Are We A Blog?

We've moved!

2010-07-27T12:59:00.001-07:00

Our blog is now located at radio.seti.org/blog. Come visit, update your bookmarks, leave comments, listen to audio, and read the occasional companion pieces to segments from recent episodes.

Are We Alone - Written in Code

2010-06-14T12:10:00.000-07:00

Genes – what are they good for? Absolutely… something. But not everything. Your “genius” genes need to be turned on – and your environment determines that. Find out how to unleash your inner-Einstein, and what scientists learned from studying the famous physicist’s brain.

Also, the bizarre notion that your children inherit not just your genes, but also the consequences of your habits – smoking, stress, diet, and other behaviors that turn the genes on.

Plus Francis Collins on affordable personal genomes, and a man who decoded his own DNA in under a week.

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - David Shenk (part 1)
Part 2 - Dean Falk
Part 3 - David Shenk (part 2)
Part 4 - Francis Collins
Part 5 - Stephen Quake

Are We Alone - Written in Code: David Shenk part 1

2010-06-14T12:09:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of Written in Code, featuring David Shenk, journalist, and author of The Genius in All of Us: Why Everything You’ve Been Told About Genetics, Talent, and IQ Is Wrong.

Are We Alone - Written in Code: Dean Falk

2010-06-14T12:07:00.001-07:00

Part 2 of Written in Code, featuring Dean Falk, anthropologist and Senior Scholar at the School For Advanced Research in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Are We Alone - Written in Code: David Shenk part 2

2010-06-14T12:04:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of Written in Code, featuring David Shenk, journalist, and author of The Genius in All of Us: Why Everything You’ve Been Told About Genetics, Talent, and IQ Is Wrong.

Are We Alone - Written in Code: Francis Collins

2010-06-14T12:02:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of Written in Code, featuring Francis Collins, geneticist, Director of the National Institutes of Health.

Are We Alone - Written in Code: Stephen Quake

2010-06-14T11:57:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of Written in Code, featuring Stephen Quake, biophysicist, Stanford University.

Interpreting your PhD thesis... through dance

2010-06-08T08:58:00.001-07:00

What if you were challenged to describe your PhD thesis without words, slides, or anything other than dance? Here are some examples, described in this week's show, which you can review to see how effective their interpretation is.

Are We Alone - Seth's Garage

2010-06-07T15:36:00.000-07:00

It’s always a surprise to go digging in Seth’s garage – who knows what we’ll find! In this impressive heap of paraphernalia, tucked between boxes of old radio tubes and hydraulic jacks, we stumble upon the secrets to our galaxy’s central black hole… witness the dance of the PhD theses… uncover the genome of milk (while moo-ving boxes) and … hey? Who’s that crunching numbers in the corner? It’s astrophysicist Mario Livio addressing the mathematical mysteries of universe.

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - Andrea Ghez
Part 2 - Kathryn Denning
Part 3 - Mario Livio
Part 4 - Danielle Lemay
Part 5 - John Bohannon & Katrien Kolenberg

Are We Alone - Seth's Garage: Andrea Ghez

2010-06-07T15:34:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of Seth's Garage, featuring Andrea Ghez, Astronomer at University of California, Los Angeles.

Are We Alone - Seth's Garage: Kathryn Denning

2010-06-07T15:32:00.000-07:00

Part 2 of Seth's Garage, featuring Kathryn Denning, Professor of Anthropology at York University.

Are We Alone - Seth's Garage: Mario Livio

2010-06-07T15:31:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of Seth's Garage, featuring Mario Livio, Senior Astronomer at the Hubble Space Telescope Science Institute and author of Is God a Mathematician?.

Are We Alone - Seth's Garage: Danielle Lemay

2010-06-07T15:28:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of Seth's Garage, featuring Danielle Lemay, Nutrition Scientist at the University of California, Davis.

Are We Alone: Seth's Garage: Bohannon & Kolenberg

2010-06-07T15:16:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of Seth's Garage, featuring John Bohannon, Gonzo Scientist and Contributing Correspondent for Science, and Katrien Kolenberg, astrophysicist, University of Vienna.

You can see their theses interpretations here.

Are We Alone - Cell! Cell!

2010-05-31T15:05:00.000-07:00

Live forever? Both cancer cells and stem cells can make a claim to immortality. Left unchecked, tumors will grow indefinitely. And stem cells offer the promise of non-stop rejuvenation.

