Facts Machine

Hi everyone!! COMING SOON: new episodes, new guests, new facts, same old puns! For now, please enjoy this episode of all the stuff that was too weird to put in a normal episode.

🎶We don't think you're ready for these jellies🎶 We are joined by evolutionary biologist, venomologist, and jellyfish expert Anna Klompen for an episode all about venom! Listen for evolutionary arms races, snails that cure cancer, and jellyfish sneezes.

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In this episode, we're joined by science journalist Marion Renault to swap facts on "uncharisma" in nature. Tune in for facts about the (wrongfully) over-looked and (superficially) unappealing organisms that keep our ecosystems and even our lives running smoothly. By the end, you'll be convinced these critters really *are* more than meets the eye--even the maggots! (Though in their case it may be...

*Editor’s note: We had some catastrophic audio failures in this one, especially during the quiz. We were remotely recording early in the pandemic, and just about everything went wrong. Nonetheless, we hope you’ll enjoy the episode despite the sounds of the birds and cars, the echoes we couldn’t eliminate, and the fact that Noah’s whole quiz had to be pieces together from super compressed zoom audi...

Everybody knows that old joke, "What did the astrophysicist say to the folklorist? We are the same person..." Maybe it's funnier in the original Icelandic? To find out, we sought the only person we know who fits that description, Moiya McTier! Join Noah, Em, Rob, and Moiya as we discuss Erik the Well-Read, why Lucifer is definitely not from Iceland, and the power of a new pair of skin-pants! Bonus...

Abandon hope, all ye who *ento* here! It's a broadly entomological arthropod-cast about bugs! In this episode, which we live-streamed on Caveat's YouTube page, we welcome comedian, writer, and legendary pun queen Sam Corbin to discuss bees with "daddy tissues", artisanal stings, and the worst kind of jelly donut.

Paradigms, they are a-changin’ in this week’s episode of Facts Machine! We’re joined by friend of the pod and scicomedian extraordinaire Dr. André Pineda , PhD, a neuroscientist, science communicator, and show runner at our home venue Caveat who leverages laughs to share science. Join us as we talk Al-Haytham “going turbo” while Europe was in a dark age, evolution by “naturalist selection”, and re...

 H2OMG! This episode’s all about the universal solvent, 60% of the human body, and (when it’s feelin’ fancy) dihydrogen monoxide. We’re joined by long time friend of the pod and first time guest of the pod Dr. Jessica Noviello , a planetary geologist, science communicator, and avowed dinosaur enthusiast currently studying the Kuiper Belt Object EL61 Haumea in her post-doctoral research. Tune...

 

 This week Noah spills his guts in the finale of our three part anatomy quiz series! Guess along as Rob and Em try to distinguish real and made-up medical terminology and encounter fruity maladies and ambiguous pouches along the way.

Make no bones about it, in this second of three special anatomical quiz episodes, Rob tests Emily's and Noah's knowledge of his favorite organ, bones! 

Don't hate, ventilate! In this first of three special anatomical quiz episodes, Emily tests Noah's and Rob's knowledge of her favorite organ, the lungs! Somehow, they end up debating the merits of different kinds of turtle bums. How? Who knows.

 Facts Machine returns with an episode all about etymologies. Join us as we dig deep to discover our favorite word origins, root and stem! #protologism

 

We're taking a break for a few weeks while we work on some *big plans*! In the meantime enjoy this episode of our unaired failures and musical interludes.

At long last, the Facts Machine episode theme you've all been waiting for -- Donkeys! Our equine friends have an incredible history, from being worshipped by medieval Catholics, causing Stoic philosophers to die laughing in ancient Greece, and carrying the comedic weight for writers from antiquity to the present day. Also it's fun to say "ass".

 In this episode, we talk male show-vinism, tell the incredible story of an Irish pirate queen, and find out what female mice really want.

This is a podcast about Pythagoras and beans, Oklahoma and the truth, and Princess Alice and her pet Spinach. Everything you think is a vegetable is a fruit. Ben Franklin has a plan for your farts.

Don't you just hate it when people only want to talk about how you discovered universal gravitation, but not about your passion project, making proportionately-sized doors for cats? Or when the press loves how you revolutionized the automobile industry by mass producing affordable cars but not how you tried to make them out of soy beans? Or how no matter how many times you explain that you discove...

Emily, Rob, and Noah went to Science Friday’s science trivia night, and they won! They also learned some interesting facts that they have brought back to share with you in this episode. Listen to find out why you shouldn’t cast your margaritas before swine, how to distinguish between a blue whale and a Soviet submarine, and whether the aurora borealis thinks you are worthy of applause.

When Facts Machine does an episode about sports, somehow you leave with more information about the mysteriously accurate predictions of 19th century authors, the ability to pinpoint the true origin of referred pain in the tip of your right shoulder blade, and possibly the first viral marketing campaign than you do about sports themselves. Play ball!

Live at Caveat in NYC, Noah, Emily, and Rob head back to class with their first ever guest host, chemistry teacher extraordinaire Rich Fisler! In this episode, the facts are elementary, the laughs are periodic, and discussion of fewer puns was tabled.