September 6, 2021 • 61 mins
China seeks to crack down on 'video game addiction' with strict new laws on internet gaming. Capybaras prompt a conversation about class in South America. Studies show human beings are evolving new arteries -- and no one's quite sure why, or what it means for the future. All this and more in this week's Strange News.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of I Heart Radio. Hello, welcome back to the show.
(00:25):
My name is Matt, my name is Noel. They called
me Ben. We're joined as always with our super producer
Alexis code named Doc Holiday Jackson. Most importantly, you are you.
You are here, and that makes this the stuff they
don't want you to know. It's the top of the week.
We're traveling around the world. We're going to China, We're
(00:46):
going to Argentina. We're also going into the future in
a very weird way that may directly affect you. You're
not gonna look at your forearms the same after you
listen to a show. Let's let's baby start by going
over the Pacific. Uh, and with a little bit of
(01:06):
backgrounds here. Uh. You know, we talk about video games
in this show. Matt, Nold, Uh, code named Doc and
I all have various games that we enjoy and sometimes
we've even played online together. But like a lot of
people who are older, who are adults, you know, we
always have that battle of like is this a waste
(01:27):
of time? Is this good relaxation? At what point does
it become an addiction? Because video games, you know, I
think it's common knowledge now they really can be addictive. Oh, yes,
they They are meant to do that, just like social
media is meant to send you down a rabbit hole
of always having to check your feeds before we jump
(01:49):
into it, guys, really quickly, can I do one of
these fast roll offs of what's happening today or what
happened over the past couple of days. Just it's going
to go so fast you're not even gonna believe. Yeah,
I'm a bookend. I'm gonna book end with one on
my own, though. I want to see if we got
the same stuff. Okay, well I'll just hit it and
then you can finish it if if you got something,
uh first, something we were reading about, we haven't covered
(02:11):
it in full yet. The situation in Afghanistan. The story
came out about the CIA clandestinely meeting with the Taliban.
That's crazy and definitely something we're talking about. The US
is also conducting strikes again, drone strikes in Afghanistan, as
they're you know, pulling out and almost completely pulled out
and spoiler alert, there's a lot of collateral damage. Again, Um,
(02:34):
a category for hurricane just hit Louisiana on the anniversary
of Hurricane Katrina. And this is Hurricane Ida. This is
Hurricane Ida that just happened in the day before we're
recording this. It's it's August thirty right now. And uh,
the DPRK is allegedly ramping up its production again of
nuclear materials. Well, it's it's reignited its reactor, yes, which
(02:58):
is slightly different. But the big question with that you
get to you hit me on the hobby horse. The
big issue with that, most analysts would say is that
it indicates a move to go back to the negotiating
table for further aid. And that's just based on past patterns,
which is what all these folks are trying to guess at.
(03:21):
But for anybody who has seen that in the news,
that doesn't mean that bombs are about to fall. That
doesn't mean that I c b M s are going
to be launched. I do want to I don't know.
I never thought it would be in this position. But
in defense of the CIA, with what he said about Afghanistan, Uh,
(03:42):
imagine they had to go forward and get get in
front of it. They had to announce that meeting happened,
because what if they didn't announce it and someone found
out about it, that's even worse. So they're going to
clearly not disclose the substance of the conversation. But it's
it's not unusual to be loved by anyone. It's not
(04:05):
unusual for for the CIA to meet with clandestine powers
like that. That's how the company operates, agreed. I think
it was the acting director of the CIA though, who
went in person, which feels a little out of character
for what they would choose to do from a strategy perspective,
but hey, who knows, who knows? The ways of the
(04:26):
company are mysterious, that right, if I may. I just
wanted to add something to the Afghanistan bit um. Pretty
big news a couple of days ago that there was
an attack on the airport you know where people are
trying to evacuate by a group called isis k and
I was not familiar with isis k Um, and then
(04:48):
looking into them realized they're kind of like almost the
even more conservative branch of ISIS and they are obviously
more conservative than the Taliban but they're essentially, you know,
rebelling against the Taliban. And just like, I'm surprised that
I've never heard of this group before, Ben, do you
know anything about is s K that you might be
(05:09):
able to clue listeners in, because I think maybe a
lot of folks are in the same boat as me.
Is this uh ISIS is maybe understood as a confederation
of aligned groups that share the same extremist beliefs. So
that's why you'll see it sometimes referred to in the
past as EISL and sometimes as just I s the
(05:32):
Islamic State UH. And this is because these these groups
UM may have differing like on the ground day to
day aims, but they agree on the main thing, which
is the establishment of what's called a caliphate theocracy UM
and this Yeah, and they're they're not buddy buddy with
(05:54):
the Taliban, honestly for several different reasons. The Taliban once
international legitimacy, they want to be recognized as a state power.
ISAIS wants a worldwide califate. Very differently, and isis K
stands for Chorissan the K and and ISIS is this
Islamic state Chorisson, which is a region UM that includes Afghanistan,
(06:18):
Pakistan and its surrounding countries. And it's actually made up
of militants who have defected from both the Afghan and
Pakistani Taliban. So it's definitely like a more extremist and
you know, conservative militant groups. So it's just interesting and
something to follow, because I don't think they had I
don't know they had made a whole lot of news
(06:39):
as being a separate entity with different aims from ISIS
proper Um. That's something I wanted to mention. Well, I
guarantee you the company has been keeping tabs on them,
and I would say that that's probably one of the
major reasons that the US met with the Taliban, because
there is that push for legitimacy, as you said, and
(07:00):
and there is a threat, a real credible threat from
this group is KA and those are the targets that
the drones were going after, like hence the drone strikes
so right, and one of them, I believe was one
of their vehicles that was just chock full of explosives,
hence the collateral damage. And also, yeah, these attacks are continuing.
(07:21):
It's it's Monday, August is this segment is being recorded
and earlier today, at least ten civilians, including children, were
killed by US drone strikes. Yes, correct, correct, So that's
what I was referring to, terribly and coldly as the
collateral damage that the US continues to rack up with
(07:44):
the drones. Important note by the way intelligence analysts predicted
those airport attacks. And also I want to thank, while
respecting anonymity, I want to thank some of our fellow
conspiracy realists, both domestic and abroad, currently serving and uh retired,
who also reached out about this with with very valid
(08:07):
concerns that it would not make the mainstream news. Luckily
it is at this point, but it was very curious
to me to be receiving reports of stuff before, like
before it broke in the West, because there's not there's
not that much of a delay now, right because the
(08:27):
news can travel so quickly, but um in one bright
spot when much needed bright spot. We should pay our
respects and gratitude to special Forces operators who went in
under the cover of night and began rescuing the families
of Afghan nationals, who were interpreters, who were translators or
(08:49):
what would miscellaneously be referred to as fixers. Enablers, helpers,
They got them out of very dangerous situation. I'd also
like to go on record condemning Eric Prince. You guys
got me started. Condemning Eric Prince. You know the name.
You've heard him. I imagine UM Robert has a good
behind the bastards about him. This guy amid this chaos,
(09:12):
in this deluge of of blood and terror and tragedy,
This guy who started selling tickets out of out of
afghanistunt for six thousand five dollars of pop. Jez talk
about opportunistic scumbags. Yeah, I go back to our episodes
on Blackwater and all the iterations of it to learn
about that dude, academy ACADEMI. Yeah, I went back and
(09:36):
forth on that. But yeah, let's jump into this other thing.
I'm glad we talked about all those things. Just want
to bring that up because I think quick, just hey,
this is all happening simultaneously. The tiny tiny crook addendum
only fans not not not doing porn anymore, just sleeping.
They're not not doing They're not not doing porn anymore. Yeah,
they must have heard our story. Uh, and I decided
(09:58):
to pivot from their pivot. Um so yeah, they are.
They are staying the course, doing what they're good at,
just empowering porn creators to put porn out there directly
to the fans and only freedom of speech. Excellent, excellent. Well,
so yeah, let's let's jump to a story about uh,
(10:25):
not reducing freedoms. Yeah, government clamping down on what you
can do with your day. If you're between zero and
eighteen years old and you live in China, you're a
Chinese citizen. We're gonna talk about all this, and then
we're gonna wrap it up by just talking about what
it would mean if it was happening here in the
United States, to just give some context and there kind
(10:46):
of some opinion on this. So reporting out of the Guardian,
out of Reuters, out of Xinha, I think is how
you say at the official news reporting services of China.
I'm gonna jump to the Guardian article, particularly like how
they cover it here. Article is titled China cut. Some
amount of time miners can spend playing video games under
(11:07):
eight teams will be allowed to play online games for
one hour on Fridays and on weekends and on holidays,
So one hour Friday, one hour Saturday, one hour Sunday
and you get an extra hour if you got a holiday.
I'm just gonna go through some of this and then
we can discuss guys China has placed in order to
(11:29):
online video gaming companies, those who provide the services, who
actually have servers where you connect to them when you're playing,
whether it's on a console, on your phone, on your computer, whatever,
to reduce the services that they offer to customers. And
the whole point of this, at least according to the
government and to a kind of question and answer session
(11:51):
that was put out through Shinhwa, it's calling video gaming
or gaming in general and addiction youth video game, especially
as an addiction. And this one hour, by the way,
is between eight pm and nine pm, So this tiny
little window that young people would be able to play
(12:13):
bro that that's not even enough time to level up
once once by design. I mean, I know we're going
to go into it, but it can also it also
m combats the use of mining in games where you
have cafes full of people grinding and then selling items.
And it also there are a lot of people who
play M M O RPGs, so you want to be
(12:36):
able to play with your friends, so it gets everybody
into one spot where they can also be more easily
observed and surveilled. That's one of the big things. If
you're you know, if you've got tight controls over the
I s p s, like like China has as a
as a governmental group, as an entity, they've got tight
controls over the providers of the services. So being able
(12:59):
to look at it in that an hour for three
days it would be helpful. But here's the thing. That's
not the only time they're going to be looking at
the gaming industry. They're gonna be watching those I s
p s the entire time to regulate and too, to
crack down on video gaming services again the people providing
the servers to make sure they're not letting anybody else play.
(13:23):
And they're also trying to crack down on kids using
adult accounts in order to access. Uh, Like, this is
a huge crackdown. What's the what's the cut off age?
Eighteen years old? Eighteen years old, you're llegally no longer
in mind? That makes sense? Okay, that wasn't sure if
it was the same, they're not. Um, that's fascinating. So
(13:44):
I mean I asked you off off air if this
is like an issue of uh, maybe seeming to erode
the fabric of like Chinese you know, civilization and hierarchy,
and perhaps there's such a problem with kids gaming so
much and the things you're talking about then that maybe
people are uh rising in the ranks like they should.
And there's a sense, I mean, it has to be
a bigger picture. I mean, not to be too callous
(14:06):
about it, but I can't imagine it's all this we
just want our kids to be happy. To me, is
more of a productivity thing. It feels very much like that.
Some of the language that you can read coming out
of Shinhwa really does play to that. Uh. The government
authorities are asking the gaming companies to I've got a
quote here, quote always prioritize the social good and actively
(14:28):
respond to societal concerns. They're also saying that again, these
things are highly addictive, and they use phrases like losing hours,
like losing uh the society is losing x hours to
video gaming on a daily basis, or you know, however
else you want to put it. And it's interesting to
(14:49):
note that this is just a further step from previous
restrictions they had placed on on gaming and younger people.
I believe it was one and a half hour per day.
It wasn't specific days during the week. It was just
one and a half hours that you were allowed per
day to game and ed. I think it was like
three hours on a holiday. Yeah, any difference for the weekend.
(15:14):
The weekend now is the only No, not previously, not
in twenty now now it will be. Um it's pretty crazy.