We’ll find out whether the surprising discovery of stem cells in the brain really can keep our thinking organ young. And we’ll hear the remarkable story of Henrietta Lacks, the woman who unwittingly donated tissue to science in 1951, and whose cancer cells are still grown in laboratories around the world today.

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - The Story of Henrietta Lacks
Part 2 - Randy Schekman
Part 3 - HeLa Cells
Part 4 - Stem Cells
Part 5 - Rebecca Skloot

Are We Alone - Cell! Cell!: The Story of Henrietta Lacks

2010-05-31T15:03:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of Cell! Cell!, featuring Rebecca Skloot, journalist and author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.

Are We Alone - Cell! Cell!: Randy Schekman

2010-05-31T15:02:00.000-07:00

Part 2 of Cell! Cell!, featuring Randy Schekman, molecular and cell biologist at the University of California, Berkeley.

Are We Alone - Cell! Cell!: HeLa Cells

2010-05-31T14:58:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of Cell! Cell!, featuring Rebecca Skloot, journalist and author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and Randy Schekman, molecular and cell biologist at the University of California, Berkeley.

Are We Alone - Cell! Cell!: Stem Cells

2010-05-31T14:56:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of Cell! Cell!, featuring Fred Gage, neurobiologist at the Salk Institute, and Randy Schekman, molecular and cell biologist at the University of California, Berkeley.

Are We Alone - Cell! Cell!: Rebecca Skloot

2010-05-31T14:49:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of Cell! Cell!, featuring Rebecca Skloot, journalist and author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, discussing the Lacks family's reaction to learning about what became of Henrietta's cells.

Are We Alone - Life of Brain

2010-05-27T15:20:00.000-07:00

We should award frequent travel miles to your brain. After all, it’s evolved a long way from the days of guiding brachiation from tree-to-tree to become the three pounds of web-surfing, Sudoku-playing powerhouse it is today. But a suite of technologies may expand human brains further still.

From smart pills to nano-wires: discover the potential – and peril – of neuro-engineering to repair and enhance our cognitive function.

Also, how our brains got so big in the first place: a defense of the modern diet.

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - Bill Leonard
Part 2 - Michael Gazzaniga
Part 3 - Ian Pearson
Part 4 - Steven Rose
Part 5 - Ed Boyden

Are We Alone - Life of Brain: Bill Leonard

2010-05-24T15:18:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of Life of Brain, featuring Bill Leonard, department chairman and professor of Anthropology at Northwestern University.

Are We Alone - Life of Brain: Michael Gazzaniga

2010-05-24T15:16:00.000-07:00

Part 2 of Life of Brain, featuring Michael Gazzaniga, neuroscientist and director of the University of California - Santa Barbara’s SAGE Center for the Study of the Mind. Author of Human: The Science Behind What Makes Us Unique.

Are We Alone - Life of Brain: Ian Pearson

2010-05-24T15:14:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of Life of Brain, featuring Ian Pearson, futurologist at Futurizon.

Are We Alone - Life of Brain: Steven Rose

2010-05-24T15:12:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of Life of Brain, featuring Steven Rose, biologist and director of the Brain and Behavior Research Group at the Open University in London. Author of The Future of the Brain: The Promise and Perils of Tomorrow’s Neuroscience.

Are We Alone - Life of Brain: Ed Boyden

2010-05-24T15:04:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of Life of Brain, featuring Ed Boyden, neuroscientist at MIT’s Media Lab and Department of Biological Engineering.

Are We Alone - Skeptic Check: Fraudcast News

2010-05-19T10:19:00.000-07:00

There are a lot of scientific claims out there – how do you separate the good from the bad and the outright fraudulent? Experts failed to do so for years in the case of a physicist whose published papers claimed the invention of a new bio-based transistor. Plus, other stories of deceit – such as the scientist who stooped to coloring mouse fur with markers.

Also, why climate science is solid, but its scientists need to be more open with the public.

And, from the undersea “bloop” to the Denver airport conspiracy theory. Why urban myths are so popular.

Plus, Phil Plait describes someone’s plans to meditate away the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

It’s Skeptic Check… but don’t take our word for it!

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - Phil Plait
Part 2 - Eugenie Samuel Reich
Part 3 - Michael Shermer
Part 4 - Sheila Jasanoff
Part 5 - Brian Dunning

Are We Alone - Fraudcast News: Phil Plait

2010-05-17T16:54:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of Skeptic Check: Fraudcast News, featuring Phil Plait, Astronomer, keeper of badastronomy.com and author of Death from the Skies!: These Are the Ways the World Will End . . ..

