Stuff You Should Know - Have all the good ideas already been discovered?

Episode Date: November 17, 2010

It's no secret that human beings have an obsession with innovation -- but has our species already found every good idea? As Josh and Chuck break down the continuing search for the next great idea, they touch on everything from hand tools to cancer cures. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Flooring contractors agree. When looking for the best to care for hardwood floors, use Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner. The residue-free, fast drying solution is specially designed for hardwood floors, delivering the safe and effective clean you trust. Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner is available at most retailers where floor cleaning products are sold and on Amazon. Also available for your other hard surface floors like Stone, Tile, Laminate, Vinyl, and LVT. For cleaning tips and exclusive offers, visit Bona.com slash Bona Clean. The War on Drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. The cops, are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call,

like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid work. Be sure to listen to The War on Drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from HowStuffWorks.com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with me as always is Charles W. Chuck Bryant, and that makes the Stuff You Should Know. That's right. Yes, it is. And not other imitators. I wonder how many times I've said that. That makes the Stuff You Should Know?

No, just the whole spiel, the whole opening. Hey, welcome to the podcast. Well, you've said it about 270 something times, I think. Luckily, we have them all saved and we could count. We do. I don't know if it's lucky though, Chuck. That's a lot of shows, dude. We should do something special for 300. That's like, that's a lot of shows. It is. That makes me proud. Okay. Well, do you think maybe we could get some cake around here or something? A shrimp cocktail? For the love of Pete? No, I'm allergic to shrimp now, remember? I know. But that's the like to throw it out there. Actually, I ate a shrimp wonton the other day and nothing happened. Really? Or I ate a wonton with shrimp and nothing happened. So it was just like tiny

little bits of shrimp? I don't know. Either that or I'm getting stronger. Maybe so. Superhuman, you might say. Transhuman. Speaking of human. Yes. Chuck, there is a recent study that came out in part from one of our universities here in the city, Emory, right down the street. Great school. There's been this problem that's been plaguing researchers for a really long time, and that is at the beginning of the lower Paleolithic period, which is about 2.7 million years ago, we started using sharp rocks as bashing and cutting tools. So we figured that out. Okay. You can take a rock. That's technology. Sure. That's not horse. That's technology. Yes. Okay. You can take this rock and you can use it to open a coconut or the head of someone who's wrong

to you. Using an implement to complete a task. Well, specifically sharp rocks. Okay. It took two million years, the end of the lower Paleolithic period, before we figured out that we could actually attach handles to these things and turn them into axes. How long it took? Yes. Wow. This is baffled scientists. How could it possibly have taken two million years to go from using your hand to attaching a stick? Sure. This doesn't make any sense. Well, they were dumb back then. A dumb is close to it. They literally were lacking the region of the brain needed, apparently, according to this new study. Basically, we developed a region in the right hemisphere, specifically the supramarginal gyrus, which allowed us to go, hey, let's put a handle on this.

After we did that, we moved out of Africa and started colonizing the rest of the world. They pinpointed the region of the brain that is specific to innovation. To specific to stone toolmaking. Okay. I thought you meant innovation in general. No. That's where your ideas come from. No. Give me a second. I'll run. Oh, shoot. Did I ruin it? It's okay. Okay. So we go from, can't figure out how to attach a handle to a sharp rock. Okay. Two million years. We figure that out. We leave Africa and we start colonizing the rest of the world. And all of a sudden, things start entering light speed. Right. Oh, yeah. And it seems like over the last couple hundred years, especially since the industrial revolution,

our ability to innovate, to grasp new ideas, to understand the world around us has just been hitting this hyper speed. And a lot of people wonder if we've reached a point where all the ideas, all the good ones at least, have already been discovered. We understand how everything works and there's really just figuring out how to dot the i's and cross the t's, right? Right. There was actually a guy who famously said in 1899, a guy named Charles Buell. I love this quote. He was the commissioner of the Patton's office. It's attributed to him, I should say. Yeah. But he said something like everything that can be invented has already been invented. And he said this in a memo basically saying like you should go ahead and shut down the Patton office. He clearly

