The Infinite Monkey Cage - Fierce Creatures

Episode Date: January 26, 2015

Brian Cox and Robin Ince are joined on stage by naturalist Steve Backshall, zoologist Lucy Cooke and comedian Andy Hamilton as they battle it out to decide which creature wins the title of earth's most deadly. The panel reveal their own brave encounters with a host of venomous, toxic and just downright aggressive beasts, including the bullet ant, rated the most painful stinging insect on the planet, deadly tree frogs and snakes, sharks, scorpions and hippos. They ask whether our seemingly innate fear of snakes and spiders is justified, and whether the deadliest creature on the planet is in fact a human being.

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Hello, I'm Robin Ince. And I'm Brian Cox. And welcome to the podcast version of the Infinite Monkey Cage, which contains extra material that wasn't considered good enough for the radio. Enjoy it. Hello, I'm Brian Cox. And I'm Robin Ince. And this is the Infinite Monkey Cage. The show described by one disgruntled blogger as one of those shows that thinks you can prove anything with facts and evidence. Genuinely true. And presented by someone described as so-called Professor. Brian Cox. And he is, by the way, just so you know, he is so-called Professor Brian Cox, because he is.

Professor. And so, as you probably realise already, he is very much the brains of the operation while I'm the not brains The John Peel impersonator I'm the not brains really of the operation, that's my main job You do great impressions then I can do Mr Magoo being Richard Feynman

I've got a friend who's an artist and sometimes says something I don't agree with too well, he says, I as an artist when I see a flower, there we go It's not the flower at all. Seamlessly got out of that. Anyway, so, today, in fact, even though I am the not-brains, by the way, I just have to quickly tell you this. Just after the last series that we did,

I did go and have a brain scan, which was worrying, because I genuinely thought, what if it does turn out that I haven't got one? But as long as I didn't know, it was fine, but on the act of observation, you know, kind of Schrodinger's brain system. And afterwards, I found out that the woman doing the brain scan, this is the only time it's ever happened to me,

apparently halfway through the scan, she went, oh, my God, his brain's so big, I'm not sure I can fit it all in. And then blushed. And that is the only time anything about me has ever made a woman blush. And it turns out I have quite a big occipital lobe. I look at a lot of things. And I'm not showing off, by the way, about having a big brain, because, as we know, a brain size within a certain range,

it doesn't really make much difference. Einstein had a smaller brain than me, but I reckon had the intellectual edge. So, anyway, today we received a memo from the BBC Deputy Assistant Science Facilitator Modulating Ombudsman saying that Brian has been confusing people with his particle physics speech, such as... Asymptotic freedom!

And could we target a broader demographic who enjoy scary things and contemporary dance? So... LAUGHTER and contemporary dance. So... LAUGHTER How many more of these have you got, Robin? Can you just get them all out of the way now? Oh, no, no, no, they're going to be scattered through, Mr Tango Man. Today's show is called, quite simply,

Nature's Most Frightening Things. Cha-cha-cha. LAUGHTER Actually, that's almost true. Today we're looking for nature's most deadly animal. Is it sharks? things. Cha-cha-cha. Actually, that's almost true. Today we're looking for nature's most deadly animal. Is it sharks? No. Oh. Why is it that at times we seem to be petrified of the innocuous and unaware of the truly

deadly? What are the most astounding and ingenious methods of survival that have evolved by the process of mutation, heredity and natural selection? We are joined by two people who for some insane reason, constantly confront a barrage of fanged, stinging, poisonous, toxic, deadly creatures and a comedian who sometimes gives Sandy Toxfig a piggyback.

And they are... My name's Steve Batchel. I am a naturalist and my favourite toxin is dendrobata toxin, which occurs from the skin secretions of poison dart frogs, and in one particular species, Phyllobites terribilis, which is no bigger than the end of my thumb, it's said to have enough poison in one frog

to kill ten people. But let's see what else you can win. Hello, my name's Lucy Cook, and I'm a broadcaster and zoologist, and my favourite toxin is the one produced by the slow loris from its elbows, because I think it'd be really cool to have poisonous elbows, particularly on the tube. Good evening, my name is Andy Hamilton,

from Fulham, London, England and my favourite toxin actually I don't like to choose a favourite toxin because I find it causes resentment among the other toxins but if I had to choose I think I would go for cyanide

because it smells of almonds which means that poireau can always smell it cyanide is a toxin, is it? It smells of almonds, which means that poireau can always smell it. Cyanide is a toxin, is it? Broadly speaking, it's a toxin, isn't it? It is, yeah. It's a poison, not a venom, which is... No. Oh, don't worry, Steve. We'll be dealing with the old toxic venom conundrums in a moment.

But let's first say, and this is our panel! Yeah! Well, Steve, we'll start with you. And first of all, obviously, this show has actually been pre-recorded by some months, so congratulations on winning Strictly Come Dancing. Coming third is Strictly Come Dancing. Coming fifth and being knocked out in the first round. So one of those will work in the edit.

What is the... This is the only thing I'm going to ask about the dance competition, but what is the difference between the feeling of fear, where, you know, when I watch you on television and you are approaching, you know, Taipan snake, one of the... It's certainly one of the most poisonous snakes. The difference between that and then going in front of people and dancing, you know,

which one actually makes you feel more nervous and more nauseous? It sounds absolutely ludicrous, but there's no comparison. It's the dancing by a mile. I'm far, far less nervous swimming out of a cage alongside a great white shark than I am going under a spotlight doing something at which I am absolutely terrible, knowing that at least 10 million people are watching. You're just so completely exposed.

Not that I'm doing it naked, though, to be honest, not far off in some of the outfits. Out of the cage with the great white, it is a dangerous thing, isn't it? Because I've swum in a cage with the great white, and it attacked the cage. It depends very much on the situation. So there's one particular place in Guadalupe in Mexico where the water clarity is extraordinary. You can see

the sharks from a very long way away. You can assess their behaviour and there are certain things about the posture that a shark will take on that will allow you to tell whether it's basically in an aggressive mood. If it has an arch back, if it has the pectoral fins drop down low, the gills billowing, the mouth open and the movements are angular, then

it's ready and raring for action and you stay in the cage. If on the other hand, you've got a shark that's gliding along with the petrel things spread wide like wings, it's just kind of moving around, checking out its environment. It's not interested in attacking. And I've spent hundreds of hours in the water with sharks now and you can tell pretty much 100% which ones are the ones that you have to be worried about and which aren't.

What if you meet a very clever shark who listens to Radio 4? He's going to suss you out next time, isn't he? He's going to glide past looking disinterested and then that'll be it, Steve. Well, if the next time I'm back here I only

have one arm, Andy, then that's probably why. Are all these things true that you hear? When I swam with them, they said, well, you can punch them on the nose, they don't like that. You can get... It's easier said than done with the great white, I suppose. I wouldn't fancy trying it. They don't change direction very quickly, do they,

once they start coming at you? It depends on the species. Great whites certainly do not have the ability to turn completely around and sort of go backwards, like, for example, a lemon shark does. It's much more manoeuvrable. They do. You're absolutely right. The whole thing about punching them on the snout is not an urban myth.

They have these incredibly highly sensitive pores in the snout called the ampullae of Lorenzini, which are filled with a gel which makes them incredibly sensitive to electrical signals and allow them to sense the moving muscles of their prey. But it does mean that their snout is phenomenally sensitive, so much so that, in some species, by tickling or

rubbing the snout you can put the shark into a kind of of torpor of stupor and they'll pretty much go to sleep it's called tonic immobility and you can you can flip a shark over and it will just lie there going oh that feels so good that just feels amazing it is literally like having a labrador puppy that's lying there enjoying it so much that it's just totally transfixed. Have you used that on Strictly? See, that's what we need. If you could be a cage dancer with the sharks... LAUGHTER

..that could be the worst of all worlds. Lucy, you obviously also work with animals which are toxic, venomous, etc. Now, when we started talking about the idea of doing the most dangerous animal on Earth show, a lot of people went, well, isn't the most dangerous animal human beings? So how do you feel? When people do say, are we the most dangerous animal?

Yes. Short answer, but yeah. No, we are. There was a recent survey that came out in the last 40 years. We've managed to kill 50% of all species. Although all 50% of all species have died out. So, you know, that's really just down to us and what we've done. So that probably means that we are the most deadly of all animals.

I think killing other... Animals that have killed other humans, the mosquito is the most deadly of all animals. And then we come second. But then if you included all the other animals that are out there potentially to be killed, we done pretty well we've done better than mosquitoes so the mosquito so that's malaria yeah malaria and dengue fever which friend of mine in the audience has had recently and uh it was it was great wasn't it yeah and um and and a whole host of other really

nasty things mosquitoes are almost as nasty as us, but not quite. So, in many ways, we're the winner. I love the way your jolly voice there. A friend of mine who had dengue fever just said, Give us away. Still not that well. Her internal organs were bleeding, actually. Yeah, you've got a very jolly way. It's very rare we see that in casualty.