Are We Alone - Fraudcast News: Eugenie Samuel Reich

2010-05-17T16:52:00.000-07:00

Part 2 of Skeptic Check: Fraudcast News, featuring Eugenie Samuel Reich, news reporter and author of Plastic Fantastic.

Are We Alone - Fraudcast News: Michael Shermer

2010-05-17T16:50:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of Skeptic Check: Fraudcast News, featuring Michael Shermer, publisher of Skeptic Magazine and columnist for Scientific American.

Are We Alone - Fraudcast News: Sheila Jasanoff

2010-05-17T16:48:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of Skeptic Check: Fraudcast News, featuring Sheila Jasanoff, Professor of science and public policy at Harvard University.

Are We Alone: Fraudcast News - Brian Dunning

2010-05-17T16:45:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of Skeptic Check: Fraudcast News, featuring Brian Dunning, Science journalist and producer of the podcast Skeptoid.

The Gold Spotted Oak Borer

2010-05-11T16:26:00.000-07:00

For this week's show, Alien Invasion, Molly traveled to the Cleveland National Forest in San Diego County to cover the story of the Gold Spotted Oak Borer, a beetle invading swaths of Live Oak forest. There she met U.C. Riverside biological control specialist – and entomologist – Mark Hoddle and graduate student Vanessa Lopez, who are trying to stop the invasion.

You can view the photos below as a slideshow by clicking the play button (on the far right under the main photo), or click on the main photo to advance to the next one.

Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer

Alien Invasion

2010-05-10T17:20:00.000-07:00

They’re heeeere! Yes, aliens are wreaking havoc and destruction throughout the land. But these aliens are Arizona beetles, and the land is in California, where the invasive insects are a serious problem.

And what of space-faring aliens? We have those too: how to find them, and how to protect our planet – and theirs.

From Hollywood to SETI’s hi-tech search for extraterrestrials, aliens are invading Are We Alone?

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - The Gold Spotted Oak Borer part 1
Part 2 - Paul Davies
Part 3 - Frank Drake
Part 4 - The Gold Spotted Oak Borer part 2
Part 5 - Andy Ihnatko
Part 6 - Margaret Race and Margaret McLean
Part 7 - The Gold Spotted Oak Borer part 3

Are We Alone - Alien Invasion: Gold Spotted Oak Borer part 3

2010-05-10T09:20:00.000-07:00

Part 7 of Alien Invasion, featuring Mark Hoddle, Biological Control Specialist at the University of California, Riverside and Vanessa Lopez, graduate student in entomology, University of California, Riverside in the search for a tree destroying insect invading the Cleveland National Forest in California.

Are We Alone - Alien Invasion: Margaret Race and Margaret McLean

2010-05-10T09:17:00.000-07:00

Part 6 of Alien Invasion, featuring Margaret Race, biologist and Principal Investigator at the SETI Institute, and Margaret McLean, director of bioethics at the Markkula Center for Ethics, Santa Clara University.

Are We Alone - Alien Invasion: Andy Ihnatko

2010-05-10T09:15:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of Alien Invasion, featuring Andy Ihnatko, journalist and tech blogger.

Are We Alone - Alien Invasion: Gold Spotted Oak Borer part 2

2010-05-10T09:14:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of Alien Invasion, featuring Mark Hoddle, Biological Control Specialist at the University of California, Riverside and Vanessa Lopez, graduate student in entomology, University of California, Riverside in the search for a tree destroying insect invading the Cleveland National Forest in California.

Are We Alone - Alien Invasion: Frank Drake

2010-05-10T09:07:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of Alien Invasion, featuring Frank Drake, Senior Scientist, SETI Institute.

Are We Alone - Alien Invasion: Paul Davies

2010-05-10T08:56:00.000-07:00

Part 2 of Alien Invasion, featuring Paul Davies, physicist and author of The Eerie Silence: Renewing Our Search for Alien Intelligence.

Are We Alone - Alien Invasion: Gold Spotted Oak Borer part 1

2010-05-10T08:52:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of Alien Invasion, featuring Mark Hoddle, Biological Control Specialist at the University of California, Riverside and Vanessa Lopez, graduate student in entomology, University of California, Riverside in the search for a tree destroying insect invading the Cleveland National Forest in California.

