Uncertain

In this episode, former big league pitcher Dr. Dave Baldwin talks about his run-in with Ted Williams, his life in science, the physics of the gyroball versus the slider, and how he finally made it to the Baseball Hall of Fame. Plus we'll test your knowledge about some baseball science. Websites mentioned on this episode include http://www.dartmouth.edu/~chance/chance_news/recent_news/chance_news_13.04.html; http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=3486; http://www.americanscientist.org/template/AssetDetail/assetid/42392

In this episode, psychiatric geneticist Laura Jean Bierut talks about her article in the April Scientific American about the influence of genes on alcoholism. And Scientific American editor George Musser discusses the March 26th Isaac Asimov Memorial Debate at the American Museum of Natural History that dealt with the discrepency between the calculated and actual positions of the Pioneer spacecraft. Plus we'll test your knowledge about some recent science in the news.

In this episode, the J. Craig Venter Institute's senior computational biologist Douglas Rusch talks about the Global Ocean Sampling Expedition's genomic treasure hunt and the first batch of research results that just came out. We'll also talk about an analysis of pharmaceutical agents in the Journal of Natural Products that showed that the majority of approved agents in the last quarter century are still derived from natural products. Plus we'll test your knowledge about some recent science in the news. Websites mentioned include http://www.plos.org; http://collections.plos.org/plosbiology/gos-2007.php; http://pubs.acs.org/journals/jnprdf

In this episode, Stanford University's Chip Heath talks about his book Made To Stick, which discusses the secrets behind crafting messages and ideas that capture the imagination; and Nick Goddard discusses the experiment he did to find out how far he could bike on the energy equivalent to that in a gallon of gasoline. Plus we'll test your knowledge about some recent science in the news. Websites mentioned include www.madetostick.com; /www.transalt.org; www.betterworldclub.com

In this episode, the Wildlife Conservation Society's Stephen Sautner and John Delaney talk about the appearance of a beaver in New York City for the first time in 200 years and journalist and author Alan Weisman talks about our reaction to the event and other similar stories. Elaine McSherry, winner of the AccesScience '07 competition, explains why it's good to be explain science. Plus we'll test your knowledge about some recent science in the news.

In this episode, Scientific American contributing editor Wayt Gibbs talks about a session at the recent meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science devoted to the question of scientific authority: who has it, how they got it and what the public should know about it. Plus we'll read listener mail, talk about the movie Something The Lord Made (which depicts the first heart surgeries) and test your knowledge about some recent science in the news. Websites mentioned on this episode include www.aaas.org; www.sciamdigital.com; www.sciam.com/news; www.hbo.com/films/stlm

In this episode, TV essayist and radio host Mo Rocca talks about the science of comedy and vice versa; and journalist Corinna Wu reports on the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Plus we'll test your knowledge about some recent science in the news. Websites mentioned on this episode include www.sirius.com; www.aaas.org; www.tinyurl.com/33x2ww

In this episode, Scientific American Mind contributing editor Robert Epstein talks about the pitfalls and potential of online dating. And Myelin Repair Foundation founder Scott Johnson talks about how the foundation is accelerating the search for multiple sclerosis therapies, as well as serving as a model for a new kind of biomedical research approach. Plus we'll test your knowledge about some recent science in the news. Websites mentioned on this episode include www.sciam.com; www.sciammind.com; www.myelinrepair.org

In this episode, SciAm.com associate editor David Biello discusses the report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released last week in Paris; Academy Award Winner and Dolby Laboratories Senior VP Ioan Allen talks about the cyan dye audio track innovation that will be honored Saturday at the Scientific And Technical Academy Awards ceremony. Plus we'll test your knowledge about some recent science in the news. Websites mentioned on this episode include www.sciam.com; blog.sciam.com; www.sciammind.com

In this episode, journalist Michael Antonoff, author of the article Digital TV At Last? in the February issue of Scientific American, talks about the upcoming switch to all digital television broadcasting, scheduled to take place February 17, 2009; SciAm.com associate editor David Biello discusses the war being waged between open access science journals and those that charge readers; and Scientific American magazine editor Mark Alpert gives us the lowdown on how the last Congress's failure to pass a budget has left Fermi National Laboratory in the lurch. Plus we'll test your knowledge about some recent science in the news. Websites mentioned on this episode include www.sciam.com; blog.sciam.com; www.sciammind.com

In this episode, food ingredient expert Roger A. Clemens discusses research suggesting that coffee drinking has numerous beneficial health effects. Scientific American editor-in-chief John Rennie talks about pseudoscience and paranormal debunker The Amazing Randi's skeptic conference last weekend in Las Vegas. Plus we'll test your knowledge about some recent science in the news. Websites mentioned on this episode include www.ift.org; blog.sciam.com; www.sciam.com/news

In this episode, mathematician Michael Jones talks about improved methodologies for cake cutting. (It involves the equitability of the division, not the sharpness of the knife.) Los Alamos National Laboratory theoretician Eli Ben-Naim talks about relative competitiveness of professional team sports and devising more efficient schedules. Plus we'll test your knowledge about some recent science in the news. Websites mentioned on this episode include www.sciam.com/podcast; http://cnls.lanl.gov/~ebn; http://www.ams.org/notices/200611/fea-brams.pdf; http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa006&colID=15&articleID=1373A988-E7F2-99DF-3DF48A64628C76E9