As we step into the New Year, the hosts of Let's Learn Everything kick off with a Q&A episode enriched with fan-submitted questions. Discussing everything from personal anecdotes to science communication methods, this episode catches the spirit of humor, curiosity, and learning. Here’s a summary of the key insights and discussions from the episode.
Key Topics Discussed
Favorite Words and Topics
- Each host shared their favorite newly learned words, showcasing the unique interests that have emerged from previous podcast discussions:
- Ella:
- Quantum – A term made less intimidating through engaging explanations.
- Whale Fall – A poetic term that brings fascination to marine life.
- Caroline:
- Kleptoparasitism – A fun and intriguing word that sparked interest and laughter.
- Mix of other terms that describe animal behaviors effectively.
- Tom:
- Abyssopelagic – Captures the mysterious deep-sea environment, proving a conversation starter.
- Supercentenarian – A term referring to people over 100 years old, reflecting curiosity about longevity.
- Ella:
Insights on Podcast Format Changes
- The episode reflects on how the transition from individual student topics to the current format has impacted their creativity and engagement:
- More time for in-depth discussions.
- Enhanced listener engagement through a relaxed conversational approach.
- The format change led to a more enjoyable experience for both hosts and listeners.
Navigating Science Communication
- The hosts discussed their experiences in science communication and the importance of humor in making complex subjects approachable:
- Humor serves as a hook that draws audiences in, making learning enjoyable.
- Different platforms contribute uniquely:
- TikTok: Quick grabs of interest; can spark curiosity but lacks depth.
- Podcasting: Offers deep dives into topics, fostering a thoughtful exploration of science.
- YouTube: Balances entertainment and education well but requires significant effort to produce content.
- The significance of diversifying content across platforms to maximize reach and impact.
Personal Reflections and Experiences
- The hosts shared personal learning experiences over the past year:
- Ella is learning Japanese, finding it akin to solving puzzles, which adds excitement to language learning.
- Tom reflects on his experience hosting SciShow and the challenges of engaging a broad audience while maintaining authenticity.
- Caroline is transitioning jobs, which poses new opportunities for creativity and growth in science communication.
Audience Engagement
- The interaction with listeners through questions reflects a growing community eager for knowledge. Some notable queries included:
- Suggestions for making science communication fun and vibrant for young audiences.
- Inquiry about how to effectively present complex concepts without losing interest.
Conclusions and Future Outlook
- Moving into the new year, the hosts emphasize a commitment to continue learning and sharing knowledge. They reassured listeners that they would not strive to "learn everything" but rather maintain a consistent journey of exploration together.
- Gratitude to Listeners: The episode ties back to appreciating the audience's ongoing support which fuels their passion to create and engage with science communication.
Final Thoughts
- This New Year Q&A exemplifies how humor and community engagement drive the success of the Let's Learn Everything podcast. The hosts reflect on their growth as communicators and their excitement for new topics in the upcoming year, promising continued exploration of intriguing subjects.
Join the hosts of Let's Learn Everything as they embark on another exciting year of learning and discovery!
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Hello, and welcome to Let's Learn Everything, the show where we learn anything and everything interesting, this time about us. It's the holiday season until I was some time to west our weary heads. We will be answering your questions that were submitted. We'll be going over a range of questions covering everything from how we make the podcast to our favorite things. My name is Ella, and today we'll be answering
What do the notes of the student of the episode tend to look like? That's a great question. My name is Caroline and my question is, what is your favourite, wonderful word that you have learnt in this podcast?
My name is Tom, and my question is, would you still love the other podcast hosts if they were worms? Timely with that one. I won't say what I was going to say, but that's really fun. I love that question. You were going to say no.
i was gonna say i was just absolutely not you wouldn't keep us in a little terrarium they wouldn't be able to have a podcast it depends are they like anthropomorphic worms let's not get into it right now we can all answer it afterwards we can come to this we gotta save that we gotta keep that the ends that people listen to the full episode
So before we get into anything, I have a few statistics to wrap up our year. Fine. Also, it's the new year. And we are... It is. And we will remember that always. We will remember that right now. It's 2025. I mean, absolutely. I didn't remember it. It's not 2024 right now as of recording this. No, it's 2025. 2024 as of recording this. That's not large. No, it is.
But for our lovely listeners, you'll be enjoying the new year right now. What's it like? What's that like? Is everything okay? Wow, you're in the future. I hope your new years were great. I hope you've already failed your resolutions because you know, failure is a part of life and we have to accept that sometimes. So deep.
Thank you. Last year, we have 22 numbered episodes, including four guest episodes. That adds up to 2,297 minutes of content. Wow. I'm glad we can't have the same leg. With an average episode length, an average episode length of one hour and 44 minutes.
Okay. No, no, that's the average average average average. And we had some guess episodes like an hour 10. So, okay. So they massively brought the average down. They brought the average down and then. But then there were many episodes that brought it.
Yeah, yeah, if you look back through it generally they got longer as the air went on as because we changed. Oh, that's funny. So we changed our format and then we had our topics more or less the same life and clearly our topics have just got longer throughout the day. Can I tell you it's and I guess maybe this is a question is like.
Do we do that consciously? From the edit side, I don't consciously like I'm not I wanted to be critical. I have not done it consciously. No, not at all. Not at all. From the edits, I'm not like being like, Oh, this is too long. We should cut X, Y, or Z. I think when when the podcast first started, I was like,
I was like, and we can't keep it over an hour. That's that stretch of the limit. And I will say, if it's like two hours, then maybe I'll think about something. But for the most part, and we'll talk about that about how the format changed. But yeah, we've got a question. Yeah, we have a question. That is not conscious on my part at the very least. That's very funny. No, not at all.
So last year I counted which topics we covered that fell into which categories, and I did say this year, but we covered fewer topics because we changed from science to science, but still. So I thought that might mean we'd end up with a less of a spread, but actually, yeah, the spread was better this year than last year.
No, I mean, on top still a same as last year, any guesses as though for the most animal biology? Animals, environment, animals in slash nature, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, five or six, then similar to last year, it's a biomedicine medicine, human, yeah, and that was three, drew the space for three.
Okay. Cool. Evolution two. Nice. And then one for a bunch of others, climate, physics, geoscience, language, pseudoscience, psychology. Wow, fun one. Really good spread video, I think. I gotta bring up the, I gotta do some math. I gotta find a way to make math fun. I think we've been missing that. Yeah. We'll talk about that today. Oh, interesting. We've got time. Lots of questions.
And also, before we dive into the questions, I want to say a huge thank you to everyone who submitted a question. Incredible. And also, they were all quite different from last year as well, which was amazing. Wow, what the fuck? Nice. So I'm just mentioning not to brag, but to say I'm incredibly sorry if we don't get to yours. There's only so much time we have. Yes. Yeah, for sure.
Also, I want to listen. I haven't listened to our first one. I would be so curious how different that was. What did we even have to say? We did do it pretty forget. We didn't have to like episode like five or something like that. I think it was more just sort of, I think a lot of the questions were just sort of like, why are we doing this? More like, yeah, like what is this? It is funny. I like, I love doing this. It's really cute. That's nice.
I also in the form this year, I added like a comments box. Oh, yeah. I'm not really sure. I'm so self-indulgent. Yeah, I'm not sure I expected. Maybe I thought people would be like, oh, I like this episode more like these kind of topics more like the sound call is not great in this one, but actually they were all just really, really nice.
It was like so overwhelmingly kind and moving and thoughtful. I've read every single one of them. I don't have time for this episode to go over them. That would be two hours on its own. But Carolina, Tom, you can go and read them after this too. And it would really ping a sad day, like just sit there and self-indulgently scroll through. But I get, you know, like over the holidays, like maybe into the new year as like a little
and a little bottle of kindness. A little treat for yourself. Yeah, absolutely. Oh. Do either of you have anything to add before we move on? Thank you, Ella, for calling these questions together as well, because that sounds like a mammoth test. And you got, we appreciate you. Wearing a Christmas suit like a good interview host like we're doing. Well, it's January, so it's really unseasonable of me. Really late. Yeah, yes. Yeah.
or extremely extremely early. Yeah. Onto the show. So last year, my boyfriend and I made some music for this. He's been doing music longer now, so he wanted to remake it. Oh my God. A lot of the vocals have remained the same. It's just the tracks that have changed, although the vocals are a bit different. So Tom, if you can play, welcome. Oh, I remember the last one. I remember this one, actually. When you said the title, I was like, wait, I remember, OK, here we go.
I'm I'm I'm I'm blown away. I'm absolutely blown away. I feel like that's I can't it's like the the Wizard of Oz turning to color the upgrade from last time. Oh my god. Yeah, what the fuck?
It's done a great job, a really great job. Yeah, that was like produced. Wow. Yeah. I guess we should say thank you, you're no. Yeah. I like that. What an incredible... For your physics fact checking and your musical ability. Yeah. Yeah. So... I feel like we have to do a better job now.
Someone, the first question, I'm going to ask you, someone said, I don't know why they said it, because I think we say these things all the time, but it's a good opening question. And this is from Kenner, and it's, can we get everyone's names and pronouns? Oh, my, my, my name is Ella. My pronouns are she, her. My name is Caroline, and my pronouns are they, them.
My name's Tom. And the topic today is, okay, sorry. That's really hard not to, I use he, him. It is funny. I guess we don't say it off. Yeah. Comes up every now and then. I guess not. I mean, certainly our names, we say every single episode. Yeah. I guess, I guess. Yeah. I cannot know, no shade you at all is good not to make assumptions. Moving on. Electric asked, what is your favorite fact about yourself?
This is hard. I thought, oh, my favorite fact about myself. I host a wonderful podcast. I like to say I would say that I have a YouTube play button. I would say that my favorite fact about myself, all like one of them would be something that like shocks people like that people like what?
Of course. It's going to be like your favorite science fun fact. Yeah, exactly. So I'd say it's probably like something like the fact that my family are Mormons. Like I always find people find that. That is a good one. Yeah. OK, so I will say then that I am hypermobile in my arms and in my feet. That's a good one. Sometimes my toes will just like
Just like, hey, oh my god. I'm back in. It's a really fun fact. I really enjoy it. I can't go swimming because my toes are like, these are these are all so indicative of us. The way we say them, the way we pick them. Well, also because mine was going to be that and I've said it before or told the story before that I bought a unicycle by accident in high school.
I feel like I've heard that one before from you, but I am still shocked by it. Yeah. And that's wonderful. That's a sign of a great fun fact. I'm trying to think. Yeah. An interesting question. Great question. Maybe we should think about this one and come back to it. And did if we have it. Well, this is great because next year, and we can cut this because I am going to do this next year. My topic is going to be Caroline. And so this is good. So I can get some fun.
Oh, great. OK, cool, cool, cool, cool. Nice. Imagine when I was doing a topic or the other one that would be so awful. Yeah. The idea of, like, we all laugh at the start and then we get to the topic and they're like still committing to it. You're like, why? What do you mean? What do you mean? I let, yeah, I go, I'd like to talk to your parents and your friends. Yeah. We all know that. Yeah. But the most interesting thing, and this is a quote from Caroline, is
I guess that's what this episode is, is basically for the topic of ourselves. Yeah. So this next question, we answer something like this every year. This was from several people who need to live oak, Jeeves, and who we think is our friend, Dex, from TikTok. It's never been confirmed, but also they have never denied it. Never denied it. And they send the same question every year. So I'll read off Jeeves' version of the question.