Robots Call the Shots

2010-05-03T13:04:00.000-07:00

Dr. Robot, I presume? Your appendix may be removed by motor-driven, scalpel-wielding mechanical hands one day. Robots are debuting in the medical field… as well as on battlefields. And they’re increasingly making important decisions – on their own. But can we teach robots right from wrong? Find out why the onslaught of silicon intelligence has prompted a new field of robo-ethics.

Plus, robo-geologists: NASA’s vision for autonomous robots in space.

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - P.W. Singer
Part 2 - Pablo Garcia
Part 3 - Robyn Asimov
Part 4 - Wendell Wallach
Part 5 - Robert Anderson

Robots Call the Shots - P.W. Singer

2010-05-03T13:01:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of Robots Call the Shots, featuring P.W. Singer, director of the 21st Century Defense Initiative at the Brookings Institution, and the author of Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century.

Robots Call the Shots - Pablo Garcia

2010-05-03T12:59:00.000-07:00

Part 2 of Robots Call the Shots, featuring Pablo Garcia, principal engineer working on medical robotics at SRI International, Menlo Park, California.

Robots Call the Shots - Robyn Asimov

2010-05-03T12:57:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of Robots Call the Shots, featuring Robyn Asimov, daughter of author Isaac Asimov on the three laws of robotics.

Robots Call the Shots - Wendell Wallach

2010-05-03T12:54:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of Robots Call the Shots, featuring Wendell Wallach, Chair of a technology and ethics working group for Yale University’s Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics, and the co-author of Moral Machines: Teaching Robots Right from Wrong.

Robots Call the Shots - Robert Anderson

2010-05-03T12:48:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of Robots Call the Shots, featuring Robert Anderson, Planetary geologist, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, discussing robot and rover autonomy.

Seth on Larry King Live - April 30, 2010

2010-05-01T10:13:00.000-07:00

On Friday, April 30, 2010, Seth appeared as part of a panel on Larry King Live, to discuss Stephen Hawking's assertion that intelligent aliens would most likely be hostile. The panel also includes astrophysicist Michio Kaku, science fiction author David Brin, and comedian Dan Aykroyd.

The program is divided into three segments here:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Seth responds to Stephen Hawking

2010-04-30T11:53:00.000-07:00

Stephen Hawking and Malevolent Aliens

On a recent TV show, famed physicist Stephen Hawking said that we should go easy in our attempts to interact with aliens, because – after all – any contacts would surely be with more advanced beings than ourselves, and if they came to Earth (or sent their robotic emissaries), the results could be bad news.

Hawking’s statement is certainly congruent with what we know of our own history. When the Spaniards landed in the New World, they decimated the local culture. Even when intentions were thoroughly benign, such as when Captain Cook flitted about the islands of the South Pacific in the late 18th century, the result was a dramatic change in lifestyle for the natives.

Clearly, the historic precedent for a visit by another culture is riddled with disaster.

Still, we needn’t fear that any aliens we hear with our SETI experiments will scramble their spacecraft and head for our planet. And that’s because they won’t know we’ve tuned them in. Putting it bluntly, SETI poses neither danger nor cause for worry.

However, suppose we send messages to the stars, either by answering a detected signal, or simply broadcasting inquiries to space? Is there danger in that? Might the aliens – whose mindset we cannot accurately guess – be likely to wreak havoc and destruction on our planet?

That seems a priori fairly unlikely. After all, the receiving civilization would be far more advanced than ours (at least from a technical standpoint), and random destruction hardly sounds like something they would find useful. But no matter what your opinion of the alien mind-set may be, worrying about broadcasting our presence is silly – after all, we’ve been transmitting signals for more than a half-century. Our TV, our radars … even the light from our cities. The truth is out there.

Such “leakage” signals would be hard to find, of course. But any society that could possibly be a threat – any society that could come here on an alien wilding expedition – would have telescopes and antennas far larger than our own. They could find the signals that we’ve been sending willy-nilly into the cosmos since the Second World War. So it hardly pays to worry about them. That horse has left the barn.

So here’s the bottom line, as I see it. The suggestion that we should keep mum … not just now, but forever … is, to put it mildly, unwarranted.

- Seth Shostak

Sylvia Earle to receive Green Book Award

2010-04-26T10:42:00.000-07:00

Sylvia Earle, winner of the 2009 Ted Prize for her plan to create a global network of protected marine areas, will be celebrated again this week for her dedication to saving the world's oceans. On April 28th, the Stevens Center for Science Writings is awarding Earle the 2010 Green Book Award in recognition of her commitment to raising awareness of our imperiled marine environment in such books as "Exploring the Deep Frontier," "Sea Change," and "The Atlas of the Ocean."

