413: We Disagree (But In A Cute Way)
01:00:51 Share

You're listening to a Complexly podcast. Hello and welcome to Dear Hank and John. It's a podcast where two brothers answer your questions, give you dubious advice, and bring you all the week's news from both Mars and AFC Wimbledon. John. Hank forgot that I'm supposed to come in in the middle there because it's been so long since we made the podcast. Hank forgot the intro. It's been so long. What's the intro now? We did a different intro? No, I say I prefer to think of it as Dear John and Hank. Oh, you're right. Which in fact, starting in 2028, it will be.

It will actually – Elon is trying to figure it out, John. Oh, let me tell you my level of confidence that this podcast is going to be called Dear John and Hank in 2028. I will now – forget about the name of the podcast. I'll bet you whatever you want, any amount of money. For people who don't know –

A long time ago, we wagered, and I am the one. It's good to be humbled. We wagered that whether or not humans would be on Mars by the year 2028, which at the time seemed very far in the future. Yeah. Very far. Inaccessibly far away. Right. That's the thing about the future, though. It just keeps happening. Yeah.

It does. It does. I was just having breakfast and I said to Catherine, in five years, it's going to be 2030. Yeah. Yeah.

2030. That sounds so future. And this podcast will have been called Dear John and Hank for two years. It sure will. It sure will. I mean, very little in the future is inevitable. There's very little that we can predict about the future. The only thing we know about the future is that humans will not be on Mars by 2028. Yeah, it's too bad because there's this restaurant I want to go to on Mars. The food is fantastic, but the atmosphere is terrible.

Oh, yeah. It's very limited. All right. That's your dad joke. That's your one for the week. I had a different one ready, but then we went on a Mars tangent. John, where the hell have you been? Well, where have you been? I've actually been- Where have you been? I've been all over. I thought it was all your fault. I've been on four continents promoting my book, Everything is Tuberculosis. It's been nonstop. It has not been all my fault though, because a couple of times I was ready to record and you were too busy. So at any rate, we're very sorry to have

Oh.

Let me go straight to the boys real quick. I've got to tell you, as AFC Wimbledon news has gotten more exciting, Mars news is like, I don't want to think about this. Mars news is just a darkness all the time. I know. It always felt so like, oh, people, apolitical. But now I'm like, oh, God. Yeah. Well, there's not a lot that's apolitical at the moment. But you know what it is? Well –

I was going to say AFC Wimbledon, but no, nothing is. Nothing is. As the great theologian put it, politics isn't everything, but politics touches everything. Anyway, I got to go. So first off, AFC Wimbledon barely qualified for the playoffs. That's the context that you need. We had to win at Grimsby. And Hank, let me tell you a story that will astonish and shock you. We have a 35-year-old midfielder named Sam Hutchinson. He never scores goals. He scores like once every three years or so on average. Sure.

And...

How long is the average professional soccer career? Yeah, exactly. He's scored like four goals in his 35 years. So this guy, Sam Hutchinson, six minutes into the game, he feels a little bit of chest tightness. And he thinks about coming off. He's like, I don't feel right. This is really weird and unpleasant. And I'm kind of tempted to ask the coach to sub me off. But he doesn't because men don't look after their health enough. And that's actually the lesson of this story.

So Sam Hutchinson continues to play with chest tightness throughout the game. He plays the entire 90 minutes. And in the second half, he scores a goal. He scores a goal against Grimsby Town that is, in fact, the goal that means that we make it to the playoffs. None of these games have more than one goal is what I've learned. That's definitely AFC Wimbledon's thing right now is not giving up any goals. And so if we score one, we win.

So Sam Hutchinson scores a goal. Everybody's celebrating like wild. Sam Hutchinson, a little bit muted in his celebrations, it has to be said, but he does, he does celebrate. He finishes the game on the bus ride home. He's like, man, this chest tightness is not getting any better. He finally talks to a trainer and the trainer is like, pull over the,

and get us to the nearest hospital. Oh, my God. Sam Hutchinson had a heart attack six minutes into the game. He scored his goal against Grimsby Town that sent us to the playoffs after having that heart attack. Don't do this, young people. John, is the film crew there for any of this? Yeah. Yeah. In fact, when you look at the halftime footage, which I have looked at,

because we're making a documentary. It's called Fan-Owned Football. When you look at the halftime footage, you can tell that Sam Hutchinson is very uncomfortable and he's trying to figure out- What the heck? I know, because he was having a heart attack. So he scored a goal that sent us to the playoffs after having the heart attack. He got treated. He got a stent put in. He's fine.

He wants to play next year. We'll see if he gets cleared for that. It's good to be a healthy person. I'm not a doctor. But that's the context for how we got into the playoffs. Okay?

Then we get to the playoffs. Owen Goodman, our goalkeeper on loan from Crystal Palace, has an absolute worldie of a game against Knotts County. I mean— A real worldie. Oh, proper worldie, Hank. There's no other way to describe it. You can get heart attacks when you're 35? I'm worried now. Oh, you should be worried. It's actually more likely that you'll have a heart attack than it is that you'll have a recurrence of cancer. I mean, we don't need to talk about the odds of various things.

But I'm so glad that I went to John Green to ask whether or not I should be worried about something. That is always the right thing to do. Especially a health thing. What do you mean, should you be worried about it? Are you kidding? You have like a 25% chance of having a heart attack in your life. And 100% chance of dying. Well, almost. Brian Johnson has entered the chat. Don't die. Don't.

I cannot believe I know his name. I can't believe I know his name either. He's been incredibly effective at making himself an influencer, despite the fact that I disagree with his fundamental precept. The weird thing is that we're enough in this world that we have friends who are involved in Brian Johnson drama directly. Oh, yeah, of course. But back to AFC Wimbledon. Okay.

I just wanted to see that. Let everybody know that we don't say everything we know. We don't say everything we know. We say most of what we know, to be fair. We say a fair bit of what we know. We don't say everything. Yeah.