had never considered the snuggie. Nice. Josh. Nice. Or anything that's been invented since 1900. So here's what I'm going to say. I'm going to go ahead and give you my summation early on. Okay. Is that I think people think at various times in history that they've plateaued. And then I think things happen, people come along, innovators, and then they reach new heights and they go, oh, well, we didn't know that. Right. And there are new ideas. Right. It's almost, it almost displays a shameful lack of historic awareness to say we've reached the end of all of our good ideas. It's just silly. It's just asking to be made a fool of. Yeah. Or for people, maybe people do that on purpose to go the innovators and say, no, yeah. Right. Using reverse

psychology. Exactly. I didn't know that's how innovation works. Yeah. You might as well just give up. Reverse psychology drives innovation. That's a good one. There are people though that say that technological, that real technological innovation has been stalled for quite a while. Yes. After the nineties, computer revolution, everything else since then has kind of been like packaging it in better looking cases and sleeker designs. And it's all like design oriented. It is. Or marketing oriented. Marketing. Sure. These guys, Cedric Laguerre and Eric Vierdo, who are both with Schema Business School, basically say smartphones. Yes. They seem incredibly new and cutting edge, but really they're just the packaging of several already

extant technologies into a really sharp looking handheld device. But that's still a new idea, I would argue. It is still a new idea, but I think what their point is is saying like, before the late nineties and before the eighties, let's say with computers, but especially the tech boom of the telecom boom of the late nineties, this stuff wasn't around. So it's not true innovation. Right. It's kind of repurposing. Sure. And what you were saying, the cosmetic changes to a computer, one of the reasons why they believe that this is going on is because we've come to a point in the computer revolution, I think Chuck, where it's not, you can still make tons of cash just by changing the casing of a CPU. Yeah. There's like no money in innovation,

basically is what I got from this one article. Right. Is that innovation costs more than it's worth when you can just repackage what you've got in a sleeker design and people buy it up. Exactly. These two authors of this article predict that we're going to have two trends that will drive innovation, I guess, currently, right? Yes. That consolidation, we're basically like, especially with either, I think they're talking just about computers. Oh, are they? Yeah. Because they're saying the big hardware firms are going to all consolidate all of the smaller hardware firms to where there's just basically be like the big three or five. And that will leave it to the software firms to compete and innovate. So we'll see more innovation in

the software side rather than the hardware side. Right. And they're also saying that the green boom is going to drive innovation. That makes sense. Like coming up with sustainable packages or sustainable solutions. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. It makes sense. One of the other things I pointed out, thought was interesting was the, they said the tech, they call it the tech refresh cycle, is too small right now. Yeah. So what's happening is they'll say, you like your CD? Well, you're going to love the super audio CD. Or Blu-ray. You like your DVD? You're going to love Blu-ray. But guess what's coming up after Blu-ray? It's going to be like super Blu-ray. And it's happening so fast. People aren't abandoning their current systems. They're just like, you know what,

I'm going to hold on because I don't want to be the guy stuck with the laser disc player in a couple of years. Right. So all of a sudden the same thing happens. No one's buying it. So it's not worth as much money. Which means that nobody's putting any effort into it. And money into it. So innovation ceases. Right. And there's a guy named Edmund Phelps, who's a professor of political economy at Columbia University, right? Yeah. And he's basically kind of saying the same thing. He's saying that there's not enough money going toward innovation, but rather than the onus being put on consumers not buying Blu-rays out of fear of looking like laser disc jerks, it's actually the government and big business that's not pouring money into

small innovators. Yeah. He said that the innovation is the only thing not subsidized by the United States government, which he says is actually a tax in a way because it's not being subsidized. Sort of a reach. You could definitely, yeah. I think a lot of these guys' points are a reach, but what he's suggesting is if the government isn't pouring money into big business so that they can pour money into, I guess, small venture firms, these people who are in their garages aren't going to take risks. They're not going to innovate. There's no incentive, right? I disagree with this. I dispute this. I do too. Because he's saying the people who do work in their garages and are the Steve Jobs and Bill Gates in the 70s, that they were driven by this lust for money.

