SciShow Tangents - Bonus Backlog Bonanza - Ep. 26

Episode Date: July 29, 2025

This bonus episode was originally posted on Patreon on May 9, 2023 titled "Bonus Episode!"SciShow Tangents is on YouTube! Go to www.youtube.com/scishowtangents!And go to https://complexly.store/collections/scishow-tangents to buy some great Tangents merch!While you're at it, check out the Tangents crew on socials:Ceri: @ceriley.bsky.social@rhinoceri on InstagramSam: @im-sam-schultz.bsky.social@im_sam_schultz on InstagramHank: @hankgreen on X

[♪ INTRO MUSIC PLAYING Hello and welcome to the SciShow Tangents Patreon patron bonus podcast just for our Patreon patrons. It's me, Hank Green, your host. And joining me this week as always is our science expert, Sari Reilly. Hello. And our resident evidence. Should I do a fun noise? Yeah, do a fun noise. Make a big fart. Oh, uh, there we go. What happened to you there? I was like, should I do it with my cheeks? Should I go?

She didn't know how to make a fart noise. That doesn't make it as good. That didn't do anything. Yeah. That's how you know. That's how you know you didn't grow up a little boy. You're like, I don't know how to make a fart noise. All of us. That's for sure. And our resident every man, Sam Schultz.

Hey there, how's it going? That's all I get. Hi. Happy to be here on this beautiful, beautiful day. It's a beautiful day. It is a beautiful day. It is a beautiful day. We should be out side. I have a sun shining on me and and that's going to go out after this and I'm going to call my mom

and I'm going to do art in my yard. That's what I love. I just just project for Awesome Hankler Fish. Oh, because you have to make like 10,000 of them. I have to make another couple hundred. Yeah. Oh, no. It's going great. It's real fun. How are your moms? I think my mom's doing great.

My parents go down south every winter. There's snowbirds as of a couple of years ago. Oh, wow. And so can I guess where they go? Yeah, Doc's, my Oh, wow. What? And so can I guess where they go? Yeah, Doc's my parents, please. No, yeah, you can. Do they go to like, the the the southern Texas? No, gosh, no. You know where I was born? Right? No. I was born in Mobile, Alabama. Every time. Yeah, I was born in Mobile, Alabama. Hank forgets this every time. Yeah, I was born in Mobile, Alabama. My mom is from that area.

Okay. So that's where they go back to. They go to Alabama. Yeah. Do they go to like at least close to the ocean in Alabama? Hank, they go to a dang island. They're surrounded by. They're surrounded by the ocean.

One of those. I know about those. I've heard of those. I don't think I've heard of them. Yeah, so they go down to the island I was born upon. Oh, wow. So if you did say the name of the island, it might actually be Dox and your parents. I think like 200 people live on the island, so it would be pretty easy to find them.

I'm glad. And it's going good down there. Warm, easy. Yeah, they seem like they love it. They live in a place that a friend owns, and they were looking at houses down there. Warm. Yeah, they seem like they love it. They were looking at how they live in like a place that a friend owns and they were looking at houses down there. So I might never see my parents again. Or you could go to like a nice part of the world. That's true. We did go. We went there this winter and it was amazing.

We watched the sun. It's like you watch the sunset in the ocean. You just see it go. Oh, it's crazy. It's like a deeply moving experience to see the just like the sun completely disappear and then it's dark in an instant. It's so different than here. And I'm not really sure why, but it just is. Got all these things on the horizon. Yeah. All this crap in the way. Tree, mountains. All those mountains. Boo. Sarah, do you want to answer this question?

Is it OK? It's a weird now that it occurs to me. I have no idea if it's a cool question to ask. No, it's fine. My mom, my mom is good. We're building our relationship. She's texted me that she's going to rent everything everywhere all at once. Oh, this weekend through red box.

So, you know, thriving in near, near Seattle area. That was a lot of detail to give you specifically where she was renting it from. Oh, this is the extent I get essays and texts and it's all like, here's the deep, we've got spring like weather, sunny, 60 degrees today and tomorrow, then back to showery 50s on Sunday and next week. And then just like next bullet point agenda of updates. Wow. Wow.

