Daniel and Kelly’s Extraordinary Universe - Bad Science Questions

Episode Date: May 21, 2019

Daniel and Jorge welcome Ethan, host of the Podcast Bad Science, and answer his questions about the universe. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. December 29th, 1975, LaGuardia Airport. The holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then, everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal. Just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, terrorism. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System

On the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly, and now I'm seriously suspicious. Wait a minute, Sam. Maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra credit. Well, Dakota, luckily, it's back to school week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend's been hanging out with his young professor a lot. He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her. Now he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want or gone. Hold up. Isn't that against school policy? That seems inappropriate.

Maybe find out how it ends by listening to the OK Storytime podcast and the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The U.S. Open is here. And on my podcast, good game with Sarah Spain. I'm breaking down the players, the predictions, the pressure. And of course, the honey deuses, the signature cocktail of the U.S. Open. The U.S. Open has gotten to be a very wonderfully experiential sporting event. To hear this and more, listen to Good Game with Sarah Spain, an IHeart women's sports production in partnership with Deep Blue Sports and Entertainment on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by Novartis, founding partner of IHeart Women's Sports Network.

Hey, Daniel, what's your favorite science fiction? movie? I think my favorite one is probably primer. Primer. What do you like about it? I like that it tells a counterintuitive tale of time travel, but it actually really tries to hold true to the rules. Like they set up some rules and they follow them and the results are not what you expect, but then you think about it, you're like, actually, that makes perfect sense. So it's like clever, it's insightful. That's the best science fiction. It's like new idea, insightful, uh, comments about how it impacts reality and human life. Right, but they don't even try to explain how they achieve a time travel, right? Like at all?

There's a little bit of yada, yada, yada, yada there. You know, they're like trying to do this and yada, yada, yada, oops, look what happened. We can travel to time. Yeah, exactly. But, you know, it's science fiction. It's not technology fiction or engineering fiction, right? It's like, imagine we had this new thing of science. What would that be like in our world? And can you make a consistent

story out of time travel? Yeah, exactly. Which is really a challenge. And as you know, because I've complained about it bitterly, most time travel movies are horribly inconsistent and totally implausible. If only you could go back in time and fix those plot holes. Yeah, I would just cancel all those projects.

Oh, man. But then you wouldn't have seen them and you wouldn't be inspired to go back. And then they would be made again, and then I would cancel them, and we'd be stuck in a loop forever. Yeah. But I'd be watching a lot of movies, so I guess that's not too bad. Yeah, yeah. You'd be creating a paradox. And the entertainment paradox, exactly.

Hi, I'm Jorge, I'm a cartoonist and the creator of PhD comics. Hi, I'm Daniel. I'm a particle physicist, and I am not the creator of any online comic website yet. Yet. And welcome to our podcast, Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe, a production of I-Heart Radio. In which we try to take the universe apart piece by piece and share. shove them down your ear hole, I guess. Your wormhole? Your brain hole. Exactly.

We try to transmit them from our brain to your brain in a way that actually makes sense so you can impress your mom or boyfriend or kids when you talk to them about it. Today we have an extra special kind of question episode in which we're taking questions from a friend. So today on the program, we have Ethan Edinburgh, the host of the podcast Bad Science. Welcome, Ethan. Hey, thanks for having me. delighted to be here. I also have no

comic series on the internet. Yet. Yet. But I will say that no one would enjoy it because my drawing abilities are very bad. So bad. The worst. My stick figures look bad. Stic figures are all you need. Have you seen the internet?

Okay, good point. Stick figures, really. I wasted a lot of time trying to learn how to draw. Apparently I just had to use stick figures. So maybe I'm good. Here you go. After this episode, you'll give it a shot. Yeah, cool. Well, we're really happier you're here, Ethan, Ethan. So tell us a little bit about the podcast, Bad Science, and where people can find it, and a little about yourself.

Sure, yeah. Are you promoting bad science? Is that what happens in your podcast? Do you say, like, all about, Gwyneth Paltrow? Yeah, pretty much. That's all that we talk about, her little jean shorts in the Avengers. No, bad science, I sit down with a comedian and a scientist every week, and we discuss the inaccuracies of films. So anything from alien to Star Wars to whatever We go through and we have a different scientist And we talk about their expertise And try to get down to what's going on there And I, you know, bud in with my stupid questions

As I'm sure I'm going to ask you guys today And the comedian also, you know, most comedians I feel Are like really curious about the world So they, you know, also You think it's necessary to be curious to be a comedian? Oh, that's a good one Probably, yeah, I think so Or at least nitpicky

why is this this way how do people think that's reasonable I don't know I was just having this argument with a friend where you know they were like is it bad that we've complained a lot and I've said like I don't know it might be a show it might show that we're able to dissect

the world instead of just accept what's going on and so I think for comedy that that might be you know that's like Jerry Seinfeld's whole career that's observational comedy yeah it's like why is this this way that's science basically right yeah so it's a show where you make sort of a comedian and a scientist on different topics

and so you sort of have that sort of accessibility of the science but also funny so it's a very kind of a show it's a show that's very kind of in the same spirit is our show. Yes. Yeah. So if you like our show you should definitely check out bad science. I think so. On our show one of us is smart

and one of us is funny. I'm saying neither of us are smart or funny. You're just riding that road in the middle. Riding that road down into the bottom there. No, I think it's great too. to educate people in an entertaining way which I think you guys do expertly

I do mediocre but the podcast I think is a great way to it's a great medium for that where it's like oh I want to learn a bunch of stuff but I don't want to be bored by it you know I also want to know about you know the secret men in black trivia at the same time so that's kind of the basis there

cool and so Daniel and I were just guests on your podcast and so that should probably already be out now so you can Definitely check that out, bad science. Yes, so fun. Thank you guys again for doing that. Great time.

