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  • 6 hours ago
First broadcast 30th September 2011.

Stephen Fry

Alan Davies
Rich Hall
Jimmy Carr
Phill Jupitus

Category

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TV
Transcript
00:01Good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, and welcome to our absolutely choice
00:07edition of QI, which is all about indecision.
00:11All in a dither tonight are A, Jimmy Carr, B, Rich Hall, C, Phil Jupiters, or D,
00:29none of the above, Alan Davis.
00:38Now, your buzzers are designed to help you make up your mind.
00:41Jimmy goes,
00:42Turn right, turn right.
00:44Phil goes,
00:46Turn left, turn left.
00:48Rich goes,
00:49Turn round, turn round.
00:51And Alan goes,
00:52Excuse me, sir, is this your vehicle?
00:55Are you sure?
00:56Will you blow into this bag, please, sir?
00:59And don't forget your nobody knows jokers.
01:02Have you got them there?
01:04Nobody knows.
01:06Yes, there is a question to which the answer is nobody knows, and if you can flag it up with
01:10your joker, you get extra points.
01:12Now, why was this tosser thrown out of the magic circle?
01:16Tosser is a technical term in this particular...
01:19What are you using real magic?
01:22That's not the reason, but it's a damn good thought, isn't it?
01:25Now, what gets you thrown out of the magic circle?
01:27Giving away the secrets.
01:28Yes.
01:29You've put your finger on it.
01:30This guy, John Lenihan, was thrown out of the magic circle for giving away a particular...
01:35A very famous...
01:37It's one that basically, you just have to buy a book and you know how to do it.
01:39As he said, if he'd been a murderer, he would have been let out of prison by now.
01:43But he's out of the magic circle for life, because he appeared on Des Lynam's How Do They Do That?
01:49And revealed...
01:50Oh, Lynam!
01:51Revealed one of the classic card scams that is used on the street corners to make money.
01:57Oh, find the lady.
01:58Find the lady, or as they call it in America, three-card-monty.
02:01Yes, because find the lady always makes me...
02:03I prefer three-card-monty, because find the lady had a really bad experience in Thailand once.
02:08Do you feel a bit of a dick?
02:13Oh, I'm sorry.
02:18They've always got the guy that comes up and goes,
02:22Oh, this looks pretty good, everyone.
02:24I might have a go at this.
02:25You're right, they have their shills.
02:26Yeah.
02:27The guys who say exactly, who put the money down, and are paid out, you know, and we've given you
02:33some money.
02:33Have you got it there with you?
02:34Oh, yeah, okay.
02:35I've got some money to pay you, I'd, in case you get it right.
02:38And here you are, now, watch the screen.
02:39All you have to do is find the lady, so watch, and then, there we go.
02:44There she is.
02:45There she is.
02:45Oh, okay.
02:46Keep your eyes on her, keep your eyes on her.
02:48Okay, which is she?
02:51You say the left?
02:52Yeah, left.
02:53Middle.
02:53Middle?
02:54Audience?
02:55Left!
02:56Obviously on the left, let's have a look.
02:58Here you are.
02:59Of course it's on the left.
03:00You just follow it with your eyes.
03:02Okay, let's have another go.
03:03Okay, this time we're doing it for money, now you've got the idea.
03:06Okay.
03:06Keep your eyes on the lady.
03:11There she is.
03:13Okay.
03:17Okay, where's she gone?
03:18Right, okay, you three put on a card each, and I will stick this in a lady's knickers in the...
03:25That's a whole other game.
03:27That's a whole other lady to find.
03:28There's a lady who put her hand up over there, Steve.
03:30She's put her hand up what?
03:32Except we put her...
03:34Oh, no.
03:37That's the trouble with this game.
03:38You always want to see it a second time, but they don't...
03:40Yes, they don't.
03:40So come on, place your bets.
03:41I'm going to go left, anyway.
03:43Okay, left.
03:44Yep.
03:44I'm going left.
03:45Left.
03:46Right.
03:46Right.
03:47Left.
03:48So three lefts and a right.
03:50Give me more.
03:53Audience, how many think left?
03:55Oh, most of you.
03:57In the middle.
03:57How many think middle?
03:58Only very few.
03:59How many think right?
04:01Oh, actually, majority think right.
04:02Okay, let's show.
04:04It is indeed the left.
04:06Put a roll!
04:07That's brilliant.
04:07Put a roll on!
04:08That's brilliant.
04:09Right, that's it.
04:10No, I'm getting my real money out now.
04:11And I'm on a roll.
04:13No, that's the time to quit.
04:15Well, look, I ought to explain when talking about John Lenihan,
04:18when I call him a tosser,
04:19that is the name for the guy who does that trick,
04:22is a tosser.
04:23It's called tossing.
04:24And you can win a lot of money by tossing.
04:27Ah!
04:27What the f***?
04:34I think somebody thought it was real money.
04:35Anyway, interesting.
04:38Wow.
04:38Okay.
04:39What the hell was that?
04:40We'll find out.
04:41Maybe, or maybe not.
04:43Okay, so...
04:44I'm not in on that.
04:45I just want you to know.
04:48Anyway, John Lenihan was expelled from the magic circle
04:51for exposing the secret of Find the Lady on television.
04:53Although the real secret is that even if you do choose correctly,
04:56someone is actually likely to run off with the money anyway,
04:59because that's the way they work.
05:00Now for something beginning with I,
05:02that you wouldn't choose in 100 years.
05:04Who expected the Spanish Inquisition?
05:08Was it, uh, was it, no.
05:12We all know, according to Monty Python,
05:14nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition.
05:16But in fact, they couldn't have been more wrong.
05:18Was it the Ku Klux Klan?
05:19Because those two fellows...
05:21I mean, it's true, they did, they did...
05:23I'm sorry, I thought that was the Pet Shop Boys.
05:27That's one of their best videos, actually.
05:29It's very, very moody.
05:31The fact is, the Spanish Inquisition always gave you 30 days' notice.
