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Hey, smart people, Joe here.
What do you like to do for fun?
Me, I enjoy a game of bball
and I especially like watching bee ball.
According to scientists,
these bumblebees are playing.
In experimental settings,
they'll roll objects around just for fun.
I mean, look at them.
They're clearly having a ball.
Animals as simple as bees and as complex
as you and me like to have fun,
but what's the point of fun?
Do all animals have fun?
And for that matter, what is fun?
Fun starts with the letter F,
but fun actually begins in your brain.
Almost every animal from fruit flies
all the way up to humans have bodies
that are wired to seek out rewards.
And in a brain, those rewards come in the form
of chemicals that fire certain patterns of neurons
and create the sensation of pleasure.
These reward systems evolved to encourage animals
to repeat behaviors that are good for their survival.
You do something, get some survival points, get a reward,
then do it again because it feels good.
So when a bumble bee lands on a flower
and starts eating nectar, it activates its reward system.
Eating nectar is good for the bee, so it releases chemicals
that create a sensation of pleasure,
which makes the bee want to drink sweet flower juice
again and again and again, kind of like me and queso.
Humans have similar systems, they're just way more complex.
Our brains reward centers are connected together
by a special pathway
powered by a special feel-good neurotransmitter.
When this pathway activates,
the neurotransmitter starts a chain reaction.
It stimulates the parts
of our brains that make us want to do things
and feel good for doing them.
When something feels good, what we really mean
is that certain cells in certain parts
of our brain are responding to specific chemicals
released by other cells in our brain.
That's what fun is, floods of unique neurotransmitters
and dopamine doesn't just make things feel good,
it makes us want things too.
So when your brain gets that dopamine surge,
it pushes you to get that thing that makes you feel good.
And then when we get what we want,
it feels good and we've got a nice little feedback loop.
This is how we learn what's fun
so that we will repeat that behavior in the future.
Fun happens when the chemistry cocktail in a brain
is mixed up just right,
which is pretty much true
for like all human feelings actually.
Pleasure is a way to influence how we
and other animals behave.
Eating when we're hungry, sleeping when we're tired,
socializing with others,
these are behaviors that help us survive so they feel good.
And this evolutionary system works really well,
so well that there's a lot of things from drugs
to social media that hack these reward systems
to make you repeat behaviors
even if what you're doing isn't actually fun.
But we can also hack these reward centers for good too
and one way that humans and other animals do that
is by playing.
Play, scientifically speaking,
has to meet a few different criteria.
First, play is voluntary and spontaneous.
That means the animal isn't doing it
in response to stress or something.
Play behaviors are also repeated over and over,
but the key thing
is that playing doesn't help the animal survive right now.
Instead, play is a way to practice the skills
that the animal will need to survive in the future
through behaviors that aren't directly tied to survival,
the way say eating or drinking are.
In the case of the bumblebees, scientists think playing
with balls helps bees develop motor skills
that they'll need later so they can find
that sweet, sweet nectar they love so much
because flowers could be kind of tricky.
And that's the thing about play.
We do it because it's rewarding all by itself,
not because we're getting an outside reward
for that behavior.
Like if bees got a sip
of nectar every time they roll a ball,
they do it over and over again because they're getting food.
But the bees roll balls because playing was pleasurable
on its own.
Play rewards us with a mental dopamine hit,
which makes us want to repeat that behavior again and again.
Repeat that behavior again and again.
That's why kittens chase yarn to become better predators
and why apes play with sticks
so they can learn to use tools.
Almost everywhere scientists have looked
for play in the animal world, they've found it.
The fact that play happens to be fun
gives animals incentive to practice behaviors
and get good at them.
This is especially true for younger animals
who've gotta prepare for surviving in a big scary world.
Humans play to learn the skills that we'll need
to survive just like other animals do.
But humans are special because honestly
we've taken play to a whole other level.
Beating a video game won't help you hunt your own food,
but it might help you develop the mental skills
you'll need to solve super complex problems
like kids playing with blocks might seem simple,
but they're actually doing
some pretty intense brain development.
They're learning to classify things
as they sort blocks into different sizes or colors.
They're observing the rules of physics and gravity.
They're developing problem solving skills.
Scientists believe that play
is part of why humans have been able to evolve
from nomadic hunter gatherers into these technological apes
with pants that we've become.
Play allowed our ancient ancestors
to adapt to new environments
and develop the skills to survive in them
like building new weapons or finding new food sources.
Play has helped our species survive so well
that we now have free time,
time that we can fill with fun
not because it's evolutionarily necessary or required
for our direct survival, but just because it feels good.
Speaking of which, if you're looking
for a good dopamine hit,
now is the perfect time to like this video.
Your neurons will love it.
Anyway, leisure time has given humans the time
and space to do amazingly creative things
like write novels, paint pictures, make science videos
and humans freedom to have fun in a way
that no other animal does has changed the world too.
Back in the 17th century,
clock makers started turning the wheels
from clocks into these moving robots called automata.
They created all sorts of weird mechanical creatures
like a digesting duck that ate,
it flapped its wings, and even pooped.
One of the most famous automata makers
was Jean-Joseph Merlin,
the owner of Merlin's Mechanical Museum
filled with his inventions
like self-propelling wheelchairs and roller skates.
But the most important machines in Merlin's Museum
were these two dolls that could walk
and dance all on their own.
They happened to capture the imagination
of one young boy who visited the shop named Charles Babbage.
Those two dolls had no real purpose
except for pure fun, a laugh, a shot of dopamine,
but they changed Babbage's life.
His fascination with these machines inspired him
to design the difference engine with Ada Lovelace.
It inspired the world's first primitive computing machines.
And without the difference engine,
we wouldn't have computers
like the one that you're watching me on today.
That all happened because of the products of human fun.
It's fun to have fun,
but having fun is also an important part of learning
how to be a human in the world around us.
It's a way for other animals to learn how to survive
in their worlds.
It helps us practice everything
from our motor skills to interacting with others
and it inspires us to solve the world's big problems.
We're just never conscious
that that's what we're doing when we play
cause if we were, it wouldn't be very fun, would it?
Stay curious and if you want a great dopamine hit,
something that's super fun, check out our Patreon page.
You can help support us making this show directly.
We thank everybody who supports the show.
If you would like to find out more
how you can join that club,
there's a link down in the description
and I wanna shout out a kid named Rowan.
I know that you are donating
part of your allowance to help us make this show.
You rock so be like Rowan, unless you're a grownup.
I don't know if you get allowance, but anyway,
check the link down in the description.
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Hey, you made it to the end screen.
We got a new set.
See you next time.