So many ways to sharpen your bean

One of the things we love about word games and number puzzles is how doing a variety of different ones often seems to massage a combination of parts of your mind the way a variety of physical exercises keeps your whole body in shape. So from time to time we’ll shout out to other sources of mental stimulation we like to supplement our spilling and spelling with. Today we salute one of our favorite YouTube channels that drives the curious mind to explore everyday things wherever they may be, Smarter Every Day, hosted by Destin Sandlin. Check it out and sharpen your bean.

If you haven’t been directed toward his videos by way of YouTube suggestions, that’s a shame, although Destin himself would prefer that you join his nearly ten million subscribers to catch his latest videos rather than have an algorithm take you there. We love how he’s equally fascinated by rain dropping on a puddle in a forest, snapping spaghetti, antique beams in a house, thousand-mile-an-hour baseball pitches, and farmers’ grain bins, in which he literally spells the beans (see opening frames). We don’t know how that grain-drying process affects the shape of soybeans in Alabama or the price of tea in China, but you’ll not unlikely sharpen your bean some with a view of the video.

So much to learn, so much to share

Smarter Every Day embodies the same sort of sense that informs the science recognized by another of our digital diversions, the Annals of Improbable Research, the people behind the ever unpredictable Ig Nobel Prizes. Destin dives into every story with a gusto to share his knowledge and sense of discovery, and a storytelling zeal to explain how the principles he identifies apply to sometimes seemingly unrelated real world situations. If you haven’t already, make like Newton and head over to see what’s dropped today.

We’d like to think he also reaches a wide variety of people among his viewership. Folks who might not otherwise cross paths or think they have that much in common. Anything that brings different people together like that, whether a YouTube channel, a cafe counter, or a comic actor, is probably a pretty good thing. Unbridled, intrepid, and free of agenda except for a desire to make sense of the world, expand knowledge, and have a little fun. Thank you, Destin, and keep us enthralled, entertained, engaged, and edified. And be careful of big bins full of beans.

 brain training communication science shout outs