This is one of the most important species in human history, and one of the most well-understood beings in the universe. Why do we use them in labs? Are they sentient? Will they get me sick? Come hear all about fruit flies getting drunk to deal with their personal problems on this episode of Species.
Summary
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | The story of the human and the fruit fly is over 10,000 years old. Older than monotheism, |
| 0:09.0 | older than most forms of agriculture, older than markets, older than most civilizations. This story |
| 0:15.7 | started as an almost quaint relationship. This animal liked rotting fruit, and we were an animal that |
| 0:24.1 | stored fruit long enough for it to rot. It was a match made in heaven, and this creature has piggybacked |
| 0:30.7 | on our globe-trotting ever since, laying eggs under the skin of almost all the fruit we forget to |
| 0:36.7 | eat. A rather harmless form of |
| 0:39.4 | parasitism, where one animal eats the food of the other just as it spoils. But after about 10,000 years, |
| 0:49.0 | this relationship flipped, and the human became the parasite. |
| 1:00.5 | Today we're going to talk about a creature we almost know better than ourselves. |
| 1:04.6 | That has helped us know ourselves better. |
| 1:10.6 | One of the most important animals in the history of science. |
| 1:18.7 | This animal has had a greater impact on our understanding of genetics than any other. |
| 1:22.6 | Today, we are going to talk about the fruit fly. |
| 1:25.3 | Drossophila melanogaster. |
| 1:28.5 | I'm Mackin. This is Species. |
| 1:38.4 | Welcome to the show. I hope you are well, and if you're not, I sincerely hope that this episode brings you a little joy today. So my advice for this week is to keep a daily journal. It's helpful at a personal level, |
| 1:46.2 | but more importantly, it might help future generations. Your descendants, yes, of course, but also |
| 1:50.9 | historians. It sounds silly, but I was trained as a historian in college, and I can't tell you |
| 1:57.2 | how helpful it is to have access to the journals and diaries and letters of people |
| 2:02.8 | from past eros. You are living through a moment in history, and believe it or not, your |
| 2:08.2 | daily journal of this experience would be really helpful to future historians who want to know |
| 2:14.5 | what it was like to live through COVID-19. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Macken Murphy, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Macken Murphy and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.