Very, very clear communicator. This is how we show our love. Which is better than no communication maybe. So I'll take it. We're learning. So every week on SciShow Tangents, we have an Ask the Science Couch thing, and we love those. And we also get more questions than we can answer.

We just do one per episode, but we get more than that. But we shouldn't let good questions go to waste, which is one of the things that we do here on the Patreon podcast. We answer some of your questions that didn't make it onto the show as quickly as we can I don't know how we're gonna do that, but we're gonna try same. What do we got? All right So the first question is from klezbot who asks how much do individuals in colonies of ants? This is from the ant episode make choices or are they more like the OOD in Doctor Who? I think they're more like the Ood in Doctor Who? I think they're more like the Ood in Doctor Who, yeah.

I don't know enough about the Ood from Doctor Who. They don't carry their brains in their hands. Oh, those guys. They're the little, the tentacle-y ones. Right. Yeah, tentacle-y. The action of making a decision is very weird philosophically regardless. Like if you get into it, have we ever made a decision are we just cascades of?

physicality with no agency Quantum physics doesn't solve the problem of free will like many people would like it to and in in that vein ants Definitely don't make decisions. So if we might not, ants definitely don't. Is how I feel. So like, just philosophically- Is it because it's all this reaction? Yeah, they're just following- To stimuli?

Stimulus. Okay. Various stimulus. There is gonna be some subjectivity in the stimulus, but I don't think that you can call that a decision. Does that, do you agree with me, Sari? Do you wanna fight about it? No, I don't really that you can call that a decision. Does that, do you agree with me, Sari? Do you wanna fight about it?

No, I don't really like pedantic arguments about things we don't know about. Yeah. Well, would that even be specific to ants? That seems like it would be any animal, right? Yeah. Any animal is like, well, and I guess depending on the complexity of that animal and ants.

Yeah, like I think that dogs might make a decision now and again Because they have a little bit more leisure time than an aunt does I don't know It's weird to think from what the act of a decision Emerges like when do you get to call it a decision and when do you just call it a reaction? And I don't actually know. This is a philosophical question. I feel like more than a science question. They don't have a hive mind though, right? They don't share their mind, no. But they have evolved into a situation in which they all act for the benefit of a larger whole,

which is also kind of true of people, honestly. Like the better way to categorize it, I guess, is if we wanna take the decision element out of it. There are different kinds of ants that follow different or prioritize different reactions to things in their environment, perhaps out of, for reasons out of their own control, but they instinctively care for young

or follow pheromones to go look for food or defend the nest or pop out a lot of eggs and whatnot. They are not a hive mind in that if the queen of a colony were to die, the ants wouldn't go into chaos because they don't take direct orders or aren't like mentally linked to the queen. They're all their own organisms as opposed to the Ood, which are maybe all mentally linked like a mushroom network or whatever. But the reason an ant colony would die if the queen died is because there would be a lack of ants.

Like, she would stop laying eggs, and then eventually the ants would just die of age, and then there would be no more ants. So it's not because they're directionless. They would still be doing ante things. They would do all the same stuff. Yeah. But they would all die of normal ant death reasons.

And then there would be no ants left. Wonder what the leading cause of death in ants is. It depends on the ant. Probably eating. You think it's old age, maybe? Being eaten. There's so many of them. Old age is an actual cause of death.

There's like something has to have gone wrong. Sure, they've reached the sort of like natural end of their lifespan, but do they have a little ant heart attack? Did they have an ant stroke? No, because they don't have circulatory systems. So it's neither of those things. Do they just like... What the hell?

