Lateral with Tom Scott - 56: World-famous battery packs

Episode Date: November 3, 2023

Caroline Roper, Ella Hubber and Tom Lum from 'Let's Learn Everything!' face questions about eccentric earrings, dawdling deliveries and cattle calculations. LATERAL is a comedy panel game podcast about weird questions with wonderful answers, hosted by Tom Scott. For business enquiries, contestant appearances or question submissions, visit https://www.lateralcast.com. HOST: Tom Scott. QUESTION PRODUCER: David Bodycombe. RECORDED AT: The Podcast Studios, Dublin. EDITED BY: Julie Hassett. MUSIC: Karl-Ola Kjellholm ('Private Detective'/'Agrumes', courtesy of epidemicsound.com). ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS: Sayan Chaudhry, Georgi, Jaime Nufio. FORMAT: Pad 26 Limited/Labyrinth Games Ltd. EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: David Bodycombe and Tom Scott. © Pad 26 Limited (https://www.pad26.com) / Labyrinth Games Ltd 2023. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maple Syrup, we love you, but Canada is way more. It's poutine mixed with kimchi, maple syrup on Halo Halo, Montreal-style bagels eaten in Brandon, Manitoba. Here, we take the best from one side of the world and mix it with the other. And you can shop that whole world right here in our aisles. Find it all here with more ways to save at Real Canadian Superstore. Why does the Austrian music group Das Osterwiener Gemussorchester give their audience soup after every performance? The answer to that at the

end of the show. My name is Tom Scott and this is Lateral. This is Lateral. Take half a pound of creativity, five ounces of playfulness, and a teaspoon of creative flair, and what do you get? If it's anything like my cooking, it'll be burnt and taste of cardboard. But luckily, our guests today are a surefire recipe for success. Joining us again, we have the crew from Let's Learn Everything, the podcast. And we start today.

Let's go with Ella. How are you doing? I'm excellent. Thank you for asking. What are you working on right now? What is going to be in the future as we record this, but in the past as people listen to this episode? I cannot tell you because every time we do a topic on the podcast, it's a surprise to the other two guests. Oh, okay. You have to go in completely cold. There's no... Caroline Roper, second person of Let's Learn Everything. Have you ever come up with a topic and then found out that one of the other members of the team is also doing that topic? We've not... Well, we've had something very very close before so we have people uh outside of the three of us to check our topics for us so that we still don't know what

each other's topic is going to be but they like make sure we don't have too much overlap apart from one time where me and ella were both like you know what we're not gonna check our episodes today who ah who needs to do that? And what was it we both ended up talking about, Ella? I did. You did the pill. I did do the pill. And I did menstrual products. And the overlap between those are surprisingly similar historically. But then it just becomes a themed episode.

Yeah. And the third member of the team. Honestly, i've got no segue that leads in from the pill and menstrual products into this introduction so please welcome the third member of the team tom long well let me tell you tom my my question for that did not uh smoothly transition between those i think my question for there was what are the two highest mountains on the world and on earth it was like a very like uh like math trigonometric calculating heights of things thing it was like a little little break between the two um so yeah well good luck to all three of you welcome back to the show this is where we try to match make

quirky questions with unexpected solutions so let's see if it's going to be love at first insight. I'm going to start you off with question one. This question was sent in by Georgie. Thank you very much. Shortly after a safe landing, a pilot has the back of their shirt cut off. Why? One more time.

Shortly after a safe landing, a pilot has the back of their shirt cut off. Why? Is this a so sweaty? I was going to say that. The the stress of it is it every time or is this a sometimes thing that happens because i don't feel like pilots are buying shirts for every day every flight that doesn't seem practical oh it's the type of pilot. Oh. Like it's a fighter plane pilot or something. Oh, wait, that might actually be.

Yeah, because if you're super secured into your seat, maybe you would need to... Oh, be like physically removed out of it. Yeah, for like safety. Yeah. We're not getting anything. No, we're getting no reaction from Tom. Were you just coming up with good ideas?

I don't want to break the flow. Were they, was it like, I'll throw in a few bad ones if you want then. Was it like they were hanging their jersey from the rafters because they did a really good job and so they cut it up and then they put it up on top of the air? Sorry, the rafters of the plane? Yeah.

I mean, it's rare that I just question a guest like that. I'm not entirely certain planes have rafters. That's what they do in sports, right? Like all-time jerseys, they retire them. Honestly, the closest answer there is probably Toms. Not in the sense of rafters or anything like that, but there's something special going on here. It's...

Well, well, well. Now I'm thrown right off the flow is gone was it like a like a sully sullenberger situation like a like a landing that was like spectacular and they wanted to like commemorate it somehow is it actually my thought was like sweat like maybe like it was such a stressful flight and they like sweated like clean through and they wanted to keep that for some reason. It would have been a very stressful flight. I mean, unless they were very, very good, it would have been a very stressful flight. It's not quite that reason. It's not sweat, but it is commemorating something. Is it a space pilot, or is it a

regular commercial aircraft? Regular pilot. Huh. Commemorate. So they had it cut off them for commemorative reasons. They successfully landed the plane, but they died, and so...

Oh! Okay, first half of that great i don't know how that factors into well they it's like you know an emt thing where they have to cut through your clothes like resuscitate you oh i love the thought process there ella that was that was really something is it something to do with the pilot like is it their last flight oh yeah or something like that

very close well also the exact opposite but very close it's their first flight it's their only flight because they are a monkey it's

the car's going right on target I'm just to hold it here we're gonna be fine just swerve off at the end i gotta i gotta i gotta take adopt the ella strategy which is say something like extremely logical so that you start nodding it at the end and be like and also he was a man made of eels is it the only time you're allowed to do that flight like can you only do that flight once for some reason because it's so stressful? It's more by definition.

You can't do this more than once. You're right. It's a first for something. It's a first for this pilot. First time flying on their own? First time flying on their own. Yes. So it is an aviation tradition that after someone's first solo flight,

in commemoration, the back of their shirt is cut off. So the last part is, why? Where did that come from? Where did it come from, historically? Is it because the first time someone ever flew alone, they... It, like, ripped. Like, it was such a close call that like somehow

my thought was like do they use the shirt and then like stitch it to the seat of the plane or something like that you know they do keep it

it can get signed by the instructor have markings on it it's very much you're proud of this as your first flight think back to where the tradition might have

come from what planes might have looked like back then, and what technology we didn't have. Seat belts. Did they tie them to the seat? Flags or indicators, maybe they had to like rip it off to like signal something to other planes, or to tell which way the wind was going. Not to other planes, they're not waving it out, it was only cut off when they got back down and they knew it wasn't going to be needed anymore.

Parachute? Oh, crikey, no. No? Single strip of fabric. No, my thought was like a parachute sewn into your shirt somehow and then you'd have to cut to get out of that. I want you to picture the scene. You've got an old propeller plane.

Maybe it's a biplane, something like that. You've got the student in front on the controls. You've got the instructor behind them and it's open air, a lot of noise, 1930s, 40s, 50s. What might that shirt tail have done? It was used... Oh, was the... Oh, okay.

It was the instructor sat behind and they would pull on the like shirt to like tell them what to do. Yep, exactly that. Because they didn't have radio. The only way that the instructor could get the student's attention was by grabbing the back of their shirt

and pulling on it and going, because there's so much noise and so much wind and so much everything. So the tradition became that when the plane landed after the first solo flight, the instructor would come up and ceremonially cut off that shirt tail because they knew they didn't need it anymore. That's so cute. That's so sweet. Tom, we go to you for the next question.

What have you got? All right. When opportunity strikes, birds of prey can be very resourceful. It has been known for a black kite to pick up a branch, fly to a new area of grassland, and then have a full stomach a few minutes later. How? Read that again.