You can hear our interview with Sylvia Earle in this week's encore presentation of Seas the Moment.

First Oxygen-Free Animals Found

2010-04-21T10:26:00.001-07:00

A recent BBC story highlights the lengths to which life will go to survive in extreme environments. Three species of Loriciferans were discovered living in the sediment of the L'Atalante basin in the Mediterranean Sea. The basin is over 2 miles deep and almost entirely depleted of oxygen. Professor Danovaro, who heads Italy's Association of Limnology said the discovery represents a "tremendous adaptation for animals which evolved in oxygenated conditions".

Hear more about extreme living environments in this week's show Habitats Not For Humanity.

Seth's Crawl Space

2010-04-12T11:42:00.000-07:00

It’s always a surprise to go digging in Seth’s crawl space – who knows what we’ll find! In this cramped never-never land, tucked between piles of spilled cat litter and old clarinet reeds, we stumble upon the language of whales … the future of technology … the secret to plant power … and the answer to whether photographic memory exists. Tune in, find out and, grab a broom, will you?

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - Larry Squire
Part 2 - Oliver Morton
Part 3 - Fred Sharpe
Part 4 - Computer History Museum
Part 5 - Nathan Myhrvold

Seth's Crawl Space - Larry Squire

2010-04-12T11:40:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of Seth's Crawl Space, featuring Larry Squire, professor at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine and a scientist at the V.A. Medical Center in San Diego.

Seth's Crawl Space - Oliver Morton

2010-04-12T11:38:00.000-07:00

Part 2 of Seth's Crawl Space, featuring Oliver Morton, journalist and author of Eating the Sun: How Plants Power the Planet.

Seth's Crawl Space - Fred Sharpe

2010-04-12T11:35:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of Seth's Crawl Space, featuring Fred Sharpe, Executive Director and Principal Investigator at the Alaska Whale Foundation.

Seth's Crawl Space - Computer History Museum

2010-04-12T11:29:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of Seth's Crawl Space, featuring a trip to the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA.

Seth's Crawl Space - Nathan Myhrvold

2010-04-12T11:23:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of Seth's Crawl Space, featuring Nathan Myhrvold, CEO of Intellectual Ventures.

When Antiscience Kills

2010-04-05T08:59:00.000-07:00

In this week's show, Phil Plait discusses the story of the ADE 651, a purported bomb detecting device used by Iraqi security forces and deemed useless by the U.S. military. It is a small hand-held wand with an antenna and is used at hundreds of security checkpoints in Iraq. “I don’t believe there’s a magic wand that can detect explosives,” said Maj. Gen. Richard J. Rowe Jr., who oversees Iraqi police training for the American military. “If there was, we would all be using it. I have no confidence that these work.” Iraq has purchased more than 1500 of the devices for tens of thousands of dollars each.

Read Phil Plait's article at Bad Astronomy
Read the New York Times article

Skeptic Check: Conspiracy!

2010-04-05T08:53:00.000-07:00

The Apollo moon landing is a hoax! 9-11 was an inside job! Our government keeps alien bodies racked and stacked in an underground bunker! And as for the evidence … well … put on your tin hats, folks, we’re going deep, deep, deep into conspiracy with journalist David Aaronovitch.

Also – the truth is out there, but it’s ignored. Jonah Lehrer on why scientists can overlook evidence.

Plus, money for meters and your spooks for free: ghost detectors hit the market.

And Hollywood Reality Check and Phil Plait on bogus bomb detectors.

It’s Skeptic Check… but don’t take our word for it!

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - Brains on Vacation
Part 2 - David Aaronovitch
Part 3 - Ghost Detector
Part 4 - Hollywood Reality Check
Part 5 - Jonah Lehrer

Conspiracy! - Brains on Vacation

2010-04-05T08:50:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of Skeptic Check: Conspiracy!, featuring Phil Plait, astronomer, keeper of badastronomy.com, and author of Death from the Skies!: These Are the Ways the World Will End....

Conspiracy! - David Aaronovitch

2010-04-05T08:47:00.000-07:00

Part 2 of Skeptic Check: Conspiracy!, featuring David Aaronovitch, columnist with the Times newspaper of London and author of Voodoo Histories: The Role of the Conspiracy Theory in Shaping Modern History.

Conspiracy! - Ghost Meter

2010-04-05T08:43:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of Skeptic Check: Conspiracy!, featuring Matt Lowry, high school physics teacher and keeper of the Skeptical Teacher web site, lamenting the sale of "ghost meters" by an otherwise reputable science supply distributor.