My question for you all this year is the same as last year. What are some pieces of media from the last year that you'd like to share and recommend? So I guess we could do TV films, music, games, and books. Ooh. I love this shit. Can I tell you? Because last year we asked, because we were going, we get asked this, and this year I tried manga books too, Jeep says,
Oh, nice. Oh, nice. You said that you didn't, you thought it was cheating. And a few people in the comments said, and on the form said, Mango account is booked, so you're safe, Tom. It said specifically, that's very nice. Yeah. So I'll say as a preface, so yeah, last year we got asked this, I mean, we got asked this question. This year, I really tried to make a concerted effort to like, if something I thought was like, year notable, I wrote it down in a little ways. Oh.
And I mean, I guess we can, you know, go around the horn for stuff. But one thing that I stands out or one of the first things I added to the list at the start of the year, and I know Ella, at least you fuck, you love, you fuck with this too, is I think maybe my favorite YouTube video from this year is the ContraPoints Twilight video.
And that was early in the year. And I almost forgot about it, but I wrote it down. It's simultaneously such great critical analysis of the movie, but also of the nature of romance and stuff like that in a way that actually changed my perspective about things that are guilty pleasures and stuff like that, where I was like... It was a fear. It's interesting that you saw pieces of media and went for YouTube.
It's totally valid to do that, but like I just didn't. But you've made me go back and think like, where YouTube, that's a really interesting one. And for me, the Star Wars Hotel video by... Oh my god. That was this year. And that's probably one of my favorite YouTube videos ever. I think I watched it like two or three times in the end, because I was so good.
I find, generally, that YouTube videos don't stand out to me necessarily as individual pieces of media, but as their whole. So it would be more likely that I recommend a creator. Yeah, yeah, yeah. For sure. I mean, well, also, these are two creators that released something once a year, if we're lucky. So it is sort of like it does build. And they are huge. They're both huge. Yeah. So they do feel like movies. Well, I'm just saying my recommendation would be for the content creator, Sean.
She's called Sean. He does. Oh, yeah. Talking videos. The skull. Yeah, the skull. Incredible. Love his videos. I do not know this. Yeah. Oh, yeah. He just does like media analysis stuff. And it's really like really well thought out in depth. Wonderful. Oh, no. Just like the sharpest, dry, weird kind of a thing. Yeah. That's a great shout. Movies.
Movies. Oh, my God. So I've got two things on the opposite end of the spectrum. One should add to me to see her as my favorites. First one is challenges. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I still need to see. I mean, I know I'm going to love it. Everyone I know loves it. I need a word. Honestly, it was the soundtrack is amazing. And then, and then the other end of the spectrum zone of interest. Holy fucking shit. What a Jesus Christ. That is a movie that the very last shot.
I was watching with friends. I literally said, holy fuck out loud, because I was just like. Have you seen it? I don't think I have. No. And to be fair to me, I've only seen from movies that have been released this year, I think I've only been to like the cinema twice and see stuff released this year, a handful of times. And the only notable things that I can remember watching Deadpool and Wolverine, which I did not enjoy.
I can't do it, which I really enjoyed. So like, you know, my movie-watching scope should probably be expanded a little bit in the next 12 months. Well, talk about a double feature. Right. Yeah. Those two. It's a real Barb and Hymer is real.
Challengers of interest. Double feature. What about you guys? Easy answer for me is because they turned my favorite book into one of my favorite movies this year was the anime for look back. It's only an hour long, which is great. It's just a movie about why people make art.
And it, um, I knew the story going in. So I was like, I'm not going to cry. Like five times in the theater with my friends. It was, I've, it's the most weepy theater I've ever heard of my entire life. And it's, uh, it's just like a beautiful, uh, and they did it. Like they, they turned, uh, a great manga into a great movie. And it's great. And I love that people can see it now because it's, it's, it's, it's, yeah, again, takes an hour and it's life changing. It's great.
Any stand-up music this year? Ooh. Music. Chaplain. Easy. Easy. One of my favorite artists of the year. I have to double check. I think we shouted Chaplain last year. Did we? I have to double check to see if we were prescient.
Top is Moona, second is Sufian, Steven's, third is Carly Rae Jepsen. Oh, you could have seen that coming. I'm so glad Carly Rae Jepsen's in there. Four is Chappell Rhone, who I've been really big into this year, and it's amazing. Nice.
But I mean, no one could have predicted that was genuinely the same this year. Yeah, absolutely. New York rise. I'm just going to shout out a band called Young Fathers, who they were nominated for a Brit Award, which is like the UK's Grammys, much less influential. But yeah, I just thought I'd say something that wasn't super obvious, like Kate Bush, who I've loved.
Yeah, my, I mean, my obvious album of this year was obviously Charlie Bliss, a different fan, not Charlie. But yeah, one of my favorite bands finally put out a new album, Charlie Bliss, and it's incredible. It's, it's super fast bops, but also super contemplative. We are all 30 now beats about being like the music industry and what it's like to just a bop and a half. Well, my favorite top artist this year was them. I was so happy they finally put out a new album and it was amazing.
TV. Again, I feel like I watch stuff to turn my brain off to. And the thing I've been enjoying most this year has been watching Lucifer for the first time, which is ridiculous. I know. I know that it's ridiculous. But hey, something about queer demons and angels just really does it for me. You know? Yeah, you know, it does it harken back to Tumblr days? Oh my gosh. Absolutely. Yes.
It's very self-indulgent. I watched our cane for the first time this year, both seasons. And it's just super great. Dude, I haven't finished season two. I've not seen it, but I've heard such good things about it. I mean, it's beautiful. Holy shit. It looks amazing. It looks amazing. And then also baby reindeer came out the start of this year. Oh, I forgot.
I've only I've heard great things about it. Yeah, which is like incredibly intense watch and very devastating Would recommend it's about a comedian who's being stalked. Yeah, and it's based on a true story and it's very
It's a lot. Got checking out. There's an anime called Chihaya Furu that I've recently absolutely fallen in love with, or this year I recently fell in love with. It's Pro ZD's favorite anime, I believe, is one of the ways I can pitch it. But it's so... What's it called, sorry? Chihaya Furu. It is about a card game that even in Japan is niche.
Um, so it's one of the most niche seeming, uh, and like it's about like a, a card game about memorizing poems. So it's like so on paper, but it's, it's, I mean, it's famous for being, um, some of the most well written and it is and it was, and it's great. And by episode three fully sobbing, it's just, it's just really beautiful. And I think maybe that's part of the magic is that on paper, it seems so, so, so niche, but it really is so, um, beautiful. Yeah.
Games. I did not play a single new game this year. Not a single new video game. Caroline, I got the game for you. This is easily my game of the year. Go on. Yeah. You have a PC. Yeah. Easiest game of the year. Webfishing. Have you heard of this?
have not heard of this. Is it indie game made by one person? It's literally like if you took the fishing mechanic from play online. I don't know. It's not. No, it's on steam. It's just called web fishing, but it has that vibe. It is literally like if you took the fishing minigame from Animal Crossing, expanded it and made it so much sillier. Oh,
Fantastic. Yeah, I'm sold. I'm so sold. It is just the perfect game for calling up a bunch of friends on Discord and hanging out while you go fishing. My game is grounded, which is... I haven't heard this. A game where you are... It's a honey, I shrunk the kids thing, so you become your child and you're shook down the size of something tiny and then you have to like... Oop, giant bugs. Can't play this.
It's a survival kit game where you're in a garden and there are a lot of spiders in it. And it's actually, it's not scary. It's not supposed to be scary, but when you run into like a wolf spider and you're a tiny little child, it's very scary. And it's super fun and cute. And I'm playing it online with my friends and we build, um, my friend Connor, he like, he's like building these elaborate sky bases with like zip lines everywhere. And then I'm just holding around after him cleaning up and like making things pretty.
I have a game where your personality can show and how you play like that is very cute. Can I say what my favorite book of the year was? Because that is a favorite book go. It's Meet Me at the Surface by Jodie Matthews, which is all about. It's all inspired by like Cornish Folklore and stuff like that. And it's quite like dark and mysterious, which was a really good read.
I would recommend dark and mysterious. The next question comes from Job, and they ask, you guys still haven't met, have you? That's a good update, honestly. That's probably one of the best requirements to have, because I love the way that's phrased. Yes, we have. Well, I have. Yeah, Ella has. Oh, wait, that was this year. You're right. Wow. Oh, my goodness.
I've met Tom and Caroline. I think about this time last year, Caroline, we'd already met again since a few times. And then I went to New York in March and met up with Tom there. It was super cute. I happened to be hosting an Oscar's watch along party and a friend of mine who listens to the show. I forgot to mention because it was kind of his last minute that you would be able to make the party. Literally, walking was like,
What? Yeah, but no, me and Caroline, we've still not. It's not happened. Yeah. I think that's this. That's this year. That's the goal, maybe. Which is interesting. You've never seen us at the same place at the same time, which is pretty interesting. Pretty suspicious, isn't it?
We both have glasses. What about right now? Like, I mean, not at the same place, but it's one of, I'm looking and speaking to both of you. Man, AI is coming to its bounds. Man, AI is really coming from bounds, you know. That's okay. I think that should be our goal for this year is getting Tom to come here. Oh, yes. Oh, that'd be so cool. That'd be nice. Yeah, that'd be nice. Gia asks, would you still love the other podcast hosts if they were words?
I have had a topic in my list of topics called, Oh, no, your girlfriend's turned into a worm. What will you do? And it's been sat there forever as a topic to go through. As it gets less and less relevant every year. Oh, yes. Oh, yes. But also it is one of those memes that keeps coming up and it never, it's never fully died and all surprises me. So maybe there's a topic in there about me mode, but we've already sort of talked about that before.
I asked your note, I said, if I was a worm, I just said, if I was a worm. And he said, I'd cut you in half. I was like, what the hell, man? Then I'd have two of you. Oh, that's terrifying. Anyway, but my answer would be yes, I would still love you. Of course, I would put you guys in little terrariums with some dirt and some plants, and you know, let you. I'd make sure your mic stand was all set up by your terrarium and that we could.
How are you going to research a topic if you're a one though? That's the big question. Yeah. Today's topic, eating your own poop. And the other one was like, oh, that's been on my list for forever. Tom, can you please play science?
Science. The first question is from Hannah and they ask what is something that you learned in college that research has since changed. What a good question. Yeah.
This is, I think this is a bit tough for me. It's, it's, I mean, well, I'll say, I'll say something like just brief. And I've mentioned it on the podcast before that I think that like in, when I was in college taking like cognitive science and computer science, uh, catch EPT didn't exist. And so I, I, but you remember speculating a lot about like neural networks and being like maybe one day they'll be able to be smart, but it was so theoretical. I know one would have guessed that in the next like five, six years it would have, I guess it was more, oh God, I'm old.
In the next five, six years that like that would come about that quickly and also be as pervasive as it is. Yeah. Yeah. And have like leaked into the world. And I don't want to be boring about it, but that is would also be my answer. Yeah. Oh, really? Oh, OK.
my because my undergraduate degree was a biomedical science PhD was biomedical science related and and things change all the time there like big ones have happened at least while I've been researching which is like a CRISPR and induced pluripotent cell super cool stuff but hey I specifically LLMs or large language models are
have completely changed the way things are done. I talked about it in one of the episodes, but even since then, that was two years ago, almost, AI is doing even more in diagnosis, finding chemical and protein structures. In fact, the chemistry Nobel this year was awarded to the scientists who developed Alpha Fold 2, which predicts protein structure.