Exactly. I think that's wrong. I think that people innovate first and foremost to get this idea out of their head and burst into reality, right? I'm glad you said this because I completely agreed. Regardless of what you think of the Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg didn't invent Facebook to make dobs of money. He invented it to make real friends. Yeah, to innovate. That's my point that you made is that these people in the garage, the true innovators, they don't care if they have two pennies to rub together. They're still going to be trying to innovate and make a name for themselves and come up with something awesome. Right. Now, there are people out there who are trying to innovate for the riches. Snuggy. I'm sure the guy who invented the snuggy wasn't

in his garage and just wanted to get this out or else I'm never going to sleep again. Yeah, that's the people that are looking for the next get rich quick thing. But I think you can also make a point that when you introduce money to innovation, it leads to actual stagnation. Because when you introduce money, there's now something to lose and people are less willing to take risks and risk is one of the driving willingness to take risk is one of the driving forces of innovation. The war on drugs impacts everyone whether or not you take America's public enemy. Number one is drug abuse. This podcast is going to show you the truth behind the war on drugs. They told me that I would be charged for conspiracy to distribute 2,200 pounds

of marijuana. Yeah, and they can do that without any drugs on the table. Without any drugs. Of course, yes, they can do that. And I'm a prime example of that. The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. The property is guilty. Exactly. And it starts as guilty. It starts as guilty. Cops. Are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Hey, y'all. This is Dr. Joy Harden Bradford, host of the award winning weekly podcast Therapy for Black Girls. Our incredible

community of sisters has been building the Therapy for Black Girls podcast for five years running. And over that time, we've published over 250 episodes and gained over 18 million podcast downloads. During this time, we've tackled the stigma surrounding mental health and shared conversations to help us all understand ourselves and others a little better. Hundreds of incredible licensed mental health care professionals and other experts have joined us to share tips on taking better care of ourselves. We flipped through the pages of your favorite romance novels with author Tia Williams, checked in with Grammy award winning artist Michelle Williams and discussed the hurdles of balancing competitive sports, motherhood and mental health with Olympic athlete Natasha

Hastings. Five years down and many more years of work to be done. Join us now by checking out the Therapy for Black Girls podcast on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Well, Phelps had a good idea and this will never happen, of course, because it's a good idea to create the first national bank of innovation. All capitalized. Not all caps, but each word is capitalized. He should do it all in all caps with exclamation points. But basically, it would be a bank that you could go and partner as a startup company and partner with this bank for financing and I would guess some sort of low interest loans to spur innovation. That was a great idea. So it is a good idea and this does happen in the real world and the government

does pour money into innovation. He's not exactly correct in that sense and I also kind of resented that he placed big business in between people in their garage innovating and government subsidies that we have to have big business. Give them the money and they'll skim a little off the top and give it to this guy in the garage. He's drawn broad strokes here for sure. There are government programs and we'll talk about one from the National Institutes of Health where the government says, hey, you have a really good idea, Mr. or Ms. Research Scientist and we're going to give you enough money to survive for three years. Yeah, because the deal is you can always get grants if you put together a nice package. But this program with the NIH, what's it called? The

New Innovator Award? Director's New Innovator Award? Yeah. This is intended for people who have such a good idea but it's so new that they don't have the data to write a grant where people would say like, looks like you're onto something here. So they're sort of throwing money at stuff that's like, you're the dude in the garage and we believe in this idea. Go see what you can find out. Right. And we're keeping big business out of the way. Yes. But now the NIH owns you for the rest of your career. Yeah, probably so. Yeah. So let's talk about, there's three people at UCLA that got these grants recently and they're up to some kind of some interesting, one could say innovative stuff, right? They have some good ideas. Hugely innovative. About how to approach problems like the

Professor Dino DeCarlo. All these, I think these people are younger than us, by the way. I'm sure they are. Dino DeCarlo is working on ways to basically apply heat or pressure or chemicals to very specific sites in cells using nanoparticles and magnets, which is tough. Sounds like a winning idea to me. It is. Basically one of the big problems we have with getting cells, engineering cells to do specific things like, I don't know, attack other cells for fun. Like, if tell me that wouldn't be like a big Christmas gift this year, if you could like make cells fight with one another under a microscope, then what you have to basically try to engineer the cell, you know, time after time after time and basically program it to do what you want it to do. Yeah.

