A Little Bit Of Science

"Something happened in 2015," he says, "...it was then that many people on the internet became flat earth adherents." I don't mean to alarm you listener - you are, after all, a lover of science, a lover of sensible, well produced knowledge - but flat eartherism (or globular denialism, if you want to flip it around) is SO HOT RIGHT NOW. If there was a chart tracking weird anti-scientific beliefs,*...

Here in the Southern half of the universe it's coming up to spring - and you know what that means: lambs frolicking in meadows, teenagers frolicking in meadows, people with hay fever sneezing! To celebrate the oncoming season of the sneeze, we explore the world of pollen with ThatPollenGuy, Professor Simon Haberle - we talk ancient roadways, 3d printing, huge sneezes and excellent pollen collectio...

Back in the olden days we beard stroking eggheads used to sit around in our ivory towers, picking buttercups of wisdom, musing deep thoughts about the nature of the cosmos. Profound, but a little bit... useless. But that's all gone now! These days, we're creators of impact - making a difference to the world - changing lives for the better! Well, maybe. Or at least, we're trying to... So to help ma...

It's a jungle out there in the academic world... and stalking in the midst of that jungle is a threat - to knowledge, to trust, to our very lives! That's right, it's the PREDATOR! (Predatory journals that is). We explore! The Wholesome Show is Dr Rod Lamberts and Dr Will Grant, proudly brought to you by the Australian National Centre for the Public Awareness of Science! See omnystudio.com/listener...

Listener, we love selfies at The Wholesome Show - we've taken photos with every z grade celebrity we can get our hands on!... But I have to confess, I didn't know they were so dangerous... That's right, 10 times as many people die of selfies every year as die of shark attack! It's terrible, so to save you from a terrible selfie related death, we've explored... The Wholesome Show is Dr Rod Lamberts...

Imagine dancing through the forest, barefoot and fancy free. But shoeless, your foot lands... on a slug... and the slug squelches like jelly between your toes. Disgusted? Well it turns out, this is not only objectively gross, but it can make you more politically conservative! We explore the political psychology of disgust! The Wholesome Show is Dr Rod Lamberts and Dr Will Grant, proudly supported...

How's your yoga game listener? Do you have a pretty wicked warrior two? A solid downward dog? A blissful savasana? You may be pretty awesome... But could you hold your lotus pose UNTIL DEATH? That's right listener, this week we explore the Sokushinbutsu - Buddhist monks who took their asceticism to the point of death, even becoming mummified while STILL ALIVE... The Wholesome Show is Dr Rod Lamber...

In July 1518, Frau Troffea stepped out into the streets of Strasbourg and began to dance a fervent dance. She danced through the day - and through the night. In fact, she wouldn't stop dancing for somewhere between four and six days - and during that time 34 other people would join her. Over the course of the month, some 400 people would dance in the streets of Strasbourg. But this wasn't fun. The...

You can't go anywhere on the internet these days without someone launching something new on the blockchain - a new social network, a currency based on selfies, or a way to fund a trip to the moon! Is the blockchain the greatest new technology since podcasts? Or just the latest crazy snake oil to come out of the fevered imagination of the techno-mafia...? We explore! The Wholesome Show is Dr Rod La...

Should we be worried about the coming world of artificial intelligence? Some people (ie Will) worry about Skynet and doombots like Roko's Basilisk, but Professor Genevieve Bell from the Autonomy, Agency and Assurance Institute reckons there's far more concrete things here in the now that we should be paying attention to... The Wholesome Show is Dr Rod Lamberts and Dr Will Grant, proudly supported...

The phrase NUCLEAR RADIATION conjures up pretty fearful images these days - reactor meltdowns at Chernobyl and Fukushima, the dead of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the three-eyed fish of The Simpsons. But for a brief window in the 1950s a movement of people sought to harness the power of the atom not for weapons or energy - but for ever better... garden crops! We explore the Atomic Gardening Society...

Welcome to part 7 of Life in a Herd! In this series we're journeying with our picnicking epidemiologist upstream to find out who it is who's chucking the bodies of our modern world into the river. In this episode we wrap up - what does it all mean, what do we do from here? Enjoy! The Wholesome Show is Dr Rod Lamberts (@rodl) and Dr Will Grant (@willozap), proudly supported by the Australian Nation...