Internal organs are bleeding. Steve, you must have had all sorts of diseases like that. I always find it... I don't like filming in jungles and things like that, but that's where the animals live, usually, isn't it? Yeah, rainforest. It is. We do spend an enormous amount of time in rainforest environments

for just the reason that it is the most biodiverse environment on the planet, and if we don't find the jaguar or the harpy eagle that we've set out to find, we're almost certainly going to find something else, whether it's an intriguing frog or a snake or something. But it is also the place where you have the highest density of pathogens and parasites. And you pretty much always come back with something, whether it's a botfly larvae living in your head. Can you have one of those, Steve?

One of my cameramen had 69 infest him. I can't remember why I'm so precise about the number, but it was exactly 69, and he was on his own. He was infected with all these botflies. There's several different kinds of botflies, but they're usually quite large, and the particular species, this one, will catch

smaller flies, lay its eggs onto the smaller fly's legs. That smaller fly will then land on a large warm-blooded mammal and the second it lands the eggs hatch out and the larvae crawl down the legs and bury into the skin of the larger animal it's instantaneous it's an extraordinary thing and then they grow they feed on the on the flesh of their host and eventually they drop out they pupate and they turn into an adult fly again but for that period of time that they're in your skin, it is the most intensely painful, irritating, itching sensation.

He said he could hear them at night, scratching inside his head. And then he said that he got himself a bottle of rum, drank the entire thing, and just waited for death to take him. And then, out of the forest came a shaman who covered him in ointment, which popped all of the botflies out and he survived. It's a great story. So, Andy, do you still regret not going into nature documentaries?

Does this show go out at tea time? It does, doesn't it? I think, yeah, that's pretty horrific. I was just thinking, it's a bit unfair to label the mosquitoes as deadly, though, because deadly sort of carries that overtone of intent, doesn't it? I mean, human beings have... We've probably... A lot of the exterminating of species has happened because we've killed them and eaten them or done something like that.

But, of course, the mosquito has no idea we even exist. I mean, he's just taking blood because they need the blood. Is it the female, isn't it? It's the female mosquitoes. Yes, that's right. The females... There's about 3,500 different species of mosquitoes. The majority of them are of no harm whatsoever to us. They don't drink blood. And the males, as adults, don't drink blood either.

They usually lap nectar, and they're quite important as pollinators. But the females, particularly of the Aedes and the uh anopheles mosquitoes will take a drink of blood before they're ready to basically lay their eggs it's a protein feast but it's still not their fault though just before he says this woman bashing that's going on yeah i feel it's the only woman on the panel that need to sort of stand up it's not the female mosquito isn't doing it intentionally obviously it's a vampire no she's been infected by plasmodium and all sorts of other nasties. Oh, it's so easy to blame the plasmodium.

Do you know what? That is the really interesting bit, though, because plasmodium is this tiny single-celled organism that has no brain, and yet it has the ability to alter, fundamentally alter the behaviour of the mosquito to make the transmission of plasmodium more effective. So when a mosquito bites you, in its saliva it has an enzyme called aporase,

which thins your blood and it makes it easier for the blood to keep flowing into its system. But when it's infected with a malarial parasite, it goes straight to the salivary glands and it shuts off the flow of aporase, which means that each female mosquito has to visit at least twice as many hosts to get the same blood meal. So that parasite has completely altered the behaviour of the mosquito so that it goes around, it bites more people

or more mammal hosts and therefore spreads the disease more effectively. And throughout the natural world, you find instances of how parasites, which are not sentient beings, can completely alter the way their hosts behave. And it has been such an important way in the way

the whole natural world has moved forward, really. The whole evolutionary arms race that we are basically a part of has very much been driven by that relationship between parasite and host. We wouldn't exist. Lucy, we should ask you, because Steve has obviously nearly died hundreds of times

with these things and parasites and sharks. In your experience, your filming experience, or your field experience, what are the nastiest things you've encountered? Well, I nearly, sort of ironically, I nearly died because I loved an animal too much, which was sort of, you know, slightly unexpected, because I really love frogs.

Somebody's got to, and I really love frogs. And I went to Colombia to look for the frog, to look for Phelobartis terribilis, which is the world's most toxic animal, which is this little banana yellow frog. It's about an inch and a half long. And it is so toxic that it can kill ten men, and it sweats out this toxin out of its skin

that's the fastest-acting neurotoxin that's known. It will kill... One frog could kill two bull elephants in three minutes flat and there's no antidote they've actually done that yeah what a terrible bit of vivisection that was yeah anyway so we went to go and look for this and it was a massive great big mission to get there because it's in the wild west of columbia which is seriously wild and dangerous and we had to go past the front line and guys with machine guns and i had to sign away my life and the whole thing was very scary indeed and then we got into the jungle and we had to go past the front line and guys with machine guns, and I had to sign away my life. And the whole thing was very scary indeed.

And then we got into the jungle, and we found the frog, and I had to wear protective gloves, because if you just touched it with your fingers, and the toxin could get into your fingers, and obviously if you touch your face, then you'd be dead in three minutes. And it's one of those cheery poisons that shuts down all your nerves and everything. So for the last minute, you appear to be dead, but you're actually still alive, silently screaming inside.

I'm still alive! Save me! But actually everybody thinks you're dead at that stage. So... I've done gigs like that. Yeah. So we go there and we find the frog and I'm just like, it's just amazing. I've been on this massive journey and I've wanted all my life to see this animal. And I've got my plastic gloves on, but still I'm literally just shaking because it's like holding a loaded gun.

And the thing hops, obviously. So everybody, everywhere I point it, everybody's like moving away. And I'm just like, I'm talking about it. And then I just, sometimes I get overwhelmed by the amazingness of evolution and how wonderful and fantastic thing it is. And I burst into tears. And I went to wipe the tears away from my eyes. And my entire crew went, stop! And so, yeah, I nearly did it.

And it was nearly death by frog, which would have been so awful. And lots of schadenfreude, I think, from people that know me and don't really like me very much. I loved it too much. Were you doing research into this? Do we have any idea why that frog is so awesome? Malice. It's, as Steve was saying, it's an evolutionary arms race, basically.

It's a freak, it's a total freak, because you're absolutely right, it does not need to be that poisonous. There's no need for it to be so poisonous. But its nemesis is this snake, which is the only thing on this planet, other than the frog itself, that can tolerate the toxin that it sweats out. How unlucky is that? You're the one predator.

And so they've been over millennia, they've been in this evolutionary arms race of predator and prey getting more and more poisonous. We should elaborate a bit on that because it's an interesting example of evolution. So there's a small area, presumably, where these two, the predator and the prey, are so it's only the size of washington state that's the that's the the size of the place where you find the frog it's a tiny area and it's the original poison dart frog there

are lots of frogs that are called poison dart frogs but this is the only one that the imbera indians actually use to poison their darts and if they if they use it on their darts the darts will still kill a jaguar after three years that's that's potent yeah and i met the guy i met the embera still now i i met the one of the guys who makes the blow guns and i said to him god you know just these darts lying around that's a bit dangerous isn't it you ever had any accidents and uh and he goes yeah no no we have actually you know um you know my uncle actually he was he goes, yeah, no, no, we have, actually. You know, my uncle, actually, he was shooting parrots in a fruit tree, as you do, and he shot the dart up and it came back down

and it shoved him in the shoulder, and three minutes later he was dead. And he said, and it was around the time, it was about ten years ago, that guns were appearing in the area, so we switched from blowpipes to guns because they were safer. But it's going to seem like a silly question because you could almost say, well, this snake,

it's a particular species of snake that only preys on these frogs. And obviously it's been driven. The frog tries to defend itself, it will poison a few of the snakes, the ones that are immune will breed, and there you go. But why didn't the snake just eat a different frog? Well, because the different frog probably exudes a different poison that it isn't tolerant to. Right, so that's what that snake eats.

Yeah. The really clever thing about this frog, one of the things about the really clever thing about the frog is that it doesn't actually make the toxins itself it's actually like a little mini biosequestor and it actually gets the toxins from a beetle that it eats and then I think the chemicals are slightly modified by the frog and then exuded from its skin

which is also a great advert for the importance of biodiversity because everything's important, even the little beetles because pharmaceutical companies are really interested in that frog because it blocks the sodium receptor sites. It could be used for treating irregular heartbeats and it's being investigated. But if you take the frog out of the jungle, it loses its toxicity and it's benign

because it has to eat its dangerous diet. There's actually an awful lot of natural poisons and venoms that have tremendous potential for pharmacology. A lot of natural poisons and venoms that have tremendous potential for pharmacology a lot of them particularly venoms tend to be incredibly complex molecules and they can be used for all sorts of different things there's a drug on the market at the moment called capratyl which is another heart drug for hypertension which comes from the venom of neotropical lance heads there's another one for diabetes which comes from the gila monster there's one for that has coagulant properties

that I think comes from Russell's viper, whose venom achieves something very similar. Who was Russell? I assume he was the naturalist who described it first. Russell's viper is probably the most dangerous snake on Earth, not that snakes are particularly dangerous to human beings. But because this molecule has evolved over deep time to have such intense functions in the body of its either prey

or things that it's defending itself against, they have tremendous potential for chemists. Well, Andy, I'll just go to you, because we've asked everyone else about the most dangerous animals, and I'm sure that you've probably been to the rainforest, etc., and done it for you. What's the thing that you find most kind of initially shocking in another species, anything you've had to confront?

