A Smarter Way to Make Big Life Changes & The Strange Rise of the House Cat

Why do leaves turn such spectacular colors every fall? It seems as if the green simply changes to red, orange or yellow — but that isn’t quite what happens. There is a lot more going on inside those leaves than you might imagine. Listen as I explain the fascinating process that creates the colors of autumn. https://www.weather.gov/dvn/climate_fall_colors When you want to make a big change — lose weight, save money, get ahead at work, break a habit — the usual advice is to buckle down and try harder. But there may be a much smarter and easier way. Research shows that where you are and who you surround yourself with can dramatically change what you do and who you become. Angela Duckworth joins me to explain why changing your situation can sometimes be far more effective than relying on willpower — and how to deliberately put yourself in places and around people that bring out your best. Angela is a psychologist and professor at the University of Pennsylvania. Her TED Talk is one of the most watched of all time, and her book Grit was a #1 New York Times bestseller. Her new book is Situated: Find the People and Places That Bring Out Your Best (https://amzn.to/4xvpE3g). Cats are strange pets when you think about it. They can be affectionate one minute and act as if you don't exist the next. Yet humans have welcomed hundreds of millions of them into our homes. So how did this unlikely relationship begin? It turns out cats had something humans desperately needed — and humans had something cats wanted just as badly. Rod Phillips reveals the remarkable history of how cats worked their way into human civilization and ultimately into our homes and hearts. Rod is a professor of history at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada, and author of Cats: A History (https://amzn.to/3SEKrCi). Why does food often taste so lousy on an airplane? You might blame the airline or whoever prepared your meal, but part of the problem is actually you. At 35,000 feet, something happens that can make perfectly good food taste surprisingly different. Listen and you may never judge airplane food quite the same way again. https://www.cntraveler.com/stories/2014-04-03/why-airline-food-tastes-so-bad PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS TREES. COM: Right now, ⁠https://Trees.com ⁠have great deals on planting essentials, up to half off on select plants. And listeners to our show get 20% OFF their purchase when using the promo code SYSK at checkout. MONARCH: Write your own money story with Monarch! Use promo code SYSK at ⁠⁠https://Monarch.com⁠⁠ to get your 1st year of Monarch Core half off at just $50 VINTED: Ready to clean out your closet and make some extra money? Download the Vinted app for free and start listing! With no seller fees, you keep every dollar you earn and for a limited time, enjoy free shipping in the US on Vinted. WAYFAIR: Ready to upgrade your home for way less? Head to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Wayfair.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ right now to shop all things home and get your space ready for less. QUINCE: Find your next Fall favorites at Quince! Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Quince.com/sysk⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. Now available in Canada, too! DELL: Built for those who want better. The Dell XPS, built for you! INDEED: Get a $75 Sponsored Job credit to help get your job the premium status it deserves at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Indeed.com/PODCAST⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Mike Carruthers?

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• 0:44Mike Carruthers?

  things that are surprisingly easy to miss on your own. And I found that once you actually see the numbers, you look at your money differently. If you've ever wondered, where exactly is all my money going? I think you'll find Monarch pretty eye opening. Write your own money story with Monarch. Use code SYSK at monarch.com to get your first year of Monarch Core half off at just $50. That's 50% off your first year at monarch.com with code SYSK.

• 1:22Mike Carruthers?

  Today on Something You Should Know, what really makes leaves change color in the fall? Then, want to make a big change in your life? There are ways to make succeeding a whole lot easier.

• 1:35Speaker 01

  Nobody can be accountable to their own goals personally at the same level as when you are accountable to your peers. We talk about peer pressure. I think there's such a thing as peer power, but only if we initiate that in our lives.

• 1:50Mike Carruthers?

  Also, why airplane food may taste bad, and you're the reason why. And cats. They can be aloof, mysterious, and act like they couldn't care less about us. And dogs may be the reason why.

• 2:03Speaker 02

  If there were no dogs, we would think of cats as the most highly domesticated animal there is. Compare them to, I don't know, birds, or cows, or goats. A cat couldn't be more domesticated. It's only when we compare them to dogs that they appear not to be.

• 2:17Mike Carruthers?

  All this today on Something You Should Know. There's probably no better endorsement for a company than this. I keep buying their stuff. That's exactly what's happening with me and Quince. It started with their clothes. I've bought sweaters, polos, pants, jeans, shoes, a belt. And Quince has become one of the first places I look when I need something new to wear. And my wife and son buy from Quince too, all the time. What keeps bringing us back is the quality and the price. Quince uses premium materials like 100% Mongolian cashmere, organic cotton, merino wool.

• 2:59Mike Carruthers?

  Their cashmere sweaters start at just $60. And with colder weather coming, they have down jackets and classic wool outerwear as well. Quince prices everything 50 to 80% less than similar brands by working directly with ethical factories and cutting out the middlemen. And it's not just clothes. They have bedding, bath, kitchen essentials, and furniture. We even have Quince pillows. So this isn't one of those endorsements where I try something once because they sent it to me. We shop at Quince, and I absolutely recommend you try it. Find your next fall favorites at Quince. Download the Quince app for app exclusive offers or go to quince.com.

