Synopsis: Tiny Eyes, Roving Mars, Feeling Secure, Vitamin Hopes, Alcoholic Assays, and an Interview w/ Scott Sigler re: Contagious.

Justin: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!

The following hour of programming does not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors. This is lucky because if it did, it would be very boring, all about when you can take a class, what after school or things you can be doing, all kinds of boring UCD stuff.

Instead, we bring you the cutting edge in science-y news. Stay tuned, This Week in Science is coming up next.
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Synopsis: Skinny Monkey with less calorie intake live longer? Bacterial Bloat, Flower Power burst confounds Darwin, When Good Words Go Bad, World Robot Domination–crickets, bats, Bad Words Done Good, and Interview w/ Chris Mooney, author of Unscientific America

Justin: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!

Science! The act of learning by a careful observation that often starts fast in a question, a “how”, a “what”, a “why”, sort of a thing is followed up then by experiment, observation. This is the basis of the whole scientific set up, observing, testing, observing some more and then learning from it.

We have taken the simple act of looking at things to a wide-range of amazing places in recent years. Making observations of everything from spinning electrons to orbiting planets and distant stars, from the double Helix to galaxy clusters, billions of light years away from our Earthly observatory.

And between the gathering of the stars, we humans plot these points of interests, seek out more and even create new ones ourselves. The picture that is forming is actually quite stunning, both in what it reveals and in our ability to reveal it.

If the human may be allowed a narcissistic moment to lavish phrase upon humanity itself, I think we’re doing a really good job. And while spinning clusters of observant narcissistic humans, much like the following hour of our programming, do not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors.

We can all take pride knowing that, of all the life forms on planet Earth, it is we humans who have contributed the most to scientific knowledge. We are so well adapted to learning new things that at times it seems, we just can’t get enough. Even now, even this very moment, we are eager to perform the act of observing as we turn our attentions to another episode of, This Week In Science, coming up next.
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Synopsis: The Top 11 Science Stories of 2008… Merry TWIS-mas!!!

Justin/Kirsten: We wish you a Merry TWIS-mas. We wish you a Merry TWIS-mas. We wish you a Merry TWIS-mas and a Happy New Year.

Bring us some sciencey stories. Oh, bring us some sciencey stories. Oh, bring us some sciencey stories.

Justin: We want them right now.

Kirsten: Right now.

Justin/Kirsten: We won’t go until we get some. We won’t go until we get some. We won’t go until we get some. So bring them right now.

Kirsten: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!

You are listening to This Week in Science. And…
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Synopsis: The End of the World Dead sea zones, This Week in Evolution, Why Being an Astronaut Isn’t So Hip, Police and Non Lethal Weapons increases death rates? Don’t Mix, Recess Makes You Smarter, and Interview on Autism w/ Dr. Simon Baron-Cohen

Kirsten: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!

I’m not Justin. You are listening to This Week in Science. And anything that you hear during the next hour does not represent the views of the University of California, at Davis, ASUCD or even KDVS. This is all us.

Justin: Good morning, Kirsten!

Kirsten: Good morning, Justin! Welcome everyone. It’s This Week in Science. And we have so much science news. We have a great show ahead. We are planning to interview Dr. Simon Baron-Cohen today.

Justin: For the second time.

Kirsten: For the second time.

Justin: We’re planning to have.

Kirsten: Exactly. We’ll see. We’ll make sure all the phone numbers are accurate and all of the overseas connections are working properly. You know, I went out and hand check all the under sea cables just to make sure it’s going to work.

Justin: Nice. See. That’s why you’re so thorough, Kirsten.

Kirsten: I know, I plan – I really do try and plan ahead when I’m producing a show. What do I have today? I have got stories about The End of the World and Evolution.
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Synopsis: Digg’n Physics via Twitter, Dino Skinny, Bird Brain Insights, Fish Freakouts!, Tunguska Shuttle Hugs, Building Better Melons, Minion Mailbag, and The Question of the Month!

Justin: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!

What is right is right. And what is wrong is wrong. What is true is true. And what is untrue is untrue. What is science is science. And what is not science is not science. Such absolutes are hard to find in the push-pull of human nature driven world.

For what is right, like a free election can be untrue in it’s result. What is most easily condemned as wrong, like the murder of innocents can be true as we have seen too often in the past than most recently in Iran.

What is not science can be disguised as science in order to gain our trust. And fake science journals rigged industry research and false claims by hired assassins of truth — tobacco isn’t addictive, global warming isn’t happening, drugs will never kill you.

As the fabrication of false denials are found out, defrocked, defiled and filed under fraudulent, they much like the following hour of our programming, do not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors.

As living in a world without absolutes can make for a foggy notions sense of being, let us create a few absolutes upon which to stand. What is science is absolutely right and never wrong. For it is a continuing process, the self-correction, that is willing to change when it isn’t correct.

What is science is absolutely true and never untrue. For this ever moving towards truth, regardless of where it started and what we want truth to be has no relation to what truths we find.

And science is a process of getting it right. That is willing to get it wrong until we are getting at what is true more often than we are settling for what is untrue. And so, science therefore rejects all absolutes. All absolutes that is a long the way to becoming, This Week in Science, coming up next.
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Synopsis: Bisphenol A and estrogen, Toxoplasma Gondii causing car crashes?, Beware of Robo-Ferret used to sniff out hidden things, RoboGames Redux, Adventures in Popularity, Move Over Silicon!, Go Fly A Kite, TWIS Bits, and Interview w/ Dr. Greg Gibson re: Genes and Illness.

Justin: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!

It’s no secret, no one gets out of here alive. The question then, if anyone asks, is what if anything we do with the time we have in the great go around. Suggestions are plenty and opinions abound or regardless of intentions of what we do or who we are and why we are doing these things, our opinions, like the following hour of our programming, do not necessarily represent those of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors. Still, regardless of self-opinion, this is the moment in which we can do.

In a sense, what we can do is who we are, we are all about to be, This Week in Science, coming up next.
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Synopsis: Remote Control Brains, Making Blood Crawl, Birdsong Basics, This Week in Science History, Drink To Your Sanity, and an Interview with Dr. Leonard Mlodinow re: The Drunkard’s Walk.

Justin: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!

In the wake of the H1N1 worry, the world has a new wave of statistical woe on the way. As the number of confirmed deaths continued to drop, from hundreds, to dozens down to only ten within a single week.

The latest statistical projections of the un-die-ing situation now suggest that we are trending towards a potential population explosion!

If people continue to un-die at this rate, we may soon be looking at a human transmittable in fallopian pregno-demic that could grow exponentially over the next nine months.

And while this exponential growth oddly mirrors the rate of natural human reproduction it, much like the following hour of programming, does not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its Sponsors.

Listeners should be wary, as face masks will not be enough to protect you from the probability of procreation. Staying indoors with loved ones might actually contribute to the further spread of parental syndromes.

While the CDC sits idly by and does nothing to slow the rapid rate of confirmed un-deadenings, you can be comforted to know that we will be dedicating the next hour to keeping you reasonably safe by offering you something else to do, here on This Week In Science coming up next.
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