So anyway, point being, AFC Wimbledon, go to Knotts County, score a goal, don't give up a goal, and then play the second part of the playoff semifinal, score a goal, don't give up a goal. At the end of that game, there's so much celebration that, you know, we've got a mascot. He's a womble.

which is like an 80s British television show mascot. Okay. And the Womble was crowd surfing. They were singing, we're going to crowd surf the Womble, we're going to crowd surf the Womble, and then they crowd surf the Womble. That's awesome. That's like VidCon 2010, but with a tongue.

Exactly. So we make it to the playoff final, Wembley, 50,000 people, 30,000 Dons fans. For context, Hank, nine years ago when we made it to the playoff final previously, there were only 22,000 Wimbledon fans. So this is a club that has grown a lot in the last nine years thanks to hard work from everybody.

And we get there. I fly directly from the – I bike, actually. I ride my bike from the Indy 500 to the airport, which might be the first time anyone's ever done that. I thought about – recently in Boston, I thought about taking a bike to the airport because traffic was so bad. And somebody said, do not do that. Well, I will say it was a bit sketchy in places. There was a bike path the whole time. But I don't know how much you know about Indianapolis bike paths, but some of them leave a bit to be desired. Yeah. Yeah.

So my friend Stuart and I biked to the airport. We board a plane to Detroit. Then we board a plane to London. We get to London. We take a shower. We go to the pub. The Nerdfighters are at the pub, Hank. The Nerdfighter Dons are there. They've got their Nerdfighter Don flag, the blue and yellow Nerdfighter flag. We're hanging out. We're having a couple pints.

And then it's time for the game. My dad's there. Also your dad. Yeah. Lucky, lucky charm. He's a lucky charm. He was there nine years ago. And so he felt like he needed to go back. It was very good of him to go. Um, I think he's the reason why we won the game. And then, uh, it was a tense first half looked very much like there was very little between the teams. Wouldn't say there was a ton of quality on the pitch. Then Marcus Brown, uh,

Nerdfighteria's own Marcus Brown had a shot. It got deflected. It fell to Myles Hippolyte. And Myles Hippolyte scored for only the third time this season with an absolute banger on the half volley. We were up 1-0 at halftime. It's a good goal. All the kids were in – It was an extra time in the half? It was extra time in the half, extra injury time in the first half.

I went outside to get a beer at halftime and all the kids were on each other's shoulders. One of the really encouraging things about this whole experience was seeing how many young people have fallen in love with AFC Wimbledon. It's not just me and people older than me. It's like there's a whole generation of youth who are bringing that energy to the stadium where they're on each other's shoulders, singing all the songs. And they were singing the Dons are going up, ole, ole. And then they saw me.

And they sang my name, which was the highlight of my life so far. So we go into the second half. All we need to do is not give up a goal. And that is what we managed to do. And I would say with about 10 minutes left, it became impossible for me to speak or breathe. I was with my dad, with Stuart, with my buddy Ryan, with my buddy Aaron and his son, with Rosianna, with Lex and Nick, like all these people who've loved Wimbledon with me for years.

And I mean, it was so tense, Hank. I can't even tell. Every time the ball went into the opponent's penalty area or our penalty area, I was just, I was shuddering with terror. I just wanted to win that game so badly. I wanted to see Wimbledon become a third tier English soccer team again so badly. And then the ref blew his whistle and we went absolutely bananas. We went berserk. It was incredible. It was like my...

I wasn't even inside of my body. It was too, it was a world where all hope is justified. And I say that with all apologies to the Walsall fans who of course felt the exact opposite. After the game, we go to box park, which is this like somewhat sterile, uh, party venue near Wembley have a, have a couple more pints. And then the players show up, all the players show up. I get to hang out with Marcus Brown, uh,

and his girlfriend, who's very grateful to us, by the way, she said, thank you for giving Marcus a home. Aw. That's so sweet. And all the players were great. A couple of them asked about you. Jake Reeves. Jake Reeves asked if you were in the building. I said no. He had to be at his wife's girlfriend's. My current wife's birthday event. Your current wife's birthday event, which I said was a BS excuse, but he bought it.

That's a TikTok trend, by the way. The current wife thing. I just felt bad about it. Oh, I don't even know. I don't know about that. Oh, it's just a thing where you call your wife your current wife and she chops you in the throat immediately. Oh, I see. Or you call your husband your current husband and they're like, what did you? Oh, I get it. Okay. That sounds like a TikTok trend. I'm so glad I'm not using that particular app these days. But anyway...

It was magical, Hank. It was to be with the players and their families, to see Sam Hutchinson, be able to give him a hug, be able to see his beautiful kids. It was just magical. It was really, really special. And I'm so, so grateful for the opportunity to have lived this season with AFC Wimbledon. I went to seven games this season.

I'm so glad that I was able to go to so many games, that I was able to see them lose away at Bromley, that my poor son continued his streak of only ever seeing Wimbledon lose away at Knotts County. It was just – the whole season just – you don't – the thing about football –

is it's a drama. It's a play. It's musical theater because the fans make it musical theater by all their singing. And the thing about football is that it's a play where nobody knows the end until the end. The players don't know. Are you still there? Hank's power just went out, but I'm not going to let that stop me. Nobody knows the end of the play until the play is over.

And that is what makes football so beautiful, so stinking beautiful, is that together we wrote the end of this magnificent play. I wonder if Hank's power will come back on. In the meantime, let me tell you more about AFC Wimbledon. I've been talking to a wall for like five minutes in utter joy. It hasn't bothered me at all that Hank wasn't here. I didn't even notice that he wasn't here. He just texted me that his power went out. So...

This whole experience, being with 30,000 Wimbledon fans, being at England's National Stadium, Wembley, knowing that I'm helping produce a documentary about this magical day, it all just felt so right. And you know how rarely – you know, listening out there, how rarely in life things just feel right, right?