• 3:41Mike Carruthers?

  Get free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada and the UK too. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, please let them know it was Something You Should Know. It's the best way to support our show.

• 3:58Speaker 03

  Something You Should Know. Fascinating intel. The world's top experts. And practical advice you can use in your life. Today, Something You Should Know with Mike Carruthers.

• 4:11Mike Carruthers?

  As the summer fades and we head into fall, the leaves, in many places, start to change color. But why do they change color? That's the topic we start with today. I'm Mike Carruthers. Welcome to Something You Should Know. We tend to think that leaves turn red and yellow because the weather gets cold. But trees are actually paying more attention to the shortening days. As summer ends and daylight decreases, trees stop producing chlorophyll, which is the substance responsible for green leaves. As the chlorophyll breaks down, other pigments, other colors in the leaves become visible.

• 4:52Mike Carruthers?

  So those yellows and oranges and reds weren't necessarily created in autumn. They were there all along, hiding underneath the green, all summer. Now, temperature does matter in determining how spectacular the colors will be. Warm sunny autumn days, followed by cool but not freezing nights, tend to produce brilliant colors. An early hard frost can actually spoil the show by causing leaves to wither and fall. You can sometimes see the effect of sunlight on a single tree. Leaves getting direct sun may turn red, while leaves on the shady side remain yellow. So autumn color isn't simply a sign that it's getting cold.

• 5:35Mike Carruthers?

  It's a tree shutting down its summer food making operation and getting ready for the winter. And that is something you should know.

• 5:47Mike Carruthers?

  If you want to change something about yourself, like lose weight, save money, exercise more, get ahead at work, the usual advice is to buckle down, use some willpower, and try harder. But what if trying harder isn't the best place to start? There's a lot of research showing that where you are, who you're with, and what's around you can have an enormous influence on what you actually do. In other words, instead of trying so hard to change yourself, you may be much better off changing your situation. You can make temptation easier to resist, good habits easier to follow, and even bring out a different side of your personality without relying so much on willpower.

• 6:33Mike Carruthers?

  That's especially interesting coming from Angela Duckworth because she is famous for studying grit, the power of passion and perseverance. But she has come to realize that grit alone isn't always enough. Angela is a psychologist and professor at the University of Pennsylvania. Her TED Talk is one of the most watched TED Talks of all time. And her book, Grit, was a number one New York Times bestseller. Her new book is Situated. Find the people and places that bring out your best. Hi Angela, welcome to Something You Should Know.

• 7:09Speaker 01

  Thank you for having me, Mike. I'm excited.

• 7:11Mike Carruthers?

  So first, explain this idea that changing your situation can change your life or change something about your life. Explain how this whole concept works.

• 7:23Speaker 01

  Well, Something You Should Know is that your situation, your objective, physical, and social circumstances are shaping everything you do. And you can shape the situation first. That one of the most, I guess, effective and efficient ways of changing yourself is to change who you're with and where you are.

• 7:46Mike Carruthers?

  So what would be an example of how those changes in your situation can change things in your life?

• 7:53Speaker 01

  If you are in a situation where temptation is near at hand, and I know many of us would say, well, that's not me. But I would ask you, where's your cellphone right now? For example. Then you are dramatically more likely to indulge in that temptation, perhaps to your later regret. If you don't want to eat something, put it far away. If you do want to eat it, put it close at hand. If you don't want to look at your phone, don't charge it in your bedroom, as the vast majority of Americans in my research with Gallup, like, apparently do. If you have no problem with your phone at night, then it doesn't matter. But, you know, those are just, in some ways, trivial examples of how your physical situation changes what you think about

• 8:36Speaker 01

  and then in turn, what you end up doing. But of course, there are people too. I think one of the things that is striking about the last 15 to 20 years of American culture is that we're spending less time with people. So our situations don't have people in them as much as they used to. And one of the big lessons of the achievement research that I've been doing and that of other scientists is that it is almost always easier to achieve a goal if you are striving toward that goal in the company of others who have the same goal.

• 9:11Mike Carruthers?

  But it would seem to matter a lot who the people are you surround yourself with. That, you know, some people can bring you up and encourage you to succeed, and other people can just pull you down.

• 9:25Speaker 01

  You know, every time I assign to my undergraduates or my MBA students here, I teach at Wharton and at the University of Pennsylvania. Anytime I assign a team project, I get an email from a student who worries about the team dragging them down and about, you know, the possibility that, like, at the end of the semester, they'll have done all the work. And in fact, twice the work that they would have had to do if it were just an individual project. And in fact, a lot of worry and a lot of research has been, oh, like, what if you have group think? What if you all end up having the same idea? What if you're, you know, what if you create slacking? But one of the striking findings from my research, and again, that of others, is that when you set a goal,

• 10:08Speaker 01

  and as you point out, you have a team of like-minded strivers, right? And you tell each other, for example, like, this is the goal I'm trying to achieve. Like, I would like to go to the gym Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. What's your goal? The person that you tell that to is your accountability partner. They might in turn share their goal, and it might be a totally different goal. Like, I would like to stop procrastinating on these applications for a fellowship. But what research shows is that both of you are more likely to achieve that goal just for having told the other person. So when we think about being our best, I do think we should be thinking about being our best in the company of and because of other people.

