Oh, hey Nate.

Justine.

Hello, hello.

So I recently heard about a really interesting experiment that I would like to share with you and

this podcast.

May I?

Okay. Yes, I'm all ears. All right, so this experiment is about the

suggestability of perception and specifically our sense of smell and it was

conducted by someone named Rachel Hers.

So my name is Rachel Hers.

I am a neuroscientist and I have been studying the psychological science of scent

for over 30 years.

So what Rachel did is she gathered a group of people to be her

test subjects and in the first session she'd present them with five different

smells. For each one she'd give them a label for what they were smelling.

And in one case I presented to you and I say this is Parmesan cheese and you go,

oh yeah I really like this, I would eat it, it's very familiar, etc.

But then she brought the same participants back for a second session about a week

later. She'd hand them a jar with the exact same scent,

except this time she'd tell them that the source of the smell

was a different thing.

And now I say this is vomit.

...