Big Picture Science for Dec. 25, 2023 - Iron, Coal, Wood

Big Picture Science - Iron, Coal, Wood

REPEAT
Maybe you don’t remember the days of the earliest coal-fired stoves. They changed domestic life, and that changed society. We take you back to that era, and to millennia prior when iron was first smelt, and even earlier, when axe-handles were first fashioned from wood, as we explore how three essential materials profoundly transformed society.

We were once excited about coal’s promise to provide cheap energy, and how iron would lead to indestructible bridges, ships, and buildings. But they also caused some unintended problems: destruction of forests, greenhouse gases and corrosion. Did we foresee where the use of wood, coal, and iron would lead? What lessons do they offer for our future?

Guests:

• Jonathan Waldman – Author of Rust: The Longest War.
• Ruth Goodman – Historian of British social customs, presenter of a number of BBC television series, including Tudor Monastery Farm, and the author of The Domestic Revolution: How the Introduction of Coal into Victorian Homes Changed Everything.
• Roland Ennos – Professor of biological sciences at the University of Hull and author of The Age of Wood: Our Most Useful Material and the Construction of Civilization.

This repeat podcast originally aired on February 1, 2021

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/iron-coal-wood

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Dec. 18, 2023 - The Ocean’s Genome

 

Big Picture Science - The Ocean’s Genome

After helping to sequence the human genome more than twenty years ago, biochemist Craig Venter seemed to recede from the public eye. But he hadn’t retired. He had gone to sea and taken his revolutionary sequencing tools with him. We chatted with him about his multi-year voyage aboard the research vessel Sorcerer II, its parallels to Darwin’s voyage, and the surprising discoveries his team made about the sheer number and diversity of marine microbes and their roles in ocean ecosystems.

Guests:

• Craig Venter - Genomicist, biochemist, founder of the J. Craig Venter Institute, and co-author of “The Voyage of Sorcerer II: The Expedition that Unlocked the Secrets of the Ocean’s Microbiome.”
• Jeff Hoffman - Lab manager at the J. Craig Venter Institute and expedition scientist on the Sorcerer II expedition.

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/the-oceans-genome

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Dec. 11, 2023 - Skeptic Check: Naomi Klein

Big Picture Science - Skeptic Check: Naomi Klein

Our information age is increasingly the disinformation age. The spread of lies and conspiracy theories has created competing experiences of reality. Facts are often useless for changing minds or even making compelling arguments. In this episode, author Naomi Klein and science philosopher Lee McIntyre discuss why the goal – not simply the byproduct - of spreading disinformation is to polarize society. They also offer ideas about how we might find our way back to a shared objective truth.

Guests:

• Naomi Klein - Associate professor of Geography at the University of British Columbia and a co-director at the Center for Climate Justice. Author of Doppelganger: A Trip Into the Mirror World
• Lee McIntyre - Philosopher of science and a research fellow at the Center for Philosophy and the History of Science at Boston University, and author of Post-Truth and On Disinformation.

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/skeptic-check-naomi-klein

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Dec. 04, 2023 - End of Eternity

Big Picture Science - End of Eternity

REPEAT
Nothing lasts forever. Even the universe has several possible endings. Will there be a dramatic Big Rip or a Big Chill­–also known as the heat death of the universe–in trillions of years? Or will vacuum decay, which could theoretically happen at any moment, do us in? Perhaps the death of a tiny particle – the proton – will bring about the end.

We contemplate big picture endings in this episode, and whether one could be brought about by our own machine creations.

Guests:

• Anders Sandberg – Researcher at the Future of Humanity Institute at the University of Oxford
• Katie Mack – Assistant professor of physics at North Carolina State University, and the author of “The End of Everything, Astrophysically Speaking.”
• Brian Greene – Brian Greene, professor of physics and mathematics at Columbia, and author of “Until the End of Time: Mind, Matter, and Our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe”

This repeat podcast originally aired on May 3, 2021

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/end-of-eternity

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Nov. 27, 2023 - In Living Color

Big Picture Science - In Living Color

REPEAT
The world is a colorful place, and human eyes have evolved to take it in – from vermillion red to bright tangerine to cobalt blue. But when we do, are you and I seeing the same thing?

Find out why color perception is a trick of the brain, and why you and I may not see the same shade of green. Or blue. Or red. Also, platypuses and the growing club of fluorescent mammals, and the first new blue pigment in more than two centuries.

Guests:

• Paula Anich – Associate Professor of Natural Resources, Northland College
• Michaela Carlson – Assistant Professor of Chemistry, Northland College
• Rob DeSalle – Curator at the American Museum of Natural History, and co-author of “A Natural History of Color: the Science Behind What We See and How We See It”
• Mas Subramanian – Professor of Materials Science at Oregon State University

This repeat podcast originally aired on March 8, 2021

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/living-color

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Nov. 20, 2023 - The T-Rex Files

Big Picture Science - The T-Rex Files

REPEAT
T-Rex is having an identity crisis. Rocking the world of paleontology is the claim that Rex was not one species, but actually three. It’s not the first time that this particular dino has forced us to revise our understanding of the past. The discovery of the first T-Rex fossil in the 19th century taught humanity a
scary lesson: species eventually go extinct. If it happened to this seemingly invincible apex predator, it could happen to us too.

