>> tonight, should students be taught gay history? only if they're teaching that gay is history. [laughter] then a controversy at the "today show." the cooking segment got out of control and they ate matt lauer. and my guest will discuss his book "incognito: the secret lives of the brain." if i find out my brain has been seeing another skull, i will be pissed. you say potato, i say who are you and why are you saying "potato" to me? this is "the colbert report." captioning sponsored by comedy central [theme song playing]

[cheering and applause] [awed -- audience chanting "stephen"] >> stephen: welcome to "the report." thank you. thank you. welcome to "the report." ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining us. you know, sometimes i am tempted to keep you people from chanting, but then i think, why waste your breath moaning? nothing can be done to stop the shouting. nation, thank you for picking me up with that cheering, because this is without a doubt a dark time for america. partly because it's night. [laughter]

but also because this morning america's manned space program came to an end when the shuttle "atlantis" touched down for the last time. thanks, obama. [laughter] ground control to major bummer. [laughter] request permission to dock with a box of tissues. [laughter] [audience reacts] [laughter] [laughter] [cheering and applause]

>> stephen: folks, america has always been the leader in space. from the historic 1969 moon landing to the landmark 200940th anniversary of the moon landing. in between we used our shuttle fleet to build the international space station, launch the hubble telescope and deploy a ragtag band of oilmen to save the earth from a killer asteroid. now without our shuttle fleet, we're stuck hitching rides with the damn ruskies, and since they don't have any competition now, the price is shooting up like an i don't know because we canceled the space program. the cosmo-nazis started off charging $22 million per astronaut. but now suddenly it's $43.4 million, and it's going to go up to $63 million by 2016. and that doesn't even include the $25 baggage fee. [laughter]

i am on to you. it may weigh 50 pounds down here, but in space it's t-p[cheering and applause] yeah! yeah! and, folks, this isn't just about the end of america's space dominance. it's really about me. [laughter] i was huge in space. i launched a a wriststrong bracelet into space. i got a treadmill named after me. i went to nasa, finished the entire astronaut training regiment in about two hours. [laughter] but my astronaut skills are now as obsolete as dougher -- dodo husbandry, z une programing and u.s. manufacturing. but take heart, nation, because i know somewhere out there tonight a young child is looking up at the stars and daring to

dream that one day he too can pay the russians $63 million. [laughter and applause] nation, this is my question: you are all my students, and i am hot for teacher. this is "eyes on education." ♪ ♪ first period. [bell rings] history. folks, our public schools are filled with violence, drugs and guns. but they are about to get dangerous. >> california's governor has signed a bill that requires schools to teach gay history. >> this is an outrage. bringing gay history into our classroom teaches our children a

dangerous lesson, that gay people exist. [laughter] and straight nation, it only gets worse. >> lessons in public schools will now include the contributions of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender americans. >> transgender americans? great. now our kids are going to learn about how franklin roosevelt became eleanor roosevelt. but that won't be the only revelation in these teacher-taught lesson plan-on-man action. >> starting in 2013, students will learn about famous gay people, is up as harvey milk, san francisco's first openly gay politician. >> if, in fact, there is a discussion in english about oscar wilde, it will reference the fact that he was gay. >> stephen: what? this guy was gay? [laughter] that changes everything i never learned about him. and, folks... [cheering and applause]

and i am not the only one who sees where this thing is going. >> california rewriting the text books, the history books saying, by the way, george washington was a homosexual. >> yes, how dare california say that a man in a powdered wig and high silk stockings is gay. next thing they'll accuse him of crossing the delaware on a pride float. well, california, california, you're so eager for gay history, i will give you gay history. gay was invented in ancient greece by socrates, who came up with the socratic method, which i believe is a gay sex move. in the fifth century, the visigoths spread their gay culture of pantslessness throughout europe. see this guy swinging in the breeze here? i believe that's what's called the sac of rome.

then in 1504, an angry and depressed michelangelo sculpts his ex-boyfriend dave, giving him rock hard abs but in a bitchy and vengeful move gives him an incredibly small cannoli. then after that nothing gay for 500 years. straights were on a role until the '70s when gay made a comeback when paul lynn was given the center square. impressionable children homesick from school watched him, were converted, and boom, ever since it's been gay, gay, gay, gay, gay, thus endeth the lesson, which brings us to our first pop quiz: if a society begins teaching its children about gay history in 2011, how long until they all become gay and a great country crumbles into dust? a, instantly. b, all of the above. second period.

[bell rings] social studies. nation, i don't keep an eye just on education in america. i also watch what they're doing in china. someone needs to teach those kids better penmanship. i'm going to say "l," a very lazy "t." whatever. well, china is exploring a new frontier in education with the help of the happiest company on earth. >> a new cast of english teachers has come shanghai, and it's safe to say the group is unlike any instructors this city's children has seen before. this is the disney english school first, of many planned for china. it's the walt disney company's newest forway into the world's most populous nation. >> stephen: the disney english school, now chinese kids learn words like "micky" and "mouse" and "sew that mickey mouse

hoodie faster" and future classes can cover more advanced conversational english like "zip dee due dah" and "supercal tragic." of course, some say they're brainwashing these children as potential clients. exactly. got to get them young. folks, we need disney english schools here in america. we cannot allow a princess gap. american kids are dangerously underexposed to disney marketing. they have only movie, toys, theme parks, tv shows, ice spectaculars, broadway shows, night lights and toy story credit cards. kids, you can be in debt to infinity and beyond. [cheering and applause]

time for another pop quiz. the little mermaid is to pinocchio as aladdin is to, a, goofy, b, the singing teapot, c, buzz light year, and d, who cares, we just raised your brand awareness of six disney characters. characters. ♪ and you? yes. ♪ and you? yes. [ telephone ringing ] and you? [ woman ] yes. ♪ girls like fabio,

foreign land spices, fabio, komodo. old spices. yes. [ old spice whistle ]

>> stephen: welcome back, everybody. thank you very much. nation, it's no secret. i've said it on this show many times. i am an avid watcher of the "today show." i watch it just to find out what day it is. turns out it's today. they always get that right. but earlier this week, folks, i saw a segment that shook my faith in breakfast news. ivan. >> this morning we're kicking off a special series, breast obsessed in america. >> there are so many words for these, tah-tahs, puppies, rack. >> stephen: the rack? i am disappointed. this is the kind of filth i

expect from charles osgood. this breast obsessed in mesh series is a blatant pabdzering dressed up like news. look at nbc's evidence that america is breast crazy. >> how much are breasts on the human mind? a quick google search for them paired with boobs and a slang word starting with the turns up almost a billion hits, more than four times the yield for a search on the brain. >> stephen: almost nobody is looking up brains. or apparently using them at nbc. this kind of "reporting" has no place on a news show. it is disgusting. it is debasing. it is vile. and nbcious i have just one thing to say, what about bust? [cheering and applause] that's right. that's right. i like big busts and i cannot

lie. i'm a butt man. there are millions of us, like two-time pulitzer prize winner author david mccullough. >> my anaconda don't want none unless you got buns, hon. >> stephen: see? so tell me, nbc, where's butt week? i want hard-hitting reports on high and tight apple bottom booties you can bounce a quarter off and get back two dimes and a nickel. in-depth exposes on the sweet beachy curves you just want to polish with windex until you see your face in it. i'm talking about something so firm you can snap a pool cue across it. are you saving that scoop for brian williams? i'm sad to say this is a pattern with the peacock. they have a network-wide anti-butt bias. watch any of their news coverage. their anchor, world leaders

always shot waist up and from the front. because that's where nbc's precious boobs are. and more to the point, it's where the butt isn't. you almost never see ass on nbc except on celebrity apprentice. i mean... [cheering and applause] i mean, you've got. to he's talking out of it. [laughter] so i hereby call on the colbert nation to go down to the "today show"'s window in rockefeller plaza tomorrow morning and demand equal time for the booty. [cheering and applause] i want to see signs like, "no keesters, no peace" and "nbc equals no butt coverage." the point is, because here's the point, folks, this boob week is just a cheap ratings grope, like

shark week. oh, oh, you know what somebody should do? shark boob week. or boob shark week. that i would watch. we'll be right back. [cheering and applause] [ male announcer ] at nissan, we test the altima's durability

