SGU Episode 912

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SGU Episode 912
December 31st 2022
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SGU 911                      SGU 913
Skeptical Rogues
S: Steven Novella
Quote of the Week
QUOTE
AUTHOR, _short_description_
Links
Download Podcast
Show Notes
[ https://sguforums.org/index.php?BOARD=1.0 Forum Discussion]

Introduction

Voice-over: You're listening to the Skeptics' Guide to the Universe, your escape to reality.

Psychic Predictions ()

The rogues review predictions for 2022 and make their own predictions for 2023.

_ROGUE_'s Results ()

_text_when_ROGUE_references_previous_predictions_

Rogues' Predictions for YYYY

_ROGUE_'s Predictions ()

_text_when_ROGUE_introduces_new_predictions_

News Items

S:

B:

C:

J:

E:

(laughs) (laughter) (applause) [inaudible]

Who's That Noisy? ()

Answer to previous Noisy:

_brief_description_of_answer_ _perhaps_with_a_link_

New Noisy ()

[_short_vague_description_of_Noisy]

short_text_from_transcript

Questions/Emails/Corrections/Follow-ups ()

_consider_using_block_quotes_for_emails_read_aloud_in_this_segment_
with_reduced_spacing_for_long_chunks –

Question_Email_Correction #2: _brief_description_ ()

[top]                        

Science or Fiction (h:mm:ss)

Item #1: _item_text_from_show_notes_ Item #2: _item_text_from_show_notes_ Item #3: _item_text_from_show_notes_ Item #4: (_item_text_from_show_notes_)

Answer	Item
Fiction
Science

Host	Result
Steve

Rogue	Guess

Voice-over: It's time for Science or Fiction.

Steve Explains Item #_n_

S: Well, let's move on to science or fiction.

S: Each week I come up with three science news items or facts, two real and one fake, and then I challenge my panel of skeptics to tell me which one is the fake.

S: So this is the last science or fiction for the year, and we're going to start, as we always do on this episode, by going over some statistics.

S: Are you guys ready for this?

E: No.

E: No.

S: I have a feeling you did terrible.

S: I included the episode that hasn't aired yet because obviously we had a couple of listeners who very nicely –

E: Why would you do that? I got those wrong.

S: Collated the stats for us, but I had to add in the episode they haven't heard since they were not privy to it.

S: All right.

S: We'll start with Bob, who got 27 correct out of 53 participations.

S: I don't know how that turned out to be 53.

S: They must have included the one from the end of last year.

C: Oh, but also, Steve, if you included both of the ones we just recorded, what –

S: I did, only the one that's going to air. Oh, okay.

S: I looked at the top.

S: I did not include the one that's not going to air.

S: You included the sweep.

S: I know what I'm doing.

S: I know what I'm doing.

S: Relax.

S: So Bob, you're at 50.9%.

S: So you broke 50%.

S: That's good.

B: That's good, Bob.

B: Yeah, whatever.

S: Yeah, that's great.

S: Evan, 26 out of 49 for 53.1%.

E: Oh my gosh.

E: Better than I thought.

S: Jay, 29 out of 50 for 58%.

C: Ooh, Jay.

S: And Cara, how do you think you did?

C: Like around how Jay did probably.

S: I'm assuming you're going in order, so slightly better.

S: 35, 48.

S: 72.9%, Cara.

S: Yeah.

S: Jeez.

S: You always underestimate how well you do.

S: 72.9%.

C: Yes, because the hard beats are so hard.

C: What about you, Steve?

C: I had 0%.

S: I played one game and I lost.

S: So I was at 0%.

S: You suck.

E: We got to get you in the game, up to bat a few more times.

E: Yeah, yeah.

S: You guys should cover more often.

S: So I guess for a few.

S: Yeah, put me down for a couple this coming year, Steve.

E: Yeah, okay.

S: There's some other ways to break this down, however.

S: So we could go by the percentage correct based on when they went in the order, when you guys went in the order.

S: So the first person, the person who went first was correct 46% of the time.

S: Second, 54%.

S: Third, 61.2%.

S: Fourth, 72.7%.

S: Wow.

E: Nice.

E: That is – wow, how linear can you get right there?

S: And on a few times when we had five people, the fifth person going was correct 100% of the time.

