Lab Out Loud®

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Randy Olson (Credit: Sandy Huffaker for the New York Times

For our 100th podcast interview (including 52 interviews with Periodicity), we talk with former marine biologist turned filmmaker and author Randy Olson.  Since we last talked with Randy about Flock of Dodos, he has since put out another movie (Sizzle: A Global Warming Comedy) and a book (Don’t Be Such a Scientist: ).  We talk with Randy about his new book and the importance of how scientists communicate.

We’d like to thank NSTA for their continued support of Lab Out Loud.  If you haven’t already done so, make sure to join or renew your membership.  If you have any comments from our third season, or have any suggestions for next year, please contact us.

Links:

• Don’t Be Such a Scientist
• Randy Olson – Wikipedia Entry
• Don’t Be Such a Scientist
• Don’t Be Such a Scientist (amazon.com)
• Don’t Be Such a Scientist (Facebook group)
• Sizzle: A Global Warming Comedy
• Flock of Dodos
• Muffymoose.com
• Eager to Tell Stories of Science, a Biologist Evolves (NY Times)
• Invisibly Emptied Oceans (Dot Earth, NY Times)
• Their Own Worst Enemies
• Science-Based Medicine (book review)
• Randy Olson’s Forthcoming Book: Don’t Be Such a Scientist (book review)
• WSST’s Periodicity
• Periodicity Episode 46: Flock of Dodos

Barnacle Sex Music Video (Barnacles Tell No Lies)

Direct download: LOL48.mp3

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Daniel Loxton

Our guest this week is Daniel Loxton, editor of Junior Skeptic and author/illustrator.  Daniel joins us to talk about Junior Skeptic, shepherding and his new book: Evolution: How we and all Things Came to Be.

Links:

• Wikipedia Entry on Daniel Loxton
• Evolution: How we and all Things Came to Be (Amazon.com)
• Junior Skeptic Explains Evolution (Wired)
• Junior Skeptic
• Follow Daniel on Twitter

Praise From GeekDad (Wired):

Evolution

Daniel Loxton’s Evolution: How We and All Living Things Came to Be (Kids Can Press, 2010) is the best overview of evolution for children of which I’m aware.  There have been other recent kids’ books on Darwin, motivated by last year’s 150th anniversary of Origin of the Species.  Instead of focusing on Darwin, Loxton sticks with explaining the mechanics of natural selection, both what it can accomplish and explain and what it can’t.  Beautifully illustrated and elegantly written, any child interested in the story of life will be fascinated by it. There’s no need to take my word for it: This review is a couple of weeks later than I’d hoped, because my 6-yr-old kept stealing it and carrying it around the house to study.






Direct download: LOL47.mp3

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Paleontologist Scott

You may know this week’s guest as Paleontologist Scott from the PBS hit show “Dinosaur Train”. In episode 46, Paleontologist Scott talks about the show, being a paleontologist, and his new book Dinosaur Odyssey.

Links:

• Scott Sampson’s Website
• Purchase Dinosaur Odyssey: Fossil Threads in the Web of Life
• Dinosaur Train (PBS)
• Dinsosaur Train Videos
• Dinosaur Train (Wikipedia Entry)
• Dinosaur Fossil Reveals True Feather Colors (wired.com)
• Listen to Colouring in Dinosaurs (Quirks and Quarks)
• Masiakausaurus
• Dinosaur Planet (IMDB)

Dinosaur Train Characters "Buddy" and "Tiny"

Direct download: LOL46.mp3

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Nicholas Wade

This week we talk with Nicholas Wade, author and science writer for the New York Times.  Nicholas talks with us about his new book (The Faith Instinct), recent science breakthroughs and what to expect in the coming year.

Links:

• Articles by Nicholas Wade from the NY Times
• nicholas-wade.com
  
• Wikipedia Entry on Nicholas Wade
• The Faith Instinct (on Amazon.com)
• Before the Dawn (on Amazon.com)
• An Interview with Nicholas Wade from PLoS Genetics
• An Interview with Nicholas Wade from the Scientist
• Listen to our Interview with Nicholas Wade about his book “Before the Dawn” (from our previous podcast: Periodicity)
• See Nicholas Wade on The Colbert Report

Direct download: LOL41.mp3

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Sean Carroll (physicist) and Sean B. Carroll (biologist) talk to us about their respective science fields, science education and being Sean Carroll.  (NOTE: Scientists displayed below in alphabetical order)

Links:

• “Sean” data from Wolfram Alpha
• “Sean Carroll” Google Search
• Sean Carroll on Google News

Sean B Carroll

Sean B. Carroll (biologist)

• seanbcarroll.com
• Sean B. Carroll’s Lab
• About Sean B. Carroll
• HHMI Investigator Bio
• Remarkable Creatures – NY Times Column
• The Science of Evolution (video from the New York Times)
• What Darwin Never Knew (PBS)
• “Year of Darwin” You Tube Video
• Lecture Video from Q2C Festival
• Sean B Carroll at Scientific Commons
• Sean B Carroll Author Page at Amazon.com
• Lab Out Loud, Episode 2: Sean B. Carroll
• Lab Out Loud, Episode 26: Stories of Evolution
• Sean B. Carroll on Resurrecting the Extinct
  (60 Minutes – 01/10/10)

Sean M Carroll

Sean M Carroll (physicist)

