Month: June 2017

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The Gist - Why So Morose About Lactose?

There’s almond milk, coconut milk, hemp milk, soy milk, hazelnut milk, oat milk, and milk made from anything that grows, pretty much. But is any of it actually milk? And is it actually healthier than dairy? Our debunker-in-chief, Maria Konnikova, investigates the lofty claims of nondairy milks. Konnikova is a contributor to the New Yorker, and the author of The Confidence Game. Her new podcast is called the Grift. 

In today’s Spiel, the White House’s long con on infrastructure. 

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Undiscovered - Six Degrees

Are you just six handshakes away from every other person on Earth? Two mathematicians set out to prove we’re all connected.

You have probably heard the phrase “six degrees of separation,” the idea that you’re connected to everyone else on Earth by a chain of just six people. It has inspired a Broadway play, a film nerd’s game, called “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon”...and even a No Doubt song! But is it true? In the ‘90s, two mathematicians set out to discover just how connected we really are—and ended up launching a new field of science in the process.

Annie holds one of Milgram’s “Letter Experiment” mailings sent to June Shields in Wichita, Kansas. Accessed at the Yale University archives. (Credit: Elah Feder)

 

 

A version of psychologist Stanley Milgram’s “Letter Experiment” mailings. “Could you, as an active American, contact another American citizen regardless of his walk of life?” Milgram and his team wrote. They asked for recipients' help in finding out. Accessed at the Yale University archives. (Credit: Elah Feder)

 

(Original art by Claire Merchlinsky)

 

GUESTS

    Duncan Watts, Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research, author of Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age Steven Strogatz, Jacob Gould Schurman Professor of Applied Mathematics at Cornell University, author of Sync Andrew Leifer, Assistant Professor in the Department of Physics and the Princeton Neuroscience Institute at Princeton University

 

FOOTNOTES

    Read Duncan Watts’ and Steven Strogatz’s breakthrough 1998 Nature paper on small-world networks. Read Stanley Milgram’s 1967 article about his letter experiment in Psychology Today. Watch Duncan and Steve discuss the past and future of small-world networks at Cornell. Watch C. elegans' brain glow! And read more about the brain imaging work happening in Andrew Leifer’s lab. Browse the small-world network of C. elegans’ 302 neurons at wormweb.org. Read Facebook’s analysis of Facebook users’ “degrees of separation.” Just for funsies, a network analysis of Game of Thrones.

 

CREDITS

This episode of Undiscovered was reported and produced by Annie Minoff and Elah Feder. Editing by Christopher Intagliata. Fact-checking help by Michelle Harris. Original music by Daniel Peterschmidt. Additional music by Podington Bear and Lee Rosevere. Our theme music is by I am Robot and Proud. Art for this episode by Claire Merchlinsky. Story consulting by Ari Daniel. Engineering help from Sarah Fishman. Recording help from Alexa Lim. Thanks to Science Friday’s Danielle Dana, Christian Skotte, Brandon Echter, and Rachel Bouton.

 

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The Goods from the Woods - Episode #145 – “Motor City Madness” with Harry Moroz

In this episode, the Goods from the Woods Boys are talkin' about the Steiner Brothers, raising rabbits, and about our guest, comedian Harry Moroz, trying to get his friends laid like a miniature "Hitch". This episode contains one of the funniest stories we've ever heard. Give us a listen today! Song of the week this week: "Romeo" by Gino Washington.  Follow the show @TheGoodsPod  Rivers is @RiversLangley  Dr. Pat is @PM_Reilly  Mr. Goodnight is @SepulvedaCowboy  Pick up a Goods from the Woods t-shirt at: http://prowrestlingtees.com/TheGoodsPod