Stuff You Should Know - How Rainforests Work

Episode Date: October 9, 2012

It's been called the world's lungs, the world's pharmacy and the world's air conditioner. It takes up only 6 percent of Earth's land, yet houses 50% of the world's species. Find out the math behind why they may be gone in 40 years in this episode. 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. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from HowStuffWorks.com. Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant and the little dinosaur friend of yours. Yeah, he's kind of become a fixture. Or she. What's his, yeah, it looks like a she, I guess. Yeah, it's a she. What's his, her name? Oh, Dinah. Nice. That was sharp. Thank you. I appreciate that. Not as sharp, however,

unfortunately, as the blade of the kettleman's chainsaw cutting down their tropical rainforest like crazy. Yeah, or burning it. Yeah, crazy. Well, that's what they used to do supposedly. I don't know if you know this or not, but I read a couple of books by a guy named Charles C. Mayan. One's called 1491 and the other calls 14, the other is called 1493. And in it, he talks about how there's a lot of evidence that the Amazon basin was a completely human managed creation that it's not like some virgin tropical rainforest in its natural state that it was like created. Like we planted it. Yeah, really. And managed it. And I think he says like, if that's the case, then it's like the largest public works

project ever undertaken in the history community. But one of the pieces of evidence is this like slash and char agriculture where it's like you set the forest on fire, but you don't let it burn all the way down into ash. You like, you know, put it out and it leaves these stumps of charcoal, which actually make the ground more fertile, which it turns out is a surprising factor. If you ask me a surprising fact, yeah, of the podcast that the ground, the soil in this incredibly lush Amazon rainforest or any rainforest tropical rainforest, we say is really not very fertile at all. Yeah, at least deep down. That's a good point. Yeah. And that is in this article. And I thought that was pretty interesting too. And I thought this article was jam packed and stuff.

And then it just takes a really depressing turn at the end. Yeah. Because everyone knows what's going on with the rainforest. And we're going to read a plug later. But our old friend, Joanne, who nominated us for an Emmy nomination. Of course, we learned quickly that spoken word albums, you don't have a shot. It's what you know. Well, no, it's kind of a rip off because all the spoken word Emmys, I'm sorry, Grammys, you have to say Emmy. All the spoken word Grammys are people reading their autobiographies who know everybody. It's just such a rip off. I know. It's like hardworking folks like you and I can't be nominated for a Grammy because Tina Fey read her book out loud. Yeah, a microphone. And look, it's so funny. She's got like a man's forearms.

It's hilarious. I love Tina Fey. But anyway, Joanne standaloneist, and I think I'm pronouncing that right, works for the Amazon Institute. Right. And she's one who kind of got me thinking about this today. And now we're going to plug her organization later. Okay, you can adopt a sloth. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's great news. Pretty neat. So having said that, thank you, Joanne. You know, my big problem with those programs is you don't actually get to take the sloth or the kid or whoever home with it. It's a symbolic adoption. I think it's just like giving money to somebody is what it amounts to pretty much. But yeah, I think that's a good thing to plug chuckers. Great. Chuck, I want you to know something. The tropical rainforests on earth cover six to seven

percent of the dry land on the planet. Yeah, not counting the oceans. Right. But they make they are home to about 50% of the species on the whole planet. Yeah, mind boggling. I'm going to just going to go ahead and say this whole podcast, you will be blown away by the numbers, the sheer numbers of diversity going on. Yes. And sadly, 6% now it used to be 14%. Yeah, it's going away at an alarming rate. Yeah, there's a statistic given at the end of this article that I've heard many times with some of these like kind of hippie ecology statistics, you have to kind of go back and look, you know, a lot of them like they're just so staggering and it's very important stuff that some sensational ones kind of slipped through

the cracks and like reported over and over and over again. Right. Right. But the 40 like okay, so the there's a statistic that at the current rate of deforestation, there will be no tropical rainforests left on earth in 40 years. And I looked it up and apparently that's fairly close to accurate. So at the rate that it's being deforested today, which is about 50,000 acres a day. Yeah. 1.3 acres a second or something like that. 1.5 acres a second. Okay. Every second. Yeah, that is depressing. Yeah. So 50,000 acres a day. So if you take the total acreage of rainforest left on earth and divide it by 50,000 acres lost a day, if you do that constantly 24 hours a day, every day in 40 years, there's no rainforest left at this rate. You want to hear something else

