SciShow Tangents - Introducing: SciShow Tangents

Episode Date: November 2, 2018

Introducing the lightly competitive knowledge showcase from the geniuses behind the YouTube series SciShow. Every Tuesday, join Hank Green, Ceri Riley, Stefan Chin, and Sam Schultz as they try to one-up and amaze each other with weird and funny scientific research... while not getting distracted. There will be tangents about video games, music, weird smells, surprisingly deep insights about life, and of course, poop, but it always comes back to the science.

From WNYC Studios and the team behind the YouTube series SciShow, it's SciShow Tangents. The new podcast where four friends try to outsmart and outwit each other, but usually just get excited about the awesome science we're learning about. I'm Hank Green, and I'm made of molecules. I'm Sari Reilly, and I'm definitely not a robot. I'm Stefan Chin, and I'm made of molecules. I'm Sari Reilly, and I'm definitely not a robot. I'm Stefan Chin, and I never skip leg day. And I'm Sam Schultz, the Chris Kirkpatrick of science podcasting. The who? Chris Kirkpatrick from NSYNC. He was the bad boy. Every Tuesday, we tackle a new topic from amphibians to satellites. And we compete for who has found the

coolest, weirdest, funniest scientific research on that topic. Like how all the poop astronauts left on the moon is legally the property of the U.S. government. But we start each podcast with a traditional science poem. Go for it, Hank. This is a poem about my general experience playing Kerbal Space Program. The engines on her rocket were lit. I instructed her booster to floor it, but then my mom called and I didn't press pause. She ran out of fuel in her orbit. Orbital mechanics give me the panics whenever I play KSP. My rescue sped faster, but then flew right past her, a satellite she always will be. That's so sad.

All right, but what if all those rockets collided and became a bunch of space garbage? Do those count as satellites? Or like if a spacecraft dumps out all its pee and it freezes into tiny ice crystals? What? I mean, the pee would probably vaporize like right after that instead of snowballing into a big gross comet thing. So there's no way that would be a satellite, right? Yeah, I don't think that would be a satellite. But we can see astronaut waste when it's dumped out.

It kind of looks like a shooting star. Beautiful. Anyway, we also make each other find the true fact in a web of lies. Okay, which one of these facts about the Russian space station Mir is true? Number one, Mir was riddled with giant free-floating hairballs

that jammed vital systems. What? Wait. Okay. Gross. You keep going. Number two, Mir launched and tested a giant mirror that redirected the sun's light to combat the long Russian winters. Number three, Mir smelled like caramel popcorn and no one could figure out why.

I mean, considering what I imagine space to smell like, that sounds great. I'm also dubious about hairballs. So maybe if someone like lost a hair clump, you could collect it. It wouldn't be an immediate crisis. Right. The popcorn smell sounds interesting. It was number two, the space mirror. Plus, we take the massive amount of scientific knowledge in the room and use it to answer some listener questions. I can tell you how gene editing really works down to the specific enzymes. I can tell you why ostrich phalluses are a lot like Hot Wheels tracks.

And I know just enough about a lot of things to get me into trouble. All excellent opportunities for tangents. But hey, this podcast isn't all about science. Everything is science. And if you want to learn about everything with us, listen to our lightly competitive new podcast, It's SciShow Tangents, premiering November 13th. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

But one more thing. Stick around until the very end of each episode for a butt fact. Trust me, it's worth it.