RecSciPod S01E14 full transcript
Timestamps:
- 0:00 Intro
- 1:15 Ologies quiz
- 17:37 Cocaine bee study
- 30:46 iPhone vs Android study
- 43:34 What did you learn today, outro
Intro
Lu: Khaky
Tirth: Oh okay, okay, so “I.”
Lu: With a “Y.” Welcome everybody to another episode of Recreational Science, the podcast where we explore creativity in science by examining some of the funniest, wackiest, and most provocative studies ever done. I’m Lu.
Tirth: And I’m Tirth. Listeners, come join us on this journey, a journey where two irreverent scientists discuss irreverent science.
Lu: Oh, okay, okay, very good.
Tirth: What do you think of that?
Lu: I think it misrepresents everything that I like to represent, which is respect, of course, for everything. For science, for this podcast, even for you Tirth.
Tirth: Oh, I wasn’t aware you had respect for me to that level.
Lu: A little bit, a little bit, please. Don’t put words in my mouth.
Tirth: There we have it.
Lu: But, okay, irreverence, big word, another big word, good.
Tirth: I like to use big words, you know, for our listeners, in case they’re preparing for the SATs.
Lu: Very good.
Tirth: The SAT still does vocabulary, doesn’t it?
Lu: I have no idea. Speaking of tests…
Tirth: Yeah.
Ologies quiz
Lu: As you know, I’m constantly looking for ways to improve…the podcast.
Tirth; Oh, right, right. Yes, yeah, that’s true.
Lu: And part of this, part of this, of course, is improving our website, which, by the way, I know you’ve never visited our website, but we have one.
Tirth: No, that’s not true. I’ve been there. I’ve been there.
Lu: Link’s in the description, listeners, go ahead and give that a click. So on the website, you also find a lot of information about the two of us, lots of very compromising stuff on Tirth, and also a catalog of all the articles we’ve done. And the articles are organized based on the category, the field of study. These include anatomy, animal behavior, chemistry, medicine, microbiology, neuroscience, physics, and psychology.
Tirth: Great. Look at us. We’re covering the breadth of science.
Lu: Very wide, very varied list categories. I’m very proud of us. But you know what, though? The list could be wider.
Tirth: Of course.
Lu: And Varieder.
Tirth: Always.
Lu: So I want to quiz you on different fields of study.
Tirth: All right. Hit me.
Lu: Because in the future, I want us to expand into more niche fields. So this is a quiz about niche fields of study. Different ‘-ologies’, you might call them. Since you’ve done so poorly on our prior quizzes, very poorly…
Tirth: I’ve done quite well. Please. I think your memory is faulty.
Lu: No, no, no. You’ve embarrassed yourself, you’ve embarrassed me. You’ve embarrassed most of our listeners probably. Just one catastrophe after another.
Tirth: …exceptionally well.
Lu: Because of that and because, you know, I’m always looking out for you, trying to make things easier for you…
Tirth: Mission failed.
Lu: …make sure you look like the smart guy that I know you to be, I’ve decided to make this one multiple choice. And I’m going to give you some lifelines.
Tirth: What if I don’t even need the multiple choice? Do I get bonus points?
Lu: No, no, no, no bonus points. That’s not part of this.
Tirth: Okay, well, that’s not…
Lu: So lifelines, I’m going to give you three lifelines. The first lifeline is read the answer choices again, the second lifeline is remove one of the answer choices at random, the third lifeline is spell the word.
Tirth: OK, the first one’s like – you know – it’s like when you call in like 1-800-HELPLINE, like when they list up all the menus at the end, they’ll say press star to repeat the menu.
Lu: Yeah, basically. It might come very helpful. And spell the word might also be very helpful because I have not looked up the pronunciations of these words. So don’t expect them to be accurately pronounced. Okay, you ready?
Tirth: I see. Yeah, okay.
Lu: First word, what is apiology the study of? Is it A) apes, B) bees, C) cats, or D) deez nuts?
Tirth: This is very easy, OK? So I’m going to assume that this will get harder as the questions go on.
Lu: It might. We’ll see.
Tirth: You know, as they say on who wants to be a millionaire, I want to select choice B, final answer.
Lu: Final answer. You sure?
Tirth: Yeah.
Lu: You sure? You sure you don’t want to say D?
Tirth: No, final answer. I’m very tempted. I’m very tempted to…
Lu: You know you want to say deez nuts. Just say it…
Tirth: Deez nuts!
Lu: Okay, wrong. The answer is B) bees.
Tirth: You know me too well, man.
Lu: Off to a bad start. Question number two: What is oology the study of? Is it A) Cheerios, B) SpaghettiOs, C) eggs, Or D) deez nuts?
Tirth: I see where this is going. I see. I’ve caught on.
Lu: Oh, have you?
Tirth: Okay, I want the listeners to know the correct answer is C) the study of eggs.
Lu: Is that your final answer?
Tirth: My final answer though is D.
Lu: Deez nuts?
Tirth: Deez nuts!
Lu: I see where you’re going with this. Because huevos, the Spanish for eggs, is also used to refer to deez nuts.
Tirth: Exactly. Yes. I know you love yourself some Spanish, you know.
Lu: Huevos, yeah. Big fan,
Tirth: Being from Texas and all, you know.
Lu: Very culturally sensitive of you, Tirth, very good. But no, the answer is C) eggs. 0 for 2, Tirth. 0 for 2. Terrible start.
Tirth: Please, 2 for 2 where it counts.
Lu: Number 3. What is philematology of the study of? A) Phil Hartman, famous comedian, very funny guy…
Tirth: Legendary SNL comedian.