• 10:50Mike Carruthers?

  So I've certainly heard, I think everybody's heard that concept of, you know, if you don't want to overeat junk food, well done, don't bring junk food into your house. If it isn't there, you cannot eat it. I mean, and that's essentially, at a very low level, what you're talking about, yes?

• 11:07Speaker 01

  It is. And what my research shows, I surveyed hundreds of Americans, asking them really almost exactly that question, Mike, like, you know, would you like to eat less junk food? Unanimously, yes. Like, we asked them, what do you think people should do? And they said, oh, they should not bring junk food in the house. If you're going to have it in the house, put it on a high shelf, try to buy things in smaller packages, try not to buy junk food at all. So these are all situational solutions. Then we asked them, same people, same Americans, what do you do? Well, I use willpower, right? So I think we know at some abstract level, or some intellectual level, that the best way

• 11:46Speaker 01

  to change ourselves is to change our situation first. And yet, so many of us wait around until the heat of the moment, and then say, yeah, but I won't eat that, I won't scroll on that, I won't do that. And that, to me, is a big mistake.

• 12:03Mike Carruthers?

  I certainly understand that and empathize with those people, because it's one thing to sit at home and say, you know, write down, I'm gonna stop eating junk food, and this is my big goal. But then you're at the grocery store, and you're really hungry, and you see those Twinkies, and, you know, it's a moment of weakness that basically sabotages your goal.

• 12:25Speaker 01

  Well, a lot of people are watching The Odyssey. So let me just use King Odysseus as an example here. You know, there's a chapter in The Journey Home, where King Odysseus is trying to, you know, make it home on a journey, he's been away for 10 years. And he is visited by the goddess Circe. And Circe says, you know, you're going to encounter temptation on the way home. So if you're with me, like, this is analogous, maybe a little less, you know, mundane than like, being at the grocery store and faced with temptation. But the goddess Circe says, you're going to be faced with temptation. In fact, you're going to be on this journey home, and you're going to want to stop on these islands, where these beautiful sirens are going to sing a song that's so beautiful, you know,

• 13:10Speaker 01

  you can't actually stop listening to it. And then you're going to essentially be marooned there, and you're never going to get home. And this, in effect, is what we confront when we have temptations, whether it's Twinkies at the grocery store, or, you know, that next video that you regret watching, you know, long past your bedtime. We think we are strong enough. Odysseus thought he was strong enough. And Circe said, believe you me, you're not strong enough. You need a physical restraint, you need a physical situational solution to resisting temptation. And that is what Odysseus does. He binds himself to the mast with rope, and, you know, he sails past temptation. So I think what we need

• 13:49Speaker 01

  to do, in modern, real life, is to have situational fixes, to not say, you know what, I'm gonna buy this jumbo pack of Twinkies, but I know that I'm only gonna eat them, you know, very rarely, and at the appropriate times. We think we're going to be strong, but in fact, in the future, we are going to be weak. So binding yourself to the mast is essentially not buying the Twinkies, or buying one, so that you are not tempted to have, you know, a whole pallet of them, when you are weak, as you will be in the future.

• 14:23Mike Carruthers?

  So talk about the degrees of resisting temptation, which you just mentioned. Some people will say, don't bring it into the house. Others will say, we'll put it on a high shelf. But if you know it's on a high shelf, you know right where it is when temptation strikes. So do those little degrees help, or just don't bring it in the house?

• 14:44Speaker 01

  I think friction helps anyone, right? And more friction is better. So for some people, they're like, I could reach the high shelf, or even if that requires, they need more friction. In fact, I think some dieters would say, they can't bring it in the house. And some dieters, honestly, I know this is controversial, will say, that's not enough, they need a GLP-1. And I'm gonna, you know, claim here, and you don't have to agree with me, that taking a GLP-1 is a way of changing your situation. Your situation used to have ultra-processed food. Now, the world still has ultra-processed food, that continues to be manufactured. But now you're taking a GLP-1, and, you know, that changes your

• 15:27Speaker 01

  behavior. So in some ways, that's a, you know, a very radical way of changing your situation. But anything that's not relying on changing your thoughts, or changing your behavior directly, to me, is a situational strategy.

• 15:39Mike Carruthers?

  I want to hear how else, and where else in life, we can use this strategy. And we'll do that in just a moment. A big thank you to today's sponsor, Vinted. I think most of us have what I call "someday clothes." I'll wear that someday. That'll fit better someday. Someday, I'll have a place to wear that. Meanwhile, it's been hanging in the closet for three years. Vinted offers another possibility: sell it. Every day, people can sell clothes they're no longer wearing, and make some extra money. And they've made the process pretty painless. Take what you don't wear, list it on Vinted. Listing is quick and simple. And when an item sells,

• 16:23Mike Carruthers?

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• 17:01Speaker 04

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• 17:31Mike Carruthers?

