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com slash weirdest. Rules and restrictions

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Let getting dressed be one less thing to worry

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about.

1:26

At Popular

1:27

Science, we report and write

1:29

dozens of science and tech stories every

1:31

week. And while most of the stuff we stumble

1:33

across makes it into our articles, we

1:35

also find plenty of weird facts that

1:37

we just keep around the office. So we figured,

1:40

why not share those with you? Welcome to

1:42

the weirdest thing I learned this week from the editors

1:44

of Popular Science. I'm Rachel Feltman.

1:47

I'm Chelsea B. Coombs. And I'm Annalie

1:50

Newitz. Annalie, welcome to the show. Yeah,

1:52

thanks for having me. I'm excited to tell you all

1:54

about weird things. Oh my gosh. Thanks so much for

1:57

coming on. Listeners, I'm sure most of

1:59

you know, but... If you don't, Annalee

2:01

is a fantastic writer

2:03

of science, fact, and fiction,

2:06

and many other things. They also

2:08

host an awesome podcast called

2:10

Our Opinions Are Correct. I

2:13

would love for you to tell our listeners

2:15

a little bit more about who you are. Yeah,

2:18

so as you said, I kind

2:19

of divide my time between

2:22

writing science journalism and just

2:24

making shit up in science fiction. My

2:27

latest novel is called The Terraformers,

2:30

and it's about terraforming, just

2:32

like it says on the label. My

2:34

latest nonfiction book is called Four Lost Cities,

2:37

and it's about ancient archaeological

2:39

discoveries. And

2:41

I'll be talking a little bit about some of the themes from that

2:44

book today. And

2:46

also, yeah, you can catch me every two weeks on

2:48

Our Opinions Are Correct. It's a podcast about

2:51

science fiction and society and science. And

2:55

yeah, it's my co-host, Charlie

2:57

Jane Andrews, and I like to do

2:59

a lot of giggling and a lot of researching. So

3:02

it's very, I think fans

3:04

of this podcast would probably enjoy it as well.

3:06

Absolutely. I completely agree. Well,

3:09

let's get into it. On the weirdest thing I learned this week,

3:11

we start by each offering up a little tease

3:13

about some kind of fact or story we

3:15

found in the course of reading, writing,

3:18

reporting, et cetera. And decide between,

3:20

we just absolutely have to hear more about first. Then

3:23

once we've all had time to spin our little science

3:25

yarns, we reconvene and decide what

3:27

the weirdest thing we learned this week actually was,

3:29

except not in a winner or loser type

3:31

of way anymore, as I officially

3:34

decided a few episodes ago. And

3:37

I will not rewrite the intro. Sorry.

3:40

Chelsea, what's your tease?

3:43

So researchers

3:46

thought that the remains of this powerful

3:48

copper age leader were of a

3:50

man, but a tooth proved otherwise.

3:54

Love

3:54

a tooth. A tooth caper.

3:57

Yeah.

3:59

Uh, Annalee, what's your tease?

4:02

My tease is that we

4:04

now have new evidence

4:07

from after the end of the Bronze

4:09

Age about how

4:10

people survive an apocalypse

4:13

and they do it in style with really

4:15

good

4:16

cooking material.

4:18

Oh, that's

4:19

something I personally

4:21

can use. So I'm really excited to hear

4:23

more about that. My

4:25

tease is that I

4:29

am going to talk about

4:32

birds who disrespect

4:35

authority and break the

4:37

law. Um, love it. Yeah,

4:40

same. Um,

4:42

Chelsea, what do we talk about

4:44

your tooth find first?

4:47

Okay. I mean, we love talking

4:49

about teeth. Teeth, teeth, teeth, teeth,

4:51

teeth. What's your favorite thing? Um,

4:56

so it's

4:57

really hard to tell someone

5:00

sex from poorly preserved

5:02

remains. And while archaeologists

5:04

have often relied on size differences

5:06

they see in craniums and pelvises,

5:09

those parts don't always escape

5:11

the sand of time. So in 2008,

5:15

archaeologists came upon a burial chamber

5:17

in Valencina, Spain with

5:19

an incredible treasure trove of goods,

5:22

including an entire African elephants

5:25

tusk, which was kind of a weird thing

5:27

to find in Europe, um, during

5:29

that time, a large ceramic

5:32

plate with traces of wine and cannabis,

5:35

a flint dagger, an ivory

5:37

comb, and just

5:39

one person's remains in it. So clearly

5:42

this was the burial site of a very important

5:44

person. I just love how you clarified just one

5:46

person. It reminds me of like when

5:48

you make a really big Chinese food order and

5:51

you're like, I only need one set of utensils.

5:53

I

5:55

got my elephant. Yeah, exactly. I mean,

5:58

it's all for me. It's for me though. I've

6:01

got my weed, you know, as long as

6:03

you've got your weed and your wine, I

6:05

think it's probably fine. Weed and weed, perfect.

6:10

So this person was obviously really important

6:13

and the remains weren't super well preserved

6:15

and using standard methods

6:17

that were used for analysis

6:20

of bodies at the time, the researchers

6:22

had determined that the remains

6:25

belonged to a man between 17 to 25 years

6:27

old who they dubbed

6:29

the ivory man because he

6:31

had a giant elephant tusk. You

6:35

get one elephant tusk and then that's

6:37

all anyone talks about. Yeah, that's their whole identity.

6:40

People are just all about how you're an ivory guy.

6:43

Right, exactly. Who knows

6:46

what other things this person really liked.

