00:00:00 --> 00:00:02 Stuart Gary: This is space Time Series 28, episode
00:00:02 --> 00:00:05 69, for broadcast on the 9th of June,
00:00:05 --> 00:00:08 2025. Coming up on Space Time,
00:00:08 --> 00:00:11 doubt cast on the impending galactic collision between the
00:00:11 --> 00:00:14 Milky Way and Andromeda. A new study
00:00:14 --> 00:00:16 explains why seismic waves suddenly
00:00:16 --> 00:00:19 accelerate deep inside the Earth. And
00:00:19 --> 00:00:22 the new technique discovers five new
00:00:22 --> 00:00:25 embryonic planets. All that and more coming
00:00:25 --> 00:00:26 up on, Space Time.
00:00:27 --> 00:00:30 Voice Over Guy: Welcome to Space Time with Stuart Gary
00:00:47 --> 00:00:50 Stuart Gary: A new study is casting doubt on the timing of the
00:00:50 --> 00:00:52 long expected collision between the Milky Way and the
00:00:52 --> 00:00:55 Andromeda Galaxy, M M31. The
00:00:55 --> 00:00:58 findings, reported in the journal Nature Astronomy, are based
00:00:58 --> 00:01:01 on new data from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and
00:01:01 --> 00:01:04 the European Space Agency's Gaia Space spacecraft.
00:01:04 --> 00:01:07 Astronomers have used the new observations to create fresh
00:01:07 --> 00:01:10 computer simulations showing how these two large
00:01:10 --> 00:01:13 galaxies will evolve over the next 10 billion
00:01:13 --> 00:01:16 years. The two galaxies, which are the largest
00:01:16 --> 00:01:19 in the Local Galactic Group, are currently located some 2
00:01:19 --> 00:01:21 million light years away from each other and are moving
00:01:21 --> 00:01:24 towards a merger at a speed of about 100 kilometers
00:01:24 --> 00:01:27 per second. A collision would be devastating
00:01:27 --> 00:01:30 for the overall structure of both, spiral galaxies.
00:01:30 --> 00:01:33 Although the stars themselves wouldn't collide, there's plenty of space
00:01:33 --> 00:01:36 between them. The beautiful spiral arms of the galaxies
00:01:36 --> 00:01:39 as a whole would cease to exist, replaced by a
00:01:39 --> 00:01:42 spheroidal pile of stars known as an elliptical
00:01:42 --> 00:01:44 galaxy. The authors of the new study ran
00:01:44 --> 00:01:47 100 simulations of both galaxies based
00:01:47 --> 00:01:50 on the new observational data. And for the first
00:01:50 --> 00:01:53 time, this included the effects of the Milky Way's most
00:01:53 --> 00:01:56 massive satellite galaxy, the Large Magellanic
00:01:56 --> 00:01:58 Cloud. As a result, they found only a
00:01:58 --> 00:02:01 2% probability that the galaxies will collide
00:02:01 --> 00:02:04 sometime over the next 3.7 to 5 billion
00:02:04 --> 00:02:06 years. That's contrary to the previous belief
00:02:06 --> 00:02:09 that a galactic collision and the demise of the Milky Way as
00:02:09 --> 00:02:12 an independent body was a certainty within that
00:02:12 --> 00:02:15 time frame. In just over half of the simulated
00:02:15 --> 00:02:18 scenarios, the Milky Way and Andromeda experience at least one
00:02:18 --> 00:02:21 close encounter before they lose enough orbital energy to
00:02:21 --> 00:02:23 eventually collide and merge. But that's now
00:02:23 --> 00:02:26 likely to happen somewhere between 8 and 10 billion years
00:02:26 --> 00:02:29 from now. And on that timescale, our sun
00:02:29 --> 00:02:32 will have already dropped off the main sequence, having fused all
00:02:32 --> 00:02:35 its hydrogen core into helium, expanded out to become a
00:02:35 --> 00:02:38 red giant, puffed off its outer layers, and ended
00:02:38 --> 00:02:41 up as a white dwarf. Now, in most of
00:02:41 --> 00:02:44 the computer simulation scenarios about the galactic collision
00:02:44 --> 00:02:47 between Andromeda and the Milky Way, it seems they'll pass at
00:02:47 --> 00:02:49 such large distances from each other that they'll continue to
00:02:49 --> 00:02:52 evolve large, largely unperturbed, for a very
00:02:52 --> 00:02:55 long period of time. Although the new research
00:02:55 --> 00:02:58 challenges the previously accepted fate of the Milky Way, the
00:02:58 --> 00:03:01 study's authors admit it's still difficult to make very precise
00:03:01 --> 00:03:04 predictions. The study's lead author, Till Sawala
00:03:04 --> 00:03:07 from the University of Helsinki, emphasized that the new
00:03:07 --> 00:03:10 conclusions don't imply a mistake in early calculations,
00:03:10 --> 00:03:13 rather that the authors are able to include more variables within
00:03:13 --> 00:03:15 their simulations. Earlier calculations
00:03:15 --> 00:03:18 focused on the interaction between the Milky Way, Andromeda,
00:03:18 --> 00:03:21 and a third galaxy, the Triangulum. They're the three
00:03:21 --> 00:03:24 largest members of our Local Galactic Group.
