IELTS Speaking for Success - ☄️ Outer space and stars (S08E21) + Transcript

Episode Date: January 30, 2023

Do you enjoy looking at the stars? Have you ever learned about outer space and stars? Are you interested in films about outer space and stars? Can you see many stars at night where you live? Would you ever like to go into space? What would you do if you had a chance to go there? Tune in and have a great day! - Get exclusive episodes on IELTS Speaking parts 1, 2, and 3: https://linktr.ee/sfspremium Our course on Phrasal Verbs: https://successwithielts.com/podcourses Transcript: https://successwithielts.com/s08e21 Our IELTS Writing podcast: https://linktr.ee/wfspremium Find an IELTS Speaking Partner: https://links.successwithielts.com/ieltspartner Our social media: https://linktr.ee/successwithielts © 2023 Success with IELTS Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello, lovely. I'm Maria. And my name is Rory, and we're the host of the IEL Speaking for Success Podcast, the podcast that aims to help you improve your speaking skills, as well as your listening skills along the way. We've started this podcast to give you happiness, joy, gorgeous grammar and super vocabulary for your high I.I.O.S. Your bad night's score. Rory, are you paying attention? Rory! Rory! No, sorry, Maria. I was just staring off into space there, wasn't I?

Hmm, space, you said. Let's talk about space. Hey, yes, dear listener, in Aild speaking, part one, they can ask you questions about space and stars. And it's a comeback. We used to have this topic, I think about two years ago, and we recorded an episode about that. So this is like version two of this topic. Make sure you listen to both of them, and you are a star. Are we talking to the people watching?

Are you talking to me? I can't see because I've only got this one camera. Rory, you are also a star. Oh, thank you. And I'm a star. And a modest one. Let's talk about stars and outer space. Do you enjoy looking at the stars?

When I get the chance I do, and it's not just the stars either. It's the planets and the nebulae. I used to love, and I still do, sitting on the decking at 3 o'clock. in the morning on a Saturday, just watching them for ages. Have you ever learned about outer space and stars? Well, we had a few inputs in school, but most of what I know about, well, celestial events and heavenly bodies I've read or watched for myself. I don't think primary or even secondary school children probably need to learn that much

about coronal mass ejection or star formation. So it's really something that you have to pursue for yourself outside of the basics, like what the order of the planets is in the solar system, for example. Are you interested in films about outer space and stars? Oh, absolutely. I love hard and soft science fiction. So anything about extraterrestrials and space travel is right up my avenue. I really like the plots of films like Arrival and Contact, but I also like the mindless fun of Starship Troopers as well.

Can you see many stars at night where you live? Well, the light pollution here is quite low, so you don't just see stars and constellations. You can see planets like Mars. And if you move further out of the village where there's almost no people, then you can even see things like the Orion Nebula, for example. I can't think of anything else that you could see, but they're all up there, twinkling away. So that's great. Would you ever like to go into space?

Well, with the current level of technology, probably not. I mean, if we had a space elevator or a skyhook, for example, to make it safer, then and I would absolutely be down for that. But I'm not strapping myself to the top of a rocket filled with fuel and setting it on fire to get there. That's just, it just seems really dangerous. What would you do if you had a chance to go into space? Well, it would be cool to see the Earth from orbit

and just see what everything looks like. I'd also really like to do the space, not the, I'd like to do a spacewalk, just for the novelty and the risk that's involved, to be honest. I doubt I'd make the astronaut fitness requirements, though. We have our super premium episodes for you with speaking part two and three with new, super new IOTS speaking topics. This week, Rory is describing a historical period he'd like to know more about. And speaking part three, we're going to discuss history in general. The links are in the description.

Do check them out, okay? Houston, Houston, did he use all gorgeous vocabulary? Uh-huh. What's about grammar? Uh-huh, the second conditional? Okay, okay. So, look at the stars. Rory used to gaze at the stars or stargazing.

I enjoy stargazing. Like, I enjoy looking at the star. Rory, are you a stargazer? I'm an opportunistic stargazer. So whenever the opportunity presents itself, then I will do that. But I'm not an amateur or a professional astronomer with a telescope. So if you enjoy looking at the stars, you can say, oh, I enjoy going out to stargaze. So to stargays, I enjoy stargazing.