They're going after companies like ten Cent, after essentially the
Amazon of of other countries, Ali baba. They're going after
all kinds of companies and third parties to like make
(15:38):
this this action actually occur. They also arrested the Top
League Legends player once their identity was revealed, under what
charge It was too good, too much ponage. Well, what
I heard is he powned jimping directly direct You can't
(16:02):
do that, Cane. No, no, President, she is not about
getting pound um. So, how do they propose to enforce
this without like directly mandating that the gaming companies put
in stricter age restrictions or like or how do they
monitor this? I mean, then you make a good point
about limiting the hours does streamline the monitoring, but short
(16:25):
of just like you know, grageous, uh, privacy invasions. How
are they gonna go about this? Well, yeah, some of
those levers, the mechanisms already exist. The problem is proving
that whoever is using the computer at you know, four
pm is actually or let's say probably like six pm.
(16:47):
Let's say once kids are you know, out of school.
How do you know if a kid is actually using
the computer or not the adult and just signed in
under an adults account and you know, unless you're using
facial recognition technology through the phone or through you know,
whatever device is being used to play. And that's where
a lot of the doubts come in from, you know,
(17:09):
especially from the private companies that are making millions and
millions of dollars off of video games and kids playing
video games. Guys, there's not really enough time to fully
fully flesh this thing out as far as our opinions
and what we think. We're gonna have to take a
break here in just a minute. But first of all,
I can't imagine what this would have been like if
I was trying to play my Super Nintendo and you know,
(17:32):
the President came down and told me I couldn't or whatever, um,
I would be devastated. But at the same time, I'm
thinking about how much time I really do I don't
want to say waste, just how much time I invest
in virtual worlds. And we've talked about that before on
this show. All of us do it to one extent
(17:55):
or another. And Uh, I'm wondering if my life would
be better if I was doing something else, or if
I would be lacking something because I didn't learn these
stories and live through these characters. I don't know, don't stigmatize.
I mean, what's the difference between reading a book exactly
and also, like, I mean, shouldn't that be your choice
(18:17):
to to discipline yourself and make that change. Do you
really need the long arm of government to like, you know,
slap you on the wrist when it's time to get
off the PlayStation. I was just saying, maybe I do
need a long arm to be like to smack me
across the face a little bit and say, hey, let's
write some more music, turn off turf video. That's that's fair.
But to your point, Matt, I mean, if something like
(18:38):
this did happen in the United States, people would absolutely
lose their ship. Sure, I mean, it's just not you know,
I mean, we can't even get rid of guns or
clamped down on gun laws when like people are literally
murdering children in schools. Point that out right. Uh yeah,
this is really interesting, maybe worth a full episode because
(18:58):
these measures seem draconian and a lot of the language
if you go, like, if you read Sinoa's English version,
you're not going to get the exact same version that
is propagated in the domestic audience. And first, yeah, the
Internet in China is locked down. There are people who
are in the PRC who are listening to us right
(19:21):
now through a VPN right or through some other some
other way to circumvent whether it's surveillance or whether it's
just plain old access. And this is because, um, I
don't know if people know this. I think we talked
about this in previous episode. How tight is their surveillance
in China. I don't know if this is still the case.
But there used to be an internet cafes. There used
(19:44):
to be these little cartoon police officers that would pop
up on screen every so often just to let you
know that they were keeping an eye on you for
your safety. And weirdly enough, their eyes were blue, which
always mystify one of my old professors Chinese National. That's interesting.
Do you think that's to other them and someone? No?
(20:05):
I don't understand, Like that's what an odd choice doing reference?
I don't know. But but the the issue here is
that the way it's being phrased is that there are
not just going after a big industry, but they're they're
portraying video game manufacturers as predatory. Over six of children
(20:28):
under eighteen are playing some sort of game. There are
people who essentially live in internet cafes, which I think
will get to if we do a full episode on this. Um.
The question is how do you about that? How do
you incentivize people and what would you rather have them do? Um?
(20:48):
Anything outside? Just get outside, kids, but don't go to Tienamn. Right, well,
just you can go to Tamn. Just you know, don't
think about you. I did want to say, and you
might know this more than more than me, matt Um,
I don't really think of China as big in the
game development industry as say Japan. Is that accurate? I'm
(21:12):
looking I'm looking up video game developers in China and
I'm definitely seeing plenty of course, but none, no, none
of them are big names that I've heard of, Well,
they have a huge domestic market. We'll sure they have
a market. I mean in terms of like is Capcom Chinese,
there's that Japanese Japanese. Yeah, he's Japanese. When you say
domestic market, you mean like you know, in SERMs of customers,
(21:34):
but like I don't really see nearly as much like
game development. I want to say, is one of the
biggest ones. Maybe I'm wrong, Yes, No, I think you're correct. Also,
the well, what I mean when I say domestic market
is you don't necessarily need to sell a game internationally.
You can you can do pretty well with just that,
(21:57):
you know, potential over one point three billion people population totally.
I'm just wondering if like I don't see this happening
in Japan, you know what I mean, because it's such
a big party. They would be like demonizing one of
their own, you know, very important exports and industries and
something that's like cultural, whereas in China doesn't seem to
(22:18):
be as much a part of like the identity you know,
of the country. Not to say that Japan is only
known for making video games, but obviously some of the
biggest names in gaming in the universe are from Japan. Yeah,
but ultimately it doesn't matter where the games are coming from.
This is, like you said, a huge number of people
who do play video games in China, and it could
(22:39):
affect the entire global market. Uh, if you know this
kind of thing is Oh no, that's a very good point.
I'm just saying, I think it would be less quick
to do this if they would be shooting their own
industry in the foot. The ramifications, though, are huge. You're right,
it could have serious ripple effects in terms of and
if it started, if they really started stigmatizing gaming. You know,
(23:00):
there's also there's also a proliferation of unnamed spokespeople if
you look at the official statements, because I was I
first thought this was kind of an onion, Aescar parody
story when it broke, and it was it was earlier
in August, I think, and there they really do have
unnamed spokesfolk. Spokesfolk. There we go. They do have unnamed
(23:20):
spokes folks saying things like teenagers are the future of
our motherland right. Protecting the physical and mental health of
miners has related to the people's vital interest relates to
the cultivation of the younger generation in the era of
national rejuvenation. So this and I'm not saying it's insincere,
but I'm saying, does this remind you of any other
(23:42):
online surveillance laws that came under the guise of won't
someone think of the children? Sesame credit? I mean, oh,
not just sesame credit, but surveillance laws in the West Europe. Yeah,
so this was Yeah, there was a story that broke
in early August, and that's when ten Cent and news Ease,
cam Nettie's, a couple of these companies lost a ton
(24:05):
of their shares, their stock I think they their stocks
fell around ten percent, and then there was a lot
of discussion about it. That article ended up getting removed.
Some of those shares went back up then in at
today is when these all these articles came out, at
least in the West. That's when I when I first
saw it from the Guardian and Reuters. There's a New
(24:25):
York Time piece on it that's really good too. Oh nice.
I don't pay for that one, but you can. Yeah,
you can if you right now wherever you are in
several places, you can probably get the Guardian or the
Reuter's article. The Shinha one is news dot CN and
the article came out today eight thirty. You should be
(24:48):
able to find it. I think that's it for now, guys.
We can talk more about this later. Maybe we'll cover
more of this in the future, but for now we
have to take a break. We'll be right back with
more strange news. And we are back with another strange
news story. This one, Um. We are moving from China
(25:12):
over to South America, specifically Argentina, where a very bougie
gated development um called Nord Delta is being absolutely overrun
by uh cappy barras Cappy barras cap. I don't know.
I think it's probably potato potato cappy Bara cappy barra um, which,
(25:34):
if you're not familiar, they are the world's largest rodents um.
They are massive. They almost have this like horse like
slash hippopotamus slash dog kind of look to them. Um.
They are massive. They can be up to three feet
(25:55):
tall and they are they walk on all four so
that's pretty tall for someone that's on all four wars.
And they can weigh as much as a hundred and
seventy five pounds um. And they are apparently wreaking havoc
on some of these you know, fancy homes in this
Nord Delta community UM and the Nord Delton's or you know,
(26:17):
whatever you want to call them. The residents there are
not too happy about it. UM. And there's more to
this story. It's actually than meets the eye. That's really interesting.
So Nord Delta is actually was built in an area
of wetlands on the Luhan River Delta that's right by
Buenos Aires, and it's an area that has been under
(26:39):
a lot of scrutiny, and lots of areas in this
part of the country a lot a lot of scrutiny
by environmentalists who are saying, okay, we need to stop,
you know, paving paradise and putting up parking lots. You know,
are like fancy boogie uh communities like this UM. And
so that's exactly what this was, is one of these
areas that was being pushed to be protected by the government,
(27:02):
but the government is in fact instead subsidizing this type
of construction UM and you know, paving over these these areas.
And so essentially the cappy bars or carpin shows as
they're known colloquially in that region are essentially just kind
of hanging around the area that they already were living in.
(27:24):
I'm not sure if it's like a how how recent
it maybe maybe just be a story that's kind of
popped recently. But um, I'm not sure where they came
from or if they were just kind of hanging around
in the in the in the woods and now they're
just getting bold and coming in, you know and chewting
on people's lawns. Because this development has been around since
I believe, uh, two thousand roughly, if I'm not mistaken. Um.
(27:47):
But it's an interesting story because they have become essentially
like mimified these these these carpin shows, uh, and they've
been turned into this kind of like symbol of class
warfare in South America, UM, with these developers and you know,
like politicians kind of not looking out for the best
interests of the environment of the people that actually live
(28:11):
there and maybe that are a little less fortunate. I
can't afford to live in a place like Nord Delta. Um.
So all these memes kind of have these little guys
dressed up in kind of freedom fighter uniforms and like
photoshopped onto like the bodies of like Afghani, you know. Um,
militants and things like that. Um, it's very very interesting.
Like there's a few if you go to uh you
(28:34):
just type in carpincho u nord delta memes, you should
be able to find a ton and they're all in
you know, kind of this Argentinian dialect of Spanish, but
very much worth a look. Um. But I don't know,
like this is the kind of thing we see in
the United States too, Like even with like a store
preservation and areas that are just kind of like Atlanta
(28:54):
is really bad about it, um, in terms of bulldozing
history and building things on top up of it that
are much less important. You know, you could argue to uh,
the identity of a place. And I think it's even
more so the case with environmental stuff, where you're actually
killing an ecosystem and then getting piste off that like
the things that you displaced are like coming back and
(29:16):
pooping on your lawn. Yeah, that's a big issue here.
Is there a lot of pooping on lawns, Um, A
lot of eating of shrubberies and you know topiarias and
you know, gardening and stuff. Um, but I don't know,
what do you guys think are the carpine shows just
kind of coming back to claim what's their's or are
they like an infestation that needs to be dealt with. Uh.
(29:36):
Capa bara are not invasive. Their native to South America,
and they've got they've been around for a while. They're
they're super common. You know, the their conservation status is
of least concern, which puts them, you know, around what
you would you would consider squirrels or another smaller rodent
(29:58):
in your neck of the global woods. Uh. This is
there's there's a great Guardian piece about this as well.
The question is really like should they be driven out
from this community? And it's already exacerbating, of course, the
ongoing conversation about wealth inequality in Argentina. And this is
(30:19):
this is like a flashpoint. This is the ability to
put a face on something, an adorable face, by the way,
objectively speaking, where whereas other people outsiders might have been
just board or a little bit sedated by a barrage
of statistics and graphs and trends. Uh and you know,
g D P, etcetera. So I think it's I think
(30:42):
it's convenient. Um, I also think it's efficacious. I think
it's a good thing to spread awareness. We should mention
cappy bar are not violent creatures at all, and they're
huge in Japan, I mean literally, but also they're very popular. Yeah.
