Original subtitles

CHARLIE: Hey, guys! Charlie here, you know my sister, Kirby.

KIRBY: Hey guys!

Did you know a lightning bolt has enough electricity to

toast 100,000 pieces of bread?

CHARLIE (off-screen): Or that platypuses can sense electricity

with their bills?

KIRBY: It's time for Weird But True!

CHARLIE: It's time for Weird But True!

(theme music plays).

Kirb! Let's go for a bike ride!

KIRBY: Mm, no thanks.

I think I'm just gonna craft for now.

CHARLIE: Ahh! C'mon!

I have so much extra energy.

We've been crafting inside all day.

Hey guys.

KIRBY: Hey!

CHARLIE: I'm glad you're here. Because Kirby's being a loaf.

KIRBY: I'm not being a loaf!

WOMAN (over radio): Breaking news!

Storms on the way!

Flash floods and downpours!

Ahh!

CHARLIE: I'll get the lanterns.

KIRBY: Every time a storm rolls in.

(thunder)

CHARLIE (off-screen): No!

KIRBY (off-screen): We lose power.

CHARLIE: This is the worst!

All I wanna do is go for a bike ride.

KIRBY: All I wanna do is use my hot glue gun!

What are we gonna do?

CHARLIE: The only thing we can do, Kirb.

We gotta find a solution to our power problem.

We gotta figure out how to get the lights back on and make

sure they stay on the next time a storm rolls around.

So, today we're unraveling the world of.

KIRBY (off-screen): Electricity!

CHARLIE (off-screen): Electricity!

KIRBY: Ok. Electricity.

CHARLIE: Electricity.

And the lights are back on!

WOMAN (over radio): A break in the weather?

Stay tuned!

KIRBY: For now. But there's another storm coming.

CHARLIE: Kirb, I can't handle another blackout.

We gotta find a way to keep the lights on!

KIRBY: So, I guess we should start with electricity's history.

CHARLIE: No, we should start with the science.

KIRBY: I think we should start with history.

CHARLIE: We usually do science and it usually works out

pretty well, Kirb.

KIRBY: You think you know everything, Charles?

CHARLIE: I think I know little about a lot of things, Kirb.

KIRBY: Oh yeah?

CHARLIE: Yeah, did you know this?

Not many people talk about it, but electricity was never invented.

It's always existed in nature.

KIRBY: What?

CHARLIE: You've never been to South America have you?

KIRBY: No, why?

CHARLIE: Well, there's this place called Venezuela.

Where they have this thing called the "Everlasting Storm."

KIRBY: Whoa.

(thunder)

CHARLIE (off-screen): It's a crazy intense thunderstorm that's happened

almost every night for over 100 years.

Thunder rolls through the sky and lightning strikes 15,000 times.

Almost. Every.

Single. Night!

Ooh!

KIRBY: Well you think that's good?

There's this thing called an electric eel.

KIRBY (off-screen): They produce huge electric shocks

to defend themselves, that's five times the voltage in a

standard wall socket.

It can shock a horse straight off its feet!

CHARLIE: Ah! Really?

KIRBY: Really.

CHARLIE: Wow. Well you've heard of an elephant, right?

KIRBY: Yeah, why?

CHARLIE: Well there's this thing called the elephant-nose fish.

KIRBY: No.

CHARLIE (off-screen): It's this fish that can find its

way around murky waters by generating an electrical field

with its tail and sensing disturbances with a special

nose-looking body part that's actually a chin called

a schnauzenorgan!

KIRBY: A what?

CHARLIE: A schnauzenorgan. KIRBY: A schnauzer.

CHARLIE: An organ. So animals use electricity.

KIRBY: And humans were eventually able to do the same.

CHARLIE: But they didn't invent it, they discovered it.

And it wasn't Ben Franklin or Thomas Edison.

They came much later.

KIRBY: It was actually this guy, Thales of Miletus,

a Greek philosopher.

CHARLIE: You son of a gun.

KIRBY: I am the queen of transitions!

CHARLIE: Ugh, fine, we'll start with history.

KIRBY: To the craft zone!

KIRBY (off-screen): So this guy,

Thales of Miletus discovered that when he rubbed a piece of

amber with a piece of fur.

It was attracted to super light things like feathers.

He discovered static electricity.

CHARLIE (off-screen): It took 2,000 years before scientists

discovered more things about electricity.

KIRBY (off-screen): In 1600, William Gilbert first used the

word "electricity."

CHARLIE (off-screen): In 1752, Benjamin Franklin invented

the lightning rod.

KIRBY (off-screen): In 1800, Alessandro Volta invented the

first electric battery.