Conspiracy! - Hollywood Reality Check

2010-04-05T08:34:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of Skeptic Check: Conspiracy!, featuring Jim Underdown, Executive Director, Center for Inquiry, West – Los Angeles. A substantial reward for the demonstration of paranormal abilities attracts a bevy of interesting characters.

Conspiracy! - Jonah Lehrer

2010-04-05T07:28:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of Skeptic Check: Conspiracy!, featuring Jonah Lehrer, contributing editor at Wired magazine and author of How We Decide.

Hunt for Aliens

2010-03-30T11:36:00.000-07:00

This coming week, Seth will be on Naked Science on the National Geographic channel. The episode is called "Hunt for Aliens" and features NASA scientists, planet hunters, and astronomers discussing emerging methods of finding Earthlike planets and alien life and possible future techniques, including fiber-optic probing and interstellar travel powered by light at warp speeds. Also, an inside look at the Allen Telescope Array.

Airtimes are Thursday, April 1 at 8pm, Sunday April 4 at 7am, Thursday April 8 at 7am and Sunday April 11 at 11pm.

SETI: Now What?

2010-03-29T15:15:00.000-07:00

Hello! Is anyone out there? As the scientific search for extraterrestrial intelligence marks its 50th anniversary, there’s been no contact as yet with alien beings. But SETI researchers maintain that we are not alone. Find out why in a SETI retrospective that looks at the past and future of the search.

We remember the first scientific SETI search… Carl Sagan… how the SETI Institute began… the WOW signal…and the 1993 NASA budget cuts.

We’ll also hear from critics of the search… scientists involved in optical SETI and SETI@home. Plus, international collaborations… and where the search is headed.

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - Are We Alone?
Part 2 - The Birth of SETI
Part 3 - Contact
Part 4 - Abandoned
Part 5 - Ben Zuckerman
Part 6 - SETI@Home
Part 7 - The Future of SETI

SETI: Now What? - Are We Alone?

2010-03-29T15:13:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of SETI: Now What?, a look at what prompted the need to search for extra terrestrial intelligence 50 years ago.

SETI: Now What? - The Birth of SETI

2010-03-29T15:11:00.000-07:00

Part 2 of SETI: Now What?, featuring Frank Drake, Director of the Carl Sagan Center for the Study of Life in the Universe, SETI Institute.

SETI: Now What? - Contact

2010-03-29T15:08:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of SETI: Now What?, featuring Jill Tarter, Director of the Center for SETI Research, SETI Institute, and Tom Pierson, CEO, SETI Institute, discussing how the SETI Institute began, the book and film Contact, and the "Wow!" Signal.

SETI: Now What? - Abandoned

2010-03-29T15:06:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of SETI: Now What?, featuring the tale of how one U.S. Senator ended SETI's funding from NASA.

SETI: Now What? - Ben Zuckerman

2010-03-29T15:03:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of SETI: Now What?, featuring Ben Zuckerman, physicist, astronomer, UCLA, on why SETI may be a waste of time.

SETI: Now What? - SETI@home

2010-03-29T14:59:00.000-07:00

Part 6 of SETI: Now What?, featuring Dan Werthimer, Chief Scientist, SETI@home, University of California, Berkeley.

SETI: Now What? - The Future of SETI

2010-03-29T14:55:00.000-07:00

Part 7 of SETI: Now What?, featuring Paul Horowitz, physicist, electrical engineer, Harvard University, discussing optical SETI, as well as a description of the launch of the Allen Telescope Array.

Thanks for the Memories

2010-03-22T13:28:00.000-07:00

Memories are slippery things – some are crystal clear, others more like a muddy pool, and some… well, they seem to vanish completely.

Scientists admit that memory is all very complicated, but one piece of the puzzle lies in how we age – we’ll hear the latest research.

Meanwhile, meet the man who digitally logged his every waking moment – and why maybe the secret to happiness isn’t in remembering but in forgetting.

Plus, the case for deleting data from your hard-drive… and from your brain itself.

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - The Memory Test
Part 2 - Adam Gazzaley
Part 3 - Gordon Bell and Jim Gemmell
Part 4 - James McGaugh
Part 5 - Viktor Mayer-Schönberger
Part 6 - Todd Sacktor

Thanks for the Memories - The Memory Test

2010-03-22T13:27:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of Thanks for the Memories, featuring a short term memory test on our intern, Sandra Chung, and volunteer Jay Weiler.