Yeah, and it was great. We sat around and talked for an hour about the Avengers. Yeah, yeah. And the science behind the Avengers and the stretches of the imagination in Avengers. And so you should definitely check that out. Yes, yes. The good science, the bad science, the engineering, all of it. It was a lot of fun.

Yeah, there was a vicious engineering versus science debate that happened that I just kind of, I was in the front row eating popcorn for it. You're like watching your parents argue. It's like watching you. I loved it. You like to create a little bit of tension on the podcast? I mean, not on purpose, but if it's there, I'm highlighting it. I want to see that play out. Cool.

Well, today, Ethan, we're answering your science questions. Yes. And so tell us, what's your kind of relationship to science? Have you been interested in it? I'm a very curious man. I have these questions all the time. I've used my podcast. as a way to, like, as a self-serving way to learn, but I still have just endless questions,

so I'm happy to be here and ask you guys. But my relationship with science is probably somewhat typical. I was in classes in school. I've had anatomy and chemistry and these types of things, and I was always fascinated by it, not very good at it, just so you guys know, don't have a PhD like you guys. So I love science, love to learn about it, and still somehow, after a year of doing, the podcast feel like I know nothing and but it does uh make me really happy to learn that there's so much there's so many areas of science that scientists don't know anything about so that

makes me feel like okay well we're kind of in the same boat here when it comes to like you said like dark matter dark energy uh i don't know if i'm even saying that right what a schmuck but uh no it's definitely i think it's definitely impossible for anyone human being to know everything that all humans know you know like we're all experts yeah we're all experts yeah we're all experts you're expert in something and, you know, in things that we have no idea about. Great. So, yeah, I mean, I'll teach you guys some jazz chords after this.

Yeah, we can hang out. In the show, we're big believers in the idea that you don't need a degree or a PhD to participate in science, to ask interesting questions about science, to, you know, to learn from it and even contribute to the search for it. Yeah. Science is a part of being human. You see, especially in kids, right?

Kids ask the best questions, because they're curious about the world. We all want to understand the world. And something else really exciting about it is that there are big questions. You don't need a science degree to understand the question. Totally. What is dark energy?

How the universe begin? These are fun questions everybody wants to know the answer to. Well, today you have four really interesting and tough questions, I think, for Daniel here. Great. For us here today. You have questions about the recent black hole picture. Yes. The photo of the black hole.

Yes. You have questions about Jupiter and what's at the core of it. And questions about the big things. and the future of humanity. So not small questions here, Ethan. No, yes. I'm going big today. I'm here to light a fire. No questions about secret jellybelly flavors or anything.

We're going big. No, we're going big. Yeah, I mean, I don't know which one you guys want to start with. I know, I feel like the future of Earth one is it might be like grim. So I don't know. Like sometimes we get into that zone on bad science and I feel like, oh no, we got to like get away from this because it's like, it's dark, you know, where we're at right now a little bit. Well, you're assuming the future of humanity is grim, is that...

I just think that we could go there. That's all I'm saying. So I don't know if you want to leave that one for last. I'm just throwing it out there. I feel like there's a good one to end on. Okay, great. Let's end on a downer. That sounds good.

End with a bang. We'll end with the bang. Well, I mean, assuming people are still listening by then, maybe the Earth hasn't ended by the end of this podcast. Yeah, maybe you'll have ended by then, in which case it's all moot. I mean, you never know. Somebody in a missile silo is going to press the button just before they listen to that part of the podcast. We just need Tony Stark to go after it and catch it and just throw it into a portal.

A wormhole, yeah. A wormhole defense. A plot hole. A plot hole or a wormhole? I don't know. I think they're the same thing. In the Avengers movie, maybe. With that, let's take a break. We'll be back in just a short minute.

December 29th, 1975, LaGuardia Airport. holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then, at 6.33 p.m., everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal. Apparently, the explosion actually impelled metal, glass. The injured were being loaded into ambulances, just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, and it was here to stay. Terrorism. Law and order criminal justice system is back. In season two, we're turning our focus to a threat that hides in plain sight. That's harder to predict and even harder to stop. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System on the IHeart Radio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly, and now I'm seriously suspicious. Wait a minute, Sam, maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra credit. Well, Dakota, it's back to school week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend has been hanging out with his young professor a lot. He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her. Now, he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want her gone. Now, hold up.

Isn't that against school policy? That sounds totally inappropriate. Well, according to this person, this is her boyfriend's former professor, and they're the same age. And it's even more likely that they're cheating. He insists there's nothing between them. I mean, do you believe him? Well, he's certainly trying to get this person to believe him because he now wants them both to meet.

So, do we find out if this person's boyfriend really cheated with his professor or not? To hear the explosive finale, listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. I'm Dr. Scott Barry Kaufman, host of the Psychology Podcast. Here's a clip from an upcoming conversation about exploring human potential. I was going to schools to try to teach kids these skills and I get eye rolling from teachers or I get students who would be like, it's easier to punch someone in the face. When you think about emotion regulation, like you're not going to choose an adaptive strategy which is more effortful to use unless you think there's a good outcome as a result of it if it's going to be beneficial to you. Because it's easy to say like go you go blank yourself, right? It's easy.

It's easy to just drink the extra beer. It's easy to ignore to suppress seeing a colleague who's bothering me. you and just like walk the other way avoidance is easier ignoring is easier denial is easier drinking is easier yelling screaming is easy complex problem solving meditating you know takes effort listen to the psychology podcast on the iHeart radio app apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts Yeah, the recent discovery or advancement, I guess, is this picture, is the black hole picture, which I thought did look like the interstellar, like, rendering of a black hole a little bit.

Yeah, they got that pretty close, right? Yeah, so cool. I thought it looked more like a fuzzy donut, actually. A fuzzy, oh, yeah, it just kind of looked like a spicy cream donut. Well, that's my impression of the whole movie interstellar. It's a bit of a funny stale. Stales, mushy. No, but there were people online who thought.

It was all faked. It wasn't a real picture of a black hole. And it was actually a picture of a donut. Like literally a donut. That would have been a great hoax. Really? Yeah. I kind of want that to be true now.

That would assume a sense of humor in scientists. Which you have never found before. Which does not exist. Can't not compute. Harroar. Which could be disproved by the existence of really funny science podcasts, which... You're right. I've heard there are some.

There's a few of them out there that are good. So I was reading very briefly, very brief research on this. But they needed, and it was like, what was the name of it? It was like the name of the hard drives were ridiculous. I can't remember what it was called. But they needed these like extra huge hard drive, you know, terraflops or some, I don't know what it was called. It was 11d-blogs of data. Yeah, but gigabloops.

Thank you. It sounds like a rig and morty alien. But yeah, no, they needed like, I don't know. bunch of data to, and I saw a picture of it. There's like a lady with like rows of these hard drives, which I thought was really cool. I didn't know if you guys knew about that, but it was years in the making to get this picture. So, A, why was it years in the making? What were they doing for these years? Why is it so much data? And what are we looking at here? Yeah, these are great questions. Thank you. I think there's really sort of two fascinating

aspects there. One is like, how did they do it? Like the technology of it? Why is it hard? Why do it take so many years and number two like what does it mean yeah so how did they do it yeah maybe step us through like the just the problem of taking a picture of a black hole in the center of the universe center of the galaxy like like you know what does that even mean like how far away is it what's preventing us from just looking at it yeah and falling into it and dying also a good question right right so folks will probably remember black holes like really really dense right so dense that the gravity inside the black hole is strong enough to bend space so that nothing can escape, right? So it's black because photons even can't escape it. So if it would just like

saw a black hole in the middle of nowhere with nothing around it, it would be invisible. So like you can't really see a black hole directly. That's really scary. Yeah, unless something passes behind it, right, then you could see like its shadow. And we did a whole podcast episode about what is it like to see a black hole. How can you see them? And the short answer is you can't see the black hole directly, but you can see this stuff around it. So, for example, you have a black hole, it's gobbling gas, right? It's like sucking stuff up from somewhere. And the stuff that hasn't yet gone into the black hole, it's like swirling around it.

It's called the accretion disc. That stuff is getting hot and confused and upset and banging into itself and emitting like gamma rays and radio waves and all sorts of radiation. And you can see that. That's the part you can actually see. Oh. But they took pictures of two black holes or just one black hole. I think they took pictures of two.

they've only released one that I've seen so far. Okay, and where is that black hole in? So one that they looked at is in the center of our galaxy, right in the center of the Milky Way. They haven't released that one yet. The other one is in another galaxy. And the difficulty of seeing black holes, I think you were leading to, is that black holes are at the center of galaxies, and they're surrounded by huge blobs of stuff. So you just like look in the center of the galaxy, you're going to see the stuff around the black hole, like the dust and the gas and all that stuff. It's hard to see through that.

And these galaxies are really far away. so this galaxy they were looking at is really far away and makes the black hole like super duper tiny it seems almost impossible to me I mean you can't even see galaxies when you look at the night sky or if you see one they're not that big right it's just like a little fuzzy oval and so you're saying that we actually took a picture of a black hole

inside of that little tiny blob that's bright yeah exactly it's amazing because if you use the Hubble like the telescope the best telescope we have in space to zoom in on those galaxies you can get pretty nice pictures. But if you take like a single pixel from the Hubble, the black hole is like a tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny thing inside a single pixel of the most powerful telescope.

So one problem is they're basically invisible. The other one is it's small and really, really far away. So this is a hard thing to look at. Wow. Okay. I mean, I'm confused by a few things. Number one, conspiracy corner here. Why not release the other picture?

Why not release the other picture? You said they have two and one's released and one's not? so what's the government hiding aliens and chocolate that's usually the answer that was the picture of it was like the black hole but then there's like an alien doing a selfie chocolate I want to see that they found the Chesirac no I think they're just not

done processing that one yet so it's coming out yeah well okay good it's coming out they're staggering them like Game of Thrones episodes it's not a binge worthy science is coming they're waiting for the ad campaign you know to get the right sponsors and all that kind of stuff yeah sure and the reason it took so

long is that it's really far away and it's tiny and the wavelength of light that we use to see it radio waves are really large and so in order to see something really really far away you need a really really big telescope you got to gather enough light and also because the length of the light waves is so large compared to the size of the thing in the distance you need basically an earth-sized telescope Jesus yeah so we don't have that we don't really have that we don't have a single telescope that's the size of the earth right okay But what they did is they said, let's take a bunch of telescopes all around the Earth. Oh.

Okay. And take pictures from each of those little ones and then pretend that they're all part of a bigger telescope. Okay. And you're thinking, okay, but you're missing most of the telescope. And that's true. But, you know, the Earth spins and rotates, so you can sort of like fill in the gaps. So you're never taking one Earth-sized picture. But if you wait a few years and then you collect 11 gigablops of data and analyze it,

you can reconstruct the black hole because it's not like an action shot. It's not like in motion. This is like integrated over years, a single picture. And as the Earth rotates around the sun, too, right? Did that give us an actually little bit of like coverage? Yeah, exactly. Exactly. After Earth spins and it rotates.

And, you know, our galaxy is moving compared to that galaxy. And so we get all these different angles. And you have to add them all up to get one picture. So it's not a picture. It's not a snapshot of a moment of this Black Hole's life. it's a combination of a bunch of cameras taking a bunch of pictures and then... For a long time.

Yeah, it's like, say you had a statue in a town square and you had a picture from somebody's tourist photo of the back of it. And then a year later, somebody took a picture of the front of it. A year later, somebody took a picture of the side and you put together like a 3D reconstruction of what that statue looked like. Gotcha.

Because the statue's not moving, it's pretty cool. You can do that. Okay. But the stuff around the black hole is moving, right? I mean, can we... Do we know how fast that stuff's move? like the speed at which it's getting sucked into the abyss? Yeah, it's moving really fast.

It's getting sucked in there. And I was reading that... That's why it's glowing, right? It's like it's falling and being shredded so fast that it just explodes, right? Yeah, and the environment around a black hole is not a nice place to be, right? Gravity is a really powerful force, but the strength of the force varies with distance. Like the further you are away from the black hole, the weaker it is, and the closer you are, the stronger it is, right? Right.

But because the gravity is so strong near the black hole that if you were near the black hole, the force of gravity on your legs, for example, would be different than the force of gravity on your head if there are different distances. And that means there's effectively a force tearing you apart. So a black hole, if you got near it, would literally pull you in pieces because the differential gravity on the different parts of you. So I wouldn't recommend it. Okay. And that's what's happening in the gas. That's what Jorge was saying.

So that gas is getting squeezed and pulled and torn apart. And that makes it glow. And that's what we're seeing is the glow of the gas. around the black hole. Interesting. That's the donut. That's the donut. That's the doughnut.

That's the thing that looks like a donut, not actually a donut hoax. Okay. So it's like space is black, and then you got the glowing stuff around the center, the edges. But then the center is black again, right? Because that's what the black hole. That's right. That's the event horizon. That's the place inside which no light can ever leave.

And so what you see in the picture is gas around the black hole, right, which is glowing. And then in the center is blackness. right, and that's where the black hole is. Well, it just looks like blackness, but actually it's like a wormhole to the other side of the universe. Right. To the DC universe. Right. Okay, I just wanted to make sure.

Exactly. And the size of that hole is not really the size of the black hole itself, right? Like the black hole, we don't know what's happening inside the event horizon. Like huge mystery of science. Like, what's in there? Is it a tiny little dot that's super duper heavy? Is it some quantum fuzziness? Is there something else going on? We don't know.

But there's a sphere, we call the, event horizon that says nothing from inside here can ever leave. But the picture you see of the black hole is actually bigger than that event horizon. Whoa. Yeah, because it's really complicated the space around a black hole. Like, you look at something, you imagine that you're seeing

the photons sort of in the same order that they were sent to you. Like, I see the photons from your head above the photons from your foot. So imagine your heads above your foot, right? Right. But if there's some like complicated lens or mirror between us, that can get all mixed up, right? Sure. Well, a black hole is a huge complicated lens.

it bends space. So part of the blackness you're seeing is like the backside of the event horizon because light from that comes around and gets bent towards your eyes. So it's a really complicated mix of all the service of. It's like a glitch in the matrix here what you're describing.

Pretty much, right? It's like a broken part of reality. It's no, it reveals the matrix, right? It shows us how the matrix actually works. It tells us like what's going on in science. This is the best, the most extreme areas of the universe are the place to learn like where things break down and where we don't understand them.

And so that's why it's pretty awesome. But he's sort of right in that it does break our models of the universe, right? Like things, like our, we don't have a good model for what's happening inside of black hole, right? Like everything just breaks down. We have two models for what's happening inside a black hole. They don't agree. Both of them are wrong. Wow.

And so, yeah, we don't know. But they're both right about everything else in the universe. Yeah. They just disagree about what's inside the black hole. Exactly. And the black hole is the place where they disagree most and also a place where we can't look inside. So that's like frustrating and tantal. and amazing.

Yeah. Do you prescribe to, you know, that this could be a interdimensional thing? Like there's some other, I don't know, dimension or universe, multiverse, like, and black hole is the, I don't know, what entry point for something. Does that make sense? That would be pretty awesome if it were true. There are a lot of theories of wormholes, like how black holes could be connected to white holes and they could be, and these are really big black holes.

So, you know, honestly, it could be true. Like, all that crazy stuff you just said. honestly, could be reality. That's the thing I love about it. Great. Does he get credit for it, though, if it turns out to be true? Oh, yeah. I'm not sure he's the first person to spewed.

Does he credit it to? Maybe that's a unique set of science words nobody's ever said before in that order. Hey, I'll take it. I'll give it to you. You get an honorary degree from Daniel and Jorge University. Yes, finally. Our mom's going to be so proud.

But I think also there's a larger context. I think some people think, oh, we saw a picture of black hole, so now we know they're real. We sort of already knew they were real. Okay. We could tell the black hole. were there indirectly from their gravity, the way the stars move around them.

A lot of black holes are not that hard to see. The gas around them is super bright. It's actually one of the brightest things in the universe. We call them quasars. They emit a huge amount of radiation. These ones that they took a picture of are the more common ones that are not very bright that are hard to see.

That's why it's so impressive. Wait, wait, wait, wait. If quasars are the brightest thing, it's easy to see and it's around the black hole, why haven't we seen pictures of that? We have. We've seen quasars. Quauses are all over the place.

We've seen them as stars, basically. We've never had this kind of detailed picture of an actual black circle, right? This is the first time we see, like, an actual black circle, right? The cool thing about this is it's the first time we've seen them in this way, this directly, and resolved the shape of the event horizon. That's the thing we hadn't seen before. It's like, what does the event horizon look like? We think it's a circle.

What if it was something else? What if it was a hexagon? Yeah. Or like a big middle finger or a question mark. A big cube. A big cube. Yeah. Or the agents of shield symbol or something.

That's what you're looking at in the picture then, right? You're looking at the glowy stuff, the doughnut is the gas around the black hole, but then what you're seeing, the black spot in the middle, that is like the event horizon of a black hole. That's like the spot where not even light can escape. It's the first time that we can put it as our wallpaper. Yeah. First selfie.

Very cool. And wait, what about white hole? then. That is also real. Have we seen those? Do we have pictures? White hole could be real. We don't know. Theoretically possible. Never been observed. Wow. But yeah, could be a thing in the universe for sure. Could be a thing. Okay. Stay tuned.

And remember, black holes used to be in the could be a thing in the universe category, but nobody really believed it because it sounds too crazy. Now, actually a thing, we have pictures of them. Yeah. So there's a good, long, rich history of stuff going from crazy idea, nobody really believes, but we can't rule it out to, look, there's a hundred of them over there. Yeah.

So that's pretty awesome. Wake up, you doubters. Yeah. The universe is filled with crazy, nasty, hot stuff, weirder than we could ever imagine. So it's a great source of entertainment for me. Cool. Well, that's your first question, Ethan.

We'll get to your other questions. But first, let's take a quick break. December 29th, 1975. LaGuardia Airport. The holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then, at 6.33 p.m., everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal. Apparently, the explosion actually impelled metal glass.

The injured were being loaded into ambulances, just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy. emerged, and it was here to stay. Terrorism. Law and order criminal justice system is back. In season two, we're turning our focus to a threat that hides in plain sight. That's harder to predict and even harder to stop. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly, and now I'm seriously suspicious. Oh, wait a minute, Sam. Maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra credit. Well, Dakota, it's back to school week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend has been hanging out with his young professor a lot. He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her. Now, he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want her gone. Now, hold up.

Isn't that against school policy? That sounds totally inappropriate. Well, according to this person, this is her boyfriend's former professor, and they're the same age. And it's even more likely that they're cheating. He insists there's nothing between them. I mean, do you believe him? Well, he's certainly trying to get this person to believe him because he now wants them both to meet. So, do we find out if this person's boyfriend really cheated with his professor or not?

To hear the explosive finale, listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. I'm Dr. Scott Barry Kaufman, host of the Psychology Podcast. Here's a clip from an upcoming conversation about exploring human potential. I was going to schools to try to teach kids these skills, and I get eye rolling from teachers or I get students who would be like, it's easier to punch someone in the face. When you think about emotion regulation, like, you're not going to choose an adaptive strategy, which is more effortful to use unless you think there's a good outcome as a result of it, if it's going to be beneficial to you.

Because it's easy to say, like, go you go blank yourself, right? It's easy. It's easy to just drink the extra beer. It's easy to ignore, to suppress, seeing a colleague who's bothering you and just, like, walk the other way. Avoidance is easier. Ignoring is easier. Denial is easier. Drinking is easier.

Yelling, screaming is easy. Complex problem solving, meditating, you know, takes effort. Listen to the psychology podcast on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right. We have Ethan Edinburgh here from the podcast, Bad Science, a podcast which deconstructs science fiction movies with real scientists and comedians. Yeah, yeah. Doesn't even have to be science fiction movies. Just anything that there's a science spin on, we'll attack it. Sciencey movies. And you ever take a movie and you're like, actually, this is all good science. So we should rename our podcast or cancel this episode. Does that ever happen? Accurate science. Sometimes there are like Apollo 13.

was one of them, that science was all pretty accurate. Have you ever watched a documentary by accident and be like, oh, wait, we can't. We can't. This is all true. No, I mean, we usually... Have you ever dismantled the documentary? Claimed it was bogus. And then discovered it was real.

Yeah, that's normally what we do. No, we, I mean, honestly, we will just use it as like a launching pad to talk about science. So I'm not in the field, you know, I'm not trying to attack these movies or say like, oh, this is wrong and this isn't good. You know, I mean, normally because I don't know anything.

But also, just to, you know, say the movie is great, here's what I love about it, here's what didn't really make sense to me, but let's dive into how snakes reproduce because that's interesting, you know? Oh, I see. That is interesting. Yeah, we just did anaconda, so it's on my mind. Wow. Yeah, yeah.

It was a good one. So did they just, like, bud off a little mini anaconda off the back, or how does that work? It's honestly nuts. Did they have eggs? How snakes, I had no idea. Well, they, so first of all, the, I'm not going to get super into it, because we don't have a ton of time. We can look up your podcast, right? Yeah, yeah.

Go listen to the eggs. Anaconda episode, I'll just tease you with the fact that males, and this is across a lot of species apparently, you know, multiple males will, like, smell the pheromones from a female and all want to mate with the same female, and they'll create this anaconda ball. So, like, there's, like, seven snakes all wrapped in one, and they'll just stay that way for, like, weeks at a time, fighting and trying to mate, and it's a disaster. You just gave all our listeners a nightmare. I know, I'm sorry. It's a ball of snakes, guys. This is real. It's out there. It's probably not in your backyard. It's scarier than the film Anaconda. So imagine that. Snakes on a podcast. Yeah, finally. Well, today we're

answering your science questions about physics and the universe. And so your next question is about Jupiter. Right. So I've always been fascinated with Jupiter because it's the largest planet and it's like a gas giant and that huge red spot is super weird. And I remember learning as a kid that we just don't know what's in the middle because we just can't send anything out there. We can't measure what's there. And so I want to know if that's still true and what do you guys think, you know,

theoretically is in the middle, you know, and why can't we tell? We can see a picture of a fuzzy donut in the middle of the galaxy and we don't know about Jupiter? Yeah. Why is that, Daniel? Well, we actually have learned the core of Jupiter is actually a huge ball of snakes.

They're all fighting. It's amazing. It's a fascinating question. And, you know, it's really interesting. Like, we see these things in the sky. Can we understand them what's in there? Are they like our planet or not? When I was a kid, I always wondered, like, why can't you land on Jupiter?

You just, like, sink forever through gas and pass through the other side or something? But Jupiter is really interesting. It's got a lot of layers. It's like an onion, you know, or you cut through it and you get to different stuff. And we can actually probe it a little bit two different ways. One is we can study the density of Jupiter. Okay. Because we fly satellites around it, and those satellites can measure the gravity of Jupiter.

And the gravity of Jupiter depends on how much stuff there is, right? More stuff, more gravity. Right. So we can measure sort of in the same way that we can measure, like, what's inside the Earth. We can measure the density of different regions inside Jupiter just by measuring how the gravity changes as you move around, which is pretty cool. Okay. So this is sounding like we do kind of know what's in there.

That gives us a picture. And then once we actually dropped something into Jupiter, and we're like, okay, let's see what's in there. They built this thing. They try to make it really, really tough. I guess they used, you know, adamantium or vibranium or whatever. And they dropped it in there. And it lasted like, you know, tens of seconds before it was just like crushed into a tiny pulp.

So because Jupiter is really big and so it has a lot of gravity. And so it's squeezing things really, really hard. And so it's really dense. And so mostly Jupiter is a huge ball of hydrogen. But that ball of hydrogen gets compressed by all that gravity and crazy stuff starts to happen. Well, it changes a state of matter, right? Like, most of the biology that you see in Jupiter is like hydrogen, right? But it's in different forms of hydrogen.

Right. So as hydrogen gets hotter or more compressed, it changes, right? Hydrogen here on Earth is just a gas. We can breathe it or, you know, put it in a balloon or whatever or inside a, you know, an ill-fated airship, for example. You know, the humanity, the humanity. Yeah. But on Jupiter, it gets compressed.

And so the outer layer is gashes hydrogen. Then you sink down further and you get liquid hydrogen, right? So you compress a gas and it turns into a liquid. And then below that, it turns into this crazy stuff. It's helium rain. Helium rain? Rain. It's like drops of helium that are like going up and down, like clouds of helium, then raining down.

Whoa. Helium is crazy stuff. And like you've got to be really, really dense or really, really cold to get it liquid. So it's under a lot of pressure. So it's raining inside these other layers of Jupiter. And it's raining helium, you're telling me. It's raining helium and neon. And this isn't a big practical joke that you're trying to prank me.

I'm trying to actually deliver some real science here. Okay. Exactly. And then it just gets crazier. Like, as you go down, you get crazier and crazier stuff. A huge blob of it is this thing we call metallic hydrogen. Okay. She's like hydrogen that acts like a metal, like it conduct electricity. That likes heavy metal music.

Yeah. I think so. Yeah, exactly. And it can conduct electricity. It can be a solid or it can be a liquid, right? so if you went down far enough you would like pass through the rain of helium assuming you were in some like incredibly powerful ship that could withstand all this pressure and then you would either get to the surface of the um you get like an ocean of liquid

metallic hydrogen and then you'd get to like a surface of like metallic hydrogen which i don't know what that would be like we don't have that here we do not have that here no exactly okay okay so that's the answer that's uh it's metallic possibly liquid there's one more layer though because Jupiter is not just hydrogen It's hydrogen plus is a bunch of rocks And other stuff in there And that stuff all sunk to the bottom So the very, very core of Jupiter

is actually basically a big rock You know, it's like a big rocky, icy ball Oh, okay You know, like the kind of stuff that made the Earth And so when the solar system formed Different planets got different amounts of stuff Jupiter got a huge serving of hydrogen And a big blob of rock, Earth got mostly rock, right?

So you could sort of think of like Jupiter as a much smaller planet with a really, really, really big and really, really dense atmosphere that's like liquid hydrogen. So it's pretty crazy over there on Jupiter. And again, it's not like we have a picture of this or we send a probe down

or we've taken x-rays of Jupiter. It's more like we have models of what's going on in there and those match what we're seeing from satellites that go around Jupiter, right? That's right. And we can probe it gravitationally. We can also probe it electromagnically. Like we can look at the magnetic field of Jupiter.

And in order to have a magnetic field, to have certain stuff going on inside. Right. And so we can compare, like, is the magnetic field the way you would expect if this model works? So it's indirect. Like, you haven't sent probes deep into Jupiter that survived. But we have a pretty good picture. But, yeah, it's indirect.

Okay. I do think taking an x-ray is a smart idea, though. Somebody should do that. Yeah. Why not? Get on it. Okay, so I was also wondering about the Big Bang, and if something happened before the Big Bang.

Yeah, that's a wonderful question. Tell me, why do you want to know? Like, if I told you the answer, if I knew the answer and I told you, how would that change your life? It probably wouldn't because even just the Big Bang is a huge mystery to me and how the universe came to be and how it's all evolving all the time, expanding all the time. That's just mind-numbing. But I just, I'm very, you know, it's like that what comes after the end or what comes before the beginning, you know. So I just was curious if there's any, because we can measure, which I already find fascinating, that the Big Bang even happened, what if 13.8 billion years ago or something like that?

Nice. So just that is crazy to me that we even know that that happened. But, yeah, I don't know. I mean, why, if there's any information at all out there, how could that, A, have happened, and what could have possibly been before that? It's a great question. I think it's a really deep question. I think we knew the answer.

It would change the way we felt about, like, our whole example. existence, you know, like, if you knew, like, how the universe came to be and what happened beforehand, that made it happen, that's a pretty deep question. I mean, I feel like I'd be... Do you think it would change the human condition that much? Like, you know, people suddenly abandon Instagram and devote themselves to knowing more about... You know what I mean? Like, do you really think people would change their everyday life? I think so. I think it's a delicate territory, but I think a lot of people believe in a creator and also accept the, you know, old universal. universe hypothesis. The universe is 14 billion years old almost. And they imagine the universe

had a creator because there was this moment when it started. But what if there wasn't? What if we knew that that moment was instead the end of the previous universe, just part of some infinite cycle and there was no moment of creation? I think that argument plays a big role in a lot of people's context for the universe and their belief in God. So I think it would inform people's decisions just as the more we learn about our origin and where we are in the universe and how big and old it is, we learn about our context. And it changes people's views about how important we are or aren't. So, yeah.

It's a great answer. So what is the answer to the question, though? The answer is we have no idea what came before the Big Bang. Okay. And also, we might never. Wow. Like, it might be impossible to learn, you know? It might be that you're still in the Big Bang, right, Daniel?

Yeah, there's that also. Like, what is the Big Bang even mean, right? Some people think of the Big Bang as this moment very, very early on in the universe when the universe expanded really, really fast. And the numbers, I'm about to tell you, are crazy. It's really hard to imagine. but, like, the universe expanded by a factor of 10 to the 25, that's like 10 with 25 zeros,

in 10 to the minus 30 seconds. Whoa. Yeah, they went from really, really small to enormously massive, really, really quickly. And it's not moving at that rate anymore? It, like, slowed down? Yeah, it did that really, really briefly. Okay.

And then it just sort of puttered along for about 10 billion years. Okay. And then five billion years ago, it started expanding again. Wow. And we don't know why, but we call that dark, energy. Oh. So, you know, loot back to the podcast we talk to you about.

That's the Tesseract, man. And, you know, the Infinity Stones were created in the moment of creation and maybe responsible. I mean, I just feel like I'm equally insignificant, no matter how the Big Bang happened or what happened before it. No, you're musical, man. So you're definitely significant. Yeah, people are going to be listening to those records, yeah, for billions of years.

But I think the point is that, you know, 14 billion years ago sounds like a long time. Sure. If you imagine maybe the universe is trillions of years, it's going to be around for trillions of years, then, you know, technically we're sort of like at the beginning of the universe, right? We could be still in the kind of like the echoes of the Big Bang. I mean, it still makes me feel like I'm totally meaningless, but I hear you, and that's nice. Or special, extra special, maybe, right? Yeah, no, it's both.

That's true. That's true. It is both. And so we look backwards. We try to understand, like, what happened in those first few moments. We have some ideas for, like, how do you get this crazy expansion? And what would you need to make that happen? And we have, like, a few sort of ideas for how to put that together that are really pretty fuzzy.

But what we don't know is how do you create those conditions? Like, in order to make the universe explode in the first few moments, you need this stuff called inflationary matter. All right? How do you make inflationary matter? We literally have zero ideas, okay. But, you know, that's how science works. We're like, okay, to explain this, we need, you know, something before it. How do we explain that?

Okay, now, how do we explain that? It's an iterative process. Yeah. But if the universe started from this, like, really, really dense state, it might be that all information from what happened before it is destroyed, right? That it's just gone. The records were swight. Meaning that nobody will ever know.

Nobody will ever know, not even like humans in billions of years. Yeah. It's possible. Or it could be that there's like dregs of information and super duper smart scientists will be able to figure it out. Yeah, that could be also. We don't know. But it could be that the universe is in a cycle.

You know, it expands. And then we don't know what dark energy is doing or if it could turn around and make a crunch. So it could be that our universe started at the end of the last universe when there was crunch. There's also a lot of really crazy philosophical questions. Like, was there time before the Big Bang? Like, what is the word before the Big Bang even mean? Right, right, sure.

And you might think... Like, maybe there's no before the Big Bang. Yeah. Like, Big Bang is it. That's when time started, right? And you might think, well, that's crazy. That's just like a bunch of words that don't mean anything, but... That means something to me.

But, like, imagine, for example, I think this is Stephen Hawking's analogy. Imagine you're at the North Pole, right? Which direction is north from the North Pole? There's no more north. Yeah. That's the northeast north. You're at the northest. Yeah.

Exactly. And so it might be the time is like that. It sort of started there and you can't really, if you go back to zero, you can't really ask what's before because there is no more beforeiness. Yeah. We don't know. I would like that, actually. That seems like a nice organized, you know, like this is when it started. That sits well with you?

Yeah, that's nice. All right. That's pretty. That's definitive. Yes. I appreciate that. Cool. So you have one last question for us, Ethan, and it's a big one.

Yes, it is a big one because I worry about this all the time, and I'm talking to marine biologists and environmentalists of different expertise, and sometimes we get into this place of sheer frustration because of what's happening with the climate. And to me, it's hard to be optimistic about it. And it seems like we are messing up huge and have been for a while. and you know you can look up these like little documentaries even from the 60s and like they knew that what we're doing is bad and we need to stop and like we just keep on keep on trucking so yeah my question is how do you guys view that how do you deal with it how do you you know do you think that we're headed in a good direction or a bad direction or both are there things to be optimistic about and please tell me about them no all right I'll see you next time guys we'll end it there

that's our uplifting podcast yeah um what you mean that when you ask the question are we going to save the earth or destroy you're talking about the climate

and the our ability to live on the planet not like if we're accidentally going to open a wormhole or no I mean I think that possibility why don't you look at me when you say that I'm not open any wormhole I didn't I didn't I didn't like

I didn't look at the scientists working to create black holes here on earth yeah plenty of weirdly tapping his fingers. I mean, I think that whole thing is possible nuclear bombs, like, okay, that's a threat that, you know, at any moment we could all just end, sure. But it seems like we're in this slow decline that we know about with the climate, man-made climate change, global warming, all this, you know, melting ice caps.

And so, yeah, that's really what I'm referring to. It's like, can we reverse this process? Can we save the Earth? How will we do it? or, in your guy's opinion, are we screwed? You know? I think we're screwed, but I think the answer is different from what you might expect because the thing I worry most about is actually the nuclear bombs.

Oh. Because I grew up in Los Alamos. I know a lot about, like, the nuclear infrastructure and all this kind of stuff. And, you know, we have a lot of nuclear weapons. Yeah. And they have a lot of nuclear weapons. And they're all pointed at us. And we're on a hair trigger.

Right. And they're on a hair trigger. like that you have to be able to launch nuclear weapons within like a minute of hearing that somebody else has attacked you otherwise all your nukes are destroyed so dumb so you need like to be able to launch nukes within a minute no congressional approval nothing else just whoever is the president it's like shocking that it hasn't happened yes exactly so now ask yourself this question how long can we go on for with people having their finger on this button and never press it never ever ever ever ever ever i don't know a billion years i don't think so i think it's inevitable I think as long as we have the technology. They're going to press it at some point. No, I think there's going to be a miscommunication or a mistake or a technical glitch. And, you know, we've been close to that several times. It's really terrifying if you look up the history of that.