Lu: B) liking things, C) kissing, Or D) deez nuts?
Tirth: All right. All right. You know, this is hard because, you know, back in the day when we used to take those tests and scantrons, remember that? And then we would have like a series of questions where the answer was just one choice, like C or D or whatever. And then, I don’t know about you, but I would get suspicious. I’m like, wait a minute, why are they all D?
Lu: Yeah. Can’t have five C’s in a row.
Tirth: Right. And that’s kind of happening. I mean, we’re only three questions in, so, you know, like in my mind, I’m like, why are they all D? You know, that’s my…
Lu: Oh, I see. I see.
Tirth: Okay. So- I’m sorry. Can you – I want to take my lifeline.
Lu: You want to use your lifeline? Which lifeline?
Tirth: Can you spell the word?
Lu: Philematology, P-H-I-L-E-M-A-T-O-L-O-G-Y.
Tirth: Okay. So I think ‘phil-‘ is like the Greek root or prefix or handle or whatever for liking something. Which is why Philadelphia is the city of brotherly love. So I think one of the options, I think option B is about study of liking things.
Lu: Is that your final answer? B?
Tirth: Sure. Yeah. Let’s go with B this time.
Lu: Incorrect. C) kissing.
Tirth: Really?
Lu: Philemba is based on the Greek word for kiss.
Tirth: Interesting.
Lu: Good guess though.
Tirth: Thank you.
Lu: Doing very poorly again, 0 for 3. Question number 4. What is Cryptozoology the study of? A) Dogecoin, B) mythical creatures, C) secret animals, or D) the binomial nomenclature?
Tirth: You switched up. I see. Okay, so this one’s a little tricky, actually, because B and C are very similar choices. Mythical creatures and secret creatures are pretty similar things in certain contexts, like in fantasy and things like that, you know. I’m going to go with C though. Cryptozoology, it’s the study of secret creatures.
Lu: Secret animals.
Tirth: Yeah.
Lu: Incorrect. B) mythical creatures.
Tirth: Come on.
Lu: Wow. 0 for 4. And you used one of your lifelines. This is going terribly, even though I try my best to help you.
Tirth: Sure you do.
Lu: Still going terribly. Embarrassing. Okay, number five. What is garbology the study of? Is it A)
garbage, B) Greta Garbo, the actress, C) grace and elegance, or D) the Cleveland Browns.
Tirth: Garbology. I don’t know if it’s the same origin of the word, but garb means like clothing and outfit. So I’m gonna go with C) grace and – what is it – grace and style?
Lu: Grace and elegance.
Tirth: Yeah, I’m gonna go with that.
Lu: Is that your final answer?
Tirth: That is my final answer.
Lu: You sure? You don’t wanna use lifeline?
Tirth: No.
Lu: Okay, incorrect.
Tirth: No way.
Lu: The correct answer is A) garbage.
Tirth: No, it’s not.
Lu: Yes, it is. The study of garbage. Garbology, come on. That was supposed to be a gimme, Tirth.
Tirth: No, it’s not a gimme.
Lu: It’s supposed to be a gimme.
Tirth: It’s not a gimme. Garbage? It’s never that, man. There’s – it’s called waste management.
Lu: No, no, no, no.
Tirth: Tony Soprano. Tony Soprano was in waste management. He would know.
Lu: That’s the application. This is the academic study of garbage..
Tirth: It’s the Department of Garbology. Right. I see.
Lu: That would be at like a university. Yeah.
Tirth: Uh-huh. I see.
Lu: Okay. Uh, 0 for 5. Rough, rough. Number 6. What is Pogonology the study of? Is it A) pogosticks, B) gambling, C) mosh pits, or D) beards?
Tirth: Oh, uh, how many questions are left by the way?
Lu: Uh, there are 10 total.
Tirth: 10 total.
Lu: There are 10 total.
Tirth This is question 5?
Lu: Number 6.
Tirth: All right, so I can use a lifeline.
Lu: You can.
Tirth: I mean, the first lifeline is useless, so it doesn’t help me much. So I’m going to use the one that is useful. Take away some of the choices. 50-50, I guess.
Lu: Let’s take away one answer choice at random. So I’ve used a random number generator.
Tirth: Oh, fancy.
Lu: And it randomly chose 2 out of 1 through 4.
Tirth: What if it removes the correct answer though?
Lu: It’s possible. Yeah.
Tirth: Okay. Possible. I guess we’ll see.
Lu: But not likely. Only 25% chance that it removes the right answer. So yeah.
Tirth: Fair.
Lu: So we removed gambling. You have 3 other choices. Pogo sticks, mosh pits or beards?
Tirth: Pogo sticks.
Lu: Is that your final answer?
Tirth: It is my final answer. Pogo sticks. I always wanted one as a kid. Never had one.
Lu: Never had one?
Tirth: No.
Lu: Really?
Tirth: All the cartoons I watched, everybody had a pogo stick in them. I was always like, oh, this would be fun.
Lu: That’s the saddest story I’ve ever heard. And because of that, I’ll give it to you. I’ll give you the point. Even though you’re wrong.
Tirth: Wait, but…
Lu: Even though you’re wrong, the answer is D) beards.
Tirth: I should know, man.
Lu: You should know.
Tirth: But listen, you know how they say there’s street smarts, right?
Lu: Okay, yeah.
Tirth: People with like street knowledge.
Lu: Yeah, which you don’t have.
Tirth: I mean, maybe not in everything, but when in beards, I have the lived experience, right? I don’t need…
Lu: You’re not academic about beards. You study it from your daily experience.
