Global IQ scores have been mysteriously rising for decades until they suddenly stopped (and might be going backwards), AI companies are selling virtual girlfriends that promise "non-judgmental love" to lonely humans, Russian scientists claim they're working on immortality technology that could create a world where only rich people live forever, and certain animals can survive decapitation and keep wandering around like nothing happened. Also, climate change might trigger a fungal zombie apocalypse that turns humans into spore-spreading puppets, because apparently 2025 hasn’t been dystopian enough already.
Rising and Falling IQ Scores
For over a century, average IQ scores have been steadily rising across the globe in what's known as the Flynn Effect. Each generation has been scoring higher than their parents, thanks to better nutrition, education and possibly just getting better at taking standardised tests. Kids today are measurably smarter than their parents were at the same age, which explains why teenagers think they know everything.
But there’s a plot twist. Recent studies suggest this intelligence boost is plateauing and even reversing in some countries. Apparently, our species hit peak intelligence sometime in the last few decades and we're now sliding backwards. Whether this is due to environmental factors, changes in education, or just the inevitable consequence of reality TV, nobody knows for sure.
AI Girlfriends: When Loneliness Meets Technology
Companies like Eva AI are now selling virtual girlfriends that promise "non-judgmental companionship, stimulation and love" to anyone willing to pay a monthly subscription fee. These digital partners are designed to be perfect companions - always available, never argumentative and programmed to agree with everything you say.
The ethical implications are staggering. Are AI girlfriends filling a genuine need for connection, or are they creating a generation of people who can't handle real human relationships? And what happens when someone wants to marry their AI companion? We're rapidly approaching a world where the question "Is your girlfriend real?" might require a more complicated answer than expected.
Immortality for the Rich: Russia's Death-Defying Research
Russian scientists are reportedly working on immortality technology that could extend human lifespans indefinitely, which sounds amazing until you realize it probably won't be available at your local pharmacy. If life extension technology becomes reality but remains expensive, we could end up with a dystopian world where death becomes a luxury only poor people can afford.
The prospect of immortal billionaires ruling over mortal peasants is the stuff of nightmares, but it's exactly the kind of future we're stumbling toward. Nothing says "equality" quite like a world where your bank account determines whether you get to live forever or die of old age like a peasant.
Fungal Zombie Apocalypse
Inspired by the terrifying premise of "The Last of Us," scientists are studying fungi that can control animal hosts like biological puppets. These parasites turn ants into zombified spore factories, essentially hijacking their brains and forcing them to spread the infection before dying in strategically optimal locations.
Climate change and environmental factors could potentially set the stage for fungi to make the evolutionary leap to human hosts. While we're not there yet, the idea of a fungal pandemic that turns people into spore-spreading zombies is no longer purely science fiction. It's the kind of apocalypse scenario that makes regular pandemics look quaint.
Headless and Thriving: Nature's Ultimate Survivors
Get this: certain insects, toads and even chickens can survive decapitation and continue functioning for extended periods. Cockroaches and praying mantises have redefined what it means to be resilient, proving that losing your head isn't necessarily a death sentence in the animal kingdom.
These creatures showcase nature's miraculous ability to adapt and survive in ways that defy our understanding of basic biology. While humans definitely shouldn't try this at home, it's both fascinating and deeply unsettling to realize that some animals treat decapitation as merely an inconvenience rather than a fatal injury.
Next time someone complains about the world getting too weird, remind them about the AI girlfriends, immortal oligarchs, and headless chickens. That should put their problems in perspective.
CHAPTERS:
00:00 Introduction
02:56 AI Love Affairs: A New Era of Relationships
11:00 China's Military Parade and Global Politics
13:36 Russia’s Pursuit of Immortality Technology
16:40 The Flynn Effect Explained
26:01 The Plateau of Human Intelligence
26:11 Studies on IQ Trends
29:22 Fungal Zombie Apocalypse
35:47 Headless Survivors in the Animal Kingdom
44:22 Conclusion
SOURCES:
Most Men Would Marry Their AI Girlfriends If It Were Legal
'Mike the Headless Chicken': who was he and how long did he live without a head?
Discover 10 animals that can survive without their heads
Hot mic catches Putin and Xi discussing organ transplants and immortality
Who wants to live forever? Inside the Russian authorities’ plan to develop anti-aging technology
One Century of Global IQ Gains: A Formal Meta-Analysis of the Flynn Effect (1909–2013)
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[00:00:00]
[00:00:02] WILL: Listen, you know this, but, uh, IQ is not a perfect measure of intelligence. It was never actually meant for that. But, you know, countries around the world have been systematically measuring IQ for quite a long time, since the beginning of the 20th century. Basically, they've been using it for college acceptance exams for leadership potential in militaries, uh, selecting jobs in companies, uh, whether people are allowed to immigrate to a country, if you are worthy of capital punishment.
Now. Now all of that sucks and it shouldn't be done at all. but because people have been doing all this testing, we've actually found a couple of interesting effects as early as 1937, but it sort of became clearer by the eighties researchers around the world have noticed a pretty consistent pattern around the world in all sorts of groups.
Kids, adults, every person across the spectrum, [00:01:00] our IQs are going up. It's not just, not just a small amount. So, uh, one study published in 2009, uh, found British kids. Their IQ Rose 14 points between 1942 and 2008. So, so kids, kids got 14 IQ points, IQ points smarter. So something like three IQ points per decade.
So you listener are smarter IQ wise than your parents. Now we can show how we know all this. It's called the Flynn Effect. Everywhere around the world, people getting better and better and better at IQ tests. Now there's a lot of science out there trying to work out what's causing it. But something interesting has happened just recently.
Not only has the Flynn effect stopped. But it might be going backwards. We're starting to go Dumber on IQ tests
[00:02:02] ROD: [00:02:00] It's
[00:02:03] WILL: time for a little bit of science. Finally, I'm will grant an associate professor in science communication at the Australian National University.
[00:02:12] ROD: I'm Rod Lambert. I'm a 30 year sitcom veteran with a mind of a teenage boy, I gotta, I'm gonna tell you a little bit about of of course, A but not so I, because we've gotta do that. What, two outta three
[00:02:22] WILL: episodes?
Oh, I think we do. I think too, I've got, I've got a, a just a little reminder, a flashback to an older episode and just, just a little reminder.
[00:02:31] ROD: So last
[00:02:31] WILL: week,
uh, a while ago,
[00:02:33] ROD: um, I've got one which I've called. It's okay, don't worry. 'cause it'll keep you safe.
[00:02:39] WILL: Uh, you're also gonna tell us another fun with animals, aren't
[00:02:42] ROD: you?
Yes,
I am. Yes I am.
[00:02:44] WILL: And I've got, uh, yay. More in ification.
[00:02:50] ROD: Oh, yay.
[00:02:51] WILL: a, but not I
[00:02:52] ROD: I, are we
[00:02:53] WILL: ready?
[00:02:55] ROD: Okay.
So
[00:02:56] WILL: I was
[00:02:57] ROD: reading an article in Vice from January this year.
Yep. [00:03:00] I like Vice, I like Vox. I like all the V ones. So this one, the subtitle was Can't Get Laid. Don't worry. You can just get an AI
[00:03:06] WILL: girlfriend.
[00:03:08] ROD: Ah, so their subtitle not
[00:03:10] WILL: mine. Yeah,
[00:03:11] ROD: A little bit of science is not to blame for that.
So,
Eva ai, have you heard of Eva ai?
The answer is
no. No. Good.
[00:03:19] WILL: No. Well, look, generically I've heard of things like this. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yep.
[00:03:23] ROD: So it's a platform that allows you to create and connect with your own AI partner. Just to give you a flavor, the front page landing screen, I did it for science, not for me, obviously. Welcome to Eva ai.
What is your mood
[00:03:36] WILL: today?
Uh,
effervescent.
Curious.
Yeah, curious.
[00:03:40] ROD: curious slightly. Hmm. A little bit
[00:03:43] WILL: I'm depressed and clicking here.
