What are the Weirdest Things the Government Invests In?

a shot. Well that's where the coozies come in. Just a couple of years ago, to students at the University of Washington, we're doing some pretty cool research on how foam couzies helped keep a can cold in the summer heat. And you know how much they got from the National Science Foundation to explore this one point three million dollars you're making up? I'm not. And it turns out that there's a little more to the story than just that headline, and that the study was part of an effort to

learn more about climate change. But it's more fun to ignore the important science e stuff and just say one point three million to study cazies. And I'm sure we could come up with a bigger, more noble cause behind our ideas, but it does make you wonder what are the weirdest things our government has invested in? And that's what we're talking about today, Mr Hei their podcast listeners,

Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as always I'm joined by my good friend Mangueshot Ticketer and today we're breaking out our calculators and taking a hard look at questions on government spending. What exactly does the US budget pay for? And more importantly, what's the weirdest stuff our country has ever invested in? And to talk about that, We've got a few fun guests today. Who's

gonna be joining us today, Mango. Today we'll be joined by James Ledbetter, author and editor of inc Magazine, and he's got this great new book, One Nation Under Gold, where he digs into Operation Goldfinger, this bizarre secret federal plan from the sixties that tried to sniff out golden strange places. And we're also going to talk to a couple of coin collectors. You know a thing or two about unusual investments. They're going to give us a low down on some of their best finds and in return,

we'll put them to the test. All right, Well, that sounds like a fair trade. So to kind of dip our toes into this topic, I thought we should first address what most people already know about government spending, which it turns out isn't a whole lot. Plenty of us could probably point to healthcare and national defense as big parts of the US budget, but beyond that, the specifics actually get a little hazy for most people. Yeah, sad,

but true. The Pure Research Center to the study back in two thousand fourteen that really helped illustrate just how little we know about where our money goes. PU pulled Americans on what they knew about carent events and issues in the news, and while the average respondent was fairly knowledgeable about many of the topics, when it came to how much the government spent on particular programs, most people were pretty clueless. So when they were pulled out, what

were they asked about? Well, respondents were asked how much money they thought the government spent on four programs. It was foreign aid, transportations, social security, and paying down interest on the national debt. Or rather, they were asked to put them in order from like largest the smallest, so at thirty three the majority of people said we spend the most money on foreign aid, followed by interest on the national debt. That was at thought. Social Security received

the most money and only four percent. Name transportation is the top expense, all right, so I'm guessing that's a little off. So what's the actual breakdown, Well, social Security nets the most money of the programs on the list by far. It received ninety four billion dollars in the fiscal year two thousand and sixteen, and that's roughly seventeen

times the annual spending on foreign aid. It's also nine point five times the amount spent on transportation and almost three and a half times the amount spent on interest for the national debt. So people underestimated how much we spend on Social Security and they also severely overestimated the money we devote to foreign aid. Yeah, yeah, I'd say,

well that that's that's very interesting. How do you think we should reconcile the fact that Social Security always ranks is one of the most popular government programs among Americans. So I'll barn aid consistently ranks as the least popular spending category. I think it really points to how our preconceived notions and political opinions can color the way we view the world, including our nation's spending habits. Well, how

is that? Well, we tend to assume the worst about our government spending, and I think that's because we're aware in this really broad sense that the country burns through a lot of money and that the national debt is this like sky high number that's unimaginable, but it's always on the rise, even if we don't know the specifics. Yeah, I mean, it seems like we take the pessimistic approach, and you know, it's easy to imagine our government that we must spend the least amount on programs we like

and the most on ones we don't like. And I guess that's kind of human nature too exactly. But a closer look shows that the worst case mentality doesn't always add up. For example, foreign aid, that's the program that tops the chart in terms of unpopularity, but in reality it only accounts for roughly one percent of the total federal budget. Wow, I wouldn't have guessed that. All right, So let's set the record straight on this and once again,

and it's Pew Research to the rescue here. So they broke down how the US government spent its three point nine five trillion dollar budget last year, and according to their senior writer, Drew to Silver, our country is basically a giant insurance company that also has a defense gig on the side. So we spend most of our money

on healthcare in the national defense, oh definitely. About seventy of the total budget went for different kinds of social insurance, so that would include Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare, unemployment compensation, veterans benefits, all of the things kind of like this. Now, another fifteen percent of total spending went for national defense. Interest payments on national debt came in and looks like six percent, and education and related services made up less

than three percent. So I'm just looking at the numbers on your page here, So seventy fifteen six three that's only whereas the other six well, that's the crazy thing. Every other program, whether that's national parks, public broadcasting, foreign A, NASA, you name it, all of those fit into the remaining six percent of the federal budget, which is all the stuff we squabble about. But it's all the fun stuff too.

