SGU Episode 885

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SGU Episode 885
June 25th 2022
Computer illustration shows NASA's Juno spacecraft over the Great Red Spot.
SGU 884                      SGU 886
Skeptical Rogues
S: Steven Novella
B: Bob Novella
C: Cara Santa Maria
E: Evan Bernstein
Quote of the Week
If we're never wrong then we're never surprised. If we grow too protective of our existing beliefs, then we stagnate and stop learning. If we've reached any degree of competence within our field, it's because we got things wrong along the way. So why stop now? It's interesting, I think, for each of us to consider the following: What am I currently wrong about? It's an impossible question to answer, but a curio, though, to contemplate nonetheless.
Hector Chadwick, UK-based mentalist
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Voice-over: You're listening to the Skeptics' Guide to the Universe, your escape to reality.

S: Hello and welcome to the Skeptics' Guide to the Universe. Today is Wednesday, June 21^st 2022, and this is your host, Steven Novella. Joining me this week are Bob Novella...

B: Hey, everybody!

S: Cara Santa Maria...

C: Howdy.

S: ...and Evan Bernstein.

E: Good evening everyone!

S: Jay is out because he has a tummy bug.

C: Jay has a tummy ache so he can't be here.

E: I've had I've known some other people right around this time who has also come down with this. I don't know they're calling it a foodborne illness. They think it's something they ate and it knocked them out for 24 hours or so.

C: It usually is. Like a norovirus or a rotavirus or a bacterial illness.

S: Could be an enterovirus. That's a summer virus and can give you a GI infection. So he's probably got one of those.

C: I had noro twice and it was the sickest I think I've ever felt in my entire life. It was horrible.

S: Do you feel worse when you have like a bad stomach bug or when you have a bad upper respiratory infection? What makes you feel worse?

C: Well it's it's interesting because I feel like a stomach virus is really acute. So you feel way worse but it's over faster. Whereas the upper respiratory is like stressful and lengthy and you're just like over it because it takes so long to clear. But when I have─

S: Cruddy.

C: ─yeah it is. It is. But when I had noro. Like I thought I was gonna die. Because you're tethered to the bathroom.

S: Yeah. It's more debilitating.

C: Yeah and I also it's kind of weird. I haven't vomited since I was a child. I have like a weird paranoia around puking. And so yes I've had noro twice and did not puke either time. So I was like I was green and like pressing my face against the tile and like oh it was bad it was really bad. For most people it comes out of both ends. For me it was only one end but I probably would have felt better if I had puked. I just refused. I refused.

E: So you suppress the urge?

C: Oh yeah because I had that thing you get where you start to salivate uncontrollably and you're burping. Oh it's terrible.

B: Wow.

C: I didn't throw up.

E: Yeah it's like it's almost like you have a blockage and you have to clear the blockage by vomiting.

C: Yeah but I just didn't. I was like keep it down just deep breathing. A lot of real kind of like focus.

E: I'd rather get it over with.

C: That's what a lot of people say and I probably should have actually looking back. But I couldn't eat for two days. It was I mean it was a whole thing. It was bad. So I'm hoping that Jay doesn't have that because I would not wish that on anyone.

E: But as Steve mentioned it could be a summer virus and that could be the case. Do you know why? Because today's June 21^st. First day of summer.

B: Yes that's right. Longest day of the year. And that means Cara what?

C: Shortest night?

B: Yes. The other side.

E: Beautiful thing.

C: So so explain me this solstice experts. Why is it the first day of summer and not the middle of summer?

S: Yeah it's arbitrary. Well I've wondered that since I was a child. Why is the summer begin halfway through the warmest section. And part of it I think is because the weather like the seasonal weather is delayed a little bit behind the position of the Earth and the Sun, you know what I mean? It's because it is true. The next couple of months are going to be warmer than the last couple of months. Not like we're in the─

B: Absolutely.

S: ─middle of the hot season. We're not. It is shifted a little bit later. But also you look at like the analemma. You have like the figure eight with the Sun at the top, the bottom and the two sides. So that's where they made the cutoffs for the seasons. But they could have made them in where like the top quarter was the summer and the lower quarter was the winter. Instead of making the topmost point the beginning of summer. But ultimately arbitrary it's fine. But I always thought that was a little weird too.

C: Agree, yeah. It just feels like─

B: It didn't.

C: ─it's been summer. Here in LA at least it feels like it's been summer for two months.

B: Yeah well for you.

E: Yeah that's the difference Cara.

B: Yes I agree but for in New England I mean we had just a couple days ago where I was wearing a jacket outside.