6:48

But since then, there have

6:51

been some really cool advances in science

6:53

that make determining human remains

6:56

sex much easier and they involve

6:58

teeth.

7:00

So there's a protein in our tooth enamel

7:02

called amelogenin that

7:05

comes in different forms based upon

7:07

the sex chromosomes someone has. So

7:09

there's a form for the X chromosome

7:12

and a form for the Y chromosome. And

7:14

it's often preserved pretty well even in

7:16

places where, you know, bones

7:19

are messed up, you know, things

7:22

are disintegrated, all that kind of stuff.

7:24

So using this methodology in 2021,

7:27

archaeologists determined

7:29

that the ivory man was actually

7:32

the ivory lady. Yay. Which

7:34

is great. Like, I love that we're

7:37

finally figuring this out. But

7:39

what's really fascinating is there's

7:42

this huge sex and gender bias

7:44

present in all science, right? But

7:46

in this case, specifically, archaeology, and

7:49

that's informed our ideas about what prehistoric

7:52

society was actually like. So

7:54

it's really easy to assume that an important

7:56

leader in these early societies was

7:58

a man, especially when you don't have

8:01

the scientific means to do so otherwise.

8:03

And a lot of that has been shaped by the cultural

8:06

and the political worlds that we live in

8:08

in the last few centuries since

8:10

we started analyzing these ancient

8:12

archaeological finds. Laura

8:15

Baisas actually originally wrote

8:17

about this story for PopSci, and

8:20

she got this amazing quote from one of the

8:22

researchers, Leonardo Garcia

8:24

San Juan. In the ethnographic

8:26

literature, the leaders of the pre-state societies

8:29

are, in most cases, male individuals

8:32

and concepts such as big man, chiefdoms,

8:35

and aggrandizers are used

8:37

to describe these societies. Our

8:39

study shows that this was not necessarily the

8:41

case in prehistory. In our

8:43

view, this implies that we need not only

8:46

to rethink what has been said for Copper

8:48

Age Iberia, which is where this

8:51

particular burial site was, but

8:53

for the processes that led to social complexity

8:55

worldwide.

8:57

And I think that's so great that they

8:59

actually said that within the study.

9:01

And there have been a number of different studies

9:04

recently that have come out that have kind of

9:06

taken what we thought were kind of like the

9:08

sex and gender rules of

9:10

the past. There

9:16

was another study that recently came out that

9:18

found that, yes, women were

9:20

also hunters, not just gatherers.

9:23

So it's really interesting to see

9:26

that we're kind of reevaluating everything

9:29

that we thought we knew.

9:32

And it's great to actually be using scientific

9:34

evidence to do that. Totally. Love

9:37

it. Yeah. Well, and

9:39

I mean, I know that, I mean, like you were saying,

9:42

sexing skeletons is incredibly

9:44

difficult and not an exact science.

9:47

Exactly. And I don't remember exactly

9:49

when this happened. I want to say it was in the 80s. But

9:52

yeah, like anthropologists and paleontologists started

9:54

talking about, you know, we have this

9:58

like we're finding.

9:59

more supposedly male skeletons

10:02

than we should be based on the

10:04

number of people that exist at

10:07

a given time. And when

10:09

they looked closer, they were like, yeah, anytime

10:11

it's ambiguous, there's this bias

10:14

to say it's a male skeleton.

10:17

And first of all, we

10:20

won't go too deep down the rabbit hole of

10:23

sex isn't actually a binary and gender's

10:26

all made up. But I

10:28

think it's really interesting

10:30

to see researchers not

10:33

just focusing

10:36

on getting better at doing DNA analysis on

10:40

old stuff, which is obviously cool

10:43

and important science, but also being

10:45

like,

10:46

and also

10:47

what does it mean that so

10:50

much of our knowledge base

10:52

was built on the idea that

10:54

things probably worked the way they did

10:57

for rich white Europeans in the 1800s. Exactly.

11:03

It's very cool. Archaeology has

11:05

been a lot of projection on

11:07

the part of

11:08

mostly white men, especially in the 19th

11:11

century when the field was

11:13

actually being developed in Europe and the

11:15

idea of archaeology was being invented.

11:18

And it's interesting because so

11:21

many of these discoveries

11:24

have been sitting around in museums, like we just

11:26

have skeletons in museums and now people

11:28

are going back and saying like, hey, what if

11:31

we checked out the DNA? Or what

11:33

if we just examine these bones more closely?

11:36

One of the sites that I have

11:38

written about a lot is the city

11:40

called Cahokia, which is in Southern

11:42

Illinois, it's an indigenous

11:43

city. And there was a

11:45

discovery there in the 60s of

11:48

a

11:50

so-called bird man, because

11:53

he was buried with a bunch of bird

11:55

imagery. So he became bird

11:57

man.

11:59

And we have a theme. Yeah, we have a

12:02

theme here. And so he was buried with

12:04

all of this incredible, you know, pomp

12:06

and ceremony, lots of projectile

12:09

points and shells, blah, blah, blah. So everybody's like, great.

12:11

It's obviously, and when I say everybody, the

12:13

dudes are like, obviously, this

12:15

is a king. And they're like, OK,

12:17

that solves everything. This society had

12:19

a king, the end. And then about

12:22

five years ago, the skeleton and

12:24

all of the other remains that had been discovered with

12:26

it were re-examined. Turned out it was

12:28

actually a man and a woman whose

12:31

skeletons had been buried on top of each other.

12:33

And the bones had been inter-twingled and

12:35

also flattened and kind of distorted.