When opportunity strikes, birds of prey can be very resourceful. It has been known for a black kite to pick up a branch, How? Read that again. It went around stabbing everything with its stick. Great. No? It's a payment. What? A payment to another animal in exchange for food. Oh. If a kite brought me a stick, I would feed it.

Wait, so was the stick used to impersonate a snake? And then when the kite dropped it, animals would scatter and move around. So the kite would see the animals then and then attack them. There's a part of that that is very spot on but i won't say what i think you guys are i think you guys have got i think carol yeah caroline caroline being the ecology person i think will will hit this eventually tom i don't know if you have any guesses is it trying to attract animals with this or act as a decoy is it flushing creatures out of hiding? Yes, I will say that. Flushing them out?

The black kite's preferred prey is small animals. So it's trying to flush mice out of burrows or rabbits out of burrows or something like that. Would it literally stick the stick into burrows to try and move rodents out of them? No, it's something i will say this even though its prey is small animals it's causing a big thing to happen is it in water you're on a similar track where it is sort of like a a chain of events that happens if you drop a stick a different animal comes and gets and grabs it and that it destroys a be animal comes and grabs it. It destroys a beaver dam and the beavers all come out to fix it.

Meanwhile, downstream, someone's getting flushed out. No, never mind. One stick won't do that. And then we got Johnny with the getaway car. It is a criminal act. Okay. I can confirm that. Wait, so does it involve humans in some way then?

It doesn't. No, that's a good insight, but no. Oh, I thought it might be dropping it on a cage and breaking glass and the animals get out. Is it something to do with vibrations of the stick? No. Something to do with vibrations of the stick? No. Wait, it picked up a branch, dropped it in another field, right?

Mm-hmm. I assumed that the full stomach was from a field, but... Oh, Ella's got it. It's stolen the branch from another bird's nest? Oh, no. I assumed that the animals were going to be in the field that it was dropping the branch in. But maybe the animals are coming from where it's stolen the branch from

to try and get it back. You guys are circling around crimes but you haven't named the right crime yet. Theft. Vandalism. Arson. Petty theft. Tax fraud. Well, the stick is on fire and you drop it in a field with grass and it burns everything and the animals all flee ella you are correct no way i'm said it it is arson so they they set fire to grasslands causing a stampede which then just like routes out all

the animals i looked into this because i didn't believe it myself there is literally a paper titled intentional fire spreading by quote fire hawk raptors in northern australia wow you know there is some like debate about it could possibly be like unintentional, like they go to pick up a branch thinking it's like a prey and that it happens to be on fire and dropping it. But there are it's like a super interesting phenomena because it is so hard to believe. And there's like a ton of like indigenous ecological knowledge about this. But there's also a lot of people who are like no way well that's there's no way and they don't consider it when they consider firefighting which is interesting can you imagine like trying to research this because you you have to wait for an animal

to to do that basically and then just hope that you're there to watch it like that must be so hard to study uh yes so basically when a bushfire is happening a black kite will pick up a flaming branch and fly to a different grassland to start a new fire this causes a stampede the larger animals will trample the smaller ones which the kite can then pick up easily oh Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah. Kites circle around over carcasses to catch insects, or they swoop down to pick up small animals off the floor. They pass their catch into their beaks midair so they don't actually have to land.

And this is amazing. The toy kites used by children on the windy day get their name from these birds. Thank you to James Nuffio for sending this question in. The Graflex speed graphic camera was popular with photojournalists in the 1940s. Though obsolete, the battery holder for the flash gun is now worth hundreds of dollars thanks to a 1977 event. What was it?

I know the answer. Oh, Tom, are you all ready? You know it. Oh know the answer. Oh, Tom, are you already... You know it. Oh, yeah. All right, Tom, you get to sit down to this one. I'll give the other two the question one more time. The Graflex speed graphic camera was popular with photojournalists in the 1940s.

Though obsolete, the battery holder for the flash gun is now worth hundreds of dollars thanks to a 1977 event. What is it? Caroline, Ella, good luck. Oh, the holder for the flash gun. You said not the... The battery holder for the flash gun.

The battery holder. Okay, so I think, off the top of my head, I would guess that it is a specific shape and was used in an outfit for a movie 77 what's that some kind of star wars time there's a star war happening well because this is when i was working at the science museum we had like a bunch of um like plane engines and parts of the plane engines were used in star wars as like various drones and stuff like that. So that's not like completely out of reach.

It's not even slightly out of reach. It's entirely correct. But can you name the part of the outfit? What specifically is a battery holder for a flash gun in Star Wars? How big is it? It can't be huge. Maybe like 10 centimetres of battery? Yeah.

A gun on a stormtrooper's gun or something? Something on a droid? A lightsaber! A lightsaber face! I was about to say a more elegant weapon from a more civilised age.

Wow! Of course. Oh, really? Oh, that's so cool. That is the base of Luke Skywalker's lightsaber. It is a battery holder from a flash gun from a 1940s camera. I just want to say,

Ella, that was incredible that you were just like, maybe it could be this thing from this and you were absolutely spot on. That was lateral. That was lateral thinking. Hey. And Caroline, you're also right.

Obi-Wan Kenobi's lightsaber began its life as a balance pipe from a Rolls Royce jet engine. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No way. With that wonderful bit of deduction, Ella, we'll move straight on to your question. Yeah. Go for question. Yeah. Go for it.

Okay. In medieval times, why was it important for cooks to be students of religion as well? Once more. In medieval times, why was it important for cooks to be students of religion as well? important for cooks to be students of religion as well. Like in terms of growing the good crops, was it something that only churches had access to maybe? That still sounds like a euphemism from marijuana. I know that's from a previous episode, but like you gotta stop, please. Growing the good crops really sounds like a euphemism. The real good crops, you know. I like that idea of like sacred knowledge, but no, not quite.

I mean, because there's tons of like resources attached to the church at the time. So I'm wondering if it's even something like being able to learn how to read or something like that. Or maybe if you want to be a professional cook, you have to be paid to do that. So would the church be the group to have the resources for that? No, this is, you don't have to work for the church. What was the phrasing again? Like a scholar of a student of the church or?

Yes, student of religion. Could this be a language thing? Like one of my standard go-to linguistic anecdotes is that in English, we order food in French, basically, and we talk about animals in English. Like you order beef, but when you're talking about the animal, it's a cow. Like pork and pig, apart from chicken, because that was poor people's food. So that's all English. And I'm trying to work

out if there's something in the religious background there about the words but i wouldn't that wouldn't affect your cookery skills right you could still like identify what food was well yeah so when you say like they are a cook does that mean like a professional cook because like obviously lots of people are cooking no they don't you don't have to like a professional cook? Because like, obviously, lots of people are cooking. No, they don't. You don't have to be a professional cook. Yeah, I was wondering if this is like a graveyard cemetery distinction where it's like you're only... I'm wondering, is this a social thing or is this more of like...

Wait, sorry, graveyard cemetery distinction? Graveyards are attached to churches, I believe, and cemeteries are not. You don't have to have this faith. You don't have to be religious. You just have to understand something about the religion. This isn't like a religious dietary restriction thing, presumably, because this is medieval times and the vast majority of the UK did not have dietary restrictions for religion there.

Apart from not eating meat on Fridays? Nothing to do. Nothing to do with that. Okay. I think if you think this is medieval times, what equipment would you not have had when you were cooking? It's not specialised equipment. It's something you need to know when you're cooking

hygiene um water running water pots pans fire yeah heat pans the night the fancy chef's hat that can hide a rat inside to help you cook that is very important yeah no it's nothing that you actually cook with okay books is it cookbooks uh no but like there's something in that because when you're using a cookbook what's something really important as part of the ability to read like an open area with light candles? No, no, no. Back to the cookbook. Back to the recipes. What do they tell you? Is it to identify animals? Measurements.

