Futility Closet - 219-The Greenbrier Ghost

Starting point is 00:00:00 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 presidential wordplay to a self-enumerating crossword. This is episode 219. I'm Greg Ross. And I'm Sharon Ross. In 1897, shortly after Zona Shue was found dead in her West Virginia home, her mother went to the county prosecutor with a bizarre story. She said that her daughter had been murdered and that her ghost had

Starting point is 00:00:38 revealed the killer's identity. In today's show, we'll tell the story of the Greenbrier Ghost, one of the strangest courtroom dramas of the 19th century. We'll also consider whether cats are controlling us, and puzzle over a delightful oblivion. On Route 60 in Greenbrier County, West Virginia, there stands a roadside marker that reads, Interred in nearby cemetery is Zona Heaster Shue. Her death in 1897 was presumed natural until her spirit appeared to her mother to describe how she was killed by her husband, Edward. Autopsy on the exhumed body verified the apparition's account. Edward, found guilty of murder, was sentenced to the state prison, only known case in which testimony from ghost helped convict a murderer. That's the story that's traditionally told about the so-called Greenbrier ghost.

Starting point is 00:01:28 The truth may be even stranger. It starts at 10 o'clock in the morning on January 22, 1897, when Edward Shue, a blacksmith, asked a local boy to visit his wife to ask whether she needed anything at the store. The boy knocked on the door, got no answer, and went inside. There he found the body of Shue's wife, Zona, lying on the floor. She was stretched out perfectly straight, with her feet together, one hand by her side and the other lying across her body. Her head was inclined slightly to one side.

Starting point is 00:01:54 The boy ran to tell his mother that Mrs. Shue was dead. When the local physician, George Knapp, arrived to act as coroner, he found Edward Shue overwrought at his wife's death. arrived to act as coroner, he found Edward Shue overwrought at his wife's death. He carried her body upstairs and dressed her himself in a dress with a high neck and a stiff collar and put a scarf around her neck and a veil over her face. He sat by the bed, cradling her body in his arms, so desolate with grief that Knapp couldn't make a thorough examination. He could see that Zona's neck and cheek were discolored, but when he tried to examine them, Edward protested so vigorously that the doctor finally withdrew and left the house. He reported the cause of death as everlasting faint, meaning a heart attack. Zona's death was even more tragic because she was just making a start in life.

Starting point is 00:02:33 Edward, who went by the name Trout, had only arrived in Greenbrier County a few months earlier. He and Zona had immediately fallen in love and were married within weeks. He was about 35, she about 23. Not much was known about his past life. Rumors said he may have been a criminal, but he seemed genuinely distraught over the loss of his new wife. He was just as distraught at the wake when the community gathered to view Zona's body at her mother's house that Sunday. Trout stood by the coffin as long as it was open and said to everyone who came near, isn't she pretty? He said he dressed her himself and seemed agitated when people got too close. He'd put a pillow on one side of Zona's head and a folded sheet on the other and had wrapped her

Starting point is 00:03:08 favorite scarf around her neck, saying she'd wanted to be buried in it. Many people noticed that Zona's head seemed to move unnaturally on her body when the coffin was moved. Before the coffin was closed, Zona's mother removed the sheet from beside Zona's head. She offered it to Trout, but he wouldn't take it and told her to keep it. In the weeks after the burial, the rumors about Trout's history began to darken. It turned out that Zona had been his third wife. His first marriage had ended in divorce when Trout was in prison for stealing horses, and his second wife had died mysteriously less than eight months after that. And people recalled his behavior after Zona's death, when he'd moved and dressed her body himself and wouldn't let anyone come near her, even the doctor. These rumors had been troubling the county prosecutor, John Alfred

Starting point is 00:03:48 Preston, for about a month, when Zona's mother, Mary Jane Heaster, visited him with an extraordinary story. She said she'd prayed constantly for several days after the funeral, and during that time she'd washed the sheet the trout had given her after the wake. To her consternation, the water turned red. She thought at first that this had ruined her other wash, but when she scooped up the water in her hand, it was clear. She'd even boiled the sheet and hung it out to dry, but the red color remained. She was convinced that this was a sign of something suspicious in her daughter's death. She'd never liked Trout Shoe, and for a few nights she said, I prayed that she would come back and tell on him. Then, to her astonishment, Zona had. On four successive nights, her dead girl had