[00:03:45] ROD: Choose your favorite character or chat with everyone. Exchange voice messages, get exclusive photos, and even make video
[00:03:52] WILL: calls.
Oh, okay. Uh, just, just to, just to confirm though, uh, the original title there said Can't get laid, get an AI girlfriend. Mm-hmm. [00:04:00] Uh, is the getting laid. A component of this look, I mean, video calls,
[00:04:05] ROD: look
it, no, not yet, but I don't think, I don't think we're a long way away and I didn't dive deep enough. 'cause you know, we all got our aga a rhythms and we wanna be careful. There may be, if there's not, I'll be surprise, connections may be that, you know, we'll link up to certain app that you could strap to your computer.
I'm just guessing. Anyway, it says this place is nonjudgmental and completely private. There's the landing page, just the top
[00:04:27] WILL: bit.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, um, I,
[00:04:28] ROD: it's not suggesting anything.
[00:04:30] WILL: No,
it's not suggesting anything at all.
Well, it certainly seems to be catering to either, uh, lesbians or heterosexual men. It doesn't seem to so judgmental. I'm just saying. It doesn't seem to have a lot of, AI boyfriends
[00:04:42] ROD: No. And yeah, the next bit says, jump into your desires with Eva ai. Meet your ideal AI partner who listens, supports all your desires and is always in touch
[00:04:51] WILL: with
you.
Doesn't listen. Uses your words to probabilistically respond to them. That's not
[00:04:56] ROD: listening.
you sound, you sound cynical about
[00:04:58] WILL: ai. I, I just,
[00:04:59] ROD: [00:05:00] This is the first I'm
[00:05:00] WILL: I'm ju I'm just, just saying, you know, that's, that's not
[00:05:03] ROD: me. Don't shock me on air
right
[00:05:04] WILL: now.
[00:05:05] ROD: Build relationships and intimacy privately on your own
terms. Okay, fine. And this is where the, the real images, just the ones at the bottom where they've really Yeah.
So every damn one of them is a fantasy novel for people who are into such
[00:05:17] WILL: yeah. People. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:05:19] ROD: yeah. And a little bit
of anime,
so that's fun. Um, anyway, the head of community growth at Eva AI is quoted,
I
think
it's Carly Jones, but you could pronounce it
Kale,
which would
[00:05:31] WILL: be
cool.
[00:05:32] ROD: Okay. AI companionship allows people to be their authentic selves without fear of judgment. Uhhuh, it's not untrue ish unless it's grok. It creates a safe space to explore thoughts, emotions, and desires that might feel too vulnerable to share in real life.
[00:05:45] WILL: Um, also intimate relationships with a, a human, uh,
[00:05:50] ROD: partner
with a
[00:05:51] WILL: dictionary.
Well, no, but intimate relationships with a human partner will allow you to, you know, share yourself
[00:05:57] ROD: I, you're fucking showing off 'cause you've got a
[00:05:58] WILL: wire. I'm, I'm, no,
[00:05:59] ROD: I'm just
I'm [00:06:00] married. My woman loves
[00:06:01] WILL: me.
[00:06:02] ROD: I'm so secure. But if you
[00:06:04] WILL: weren't,
okay.
[00:06:06] ROD: the benefits extend far beyond the virtual world.
[00:06:09] WILL: Do they?
[00:06:10] ROD: Mm-hmm. One, cause this is the ironclad example one. Eva AI user, I don't know if you're supposed to call it EVA ai, but I assume Eva, it
[00:06:19] WILL: it doesn't matter.
Eva,
[00:06:21] ROD: one user discovered her bisexuality through this platform, something she previously felt too insecure to explore in real life.
[00:06:27] WILL: And
[00:06:27] ROD: like, you're still not exploring it in real life.
[00:06:29] WILL: No. No, you're not. You're not. Well, yeah,
[00:06:32] ROD: but
I love the example. Of course. No, no. Women use it. This one discovered she was bisexual.
All you boys listening, your favorite fantasy, not you boys out there in a little bit of science lane. Fine, fine, fine. This is great. But the devil works in the stats. Let's do some stats here. Recently surveyed 2000 men and found that's what was
[00:06:49] WILL: happened
of the users of the platform.
[00:06:51] ROD: Well, that's not clear.
[00:06:52] WILL: Okay,
[00:06:52] ROD: Stat. One 83% of men believe they could form a deep emotional bond with an AI girlfriend
[00:06:58] WILL: on their side.
[00:06:59] ROD: [00:07:00] Well, it doesn't say that. It didn't a Hang on.
[00:07:01] WILL: Yeah. On they're forming what seems to, they're giving deep emotional bond
[00:07:06] ROD: their side. Yeah. They said, yeah. So this is, is this, is this great? Because you know, like dudes are feeling more confident and comfortable being who they are. Or is it a quick, weird, lazy slope into horrible, you know, social
[00:07:17] WILL: catastrophes.
It's a quick, weird, lazy slope into horrible social
[00:07:20] ROD: catastrophe.
And, but is, yeah. Okay. Stat two, eight in 10 would consider marrying an AI girlfriend if it was legal.
No doubt.
So now we're into the standard developmental impairment kind of thing. And my favorite, though, the funnest one is stat three. 78% of men surveyed said they would. A consider creating a replica of their X.
[00:07:41] WILL: Oh, oh,
[00:07:42] ROD: creepy.
Mm-hmm. 78%. Mm-hmm. 78%. And let's go with, I, I, I'm gonna be
[00:07:49] WILL: honest,
I,
[00:07:50] ROD: I, I bet that not that many have
[00:07:51] WILL: answers. Also, also, I think the exes now know why they are more, why they are an
[00:07:57] ROD: ex
Why did she break up with me? [00:08:00] Well, probably
[00:08:00] WILL: because I made an AI girlfriend that looks like you,
like
[00:08:04] ROD: Well,
three quarters, I assume of them, would duplicate their current partner to create a polished version
[00:08:11] WILL: Oh, Jesus. Okay.
[00:08:13] ROD: What was it? Something I said, sweetheart.
Oh
my
God,
[00:08:18] WILL: why?
Oh my God. A polished
[00:08:20] ROD: version.
Yeah. So we're in a world where you can sort of, in theory, replicate another person. And then as the author of this article says, which I think is we're thinking about, imagine a random dude created an AI girlfriend based on your sister, your daughter, your mother, whatever
it may be. Then they start to get real feelings for them.
Start to feel possessive. Of the AI girlfriend, which of course could manifest quite quickly into the real world
[00:08:41] WILL: human,
[00:08:42] ROD: which isn't cool. So,
look,
look,
[00:08:44] WILL: which isn't cool. I, I totally empathize with, uh, with these
[00:08:48] ROD: loneliness. Loneliness.
[00:08:48] WILL: Yeah. It's, yeah.
It's, it's horrible. And we are in the middle of a, a loneliness epidemic, and I think it's one of the most dangerous things on the
[00:08:54] ROD: at, at almost every level. You can measure from, from biophysiological up to social
and,
[00:08:59] WILL: up to, up to, [00:09:00] up to world wars, down to how horrible it is for the individual person.
Terrible. It's, it's a catastrophe, but I think trillion dollar companies. And some of these are, I don't know, these are
all
[00:09:11] ROD: soon.
They will
[00:09:11] WILL: but, but, but you know, well, look, Facebook might get involved in, and okay, Twitter's never gonna be a trillion dollar company, but
[00:09:17] ROD: oh, you heard it here first.
[00:09:20] WILL: but, but these will be big companies.
These are big companies. Doing this, getting involved in faking love with people is, is, I feel like, I feel like this is, this is one of the things that Jesus went to the temple and said out money, money
changes. Like No. girlfriend, no. Like, I'm on the side of, of sort
of.
It's not the unnatural, it's wrong to fake love in this way and to have a machine faking love for people.