Like things just feel like everything went the way that you hoped it would go. And that was one day where everything went the way I hoped it would go. And I was with people I love. I was in community. I was fighting the terrible disease of loneliness, as Kurt Vonnegut called it. And it was just magical. I don't care whether you like football or whether you like –

competitive jigsaw puzzling or whether you don't like competition at all. I just want there to be something that you can love with other people. A third thing that isn't you or them, but is something that you can love together, whether it's poetry or the Sunday New York Times crossword puzzle or birding or whatever it is. I just want there to be something like that in your life. For me, it's AFC Wimbledon. For you, it can be whatever you need it to be. But that's what it is for me.

All right. That's all I wanted to say. Now I'm going to wait for Hank to come back. I'm going to call Hank. Hello. I want you to know that I didn't even know you were gone for several minutes. I was just saying that to Catherine. I bet he doesn't even know I'm gone.

Is the power still out? Yeah. Oh no. It's out in the house. It's out in the neighborhood. I don't know. It's like, it's a weird time for it to happen. Cause it's not like there's anything wrong. Like it's. Is there any way we can, is there any way we can keep what we've already recorded? Because it was magic.

Was it magic? Is that what you think? Yes, because I was talking the whole time. Yeah, I assume. I mean, look, my side isn't important. What did I do that whole 15 minutes? You set me up repeatedly in very nice ways, and you made a good joke about Mars. Yeah, I made a good joke about Mars.

We just teleported. I'm wearing different clothes and John's in a different place. Three days later, because my power went out at my house for a full hour. Yes. And it was never truly explained to me why this happened, but they did say that this is a thing and they were aware of the outage and then there were trucks driving around and I assume a squirrel died.

Yeah.

They do also get demoted about once a decade. They do seem to be related because we're kind of a League 1 team and kind of a League 2 team. Oh, yeah. Hopefully – But now you got that League 2 stadium or is League 2 the lower one? League 2 is the bad one. You got that League 1 stadium. You got that League 1 stadium. So hopefully we can stay up this time around. Hopefully no catastrophes like COVID, et cetera. I mean not primarily for –

footballing reasons, but also that. There could be better reasons. I have to tell you, for those of you watching me on Patreon, my hair looks grayer than ever, but I think it's just because my shirt is gray.

I don't know, man. I was just thinking I'd like a little gray. It's just, it's... Oh, I refuse to indulge that. We're going to answer questions from our listeners, beginning with this one from Emily, who writes, Hello, my name is Emily and I'm 27. I'm an atheist and I have a twin sister who's religious and we have a hard time talking peacefully about our different beliefs whenever they come up. In the past, we've gotten into huge fights over it. And right now we've agreed not to talk about it at all. But religion is extremely important to her and something she engages with daily. So if we never talk about it, I miss out on huge aspects of her life.

You always seem to talk about this respectfully and calmly. So I thought y'all might be the right source to turn to Emily. I feel very lucky that I don't ever feel like you think I'm doing a wrong thing. That's like imperiling my soul. Immortal soul. That's the issue is that if I thought Hank was imperiling his mortal soul and that like, Oh, is it mortal? Is my soul mortal or immortal? I don't know which one it is.

Because you don't believe in one. I'm pretty sure the self is an illusion. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So your soul would be immortal.

Um, I apologize if you, but I feel like I have heard the phrase mortal soul. I'm going to look it up at any rate. If, if I thought Hank was imperiling his immortal soul, I would obviously feel very different because I would feel like the most important thing in the world is of course, to get Hank to accept Jesus Christ as his Lord and savior, uh, and have a personal relationship with Jesus so that he can avoid an eternity of damnation. Like that would obviously be a very important priority for me. Now that's not my particular brand of Christianity. And so, uh,

I am not worried about Hank's immortal soul, nor am I particularly worried about my own. For me, thinking about that stuff is largely a thought experiment, and I don't see a ton of evidence for it in the Gospels. But anyway, that's aside from the point. The point is,

That it is hard to talk about this stuff respectfully if the stakes are extremely high. And there are no higher stakes than what happens to you for the rest of all time because you're only here for 100 years at the outside and the rest of all time is literally forever. Yeah, it does approach zero.

Um, that's some, there's some calculus there for you. Yeah. Like this, this part of your life, if this is the life that determines your eternity, then this part of your life is basically irrelevant. And all that matters is setting yourself up for eternity. That's one of the issues I have.

actually with the relentless focus on the immortal soul is that it renders this world a little bit irrelevant. And I don't think this world is irrelevant. I think this world is super important. And, and so that's one of the things that Hank and I share as beliefs. Yeah. I, yes, this world being super important. And, and also I, that's, that's really interesting. Cause like then this world is only sort of like a,

shaping the key to the right shape so that you can unlock. Right. Yeah. I mean, and I, you know, obviously we don't know the details of your situation, but it's always seemed to me like this is one of the big weaknesses in religion, which is why I like talking about it with John, because it's not part of it. You know, it makes the whole religious thing seem stronger to me when the whole idea isn't

Like, of course, you must believe this or else. Yeah. Which to me seems like a pretty easy thing. Like, it seems like the way you would construct it if you really wanted everyone to believe it as a human, if you were constructing it as people. It also seems like a threat, right? And my own...

religious experience is the opposite of a threat. It's a promise. It's an opportunity. It's a way into thinking about these big old questions around suffering and justice and thinking about them in the context that other people have thought about them in. Part of the reason Hank and I are somewhat insulated from these arguments is because we're able to see each other's perspective and really respect each other's perspective, but we're

That's because we've done a lot of work to make, to build that common ground, I guess. Right. And it can't be one of us doing the work. Right. It has to be both of us doing the work. Yeah, exactly. We have to be able to do that. And I, by the way, I think Hank is like dead wrong about his, the way that he thinks about human life. And I think Hank thinks that I'm dead wrong. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, we definitely at the root, like we do disagree. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. It just doesn't matter. I don't think that John thinks that because of my belief I'm living bad.

No, I don't. And I also don't think that he thinks that I'm – because of my belief or anyone else's lack of belief that if they live a good life, then that some technicality could result in eternal suffering. I'm sure people might not love calling that a technicality, but yeah. I like the idea of you getting up to heaven and saying to St. Peter, I mean, we can agree this was a technicality, right? Yeah.

Here's what's up. What if I accept Jesus into my heart right now? This just feels like some serious legalism, you know? It feels like the letter of the law, not the spirit of the law, St. Peter. And aren't we all about spirits up here?

It seems like you're really excluding a whole lot of people from this just because of where they got born. That seems like mean. Or when they got born. I mean, something like a small majority of people were born before the birth of Jesus, like of people who've lived so far. Is it really like, could it be the cutoff? Could it be like 50-50? It's very close to the cutoff. The year zero is very close to the cutoff so far. At some point, it will be the cutoff. That makes me think.

I don't know. Maybe there's something to it. Thanks on a journey of meaning.

Yeah, I mean, my own, I guess my own response to Christianity is really grounded in my particular faith tradition of Episcopalianism. And also in, you know, an inevitably somewhat personalized theology that just makes a lot more space for people who disagree with me than other religious traditions are able to make. And like, that's

Part of the reason I chose Episcopalianism. So like I, for me, I can't really separate all that stuff out. I'm a big fan. Do you get to choose? Do you just get to choose what part of religion of Christianity you're in?

Well, I mean, I guess two schools of thought about that. I mean, you know, we grew up Methodist, you and I, or Presbyterian, and now I'm Episcopalian, and I'm Episcopalian for reasons. And so I guess it's a choice I make. But it's a choice I make that's deeply influenced, of course, by circumstance, just as the choices everyone makes are deeply influenced by circumstance. Interesting. I think this is what a great conversation to be having on.

as we celebrate our second decade of Dear Hank and John. This is what the people want. Right. Oh, they do. No, people really want us to disagree about religion and they really want us to like disagree loudly about it. But the metaphor I always use is that if you're in a burning building and you hear a voice that says, leave the building, the building is on fire.

You have the debate about whether or not that voice came from God or came from someone. You have that debate later. Yeah. First, you have to get out of the building. And as a people, we are in the burning building. Hank and I agree that we are in the burning building. And also, we'll never not be.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's not like a metaphor for climate change or for the erosion of democracy or something. The burning building is like being a human and being unaware of how to handle that.

Yeah, and the fact that injustice has always been with us and always will be with us. So the building will always be on fire, and we will always be leaving it and trying to put out that fire. We will always be in that process one way or another. The metaphor is getting a little strained, but I think it's still holding up under the pressure. The building is always on fire. And yeah, and like I am –

you know, aware that we don't know where all the voices come from, like the voice that calls us to justice or the voice that calls us to greed or the voice that calls us to family and loyalty. Like what, like I, you know, I have, obviously I think that like we are cultural beings and evolved to be cultural. And, and so there's, so of course we've got, we've got all these voices yelling and it is hard. It's very hard. It's very hard to be a thinking person.

Yeah, I think that's part of making space for other people's beliefs is understanding that it's hard. Where it is hard to make space for people's beliefs is when they think that like your existence is invalid because of their beliefs.

And that's really hard. Or even less intense than that in the case of two sisters. I don't think that she thinks that her sister is invalid, but it may be that her sister is imperiling herself or that she isn't getting to live the full, beautiful existence that you get to live when you –

you know, are close to God at all. And yeah, well, I actually do think that you're missing out on that, but we can move on to the next. I know. I think you're missing out on stuff. You know, but like in a cute way. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Not in a, not in a way that I think imperils your enjoyment of being alive. I mean, I think it would be like really cool to like believe in a deity. Like that sounds intense. Yeah. And yeah. Uh,

And gratifying. And also, like, you know, it could be for some people very simplifying, but I think that that's the sort of dangerous direction. Yeah, it can be very simplifying and it can it can provide answers where you should be asking questions. And there are lots of there are lots of risks and dangers to embracing religious experience, for sure. We got another question.

Yeah, you want me to ask it? Yeah, sure. All right, it's from Miri, who writes, Dear John and Hank, Hi, my name is Miri, and I'm 10 years old. I love to listen to your podcast before bed. Miri, we are a hit podcast for teens. We are not a hit podcast for tweens. Oh, yeah. Also, hit podcasts aren't sleepy. You can't fall asleep to a hit podcast. Great, now we're a sleep podcast for tweens. This is a catastrophe. Yeah.

No, Miri, we're so lucky and grateful that you listened to our podcast. Thank you so much. Man, I'll tell you what, Miri is asleep already after that AFC Wimbledon intro. Miri will never know. Miri says, my question is, when we draw stars, why do we draw them as the five-pointed shape when in reality they are spherical balls of fire? Additionally, if the sun is

a bigger version of a star. Why do we not draw it as a five-pointed shape, but as a circle with straight rays? This is a great question. Almost never sneery, usually cheery, meery.

It's because we used to draw stars before we invented glasses and everything was very fuzzy. No, that's not true. No, that's not true. No, it's because I imagine that it's because the stars twinkle. And in creating the five-point star, we're trying to express some of the twinkling, some of the ways that they appear to be almost pointed in our vision of them.

Whereas when we draw the sun, which looks like a giant ball of fire in the sky, we draw it as a giant ball of fire. Now, I never have understood why we have those rays coming out of the sun. Not really, though. Because sometimes there's rays. Not like... Yeah, yeah. No...

Hank, respectfully, the sun has never – I've been alive for 47 years and I've spent too much time looking at the sun probably. The sun has never looked like a child's drawing of the sun ever. So for the – that's true. For the most part, what you've got when you're looking at the sun is something you cannot see.

So, like, you can look at the sun and, like, you basically can't see it. It's too bright to see. Now, there are circumstances when it's setting in particular when you can see the sun. Also, when there are wildfires, this is amazing. And so when there's a really bad wildfire, occasionally you can see the sun high in the sky, full sun in its form.

That perfectly round little dime in the sky vision, which has like a red thing through the brown smoke. As a Montanan, I've seen this a few times. And that is wild. And it doesn't really look like the sun to you. Because, of course, one thing about the sun is you can't look at it. Another thing about the sun, though, is that it's lighting up the atmosphere next to it.

