The Bugle - Bugle Bonus Ep!

Episode Date: April 1, 2026

Bonus episode time Buglers! While Andy, take a well deserved rest from bringing you the latest slurry of frankly idiotic news. Producer Harry has rounded up a few clips from the start of 2026, that di...dn’t make it in the first time round, we’ve also got a clip from our voluntary subscription only show Ask Andy and a Top Story from The Bugle’s, Science and Tech pull out The Gargle, so sit back, get comfortable and enjoy. It's Bugle episode 4373A! We’ll be back next week with Nato Green and Alice Fraser. If you like The Bugle ad-free and uninterrupted. Then why not join The Bugle’s voluntary subscription, with your support Andy and his cohort of co-hosts can continue to blast there trademark mix of satirical insight and shameless drivel all over the planet.🎧 Support The Bugle! Become a Team Bugle subscriber for bonus episodes, exclusive video editions, and the righteous satisfaction of funding satire:http://thebuglepodcast.com📺 Watch Realms Unknown on YouTubeProduced by Chris Skinner, Laura Turner and Harry Gordon. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:12 newspaper for a visual world. Hello, buglers, and welcome to Bugle Bonus Episode 4,373A for April is here, but we are not. I'm Andy Zaltzman, and the bugle is off this week. The clocks went forward on Sunday here in London, but I forgot to change mine, so I recorded an hour of highly pertinent satirical chair, but what I thought was the right time, but we didn't actually press the record button until an hour after I'd started. Fact. So instead of us trying to find or shed or pretend we can discern some light amidst the music gloomery,
Starting point is 00:00:47 we have a bugle bonus episode for you. Producer Harry has rounded up a few leftover nuggets of pure gold from the start of 2026. The bits that didn't make it in first time round, so, well, nuggets of pure silver, I suppose, but still on the podium, which is the important thing. We've also got a clip from our universe-exclusive voluntary subscriber-only show Ask Andy and a top story from the Bugle's revamped Science and Tech pullout The Gargle with Alice Fraser. So sit back, get comfortable and enjoy.
Starting point is 00:01:16 Unless you're doing something in which sitting back and getting comfortable is dangerous or inappropriate, for example, performing surgery or doing competitive ski jumping. Our first clip is from Ask Andy, the almost monthly show in which I and producer Chris answer the questions put to us by our voluntary subscribers. Such as this one, the question of how the bugle and our time at times on, online eventually came to an end. Tim asks a question. We always struggle with questions that are vaguely related to the bugle as a as a commercial entity. And this touches on that. The bugle was launched as part of Times Online and was briefly associated with Radiotopia. Can you share
Starting point is 00:02:01 anything about why that wasn't appropriate for the bugle and why you chose to return being independent? Are there any other podcast consortiums you would consider working with? I suspect Go-Hanger would be interested in the rest is bullshit. by Tim. It's a strong rebrand. Yes. Thanks, thanks, Tim.
Starting point is 00:02:21 I mean, that's very much been the unspoken subtitle of the bugle since it's founding in 2007. Well, it's quite a simple answer to why Radiotopia
Starting point is 00:02:34 wasn't appropriate for the bugle. It's because Radiotopia, we were with for two years after our relaunch in the post-John-Oliver era in 2016. They basically said, we're not getting you enough adverts and we don't think we can. You're better off going your own way. So that's quite simple answer. It was just, I know, we're very good about it and it was nice being part of that network for a couple of years.
Starting point is 00:03:02 But I was never that comfortable with, so we were dependent then on adverts rather than the listener donations, which we'd had post times pre-radiot, so I guess the second half of John's time with the show. I was never that comfortable with adverts. We ended up turning down quite a few offers for things that we weren't entirely ethically comfortable with. And I like not having adverts. You people make it possible.
Starting point is 00:03:27 You have facilitated the continued existence of the bugle post-radiative and indeed post-times online previously. So I prefer it that way. it's also more stable rather than relying on a couple of sources of advertisers coming in with money, then there's a few thousand of you dotted around the world, potentially up to 8.5 billion these days. So that's, you know, if we can get everyone in the world to join the voluntary subscription scheme, then we'll have an extreme financial stability, Chris.
Starting point is 00:04:07 You're a man, I think, who many people would consider to be a trustworthy, an honest man. And yet you could not convince me any time you tried to do a read to make me buy a mattress. It just didn't work. No, I do love mattresses though, to be fair. If I couldn't sell a mattress, then what hope?