What DeCarlo is coming up with is a way to use very tiny magnets and even tiny nanoparticles that can basically, my brain is so small. When you move the magnet with a joystick, it attracts the nanoparticles in a certain direction or whatever and you can have the nanoparticles apply heat or pressure or a specific chemical to a specific site on a cell and direct it to go attack another cell for your pleasure. That's awesome. Your amusement. So 1.5 mil goes to DeCarlo. And for a good reason. For a good reason. The other winner, one of the other winners was Hugh Huang and you came up with basically, I'm going to break this down easy. Instead of saying, let me come up with a cure for cancer, Hugh Huang said, let me

come up with a way to detect cancer so early, like way earlier than we've ever detected it before, that we can stop it in his track, essentially curing cancer. Yes. And he's doing this. Actually, I don't know. She's doing this through nanomaterial called graphene that is just one atom thick. Yes. Graphene is like the super clearly not of this world material. It's literally a carbon atom thick. That's it. So it ends up being a sensor, a biological sensor to tell you when cells aren't doing the things it should be doing. So did you know a gram of this stuff? It's flattened, covers a football field. A gram. Wow. It's ultralight. That is thin, my friend. It's one atom thin. So 1.5 mil to Hugh Huang.

Right. Well, did you explain how? Oh no. Let me try to handle this. Okay. So basically what you do is you put a graphene conductor, a transistor in a cell. And when these biological markers, right, say histones or something like that, start to accumulate, they're attracted to the graphene. And these, by the way, these biological markers we found are correlated with the growth of cancer, the origin of cancer. Yeah, that's where they're starting. And when some of these markers like are attracted to the graphene, they create an electrical charge that we can sense. And the graphene is so thin but so highly conductive that with just a couple of these molecules attaching to the graphene, we would be able to detect it. It'd be like, whoop, whoop, whoop.

Right? Yeah. We'd be like, oh crap, you have cancer. And we cure it right then. Wow. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. And it's a good way to approach a cure for cancer if you ask me. Did I explain that well? I think so. I think so too. And the last winner this year was Jin Hyeong Lee. And Jin is trying to debug the brain circuit using, you know, we have the wonder machine, which is our favorite thing in the world, the FMRI, which measures blood and oxygen levels in the brain. So it tells you these areas light up. They're called bold signals, blood and oxygen level dependent. They light up to correspond to certain brain. Right. And we've talked about this before. Like you're seeing that there's more oxygen

that's going to that part of the brain. So we've assumed this is the basis of the FMRI. Right. If it has more oxygen being delivered to it, that must mean that that region of the brain is active when you show somebody a picture of, you know, their kid, like being carried away into a van. Right. That, you know, that's the fear region right there. That doesn't really say anything though. And it doesn't, it doesn't really implicate. Well, it's not, it's showing, okay, well, there's more oxygen in this region. Right. Right. What this is, what Jin Hyeong Lee is looking at is how or what specifically on the neuronal level is being activated. Right. Right. He's using optogenetics. Right. So it's going to be called the OFMRI.

And that's beyond even what we thought was the wonder machine. So this is the super duper wonder machine. Right. And basically he's using light to allow genetically specified neurons to be activated. Right. You know, our, one of our listeners that Emery has been harping on us doing one on optogenetics for a while. Oh, really? We should get this person in here. This is probably as close as we're ever going to come out. The war on drugs impacts everyone, whether or not you take drugs. America's public enemy number one is drug abuse. This podcast is going to show you the truth behind the war on drugs. They told me that I would be charged for conspiracy to distribute a 2,200 pounds of marijuana. Yeah. And they can do that

without any drugs on the table. Without any drugs. Of course, yes, they can do that. And I'm the prime example of that. The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. The property is guilty. Exactly. And it starts as guilty. It starts as guilty. Cops. Are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Hey, y'all. This is Dr. Joy Harden Bradford,

