Science, Spoken

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A Crucial Climate Mystery Hides Just Beneath Your Feet Apr 17, 2017

Show notes

This storyoriginally appeared on Gristand is part of theClimate Deskcollaboration. What Jonathan Sanderman really wanted was some old dirt. He called everyone he could think of who might know where he could get some. He emailed colleagues and read through old studies looking for clues, but he kept coming up empty. Sanderman was looking for old dirt because it would let him test a plan to save the world.

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How Hard Does Thor Hit Hulk in That Ragnarok Trailer? Let’s Do the Physics! Apr 14, 2017

Show notes

I can’t imagine a blockbuster movie about superheroes without some cool physics. After all, these aren’t dramas, but action movies with jumping and flying and punching. Of course, the point of the jumping and flying and punching is to advance the story, not provide a physics lesson. But nothing says they can’t do both. The firsttrailer for Thor: Ragnarokprovides a great chance to do this.

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To Save Florida’s Famous Oranges, Scientists Race to Weaponize a Virus Apr 13, 2017

Show notes

On a plate, a single banana seems whimsical—yellow and sweet, contained in its own easy-to-open peel. It is a charming breakfast luxury as silly as it is delicious and ever-present. Yet when you eat a banana the flavor on your tongue has complex roots, equal parts sweetness and tragedy. In 1950, most bananas were exported from Central America. Guatemala in particular was a key piece of a vast empire of banana plantations run by the American-owned United Fruit Company.

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The ‘Most Dangerous’ Volcano Can Be a Tricky Thing to Pin Down Apr 12, 2017

Show notes

I know you've all seen lists like this before: what is the "world's most dangerous volcano"? Most of the time, that discuss devolves quickly into something about "supervolcanoes", which is very exciting and all because they can generate massive eruptions. However, they are far from being the "most dangerous" volcano.

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Pricey Technology Is Keeping People Alive Who Don’t Want to Live Apr 11, 2017

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Some people just want to die. Not because they are trapped by depression, anxiety, public embarrassment, or financial ruin. No, these poor few have terminal illnesses. Faced with six months to live, and the knowledge that the majorityof those 180 days will be bad ones,theyseek a doctor’s prescription for an early death. Soon, terminal patients in California will have that option.

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Why You Should Put Your Supercomputer in Wyoming Apr 10, 2017

Show notes

Travel just few miles west of bustling Cheyenne, Wyoming, a you’ll find yourself in big-sky country. Tall-grass plains line the highway, snow-packed peaks pierce the sky, and round-edged granite formations jut out of the ground. But in this bucolic scene sits an alien building: a blocky, almost pre-fab structure with a white rotunda, speckled with dozens of windows that look out onto the grounds. Inside, it’s home to two supercomputers that focus on the vast landscape above.

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Coastal Inundation Reveals the Upside of Climate Change Apr 07, 2017

Show notes

In Miami Beach, they call it “sunny-day flooding.” You’ll be hanging out downtown under clear blue skies—only to see, whoa, the streets slowly filling with water. Miami Beach, Florida, is a coastal city built on porous limestone, so as climate change melts polar ice into the oceans, water is literally pushed up out of the ground. “It’s an eerie, scary, unnerving feeling, like something out of a sci-fi movie,” says Philip Levine, mayor of the city of 90,000.

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You Could Soon Print Out Simple Electronics With Your Deskjet Apr 06, 2017

Show notes

Computers used to require entire buildings to operate. Now they fit in our pockets. Similarly, factory-size electronics manufacturing is approaching a contraction. Want proof? Look at that $50 printer on your desk and imagine, instead of using it to spit out a hard copy of that thank-you note, that you used it to print some digital memory. Not enough memory to power a laptop. Think smaller, like smart tags to inventory all the crap in your workshop.

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Elon Musk Isn’t the Only One Trying to Computerize Your Brain Apr 05, 2017

Show notes

Elon Musk wants to merge the computer with the human brain, build a “neural lace,” create a “direct cortical interface,” whatever that might look like. In recent months, the founder of Tesla, SpaceX, and OpenAI has repeatedly hinted at these ambitions, and then, earlier this week, The Wall Street Journal reported that Musk has now launched a company called Neuralink that aims to implant tiny electrodes in the brain “that may one day upload and download thoughts.

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Want to Play Scrabble Like a Pro? Here’s Your Memory Trick Apr 04, 2017

Show notes

Bennett Schwartz is one of the nation’s leading memory experts, and when I visited him in his office at Florida International University, he was standing at his desk. A soft sunlight crowded the room. Large windows framed the palm tree-lined quad outside. Dressed in a short-sleeved shirt and slacks, Schwartz appeared to be quietly talking to himself, with hushed, mumbled words, and for a long moment, it seemed as if he was some sort of monk, living in another, more esoteric world.

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