I'm not a stargazer. Gays are like, I don't like looking at the stars. Roy did use a very specific word about this, you know, a cloud of gas and dust. in space. What was it? Nebula. Nebula. Oh, the nebula.

Yeah. Well, nebulae. Nebula. They're, oh, everybody thinks they're giant clouds of gas. But it's not just that. It's their collections of material that are spread out across

a really large area of space. It's easy to say that they're just gas. but it's not that simple. There are things inside Nebula, for example. But people think, oh, it's like a cloud. There shouldn't be anything solid inside of it, but there are. You can also say I enjoy looking at myriads of stars, myriads, lots of stars, like countless.

You can't count them, countless stars. And Nebula. Nebula is one in this plural, right? So if we talk about many, lots, you say... Nebula. You said that you had some inputs at school about space and stars. So inputs obviously lessons. Yeah.

But a good one, yeah? Like input sessions. Like they put stuff in you, right? Or maybe just they want to put stuff in you, but it doesn't stay in or it doesn't go in. It's just, you know. Yeah. So inputs.

at school about stars and space. And also which events? Celestial. Yes. So like, well, celestial events or celestial bodies, it really doesn't matter. But there are things that happen in space. So we talk about celestial,

then it's something happening in outer space, beyond the earth. The moon is a celestial body. Yes. A heavenly body. And then you can say that, oh yes, I did study astronomy at school or I had some inputs

on stars in space and also I remember something about coronal mass ejections and star formations that's not from school, that's just something I read about or watched videos about. So a coronal

mass ejection is just it's like, oh God if you're an astronomer, please don't get angry with me but it's when a lot of hot stuff comes out of the sun and is fired into space. That's what it is. A lot of hot stuff, hot stuff. Oh, it's hot.

Plasma. Plasma? Okay. I would call it plasma. I mean, probably there are astronomers right now that are like, oh my God, this person's an idiot. But that's basically what it is. It's when stuff is fired out of the sun into space. Sometimes it hits the earth and you can see it in things that look like the northern lights, for example.

Or it can cause power outages if it's really, really strong. Right. So this answer is your chance to show off your space vocabulary. Oh yeah, I remember learning. So I remember learning, right, about meteors, meteors and comets at school. Or also you can say about, I remember learning about the solar system. Rory loves hard and soft science fiction. Hmm, hard and soft.

Yes, but like, the hard science fiction is just a way of saying it's more realistic compared to soft science fiction, which is when you can just make up the rules for how things work. So really, the way that we understand physics now, you shouldn't be able to travel faster than the speed of light. So if you have spaceships in your movie that are traveling faster than light, then that's soft science fiction. If the spaceships in your movie are not doing that, then that's harder science fiction. for example. So arrival in contact focus on things like radio waves

and the difficulties of communicating with aliens. So that's quite realistic because they wouldn't just show up starting to speak English. Whereas if you watch Star Trek and all the aliens are speaking English because of the universal translator, that itself science fiction. And in Starship Troopers,

just the idea that alien insects construct their own spaceships, yeah, that's very, soft science fiction. Extraterrestrial life. Extraterrestrial, so life from outer space. So be careful with pronunciations. Extraterrestrial, right?

How do you say it, Robbie? Extraterrestrial. Oh, just say aliens. It's hard enough to say that. And also, like, I was just thinking about when I learned the Russian word for aliens as well, it's also difficult to say, so just say aliens. So if you enjoy space, you can say, oh, Oh, this is right up my street.

This is right up my street. Rory changed street into avenue. But it's the same thing. Yeah, so this is right up my avenue. Is this an idiom, Rory? Yes. Yes, it is. Ideometric language.

For a high score. If I don't like space, if I don't like this topic, what do I say? It's not up my street. It's not my thing. Yeah, just it's not my thing. it's not really up my street at all. But I suppose you wouldn't really say that. You'd be more likely to say it's not my thing.

