Hysteria 51

Cavemen used to fashion dolls out of sticks and rocks. They would play with them for hours, pretending that they were going on epic hunting trips and fighting off saber-toothed tigers. Fast forward a few thousand years, and dolls became all the rage in ancient Egypt. People would bury them in tombs with their deceased loved ones, probably as a way to keep them company in the afterlife. Kind of like a creepy little buddy system. During the Middle Ages, dolls were mostly used as religious objects...

Science is full of all sorts of paradoxes: We can travel to the depths of space, but can't cure the common cold. We can split the atom, but can't figure out why time flies when you're having fun. We can map the human genome, but can't predict the weather accurately. It's like we've unlocked the secrets of the universe, but can't find the remote control.... But those don’t make our eyes cross or the smartest of us lose sleep over night because of how intangible an answer seems to be...

How did a septuagenarian buggering wannabe rock-star suffering from dyslexia go from handyman to cult leader, culminating in the death of 80 people? We try to answer that very question this week (and not because Cbot is looking for tips). Plus, Kevin Crispin returns to the lower 4th, J.T.R. Brown makes his debut on H51 to help us wrap our heads around the mental health (or lack thereof) of cult leaders, and CBot regales us with his love for the year 1993...