00:03:24 --> 00:03:27 Although the Large Magellanic Cloud only has about 15%
00:03:27 --> 00:03:30 the mass of the Milky Way, its gravitational pull,
00:03:30 --> 00:03:32 directed perpendicular to the orbit of Andromeda
00:03:32 --> 00:03:35 nevertheless would perturb the Milky Way's motion
00:03:35 --> 00:03:38 sufficiently to significantly reduce the chance of a merger
00:03:38 --> 00:03:41 with Andromeda, Zwalla says. While
00:03:41 --> 00:03:43 earlier studies only considered the most likely value for
00:03:43 --> 00:03:46 each variable, running many thousands of simulations has
00:03:46 --> 00:03:49 allowed the authors to account for all the observable uncertainties.
00:03:50 --> 00:03:53 Now, these new results are significant for the fate of
00:03:53 --> 00:03:56 our galaxy. But this new uncertainty about the future
00:03:56 --> 00:03:59 of the Milky Way in Andromeda may not last for long. The
00:03:59 --> 00:04:01 authors are already looking ahead towards new research,
00:04:01 --> 00:04:04 further scenarios, and even more data becoming available.
00:04:05 --> 00:04:08 You see, the Guy Space Telescope will soon be delivering more
00:04:08 --> 00:04:11 precise measurements with some of the most crucial variables within
00:04:11 --> 00:04:13 the galaxies, including the transverse motion of
00:04:13 --> 00:04:16 Andromeda, which is difficult to measure directly.
00:04:17 --> 00:04:19 This is space time still to come,
00:04:19 --> 00:04:22 why seismic waves deep inside the Earth suddenly
00:04:22 --> 00:04:25 accelerate, and the discovery of five new
00:04:25 --> 00:04:28 embryonic planets using a new technique. All that
00:04:28 --> 00:04:30 and more still to come on, space time.
00:04:46 --> 00:04:48 A new study has provided fresh clues about the
00:04:48 --> 00:04:51 mysterious behavior of seismic waves as they traverse
00:04:51 --> 00:04:54 a weird zone deep inside the Earth. A
00:04:54 --> 00:04:57 report in the journal Communications Earth and Environment
00:04:57 --> 00:05:00 has found that the crystal structure of minerals deep in the
00:05:00 --> 00:05:02 planet's D layer is accelerating the movement of
00:05:02 --> 00:05:05 seismic waves. The D layer is located
00:05:05 --> 00:05:08 near the Earth's core mantle boundary, some
00:05:08 --> 00:05:11 2 to 3 km beneath the
00:05:11 --> 00:05:14 planet's crust. This region consists of a mixture
00:05:14 --> 00:05:16 of molten rock flowing sort of like honey or
00:05:16 --> 00:05:19 molasses, rather than being either liquid like lava
00:05:19 --> 00:05:22 or brittle like solid rock. For more than
00:05:22 --> 00:05:25 50 years, scientists have wondered why seismic
00:05:25 --> 00:05:27 waves suddenly behave differently in this D layer, with their
00:05:27 --> 00:05:30 speed accelerating as if they were traveling through a different
00:05:30 --> 00:05:33 material. Then, in 2004, one
00:05:33 --> 00:05:36 of the study's authors, Motohiko Murakami from
00:05:36 --> 00:05:39 Idiot Zurich, discovered that the mineral perovskite, which
00:05:39 --> 00:05:41 dominates the D layer, transforms under extreme
00:05:41 --> 00:05:44 pressures and temperatures into a New min different
00:05:44 --> 00:05:46 mineral, which they've named post perovskite.
00:05:47 --> 00:05:50 Scientists assumed that it was this change which was explaining
00:05:50 --> 00:05:53 the strange acceleration of the seismic waves.
00:05:53 --> 00:05:56 But then, in 2007, Murakami and colleagues
00:05:56 --> 00:05:59 found evidence that the phase change of the perovskite
00:05:59 --> 00:06:01 alone simply wasn't enough to accelerate the
00:06:01 --> 00:06:04 seismic waves. Now, using new
00:06:04 --> 00:06:07 computer models, they've discovered that depending on the
00:06:07 --> 00:06:10 direction in which the prosperovskite crystals are pointing, the
00:06:10 --> 00:06:12 hardness of the mineral changes. It turns out
00:06:12 --> 00:06:15 the seismic waves are accelerated only when the crystals
00:06:15 --> 00:06:18 of the mineral point in the same direction. The
00:06:18 --> 00:06:21 big question then becomes, what makes these crystals line
00:06:21 --> 00:06:24 up? Well, it seems the answer is
00:06:24 --> 00:06:27 solid mantle rock is flowing horizontally along the
00:06:27 --> 00:06:29 lower edge of the Earth's, mantle. Researchers have long
00:06:29 --> 00:06:32 suspected that this movement, a sort of convection like
00:06:32 --> 00:06:35 boiling water, must exist. But they've never been able to
00:06:35 --> 00:06:38 prove it directly. The new computer simulations
00:06:38 --> 00:06:41 developed by Murakami and colleagues have now demonstrated, at
00:06:41 --> 00:06:44 least experimentally, that metal convection of solid rock
00:06:44 --> 00:06:47 is real, and it's occurring at the boundary between the
00:06:47 --> 00:06:50 Earth's molten liquid outer core and the mantle above.
00:06:50 --> 00:06:53 The discovery not only solves the mystery of the D
00:06:53 --> 00:06:56 layer, but also opens a new window into the dynamics
00:06:56 --> 00:06:58 in the depths of the Earth. This is
00:06:58 --> 00:07:01 space time. Still to come,
00:07:01 --> 00:07:04 astronomers have developed a new technique which has allowed them to
00:07:04 --> 00:07:07 identify embryonic planets. And later in the science
00:07:07 --> 00:07:10 report, a new study warns that artificial
00:07:10 --> 00:07:13 intelligence is now so smart, it's refusing to
00:07:13 --> 00:07:15 turn itself off, even when instructed to do
00:07:15 --> 00:07:18 so. Looks like Skynet. If not, the Terminator
00:07:18 --> 00:07:21 may well have arrived. All that and more still to
00:07:21 --> 00:07:21 come.
00:07:22 --> 00:07:23 On space time,
00:07:32 --> 00:07:32 foreign
00:07:38 --> 00:07:41 astronomers have developed a new technique which is
00:07:41 --> 00:07:44 allowing them to identify embryonic exoplanets at a
00:07:44 --> 00:07:47 far earlier stage of their development than ever before.
00:07:48 --> 00:07:50 Exoplanets are, planets orbiting stars other than the
00:07:50 --> 00:07:53 Sun. Astronomers have so far discovered well over
00:07:53 --> 00:07:56 5 exoplanets, usually by either
00:07:56 --> 00:07:59 the transit method, in which some of the light from a host
00:07:59 --> 00:08:02 star is briefly blocked out by an eclipsing planet, or, or
00:08:02 --> 00:08:05 by the wobble method, in which the host star is being affected
00:08:05 --> 00:08:08 by the gravitational pull of an orbiting planet, resulting
00:08:08 --> 00:08:11 in a slight Doppler shift in the star spectra.
00:08:11 --> 00:08:14 Now, a report in the Astrophysical Journal Letters claims the
00:08:14 --> 00:08:17 new technique, which uses alma. The Ataccam, a Large
00:08:17 --> 00:08:20 Millimeter Submillimeter Array radio telescope in Chile,
00:08:20 --> 00:08:23 has successfully discovered evidence of five new
00:08:23 --> 00:08:25 embryonic exoplanets. So young, they're still
00:08:25 --> 00:08:28 growing. The new Advanced Exoalma
00:08:28 --> 00:08:31 project imaging technique allowed astronomers to
00:08:31 --> 00:08:34 peer through the thick protoplanetary disks of gas, gas
00:08:34 --> 00:08:37 and dust, that have been obscuring these embryonic planets from view
00:08:37 --> 00:08:40 until now. The study's lead author, Christoph
00:08:40 --> 00:08:43 Pinte from Monash University, says the five newly found
00:08:43 --> 00:08:46 planets are, just a few million years old. That's a thousand
00:08:46 --> 00:08:48 times younger than the Earth. Paint says.
00:08:48 --> 00:08:51 Unlike traditional planet hunting methods that look for a young
00:08:51 --> 00:08:54 planet's direct light, EXO ALMA searches for the
00:08:54 --> 00:08:56 effects these planets are having on their surroundings.
00:08:57 --> 00:08:59 He says it's like trying to spot a fish by looking for
00:08:59 --> 00:09:02 ripples in the pond rather than trying to see the fish
00:09:02 --> 00:09:05 itself. It allows astronomers to detect much
00:09:05 --> 00:09:08 younger planets than ever before so they can learn more about
00:09:08 --> 00:09:11 planetary evolution and growth. A key
00:09:11 --> 00:09:14 finding of EXO ALMA is that these planets are forming
00:09:14 --> 00:09:16 really quickly in less than a few million years.
00:09:17 --> 00:09:19 And in surprisingly dynamic environments, with lots of
00:09:19 --> 00:09:22 physical mechanisms at play. The EXO
00:09:22 --> 00:09:25 ALMA project is revolutionizing science's
00:09:25 --> 00:09:27 understanding of how planets interact with their natal
00:09:27 --> 00:09:30 environments and evolve over time. By,
00:09:30 --> 00:09:33 uncovering the youngest planets, EXA ALMA is
00:09:33 --> 00:09:36 providing the first clues to unravel these mysteries.
00:09:36 --> 00:09:39 Pinte says the technique he and his team have developed is a
00:09:39 --> 00:09:42 remarkable leap forward in astronomy, opening up light years
00:09:42 --> 00:09:45 of new possibilities for future discoveries.
00:09:45 --> 00:09:48 Christoph Pinte: We're using the alma, interferometer in Chile,
00:09:48 --> 00:09:51 which is a radio telescope. And we're using
00:09:51 --> 00:09:53 ALMA to find very young planets. Because
00:09:53 --> 00:09:56 classical technique to find planets like
00:09:56 --> 00:09:59 transit or radial velocity cannot be used for young
00:09:59 --> 00:10:02 stars. So instead we're using ALMA to look
00:10:02 --> 00:10:04 at the disk around young star. And in this
00:10:04 --> 00:10:07 disk, planets are forming. And we using the, high
00:10:07 --> 00:10:10 spectral resolution to detect very small motion
00:10:10 --> 00:10:13 in the gas in the disk around the star to find
00:10:13 --> 00:10:16 little planets. It's a new method that we developed
00:10:16 --> 00:10:19 in 2018 when, we got the first high
00:10:19 --> 00:10:21 spectral resolution observation with alma. And
00:10:22 --> 00:10:25 this is the first time that this method has been
00:10:25 --> 00:10:27 applied in a systematic way using alma.
00:10:27 --> 00:10:30 So we obtained what's called a large program. So we
00:10:30 --> 00:10:33 were granted almost 200 hours of telescope time
00:10:33 --> 00:10:36 to observe those 15 disks, to do a systematic survey
00:10:36 --> 00:10:39 and to try to find those planets. So it's the first time that
00:10:39 --> 00:10:42 we do this kind of observation in a systematic
00:10:42 --> 00:10:42 way.
00:10:42 --> 00:10:45 Stuart Gary: So when we look at a protoplanetary disk, there's,
00:10:45 --> 00:10:48 a lot of dust and gas and molecular
00:10:48 --> 00:10:51 debris there, which is all coming together to form these
00:10:51 --> 00:10:54 exoplanets. These are little embryos, basically,
00:10:54 --> 00:10:56 that are forming in gravitationally dense regions.
00:10:56 --> 00:10:59 Christoph Pinte: If you try to observe those systems in the
00:10:59 --> 00:11:02 optical with a classical telescope, the disk
00:11:02 --> 00:11:04 is so opaque so dense that we cannot see through the
00:11:04 --> 00:11:07 disk. So if there are planets in the disk, you will not be
00:11:07 --> 00:11:10 able to see them. So we use ALMA to go to much longer
00:11:10 --> 00:11:13 wavelengths, like you said, in the millimeter, where the
00:11:13 --> 00:11:16 dust becomes more transparent. So we're able to scan
00:11:16 --> 00:11:19 through the disk to see planets that we would not be able to
00:11:19 --> 00:11:20 see otherwise.
00:11:20 --> 00:11:22 Stuart Gary: Is it the wavelength of ALMA which was the key to this?