Starting point is 00:04:29 Yeah. I mean, maybe that was the read we missed. Is that honesty that I got there? Yeah. I certainly couldn't sell questionable American educational establishments convincingly. So I didn't try. But no, there was no hard feelings. It was, I enjoyed being with Radiotopia, but it didn't work out after the second year.
Starting point is 00:04:50 In terms of consortiums, we would consider working with, I don't know, I like being independent. So, you know, I like, you know, I'd have to stop doing Ask Andy, Chris, if we were part of a, you know, who knows. Right, look, when Fox comes calling, we're in. Never say never. heart, I'm a true bro. There you go. Usually this sort of premium
Starting point is 00:05:18 Q&A hypercontent is only for the ears of our voluntary subscribers. So if you're not one of them, you two can be a bugle sustaining hero of our times by going to the buglepodcast.com and joining the scheme. Back to earthly bugles now and back in January, NATO Green
Starting point is 00:05:34 and Nish Kumar joined me as we discussed Nigel Farage, his allegedly racist school by past, coming back to haunt him, and the latest soul-sapping Reform UK Party Ac Well, it's not been the most joyous news starts to the year. Brexit is, well, it's going to be 10 years old. Well, certainly the referendum 10 years ago this year, which is frankly terrifying on numerous levels. And, Nish, the EU is reportedly demanding what's being described as a Farage clause to ensure itself
Starting point is 00:06:17 in case Nigel Farage from whom all this emerged becomes Prime Minister of the UK at some point in the I'd like to think medium term future at the very earliest hopefully, obviously never future but I mean this is
Starting point is 00:06:41 I don't know quite how to interpret because they're demanding a sort of a Brexit reset agreement that slightly reduces the catastrophic impact of Brexit economically. And they need to make sure that the undoing of the undoing of Brexit by Farage doesn't cause too much chaos. Can you make any sense of this? Look, it's been a sort of chaotic week for Nigel Farage and reform. On the plus side, as we're recording on Monday the 12th of January, the former Conservative MP, Nadine Zahawi,
Starting point is 00:07:20 has actually defected to the Reform Party, which is another phenomenal, phenomenal feather in the cap for Nigel Farage's party of working people. Nadine Zahari is famously a minister who claimed a bill of about £5,800 from his exquisite, pounds from his expenses as an MP in order to heat his horse stables. So once again, we can see the Reform Party reaching out to working class Britain. Just quickly on that, Nish.
Starting point is 00:07:51 I mean, there were concerns that a possible future reform administration would lack experience of government. And that's surely been allayed as the former, albeit briefly, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Tory Party Chairman Nadim Zahawi has jumped ship from, I don't know, shit. One sinking ship to, I don't know what the... Anyway, so if they do win the election, they will at least have someone who has valuable on the ground experience
Starting point is 00:08:18 of being absolutely f***ing useless at the highest level of government. And that is absolutely crucial for also having to resign for breaching the ministerial code. I mean, there's a key parts of experience that they didn't have before. So that's... You can't underestimate the value of having corruption experience. It's like when a football team buys someone that's already won a title, or you've got to have that muscle memory to really hit the ground running when you start a government.
