Ologies with Alie Ward - Audiobook Mixtape: Gift Ideas from the Ologists’ Brains

Episode Date: December 18, 2019

Need holiday gift ideas? GET BOOKS. This episode is like an audiobook… but also a mixtape? It's got a little bit of everything, from cozy cabin tales to dark caves to our own reflections, how your atoms will be recycled, New Year’s resolutions, cat training, dog rescues, battling past demons, aging, the apocalypse, crime TV and even Egyptian boobytraps. Alie has wanted to deliver excerpts from ologists’ books for over a year but she let them pile up for an even bigger compilation. Consider this like a refresher of some episodes you’ve loved, a teaser for ones you haven’t yet heard, and a sneak preview of books written by the pod’s beloved guests. To get your hands on some of these titles, go to alieward.com/ologies/bookworm for info and links.A donation went to 826LASponsors of OlogiesTranscripts & bleeped episodesSupport Ologies on Patreon for as little as a buck a monthOlogiesMerch.com has hats, shirts, pins, totes!Follow @Ologies on Twitter and InstagramFollow @AlieWard on Twitter and InstagramSound editing by Jarrett Sleeper of MindJam Media & Steven Ray MorrisTheme song by Nick Thorburn

Oh hey, it's your cup of coffee that you forgot about, so it's lukewarm, but if you add more coffee to warm it up, you're gonna have to add more creamer, and then you're gonna have a full cup of coffee. That's too much coffee, but you do it anyway. Alley word, back with a special episode of Ologies. I wanted to do this one for a year, and I put it off, and guess what? Bonus. I now have more material for it. Nice. Holiday shopping is tough, but you know what's fun to buy is books. Why get something plastic that's gonna end up in garbage town when you can get wisdom and a humor and history and potentially a better life in a book? So, so manyologists are also authors, and they have just poured their souls and their brains into amazing books, and so consider this

episode kind of like an audio catalog, just flitted bits and previews and some special selections, so you can get the gist of their books and then get their books, and links are gonna be up at alleyword.com slash ologies slash bookworm, and you can maybe get one for yourself or a loved one, or an office mate, or an in-law, or a stranger, but their books are so good, and I thought I would put together a compilation that's kind of like an audiobook mix tape. Does that make sense? Okay, let's do it. But before we bookworm, a few thanks to all the folks on patreon.com slash ologies who support the show. Thank you to everyone wearing and buying ologies merch from ologiesmerch.com. Thank you to everyone who subscribes and rates, and of course, who reviews the

show. You know I gingerly creep it, and I pick a new one each week, such as this week's from Ben Rocks, who says, after an old man in a national park told me that he tries to be boggled at least three times a day, I've been seeking how to get my fix of amazement, joy, and most of all hope. This podcast has me thoroughly inspired and jazzed about life. I'm now looking into grad school options. The only problem is that ologies has expanded my interests exponentially, so I need to decide what to go for. Thank you, Ben Rocks. A daily triple boggle. What a goal to have. Let's all adopt that goal. I'm into it. Okay, books. So not only is this episode a trip down literary lane, but also if you haven't listened to some of these ologists, this is a great intro

into the work. Go back and listen to their episodes. So without any further yammering from old dadward, let's get you some bookage in your ears and your brains. Settle in for story hour with this special episode of bookwormery of various author ologists. Okay, so this episode, it's originally airing. This is December. We're in December. And earlier this summer, we had on architect and cabinologist Dale Mulfinger. Oh, I love him. And now that it's cozy and snowy in the Northern Hemisphere, at least, let's hear an excerpt from the book, Cabinology, a handbook to your private hideaway, which is Taunton Press, published 2008. You're going to feel hooga as hell. You're going to get cozy as a mofo. You ready? Okay.

He writes, this book of all things cabin will help you mold your dreams into the reality of that glowing fireplace and that pre-dawn aroma of freshly brewed coffee into the pitter patter of your loved one, just rousing overhead in the loft. He writes, in the early 1960s, I went with a college pal to his parents' cabin in Northern Minnesota. I didn't know it at the time, but that's when I became a cabinologist. I was a prairie farm boy who knew something about nature, weather, and the seasons. But when I visited that cabin on Lake Vermillion, my eyes were opened to some of nature's finer points. You know what I mean? The way the night sky out there is ridiculously bright with stars, the deep quiet of the woods before anybody else's up, the smell of wood smoke, the startling

tug of a fish on a line. For me, that trip revealed a new world, all the images, feelings, experiences of cabin life sank in deep and never left me. I was hooked and I wanted a cabin of my own. I'm an architect in Minnesota, he writes, where if you're nuts for cabins, there are worse jobs to have and less advantageous places to live. Years ago, not long at our school, I designed and built a cabin for my young family, just an hour from our Minneapolis home. It was simple and practical and not much more than a screened-in sleeping porch in the woods without a house attached. But it let us get away from the traffic and television for a weekend or for a week and live simply or simply live. It wasn't the tiny cabin, but nature, weather, the seasons, at

least spring, summer, and fall when we used it, that drew us out there. Covered from the rain, we read to each other and played checkers under the rattling roof. When the sun came out, we hunted mushrooms and scanned the poplars for chickadees and wax wings. We went to bed early and got up early. It was a treat. About the same time, I designed my first cabin for a client. It was larger, more complicated, and better equipped than mine. But it taught me that, unlike a lot of city houses, it's rare for any two cabins to be quite the same. Since then, I've designed more than 50 cabins, cottages, lodges, and camps. That's something else I learned. What you call a cabin depends on where in this country you live. And I, as I write this, have several more on the drawing

board. Safe to say, I'm hooked on cabins as I was 40 years ago. He writes, my objective is to get you from here, your dream, to there, an actual cabin. I'll share the lessons I've learned while designing, building, and hanging out in cabins all over. When you're finished with this book, you can get started on the real thing. Or maybe the dream will have to remain a dream for a while until your kids finish college or you win the lottery. That's okay too. I'm ready when you are. So that is Cabinology is the name of the book by cabinologist Dale Mulfinger. So now that you're all cozy, let's hear what Dr. Chris Winter of the 2018 two-part some-knowledge episode on sleep has to say. Here's an excerpt from his book, The Sleep Solution, Why Your Sleep is Broken and