Thanks for the Memories - Adam Gazzaley

2010-03-22T13:25:00.000-07:00

Part 2 of Thanks for the Memories, featuring Adam Gazzaley, director of the Neuroscience Imaging Center at University of California, San Francisco.

Thanks for the Memories - Gordon Bell & Jim Gemmell

2010-03-22T13:22:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of Thanks for the Memories, featuring Gordon Bell, principal researcher at Microsoft Research, and Jim Gemmell, senior researcher at Microsoft Research.

Thanks for the Memories - James McGaugh

2010-03-22T13:20:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of Thanks for the Memories, featuring James McGaugh, neurobiologist at the University of California, Irvine.

Thanks for the Memories - Viktor Mayer-Schönberger

2010-03-22T13:17:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of Thanks for the Memories, featuring Viktor Mayer-Schönberger , director of the Information and Innovation Policy Research Center at the National University of Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, and the author of Delete: The Virtue of Forgetting in the Digital Age.

Thanks for the Memories - Todd Sacktor

2010-03-22T12:01:00.000-07:00

Part 6 of Thanks for the Memories, featuring Todd Sacktor, neurologist, SUNY Downstate Medical Center.

Physics Phrontiers

2010-03-16T15:58:00.000-07:00

Physics means getting physical if you’re tackling the biggest, most mysterious questions in the universe. Stoic scientists endure the driest, darkest, coldest spots on the planet to find out how it all began and why there’s something rather than nothing. From the bottom of an old iron mine to the top of the Andes, we’ll hear their stories.

Plus, Steven Weinberg on this weird stuff called dark energy, and Leonard Susskind sees double, no, triple, no, …infinite universes.

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - Anil Ananthaswamy (part 1)
Part 2 - André de Gouvêa
Part 3 - Steven Weinberg
Part 4 - Bottled Dark Energy
Part 5 - Anil Ananthaswamy (part 2)
Part 6 - Anil Ananthaswamy (part 3)
Part 7 - Leonard Susskind

Physics Phrontiers - Anil Ananthaswamy part 1

2010-03-15T15:56:00.000-07:00

Part 1 of Physics Phrontiers, featuring Anil Ananthaswamy, corresponding editor for New Scientist magazine in London and author of The Edge of Physics: A Journey to Earth’s Extremes to Unlock the Secrets of the Universe.

Physics Phrontiers - André de Gouvêa

2010-03-15T15:52:00.000-07:00

Part 2 of Physics Phrontiers, featuring André de Gouvêa, associate professor of physics, Northwestern University.

Physics Phrontiers - Steven Weinberg

2010-03-15T15:48:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of Physics Phrontiers, featuring Steven Weinberg, Nobel Prize-winning physicist at University of Texas at Austin and author of Lake Views: This World and the Universe.

Physics Phrontiers - Bottled Dark Energy

2010-03-15T15:29:00.000-07:00

Part 4 of Physics Phrontiers, wherein Seth visits a local hydroponics shop which sells jugs of dark energy as botanical growing supplements.

Physics Phrontiers - Anil Ananthaswamy part 2

2010-03-15T15:28:00.000-07:00

Part 5 of Physics Phrontiers, featuring Anil Ananthaswamy, corresponding editor for New Scientist magazine in London and author of The Edge of Physics: A Journey to Earth’s Extremes to Unlock the Secrets of the Universe.

Physics Phrontiers - Anil Ananthaswamy part 3

2010-03-15T15:24:00.000-07:00

Part 6 of Physics Phrontiers, featuring Anil Ananthaswamy, corresponding editor for New Scientist magazine in London and author of The Edge of Physics: A Journey to Earth’s Extremes to Unlock the Secrets of the Universe.

Physics Phrontiers - Leonard Susskind

2010-03-15T14:37:00.000-07:00

Part 7 of Physics Phrontiers, featuring Leonard Susskind, professor of theoretical physics, Stanford University.

Skeptic Check: Climate Clamor

2010-03-08T14:23:00.000-08:00

Arctic ice is melting, atmospheric temperatures are climbing – yet climate change science is under attack. Detractors claim that researchers are manipulating data and hoodwinking the public. And the public is increasingly skeptical about the science.

Find out what’s behind the surge of climate change skepticism – and what global warming deniers learned from big tobacco about how to spin scientific evidence.

It’s Skeptic Check… but don’t take our word for it!

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - Stephen Schneider (part 1)
Part 2 - Phil Chapman
Part 3 - Stephen Schneider (part 2)
Part 4 - Simon Donner
Part 5 - Naomi Oreskes

Climate Clamor - Stephen Schneider part 1

2010-03-08T11:56:00.000-08:00

Part 1 of Skeptic Check: Climate Clamor featuring climate scientist Stephen Schneider, discussing how climate science works, how it doesn't, and how arguments regarding anomalous storms and a context-free quotes from emails stem from intellectual bankruptcy.

Climate Clamor - Phil Chapman

2010-03-08T11:54:00.000-08:00

Part 2 of Skeptic Check: Climate Clamor featuring Phil Chapman, Apollo 14 Mission Scientist, now a geophysicist and consultant on energy and astronautics.

Climate Clamor - Stephen Schneider part 2

2010-03-08T11:50:00.000-08:00

Part 3 of Skeptic Check: Climate Clamor featuring Stephen Schneider, Climate scientist, Stanford University, discussing the misinformation consumed and spread by climate change denialists.

Climate Clamor - Simon Donner

2010-03-08T11:47:00.000-08:00

Part 4 of Skeptic Check: Climate Clamor featuring Simon Donner, Geographer at the University of British Columbia, discussing the effects of climate change on the oceans as observed through study of coral reefs.

Climate Clamor - Naomi Oreskes

2010-03-08T11:43:00.000-08:00

Part 5 of Skeptic Check: Climate Clamor featuring Naomi Oreskes, Professor of History at the University of California, San Diego and author of Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming.

Turning Water into Slime

2010-03-01T21:10:00.001-08:00

Here's a quick one minute video demonstrating the slime power of the hagfish. The animal is anesthetized, given a small pulse of electrical current, and when the tiny bit of slime extracted from it is put into a glass of water, well... You've Been Slimed!

Hagfish aren't really fish, as they have no jaw. In fact, they're the only animal that has a skull and no vertebral column. Their slime is believed to be used primarily as an escape mechanism. They secrete it when captured, but it is also believed that they use it as a lubricant to free themselves from the carcasses on which they feed. The slime also acts to clog up the gills of predator fish, and so the hagfish has developed a peculiar way of keeping its own gills free of slime. When agitated, the hagfish secretes enough slime to turn a 20 liter bucket of water into pure slime in a matter of minutes. To clear itself of this immense amount of slime, the hagfish ties itself into a knot, which then travels the length of its body, thereby wringing out the slime, and likely freeing it from its captor.

I've Been Slimed!

2010-03-01T21:08:00.000-08:00

In this week's show, Seth & Molly make slime in the SETI kitchen with guest Tori Hoeler. Here's how: Fill one cup with water and add a spoonful of the Borax powder and stir it up. Fill another cup with about 1/2 inch of glue. Add three tablespoons of water to the glue and stir. Add a few drops of food coloring and stir again. Add two tablespoons of the Borax solution and stir well and voila! You've been slimed! Of course, for the above photo, I'm the one forced to pose with the slime. It was kind of slick, viscous, sticky. I wish there were a single word to use to describe it. Blimey! I'm stymied.

You've Been Slimed!

2010-03-01T14:08:00.000-08:00

Hollywood horror flicks have captivated us with alien blobs, but the slime slithering on our own planet is as beguiling. From microscopic machines to life on ocean floors, new research reveals how essential slime is to life on Earth, and possibly other worlds.

Discover the new materials made from hagfish slime… the social life of a slime mold… and the threat posed by the gray goo of self-replicating nanobots.

Plus, it’s been 50 years since it first oozed across the screen: why there’s no escape from The Blob!

Listen to individual segments here:
Part 1 - Tori Hoeler
Part 2 - Douglas Fudge
Part 3 - John Tyler Bonner
Part 4 - Chris Phoenix
Part 5 - Andre Bormanis

You've Been Slimed! - Tori Hoeler

2010-03-01T13:26:00.001-08:00

Part 1 of You've Been Slimed! featuring Tori Hoeler, Astrobiologist, NASA Ames Research Center.

You've Been Slimed! - Douglas Fudge

2010-03-01T13:23:00.000-08:00

Part 2 of You've Been Slimed! featuring Douglas Fudge, Biologist, University of Guelph, Canada.

You've Been Slimed! - John Tyler Bonner

2010-03-01T13:03:00.000-08:00

Part 3 of You've Been Slimed! featuring John Tyler Bonner, Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Princeton University, and author of The Social Amoebae: The Biology of Cellular Slime Molds.