Futility Closet - 190-Mary Patten and the Neptune's Car

Episode Date: February 26, 2018

In 1856, an American clipper ship was approaching Cape Horn when its captain collapsed, leaving his 19-year-old wife to navigate the vessel through one of the deadliest sea passages in the world. In ...this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll tell the story of Mary Patten and the harrowing voyage of the Neptune's Car. We'll also consider some improbable recipes and puzzle over a worker's demise. Intro: In 1943, the U.S. considered releasing glowing foxes in Japan to frighten Shintoists. Rice University chemist James Tour fashions stick figures from organic molecules. Sources for our feature on Mary Patten: Paul W. Simpson, Neptune's Car: An American Legend, 2018. Glenn A. Knoblock, The American Clipper Ship, 1845-1920, 2014. Sam Jefferson, Clipper Ships and the Golden Age of Sail, 2014. David Cordingly, Seafaring Women, 2010. Jane D. Lyon, The Great Clippers, 2016. Bill Caldwell, Rivers of Fortune, 2002. Julie Baker, "The Troubled Voyage of Neptune's Car," American History 39:6 (February 2005), 58-65. Raymond A. Rydell, "The California Clippers," Pacific Historical Review 18:1 (February 1949), 70-83. Ann Whipple Marr, "Mary Ann Brown Patten," Oxford Dictionary of American National Biography, Dec. 2, 1999. "Neptune's Car," Ships of the World, 1997, 356. Kenneth J. Blume, Historical Dictionary of the U.S. Maritime Industry, 2012. "Mary Patten, 19 and Pregnant, Takes Command of a Clipper Ship in 1856," New England Historical Society (accessed Feb. 2, 2018). "The Story of Mary Patten," National Sailing Hall of Fame (accessed Feb. 2, 2018). "Women in Maritime History," San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park, National Park Service (accessed Feb. 2, 2018). Alan Flanders, "Clipper Neptune's Car Saved From Disaster by Quick-Learning Wife of Stricken Skipper," [Norfolk] Virginian-Pilot, Oct. 15, 2000, 3. George Tucker, "Woman's Touch Helped Clipper Ship Make History," [Norfolk] Virginian-Pilot, Nov. 14, 1999, B3. Joanne Lannin and Ray Routhier, "The Ladies of Maine," Portland Press Herald, March 13, 1996, 1C. "A Noble Woman," Sailor's Magazine, April 1857. "A Heroine of the Sea," Friends' Intelligencer 14 (1857), 46-47. "A Heroine Arrived -- The Young Wife Who Took Neptune's Car Around Cape Horn," New York Times, March 18, 1857. "A Wife Worth Having," New York Times, Feb. 21, 1857. "Report of the Select Committee on the Rights of Married Women," Journal of the House of Representatives of the State of Ohio, 1857, 110. "Modern Female Heroism," Annual Register, March 1857. "The Heroic Mrs. Patten," Boston Evening Transcript, June 23, 1857. "Marine Matters," New York Times, March 24, 1857. "Neptune's Car," New York Times, July 27, 1857. "Funeral of Capt. Joshua A. Patten," New York Times, Aug. 31, 1857. "Personal," New York Times, Sept. 23, 1857. "Marine Matters," New York Times, March 20, 1857. "Personal," New York Times, March 20, 1861. Listener mail: Jeffrey Gettleman and Kai Schultz, "India's Punishment for Plant-Eating Donkeys: Jail Time," New York Times, Nov. 28, 2017. Faiz Siddiqui, "Donkeys Destroy Plants, 'Jailed' for 4 Days in Orai," Times of India, Nov. 28, 2017. "50,000 Meows by @hugovk," github, Nov. 1, 2014. "Delicious Recipes," scootah.com (accessed Feb. 23, 2018). Wikipedia, "Echo Answer" (accessed Feb. 23, 2018). Lindsay Flint sent this example of answering yes/no questions in Welsh. This week's lateral thinking puzzle was contributed by listener Gillian Brent. You can listen using the player above, download this episode directly, or subscribe on iTunes or Google Play Music or via the RSS feed at http://feedpress.me/futilitycloset. Please consider becoming a patron of Futility Closet -- on our Patreon page you can pledge any amount per episode, and we've set up some rewards to help thank you for your support. You can also make a one-time donation on the Support Us page of the Futility Closet website. Many thanks to Doug Ross for the music in this episode. If you have any questions or comments you can reach us at podcast@futilitycloset.com. Thanks for listening!

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Starting point is 00:00:00 As fans of history, we're excited about a new podcast being launched by The Great Courses Plus called Food, a Cultural Culinary History. It's a fascinating look at food as a driving factor in history, from cave people to the present day. You can learn interesting food facts, try delicious historical recipes, and more. Just search for Food, a Cultural Culinary History on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, or wherever you get your podcasts today. Welcome to the Futility Closet Podcast, forgotten stories from the pages of history. Visit us online to sample more than 10,000 quirky curiosities from glowing foxes to molecular people. This is Episode 190. I'm Greg Ross. And I'm Sharon Ross. In 1856, an American clipper ship was approaching Cape Horn when its captain collapsed, leaving his 19-year-old wife to navigate the vessel through one of the deadliest sea passages in the world. In
Starting point is 00:01:02 today's show, we'll tell the story of Mary Patton and the harrowing voyage of the Neptune's car. We'll also consider some improbable recipes and puzzle over a worker's demise. On July 1st, 1856, a clipper ship called the Neptune's Car set out from New York for San Francisco, carrying a cargo of iron, sheet lead, and mining machinery for the California goldfields. Its captain was Joshua Patton, 28 years old. He'd command a crew of three dozen men on the trip down the Atlantic, around Cape Horn at the bottom of South America, and up through the Pacific to California, a journey of 15,000 miles. In those days, if several clipper ships left port at the same time, it was common for them to compete in a friendly race to their destination. In this case, Patton would be racing two other famous clippers,
Starting point is 00:01:53 the Intrepid and the Romance of the Seas. The race between them was good-natured, but the pressure for speed was real. A captain might earn $3,000 for a successful trip from New York to San Francisco, but he might get $5,000 if he could do it in less than 100 days. Patton had done it in 101 days, and he was aiming to beat that record. If he succeeded, he'd have someone to share the celebration with him, because he was bringing along his wife, Mary, who was just 19 years old. The two had been married three years earlier at Boston's Old North Church. She hadn't seen much of him during the first two years of their marriage, as he sailed between New York and Boston. But in 1854, the captain of the Neptune's car had
Starting point is 00:02:28 fallen ill just before a trip to San Francisco, and Joshua was offered the chance to take over. He didn't want to abandon his young wife for a trip as long as that, so he got permission to bring her along. That might have been boring for Mary, because normally a captain's wife had little or nothing to do with the day-to-day running of the ship. But Mary was highly educated and very intelligent, and during that trip, she studied the business of sailing and learned the principles of navigation, how to use a sextant, and plot a course. On that first journey, they were racing the Westward Ho, the fastest clipper of that era. They lost the race, but they reached San Francisco in excellent time, and that impressed the captain of the Westward Ho so much that he challenged Joshua to a race to China. Mary had gone along
Starting point is 00:03:04 on that trip as well and improved her skill even further. When they returned, Joshua wrote, she is uncommon handy about a ship, even in weather, and would doubtless be of service if a man. He said she could have gained a master's certificate if she'd wanted to. Now, as the two of them prepared for this new trip to San Francisco, they had some bad luck. The first mate broke his leg and had to withdraw. The owners refused to postpone the voyage since their profits would be highest if the ship could complete the trip quickly, so they hired a new first mate on short notice, and they set out on July 1st with the Romance of the Seas a day ahead of them and the Intrepid close behind. As they headed south through
Starting point is 00:03:37 the Atlantic, the new first mate, William Keeler, began to cause trouble. He was abusing other crew members, sleeping on the job, and shortening the sails, which slowed their progress. It's not clear why he was doing this. Possibly he was just a natural troublemaker, or possibly he had bet against the ship in this race among the three clippers. Joshua disciplined him, but he didn't improve, so as they passed Brazil, he put him in irons and confined him below deck. Unfortunately, there was no one to replace him. The duties of a first mate included navigation, and the second mate, a man named Hare, didn't have those skills. Since Patton was the ship's only remaining professional navigator, he had to serve as both captain and first mate. That was exhausting. Patton had already been feeling unwell, and now, badly overworked, he got weaker and soon developed a fever.
