A Problem Squared - 082 = What Is Lint and Zero Hints

Episode Date: March 25, 2024

In this episode... 🧺 What is lint?  👌 When does zero count?  💼 And, as always, some business from the business briefcase.  Please do send us your problems and solutions to the website: www.aproblemsquared.com. Bec’s got loads of gigs coming up! If you wanna go see her check out dates on her website: https://www.bechillcomedian.com/tour-gigs. Matt’s also got an Evening of Unnecessary Detail every two weeks at the Cockpit Theatre in Marylebone, London. There’s going to be a mathssive (get it) Evening of Unnecessary Detail Extravaganza show at the Bristol Beacon on the 12th March.Find details for those here: https://festivalofthespokennerd.com/tickets/. If you want more from A Problem Squared, you can also find us on Twitter, Instagram, Discord and on Patreon.

Hello and welcome to a problem squared the podcast which is like the opposite of when a bird flies into a classroom. Oh, and I will not be elaborating. I feel like that's cleared that up nicely. I would say that's it is it is like flying into a classroom. It's the exact opposite of that. No, no. I think it is. What?

Yeah, it causes chaos. No. Everyone gets giddy and excited. We solve problems. No, produce chaos. Maybe both. Anyway, as you may have noticed, this is a podcast of two hosts. We've got Beck Hill, writer, comedian, performer, author. The opposite of the kid at

the back of the class saying, hang on, it's just a bird. We've all seen birds. We're supposed to be learning here. Yep. Yep. And I'm Matt Parker, mathematician, YouTuber, etc. The opposite of the teacher frantically jumping up on a desk, waving a textbook at the bird yeah you'd be sitting there like just leave it i i found it very funny when i was a teacher to be calmer than the situation required okay so this has happened to you i i've not had a bird i've had all sorts of ridiculous things happen what's the most ridiculous thing that happened when you're a teacher the most exciting thing that's ever happened when i was a teacher is if it starts snowing outside yeah sure all the kids get up as one and run to the window yeah i would do the same yeah but i said what's the most ridiculous thing most ridiculous

thing some students went through a phase of finding fake mustaches very funny and they had a little competition where they keep trying to hide them in different places on each other's stuff okay and wear them like you look up and a bunch of the kids with their fake moustaches on but like they just draw them and cut them out of paper yeah cute and it was one of those things where i'm like and you taught high schoolers these are high schools yeah they were year nines at the time and you know what like a lot of things it was very funny yeah but i just pretended i didn't even notice it must be really hard because you know what? Like a lot of things, it was very funny. Yeah. But I just pretended I didn't even notice. It must be really hard because you know if you start acknowledging that that is funny, then you've lost them. It's not going to end.

And I've lost the high ground if other kids are mucking around in a way that's not as clever or as funny. Yeah. They don't see the difference. Then you've made a judgment. Why do they get to mess around with their fake mustaches and we can't stab each other with pencils right so and then you've got to say look it's funnier if it's a mustache then they start trying to make like shivs out of mustaches and i mean to their credit one of them managed to stick a fake mustache on my water bottle on my drink bottle and i continued to pretend i hadn't noticed it was there and just drink out

of the drink bottle. That's great. Which I thought was hysterical. Would you know that they're like, they think it's funny. They were losing it. Because they're like, he hasn't noticed. Yeah. Great. Love that.

Had a lot of fun as a teacher. I would not be able to last. I'd find it far too easy to laugh. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I thought my strategy was always don't let them know I know how funny things are. Which amused me no end. I'm really bad at keeping quiet when something's funny.

Well, you know what's going to be funny? On this episode. I'm going to look at the humble tumble dryer lint problem. I've got a list of reasons why you should start counting at zero and the list starts at zero. And we'll have some, any other blackbirds in the school? Birdness, yeah. Any other birdness?

Any other business we'll have coming up at the end of the episode. Bec, how are you doing? I'm good. How are you? I'm good. You know, enjoying this halfway through March feeling. Yes. At the time that everyone's listening to this, I'm now in LA.

Oh, you're there already? I'm there already. Hello, future me. Oh, you are. Yep. But at the time of recording, I'm very excited because I was telling you about this. I have hired a professional organizer. You have?

You have told me about this. Yeah, I was scrolling through Instagram. Yep. Instead of tidying. Instead of tidying, exactly. And there's a few people that I sort of follow who like tidy for mindfulness or clean for mindfulness. Oh, like Zen gardening, but clean. Yeah.

So there's someone who they go around to people's houses and clean them oh wow and but they like film the process and it's very very satisfying yeah and doing deep cleans of everything and again very satisfying to watch now i don't need a deep clean i'm relatively hygienic and stuff yeah but it's sort of organized chaos but it's getting a bit more chaos than organized now yeah and so i was like hang on like you can hire a cleaner yeah but surely there's someone who can organize your tidy a tidier yeah and so i found out there are and so i've got a lady coming in on saturday and monday i'm so excited she's gonna go through all of my things i just i can't even picture the logistics.

They help with paperwork, Matt. They come in. They help with paperwork. I just. They sound like some kind of deity. Like, they're going to come in and be like, right. And then just sort your physical life out. Yeah.

And what's really handy is that, because I'm going to be in LA for a month and a half, and they're going to help me go through my wardrobe while they're doing that. I can be like, help me pack for L.A., please. What do I want to take to L.A.? Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Yeah.

I can't wait. You have to report back. I will report back. I'll report back if they're any good. I'll tell folks. I'm also going to have a Zoom meeting with a producer from America's Got Talent this week. Because you've got talent. Apparently.

So you'll be in America. And you've had Zoom meetings with them before. Both Britain's Got Talent and America's Got Talent have come knocking at various points. Oh, Britain's Got Talent have come to me many, many times. Yes. And actually, America's Got Talent have come a couple of times as well. And in the past, the timing has not been good. No.