And in 1821, Michael Faraday paved the way for the electric motor.

CHARLIE: And then came the true father of modern electricity.

Nikola Tesla.

KIRBY: Thomas Edison.

You mean Thomas Edison.

CHARLIE: I think you're mispronouncing it, Kirb.

It's ok, cause it's Serbian.

It's like Tes-la.

KIRBY: Edison! CHARLIE: Tesla!

KIRBY: It's Edison! CHARLIE: Tesla!

KIRBY: Edison!

Hi! I'm Thomas Edison!

The father of modern electricity!

I brought the people out of darkness with the lightbulb!

CHARLIE: I'm Nikola Tesla, the true father of modern electricity!

Hate to break it to you bud, but your "lightbulb" wasn't

even the first "lightbulb."

Cities and factories were already lit with a different

type of electric light.

This, the arc lamp.

Yours was uh just a bit cheaper.

KIRBY: How dare you! CHARLIE: How dare you!

KIRBY (off-screen): Here's the story.

Edison invented the lightbulb and provided a cheap way for

people to light their homes.

It was a big deal.

This is a big deal.

KIRBY (off-screen): So, he established the

Edison Illuminating Company.

We'll send power to people's homes and light them up!

All using my system: the direct current.

KIRBY (off-screen): AKA DC current.

Things were going great.

Until Tesla arrived on the scene as Edison's assistant.

And he had an idea.

CHARLIE: I've got an idea for a new type of current that can

travel even further than direct current.

It's called alternating current.

KIRBY (off-screen): AKA AC current.

Edison hated the idea.

I hate this idea.

CHARLIE (off-screen): But other people didn't,

the people with all the money.

CASEY: Hey there, cowboy, I love your idea and I got like

a bajillion dollars.

You want to ride this pony?

CHARLIE (off-screen): So they did.

The world's fair in Chicago used alternating current.

The first hydroelectric plant at Niagara Falls used

alternating current.

It was all the rage!

Edison was upset, fewer and fewer people were using his DC current.

He got angry and did some crazy things.

Like campaign against AC current.

KIRBY: DC current's forever!

AC current stinks!

CHARLIE (off-screen): Things got a little out of hand.

Soon Edison was forced out of his company,

which adopted AC current too.

Today, alternating current is used to power most things.

Anything you plug into your wall uses AC current.

KIRBY (off-screen): But some things like computers and

electric vehicles use direct current, with converters.

CHARLIE: So I guess the title of the father of modern

electricity is still up in the air.

KIRBY: Yeah.

But I mean I think the bigger question is we don't really

know what electricity is.

CHARLIE: Ohh, so now you wanna go over the science, Kirb?

KIRBY: Sure.

CHARLIE: Ok, so what is electricity?

KIRBY: Magic.

CHARLIE: I mean, what's it made out of?

KIRBY: Magic.

CHARLIE: C'mon, Kirb, it's made out of electrons.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Electrons are tiny particles

in atoms that orbit around the nucleus, this part.

When electrons move, through a metal wire or something

similar, that's called an electric current.

When the wire makes a loop, it's called a circuit.

Electrons need a complete loop to flow.

So what do you think, Kirb?

We just kind of like smash into these walls,

check out those wires, try to find the problem?

KIRBY: Yeah, that's not a good idea.

CHARLIE: How come?

KIRBY: Charles, this stuff is dangerous.

I feel like we have to go somewhere else,

learn a bit more before we address the HQ issue.

CHARLIE: We gotta figure this out quick.

Have a place in mind?

KIRBY: Yeah. The Franklin Institute in Pennsylvania.

They have a whole part of their museum that's dedicated

to electricity.

(radio static)

WOMAN (over radio): More storms coming!

CHARLIE: Seems like it's now or never!

Let's roll!

CHARLIE (off-screen): We're off to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Home of the US Treasury Mint and former home to a guru of

electricity, Ben Franklin!

KIRBY (off-screen): Weird but true.

CHARLIE: Ladies and gentlemen, we've traveled all the way to

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to introduce this next guest.

KIRBY: You may know him as the inventor of the bifocals or

for being on the $100 bill.

CHARLIE: The one. KIRBY: The only.

CHARLIE: Ben Franklin!

How you doing there, Big Ben?

KIRBY: It's just a statue, Charl.

CHARLIE: True. We traveled all this way to visit this museum.

CHARLIE (off-screen): This is the Franklin Institute,

where we can learn about Benjamin Franklin and all of

his research about electricity.

KIRBY: Looks pretty sweet!

Let's go check it out!

KIRBY (off-screen): Susannah Carroll is a curator and helps

care for their Ben Franklin collection.