There's been times when, like, one guy has just said that, no, we're not launching and has, like, literally saved humanity. Wow. So it's pretty dangerous. We're living with huge guns, pointed at our heads at a hair trigger all the time, and that will eventually go off unless climate change destroys human. civilization, and then we lose the capability

to maintain it by our nuclear weapons. So hopefully we ruin the planet. And, you know, then the few survivors, you know, living in the swamp, will not die of radiation poisoning. Sweet. Okay. Thanks for having me, guys. All right, let's, you know, I think

I have a more positive view, which is, you know, I feel like I think things are not going to get better anytime soon, right? And I think part of the problem is just that a lot of it's just kind of a communication problem. You know, like our forecast for the future is based on models and, you know, our current understanding of things

and they're projecting far into the future. And so right now I think it's harder for scientists to communicate and for people to really absorb the idea that we're heading in a bad direction. But, you know, I think eventually things will become more obvious and people, population, hopefully through podcasts like yours and ours, just kind of become more familiar with science. are able to absorb the message and hopefully it won't be too late. Yeah, that would be nice.

And maybe in the process we could also make some sort of nuclear arms treaty where we just all agree to blast them all into the black hole. Or at least make it like a two-step button. I feel like that would help a lot. Yeah, or three-step button. Why is not there? There's a clever proposal from an ex-defense secretary of defense to get rid of all of our stationary nuclear weapons, the ones that are like vulnerable.

Yeah, the ones like in underground silos. Those are the ones that can be destroyed by their nukes, right? So if your nukes are on submarines or in the air instead, that you don't have to launch within a minute. You can wait and really make sure it's happening and you have 30 minutes or so because your nukes are not necessarily going to be destroyed by their nukes. So you don't have to be on a hair trigger.

Shouldn't we just not allow nukes? I mean, is that a crazy thought? Why do we need huge bombs? Right? Yeah, why don't we all just get along? I mean, he'd talk it out. Yeah, talk it out. I think guns are even unnecessary. Can't we just use a, like, paintball? Why a nuke? Replace nukes with paintballs. That's what I'm going for.

Why is there war in human history? Yeah. I think we can answer that today. Okay, great. Well, I feel, Ethan, I feel like maybe the answer to all of your questions today has been, we have no idea. No, I got... Which, by the way, is the title of our book, Daniel, book plug. Oh, there it is, yeah, true. But, yeah, do you feel like we left me hanging out of a bit? I felt very informed. I think there was a lot of answers today. I mean, the core of Jupiter was a big one for me. I mean, helium rain was shocking.

The title of your next album, right? Yeah, that sounds like a great song. I mean, that does sound, I'm sure people would be like, okay. I have a little bit for us. Come on. What does helium rain sound like. Helium rain. It sounds like almost like a love song there.

Like purple rain, but it would be with helium in it. It's actually a cover. It's a weird al parody, actually. No, I think, well, first of all, that's a really intriguing title. I think anything helium rain I'm going to check out just based on the title is like what the hell is that but no I think the whole like the black hole stuff and the there's a lot there yeah I feel I feel what's the word I'm looking for educated I got I got schooled today right well here's your degree oh thank you yes it's so gorgeous put up on you all show it to all your friends I will I will

but I think that's a big part of what we like to talk about is that there are still big mysteries out there and even the scientists and the experts are still asking questions. And everyone out there, people listening, people studying this and kids in the future can all participate in answering these questions.

Yeah, and some of these questions that we're asking, people will know the answer to them in 50 years, right? And they'll look back and be like, ha, ha, ha, those guys didn't know anything. You know, how silly were they? Hey, listen, if people are listening to this in 50 years, we did something right, boys.

That's awesome. Dig this out of the rubble of human civilization. Are the helium rain of our climate? No, but I mean, imagine like what people used to think about

100 years ago, the questions they had 200 years ago. Right. Now children know the answers to those questions, right? So in 500 years, yeah, six-year-olds will, like, casually know

the answer to questions we are struggling with today. And I love that progression of human knowledge. It's just wonderful to think about it. Yeah. Cool. Well, I hope people enjoy that.

And thank you, Ethan, for being on the show today. And having us in your show. Hey, that science. Anytime. An absolute delight. That's right. Bad Science and Good Answers. And you can find bad science at...

Anywhere. Anywhere you listen to podcasts, yeah. And I also, if you're curious, have a very stupid, fake financial podcast called Success Express. They're like 15-minute episodes, and they're just basically a bunch of fake advertisements. So if you want to laugh and not think about anything, that's probably the way to go. Sounds wonderful. Thanks for being on, and thanks to all of you guys for listening to this discussion. See you next time. If you still have a question after listening to all these explanations,

please drop us a line we'd love to hear from you. You can find us at Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at Daniel and Jorge, that's one word, or email us at Feedback at Danielandhorpe.com. Thanks for listening, and remember that Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe is a production of IHeartRadio. For more podcasts from IHeart. Visit the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal, just a chaotic, chaotic scene.

In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, terrorism. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly, and now I'm seriously suspicious. Wait a minute, Sam. Maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra credit. Well, Dakota, luckily, it's back to school. week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend's been hanging out with his young professor a lot. He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her. Now he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want her gone. Hold up. Isn't that against school policy? That seems inappropriate. Maybe find out how it ends by listening to the OK Storytime podcast on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Culture eats strategy for breakfast, right? On a recent episode of Culture Raises Us, I was joined by Belisha Butterfield, media founder, political strategist, and tech powerhouse for a powerful

conversation on storytelling, impact, and the intersections of culture and leadership. I am a free black woman. From the Obama White House to Google to the Grammys, Valicia's journey is a masterclass in shifting culture and using your voice to spark change. Listen to Culture raises us on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast.