When We Tamed Fire
The ability to make and use fire has fundamentally changed the arc of our evolution. The bodies we have today were, in many ways, shaped by that time when we first tamed fire.
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Why Do We Have Private Prisons?
The US imprisons more people than any other country in the world. Today, Danielle explores why so many Americans are incarcerated and why we've turned to private prisons to hold that population.
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Why Do We Get Dizzy (…and Astronauts Don’t?)
We’ve all gotten dizzy before… but have you ever gotten WEIRD DIZZY? I teamed up with Vanessa Hill from BrainCrat to answer the question “why do we get dizzy?” and in the process we learned about some very strange and hilarious ways to get extra-special dizzy! Get ready to learn about your vestibular system, the system that lets you know where your body is in space.
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The Mystery Behind the Biggest Bears of All Time
The short-faced bears turned out to be remarkably adaptable, undergoing radical changes to meet the demands of two changing continents. And yet, for reasons we don’t quite understand, their adaptability wasn’t enough to keep them from going extinct.
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El Chupacabras, a Modern Mystery
Did you know there are two different types of chupacabras? Or that these bloodsucking monsters only starting popping up 25 years ago? Sightings of el chupacabras, the “goatsucker,” began in Puerto Rico in 1994 for a very real reason—the unexplained deaths of many farm animals.
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The Beauty and Anguish of Les Misérables!
Victor Hugo’s Les Miserable is one of history’s most famous novels and one of the longest-running musicals in Broadway history. On this special episode of It’s Lit! we explore how Les Miserable became both a national and revolutionary anthem, and so publicly adored that all 1,900 pages never went out of print.
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The Mystery of the World’s Greatest Butterfly Migration
The monarch butterfly migration is one of nature’s greatest events. This orange-winged wonder travels up to 4,500 km from all over North America to spend the winter hanging from oyamel fir trees in central Mexico’s mountain forests. But how does an animal with a brain the size of a poppy seed navigate to this one special place?
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Why Are We Obsessed with Cults?
What is it about cults that captures the public imagination? Why are we so interested in the stories of Jonestown, Charles Manson, and Patty Hearst? Today Danielle explores how these groups entered the public consciousness and why we find it so hard to look away.
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How to be Crushed by the Atmosphere!
Air. I bet you never even notice that it’s there. Yet you are swimming in an ocean of it every day. If there’s a literal ton of air pressing down on you all the time, so why don’t we feel it? We look back at the history of physics to learn how we figured out air pressure, why vacuums don’t suck.
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Why Are So Many People Allergic To Food?
More people have food allergies than ever before. Peanuts, tree nuts, shellfish, eggs, and even milk… the list of possibly dangerous foods seems to get longer every day. But why do some people’s bodies have deadly reactions food? And why are food allergies on the rise? In this video we explain what food allergies really are, and what the difference is between food allergy and food intolerance.
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When Camels Roamed North America
Camels are famous for adaptations that have allowed them to flourish where most other large mammals would perish. But their story begins over 40 million years ago in North America, and in an environment you’d never expect: a rainforest.
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When Apes Conquered Europe
Today, our closest evolutionary relatives, the apes, live only in small pockets of Africa and Asia. But back in the Miocene epoch, apes occupied all of Europe. Why aren’t there wild apes in Europe today?
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Why Megalodon (Definitely) Went Extinct
For more than 10 million years, Megalodon was at the top of its game as the oceans’ apex predator...until 2.6 million years ago, when it went extinct. So, what happened to the largest shark in history?
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When We First Made Tools
The tools made by our human ancestors may not seem like much when you compare them to the screen you’re looking at right now but their creation represents a pivotal moment in the origin of technology and in the evolution of our lineage.
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When Giant Scorpions Swarmed the Seas
Sea scorpions thrived for 200 million years, coming in a wide variety of shapes and sizes. Over time, they developed a number of adaptations--from crushing claws to flattened tails for swimming. And some of them adapted by getting so big that they still hold the record as the largest arthropods of all time.
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How Sloths Went From the Seas to the Trees
The story of sloths is one of astounding ecological variability, with some foraging in the seas, others living underground, and others still hiding from predators in towering cliffs. So why are their only living relatives in the trees?
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I'm Young & Healthy, Can I Skip Health Insurance?
For many young people, health insurance is a big expense that may seem unnecessary... but is it smart to go without it?
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Should I Invest In Cannabis Stocks?
Legal cannabis production is taking the investing world by storm. As more big names move to cash-in on this green-gold-rush, you might be wondering… am I missing out?
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Can You Really Retire in Your 30s?
The popular “FIRE” movement proclaims that anybody can retire decades earlier if they save like crazy and slash their costs. Is this realistic? Is this something you could achieve?
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Does Wealth Make You Meaner?
Books and movies love to show wealthy people as cruel, unfeeling, and miserly. Turns out science has an explanation for why greater amounts of wealth can turn us into Scrooges. Should you just avoid growing your wealth… or is there a better way to protect yourself from the corrupting influence of money?
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Are White Walkers Really Nordic Zombies?
What do the Sagas of the Icelanders and Game of Thrones have in common? Dr. Zarka answers this question and explores how the draugr, Nordic undead monsters, bear a striking resemblance to the White Walkers—and more importantly, how these monsters connect to the history of Ancient Nordic peoples.
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Why Do Schools Teach Sex Education?
Why are school teachers tasked with teaching students about sexual education? Today, Danielle explores how sex ed ended up in America's schools!
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Why Do We Have Hobbies?
Where did the concept of a hobby come from? And how did humans turn the things they do purely for fun into side hustles and competitions that actually pay the bills?
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Where on Earth do you weigh the least?
You may have heard that a kilogram of feathers weighs the same as a kilogram of steel, but that all depends on where you weigh them. This video is all about the difference between mass and weight, and how weirdly awesome Earth’s gravity really is.
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The Island of Huge Hamsters and Giant Owls
Back in the late Miocene epoch, there was an island--or maybe a group of islands-- in the Mediterranean Sea that was populated with fantastic giant beasts. It’s a lesson in the very strange, but very real, powers of natural selection.
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