scary? Yeah. 500 years ago, there were 10 million Indians living in the Amazonian rainforest. 10 million today, less than 200,000. Yeah. That's the Amazon alone, right? Yeah, Amazonian rainforest. Well, the Amazon is by far the largest rainforest. It's the Amazon makes up 54% of the tropical rainforest left on earth of all the tropical rainforest. Yeah. But all in, I think there are more than 80 countries through Africa, Australia, Asia, Central and South America. Right. And we're talking tropical. We're not talking about you in Seattle and you in Oregon. Those are rainforests. They're beautiful. They're not tropical rainforests. But they're not tropical. You try to find a sloth in there. You can't do it. No sloths? Not that I know. No, I don't think so.

So I guess let's talk about weather. Okay. Lots of rain in a rainforest. Yeah, they don't call it that for nothing. No. Did you convert these inches to feet because it's startling when you do? No. I'll give you inches first. And if you have that conversion, that's great. 160 to 400 inches of rain per year. 13 to 33 feet of rain of rain every year. And it rains a lot in Georgia. Right. Yeah. No, it makes Georgia look like the Sahara Desert. Yeah. Maybe even the Gobi. Yeah. For those of you living outside of the United States and what other country was it that used the imperial system, Liberia? Yeah. We're talking 406.4 to 1016 centimeters. That's a lot of centimeters. It's a lot of meters. There is no dry season. Yeah. Like you have in some places like where you

have like monsoon season dry season. It's wet all year round. Spread out pretty evenly. Temperature remains pretty constant. Hot and muggy. Yeah. And dip below 60. That's because tropical rainforests form a band around the equator. Yeah. Between the two meridians, the tropics. Things don't change a lot there. Right. Because the, what is it? The procession of the earth doesn't create seasons like it does elsewhere in the northern or southern hemisphere. Sure. We get a little further away from the sun. It gets a little cooler. Right. So what you have, hot, wet. Yeah. And green. Yes. And there is like monster green. Monster green. Like, I guess we should start at the top with a canopy. Yeah. I drew also a chuck if you need any help.

I drew a little diagram. I did you. It's a text to picture. You need to put a little happy face on your sunshine. I didn't bring a pen or what I would. We can add that later. But if you need this, this is here. I appreciate that. The canopy, we're talking giant trees 60 to 150 feet tall, forming the thick canopy such that only like 1% of light will eventually hit the floor of the jungle. And then above that, sometimes you're going to have these, and I see you drew them, the little, what are they called? Emergence. Emergence. These trees that are so stubborn and intent on getting sunlight, they're like, you know, I'm going to grow even higher than the canopy and steal all that sunlight for myself. Yeah. There are crooks. There are crook trees,

basically. There's a lot of crooks that we're going to get to in this. Yeah. It's kind of, okay. So one thing that I learned from reading this is the tropical rainforest is a real like dog eat dog ecosystem. Maybe we should just get rid of it all. I don't think so. I mean, it's brutal. Plants like sucking the life out of other plants. Yeah. That's just how it goes. That's what it's like in the jungle, Josh. So you've got the canopy level. Got the canopies way up high. And you said another fact of the podcast to me, only 1% of the sunlight that hits that canopy makes it down to the forest floor. Yeah. And another cool thing that was pointed out a little later is that if like one of these trees dies and there's a hole in the canopy and little sunlight

gets through, it's like everyone and everything goes berserker. Plants and animals like, son, you got to get to it. That's our life. Yeah. And they like scrambled toward these little sun spots. It's like that rush song, the trees. Yeah. That was a good one. That was in their way proggy early phase. Then I like progrock because I like rush. Yeah. Well, apparently, their new album's pretty good. Everything they did was good. No, I mean, they had name one album of theirs that wasn't good. Well, I mean, anything since the late 80s to me. No, man. I'm telling you, it was still good. Yeah. Well, they're getting high marks for their new one for being like sort of a throwback to their old sound. That's great. I actually don't like their

