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Solar Cooling. Asteroids and ice. Lost Language Found. Bacteria and Asthma Linked. From Eye to Brain. No Need To Smooch a Stranger to Save a Life. Bad Moos for the future
Show Notes:
Less Solar Activity, Earth Gets Warmer
A snapshot of the solar activity between 2004 and 2007 has revealed unexpected results. A study by Joanna Haigh has revealed than in spite of a decline of the Suns activity in this period, the Earth may have become warmer, challenging what we knew about the Sun’s role on our climate. By using satellite data and computer modelling, researchers have analyzed how the spectrum of radiation and the amount of energy from the Sun has changed since 2004.
Second Asteroid Found with Water Ice
Scientists have discovered water ice on an asteroid for the second time. Researchers studying Asteroid 65 Cybele, have found evidence of water ice and other organic materials on this 180 mile diameter asteroid which is orbiting the Sun between Mars and Jupiter. This evidence as well as the water ice discovery on asteroid 24 Themis, suggests that water ice could be more common on space rocks than previously thought, supporting the theory that an asteroid had brought our planet its water and the building blocks for life to form here.
Language Found New To Science
National Geographic’s Enduring Voices project expedition to Northern India, has stumbled upon a completely new language to science called Koro. Researchers targeting a language hot spot in Nothern India came across the language while researching two poorly recorded languages of Aka and Miji in the hills of Arunachal Pradesh. They discovered that Koro is spoken by about 800 people and is so unique compared to the local dialects that it is as different as Japanese is to English.
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Bacteria, Another Cause of Asthma Attacks in Children
Scientists in Denmark have discovered that bacterial infections may trigger asthma attacks in children. A study examining 361 children found viral and bacterial infections during asthma attacks. This opens a whole new possibility of using antibiotics in the treatment of people with asthma.
From the Eye to the Brain
Scientists have finally mapped how cells in the eyes communicate with the brain. By comparing a clearly defined visual input to an electrical output of the retina, scientists were able to trace for the first time the neuronal circuitry that connects individual photoreceptors with retinal ganglion cells, the neurons that carry visual signals from the eye to the brain. The discovery may lead to better retinal implants.
Untrained Bystanders Should Attempt CPR
Researchers have concluded that there is no need to give mouth to mouth resuscitation if you come across someone in need. During their studies, they found that the odds of survival was more when people used compression only. They found that people were less reluctant to try CPR when mouth to mouth was not involved, therefore eliciting a quicker response in attempting to save a life.
Meat Lovers May Endanger the Future of the Planet
People may have to cut meat from their diets if they want to save the planet from more greenhouse gases, habitat destruction and nitrate pollution. Researchers have calculated that by 2050, the environmental impact of sustaining livestock for an ever growing population could have a detrimental impact on the planet. The research concludes that a cut in meat reduction of between 19 to 42 % would be enough just to stand still regarding environmental damage.
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I'm the host of this little science show. 
Could you discuss the fact that maybe man-made electromagnetic pollution might be a cause of global warming? Or what effects do the uses of electromagnetic devises, radio, satellites, microwave dishes, cell phones and towers, etc, have on humans and the Earth as a whole??? Maybe there is something happening between the Suns radiation and our own man made radiation? I am not really qualified to figure out something this complex……
Thanks,
Devin
Show notes XD
I freakin love you guys
Justin mentioned “I’m a doctor like Dr. Phil is a doctor”. However, Dr. Phil has a PhD in clinical psychology, so Dr. Phil is a doctor in the same way that Dr. Kiki is a doctor.
Just sayin’. 🙂
Justin has my vote on the more efficient products will lead to less expensive fuel which will lead to more consumption of fuel. I have a hybrid car which uses less fuel so I can go further for the same amount of money. Now I do it more often which uses more fuel overall.
We are never going to reduce the amount of energy that we consume. We will just use as much as we can get. We have to come up with many better sources.
I don’t want more dead scum from deeper and deeper underground. I wanna jet pack with a fusion neutron accelerator – metallic blue with chrome side winders, anti-lock speed reducer, automatic collision avoidance, plasma weather shield, and of course a real leather seat. Here I come, get outta my way.
Oops! MY bad… I was under the impression that he did not have a PhD, but simply a therapist license. If I am wrong, so be it.
Had a couple science-type questions that I’ve never been able to track down answers to.
