From ancient clay pots to the heat-proof panels on the space shuttle, ceramics have been an integral part of human technology from the very beginning. I can’t even think of any jokes about ceramic! It’s just cool!

More importantly! Over the last week or so, Hank has absolutely ruined everyones’ Twitter timelines with one simple question: “is butt legs?” In this episode, you get to bear ear-witness to the genesis of this wretched, society-shattering question! #buttislegs

Follow us on Twitter @SciShowTangents, where we’ll tweet out topics for upcoming episodes and you can ask the science couch questions! 

If you want to learn more about any of our main topics, check out these links:

[Truth or Fail]

Non-deflatable football

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deflategate

http://www.madehow.com/Volume-1/Air-Bag.html

Strong water

https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/Aluminum-oxide#section=Mechanism-of-Action

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.470.4214&rep=rep1&type=pdf

Pajamas

https://www.underarmour.com/en-us/tb12

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3699878/

https://www.espn.com/espnw/life-style/story/_/id/23315114/we-tried-do-tom-brady-recovery-pajamas-live-their-name

[Fact Off]

Moon art

Magnetic field

https://www.livescience.com/57868-earth-magnetic-field-spike-ancient-times.html

https://www.space.com/43173-earth-magnetic-field-flips-when.html

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/02/14/515032512/iron-age-potters-carefully-recorded-earths-magnetic-field-by-accident

https://www.newyorker.com/tech/annals-of-technology/earths-mysterious-magnetic-field-stored-in-a-jar?verso=true

[Ask the Science Couch]

Glazes

https://edu.rsc.org/feature/the-chemistry-of-pottery/2020245.article

https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/materials-science/glaze

Specific materials (tin, salt, etc.) 

https://www.thesprucecrafts.com/ceramic-and-glaze-fluxes-2745860

https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1560&context=open_access_etds

https://www.britannica.com/art/tin-glazed-earthenware

[Butt One More Thing]

Ceramic butt wiping

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/toilet-tissue-anthropologists-uncover-all-the-ways-weve-wiped/

https://www.bmj.com/content/345/bmj.e8287.full