- 4 hours ago
First broadcast 12th February 2010.
Stephen Fry
Alan Davies
Bill Bailey
Rich Hall
Barry Humphries
Stephen Fry
Alan Davies
Bill Bailey
Rich Hall
Barry Humphries
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:05Good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening and welcome to QI, where tonight we're looking at G
00:10for gravity, assisted by our weighty contestants and of course my own gravitas.
00:16Distorting space-time for us tonight, we have four massive stars, a gigantic pulsar, Rich Hall, a huge red giant,
00:31Bill Bailey, a colossal supernova, Barry Humphries,
00:44and a hypothetical black hole, Alan Davis, and tonight their buzzers are all weighty, Rich goes...
01:01Oh, man.
01:04Weighty, you see, and Barry's goes...
01:08Wait for it, wait for it!
01:11And Bill goes...
01:14Your weight is 12 stone, 2 pounds, 4 ounces.
01:19You wish.
01:20You wish.
01:22Sorry.
01:24How dare you?
01:26Oh, the new cockiness of the...
01:29Oh, no, no, no, no.
01:32And Alan goes...
01:34No!
01:38Oh, let's do it.
01:39So, let's...
01:41Let's drop right in, shall we?
01:43My first question is, how can you get from here to anywhere on Earth in exactly 42 minutes and 12
01:50seconds?
01:52Wait for it!
01:53I meant to say, I like that tie very well.
01:59I'm coming from a man with your colour sense, that makes me so happy.
02:03I was hoping I wouldn't be overdressed tonight.
02:0742 minutes and 12 seconds.
02:09You can get to anywhere.
02:10Through the Earth.
02:11Through the...
02:11Oh, develop.
02:14Develop that thought.
02:16It's a theoretical rather than a practical.
02:19Burrow, then.
02:20Yes.
02:20Burrowing?
02:21Yeah.
02:22Through the Earth?
02:23Yeah.
02:23Directly?
02:24You'd have to be more vigorous than that.
02:27That's just getting the surface soil off.
02:31All right.
02:32Well, there's a start somewhere.
02:34You wouldn't start like that, would you?
02:36Well, what speed would you have to go through the Earth to do it in 42 minutes, though?
02:40At the speed that is determined by...
02:43Gravity.
02:44Gravity by maximum velocity.
02:45Yeah, the idea is if you were to tunnel straight through...
02:49Yeah.
02:49You mean, if there was a tube that went through the tunnel that went through and you jumped down it...
02:53Yeah.
02:53...it would take you 42 minutes to come out the other side.
02:55Exactly.
02:56But would you drop...
02:57I'd like it if you dropped straight through and dropped out the other end.
02:59Yeah, you would accelerate all the way to the middle and then you would decelerate out.
03:03So you'd just make it.
03:04Yeah.
03:04You'd be in Australia.
03:06Ah.
03:06That's the point.
03:07I was going to say.
03:08Yeah.
03:08But actually, you could do the tunnel from London to Moscow.
03:11It could go in any sort of section across.
03:13That's why I said from anywhere from here.
03:15Gravity operates at all angles.
03:17It doesn't just operate from the north to the south, as it were.
03:20Is that jump?
03:21Is that jump?
03:21You could...
03:22So from London to Paris...
03:24Is that...
03:25London to Paris would be the same length of time?
03:27Yeah.
03:28It would, indeed.
03:29It would have to be the same time.
03:30If I dug a tunnel, I could get from here to right there in about 12 seconds.
03:33Yeah, there...
03:34You're right.
03:34The other 42 minutes is just...
03:36Yeah.
03:37...waiting for your luggage.
03:38It takes that length of time.
03:40But the Antipodes things are interesting.
03:43An Antipode is the exact opposite points on the Earth.
03:46They don't have to be north to south.
03:48There are Antipodes from one part of the equator to the other, obviously.
03:51It's the exact opposite.
03:52I thought we were New Zealand.
03:53Well, interesting thing is, actually, we're nowhere land.
03:57And there was a contest to make an earth sandwich for someone to put a piece of bread
04:04on one part of the earth.
04:06And the others would put the piece of bread on the exact antipode of that.
04:11And there are not many choices, oddly enough.
04:13So New Zealand was one piece of bread.
04:15Iceland.
04:15Not Iceland.
04:16A little further south.
04:18Tewksbury.
04:18Spain.
04:19Spain is the right answer.
04:21Ah, brilliant.
04:22Very good.
04:23But there was immediate controversy because they used baguettes pieces of bread.
04:27And so no one was quite sure whether they were oriented in the same direction.
04:30So it might have been a cross shape, which would have disqualified it for a sandwich, really.
04:33You can't have a sandwich with baguettes crossing, can you?
04:36Anyway.
04:37How do you get to be involved in these competitions?
04:40I fear the answer is you have to be Canadian.
04:42The Canadian brothers who won it.
04:44They were called Jonathan and Duncan.
04:46But anyway, they could have chosen Indonesia to?
04:48Oh.
04:49America.
04:50No.
04:50You're going sideways.
04:51Well, South America is Colombia.
04:53So not bad, not bad.
04:54But one of the most interesting ones, from a practical point of view, if you're a particular
04:58kind of religionist, would be the Antipode of Mecca.
05:01The exact opposite of Mecca, you see, is a tiny little atoll in the South Pacific.
05:05Christmas Island.
05:06Tematangi Atoll.
05:08It's also known as Captain Bly's Atoll.
05:10Oh, yeah.
05:10And there it is.
05:11That's actually a photograph, amazingly.
05:12It's actually got a huge lagoon in it.
05:14And the great thing is if you're a Muslim, you could kneel there, you could face any direction,
05:18you'd be facing Mecca.
05:20Yeah.
05:20Because it's the Antipode.
05:21Right.
05:21We were talking about the gravity train, weren't we?
05:24Gravity.
05:25The idea of it going through the...
05:26Is it feasible, then?
05:27Does Richard Branson already figure out some way of...
05:30It's not...
05:31No, it's not feasible on Earth.
05:32On the Moon, it might be because the Moon has no molten core.
05:35Though, oddly enough, it would be 53 minutes.
05:37Which moon are we talking about?
05:40Oh, that's a sore point.
05:41Let's just...
05:43Our usual friendly moon, the one we look at.
05:46Oddly enough, that would be 53 minutes to get through.
05:49What?
05:49Why would it take longer to get through the Moon, which is so much smaller?
05:52The gravity is so feeble.
05:53Yeah.
05:54Yes.
05:54And they're just doing mass.
05:55What's the point of it, really?
05:57You can get through it like that, though.
05:59Yeah, yeah.
06:00Because the Antipodes are not that exciting, are they?
06:02No, the other side of the Moon is just as boring as the Moon.
06:05Exactly.
06:05What, I tell you, though, is interesting, is who do you think worked out the 42 minutes
06:10and 12 seconds?
06:11Patrick Moore.
06:12No.
06:14Erm...
06:14QI researcher.
06:16I don't know.
06:17Alan Titchmarsh.
06:18Can we just stay in the garden?
06:22Er...
06:22Charlie Dimmock.
06:23Yeah.
06:24Where are they now, eh?
06:25I don't know.
06:26I don't know.
06:28I don't know.
06:28What's so amazing about it was that it was actually a series of letters between Isaac Newton
06:32and Robert Hooke in the 17th century.
06:33They worked out the exact mathematics and it's not changed.
06:36It's still exactly as true as it was now.
06:38You know that in the film Brazil where they put things in tubes and they never know where
06:40they go.
06:41I love that.
06:41Just put it in a tube and it pops out in the Antipodes.
06:45You're too young, young Scampy Grace, aren't you, to remember the change machines in shops.
06:51Ah.
06:51Do you remember those?
06:52Beautiful.
06:52Scampy Grace.
06:53Was it, erm...
06:54It was wonderful.
06:55What was the one in...
06:56Gamages, was it?
06:57That's right.
06:58You gave the money.
06:59Real money.
07:00No credit cards.
07:01That's it.
07:02And a very nice girl with...
07:04in black with B.O.
07:06She'd...
07:07She took the money...
07:09Yeah.
07:09And she wrapped it in the docket.
07:11It was called the docket.
07:12The docket, yes.
07:13Oh, yeah.
07:13And she put it in a cylinder.
07:15Yeah.
07:15It looked like a milkshake.
07:16And the cylinder was immediately put... sucked into some other part of the store.
07:19That's right.
07:20It was a vacuum.
07:20It was sort of...
07:22So you put the fiver in, then put the docket in which said you've bought something worth
07:25three pounds, seven and six, and there's the five pounds.
07:29And it would go...
07:30Like that.
07:30All that noise, as you say.
07:32And then you'd sort of wait there and chat.
07:34They were subject to abuse, those machines.
07:36Well...
07:36Yeah.
07:45It wasn't B.O. after all.
07:47It wasn't B.O. after all.
07:48Just aren't enough tubes, are there?
07:51There aren't enough tubes in the world.
07:52Yeah.
07:53Just things that work mechanically are kind of larky and fun.
07:56That big sucking sound that you hear.
07:58I would like to know the force in an airline toilet.
08:01I don't know what creates that.
08:03Isn't it?
08:03That is...
08:04That's frightening.
08:05I have to cover my ears.
08:06If you...
08:07If you mistimed it, your intestines would...
08:09Put your head down.
08:10Shoot up.
08:11Yeah.
08:12If you're sitting on it, and you've sealed round the rim...
08:15You would lose your cuts.
08:17You can lose your innards.
08:18Yeah.
08:19I've heard of that happening.
08:20Wow.
08:22There's a guy where I live in Montana who...
08:24Because we have prairie dogs, and prairie dogs are like...
08:26That big.
08:27They're cute.
08:27They're like a cross between like a meerkat and a squirrel.
08:29Yeah.
08:30But they're rodents, and they dig tunnels.
08:31And if you don't want to shoot them with a .22, this guy will come around and suck them out.
08:35With a...
08:36With a grain elevator.
08:37Oh.
08:38On the back of a truck.
08:39Oh.
08:39With a big howitzer cannon nozzle.
08:41And he knows exactly how many are in the tunnel.
08:43He'll go...
08:43There's four in that tunnel.
08:44And he turns his thing on and goes...
08:47Oh, no!
08:49Amazing sound in the world.
08:51And then they come through, and then they have like his 80s blow-dry look, right?
08:54They've just been sucked through it like 80 miles per hour.
08:57And they're like miniature werewolves, and I said to them...
09:00So they don't get shredded?
09:02It's not like...
09:02No, not shredded.
09:02It's not like Steve Buscemi in Fargo.
09:04No, no.
09:05But they are looking at you like the old man Explanation.
09:08Look out at this show.
09:11Look out at this show.
09:16I said to the guy, doesn't this give him brain damage?
09:19And he went, yeah, of course.
09:22But it doesn't kill him, that's the humane alternative.
09:25And I said, what do you do with them after you catch them?
09:27And he says, I just take them across the river and let them go,
09:29and then I wait three or four days and work that side of the river.
09:34To return to the original question, if you drive a tunnel straight through the earth,
09:37a gravity train would take you where you want to be in exactly 42 minutes and 12 seconds.
09:43Aristotle, as I'm sure you all know, thought that heavier objects fell faster than lighter objects.
09:50And it seems an intuitive and correct idea.
09:53But Galileo worked out that they didn't.
09:55And how did he do that?
09:57Wait for it!
10:00He dropped two cannonballs off the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
10:03Ah, well did he.
10:09I'm sorry about that.
10:10The reality is that he worked out that this was the case from his head.
10:16He then did some experiments with ramps and things that proved it to be true.
10:20What's heavier, a tonne of gold or a tonne of feathers?
10:22Exactly that kind of thing, if you like.
10:24But what he's saying is that...
10:25What's that?
10:25Half a tonne.
10:28He's saying half a tonne of coal.
10:30What Galileo said.
10:31Sounds like I saw an Elton John party request, I saw it, yeah.