First, I keep seeing all this research into artificial hearts that beat like a real heart. I’m assuming that the technical aspects of trying to get a reliable robotic heart to beat reliably over many years is a very difficult task to overcome.
My question is, do you physiologically “need” a beating heart, as opposed to a steady flowing pump, like (for lack of a better description) a sump pump? I know the arteries and veins have basically one way flow valves built into them, but I don’t know if that would be a deal killer, no pun intended. I think a steady flow pump would be easier to design and make reliable since other that worrying about the motor burning out and after vibratory attenuation to keep it from vibrating apart, it would be pretty solid, as opposed to something that has to start/stop at least 60-90 times a minute.
My second question might be harder to explain. Basically, the question is, how fast are we physically moving through space. More specifically, since velocities are additive, if we were able to have an ‘outside observer’ that could clock our speed, how fast would we be moving. To follow my chain of thought (hopefully no broken links), if we’re traveling something like 500 miles an hour due to the rotation of the Earth, added to the velocity of us revolving around the Sun, which is revolving around the Galactic Core, which is being propelled through interstellar space, etc., how fast would this ‘outside observer’ say we were going based on all this additive velocities? Related to this, which is what started this train of thought initially, is that the faster you go, the slower time travels as viewed again by this ‘outside observer’. So based off all this velocity we’re traveling, is there a significant time dilation/contraction? Thought maybe either of these questions could be a source for a future show. Hopefully at least you might be able to find an answer to either/both whereas I could not. Asta la Pasta 🙂
i have a therapist license?
Hi Chad,
The first question is beyond my sort of knowledge about the human heart… ask me about love, hope or suffering and perhaps I can riff for a bit…
The second question is one of my favorite things to think about! The shortest answer I can offer you is that all matter anywhere in the universe is all moving at the speed of light… what we call time is an affect of mass… what we call mass is the way in which large amounts of energy seem to slow time…
To lengthen the answer we need to delve into what is one of the oldest philosophical questions in science… and it centers on whether or not there is an absolute space.
To start the convo you have to pick sides in an ongoing debate (don’t worry, you are allowed to switch sides as often as you like and begin arguing against your previous point)
1) There is such a thing as absolute time and absolute space. A measurable distance of up, down, left, right, forward and back distance to the universe, no matter where you go…
or
2) Time and space are entirely dependent on relative distances between matter and the speed at which it is traveling.
The problem for (1) is that, there is no land mark for any point in space. We are on a planet that is spinning, in a solar system that is spinning, in a galaxy that is spinning, in a hub of galaxies that are spinning, in a cluster of spinning hubs that are in motion in a universe that for all we know is orbiting a gaggle of universes in a murder of multiverses… and in all of this motion we cannot yet pinpoint one pushpin of coordinates into space and know in the next moment where that pushpin has been placed.
The upside of (2) is that it makes no difference what so ever that we are in motion on the planet moving in all these parameters of motion, because we are moving with it and therefore we, and the planet are at rest. It is easy to determine where things are in relation to other objects and the relative speeds at which they are traveling. In this scenario, time is also a local event, not a universal one.
I prefer the first scenario, only because it is more intuitive to me based on having existed in a world where scenario 2 has given the impression of us existing in scenario 1 because from our perspective there seems to be absolutes of distance and time… the trouble for my intuitive preference then of course is that it is based on scenario 2 being correct as well…
To solve this puzzle of perspective we would need a time machine. Not a big one, no shiny metal pod with vacuum tubes and randomly place Jacobs ladders or even a DeLorean with a flux capacitor… a tachyon particle emitter and detector would suffice… a particle that could move backwards in time and be detected in such a way as to give us a point of reference in space… separate from our relative time.
But here’s the rub. If you travel in time, what are you really doing? In scenario 1 you are leaving the measurement of time at one point, and returning in another. This makes time travel very dangerous.
If your front door is a time machine and you go back in time 24 hours… you won’t arrive at your front door yesterday… because you traveled in time, not space. Where you are in space when you walked through your time machine is where you will be in the new now, and where your front door will be in 24 hours. But you are now floating helplessly at the point in absolute space where your front door will be in 24 hours of planetary, solar and galactic migrations… and soon you are dead.
If you travel in time via the physics of scenario 2 you should arrive at your destination just fine… time and space are two aspects of the same thing and all momentum of traveling in space relative to time is conserved… according to the agreed upon laws of physics, there is no reason the arrow of time should not be reversible this way. So where are all the time travelers?
The economic argument. Most excellent.