Their digestive system stop working? What is the leading cause of ant death? Hank asks on Twitter. When a bug gets old, what's wrong with the bug? Yeah. I would say like injury or exhaustion maybe, like a lack of nutrients too. Yeah, probably starvation is up there for sure. And an injury is probably also quite likely, or being consumed, which might count as injury. I don't know. Where do you put like eaten by ant lion or ant eater or any other ant specific predators? Woodpecker. Like what does that

count as? Consumed? We don't have that one on the list of human causes of death. Luckily, that's nice. That's a nice thing about being a person. My friend Paul answered my question and said that the leading cause of ant death is ant acid. Oh, Paul. Okay. That's kind of true though, because anteaters, their stomachs don't produce hydrochloric acid. They don't produce stomach acid, but they get formic acid from the ants that they eat. And so the ants get digested within their own acid. What? Ants digest themselves. Yeah. So they rely oned within their own acid. What? Digest themselves.

Ants digest themselves. Yeah, so they rely on the ant, the acid. That's crazy, Zari, can I use that? Because I'm going to be on a podcast, I'm supposed to have a good fact, and I'm looking for one. Do you want my spreadsheet? But yeah, you can use that if you want. It's on the spreadsheet.

The way you ask Zari for a cool fact is to text her at 12 o'clock at night, the night before the podcast, okay? Yeah, don't you know that, Hank? You gotta follow the rules. Much like a magic eight ball, you summon me in the middle of the night and you're like, what? But yes, you can use that fact. All right, all right, all right. Have we only done one question?

We've only done one question. Rapid fire. No, we are out of time. I have a surprise though, kinda Okay Okay So a couple months back on the podcast Sarah revealed that she had hosted a bunch of educational videos While she was at MIT and we watched a little bit of one about lizards regrowing their tails So originally I wanted to watch that whole video and goof on Sarah except I watched it and I was like this is just good

And normal wasn't even funny fortunately Sari also sent me some other videos that she did at MIT and I found one that is a real gym so Sari do you want to set up what we're gonna look at so one of my on-campus jobs after I I made many videos for many purposes but once that attracted the attention of the biology department, I worked on a molecular biology course on edX called 728X, which is the MIT number for the molecular biology course. Did a lot of animated videos for them, editing, filming, whatever. And then they needed to make a trailer for it. And they were like, ah, we need a student in the trailer

being amazed by molecular biology. You're the only student we know. You're the student worker who does the things here. And I did a lot of narration for them too. So I ended up narrating the first part of the trailer, but then also being directed by my supervisors to act amazed by molecular biology. Don't give it away too much, okay?

Okay. It's really only the first 20 seconds that we have to watch. Used to wear a lot of rings. Do you feel like studying biology is just memorizing hundreds of protein names and functions? I was wondering about the rings. Wake up and take a different approach with MIT biology. You'll experience an approach to learning infused in experimental research.

Oh, my Pac-Man. My Pac-Man. Oh, wow. Protein. Protein. That's really the end of it. You can just watch that first 20 seconds over and over again if you want to. Horrible.

Because it's just really like... Baby Sari. I really like the face you make when you're so excited about science. So we had that, probably like five different takes and they were like, Sari, more excited. Because I'm not the most emotive person and especially as an undergrad, it was very reserved. They were like, Sari, you gotta do more excited. More excited. And I was like, okay, one time I'm gonna do it really goofy

and you're gonna hate it. And that's the take, of course, they used in the final video where I accidentally flung my pencil across the room. Oh, that was just acting, Sari. There it goes, it's gone. That was you being really goofyeri. There it goes. It's gone. That was you being really goofy. That's as goofy as Ceri gets. Yes, that's maximum goofy. I'm worried that you and Pac-Man have had a thing.

Like you had a little swing. You were really happy to see him. Oh yeah. Hey, Pac-Man. I think it's, um... What is it? It's one of the things, the enzymes that helps with DNA replication is what Pac-Man is. Oh, it's the Clipper guy. It's the little guy that goes snip, snip. No, it's not a...

Isn't there a snipper guy? There is a snipper guy, but I don't think... I think this was like a polymerase or something. I could have gone with that one too. The one that cradles the DNA strand and helps... I bet I could have. Yeah. Attack on additional things. How'd you do in this class?