10:34Of course the answer is that one of them is heavier, isn't they?
10:37Because gold is measured in Troy weight rather than Avoir du Poix.
10:41And they're different.
10:41So a tonne of gold is different to a tonne of feathers.
10:44Sorry.
10:47I believe.
10:48I'm sorry.
10:49But what Galileo said was that half a tonne of coal falls at the same speed as a tonne of
10:53coal.
10:53That's the point.
10:53Falls at the same speed.
10:55You know, if you let go at the same time, they'll both hit the ground at the same time.
10:57How can you get a tonne of coal up in the air?
10:59Well, indeed.
11:01Galileo's reasoning was thusly wise.
11:03He said that if you had a heavy object, if you believed Aristotle, it falls fast and the lighter one
11:10slow.
11:11So suppose you attach the light one to the heavy one.
11:13Well, the heavy one falls faster than the light one, so it would make the light one fall faster.
11:20Or the light one would hold the heavy one up because it's going slower.
11:25So by attaching them together, you would make it go both faster and slower.
11:29And that's obviously impossible.
11:30The only explanation is that they both travel at the same speed.
11:34And he then proved it.
11:35And an Apollo 15, Scott, the astronaut, thought he'd try and see if Galileo was right.
11:40And we have a clip of him doing it.
11:42It's rather wonderful.
11:42And I'll drop the two of them here and hopefully they'll hit the ground at the same time.
11:48How about that?
11:51How about that?
11:52It proves that Mr Galileo was correct in his findings.
11:56Isn't that cool?
11:57Astronaut David Scott proving Galileo right with a hammer and a feather.
12:01But Galileo established it by the power of his own thought.
12:04Similarly, Newton worked out the laws of gravitation and published them in 1687,
12:08which was just 100 years before Les Frères Montgolfier, the Brothers Montgolfier,
12:13astounded the world with the first balloon essence.
12:15And it was only one year after that, the dashing old Etonian George Biggin and Letitia Sage
12:20were in a hydrogen balloon and they took off from Southwark.
12:24And I want to know, basically, how far did George Biggin go?
12:28Not to Biggin Hill, surely.
12:30Well, I want to know how far did Mr Biggin yet?
12:32All the way.
12:33Hey!
12:35Well, oddly enough, that may be the right answer
12:37because it was one of the most extraordinary things you could imagine.
12:40A balloon ascent was an astonishing sight
12:42and 150,000 people turned out to see the first one.
12:45And this Italian who brought ballooning to England, who was called Lunardi,
12:50put these two people in and thought, that's probably too many.
12:53So he jumped out just as it was taking off and left this couple on their own,
12:57these complete first-time balloonists.
13:00Were they tethered?
13:01No, they took off.
13:02Did they just keep going then?
13:04Well, it became one of the sensations of the age because...
13:06Mile High Club, first one.
13:07They were the first members of the Mile High Club, as it were.
13:10Yeah.
13:11Well, what happened was they were seen as they were going over Piccadilly.
13:14She was seen on all fours.
13:17Is it a glass-bottom balloon then?
13:23She claimed later that she was fastening up the opening of the balloon.
13:26Yeah.
13:28I'll test that.
13:29Yeah.
13:29Me, officer?
13:30No, no, officer.
13:31Opening in the balloon, officer.
13:33The technical answer is that they got as far as 14 miles, they got as far as Harrow,
13:37shouting down and using a speaking trumpet at people below.
13:40It must have been rather astonished.
13:42Very slack-jawed yokels from the village of Finchley and other such things or whatever.
13:46Work, you idle buggers!
13:49Well, there was a great scandal about it and it became the issue of the age, was whether
13:54or not you could do it.
13:55And one of the most remarkable social records of that age is the wager books, the betting
14:01books of the great London clubs, particularly Brookses and Whites, which were in St Jameses.
14:06And people used to bet on anything and the book still existed in the handwriting.
14:10And there is one here, Lord Chumley has given two guineas to Lord Derby to receive 500 guineas
14:17whenever his lordship plays hospitals with a woman in a balloon 1,000 yards from the earth.
14:23Four plays hospitals with, I think you can insert your own, er, word.
14:29Sorry.
14:30Let's see what that means.
14:32Good.
14:37So there you have it, yeah.
14:38Did he pay up then?
14:39Is that in the book?
14:40Er, we don't actually do.
14:421,000 yards!
14:43No, you were only 900 yards.
14:46It's true, they had no way of measuring.
14:47What did they use for an altimeter measure?
14:50They dropped things as they took to hit the floor?
14:52No.
14:53They used a barometer, barometers existed.
14:55There was different pressure at different bands.
14:57So it's quite accurate.
14:58The barometer was quite a hefty piece of kit, wasn't it?
15:01Yeah.
15:02You had to hang it up and tap it with the stem of your pike.
15:07Well, as with flight, of course, you know, as soon as a new technology like this emerges, as we saw
15:11with aeroplanes later, there are various targets that you want.
15:15Be the first person to do this, the first person to do that.
15:16We've seen the first person to play hospitals on board a balloon.
15:20But one of the great things is to cross the...
15:23Channel?
15:23Channel, exactly, cross the channel.
15:25Well, with aeroplanes...
15:26M-25?
15:26Lerio, of course, not the M-25.
15:29But the channel.
15:30And the channel was an extraordinary business.
15:32It was a Frenchman called Blanchard, and he's an American backer.
15:35But they hated each other, and they loved their own country.
15:38So first, the Frenchman.
15:39Can you imagine a Frenchman not playing fair?
15:41Hard to imagine.
15:42But anyway, try and picture it.
15:44Had carried lead weights on a sort of belt, this Blanchard, so that he could then claim to the American,
15:50Oh, there's only room for one of us, unfortunately.
15:52I would have to do this record alone.
15:54And the American saw the weights and made him take off his ballast.
15:58And then they accidentally dropped each other's national flags out of the balloon when they took off.
16:02And then the balloon started to drop over the channel too early,
16:06and they threw out their food, they threw out their instruments,
16:09then they started to throw out all, obviously, the sandbags.