But now, imagine if I'm listening back to this in the future and I've got my own residency in Las Vegas. Exactly. Yes. I'll be like, it's backfired tremendously. I regret everything. I've got a gambling addiction now. Be quiet for a second in case we can hear like echoing, like somehow future Beck is able to. To warn me.

Yeah. Or it's just me going, but you had a Zoom meeting and nothing happened from it Beck. And now I feel like a fool. Well, let's find out. Oh, my tummy just rumbled. That was future Beck. Wow. What were they trying to say?

How'd that tummy rumble make you feel? Like I want to finish eating this biscuit. Okay. It was future Beck, but from 30 seconds from now. Yeah, yeah, exactly. How about you, Matt? I'm good. You've got me cycling every day.

Yeah, and you've been keeping me updated as well. This morning was ride 83. Yes, as of recording. As of recording. Again, by the time this comes out. Again, we're not. And I estimate I'm feeling healthier. I feel like I'm maybe 40% of the way there.

Yeah, you look healthier. Yeah, I am feeling healthier. Not as healthy as I want to feel, but I feel like I'm almost halfway healthy. Yeah. I know health can't be gauged by looks alone. No, exactly. But I'm feeling halfway to healthy is roughly what I'm thinking. Yeah, I'm on the halfway to healthy.

Exactly, just like that famous song. And I nearly, I nearly, I was in London doing some work in London. And to be able to keep up my cycling everyday challenge, I would have to go out and use the London city bikes, which we've discussed before. But then my schedule for the day kind of changed. Instead of being able to do a leisurely afternoon cycle on a city bike i was going to have to do it before i even started

work so i was going to get up early and do it very early yeah but it as you may have noticed at the moment in england it's still winter yes i was like oh it's so cold and i brought like cycling ish stuff but i hadn't brought gloves And I did it once before where I was like, eh, I'm not out for that long, less than an hour. How cold can my fingers get? Very cold. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So cold.

You need to be able to feel that you're gripping the handlebars. Yeah, exactly. And it's not that bad because, you know, it's not like I'm doing a multi-hour ride or I'm going somewhere or anything. Like I get back in, you warm up while you're cycling, but still it's not comfortable. But I was like, I still want to do the ride. I'm going somewhere or anything. I get back in, you warm up while you're cycling but still it's not, it's not comfortable. But I was like, I still want to do the ride

and I want to be comfy. So, I realised I had some spare pairs of socks. I really like, so you've made some mittens is what you're telling me. Well,

okay, so I put a sock on each hand and I discovered five reasons why that was a bad idea. Yeah, because your thumb needs to go the opposite way

around the handle. That's one of them. Well done, well done. You got rid of your prehensile. Thumb doesn't go around the handle. And I thought I'd be fine just doing like a sloth like hook grip. No, you need opposable thumbs. And I tried like getting enough

bagginess in the sock to reach around. Like a sock puppet. Yeah, but it wasn't comfy. Like a sock puppet. It's a sock puppet yeah but it wasn't comfy like a sock puppet the sock puppet you did your sock puppets were eating your hand you should put little yeah i should have if i had googly eyes i would have made it so that's one of the five another one is when you're putting socks on your hands and i was wearing like because i got like this high vis cycling jacket yeah with long sleeves because it was cold. And it was wet.

It wasn't raining, but the ground was wet. Putting the first sock on, easy. Because you've got a free hand that's not in a sock. You put the sock on. Yep. The second socks won't get you. Really, really struggled. Couldn't get the second sock on.

You've just reminded me that when I used to do a double act with Tom Goodluck. Dirty Laundry. Another Awesome Laundry, it was called. Awesome Laundry. It's for children. Sorry. I was thinking of a different show. When we wrote it, we're like, this is genius.

When it came to practice, getting the second sock on. Getting the second sock. I think it involved a lot of teeth. I think there was a lot of like. I think it was a lot of like... I didn't... I was also trying to shove it, like I was trying to shove it up the sleeve. So I ended up taking the first sock off

to put the second sock on, which solved one problem and caused another. But I figured I'd just get better at it. Yeah, so I eventually got both socks off and I discovered the second problem, which is when I'm wearing socks on my hands, I can't use my phone. Oh, yeah, of course. And I data log all my cycling. Do you ever use your nose to do cycling?

I have. I definitely. I gave that a go. I gave the nose a go. Too cold. Oh, right. For some reason, that wasn't responding. So I had to de-sock one hand.

By now, I'm getting real good at putting it back on, though. Yeah. Set the timer going. Uh-huh. And then put the phone in my pocket and then put the other sock back on and get cycling yep now the last two are pretty much the same thing shoelaces not shoelaces they stay done up thank goodness i double knotted them and i tucked them under the other laces you could be argued this is the same thing i think it's two distinct versions i figured can't use your bell no i, I could use the bell. Gears.

Fine. Gears are fine. Gears are handier when the thumbs around because they're like on the city bikes. It's like a throttle. But you still managed to. That was all fine. Okay. I figured once I had these socks on, it would just look like I'm wearing gloves.

Yeah. Like I wouldn't look ridiculous. But they did look more like socks. You know what you should have done? Put some shoes on Space shoes But then Then there are two scenarios The problem is

Partly I was cycling Through London streets And then I was cycling All the way around Hyde Park in London And so Partly I forgot I've got to indicate

To other cyclists and people My moves So whatever I'm indicating I'm just waving Kicking them in the face And with a sock and then I count this as a

separate problem you know how easy it is to buy gloves I did look up glove shops it was early in the morning you don't need a glove shop pretty much every

corner store I googled glove outlet yeah I think that's your problem you're looking for a glove specialist instead of the service station

googling hard yeah that's true your nose can only type so fast Your nose can only type so fast. Yeah, my nose can only type so quickly. And then when I'm on the streets, I forget how much I wave at people who wait. And so I'm just waving at people with socks on my hands. So. Socks on his hands and gloves on his toes.