Oh, scales? No, no, no. Keep down there. Keep down that way. The ingredients. Measuring cups. You've said everything in a recipe, but the thing that... The order to cook things in? No. Numbers, math.

The amount of time you have to cook things for. Yes, the amount of time you have to cook things for. Hourglasses, candles that they had to... How to tell the time? Yes. Yes. How do they tell the time? Are we blanking on this? Is this general knowledge we should all know what on earth does a student of religion know about time that regular people

don't so you can measure time with the burning of a candle it's not super accurate with with uh um hourglasses sund sundials, church bells. I'll say it's not physical. It's not physical. It's not physical. It's like the knowledge that you would have. You would know how long the Lord's Prayer is. And that's like exactly one minute.

No way. You cook something for the duration of so many Lord's prayers. Yeah, that is exactly it, Tom. Tom! There's something in my head about an old medieval cookbook where it said something like, I won't be fry for so many minutes. It was like, put on the stove and say three Lord's prayers

or something like that. Yes, it's basically that. So cooking times were often specified in terms of the number of times it took to say a common prayer. It doesn't necessarily have to be the Lord's prayer. So for example, one recipe book on the subject of cooking written by Martino da Como of Italy says, cook for the time it takes to recite two paternosters. says, cook for the time it takes to recite two paternosters. One good example here is for pancakes, one Hail Mary on the waffle iron, which is 15 seconds.

They had waffle irons, but they didn't have hourglasses. I should clarify, they had them, but sand timers and water clocks were too expensive, at least accurate ones were too expensive for most people. Also for short periods of time like that. Exactly. Although there is a recipe here, which is for 20 to 25 minutes,

which is for bread dough, and you would do one entire rosary. That doesn't seem practical to me. Holy moly. Yeah, you should just do like one quarter of a Let's Learn Everything podcast. That's an idea. A recipe podcast that's not religious, but you just, you start on and like one quarter of a Let's Learn Everything podcast. That's an idea. A recipe podcast that's not religious,

but you just, you start on and you cook along with it. And there's some entertainment and about five minutes is, oh, you need to do that now. Oh, that's a great idea. Such a good idea. Next one's from me. Good luck, folks. In a flat open field with no obstructions, Angus can see the same number of cows and bulls.

In the same field, Daisy can see twice as many bulls as cows. You would disagree with them both. How many bulls and cows are there? Oh no, this is a maths question. I knew we were going to get that. I'll say it one more time. In a flat, open field with no obstructions, Angus can see the same number of cows and bulls.

In the same field, Daisy can see twice as many bulls as cows, and you would disagree with them both. How many bulls and cows are there? I think I might know the answer to this. No way. Are they just really bad at identifying them? Yeah, is it a matter of perspective?

It's hard, you know? I mean, it sort of is a matter of perspective, but there's no visual tricks involved. Is there a hint in the names? See, I thought, I thought as soon as I saw this question, someone's going to get the hint in the names.

Yes, there is, Tom. Oh, what are the names? Angus, Daisy. Angus and Daisy. Wait, are the people who are seeing the cows, they're cows? Yes, I knew it. I saw that question. I thought they're going to get that one on the names.

Yes. That's so clever. Yes, you have worked out the trick in the question. It is that Angus is a bull and Daisy is a cow. So you know what? I'm going to give you the maths problem from that. Oh, okay. Angus can see the same number of cows and bulls.

Daisy can see twice as many bulls as cows, and you would disagree with them both. Now, I realise that in audio, this is a tricky one. I would like to say I'm opting out of this question immediately because I hate maths so much. I would like to say

how distressed the three of us look. Actually, no, me and Ella look quite distressed. Tom Lum looks like he's about to really enjoy trying to figure this out. I got visual cows in my brain 24-7. That's how I do most math. I can't visualize things. Oh, yeah. Angus is looking at three cows and three other bulls.

Why three? And so he sees an equal amount. Oh, you're just starting at a base of like an equal amount i guess that's true i guess it could be a different amount i would i would like to say caroline has caroline has a fantasia so caroline literally cannot picture things i'm literally drawing it on a post-it note right now i'm rotating these cows in my brain like it's nobody's business just for fun so i'm seeing going you on... Three cows and three bulls. So Angus is one of them.

No, because Angus can see an equal number of... So there's two cows and three bulls then. So Angus is one of them and so he sees two cows and two bulls. And then if Daisy

is one of the cows, then she sees... She sees twice as many bulls as cows. One cow and three bulls. Okay, so I goofed it then. So it's got to be four bulls as cows one cow and three bulls okay so I goofed it then so it's got to be four

bulls and three no yes four bulls and three cows because the

Angus is seeing himself so he's seeing three other bulls and then three cows but whichever the other name was Daisy

Daisy Daisy can see two other cows and including angus four literally had to draw that on a post-it note to figure it out what i love is tom you started so strong you just went yeah so uh angus can see three and three i'm like oh he's got it immediately and intuitively and then i lost it veered off and lost faith in it and Caroline swooped in. I became Angus. You know what? I became Angus. I was too lost in it. I couldn't remove myself. I was too impassioned. I just had to sit quietly for a second to do the math. Yeah, we cut it out. We spent like an hour doing that drawing on the chalkboard yes angus and daisy are a bull and

a cow respectively and the answer to the mathematical trick is four bulls and three cows caroline next one is yours let's do it so this question has been sent in by cyan chowdhury shortly after a september 2016 announcement the company M3D released a design for some earrings. They are truncated cones with a one inch opening at the wider end. How did they help reduce anxiety? I'll say it again. Shortly after a September 2016 announcement, the company M3D released a design for some earrings. They are truncated cones with a one inch opening

at the wider end. How do they help reduce anxiety? Ear plugs. I was thinking ear plugs. Wait, so like the earring itself is an ear plug? Yeah, you just like

flip it up into your ears. Or if you want to be really clever, you just kick your head in just the right way and it's all in the cup. Earplug in the ear hole. We're like an ideas factory on this podcast.

So that's a really good idea, but that's not the answer. Also one inch hole. Like that's quite a big earplug that is. That would be a lot. What's a truncated cone? Can someone describe that shape to me? Because I don't know. It's like a cone that's squished, right? Oh no, with the top chopped off.

So like without the pointy end, so it's... Like a dog ball shape kind of a thing, right? I guess? Kind of, yeah. Is it a whistle? No. No, it's not a whistle. Does it have functionality, I feel like, to reduce anxiety? It must have. It's got it, right?

What do you mean by functionality? It reduces anxiety. That's its function. That's what it does. That's the impact it has at the end. But is that its original function, to reduce anxiety? It wasn't designed specifically to reduce anxiety. You store your keys in it somehow and anytime you wonder if you've lost your keys at home, then you can just feel your earrings

and there's your key. Doesn't work with a one-inch hole. Now, Tom, that was like, like you went for the dumb answer, but you're kind of not too far off, you know? Oh, okay. You can store something in it then, something that's important to you.

Yeah. AirPods? AirPods. Really? Yeah, yeah. So they just hang, they just like, into little sockets there? Yeah, so you just put them in, yeah.

Because what was released at the same time? Oh, right right the year yeah that should have been the okay yeah 2016 in september of 2016 the iphone 7 was launched alongside this apple unveiled their new wireless airpods people were worried that these could fall out get lost stuff like that so to help prevent this these earrings kind of take the form of a little basket which could then catch your airpods if they fell out oh it's a bath okay so they're not even in my head i'm thinking they're like dangling down and somehow there's some kind of it's a storage container yeah in my head you're like locking it in and it's literally to catch your air pod that falls out

oh yeah yeah yeah which is why there's that one inch opening so that if you're like the bottom of the air pod could then fall into it

and get caught by it I was seeing the cone as being the other way up I was seeing it as being a cone pointing upwards it's not it's a cone

pointing down I was also that makes a lot more sense yeah maybe we aren't clever product designers actually but that makes a lot more sense yeah maybe we aren't clever product designers actually but that makes sense about why you would think it would be something to like plug your ears with if that was the way around that it was you know i i haven't seen what these look like but i can

imagine they look ridiculous i mean i don't see them around. This is the first time I'm hearing of it. I like my fun earrings. I don't know if I would wear these as a fashion accessory, but that's just me, you know? So in September of 2016, the iPhone 7 was launched at the same time AirPods were released. So these earrings were designed to catch your AirPods if they fall out of your ears.

We have rattled through the questions in this episode. So we have the rare shiny bonus question here. Ooh, how exciting. In the US, what are delivered at a rate of 0.4172 miles per hour? I'll say that again. In the US, what are delivered at a rate of 0.4172 miles per hour. I'll say that again. In the US, what are delivered at a rate of 0.4172 miles per hour? So is it a human person delivering these? Yes. Okay. Because my brain was immediately like, we're working the snails today, aren't we? We're going for it.

For anyone who knew the answer to that straight off, your question was wonderful, and there's a reason I just gave a very decisive answer there. Oh, because there could be some kind of... OK. What was it again? I apologise. Delivered at a rate of 0.4172 miles per hour. 0.4172 miles. So it's about half a mile an hour.

Is it something that has to be moved very, very carefully? Yeah. Something fragile. You'd want to be careful with this. Yeah, it's quite fragile. A child is delivering in the delivery room.

Oh! Sorry, they're shooting out at half a mile an hour. That does not sound good. I don't know where child suddenly came from there, Tom, but you're not wrong. Oh, no. Okay.

Delivery. I thought, you know, like in the delivery. Yeah, labour. Is it panda births? Because they like shoot out. They're deluded by humans. Well, sometimes they are. It's labour. Is it just labour? humans. Well, sometimes they are. It's just, it's labor.

Is it just labor? The question does say in the US. And you're right, it's that kind of delivery. I don't know where that came from, Tom, but you're absolutely spot on. There's one other thing in this question. It's just the word delivery. Because, oh, it's the US specifically.

Why is it so quick? Why is it so... Is it like our stork system that we have? Sorry, we have that in the US. We have the, like, storks that deliver have? Sorry, we have that in the US. We have the like storks that deliver babies and stuff like that. It's part of your healthcare, right? Yeah. My mom told me.

That's what I'm talking about! You should see the bill! Hey! Oh my god! Sorry, that's a terrible pun, but I am so proud of that. That was full dab joke. Wow! I felt that one gearing up as oh we got a joke here we got a joke i think i think you get my position on the podcast i think

i'm gonna retire why would it be i wonder if that's fast or slow then it seems to me like it's fast i thought they'd come out very very slowly could. Could it be like in a, happening on a, in an ambulance? Like that's why it's moving at that speed? Or moving? Is it like the charge per the room? You want to get it out quicker? Is it about a piece of technology that's... It's a very specific number, that is.

0.4172 miles per hour. If I change that to the metric system, will it make more sense to me? If you change it to the metric system, it won't work at all. In fact, I can tell you it's delivered at zero kilometres per hour. What? Wait, but...

What? Is this like a rounding error due to measurements? You're going to hate me. Or something like that? You're going to absolutely hate me. Oh, no. You say that after saying the Bill pun, so I can't believe it. What could possibly be worse?

I... Wow. We're all silent. This is really stumped us. Is there like a minimum number it has to be or something? It's 0.4172 miles per hour and zero kilometers per hour. What on earth? Babies are delivered at.