SUSANNAH: Weird but true, Benjamin Franklin was an avid

swimmer, and invented the swim fins.

CHARLIE: Hey Susannah, it's so nice to meet you.

SUSANNAH: Hi, nice to meet you too Charlie.

KIRBY: Hi I'm Kirby.

SUSANNAH: Hi, Kirby.

CHARLIE: Here's the situation.

Back at headquarters, the lights went out,

and we're not exactly sure how to get them back on.

So we're here to learn everything we can about electricity.

Apparently, Ben Franklin is like the guy when it comes to electricity.

Right?

SUSANNAH: He is the guy.

CHARLIE: At the time, were people using electricity for anything?

SUSANNAH: Yeah, there was some experimentation,

Franklin actually saw some experiments in Boston that

really got him excited and created his own lab so that he

could test all his theories.

And Franklin actually developed some of the

vocabulary: charge, positive, and negative that we use today

when talking about electricity.

CHARLIE: That was him? SUSANNAH: That was him.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Benjamin Franklin was always curious.

And innovative.

He decided that lightning might be the same thing as electricity.

To prove it, he needed something to get close to the

clouds and attract the lightning.

By tying an iron key to a kite string during a storm,

he was able to identify the electrical charge.

SUSANNAH: This is one of the earliest known examples of

Franklin's lightning rod.

CHARLIE: This is something that he invented, right?

SUSANNAH: Yes, yes.

CHARLIE: So, like before Benjamin Franklin,

there were no lightning rods.

SUSANNAH: That's right.

CHARLIE: And now, they're on skyscrapers and buildings

all over the place.

SUSANNAH: Mhm, yep, the lightning rod would be on the

top of a house, it would pull the lightning from the sky and

draw it all the way down into the ground.

And that's why we call it grounded,

because then it wouldn't shock anyone else or catch a house on fire.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Wow.

KIRBY (off-screen): Wow.

SUSANNAH (off-screen): It's made out of a metal, iron,

which is a conductive metal.

CHARLIE: All right guys, conductive materials,

or conductors.

CHARLIE (off-screen): That's a word you hear a lot when talking about

electricity, so let's look into it just a bit more closely.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Materials are either

insulators or conductors.

Electric currents can flow through conductors,

but they can't easily flow through insulators.

It all has to do with their electrons.

In insulators, the electrons are relatively fixed near

their atom's nucleus.

But in conductors, there's a sea of electrons,

that can flow throughout the whole thing,

shared by all of the atoms.

Things like wood, glass, and rubber are all insulators.

Electricity cannot easily flow through them.

Metals like copper, silver, and aluminum are conductors.

Electricity can easily flow through them.

Cool, cool.

Back to the museum!

We're moving on to the big boy right here?

SUSANNAH: Yeah.

You would see something like this,

a generator in different labs.

And this would create an electric shock that you could

wrangle and then use to make something power,

or something go, but.

KIRBY: You could capture an electric shock from this thing?

SUSANNAH (off-screen): Mhm.

KIRBY (off-screen): That's wild.

SUSANNAH: You can make it. And capture it.

And hold it.

CHARLIE (off-screen): So this is kind of like a generator,

like an early generator that could create the electricity.

SUSANNAH (off-screen): Right.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Wow so, Ben Franklin.

Not just a guy who flew a kite.

KIRBY: Nope. CHARLIE: In a storm.

KIRBY: Uh-mm.

CHARLIE: He figured out that thunder and lightning was

actually electricity, invented the lightning rod.

Generators, batteries before batteries were a thing and it

seems like we got a lot more to see upstairs, right?

SUSANNAH: Absolutely.

CHARLIE (off-screen): All right. Point us in the right direction.

SUSANNAH (off-screen): Head right up there.

CHARLIE: This is the electricity exhibit at the Franklin Institute,

this is what we came to see.

KIRBY: And the place is covered in exhibits and toys and all

these things to help us learn about electricity,

and we got it all to ourselves.

Should we check it out?

CHARLIE: Let's go check it out!

KIRBY: This is so cool.

So by spinning this magnet around this coil of wire we're changing

the magnetic field inside of here and creating an

electrical current which can be measured with this

meter right here.

CHARLIE: Electricity seems like such a magical or a weird

thing, but when you boil it down, this is what it is.

CHARLIE (off-screen): A magnetic force moving through

a conductive wire.

That just moves electrons along, it's that simple.

Kirb, check it out.

Have you ever wondered how energy efficient light bulbs work?

What's the deal with them?

All right, right here, as I turn this crank,

I'm generating a current through these different light bulbs.

This is a normal light bulb.

It's like kind of bright, right?