12:38

And there were actually the bones of some other people in

12:40

there too. And what now

12:43

archaeologists believe is that actually it

12:45

was probably a sacrifice and that

12:47

the two people sacrificed probably represented

12:49

something related to springtime or

12:51

fertility. There's a lot of

12:53

stories about male

12:55

and female, you know, archetypes that kind

12:58

of come together in the spring. So now

12:59

instead of being a king, it turns out maybe

13:02

this was like a young man and woman who were

13:04

part of a sacrificial ritual and

13:07

then buried with a bunch of cool shit. Because

13:09

that's how you do it when you sacrifice. You have a big party.

13:12

Make it nice. Yeah,

13:14

make it nice. Have a barbecue. Yeah,

13:16

so I'm really

13:18

glad that we're getting so many scientists

13:21

who are going back to re-examine

13:22

these old discoveries. It's really

13:24

changing history. I mean,

13:27

I feel better knowing that my

13:29

matriarchs back in history were like

13:31

kicking

13:31

butt and throwing spears. Yep,

13:34

exactly. And like the really interesting

13:36

thing also was they found another

13:39

burial site around the same place that

13:43

was basically

13:47

it was women who were two to three

13:50

generations after this ivory

13:52

woman. And so they are

13:55

thinking basically this was a very

13:57

matriarchal society. You know, they

13:59

really. really valued women

14:02

and the women were the leaders of

14:04

the society. And another really interesting thing

14:06

too, sorry to be like, here's another

14:08

thing. I'm

14:10

into it. More

14:14

badass women? No. I

14:16

know, I

14:16

know, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. So

14:19

because they didn't find any like

14:21

babies that had been buried

14:23

in this kind of like rich style because

14:25

a lot of societies they do that, you

14:27

know, they baby is born to a king

14:30

or a queen and then they, the baby

14:32

dies and then they bury it with all this

14:35

opulence. Well, they didn't find that in

14:37

this archaeological site. So

14:40

they actually believe that the ivory

14:42

woman was not, you

14:44

know, the big leader of this

14:46

group of people because she was born

14:48

into it. She was the leader because

14:51

she had those skills to be

14:53

a leader. So that's another

14:55

really fun little extra sprinkle

14:58

of goodness that's in this story.

15:01

And I really hope that we do go back

15:03

and look at all of these assumptions we've

15:06

made in the past and actually

15:08

think about what they mean and

15:10

whether they're actually real. When

15:13

I was writing my book,

15:16

definitely like the whole chapter

15:18

about porn is like we simply

15:21

cannot know if porn as

15:23

we know it existed because

15:26

it's all about your intention

15:28

and how you perceive the object. And

15:31

we could find so

15:34

many phalluses from so many

15:36

parts of history and other other

15:39

sexual body parts as well. And

15:42

we have and we still have no idea. We

15:44

have absolutely no idea. Was it religious?

15:47

Was it a joke? Was it for sexy

15:49

stuff? Was it purely aesthetic? No

15:51

idea. And one of my favorite,

15:54

like, archaeological

15:57

biases that I kept finding

16:00

really great historians and archaeologists

16:02

talking about when I was researching

16:04

this stuff is like there always has

16:07

been and in the

16:09

past with even more of a Drive

16:14

to like Interpret things

16:16

that were unusual as being Really

16:20

religiously or spiritually significant

16:22

being like oh This

16:24

must have been a ceremony involving

16:28

Like blank these penises must have been

16:31

for worship and maybe they were but also Maybe

16:34

they were just maybe people just liked

16:36

penis art. Um, so

16:38

yeah, I love I find

16:40

it both like Maddening

16:44

and also super interesting

16:46

how Like we can

16:49

come up with as many stories as we

16:51

want to like put these puzzle pieces together

16:54

and none of them will either ever be a 100 percent

16:58

right and some of them will be completely wrong

17:00

and it's all about just like kind of what

17:03

we've got going on at the time So

17:06

they could both be right, you know, yeah one

17:08

person's right religious object is another person's

17:11

dildo like, you know, history teaches

17:13

us nothing it's

17:15

History teaches us anything

17:18

it's that sorry

17:18

Yeah, well in that too.

17:21

I mean I mean I went in our bog butter episode.

17:23

I talked about how like one

17:26

of the things researchers were working on is is like

17:30

Getting away from this idea that there had to be one purpose

17:32

for putting butter in a pot They're

17:34

like you got butter. You got bugs

17:37

people could put those together for all number

17:39

of reasons that they probably did Uh

17:42

humans we're goofy. Yeah,

17:45

we're always doing All

17:49

right, we're gonna take a quick break and then we'll be back

17:52

with some more facts You

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This episode is brought to you by Babbel. Most

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Let getting dressed be one less thing to worry

20:47

about. Okay,

20:56

we're back and I'm going to talk

20:58

about some rebellious

21:01

birds. Some birds sticking

21:03

it to the man. So,

21:07

researchers at the Natural

21:09

History Museum in Rotterdam have

21:13

found that anti-bird spikes

21:15

are being co-opted for extremely

21:18

pro-bird purposes. They

21:20

are showing up as materials

21:22

in nests. And yes, I can see

21:24

you both nodding. I know this is such a

21:26

good news story and I was like, I

21:29

know they're both going to have seen it and I love it so

21:31

much. I am going to talk about it anyway.

21:35

So yeah, basically researchers

21:37

in the Netherlands, they just published this paper

21:40

in July, but they

21:43

had come across a couple of instances

21:45

of these anti-bird

21:48

spike bird nests and they were like, let's

21:50

look into this more. And in the course of writing

21:52

the paper, they found more.