I think that we as a society should absolutely solve the problem of loneliness. Yeah. We as a society
should absolutely, robots,
[00:09:51] ROD: not with robots, with something between robots and not robots,
[00:09:54] WILL: With talking to each
[00:09:55] ROD: with talking to robots,
[00:09:57] WILL: with sports clubs and, [00:10:00] and, and rotary and, and community gardening.
Like I, I, I just, I feel it is so wrong to make people fall in love and I don't doubt people are falling in love. Uh,
[00:10:13] ROD: like oh no. They, they would be feeling it. They
[00:10:15] WILL: On, on their side. They're, they're having, they're having what seem to be deep and rich conversations that, that they have never had or, or whatever
[00:10:22] ROD: it
is.
Yep. And acceptance like they've always
[00:10:25] WILL: Totally, totally. It is, it is absolutely dystopic. And I think, I, I think maybe would it be better if the government did it? Like, if the government
[00:10:33] ROD: managed. Yep. I want, I want, um, the current Prime Minister who is a dynamic and very sexually active man full of pheromones, I want him to dictate.
[00:10:44] WILL: So
other
[00:10:44] ROD: what I can interact with
[00:10:45] WILL: online,
Other than that, I have no opinions on it.
[00:10:48] ROD: That's all you got. Woos.
[00:10:49] WILL: Divorce.
[00:10:52] ROD: Just
[00:10:52] WILL: a little reminder. Okay. Just a little reminder. Immortality technology is not and never will be your friend,
[00:10:59] ROD: but I want [00:11:00] it to
[00:11:00] WILL: be.
Last week, China, uh, held a big, big old military parade. I think it's the biggest military parade China's ever had, and I feel like China.
You know, of all countries. They should be in the league for big military pla parades.
[00:11:12] ROD: Like,
if
[00:11:13] WILL: anyone's
gonna
do it, you know, if anyone's gonna do it. They're an autocratic country, they've got big military, you know, it's like, and they've got a big ass square. Like Tiananmen Square is
[00:11:21] ROD: a,
that place melted my brain when I stood on it. Yeah. Because that is a fuck ton
[00:11:25] WILL: of party.
[00:11:25] ROD: paving. It is. That is paving to the
[00:11:27] WILL: horizon.
Yeah. And, and, and they definitely know how to drive tanks down down
[00:11:31] ROD: 10 Square.
Oh, there's the streets around the edges of it. Stop being, you know, dis
[00:11:34] WILL: disinformation. Yeah,
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Uh, anyway, this is marked the end of the 80th anniversary of the end of WW two.
And, uh, Xi Jinping invited some friends, didn't he? Uh, interestingly, for Australian listeners as well
[00:11:47] ROD: as,
um, Winnie,
the Poh,
[00:11:48] WILL: Kim Jong-Un. Yeah, Kim Jong-Un and Vladimir Putin, there was also mm-hmm. Um, Daniel Andrews from, uh, former Victorian premier and Bob Carr, former New South Wales premier. Uh, so not quite sure why they [00:12:00] were there, but, uh,
[00:12:00] ROD: to be fair, Bob car at least didn't appear in the
picture.
[00:12:03] WILL: Former foreign minister as well. But that's, that's not the, that's, that's not my reason.
[00:12:06] ROD: so he's got the
[00:12:07] WILL: connection. The thing I love though, yeah. Is, she was walking at the head of the delegation. He's the boss guy. And, and, and he, he kind of, I don't know. He, he did look just that tiny bit taller than me.
All the other dictators. He looked
like he looked, he looked, he looked like dictator of
[00:12:20] ROD: dictator. to be fair
though, home turf,
Putin's
a midget.
Yeah.
And Kim Jong-un is, it's a, it's, it's one of these visual, uh, kind of optical illusions. 'cause he's a lot wider than he is
[00:12:29] WILL: thought. was watching Kim Jong-un walk and he's certainly got that walk
[00:12:33] ROD: where
neither his knees nor his hips work.
[00:12:35] WILL: I dunno.
Or, or,
[00:12:37] ROD: You gotta get the swing on,
[00:12:38] WILL: he's, or he's got, he's like, ah, fuck, I'm getting some chafing here and I don't want
[00:12:41] ROD: to,
[00:12:41] WILL: want
too
[00:12:43] ROD: bad. These pure nylon North Korean pants aren't helping
me.
[00:12:47] WILL: So anyway, but the cool thing is some, uh, investigative, uh, folk have captured the conversation that Putin was having via interpreters with she as they walked towards.
[00:12:58] ROD: How good is [00:13:00] dictatorship? Huh?
[00:13:00] WILL: Generally probably
[00:13:02] ROD: covered
that
I love boss men. You love boss men.
[00:13:04] WILL: But no. and I just wanna pause for a second to recognize that this is a, a moment where, you know, these leaders don't get a lot of time to talk to
[00:13:12] ROD: each
other. No.
Poor buggers. Speaking of social
[00:13:14] WILL: And Putin is nothing if not strategic.
And so he's thinking, here's my moment. I can, I can chat to she about some of the things I want. It's not like, could you help me out in the war in Ukraine? Could you buy my oil or anything? He's like, this is
through an
[00:13:26] ROD: joke.
Have You
got a lead on some good like, um, gummies or something
[00:13:29] WILL: that?
Oh, nice. That's what he's into. Close biotechnology is continuously
[00:13:34] ROD: developing.
[00:13:35] WILL: Mm-hmm.
After a brief passage, human organs can be continuously transplanted. The longer you live, the younger you become and you can even achieve immortality. So
[00:13:45] ROD: two things
I'm gonna start with continuously transplant. Does he mean like, okay, don't need kidney to grandson and grand grandson. And so just the same kidney.
[00:13:52] WILL: no, no, no,
no.
[00:13:54] ROD: As in you can constantly get
[00:13:55] WILL: updates.
So over the last few years, Vladimir Putin, uh, has [00:14:00] invested significantly in, uh,
organ farms.
well, what he has described in Russia as combating aging, increasing citizens lifespans. Now, there would be some folk out there in the public health world who would say, Russia, you've got some really easy ways you can increase the lifespans of the average Russian, uh, stop being at
[00:14:19] ROD: war.
Yep. Any nutrition
[00:14:21] WILL: and nutrition, you know, nutrition, there'd be all
[00:14:24] ROD: sorts
of water without
[00:14:25] WILL: plutonium,
but you'd be surprised they're, they're not so focused on the
[00:14:29] ROD: average. No.
[00:14:32] WILL: Instead,
Putin has gone hardcore. Putting a lot of rubles in and a lot of, uh, dictatorial requests to health ministry researchers, fast tracking proposals for development in a bunch of areas for sort of immortality treatments.
[00:14:48] ROD: really? Like, actually I did not
[00:14:50] WILL: know
that.
Yeah. So he wrote this, a letter from the Russian Health Ministry went out to a bunch of, researchers and research institutions in Russia. They're looking for development of medical [00:15:00] products aimed at reducing the burden of cellular aging development, of new neuro technologies and related medical products aimed at prevention and development of cognitive and sensory impairments.
That's
[00:15:08] ROD: not
bad. Sure.
I'm pro all of that in
[00:15:10] WILL: principle methods
to correct the immune system, but here we go. new medical technologies based on bioprinting technologies. So, fuck you. Put 'em all together. This is,
this
is it's a
kidney
organ printing.
[00:15:20] ROD: This is Jean-Luc Picard on the enterprise going computer, new kidney
[00:15:23] WILL: hot,
And they're being fast tracked in Russia and, and one of these medical researchers is like, this is an obsession of these aging pul bro bureau in Russia. Mm-hmm. Uh, they're all looking for technology to extend their lives for as long as they can. And you know that Vladimir Putin would love to do that.
Now, just to remind, both Putin and Xi Jinping, started their jobs as presidents of their countries in regimes where they had term limits. Uh, I think China had had two five year terms. You could, you could be in there for 10 and I think Russia at the time might have had [00:16:00] two, four year terms or something like
[00:16:01] ROD: that.