Starting point is 00:08:44 Farage's school days still continue to be under scrutiny. There's now 34 allegations of him using racist and anti-Semitic language while he was a student at a very, very elite private school that's actually sandwiched neatly between and in my houses. But I guess the good news for him is the EU is already seeking a kind of of contingency in the event that he does become prime minister. That's the, according to the financial times, the draft text of an agreement on agriculture trade, which the Labour government is trying to negotiate to reduce the checks on produce,
Starting point is 00:09:23 calls for any party pulling out of the agreement to cover the cost of reinstating border and infrastructure controls in the future. Not a great sign for Kirstama that the EU is saying, listen, we will sign this agreement, but when you are inevitably voted out in two years' time, we're going to need some sort of a backup. But I'll be honest with you, Andy, it's even worse news for me because this thing is being nicknamed the Farage Clause. And I am furious because Farage Clause was the title of a Christmas film that I've been working very, very hard on. The premise is very simple. On Christmas Eve, reform leader Nigel Farage runs over Father Christmas. When he realizes his mistake, he shouts,
Starting point is 00:10:00 good riddance to that Finnish socialist. Presents for everyone, I guess having a big white beard isn't the only thing that this guy has in common with Carl Marx. Farrage is then informed by an elf who's played by Will Ferrell, right? It's very important that we secure Ferrell. Everything's about IP these days, so we're folding this thing into the elf cinematic universe, the ECU. Will Ferrell informs him that he now has to take over the responsibilities of Father Christmas. Farage is furious. Here's more sample dialogue from the film. Farage says, why would I celebrate a festival to commemorate the birth of a Jewish refugee from Palestine? I will say that later in the film, there is a scene where Farage
Starting point is 00:10:36 denies all of these remarks, despite many corroborating testimonies. Anyway, on Christmas night itself, Farage travels from house to house, only giving presents to people who have an English flag up in their window. But the twist is that the presents he gives them are
Starting point is 00:10:52 a lump of coal, because he says, it's the best present you could ever have to strike back against this net zero BS. Hours later, he is arrested for drunk driving a sled. That sets us off for the sequel. entitled Farage Clause 2, the trial of Farage. And the tagline is, has he been naughty or nige?
Starting point is 00:11:11 We are looking at casting at the moment. We've obviously got Will Ferrell in place to play the elf. We're actually in negotiations, advanced negotiations with Andy Circus, to play Nigel Farage in mocap. And we can actually use the same mocap from the Lord of the Rings. Because if you look at Farage's face, you realize he pretty much looks like Gollum. So all we've got to do is wax Smigol into a poorly take. tailored suit, animate him holding a pint of real ale, and we're good to go.
Starting point is 00:11:41 Well, I'll look forward to the Oscars next year. It's going to be your acceptance speech is going to be sensational, I'm sure. So, Nish, I have a question. So I wouldn't presume to have an opinion about UK and EU diplomatic negotiations. It's not really my domain. But so I was, you know, trying to understand that there's a negotiation about the extension of the Brexit agreement. There's the Farage Clause. And then somewhere deep in the story in the details, what it appears is that mostly it's about hiring veterinarians.
Starting point is 00:12:21 The Farage Clause is that if something occurs, they might have to hire more veterinarians in Rotterdam, which is a very like weird like if this than that sort of decision. Yeah. Yeah. I didn't realize that EU was under the thumb of big veterinarian. Listen, that big vet has got his hand right up the EU's keister. It's like so many things, it's basically to do with, like a lot of things with Brexit, it's sort of couched in very emotive language, but it's actually quite boring regulatory conversations.
Starting point is 00:13:01 that nobody really seems to what to have. But yet the EU is basically trying to make sure that it's compensated if we pull out at any point. It's really, they are worried that we're going to go full Catholic and try and condomless fuck them. That's essentially the concern here. And they are not believing our promise that we can absolutely control it and we'll just come on their stomach.
Starting point is 00:13:28 But isn't it, but isn't the compensation for the UK pulling out not having to deal with the UK anymore? You know what, Natime? Your skills as a union negotiator starting to come to the fore here. And I would actually, despite you saying you have no experience here, I think we need to get you into the room. And I think you need to be, get Keerstam around the way and say,
Starting point is 00:13:54 listen, I'll handle this. You come, we are, these people are fucking annoying. I don't know if you. We've met people from the UK recently, but they're fucking annoying, and they've been really annoying you this entire time. How about we say that if they pull out immediately, you just never have to deal with them again? Well, that brings us to the end of the first bugle of 2026.
Starting point is 00:14:14 I'd love to say that's probably the worst collection of stories we'll have to deal with in a week this year, but I'm pretty sure that it won't be. It might not even be the worst selection of stories we have to deal with in the first two-thirds of January, to be honest, but to find out. Tune in next week and see what the world has provided for us by then. Well, because there was so much to deal with this week, we didn't have to talk about the cricket in Australia. Andy, how is your emotional state right now?
Starting point is 00:14:45 Andy and I've been corresponding by text message, which is sort of part of my weird feeling that I have, that I could just privately text Andy for cricket statistics. I will say he responds immediately. and with total detail to every single stupid question I ask him. I know we don't have time to talk too much about the cricket. What is your emotional state having watched England get... I mean, I think I've looked up a few stats,
Starting point is 00:15:14 and it says here that England got absolutely fucking thrashed. Yes. I put all the information into a spreadsheet, and it actually says on Excel, fuck me, that was shit. Yes. I mean, I think that shows technology really can interpret data quite effectively these days.