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everybody. my guest tonight is a neuroscientist here to talk about the neurological underpinnings of the subconscious, if there is such a thing as the subconscious. please mommy breast david eagleman. [cheering and applause] , hi, david eagleman. all right, sir, you are a

neuroscientist. what is a neuroscientist for a good folks? >> we try to figure out how the brain works. [laughter] >> stephen: does it always work? >> it's always doing stuff under the hood that you don't even know about is the thing. it's always screaming along with activity in ways that your conscious mind doesn't even have access to. [laughter] >> stephen: okay. you work on time perception, neural law, and you have a new book called "incognito: the secret lives of the brain." what do you mean "secret lives of the brain"? >> well, the brain is the most complicated thing we've ever found in the universe. it consists of hundreds of millions of neurons connected in such complexity that a cubic millimeter of brain tissue as many connections as there are stars in the milky way galaxy. >> stephen: bull [bleeped]. >> it's true. >> stephen: really?

really? a cubic millimeter? >> yes. so the really amazing part is that the brain is running all of its operations, almost all of it under the hood of conscious awareness. so these massive things are going on, and you don't know, the things you act... the things you believe, the things you think, you don't know where they come from. they get generated under the surface and served up to your conscious brain, and you say, hey, i just thought of something. but it wasn't you that thought of it. your brain has been working on it for days or weeks. >> stephen: wait. there's somebody else in my head? am i just like a vehicle for my brain to go around? >> as pink floyd said, "there's someone in my head, but it's not me." it's essentially that situation. >> stephen: are you high? [applause] because i have never heard... i never heard... i have never heard anyone outside of a college dorm room quote pink floyd, thank you very much.

>> glad to be the first. >> stephen: okay. do you need to know what your brain is doing, because my brain tells me thing all the time and i just ignore it. >> right. your brain is like the c.e.o. of a company, which only has access to maybe the long-term vision of the company and doesn't really understand all the machinery of the company beneath it. so the c.e.o. sets the long-term vision, but the operations that make it all work, you don't really have access to. >> stephen: it's not unionized, is it? the c.e.o. is making 100 times what the guy on the assembly line is making, isn't he? >> that's the funny part about our conscious lives, the conscious you, the part that flickers to life when you wake up in the morning, that's the smallest bit of what's happening in your brain. >> stephen: what happens in dreams? is that real? is there a difference to my brain whether or not i really do things? let's say i am naked horse back riding and like there's women rubbing me with scented oils and

then i ride up to a huge crowd on a spanish hilltop and everyone cheers my name and then i play a game of chess with human figures. okay. now if later that night i dream that i do that, is that as... [cheering and applause] is that as powerful in a dream? does it matter whether it's real or dream state for the effect on my psyche? >> you know, the fact is what dreams show us is that we can be fooled into believing terrorist realities. and so it's taken as a real hypothesis that this might be a simulation. we already know that we can be fooled into completely buying something. >> stephen: waited a second. is this "inception"? are you and i... are youdy dicaprio? >> did you bring the top? >> stephen: [bleeped] i lost it. what do you think? at the end do you think he's

still dreaming? >> yeah, yeah, probably. >> stephen: you think he's still dreaming? >> this whole thing might be a civilization, two billion more advanced than we are and they're recreating 2011. >> stephen: how can we figure out whether that's true? >> got to wait until you die and wake up probably. back to the book. >> stephen: wow. >> none of that is in the book. the book is about all these unconscious influences on how we make decisions in our lives. >> stephen: you had to think of team of rivals theory. what is that? >> it turns out you are not one thing. your brain is make up of lots of competing subpopulations. you should think about the brain like a neural parliament with different political parties battling it out the steer the ship of state. >> stephen: really, parliament? are you saying my brain is british? because that was... i need a reason to explain why i drive on the wrong side of the road sometimes. [laughter] so if there are different political parties in my head

battling for control, who wants to raise my emotional debt ceiling? [cheering and applause] david, thank you so much. david eagleman, the book is ♪ have a better day [ male announcer ] only subway has a deal this flat-out delicious -- the new $3 flatbread breakfast combo. a toasty 6-inch flatbread breakfast sandwich and a 16-ounce cup of freshly brewed seattle's best coffee. all for just $3. build your better breakfast today. ...was it something big? ...or something small? ...something old? ...or something new? ...or maybe, just maybe... it's something you haven't seen yet. the 2nd generation of intel core processors. stunning visuals, intelligent performance. this is visibly smart.

♪ and you? yes. ♪ and you? yes. [ telephone ringing ] and you? [ woman ] yes. ♪ girls like fabio, foreign land spices, fabio, komodo. old spices. yes. [ old spice whistle ]