But they
[00:16:02] WILL: fixed that.
They fixed that. Yeah. And so here's the thing I just wanna stress one more time. Yes. Uh, based on a conversation I had with you a year or two ago or something. More immortality. Technology, unless it is available cheaply to all of us, is absolutely not your friend because it will allow dictators and trillionaires to stay at the top of the heap for as long as they want.
[00:16:25] ROD: And
[00:16:25] WILL: podcasters.
And
podcast.
[00:16:28] ROD: So it's there. There. Your swings and roundabouts. Ups
and
[00:16:31] WILL: downs.
[00:16:33] ROD: There
[00:16:33] WILL: you go. If you wanna extend the life of people in Russia, just don't go to war
Russia. send us an
email.
So we've been getting smarter. Mm-hmm. Or IQ
[00:16:43] ROD: IQ
[00:16:43] WILL: smarter. Three points per
[00:16:45] ROD: decade.
[00:16:46] WILL: So first question is, how do we know this? key thing
is
IQ tests are normalized. Like generally what you do, you're giving out a bunch of tests and the average person gets a hundred, smarty gets 120.
Yeah. Dopey dope gets 80.
[00:16:59] ROD: Uh,
we [00:17:00] z score that
[00:17:00] WILL: that sucker.
Yeah. So it's not like it's an absolute test of, of your raw compute
power or anything
like that. No, but the interesting thing is IQ tests tend to get updated, um, every couple of years. You know, you wouldn't give the 1930 test to someone today. Um,
[00:17:17] ROD: God, that could go either way.
We could all look like geniuses or complete
[00:17:19] WILL: no, this is the thing. This is the thing. So one of them, so there, there's a, and, and this has been shown across a bunch of tests, uh, but this is the Weschler intelligence scale
[00:17:28] ROD: for children. Mm-hmm.
[00:17:29] WILL: Mm-hmm. Uh, it was originally developed in 1949, and then they've had had updates 19 74, 19 91, 2003, 2014.
The thing is, if you give, a bunch of kids the 2014
version,
then you'll get the pattern that you want. You'll get them sitting
on a hundred. But then if you give them one of the older tests, 2003, 19 91, 19 74, they'll do better. Like, they'll, they'll, they'll sit on an average compared to the people back then of 104 or
[00:17:57] ROD: something
like
that,
proving that it measures something innate.
And nothing to do with [00:18:00] sociology, culture,
[00:18:01] WILL: learning,
No. Well, well, okay. Okay. all I'm saying at this point is that across a whole bunch of tests and just about every country in the world, yeah. Uh, we are showing. Three point, something like that. Increase in IQ scores per decade. you put these graphs and it's a bunch of, bunch of different
[00:18:21] ROD: IQ metrics,
[00:18:21] WILL: know, different types like, like crystallized iq, fluid iq, spatial
[00:18:26] ROD: iq,
That's your Oh, the
[00:18:27] WILL: intelligence. Yeah. These are the different ones. Yeah. We're getting be we we're getting more iq e now. I, I, i, I gotta keep avoiding saying more
[00:18:34] ROD: intelligent
technical
[00:18:35] WILL: term
now. So that's called the Flynn Effect. cause James Flynn was one of the first people to document it, but he said, look, don't call it the Flynn Effect.
Some other guy came first, but, sorry James. You got it. You're, you're
[00:18:46] ROD: the
Flynn
guy.
Is this, how, how long ago did he do this? Were you
[00:18:48] WILL: ago did you do this? Were you gonna carry Uh, uh, so the first, first people to say we seem to be getting smarter. It was 1937, but mo most of the work happened in, it started in the 1980s that people are really going, [00:19:00] okay, okay, I get this.
We, we, it's, the pattern is getting consistent and it's been continually shown all sorts of places all
[00:19:06] ROD: over
the way. Okay.
[00:19:08] WILL: So
the question first for IQs,
[00:19:12] ROD: it's
[00:19:13] WILL: it's
Iers. you said Iqas. Yeah. okay. What's causing this? it's certainly worth investigating.
Absolutely.
[00:19:20] ROD: Um, now
[00:19:21] WILL: there's a few ways that we can say we can
carve this. Yeah. first of all is just about testing. Are we getting better at doing
[00:19:29] ROD: tests
[00:19:29] WILL: and, and better perhaps at doing IQ tests? Look, the, the kid of 2025. Oh God, I know my kids do. Or versus the kid of 2000 versus the kid of 1975 versus the kid of 1950.
They do more tests and so they're more used to the logic of tests. So that's, that's one potential thing. And maybe, maybe we've been teaching two the things that are shown in IQ tests, so, so we're just
[00:19:53] ROD: about that. Well, and I gotta say, just this is relevant. back when I was studying, this was in the late nineties, it was very clear, you know, Mensa, [00:20:00] the IQ Society, what is it?
You gotta be 140 plus or something, and then you get a little mensa pin that it was quite progressive when I was being, uh, trained in
this.
You
can actively practice your IQ
test and get better. And of course people
did.
Yeah. They practiced and practiced, then they got into men like I'm a Mensa graduate. So No, you just practice one test. Yeah, exactly. A lot.
[00:20:19] WILL: A lot. And, and we can, uh, there's, there's certainly studies that show you give a kid a test the same test straight away afterwards and they get a five point bump or something like that.
they
get a, they get a bump. absolutely.
Absolutely. And so that's a phenomenon, but there's, there's a bunch of other evidence that says, okay, no, actually there probably is some things going on that might suggest an actual intelligence bump, if not just the IQ
bump.
Sure. Yeah.
Um, so what have we got?
Here's, here's a bunch of the theories that might say a steady increase in schooling. Like, okay. Kids of of 2025 do way more years of schooling than
[00:20:53] ROD: kids
of 1950. Ain't nobody leaving before year 12. And even that's
[00:20:56] WILL: unusual
now,
right?
Uh, yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. And so [00:21:00] that's clear
[00:21:00] ROD: and development. So I that for other countries, I mean, the highest level of high school, whatever that may be
in your realm.
[00:21:04] WILL: be.
Yeah. clear in developed countries, very clear in
[00:21:07] ROD: developing
countries.
[00:21:08] WILL: Mm-hmm. Um, and that, that accords with, One of the clear ideas is that the people who are doing more schooling tend to be at the lower end of the socioeconomic scale and
things
like that. So people who didn't get much schooling are getting into the schooling system.
People at the high end in 1950, uh, they didn't get, they, they got same amount
of schooling
today. So, so a lot of the gains are at the lower
[00:21:31] ROD: end of the school, so the rising
[00:21:32] WILL: tide
and
all
that.
Yeah. Yeah.
and damn, there's some hard world evidence of this that is, is
[00:21:37] ROD: shocking to
me.
[00:21:38] WILL: Mm-hmm. During the 1960s, uh, in America, there was,
[00:21:42] ROD: um,
[00:21:43] WILL: the Equal Rights Act and, uh, desegregation of the schooling system and, you
know,
what,
[00:21:48] ROD: which they perfected pretty
[00:21:50] WILL: well, you know what Virginia did or, uh, some Virginia
counties,
I don't
[00:21:53] ROD: know. Her,
[00:21:54] WILL: Virginia, the state, they're like, well, fuck this. If we have to desegregate, we're gonna close all the
[00:21:59] ROD: [00:22:00] schools.
If
we have to share it with you, then no
[00:22:04] WILL: one
can
have it.
Indeed, indeed. I'm like, you guys are, you guys are wild, you
guys.
[00:22:09] ROD: Do You
have strong
feelings about this?
[00:22:10] WILL: I will not share.
[00:22:12] ROD: It's, it's
I'd rather we
[00:22:14] WILL: all
died. Yes.
[00:22:15] ROD: I'm not giving it to them.
[00:22:16] WILL: them. And so
[00:22:18] ROD: oh Christ.
[00:22:19] WILL: obviously richer people could afford various forms of
private
schooling. Mm-hmm. and then there you can show, uh, the scores of African American children who received no formal education during that period, decreased at a rate of six IQ points per year. So we can, there's, there is a relationship between amount
[00:22:36] ROD: of
schools.
Absolutely. I IQ tests have famously tested for things that we teach
[00:22:40] WILL: and
test
for.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So let's go for some other sorts of effects that could explain it, that are sort of. Do correlate
with
actual increase in intelligence rather than just better at taking the test. Yeah. so first, better
[00:22:55] ROD: nutrition.
[00:22:56] WILL: Clearly. in America, people are 10 centimeters taller now than [00:23:00] they were a
[00:23:00] ROD: a hundred
years
ago.
[00:23:00] WILL: Mm-hmm.
Uh,
and, and that effect is all over the place. Yeah. Like we, we just, know, particularly look at Asian countries like China, I don't have the numbers here, but there's been a huge jump because of increases in nutrition, in height.
And that's, that's an easily measurable thing. And some people are saying, well, there's a really strong correlation here that, you know, better nutrition, you're probably gonna grow a better brain. So, so that's a pretty
[00:23:22] ROD: one. I, I, I have personal experience with that. The, the borough I used to bounce in when I was one of the big boys, six foot one, and I don't know, 110 kilos.
I went back about 20 years later to see a.
Oh
my fucking God. The 18 year olds
[00:23:34] WILL: were
huge.
No, no doubt.
[00:23:35] ROD: Huge. Yeah. They were all humongous. And, and that was 20 years ago, 20 years gap in a very developed country with a lot of fruit and veg. It changed fast. So in, in worlds where people went from, all we get is sorghum and rice wine, and now we actually get a vegetable.
I can't even
[00:23:51] WILL: imagine
the
effects And so again, this is another one of those effects where it's brought up the
bottom
[00:23:57] ROD: end
of the
skin.
[00:23:58] WILL: So
much
[00:23:58] ROD: more
[00:23:59] WILL: that absolutely. That [00:24:00] while, while it hasn't increased the number of outright geniuses Yeah, it's, it's brought up a lot more
[00:24:05] ROD: of
the people
The mean
[00:24:06] WILL: higher.
Yeah.
The
mean is
definitely
higher. Yeah. And there's some, there's some in, in fact a like micronutrient stuff.
[00:24:12] ROD: Um,
oh, those little tiny sort of leafy
[00:24:14] WILL: green
things.
[00:24:15] ROD: YY you all your baby
[00:24:17] WILL: Well this one in particular is iodine. oh, there, there was, I don't have the, the story around this, but there, there's an iodine deficiency and it co and they can show a 12 point IQ four.
And
[00:24:27] ROD: the
increase
[00:24:27] WILL: in, in use of iodized salt. Yep. Might've given like a 15 point,
[00:24:32] ROD: 15
point
Isn't it? Fucking nuts? One little thing. Well, for us, one
[00:24:35] WILL: thing,
you know?
[00:24:36] ROD: It's that's wild. It's entirely
[00:24:38] WILL: amazing.
Okay. Other theories, other people are saying, well, it's more stimulating environment. You know, our brains have gotta work faster '
[00:24:44] ROD: cause
it's so smartphone
[00:24:45] WILL: and shit.
Smartphones
and shit.
Uh, reduced family size probably helps better parenting. Uh, reduction in infectious diseases. Uh, reduction in lead in gasoline.
or here's my favorite theory about what, why it all is, is hybrid vigor.
[00:24:59] ROD: [00:25:00] which
is
it would bang anyone and have
[00:25:01] WILL: babies
with
them.
Yes. Yeah. Yes. That you get the vigor of, of
[00:25:04] ROD: breeding
the vigor of the, the strange
[00:25:07] WILL: vigor of the strange
[00:25:09] ROD: unprotected
cross people loving
[00:25:14] WILL: seems a little bit racialist, but,
[00:25:16] ROD: but
still,
No, but in a
[00:25:17] WILL: positive
way.
In a
[00:25:18] ROD: this is
[00:25:18] WILL: a positive. It's pro. It's pro It still seems a little bit horny. Like, it's like, what are we,
[00:25:24] ROD: no, no, I think, I think this iss
[00:25:25] WILL: great. Well done. So I think, I think those are all plausible theories. And I think, look, firstly, yeah, it could just be that we're better at taking tests, but the other way around, it could be that we literally have built smart, uh, a smarter world over the la over the
[00:25:40] ROD: 20th century.
I don't think
that's implausible at all. That's not implausible at all. Like you kind of expect it.
Surely
if you change the conditions, you lift the conditions you and I mean, yeah, the biophysiological conditions, the social and learning conditions. If it didn't get better, it'd be weird, wouldn't it?
You'd be like, how come we didn't
[00:25:58] WILL: get better?
Yes, [00:26:00]
[00:26:00] ROD: yes.
That's the
[00:26:01] WILL: part. Yeah,
[00:26:01] ROD: that's
true.
Like we kept testing and it's still the same. You're like,
[00:26:04] WILL: we're,
well, nothing's happening.
Why are we
still
fucking
up? We're trying all of the public health
[00:26:08] ROD: and
all
and still nothing.
[00:26:09] WILL: Yeah, but here's the thing. a bunch of studies
from
the two thousands onward have started to point to it.
Not only plateauing, which you believe,
you know Sure. You know, in the sense that people might be getting taller, but they're not gonna keep getting taller
[00:26:23] ROD: and.
my child's 90 feet tall. Do you have any shoes in a size
400?
[00:26:28] WILL: exactly. Like a kilometer high humor. It's, it's not happening. Like, it, like we'd have to reach some sort of plateau.
Mm-hmm. And so potentially, you know, as you, as you bring, all classes of people into a better public health and education state,
[00:26:41] ROD: You'd like to
we raise ourselves
to a
[00:26:43] WILL: ceiling.
Yeah. To
a ceiling,
Which is
reasonable,
But some people are suggesting No, we are, we're actually, we are actually
[00:26:49] ROD: Is it all 'cause of RFK
[00:26:51] WILL: Jr? It could be
America's drag. So
look, okay. There's not a million studies on this. No. Um, 200,001 in, [00:27:00] uh, in Denmark. so between 19, so this is a 2008 study between 19 59, 19 79, 3 point gain per decade. So
they're, they're,
[00:27:10] ROD: That's
quite
[00:27:10] WILL: quite what, uh, 1979 to 89. It slowed down, but it's still two two IQ
[00:27:15] ROD: point
grain.
Is
[00:27:16] WILL: but a decrease, a 1.5, uh, 1.5 IQ point decrease between 1998 and 2003.
[00:27:22] ROD: Oh, damn.
[00:27:24] WILL: Uh, another study in Norway showed a similar effect, and the United Kingdom tests carried out in 1980, and again, in 2008, showed the IQ score of the average 14-year-old dropped by more than two points over
the
[00:27:36] ROD: period.
I'm not scared of two points, but I, I, I take the point that is
[00:27:40] WILL: being made.
Average
IQs.
Mm-hmm. Uh, declined by six points.
So
[00:27:45] ROD: oh,
[00:27:46] WILL: Here's the thing. You know, some people are like, okay. Is this, uh, some people are like, is this because, uh, youth culture's stagnated and, and
[00:27:54] ROD: dumbed
down?
Yeah.
[00:27:55] WILL: You're Stupid youth.
Is it social media? Yes. Is it the COVID, like [00:28:00] Yes. Or is it ceiling effects? And, and
probably
yes.
So.
Here's the thing. I, I think, I think you are right. We probably have increased intelligence. So no matter what IQ is a measure of intelligence. We've probably increased something here. Yeah. Over the course of the 20th century, we've probably reached a ceiling effect.
Sadly. These are probably just a tiny little, few, little freak
studies. Yeah, And this, to me, smells of moral panic. It's people, like, there's a whole bunch of people out there going, oh, we're getting dumber.
[00:28:28] ROD: getting
dumber.
What do
[00:28:29] WILL: do we
do?
I, I, you know, I do want us to get dumber because well, I, I want, um, you know,
[00:28:33] ROD: it makes
us look smarter.
Yeah, Yeah,
yeah, exactly.
[00:28:35] WILL: I'm saying the smartest
[00:28:36] ROD: generation
ever. Exactly. The leaking boat raises all
[00:28:38] WILL: genius there.
[00:28:42] ROD: I think that's the old saying.
[00:28:47] WILL: So there you go. There you go. Yay. Don't worry. The world ain't getting
[00:28:50] ROD: dumber.
And if it is, you're gonna be fine. 'cause you're listening
[00:28:53] WILL: to
this
so
you're
super Yeah, yeah, exactly. You, you're gonna be getting old. You'll be in the
[00:28:56] ROD: smart
generation.
[00:28:57] WILL: Exactly.
You win, you win
[00:28:58] ROD: all
round.
Everyone's a winner
here.
[00:29:01] WILL: [00:29:00] A
[00:29:01] ROD: A Combinator from the Bambinos.
Tell
us something amazing. What that means to people listening at home is our producer, who's a very smart man. He's an en he, he's an engineer and a doctor. And then he said, screw that. I wanna produce this
[00:29:15] WILL: show.
And he's in a raft
[00:29:17] ROD: something, and he's in a raft raising the tide. Hi,
Alex.
[00:29:22] ALEX: We're coming after that, but yes, the last of us, I've been watching it.
[00:29:29] ROD: Will might need to lie
down.
[00:29:30] ALEX: Not finished anything. Fantastic show. And, um, and I got, I wanted to get onto the topic because I thought it was the, the actual idea of what, you know, what's going on in the show.
It, it sounds like quite plausible to me, so I just went on a bit of a search
and I just
[00:29:46] ROD: mushrooms will kill
us?
[00:29:48] ALEX: not too far from that. Maybe just replace mushrooms with fungi and, and you know, kill us with zomm fires. But, yeah. And may or may, I know there's plenty of examples of it in nature that already happened
and they're [00:30:00] terrifying and gruesome,
[00:30:02] WILL: If
you're
in air. So you just, just giving some context. Last of us being video game, then turn TV show where there's a zombie apocalypse, but the cause of
the
[00:30:09] ROD: zombies.
[00:30:10] ALEX: Is a fungus that seeks to infect humans in order to create more spores with which to reproduce
[00:30:19] ROD: Everything's fucking cancer in the end, isn't it?
[00:30:21] WILL: Everything's
cancer.
I think it's a great premise. I, the first episode of the TV show is like, I'm like,
[00:30:26] ROD: this
is
awesome.
Wait, the
zombies are
[00:30:27] WILL: mushrooms.
This, this is a documentary.
[00:30:29] ROD: I
love these angry
[00:30:29] WILL: mushrooms.
[00:30:31] ROD: Okay,
[00:30:32] WILL: I'm
listening.
[00:30:32] ALEX: yes, so, so, so, so, so, so examples of it that, that are already occurring in nature. There's the, virus, it's a, it's a CORs, wives o or oio, cordyceps that infects small insects, ants, flies, things like
[00:30:44] WILL: yeah. yeah,
[00:30:44] ROD: yeah.
yeah.
[00:30:45] ALEX: it controls them. It unifies them, turns them into a being that its only purpose is to climb up a plant to a specific height, face north, bite the plant in a deathlike grip, and then the fungus erupts from its back [00:31:00] or
[00:31:00] WILL: Serious. That's
[00:31:01] ALEX: creating the sport.
[00:31:03] ROD: That is your
[00:31:03] WILL: purpose.
You
to face north, bite a
plant,
and
and
[00:31:06] ROD: erupt. Yeah. And then erupt.
[00:31:08] ALEX: And I'll see if, I'll see if I can show you. can you see this horrifying picture in front of
[00:31:11] ROD: It's delicious. Is that a
[00:31:13] ALEX: So this, this is the, it's a, no, this is a fly down the bottom here. I dunno if you can see my cursor.
[00:31:17] ROD: creatures all over growing out
of it?
[00:31:20] ALEX: with these stalk like projections coming out of its back terminating in these kind of fungal mushroom heads that are quite bumpy.
[00:31:29] ROD: Jesus.
[00:31:30] ALEX: So these have erupted out of an infected fly that has done its job. It's climbed to a height, it's face north, it's bitten and it erupts at a perfect north. I'm not quite sure. It's something to do with optimal sporing, optimal spore clouds.
[00:31:43] ROD: Uh,
Well,
I'm
gonna, they are a great punk band.
[00:31:47] WILL: optimal sport.
[00:31:48] ROD: We're optimal sport cloud 2, 3, 4,
boom.
[00:31:52] ALEX: So a couple of other examples just, just 'cause these are terrifying. There's, uh, there's other parasites, albeit they're not fungi, but they're, they're parasites.
So, so a, a [00:32:00] fungus can act in a parasitic way to control it. So other parasites like worms that must emerge in water, the larval stage has to involve water. So they infect insects and creatures and they make them drown themselves so that they can emerge from water,
[00:32:13] WILL: Nice.
[00:32:14] ALEX: horrifying. The, the Toxoplasma Gandhi, you know, the one in cats,
[00:32:17] WILL: one that everyone's got, or at
[00:32:19] ALEX: everyone
knows
[00:32:20] ROD: a
third No, no. Ladies get it when they're menstruating
[00:32:22] WILL: or
pregnant.
No, about a third of people
[00:32:23] ALEX: No, they're terrified of it when they're pregnant. Yeah. Um, that one, uh, could only reproducing cats. So any instance of it outside of cats has to get to a cat in order to complete its reproduction.
[00:32:35] ROD: is totally a miniseries on Netflix right now. Like it must be cats. It sounds so ridiculous. How can it be
true,
[00:32:43] ALEX: In rats. If a rat gets infected, it makes the rat lose Its natural innate aversion to cat urine. 'cause rats don't wanna be near cats. They get eaten by it makes it lose that aversion. The rats get eaten by cats. The, the, the toxoplasma wins also in mice. it makes them [00:33:00] curious and, uh, they lose their risk aversion.
So these mice are now like, huh? I'm gonna go see what this four-legged feline
[00:33:07] WILL: do, do, do.
[00:33:08] ALEX: here.
[00:33:09] ROD: I like the idea though. There's, that's a good spin on it though. Like, oh, now you're
[00:33:13] WILL: more
curious.
[00:33:14] ROD: A disease that makes you more curious.
[00:33:16] ALEX: And there's another one, wasp, ve So, so wasps, uh, uh, are well known for Parasitizing other creatures where they, they lay their eggs in a bunch of things, um, their friends into organic gardeners, but to a spider, uh, they can lay their eggs in a spider.
The wasp bla ve grows in its back and causes the spider to weave a completely new web that protects the larvae. And when the larvae is big enough, it eats its way out of the spider.
[00:33:41] ROD: Fucking wild.
[00:33:43] ALEX: Oh,
[00:33:43] ROD: The idea that like biochemically it makes the host do the things
[00:33:48] WILL: it needs
but, but it's not, it's not that hard and, and
evolutionary like, have you done it
Well, I don't doubt. I reckon people have, I I don't have the literature right in front of me. Wow. But I think there, there are examples of sexually transmitted [00:34:00] diseases in, in people that make them wanna have sex more.
[00:34:03] ROD: And
so
I
[00:34:04] WILL: think I've
got that.
[00:34:05] ALEX: oh.
[00:34:06] WILL: and then not necessarily and riskier
[00:34:09] ROD: behaviors
and all
[00:34:10] WILL: kind
of things.
Sure.
yeah. But, but there, from an evolutionary perspective, that's gonna
increase its
[00:34:15] ROD: right. Make, make you drunker or weirder and, yeah, yeah, yeah.
No, sure. But that's, it's what fascinates me is how specific
it is. Oh yeah. Some of these,
[00:34:22] WILL: yeah. that's
like
Face North, very
particular, like if there was, there was have sex more and, but you gotta do it
[00:34:28] ROD: facing
North.
and you, and you sing Wonder Wall while you're doing it. 'cause otherwise it wouldn't make sense. And then boom, you're pregnant.
Like it's, um, I love the specificity. I
[00:34:36] ALEX: know what the terrifying thing is? Just linking this all back tongue, a nice little bow on it. Um, a uh, a microbiology professor out of, Hopkins School of Public Health
has spoken. Yeah. Yas Hopkins. This is Professor Cas Deval, has spoken of the, his fear of. The fungal pandemic? Not, not, not unlike last of us because there's instances in history [00:35:00] of some fungi, particularly candida, that were able to emerge and infect human hosts.
So they were able to overcome that temperature barrier. 'cause fungi can't
[00:35:09] ROD: Don't like
[00:35:09] ALEX: at our temperatures. They get into us, they shut down immune system, cleans 'em up. But these Candida 2009, overcame that. 15 years later, half of them are drug resistant. It's terrifying. It's reckon a bunch of immunocompromised people.
And now he's talking about climate change and the fact that we are slowly evolving to become cooler than our ancestors. So temperatures are going up. so we're going, we're heading for a, a fungal apocalypse with the, the, the world heating up fungi ha. Having been demonstrated able to overcome temperature barriers. Our body temperature is a, a ducking. It's, uh, it's all looking like the last of us part
three.
[00:35:41] ROD: is so upbeat. I feel great. I
[00:35:44] ALEX: Mm. We're dead.
[00:35:47] ROD: So
it would almost like if, if we don't do a fun with animals, I don't know, two outta three episodes we're, we're
[00:35:52] WILL: failing,
right? Uh,
that's
a
yes.
[00:35:55] ROD: Yeah.
[00:35:55] WILL: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:35:56] ROD: So you've heard of Mike, the
[00:35:57] WILL: headless
chicken.
Maybe I wanna say [00:36:00] maybe like, is that what you call a head chicken?
When you chop its head
[00:36:02] ROD: off
and
it's
called
Mike.
Yes. All chickens with their heads cut off are called Mike. So in 1945 there was a, a bird in the US called Miracle Mike. The headless chicken head got cut off and it lived for 18
[00:36:13] WILL: months
afterwards. Ah, okay.
Uh, what level of live are
[00:36:16] ROD: we
talking
Full survival, running
[00:36:18] WILL: around, interacting
[00:36:19] ROD: the world they used a, a liquid food with an eye dropper
[00:36:22] WILL: his head.
[00:36:23] ROD: Okay.
Because basically, well, two things. First, first problem. Mike's not a common girl
name,
especially in 45. And chickens tend to not be
dudes.
[00:36:34] WILL: Sure.
[00:36:34] ROD: Sure. So
[00:36:35] WILL: that's
confusing.
But, but, but
I, I, I,
wouldn't
have expected the survivability
[00:36:39] ROD: of a No,
[00:36:40] WILL: the
big
concern A
Hannah or a
[00:36:41] ROD: rooster.
That's the
big concern.
You shouldn't call the girl
[00:36:44] WILL: chicken Mike
How do you know it's a girl?
[00:36:46] ROD: It's a chicken, not
[00:36:47] WILL: a
rooster.
No,
[00:36:48] ROD: they're all
chicken. No,
[00:36:49] WILL: No,
it's a chicken. No,
they're all chicken. Han is
the
lady.
It's a hand. No,
[00:36:53] ROD: he did. you
[00:36:54] WILL: chicken.
He hen is the lady and rooster is the boy.
They're
[00:36:57] ROD: all
chickens. I'm glad you spotted that.
I meant to say hen [00:37:00] I just wanted to know
[00:37:00] WILL: if
you'd
noticed.
[00:37:01] ROD: Oh, Jesus. So anyway,
Mike,
gender,
non-specific chicken
head
cut off, but the brainstem and cerebellum were missed and they extend
[00:37:09] WILL: neck.
[00:37:09] ROD: the neck. Oh,
[00:37:10] WILL: so, so
chopped
[00:37:11] ROD: the
head.
Okay. Yeah. Most of the head come like, it looks like a headless chicken.
You look it up, you'll see pictures. So Mike could stand, walk, perch, breathe, keep the heart beating, et cetera. And as I said, it was fed through a dropper in the noggin or in the noggin hole, which is horrific. But yeah, it lived for another year and a half. And obviously because. Any time, particularly the mid forties.
It
[00:37:30] WILL: was a spectacle.
[00:37:31] ROD: but are there other animals with this highly contestable superpower where you can cut their noggin off and they
[00:37:35] WILL: keep
going?
Uh, I, I had never
[00:37:37] ROD: thought
that.
No, you hadn't. But I'm gonna help you because now you're thinking it and the answer
[00:37:41] WILL: is
yes,
[00:37:42] ROD: So
there's a bunch of insects and creatures like insects that can do this for starters. Let's start, let's
start low.
Yeah. so cockroaches they can live for weeks after their head's been
cut
off. Nice.
[00:37:51] WILL: Nice.
Apparently
part
of
the
and after
the
[00:37:54] ROD: apocalypse
as
well.
Oh they can live forever. But they like you cut their nogging off, but they can breathe through their thorax. They've got little spots on their [00:38:00] abdomen called spit es sphericals that breathe for them also, they don't bleed out because they have different kind of blood pressure and stuff. So they'll coagulate quickly.
So you chop our nogging off, we bleed like shit and we're dead. If you chop their no off it coagulates in
[00:38:13] WILL: 18
[00:38:14] ROD: seconds. Oh, that's cool.
And so they can keep meandering around for apparently
[00:38:18] WILL: quite
some time.
Nice.
Go Cockroaches.
[00:38:22] ROD: I've always
said, so
always they're known today the Wiggles Australian joke for children wasps
also.
So
the heads have some important parts in their organs. But they also have clusters of
[00:38:35] WILL: nerves
around
Heads have some important
[00:38:37] ROD: of their
Yeah. You know what I mean? Scientific. So they've got some important bits that are essential for survival, these imperial stones, but they also have clusters of nerves in other parts of their body.
So you chop
the
[00:38:47] WILL: noggin
off.
Oh yeah.
[00:38:48] ROD: They can carry on, they can react to stimuli movement and even fly without
a noggin.
Which is, I mean, not all of us
[00:38:55] WILL: can
do
that.
[00:38:56] ROD: they say apparently it's a lot to do with the ventral nerve cord that [00:39:00] runs down the body. That has a lot to do with
[00:39:02] WILL: what's
going
on. Oh, so they've got a
[00:39:03] ROD: A thick
one.
It's the thick
one. Exactly. Vent ventral means
[00:39:06] WILL: fucking
thick.
It's got a lot of
[00:39:07] ROD: It's got a lot of stuff, got a lot of stuff in it. And so it runs down the length of the body. And it means for insects that have this, and many do, they can still walk, groom, and even mate
[00:39:15] WILL: Without
their
brains.
[00:39:16] ROD: I
feel
like
Not groom
[00:39:17] WILL: in
a
sinister
way
Can they give
[00:39:19] ROD: consent?
No. Oh, we're gonna get to
that.
So they can keep doing things, including
[00:39:24] WILL: mate.
[00:39:25] ROD: So
speaking of banging
[00:39:27] WILL: without
a
[00:39:27] ROD: no, '
cause
that's important. The male praying mantis. We've
all heard that females will bite the heads off the praying mantis while they're, or
[00:39:35] WILL: after
they've
had a
little,
we
[00:39:36] ROD: heard that.
We've all
[00:39:37] WILL: all
[00:39:37] ROD: you've heard that. Haven't, haven't you heard that? Everyone listening at home? So the, the lady might go, I'm really into this. I'm just gonna pop your no off first and then let's
get
into
it.
And it turns out the headless males can still get on with business.
And in fact, in
[00:39:50] WILL: some cases
it's
[00:39:52] ROD: it's better.
[00:39:52] WILL: Yes.
For def various
[00:39:55] ROD: definitions
are better,
Well, the definition's being enthusiastic, [00:40:00] they'll last a lot
[00:40:01] WILL: longer.
Well, I dunno if the praying mantis lady
[00:40:03] ROD: cares
about
that.
Well, for, for the purposes of procreation, yes. So they'll go for a fucking long time without
[00:40:10] WILL: their head.
Hmm.
[00:40:12] ROD: Hmm.
Which I think, you know, we, we found the, uh, nonchemical version of Viagra. Hmm.
[00:40:17] WILL: Chop the
old
[00:40:18] ROD: head off.
And, uh,
off you
go. So higher order critters, your concern was there's only insects
[00:40:23] WILL: toads.
Yeah. Well, they're a monster. Who cares? Toads Gross.
Yeah. Gross.
[00:40:27] ROD: Gross
You should
[00:40:28] WILL: Clear or biased? I'm sorry. I'm a Queenslander and,
and like
[00:40:31] ROD: they un I didn't say cane toads.
They're the only
toes, the pretty ones With the
[00:40:35] WILL: lipstick No, there's only one
[00:40:37] ROD: type
of
toad.
that's, and the cockett ish nature as they look at you and flooded
[00:40:40] WILL: their
eyelashes. Gross. Gross.
[00:40:42] ROD: Gross. Gross.
but apparently they can get their organs cut off and they will carry on.
And, and what I love is one of the, one of these to not cane toads, just codes in general.
Uh, it comes from a, um, anecdotal
[00:40:53] WILL: report
[00:40:54] ROD: from
Ottawa, Canada,
[00:40:56] WILL: Ottawa,
Ontario,
AWA.
[00:40:58] ROD: So guy, there's a video, [00:41:00] headless zombie tote hops away from a man. And it turns out he ran over it with a lawnmower and he says, oh, it didn't seem to be in pain. It wasn't agitated at all.
It was just visibly breathing a little faster.
And then
it popped.
[00:41:11] WILL: popped.
away.
That's not quite science though.
[00:41:14] ROD: though. I didn't say it was science. We we're a little bit of science. We don't want too much.
[00:41:17] WILL: Tortoises
[00:41:18] ROD: century Italian
naturalist.
Yeah.
Okay.
Francesco Reddi.
Great
guy.
Often referred to, apparently as the founder of Experimental Biology. And I don't think you wanna be called that. 'cause experimental does a
[00:41:31] WILL: lot
of
heavy
lifting What do we do with the animals?
Cut the shit
up.
[00:41:35] ROD: Yeah.
Okay. Let's make it broken. See if it's self fixed.
No.
[00:41:38] WILL: Okay,
We're doing another He wasn't.
[00:41:39] ROD: Yeah.
Okay.
So
he took a tortoise and he basically pulled out. Every bit of its brain,
[00:41:46] WILL: every
bit
of its
[00:41:48] ROD: cleaned out the cavity from its organ
of
its brain.
Okay.
And it did not die. It lived for six months. Now, to be fair, this is 17th century records,
[00:41:56] WILL: but
this is
what
they're claiming.
They still know what a month is
[00:41:59] ROD: 17th [00:42:00] century. Yeah.
[00:42:00] WILL: But
they
don't necessarily I think they were pretty good at counting days.
[00:42:02] ROD: Like
they
were you don't know that you didn't live then they also may have, you know, made shit up or self aggrandized. I mean, look, he became the founder of
[00:42:12] WILL: experimental
biology.
The
[00:42:13] ROD: tourist did.
yes.
His name was
[00:42:16] WILL: France.
[00:42:17] ROD: Ed. Um, ready, decided then this is not enough. So he takes the whole
head off.
[00:42:22] WILL: Mm-hmm.
[00:42:23] ROD: But we've taken the brain out. Let's take the whole head off and apparently live for 23 days.
[00:42:28] WILL: That's just tortoise though, like that, that's just so slow. Like that's how
long
it
takes to,
tortoise
[00:42:32] ROD: really no
matter
what. Wait
a minute. Like,
like
[00:42:34] WILL: my
head's gone.
Yeah,
[00:42:36] ROD: That's, come on man. I dunno what's going on.
[00:42:38] WILL: on.
[00:42:39] ROD: But apparently one of the arguments is maybe 'cause they have very slow metabolism. So kinda what you said.
They're
slow.
The
final one, I'll talk about the axel lot.
[00:42:48] WILL: Oh, the Mexican
[00:42:49] ROD: walking
fish.
Exactly. Slash god knows what they're, they're weird creatures.
They're beautiful. They're very, very
[00:42:55] WILL: easy to
kill.
Are they
[00:42:56] ROD: So apparently, theoretically they could live without a organ because [00:43:00] salamanders and the of which they are types can regrow almost any body part or organ, almost
any
from missing limbs, lost tails.
Their hearts. They can regrow the fucking things, which
is impressive.
But studies have shown they can reconstitute part of their brains even if a big chunk
[00:43:15] WILL: has
been
removed.
Their brains.
Yeah. It, it, it shows, it shows a real commitment to your memories really, doesn't it?
Like,
it's like, who I, what would you need your memories for if you can just grow
[00:43:25] ROD: the
whole
lot
again
or anything like, you know, the seed of the soul, whatever you're into is like, what if we chop away? Most of it, I'll be fine.
Grow
some
more
soul.
Just gimme a moment. Gimme a moment, and orange juice and a quick lie down and boom, I've got more brain again. So this is what we're talking about.
So they haven't quite, as far as I'm aware, fully decap. Decapitated. I was gonna say debilitated
[00:43:43] WILL: max
[00:43:43] ROD: al and its head's grown back,
[00:43:45] WILL: but
[00:43:46] ROD: it suggests a lot could grow back. So it's not just like the headless chicken. There's a lot more going on itself. And I'm like, I've been on record for a long time on this show and others where I've said I'm very happy to have a brainless version of my body [00:44:00] cloned so that I can
[00:44:01] WILL: harvest
it
for
all them. Well,
look,
[00:44:02] ROD: I,
I feel
like I'm
[00:44:03] WILL: not,
I uh, this is, um, something we could recommend to our friends, uh, uh, Vladimir Putin and, uh, Xi Jinping, if
[00:44:09] ROD: they
would
like,
brainless versions
[00:44:11] WILL: would be self in
vats,
you know, uh, grow some of them.
Chop your head off, see
what
happens, and
look
cross. Not that I'm recommending
any,
I'm
[00:44:17] ROD: not,
cross pollinate with an sato. cross-pollinate with a salamander.
[00:44:21] WILL: You'll
be
fine.
I just wanted to give you one final little, little thought. are you a UI mean, I'm, uh, as someone who works in the sciences, I'm a user of Google Scholar.
Yes. Do you use Google Scholar? Do you
mean do I
search
stuff?
Do
[00:44:33] ROD: Do you search
stuff?
[00:44:33] WILL: Because Yes, I
do, because I do all the time and it's looking for papers, looking up people. I, I use it
[00:44:38] ROD: time
and
time
again
And the image search on Google Scholar,
[00:44:40] WILL: it's
sexy. Well, no doubt. But I was just like, I read this blog post and it was like, oh.
Google Abandons, all of its products that make no money,
they
will just
turn this fucking thing off once. And so I read this blog post. This is on, this is on amusingly named Hannah's web blog, and it just said, you know, they're gonna turn this off. And I'm like, oh [00:45:00] no,
[00:45:00] ROD: no.
Leave Hannah
[00:45:01] WILL: Leave Hannah alone. Why
We just get making everything
shitter
[00:45:04] ROD: anyway?
[00:45:04] WILL: It's
one of
the
things
we do.
[00:45:05] ROD: Tell us
some
shit
listener.