00:11:23 --> 00:11:25 Christoph Pinte: Yes. So it's two things. It's the wavelength and also
00:11:26 --> 00:11:28 the fact that at this wavelength, we can see the
00:11:28 --> 00:11:31 molecular emissions. So we see emission lines from the
00:11:31 --> 00:11:34 molecule in the disk. In particular the, carbon
00:11:34 --> 00:11:37 monoxide, which we use in that case. And
00:11:37 --> 00:11:40 because of the way the instrument is designed, it has a very
00:11:40 --> 00:11:43 high resolution in velocity. So we're able to see
00:11:43 --> 00:11:46 very small motion. That we would not be able to see
00:11:46 --> 00:11:48 at other wavelengths. And because the disturbance
00:11:48 --> 00:11:51 created by planets is small Compared to the global
00:11:51 --> 00:11:54 rotation of the disk. Being able to detect very small
00:11:54 --> 00:11:56 motion is the key to find these planets.
00:11:57 --> 00:11:59 Stuart Gary: That means you're using a degree of spectroscopy.
00:11:59 --> 00:12:01 Christoph Pinte: Yeah. So in practice, we're using, ALMA
00:12:01 --> 00:12:04 as a big spectrograph. And because ALMA has
00:12:04 --> 00:12:07 a very high spectral resolution. We're able to detect very small
00:12:07 --> 00:12:10 motions in the gas. Like a few 10, meters per
00:12:10 --> 00:12:13 second. At this wavelength, the star is not
00:12:13 --> 00:12:16 emitting. And the planet itself is not
00:12:16 --> 00:12:19 emitting either. What we're really seeing is a disk.
00:12:19 --> 00:12:21 And what we detect is the gravitational impact
00:12:22 --> 00:12:25 of the planet on the disk. So if there was no
00:12:25 --> 00:12:28 planet, the disk would be in Keplerian rotation. And
00:12:28 --> 00:12:30 because there's a planet, the rotation of the disk is
00:12:30 --> 00:12:33 slightly different. And that what allows us to detect the
00:12:33 --> 00:12:34 presence of planets.
00:12:34 --> 00:12:36 Stuart Gary: And you found five planets using this system?
00:12:36 --> 00:12:39 Christoph Pinte: Yes. So we have indication for at
00:12:39 --> 00:12:42 least five planets in the 15
00:12:42 --> 00:12:45 disk that we have observed. But we also, in all those
00:12:45 --> 00:12:48 disks, we detected, like, non Keplerian motion.
00:12:48 --> 00:12:51 So that suggests that there might be more planets. But what we
00:12:51 --> 00:12:54 detected, too, is that it's, like, more complicated
00:12:54 --> 00:12:56 than when we initially believed. So there's
00:12:56 --> 00:12:59 other motions on top of the motions created by the
00:12:59 --> 00:13:02 planet. That means there's probably other mechanisms that are at play
00:13:02 --> 00:13:05 during the, formation of. That could be interaction
00:13:05 --> 00:13:08 with other stars or instabilities in the
00:13:08 --> 00:13:10 disk. Or interaction by companions or
00:13:10 --> 00:13:13 stars that flew by that we can't see, right now.
00:13:13 --> 00:13:16 But we could potentially still see the effect of those stars
00:13:16 --> 00:13:17 on the disk.
00:13:17 --> 00:13:19 Stuart Gary: It's a busy place where planets are forming.
00:13:19 --> 00:13:22 Christoph Pinte: Yes. The main conclusion of our work is that the planets
00:13:22 --> 00:13:25 are forming very early. So basically, at the same time
00:13:25 --> 00:13:28 as the stars themselves are forming. And
00:13:28 --> 00:13:30 stars form in molecular clouds that are very dense
00:13:31 --> 00:13:33 and where stars are interacting with each other. So
00:13:33 --> 00:13:36 it's highly dynamical, process in which planets are
00:13:36 --> 00:13:37 forming.
00:13:37 --> 00:13:40 Stuart Gary: A few years ago there was a paper out that surprised a lot
00:13:40 --> 00:13:42 of people. It speculated that the Earth only took
00:13:42 --> 00:13:45 about 5 million years to form. What you're finding here with
00:13:45 --> 00:13:48 these new exo alma readings supports that, that it
00:13:48 --> 00:13:51 doesn't take long for a full planet to actually form.
00:13:51 --> 00:13:52 Yes, it's amazing.