earliest stuff like 2112. Not that big one. Boy, that's a dude conversation. Ever been to a rush show? Yeah. Five girls there. Yeah, it's true. And they're looking around like this. Yeah, exactly. And the guys don't even notice them. Yeah. Because Getty Lee's on stage. And I'm wearing a wizard's hat. Yeah. All right. So the forest floor where it's nice and dark and dank, you're going to find what you would probably expect, which is a lot of moss and fungus. No grass. No. You'd be hard pressed to grow any grass on the forest floor of a tropical rainforest. I think you're right. Because there's not much light like we're talking about. One percent. One percent of available light. Yeah. The one percenters. They're on the jungle floor. So like you said, let's say a tree

dies. There's an opening. It's kind of like a rent control apartment. Yeah. Right. Everybody's scrambling for it. Sure. This happens probably more than you would think. And it's not even necessarily a tree dying. A tree could just fall over as we'll see later. Oh, yeah. But when that's not the case in an area where there's seedlings trying to grow, most of them die. Yeah. Because you have to make it 60 to 100 feet to the top of the canopy to start growing branches. It's pretty remarkable. It takes a lot of light to generate or to undertake the process of photosynthesis to get that tall to ensure your survival anyway. Yeah. And if you are one of those lucky one percent seedlings, oh wait, I just confused two different statistics. Yeah. If you are one of those lucky

seedlings that happens to have an opening in the canopy and makes it all the way up there and starts growing, makes a nice life for yourself, you are probably going to be subject to basically what are parasitic plants. Yeah. Not carnivorous plants even. Parasitic plants. Yeah. The epiphytes actually grow onto giant trees. They use that as their ladder to get to the top. Well, they form the understory too. So you have the canopy and then just under that where there's still some light coming here. Sure. But nothing like above the canopy. You have those epiphytes and those are like ferns and orchids. Yeah. Which are very beautiful. Air plants. Yeah. Because the roots aren't in the ground. They're on the side of the tree. Yeah. They're like the succubus. Yeah. And they can

eventually kill this tree if they get to the top and they're doing fine up there and then their roots spread out and choke the tree to death. Yeah. Then that tree can actually decompose but the lattice framework is still there. Yeah. So the epiphyte is just like, great. Thanks for the ride. Sorry. Sorry I killed you. Thanks for the ride, lady. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. So an epiphyte can turn into a strangler. It's basically an epiphyte that's gone bad. Well, like you said, it's doggy dog. Everyone's trying to get up to the top. I know. But if you're an epiphyte or a liana, which is a, I think that's how you pronounce it. Yeah. Which is basically a vine that can grow all the way up and then starts to spread. It's like kudzu. Yeah. You're not doing anything really

on your own. You're dependent on some other organism. Whereas if you're a tree, you're just doing your own thing. Yeah. But then you're dependent on the sun. Well, yeah. Rain. You can hardly be faulted for that. Everyone's mooching off of somebody. Except I guess the sun. The sun is the one that's providing it for everybody. All right. So you were talking about the infertile soil. It rains so much that the nutrients get washed away really easily and they don't never get to like penetrate deep into the earth. Right. So Jerry laughed at that. And it wasn't unsettling or off-putting. And so what happens is you get a very thin layer of fertile soil. So what you get there is very thin, not very deep roots. And in the end,

you get trees that fall down pretty easily. Yeah. Like in here in Atlanta, when we go through heavy drought, you'll also often see like trees falling down during windstorms because their roots never like got super low. Yeah. This is exactly the same thing. Exactly. But some trees have adapted a way around this called buttresses, which is basically like a trunk coming off of the trunk and just going down to stabilize it. Yeah. Did you look those up? I've seen those before. It's pretty cool. I mean, it's like a stand almost surrounding the base of the tree. It's kind of neat. Yeah. It's a buttress. Yeah. Well, a buttress of any kind is a support system. You're one of my buttresses. I appreciate that. So I think that is worth saying again,