There there were some complaints too from residents that the
capin bars were biting their dogs. Um. And there's this
(31:02):
ecologist named Enrique Viale who kind of summed up what
I was just saying a minute ago, really very succinctly says, um,
it's the other way around. Nord Delta invaded the ecosystem
of the Carpeen shows Um. And this is a guy
who's been campaigning for ten years to pass laws to
defend these wetlands. There are reasons, actually functional reasons for
(31:22):
preserving these wetlands other than just like that they're like
beautiful and have these kind of diverse environments. It actually
can cause problems in other areas. Essentially, when you have
these wetlands, they can actually act as like buffers against
wildfires because they're you know, wet, and they keep wildfires
(31:46):
from spreading. You mentioned that Guardian piece Ben, which is
fantastic by Yuki Goni reporting from Buenos Aires. Uh, and
he points out that there's been this huge amount of
sprawl that's been happening in in this part of the country,
in northern Argentina, these wetlands specifically ones referred to as
(32:06):
the Piranhia wetlands. They go from the northern tip of
Argentina to the river Plate and then all they the
Atlantic Ocean. Um. And there are things like they're these
soy farmers that have also dispossessed a lot of this
land and then you know, made into these giant factory
farms for la it's called soy mega farming mondo agriculture
exactly exactly. And it actually can cause uh an uptick
(32:30):
in wildfires. They can without this buffer you know that
literally acts as like a safeguard you know, between these
fires and like areas around them. So when you start
to get rid of these and these developers that are
just kind of doing this stuff very quickly without thinking
about the big picture, um, you can have some real problems.
And and who does that affect. It affects poorer neighborhoods
(32:51):
that either end up getting flooded, you know during weather
events you know um or you know, their communities can
get burned to be victims of these fires. So it's
ultimately kind of upstairs downstairs kind of situation, which I
think is why the memes have taken such hold, because
you're right, man, it is putting a face, a very
cute face, on a much larger problem that does not
(33:15):
necessarily involve the cappy bars themselves. But it's just like
a bigger issue, a systemic issue that I think it
needs to be dealt with, but it doesn't necessarily look
like it's going to be because it does appear there
is also, you know, quite a bit of pocket lining
going on in the government and their connection and developers,
and you know, it's not uncommon, especially in this part
(33:37):
of the world and in this region of South America.
But um, do you guys see any potential for something
positive coming out of this or is it just like
a flash in the pan kind of meme you know,
party with that will eventually die. I mean, just speaking
for myself again, raising awareness of what's going on, it's
(33:58):
it's fascinating and it's predictable that people in people outside
of the region, people outside of Argentina, will tend to
be more aware and tend to care about something if
the information comes to them in an easily digestible, largely
visual form like a meme. Will that result in action?
(34:19):
Will that result in um substantive conversations about how to
how to address wealth inequality in Argentina? I mean, that's
that's a tough call. I I hope it happens. I
think a capit barra is a very good mascot for
a cause, you know what I mean? The US has
(34:40):
some odd choices for their their political mascots. Right, it's
still what a donkey and an elephant? Right? Last I checked? Yeah?
And uh, and so why not a capybara. That's what
I'm saying. If you, if you're listening, uh, this might
be this might be a good thing to have as
a representative of a party. Perhaps. Now you've been quiet
(35:00):
on this one. What do you think I've been super
quiet because I really like copy bars. I feel like
I remember reading about them being eaten in some cultures
because they were so because they were so prevalent, they
just existed everywhere, and like many rodents, they proliferate and
then you can eat them because there's so many. Yeah,
(35:21):
they can also eat their own feces as a source
of new nutrition or sorry, gut Flora's superpower. It's a
weird one. It's it's a gift and curse, you know,
heavy ways the head, even leaving lunch for somebody else.
Way to think about it, I think they're um, they're
fur is also used, but it's it's like any other animal.
(35:42):
It's not universally accepted as a good source of nutrition,
not by not by everybody. Is my understanding. At least
got you that aside. No, um, I don't know. It's
really what you guys are talking about. That's what. Sorry,
it's been quiet because I agree with a lot of
the points that are being made year. If you can
put a cute face to anything to any cause, or
(36:03):
a face is memorable or an image that's striking, much
like just the stoic look of a cappy bara as
it's looking out into the distance, that's a good point.
You're gonna get people to get on board, yeah with
that thing. So it reminds me of the story Ben
and I did on Ridiculous History once about this guerrilla
in Johannesburg that escaped from I'm sorry. A criminal was
(36:26):
running away from cops and he fell into this guerrilla
pit in a zoo and the guerrilla like uh, you know,
held him down until the cops got there and it
was during apartheid. So the guerrilla I can't remember the
grilla's name, but became this kind of smax became the
symbol of like, you know, uh, rule of law, you
know what I mean, and kind of like almost became
(36:48):
this like batman esque guerrilla figure. Um, this is obviously
not just one cappy bar. This is many of them,
and there're so a gain. These memes are great. Like
there's one where it's like, but she's just showing how
many they are, how many there are, and there's just
like a bunch of capy bar I just kind of
lazing around. There's a cute little fat boys. Um, but
it's saying like copy bar is practicing social distancing because
(37:10):
they're links sinks feet away from each other roughly. It's
really cute. But yeah, check it out, especially if you
read Spanish and if you can't, Google Translate was doing
a pretty fine job on these. And I would recommend
the website per Feel I think that's how you say it.
P E R f I L dot com. There's some
pretty good reporting about the wet lands conservation efforts. You
(37:31):
can check that. Yeah, yeah, okay, so maybe let's do
a little bit of positivity and some eye bleach. So positivity.
One thing that could come out of this is if
the if the Kappa bara population becomes livestock, if they're farmed,
then that would ensure that the wetland habitats are protected.
(37:52):
Is there an enterprising member of this community who's already
well to do? Is like, I'll get some good pr
and getting the kappa bar business. Possibly. But the more
wetlands you can save, the fewer wildfires you will have.
So I think that's I think that's an important aspect
um for eye bleach. If you want your person who
enjoys kind of serene, peaceful things, then why not check
(38:16):
out the multiple YouTube clips of capybara in Japan. Uh
They're soaking in hot springs and they look very much
at piece. It's it looks like a cartoon. It looks
like it's from Studio Ghibli. You'll feel a little bit
better about what's going on about whatever is going on hotly,
that's amazing. I I completely agree Pen, they are adorable images. Um,
(38:39):
But for now, while y'all are checking those out, we're
gonna pop to a quick break for a work more
sponsor and then we'll be back with one more strange news.
We have returned, Doc nol Matt. I just sent a
brief video Cappy Barra taking a soap at a Tokyo zoo,
(39:04):
and maybe maybe that'll get us through the next really
weird conversation we're about to have. Oh yeah, I'm sorry, Ben,
I'm gonna have a tab open with Cathy bar of
pictures now as we do this whole segment, because I
cannot take my eyes away from these adorable little dudes.
How did they happen? Do you ever see an animal
and you just think, how? How did that happen? Most
(39:27):
of us have a passing knowledge of evolution right for
the for the first time ever, quite recently here in
the United States. Uh, the majority of people agreed with
the concept of evolution. Did you hear about that? That
was a recent poll. No, that's great. People are on
board with evolution mainly. Yep, yep. How long did that take?
(39:53):
I saw your attention to an article from just yesterday
on Science Alert, which is a great website. More Americans
are finally coming around to accepting the science of evolution.
I guess all those little, uh little edits they made
and textbooks didn't keep it didn't stick, you know, yeah,
yeah it was. I think the first time it became
(40:14):
a majority was in twenties sixteen, so more recent than
a lot of people would maybe like to admit. Uh.
Now we are in a situation where evolution, as weird
as it may seem. You know, you see a platypus,
that's the most famous example. You see a giraffe and
you're like, wow, that's a very specific flex, right, how
(40:37):
did that happen? And then you see things like a
capybara and you're thinking, do they not have predators? They
live in a Disney Pixar environments. That neck to body
ratio is way off. It's just that it shouldn't shouldn't
be for a giraffe. No, No, for a copy of bara.
I mean it's like it's like their head. It feels
(40:58):
like it's it would be hard for it to hold
it up it's so big and it has such little neck,
you know, I mean, I don't know. It's just a
very very weird, stumpy creature and I don't understand what
it's for. I feel weird saying it, and not to
not to shame them, but they don't look like they
can run or I met if they try and throw
(41:18):
cute though I know, I know, it's like you. You
would want to sit there and go ah, you can
do it on your own. Shucks a little buddy. Fast forward,
third act of the Pixar. This Capabarra has just one
animal Olympics exactly so. So the thing is Capabara aren't
the only animals that have evolved. They're not the only
animals that will evolve right on on this planet. No
(41:41):
matter what happens with the current season of life on Earth,
which is heavy on humans, human beings are evolving as well.
If you are listening to this, I would like you
to pay very close attention to your arm. Let's do
let's do a little bit of a thought exercise. Folks
(42:02):
listening along, playing along at home. So if you can
close your eyes and just imagine feeling your arms in space.
If you want to hold them up so that your
elbows are parallel with your shoulder right, kind of like
you're making a touchdown, you're pulling a widow's son, then
(42:23):
you will you'll be able to if you have your
eyes closed, you really think about it, you'll be able
to feel the movement of your digits in your hands.
You may be able to feel your pulse in your arms.
I don't like this, okay, okay, it trips me out, Ben,
because I know where we're going with this. And there's
a reason they call it gross anatomy, because I could
(42:48):
feel everything that we're about to talk about, and it's
like it's like we're doing a comedy and I know
the jokes that you're about to tell, and instead of
happy and laughter, I've got like ingly sensation and weird
feelings in my arms. As you're doing all of this,
you may be feeling something different from your friends, maybe
(43:11):
even from your family members. Those are a little less
of a probability of that. And if you are an
older person than odds are you are definitely feeling something
different than a very young person. Because I bury the
lead here a little bit. Human beings are evolving. The
most recent proven thing is really weird. Uh. We're growing
(43:34):
extra arteries in our forearms. Why seems to be the answer,
But it's something called the persistent median artery of the forearm.
If you stave your arms up, I appreciate the commitment
you can put them down and your arms will have
a you have what's called an accessory artery in your
(43:56):
owner artery in your proximal forearm. And this is something
that usually like it happens while you are just stating right,
and it usually typically regresses about eight weeks into gestation.
But what people have found is that this is staying
(44:17):
around now. It's supposed to be temporary and it's not
vanishing anymore. The University of Adelaide and Australia, along with
some help from researchers at Flinders University, found that more
and more and more and more adults have an extra channel,
an extra artery. People have been studying this since the
seventeen hundreds and no one, no one is sure why
(44:41):
this is happening. But about ten of people in the
eighties or so kept this artery, and now it's up
to thirty, which is a clear trend statistically significant. It
means that humanity has been able to point to another
thing that proves it's a work in progress overall, which
(45:03):
is which is bizarre because it be you know, it
would be like, um, it would somehow make more sense
if our eyes were just evolving to be bigger. And
then you know, people could say oh, the aliens, they're
visiting folks or humans from the future, et cetera. But
what do you guys think about this? What does this
make you think of? Did this surprise you? Well? I've
(45:23):
always thought that it was kind of silly to think
that we would stop evolving, like if we reached our
our final form, you know, like I mean it. It
just seems that we the timeline of our lives and
our lifetime on this earth and even as a species,
is so tiny compared to like the whole of evolution
that's led to this point. I just feel like it's
inevitable that we will continue, and maybe we'll just see
(45:44):
little snippets of it like you would in the long
process that is evolution of another type of species over time.