Tirth: Right. I don’t need no academic – like no ivory tower, hoity-toity academic, you know, pogo-logists or whatever they’re called.
Lu: The pogonologists.
Tirth: Pogonologists, yeah.
Lu: I see. They’re too hoity-toity for you. You’re a man of the streets.
Tirth: At least in this regard.
Lu: In terms of beards.
Tirth: Yeah. I mean, I am pretty self-aware because normally I’m an academic in my day job.
Lu: Next question. Number seven. What is noology the study of? Is it A) negativity, B) matter, C) mind, or D) that scene from The Office where Michael found out Toby came back to Scranton.
Tirth: That’s a great scene. It really spawned a lot of memes and GIFs. Just Michael going no, no, no, screaming.
Lu: Yeah.
Tirth: Um, I think I actually know this one though.
Lu: Go ahead.
Tirth: This is the study of mind.
Lu: Ah.
Tirth: And you know how I know this? Noology sounds awfully like neurology.
Lu: Good. Good association.
Tirth: If you speak it, you know, five times as fast, they both sound the same.
Lu: What answer choice was that again?
Tirth: Uh, C.
Lu: That’s correct. Noos is the Greek word for mind. Very good. Okay. One out of seven so far.
Tirth: Well, it’s more than that, but okay.
Lu: No, one out of seven. Question number eight. What is kiddology the study of? A) toys, B) bluffing, C) busting chops, or D) young goats?
Tirth: I mean, B and C are kind of similar, aren’t they?
Lu: Uh, I don’t think so. I mean, I think they’re kind of the opposite in a way.
Tirth: No, like when you when you’re bluffing, you’re busting someone’s chops, you know, in a sense.
Lu: I feel like when you’re busting chops, you’re calling someone out for bluffing.
Tirth: No, you’re like kind of messing with somebody. I think it’s the study of young goats because they’re called kids.
Lu: Because they’re called kids… Final answer?
Tirth: Makes sense. Yeah, final answer. D.
Lu: Incorrect. Study of bluffing, B. Study of deception or bluffing.
Tirth: Well, that’s what I was doing. Of course, you see what I was doing. This was very meta of me.
Lu: You were bluffing with the wrong answer.
Tirth: Yeah. I mean, that’s like, it’s like poker when I have nothing, but I’m bluffing as if I have like pocket aces. I mean, you play poker with me. You’ve seen me do this.
Lu: You’ve lost a bad amount of money on poker.
Tirth: No, I’ve done quite well, exceptionally well.
Lu: I think one month during med school, you had to live on the street because you couldn’t afford rent. Can you confirm?
Tirth: That’s not true at all.
Lu: Remember our oath of honesty.
Tirth: Yeah, I abide by it.
Lu: Next question, number nine. What is punology the study of? Is it A) puns, B) punishments, C) pundits or D) puny things?
Tirth: I almost expected to see Punnett squares in there.
Lu: Oh, that would have been a good one. Let’s make it that, Punnett squares.
Tirth: so D) Punnett squares?
Lu: D) Punnett squares.
Tirth: I think it’s Punnett squares, man.
Lu: Wow.
Tirth: Remember those? Haven’t used them in a long time. Remember them?
Lu: Uh, yes, I do. I do. Please, Tirth.
Tirth: I mean, we used to have entire exams with just Punnett squares in them.
Lu: That’s true. Genetics. Classic. Wow, that’s a bold choice to go with Punnett squares.
Tirth: Thank you.
Lu: Given that was not one of the original four choices. Bold man. Is that your final answer, Tirth?
Tirth: That’s my final answer, yes.
Lu: Incorrect. It’s the study of puns.
Tirth: No way, man, no.
Lu: It’s another gimme, Tirth.
Tirth: No, it’s not.
Lu: See how far I go to try to help you out? And you decline my help and you invent your own answer choice and then choose it for some reason?
Tirth: If that were true, pogonology should be the study of pogo sticks, but it’s not.
Lu: It’s not. There’s no stick in pogonology. All right, last question. You ready? What is andrology the study of? Is it A) humans, B) androids, C) Ioann Kuznetsov, a Ukrainian Russian rapper who goes by the name Andro or D) deez nuts?
Tirth: So andrology… androgens are these like hormones that are like part of the male reproductive system. I think…
Lu: Women have them too.
Tirth: They do?
Lu: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Tirth: Okay, I think I forgot a lot from med school.
Lu: I mean, not as much.
Tirth: Okay, well, that’s news to me. I guess I forgot this is true. All right, so I think it’s something to do with men. First thought is humans, because a lot of these terms were coined when humans and men meant the same thing. You know, kind of sexist in that sense.
Lu: Very sexist of you, Tirth.
Tirth: No, not of me. I didn’t coin the freaking term. What are you talking about?
Lu: But you’re bringing it up.
Tirth: I’m just being aware.
Lu: You’re bringing it up.
Tirth: So that’s my instinct is to say that.
Lu: Is that your final choice?
Tirth: But every fiber of my being, no, every fiber of my being is screaming, screaming, I should say D.
Lu: Deez nuts?
Tirth: Deez nuts. It’s really hard not to say it.
Lu: Interesting.
Tirth: Yeah. So I’m going to lock in. Deez nuts!
Lu: Well, you’re correct. The answer is D) deez nuts. Andros is Greek for man. Andrology is the study of the male reproductive system and sexual health. Very good. Deez nuts.
Tirth: Thank you.
Lu: Deez nuts.
Tirth: Thank you. Well, hey, hey, you forgot one. You forgot one -logy.
Lu: -Ology. Uh-huh.
Tirth: You know which one? Starts with an A. You want to guess which one I’m going to bring up?