How to Fix It, which was published by Berkeley in 2017. In it, he writes, according to researcher Raymond Rosen, most physicians have received less than two hours of training about the entire field of sleep in their four years of medical education. Minhai, Toyota Rescue, and sleep specialist Ronald Shervin's research from 2007 revealed sleep is dramatically underrepresented in medical school textbooks. Given that our psychiatry lecture about men who fantasize about their wife's footwear lasted 30 minutes, you can see just how dramatically underrepresented the whole of sleep medicine was in our curriculum. Again, less than two hours of training in their entire four years. So despite what's often minimal education about sleep medicine, it's among the

most common problems physicians are asked to address. To criticize a primary care doctor for failing to treat sleep difficulties effectively is like being upset at a pathologist for a difficult labor and delivery. It's not her job. So what can you do? Get smart and quit getting your sleep information from Cosmo, from sleep books that make a simple subject complicated, and from your next door neighbor. It's time for you to stop complaining about your poor night's sleep and throw your misconceptions about sleep out the window. You can understand sleep and why yours ain't working. So gather up your over-the-counter sleep aids and toss them down the drain. School is about to begin. So if you want to get that book and fix your sleep or get it as a gift for

someone who struggles with snoozing, put the sleep solution by Chris Winters on your gift list. Now you can raise a glass to good sleep, even though Booze doesn't help you sleep. You're going to learn that in his book. But okay, how about Mixology? The Mixology episodeologist, Matthew Biencanalo, talked about his own kind of origin story as a cocktail wizard, and this excerpt is from his book, Eat Your Drink, Culinary Cocktails, that was put out in 2016 by Day Street Books. He's also about to release a new book called Oma Cocktail, and I will link that in the episode notes as well. But this is from his first book, Eat Your Drink. He writes, I grew up with an alcoholic mother and alcohol became a very negative and painful

experience for me. I associated it with the ultimate path of destruction, and being behind a bar was the last place I thought I'd find myself. So a year and a half into mixing cocktails and witnessing the effect I was having on the guests, I understood that I was slowly, one drink at a time, rescripting my relationship with alcohol, making it something that was beautiful and fresh and needing to be savored. And through this repetition, I intentionally was able to heal my wounds, freeing myself to dive even deeper into my craft. My favorite thing to hear from customers is not that this is the best drink they have ever had, but that they have never had anything like it before. And I hope this book can shatter this myth of mixology a little bit. A lot of my work can look

intimidating for the home bartender to do, but my drinks actually follow a simple formula, and the true art and passion come from the individual's choice of ingredients. It is a passion that's reignited every time I stroll the farmer's market or encounter a guest for the first time. Very lucky to be around the greatest markets in the world, which consistently surprised me with each season and allowed me to stretch my imagination in ways I didn't even think were possible. I hope this book inspires you as much as writing it has inspired me. And again, that is mixologist Matthew Biancanello from Eat Your Drink Culinary Cocktails, and his new one out is Oma Cocktail. So Matthew's book makes you thirsty and also hungry. Maybe you can drink some rum out of a pumpkin or just some

water. You gotta keep hydrated. What else can you do with a pumpkin? Well, let's ask Cucurbitology guest Anne Copeland. Oh, Anne Copeland. I love her so much. She loves frickin' pumpkins to her core. And after her episode, Cucurbitology aired this past October, her self-published book, Pumpkin Pumpkin, Folklore, History, Planting Hints and Good Eating, shot up to the top 10 of the cooking books on Amazon. It made me so happy. So if you're making a pumpkin pie or a stew or you just want to hug a pumpkin with your whole heart, get all up in her book, Pumpkin Pumpkin. I'm going to read you an excerpt from the introduction. Oh, she's the cutest person alive. It reads, driving along a back road in Virginia one bright October day many years ago with a

good friend. I suddenly said, pumpkins, we're coming to pumpkins. My friend seemed confused because I really wasn't familiar with that part of Virginia at all. I had never been there before. But as we rounded a curve, there was a great field of large golden pumpkins. I guess I've always had a special affinity for pumpkins. Pumpkin season has always been more than a time to don masks, carve jack-o-lanterns, and put out treats for tricksters. It is a season that in my mind lasts long beyond the last pumpkin pie of Thanksgiving. The season of the pumpkin is something of a paradox. At a time when many growing things are resting and bare, the pumpkin is at its peak of abundance under the autumn sun. Each year the selecting of the

pumpkin has been one of my special adventures. I never know until I see the just right pumpkin what its characteristics will be. A good pumpkin, I have determined over the years, must always have at least one slight flaw in its otherwise perfect complexion. This much I know each year, although what the flaw will be remains a mystery until I see it. Also, a pumpkin is a berry. So listen to a cucurbitology episode for more on that. It'll blow your gourd. Hey, have you ever grown a pumpkin or had one maybe on your cabin porch and you wondered what was gnawing on it while you were sleeping in after a nightcap? Well, if you live in Southern California or you know someone who does, get this next book. It's called Wild LA. Explore the Amazing Nature in and around Los Angeles.