S: Oh, that's amazing.

S: Wow.

B: That's really cool.

B: How many times is that though?

B: A fifth person?

E: Probably not a third time.

S: Probably only a couple of times.

S: Yeah, probably only a couple of times.

S: Now, so the emailer said, so there is a clear advantage to going later in the game with last and fifth being the best spots.

S: Apparently so.

S: However, he is committing a fallacy and making that conclusion.

S: What is the false assumption he's making?

J: That going later increases your chances.

S: No, but what – that's the conclusion.

S: But there's a premise.

S: There's a false premise in there.

S: Jamblers.

S: It's an unstated premise.

S: It's not an –

C: That somebody is getting it right before you? No.

S: The unstated premise is that the order is random.

S: The order is not random.

S: I decide when you guys go.

S: Now, I try to mix it up to make it fair.

S: But I also – if I think you have an advantage, I will make you go last.

S: Sure.

S: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

E: You do that a lot.

E: It's a topic about Thanksgiving.

S: Jay is going last.

S: Yes.

S: If it's like a psychology thing, I'll make Cara go last.

S: If it's an astronomy thing, I'll probably make Bob go last.

S: If it's a tax thing, they never have.

E: Tax thing, you never know.

S: So he was assuming that going last caused you to have an advantage, but it's more that if you have an advantage, I make you go last.

S: Right.

C: Interesting.

C: And it's probably – I would assume the variance is kind of in both, Cara.

J: You see how complicated this gets?

S: No, I do think it's both, mainly because there's a dose response, right?

S: It's a linear – it's not just that last position.

S: It is – but I also – I also think like if I think you're the person who's most vulnerable, I'll make you go first.

E: For sure.

E: It's the only way to blind us during this game.

S: Yeah.

S: We've tried that.

S: It just wasn't as fun.

E: Too cumbersome.

E: Yeah, right.

E: It doesn't – the dialogue goes over.

S: All right.

S: So here is the stats on who went first.

S: Bob went first 20% of the time.

S: Cara 22%, Evan 26%, Jay 22%.

S: Not a bad distribution.

S: Not a bad distribution.

S: I'm freewheeling it.

S: So that's pretty good.

S: The person going last was Bob 14%, Cara 30%.

S: So you do have an advantage going in that last position.

S: Wow, that's big.

S: Who would Cara bias there?

S: Evan 22%, Jay 28%.

C: So that – I mean that could be some contribution to me and Jay's higher wins.

C: It could be.

C: But also like you said, sometimes you put us last because you're afraid that we have more knowledge about the topic.

S: Right, right, right.

S: So that could also advantage us.

S: I do look at the stats and it does influence me a little bit for the following.

S: It's like if things get a little bit too out of range, I do correct a little bit.

E: There's no perfect formula.

E: I mean let's face it.

S: Yeah.

S: Oh, yeah.

S: Yeah.

S: It's all based on what's going to be the most fun and interesting.

S: And then finally, the first answer was correct 40% of the time.

S: The second answer 32% of the time and the third answer 28% of the time.

S: Interesting.

S: So again, the emailer said – so if you went in doubt, guess the first answer.

S: What's the fallacies?

S: I mean I think they were joking.

S: But I mean the fallacy there is that past performance is a prediction of future performance.

S: Right.

S: Now the order of which one is correct is random.

S: I literally roll a die and whatever it is, that's what it is.

S: How funny.

S: Because that you can't randomize things subjectively.

S: You know what I mean?

S: Like I would definitely be biased and –

E: You've tested this die that you roll for accuracy and – Yeah, it's just a regular D6.

S: It's fine.

S: And every year it's a different number.

S: It's a different number that's – I think last year it was more number three I think or whatever, number two.

S: But it is completely random.

E: It's all random.

E: It's all random.

S: Because otherwise if you tried to randomize something yourself, you would do things like not pick the same one three in a row and then you would basically know that –

C: You would commit a bunch of weird fallacies in your attempt to randomize.

S: So I just roll a die. So always interesting.

S: Now you have one more episode this year right now.

S: Right now.

E: So this will count.

S: This will count.

S: We'll adjust the percentages.

S: We'll see how you guys do.

S: Is everyone – Now Ian, you actually had a couple – I think you went once last year and you were at 100%.

S: All right, Ian.