like the reason that the tree roots are shallow is because nutrients are scarce. Yes. And one of the reasons why is because it rains so much. Right? Yeah. But even still, like these plant species and animal species, as we'll see, are they're just adapted for life in this really high up. Like everything that sustains life is basically up there for the most part. And all of these plants and animals have made these awesome adaptations to live high up in the air in a place where nutrients are really hard to come by. And there's a lot of competition for everything. A lot of competition. I just think it's best like a buttress. It's like, oh, I'll fall over if I don't grow another trunk. So I'll grow another trunk. Well, or the epiphytes

can get to the top and then leap from tree to tree and further seal in the canopy. Yeah. Which is kind of cool. Yeah. So we should talk about bacteria for a minute. Plays an important part. What? In any ecosystem. Yeah. But especially in the rainforest, you know, trees break down bacteria with food or, sorry, provide bacteria food. Bacteria eats it up. I can't believe I agree with that. Like, yeah. Trees break down bacteria's food. And then the bacteria poop that out and feed the trees. Right. And they're just like, it's a great little relationship. Symbiotic. Everybody gets what they want. It's like those little birds that pick bugs off of the back of what a hippo. Is it a hippo that does that? I don't know. I've seen that now. Or there's no,

there's one that there's a bird that picks food out of like the mouth of a hippo. Really? It's really dangerous to be that bird. But like the hippos are like. Thank you. Yeah. That's cute. And here's another mind blowing stat if we want to talk about diversity. Let's say you live in Northwest Oregon. Okay. And you're like, dude, we've got like a dozen tree species here in this forest. It's like so diverse. Yeah. Hit the hacky sack again. Let's get out of here. 300 different distinct tree species in the rainforest. Yeah. 300. Yeah. But just trees. They're really, really spread out. Yeah. So like in an acre, you might find just like a few of that species. Yeah. So there's a bunch of different species packed into one acre. Yeah. I mean, it's crazy. Yeah.

10 million animal species. Yeah. That's a million. That's a lot. Unfortunately, they're being destroyed at the rate of 50,000 species per year. Experts say that we're losing 137 plant animal and insect species every single day. Right. Deforestation. 137 species. Not just like, oh, that bug died. It's like all of that bug died. Yeah. Today. Yeah. On Monday. Yeah. And guess what will happen tomorrow? All of another insect will die. 137 of them. It's great. It's just like, it's the saddest thing ever. And it's not just said too. I mean, we'll see in a second like what the problem is when that happens. You know, biodiversity is important. And if you're talking about the cradle of biodiversity, then it becomes even more important. Right.

Because it's like the cool part of town and then the suburbs as far as planet Earth goes. And the excerpts. We can't even talk about that. All right. But out of these 10 million, of course, insects are going to be the most abundant. And then out of all of those ants are the most abundant thing in the rainforest. Yeah. So I found somewhere that they make up 30% of the biomass of a tropical rainforest. Really? From what I understand, like, that's like the entire biomass, the trees and all that stuff. Wow. The ants make up 30% of that. Oh, man. Yeah. I bet they're not fun to deal with. Yes. And something like 15%. So half of that is fire ants. Really? Wow. Can you imagine? Have you seen this incredible movie? It's called

Medicine. Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. It's an Indiana Jones movie. There's these fire ants in there. It's just crazy what they can do to amaze. Such an abomination. Did you see the South Park about that? Uh-uh. Was it great? It was great. It was also probably the most disturbing South Park you've ever seen. That would happen. Yeah. We can't say it on the air, though. No. I shouldn't even be endorsing that episode. 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 2,200 pounds a month. 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. 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 for it. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. I'm Marcel Swiley, that dude and host of more to it, a new iHeart original podcast that takes a deep dive into the biggest topics in sports, entertainment and culture. The journey begins

with headline news, which leads to deeper discussions about life lessons that are presented in every story. Each week we tackle subjects and issues beyond the public's perception and narrative. To learn more about the stories and about ourselves. Hosted by someone who defied the odds to go from Compton to the Ivy League and then played 10 years as an all pro defense event. This is not your typical sports show with topics ranging from the social ills that surround us all to the character growth that occurs from overcoming adversity. You'll get inspired hearing stories that highlight the growing pains that fuels anyone on a successful journey. You'll leave every episode with a greater understanding that no matter the story, the person or outcome, there is always more to it.