The point is, I've kept up my cycling every day until i'm healthy challenge but a great great personal yeah but now everyone thinks that you are mentally unhealthy uh first problem was sent in by stefan stefan went to the problem posing page at a problemsquared.com, entered their problem, which is, well, it just starts with the word lint. That's their problem. Stefan's problem is lint. To quote Stefan, more specifically, the lint that collects in a tumble dryer filter.

They have many questions. They've numbered them. Number zero. What is lint? Okay. Do you know you know what i'm gonna start by answering it at one at a time excellent i mean just to listen to know there's more yeah but let's get zero out of the way what is lent okay so lint is generally like the little bits of fibers that come off of stuff and collect together. You can get lint in all sorts of scenarios. Anything fibrous.

You can get navel lint. Navel lint. That's your belly button lint. So that's when all the little fibers and stuff that your belly button happens to catch. Coming off your t-shirt or whatever you may be wearing. Yeah. You can get pocket lint. Oh, yeah.

Which is usually when the fibers, basically when the pockets are, the inside of the pockets rubbing together and then Yeah, exactly. And in this scenario, lint is all the little bits of fibers that are sort of coming across and bunching up together in the tumble dryer. And they're being caught by the filter. They're being caught by the filter. If anyone's thinking, what? What's a lint? What? Go look at your tumble dryer if you have one. Yes. Or washing machine and check the filter. Yeah. And essentially it's because most textiles are created by bunching fibers, essentially.

So it starts as lint. Well, in a sense, yeah. Think about when you shave a sheep. I do often. You end up with all the wool. Now, if you had wool from a sheep. sheep i mean my dad used to work shaving sheep yeah exactly hearing that was the phrase they would use yeah that's it i forgot i forgot what it was but if you're sharing you are sharing a sheep yeah to shave it so you end up the bits of wool i don't know if anyone listening has had the joy of getting to

hold fresh wool that's been shorn off a sheep it is it's love it's kind of like when you get a haircut but it's all soft and and it's dense dense yeah especially when it's been washed a bit as well because sometimes it's a bit dirty but it's yeah but you can sort of pull it apart the same way that you do with like loose cotton like cotton balls you can sort of pull it apart the same way that you do with like loose cotton, like cotton balls. You can sort of pull them apart. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. So in a very long bit of wool or yarn, it's not like there's lots of very long fibers. It's just a bunch of short fibers that are all...

Exactly. ...twizzled together. And they, you know, back in the day, they'd use a spinning wheel for that. Yep. So you sort of got that. It's bunching it together. It's spinning it around. And it's just becoming, it's sort of becoming bunched up enough.

Yep. That it's pretty strong. And the way it's all wrapped around each other, it's how becoming it's a sort of becoming bunched up enough yep that it's pretty strong and the way it's all wrapped around each other it's how you end up like that and if bits of that get worn off again yeah because it's made of all tiny little fibers then some of these fibers become loose they come off sometimes it's they just get damaged and broken and so those little bits coming off in the same way that your your hair and skin does as well you know like life yeah what's really interesting is the etymology of the word lint oh so it's related to the word linting linting which is the term used for the cultivation of shorter fibers from the cotton plant oh so it is so you'd be linting if you're taking all the fibers from

the cotton plant and then manufacturing it into cotton. So it is going back to its original state. Yeah. Returning to its state, which just bring us to question one. The second question. Yes. Says Stefan, if one were to keep a piece of clothing in the tumble dryer, as I assume with it running, would there eventually be nothing left of it? So would it entirely turn back to lint? As an example, they say, how long would that take for the average T-shirt?

Yeah. What I take from this is, is lint like, you know, like when you buy a new bit of clothing and the dye runs for a while, so you've got to wash it carefully. Yes. And that stops happening because all the loose dye has been washed out or whatever the case is. So is lint something where after a while you've got all the lint out and now it's just a t-shirt that won't lint anymore? Or is linting just an inherent property of a cotton t-shirt existing and it will continue linting until the day it dissolves? Well, the reason that it occurs is mainly to do with the mechanical part.

The heat does play an element element but it's mainly the fact that it's being tumbled around it's the tumble part of the tumble dryer as opposed to the dryer the dryer doesn't help but the tumbling part it's all the friction and everything ends up meaning that the little bits are getting caught on each other it's all yeah like if you were to rub two pieces of fabric together for long enough, eventually they're going to worn down. So in theory, you could keep tumble drying something until it lints a hole in itself. Yeah, until it's just lint. The problem with trying to solve this question is that most of the time,

the stitches that hold together the panels of a t-shirt come apart first or holes appear in the fabric first and then the t-shirt's gone. Like people chuck it out, you know, and it becomes a rag. But this is like if you put it in there and you didn't let it out, you just ran the tumble dryer around the clock and you keep cleaning the filter as you should. Well, you'd probably also want to make sure that, you know, that's the other thing is that it can lead to fires and stuff like that so and i don't know if you can over dry a t-shirt

but i so dry i tried i really wanted to answer this i thought it was really interesting and i love i love this as a question but the only way i could physically answer it is if i tried to tumble dry a t-shirt as many times an average t-shirt for as long as possible until it disappeared and the issue with that is that i do not own a tumble dryer so good point would you agree that it feels likely if you had the time effort and tumble dryer you could get a t-shirt and systematically tumble dry it into dust yeah okay i don't know how long that would take no but it would happen when i tried to research it i couldn't find anyone who'd gotten to that stage because as soon as the t-shirt either fell apart

or got holes in it it gets turned into a rag chuck it whatever no commitment yeah what i'm saying is if any if i can get access to a tumble dryer and a lot of time and probably a fire department on hand i would make that as a video a long time but's going to take a long time. But I mean, I'm going to. I reckon it's years. Money. Yeah. I did find some research that suggested like certain like towels and stuff. They'd said that they tested that.

And after 20 washes, a towel, quite often a towel has lost 50% of its sort of strength from the. Yeah, a lot of lint comes off in it. Because obviously the texture of a towel is designed to catch things. so it sort of rubs up against itself and everything that's why you shouldn't wash towels question two do all clothes and various materials create lint and if they do or if they don't i guess follow on question which are worse are some worse than others and they suspect a shot in the dark ste Stefan thinks denim probably doesn't lint much. I don't know. Yeah, denim actually does lint quite a bit.