Hear how the amateur fossil hunter Barnum Brown’s discovery of T-Rex changed our understanding of ourselves, and the epilogue to the dinosaur era: how our mammalian relatives survived the potential extinction bottleneck of an asteroid impact.

Guests:

• Thomas Carr - Vertebrate paleontologist and Professor of Biology, Carthage College
• Peter Makovicky - Vertebrate paleontologist and Professor of paleontology in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Minnesota
• David Randall - Author of “The Monster’s Bones: The Discovery of T Rex and How It Shook Our World”
• Steve Brusatte - Personal Chair of Paleontology and Evolution, University of Edinburgh. Author of “The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs” and, most recently, “The Rise and Reign of The Mammals”

This repeat podcast originally aired on October 17, 2022

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/the-t-rex-files

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Nov. 13, 2023 - Neanderthal in the Family

Big Picture Science - Neanderthal in the Family

REPEAT
Back off, you Neanderthal! It sounds as if you’ve just been dissed, but maybe you should take it as a compliment. Contrary to common cliches, our Pleistocene relatives were clever, curious, and technologically inventive. Find out how our assessment of Neanderthals has undergone a radical rethinking, and hear about the influence they have as they live on in our DNA. For example, some of their genes have a strong association with severe Covid 19 infection. Plus, how Neanderthal mini-brains grown in a lab will teach us about the evolution of Homo sapiens.

Guests:

• Svante Pääbo – Evolutionary geneticist and Director of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
• Doyle Stevick – Associate professor of educational leadership and policies at the University of South Carolina.
• Beverly Brown – Professor emerita of anthropology, Rockland Community College, New York.
• Rebecca Wragg Sykes – Paleolithic anthropologist, author of “Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death and Art.”
• Alysson Muotri – Neuroscientist and professor of pediatrics, cellular and molecular medicine at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine

This repeat podcast originally aired on March 22, 2021

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/neanderthal-in-the-family

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Nov. 04, 2023 - Night Flight

Big Picture Science - Night Flight

Owls are both the most accessible and elusive of birds. Every child can recognize one, but you’ll be lucky to spot an owl in a tree, even if you’re looking straight at it. Besides their camouflage and silent flight, these mostly nocturnal birds, with their amazing vision and hearing, are most at home in the dead of night, a time humans find alien and scary. Ecologist Carl Safina got to know an injured baby screech owl well. Their relationship saved the owl’s life and gave Safina insider’s wisdom about these aerial hunters of the night.

Guests:

• Carl Safina – ecologist at Stony Brook University, head of the non-profit Safina Center, and author of “Alfie & Me: What Owls Know, What Humans Believe”
• Tom Damiami – natural resources interpreter, singer on Long Island, NY and leader of the Shelter Island Owl Prowl
• Gordy Slack – science writer, former senior editor of California Wild, the science and natural history magazine published by the California Academy of Sciences

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/night-flight

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Oct. 30, 2023 - Extraordinary Ordinary Objects

 

Big Picture Science - Extraordinary Ordinary Objects

“To live is to count and to count is to calculate.”  But before we plugged in the computer to express this ethos, we pulled out the pocket calculator. It became a monarch of mathematics that sparked a computing revolution. But it’s not the only deceptively modest innovation that changed how we work and live. Find out how sewing a scrap of fabric into clothing helped define private life and how adding lines to paper helped build an Empire. Plus, does every invention entail irrevocable cultural loss?

Guests:

• Keith Houston – author of “Empire of the Sum: The Rise and Reign of the Pocket Calculator.”
• Hannah Carlson – teaches dress history and material culture at the Rhode Island School of Design, author of “Pockets: An Intimate History of How We Keep Things Close.”
• Dominic Riley – bookbinder in the U.K.

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/extraordinary-ordinary-objects

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Oct. 23, 2023 - Like Lightning

Big Picture Science - Like Lightning

REPEAT
Every second, lightning strikes 50 to 100 times somewhere. It can wreak havoc by starting wildfires and sometimes killing people. But lightning also produces a form of nitrogen that’s essential to vegetation. In this episode, we talk about the nature of these dramatic sparks. Ben Franklin established their electric origin, so what do we still not know? Also, why the frequency of lightning strikes is increasing in some parts of the world. And, what to do if you find someone hit by lightning.

Guests:

• Thomas Yeadaker – Resident of Oakland, California
• Chris Davis – Medical doctor and Assistant Professor of Emergency Medicine at Wake Forest University and Medical Director for the National Center for Outdoor Adventure Education
• Jonathan Martin – Professor of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, University of Wisconsin, Madison
• Steve Ackerman – Professor of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, University of Wisconsin, Madison
• Peter Bieniek – Professor of Atmospheric and Space Science, University of Alaska, Fairbanks

This repeat podcast originally aired on September 12, 2022

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/like-lightning

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Oct. 16, 2023 - Skeptic Check: Worrier Mentality

Big Picture Science - Skeptic Check: Worrier Mentality

REPEAT
Poisonous snakes, lightning strikes, a rogue rock from space. There are plenty of scary things to fret about, but are we burning adrenaline on the right ones? Stepping into the bathtub is more dangerous than flying from a statistical point of view, but no one signs up for “fear of showering” classes.

Find out why we get tripped up by statistics, worry about the wrong things, and how the “intelligence trap” not only leads smart people to make dumb mistakes, but actually causes them to make more.

Guests:

• Eric Chudler – Research associate professor, department of bioengineering, University of Washington, Seattle and co-author of “Worried: Science Investigates Some of Life’s Common Concerns”
• Lise Johnson – Director of the Basic Science Curriculum, Rocky Vista University, and co-author of “Worried: Science Investigates Some of Life’s Common Concerns”
• Willie Turner – Vice President of Operations at the Hiller Aviation Museum in San Carlos, CA
• Charles Wheelan – Senior Lecturer and Policy Fellow, Dartmouth College, and author of “Naked Statistics”
• David Robson – Commissioning Editor for the BBC and author of “The Intelligence Trap: Why Smart People Make Dumb Mistakes”

This repeat podcast originally aired on May 27, 2019

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/skeptic-check-worrier-mentality

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Oct. 09, 2023 - Going Multicellular

Big Picture Science - Going Multicellular

Imagine life without animals, trees, and fungi. The world would look very different. But while the first life was surely single-celled, we don’t know just how it evolved to multicellular organisms. Two long-term experiments hope to find out, and one has been running for more than 35 years. Hear about the moment scientists watched evolution take off in the lab, and how directed evolution was used to create a multicellular organism. Also, how single embryonic cells become humans, and what all of this says about the possibility of life on other worlds.

Guests:

• Jeff Barrick – molecular scientist at the University of Texas at Austin where his lab oversees the Long-Term Evolution Experiment that’s been running since 1988.
• Will Ratcliff - an evolutionary biologist at Georgia Institute of Technology
• Ben Stanger - cancer researcher, professor of medicine and developmental biology at the University of Pennsylvania and author of “From One Cell: A Journey into Life’s Origins and the Future of Medicine.”
• Joseph L. Graves - evolutionary biologist and geneticist at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University and author of “A Voice in the Wilderness: A Pioneering Biologist Explains How Evolution Can Help Us Solve Our Biggest Problems.”

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/going-multicellular

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Oct. 02, 2023 - How Hot is Too Hot?

Big Picture Science - How Hot is Too Hot?

Extreme heat is taking its toll on the natural world. We use words like “heat domes” and “freakish” to describe our everyday existence. These high temperatures aren’t only uncomfortable - they are lethal to humans, animals, and crops. In search of an answer t0 our episode’s question, we discuss the dilemma of an ever-hotter world with an author who has covered climate change for more than twenty years.

Guest:

• Jeff Goodell – author of “The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet.”

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/how-hot-is-too-hot

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Sept. 25, 2023 - Skeptic Check: Near Death Experiences

Big Picture Science - Skeptic Check: Near Death Experiences

Near death experiences can be profound and even life changing. People describe seeing bright lights, staring into the abyss, or meeting dead relatives. Many believe these experiences to be proof of an afterlife.

But now, scientists are studying these strange events and gaining insights into the brain and consciousness itself. Will we uncover the scientific underpinning of these near-death events?

Guests:
Steve Paulson - executive producer of To the Best of Our Knowledge for Wisconsin Public Radio
Sebastian Junger - journalist, filmmaker and author of “The Perfect Storm: A True Story of Men Against the Sea”
Christoph Koch - neuroscientist at the Allen Institute in Seattle and chief scientist of the Tiny Blue Dot Foundation in Santa Monica CaliforniaDaniel Kondziella - neuroscientist in the Department of Clinical Medicine at the University of Copenhagen

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/skeptic-check-near-death-experiences

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!

Big Picture Science for Sept. 18, 2023 - Into the Deep

Big Picture Science - Into the Deep

REPEAT
Have you ever heard worms arguing? Deep-sea scientists use hydrophones to eavesdrop on “mouth-fighting worms.” It’s one of the many ways scientists are trying to catalog the diversity of the deep oceans — estimated to be comparable to a rainforest.

But the clock is ticking. While vast expanses of the deep sea are still unexplored, mining companies are ready with dredging vehicles to strip mine the seafloor, potentially destroying rare and vulnerable ecosystems. Are we willing to eradicate an alien landscape that we haven’t yet visited?

Guests:

• Craig McClain - deep-sea and evolutionary biologist and ecologist, Executive Director of the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium.
• Steve Haddock - senior scientist at the Monetary Bay Aquarium Research Institute, and co-author of a New York Times op-ed about the dangers of mining.
• Emily Hall - marine chemist at the Mote Marine Laboratory, Sarasota, Florida
• Chong Chen - deep sea biologist with the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC)

This repeat podcast originally aired on November 23, 2020

Download podcast at - https://bigpicturescience.org/episodes/into-the-deep

You can listen to this and other episodes at http://bigpicturescience.org/, and be sure to check out Blog Picture Science, the companion blog to the radio show.

Get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!