- 2 days ago
First broadcast 12th December 2014.
Stephen Fry
Alan Davies
Jack Whitehall
Sara Pascoe
Adam Hills
Karl Eccleston
Brian Fairburn
Stephen Fry
Alan Davies
Jack Whitehall
Sara Pascoe
Adam Hills
Karl Eccleston
Brian Fairburn
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:01Good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening, good evening,
00:04and welcome to QI, which tonight is a tissue of lies.
00:09Let's meet our perfidious panel, the Duke of Deception, Adam Hills.
00:18The Duchess of Dissembling, Sarah Pascoe.
00:25The Marquis of Mendacity, Jack Whitehall.
00:31And with his pants on fire, Alan Davies.
00:40Our buzzers this evening are charged with enigmatic mystery.
00:46Adam goes.
00:50Sarah goes.
00:56Jack goes.
01:02And Alan goes.
01:04I don't believe it.
01:08Now, before we start, remember that I have hidden a lavatory inside one of the questions, all right?
01:18Because it's the old series, one of the questions involves a lavatory.
01:22And if you think you've spotted which it is, you wave your penny and spend it.
01:26You spend your penny.
01:27All right, let's start with a lark.
01:30We like to do larks on the L series.
01:32I'm going to show you how your senses can deceive.
01:35So, Alan and Jack, you should each have a rubber hand and a little grey wooden partition.
01:42Alan will explain and Jack will explain.
01:45I'm not quite okay with prosthetics, but I'll give it a crack.
01:50Oh, my hand, I see.
01:52You can stand up, Jack, if you like.
01:54Oh, yeah, I've forgotten what I do here.
01:55This goes here.
01:56Under this one, I'll just put it like that.
01:58Okay, what you've got here is a perfectly obvious real hand, your right hands, and a perfectly obvious fake hand.
02:05And you've each got a brush.
02:07So, all I want you to do is brush each hand sort of simultaneously.
02:11And what you should feel, Adam and Sarah...
02:15The excruciating pain.
02:17Is that...
02:18As I jab hard into the hand, to know they roar.
02:22Sarah, scream!
02:23We'll come to that.
02:24At the moment, just a gentle rubbing.
02:27Eventually...
02:28This hand will fall off.
02:31Eventually, you will feel, in the rubber hand, the same sensation you feel in your real hand.
02:37Which seems extraordinary.
02:38Yeah.
02:39But you will.
02:39And let me know when you do.
02:40Okay, okay.
02:41It may not have happened yet.
02:44And then you will use it.
02:45You have to keep going.
02:46I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
02:47You have to keep going, Alan.
02:48I'm doing it, I'm keeping going.
02:50I'm keeping going.
02:51Ah, are you starting to feel this?
02:51I'm now starting to feel that this is my hand.
02:53That's it, that's what happens.
02:55Having trouble distinguishing.
02:55Are you not, Sarah?
02:56No.
02:57You're not feeling anything?
02:57Keep going, Alan.
02:58Oh, oh, oh, that's nice.
03:00You look?
03:00Yeah.
03:01So you can feel that in the rubber hand?
03:02Lower.
03:03Yeah, definitely.
03:03Lower.
03:04Do you wish you...
03:04You play your cards right, might get a happy ending with this.
03:06You're not feeling anything, sorry.
03:07It feels very much like my hand, like a set foot.
03:09Oh, no, it does feel like your hand.
03:10No, no, not that hand.
03:11My hand feels like my hand.
03:12Well, that would do, yes.
03:13My hand has never felt more like it belongs to me.
03:16I'm going faster.
03:18I think that will help.
03:20Okay.
03:21Okay, I got it, I got it.
03:22It's amazing, I got it.
03:23Yeah, yeah.
03:24Faster is better.
03:25Keep going.
03:29Right.
03:30It's my hand.
03:32It's my hand.
03:33It really does feel like...
03:34It's my hand, no.
03:35It's bizarre, isn't it?
03:37It's genuinely bizarre.
03:39And now you can get out the other brush.
03:41What?
03:41What?
03:42They've got to...
03:43Wait, wait, wait.
03:45No, no!
03:46No!
03:47No!
03:48No!
03:49That's amazing, isn't it?
03:51It is amazing, because I didn't believe it was going to happen.
03:53No, you didn't believe it, that's what's so good, is you really didn't believe it.
03:56It doesn't matter how much you know your hand is fake, it doesn't matter how much you know it's rubber,
04:00the effect works.
04:01You see it, you see that it's a clear fake, but extraordinary that the brain overrides
04:05what it knows with what it feels.
04:08That's to say the cognitive side.
04:10That's not that he's just next to a slightly more coordinated man-child with a rubber hand.
04:15We can show you a replay of Adam's reaction here, because we've actually got it here.
04:18If you watch this here...
04:20Oh, that shirt is awful!
04:24That is genuine.
04:26And the...
04:29It's said all the more extraordinary by the fact, of course, you, as is well known, have a prosthetic foot.
04:35I do, I do indeed.
04:36And so you are used to all the cliches there are about prosthesis, and about phantom limbs,
04:41and all the rest of it.
04:42Indeed, I have a...
04:44Can I take this?
04:45Yes, put that away, do it.
04:46No, I meant, can I take it home?
04:47Oh, yes.