host of the award winning weekly podcast therapy for black girls. Our incredible community of sisters has been building the therapy for black girls podcast for five years running. And over that time, we've published over 250 episodes and gained over 18 million podcast downloads. During this time, we've tackled the stigma surrounding mental health and shared conversations to help us all understand ourselves and others a little better. Hundreds of incredible licensed mental health care professionals and other experts have joined us to share tips on taking better care of ourselves. We flipped through the pages of your favorite romance novels with author Tia Williams, checked in with Grammy award winning artist Michelle Williams, and discussed

the hurdles of balancing competitive sports, motherhood and mental health with Olympic athlete Natasha Hastings. Five years down and many more years of work to be done. Join us now by checking out the therapy for black girls podcast on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Well, it's a great idea, though, obviously, because Jin Young Lee won one of the innovator awards as well. Yes. And they give these out every year. So they clearly believe that we're not out of good ideas. No. Excellent point, Chuck. The NIH. No, and we're not out of good ideas. So yes, Chuck, we we you pick those out. You found those guys. All right. Well, I didn't personally find them. You're like, these guys should get the NIH found them.

There are very good ideas out there, right? Oh, yeah. But there is a debate that's raging in science about whether these ideas like optogenetics, or, you know, using graphene or nanoparticles to cure detect cancer. Are these variations on a theme? Are they applying cosmetic changes to a computer rather than really creating new parts to it? Right. And basically, the question is, are there any more major discoveries for us to make? Or are these really just basically variations? Remember, I've always said, like, we have the pieces on the table. Now we just have to put them together. Is that the point that we're at? Right. Well, you said we were. I did. And then we started researching this. I'm like, I wonder. Right. I think I still do believe that.

Sure. But within that, though, there's so much that it's, to me, a little bit like splitting hairs. Well, you're absolutely right. And especially when you throw in the word discovered, right? Yeah. Discovery indicates something that's already out there. We just figure it out or stumble upon it. Sure. And an idea necessarily kind of. An invention. Yeah. It leads to an invention. It's something we've created like technology. So let's talk about discovery, right? We have a lot of problems that are still facing us and how we understand the universe, like human consciousness. Right. How do brain cells create our understanding of the world? Like what we see as reality? Right. How is that possible? And can we figure everything out? Well, that's the big question.

Is there, there's a, there's a, like I said, there's a lot of debate about whether or not we'll ever be able to figure everything out. Or if the human brain just simply isn't programmed to understand the world fully, you know, we'll, we'll, there's a guy who's a physicist. His name is Russell Standard. And he's written this book called The End of Discovery. And basically he's saying, he says that we're in quote, a transient age of human development, right? Right. Where we're, we're past the point where we figured out you can put a handle on a rock and make it an axe. Right. But we're right before the point where we can no longer make discoveries, not because we've understood everything, right? Or figured everything out, but because we've reached the limits of what

is knowable for the human brain. Sure. But even that, look at that, that part of the, the right hemisphere that developed and allowed us to put the axe handle on, right? Right. Who's to say that our brain won't, that we won't reach that point where we can't know anything any longer, or we can't know everything. And then we evolve even further. And now all of a sudden we're even better at understanding our world. Right. But will we end up eventually coming to a point where humans understand everything and there is no more discovery to make? I say no, because he, he points out in here, and this is, I think, very valid, uh, from the midnight century that, 19th century, I'm sorry, they said that a lot of people in science said, you know, we've kind of

debunked religion and philosophy and all these things with scientific discovery. But he points out and I agree that even if you figure out all the problems of science, which will never happen, right, there's still human life and consciousness in the subjectivity of what goes on inside a person's head. You're never going to solve, that's not solvable. Right. That's what I argue. That's subjectivism. Yeah. And before, I think I believe in that. There, well, the, the whole, the, I guess, I, I agree with you. Um, there's this aspect of the universe that Kant called the New Aminon, New Aminon. Okay. That was specifically tailored for my thick tongue. It's good. But basically the New Aminon is the thing itself, right? Yeah. Where, um, it has, it's just the

objective, it's the objective universe and we don't interact with that. Everything we know and understand is subjective. Yes. And this is where subjectivism is, is based that basically we can never fully know anything or, and we certainly won't ever know everything because one thing that will always be elusive is what you see. My reality is different than your reality. Exactly. And there's so different. There's an extreme version of it called solipsism. Right. Yes. And solipsism is the, the, um, this extreme version of subjectivism that basically says, um, we, everything is so subjective that I can't fully verify that you exist. The only thing I know that exists is my reality, but all of you may be made up. I may be totally

completely out of my mind and actually in a padded cell right now and none of you are really real. Well, that sort of touches on the whole quantum, uh, mechanics thing. Right. Don't you think? Please. Well, I mean, I don't have a whole lot to say about it because we've covered it, but it definitely, uh, is along the same line. So you think, well, yeah, there's a, there's an interpretation of quantum mechanics that basically says, um, everything we know about the universe we know through observation. Right. And, but once you observe it, it changes. That's part of it. And when, when we observe, we, we gain information, right? But we can't observe everything at once. So all we know exists in our reality for sure is what we're observing. Right. So everything else,

like what's going on out there in the office right now doesn't exist because we're not there to observe it. Yeah. Mind blowing once again. It is mind blowing, but it also, we say all this, not just to, you know, rock out to Floyd, but, um, because this is, this is what science is up against. This isn't just gibberish. This isn't just philosophical gibberish as much as science would like it to be. There is a true problem with the fact that subjectivity, not objectivity, is how we interact with our universe, even though science is based, it's supposed to be based exclusively on objectivity. Right. Right. Well, uh, Stephen Hawking, you might have heard of him. And, uh, another dude named, uh, Leonard, uh, load, loader now. Is that how I'm going to

pronounce that? Sure. There's a silent M in there somewhere. They have a new book called The Grand Design, and they are now saying that, uh, I think scientists used to say, we're going to find the theory of everything. Now they're saying, you know what, we're probably not going to find the theory of everything, but it's probably going to be more like what they call, quote, a family of interconnected theories, uh, which describe your reality under very specific conditions. And this is kind of huge for Stephen Hawking because he's long been a big supporter of the theory of everything, which takes the standard model of physics, includes gravity, which has always been elusive. Right. And then marries it with quantum mechanics

to explain everything. That's the theory of everything. It's one theory that explains everything. Right. Like that surfer guy? Exactly. Yeah. Garrett, Lisa, I think. Yeah. But it was a long time ago. It was. And, you know, it's going to be years before he's shown to be correct or incorrect. Right. But Hawking saying, it's probably not going to be the case. There's going to, there's too many different variables that don't fit together. Right. But the thing that really scares a physicist that will scare any physicist is this sports. Are those models that we've come up with? Yeah. Are they how the universe actually works or how we look at the universe and see how it works? You see what I'm saying? There's that subjectivism again. It can't be whipped. Well,

and all the things that we've said over the years that we have formed to be true, are those even true? Or are the conclusions we're reaching just based on years of thought compiled that may not have been true to begin with? So, you know what I'm saying? I mean, like we arrive at reality by consensus. Yeah. But is that consensus? Was that even accurate along the way? Not necessarily. It's been shown time and time again that it's, it hasn't been accurate. Yeah. Through these, the five revolutions as V.M. Ramachandra put some. Copernicus. Copernicus was the first one who said that Earth is not the center of the universe. Darwinism. Very good, Chuck. Darwin says like, hey, we're actually just a bunch of apes.

