Episode 20: The Tennant, OTC Time Travel, Ask OTC, Brother vs. Brother, Unchained Melodies, and Richard Feynman

This week Dave and Steel are joined by Jon, the infamous younger brother of Alan, their guest last week. Together, the trio discusses Jon’s acting chops, amateur physicists and Jon’s impressively detailed theory of time travel (first developed when he was in the 6th grade!), answer listener questions about dating, The Hulk, space travel, and NASA’s dreamiest astronaut, hear Jon’s versions of the family stories Alan shared last week, talk about their favorite video games (old and new), share nerdly music from They Might Be Giants, Socalled, The Aquabats, Bombadil, The Uncluded, and the Thomas Was Alone video game soundtrack, and share some book wisdom from the illustrious physicist and science popularizer Richard Feynman.

Links

The Tennant [The Tenant]

The Tennant’s End

OTC Science

  • Dave loves the idea of amateur physicists. See here and here and here for more on why.
  • Peter Vranas’ faculty page (see the research page to read about his thoughts on the retrosuicide paradox).

Ask OTC

OTC Video Games

Favorite Game of All Time

Favorite Game Currently

Unchained Melodies

They Might Be Giants — Purple Toupee

Socalled — Work with What You Got

The Aquabats — Cat with Two Heads

Bombadil — Laundromat

The Uncluded — Delicate Cycle

Book Wisdom

This week’s book wisdom was taken primarily from Richard Feynman’s book The Meaning of It All: Thoughts of a Citizen-Scientist, which collected three of his best known lectures on science and human understanding.

Episode 19: Hug Daddy Game, Top 5 Norwegian Words, Small Talk, Expert Testimony: Ask the Marketer, Brother vs. Brother, Unchained Melodies, and East of Eden

This week Dave and Steel are joined by their old friend Alan. Dave introduces the two men to a game he plays with his daughters called the “Hug Daddy Game,” Alan shares his fave favorite Norwegian words, and they run through a segment of small talk, discussing the latest FIFA scandals, Alan’s love of a well-edited Hobbit remake, and Nate DiMeo’s fantastic podcast the Memory Palace. We then present a very special feature, “Ask The Marketer,” in which we present several difficult to market products to Alan, a professional marketer, and he explains how he’d market these increasingly repulsive brands/products, following which we share great music about fictional characters from The Flaming Lips, The Brunettes, Mumford and Sons, The Spin Doctors, Suicide, and Duck Tales, and Alan closes the episode with some book wisdom from John Steinbeck’s East of Eden.

Links

Small Talk

Unchained Melodies

The Flaming Lips — Waitin’ for Superman

The Brunettes — Hulk is Hulk

Mumford and Sons — Timshel

The Spin Doctors — Jimmy Olsen’s Blues

Suicide — Ghost Rider

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDKGohwlrZ4

Duck Tales — Theme Song

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUxuvs9vhKg

Book Wisdom

This week’s passage came from chapter 13 of John Steinbeck’s masterful novel East of Eden.