And so there is this like fading out of brightness. And I think that those little like semi-circles are,

The consummate use are all sort of to kind of represent the fading out of the brightness next to the sun. Yeah. There's not usually like a sharp line right around the sun. There's like brightness next to it. Right. Okay. I still don't know exactly how that leads to little lines being drawn out of the sun. And then the lines I think are maybe representations of when you see like crepuscular rays. You know about crepuscular rays, right? Yeah.

I mean, it's one of my areas of expertise. You know about the crepuzzles? It's like when the sun shines through clouds, you can see it lighting up the water vapor in the air in like long straight lines.

Oh, yeah. Okay. All right. Well, I guess that's what it's expressing. So I guess we've answered. Which is like not that usual of a phenomenon, but it's not also, it is something that like if you were drawing the sun, maybe you would think about those. I also think that a lot of times we use weird shorthand and we, in our visual, in our visual language, and we don't know why, like why is a heart shape heart shaped? Like hearts are not heart shaped and never were. Yeah. Yeah. Heart shapes are super weird.

Heart shapes are weird. The five pointed star is weird. It's weird that sometimes when you draw an apple, you draw like a hashtag or something like inside the apple to give it the illusion of there's light shining on it or whatever. Like there's all kinds of ways that we do this. We do this with metaphors in books too. Like certain things are just metaphors for other things. And it's not really clear why. Like lambs are metaphors for innocence and calves are not, you know? Yeah.

Like anyone who's ever been around a baby sheep knows that it's not that fun. It's not that innocent. That's one of my areas of expertise, baby sheep.

You can actually watch a minute of physics. So about the stars. So about stars having points. You can watch a minute of physics video about this and it explains it very well. And it is basically that when you look at a point of light in the sky and relax your eyes, it actually does look like it has little lines coming off of it. And that's because of diffraction that happens as it is coming into your eye. And this also happens with telescopes and happens more with telescopes because they have things going on.

optical things going on. And so when you look at Hubble Space Telescope images or Webb Telescope images, you can see what's called diffraction spikes. Right. Those stars look almost like the five-pointed stars that people draw. Isn't that interesting? Yeah. And they have different numbers of points depending on the design of the telescope. This next question comes from Kirsten, who asks, Dear Hank and John, but mostly, John, have you tried Blackberry Dr. Pepper? My dad bought a case and I can't decide if it's good or not. The taste is...

is what I can only describe as Dr. Pepper and Blackberry Jelly gotten in a fist fight. I'm not sure if anybody won, though. Thoughts? Conflicted? Kirsten? I'm sure you have. I have tried it. As the world's foremost Dr. Pepper influencer, why didn't you make a video of this?

I probably should. I should make a video where I try all of the bad flavors of Dr. Pepper, the strawberry and cream. You're all set up to film really quickly now. You just pop it here in Zencaster and just drink away at all the Dr. Peppers and do it to your list. I would love that. I would watch the heck out of that. Is that how you make your videos? That's how I watch a lot of my videos. Not in Zencaster. I have a software that I don't have confidence that you can

function properly. You are correct to lack that confidence. And I think instead of making that video, I'm just going to live my life, if that's okay. I know that you have not realized this is an option. I know you haven't realized this is an option. You simply don't. But I think I'm going to go outside.

I'm going to get in the garden for a bit. Here's the thing about Blackberry Dr. Pepper, which is the same problem as Strawberries and Cream Dr. Pepper, which is the same problem as Cream Soda Dr. Pepper, which is the same problem as Raspberry Dr. Pepper. In 1889, Dr. Charles Alderton, who was a chemist, invented the world's perfect soda.

Right. This is also true, by the way, of Dr. Oreo, who they keep messing with his invention. It's not going well. I've seen the Brennan Lee Mulligan sketch where he loses his temper about different flavors of Oreo. It is the exact same phenomenon where you have a perfect product. The perfect product has been a bestseller for literally over a century. Everyone loves the product.

And yet you have a product design team that is tasked with designing new products. And the truth is, we don't need a new Dr. Pepper. We don't need Blackberry Dr. Pepper because Dr. Pepper already contains the exact right amount of Blackberry. It contains the exact right amount of strawberry. It contains the exact right amount of chocolate. It contains the exact right amount of root beer. It's perfect. It's perfect.

Here's the thing, John. This sounds ridiculous to me, but this is exactly how I feel about Coca-Cola. So I know you're being serious. I'm being serious. What do you mean? It sounds ridiculous to you. Because Dr. Pepper tastes very – it tastes so weird.

Yeah. It tastes weird because it was designed for the human palate and it has no real world analog. I need to talk to a flavor chemist. Because first of all, I almost – that was one of the things that I thought I might do with my career was – Flavor chemistry? And flavors. Yeah. And – Little did you know you got – you were going to get into a field that had already been perfected in the 1880s. Yeah. Well, I am curious about this because –

There isn't anything the Coca-Cola company can do that makes a better Coke than the one they made 100-something years ago. And I don't know what's going on because it must be psychological. It must be me. It can't be that they hit the best perfect flavor. No, they did.

No, they did, Hank. There were thousands of soda flavors in the 1880s, and four of them made it down to us because the best four did. The four perfect ones made it to us. We have so many more tools now. But we don't need them because we already made the perfect soda flavors. We've done it. I also really want to go back in time and taste soda.

a 1980s and a 1960s and a 1940s and a 1920s Coke. Yeah. I just, I want to know what it's like. I'm not sure that's the first thing I would do if I traveled back in time, but it would be on my list. That way I'm not going to mess anything up, you know? Yeah. I don't want to kill baby Hitler and try an early Coke. Yeah. I just, where do you draw the line though at the killing baby Hitler? You kill baby Stalin. You kill baby Paul pot.

Yeah. But then how many babies are you going to kill, John?

Five? Six? Here's the thing. You have to set a limit on the number of babies. No, we solved this problem back in 2007 with the evil baby orphanage. You don't kill the babies. You put them in an orphanage and you raise them up to be good people. We legitimately – here's some 10 years of Dear Hank and John stuff. We thought pretty hard about like writing –

a young adult or like a, like a middle grade book or like a series of comic books about the evil babies in the evil baby orphanage. It turns out it's hard. It's a good idea though. But there is like a, there's like a vlog brothers problem. It was like a nerd fight area problem where it takes something that is too serious and makes it too silly. Right. That is the issue. I think that someone else could do it, but we can't do it because we take things seriously.

Yeah. Yeah. It was like yesterday as we were recording this, Elon Musk and Donald Trump had a big fight. Yeah. Publicly because, of course, that's how they would do it. Right. And I tweeted like a funny tweet and then I was like, I need to make a video about this. And my first thought was I can make a video where I just like talk about people's funny tweets about this because there's like, of course, posters are posting. Yeah.

And this and the posters are like, yes, finally, an opportunity to post. And everybody will like my posts and everybody's running to the Internet to like enjoy the drama. Right. And I sit down to make this video and I'm like.

You know what? I like actually now that I'm sitting here, I realize that this isn't the deal. Like none of this like this is like indicative of a larger problem, which is that we have normalized corruption in America. Yep. That's the right video to make. Can I tell you my tweet that I was very proud of? Yeah. Mine just said, I wish both of them the worst. Mine was this is like this is like Kendrick versus Drake, except they're both Drake.

Oh, that was you? Well, okay. I came up with it and I was super proud of it. Yeah, I saw that tweet. And I tweeted it. And then somebody replied with a tweet that was five minutes older that wasn't quite as good as my tweet, but was the same joke.

And they were like, why did you steal this? And I was like, of course I didn't steal it. More than one person can have the same idea. There's just one other public feud that was recent. Exactly. And we all have thoughts about it. And there's an obvious joke. And the first thought that you have is, but neither of these guys are anything like Kendrick Lamar.

I was really proud of my joke. And then I was like, oh, I wasn't the first person with that joke. So I deleted it. But I delete almost all of my tweets. And I don't put them on Twitter. I put them on Blue Sky. So if you want to follow me, follow me on Blue Sky. Blackberry, Dr. Pepper sucks. Dr. Pepper rules.

Elon Musk drinks Blackberry Dr. Pepper. How about instead of focusing on that, we just focus on Elon Musk's Doge decisions will directly lead to the deaths of millions of human beings? It is weird to like that. Yes, this is the thing that like every video, every column about this should be. This isn't the thing.

And that's a really, like, I think that's actually a perfectly compelling frame that lots of people should be using. Yeah. I should probably show you my video for next week and have you rewrite it and make it a good YouTube video. I'll happily take a look. Okay.

This next question comes from Elizabeth who writes, Hey, John and Hank, I'm a junior at college. I recently transferred due to some mental health struggles. I'm having a hard time with the decision I made as it puts me behind in school. How do I become okay with the fact that I might not graduate in four years like I planned? How do I become okay with the feeling of being behind my peers? Thank you for everything you've unknowingly done for me, Elizabeth. Elizabeth, I have been in your shoes. Hank Green graduated from college in four years like the model student that he always was, but not me.

I had a mental health breakdown combined with whooping cough, a classic John Green combo. It's true. It's true. The family really came together to support him. And by the family, I mean everybody but me. I mean, who do you know who's more likely to have a concomitant mental health crisis and whooping cough? And whooping cough. Yeah. No, that sounds right. Yeah.

The wild thing about John is sometimes somebody will say, is John a bit of a hypochondriac? And I'll be like, yeah, but he also gets a lot of weird diseases. Yeah, no. It's like the time I went into the ER and I was like, I'm pretty sure I have meningitis. And they were like, listen, man, if you had meningitis, we'd know. And I'd be like, all right, well, you can test me. And they were like, dude, you have meningitis. And I was like, I know. Look, look, I know about all the diseases. Oh, God.

I told John at the very beginning when I was starting to have ulcerative colitis symptoms, I was like, I was like, I'm having this stuff. I'm going to see the doctor. They're going to give me a colonoscopy. And he said, man,

I hope you don't have ulcerative colitis, but that's what it sounds like. You just like anxiety yourself into an MD. I missed most of your cancer diagnosis because I was in Sierra Leone. But when dad picked us up and told us that you had an enlarged lymph node and where the enlarged lymph node was and that the doctors were concerned, I was like, of course the doctors are concerned. You might have Hodgkin lymphoma. Yeah, I mean...

It was funny. Like the doctors were all pretty sure what was going on the whole time and just wouldn't say it to me. But there were like moments when they, you know, they had to rule out more, more things.

you know, mostly more severe stuff. Right. That I could have had like melanoma that moved to my lymph nodes or something. But yeah, it's wild. There was a lot of, of like, it might not be cancer. I'm like, but are you sure it might not be cancer? Cause it seems like it just is. It feels like six weeks ago when I would go to the doctor, they didn't say it might not be cancer.

They just said like, they just assumed it wasn't cancer. And now you're like, now you're trying to tell me that it might not be cancer. That there's still a chance. That makes it feel like it's probably cancer, right? Yeah. It might not be. It definitely probably is. Anyway, what were we talking about? We're talking about this person, Elizabeth, having to take a semester off and

feeling like they're behind their peers. I mean, I totally get it. I felt the same way. It was weird to graduate late. It felt weird not graduating with my class. It felt weird standing in the audience and not wearing the robes and everything.

And so I get it. However, what you did was take care of yourself, which is the best thing that you can do. And you allowed yourself an opportunity to graduate from college eventually precisely because you were taking care of yourself. And so you did yourself a huge favor.

And it sounds like you're back at school, which is incredible, which is itself a huge achievement. And that's worth celebrating. So I would ask you to reframe it and frame it around what you've accomplished by taking care of yourself, taking that time off, making sure that you get the care that you need instead of what you haven't accomplished. Yeah.

You're not behind. You're on your timeline, right? That's right. And like all of the wins are wins. And so you like got to look at those wins.