It's cotton, right? Denim? Yeah. And do you know what? I will come, I'll swing back around to this in an answer that's going to come up. But yeah, denim does actually create a fair bit of lint. Just think about the pockets in your jeans and how much lint you tend to end up with those or how much lint you end up in your belly button when you wear jeans. But yes, basically everything made of fibers has lint created from.

Latent lint potential. Yeah. But I did find on utopiacleanersboston.com. Oh, yeah. They call these clothes lint producers. Oh. Called, yeah. They call these clothes lint producers. Oh. And lint producers more specifically are ones that create so much lint that it tends to stick to the rest of your laundry.

So the culprits. Lint givers, not lint takers. That's right. And there are lint takers as well. I'll get to that. The culprits of producing lint are fleece sweatsuits. Yep, yep. Chenille items.

New terrycloth towels. Again, there's a towels. And fl sweatsuits. Yep. Yep. Chenille items. New terrycloth towels. Again, there's a towels. And flannel pajamas. Yeah. Be creative, Lint. Then look for lint attractors. That's your lint takers. Yeah, yeah, yep.

Lint attractors are things like corduroys, synthetic blends, and dark fabric. So they tend to- Just take in the lint. Yeah. I would argue that dark fabric doesn't necessarily take more lint than others, but... I think it looks obvious. Yeah, it's more obvious. And they said to prevent lint...

Now, this isn't preventing lint from occurring. It's still going to show up in your filter. Yeah. But to prevent it getting onto other clothes... Got it. Yep. Sort lint attractors from lint producers and wash them separately. Oh, that makes sense.

Question three. What is the point of the filter? Why not just let the lint fly out the vent why not make it like you know like those um candy floss machines yes just shooting lint out the top of the machine yeah just wave a stick around it and kind of answer the question there because you're gonna going to get lint everywhere. Yeah, yeah. Stefan. And if you're thinking, oh, but it's so fine. It's just in the air.

It doesn't matter. Inhalation of excessive amounts of lint, as observed in early textile workers, may lead to diseases of the lungs, such as bisinosis. Lint shed from clothing during the course of wear may also carry bacteria and viruses. So you kind of don't want that just going off into the air. And that's actually for the same reason that lint can present a danger during surgery. Oh. That's why they're going to wear all those scrubs and everything.

You don't want lint in the wound. Yeah, you don't want anything carrying microorganisms or anything like that. Don't be breathing that. No. And stuff that goes in your lungs stays in your lungs. This was something I only recently was told. And it has changed everything because i'm one of those people where it's like work in a well-ventilated area or

wear a mask while doing this and i'm like nah it's fine it's fine i'll get a bit of a headache and now i'm like oh no all those things i was breathing that's why obviously that's why asbestos is so bad yeah it's all stays in there stays in there so yeah yeah we do that's why there's a lint filter lint filter yeah you can also get mechanical problems you can get mechanical problems yeah so the lint that goes into the air it's like fine fibers and stuff that can get stuck in mechanical devices and so that then you end up with you know collecting in other places why is my hipster coffee grinder not working very well? For the lint.

For the lint. Yeah. Or it could cause a, worse, could cause a fire if enough of it gets clogged up in something it shouldn't be. Yeah, that's not good. So, yeah, lint filters, very important. Question four. And back, I feel like we've hit peak back here.

Is there anything I could do with the lint to recycle it? Yes. Good. You can compost lint. Oh, you can compost lint. Yeah, now, a lot of the stuff that we wear today is made of synthetics oh yeah so some of that might not compost right but cotton lint or anything that's come from sort of yeah natural natural things you can you can compost

lint makes very good tinder so if you're trying to start a fire you can use lint again be careful because you don't want to burn any synthetic stuff that's well not just that it's flammable that's a point of tinder but you you want to make sure that you want them you're not burning anything that that's going to put stuff in the air chemicals and stuff synthetic lint i know we talked about how it can be an issue with surgery, but clean lint often used... Clint. Clint. There you go, Clint.

Was used as a form of wound treatment for cuts as early as 1500 BC. That's a long time ago. Yep. And as recently as the American Civil War. That's also a long time ago. That spans 3,000 years. Yeah, that's a long time. And that sort of lint was called a sharpie or charpie.

Sharpie. Don't know if I'm pronouncing that right, but yeah. Can you set up the lint and make a smaller version of the original item of clothing? Like make a tiny t-shirt out of your t-shirt lint? Yes, technically you could. Maybe not an amazing version. No. Of what you had, but you could spin it.

You could spin it? In the same way you do with fleece. Back into thread. Yeah. Now, it's not going to be a nice thread. Not necessarily going to be a smooth thread. It's probably going to be more like a lumpy wool. But you could, in theory, turn that into some form of yarn and then remake something from it.

T-Mill, the t-shirt service that i've used for our problem squared stuff yeah and some of my um senate mass merch you can you can basically you can recycle your cotton t-shirts by sending them back and i guess they lintify and re-re-cottonate yeah i never saw i never looked into that but that's you know i feel like that's a cotton t-shirt with my propensity to deep dive further than necessary. I'm going to leave this to the listeners. Yeah. Let us know, everyone.

Yeah. Up next, question five. Stefan has been led to believe that running a tumble dryer is expensive, especially compared to just hanging clothes up. Because if you've got the space, you can hang stuff up and it will dry itself. As someone who lives in a tiny flat you can also do that if you don't have space that's very true we don't have space for a tumble dryer we do have space for a clothes horse so you can move around yeah so let's say they invest in a tumble dryer can they then recover the lint and make some money on the side who would buy it i can see this is

what we were saying a second ago yeah so. So felting is another thing, making felt animals and things like that. Sell them. Yeah. And there's a lot of people that demonstrate how to make things from lint online. Oh, okay. Yeah. So there's loads of stuff out there. If you're like, oh, what to do with leftover lint.