• Preposterous Universe
• About Sean Carroll
• Sean M Carroll at Caltech
• Sean M Carroll (Wikipedia Entry)
• Blog / Cosmic Variance (Discover Magazine)
• Upcoming Book: From Eternity to Here
• Textbook: Spacetime and Geometry
• Lecture Video from Q2C Festival
• Lecture Notes on General Relativity
• Cosmology Primer
• Video Lecture on DVD: Dark Matter, Dark Energy
• Sean M Carroll at Scientific Commons
• Sean M Carroll Author Page at Amazon.com

Direct download: LOL40.mp3

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Dr. Sean B. Carroll returns to the show this week to celebrate Darwin Day (Feb. 12, 2009).  With two new books out (Remarkable Creatures and Into the Jungle), Dr. Carroll discusses the power of storytelling in teaching science.  In fact, he even treats us with a story of how Darwin, Alfred Russell Wallace and Henry Walter Bates all contributed in developing the theory of evolution.

Brian and Dr. Carroll

Links:

• seanbcarroll.com
• Sean B. Carroll’s Lab
• About Sean B. Carroll
• The Science of Evolution (video from the New York Times)

Books:

• Remarkable Creatures (at amazon.com)
• Into the Jungle (at amazon.com)
• The Making of the Fittest (at amazon.com)
• Endless Forms Most Beautiful (at amazon.com)

• Read and Download full text of On the Origin of Species
• Download On the Origin of Species Audiobook from Librivox
  

Other Darwin/Evolution Coverage:

• NY Times: Evolution
• Nature Celebrates Darwin 200
• Discover Magazine does Darwin
• 12 Elegant Examples of Evolution from Wired Magazine
• Darwin and Wallace Shift the Paradigm from wired.com
• All of Science Owes Debt to Darwin from the San Francisco Chronicle
• The Evolution of Darwin’s Theory from the LA Times
• I Am Evolution (from NPR’s This I Believe)
• Darwin, Britain’s Hero, is still Controversial in US (from NPR)
• Celebration Darwin’s Evolution Revolution (NPR)
• At Home with Darwin… 200 Years On (BBC)
• National Geographic: What Darwin Didn’t Know
• National Geographic: Modern Darwins
  
• National Geographic: Darwin’s First Clues
• National Geographic: The Man Who Wasn’t Darwin (Wallace)
• Evolution Wine

Direct download: LOL26.mp3

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Dr. Eugenie Scott

In response to the movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, we decided to talk with someone who has invested her life defending evolution. Dr. Eugenie Scott, Director for the National Center for Science Education, talks to us about the movie, the NCSE response, and the place of evolution in science education.

• National Center for Science Education
• Expelled Exposed: Flunked, Not Expelled – What Ben Stein isn’t telling you about Intelligent Design
• Ben Stein: “Science Leads you to Killing People”
• Doonesbury Comic regarding medicine and Intelligent Design
• The Post-Crescent: It’s Your Call

• PZ Myers (Pharyngula) gets expelled from Expelled
• Boston Globe: No Intelligence Allowed in ‘Expelled’
• Scientific American: Expelled Explained
• Expelled Producers Accused of Copyright Infringement

Direct download: nstalol15.mp3

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PZ Myers

In this episode, we chat with PZ Myers – lead author of the blog Pharyngula (Pharyngula is hosted at Science Blogs – a project from Seed Magazine). Myers is a biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota, Morris.

• Contact Information at UM Morris
• Curriculum Vitae
• Personal Page
• Profile on Nature Network
• Pharyngula Galleries
• Articles written by PZ Myers at Seed Magazine
• 2006 Weblog Award Winner: Best Science Blog

Preview from the Show:
Myers: What you want to do with a blog – it’s such an informal medium – if you get all stuffy and treat it as something where you are going to write a formal treatise everyday, I don’t think you’ll get as much interest. So by keeping it personal, keeping it human, what I think I’ve done is open up a little window into a science professor’s life, which is sometimes scary, but fun.

Basler: Do you think that this type of casual communication [blogging] is something really important that the students are going to need in the future, or was it just an experiment to try out because you were blogging?
Myers: Oh it’s both. I mean, this is a brave new medium. I’m trying new things; I wanna explore this and see what we can do with our students. But I also think it’s important for the future of science and science education – that what we want is active, involved learners at every stage of the game. And if this is a way that we can get people talking about science, then that’s a huge step – that’s important.

Myers: My schedule’s turning into a frightening thing; it’s getting so packed full of requests to talk, but I try to indulge in as much as possible.
Bartel: So you’re working on Darwin Day instead of enjoying it, is what you’re saying?
Myers: Well, getting up in front of an audience and talking about evolution and talking about science, talking about philosophy in these ideas – that’s not working is it?

Links:

• Wikipedia Entry
• The Mad Scientist (from Minneapolis/St. Paul City Pages)
• Monkey’s Uncle (from Minneapolis/St. Paul City Pages)
• PZ Myers on Richard Dawkins (from Seed Magazine)
• Interview with DailyKos
• Interview by John Horgan
• DarwinDay.org
• Darwin Day Celebration at Lawrence University – February 9, 2008

Books Discussed on the Show:

• Your Inner Fish by Neil Shubin
• The Reluctant Mr. Darwin by David Quammen

Direct download: nstalol9.mp3

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Dr. Sean B. Carroll

Dr. Sean B. Carroll (Professor of Molecular Biology and Genetics and an Investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at the University of Wisconsin) talks to us about evolution, his new project, and science literacy.

Direct download: nstalol2.mp3