Third Space Podcast

Acknowledgement. In this episode, Daniel and Bennett discuss greetings and how odd they can be. Daniel satiates his curiosity about light bulbs and learns why we can't just have TV technology inside them (or can we?!). And finally, they discuss houses; what kind of house would be best? What room is the most important? How valuable is land? Are tiny homes a sinister social engineering scheme?

Well, Zelda came out, so of course Daniel and Bennett discuss it a little. But considering the length of the game, it will likely be a recurring mini-topic. Afterwards, Bennett forces a Daniel Does Science, this time asking: is it alive?! Daniel does a surprisingly good job assessing the living qualities of things like milk, blood, and mildew. This leads into a little bit of discussion on the educational system as well.

Daniel introduces a new segment called Overrated Or Underrated Or Just Rated (OOUOJR) that really allows Bennett to flex his judgment muscles. Shopping malls, empathy, electric cars, and jerking before bed, among other things, all are judged. See if you concur.

Mind Your Morals returns, this time with a topic that is a little closer to the real world than those of previous episodes: the practice known as assisted suicide, or more recently, Medical Aid in Dying (MAID). Bennett presents Daniel with situations ranging from the sympathetic to the slightly outlandish, and Daniel tries to weigh the weight weights of morality and whether people should be assisted in achieving their own deaths. 

What do you think about birds? A simple question, but one that occupies Daniel and Bennett for half of the podcast. They then consider what a world might be like if cheap, nutritionally complete pills were readily available. Would restaurants disappear? Would fat people cease to be? Would it be overall a good thing or a bad thing?

The recent Super Mario Bros. movie serves as the backbone of this podcast. Bennett gives his movie review, but the discussion spawns tangents about mind-over-matter, identification with characters in media, video game design, and sequelitis. And somehow we forgot to even say "So long, gay Bowser!"

The snow melts away, leaving plentiful piles of pet poop, which Bennett complains about. Daniel muses on the sentience of AI and whether humans are the only beings with souls. And Bennett brings up Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy, an interesting disorder that Daniel and Bennett speculate on in relation to some current societal issues.

Daniel returns from his honeymoon to discuss teenage risk assessment, Willene in the Ingles parking lot, and Io, the moon of Jupiter, with a little help from Bennett. The conversation then broadens to vacation and travel in general; why do people travel? What's up with the people who make travel part of their identity? Should we live in a van?

Daniel conceptualizes a brand new segment for this episode: Father Bennett. Bennett is not actually a father, whether biologically or Catholically, but nevertheless Daniel presents him with a particular parenting scenario and has him explain how he would behave. This scenario involves Bennett's hypothetical teenage daughter wanting to wear somewhat revealing clothing, and Bennett handles the situation with tact and grace (in Bennett's opinion).

Mind your Morals returns after a few episodes, this time examining the risque topic of strip clubs. Are they moral, either for the strippers, the patrons, or the owners? If not, on what grounds? What about weird futuristic scenarios with VR strip clubs and robo-boobs? Bennett and Daniel examine it all.

Daniel has a cough, which turned out to be Covid. If it wasn't called that, it wouldn't have mattered at all, but by that name, it meant wearing the Scarlet Letter of a mask. We talk about that a little, and then Daniel turns the tables on Bennett by asking him to defend poetry. And he actually does it, sort of. Enjoy the discussion and the return of the phenomenal jingle.

You can consider this the beginning of a new Third Space Podcast, one where we shift from roughly monthly multi-hour podcasts to weekly sub-hour ones. In this episode, we do a fair job at trimming down the time while still keeping a favorite segment: Superpowers and Drawbacks. We also discuss... aliens! And don't miss out on the super sweet AI-generated jingle. Maybe AI really will take over the world.

In this episode of Third Space Podcast (3SP, see what I did with the title there?), Daniel enthusiastically introduces the conversational topic of ChatGPT, the recently popular AI chatbot. They discuss its function, potential, limitations, and the implications of AI bots for education and society; whether we will be overtaken by AI or tame it and be better humans with better tools.

In this well-paced episode, Bennett blows smoke about smoke detectors, then Superpowers and Drawbacks returns to its roots with a level 1 set of choices, and finally Bennett and Daniel discuss a generally unpleasant but also strangely interesting topic: death. Namely, the associated costs and rituals that accompany death and the possibility of exploitation in the death industry.

This is a very fun episode. We begin with This or That, back for the third or fourth run, and then we launch Country or Crock, which is very reminiscent of episode 35's Rap or Crap. Bennett presents Daniel with snippets of stereotypical or hilarious country songs in a variety of categories and has Daniel try to guess which are real and which Bennett just made up. If you don't hear from Bennett again, it's because he's moved to Nashville to become a honky-tonk star.

Bennett and Daniel kick things off by wondering why we still bother with signatures, which spawns multiple mini-topics ranging from celebrity autographs to retro video games. Then, after a long absence, Mind Your Morals returns, and by the end of the segment, we've eliminated cancer, racism, and mosquitos. So moral!

It's been a while since the last episode, but for good reason: Daniel got married! Not only that, but he's also gotten a new job and moved to a new state, so there's lots to catch up on. We talk about all things wedding-related, but not before discussing the difference between generalists and specialists, and how the US seems to be specializing more and more, for both good and ill.

This episode is all about Star Wars! Bennett and Daniel both, at some time or another, have considered themselves Star Wars fans, and here they discuss how they were exposed to Lucas' creative world and how they came to love it. And then, Bennett recounts his recent experience watching all of the live-action Star Wars content, including the more recent Disney productions that he skipped (out of disgust). Has his opinion matured? Has Disney redeemed itself? Listen and find out. Beware of spoilers.

In this episode, Bennett once again does his social duty by fixing the world's worst sport in Bennett Fixes Sports, and then Bennett and Daniel discuss a classy topic: dressing up. Has society ceased valuing dressing up? Is there some moral component to how we dress? Should dressing up be preserved, or is it better for us to accept a more casual fashion?

Bennett divulges a dubious dating drama to Daniel, we wonder about the whereabouts of words like wheelbarrow in another Adventures in Etymology, and finally we fantasize about the fraught future of phones and how terrific or terrible two-way telepathic telecommunication might be were it to become reality.