Wow, that's really cool. It's kind of like a slightly scary, very interesting, very rapid developments on the horizon here. It's not just because you go on Twitter and you're seeing these protein folds and you're like, that's a generator. That sucks. Do you have anything, Caroline?
Honestly, for mine, I was like, I have no clue what to answer this one with, because especially for my masters, so much of that was learning more practical skills of how to do conservation and how to do a lot of like data analysis and general like ecological tools and things like that, lesser than learning theory itself. It's not too too much has changed. I only finished my masters a few years ago. So there's still time for it to happen. But yeah, otherwise I can be with you guys. Airlines and infant.
I will say, we've talked about what a non-native species is and stuff like that and how we can use non-native species as well. And Ella's talked about that on the podcast before. And even from when I did my undergrad and I briefly looked at it for my dissertation, that's common leaps and bounds as well. And I'm really excited to see how that sort. Yeah, absolutely.
I think even for the general population we hear like invasive species and we have a very specific view on what that means and I know I did going into like my undergrad and my masters and I hope now that lecturers are starting to provide a bit more nuance to students about those conversations because it's really important to keep that stuff in mind. So yeah. Ethan asks, what's your favourite pseudoscience topic or theory?
I mean, I talked about my favorite pseudo-science stuff. I think it's difficult to say favorite because generally I do pseudo-science in a very negative light. But I think it's saying, do you believe in it or think it's very clever?
I think the psychology behind why people go down the route of like using crystals and things like that is interesting to me. I also loved the group of Flat Earthers, who I think they went to the North Pole to try and disprove the 24-hour sun. That's like now, I think, and I've been really enjoying seeing the fallout of that one. So that's been fascinating.
That one made me think about, I guess, my current favourite pseudo-science topic is modern geocentrism. Apparently that's a thing. There was a report by the National Science Foundation in 2014. They found that 26% of Americans believe that the sun revolves around the earth.
No way. To be fair, I think a large portion of that is going to be a failure of education, but in that there will be some staunch, modern geocentric. Yeah. Yeah. Obviously, it's not that the science is interesting. It's like what you said. I like that. It's the mindset of someone who chooses to believe that in the face of all evidence.
Yeah, I'll be on it. I'll be honest. I think these are points that are swaying me, but I'll be honest. I'm kind of a, I'm a little bit of a pseudo science hater. I'm not. I'm not. Oh, yeah. Or I guess I just don't, I don't find a lot of joy in thinking about personally, but like, I think from the, you know, like, like airlines, phenology topic, I did really enjoy also, especially that one learning about like the rise and fall of it. I thought was very interesting from like a,
History and a sort of like what can we learn from this moment. Yeah, absolutely. And what impact that actually had on real life people? I mean, you say you're a hater, but you're a hater in the same way we're a light we're an enjoyer. No, we all just hate it. Yeah, I don't think. Yes, I know. I know. Yeah.
Uh, but, but like similar to like conspiracy theories, I don't seek that out on my own. I don't like maybe, yeah, maybe that's where we differ, but like, I think it's quite useful as a science communicator and educator to know where people's pitfalls are. That's, that's interesting. That is true. Um, I know that we're not necessarily reaching out to those people on this podcast. Yeah. Um, maybe someone who listens to us can by being armed with the right knowledge. I don't know. It's just a, it's an interesting thought.
I agree. I do think you can go off the deep end like just debunking, trying to lose your mind a little bit in that. But I think you guys are convincing me. I was ready to just be like, Oh, sorry. I just remember my biochemistry. Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Um, DAF Punk asks, where did Caroline's love of amphibians come from? Oh my goodness. Um, I don't know if I could point out the root cause of it. They're just weird little guys. And I relate to that on a deep spiritual level. Oh. That's how I feel about computers.
That's great. I love that. Alum asks, what is one scientific breakthrough that you believe has the potential to drastically change humanity's future, but is still largely overlooked or misunderstood by the general public? I have an easy one for this. Oh, go. Oh, please. Please. mRNA vaccines.
Oh, that's a really good answer. When you think of changing humanity's future, in the West, you might think of great advances in technology or curing cancer or something. But in terms of the potential for mRNA vaccines to prevent massive amounts of human disease, especially in
Lesser developed countries is like, is humanity changing? And obviously very misunderstood in terms of how they work, how safe they are. And then it's just coming on in leaps and bounds. Very, very cool, very interesting science.
Not a great one. That's such a good one, yeah. The only one I had, and I'm kind of cribbing this from a thing Hank said, but I think it's an interesting thing to think about. It's similar to that, is I know there was some recent news about vaccines being able to be given through a nasal inhaler.
And I remember him saying that like, or someone saying that like that, the, you know, we underestimate that like making medicines like that easier, like avoiding needles can help. I mean, and to your point, so earlier points about pseudoscience stuff like that can actually be surprisingly big to increasing, you know, the use of the use of some of these medicines. And that obviously has the huge compounding effect also. Yeah, that's an interesting one.
I was in terms of an underrated one. I was like, I hadn't thought about like. Yeah, because when I was thinking about the answer to this question, I went for something that now that you two shared your answer, I'm like, oh man, you two hit the nail on the head because I think I was thinking about genome editing and how that could be a really interesting tool. We've talked about it before. No, no, no. Genome editing is incredibly important. Where I would like move yours into is saying, I think genome editing has been overestimated when it comes to what I can do to humans. Yeah.
Yes, but where it's been underestimated is like what it can do, like you say, to crops. Yeah, like those are the things that people aren't thinking about. So I think it's a really good point, Caroline. Sylvia asks, throughout the podcast, you've called out a lot of words as excellent. What's each of your favorite, most used funniest, etc. Words you learned from doing the show.
this. So we some of some of these questions Ella has given us a head of time to prep. Yeah. Yeah. This I am so fucking glad you did because the moment I heard this, I mentally played back every sync because we say it almost every episode where I could hear my the echoes of myself being like, love that word. Amazing. Nothing.
So I had to dig. I dug. I dug through for some good ones. But like, I'm glad because I didn't because I was like, how do we even go about this? Why did I clean this question? Because I wanted someone else to answer it. I want people in the discord to answer those and you should.
Oh, please, yes. Oh, no. I might start off with mine because mine is going to be way less good than the list that Tom has come up, but it's a bit soppy. My favorite one is actually one that Tom explained in a way that made it less scary to me. And that's the word quantum.
Oh yeah! Now that you've explained, and the way you did that topic, I was like, I love, I know, I know, I'm sorry. But yeah, you made that word way less scary to me, and I appreciate that. Tom, thank you. Wow, what a quantum is your favourite word you know. I'm not necessarily my favourite word ever, but also I could not think of any other ones, and then I looked through and I was like,
And isn't that love? Hold on. My favorite was Autumn Leaves. That was my favorite word. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And let me look. I believe in me. Oh, I'm so excited. That was all for me.
I know I didn't compliment me. My favorite word after extensive research is fallow diem. No, it's not. That's just the name of the pseudo penis of the Sicilian that we've learned in episode 69. That's a great word. It is a good one.
No, I tried to go through a bunch of episodes until I found a war that was very satisfied by But some honorable mentions. I know it's it's literally the name of the episode, but I love abyssopologic abyssopolic
That rule, it matches the vibe of the word where it's like it gives you that sort of like, but also it's a useful word, which I think also very nice. Like it describes that area from the Ignobel episode. Super Centurion, I really like.
good one. Because I think it's that first of all, it's fun. I think the word has to be fun and also kind of useful or like maybe think about something new. I'm great. Super centering are people who are over 100 years old. And like, that's a useful term to categorize that. Shatter cones. This is from an oldish one, Ella, but that's from a distant object because you're talking about. Yeah, that was what that was like when you can tell when an asteroid has hit the earth, right? Yeah, I mean, shatter cone, like it's just such a lie.
Funny, I remember you being happy about it during the episode as well. Oh god, doo doo doo doo. Oh, all of the words from Whale Falls. I know that. Oh yeah. I almost said Whale Fall just as a, just as like, just as it just sounds. That's a great point. It sounds nice as well. Like there's something quite eerie and like. It's a bit spooky, which Whale Fall is a little bit spooky, so.
I wrote down specifically in Richmond, opportunist phase. I don't know why I like that one. I dug through all the notes of the episodes to see if any words stuck out or I remembered. That's what I tried doing as well, but then I just got sucked into reading your jokes.
There are jokes. A lot of them are just quotes from us saying that. No, but I loved it. I was just enjoying it. So I kind of lost the plot of it. I didn't find anything in the end. Galacto centric was a recent one that I thought that was fun. Again, I love that because Caroline's reaction was so great because I was like, have you heard this word? Caroline was like, no, but I love it. Yeah.
But then the one I picked for me personally actually comes from guest of the show Ash Campbell and that's klepto parasitism. Yeah, klepto parasism is I've used that word actually in my life since as like, I mean, it's hamfisted way of using it, but like I called my friends klepto parasites. There's something about
Because I remember like the first time I heard that phrase being like, what? Oh, like it's such a interesting perspective to look at the world with. And also just like a bang in word rolls off the tongue. So that's my favorite. Yeah. And again, folks in this court, let us know. Let us know your favorite. Yeah, please do. The final question for this section is comes from Matthew J. And they ask, what's your favorite insect looks wise?
Don't give me anything about them being interesting in other ways. Easy answer is Praying Mances, I guess. I feel like. Mmm. Like the rosy maple moth. Beautiful pink and yellow. Very fuzzy. Oh, yeah, beautiful. Holy shit.
I've got a Google what mine's called. Oh, yeah, the purple winged grasshopper, I think, is what it's called. Oh, what the fuck? And it's beautiful. Oh, wow. Yeah, the wings are very iridescent. Lovely. Very simple. Like shimmery, shiny, shimmery see-through wings. Deep cod, Caroline.
Yeah, and I love painting that grasshopper as well. Not grabbing a grasshopper and then painting it. Oh, you make them purple. That's you. You're doing that right now. Tom, play, please. Fun. Fun. Oh, that got me on this hat spell. An anonymous asks, which host can do the best seagull impression?
Pretty good. Nice. Yeah. Beautiful. Lovely. I really want to screech, but I won't screech. I'll go. There we go. You judge. Hey, what's with all these breadcrumbs over here? I'm walking here. Let us know in the discord who won. Yeah.
I practice that. You motherfucker. This is not a gift. You gave us a good time. You cheat. Oh, that's so funny. Joseph asks, this is a long one, but I like the context here. As listeners, some of our favorite moments are when your minds are blown by incredible new facts. But what have been some sillier, perhaps disappointing revelations of yours. Personally, I grew up thinking the San Andreas fault was a giant chasm separating two parts of the country.
But as a geoscience educator in Southern California, I've since visited it several times and there's just dirt there. That's so I love the idea of getting your undergrad and masters for that. And then finally being like, what was it all for? Do you guys have any? This is a great question. This is such a good question. And I think I'm also actively disappointed every time I find out that something is from ancient Egypt. I don't want it to be anymore. I want it to be something different and unique now.