Starting point is 00:04:25 appeared to her, speaking more freely at each visit until at last she revealed that she and Trout had had an argument and that he'd reacted violently and killed her. We don't know what Preston thought of the story, but as the prosecuting attorney of Greenbrier County, it was his job to investigate foul play, and he'd been hearing more and more disquiet in the community about Trout's earlier wives and his suspicious behavior after Zona's death. He spoke with George Knapp, the coroner, who admitted that his examination of Zona's body had been incomplete. He thought Zona had suffered a sudden heart failure, but he admitted that there were bruises on her cheek. The two men agreed that an autopsy would resolve Mary Jane's suspicions

Starting point is 00:04:59 and allow Knapp to judge better how Zona had died. It would also exonerate Trout if he were innocent. They ordered the body exhumed, chose three physicians to examine it, and assembled an inquest jury. On February 22, 1897, they exhumed Zona's body. Trout Shue complained vigorously, but was required to attend the inquest. On the way there, he said he knew he'd be placed under arrest, but added they will not be able to prove I did it. The autopsy took three hours. They examined the contents of Zona's stomach, and they found nothing amiss with her vital and reproductive organs. But the newspapers reported

Starting point is 00:05:29 that when they got to the head and neck, the doctors began to whisper together, and one of them turned to Trout and said, well, Shu, we have found your wife's neck to have been broken. The Nicholas County News wrote, then Shu's head drooped, and all observers noted a change of expression came over his face. The results were printed in detail in at least two local papers at the end of February. Zona's neck had been dislocated between the first and second vertebrae, the ligaments were torn and ruptured, and the windpipe had been crushed at a point in front of the neck. The jury charged Shue with murder, and he was locked up in the Lewisburg jail.

Starting point is 00:05:58 He pleaded not guilty, apparently still believing that he couldn't be convicted on circumstantial evidence alone. He sat there for four months while each side built its case. The prosecutor, Preston, and his assistant, Henry Gilmer, wanted to avoid mentioning the ghost at trial because it would make Mary Jane look irrational. They planned to call her to the witness stand and ask only about her suspicions about Trout. Shue's defense attorneys were William Parks Rucker and James P.D. Gardner. They sought out character witnesses for Shue, but apparently they had trouble assembling their case. They'd hoped to call 120 witnesses, but in the end arranged for only one, Shue's brother. The circuit court of Greenbrier County opened on June 22, 1897, and Shue's case was heard the next day. Though it had only circumstantial evidence, the state would

Starting point is 00:06:39 have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Trout Shue had murdered his wife. The coroner, Knapp, testified that he'd been uncertain of the cause of death and that Shue had prevented him from examining the body fully. The autopsy showed that Zona had not committed suicide, her neck had been dislocated, but there was no mark to show that she'd subjected herself to any sort of violence. The boy who discovered the body, Anderson Jones, testified that he'd found it lying on the floor, stretched out perfectly straight with feet together. His mother testified that Shue had asked her four times that morning to send Andy to his house. And she could also testify that Shue had later dressed his wife's body himself and put a huge collar around her neck and a large veil over her face.

Starting point is 00:07:14 Other state witnesses testified that Shue was the only person who'd been at his house before Zona was found dead, that Zona's head seemed to be very loose upon her body, and that Shue seemed to be in good spirits even after learning of his wife's death. The prosecution called Mary Jane Heaster to testify to her suspicions of foul play, which had occasioned the autopsy, and to show that she was sane and reliable. In keeping with their plan, they didn't mention the ghost, whose story in any case would have been inadmissible as hearsay, since the defense had no way to cross-examine a ghost. But the defense attorney, Rucker, brought it up anyway, presumably to make Mary Jane look ridiculous to the jury and to discredit the good and sane character that Preston had been trying to establish. The transcript of the trial disappeared from the Greenbrier

