The video, hosted by Vsauce, discusses the concept of eating one's own body, specifically focusing on the idea of self-cannibalism. The host, Michael, starts by jokingly suggesting that eating your own snot could be beneficial as it contains antiseptic enzymes that kill or weaken bacteria. However, he quickly shifts to the more serious topic of cannibalism, noting that it is a major taboo and off-putting at a visceral level.
The video then delves into the history of cannibalism, citing instances where it has occurred in times of famine and curiosity, such as the public eating of human parts by artists Rick Gibson and Marco in the late 1980s and 2006 respectively. It also mentions a case in 2001 where a man was convicted of murder after eating a volunteer at a now-defunct cannibal cafe.
Despite the taboo, the video explores the idea of what human meat would taste like. It refers to the late William Seabrook, who described the taste of human meat as similar to fully developed veal. The video also discusses the concept of taste as a complex experience combined with smell and information from the trigeminal nerve about things like temperature, texture, pain, and pungency.
Moving on to the human palate, the video notes that of all the combinations of identified flavors, human cuisine only features a relatively small number of recipes. The video then presents a flavor network created by researchers, which shows that North American and Western European dishes tend to combine ingredients that share flavor compounds, while East Asian cuisine avoids them.
The video concludes by contemplating the idea that you are what you eat, and that your body is constantly swallowing and digesting pieces of itself. It also mentions the self-cannibalism of the sea squirt, which literally digests its own nervous system, as a more extreme form of self-cannibalism. The video ends by stating that every day, you are digesting your own bodyweight worth of nutritional energy.
Here are the key facts extracted from the text:
1. The speaker is discussing the concept of self-cannibalism, which is when a person eats their own snot. This is considered gross, but it might be smart because it could potentially allow the immune system to develop antibodies in relative safety. [Source: Document(page_content="00:00:00.03: hey Vsauce Michael here eating your own\n00:00:03.03: boogers is gross but it might be smart\n00:00:06.36: assuming you have clean fingers lung\n00:00:09.09: specialist Frederick fish injure points\n00:00:10.86: out that snot contains antiseptic\n00:00:12.87: enzymes that kill or weaken bacteria\n00:00:16.19: reintroducing those crippled\n00:00:18.11: microorganisms may allow your immune\n00:00:20.19: system to develop antibodies in relative\n00:00:22.98: safety\n00:00:23.76: that is good to knows but is eating your\n00:00:28.23: own snot cannibalism self-cannibalism\n00:00:32.60: just like a cow or chicken or fish or\n00:00:35.46: fruit or vegetable you are made out of a\n00:00:37.23: lot of edible things the meat on an\n00:00:40.77: average human body contains 77,000\n00:00:43.62: dietary calories worth of nutritional\n00:00:45.60: energy YUM if you decide to become a\n00:00:48.69: cannibal just don't show up late for\n00:00:50.16: dinner where you'll get the cold\n00:00:52.44: shoulder\n00:00:53.05: [Music]\n00:00:53.58: [Applause]\n00:00:55.52: jokes aside cannibalism is a major taboo\n00:01:00.11: it's off-putting at a visceral level\n00:01:03.11: humans have dignity they are more than\n00:01:05.42: just skin bags full of organs they're\n00:01:07.46: more than just something to put on a\n00:01:08.93: plate but human meat has been put on\n00:01:12.34: plates and in bellies there are reports\n00:01:16.85: of cannibalism occurring in times of\n00:01:18.80: famine as a last resort and because of\n00:01:22.84: curiosity and art in the late 1980s\n00:01:26.78: artist Rick Gibson publicly ate human\n00:01:29.57: tonsils and other donated human parts in\n00:01:32.57: London and Canada in 2006 artist Marco\n00:01:36.29: every city cooked and canned meatballs\n00:01:39.07: prepared with his own body fat removed\n00:01:42.62: by a liposuction in 2011 Dutch TV\n00:01:46.52: presenters Dennis storm and Valerio xeno\n00:01:48.77: cooked and ate pieces of each other