04:49I have a strange thing with my prosthetic that I've found that I do, if I'm...
04:52If I stub my toe, I will still stop and go,
04:55Ow!
04:56I will actually loudly say, ouch, and then realise, oh, it's the prosthetic, it didn't actually hurt.
05:02Yes.
05:03So it's, I'm conditioned that when you stub your toe, you yell out.
05:05And as you well know from wartime, the screams of pain people had once they'd been amputated
05:11in the limbs that no longer existed.
05:12They swore that their shins or their feet...
05:15And having itches in a limb you can't scratch.
05:16Can I imagine anything more agonising than having an itch in something you can't scratch?
05:20Did I tell you, I met this guy who's in America, and he's a Vietnam veteran,
05:24and he knew someone who'd lost both legs.
05:27Yeah.
05:27And he went to see him in hospital and said, I still haven't had sex with my wife.
05:33And he said, why not?
05:34He said, oh, I haven't got any legs now, I feel awkward, I don't really, you know.
05:39He said, well, you should just do it.
05:40And he said, he really encouraged him to do it.
05:42And he said, and then he went back to see him and he had a smile on his face.
05:45And he said, so what did you, did you do the thing?
05:48And he said, yeah.
05:49And with no legs, you can get right on up there.
06:01It's one of the unexpected advantages.
06:07I'm cutting off my legs this evening.
06:11Oh, goodness me.
06:12But the point is, the brain has a mental map of the body from birth.
06:16And even if that map is distorted by an amputation,
06:19it takes a lot for the brain to lose its sense of where everything is.
06:23It can be fooled, as the rubber hand showed you.
06:26I remember once being in bed with my girlfriend
06:28and doing that thing where I fell asleep on my arm.
06:31And of course, your arm goes numb.
06:33And I rolled then over onto my back and my arm fell across my stomach.
06:36But because it was numb, I actually thought it was her arm on my stomach.
06:40And I actually started stroking.
06:45And it was, but I then kind of realised that it wasn't her arm.
06:49It didn't feel like her arm.
06:58Well, that extraordinary rubber hand illusion proves that even our own senses can tell us porkies.
07:04And speaking of porkies, what's the point of pink?
07:08Oh, I mean in terms of, like, a gender colour.
07:11Well, actually, this isn't to do with gender. It's purely to do with the colour itself.
07:14In printing, pink, or at least a reddy pink, has a particular name.
07:18If I was going to say c-mic.
07:20Magenta?
07:21Magenta is the right answer.
07:23Absolutely.
07:23Guessing.
07:24Yay!
07:25Guessing!
07:41That's the right answer.
07:51That's the right answer.
07:52That's the right answer.
07:53I suppose, a pigment of the imagination.
07:57Which is nice.
07:58Which is nice.
07:59In terms of the senses lying, our eyes and colour is a bit like that, because the world doesn't look
08:04like this.
08:05We have cones and rods in our eyes, and rods deal with darkness and light, black to white,
08:10and the cones deal with colour.
08:12So, dogs have two cones, so they can, they're not colour-blind, but they see a lot less colour than
08:17we do in the world, so we have three.
08:18Birds have four.
08:20Yes.
08:20They can see ultra-violet rays.
08:22Yes.
08:22Wait, what's it, the six million, yeah, the six million dollar man, and Steve Austin.
08:25Yes.
08:26It obviously costs a lot more now, six million.
08:28Oh!
08:28So, Steve Austin got a bionic eye.
08:31Lee Majors, yes.
08:32And all they gave him, really, was a zoom procedure.
08:35Yeah, I mean, dung, dung, dung, dung, exactly.
08:36So he could see things further away.
08:38Yeah.
08:38That was pretty feeble.
08:40Well, he could have given him about eight extra cones.
08:42He could run it, that's true.
08:44And he could have seen so much.
08:45But how could they have shown that to us?
08:46So many props he could have had.
08:47Now we have the Instagram eye, and he could make it all sepia in old fashion.
08:52But our eyes would still only have three cones to watch him seeing something, so it would still look like
08:57sharp eyes.
08:57It would have needed a sidekick to say, but what can you see?
09:02Oh, yeah.
09:02Like a bird.
09:03I can see ultra-violet light, which is where the villain has revealed how it is.
09:07Let me run over their farm.
09:09And also, while we're on the subject of the bionic man, he had one leg that was really good,
09:15and yet they showed him running at 70, when the reality was he would have been hopping at 70.
09:21Because the other leg would have just been destroyed by the speed at which biomechanically he would have been unable
09:26to cope.
09:28It would have ruined my childhood.
09:30They would have been better off if they had taken off both legs, given him two bionic legs.
09:34I'd have given him wheels.
09:35And the sex wheels.
09:37And the sex would have been amazing.
09:41Bionic sex.
09:42Well, there was the bionic woman, Lindsay Wagner, and she had ears, didn't she?
09:45Oh, yeah, she could hear anything.
09:46Lee Majors, Lindsay Wagner.
09:48Well, before anybody in New York's audience was born.
09:50Yes, they were totally mediappy.
09:52Yes, good.
09:52I'm sorry.
09:53And, like, before your time as well.
09:55Oh, God, we feel so old, don't we?
09:56Yeah, but it was great.
09:57It was, yeah.
09:58We could go to university for free.