DNA. Freud. Yeah, before DNA. Freud's saying like, we actually are driven by desires that we can't control and aren't really aware of. DNA. DNA. Which is saying, I think James Watson who found DNA, along with Francis Crick said, quote, there are only molecules. Everything else is sociology. I love that quote, man. It's one of my favorites. And then the fifth revolution, the neuroscience revolution that we're all, everything, all of our understanding and movements and experiences are nothing but neuronal transmissions, electrochemical impulses, right? So there's not even sociology. That even is just based on firing neurons. Right. That's, that's where we're at right now. That's why I say, I think we have everything

on the table. We just haven't put it together, but it's entirely possible historically speaking to say, well, we thought that before. Right. And we didn't. And what revolution is next? Will that, will the next revolution get us over the wall of subjectivism? Or will that be the wall that we always run into? This is a good one. It was. I was worried about this one. It came out pretty good, didn't it? I think so. Yeah. Don't you like it when we, like, pat ourselves in the back of the end of the show? I think this one deserves it, man. Well, so from blue rays to neurons and at the end of the day, Josh and Chuck say, we are not out of new ideas. Can I speak for you? We are not out of new ideas. And just when you think you're out of new ideas, just when you

think you've plateaued comes a few Wang along to say, no, no, no, no. There are new ideas. And here's one. Now give me the cash. If you want to learn more about innovation and new ideas, we have tons of stuff all over the site. Just type in innovation, type in discovery. I'm sure that'll bring up a ton of stuff and type in neurons. That'll bring up some pretty cool stuff too. You can type all those words into the handy search bar at howstuffworks.com, which means it's time for listener mail. Yes, Josh. I'm going to follow this very heady podcast with the opposite in email form. This is from our 13 year old fan, Peyton in California. Well, hello. I'm sending this from

my eye touch while laying in bed. I'm supposed to be asleep. So anyway, I just started listening to your podcast after my friend Claire. Yes, that's the Claire from California whose email you read on the air who thinks Jerry looks like Tina Fey. Claire is his Peyton's friend. So she said, oh, you got on the air. So I'm going to start listening to you. Actually, I'm saying Peyton is a girl. Peyton may be a boy you never know. I don't seem a boy. Oh, really? Yeah. It's androgynous, right? Yeah. And Biveline at least. Claire posted on her Facebook page that I said, listen to the most recent podcast because you guys read her letter or something. I thought it was so cool. Claire and I are really good friends. Anyways, I love this podcast. Gosh, I feel so boring

because I keep saying podcast. Is there like another word for that? Anyways, I definitely she does that thing like the kids do now where they put like eight s's at the end of a word. Have you seen that? Yeah, I don't get that. I guess so. I most definitely enjoyed the podcast on the octopi and stuff. I thought it was octopi. I thought it was informational and funny. By the way, this email doesn't make any sense because my eye touch is dumb and auto corrects words that I've already spelled right. Urg. Moving on. Your iPhone does that too and mine does that. What is an email written with one of those pens that has like four different color ink you can select from? But it feels like. But the reason I brought that up is I have an idea

to start a website called my iphone spelled what.com because you ever look at some of them you send and you're like, can you please make sure you take the sofa out of the oven when you get home? Yeah. When you meant to say sturgeon? Let's say. Sturgeon is sofa. I would go to sturgeon. Okay. Take the surgeon out of the oven, which is I think so much better. I wish we would have planned this. It's okay, buddy. Anyway, it can make for a lot of fun. So that's my new idea. Okay. And that's lots of love from Peyton, age 13 in Cali. Thanks a lot Peyton, age 13 in Cali. Boy or girl. We're not exactly sure, but either way, we appreciate you taking the time to write in. And if you have a movie that Chuck and I have not seen, you assume we haven't seen that you think

we should see. Best movie, best overlooked movie of all time. We're always looking for good suggestions. Wrap it up in an email and send it to stuffpodcastathowstuffworks.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstuffworks.com. The howstuffworks.com iPhone app is coming soon. Get access to our content in a new way, articles, videos and more all on the go. Check out the latest podcasts and blog posts and see what we're saying on Facebook and Twitter. Coming soon to iTunes. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. The cops, are they just like

looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil asset work. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Langston Kermit. Sometimes I'm on TV. I'm David Boring. I'm probably on TV right now. David and I are going to take a deep dive every week into the most exciting groundbreaking and sometimes problematic black conspiracy theories. We've had amazing past notable guests like Brandon Kyle Goodman, Sam J. Quinta Brunson and so many more new episodes around every Tuesday,

many episodes out on Thursdays where we answer you, the listeners conspiracy theories. Listen to my mama told me on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast.