The Cuckoo Mafia

mafia names. You're you're you're a monster personas. Yeah, Julie bat in the corner, Douglas, bat in the corner baseball back. I was thinking an actual bat since we just did an episode on Vampire Back. Oh no, no, no, it's like I got a bat in the corner. This this guy might be rabbit. I'll just unleash ing at you any moment you have to go get a raby shot and everything going from the jugula. Yeah, all right, Or maybe we can just call me Joe Pesci, Joe Phi okay,

forever associated with movie. That's right, very very typecast that man. Yeah. So, if you haven't guessed already or bothered to read the title of podcasts, we are of course talking about the cuckoo mafia. We're talking about the animal mafia. We're talking a little bit about the the human mafia as well,

and in the various forms one encounters it. Yeah, because you do if you actually take this system, this organized system, when you begin to really peel back the layers you can see in all different places in society, right, Yeah, you really begin to see mafia organized crime. And is not this uh bunch of stereotypical looking guys. Uh, you know, Joe Pesci's and uh and and their their ilk standing

in the corner and doing very stereotypical things. You see it as kind of an economic model that is spread not only through all human culture, but even into the animal world. Well, I was gonna say, like even in our break room, you have Jonathan Strickland there, who you know, you gotta put money in a certain place in the the break room right to get access to the coffee. Coffee, right,

or there's no more coffee. And that's just the way it is, right if you want coffee supply fresh and you want it every day, and then Stricklin gets his payment, right, Or the way that when we bring our yogurts and we always have to bring in that one extra yogurt because one Christian conger insists on having quote just enough to wetter beak otherwise, otherwise all the yogurt winds up on the floor, all of it, and it's it's it's discussing in it and it it really takes to that

because like that's delicious yogurt and it all went to waste. And why because I wasn't willing to put up with just a little yogurt loss in my diet each week. That's right. Everybody loses the yogurt if you do not supply it for Kristen alright, So we are not trying to glorify the mafia, which is actually if you think about mafia, that is a huge umbrella term under which many different organizations from different cultures around the world huddle underneath.

And we tend to think of the Godfather and then this quaint group of men just playing checkers and their undershirts. Um. But worldwide we'd see mafia doing different types of damage in the way of human trafficking, legal wildlife trading, uh drugs of course, to just to name a few. So

I want to put that out there. This is not glorifying the mafia, but we just wanted to kind of cover how they work in the world, so that we have a better understanding of how animals may be doing the same sort of strategies and tactics at the mafia is indeed, Yeah, And I should add I love the Guy Father movies. Those are some great films, and there are a few other organized crime pieces here and there

that I've really enjoyed over the years. But I find more and more I just cannot watch films or get involved in in media that is about those sort of stereotypical gangster character is one of the reasons I never even could manage to watch The Sopranos, even though I

know The Sopranos is supposed to be brilliant. I know, I know, but at the at heart, it's about these, uh, these these criminal guys that I've seen are you know, I'm sure less um artistically solid takes on them so many times before, it's like I just don't have any more room for it, Like I'm not convinced there's anything new that I can gain from characters that are even partially cast from this mold. All right, let's talk about

this mold. Because when we talk about in the mafe, we are essentially talking about Kosa nostra, which is roughly translated as our thing, which is kind of this closed circuit within a criminal syndicate. And we talked about these criminal syndicates we're really talking about, at least in this old usage of that term um in southern Italy Sicily, these different neighborhoods in which certain families lorded over those communities.

And I thought this was really interesting. I found this little tidbit of John Gotti talking to some of his subordinates about Kosa nostra and um. This was right before he got ratted out by a bunch of people. And he says, this is going to die. Okay, I'm gonna quit doing that being an hour from now, or be it tonight or a hundred years from now, when I'm in jail. It's gonna be a cost some guys, some people downstairs. He's referring to the nightclub below. Now, who

I know who's babe, stomach is rotten. I know who stomach ain't rotten. You could I could smell it the way a dog senses when a guy's got fear. Okay, that's not just for local color to give you an idea of what the mafia sounds like, because everybody probably already knows that. Um, but I thought that that conversation, just that little excerpts spoke volumes about the environment of fear and implied violence that would come to those who

crossed the code. Yeah. There you see, um, the beginnings of a system that's keeping everybody in check because it's hard. It is a parasitic relationship. It is a parasite feeding up on the host. But on top of that, we have this layer of fear and intimidation, which and it

comes down to an economic model. I mean, did just think of just your average mafia scenario from a thousand movies, right, some guys running a shop and some uh you know individual walks in, perhaps with a heavy behind him, and says, hey, you've got a nice shop. Here. Would be a pity if something happened to it. I can prevent things, bad things from happening to it, if you give me X

amount of dollars, you know, per per month. So it comes down to, all right, which if I'm gonna expend, I'm gonna have to waste some energy, expend some energy to pay this man, all right, so we we will put how much we stack that money up on the counter. But then if I were to resist this individual, I would have to expend even more energy, right, I would have to somehow fight him back physically or align with those who would and and then that comes with inherent risks.

So it comes down to just an economic decision which is easier and which entails less risk. And the interesting thing about this is that within this code, this system, there's a kind of justice that is doled out, particularly if you are in the mafia landscape, right and you're one of the enforcers. If the person doesn't pay up, there's a justice. You know, you're not your restaurant's not going to run very well pretty soon. Maybe your brother

won't get that promotion. You know, there are things that benefit the person who's paying, not just um, just the maintenance of their restaurant, but perhaps there's social stature right and there, and I've been often there is some degree of protection there, certainly from other nefarious individuals. Like you're probably not going to be paying to protection rackets to

two different parasitic mafia dudes. You're gonna be paying one dude, and that dude is going to keep you have to dude off your back because you are now part of his turf. So that's a great point. That's safety elements. So that kind of comes down to this idea of what is altruism and we should probably do another episode

UM that is completely dedicated to altruism because it's very interesting. UM. But there's this idea of altruistic punishment versus selfish on selfish punishment, which is what the mafia does write that selfish unselfish and according to Princeton University and University of Arizona researchers, society's rule against selfishness or rules rather are

rooted in the very exploitation that they condemn. And it may be that the reason that some of the selfish unselfish UM justice punishment comes down the pike is because it's a resources issue. At the end of the day, it's a little bit easier to seed control to a couple of really influential UM peddlers out there in the community and say rather than really be engaged civically and try to meet out justice in a way that is thoughtful and community minded. Yeah, because on one hand, with

the altruistic punishment model. You have the idea of you know, like the wise, benevolent mayor of the town saying, oh, well, if you break the rules, they're gonna be there. There's gonna be a cost, or you know you're gonna you know, you're gonna wind up in the jail cell. You're gonna wind up with a with a fine, Are you gonna

be expelled? What have you? And then on the on the selfish on selfish side of the the word, agin the mafia punishment, that is one guy saying, hey, these people on my turf, you can't mess with them, that's what I do. You can't exploit them because I am exploiting them to the degree that I can get away with it. Yeah, And the system of altruism was actually reported in the

journal Evolution. And what they did is they they took a simulation model that gauged tow community with Stanza system built on altruistic punishment or selfish on selfish punishment, and they did they found that that um, that kind of altruistic punishment which the community comes together and is very civic minded, does demand a lot of resources. And that is perhaps why systems like the mafia tend to do really well because as a result, there is a lower

instance of crime overall in that community against citizens. So you may say, oh, hey, a couple of people become fat cats and they're awful and they do some terrible things,

but as a whole, the community is protected. Yes. And what was what's really fascinating about this, uh, this Princeton University University at Arizona study, was how they draw in that idea that not only does the simpler economic model again is that is the fat cat model, the mafia model as opposed to the altruistic ruler model, but their idea that we get that that more altruistic version of civilization and society emerges from the fat cat model. It

evolves over time. And you really see this if you sort of squint your eyes and really think about the systems of power in the world, Like, what is the difference between the mafia boss who keeps things under wrap but is getting plenty on the side, is living very comfortable at the top. What is the difference between that dude, that Joe Pesci sort of type cast character and a government.

What's the difference between that dude and a corporation what's the difference between that dude and just a you know, you're average local, nice guy employer, Like there are elements of the same model everywhere you look. Well, yeah, and talk about influence peddlers and fat cats if you're talking

about lobbyists. And I'm not saying that all lobbyists are working outside of the margins, but we have a couple of cases under our belt that we can point to lobbyists having tremendous wealth and power and essentially some people, looking at it this way, buying politicians, uh literally buying them by offering them money or goods um or maybe just even their influences so great that they have that

politician in their pocket. Now, let's get out of the mafia model for a moment, and let's get into a more medieval model, which actually, yeah, I mean this, this predates the mafia right and medieval Knights basically a military order created in nine to protect Christian pilgrims visiting Jerusalem.

I'm talking about the Knights Templar. They branched out over time in Western Europe and they created a network of banks that in the abled religious pilgrims to deposit assets in their home countries and then withdrawal of the funds in the Holy Land. Right, so what do you have over time? You have the Nights Templar gaining huge amounts of financial resources, and we still have that protection element

in there. So all of a sudden the threat becomes and sometimes it's not even the threat is so pervasive they don't have to say it. If you don't pay up, if you don't give it to the Knights Templar, perhaps

something bad will befall you. It's in the Nights Templars model is an interesting to want to look at too, because of course the Knights Templars did reach that point we're talking about, at what point do I say it's actually worth the effort to break down this organization, And that eventually occurred there would be Catholic Church, of course,

eradicated the Templars after a while. So and you can definitely make the argument that this is a case of one fat cat looking over the other fact at and unim like, you know what used to be a smaller cat in our feral community, but now you're a little too big, a little too powerful, and uh and uh, and we're gonna see that you go away and I don't want to put it all on the the Catholic Church. The King of France also played a substantial role in

that scenario as well. But that does go back to um that mathematical model in which we're talking about two people, those two fat cats that are trying to cancel each other out and and say, at the end of the day, their coda rules. Yeah, because everybody can't be a fat cat, and you can only have so many parasites living off the host. Uh and and so there's there's a careful balance that has to be maintained. And again, you can look to governmental models, you can look to big business,

and you see very similar things. There can only be so many dominant players in the particular commercial market, and what did they do that. There's a certain amount of competition they will tolerate, and then there are certain certain types of competition that they will readily feast upon or destroy. All Right, we're gonna take a quick break, and when we get back, we're gonna talk about Kuka birds, gonna talk about their spaghetti dinners in their back room. All right,

we're back. Before we start talking about our fine feathered friends, let's talk about tree wasps and cancer cells because they do actually have something to do with this whole mafio. So this system, indeed, we now wasps engage in UH and some of the other practices. We're going to discuss UH shortly. But tree wasps. UH haven't observed that police hives to make sure that no member other than the queen lays eggs. And the same police, though, will often

lay illicit eggs themselves. So that's the case where it's my job to lay down the law. But since I'm the one laying down the law, I'm the one that can bend it a bit, indeed, and so it's kind of interesting. I'll just slip in a couple of my eggs. That's all right. I'm the influence peddler here exactly. And then in terms of cancer cells, we know that mutations and a cell's own DNA initiate the changes that put

it on a really destructive path. But it's a lot more or nuanced than that, because the micro environment of a tumor acts like a kind of co conspirator. And we won't get way into this because we could dedicate entire podcast to this, but essentially, what you see our cancer cells that will prevent other tumors from forming, as if to say, no, no, no, this is my my tumor corner here, which you know, essentially at the same time as kind of a good things. There's no more

tumors that are forming. But you see this again in nature and you see it best and birds ah yes, And that of course is why we call this episode the Cuckoo Mafia, because we see some really fascinating birds that are involved in brood paraticism also known as egg dumping now egg dumping. When you just say that, it brings to mind like just this idea of of a bird that I know what to do with his eggs, just like throwing them off a cliff or something. But

that's not not what's going on here. This is the idea that that on one hand, you have the birds that are are are laying their heads, they're raising their young, uh and it's a nice, beautiful, wonderful thing that you would see in a child's book about nature. And then you have those other birds. Those birds don't care. They don't want to look after that egg and raise that that chick and and vomit food into its mouth. They have other things to do. They have a different set

of values, but they have a genetic mission. Like all organisms, they need their offspring to survive. So they've developed this practice of dumping eggs on these other bird nests, on these other more stable environments, with the intention that the egg will hatch and the chick will be raised in that environment. And ha ha ha on that that poor bird in the nest, right, And we see this in

sea birds. But the thing about seabirds is that they will deposit their eggs and then take off, and then they won't know whether or not this actually came to fruition there. They're young, broad right, and in some cases, if the ag hatches, it's likely going to be eaten

by the very family that they were dumped upon. It's not a good model, really, And they have to find eggs that are species that are somewhat similar to them so that the egg can maybe squeak in there and go unnoticed at least for a while, right, Because eggs, if you just looking at chicken eggs in the fridge, you know, just the white kind that come from here supermarket. You may miss out on this. But there is a lot of difference among all the different types of bird

eggs out there. There's different colors, different patterns, and so a bird is going to be able to tell if hey, I I lay brown eggs and there is a blue speckled one in here. Something is off. Somebody's trying to pull one over on me, It's true. And so we have birds that will do the sort of egg dumping, but they're going to take these mafia like tactics and ensure that that egg will be taken care of, that it gets protected, and it does that vise of the

the own protection or destruction that it offers. Right. One of the best examples of this, of course, is the the cowbird. There are two species of cowbird. You'll find both in North America, and they've they've managed to spread out even more from their original territory due to the way that we we treat our land as a as a human species. But what's remarkable here is that they are very much like that that scenario we're talking about earlier. Hey, nice story, would it would be a pity if something

happened to it? And then if you don't pay up, what happens, Well, suddenly the front window to your store is broken, your your merchandise is thrown out in the street, maybe something catches on fire. There's retribution if you do not obey the laws. Now, these earlier models that these these sea birds we're talking about, there's no retribution. They're just they're just taking a risk. Maybe maybe they'll raise it,

maybe they won't. Maybe it'll hatch and the young, young one will will be able to squirm away before it's it's pecked off as as an interloper. But with a cowbird, uh, there is retribution. Now this used to be just more of a theory than anything. Believe. The original theory, the mafia theory of the cowbird, came from evolutionary biologists uh Amas Xavi and back in seventy nine. But eventually scientists

put all this to the test. That's right. Jeff Hoover at the Illinois Natural History Survey in Champagne, Illinois, provided artificial nests for one and eighty pair of profonetary warblers and then waited for the cowbirds to cuckle them to deposit their eggs. Then he selectively removed the cowbird eggs. So what happened pretty soon the cowbirds swooped in, they retaliated, They returned to the nest to eat or destroy the

remaining warbler eggs. And what's more, warblers that had laid too early for the cowbirds to cuckle them, they also suffered retrobration to their nests also got turned over and destroyed, and the cowbirds would routinely eat or trash these more developed eggs to force the warblers to rebuild their next elsewhere and start over again and hopefully have it in sync when with the cowbirds could swoop in and deposit an egg. So, yeah, they came in and just totally

devastated things. They really drove home and we're again we're gonna anthromorphize a little to layer that mafia understanding of this on the behavior, but they really come in tear everything up, murder with the strong message, Hey, do you

want to survive in this world? If you want to carry out the genetic mission of passing on your own genetic material and saying that your children exist into the next generation generation behind it, the only way you're gonna do it is by playing along with this little scheme of ours. You're gonna have to accept it to a agree because the cost is way too high for you to pay. Yeah, and to put numbers behind that cost.

Hever says that, um, I get that this is what you just described as an evolutionary state of acceptance, and that the cost is that on average, the host birds will raise three of their own chicks when they also support a cowbird chick. Yet they raised just one of their own if a cowbird egg has been rejected. And I like this idea of it's an evolutionary state of acceptance, like I gotta, I gotta accept this because of terms,

it's an offer I can't refuse. Yeah, and you can extrapolate that to to human culture as well, that there's sort of this built in mathematical reason for why we will tolerate a certain amount of of corruption, a certain amount of of criminal activity, in a certain amount of just general awfulness on the part of people's and organizations

that rule over our world. Yeah. And speaking of mathematical models, this mafia hypothesis, which had been really controversial, was finally borne out uh Maria Abou Chakra, Arnie Charleston, and Christigian hill Bay. They modeled this hypothesis with cuckoopers who were ravaging I think they are magpie birds, and they found that this theory does explain the behavior as long as two conditions are met, one that the cuckoos visit the same nest repeatedly, into that the host birds are capable

of learning. That's pretty important, right, because they also point out that they never establish an equilibrium here. So they are regular cycles, uh, in terms of the frequency of mafia such as we're talking about with retribution and non mafia no retribution parasites and host and the acceptance of the egg. So it's so you will have periods where it's kind of like did you ever read Fwick The Big Hearted Moose by by Dr Seuss's fabulous story Moose

has antlers. He lets one animal live in his antlers, then another one's living there, and then there are more and more animals living in his antlers until he finally says enough is enough and he takes the antlers off and he's no longer supporting all of these freeloaders. So you kind of so inevitably you see this this cycle, like how is it builds up? How much criminal behavior is a species going to accept before they retaliate? And

then it gets back down? And then which ones are going to actually um come in and destroy your stuff if you throw the parasites out. So it's the the relationship has to continually um find itself. Yeah, it's interesting because um there is as you say, there's no equilibrium here and um when you see the host behavior here,

it's either one of two things. Conditionally they'll accept an egg or completely unconditionally, And that conditionally only occurs when there is not a large population of um, the parasitic birds, the cuckoo parasitic birds exhibiting that mafia behavior. So in other words, they tend to be the majority. But what happens is that the pendulum begins to swing back the other way, because then the parasitic birds go, hey, we need to start tipping over some nust here. Let them know.

And as soon as they become the majority the birds that are exhibiting that mafia tendency, then all of a sudden you have absolutely, like unconditionally of course drop her egg to do it. I'd love to host them great. And why this is so important is that this means that the cowbirds they don't have to specialize uh, their their eggs. They don't have to change any of the dynamics and try to you know, fit in with other species. They don't have to worry about that that egg just

looking completely out of place, because it does. Because the message is like, hey, if you know it's it's you know, we're not trying to be a subtle here. You know, if you if you don't pay me money, I'm going to break your shop. If you don't raise this egg, which looks sotly different from the other eggs, I'm gonna come in and tear up your nest. And don't you wish that dinosaur train had started with this modia parasite premise?

Oh man, you know, because isn't it The t rex has been dropped in the nest and it's very obvious to the mom turnded on like, oh, this is not my kid here, Yeah, well it is her kid. Well, yes, what I'm saying in in the mafia version that hasn't come out yet, Yeah, yeah, it would be it would be interesting to explore the certainly the the the animal

mafia side of that family dynamic. Indeed, although I guess you know, historically wouldn't be necessarily accurate because we don't have evidence during that period and then the fossil record to say that we would have some parasitic well, they have that character that marches out of the door and uh and and explains to us what's real. Yeah, the big downer, right, the debut downer who's like the dinosaurs aren't actually purple and red and green spotted. Yeah. Alright,

So there you have it. The animal mafia, the cuckoo mafia, the cowbird mafia. But let's turn back, just just one last time, even away from dinosaur train, and discuss the real world of human mafia, because you found a little bit of interesting data about their renewable energy interests. Look, yeah, because again, the mafia is a huge thing, right, It's not just a bunch of you know, Italian in their

undershirt explain checkers. Um. But I will say it goes back to the roots here in Sicily, because it turns out that the mafia is very interested and renewable energy, specifically wind farms. Because one, it fits the landscape of southern Italy right where they have a lot of influence and a lot of land under their sway. Too, it's really easy for them to launder money for renewable energy as you can you can make a lot of money

is renewable energy. I mean it's a fact. Yeah, because it's not that there's not a lot of checks and balances going on with that, and so as a result you have this great robust alternative energy source going on

in Italy. So also government government money flowing into it as well, you know, because ultimately that comes down to it if if if money is to be made off of it, the mafia is interested in it, if there's blood to come out of the host, then the parasite wants a taste, and they're being smart about their money. Of course, now people will say that doesn't make things

right just because this is going on there. There are terrible things that are being exacted upon humanity as a result, But it does make it that the whole point about, um, greater resources and protection for the community. Uh, pretty plain and insight with this example of renewable energy making that part of Italy, which historically has been poor flush with money. Yeah.

You know, Um, you watch Breaking Bad, correct, you reached the point where you think it's early on in one of the couple of seasons where you you encounter a potential money laundering business, a laser tag establishment. Yes, that is really colored the way I think about a lot of businesses. Like if I go to do a business and it's just a little too dream come true, then I start to think about about the possibilities that it's just a money laundering front. Like there are a few

different stores. I'm not gonna name any names, of course, but there are few different stores in the Atlanta area, you know, And maybe I go inside and they just have a few many toys for sale, or it just seems that it seems just like a like too much of a dream store. And I started doing customers, right, maybe there aren't that many customers, and I started I started thinking, it's like, how is this staying afloat? This

has to be some sort of a money laundering scheme. Yeah, that show has completely changed my, uh perspective of nearly everything that I encounter. In fact, I was driving through my neighborhood the other day and the house was being tented for pest control, and I was like, oh, yeah, I know what's going on in there. Uh oh, Walter White, You've changed our lives. It really should have invested in wind farms, So didn't you think that would have been

kind of a jam. That would have been an interesting place. I can I mean that sounds very breaking bad. If it were still going on, and I could, I could easily imagine that point, and I a should have also pointed out we discussed before that the wasps of course, that the world of wasps includes a lot of vile behavior, and that you'll see plenty of examples of parasitic wasp laying their young inside of other nests, zombifying poor ladybugs, but either bidding but also like hatching early in alien

nests and then eating all the other young. So so no, no matter how bad you've got it, birds, just remember it could be worse. You could have to put up with the wasps. Alright, so well, we thank you for putting up with us uh and joining us for the show. And if you want more, then be sure to check out stuff to Blow your Mind dot com. That is our our mothership. That's where you'll find all the episodes of the podcast. You'll find all of our video products.

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