Kurzgesagt wraps up 2017 with a follow up to its fascinating clip about the relationship between an organism’s size and the way it evolves. This time out, we learn how we might actually explode if we weren’t the size we were meant to be. Say, was that Barb at 1:30?

Knives are typically made from tool steel. But the guys at Ollari’s show us how with the proper cutting blades and an angle grinder, a block of granite can be transformed into a sharp-edged cutting tool as well. We’re betting Primitive Technology would do the same with only a rock.

Primitive Technology hit the proverbial reset button on his live-action Stone Age role-playing game. He’s starting on a new and different map – a tropical rainforest with a permanent creek. We like to think he bartered for it with cargo shorts and cameras.

Individual insects have limited skills, but when they form a colony, the whole is much greater than the sum of its parts. Kurzgesagt explores the phenomenon known as “emergence” – which sounds like a great name for a flick where billions of ants rise up to take over the world.

Kurzgesagt follows up their earlier clip about the moral and ethical dilemmas of longer life with a video about scientific developments which could extend our lives – or the quality of our healthy years – much sooner than you might think.

Techmoan looks at another strange and wonderful bit of retro technology. This time, he unboxes a 40-year-old gadget from Japan that does something we’ve never seen before. We won’t spoil the surprise, and will let you discover it for yourself.

Continuing his attempts to reach the Iron Age, Primitive Technology is experimenting with furnaces that can reach high temperatures without using bellows or charcoal. This tall furnace sucks cold air through the bottom and reached around 1200ºC.

Kurzgesagt teamed up with CGPGrey to explore the moral, ethical, and practical concerns about our longevity as humans, and whether being able to control our mortality is a good or a bad thing. Be sure to watch the second part here.

It’s a nasty thought, but our bodies are teeming with billions of bacteria all of the time. At times, these microbes are helpful partners, doing things like digesting food, and at other times, they want to kill us. Kurzgesagt explores the delicate balance of the human microbiome.

Primitive Technology made bricks and roof tiles out of plain old mud. He made molds out of wood, then dried the bricks in the sun and in a kiln. He realized that he should filter the mud next time, because the sand and gravel resulted in brittle bricks and tiles.

Kurzgesagt explores the crazy notion that perhaps what we’re experiencing isn’t real at all, and that we’re all part of a massive simulation in some ultra-powerful computer system. Vsauce 3 has their own take on the thought experiment here.

The unique YouTube channel Film Color Palettes compiles scenes from visually compelling movies, and then proceeds to break down the images into collections of color swatches. It’s a neat resource for designers and artists, though it could use more videos. (Thanks Lane!)

(PG-13: Language) Former Black Flag vocalist, host and activist Henry Rollins talks about the scariest places on Earth, his favorite snack and his go-to cheap dinner, the concert shirt trend and more with First We Feast’s Hot Ones.

Kurzgesagt’s latest thought experiment explores what might happen to us if we somehow managed to load up bits of the Sun brought them right here to Earth. Depending on which part you captured, it could simply vanish, or destroy life as we know it.

Primitive Technology shows us how to make a very simple blower that can easily keep a small furnace going. The blower is made of a stick, a rectangular piece of bark that acts as a rotor, and a length of twine that can be pulled to spin its blade.

Kurzgesagt simplifies two thought experiments stemming from black holes. The universe being a “hologram” is too literal though. Saying that you can describe a cube by drawing a cube is not the same as saying that a cube is indistinguishable from a drawing of a cube.