The light pollution. So if there is a lot of light in your city, you can say, whoa. So I've got a lot of light pollution, so I can't see any stars. Rory told us that the light pollution is low. So he actually can see the stars and constellations. Constellations are just the imaginary.

shapes that people make by drawing imaginary lines in the sky. The way that stars are placed is not organized that way. It's just how they happen to look for human beings who are trying to find patterns and things that don't necessarily have one. Or if you believe in astrology, then they control your destiny and what kind of food you like. Yeah, and there are different kinds of constellations. And you can say, oh, I can spot different constellations from where I live and I know the names of constellations.

Also, I can see planets like Mars. Planets are without article, right? No articles. Mars. I suppose it will depend on what you're talking about. The names of the planets do not have articles, yes. But if we are talking about the word planet, then you can say the planet Mars. And also you can spot.

You can spot Mars, spot like notice, or you said like nebula again, but Orion, you said the Orion nebula, the Milky Way. But that's because, well, we talk about the Orion nebula,

that's not, it's being used as an adjective there. It's a specific nebula with a specific name to describe it. And you usually see stars on a clear sky. So air clear sky. But if you don't have, any clear skies, then you can say the sky is usually hazy or the sky is overcast, like cloudy.

So I don't see many stars. What is twinkling away? Twinkle, twinkle little star. Oh, it's actually, the reason that stars twinkle is quite complicated. But the first thing to talk about is twinkling. So twinkling is when you see it's not like constantly on. kind of going, it's intense, and it's not so intense, and it's back to intense again. But the reason that stars twinkle, oh, strap yourselves in, folks.

So, the reason that stars twinkle is because of, first of all, the stars are not solid things. They move around and change, and they have hot spots and cool spots, and that will affect the intensity of the light. But the other thing that affects the intensity of the light is you've got your star here, and you're watching all the way over here. And in the middle, there's all kinds of stuff. including something called the Ort Cloud, which is a giant cloud of comets and debris from the beginning of the solar system that the light has to travel through. And then there's all the nebulas and gases in between the stars that the light has to travel through as well on its way to your eye.

Houston, Houston, we have a problem. We have a problem. It's Rory. He's, he's, we should shut him up. This is, no, this is cool. Like, this is why the stars twinkle. Everybody thinks it's just one thing, but it's a whole process. And when you think about the distance, that light has to travel and what it has to go through in order for you to be able to see it and appreciate it, thousands, maybe millions of years after you've seen it is, or sorry, after it's been emitted, is amazing.

How can people not find that fascinating? You're rude. How are you? Are you okay? Are you, is it boring for you? Is it boring or is it interesting? It is interesting. It's interesting. This is how the mechanics of the universe work.

It's cool. You don't look very convinced. Oh, I'm very convinced. I really enjoys your explanation. I took notes. I wrote it down. Fine. Fine. What's the next piece of grammar and vocabulary that we need to talk about? I'm sure that will be much more interesting.

And you complained about the level of technology. So you're saying that you wouldn't go into. space now because the technology is, you know, like, it's just, I'm not strapping myself to a fuel tank. That is basically what we do. We blow up fuel in order to get into orbit. There are much more efficient ways of getting people into space than doing that. Yeah, like a space elevator. Roy is going to wait till they invent a space elevator, elevator like lift. Well, they don't need to invent it. They just need to build it. Ah, build it, just up to space. Okay, so Rory is going to open the door, go inside the lift

and it's like a lift like a lift in a building and it goes right up there to Mars well not necessarily to Mars you probably only need it to get into space and then from there you can go to Mars and then hook up with another space elevator there and what did you mean by a sky hook

so kind of like okay I'm just looking at a diagram for a sky hook now and this is really difficult to explain in like a minute but basically what a sky hook is, it picks things up from the atmosphere and moves them around and as the earth is moving, then it travels that way and then pops you back down. But it could still be used to get into orbit, I suppose. You just like swing it up the way. And then you'd have to make sure that you had