Here's a compact fluorescent bulb.

KIRBY (off-screen): Easier.

CHARLIE (off-screen): It's a little brighter.

But here's an LED, energy efficient. Woo!

KIRBY (off-screen): Woah!

CHARLIE: This takes nothing.

KIRBY (off-screen): Making electricity no problem.

CHARLIE: Barely turning it around and its lighting up.

CHARLIE (off-screen): How cool is that?

KIRBY: It's bumpin', it's bumpin'.

CHARLIE: What else is over here? KIRBY: Let's go explore this.

CHARLIE (off-screen): This is awesome all right,

so remember how electricity flows through currents that

need to be in closed loops.

Well here's a cool thing: our bodies have conductive

materials inside of them.

CHARLIE (off-screen): So if I hold this ball.

KIRBY (off-screen): And I hold this one.

CHARLIE: All it takes is a little touch to complete the circuit, ready?

CHARLIE (off-screen): Boop.

KIRBY (off-screen): Boop. Boop. Boop.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Boop. Boop. Boop.

KIRBY: And the light goes on because we're completing the loop.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Boop, boop, boop.

KIRBY (off-screen): We are making electricity

through our bodies.

CHARLIE: We are literally part of the electricity exhibit.

What's next?

KIRBY: I don't know but I see a dance floor.

CHARLIE: As we're dancing, on this dance floor,

there are springs underneath the panels that are

compressing whenever we stomp down.

They're converting all of our mechanical energy into energy

that powers these lights.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Yeah, moving.

KIRBY (off-screen): So keep dancing.

CHARLIE: Move it uh, uh.

KIRBY (off-screen): More dancing, more electricity,

CHARLIE (off-screen): Just when we think we've seen it

all at the Electricity Exhibit,

museum guide Brittany Wickham kicks it up a notch.

BRITTANY: You're gonna love our giant tesla coil

right behind me.

KIRBY (off-screen): What?

CHARLIE (off-screen): This thing on the ceiling?

BRITTANY (off-screen): This is massive.

Now this is high voltage, this is going to generate a lot

of electricity right above us.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Invented by Nikola Tesla in 1883,

the Tesla Coil transforms electricity from low voltage

to high voltage making it easier to transport over long distances.

Voltage is the force of an electric current measured in volts.

The voltage in today's standard wall socket is 120 volts.

The Tesla coil dramatically increases the voltage

to 10,000 volts.

Important safety note, you can experience very high voltage

with lightning and static electricity,

but a bunch of factors determine whether you'll be

hurt by exposure to high voltage.

Always get adult approval before experimenting with electricity.

BRITTANY: All right, let's get the Tesla coil running!

KIRBY (off-screen): Oh man.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Let her rip!

KIRBY: Here we go!

(screams)

CHARLIE: It's like a lightning storm in the room!

CHARLIE (off-screen): Ohhh! This is like the closest thing to magic.

KIRBY (off-screen): I know.

BRITTANY (off-screen): Not magic.

CHARLIE (off-screen): That I've ever seen.

BRITTANY (off-screen): Science.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Not magic. It's science.

BRITTANY (off-screen): It's science.

CHARLIE: That was crazy! Oh my gosh.

Brittany, thank you so much for helping us out.

BRITTANY: Thank you for coming.

CHARLIE: We really appreciate it.

CHARLIE (off-screen): I feel, inspired.

Learning about Benjamin Franklin all of his

inventions, these demos.

I'm pretty psyched to get back to HQ and figure out how to

turn on the lights to make sure they stay on.

We'll see you there in a bit?

Awesome!

KIRBY (off-screen): Weird but true.

CHARLIE: So guys, we've been thinking and we're pretty

confident we can solve our blackout problem before the

next storm hits.

KIRBY: So electricity isn't running through the walls of

HQ when the lights go out.

CHARLIE: We need something that can run a current

through this room.

KIRBY: We need a special machine that they have at

power plants, called a generator.

CHARLIE: And generators work largely using two things:

a magnet, and a conductive material.

So scientists have found that when you move conductive

materials in relation to a magnetic field.

It causes electrons to flow.

That's the basic idea behind how generators work.

And we made our own mini generator here in HQ to

show you guys.

So come check it out.

KIRBY: Ta dah.

CHARLIE: We got a reel, a rod, copper wire and inside here

are some magnets.

So as Kirby turns this fishing reel it spins the rod,

spinning the magnets.

Wrapped around the magnets is a spool of copper wire.

Copper's a conductive material,

so it causes electrons to flow.

Electrons are flowing through the entire grid including

in our house.

KIRBY: And when we lose power during a storm it's probably

cause there's an interruption in the circuit.