Starting point is 00:15:33 Yeah, I mean, you say we were Anglia were thrashed, but actually statistically, England were thrashed by less than they'd been thrashed in the previous three thrashings, and in fact, really by less than in, I think, eight of the previous nine thrashings that they've had in
Starting point is 00:15:51 the last ten series. So look, massive progress. And they just found new and interesting ways to lose. You know, they've, you know, really stretched the concept of what is, you know, how it is possible to lose cricket matches. They can do it from, you know, many different ways, matches that seem almost impossible to lose from. They've played, I mean, also, you know, just played some of the worst imaginable cricket.
Starting point is 00:16:19 So it just means that, you know, the future is something to be excited about, that they're probably, it'd be really hard to be that shit again. and so there's that to cling to and they've given me lots of stats to me lots of stats to to think about you know
Starting point is 00:16:35 in statistics is truth I mean who would have thought niche that we'd be talking on this podcast about England being the first team in test match history to lose a match in which one of their players had scored
Starting point is 00:16:47 150 or more in both in England that had never happened before never happened before last week I just want to offer my my reflection as an American watching this exchange. This is like an anthropological study. Nish asked the question, a question that is, as far as I understand it,
Starting point is 00:17:09 is rarely asked by one British man to another British man, how do you feel? That's the only context in which it is acceptable to ask that question. And the response was the most British response. which was basically, in so many words, success is about lowering your expectations. Yeah. These are hard learned lessons from four and a half decades of watching English.
Starting point is 00:17:37 You have to understand that England's batters were like me while I was having sex in my 20s, just aimlessly groping around whilst constantly telling people that I was reinventing the form. Yep. And it was all over very, very quickly indeed. And yet somehow felt like it was going on too long for the participants. And even the victory felt like a defeat. It's good to benchmark your shame.
Starting point is 00:18:07 There's a very valuable lesson in there, NATO. Now for something a little bit less heavy. Not less heavy, sorry, more heavy. Sorry, I'm always getting those two mixed up. But less British. With so many Trump-related news stories already pyroclastically vomiting their way into 2026, we were bound to have a few that we had to cut out at the time. Late in January, I was joined by Tiff Stevenson and Josh Gondelman,
Starting point is 00:18:33 as we discussed the US president's behavior in slamming his NATO allies. In some other Trump, around the whole conference in Davos and the Greenland squabbles, he took a, he slammed his NATO allies saying that, we've never needed them. He said they'll say they sent some troops to Afghanistan, and they did. They stayed a little back a little off the front lines. There's two things to say about that.
Starting point is 00:19:12 A, if these NATO allies did stay a little off the front lines, they weren't as far off the front lines as the eight and a half thousand miles that Billy Bonespurs kept between himself and the front lines in Vietnam. And also, they didn't. They were very much on the front lines being killed and injured in significant numbers. But this is, I guess, what we come to expect
Starting point is 00:19:33 from the despot draft dodger, the tremulous tyrant, the awfully cowardly autocrat, the chicken Caesar himself. There was an understandably furious response from veterans and relatives of people who had been very much on the front line as NATO allies.
Starting point is 00:19:52 And Trump, in some fairly classic way, sniffled his way, attempted to snivel his way back into their good books and said that UK soldiers, and particularly in Afghanistan, were among the greatest of all warriors. And look, I'm in showbiz. I know there's a time and a place for hollow and sincere compliments tinged with fatuous over-exaggeration, but this disappointed me from Trump, Josh. If you're going to lie, at least have a courage and decency to stick with it and not trying to de-borsh yourself as soon as people complain. It's such a classic Trump situation, right?
Starting point is 00:20:25 He was so disrespectful in a way that borderline destabilizes the global. world world order. And then this is, I don't know, veterans and relatives of veterans said Trump should apologize. And that's not going to happen. That's, that was a bummer because obviously what he did was wrong, but he's not going to apologize. Like, are you new here?
Starting point is 00:20:52 That's the one thing Trump isn't ever going to do. Is he going to hug a flag? Yeah. Is he going to stand still at a. rally and just sway for half an hour while music plays, for sure he'll do that. There's an enormous trove of documents that insinuates he commits sex crimes with children. So the menu is vast of things Trump might do. He doesn't apologize.
Starting point is 00:21:15 And we probably won't see him dunk a basketball unless Earth's gravity is suspended for I mean, what's amazing about this story is he had British moms calling him out and you love to see it. I don't want to fuck around with the British mom. They literally, all of these, like, mothers of veterans who were dead or had limbs, like all their limbs blown off were coming out, going, this is the rantings of a child. One woman said it wouldn't be printable what I think of him.
Starting point is 00:21:44 Who does he think he is? The creed of Shiba, what a liberty taker. Who told this tango toss pot he could speak on heroism? I wouldn't touch that ego chito with a barge pole, etc. I may have made a couple of those up, but they're mostly real. I mean, the thing is, Josh, that America's voters elected him to alienate all of America's allies all of the time, not too chicken-heartedly squibble out and he gets a bit of a bit of blowback. And this followed his climb down on Greenland. We talked a bit about Greenland last week, but he withdrew the threat of military force, changed his mind, his mind the right term, I don't know, and about slapping sanctions on Europe, which was a threat peevy made. because he was so cross about not being given a Nobel Prize
Starting point is 00:22:31 and then said that he doesn't have to think about peace anymore because he's underappreciated as a peacemaker. He said all he was asking for was a bit of ice. I'd love to see the size of the gin and tonic. He's going to put it in. Not entirely clear still why he got so stroppy. Some have suggested that it was because Europe sent a handful of troops to Greenland. I think it's more likely he just hadn't been burped properly after his dindins,
Starting point is 00:22:55 but I guess what history be history be there. judge. And, you know, so a tough and testing week for Kea Stama and Trump's other NATO allies as Trump bestrides the world like a roaring line walking about, seeking whom he may devour. The thing is, there's no eye in NATO, but there are four eyes in economic imperialist and a con. And also you're left with complete ass from the remaining letters. So I don't know, I think that's probably something you can read into that. I think that there is, I think we're missing something here. So the story we did earlier on about the zero gravity for seven seconds, that was due to take place on August 12th, right? 2026. Now, when scientists have gone and looked at that,
Starting point is 00:23:42 they said the only thing that is actually potentially going to happen on August 12th is an eclipse. And according to NASA, totality will be visible from Greenland, Iceland, Iceland, Spain, Russia and a small part of Portugal. Now it makes sense. right? That's why Trump wants it. God, he's such a baby. He'll be the one grabbing the cereal box pinhole out of another kid's hands so that he can see it. You know, I saw the eclipse. You can see it best from the Gulf of America land. I don't know what he's going to call it. I'm thinking he'll change it to Gulf of America land or maybe red, white, and blue land. This is such a brilliant hypothesis. I only have a quibble with one part of it because I don't know if you remember this.
Starting point is 00:24:25 The last time there was an eclipse, he just looked directly at it. So he will not be grabbing for the cereal box pinhole. He's just going to Greenland and staring upwards. It is like so bizarre to me. Like I just woke up one morning. And obviously this threat has been diminished over the past week of using military force to seize Greenland. And that was just like a bad idea that I hadn't considered was Paul. possible, you know? Like, I just didn't know that that was, that was like one of the ones we could
Starting point is 00:25:01 grab for. And it's not even like desirable. There's no reason to do that. Like using military force to seize Greenland is like stabbing your cousin in the hand so you can have the last pig in a blanket at a family party. It's like, it's not worth it. Well, they've got military, like strategically, there's, I guess, some kind of, um, logic behind wanting to have, but aren't there already military bases on there? It's already happening. Anything that America could need is already happening. He also referred to windmills as losers, which is, that's got to be up there with one of the
Starting point is 00:25:45 oddest insults in American presidential history, describing windmills as losers. But this is the world, this is the world that we live in. He doesn't like what they do to his hair. He thinks it's the mills and not the wind itself. Donald Trump there, I should say we did invite Mr. Trump onto the bugle for a right to reply, but unfortunately he claimed he was busy playing with his toy battleships in the bath at the White House. And now something from our most recent episode of the bugle. I was joined by Nish Kumar and Tom Ballard as we re-delved into the murksome netherworld of Elon Musk.
Starting point is 00:26:30 who, and I know this sounds bang out of character for him, was found to have not been entirely 110% non-misleading with Twitter investors. More massive B. News now, and Elon Musk has... This is one of the episodes, so I'm quite pleased we still bleeps for our words. Elon Musk has been found to have misled Twitter investors by a jury in San Francisco. Francisco, after two days of deliberations, they returned a unanimous verdict against Musk who was appearing under his full legal birth name, elongated Bielzebubbles,
Starting point is 00:27:16 Rat Kid, Midas, Muskerham, Wonka. Musk, the 54-year-old refugee of all fixed abodes, was described as smarmed and dangerous. He'd been sued by a group of Twitter investors who'd argue that they had relied on his statements in 2022 before. before. Now, this is, let me answer. This is 2022, not 1922 before the world knew who Elon Musk was or what his muskian motorsop around. 2022. If you're looking to Elon Musk for reliable market information in 2022, you need to take another long, hard bath with yourself and think about your life choices. Musk claimed you didn't mislead investors. For those who've not heard the word mislead before, you can find it in the updated 2020's edition.
Starting point is 00:28:04 of Roger's thesaurus as a synonym for talk whilst in possession of power, influence and or wealth. Look, I mean, whatever you think of Musk, he is unquestionably a visionary. And you look at his takeover of Twitter. And not many people, I think, would have had the imagination and ambition to look at the swirling cesspits of vitriol, mendastian division that proliferated on Twitter and think, I reckon I could make this worse. I do admire that level of vision and ambition, I think.
Starting point is 00:28:37 That's private market innovation. Yeah, you've got to respect that. So the details of Friday's verdict are that the San Francisco jury has found that he artificially lowered the price of Twitter stock by a range of roughly $8 per share to $3 per share between May and October 2020, because of his public statement. So he, in fact, if you could cast, mind back to that period of time. He was basically saying that Twitter had issues with fake accounts or bots and then was threatening essentially to pull out of the deal entirely. And the verdict
Starting point is 00:29:14 that the courts rendered, it seems to suggest that he did that deliberately to artificially lower the share price. And Brian Belgrave is the leader of a group of investors, is a small business owner from Oregon, said that he had, he sold his shares early. assuming that Musk was going to pull out of the sale and he said, I got screwed, I got cheated. Brian, my brother, why in the name of God did you not assume that was going to happen? But in any case, the real issue here is
Starting point is 00:29:44 what impact is this going to have on Elon Musk? And I think we can, the exact numbers are not available currently. But according to the BBC, it could cost him thousands, which I think we can all agree is really going to put a huge financial debt. given that he earned about a million quid in the time since I started this sentence. I don't know what you guys are talking about. Sure, the BBC said that Elon lost this case, but I asked Brock what happened, and it told me that he won the case.
Starting point is 00:30:17 And the jury actually said he's really cool and epic and funny. And I also asked him for a dick pick. And when they saw the picture of his dick, they were like, wow, what a perfect dick, Elon. You're awesome, Heil Hitler. So that's what I got out of my Groch search on this. During Musk's testimony before the jury, he said, if this was a trial on whether I've made stupid tweets,
Starting point is 00:30:34 I'd say I'm guilty, which is the closest thing to self-awareness we've heard from Elon Musk in a long, long time. It's a tough case. Like, as you say, on one side you've got Elon Musk, on the other side, you have people who are following Elon Musk in order to guide their investment decisions. It's a real battle of who could give a fuck. Whoever wins and we all lose.
Starting point is 00:30:55 It's the tagline for Alien versus Predator. It's like if Andrew Mountbatten would have been sued by contestants on Married at First Sight. I'm really happy to just fucking split the baby on this one, guys. I don't give a shit. And finally, a snippet from the gargle, the bugle's fortnightly science and tech pull-out sibling audio magazine. Back in February, host Alice Fraser was joined by Josh Gonderman and James Colley to unpack the top story,
Starting point is 00:31:31 the University of Buffalo, sensational discovery of the huge. Human chin. Stories this week. The mankind with discussions on the rise about what constitutes humanity we have at last achieved an answer. And it is chins, yes, not self-awareness or language or couples therapy that takes us above the animals. It is chins. James Colley, as a man with a handsome chin, can you stare powerfully into the upper quadrant of the frame while you tell us a little bit more about this story? Well, so this comes from the University of Buffalo.
Starting point is 00:32:11 Now, the team to run this research, the team of the University of Buffalo, investigated the collection of 532 skulls they just so happen to have lying about. Don't worry about it. Thank you for coming, Mr. Colombo. No further questions. Thank you. Now, this is a complicated story. I'm not sure how complicated they think it is because I've got to quote new scientist here.
Starting point is 00:32:34 In simple terms, the chin is a bony-protectual. of the lower jaw that extends me on the front teeth, which, to which the average new scientist subscriber probably went, oh, I mean this in the dark. Okay, so. Is that how you spell that?
Starting point is 00:32:51 I'd only been hearing it out loud. They found out why I have a chine. A chine? What's a chine? Oh, a chine. We have our reason. Very, very exciting. Drum roll, please.
Starting point is 00:33:06 and it is the, no reason. We just have them. Evolutionarily speaking, we were working on something else at the time and ended up with a chin. We acquired chins in the same way that I have children. It wasn't what I was trying to do, but it was more of an offshoot of what happened. Look, you were not not trying.
Starting point is 00:33:27 It's like, if we get some research out of this, sure, who cares. But I think like, so as, and Alex, similar as the owner and operator of a four-year-old child. Like you can assure the question, why do we have chins was going to come up sooner or later? And to be able to confidently answer, oh, don't worry about it. Watch TV is going to be really helpful for me. I tried to take a couple of punts at it for us. So none of our close relatives have chins.
Starting point is 00:33:58 The simple scientific reason for this is that apes and other hominids do not have a soul and therefore cannot wear a sole patch. And so without the sole path, they're simply evolution steps in and doesn't allow it. And as homo sapiens evolved and slowly gained consciousness, football allegiances, acoustic guitars, hacky sacks, and penny farthings, there were suddenly a plethora of reasons
Starting point is 00:34:22 we would need to be punched square in the jaw and therefore nature provided one. So that's my theory of why it's happened. There was previously a theory that the chin existed to protect the kind of tender parts of your neck and throat. But all that really means is it's way more likely for your face to get f***ed up if someone swings on it. Just a real pointy part at the bottom of your face to land an uppercut on.
Starting point is 00:34:48 Good news. We found a way to protect your thigh. We've put a ball bag right in front of it. That's right. It's just kind of a soft landing pad for fists and knees against your thighs. Also, because there were many hypotheses before this current one and others, thought that the chin was attractive to potential mates, and that's why we selected for it as an evolutionary trade,
Starting point is 00:35:08 which is interesting because I would always think that would go the other way. Like, what is a chin if not a canvas for soup and barbecue sauce rendering you unable to reproduce? I would say as an exposed chin habit. Like, to me, it gives me more the affectation of a cartoon bulldog that has ever any kind of prowess or indication. I, you know, I am glad that this research has come out because it gives me something to point to when in conversation with my aforementioned
Starting point is 00:35:37 four-year-old. Although I have to say I do appreciate the requirement to constantly deduce first principles from any order of magnitude. For example, I was asked today why you don't put your fingers in your mouth in public. And I had to explain that it makes people feel quite insecure to have attention brought to the places that lead to the inside of your body because people don't like being reminded that the inside of their body is squishy and disgusting. And so we don't touch any of our holes in public. And I feel like I can stand behind that as a principle. That's not bad at all.
Starting point is 00:36:13 Yeah. Make sure a bit better for me because I would have gone with it's yuck. One interesting thing about this, I didn't know this before, but there is the idea of a chin is what's known in evolutionary science as a spandrel, perhaps, which is a feature that evolved incidentally. along with a more crucial attribute, although spandrel does sound like the offspring of a spaniel and a mandrel. Who knows where they met? And it seems like the chin might be a result, right?
Starting point is 00:36:43 It's not like we need a chin, but it's because that's what comes along with our upright posture, large heads and small teeth, which is so funny to me to think about, like when you talk about a leading man in a movie having a strong jawline, but we're also impressed by are his itty-bitty-baby-insizer. which I just, I don't know, it's so fun. And it's also like the idea that it makes me think that like maybe celery only exists because we also have buffalo wings and blue cheese dressing. I just love the thought of being like, oh, that that Gregory Peck, that Carrie Grant, neither of that.
Starting point is 00:37:24 There were soup only people. You've got to look at it. Look, if I know anything about evolution and I do not. My guess is that this body protrusion was on its way to trying to become a crab. Dude. Face crab, very important. Well, that is all for your bugle bonus episode. You can get the gargle every two weeks, wherever you get your podcasts,
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