Ask a Spaceman!

What makes the principle of least action so important? Who came up with it? Is it all just a bunch of math or does it actually mean something? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books  ...

What is a pulsar? How can we use them to map gravitational waves? What kind of technology does it take? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep those questions about space, scien...

What are some of the problems with dark matter? What about modified gravity? Are there any other solutions? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep those questions about space, s...

How big can a rocky planet get? Can a rocky planet turn into a gas giant? Why are some planets rocky and others gassy? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep those questions abo...

How do giant black holes shut off star formation? How do they turn it back on? Which came first, the black hole or the galaxy? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep those quest...

How did gravity get so ridiculously weak? Could it be related to extra dimensions? What does string theory and the concept of the "bulk" have to do with it? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutte...

What is the dipole repeller? Why is it a dipole? What is it repelling? What is the Bootes Void and how is it connected to dark energy? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep tho...

What does everybody think is the twin paradox? What's the REAL twin paradox? How is the paradox resolved, and what does it teach us about synchronicity? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.co...

How was radioactive decay discovered? What are the different kinds of decay? How does quantum mechanics make all this happen? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep those questi...

What makes the Big Bang theory so successful? How were alternatives ruled out? What are the electric universe and steady state theories? Do any other options remain, like conformal cyclic cosmology? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/Pa...

Why are Lagrange points so crucial to astronomy? What makes even simple gravity so difficult? How do you "put" something at a Lagrange point? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   K...

What is the fine structure constant? Where does it come from? Why is it so important? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep those questions about space, science, astronomy, ast...

Why do we care about loop quantum gravity? Is it a viable path to uniting quantum mechanics and general relativity? What does it mean for spacetime to be discrete? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www....

How are globular clusters so old? Where did they come from, and how are they linked to galaxy formation? What makes them so globular, anyway? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   K...

What is the simulation hypothesis? Is it just pseudoscience? How do we grapple with its implications? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep those questions about space, science...

Where did 'Oumuamua come from? What is it made of, and how did it end up here? Is it really an artifact of an alien civilization? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep those qu...

What missions will come after the James Webb Space Telescope launches? What new discoveries await us? How long will they take to start? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep th...

How do giant planets make diamond rain? Does it really, you know, rain? Where does diamond rain exist? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep those questions about space, scienc...

What is a vacuum, and what makes a false one? What happened in the early universe to bring about our current physics? Will it happen again? If so, when? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.co...

What are the different kinds of gamma ray bursts? What powers them? What do we still have to understand about them? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books   Keep those questions about...

Is there more to say about the "crisis in cosmology"? What are the fundamental disagreements? Is there any way out of this mess? Why am I talking about it again? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pm...

What kind of signals are we searching for from aliens? What are technosignatures and biosignatures? How are we looking for non-intelligent life? Is there any hope of finding life in our own solar system? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.c...

Why is James Clerk Maxwell so dang awesome? How was he able to unify the forces of electricity and magnetism? Why was his work so revolutionary? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.com/books...

Part 2 of 2! How did the observation of a kilonova change astronomy? How did that one observation kill off alternate models of gravity? What's in store for the future of gravitational waves? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutte...

Part 1! What are gravitational waves? What makes them? How can we detect them here on Earth, and why is it a big deal? I discuss these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman! Audio Credit: Caltech/MIT/LIGO Lab Support the show:  http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter All episodes:  http://www. AskASpaceman.com Watch on YouTube:  http://www.youtube.com/PaulMSutter Read a book: https://www.pmsutter.c...