05:35They said, we're coming to inquisit you, or whatever verb...
05:41Now, is that Mr Rabinowitz?
05:43It's the Inquisition here.
05:46How are you?
05:48Listen, we're going to come round,
05:49and we're going to pull your balls out through your mouth.
05:52We're in the area.
05:54Yeah.
05:55But only for the next 30 days.
05:58Take advantage.
05:59Sorry, they gave you 30 days...
05:59They can sound like TV licence band.
06:02They gave you 30 days to prepare your case
06:05and prove that you weren't a heretic.
06:06So you had to wait around the house all day.
06:08Yeah.
06:09You'd have to be there between 8 and 5.
06:10Or get a priest.
06:13It's exactly...
06:14Or say, sorry, to torture my neighbour, I won't be in.
06:17He'll take my torture for me.
06:19No, it is a surprising thing, perhaps.
06:21But the Spanish Inquisition, when was it instituted?
06:24Can you...
06:24It went on for 350 years.
06:27Give me a century as to when it started.
06:29I can tell you, 1483.
06:30I can tell you an interesting...
06:31Bloody hell, that's close.
06:32Did I just say 1483?
06:33Yeah.
06:34Was that a guess?
06:38LAUGHTER
06:41See if I'm right?
06:46It was 1478, but that's...
06:49I mean, it's five years.
06:50That's very close.
06:51Well done.
06:52Well, in the beginning, they were coming around in five years.
06:55So in 78...
06:57But you have to know, it was the Spanish who took it upon themselves
07:00to have their own Inquisition.
07:01There was a papal Inquisition, but they wanted to take it upon themselves to have their own.
07:05It was an anti-Semitic piece of legislation, essentially.
07:07It was because they doubted that Jews who had to convert to stay in Spain,
07:11they doubted that they actually really meant it.
07:14And it was under these rulers of Spain at that time,
07:17who were, of course, Ferdinand and Isabella.
07:19Wow.
07:19Yeah.
07:20She's a dog.
07:21She's a dog.
07:22LAUGHTER
07:22You know what?
07:23She wouldn't mind you saying that.
07:24She would take it on the chin.
07:25Hey!
07:26LAUGHTER
07:26I went to a museum of torture in Spain.
07:30Did you?
07:30And I thought, I didn't know anything about it,
07:33but I imagined that the Spanish Inquisition was an awful few years.
07:37Yeah.
07:38But it went on for 350 years.
07:40And they had lots and lots of implements of torture that really...
07:44Oh, it was grotesque.
07:44I mean, you can't make it up.
07:46But the one that really sticks to my mind is one where you would be impaled through your anus
07:50on a very long, large pole that would go up your inside but miss all your vital organs
07:55and then come out of your shoulder.
07:57Oh, God.
07:58And so it wouldn't kill you, and then you'd just be there for days.
08:01And usually, you'd be...
08:03It'd be something public, so you'd be an example.
08:05Do you know what I...
08:06They were forever put hanging people from cages...
08:08Yes.
08:09...full of spikes from a pole at the entrance to towns.
08:12Well, but the Catholic Church, you won't be surprised to know,
08:14still has the Inquisition.
08:16It's changed its name over the years.
08:18In 1908, it changed the name to the Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office.
08:22In 1965, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
08:25And the leader under Pope John Paul II was...
08:29Who was in charge of it?
08:30Ratzinger.
08:31It was indeed, our current Pope.
08:33He was in charge of the Spanish Inquisition, was he?
08:35Not the Spanish Inquisition.
08:36They're very good at changing their name, I always think.
08:37When people talk about the Roman Empire sort of falling,
08:40I don't think they did fall, did they, the Roman Empire?
08:42They just became a church, continued on regardless.
08:44Basically, yeah.
08:45Now then, given the choice, what would be the next best thing
08:48to having a Nobel Prize winner in our audience tonight?
08:52Dennis Leary had a great joke about the Nobel Peace Prize.
08:55He said, the Nobel Peace Prize, I'd kill for one of those.
08:58That's very good.
08:59Now, there is a sort of serio-comic version of the Nobel Peace Prize.
09:04Oh, it's the Ig Nobel Awards.
09:06The Ig Nobel Prize is given to people who usually are genuine scientists,
09:10who have conducted research, some of which is just a little bit weird.
09:15There, for example, we have on our left a woman who invented an emergency bra
09:19that could be torn apart and turned into a gas mask.
09:23Two gas masks, obviously.
09:26And there on the right is the inventor of the Ig Nobel Prize, Mr. Mark Abraham.
09:29And I'm proud to say that in our audience, we have a winner of the Ig Nobel Prize,
09:34Professor Chris McManus.
09:35Are you there?
09:37There he is.
09:39Woo-hoo!
09:43Now, Professor McManus, they called you in the press the oddball professor.
09:49Perhaps you'd like to tell us the reason you won the Ig Nobel Prize.
09:52Well, I got the prize in 2002 for some work that was done half a lifetime earlier in 1976.
09:59Yes.
10:00And the paper was published in the most prestigious of science journals, Nature,
10:04and it was called scrotal asymmetry in man and in ancient sculpture.
10:10So, Tim, your work was looking at how male testicles were asymmetrical?
10:16Precisely.
10:16I've got an issue.
10:18Maybe you could help because you're an expert.
10:20Perhaps I should examine you afterwards.
10:21It's probably easy.
10:24I think I'm going to explain it.
10:25One of mine is bigger than the other two.
10:33Very good.
10:34Right.
10:35You are actually speaking to purpose, aren't you?
10:37Because there are higher percentage of men have one ball that hangs lower than the other,
10:40and you'd perhaps like to tell us which that is.
10:42That's right.
10:42Well, most people have the right one is higher and the left one is lower.
10:47Right.
10:47And that's the normal way around.
10:49Wait a minute.
10:49Which is fine.
10:50Yeah.
10:53So, it's okay.
10:58I've got two on the left.
11:00Is that right?
11:02Nothing on the right at all.
11:03Right.