something to stop you from floating away because of the momentum. Anyway, look, the point is that there are much safer ways to travel through space and to move things around that do not involve blowing up rocket fuel. So use your imaginations, people. The examiner asks you, what would you do? So that's the second conditional. So if I could go into space, I'd, I would do something. And Rory told us that it would be cool. It'd be cool to see the earth from orbit. Orbit, like not like obit, like chewing gum. Orbit, shouldn't be the orbit, from the orbit. Well, from the orbit of Earth,

but if you're already there in orbit above Earth, then you don't need it. Like, it's clear that you're in orbit of Earth. Where else would you be in orbit of? And we say the Earth, right? So it would be cool to see the Earth, not Earth, the Earth. Well, you can say both. It would be cool to see the Earth,

or it would be cool to see Earth from orbit. It doesn't make a difference. there's only, well, I suppose, Earth without the article would be our planet, the Earth would be what you're looking down at. But they're both meaning the same thing, the thing you can see from space. I'd love to do a spacewalk.

A spacewalk, like when you go out there from the spacecraft and you just walk on the moon, or you just walk out in the space. Well, a spacewalk is when you, like, let's say the hatch opens, and you float out through and you're walking in space. Floating Rory. Can you imagine this like floating Rory, Scotland, freedom in the space for everybody? That would be nice.

I'd love to be an astronaut. So we say astronaut, right? So people who go into space in a shuttle or in a spacecraft, in a space vehicle. But Rory doubts that he'll meet. The astronaut fitness requirements. So, like, you should be fit, fit to go into space. Maybe not for Rory. If you were a planet, Rory, which planet would you be?

I don't know. What planet would you be? Oh, I'd be Saturn. Because I love the rings, and I actually saw Saturn at the observatory near Baikal Lake. It was this huge telescope and I looked and I saw this planet like with these eyes. It was amazing. It was I think one of the most breathtaking experiences in my life. When I saw this little like a jewel, like amazing planet, it was unbelievable and I was deeply touched by Saturn's rings.

Jupiter also has rings and so does Uranus. and Neptune, I think. They're very small, but they're there. I know lots about space. I'm not apologizing for it. Thank you very much, dear listener, dear viewer, our favorite band, for listening, for watching. Please write in the comments. What do you reckon, like, what do you think about this? Space, stars? Are you a star person? Well, of course you are a star. Are you into this or not really? Which planet would you like to be? Would you like to go out there? and be floating in the outer space, like Rory or not. Please let us know, love, kisses, and take care.

And watch the stars. Bye. Houston, Houston, we're done, we're done. Okay, everything's fine. Yeah, bye. Do you enjoy looking at the stars? When I get the chance I do, and it's not just the stars either, it's the planets and the nebulae, I used to love, and I still do, sitting on the decking, at 3 o'clock in the morning on a Saturday, just watching them for ages. Have you ever learned about outer space and stars? Well, we had a few inputs in school, but most of what I know about, well, celestial events

and heavenly bodies I've read or watched for myself. I don't think primary or even secondary school children probably need to learn that much about coronal mass ejection or star formation. So it's really something that you have to pursue for yourself outside of the basics, like like what the order of the planets is in the solar system, for example. Are you interested in films about outer space and stars? Oh, absolutely. I love hard and soft science fiction. So anything about extraterrestrials and space travel is right up my avenue.

I really like the plots of films like Arrival and Contact, but I also like the mindless fun of Starship Troopers as well. Can you see many stars at night where you live? Well, the light pollution here is quite low, so you don't just see stars and constellations. You can see planets like Mars. And if you move further out of the village where there's almost no people, then you can even see things like the Orion Nebula, for example. I can't think of anything else that you could see, but they're all up there, twinkling away,

so that's great. Would you ever like to go into space? But with the current level of technology, probably not. I mean, if we had a space elevator or a skyhook, for example, to make it safer, then I would absolutely be down for that. But I'm not strapping myself to the top of a rocket filled with fuel and setting it on fire to get there. That's just, it just seems really dangerous. What would you do if you had a chance to go into space? Well, it would be cool to see the Earth from orbit and just see what everything looks like. I'd also really like to do the space, not the, I'd like to do a spacewalk,

just for the novelty and the risk that's involved, to be honest. I doubt I'd make the astronaut not fitness requirements though.