You wouldn't clock it overnight. You just see one little
change that led to another little change that then became,
you know, important enough to stick around, you know. I
don't know, That's just how I would I always thought, Ben,
I'm feeling like the guy at a big party and
(46:05):
it's the first time he's done mushrooms or something. This
makes me feel very trippy. Like any time we talk anatomy,
anytime we talk about what's inside of our meat bodies, um,
and how they function. It wears me out. And to
think that somehow, over time the instructions that are inside
all of us just just tiny, like make these tiny,
(46:28):
tiny little changes. And you know, we breed enough times
with with someone that has as humans, we breed enough
times with enough of these changes than they take hold.
It is weird to think that this thing that may
maybe what it may be better for dexterity in your hands, right,
(46:49):
if you've got a little more blood flow something like that, um,
but it could also lead to terrible things like problems
with your wrists right or your joint if you if
you got that. So like I'm trying to imagine what
would be the what would be the reason that this
thing would be successful as a mutation? You know. Yeah, yeah,
(47:11):
So this is and I've tricked us a little bit
because this is news for evolution, and news on an
evolutionary scale is not quite news the day. But I've
got some cool news of the day to make up
with as we close. Um. The same way, like geological
time is not really clock time. Yes, the Yellowstone Caldera
is about to blow, but about means does not mean Thursday,
(47:34):
and so, so here's the idea the researchers based on
their work published in the Journal of Anatomy back in
so they imagine that having this persistent media and artery
could give you more of a boost of blood supply,
making your fingers possibly more dexterous, giving you a little
(47:56):
extra mph in your forearms, while at the same time
putting you at a higher risk of carpal tunnel syndrome.
So there's a cost cost benefit, like you said, just
like some people who have evolved to be more resistant
to malaria may also suffer from sickle cell anemia. I
(48:17):
really hope that I have them just for my I
don't know, drumming needs. And did you did you say
there was a number of percentage of of of how
often this is happening that's higher than it used to
be or something like that, or how often this is
making it out of the womb or out of the
gestation period. Yep, there was a ten percent chance for
adults to have this mutant artery, which are just calling
(48:40):
it for the click baity nature of it. Uh, back
in the eighties and now it's about thirty and seems
to be rising. So if you're listening. You have children
right now, then this is not a certitude, but the
odds are that they are going to be more likely
to have this remaining in adulthood. But again, I mean
(49:03):
from the eighteen eighties to the present day, it's only
just like a blip on. And what we would look
at like as an evolutionary timeline, I mean most the
evolution of certain species and in these mutations that end
up sticking because of changes in environment or whatever. I mean,
those can take thousands of years. That's why we're we're
(49:25):
not talking about a giraffe like neck that we're all developing.
We're talking about a fairly tiny piece of tissue, right,
I mean, that's really what it is, and it's not
a new thing. It's just sticking around longer. Like the
ability to digest uh dairy into adulthood, that is, that
is largely a juvenile trait for many organisms. You know, um,
(49:48):
at least the milk drinking ones. I don't know why
that sounded weird, just say that milk drinkers, the milk drinkers.
But let me let me hit you with one more
here another example. Oh and by the way, pretty one
who isn't aware of what we're talking about. The ability
to digest lactose dairy products into adulthood is a mutation,
(50:10):
and we know it's a mutation because not every member
of the human species has it. It's it's weird catching on.
But then also blue eyes were mutation, probably from like
one person in Estonia. What's their story about. I'm just
gonna hit you all with this. Uh, the extra blood
vessel you may have is not the only thing. You
(50:30):
may be getting. A new nee bone, a very old
nee bone, but yeah, check the check the zoom chat.
There's a knee bone called the fabella, and it used
to be really rare in human beings, but as of
twenty nineteen, turned out that it is three times more
common than it was just a hundred years ago. So, Nol,
(50:52):
you brought up an excellent point. Evolution happens slowly, right,
at least in the way a human being would think
of it an individual scale. So why does this stuff
seem to be increasing so so very quickly. The first
answer is probably we're paying more attention to it and
we're noticing more things. You know, those studies back in
(51:14):
the eighties maybe weren't as comprehensive, So maybe maybe you
had that extra blood vessel all along. I don't know
what to do with this other than to be amazed.
It's not really a conspiracy, except whether you think there
might be some people still today attempting to guide evolution
(51:34):
in one way or another. This is probably just like
stone or talk like let's do it late, late night
bar talk kind of stuff. But I've always wondered if,
like the way our brains are used now differently in
the way they were used because of things like you know,
smartphones and the Internet, and parts of our brains. Maybe
we're once devoted to like remembering people's phone numbers or
(51:57):
you know, certain things that we now have like assists
with all of this technology that we don't need to anymore.
Do you think that part of our brain gets like
repurposed for other stuff that makes us smarter or is
it a balancing act because we're also dumbing ourselves down
by just like you know, reading tweets and like looking
at internet clickbait trash all the time. Like I just wonder,
(52:18):
like if there's parts of our brains that are maybe
just just shifts. But is that a form of evolution
that can actually be influenced by technology. Yeah, that's a
really interesting question. One good way to look at this
would be through analogy. So what what we're seeing now
and what we're able to measure now would be uh
(52:39):
individual changes that may follow similar patterns, Like we know
to the earlier story about video game addiction, that this
video game environment can alter structural aspects of an individual's brain.
But the question of whether or not those changes are
heritable inheritable meaning like you know your kid would be
(53:03):
way better at Tatris than you because you put in
the time or something like that. That's that's not quite
the same thing. To do that, we have to understand that,
we'd have to understand a lot more about epigenetics, which
simply is not there. What we do know is that
experts largely agree if you go back three hundred thousand
(53:23):
years ago in time and you ran into early Homo sapiens,
you would see their brain size was already pretty much
the same as your friends and fellows here in one.
But with that being said, here's the analogy that I
think works. So let's say you, for some reason, you're
(53:44):
born your normal and you decide that you don't want
to use your left arm ever, use everything else but
your left arm. Increasingly, your left arm will attrophy. And
let's say you meet someone and you get together, fall
in love or don't, but you have a kid. Is
the point that kid's not going to have an atro
feed left arm because of your actions, that kid will
(54:05):
overwhelmingly likely without some intervening variable, they'll have the ability
to use both arms. So what happens to your individual
haunted house? Because I believe human beings are just ghosts
haunting their own houses. Like whatever happens to your house
is not going to affect the next house in that way.
And we still have a lot to learn about it.
(54:27):
And maybe now we'll be able to learn a little
bit faster because maybe we can all type a little
bit faster. I don't know what is that, but I
think you got into a nature versus nurture that but
a little bit because if that kid grows up hanging
out with the parent who never uses their left arm,
maybe they started going, oh, I kind of want to
be like my parents. Maybe I don't want to use
(54:48):
my left arm. That's true, Yeah, nature versus nurture absolutely,
but it's also like you know, I mean the idea
of good genes are like, you know, your dad was
a really great basketball player, therefore you automatically are built
to be a really great basketball player. But that would
only work, I think if you put in the work.
And I think nurture has a lot to do with
that too. If you're you are aspiring to be this thing,
(55:10):
maybe you have some natural ability, but was that developed
from like you know generations that then like the somehow?
And that's what epigenetics is, right, It's the idea of like,
you know, changes in the expression of genes, I think,
without affecting like the the overall DNA sequence, But it's
the idea of heritable traits that could be things like
(55:33):
you know, ability related. Right. Yeah. There there's a lot
of really fascinating stuff on on epigenetics, and it is important,
It is very important to understand this fully. Uh, it's
probably more than we have time to go into today,
but we would love to hear your thoughts. Why do
you think people seem to be evolving this quote unquote
(55:57):
extra artery? Do you get a weird knee bone? Tell
us about it. What's your position on evolution and what
if any role is modern technology playing people are definitely
outsourcing functions of their brains increasingly to electronic devices, which
which makes sense. It's approaching a cybernetic future, you know
(56:17):
what I mean, the marriage of meat and machine if
you want into wax poetic. But that's a story for
another day. We do hope you tune in to check
it out. Just to finish with our news round up,
CBS has reported that UFOs are regularly spotted and restricted
US airspace. Cool nobody panic U. The US is getting
(56:41):
removed from the European Union Safe Travel List, so check
that twice before you get your vacation tickets. And Hurricane
Ida has reversed the flow of the Mississippi River officially,
which we we didn't mention earlier. That happened just about
three hours ago before we went into recording. So our
thoughts are with everybody who is in the area and
(57:04):
make sure your loved ones are safe. Really interesting, I
think there must be a phenomenon that happens regularly with
this kind of category of hurricane, because there is a
documentary around Hurricane Katrina called Put the River in Reverse,
So I think that must be a reference to that
must be a thing that happens I've never heard. I
(57:24):
didn't ever think about that. What isn't common is how
quickly this thing ramped up. You can read stories about
that right now, about how much more dangerous this this
tropical storm slash group of thunderstorms became a hurricane then
ramped way up to a Category four so fast it
(57:46):
was just five miles under being a Cat five for
a minute. Uh. And of course, one more argument against
people wearing masks. The famous or infamous televangelist Jim Baker
has complained that God cannot hear your prayers if you
are wearing a mask. Oh, because it's too muffled. I
guess your prayers are too muffled. Well, I'm not an expert.
(58:09):
I didn't know he had to actually hear with like ears.
There's a lot of a lot of assumptions being made
here that God has ears and is listening, presumably with
some sort of high powered listening device from so so
far away. You think the mask wouldn't really be a concern. Yeah,
not high powered enough apparently. But let us let us know,
(58:30):
let us know your thoughts on what we shared today.
We are going to have a full episode on video
game addiction. Uh. It is worthwhile, it's important, it might
hit close to home for us. Uh. We are also
keeping a close eye on the developments not just in
Afghanistan but around the world. We want to hear your
thoughts a capa Barra and Argentina. We want to hear
(58:54):
your thoughts on the idea of humans evolving. And above all,
please be well, stay safe and don't hesitate to reach
out to us with strange news of your own. We
can't wait to hear you. And also we did an
episode on prosperity theology. Right do that Craflo Dollar make
(59:15):
you holler so they can finance his what is it
gold plated jet jet? Uh? So clever by his church
the other day. Really is it still open? It was big?
Is it still mega? That's all I know? It was
fairy mega, highly mega, got it? So let us know
all this and more. As we said, we look forward
to hearing from you, and we try to be easy
(59:37):
to find, not just online but on phones. You know,
pull a candy man, send our names in the dark
and the mirror, et cetera. Yeah, you can do that.
I wouldn't recommend that one. That one gets real spooky. Um,
I'm excited to see the new Candyman. By the way,
it's getting really good reviews. And I revisited the old one.
UM didn't think it held up super great, but still
(59:57):
some spooky bits, but very much a vic him of
the nineties, kind of schlocky, you know, acting and stuff.
But the new one, obviously, we're all huge fans of
Jordan Peele and I think we're probably all pretty excited
to see it. But um, short of candy manning us
into being, you can find us on the Internet where
we are conspiracy stuff on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, conspiracy
(01:00:21):
stuff show on Instagram. That's right, And we do have
a phone number, So just flip open your phone, uh
and type in one eight three three st d w
y t K and UH leave yourself a really cool nickname.
Tell us whatever you want to tell us. You've got
three minutes. Just just go wild with it. And we
(01:00:42):
love to laugh, especially lately or really just getting weird.
And once you have time traveled back from the nineteen
nineties with your flip phone, UM, you can also send
us a good old fashioned email with your computer. We
are conspiracy at iHeart radio dot com. M H stuff.
(01:01:16):
They don't want you to know is a production of
I heart Radio. For more podcasts from my heart Radio,
visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you listen to your favorite shows.
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of I Heart Radio. Hello, welcome back to the show.
(00:25):
My name is Matt, my name is Noel. They called
me Ben. We're joined as always with our super producer
Alexis code named Doc Holiday Jackson. Most importantly, you are you.
You are here, and that makes this the stuff they
don't want you to know. It's the top of the week.
We're traveling around the world. We're going to China, We're
(00:46):
going to Argentina. We're also going into the future in
a very weird way that may directly affect you. You're
not gonna look at your forearms the same after you
listen to a show. Let's let's baby start by going
over the Pacific. Uh, and with a little bit of
(01:06):
backgrounds here. Uh. You know, we talk about video games
in this show. Matt, Nold, Uh, code named Doc and
I all have various games that we enjoy and sometimes
we've even played online together. But like a lot of
people who are older, who are adults, you know, we
always have that battle of like is this a waste
(01:27):
of time? Is this good relaxation? At what point does
it become an addiction? Because video games, you know, I
think it's common knowledge now they really can be addictive. Oh, yes,
they They are meant to do that, just like social
media is meant to send you down a rabbit hole
of always having to check your feeds before we jump
(01:49):
into it, guys, really quickly, can I do one of
these fast roll offs of what's happening today or what
happened over the past couple of days. Just it's going
to go so fast you're not even gonna believe. Yeah,
I'm a bookend. I'm gonna book end with one on
my own, though. I want to see if we got
the same stuff. Okay, well I'll just hit it and
then you can finish it if if you got something,
uh first, something we were reading about, we haven't covered
(02:11):
it in full yet. The situation in Afghanistan. The story
came out about the CIA clandestinely meeting with the Taliban.
That's crazy and definitely something we're talking about. The US
is also conducting strikes again, drone strikes in Afghanistan, as
they're you know, pulling out and almost completely pulled out
and spoiler alert, there's a lot of collateral damage. Again, Um,
(02:34):
a category for hurricane just hit Louisiana on the anniversary
of Hurricane Katrina. And this is Hurricane Ida. This is
Hurricane Ida that just happened in the day before we're
recording this. It's it's August thirty right now. And uh,
the DPRK is allegedly ramping up its production again of
nuclear materials. Well, it's it's reignited its reactor, yes, which
(02:58):
is slightly different. But the big question with that you
get to you hit me on the hobby horse. The
big issue with that, most analysts would say is that
it indicates a move to go back to the negotiating
table for further aid. And that's just based on past patterns,
which is what all these folks are trying to guess at.
(03:21):
But for anybody who has seen that in the news,
that doesn't mean that bombs are about to fall. That
doesn't mean that I c b M s are going
to be launched. I do want to I don't know.
I never thought it would be in this position. But
in defense of the CIA, with what he said about Afghanistan, Uh,
(03:42):
imagine they had to go forward and get get in
front of it. They had to announce that meeting happened,
because what if they didn't announce it and someone found
out about it, that's even worse. So they're going to
clearly not disclose the substance of the conversation. But it's
it's not unusual to be loved by anyone. It's not
(04:05):
unusual for for the CIA to meet with clandestine powers
like that. That's how the company operates, agreed. I think
it was the acting director of the CIA though, who
went in person, which feels a little out of character
for what they would choose to do from a strategy perspective,
but hey, who knows, who knows? The ways of the
(04:26):
company are mysterious, that right, if I may. I just
wanted to add something to the Afghanistan bit um. Pretty
big news a couple of days ago that there was
an attack on the airport you know where people are
trying to evacuate by a group called isis k and
I was not familiar with isis k Um, and then
(04:48):
looking into them realized they're kind of like almost the
even more conservative branch of ISIS and they are obviously
more conservative than the Taliban but they're essentially, you know,
rebelling against the Taliban. And just like, I'm surprised that
I've never heard of this group before, Ben, do you
know anything about is s K that you might be
(05:09):
able to clue listeners in, because I think maybe a
lot of folks are in the same boat as me.
Is this uh ISIS is maybe understood as a confederation
of aligned groups that share the same extremist beliefs. So
that's why you'll see it sometimes referred to in the
past as EISL and sometimes as just I s the
(05:32):
Islamic State UH. And this is because these these groups
UM may have differing like on the ground day to
day aims, but they agree on the main thing, which
is the establishment of what's called a caliphate theocracy UM
and this Yeah, and they're they're not buddy buddy with
(05:54):
the Taliban, honestly for several different reasons. The Taliban once
international legitimacy, they want to be recognized as a state power.
ISAIS wants a worldwide califate. Very differently, and isis K
stands for Chorissan the K and and ISIS is this
Islamic state Chorisson, which is a region UM that includes Afghanistan,
(06:18):
Pakistan and its surrounding countries. And it's actually made up
of militants who have defected from both the Afghan and
Pakistani Taliban. So it's definitely like a more extremist and
you know, conservative militant groups. So it's just interesting and
something to follow, because I don't think they had I
don't know they had made a whole lot of news
(06:39):
as being a separate entity with different aims from ISIS
proper Um. That's something I wanted to mention. Well, I
guarantee you the company has been keeping tabs on them,
and I would say that that's probably one of the
major reasons that the US met with the Taliban, because
there is that push for legitimacy, as you said, and
(07:00):
and there is a threat, a real credible threat from
this group is KA and those are the targets that
the drones were going after, like hence the drone strikes
so right, and one of them, I believe was one
of their vehicles that was just chock full of explosives,
hence the collateral damage. And also, yeah, these attacks are continuing.
(07:21):
It's it's Monday, August is this segment is being recorded
and earlier today, at least ten civilians, including children, were
killed by US drone strikes. Yes, correct, correct, So that's
what I was referring to, terribly and coldly as the
collateral damage that the US continues to rack up with
(07:44):
the drones. Important note by the way intelligence analysts predicted
those airport attacks. And also I want to thank, while
respecting anonymity, I want to thank some of our fellow
conspiracy realists, both domestic and abroad, currently serving and uh retired,
who also reached out about this with with very valid
(08:07):
concerns that it would not make the mainstream news. Luckily
it is at this point, but it was very curious
to me to be receiving reports of stuff before, like
before it broke in the West, because there's not there's
not that much of a delay now, right because the
(08:27):
news can travel so quickly, but um in one bright
spot when much needed bright spot. We should pay our
respects and gratitude to special Forces operators who went in
under the cover of night and began rescuing the families
of Afghan nationals, who were interpreters, who were translators or
(08:49):
what would miscellaneously be referred to as fixers. Enablers, helpers,
They got them out of very dangerous situation. I'd also
like to go on record condemning Eric Prince. You guys
got me started. Condemning Eric Prince. You know the name.
You've heard him. I imagine UM Robert has a good
behind the bastards about him. This guy amid this chaos,
(09:12):
in this deluge of of blood and terror and tragedy,
This guy who started selling tickets out of out of
afghanistunt for six thousand five dollars of pop. Jez talk
about opportunistic scumbags. Yeah, I go back to our episodes
on Blackwater and all the iterations of it to learn
about that dude, academy ACADEMI. Yeah, I went back and
(09:36):
forth on that. But yeah, let's jump into this other thing.
I'm glad we talked about all those things. Just want
to bring that up because I think quick, just hey,
this is all happening simultaneously. The tiny tiny crook addendum
only fans not not not doing porn anymore, just sleeping.
They're not not doing They're not not doing porn anymore. Yeah,
they must have heard our story. Uh, and I decided
(09:58):
to pivot from their pivot. Um so yeah, they are.
They are staying the course, doing what they're good at,
just empowering porn creators to put porn out there directly
to the fans and only freedom of speech. Excellent, excellent. Well,
so yeah, let's let's jump to a story about uh,
(10:25):
not reducing freedoms. Yeah, government clamping down on what you
can do with your day. If you're between zero and
eighteen years old and you live in China, you're a
Chinese citizen. We're gonna talk about all this, and then
we're gonna wrap it up by just talking about what
it would mean if it was happening here in the
United States, to just give some context and there kind
(10:46):
of some opinion on this. So reporting out of the Guardian,
out of Reuters, out of Xinha, I think is how
you say at the official news reporting services of China.
I'm gonna jump to the Guardian article, particularly like how
they cover it here. Article is titled China cut. Some
amount of time miners can spend playing video games under
(11:07):
eight teams will be allowed to play online games for
one hour on Fridays and on weekends and on holidays,
So one hour Friday, one hour Saturday, one hour Sunday
and you get an extra hour if you got a holiday.
I'm just gonna go through some of this and then
we can discuss guys China has placed in order to
(11:29):
online video gaming companies, those who provide the services, who
actually have servers where you connect to them when you're playing,
whether it's on a console, on your phone, on your computer, whatever,
to reduce the services that they offer to customers. And
the whole point of this, at least according to the
government and to a kind of question and answer session
(11:51):
that was put out through Shinhwa, it's calling video gaming
or gaming in general and addiction youth video game, especially
as an addiction. And this one hour, by the way,
is between eight pm and nine pm, So this tiny
little window that young people would be able to play
(12:13):
bro that that's not even enough time to level up
once once by design. I mean, I know we're going
to go into it, but it can also it also
m combats the use of mining in games where you
have cafes full of people grinding and then selling items.
And it also there are a lot of people who
play M M O RPGs, so you want to be
(12:36):
able to play with your friends, so it gets everybody
into one spot where they can also be more easily
observed and surveilled. That's one of the big things. If
you're you know, if you've got tight controls over the
I s p s, like like China has as a
as a governmental group, as an entity, they've got tight
controls over the providers of the services. So being able
(12:59):
to look at it in that an hour for three
days it would be helpful. But here's the thing. That's
not the only time they're going to be looking at
the gaming industry. They're gonna be watching those I s
p s the entire time to regulate and too, to
crack down on video gaming services again the people providing
the servers to make sure they're not letting anybody else play.
(13:23):
And they're also trying to crack down on kids using
adult accounts in order to access. Uh, Like, this is
a huge crackdown. What's the what's the cut off age?
Eighteen years old? Eighteen years old, you're llegally no longer
in mind? That makes sense? Okay, that wasn't sure if
it was the same, they're not. Um, that's fascinating. So
(13:44):
I mean I asked you off off air if this
is like an issue of uh, maybe seeming to erode
the fabric of like Chinese you know, civilization and hierarchy,
and perhaps there's such a problem with kids gaming so
much and the things you're talking about then that maybe
people are uh rising in the ranks like they should.
And there's a sense, I mean, it has to be
a bigger picture. I mean, not to be too callous
(14:06):
about it, but I can't imagine it's all this we
just want our kids to be happy. To me, is
more of a productivity thing. It feels very much like that.
Some of the language that you can read coming out
of Shinhwa really does play to that. Uh. The government
authorities are asking the gaming companies to I've got a
quote here, quote always prioritize the social good and actively
(14:28):
respond to societal concerns. They're also saying that again, these
things are highly addictive, and they use phrases like losing hours,
like losing uh the society is losing x hours to
video gaming on a daily basis, or you know, however
else you want to put it. And it's interesting to
(14:49):
note that this is just a further step from previous
restrictions they had placed on on gaming and younger people.
I believe it was one and a half hour per day.
It wasn't specific days during the week. It was just
one and a half hours that you were allowed per
day to game and ed. I think it was like
three hours on a holiday. Yeah, any difference for the weekend.
(15:14):
The weekend now is the only No, not previously, not
in twenty now now it will be. Um it's pretty crazy.
They're going after companies like ten Cent, after essentially the
Amazon of of other countries, Ali baba. They're going after
all kinds of companies and third parties to like make
(15:38):
this this action actually occur. They also arrested the Top
League Legends player once their identity was revealed, under what
charge It was too good, too much ponage. Well, what
I heard is he powned jimping directly direct You can't
(16:02):
do that, Cane. No, no, President, she is not about
getting pound um. So, how do they propose to enforce
this without like directly mandating that the gaming companies put
in stricter age restrictions or like or how do they
monitor this? I mean, then you make a good point
about limiting the hours does streamline the monitoring, but short
(16:25):
of just like you know, grageous, uh, privacy invasions. How
are they gonna go about this? Well, yeah, some of
those levers, the mechanisms already exist. The problem is proving
that whoever is using the computer at you know, four
pm is actually or let's say probably like six pm.
(16:47):
Let's say once kids are you know, out of school.
How do you know if a kid is actually using
the computer or not the adult and just signed in
under an adults account and you know, unless you're using
facial recognition technology through the phone or through you know,
whatever device is being used to play. And that's where
a lot of the doubts come in from, you know,
(17:09):
especially from the private companies that are making millions and
millions of dollars off of video games and kids playing
video games. Guys, there's not really enough time to fully
fully flesh this thing out as far as our opinions
and what we think. We're gonna have to take a
break here in just a minute. But first of all,
I can't imagine what this would have been like if
I was trying to play my Super Nintendo and you know,
(17:32):
the President came down and told me I couldn't or whatever, um,
I would be devastated. But at the same time, I'm
thinking about how much time I really do I don't
want to say waste, just how much time I invest
in virtual worlds. And we've talked about that before on
this show. All of us do it to one extent
(17:55):
or another. And Uh, I'm wondering if my life would
be better if I was doing something else, or if
I would be lacking something because I didn't learn these
stories and live through these characters. I don't know, don't stigmatize.
I mean, what's the difference between reading a book exactly
and also, like, I mean, shouldn't that be your choice
(18:17):
to to discipline yourself and make that change. Do you
really need the long arm of government to like, you know,
slap you on the wrist when it's time to get
off the PlayStation. I was just saying, maybe I do
need a long arm to be like to smack me
across the face a little bit and say, hey, let's
write some more music, turn off turf video. That's that's fair.
But to your point, Matt, I mean, if something like
(18:38):
this did happen in the United States, people would absolutely
lose their ship. Sure, I mean, it's just not you know,
I mean, we can't even get rid of guns or
clamped down on gun laws when like people are literally
murdering children in schools. Point that out right. Uh yeah,
this is really interesting, maybe worth a full episode because
(18:58):
these measures seem draconian and a lot of the language
if you go, like, if you read Sinoa's English version,
you're not going to get the exact same version that
is propagated in the domestic audience. And first, yeah, the
Internet in China is locked down. There are people who
are in the PRC who are listening to us right
(19:21):
now through a VPN right or through some other some
other way to circumvent whether it's surveillance or whether it's
just plain old access. And this is because, um, I
don't know if people know this. I think we talked
about this in previous episode. How tight is their surveillance
in China. I don't know if this is still the case.
But there used to be an internet cafes. There used
(19:44):
to be these little cartoon police officers that would pop
up on screen every so often just to let you
know that they were keeping an eye on you for
your safety. And weirdly enough, their eyes were blue, which
always mystify one of my old professors Chinese National. That's interesting.
Do you think that's to other them and someone? No?
(20:05):
I don't understand, Like that's what an odd choice doing reference?
I don't know. But but the the issue here is
that the way it's being phrased is that there are
not just going after a big industry, but they're they're
portraying video game manufacturers as predatory. Over six of children
(20:28):
under eighteen are playing some sort of game. There are
people who essentially live in internet cafes, which I think
will get to if we do a full episode on this. Um.
The question is how do you about that? How do
you incentivize people and what would you rather have them do? Um?
(20:48):
Anything outside? Just get outside, kids, but don't go to Tienamn. Right, well,
just you can go to Tamn. Just you know, don't
think about you. I did want to say, and you
might know this more than more than me, matt Um,
I don't really think of China as big in the
game development industry as say Japan. Is that accurate? I'm
(21:12):
looking I'm looking up video game developers in China and
I'm definitely seeing plenty of course, but none, no, none
of them are big names that I've heard of, Well,
they have a huge domestic market. We'll sure they have
a market. I mean in terms of like is Capcom Chinese,
there's that Japanese Japanese. Yeah, he's Japanese. When you say
domestic market, you mean like you know, in SERMs of customers,
(21:34):
but like I don't really see nearly as much like
game development. I want to say, is one of the
biggest ones. Maybe I'm wrong, Yes, No, I think you're correct. Also,
the well, what I mean when I say domestic market
is you don't necessarily need to sell a game internationally.
You can you can do pretty well with just that,
(21:57):
you know, potential over one point three billion people population totally.
I'm just wondering if like I don't see this happening
in Japan, you know what I mean, because it's such
a big party. They would be like demonizing one of
their own, you know, very important exports and industries and
something that's like cultural, whereas in China doesn't seem to
(22:18):
be as much a part of like the identity you know,
of the country. Not to say that Japan is only
known for making video games, but obviously some of the
biggest names in gaming in the universe are from Japan. Yeah,
but ultimately it doesn't matter where the games are coming from.
This is, like you said, a huge number of people
who do play video games in China, and it could
(22:39):
affect the entire global market. Uh, if you know this
kind of thing is Oh no, that's a very good point.
I'm just saying, I think it would be less quick
to do this if they would be shooting their own
industry in the foot. The ramifications, though, are huge. You're right,
it could have serious ripple effects in terms of and
if it started, if they really started stigmatizing gaming. You know,
(23:00):
there's also there's also a proliferation of unnamed spokespeople if
you look at the official statements, because I was I
first thought this was kind of an onion, Aescar parody
story when it broke, and it was it was earlier
in August, I think, and there they really do have
unnamed spokesfolk. Spokesfolk. There we go. They do have unnamed
(23:20):
spokes folks saying things like teenagers are the future of
our motherland right. Protecting the physical and mental health of
miners has related to the people's vital interest relates to
the cultivation of the younger generation in the era of
national rejuvenation. So this and I'm not saying it's insincere,
but I'm saying, does this remind you of any other
(23:42):
online surveillance laws that came under the guise of won't
someone think of the children? Sesame credit? I mean, oh,
not just sesame credit, but surveillance laws in the West Europe. Yeah,
so this was Yeah, there was a story that broke
in early August, and that's when ten Cent and news Ease,
cam Nettie's, a couple of these companies lost a ton
(24:05):
of their shares, their stock I think they their stocks
fell around ten percent, and then there was a lot
of discussion about it. That article ended up getting removed.
Some of those shares went back up then in at
today is when these all these articles came out, at
least in the West. That's when I when I first
saw it from the Guardian and Reuters. There's a New
(24:25):
York Time piece on it that's really good too. Oh nice.
I don't pay for that one, but you can. Yeah,
you can if you right now wherever you are in
several places, you can probably get the Guardian or the
Reuter's article. The Shinha one is news dot CN and
the article came out today eight thirty. You should be
(24:48):
able to find it. I think that's it for now, guys.
We can talk more about this later. Maybe we'll cover
more of this in the future, but for now we
have to take a break. We'll be right back with
more strange news. And we are back with another strange
news story. This one, Um. We are moving from China
(25:12):
over to South America, specifically Argentina, where a very bougie
gated development um called Nord Delta is being absolutely overrun
by uh cappy barras Cappy barras cap. I don't know.
I think it's probably potato potato cappy Bara cappy barra um, which,
(25:34):
if you're not familiar, they are the world's largest rodents um.
They are massive. They almost have this like horse like
slash hippopotamus slash dog kind of look to them. Um.
They are massive. They can be up to three feet
(25:55):
tall and they are they walk on all four so
that's pretty tall for someone that's on all four wars.
And they can weigh as much as a hundred and
seventy five pounds um. And they are apparently wreaking havoc
on some of these you know, fancy homes in this
Nord Delta community UM and the Nord Delton's or you know,
(26:17):
whatever you want to call them. The residents there are
not too happy about it. UM. And there's more to
this story. It's actually than meets the eye. That's really interesting.
So Nord Delta is actually was built in an area
of wetlands on the Luhan River Delta that's right by
Buenos Aires, and it's an area that has been under
(26:39):
a lot of scrutiny, and lots of areas in this
part of the country a lot a lot of scrutiny
by environmentalists who are saying, okay, we need to stop,
you know, paving paradise and putting up parking lots. You know,
are like fancy boogie uh communities like this UM. And
so that's exactly what this was, is one of these
areas that was being pushed to be protected by the government,
(27:02):
but the government is in fact instead subsidizing this type
of construction UM and you know, paving over these these areas.
And so essentially the cappy bars or carpin shows as
they're known colloquially in that region are essentially just kind
of hanging around the area that they already were living in.
(27:24):
I'm not sure if it's like a how how recent
it maybe maybe just be a story that's kind of
popped recently. But um, I'm not sure where they came
from or if they were just kind of hanging around
in the in the in the woods and now they're
just getting bold and coming in, you know and chewting
on people's lawns. Because this development has been around since
I believe, uh, two thousand roughly, if I'm not mistaken. Um.
(27:47):
But it's an interesting story because they have become essentially
like mimified these these these carpin shows, uh, and they've
been turned into this kind of like symbol of class
warfare in South America, UM, with these developers and you know,
like politicians kind of not looking out for the best
interests of the environment of the people that actually live
(28:11):
there and maybe that are a little less fortunate. I
can't afford to live in a place like Nord Delta. Um.
So all these memes kind of have these little guys
dressed up in kind of freedom fighter uniforms and like
photoshopped onto like the bodies of like Afghani, you know. Um,
militants and things like that. Um, it's very very interesting.
Like there's a few if you go to uh you
(28:34):
just type in carpincho u nord delta memes, you should
be able to find a ton and they're all in
you know, kind of this Argentinian dialect of Spanish, but
very much worth a look. Um. But I don't know,
like this is the kind of thing we see in
the United States too, Like even with like a store
preservation and areas that are just kind of like Atlanta
(28:54):
is really bad about it, um, in terms of bulldozing
history and building things on top up of it that
are much less important. You know, you could argue to uh,
the identity of a place. And I think it's even
more so the case with environmental stuff, where you're actually
killing an ecosystem and then getting piste off that like
the things that you displaced are like coming back and
(29:16):
pooping on your lawn. Yeah, that's a big issue here.
Is there a lot of pooping on lawns, Um, A
lot of eating of shrubberies and you know topiarias and
you know, gardening and stuff. Um, but I don't know,
what do you guys think are the carpine shows just
kind of coming back to claim what's their's or are
they like an infestation that needs to be dealt with. Uh.
(29:36):
Capa bara are not invasive. Their native to South America,
and they've got they've been around for a while. They're
they're super common. You know, the their conservation status is
of least concern, which puts them, you know, around what
you would you would consider squirrels or another smaller rodent
(29:58):
in your neck of the global woods. Uh. This is
there's there's a great Guardian piece about this as well.
The question is really like should they be driven out
from this community? And it's already exacerbating, of course, the
ongoing conversation about wealth inequality in Argentina. And this is
(30:19):
this is like a flashpoint. This is the ability to
put a face on something, an adorable face, by the way,
objectively speaking, where whereas other people outsiders might have been
just board or a little bit sedated by a barrage
of statistics and graphs and trends. Uh and you know,
g D P, etcetera. So I think it's I think
(30:42):
it's convenient. Um, I also think it's efficacious. I think
it's a good thing to spread awareness. We should mention
cappy bar are not violent creatures at all, and they're
huge in Japan, I mean literally, but also they're very popular. Yeah.
