Your Brain on Facts

This topic came from our monthly Patreon topic poll.  It didn't win, but a patron was curious how I would make this topic interesting.

What do you …

(Thanks to special guests Sophia and Matryoshka for jingling their collars in range of the mic.)

The havoc that human beings (and a cat named …

Follow the stories of five people (an outlaw, a murderess, a nightclub dancer, a natural wonder, and a first lady) who covered a lot of ground... …

Voice acting is so much more than just cartoons; it’s documentary narration, GPS voices, smart speakers, and so much more. And if you can get in good, your career will be legendary, even if no one knows your name or …

April Fools!  But it's the good kind of prank.  Today I'm participating in Operation Switcheroo, where podcasts hosts share their feed with a similar …

When you think of world-saving heroes, you think Superman, Captain America, Randy Quaid in Independence Day.

But there are real life people who have saved thousands, even millions of lives within living memory, and …

From Twinkies and PMS to sleepwalking and The Matrix, we look at brilliantly bizarre legal strategies people have tried and sometimes even succeeded …

From military dolphins to railroad monkeys, hear about some of the more surprising jobs that our cousins in the animal kingdom can do.

Music by Kevin …

Welcome to the third installment of our infrequent series: We Can’t Have Nice Things.  This time, we’re looking at people who, through ignorance or malice ruins something not theirs -- vandals.  Their motives range from …

Since colonial times, African-Americans have fought in America’s wars.  Black soldiers have put their lives on the line for a country that for …

The human body can be a frail and fragile thing; we can be taken out by a small clump of our own cells. Then there are some bodies that seem to be …

We've all been through bad break-ups, but we should count ourselves lucky we were exiles, imprisoned or beheaded.

Special guest: Fan Theory World

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In the third installment of our sometimes-series We Can't Have Nice Things, we get back to basics and look at brazen acts of vandalism on natural …

From using a train in a car race to marathon doping with deadly poison, there's far more excitement in racing than simply declaring a winner.

Check out our new tiers and limited time special offer on Patreon.

Music by …

If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself, even if it means inhaling strange gasses, being stung by wasps, or swallowing patient's bodily fluids.

Check out our new tiers and limited time special offer …

What is the oldest playable instrument we've found?  How do you make music with lightning?  From clacking rocks together to the magnificent Marble …

Mankind has waged war for many reasons: land, oil, a pretty face, a wooden bucket, you name it.  How did a pig put the US and UK on the brink of war in Canada?  Who declares hostility over watermelon?  And what about …

Sigmund Freud may be the father of psychoanalysis, but he got a LOT of stuff wrong.

Special guest extravaganza with Bunny Trails, Ignorance Was Bliss, Interesting Sex, and The Story Behind podcasts.

Support the show

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7 billion people spread across 59 million square miles, but we all need to eat and we eat more things that are than same than different.  Learn about …

You've probably heard about the Austrian Christmas demon Krampus, but what about Befana, the Italian Christmas witch?  In what country do you need reservations for Xmas dinner at KFC?  Where do people wish you happy …

In our instantly-connected world, there are entire groups of people you may never have heard of, whether they have never had contact with others or …

As long as we have had media on which to record our art, there have been competing formats.  While more modern examples like Betamax vs VHS or Blu-ray vs HD DVD may leap to mind, format wars go back as far as the days …

From naming ceremonies around the world and adult circumcisions, to unexpected disasters and baptising the dead whether they want it or not, we look …

Think you don't speak French because you failed it in high school?  Wouldn't know Hindi from Urdu?  You actually speak them every day!

Mentions: …

 From the Yellow Pages and Golden Book, to Mao's little red book, three different green books and more!

 Music by Kevin MacLeod, Audionautix, and …

From music hall to Red Dwarf, pantomime to Absolutely Fabulous, we look at the history of British comedy, the names, shows, and historical events …

There are many reasons why an individual or group would eat other people - religious rites, shows of strength, signs of respect, and of course …

George Carlin wasn't wrong with his list of 7 dirty words you can't say, but he missed a whole lot.  Everyday parts of our media and surprisingly …

There are some musicians that leave an enduring legacy through long and storied careers, like the Rolling Stones, who formed in 1962 and swear 2018 …

Hispanic Heritage Month runs from Sept 15 to Oct 15.  Join us in celebrating cultural touchstones and famous people, as well as learning things like …

Will Shel Silverstein turn your kids into cannibals? Is a baby penguin spreading the "gay agenda"?  We look at children, young adult, and LGBTQ books …

Banned Books Week is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read. Banned Books Week was launched in 1982 in response to a sudden surge in the …

Goats are the internet’s second favorite animal, a ruminant quadruped that gives us milk, meat, fiber, and hilarious videos.  Legend has it they also …

What’s in a name?  That which we call a city by any other name would smell as sweet.  Some nicknames are obvious. Denver, CO is the Mile High City …

If you want to open an actual door to the past, you’ll have to do it without a doorknob. The patent for the a knob that turns to move a latch inside the door wasn't filed until 1878.  Lots of things, from CPR to …

Genghis Kahn's empire killed 2/3 of Northern China, but people under his rule knew unrivaled gender equality and religious freedom.  Mother Teresa …

There is a literal world of funeral practices to choose from, from an Irish wake to Tibetan sky burial, from New Orleans Jazz funerals to Balinese ngaben cremation, from being buried in a car-shaped coffin in Ghana to …

Tests are all around us.   You probably took one the minute you were born.  We look at tests named for the people who created them - Bechdel, Myers-Briggs, Apgar, and more.