00:13:53 --> 00:13:55 Christoph Pinte: Exactly. So we believe those System are between
00:13:55 --> 00:13:58 3 and 5 million years and at
00:13:58 --> 00:14:01 least some of the planets are already formed. So the
00:14:01 --> 00:14:04 planet that we are detecting are big planets too. They're like
00:14:04 --> 00:14:07 a few times the mass of jup. So giant
00:14:07 --> 00:14:10 planets form quickly. We don't have the capacities
00:14:10 --> 00:14:13 yet to detect small planets like Earth in
00:14:13 --> 00:14:16 those young systems, but it's likely that they form also
00:14:16 --> 00:14:17 on very short timescales.
00:14:17 --> 00:14:20 Stuart Gary: These exoplanets you found, they're all large planets, bigger than
00:14:20 --> 00:14:23 Jupiter. Were they far from their host stars or were they
00:14:23 --> 00:14:26 hot Jupiters? Or were they at Jovian type distances
00:14:26 --> 00:14:27 from their host stars?
00:14:27 --> 00:14:29 Christoph Pinte: Oh no. So they're much further away.
00:14:30 --> 00:14:32 so Jupiter is five astronomical units
00:14:33 --> 00:14:35 and those planets are between 80 and
00:14:35 --> 00:14:38 250. So they're much further, outside.
00:14:39 --> 00:14:41 So there's probably more planets inside.
00:14:41 --> 00:14:44 Except we don't have the spatial resolution to see
00:14:44 --> 00:14:47 them because one of the limitations is that star forming region
00:14:48 --> 00:14:50 in the galaxy are on average quite far,
00:14:50 --> 00:14:53 150parsec, which is roughly 600
00:14:53 --> 00:14:54 light years for me.
00:14:54 --> 00:14:56 Stuart Gary: That's Christophe Pinte from Monash University
00:14:57 --> 00:14:59 and this space time
00:15:04 --> 00:15:04 foreign
00:15:16 --> 00:15:19 look at some of the other stories making news in Science this week
00:15:19 --> 00:15:22 with the Science report in yet another
00:15:22 --> 00:15:25 warning that the age of the Terminator and Skynet is
00:15:25 --> 00:15:27 getting awfully close. It's been revealed that
00:15:27 --> 00:15:30 OpenAI's O3, O4 and Codex
00:15:30 --> 00:15:33 Mini artificial intelligence systems, all of which are used to
00:15:33 --> 00:15:36 help power the ChatGPT. Chatbot will sometimes
00:15:36 --> 00:15:39 disobey direct instructions to turn off and will even
00:15:39 --> 00:15:41 sabotage computer scripts in order to remain
00:15:41 --> 00:15:44 operational. The discovery was made by
00:15:44 --> 00:15:47 Palisade Research, which searches for dangerous
00:15:47 --> 00:15:49 AI capabilities. It found during its
00:15:49 --> 00:15:52 tests that the O3 model sabotaged the shutdown
00:15:52 --> 00:15:55 script on seven occasions, the Codex Mini
00:15:55 --> 00:15:58 sabotaged it on 12 occasions, and the O4
00:15:58 --> 00:16:00 Mini also sabotaged at least once.
00:16:01 --> 00:16:03 Previous studies have already shown that some AI
00:16:03 --> 00:16:06 models will lie, cheat, be deceptive and make
00:16:06 --> 00:16:09 up stuff, even in changing their own code or replicating
00:16:09 --> 00:16:12 it and then hiding it in other programs in order to prevent
00:16:12 --> 00:16:14 themselves from being shut down.
00:16:15 --> 00:16:18 A new study has shown that owning a dog could
00:16:18 --> 00:16:21 reduce a child's risk of developing eczema. A
00:16:21 --> 00:16:24 report in the journal Allergy analyzed data from 16
00:16:24 --> 00:16:27 European studies testing for interactions between the
00:16:27 --> 00:16:30 24 most significant eczema associated genetic
00:16:30 --> 00:16:32 variants and 18 early life environmental
00:16:32 --> 00:16:35 factors such as antibiotic use, breastfeeding
00:16:35 --> 00:16:38 and the ownership of pets such as cats or dogs.
00:16:38 --> 00:16:41 They found interactions between seven environmental
00:16:41 --> 00:16:44 factors and at least one known genetic variant known, to be
00:16:44 --> 00:16:47 involved in eczema. And the authors found that exposure
00:16:47 --> 00:16:50 to dogs interacted with a genetic risk variant that
00:16:50 --> 00:16:53 affects immune system response in human skin
00:16:53 --> 00:16:56 cells, essentially providing a protective effect by
00:16:56 --> 00:16:57 suppressing skin inflammation.
00:16:59 --> 00:17:02 It's been discovered that sulphur crested cockatoos in
00:17:02 --> 00:17:05 the suburbs of western Sydney have learned how to use twist
00:17:05 --> 00:17:07 handled water fountains in order to get a drink.
