Solutions From The Multiverse

Send us Fan Mail Welcome, listeners, to an episode that bursts with wild ideas, insightful discussions, and creative thinking. Today, we're exploring the unexpected, from the adrenaline-fueled thrill of rage rooms to honking horns in Delhi, and their innovative solution. We dive headfirst into a birthday party in a rage room, equipped with sledgehammers, crowbars, and artifacts ready for dest...

Send us Fan Mail Imagine a world without sushi or vanilla ice cream. Harrowing, isn't it? This week, we're exploring the ramifications of climate change on our favorite foods, and the conversation gets as juicy as a prime cut of Brazilian steakhouse beef. From the idea of climate calming to the concept of a Rube Goldberg machine, we're serving up a discussion as diverse as an intern...

Send us Fan Mail Ready to get your mind buzzing with the electrifying possibilities of fusion energy? This episode is exactly what you need. We pull back the curtain on this enigmatic power source, exploring why it’s been elusive for decades and how AI might pave the way for its development. You'll learn about the parallels between the urgency of the Manhattan Project and today's quest f...

Send us Fan Mail Feeling overwhelmed by the world's biggest issues and struggling to see how your individual actions can make a meaningful difference? Let's shake up your perspective. In our latest episode, we dip our toes into the turbulent yet intriguing waters of general strikes, drawing parallels with historical game-changers like the invention of chain mail and the anatomists defyin...

Send us Fan Mail There is a build-up of small solutions, each one too short for its own episode. So here they are rapid-fire style. The last one is a doozy! What's your favorite?  Support the show Help these new solutions spread by ... Subscribing wherever you listen to podcasts Leaving a 5-star review   Sharing your favorite solution with your friends and network (this makes a BIG difference...

Send us Fan Mail It is SFM's 1 year anniversary! 🎉🎊🍾🥳 In this episode, Scot and Braus celebrate and reminisce on the past year of presenting new and unheard-of solutions to all of you. Thanks for your support. Enjoy! Support the show Help these new solutions spread by ... Subscribing wherever you listen to podcasts Leaving a 5-star review   Sharing your favorite solution with your friends...

Send us Fan Mail You probably know that buying local is good to do, but what if there were a full theory of economic development based on the idea? There is a near-universal consensus that countries should do the opposite of buying local—the theory of "export-oriented development" says countries should maximize their exports and then import everything they need from elsewhere. But this c...

Send us Fan Mail Enjoy this sprawling episode in which Braus and Scot discuss a bunch of different solutions, the biggest one being how cremation, like everything else, has to ditch natural gas in favor of a low-carbon alternative. 🌎  In the second half, our hosts debate cremation vs. burial and celebrity vs. being historical.  Enjoy! Support the show Help these new solutions spread by ... Subscr...

Send us Fan Mail Slavery... sucks. And it wasn't "abolished" with the civil war. " 49.6 million people live in modern slavery – in forced labour and forced marriage." (Antislavery.org) One form of modern human bondage is human trafficking in the sex trade. In this episode, Braus and Scot bring their solutions and humor (respectively) into this serious topic. Braus proposes...

Send us Fan Mail **Click and Clack here on Car Talk ** We've been pretty car-phobic on SFM so far, so in this sprawling and goofy episode, Scot and Braus reverse that trend and consider some car solutions that you will likely not expect. No flying cars here! Most of the episode focuses on the right to die with dignity and how cars, oddly, could be part of the solution to that massive and grow...

Send us Fan Mail Happy 4th of July! 🦅💥🇺🇸 Come to think of it, do you really live in a democracy if you spend 95% of your time lorded over by our bosses and CEOs? No! So how could we have more democracy at work? Today Braus proposes a new designation of "democratic corporations". These corporations would continue to pay the rock-bottom low corporate tax rate of 21% (lowered from 35% in...

Send us Fan Mail Unpleasant Biological Fact: Men can start families almost any time in their lives,  while women can only do so reliably before roughly the age of 40. So, what would it mean for women and the movement for women's liberation if we deliberately designed society to launch young people sooner? In today's solution, Braus proposes using recent advancements in evidence-based edu...

