December 30, 2019 • 39 mins
Join your Invention hosts Robert and Joe for another round of listenener mail on recent episodes devoted to the Microwave Oven and all sorts of toys.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Invention, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey,
welcome to Invention. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm
Joe McCormick, and we're closing out the year here with
your own voices another episode of Invention. Listener mail, But
I gotta say before we get into the emails, Robert
and I were just talking about how we had to
(00:24):
address probably the largest thread that's ever happened in our
in our Facebook discussion group, which was people reacting to
the idea of microwaving water and and saying like, why
don't they have electric kettles in the United States. Yeah, So,
you know, we have a lot of international listeners, and
I think part of it is something is mundane and
every day is heating water. Uh, it's something you don't
(00:47):
think about. You don't think about how do they heat
water in other countries. And then outside the United States,
you might be listening to the show. You might hear
us talking about the usefulness of microwaving water to heat
it up for things, and they might think and apparently
some people have interpreted this as being an admission that
we do not have electric kettles. Now, a little known
fact in Tennessee we only heat up water with a blowtorch. Um, incorrect, Uh,
(01:11):
stop spreading misinformation show about American water heating practices. But
but now the truth of the matter is, I know
from my own standpoint, I use an electric kettle every day. Uh.
It is just you know, a kettle with plugs into
this little stand. The stand itself plugs into the wall
and I instantly get hot water, which we use around
the house to make tea, to make coffee, I make
(01:34):
my coffee using an aero press, which, as far as
inventions goes, is a fabulous coffee brewing invention. I've been
begging us to get advertising from them from from that
company for a while. I've also wanted to get coffee money.
If we can get kim X as a sponsor, I
think that'd be great. If you're listening coffee companies, Um,
we're down. I just need to cash. But anyway, I
(01:56):
use I use hot water for that and also for
other incidental uses, such as adding a little hot water
to the cat's food so that it is even wetter
to try and keep this desert creature from drying out
and dying on us. But weirdly enough, there are other
times in places where I don't use the electric kettle
even though it's there, Like if I need to heat up,
(02:17):
say a honey syrup for a cocktail, for some reason,
I never think to use the kettle. I always use
the microwave for that. Uh. You know, I gotta say
I don't have an electric kettle, and this has made
me think maybe I need to get one. It seems
like it's a it's a very fast way to heat
up water, hopefully, very efficient to write, and it's also
great for me if I'm making coffee of the house.
(02:39):
It's probably a day when I'm working from home. So
I'll go through this ritual where I'm like, all right,
I think I need some more coffee. Turn on the kettle,
let it heat up. I'll work a little more while
it's working, while it's heating up, and then I'll get
carried away of what I'm working on. Now the water
has heated up, and now it's getting cool again, so
I have to turn it on again. So second or
third time I actually remember to make coffee. If you're
(03:00):
if you're heating up your kettle on the stove, uh, screaming,
and you don't stop screaming at you and or forgetting
that it's there can have disastrous effects. So all great
reasons to have an electric kettle in your life in
my opinion. Anyway, all that to say, we actually do
have electric kettles here in the United States. They're they're
not something that's hard to find, though I will say
(03:21):
I don't know if they're extremely popular at least not
in the way they seem to be in like England
that or in the UK. Right, and well, one of
our listeners on the discussion module the Stuff to blok
my discussion moledule, they chimed in. Well, you know, coffee
is more popular in the United States than tea is. Again,
it's not to say that people don't drink tea. Lots
of tea drinkers in the United States. Tea is very
(03:42):
very popular. Um, but I don't know, maybe that is
part of it. Like there's not not that there's not
a tea culture, but tea culture is not as predominant
and all encompassing as one would find, say in the
United Kingdom. Okay, have we sufficiently beaten the electric kettle
beating it to death? Well, and until we actually do
an episode on the electric cattle and discuss where this
(04:03):
invention came from. You know what's an actually I think
very interesting electric cooking device we could come back to
is the rice cooker. Oh yes, I'm a big chance. Yeah,
I think we've discussed that that before as well. Uh
we would you use one all the time? All right,
maybe we should look at this first message from Melissa,
Melissa says, hello, invention pod people on a recent Stuff
(04:26):
to Blow your Mind listener mail special. Of course, that's
our other podcast, Stuff to Blow your Mind. If you're
not already listening, check it out, Melissa writes. Roberts seemed
excited about the idea of an invention episode on knives.
If somehow you find you don't have enough material already,
you might be interested to mention the special knives used
by medieval scribes to erase mistakes made on parchment by
(04:47):
gently scraping it before the ink sets. In medieval illuminations
of scribes always depict them holding a pin in their
right hand and a knife in their left. The knife
was multi functional, and the scribe could use it to
sharpen their quill, hold down the parchment, or, as I said,
erase errors. Thanks Melissa, Yeah, that's a good point. I
think that, you know, scraping of manuscripts has definitely come
(05:09):
up on stuff to about your mind in the past,
talking about Grimore's and perhaps about you know, unfinished works.
But certainly I don't think we don't. We did a
deep dive into the tools that were used, and just
to the extent that the knife would be in one
hand and the uh, the writing apparatus would be in
the other. I don't think I knew about this, so
this is interesting. Yeah, it's also a great idea for
(05:30):
dungeons and Dragon's character. You know, they could have the
paint they're there, there's their their paintbrush or what have you.
And on the other hand, they have their special um
scraping knife which you can also be used to stab cobalts.
All right, here's another one and uh, this one comes
to us from Sam and also concerned sharp objects. Sam rights.
I have to say your episode about scissors was one
(05:52):
of my favorites. As a sower by trade, I have
great appreciation for scissors. I gotta say sower here is
spelled the same way sewer is. I assume that this
means not a sewer, but that that was my impression
as well. Anyway, Sam continues onto scissors as a weapon.
You seem during your podcast to be stuck on somehow
(06:12):
using the mechanical advantage of scissors when using them as
a weapon, insisting that you would want the long handle
short blade style to get more force out of them.
This is nuts. How on earth are you going to
actually use them like scissors as a weapon. Imagine someone
coming at you trying to cut you with a pair
of scissors like that. It would not work. The reason
(06:33):
that long tailor sheer style scissors are used as movie
weapons is because they are a great stabbing weapon other
than throwing loose scissors like weird Ninja stars. This is
my personal active shooter defense strategy dream. This seems like
the only practical way to use scissors as a weapon. Anyways,
keep it up. One item I would be super interested
in hearing the history of is the Mighty seam Ripper.
(06:57):
Thanks Sam, uh I gather your correct Sam, And now
we I don't think we were dwelling much on like
how to use scissors as a weapon. We were commenting
on like use of scissors as a weapon in media,
like in movies and stuff. Uh, and how they're always
like those long blades, and yeah, I guess you know what.
You're correct, they're pretty much always used for stabbing, not
for sharing as a weapon, unless, let's see what would
(07:19):
be an exception to that. I think the Exorcist three,
that's true. Yeah, otherwise you just need to be a
giant crab or something to really get your your your
scissoring action on. You've clearly thought way more about using
scissors as a weapon than we have, so we uh,
we give you that one. But either way, thank you
very much, Sam. Uh. Should we move on to we
got a bunch of messages about the microwave. Maybe maybe
(07:41):
we should do that next. Yeah, yeah, since we we stopped,
we started the episode off by talking a little bit
about it. Now. We specifically asked h if anybody out
there had ever tried to cook a turkey in the
microwave like those old horrible recipes, and boy what we
heard from a few of you. So this first message
comes from Sharon, subject line high mind ms Sharon, and
I once cooked a turkey in a microwave oven. The
(08:03):
year was seven. My husband, infant son, and I were
going to be moving soon, and one of my jobs
was preparing meals with the contents of the fridge and freezer.
I hit a roadblock in the freezer as it contained
a turkey, a gift from the recent holidays. With a
non working oven, I was left with the stovetop or
the microwave oven as options to cook the turkey. The
(08:25):
microwave had been an extravagant gift from a former employer
in nineteen eighty two and came with an extensive manual,
which of course included directions for cooking a turkey. After
an encouraging long distance call with my mom, I prepped
that turkey for the microwave. I don't recall all of
the details, but I do remember being pretty excited about
actually using the temperature probe that was a standard issue
(08:47):
with microwaves of the day. Per directions, the turkey was
cut up and cooked in pieces temperature probe inserted. I
think that's a good move instead of trying to cook
a whole. The end product was very tasty, not of course,
like an oven listed turkey with that yummy brown skin
and drippings for gravy, but definitely edible. Thanks for jogging
my memory on this culinary adventure from long ago, and
(09:08):
I do wonder now why I didn't just move the
turkey across town and roasted in an oven. Thank you
for invention and stuff to blow your mind podcast which
make my commute painless, Sharon, That is that is exactly
the kind of story I wanted to hear about the
cooking of the turkeys. Though it does raise the question
who gives a whole turkey as a gift like this?
It's a strange because it's a production to U to
(09:30):
deal with this turkey. Uh, you're you're basically giving somebody
a project and making demands on their freezer space. It's
halfway there to my favorite kind of gift, which is
a really unmanageable pet. Oh. Yes, yes, like Merry Christmas,
here is your Komodo dragon? Yeah? Or just I mean
you didn't even have to be exotic just to anytime
(09:52):
you see somebody, especially if it's like a romantic situation
where perhaps the the bond is not completely um uh,
you know, gol together for two individuals, for one to
give the other a puppy, That always just seems terribly inappropriate, uh,
for all concerned, including the puppy. Now, we don't want
to smear puppies that were given that way. I know
(10:12):
some great puppies that were exactly in that situation. But
but you have to have doing it. Were these gifts
entirely thought out? I don't know, But then again, it
is the acquisition of a puppy, ever entirely thought out.
I guess. I guess. It's a decision you make, you know,
partially with your brain, but also with your heart. Okay, Now, strangely,
we just read an email about somebody cooking a turkey
(10:35):
in a microwave oven in nineteen seven. Guess what our
next email is about from a totally different listener. Um,
what has to do with the turkey? But what's the
year seven? Something was in the air? Do you want
to read Trish or Shire. Okay, hey, guys, I love
the show as well as stuff to blow your mind.
I just finished the Microwave series and I have a
relevant story. When I was four, my mom and I
(10:57):
moved across the country to a new city. Are apartment
was older, complete with a totally probably haunted, claw footed
tub and a hulking metal beast of a microwave. The
safety of the aging gas stove was questionable, but Mom
was totally comfortable with the microwave. So on Thanksgiving she
cooked an entire turkey in that microwave. I called her
(11:18):
to ask, and she recalls it taking about an hour
to cook. I remember it being tasty, if a little
less brown than subsequent oven turkeys. In all, it's a
nice childhood memory. Just thought i'd share my anecdote. Cheers, Trish,
Thanks Trish. Yeah, what was going on in seven? I
don't know. I mean, maybe it goes deeper. You know,
these are both tales two of people moving right. Uh,
(11:39):
you know, maybe that was a year of new beginnings.
I don't have to consult the astrological chart on that one, right,
But but yeah, both of these cases where people were like,
we have a turkey, we need to cook it, we
have limited resources. We were kind of forced into the
scenario that that microwave. Early microwave marketers anticipated the idea
(12:00):
that this would be your go to cooking instrument, though
instead of being by choice, it was by circumstance, and
in both cases it seemed to have worked all right.
This next message comes from Scott. Scott says, when I
was a young marine back in the late seventies, I
was assigned to the computer center at the Marine Corps
Finance Center in Kansas City. This was the main administrative
(12:21):
and financial hub for the entire Marine Corps, and we
collected data from all units for reporting and record keeping.
Given the state of computer tech at the time, much
of that data arrived in the form of paper documents.
We received boxes of paper forms daily which had to
be entered into the computer system. This was achieved by
scanning them via optical character recognition scanners. Whoa in seventies.
(12:44):
I didn't even know that that was around back then. Um.
Each page was fed under a scanning head which read
the typewritten reports and turned them into a text file.
The achilles heel of any machine which has to move
pieces of paper is the paper itself, and unless the
paper is in ristine condition, it will jam and cause
all manner of hate and discontent for the human operating
(13:05):
the machine. Quite often the reports we got were definitely
not in pristine condition, generally because they've absorbed humidity during transport.
How is this related to the microwave episode. Well, The
accepted solution for fixing feed problems was to dry out
the forms by taking them down to the break room
and nuking them for a few minutes in the same
microwave machine everyone used for heating up their lunches. Thanks
(13:27):
for the podcast, Scott, Well that that is that is interesting.
I hadn't thought about that. We I think we touched
briefly on the idea that there are industrial uses for microwaves.
I think it was with lumber right right, Yeah, that
was the example of the walk in microwave. Yes, yes,
that that made the events of whatever that movie was
(13:47):
possible with one of the kids, spy hard kick ass.
That's it. The seth Are producer just told me, alright,
we have another microwave missive here. This one comes to
us from Evan. Hey, Robert and Joe. I wanted to
let you know of a fascinating microwave application that you
didn't mention on your recent microwave shows. It's called microwave
(14:09):
induced centering and is being used in the production of
metal parts using a three D printer that's centering s
I N T E R I n G, which I
believe that the word came up in our episode on
the one ring on stuff to blow your mind. Anyway,
it continues. These printers use a plastic binding agent to
help shape metal powder into a specific part. Yes, we
(14:32):
definitely talked about this, and um gosh, which metal was
it that we were talking about? Tungstens, I don't know.
Go back and check out that episode if you want
more centering action anyway continues. The plastic is later burned
off and the remaining metal powder is heated just enough
for the metal to form metallic bonds, but not enough
for the metal to become a liquid and lose its shape.
(14:53):
This process is called centering and is currently being done
with convection ovens. The downside is that centering can take
over twelve hours to complete, but in recent years, companies
are starting to come out with microwave based ovens that
can center these metal powder parts in thirty minutes or less.
This speed increase happens because microwaves induce an electric field
(15:13):
on the surface of each metal particle. Current then flows
between the metal particles quickly and efficiently, heating that region
so that the metal bonds can form. This is the
same effect that makes putting bulk metal objects in the
microwave dangerous. The electric field on the surface of the
objects can severely shock you or burn your food, but
it can be an effective way to heat metal powders
(15:34):
too high temperatures. The technology isn't perfect just yet and
may take a few more years to really make an
impact in manufacturing. By the way, I love both of
your shows and look forward to hearing them every week.
Keep up the good work, sincerely, Evan. Very interesting things absolutely.
By the way, if you do end up possessing the
one ring, do not put it in a microwave. Horrible effects. Alright,
(15:56):
let's look at one last message about the microwave oven.
This comes from Joseph. Joseph refers back to our discussion
about the irradiation of food in the microwaves episode. You know,
we talked about bombardment of food items with actual ionizing
radiation unlike microwaves. Uh, and how you know that's regularly
done and is considered safe. It's both done to image
(16:18):
the food to make sure there are no like say,
metal screws or other contaminants in it. But then it's
also done to sterilize food in some cases, like irradiating
spices to kill microorganisms or insects or whatever. So Joseph says,
I love invention and stuff to blow your mind. I
travel a lot for work, and these are two of
my favorite podcasts to listen to on the road. There
(16:38):
is a food purposely irradiated that I didn't here mentioned
in part two of the Microwave episodes. At least for
a while, you could purchase irradiated ground beef. The radiation
would kill any living organisms, making the meat sterile. I
miss being able to eat a juicy, rare hamburger safely.
Oh that's interesting. Yeah. Um, I've not seen it in
(16:59):
a store in years. I think people were afraid to
eat the meat, or they were afraid the meat was
radioactive and it didn't sell. Well, well, maybe that's going
to change because enough people are playing the Fallout games
to know that the glowing green meat is is ideal.
Always pick the glowing green meat out of your kills.
Uh though, actually did look this up and it looks
like yeah, I think there are some efforts to bring
(17:21):
back the radiation of of ground meats for food safety
reasons and uh yeah, and they tried it before. I
think there was just like some consumer hesitancy about it.
They they need a new adjective. I think they need
to branded slightly differently. Shiny meat. Shiny shined meat like
sunshine is radiation it has been shined, it's it's been,
(17:42):
it's undergone the shining um so u. Joseph continues. On
a recent toy episode, you discussed why a Jack in
the box would keep a child fascinated. I think, at
least in my own case, I used it to learn
to control my startle reflex. I tried not to react
when it popped. I still do a similar thing as
an adult. Interesting, Please tell me I'm not the only
(18:03):
person who stares down at the toaster and tries not
to flinch when the toast is ready. Plus watching the
nichrome wire glow and watching and smelling the myard reactions
occur our bonuses to my grown up Jack in the box,
I guess that's the toaster. Keep those shows coming, sincerely, Joseph.
Oh wow, Yeah, I don't know that I stare a
lot and do a toaster. Now, I don't. I don't
(18:24):
actually have a pop up toaster, but I do remember
having a similar experience as a kid, like you really
want to see what's going on in there, and there's
all sorts of cool glowing that's happened. I I know
what you're talking about, Joseph. I have stared at the
heating element. I mean, like a resistance based heating element
is beautiful. I think so at least. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
(18:45):
I think I was. I was talking with my mom
actually about early memories, like what SMI earliest memories, And
she was talking about staring at a like an electric
heater that has some sort of a heating element, and
you know, it's like it's yours, irresistible to the hold.
But she was also told like, don't you dare touch it.
It's the most dangerous thing in the world. So that
also helped the memory like really take holds in her mind.
(19:09):
All right, Uh, should we take a quick break and
then come back for more. It sounds good. Let's do it.
Let's shut the door in the microwave and then come back.
All right, we're back, and uh, let's talk a little
bit about bubble wrap, which comes to us from Matthew.
Matthew says, we love your show. You were talking about
(19:30):
bubble wrap. I was in the Marine Corps returning from
a deployment in nine. Again we're in the eighties here
and again we have another marine writing in uh. And
at the and at the welcome back ceremony, all the
families were their spouses, kids, et cetera. In a rare
moment of brilliance, they had rolled out large rolls of
bubble wrap and sheets on the floor of the hangar
(19:52):
to keep the kids busy. My son was only three
and that is all he remembers of the day topping
the bubbles. He's thirty three now and has been in
the Marine Corps himself and returned from a deployment. I
was there, and the bubble wrap is still the main
feature for the kids. That's so great. So much changes
while the basics never do. Oh, that's wonderful. Thank you
so much, Matthew. Alright, this next message comes to us
(20:15):
from Olivia, also about bubble wrap. I think this is
in response to us talking about why it is so
fun to pop the bubbles? Uh, and so Olivia says, Hello,
Robert and Joe. In the most recent Invention episode, in
the last five minutes or so, you'll discussed squeezeballs, fidget spinners,
and just the human inclination to be messing with stuff.
I'm not aware of any research at the moment that
(20:36):
I can point you to, but I can give some
anecdotal information on the topic. I don't know if you
all plan to do an episode. This may provide some
background as to what to look into. So for one,
these items can be categorized as STEM toys or fidget toys,
and within some of the FRING groups I run in,
they're super popular, especially within groups where a lot of
(20:56):
us are neuro divergent, specifically having either a d h
D or autism. I have a d h D myself,
and I find that it can be very difficult at
times to concentrate without having something to do with my hands.
As this feeling can be common to the two conditions
listed above, many of us turned to fidget toys as
a convenient way to keep our hands busy. As a
side effect of this, my neurotypical friends those without a
(21:19):
d h D, autism, or any other such effect, have
had the chance to be exposed to these toys when
they wouldn't normally, and often they find they love them
and we'll go out and purchase their own. But if
you want to see more examples of the types of
toys that exist out there, I'll oh and she links
a STEM selling website below. Many many people will fidget
with whatever they have, but there can be a stigma
(21:41):
around using items specifically designed for it. Back when fidget
spinners were at the height of their popularity, there was
some controversy within the neuro divergent communities about it, specifically
that because of their popularity, spinners and many other toys
were getting banned from classrooms. This was due to the
fact that toys that are very active with lots of motion,
like spinners, can work different for different kids. Neurotypical kids
(22:05):
will tend to be more distracted by these toys instead
of aided by them in concentration like they like they
do for neuro divergent kids. So on one hand, while
these items were becoming more normalized and making them easier
to get into the hands of kids who could benefit
from them, they were also being banned from the environments
where they would specifically be the most useful. Anyway, the
(22:26):
one toy that prompted me to write in is the
Infinite bubble Wrap key chain. I'll attach the video below
of someone using it. I haven't had the chance to
use one myself, but some of my friends absolutely love them.
While the experience isn't identical to bubble wrap proper, my
friends say that it scratches the same itch tactically as
the classic product. Plus it's small and reusable, so it's
(22:47):
always convenient. Also, I'd just like to say thanks so
much for making both Invention and Stuff to Blow Your Mind.
I've been listening since the first episode of Stuff from
the Science Lab and have been a loyal listener since.
At the time, I was in seventh grade in middle school,
and now I'm a recent college grad with a degree
in engineering. I can honestly say that without your podcasts
and a few of the other Stuff podcasts, I would
(23:09):
not be who I am today. My friends and family
all poke fun how I seem to know something about everything,
and that is all thanks to these podcasts. I've learned
so much over the years. So seriously, thanks so much
for making all these Stuff to Blow Your Mind has
long been one of my favorites, and Invention has quickly
become a new favorite too with most sincere thanks Olivia
(23:30):
up there. Yeah, yeah, I mean it will be uh
next month in January, it'll it will be ten years
since the first episode of of a show launched a
titled Stuff in the Science Lab, which was then rebranded
into Stuff to Build Your Mind. So yeah, we're coming
up on for me a decade of podcasting here. Yeah,
(23:51):
I know it's been a heck of a journey for you.
It's been a heck of a journey for me, the
part of it that I've been here. And um, yeah,
and so thank you so much for getting in touch Olivia.
This is this was wonderful. Now. I loved all that
she had to say though about fidget toys in general
and helping some people focus serving as a distraction to others.
I think that's very insightful. I know we've talked before
(24:11):
on the show about our own personal experience with things
like this. Um. I think it was the episode of
stuff to blow your mind about imaginative worlds and daydreaming
and even maladaptive daydreaming. And I spoke how on help
when I was a kid, especially, I would need to
have a rubber band in my hand and twiddle with
(24:31):
their other band, especially when I was daydreaming like that
it would aid in my daydreaming. It was like a
talisman almost. Yeah. Yeah, And and I was also very
specific about the color it needed to be green or red. Uh.
You know, I would have probably settled for orange as well,
but brown and gray we're not going to cut it. Uh,
And I don't need those anymore, but I do still
(24:51):
find myself, especially in the podcasting booth here, I need
something for my hands. Uh. So, like right now it
is a partially torn apart sharpie, an orange sharpie and
clear and weirdly enough, it has to be orange. Um.
I get a little perturbed if I don't have an
orange sharpie to use. But but ideally I need to
have like a squishy sand bag. Uh. That's better because
(25:14):
of I drop it, it it makes less noise. But I
can definitely still at this point in my life. Um,
you know understand the need to have something in your
hand to fiddle with in order to keep your mind
focused on something. Oh yeah, yeah, I understand the feeling.
It's it's powerful, all right. What are we looking at
next here? Oh, let's see we have one from Amy
(25:36):
and it looks like this one is going to mention
a bubble rap but also a little science fiction. Amy
rides high Robert and Joe. I just listened to the
bubble Wrap episode on Red Dwarf season three, episode five.
The episode Time Sliders, Rumor goes back in time to
tell his younger self to invent quote tension sheets. Bubble
wrap that is meant to be popped for its therapeutic
(25:57):
effect because a kid he went to school with dead
and became wealthy. While he tells himself about it, the
other kid listens, but the younger him ignores the idea genius.
This episode is all about photography too, so it ties
in with your recent episodes. You guys have to watch it.
I enjoy invention and stuff to blow your mind, Live
long and prosper amy. This is not the first bit
(26:19):
of listener mail we've gotten about the show Red Dwarf,
which I've never watched, but it seems like it dovetails
with a number of things that come up on our podcasts. Yeah,
I vaguely remember seeing catching a little of it back
in the days, you know, on cable. I don't know
if it was on Sci Fi or maybe even on
one of the comedy channels, but I remember catching part
of it but never really getting to dive into it.
I have friends who are really into it though. We
(26:42):
also heard from a listener named Prudence who had had
some stuff to share about bubble rap, but I think
more importantly said a topic suggestion. I would love to
hear the history of autopsy. That would be interesting get
into autopsy the section, Uh, just sort of general anatomical
explorer ration. I think this may have something to do.
(27:02):
I don't want to mind read prudence, but it may
have something to do with our our talk in the
Caskets episodes about the needs for human cadavers in order
to do medical dissections. Um. But yeah, yeah, I mean
there's gotta be taboos that come and go about that
through through history, and like, how are the standard practices
first created? Totally? All right, let's look at an email
(27:27):
we got about our episode on the telescope. This comes
from our listener, Dimitri Dmitri. Says, Hi, Robert and Joe.
I was listening to Invention since episode one. You announced
it on Stuff to blow your mind, and I love it.
Finally you touched a topic that I'm passionate about astronomy
and the telescope, so I decided to write in first
one curious observation. Up until recently, to be precise, we
(27:51):
have only seen the universe using the electromagnetic spectrum, different
wavelengths of it, yes, but still a single type of information.
But then came LEGO, the laser interferometer, gravitational Wave Observatory
in sixteen, for the first time we could see the
world through the eyes of gravitational waves. I guess that
(28:11):
for early telescope users like Galileo, it was similarly eye opening.
I definitely can compare this Ligo to the first telescopes
coming online. By the way, all of the human senses
have to do with electromagnetic force. I was trying to
think for a second, they're like, wait a minute, like
touch and smell. But yeah, I guess chemistry, you know,
chemistry and physics is that's electromagnetic fields and forces, and yeah,
(28:33):
so yeah, Dmitri continues, second to your discussion about the stars.
I've lived in different cities my entire life and don't
see many stars very often. But I photographed the night
sky recently. I went to the darkest sky place within
a two hour drive from my home with my family,
and I saw the Milky Way with naked eyes. You
can find the image, and then he links to his
(28:55):
Instagram page to find the image with the center of
the galaxy. He says, it's definitely at least surreal to
lie on your back and see all those stars. Moreover,
and then Knee links to another image you can even
see a faint spot of Andromeda, a galaxy two point
five million light years away. Uh. This is another level
of excitement that I discovered at home later. Uh. And
(29:16):
oh boy, Andromeda's we gotta date with Destiny, end up
with Andromeda and the far future, and that's going to
be exciting. Yeah, if you could, if you could live
long enough, that image would definitely come into sharper focus
for you. All Right, on that note, we're going to
take one more break, but we'll be right back with
more invention listener mail. Alright, we're back, all right. This
(29:42):
bit of listener mail comes to us from Irene. Irene
writes in about canning. We did an episode dealing with this,
and I'm not going to read the entire email. First
part of the email is basically Irene expressing how much
she loves canning, which is all wonderful. We love to
hear about people's enthusiasm for a particular invention. But then
she goes on to discuss our interest in canning, or
(30:05):
potential interest in canning. She says, I believe it was
Joe or maybe both of you who expressed some interest
in trying your hand at canning. I highly encourage you
to try it. There is no more gratifying sound than
that of the lid popping down when you pull the
jars from the canner and they begin to cool and seal.
That pop is the sound of success, and I never
tire of it. I usually shout yes for each jar
(30:26):
lid that successfully pops for me. You can improvise almost
everything you need for canning except for one tool, and
that's the jar lifter a k a. Canning tongs. There
is no substitute for canning tongs, and you'll risk injury
if you try to pull a hot jar out from
the water with anything other than canning tongs. Uh. This
comes from the horse's mouth, as one who suffered a
(30:46):
nasty burn trying to retrieve an arrant jar from the
boiling water using a regular pair of tongs. Don't even try. Fortunately,
canning tongs are very inexpensive and can be found at
most grocery and discount stores. Fire there is an element
of danger in canning with all the hot water in
the canner and usually another pot of hot syrup, brine, parade, apples,
(31:07):
and other and other items. With two large pots of
boiling something I've gotten burnt cut and nearly set wooden
spoons and pot holders on fire. So the danger thing
adds a little bit of fun. The pop of the
lids ceiling successfully is the payoff for the heat, the work,
and the danger. The real joy is giving people something
delicious in a jar, especially when they don't expect it.
(31:28):
Jump in and give it a try. Thanks again for
and exploring an odd topic. Near and dear to me.
Keep up the good work and keep the episodes coming.
I'm almost always listening to podcasts while i'm canning. Best regards,
irene Um. Yeah, I'm glad she brought up the canning
tongs because I remember I honestly don't remember it was
my mom or my grandma. They definitely had the canning
(31:49):
tongs around, and I guess you know, if you can't
picture him, you need to look them up. But they're
a pair of tongs looks generally like sort of doubled
h you know, wide enough so they can grip a
can in. But I remember as a kid they were
really fun to play with because you know, they're essentially
this right size to grab your own arm or someone
else's arm, uh, and or pick up toys in a
(32:10):
way that normal tongs, um you know, don't do as well.
You know how much we love a tool the devils
as a toy, especially a kind of dangerous toy. Yeah, uh, Robert,
we actually had just had one come in recently that
I thought you might like. So do you mind if
I read this one from Jeremy here? Yes, go for it. Okay,
Jeremy says, I just finished your third Toy episode, and
(32:32):
I wanted to let you know how much I've been
enjoying your podcast. I listened since the first episode, and
I'm a fan. Ironically enough, as you finish up this
episode on Toys, I am putting together a miniature of
my game of choice, Age of Sigma. I understand Robert
plays forty K. I think that refers to Warhammer forty
k or right, yeah, yeah, he's referring to to my
(32:54):
painting of Warhammer forty figures, and he's talking about what
was originally knows just Warhammer or were fantasy. Uh, he says,
I understand Robert plays that, but nobody's perfect. I don't
know if miniature war gaming is the topic you guys
can cover on Invention or not, but I would love
to hear something on it. Not only is it enjoyable
for the obvious reasons, but it's phenomenal for getting into
(33:15):
a community of like minded people that are not just
into playing games, but it's they're also hobbyists and in
many cases amazing artists. Additionally, you find that there are
some pretty famous people that enjoy the same hobby. Great
examples are Peter Cushing and Robin Williams. I didn't know
about Peter Cushing being into miniature gaming. Uh. I had
(33:37):
read that Robin Williams had gotten into it, possibly because
one of his one of his sons was interested at
some point, but but that's all I really knew about it.
There are some other interesting historical figures that pop up
in the history of miniature war gaming and the you know,
especially sort of the definitely the pre Dungeons and Dragons
(33:57):
era of gaming and sort of like class English gaming.
So that would be something that could finish to potentially
be fun to discuss because you're you have a few
different things coming together in miniature war gaming, right, I mean,
you have you have hobbyists, you have the creation of miniatures,
who have the utilization of miniatures in either a strategic
form that is entirely about the the puzzle of strategy
(34:21):
and games of skill, and to a certain extent extent chance.
But then there's also the whole idea of simulating a
battle scenario to some extent, and and and that would
be something to look at as well too. You know where,
where in the history of of war gaming in particular
does it tie in with actual military strategy. Oh yeah, well,
I think we could definitely look at the history of
(34:43):
inventions for simulating conflict. Anyway, Jeremy continues, thanks for all
your work, and I hope to hear it in perpetuity.
That's a strange sentence. Does that mean forever we have
to keep going forever? I guess so. Oh, I don't
know if I can do that. As for the Wicked,
all right, Well, as long as we're talking about pastimes
(35:04):
and games, we should talk a little bit about toys.
Here's a listener mail we received from Steve, Robert and Joe.
I thoroughly enjoyed Toys Part one, particularly the segment on
the frisbee. It reminded me of being a kid around
kindergarten age when my parents came home from Saturday grocery
shopping with a brand new red Frisbee, and not only
had the ridges uh and thicker outer rim you mentioned
(35:25):
as new features in the nineteen sixty four model, but
the center was made to look like the bridge of
a flying saucer, inspiring my older brother to paint the
windows silver. The segment on the origins of the Frisbee
also made me think of a story my dad told
me when he was getting up there in years. In
the late forties and early fifties, he worked at the
National Film Board of Canada and Ottawa. Oh that's great.
(35:47):
I'm a big fan of the National Film Board of
Canada and their their work there is short films because
I think some of them played Sorry, is that what
Boards of Canada is named after? Yeah? Yeah, the musical
like Boards of Canada is is a reference to the
National Film Boards of Canada. Amazing. Yeah. And and so
I lived in Canada for a little bit when I
was much younger, and I believe that the CDC station
(36:10):
would air a little National Film Board of Canada shorts
such as one fabulous piece in which you had these
stop motion uh sand creatures forming out of the sand
and building a sand castle. It's it's wonderful if you
look it up, it's It's hosted online, as are all
of the films I think. Anyway continues, Uh, The office
(36:31):
was on a bluff above the Ottawa River, and to
dispose of the many empty film cans their work generated,
he and his colleague would fling the tops and bottoms
out of the window frisbee style and try to get
them to the river. He said. They mostly landed on
the rocks of the bluff, but they had great fun
doing it. Looking forward to part two, a little bit
(36:51):
of lighthearted littering in the post war period. Yeah, forties
and fifties. You know, it was a different time. But
interesting too about the National Film Board of Canada being
around back then. I say, I'm a big fan of
their films, but I've never really looked too much into
their history, so so I had no idea how back
it went. Evidently to the forties and fifties at least. Uh.
(37:13):
We got one message from Vivian that was actually one
of a couple of messages we got about. When we
we asked, hey, is anybody still making like wooden jigsaw puzzles?
Vivian says, Hi, Robert and Joe, and one of your
toys podcasts. You were talking about puzzles. You're wondering if
wooden puzzles are still being made. Um, one of you
said they knew about wooden puzzles for small children. Here's
(37:34):
a link to a company in Canada who makes wooden puzzles.
They are even fun for adults. I have a link
to one below, and so I looked this up. This
company is called stump Craft, and uh, they make extremely
elegant looking, artistic kind of creation puzzles. Robert, I've got
an image for you here that looks awesome. Yeah. It's
a very colorful fantasy imagery with like a third eye. Uh, yeah,
(37:57):
I'd be into that. Here's another one they got looks
like some who kind of like an alien landscape or
so I guess it's supposed to be the bad Lands. Yeah,
I like it. All right, We're gonna go ahead and
close up the mail bag with that one. But obviously
we would love to hear more from invention listeners as
we roll into the new year here and consider all
(38:20):
new inventions to visit. Inventions, big invention, small inventions that
are clearly game changing, inventions that also have you know,
a you know, a less pronounced effect on on life,
but still change the shape of human life as we
know it. So by all means, reach out to us
let us know what you would like to hear. Huge
thanks as always to our excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson.
(38:42):
If you would like to get in touch with us
with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest
topic for the future, to maybe get a piece of
listener mail featured in a future episode, or just to
say hi, you can email us at contact at invention
pod dot com. Invention is production of I Heart Radio.
For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the i
(39:04):
heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows. M
Welcome to Invention, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey,
welcome to Invention. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm
Joe McCormick, and we're closing out the year here with
your own voices another episode of Invention. Listener mail, But
I gotta say before we get into the emails, Robert
and I were just talking about how we had to
(00:24):
address probably the largest thread that's ever happened in our
in our Facebook discussion group, which was people reacting to
the idea of microwaving water and and saying like, why
don't they have electric kettles in the United States. Yeah, So,
you know, we have a lot of international listeners, and
I think part of it is something is mundane and
every day is heating water. Uh, it's something you don't
(00:47):
think about. You don't think about how do they heat
water in other countries. And then outside the United States,
you might be listening to the show. You might hear
us talking about the usefulness of microwaving water to heat
it up for things, and they might think and apparently
some people have interpreted this as being an admission that
we do not have electric kettles. Now, a little known
fact in Tennessee we only heat up water with a blowtorch. Um, incorrect, Uh,
(01:11):
stop spreading misinformation show about American water heating practices. But
but now the truth of the matter is, I know
from my own standpoint, I use an electric kettle every day. Uh.
It is just you know, a kettle with plugs into
this little stand. The stand itself plugs into the wall
and I instantly get hot water, which we use around
the house to make tea, to make coffee, I make
(01:34):
my coffee using an aero press, which, as far as
inventions goes, is a fabulous coffee brewing invention. I've been
begging us to get advertising from them from from that
company for a while. I've also wanted to get coffee money.
If we can get kim X as a sponsor, I
think that'd be great. If you're listening coffee companies, Um,
we're down. I just need to cash. But anyway, I
(01:56):
use I use hot water for that and also for
other incidental uses, such as adding a little hot water
to the cat's food so that it is even wetter
to try and keep this desert creature from drying out
and dying on us. But weirdly enough, there are other
times in places where I don't use the electric kettle
even though it's there, Like if I need to heat up,
(02:17):
say a honey syrup for a cocktail, for some reason,
I never think to use the kettle. I always use
the microwave for that. Uh. You know, I gotta say
I don't have an electric kettle, and this has made
me think maybe I need to get one. It seems
like it's a it's a very fast way to heat
up water, hopefully, very efficient to write, and it's also
great for me if I'm making coffee of the house.
(02:39):
It's probably a day when I'm working from home. So
I'll go through this ritual where I'm like, all right,
I think I need some more coffee. Turn on the kettle,
let it heat up. I'll work a little more while
it's working, while it's heating up, and then I'll get
carried away of what I'm working on. Now the water
has heated up, and now it's getting cool again, so
I have to turn it on again. So second or
third time I actually remember to make coffee. If you're
(03:00):
if you're heating up your kettle on the stove, uh, screaming,
and you don't stop screaming at you and or forgetting
that it's there can have disastrous effects. So all great
reasons to have an electric kettle in your life in
my opinion. Anyway, all that to say, we actually do
have electric kettles here in the United States. They're they're
not something that's hard to find, though I will say
(03:21):
I don't know if they're extremely popular at least not
in the way they seem to be in like England
that or in the UK. Right, and well, one of
our listeners on the discussion module the Stuff to blok
my discussion moledule, they chimed in. Well, you know, coffee
is more popular in the United States than tea is. Again,
it's not to say that people don't drink tea. Lots
of tea drinkers in the United States. Tea is very
(03:42):
very popular. Um, but I don't know, maybe that is
part of it. Like there's not not that there's not
a tea culture, but tea culture is not as predominant
and all encompassing as one would find, say in the
United Kingdom. Okay, have we sufficiently beaten the electric kettle
beating it to death? Well, and until we actually do
an episode on the electric cattle and discuss where this
(04:03):
invention came from. You know what's an actually I think
very interesting electric cooking device we could come back to
is the rice cooker. Oh yes, I'm a big chance. Yeah,
I think we've discussed that that before as well. Uh
we would you use one all the time? All right,
maybe we should look at this first message from Melissa,
Melissa says, hello, invention pod people on a recent Stuff
(04:26):
to Blow your Mind listener mail special. Of course, that's
our other podcast, Stuff to Blow your Mind. If you're
not already listening, check it out, Melissa writes. Roberts seemed
excited about the idea of an invention episode on knives.
If somehow you find you don't have enough material already,
you might be interested to mention the special knives used
by medieval scribes to erase mistakes made on parchment by
(04:47):
gently scraping it before the ink sets. In medieval illuminations
of scribes always depict them holding a pin in their
right hand and a knife in their left. The knife
was multi functional, and the scribe could use it to
sharpen their quill, hold down the parchment, or, as I said,
erase errors. Thanks Melissa, Yeah, that's a good point. I
think that, you know, scraping of manuscripts has definitely come
(05:09):
up on stuff to about your mind in the past,
talking about Grimore's and perhaps about you know, unfinished works.
But certainly I don't think we don't. We did a
deep dive into the tools that were used, and just
to the extent that the knife would be in one
hand and the uh, the writing apparatus would be in
the other. I don't think I knew about this, so
this is interesting. Yeah, it's also a great idea for
(05:30):
dungeons and Dragon's character. You know, they could have the
paint they're there, there's their their paintbrush or what have you.
And on the other hand, they have their special um
scraping knife which you can also be used to stab cobalts.
All right, here's another one and uh, this one comes
to us from Sam and also concerned sharp objects. Sam rights.
I have to say your episode about scissors was one
(05:52):
of my favorites. As a sower by trade, I have
great appreciation for scissors. I gotta say sower here is
spelled the same way sewer is. I assume that this
means not a sewer, but that that was my impression
as well. Anyway, Sam continues onto scissors as a weapon.
You seem during your podcast to be stuck on somehow
(06:12):
using the mechanical advantage of scissors when using them as
a weapon, insisting that you would want the long handle
short blade style to get more force out of them.
This is nuts. How on earth are you going to
actually use them like scissors as a weapon. Imagine someone
coming at you trying to cut you with a pair
of scissors like that. It would not work. The reason
(06:33):
that long tailor sheer style scissors are used as movie
weapons is because they are a great stabbing weapon other
than throwing loose scissors like weird Ninja stars. This is
my personal active shooter defense strategy dream. This seems like
the only practical way to use scissors as a weapon. Anyways,
keep it up. One item I would be super interested
in hearing the history of is the Mighty seam Ripper.
(06:57):
Thanks Sam, uh I gather your correct Sam, And now
we I don't think we were dwelling much on like
how to use scissors as a weapon. We were commenting
on like use of scissors as a weapon in media,
like in movies and stuff. Uh, and how they're always
like those long blades, and yeah, I guess you know what.
You're correct, they're pretty much always used for stabbing, not
for sharing as a weapon, unless, let's see what would
(07:19):
be an exception to that. I think the Exorcist three,
that's true. Yeah, otherwise you just need to be a
giant crab or something to really get your your your
scissoring action on. You've clearly thought way more about using
scissors as a weapon than we have, so we uh,
we give you that one. But either way, thank you
very much, Sam. Uh. Should we move on to we
got a bunch of messages about the microwave. Maybe maybe
(07:41):
we should do that next. Yeah, yeah, since we we stopped,
we started the episode off by talking a little bit
about it. Now. We specifically asked h if anybody out
there had ever tried to cook a turkey in the
microwave like those old horrible recipes, and boy what we
heard from a few of you. So this first message
comes from Sharon, subject line high mind ms Sharon, and
I once cooked a turkey in a microwave oven. The
(08:03):
year was seven. My husband, infant son, and I were
going to be moving soon, and one of my jobs
was preparing meals with the contents of the fridge and freezer.
I hit a roadblock in the freezer as it contained
a turkey, a gift from the recent holidays. With a
non working oven, I was left with the stovetop or
the microwave oven as options to cook the turkey. The
(08:25):
microwave had been an extravagant gift from a former employer
in nineteen eighty two and came with an extensive manual,
which of course included directions for cooking a turkey. After
an encouraging long distance call with my mom, I prepped
that turkey for the microwave. I don't recall all of
the details, but I do remember being pretty excited about
actually using the temperature probe that was a standard issue
(08:47):
with microwaves of the day. Per directions, the turkey was
cut up and cooked in pieces temperature probe inserted. I
think that's a good move instead of trying to cook
a whole. The end product was very tasty, not of course,
like an oven listed turkey with that yummy brown skin
and drippings for gravy, but definitely edible. Thanks for jogging
my memory on this culinary adventure from long ago, and
(09:08):
I do wonder now why I didn't just move the
turkey across town and roasted in an oven. Thank you
for invention and stuff to blow your mind podcast which
make my commute painless, Sharon, That is that is exactly
the kind of story I wanted to hear about the
cooking of the turkeys. Though it does raise the question
who gives a whole turkey as a gift like this?
It's a strange because it's a production to U to
(09:30):
deal with this turkey. Uh, you're you're basically giving somebody
a project and making demands on their freezer space. It's
halfway there to my favorite kind of gift, which is
a really unmanageable pet. Oh. Yes, yes, like Merry Christmas,
here is your Komodo dragon? Yeah? Or just I mean
you didn't even have to be exotic just to anytime
(09:52):
you see somebody, especially if it's like a romantic situation
where perhaps the the bond is not completely um uh,
you know, gol together for two individuals, for one to
give the other a puppy, That always just seems terribly inappropriate, uh,
for all concerned, including the puppy. Now, we don't want
to smear puppies that were given that way. I know
(10:12):
some great puppies that were exactly in that situation. But
but you have to have doing it. Were these gifts
entirely thought out? I don't know, But then again, it
is the acquisition of a puppy, ever entirely thought out.
I guess. I guess. It's a decision you make, you know,
partially with your brain, but also with your heart. Okay, Now, strangely,
we just read an email about somebody cooking a turkey
(10:35):
in a microwave oven in nineteen seven. Guess what our
next email is about from a totally different listener. Um,
what has to do with the turkey? But what's the
year seven? Something was in the air? Do you want
to read Trish or Shire. Okay, hey, guys, I love
the show as well as stuff to blow your mind.
I just finished the Microwave series and I have a
relevant story. When I was four, my mom and I
(10:57):
moved across the country to a new city. Are apartment
was older, complete with a totally probably haunted, claw footed
tub and a hulking metal beast of a microwave. The
safety of the aging gas stove was questionable, but Mom
was totally comfortable with the microwave. So on Thanksgiving she
cooked an entire turkey in that microwave. I called her
(11:18):
to ask, and she recalls it taking about an hour
to cook. I remember it being tasty, if a little
less brown than subsequent oven turkeys. In all, it's a
nice childhood memory. Just thought i'd share my anecdote. Cheers, Trish,
Thanks Trish. Yeah, what was going on in seven? I
don't know. I mean, maybe it goes deeper. You know,
these are both tales two of people moving right. Uh,
(11:39):
you know, maybe that was a year of new beginnings.
I don't have to consult the astrological chart on that one, right,
But but yeah, both of these cases where people were like,
we have a turkey, we need to cook it, we
have limited resources. We were kind of forced into the
scenario that that microwave. Early microwave marketers anticipated the idea
(12:00):
that this would be your go to cooking instrument, though
instead of being by choice, it was by circumstance, and
in both cases it seemed to have worked all right.
This next message comes from Scott. Scott says, when I
was a young marine back in the late seventies, I
was assigned to the computer center at the Marine Corps
Finance Center in Kansas City. This was the main administrative
(12:21):
and financial hub for the entire Marine Corps, and we
collected data from all units for reporting and record keeping.
Given the state of computer tech at the time, much
of that data arrived in the form of paper documents.
We received boxes of paper forms daily which had to
be entered into the computer system. This was achieved by
scanning them via optical character recognition scanners. Whoa in seventies.
(12:44):
I didn't even know that that was around back then. Um.
Each page was fed under a scanning head which read
the typewritten reports and turned them into a text file.
The achilles heel of any machine which has to move
pieces of paper is the paper itself, and unless the
paper is in ristine condition, it will jam and cause
all manner of hate and discontent for the human operating
(13:05):
the machine. Quite often the reports we got were definitely
not in pristine condition, generally because they've absorbed humidity during transport.
How is this related to the microwave episode. Well, The
accepted solution for fixing feed problems was to dry out
the forms by taking them down to the break room
and nuking them for a few minutes in the same
microwave machine everyone used for heating up their lunches. Thanks
(13:27):
for the podcast, Scott, Well that that is that is interesting.
I hadn't thought about that. We I think we touched
briefly on the idea that there are industrial uses for microwaves.
I think it was with lumber right right, Yeah, that
was the example of the walk in microwave. Yes, yes,
that that made the events of whatever that movie was
(13:47):
possible with one of the kids, spy hard kick ass.
That's it. The seth Are producer just told me, alright,
we have another microwave missive here. This one comes to
us from Evan. Hey, Robert and Joe. I wanted to
let you know of a fascinating microwave application that you
didn't mention on your recent microwave shows. It's called microwave
(14:09):
induced centering and is being used in the production of
metal parts using a three D printer that's centering s
I N T E R I n G, which I
believe that the word came up in our episode on
the one ring on stuff to blow your mind. Anyway,
it continues. These printers use a plastic binding agent to
help shape metal powder into a specific part. Yes, we
(14:32):
definitely talked about this, and um gosh, which metal was
it that we were talking about? Tungstens, I don't know.
Go back and check out that episode if you want
more centering action anyway continues. The plastic is later burned
off and the remaining metal powder is heated just enough
for the metal to form metallic bonds, but not enough
for the metal to become a liquid and lose its shape.
(14:53):
This process is called centering and is currently being done
with convection ovens. The downside is that centering can take
over twelve hours to complete, but in recent years, companies
are starting to come out with microwave based ovens that
can center these metal powder parts in thirty minutes or less.
This speed increase happens because microwaves induce an electric field
(15:13):
on the surface of each metal particle. Current then flows
between the metal particles quickly and efficiently, heating that region
so that the metal bonds can form. This is the
same effect that makes putting bulk metal objects in the
microwave dangerous. The electric field on the surface of the
objects can severely shock you or burn your food, but
it can be an effective way to heat metal powders
(15:34):
too high temperatures. The technology isn't perfect just yet and
may take a few more years to really make an
impact in manufacturing. By the way, I love both of
your shows and look forward to hearing them every week.
Keep up the good work, sincerely, Evan. Very interesting things absolutely.
By the way, if you do end up possessing the
one ring, do not put it in a microwave. Horrible effects. Alright,
(15:56):
let's look at one last message about the microwave oven.
This comes from Joseph. Joseph refers back to our discussion
about the irradiation of food in the microwaves episode. You know,
we talked about bombardment of food items with actual ionizing
radiation unlike microwaves. Uh, and how you know that's regularly
done and is considered safe. It's both done to image
(16:18):
the food to make sure there are no like say,
metal screws or other contaminants in it. But then it's
also done to sterilize food in some cases, like irradiating
spices to kill microorganisms or insects or whatever. So Joseph says,
I love invention and stuff to blow your mind. I
travel a lot for work, and these are two of
my favorite podcasts to listen to on the road. There
(16:38):
is a food purposely irradiated that I didn't here mentioned
in part two of the Microwave episodes. At least for
a while, you could purchase irradiated ground beef. The radiation
would kill any living organisms, making the meat sterile. I
miss being able to eat a juicy, rare hamburger safely.
Oh that's interesting. Yeah. Um, I've not seen it in
(16:59):
a store in years. I think people were afraid to
eat the meat, or they were afraid the meat was
radioactive and it didn't sell. Well, well, maybe that's going
to change because enough people are playing the Fallout games
to know that the glowing green meat is is ideal.
Always pick the glowing green meat out of your kills.
Uh though, actually did look this up and it looks
like yeah, I think there are some efforts to bring
(17:21):
back the radiation of of ground meats for food safety
reasons and uh yeah, and they tried it before. I
think there was just like some consumer hesitancy about it.
They they need a new adjective. I think they need
to branded slightly differently. Shiny meat. Shiny shined meat like
sunshine is radiation it has been shined, it's it's been,
(17:42):
it's undergone the shining um so u. Joseph continues. On
a recent toy episode, you discussed why a Jack in
the box would keep a child fascinated. I think, at
least in my own case, I used it to learn
to control my startle reflex. I tried not to react
when it popped. I still do a similar thing as
an adult. Interesting, Please tell me I'm not the only
(18:03):
person who stares down at the toaster and tries not
to flinch when the toast is ready. Plus watching the
nichrome wire glow and watching and smelling the myard reactions
occur our bonuses to my grown up Jack in the box,
I guess that's the toaster. Keep those shows coming, sincerely, Joseph.
Oh wow, Yeah, I don't know that I stare a
lot and do a toaster. Now, I don't. I don't
(18:24):
actually have a pop up toaster, but I do remember
having a similar experience as a kid, like you really
want to see what's going on in there, and there's
all sorts of cool glowing that's happened. I I know
what you're talking about, Joseph. I have stared at the
heating element. I mean, like a resistance based heating element
is beautiful. I think so at least. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
(18:45):
I think I was. I was talking with my mom
actually about early memories, like what SMI earliest memories, And
she was talking about staring at a like an electric
heater that has some sort of a heating element, and
you know, it's like it's yours, irresistible to the hold.
But she was also told like, don't you dare touch it.
It's the most dangerous thing in the world. So that
also helped the memory like really take holds in her mind.
(19:09):
All right, Uh, should we take a quick break and
then come back for more. It sounds good. Let's do it.
Let's shut the door in the microwave and then come back.
All right, we're back, and uh, let's talk a little
bit about bubble wrap, which comes to us from Matthew.
Matthew says, we love your show. You were talking about
(19:30):
bubble wrap. I was in the Marine Corps returning from
a deployment in nine. Again we're in the eighties here
and again we have another marine writing in uh. And
at the and at the welcome back ceremony, all the
families were their spouses, kids, et cetera. In a rare
moment of brilliance, they had rolled out large rolls of
bubble wrap and sheets on the floor of the hangar
(19:52):
to keep the kids busy. My son was only three
and that is all he remembers of the day topping
the bubbles. He's thirty three now and has been in
the Marine Corps himself and returned from a deployment. I
was there, and the bubble wrap is still the main
feature for the kids. That's so great. So much changes
while the basics never do. Oh, that's wonderful. Thank you
so much, Matthew. Alright, this next message comes to us
(20:15):
from Olivia, also about bubble wrap. I think this is
in response to us talking about why it is so
fun to pop the bubbles? Uh, and so Olivia says, Hello,
Robert and Joe. In the most recent Invention episode, in
the last five minutes or so, you'll discussed squeezeballs, fidget spinners,
and just the human inclination to be messing with stuff.
I'm not aware of any research at the moment that
(20:36):
I can point you to, but I can give some
anecdotal information on the topic. I don't know if you
all plan to do an episode. This may provide some
background as to what to look into. So for one,
these items can be categorized as STEM toys or fidget toys,
and within some of the FRING groups I run in,
they're super popular, especially within groups where a lot of
(20:56):
us are neuro divergent, specifically having either a d h
D or autism. I have a d h D myself,
and I find that it can be very difficult at
times to concentrate without having something to do with my hands.
As this feeling can be common to the two conditions
listed above, many of us turned to fidget toys as
a convenient way to keep our hands busy. As a
side effect of this, my neurotypical friends those without a
(21:19):
d h D, autism, or any other such effect, have
had the chance to be exposed to these toys when
they wouldn't normally, and often they find they love them
and we'll go out and purchase their own. But if
you want to see more examples of the types of
toys that exist out there, I'll oh and she links
a STEM selling website below. Many many people will fidget
with whatever they have, but there can be a stigma
(21:41):
around using items specifically designed for it. Back when fidget
spinners were at the height of their popularity, there was
some controversy within the neuro divergent communities about it, specifically
that because of their popularity, spinners and many other toys
were getting banned from classrooms. This was due to the
fact that toys that are very active with lots of motion,
like spinners, can work different for different kids. Neurotypical kids
(22:05):
will tend to be more distracted by these toys instead
of aided by them in concentration like they like they
do for neuro divergent kids. So on one hand, while
these items were becoming more normalized and making them easier
to get into the hands of kids who could benefit
from them, they were also being banned from the environments
where they would specifically be the most useful. Anyway, the
(22:26):
one toy that prompted me to write in is the
Infinite bubble Wrap key chain. I'll attach the video below
of someone using it. I haven't had the chance to
use one myself, but some of my friends absolutely love them.
While the experience isn't identical to bubble wrap proper, my
friends say that it scratches the same itch tactically as
the classic product. Plus it's small and reusable, so it's
(22:47):
always convenient. Also, I'd just like to say thanks so
much for making both Invention and Stuff to Blow Your Mind.
I've been listening since the first episode of Stuff from
the Science Lab and have been a loyal listener since.
At the time, I was in seventh grade in middle school,
and now I'm a recent college grad with a degree
in engineering. I can honestly say that without your podcasts
and a few of the other Stuff podcasts, I would
(23:09):
not be who I am today. My friends and family
all poke fun how I seem to know something about everything,
and that is all thanks to these podcasts. I've learned
so much over the years. So seriously, thanks so much
for making all these Stuff to Blow Your Mind has
long been one of my favorites, and Invention has quickly
become a new favorite too with most sincere thanks Olivia
(23:30):
up there. Yeah, yeah, I mean it will be uh
next month in January, it'll it will be ten years
since the first episode of of a show launched a
titled Stuff in the Science Lab, which was then rebranded
into Stuff to Build Your Mind. So yeah, we're coming
up on for me a decade of podcasting here. Yeah,
(23:51):
I know it's been a heck of a journey for you.
It's been a heck of a journey for me, the
part of it that I've been here. And um, yeah,
and so thank you so much for getting in touch Olivia.
This is this was wonderful. Now. I loved all that
she had to say though about fidget toys in general
and helping some people focus serving as a distraction to others.
I think that's very insightful. I know we've talked before
(24:11):
on the show about our own personal experience with things
like this. Um. I think it was the episode of
stuff to blow your mind about imaginative worlds and daydreaming
and even maladaptive daydreaming. And I spoke how on help
when I was a kid, especially, I would need to
have a rubber band in my hand and twiddle with
(24:31):
their other band, especially when I was daydreaming like that
it would aid in my daydreaming. It was like a
talisman almost. Yeah. Yeah, And and I was also very
specific about the color it needed to be green or red. Uh.
You know, I would have probably settled for orange as well,
but brown and gray we're not going to cut it. Uh,
And I don't need those anymore, but I do still
(24:51):
find myself, especially in the podcasting booth here, I need
something for my hands. Uh. So, like right now it
is a partially torn apart sharpie, an orange sharpie and
clear and weirdly enough, it has to be orange. Um.
I get a little perturbed if I don't have an
orange sharpie to use. But but ideally I need to
have like a squishy sand bag. Uh. That's better because
(25:14):
of I drop it, it it makes less noise. But I
can definitely still at this point in my life. Um,
you know understand the need to have something in your
hand to fiddle with in order to keep your mind
focused on something. Oh yeah, yeah, I understand the feeling.
It's it's powerful, all right. What are we looking at
next here? Oh, let's see we have one from Amy
(25:36):
and it looks like this one is going to mention
a bubble rap but also a little science fiction. Amy
rides high Robert and Joe. I just listened to the
bubble Wrap episode on Red Dwarf season three, episode five.
The episode Time Sliders, Rumor goes back in time to
tell his younger self to invent quote tension sheets. Bubble
wrap that is meant to be popped for its therapeutic
(25:57):
effect because a kid he went to school with dead
and became wealthy. While he tells himself about it, the
other kid listens, but the younger him ignores the idea genius.
This episode is all about photography too, so it ties
in with your recent episodes. You guys have to watch it.
I enjoy invention and stuff to blow your mind, Live
long and prosper amy. This is not the first bit
(26:19):
of listener mail we've gotten about the show Red Dwarf,
which I've never watched, but it seems like it dovetails
with a number of things that come up on our podcasts. Yeah,
I vaguely remember seeing catching a little of it back
in the days, you know, on cable. I don't know
if it was on Sci Fi or maybe even on
one of the comedy channels, but I remember catching part
of it but never really getting to dive into it.
I have friends who are really into it though. We
(26:42):
also heard from a listener named Prudence who had had
some stuff to share about bubble rap, but I think
more importantly said a topic suggestion. I would love to
hear the history of autopsy. That would be interesting get
into autopsy the section, Uh, just sort of general anatomical
explorer ration. I think this may have something to do.
(27:02):
I don't want to mind read prudence, but it may
have something to do with our our talk in the
Caskets episodes about the needs for human cadavers in order
to do medical dissections. Um. But yeah, yeah, I mean
there's gotta be taboos that come and go about that
through through history, and like, how are the standard practices
first created? Totally? All right, let's look at an email
(27:27):
we got about our episode on the telescope. This comes
from our listener, Dimitri Dmitri. Says, Hi, Robert and Joe.
I was listening to Invention since episode one. You announced
it on Stuff to blow your mind, and I love it.
Finally you touched a topic that I'm passionate about astronomy
and the telescope, so I decided to write in first
one curious observation. Up until recently, to be precise, we
(27:51):
have only seen the universe using the electromagnetic spectrum, different
wavelengths of it, yes, but still a single type of information.
But then came LEGO, the laser interferometer, gravitational Wave Observatory
in sixteen, for the first time we could see the
world through the eyes of gravitational waves. I guess that
(28:11):
for early telescope users like Galileo, it was similarly eye opening.
I definitely can compare this Ligo to the first telescopes
coming online. By the way, all of the human senses
have to do with electromagnetic force. I was trying to
think for a second, they're like, wait a minute, like
touch and smell. But yeah, I guess chemistry, you know,
chemistry and physics is that's electromagnetic fields and forces, and yeah,
(28:33):
so yeah, Dmitri continues, second to your discussion about the stars.
I've lived in different cities my entire life and don't
see many stars very often. But I photographed the night
sky recently. I went to the darkest sky place within
a two hour drive from my home with my family,
and I saw the Milky Way with naked eyes. You
can find the image, and then he links to his
(28:55):
Instagram page to find the image with the center of
the galaxy. He says, it's definitely at least surreal to
lie on your back and see all those stars. Moreover,
and then Knee links to another image you can even
see a faint spot of Andromeda, a galaxy two point
five million light years away. Uh. This is another level
of excitement that I discovered at home later. Uh. And
(29:16):
oh boy, Andromeda's we gotta date with Destiny, end up
with Andromeda and the far future, and that's going to
be exciting. Yeah, if you could, if you could live
long enough, that image would definitely come into sharper focus
for you. All Right, on that note, we're going to
take one more break, but we'll be right back with
more invention listener mail. Alright, we're back, all right. This
(29:42):
bit of listener mail comes to us from Irene. Irene
writes in about canning. We did an episode dealing with this,
and I'm not going to read the entire email. First
part of the email is basically Irene expressing how much
she loves canning, which is all wonderful. We love to
hear about people's enthusiasm for a particular invention. But then
she goes on to discuss our interest in canning, or
(30:05):
potential interest in canning. She says, I believe it was
Joe or maybe both of you who expressed some interest
in trying your hand at canning. I highly encourage you
to try it. There is no more gratifying sound than
that of the lid popping down when you pull the
jars from the canner and they begin to cool and seal.
That pop is the sound of success, and I never
tire of it. I usually shout yes for each jar
(30:26):
lid that successfully pops for me. You can improvise almost
everything you need for canning except for one tool, and
that's the jar lifter a k a. Canning tongs. There
is no substitute for canning tongs, and you'll risk injury
if you try to pull a hot jar out from
the water with anything other than canning tongs. Uh. This
comes from the horse's mouth, as one who suffered a
(30:46):
nasty burn trying to retrieve an arrant jar from the
boiling water using a regular pair of tongs. Don't even try. Fortunately,
canning tongs are very inexpensive and can be found at
most grocery and discount stores. Fire there is an element
of danger in canning with all the hot water in
the canner and usually another pot of hot syrup, brine, parade, apples,
(31:07):
and other and other items. With two large pots of
boiling something I've gotten burnt cut and nearly set wooden
spoons and pot holders on fire. So the danger thing
adds a little bit of fun. The pop of the
lids ceiling successfully is the payoff for the heat, the work,
and the danger. The real joy is giving people something
delicious in a jar, especially when they don't expect it.
(31:28):
Jump in and give it a try. Thanks again for
and exploring an odd topic. Near and dear to me.
Keep up the good work and keep the episodes coming.
I'm almost always listening to podcasts while i'm canning. Best regards,
irene Um. Yeah, I'm glad she brought up the canning
tongs because I remember I honestly don't remember it was
my mom or my grandma. They definitely had the canning
(31:49):
tongs around, and I guess you know, if you can't
picture him, you need to look them up. But they're
a pair of tongs looks generally like sort of doubled
h you know, wide enough so they can grip a
can in. But I remember as a kid they were
really fun to play with because you know, they're essentially
this right size to grab your own arm or someone
else's arm, uh, and or pick up toys in a
(32:10):
way that normal tongs, um you know, don't do as well.
You know how much we love a tool the devils
as a toy, especially a kind of dangerous toy. Yeah, uh, Robert,
we actually had just had one come in recently that
I thought you might like. So do you mind if
I read this one from Jeremy here? Yes, go for it. Okay,
Jeremy says, I just finished your third Toy episode, and
(32:32):
I wanted to let you know how much I've been
enjoying your podcast. I listened since the first episode, and
I'm a fan. Ironically enough, as you finish up this
episode on Toys, I am putting together a miniature of
my game of choice, Age of Sigma. I understand Robert
plays forty K. I think that refers to Warhammer forty
k or right, yeah, yeah, he's referring to to my
(32:54):
painting of Warhammer forty figures, and he's talking about what
was originally knows just Warhammer or were fantasy. Uh, he says,
I understand Robert plays that, but nobody's perfect. I don't
know if miniature war gaming is the topic you guys
can cover on Invention or not, but I would love
to hear something on it. Not only is it enjoyable
for the obvious reasons, but it's phenomenal for getting into
(33:15):
a community of like minded people that are not just
into playing games, but it's they're also hobbyists and in
many cases amazing artists. Additionally, you find that there are
some pretty famous people that enjoy the same hobby. Great
examples are Peter Cushing and Robin Williams. I didn't know
about Peter Cushing being into miniature gaming. Uh. I had
(33:37):
read that Robin Williams had gotten into it, possibly because
one of his one of his sons was interested at
some point, but but that's all I really knew about it.
There are some other interesting historical figures that pop up
in the history of miniature war gaming and the you know,
especially sort of the definitely the pre Dungeons and Dragons
(33:57):
era of gaming and sort of like class English gaming.
So that would be something that could finish to potentially
be fun to discuss because you're you have a few
different things coming together in miniature war gaming, right, I mean,
you have you have hobbyists, you have the creation of miniatures,
who have the utilization of miniatures in either a strategic
form that is entirely about the the puzzle of strategy
(34:21):
and games of skill, and to a certain extent extent chance.
But then there's also the whole idea of simulating a
battle scenario to some extent, and and and that would
be something to look at as well too. You know where,
where in the history of of war gaming in particular
does it tie in with actual military strategy. Oh yeah, well,
I think we could definitely look at the history of
(34:43):
inventions for simulating conflict. Anyway, Jeremy continues, thanks for all
your work, and I hope to hear it in perpetuity.
That's a strange sentence. Does that mean forever we have
to keep going forever? I guess so. Oh, I don't
know if I can do that. As for the Wicked,
all right, Well, as long as we're talking about pastimes
(35:04):
and games, we should talk a little bit about toys.
Here's a listener mail we received from Steve, Robert and Joe.
I thoroughly enjoyed Toys Part one, particularly the segment on
the frisbee. It reminded me of being a kid around
kindergarten age when my parents came home from Saturday grocery
shopping with a brand new red Frisbee, and not only
had the ridges uh and thicker outer rim you mentioned
(35:25):
as new features in the nineteen sixty four model, but
the center was made to look like the bridge of
a flying saucer, inspiring my older brother to paint the
windows silver. The segment on the origins of the Frisbee
also made me think of a story my dad told
me when he was getting up there in years. In
the late forties and early fifties, he worked at the
National Film Board of Canada and Ottawa. Oh that's great.
(35:47):
I'm a big fan of the National Film Board of
Canada and their their work there is short films because
I think some of them played Sorry, is that what
Boards of Canada is named after? Yeah? Yeah, the musical
like Boards of Canada is is a reference to the
National Film Boards of Canada. Amazing. Yeah. And and so
I lived in Canada for a little bit when I
was much younger, and I believe that the CDC station
(36:10):
would air a little National Film Board of Canada shorts
such as one fabulous piece in which you had these
stop motion uh sand creatures forming out of the sand
and building a sand castle. It's it's wonderful if you
look it up, it's It's hosted online, as are all
of the films I think. Anyway continues, Uh, The office
(36:31):
was on a bluff above the Ottawa River, and to
dispose of the many empty film cans their work generated,
he and his colleague would fling the tops and bottoms
out of the window frisbee style and try to get
them to the river. He said. They mostly landed on
the rocks of the bluff, but they had great fun
doing it. Looking forward to part two, a little bit
(36:51):
of lighthearted littering in the post war period. Yeah, forties
and fifties. You know, it was a different time. But
interesting too about the National Film Board of Canada being
around back then. I say, I'm a big fan of
their films, but I've never really looked too much into
their history, so so I had no idea how back
it went. Evidently to the forties and fifties at least. Uh.
(37:13):
We got one message from Vivian that was actually one
of a couple of messages we got about. When we
we asked, hey, is anybody still making like wooden jigsaw puzzles?
Vivian says, Hi, Robert and Joe, and one of your
toys podcasts. You were talking about puzzles. You're wondering if
wooden puzzles are still being made. Um, one of you
said they knew about wooden puzzles for small children. Here's
(37:34):
a link to a company in Canada who makes wooden puzzles.
They are even fun for adults. I have a link
to one below, and so I looked this up. This
company is called stump Craft, and uh, they make extremely
elegant looking, artistic kind of creation puzzles. Robert, I've got
an image for you here that looks awesome. Yeah. It's
a very colorful fantasy imagery with like a third eye. Uh, yeah,
(37:57):
I'd be into that. Here's another one they got looks
like some who kind of like an alien landscape or
so I guess it's supposed to be the bad Lands. Yeah,
I like it. All right, We're gonna go ahead and
close up the mail bag with that one. But obviously
we would love to hear more from invention listeners as
we roll into the new year here and consider all
(38:20):
new inventions to visit. Inventions, big invention, small inventions that
are clearly game changing, inventions that also have you know,
a you know, a less pronounced effect on on life,
but still change the shape of human life as we
know it. So by all means, reach out to us
let us know what you would like to hear. Huge
thanks as always to our excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson.
(38:42):
If you would like to get in touch with us
with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest
topic for the future, to maybe get a piece of
listener mail featured in a future episode, or just to
say hi, you can email us at contact at invention
pod dot com. Invention is production of I Heart Radio.
For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the i
(39:04):
heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows. M
Invention News
Hosts And Creators
Robert Lamb
Joe McCormick
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