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Hey, Wowzer fans, Mindy here.
And before we start the show, I gotta let you know that this November, with a special new episode featuring our friends at Circle Round and Terrestrials on Radiolab for Kids,
And don't miss when Elmo from Sesame Street stops by Wow in the World to make us all belly laugh on November 24th.
Oh, but that's not all, Reg.
On December 1st, we are sharing our 250th episode of Wow in the World with all of you.
We think this one is going to be music to your ears.
Literally.
Did I mention it's a musical?
And if you're a member of the World Organization of Wowzers...
Oh boy, do I have a surprise for you.
You can listen to our 250th episode early with me and other members from around the world on Saturday, November 22nd, at 7 pm.
Eastern.
That's right, we are throwing another listening party.
Join us as we dance along to our new songs.
React to the episode with other members in the chat and more.
Grownups.
If you want your wowzer to join this members-only listening party, you can sign up to become a member today at Tinkercastcom.
Slash wow.
Already a member?
Well, you can find the link and password to join the event when you sign in at Tinkercastcom.
Slash wow.
That's it.
It's going to be a November to remember.
But for now, let's get on with the show.
Woo! on the weekend we wow on the weekend because this is what we do on the weekend talking laughing me and reggie singing laughing and then we oh wait no i said laughing twice uh whatever we wow on the weekend yeah we wow on the weekend we wow on the weekend because this is what we do Welcome to Wee Wow on the Weekend, the show where I, Dennis, answer your questions, sing songs, conduct interviews, eat brunch, host Crafternoons, listen to... Reggie!
Reggie!
Turn off the cartoons, please, and get over here.
It's time to make the show.
No, I did not invite you to my basement just to hang out.
Reggie, we're making WeWow on the weekend and you said you wanted to be my co-host.
Executive producer?
No one even knows what that means.
Fine, fine, fine, fine, fine, fine.
You can be executive whatever.
Just no TV until we're done.
Okay, let's just move into the Q&A segment.
The Q&A segment.
Or wait, people might not know what that means.
Questions and answers segment.
Yeah, now that's too long.
Let's just shorten it to Q&A.
The Q&A segment.
That's right, Reggie, the Q&A segment, where my devoted listeners call in and ask me questions.
All right, let me just get the old answering machine pulled up here.
Okay, there we are.
You have no new messages.
Hmm, that's strange.
Oh, well, I'll just get the backup answering machine.
Well, obviously there's a backup, Reggie.
Okay, here we go.
Hit it, voicemails. reach Dennis from WeWow on the weekend.
That's me.
Do you have a question?
Well, I do too.
Lots of them.
And who's going to answer all my questions?
You?
Probably not.
But I guess I can answer yours.
Leave me a message.
Hi, Dennis.
It's me, Den-a-tist.
Yeah, your dentist.
I have a question for you.
What is your favorite color?
Wow.
Thanks for your question, Mr. Dentist.
My favorite color is puce.
I actually don't know what color it is.
I just like the word.
Puce.
Puce.
Puce.
It's just, it sounds like... Oh, it does sound like a laser beam.
Next question.
Hi, Dennis.
It's me, Denmark.
I'm from Denmark.
Well, naturally.
I have a question for you.
How does a microwave work?
Wow.
Thanks for your question, Denmark.
The answer is nobody knows.
Next question.
Reggie, what do you mean electromagnetic radiation to cause polar molecules in the food to rotate?
That doesn't make any sense.
Well, you say tomato.
I say tomatoes are gross.
Thanks for your calls, everyone.
If you've got a question for me, call and leave me a message.
The number is 1-888-7-WOW-WOW.
I just might answer your question on Wee Wow on the weekend.
Okay, that takes care of that.
Good idea.
Let's move on to our next segment, which I call Inside Tinkercast Studios.
Inside Tinkercast Studios.
This is the part of the show where we revisit an episode of one of my favorite Tinkercast shows.
This weekend, we're revisiting the first ever episode of Wow in the World.
And it's a weird episode because I'm not in it.
Yeah, I don't show up until like season two or something.
No, you're not in it either.
No, you're not.
You don't show up until episode two and we're still on episode one.
Because episode one has like three different stories in it.
I don't know why.
That's just how the show went for like ten episodes or something.
Well, let's listen to the other half of episode one.
This story is called Our Sushi-Powered Brains.
And in it, Mindy and Guy talk about how the human brain evolved over time.
I know!
I'm so excited!
Let's listen.
There we go.
And play.
Wow in the World will be right back.