There there were some complaints too from residents that the
capin bars were biting their dogs. Um. And there's this
(31:02):
ecologist named Enrique Viale who kind of summed up what
I was just saying a minute ago, really very succinctly says, um,
it's the other way around. Nord Delta invaded the ecosystem
of the Carpeen shows Um. And this is a guy
who's been campaigning for ten years to pass laws to
defend these wetlands. There are reasons, actually functional reasons for
(31:22):
preserving these wetlands other than just like that they're like
beautiful and have these kind of diverse environments. It actually
can cause problems in other areas. Essentially, when you have
these wetlands, they can actually act as like buffers against
wildfires because they're you know, wet, and they keep wildfires
(31:46):
from spreading. You mentioned that Guardian piece Ben, which is
fantastic by Yuki Goni reporting from Buenos Aires. Uh, and
he points out that there's been this huge amount of
sprawl that's been happening in in this part of the country,
in northern Argentina, these wetlands specifically ones referred to as
(32:06):
the Piranhia wetlands. They go from the northern tip of
Argentina to the river Plate and then all they the
Atlantic Ocean. Um. And there are things like they're these
soy farmers that have also dispossessed a lot of this
land and then you know, made into these giant factory
farms for la it's called soy mega farming mondo agriculture
exactly exactly. And it actually can cause uh an uptick
(32:30):
in wildfires. They can without this buffer you know that
literally acts as like a safeguard you know, between these
fires and like areas around them. So when you start
to get rid of these and these developers that are
just kind of doing this stuff very quickly without thinking
about the big picture, um, you can have some real problems.
And and who does that affect. It affects poorer neighborhoods
(32:51):
that either end up getting flooded, you know during weather
events you know um or you know, their communities can
get burned to be victims of these fires. So it's
ultimately kind of upstairs downstairs kind of situation, which I
think is why the memes have taken such hold, because
you're right, man, it is putting a face, a very
cute face, on a much larger problem that does not
(33:15):
necessarily involve the cappy bars themselves. But it's just like
a bigger issue, a systemic issue that I think it
needs to be dealt with, but it doesn't necessarily look
like it's going to be because it does appear there
is also, you know, quite a bit of pocket lining
going on in the government and their connection and developers,
and you know, it's not uncommon, especially in this part
(33:37):
of the world and in this region of South America.
But um, do you guys see any potential for something
positive coming out of this or is it just like
a flash in the pan kind of meme you know,
party with that will eventually die. I mean, just speaking
for myself again, raising awareness of what's going on, it's
(33:58):
it's fascinating and it's predictable that people in people outside
of the region, people outside of Argentina, will tend to
be more aware and tend to care about something if
the information comes to them in an easily digestible, largely
visual form like a meme. Will that result in action?
(34:19):
Will that result in um substantive conversations about how to
how to address wealth inequality in Argentina? I mean, that's
that's a tough call. I I hope it happens. I
think a capit barra is a very good mascot for
a cause, you know what I mean? The US has
(34:40):
some odd choices for their their political mascots. Right, it's
still what a donkey and an elephant? Right? Last I checked? Yeah?
And uh, and so why not a capybara. That's what
I'm saying. If you, if you're listening, uh, this might
be this might be a good thing to have as
a representative of a party. Perhaps. Now you've been quiet
(35:00):
on this one. What do you think I've been super
quiet because I really like copy bars. I feel like
I remember reading about them being eaten in some cultures
because they were so because they were so prevalent, they
just existed everywhere, and like many rodents, they proliferate and
then you can eat them because there's so many. Yeah,
(35:21):
they can also eat their own feces as a source
of new nutrition or sorry, gut Flora's superpower. It's a
weird one. It's it's a gift and curse, you know,
heavy ways the head, even leaving lunch for somebody else.
Way to think about it, I think they're um, they're
fur is also used, but it's it's like any other animal.
(35:42):
It's not universally accepted as a good source of nutrition,
not by not by everybody. Is my understanding. At least
got you that aside. No, um, I don't know. It's
really what you guys are talking about. That's what. Sorry,
it's been quiet because I agree with a lot of
the points that are being made year. If you can
put a cute face to anything to any cause, or
(36:03):
a face is memorable or an image that's striking, much
like just the stoic look of a cappy bara as
it's looking out into the distance, that's a good point.
You're gonna get people to get on board, yeah with
that thing. So it reminds me of the story Ben
and I did on Ridiculous History once about this guerrilla
in Johannesburg that escaped from I'm sorry. A criminal was
(36:26):
running away from cops and he fell into this guerrilla
pit in a zoo and the guerrilla like uh, you know,
held him down until the cops got there and it
was during apartheid. So the guerrilla I can't remember the
grilla's name, but became this kind of smax became the
symbol of like, you know, uh, rule of law, you
know what I mean, and kind of like almost became
(36:48):
this like batman esque guerrilla figure. Um, this is obviously
not just one cappy bar. This is many of them,
and there're so a gain. These memes are great. Like
there's one where it's like, but she's just showing how
many they are, how many there are, and there's just
like a bunch of capy bar I just kind of
lazing around. There's a cute little fat boys. Um, but
it's saying like copy bar is practicing social distancing because
(37:10):
they're links sinks feet away from each other roughly. It's
really cute. But yeah, check it out, especially if you
read Spanish and if you can't, Google Translate was doing
a pretty fine job on these. And I would recommend
the website per Feel I think that's how you say it.
P E R f I L dot com. There's some
pretty good reporting about the wet lands conservation efforts. You
(37:31):
can check that. Yeah, yeah, okay, so maybe let's do
a little bit of positivity and some eye bleach. So positivity.
One thing that could come out of this is if
the if the Kappa bara population becomes livestock, if they're farmed,
then that would ensure that the wetland habitats are protected.
(37:52):
Is there an enterprising member of this community who's already
well to do? Is like, I'll get some good pr
and getting the kappa bar business. Possibly. But the more
wetlands you can save, the fewer wildfires you will have.
So I think that's I think that's an important aspect
um for eye bleach. If you want your person who
enjoys kind of serene, peaceful things, then why not check
(38:16):
out the multiple YouTube clips of capybara in Japan. Uh
They're soaking in hot springs and they look very much
at piece. It's it looks like a cartoon. It looks
like it's from Studio Ghibli. You'll feel a little bit
better about what's going on about whatever is going on hotly,
that's amazing. I I completely agree Pen, they are adorable images. Um,
(38:39):
But for now, while y'all are checking those out, we're
gonna pop to a quick break for a work more
sponsor and then we'll be back with one more strange news.
We have returned, Doc nol Matt. I just sent a
brief video Cappy Barra taking a soap at a Tokyo zoo,
(39:04):
and maybe maybe that'll get us through the next really
weird conversation we're about to have. Oh yeah, I'm sorry, Ben,
I'm gonna have a tab open with Cathy bar of
pictures now as we do this whole segment, because I
cannot take my eyes away from these adorable little dudes.
How did they happen? Do you ever see an animal
and you just think, how? How did that happen? Most
(39:27):
of us have a passing knowledge of evolution right for
the for the first time ever, quite recently here in
the United States. Uh, the majority of people agreed with
the concept of evolution. Did you hear about that? That
was a recent poll. No, that's great. People are on
board with evolution mainly. Yep, yep. How long did that take?
(39:53):
I saw your attention to an article from just yesterday
on Science Alert, which is a great website. More Americans
are finally coming around to accepting the science of evolution.
I guess all those little, uh little edits they made
and textbooks didn't keep it didn't stick, you know, yeah,
yeah it was. I think the first time it became
(40:14):
a majority was in twenties sixteen, so more recent than
a lot of people would maybe like to admit. Uh.
Now we are in a situation where evolution, as weird
as it may seem. You know, you see a platypus,
that's the most famous example. You see a giraffe and
you're like, wow, that's a very specific flex, right, how
(40:37):
did that happen? And then you see things like a
capybara and you're thinking, do they not have predators? They
live in a Disney Pixar environments. That neck to body
ratio is way off. It's just that it shouldn't shouldn't
be for a giraffe. No, No, for a copy of bara.
I mean it's like it's like their head. It feels
(40:58):
like it's it would be hard for it to hold
it up it's so big and it has such little neck,
you know, I mean, I don't know. It's just a
very very weird, stumpy creature and I don't understand what
it's for. I feel weird saying it, and not to
not to shame them, but they don't look like they
can run or I met if they try and throw
(41:18):
cute though I know, I know, it's like you. You
would want to sit there and go ah, you can
do it on your own. Shucks a little buddy. Fast forward,
third act of the Pixar. This Capabarra has just one
animal Olympics exactly so. So the thing is Capabara aren't
the only animals that have evolved. They're not the only
animals that will evolve right on on this planet. No
(41:41):
matter what happens with the current season of life on Earth,
which is heavy on humans, human beings are evolving as well.
If you are listening to this, I would like you
to pay very close attention to your arm. Let's do
let's do a little bit of a thought exercise. Folks
(42:02):
listening along, playing along at home. So if you can
close your eyes and just imagine feeling your arms in space.
If you want to hold them up so that your
elbows are parallel with your shoulder right, kind of like
you're making a touchdown, you're pulling a widow's son, then
(42:23):
you will you'll be able to if you have your
eyes closed, you really think about it, you'll be able
to feel the movement of your digits in your hands.
You may be able to feel your pulse in your arms.
I don't like this, okay, okay, it trips me out, Ben,
because I know where we're going with this. And there's
a reason they call it gross anatomy, because I could
(42:48):
feel everything that we're about to talk about, and it's
like it's like we're doing a comedy and I know
the jokes that you're about to tell, and instead of
happy and laughter, I've got like ingly sensation and weird
feelings in my arms. As you're doing all of this,
you may be feeling something different from your friends, maybe
(43:11):
even from your family members. Those are a little less
of a probability of that. And if you are an
older person than odds are you are definitely feeling something
different than a very young person. Because I bury the
lead here a little bit. Human beings are evolving. The
most recent proven thing is really weird. Uh. We're growing
(43:34):
extra arteries in our forearms. Why seems to be the answer,
But it's something called the persistent median artery of the forearm.
If you stave your arms up, I appreciate the commitment
you can put them down and your arms will have
a you have what's called an accessory artery in your
(43:56):
owner artery in your proximal forearm. And this is something
that usually like it happens while you are just stating right,
and it usually typically regresses about eight weeks into gestation.
But what people have found is that this is staying
(44:17):
around now. It's supposed to be temporary and it's not
vanishing anymore. The University of Adelaide and Australia, along with
some help from researchers at Flinders University, found that more
and more and more and more adults have an extra channel,
an extra artery. People have been studying this since the
seventeen hundreds and no one, no one is sure why
(44:41):
this is happening. But about ten of people in the
eighties or so kept this artery, and now it's up
to thirty, which is a clear trend statistically significant. It
means that humanity has been able to point to another
thing that proves it's a work in progress overall, which
(45:03):
is which is bizarre because it be you know, it
would be like, um, it would somehow make more sense
if our eyes were just evolving to be bigger. And
then you know, people could say oh, the aliens, they're
visiting folks or humans from the future, et cetera. But
what do you guys think about this? What does this
make you think of? Did this surprise you? Well? I've
(45:23):
always thought that it was kind of silly to think
that we would stop evolving, like if we reached our
our final form, you know, like I mean it. It
just seems that we the timeline of our lives and
our lifetime on this earth and even as a species,
is so tiny compared to like the whole of evolution
that's led to this point. I just feel like it's
inevitable that we will continue, and maybe we'll just see
(45:44):
little snippets of it like you would in the long
process that is evolution of another type of species over time.