What do you jump on a chair when you witness? Not a lot. I mean, we were attacked by a hippo. That was quite spectacular. We'd made the mistake. They're very dangerous. Well, I was thinking about what you were saying about, you know, the two animals get locked in an arms race where they each increase. But there is that thing. The other element of deadliness is aggression, isn't it?

And, I mean, the reason hippos are the biggest killer in Africa is primarily they're just so aggressive. And, like you said, they don't need to be that poisonous. I mean, a hippo doesn't need to be as aggressive. We were in a little low-bottom skiff. We were out early in the morning looking at kingfishers, and we came across this herd of hippos that were grazing. And this little lad, he was only about 11,

he put the outboard in again, and we went round. And unfortunately, we ended up with hippos behind us in the water, and one very large bull hippo sort of bouncing on the shore and roaring and uh this little lad turned to me and he said you see that hippo on the shore i said what the one that's bouncing up and down and roaring he said yeah he said that's the bull hippo i said right he said you see these ones behind us i said yeah he said that's his harem so i said is this a good place to be between a bull hippo and a harem? He went, no.

He said, but it's all right, we'll be all right. He said, cos he's scared of the outboard. And at that moment, he revved the outboard as if to make the point. He went... And the outboard died, and there was an awful moment of silence, you know, where you could just hear the water lapping against the boat.

And then the bull hippo did a sort of double take, where he kind of realised, oh, my enemy is dead. And he charged us, yeah, and this kid was pulling at the outboard. My wife was taking photographs. She got a brilliant photograph of a hippo with a huge bow wave in front of his head and luckily this kid got the outboard going and the hippo stopped but did it so opened his mouth you know they're very big those tasks you know but i mean that's an example it seems to me that

that in a way the animals are very aggressive like there are some snakes aren't there that and you know most snakes are shy and they will move away if they hear you coming and or if you disturb them but there are like mambas that will chase, aren't there, that... You know, most snakes are shy and they will move away if they hear you coming or if you disturb them. But there are, like, mambas that will chase you, aren't there? That's a total myth. A total myth. No, I mean, I've filmed with mambas lots of times. And generally speaking, what they try and do, if they're confronted with a human being,

is to try and get to somewhere safe. And that is usually a hole in the ground or it's up a tree or it's into a thicket and they will move at great speed that you know in the guinness book of records as being the fastest snake on the planet straight towards whatever that is whatever wherever that safety is and if you are in the way of that then it might well will go towards you but i i've honestly never seen a snake chasing human being or heard a credible story but no i won't because we were talking about this beforehand, about the idea of hardwired fears, that there's a certain talk that the idea that we are born

with innate fears to, I think it's, is it right, falling, darkness and snakes? That a child even who has had no cultural experience with such of a snake, that apparently there will be, you know, the people who jumped just happened, you know, when they saw anything that such of a snake that apparently there will be you know the the people who jumped just happened you know when they saw anything that looked like a snake that seems to have gone down that that's been inherited and we have an innate fear of snakes and i just wonder yeah well steve didn't get that gene then did he no well do you know what actually i mean arachnophobia

is said to be the most common fear across cultures and societies around the world. And something that I have seen incredibly clearly. I did a lot of years where I would go to schools and do animal introductions for kids. And what I would see, without exception, was that if you did a talk for three, four, sometimes five-year-olds, and took out a big hairy tarantula out of a box, every single one of them will take that tarantula into their hand. Without exception. If you come back at six, seven, eight years old, they pick up on the cues from the

adults around them. So if their teacher goes, oh, it's a big hairy spider, then they won't take it into their hand. My little boy, when his fifth birthday passed, he did that. Big tarantula on his hand. Absolutely no problem. That's all. It's absolutely true and

and yet you i think most people would think that that is an innate fear that is something that we have got lurking there in the back of our mind and it makes sense that we would have innate fears that you know way back in our ancestral past when when there were certain things that that could genuinely do us damage every single day whether it's snakes or spiders or darkness or height or deep water that we would maintain those fears but my experience, it doesn't seem to be true of spiders. And spiders, 35,000 to 50,000 different species of them around the world, only a handful of them even capable of doing any harm to a human being. In Australia, where they have the world's most venomous spiders,

in the whole decade of the 1980s, I think there was one person killed by spider bites. Things like the red-back spider just never kill people anymore. But that's because of the availability of medical care 1980s, I think there was one person killed by spider bite. Things like the red-backed spider just never kill people anymore. But that's because of the availability of medical care, though, isn't it? A lot of it is down to the availability of antivenin, but also that people don't get bitten anything like as much as we think they do. And certainly you can see in the hysteria

that easily is generated around wild animals that we like that sense of the fear and the terror of the natural world, no matter whether it's true or not. I mean, you know, if there is a shark attack in Australia, it will make front-page news here in the UK. We have this image that sharks are a deeply dangerous, terrifying animal, yet fewer than 10 people a year are killed by sharks all around the world. They are of no significant cause to human mortality.

But it's exciting to think about a shark attack. It's something that has a grim, sinister, macabre kind of air to it that particularly the media seem to love. And the same is very true of spiders. We've had an awful lot of hysteria in the British press about spiders of late. Spiders are getting huge! They're getting enormous!

Massive monster spiders are invading our houses! Black false widow spiders are going to eat us getting enormous massive monster spiders are invading our houses black false widow spiders are going to eat us all alive and our limbs are going to rot off it's all nonsense but it makes good yeah it makes good we're going to cut that just before you say it's all nonsense but the sort of false widow is that that's the most venomous spider in the uk is it yeah i think that think that's fairly safe to say. But most of what's written about them is nonsense. It's a small, slow-moving spider, pretty inoffensive. They've been around for a long time, for at least 100 years.

You'd have to work pretty hard to get bitten by one. And they don't have a necrotising venom. All this talk of people losing their limbs to massive, ulcerating, flesh-eating venoms is nonsense. Those are secondary affections that could be anything from a scratch from a bramble to, I don't know, a nick from a paper cut. But it's certainly not from the venom of the false widow spider. So books are the real villains then? Books are getting bigger, warns government ombudsman. villains then this is the real books are getting bigger government ombudsman the i'm so i still love the fact that most people get their five-year-old kid a party entertainer like a clown

for their doing you just said no just get a tarantula well no but it's interesting because we i saw that with you know as you said all these five-year-olds and they'd all pretty much hold these animals the big millipedes the spidersards, some snakes, absolutely no problem at all. But that's because they've got confident handlers who are handling. They're taking their cue, presumably, from the confident handler, aren't they? They're saying, oh, he looks... I mean, we had one like that where these kids, I remember they laid out in a row on the floor

while a python used them as a kind of travelator. I don't think you could get ten adults to do that no matter how pissed they were. Something else we wanted to talk about, which I didn't know anything about until today, which is the Schmidt Pain Index. This is something I don't know... Can you explain a little bit about what that is?

Yeah, there's this guy called um schmidt schmidt yeah he's got a fast and he's like basically he works out of um a university in tucson arizona and he's developed a pain index because he thought it'd be really useful for people to be able to sort of categorize the pain from stinging insects and he's been st apparently, by 150 in his line of work, because he's an entomologist and he specialises in stinging insects. So he's been stung by lots of them. And so he's developed this thing called the Schmidt Pain Index. He's written scientific papers about it,

painstakingly categorising the level of pain for each stinging insect. And it's a fantastic thing. I really do recommend that everybody goes away and Googles it and reads it because it reads like a fine wine guide or something. Because he sort of says these things like, yes, the fire ant is just like a light breeze on a paper cut, whereas the, you know, the tarantula wasp is like, you know, sticking a live hairdryer into a bath whilst you've been lacerated by razors, you know, the tarantula wasp is like, you know, sticking a live hairdryer into a bath

whilst you've been lacerated by razors, you know. So it's sort of like really florid descriptions, the kind of thing Gilly Goulden would do. He's not only being bitten and stung by these things, he's then having to go through the experience of getting in a bath with a hairdryer to find out if that's the most good. I think so, yeah.

Anyway, so what's interesting about it is it only goes up to four. So you'd think that... So he decided, which I think is quite true, he's got like 150 different stinging insects, but he's chosen to only take his scale up to four. So there's an awful lot of ones and twos and threes, but there are only three fours.

And I have to say, I have been bitten by the number one four which i bet steve has i bet steve's story is better than mine i'm going to tell you mine anyway because i've got the mic first but so you know i've been it's a bullet ant is number one which is this sort of very large ant that hangs around in the jungles of the amazon in the amazon and and if you go you know i was staying at a scientific field station at the time and all the biologists there it's like a rite of passage everybody's been stung by a bullet ant. So cool, because it feels a bit like being shot by a bullet. So inevitably, the day comes where I'm rushing around

with these monkey researchers, looking up at the trees, running around you, not looking where you're going, and I feel this thing goes in my shirt. And then I just think to myself, oh, crap. I really hope that that's not the bullet ant. I really hope that's not the bullet ant. And I look in there, and I can see the thing, and it's, like, stinging, and it's stinging my left breast.

And so then sort of the awfulness of the situation, I had to actually then get my left breast out so that the monkey researchers could use the venom extractor on it. I'm feeling a bit faint, Robin. And so they did their best to get the venom out, and I tell you what, it really did hurt, actually. It really, really hurt a lot, a lot more than anything else. I'd have given it a five, quite frankly.

It's a really interesting venom, the bullet ant venom, though, because bullet ants have massive mandibles, which is what they use for dissecting their prey. I felt those. They don't use their sting for for prey capture at all it's purely for defense and it's an almost completely pure neurotoxin and one of the reasons that people use it for tribal initiation ceremonies and why biologists would be able to actually be around going try out a bullet and sting it's great is because although it causes extraordinary pain

it's not dangerous it's not dangerous at all it has no allergens there's almost no no danger of a histamine reaction to the venom it's a venom that has evolved over time purely for use so that a massive great big animal comes and sticks its snout into a bullet ant's hole and it one single sting is enough to make that big animal never come back again and just totally over override its nervous system i haven't been back. No, I'm not surprised. Neither me nor my breasts have been back, actually. With a bullet ant sting, the pain is throughout your whole body. You start shaking, you start sweating. It's completely systemic. It goes through your whole body,

and it really does affect your nervous system. Your heart rate goes up. And if you have quite a few of them, you will be passing in and out of consciousness, there will be nothing in your world apart from pain for at least three or four hours and that is from an animal that's about the size of a fuse.

And then it just passes, the pain disappears and there are no further effects. It disappears completely, you have a massive overdose of adrenaline, you feel fantastic but no, there's no ill effects and and the chances of being being killed by it are next to none so is that that's your most painful encounter with an animal yeah my my bullet ant sting story was there's a tribe called the sateri maui in brazil that have an initiation ceremony for their young men to become adults and so what they do is they

take bullet ants they get hundreds of them, and they anaesthetise them in a sort of plant sap, and then they weave them into a pair of palm gloves with the stingers on the inside. And then the ants wake up, and you put the gloves on for about ten minutes and dance and get stung hundreds and hundreds of times, and then that is your transition into adulthood.

And you're using this one strictly at the moment? Oh, no. Yes, Robin, yes. You are an idiot, though, aren't you? You really are. It's interesting. It's almost kind of like... There's a lot of these initiation ceremonies.

I actually read Jared Diamond said a very interesting thing about things like initiation ceremonies, and they might be something to do with the handicap principle and the whole idea that essentially you've got men showing how potent they can be, that they can still manage to live and still manage to bear progeny despite the fact they're doing really stupid stuff, like sticking their hands into bullet ant gloves but but this one actually does seem to have a very real effect because like

i said you have such a massive overdose of adrenaline at the end of it that you feel like a god i mean for for a week afterwards i i felt like pretty much if i'd leapt off leapt off a cliff i could have flown um and and the people think that it makes them better hunters, that it makes them better fishermen, that it makes them better lovers. And so it's become a massive, intrinsic and very important part of their culture. Did you find you got on people's nerves in that week? The only reason I said that is because what you describe

was very like people on cocaine, wasn't it? Who always think they've had the most brilliant idea ever, you know, and you sit there thinking, you are so boring. You know, I mean, the elation, you know, it's a one-way street, isn't it? Can we persuade people in the TV industry to swap their previous choice for our new bullet ant gloves. Honestly, you'll come up with something even better than Gogglebox.

We have one final question for you. Before that, we always ask our audience a question, the hive mind of the Munch Cage audience, and today we asked them, what animal would you most like to be killed by and why? So, let's find out what we've got.

First of all, a hedgehog, because they're awesome. To be licked to death by a hundred golden retriever puppies. The worst one to be licked to death by TVs. Oh, I'm not reading that. And Iruk... I hope... Irukandji jellyfish, I'm not reading that. And Irukandji

jellyfish, aka the peanut jellyfish. So small you don't even know you've been stung. You fall unconscious after 30 minutes, then appear to have a massive heart attack. Seems like quite a nice way to go if you have to. We do have some quite weird clangor in my sleep. I'd like it to be a giant panda. They get

unnecessary amounts of good press. It's time we found out their true evil. So, let's find out. Andy, what would... One animal. Just choose the one animal. What would you like to be killed by? I think I'd quite like to be killed by a leopard, I think. I don't know why, I just really like leopards.

I nearly got a scorpion. My wife Libby, we were in Tanzania, and she was in the bath, and I was lying naked on the bed because it was very humid, and she went, Andy, can you come in here a sec? And I walked in, and she's a bit short-sighted. She was peering over the side of the bath and said what's that? And I looked at her and said

oh it's a scorpion. She said oh alright I'll stay in the bath. She said can you get rid of it? Can you get rid of it? And I said well I think I'll go and put some pants on and maybe some shoes because it's quite a big scorpion and but the trouble was

the door opened inwards so I couldn't I was reaching over him and as the door he got really antsy and the towel came up and he was getting quite close I was thinking so I've got the door half open naked with a scorpion and I'm thinking this is a I'm not sure what to do this is not a situation I've encountered in my childhood before. So luckily a Tanzanian soldier was walking past and he saw me and I looked around and I said, ah, a scorpion. And he just came in massive boots and he just squished them. And I went, thank you very much.

I loved your reasoning when you went, I'll put some pants on, because it was quite a big scorpion. I'd have done it naked with a smaller scorpion. You know, the bigger ones are more judgmental. Yeah, it was that old locker room insecurity that came in. Lucy, well, you've got close to it with your tears and the tree frog. What was one animal that... I think I would choose the Phelobartis cerebris.

I'd choose the death that I nearly had, because it would be fast, at least. It's one of the fastest that I can think of. But you'd feel so silly, wouldn't you? Well, not if I hadn't done it by accident. If I'd intentionally done it and I'd eaten one, then I wouldn't feel so foolish. So it's a very quick sort of Dignitas thing.

Yeah, exactly. It would be sort of Dignitas thing. Yeah, exactly. It'd be perfect for Dignitas, actually. Maybe this is the way to do it. I thought that. It's really interesting, but a couple of morbid people, it's interesting, when I tell that story, they go, ooh, that'd be a brilliant way to commit suicide,

wouldn't it? And you just think, ooh, you're dark. I don't know about you. Frog D dignitas. The Daily Mail are going to go nuts with this. BBC encourage suicide at latency payers' expense. And not even using British frogs. Using foreign frogs.

Steve, you've come close. What would you like to... You've come close. What would you like to... I think if I had to choose, it would probably be the venom of the blue-ringed octopus, which is something called tetrodotoxin, and it's described as being almost completely painless. There was one of the very few cases that's been documented of someone being killed by a blue-ringed octopus was a diver who brought one back from a rock pool and placed it into the cleavage of her bikini for a photo.

They're very beautiful little octopuses. And it bit her and she died about 12 hours later without any knowledge of what had happened to her whatsoever. So, yeah, I guess I was going to go. And a great Instagram photo as well. So you want to die wearing a bikini? There's another one for the Daily Mail. So, thank you very much to our panel,

who've been Steve Batchel, Lucy Cook and Andy Hamilton. As usual, we get sent quite a few emails and letters. And here is one of them. This is from Amy Elvidge. Dear Infinite Monkey Cage, in your show on human uniqueness, someone said that the elephants were unique because of their ability to pick things up with their noses. This isn't true. Tapers do it too.

Also, humans can. I did with pens and stuff. I'm 13.. Tapers do it too. Also humans can. I did with pens and stuff. I'm 13. I demonstrated this by sticking a pen up my nose and my parents got cross. It's like they're not even interested in scientific creativity. This one is Dear Brian and Robin. I enjoy listening to

The Infinite Monkey Cage. I like it when you have songs and when Robin does funny voices and things. Yeah. There we go. That'll do. I could it when you have songs and when Robin does funny voices and things. Yeah, there we go, that'll do. I could do your voice. It's wonderful and exciting and mysterious. Oh, I've had another text message. How do they work? It's like magic.

Do you know if the Andromeda Galaxy will collide with our galaxy? And if so, when, please? It's a wonderful letter. It's from Miko Campbell. He's eight years old. It's fantastic. So the answer is in about four billion years. So you're all right, Miko. Thank you.

Thank you very much for listening. Thank you to our panel. We hope to see you and hear from you again. Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! Goodbye! again. Goodbye! Goodbye! In the infinite monkey cage Without your trousers In the infinite monkey cage

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