CHARLIE: Maybe a tree fell on a power line,

or it was struck by lightning or something like that causing

it to shut down.

KIRBY: And when we lose power, we just have to hook up HQ to

its own generator.

CHARLIE: So the electrons can keeps flowing.

KIRBY: But I don't really wanna keep cranking this

reel all day.

CHARLIE: Well in actual power plants,

they don't have fishing reels.

They have these things called turbines,

and they spin 'em in a whole bunch of ways.

KIRBY: I think we should spin it with something reliable to

make sure we have electricity.

CHARLIE: I feel like we should prioritize clean

renewable energy.

I don't want to be polluting more than we normally are.

KIRBY: I think reliability is a big thing here, Charl.

CHARLIE: I feel like it'd be pretty foolish to prioritize

anything above the environment, Kirb.

KIRBY: Are we doing this?

CHARLIE: I guess we're doing this.

Hey Casey, can you help us out with something?

CASEY (off-screen): From Weird But True HQ in Chicago, Illinois.

Decision Power Outage.

Hello, I'm Casey, amateur clarinetist,

soup kitchen volunteer, and basketball rec league referee.

CASEY (off-screen): I'd like to welcome you to the first Power Source debate.

We have two participants tonight: Charlie and Kirby.

They'll be debating one topic: what source will they use to

power their generators?

Kirby, you'll have the floor first.

KIRBY: Thank you, Casey.

I support a plan that powers our generator using fossil

fuels, natural fuels from our earth like gas and coal.

They are dependable and they are cheap.

KIRBY (off-screen): Most power plants in the US use this type

of power source.

You burn coal and oil, which heats up some water turning it

into steam.

The steam then shoots past the turbine, spinning it.

It will not fail, so we can keep crafting like all day long.

(applause)

CASEY: Charlie, you'll have some time to respond.

CHARLIE: People of HQ.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Burning fossil fuels creates air

pollution, pollutes wastewater,

and on top of that, they are in limited supply.

Renewable energy is the way to go.

(applause)

KIRBY: Renewable energy is unreliable.

CHARLIE: Well how about hydroelectric power?

CHARLIE (off-screen): They move the turbine using flowing water.

KIRBY: Well, we don't live near a flowing river or a dam.

CHARLIE (off-screen): Well how about tidal energy?

They use underwater windmills to turn the turbine.

KIRBY: The tide in Lake Michigan isn't even five centimeters.

CHARLIE (off-screen): What about wind power?

They use giant above ground windmills to power the turbine.

KIRBY: Well what if it's not windy?

CHARLIE: Chicago's the "windy city," Kirb!

KIRBY: That's not why it's called that, Charles!

CHARLIE: Yeah, it's called that because all the

politicians are blowing hot air!

KIRBY: Fine! No fossil fuels!

KIRBY (off-screen): We'll do nuclear.

At nuclear power plants, they split atoms to generate

a lot of heat.

That's used to generate steam like in the fossil fuel plants.

CHARLIE: And how are we gonna build a nuclear reactor, Kirb?

KIRBY: I don't know.

We'll find it in some book.

CHARLIE: My opponent will tell you that.

KIRBY: My opponent will tell you that.

CHARLIE: A defining moment.

CASEY: Guys, guys, guys. Stop.

They're just generators.

CASEY (off-screen): Figure out something that will work for both of you.

Just try and agree on something.

CHARLIE: Ah, I'm sorry, Kirb.

CHARLIE (off-screen): I'm just a little worked up right now, you know?

I didn't get my daily bike ride in this morning.

Being cooped up in HQ because of all the rain just driving

me a little nuts.

KIRBY: Yeah, I mean it's getting to me, too,

but I'm pretty sure I know what to do.

WOMAN (over radio): Severe thunder storms.

(thunder)

CHARLIE (off-screen): It's working!

KIRBY: We decided to go with good old mechanical power.

And as Charles pedals the bike,

it's spinning an old motor.

And inside the motor are a bunch of magnets,

spinning around copper wires.

CHARLIE: It causes an electric current to flow through a

circuit that we hooked up to all of HQ.

KIRBY (off-screen): It's perfect.

I get to use my hot glue gun and Charles gets to

burn off some steam.

CHARLIE: Whoa.

KIRBY: Charles, keep going, we're gonna lose the lights!

CHARLIE: All right guys, it looks like we got a new

project on our hands.

But thanks so much for stopping by!

Come by again when we discover more things that are weird.

KIRBY: But true!

CHARLIE: We'll see you guys later! Woo!

KIRBY: Keep going! CHARLIE: Woo!

Captioned by Cotter Captioning Services.