It's put out by Timber Press. Just put out this year, 2019. And it's co-written by entomology episode guest Leela M. Higgins. Also, Greg Pauley, Jason Goldman and Charles Hood all contributed. They all work with my beloved favorite museum, the Natural History Museum of LA County. And this book, Wild LA, needs to be on every shelf in every LA home. It details all the flora and fauna in a city most people do not know is recognized as a biodiversity hotspot. One of the few in the world. It's also just a gorgeous book. It's so handy. So many beautiful pictures. It's great when you want to know like what that flower or lizard or bug is. City wildlife, you guys, it exists. Here's an excerpt from that book, written in part by Leela Higgins, entomologist. Los Angeles is

full of nature. When Miguel Ordinana was little, he loved going to the University of Southern California football games with his mom, Adelia. He'd cheer for the Trojans and dream about becoming a football star. That dream changed eventually into becoming a wildlife biologist, but he still likes watching games. In the 2015 season opener, he sat with his mom and two little brothers, the whole family rooting for the Trojans to beat the Arkansas State Red Wolves. For more on Red Wolves, see the Lupinology episode side note. Now during the game, Miguel's 13 year old brother, Aaron, spotted a creature flitting above their heads in the night sky. Miguel, bat, he yelled, shifting his attention from the field to the sky. Miguel looked up and spotted the bat,

then another and another. They were swooping and arcing in front of the stadium's massive lights hunting. Bats loved to eat moths and because these tasty bugs are attracted to light, all a hungry bat needs to do is hang out near a bright spotlight and wait for dinner. Miguel was prepared for moments like this. He pulled a bat detector from his pocket, plugged it into his iPhone and waited to see if it could pick up bat sounds over the screaming fans. Miguel's bat detector contains a miniature microphone tuned to the frequencies bats use to echolocate and because each type of bat makes different calls, scientists can use recordings of the calls to figure out which species made them. Back in his office at the Natural History

Museum, Miguel used special software to analyze the 105 bat sounds he recorded during the game. Half came from just one species, the Mexican free-tailed bat. Los Angeles County is home to at least 20 different bat species. Most prefer more undisturbed areas like Griffith Park or the Santa Monica Mountains, but the Mexican free-tailed bat is really good at adapting to the big city. It can make a home for itself by roosting inside man-made structures instead of caves. Before 2013, nobody realized that free-tailed bats spent time near Exposition Park, but thanks to Miguel and his brother, we now have a better understanding of how these animals interact with our city. The bats at the football game are a good reminder that wildlife can be found anywhere.

There's no line where nature stops and city begins. Nature can be found under your sofa, where an alligator lizard has snuck in and cornered a cricket, or in the potted plant on your balcony, where ladybug larva chow down on aphids, or in the park down the street where a Cooper's Hawk turns a pigeon into breakfast. Gaze down on the landscape from above and you'll notice Los Angeles is more than just paved roads and manicured lawns. It's a patchwork of tame and wild spaces. Rugged mountains give way to carefully groomed beaches and surging rivers are enclosed by tons of concrete. Oak trees, hundreds of years old, rest beside newly laid soccer fields. As you'll see, it's not just bats who find a way to thrive

in this patchwork landscape. Of course, we're going to hear more from chiropterologist Merlin Tuttle, but that was an excerpt from Wild LA. Now, what about snakes? Do you hate them? Do you know somebody who hates them? Do you love and respect them, as Dr. David Steen does? Enough to write an entire book about them? So charmingly gruff, dryly hilarious. You know Dr. David Steen from Twitter as alongside Wild and from the Herpetology episode, and perhaps from his brand new book, Secrets of Snakes, The Science Behind the Myths, which was put out by Texas A&M University Press. The first edition just came out in late September, so it's brand new, and I emailed him asking for his favorite excerpt, and he wrote back,

he recommended that I read you The Dedication, which goes, there are tons of danger noodles, nope ropes, and long boys throughout our streams, our forests, and our backyards. They silently live alongside us every day, but could not care less about what we think. This book is dedicated to all the people wanting to learn more about them anyway. In these pages, I've tried to answer the most common questions about snakes, not just by explaining the relevant biology, but by plucking the latest science out of obscure journals and putting it right here. In some cases, I tried to explain how the scientific method has been used to learn more about snakes, and what research we still need to do before we

can produce an answer to a question in a satisfying way. Sometimes, I don't know the answer. When it comes to snake myths, I have tried to avoid saying that anything is impossible, but I have no problem saying something is inconsistent with what we know about the world. Finally, I provide some helpful tips for those of us who are not necessarily enthusiastic about snakes around our homes and are looking for environmentally friendly ways of keeping them away. I view this book as the culmination of my science communication efforts, which span more than a decade and have reached hundreds of thousands of people. It's not a comprehensive tome about snake biology, nor is it a field guide. Rather, each

chapter represents a topic that I've learned is important after hearing from you. By the time you finish this book, I hope I have helped you learn more about these slithering creatures around us. And I hope you have gotten a refresher on how scientists answer questions. And most importantly, I hope I have provided you with ammunition that you can use next time you get into a debate about whether the snake that just fell into your canoe was a cottonmouth. And again, Dr. David Steen's book is, Secrets of Snakes, the Science Beyond the Myths. Now, what if you prefer fewer scales, more fuzz? Perhaps bats are your speed. You're like that bat story from before, loved it. Maybe you know someone who is fascinated at dusk watching these airborne mammals just vacuuming

up mosquitoes with their squish face noses. Well, you're going to want to get all up in Dr. Merlin Tuttle's books, including The Secret Lives of Bats, My Adventures with the World's Most Misunderstood Mammals, which was put out in 2018 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Now, Merlin, Dr. Merlin Tuttle, was the recent guest in the two part chiropterology episode on bats. And it's safe to say if you listened, you're obsessed with him. I get it. So am I. We're all obsessed with Merlin. I'm going to read you part of chapter one titled Teenage Discoveries. I've always been fascinated by nature. So when at age 17, I discovered thousands of gray bats now referred to as gray myotis, doing things that according to the books of the day, they weren't

supposed to do. I was immediately intrigued. It all began in April 1959, when a high school acquaintance told me about a bat cave near my home west of Knoxville, Tennessee. Bologna Cave was named for its bologna shaped formations. And it was said to sometimes shelter thousands of bats. So the next weekend, I easily persuaded my father, who was always open for new adventure, to help me find it. We headed out on a beautiful spring afternoon. The sun was bright. The air was scented with honeysuckle blossoms as we followed a barely visible trail along a fence, then into the shade of stately old oak and hickory trees. A half mile later, we found ourselves staring into a gaping pit about 12 feet in diameter at the top, sloping down like an ant

