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SPEAKER_01: This week on The New Yorker Radio Hour, the novelist Jennifer Egan on how we could end the enormous problem of homelessness if we had the will to do it. That's The New Yorker Radio Hour. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, this is Radiolab. I'm Latif Nasr. Just
SPEAKER_15: gonna start with a quick announcement. Our senior producer and correspondent, Simon Adler, is doing a live show at the one and only Hot Docs Festival in my hometown of Toronto on May 5th. You probably remember his mixtape series about how the cassette tape changed everything. This is sort of that and it's more than that. It's so good. From self-help tapes to mixtapes to a lonely recording made on the flip side of the moon. This show, it's all about the tension between sort of collective shared experience and the kind of bespoke made for you media bubble that we all kind of inhabit now. The show is called Radiolab Live, how the cassette tape changed us happening once again in Toronto, Hot Docs Cinema, May 5th. I've seen it. It's good. Go, go, go. I myself may be making a little virtual appearance. Tickets are still available. Let's pivot here from that live show to another live show. We have a rewind for you. A golden oldie, if you will. Now that I think about it, probably also recorded on a cassette tape. It is a story about a maddeningly tense showdown between two people in front of a live audience, but it's actually really a tussle between what's good for each of them individually and what's the greater good. We originally aired it in 2014 as part of an episode called What's Left When You're Right. Weird title, I know, but boy does this segment ever hold up. So here you go. The golden rule. Yeah, wait, you're listening to Radiolab. From WNYC. Rewind.
SPEAKER_06: OK. This is Andy Rowe. So what I've got here, you can hear it rattling because it's falling
SPEAKER_06: apart. He's a TV producer in London and in his office where we reached him, he's got
SPEAKER_02: these very special metal balls. This is the original prototype of a golden ball. It's
SPEAKER_06: lovely and shiny. It's very light. Each one's the size of maybe an orange or a tangerine
SPEAKER_02: or a tennis ball painted gold. And it makes a very satisfying clunk when it closes. And
SPEAKER_02: clunk. That is the sound of betrayal. Because Andy has used these balls to bring out the worst in people. To show how ugly and conniving we can be, but also how wonderful.
SPEAKER_14: And if you think you know about all that, then you could win big on golden balls.
SPEAKER_02: OK, so we're talking about a game show called, of course, Golden Balls. Andy was one of the executive producers, did pretty well. We were really, really proud of Golden Balls. Ran for three years in the UK.
SPEAKER_06: Nearly 300 episodes in quite a short space of time in the show. We thought it was such fun.
SPEAKER_02: And it is fun because in many ways it is just a normal game show. But I would argue there is more going on here. In fact, I'm about to argue that because there is a moment in one of those 300 episodes, one moment that I just cannot shake. Because you remember the first time I showed you this clip. I certainly do. I was totally, totally, totally thrown by it.
SPEAKER_02: Because what's about to happen is that two guys with totally different moral philosophies are about to go BING! Yes. With some fascinating results. And this story, in fact, inspired the whole show. It did. Today. Three different smackdowns, all that somehow smack down. Not in the way that you would expect. Different people, different dreams, different world views.
SPEAKER_04: All going KAPOW!
SPEAKER_04: We're calling the show What's Left When You're Right.
SPEAKER_02: Which is... Genius. You'll find that out later. It will ultimately make sense. Perfect sense, I think. For now, can we get the Golden Balls happening? Yeah.
SPEAKER_06: Um, all I can remember was that, um... Alright, so before we get to the moment that I want to talk about, we kind of have to walk
SPEAKER_02: a few paces to sort of lay the foundation. Which is that we have to explain the rules of this game, which are...
SPEAKER_06: You cannot describe Golden Balls in a sentence to anybody. It makes no sense whatsoever.
SPEAKER_02: But I will try and simplify. So basically there are all these early rounds where people are winning money, losing money, cheating each other, lying, strategizing, voting one another off the show. I'm gonna skip all that, because it is in the last five minutes. All hell breaks loose.
SPEAKER_06: And it's that classic shout at the telly moment where you're sitting at home going, I can't believe what that guy just did. I can't believe he just did that.
SPEAKER_02: Because basically the whole game culminates with a face-off.
SPEAKER_02: Two players sit on opposite sides of a table with this host between them.
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, Jasper Carrot is naming. A man whose head is as shiny and smooth as a Golden Ball itself.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, no, I just edited in someone laughing at my own joke. That just happened. In any case, when you get to this moment at the end of the game...
SPEAKER_06: Where there's two people facing each other in the spotlight, it's all gone quiet. In that moment, their hearts are racing.
SPEAKER_02: Because they've got to make this key choice, which is not just about money, although there is money on the line, of course. It is a choice that will reveal who they really are. Not who we all are. Humanity's soul will be laid bare.
SPEAKER_04: This may be true, but why don't we just lay out the rules themselves. Sorry, got a little carried away.
SPEAKER_02: No, that's okay. Alright, so in the final round, each of the contestants get two Golden Balls.
SPEAKER_14: And they are the most important Golden Balls of the game.
SPEAKER_02: One ball says split.
SPEAKER_14: You each have a Golden Ball with the word split written inside. The other ball says steal. You both have a ball with the word steal written inside.
SPEAKER_02: Now split, like say you and I are playing, right? If I choose the split ball, what I'm really saying is that this jackpot, whatever it is, say it's 3200 pounds sterling, okay? I'm saying I want to split it with you. Let's just split it in half. 50-50, even Steven, I'm a good guy. Now if you also choose split, then we split it. You get half, I get half, everybody's happy. The feeling of kind of joy that everybody had when it was a split was fantastic.
SPEAKER_14: You're both going home with 1600 pounds each.
SPEAKER_02: Okay so that's one outcome, it's one of four outcomes I believe. Because obviously there are other ways this could go, because one or both of the contestants can choose steal. And what steal basically says is, forget sharing, I want to take the whole thing for myself. And if we both decide that, if you both choose the steal ball, we both screw each other and it cancels out.
SPEAKER_14: You leave today's game with what you came with. Nothing.
SPEAKER_04: Nobody gets anything. Nothing. I like the way he says nothing. Nothing. With a little bit of contempt. Deservedly. Yes.
SPEAKER_02: Nothing? Nothing. Except each other, which equals nothing. Exactly. Right, so if we both decide to split, it is mutually good. If we both decide to steal, it is mutually bad. Now where things get thorny, is it, say you got a mismatch, like one person chooses split, the other person chooses steal. Now in that scenario, the person who chose split, the nice guy or gal, gets nothing. Whereas the person who chose steal, the conniving, duplicitous bastard, takes everything.
SPEAKER_04: So you, if you steal and the other person is kind, then you walk away with the money. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02: I mean, by the way, this is the classic prisoner's dilemma from game theory, which some people may recognize. But the basic idea is that there is an incentive to share, because if you split, you split, each person takes half, but there is also an incentive to lie, because if I can convince you to share the money and I turn around and shaft you, well then I get more money that way. And the best part about this game, for our purposes, is that before the contestants make a choice, Jasper the host gets them to talk to each other about what they're going to do.
SPEAKER_14: Okay, before I ask you to choose, I think you have some talking to do to each other. All right, so watch this one.
SPEAKER_02: You got a young blonde girl facing off with a larger gentleman with a mustache. Older? Yep. And the jackpot is a hundred thousand pounds. Steven, I just hope they weren't puppy dog tears and they were real tears and you were
SPEAKER_08: genuinely going to split that money. I am going to split this.
SPEAKER_03: I just, fifty thousand, I'm, I'm just, it's unbelievable. Fifty thousand. You're genuinely going to split.
SPEAKER_04: She's crying at this point. She's kind of adorable. I like her. She's like an innocent.
SPEAKER_03: If I stole off you, every single person there would run over here and lynch me.
SPEAKER_08: There was no way I could, I mean, everyone who knew me would just be disgusted if I stole.
SPEAKER_04: See how he's gripping his legs? He's up to something.
SPEAKER_03: Please. I can look you in the, Sarah, I can look you straight in the eye and tell you I am going to split. I swear down to you, I am going to split. Okay. This is serious money.
SPEAKER_14: Sarah, Steve, choose either the split or the steal ball now. Hold it up.
SPEAKER_03: We're going on with 50 grand each. I promise you that.
SPEAKER_02: Moment of truth. He chose split. She chose steal.
SPEAKER_04: The nice girl was a thief.
SPEAKER_02: The nice girl was bad. Every time I see this, it totally breaks my heart because a guy just falls onto the desk. He's got his head in his hands. He's just destroyed.
SPEAKER_14: Stephen, I'm so sorry. Commiserations you've lost.
SPEAKER_04: Look at her. She's looking away. She can't look at him. He's fallen into a slump on the table. It's just awful.
SPEAKER_06: It's evil, isn't it? It's such a good little game.
SPEAKER_02: And here's the thing. If you analyze all the outcomes, which social scientists have done, what you see is that a majority of the time, something like what I just showed you happens. People get up there and they're like, I swear I am a good person.
SPEAKER_02: Over and over they say, I am not the kind of person that's going to cheat you. And then they do it.
SPEAKER_02: They stab them in the back. And these are grandmas, policemen. And here's my theory. It's not that they're mean people. It's that they don't want to be that guy slumped on the table. They don't want to be the sucker. The fear of being the sucker far overwhelms the desire to do good to their fellow contestants. There's something wrong with this program.
SPEAKER_04: The obvious thing to do is to share. You manage to wheedle your way into the approximate possession of a fortune and all you have to do is agree to split it. What if you don't trust the person across the table from you?
SPEAKER_02: Would you still share it? Well, that's interesting.
SPEAKER_04: Yeah. Let's suppose I happen to be, I'm introduced to a person named Snidely Whiplash. He has an enormous oiled mustache and he's wearing a cape. And he has this habit of rubbing his hands malevolently. And his eyes are twitching. And his eyes are twitching. So I'm sitting opposite him and I'm waiting to share with this guy. See it's in a situation like that. That's when it's a real test.
SPEAKER_02: That's interesting. In this game. So what do you do if you don't want to be a sucker and you're not sure you can trust the person across the table? There's no good answer to that. But then... Hi. Hi, is this Nick? It is. This brings us to the moment in question. We ran into this guy.
SPEAKER_07: My name is Nick Corrigan. I work for Media Academy Cardiff based in Wales.
SPEAKER_02: So Nick runs a not for profit in Wales and right away when you talk to him you notice two things. He loves Wales.
SPEAKER_07: It's the most beautiful country in the world. And he loves game shows. Yes.
SPEAKER_02: What was your first one?
SPEAKER_07: When I was about 17. He was on a quiz show. And I won a book.
SPEAKER_02: Nick has since been on, by his count, 44 game shows. Whoa! He's won 43 of them he says. He's won a boat. He's won a house full of stuff. Trips to various places. This is like what he does. And when he first encountered golden balls, he noticed the same miserable pattern that we all notice which is like the nice people get up there, they say let's share.
SPEAKER_07: Let's do it. We can be in this together. And then every time, they were just shafted.
SPEAKER_02: But then Nick got an idea. How did you get that idea?
SPEAKER_07: I think I was probably swimming. I get all my greatest ideas when I'm swimming. It was only when I went back and had a cup of tea, as everybody in Wales obviously drinks tea. With your lump of coal right next to you.
SPEAKER_04: Yes. Your pet.
SPEAKER_07: Your little pet coal lump. Coal is very important to Wales. When I got back, I thought actually it can't fail.
SPEAKER_02: So Nick makes it onto the show, makes it to the last round.
SPEAKER_14: Welcome back to golden balls. And he finds himself sitting across the table from a man named Ibrahim, who, the two of
SPEAKER_02: them are a study in contrast. Nick is tall, he's got really intense eyes, feathered hair. Ibrahim is short and bald and looks kind of like a mini Telly Savalas.
SPEAKER_14: Ibrahim and Nick, you now face a very straightforward choice. Jasper the host lays out the scenario.
SPEAKER_02: They're competing for 14,000 pounds.
SPEAKER_14: They have to decide to split or steal.
SPEAKER_02: And now we get to the good part. Now keep in mind as you listen to this that almost 100% of the time what happens in this moment is one person looks at the other and says, I promise you, I will choose the split ball. We'll share it. We'll share it together. Yeah, that's what they say. Nick takes a very different approach.
SPEAKER_07: Ibrahim, I want you to trust me. 100% I'm going to pick the steel ball. Sorry, you're going to. I'm going to choose the steel ball. You're going to take. I want you to do split and I promise you that I will split the money with you. Well after you've took the steel.
SPEAKER_05: Yeah. You're going to take steel. Yeah. I'm going to take split. Yeah. So you take the money. And I will split it with you.
SPEAKER_07: After the show. Yeah. There was utter panic in the studio.
SPEAKER_02: Just this whole idea was like, I'm not even going to pretend I'm not going to steal. And then I'll meet you on a corner after the television show and give you the half of it.
SPEAKER_04: Well, that's ridiculous.
SPEAKER_07: All the researchers started running around going, what's he doing? Can this be done? There was panic. Ibrahim, I promise you I'll do that. If you do steal, we both walk away with nothing. I'm telling you 100% I'm going to do it. I appreciate that. Right.
SPEAKER_05: I'll give you another alternative.
SPEAKER_07: Why don't we just both pick split? I'm not going to pick split. I'm going to steal. Ibrahim, honestly, 100% I'm going to steal. It's in your nature to steal? No, I'm honest and I'm going to tell you. You're an honest man. I am. That's why I'm telling you I'm going to steal. If you do it, then I will split the money. I can't see myself doing that. Okay, well, I'm going to steal, so we're going to leave with nothing. Where's your brains coming from?
SPEAKER_07: I can't work out. I know that I'm a decent guy and I will split the money with you. Well, we should just both split then. No, I'm going to do steal.
SPEAKER_02: This argument went on and on. Blimey O'Reilly. The actual argument, not the edited version online, went for 45 minutes. There was name calling, there were threats, and over those 45 minutes, there was an interesting shift. Nick says that the audience began to turn on him.
SPEAKER_07: The audience behind were booing me.
SPEAKER_02: Which I get because as I was watching it, I mean, initially it seems like a really cool, clever strategy, but then you realize as it goes on that he's being kind of a ass. He's not giving the other guy a choice. He's actually kind of bullying him.
SPEAKER_07: No matter what he said, I was not budging from the fact and my intransigence just infuriated him.
SPEAKER_04: Did you ever actually like hate him or actually? Yes, I did hate him.
SPEAKER_05: Yes. Yes. Yes, I did. This is Ibrahim. Ibrahim Hussein. I'm a market trader. I work on flea markets. He sells textiles. In London.
SPEAKER_04: It took us forever to track him down.
SPEAKER_05: Months. You found me at last. But I did hate him, I think, because he couldn't be, he couldn't, you couldn't negotiate with him. There was no negotiation. I was saying to him, like, if I give you my word that I'm going to split, then I'm going to split. If I gave you my word, now let me tell you what my word means. Okay.
SPEAKER_05: My father once said to me, a man who doesn't keep his word is not a man. He's not worth nothing. Not worth a dollar. I agree. So, Ibrahim, I'm going to steal.
SPEAKER_07: So you've got the choice.
SPEAKER_02: That was the point where I was like, Nick, give the guy a chance at least. Come on.
SPEAKER_05: We've lost everything. Okay. We've lost then. We're walking away with no money because you're an idiot. No, that's not true. You're an idiot. You're an idiot. That's not right. You're an idiot. You're an idiot.
SPEAKER_14: That's what you are. This can go on all night and these people have got to get up for breakfast. Nick, choose split or steal.
SPEAKER_02: And right before they have to make their decision, it seems that Ibrahim caves. Maybe Nick wore him down and he's like, fine, you choose steal, I'll choose split. Hopefully you'll share the money. Right, I'll tell you what, I'm going to go with you.
SPEAKER_05: Okay. I promise you I will skip it.
SPEAKER_14: You cannot change your balls now. Split or steal.
SPEAKER_02: They both turn over their balls. Ibrahim, as we suspected, chose split.
SPEAKER_05: I felt I had no alternative. And Nick also chose split.
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
SPEAKER_14: Congratulations, you're both split and each received six thousand eight hundred pounds.
SPEAKER_12: Why did you put me through that? Why did you do it to me? Lulu here. If you ever heard the classic Radiolab episode, sometimes behave so strangely, you know that speech can suddenly leap into music and really how strange and magic sound itself can be. We at Radiolab take sound seriously and use it to make our journalism as impactful as it can be. And we need your help to keep doing it. The best way to support us is to join our membership program, The Lab. This month, all new members will get a T-shirt that says sometimes behave so strangely to check out the T-shirt and support the show. Go to Radiolab dot org slash join. Radiolab is supported by Capital One with no fees or minimums. Banking with Capital One is the easiest decision in the history of decisions, even easier than deciding to listen to another episode of your favorite podcast. And with no overdraft fees, is it even a decision? That's banking reimagined. What's in your wallet? Terms apply. See Capital One dot com slash bank Capital One N.A. member FDIC. Radiolab is supported by Apple Card. Apple Card has a cash back rewards program unlike other credit cards. You earn unlimited daily cash on every purchase, receive it daily and can grow it at four point one five annual percentage yield when you open a savings account. Apply for Apple Card in the wallet app on iPhone. Apple Card subject to credit approval. Savings is available to Apple Card owners subject to eligibility requirements. Savings accounts provided by Goldman Sachs Bank USA member FDIC. Terms apply. After what her emails became shorthand in 2016 for the media's deep focus on Hillary
SPEAKER_13: Clinton's server hygiene at the expense of policy issues, is history repeating itself?
SPEAKER_10: You can almost see an equation. Again, I would say led by the times in Biden being old with Donald Trump being under dozens of felony indictments.
SPEAKER_13: Listen to On the Media from WNYC. Find On the Media wherever you get your podcasts.
SPEAKER_02: The whole game he swore he was going to steal, but then he ends up splitting. Do you think that he was lying the whole time and always intended to share?
SPEAKER_02: Maybe he could have changed his mind at the last second. Whatever the case, here's why his strategy was so brilliant. I was shocked. I was shocked. I was taken aback. When we asked Ibrahim, like, if Nick hadn't deployed that crazy strategy, would you have still split? Because that's what you were saying to him the whole time, that you're going to split it. You're going to share the money. Would you have still done it? No, not at all. Not at all.
SPEAKER_05: Oh, I was always going to steal. I was never going to split. Never. Really? I was never going to split. Why? Why? Why? The reason being, if I split and the other guy steals, I get nothing.
SPEAKER_05: I'd rather both of us walk away with nothing than someone, what's the word, embarrass me to a certain extent.
SPEAKER_02: Didn't want to be the sucker. And then I asked him, like, what about that speech with your dad? You know, that's the one that kind of got me. My father once said to me, a man who doesn't keep his word is not a man.
SPEAKER_05: Can I, no, can I just jump in about that? Yeah. My dad, I never met him. And my mother brought me up, me and my brother and my sister. And I never ever met my father.
SPEAKER_04: So that you made that up? Yeah, I'm afraid so.
SPEAKER_05: You made that up? Yeah. Yeah. I think I saw it on a film once. And it always stuck with me. I thought I'd be able to use that one day. I've never been a good boy.
SPEAKER_02: I think that is the real victory here. Like Nick got a guy who was never intending to share the money, whose whole philosophy was like, don't trust anybody. Don't trust no one. He got that guy to be good against his will. And that guy thanks him for it. He did con me to a certain extent, but he conned me into 7,000 pounds.
SPEAKER_02: And Nick for his part is also grateful to have the money so he can give it to charity.
SPEAKER_07: I run a children's charity. I do all the health and safety and all the fundraising.
SPEAKER_02: Is that connected in any way to your multiple appearances on game shows? Yes. It is? Yes.
SPEAKER_06: Huh? Directly? Yes. You sound surprised. I do because it's a very...
SPEAKER_15: Wow. I kind of forgot how abruptly that ends, but man, what a ride, right? Okay. Before I go, just wanted to remind you one last time, Radiolab senior producer Simon Adler doing his multimedia extravaganza Radiolab live, how the cassette tape changed us on May 5th during the hot docs festival at the hot docs cinema in Toronto. I'm from Toronto. The hot docs cinema is like one of the best things about the city that I am from. There are a few tickets still left. Jump on them if you are going to be around. Yeah, it'll be great. Okay. Catch you next week. Radiolab signing off.
SPEAKER_11: Radiolab was created by Jad Abenrod and is edited by Soren Wheeler. Lulu Miller and Latif Nasr are our co-hosts. Dylan Keefe is our director of sound design. Our staff includes Simon Adler, Jeremy Blum, Becca Bresler, Rachel Cusick, Eketi Foster-Keys, W. Harry Fortuna, David Gable, Maria Paz-Coutierres, Sindhu Yanasanbandhan, Matt Kielty, Annie McEwen, Alex Neeson, Sarah Khare, Anarasquett Bass, Sarah Sandback, Ariane Wack, Pat Walters, and Molly Webster, with help from Andrew Vignales. Our fact checkers are Diane Kelly, Emily Krieger, and Natalie Middleton.
SPEAKER_09: Hi, this is Finn Colling from Storrs, Connecticut. Leadership support for Radiolab science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
SPEAKER_00: WNYC Studios is supported by On Being with Christa Tippett. I'm Christa Tippett of On Being, where we take up the big questions of meaning for this world now. In our new podcast season, we're going to have a different human conversation about AI and also the intelligence of our bodies, grief and joy, social creativity and poetry, and so much more. A conversation to live by every Thursday.