10:11Anyway, the fact is, yeah, magenta doesn't really exist, and yet it does for our eyes.
10:15There's also a special kind of pink, which is known as Baker Miller Pink, which is you take a gallon
10:21of white paint and a pint of red paint, and you come up with what's in the middle, a sort
10:26of bubblegum-coloured pink.
10:27It's pretty, isn't it?
10:28What's interesting about that is that it was generally thought by psychologists and others to create a feeling on passivity,
10:35and so it was used in prisons and mental asylums, and it was known as Drunk Tank Pink.
10:41That looks like a fun prison, to be honest.
10:44I would definitely like a fun prison.
10:45Gay prison.
10:47So, the other thing they did, and some American sporting teams thought that, well, this is true about this pink,
10:53they changed their visitors' changing rooms to pink in order to make the visiting team,
10:58more passive, which is kind of cheating, really, isn't it?
11:02It is.
11:02It's not very sporting.
11:03It's not very sporting.
11:04So, university sporting rules in America now mean that you can change any changing room's colour, as long as your
11:10own is the same colour, to stop that advantage.
11:13It would be interesting to see actually how much difference it makes, because surely this is an incremental thing we're
11:17talking about.
11:18You're completely right.
11:19The fact is that, apparently, even after half an hour, people get used to it, and if they've been in
11:24a prison or a drunk tank before, it reminds them of the drunk tank, and they actually get angry and
11:29more aggressive.
11:30So, it's really of no use whatsoever.
11:33Well, that's it.
11:33If you see pink elephants, they might not really be there, because it seems to be an imaginary colour.
11:38Which room in the house would you keep these in?
11:41I'll just push it.
11:43In the library.
11:47Adam is about to score points!
11:51Really?
11:52Yeah.
11:56That is it.
11:59That's the penny well spent.
12:01And can I just point out, in Australia, that's $2.50.
12:05What's that game with the pennies?
12:07Oh, don't even...
12:07Two up.
12:08Two up.
12:09Two up.
12:09It's a betting game.
12:11It is a betting game, but it's only played one day a year.
12:13That's right.
12:13What do you do?
12:14It's only played on Anzac Day, and it's played with pennies, I think.
12:16That's right, it is.
12:17Real old-fashioned pennies.
12:18Yeah, and you flick them up in the air, and you have to bet on whether you get two heads,
12:22two tails, or a head and a tail.
12:23And if you win a lot of money, you're allowed to leave the room, and you had half an hour's
12:27grace before someone would chase you and club you over the head and steal your winnings.
12:32It being Australian.
12:33Yeah.
12:34In the nicest possible way.
12:37Yeah, and the only day that it's allowed to be played now, it's illegal any time of the
12:40year, except on Anzac Day.
12:42Well, if you have a look at the picture again, there's actually English literature books,
12:47and this, I'm afraid, is a French chamber pot, or commode, if you prefer, and they liked
12:54to shit on us and our literature.
12:56Oh, I'll just say they can't do anything else.
12:59Yeah.
13:00When you open the lid, you say, you go, ugh.
13:02Yeah.
13:03Ah, shit on you.
13:05Exactly.
13:06Because I can't beat you in a war, I will poo on your books.
13:10And the middle of the lid, he goes, boy, boy for sale.
13:16But perhaps the most impressive invention in recent times for your lavatorial wants.
13:19Helicopter.
13:20Erm, well, you've got to go briefcase.
13:23It's Japanese, of course.
13:25Yeah.
13:27How much credit do you get than that?
13:30It's just simply superb.
13:32It's got everything you could possibly want, including a newspaper to leave through.
13:35Your easement is taking a bit of time.
13:37And I've always felt really sad when I leave a toilet.
13:39Like, oh, we've become such good friends.
13:41I wish I could just pack it up and...
13:43No, I can.
13:44It's got a generously equipped ceiling lid.
13:46You can quietly and discreetly go about your personal business any way you please
13:49with a fold-up leather privacy panel.
13:51It's tucked away neatly to the side.
13:52Yeah, it looks like it hides you completely, that panel.
13:55Small tray with...
13:56What's that suitcase just sitting there?
13:59It's got a small tray with a cup holder.
14:02Oh, great.
14:02So I don't even have to throw in the drink.
14:04Cup holder, you're right.
14:05You see, that's like Herman Simpson, isn't it?
14:07Do you remember that episode where he bought a huge RV?
14:09And Martin said, oh, how am I...
14:11He said, but, Martin, it's got six cup holders.
14:14Six!
14:16Men like cup holders.
14:17There's just something so great about them.
14:19It's got a vanity mirror.
14:21I like the leather finish.
14:22Yeah, refillable hand sanitising dispenser.
14:25Maximum weight capacity is 80 kilos.
14:27Exceeding the recommended weight will void all warranties.
14:3080 kilos?
14:3180 kilos.
14:32I'm going to get the elephant to shit in it.
14:35I mean, 80 kilos.
14:37I weigh less than 80 kilos.
14:38I know.
14:38I really need to get the...
14:40It may result in...
14:41I'm going to exceed the limit!
14:43It may result in rupture of waste tank,
14:47possible bacteria contamination of briefcase contents,
14:50and massive stench.
14:53So you don't want to do that.
14:54I'm assuming you haven't emptied it for a year.