Lu: Yeah, apology?
Tirth: Yeah, for springing this on me.
Lu: Which is what you owe me?
Tirth: No, you owe me. You owe me this.
Lu: Please.
Tirth: For springing this on me.
Lu: Give me an apology, Tirth.
Tirth: No, our listeners are entertained, I’m sure. I’m sure they’ll leave comments when this is on TikTok and YouTube. They’ll leave comments.
Lu: Well, you know, I was going to say they’re probably embarrassed at how poorly you did. Because I think you got the first eight wrong. But then you ended on a high. So, okay.
Tirth: That’s what people remember, there’s a strong recency bias.
Lu: Yeah. Deez nuts. You won off of deez nuts. You should be proud of that.
Tirth: I am very proud.
Lu: Good. Good. All right. Are you done embarrassing yourself, Tirth? Should we move on?
Tirth: Sure. I wouldn’t say I was embarrassing myself, but if you take it that way, sure.
Cocaine bees
Lu: Tirth, got an interesting study for you today.
Tirth: I hope so.
Lu: Cocaine. What’s your favorite thing about cocaine?
Tirth: What’s my favorite thing about cocaine?
Lu: Yeah. From personal experience.
Tirth: Oh no. I have no personal experience. Number one.
Lu: Oh, I see. I see. Okay. I see. Wink, wink. Tirth…
Tirth: Hey, is something wrong with your eye?
Lu: If you were a coke head, as they say, what would be your favorite thing about cocaine? Wink, wink.
Tirth: Is your eye okay?
Lu: My contacts…
Tirth: Maybe we should do some cocaine eye drops. You know, sometimes they…You know, cocaine eye drops can help with stuff like that.
Lu: I see. That’s your favorite thing about cocaine?
Tirth: No, no. It’s one of my favorite things about cocaine. Another one of my things is that it used to be used as a local anesthetic.
Lu: Oh, is that true?
Tirth: Yeah, in the late 19th century.
Lu: Did it work?
Tirth: Oh, yeah. Actually, it works quite well.
Lu: Local, like you inject it?
Tirth: You can. Yeah. You can also rub on it, like on the gums or something.
Lu: Oh, on the gums. Isn’t that the same as basically snorting cocaine?
Tirth: Yeah, but I don’t know if powder has the same anesthetic effect. I’m not sure, but it was used in surgeries. So much so that surgeons actually got addicted to it.
Lu: Because of the fumes?
Tirth: No, they started doing it. Cocaine was very common. It was seen as like the magic bullet for everything. It was freely available. Like William Halstead was like one of the top surgeons in American history, pioneered a lot of surgeries and was one of the architects of the modern residency system. He did so much cocaine. Did a lot of cocaine. If he didn’t take cocaine, he couldn’t operate because he would get tremors from withdrawal.
Lu: I see. And that’s presumably why you followed in his footsteps.
Tirth: Well, I followed in his footsteps to become a physician.
Lu: Yes. Wink, wink. People love cocaine, Tirth. Because it stimulates two parts of the central nervous system. You would know this more than I do…because you’re a neurologist. The motor system: people on cocaine, they have increased alertness, increased energy, increased motor activity. The other system is a reward system: people get a sense of euphoria. They get a sense of well-being, they get very confident, and they feel really good. Which is why I think people like it a lot.
Tirth: Hey, by the way, it’s the same underlying mechanism as dopamine. Both dopamine pathways.
Lu: Yes. So for this presentation, I tried googling cocaine fun facts, but my internet went dark.
Tirth: Oh, yeah. Now you’re lucky the FBI didn’t knock down…
Lu: No, FBI? No, no, no. Look, I don’t care about the FBI. Because you know me as a brave man.
Tirth: Is that correct?
Lu: Yeah. Well known as a brave man. People use various adjectives to describe my bravery. Right? Fearless, careless, foolhardy, insolent, supercilious, right?
Tirth: Reckless.
Lu: People use all these words to describe my bravery. I’m not afraid of the FBI or any of the feds. CIA, military, not afraid. But there are two federal agencies I will not mess with: one’s ATF and the other one is the DEA.
Tirth: Oh, okay. So, guns and drugs.
Lu: Guns, alcohol, drugs. Exactly.
Tirth: And fireworks.
Lu: …Tobacco.
Tirth: …And fireworks.
Lu: No, no, no. Please.
Tirth: Isn’t that what the F is?
Lu: I don’t think they… firearms.
Tirth: Okay, I thought it was fireworks.
Lu: Oh, you think it’s alcohol, tobacco and fireworks?
Tirth: Yeah. I was like, okay. All the fun things in life, I’ll put them all together.
Lu: Oh, I see. I see. Yeah. Very busy on New Year’s Eve.
Tirth: Yeah. It’s the fun police.
Lu: Very, very busy. Yeah. These two agencies, Tirth, as you know, they shoot first, ask questions, never.
Tirth: Never.
Lu: They’ll raid your house in the middle of the night.
Tirth: Yeah. They don’t care.
Lu: Yeah. They don’t care.
Tirth: They’ll shoot your dog.
Lu: Yeah. So I’m sorry to say, I do not have any cocaine fun facts.
Tirth: Oh, what a shame.
Lu: Big shame. But the study I’m presenting today asked the question, what happens if we give cocaine to honeybees? So Tirth, what field of study is this?
Tirth: Oh, um, apiology.
Lu: Apiology. Very good. The study of honeybees. So it turns out cocaine is actually made by the cocoa plant as an insecticide. It’s used to prevent insects and other herbivores from eating the plant. So the question is then, why do humans love cocaine so much when animals are supposed to hate it? This is is a very famous question…
Tirth: I see.
