Michael Regilio
speaker
2,071 appearances
9 recordings
1 series
first heard Nov 2024
last heard 12 Jul
Michael Regilio’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 3 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 1.
Appearances
Wow, them are some bragging rights. It's clear we stand on the brink of unprecedented possibilities, from curing genetic disorders and enhancing human capabilities to ethical dilemmas and unforeseen consequences. The power to edit our genetic code opens a Pandora's box of opportunities and challenges.
As we move forward, it's super important that we balance innovation with responsibility, ensuring that the benefits of genetic advancements are accessible and equitable. Let's stay informed, engaged, and thoughtful as we navigate this brave slash weird new world.
Hi, Jordan. You're a recognizable figure. I'm sure there's some pressure to be presentable.
Who did they think you looked like?
Seriously, what'd you do? Did you put on like a fake nose and try again?
All right. Good luck with that. Look, certain things we do to look good, like working out and eating right, have health benefits. We look good and we feel good. Certain things we do to look good have health risks, like taking drugs to regrow hair.
Yeah, it can. In fact, one study found that some women with breast cancer were more distressed about losing their hair than their breasts. By age 50, 50% of men and women are experiencing some level of hair loss, and 85% of those people experience anxiety.
Speaking of which, on average, a human has between 2 and 5 million hairs, of which about 100,000 are on the scalp.
Right. And blonde-haired Caucasians have the highest hair density, which I can relate to because as a younger man, I had a thick blonde shock of hair, but no longer. I now have a thin patch bordering on a bald spot at the back of my scalp. This crop circle used to bum me out a lot. Now, it only bums me out a little.
But recently, I've noticed that there are a lot more hair regrowth products and drugs being advertised.
Yeah, and all these commercials have made me wonder if I'm, like, missing something. Have there been, like, some major breakthroughs? Just how effective are treatments now?
When I first realized my hair was thinning in the back, I was really insecure about it. Then one day, I went to the movies with a bunch of friends, and as fate would have it, I was in the row directly in front of my friends. Why weren't you in the row with your friends? Look, I don't want to get into that. Look, but there they were all staring at the back of my head. Let me tell you something.
When you have a bald spot on the back of your head, you might not be able to see it, but you can feel it. Weirder still, you can feel people looking at it.
Fine, but look, the fact of the matter is I could feel the heat from their stares, those lasers you mentioned. It completely ruined the movie. I was so self-conscious, but somehow after that night, I was less self-conscious. I didn't need to hide it anymore. Everybody knew. Then I began making jokes about it on stage. Those jokes got laughs, and suddenly I was okay with my patch.
That is, until this new wave of hair replacement advertisements came along. Suddenly, I started feeling all weird again. I could feel my bald patch again. In the advertisements, all these cool dudes are just taking a pill and presto, they have a full head of hair.
When I looked at the topic list for Skeptical Sundays, I saw this topic and I thought, let's do it. And while researching this topic, let's figure out if I should try one of these treatments.
Okay, so look, obviously, I'm not alone in wanting to go back to a full head of hair. The history of hair replacement goes back thousands of years. In fact, it was around the year 4000 BCE that ancient Egyptians rubbed their heads with a concoction of ground-up dates, dog paws, and donkey hooves.
I'm not sure why specifically they believed animal feet cured baldness, but in general, people losing their hair will believe anything and try anything. Like another Egyptian cure found in a medical text called the Eber's Papyrus, which instructed people to boil porcupine hair and press it to their scalp for four days. Were they trying to grow the porcupine hair? I don't understand. No.
I don't know, but I'm guessing most people would take porcupine hair over no hair. In fact, I bet it would look sharp. Ah, isn't that kind of the point? Indeed. Porcupine hair seems tame compared to what the father of Western medicine, Hippocrates, smeared on his big brain case. Opium, horseradish, pigeon droppings... Beetroot and spices.
Right. So in a way, it was a cure. I'm also guessing that once you've rubbed enough opium into your scalp, you'll stop caring about your hair. Yeah. You know what? This was an okay treatment for baldness. Hippocrates did, by the way, tap into the true root of hair loss. For real. He noticed that eunuchs never go bald, and he wasn't wrong to notice it. He was onto something.
Showing 1681–1700 of 2,071 · page 85 of 104
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