Gary’s Q&A

Listener question & Gary’s response · Transcript passage

Swimming_ants What got you into podcasting, and have you ever thought about doing a monthly theme for episodes?

I’ve talked about the podcast’s origin several times in previous episodes, so I’m not going to repeat it here. As for doing monthly themes, that will never happen. The entire point of this show is to provide something different every day. If you aren’t interested in today’s topic, you might be interested in tomorrow’s.

My goal is to create an antidote to the content algorithms you experience online. Algorithms will feed you what you think you want to see based on your previous consumption.

This show is human-based serendipity, where you might hear something that you didn’t even know you didn’t know about.

So, there will be no month-long themes.

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Sylia Gray asks, ” Do you have plans to do an episode on Korean culture and history, like Hangul (Korean alphabet)? Or how about the Battle of Myeongyang (which was like Korea’s own Battle of Thermopylae, against Japan), which Korea won despite their massive numeric disadvantage thanks to their legendary admiral Yi Sun Shin?

The writers and I have a weekly meeting where we cover what episodes we will be writing over the next week.

One of the things I brought it was covering areas that have been undercovered in previous episodes, and one of the topics that suggested was Korea.

So the short answer is yes, we will have some more Korean-themed episodes coming up.

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BAM asks Is there anything on your list for possible future episodes that was an idea sparked by watching a Ken Burns PBS documentary?

I can’t say that I have ever done an episode based on a Ken Burns documentary. That being said, there have been many episodes that I’ve done that have shared topics with Ken Burns documentaries.

The biggest topic Ken Burns has done a series on that I want to cover in a future episode is the history of jazz.

I’ve tried to do an episode on jazz before, but I found the subject too vast. There isn’t just a single thing called jazz that I could narrow it down to.

I’m sure I’ll try to tackle the subject again in the future, or at least put some parameters around it to make it doable.

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Drew “Dr.C” Clinkenbeard asks If you could get an answer to one (or two) questions from any of your episodes, what would it be? in other words, what is one unsolved mystery you’d crack? (The Everest episode made me think about this)

The question I would be interested in resolving is the authorship of Shakespeare’s works.

I’ve read more on the subject since I recorded the episode, and it is shocking just how little evidence there is that the man from Stratford-on-Avon wrote the works that we attribute to him.

Almost everything we think we know about Shakespeare has no evidence to support it. Almost all of it is based on supposition.

This isn’t a conspiracy. There wasn’t anyone trying to cover up the truth.I think it is the greatest case of misattribution because someone used a pen name and wanted to keep their identity secret.

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Bananaman5000 asks What is your favorite hot springs? Love the podcast, keep it up :)My favorite hot springs are the Takhini Hot Springs, outside Whitehorse, Yukon. They are about a 30-minute drive outside Whitehorse and are especially great places to visit in the winter.A very honorable mention has to go to Hot Springs Island in the Haida Gwaii Islands off the coast of British Columbia. I say it gets an honorable mention because the hot spring was turned off after an earthquake in 2012.

I have heard reports that the hot water has started slowly trickling back, but I haven’t had it confirmed.

Listener question & Gary’s response · Transcript passage

Eric Dombrowsky asks Hey Gary, I know that ever since you started this podcast, you’ve been very focused on churning out a new episode each and every day (much appreciated by the way). However, I also understand you haven’t traveled much during this time. Do you ever miss the travel photography days when you were constantly traveling the globe and going to far-flung places? Do you have any international travel plans for the future, if so where?

I haven’t been out of the country since I started doing this podcast. Having to post a show every day has made traveling very difficult. That being said, I don’t miss it as much as most people think I do. It isn’t that I don’t like traveling, so much as I really got my fill from being on the road for so long.

I’ve traveled more by an order of magnitude than most people ever do in an entire lifetime. That doesn’t mean I’ll never travel again. I’m very certain that I will. It’s just that I don’t have some desperate yearning to fulfill my bucket list, as I’ve done most of that already. It is sort of like asking someone who was just at a buffet if they are hungry. Just because they are full at the moment doesn’t mean that they will never eat again.

Listener question & Gary’s response · Transcript passage

Let’s get right into things. The first question comes from Brian Dougherty, who asks, Since there are over 2000 episodes to be listened to in order to reach the completionist club, would you consider recognizing those of us that have listened to more than half of the episodes? I was thinking “Living on a Prayer “, since we are halfway there.

First, Brian, a correction. You do not have to listen to the episodes in order. You only need to listen to all of them.

I’ve been considering this for a while now. The completionist club will only become harder to join over time as more episodes are produced.

The completionist club will always be the pinnacle podcast listening achievement.

However, for those working on membership, there are several milestones that can be recognized along the way to completing it.

Every 500 episodes will have a status that will be recognized on the way to completionist club membership.

Those who listen to 500, 1000, and 1500 episodes will earn the corresponding 500, 1k, and 1.5k status.

Those who have achieved episode milestones will be eligible for limited amenities at local participating completionist club chapters. Terms and conditions may apply; contact your local completionist club concierge for details.

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Heike Caldwell. Have you ever met someone famous during your travels, and if so, were you surprised by how nice or not so nice that person was?

The only famous person I can say I met, and I use the term met loosely, was Anthony Bourdain. Just a few months before he died, his film crew was staying at the same hotel I was staying at in Lafayette, Louisiana, during Mardi Gras.

Every morning, he would be outside the main door of the hotel smoking a cigarette and texting with someone. He was there, waiting for his crew to pack up their van and head out to shoot for the day.

It did say hi to him, and he was very nice and gracious, but that was about the full extent of it.

I know a bunch of people who are podcasters and influencers, but I’m not sure if you’d call them celebrities.

That being said, I’m not really that big on celebrities and famous people. If I did meet someone, I almost certainly wouldn’t ask for a selfie.

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Tony Grubb asks If we could harvest an extinct animal for food for the world, what would be best? Dino burgers or Dodo chicken wings?

That is an easy question to answer because I actually did an episode on the subject. It would be the aurochs, the extinct ancestor of modern cattle, that our ancestors hunted.

The aurochs is basically just a bigger version of what we already have, so we have the infrastructure to use these animals today.

We don’t yet know how this would work. It might be that the aurochs can’t be domesticated in the same way that modern cattle can, and the entire project would be a failure.

That being said, I think it would be a lot easier than trying to raise dinosaurs….that and the whole Jurassic Park thing.

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Joshua Felty asks There’s a lot of movies coming out in theaters in 2026. Are you looking forward to any of them in particular?

Yes. Dune Part 3. Dune Parts 1 and 2 each covered one-half of the original Dune book. Dune Part 3 is going to cover two books: Dune Messiah and Children of Dune.

The first two movies were fairly true to the books. By nature of covering two books with one movie, it will require more adaptation than the first movies did.

Denis Villeneuve has indicated that his involvement will be over with this film; however, a lot of people are wondering if someone might do God Emperor of Dune at some point in the future. Many people think that God Emperor is the best book outside of the original, and it wouldn’t require the same cast members, save for one.

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Steve Augustino asks Long-time Completionist Club member here. I continue to be fascinated by the 1000+ “future topics” list. Is it actually helpful in guiding new episodes? In my work, when I would compile “to do” lists, I always stopped at 12, figuring that others below that number were not important enough yet to pay attention to. Does this principle apply to your list as well? For example, is the fact that some topics have lingered on your list for a while perhaps evidence that they are just not worthy of an episode in this podcast?

The list currently has around 960 topics, and it ebbs and flows as episodes are recorded.

The purpose of the list is to keep track of items, so I don’t forget them. Ideas can come from anywhere. Articles I read, videos I watch, and movies I see are all fair game for ideas.

If I come up with an idea that is even remotely viable as an episode, I put it down. I don’t worry about if or when I’ll end up using it; I just write it down.

That said, you are correct that not everything on the list will make it into an episode. Sometimes, after further review, it just doesn’t seem like it will make a good episode. Other times, it might just wind up being mentioned in another episode about a broader subject.

There is also a recency bias. I’m far more likely to do an episode on an idea I just came up with, just because it happens to be top of mind.

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Mands on the Discord Server asks, Hello Gary, I have finally completed and listened to all of your episodes.. I came across it by accident one day on my commute to work, and now it’s my daily visit. I do have a question though.. have you ever visited Cape Town, South Africa, and what are your thoughts on it?

Yes, I’ve been to Cape Town several times, and I have spent a fair amount of time there. I had to go to Cape Town to take a ship to the island of St. Helena, and I had to board a ship to sail up the west coast of Africa.

Cape Town is a great city. It is arguable the best city in Africa, and the city it reminds me most of in terms of climate is San Francisco.

That being said, I’m also partial to Durban and Swakopmund in Namibia.

Cape Town and the whole Cape Region are definitely worthy of a future episode because it is so unique culturally, geographically, and even botanically.

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Crystal D asks, Hello Gary, do you generally have a schedule of when you want to publish shows? Will current events, holidays or anniversaries prompt you to adjust the schedule of a topic? Thank you and keep up the amazing work!

I don’t usually time episodes with events or anniversaries. I’ve already covered the major holidays and probably won’t be revisiting most of those unless there is a unique take on the story.

I also don’t want to get stuck in the “This Day in History” format. I want the flexibility to record an episode whenever I want.

That isn’t to say I’ll never do it, but I don’t usually. The only date I have something planned for going forward is July 1, and to give you a hint, it isn’t about Canada Day.

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Alien_potato asks, Hello, Gary! Big fan of the podcast! When you travel abroad, do you just go around using English, or do you make the effort to learn some words in their language to make communication easier? And if you do, do you use language learning apps/programs or have another person to teach you?

The dirty secret is that you can pretty much travel around the world using English. English is the international language of travel and tourism. That being said, you should at least try to learn the basic words for hello, please, thank you, excuse me, and goodbye.

To learn basic phrases, you don’t need to use an app or buy a book. Just a simple online search will get you the basic words and phrases you need.

Learning the phrases isn’t a matter of needing them to function; it is just a way to show the local people you interact with that you respect their language and are making some sort of effort.

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Fat Yankee asks, It’s seems most of my history podcasts either have recently done or are planning to do live episodes or performances. You’ve been there and done that. Do you have any further plans to take the show on the road? Also, what role do you see live episodes and live one-off performances having in history podcasts or podcasting in general?

I’ve considered it, and I’ve been considering it more.

Now that I have some help, I have more flexibility in my schedule. Also, when I had the anniversary party, I wanted to see how many people would come to the middle of Wisconsin to gauge how well a live event would go over.

I was pleased with the turnout and how far people were willing to travel, so I’m open to doing something in a larger city where people wouldn’t have to travel.

My show doesn’t really lend itself to doing a live performance. I have done it, and there are two live shows that can be found in the feed, but they are only about 15 minutes long.I would need to come up with some sort of format to keep everyone entertained for a longer period of time. Because I don’t have a co-host, I can’t really just talk about history on a stage. At the anniversary party, I spent about two hours answering questions and sharing photos and stories from my travels.

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BSxNÄZT aka Nate asks How’s your Latin coming along? Is there another language that you’ve jumped into learning? I’ve recently started learning Russian. Nathan from Cairns, Queensland.

I do a little bit of Latin on Duolingo every day. That said, I’ve come to the conclusion that, unless they make major changes, Duolingo is a horrible platform for learning Latin. It isn’t nearly as developed as their courses for other languages.

What I need to do is set aside about an hour every day to start going through the Lingua Latina per se Illustrata books again.

These books are like children’s books that have become the most popular way to teach Latin. There are no translations in the books. They start with the simple phrase “Roma in Italia est,” and you go from there, learning vocabulary and grammar as you go.

There are other online resources out there for learning Latin, and I am playing around with some of them as well.

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BAM asks, Is there a specific reason that you never say your own name Gary Arndt in the credits at the end of every episode?

Yes. My name is on the show. If you look at any podcast app, my name is clearly listed as the publisher. It just seems like it would be repetitive to say my name in every single episode.

There are a lot of podcasts in this space that do the exact same thing. I only think it is necessary to give credit if someone else is providing assistance for an episode.

Even if I’m not listed as the writer, I’m still involved in editing every show. Sometimes the edits can be extensive, and sometimes I don’t need to edit much at all.

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Our last question comes from VladSander, who asks Hello Gary, Greetings from Binghamton, home of the Twilight Zone. My question is thus: How much knowledge do you think was lost during the burning of the Library at Alexandria?

The short answer is that it was a significant loss, but the popular version is exaggerated.

The common story is that humanity lost an enormous chunk of its ancient knowledge in a single fire.

That’s not how it worked. There was no single “apocalypse” event that wiped everything out at once. Ancient texts were copied and circulated across the Mediterranean, and copies existed in Other libraries, such as those in Pergamon and Rome.

Undoubtedly, some texts that didn’t exist anywhere else were probably lost, but not nearly as many as most people think. The policy in Alexandria was that any text brought into the city was confiscated for copying. The unique texts were probably those created by scholars in Alexandria.

The amount of surviving ancient texts is probably 1% or less. This is not due to the fire in Alexandria, but rather because papyrus or parchment doesn’t age well because it is organic.

I touched upon this in my episode on the Herculeum scrolls. There are texts we know of because they were referenced in surviving works, but we have no copies of them.

All of the texts we have from ancient Rome, for example, can fit on a single bookcase. Everything else created over the course of centuries has been lost.

Listener question & Gary’s response · Transcript passage

Let’s start with the first question, which comes from Dave Hudson on Patreon, because membership has its privileges. He asks,

Hi Gary, long-time member of the completionist club, I love this show. Thanks so much for my daily dose of great knowledge! My question is – are there any alternatives to the format of college debate? I remember seeing a story about it (I think it was 60 Minutes), and I was shocked at the speed. I understand the concept that it is about the number of points the debater can make. My question is, are there any other debate societies in college or beyond that focus more on a measured approach that scores based on the quality of the argument as opposed to the quantity?

For those of you who aren’t familiar with it, academic debate at its highest level is a very fast-paced activity. For most of my debate career, in both high school and college, I was first affirmative and second negative. The first affirmative constructive, the first speech in a debate round, is the easiest as it is scripted. The first affirmative rebuttal is usually considered the hardest speech in a debate round, as you are responding to 12 to 15 minutes of arguments in just 4 or 5.

As such, you have to talk very fast. Likewise, knowing their advantage, the negatives might try to speak quickly and put forward many arguments to cause problems for the first affirmative.

So, that was me. Like everyone else, I had to learn to speak very, very quickly, at a rate that most people probably couldn’t comprehend unless they were trained to listen at those rates.

My college debate coach was Scott Nobles, who was the very first National Debate Tournament champion in 1947. When I was debating in the late 80s and early 90s, I asked him how this style of debate developed, as he had been around for the entire history of the activity by then.

He said it started in the late 1960s. The team most notable for the style, known as spreading, was a team from the University of Houston, known as the “men in black” because they always dressed in black. So, this style has been around for over half a century.

Needless to say, not everyone liked this. In the 1980s, an attempt was made to create an alternative form of debate called Lincoln-Douglas Debate or LD, in high school. It was one person instead of two people, and the intent was for debaters to talk more slowly.

However, LD soon fell into the same habits as two person debate, known as policy debate.

In the early 2000s, another form of debate, called public forum debate, was developed. Public forum was similar in structure to policy debate, except that the speeches were shorter, the topics changed more frequently, and, most importantly, the debate rounds were judged by lay people from outside the activity, not by professionals within it.

As such, it remains much slower-paced.

In college there is a format called parliamentary debate, which is more akin to public forum, and it has been around a while.

That being said, the speed at which debaters talk is not a reflection of the quality of their arguments. It is still usually the quality of an argument that will win.

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Niels from the Discord server asks, In team sports, there’s a lot of special positions, knuckleball pitcher, long snapper, place kicker, etc. What is your favorite niche position and why? Seeing I’m from Denmark, the place kicker in football holds a high place in my heart. Thank you for a great podcast. I was delighted to hear your episode on the evacuation of the Danish Jews during World War II. Regards from elite platinum status member Niels from Aalborg, Denmark

It has to be the long snapper, because it is such a waste of a roster spot on a football team. While you certainly want someone who can long snap, it is a skill that could and should easily be developed by anyone who plays the position of center. It is a single movement that can be practiced over and over at any time. It doesn’t require any special physical attributes that the center wouldn’t already have. If you can develop the skill, it just makes you that much more valuable to any team.