Science Talk

Primatologist Frans de Waal discusses his latest book, Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? (Norton, 2016).   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mathematician and author Adam Kucharski talks about his new book The Perfect Bet: How Science and Math Are Taking the Luck Out of Gambling (Basic Books, 2016).   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If a socially prominent gorilla is in the midst of a meal, it may hum or sing to tell others nearby that it's busy at the moment and will get back to you later.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Scientific American's energy and environment editor, David Biello, met with Bill Gates on February 22 to discuss tackling carbon emissions while at the same time making necessary energy available to ever more of the globe’s growing population.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Scientific American editors Mark Fischetti, Dina Maron and Seth Fletcher talk about the info they picked up at the just-concluded annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington, D.C. Subjects covered include gravitational waves, whether there's really a war on science, the growing concern over Zika virus, sea level rise and advances in artificial intelligen...

Scientific American's Josh Fischman talks with renowned astrophysicist and general relativity expert Kip Thorne about the discovery of gravitational waves by the LIGO Project, co-founded by Thorne.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Freelance journalist Kevin Begos talks with archaeologist Aren Maeir, from Bar Ilan University in Israel, at his dig site in Gath, thought to be Goliath's hometown and a major city of the Philistine civilization.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The University of Cambridge's Piers Mitchell, author of the 2015 book Sanitation, Latrines and Intestinal Parasites in Past Populations, talks about the counterintuitive findings in his recent paper in the journal Parasitology titled "Human parasites in the Roman World: health consequences of conquering an empire."   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Evolutionary biologist Nicholas Matzke talks about the Kitzmiller v. Dover evolution trial on the 10th anniversary of the decision. He advised the plaintiffs while working for the National Center for Science Education. He also discusses the continuing post-Dover attempts to get creationist narratives taught in public school science classrooms.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm...

Ken Perlin, a New York University computer science professor and virtual reality pioneer, talks with Scientific American tech editor Larry Greenemeier about the state of virtual reality, its history and where it's heading   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Science journalist and equestrian Wendy Williams talks about her new book The Horse: The Epic History of Our Noble Companion   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Harvey Mudd College math professor Arthur Benjamin talks about his new book The Magic of Math: Solving for x and Figuring Out Why   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stephen Hoover, CEO of Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center, talks with Scientific American tech editor Larry Greenemeier about the revolution underway in machine learning, in which the machine eventually programs itself   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The 2015 Nobel Prize in Chemistry goes to Tomas Lindahl, Paul Modrich and Aziz Sancar for discoveries of the mechanisms by which cells maintain the integrity of their DNA sequences   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The 2015 Nobel Prize in Physics goes to Takaaki Kajita and Arthur B. McDonald for the discovery of neutrino oscillations, which shows that neutrinos have mass Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The 2015 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine goes to William C. Campbell and Satoshi Ōmura for their discoveries of a medication against roundworm parasites and to Youyou Tu for her discoveries concerning a novel therapy against malaria. Some 3.4 billion people are at risk for the diseases these drugs treat   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Medical researcher Richard Johnson, of the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, talks about his October Scientific American article "The Fat Gene," co-authored by anthropologist Peter Andrews of University College London and the Natural History Museum in London. Their piece is about how a genetic mutation in prehistoric apes may underlie today’s pandemic of obesity and diabetes   Learn...

Physicist and cosmologist Lawrence Krauss, director of the Origins Project at Arizona State University, talks about his article "What Einstein Got Wrong," in Scientific American’s September issue, devoted to the 100th anniversary of Einstein’s publication of general relativity   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jimmy Carter talks about his public health efforts to eradicate guinea worm and improve global mental health and women's health. Plus, magazine collector Steven Lomazow brings part of his collection to the Scientific American 170th birthday party   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Smith College sports economist Andrew Zimbalist talks about why the Olympics is almost always a big financial hardship for the host city, a subject he treats at length in his book Circus Maximus: The Economic Gamble behind Hosting the Olympics and the World Cup. Recorded at the Bergino Baseball Clubhouse in New York City   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stephen Hawking and entrepreneur and former physicist Yuri Milner announce a $100-million, 10-year initiative to look for signs of intelligent life in the cosmos Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stephen Hawking and entrepreneur and former physicist Yuri Milner announce a $100-million, 10-year initiative to look for signs of intelligent life in the cosmos   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At 8:52 P.M. Eastern time, July 14, 2015, an all's-well signal from the New Horizons spacecraft finished its 4.5-hour, three-billion-mile trip from near Pluto through the solar system to alert mission control on Earth that it was in working order and had succeeded in gathering data   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At just before 7:50 A.M. today, July 14, 2015, the New Horizons spacecraft made its closest approach to Pluto. After a 9.5-year, three-billion-mile voyage, the ship got within about 7,750 miles from the surface Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Norman Augustine, former CEO of Lockheed Martin and former undersecretary of the Army talks about the report he co-chaired for the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, "Restoring the Foundation: The Vital Role of Research in Preserving the American Dream"       Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices