Learn about your body’s electromagnetic field; why you probably never learned that ancient Greek and Roman statues used to be brightly colored; and the surprising trick to a winning pep talk. Please support our sponsors! Get 10% off your first order from Saturday Morning Coffee Company at SaturdayMorningCoffeeCompany.com In this podcast, Cody Gough and Ashley Hamer discuss the following stories from Curiosity.com to help you get smarter and learn something new in just a few minutes: You Have an Electromagnetic Field, but It's Not What You Think — https://curiosity.im/2KMXqMl Greek and Roman Marble Statues Were Once Brightly Colored — https://curiosity.im/2Zzu9c8 This Is the Surprising Trick to a Winning Pep Talk — https://curiosity.im/34sFiiU Download the FREE 5-star Curiosity app for Android and iOS at https://curiosity.im/podcast-app. And Amazon smart speaker users: you can listen to our podcast as part of your Amazon Alexa Flash Briefing — just click “enable” here: https://curiosity.im/podcast-flash-briefing.
Learn about your body’s electromagnetic field; why you probably never learned that ancient Greek and Roman statues used to be brightly colored; and the surprising trick to a winning pep talk.
Please support our sponsors! Get 10% off your first order from Saturday Morning Coffee Company at SaturdayMorningCoffeeCompany.com
In this podcast, Cody Gough and Ashley Hamer discuss the following stories from Curiosity.com to help you get smarter and learn something new in just a few minutes:
Download the FREE 5-star Curiosity app for Android and iOS at https://curiosity.im/podcast-app. And Amazon smart speaker users: you can listen to our podcast as part of your Amazon Alexa Flash Briefing — just click “enable” here: https://curiosity.im/podcast-flash-briefing.
Find episode transcript here: https://curiosity-daily-4e53644e.simplecast.com/episodes/your-bodys-electromagnetic-field-winning-pep-talk-tips-and-brightly-colored-ancient-statues
CODY: Hi! We’re here from curiosity-dot-com to help you get smarter in just a few minutes. I’m Cody Gough.
ASHLEY: And I’m Ashley Hamer. Today, you’ll learn about your body’s electromagnetic field; why you probably never learned that ancient Greek and Roman statues used to be brightly colored; and the surprising trick to a winning pep talk.
CODY: Let’s WIN! ...some curiosity.
You Have an Electromagnetic Field, but It's Not What You Think — https://curiosity.im/2KMXqMl (Cody)
[ad lib]
If you think the idea of a colorful aura generated by your electromagnetic field belongs in the realm of metaphysics, think again. Turns out physicists have confirmed we do have an electromagnetic field, but it’s not what you think, and it’s definitely not amber or any other color. Here’s the science. Our atoms are mostly empty spaces. If the nucleus of an atom was the size of a marble, the farthest electrons to orbit it would be about a football field away. So, with all that empty space, why don't atoms pass right through each other?
The answer lies in the electric field that surrounds each atom. The electrons exist as a cloud of quantum probabilities, each on certain energy levels at set distances from the nucleus with set amounts of electrons allowed on each orbital level at a time. An electron can jump from one energy level, or orbital, to another, but in order to do this, you need an exchange of energy. So, when two objects get close to each other, their electrons begin a coordinated dance.
We’ve talked about it on this podcast before, but this dance of electrons prevents anything from ever actually touching anything else. If someone punched you hard in the nose, the electrons of the atoms in his fist are pushed into the space of the electrons of the atoms in your nose. But since the face electronics are already occupying the lower-energy orbits, the fist electrons would have to hop into a higher-energy orbital to really touch. This would take more energy than the human body can muster. So instead, the atoms repel each other, all in unison and technically the fist and face never really touch.
And that’s why it’s not only possible that the human body creates electromagnetic fields, it literally is one giant electric field. And now that we’ve solved that mystery, I can turn my focus to getting my chakra cleansed.
Greek and Roman Marble Statues Were Once Brightly Colored — https://curiosity.im/2Zzu9c8 (from next Friday 9/20) (Ashley)
You know those pure white Greek and Roman marble statues you can see in museums and historical sites? Well it turns out those statues weren’t always so white. In fact, according to most scholars, they were brightly colored. And if you didn’t know that, then you’re not alone: in fact, the myth of the pure-white statue may have been pushed on purpose by artists over the years. And this belief has impacted the very design of sculptures for centuries. Here’s what we know. Researchers have found trace amounts of pigmentation in ancient relics, sometimes protected in the crevices of their nostrils and sometimes faintly remaining on more exposed sections. The majority of that color had disappeared over the years, though. So European artists came to assume those classical works had always been pure white. When the Renaissance rolled around, sculptors who wanted to emulate that style naturally created works in that colorless, alabaster look, because they frankly just didn’t know any better. Makes sense. The thing is, when interested parties in those days set out to restore the statues, they were known to have actively removed pigments from the statues they found. It’s hard to say whether they realized that they were perpetuating a false legend, or if they truly believed they were "fixing" a statue that had somehow ended up painted at one point. But as the centuries rolled on, evidence began to pile up that made it pretty clear classical statues were meant to be viewed in Technicolor. Enter Johann Joachim Winckelmann [YO-hahn WAH-keem VINCKLE-min]. In the mid-1700s, VINCKLEmann published a foundational text in art history that perpetuated the myth that statues were pure white. And this wasn't just an aesthetic preference — it was a matter of ideology. He wrote, quote, “the whiter the body, the more beautiful it is,” unquote. And as you might guess, he wasn’t just talking about the color of stone. Since then, scholars have accepted that ancient statues were brightly colored, but the stereotype popularized by Winckelmann survives to this day. Fortunately, you’re a curious person, and now you know better — at the very least, a lot better than a racist art historian from the Renaissance era.
[SM COFFEE]
CODY: Today’s episode is sponsored by Saturday Morning Coffee! If there’s one thing in this world more influential than art history, it’s coffee. The coffee I have literally every day to keep me functioning in any capacity. [ad lib]
ASHLEY: Saturday Morning Coffee is a blend of Colombian and a Direct Trade Honduran that has a rich taste, with notes of Chocolate and Caramel. It’s not as sugary sweet as most specialty coffees because it’s roasted a bit longer, which gives it a really nice, smooth finish. [ad lib optional]
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ASHLEY: Saturday Morning Coffee also ships to Army and Fleet Post Office addresses, so you can send a Saturday Morning Coffee Company product to a Service Member’s APO or FPO address.
CODY: You can find Saturday Morning Coffee Company on Facebook at-saturday-morning-coffee-company, or visit their website, saturday-morning-coffee-company-dot-com. This is a small company, so remember to go straight to their website, saturday-morning-coffee-company (all spelled out) dot-com. And use the promo code CURIOSITY for a 10 percent discount off your first order — just for Curiosity Daily listeners!
ASHLEY: One more time, that’s promo code CURIOSITY at checkout. Support our sponsors AND shop from a small business at saturday-morning-coffee-company-dot-com.
This Is the Surprising Trick to a Winning Pep Talk — https://curiosity.im/34sFiiU (Cody)
A new study has unearthed a surprising trick to a winning pep talk. And it could have implications for how you motivate others, whether it’s in the locker room at halftime or on a conference call at work. Picture your favorite football or hockey team. They’re down a handful of points when they head to the locker room partway through the game, and they really need to step it up if they’re gonna come back and win the game. Will they be more motivated if their coach tries to stay positive and encourage them, or if the coach starts throwing chairs and screaming? Researchers at UC Berkeley wanted to know what kind of pep talk worked best. So for a study published in the Journal of Applied Psychology in June, they asked 50 high school and college basketball coaches if they could get recordings of the coaches’ halftime locke room talks. The researchers ended up with recordings of 304 speeches and games played by 23 teams. And they rated the coaches’ emotions during pep talks on a scale from “positive” emotions like pleased, excited, glad, relaxed, and inspired to "negative" emotions like disgusted, nervous, angry, frustrated, sluggish, and fearful. The researchers found that teams were more likely to win when coaches went negative than when they were positive. And that was even true when the team was already winning in the first half. Just to make sure the results were real, the researchers invited former high-school and college athletes to watch the speeches and rate how motivated they felt after watching each one, plus what they thought the basketball team should do in response to the coaches' words. This second test confirmed the findings of the first: The moderately unpleasant coaches made participants feel most motivated. But to be clear, the goal is not to be as negative as you can. Instead, you might say something like “I don’t care if you’re up by 10 points, you can play better than this.” That’s a bit more productive than angrily throwing a chair and screaming “you suck?” The researchers suggest that SOME of this approach could be translated to the business world; if you’ve got a super important project that needs to be done, it might not hurt to throw a few negative emotions like “I believe you can do better” to your otherwise positive speeches. Just don’t overdo it, because too much negative feedback means demoralized employees. No chair throwing, but maybe sometimes a bit more pushing could help.
ASHLEY: And now, let’s recap what we learned today. Today we learned that your body is pretty much one electromagnetic field.
CODY: And that my chakra is FILTHY. We also learned that ancient Greek and Roman statues used to be brightly colored, but a widely circulated myth in the 1700s helped whitewash that fact from history.
ASHLEY: And that if you want to give an effective pep talk, try going a little negative. Just be careful how you go about it in the business world.
[ad lib something hilarious or we’re both fired]
CODY: Join us again tomorrow to learn something new in just a few minutes. I’m Cody Gough.
ASHLEY: And I’m Ashley Hamer. Stay curious!