  We're talking about how making changes to your situation, and the people in your life, can change your life. And my guest is Angela Duckworth. She's author of the book Situated: Find the People and Places That Bring Out Your Best. And Angela, we were talking about how you can make changes that make it easier to not eat junk food, which I think illustrates the point really well. But where else in life can we use this? And how does it work?

• 18:00Speaker 01

  Well, I mentioned relying on peers. And I remember reading a paper recently, that was just, you know, these striking line graphs of how often people are turning away from groups, and turning just to, I guess, themselves. You know, we exercise alone, we entertain ourselves alone, many of us are eating alone, many of us are working at home alone. And when I say use peer power, what I mean is to resist that trend, and to say, you know what, I want to run a marathon, I'm gonna join a running club. I want to go to the gym more, I'm gonna have a workout buddy. I'm trying to write a book, I'm gonna join a group of struggling writers, so we can meet. If you are an alcoholic, and trying

• 18:44Speaker 01

  not to be an alcoholic, the single most effective way to beat your addiction, according to research, is to join Alcoholics Anonymous, to do what you could try to do on your own, DIY, which by the way, is 50 times more common in the English language than it was when it was introduced about 50 years ago. Instead of doing it DIY, I'm gonna use peer power, I'm going to intentionally join a group of people who have a similar goal, even if those goals are individual goals. I think that's one of the most important things for young people to hear, because when you look at these trend lines, they are most steep

• 19:25Speaker 01

  for young people, for teenagers and young adults. So whatever you're trying to do, that hard thing, make it easier by being part of a group that is also trying to achieve a goal like yours.

• 19:38Mike Carruthers?

  Well, I find it really interesting what you said a moment ago, that just telling somebody you're going to do something has an effect.

• 19:45Speaker 01

  You know, there is this football team that I studied as part of researching this book. They are the De La Salle Spartans. And they have taken this to a high level. And I think it is something everyone should know, which is that writing down your goals, which if you're on the De La Salle Spartans, every week, you write down your week's goals. They have game goals, and, you know, conditioning goals, and practice goals, if you are a football player on the De La Salle Spartans. But they don't stop there. And by the way, research shows that making a physical note of your goals, okay, that helps. But they swap goals with each other. They call them commitment cards. And the person with whom you swap

• 20:24Speaker 01

  cards is your commitment card partner for the week. Now, does this work? There's not a control group, but I will tell you this. The De La Salle Spartans are the winningest football team in history. 151 consecutive wins without losses over a 12-year period. They continue to be one of the winningest football teams in America. And when you ask the coaches, in particular, the coach under whom this streak happened, and who created the commitment card tradition, he will say that nobody can be accountable to their own goals personally, at the same level as when you are accountable to your peers. So again,

• 21:06Speaker 01

  you know, we talk about peer pressure. I think there's such a thing as peer power, but only if we initiate that in our lives.

• 21:13Mike Carruthers?

  There are situations, though, that are difficult to change. If you're in a marriage, or you have children that are problematic, you can't trade them in and get other children. So what about in situations that are a little more structured, and just not possible to get out of?

• 21:32Speaker 01

  You know, I want to agree with you, you know, undeniably that there are aspects of your situation, whoever you are and whatever your privilege, right? There are aspects of your situation that you cannot change, that you have no agency to change. But if you would just make another list, and maybe it is shorter, but I don't think it's empty, of the things that you can change. I mean, even relationships, maybe you're not able to change your family of origin, but you can create relationships with, for example, mentors. One of the common denominators of high achievers in my research is that they are proactive about asking other people they don't yet know for advice.

• 22:15Speaker 01

  They are proactive about working on projects with mentors that put them in the same orbit for weeks or months. And finally, they, they very intentionally cultivate mentors for life, you know, mentors who really change, you know, everything about your situation because they are always looking out for you.

• 22:35Mike Carruthers?

  But finding a mentor, I, I think that's difficult for a lot of people.

• 22:40Speaker 01

  Well, let me get more tactical because I think looking and, you know, just hoping a mentor will appear on the horizon is not great advice. But just to take Oprah Winfrey as an example, she is a mentor magnet without parallel and has had many influential mentors. And one of them is Maya Angelou, you know, the great author and activist. And before Oprah Winfrey was as famous as she is now, she was a no name journalist from Baltimore who begged and begged Maya Angelou for an interview. And Maya Angelou eventually submitted, you know, essentially because Oprah was so gritty. It was only five minutes. She only asked for five minutes of conversation and advice and she was prepared.

• 23:25Speaker 01

  She listened. At the end of the five minutes, she said, "Thank you, Dr. Angelou, and goodbye." And Dr. Angelou looked at her watch and then looked up at Oprah and said, "Who are you, girl?" And that was the beginning of a friendship and, and a mentoring relationship that, that may change, I think you could argue changed both of these women's lives. So don't just keep looking on the horizon to see who shows up. Send an email or a letter to someone whom you would like to meet and ask them for five minutes of conversation and advice. It's pretty hard to say no to an email like that.

• 24:00Mike Carruthers?

  Well, you mentioned the word a moment ago, and so you opened the door, but talk about grit. I know you, you wrote a great, a great book about it some years ago, but how that works into this?

