Kids v. Sarcasm, 24,000-Year-Old Worm, Why Betelgeuse Dimmed
Curiosity Weekly
Warner Bros. Discovery
4.6 • 963 Ratings
🗓️ 2 August 2021
⏱️ 12 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Learn about why younger kids don’t understand sarcasm; a 24,000 year old living worm; and Betelgeuse’s “Great Dimming.”
Kids don't get sarcasm until around age 7 because of the kind of thinking it requires by Kelsey Donk
- Pexman, P. (2021, June 8). Why it’s difficult for children to understand sarcasm. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/why-its-difficult-for-children-to-understand-sarcasm-160915
- Do young children understand irony? (2007, January 25). Research Digest. https://digest.bps.org.uk/2007/01/25/do-young-children-understand-irony/
- An Acquired Taste: Children’s Perceptions of Humor and Teasing in Verbal Irony. (2021). Discourse Processes. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1207/s15326950dp4003_5
- Pexman, P. M., & Glenwright, M. (2007). How do typically developing children grasp the meaning of verbal irony? Journal of Neurolinguistics, 20(2), 178–196. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jneuroling.2006.06.001
A 24,000 year old worm was discovered in Siberia, alive and kicking by Cameron Duke
- Grover, N. (2021, June 7). 24,000-year-old organisms found frozen in Siberia can still reproduce. Theguardian.com; The Guardian. https://amp.theguardian.com/science/2021/jun/07/24000-year-old-organisms-found-frozen-in-siberia-can-still-reproduce
- Shmakova, L., Malavin, S., Iakovenko, N., Vishnivetskaya, T., Shain, D., Plewka, M., & Rivkina, E. (2021). A living bdelloid rotifer from 24,000-year-old Arctic permafrost. Current Biology, 31(11), R712–R713. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2021.04.077
Remember when Betelgeuse was acting weird? Turns out it was just a dust cloud by Steffie Drucker
- Original Betelgeuse episode: https://www.curiositydaily.com/live-longer-by-appreciating-art-betelgeuse-might-go-supernova-and-birds-freaky-fast-vision/
- Mystery solved: Dust cloud led to Betelgeuse’s “Great Dimming.” (2021). EurekAlert! https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2021-06/hcfa-msd061221.php
- Plait, P. (2021, June 16). We may finally know why Betelgeuse dimmed so much. Bonus: No supernova. Yet. SYFY WIRE; SYFY WIRE. https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/we-may-finally-know-why-betelgeuse-dimmed-so-much-bonus-no-supernova-yet
- Betelgeuse Merely Burped, Astronomers Conclude. (2021). The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/17/science/betelgeuse-montarges-star-supernova.html
- Castelvecchi, D. (2021). Why the supergiant star Betelgeuse went mysteriously dim last year. Nature. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-01633-4
- Montargès, M., et. al. (2021). A dusty veil shading Betelgeuse during its Great Dimming. Nature, 594(7863), 365–368. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-03546-8
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi, you're about to get smarter in just a few minutes with Curiosity Daily from Curiosity.com. |
| 0:06.0 | I'm Cody Goff. |
| 0:07.0 | And I'm Ashley Hamer. |
| 0:08.0 | Today you learn about why kids don't understand sarcasm until they're about seven years old, the discovery of a 24,000 year old |
| 0:15.3 | worm that's still alive, and the explanation for why the star Beetlejuice was acting weird |
| 0:21.3 | back in 2020. |
| 0:22.3 | Let's satisfy some curiosity. |
| 0:25.1 | Make a sarcastic joke to a small child and you'll figure out pretty quickly that they just |
| 0:30.6 | don't get it. And sure, you might expect kids not to understand your meme references or political jokes, |
| 0:38.0 | but sarcasm? |
| 0:39.0 | That seems kind of basic. |
| 0:41.0 | Well, according to some psychological studies, sarcasm actually |
| 0:45.6 | takes some advanced thinking, so kids don't get sarcasm until around age 7. |
| 0:50.8 | To understand why, we have to do that thing where you explain what makes jokes |
| 0:56.2 | funny, you know, rendering them absolutely unfunny in the process. So here's the deal. |
| 1:01.7 | Imagine you've just finished your entire plate at a restaurant. |
| 1:06.0 | And when the server asks how the food was, you reply, |
| 1:09.0 | ugh, it was terrible. |
| 1:11.0 | That's a joke, and it relies on the gap between what you've said and what you actually mean. |
| 1:17.0 | You've said the food was terrible, but you mean the server to understand that it was |
| 1:21.5 | delicious. |
| 1:22.3 | Otherwise, you wouldn't have eaten it all. |
... |
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