11:03But the surprising thing is that in ancient and indeed Renaissance sculpture, you found...
11:11If you look at Michelangelo's David or any of these great sculptures, the right one is higher and the left
11:17one is lower and it's bigger.
11:19Yes.
11:20Which makes sense if you think about it.
11:23Why does that make sense?
11:25Well, you'd expect the heavier one to go lower.
11:28Yes, right.
11:29Oh, I see.
11:29But it's against what is...
11:31But it's against what is...
11:31The trouble is, it ain't that way.
11:32When you get home later, you'll find that...
11:35Oh, no, no, man!
11:37The higher one is also the bigger one.
11:40So...
11:40The Greeks got it wrong.
11:41That's the...
11:42That was where it got interest.
11:43But that's odd because they had bodies.
11:45Is it because the Greek sculptors used mirrors and used their own equipment and therefore got it the wrong way
11:50around or was there some other reason?
11:52I think probably that their real problem is that they had a theory and there's nothing more dangerous than a
11:56theory that's wrong.
11:58Yes.
11:58And they actually didn't know what the testicles were for.
12:00This seems a bit strange, but they haven't quite worked it out.
12:04Mine are purely decorative.
12:06So what was the Greek theory?
12:08Aristotle had this charming theory that little boys have tiny little testicles and very high voices.
12:14But as you get bigger and you go into puberty, the testicles get bigger, they pull down and they tension
12:20the body and the voice gets deeper.
12:22Oh.
12:23So they thought there were weights to tension the male body.
12:26And is that not the case?
12:29Which is why Barry White never did a marathon.
12:34So for that though, you won the Ig Nobel Prize and is that something you're proud of?
12:40It's something I can't deny, put it that way.
12:43Right.
12:43But it doesn't go to stupid people, it does go to genuine scientists.
12:47At the end of the Nobel Prize is Mark Abrams always sends his consolations to those people.
12:52To those who haven't won it and particularly to those who have.
12:54I also believe that you're expected to make an acceptance speech.
12:56I did.
12:57And it's traditional for the acceptance speech to be interrupted by a young girl who shouts, please stop it, I'm
13:03bored.
13:03Is that correct?
13:04Yes.
13:04Mark has the problem that the Oscars and all other awards ceremonies have, that everybody talks too long and thanks
13:09everybody.
13:10Yeah.
13:10So he came up with this device called Little Miss Sweetie Poo, who's a charming eight-year-old girl and
13:15after precisely 60 seconds she walks across the stage and says,
13:19please stop, I'm bored, please stop, I'm bored, please stop, I'm bored.
13:23And they do.
13:24It's a brilliant idea and indeed you had your own daughters did that job, I believe.
13:28Well at the show in London I have identical twin daughters and so we have both of them doing, please
13:32stop, I'm bored, please stop, I'm bored.
13:34Is not one of them slightly bigger than the other?
13:39Maybe a little shorter?
13:44Well that's brilliant.
13:45Well Professor McManus, thank you very much indeed and congratulations.
13:50This has been, that is quite interesting.
13:52That is quite interesting indeed.
13:54Anyway, the next best thing to winning a Nobel Prize is winning an egg Nobel Prize.
14:00First they make you laugh and then they make you think.
14:02Now here's a tricky decision.
14:04Which is more mammally, a mouse or a hippopotamus?
14:08More mammally.
14:09Right, so is this which one has got more breasts?
14:14No.
14:16It's about the way we decide, because indecision is our theme today.
14:19It's that if you give people tests about categories and you show them certain kinds of items that fit a
14:26category.
14:27Say you're doing the fruit category and you show them an apple and a pear, they'll instantly go fruit.
14:32But show them a fig and a raisin, they'll take a bit longer.
14:36Show them a pumpkin and an olive, they'll take a lot longer.
14:39Because they're, oh are they frozen?
14:40And it's the same with mammals.
14:42People will instantly say a mouse is a mammal.
14:44The hippopotamus will go, oh it's sort of wet and slimy.
14:47Oh of course it's a mammal.
14:47And it just takes that bit longer.
14:49I think if, if, if I was to stage an all mouse production of West Side Story.
15:00The way this is set up though, it does look like the hippo is sort of sneaking up on the
15:04mouse.
15:04It does.
15:06Can we photoshop a Rizzler in that mouse?
15:09Oh yes!
15:13Should I be really sort of nerdily myself now and say that really you shouldn't say Rizzler.
15:17Do you know what you should say?
15:18What should you say Stephen?
15:20Well, it's French and Riz is the French for rice.
15:23Yeah.
15:24And the company that makes it is La Croix.
15:26And you may notice if you see a Rizzler packet sometimes you might have torn the top part off.
15:30Why Stephen?
15:32For some reason, some reason you might need a spare piece of cardboard.
15:36Yeah just a jot.
15:38Yeah just a jot on someone's email address.
15:42So, but you'll notice it says Riz, La, i.e. Rizz, La we think.
15:47And then there's a big cross and the company is La Croix, which is the cross.
15:51And it's rice, the cross, it's rice paper made by the cross.
15:55La Croix.
15:55La Croix is the name of the company.
15:57Stephen when I get to Glastonbury, I'm going to be talking about that for nine hours.
16:03It's there, right?
16:05Look, look, look.
16:07Now where the cross was.
16:10I tore that bit off.
16:14Well I just...
16:15I'm like a fajita.
16:19Anyway, I can see I'm boring you.
16:22Here I am.
16:22Not until we get an eight-year-old girl running in front of you.
16:25There you are.
16:26Bring all the twins.
16:28One way to tell if something's a mammal is to check whether it has nipples,
16:32which reminds me a piece of Eye for Irishness.
16:35What do you call an Irishman with no nipples?
16:39Oh that's Richard Harris of course.
16:41In A Man Called Horse.
16:42Oh God, A Man Called Horse.
16:42It's a great movie isn't it?
16:43It seems extreme when I first saw that, but now there's guys in Camden Town that have that done.
16:47Yeah, that'd be an Edinburgh show now, wouldn't it?
16:51Yeah.
16:51Part of the festival.
16:52He deserved ten times worse than that for writing MacArthur Park.
16:56Oh yes, the cake had left out in the rain.
16:57Yeah, someone left the cake in the rain, who cares?
17:00My man left the cake out in the rain, it would have absorbed all the rain.
17:03She made a very dry cake.
17:06He didn't have to write, to be fair, to Richard Harris.
17:09It was written by Judy Webb, but he did sing it.
17:12And he's guilty of that.
17:13But this question isn't about Richard Harris.
17:15This is about Irishmen with no nipples.
17:17It seems bizarre, but there is a real historical point of interest here.
17:22What could an Irishman never be if he had no nipples?
17:26Symmetric.
17:26We're going back into the past in Ireland.
17:33It's a very peculiar thing, but part of your way of showing loyalty to your sovereign,
17:38if you were an Irish subject in the ancient days of the Irish kings,
17:42was you had to suck their nipples.
17:44Right?
17:45So, and you may say, well, okay, but what kind of person doesn't have nipples?
17:49There would be fights, contests, and people would apply, as it were, to be king of Ireland.
17:55And if they were found not suitable, they would have their nipples cut off,
17:59which meant they could never be king of Ireland.
18:01Sorry, they did it like Britain's Got Talent.
18:04Basically, yes.
18:05This is how Britain's Got Talent, they should just tweak it so it's the same.
18:09It would be quite something.
18:10But there was old crochen man, which was one of the peat bog discoveries,
18:14and he was so well preserved that when he was discovered,
18:17it wasn't archaeologists or museums or anthropologists who I got in touch with,
18:21it was the police.
18:22But in fact, it was from between 300-odd to 100-odd BC that this person had died.
18:28So the chances of getting, you would describe that as a cold case.
18:31Oh, yeah, you were.
18:32The chances of getting a conviction.
18:34But he was so well preserved, people said,
18:35oh, my God, here's this recently killed body.
18:37But he was found with nipples pinched and cut off.
18:40So he appears to have been someone who basically was deprived ritually
18:45of his attribute of kingship before being killed.
18:48So there you are.
18:49That seems to be the case.
18:51But there are extra points, if you can tell me, the national colour of Ireland.
18:55Well, this feels like a trap.
18:57It does indeed.
18:58That's the flag, but that's not necessarily an indication of what the national colour is.
19:02Blue.
19:02National colour.
19:03Blue is the right answer.
19:05Yes, get in.
19:05Very good.
19:09The fact is, of course, it's changed and now everybody thinks it's green
19:13and green is where one paints themselves green in Chicago and New York
19:16for St. Patrick's Day.
19:17But St. Patrick's colour was blue.
19:19And it was known as St. Patrick's Blue.
19:22The coat of arms of Ireland, you may see,
19:24is a shield of a harp against a ground of St. Patrick's Blue.
19:28And the Irish guards are distinct because of the blue in their bearskins.
19:33So blue was always really the colour of Ireland until really it was in 1798
19:38when they had one of their many rebellions
19:40and green then became a symbol of Irish nationalism
19:43and sort of took over from blue.
19:46Sucking a king's nipples was a gesture of submission in ancient Ireland.
19:49So if you lost yours, you couldn't be king.
19:51Now, you've got a big decision coming up in 40 minutes' time, imagine, okay?
19:55So, what's the best thing you can do now
19:57to ensure that you make the right choice?
20:00Just make the decision now.
20:03Now, it's coming up in 40 minutes' time.
20:05You may not know what it is, like Dwight.
20:07You need to get yourself into a rage
20:09because you make all the right choices when you're angry.
20:11That's very well remembered from a previous edition.
20:13So one of them is anger.
20:14Anger, it's true, apparently you make better decisions when you're angry.
20:18I'm giving you a clue.
20:19You give me a clue?
20:21Have some water.
20:22Yeah, have some water. Lots of water, lots and lots of water.
20:24Drink lots of water.
20:25Yeah, so that in 40 minutes' time...
20:27You'll be in the loo and you won't have to make the decision.
20:29Oh, no.
20:32Bizarrely, no.
20:33In 40 minutes, you'll be popping to go to the loo.
20:34Yes.
20:35And that's apparently when we make our best decisions.
20:37Do we need a week?
20:38Shut up.
20:39Shut up.
20:40It's true, girlfriend.
20:44Shut up.
20:46Absolutely.
20:47The last sort of big decision I made when busting for a piss was to pull over and take
20:52a piss by the side of the road.
20:53That seemed like the best decision I ever made, but it happened.
20:56If you're given a serious decision to make, it seems that for some reason it somehow allows
21:03you to make clear decisions.
21:05Do you know why I think it is?
21:06I think it's probably right, but I think it's the conscious versus the unconscious mind.
21:10I think your unconscious mind is the smart bit, and the answers kind of bubble up.
21:14You know when you're trying to remember something?
21:16Absolutely.
21:16To not try and concentrate on that thing, to try and distract yourself, and sometimes
21:20it just bubbles up more organically.
21:21Absolutely.
21:22Whereas actually when you try and focus on it, and actually when you need a pee, that's
21:24all you can think about, is needing a pee.
21:26I think that's right, or the answer to the crossword clue pops into your head.
21:29Exactly.
21:30I'm going to try and nail the general ignorance.
21:33Exactly.
21:34I think I'm definitely going to do a celebrity mastermind now.
21:37You should.
21:38Just 20 bottles of Evian before I go on.
21:43What?
21:44Ask!
21:46Red!
21:47Orange!
21:48Hitler!
21:49I'm going to go, John!
21:52Red, orange, Hitler.
21:53I'm trying to think what that would be.
21:55What is your specialist subject?
21:58A painting.
22:00Oh, I love it.
22:01Fair enough.
22:02Good one.
22:02So, now according to the father of history, who was Herodotus, the Greek historian, surely
22:07there hadn't been much history.
22:09Of course.
22:11It was my roots.
22:11Really back then, it was, I mean, when he's talking about it, it was, you know, two weeks
22:15ago.
22:17Has he got his hair woven into his beard?
22:20It does.
22:21It does have all one piece, doesn't it?
22:22Father of hair.
22:23Yeah.
22:24That's the, but he wrote of the Persians that when they wanted to make a decision, they
22:29made a decision drunk and then reviewed it when sober.
22:33And if they both tarried, they thought it was right.
22:35Or they made a decision when sober and then reviewed it when drunk.
22:39And he said also, as if shocked, he said, um, to vomit or obey natural calls in the presence
22:45of another is forbidden among them.
22:48And it's like, gosh, Persians are really weird.
22:50They don't pee and poo in front of each other.
22:52I think that says more about Greeks, which Herodotus was.
22:54But he was surprised by that.
22:57Did he think it's odd?
22:58Pooing and...
22:59Does he mean that they go back behind a tree, whereas the Greek would go in front of
23:02the tree?
23:02Yeah, or in front of each other.
23:03The Romans used to all sit around chatting, didn't they?
23:06I've seen the toilets in Pompeii.
23:08They just used to sit there.
23:09What?
23:10Yeah.
23:10Next to each other.
23:11Yeah.
23:12Yeah.
23:12And why not?
23:13Well, all kinds of reasons.
23:14We stare straight ahead.
23:16Straight ahead at the war.
23:18Whereas me, I mean, I'd go in with a ghetto blaster so people can't hear the noises, honestly.
23:22That reminds me of one of the stories about Marilyn Monroe.
23:25Do you know this story?
23:25When Marilyn Monroe was engaged to Arthur Miller, the playwright, she was very nervous about meeting
23:29Arthur Miller's parents, who were Jewish intellectuals.
23:31And they went to their quite small house in New York.
23:34Arthur said, you know, come and eat, Mum and Dad.
23:35And they were having a dinner.
23:37And at one point, she wanted to go up and use the loo.
23:40And she realized, when she was given directions to it, that it was above the dining room.
23:44And so to disguise the sound of herself peeing, she turned the taps on.
23:48And then had a pee, and then flushed the loo, and turned the taps on, washed the hands,
23:51came down again.
23:52And the next day, Arthur Miller called up his father and said, so what did you think of Marilyn?
23:56His father said, nice girl, pisses like a horse.
24:00His father said, nice girl, pisses like a horse.
24:04Wow, what?
24:08Now, what big decision did the driver of the number 78 London bus have to make in December 1952?
24:16Turn right.
24:17Oh, yes, Jimmy.
24:19Coronation is all I know about 52.
24:21Ah, yes.
24:21The Queen didn't get the bus to choose.
24:23No, no, she didn't.
24:24You might, if your bus users know where the 78 bus goes.
24:28It's, no, it doesn't go in my way.
24:30Tower Bridge.
24:32It does.
24:32He had to jump the bridge.
24:34He, brilliant.
24:35He had to jump the bridge.
24:38Whoa.
24:40Whoa.
24:43He was approaching it, there was some mistake with the warning sign, and as he was getting
24:46on the first, do you know what they call each one of these?
24:49They're called bascules from the French for a seesaw.
24:51And as he was approaching the first one, he, he, he was already on it when he saw they
24:55were rising.
24:56And he took a split second decision and accelerated.
24:59And the second one was lower down.
25:01And he, he, three, three foot in the air, whatever it was, and then just landed on the
25:04second one.
25:05No one was injured.
25:06And he won for his bravery, 10 pounds.
25:10And it was an employee of the month.
25:12And employee, I'm sure, employee of the month.
25:14The only driver of the week.
25:15Yeah.
25:15But I mean, it was a very brave, very, very brave fellow.
25:17You'll want to know his name.
25:19Bob Knievel.
25:20It was a, it was a very good, I'll describe his name, Albert Gunton.
25:25Bertie Gunton.
25:26Of course it was.
25:27Bertie Gunton.
25:27And, and he should be proud.
25:28And if his family are watching, I hope you're still proud of him, and I'm sure you are.
25:31What is that thing about split second decisions, though?
25:33I don't know.
25:34He just made the right one.
25:35He needed a wee.
25:35He must have needed a wee.
25:37The car is kind of where that happens, of making a split decision and coming close to something
25:41and to go to my car.
25:42I know it's weird what happens, isn't it?
25:43Of course, I mean, there are two answers to that.
25:44One is, there may be something small you've seen that you just can't remember.
25:48And the other is, you wouldn't be able to tell the story if you'd got it wrong and you'd
25:51been dead in a crack.
25:53So it was everybody who is alive by definition.
25:55Oh, so all the, all the anecdotes about I made a split second decision and it went very badly.
25:59Yes.
25:59They're not here.
26:00Naturally, not there to be told.
26:02There is that side of it.
26:03Yeah.
26:04But anyway.
26:04It's like the conductor who fell out the back.
26:06Yes, exactly.
26:08LAUGHTER
26:09LAUGHTER
26:12APPLAUSE
26:15APPLAUSE
26:16Well, one thing we can say...
26:17See, he falls into the Thames.
26:18Gun-to!
26:21LAUGHTER
26:21One thing we can say with confidence, Boris, is that that wouldn't have happened with a bendy bus.
26:28No, but the brilliant thing that would happen with a bendy bus, Stephen, is that it would
26:31go between the two things of the bridge, and then the bridge could play the accordion.
26:34LAUGHTER
26:35It's true!
26:36It never occurred to me.
26:38It never occurred to me.
26:40Now, if one or other of these identical twins committed a burglary and you had eyewitness reports,
26:46DNA and fingerprints, how could you get a conviction?
26:49Turn left.
26:50Yeah.
26:51Waterboarding.
26:52LAUGHTER
26:55I may have to refine that.
26:57Turn right!
26:57It's even simpler than that.
26:59It's twins.
26:59Yeah.
27:00It's the evil one.
27:01LAUGHTER
27:03It's...
27:04A, we have to be legal, so waterboarding's out.
27:06But they're identical.
27:08Monozygotic twins, in other words, they're DNAs.
27:10And what have we got?
27:10We've got DNA.
27:11Yeah, you've got fingerprints, you've got...
27:13You've got eyewitness reports.
27:14Are fingerprints the same in...?
27:15No, that's the point.
27:16Fingerprints...
27:16Fingerprints are very, very, very similar, and you have to be a heck of a...
27:20of an expert to be able to detect the difference, but in a court of law, you can demonstrate
27:24the difference.
27:24Stephen, is this a real question or did you forget to tape a CSI last week?
27:28It's a real question.
27:30It's a real question.
27:30There have been, indeed, very recently, here's a case, just January 2009, $6.8 million worth
27:36of jewellery was stolen from the Kaufhaus des Vestens, which is one of the great department
27:40stores of the world, one of my favourites, in the Kürfürstendamm in Berlin.
27:45And they stole all this jewellery...
27:46But it was German, so nobody cared.
27:48Well, $6.8 million worth, so a lot of insurance, and a pair of twins named Abbas and Hassan
27:53Amurat were amongst the three suspects and walked free, despite there being DNA evidence
27:58of their presence in the scene, or one of their presences.
28:01That's the point.
28:01From the evidence we have, we can deduce that at least one of the brothers took part in
28:05the crime, but it has not been possible to determine which one.
28:08So you can't imprison both just because one of them did it.
28:10That's the point.
28:11What happens with conjoined twins, then?
28:14That has happened as well, because in the case of the original Siamese twins, one of
28:18them was rather a drunkard and committed an offence, but couldn't go to prison because
28:22it would mean imprisoning the other one.
28:24So they got away scot-free.
28:27Now, identity parades, fascinating things.
28:29As you know, you are a suspect, and the police are supposed to get people who look vaguely
28:34like you, all wear the same clothes, line them up, and an eyewitness says it was number
28:37three or whatever.
28:39Anyway, nowadays they use something called VIPER.
28:40Do you know about that?
28:41What VIPER?
28:42VIPER stands for Video Identification Parade Electronic Recording.
28:45Because, as recently as 1997, the South Yorkshire police had a suspect who was six foot three,
28:5116 stone, and black.
28:53They couldn't find anyone of a similar description, so they got a make-up artist to black up a
28:57group of white men, not including their hands, and unsurprisingly the eyewitness chose the
29:04genuinely black person.
29:06Well, these days they have all kinds of identity parades, but the old type that we're familiar
29:10with is nowadays not regarded as reliable, and there are reasons for that.
29:14And we might even be able to demonstrate what those reasons are, because earlier in the
29:18show, you may remember, a rascal ran across the set and stole some money straight from
29:24my hand.
29:24You all saw it happen.
29:26You apprehended him.
29:27Can you pick the culprit from this line-up?
29:29We've apprehended him, and we've got some others to see if you can find out who it is.
29:34Okay, here they are, one, two, three, and four.
29:37So, was it number one, stealing our money?
29:40Was it number two, stealing our hearts, or is that just me?
29:43Or was it number three, was it number three, stealing himself for a spanking, or was it
29:50number four, stealing a format idea from Nevermind the Buzzcocks?
30:06Very good control from our ID parade here.
30:11So, I'm going to ask each one of you to give me numbers to which you think it was.
30:15You all saw the moment, or at least very briefly, which is how crimes are committed.
30:19Phil, are you going to give me number one, two, three, or four?
30:23Er...
30:23This isn't fair.
30:24Phil's had much more experience in this game than others.
30:25That's true, yeah.
30:27Phil's built a career on this game.
30:29Yeah, he knows which one is in the kooks.
30:31I think...
30:33He could just stick a bass player in their form.
30:37So, it was fleeting, wasn't it?
30:38It was fleeting.
30:39Two.
30:39Number two?
30:40I'm going one.
30:41One.
30:42One, two and one?
30:43Two.
30:44Two?
30:44It's number one.
30:45Number one.
30:45Okay, so we're split between two and one.
30:47Those of you in the audience who think it's number one, raise your hand.
30:52That's quite a fair number.
30:53Those of you who think it's number two...
30:54You probably had a better view, actually, didn't you?
30:55Oh, that's quite a lot, too.
30:56You did all have a better view.
30:57Those who think it's number three?
30:59A few of you think it's number three.
31:00And those of you who think it's number four?
31:02Again, a few of you.
31:03With the real feet, please step forward.
31:05Wait a minute.
31:06There you are.
31:07Number two.
31:08Well done.
31:11Very good.
31:12Very good.
31:13Very good indeed.
31:14So, thank you all.
31:15Thank you all for our line-up, including the three innocents.
31:19Can I just...
31:21I...
31:22Yeah.
31:24I got that wrong.
31:25I said number one, and it was actually number two.
31:27But when I saw number one, I instantly thought,
31:29that guy has done something very, very bad.
31:33And I think it will...
31:34You know, a couple of months' time, the news will land,
31:36he's done a terrible, terrible thing.
31:37he's done a terrible, terrible thing.
31:39And that, unfortunately, is the kind of way people go.
31:42They say, oh, I don't like his face, or I do like his face.
31:44But I have to say, I'm very impressed by the audience,
31:46because, as you probably all know, we've all heard of tests
31:48in which this kind of thing happens at, you know,
31:51sort of, if you're doing forensics or criminology,
31:54this happens in lectures and so on.
31:55I was sitting in a cafe, and then I saw some kids stealing a scooter
31:58with some bolt cutters.
31:59Yeah.
32:00And they sped off with it, and then a few minutes later,
32:02the police arrived, and I went over the road, and I said,
32:04I saw the kids who did this.
32:07Yeah.
32:07And the cop said, what colour was the scooter, sir?
32:10And I said, it was gold, kind of metallic gold.
32:12And the owner was there, and he went, it was silver.
32:15So suddenly you weren't very trusted.
32:17No.
32:17And then, about ten minutes later, the kids came past,
32:20and I followed them round the corner onto hybrid fields,
32:23keeping my distance.
32:24Yes.
32:25And then phoned this into police station, and I said,
32:27they're here, I'm following them, I'm following them now.
32:29They're walking along.
32:31No one came.
32:33What's because you were doing a silly voice?
32:37Yeah, do it in your own voice next time.
32:39Yeah, sure.
32:40Well, that was very interesting.
32:41It shows that it's entirely useless having an ID parade.
32:44You have to say it did very well.
32:45I'm surprised.
32:46It is on a pop voice.
32:47I got it right.
32:47You got it right?
32:48You know how I got it right?
32:49How?
32:50I wet my pants.
32:52That's it.
32:53Exactly.
32:57You're learning.
32:59All right.
33:00It is more difficult than we think or realise to pick a suspect
33:03from an identity parade or their audience,
33:05and half our panel did very well.
33:07And now to the moment when I'm afraid you have no choice at all.
33:10It's general ignorance.
33:11So fingers on buzzers, please.
33:12And remember, we haven't had our nobody knows question yet.
33:15Oh.
33:16Who was the first person to go round the world in 80 days?
33:19Turn right.
33:20Yeah.
33:21Michael Palin.
33:23Really?
33:24Really?
33:25Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
33:28It's a real person.
33:30I'm not counting fictional.
33:31In the fiction, of course, it's...
33:32Phileas Fogg.
33:33It was Phileas Fogg, yeah.
33:34The blue whale.
33:36First person was very much in the question.
33:39But it's interesting I said first person.
33:41Because, in fact, it was a woman.
33:43Amy Johnson?
33:44Oh.
33:45Say that, show that again in the audience.
33:47Nelly Flyne.
33:48Well done, audience member.
33:50Nelly Flyne is the right of...
33:51Nelly Flyne?
33:53Yes.
33:54A picture.
33:54And...
33:57Very interesting, indeed.
33:59And I think Nelly Flyne is someone we all should have heard of, because she's a very remarkable
34:02woman.
34:04She was possibly the world's first investigative journalist.
34:06She was a remarkably bold, brave and adventurous woman.
34:09Wow.
34:09She worked for The World, which was Joseph Pulitzer's newspaper.
34:14In 1890, after the astonishing success of Jules Venn's novel, Around the World in 80 Days,
34:18Joseph Pulitzer decided that he would try and get someone genuinely to go around the world in 80 days,
34:23which hadn't been done yet.
34:24And he awarded the role to one of his journalists.
34:26And Nelly Flyne said, basically, if you don't give me the task, I will leave the world and go to
34:32another newspaper.
34:33And so valued was she that he said, well, okay, you've got the job.
34:36And she did it in 72 days, which is pretty damned impressive.
34:41In those days, in the 1890s, before aeroplanes, obviously, getting from one place all the way around the globe
34:46to another in that amount of time was a heck of an achievement.
34:49It took a bloody long time to get from Scotland to London in those days.
34:52Well, quite, exactly.
34:53Can you remember in the book the sorts of forms of travel Phyllis Fogg used?
34:57There were some trains going on, weren't there?
34:58Trains, yes.
34:59Hot air balloons.
35:00Yes.
35:00Not hot air balloons.
35:01That's the bizarre thing.
35:02Just had a balloon on the screen.
35:03I know.
35:04Because of the film.
35:05In the film, the Michael Todd film, David Niven, one always thinks of the balloon.
35:09But in fact, in the book, he doesn't use a balloon.
35:11Anyway, she did it in 72 days, 6 hours and 11 minutes from New York to New York.
35:16Grand parade.
35:16But maybe she should be better remembered for her campaigns against bad landlords, injustice,
35:21injustice to women in prisons.
35:22And most amazingly, she also managed to smuggle herself into an insane asylum
35:26and wrote an extraordinary report about the unbelievable cruelty that was dealt to the mentally ill.
35:31Well, I think that's a more extraordinary story than you know.
35:33It sounds to me like she managed to talk her way out of an insane asylum.
35:36Well, of course.
35:37With a story about being an investigative journalist.
35:39Well, you're actually right.
35:41In both cases, impressive.
35:42Now, how can you tell which of these chicks is male and which is female?
35:48Oh, this must be.
35:49This must be.
35:50Oh, I'm afraid not.
35:55Have you said that in the 1920s?
35:57Because the answer would have been, nobody knows.
35:59Oh, for God.
35:59But in 1929, the Japanese astonished the world by revealing that they found a way to sex chicks,
36:06as you say, in other words, to determine their gender.
36:10It sounds so wrong, doesn't it?
36:12I know how to sex a chick.
36:14I can do it.
36:16It seems impossible with the naked eye to do it because the day old chick,
36:19you have to wait till they're six weeks old and the pastor used to have to.
36:22And in the egg-laying industry, that's a heck of a waste because I'm afraid to say
36:26that the male chicks have no use whatsoever to the egg-laying industry.
36:29Guest on the first day.
36:30Enjoy your eggs.
36:31Yes.
36:32That's why...
36:33Quite.
36:341927 at the World Poultry Congress in Oswer.
36:37This was announced...
36:37The what?
36:38At the World Poultry Congress.
36:40That's a lot of chicken.
36:42For one representative of Albania, make himself known.
36:45What?
36:45Albanian chicken!
36:47That sounds bad, but of course it's one of the biggest businesses in the world.
36:50The most populous number of birds.
36:52We eat them, we eat their eggs, and so there are World Poultry Congresses.
36:55Yeah, listen, you know what?
36:55We've all done corporate gigs.
36:57I imagine...
36:57I imagine I did it.
36:58I imagine I did 20 minutes at the end.
37:00I once did Philips Small Appliances.
37:03That poor boy.
37:06It was a long time...
37:09It was a long time ago.
37:11You leave his appliances together.
37:12It was a long time ago.
37:13Which is why I won't have him in the house anymore.
37:17So how do you sex a chicken?
37:19Well, it's very complex, that's the point.
37:21And it's highly...
37:22No, we do know.
37:23It's highly paid.
37:25And the discovery lowered the price of eggs worldwide overnight.
37:29That's how important it was.
37:31And the Zen Nippon Chick Sexing School was founded.
37:35I know you're laughing.
37:37I know you're laughing.
37:38I know you're laughing.
37:39It's true.
37:40It's true.
37:41You're looking at a graduate.
37:43And they taught their sexes in such a rigorous way that only 5-10% of applicants received accreditation.
37:51But when you passed, you were paid huge sums of money.
37:54You had chick master.
37:56Yeah.
37:56Hundreds of dollars a day.
37:57It was a really big business.
37:59Boy.
37:59And it still is.
38:00It still is.
38:01How do you know?
38:01I know.
38:04You don't know.
38:04There was one...
38:07The best of the business can sex around 1,200 chicks an hour.
38:11And there are some incredibly talented ones who can have one in each hand.
38:15Boy.
38:15Boy.
38:15Boy.
38:16Boy.
38:17Boy.
38:18Boy.
38:19Boy.
38:21Boy.
38:23Boy.
38:24The point is...
38:26The point is you pick them up and you just go like that.
38:29Pop them in bins.
38:30Girl bin, boy bin.
38:31Girl bin, boy bin.
38:31And you can do 1,200.
38:33So something you need to wait.
38:35No, it's not.
38:35They look...
38:36They do a slight squeeze.
38:38I've got...
38:39They do a...
38:40You won't like this.
38:41They do a slight squeeze.
38:42And if they go...
38:43Ow!
38:43And if they go...
38:47That's naughty.
38:48They go...
38:49Steady on me.
38:50It's a boy.
38:51They have a cloacal tract, which is their reproductive and their excretory tract.
38:55And there is a slight difference in the ridges and bumps.
38:58Sort of innies and outies that they have.
39:00So you do a slight squeeze.
39:02If it's too big, you throttle them or the outie becomes an innie.
39:06So it's a real skill.
39:07This is something I vaguely knew about growing up in Norfolk.
39:09Because in Norfolk, there is a community of Vietnamese turkey sexes.
39:13Who knew...
39:15I know it's not bad.
39:16I can never watch Platoon again!
39:20You've ruined Apocalypse Now for me.
39:23I'm sorry about that.
39:24What sexy chicken!
39:26You tell me now!
39:28This is...
39:29This...
39:30I know it sounds awful.
39:32They live in tunnels under the fence.
39:36This is not in the fence, it's in Norfolk, he said.
39:39Defensively, the fence came from...
39:41Thank you, Paul.
39:42So, tell me they work for Bernard, please.
39:44Well, of course.
39:45Yeah, Bernard Mattis is the largest employer for...
39:48Mr. Matthew, this one boot it for!
39:56All right, chicken sectioning is a fine art these days.
39:59Now, the sun rises roughly in the east, as we know, and sets in the west.
40:03But what does the moon do?
40:04Yeah.
40:05Where does it rise in?
40:06What direction does the moon...
40:07Which moon are we talking about, Stephen?
40:11Ohhhhhhhhhh.
40:14This show is getting shot.
40:15Oh, whoa!
40:16Oh, oh, oh, oh!
40:17Wow!
40:18It goes the other way on.
40:19The opposite direction.
40:20Well, actually...
40:22Sorry to say, that isn't true either.
40:25Oh, I know.
40:26No, it's the same.
40:27It's the same.
40:28It's the same.
40:28Also, rises in the east.
40:29Are you sure?
40:31The same.
40:32Correctly correct, Stephen.
40:33Well done.
40:34Yeah.
40:34The moon rises in the east and sets in the west like the sun.
40:37And lastly, how many different species of mussel can you see here?
40:42Is this it?
40:43Oh, oh, oh, oh!
40:43Is this the question?
40:45Oh!
40:45There you go.
40:46Oh, sir, Jimmy got there first.
40:48Nobody knows it's the right answer.
40:49I just found it quicker than time.
40:50It had to be in the last one of the show.
40:52Well done, you're absolutely right.
40:53It's the last one we have.
40:54Yeah, the fact is, it's almost impossible to identify species...
40:56Even belgos themselves.
40:58Yes.
40:59Impossible to do or impossible to care?
41:02Well...
41:02Do you think they just go, it's mussel, should we just boil these and eat them?
41:05Because they are delicious and times are wasted.
41:07We used to think by size and appearance you could tell which species was which.
41:11We now find it seems it's only the genome that tells us.
41:13Species we thought were completely different, we've discovered are the same.
41:16And, conversely, species we thought were the same turned out to be different.
41:20So which nation are secretly training their citizens to be able to tell what species
41:25are they from?
41:26I wonder.
41:27The Albanians have muscle ninjas.
41:29It's almost certainly the Albanians, you're right.
41:31But the time has finally come to act decisively and declare tonight's winner.
41:36It's very exciting looking here.
41:38Wow.
41:38Yes, indeed.
41:39Let's, um...
41:40Well, let's start at the top with a fantastic result.
41:44Our winner, with a clear plus 10 points, is Phil Jupitus!
41:50I never had a hat.
41:52I never had a hat.
41:54In a rather surprising second place, with four points, it's the audience!
42:01Congratulations!
42:04Very impressive.
42:08That puts, um...
42:09That puts Jimmy, who would otherwise have come second, in third place with minus one.
42:18And, uh, in fourth place with minus two, Rich Hall.
42:25But, um...
42:26Still doesn't stop Alan from coming last, I fear, with minus 14!
42:37So, it's thanks to Rich, Jimmy, Phil and Alan, and I leave you with this tale of choice
42:42in Soviet Russia, from comedian Yakov Smirnov.
42:45In Russia, we had only two channels.
42:48Channel one was propaganda.
42:50Channel two consisted of a KGB officer telling you,
42:53turn back at once to channel one.
42:56Thank you and good night.
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