed down to us. Shakespeare wrote about the assassination of Julius Caesar and Anthony and Cleopatra simply because

Starting point is 00:03:54 he could tell those stories. Over a period of 3,000 years, there were 33 Egyptian dynasties. Each of those probably had tons of intrigue, fascinating stories, and characters that would make for great drama. The problem is, we don't know any of those stories, because they were never passed on because they were never written down. So people are interested in the Roman Empire, and it's been that way for centuries, and I think it's going to continue to be that way even centuries in the future. Glenn Fowlough asks, when I next travel to the United States, how likely is it that I could pick up Green Bay Packers tickets? Can you purchase them online, or is there a waiting list like Manchester United? Glenn, this is a really good question, and if you want to experience American football at its finest, I would highly recommend going to Green Bay, Wisconsin, to watch a game on Sunday.

Starting point is 00:04:40 That being said, let me tell you the problem. Lambeau Field has a capacity of 81,441 people. The season ticket waiting list is 140,000 people. The number of season tickets that becomes available every year is usually somewhere around 100. That means the expected wait to get a season ticket for the Green Bay Packers is now over 100 years or the average human life expectancy. There are people who are getting season tickets.

Starting point is 00:05:10 this year, who were put on the wait list by their parents when they were born in the early 1970s. Now here's the good news. Not all the tickets at Lambeau Field are just for season ticket holders. In fact, most of them are not. If you wanted to buy a ticket for a game, you probably could easily do so online. And here's the best part, you can buy legal scalped tickets at Lambeau Field. The city of Eschwavanaugh where the stadium is located actually has an area set aside where you can go and buy tickets. And if you wait to within one hour of the start of the game, the prices start to drop dramatically. So I know several people who have done it this way, they just show up and they are able to get tickets, and the price will usually go for around $100 to $120, depending on

Starting point is 00:05:54 who the Packers are playing. So yes, it absolutely can be done, and I highly recommend doing it. Sam Robinson asks, although you've started having individual episode artwork, I'm curious how you've settled on the original design. Also, have you done an episode on every unique thing in the our work? Well, Sam, that's a really good question. The original cover art for the podcast was done by a designer named Aaron who works at evergreen design studio.com, and if you're looking for a graphic designer, I'm sure she'd be glad to help. The design that she came up with and the one I accepted has a whole bunch of different iconic structures and buildings from around the world. So, how many of those have I done actual episodes on? Well, I've done one in the Eiffel Tower,

Starting point is 00:06:33 I've done it on the Statue of Liberty, I've done it on the leading tower of Pisa, I've done it on Easter Island. I have not done one on Big Bend. I have done one on Venice, but not particularly on St. Marks, nor have I done one on Red Square. In the background, you'll see a satellite and a jet, and I have done episodes on a Boeing 747, and I have done one on how satellites work. However, I have not done one yet on hot air ballooning. So, of the identifiable things on the artwork, I guess I still have three more that I eventually have to do episodes on. So, stay tuned. Deborah Schlitz-Figueroa asks, On the days the Green Bay Packers are playing,

Starting point is 00:07:09 do you try to rush to complete the podcast before the game or wait to work on it after the game? Well, Deborah, I'll just say this. There's a reason why I usually do at least one encore episode on the weekends. Paul Stephen asks, I'm a bus driver by trade and was wondering what was the most interesting ride you've had when someone else was driving you around. Well, Paul, the answer to that question is a tuck-tuck driver

Starting point is 00:07:31 that I had in CM-Rip, Cambodia. He was driving me all around, Angor and all the various temples. And I told him that I wanted to visit a temple that was much further away known as Previer. Previer was just named a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and it literally sits on the border with Thailand. However, just a week before I wanted to go, Ties actually crossed the border to try to claim the temple, and the Cambodians fought back and reoccupied it. So, he was willing to take me there, but he had to do so on his motorbike, not in a fully blown tuck-tuck. We had to start very early in the morning because it was a several-hour ride

Starting point is 00:08:04 to get there. And I should note that his father was a police officer in CM-Reap, and he gave him a gun before we went on the trip, just because you never know. He put the gun in a compartment underneath the seat of the bike. It was a long trip. We made a couple rest stops. We finally got there. I spent about 90 minutes visiting the temple, talking to some of the soldiers who were there, who mostly seemed to have been lounging around, and then we left. And it was a very long ride back. We got caught in the rain at one point, which made for a very uncomfortable trip. After the sun went down, we pulled over near the side of the road to take a break, and a car pulled over, and two men came out and started talking Khmer to my driver.

