The Chaser Report - Swearing in as... SCIENCE VS

Episode Date: August 25, 2022

For their final podcast swear-in, Dom and Charles anoint themselves the hosts of the critically successful SCIENCE VS! Black holes have sound, but can NASA be trusted? Meanwhile dolphins are terrorising fishermen for a laugh, and Tasmanian tigers are getting the Jurassic Park treatment. Plus we finally read your reviews again! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Chaser Report is recorded on Gatigal Land. Striving for mediocrity in a world of excellence. This is... You're listening to Science Verses. Hello and welcome to Science Versus. One of the most successful Australian podcasting nationally. presenter, Wendy Zuckerman, used to work at the ABC. Yes.

Unfortunately, Wendy's not. not here today? No, he's not here today. And in fact, this is the Chase Report impersonating science verse, as much as former Prime Minister Scott Morrison signed himself into a whole lot of other jobs. And it keeps coming out that he did more and more things. Did you hear about that grant that he approved? This is like $800 million worth of grants that he approved as Prime Minister in the later after the election. But one of them, he did it with the power of industry and trade. Oh, there you go, which is also science. So he signed himself in as the Minister. for science.

So what better thing to do than science versus? So the point is that this is the definitive podcast on science today. So this is going to be an amazing show. Amazing show. Because we're going to tell you all about science. And Science Versus started as a little project at the ABC. At the same time as David Hunt and I started our Rum Rebels and Ratbags podcast. Oh, yes.

Which did quite well in Australian History podcast. In fact, didn't it outright science versus? I think it did initially. Yeah. But the difference was that Science Versus was picked up by Gimlet in the very cool podcasting company in the US because it was globally relevant, whereas ours wasn't, and then bought by Spotify. So it's now made by several of the world's largest companies. Looking at their last episode here, they interviewed a guy called Dr. Anthony Fauci.

So they're doing okay. They're doing okay. Yeah, they're doing all right, but they're no chaser report. Oh, God, no. No, no. You wouldn't want to be science versus. In many ways, we're giving them a signal boost, I feel, by impersonating science versus. So science stories of the week, what have we got?

Let's look at some stories. Well, should we go to an ad first? Yeah. It's been scientifically proven that this ad is great. You're listening to Science Best. Unless you check out the podcast reviews that are left on the Apple Podcast app, app, you can leave one today. Please make it five stars.

So, Charles, I've got some science for you. Oh, okay, yes, great. This is science. It's, in fact, from LiveScience.com. Orcas are attacking boats near Europe, right? What they're doing is they're coming up to boats. off Europe in the Mediterranean or Norway, places like that, and snapping off the rudders.

Oh, yes. Can I guess why they're doing that? Why do you think? Because they're protesting their depiction in free willy, too. Is that what it's happened? It doesn't say that it's that. I mean, my hypothesis, because as a scientist, I like hypothesis. Oh, yeah, yeah.

Is that it's nature deciding to get rid of us. I think it's increasingly clear that Mother Nature, there's some title of all creatures on the planet have just gone, no, fuck humans. They're ruining everything. So, don't dolphins, because orcas are dolphins, aren't they? Killer whales. Yeah, they're killer whales.

They're actually dolphins. Are they? Okay. Yeah, sorry, just speaking scientifically. Sure. Science me. Adolescent dolphins go through a phase where they do antisocial things to humans. Often, like, that would be this season's craig.

Well, it says here that it could be a fad. Yeah, it's a fad, yes. They have influences. There are influences in the orca world. Because you know what they did a few years ago, what the fad was amongst, and it's only amongst male adolescent hawkers that do this. But the fad a few years ago was they would kill, was it seals, baby seals or something like that, and then wear the corpses on their head. Do you remember that?

They did it. In 1987, it was. Yeah. Orcas in the Pugas in the Puget Sound began wearing dead salmon like hats. Yes, that's right. Why didn't we think of that? Yeah. Well, that was the last time hats were trendy, wasn't it?

They also started walking on their tails at one point. And this is because there was one dolphin that was being healed in a kind of research center. I am. They had captive dolphins who were trained to walk on their tails, right, for entertainment purposes. Yeah. Picked up the behaviour and spread it. Oh, right. And this just goes to show that we're the superior species because they didn't keep going.

They didn't push on to be able to walk on land. They actually just went now, fuck that. They probably win. Oh, fuck. We don't want to be like humans. They're awful people who lock up our friends. Yeah, and make them do tricks and spin balls on their noses. Yeah.

They play with crab pots, apparently, in the Pacific. But no, the rudder thing, I mean, that's actually pretty chilling because these boats then have to just drift along. And no one's died yet, but they easily could. Well, I kind of think it's fair game. I mean, we're the ones who are invading their geographical space. We're invading their space, surely they should be allowed to do what they would like. Like, if they came on land, we'd have no conjunction in just being mean to them.

That's true. That's true. If they knocked on our door, walking on their fins. Yeah, walking in their fins, what would we do? We would push them over. Which would be very easy to do. It wouldn't be hard. But I'm just imagining if this story we were used and adapted into a movie.

Yes. It would be like the most slow-paced version of jaws, where instead of actually taking a bite out of him, like the Great White Shark, the orca just disables the rudder and they to slowly drift for days. I think Tom Hanks would do a very good job on that. Give them a volleyball as a coaster. Yeah, exactly.

So that's one bit of news from the world of science. Another bit of news is that. I don't feel that was very science-y. It's orchid animal behavior. It's orca, yeah. All right, well, what about this? Let's go to space. Let's go to space.

And this is from NASA. NASA has recorded a black hole from the Perseus cluster. It sounds like this. I mean, that's pretty chilling, isn't it? That's like a hole. That's eerie. What, that doesn't make it. That is just not true.

That is not true. There's no such thing. Are you saying NASA made this up? Yes. Because, well, A, there's no such thing as sound in space. Everyone knows that. Space is silent because there's no medium through which sound can be transmitted. Second of all, all, everything NASA puts out is bullshit.

Okay, well, let's talk with the second point later. The first point is, no, you're wrong. It is because the reason why we can actually hear it, and they address this, it's because, well, it says NASA tweeted about this, that there's a misconception that there is no sound in space simply because there is very little. And when there's a galaxy cluster, there's enough. gas, the sound can actually transmit through it. So they've picked it up and amplified it, and it sounds bizarrely like the chilling

sound of every black hole in a sci-fi movie, like Ed Wood and all this, they're actually right. It does sound terribly spooky like that. Some have suggested that the Guardian article that I was reading suggested it might also be a new Bjerk album. I'm not entirely sure. But it makes me think that is, I mean, that sound, I would rather listen to those radio waves than most of commercial FM.

But I just doubt that it's still true. Like, I get your explanation, but it's like, you know, they go, oh, this is what the galaxy looks like. And then you find out, well, what we did was we got these waves that had been redshifted, you know, to be completely different. Indivisible light. Yeah, and we just adjusted it so that here is, it's sort of like a synoptic chart or something like that.

Like we've just mapped different colors according to different radio waves. Well, they have said here that they... Hey, presto, this is what it looks like. It's just rubbish. Yes. Which makes me wonder, Charles, couldn't NASA's technology be used on the Ray Hadley morning show to make it better? They take the signal the radio waves coming up from Ray Hadley and edit it and mix it around. So it actually is less shit.

Yes. So I'm not quite understanding, but so... Well, you're saying... You take the signal. You take the signal. You take the signal. And just as they took the black hole signal and made it listenable. You'd interpret it using AI.

Yes. You'd amplify the good bits. Yes. And you'd get rid of the bad bits. And you'd basically have dead air for three hours in the morning. Wouldn't you? But it'd be very listenable. Yeah, although surely, I mean, could you mix it in with a bit of music and turned it into a sort of...

It could even be white noise. I mean, my... You know, for children, we've got it. Maybe there's a white noise generator. Yeah. And, I mean, to be fair, a lot of broadcasts on TGB are very pro-white. So it would fit in quite well with the station. You're listening to Science Best.

