00:21Because I like to win one against you every now and then.
00:24Okay, you're hot, Dana.
00:25Let's go!
00:26Well, today, I'm going to teach you about the invention of...
00:31What do you think?
00:32The iPod?
00:33Very important device in the history of the world.
00:37Chairs.
00:37The invention of chairs.
00:38Cars.
00:39No?
00:41Shoes?
00:42When people say the invention of...
00:44Yeah.
00:45What are some of the top things that we know the story of?
00:48The invention of spaceships.
00:51I've never heard of anyone.
00:54Who would we even attribute that to?
00:56NASA?
00:59Electricity.
01:00We don't invent electricity, right?
01:02Yeah.
01:03We find it.
01:03We kind of discover it.
01:04Yeah, we find it.
01:05The invention of the...
01:07What device?
01:08A mill of some sort.
01:09Oh, my God.
01:10Sewing.
01:11You're so all over the place.
01:13The telephone.
01:14I said iPod.
01:15That's close.
01:16Who invented the telephone?
01:17Franklin.
01:18Ben.
01:19Oh, my God.
01:23Well, he did electricity.
01:24Sometimes you say things that are so stupid that I actually have to, like, double check in my brain if somehow that's a fact I missed.
01:30Eli Whitney?
01:31Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone.
01:36Now, he's credited with it, but there's a lot of controversy.
01:40A big part of the fact that there's controversy around who invented the telephone is that there were other people who were kind of working on it at the same time.
01:49In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell filed the first patent for a telephone.
01:55Okay.
01:56Bell had been working with deaf children in Boston.
01:59Ah.
02:00How nice is that?
02:01That is nice.
02:02Was he using the cans?
02:03I don't think so.
02:04How the fuck does that work, by the way?
02:06I've never understood that, but that has to do with how sound waves travel through a medium, right?
02:11In which case...
02:11A string?
02:12A string, yeah.
02:13No.
02:14That doesn't...
02:15No.
02:15Have you ever tried it?
02:16No, but that doesn't add up.
02:17You can see how a string is similar to a telegraph cable, right?
02:23Like a wire.
02:24No.
02:24Wires are wires.
02:25Strings are, you know, strings.
02:28Okay, they're pretty...
02:30They're not dissimilar.
02:31No, but they have different material.
02:34All right, let's...
02:35Okay.
02:37It's too hot to do this.
02:40When you start talking cans and strings, I can't...
02:43You started talking cans and strings.
02:45You brought up cans and strings.
02:47I didn't bring that up.
02:50Why would I ever bring that up?
02:51I don't like when you yell at me.
02:53I'm not yelling.
02:54I'm speaking sternly.
02:55I don't like when you speak sternly to me.
02:58I'm not a toddler.
03:00You are.
03:02Well, kind of, but...
03:03You act like one.
03:04Okay, keep going with Bell.
03:05Starting in 1874, Bell had been working on a device that could transmit speech electronically.
03:14His big breakthrough was that he found a way to convert sound waves into electrical impulses,
03:19which he then passed through a wire, converting them back into audible sound.
03:23Huh?
03:24Don't ask.
03:25I know.
03:26You're asking the wrong guy.
03:27It's like putting a disc in an Xbox.
03:30How does that disc have a game on it?
03:34How do these people figure this shit out?
03:36He's building upon work that has led to that moment.
03:39And there was this field of work called telegraphy, where people were working on this.
03:43Prior to this, there was the telegraph.
03:49Telegram.
03:50Telegram.
03:51Yeah, telegram, right?
03:52Yes, that's like when you can read people's minds.
03:55Oh, man.
03:56Right?
03:59Same field.
04:00Telegram was the way that we did communicate, right?
04:04Yeah.
04:04Around the world up to that point.
04:06But we didn't have the audio.
04:08Okay, yeah.
04:08We couldn't hear that.
04:10So this was a big leap forward from the telegram.
04:12Yep.
04:12Dana, stop.
04:15I hear you're hungry.
04:17Stop.
04:17Have been instructed to forward you six pounds of frozen beef.
04:21Stop.
04:22Enjoy in good health.
04:24Yours, the cow farm.
04:27Yeah.
04:28That sounds like a nice call to receive.
04:29It's brought to you on a plate.
04:31It's like a raven coming in with a note.
04:33Not wrong.
04:34I know.
04:34Or a pigeon or whatever.
04:36Any sort of carrier bird.
04:37Again, how the fuck do they know?
04:39Yeah.
04:39The birds sort of go.
04:40It makes no sense, man.
04:43I don't disagree.
04:44It makes you think there's something bigger than us.
04:47But how do they know the pigeons where to go?
04:50I love that it's a pigeon's ability to know direction that makes you believe in God.
04:56Rather than, say, the miracle of life or the wonders of the universe.
05:02Yeah.
05:03Pigeons.
05:04Or like an Xbox game.
05:06Sure.
05:06The first telephone line was constructed between Boston and Somerville, Massachusetts.
05:12Oh, I lived in Somerville.
05:14Look at that.
05:15Yeah.
05:151877.
05:17I did.
05:17Me and my buddies.
05:18We had a, there's four of us.
05:19Cool.
05:20We used to play a beer die on our kitchen table.
05:23I'm happy to hear it.
05:24This invention so pushed forward the technology of communication that just three years later
05:32in 1880, there were over 50,000 telephone lines in the United States alone.
05:37There was another guy named Elisha Gray who filed a patent for a similar device on the
05:43exact same day that Alexander Graham Bell did.
05:47However, because he filed his slightly later in the day, the credit went to Alexander Graham Bell.
05:53Fucking Elisha.
05:54But you know what I say?
05:56The cream rises to the top.
05:58Yeah, okay.
05:58And so maybe he had some demons or something that we don't know about.
06:02Elisha Gray?
06:03Yeah.
06:04Maybe that, maybe it's good that he didn't get all the credit.
06:07I'm sure that.
06:07Could have changed history.
06:08There's another guy.
06:09I think he's an Italian guy named Antonio Miucci who in 1850 developed a device that
06:16he called the Teletrofono in order to communicate with his bedridden wife.
06:22You've spent many, many days, if not weeks in bed.
06:25I like to eat in bed.
06:26You would have had to get out of bed.
06:28I do a lot of errands.
06:30I do.
06:30He tried to file what's called a caveat, which was a precursor to a patent, but because
06:36he didn't have the money, he couldn't renew his patent and it fell through.
06:40But in 2002, somehow the world decided to actually credit him for his work on helping
06:47to develop.
06:48Bell formed a company called the American Bell Company, right?
06:52Later, when they started spreading more long distance kind of lines and things like
06:57that, they filed a new company called the American Telephone and Telegram Company, also known
07:03as AT&T.
07:05Bingo.
07:06If this guy had any fucking ounce of marketing ability, he'd call it the Bellophone.
07:14That's not bad.
07:15That's not even a joke.
07:16I'm going to give you credit for that.
07:17It's not a joke.
07:18That's not the worst thing you said.
07:19I'm a hundred percent serious.
07:20Yeah, the Bellophone.
07:21It's a great invention.
07:23And honestly, the world is a better place for it.
07:26Yeah, I think.
07:27It opened up communication lines that helped families stay in touch across long distances,
07:32as well as businesses to communicate with each other and place deals and orders and all
07:37these things that just connected the world in a way that hitherto it had not been.
07:42I can call my mom right now.
07:44How about that?
07:45Hi.
07:46Hey, mom.
07:47What you doing?
07:48I'm shooting with Francis right now.
07:50We're talking about phones.
07:52Francis.
07:54Hi, Mrs. Beers.
07:55How are you?
07:56How are you?
07:57I'm so well.
07:58It's so nice.
07:59It's nice to hear your voice.
08:00I'm sorry we haven't met yet.
08:02Oh, I really, really look forward to meeting you someday.
08:05You are a very bright person.
08:07Oh, thank you.
08:09I'm trying to wash some of it off on young Dana, and he's been learning.
08:14You're an excellent teacher, Francis.
08:16If only our country valued education the way that it values chugging beers.
08:22All right, all right.
08:23Francis, I really do hope I get to meet you sometime.
08:26And you.
08:26Lovely to speak with you.
08:28Have a great day.
08:29You too.
08:29Thanks for all your good work.
08:31Love you, mom.
08:31Bye.
08:32Bye, Dana.
08:33Love you.
08:33Look at that.
08:34That's about as sweet as it gets.
08:36Yeah, and I mean.
08:37Amazing.
08:38Yeah.
08:38To hear such an angelic woman and imagine how someone so sweet and wonderful could have
