Ep. 443: Destroy and Rebuild Pt. 7: Tsunamis
Surf’s up! Today we’re going to be talking about one of the most devastating natural disasters out there: tsunamis. We’re talking huge waves that wreck the seashore. But it turns out, there many ways you can get a tsunami, and one of those has to do with space.
Ep. 442: Destroy and Rebuild Pt. 6: Magnetic Pole Reversal
If we look back into the geologic record of the Earth, it appears that our planet’s magnetic field flips polarity every few hundred thousand years or so. Why does this happen? When’s it supposed to happen next? Is it dangerous?
Ep. 441: Destroy and Rebuild, Pt. 5: Continental Drift
Want to travel the world but you don’t have a lot of money? No problem, your continent is drifting across the surface of the Earth right now. In a few million years, you’ll reach your destination.
Ep. 440: Destroy and Rebuild, Pt. 4: Supervolcanoes!
There are regular volcanoes, and then there are the super-volcanoes. Massive calderas of hot magma of incomprehensible size. Bad news, these things explode randomly and catastrophically. Worse news, there are a bunch around the Earth.
Ep. 439: Destroy and Rebuild, Pt. 3: How Do We Terraform Earth?
We always want to talk about how we can make Mars more Earth like, but the reality is that we’re making Earth more Venus-Like. We’re Venus-forming Earth. What are the various factors we’re impacting on a global scale, and how can we fix them?
Ep. 438: Destroy and Rebuild, Pt. 2: Geoengineering
We know humans are having an impact on planet Earth, but what if we really put our backs into it, and intentionally tried to change the entire planet? Either to make it better, or to fix some terrible mistake we’ve made. The technique is called geoengineering. Could it work?
Ep. 437: Destroy and Rebuild, Pt. 1: The Torino Scale
We love to destroy the universe, and also rebuild it. Today we begin a new series where we destroy and rebuild. Let’s talk about some existential threats we face, and ways we could recover, starting with the sword of Damocles hanging over our head: killer asteroids!
Ep. 436: Common Misconceptions in Probability
Human beings are bad at many things, but we’re particularly terrible at understanding probability in a rational way. We underestimate, overestimate and generally mess up probability. We’ll try to fix it here, but we’ll surely fail.
Ep. 435: The Butterfly Effect
Small changes can have a big impact. But can a butterfly’s wing-beat in the Amazon really impact the weather halfway across the world? And where do small changes have no impact?
Ep. 434: Am I On An Alien World?
Once again, science fiction television and movies has let you down. They try to recreate what it might be like on an alien world, but surprise surprise, they mostly get it wrong. That’s because a truly alien world would be different in so many ways, it would blow your mind. Today we’ll help you figure out if you’re on a movie set, or you’ve actually crash-landed on an alien planet.