EPISODE NUMBER: 5125 (September 30, 2009)
GUEST: Richard Dawkins
SEGMENTS: Threat Down, C.O.L.B.E.R.T. treadmill
VIDEOS: Wednesday, September 30, 2009
It seems like forever since we saw a Threat Down, and this one was worth the wait. The whole dog/pants/sanitizer/cart thing was a fantastically absurd story to feature. And it’s good to see that Stephen still considers bears a threat.
And yay for the C.O.L.B.E.R.T. treadmill! We mentioned the story a few days ago, but it was really neat to see footage of the treadmill being put together, and it was doubly neat to see the patch in space. Because I’m a total nerd like that.
The Richard Dawkins interview was quite interesting. It’s such an interesting study to see what appears to be Stephen screaming as “Stephen”, but the actual Stephen having to creep in and join the conversation as well. It’s fun trying to figure out which Stephen is asking the question. Dawkins threw out my very least favorite phrase in interviews ever, “Read the book”, which really started the interview on a sour note for me. I have to admit, though, I loved Stephen’s Reece’s Peanut Butter Cup analogy, mostly because Reece’s Peanut Butter Cups are proof that there is a God and he loves us. And I absolutely loved how Stephen dropped the “No, I wasn’t listening” line on Dawson – classic!
What did all of you enjoy most about tonight’s episode?
- It will be missed.
- Send Max Baucus your health care bill. All of them. Believe me folks, he’s good for it.
- They have declared World War 3-ply.
- It seems the best, fluffiest toilet paper is made from old wood. Which is why from now on, I’m only getting toilet paper made from Hugh Hefner. I have a Peabody award.
- Oh, so now I can’t wipe with a Hummer either. I’ve gotten used to all the different settings.
- Environmentalists, I swear, if you take away my plush toilet paper, I’m just going to use the next softest thing – spotted owls.
- Shh – Kang, you’re going to blow it for us parents! Children are small but relentless opponents who want to replace us.
- Metal Cart! Hand Sanitizer! Dog! Synthetic Pants!
- This is a threat to germaphobic pet owning polyester pants wearers everywhere.
- I’ve ran out of room for the metal cart, so I’ve included an asterisk and a footnote over here.
- That means we can’t shoot them, just as we got the right to take guns into national parks. It’s like the gift of the magi if the husband had been a grizzly bear and he had sold his pocket watch to buy his wife a gun.
- Turns out, NASA didn’t have the moon rocks to follow through. Instead of naming the node after me, NASA slapped my name on a treadmill and launched it into space. Well I have just one thing to say. NASA slapped my name on a treadmill and launched it into space! Suck it, space node!
- Put down the Tang, tubbo!
- I didn’t listen to you last time, you see, you don’t know how this works.
- Dawkins: Where’s the evidence for God? Stephen: Reece’s Peanut Butter Cups.
- God, are you deaf? It came from God!
- Floored me? No, I wasn’t listening.
- If that’s true, and we’ve had a million years of doing this, why are there still so many ugly people?
Well, I voted for the threatdown because I love any time Stephen defends white lies. The interview was spectacular, though. Out of the park home run.
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The interview was brilliant, but OMG SPACE TREADMILL UPDATE! Lucky for you guys that you did not see my reaction when he started that update by pretty much pointing out what I blogged on Monday. Wheeeeee!!! BTW, that footage they used to show the treadmill being installed on the ISS was actually shot several weeks ago, when Discovery was still docked at the station and they moved the main parts of the treadmill from the MPLM onto the station. I blogged about that here.
It would’ve been so cool if they had done this segment tonight, when I’ll actually be in the audience, but then I probably would’ve freaked out and completely embarrassed myself.
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Have fun tonight! I am sure it will be amazing!
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Have fun tonight – can’t wait for your taping report!!
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Have a great time! If he sends anything flying into the crowd I hope you catch it ;)
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Have fun tonight!
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Hope you had fun tonight – I can’t wait to hear about it!
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I had to go with the Threat Down because it has been so long and I love it when Stephen talks directly to kids…the boogeyman gets hungry when kids are naughty! Sounds twistedly familiar to something my uncle once told us!
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I love it when Stephen sinks his rhetorical teeth into a juicy interview and last night’s certainly was that.
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First of all I loved Stephen calling on people to send their medical bills to Max (douchebag) Baucus. I also thought that the dog, sanitizer, pants, metal cart thing was hysterical, especially the sign. I thought it was adorable when someone from the audience yelled out the last threat with him and he stopped and grinned. “Hey Grammy! Write me back!” :D
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So glad to see Threatdown back! And I knew it would somehow end with bears! I have a stack of medical bills I will now be sending to douchebag Max.
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That was a funny Threatdown! The dog/pants/hand santizer/cart story was truly bizarre. I’ve really been enjoying watching both Stephen and Jon skewer the whole healthcare debacle. At least I can laugh through my disappointment. I enjoyed the interview the most last night. Any time religion comes into play it’s going to be interesting! And I’ve been craving a Reece’s Cup all day. They are, indeed, proof of God.
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“If that’s true, and we’ve had a million years of doing this, why are there still so many ugly people?”
The best part of the interview!
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That was a good point but it missed a lot better one since the perception of the beauty of symetry on a wider scale like in the beauty of a sunset or the elegance of mathmatics can’t be accounted for as a survival trait.
Unfortunately the narrow focus that Dawkins puts on evolution in regards to only biology and misses the larger implications when evolution is applied to everything compromises a lot of his arguments so that his conclusions can’t be supported.
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ThreatDown was pretty hilarious. But the beginning with the health care bill, man, a whole lot of gallows humor, in a way, wasn’t there? Hehe.
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Tony Harris’ “What the… Seriously?!” ROFL
H = Human
A = Ass
R = Receiving
R = Receptacle
I = In
S = Studio
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It was difficult to choose a favorite segment, but I went with the health care bill, mainly because of the “send your health care bill to Baucus.” Favorite parts of the Threatdown were: the crack (sorry!) about Hefner; the character break at the start of the #1 Threat, & the tie-in to “The Gift of the Magi” (love that story!). I really enjoyed watching the C.O.L.B.E.R.T. segment, especially Stephen’s outright glee. This interview with Dawkins was somewhat more satisfying than his previous visit. The Reeses analogy was terrific.
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The interview was pretty great tonight. I loved it when Stephen said, “God did. Are you deaf?!” Hahhaha. Brilliant. I was really disappointed when I saw that the number one threat was beetles, not bears, but to my surprise it had to do with bears. Woot.
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What I want to know is, how did the audience member know the number one threat was pine beetles? He said something in passing at the beginning like “you do that so well you would think you had done it before..” Did they have to repeat a segment?
I loved the Threatdown. I am also glad he named and shamed those “Democrat” senators. I am angry about this health care debacle, and I’m Canadian.
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I definitely think they repeated the last part of the ThreatDown. When Stephen is putting down the sign, they cut to another angle, and his attitude and stance completely changes from “I’m putting this down to go to my next joke” to “Okay, I’m pretending to put this down again so that I can try that joke that I just screwed up AGAIN.” My guess is that he had to re-do threat #1 more than once, because several people were saying it along with him. So I assume he kept tripping over the words.
I do wish someone who was there had posted a report, though. I’d love to know the juicy details. ^_^
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the Gift of the Magi reference made me very pleased, since I went on a little O Henry spree this summer and I’ve read and enjoyed that story multiple times.
I voted for the Dawkins interview though because I like talking evolutionary biology. I can’t believe it takes a whole giant book in 2009 to make a case for it, though. I am not sure who is target audience is, but in terms of evolutionary biology in general, that’s about the least interesting area of study, imo. all scientists take its existence as a given and then get into the cool stuff like speciation or sexual selection.
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Love it when the line between Stephen and “Stephen” becomes blurred as it did during the Richard Dawkins interview.
There are now Dark Chocolate Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. What does this mean?
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