Yeah, there's loads. Lint industry. But I wanted to find examples of people selling stuff made from lint. That's the important step. So I found yarnyarn.co.uk. Right. Specifically sell. Recycled denim fibers left over from manufacturing.

Oh, and they're just selling the fibers. They're literally selling. They're selling the lint. Yeah, for 10 pounds. 10 pounds for what kind of massive lint are you getting there? 50 gram bag. Wow, that's expensive. 10 pounds for what kind of massive lint are you getting there 50 gram bag wow that's expensive 10 pounds for 50 grams the copy says recycled denim fibers have been reclaimed from denim manufacturing in india beautiful ethical fibers eco-friendly craft supplies they're making bank

yes that's a resounding yes yeah i mean it looks much nicer than the lint that you get in the tumble dryer. Oh, yeah. But if you sold it for like five quid, 50 grams. Just put a real eco spin on it. Call it a craft supply. Yeah. Potentially, you could sell your lint. I think you'd be hard pressed to find buyers. I don't know how many things yarn, yarn manages to sell in this.

Good point. It's one thing to advertise it for sale. It's thing to sell it yeah but there you go technically potentially people out there might want to buy your lint they've then got i don't know why this is 5.5 but they've decided to mix up the numbering system they want to know what's more expensive this is nothing to do with lint they just got a sub question what's more expensive running the tumble dryer for an hour or just hanging your clothes out and using a dehumidifier for 24 hours wow they're just asking you to do some yeah this is a separate problem oh is there a problem but you know what i'm like try and sneak i know you lure back in with the lint what can you make from it oh can you sell it and then you're like oh by the way work up my power bill for two different options, please. Yeah, so I did. Oh, of course.

So what's the result? Well, luckily, Curry's, the electrical store. Electrical supplier in the UK, yeah. Yeah, on their website. They actually have this question. Is it cheaper to use a dehumidifier than a tumble dryer? Oh, there you go. They're doing the work.

Yeah. It looks like, imagine what you could have found if you just Googled Stefan. Stefan. That is your real name. Curry says, if you're drying your clothes it's definitely cheaper to use a dehumidifier instead of a tumble dryer your average desiccant dehumidifier set to laundry mode uses about 650 watts whereas a tumble dryer you'll be looking at a whopping 4 000 watts while it might be slower it's easily the more cost

effective method now I will say that Curry's have based this not on running the dehumidifier for 24 hours but as someone who does not have a tumble dryer and uses a dehumidifier all right yep with a clothes horse we never have it on for 24 hours that's ridiculous you shouldn't it's too long so i don't think you would ever reach that point i did calculate what it would cost for an average dehumidifier for 24 hours versus a tumble dryer running for an hour. And it worked out to about the same on average. I think it was about a pound 20 per load of laundry. Okay. There you go.

Yeah. But you wouldn't need the dehumidifier for 24 hours. I do not think we're going to get some consumer advice in the middle of this lint chat. Final, final section of the problem number six stephan wants to know if they are thinking about this too much or have they not thought about it enough are there more questions they should be asking so they're ending on a meta question three three questions yeah so i'm gonna say yes you are thinking about this too much correct no the problem isn't that you haven't thought about it enough no you've ticked that box or you have thought about it enough but you've stopped there you've stopped short of googling

and gotten the extra step of sending all these questions to someone else to do and you know what i appreciate it because i actually really enjoy it thank you people look things up themselves we'll be out of a podcast. We would. Yeah, actually. I'm making fun of you, but I really, I mean, there was a lot of problems to choose from and I was like, ooh, lint. That's a t-shirt there.

Ooh, lint. And then we will make that t-shirt, ooh, lint. And then we'll see how many times we have to tumble dry it. Yeah. Are there more questions I should be asking? Look, Stefan, I think it's going to get to a stage where you're asking further and further questions away from Lint. Let's stick to the subject.

Stick to Lint. Wow. I mean, I feel like you've solved all these problems in great detail. Thank you. Even the ones that were the Trojan problems. Seven and a half, if you count the zero. Yes, which I do. So I'm going to give you a re an upcycled ding

it's a ding left over from the manufacturing process of the previous episode oh thank you i think we could sell that for about 10 yeah it's a crafting supply ding there you are thanks matt and thanks stefan i genuinely enjoyed looking into this. This next problem comes from Thomas to the problem posing page. And Thomas says, my cousin and I disagree on zero. Oh, they agree on everything. Yeah. First off, should we say zeroth off? Zeroth off. She disagrees that starting a list at zero is a good idea. Oh, they agree on everything. Yeah. First off, should we say zeroth off?

Zeroth off. She disagrees that starting a list at zero is a good idea. Oh, what? And also disagrees that you can count zero of something, such as the age of newborns or the number of coconuts in my pantry. How can I win this argument? Oh, wow. That got personal. It's not which is better.

No, just how do I win? I want to win this. I'm right. How do I win i want to win this i'm right how do i win yeah so matt yeah problem dear to my heart now i can't tell if our previous problem poser stefan started their enumerated list at zero because they believe starting at zero was a great idea yeah or i do that and they're making fun of me it could be either yeah but they did they started at zero and i famously like counting from zero so i have been using zero for a long time it took me a lot of emails when my first book was published i really wanted to start on page zero oh no yeah the publishing industry they were not had they do not like weird changes they do not i i tell a lot of stories where it's like me

and my eternally frustrated publishers but they are probably the most flexible and the most wonderful publishers i could have yeah the crew at alan lane at penguin random house are absolute legends yeah and they tolerate a surprising percentage of my ridiculous ideas yes my next book i did not think i'll be allowed to do this instead of page numbers have i told you this no instead of page numbers each page has the sign of the page number were an angle in degrees. So the page numbers start at 0.000000. And then they gradually go up for the first quarter of a book until they get to one. And then they gradually come down to zero.

And then down to negative one. And then back up. They do a sine wave. They go up to one and then down to negative one and then back up to zero do a sine wave. They go up to one and then down to negative one and then back up to zero. And that equals a triangle. It's a trigonomic function of. So, you can have two pages of the same number.

Yeah, and in the index, it's like you look up a word and it's like that's on page negative 0.279. And you've got to work out which one. Yeah. But importantly, that is a problem with. Not a problem with, but that's part of using trigonomic functions like sign, is that there are many, you get many different, there are many to one. You can put in different angles and get the same sign value. Yeah. And I like ridiculous things in my books, which give you the same sensation or the same situation as stuff I'm talking about in the book. same sensation or the same situation as stuff I'm talking about in the book. And so the fact that people can live the emotional experience of realizing a sign of an angle does not uniquely

define the angle because it doesn't uniquely define what page something's on, I find deeply pleasing because you're experiencing the sign function and its drawbacks by using the index in my book. I technically have a zeroth page i mentioned this in a previous episode i talk about the this page is the first and also a last the last which is a flip chart that i do but at the opening page yeah it always comes back to that page which means that so if you can hear that there is a dog drinking loudly very loudly sorry but the um it does sound like I'm in the bathroom. I really needed a wee.

She's so loud. Give her a second. Sometimes it feels like she's sarcastically drinking water. Yeah. And she's just loudly dribbling everywhere. Yeah, well, now the clock's ticking before she needs a wee. Yeah, so the flip chart goes right back to the the last page yep that it ends on which technically means that i think that it's a zeroth page yeah yeah i will i

will i mean i'll happily say it's a page it also because the whole thing's a poem and normally you do a poem in like rhyming couplets yep and it does work as rhyming couplets but the last line is the same as the first line. Right. So there's an odd number of. Yeah. It's very, very.

I love it. Very fun. So that's now a third reason. It's fun. Yes. To be fair, I do it mostly because it's fun. So the third reason is a big one. The other two reasons,

the one that's probably less important is we, in programming and computer science, you use zero all the time. If you're going to index a list, you start from zero. It's always the zeroth element in your list. If people... I remember last episode, the Pi Day episode.

Yep. I talked about throwing together some terrible Python code. And that was done by comparing consecutive strings of digits in Pi. See if they're the same. The way I programmed that was by having the two kind of sets of numbers move their way along pi and what i'll do each time is take the zeroth item out of the front list and put it at the back of the other list and then take the zeroth item from the back list and chuck it out of the list and i had to do everything specifying the zeroth item because in python

like i think pretty much all programming languages you start counting you got the zeroth item in the list and then you count up one two three four which can get a little confusing i'm not saying it's flawless but binary numbers or any numbers start at zero because you start with nothing like you got zero like it's there you can't you can't say no there's no zero because the smallest number you can write down is all zeros. Yeah. And particularly back in the day when like storage and processing power and all these things were quite limited, why would you waste a whole number in your list? You can get one more thing in your list for the same length of number you're using for the counting.

Yeah. And we're always always humans have always squeezed every last bit of processing power out of whatever hardware we have available at the time and so of course in computing and programming we use zero because to not use it would be wasteful and less efficient than the maximum we can get out of it so so counting from zero is always always works like in terms of computing it just makes sense because otherwise it's wasteful. And I then think it's hilarious to take things from the world of computing and programming and mathematics and then infuse them into my everyday life. Yes.

Because I count from zero a lot. The useful thing is sometimes things just start at zero. Like they mention ages. Well, that was the big one for me because I used to be much like Thomas's cousin. Yep. When we started doing this podcast, I was very annoyed at how you count from zero. I do. It's very funny.

And I think I managed to talk. You wanted to do, you wanted to start the episodes from zero. Yeah. But I was like, that is very confusing. And we didn't do it. But I think we were going to do a trailer and that was going to count as zero. Oh, maybe. the episodes from zero yeah but i was like that is very confusing and we didn't do it but i think we were going to do a trailer and that was going to count as zero but for me the big the big thing to make me go oh yeah was the realization that you don't turn one until you have been alive for

one year yeah that is then your your first birthday because technically technically your first birthday is your birthday the day that you're born but we don't count that because we're celebrating one year after that point yeah age so you've got to get to that point first and so that was kind of the big one that that made a difference for me and i think it was you had your joke about you've talked about this in previous episodes and everything about the 40th birthday is when you turn 39 is when you yes yeah because you've already had your your first birthday when you turn zero yeah so when someone turns 39 you can be like happy 40th birthday yeah yeah fence post so and. And it makes sense because it's easier to calculate ages, like time between two things.

If you use zero, it makes sense. But, like, there's no zeroth year. So if you go back in time in our common era, you get back to 1 CE, and the year before that is 1 BCE. So we go straight from 1 to negative 1. And we have discussed this a couple of years back on the podcast about how there's no zero year. And that causes problems if you're trying to work out the time between two dates.

Yeah. Because you're missing zero. You need zero. Yeah. So sometimes you just need zero. If you're going from 1500 BCE to the American Civil War. Exactly. You'd be off by one.

Yeah. Classic. And a friend of mine jim and you said that like you were making up a name i know it's because you were trying you were thinking for a second i was wondering if i do this surname james prop was getting out a mobile phone a cell phone they're american contract for one of their kids and they had like a you can cancel this within two weeks policy and so they took the phone out let's say on a monday and the kid had it for a while and it wasn't working out they were going to go with a different provider or something and so

jim walked back into the place where they got it like on the monday two weeks later so they got it like at 5 p.m on monday two weeks later he goes in first thing in the morning and says i want to return this phone within the first two weeks and they they're like, no, you're currently on day 15 of your contract. You passed two weeks. And he's like, no, but it's literally been less than two weeks since I left the store with the phone because I left Monday afternoon two weeks ago and I'm back now Monday morning. But they started counting with one.

So the day you got the phone is one. I would also argue that they started counting on the day rather than on the time. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. It's a good point. Yeah.

