Science, Spoken

Latest Episodes:

Can Our Phones Save Us From Our Phones? Jan 31, 2018

Show notes

Hi. My name is Robbie, and I'm addicted to browser tabs. For years, I deluded myself into thinking they were an efficient way to gather information on a given subject. Or subjects. Sub-subjects, too. You see the problem. Which is why, for the past few months, I've been experimenting with a Chrome extension called xTab. It works by limiting the number of tabs I can have open in a given browser window.

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Meet the Company Trying to Democratize Clinical Trials With AI Jan 30, 2018

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A decade ago, Pablo Graiver was working as a VP at Kayak, the online airfare aggregator, when he sat down to dinner with an old friend—a heart surgeon from his home country of Argentina. The talk turned to how tech was doing more to save folks a few bucks on a flight to Rome than to save people’s lives. The biggest problem in healthcare? “Clinical trials,” she said. “They’re a disaster.

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Don’t Call It a Blood Moon. Or Supermoon. Or Blue Moon Jan 30, 2018

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On Wednesday, humanity will be treated to a celestial trifecta: A supermoon (meaning it’s relatively close to Earth), but also simultaneously a blood moon (it’ll be orange or red), but also simultaneously a blue moon (the second full moon in one calendar month) will pass in the shadow of Earth, for a total lunar eclipse. It’s going to be righteous.

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Yes, There Is Gravity in Space Jan 29, 2018

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This week, I settled down to watch the first episode of The 100. If you haven't seen the show, I'll just point out that it takes place in the near future (though it ran, on the CW, in the near past). For reasons that I won't get into, there is a spacecraft with a bunch of teenagers that is traveling from a space station down to the surface of the Earth. During the reentry process, one kid wants to show that he is the master of space travel and that he's awesome.

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Scientists Hate the NIH’s New Rules for Experimenting on Humans Jan 29, 2018

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She’s probably mostly kidding when she tells the origin story this way, but Kathy Hudson—until last year the deputy director for science, outreach, and policy at the National Institutes of Health—says that a massive update to the NIH’s rules for funding science started with humiliation.

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Why No Gadget Can Prove How Stoned You Are Jan 26, 2018

Show notes

If you’ve spent time with marijuana—any time at all, really—you know that the high can be rather unpredictable. It depends on the strain, its level of THC and hundreds of other compounds, and the interaction between all these elements. Oh, and how much you ate that day. And how you took the cannabis. And the position of the North Star at the moment of ingestion. OK, maybe not that last one.

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How Much Kinetic Energy Could Black Panther Collect from Bullets? Jan 26, 2018

Show notes

A new clip from the upcoming movie Black Panther was recently shown during an episode of Ellen. In the scene (which I assume isn't a spoiler, since it was on TV), the Black Panther is in pursuit of (or being pursued by) some people in another car. As the Black Panther rides on top of the car (which is, of course, the most efficient way to travel as a superhero), the bad guys are pelting him with bullets. Honestly, I shouldn't make such judgements—maybe they're not bad, just misunderstood.

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SpaceX Test Fires Its Falcon Heavy Rocket for the First Time Jan 25, 2018

Show notes

The long-awaited Falcon Heavy rocket roared to life on Wednesday at 12:30 pm Eastern, as SpaceX fired up the 27 Merlin engines that power the triple-booster rocket at Kennedy Space Center. Perched atop what CEO Elon Musk claims will be the most powerful lift vehicle in the world is the billionaire’s Tesla Roadster, which will launch toward a Mars elliptical orbit on the Falcon Heavy’s upcoming maiden flight.

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The Science of Why Swearing Physically Reduces Pain Jan 25, 2018

Show notes

For a very long time, conventional wisdom held that swearing was not a useful response to pain. Many psychologists believed that swearing would actually make pain feel worse, thanks to a cognitive distortion known as catastrophizing. When we catastrophize we leap to the conclusion that the bad thing that is currently happening is the absolute worst thing.

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Why Robots Should Shake the Bejeezus Out of Cherry Trees Jan 24, 2018

Show notes

I don’t think sci-fi saw this coming. For so long, futuristic books and films have promised us robots like C-3PO that translate alien languages and assist us in hijinks. Or ones like Rosie that clean our houses. Or, on the other end of the spectrum, robots that level our houses and destroy humanity. Looking at you, Arnold. The reality of modern robotics couldn’t be more different. These days, it’s more about developing robots that ... shake the bejeezus out of cherry trees.

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