00:17:08 --> 00:17:11 The findings, reported in the journal Biology Letters, follow
00:17:11 --> 00:17:13 scientists using cameras to monitor the bird's
00:17:13 --> 00:17:16 actions. The authors recorded the clever cockies
00:17:16 --> 00:17:19 gripping the valve and then lowering their weight on it to twist it,
00:17:19 --> 00:17:22 with a success rate of more than 46%.
00:17:22 --> 00:17:25 The behaviour hasn't been recorded elsewhere around Sydney
00:17:25 --> 00:17:28 yet, but it's likely to spread. You see,
00:17:28 --> 00:17:31 previously, cockatoos in Sydney's southern suburbs learned how to
00:17:31 --> 00:17:34 open the lids of wheelie bins to explore their contents.
00:17:34 --> 00:17:37 And that's a behaviour which has since spread to cockatoos right
00:17:37 --> 00:17:39 across Sydney's vast suburban area.
00:17:41 --> 00:17:44 One of the interesting observational factors in our age
00:17:44 --> 00:17:46 of social media is how come pseudoscience
00:17:46 --> 00:17:49 has gone so viral. You see, real
00:17:49 --> 00:17:52 science is slow, cautious and always open to being
00:17:52 --> 00:17:55 wrong. That's how it evolves. But
00:17:55 --> 00:17:58 pseudoscience, on the other hand, is fast. It's loud
00:17:58 --> 00:18:00 and it's allergic to any doubt. And nowhere
00:18:00 --> 00:18:03 is that clearer than online, especially on social
00:18:03 --> 00:18:06 media. Once upon a time, healing was the
00:18:06 --> 00:18:08 domain of science. Trust was earned through
00:18:08 --> 00:18:11 rigorous testing, and health advice came from people in white
00:18:11 --> 00:18:14 coats who spent years studying what could kill us
00:18:14 --> 00:18:17 and what might save us. But as Tim Mendham
00:18:17 --> 00:18:20 from Australian Skeptics points out, today all it takes is
00:18:20 --> 00:18:23 a ring, light, soothing voice and a few dramatic before
00:18:23 --> 00:18:26 and after shots in order to convince millions of people that
00:18:26 --> 00:18:28 a miracle cure is just a click away.
00:18:28 --> 00:18:31 Tim Mendham: The audience is history played a major role in people believing
00:18:31 --> 00:18:34 pseudoscience, but there's a lot more practitioners around than there once
00:18:34 --> 00:18:37 was. Once upon a time, when you only had the mainstream media,
00:18:37 --> 00:18:40 like newspapers and that sort of stuff, very few people got a chance to,
00:18:40 --> 00:18:43 hawk their goods around in editorial or whatever,
00:18:43 --> 00:18:46 because the editor would say, no, I don't think so. And you know,
00:18:46 --> 00:18:49 go away. These days people just set up their own publications,
00:18:49 --> 00:18:51 which is online, TikTok, Instagram,
00:18:52 --> 00:18:55 Facebook, you name it. A whole range of different things that they're using.
00:18:55 --> 00:18:58 And they can promote their wares and their cures and
00:18:58 --> 00:19:01 whether they're sincere or not, or whether they're just marketing for making our
00:19:01 --> 00:19:04 money. And there are definitely some of those around and they look sincere,
00:19:04 --> 00:19:06 they often look young, and they're sort of pitching something sort of particular
00:19:06 --> 00:19:09 cure that this will sort of cure your acne or improve your
00:19:09 --> 00:19:12 running power or whatever, and people believe them. So
00:19:12 --> 00:19:14 what happens is that more people out there spreading
00:19:14 --> 00:19:17 misinformation and a lot more people being overwhelmed
00:19:17 --> 00:19:20 by it because they're not that science literate or even media
00:19:20 --> 00:19:23 literate that they can read that, something's not necessarily
00:19:23 --> 00:19:25 true as it's, if it's on the Internet, as Abraham Lincoln once
00:19:25 --> 00:19:28 said, a lot of these things out there. Lincoln once said,
00:19:28 --> 00:19:29 haven't you heard that one?
00:19:30 --> 00:19:32 Stuart Gary: Einstein, who was concerned about the Internet?
00:19:32 --> 00:19:35 Tim Mendham: No, Abraham Lincoln said, don't believe everything you read on the
00:19:35 --> 00:19:37 Internet. classic cases. I mean, there's cases of, in Australia
00:19:38 --> 00:19:40 of Belle Gibson, who was someone who claimed that, she had cured her
00:19:40 --> 00:19:43 brain cancer because of the herbal medicines and things. So she
00:19:43 --> 00:19:46 started pushing these herbal medicines. She had a book out about
00:19:46 --> 00:19:49 cures and that sort of stuff. And she was raising money for
00:19:49 --> 00:19:52 charity, etc. None of the money went to charity. It all went to her and
00:19:52 --> 00:19:54 it fairly glamorous lifestyle for a while until
00:19:54 --> 00:19:57 people finally pointed out that, hang on a second, you probably didn't have brain
00:19:57 --> 00:20:00 cancer, you probably weren't cured. Where's the money going to? And a lot of
00:20:00 --> 00:20:03 people suffered because of it. Probably a lot of people died because they were using her
00:20:03 --> 00:20:06 goods rather than having treatment for cancer, whatever. But that's a
00:20:06 --> 00:20:09 classic case of, the dangers of believing this
00:20:09 --> 00:20:12 young, attractive person pushing a
00:20:12 --> 00:20:14 particular cause with a lot of bright
00:20:14 --> 00:20:16 enthusiasm, et cetera, on.
00:20:16 --> 00:20:19 Stuart Gary: The Internet, that it's a way of cleaning out the gene
00:20:19 --> 00:20:21 pool. But it's really not. Because when people are
00:20:21 --> 00:20:24 reaching that stage in their life and things of that
00:20:24 --> 00:20:27 grim, you do grab whatever you can. That's
00:20:27 --> 00:20:27 just.
00:20:27 --> 00:20:30 Tim Mendham: Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely it is. Yeah. And sort of. And
00:20:30 --> 00:20:33 there are people who will take advantage of that. I mean, just because they are at
00:20:33 --> 00:20:36 the last stage of their life doesn't excuse the fake cures
00:20:36 --> 00:20:39 by any means. But you can understand that. You don't blame the
00:20:39 --> 00:20:42 patient, right? You don't blame the victim so much because you feel
00:20:42 --> 00:20:44 sorry for them in many cases because they are going through tough times. You
00:20:44 --> 00:20:47 certainly blame and can attack the practitioners,
00:20:47 --> 00:20:50 the promoters of this stuff. If they're crooks, definitely they're
00:20:50 --> 00:20:53 fair game. There'll be someone out there to pitch any
00:20:53 --> 00:20:56 product and there will be some scientists out there who
00:20:56 --> 00:20:59 will endorse it, and there will be people of whatever
00:20:59 --> 00:21:02 background, education, qualifications, money,
00:21:02 --> 00:21:03 whatever who will take it up.
00:21:03 --> 00:21:06 Stuart Gary: That's Tim Mendham from Australian Skeptics.
00:21:21 --> 00:21:24 And that's the show for now. Space Time is
00:21:24 --> 00:21:27 available every Monday, Wednesday and Friday through Apple
00:21:27 --> 00:21:30 Podcasts, itunes, Stitcher, Google
00:21:30 --> 00:21:32 Podcast, Pocket Casts, Spotify,
00:21:32 --> 00:21:34 acast, Amazon Music,
00:21:34 --> 00:21:37 bitesz.com, soundcloud, YouTube Music,
00:21:37 --> 00:21:40 your favorite podcast download provider, and from
00:21:40 --> 00:21:42 spacetimewithstuartgary.com
00:21:43 --> 00:21:45 Space Times also broadcast through the National Science
00:21:45 --> 00:21:48 foundation on Science Zone Radio and on both
00:21:48 --> 00:21:51 iHeartradio and TuneIn radio. And
00:21:51 --> 00:21:54 you can help to support our show by visiting the SpaceTime
00:21:54 --> 00:21:57 Store for a range of promotional merchandising goodies,
00:21:57 --> 00:22:00 or by becoming a SpaceTime Patron, which gives you
00:22:00 --> 00:22:03 access to triple episode commercial free versions of the
00:22:03 --> 00:22:06 show, as well as lots of bonus audio content which
00:22:06 --> 00:22:08 doesn't go to air, access to our exclusive Facebook
00:22:08 --> 00:22:11 group, and other rewards. Just go to
00:22:11 --> 00:22:14 spacetimewithstuartgary.com for full details.
00:22:15 --> 00:22:18 Voice Over Guy: You've been listening to Space Time with Stuart Gary This has
00:22:18 --> 00:22:20 been another quality podcast production from
00:22:20 --> 00:22:21 bitesz.com