Oh, it's something about the earth turning. Is it? Earthquakes. I'm going way off track here at some point a light bulb is going to come on and I'm going to string this one out okay this is so interesting is it like if you line all of the babies up into a row

per hour that's how far you could get it's a word one this it's a word one, this. This is a word play one. It's a word one. Oh gosh. Miles is something to do with something about the word,

is it something about the word delivered in this scenario? Is it the name miles? It's the name miles. Oh no. It's.4172 miles per hour. I could also say 3,657.5 miles per year. The 107th most popular name for male babies. And that means 0.4172 miles per hour.

You're right, Tom. I do hate you. In hindsight, I should have said you're going to be so angry at our question writers. No, it's you. No.

That's who you want us to blame, is it? Okay, okay. No, it's you. It's you. Yeah. No kilometers per hour. Well, you don't know

if there's any there could be babies called kilometre in the United States we'll prove you wrong the final bit of the show then you're still angry

about that last one I'm so mad I'm so angry I'm like why did we agree to come back if that's what we're going to get

the question I gave the audience at the start Why did we agree to come back if that's what we're going to get? The question I gave the audience at the start, why does the Austrian music group Das Erste Wiener Gemüster Orchester give their audience soup after every performance? Does anyone want to take a quick shot of that? Anyone who speaks German, despite my appalling pronunciation, will probably have got this already. Is it like you're deliberately supposed to scream the lyrics, so you might need something to soothe your throat at the end of it?

That's clever. How sweet would that be? Does the type of soup matter? It is always roughly the same kind of soup, yes. Is it German for the soup orchestra? Is it that simple? It's close. It's close.

It's Das Erste Wiener Gemüse Orchester. Again, I'm mispronouncing that. The first Vienna something orchestra. Eating orchestra? Soup? Do they play with soup? Do they use soup? Is it like bowls or splashing? Very close. Do they use cutlery to play all of their instruments

also close is it made up of chefs in this orchestra oh do they all have to slurp at different pitches to make the music oh no no no they don't And we've hit the bad idea section of the show. And would you like a demonstration of that, Tom and listeners? It's actually to prevent waste. So they're using the soup in the orchestra. Not quite. They're cooking. They are soup.

They're making soup during the show. After the show. They're chopping up vegetables whilst they're doing it. They play vegetables? They play vegetables. It is the first Vienna vegetable orchestra. Gemüse. Did you say Gemüse?

Gemüse. Or something. I have a phonetic pronunciation guide in front of me. I'm just going to apologise to every German speaker in the world. Yes, they have carrot flutes, pumpkin drums, onion maracas

and leek violins and in order to prevent waste, the audience gets soup at the end of the performance. That's nice. That's amazing. Yeah, I guess you couldn't have like a Stradivarius leek

that has been for hundreds of years been passed down by us. That's great. Last time, I think it was Tom who gave the plug for your podcast. So this time we're going to go to Ella. Tell us about Let's Learn Everything.

The three of us make up Let's Learn Everything, a science comedy podcast where we talk about science and also other miscellaneous things. For example... Caroline, give us some topics. I think that's what we did last time, but nevertheless, Caroline, give us some topics. think that's what we did last time but nevertheless caroline give us some topics we've talked about how fantastic pigeons are we've talked about oh no you see tom and ella both told me to prep a list of episodes before and i didn't do that tom tom love go tom you go for it we did a topic topic about bagged milk with a guest on this own show itself,

Sabrina Cruz hopped on once. We've talked about cosmic rays. We've talked about telephone music and emojis, things big and small and silly and everything in between. We've talked about the Eurovision Song Contest, the most important thing. It's an amazing episode.

Yeah. Where can people find you let's learn everything.com all of our socials are there and that's our show for today thank you very much well done everyone uh if you want to know more about this show or send in your own idea for a question you can do that at lateralcast.com we are at lateralcast pretty much everywhere and you can get video highlights at youtube.com slash lateralcast. Thank you very much to Tom Lum, Caroline Roper, Ella Hubber, Booyakasha. Oh, regrets. I'm Tom Scott. Oh, they're staying in. We're not editing that. They're staying in.

I'm Tom Scott. This has been Lateral. No. No.