I'm curious also if this has happened with a topic of yours before where you like written or you like I know we all keep like a list of top potential topics have you ever had topic that you're like this can be a banger then you go to research and just like this actually happened recent or this what you've heard recently animals during eclipses.
was something I thought could be a whole big topic and then was just like, oh, it's mostly nothing. And so I mean, for the podcast, that was perfect. And it's a perfect holiday little bite size one where it's like, yeah, you know, it's just like, oh, not really a lot happens. But some, some little things happen. So I mean, that was one that was like,
Yeah, because the other one for me in a similar vein was carcinization and that, like, not necessarily learning, but sort of remembering that actually not everything goes down the becoming. Yeah, not everything becomes crab is disappointing. Yeah, deeply. I actually got one, one of these moments from, I think it was last year, I was in 2023. But in China, they have something that's been dubbed China's artificial sun.
Ooh, yeah, that sounds disappointing. It's the experimental advanced superconducting tokamak. Do you know what tokamak is? No, but a fantastic word. No, it sounds like a British word for a fast food.
It's an experimental machine which harnesses fusion energy, so it's supposed to be doing what's happening inside the sun. So they're trying to replicate the way the sun does fusion. Cool. And I genuinely thought it was a big sun ball. Yeah, that's why I heard that. Why is it? It's a big bit of metal.
And I was genuinely so disappointed when I looked at a picture. So that was that was disappointing. Yeah, I will say, one, it's I'm looking at this is hilarious. There are so many pictures that are like the big metal thing, but they've like made it like glowing orange just to have like the effect, which is so dark. That's really funny.
It's interesting because, you know, I think, you know, when it comes to the topic writing process, and I don't know if we're going to talk about that. Oh, maybe we'll talk about it right now. Tom, could you please pay making the podcast? Making the podcast.
Thank you. I didn't really record any vocals, so. It's great, I love that. So lots of people asked some variation of this question. Joanna, Rainbow Llama, Adjay, Pong Seton, Eli, but I'll read Ashley Hall's version of it. What are some topics you've had to abandon or refine because you started researching and found they were too broad to cover fully? What topics have you had to abandon or expand because they were too narrow?
Are there any topics that you feel really passionate about, but no, you can never cover because of these factors? I was going through some of my old scripts. It's so funny. I think it was really early this year. There's like a notes app note that it just has the topic name at the top and the topic is just light. And then there's I just have like one quote and then I abandoned it.
I was like, yeah, you can't just do it right. Also, I think, you know, when I think about this really hard sometimes when I do a really broad topic, I think, well, how much of that is going to knock out other topics for everyone else. Oh, great point. Yeah. Totally totally. Yeah. It could just take out a lot of interesting facts and what could be smaller topics. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So that's, yeah, that's on the broadness on the narrowness. There's loads of things that I've
Oh my god, yeah. Oh, thought. Yeah, would be more interesting that I can't even remember them. There's so many that I'll just have an idea and I'll start searching. Well, yeah, in terms of broadness, there was one in particular that I remember really well, because I was going to talk about it was a psychology topic, and it had been inspired by a video on TikTok that I had seen.
I had started writing the topic and put it into a topic check which is where we share what topics we're going to do to over there all the way to that point and i was already a bit like man this is broad i'm not so sure about this i then went back to the video that had inspired me and tom you had commented on it.
I just needed that little push to go. No, I'm not doing this because sometimes you don't want to abandon a topic, especially if you've already got to the point where you're putting it in the topic, checking things like that. It is so interesting how, you know,
The fact that that little thing was enough shows the bigger thing, which is that the topic wasn't clicking with you, right? It's sort of like, and I've definitely done that before with topics where I have like two scripts that I'm basically writing at the same time, which is horrible because I'm like, I don't like neither one is super clicking.
I there was one for very rarely do I abandon the topic because it's too narrow because I think you can just add a more yeah, like parts to it, you know, like building blocks. Yeah, I have like a whole list like documents I've started and started writing an outline of scripts.
but things are too broad. And they always end up being like big, big medical science topics for me, like CRISPR or the microbiome and diabetes is my white whale. Oh, gosh.
When I would have the audio clip so I can play it in a dramatic intro montage for you next year. It's not like yours, Tom, which was really difficult to explain. It's not difficult to explain. It's difficult to make interesting and exciting still. And it's so broad that it's like, I don't know how to make a good story out of it. But I want to do it because it was my PhD topic.
Yeah, I think especially with broadness, another thing that can be a poison is like when you go to search it and or you do your initial search and you just see like 50 of like the same like Smithsonian articles are identical to like the exact same question. You're asking like one or two can be helpful because it can guide you along. But if it's like.
Oh, everyone's already talked about this or like everyone said the same picture about it. And it's just like, I don't want to just like rehash the history. Well, you know, I think one thing that's been helpful and you see, we'd see happen on the podcast a lot is like, having a slight, having a pitch to it that's slightly different than just the name of the topic.
Let me just tell you about it. Either a question that makes it more pointed. Very recently, where are we? The topic about where are we? It was originally called Space Maps. That was about maps of space.
And it was okay, but as I was writing it, I was like, oh, what's more interesting is the question of where are we? And that's and that's a better angle to go through it with because if it's just space maps, it's like, here's one map. Here's another map. There's not a force through it all. And I was like, well, the most interesting parts of this are the question of where are we and that. And so I had to fully rework like,
take i cut so many things from that and then move things around and then change a ton to rework it but in the end it turned out great absolutely agree with you because so much of my reworking isn't necessarily the topic itself it's the story that you can tell through that yeah i just i often have an outline when i write which is like okay let's start with the history let's get to.
Yeah, yeah. The definitions, let's do this, this, and this, and this bit. And then all I end up doing is just reshuffling the order of that. Yeah, absolutely, yeah. And then, like, putting connectors and, like, ideas that link them better to make it flow, rather than, like, having necessarily a story from the top of my head. I like what you're saying, Tom, about this idea of, yeah, something that's been talked about a lot
Can you just put a different spin to it, a different angle to it? But I'll say, for example, when it comes to something like talking like, no one, people don't think to look that stuff up. So it's okay to not have that kind of thing with like some groundbreaking new spin on. Because I've never thought I'll go and look for the science of that stuff. I'm not saying like, this is what I'm just saying. Sometimes you don't need that sometimes. Like, yeah, sure, sure.
The next guest episode that's coming out, I asked this person why they're doing a certain project when it's, I feel like it's been done a lot before. And they said that it was because it's bringing it to a new audience. And I think that that's something that's really important. I try and remember when I'm like trying to come up with something like, I don't always kill myself over it, you know?
Yeah, for sure. But I do try new things too. It's nice to mix things up on the podcast sometimes. Anthony asked, what do the notes of the students of the episode tend to look like? This is a really interesting question. That's so funny. Yeah.
Because I think for me personally, it's never, um, well thought out note taking. It's usually, I forget that I'm the student and then anything that makes me go, Oh, I will just write it down. It's often like a key term or something that made me laugh or a quote that makes me giggle so that I can remember exactly what I do. Yeah. Yeah. I'm so glad. Yeah. Yeah.
It's also funny because we haven't ever explicitly said that like, I guess we have talked like joke. Oh, it was jokingly say the stuff that the students taking notes, but like we haven't ever we've never talked about this. Yeah. What's higher? Yeah. I mean, we take notes just to do the summary at the end. We're not taking notes.
real notes that we go away. It's funny because I will actually take similar notes sometimes during, even when I'm not the student, if I presented the previous topic, if it's just like something that I'm like, oh, that's good. I want to write that down. It is funny stuff, any big good word.
Uh, there's also to be completely honest amidst the notes. There is also like a joke that I wanted to get to, but then was like, eh, it's too late to bring this up now. So a lot of love from me. Yeah. But that's, uh, that's what's there.
Lars asked, what is your opinion on maths? And is there a chance they will ever be a maths-themed topic on the podcast? Oh, definitely. They're definitely one way. I will say straight away, not from me anytime soon, not that I don't like the idea. I've considered a few like unsolved maths problems and the drama around grooves people submit.
or like statistics and why people find statistics so hard. But I find maths really, really hard. It's not necessarily that fun for me to learn, which makes writing about it hard, because you want to have fun when you're learning. You want to be enjoying the whole process. Yeah, totally. But I'd love someone, Mathsy or for Caroline and Tom to come in and sweep me off my maths feet.
I'll say, yes, absolutely, I would like to do some math topics at some point. It is just finding somebody in my life, just like how Ella has a physics person to make sure things are correct. I feel like I need somebody, Matthew, in my life. And I try to explain maths to me, you know, and it's just not gone well. Yeah. My brain literally like switches off when there's maths involved. Oh, I have to concentrate really intensely hard. So.
We've done some in the past. I've done pie. Like, why is pie so big? How much pie do we need? That didn't feel like a master figure. Maybe that's why it was a good master figure. Oh, it was, yeah. And then interesting numbers with Annie. We did that. But I agree that it's missing in the... We need to cover more, but I do agree also. Yeah, pie was a great one. Pie was an amazing one as well. So there you go. We have done maths.
No, it's on the list. It's on the list. I'm actively, it's actively something that I think also, I mean, we've been guests like Toby, I think could also bring, bring something to, to make a mess. I think it would be a really good guest topic. Yeah. Helena asks, what's a topic you wish someone would do instead of you? Maths.
I think this is a really interesting question. I think a topic I would have like previously said that I wanted one of you to do might have been like a big physics or space topic because I thought I just wouldn't have the capacity to do that. But this is I did like gravitational waves.
which was so good. My mind changed a lot because not only was it really fun to research and write, I was learning too there and in a way that I found really fun. And so now it's actually the other way around. I want you guys to cover stuff I.
No already. Um, so I can hear it from a new perspective and it can be fun again. Um, that's really interesting. Yeah. The same reason there's like, I find it hard to write about diabetes. Like I probably really liked to hear one of you guys talk about it. That one might be a bit annoying for you because I'd be like, actually, like maybe, maybe something like cancer, you know, like a big bottle of biomedical science topic. I would be interested in it.
Yeah, I think obviously if it's, if it's a little too um, actually, then like that. Um, but, um, sometimes having the assist on a topic is super, like, for example, when Caroline did the, um, did the Christmas question about, uh, taste buds and then Ella was able to just like pop in with like a quick fun fact or definitely like that. So that's actually great. So I mean, so there's a double whammy to that then. Like if you guys did, so one of you did like cancer as a topic, it would make that about so make cancer fun. That's obviously not what I'm saying.
Yeah. Make a topic that I know quite well, more interesting again. Yeah. Yeah. And also I could be like, oh, here's something I know too. So yeah, I feel like that's a really nice thing is to get someone to do topic you kind of know already. Yeah. Well, my answer was dumb. I said, I should do microscopes because I've said that before. You have said it. And it's on my list. And I keep on meaning to kind of explore it more. But then I get kind of stuck.
Yeah, I think I think similar to like a broad topic. I think sometimes it's almost like hard to find the gold in it. Or again, the fascination. Yeah, finding that through. Yeah, I need to find like the angle. I don't know about what you guys, but like when there's a broad topic like that, let's like, you know, you find one like,
You're digging through and you find a paper that you've never seen, that it's so interesting that you know the other people love. It doesn't matter what the rest of the topic is. If we can get to this, if we can build up to this, it's game of itself. I have so many topics that are based around a single thing that I want to get to. It just makes you go like, yeah, like the chef's kiss little gem there for sure. I'm glad we all, yeah, that's funny.
The card, a cat of spades, asked, do you all ever get recognized out in the wild? How do you respond? How would you want to be approached if a fan saw you? Oh, that's interesting. That's a lovely question. Mal, probably. I think.
Back away in fear. Yeah. Well, so this is really interesting because we, Ella, I will share our story about when we went to Lateral Live, which the episode has just come out now, which is really exciting. And the sort of like, if we're going to get recognized, this is the space where it's going to have to be really, really badly wanted for someone to come up to us.
I'm walking around, like, looking around, hoping someone might stay, so nothing. And waving from our seats and stuff like that. Some people on social media afterwards said, oh, I thought I saw you there, and we were like, why didn't you come up to us? Someone said they saw us, but they didn't.
want to bother us or they were too nervous come up and I was like please do because we're not actually famous in any way and also we're on a podcast and no one knows what we look like so yeah so if you do recognize us come and say hello yeah we're not that's
Also, you know, we're not at Chapel Rown, famous where this, we're saying something like this, we'll bite us in the ass, but also sometimes if you're with someone, what's more impressive than being recognized in front of that person? So sometimes like, you know, I've been with friends at like a climbing gym one time and like I'm talking with them and then like, I go to leave and then someone, then someone goes up, I was like, hey, I love XRZ. And then I go back to the friend group and I can't be like, that person,
You won't believe it when you were gone. The moment you left, they recognize it. So, okay, I'm not encouraging, like, actively, like, but also, I kind of am. But I would definitely go back to Twitter and say, that person just said they loved me. Yeah, yeah.
I think or when it comes to like what you expect, I think just saying like, oh, I love what you do or X, Y, Z. If you want to talk about like a topic also, obviously, if you hate it, tell us that too. Yeah. Tell us about faces that you don't like it. Tell us, say to my face, not behind my bag. Yeah, I think just saying, just saying you like that you like, if you like what we do saying that and then. Yeah.
Yeah, I'm happy. I'm happy to chat about any specific signs or something like that to talk a bit more. But if you just want to literally just pop and say, love the show, nice to meet you, then even take a picture or anything like that. I think we'd be more always going to want to take a picture with us. But maybe I'm just being too. But if you do, Tom, you're doing big stuff now. You're on things. I think you underestimate. I think there's plenty of folks who... I mean, I love it. I'm just trying to not let you go get too big.
And yeah, sure, sure, sure. Maybe they'll take an audio picture with you. Oh, yeah. Iris asked, do you all feel like you're running out of topics you're interested in slash passionate about? I feel like more frequently it's joked. Wow, Caroline immediately shake their head.
Yeah. I feel like more frequently it's joked about the topics or whatever you can find around you. And I'm wondering if you find it hard to come up with ideas for podcasts. Oh, funny. I think that's a really good thing. Interesting thing to point out, Iris. Yeah. It's definitely a joke we've made. I want to say we do say this partly is a joke and it's partly true, but the truth of it isn't a bad thing.
Yeah, like you can find a topic by doing a bit more detailed research and we do do that, but also being able to look at something and realize there's something to learn in that. That's pretty fun. So wonderful. Absolutely. Like with the autumn leaves topic,
I was so unsure going to if that was going to be a successful topic in any way. And then once again, it's that like when you find a paper that just answers the questions you have and it's so delightful and so anxious. Yeah, good word, right? But yeah, there is so much joy in just learning and there's so much to learn about those everyday things that you just don't often get the chance to sit and think about it. And we do get the chance to sit and think about it as part of this podcast. Yeah. So yeah.
And that's, yeah, that's really fun when you get something like that. Yeah, I mean, I agree with it. I think I think the looking around is not an indicator of running out of topics. I think it's sort of we find that way of coming up with topics by seeing the world around you super fun. Yeah.
That's exactly it. I completely agree. It's the way I think about the way I think about topics has changed. When we started, especially the miss, a lot of it was stuff I already knew was already interesting. It was the things are preloaded ammo in our brain. Exactly. Our favorite fun facts to tell us things are literally like what we studied in undergrad.
And now I get to find things that are new and exciting. I get to find interesting new things. And also we're learning along with you guys now more than we were when we started this podcast, which I think is a really nice thing.
Um, yeah, the answer is I'm a good Christ. I'm looking at my list of topics. Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot. There's a lot. I'll give you a teaser, actually, for my first topic. And when we get back, it's going to be a topic that I've said I'm going to cover forever and didn't get around to. I'm finally going to do it. So it's kind of like these things are still there that we're not going to run out. Turns out there's a lot in the world.
JLT asked, what are the logistics behind coordinating a guest? Is it hard? Are there plans for more guests in the future? Can you talk about it a little? Yeah, I mean, it's a combination of either someone reaches out and says, we like the show or us reaching out and saying, we love what you do. You know, logistics wise, it's like, well, we'll give them a rundown. We'll show them some examples of the show, good guest examples, episodes,
One person will usually be the wrangler of the guest to make sure charge of the person. To specifically also to make sure that their topic doesn't overlap with the past would be something that fits with the show but also then keeping the others in secret.
Um, and then making sure that if there's any like miscellaneous thing, they want to talk about two that we can ask those questions. Um, we'll also, the Wrangler will guess Wrangler will also like do some extra research, you know, to be like what's some things we can ask this person. Um, but when it comes to just having them on, it's, uh, it's just a fun. It's just nice. It's just, uh, fun. Isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. We've, we've done a good job finding guests that are vibe super well.
Yeah, totally. Gretchen was so good. I'll say a fun behind the scenes thing to say about that is I told Ellen Caroline that episode actually required a ton of fucking editing because we were all on the same wavelength.
It was too similar. We were hopping topics like madness and I had to like move stuff to make sure we were like talking about the same topic as I'm supposed to. Yeah, yeah, you did such a good job with that edit. It was seamless. There's literally a moment in the episode where Gretchen goes like, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And we all go like, mmm.
What was the rest of the question again? I forgot. Can you say it again? Are there plans for more guests in the future? I mean, absolutely. We already got a guest lined up for, can I say, release in January?
Probably January, January, February. We'll see what I want. That's the other thing with guests is we obviously don't want to become solely a guest. We're not a guest podcast. Like we love having people on and they bring something new. But last year we did four guest episodes. I think that's probably about where we're going to stay. Maybe one more, but I think that felt good. Yeah. We have one if we get successfully for the next year, if we do get the and I'll censor this, if we do get
I think that would be so great. That would be really good. At the end of last year's Q&A, when we were saying what guests we had coming up, we did say three names that we bleeped and Tom and Hank were two of them. We were like, these are the things we're trying to get this year. We're going to get home. We're going to get Hank. Wow.
And we got that we got make our bleeps bigger this year. All right, I'll say it's Vladimir Putin. Get on the phone. We didn't get a third person because they're not doing podcasts at the moment. So that was, but I won't say it just in case one day, just in case.
Rainbow Llama asked, how has the format changed been since moving from main question to main, missed student? Is there anything that you think worked better in the old format? Is there any other format you're thinking about trying? Like they asked, for example, one offs or making a main topic span to one or more episodes, two or more episodes.
How do you guys feel about the change? I love the amazing. Incredible. Just so good. Just so nice. I think we were all starting to reach a point where, and I know for me personally, when we started off doing the podcast, I was at uni. I had so much spare time. Yeah, we had. I was doing my PhD. I had a lot of spare time.
And then jobs happened and all of a sudden it was like, wow, can't do this anymore. This is too much. And it was feeling like too much. So when we did the switch, wow, it made not doing the podcast before wasn't enjoyable, but it did make it so much more enjoyable with that format change, which was wonderful.
I mean, I would say on the actual like, how it comes across as a listener, I would say we've had people comment, it's either improved it or, you know, kept it at the same level, changed anything. Yeah. Yeah. Someone recently told us that it meant that you could get into more in depth and like see the two top things like and follow it without because otherwise three could have was a bit overwhelming. And I can see how that would be the case. Also,
Yeah, for sure. It has been in all three of our natures to get more and more deeply into these topics. And we've just naturally done that. And this allows that before it. I feel like we were restricting ourselves slightly when it came to certain parts. Especially with our conversations we have.
Yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah, 100%. There's, there's, I love giving a little bit more space into the topic for, uh, happen with the scary stories where I was just like, insert a little fun game where we just chat about. Yeah. Um, I mean,
So quantum physics from both a length of topic and amount of time to prep for it could not have happened otherwise to happen for this for the topic chain. I mean, yeah, it's been amazing. I think the amazing thing is that it's been both good for us outside of the podcast. And then also surprisingly for the podcast, I feel like the show has really adapted. We say all the fucking time, like we genuinely say off mic all the time, like, holy shit, how did we used to
And like it's so it's so anytime someone's about to go on break, which is we all just like go like, that was a good idea. That worked really great. And breathe. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The only thing I would say I miss from the three format is the question topic and how yeah, completely agree. Often we didn't do this. We would just ask a question and present it as a normal topic. But sometimes you made those question topics and very question heavy for the two other hosts. And I did like that aspect of it. Yeah.
I remember someone made that note before, and I read that, and I think I now consciously think about if I can make science topics, question-y. Questions, yeah. In fact, we do that. And I think all three of us- I mean, autumn leaves, like, what the fuck? Yeah, that's like, yeah. I think it's clear to me that as time has gone on since we changed, all three of us actively script questions in for each other, which I think is a really great little change that actually makes quite a lot of difference.
I will say this and I saw this a few weeks ago. It's so funny. Someone thought someone in the discord was catching up and they got to the moment where it changes and they thought that when someone was quote unquote on break, they wouldn't be on the podcast.
So we would just be like me and Ella and then Caroline because we don't have a topic. We'd just be gone. I thought that was so funny. And they were like, I'm so relieved. That's nice.
I mean, getting to do the, my YouTube thing also for sure. And then, I mean, other things like being on lateral more, I would even just like other things outside of it. It's, it's, it's been great. And I mean, but most importantly, I'm glad folks, folks have, have, have also liked it as well. It's, it's nice to get a, get a win-win like that. It's, it's very rare and it's, it's nice.
Next year on topic. Yeah, guys, that's format. The format show is changing. Next year one topic that you're after none. No topic. Next year, negative one negative. We actually start lying into your science. We do just, we do just give you fake facts and ruin everything. What we do once you're those science and one conspiracy theory ever.
This episode of Let's Done Everything is brought to you by Wild Grey. Okay, quick, before Ella and Caroline get back. Maybe I can answer a few questions all on my own. Okay, first one, first one. This year, what's been your favorite bake from Frozen subscription box? Wow, that's such a good question. Man, our listeners are so insightful, I mean, you know, um...
It's gotta be Wild Grain, you know, I think it's a classic answer, but like they're the first to do it, and they've got everything from bread, to pastries, to pasta, also been supporters of the show for a long time. So I think, yeah, I think it probably goes with that. Okay, next question. What's your favorite Wild Grain item to get? Oh, fuck, I wish I had more time to prep for this question. Caroline, why don't you go first?
Fuck, right, okay, it's just me. Well, honestly, you know, it's a boring answer, but probably their classic sourdough. Because their boxes are fully customizable, I always make sure to include at least one. But then after that, I always like to toss in something new, and I've yet to be disappointed that way. I had never tried their Apple Caramel Galette, and also their slow fermented veggie pizza, and they were both amazing. Okay, next question. What's your favorite wild grain promo code? Oh, I bet we all have the same answer. Should we all say it at the same time?
This was a dumb idea. I miss my co-host too much. I know exactly how Carolina would answer this. They would probably say something like, for a limited time, Wild Grain is offering our listeners $30 off the first box, plus free croissants, and then Ella would say croissants, in every box. When you go to wildgrain.com, slash let's learn. Start your subscription. That's wildgrain.com slash let's learn, or you can use promo code, let's learn at checkout.
Oh, there is one more left here. Let me see. This next question says, I figured you might peek ahead at the questions. Thank you for doing the ad for us, Tom. And that question was submitted by Ella. Huh. What a weird question to ask. Not really even a question. Also, what a coincidence. Ella's name is Ella. Huh. Small world.
If you need a laugh and you're on the go, try STOP, P-O-D-T-A-S-T-I. Hmm. Are you trying to put the name of the podcast there? Yeah, I'm trying to spell it, but it's tricky. Let me give it a try. Okay. If you need a laugh and you're on the go call STOP, P-P-A-D-I will never fit. No, it will. Let me try.
If you need a laugh and you're on the go, try STOPPPDCOO. Ah, we are so close. Stop podcasting yourself. A podcast from maximumfun.org. If you need a laugh and you're on the go.
My name is Jordan Krushiola, and I love movies. But you know what I might love even more? Talking about movies. And the directors, actors, and writers that join me every week on Feeling Scene love to talk about movies too. Like our recent co-host, the writer and director Justin Simeon. And I love the premise of your show, Feeling Scene. I think that's kind of always my goal when I'm making something. Nothing touches my heart more than when someone comes out of my movie and says, oh my God, I never thought I would see myself.
So hang out with us and geek out about watching movies, making movies, and the ways the movies we love speak to us directly. You might just start asking folks around you, hey, what movie character made you feel seen? We're doing it every week at maximumfun.org.
For full disclosure, to listeners, Ella has kept a portion of the questions completely secret and labeled them secret. And I realize we haven't cracked that nut yet. Yeah. Well, we're about to crack it now. Tom, please play secret.mp3. Why does Ella, the largest host, not simply be the other two?
You know you created a whole In the section of questions that I thought was a whole category of
Again, again. Why does Alan, the largest host not simply be the other two? Yes. So good. Can we have a spot for five things? I think I need to listen to that like 20 times listeners. There is weeks of buildup, literal weeks and weeks of buildup of Ella saying, don't look at those secret questions that I have. There's a secret news section receiving secret.mp3 and not clicking on it.
Dice Cup Merlin, Matt Pritchard, asked, how many of this year's questions are about the strongest host eating the others? And if no one were to submit a question about that, would you make up a listener and claim that they had asked the question? The first answer to that is, including this question, there were 12, which is what. Where we really am. Would you make up a listener and ask the question if it hadn't been asked? Well, I didn't have to worry about that, but yes, I would have.
Twelve. Twelve. Twelve. Never stop. I love people. Lots of people, including Ari, Luke, Fern, Daft Punk, Ashley Hall, are something like this, but I chose Ari's for no particular reason. Why has an Ella, the biggest, strongest, smartest, most beautiful and lovable host? Yeah, no reason at all. Ethan, the other two smaller, lesser hosts yet. And it's because I have come to care for them, but should they cross me?
Wow. And now I feel like I am the one that Ella loves dearly. That's why I said I was like, you're already the ones. God fucking damn it. David Weber and end girls asked, why don't the weaker host just gang up and eat the strongest host to put an end to her tyranny? Tom, we've not been teaming up enough. We haven't thought about unionizing yet. No.
I have some pamphlets for you. Thank you. Yeah. And finally, Lexi asks, do you know the LA eating other host gags last joke? Someone made once upon a time is borrowed from a future armor episode where the aliens are talking about the sitcom friends. Yes.
Nice to clarify for folks. Yeah, I think it's good to clarify. And also, while that there are so many sub questions, I thought this was a bit. This is actually legitimately a meaningful category of questions that we received. OK, that's it though. Funny. No, fun is a different section. Look, could you probably let's get personal? This is a new record, actually, this one from me.
It's giving, like, Steven Universe. Oh, it does, yeah. I love it. Oh, yeah. And just like Steven Universe, the introspection. Yeah. All of these tracks are, like, different parts of the main welcome theme.
with just me. I thought so! Which is a nice little touch. What a fun bit of lore. CBT business, Ziad, until asked something on the lines of what are your jobs outside the podcast? There have been some changes here since last year when the first year. Thought it would be a good chance to catch up. Why don't we start with you Caroline?
I, as of recording this, am about to change jobs, actually, which is very exciting and working at the same place. I was a community engagement officer for Heritage Lottery Fund project, so I was working on a castle site that was applying for some money and talking to people about that. I'm now an Environment and Sustainability Officer, which is very exciting. And I only sort of know what that's going to entail. I'm very excited about the role change, though. It's very cool.
I don't, yeah, I guess we don't talk about this on the part as much, but I'm gonna say Caroline, you're hearing your job, new job stuff, every time I get the message in our little group chat, I'm always like, it makes me happy that day. Yeah, because since I left the science museum, I've had a few jobs, because I've never had a, I've not had a permanent contract since then. And now I have returned to the realm of permanent contracts, which is incredibly exciting. Meanwhile, on the flip side of that,
I also have a new thing because the role opened up recently. I'm the CEO for UnitedHealthcare. I can't wait to think real hard of whether I'll include that or not. It's good.
So, yeah, at the end of last year, I got laid off from my software development job, and it's been a weird year for software. There's a lot of layoffs and stuff going on. So, I have been sort of trying the freelance create-ery thing a thing this year, and it's been interesting. It's been okay. You know, sort of... That's so scary, though, but yeah. It's really scary.
Because obviously I was doing software before, it's much easier for me to be able to try that experiment for a bit, right? Because there's having built up some money so that it's not fighting for my life, every single video I make trying to be like,
Figuring it out, kind of seeing where things are going. You're figuring it out. Tom Lum does have a Patreon if you want to support him for his YouTube videos. I still have the same job I had last year. I'm a producer for BBC Science Radio.
I don't, I talk about it sometimes, but I don't necessarily talk about what it is I make. And so I think maybe that might be nice to shout out the stuff I make. Yeah. Yes. Right now I make a program for BBC Radio 4 called Inside Science, which is like a weekly magazine news program.
So lots of different science stories. I don't think that that would be something our listeners would enjoy it. Or like, that's not true. I don't think it's something that aligns with what this podcast is. So I would necessarily recommend it. But I do produce and host another series called Unstoppable on the BBC World Service, which means you can listen to him in America.
and anywhere else in the world. And I host that with another X, PhD, X, scientist, Julia. And we talk about, we just tell each other interesting stories of women in science. And the new season is coming out of that in March, including an idea that I got from this podcast from Tom. So that's really exciting. And I actually do think maybe some people would who listen to our podcast would enjoy that. So maybe give that a try.
Someone who I think meant to put their name back, so they just put phonetically works. Sorry. I don't like next year. Tom, your hair looks so silky and smooth. What do you use for it?
This is so fucking funny. Hold on, hold on. I use head and shoulders. Yeah. Oh, wow. That's it. The neutral scent one. Yeah. I was going to say, the neutral scent on the apple scented head and shoulders is like my preferred, but, you know, used to use apple. Nice.
I use whatever the cheapest one I can find. It's like a $1 shampoo. Oh, wow. And it works fine. I think my hair's fine. Yeah, it's lovely. I use a Trezine usually because I am worried about bougie. I know. Well, my hair's not very thick and I worry if I use a dandruff shampoo, then my hair will fall out.
Let me all give it a shot. Caroline? Hello. Joel would love to hear about your experience of being non-binary, and Piffy would like to know how they can explain being non-binary to family members.
Oh, first off to Piffy, congrats for coming out. How fun is that? How exciting is that? For me, I don't know. Oh, gosh. What a question. What is it like? I mean, it's just who I am. So don't know if I can really say any more than that. It's just who I am. And therefore my lived experiences are all shaped through being non-binary, which is cool.
I kind of have a question then to expand on Joel's point is you're, you know, you are feminine presenting right now. Sometimes you haven't been in the past before, you've been gender neutral, but I like to flip flop between the two. Yeah, absolutely. Do you think that that affects the way people view your validity as a non-binary person?
100% oh my god yeah absolutely and it's especially in the workplace it's much harder to get people to understand what I'm even talking about sometimes when I'm sharing like pronouns and things like that and if I'm explaining the concept in general to people I often start off by talking about
sex and male and female and the people who don't necessarily align with that because it's a concrete thing that people can see and point out and go, ah, yeah, science, I understand that. And then from there talking about how gender is different to that and how non-binary is an umbrella term and which- That's a lot. A lot of steps. Just to say your pronouns, isn't it?
Often if I'm coming up to people for the first time, I'm not opening up to discussion at all. Yeah, just bam. This is who I am. And that's the end of the conversation for now. And I might come back to having discussions about what that actually means to me later on, but I'm not willing to open up discussions about it the first time I'm saying it to somebody because it will just open up too many cans of worms for one guy. Yeah.
I mean, I think that's a really fair and interesting point. I think, you know, some people might have the expectation that it's like, explain yourself to me. It's like my guy. I'm just, it's like, you would never ask the same thing of like a cisgender person to be like, Hey, why are you, why are, why
do you use here? Those are also valid questions. It's a lot of sitting down and figuring yourself out and we should all probably go through that journey to establish if you do feel like a man or a woman or something else, but often for cis people it's not an expectation to sit down and have those thoughts.
Yeah, absolutely. I think it's really interesting on the content creation side things, because even though I don't make like TikToks on, even though I don't make videos on TikTok anymore, I still have videos up that people will see on comment on periodically. And so many times somebody will see my pronouns in my name and go, I'm not listening to anything you're saying.
because that exists there. And I used to really play up on that when I made videos. I used to talk about stuff like that even more, because I was like, well, if you're going to say mean things about me, I'm going to use it for engagement, you know? It's a bit sad to do. You've got to do what you've got to do. But you've got to do. Yeah, absolutely. What was Piffy's other question? Was that about how you would come out?
Yeah, so Piffy would like to know how they can explain being non-binary to family members. And they also ask us fun ideas on coming out. I don't know if you have any of those. I would say, it's like, I think it's like, when you do like a gender reveal and it's like a boy, like blue or pink, you just, you're just like yellow. Yeah. What does it mean? Nobody knows.
um but yeah i would say in terms of like explaining it and in terms of coming out in general that's such a personal thing to you i would say don't put too much pressure on it the first time around because people are not going to understand it and that's okay you know people are allowed to not understand things people are allowed to get things wrong when it comes to that side of things um obviously if people are being outright disrespectful rude and mean don't accept that don't just feel like you have to deal with that but also
Try and take the pressure off that stuff as well because people will respond how they will respond and you can't control their response. So yeah, don't think about it too much. Sometimes be safe when it comes to coming out. Obviously, if you're in an environment where you might get kicked out of your home or something like that, just make sure that you really know that that is what you want to do and be able to deal with the fallout that might happen afterwards. But otherwise, don't think about it too much.
Let the conversation go where it's going to go. That's very sound advice, Caroline. Thank you for that, Caroline. That was great. Corinne asked, what is something you think the other hosts would be surprised to know about you? This still occasionally does happen. It does happen every now and then, doesn't it? It's funny because sometimes it happens when we go on other shows. I think it's happening on the lateral or even on escape this pod. I said something that surprised you guys. I said on lateral, I was like, I collected spoons.
when I was younger, and you guys are like, what? It's funny because I wrote in, when I was thinking about the sense that I said, I don't think there's anything left for like, you guys to be surprised about, but based on the fact that, you know, we've known each other for four years, five years, a while, four years. A while now, yeah. And don't scare me. And I do feel like every time I say something, I guess I have a lot of things about me that come out of left field.
The beginning of this where I was like, my toes pop out sometimes and you guys are like, that's crazy. Sometimes these things just don't come up in conversation until we're presented a very unique opportunity to divulge something. Yeah. Did I tell you I collected, I still do if I see the machines squashed pennies?
that print, you know, they- Oh, gosh, pennies. Yeah, that's great. Maybe that won't surprise you because you know about my spoons. No, that surprises me. Pretty, Pete. I feel like you would go into one of those at like a Disney World and turn your nose up at that like cranky, crank, penny thing. Turn my nose up. I mean, I know that my persona is quite like a negative and a combative, but I engage with everything in life very sincerely, like everything.
And if something gives me like an ounce of joy, then like I engaged with it again and again. With no shame. Oh, how many of joy? Yeah, that's, I can't think of other than that off the tour of my head, but they'll come up. There's still time. I think the rock climbing for me was that's been my most like non, but even I guess I didn't find it. No, I remember why I didn't find that surprising at the end is because I was like climbing sports for nerds. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
And I say that with great love in my heart. A lot of my friends are climbers. That's why. Yeah. If you'd been like, I play like American football, I've been like, that's genuinely shocking to me. Oh, I mean, they're great. I have that with their one album on vinyl. So like, I love American football. Wow. Yeah.
Actually, I do enjoy football on occasion and recently went to a football match in person. Yes. That's quite surprising. This being soccer, when you said you went to a football match, I was genuinely shocked.
Sit right with my head and I have a great time. I was like chanting and booing at the referee and all of that jazz, you know, it was great. Last question, an anonymous person has asked, what is your favorite learning experience from 2034 that was not on the podcast? That's an interesting, it's a good question. I like that. Yeah.
I've got a few. Um, go on. The first one for me was still science. And I've talked about it on the podcast, but, um, because you guys have gone and done like stand up comedy about science before. And that's a world that I had never.
entertained ever. I'd never gone to comedy shows and things like that. And this year I started going to science comedy shows and learning about science in a different way. And I had my goodness, I really enjoyed doing that and just doing some different things in the sciencey world. I mean, it seems so up your alley. Right, it's ridiculous that I haven't before.
But the other thing, on the flip side of the two big passions in my life, I guess, is the art side of things. Because I... Oh, sorry. You're two big passions, me and Ella. Yeah, of course. Just to clarify. Apart from you guys, there's then science. It's Ella as the biggest scariest host who could eat me, so I have to put her at the top. Then Tom, then science and then art.
And I had not painted anything since I started uni, basically doing my masters. Again, I hadn't painted anything for a really, really long time. And I got to pick that up again this year by doing some of our Pride merch artwork, which is really cool. Wow, yeah. Yeah, right. But I also started doing some art classes on art meetings that I've never done before. Oh my gosh.
I'm so the big one was I learnt how to do lino printing, which that's the front. Yeah, and I shared some pictures on Blue Sky, but for the most part, I've kept that to myself as well, which is very, very fun. It's so nice to have something like that. Yeah. What about you, Tom?
Um, not going to be surprising at all. In fact, some people are going to be surprised to took this long. It's only a little bit, but I have enjoyed that. I've tried not to mention it very purposely, not to mention it too much on the podcast, but it's leaked through a few times is, uh, yeah, this year I learned to play Magic the Gallery.
Yeah, that's cute. I started this year. I've made a lot of friends with it. It's been fun to learn. But the other thing I went to, and the reason I'm excited to say this one is because viewers can watch this. This year I went to the XOXO Festival. It was a small creator festival that no longer exists anymore. That was the last one in Portland.
And there were some talks there that were just so fascinating about the nature of the internet, just some amazing talks there. And they're all on YouTube, so you can watch them all on the XOXO talk. I'll link them in the description. But yeah, yeah, sitting in the auditorium and just like, I was like, because most talks goddamn, some talks can be such bullshit, but these were very interesting into the nature of the internet and social media and stuff. And I really really love that. That was one of my favorite things I did this year was going to that.
What about you Ella? Thanks for asking Caroline. Sorry, I also it's it's it's hard because I presume you've read them all. Yeah. I wasn't saying that as a dig to you. I just felt bad for not asking, but I was like, because I presumed you had you had something to say. I am curious.
I've mentioned to you guys a few times, I'm sure I've done it on the podcast. I'm learning Japanese right now because I'm going to Japan in May. And obviously learning a language isn't necessarily like a learning experience. Lots of people do it all the time. But I've always been, I've always given up on languages really quickly after trying to start learning them. But I do this like an hour a day and have for like
Five months. And I'm really enjoying it because it feels like a puzzle. That's amazing. These Japanese are so different from English. It's like I work doing a constantly doing a puzzle. It makes my mind really active. And I'm always thinking about it. And I've started getting Japanese tweets recommended to me on Twitter. And I sit there and try and read them. I can't read them.
I tried. Then as an individual learning experience, I put on a live show this year, like a produced a live show a couple of months ago. And it was about the science of laughter. And it was like a comedian and you're a scientist and then a presenter. And like I put that all together. I did all of the research. I did. I talked to all of the guests. I made the scripts, like wrote them out and then set it all up. And it was like a very intense experience. But like as far as like,
producing something really clean, and fun, and science, he still was like a huge huge learning experience for me. Wow, yeah. Yeah. Not to tag on, but I also, I forgot, um, doing the YouTube video, not just the video part, but learning camera stuff was really fun. And now I still have a, um, enjoy some of that. Sorry. Yeah. Just wanted to really know. So yeah, I think it's just a lesson.
Good question. Always learning. I mean, that's kind of like the nature of the podcast, so whatever. But it's nice that we like to do that outside of the show. I actually, you know, it does worry me when I started working in science full-time, like learning science, which I might be like, am I going to get fed up with this? I'm not. And even in my life, you know, that was the last question of this section. Can we get science communication, please, Tom? This bit is about science communication.
I'm glad you kept that audio clip. So this is actually relevant to Caroline's learning experience going to science comedy. Tizzy top the clown said, as an aspiring clown, humor is very important to my line of work. Some might even say essential as host of a science podcast. Do you all feel that humor is relevant or even useful in modern science communication? If so, why? Now,
Um, first of all, also, you're not an aspiring clown. You are a clown. Is there like, maybe there's some like formal process that you have to go through to become like a registered clown that makes it. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe legally or not. Like if you're legally not a clown yet. Yeah. If you're an aspiring pilot that doesn't make you a pilot, just putting that out there.
But for clowns, sure. I mean, first and foremost, I feel like if you make something funny, it becomes so much more approachable straight away, right? Like if you have the power to make somebody laugh through something, then that person's sort of like you bring them onto your side a little bit as well, I think, and that can make communicating a bit easier with them.
I also, I call the show a science and comedy podcast. I always use both words. It's, it's funny because also I do think, I don't know how you guys feel about this because it's like part of it is like it is using it as like a useful tool. The other half of it is just like that's just.
how I like to spend time. So I was talking with Toby gets on the show when we were at VidCon and I had just done the release my long form video and she was like, what was the hardest part? And I was like, oh, I think it easily like the camera stuff because I had to learn so much stuff. And she was like, it's not what about like the jokes and the writing in that. And I was like, oh, no, that's that has to happen. That's that's
Yeah. That's not like a thing I even like plan explicitly. That's just what happens when I write sometimes. You know, sometimes it's played up more. I'm just such a natural born comedian. It's just so funny. It's less that it's more just like, I can't not say the dumb thing that comes to my mind. Yeah. It's just so sometimes it's just what I enjoy, I guess. Yeah. It's my own natural way of saying that.
I don't want to, I mean, it's a very good point. Our podcast is a science and comedy podcast, but it's, it's definitely more science than it is comedy, right? I think, but I think people, other people, other scientists use comedy in a much more like, um, forward way, like much more. What's the word I'm looking for?
Pre-meditated or obvious way, explicit way, and much more explicit way. I think that has an incredibly important place. It has an important place in any kind of learning. It's not just science, comedy in news shows, people who are doing funny ways of delivering news.
That's just as relevant as any other type of news format. And so I think it's just a different way of learning. The things I often remember from the podcast the most, the things that made me laugh, were like shocked me into laughter. So I think that's something to be said.
Yeah, like a point. Well, if you were like, no, actually, actually, actually, no, this is a great point. I don't think it's necessary. That's what Carolyn, I just keep on telling you throughout the year. Every time you make a joke, Tom, we're not doing that anymore. You remember when the listeners spoke up, they said it. Phillip from Florence asked,
Hello, wonderful people. I'm an aspiring science communicator. Is aspiring relevant here? I don't know. Are you just a science communicator? No. Listen, you say you're an aspiring science communicator. You're not. You can just say you're a clown.
I'm an aspiring science communicator from Italy and I love the fact that every one of you has gone through several different forms of psychom for ending up where you are now. My question is exactly about this. How has the experience of science communication changed on different platforms? And then Kimberly asked something similar, which is what do you think the best platform is? So changing and the best platform. I'm happy to go ahead here. Yeah, go for it. I would like to separate this out into like TikTok podcast and YouTube mainly. Yeah.
Obviously, there's some written forms, but let's just go with these kind of media ones. TikTok is sensationalist a lot of ways. It's attention grabbing, but that has its place if it's done well. For delivering short, sharp facts that get people just immediately zapped interested in a bit of science.
Yeah, podcasting is thoughtful and long form, but it's really, it's harder to get people to engage with that if it isn't already willing to engage with science. So that's why where something like TikTok would come in to start ease people in. TikTok's like lots of matches and then a podcast is like logs, right? That's a really good one. YouTube, I think you can take the best of both because you can like lead with the sensationalist stuff and then before you break it down into something more detailed in science.
But also, it's a lot more effort, right, than the other two. So it's not necessarily the best platform for doing regular stuff. But, or I think all have their place and their usefulness. It depends on what you're trying to achieve.
Yeah, absolutely. Oh, that's a great point. Well, I was going to say, I feel like the underlying currents of what you're saying, Ella, is that being on multiple platforms, not being solely dependent on anyone is very important. Oh, yeah. I mean, I say that I'm only on this one. We're on this one now. Tom's the only one succeeding in that one.
Well, well, no, I mean, you guys also in your work do do do design. Yeah, that's a shame. Then you get Carolina, you know, you're talking about looking at stand up and stuff like that too, as well. Yeah. I love that necessarily for yourself, but like, you know, I think I've then pondered the idea. Absolutely.
I mean, I think every year we are gladder and gladder that we decided on a way to start a podcast from going off of a TikTok. Yeah, absolutely. Like I think that every year that that decision has gotten more and more. I mean, yeah, the podcast, the consistency of the podcast and not having to worry about having to fight the algorithm for people to hear it is just like so. Yeah, on the experience side from Phillips question, like, yeah, the
I would say the experience of doing a podcast is much, much better than trying to make a TikTok. I also talk about things I like a lot more on the podcast, because I started to just talk about things that I thought people might actually pay attention to, and TikTok was not a good way to do it. That's it. God, it's such a slow start. I remember very clearly we were first publishing the episode, and compared to TikTok, well, again,
Great. Best thing about TikTok is the instant feedback. Like, holy moly, you'll get that right away. I remember posting the, publishing the podcast and then just being like, so now, well, like it takes literally, even if someone watches it right away, it still takes them like two hours to finish an episode. Like it's really slow. Yeah. So we've been doing it. How long have we been making this podcast? Three years. Just over three years. Just over three years. It's only this, at this three year mark that I've been like, oh, we, people are listening to this.
Yes, it's taking a hot time. I'll be honest, I mean, there's stuff about TikTok going away in the US, but I don't think things have changed a ton. I still think there's value to each of them and against your point. It depends on what you want to get out of it. What are you trying to achieve? Is that a really deep conversation? Or is it something just, as Tom said, you say, lighting a match in someone, making that first spark? Really good.
I think the thing that I like about TikTok especially is that it does feel like it's made science communication a lot more casual as well in some ways. And it's easier to dip your toes into as a creator. Let me give this a bit of a go. And I think that's all wonderful. We toss up something on the green screen background. Let me just.
And I do think that's great for especially visibility of people who you don't often see as science communication. I think that's a really great thing like for queer people, people of color, disabled people, like it does open that up in a way that sometimes things like more traditional science communication
doesn't, you know? So I do think it is a wonderful tool in that way as well, which I appreciate TikTok for is there are so many creators that I would never have been able to access that I now can because of this platform, which is lovely. Yeah, as much as we hate on it. Yeah, I mean, I don't like using it personally, but I like other people using it. Absolutely. Yes. Sarah Finn asked to Tom, what was it like to host SciShow?
Oh, yeah, it was a blast. I mean, everyone there is really fun to work with. Those are eight episodes that are out. We filmed all eight in one day. Yeah, it was a lot. I genuinely was like, I don't know if I'll be able to do that, but we did. How good are you at reading off a teleprompter?
Oh, yeah. Better now. Yeah, that is the other thing is because as hosting, there's a bunch of other amazing folks writing it in the script. And I'll give it a pass and make sure that it feels more like in my voice or punch up anything. But yeah, it is also that's the other interesting thing is it is. It's just the hosting part of it, which was weird.
Wow. Sorry, I just got really excited by the idea of that I could write because I write for SciShow sometimes. I'd love to write you a script, Tom, and try and do it in your voice and put in Tom jokes. I would absolutely love that. I'm going to pitch something to them next time you do your hosting gig with them. Jesus Christ. Can this be for Tom?
I was doing earlier things. Someone was like, do you guys have any ideas for fun format changes? We do have some ideas for silly goofy format topic changes all the time. Like, I don't want to say because we're going to do stuff like that. But maybe even like a script swap or something like that could be so silly. Oh, again, choosing topics for each other like. Yeah.
But yeah, it did take a second to be like, fully just focused on the host aspect and be like, you know, any, any feedback where it's like, hey, say it like this instead, I had to be like, yeah, cool, rock and roll. And then getting used to that is took a second, but then was very, was very fun. And they're all great. Everyone's rock and roll there. It was wild. Yeah, it was, it was hard work, but it, it, we did it. Yeah, it sounds like well done, Tom. Well done. Thanks.
So Miriam said, I work part time as a nature conservation educator for school groups. I like reminding kids that if they ask a question, I don't know the answer to, they can still find the info out there. But I'd like to go further in instilling that excitement. As science communicators, how would you convince a child that going down a Wikipedia rabbit hole and making everyone else's problem is in fact a cool and fun hobby? Do I just have to let them discover it for themselves?
If I was going to give practical advice, I would show them doing it. I would find an example from one of our good friends' pages, that's Wikipedia, and show the funny examples.
and then maybe like go or find a particularly good Wikipedia rabbit hole that you know of and just show them that. But often it is just in some people's nature to do that and some people's nature, but not. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I think it was also the question of, I think sometimes we take for granted internet literacy and like how to go down where rabbit holes like clicking on the links and clicking on the sources and especially in the world where we search something on Google, like the AI summary pops up rather than the link.
You know, showing tools like the Internet Archive and, um, way back machine and stuff like that. I think giving them the tools to find the thing that interests them. I think this is sort of the, a good thing to go down. That's a really, really good show.
Or, you know, using, and I'm not advising this because it's not, I'm not allowed, but maybe like talking about archive.ph or, you know, whatever. Where you do find that. No, I'm not.
to get around paywalls and stuff. Sorry, I got a lump in my throat. I think also listening when they are excited or even sharing your own excitement. Yeah, this is what I was thinking was like, man, it's just great that they are asking questions to start off with and fostering and nurturing that curiosity side, how they go from there, whatever. But at least you've got them at that beginning point of like, they're curious about things and that's great. I mean, the fact that
Miriam is asking this question, just says to me that they probably are already very good at nurturing. So final question for this section, Octopati asks, what are some educational science communication cases you guys enjoy and are inspired by making the learning of any topic, not just science, a fun thing, maybe they be from books, TV, the internet.
My YouTube rep for science stuff is Bobby Broccoli who does like multipart videos on science drama. And if you want to call it that like science scandals but in the process teaches you all about different aspects of that science so so good.
I always have tik tokas that I like to go. Yeah. So there's obviously a greasy geologist Kate Larson. I love learning about geology because it's something that I feel like I know so little about. And she explains it so well.
but also like some of the classics, Alexis Nicole, chaotic forager, even like Friends of the Pod. I love Ellen's, Ellen Weatherford from Ellen's stuff is videos are so good. And I have been actively inspired by all of those people on topics in the past. So yeah, they are, they're all great at what they do. And I love TikTok's icon is tagging off of
the past guest on the show. It's like, it's tripe, but it's like genuinely true that like all the guests we've had on have been inspiration. I mean, I mean, first of all, Hank and Tom Scott, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Zach and Kelly, who we've already said a million times up on an award-winning book.
Yeah, I mean, I say, I've said on the episodes when we have them on where I'm like, hey, I had this shirt when I was in high school that you like did, you know, stuff like that. So those as a new shout, there's another recently, I saw a long form video from a YouTuber, Angela Collier, who did a like two hour long video on Richard Feynman's legacy.
I haven't seen it, but it's in my watch list. It's both like enraging, but also super nuanced at the same time and shares a lot of her personal experiences with the repercussions of that sort of misogyny and science and stuff like that. And I was like,
I was watching and I was like this is the shit like this is the shit I wish I could make you know like this is the kind of stuff that inspires me to be like, let's get into the paint let's talk about this. I love that one I was really inspired by that one. Right. That's the end of that section we have one final section. Okay.
I was listening back to it last year. Caroline got it so off. I always try one Caroline. You want to try getting the timing? Fun. It's difficult to say if it's on time because it was a delay. It's just so difficult to say in the edit whether or not I'll move that farther or closer to the action. Did you move on really far away?
That brings us to our final question. Well, kind of final statements slash question that a lot of people ask this stuff.
Rishi, for example, is disappointed. We haven't learnt everything yet and would like an explanation. George wants to know what we will do when we have learnt everything. I think my favourite question in this vein was from Abel and Eleanor, who asked something along this line, would you rather have learnt everything or still be learning everything?
Wow. Well, I mean, that's all. Just a peek behind the scenes as this is the Q&A. We had a fun little, like, quote unquote, resolution to the crisis we had manufactured where I think I set a date as a joke for learning everything. No, I had to come.
set a date. But as it got closer to that date, me and Ella were like, this doesn't matter. Tom was like, we must find a resolution to this that means that we can continue doing it. Some people didn't mention in the podcast, in the Discord, they were like, June's coming up, June's coming up. Also, when you set the date, you said it so soon in the field. You didn't even give us a year, Matt.
And so I refused to, and we, I think we pulled something cute out of a hat, which was great. I'm not going to do that again. That was cute. That was cute. So we're not setting another date. I don't know. Oh, if folks don't know, it's, it was at the end of the, it's the post credits scene at the end of the day. Don't tell them what it is. But if you haven't got to the post credit scenes of the ones, it's the post credits of our best of episodes. Oh, yeah. The best of them. Yeah.
It's very, very nice, very great idea. I thought that was a good way to do that. But to answer, obviously, I would still rather be learning everything than have learned everything, because that means there's more to learn, and I love to learn. Thank you. If we don't put a deadline here, I'm afraid I won't be able to do anything, because I can't do anything if I don't have a deadline. And I'm not going to do anything until two days before the deadline, and I'm going to try and learn everything in that time.
The plugs and shout outs are the same as normal, which is our discord, which you can find at Let's Learn Everything dot com. Hey folks, Editor Tom here with a quick last minute plug that I am on one of my favorite podcasts called Never Post. They did a big end of year recap panel quiz show with a bunch of my absolute favorite creators. It was an absolute blast to do so much fun. So go check it out. The podcast is called Never Post and the episode is called Post Mortem 2024.
quick housekeeping note that next episode will be a recast of either one of our episodes or an episode that we guessed it on as part of our tradition of having a little break in the new year. But otherwise, how do you guys feel of a review of this year? How's it been with this bike? I think it's been, oh, I think it's been a bang and ear. It's just nice. Yeah.
My general feelings have been terrific about this year. Really terrific. The changes have worked so well. Yeah, I'm just enjoying it more than ever. I hope you guys feel the same. We keep doing. Y'all keep surprised. I mean, Caroline's rock climbing is is end. One of all time are so good. And so, yeah, you guys are still still still killing it. It's listening. I'm excited for next year. Yeah. Do you mean this year?
this year. No, actually, I'm excited for 2026. 2026 is actually the, that's the, we're really going to hit on a stride. Really going to learn everything at that. Yeah. Huh? No. No. What was I going to say? Oh, yeah. Something I'll say to the audience that I said, I said, Tom, Tom Caroline all the time. And that often when I join a call, because we recall quite late in the UK, I'll be like quite tired.
Or maybe sick or something. I'd be like, oh, guys, I don't know if I can do this or I'm not going to bring good energy. And then like 10 minutes into recording, I'm always just, it's so easy. Like, I forget I'm tired. I forget I'm sick. I'm always just having a blast. And I just want people who listen to the podcast to know that, that how fun it is to make and how wonderful these two people are to make it with. Thank you. Thank you.
How many stars is that? Two. For the two of us, we are the two stars. And the worms and stars all in one go, I'm getting confused, mixed messages. And you're going to eat us. That was my review corner for the year. And then the final thing we should say is thank you to our audience.
Yeah, my god, I mean, absolutely. We would be doing this if it wasn't for you guys point. Honestly, I mean, it's through the max fund support, through the energy and the discord. I loved where I think one of the biggest outpours was when you had the swearing topic, Ella, and there was just so many people.
Let me tell you, I think that's the most uproarious we've had our Discord. It always makes me, we always give that shout out and everyone always delivers. But also, I mean, the people who, I'm sure there's people who like send in a question that never do the Discord, there's so many other people who do this in the showing. It's still appreciated. Or a max fund supporter, you know, just a listener, a silent listener. We still love you. Not much, but...
I'm kidding. We love you all. We love you all. It's such a privilege. It's a privilege to be able to make this podcast and that's only possible because there are people listening to it.
To wrap this up. I'm not doing a summary valid. Oh, what are we doing then? Bye. Bye. See you for the next one. This has been nice. We could say join us next time we'll learn everything. Well, I think you've just said it. There you go. Can you imagine the music builds up to that and it just cuts there?
Um, no, no, Summery, because, oh, we talked about a lot. Maybe you listened to it again. No, stay second time. I'm confused. Um, but please do join us this year when we will learn about everything.
Let's Learn Everything is a Maximum Fun podcast hosted and produced by Ella Hubber, Tom Lum and Caroline Roper with editing and music by the wonderful and talented Tom Lum. Maximum Fun. A worker-owned network of artist-owned shows supported directly by you.
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