Grown-ups, this message is for you.
Hey, grown-ups.
It's Mindy and Guy Raz here from Wow in the World.
Mindy and I have some brand new wow in the world toys out in the world just in time for the holidays, made for the kids who love science and for the ones who don't.
Yet, from our 100 experiments, that wow kit, to the telescope and astronomy kit, our Wow in the World toys help your wowzer learn about their world through play.
Plus, you can hear exclusive audio content from me and Guy Raz to help your wowzer discover even more wows.
Grown-ups.
Give the gift of wow and wonder this holiday season with our latest Wow in the World toys designed with your curious wowzer in mind.
You can shop our Wow in the World toys at Tinkercast.com slash toys.
That's Tinkercast.com slash toys.
That's it.
Back to the show.
Mindy, I just stumbled on the most incredible mystery.
Man, the jig is up.
It's in my pocket.
What?
Your cat.
She climbed into my pocket, like two days ago when she smelled the can of open tuna I had in there.
And You have my
Cat in your pocket?
Yeah, she's just been hanging out in there eating tuna ever since.
Isn't that right, kitty?
Wait, that's the mystery you're talking about, right?
Uh, no, no.
I was actually talking about a mystery that could explain why we humans can do things no other species can do.
Like use our fingernails to pick dirt out of our fingernails.
Well, I was thinking more about things like How we humans can use our imaginations and how we can communicate with language, or even how we can cooperate and work together.
These are things that we humans can do better than any other species on Earth.
Wait, time out.
Let me make sure I got this straight.
So a species is any group of living things that are basically alike.
Right?
Right.
So humans are one species.
So are lions.
So are fruit flies.
So is garlic.
You get the idea.
Still feels weird to call garlic a species.
But anyway, garage...
If we humans are all basically related, then where do we come from?
Do we know?
Well Mindy, the best scientific evidence or proof we have of our common human origins begins in Eastern Africa.
Every human being on planet Earth today has his or her roots in Eastern Africa.
That is where our species, Homo sapiens... began about 220,000 years ago.
Wow, the human species really is just one big family.
But Gairaz, what kinds of things can we do as a species that other species, like your cat or dogs or even chimps, can't do?
Well Mindy, Talking about chimps is a particularly good example, because chimpanzees, of course, are our closest living relatives, right?
Right.
But they are still very, very different from us humans.
For example, they can't speak languages.
They can't read books.
They can't start a soccer team and play against another chimp soccer team, right?
Right?
I'm sorry.
I'm just imagining chimps in little soccer cleats.
It's so cute.
I can't stand it.
What I'm trying to say, Mindy...
Is that our human brain is more complex than any other species.
You're telling me, Guy Raz.
One time I tried to take my brain apart and I could not figure out how to put that thing back together again.
What?
And then, on top of it being so complicated, it's just so big, because I mean you've seen my head right?
And then I was like, why is my head so big?
Big?
Why are humans' heads so big?
Is it because we have bigger brains than other creatures?
That must be it, right?
Not a bigger brain.
Elephants, actually, and even whales have bigger brains. bigger brains than humans.
But our brains have more neurons in an area called the cerebral cortex.
Wait a minute.
Neurons and the what?
Well, neurons are these teeny tiny microscopic cells in our brains.
And you can think of them as like little messengers.
They send messages to other neurons in other parts of our body.
And the cerebral cortex is a part of our brain that gives us our cognitive abilities.
And what I mean by that is it's the part of the brain that helps us do things like plan ahead.
So like to plan a party.
Exactly.
Or plan an escape.
Yep.
Or plan to go to the pet store to buy some bird seed and then plan to ask the cashier how long it will take for the birds to grow once you plant the seeds.
Uh, yeah, if you really want to do that.
It's on my bucket list.
Anyway, our cerebral cortex is what allows us humans to do things like imagine the future or think about the past and learn from our mistakes.
So how come our brains have so many more neurons in the cerebral cortex than other creatures?
Well, Mindy, there are several theories based on evidence or clues about why this happened.
And the most widely accepted theory...
It has to do with cooking.
Cooking?
Yeah, that once our human ancestors discovered fire, they started to cook their food.
And that made it easier for us to digest more of it and help our brains to grow.
But another theory has just been revealed by a small team of scientists.
And I should point out, Mindy, that this is just a theory, so it's still sort of a guess.
So what is it?
Why are our human brains smarter than the brains of other creatures?
One word, Mindy.
Sushi.
Our brains are made of sushi?
Uh... Wait a minute.
Are you trying to tell me that somehow spicy tuna rolls make us smarter?
Well, not exactly like the beautifully prepared sushi that you might get at a Japanese restaurant, but more like the seaweed that wraps around the sushi.
So how did seaweed help us get smarter than other species?
Well, Mindy...
Scientists at the University of Denmark have also been asking that very same question.
And what they discovered was that our early human ancestors probably ate a lot of seaweed.
Ugh, and they probably ate it right out of the ocean without even using chopsticks.
Well, about two and a half million years ago, our human ancestors started to make their way to coastal areas of Africa, areas near the beach.
And if they were lucky...
They'd find food that washed up on the shore, so fish and oysters, maybe some clams and any other sea creatures that washed up.
But it's much much, much more likely that when they got to the beach, all they found was a lot of seaweed.
Yeah, I get that, but why would they eat it right off the bat beach?
It probably had sand in it, mindy.
The reason, of course, is because it's edible.
It's safe to eat, but also you can find a lot of seaweed on the beach, so it was probably a quick and easy way for these distant human relatives to fill their bellies.
Yeah, but you said it made them smarter.
Well, that's right, Mindy.
Seaweed happens to be very, very healthy and nutritious.
It's full of things like iodine and taurine and zinc and magnesium and vitamin B12.
Hold the phone, Guy Raz.
So what exactly makes all those things so nutritious?
Well, these nutrients are really important for human health.
In fact Mindy, whenever you eat healthy foods, you are probably putting a bunch of grape juice, vitamins and minerals into your body.
They're invisible, but you can find them in many different kinds of foods.
But seaweed, it turns out, is chock full of these nutrients.
So what do these nutrients actually do to you?
Well Mindy.
In the case of seaweed, nutrients like zinc are important to help our brain learn new things and to remember them.
Magnesium helps our brain understand things.
Vitamin B12 is actually important in helping us to understand languages.
So over time and I'm talking hundreds of thousands of years as our human ancestors ate things like seaweed, and ate them in abundance, so ate a lot of it their brains also developed into the modern brain that we Homo sapiens have today.
Okay.
Well, I have to admit I was a little skeptical at first, but now you've sold me on the seaweed.
So, with that, Guy Raz, I would like to take you someplace special for lunch today.
Uh... Guy Raz, get in the car.
We are going to eat the beach.
What?
I hope you don't mind a little sand in your seaweed.
Wow!
Cool!
Reggie, you know what we should do?
Go eat seaweed?
No!
Ew!
I was thinking we should go get a bunch of little soccer cleats and get that Chimp Soccer League started that Guy Raz was talking about.
Oh, right.
He said chimps can't play soccer.
Right, right, right, right, right.
I mean, do we know for sure that they can't?
Okay, fine.
We better wrap this up.
Thanks, everyone, for listening to this episode of We Wow on the Weekend.
Be sure to give our phone lines a call to ask me, Dennis, a question.
Otherwise, we'll be hearing from Dentist and Denmark again.
No, Reggie, those were real people with real questions.
Oh, right.
The phone number is 1-888-7-WOW-WOW.
That's 1-888-7-WOW-WOW.
I just might answer your question on Wee Wow on the weekend.
Okay, we're done.
Yes, now you can go watch cartoons.
I finally collected all 14 Power Stones from the realms of Zingo!
Grimdu, no!
I'm not Grimdu, you're Grimdu!
My name is Zortan, remember?
Oh, right.
This show is really weird. joining us for this edition of WeWow on the Weekend.
Our show is written by Ruth Morrison and Jed Anderson.
Original sound design and production is done by Henry Moskal and Marion Lozano, with help from Jed Anderson and Tyler Thull.
Original music for WeWow on the Weekend is composed and performed by Tyler Thull.
Special thanks to Steph Sosa, Rebecca Caban, and all of the other tinkerers at Tinkercast HQ.
There's still time to share your WeWow Crafternoon challenges with us.
Grownups.
You can upload pictures and videos of your projects to us at tinkercastcom.
Slash, share or call us at 1-888-7WOW-WOW.
Our website is tinkercast.com.
There you can learn more about becoming an official member of the World Organization of Wowzers.
Learn about upcoming events, shop our shop and pick up a copy of the latest edition of our number one New York Times bestselling book series.
Wow in the Wild.
Thanks again for thinking, tinkering, experimenting, and exploring with us this week.
Meet us back here on Monday for Wow in the World.
And remember, who wows?
We wow! the world was made by Tinkercast and sent to you by Wondery.
