18 January, 2018 – Episode 654 – This Week in Science Podcast (TWIS)

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Live from SF Sketchfest!, Syrup Futures, Dead Saiga, Does Climate Depress You?, But, Space Lasers…, Creative Brains, Blair’s Bear Poop, Stabby Slammy Time, Chameleon Glow, Viral Memory, Something Shocking, And Much More…

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DISCLAIMER, DISCLAIMER, DISCLAIMER!!!
There is a world that exists
beyond the calcium reinforced collagen skull-casing that surrounds your brain…
That world out there…
That is reality.
But in reality,
no one lives in reality…
The world you live in is the one between your ears…
Because like it or not,
that’s where you spend pretty much every second of every day…
What you put into your world is all your world will ever be…
And most of what we humans tend to put into our heads
was designed to entertain the brain…
And everything else that goes along with that
is meant to influence the brain…
To buy this,
be like that,
vote this way,
drive that id-mobile,
eat this kind of food
while laughing with a pretty friend who only prefers that brand of beverage…
Brains are being trained
that every problem is easily solved…
and every product is a solution…
So complicated is reality
…and in so many ways that some people actually become curious about it…
Those curious people ask questions…
they read books…
watch documentaries…
Visit museums…
And some spend a great deal of time in schools,
studying complicated things with other curious people
They take jobs that take on complicated challenges…
But by far the most important thing that curious people do is understand…
That the world will only ever be as good as the one between their ears…
So we’ve brought a whole bunch of curious stories to stick in yours
Here on this week in science,
coming up next…

Syrup Futures
In a drier future, there will be no more maple trees to produce pancake syrup.

Dead Saiga
A normally innocuous bacterium became deadly as a result of hot, humid weather. Will this happen more often with climate change?

Does Climate Depress You?
You might just be biospheric if the fate of the planet due to climate change stresses you out, but if it rolls off your back you could just be an egotistical bastard.

But, Space Lasers…
Chinese researchers published a paper investigating the feasibility of a laser in space to destroy space junk. But, what if they aimed it at something else?

Creative brains
Can MRIs predict who is creative and who is not?

This Week in What Has Science Done for me Lately?!?
LIVE READ FROM AUDIENCE MEMBERS

Let’s talk about poop!
Bear poop can tell us a lot of things, like where a bear was, and… Well, maybe before now that was all. But now bear poop tells us that they are huge seed dispersers! And here were are in California, without any more brown bears. Uh oh…

Whether stabby-stabby or slammy-slammy, mantis shrimp don’t often fight to the death
These deadly shrimp size each other up and often back down from a fight, rarely invoking the use of their powerful gifts.

That Chameleon Glow
We now know the chameleon bones actually glow.

Viral Memory
An unexpected discovery found that a protein important for memory formation, called Arc, acts like a virus in that it shuttles between neurons. Understanding why and how it does this will help in the understanding of information transmission within the nervous system, and could also be a new way to get gene therapy into cells without using viruses themselves.

In which Kiki gets to achieve her Type-A personality goals of controlling Justin…
Live demonstration of Backyard Brains Human-to-Human Interface with Bill Reith

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