Stuff You Should Know

By iHeartRadio & HowStuffWorks

Society & Culture

What's Stuff You Should Know about?

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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SYSK Selects: How the Donne...

06.22.2019

Did they or didn't they? There is plenty of written evidence that the ill-fated Donner Party resorted to cannibalism - except there are no bones. Learn the details of one of the worst disasters of the early West in this ...

Stuff You Should Know episodes:

06.22.2019 SYSK Selects: How the Donner Party Worked Did they or didn't they? There is plenty of written evidence that the ill-fated Donner Party resorted to cannibalism - except there are no bones. Learn the details of one of the worst disasters of the early West in this ...
06.20.2019 What happened to the Neanderthals? As recently as 40,000 years ago we lived among humans from an entirely different species – Neanderthals. About the same time our species showed up, Neanderthals suddenly vanished. Just what happened to the other guys? Did our ancestors do something ...
06.19.2019 Short Stuff: Emperor Norton After a San Francisco real estate mogul went bankrupt, he reinvented himself as the Emperor of the United States – and became the city’s most celebrated resident. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
06.18.2019 How the Hygiene Hypothesis Works In the early 90s, a new study that found that kids who are exposed to more germs early in life are less likely to develop allergies later. With the West in the grip of a full-blown immunity crisis (still going ...
06.15.2019 SYSK Selects: What's the Deal with Crop Circles? For a while in the 1980s, people were fascinated and confused about what exactly crop circles were. Now we know that they aren't signs left from aliens, but art made by humans. Learn all about these stunning, large form art ...
06.13.2019 How Area 51 Works The secret military base Area 51 is inextricably linked to every secret, shady project the US government is rumored to be involved in – from reverse-engineering alien technology to coordinating a one-world government. The truth is much more mundane. Learn ...
06.12.2019 Short Stuff: Smoke Signals Were smoke signals real or a Hollywood invention? Turns out, they were indeed a thing and invented by the Chinese, even. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
06.11.2019 What's the gig economy? The gig economy is not new, but it's bigger than ever. Is that a good thing? We'll discuss that today! Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
06.08.2019 SYSK Selects: How Capgras Syndrome Works There is an extremely rare condition where the sufferer is convinced that everyone around him is an impostor posing as their friends and family. Learn about the neurology behind this strange and sad mental disorder in this episode. Learn more ...
06.07.2019 Introducing Unpopular At times when people accepted the status quo without question, some rebels have dared to resist. When a cause is noble, it often pays to be unpopular. Listen to Unpopular every Tuesday. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
06.06.2019 What is perfect pitch? Perfect pitch, or absolute pitch, is when you can sing a note with no reference from other notes, perfectly on key. Is it an asset? Chuck says yes. Learn all about this musical rarity today. Learn more about your ad-choices ...
06.05.2019 Short Stuff: Robert Johnson and the Devil Did the legendary blues singer really sell his soul to the devil in exchange for amazing musical skills? Probably not! But there’s still an interesting story there and it features the Coen Brothers. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
06.04.2019 How Barcodes Work Barcodes are everywhere. Those little lines and numbers that make up one of the most recognizable barcodes, the UPC, was designed to make going to the grocery a lot less miserable. It ended up becoming the central symbol of the ...
06.01.2019 SYSK Selects: How TV Ratings Work Ever wonder why some great shows go off the air after a season or less? Blame it on the Nielsen company, which has for more than 60 years been the almost exclusive decider of what goes and what stays on ...
05.30.2019 The Tylenol Murders, Part II The panic that began in Chicago spreads and begins to change the world. The investigation into the murders turns up leads and suspects, but still no one has ever been charged with the murders. It remains unsolved to this day. ...
05.29.2019 Short Stuff: Look-Alike Old Couples You know how some older married couples (sorry, senior adult married couples) start to look alike over time? That’s a really weird phenomenon if you think about it. So science has looked into it and they think they kind of ...
05.28.2019 The Tylenol Murders, Part I On one terrible day in Chicago in 1982, seven people died suddenly and mysteriously. In just a matter of hours, it becomes clear, someone has poisoned bottles of Extra-Strength Tylenol, one of the most trusted and widely-used products in America. ...
05.25.2019 SYSK Selects: How Acne Works Over the course of our lives, 80 percent of us will experience acne. Ultimately, acne comes down to one thing, a blockage in the sebaceous gland. Learn what makes a blackhead black, and everything else about zits, in this pus-filled ...
05.23.2019 What was Tin Pan Alley? Tin Pan Alley was an area of New York around the beginning of the 20th Century that served as ground zero for the earliest iterations of the music publishing industry. Learn all about this unique place and time right now. ...
05.22.2019 Short Stuff: James Polk, Disinterred Did you know that former president James Polk had his final resting place moved twice? It's true! And almost a third time even. Let's go listen to some short stuff. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
05.21.2019 How Crystals Work In a new age shop or on display at the Smithsonian, there are varying interpretations of what crystals can be used for. But at their base, they are a thumb in the eye to entropy, a perfectly ordered piece of ...
05.20.2019 Introducing Ephemeral Lost materials, dropped threads, forgotten stories. Ephemera in the way that it’s intertwined in our lives. All those things, tangible and intangible, that you wish you could take just one more look at before they vanish into the past. Listen ...
05.18.2019 SYSK Selects: How Dying Works Chuck and Josh have covered just about every aspect of death except dying itself. Here, they fulfill the death suite of podcasts with an in-depth look at just how people die, what happens to the body during the dying process ...
05.16.2019 10ish Cases of Really Bad Luck Some guys have all the luck, some guys have all the pain. So said Rod Stewart. And if this list is any indication, “guys” is gender neutral. Listen to this episode as Chuck and Josh cover some instances of amazingly ...
05.15.2019 Short Stuff: Honorary Degrees Honorary degrees are not real degrees. They are marketing opportunities for universities. They make us mad, but we want one. Learn all about them in the next 12-15 minutes. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
05.14.2019 How Trampolines Work The world’s loved trampolines since they were invented by a pair of acrobats in Iowa in the 30s – so much so, trampolining is now an Olympic event. What people don’t love about trampolines is their propensity to cause paralysis, ...
05.11.2019 SYSK Selects: How Lie Detectors Work Instead of actually detecting lies, polygraph machines sense physiological variations, ostensibly brought on by guilt. The results are subject to interpretation, and therefore controversial. Join Josh and Chuck as they investigate the polygraph. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
05.09.2019 Do Dietary Supplements Work? The world takes $40 billion of dietary supplements – from vitamin A to yohimbe bark – every year. Yet, the jury is still out on whether most of them work. In America, the FDA isn’t allowed to approve supplements, and ...
05.08.2019 Short Stuff: Nicknames What's in a nickname? Sometimes they make sense, sometimes they don't. Let's get our shorty on and find out the deal. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
05.07.2019 Remembering Live Aid Live Aid was a revolutionary concert event in two countries in 1985 that spanned the world via satellite. The brainchild of musician Bob Geldof, it really did help change the world in many ways, but its direct impact on Ethiopian ...
05.04.2019 SYSK Selects: How Does a Diving Bell Work? About 2,400 years ago Aristotle mentions the use of diving bells, apparatuses that convey divers to the bottom of the sea -- or at least below the surface of the water -- and allows them to breathe -- at least ...
05.02.2019 What Happens When the Government Thinks You're Dead? It’s bad enough when the government knows you’re alive – there are taxes to pay, laws to be followed, all sorts of boring and unpleasant things. But each year, thousands of Americans find out life is far, far worse when ...
05.01.2019 Short Stuff: The Number 23 There are people out there who believe that there’s something special about the number 23. Exactly what? Who knows. Exactly why? Because it pops up a lot. But does it? Who knows. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
