Dr. Kiki: This is Twis. This Week in Science episode number 653 recorded on Wednesday, January 10th, 2018. The 2018 prediction show.
Hey, everyone, I’m Dr. Kiki and tonight, on This Week in Science, we are going to fill your heads with predictions from last year, predictions for this year and yeah, actually, some science news. But first, TWIS is supported by listeners like you. We thank you for your support. We really couldn’t do it without you.
Justin: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!
Those who can not remember the past, it has been said, are condemned to repeat it. As if the past were only a thing to avoid. Many good things have come from the past. Every good thing, in fact, has its origins in the past. Much of it worth repeating. So, it’s just as well to point out, those who don’t remember the past will have a hard time replicating the positive results that they’ve received at some point before.
Justin: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer! It’s a new day, a new year and a new decade. A time of resolutions and commitments to a better you in the future to come. With all of the things real or invented that we worry about in the course of making our way through a day, this year, let’s agree together – that the best way in which we can improve ourselves is to create a balance between the need for survival and the act of enjoying our lives.
Let us dedicate the coming year to doing those things that bring us joy, pleasure and peace of mind. While the Epicurean philosophy of tempered enjoyment much like the following hour of programming does not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors, we hope that you enjoy your time with the conversations to come on This Week in Science. Coming up next.
Synopsis: Climate Change Denial, Microbes in the Sea fixing nitrogen, Microbes in your Gut need pro biotics to replenish, The Weird From Washington, TV Sadness, Bleach Works, Wide-Hipped Women, Anti-Matter Xplosion, and Rocky CO2.
Justin: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!
What can be said that has not been said before? Quite a bit, actually. From dark matter, global warming, microbiology to neurons, nanotech and sociological peculiarities – a newly learned landscape adds a new lingo to the literate lexicon that has yet to be made fully lucid by poet pens or baby naming trends. The list of things to say that have not been said before is growing at a pace only comparable to the expansion of time and space itself.
And while this conversation condenses briefly into the following hour of our programming, it does not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors. Rather, it represent in some small way how little we have known in the past, how much we know at present and hints to us through many tantalizing examples the vast buried treasure of what still remains unknown.
So, what can be said that has not been said before? Just about everything you’re about to hear on This Week in Science, coming up next.
Synopsis: Skinny Monkey with less calorie intake live longer? Bacterial Bloat, Flower Power burst confounds Darwin, When Good Words Go Bad, World Robot Domination–crickets, bats, Bad Words Done Good, and Interview w/ Chris Mooney, author of Unscientific America
Justin: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!
Science! The act of learning by a careful observation that often starts fast in a question, a “how”, a “what”, a “why”, sort of a thing is followed up then by experiment, observation. This is the basis of the whole scientific set up, observing, testing, observing some more and then learning from it.
We have taken the simple act of looking at things to a wide-range of amazing places in recent years. Making observations of everything from spinning electrons to orbiting planets and distant stars, from the double Helix to galaxy clusters, billions of light years away from our Earthly observatory.
And between the gathering of the stars, we humans plot these points of interests, seek out more and even create new ones ourselves. The picture that is forming is actually quite stunning, both in what it reveals and in our ability to reveal it.
If the human may be allowed a narcissistic moment to lavish phrase upon humanity itself, I think we’re doing a really good job. And while spinning clusters of observant narcissistic humans, much like the following hour of our programming, do not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors.
We can all take pride knowing that, of all the life forms on planet Earth, it is we humans who have contributed the most to scientific knowledge. We are so well adapted to learning new things that at times it seems, we just can’t get enough. Even now, even this very moment, we are eager to perform the act of observing as we turn our attentions to another episode of, This Week In Science, coming up next. Continue reading “Transcript-TWIS.ORG July 14, 2009”
Synopsis: Special Evolutionary Episode! The Debate Rages Between Justin and Kirsten (Or, Was It Lamarck and Darwin?), Refereed By Dr. Tim Coulson and His Shrinking Sheep
Justin: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!
What we hold in our minds to be the world is an illusion, constructed out of observation and often crafted by our parents, teachers, friends, and in the current age by media full of messages. Our personal illusion of the world is always filtered through some combination of these influences.
One of the wonderful things about science is that it is the only motive thinking that seeks to ignore that personal world to reject our illusions and force the mind to look at information each time as if the real world were brand new and in need of introduction.
This way of saying without assumption of knowing can make visible in a glance that which would have remained invisible to the filtered eye — a glance of Hubble’s data plot revealing an expanding universe; a glance like Fleming’s bacterial dish ushering in the age of antibiotics, a glance that patterns across a flickering screen signaling that a cosmic discovery; a genetic breakthrough or needed cure is on the way, one step closer or at least within our reach.
And while the world without science remains illusionary at best, it like the following hour of our programming still does not represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors.
Yet, we will continue with wide-eyed introductions to reality, continue glancing over steady strings of data that flows past our radio vision seeking that data plot that oddly dotted dish, that flickering signal from an illusion free world of This Week in Science, coming up next. Continue reading “Transcript-TWIS.ORG July 7, 2009”
What you’re about to encounter over the next hour is an elimination of information. You will hear tales of current discoveries in science. These implications will then be pondered aloud in what may appear to be an effort to add endless amounts of information to your brain.
But do not be fooled, dear Minions, science is a reductive art. Boiling off extreme news info, laser focusing beams of investigative interest spinning the center fuse of potential inferences until only the applicable data points remain — reducing reality to its most basic definitions so that it can be transmuted into useful knowledge, devoid of uninformed observation and human illusions.
And while boiling laser focused alchemist, much like the following hour of our programming, does not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors when all information not worth knowing can be eliminated, what is left can be called fact, can be construed to scientific truth, can be viewed in context to the role of plays within the unfiltered, uninformed extreme misinformation world of human illusions. Only then can it be discussed here on This Week in Science, coming up next. Continue reading “Transcript: TWIS.ORG June 9, 2009”
I think I can. I think I can. I think I can. The mortal words of the anthropomorphic little engine that did while face the seemingly undoable task of scaling a steep mountain grade. Much like the little engine, bound to travel the rails laid before it, science too has little choice but to take head on the obstacles and its path.
There are less treacherous tasks to tackle in life than those of astrophysics quantum unification and autoimmune disease. There are much smaller mountains to master than those of global climate, cancer or the multitude of mental afflictions that assault the human line.
And just like the moralistic little engine tail, it is the belief that anything can be accomplished through persistent thinking and doing that science ultimately makes a grade.
And while making the moralistic mental grade, much like the following hour of our programming, does not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors, the plain old fashion pluckiness of science continues to push us to new heights chugging away with pistons of persistent PhDs patiently plodding out data proofs like pops of smoke from the stack of a story book steam engine.
“I think I can” unify all forces under one theory. I think I can cure cancer. I think I can put a man on Mars. And while the plucky mountain climb continues, other trains are just now returning to the station here on This Week in Science, coming up next. Continue reading “Transcript: TWIS.ORG April 14, 2009”
While the following hour of our programming is not intended to be offensive, if you feel yourself in any way provoked, you should be provoked into thinking not to anger.
The content is for mature audiences. Though, by mature audiences, we mean to include five-year olds with the love and interest in science. The show itself well about science and employing scientific means to get science-y news to your ears, does not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors.
And though the world is strange enough as it is, each week here we seem to discover that it can stranger still. “What can be stranger than ants raised by butterflies or see-through frogs?” One might ask. The answers await us in This Week in Science, coming up next.
Good morning, Kirsten!
Kirsten: Oh, great morning.
Justin: Yeah.
Kirsten: Do you know what today is?
Justin: Tuesday, right?
Kirsten: Besides that, what’s the date today?
Justin: No idea.
Kirsten: Today is the third month – the third day of the third month of the ninth year of 2000, whatever.
Justin: What? You’re – now what?
Kirsten: And I’m rambling. No I’m not. Today is Square Root Day.
Kirsten:: That was an interesting one Justin, good morning.
Justin: I’ve got a cold. Something and I could…
Kirsten:: You do?
Justin: Yes, which is a perfect opportunity for me to do an entire show as Krusty the clown.
Kirsten:: Oh, I think we can do without Krusty the Clown this morning.
Justin: No?
Kirsten:: Krusty’s one of – I don’t know. I have a soft spot in my heart for Krusty but, he’s a little bit annoying. There’s obnoxiousness going on.
Justin: I’ve heard that now.
Kirsten:: I’ve heard that before.
Welcome to This Week in Science. It’s a bit after 8:30 in the morning on Tuesday, December 4th. It’s Kirsten: and Justin here and we are going to be with you for the next hour talking all about science news. What else is new in it? Continue reading “Transcript: TWIS.org Dec 04, 2008”
Dr. Kiki: This is Twis. This Week in Science episode number 653 recorded on Wednesday, January 10th, 2018. The 2018 prediction show.