Found on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you find your favorite shows. So these insects also have a very symbiotic relationship with the forest. Yeah. Because they, along with birds, help spread the seeds around because there's not a lot of wind going on. There's like zero wind. Yeah, so seeds aren't going to propagate by flowing through the air like they do elsewhere. So you got these little insects eating them and then carrying them off 10, 20 feet away or birds carrying them miles and miles away. Pooping them out. Pooping them out and then you're spreading seed, which is probably another reason why each acre has like so many different kinds of plant life going on. Yeah, well, I think that's definitely why. The birds also,

especially like say hummingbirds, which there's an abundance in the tropical rainforest, they will get pollen all over themselves as they go from like orchid to orchid. Yeah. So that helps propagate orchids or epiphytes, which typically can't really get from tree to tree. Right. You know. So when you, when you have an orchid that's evolved specifically for a hummingbird, it's going to attract those hummingbirds with your delicious nectar and help generate new orchids. Nice. Elsewhere. I associate hummingbirds with the sun for some reason. Yeah. Probably just because where I live. Yeah. But it's hard to imagine them in like in the dark jungle. Well, I think in the understory, which is where the epiphytes are, it's, it's not that dark. It's like 100 feet down

where it's like you can't really see. Yeah. Reptiles, obviously tons of reptiles and amphibians. If you want to avoid snakes, then the Amazon rainforest is probably not where you want to go. Yeah. But a lot of these are being smuggled out. Evidently live animals with the fourth, fourth largest smuggling commodity, smuggling out these live animals for resale. Is it for bushmeat or just for pets? No, a pet, like black market pets. There's a documentary on that. I haven't seen it yet. Yeah. I was kind of surprised behind drugs, diamonds and weapons. See, that's such a BS. They always say that like it's always like those and then whatever you want to put behind it. I've seen counterfeit materials for being smuggling for fourth. Yeah. For like black market

stuff. It's like whatever, whatever you're talking about, it's always the fourth one after those. Yeah. Drugs, diamonds, weapons and knockoff furbies. Right. You might be right, Josh. I think I am. But I'm going with it. But she did talk about earlier about the different types of adaptations for the animals. Yeah. Like little webs of skin, like on a flying squirrel and other animals to allow it to like soar between trees. It's creepy. Pretty neat. Prehensile tails. I love a prehensile tail. Which is just like an extra hand, especially for a grasping hand basically is what it is. Not like a card playing hand. Yeah. More like a branch grabbing hand. Like I'm going to hang on to this with and like carry my body weight

with my tail. So I can use both hands. Watch me show off. Exactly. I'm a howler monkey. Can you do a howler monkey impression? No. Can you? No. Okay. I don't know anyone who can either. I was just hoping you could. I bet that guy from police academy could. Oh yeah. Michael. I know you know his name. Michael. Do you remember it? Michael Winterbottom? No. No. I don't know. He was good though. You know we're going to get some emails about it. Yeah. Oh, it was Michael so-and-so. Right. Lots of bats and then that's lots of bat scat. Dude, there is a there's a park in Zambia called Kansaka, Kansenka, Kansenka National Reserve and it's home to the largest bat migration in the world. Every October, 10 million bats come to roost and eat these mangoes

that are ripening nearby. Wow. And they cover everything and apparently when they when they take off at dusk, they blot out the sky for like 20 minutes in every direction. It's so scary. Yeah. I'm sure they're they just want the mangoes there. Yeah. Yeah. They don't care about you but man, man. I even like bats and I'm creeped out by that. Yeah. Austin, Texas has nothing on those. Oh, yeah, they have that tunnel. Yeah, the overpass. Gorillas, great apes, orangutans, pigs, big cats. Oh, and elephants and bat scat, by the way. Another thing I found in 1493. Like that was a huge, huge industry. Yeah. Bats. But like bat guano mining because they used it for like fertilizer for so long. Oh, yeah. That like people made