Starting point is 00:07:53 County Courthouse in the early 20th century, but we had the accounts of the participants and the newspapers that covered the trial. The judge, J.M. McWhorter, remembered that Rucker had asked Mary Jane, Mrs. Easter, didn't you have a dream that aroused your suspicions and led you to have the body exhumed? She said, I had no dream, for I was as fully awake as I am at this moment. He said, and did you not have a dream or vision that led you to have the body disinterred? She said, well, I was not satisfied that my daughter came to her death from natural causes, and I prayed earnestly that it might be revealed to me how she came to her death, and after about an hour spent in prayer, I turned over and there stood my daughter, and I put out my hand to feel of the coffin, but it was not there. She seemed to

Starting point is 00:08:28 hesitate to speak to me and departed. The next night, after I had prayed again that the manner of her death might be shown, she again appeared and talked more freely and gave me to understand that I should be acquainted with the whole matter and disappeared. The third night she again appeared and disclosed more to me, and on the fourth night she appeared and told me all about the difficulty, how it occurred, and how her death was brought about. She said Zona told her, he came that night from the shop and seemed angry. I told him supper was ready, and he began to chide me because I had prepared no meat for supper, and I replied that there was plenty. There was bread and butter, applesauce, preserves, and other things that made a very good supper. And he flew mad and got up and came toward me when I raised up, and he seized each side of my head

Starting point is 00:09:04 with his hands, and by a sudden wrench dislocated my neck. Mary Jane said she went on to describe to me the location of the building and surroundings in the neighborhood where they lived so that it was fixed in my mind as a reality. Rucker asked her several times whether the vision might have been only a dream but she insisted it was real. He asked do you think that you actually saw her in flesh and blood and she said yes sir I do. I told him the very dress that she was killed in, and when she went to leave me, she turned her head completely around and looked at me like she wanted me to know all about it. And the very next time she came back, she told me all about it. The first time she came, she seemed that she did not want to tell me as much about it as she did afterwards.

Starting point is 00:09:39 The last night she was there, she told me she did everything she could do, and I am satisfied that she did do all that too. This might have seemed impressive. The autopsy had shown that there was no meat in Zona's stomach, just as the ghost had said. Mary Jane could describe the layout of Zona's new home, though she hadn't visited it in the few months she'd been married. And the ghost described the dress that Zona had died in and said she'd been killed by a dislocated neck. But the autopsy would have told Mary Jane the contents of Zona's stomach and the details about the neck injury, and other neighbors could have described to her Zona's house and the dress she died in. A more careful defense attorney might have shown that the ghost story had been vague in the beginning

Starting point is 00:10:11 but grew more detailed as facts had come to light, but Rucker apparently didn't think that quickly. He realized too late that the testimony wasn't going his way and then tried to discredit all of Mary Jane's testimony as the ravings of a distraught mother. As I said, Mary Jane's testimony was inadmissible since it constituted hearsay, but the defense hadn't moved to strike it because they'd brought it up, and the prosecution hadn't stricken it because it worked well for them. Altogether, Shue's defense was weak. In the end, it's not clear that even his brother testified for him. Shue spoke for himself at the end, but according to one newspaper account, his testimony, manner, and so forth made an unfavorable impression on the spectators. The defense argued that if he were guilty, he might have fled the

Starting point is 00:10:48 county, but he'd often voiced his belief that he couldn't be convicted on circumstantial evidence. In the end, there was no middle ground for the jury to take. They'd have to decide either for murder in the first degree or for acquittal. The lawyers didn't mention the ghost in the summing up, and the judge may have instructed the jurors to discount that strange story as hearsay, but it was still the only account of Zona's murder that they'd heard, and it appears that most people in the community believed that Mary Jane had seen the ghost of her daughter. That's interesting that that would have been the only full story that they'd heard. You know, people like a story, a story that makes sense, a story that fits all the details,

Starting point is 00:11:21 and in the absence of having anything else, you're going to go for the story that you have. Yeah. That's kind of like a psychological trait that we have that makes us willing to believe even stories that might not be true just because we want there to be a story. Yeah, and especially if there's an absence of anything else, you take what you're given. The jury deliberated an hour and ten minutes and found Trout Shue guilty of murder. He was sentenced to life in the penitentiary. A newspaper later found that 10 of the 12 jurors had wanted to hang him. Mary Jane's story was sensational, but we can't say for certain that it swayed the jury. The Greenbrier Independent reported that the verdict

Starting point is 00:11:56 had been reached on the circumstantial evidence with no reference to the ghost. So what really happened here? Can we say that a ghost testimony got her body exhumed and her murderer brought to justice? Strictly speaking, we can't say that we know that. We have no evidence that Preston, the prosecutor, believed the ghost story himself. He'd heard weeks of troubling stories about Trout Shoe before a Mary Jane Easter approached him. And the inquest gave a clear reason for her trial. Zona's neck had been broken in a way that suggested deliberate murder. At the trial, the judge could have ruled that the ghost testimony was inadmissible since it might prejudice the jury, or he could have ordered the jury

Starting point is 00:12:28 sequestered while that question was discussed. He did neither because neither side raised any objection to it. The defense wanted to show that Mary Jane was irrational, so they allowed her to tell the story, and the prosecution let him because they knew that everyone in town had heard the rumor and that it would work in their favor. So the testimony was heard. But we can't be certain that the prosecution, the defense, the judge, or even the jurors believed the ghost story. Mary Jane Heaster had introduced it, hoping to get the case reopened, but she succeeded only because the circumstantial evidence was already so damning. It's possible that Mary Jane Heaster truly believed that she'd seen her daughter's ghost, but in 1986, a writer named Katie Letcher Lyle found another

Starting point is 00:13:01 possibility. Zona's death had been reported in the Greenbrier Independent on January 28, 1897, on page 3. On page 1 was an unrelated story from Australia. The ghost of a missing man had been seen sitting near a horse pond, and a search had discovered his body there. Years later, as he lay dying, the witness had confessed that he'd invented the ghost. He had seen the murder take place, but feared retribution if he reported it, so he merely said he'd seen the dead man's ghost. The article says, As soon as he started the story, such is the power of nervousness that numerous other people began to see it until its fame reached such dimensions that a search was made and the body found and the murderers brought to justice. Lyle suggests that Mary Jane Heaster read this article and decided to invent a ghost story in order to press a case against Trout Shue, whom she suspected in her daughter's death. She approached John Preston with a story that initially was vague. One newspaper account of the autopsy says only that Trout Shue was suspected of having brought about Zona's death

Starting point is 00:13:53 by violence or in some way unknown to her friends. But after the autopsy was performed, she was able to add convincing details to make sure the story fit the facts, and by the time of the trial, the earlier vague version had been forgotten. Again, there's no conclusive evidence that the story fit the facts, and by the time of the trial, the earlier vague version had been forgotten. Again, there's no conclusive evidence that the story swayed the jury or anyone else, but we can say that Mary Jane's efforts convinced Preston to order the autopsy, and that the circumstantial evidence that it uncovered was enough to convict Trout Shue. So, if that was justice, she got it. Trout Shue died in the West Virginia State Penitentiary in Moundsville in 1900. Zona lies today in the cemetery behind the Sewell Methodist Church. Her tombstone reads, In Memory of Zona Heaster Shue, Greenbrier Ghost, 1876-1897. I have updates to a couple of lateral thinking puzzles this week, so consider this one big spoiler alert. Julia Williams sent some follow-up about the puzzle in episode 213, in which the town

Starting point is 00:14:51 of Wunsiedel, Germany turned a neo-Nazi march in 2014 into a walk-a-thon to support an anti-extremist charity. We had wondered whether the ploy had worked to keep the neo-Nazis from returning, as I couldn't find any follow-up information. Julia wrote that she had studied in Leipzig from 2004 to 2009 and there were also neo-Nazi marches there. She said, thankfully there were always a lot more protesters for a neo-Nazi free Germany but the atmosphere on the days of the marches was always subdued and very tense throughout the city. Several thousand police officers would start arriving days before from all over Germany, helicopters flying, etc. A peaceful city getting nervous. Now this is a bigger city than Wunsiedel with lots of students and a lot of rather left-wing subculture. You wouldn't have to be worried about there being a lot of

Starting point is 00:15:40 counter-action when the neo-Nazis marched. And Julia explained that Leipzig has half a million inhabitants, and when the neo-Nazis would have a demonstration, several thousand people would show up to protest against them. Julia said, usually the neo-Nazis tried marching from the train station to the city quarter of Konovitz, which is traditionally very left-wing. This was an intended provocation. There would be maybe 200 to 500 neo-Nazis. The goal of everyone non-Nazi was then to create a sit-in as close to the train station as possible to keep the neo-Nazis from marching. The police would ask everyone to clear the streets.

Starting point is 00:16:14 It would go back and forth. Sometimes the sit-in shifted a few meters and the police would start all over again, asking everyone to clear the streets. There is a legal requirement for demonstrations to move at a certain pace. Whenever the sit-ins created a long enough delay so the neo-Nazis could not pass certain waypoints within a certain time frame, their demonstration was officially canceled. The few times I attended the protest, this strategy worked, and the demonstration did not reach their originally planned destination. At least once, they did not even leave the train station. It was, however,

Starting point is 00:16:45 a huge effort for the city that one could really feel in the air every time, and it required lots of people on the streets. Considering that Wunsiedel has less than 10,000 inhabitants, I can only imagine how much more work and effort it must be for the citizens to organize effective protests against neo-Nazi marches. It's funny. It almost sounds like a sport or a game. Everyone's obeying certain invisible rules. I mean, if you're just observing that, and you didn't know what was happening, you can see that it's a conflict, but it never comes to blows. It's just funny how that works.

Starting point is 00:17:18 And it actually is to everybody's credit that apparently there wasn't any outright violence. As for Wunsiedel's ploy to thwart the neo-Nazi marchers, Julia said, unfortunately, they continued marching. I'm guessing you can't find a lot about this online because the town does not want to draw a lot of attention and more neo-Nazis to the marches. According to German Wikipedia, the marches started in 1988 to commemorate Rudolf Hess's death in 1987. He was buried in Wunsiedel. By 1990, there were 1,600 neo-Nazis marching. Since then, the neo-Nazis are not allowed to

Starting point is 00:17:52 march by the cemetery nor make any references to Hess in their marches. Instead, they now commemorate the former organizer of the marches who died in 2009. The network of townspeople involved in the walk-a walkathon of 2014 continues organizing different events on the days of the marches, e.g. a Day of Humanity in 2017, with their own rallies and marches. You can find videos on YouTube if you look for the network's name, Wunsiedel ist bunt, or Wunsiedel is colorful. My understanding is that two creative agencies were involved in the stunt from 2014. That's why it was staged more professionally than the protests before and after. So I was sorry to hear that Wunzidl's ploy didn't work more permanently for them,

Starting point is 00:18:34 but thank you for that update, Julia. Yeah. Dan Cash sent an update on the puzzle from episode 215 about the one quiet and one loud kitty with the subject line meowsers. Hey guys and Sasha. I was just listening to the latest podcast where you talk about cats who've learned to communicate with their humans through vocalization. I have a thing or two to add. My old roommate had a cat Sid who would fairly ignore her when she got home from work as she just came in, fed him, and went about her evening. When I came he would meow and meow and meow tripping me up and being obnoxious until i picked him up and cuddled

Starting point is 00:19:10 him all he wanted was my attention once he'd had enough he'd trot off and eat the food that had already been put out for him it was when i found myself gazing at him in my arms the same way a new father gazes at his baby that i knew we had to slow things down. Anyways, a researcher at the university here in Brighton, UK has found that a cat will modulate its meowing to such a pitch that it is very close to that of a crying baby, triggering a nurture response from its owner and hence getting its demands met as quickly as possible. And Dan sent an article from New Scientist with the title Hungry Cats Trick Owners with Baby Cry Mimicry. A research team recorded 10 different cats purring when they were soliciting food and

Starting point is 00:19:51 when they weren't. 50 people consistently rated the solicitation purrs as sounding more urgent and less pleasant. And the researchers found that the solicitation purrs had an unusual peak in the 220 to 520 hertz frequency range contained within the more typical lower frequencies of the purrs. This is similar to the frequency range of 300 to 600 hertz for a baby's cry. The louder the high frequency element was in the purring, the more urgent the purr was rated to be, and the researchers suggest that the cats may be exploiting our innate tendencies to respond with caregiving to these types of sounds. The New Scientist article has a sample of each of the two kinds of purrs if you want to hear them for yourself. It did also occur to me that if humans find the solicitation purrs to be

Starting point is 00:20:39 unpleasant, then the cats may be training us through negative reinforcement so that when we do what they want, they stop the unpleasant sound, which then reinforces us to do their bidding. I don't know if the researchers considered that aspect. So just to be clear, the cats aren't, these aren't their natural vocalizations. They've sort of tuned them to manipulate humans. We don't know that. I mean, I wondered that too.

Starting point is 00:21:01 Like, right, whether cats are just luckily stumbling on to vocalizations that really push our buttons or whether we're training them through positive reinforcement right that if they make vocalizations of a certain type we're much more likely to jump up and feed them their breakfast i guess that makes sense i mean over time if you live with anyone long enough, you sort of learn how it works. You learn what works. Dan also said, it appears that toxoplasmosis, the disease you can pick up from handling cat poop, also makes you more pliant to the whims of your feline overlords, while also making you more prone to taking part in risky behavior. It's no good, guys. They're using psychological and biological

Starting point is 00:21:45 weapons to make us love their smoochy little faces. We don't stand a chance. According to the Mayo Clinic, toxoplasmosis is a disease that results from infection with the toxoplasma gondii parasite, one of the world's most common parasites. The World Health Organization says that toxoplasmosis is found in every country and that in some countries over 90% of the population tests positive for it. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention state that up to 95% of some populations have been infected with toxoplasma, with infection rates usually highest in areas with hot, humid climates and lower altitudes. The infection rate in the U.S. is estimated to be 11% of people 6 years and older.

Starting point is 00:22:30 Toxoplasmosis is often thought of as being transmitted through cat poop, as Dan said, but there are actually multiple routes of transmission, including eating contaminated food, such as undercooked meat that contains the parasite, or other food that's touched, say, cutting boards or utensils that were used with the meat, drinking contaminated water, or ingesting contaminated soil, such as might be on a gardener's hands or unwashed produce. Infected mothers can also pass the parasite on to their unborn children, which is why pregnant women are advised not to clean cats' litter boxes,

Starting point is 00:23:01 though I should note that the parasite needs to be swallowed, so simply coming into contact with it shouldn't usually cause infection. Although toxoplasmosis can have serious effects on developing fetuses, most people who are infected don't show any symptoms, or may have mild flu-like symptoms. However, whether you show symptoms or not, the parasite can remain in your body, and some researchers are claiming that it can produce psychological effects in the hosts. And this gets kind of creepy. Although T. gondii can infect most warm-blooded animals, it only reproduces in the gut of a feline. In order to get there, the parasite apparently changes the behavior of intermediate hosts, such as mice or rats, so that these hosts

Starting point is 00:23:43 will be more likely to be eaten by a feline. So for example, uninfected mice, even those born in a lab that have never encountered a cat, will avoid cat smells. But those infected with T. gondii do not, and are therefore more likely to end up inside of a cat, right where the T. gondii want to be. Some studies have even found that infected rats seem to be attracted to areas that smell of cats. Although scientists have usually suggested that this behavioral change is due to parasitic cysts in the brain that can alter brain chemistry, some researchers have recently reported that mice that no longer show any presence of the parasite in their brains

Starting point is 00:24:20 still remain unafraid of cat smells. That's fascinating. It's fascinating for the T. gondii, not so good for the rats, right? So while all of that is really unfortunate for rodents, the scarier question for us is whether infected humans will also show behavioral changes. And right now, that's a bit of an open question. There are a variety of studies purporting to link T. gondii infection to a range of psychiatric conditions or personality traits, such as schizophrenia, depression, and obsessive-compulsive disorder, impulsivity, risk-taking, and entrepreneurship, and rates of suicide and homicide. Some studies have reported sex differences in the effects, such as infected women being more warm, outgoing, and conscientious than non-infected women, and infected men being more rule-breaking, suspicious, and dogmatic. But the question of a causal relationship between the parasite and human behavior remains unsettled.

Starting point is 00:25:16 For example, while several studies have suggested a link between T. gondii and schizophrenia, others have not found a connection. And toxoplasmosis is rather common, but schizophrenia is much rarer, suggesting that even if T. gondii is involved, the situation is not straightforward. Further, in some cases, you have studies showing apparently contradictory results, such as some studies finding that people with T. gondii are less fearful and more risk-taking, while at least one study reported higher levels of apprehension and insecurity in infected individuals.

Starting point is 00:25:48 So while cats may be manipulating us with their vocalizations, and based on our household, I have no doubt that they are, we're not sure yet how much their parasites might be controlling us. There are actually many examples of parasites significantly affecting the behavior of their hosts, which is a rather disturbing thought. For example, there is a type of worm that after developing for a time inside of a cricket, manages to convince the cricket to fling itself into water, thereby committing cricket suicide and getting the worm into the aquatic environment where it needs to be. Or a parasitic fungus that, after developing for a few days inside of a rainforest ant,

Starting point is 00:26:28 manipulates the luckless ant to climb about 25 centimeters up a tree to where conditions are best for fungal growth and clamp down on a leaf before dying and having fungal threads emerge from its body. There has even been a small study showing that the flu virus may make people more sociable, causing them, before they become symptomatic, to interact with significantly more people in significantly larger groups than before they were infected. So think about that the next time one of your friends suddenly decides to throw a party. I understand the doubts about T. gondii, but if this principle has been demonstrated,

Starting point is 00:27:01 and it's even a little true, in a population where the incidence is high and over a long period of time, that could affect history. It could have really pronounced effects on human civilizations if it's there at all. You know what I mean? You mean even if it affects a small percentage of individuals? Yeah. In a big enough population and overall, you know, apparently, how long have humans and cats associated with each other? Thousands of years. That would have a significant effect.

Starting point is 00:27:26 Right. And it's not just cats. I wanted to make sure cats don't get a bad rap here. There was actually a large study that was done in the UK where they examined cat ownership when people were, when mothers were pregnant with their children and when the children were young. And then they looked at them in adolescence to see if there was more evidence of psychosis, for example. Because one of the strongest links or the links that have had the most studies behind it is with schizophrenia. And the large UK study did not

Starting point is 00:27:53 find a relationship between cat ownership and children being psychotic as adolescents or showing psychotic symptoms. But that's even worse then, because you don't have to have a cat in the equation. No, you don't have to have a cat in the equation. Like I said, you can eat an animal that contains the parasite or anything that's been contaminated by the parasite. So as long as this parasite's been associated, it's been around, basically. Right, exactly. Yeah, and so we don't know. We don't really know yet how much it might be affecting us or how much any other parasite might be affecting us, right? might be affecting us, right? And on that topic, while I was doing the research for this,

Starting point is 00:28:31 I kept thinking about the rather new field of research into the human microbiota, which suggests that the trillions of microorganisms living inside of us might influence our mood or other brain functions considerably more than anyone had previously recognized. But that would be a whole other story. So thanks so much to everyone who writes in to us. We're always sorry that we can't read all of the interesting emails that we get on the show, but we do appreciate your sending them. So if you have any comments or updates for us, please send them to podcast at futilitycloset.com. dot com. It's Greg's turn to try to solve a lateral thinking puzzle. I'm going to give him a strange sounding situation and we're going to see if he can figure out what's going on, asking only yes or no questions. This puzzle comes from Ben Snitkoff, who says, this puzzle is based on something that happened to me. I'm changing the gender in this case

Starting point is 00:29:23 because it doesn't matter and I feel that a disproportionate number of the prompts default to men. Here, here. So here is Ben's puzzle with a female protagonist. A woman is sent a survey about a recent event. Upon reflection, she cannot remember anything about the event, but proceeds to answer the survey anyway,

Starting point is 00:29:40 to the delight of the person who sent it. Okay. Recent event. Okay, recent event. Okay, this is true. This is something that happened to Ben. Yes. Sent a survey about a recent event. You say can't remember anything? Correct.

Starting point is 00:29:54 So this was an experience that the person had immediately? Would you say that? Obviously. I don't know what you mean. It's a survey about something that happened to the person who received the survey? Yes. you mean was it it's a survey about something that happened to the person who received the survey yes um and responded would you say responded was this like an opinion survey just asking someone's

Starting point is 00:30:13 subjective impression of something yes i mean okay i'm saying yes uh subjective impression of something sort of that's part of it. But, okay, and she answers... What I'm getting at is whether she answered things objectively correctly. Yes. She was asked questions and answered them. Yes. I'm not sure what you're asking. They weren't just factual questions.

Starting point is 00:30:37 It was her opinion about something? Would it help me to know what the survey specifically addressed? Sort of. It wasn't like her opinion about something, you know, like a political survey where it's like your opinion. Yeah. What do you think about this topic? So it wasn't like that. Okay.

Starting point is 00:30:56 It was a survey about a recent event that had occurred to her. But she didn't remember the event? Correct. But she didn't remember the event? Correct. But answered the questions... What I'm getting at is, would you say she answered the questions accurately? Yes. Which is why the person who sent it was happy.

Starting point is 00:31:16 Was she guessing what the answers were? No, I think she was answering to the best of her ability. Okay. So it would help me to know what the survey was asking about? Yes. And this really did happen to Ben. So this isn't some, I don't know, crazy, she was in outer space, or this is something that could happen to one of our listeners very easily and believably. Does the survey involve commerce in any way, like a product or a service that she'd used?

Starting point is 00:31:44 Something along those lines, maybe. A product? No. Something she'd bought? No. A service? Yes, I think that's close. An experience she'd had? Correct. But a service-like. Okay. And the fact that she couldn't

Starting point is 00:32:02 remember anything about the event actually pleased the person who sent the survey. Is this concerned with sleep at all? Was she unconscious? Yes. Okay, and that's why she couldn't remember whatever it was? Yes. So the person who sent the survey, was that a company, I guess, or the provider of the service?

Starting point is 00:32:20 Yes. And was just writing to see how it went, I guess, or what her impression was? Yeah. All right, so she was unconscious. Yes. And was just writing to see how it went, I guess, or what her impression was? Yeah. All right. So she was unconscious. Yes. You say, I think you hesitated at sleep. It wasn't quite sleep.

Starting point is 00:32:32 Yeah. Sleep isn't quite right, but I'll go with unconscious. Drugged? Yes. Sleeping pills? No. Something like that? Some sleep aid?

Starting point is 00:32:42 No. But the service was to induce sleep? Not exactly sleep. Unconsciousness? No. Something like that? Some sleep aid? No. But the service was to induce sleep? Not exactly sleep. Unconsciousness? Correct. And they were writing to see did this work and she said yes and they were pleased at that. Yes. So what service do they try to render you unconscious? Anesthesia?

Starting point is 00:32:58 Yes, that's exactly it. The survey was sent by the woman's anesthesiologist asking how her experience with the anesthesia was because she remembered nothing. it was a positive experience. That's like the best answer you could give. Right. And Ben adds, the true story, after a recent outpatient surgery, I was sent a survey from the anesthesiologist. The first question on the survey was whether I remembered enough to complete the survey, which really flummoxed me for a moment.

Starting point is 00:33:23 So thanks so much to Ben for that gender equalizing puzzle in which we are very glad to hear that no one died, right? And I want to remind everyone that we're sorry that not all of the puzzles we get do end up making it onto the show, but we do appreciate them all. So if you haven't heard one of yours yet, please feel free to try sending in another one

Starting point is 00:33:41 and maybe that one will work out better. So if anybody does have a puzzle they want to send in for us to try, please send it to us at podcast at futilitycloset.com. Futility Closet is a big commitment of time to make each week and is supported entirely by our wonderful listeners. If you would like to help support our celebration of the quirky and the curious and get bonus material, such as extra discussions, outtakes, more lateral thinking puzzles, and updates on Sasha,

Starting point is 00:34:10 our podcast mascot who is almost certainly controlling our brains, then check out our Patreon campaign at patreon.com slash futilitycloset, or see the Support Us section of the website. If you're looking for more quirky curiosities, check out the Futility Closet books on Amazon, or visit the website at futilitycloset.com, where you can sample more than 10,000 exceptional esoterica. At the website, you can also see the show notes for the podcast, with links and references for the topics we've covered. If you have any questions or comments about the show, you can reach us by email at podcast at futilitycloset.com.

Starting point is 00:34:46 Our music was written and performed by Greg's stupendous brother, Doug Ross. Thanks for listening, and we'll talk to you next week.

Futility Closet - 219-The Greenbrier Ghost

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