Starting point is 00:04:17 Mary read the ship's medical books to try to treat him, and when he couldn't captain the ship, she began to set the course and navigate the ship herself. and when he couldn't captain the ship, she began to set the course and navigate the ship herself. In planning this trip, they'd scheduled a departure in July, so the ship would pass around Cape Horn at the bottom of South America just as spring arrived in the southern hemisphere. But now, as they neared that point, they found that winter was holding on, with gale force winds and high seas. At one point, Joshua considered turning around altogether and retreating to Rio de Janeiro, but he'd promised the owners that he would dock only in San Francisco, and he wanted to win the race. So he didn't leave the deck. At one point, he worked eight days and
Starting point is 00:04:49 nights without sleeping. Finally, inevitably, this caught up with him, and he collapsed on deck during a storm just as they approached Cape Horn. Some crew members carried him below. Murray asked them to lash him to his bunk so he wouldn't be thrown out of it in bad weather, and she tended to him while the ship sailed on against 50-foot waves and winds of 100 miles an hour. Joshua's illness was what they called brain fever, but today we'd recognize it as tuberculosis. He was seriously ill and could no longer perform his duties. That left the ship without a navigator. The second mate, Mr. Hare, was senior officer on deck, but he couldn't plot the ship's course, and the only other navigator on board was Keeler, the first mate who was still confined below deck. That left only Mary herself to plot the course and command the ship.
Starting point is 00:05:28 She didn't know if she could do it or if the crew would listen to her, but she thought she was their best chance. On top of all this, just at this point, Mary began to realize that she was pregnant. She didn't tell anyone about this. Joshua was too sick to understand her, and it would have been socially inappropriate to tell the crew. As they approached Cape Horn, Keeler, the first mate who was confined in his quarters, wrote her a letter reminding her that Cape Horn was one of the most difficult passages on earth and offering to take charge of the ship. She replied that her husband hadn't trusted him as mate, so she couldn't trust him as commander.
Starting point is 00:05:57 Keeler was enraged at that, and when the other sailors brought him food and water, he tried to convince them to join in a mutiny against her and the captain. Mary heard rumors about this, and she gathered the sailors on the quarterdeck. She explained that the captain was sick and asked them to stand by her and the second mate. We don't have a record of exactly what she said, but she would have explained that the goal of the voyage was to deliver the cargo to San Francisco and that the ship's owners would suffer a heavy penalty if they put in at a foreign port on the way. In the end, the sailors gave her their support and promised to obey her commands. Some accounts say they gave her three cheers. So now, with their help, Mary set out to try to
Starting point is 00:06:29 guide the ship through the stormy seas around Cape Horn. This was almost unthinkable. She was 19 years old and four months pregnant and needed to navigate a clipper ship the size of the Cutty Sark through one of the harshest winters on record while tending to a sick husband and commanding a crew of 36. And the conditions were appalling. At one point, another ship, the Rapid, passed them going in the other direction. It had given up trying to fight its way into the Pacific. Of its 24 men, 10 had drowned and another 10 were sick or injured. It was flying a flag of distress, and according to protocol, Neptune's car ought to have stopped to offer assistance, but they were battling for survival themselves and just kept going.
Starting point is 00:07:03 Mary knew she had to find calmer waters, but under the stormy sky she couldn't use the sexton, and she had to rely on dead reckoning. She wasn't sure of their exact location, but decided to abandon the course westward and gamble on finding better conditions south-southeast. So they turned around and ran with the wind. That made the ship more manageable, but it carried them farther from their goal. Mary was desperately busy, but whenever she could, she tended to her husband. She shaved his head to help cool his fever, and she read every medical book she could find, but nothing really helped. She needed to get him to a physician. Her decision to change course
Starting point is 00:07:33 turned out to be wise. The day after they began their escape from the horn, the sun broke through and the seas became less angry. She worked out that they were 250 miles southeast of Cape Horn, in Drake's Passage, and now she ordered them westward again. The going was easier here, but now a lookout in the crow's nest noticed a haze around the clouds to port, which was a sign of ice in the water. They took in the sails to slow their progress and spent the next four days carefully maneuvering among icebergs in the passage. Finally, 18 days after she'd asked the crew for their faith, they emerged from Cape Horn into the Pacific. Now they had to sail north through 5,000 miles of open ocean, riding up the western coast of South America toward San Francisco.
Starting point is 00:08:10 They made good time, and as they sailed into warmer waters, Joshua recovered somewhat and was able to resume command of the ship. He saw that Mary and Hare were exhausted, so to relieve them, he released Keeler from below deck and reinstated him as first mate. And because he himself was still too weak to leave his quarters, Joshua also gave Keeler responsibility for navigation. It seemed that trouble was behind them, but Mary began to suspect that something was wrong. As she watched the ship's progress, she thought they seemed to be headed toward the coast. She warned Joshua, and he asked the ship's
Starting point is 00:08:37 carpenter to build a compass in his quarters. And that told him that Mary was right. They were headed for Valparaiso, Chile. That had to be stopped. Joshua was afraid that if they went into another port, the crew would leave and the cargo would be destroyed before the owners could claim it. He ordered Keillor to be arrested again and locked him below deck, and he issued a general order that under no circumstances was the ship to dock at any port but San Francisco. Then he suffered a relapse. By the time they crossed the equator on October 17th, he was blind and largely unconscious, and Mary resumed command of the ship. It's not clear why Keillor wanted to head for port. Again, possibly he had bet against the ship in the race among the three clippers, or possibly he hoped to run away to avoid punishment for his misbehavior. Anyway, happily, after that, with Mary in command, there
Starting point is 00:09:17 was no further incident. They tried to make up for lost time and even managed to log over 300 miles in one day, but the winds died just as they were approaching San Francisco and they had to spend 10 frustratingly quiet days just outside the city. Finally, a light breeze picked up and Mary herself steered the Neptune's car into the harbor on November 15, 1856. The New York Times reported, those who saw her enter the harbor say no vessel ever came into that port looking better in every respect. Altogether, Mary had held the command for 56 days. Between navigating the ship and caring for her husband, Mary had held the command for 56 days. Between navigating the ship and caring for her husband, she had rarely slept, and in one stretch she hadn't changed her clothes for 50 days in a row. They were a month late to port, but so were their
Starting point is 00:09:54 competitors in the race. Romance of the Seas had arrived only a few days earlier, and Intrepid wouldn't show up until 11 days later. When it did, its captain marveled at Mary's achievement. He said her skill in captaining Neptune's car safely into port was no fluke. Few shipmasters could have excelled Captain Patton's wife in seamanship or as a navigator. Mary became an instant celebrity. Newspapers across the country carried her story, calling her the Florence Nightingale of the ocean. By now, Joshua was deaf as well as blind, and Mary was six months pregnant. They left the Neptune's car to be sailed back to New York by another captain
Starting point is 00:10:23 and made their own way home as quickly as possible by taking a steamer to the Isthmus of Panama and crossing overland there. She ignored the publicity and nursed Joshua all the way home, a journey of two months. He rallied a while during the trip but relapsed by the time they reached New York in mid-February and had to be carried ashore on a stretcher. One reporter wrote, by his side, superintending every movement, was a young lady of prepossessing person, but with a countenance careworn and anxious from long watching. At the Battery Hotel, a reporter from the New York Daily Tribune found that all her attention was on her husband. When he tried to ask her about herself, quote, she said she had done no more than her duty, and as the
Starting point is 00:10:57 recollection of her trials and sufferings evidently gave her pain, we could not do otherwise than respect her feelings. They stayed at the hotel for two weeks before returning to Boston, and their son, Joshua James Patton, was born two and a half weeks after that on March 10, 1857. Joshua had grown worse. He may have been too ill even to understand that he had a son. Mary returned to her quiet domestic life and spent most of her time caring for her new baby and her sick husband. A shipping line gave her a bonus of $1,000 and commended the love and devotion she'd shown to her husband. They wrote to her, Nor do we know of an instance on record where a woman has, from force of circumstances, been called upon or assumed command of a large and valuable vessel and exercised a proper control
Starting point is 00:11:34 over a large number of seamen, and by her own skill and energy impressing them with a confidence and reliance making all subordinate and obedient to that command. She wrote back, Gentlemen, I received yesterday your communication of the eighteenth instant, and it is with mingled sensations of gratitude and embarrassment that I leave my post as a watcher by my husband's sickbed to reply. I am sincerely grateful to you and to all those you represent for the very kind expressions of sympathy and for the liberal enclosure which you have transmitted to me in their behalf. I feel very sensibly, gentlemen, that kindness which has prompted you to commend the manner in which I have endeavored to perform that which seemed to me, under the circumstances, only the plain duty of a wife, toward a good husband stricken down by what we
Starting point is 00:12:12 now fear to be a hopeless disease, and to perform for him as well as I could those duties which he could not perform for himself, especially when it was to carry out his own expressed wish. But I am at the same time seriously embarrassed by the fear that you have overestimated the value of these services, because I feel that without the services of Mr. Hare, the second officer, a good seaman, and the hearty cooperation of the men to aid our endeavors, the ship would not have arrived safely at her destined port. Be assured, gentlemen, that through all the trials which may be before me, and while I live, your considerate kindness will ever be held in thankful remembrance by yours very respectfully, Mary A. Patton. The New York Times suggested that a reward of five times that amount, or $5,000, might have been more appropriate since she had saved a cargo worth $350,000 and, quote, both vessel and cargo
Starting point is 00:12:53 were in better trim than any of her competitors when she reached port. The ladies of Boston raised a further $1,400 for her and she continued to be showered with praise. One letter to the Times read, few women could have done so much and done it so well. She was at once navigator, nurse, physician, and protector of the property entrusted to her husband. Mary objected to claims that she and her husband were penniless because she didn't want to seem to solicit charity. She said they were poor, not destitute.
Starting point is 00:13:18 And while the newly organized women's rights movement pointed with pride to her accomplishment, she modestly declined to join their ranks. She didn't give a reason, but it looks like she was just busy and humble and didn't like the fuss. Her husband, Joshua Patton, died in a Massachusetts asylum in July 1857 at age 30, three months after their son was born. All the ships in Boston Harbor flew their flags at half mast. By the time of his death, Mary herself was already suffering fevers. It turned out that while she was tending to him in the stuffy cabin of the ship,
Starting point is 00:13:47 she had contracted tuberculosis herself. She lived for a time with her mother in Boston, but died four years later on March 17, 1861. She was only 24. Mary Patton is the first woman in the history of the United States to command a commercial merchant vessel. In 1986, she was elected to the National Maritime Hall of Fame, and she's remembered today in the name of the hospital at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy in Kings Point, New York.
Starting point is 00:14:21 In episode 31, we learned about animals being put on trial for misbehaving. Richard Clark let us know that animals haven't only just been tried, but there was a recent case in which misbehaving animals were jailed. In November 2017, eight donkeys were jailed for four days in India for eating expensive plants. Although it was the animals who were imprisoned, it seems that in this case, the intent was actually to punish the owner, who was apparently pretty frantic when his donkeys disappeared. In the end, he had to get a local political leader to intercede on his behalf to get his donkeys released. And there's a video of the donkeys being let out of the jail, walking
Starting point is 00:14:58 slowly, heads down. And to me, it did look like most of them were suitably chastened. Contrite. Contrite donkeys, yes. Matt wrote, Dear Sasha, Back in episode 87, computer-generated Aesop's fables were discussed. Since those stories were created, the art of computer-generated prose has improved. Each month in November, the NaNoGenMo, National Novel Generation Month, contest is held.
Starting point is 00:15:27 November, the NaNoGenMo National Novel Generation Month contest is held. And Matt sent a link to a post by Leah Henriksen, a doctoral student researching the implications of natural language generation and computer-generated texts, which says that NaNoGenMo was inspired by National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo. NaNoGenMo was first proposed as a whim by Darius Kazemi in 2013, and according to Henriksen, has increasingly gained traction in the programming world. The stated challenge is to write a code that generates a novel of at least 50,000 words. Kazemi says, the novel is defined however you want. It could be 50,000 repetitions of the word meow. It could literally grab a random novel from Project Gutenberg. It doesn't matter as long as it's 50k plus words. But as you might guess, according to Hendrickson, most of the novels generated don't actually make
Starting point is 00:16:17 for very inspired reading. I personally think people should work on the idea of grabbing another novel from Project Gutenberg. But as Matt sent his email to Sasha, he noted, I think you will especially appreciate Meow Meow, which it turns out is indeed a series of novels generated from the word meow. And these meow novels are actually more sophisticated than you might initially think. The program takes an excerpt from another novel and replaces all the words with a meow of the same length, keeping the same punctuation. So there are meow transformed excerpts from Moby Dick,
Starting point is 00:16:53 The Jungle Book, and even an inquiry concerning the principles of morals by David Hume. So here's a bit from Moby Dick with my apologies to Sasha for any mispronunciations. Meow, me, mew, mew, meow. Meow, meow, me, meow, meow, meow, me, meow. Mew, me, mew. Definitely great literature.