Starting point is 00:08:42 To this day, I have no idea what they were talking about. However, my driver pulled up the seat of the motorbike and put his hand in the compartment where the gun was. They kept talking for a few minutes more, and eventually they left. And the moment they left, my driver said, let's go, we have to leave now. He got me home safe, nothing happened, but I still to this day don't have any idea what happened or who those men were. That would probably be my most interesting story of someone driving me around. Tristan Paris asks, what are the main sites you use for research? Have you ever thought of adding

Starting point is 00:09:16 footnotes for fact-checking your research? I use all sorts of different websites depending on what it is I'm researching, because every topic is different, there are going to be different websites for every topic. Adding footnotes to my script would only mean taking more time to produce a show every day, an act which is already taking up the vast majority of my day. So I currently don't have any plans of adding footnotes because the intent of the show is really not to create an academic paper. My goal is just to create a short introduction to a topic that people can then use if they're interested to learn more. Now that being said, if you want to fact check any one of my episodes, anyone is free to do it. And in fact, I have tens of thousands of people listening to every episode

Starting point is 00:09:56 of the show. So for almost everything I do a topic on, there's somebody out there that knows more about it than me. There have been times where I've screwed up and had a factual error in the podcast. And believe you me, when that happens, I hear about it. Sevey asks over on the Discord server, what cities do you most want to revisit or see for the first time? One city that I really haven't explored, even though it's one of the largest cities in the United States, is Houston. I've been to the airport, but I can't really say I've actually been to Houston proper, and I would love to go see it. And there are a lot of cities that would love to revisit. Some cities like London or Paris are really big, and you can visit a new neighborhood every time, and it'll be like a completely different

Starting point is 00:10:38 experience. There are some cities like New York and Los Angeles that I've been to many times, and quite frankly, I have no desire to go back to, but I'm probably sure I will because something with business always takes me there at least once a year or every other year. Eric on the Discord server asks, if you had to leave the USA and live permanently somewhere else, where would you choose and why? There are many great cities in the world, and I would be happy to live in any of them if I had to. But many of the great cities also happen to be very expensive cities, places like Vancouver or Sydney or Singapore. So if I absolutely had to leave the United States, I guess I would probably try to be itinerant

Starting point is 00:11:16 again, maybe living in one place for three to six months before moving to another city and moving to another city. The final question comes from Sylvian Charac. who asks, Hey Gary, how do you feel when you listen to one of your older episodes, especially the first ones? Well, things have changed quite a bit since I first started recording the show back in July of 2020. For starters, the audio quality is now better. I have a better microphone, and more importantly, I have a better area to record in. When I first started recording the show, the computer and the microphone was only 10 feet away from a refrigerator that was constantly running. Moreover, the room I was recording in had hardwood floors, which means that sound was bouncing off of

Starting point is 00:11:55 everything. Today I'm in a better recording environment and I have a better microphone, so things just sound better. My earlier episodes also tended to be a few minutes shorter than my current episodes. Now that I'm 1,100 episodes in, I've actually considered going back and re-recording some of my older episodes rather than just doing encore episodes. I could record it with better sound quality, but also go back and revisit the script, add some new details, and flesh out a lot of the concepts. Well, that does it for this month's question and answer. If you would like to ask a question for next month, just join the Facebook group or the Discord server, and I'll be posting a call for questions sometime around the end of the month.

Starting point is 00:12:37 The executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Charles Daniel. The associate producers are Peter Bennett and Cameron Kiefer. I wanted to give a big thanks to everyone who supports the show on Patreon. Your support helps me put out a new show every day. And if you're interested in Everything Everywhere Daily merchandise, Patreon is currently the only place where it's available. And if you'd like to talk to other listeners of the show and get notified to future episodes and projects, please join my Facebook group or Discord server. Links to everything are in the show notes.

Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - Questions and Answers: Volume 11

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.