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Stuff You Should Know

Stuff You Should Know

If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.

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Books Mentioned in This Podcast

Surya Siddhanta

Surya Siddhanta

by Bharadwaj Sudhikant

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And not too long after that, or around that time in India, the world's oldest astronomy book, the Surya Siddhanta, obviously the whoever wrote it was like, I'm going to try to guess the diameter of Saturn, and I don't think they guessed at it like, you know, how many jelly beans are in this jar kind of guess, like they used math and geometry and all sorts of great stuff.

Episode: How Saturn Works | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

On Narcissism

On Narcissism

by Sigmund Freud

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Uh, and then one guy—and this is from a 1978 New York Times piece—said, 'The doorman told me to go home and read Freud's essay on rejection.' Wow, wow, that's pretty great!

Episode: The Filthy Magic of Studio 54 | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

by Milton Rokeach

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For some reason, I thought I read the book, but I don't think I did.

Episode: Selects: The Three Christs of Ypsilanti Experiment | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

by Milton Rokeach

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I think we just covered the book in college in a psychology class.

Episode: Selects: The Three Christs of Ypsilanti Experiment | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

by Milton Rokeach

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There's a quote here from the book, and big thanks to Dave Ruse for putting this one together; I know this was a huge—it’s a tough one to wrangle.

Episode: Selects: The Three Christs of Ypsilanti Experiment | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

by Milton Rokeach

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But he's a famous poet at the time, and he was basically saying like, 'You know, surely, Rokeach, the guy who's writing the book, will understand that the character, this doctor, is like out of his mind.'

Episode: Selects: The Three Christs of Ypsilanti Experiment | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

by Milton Rokeach

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In his book, he also talked about being inspired a little bit by some stuff that Valer wrote about it, right?

Episode: Selects: The Three Christs of Ypsilanti Experiment | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

by Milton Rokeach

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The entire situation was sad from the start, but there was a passage in the book where Leon receives a letter, and R realizes he’s holding back tears.

Episode: Selects: The Three Christs of Ypsilanti Experiment | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

by Milton Rokeach

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Despite a lack of closure, the book was published in 1964, achieving significant success in psychology, though it faced immediate backlash.

Episode: Selects: The Three Christs of Ypsilanti Experiment | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

by Milton Rokeach

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In a new foreword, he admitted to suffering from god-like delusions himself, fully recognizing he had played God with these men, and expressed regret for publishing the original study.

Episode: Selects: The Three Christs of Ypsilanti Experiment | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

The three Christs of Ypsilanti

by Milton Rokeach

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He made an admission in the book, stating, 'We do not know to what extent our very presence, behavior, and questions may have influenced the results obtained,' which is an odd thing to claim since the primary goal of the experiment was to exert influence over the participants.

Episode: Selects: The Three Christs of Ypsilanti Experiment | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Mystery of the Blue Train

The Mystery of the Blue Train

by Agatha Christie

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One of the big things that came out of that French book, The Birth of a Lie is the, um, the filmmaker unearthed a recording that was, I don't know where he found it, but they found it and released the transcript of it that clearly has, um, if not Zimbardo, at least Jaffy, definitely Jaffy, coaching the um, the guards!

Episode: Selects: How the Stanford Prison Experiment Worked | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Principles of Scientific Management

The Principles of Scientific Management

by Frederick Winslow Taylor

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Uh, and that is the year, I'm sorry, the next year is when he put out the 'Principles of Scientific Management', which was probably easily the biggest business book, um, maybe at the 20th century, but at least the first half of the 20th century.

Episode: Taylorism: Work Faster! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The doctors' case against the pill

The doctors' case against the pill

by Barbara Seaman

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And in 1969, a very famous book came out called The Doctor's Case Against the Pill written by a medical journalist named Barbara Seaman.

Episode: Selects: How The Pill Changed the World | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Mad Gasser of Mattoon

The Mad Gasser of Mattoon

by Scott Maruna

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But there was a guy named Scott Maruna, who was a high school chemistry professor and grew up in Charleston, about 12 miles away from Mattoon. He decided to go to Mattoon a few years back and talked to some locals and put together a book about the subject: The Mad Gasser of Mattoon.