I know, it's a pretty sweet six percent, And it's inside that six percent that we're going to be focused on today. Yeah, but again, the worthiness of those programs is up for debate depending on who you ask, right, So we're not going to get into that debate. If you haven't noticed, we typically avoid big political statements here on the show, but we do love to dig up the most interesting fact. So that's what we're gonna stay focused on. Right. Well, we definitely see federal spending running

into the same problems we face as individuals. You know, what to buy at the grocery store, or how much of your incomes should go to entertainment versus savings. Most people aren't going to agree on this stuff, and the fact is not everyone wants to spend their money in the same way, and that causes pretty big headaches when

you're spending from a pot to which every taxpayer contributes. Sure, and that's why you'll never reach a consensus on certain line items, like, for example, whether or not it was a wise move for the government to invest nine dollars to promote Vidalia nions as part of a promotional campaign for the fourth Shrek movie. Ninety thousand dollars. I think we can all agree that sounds like a really bizarre

use of money. Don't tell me that actually happened. It did, but I'm not so sure the can was a waste. Like according to the Vidalia Onion Committee, which is a real committee I was going to call, onion sales were up thanks to the Shrek promotion, and that's a huge deal here in Georgia, where agricultural makes up like a good chunk of the economy. By the way, did you know even more than that was spent in two thousand twelve to help Idahope promote their caviar. It's like three

hundred thousand dollars Idaho. Again, it was to help the local farmers in rural areas. Onions and caviar yummy. All right, fair enough, But but here's another one for you, unrelated to food. So in two thousand and ten, the government gave six hundred and fifteen thousand dollars to the University of California at Santa Cruz so they could digitize Grateful

Dead memorabilia. How crazy is this? That's over half a million in federal funds that went a digitally preserving old Grateful Dead concert tickets, t shirts and posters of dancing Teddy Bears. I mean, maybe it's just me, but that seems a little tougher to defend. I feel like we're gonna get a ton of angry emails from deadheads now. By the way, I was on Wikipedia the other day and I found this incredible page of what fans are called, And so do you know what Barry Manilow's fans are called.

They're called fan alos and cris Pines fans they're called pine nuts. I'm a huge pine. Maybe I didn't know that, but I mean, I see your point, right. Like expenses like the Shrek Onion promotion and a federally funded Grateful Dead archive, they're tough to justify because they tend to benefit a much smaller segment of the population than you know, something like medicare Well, it's definitely an eye of the beholder kind of thing, and some programs will seem like

good investments to you and others won't. And there's bound to be a lot of disagreement among people as to which or which. Absolutely so one of my favorite examples of that disparity and thinking comes from this weird research study from two thousand five. Biologists at Yale University received a federal grant to study the reproductive anatomy of ducks

and namely the mail ducks unique corkscrew shape privates. Right, So, like, pundits and politicians were all over this, and they counted the study as like a particularly egregious case of wasteful government spending, so much so that the lead researcher, and her name was Patricia Brennan, she actually came forward to defend her work for the public. What did she say, Yeah, it's a pretty great statement. Actually, so I'm just gonna go ahead and read it. Quote, this is basic science.

The headlines reflect outrage that the study was about duck genitals, as if there's something inherently wrong or perverse with this line of research. Imagine if medical research through the line at the belt Genitalia, Dear readers, are where the rubber meets the road evolutionarily, that's a statement. What a great quote there. But you know, that kind of dismissive attitude is it's actually pretty common when dealing with research projects that can admittedly sound a little nutty when take and

in isolation. In fact, there are a few senators who've made it a yearly tradition to publish waste books, as they call them. These detail hundreds of what they deemed to be the worst cases of wasteful spending for a given year. I should note that the two thousand sixteen

waste book was titled Pokemon Go. It's pretty great. But while these reports always make some fair points, they also tend to ridicule grants for quirky research and present them without mention of their connections to the broader fields of legitimate study. Yeah, and I want to make sure we don't fall prey to that same temptation. But that's a They're definitely other parts of the federal budget that seemed

wasteful no matter the context. What do you say we look at some of the strangest cases of clear cut waste, along with a few more examples that skirt the line between impractical and outright crazy. All right, well, that sounds good to me. Why don't we start with Operation gold Finger, which seems like a prime candidate for the outright crazy category. Why don't we see if we can get our first

guest on the line to talk through it. Our guest today is the editor of inc magazine and the author of a new book titled One Nation Under Gold, How One Precious medal has dominated the American imagination for four centuries. It's a terrific book. And with today's episode being focused on weird government investments, we're going to focus this conversation on an incredibly bizarre effort known as Operation gold Finger. James Ledbetter, Welcome to Part time Genius. Thank you so

much for having me. All Right, well, James, can you help us set the stage for our listeners. So it's the early nineteen sixties. What is the state of gold at this point? So, when World War Two was coming to an end, the major powers of the world gathered in New Hampshire in Bretton Woods to hammer out a

new monetary system for the globe. Uh and that system had at its heart the convertibility of the dollar to gold at the rate of thirty five announced so Bamian theory, anyone with thirty five dollars could go to the United States Treasury and get a bounce of gold, and anybody with announce of gold could go to the High States Treasury and get thirty five dollars. That every other currency in the world was then pegged to the dollar, and the dollar was fully convertible to gold. This system worked

pretty well. It arguably worked too well in the sense that the growth of Western Europe and Japan starting in the late forties through the nineteen fifties was so rapid and extensive that you now have all of these dollars out in the world and dollar backed securities that if they were to be redeemed at the same time at that treasury window, there would be no more gold. And that was considered to be an absolute disaster that had to be prevented because it would it would bring the

whole system crumbling down. And that's not because we didn't have any gold. We had amassed the largest stockpile of gold known to mankind, but it still wasn't enough to deal with all of the dollars that were out there. And so with this problem being very well known by the country's leaders and the Federal Reserve, there was a kind of desperation about what to do, and so on top of that you have pressure coming from the United

States gold mining industry. The the keeping the value of gold at thirty five an ounce was very depressing to the US gold industry. That it's a little analogous to like oil companies when oil is at twenty barrel it's really not worth their time to drill in certain places or to go where you need to do fracking. At a hundred dollars a barrel, it's it makes a lot

more sense. But with the price fixed at thirty most of the gold that was easily accessible in the United States had already been tapped out, and and so the question is where what could be done to get more gold? And a strange combination of high placed Treasury officials, l v j's science and technology advisor, and some sympathetic members of Congress cooked up this scheme in the mid sixties that because it's the mid sixties, what else are they

going to call it? Operation Golder and the idea, the idea was to use state of the art technology to basically find gold where it had never been found before. So you had this is all completely top secret. There was no congressional debate, There was no budget line item for it. You know, there wasn't like people said, oh yeah, let's let's uh, let's sign off on the on the

on the alchemy quest. Um. It was completely hush hush because they were afraid, uh they they they believed that there was so much gold that they could find that it was essentially you know, double or triple the amount of gold already mind in the world. That's that's so one of the things I say is it's not like

discovering a new gold mine. This was like they thought discovering a new planet, and that they felt that that if that got out, it might be so disruptive to the world central banks that you could cause you know, any number of economic problems. And so what were some of the weirdest places that they started looking for gold? It feels like this insane exploratory mission. Yeah, so so they were There were kind of three parts to Operation

gold Finger. The first part involved using state of the art technology to see if there is in fact gold in places where it had traditionally not been looked for. So, for example, uh, is their gold in the ash that comes out of cold plants? Is there gold in certain types of um plants and flowers? Is their golden animal brains? Is their gold in deer antlers? Is their gold in seawater?

Um Literally dozens and dozens of projects all across the country and internationally to find out if there's some you know, kind of hidden source of gold. And this is almost comical. This is an instant of when science kind of gets in the way of wisdom because the technology was really great. The fact is there are traces of gold in lots of places, but at parts per million or parts per billion, to get the gold out of the deer antlers would cost way more than thirty five dollars, So it really

wasn't a solution, even though yeah, it was kind of there. UM. The second component of Operation gold Finger again goes back to this idea that we know where the gold is, but all of the gold that can be easily and profitably mined in location X has already been mined out. There's a very good chance that there's more gold underneath there, but it's not really accessible um at thirty five dollars

announced if you use conventional explosives. But what if what if we put nuclear explosives in the ground and blast out the gold and then lead it out with a with a with a chemical and this this was a very enticing idea in the in the mid sixties, there were a lot of government scientists who really believed in what we're called the peaceful uses of atomic energy. UM. It was a somewhat naive time in the sense that people were not paying a lot of attention to radioactivity. Uh,

and that's a bit of a problem. But there were a number of experiments that were conducted using nuclear weapons to to move large amounts of earth, and it was it was kind of in the books to do this for mining purposes. But by the time the words started to get out and some of the more um uh kind of conscious scientists, the program was eventually scrapped before it actually took the form of of using nuclear weapons for for gold mining. Um. And then the third component,

which really didn't get too far beyond the conceptual stage. Um. But let's call it what it is, was to turn base metals into gold. It was nothing short of a twentieth century alchemy proposal. And here again the science kind of outpaced people's understanding of things. You can do this, It can be done. Glenn Seaborg, who was for many years the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, and there's there's elements named after him. He's he discovered a number

of elements. Very distinguished scientists actually did this. In you could you could take very very thin foil of bismuth and bombard it with proton beam and it displaces electrons, so that some of this remaining is in fact an isotope of goals. So you can create gold out of

base metals. But again here's the problem. When Seaboard did this, he estimated that to produce gold by this method would cost probably one quadrillion dollars per ounds as a way of replacing the gold that was propping up the dollar that was worth thirty five This was not really a very good proposal. Um. But but you know, it's it's

kind of easy to make fun of these ideas. Now, it has to be said that at the time these these were considered viable ways of propping up the global economy, which was it was a very serious, sober thing to do.

But it shows you how twisted and um and kind of um uh, what's the word I'm looking for, how unsustainable the monetary system had become, that that that that you would have someone seriously thinking of putting nuclear weapons in the ground, is you know, a better way of propping up the world's monetary system as opposed to say changing the rules. It just shows you how the logic

had had really become you know, kind of work. And I think that's that's part of the theme of my book One Nation Under Gold, that for whatever reason, sometimes we're good, sometimes we're not so good. This metal has kind of warped the American mind over time, and uh, and we we can't we can't stop. It's it's this utter, utter fascination with this substance. Well, James, this has been terrific. I hope everyone will check out One Nation Undergold. James,

thanks so much for joining us. Thank you for having me. You're listening to part time Genius and we're talking about the weirdest things our government spends money on. To ango. Before the break, you mentioned that there were some clear cut cases of wasteful government spending that are tough to dispute. So when you said that, what did you have mind?

Oh man, where to begin? I'd say one of the worst I came across was the staggering ninety million dollars that federal agencies spent on unnecessary printing charges each year. Like this includes about twenty eight million dollars just to print the Congressional Record, and that's a daily transcription of every word spoken in Congress. So there are over copies of this record printed every single day. And the worst part is the whole thing is available online. Yeah, that's

pretty much the definition of wasteful. And I've I've got another one here. So, according to a two thousand thirteen report by the Office of the Inspector General, the government spent big on inside advertising to increase traffic to their Facebook and Twitter pages. How exciting is that Facebook and Twitter for government? All told, the State Department told out six hundred and thirty thousand dollars of the course of two years, and this was basically to buy more likes

for their social media posts. Man, did they at least get the traffic they wanted? Well, no, unfortunately. I mean although the State Department's pages did see an uptick and visit ters, I think it was less than two percent of them actually liked or favorite at any post. So not only was it a big waste of money, but I'm guessing it was kind of a blow to the government's pride. You know, I almost feel bad for them. But what about how much is spent on the annual

upkeep of vacant government buildings? Yeah, I remember you were looking into this, so I'll buy it on this one. So how many of our tax dollars go to empty buildings, way way too many of them. So, according to the l A. Times, the government spends as much as one point seven billion dollars each year just to maintain the more than seven hundred seventy thousand vacant buildings it owns.

And you want to talk about wasteful. Even though the government already pays for all that unused space, some of the agencies continue to buy at least new spaces rather than put the vacant ones. To use seven hundred and seventy thousand vacant buildings, that is insane. Well, it's it's especially frustrating in cases like that where a little more communication could cause multiple problems to cancel each other out. I mean, in addition to easy workspace for employees, these

buildings could be used as government storage. Take the I R S. I mean, the I R S alone has more than twenty thousand pieces of unused office furniture, and rather than sell it or stored in government buildings, the agency pays nearly one million dollars each year to rent storage space. That's so crazy. But you know, as crazy as these expenses are, if we want to find the weirdest government investments, we've got to talk about DARPA. Very

good point, all right. So for those who haven't thought about DARPA lately or or ever, the full name is the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Was created back in ninety eight to help with the US space race and quickly switched focus to developing technical innovations for defense. This was once NASA took over the space research. DARPA research has led to all kinds of breakthroughs, from the first stealth aircraft, communications, satellites, and drones to the less military

minded inventions like driverless cars and robotic vacuum cleaners. Right, and if rumas weren't weird enough, DARPA is also responsible for about sixty years worth of really far robotics projects, many of which were never put to active use. You know. One of my favorite examples of this was called EATER. That's e a t R, also known as the Energy Autonomous Tactical Robot. I don't know if you saw this, Mango,

but it was back in two thousand twelve. They were all these online rumors that the government was developing some kind of monstrous flesh heating robot. It was to be used in combat. What I mean, I feel like I definitely remember about that. Well. Thankfully, the rumors turned out

to be exaggerated. Researchers clarified that Eater was strictly vegetarian, which is comforting seeing as the robot was equipped with a chainsaw and a powerful gripper arm and this was help but collect plant based biomass to use for energy, and the idea was that Eater could support troops in the battlefield without the need for conventional fuels. I mean, it's actually kind of cool. So instead it would simply collect twigs, grass, paper, other plant materials to help power itself.

And I like this statement from the CEO of the company that was funded by DARPA to help develop the robot. He said, completely understand the public's concern about futuristic robots feeding on human population, but that is not our mission. That's super comforting still for my money. You know, the scariest thing Dark has worked on has to be their Total Information Awareness project from way back in two thousand two. I mean, that does sound way scarier than managing robots.

I know. It was basically this massive counter terrorism database that was supposed to collect, process, and even analyze mind data to help prevent terrorist attacks. And as you'd imagine, there was a lot of pushback against what was essentially this electronic version of Big Brother. And if you thought the name was creepy, you've got to see the logo they came up with. They used the Eye of Providence symbol that's on the back of the dollar bill, you know,

the pyramid with all seeing eye on top. But then they managed to make it even more creepy by showing it projecting a beam of light onto the surface of the entire planet o God. Yeah, okay, nothing unsettling about that. Now. Not all their research is terrifying, though. One of the weirdest, coolest, and most non threatening projects from dark Uh is this

robot that can play jazz music. And we already have artificial intelligence programs that can produce pseudo original classical music by analyzing the work of human composers, but DARPA has its eyes set on robots that actually write and perform their own jazz songs. All I think about when you said this is like the creatures from Showbiz Pizza. That's pretty much what it is. They were so far ahead of their time that show Biz. But tell me why

jazz and how do musical robots like help with defense. Well, jazz was chosen because it would require the robots to improvise. I think it kind of makes sense. So in order to jam along with human musicians, the robots need to be able to think and react to the situation in

real time. So the aim is to produce a form of AI that can make you know the spur of the moment decisions and response to constantly changing conditions, which is definitely a skill that would come in handy on a battlefield just as much as in a jazz club. So I can't believe you just convinced me that jazz playing robots are smart investment, or at least that they're not the worst way to spend our talks about No,

not the worst. But it's, like we were saying earlier, so many of these seemingly outlandish projects don't sound nearly as crazy when they're given the proper context. So how about we try and experiment, mango. Let's take a look at a couple of the country's most recent strange investments and see if they're as silly as they sound, if they're actually worth the money. I'm up for it. But why don't we take a break for a quiz, first

a mango. Who do we have on the line today, We've got Charles Morgan and Hubert Walker from the wonderful publication Coin Week. Welcome to part time genius guys. Hi guys, he has gone for having. When people are getting into coin collecting, what are some of the mistakes they tend to make? So the first one is that people who really get into a hobby really intensely in the beginning, I think that there's a race that they need to buy everything they see because somehow they're all going to

disappear and they're gonna run out of time. And the fact the matter is like nobody has ever are a symbol of a a coin collection and that has everything. It's just it's it's probably not even possible even if you, you know, even with Esos his money, I don't think you could do it because you would run out of time, and then there would also be coins that would be so rare that maybe there's only one or two known and you have to convince the person who owns at

the celt Sea. But the second thing is one of the most profoundly stupid stories that we had covered in the last few years involved a guy who was an investor who bought a quarter million dollar gold coin from a one of those you know called the eight hundred numbers listened to on radio kind of gold dealers, and they sold him this this amazing coin, like any collector who is a real collector would have been just thrilled

to own it. But he found that it had a flaw, a little bit dingy, so uh, he basically polished the life out of it, and by the time we saw it, it looked like costume jewelry, like something that it didn't even look real anymore. I mean it was it was gold, so it looked like gold, but it was so shiny, and it was a coin. It looked like something made to look like gold. And he still only got like five six thousand dollars for it on auction. So now

you're used to dealing with much more valuable coins. But I was curious, what are your thoughts on getting rid of the penny. I'm personally in favor of a total coinage reform, which would include getting rid of the penny at least and maybe the nickel. And if you think about it, there has never been a success They push to eliminate a piece of paper currency in favor of

a coin. Uh. In the past, probably a hundred or so years in this country, we used to actually make currency notes called fractional currency, which were parts of a dollar. That was done during the Civil War because they didn't want to, you know, use silver precious and being hoarded.

So they were making basically stance over money. But uh, you know, when they tried to introduce the Susan B. Anthony dollar, it didn't replace the one dollar bill and the presidential dollar in the second to we it all are also failed to do that. So from a minting industry sent point, the elimination of any point from circulation, it is a slow death spiral for that as an industry.

The second part is the good part. So in the United States we have essentially had the same coin structure since seven The coins are different and there are some different denominations that don't exist, more like a half cent, half dime, two cent, or three cent piece. But in eighteen fifty seven the United States meant in a major pointage reform which eliminated the half cent and the cent large cent size cent which was oh gosh, maybe in

between the size of a half dollar and a quarter. Essentially, that's how big the scent used to be, and they eliminated it in favor of the small size scent that we used today. Well, the elimination of that meant that there were scents that were made from three the eighteen fifty seven, which are like now obsolete, and they were being redeemed it turned in and destroyed. Well, that's what started coin collecting in America as sort of a popular hobby.

And so my opinion is if they eliminated the scent and the nickel, it would actually help coin collecting because people who grew up using those coins would realize they were no longer going to be available and people would start looking for the different dates and mint marks and things like that. So for coin collectors eliminating stuff like that it's probably a good thing, But for the mincing

industry it's not. That makes a lot of sense. Well, you guys are used to dealing with rare coins and much more valuable coins, but we're gonna put you guys to the test with something a little more simple. Mango, what game are we playing today? We're playing the quarter quiz, and basically we're gonna tell you what's on the back of the U S quarter and you just have to

tell us the state where it's from. But we're gonna have you guys face off against one another, and in order to chime in, we're going to have you make some animal noises. So Charles you will chime in with a cow's move, and Hubert you will have the lovely caca. Alright, so let's get started. Question number one. This stake quarter has a picture of a common loon on it, though the phrase Land of ten Thousand Lakes might be the bigger giveaway. All right, so that's Hubert, what's the answer there?

All right? I think that would be Minnesota, Absolutely nicely done. Question number two. There are no slot machines or poker tables on the back of this stake quarter, just a pair of beautiful mustangs running free. Oh that sounded like a very realistic cow. Okay, Charles, what do you think I do? Mind us? Uh? That would be Na Bob, absolutely, and Nevada is actually home of the nation's wild horses.

Question number three. This state quarter has the phrase Crossroads of America on it, right under a picture of a race car. Okay, Hubert, Indiana al right, well done. Question number four. Unlike North Carolina, which also features the Right Brothers plane, this state quarter paired. They're playing with a picture of John Glenn in a space suit. Wow, Huber just barely beats Charles with a coca alright, what's the answer?

It is Ohio? Alright? Question number five. This state quarter has a ring necked pheasant in the foreground, though the pick of Mount Rushmore in the back might be more recognizable. Um I, why don't we give it to Charles? Yeah? That would that would be the South Dakota. You got it, all right? Question number six, This state has a bucking cowboy on it, and it's accompanied by the phrase the equality state. It's better known as a home of Dick Cheney.

This is also probably the worst coin design and the entire STA series, and that would go to Wyoming. Wait, why why do you think it's the worst state design. Well, it's not because of the iconic image of the bucking cowboys, because there's no detail on it. It's just basically a silhouette. I mean that's kind of boring. Anything that is pretty boring. Okay, Well, if I'm not mistaken, we are tied at three. So this is the very last question, the tiebreaker number seven.

This state quarter has a picture of a peregrine falcon and the phrase may it be forever in Latin. There are zero potatoes on it, however, alright Hubert for the wind Idaho, it is Idaho. Alright, Mango. How our contestants done well? He just barely edged out Charles. But it was a great competition. And as always are, whinner gets a note to his mom or boss sing his praises.

And because we don't want Charles to go home h empty handed, We're gonna send you home with the weirdest poin press we could find online, a hedgehog coin purse. I can't wait to use it. Well, congratulations guys, and thanks so much for joining us on part time genius. Thanks so much, guys, great, thank you guys. Thanks, We will thank you. Okay, Well, so it's time to live out the ultimate taxpayer fantasy. We're basically gonna audit the U. S. Government and see if any of their two thousand and

sixteen investments past muster. Where do you want to start? Alright? So here's what I want your opinion on. The researchers and m I T developed a new program to view six hundred hours of television shows and four hundred hours of online videos to see if they could learn about and anticipate human behavior. So with this, do you think the government was right to foot the bill for a couch potato computer. I'm not falling for this. I feel like I need some more information, So tell me what

it watch. Well, the program was trying to anticipate actions like hugs, kisses, high fives, and handshakes, so the researchers had to watch tons of YouTube videos and hours and hours of Desperate Housewives, The Office, and Scrubs, to name a few, which isn't a bad plan, but like, what was the end goal? I mean, is the government really

interested in like saving people from being left on high fives. Well, the real hope is that, with enough time and enough binge watching, the program could be used in security cameras. Is a way to automatically call for help. It identifies that somebody is about to be injured, or that a crime is about to be committed. It's it's it's actually pretty interesting stuff. Yeah that's pretty neat. So, um, why

don't we try another one? Since it's beach season, let's look at the three million dollars study the National Science Foundation did on how background music affects viewers perception of sharks. But before I go into more detail, I'm going to give you how the Internet frame the studies conclusion. So here it is the theme music from Jaws caused people to view sharks in a negative manner. That did. I mean, I'm not gonna say we got ripped off, but it

does strike me as a fairly obvious conclusion. I mean, the Jaws theme was composed to feel ominous. It follows that the song would make viewers wary of whatever's played alongside it, whether it's sharks or whatever, which is a totally fair response. Now, let me fill in some of

the gaffs and we'll see if it changes your opinion. So, as part of the study, researchers determined that the public's negative perception of sharks is actually hindering conservation efforts, and we tend to ignore cases where sharks are exploited or abused, and we donate less money to shark conservation programs than we do to similar programs for other creatures. I mean, that's a little sad, But again, is this surprising our culture?

Has a bad habit of blowing shark on human violence way out of proportion, especially when you look at all the Jaws and shark nadoes of the world. So what what is the angle here? Well, according to the NSF and I'm quoting here, participants rated sharks more negatively and less positively after viewing a sixty second video of swimming sharks set to ominous background music, compared to participants who watched the same video clips set to uplifting background music

or silence. And here's the thing, right, Like, researchers didn't use footage from Jaws or other horror flicks. They used a clip from the BBC's Blue Planet Nature series, which just showed sharks like swimming around and being sharks. So basically, the study is a warning about making educational content that borrows too heavily from the Hollywood Shark Playbook. Yeah, pretty much so, the studies actual non inflammatory conclusion was quote.

Given that nature documentaries are often regarded as objective and authoritative sources of information, it is critical that documentary filmmakers and viewers are aware of how the soundtrack can affect the interpretation of the educational content. All right, I think I see where you're going with this, and you know, suddenly a laughable research study doesn't seem quite as ridiculous. But I mean, three million dollars, was it really worth

that much? Yeah? I mean, I guess that depends on how the educational community responds to the findings, and of course whether or not you like sharks. All right, Well, you know this might sound silly, but auditing the government is much harder than I thought it would be. There's just so many angles from what you can analyze these expenses,

and they all make a certain amount of sense. I mean, our country spent a hundred and twenty five thousand dollars on a three D printer that can create edible pizzas for astronauts. On the one hand, that's exorbitant, But on the other, do we really want to be the kind of people who would deny astronauts pizza? I don't, I know.

I mean, there are real benefits to even the most ridiculous sounding investments, but balancing those potential benefits against the real world costs, I mean, that can all be dizzying. That's why it's so important to try and keep things

in perspective when looking at these weird government investments. What do you mean by that, Well, just like with the thread of sharks or that one percent of funding goes to foreign aid, we have a way of making these weird expenses out to be way bigger problems than they really are. Take those government waste books, for example, they

document billions spent on questionable grants and programs. But even all nineteen billion dollars of that is only half of one percent of the three point nine trillion dollar federal budget. So while it's definitely not something we should ignore, it doesn't make as much of an impact on the government's bottom line as you think. That's actually pretty comforting. I mean, I want people to like sharks and I want astronauts

to eat pizza. So if those things can happen at no huge cost to the country, I consider that a win in my boat. We'll hold onto that feeling well, because it's time for the fact not bring it on mango, h All right, So I'll kick it off. Every wonder where all those old Neon signs go when they burn out. In two thousand ten, one eight million dollars was given to construct a Neon sign graveyard near Las Vegas, and I mean, I clearly want to check this place out. Yeah,

I kind of do too. Alright, well, Mago, you and I both have young sons who are very curious about video games. Are doing the whole Minecraft thing now, but it won't be long before they're begging to play games like World of Warcraft. And it turns out there could be some good money in this. The creators of one study received two point nine million dollars to look into how online virtual worlds such as World of Warcraft and Second Life can help organizations collaborate and compete more effectively

in the global marketplace. Have you ever been to Denali National Park? I haven't. Well, when you do, I'm sure the animals and mountains and stuff will be pretty cool to look at. But be sure to check out the toilets because they've got some seriously fancy new ones, or at least they'd better be fancy. At forty one dollars perceed with thirty six toilets, that comes out to one

point five million dollars. Wow. All right, Well, I'll try to swing by right after I visit the home for the US Ambassador to NATO and Brussels to see the nine hundred and sixty violets, nine hundred and sixty tulips, nine hundred and sixty begonias, five four Iva geraniums, and lots of other plants, totaling seven hundred and four thousand dollars for this one residence. I feel like he cut the budget on the ivy geraniums. Yeah, everything was at

nine hundred and sixty until the ivy geranium. So 'st year, the government allocated like close to a million dollars to post poems and zoos throughout the country. The poems are there to quote, increase environmental awareness. Thank goodness, Yeah, thank goodness for that one. All right. I'm not sure if you remember this ad back in two thousand and ten, but the government invested two point five million dollars on what would later become known as the worst Super Bowl

ad ever. So back in two thousand twelve, then Congressman Mark Newman noted that he wanted to save taxpayers a hundred seventy five thousand dollars by cutting the funding for a study on quote the connection between cocaine and the risky sex habits of the Japanese quail for risky sex, I know. And while the study was really intended to help researchers understand the connection between drug abuse and sex habits and public health options. I want to see his

study on coked up quails. All right, I'm with you on this one. That seems like the most necessary use of government money we've talked about all day. So I'm gonna get this one to you. Congrats, thank you, and that's it for today's Part Time Genius. Thank you so much for listening. Thanks again for listening. Part Time Genius is a production of how stuff works and wouldn't be possible without several brilliant people who do the important things

we couldn't even again to understand. CHRISTA McNeil does the editing thing. Noel Brown made the theme song and does the mixy mixy sound thing. Jerry Rowland does the exact producer thing. Gay Bluesier is our lead researcher, with support from the Research Army including Austin Thompson, Nolan Brown and Lucas Adams and Eves. Jeff Cook gets the show to your ears. Good job, Eves. If you like what you heard,

we hope you'll subscribe. And if you really really like what you've heard, maybe you could leave a good review for US. Do we do we forget Jason? Jason who s