01:25 Bechdel-Wallace 

09:00 DuVernay

13:40 …

Without getting into current politics, we can’t ignore the plight of children seized from parents of a particular group.  And it’s not the first time …

Death doesn’t mean everything stop for you.  There are lots of ways we can live on after shuffling off the mortal coil.  From body parts taken from famous bodies, to cells that won't stop growing, to a taxidermied …

I’m pretty good at this wife business, but I can’t say that I would take over my husband’s public office after his death, re-edit his film to launch …

“The body is a temple and it’s our job to decorate it."  From tatau in Polynesia to Sailor Jerry to the oppressed class that gave rise to the Yakuza, …

We all lose things -- keys, wallets, patience -- but how do you lose an entire city?  Hear the stories of three American towns built in a hurry but kept off the map, secure Soviet enclaves known by their post codes, …

For Independence Day, we're doing a two-parter on heroic animals, innovations from the field, and noteworthy bad-asses.

Topics include a pigeon who saved hundreds of lives, a crossbow for grenades and Jack Churchill, …

For Independence Day, we're doing a two-parter on heroic animals, innovations from the field, and noteworthy bad-asses.

Topics include a pigeon who saved hundreds of lives, a crossbow for grenades and Jack Churchill, …

Ecce Homo was a fresco of Jesus Christ that had degraded significantly over time.  No one asked the little old lady next door to help.  She had no …

My father was a sci-fi fan of the old school.  The man had the entire original Star Trek series on VHS, commercial free, and an Enterprise technical …

A strategic reserve is a commodity held back by governments to stabilize prices or protect against shortage.  Your mind may go immediately to the 35 million barrels or so of crude oil that the US has in storage, but …

We assign a great deal of significant to last words. We expect them to be deep and profound, the sort of thing you immortalize on a $3,000 headstone. We hope we’ll say something really clever when it’s our turn, and not …

Some actors fall victim to typecasting, but others have a single character they can't disassociate themselves from.  Sometimes that means always being cast as a character similar to the one they made famous or that made …

If a monkey takes a picture in the woods, can the monkey claim the copyright?  Trademark and copyright laws can get pretty sticky.  For the layperson, trademark, copyright and patent sound interchangeable.  Find our who …

In this episode, we cover the way people in Victorian Europe used (and abused) Egyptian mummies, whether or not mummies were burned for fuel, …

From the skin between your thumb and forefinger to the stringy things you have to pick off bananas, today's episode will teach you dozens of names for everyday items, even if you can't tell your natiform from your …

When you think of big heists, your mind probably goes to banks, jewelry, and fine art, or maybe a casino vault; carefully organized plans by people …

A microphone is a good enough platform for getting back at people, but an entire recording studio is even better.  Popular music is littered with …

From trolls and griefers, to crashing virtual funerals and spreading digital plagues, we look at online gamers ruining everyone else's fun in the …

Small things can have reverberating effects on history, both good and bad.  In 1453, the great walled city of Constantinople, which had withstood sieges for 1,100 years, fell to the Ottomans...because someone left the …

Mel Brooks said it best, “It’s good to be the king.”  There’s the seemingly limitless power and unspendable amounts of wealth.  On the flip-side, …

Hop on down the bunny trail as we examine the origins of some beloved Easter traditions and teach the goyim a little about Pesach.

In the age of bigger, better, faster, more, it’s easy to default to thinking that we invented everything, that the complex things that make up our …

We dip our toes into the deep water of "the first woman to..." with pilots, daredevils, doctors, and athletes.

There exists a small deserted town, which has been seized by eminent domain and condemned by the state. Why would an entire town that once housed …

Take, for example, George Washington’s youthful proclamation on the lumberjacking of his father’s cherry tree - “I cannot tell a lie. I did cut it …

Gutenberg may have gotten all the press, but he wasn't the first to use movable type. Think you know the first video game or who was the first to fly across the Atlantic? Listen in and see!

You say potato, I say a dangerous tuber that people will only eat in the face of actual starvation.  You say tomato, I say a poison apple from the mysterious new world that’s killing the aristocracy.

From a lone example of a trilobite in Hunan, China named Han Solo to a butterfly pea flower reminiscent of a Georgia O'Keefe painting, called …

From rainbow parties to Spiritualism to two bands touring as a band they're not, we take a look at some noteworthy hoaxes and false panics.