Starting point is 00:17:22 Matt sent links to some other examples of software-generated works, one of which was a recipe book, which seems to me to stretch the definition of a novel a bit, but which was pretty funny. So here's a recipe for Florentine toasted vanilla, whose ingredients include eight quarts albacore tuna, five smidgens almonds, 10 drops apple juice, nine pounds chowder, one-fifth fondue, nine dessert spoons Italian bread, 0.5 drops onions, nine dessert spoons pear, three pounds sandwich, and 2.5 coffee scoops yogurt. And if anyone could manage to follow the directions for this recipe, I would be pretty impressed. Some of the directions are whisk in fondue and albacore tuna until combined, heat oven to 500, heat oven to 425, place chowder in a large deep skillet, bake 40 to 50 minutes in the preheated oven or until lightly
Starting point is 00:18:26 brown heat oven to 425 cook until the other side begins to brown gently fold in the sandwich cover and refrigerate overnight top with remaining pear and given that you don't actually use the pear anywhere else in the recipe it seemed to me that it should all be remaining. Actually, you're never given directions for doing much with many of the ingredients. Like you're told to let the yogurt rest, but you never do anything else with it. So I guess you'll just have some well-rested yogurt on the side of your dish. There is also a recipe for cocktail coffee scampi, which contains five ounces mousse, nine pounds French dip, six pints French fry,
Starting point is 00:19:11 one cake pan hot dogs, and nine pounds milkshake, but no actual coffee. And those directions include sift together milkshake and gumbo, whisk in garlic and hot dogs, cook for two to three minutes until bubbles appear on the sides and center of each mousse. So links in the show notes for those who want to learn some new recipes.
Starting point is 00:19:32 And you'll have to let us know if you actually try making any of these creations. I was going to say, if you were really dogged, it sounds like you could actually try to make some of those. You could attempt to, but I don't know how you're going to like fold in a sandwich or sift milkshakes. Or measure half a drop. Right. In episode 118, we discussed how the corpse of outlaw Elmer McCurdy had several post-mortem adventures, including being used in a California funhouse in the 1970s. A couple of listeners sent us an update on the peripatetic McCurdy. Matt Huber wrote, Hello, Greg, Sharon, and Sasha.
Starting point is 00:20:06 Over the holiday break, I happened to watch an episode of The Toys That Made Us on Netflix. The third episode of the series is on He-Man and the Masters of the Universe series of action figures and their creation. It turns out one of the creative designers, Mark Taylor, was at an amusement park in Long Beach as a kid. While going through the funhouse, a corpse dropped in front of him. He believed that it was a real corpse until he was older and attributed it to his young imagination. Mark went on to work for Mattel, and when designing the character of Skeletor for the He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, he drew upon that funhouse experience to give that character some extra creepy. After talking about this experience
Starting point is 00:20:45 in the TV show, Mark mentions that while watching a TV show on Discovery, that he learned that it was in fact a real corpse in that funhouse. I, of course, immediately remembered a Futility Closet podcast that featured a traveling corpse. So I checked back in the archives and sure enough, it was Elmer McCurdy that had been in that funhouse. So in addition to his litany of acting careers that Elmer had carried out post-mortem, we can also attribute him as the inspiration for one of the, in my opinion, greatest cartoon and toy villains of the 80s. Thanks for the wonderful podcast and podcat. I always enjoy the esoterica that you managed to find. That is a great story. That's like the best coda you could think up for that. I always wonder what McCurdy would think if he knew what was in store for him.
Starting point is 00:21:28 That's just an amazing story. Lindsay Flint sent in some follow-up to a topic we've covered a few times on the show, that of the best way to answer yes or no questions, which is something we continue to struggle with sometimes while doing the lateral thinking puzzles. Dear Sharon and Greg and Sasha, I'm not sure if this has been discussed before, but I recently started studying Welsh and learned about a new way to unambiguously answer yes-no questions. Instead of other languages where there are different versions of yes or no, depending on whether the question is affirmative or negative, in Welsh you don't use yes or no
Starting point is 00:22:01 at all. Instead, you answer by repeating the verb back in response. So if you're asked if you went on a walk today, you'd respond with either I walked or I didn't walk. Linguists call this an echo answer, and it's also used in the related Irish and Scottish languages, which don't even have words strictly for yes or no. Welsh does, though their use is limited. And it's also found in unrelated languages like Finnish, Portuguese, and Mandarin Chinese. While it would be helpful in lateral thinking puzzles, it also means you can't let your mind wander too far when being asked a question, as you have to repeat part of what
Starting point is 00:22:34 you were being asked. Lindsay also says, here's a page showing a small selection of ways to answer such questions in Welsh. This will also show why I used English in my example. While Welsh uses the Latin alphabet, several letters correspond to different sounds than they do in English, and it makes Welsh words look unpronounceable, sometimes even to those learning it. Thank you for all of the work you put into the podcast. I love starting out the week listening to the wonderful stories you find. And thanks and scritches to Sasha for letting her humans take a break from lavishing her with attention long enough to make a great show. It really is rather magnanimous of Sasha, or at least she thinks so. And I think of all the solutions we've heard to the problem of unclear yes or no answers, this is the one I like best so far, both for being pretty simple to use and for
Starting point is 00:23:21 producing rather unambiguous answers. So for those tricky, negatively phrased questions such as, so they weren't in outer space, apparently we need to answer either they were or they weren't. And that works for me if we can actually remember to do it. That's pretty good. I like that. But in the middle of a puzzle trying to remember that. Because it's simple and natural and it's... And it's very unambiguous.
Starting point is 00:23:41 Yeah. Definitely. And I also very much appreciated Lindsay not making me attempt to pronounce any Welsh. Coincidentally, on the same topic, Anthony Knight wrote to us, I thought I'd share with you what my nine-year-old daughter said when playing on the Nintendo Wii, as it was a great example of positive-negative questions and perhaps shows how children think and simplify sentences. She asked me, so are you not supposed to go in the water?
Starting point is 00:24:07 I said, no. She fell in and looked at me angrily and said, oh no, you're not supposed to daddy. So you should have said yes. Confusing, but she was right. So Anthony, apparently the next time you need to give an echo answer and say you're not supposed to.
Starting point is 00:24:22 We're going to try to start a new linguistic movement here for English. That does make sense. You can see why that would be confusing. Yes, you're not supposed to. We're going to try to start a new linguistic movement here for English. That does make sense. You can see why that would be confusing. Yes, you're not supposed to. That makes perfect sense. Anthony also said in his email, PS, still can't decide whether or not it's a good idea to go for round door handles. You guys are no help. So yeah, bear prevention versus ease of use. That is quite the dilemma. And on the topic of bears, because apparently we really can't go too many episodes without discussing bears. And now it's been all the way since episode 183 since we have.
Starting point is 00:24:55 Russell Aminzadi wrote, Dear Greg, Sharon and Sasha, I just listened to the advice on bear safety in the December 25th episode, and it brought me back to a joke I heard in Boy Scouts. Scouts should always be alert for bears when hiking in the December 25th episode, and it brought me back to a joke I heard in Boy Scouts. Scouts should always be alert for bears when hiking in the backcountry. In bear habitat, you should wear small bells on your clothes that make noise. This ensures that you won't surprise a bear, which can attack if startled. In addition, you should carry pepper spray in case you do encounter a bear. The spray is similar to chemical mace, and if sprayed directly into the bear's face, it can often convince a bear to back off.
Starting point is 00:25:26 Keep an eye out for fresh bear scat so you have an idea if bears are in the area. Finally, learn to know the difference between black bear and grizzly bear scat. Black bear droppings are small and contain berries, leaves, and sometimes bits of fur. Grizzly bear droppings contain small bells and smell of pepper. contain small bells and smell of pepper. And Morgan Walther sent in some emergency bear identification for us. Love the podcast and the site. Catching up recently, I heard you wondering how to identify a bear to take advantage of the right defense tactics in episode 183.
Starting point is 00:25:59 I was told once the easiest way to tell a grizzly from a black bear is to climb a tree. If it comes up after you, it's a black bear. If it knocks down the tree, it's a grizzly. Hope this helps. Absolutely. Completely confirms my intentions to stay as far away from bears as possible. So thanks so much to everyone who writes in to us. And continued thanks for pronunciation helps with the tricky names. If you have anything you'd like to say to any of us here, please send it to podcast at futilitycloset.com.