lion funnel. Limestone walls adorned in moss and ferns dripped from recent showers. This clearly was the cave, my friend had described. Wondering if the bats could still be there, we carefully climbed down into the cooler entrance, jumping the last few feet to the floor. Before venturing into the dark interior, we retrieved our new miners' caps and carbide lamps from our knapsacks and added fuel. Each lamp included an upper and a lower chamber. We added quarter inch chunks of carbide into the lower ones and poured water into the upper ones. When water contacts carbide, it produces acetylene gas, and when the gas exits through a tiny nozzle in the middle of a shiny metal reflector, it can be lit with a spark from an embedded flint. This provided each of us with

a half inch flame for light. We could alter the brightness by adjusting a lever, which controlled the rate at which water dripped onto the carbide. Even at their brightest, these lamps were dim compared to today's LED lights, but they were the best we had. After allowing our eyes to adjust to the yellowish glow of our lamps, we began to look around. First noticing a room the size of a small bedroom on our left. It was strewn with old moonshine still paraphernalia, broken mason jars and parts of wooden barrels. The ceiling was smoke blackened from the distilling process. Far more concerned about finding bats, we would later regret having assumed that moonshine stills in Bologna Cave were limited to the far distant past.

This was our first venture into a cave. My father led the way and we stepped carefully around slick spots on an uneven floor. Our hands often supported us against the moist limestone walls. After going by several side passages, my father exclaimed, wow, look at this. We were just entering a room the size of a two-car garage, which our dim lights barely covered. Along one side, bologna-shaped formations ran down a wall into a pit. Because the bottom was beyond the reach of our lights, it seemed endlessly deep. I sure hope the bats don't live beyond that, I commented, pointing into the chasm. You'll have to pick up the secret lives of bats to hear what happens next, but Merlin also recommended a short graph from the introduction, which reads,

In the following pages, I will share highlights from a lifetime of thrilling adventure and scientific discovery, covering every continent where bats live. From moonshiner standoffs to close encounters with tigers, cobras, and poachers, and bats as cute as any panda, and as strange as any dinosaur, tiny bumblebee bats to giant flying foxes. Follow along and I hope that through my adventures, you too will become passionate about bats. So that is the secret lives of bats by Merlin Tuttle from the Chiropterology episode, He is a Treasure. So, okay, let's say that you love mammals, but specifically the ones that live indoors with you. So, Sinologist and animal trainer Brandon MacMillan has dedicated his whole life to rescuing doggos. And his book is called Lucky

Dog Lessons, Train Your Dog in Seven Days. It was put out in 2018 by Harper One. And in it, he talks about his history with dogs. But first, let's take a quick break to hear about some sponsors of the show who make it possible to donate to a charity each week. And this week's recipient is chosen by me. And it's 826LA.org. And 826LA is a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting students with their creative and expository writing skills to help teachers inspire their students to write. So, 826LA provides after-school tutoring, evening and weekend workshops that have in-school tutoring, help for English language learners, and assistance with student publications. So, that donation was made possible by some sponsors, which you may hear about now.

Okay, back to the book, Lucky Dog Lessons, Train Your Dog in Seven Days by Brandon MacMillan. In it, he writes, let me back up a little bit to how dogs in particular became such an important part of my life. When I was 22, I had a life-changing experience. I read the statistics on shelter dogs in America and learned that every year in the United States alone, over a million dogs are euthanized because they can't find homes. That's one million. That's a lot of dogs. And they're not dying in some far-off place we've never heard of. It's happening right here in our own cities and suburbs. I couldn't stand the thought of it. And ever since I caught on to that statistic, I've dedicated more and more of my life to rescuing unwanted dogs who stood no chance of

finding homes and to proving they're just as trainable, if not more so, than breeder-bought dogs. Back then, he writes, I was working for a Hollywood company that trained animals for film and television. We were a successful old-school company, and my boss had always worked mainly with breeder-bought dogs with known bloodlines. He believed that knowing everything about the dogs from birth made them better dogs to train. But my view was a little different. At the time, I lived in an apartment where I could see the yard of a local animal shelter. Every day, after working with my company's stable of purebred dogs, I'd go home and look out my window and see some of the same breeds, German shepherds, rottweilers, chihuahuas, pit bulls, and others all at this

shelter. And at first, I was annoyed by the never-ending barking. But after reading the stats on shelter dog deaths, I came to the sickening realization that those dogs were living on borrowed time. Many were destined to end up among the million. The knowledge aided me and inspired me to take action. My plan was simple. Even if it was a little ambitious, I'd rescue dogs who stood no chance of finding a home and turn them into movie stars. I went to my boss and I asked if I could rescue one dog to train for the business. After a debate, which turned into an argument, he agreed on one condition. My job was on the line if I failed. The next day, I went to a shelter in L.A. that had one of the highest mortality rates in the Southwest. This was the Shawshank

of shelters, a cold and outdated facility that had seen its funding stripped away by city budget cuts. It was bursting at the seams with dogs, and animals there had a greater chance of getting euthanized than of finding homes. As I made my way down the row of kennels, I spotted a young rottweiler named Raven. She seemed sweet, had a good attention span, and was more interested in me than all the distractions around her. I adopted her out of the shelter that day and I took her home. Raven had a few issues to work out, but after a couple of months of intensive training, she went on her first job, a music video for Outcast. Raven knocked it out of the park. The director told me my dog performed better than the humans did that day. After that,

