December 20, 2019 • 11 mins
It's easy to marvel at the work of scientists, both in terms of the scientific concepts themselves and in the ways scientists behave. Both of those things, as well as foreign language verb tense, feature in this casual discussion of this week's episodes.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, the production
of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hello, and welcome
to the podcast. I'm Tracy Vie Wilson and I'm Holly Fry.
It's time for our behind the scenes many So time
and an accidental science week that we're having this week.
(00:22):
We didn't plan for it to be science week, but
it is. It happens that way. It's always funny to
me because often, um, Tracy and I don't always consult
each other on what we're working on. At this point,
we've both done so many that we don't really you know,
need to check in all that much. But every once
in a while this happens where we both seem to
be on the same wavelengs and we do slightly related episodes.
(00:46):
Yeah science time. Yeah. Usually at most they're sort of
an f y I check in stop of what the
topic is, or if it's something that one of us
knows is sort of more difficult subject territory for the other,
they'll they'll be sort of a hey, just as it are,
we are we okay to talk about this this week? Yeah? Yeah,
uh So. In my life, I have always struggled and
(01:08):
continued to struggle with basic arithmetic. But then when I
got into like more complicated mathematics and then like into
more mathematically involved physics and chemistry and stuff like that.
In school, I actually did pretty well and all of that.
But the work that Shian Chung Wu was doing and experimental,
(01:30):
you know, subatanic physics, I don't understand. I watched so
many explanatory videos on uh beta decay. Basically I get
on a basic level, but I watched so many videos
that were about her experiment and about what parody is,
and about a lot of the more general state of
(01:54):
the field of experimental physics at the time, and I'd
be like, Okay, I don't don't feel like I understand
what this means. It's it's weird. I felt like I
was pretty good and as a physics student until I
got to this episode. Um, the thought in my head
is so weird. I'm reluctant to say it, but I'm
(02:16):
gonna uh, I feel like I'm gonna sound like a
crazy person. Come with me. I feel like this is
one of those places we're having studied Samuel Beckett really
helps me. Huh. Here's why, because there is a level
of just acceptance with Beckett like you have to understand
(02:37):
that you don't always grasp all of what it is,
and you just accept it, and then you're in the
material and it sort of starts to make its own
weird logical sense. And I feel like that same thing.
I am a little bit better now at applying to
things like physics that are difficult concepts and it kind
of makes a weird sense to me. Does that make sense? Yes,
(03:00):
where I'm like, oh, yes, of course the mirror image
of parody makes absolutely of course that makes sense. But
if anybody ever had to really get a scientific explanation,
I would be like, let's consult the book. Yeah, yeah,
there there was a whole lot of physics. Headshaking. I
also really appreciated the fact that there is a biography
(03:25):
of San Chung Wu and it was actually written in
China in Chinese and translated into English. And one of
the things that folks who read a lot of literature
that is outside of where they grew up in the
language they speak, one of the things that people notice
is the way different cultures address language and address the
(03:47):
craft of how you put a story together, Like there
can be differences, um, and it was really interesting to
me to read this biography which was written in Chinese
translated into English, that like the structure of it was
a little different from what I am used to. There
was like more repeating of previous material at the beginning
of a chapter, which I just found to be fascinating
(04:07):
and was like it was it led me down a
whole rabbit hole of like, is this more a more
common way of structuring a story in China and in
Chinese or is that this like this one particular writer's style,
And so now I'm very curious. I wonder too. I
do not speak Chinese, but my understanding is that there
(04:29):
are not conjugations of verb tense in Chinese, so it's
not like a verb conveys future or past. It's all
sort of now. So I suspect in translation that might
lead to some of that repetition um where it seems
like it's the same thing coming up again and again,
but in fact it probably through nuance, was conveyed as
(04:52):
being framed in different ways on the timeline would be
my guests. Yeah, okay, that's fascinating too. Uh. That kind
of reminds me of how occasionally when I will need
to run some like French through Google Translate that gets
really confused about the gender of anything because you know
(05:13):
all the all the nouns. There's law and the law,
and when you when you speak French, you will understand
that you were talking about her dog. But suddenly Google
Translate will be like his dog, and I'm like, no,
you're just confused to Google Translate anyway. Neither of us,
as Chinese speakers is very amazing and pronouncing Chinese words, No,
(05:40):
they're very, very difficult for me. And as I said loud,
last week's casual Friday or not last week's, but several back,
I think I tend to speak everything with a French accent,
which is a garbage way to do it, and I'm
trying to cure myself of that very very bad habit. Yeah,
our our, our pronunciations on this one did come from
Mandarin Chinese speakers, and then we did our best to
(06:04):
try to render that accurately. So fingers crossed that we did, okay,
and apologies if we did not. So So, Tracy, I
have to confess that in recent years I have felt
a large degree of guilt over every time that I
ever inhaled helium to make my voice sound silly now
knowing that it is a finite resource that we kind
(06:26):
of live on a precipice of running out of all
the time. I don't think I've come to that point.
But when we had that conversation at the top of
the episode about how I was the person that had
to go get the little helium tank and balloons for
my brother's wedding, like it was the smallest tank that
was available at at the you know, party supply store.
(06:48):
But I did start feeling kind of guilty by the
end that what I wound up doing with it was
when I moved and I was like, I still have
this little helium tank. I basically brought it to the
house stuff works video department, and who knows, who knows
whether it made its way into some kind of video
use after that point. Probably they're a resourceful group. They
(07:10):
are very resourceful. Yeah, I also just uh, I know,
I I messaged you about it while I was working
on it. But I was so pleased that this had
an instance in this episode of scientists who could have
gotten into an argument over who should get credit for
their work, but instead became best friends. To me, that's
the others well, and uh like, to some extent, I
(07:31):
get it when there are big scientific disputes, because I mean,
sometimes those kind of discoveries really make or break somebody's career,
so I understand. But at the same time, those they
can become so acrimonious. Yeah, it's uh. We talked about
this a little bit in our our sul Hurts episode
as well, Like, there's there's that part of me that
(07:53):
just just sad because I'm a little bit of an
idealist and I want the pursuit of knowledge to be
this pure and beautiful thing in every by to work
together and cheer each other. But as you said, there
are high stakes in terms of people's livelihoods, and it
does make sense that there would be moments of disparity
between people. I don't know how to fix that. I
don't I don't know how to fix the human condition,
(08:17):
but I'm I'm pleased that in this one instance, related
to observing the sun without the need for an eclipse
and figuring out how to use a spectroscope for any
time viewing it resulted in a nearly four decade close friendship. Um.
I really appreciated that by total coincidence, we did this
episode after our earlier episode of the week because when
(08:41):
I was working on Chan Chung Wu, I really was
like my I felt like the understanding of what she
was talking about was on the other side of a
wall in my mind that I was banging my head against.
And then we got to come over to Helium, which
included like all my favorite types of things from when
I took physics and astronomy, and I was like, hey, yeah,
(09:02):
my brain, my brain can still do science. It just
can't do uh some beta decay parody in subatomic physics situation. Yes,
elemental signatures in the visible light spectrum is a good
stuff and it it As I said in the episode,
it's one of those things that I still I can
(09:23):
I can wrap my brain around what's happening, but I'm
still wowed when when astronomers and astrophysicists today look at
at a new thing that we've discovered out in the
the vast expanse of space and they're like, oh, we
think it's made of this and this, and I was
like wow, um, because I love it and I love science.
I always feel like a little bit, you know, my
(09:45):
science grasp is um hit or miss I find, but
I still love it so deeply, and I love that
the there are people who use their incredible intellect for
the betterment of our understanding of our place in the universe.
To me, that's like one of the noblest pursuits for sure.
And if there are folks that are like man, what
(10:06):
is why is it so much science? I don't know
what you're working on for next time, but next time
what I'm working on is very far away from what
we are talking about this week. Yeah, same, same, I
always want to talk about science, but I know I
do it a lot. I almost had a moment one
of the people while I was researching this episode. There
(10:26):
was a person that came up uh, and then it
became about photographing the moon, and I was like, no, no, no,
get away, You've done so yeah. Um. I responded to
a couple of listener suggestion emails that we got over
the past week with with basically, yeah, that is actually
on my short list for a thing, but it has
so many overlapping UH themes with stuff we've just done
(10:50):
that I'm trying to save it for a little bit later.
That doesn't always work out. We still have runs of
a similar theme on the show, but you know, we try. Yeah,
it happens. It happens. And then, as we said, this
was completely coincidental that we both picked science this time. Yeah,
sometimes that's just how it goes. Uh, we're on whatever,
We're both in the science zone for whatever reason. Stuffy
(11:17):
Missed Industry Class is a production of I Heart Radios
How Stuff Works. For more podcasts for my heart Radio,
visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows.
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, the production
of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hello, and welcome
to the podcast. I'm Tracy Vie Wilson and I'm Holly Fry.
It's time for our behind the scenes many So time
and an accidental science week that we're having this week.
(00:22):
We didn't plan for it to be science week, but
it is. It happens that way. It's always funny to
me because often, um, Tracy and I don't always consult
each other on what we're working on. At this point,
we've both done so many that we don't really you know,
need to check in all that much. But every once
in a while this happens where we both seem to
be on the same wavelengs and we do slightly related episodes.
(00:46):
Yeah science time. Yeah. Usually at most they're sort of
an f y I check in stop of what the
topic is, or if it's something that one of us
knows is sort of more difficult subject territory for the other,
they'll they'll be sort of a hey, just as it are,
we are we okay to talk about this this week? Yeah? Yeah,
uh So. In my life, I have always struggled and
(01:08):
continued to struggle with basic arithmetic. But then when I
got into like more complicated mathematics and then like into
more mathematically involved physics and chemistry and stuff like that.
In school, I actually did pretty well and all of that.
But the work that Shian Chung Wu was doing and experimental,
(01:30):
you know, subatanic physics, I don't understand. I watched so
many explanatory videos on uh beta decay. Basically I get
on a basic level, but I watched so many videos
that were about her experiment and about what parody is,
and about a lot of the more general state of
(01:54):
the field of experimental physics at the time, and I'd
be like, Okay, I don't don't feel like I understand
what this means. It's it's weird. I felt like I
was pretty good and as a physics student until I
got to this episode. Um, the thought in my head
is so weird. I'm reluctant to say it, but I'm
(02:16):
gonna uh, I feel like I'm gonna sound like a
crazy person. Come with me. I feel like this is
one of those places we're having studied Samuel Beckett really
helps me. Huh. Here's why, because there is a level
of just acceptance with Beckett like you have to understand
(02:37):
that you don't always grasp all of what it is,
and you just accept it, and then you're in the
material and it sort of starts to make its own
weird logical sense. And I feel like that same thing.
I am a little bit better now at applying to
things like physics that are difficult concepts and it kind
of makes a weird sense to me. Does that make sense? Yes,
(03:00):
where I'm like, oh, yes, of course the mirror image
of parody makes absolutely of course that makes sense. But
if anybody ever had to really get a scientific explanation,
I would be like, let's consult the book. Yeah, yeah,
there there was a whole lot of physics. Headshaking. I
also really appreciated the fact that there is a biography
(03:25):
of San Chung Wu and it was actually written in
China in Chinese and translated into English. And one of
the things that folks who read a lot of literature
that is outside of where they grew up in the
language they speak, one of the things that people notice
is the way different cultures address language and address the
(03:47):
craft of how you put a story together, Like there
can be differences, um, and it was really interesting to
me to read this biography which was written in Chinese
translated into English, that like the structure of it was
a little different from what I am used to. There
was like more repeating of previous material at the beginning
of a chapter, which I just found to be fascinating
(04:07):
and was like it was it led me down a
whole rabbit hole of like, is this more a more
common way of structuring a story in China and in
Chinese or is that this like this one particular writer's style,
And so now I'm very curious. I wonder too. I
do not speak Chinese, but my understanding is that there
(04:29):
are not conjugations of verb tense in Chinese, so it's
not like a verb conveys future or past. It's all
sort of now. So I suspect in translation that might
lead to some of that repetition um where it seems
like it's the same thing coming up again and again,
but in fact it probably through nuance, was conveyed as
(04:52):
being framed in different ways on the timeline would be
my guests. Yeah, okay, that's fascinating too. Uh. That kind
of reminds me of how occasionally when I will need
to run some like French through Google Translate that gets
really confused about the gender of anything because you know
(05:13):
all the all the nouns. There's law and the law,
and when you when you speak French, you will understand
that you were talking about her dog. But suddenly Google
Translate will be like his dog, and I'm like, no,
you're just confused to Google Translate anyway. Neither of us,
as Chinese speakers is very amazing and pronouncing Chinese words, No,
(05:40):
they're very, very difficult for me. And as I said loud,
last week's casual Friday or not last week's, but several back,
I think I tend to speak everything with a French accent,
which is a garbage way to do it, and I'm
trying to cure myself of that very very bad habit. Yeah,
our our, our pronunciations on this one did come from
Mandarin Chinese speakers, and then we did our best to
(06:04):
try to render that accurately. So fingers crossed that we did, okay,
and apologies if we did not. So So, Tracy, I
have to confess that in recent years I have felt
a large degree of guilt over every time that I
ever inhaled helium to make my voice sound silly now
knowing that it is a finite resource that we kind
(06:26):
of live on a precipice of running out of all
the time. I don't think I've come to that point.
But when we had that conversation at the top of
the episode about how I was the person that had
to go get the little helium tank and balloons for
my brother's wedding, like it was the smallest tank that
was available at at the you know, party supply store.
(06:48):
But I did start feeling kind of guilty by the
end that what I wound up doing with it was
when I moved and I was like, I still have
this little helium tank. I basically brought it to the
house stuff works video department, and who knows, who knows
whether it made its way into some kind of video
use after that point. Probably they're a resourceful group. They
(07:10):
are very resourceful. Yeah, I also just uh, I know,
I I messaged you about it while I was working
on it. But I was so pleased that this had
an instance in this episode of scientists who could have
gotten into an argument over who should get credit for
their work, but instead became best friends. To me, that's
the others well, and uh like, to some extent, I
(07:31):
get it when there are big scientific disputes, because I mean,
sometimes those kind of discoveries really make or break somebody's career,
so I understand. But at the same time, those they
can become so acrimonious. Yeah, it's uh. We talked about
this a little bit in our our sul Hurts episode
as well, Like, there's there's that part of me that
(07:53):
just just sad because I'm a little bit of an
idealist and I want the pursuit of knowledge to be
this pure and beautiful thing in every by to work
together and cheer each other. But as you said, there
are high stakes in terms of people's livelihoods, and it
does make sense that there would be moments of disparity
between people. I don't know how to fix that. I
don't I don't know how to fix the human condition,
(08:17):
but I'm I'm pleased that in this one instance, related
to observing the sun without the need for an eclipse
and figuring out how to use a spectroscope for any
time viewing it resulted in a nearly four decade close friendship. Um.
I really appreciated that by total coincidence, we did this
episode after our earlier episode of the week because when
(08:41):
I was working on Chan Chung Wu, I really was
like my I felt like the understanding of what she
was talking about was on the other side of a
wall in my mind that I was banging my head against.
And then we got to come over to Helium, which
included like all my favorite types of things from when
I took physics and astronomy, and I was like, hey, yeah,
(09:02):
my brain, my brain can still do science. It just
can't do uh some beta decay parody in subatomic physics situation. Yes,
elemental signatures in the visible light spectrum is a good
stuff and it it As I said in the episode,
it's one of those things that I still I can
(09:23):
I can wrap my brain around what's happening, but I'm
still wowed when when astronomers and astrophysicists today look at
at a new thing that we've discovered out in the
the vast expanse of space and they're like, oh, we
think it's made of this and this, and I was
like wow, um, because I love it and I love science.
I always feel like a little bit, you know, my
(09:45):
science grasp is um hit or miss I find, but
I still love it so deeply, and I love that
the there are people who use their incredible intellect for
the betterment of our understanding of our place in the universe.
To me, that's like one of the noblest pursuits for sure.
And if there are folks that are like man, what
(10:06):
is why is it so much science? I don't know
what you're working on for next time, but next time
what I'm working on is very far away from what
we are talking about this week. Yeah, same, same, I
always want to talk about science, but I know I
do it a lot. I almost had a moment one
of the people while I was researching this episode. There
(10:26):
was a person that came up uh, and then it
became about photographing the moon, and I was like, no, no, no,
get away, You've done so yeah. Um. I responded to
a couple of listener suggestion emails that we got over
the past week with with basically, yeah, that is actually
on my short list for a thing, but it has
so many overlapping UH themes with stuff we've just done
(10:50):
that I'm trying to save it for a little bit later.
That doesn't always work out. We still have runs of
a similar theme on the show, but you know, we try. Yeah,
it happens. It happens. And then, as we said, this
was completely coincidental that we both picked science this time. Yeah,
sometimes that's just how it goes. Uh, we're on whatever,
We're both in the science zone for whatever reason. Stuffy
(11:17):
Missed Industry Class is a production of I Heart Radios
How Stuff Works. For more podcasts for my heart Radio,
visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows.
Stuff You Missed in History Class News
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Holly Frey
Tracy Wilson
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