Welcome to part 6 of Life in a Herd! In this series we're journeying with our picnicking epidemiologist upstream to find out who it is who's chucking the bodies of our modern world into the river. In this episode we talk with Professor Don Nutbeam, Professor of Public Health at the University of Sydney. Enjoy! The Wholesome Show is Dr Rod Lamberts (@rodl) and Dr Will Grant (@willozap), proudly sup...

Welcome to part 5 of Life in a Herd! In this series we're journeying with our picnicking epidemiologist upstream to find out who it is who's chucking the bodies of our modern world into the river. In this episode we talk with Associate Professor Cynthia Webster, from the Department of Marketing and Management at Macquarie University. Enjoy! The Wholesome Show is Dr Rod Lamberts (@rodl) and Dr Will...

Welcome to part 4 of Life in a Herd! In this series we're journeying with our picnicking epidemiologist upstream to find out who it is who's chucking the bodies of our modern world into the river. In this episode we talk with Professor Sharon Friel, Professor of Health Equity at the School of Regulation and Global Governance (RegNet) at the Australian National University. Enjoy! The Wholesome Show...

Welcome to part 3 of Life in a Herd! In this series we're journeying with our picnicking epidemiologist upstream to find out who it is who's chucking the bodies of our modern world into the river. In this episode we talk with Summer May Finlay - Yorta Yorta woman, Croakey journalist, Cancer Institute consultant and Phd student at the University of South Australia. Enjoy! The Wholesome Show is Dr R...

Welcome to part 2 of Life in a Herd! In this series we're journeying with our picnicking epidemiologist upstream to find out who it is who's chucking the bodies of our modern world into the river. In this episode we talk with Professor Penny Hawe, from the Menzies Centre for Health Policy at the University of Sydney. Enjoy! The Wholesome Show is Dr Rod Lamberts (@rodl) and Dr Will Grant (@willozap...

Three doctors sat down for a picnic by a river. An emergency physician, an intensive care specialist, and an epidemiologist. Suddenly they notice a body in the water! They rush into the current to pull the man ashore, clear his airways and start giving CPR. But then they see another person in the water, face down. They rush out, and drag her in. They clear her airways and do CPR. But then a third...

Do you believe in the paranormal? In ghosts? In spoon bending? In the ability to move objects with your mind? If you're like most rational science minded folks, then - wait for this - I can read your mind and your answer is 'hell no!' But what if we told you that science itself... might not be so sure... We explore the world of extrasensory perception and the replication crisis! The Wholesome Show...

Do you experience a salty taste when your elbow touches things? Or the aroma of oysters when you listen to Brahms? If it's not hallucinogenic drugs, then it's probably synaesthesia! We sat down with Dr Stephanie Goodhew to explore all the different flavour and dimension combinations under the sun! The Wholesome Show is @rodl and @willozap, proudly supported by @ANU_CPAS! See omnystudio.com/listene...

Your phone rings. But instead of your normal ringtone*... it's a weird voice saying "The person calling you is dishonest! The person calling you is dishonest!" Welcome to the brave new world of China's rapidly developing Social Credit System - where trustworthy citizens earn points they can convert into free umbrella rental, and the untrustworthy find themselves blocked from flights, loans, houses...

Should your boss by you some trainers? Ruthless capitalists probably say no, but they're dickheads and wrong about a lot. Sensible people are starting realise more and more that the answer is probably yes - it'll make you healthier, and make their workplace more productive! We sat down for a workplace health and wellbeing inspection (not an audit) with the awesome Christine and Michael from Health...

Does a huge head correlate with intelligence? No listener, of course it doesn't! But people used to think that, and wanted to craft society on that basis... But here's the strange thing. While you might be thinking eugenics is just a historical topic, I hate to break it to you listener, there's still some folk out there who truly believe... Rod and Will sit down for a beer to explore! Also: We exp...

Simple question listener, but would you cut your arm off and add a totally awesome prosthetic snake arm thing instead? Because people are doing that now and that's ***totally radical***! Or a complicated ethical leap for society to take. You know, one of the two. We sat down for a beer with Professor Margrit Shildrick, Professor of Gender and Knowledge Production at Linkoping University, Sweden, t...

When I say the word 'hypervisibility', do you think of those awesome t-shirts in the 1980s that changed colour when you sweated? You probably should, but then you should also think of the problems faced by high profile women scientists and science communicators. They're hypervisible, which means trolls, attacks and threats... Kate Hannah of Te Pūnaha Matatini (which means 'The Meeting Place of Man...