I never took the class. They just had me work on it. I took cell biology, which I also worked on the course for, but molecular biology, I don't think I ever took because I had already completed my electives for my biology degree. And then the last thing I had to do was petition. Well, I was supposed to take a very intensive lab class in which I learned how to write scientific papers. And then I was like, what if instead I overwhelm the deciding committee

with the hundreds of hours of videos that I've made about biology? Genius. And stuff like that. And so I wrote a big proposal and I was like, does this count as my thesis, like my undergrad thesis instead of me taking this class that's going to make me spend 40 hours a week in lab or whatever. And then they said yes. So got out of it.

That's the secret. Do a bunch of other work and then say, I don't want to do that one. Will you give me a biology degree? And the answer was yes. I have a question that so underneath this video on our show flow, there's another video that I clicked on and it has, it's from 14 years ago from a account with one YouTube subscriber. It has three comments all from the same person.

Okay. Oh no. Okay, wait, Sam. So everybody, everybody, we could watch this one again. We can watch this one real quick too. So this is a video that faith's revealed to us earlier today. And I thought, well, we're watching one old video. We better watch the other one too.

So let's watch it real quick. Why don't you ever want to fly with Peter Pan? Cause you never, never land. So for context, this is a video from 2008, 14 years ago. And Sam and I were talking about like search engine optimization and putting tags on YouTube videos and how you don't really have to do that anymore. And I was like, this was the video. So I went uploading this video just It was August 2008. I just tagged Obama and then it got like 6,000 views like immediately. It was like great

It's not even a little bit about Obama or any sort of politics. No, and it is use tags on YouTube anymore That's why they don't use tags on YouTube anymore. And that's why. It's also just 50% credits. Well, it also, I like that it does make it clear just so you make sure that you know what the joke is. You didn't get it. How old were you in 2008? Eighth grade. Okay.

Perfect. How older eighth graders. I was two years in the college at that point. We don't need to talk about how old we were at that point. I was also in eighth grade. We're the same age. I didn't even realize. Well, my years match up with the years of so I was in first grade in 2001. It's very convenient. Also, in 2008, I was a professional youtuber

Holy was professional as as me Most of the rest of the videos have like 12 views so six thousand. Yeah, no, it's huge. I do want to know who your one subscriber is So do I. I have no access to this account whatsoever. I love the comments too, where the first one's like, yeah, I was okay, I guess. And then the same person comments,

who knows how much longer later saying, actually, now that I think about it, it wasn't that good. It could have been brutal. And also all of those comments somehow happened like two years after the video came out. Yeah. Yeah. He also did not like the guy flying around. So annoying. It's so annoying.

That was my intro to voice acting. My entire voice acting career. Intro and outro to voice acting. Think happy thoughts. Think happy thoughts. Oh, is that what he's saying? Yeah, that's what he's saying. I thought he was saying spaghetti box.

But that makes way worse sense. That's funnier. That's funnier. Spaghetti box. Spaghetti box. So those are my little presents for you guys. And then this will be published in video version too, you guys at home can can play along as well and if you ever find an embarrassing video of me just don't even look at it I guess yeah well that's my new mission

luckily I don't have any I don't have any embarrassing videos on YouTube that's the thing about being a child rather than a professional YouTuber, you can hide your past. Everybody, thank you so much for coming and being on the podcast today, to Tuna and Faith as well, and to all of you for being patrons of SciShow Tangents so that we can continue to make the funnest podcast on Earth, the best science trivia game show podcast that exists. It's called SciShow Tangents. Tell people about us. But more than anything, thank you for your support as a patron. It's wonderful for us. And we are very grateful that you care enough about what we do

to support us in that way. And I'm grateful that we can come to you with an extra special episode. I didn't have the mic pointed at me, so I did not sound great that whole time, but that's fine. It's fine. You sounded like you were far away, like you were shy. It's a little farther away. Yeah. It's a very directional mic.

And we will see you next time on Sideshow Tangents Regular, and then soon after that, here on our special video and audio just for you. Goodbye.