Send us Fan Mail If we support democracy, we've got to support and promote voting. But get-out-the-vote (or GOTV) promotions are often lackluster doorknob hangers or cringe advertising promotions by celebrities like Vote or Die or Rock the Vote. What else could we do to promote folks going out to vote? In today's solution, Braus proposes voting sweepstakes. If you vote, that enters you t...

Send us Fan Mail What would solve all of our social ills? Unlimited energy from cold fusion? A benevolent general artificial intelligence? The arrival of angels and the rapture? Those would be great, but in this solution, Braus will propose something simpler: protected bike lanes. Today most people won't bike in a big city because it is (or feels) too dangerous. By making biking save, the pro...

Send us Fan Mail Morality is a mess.  The stakes for being good and virtuous are the highest they have been in over 100 years. Depending on who you ask, if you make the wrong decisions today, you could contribute to destroying the earth, bring about the end of democracy, or go straight to hell. And, no matter who you ask, saying or doing what others consider inappropriate or evil could get you can...

Send us Fan Mail Each week a new solution. This week is not so much a new solution as an application of a hot new idea to an old practice. With abortion and LGBTQ+ issues in the news every day in these times, many folks resort to the concept of bodily autonomy to (rightly) defend the rights of grown adults (and some teens with the help of their parents) to make decisions about their own bodies. Bu...

Send us Fan Mail On January 6th the United States experienced something very close to a coup. So this next election, where Donald Trump will run again and likely fight the results again, the people have prepared. The forces of democracy (left and right) in our country have banded together and started a 14-point, nationwide plan to prevent election fraud and any potential coup. NOT! In fact, precio...

Send us Fan Mail Disclaimer: This solution is not science or representing data or research, it is just a hunch based on a scientific rationale. Men's sperm counts have dropped off significantly in the last few decades in the United States. And no one knows why exactly.  No one has discussed one possible answer: memory foam mattresses! The introduction of memory foam mattresses to American bed...

Send us Fan Mail Lust, Greed, Pride, Envy, Sloth, Gluttony, Wrath The seven deadly sins are a neat sort of concept. They are the "major vices." Perhaps because they are diabolical they are easier to remember than the cardinal virtues: Justice, Prudence, Temperance, and Fortitude. But the list is a bit old school no?  In today's solution, Braus proposes that we should have an updated...

Send us Fan Mail For the first time in hundreds of years, the average life expectancy in the US went down the past few years. That ought to freak you out. So what can we do about it. At the same time, some folks are starting to think there should be a sort of upper-age limit to public service. After all, there are age limits for entering public service (25 for congress, 30 for senate, 35 for presi...

Send us Fan Mail Kansas City has done a neat thing. They've made all public transportation free as of 2019. In 2023, BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) is about to spend millions installing new turnstiles—what if instead they just took the turnstiles out? You still can't get a transfer between BART and MUNI (trains and buses)—what if instead of making the payment systems interoperable (which...

Send us Fan Mail College ball is a multi-billion dollar industry, and while the coaches are paid millions, the players (often people of color) are given nothing but a scholarship to attend college. Only a small fraction of those players end up in the NBA.  In this Braus proposes a way to pay college basketball players by taking a page from the book of the economist Thomas Piketty who proposed fixi...

Send us Fan Mail In this controversial (and dare we say 🍌🍌🍌) episode, Braus pushes the limit of political activism. Believe it or not, anyone in the world can volunteer their time to help an American political campaign (click here to read the rules from the Federal Elections Commission: https://www.fec.gov/updates/foreign-nationals/ ). This means that if you are an international person, perhaps...

Send us Fan Mail Most classrooms are based on lectures, worksheets, textbooks, and exams. But what if instead, learning was built around interesting real-world projects? While "project-based learning" is usually limited to college and above, our guest today (a founder of a new college in Berlin!) will suggest that even first graders ought to start learning through projects. What projects...

Send us Fan Mail In this light-hearted episode, Braus and Scot flex their nerd muscles discussing a potential new fantasy VR game. Who doesn't want to be a wizard or a witch? Who hasn't been enchanted by the spells of mages and sorcerers like Gandolf or Dumbledore? Existing VR magic games are simple "press A to shoot fireball" sorts of games. In the new "Mage Simulator&quo...