04.30.2019 Michael Dillon: Trans Pioneer Michael Dillon was a lot of things - author, doctor, and most importantly, trans pioneer. Learn all about his story in today's episode. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
04.27.2019 SYSK Selects: How Zero Works Few numbers have as storied a past as zero. Even fewer have had as great an impact on our ability to understand our universe. Yet zero is a relatively recent arrival in math. Find out all about this surprisingly fascinating ...
04.25.2019 What Were Human Zoos? One of the off-putting byproducts of 19th century European colonialism were human zoos, living dioramas of people from far-away places made to be gawked at. Listen in to what the deeper meaning of humans zoos held people on both sides ...
04.24.2019 Short Stuff: Fear of Public Speaking Speaking in public is frequently cited as people’s number one fear, even more fearful than death. Most people go through life avoiding public speaking, but it turns out that only makes things worse. The best medicine? Public speaking. Learn more ...
04.23.2019 Is birth order important? There have been a lot of studies over the years regarding birth order. Some conclude that it's a big deal, while others more or less discount its importance. Learn all about it today. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
04.20.2019 SYSK Selects: How Marijuana Works For millennia people used marijuana for fun and medicine. Not until the 20th century that was it vilified, unfairly say many. Weed has done lots of good things, from alleviating cancer symptoms to unlocking secrets of the brain. Learn all ...
04.18.2019 How the Hoover Dam Works, Part II And now for something completely different. Just kidding – tune in to hear the thrilling conclusion of America’s most amazing public works project in the 20th century. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
04.17.2019 Short Stuff: Emu Wars Did Australians really wage war on a group of emus? YES. Learn all about it in today's short stuff. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
04.16.2019 How the Hoover Dam Works, Part I It’s one of America’s biggest accomplishments in the 20th century, a slab of concrete holding back one of the country’s most finicky rivers, providing water and electricity to a swath of majors cities that otherwise couldn’t exist. Learn more about ...
04.13.2019 SYSK Selects: How Yo-Yos Work You may have played with a yo-yo before -- perhaps you've even walked the dog -- but do you know about the physics behind what makes a yo-yo sleep and wake up? Learn all about inertia, angular momentum and the ...
04.11.2019 How the Electric Chair Works The electric chair is an all-American invention. It spread almost nowhere else in the world as a capital punishment but worked overtime in the States. Despite the terrible sights and sounds an electrocution produces, it was created out of humaneness. ...
04.10.2019 Short Stuff: Lake Peigneur In 1980 something catastrophic happened to the quiet town of New Iberia, Louisiana. Their wide, shallow lake grew much deeper after it underwent an apocalyptic transformation. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
04.09.2019 How Free Range Parenting Works Free range parenting is all about giving your child the freedom to play and explore life on their own. Are there benefits? Sure. Do some people hate the concept? Yes! Listen and learn right here. Learn more about your ad-choices ...
04.06.2019 SYSK Selects: How Pollen Works For about 375 million years, plants have been using pollen (aka plant sperm) to propagate their species. And the technique has stuck around because it works. Join Chuck and Josh for a cozy look at the ins and outs of ...
04.04.2019 Were Nazis Drug-Fueled Crankheads? Nazis were bad people. And it turns out a lot of them were high as kites on speed. Was this a recipe for disaster? Yes it was. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
04.03.2019 Short Stuff: Unspent Campaign Money Have you ever wondered what happens to all those campaign donations when a political campaign goes belly up? Or, even worse, is in debt! Wonder no more! Learn more about your ad-choices at https://news.iheart.com/podcast-advertisers
04.02.2019 How Rape Kits Work Rape kits are simple forensic evidence collection kits used when someone is sexually assaulted. But the story is deeper than this. Learn all about rape kits, the sad backlog problem, and what you can do to help, in today's episode. ...

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