14:56Two suitcases when you turned up to meetings.
14:58Everyone would be like,
14:59Derek, why have you brought two suitcases?
15:02No reason.
15:03And then he just hides behind me.
15:04I accidentally went...
15:05I've been through the figures and...
15:09Massage stench!
15:10Massage stench!
15:14Did you know where the meeting goes?
15:15It was going fine until I got the bog out.
15:19Alternatively, you go the other way.
15:20Thanks for letting me use your toilet briefcase.
15:22Oh, I don't have a toilet briefcase.
15:26I always say that the 80 kilos includes the person sitting on it.
15:29So I think I would break it.
15:31It's a horrible feeling.
15:32Maybe they...
15:34That changes everything.
15:37Maybe they sell it to kind of banker-wankers in the city
15:40with the boast of it has an amazing surface to do cocaine off as well
15:44when you open it up.
15:45It would be perfect, wouldn't it?
15:46Absolutely, with the little dimples.
15:48You could snort out on the little leather dimples.
15:50Anyway, that's the gotta-go briefcase.
15:53And it's yours, I'm sure, for a very reasonable price.
15:55If that question left a bad smell,
15:57why is the noseless lemur so badly named?
16:04I'm going to take a punt and say it's not a lemur.
16:07Oh, you're brilliant.
16:09We were hoping you would say it has actually got a nose,
16:11in which case it's badly named.
16:12But you're right, it isn't a lemur.
16:14Never was, never will be.
16:15In fact, it's a fish.
16:17It's pretty...
16:19Pretty difficult to think to confuse a lemur and a fish.
16:23You'd think that was a map of Madagascar,
16:25where lemurs come from,
16:26but in fact, that is the fossil,
16:28and for a very long time,
16:29it was considered to be a lemur,
16:30and it was known as Scalabrini's noseless lemur.
16:33Pedro Scalabrini was an Italian-born Argentinian naturalist.
16:37In 1898, he gave a fossil fragment
16:39to a paleontologist called Florentino Ameguino,
16:42who was so patriotic in his Argentinian-ness
16:45and he hated the fact that, particularly Charles Darwin,
16:49had said that all primates originated in Africa,
16:52which we now know to be true.
16:54And a lemur is a primate.
16:56And lemurs only come from Madagascar,
16:57which was shaved off from the mainland of Africa
17:00many, many millions of years ago.
17:02There's an aye-aye.
17:03Wonderful lemur.
17:05That's an English footballer just before a penalty shootout.
17:11Desperately afraid.
17:13Who wants to take one?
17:17So, yeah, he tried to prove, Ameguino,
17:19that lemurs existed in South America
17:22in pre-Columbian times,
17:23which they didn't.
17:24It turned out in 2012
17:26that it was, in fact, an extinct fish.
17:28Do you know that picture of the lemur,
17:30the lemur's face?
17:31The aye-aye, yeah.
17:31I'm assuming that's what I would look like
17:33if I was using the toilet briefcase.
17:36Those perfectly round eyes.
17:38That's so beautiful.
17:39That's after the massive stent.
17:43They are marvellous creatures.
17:44Well, talking of paleontological things,
17:47the first platypus that was ever seen by a Western man,
17:51nobody believed.
17:52No.
17:53But we did have a habit of explorers making up monsters
17:56and drawing pictures in the 16th and 17th century.
17:58We certainly did, and that was considered an example
18:01of an obvious and ridiculous hoax.
18:04How could that be?
18:05And George Shaw, who was the naturalist,
18:07examined it minutely for stitch marks around the beak
18:09because he could not believe that such...
18:11No-one...
18:12But even when you see them in real life,
18:13I went to see them in Melbourne,
18:14and you just can't believe it.
18:16You just watch them for ages going,
18:17you don't make any sense!
18:20Their mouths look like they belong in a Japanese briefcase.
18:25They do.
18:26They're so charming.
18:27Oh, wonderful. And they're smaller than I expected.
18:29Exactly, yeah.
18:30It took 30 years from the first specimen to arrive in Europe
18:33for people to believe that it was real.
18:35They were absolutely convinced.
18:36Oh, we're not going to fall for this.
18:37We're not going to fall for this.
18:38But there it is, the papers.
18:39Did you know the first...
18:40I'm pretty sure the first kangaroo that was sent back
18:42to one of the British museums,
18:45they sent it back,
18:46but they didn't give an example of how it stood,
18:48so it was mounted on all fours.
18:50Oh, that's very nice.
18:51With its tiny little paws, because its front paws are...
18:53It's a messy bun, Steve.
18:59Looks as if it's ready for action.
19:01Er...
19:02You know.
19:04I'm sorry.
19:06Now, what's this going on about?
19:25That was a 1972,
19:28rather before its time, piece of rap
19:30by an incredibly famous Italian
19:32called Adriano Celentano,
19:35who is not known here.
19:36He had a huge hit with this,
19:38which is called
19:39Prisen Colleenin Sinai Chuzo.
19:42You can say it with mouth,
19:44and that'll help you.
19:45Oh, wow.
19:45Prisen Colleenin Sinai Chuzo.
19:48In the Colmen Ceylon,
19:51Prisen Chulianin Sinai Chuzo.
19:52All right.
19:55This is Italian for Gangnam Style.