Episode: LIVE: Minneapolis - The Madd Gasser of Mattoon | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Wizard of Oz, L. Frank Baum

The Wizard of Oz, L. Frank Baum

by L. Frank Baum

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He was also the son of the legendary producer of The Wizard of Oz, Mervin Leroy, which explains Warner Leroy's daughter's name.

Episode: The Story of Tavern on the Green | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Wicked

Wicked

by Gregory Maguire

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Red shoes Leroy, or uh what's the what's the Witch and uh Wicked?

Episode: The Story of Tavern on the Green | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Princess Bride

The Princess Bride

by William Goldman

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And he said have you never seen The Princess Bride?

Episode: The Saga of Silk Road | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Old Yeller

Old Yeller

by Fred Gipson

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Yeah, and a book, I think, too!

Episode: The Saga of Silk Road | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Anarchist Cookbook

The Anarchist Cookbook

by William F. Powell, William Powell, William Powell, Peter M Bergman

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Oh wait, I may have mixed that up with the Anarchist Cookbook episode. By the way, everyone, we forgot to mention the Swatch guards!

Episode: The Saga of Silk Road | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Frugal housewife

Frugal housewife

by l. maria child

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One of the other things I saw, um, there's a book called The Economical Housewife from the 1850s that it might be the first recipe for dandelion wine, and people still make that today.

Episode: The Fascinating History of Dandelions | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Dandelion Wine

Dandelion Wine

by Ray Bradbury

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Um, I mean, it's definitely a thing; Ray Bradbury had a novel called Dandelion Wine from 1957, so it's something that's been enjoyed all over the world.

Episode: The Fascinating History of Dandelions | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Prospecting for uranium

Prospecting for uranium

by U.S. Atomic Energy Commission.

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Well, the ones that came with uranium, uh, they had, you know, booklets; one was called Prospecting for Uranium! Uh, that, that taught you how to mine a radioactive ore!

Episode: Kids' Chemistry Sets: KABOOM! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

It

It

by Stephen King

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I've always wanted to write in, but just hadn't found the right topic until the 'It' stranger things script retooling debate during emojis. Stephen King is by far my favorite author and it is my absolute favorite of his novels! Highly recommend!

Episode: Selects: What's a quinceañera anyway? | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

It

It

by Stephen King

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My whole point has been that they played up the same things that Stranger Things was known for and that you wouldn't find in the book It, and that they plumped up that stuff because of Stranger Things! That's my assertion!

Episode: Selects: What's a quinceañera anyway? | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Disorders of personality

Disorders of personality

by Theodore Millon

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So in the late 60s, the DSM-2 introduced a diagnosis called hyperkinetic reaction of childhood, and it's essentially ADHD that they were talking about.

Episode: ADHD pt 1 | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Classic Ghost Stories

Classic Ghost Stories

by Algernon Blackwood

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What's it called? This is 'The Woman's Ghost Story' by Algernon Blackwood.

Episode: 15th Annual SYSK Halloween Spooktacular! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Grimm's Fairy Tales (Brothers Grimm)

Grimm's Fairy Tales (Brothers Grimm)

by Brothers Grimm

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Um, of course, central to a lot of these stories were the Brothers Grimm, uh Jacob and Wilhelm, who we did I think a two-parter on the Grimm brothers, uh didn't we?

Episode: Spend Some Time with Fairies | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Fairy and folk tales of the Irish peasantry

Fairy and folk tales of the Irish peasantry

by William Butler Yeats

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Uh, also late in the 19th century, none other than William Butler Yeats published, I don't know if it was the first one but maybe one of the first big guidebooks almost about fairies. It was called Fairy and Folktales of the Irish Peasantry, uh published in 1888.

Episode: Spend Some Time with Fairies | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Backyard fairies

Backyard fairies

by Phoebe Wahl

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Well, I'm looking, yeah, yeah, 'Backyard Fairies' by Phoebe Wahl.