• 24:12Speaker 01

  When, when I talk about grit, I talk about somebody who has passion and perseverance for long-term goals. And, and I, I think there's a lot to say about that. There's a lot to say about their mindsets, you know, the, the beliefs that gritty people carry with them that give them positive, optimistic thoughts. I'm going to tell you something I think people should know, which is that there are four positive, optimistic thoughts that drive passion and perseverance for long-term goals. First, this is interesting. Second, this is important. Third, I can do this. Four, I know what to try next. And for much of my career, that occupied me.

• 24:54Speaker 01

  I thought, wow, imagine what people could do if they woke up in the morning and they had these four positive, optimistic thoughts that would lead them to, to strive and to not give up. And in the last half of my career, I've just been asking myself, do those four positive, optimistic thoughts only come from the inside? Or for example, this thought, I know I can do this. Does it partly come from a mentor looking you in the eyes and putting their hands on your shoulders and saying, "Mike, you can do this." And I've come to believe through my research that that's exactly right, that our situation inspires certain thoughts and not others. And those thoughts, of course, motivate our behavior.

• 25:39Speaker 01

  So if you are trying to look for the chain reaction in your own life, if you want to be better than you are, then of course you're going to have to think differently than you think now. But if you go all the way back to where those thoughts originate, you realize that your situation, your, your physical and social circumstances, that's where to begin. I think the mistake is to say, "Well, I'm just going to try harder." That's waiting, you know, to the last moment. And I, I don't know that it's especially wise to just say like, "I'm just going to force myself to think more positively," because how long will that last? But put yourself in a great group of peers, get yourself a mentor, set up your personal space, decorate your personal space with quotes that continue to, you know, give yourself

• 26:22Speaker 01

  the sort of self-talk you want and let your situation do the work.

• 26:26Mike Carruthers?

  So you've given people a lot to think about. Wrap this all up for me and, and some parting words of advice.

• 26:33Speaker 01

  I think the way to change yourself is to change your situation first. Human beings are incredibly sensitive to the people and the places around them. And if you can notice where you are at your best and put yourself in those situations, then you will be making, doing hard things. And of course, that is the road to excellence effort. You will be making hard things easier.

• 27:03Mike Carruthers?

  Well, when you have a way to make hard things easier, I, how do you, how do you argue with that? I've been talking with Angela Duckworth. She is a psychologist and professor at the University of Pennsylvania. She has a TED Talk, which is one of the most watched TED Talks of all time. The name of her book is Situated: Find the People and Places That Bring Out Your Best. And there's a link to that book in the show notes. And Angela, thank you for coming on and talking about this.

• 27:32Speaker 01

  Thank you, Mike. I have loved this conversation and I look forward to the next one.

• 27:36Speaker 04

  New and exclusive holiday decor just launched online at The Home Depot. Check out the viral Grand Duchess collection with smart holiday lights you can control from your phone. Easily customize the twinkle across trees, wreaths, and garlands to match your holiday vibe. Create stunning light effects, then switch it up with the tap of your fingers. Even the man in red will be impressed. Shop the holiday decor you want, online only, at HomeDepot.com.

• 28:09Speaker 05

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• 28:40Mike Carruthers?

  Cats are a little strange when you think about them. Dogs have been bred for thousands of years to work with us, protect us, and follow our commands. Cats, eh, not so much. And yet today, tens of millions of American households have pet cats. So how did an independent little predator that often seems perfectly capable of living without us become one of the world's most popular pets? The answer goes back thousands of years when cats discovered that hanging around humans offered some very practical advantages. And humans discovered that cats possessed a skill they so badly needed.

• 29:23Mike Carruthers?

  From there, a remarkably unusual relationship developed. We fed them, we welcomed them into our homes, and eventually treated them like members of the family, while cats somehow managed to remain very much cats. Here to explain how this happened and what the long history of cats reveals about these mysterious animals is Rod Phillips. He's a professor of history at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada, and author of the book, Cats: A History. Hey, Rod, welcome to Something You Should Know.

• 29:55Speaker 02

  Thanks, Mike. I'm very happy to be here.

• 29:57Mike Carruthers?

  So if an alien came down from outer space and said, "Okay, I understand you human people, but explain these cats." What, what's a cat and what is it? How would you explain that? What is a cat?

• 30:11Speaker 02

  A cat is, it's a small mammal. It's pretty harmless. And cats have been around humans for maybe 10, 12,000 years in various capacities. But for, for most of the time, they were useful for dealing with rodents particularly, but vermin in general, and protecting humans' grain supplies and other food supplies from, from rodents like rats and mice. That's the essence of their presence in, in human society.

• 30:44Mike Carruthers?

  Has that always been their essence? Has, have they always served as pets? I mean, they must have been wild at some point and somebody said, "Hey, let's let the cat into the house." So then they became pets?

• 30:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's, it's a complicated and a long story. But, you know, to go back to the beginning, cats evolved from wild cats. So wild cat is a, is one word, not just a wild cat. It's a wild cat. And wild cats are indigenous to many parts of the world, particularly in Europe and Asia and Africa. And the, the first real contact between humans and wild cats came in the Middle East, probably somewhere around Iran and Iraq. When humans began to settle down, they stopped being hunters and gatherers. They settled into sort of fixed communities and they began to practice what we now call agriculture. So agriculture meant cultivating certain, certain crops, particularly cereals and grains,

• 31:42Speaker 02

  also vines to make wine, grains to make beer, and so on. And as they, as they did that, they began to store grain for future harvests and also to keep themselves alive for, for the following year. So they began to store grain in, often in underground pits that were just sort of covered with whatever they had. And these, these pits, of course, attracted rodents. So rats and mice came to feed on the grain. And then we have these wild cats that are living out in the wild. And they were drawn to human communities because human communities now had these rats and mice. And these were, you know, natural prey for, for the wild cats.

• 32:25Speaker 02

  Now, this is the first contact that we know, and we can see this in excavations where we have the remains of human settlements, along with the remains of wild cats and also evidence of grain supplies. So that's how we have evidence of this. And then, over time, over thousands of years, wild cats evolved into cats. Now, cats are basically the same as wild cats. They look like wild cats. If you look at a picture of a wild cat, I've never actually seen one in the flesh or in the fur. If you look at a wild cat, it looks much like a tabby cat. But it's bigger. It's a few pounds heavier. Not that much bigger, I should say.

• 33:10Speaker 02

  It's just a few inches bigger. But they're essentially the same as the wild cat, but cats have smaller brains. They have different digestive systems. And above all, they behave a bit differently. So as cats were among humans, they became kind of more used to being among humans. They were no longer hostile and aggressive towards humans, as wild cats can be.

• 33:36Mike Carruthers?

  Yeah, I was gonna ask you. Were wild cats, or are wild cats, dangerous?

• 33:42Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, they are. Well, you know, they're like a lot of animals. They would rather not be near humans. And so, wild cats in the wild these days, if they see humans, they just move away. If they get confronted, if they have nowhere to go, they can be quite aggressive. And they'll be quite dangerous as well. I mean, they're not big cats like lions and tigers, you know, but they're pretty dangerous. So cats, you know, changed that behavior. They became more friendly towards humans. Until, you know, over time, over thousands of years, they became sort of used to humans being around them. And, you know, we don't know whether they let humans touch them, or pick them up, or anything like that. But they certainly became much more

• 34:26Speaker 02

  used to having humans around them, and humans became used to having cats around them.

• 34:31Mike Carruthers?

  So their original purpose was really to catch mice and rats, but at some point, they became pets?

• 34:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's a very long process. I mean, over time, you can see that the prime purpose of having a cat around was to feed on rodents. Was to deal with rodents. I mean, bear in mind that, you know, this is beneficial to the cats and to humans, because, you know, the cats got food, and the humans were, you know, had vermin and rodents and so on removed from their food supplies and their houses. So it was beneficial. But there was no sense that humans thought that cats should be domesticated in any way, that they should form relationships with cats. They were just convenient to have around. They would come in, they'd go out. They'd feed themselves. They didn't need to be looked after.

• 35:26Speaker 02

  And, you know, one of the things that is interesting is that around the same time, people began to have dogs. Now, dogs and cats are often seen as mutual enemies, and probably they are in some respects. But people forged different relationships with dogs. They brought them into their homes. They began to train them. They began to breed them. You know, they trained dogs to guard houses, to herd animals, to pull sleds, you know, all kinds of things. Whereas cats were never trained to do anything. You know, what they were valued for, which was catching mice and rats, they just did because that's what they did. And so, you know, over time, you can see that, you know, people had cats around them.

• 36:11Speaker 02

  They had dogs, often in their houses. But they began to treat them quite differently. And, you know, while they forged relationships with dogs, they didn't see any need to with cats. So cats were, you know, kind of on the fringes of things. Dogs were quite central to humans. Cats were on the fringes. And it's their sort of fringe status they were thought of as, you know, more outsiders. And you see a lot of commentary saying, "Well, you know, dogs belong in human society, but cats don't." And so, they're there, they're present, but they're outsiders at the same time. And that's really important for for some of the attitudes that developed about cats later on.

• 36:53Mike Carruthers?

  Yeah, well, you know, there's two types of people in the world, right? There's dog people and cat people. And, you know, they all have their... They both have their own reasons for liking their particular favorite pet, but there are very different reasons.

• 37:08Speaker 02

  They are. And, I mean, I think if we asked people, you know, a few hundred years ago, a thousand years ago, if they were dog people or cat people, it wouldn't even be a question. But everyone was a dog person, and you'd say, "Why would I be a cat person?" Because, you know, cats just didn't figure in people's daily lives. I mean, they were there, but they were kind of overlooked. They were just under the radar. And it's true, you know, that you find very, very few references to cats in archives, for example, whereas, you know, dogs figure quite prominently.

• 37:42Mike Carruthers?

  Well, but I think it's partly, or mostly, because dogs seem to reciprocate or react to human contact, whereas cats couldn't care less.

• 37:54Speaker 02

  Yeah, there's that. I mean, we often think of dogs as domesticated animals, and cats as really not domesticated, or only half-domesticated. And we use dogs as a kind of model to judge cats against. So we can say a dog is a very domesticated animal. It's a person-friendly animal. You know, you can train a dog. A dog will always come when you call it. You know, when you come home, the dog will come to the door. But a cat, well, hard to train. You know, we all know about herding cats. Cats are hard to train. They tend to be aloof. You come to the door, there's no cat. So, you know, they're quite different. And so, you know, people think of cats as being aloof and selfish and deceptive

• 38:38Speaker 02

  and many other things. But when they do that, they're comparing them to dogs. And I often think that if there were no dogs, we'd think about cats very, very differently. Because if we just had, if there were no dogs, and we had cats in our houses, we would cats think of cats as the most highly domesticated animal there is. Compare them to, I don't know, birds, or cows, or goats, or anything like that. A cat couldn't be more domesticated. But it's only when we compare them to dogs that they appear not to be.

• 39:08Mike Carruthers?

  But if cats did not have the inclination, ability, and desire to catch mice and rats,

• 39:18Mike Carruthers?

  they probably wouldn't even be... We wouldn't be having this discussion. I mean, that's why they showed up. That's why they're part of our society and part of people's lives, because of that ability and skill.

• 39:32Speaker 02

  Absolutely. You're absolutely right. I mean, I've never thought of it in those terms, but you're absolutely right. If cats had not come to human settlements to hunt and kill and eat the rats and the mice that were feeding on human grain supplies, no, I mean, they would have remained wild cats. They would have remained in the wild, like, you know, like a lot of animals, a lot of other animals. And we would never, they would never evolve into cats. So you're right. It's, this is the key thing about them that brought them into human society. But, you know, they're just wired differently from dogs. They don't have the same kind of, you know, what we call the affiliative characteristics of dogs.

• 40:14Speaker 02

  They're just not as willing to deal with humans as dogs are. They don't have, you know, we think of dogs as loyal, because we like to, you know, impose these human qualities onto animals. So we think of dogs as loyal and friendly and, you know, our best friend. And for cats, we don't. And so, you know, there they are, just always present, always useful, but not loved and tolerated more than liked, I think.

• 40:47Mike Carruthers?

  So when you say cats evolved into house cats,

• 40:53Mike Carruthers?

  did they evolve, or were they bred?

• 40:56Speaker 02

  No, they evolved. There's no evidence that people bred cats until, you know, maybe 200, 300 years ago, when particular breeds like Siamese, Burmese, Angoras, and Russian Blues, and so on. You know, there are now dozens of, you know, what are called purebred cats or recognized breeds of cats. You know, and they developed independently. By the 19th century, yes, people were breeding them. They were looking for stock, and they were breeding the stock and so on for shows and for commercial purposes. But for the most part, for, you know, for tens of thousands, for thousands of years, cats just bred themselves. They weren't bred by humans.

• 41:41Speaker 02

  Unlike, again, unlike dogs in this respect. So, you know, we get, you know, the hunting dogs, the herding dogs, the working dogs of all kinds. And, you know, they're bred into many, many different varieties. I mean, most cats look like cats. Doesn't matter whether they're Angoras, or Siamese, or your household tabby. They all look more or less the same. Whereas you think of dogs, you think of, well, you know, Malamutes, and Spaniels, and Chihuahuas, and Greyhounds. I mean, there is a huge variety of dogs, which there really isn't of cats.

• 42:15Mike Carruthers?

  But cats are related to big feline things like lions and tigers, right?

• 42:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, they're all part of the the cat family. You know, but there are many, many species within the within the family and then subspecies as well. So, you know, the the wild cats are a species of the of the family of of cats. And then cats cats evolved from them over over thousands of years. As I said, they're, you know, a little bit smaller. But and what's more important is that they behave differently. They've they've they've learned to behave differently towards humans than than the big cats. But the the interesting thing is that all the cats in the world, you know, whether I don't know if you have a cat, but I mean, you know, your cat, people's cats, your neighbor's

• 43:04Speaker 02

  cats, cats in Japan, or or Russia, or France, or anywhere in the States, in Canada, all these cats have exactly the same DNA as the wild cat in the Middle East. So these are still the wild cat of the Middle East, but they've that they've they've modified their behavior and they look slightly different. It's quite a quite an astonishing thing to to to realize. This is only in the last 20 years that that scientists have found that that they share this DNA.

• 43:36Mike Carruthers?

  So in my neighborhood, we have at least one, probably more, bobcats that wander around and you see them every once in a while. And we see them on our Ring camera and what they look so much like a house cat, but bigger.

• 43:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, again, another another species of of the cat family. But but interestingly, you know, no other, no other species of the cat family, so not bobcats, not ocelots, or, you know, any others, have actually been taken in by humans. And, you know, what what we think of as being domesticated by by humans. I mean, there are, you know, many other species of small cats. I mean, obviously, you don't want to, you don't want a lion or a panther in your living room, but there are many, you know, other other kinds of small cats, not quite as small as cats, but things like bobcats and so on, that that you you could think might have been domesticated, but but they weren't.

• 44:36Speaker 02

  And we don't know quite why. We don't know if wild cats were kind of had a tendency to be less hostile to humans. You know, you can, you can look at these animals in in zoos or in in places where they're penned, but they you can't, you don't know what they're like in the wild. And they, we know that, you know, certain, certain animals like ocelots, for example, are pretty friendly to their keepers. You know, they'll rub up against their legs and roll over. But but in the wild, probably not. So, yeah, this is the, this is the only species of of the of the cat family that we've domesticated. But they often behave the same. I mean, if you, if you know cats, you know that they love boxes.

• 45:19Speaker 02

  They'll jump into a box if you leave an open box, they love jumping into them. And there's a great video of of of a zoo. The keepers put a huge appliance box into the into the pen of a lion, and it does exactly as a cat does. It walks up to it, it sniffs it, and then jumps into it. Of course, it destroys the box. But, you know, I mean, there are so many similarities between cats and and their big siblings.

• 45:48Mike Carruthers?

  You said, you know, as everyone knows, you dogs come into your house and you can train it to sit and, you know, guard the house and whatever. But cats can be trained. We've seen trained cats in shows and things, so it's not like they can't be trained, but they seldom are.

• 46:04Speaker 02

  No, cats, cats can be trained. And they can be certainly be trained much more than people than people train them. I think for the most part, people don't want to train cats. I mean, they they take cats on, you know, knowing that they're going to be untrained. I mean, you can train a cat to use a litter box, not to scratch furniture, you know, to to come for food and that kind of, I mean, not to jump on the kitchen counters, you can train them. But most people don't go any further than that. I mean, you can train a cat to walk on a leash, to do tricks, to roll over, high five, you know, all the, all the kinds of things that people like to train their dogs to do.

• 46:46Speaker 02

  It takes longer with cats, partly because cats just aren't as receptive to treats. I mean, you know, what the best way to train a dog is using treats to reinforce behavior. Cats just don't care for treats nearly as much. And so they're, you know, for that reason, they're a lot more resistant to training. But no, you certainly can, you certainly can train them. And there is talk about using cats much, much more. The the sense of smell, I mean, people think dogs have a great sense of smell, but cats have a much finer sense of smell than dogs. And there is talk of of training cats for for purposes like sniffing out explosives and that kind of thing.

• 47:27Mike Carruthers?

  Now, I've heard that, you know, there's concern about cats today because they kill a lot of birds and that, you know, people who like birds are very concerned about that.

• 47:38Speaker 02

  It's absolutely true. And actually, this goes back to the 19th century, when there was concern about the decline of the bird population and people began to point at cats. Well, I mean, there are lots of reasons why bird populations decline, and one of the major ones is loss of habitat, you know, with urbanization and industrialization, mining, and that kind of thing. So, you know, bird populations decline for a lot of reasons, but cats are certainly very very important. It's not so much house cats or, you know, like people's pet cats that go out and roam. I mean, they they will, of course, kill birds and kill other other small mammals and so on. It's mostly feral cats. And if you, if you look at the cat population of the world, and we have no idea how many

• 48:23Speaker 02

  cats there are, people suggest between 600 million and a billion in in the world, but most of them are feral cats. So they're they're cats that live in the wild, they live in, they live in groups called colonies, they live away from human populations, and they just feed on what on what's available. And so they feed on birds, they feed on small mammals, they feed on snakes, reptiles of very of various kinds. But certainly, the the the cost in terms of of birds is huge as far as as far as cats are concerned, but mainly mainly feral cats.

• 48:57Mike Carruthers?

  Well, it's interesting what you said. I'd never really thought about it before, but we compare dogs and cats, and so we think cats are aloof because they're aloof compared to dogs. But cats are cats, and they're very domesticated, and and people love them. I've been talking with Rod Phillips. He is a professor of history at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada, and he is author of a book called Cats: A History. There's a link to that book in the show notes, and Rod, thank you for being here.

• 49:28Speaker 02

  Thanks, Mike. I appreciate it.

• 49:33Mike Carruthers?

  Airline food has a terrible reputation. But here's something interesting. At cruising altitude, the cabin is extremely dry, and the air pressure is lower than what you're accustomed to. Both of those things interfere with your ability to taste and smell. Research has found that our perception of saltiness can drop by as much as 30%, while sweetness can drop around 20%. And even the constant background roar inside an airplane can alter the way we perceive flavor. Well, this creates an unusual problem for airline chefs. Food that tastes perfectly seasoned in their kitchen can taste bland and terrible at 35,000 feet.

• 50:18Mike Carruthers?

  That's why airline meals often use stronger seasonings and ingredients that are rich in umami. It's that savory taste that's found in things like tomatoes, mushrooms, and Parmesan. It may also help explain the curious popularity of tomato juice on airplanes. Tomato juice holds up unusually well when your other taste sensations have been dulled. And that is something you should know. You know, if you were to share this podcast with someone you know, a friend of yours, a relative, or a stranger, you'll be doing them a favor because now they'll have a new podcast to listen to that perhaps they haven't, and you will look so smart for having done so. And we would appreciate it a lot.

• 51:02Mike Carruthers?

  It helps us grow our audience, and that's what helps keep this podcast going. I'm Mike Carruthers. Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know.

• 51:12Speaker 04

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