like fortunes like oil fortunes off of these things and it was all like in in these tropical areas. Wow. There were like quarries of that they were digging out bat guano from. Huh. Yeah. And who are the big names there that got rich? Oh, I don't remember. Okay. I would imagine they were mostly in Brazil. Okay. It's not like the getties or the standards. I don't think so. The standard standard oil. I knew a standard. Really? Sure. Um, people like we talked about indigenous tribes, uh, like are being basically shoved out at an alarming rate. And these people, it's really sad because they have like these medicine men who have a great deal of knowledge who are very old. And if they're not in one of the little hippie websites, I went to said, if

you know, one of these medicine men dies, then it's like burning down a library. Like unless they passed on their knowledge, then it just dies with them. Yeah. Just like some native languages do. It's really sad. Yeah. And that's why the movie medicine man was was said in the Amazon because like people think if there's a cure for cancer and AIDS, it lies in the jungles. So okay, that's one thing. Which I believe, by the way, well, they call rainforest the pharmacy of the world. Yeah, but I just have a personal theory that there is no disease where and there is not a cure here on earth. Yeah, I think it's pretty biblical of you. No, it's nothing to do with that. You don't think so? No, I just think it's the yin and yang of mother nature. Like

there cannot be one without the other. I got you. Does that make sense? It's pretty interesting. I don't have anything to back that up. It's just my personal thought. Well, let's stick around, you know, and yeah, sure. Yeah. So apparently, 25% a quarter of all the medicines we use today have their origins from plants in the rainforest. That's a pretty significant backing for what you're saying. Well, yeah, which always cracks me up when we get crap for talking about like eastern and western medicine, people like you should just call it real medicine or not real medicine. I don't think a lot of these people realize how much of their pharmaceuticals are based on plants that some shaman discovered, you know, we have a lot of angry listeners.

But just 1% of the plants in the Amazon rainforest has been analyzed by Western chemists, I guess. Yeah. Isn't it crazy? Yeah. Remember, we did an ethnobotany episode that was pretty good. Oh, yeah, that's right. But even still, even with just that 1%, 25% of our Western medicine from that 1%, 25% of all of our medicines came from that 1% analysis. Yeah, 121 prescription drugs are plant derived. Yeah, that's amazing. We get a lot of food. Apparently, there's something like 2000 types of usable fruit 3000 3000 total indigenous tribes throughout the rainforests use about 2000 estimated. And then we in the West have used like 200 and then that's yeah, they're like, literally 1800 types of fruit that we just don't eat over here.

Yeah. And you go to these farmers markets and you see something like, wow, I've never seen this whatever it is. Yeah. Like, imagine 1800 different things that you've never seen before. Right. Yeah. And that's like a farmer's market. I'm still like blown away by jackfruit. Which one is that? It's they're huge and they have like spying like, you know, I mean, so yeah, my dad's into that stuff now, exotic fruits. He should go to like, he goes to the Buford highway. Okay. And speaking of good eating, the Amazon will not the Amazon. I always want to see the Amazon, but the tropical rainforests of the world are home to one quarter of the bird population. Parrots. Oh, yeah. Two cans. Yeah. Yum. You can't eat a two can. You need fruit loops.

A lot of the things that we take for granted over here came from the rainforest like potatoes, rice, black pepper, my favorite spice, cinnamon, cloves, avocado, pineapples, corn, chocolate, coffee, tomatoes, like everything you love, almost 80% of the food we eat. I don't think potatoes were from the rainforest. I think they were from the mountains of the Andes. Why did it say that in here then? Is wrong? It's possible. Well, roughly 80% of the food we eat originally came from tropical rainforest. So that's pretty amazing stat too. Also yet we're just tearing them down willingly. Yeah, that's kind of a problem. So we're losing the pharmacy. We're losing tons of delicious fruit and delicious birds. Yeah. Losing people.

A lot of people, 10 million to 200,000. 10 million from pre-Columbian. Yeah. I mean, it's been a while, but still, that's a drastic reduction. You also hear that we're losing the world's lungs, but apparently that's not necessarily true. Yeah. They used to call, it's funny, it goes, they go by the lungs of the world, is the Amazon, the pharmacy of the world, and then someone else in here calls it the air conditioner of the world. Right. Why can't it just be the jungle? Well, I think we're trying to drive it home to like fat lazy Westerners who are like, oh, I need that stuff. Right. I don't want to be hot. Yeah. They used to think that the rainforest was super important for providing oxygen, but apparently recent evidence

shows that it doesn't have that much of an effect on oxygen supply. Not a net effect. Not a net effect. It does. It still produces like 20% of the world's oxygen supposedly, which was the stat that was bandied about for a long time, but it requires about that much to decompose everything on the floor. Gotcha. Yeah. But it is the air conditioner of the world in a way. How so? Well, the dark depths of the rainforest are going to absorb a lot of heat. And if you mow these things down, there's going to be a lot more sun reflected back up in the atmosphere, which is going to increase the overall temperature of the planet. So let's talk about why. Why would anybody mow this down if these things are like the nature's pharmacy or the world's pharmacy,

the world's air conditioner, the world's longs, the world's, the world's strip club. Yeah, everything. Right. So like, why would anybody cut the stuff down? Short-sightedness of huge corporations is my answer. Even more directly, like, what are they after though? Clearing land for like lumber. Yeah. Paper products. Yeah. Making pastures for cows. Yeah. Which is not a very smart way to go about things. No, it really isn't like, let's cut down old growth rainforests for these cows. Yeah. So they can have a, you know, barren landscape. Well, that's part of the problem is because these soils are so nutrient poor, apparently when you clear cut the rainforest, Chuckers, you have like usable land, arable land for a year or two.

Yeah. So it's part of it's because this nutrient turnover from all the rainfall. Yeah. But also, all of a sudden, the soil that's used to almost no sunlight whatsoever is suddenly subject to light and heat of immense proportions. We're at the equator. Yeah. And so it bakes and cracks and loses its nutrients even faster through runoff. So causes flooding. It's really a terrible, terrible use of this land using it for crops and livestock. Yeah. I've got a stat for you too. I mean, it doesn't pay off either in the long run. This one statistic is that land converted to cattle operation yields the land owner $60 per acre. If they harvest it for timber, it's going to be worth $400 per acre. But if you use renewable and sustainable practices

when you're harvesting, your land is going to yield $2,400 per acre in the long run. Wow. So it's short sighted and it's not these like, it's not these indigenous people that like, we need crops. So we're going to cut down the rainforests. It's Mitsubishi and who else? Texaco, Georgia-Pacific. Oh, what's the huge union? Like these huge corporations are going in there and doing this. Unicow. Oh, okay. Yeah. What do you think I said? Uniclow. I don't know what that is. It's this clothing company out of Japan. Oh, really? Well, they hate the rainforests. Right. They don't even have any stake in it. They just go cut it down for fun.

Yeah. We're laughing, but that's really sad. Well, also, indigenous tribes who are protected are frequently murdered by mercenaries who are hired by these mega corporations that, you know, want this land and drive these people off of their protected land. I believe there was like a little girl who was found dead, an indigenous tribe member who was found dead like chained to a tree and like just killed by loggers who wanted that land. It's really bad down there. That was Brazil, I think. Well, plus the mudslides and flooding and everything else that happens when you disrupt an ecosystem so drastically. Yeah. It's like the hunting whale sharks. Yeah. That's what I was reminded of when you were saying like the economic impact of preserving it is way

better than just using it up right then. Yeah. Short-sightedness. Very sad that companies still like that there's not a body that can say like, we got to stop this now. There's tons of people like Joanna doing this great work. Yeah. Don Henley stinging these people that have been on it for years, but it just keeps happening. Well, why don't you plug them? Are we done? I don't have anything else. Handy search bar. Well, no, we should tell everybody about something very special and dear to our hearts. New York City. That's right. We are going to Comic Con and we will be doing a live podcast on Friday, October 12th at Comic Con at the Jabot Center. It's like our new thing. We did San Diego. Now we're doing New York. That's right. Next up Albuquerque. So if you are

going to Comic Con, you should come by and see that. But after Comic Con, we have one of our famous, that's famous to us, All Star trivia nights. Right. Where is it going to be? The cutting room? It is at the grand reopening of the cutting room in the Flatiron District, which is, what's the address? It is 44 East 32nd Street in New York and it's in the Flatiron, you said? Yep. And doors open at 730. Trivia goes down at 830. And what is first come first serve, right? Free, free, free first come first serve. We will have a bar there that you can buy drinks. Yeah. You can buy us drinks. That's right. That's legal. We're going to basically be having a really good time. If you're not familiar with our trivia nights, just come out and check it out. It'll

be worth your while. Absolutely. And stay tuned for info on Facebook and Twitter about the makeup of the All Star team. We are filling that out as we speak. But we will have some special guests that you will want to meet. Yeah. And at the very least, you can come take on me and Chuck, right? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. It's just fun. So what is that? That's Friday, October 12th, right? Yep. The panels at when? The panel is at I believe 645. Okay. And then we're going to be at the cutting room starting at 830. Trivia starts at 830 doors at 730. Be there. Be square. You're good at this. Thank you. The war on drugs impacts everyone, whether or not you take to 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 2200 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. 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 answer for it. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the I heart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you

get your podcast. I'm Marcel Swiley, that dude and host of more to it, a new I heart original podcast that takes a deep dive into the biggest topics in sports, entertainment and culture. The journey begins with headline news, which leads to deeper discussions about life lessons that are presented in every story. Each week we tackle subjects and issues beyond the public's perception and narrative to learn more about the stories and about ourselves hosted by someone who defied the odds to go from Compton to the Ivy League and then played 10 years as an all pro defensive event. This is not your typical sports show with topics ranging from the social ills that surround us all to the character growth that occurs from overcoming adversity. You'll get

inspired hearing stories that highlight the growing pains that fuels anyone on a successful journey. You'll leave every episode with a greater understanding that no matter the story, the person or outcome, there is always more to it found on the I heart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you find your favorite shows. So, okay, if you want to learn more about rainforest, type that word in R A I N F O R E S T S into the handy search bar at house.coarch.com and it will bring this up and I said handy search bar. So it's time for plugging the Amazon Institute. That's right. Things are, they're making some headway over there, but she basically points out that the bounty that Amazon is great provides a lot of fish, fruits, vegetables, medicinal plants,

plenty of fresh, clean water. I saw a stat, I can't remember it that we didn't mention something about a percentage of the world's clean, fresh water is in the rain for it's like a lot. Yeah. I can't remember how much it was. Oh, we've got the ice caps in melting over there. Okay. However, due to a lack of nutritional education, they hunt monkeys and sloths to eat there. These animals do not provide any nutritional value though. They are bones and tendons and they don't taste good either. Weird. They just fill space in a hungry stomach. So you can participate in the adoptive sloth program. Your money buys food and protection basically two kilos each of beans, rice, coffee, sugar and flour, soap, milk and eggs are given in exchange for a sloth or a

monkey that was scheduled to be skinned and grilled is how they put it. So if you donate 75 bucks, you can adopt a sloth. You get a certificate of ownership with the name you've chosen for your sloth. You own that sloth. And you get a CD of rainforest sounds and students can actually adopt a sloth for a class. And they have curriculum that they provide teachers K through 12. They provide teachers with an educator's packet of lesson plans. If you email with your class size and curricular structure, they will give you like customized material for your classroom. Nice. So it's kind of cool. So you can read all about this at amazoninstitute.com and they're well worth supporting. That's a good going Chuck. Yeah, good going, John. Yeah, yeah. Thank you very

much for everything for nominating us for an Emmy. Grammy. Grammy. What is wrong with us today? Well, we're heading to TV. We're like Emmys. If you have a really good nonprofit that's helping things people, let's you adopt something. We're always down for that, especially if you're willing to nominate us for an award too. That definitely greases the wheels. You can tweet to us at syskpodcast. You can join us on facebook.com slash stuff you should know. Or you can send us an email to stuffpodcast at discovery.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstuffworks.com. 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. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. Are huge challenges, so embrace the holidays at iHeartland in fortnight. Head to iHeartradio.com slash iHeartland today.