S: Good job, Ian.

IC: DWI.

IC: Out of one, you know, one of one.

S: All right.

S: So I have three items this week and the theme for this week – Now I mix it up.

S: Usually at the end of the year show I do some kind of end of the year themed thing.

S: So sometimes I'll do items that we've covered earlier in the year or news items that we didn't cover earlier in the year.

S: For the first time though, I'm going to do a 100-year shift.

S: So these are three items about 1922.

S: No way.

E: 2022.

E: No problem.

S: See how much you – Yeah, this is always – trying to place things in history is always interesting.

E: The answer is flappers.

S: OK.

S: Three science news items about 1922.

S: Here we go.

S: Item number one.

S: In 1922, physicians Frederick Banting and Charles Best of Toronto, Canada, injected the first patient with insulin, a 14-year-old boy with type 1 diabetes who would have died without the treatment.

S: Item number two.

S: In 1922, Walter Hurt, Bruno Tesch, and others developed hydrogen cyanide as a pesticide under the brand name Zyklon B.

S: And item number three.

B: That was 22 as well?

S: Yep.

S: The theme is 1922.

S: And in 1922, Walter Sutton and Theodore Bovary independently developed the Bovary-Sutton chromosome theory, identifying chromosomes as the carriers of genetic material.

S: All right.

S: Cara, since you are winning this year, you get to go first.

IC: How dare you?

IC: Actually, I'm winning.

S: No big deal.

C: Yeah, but that doesn't – Okay, so I don't know off the top of my head which of these really sticks out.

C: Okay, so 1922, I'm really trying to like put myself in what was going on in 1922, like what did laboratories look like, what kinds of discoveries were happening to them, all from memory.

C: So basically insulin, hydrogen cyanide as a pesticide, which I know the least about.

S: You recognize the name Zyklon B?

C: I recognize Zyklon B.

C: I've definitely heard that name, but I know the least about like when that would have been or if that is – I don't think you would pull one over on us and like use a different formula.

C: This probably was discovered.

C: It probably was discovered by these guys or developed.

C: But like I don't know if it was 1922 or if it was like, I don't know, 1960.

C: Wait, 60.

C: And then Walter Sutton and Theodore Bovary independently developing the Bovary-Sutton chromosome theory, identifying chromosomes as the carriers of genetic material.

C: I feel like we knew that before then because I feel like Mendel was like in the mid-1800s, and I know that he didn't know about genes, but like it was like Darwin first was saying there's something that's being passed on and we don't really know what it is.

C: And then Mendel was like there are these discrete packets of information, like look, the bees are wrinkly, and now they're not, and now they're wrinkly again.

C: But like nobody knew what genes were, and I feel like Mendel was in the mid-1800s, so I feel like that would have happened sooner.

C: So I don't know.

C: That's the one that sticks out to me as being like a little bit off.

C: Like I think it's too late for the Bovary-Sutton chromosome theory, but I could be way off on the pesticide too.

C: But I'm going to put my nickel down on the chromosomes, the third one.

S: Okay. And Che.

J: Did you just pick the last one, Cara?

J: I did.

J: I did.

J: I'm going to go with Cara.

J: Any particular reason?

J: Statistically making the correct decision.

C: Based on – oh, this is terrible.

C: Don't base anything you do right now on anything that Steve read previously, like science or fiction.

C: And remember I'm sick, Jay.

C: I'm very sick.

J: But I'm sick too.

J: That's why it makes perfect sense.

J: Right.

J: Yes.

S: All right. Evan?

E: Frederick Banting and Charles Best.

E: Do all these have like multiple people associated with them?

E: It looks like they do.

E: Most scientific discoveries do.

E: At least two.

E: Okay.

E: Yeah, that's true.

E: Of course, of course.

E: Insulin, huh?

E: Who injected the first patient with insulin?

E: Would that have been 1922?

E: That could have been earlier maybe.

E: 14-year-old boy.

E: I don't know.

E: I know nothing about this.

E: 1922 though.

E: Why do I have a feeling though insulin was around earlier than that?

E: This would have been the first time a patient got injected with it?

E: It seems a little off.

E: The second one, Walter Heard and Bruno Tesch and others developed.

E: Oh, boy.

E: The pesticide and then Zyklon B, of course, the gas used in the concentration camps.

S: So not the 1960s.

S: Right.

C: Right.

C: Right.

C: So that's what I was missing.

E: 1922.

E: Shit.

E: Under the brand name Zyklon B.

E: I don't know about this one either.

E: Shit.

E: I cannot make that connection at all.

E: Gee whiz.

E: I don't know.

E: I don't know.

E: Steve, I don't know any of these.

E: And even the last one.

E: I don't know.

E: I mean, I wasn't alive.

E: Don't blame me.

E: Gosh.

E: I guess I'll be different just for the sake of being different.

E: I'll say the Walter Heard and Bruno Tesch, they may have developed something, maybe a pesticide or something, but I don't know if it was Zyklon B specifically.

E: I think theirs in there is the fiction part of it.

E: I don't know.

E: But that's what it is.

B: OK, Bob.

B: So among the rogues, I'm last, finally.

B: No, Jay hasn't gone.

B: Jay hasn't gone either.

B: Wait, Jay went.

B: Jay went.

B: Jay went.

B: Jay went.

B: So that brings me to a paltry 14.6% in the fourth position.

B: So I thought about thanking you for that, but I decided against it, Steve.

B: So I will say, let's see.

B: Yeah, 1922, insulin.

B: Yeah, it could be.

B: Hydrogen cyanide, 1922 as well.

B: That could be.

B: That seems like a reasonable time.

B: The third one, though, the chromosome theory, 1922, just seems too late to me.

B: So I mean, I would have thought, you know, late 1800s, certainly before 1922.

B: So that's why I'll say that's fiction.

S: OK, and Ian, you get to go last.

IC: Does this mean you think I know more about all these items than anyone else?

IC: Sugar.

S: If that makes you feel better.

IC: Given that I replaced all of Steve's dice with trick dice in the house, I'm going to say that it's number one.

IC: I don't know.

IC: You know what?

IC: I must be ignorant because I thought Zyklon B was like a planet or something sci-fi.

IC: You know what?

IC: I'm going to be different as well and be I'm going to go with number one and say that it's not insulin.

IC: All right.

C: Boy, look at that.

C: No sweep for Steve.

S: So do you think insulin is earlier or later than 22?

IC: I would say it's earlier.

S: All right.

S: So yeah, we're all spread out.

S: I like to see that.

S: Bob Jay and Cara think that the chromosome theory is too late.

S: Evan thinks that Zyklon B was not developed by these guys or something different.

S: And then Ian thinks that insulin was, did you say earlier or later?

IC: I mean, the only thing is that you still have to carry vials or you did for a while of insulin and shoot yourself up.

IC: So maybe it is later.

IC: It's just like so kind of archaic.

IC: You know, I'm going to say later.

C: Yeah.

C: Just wow.

C: Wasn't it produced from like rabbits?

S: Maybe.

S: I don't know.

S: Horse pancreases actually.

S: Oh, horse.

S: Oh, okay.

S: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

S: Here we go.

S: Well, I guess we'll take them in order since we're all spread out.

S: In 1922, physicians Frederick Banting and Charles Best of Toronto, Canada injected the first patient with insulin, a 14-year-old boy with type 1 diabetes who would have died without the treatment.

S: Ian, you think this one is the fiction.

S: Everyone else thinks this one is science.

S: And this one is science.

S: Sorry, Ian.

S: Yeah, 1922.

S: Yeah, so we knew about insulin before then, but they had to purify it.

S: And these are the, you know, other people did that.

S: And these are the first, you know, physicians to actually inject it into a human being.

S: It had been studied in animals beforehand.

S: And the first injection only worked temporarily.

S: This is, again, type 1 diabetes prior to this was a death sentence.

S: You go into a diabetic coma and you die.

S: That's it.

S: You're basically not making any insulin and you can't live without insulin.

S: So this 14-year-old boy was basically in a diabetic coma.

S: They injected him with insulin.

S: It brought his sugar down a little bit, not enough.

S: Then they gave him a second injection and he basically completely normalized his blood sugar and he came out of it.

S: So, you know, we now know that.

S: This is amazing.

S: You know, you're not going to take somebody out of a diabetic coma with one injection of diabetes.

S: Essentially, the insulin helps the sugar get into the cells.

S: So the cells, all your sugar is in the blood.

S: It's not getting into the cells.

S: And so you give them an injection of insulin.

S: And yes, some of that blood sugar is going to go into the cells, but they're starved.

S: So you know, you need to keep doing that until you renormalize things.

S: So typically we put people on an insulin drip and just keep giving it to them until we normalize.

S: We don't want to renormalize their blood sugar.

S: Yeah, so that...

S: Yeah, to give too much.

S: Then you tank their blood sugar and then that's the opposite problem.

S: That could kill them too.

S: Put them in that, get a seizure or something.

S: So then you just give them some—you just give them sugar, right?

S: The treatment for that is sugar.

C: Yeah, because—yeah, then it'll just use

B: it. Right.

B: If you need a treatment, I guess that's a

S: good treatment. Yeah, yeah.

S: Sugar!

S: So absolute revolution.

B: Absolute revolution.

B: Oh my God, that must have been so amazing.

S: And so at first, we were just purifying it from the pancreases of animals and mostly horses.

S: And then of course, later on, we developed recombinant insulin.

S: Basically, I think it's yeast.

S: We have yeast cranking out insulin.

S: That's sweet.

S: That was another revolution.

S: Yeah.

S: Okay, let's go on to number two.

S: In 1922, Walter Hurt and Bruno Tesch and others developed hydrogen cyanide as a pesticide under the brand name Zyklon B.

S: As Evan pointed out, Zyklon B was the—what was—that is the gas that was used in gas chambers in the concentration camps.

S: That's—that's why that name is famous.

S: But it was developed as a pesticide, right?

S: And it's Zyklon B because this was a revised version of Zyklon A. You know, they had—they just—they tweaked it and so it was the second iteration, Zyklon 2.0 as it were.

C: It's weird, Ian.

C: I didn't know that either.

C: Like I didn't make that connection at all and this is like—I feel like this is new.

C: I had heard the word but this feels like new information.

C: Jay and Bob, you guys knew that?

C: Knew what?

J: The Zyklon B was the— Zyklon B was the gas.

C: No, the Zyklon B was the gas.

C: Oh, yeah.

J: I mean, I learned it like several times in—in school.

J: I watched a lot of World War II stuff.

E: So interesting.

E: I mean, it comes up all the time.

E: I watched a lot of World War II stuff.

C: Yeah, I guess I don't watch a lot of World War II stuff but I'm also wondering if there's been a generational shift in like how much detail is given.

C: Maybe.

C: You know, when we learn about this kind of stuff in school that there's like a fear of getting too graphic or too detail-oriented with kids.

C: Yeah, I don't know.

C: Jay Which is a mistake, I think.

C: We're demonizing corporations.

E: I agree but— Jay In Hebrew school, we learned about this when I was seven years old.

E: Yeah, of course.

E: Jay Yeah, of course.

S: So the question is, is 20 years too big a gap?

S: You know, this is like 20 years before it would have been used.

S: So Evan, you think this one is the fiction.

S: Everyone else thinks this one is science.

S: And this one is science.

S: Sorry, Evan.

S: Yeah, so that was the delay.

S: It was developed 20 years before it started to get used in the concentration camps.

S: And now it's absolutely famous for that reason, not as a pesticide.

S: It was used for de-lousing too.

S: And interesting— Jay That's where the Holocaust deniers come in.

S: Yeah, that's what I was going to bring up.

S: The Holocaust deniers will say that the concentration of hydrogen cyanide on the walls of the gas chambers was, I think, like only 1% of what you would find in a de-lousing chamber.

S: And therefore, the implications, it was negligible and therefore not used to kill people.

S: But they leave out the fact that lice are much less susceptible to cyanide.

S: And it takes 100 times the concentration to kill lice as it does to kill people.

S: They always just leave that little fact out there and just create an implication of a conspiracy rather than providing all the facts that you could see.

S: It makes perfect sense.

S: They also will measure the amount on walls that are now exposed to the environment.

S: So yeah, it kind of washes away over decades.

S: But if you sample walls that are still intact on the inside, absolutely a lethal dose for humans.

S: OK, all of this means that in 1922, Walter Sutton and Theodore Bovary independently developed the Bovary-Sutton chromosome theory, identifying chromosomes as the carriers of genetic material.

S: Is the fiction?

S: Why is it the fiction?

S: Does everybody agree that it's because it actually happened earlier?

C: Earlier.

C: That's my guess, is earlier.

S: Then when do you think it happened?

S: What did Bob?

J: I bet you it's late 1800s makes sense.

J: Yeah, late 1800s.

IC: I'm going to say they didn't independently do it.

IC: They did it dependently.

C: I feel like you would have to change at least one other thing.

C: But yeah, I'd say late 1800s.

C: 1902.

S: It was 20 years earlier.

S: Close to the 1800s.

S: Yeah, so you were right.

S: It was too early.

S: Yeah, that was too late rather.

S: So but yeah, remember though that Mendel's work was forgotten and had to be rediscovered.

S: So there was a delay.

S: That's why it wasn't the middle of the 1800s.

S: But we didn't know.

S: We didn't know.

S: We knew that even when we knew conceptually that something like genes existed and was being passed on, the units of inheritance, we didn't know physically what was the substrate.

S: And then so then it was discovered, well, it's the chromosomes.

S: And for a long time, the thinking was that proteins were the substrate of inheritance, proteins until it was demonstrated that it was.

S: Not a bad guess.

S: Proteins are everywhere.

S: Yeah, nucleic acids.

S: Yeah, not a bad guess, but we didn't know, you know.

S: That just happened to be a wrong hypothesis.

S: And it was eventually proved that it was the DNA, which of course makes up the chromosomes.

S: Yeah.

E: And then the DNA denialists came along.

E: Yeah.

E: Said, no, it was proteins, damn it.

S: Right, right, right.

S: All right, so good job, guys.

J: Thank you, Steve.

J: Thank you.

IC: I got a chocastitis.

IC: I don't know.

IC: Something's wrong with him.

S: Yeah, yeah.

E: You and I will have to talk later.

S: Right.

S: There will be puns.

Skeptical Quote of the Week ()

(quoted text)  – (author of quote), (description of author)

S: Evan, give us the last quote of the year. Last quote of 2020.

E: The last quote of 2022 by another scientist who unfortunately we lost in 2022.

E: Here's what she said.

E: I always knew I wanted to be a doctor.

E: Unfortunately, my parents believed that girls should do as well as boys.

E: So off I set.

E: Audrey Evans, born March 6, 1925, died September 29, 2022.

E: Pediatric oncologist who is known as the mother of neuroblastoma.

E: Whoa, nice.

E: And one of the co-founders of Ronald McDonald House.

E: Now, she was known as the mother of neuroblastoma because of all the advances, research, and work that she did for this type of cancer.

E: After years of treating this type of cancer, she reduced the mortality rate caused by neuroblastoma by about 50% and currently the survival rate is above 85% thanks to her.

E: In fact, there is something called the Evans Staging System for Neuroblastoma.

E: It is named for her.

E: Awesome.

E: Sure it's not named after you?

E: Oh, yeah.

E: Well, of course.

E: Yes, asterisk.

E: I'm fond of that name.

J: Hey, Steve.

J: Yeah.

J: I think every year I say something about the hard work that you put in and how- He says work harder.

J: Without your leadership and persistent banging on the table to get us to do everything that we have to do to get this show done, it wouldn't get done.

J: I mean, by Steve's force of will, you know, like the spice.

J: He's like a mentat.

J: You make, you know, force of mind, whatever.

J: Remember that?

IC: Sure.

IC: Name that reference.

IC: Come on.

J: But I wanna thank you, Steve.

J: Do it.

J: I wanna thank you for taking me on this amazing journey which is the SGU.

J: It's like, you know, from the very beginning, I never thought in a million years that we would be what we are and be able to do the things that we do and I owe it all to you.

S: Thank you, brother.

S: It is a fun journey to take with all of you guys, with my family and friends, my close friends.

S: You guys are all family.

S: We're family.

E: I mean, let's face it.

E: We are family.

S: Yeah.

S: It is a family.

S: Yeah, I mean, this would be so– Spooky and spooky.

S: I could do this by myself, but why?

S: It wouldn't–it would be really boring.

S: You know what I mean?

S: The collaboration is fun, getting together is fun.

S: As I said, like this is like the funnest two, three hours of my week chatting with all you guys even though it's virtual.

S: It's still great to get together with everybody.

S: And what's more fun to talk about than science and critical thinking?

S: Oh, my gosh.

E: Seriously.

E: Absolutely.

B: Our voices will be on the internet until the post-apocalypse.

B: I have to tell an anecdote now about this.

S: So we were driving to the airport.

S: All the guys were in the car.

S: Well, no George, no Cara, but the guys from Connecticut were all in the car.

S: And we had a driver to take us to the last leg.

S: We wouldn't have to park at the airport.

S: And so we're just having a typical conversation, right?

S: We were chatting about what we were gonna be covering on the upcoming, you know, live shows that we were gonna do.

S: We were talking about Fusion.

S: We were talking about the chat GPT and a bunch of other stuff about Artemis, you know, all the good stuff.

S: And about 40-50 minutes into the ride, we're getting close to the airport.

S: The driver, do you know him personally, Ian?

S: I know you helped him with the ride.

IC: No.

IC: He's like a mutual.

S: He was just a random guy.

S: Yeah.

S: Yeah.

S: So he's just like, who are you guys?

S: He's like, I have to say–

B: I thought he said, what are you guys?

S: Oh, yeah. What are you guys?

S: This is the most interesting– No, he said who?

S: I think this is the most interesting conversation I've ever heard.

S: And he was just like fascinated by the whole thing.

S: Like, who the hell talks like that?

S: So we told him, yeah, well, we do this for a living, basically.

S: Like, we've been doing it for 17 years, having conversations like this and making it interesting.

S: And it was fun because we were just chatting.

S: Like, we weren't doing a show, but it was the same conversation.

S: You know what I mean?

S: Which I think has always been the strength of our show–

B: Yeah, for sure.

S: –is that it is like we're just having a chat among friends who are interested in science and critical thinking and that sort of thing.

S: And just cool sci-fi stuff.

IC: Yeah.

IC: Shout out to Tim.

IC: You'll hear this after you've been through several hundred episodes.

E: You'll eventually hear it.

E: He was a nice guy.

IC: And speaking of it, shout out to our patrons and listeners who keep this thing afloat.

E: You know?

E: Yes.

E: Hear, hear.

J: Yeah, our patrons have an awesome thing going on in Discord, by the way.

J: I mean, I keep talking to Sharon, who is one of the mods on Discord.

J: What a community.

J: The SGU has a vibrant, happy, and very discussion-heavy community going on.

J: And we really appreciate every single patron that we have out there on or off Discord.

J: I mean, we really couldn't do it without you guys.

J: It means the world to us that you believe in what we're doing enough to become a part of it in a sense.

J: I hope you have a wonderful holiday.

J: Happy New Year.

J: And to the rest of you guys, it is my honor to work with all of you.

J: Likewise.

S: It really is.

S: Yeah.

S: Likewise.

S: And I agree.

S: Yeah.

S: Again, this would be a pretty empty exercise if we weren't part of a bigger community, if there weren't people out there who were giving us feedback, sending us emails, being part of the discussion.

S: I think there's a lot of negative things you could say about social media and the impact it's had on the world.

S: But I think the one big positive thing is that it turns communication into a dialogue.

S: You know what I mean?

S: We're not just lecturing.

S: We're not talking at people.

S: We're having a dialogue and it's part of a broader discussion and dialogue, whether it's in the comments or on over email or on the Discord or on Facebook.

S: That's the best way to learn.

S: Yeah.

S: And we consume a lot of that.

S: We are taking all that feedback.

S: It's constantly being directed back into the show.

S: And that's, again, the other thing that has made this an awesome ride is just the community of critical thinkers and skeptics out there that we're interfacing with.

S: Really, really happy with the community that we've helped to build.

S: Hear, hear.

S: Roger that.

S: All right, guys.

S: Well, congratulations on another year.

S: We've basically completed 17 years of the SGE.

S: We're going into year 18.

S: Oh, my God.

S: Yes.

S: Oh, man.

S: Yeah.

S: Bring it.

S: Yeah, let's do it.

S: It is amazing.

S: We're two years away from our 1,000th episode.

S: Oh, my gosh.

S: 1,000?

E: Yeah.

E: Each part out, Joe Rogan.

B: Something special, like broadcast naked something.

B: I have one thing from the listeners for the

IC: year in review. They love Bob's innuendo, gird your loins.

IC: So maybe that'll do the merch.

IC: No, they don't.

IC: They're lying.

IC: Drop a little Gird Your Loins in Bob's face.

B: I have my finger on the pulse of awesomeness.

B: That would be a good T-shirt.

S: It would be around Gird Your Loins.

B: Gird Your Loins with the SGE.

J: No.

E: Cara gets a B-tool over that, I think.

S: It just means to tie up your tunic.

S: That's all it means, Cara.

C: Yeah, it's totally how Bob's using it.

E: I know.

B: Adjust your loin cloth.

B: It has so many meanings.

B: That's why I love it.

B: All right.

Signoff/Announcements ()

S: —and until next week, this is your Skeptics' Guide to the Universe.

S: Well, thank you all for joining me this week and this year.

E: Yes, great year.

E: It's our pleasure.

E: Thank you.

S: And thank you for joining us, Ian.

S: And Ian, we have to recognize all of the hard work that you do.

S: I know it's mostly behind the scenes.

IC: I know you're going to cut this out.

IC: I know.

IC: It's fine.

S: I'm not going to cut it out.

S: I know you want to be the man behind the curtain, and you never want the spotlight to be focused on you.

S: I get it.

S: But here it is.

S: It's your deep professionalism, and I respect that.

S: But every now and then, we have to acknowledge all of the, not just the hard work that you do, but the real expertise that you bring to the technology.

S: And the all-around awesome tea-drinking guy

B: you are. Yeah.

E: Yeah, you're just fun to be with, too.

E: I love working with you, Ian.

J: I also love eating with you.

J: You're so much fun to have a meal with, man.

J: Thanks, guys.

S: And again, it's not just that, but you've become a really close friend.

S: Again, the people we end up working with, it's not just that they're working for us.

S: It's that they really become part of the family.

S: Yeah, they got the whole package.

S: Family.

S: Yeah, they're absolutely part of the family.

S: Because we have to, you know, we're goombas.

S: You know, we've got to work with family.

S: That's true.

S: That's what I'm about.

J: And while we're talking about Ian, we can't forget Kelly, who has been an intern, tempered for you for us.

E: Thank you, Kelly.

J: Kelly has taken on a lot of the stamina-based work that I do.

J: You know, she does a lot of social media.

J: She's been going through some emails.

J: And I just really appreciate her, and she is awesome.

J: She's helped us in a lot of ways.

J: Thank you for the baked goods, too.

E: They're delicious.

S: Thank you.

S: Since we're spreading the love, we also have to acknowledge one of our primary partners in crime, George Robb.

S: Oh, yes.

E: Yes.

S: Here, here.

S: George is also a great friend, again, somebody that we consider to be family that we met through skepticism.

S: He is the leader of our live events.

S: When we go on an event weekend where we do the extravaganza, you know, George completely runs that.

S: That is all him.

S: And he is, whenever we need anything like real creative, he's our go-to guy.

S: He's just such a funny, creative guy with a great skill set.

S: So he's been a fantastic addition to SGU activity.

J: I love working with George.

J: Yeah.

J: I love – Just love hanging out with him, too.

B: Oh, yeah.

J: Talking to George is so much fun.

J: I mean, I like the group dynamic that we have, and George adds a lot to it.

J: And I particularly love when we're doing the extravaganza and George is out front.

J: You know, we're sitting in the chairs behind him and I just always have this moment where I'm like, oh, my God, this guy is so funny.

J: I love working with him so much.

J: He makes me laugh, I think, more than anybody I know.

B: He's a funny bastard.

B: Holy crap.

B: He comes out with stuff.

B: We're like, holy crap, that was funny.

B: All right.

S: Well, thanks again, everyone.

S: All right, Steve.

S: This is it for real.

S: This is really it.

S: And until next week and next year, this is the Skeptics' Guide to the Universe.

S: Skeptics' Guide to the Universe is produced by SGU Productions, dedicated to promoting science and critical thinking. For more information, visit us at theskepticsguide.org. Send your questions to info@theskepticsguide.org. And, if you would like to support the show and all the work that we do, go to patreon.com/SkepticsGuide and consider becoming a patron and becoming part of the SGU community. Our listeners and supporters are what make SGU possible.

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