C: Really?

B: It was chillier than it had been a in a while and you would never get that in July and August. Never.

E: That's right because when you have we experience every flavor of season here in New England. We get the cold cold winters and we get some pretty darn hot summers and everything in between. But Cara in lovely southern California you don't have those kinds of extremes in your weather.

C: No no no. It's really temperate here. But I was on the phone with my mom earlier today and I thought it was brutally hot today so much so that I was trying to arrange going hiking with a friend and we decided we're not going to hike we're going to go on a swim instead. But I was talking to my mom on the phone who's of course in north Texas and I was like oh it's brutal here today it's like 88. What is it like for you? And she was like. Well my car says it's 106. I was oh gosh.

E: The south has been on fire. Some of the hottest temperatures on record in June in the south.

S: Yeah they're having a heat wave really bad heat wave.

E: That a song? (laughter)

S: So Elon Musk has acquired twitter. Did it did that happen?

B: Did that happened?

C: That just happened?

E: When? When? Today?

B: Check it out Steve because I heard that he was one step closer.

E: He passed some hurdle or the government [inaudible].

S: Okay. I just saw that he was like meeting with twitter employees and he's planning on cutting back on this. He's talking as if he's running Twitter. Like wait wait wait when did that happen?

C: Yeah I don't know.

E: Twitter board unanimously recommends Musk's takeover bid. That happened earlier today.

S: There we go.

E: That's gonna be it. Is he gonna pay the money though? He's trying to get a low, he's trying to get it now for less because he thinks that there's more bots than they reported and therefore it's not worth as much.

S: Yeah but of course that's all part of the negotiation, right?

E: Of course. Right. Yeah. But he's clearing hurdles that's for sure. Welp.

S: Welp.

B: Welp.

E: See we'll see where that goes. So yeah interesting happenings in the world of Musk.

S: Right. And crypto is tanking. It's chaos.

E: Oh gosh, are we gonna go there? Oh my gosh. Luna.

Special Segment: Secret of Skinwalker Ranch (6:37)

_consider_using_block_quotes_for_emails_read_aloud_in_this_segment_
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E. ... when I first reported on this^{[link needed]}.

News Items

S:

B:

C:

J:

E:

(laughs) (laughter) (applause) [inaudible]

Jupiter Ate Baby Planets (17:53)

• Scientists find remains of cannibalized baby planets in Jupiter's cloud-covered belly

The Risk of Sitting (27:10)

• An Enormous International Study Just Confirmed The Ugly Truth About Sitting Too Much

NASA Joins Study of UAPs (42:26)

• NASA Joins Study of UAPs

Galapagos Giant Tortoise Not Extinct (59:52)

• The Galapagos giant tortoise Chelonoidis phantasticus is not extinct

What's the Word? (1:08:16)

• Nostrum

_consider_using_block_quotes_for_emails_read_aloud_in_this_segment_

Questions/Emails/Corrections/Follow-ups (1:12:48)

Followup #1: Testing AIs

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Science or Fiction (1:23:43)

Theme: Geology Item #1: Geologists estimate that the next major earthquake along the San Andreas Fault would cause vastly more damage from the resulting tsunami than the quake itself. Item #2: The Pacific ocean is so large that it contains its own antipode. Item #3: Sapphires and rubies are actually the same mineral, corundum.

Answer	Item
Fiction	Tsunami more damaging
Science	...has its own antipode
Science	...are the same mineral

Host	Result
Steve	swept

Rogue	Guess
Cara	Tsunami more damaging
Bob	Tsunami more damaging
Evan	Tsunami more damaging

Voice-over: It's time for Science or Fiction.

Skeptical Quote of the Week (1:35:39)

If we're never wrong then we're never surprised. If we grow too protective of our existing beliefs, then we stagnate and stop learning. If we've reached any degree of competence within our field, it's because we got things wrong along the way. So why stop now? It's interesting, I think, for each of us to consider the following: What am I currently wrong about? It's an impossible question to answer, but a curio, though, to contemplate nonetheless.
– Hector Chadwick, UK-based mentalist

Signoff/Announcements

S: —and until next week, this is your Skeptics' Guide to the Universe.

S: Skeptics' Guide to the Universe is produced by SGU Productions, dedicated to promoting science and critical thinking. For more information, visit us at theskepticsguide.org. Send your questions to info@theskepticsguide.org. And, if you would like to support the show and all the work that we do, go to patreon.com/SkepticsGuide and consider becoming a patron and becoming part of the SGU community. Our listeners and supporters are what make SGU possible.

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