But because there's this. Okay. In the case of the phone contract. Fair enough. But some states in the US do or don't. I'm a little hazy on this, but they have to specify when they're doing things like this for like anything legal. Competitions and stuff. Competitions.

Bail. Look at any terms and conditions for a competition these days and it will say something like, entries will close at 0000 or like 00001 or whatever on PST, Pacific Standard Time or something. But even if it's like you've got 10 days to make bail or something, they've got to specify, do they start on day one or day zero and and it is explicitly spelled out in some legal systems they will say all legal whatever's start on zero or something like that

so that's my second reason is because when it comes to keeping track of, in this case, we're talking about time, other situations, you need that zeroth day. Otherwise, like ages, you start counting too soon. And particularly if you're going to straddle the positive negative ends of a spectrum, you're going to mess up in the middle without having zero. I mean, I suppose the argument is you could say, well, you should say that when you're born it's your first birthday and

then the rest of the year you are in your first year of life yes and then you enter your second year of life you could so you could argue the other direction you could you could as someone who always enjoyed debating oh yeah which is why they're phrased as an argument because you can argue a lot of things both ways yeah if thomas's cousin is listening that's your argument is actually yes what is aging you're right it should be wrong but that was the big one for me and i like and i do agree with that you can count zero or something like i i have zero um cookies right now because i ate one i have a lot of zero things to give yes yeah you can definitely have zero of things yes and mathematically just in terms of the way we write and manipulate numbers

you need to be able to have zero of something for numbers to make sense i mean you can do i mean the romans didn't really have zero they made it work but it's chaos having having a zero in your numbering system and zero of things as like a legitimate number as perfectly valid as any other number is super useful so most numbering systems that we use now originate from the middle east don't they yeah did they have zero yes wow and that was a big big technological breakthrough yeah so so we have hindu arabic numbers so how do they win the argument matt well i think when they're like all good arguments they should enumerate their points and they should start numbering the points in their argument from zero say say zeroth of all yeah and then just do everything in one big point yeah i think for thomas to win the argument you're gonna have to

do everything starting on zero all the time yeah yeah nothing gets people onto your side like winding them up and being annoying about it yeah i mean that was my policy and here we are all counting from zero yeah and puns like you've got there's nothing wrong with zero or that kind of you know yeah i'm not gonna lie i don't i don't think you've solved this problem if anything i'm starting to go actually i'm starting to go yeah why did i give into the whole thing i'm doing my own good work yeah i've started to argue my way out of it maybe the real solution is start a podcast with your cousin yeah wear them down over time yeah that's it eventually they'll just get to a point where they accept that that's your thing yeah they'll like fine yeah and then do you know what i think the other thing was is that it's not something that

i used to do but i would do it as a because i know you like it i would sort of be like a zero thing doing that thing i'm doing the zero thing the ridiculous thing you do as stefan did you know starting something from zero and eventually it does fall into a habit. And then I'm like, oh, crap. Now I'm starting at zero. Yeah, there you go. Anyway, this is the 82nd episode. No, sorry. Because it exists.

Well, it will be once we finish it. We will have done it. Right now we're on 81. We're in the 81 point something episodes down. Could you do it by cake? That's how you win all your arguments. You've got one cake. Yeah.

And as soon as you start, like, if you take a slice out of that cake yeah it's not a whole cake anymore okay you don't have one cake you've got nine of a cake most of a cake so so how do you count that you can have fractions of your cake and eat it too yeah and you know what it starts with a zero point yeah what is a donut if not a zero you can't it's because you can't because but by your cousins drink a coke zero by your cousin's argument one slice of cake is is a cake is one cake is a whole cake because they don't believe in zero. I'd like to say that I do not endorse this current argument. I'm saying, Thomas, tell your cousin

they can have one cake, one whole cake. And if you give them a slice and they go, you said a whole cake. Say, well, by your reasoning, it should start at one. I don't think they're arguing that fractions don't exist. Technically they are. I don't know. You can't write a fraction without getting rid of the one at the beginning.

It's a zero point something. I don't know. I'm trying to help you, Matt. Can we cut this bit so I don't get a lot of emails? No, they can direct them at me. Please do. I'm arguing as the sort of person who thinks the way that Thomas's cousin does. And if Thomas's cousin wants an entire whole cake,

they're going to have to admit that once you go less than a whole cake, it is no longer one. Okay, I'm going to leave this one. And I know I'm the one doing it. So this is not my call undinged yeah fair until we hear back from thomas yeah yeah that makes arguments they did or did not try and what worked yeah all right or from thomas's cousin feel free to get in touch with us directly if you're listening to this get your cousin to listen to this and then support us on

wow go to problem posing page our interactive page at problem squared.com if you're thomas's cousin and give us your thoughts and now it's time for any other business which is the exact opposite of any other birdness okay back we we've got we've got some business in from the listeners yeah valdama on reddit replied to the subreddit for episode 80 naming cliches and squaring birthdays yep the subreddits for the whole podcast we don't have one per episode just in case people no we do we have do we have threads for each oh yeah yeah but within the subreddit sure i don't know i don't know what these terms are, Matt.

I don't know, Reddit things. People know what I mean. There's a Reddit thing. Valdemar wanted to point out, no, not all roads run to a Rome or Roma. I grew up on a small island that has roads, but no Rome or Roma on it. Anywhere to be found, as far as I know. Ah, I'm afraid they are a rounding error. Not statistically significant

Sorry Valdemar I mean where you grew up is perfectly valid I'm sure they're wonderful roads But yeah For some rounded up definition of all I'm afraid you fall under the zeros Fine fine fine Effectively all roads lead to Rome and or a Roma

Speaking of roads And it turns out all any other businesses Do lead to the problem about roads leading to Rome because someone whose name is just Typhoid Fever says they were listening to episode 76 about the road Rome situation. And while they were listening to it, I guess they were in a car or some kind of moving vehicle, they drove past Beck Hill Road in northwestern Montana. Wow. A Beck Hill Road. Yeah. Did you know you have a Beck Hill Road in northwestern Montana. Wow. A Beck Hill Road.

Yeah. Did you know you have a Beck Hill Road? I did not know that. It is Beck Hill with a K, but like B-E-C-K, but I'll take it. I'll take it. There is a Matthew Parker Street. I know there is. That's discussed.

I'll put the sign up. Unfortunately, says Typhoid Fever, they did not have enough time to drive down it. Oh, that's a lack of dedication. Oh, to find out if it does indeed lead to a roam. Be long time. I mean, that's too much dedication. Yeah, no, I appreciate that, though. And if you do manage to find that sign not connected to the pole.

Yeah. By any means, you know, hold on to it for me. And if anyone knows if there is a Beck Hill Road with no K in it, let us know. Yeah, that'd be pretty special. Brianna got in touch to say, in regards to the square root party question from episode 80, I have a suggestion for food. I would lean into the root part of square root. So I have root beer, which I think is one of your suggestions, Matt. Good suggestion.

And maybe carrot and or ginger cake. Yeah, there you go. And have some square shaped French fries uh radishes and parsnips i mean square shaped french fries i don't think that's a thing well i guess potatoes or a root like a vegetable yeah i guess more like a square shape make them square make them cubes like potato cake that's what you want okay or potato waffle i'll accept that that's it that's a square radishes and parsnips might be found easily depending on time or year and country. You could even go on a root tasting and try new and unusual to you root foods.

As an added bonus, the problem poser mentioned that their wife likes horses. Horses like carrots. So could come around full circle. I wanted to add my own Any Other Business to this. Oh, really? Because I had a realization. This episode is coming out mere days before Easter. Oh, yes, it is.

Easter will be the 31st of March. Early Easter. Early Easter. And you know what that means. Soon, there's going to be an abundance of Easter egg chocolate. Oh, yes. The best of all the chocolates. Which is a prominent ingredient in a problem squares.

I just forgot about a problem squares. Because we had an episode a year ago. On request. About, yes, if we can invent our own candy bars. I invented one. Yes, you did. Proof by baking. Which involved, I think it used every letter of the word problem.

Yes. Because it was a problem and then square. Yeah. Because they're in square shape. So, you know, if your wife's birthday is just after Easter, make some problem squares. And then you can sort that for your birthday party. Are you going to make some problem squares, Matt? I thought about

making them again i mean i'll be i'll be in the states in la then yeah but also i was like you know it was so much so much work and so unhealthy so unhealthy and finally i'm gonna mention again periods of my book are happening and i'm mentioning a lot at the beginning because I'm doing a collaboration with a print artist, Paul Catherall, who I love their print work. They do the South Bank prints. You know, you know.

You've got that National Theatre one. Yeah, National Theatre one. The Brutalist Architecture prints. Amazing. The artist who does that, we're doing a collaboration on a math shape architecture style print. And that will be the free limited edition covers people get if they pre-order

Love Triangle. I've loved Paul Catherall's work for years and we got chatting unrelated a little while ago. And then I pitched this idea of doing a collaboration print. I love that. Yeah. I haven't seen it yet. Like Paul's still working on it.

So we've had a lot of back and forth and I'm just kind of waiting to see, see what happens. So I'm very excited. Yeah. I haven't seen it yet. Like Paul's still working on it. So we've had a lot of back and forth and I'm just kind of waiting to see what happens. So I'm very excited. Yeah. But if you need to be in the first N thousand pre-orders to get one of the three different styles. Or zero thousand. If you're in the zero thousand, you get the simplex edition. Yeah.

Pretty special. At the time of record, we're halfway through the tetrahedron edition being allocated and then this the triangle edition after that which we'll have a finite number of none of that sentence made sense to me ah but for some people they're now very excited about getting in on the uh tetrahedron edition cool yeah normally i'd ask you to explain but i'm too tired now i don't link. And that's the end of the podcast. We'd like to thank everyone for listening. We'd like to extra thank our Patreon supporters who keep this whole operation up and running.

They keep us in Easter eggs to make a problem squares. And we pick three names from the Patreon at random. And I've already spun the spreadsheet and found three people we want to specifically pseudo name check. And this time that includes Thomas Anderson. You're just saying it in a Matrix style. Yeah, because that's his name, isn't it? Very cool.

Yeah. I was trying to say like the agent. I like it. But I think his full name is Thomas Anderson, isn't it? I think it was Thomas Anderson. I think so. I thought it was Mr. Anderson. It's definitely Mr. Anderson.

I think his first name is Thomas. Well done. TJ Drenan. The last one is Maximum H-ness. Thank you so much to all our Patreon supporters, everyone else who listens and shares this podcast i have been uh matt park why do you sound so bored oh it's so long what a day they're the ones listening to it hey everyone if you're still listening i mean cut your losses come on oh my

gosh this is the opposite of good hosting joined by beck hill who can do better. And a huge thanks to our producer, who is the opposite of senior leadership bursting into the room saying, what is this commotion? Why is there a bird here? Lauren Armstrong Carter. It walked on my pillow. It's my favorite line from Arrested Development. Okay, Bec, we're getting dangerously close to the number of dice in the jar. We know it's under 461. We know it's above 453.

This is exciting enough for you. How many dice are in? Sorry, I was double checking that it is Thomas Anderson. It is. It is excited enough for you. How many dice are in? Sorry, I was double checking that it is Thomas Anderson. It is. It is Thomas Anderson. We've also, as well as Skylab hanging out in the office, and my wife Lucy has joined us. Yeah, we're stunt casting now.

If you had to guess. Professional cameo. Can you see that bowl, that jar of dice up there? Beck's trying to guess how many dice are in that jar. Lucy's now counting them from afar. She's like, one, two, three. She's running the numbers. Do you want to have a guess?

Or I can give you the upper and lower bounds we're currently working to. No. No? Excuse me. I'm not going to do all that hard work to have someone else step in and take the glory. Higher. Okay, Beck.

My guess. Yep. 400. Yep. And 57. Higher. Ooh. Not many left now.

Mm-mm.