Raven went on to become the most booked dog in the company. I didn't just get to keep my job. I got a green light to grow the company's pack with more shelter dogs. Like Raven, my new rescues also went on to become obedient scholars, proving that shelter dogs aren't damaged goods. They are hidden treasures with an ocean of untapped intelligence and loyalty. From then on, everything changed for me. I advocated for rescue dogs for every job, and I also started helping people find shelter dogs who would be good matches for their families, then training the dogs specifically to meet the needs of their new homes. So for more on saving shelter dogs and training them, that was from Brandon McMillan,

sinologist, dog trainers, book, lucky dog lessons, train your dog in seven days. As I record this, I have a snoozing little shelter dog right next to me. Huh, Grammy? She's just snoozing away. My pup, Grammy, is seven, and she was from a high-kill shelter. She's just the sweetest thing, even though she threw up in my hands the other day. That's okay. It happens to the best of us. Okay, maybe you're not a dog person. That's okay. Cat people, I see you. I love you. Phelanologist Dr. Michael Delgado was on early, I think January 2019 this year. She was sharing her wisdom about kitties, and she's an expert in cats. She co-wrote the book Total Cat Mojo, The Ultimate Guide to Life with Your Cat that was put out in 2017 by Tarture Pedigree and

co-written with famed cat dad, Jackson Galaxy. If there is a cat lover in your life, this book and that Phelanology episode are just required reading, listening. Oh, you will never look at a cat the same. In Total Cat Mojo, she writes, Well, the case could be made that dogs find comfort and security in the guardian companion training dynamic. Cats do not, not by a country mile. Think about it. Did you ever wonder why we call people who work with dogs trainers and people who do similar work with cats, behaviorists? With dogs, training stabilizes their world. When done well, provides the cement of our relationship. But with cats, we want to maximize our level of influence on their behavior, but then be willing to bring a spirit of compromise when it comes to

the end result. On a relational level, while the dog is grounded by the sit, the end result for the cat is a completed action and anticipation of a reward. That, however, is far from a hollow victory. We got our cat to look at us, follow our lead, and focus on completing a task that we asked of them. That's a win because it's a relationship builder, even though it doesn't complete the relationship like it might with a dog. You could even argue that compared to cats, many dogs need training for their well-being. It's not only in their DNA from our long-term relationship with them, but training also gives dogs coping skills in light of the expectations we place on them in the many environments and situations that we put them in. Compromise is

about us meeting cats in the middle. At the communicative and relational fence, the training process I've been talking about maximizes our ability to get the cat to willingly come to that fence, something that doesn't come naturally to them. Don't expect to change them in the way that training would change a dog. Maximize and compromise is the mantra that reminds us of what a cat win looks like, which is to say that both parties will have an equal say in the outcome. It's a cat thing. So, again, that was from Total Cat Mojo co-written by Phelanologist Dr Michael Delgado. So much cat information. You're going to want to get that book. Now, if your best friend is not tiny and very hairy and is a human person and you're trying to

establish healthier habits together, matrimonialgist at the UCLA Marriage Lab, Dr. Ben Carney co-wrote a book called Love Me Slender, How Smart Couples Team Up to Lose Weight, Exercise More and Stay Healthy Together. And that's co-written by Dr. Thomas Bradbury and published by Touchstone Press. And in it, they write, many of us fantasize about how much better our health would be if we had a coach, a personal trainer, a consultant masseuse, and a health-conscious chef. But isn't it possible that each and every day you're waking up next to the person who is all of these things all at once? Millions of us have a loved one right by our sides who can encourage us to make great choices about the foods we consume and the exercise we get. Our boyfriends,

girlfriends, spouses, and partners have the potential to make the pursuit of health far easier than it would be without their support. Eating right takes extra energy and time, but our partner can share and ease the burden of shopping, preparing, cooking, and cleaning that healthy eating sometimes requires. In short, what looks like an impossible task for us as individuals may be far more accessible when we team up with our closest partner. So perhaps in the new year, you and your sweetie are planning to get jacked, just ripped, or stick to a keto, or a vegan, or a low-fod-maps diet, and you just need some teamwork prep. Maybe you're like, I'm already jacked, or I have no interest in being slender. Perhaps you'd like to know more about

criminal justice with the victimology episode's amazing Dr. Callie Rennison, who co-authored the book Introduction to Criminal Justice, Systems, Diversity, and Change alongside Mary J. Doge. I'm going to read you an excerpt from the introduction of this book, which is the textbook about criminal justice. She writes, To demonstrate how this happened, we introduce four real people and describe their actual experiences with the criminal justice system throughout the book. None of them wanted to be involved with the system, but for years and even decades, their lives have been intertwined and entangled with law enforcement, courts, and corrections. For some, if not each one of our

four case studies, involvement with the system will continue until their deaths. There are true stories related to their cases and experiences are used to enhance and inform the contextual material presented in each chapter. So that is an excerpt from the introduction of criminal justice, systems, diversity, and change. And Dr. Callie Rennison is also editor of the book Women Leading Change in Academia, Breaking the Glass, Ceiling, Cliff, and Slipper, that was edited alongside Amy Bonomi. So those are two of her books. And if you're interested more in criminal justice and victimology, Dr. Callie Rennison from the Victimology episode is amazing. Her work is just really, really incredible. And I cherished meeting her. She was wonderful.

So that was Dr. Callie Rennison. Let's talk about death. Do you want to a rather living and aging on planet Earth? Do you remember biojerontologist Dr. Caleb Finch? He was the guy who studies aging. And I thought he hated me until the last five seconds of the interview. And then he was so nice, he was like, that was great. Anyway, but he's written so many books. One of them is the biology of human longevity, inflammation, nutrition, and aging and the evolution of lifespans that was put out in 2010 by Academic Press. And in it, he writes, aging is a great scientific mystery. For four decades, I have been fascinated by the possibility of a general theory addressing genomic mechanisms in the continuum of development and aging in

health and disease. I was fortunate to learn some pathology as a graduate student at the Rockefeller by two masters of in the gross necropsy, Robert Leder and John Nelson, who taught me first hand to use tweezers and scalpel to see clues to pathology from the texture and color of tissues and fluids. Peyton Rouse made a chilling comment after my thesis lecture to the effect of, Finch, I don't see why you're wasting your time on a subject like aging. Everyone knows aging is only about vascular disease and cancer. He may yet to be proved right. He goes on to say that in his book, I will try to indicate the level of certainty and evidence being considered and not try to explain too much. Again, that was from bio gerontologist Dr. Caleb Finch's book, The Biology of Human

