Name: Joe Rogan Experience #776 - Adam Cropp
Uploaded: 2016-03-19T00:06:43.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Joe Rogan Experience #776 - Adam Cropp' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2016-03-19. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Joe Rogan Experience #776 - Adam Cropp' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2016-03-19. Transcript available.

Joe Rogan Experience #776 - Adam Cropp

Thanks for having me.
Thanks for being here.
Appreciate it.
The opinions you're about to hear do not represent National Geographic or
anybody other than us.
That's it.
And even us.
We're not sure of it.
We're not committed to these statements.
Adam, welcome.
Thanks, Joe.
Thanks for having me.
Pull this fucker right in front of your face there.
Thanks for having me, Joe.
Appreciate it.
Appreciate it, man.
Dude, you live a life of adventure.
I was so excited when you contacted me and I went to your Instagram page and
saw all the photos and saw all the places you've been and looked you up.
Man, you're living a crazy life.
I do a bit of traveling, that's for sure.
A few frequent flyer miles.
Man, I mean, so much adventure.
So many different places and so much cool shit you've seen.
How did you get into this?
I kind of grew up doing it, to tell you the truth.
I had a family who made nature documentaries.
So as a family unit, that's what we did for a living.
And so I was traveling from, well, the moment I could walk, basically.
Wow.
That is cool.
What is your dad?
Is like a filmmaker or something?
Yeah.
Or your mom?
I should say your mom or your dad.
I'm so sexy.
Well, it's a family unit sort of thing, whatever.
I guess, how do you explain dad in a nutshell?
He's kind of the Australian Jacques Cousteau, maybe.
Oh, really?
Or the Sylvia Earle, the Australian version of that, maybe.
He started off as a shark hunter back in the 60s.
It was actually hunting sharks and putting that, and filming it, putting it on
TV with Leonard Nimoy was narrating.
Spock was actually narrating them back in those days.
Wow.
He'll never be anything but Spock to me.
I know.
I know.
I love that voice.
You get fucked, man.
You have a role that's too good.
And then he turned conservationist, you know, after probably, yeah, mid-60s or
something.
So, he was a hunter, so he was going out and killing sharks, and then what made
him sort of shift into conservation?
I think it was just a realization of just, yeah, what a waste, you know, going
around and killing sharks.
And also, I think after you spend enough time with sharks in the water, you
realize they're not dangerous at all.
Like, these things are magnificent creatures.
Right.
Under most circumstances.
I mean, obviously, they do kill people.
They get hungry occasionally.
Yeah, I mean, and you do, the problem is we look like seals on a surfboard,
right?
And that's the real problem.
It's mistaken identity.
Nine times out of ten, mistaken identity.
And the only way they can figure out what you are is by coming up and taking a
little bite and going, ugh, that's, you know, surfboard and wetsuit, ugh.
But that one little bite can sometimes be, you know, kill you.
But it's very rare.
It's very rare to get eaten by a shark.
Yeah, fairly rare.
Not rare enough.
Well, okay.
Once again, perspective.
Perspective perspective.
Yes.
I mean, I should just clarify.
I'm not in favor of killing sharks.
I'm not interested in eradicating them from the ocean.
But they scare the shit out of me, man.
I was in California.
Well, in California now.
But it was like a couple years ago.
Some guy, this was my biggest fear.
Some guy was swimming with a bunch of people that were training for a triathlon.
And it was off the coast of San Diego, and he was bit in half in front of
everybody.
Yeah.
So, you know, I mean, it does go down.
But perspective.
Right.
We kill 100 million sharks a year.
Well, not you and I.
So, we probably shouldn't say we.
Some assholes.
Well, as humanity.
Yes.
Humanity kills 100 million.
Mostly for soup, right?
Yeah.
Sharks and soup.
We kill, they kill maybe 8 to 10 of us per year.
I think it's less than that.
I think it's like 5.
Yeah, it depends where you get your statistics from and what you're counting
because, I mean,
most fatalities when it comes to shark attacks, actually, the Zambezi, the bull
shark, it's
in Africa.
Right.
You don't have great records.
But I would say, yeah, 8 to 10 per year.
The crazy thing about bull sharks is they can live in freshwater, like deep,
deep, deep in
freshwater, like way up rivers.
They're kind of blind.
They can only see about 6 inches in front of their face.
So, they like rivers and dirty kind of water.
I spent two years swimming every day with a, oh, it's about a 3-meter bull
shark in captivity.
And as soon as you stirred up the water, she would come right in.
She loved it when it was murky because that's when she had the advantage over
other animals.
Oh, interesting.
Well, you know the basis for the movie Jaws was actually a freshwater shark
attack.
It was baffling to people.
They had no idea that sharks at the time would even exist in freshwater.
But it was in New Jersey.
And these people were in a river, and I think two people were killed inside of
a short period
of time by bull sharks that had swum, swum?
Swam.
Swam.
Why does swam sound right?
Swam upriver and in freshwater.
So, these people were at a freshwater beach by the river, and they got killed.
Everyone's scared of the great white, you know, the big shark.
But if you talk about the amount of attacks, bull shark is far, far more.
That's interesting.
And you think it's because they don't see well, so it's a mistaken identity
thing.
Well, it's once again, they see you using the electrical receptors.
So, they can see your heart beating, basically.
But it doesn't know what you are, and it's got really bad vision.
So, the only way it can figure out what you are and whether you're edible is to
come and
take a little bite.
And, you know, that little bite sometimes can be fatal.
Yeah, I saw something last night.
I think it's got to be bullshit.
I wish I could remember the name of it.
But it was a camouflage suit that you could wear while hunting that does not
give out the
electrical signal.
So, like a Faraday cage suit?
Well, it was like a, it was this clothes.
It was somehow or another, these clothes keep an electrical signal from, like
animals from
seeing this electrical signal.
It sounded like horse shit, though.
Well, I mean, there is some science there.
If you have a Faraday cage suit, so.
What is it?
A Faraday cage.
A whole heap of metal, basically, woven that stops electrical signals.
Yeah, this is the stuff, Jamie.
Is that real?
Make humans significantly less detectable by animals.
Yeah.
No, it would make sense, for sure.
With animals that have the electrical impulse receptors like sharks do.
Huh.
Well, sharks have that, the line on their body, right?
That's what it is?
Well, all fish have a line going, lateral line.
Yeah.
It's going down and that detects, you know, electrical impulses.
But sharks have on their nose, it's a really hard word to pronounce, I'm not
going to
try, but they have this electrical receptor on the front of their nose.
And so, when a shark sees you, it can actually see your heart beating.
Whoa.
And so, say you're swimming with sharks and someone else next to you, and you've
been,
you've never been, you've been swimming with sharks before, you're pretty calm.
So, your heart's going, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.
Person next to you, never been swimming with sharks before, freaking out.
Their heart's going, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, a million miles an hour.
That shark's going to swim up and go, hmm, lunch to the person with a faster
heartbeat.
Because they're stressed out.
They're going to be easier to catch.
Nature does not like bitches.
That's what it is.
You panic like a bitch.
Nature's like, hmm.
It's true.
If you panic when you're in with sharks, they'll come right up to you.
They want to shift you out.
Well, all animals, right?
Have you ever seen people that just freak out around dogs, and dogs start
barking at them,
and then another person can come up with that dog, hey, buddy, what's going on?
You all right?
You know?
Yeah.
Yeah.
So your dad was a shark hunter, and when he was hunting these sharks, was he
doing it
for food?
Were they eating the sharks?
This was, I mean, you got to remember the back, this is back in the day.
You know, this is kind of-
50s.
50s, 60s.
Yeah.
Early 60s.
And back then, it was, he was filming people killing, you know, 20, 30 sharks
at a time,
and it was just, it was the first underwater documentaries out there, sort of
showing that
world, and they were using explosive heads, so like a spear gun with a bullet,
303 on the
end of it.
Oh, wow.
And they were shooting them that way, but, you know, I look at those videos now,
and some
of the species they were killing are just completely harmless, you know, and it's
just, and I
guess it eventually did get to that point where they turned around and went, oh,
hang
on, this is bad.
And so, use that fame or that desire for this underwater footage and then sort
of take a
conservation angle to it instead.
So, were they initially doing it to eradicate dangerous animals?
Is that why they were doing it?
I guess there's that aspect of that, too.
I'll tell you the truth.
I think it was just good TV.
Oh, okay.
So, it was just, let's go shoot some shit and put it on television and hear
sharks and
everyone's-
Everyone's so scared of them, you know.
Right, right.
It was, yeah, quite a natural thing back then to go, you know, you're scared of
something,
you're going to kill it.
And so, your dad, while you were young, became a conservationist and then
started taking you
all around the world.
Yeah.
So, we made these kind of one-hour nature documentaries.
They were shown in Australia on Channel 7 over here, Disney Channel, I picked
them up.
They're shown around the world and mainly underwater kind of adventure.
I look back now and actually think, it's kind of reality TV, to the truth,
because it's a documentary
of a family going on an adventure and learning some stuff and seeing some cool
stuff on the
way.
Wow.
So, this has been your life all along.
Yeah.
Wow.
That's cool, man.
And so, how'd you get involved with National Geographic?
You're a National Geographic Expedition Leader.
I work for a company called Limblad Expeditions National Geographic, okay?
So, it's a partnership between Limblad Expeditions and National Geographic and
we've got a fleet
of 10 vessels and we take people to the remotest places on Earth, basically.
And so, they graciously give me a $100 million ship and 100 people on it and
kind of a, you
start here and you end here two weeks later and, yeah, go for an adventure.
Go see what you can find.
Wow.
That is fucking badass.
It's good fun.
It's, you know, it's a lot of work.
I don't, you know, it's like anything you get paid for, there's work to it.
Sure.
But, yeah, the perks are just phenomenal.
The perks are amazing.
A hundred million dollar vessel.
Yeah.
Wow.
It's a nice ship.
It's a beautiful ship.
National Geographic Orion, it's one of the best expedition ships floating at
this point
in time.
And so, like, when you go on these ships, like, what are the ultimate goals?
To collect samples, to view things, to take photographs, to try to view rare
species?
A bit of everything, really.
So, we have, you know, scientists on board doing some research and stuff like
that.
But we're also taking tourists, you know.
We're taking people who are paying, you know, a considerable amount of money.
I can go to those?
I can go on a tour?
Yeah, yeah, for sure.
You can come down to Antarctica with me.
Ooh, oh, no, that's too cold.
I want to go somewhere cool.
Antarctica's a lot warmer.
You just got back from Costa Rica.
Why didn't you invite me to that?
That's badass.
I have to point out, my friend down there, Conrad, said, make sure you invite
Joe down here.
Is that your boat?
Yeah.
No, that's the National Geographic Orion.
You're on a cruise ship.
It's not a cruise ship.
We have to be very specific about this.
It's an expedition ship.
Oh, you have to say it's not a cruise ship.
That's a fucking cruise ship, man.
There's a difference between expedition and cruising, okay?
So a cruise ship goes to port to port, you know?
Right.
You stop in at some town.
You go up, y