Episode #046: Cicada 3301 and Other Mysterious Puzzles

Some interesting "weird news" items this week, 50,000 year old carved stone heads found in Texas and Pleistocene Buttflappers used the Distraction Dance on Giant Sloths when hunting them, for example. Some obligatory ridicule of the paradigm here as well.   Russ reads an article about the strange "Cicada 3301" superpuzzles that have appeared online, leading thousands of some of the most intelligent and knowledgeable people on the planet through a bewildering crypto-labyrinth where Mayan numerology, Victorian Gothic poetry, and obscure magical grimoires from the Middle Ages are just a few of the many things that people are required to have knowledge of in order to solve the puzzles and acquire the clues for locating more, until eventually the people at the head of the game, the ones solving it better and faster than everyone else, are whisked away into the shadows, never to be heard from again; like they got hired to be MiB or something. There is also mention of the similar strange metagame from KanyeQuest, that leads one toward "Ascension" for an as-yet unknown goal, that Russ participated in briefly and helped solve a few of the puzzles and decipher a clue or two. In the second half of the show, for the first segment we discuss Episode 045, the interview with Mr. Spriggs about the Missing 411 mystery, and what our developing thoughts are on that whole topic. The final segment is spent talking philosophical concepts concerning the primacy of frequency in the material realm, and how some of it seems to originate from some other, perpendicular non-material realm. Kyle describes his thoughts about musical instruments and how they seem to be in some ways transducers of emotion into actual physical form. It's a good show. Enjoy.