Longevity. Now, let's keep on the topic of the brain and how it makes us view our own BODs. Dr. Sarah Shepard from the Sports Psychology episode is working on a new book that she says should be done in August if all goes according to perfect timing, but she'll let us know when it hits the stands in real time. That new book of hers is called the Sports Psychology Skills Primer, but she's also an expert in disordered eating and athletes and has published a book, 100 Questions and Answers About Interrexia Nervosa, and she shared a few passages that might be of help. She says each of the following is a misconception or myth surrounding nutrition, body weight, and sports performance. Myth. If someone's coach says that an athlete has to lose

more weight, it must be the right thing to do. Reality. Coaches can be a great source of support and motivation. However, decisions that affect medical health should be made by or at least in consultation with a physician. Well-meaning coaches may put undue pressure on an athlete by making comments about weight and may indeed be misinformed about the relationship between body weight and sports performance. Myth. Daily training is necessary to maintain athletic performance. Reality. Actually, muscles need days without exercise in order to refuel and recover. Taking a day or two off from training does not decrease performance and may in fact have performance benefits. So that was from Dr. Shepard's book, 100 Questions and Answers About

Interrexia Nervosa, and that was put out in 2009 by Jones and Bartlett, and her new book, The Sports Psychology Skills Primer, will be out probably 2021. She'll let us know. Now on the topic of body image, the amazing psychologist Dr. Renee Engeln from the Colology or Beauty Standards episode has a book called Beauty Sick, How the Cultural Obsession with Appearance Hurts Girls and Women. This was put out by Harper in 2018, and her book is on Amazon. It's also available at indie bookshops, so track it down locally if you can. Here is an excerpt from Beauty Sick. Beauty sickness is what happens when women's emotional energy gets so bound up with what they see in the mirror that it becomes harder for them to see other aspects of their

lives. It starts surprisingly early. As soon as young girls are taught that their primary form of currency in this world involves being pleasing to the eyes of others. Although we hear the most about beauty sickness in young women, it's a malaise that affects women of all ages. You can't simply grow out of it. You must break free with deliberate intent and perseverance. Beauty sickness is fed by a culture that focuses on women's appearance over anything else they might say or do or be. It's reinforced by the images we see and the words we use to describe ourselves and other women. Those who shame women for their appearance feed beauty sickness. Those who praise girls and women only for how they look do the same. We should not be surprised at how many

women struggle with beauty sickness. We have created a culture that tells women the most important thing they can be is beautiful. Then we pummel them with a standard of beauty they will never meet. After that, when they worry about beauty, we call them superficial. Or even worse, we dismiss their concerns altogether, saying everyone is beautiful in their own way and admonishing them to accept themselves the way they are. If you can imagine a world where girls and women are less objectified and do less self-objectification, you'll see a world where everything has changed. We would do different things. We would feel more ourselves and less defined by how much others enjoy looking at us. Our money and time would be spent differently.

Our bodies would be healthier. Depression and anxiety might be less common or less severe. It's time to focus on looking outward rather than being looked at. There's a lot to see out there in the world. There's a lot of work to be done. And if that passage moved you, I highly encourage you to listen to the two-part collology episode from the summer of 2018. Hoo boy, real life changer. In the second part, I read letters from all genders, all backgrounds. And in it, we really learn that the stories we hear about ourselves and that we tell ourselves can be so painful and really need retelling. And speaking of narratives, did you hear the mythology episode with Dr. John Booker? So he is a real-life mythologist who helps movie studios make their stories more

compelling and who studies myths of antiquity and helps encourage people to tell their own stories. And he's written several books. One of them is Storytelling for Virtual Reality. This was put out in 2017 by Rutledge Press. And in it, he makes us see how innovative storytelling retains these really ancient roots. And he says, returning to the philosophies of the ancients can help us further explore how the self-orients and changes in immersive space. In the late first century, Plutarch authored a volume titled Life of Theseus. And while recording the Greek legend, he asked whether a ship that had been restored by replacing every piece of wood on it remained the same ship. The question has become known as Theseus' paradox. And it's applicable in immersive

virtual spaces. Is a human being that has been completely replaced by digital and virtual parts still a human being? The question becomes more interesting when we consider the philosophy of Thomas Hobbes, who gave the question further nuance a few centuries later by asking if the original planks of the ship were gathered up after being replaced and used to build a second ship. Which ship would be the original? The honest answer to these questions as they apply to virtual immersive space is that we don't know. There simply hasn't been enough time to research and study how these emerging technologies will change our perceptions of who we are and how we behave. So that is from Storytelling for Virtual Reality. And as long as we're cruising through

some ancient corridors, let's stop into Egypt with Dr. Karakuni. She's, of course, from the Egyptology episode. And her latest book is When Women Ruled the World, Six Queens of Egypt. This was put out by National Geographic in 2018. Whoo! Boy, howdy. It is chock-a-block with facts and stories. I'm going to get right into it. The first two pages read Why Women Don't Rule the World. In the 5th century BC, thousands of years after her lifetime, the Greek historian Herodotus wrote about a certain Nitochris, a queen whose husband brother had been murdered by conspirators. The young, beautiful woman claimed her revenge by inviting all the collaborators to a grand banquet and a fancy and newly commissioned underground hall.

When the men were all happily eating and drinking, Nitochris ordered the floodgates opened through a secret channel, drowning them all in Nile waters. The rebels thus dispatched. Her final act was to throw herself into a fiery pit so that no man could exact his retribution on her. Kara writes one wonders whether the fiery pit could have been any better than whatever torture they may have meted out. Dr. Karakuni writes Nitochris' story has everything. Political intrigue, incest, fabulous Egyptian booby traps, and most important of all, a beautiful young queen avenging her husband's murder with cleverness and bravery. Offering herself before they could take presumably sexual revenge on her makes her even more appealing.

There's only one problem. There's no evidence from that time of Nitochris. No burial location, no statuary, no texts, no monuments, nothing, to prove that she was more than a historian's fantasy. But her narrative fits some extraordinarily familiar patterns for well-documented female rulers of ancient Egypt. She was the last ruler of her family dynasty. She acquired power by marrying her own brother. She acted in fierce protection of her husband, her brother, her patriarchy. She resorted to deceit and trickery to gain power over her enemies, and she was misunderstood by her own people who would erase her image from monuments around Egypt. Indeed, there is enough to Nitochris' legend to suspect that what might seem like nothing more than a salacious story is actually

composed of kernels of truth embedded in a romanticized cultural memory that has come down to us in fragmented and dramatized form. In one place on our planet thousands of years ago, against all the odds of the male-dominated system in which they lived, women ruled repeatedly with formal, unadulterated power. Like Nitochris, most of these women ruled as Egyptian god-king incarnate, not as the mere power behind a man on the throne. Ancient Egypt is an anomaly, as the one land that consistently called upon the rule of women to keep its regime in working order, safe from discord and on the surest possible footing, particularly when a crisis was underway. If I mispronounced all of those names, please forgive me. And that was from when women ruled the world,

six queens of Egypt by Dr. Karakuni. As long as we're talking about crises, let's have an existential one. So recent guest Dr. Adam Becker told us all about quantum ontology and had us looking at our own hands and faces asking, what is real? And his book, What is Real? The Unfinished Quest for the Meaning of Quantum Physics, which was put out by Basic Books in 2018, paints a picture of Renaissance portrait really of the quantum physics world and multiple universes and Schrodingers and Einstein's and Feynman's and theories and crackpots and more. So the first two pages of it read, the objects in our everyday lives have an annoying inability to appear in two places at once. Leave your keys in your jacket and they won't also be on the hook by the front door. This isn't

surprising. These objects have no uncharted abilities or virtues. They're profoundly ordinary. Yet these mundane things are composed of a galaxy of the unfamiliar. Your house keys are a temporary alliance of a trillion trillion atoms, each forged in a dying star eons ago, each falling to earth in its earliest days. They have bathed in the light of a violent young sun. They have witnessed the entire history of life on our planet. Atoms are epic. Like most epic heroes, atoms have some problems that ordinary humans don't. We are creatures of habit, monotonously persisting in just one location at a time. But atoms are prone to whimsy. A single atom wandering down a path in a laboratory encounters a fork where it can go left or right. Rather than choosing one way forward, as your eye

would have to do, the atom suffers a crisis of indecision over where to be and where not to be. Ultimately, our nanometer hamlet chooses both. The atom doesn't split. It doesn't take one path, and then the other. It travels down both paths simultaneously, thumbing its nose at the laws of logic. So the rules that apply to you and me and Danish princes don't apply to atoms. They live in a different world covered by different physics, the sub microscopic world of the quantum. Quantum physics, the physics of atoms and other ultra tiny objects like molecules and subatomic particles, is the most successful theory in all of science. It predicts a stunning variety of phenomena to an extraordinary degree of accuracy. In its impact goes well beyond the world of the very small and

into our everyday lives. The discovery of quantum physics in the early 20th century led directly to the silicon transistors buried in your phone and in the LEDs in its screen, the nuclear hearts of the most distant space probes, and the lasers in the supermarket checkout scanner. Quantum physics explains why the sun shines and how your eyes could see it. It explains the entire discipline of chemistry, periodic table and all. It even explains how things stay solid, like the chair you're sitting on or your own bones and skin. All of this comes down to very tiny objects behaving in very odd ways. But there's something troubling here. Quantum physics doesn't seem to apply to humans or anything at human scale. Our world is a world of people and keys and other ordinary things that

can travel down only one path at a time. Yet all the mundane things in the world around us are made of atoms, including me, you, and Danish princes. All those atoms certainly are governed by quantum physics. So how can the physics of atoms differ so wildly from the physics of our world made of atoms? Why is quantum physics only the physics of the ultratiny? The problem isn't that quantum physics is weird. The world is a wild and woolly place with plenty of room for weirdness. But we definitely don't see all the strange effects of quantum physics in our daily lives. Why not? Maybe quantum physics really is only the physics of tiny things and it doesn't apply to large objects. Perhaps there's a boundary somewhere, a border beyond which quantum physics

doesn't work. In that case, where is the boundary and how does it work? And if there is no such boundary, the quantum physics really applies to us just as much as it applies to atoms and subatomic particles, then why does quantum physics so flagrantly contradict our experience of the world? Why aren't our keys ever in two places at once? So to have an existential crisis and get your mind blown by the physics of the ultratiny, read What is Real? The Unfinished Quest for the Meaning of Quantum Physics by Dr. Adam Becker, who of course was the guest in the quantum ontology episode very recently. Now speaking of astrophysics, I know you all love Dr. Katie Mack. She just announced that her book, The End of Everything, Astrophysically Speaking, is due out next summer. I asked if she

had anything she could share and she said, I don't actually know what the rules are about releasing bits of the text, but here's a sentence about it. It's a book for anyone who's ever looked at the big majestic universe out there and wondered, what happens next? A breezy tour through a few possible cosmic apocalypses that might befall our universe. What they would look like if we were there to see them happen and how cosmologists are working to figure it all out. So that is Dr. Katie Mack of the Cosmology episodes. Upcoming book, you can pre-order it now. It's called The End of Everything, Astrophysically Speaking. Also, while you're at it, go listen to the song No Plan by Hozier, who is a fan of Dr. Mack. The lyrics in that song read, there's no plan, there's no hand on the rain.

There's no plan, there's no hand on the rain. As Mack explained, there will be darkness again. Yes, he means that Mack. Dr. Katie Mack. I have listened to the song approximately 17,000 times. I played over and over again. It's so good. As Mack explained, there will be darkness again. I hope it plays over global loudspeakers when the apocalypse comes. But when will that be, you ask? Let's ask Phil Torres, not the butterfly lepidopterology guest, but the expert in existential risk, i.e. eschatology, i.e. The End of the World. Here is a bit from chapter one of his book, our last book selection of this episode, Morality, Foresight, and Human Flourishing, an introduction to existential risks. This was

put out in 2017 by Pitchstone Publishing. And in it, he writes, one can make a very strong case that humanity has never lived in more peaceful times. According to the Harvard polymath Stephen Pinker, violence has been declining since humanity struggled as hunter-gatherers in the Paleolithic roughly 12,000 years ago. This trend has continued through the 20th and into the 21st century, despite the two world wars, Korean War, Vietnam War, Second Congo War, also known as the African World War, and rise of global terrorism. We find ourselves in the midst of what historians call the Long Peace, a period that began at the end of World War II, and during which no two superpowers have gone to war, and what Pinker tentatively dubs the New Peace, which refers to organized conflicts

of all kind, civil wars, genocides, repression by autocratic governments, and terrorist attacks having declined throughout the world, since the Cold War concluded in 1989. Now, if you choose when you would like to live in human history, since our debut in East Africa some 200,000 years ago, the most reasonable answer would be today, at the dawn of the 21st century. No question, but there is a countervailing trend that tempers the good news presented by Pinker's historical analyses. We might also live in the most dangerous period of human history ever. The fact is that our species is haunted by a growing swarm of risks that could either trip us into the eternal grave of extinction or irreversibly catapult us back into the Stone Age.

Just consider the humanity has stood in the flickering shadows of a nuclear holocaust since 1945, when the United States dropped two nuclear bombs on the Japanese archipelago. In the years since this epic defining event, scientists have confirmed that climate change and global biodiversity loss are urgent threats with existential implications, while risk experts have become increasingly worried about the possibility of malicious individuals creating designer pathogens that could initiate a worldwide pandemic. Looking further along that threat horizon, there appears to be a number of unprecedented dangers associated with molecular, nanotechnology, and artificial intelligence. Thus,

one only needs simple arithmetic to see that the total number of existential risk scenarios has increased significantly since the atomic age began, and it looks as if this trend will continue at least in the coming decades, if not further. Considerations of these phenomena have led some scholars to offer unsettlingly high estimates that a global disaster will occur in the foreseeable future. An informal 2008 survey of experts at a conference hosted by the Future of Humanity Institute gave a 19% chance of extinction before 2100, and the cosmologist Martin Rees writes in a 2003 book that civilization has a 50-50 chance of surviving the present century. To put this in perspective, consider that the average American has a 1,737 lifetime chance of

dying in an air and space transport accident. It follows that according to the FHI survey, the average American is at least 1500 times more likely to perish in a human extinction catastrophe than a plane crash. That, of course, is an excerpt from eschatologist, apocalypse expert, Phil Torres. So that's a good news. If you're traveling for the holidays, don't fret about the flight. Your relative's political views might be more likely to do us all in. That being said, there's never been a better time to think, hey, I'm going to ask some smart people some stupid questions because we're all going to die one day. Might as well cut some banks while I'm at it and text my crush. Nothing is permanent. Your atoms may become a keychain one

day. You don't know, so just make the most of the configuration that you're in now. And that being said, holidays and winter and darkness and nippy days, they're a wonderful time. Just brew a cup of anything. Spike it if you need to. Curl up in some kind of worn out wingback chair with a throw blankie and dive into the brain of an ologist through the pages of a book. So links to all of these books are up at alleywar.com slash ologies slash bookworm. You can order most of them online, sure. But consider calling around maybe to a few bookstores, see if they have them on hand. But no matter how you get them or gift them or read them, I hope they open up your world a little more and make you take advantage of the present moment you're in, the person that you are. This

show would be nothing without the ologists. We're so lucky that they take the time to communicate their work and their passion. So thank you to each and every ologist who's ever been on. And if you yourself are thinking you'd like to write a book, let this episode be some sort of cosmic sign that you should start it. Maybe it's a collection of short stories. Maybe it's the memoir of a very surprising life history, nonfiction about your work. Maybe you want to write a mystery or a romance novel. All of these ologists are authors and writers and published. So let them inspire you. Just write. Let Adam Becker's advice to you resonate. He said in the quantum ontology episode, I decided, okay, the only way that I'm going to get through this is if I plan it and then just only

pay attention to whatever's in front of me because I can't write 90,000 words, but I can write 600 words a day. And if I do that for a while, eventually I'll have 90,000 words. So the world is a beautiful, scary, wonderful place. And if you have a story to tell, I hope you tell it. Okay, some thanks. Thank you to Sisters Bonnie Dutch and Shannon Feltis of the podcast. You are that for handling merch at ologismurch.com. And thank you to Emily White and all the transcribers helping make transcribed episodes available. You can check alleyword.com slash ologies dash extras for those. There's also bleeped episodes up there. Thanks to Hannah Lippo and Aaron Talbert for admitting the ologies podcast Facebook group full of lovely, curious folks. There's also, by

the way, an offshoot the ologites book club and they're on Facebook and Instagram. I'm going to link them at alleyword.com slash ology slash bookworm. A bunch of listeners have formed a book club. You're free to join that. I'm at alleyword with one L on Twitter and Instagram. I'm also on the kids science shows Brainchild on Netflix on Innovation Nation on CBS every week. And I have my very own science show. It's on the CW. It's called Did I Mention Invention? Safe to watch with your kids. ologies is on Instagram and Twitter at ologies. And also thank you to the lovely Stephen Ray Morris who helps cut these episodes together. He's getting this up on a quick turnaround because I was battling a migraine yesterday. So thank you SRM. The theme music was

written and performed by Nick Thorburn of the Band Islands. If you stick around to the end of the episode, you know, I tell you a secret. And this week's secret, something that maybe like 100 people in the last month have reached out to ask me. So if it's been driving you crazy, yes. Yes, that is my voice on a grocery store commercial. Apparently they were trying to cast like a friendly voice for it for a while. And then one of the ad execs is an oligite. And so they were like, I asked Dad Ward if she'll do it. So it's been a fun little side gig. And I was listening to my friend Rose Eveless podcast Flash Forward. And suddenly I heard my voice and it freaked me the fuck out because I was like, what? And I realized that it was my grocery store ad running on her

podcast. What is life? So if you're like, is that you talking about fresh groceries? It is. That's me. Anyway, I hope you buy a book from an oligist. I hope you enjoyed this reading hour. Theologists are wonderful. Enjoy some books. Curl up. Okay, bye bye. Hackadermatology. Homilogy. Cryptozoology. Litology. Amp technology. Meteorology. Peptology. Nephology. Syriology. Peptology.