That's the only bit of science news. And the final one I have for you, and this is from yesterday, which is that they've discovered a mystery animal. In the Adelaide Hills, they, some bushwalker, found a creature that they thought could have been a Tasmanian tiger. So maybe they aren't extinct after, or maybe they've gone. And it does make sense. given that Tasmania is now quite fashionable as a destination.

The most unsported place would be Adelaide. Yes. Where nature's just left alone. It's pristine. Untouched by human civilisation. Most of South Australia, that's true of. And because, you know, whenever there's human interference, those humans end up being murdered.

Maybe Adelaide's been misrepresented. And it's not a serial killer capital. It's a thylacine capital. And the thylacines kill everyone by putting them in acid bars. I mean, they're very evolved. Well, that's good. I'm glad that we've got another animal who can see out the next 25 years of climate apocalypse and then become extinct. So you think scientists are kind of wasting their energy bringing creatures back when instead they should be solving the imminent death of the whole planet? Yeah, anyone who, well, anyone who's just trying to save anything at the moment is just wasting their time.

It's over. Have you not seen? China is currently suffering from the worst heat wave in the history of human. humanity is what they're saying, right? It's like 700 records were broken yesterday. And most of the temperatures, sort of like 45 degrees during the day and 34 at night. Now, that is unlivable. That is unlivably hot. Europe is suffering from its worst drought in 500 years at the moment. Like, it's over, Dom.

But as against that, Charles. You might as well just go to Portrait. Portugal, have a nice holiday, burn as much carbon as you like. Like, I'm back on the side of the climate denies. Not because I believe that they're true. It's just like, you might as well just... This is last days of Rome. If Rome had burnt to a crisp instead of just fucking up over centuries.

Last days of Nero. Fiddling while... Yeah, we should just get out of violins. That's a bleak take on things. Yeah, and certainly scientists out there listening to this... podcast of Science Versus, you shouldn't be wasting your time looking for new species or, you know, trying to revive species that are already dead. Like, don't bring more animals into this hellscape that we've created.

Unless you're bringing in things, something that could actually fix the problem, right? Yeah. So you could bring back hot climate species that are used to... Oh, no, you mean, like... Living in volcanoes. I thought you meant, like, hot. Sexy. You're hot, sexy, but...

No, I wasn't saying it. No, but, you know, clearly polar bears aren't needed anymore. Penguins really are on the way out. Yeah, so you get a whole of tropical species. Tropical species, it would be back, would be a good idea. I like that. And then, I mean, if you really wanted to do something about climate change, wouldn't the best thing to do for scientists,

instead of bringing back Tasmanian tiger, you bring back the dinosaur, and you let the dinosaurs loose basically in wherever fossil fuels are consumed? So, as in the simulation in Jurassic world, you take them to the mainland and let them loose on, I don't know, the US Capitol, Australia's Parliament, anywhere where you just need to get rid of some climate deniers. Well, it would certainly make for extra entertaining television while we all crumble.

Is that the idea? They wouldn't need everyone. See, I don't think it's the number of... Yeah, okay, so you're saying strategically, like you let them loose in the oil fields of Texas. Yeah, just basically choose the people for strategic depopulation. Yes. From dinosaurs. Yes, okay.

And presumably dinosaurs are quite good at dealing with hot climates. Well, actually, you know that they never died out. They never die out. Yeah, it's the whole... Well, this is genuine science. Science versus, right. Which is that basically paleontology has, you know, has they lied to us?

Leaps and bounds over the last 10 or 15 years. Come to the stunning realization that the dinosaurs never actually died out. dinosaurs birds are dinosaurs they're not even like the cousin of dinosaurs they're actually just dinosaurs like they've got the same bone structures they've got the same they just are dinosaurs well certainly true that when you go to see

like recreation to dinosaurs these days in the museums they tend to have feathers yes feathers and be plumage plumage beaks and in particular their bones are exactly the same structure which is a far more sort of um lightweight structure than mammals have well haven't birds fucked it then yes because back in the day they ruled the planet i mean dinosaurs were the apex predator well the argument is though

dom that actually in this climate apocalypse um mammals will die out oh so the birds are ready to but the the birds will probably survive like there's that they are strong enough and also adaptable enough because they can fly to better climate places with that yeah the one place without... That almost certainly they're better equipped than us. So they're better. So it's cockroaches and birds. Yeah.

Oh, definitely. Yeah, yeah. And then dinosaurs will actually survive this extinction as well. So this whole idea that, oh, dinosaurs got wiped out by the extinction. No, no, no, no. No, no, no, no, no. So we need to evolve wings, is what you're saying. We haven't given any chance to survive it.

We need to, no, we need to evolve bones that are hollow. That's the key. We need to have lighter, stronger bones. Yes. We're fucked, don't we? Because we're a lot heavier than we used to be.

Yeah, no, exactly. No. So it's fucked. Well, look, we promised to do a science episode. Yeah. We've concluded that everything is doomed and it's all going to be a disaster.

And if you're interested in any of the footnotes from today's episodes, even the references, you know, if you want to investigate a little bit more, then probably just don't. It was all pre-print. Isn't that what Norman Swan says?

Yeah, yeah. This is all for, Fourth coming research. Fourth coming. Yeah, yeah. So the Chaser report, looking at the reviews here. Friday today, is it? So, review day, yes.

Review day. They say, great podcast, but want to listen to more Chaser-less McCaffee. That's cut down on the ads, please, from rah, rah, rah, rah, run. Well, you can do that by going to chaser.com. com.com. You slash podcast where you can subscribe to this podcast. Yeah. So just nine bucks a month.

And you get the ad-free version. Plus, you get a whole lot of extra content. Yeah, you get even. more. I mean, in the unlikely event that your greatest desire in life is to have more of this stuff or the shit, you can just go to there and get more episodes. And they're looser, generally, than it is. Oh, yeah, they're terrible. This is pretty loose. So check that out. So that, we've got a solution is the point to that. Oh, look, there's, there's also some suggestions, although, or are we going to just continue doing

other podcasts? Maybe we should. We might well. We've got a suggestion here from All Added Out. Oh, I said right. who says, how about take on some episodes of the Infinite Monkey Cage? Or Queens of the Drone Age. They want science and tech. We should do a tech episode, Charles. Yeah, and don't do News Weekly. Yeah, you can't do it as justice, they say.

Sammy's better. Is Sammy that much better on his podcast than on ours? I love our, it says, loving the show, though, maybe only 10% of the show's length should be ads. How many ads do we have? I see, I'd never listen to it. Well, maybe only 1% of your budget should go to paying else. Yeah, you're right.

Right, we're all huge long-term fans since CNN and N days. My only feedback is you can't hear an acknowledgement of country. Well, they obviously don't listen to us because we do do an acknowledgement of country. We do now because someone write a review. Thank you for the feedback. Yes, of course we should have done that. Oh, is that why we've done it. That's why we've done it.

Someone pointed out to us that it was a thing that was worth doing. We were like, oh shit, yes it is. Yes. Five stars, good way to start the morning. There's some great guests. It's Jerry Kiran. See, this is nice. Listen just to hear Charles Firth's voice.

What's wrong with you? Thanks, Mum. A, Frankie 75. Best Uber ride ever says keep producing notes. I'm sorry. Good show, yeah, it's funny enough, says G484. All right. Less, more Gabby, less ads for paying customers.

Gabby's in Edinburgh. Well, we would have a Gabby, except she's too successful for us now. She just played a song on BBC Radio in Scotland, so we'll ever see her again. Yeah. Too many ads for trombones, says Gray as a 16. Sorry about that. And anyway, if you want to see Gabi, you should actually, uh, go to War on 2022, which is our national live show tour.

Gabby is coming along on tour with us at the end of the year, and you can go to chaser.com.com.com.com slash live and book tickets. We're 11 cities all around Australia. It's 11 cities. Gosh, you're ambitious people. All right. Our gears from road, we're part of the ACAR's credit network. And neither of us is a scientist.