21:56

And everything about this just delights

21:58

me. So. Some background

22:01

from the paper is that we

22:05

have seen lots of instances before

22:07

of birds using human-made materials

22:10

to build their nests, and

22:12

specifically using, like, stuff we would see is kind

22:14

of scary and harmful to use their nests to

22:17

build their nests. There are reports of wire

22:19

nests dating back to 1933,

22:21

and actually apparently

22:23

at the Kansas Barbed Wire Museum you

22:26

can see a proudly displayed

22:28

corvid nest made of barbed wire. So

22:32

go check that out if you haven't.

22:36

And let's see, there's

22:39

some pigeon research in

22:41

the UK. Pigeons have

22:43

been found breeding on nests made

22:46

of screws and nails, and

22:48

in Canada they have been found

22:51

to make nests out of drug users'

22:53

syringes. Side note, pigeons,

22:56

of course, are infamous for

22:58

building what appear to be terrible

23:01

nests. They will literally just, like,

23:04

put a stick on the ground and put an egg

23:06

next to it, and that's a pigeon nest. It's

23:08

because they were domesticated and they're basically

23:11

feral and they, like, don't, they don't

23:13

do that stuff. But I'm

23:15

going to link to an

23:17

amazing article, of course it's amazing, by

23:20

former Weirdest Thing guest

23:23

Sabrina Imbler where they talk about kind

23:25

of in defense of the pigeon nest. And

23:28

the point of the pigeon nest is just to keep an egg

23:30

from rolling away. And

23:32

in a built urban environment there are more

23:34

flat surfaces than one might find

23:36

in the average, you know, sort of tree or

23:39

hollow. And so

23:41

yeah, a couple of syringes might

23:44

give you exactly the bracing you need

23:46

to keep your egg from teetering

23:49

down the hallway. So the

23:52

pigeons are all right. But

23:55

yeah, there's also one of the researchers

23:57

involved in the new

23:59

study like 25

24:03

years ago was at an oil

24:05

refinery in Rotterdam and

24:07

he was like there was nothing green here it was

24:09

completely just like oil

24:12

industry like concrete toxic

24:14

air and he found a nest weed

24:16

from chicken wire and he was like wow

24:19

birds are so they'll

24:20

adapt to anything like they can

24:23

really make the best of the the

24:25

built environment and this is the wildest

24:28

nest I'll ever see and then he was quoted the saying

24:30

it turns out it wasn't which

24:32

brings us back to the anti bird

24:35

spikes

24:35

which

24:38

I'll talk more about this in a minute but like

24:41

anti bird spikes as like hostile

24:43

architecture kind

24:45

of gross definitely gross yeah

24:48

more gross depending on where they

24:50

are there there have been like some

24:52

pretty viral anti bird

24:54

spikes that were placed on trees because

24:57

there were cars under those trees and people

24:59

didn't want birds pooping on the cars

25:01

and it's like that's what the tree is for

25:03

though who like yeah that that

25:05

seems like an S problem and

25:08

yeah there there have definitely

25:10

been reports of birds injuring themselves

25:13

on spikes however conversely

25:15

the researchers pointed out in this paper they

25:19

have also seen peregrine falcons

25:21

that use anti bird spikes to

25:25

like put their leftovers on hey they

25:28

like they like whole bits

25:30

of food for later it's

25:32

a

25:36

place just for storing the food right

25:38

so it's kind of drying it out and getting

25:40

a little rotted so it has that nice spicy

25:43

flavor that peregrine falcons

25:45

love yeah that's so awesome

25:47

they're like it's like a skewer someone

25:49

just left it here for us yeah

25:53

it's like super super similar to like what

25:55

strikes have been seen

25:58

seem to do on like

26:00

you know various sort of spikes

26:04

and barbed wire and spines of

26:06

plants. Listeners if you don't

26:08

know what a shrike is I'm not gonna get into it but

26:11

they're they're mean.

26:14

Nature isn't always nice. But

26:16

anyway, peregrine falcons don't hunt with

26:18

anti-bird spikes but apparently they do see them

26:21

as a nice kebab shop situation.

26:24

So moving on to

26:26

this current study, the researchers

26:29

were made aware of this nest nearby

26:32

that was made from these

26:35

anti-bird spikes. And

26:38

they could tell upon further

26:40

investigation that the birds had torn

26:42

the spikes up themselves like they were able to

26:44

find the place nearby where

26:47

there had been spikes and they'd been ripped off and

26:49

there were bits of like the spike glue

26:51

on the nest and these

26:54

were crows and magpies. And magpies

26:57

are known to like put in quite a bit

27:00

of energy investment into getting

27:02

their nest materials. So

27:04

it wasn't totally

27:07

wild but still it was not

27:09

really what they were expecting. I think when they first

27:12

saw like okay wow they're using these

27:14

for their nests I think their first thought was okay they

27:16

must have found them in a dump somewhere and

27:18

then they were like okay you know they're harvesting spikes.

27:21

So in the course of writing this paper

27:23

they found their second

27:26

one which was a magpie nest and then

27:28

during the process

27:30

of writing it they were like okay we found another

27:34

one and then actually when the paper was in review

27:36

one of the reviewers was like hey I have another

27:38

one for you. So this

27:41

is now just like a known thing

27:44

that birds do and

27:46

the crows it's interesting they

27:48

use them as like structural support.