Starting point is 00:26:33 It's my turn to try to solve a lateral thinking puzzle. Greg is going to give me an interesting sounding situation, and I have to figure out what is going on, asking only yes or no questions. This is from listener Gillian Brent. A completely healthy worker in a factory was inspecting the inside of a tank that had only been used to hold fresh water. It was upright with the usual manhole entry at the top, about 4 meters deep and diameter of 2 meters,
Starting point is 00:26:58 and there was about 15 centimeters of water at the bottom. He wasn't wearing any safety breathing gear because there hadn't been anything poisonous or hazardous in the tank. Shortly after entering the tank, he keeled over and died. Why? There wasn't enough oxygen in the tank or some other gas had collected like too much CO2 or something. Any yes or no questions? Oh, okay. Okay. Was it the case that there wasn't enough oxygen in the tank? Yes. Gas had collected that wasn't oxygen, such as carbon dioxide or something, had collected in the tank in place of oxygen. Basically, yes. Or some other gas.
Starting point is 00:27:34 I mean, it doesn't matter what gas it is. Do I need to figure out? You don't need to know the gas, but you need to know how this came about. How did it come about? Okay. Like, why is that the case? Right. Okay, so let's see.
Starting point is 00:27:45 It didn't have a big enough opening at the top for enough fresh air to get in. That wasn't the issue. No. So it had water in it, plain water. Yes. Was the water heated in any way? And is that important? Let's say no, I don't think it...
Starting point is 00:28:01 Okay. And there was no other chemicals besides the water oh oh the whole tank had been filled with water no because then there'd be a vacuum i'm like trying to no i'm just trying to figure out okay what created a lack of oxygen because that's that's the issue there was a lack of oxygen in a tank that had previously held water in it yes and then the water most of the water was now gone. It previously held more water. There was still 15 centimeters of water at the bottom of it.
Starting point is 00:28:30 Is that important? Yes. That's important that there was 15 centimeters of water at the bottom. Is that specific amount important? No. It's important that there was some water at the bottom. Yes. Okay, do I need to know anything else about the history of this tank? Like anything that had been
Starting point is 00:28:49 done with the water or to the water or where the water went or? No, no. But something else about the history of the tank? Yes. Ah. There's some characteristic of the tank that you need to figure out. Yeah. Okay. The shape of the tank? No. The dimensions? No. That are important? Where this is, where this takes place? It's in space! No.
Starting point is 00:29:11 Dang. One of these days it's going to be in space. Okay. It's, oh, is it underwater? Is the whole thing underwater? No, you don't need to know where it is. I don't need to know where it is. Oh, I thought I did.
Starting point is 00:29:22 Sorry. Hmm. What the tank is made out of. Yes. What the tank is made out of. Okay. Plastic? No. Glass? No. Metal? Yes. Okay. The tank is made out of metal. I need to know what kind of metal. Yes. Aha. Some kind of reactive metal? Some kind of metal that I would think of as being reactive? I don't know. Yes. Copper? metal, some kind of metal that I would think of as being reactive. I don't know. Copper? Well, no. Aluminum? The fact that it's water is pertinent here. Oh, iron, because it's rusting. No, I don't know. I'm trying to jump to too many things here. Basically, that's it. It's iron and the water is rusting the tank. It's steel. The tank was made of steel. The steel had
Starting point is 00:30:00 rusted on the inside from the water. Using up the oxygen. The process of rusting had used up all the oxygen in the tank and there had been no way for enough fresh air to get in inside from the water. Using up the oxygen. The process of rusting had used up all the oxygen in the tank and there had been no way for enough fresh air to get in and replace the oxygen. This is a real case from a safety education book I read while studying engineering at uni in Western Sydney, Gillian says. Wow. Which is frightening.
Starting point is 00:30:15 That actually happened. Yeah. Do you have any idea what year? I mean, maybe a long time ago before. Yeah. Yeah, because I would hope they have precautions against us now. I hope so. Anyway, thanks, Gillian. Thank you. And if anybody else has a puzzle to send in for us to try,
Starting point is 00:30:28 please send it to us at podcast at futilitycloset.com. Futility Closet is a full-time commitment for us. While we do sometimes have some advertising on the show, the bulk of our support actually comes from our phenomenal listeners. If you would like to help support the show, please check out our Patreon campaign at patreon.com slash futilitycloset, or see the support us section of the website at futilitycloset.com. While you're at the site, you can also check out Greg's collection of over 10,000 concise curiosities. Browse the Futility Closet store, learn about the Futility Closet books, and see the show notes for the podcast with the links and references for the topics we've covered. If you have any questions or comments for us, you can email us at podcast
Starting point is 00:31:14 at futilitycloset.com. Our music was written and performed by Greg's incredible brother, Doug Ross. Thanks for listening, and we'll talk to you next week.

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