Lu: Very big question. In fact, it has a name. It’s called the Paradox of Cocaine Reinforcement, or more generally, the Paradox of Drug Reward. It’s one of the classic paradoxes. Do you have a guess as to what the answer is, Tirth? Why do humans, such as yourself, love cocaine so much when it’s supposed to ward off animals?
Tirth: Hmm. I think my answer probably would be humans are dumb enough to do anything.
Lu: Oh, I see.
Tirth: I think a lot of animals have a visceral sort of reaction to things, right? I mean, is it actually toxic?
Lu: Uh, it is toxic.
Tirth: So if a cat took cocaine, the cat would die?
Lu: Enough of it. But humans will too, right? If humans take enough of it.
Tirth: …enough of anything.
Lu: But why would it be so addictive and enjoyable at low doses? Doesn’t seem to make sense. It shouldn’t. So this study thought to answer this paradox. Prior studies have thought maybe for insects and other small herbivores, cocaine only targets their motor system and just disrupts their motor control.
Tirth: But they don’t have their reward pathway, so they don’t get the pleasure.
Lu: Right, right. But they don’t get the pleasure, the sense of confidence, competence, sexual prowess. You’re familiar with these things…
Tirth: Very familiar, very familiar.
Lu: So this study, they actually showed that honeybees may enjoy cocaine as much as humans.
Tirth: What prompted – why honeybees? Why not ants?
Lu: That’s a great question Tirth. So as you know, bees do little dances when they find food. When they find like a big flower patch, they go back and they do these little dances to communicate where the patch is and also how big the patch is, what’s the value of the thing they found. So this group thought that if they study honeybee dance behavior, they can use that as a proxy for probing their reward system.
Tirth: So, meaning if they dance more, it means that they feel better.
Lu: Yes. They have a greater sense of being rewarded.
Tirth: So if they find that they dance more after taking cocaine, that would imply that they’re getting enjoyment and reward from it.
Lu: Exactly.
Tirth: Okay. Got it.
Lu: They’re like overestimating the flower patch size that they found.
Tirth: Got it. Okay.
Lu: The title of the study is “Effects of Cocaine on Honeybee Dance Behavior.” It’s published in 2009 in the Journal of Experimental Biology.
Tirth: Great journal.
Lu: Very good journal. So as you would expect, this group gave bees some cocaine. Now, if you were tasked to give bees some cocaine, how would you do it? Powdered cocaine.
Tirth: Powdered cocaine. So I would weigh it out….
Lu: Okay. Good. Good first step.
Tirth: There’s usually some loss when you weigh things.
Lu: Okay. I don’t know where this is going.
Tirth: If you catch my drift…anyway, I’m just – it’s an aside. So I would be very careful, of course, to measure just the right amount. And then I would say – I’ll have a predetermined amount, like milligrams per kilograms, like certain milligrams. Like it has to be by body weight, because bees are several orders of magnitude smaller than humans are.
Lu: Good.
Tirth: Like a line of coke. I mean, I don’t know this, but I’m told it’s like a lot bigger than a honeybee.
Lu: I see. You seem very experienced with weighing cocaine, but the question is not how much cocaine, but how would you deliver it to them?
Tirth: I mean, I would sprinkle it on flowers.
Lu: Oh, and trick them into going to those flowers.
Tirth: Yeah.
Lu: And then they get up and their mouth is all covered in white cocaine powder.
Tirth: Like that Dave Chappelle sketch….
Lu: Uh-huh.
Tirth: I’m sure there is a much more down to earth..
Lu: Yeah, that’s ridiculous. What you’re saying is ridiculous.
Tirth: So I’m not an apiologist.
Lu: You’re not an apiologist, obviously. No, what you do is you distract the bees with some pollen, and then you rub some cocaine onto their chest.
Tirth: So you knock them over and you rub them, like little belly rubs?
Lu: No, just rub them. Rub them with a little Q-tip. Just little belly rubs.
Tirth: Yeah, I see.
Lu: That’s how you do it.
Tirth: Wow.
Lu: So then they just compare the dance behavior of bees, treated with either control or cocaine. They did three different doses of cocaine: three milligrams, or sorry, three micrograms. I think three milligrams would kill most of the bees. Three micrograms versus six versus twelve. They did a couple of different things: one is they put like a sugar feeder near their nest. Another one is they put freeze-dried pollen, and then they sent these bees out and then recorded their dance behavior when they came back. What do you think they found, Tirth?
Tirth: They probably found that at all doses of cocaine, the bees that got cocaine danced more, or more than they would.
Lu: They did. They danced a lot more.
Tirth: Yeah. And I think the dose effect probably plateaus. So six and twelve is probably the same. Or is it very similar?
Lu: Good thought. Good thought. So actually six and twelve are considered high doses for bees. So it actually went down instead of plateauing. You really only get the cocaine effect at low doses.
Tirth: Just like with humans.
Lu: Just like with humans, exactly. But very good, very good. So they found that the bees danced more. They had increased likelihood of dancing upon returning to their hive. And they danced “more exuberantly and for longer.” By doing this, they exaggerated the size of the food resource they found.
Tirth: That just means what? Like, “hey, I found a bigger stash than…”
Lu: “You must come right away. Bring everybody.”
Tirth: I see.
Lu: Because they got so excited by the flower and because they’re on cocaine.
Tirth: And the sugar and the sugar stash or whatever.
Lu: Yeah, exactly. So now you might be asking…
Tirth: I’m asking a lot of things in my mind.
Lu: I told you that cocaine does two things, right? It affects the motor system in addition to the reward system. So how do you know this is in the motor system being affected?
Tirth: Yeah, I mean, they’re tying two things together, right?
Lu: Right. So what they did was they monitored the bees when they were by themselves, and found that they did not increase, compared to control, no increase in motor activity. And also their foraging behavior – so when they’re going and looking for the food – that movement did not change, that was not different.
Tirth: Were they like flying faster or like buzzing a lot more?
Lu: None of that.
Tirth: Oh, okay. Because humans, you know, they start talking fast and…
Lu: All they did was dance faster and for longer, more exuberantly….
Tirth: That’s pretty good.
Lu: They also looked at a second thing – withdrawal from cocaine.
Tirth: Okay.
Lu: So as you know, humans go through withdrawal if they are on cocaine for a long time and they suddenly stop. Symptoms include depressed mood, fatigue, slower motor activity, irritability, slower cognition is one of them. So they want to know that the bees also exhibited slower cognition.
Tirth: Like if they’re depressed.
Lu: Exactly. So they fed the bees cocaine orally.
Tirth: Oh.
Lu: They fed the bees sugar, right? That’s their food, but they mixed the sugar with cocaine…
Tirth: I think some humans do this.
Lu: For every meal…for six days. And in case you’re wondering, the average lifespan of a bee is like two to four weeks. So this is like half their life.
Tirth: So basically, it’s like if a human did cocaine for 25 straight years…
Lu: Every day with all their meals.
Tirth: There are people who have done this, I think.
Lu: And then they trained the bees to distinguish between two odors, vanilla versus sugar, and got them good at doing that. And then they withheld the cocaine for 20 hours.
Tirth: Okay, so hold on. They had them do six days of cocaine, then they train them to recognize vanilla and sugar
Lu: They trained them during the six days.
Tirth During the six days…and then they did what? 20 hours of no cocaine at all?
Lu: For the withdrawal condition. For the control condition they kept them on cocaine.
Tirth: They still got it.
Lu: Stopping the cocaine actually caused the honeybees to perform half as well.
Tirth: At recognizing vanilla and what is it?
Lu: It’s distinguishing between sugar and vanilla.
Tirth: I mean, if you’re a bee, that’s a pretty big deal.
Lu: Yeah. Vanilla not going to do too much to you.
Tirth: No. Sugar, you need it, you’re going to die. Wow.
Lu: What do you think?
Tirth: Were they depressed? Were they just like hanging around, laying on their little bee beds?
Lu: I like to think so. I like to think so.
Tirth: You like to think so.
Lu: …on their bee beds.
Tirth: You know that movie, the Bee Movie, that Seinfeld made?
Lu: That Seinfeld made, yeah. I’ve seen the version where it speeds up every time the word bee is said. I’ve seen that version. I think it’s like 15 minutes long. By the end, it’s like 2000X…
Tirth: The bees get pretty depressed in that movie for different reasons.
Lu: Oh, they weren’t doing cocaine?
Tirth: I don’t think so. At least not that they said explicitly. It was a kid’s movie. I mean, listen, I have so many questions about this study.
Lu: Please.
Tirth: Why cocaine? Why bees?
Lu: The Paradox of Cocaine Reinforcement. Very big question. Paradox. One of the great paradoxes in science.
Tirth: I think it’s just a little… I think it’s just an excuse for them to get their hands on cocaine. Some cocaine research.
Lu: It’s possible. Possible.
Tirth: All right.
Lu: Okay, Tirth, your turn.
Tirth: Okay.
Android vs iOS
Tirth: Hey, you are a filthy Android user, are you not?
Lu: I am an Android – proud, very proud Android user. Very clean. Proud.
Tirth: Okay, wow.
Lu: Very clean. I shower three times a day.
Tirth: Wow. Wow. A lot of water wasting going on for someone who’s environmentally conscious.
Lu: Brush my teeth five times a day.
Tirth: Sounds like a compulsion, man. You better get that checked out.
Lu: No, no, please. No, no, no. It’s fine. I have it under control.
Tirth: I see. Well, so here’s the thing, Lu. I have a lot of friends in my contact – a lot of other people in my contact list as well. Very, very few Android users. The green bubbles, as we in the iPhone community like to call them.
Lu: I see. I see.
Tirth: There’s only a handful of them. You are of course one of them.
Lu: Well, you know, the elite, always few in number.
Tirth: Sure.
Lu: Can’t all be elites, elite smartphone users.
Tirth: Yeah, of course. Our friend Jimmy, who I think listens to this podcast, is also one of them. But Jimmy is a man I respect a great deal.
Lu: Jimmy is a good man. Yeah, I also respect him. So of course he’d be an Android user.
Tirth: One of our listeners, Rohit Dummy…
Lu: Oh yeah, I remember him.
Tirth: He’s also an Android user. I give him a lot of crap, right?
Lu: No, no, no, please. Apple…the very fact that Apple makes it very clear who uses iPhones and who uses Androids…using color – it’s very, I hate to use the R word, racist, but let’s face it, it’s pretty racist.
Tirth: I see. I see. You think it’s racist.
Lu: Very racist.
Tirth: Racist against whom though? That’s the key question.
Lu: Racist against Android robots.
Tirth: Android robots. Right, right. Let me ask you this now. You’ve said so far, and I – you know, please correct me if I’m wrong, okay? Please correct me if I’m wrong. So far, I’ve heard at least two reasons why you use an Android. One is that the elite of the society use it, or so you think.
Lu: They do. We do.
Tirth: Okay, sure. Nice catch. The second reason you said that it’s very clean.
Lu: Did I say that? No, I said I’m very clean.
Tirth: Oh, sorry. Okay. So just one reason. Well, okay. Let me ask you this. You think you’re very clean. Does the fact that you use an Android phone mean that if you’re clean, you’re more likely to use the Android? Meaning is the Android an extension of your personality or yourself?
Lu: That’s a good question. So the assumption underlying the question is that I chose to use the Android.
Tirth: Well, I would hope so.
Lu: When in reality, the Android chose me.
Tirth: Oh, wow. Wow. Okay. So it’s like Harry Potter when the wand chooses its wizard.
Lu: Oh, is that part of Harry Potter? I’m not familiar with that.
Tirth: Big part of Harry Potter. It actually makes for a huge plot point. But I won’t spoil it for you…
Lu: We’re going to cut this out. Cut all of it out. The last 10 minutes, we’re going to cut out….keep going, keep going.
Tirth: Okay. The reason I’m asking all these questions about the Android is…
Lu: Because you’re a racist, you’re a racist.
Tirth: No, no, please, please, I accept all comers. I’m very accepting.
Lu: We’ll see.
Tirth: It’s because today’s paper asked this very question. Can we study iPhone users and Android users systematically? Can we figure out different personality traits of each group of users?
Lu: I see.
Tirth: And reverse engineer this, meaning make a model and use that and predict which operating system each person is using based on their personality traits. Here’s the title: “Predicting Smartphone Operating System from Personality and Individual Differences.”
Lu: Very good.
Tirth: This is in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking.
Lu: Wow. That’s one of the best journals out there, I have to say.
Tirth: Covers a lot of fields.
Lu: Big fan. Big fan of that journal.
Tirth: It was published in the year 2016. This group is based in the United Kingdom. And one of the motivations they wanted to study this is, there’s a theory, I suppose – I didn’t know about this – is that people choose objects and certain objects that they use a lot every day, like phones – you know, people are on their phone five, six hours a day – they can often become an extension of self.
Lu: Makes sense.
Tirth: And it can often even become a part of their identity.
Lu: It’s like the clothes you wear, for instance.
Tirth: Yeah. And there’s actually the…
Lu: …or like wearing glasses. Becomes part of your identity.
Tirth: Yes. Yes. Exactly.
Lu: For you, wearing that obviously fake beard, it’s a part of you now. You think it’s real.
Tirth: This is very real. Very real.
Lu: Please, please. No, no, no, no.
Tirth: I tugged on it in the last episode, and nothing happened.
Lu: …and several hairs came out.
Tirth: I had great pain. Great pain to myself. Great pain to myself. In fact, the term they use is enclothed cognition.
Lu: Okay.
Tirth: The way they did this, as I said, is they recruited volunteers through an online survey. They gave them a 50 pound Amazon gift card at the end of this.
Lu: That’s pretty good.
Tirth: That’s pretty good. They got 728 volunteers. Out of these guys, 529 were included. The rest were excluded. So about 50 of them were excluded because some of them had a Windows phone.
Lu: Oh, I see. The Andrews of the UK.
Tirth: Exactly. Exactly. That’s what I thought of.
Lu: Yeah. Andrew, our friend Andrew, uses a Windows phone.
Tirth: Some of them had that, and some of them had no smartphones at all. They had dumb phones.
Lu: If there’s anything Android and iPhone users can agree on is that Windows, no good, no good.
Tirth: They don’t even make them anymore, man.
Lu: What color did their text messages come up as? Is it black? So you can’t even read what they’re saying?
Tirth: I think they’re blocked. They can’t even message.
Lu: Oh yeah. They don’t have that function.
Tirth: That’s right. Then they had them fill out a lot of questions. Specifically, these are questions – it’s like a six-factor model that is supposed to assess their personality. So they asked them questions across different dimensions: honesty, humility, emotionality, openness, this concept of avoidance of similarity, meaning if other people are using something, I’m less or more likely to use the same thing.
Lu: Yeah. Contrarian behavior. Also Andrew. That’s why Andrew uses Windows phone, I’m pretty sure. His love for being contrarian.
Tirth: Andrew, if you’re listening to this, this is all out of love.
Lu: Maybe. He doesn’t listen, it’s okay.
Tirth: Maybe it’s okay. And then phones as status. And then for each of these categories, the users had to fill out a Likert scale, they call it, where you go from strongly disagree to strongly agree, and then you quantify it. But before I get into that, do you want to guess the profile and the results and what they found?
Lu: I don’t have to guess, I already know.
Tirth: You know?
Lu: Android users: very high intelligence, very high in likability, very high in attractiveness, sexual prowess, very tall, at least 6’5, all of them, very strong.
Tirth: None of these are on the thing, you know.
Lu: Bench 400 easily, squat 2000.
Tirth: Ronnie Coleman.
Lu: Did I say very attractive? They’re all capable of growing very, very nice beards, but choose not to. They have a great fashion sense.
Tirth: Wow. I’ll say this, Lu, I’ll say this. None of this is on here, but I didn’t check the supplementary data. So maybe this is all over there.
Lu: I see. I see.
Tirth: That’s my bad. My bad. My bad. I’ll own up to it.
Lu: They’re all probably very classy, very cultured. They probably subscribe to the New York Times, probably have been to Europe, obviously. They probably eat their french fries with mayonnaise, not ketchup. You probably eat your french fries with ketchup.
Tirth: Yeah, of course. What else would I eat them with?
Lu: Typical. Typical.
Tirth: I’m a normal person. Okay. That’s the profile.
Lu: Did I say very, very attractive, very handsome, very good looking?
Tirth: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think we got it. I think what we’re getting is you need to see someone for some of these issues. It looks like you’re almost projecting.
Lu: What are you talking about Tirth? Please. Please. You asked me a question, I’m answering.
Tirth: I’m a little, I’m a little worried about you as your friend. As your friend and well-wisher, well-wisher.
Lu: …very, very athletic.
Tirth: What I hear is a cry for help.
Lu: Can play football at the D1 level if they chose to, but chose not to.
Tirth: I’m sure you think that they drive electric cars as well.
Lu: They probably drive EVs. That’s correct. Yeah. Environmentally friendly.
Tirth: Well, I’ll tell you what these guys did look at and what they did find, okay? It wasn’t any of those. Like I said, maybe some supplementary data I didn’t look at…
Lu: Oh, it wasn’t.
Tirth: No.
Lu: That’s surprising to me.
Tirth: Maybe you can write to them. They have their email address here.
Lu: That’s very surprising. Okay, okay. Let’s hear it.
Tirth: Okay. They found that female users, if you’re female, you’re much more likely to use the iPhone. Then they said, on the honesty-humility scale – remember, they have to fill out all these questionnaires, right? – the lower they are on the honesty-humility scale, the more likely they were to be using an iPhone.
Lu: Makes sense, makes sense. Yeah, android users never lie.
Tirth: On the openness scale, there was not much of a difference, but it was also trending more towards the lower, like iPhone users were lower on the openness scale.
Lu: Makes sense. Not very open-minded, unable to expand their brains.
Tirth: On the emotionality scale, iPhone users were higher. So compared to Android users, they exhibited higher emotionality.
Lu: Oh, more emotional. More prone to anger.
Tirth: Well, we don’t know that. We don’t know that. Maybe it’s generosity. Maybe it’s compassion that they’re more prone to, we don’t know.
Lu: Probably not.
Tirth: Avoidance of similarity. They ranked lower. Very low, as you may guess.
Lu: Makes sense.
Tirth: And then lastly, phone as status. They scored pretty high on it. It’s one of the strongest effects actually
Lu: That they value phone as a status.
Tirth: Yeah. Like them owning an iPhone is, that was like actually one of the strongest differences between the two groups on this scale.
Lu: Which is a paradox of sorts, because we all know Androids are much better phones.
Tirth: I think you think that. I don’t know if we know anything like that. I think you think you know that.
Lu: Please.
Tirth: Okay, so then as I said earlier, they took all this data and then they said, okay, can we apply fancy statistics to this? Make a model, a predictive model…
Lu: Very good.
Tirth: So what they found is all it takes is four factors. The gender, honesty, humility, phone as a status, and avoidance of similarity. So what they did is they asked the question, can we make a predictive model using these characteristics? And then take a group of people, so separate group of people in whom we don’t know what operating system they’re using and apply this to predict which operating system they’re using based on their personality traits.
Lu: I see.
Tirth: But then they recruited 200 people. Now, before I get into the results, if the model wasn’t good enough, if they’re just guessing at random, how accurate do you think they would be?
Lu: I guess 50%.
Tirth: Yeah, exactly. It’s like flipping a coin. Now, do you want to guess how accurate they actually were?
Lu: Unless there’s Windows Phones users in the group, in which case less than 50%.
Tirth: How many Windows Phone users do you think there are?
Lu: Unclear. You said 50 out of 7 something in the first group.
Tirth: Well, do you want to guess what the actual number was? How accurate do you think their model was?
Lu: I’m going to guess 92%.
Tirth: You’re giving them too much credit. It was 69%. It’s still well above 50%.
Lu: That’s pretty good.
Tirth: Yeah, I think it’s pretty good. So that’s it. They conclude that there’s different products on the market, some of which we use a lot, like phones. And sometimes we use them so much and we get so attached in that they become a part of us. And we may be picking things based on our personality or we value certain things and we may not realize.
Lu: Well, I guess the other thing is, you know, in their training data and also in their test data, what’s the percentage of iPhone versus Android users? Because that affects the training model, right?
Tirth: Yes, yes.
Lu: Because if it’s 90% iPhone users, you can just guess iPhone every time. You’ll be 90% correct, which is better than their 69%.
Tirth: Right. On the training population, the 700 or so people they chose, 38% were Android users, and 54% were iPhone users, the slight majority, but not outrageously so. And then the second group, I’m not seeing the data here.
Lu: That could maybe affect their, you know, final accuracy a little bit.
Tirth: Yeah. Of course. Yeah. Any other thoughts?
Lu: I think they should have kept the Windows users in, so we canl see what kind of people use Windows phones.
Tirth: We should do our own survey, man. We know at least one user. Maybe he’s in a secret, secret group where he knows other Windows users.
Lu: All right. Is that it?
Tirth: That’s it.
What did you learn today?
Lu: All right. Good stuff. Well, that brings us to the end of another episode. Tirth, what’d you learn today?
Tirth: Lu, I learned today that I think someone needs to do a study where if you rub cocaine on a human’s belly, would they get the same high?
Lu: And then feed them some sugar, see if they do a little dance? Very good.
Tirth: What did you learn today?
Lu: I learned today that Android phone users are very good looking, handsome, very nice hair, some of the best hair you ever see.
Tirth: Wow. Is that right?
Lu: And very tall, 6’5, at least, very muscular, the best of the best. You wouldn’t know anything about this.
Tirth: No, no, why would I? Right. I’m a sheep.
Lu: Yeah, exactly. All right. Well, thank you guys for listening to our show. Hope you enjoyed this episode.
Tirth: And if you like listening to us, please give us five stars, leave a review and tell a friend on whatever platform you may choose to listen to us.
Lu: All right. See you guys later.