You wouldn't clock it overnight. You just see one little
change that led to another little change that then became,
you know, important enough to stick around, you know. I
don't know, That's just how I would I always thought, Ben,
I'm feeling like the guy at a big party and
(46:05):
it's the first time he's done mushrooms or something. This
makes me feel very trippy. Like any time we talk anatomy,
anytime we talk about what's inside of our meat bodies, um,
and how they function. It wears me out. And to
think that somehow, over time the instructions that are inside
all of us just just tiny, like make these tiny,
(46:28):
tiny little changes. And you know, we breed enough times
with with someone that has as humans, we breed enough
times with enough of these changes than they take hold.
It is weird to think that this thing that may
maybe what it may be better for dexterity in your hands, right,
(46:49):
if you've got a little more blood flow something like that, um,
but it could also lead to terrible things like problems
with your wrists right or your joint if you if
you got that. So like I'm trying to imagine what
would be the what would be the reason that this
thing would be successful as a mutation? You know. Yeah, yeah,
(47:11):
So this is and I've tricked us a little bit
because this is news for evolution, and news on an
evolutionary scale is not quite news the day. But I've
got some cool news of the day to make up
with as we close. Um. The same way, like geological
time is not really clock time. Yes, the Yellowstone Caldera
is about to blow, but about means does not mean Thursday,
(47:34):
and so, so here's the idea the researchers based on
their work published in the Journal of Anatomy back in
so they imagine that having this persistent media and artery
could give you more of a boost of blood supply,
making your fingers possibly more dexterous, giving you a little
(47:56):
extra mph in your forearms, while at the same time
putting you at a higher risk of carpal tunnel syndrome.
So there's a cost cost benefit, like you said, just
like some people who have evolved to be more resistant
to malaria may also suffer from sickle cell anemia. I
(48:17):
really hope that I have them just for my I
don't know, drumming needs. And did you did you say
there was a number of percentage of of of how
often this is happening that's higher than it used to
be or something like that, or how often this is
making it out of the womb or out of the
gestation period. Yep, there was a ten percent chance for
adults to have this mutant artery, which are just calling
(48:40):
it for the click baity nature of it. Uh, back
in the eighties and now it's about thirty and seems
to be rising. So if you're listening. You have children
right now, then this is not a certitude, but the
odds are that they are going to be more likely
to have this remaining in adulthood. But again, I mean
(49:03):
from the eighteen eighties to the present day, it's only
just like a blip on. And what we would look
at like as an evolutionary timeline, I mean most the
evolution of certain species and in these mutations that end
up sticking because of changes in environment or whatever. I mean,
those can take thousands of years. That's why we're we're
(49:25):
not talking about a giraffe like neck that we're all developing.
We're talking about a fairly tiny piece of tissue, right,
I mean, that's really what it is, and it's not
a new thing. It's just sticking around longer. Like the
ability to digest uh dairy into adulthood, that is, that
is largely a juvenile trait for many organisms. You know, um,
(49:48):
at least the milk drinking ones. I don't know why
that sounded weird, just say that milk drinkers, the milk drinkers.
But let me let me hit you with one more
here another example. Oh and by the way, pretty one
who isn't aware of what we're talking about. The ability
to digest lactose dairy products into adulthood is a mutation,
(50:10):
and we know it's a mutation because not every member
of the human species has it. It's it's weird catching on.
But then also blue eyes were mutation, probably from like
one person in Estonia. What's their story about. I'm just
gonna hit you all with this. Uh, the extra blood
vessel you may have is not the only thing. You
(50:30):
may be getting. A new nee bone, a very old
nee bone, but yeah, check the check the zoom chat.
There's a knee bone called the fabella, and it used
to be really rare in human beings, but as of
twenty nineteen, turned out that it is three times more
common than it was just a hundred years ago. So, Nol,
(50:52):
you brought up an excellent point. Evolution happens slowly, right,
at least in the way a human being would think
of it an individual scale. So why does this stuff
seem to be increasing so so very quickly. The first
answer is probably we're paying more attention to it and
we're noticing more things. You know, those studies back in
(51:14):
the eighties maybe weren't as comprehensive, So maybe maybe you
had that extra blood vessel all along. I don't know
what to do with this other than to be amazed.
It's not really a conspiracy, except whether you think there
might be some people still today attempting to guide evolution
(51:34):
in one way or another. This is probably just like
stone or talk like let's do it late, late night
bar talk kind of stuff. But I've always wondered if,
like the way our brains are used now differently in
the way they were used because of things like you know,
smartphones and the Internet, and parts of our brains. Maybe
we're once devoted to like remembering people's phone numbers or
(51:57):
you know, certain things that we now have like assists
with all of this technology that we don't need to anymore.
Do you think that part of our brain gets like
repurposed for other stuff that makes us smarter or is
it a balancing act because we're also dumbing ourselves down
by just like you know, reading tweets and like looking
at internet clickbait trash all the time. Like I just wonder,
(52:18):
like if there's parts of our brains that are maybe
just just shifts. But is that a form of evolution
that can actually be influenced by technology. Yeah, that's a
really interesting question. One good way to look at this
would be through analogy. So what what we're seeing now
and what we're able to measure now would be uh
(52:39):
individual changes that may follow similar patterns, Like we know
to the earlier story about video game addiction, that this
video game environment can alter structural aspects of an individual's brain.
But the question of whether or not those changes are
heritable inheritable meaning like you know your kid would be
(53:03):
way better at Tatris than you because you put in
the time or something like that. That's that's not quite
the same thing. To do that, we have to understand that,
we'd have to understand a lot more about epigenetics, which
simply is not there. What we do know is that
experts largely agree if you go back three hundred thousand
(53:23):
years ago in time and you ran into early Homo sapiens,
you would see their brain size was already pretty much
the same as your friends and fellows here in one.
But with that being said, here's the analogy that I
think works. So let's say you, for some reason, you're
(53:44):
born your normal and you decide that you don't want
to use your left arm ever, use everything else but
your left arm. Increasingly, your left arm will attrophy. And
let's say you meet someone and you get together, fall
in love or don't, but you have a kid. Is
the point that kid's not going to have an atro
feed left arm because of your actions, that kid will
(54:05):
overwhelmingly likely without some intervening variable, they'll have the ability
to use both arms. So what happens to your individual
haunted house? Because I believe human beings are just ghosts
haunting their own houses. Like whatever happens to your house
is not going to affect the next house in that way.
And we still have a lot to learn about it.
(54:27):
And maybe now we'll be able to learn a little
bit faster because maybe we can all type a little
bit faster. I don't know what is that, but I
think you got into a nature versus nurture that but
a little bit because if that kid grows up hanging
out with the parent who never uses their left arm,
maybe they started going, oh, I kind of want to
be like my parents. Maybe I don't want to use
(54:48):
my left arm. That's true, Yeah, nature versus nurture absolutely,
but it's also like you know, I mean the idea
of good genes are like, you know, your dad was
a really great basketball player, therefore you automatically are built
to be a really great basketball player. But that would
only work, I think if you put in the work.
And I think nurture has a lot to do with
that too. If you're you are aspiring to be this thing,
(55:10):
maybe you have some natural ability, but was that developed
from like you know generations that then like the somehow?
And that's what epigenetics is, right, It's the idea of like,
you know, changes in the expression of genes, I think,
without affecting like the the overall DNA sequence, But it's
the idea of heritable traits that could be things like
(55:33):
you know, ability related. Right. Yeah. There there's a lot
of really fascinating stuff on on epigenetics, and it is important,
It is very important to understand this fully. Uh, it's
probably more than we have time to go into today,
but we would love to hear your thoughts. Why do
you think people seem to be evolving this quote unquote
(55:57):
extra artery? Do you get a weird knee bone? Tell
us about it. What's your position on evolution and what
if any role is modern technology playing people are definitely
outsourcing functions of their brains increasingly to electronic devices, which
which makes sense. It's approaching a cybernetic future, you know
(56:17):
what I mean, the marriage of meat and machine if
you want into wax poetic. But that's a story for
another day. We do hope you tune in to check
it out. Just to finish with our news round up,
CBS has reported that UFOs are regularly spotted and restricted
US airspace. Cool nobody panic U. The US is getting
(56:41):
removed from the European Union Safe Travel List, so check
that twice before you get your vacation tickets. And Hurricane
Ida has reversed the flow of the Mississippi River officially,
which we we didn't mention earlier. That happened just about
three hours ago before we went into recording. So our
thoughts are with everybody who is in the area and
(57:04):
make sure your loved ones are safe. Really interesting, I
think there must be a phenomenon that happens regularly with
this kind of category of hurricane, because there is a
documentary around Hurricane Katrina called Put the River in Reverse,
So I think that must be a reference to that
must be a thing that happens I've never heard. I
(57:24):
didn't ever think about that. What isn't common is how
quickly this thing ramped up. You can read stories about
that right now, about how much more dangerous this this
tropical storm slash group of thunderstorms became a hurricane then
ramped way up to a Category four so fast it
(57:46):
was just five miles under being a Cat five for
a minute. Uh. And of course, one more argument against
people wearing masks. The famous or infamous televangelist Jim Baker
has complained that God cannot hear your prayers if you
are wearing a mask. Oh, because it's too muffled. I
guess your prayers are too muffled. Well, I'm not an expert.
(58:09):
I didn't know he had to actually hear with like ears.
There's a lot of a lot of assumptions being made
here that God has ears and is listening, presumably with
some sort of high powered listening device from so so
far away. You think the mask wouldn't really be a concern. Yeah,
not high powered enough apparently. But let us let us know,
(58:30):
let us know your thoughts on what we shared today.
We are going to have a full episode on video
game addiction. Uh. It is worthwhile, it's important, it might
hit close to home for us. Uh. We are also
keeping a close eye on the developments not just in
Afghanistan but around the world. We want to hear your
thoughts a capa Barra and Argentina. We want to hear
(58:54):
your thoughts on the idea of humans evolving. And above all,
please be well, stay safe and don't hesitate to reach
out to us with strange news of your own. We
can't wait to hear you. And also we did an
episode on prosperity theology. Right do that Craflo Dollar make
(59:15):
you holler so they can finance his what is it
gold plated jet jet? Uh? So clever by his church
the other day. Really is it still open? It was big?
Is it still mega? That's all I know? It was
fairy mega, highly mega, got it? So let us know
all this and more. As we said, we look forward
to hearing from you, and we try to be easy
(59:37):
to find, not just online but on phones. You know,
pull a candy man, send our names in the dark
and the mirror, et cetera. Yeah, you can do that.
I wouldn't recommend that one. That one gets real spooky. Um,
I'm excited to see the new Candyman. By the way,
it's getting really good reviews. And I revisited the old one.
UM didn't think it held up super great, but still
(59:57):
some spooky bits, but very much a vic him of
the nineties, kind of schlocky, you know, acting and stuff.
But the new one, obviously, we're all huge fans of
Jordan Peele and I think we're probably all pretty excited
to see it. But um, short of candy manning us
into being, you can find us on the Internet where
we are conspiracy stuff on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, conspiracy
(01:00:21):
stuff show on Instagram. That's right, And we do have
a phone number, So just flip open your phone, uh
and type in one eight three three st d w
y t K and UH leave yourself a really cool nickname.
Tell us whatever you want to tell us. You've got
three minutes. Just just go wild with it. And we
(01:00:42):
love to laugh, especially lately or really just getting weird.
And once you have time traveled back from the nineteen
nineties with your flip phone, UM, you can also send
us a good old fashioned email with your computer. We
are conspiracy at iHeart radio dot com. M H stuff.
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