Episode: Spend Some Time with Fairies | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Animal Farm

Animal Farm

by George Orwell

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I believe that is a joke reference to the book 'Animal Farm' by George Orwell. In the book, the animals use the phrase 'Four legs good, two legs bad' as they rise against the humans. That must be it, love the show, longtime listener.

Episode: Q Anon: When Wild Conspiracy Went (sort of) Mainstream | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Deliverance

Deliverance

by James Dickey

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This is a poem by James Dickey, who was a poet but also a novelist; he wrote Deliverance!

Episode: Kudzu: The Vine That Just Won't Stop | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Memoirs of Fanny Hill

Memoirs of Fanny Hill

by John Cleland

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And they all shrugged, and she wrote a book about it.

Episode: The Shadow Biosphere: Is There Other Life on Earth? | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Little People, BIG DREAMS

Little People, BIG DREAMS

by Maria Isabel Sanchez Vegara, Lisbeth Kaiser

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And then I also want to shout out a book series called Little People, Big Dreams; it’s a kids' book series that we've been reading to my daughter. In fact, it’s kind of all she wants to read right now, and they are on great women in history and kind of brutally honest for reading to kids.

Episode: Selects: Rosa Parks: Agent of Change | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Rebellious Life of Mrs Rosa Parks

The Rebellious Life of Mrs Rosa Parks

by Jeanne Theoharis

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Um, and this was written by the same person who wrote the award-winning book, 'The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks.' Her name is uh, Jean, uh, Theoharis, it's all one word.

Episode: Selects: Rosa Parks: Agent of Change | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Helter Skelter

Helter Skelter

by Vincent Bugliosi, Curt Gentry

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And this idea is apparently the creation of the prosecutor in the case, a guy named Vincent Bugliosi, who wrote a book called 'Helter Skelter,' a 600-page book, basically the definitive True Crime book on the Manson family and the Manson family murders.

Episode: Selects: The Manson Family Murders Part 2 | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Mein Kampf

Mein Kampf

by Adolf Hitler

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Hitler cited Henry Ford as a inspiration in Mein Kampf, and I think in 1931, a reporter from the Detroit News interviewed Hitler in his office and noted that there was a huge portrait of Henry Ford behind Hitler at his desk.

Episode: Henry Ford: The Good, Bad and Ugly | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

THE THERMONUCLEAR WAR

THE THERMONUCLEAR WAR

by Herman Kahn

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He wrote a book in 1961 called On Thermonuclear War, and then went on to form the Hudson Institute, where he basically was like, we are a group that is going to forecast the future.

Episode: Selects: How Futurology Works | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Future shock

Future shock

by Alvin Toffler

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The one that I ran across in this article that I had heard of but didn't know anything about is Alvin Toffler's Future Shock. I remember that; I think, did you read it?

Episode: Selects: How Futurology Works | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Children of the Plague

Children of the Plague

by Kat Hankinson

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But back in I think the 1910s, writing, yeah, he wrote a book called Ralph 124C 41+ which predicted everything in this!

Episode: Selects: How Futurology Works | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Helter Skelter

Helter Skelter

by Vincent Bugliosi, Curt Gentry

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Yeah, like I definitely remember the book Helter Skelter being a huge, huge thing. Um, and I remember a time before like media was so robust when the idea of Charles Manson was just so terrifying to me.

Episode: Selects: The Manson Family Murders Part 1 | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Marathon running

Marathon running

by James Edward Sullivan

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He actually wrote a book in 1909 called Marathon Running, where he said, ‘Don't get into the habit of drinking and eating in a marathon! Some prominent runners do, but it is not beneficial!’

Episode: The Strange Story of the 1904 Olympic Marathon | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Wealth of Nations

The Wealth of Nations

by Adam Smith

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One of the other things that happened to kind of—but this thing was full steam ahead when Adam Smith wrote a book in 1776 called 'An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.'

Episode: The Luddites: Misunderstood Working Class Heroes | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Top ten Arthurian legends

Top ten Arthurian legends

by Margaret Simpson

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And it turned out that book was a Welsh Aran Legend, and another Reddit post contained some Mayan numerals that you had to decode that became a key that you could use to analyze the Arthurian legend with.

Episode: True Mysteries of the Internet | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Dictionary of Body Language

The Dictionary of Body Language

by Joe Navarro

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Yeah I think this quote sums it up I'm trying to learn, I'm try, sorry, trying to use body language by reading a body language dictionary is like trying to speak French by reading a French dictionary See, you can list off all the non-verbal cues in the world, but if you try and learn the body language, quote unquote, because of that, then you're just gonna end up confused

Episode: Selects: Body Language! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Secret History of the Mongols

The Secret History of the Mongols

by The Arth Estate

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There's a story called The Secret History of the Mongols, and it was written in about 1240, so shortly after Genghis Khan's death! We don't know who the author was, but that's the primary source for most of the biography of Genghis Khan.

Episode: Selects: Genghis Khan: Madman or Genius? | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Etre et le néant

Etre et le néant

by Jean-Paul Sartre

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to Kierkegaard, and I think he even calls out Kierkegaard in the section of Being and Nothingness.

Episode: The Call of the Void: Don’t Pick Up! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The coal question

The coal question

by William Stanley Jevons, Alfred William Flux

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But there was already back in the 1860s a book by a guy named Stanley Jevons, called 'The Coal Question,' and this guy was already warning about Peak Coal, essentially pointing out like coal is a non-renewable resource, everybody, and we are using it really, really fast. This guy was already ringing the alarm about it, and Rudolf Diesel was exactly the kind of person who had his ear out for this kind of thing.

Episode: The Story of Rudolf Diesel | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel

Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel

by Douglas Brunt

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Uh, if you want to know more about diesel and his engine, then just go read, uh, Douglas Brunt's book on it. And since I mentioned Douglas Brunt for one last time, it's time for listener mail. Uh, I'm going to call this Harvard follow-up with the old Puritans episode.

Episode: The Story of Rudolf Diesel | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

To Kill a Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird

by Harper Lee

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Which I thought for sure Sheriff McCulla was going to do, but apparently McCulla was intent on kind of going by the book! He followed the Hectate school of sheriffing! I don't even know what that from—uh, from To Kill a Mockingbird!

Episode: Selects: The Tulsa 'Race Riots' | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Red Badge of Courage

The Red Badge of Courage

by Stephen Crane

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Um, the Red Book, aka the order of battle of the German Army, was a very big deal, and it was basically just an ongoing, um, list of like everything they could learn about the German Army. Um, anytime they would get documents or any kind of plans, that would go into the Red Book or they would, you know, counterintelligence-wise get this stuff. And it was, you know, every unit that they had, who the leaders were, where battles had fought, how those went, it was just sort of the master book called The Red Book.

Episode: Short Stuff: The Ritchie Boys | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Dark territory

Dark territory

by Fred M. Kaplan

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The problem was at the time, Ronald Reagan was the President of the United States, and there's a guy named Fred Kaplan who wrote a book about, um, the history of cyber war called Dark Territory, and apparently, Reagan saw this film, was so freaked out by it that he got the Joint Chiefs together and was like, 'Can this happen?

Episode: Phone Phreaking: The Advent of Hacking | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Scarlet Letter

The Scarlet Letter

by Nathaniel Hawthorne

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So you'd think, of course, like I mean they're famous for the Scarlet Letter! These are the people who branded Hester Prynne with The Scarlet Letter!

Episode: The Puritans in America | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

1491

1491

by Charles C. Mann, Charles Mann

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Yeah, so all of the Native Americans, even though their society was completely upended, and I guess here's my chance to mention 1491 again because it covers all of this stuff. Man, it's been a while.

Episode: The Puritans in America | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

In the shadow of man

In the shadow of man

by Jane Goodall

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Yeah, so, um, prior to that, we kind of jumped ahead a little bit, but prior to that, um, she—in addition to that National Geographic cover story—um, less than 10 years later, um, she released her first book, 'In the Shadow of Man.'

Episode: Jane Goodall: All Good | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Complete Far Side 1980-1994

The Complete Far Side 1980-1994

by Gary Larson

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She wrote a preface for one of his, uh, book collections, and it turned into like this cool friendship.

Episode: Jane Goodall: All Good | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Awakenings

Awakenings

by Oliver Sacks, Jonathan Davis

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It's very famously associated with dopamine for anybody who has read Awakenings or saw the movie.

Episode: How Dopamine Works | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Awakenings

Awakenings

by Oliver Sacks, Jonathan Davis

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That definitely aligns with research, particularly something reported by Oliver Sacks in the book and then later in the movie Awakenings.

Episode: How Dopamine Works | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Jungle

The Jungle

by Upton Sinclair

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Oh man, it was like Upton Sinclair's The Jungle right before my little 13-year-old eyes.

Episode: Selects: How Restaurant Health Inspections Work | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Jungle

The Jungle

by Upton Sinclair

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They're certainly not really old, because at least in the United States, it wasn't until that book you mentioned, The Jungle, was published in 1905 that people like really sat up and took notice, and Congress acted almost immediately and passed the Pure Food and Drug Act the next year.

Episode: Selects: How Restaurant Health Inspections Work | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Jungle

The Jungle

by Upton Sinclair

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That's the impact that Upton Sinclair's The Jungle had.

Episode: Selects: How Restaurant Health Inspections Work | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Gary Meets Marge the Barge

Gary Meets Marge the Barge

by Jessica Chang

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Uh that is from uh, Jessica Chang in Brooklyn, New York and Jessica's book is Gary meets Marge the Barge, that's awesome, congratulations Jessica, that's a great book idea.

Episode: Whistling! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

To have and have not

To have and have not

by Ernest Hemingway

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Okay, so there's a, an adaptation of a Hemingway novel 'To Have and Have Not' with Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart.

Episode: Whistling! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

History

History

by Herodotus

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And then there's another guy, Herodotus, he was a historian from Greece; he wrote basically a monograph on Babylon a hundred years after Nebuchadnezzar, and he didn't mention the Hanging Gardens at all.

Episode: Selects: How the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World Work, Part I | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Canterbury Tales

The Canterbury Tales

by Geoffrey Chaucer

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I think one appears in the Canterbury Tales—the wife of Bath, I believe—where they're just like always in a good mood, they have money, they're independent, they don't take any guff from anybody.

Episode: Why Must Widowhood Be So Difficult? | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The burning bed

The burning bed

by Faith McNulty

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Uh, another one that came out was obviously The Burning Bed, which is a big case that we're going to talk about now because it was, uh, I mean the movie was a landmark TV movie, but the case that was based on also a landmark case in a lot of ways.

Episode: Coercive Control, the Invisible Basis of Abuse | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Coercive control

Coercive control

by Evan Stark

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He wrote a book in 2007 called 'Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal Life.' Evan Stark has done some pretty great work.

Episode: Coercive Control, the Invisible Basis of Abuse | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

GRIT

GRIT

by Angela Duckworth

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Like I mentioned before, she did a TED Talk, and she wrote a book called 'Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance.'

Episode: The Ballad of Grit | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

How children succeed

How children succeed

by Paul Tough

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He wrote a book before Duckworth did, back in 2012, called "How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character."

Episode: The Ballad of Grit | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Guinness book of world records, 1998.

The Guinness book of world records, 1998.

by Mark C. Young

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Yeah, let's, well you know what we get to do now in our typical two-episode procession, the way that is Stuff You Should Know, is we get to wash the stank of Unit 731 off of us by talking about a very fun thing, which is the Guinness Book of World Records, or the Guinness World Records. I feel like when I was a kid, it was called The Guinness Book of World Records in the United States.

Episode: The Guinness Book of Records | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Guinness book of world records, 1998.

The Guinness book of world records, 1998.

by Mark C. Young

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But only 4,000 records are put into the book every year, and a lot of those are like classics, like I think at least half are like classic ones that have been in there for years and years and years that people just want to see that weren't necessarily broken, you know, in the past year. Yeah, I tried to find new entries in the book each year and I couldn't find that number, but I mean it's not a lot.

Episode: The Guinness Book of Records | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

A Wrinkle in Time

A Wrinkle in Time

by Madeleine L'Engle

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Yeah, but so is like a Time-Life Book.

Episode: Selects: How Vomit Phobia Works | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Animal Farm

Animal Farm

by George Orwell

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And uh, sure, it caused, um, or at least it was intended to cause people to take kind of a hard look at, uh, pre-Animal Farm, uh, to make sort of a social statement about how we treated animals.

Episode: Selects: The Great War of the Worlds Panic Myth | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The World Without Us

The World Without Us

by Alan Weisman

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And by the way, I keep saying once we're gone, um remember that amazing 2007 book, The World Without Us by Alan Weisman?

Episode: The Silurian Hypothesis | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

by Hunter S. Thompson

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I read Fear and Loathing, of course, and what other one did I read?

Episode: 10 - Yes, 10! - Dumb Criminals | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The bell curve

The bell curve

by Richard J. Herrnstein, Charles A. Murray

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He has a book called 'The Bell Curve' that is often cited as data-proven evidence for white supremacy and has largely been debunked as pseudo-science.

Episode: Selects: The Legends of Lost Nazi Gold | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy

The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy

by Douglas Adams

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By the way, can we shout out that great book that a lot of this is called from, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy? No, what great book?

Episode: Hitchhiking: Two thumbs out! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Carsick

Carsick

by John Waters

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For me, John Waters is a pretty fun one because he hitchhiked and enjoyed it as a kid and then eventually wrote a book. He hitchhiked as a 68-year-old grown man in 2013 from his home in Baltimore to his other home in San Francisco and wrote a book about it called 'John Waters Hitchhikes Across America.'

Episode: Hitchhiking: Two thumbs out! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

On the Road

On the Road

by Jack Kerouac

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Whether it's obviously Jack Kerouac's On the Road is a big one, or Tom Robbins even Cowgirls Get the Blues. The Gus Van Sant movie, the main character was born with an abnormally large thumb, so she obviously had a talent as a hitchhiker, and that's kind of one of the subplots of the book and film, right?

Episode: Hitchhiking: Two thumbs out! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Even Cowgirls Get the Blues

Even Cowgirls Get the Blues

by Tom Robbins

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Whether it's obviously Jack Kerouac's On the Road is a big one, or Tom Robbins even Cowgirls Get the Blues. The Gus Van Sant movie, the main character was born with an abnormally large thumb, so she obviously had a talent as a hitchhiker, and that's kind of one of the subplots of the book and film, right?

Episode: Hitchhiking: Two thumbs out! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Fire investigation

Fire investigation

by Paul Leland Kirk

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So that book was sort of the standard until 1969, about 25 years later or so, when Paul Kirk, a biochemist and forensic scientist at the University of California, Berkeley, published a different book called 'Fire Investigation.'

Episode: The Dubious Science of Arson Investigation | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Development as Freedom

Development as Freedom

by Amartya Sen

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There’s a great, great book referenced in this same article, written by Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen, called 'Development as Freedom,' which essentially backs up what we’re discussing.

Episode: Selects: How Famines Work | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Human sexual response

Human sexual response

by William H. Masters

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None other than William Masters of Masters and Johnson’s fame said that women should use the drug to avoid falling into the third sex or the neutral gender, which is very off-base to say the least.

Episode: Testosterone and Estrogen: Wondrous Hormones | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Feminine Mystique

The Feminine Mystique

by Betty Friedan

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Yeah, there was a lot of infighting in feminism at the time—there was the Old Guard, kind of personified by Betty Friedan, who wrote The Feminine Mystique, who was kind of opposed to the gay contingent, which she called the Lavender Menace, which she believed prevented mainstream society from accepting feminism and seeing it as credible.

Episode: The 1977 Women's Conference That Changed America | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Johann Gutenberg and his Bible

Johann Gutenberg and his Bible

by Janet Thompson Ing

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Um, it's actually served as the site, the storehouse for some like truly valuable stuff, um, like the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, um, the Gettysburg Address, a Gutenberg Bible, um, the Magna Carta, actually during World War II, England's like, hey, can you hang on to this for us, 'cause the Germans are really like up our butts right now?

Episode: Selects: All the Gold In Fort Knox: Meh | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Everglades: river of grass

The Everglades: river of grass

by Marjory Stoneman Douglas

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And she was a really good writer and she wrote a book called 'The Everglades: River of Grass,' which is a great title or whatever, but it was apparently a very popular book that changed people's attitudes toward the Everglades.

Episode: The Everglades: Wowee | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Less

Less

by Andrew Sean Greer

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Um, I picked this book because that's sometimes when I'm after a novel and it's been a while, I will go to the Pulitzer list and that's exactly what I did. And I'm reading Less by Andrew Sean Greer, which won in 2018, and it is so funny and great!

Episode: The Pulitzer Prize: A major award! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

1491

1491

by Charles C. Mann, Charles Mann

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But apparently the Pulitzer committee is not interested in that kind of thing! He won, which was yours, 1491! And then the follow-up was 1493!

Episode: The Pulitzer Prize: A major award! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

1493

1493

by Charles C. Mann, Charles Mann

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He won, which was yours, 1491! And then the follow-up was 1493! He won a big award for that, but not the Pulitzer!

Episode: The Pulitzer Prize: A major award! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

A million little pieces

A million little pieces

by James Frey

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I think the sad thing is that apparently it's sort of like a million little pieces book that that guy wrote. I read that book, and it was great with a capital G! In my mind, I always thought, 'Dude, why didn’t you just call it a novel?'

Episode: The Pulitzer Prize: A major award! | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Dangerous to man

Dangerous to man

by Roger A. Caras

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But because there was a respected naturalist, Bruce Wright, writing about this, it was picked up by another scientist, a conservationist named Roger Caras, who wrote a book a couple of years later called Dangerous to Man.

Episode: Short Stuff: Ramree Island Crocodile Massacre | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Bloom County

Bloom County

by Berkeley Breathed

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Well, now that I think about it, the first one that really— not the first one that made me laugh, but the one that hit me on a second level was Bloom County.

Episode: Peanuts (the comic) Part I | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Complete Maus

The Complete Maus

by Art Spiegelman

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Essentially, Art Spiegelman, the guy who created Mouse, said that Peanuts was Schultz breaking himself up into child-sized pieces and letting them go at each other for half a century.

Episode: Peanuts (the comic) Part I | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Communion

Communion

by Whitley Strieber

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But he was a horror and science fiction writer and in '87 published the book 'Communion' which had, if you look up the cover of 'Communion', the illustration that was done by Ted Jacobs along with, you know, Strieber, because he was like this is what I saw, you got to draw this right, that is as stereotypical alien head as you could imagine on the cover of this very popular book.

Episode: The Alien Abduction Phenomenon of the Mid-20th Century | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Abduction

Abduction

by John E. Mack

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Then, yeah, he had a book in '94 about 13 different abduction cases called 'Abduction: Human Encounters with Alien.' Uh, parentheses, BTW, I teach at Harvard. Did I mention?

Episode: The Alien Abduction Phenomenon of the Mid-20th Century | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The interrupted journey

The interrupted journey

by John G. Fuller

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UPI picks it up, uh, and then a guy named John G. Fuller made it into a book in 1966 called The Interrupted Journey: Two Lost Hours Aboard a Flying Saucer. Uh, which eventually became a TV movie in 1975 called The UFO Incident, which you can watch on YouTube if you want to see a relatively young and, uh, you know, pretty, uh, in great shape James Earl Jones.

Episode: The Alien Abduction Phenomenon of the Mid-20th Century | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

How to fix a broken heart

How to fix a broken heart

by Guy Winch

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That's tip number one from psychologist Guy Winch, the author of "How to Fix a Broken Heart": Stay the heck off social media.

Episode: Selects: The Science of Break-Ups | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Llama, Llama Red Pajama

Llama, Llama Red Pajama

by Anna Dewdney

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Uh, all right, well, quickly before we talk about llama fleece, I kind of forgot until I started researching this that there was a book series for kids called Llama Llama.

Episode: The Smiley, Stubborn Llama | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Fellowship of the Ring

The Fellowship of the Ring

by John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, Christina Scull

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They are basically creating line-of-sight towers that beam from one to the other, like those bonfire towers in Lord of the Rings.

Episode: Wireless Electricity: When Can We Unplug Our TVs? | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Population Bomb

The Population Bomb

by Paul R. Ehrlich

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Oh yeah, that's not—I’m thinking of, yeah, different guy. So this guy, he wrote other things besides The Population Bomb.

Episode: Selects: How Zero Population Growth Works | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Animal Farm

Animal Farm

by George Orwell

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But my reading teacher was also the social studies teacher, and I guess that explains why all of our reading lists included Animal Farm, Hiroshima, All Quiet on the Western Front, and you know it. The Jungle by Upton Sinclair is a powerful book.

Episode: The Story of the Nuclear Boy Scout | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

All Quiet on the Western Front

All Quiet on the Western Front

by Erich Maria Remarque

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But my reading teacher was also the social studies teacher, and I guess that explains why all of our reading lists included Animal Farm, Hiroshima, All Quiet on the Western Front, and you know it. The Jungle by Upton Sinclair is a powerful book.

Episode: The Story of the Nuclear Boy Scout | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Jungle

The Jungle

by Upton Sinclair

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But my reading teacher was also the social studies teacher, and I guess that explains why all of our reading lists included Animal Farm, Hiroshima, All Quiet on the Western Front, and you know it. The Jungle by Upton Sinclair is a powerful book.

Episode: The Story of the Nuclear Boy Scout | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Cosmic View

Cosmic View

by Kees Boeke

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It was based on a book by a Dutch teacher named Kees Boeke, called Cosmic View: The Universe in 40 Jumps.

Episode: Ray and Charles Eames: More than Chairs | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

On the Road

On the Road

by Jack Kerouac

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Yeah and if you were into jazz at the time you were probably somewhat familiar of bop talk but um it filtered into the beats um who kind of introduced it to an even wider audience in the United States like it pops up here there and on the road from Jack Kerouac sure.

Episode: Like, here's the episode on "like" | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Jungle

The Jungle

by Upton Sinclair

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Like you said, he was a hardcore socialist and a writer who wrote the very famous book The Jungle about... Well, most people who have never read The Jungle probably say, 'Yeah, it's about exposing the meatpacking in Chicago, right?'

Episode: What Americans Ate When There Were No Food Laws | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Pygmalion in the classroom

Pygmalion in the classroom

by Robert Rosenthal, Lenore Jacobson

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So they published a study in 1968 called Pygmalion in the Classroom, and again they named it after Pygmalion because in that story from Ovid, the sculptor Pygmalion sculpts a beautiful woman, falls in love with her, and loves the statue so much that the goddess Venus says, "I'm going to make you a real-life person."

Episode: What's the Pygmalion Effect? | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Pygmalion in the classroom

Pygmalion in the classroom

by Robert Rosenthal, Lenore Jacobson

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All right, so where we left off, the study was called Pygmalion in the Classroom published in '68 as the paper and then also notably as a full book.

Episode: What's the Pygmalion Effect? | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

The Murders in the Rue Morgue

The Murders in the Rue Morgue

by Edgar Allan Poe

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That’s what some people thought; I think that's what Edgar Allan Poe thought too. You kidding me?

Episode: Selects: A List Of Games You Would Surely Lose to a Computer | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

Mein Kampf

Mein Kampf

by Adolf Hitler

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He wrote about it in Mein Kampf, claiming that it was a secret Jewish language used to plot against Germany.

Episode: Esperanto: Tre Mojosa | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

In broad daylight

In broad daylight

by Harry N. MacLean

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There was a book written in 1988 by Harry MacLean, a crime writer called In Broad Daylight: A Murder in Skidmore, Missouri. There was a documentary, just a few years ago in 2019, called No One Saw a Thing. Of which I watched the first episode.

Episode: The Strange Unsolved Murder of Ken McElroy | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

In broad daylight

In broad daylight

by Harry N. MacLean

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He had a long career as a lobbyist working in the legislature there in Missouri, and apparently, he would buy copies of McLean's book, have McLean sign them, and hand them out to all the delegates in the state senate. He died in 2012, and like I said, he was very proud of his work.

Episode: The Strange Unsolved Murder of Ken McElroy | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW