This week on Endless Thread it's a producer takeover with Grace Tatter and Kalyani Saxena serving up some delicious online stories. First, Kalyani digs into why the internet is so hungry for perpetual stews (a stew that is simmered and added on to in perpetuity). Then, Grace dishes on a listener conundrum about whether salty Reddit posts are worse for us than sweet ones.

Show notes:

• ZAQ_Makes' Stewtheus (TikTok)
• Want to try perpetual stew? Some tips for avoiding foodborne illness (NPR)
• r/GirlDinnerDiaries (Reddit)
• Does Venting Your Feelings Actually Help? (Greater Good Magazine)
• Endless Thread Subreddit

Long before TikTok dances, there was the Dougie.

In 2010, Cali Swag District’s “Teach Me How to Dougie” went worldwide, and for the decade-plus since, people have been trying to learn the viral moves.

More than 15 years later, a Korean TikTok creator went viral for doing the Dougie… badly. He claimed to be learning how to do the Dougie day-by-day – but his moves were so stiff and awkward, viewers from around the world – including Endless Thread producer Kalyani Saxena — were suspicious. Was @JBStarMax faking being bad at the Dougie? Kalyani presents her investigation to Ben and Amory.

Show notes:

• “Day 1 of learning to do the Dougie until I can do it smoothly” (@JBStarMax on TikTok)
• Breakdancing (@JBStarMax on TikTok)
• Know Your L.A. Hip-Hop Dances: The Controversial Origin Story of The Dougie (LA Weekly)
• Ben does the crabwalk, and Amory does the worm (WBUR)

Kurt Gödel was a genius mathematician and logician, considered by many scholars to be as influential as Aristotle. He was also buddies with fellow geniuses Albert Einstein and Oskar Morgenstern, the co-creator of Game Theory.

In 1947, Gödel told Morgenstern and Einstein he had identified an inner contradiction in the U.S. Constitution while studying for his citizenship test: the type of loophole that could plunge the United States into a dictatorship not unlike the Nazi regime Gödel had escaped when he immigrated from Austria.

So, what was the loophole? Over the years, everyone from Constitutional law scholars to laypeople on Reddit have wondered. Endless Thread plumbs the depths of Gödel's galaxy brain with the help of philosopher, writer and Gödel expert Rebecca Newberger Goldstein — and learns some surprising lessons about artificial intelligence, a German shorthand called Gabelsberger, and democracy along the way.

Show notes:

• Incompleteness: The Proof and Paradox of Kurt Gödel, by Rebecca Newberger Goldstein (Amazon)
• Oskar Morgenstern's account of Kurt Gödel's naturalization (Institute of Advanced Study)