And you're just like, I mean, this is so hard. I was just listening to, I was overhearing a conversation. I was in line for ice cream and I was overhearing a conversation about somebody who works at a coffee shop and she's a college student and she serves her peers. Like she serves her like people that she is like in classes with her. And she's like, it's, it's so weird for me to be like in this position. Like there's always going to be like these socially weird things and

And then we just have to like be ourselves and in the situations that we are in. Right. And in that way, it is weird because we are imagining it to be weird, not because it's actually weird. And that, yeah, you're just you're on you're on the schedule. It's just that your schedule isn't the same as the person next to you. Yeah. Lots of people are on different schedules. Oh, yeah. Most people are on different schedules. Yeah.

Yeah. And so you're on the schedule you're on. Which reminds me that today's podcast is actually brought to you by Elizabeth's schedule, the correct schedule. That's right. This podcast is also brought to you by John's headphones. John's headphones, he should just buy 80 pairs and have them in every room and in a pocket all the time. It's a good reference, but we haven't talked about it on the pod. Oh.

You're right, we didn't talk about it. So the pod was delayed by 15 minutes because I didn't have my headphones there. Now it makes sense. Nothing works like a joke that you explain after the fact. I'm glad you remembered that we didn't talk about that because we did, of course, talk about it. We just didn't talk about it while recording. Today's podcast is also brought to you by Hank's Mortal Soul. Hank's Mortal Soul.

It's temporary. It's going to die. And this podcast is also brought to you by crepuscular rays shining down on innocent baby lambs.

It's just a nice little scene for you to imagine. It's good. That's the kind of thing that's hard to monetize, but we're going to find a way. All right. We got to get this question from Kyla Hank, who writes, Dear John and Hank, I've listened to an older episode recently, number 302, and in it, John states that most reptiles do not have souls. Now, Kyla, I want to correct you. I stated, or at least I believe that all reptiles do not have souls. I like the idea that there's just a couple. Yeah.

You know, like somebody loved them enough that they ensouled them. Kyla says, if most reptiles do not have souls, which reptiles do have souls? Reptiles and souls. Kyla, by the way, I disagree with John heavily on this. They are cute little guys like everything else. I'm not saying they're not cute, Kyla. I'm saying that when you go to heaven, you don't have to like walk around snakes. So the reptiles that have souls are the ones that are like coolest to be around. So that just so that you can...

have them in heaven and it won't be bad you know when you put it that way it seems a little problematic but that's not what you said you said no reptiles have souls no i think i said most reptiles don't have souls and then didn't didn't complete the thought but i want to i want to amend it 100 episodes later and say no no reptiles no no no no you said most and you have to defend yourself which are the reptiles that have souls

Well, I've looked into the eyes of a tuatar, and I'll tell you, there's nothing there. That is a 165-year-old biochemical phenomenon and a biochemical phenomenon alone. Whereas, I don't know. I mean, when I look at a snake, I don't see much. Yeah, well, that's because they don't have eyes that look the same way. Hank's like, you know what that's because of? It's because nothing has a soul. It's because their eyes don't look like they're smart.

And if their eyes looked like they were smart, like they were owl eyes, if they like moved around and had like – especially if they had whites around them, that goes straight into human brainstem. Are turtles reptiles? Yes.

Yes, John. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've seen the occasional turtle with a soul. An old soul. Yeah. Like those Galapagos boys. Oh, I mean, tortoises definitely have souls, you know. I'm talking about water turtles, though. Water turtles, occasionally you'll see a water turtle with a soul. I think most tortoises have souls. But not snapping turtles. No, no, there's nothing there.

Nothing behind those eyes. But I feel like some of the milder turtles have souls. Here's what I think. I think that if you develop a deep relationship with a reptile, then you give that reptile a soul. Here's what I actually think. I think that we make each other people. We endow each other with personhood. Sure. Agreed. That is –

And ultimately, we may also endow each other with souls. I'm not interested in the question of where the soul comes from, but that implies that reptiles can have souls. Right. So here's what I'm hearing you say. There is only one soul and it is divided up.

uh, by human attention. And, uh, and then we, we, we put it up upon each other and upon, so you could even in soul, like an object that you have a deep connection to maybe. Yeah.

I have insold a few objects over the years. So we're just, we're doing magic, doing magic, insoling things. Hank's on a journey of meaning. He's getting close. That was close, Hank. Once you accept that you're doing magic, you're very close. Yeah. I mean, I'll tell you, like I have had to think about

When I was writing my MIT speech and also just like how weird this world is right now, I've been having to think a lot about like consciousness and, um,

where it comes from. A lot of people are, are, uh, have a real hard time imagining that like the phenomenon of there being a way that it is to be a thing cannot emerge from chemistry. And I just think they're wrong. Well, you think it can emerge from chemistry, but that like that's equally or even more beautiful. I do think it's really beautiful, um, that it emerged, um,

Just like I think that life is very beautiful that it emerged. I don't think either of those things are miraculous. And I don't think that the fact that it is beautiful is the reason to believe it. I just feel like that it is the correct situation. But boy, what a thing. Can we agree that it's an astonishment? I am astonished. Okay. I am astonished that life has...

Not just happened, but has continued to happen in sort of an unbroken chain for billions of years. Yeah. That's a really long time. Yeah. I think that that's probably – that's my pocket Fermi paradox solution is that it's just really hard to have stability for that long. Right. And you need stability for that long for intelligence to emerge. Yeah. I'm astonished that –

We are not looking at the universe, but we are the universe looking at itself. That astonishes me every time. That one gets me. It's really good. And that birds are also the universe being, doing. Yeah, the universe. This is great. This is a shirt. The universe farts. I mean, yes, that is correct. I don't know that that's a shirt, but it is correct. Correct.

That's the second line in my Bible. I don't know what the first one is. It's prettier than the second. But the second one is just nice to have. Yes. Just to keep everything in perspective. In the beginning was the universe, period. The universe farts, period. All right. It's time to get to the all-important news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon. And if you think we've already done the news from AFC Wimbledon, boy, are you wrong. Yeah.

What's the news from Mars this week, Hank? Oh, God. I don't know. The news from Mars has become such a bummer. It sucks, man. Well, you know, there is a great theologian who said politics touches everything, but politics isn't everything, not by a long shot. And lately I have been reminded of the part of that phrase that is politics touches everything because it really does. Yeah. Yeah.

And certainly politics touches Mars. I don't know. What do I do here? There's several pieces of Mars news. All right. You give me whatever you want.

So we've got our 2026 budget proposal in general. And this calls for a billion dollars for Mars exploration, which includes a NASA initiative called the Commercial Mars Payload Services Program, or CMPS. And that would have NASA give contracts to companies to build things like spacesuits and communication systems. Which companies? Your guess is as good as mine. Yeah.

It's all about making sure that this is a less nationalized system, which I'm not a big fan of. I think that it is good for NASA to be doing things on its own, though, of course, there are problems with that system as well. And there was also a thing called the Commercial Lunar Payload Services Program that NASA has run with several companies for moon exploration.

But at the same time, the overall $18.8 billion allocation for NASA would be 25% lower than last year, which is not great for NASA. A lot of the things that they are cutting are like the parts of NASA that study Earth, which I got to admit is a more important planet than Mars. Appreciate that shout out to Earth. It's a big – it's a good one.

And then also they are looking to cancel the space launch system rocket built by Boeing in favor of a new strategy led by other private companies. But we'll see how that goes now that everything between those two guys is drama. Mm hmm. Mm hmm.

I might start a new news in our second decade. I'm glad that 10 years ago we didn't do the news from global health because then it would have been a bummer on top of a bummer. But instead, we get to do the news from AFC Wimbledon, America's favorite, wait for it, third-tier English soccer team. We can claim that because Wrexham is now in the second tier. So yeah, America's favorite third-tier English soccer team is...

You're actually saying it is America's favorite. It probably is. You're probably right. I think it is. Entirely because of you. Well, it's a low bar to jump over and it's not entirely. I don't know. Why can't you make AFS Wimbledon like Wrexham? What's standing in your way? Literally hundreds of millions of dollars.

That's a lot. I thought that it would be, I thought that it would just be millions. No, Wrexham raised, I think their most recent raise is at a $465 million valuation, which is about 20 times bigger than AFC Wimbledon. Double gasp. I also can't believe AFC Wimbledon is worth that much. It's worth $25 million? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

I don't understand the world at all. If you'd invested what I wanted you to, your investment would be bigger. No, because it's fan-owned. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't get that money back. It never gets sold. No, 25% of AFC Wimbledon is owned by or potentially ownable by investors.

But it never gets – could it be sold? Yeah, you could sell it. You could sell it to another investor. Is there a way to make money off of that? No. Football teams don't make money. Football teams do not make money. That is actually the overarching theme of English football is – it's the old line about racehorses. You want to know how to make a million dollars in racehorses? Start out with $10 million. It's the Tommy Shrigley line turning that $100,000 into $16,000. Yeah.

Okay. Anyway, the news from AFC Wimbledon is really good. Obviously, we're in the third tier of English football. But also, in between when I recorded the first bit of the podcast and now, we've just re-signed our defender, Ryan Johnson, which is really good news for me because Joe Lewis came up to me at the after party. Our defender, Joe Lewis, who's signed for another year, put his arm around me and said, I need you to sign Jono. And I was like, Joe? Yeah.

I do not make those decisions. You think that I have that power? Pass along the message. And so Jono has been signed. Our vice captain has signed up for another two years of AFC Wimbledon magic. Uh, this is great news. Uh, it means that we've got a strong leader in the locker room, but also an amazing player on the pitch. Um,

And yeah, so that's the beginning of our summer transfer window excitement. And of course, there's plenty of money to go around.

No. Because you got all these extra games you got to play or something? No, no. You do get more money for being in League 1 than you get for being in League 2, but you don't get nearly enough more. So we did get a bunch of money because we made it through the playoffs. We played in front of 55,000 people at Wembley. Like all that meant that we were – we got more money. But we –

are going to have one of the lowest budgets in League One. There's no getting around it. So what you need is for people to go to the games. I need for people to go to the games because it's so much fun. Like the Nerdfighter Dons are the best. So you should hang out with them. It's really fun. But I also need people to sign up for the Dons Trust. And look, Hank, ultimately, and I say this with immense, immense love for AFC Wimbledon, I need people to donate to Partners in Health. Yeah.

like I always want to be careful not to be asking people to be part of like you know like if you're gonna if you're gonna do one thing for nerdfighteria make it not that

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Interesting, fascinating. But is this ticket sales like a big part of the budget? Huge part of it. Match day sales are a huge part of the budget. Sponsorships are an important part, which is why I'm so proud to sponsor the back of shorts. But also we got to go on some cup runs. We probably have to sell some players. We need things to go in our direction this year in order to stay up. That's just the truth. We need to win. We need to play like Chelsea or Liverpool once. Yeah.

Yeah. So we'll see. Is a cup run just like when you go to the pub? No, no. That's when you win your first round FA Cup game. And so in the second round, you get to play and then you get to play bigger teams. And then maybe eventually you play one game at Chelsea Stadium and make half your year's budget. Cup runs. Cup runs. Go on some cup runs. That's right. That's right.

All right. Just be good at sports. Just be good at sports. Do good on the sports stuff. Well, Hank, thank you for podding with me. Thanks to everybody for listening. We're glad to be back. We're going to be back more often. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I like recording this podcast, John. I do, too. It's one of my favorite things. It really does feel like some things were lining up against us. As Rosianna texted me when your power went out, I'm not superstitious, but I am a little stitious. Yeah.

Yeah. But we made it happen. Made it happen. We made it happen. It turned out good. Yeah. Thanks for everybody for listening. And thanks to everybody for being here for the religion episode. Dear Hank and John is edited by Chris and Kiko. We're mixed by Joseph Tuna-Medish. Our marketing specialist is

Brooke Shotwell. We are produced by Rosianna Hals-Rojas and Hannah West. Our executive producer is Seth Radley. Our editorial assistant is Deboki Chakrabarty. And the music that you're hearing now and at the beginning of the podcast is by the great Gunnarolla. And as we say in my hometown, don't forget to be awesome.