16:12Then they took their jacket off, then they took their trousers off,
16:16then they peed and pooed out of the basket.
16:19Because they were approaching the cliffs, and they're dropping and dropping and dropping,
16:22so they have a poo, and they just get over it like that.
16:24And land in the trees, and the record is made.
16:27It's not a very dignified way to break a record though, with your trousers round your ankles.
16:32No.
16:32Hanging out the abs are, we've nearly done it.
16:34Right, oh, all the press are here to meet us.
16:38Oh, oh dear.
16:40One last push.
16:43Well, anyway, that's Mr. Biggin and Mrs. Sage.
16:46They went, as Barry correctly said, all the way.
16:49From St. George's Fields to Harrow.
16:52We won't have any truck with gossip here on QI, of course.
16:55So, what do you say to a gossipy boma?
16:59Wait for it!
17:01Mind your own business.
17:03Ooh!
17:05Ooh!
17:06Ooh!
17:08Ooh!
17:08We predicted it, I'm afraid.
17:09You're getting a nice score building up, Barry.
17:12There it is.
17:13It's good.
17:14Gossipy boma.
17:15Boma?
17:16Gossipy boma.
17:17Boma?
17:17What's boma?
17:18Is it a creature?
17:19I know what it is.
17:20Yeah?
17:22It's something a surgeon leaves behind inside you after an operation.
17:27Oh, Barry, that is brilliant.
17:28That is the right answer.
17:32It's brilliant.
17:34That's exactly what it is.
17:36It's a cotton or lint or piece of sponge or something like that.
17:39Or a mobile phone.
17:40Indeed, a mobile phone.
17:41It comes from the Latin for cotton, in fact, gossipy.
17:43So, it would be like a piece of comma.
17:45Cotton wool is the most basic one.
17:46In America, 1,500 cases a year of things being left inside.
17:50Really?
17:50Yeah.
17:51That's because a lot of people eat fridge magnets in America.
17:55Yeah.
17:56Because they look like cookies or chocolate.
17:59And then they cut them open and locked all the tools just...
18:03Or they'd shoot off the tray and...
18:06Yeah.
18:06They'd be all behind coins on them.
18:08And they stick to the sides of mobile homes.
18:10All kinds of things.
18:11Yeah.
18:1354% of foreign bodies are left in the abdomen or pelvis.
18:1622% in the vagina.
18:187.5% in the chest.
18:2070% in other places like the spinal canal, brain and face.
18:24Bizarrely.
18:24The face?
18:25They do it for a bet.
18:27For the surgeons?
18:28Yeah.
18:28And then they get more work, don't they?
18:29Getting it out again.
18:30They'd probably get sued though, don't they?
18:32I'd imagine.
18:32There was one chap who had a six inch metal surgical clamp taken out.
18:37And they realized he'd already had an operation to take out one surgical six inch clamp.
18:41And he'd had two left in him.
18:42And when they took the one out, they never thought to look for another one in there.
18:46Extraordinary behaviour.
18:47Train set.
18:48The main risk factors...
18:50What do you imagine are the main risk factors?
18:52Why is it likely to happen?
18:54Because they do...
18:54There is a protocol whereby you count all the equipment.
18:56So why would it happen?
18:58Well, some of them have an ego and they do good work and they think,
19:01Well, I want someone to recognize my work so I'll...
19:03I'll leave my forceps in there.
19:06Well, apparently it's emergent...
19:06And then people go,
19:07Oh, this is the work of Dr. Bonner.
19:08This is clearly...
19:09This is a Bonner.
19:11Well, the reason they give is emergency operations that have not been planned properly
19:14and unplanned changes in the operation.
19:17And patients with higher body mass index.
19:20Fat people.
19:21Fat people.
19:21They lose their...
19:22You put it down on the side...
19:23It just goes...
19:25Sucked in?
19:26I don't know.
19:26Is that the...
19:27There's a nurse in there!
19:30Thank God you're here!
19:32This is where we need Hugh Laurie on the show, isn't it?
19:35He would explain.
19:36Of course.
19:36Exactly.
19:37He would explain.
19:38If the script was put in front of him, he's a gibbering idiot without...
19:42No, he isn't.
19:48Um...
19:48No, no, no.
19:50There are, in fact, specific words, yeah.
19:51The most common one they use is gossipiboma, which originally comes from the fact that it's cotton
19:54because the Latin gossipium is cotton.
19:56But if it's a surgical instrument, it's actually called a foreign body granuloma.
20:01Oh.
20:02Yeah.
20:02And the cheek of the surgeons is that they call it retaining.
20:06As if somehow it's the patient's fault.
20:08Ah.
20:08The patient retained this object while unconscious of a slab.
20:13You know, nothing to do with us.
20:15Yeah.
20:15Its pancreas grabbed it.
20:17That's right.
20:18Just wouldn't give it back.
20:19Yeah.
20:20No choice.
20:21Let's leave it there.
20:22There you are.
20:22I'm just slightly disturbed by this picture.
20:24It's just really disturbing me.
20:26It's like backstage at a puppet theatre.
20:29Give me it.
20:29Club puppets.
20:29Quickly.
20:31No, it's a lady with invisible breasts.
20:33Is it?
20:38We like the thought of it.
20:40Well, anyway, yes.
20:40A gossipiboma is a piece of cotton left inside you by a surgeon.
20:44Anyway, what's the use of an underwater weighing machine?
20:48Twelve stones, four answers.
20:52There you are.
20:53Yeah.
20:54I weigh a bit less underwater.
20:56That's what I'm trying to say.
20:56It's weak your weight.
20:58Yeah.
20:58Why would you have an underwater weighing machine?
21:00Wales.
21:01Wales Weighing Station.
21:02Oh!
21:04We've done sales for well-weighing machines.
21:08This is fabulous.
21:09You're thinking along with this.
21:11I just hope I get the worst marks because losing is the new winning.
21:15We are right.
21:17I have to say, you're beating fat.
21:20Don't they weigh your mass body fat by floating in a tub?
21:26Yeah.
21:26And what is a body mass index?
21:28Do you remember exactly what it is?
21:29Your height divided by your weight.
21:31Your height squared.
21:31Weight divided by your height squared.
21:33Yes.
21:33That's more or less, yes.
21:35But it's very faulty.
21:36If you're very muscular, the BMI would argue that you're overweight and obese and far too
21:43fat and you could in fact be immensely fit.
21:45Or also if you're a marathon runner and you have that slow twitch muscle as they call it,
21:48I think, then you would be starving and be considered malnutrited or whatever the word
21:53is.
21:53So when they want to make really, really accurate measurements of body mass index, they go
21:58underwater and it's considered the gold standard for body fat measurement.
22:01And what would you say, what percentage fat should you be under not to be obese?
22:05Chubby.
22:0720.
22:08How did you know that?
22:0920.
22:09No.
22:10You're fine.
22:10No.
22:11That's just, it's got a baggy thing.
22:13Yeah.
22:14With women, should women be, have more body fat or less body fat?
22:18More.
22:18More, yes.
22:19They can be.
22:21300.
22:2530%.
22:2630%.
22:26I saw one in Budgeons the other day, it was definitely 300.
22:30And all she had in her basket was a massive, massive bar of chocolate.
22:34That's all she had.
22:35A really serious expression in her face.
22:38Now when I'm in Norfolk, there's nothing I like better than I mean a good old bicycle
22:41round the broads.
22:42That is true.
22:43You and I do it together, don't we?
22:44There we are.
22:46There are such larks we have, don't we?
22:49Hacked again.
22:50I can't believe it.
22:51Home in time for lemonade and bums.
22:54And isn't it funny the other night, isn't it funny, the faster I go the more likely
22:57I am to stay stable.
22:59But if I go very, very slowly, I wobble and fall off.
23:01I wonder why that is.
23:02And you said, I know Stephen, let's make that a question in the next QI episode.
23:06And so that's what I'm doing.
23:07Why, when you slow down, do you become less stable on a bicycle?
23:10What is, what is at work?
23:11What is the physical?
23:12I have a better question.
23:13Why do you have a Hitler haircut?
23:16Why is Alan wearing a hairnet?
23:19If you just put a little mustache under that nose, that would be frightening.
23:23How come?
23:23Oh, yeah.
23:24I dressed as Hitler once.
23:25I did a school play.
23:26I played Arturo Uy.
23:28You know, the resistable riot in Arturo Uy.
23:46And I said, I'm supposed to look like Hitler.
23:48My mother's got better.
23:49She couldn't see any thought in anyone.
23:51She went, well, you look very smart.
23:52Why should you keep it like that?
23:54Oh, mother's.
23:55Oh, no.
23:55Why do we wobble?
23:57I wobble because I'm scared to death when I'm on a bike.
24:01I wobble even when I'm going very fast.
24:04What kind of bike is it?
24:06Is it a penny farthing?
24:07It's whatever I can find in the street.
24:11It hasn't got a lock on it.
24:14Too fast.
24:15Was it you?
24:16Oh, that happened in Cambridge, didn't it?
24:18That was so sad.
24:18They tried this nice, noble idea that they would have bikes, city bikes that have a special
24:23number on.
24:23And you just saw one leaning on a lamppost.
24:26You got on it.
24:27And you bicycled to wherever you wanted to be and left it outside.
24:30And there were a common exchange of bicycles already.
24:32It's a perfect socialist dream.
24:34A utopian ideal.
24:35Three bicycles.
24:36Two days, I think it lasted before.
24:38A truck arrived from Oxford.
24:39Yeah, basically.
24:42The odd thing about it is bicycles, pretty ancient invention by modern transport standards,
24:47but it was only in 1970 that the physics of them was understood.
24:51Really odd though, isn't it?
24:53There's more force working on you if you're going slowly.
24:56So you're sort of, you're being pulled from other sides.
24:59Well, yeah, people thought it was gyroscopic pull or a centrifugal one in some way.
25:04But it was demonstrated by a fellow called David Jones in 1970 that in fact it's not that,
25:09it's torque that lowers the centre of gravity.
25:11And the other thing is, it's called the caster effect, like a supermarket trolley.
25:14The fact that the back wheel is a trailing wheel, it kind of self-centres, it writes the whole thing
25:20as it trails along.
25:21I always get the trolley with a stiff wheel, with a wheel.
25:24Oh, they're the ones.
25:25At airports and supermarkets, I always get that trolley.
25:28You get that, oh yeah.
25:30I veer into old ladies with it.
25:32Oh, that's fine.
25:33I crash into displays.
25:34Yeah.
25:35I do that and blame it on the wheel.
25:37Yeah.
25:39Oh, sorry, bad wheel.
25:44So, here's the thing.
25:45If you want to go left, you turn the handle bars of your bike slightly to the right.
25:50Motorcyclists know this as a rule.
25:52Counter-steering.
25:53Yeah, counter-steering, exactly.
25:54It's very, very quick.
25:55It's done automatically.
25:56People don't know they're doing it.
25:58Which is why curbs are so difficult.
25:59If you're close to a curb, in order to steer away from the curb, you have to steer into it
26:03first.
26:04Just do a little that and then that.
26:05Otherwise, you fall over.
26:07It's weird.
26:07It's an automatic thing that people do.
26:09Very strange.
26:10There's a way of testing it.
26:11You're coasting along.
26:12Take your left hand off the right, okay?
26:15And you push the handle bars with your right.
26:17Now, with this, you can only force the handle bars left, obviously.
26:20Yeah?
26:21Yeah.
26:21But you go right.
26:23So, the reason why bicycles are stabler when they go fast is nothing to do with gyroscopes.
26:27It's all to do with torque and castring.
26:29When you're cycling, the more revolutions, the better.
26:31So, imagine it is the revolution.
26:32The red dawn has come upon us, gentlemen.
26:35We've overthrown the hated oppressors.
26:37And we're all happy.
26:38And we've got guns.
26:39So, we shoot straight up in the air, as people do.
26:41Whee!
26:41Yee-hye!
26:42Yee-hye!
26:42Is this a good idea?
26:43Shall we do that?
26:45Well, I don't know.
26:46I've often thought, where do those bullets go?
26:48Yeah.
26:48They come down.
26:49They come down.
26:50And hit people right on the top of the head.
26:52Does that often happen?
26:54Yes.
26:55Unfortunately, it does, because what goes up, as you know, must come down.
26:58And, of course, it won't happen to the guy who shoots, because when it gets to the top,
27:01the smallest amount of wind, it will, you know.
27:03They go about a mile away.
27:05Yeah.
27:05Well, not a mile, probably.
27:06But they did an experiment on a floating platform, where they fired 500 straight up in the air.
27:10And only four landed on the platform of the bullets.
27:13Four dead guns.
27:13The rest splashed.
27:14No.
27:15I think they cover themselves.
27:16496 feet.
27:18So, a typical 7.62 millimetre round, fired vertically, reach a height of...
27:22What sort of height, do you think?
27:24Half a mile?
27:25Longer.
27:2510 feet.
27:26Two and a half kilometres, nearly.
27:28Straight into the couple, shagging in the blue.
27:30Yeah.
27:33Of course.
27:38Talking about coming full circle.
27:40So, it would take some 17 seconds, then another 40 seconds or so, to return to the ground,
27:45at a speed of about 70 metres a second.
27:48So, what you're getting is this gigantic thing that will penetrate, smash the skull.
27:51Very, very dangerous cranial injuries.
27:54Here's an interesting thing, you won't believe me.
27:56I sort of don't believe it myself, and yet I know it's true.
27:58It's one of those things.
27:59It's counterintuitive, I think is the word.
28:01In this hand here, I've got a bullet.
28:03In this hand level with it, I've got a gun.
28:05I fire the gun and let go at the same time.
28:08Which bullet, that one or that one, hits the ground first?
28:12The one that you drop.
28:13That one?
28:14Yeah.
28:14No.
28:15They both hit the ground at exactly the same time.
28:17Bollocks.
28:18I know!
28:18I knew you'd say that.
28:21They both have exactly the same force acting on them.
28:25Gravity.
28:26Yes, but the momentum will defy gravity, won't it, for a bit?
28:30It would just describe a different thing.
28:32Is that because of the speed of the bullet?
28:34Yes.
28:34It could go two kilometers, the bullet.
28:37But incredibly fast.
28:38And then hits the ground.
28:40I'd have to do it at the speed of light.
28:42No, no, no.
28:43Information comes from Wikipedia.
28:45I know!
28:48Are there any scientists here who will back me up on this?
28:51Yes.
28:52See?
28:52Yes, there's some yeses there.
28:53Any assassins?
28:56It does seem incredible, but it is true.
28:59So you're saying you drop a bullet at what height?
29:02Well, you're standing.
29:03Your height.
29:04You're standing, you're standing, yeah.
29:06And you fire a bullet.
29:07Yep.
29:07And that bullet from the gun will go into the ground?
29:09They're both at the same level, yeah.
29:10I mean, there are things that could stop it happening.
29:13If the bullet went five miles a second, it would actually leave the atmosphere and obviously
29:16never fall to earth.
29:18If it went far enough, the curvature of the earth would mean that it had further to fall.
29:22But, assuming the kind of gun where it doesn't have that range, then what I'm saying is true.
29:27Is there any practical applications?
29:31Who knows?
29:31Well, there's enormous practical applications in the laws of physics that say this must be the case.
29:37Well, no, I mean, I suppose there is.
29:38It's a double assassination, isn't it?
29:40You kill a person and an ant.
29:45It's a source of personal pride to the assassin.
29:48It would, yeah.
29:49Offing of some insects.
29:50Exactly.
29:50So, if you're going to stop a bullet, the very worst way to do it is with the top of
29:55your head.
29:56Still, nonetheless, viva la revolucion.
29:58Let's say we've now entered the city, which we have secured, we've rounded up all the investment bankers,
30:03but a small group of them have holed up at the welcome break motorway service station at Scratchwood,
30:09which is the first one if you go north out of London on the M1.
30:13M1, yeah.
30:14Now, but we, the revolutionary cadre, the compadres, okay, we are in the city of London, okay?
30:20But we have to stop them.
30:21We've closed down all telecommunications, so we can't, you know, give instructions to other, you know, members of our brigade.
30:27We have to stop them from where we are, in the city of London.
30:30And they're in Scratchwood.
30:31Oh, how's that going to happen?
30:32Oh.
30:33Buy something at them.
30:34Yes.
30:35A Guinster's pasty.
30:41Got them.
30:43Um, no, this is just a bizarre fact.
30:46Without knowing it, they've chosen the one place to get to where you can get to them with a gun
30:50that exists.
30:51Here, now, today, not far from the studio, we're on the river here.
30:53And these are weapons that are on the river, and they are pointed, I promise you.
30:57HMS Belfast.
30:58HMS Belfast is the answer, which is a World War II ship, and it has guns.
31:04It's the only one with these guns, working guns, there they are.
31:07And they are pointed at Scratchwood.
31:09If you go on board, as a tourist, which you can, it actually tells you there's a sign saying he's
31:14appointed at the Scratchwood service area.
31:15Oh, God, I would so love to find it.
31:17I would so, so love to find it.
31:20Come on.
31:22That's another weird, you may know this, and it's just a weird World War II ship story as well.
31:27This is a U.S. ship.
31:28It was known as the luckiest ship in the U.S. Navy in the 1940s,
31:32because it was the only ship that was utterly unscarred at Pearl Harbor.
31:34It was called the USS Phoenix.
31:36It was sunk in 1982, but it had changed its name.
31:39Do you know what, too?
31:40HMS Belfast.
31:41It's named after a person, a personal military rank.
31:44It had been sold to another country, and named after General...
31:47Finochet.
31:48Bel...
31:48Grano.
31:49General Belgrano.
31:51It was sunk by the British.
31:53It remains the only warship...
31:55But Belgrano was...
31:55Ever.
31:56The only ship ever sunk by a nuclear submarine.
31:58And it was sunk with all hands, well, most hands lost.
32:01Over 300 people.
32:02Over 300 people, yeah.
32:03But that was known as the luckiest ship in the U.S. Navy.
32:06That's an extraordinary history for that boat.
32:07You almost want to make a movie about it.
32:08It's just bizarre, isn't it?
32:10Well, I never knew that.
32:12So, HMS Belfast may be docked in the city of London,
32:15but its guns are trained on scratchwood service stations,
32:17so it looks like those bankers are for the high jump.
32:20And talking of the high jump, this leads me to my next question.
32:22Why did Fosbury flop?
32:25Gravity.
32:27Why did he choose to flop?
32:28That's the Fosbury flop.
32:29What is it?
32:30Well, the people previously would jump forwards over the bar
32:33and land in a sandpit.
32:34And he jumped backwards over and landed on a big dirigible.
32:37That's right.
32:38These are the previous ones.
32:39The scissors, the eastern cutoff.
32:41Yeah, the western roll.
32:42That was all the rage.
32:42The western roll.
32:43The straddle.
32:43In 1968, old Fosbury appeared with this new move.
32:47And he won the Olympic gold.
32:49And now every high jumper does it.
32:51And no one will ever go back to any other way of doing it.
32:53But there's a reason why it's so efficient,
32:55why it works so well.
32:56It might be that in the other ones,
32:58you have to get all of yourself at that height
33:02at the same moment.
33:03Whereas he kind of took himself a bit at a time for that.
33:06You're sort of right.
33:07It's where your centre of gravity is.
33:10And on the Fosbury flop,
33:11your centre of gravity is actually under the bar.
33:14And on the other ones, it's way over.
33:16That's a dotted line there.
33:18That indicates the centre of gravity is that sort of,
33:20you know, hazard symbol.
33:21She's just realised there's no thing to land on.
33:25Well, that's the other thing, of course.
33:28The other thing about the Fosbury flop is it did require a move
33:31from sand to a little nice rubber cushiony things.
33:35If you do the scissors one,
33:37which we saw that sort of stepping one over there,
33:39your centre of gravity passes 30 centimetres over the bar.
33:42So what it means having a lower centre of gravity
33:44is you get extra height in exchange for no extra effort.
33:47And also these records stay for a long time.
33:50The male one was set in 93 and the female in 87
33:52and they still stand.
33:54So it looks as if we're reaching the limits of how high a human...
33:56We're reaching because gravity is getting stronger and stronger.
33:58Well, that could easily be...
34:02And long jumps too, they stay for a long time, don't they?
34:04Yeah.
34:04Who held the world long-term record from 1935 to 1960?
34:09Not Jesse Owens.
34:11It was Jesse Owens.
34:12So you're wrong by saying it's not Jesse Owens.
34:15You get the point for that.
34:16Yeah.
34:17Is there a limbo competition to sort of like...
34:20That would be a good idea.
34:22I wonder what the limbo...
34:22Olympic limbo.
34:23Yeah.
34:24Should be.
34:24Yeah.
34:25I love the limbo.
34:25Are you allowed to sort of...
34:27Flatten your nipples?
34:28For example.
34:30Snip them off.
34:31With duct tape.
34:32And then duct tape them down.
34:33I lost it.
34:34I lost the limbo dancing competition.
34:35I thought you were going to say you lost it.
34:37Lost the nipple.
34:38I lost the...
34:39I lost the nipple.
34:40It was a razor blade.
34:41Oh!
34:41We were playing in prison.
34:44Russian limbo.
34:47You lost the limbo competition.
34:50I lost...
34:50You amazed me.
34:51I know.
34:52Someone got lower than you.
34:53Somebody got lower.
34:54Can you imagine that?
34:55Someone more limbo than me.
34:57Oh.
34:58What a good reason is this.
35:00It was actually Lionel Blair.
35:02Obviously a dream.
35:05It wasn't.
35:06Me and Lionel Blair were having a limbo competition.
35:08It wasn't.
35:09And one of my nipples fell off.
35:11Yeah.
35:12That's right.
35:12I had a bit of blue cheese before I went to bed.
35:14No.
35:16It was for charity.
35:17It was a charitable limbo dancing competition.
35:20It was me, Sunita and Lionel Blair.
35:24Surely Sunita cleaned up.
35:26No.
35:26You'd think.
35:27You'd think, wouldn't you?
35:28You'd think Sunita, Lionel and me.
35:30No.
35:31No.
35:31I was third.
35:32Sunita, but Lionel...
35:33Well, he's a dancer to his fingertips.
35:36He's limbo.
35:36He's also about 70 years old.
35:38But he's limbo.
35:40Anyway.
35:41I know.
35:41Yes.
35:41So, the revolutionary thing about Dick Fosbury's flop was that it allows your centre of gravity
35:45to pass under the bar in innovation, which means that current world records are likely
35:50to stand forever.
35:51And so, to a matter of the utmost gravity, the dead weight of general ignorance.
35:56Fingers on buzzers, if you please.
35:58Hallelujah.
35:58Hallelujah.
35:59It's raining wine.
36:00Now, how big would a cloud need to be, right, in order to dispense for me my recommended
36:05daily limit of wine?
36:08Twelve stones.
36:09Four ounces.
36:13Does not confuse.
36:17Damn.
36:21That's your answer, isn't it?
36:22Yes, I know.
36:24OK.
36:25All right.
36:26Size of a car.
36:27A car.
36:28Well, oddly enough, you're strangely using the same metaphor that we are.
36:30We're using a form of transport.
36:32Of a VW.
36:33Bus is the right answer.
36:35About the size of a bus, a wine cloud would weep the same amount of water that would match
36:39i.e., 250 millilitres, which is your recommended daily allowance of wine to come from a crowd.
36:45Well, this recommended daily allowance business is very interesting.
36:49In Britain, it's 21 units, whatever that means, a week, I think.
36:53In Poland, it's 12 and a half units.
36:56It's a tiny amount.
36:57But in Canada, it's 23 and three quarters.
37:00In America, 24 and a half.
37:01South Africa and Denmark, 31.5.
37:03And guess where it's 35, Barry?
37:06Australia.
37:08Australia fair.
37:09Yeah.
37:10But our limit is 21.
37:14There's a study that found that if you drank between 21 and 30, you would belong to a group
37:19of people that had the lowest mortality rate in Britain.
37:22So, in other words, we're being recommended to drink too little alcohol for our health.
37:27In fact, it's been worked out you'd have to drink 63 units a week or a bottle of wine
37:32a day to face the same death risk as a teetotaler.
37:36I think you'll find that most people are actually making that up themselves, kind of, you know, instinctively.
37:42It's very good.
37:44Well, the odd thing is, is the guy who actually came up with it, he's admitted they made the number
37:48up.
37:48They said, well, we had to say something, so we said that.
37:50But is the assumption not that there are other lifestyle factors associated with the sort of person who likes a
37:57bit of wine?
37:57Having an accident is the main problem, obviously, yeah.
38:00But nonetheless, just statistically and actuarially, you are likely to live longer if you drink between 21 and 30.
38:06If you're a social animal, you're less stressed.
38:08It may actually be the physical effect of alcohol on the body is actually beneficial in those amounts.
38:13Anyway, if clouds were made of wine, you should limit yourself to about a bus full a day.
38:17Now, an easy one. How many bullets are there in a gunslinger's revolver?
38:22Seven. Five.
38:23Five.
38:24Twelve.
38:24Four.
38:27Six.
38:30Well, six, they're called six guns.
38:32Yeah.
38:33As you noticed, six chambers.
38:34But there was six in and one in the spout, isn't that?
38:36No, it's not quite the other way round.
38:38Five.
38:38You're right, five.
38:39Why five?
38:40Gravity.
38:45I used to know this, but I forgot.
38:47Well, it's simply safety.
38:48Wired Earth, who can be regarded as something as an expert, he said,
38:52I've often been asked why five shots without reloading were all the top-notch gunfighter ever fired with.
38:57When his guns were chambered for six.
38:59The answer is safety.
39:00The hammer rested on the empty chamber, so you could never discharge by mistake,
39:03because there was no safety catch on it.
39:05Oh.
39:05And there, of course, the great Clint Eastwood.
39:08I did a thing in America once, and there was an armourer,
39:12who's the film guy who gives you the gun and everything and takes it away
39:15and keeps you safe and gives you blanks or whatever.
39:18And he told me a fact.
39:19He'd been doing it since the thirties, he'd been working on westerns.
39:22He said only two actors he ever worked with, and he worked with them all,
39:26didn't blink when they fired a gun.
39:28This is actually, oddly enough, a shot of Clint exactly proving he was one of them,
39:32because there's guns going off and his eyes are open as much as they ever were.
39:36And he was one.
39:37He'd never blinked.
39:38John Wayne blinked.
39:39You know, Anthony Quinn.
39:40Gary Cooper.
39:41Who was the other?
39:42Kenneth Williams.
39:46The Carry On Cowboy.
39:48Yeah.
39:54The idea of those butch American armourers called Rusty and Randy or whatever,
39:59having heard of Kenneth Williams.
40:01It was your own guy, Kenneth.
40:02Goddamn Williams.
40:04No.
40:04Bravest guy I ever know.
40:05It's actually, Westworld is probably the western most people would think of.
40:09Yul Brynner.
40:09Yul Brynner never blunk.
40:10So anyway, the answer is they have five bullets, not six.
40:15So to gravy.
40:16You know when you're cooking a steak and all that red juice flows out of that red liquid?
40:20What is it?
40:20Blood.
40:21Blood?
40:22Oh!
40:24Oddly enough, it is.
40:26You'd think it was, wouldn't you?
40:27But it's not.
40:28It's another protein or substance.
40:29Not haemoglobin, but in fact something called myoglobin.
40:33It's the thing that's used to operate the muscles, but it isn't actually the blood that's coming out there.
40:38But it's not anything to do with blood then?
40:40Wait, no.
40:40It's called myoglobin.
40:42It's related.
40:43Is it colouring?
40:43Is it artificial colouring material?
40:44Nor is it artificial.
40:46It's real.
40:47You see, the two have distinct functions.
40:48When muscles are used for short, fast bursts of energy, glucose from the blood provides
40:52the fuel.
40:52For sustained activity, this stuff, myoglobin, is used to oxidise the fat and that provides
40:56the energy.
40:57I didn't realise this programme was so educational.
41:00I mean...
41:00Yeah?
41:01Oh.
41:02A lot of it's made up though.
41:04A lot of it's lies.
41:05Is it?
41:07Not the bullets that...
41:09I know it seems...
41:10I know.
41:11Absolutely.
41:11I'm going to test that out tonight.
41:13How would it be?
41:14Okay.
41:15So it's no blood.
41:16I don't know what it is if you put it in the gravy.
41:18And if you put it in gravy, you get...
41:20Yes.
41:21Gravity.
41:21Gravity.
41:22Exactly.
41:22So we go from gravity trains to the gravy train and the circle is complete.
41:26What's happening?
41:26So it's time for the scores, ladies and gentlemen.
41:30Oh, I say, this is really interesting.
41:33We have a tie for the lead, ladies and gentlemen.
41:35Rich and Alan at plus three.
41:38Plus three.
41:38Yes.
41:39Plus three.
41:47In third place with minus eight, Bill Bailey.
41:59Failing, failing to defy gravity the way Rich and Alan did and sinking like a stone, I fear.
42:04However, what a welcome and gorgeous pebble.
42:07Oh, what a shining, lustrous, gorgeous stone.
42:10At minus 36, Barry Humphrey is.
42:19Well, that's your lots and QI.
42:24My thanks to Barry Rich, Bill, Alan.
42:26And I leave you with one last interesting thing about gravity.
42:29You know, in the early days of television, it was widely believed that television sets weighed more when they were
42:34switched on.
42:35And the main reason for this belief apparently came from reading the manufacturer's instructions,
42:41which warned people always to switch off their sets before attempting to move them.
42:46Good night.
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