27:52

They might actually like the pins are basically

27:54

helping to like secure

27:56

the twigs together and support the structure

27:59

of the nest and that's probably especially

28:01

helpful on like sloping

28:04

surfaces. So they were like

28:06

these spikes might actually be like a really helpful

28:08

material for these crows. But

28:12

the magpie nests are really

28:14

really cool because magpies build

28:16

these like big elaborate domed

28:19

nests and

28:21

it seems like

28:24

they are using the spikes for their

28:26

intended purposes like they face outward

28:29

to protect the from other

28:31

birds or you know squirrels

28:33

or what have you. They

28:35

actually found one outside a hospital in Antwerp

28:38

that had 165 feet of middle strips and at least 1500

28:40

individual spikes. I will definitely

28:46

link to some pictures on popdie.com slash

28:49

weird. Yeah they are pretty magnificent looking.

28:51

One of the researchers was quoted as saying like these

28:53

are incredible fortresses they are basically

28:57

a bunker for birds. Oh

29:00

my god it's like the birds are like going

29:02

to hot topics to like make their

29:04

goth nests. Like

29:07

I love it. Yeah totally.

29:09

It was kind of giving me the same energy

29:13

as like the orcas who are attacking

29:15

boats and like there's an otter

29:18

who's like feeling their fords they're

29:20

just like yeah we're just gonna start reclaiming

29:23

all of your weird human pointy and

29:25

use it for our own thing. Yeah. Yeah. The

29:27

system right? Like nature is killing. We

29:32

are the virus.

29:35

So another paper that came out recently

29:37

that's getting mentioned a lot in conversation

29:40

with the bird spike paper is that researchers

29:44

looked at

29:45

all of the literature they could find in a bunch of old

29:48

specimens and found that 176 bird species on every

29:50

continent except Antarctica

29:54

had definitely made nests

29:57

with human

29:59

trash.

29:59

like plastic bags, fishing line, candy

30:02

wrappers, etc. And

30:06

that's obviously generally not

30:08

good. We don't want that. It's a great reminder

30:11

to like not litter and

30:14

use less single use stuff.

30:16

But one thing that I thought was super

30:18

interesting is that apparently some of that litter

30:21

can also be helpful. Apparently

30:24

cigarette butts, because they contain

30:26

nicotine, can

30:28

like repel certain parasites.

30:32

And plastic films can make like

30:35

for really good insulation. And

30:37

then like the anti-bird

30:39

spikes, there are some materials that

30:42

just can like are really good structural materials

30:44

for nests. Please don't

30:46

misunderstand. It's on the whole bad

30:49

that birds are using our trash

30:51

to make nests. There's stuff

30:53

that can really make them sick. Lots

30:55

of things that they can choke on or get tangled

30:58

in. But I do think it's really

31:00

fascinating that this is not the

31:02

only instance of them making the best

31:04

of our trash. And

31:08

isn't that cool? And apparently plastic

31:11

and other human-made products are, so these

31:13

researchers like tried to figure out

31:15

whether there were any interesting correlations

31:18

between what birds were using

31:20

them more. And where they found

31:24

the most difference in use with that species

31:26

with larger differences

31:28

in body size between male and females and

31:31

ones that build complex domed

31:34

nests were both more likely to use

31:36

human-made materials. And

31:38

they think that hints at the

31:41

idea that it's about showing off because

31:44

generally when you have that

31:46

big difference in size in

31:49

sexual dimorphism, those species

31:51

tend to have like a very intense

31:54

male courtship, real showboatey stuff.

31:57

So they're like, they might be looking for colorful

31:59

plants.

31:59

and things like that or you know

32:02

to build these like bigger wilder

32:05

nests. But

32:07

there's a lot we don't know

32:09

so more research is needed and obviously

32:12

less trash would

32:14

be great. And

32:18

yeah I did find

32:21

one last article that I'm

32:23

gonna link to on PopSci.com slash weird that

32:25

just like draws some really interesting philosophical

32:28

parallels between the sort of hostile

32:30

architecture that exists to keep

32:33

unhoused people from settling

32:36

and being safe in a space or just

32:38

like keeping anyone from

32:40

sitting down and enjoying like free

32:42

public space because how dare

32:44

that be a thing. And this sort of anti-bird

32:47

architecture because they're getting

32:49

at the idea that both of them really

32:52

hinge on this like fallacy

32:54

of thinking that we should fix

32:58

problems by kicking some of the

33:00

organisms out of the space instead of

33:02

being like what are the problems

33:04

like okay we're getting

33:06

a lot of bird poop on the cars can we like

33:10

cover the cars with something can we

33:12

get

33:13

better at washing bird poop off our car

33:17

you know but no we just put spikes

33:19

on things. So

33:21

food for thought

33:23

and that's all I have

33:25

about bird nests

33:28

today and birds

33:29

break

33:31

in the law breaking the law

33:33

but I love them I

33:35

fully support them I support magpie's

33:39

rights and magpie's wrongs and

33:42

I can't wait to see what they do next.

33:45

Same I wanted to see

33:47

them completely redoing urban infrastructure

33:50

and just like you know having

33:52

way more nests and like just

33:54

like way more like corvid parties

33:57

like you know when all of the crows in your neighborhood

33:59

like

33:59

like come and hang out in one

34:02

area and just like yell for half

34:04

an hour. I love that. I'm always like, what,

34:06

can you invite me? Like I can make

34:08

noises, but they always kinda

34:11

get weird when I start trying to talk back to them.

34:13

So I just, I just watch. That

34:16

makes sense. Yeah. I think they think

34:18

I'm making fun of them when I try to make a little

34:20

crow noise. Cause they're all making the

34:22

noises. And to me, it sounds like I'm able

34:24

to make that noise, but I'm sure to them, it sounds like

34:26

I'm

34:27

like, you know, they're like, what

34:29

is this stupid monkey doing? God.

34:33

Oh man.

34:35

Yeah. This is kind of like

34:37

on topic ish, but once, it was

34:39

like a few years ago in Brooklyn, we

34:42

were just walking and someone

34:44

had disgustingly just left their like

34:46

McDonald's on the, you know,

34:48

sidewalk and a crow swooped down,

34:51

picked up the barbecue sauce container and

34:53

then took it up to like a light

34:55

pole. And it was very cool because I was like,

34:58

he likes McDonald's. Oh.

35:03

Barbecue sauce.

35:07

Yeah. Love it. Okay.

35:09

We're going to take a quick break and then we'll be back with one

35:11

more fact.

35:19

Wait,

35:22

are you gaming on a Chromebook? Yeah.

35:25

It's got a high res 120 Hertz display. Plus

35:27

this killer RGB keyboard. And I can

35:29

access thousands of games anytime, anywhere.

35:32

Stop playing. What? Get

35:35

out of here.

35:35

Huh? Yeah. I want you to stop playing

35:37

and get out of here. So I can game on that Chromebook.

35:39

Got it.

35:43

Discover the ultimate cloud gaming machine, a

35:46

new kind of Chromebook.

35:54

Okay. We're back. And Emily,

35:56

give me some good news about apocalypses. That's

36:00

my specialty. Okay,

36:02

so let me set the scene for you. It's

36:06

around 1200 BCE,

36:09

and this is a time period in

36:11

the Aegean

36:13

Sea, which is a little branch off

36:16

of the Mediterranean Sea, where

36:18

a lot of archaeologists

36:20

and historians say that there

36:22

is

36:23

a

36:24

very big problem underway. And

36:26

the problem is that the Bronze Age civilization

36:29

that had once linked many great cities

36:32

and palaces all across the Mediterranean,

36:34

that civilization is, let's say,

36:37

it's in transition. It's being

36:39

called into question. And what

36:41

we see in the remains of great cities

36:43

like on Crete,

36:46

the great cities of the great city of Mycenae,

36:48

which is in Greece, cities as

36:51

far away as Lebanon and Syria

36:53

like Ergorette,

36:55

basically people are burning the cities down.

36:57

And there's incredible evidence

37:00

across the Aegean, across the Mediterranean,

37:03

that something happened where

37:05

people were really rejecting whoever

37:08

was controlling these cities. And

37:11

there's evidence of battles. In

37:13

Greece, there were a series of catastrophic earthquakes

37:16

kind of unrelated to this, but also adding

37:18

to the chaos, I'm sure, of that period.

37:21

So

37:22

many people refer to this as the Bronze Age

37:25

collapse. And

37:27

I and many archaeologists kind of reject

37:30

that idea that there's really a thing called a collapse

37:32

because even as some civilizations

37:35

are collapsing,

37:35

others are rising. And so

37:37

the paper that I wanted

37:39

to talk about, which just came out earlier

37:42

this year, is about that. It's

37:44

about the civilizations that rise

37:46

as these big

37:47

cities are falling apart.

37:49

And there's an archaeologist

37:52

at the University of Toronto named Sarah Murray whose

37:54

work I've been following for a while. She wrote

37:57

a book called The Collapse of the Mycenaean

37:59

Accon

37:59

which,

38:01

let me tell you, that is like, it's

38:03

just what it says on the label. It's all about how

38:06

did the Bronze Age collapse economically? And

38:08

for nerds like me, it's very exciting. So

38:12

Sarah Marie has been working on a new

38:14

project, which is called BEARS, which

38:17

stands for Bays of East Attica

38:19

Regional Survey. And what she and

38:21

her

38:21

colleagues and students are doing

38:24

is they've gone to this area, which

38:26

today is called Porto Rafti,

38:28

which is on the East Coast

38:31

of Greece. It's kind of a vacation town

38:33

now. It's Southeast of Athens. And

38:36

it's in this beautiful glimmering

38:39

bay full of lush islands.

38:42

And around 1200, right

38:44

when all of this shit

38:45

is going down with all of the Bronze Age

38:47

cities, suddenly we

38:49

see

38:50

all of this occupation of an area

38:53

that up until that point had basically

38:55

been hardly occupied at all by any

38:57

people. And archaeologists

38:59

have known for a while that there was a cemetery

39:01

in the area that had

39:04

a lot of really fancy stuff

39:06

in the graves, kind of like what Chelsea

39:08

was describing earlier, how

39:11

we judge a lot about a group

39:13

of people based on what they leave

39:15

behind in their graves. And in this case,

39:17

these graves are just full of the kinds

39:20

of

39:20

pottery wares,

39:22

jewelry, valuables that

39:26

are associated with the palatial

39:28

period of the Bronze Age, this time when

39:30

the cities were in full swing

39:31

and things were not being burned

39:34

down by angry people.

39:36

And so that made the archaeologists

39:39

curious and they were like, well, okay, so there's this fancy

39:41

cemetery that suddenly comes up out of nowhere

39:43

with all this fancy stuff in it. What else can we

39:45

find? So this

39:47

is the part that I love about this study,

39:51

other than what they found, which is that they

39:53

decided to do a non-invasive

39:55

survey of the entire Bay Area

39:58

that they could associate. with the cemetery

40:01

and that means that Sarah Murray and her

40:03

colleagues basically just walked

40:06

around on these beautiful hills

40:08

overlooking this lovely bay and picked

40:10

stuff up off the ground. And

40:13

there is so much material

40:16

culture left from this like

40:18

over 3,000 year old community that

40:20

they were able to gather an incredible

40:23

variety of pottery,

40:26

tools, lithics, like

40:29

and basically reconstruct

40:32

what was happening in this place. And

40:35

the thing that immediately

40:37

stuck out to them was first

40:40

of all on two of the islands that are

40:43

right off the coast, they found

40:45

lots of evidence that there was a really

40:48

large pottery production facility.

40:51

And

40:53

they were making this very distinctive

40:55

kind of

40:56

pottery called white ware, which is just

40:58

it's pale in color, it's kind of sandy, it has

41:00

sort of simple designs on the outside.

41:02

It was very, very popular at this time, kind

41:05

of the end of the Bronze Age, the beginning of the cool

41:07

times that this town was part

41:09

of.

41:10

And they see that

41:12

there's all of these like discarded

41:14

pieces of the pottery everywhere,

41:16

which suggests people making it and

41:18

kind of throwing away bad bits.

41:20

But also all across the

41:22

Aegean Sea, they see this

41:24

pottery being used. So

41:26

people are trading at relatively

41:28

long distances to get this nice white

41:30

ware. But the other thing that they found,

41:33

and this is the part that I really loved, was

41:35

that in the area on land

41:38

in Porto Raffti, where they think this village

41:40

was, they found tons

41:43

of cookware that is also

41:45

reminiscent of this palatial period

41:48

in the Bronze Age, because

41:50

they're not just using like

41:51

a pot and a spoon, they have

41:54

you know, a hundred different kinds of

41:57

very specific implements

41:59

for cooking.

42:00

for pressing things, for

42:02

grinding things, for stirring things, for

42:05

making all different kinds of like they have

42:08

griddles and tripods

42:10

for different kinds of little pots. And

42:13

this is the kind of kitchenware that you associate

42:15

with a

42:17

very fancy community. And

42:21

that was the moment when this

42:23

group of scholars was like, yeah, we've

42:25

hit on something

42:26

really interesting.

42:27

So this is a village or

42:29

maybe a town which

42:32

not only has survived this collapse

42:35

of allegedly this collapse of civilization,

42:38

but they're thriving. They are entrepreneurial.

42:41

They're selling or trading this whitewear.

42:45

They have a lifestyle that allows

42:47

them to have griddles, which to me is very

42:49

exciting and someone who likes to have fun

42:51

the griddle. But also they

42:53

have all kinds of material

42:56

possessions that suggest

42:57

they had a very comfortable life, very unlike

42:59

a lot of the

43:00

other areas that we see in this

43:02

period. So the question

43:05

is, how did they

43:07

survive so well? How did they manage to

43:09

stay connected to these trade networks?

43:12

Because they're not just exporting whitewear. They're also

43:14

importing obsidian,

43:16

which is like a very nice

43:19

kind of material for knives

43:21

and other sharp things. They're bringing in other

43:23

types of pottery from elsewhere.

43:26

So

43:27

what makes them so special? So

43:29

there's a couple of things. I've actually talked to

43:32

Sarah Murray before about

43:34

her work on the collapse of the Mycenaean economy,

43:36

very exciting. And

43:38

she has a hypothesis that is borne

43:41

out from this study as well, which is that the towns

43:44

that managed to survive were the

43:46

ones that had good local

43:48

connections, like a local community

43:51

that was very robust, that allowed

43:54

small scale trade with, say,

43:56

farms,

43:57

places doing metallurgy, places doing

43:59

pottery. and they're all interconnected

44:02

in this area of Greece at that time,

44:05

but also even more importantly,

44:07

this is a period characterized by

44:11

seafaring trade, which also

44:14

the Bronze Age was, but it became even

44:16

more important in this post-Bronze

44:18

Age period, and they had those two islands

44:20

off the coast where they were doing their manufacture.

44:23

That's another element that may have added

44:25

to their ability to survive

44:28

because they had an easy

44:30

way to connect with ships that were

44:32

coming through, an easy trading post.

44:35

It just was a really geographically

44:40

lucky area. The other thing

44:42

is that they had a lot of immigrants, and

44:45

there's a lot of evidence based

44:47

on the types of pottery

44:50

that they're making, the types of art, that

44:52

there were people living there from Cyprus, which

44:54

is an island that's relatively

44:57

distant from them in the Mediterranean. There's

45:00

a lot of Cypriot styles

45:02

in the whiteware, and in

45:04

fact, that's actually a type of pottery that's associated

45:07

with Cyprus. We're seeing

45:09

a multicultural community

45:12

that I think, I mean, we can't know

45:14

where they came from, but it is awfully

45:17

telling that they suddenly show

45:19

up right when

45:20

the great cities of the Bronze

45:22

Age are

45:23

being abandoned. So they may have

45:26

fled from one of these cities. It may have been a group

45:28

of multicultural pals who really liked

45:30

to do ceramics, and they were like,

45:32

okay, f*** this, we're going to go to

45:34

a new place that's really lovely,

45:37

that has ocean access, that has all

45:39

of these elements that we really need,

45:42

and we're just going to keep going with what

45:44

we've been doing, and they managed to

45:46

make it. And this

45:49

village appears to have been active for at least

45:52

a few generations, probably

45:53

about 150 years, which at the time would

45:56

have been like five or six generations of people.

45:59

And they survived in

46:02

a way that made them

46:05

both comfortable and connected to other towns.

46:09

And remember, this is a period when people

46:11

often talk about the sea people. Have you

46:13

guys heard of the sea people? Like

46:16

at the end of the Bronze Age, like a

46:18

bunch of these cities that are being burned down,

46:20

like we have records where they're like,

46:22

oh, and then the sea people came and everything was

46:25

screwed and they stole our and they burned

46:27

our things. So it's probably, sea people

46:29

was probably like a racist

46:30

epithet for a group.

46:32

And archaeologists

46:34

think it may have been the Phoenicians. They were a sea

46:36

faring entrepreneurial people

46:39

who were traders and probably

46:41

were not the bad guys, but they were probably

46:43

immigrants who were like associated

46:45

with bad stuff. And

46:48

so I think it's very likely that

46:50

the folks at this town were

46:53

doing business with the Phoenicians and hanging

46:55

out with them. And we're like, yeah, let's do

46:57

it. Let's keep going. So I

46:59

think it's a nice lesson for us now

47:02

as we think about like, we're dealing with all kinds

47:05

of disasters, political disasters,

47:07

natural disasters. But

47:10

there's always the possibility

47:12

of survival and it's through connection.

47:15

It's through having a craft

47:18

industry and having

47:20

a way of helping to trade

47:22

with other groups. And I just it's a

47:24

great it's a great snapshot

47:27

of survival at a time when

47:29

most people

47:30

were really struggling, most people in

47:32

the Mediterranean, I should say. This is a very localized

47:35

phenomenon.

47:36

I love that. I am a

47:39

go to a song which gives the

47:42

really passionate advice,

47:45

think locally globally and

47:48

perfect. I mean, and and both,

47:51

you know, like also what will you do? Like

47:54

you got some, you know, folks from Cyprus

47:56

coming on in, you know, like, whoo hoo. Yeah.

47:59

I mean that would have been global at the time for them. It's

48:02

true. It's a really

48:05

cosmopolitan little joint.

48:08

Yeah, no, I mean, I think

48:11

it's so easy

48:14

to feel like

48:16

things are collapsing. And

48:20

I think a lot of times when people look

48:23

back in history, they're like, and yeah,

48:25

societies do collapse. So there

48:28

you go. And it's great

48:30

to remember

48:33

that that's a pretty zoomed

48:36

in view of what happened during

48:42

those tumultuous periods. And

48:45

yeah, I love the idea of people

48:48

being like, we can make this work and

48:50

we have marketable skills and

48:54

some land by the sea. And what else

48:56

do you need? And

48:59

I like that it's a counter to this idea

49:01

that when our cities

49:03

are

49:03

abandoned, that we all become

49:06

like zombies who eat each other's faces.

49:08

It's like, you know, they didn't have to go

49:10

out and become cannibals or like

49:13

hunters or whatever. They're like, no, no,

49:15

we can like make some really nice pottery and like and

49:17

have really nice dinnerware and

49:19

like people will love it. And like

49:22

people still want nice things, you know, and

49:25

useful things. And they want tasty food.

49:28

To me, that's like a big part

49:29

of what makes this exciting is that they were like, oh,

49:31

no, I mean, we're going to keep having all

49:33

the griddles and all the different like

49:35

grinders and stuff like

49:37

we wouldn't get rid of that even though we're not in the city

49:39

anymore. The collapse of the city, but I am

49:41

keeping my griddle.

49:43

Yeah, exactly.

49:44

And my herb grinder. So

49:47

exactly. Yeah, no, I mean, I'm

49:50

planning on when AI takes my job

49:52

inevitably, I'm gonna I

49:54

think I'm just gonna go off somewhere

49:57

in a beautiful place by the sea and make pottery.

50:01

Or like join an archaeological expedition

50:04

that is at this place by the sea. Perfect.

50:07

We should link to the Bears

50:09

group in show notes because they're

50:12

on their website they have pictures of their

50:14

excavation

50:14

which is not an excavation they're

50:16

literally just taking beautiful hikes yeah

50:19

on a hill next to the sea. The productive

50:21

animals. Yeah and picking stuff up

50:23

putting it in Ziploc bags they're like smiling

50:26

you know they're just all hanging

50:28

out. I know. Best postdoc ever. Yes

50:31

Sarah Marie if you're listening please invite

50:33

us on your next AMBLE. Amazing.

50:39

Well great stuff

50:41

today. I

50:42

love I feel like there's like a

50:44

lot of resilience in our stories

50:46

today. A

50:48

lot of like subverting

50:50

expectations.

50:52

So good job.

50:55

Great theme today.

50:58

Emily thanks so much for

51:01

joining us it was great to have you on. Yeah

51:03

thank you so much for having me it was really fun

51:05

talking with you guys. And remind

51:08

our listeners where they

51:10

can find you and what your latest

51:13

book is.

51:14

Sure. So my latest book is called The

51:16

Terraformers. It is full

51:18

of actually very accurate

51:20

science about how you would build an ecosystem. You

51:23

can find me online at annaleenewitz.com

51:26

very original

51:26

which has most of my latest

51:28

stuff. And you

51:31

can find my podcast Anywhere

51:33

We're Fine Podcasts Are Pervaded. It's called

51:36

Our Opinions Are Correct. You can also find

51:38

it at ouropinionsarecorrect.com. So yeah.

51:41

The weirdest thing I learned this week is produced by

51:43

all of our hosts including me Rachel

51:45

Fultman along with Jess Bodie who also

51:48

serves as our audio engineer and editor

51:50

extraordinaire. Our theme music is by

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51:57

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51:57

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52:02

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