19:58Yeah.
19:59What it is, is just babble.
20:01It's babble that is supposed to sound like English.
20:03To an Italian, it sounds more or less like English sounds.
20:06There's that famous clip of the person on Malaysia
20:08has got talent where they're singing Mariah Carey
20:10Oh, yeah.
20:11Can't live without you,
20:11which is possibly the greatest song ever recorded.
20:14But she's heard it clearly through second party
20:17and doesn't know what the lyrics are.
20:18So she bursts into the chorus and she just goes,
20:20Ken Lee, Ken Lee, Ken Lee, Booty, Booty, Booty.
20:25This is about a guy called Ken Lee.
20:31Anyway, that was a huge hit in 1972.
20:34Number one in Italy,
20:35and it was in the top ten in France
20:37and in Belgium and the Netherlands.
20:39It's babble that is supposed to sound like English.
20:41But in 2011, London-based filmmakers,
20:44Brian and Carl,
20:45produced a wonderful film called Squirrel,
20:47which used a similar technique.
20:48The dialogue is actually gibberish,
20:50but it sounds like English.
20:51It's had over seven million viewers,
20:52and we can actually show you a bit of it here.
20:54Run, VT.
20:56It's fine for me.
20:58Display the Joe drink
20:58all around the maspiration town
21:00while I'm for mass,
21:01the Pope, for green,
21:03and...
21:05You want for why I chose Vereen at all?
21:07You want for why
21:08I bleed the whole chase between?
21:11You want to get...
21:11You want to get for what?
21:14You want to get for what?
21:18You want to get for...
21:29You want to get for what?
21:30That wasn't gibberish,
21:31but we've got them here tonight.
21:32Brian and Carl, thank you very much.
21:38One of the hardest things to do in the world
21:40is to talk gibberish
21:41without it becoming did you actually learn your gibberish we did yeah yeah
21:46did you imagine that there was sense behind it he thinks she's forgotten his
21:50birthday is that what that's what that's one interpretation I'm not an actor but
21:54Fiona who's in the in the in the film is an actress and so she needed to know
21:57what what this was about she needed the intentions but I think it was important
22:01to kind of have a sort of a sense behind what we were saying it was a lot like
22:04what you were talking about with the Mariah Carey Kenley and stuff it's we
22:08sort of had the sentences and then kind of gobbled them and yeah kind of wrote
22:13down the garble as it came out I understood more words in that clip though
22:18than I did in five series of the wire
22:24are you Australian yeah I'm Australian yeah I thought so and as we have a
22:29similar thing that we do where we don't use words we think I haven't noticed yeah
22:33exactly I have another thing you do just sound as if you've got heartburn
22:50that's how they get the actors on home and away to do an emotional scene they just give them
22:54heartburn right Steve the cafe's burnt down again Australians will make enough
23:02noises that could be a sentence but there are no actual words in it it's just I'll
23:06try it uh so car you having a good night again all right yeah it's all right man
23:25I have a similar thing that I can do with posh people this gentleman in the front row here
23:29in the blue trousers
23:38that's wonderful Brian and Carl thank you very much indeed very well thank you very much
23:48so time for some refreshment here we go let's have uh you pass that there to sir if you would
23:56have one myself there's one for you Alan there you go there's one for you Jack you pass one to
23:59Adam
24:00yeah I'll have one myself there's one for you Alan there you go mmm you've done this before
24:24oh look at that you look lovely you're so huge I don't think I'm going to be able to manage
24:35it oh there you are
24:35yeah what do you think they were these were once used for
24:47particularly these ones on sticks well not the yeah ones on sticks waving in tiny aeroplane
24:55is it like what Gwyneth Paltrow gives their kids
25:08seeing in the dark well you're in the right era when was it said that carrots could help you see
25:12in the dark
25:36yeah well that wasn't until the beginning of the 20th century because vitamin A is the key helps your eyes
25:40doesn't it vitamin A does help you
25:42you know it must have been around about then well it was really it it
25:47it must be so hard being a rabbit
25:54they would never get any talking
25:56oh my god they just stay in the hut
25:59what are you doing what are you doing oh man we're very powerful
26:02oh my god the problem was in the second world war there was we would run out of
26:10put it away concentrate steam
26:19it looked like the world's worst burlesque dance
26:25so in the second world war there's a very great shortage of sugar
26:28and there was a big surplus of carrots and so they put it about that carrots helped you see in
26:33the dark
26:35so they made sort of ice creams as it were out of carrots to try and make them attractive to
26:39children
26:40there is a certain amount of sugar in them as you could probably tell they tasted a little sweet didn't
26:43they
26:44yeah it was lovely and there was a group captain John Cunningham who was responsible for a very daring night
26:49raids over Germany and they gave it out that what allowed him to do it was the fact that he
26:53ate carrots
26:54in fact what they were really doing was disguising the fact that they had on board
26:59a vast radar
27:02they had radar on board they didn't want the Germans to know that the Germans knew we had ground radar
27:07not that we had radar on board
27:09so they sold the carrot story to the Germans as well
27:11that was the idea both to get children to eat their carrots and maybe to get the Germans to believe
27:15that it was carrots that allowed our bombers to see over those
27:20wouldn't it be more beneficial if they'd said the reason our pilots are so good at seeing at night is
27:25because they eat slightly undercooked chicken
27:30you should have been working in British intelligence
27:33you're just the kind of chap we need right all
27:37now how does the what the hell effect work
27:44this is relevant to people who are dieting
27:48or sometimes people who have abuse substance abuse problems and things like that
27:52so it's when you're being quite strict with yourself
27:54stop talking about me for a second here
27:56it's when you're being very strict with yourself and you think you've slipped up in a slight way
28:00so you're really really hungry and you have a biscuit when you're on a diet and then you go
28:03oh well I've ruined the diet now I've had a biscuit I'm going to finish that packet of biscuits
28:07I'm going to do some crack
28:08show me about it
28:08I'm going to
28:10have a positive evening and start again tomorrow
28:12you're so right because you think you've fallen off the wagon you might as well just
28:14oh I've done everything wrong now I'll get a tattoo
28:15yeah for the people who say well I've been I was very good yesterday and I've been good today
28:20so tomorrow black forest gato for breakfast
28:25I mean that is certainly a what the hell effect there's no question about that
28:28there is another what the hell effect but that yours I think counts unquestionably
28:32this is used by Dan Arrely and his partners at Duke University in North Carolina
28:37and what it describes is how when someone has overcome their initial reluctance to cheat
28:43subsequent dishonest behavior gets easier and he tested this with college students
28:48who's solving maths problems for money and when his back was turned they could cheat and the more
28:55they saw they got away with it the more they cheated but what was interesting is the scores were not
28:58inflated by a few students who were cheating a lot but many students cheating a little
29:04cheating in that sense is infectious you go what the hell I can do it so you do it
29:08is that like that thing when you're telling a lie and you're telling a story about what happened on the
29:12weekend
29:12oh it gets further and further and then you embellish it a little bit and then you think oh I
29:16got away with that
29:17yeah oh I might just add a little bit more to it and then suddenly it's this big fanciful story
29:21because of that tiny little
29:23the other thing is because it's a lie it's stored in a different part of your memory so when a
29:26week later someone says tell that marvelous story about that time you and you're going shit what did I say
29:31I've forgotten the lie I told but animals are just doing the animals can cheat Coco who is a wonderful
29:38gorilla in California once tore a steel sink off a wall and then used sign language to tell her handlers
29:45that the cat had done it
29:46yeah
29:49a little child like fib
29:51wee was the cat
29:52that's it yeah the next you get to human beings and more alive
29:55perhaps even more famous Jim Nim Chimski about whom her film was made who has a really developed sign language
30:00she used to duck out of sign language lessons by saying she needed to go to the loo when she
30:04didn't
30:06say oh I had to go for a pee like that and then she would go off and you'd see
30:08her not going for a pee or him rather in this case
30:10so animals are capable of deception
30:12so maybe we should only eat animals that can lie
30:16well lying seems to be a sign of intelligence I'm glad to say as an inveterate liar myself
30:21airily this man who did the work on the what the hell effect he found people who score higher on
30:26psychological tests for creativity are more likely to engage in dishonesty
30:29anyway there we are we are who we are because we cheat the what the hell effect describes how after
30:35the first lie the others just keep coming
30:36now be truthful how do you rate your own driving generosity and ability to conduct an adult relationship
30:42I was reading about how we all overestimate our own input into things they were asking couples what percentage of
30:49the housework do you do and it would add up to about 130%
30:53yeah because everyone even if they know they and do a little bit they still think that's more or it's
30:57worth more
30:57everyone thinks they do more than their partner everyone thinks I'm a good driver
31:01yeah everyone
31:02everyone thinks they're better than average driver
31:03I don't
31:04I'll be a great driver I'll be a great dad
31:05yeah I don't
31:05good in bed
31:06oh you don't think any of those things
31:07no I can't drive so
31:08you literally can't drive
31:10I don't think of myself as a good driver
31:11you don't haven't passed your test
31:12no
31:12oh well then that's fair enough
31:13yeah
31:14you probably are a crap driver
31:15yeah
31:16do you think you're good in bed
31:18I haven't passed that test either
31:20I failed on three minors and a major
31:24it was an emergency stop
31:26yeah
31:28that was the worst
31:29that was the worst
31:30impossible
31:31I kept changing lanes when I shouldn't
31:38yeah we all do have a high view of ourselves
31:42oh dear god almighty
31:44yeah we tend to think we're better at things like donating to charity
31:47voting
31:48maintaining a successful relationship
31:50volunteering for unpleasant lab experiments
31:53but I'm glad to tell you that Institute for the Child Study at Toronto University
31:56claims that toddlers who tell lies early on
31:58are more likely to do well in later life
32:01the complex brain processes involved in formulating a lie
32:04are an indicator of a child's intelligence
32:06so it doesn't necessarily mean if you lie your way through life you'll do better
32:10no
32:11it just means if you can lie early then you're quite creative and you can get through life
32:14yes
32:15I'm saying this in case my daughter is watching
32:16yeah
32:18good point
32:19don't want to get the wrong idea
32:20absolutely
32:21so now I want you to be thoroughly dishonest by pretending you don't know you're going to get a klaxon
32:26because it's general ignorance time
32:28fingers on buzzers please
32:29what are deserts mostly made from
32:32yes sir
32:33fans
32:33oh thank you
32:36what
32:37what
32:37you'd think wouldn't you
32:39not the case
32:40no only one third of the world's land surface is desert
32:43and only a small proportion of that is sand
32:45North American deserts are around 2% sand
32:48no more than that there's Monument Valley
32:50globally on average only 20% of all deserts is sand a fifth
32:53the remainder is made of rock shingle salt or even snow
32:56and camels
32:57and camels
32:59lots of cigarettes all over the desert
33:01the driest deserts in the world is
33:03the Gobi Desert
33:05no
33:06any thoughts
33:07Antarctica
33:08well
33:09there is an argument for saying the Antarctic is a dry desert
33:11it doesn't rain there
33:12but yeah it doesn't
33:14but Atacama is considered the driest land desert
33:16some weather stations there have recorded no rain whatsoever
33:19not one
33:20what a boring job
33:22yeah
33:23the largest desert on earth is Antarctica
33:26even though much of it is under snow
33:29the one area that is the driest man who shouts a lot
33:32is
33:34are the Murdo Dry Valleys
33:36it's red Indian
33:37yeah
33:38and they consist mostly of
33:42they consist of
33:45man who shouts a lot
33:47the Murdo Dry Valleys are so dry that dead animals mummify rather than decay like that one there
33:54what animal is it?
33:55seal
33:55if it's dehydrated it might come back to life if you get it wet
33:59yeah if you get it wet
34:00yeah you could
34:01yeah you could
34:01like freeze drives
34:03yeah
34:05or chicken soup
34:06ball on the tail
34:07yeah
34:07doing a ball on the tail there
34:08yeah I can see in a way
34:10it seems that if you want to identify desert the best way to do so involves looking for rain not
34:14for sand
34:15how did the Vikings bury their dead?
34:18on a boat
34:18on fire
34:19oh on a boat on fire
34:22Jack Jack Jack Jack Jack Jack
34:25no
34:26in the ground
34:27yeah
34:28more of that
34:29more of that
34:37I'm feeling sad about how tentative I was about that
34:41the myth of the burning longboat is very very recent 19th century
34:44in fact there is one story of Baldur a god who was apparently burned like that
34:47the rest of it is pretty much ladybird books
34:50laughter
34:51I love the ladyboy books
34:53did I say ladyboy books?
34:54no
34:54ladybird books
34:55and they didn't have horns either did they?
34:57no they didn't have horns
34:58that was a later
34:58well that one wasn't
34:59it really
34:59the late 19th century was a period of enormous European rediscovery of their ancient myths
35:04and so on or at least not just rediscovery but making up in the case of Britain it was Arthurian
35:09legend and Druidic legend a lot of which was totally nonsense
35:13and there was a Swedish illustrator called Gustav Malmström and he did these horned helmets and dragon's wings on the
35:19hero's headgear and his saga became an international hit and made the Vikings name
35:23and a vikingr was a pirate or raider
35:26a viking was a raiding expedition a vikingr would go on a viking
35:30and vikr or vikr is old north for a bay or a fjord and rikr or vikr means a smoky
35:36bay for example
35:37riki old riki is the old smoky town Edinburgh in Scottish
35:41I've also heard once that the kind of socialist atmosphere that pervades Sweden kind of also came from the Vikings
35:48because there was just enough alcohol to keep everyone happy so you would just there's a Swedish word called lagom
35:56which means not too much and not too little
35:58and when you gave out the vodka to all of the people rowing on the ships
36:01the aquavit
36:01you had to give them the aquavit yes not too much that someone down the back wouldn't get enough and
36:07not too little that they'd be unhappy that they didn't get enough
36:09so it was just evenly shared out over everyone that was rowing and then that's kind of pervaded Swedish culture
36:15and that's why they are now
36:16sherry people
36:17pissed
36:20lightly pissed sherry people
36:21yes vikings sometimes bury their dead in a boat but always on land
36:26which bit of whale did they use to make a whale bone corset
36:30I'm going to take a punt and say the jaw
36:33mmm not the jaw
36:34penis
36:35not the penis
36:36is it like part of the whale
36:38it is part of the whale
36:40it is part of the whale
36:40did you say the wishbone
36:44that's a huge tug of war
36:46is it the ribs
36:49the ribs
36:52that rita
36:53that is the Quantity
36:53is it the ribs
36:56oh sorry about that
36:57no other ribs
36:57no worries
36:57I think Shouty Man had it again
37:00whoa
37:02that isn't how you do it on the show
37:04this is not that thing with James Corden on Sky 1, thank you very much indeed
37:11My show.
37:12The answer is, oh, yes.
37:18What?
37:22What is the pity?
37:23More's the pity.
37:26I wish it were.
37:27The shouty show.
37:30With the drunk cricketer.
37:31Yeah, that one, exactly.
37:33No, I think they were shouting the baleen.
37:36Does that mean anything to you?
37:36Oh, the thing in the mouth.
37:38Yeah, the sieve in the mouth.
37:39There are two types of whale, baleen whale and toothed whale.
37:43The blue whale is an example of a baleen whale there.
37:46The baleen is, in fact, keratin.
37:48The same thing that our hair is made of, our fingernails, rhinoceros, hornies.
37:52And it makes it wonderfully pliable.
37:54It's like it was the plastic of the 19th century, essentially.
37:57There was a Mr. J.A. Seavey trading out of Boston
38:00who offered 54 different whale bone products.
38:02Whips, parasols, umbrellas, fishing rods, canes, hats, divining rods,
38:05riding crops, ferrules, brushes, mattress stuffing,
38:08back supporters, suspenders, billiard cushion, springs, pen holders,
38:11shoe horns, tongue scrapers and policemen's clubs.
38:14Wow. That is a good Saturday night.
38:16It is.
38:17It's empty of pockets.
38:19But real whale bone was used for something else.
38:22It was a cheap substitute for ivory.
38:24And you probably know of the carving that was done on it
38:27that sailors used to do.
38:29It had a particular name.
38:30I do not know the name of that.
38:32Oh, we're going to ask shouty man again.
38:36Scrimshaw.
38:36Scrimshaw is the right answer, yes.
38:38He's a very clever shouty man.
38:40He's a very smart shouty man.
38:42He's a smart shouty man.
38:43It may be a whole series of organised shouty men.
38:45I don't know.
38:46I'm very impressed by them.
38:47They may have to get a score at the end of the game.
38:50That's what's worrying me.
38:51Yes.
38:51Scrimshaw is, you know, that very carved whale bone effect.
38:54It's sometimes done on horns.
38:56I mean, amazing, some of them.
38:57I mean, even a whole desk was once done out of whale bone.
39:00Because whales are big animals.
39:01I'd love to think that there were cases of people
39:03wearing a whale bone corset
39:05and just being out at a party and going,
39:07I'm really hungry.
39:10It's a spare prawny.
39:13Because the bailead is used.
39:15It's this huge sieved area.
39:16It sucks in this huge amount of water
39:20filled with krill and plankton and so on.
39:22Then the baleen sort of mesh together
39:24and it pushes all the water out
39:26and all the food is left clinging to this filter
39:29which it then sucks into its mouth.
39:31Right.
39:31So it would be the equivalent of going up
39:32in your whale bone corset to the buffet in a skank.
39:36That's right.
39:37Just letting out the bits you didn't want.
39:38Yes.
39:39Most whale bone was not bone but baleen
39:41in the 19th century equivalent of plastic.
39:44Can you name a blue sea creature?
39:46Alan.
39:47Oh!
39:49Yes, Jack.
39:50Shouty man, drop it like it's hot.
39:55Right!
40:00Is he going to fall for our trap?
40:02The whale!
40:03It's the right answer!
40:05Yes!
40:06Right, guy!
40:10Wow!
40:11That's the fastest I've ever been on the draw as well.
40:13That wasn't as quick and it still broke my buzzer.
40:15It did!
40:16Oh, give me!
40:18Oh, give me!
40:19Oh, give me!
40:20Oh, give me!
40:20No!
40:21We thought you might be so afraid you'd say not the blue whale.
40:23No, I was pretty sure about that one.
40:24It is blue.
40:25I mean, it's not very blue but it's blue enough to call blue.
40:28Blue are the most things, isn't it?
40:29Well, it's all red except the colour spectrum is different underwater, isn't it?
40:32It's quite a common colour.
40:34It's quite a common colour amongst Denizons.
40:38Denizons of the people, absolutely.
40:39Thank you, Liam.
40:40Adore is blue.
40:41There's the blue marlin, which is pretty blue.
40:43Adore is blue.
40:43Yes, the blue starfish you can see is jolly blue, blue marlin there.
40:47Blue mangroot.
40:51And the beautiful blue angel there, the Glaucus atlantica.
40:55The blue angel, as well as being a Marlene Dietrich film, is a very interesting fish in
41:00as much as it's venomous, but its venom is second-hand.
41:03It feeds on the Portuguese man of war and ingests its poison so that it becomes venomous itself.
41:09Isn't that clever?
41:10That's amazing.
41:11Cunning.
41:11Very cunning.
41:13Very cunning.
41:13So the grey whale is pretty grey, the humpback is pretty grey.
41:16The sperm whale is dark grey black.
41:18But the blue whale, as you can see, is jolly blue.
41:20There it is.
41:21Bottom right.
41:22I see it.
41:23Yay!
41:24Your favourite whale.
41:26We lie to you, blue whales are blue, pretty much.
41:28Well, that's our last tissue in our box of lies.
41:32It's time for the unvarnished truth with the scores and it's pretty bally fascinating.
41:38In last place, with minus nine, oh dear, minus 19, but with a tremendous performance
41:44at a wonderful last rally, Jack Whitehall.
41:54In minus 11, an entirely creditable third place.
41:58She knew so much.
41:59Sarah!
42:00Sarah Pascoe.
42:03Get rid of the budget!
42:05That's not silly!
42:07From minus eight, second place, Alan Davis!
42:09Woo!
42:15And a staggeringly secure first place on plus 14.
42:19Oh, my goodness.
42:19Adam!
42:20Oh, my goodness.
42:27Tonight, there's a special award of minus 39 for the shouty man in the audience!
42:33Yes!
42:39It only remains for me to thank Adam, Jack, Sarah and Alan and leave you with the last
42:44words of Spanish Prime Minister, General Ramon Maria Navarez.
42:48I do not have to forgive my enemies.
42:51I have had them all shot.
42:53Good night.
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