New Scientist The Big Interview: Recent Episodes
New Scientist
Hear the stories of influential people who've made their mark in the worlds of science and culture. Through in-depth conversations with notable figures, explore everything from climate change, to philosophy, space and biology. Produced by Right Angles.
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We like to think of science and medicine as unbiased, unaffected by social constructs. But we see evidence to the contrary everyday, from false yet persistent claims that black people’s bones are denser to the reality that the covid-19 pandemic disproportionately impacted people of colour.
In her debut book Systemic: How Racism is Making Us Ill, science journalist Layal Liverpool explores the health consequences of racism. She showcases how fatal stereotypes can leave people of colour in need of medical care undiagnosed, untreated and unsafe.
In this episode, Liverpool explains how race and racism infiltrate every aspect of health – from living in polluted areas to being dismissed by doctors in the hospital. She lays out the problematic history of medicine and health science. And she highlights the many ways people are beginning to make meaningful change.
To read about subjects like this and much more, visit newscientist.com.
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If (or maybe when) we find alien life in the universe, will it look like us? As telescopes become bigger, our ability to peer into the cosmos is only getting better. So the question may not be “will we find something?” but rather “what exactly should we be looking for?”
Lisa Kaltenegger is an astrophysicist and founding director of Cornell University's Carl Sagan Institute. She even works out of Sagan’s old office and shares the same optimism and enthusiasm he brought to the search for extraterrestrial life.
Abby Beall speaks to her about her new book Alien Earths: Planet Hunting in the Cosmos, which takes readers on a cosmic adventure to faraway exoplanets with oceans of lava and multiple suns.
Through the conversation Lisa explains how Earth’s geological history can help inform our search for life, while acknowledging alien life may not look the same as us. She discusses the technology that has allowed us to enter a new epoch of exploration – and what technological advancements are needed to help advance our search for alien life. And she examines the alien worlds that feature in various science fiction worlds, like those in Star Wars and Avatar, and whether they could actually exist somewhere in the universe.
To read about subjects like this and much more, visit newscientist.com.
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From Dune to The Three Body Problem, is science fiction having a moment? Attention to the genre, as well as TV and films based on it, seems to have exploded in the past few years. With sci-fi often getting a bad rap, it’s time to ditch the snobbery and celebrate its complexity and diversity. And who better to do this with than New Scientist’s science fiction columnist – and our former editor – Emily H. Wilson?
Wilson is a journalist and author. In 2023 she published Inanna, the first of The Sumerians, a trilogy set in the ancient civilisation of Sumer. The books are an epic, speculative retelling of some of the oldest myths ever recorded.
In this episode, Rowan Hooper speaks to Wilson about the enduring popularity of the genre, and why you should be proud to call yourself a science fiction fan. Plus, the pair share loads of recommendations and explore sci-fi’s many different sub-genres, from climate fiction to cyberpunk.
You can learn more about Emily’s trilogy, The Sumerians, here.
To read about subjects like this and much more, visit newscientist.com.
Books mentioned:
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Three Body Problem, Cixin Liu
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Children of Time, Adrian Tchaikovsky
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Ancillary Justice, Anne Leckie
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Annie Bot, Sierra Greer
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Dune, Frank Herbert
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The Chrysalids, John Wyndham
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Day of the Triffids, John Wyndham
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The Dispossessed, Ursula K. Le Guin
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The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin
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The Man in the High Castle, Philip K. Dick
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Neuromancer, William Gibson
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Burning Chrome, William Gibson
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Mars, Kim Stanley Robinson
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Red Moon, Kim Stanley Robinson
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2312, Kim Stanley Robinson
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The Ministry for the Future, Kim Stanley Robinson
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Parable of the Sower, Octavia Butler
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Patternmaster, Octavia Butler
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The Broken Earth, N. K. Jemisin
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Middlemarch, George Eliot
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Impressions of Theophrastus Such, George Eliot
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Service Model, Adrian Tchaikovsky
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Autonomous, Annalee Newitz
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Excession, Iain M. Banks
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A World Out of Time, Larry Niven
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Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card
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The Ballad of Halo Jones, Alan Moore and Ian Gibson
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Tank Girl, Alan Martin and Jamie Hewlett
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How do we understand the stakes of climate change, and communicate them? As we’re facing the consequences of climate change and our historical inaction as a species, how do we come to terms with the reality and uncertainty of our situation?
In H is for Hope: Climate Change from A to Z, Journalist and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Elizabeth Kolbert breaks things down for us, alphabetically. She dissects the narratives around climate change, from sobering facts about our warming planet, to innovations to fuel our optimism.
In this episode, Kolbert reminds us how dangerous our current situation is, and what we are missing in this fight – including gaps in our understanding of how fast the climate is changing. Plus, the role of narratives in shaping how we decide to act.
To read about subjects like this and much more, visit newscientist.com.
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How much faith should we be putting in artificial intelligence? As large language models and generative AI have become increasingly powerful in recent years, their makers are pushing the narrative that AI is a solution to many of the world’s problems.
But Meredith Broussard says we’re not there yet, if we even get there at all. Broussard is the author of More than a Glitch: Confronting Race, Gender, and Ability Bias in Tech. She coined the term “technochauvinism,” which speaks to a pro-technology bias humans often have, where we believe technological solutions are superior to anything else.
In this episode, she tells New Scientist’s Sophie Bushwick that our trust in AI systems could have devastating consequences.
From discriminatory mortgage-approval algorithms, to the racial biases of facial recognition technology, to the misinformation that appears in chatbots like ChatGPT, Broussard explains why there’s no such thing as trustworthy AI. And she discusses the need for greater education about AI, to help us separate reality from marketing.
To read about subjects like this and much more, visit newscientist.com.
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Half of the human population undergoes the menstrual cycle for a significant proportion of their lifetimes, yet periods remain a taboo topic in public and private life. And that makes it harder both to prioritise necessary scientific research into conditions like endometriosis and for people to understand the basics of how their bodies work.
Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation isgynaecologist Jen Gunter’s latest book. In this practical guide, she dispels social, historical and medical myths about menstruation and offers answers to your biggest period-related questions – including why we menstruate in the first place, when a missed period is a health concern and “how heavy is too heavy?”
In this episode, Christie Taylor speaks to Gunter about how humans are part of an exclusive club of menstruators in the animal kingdom, the persisting social stigma around menstruation and menopause, and why these processes remain under-researched in science despite their vast importance. Plus, a call from Gunter to take seriously the very individual and sometimes painful experiences people may have with their periods, while also creating more access to menstrual care.
To read about subjects like this and much more, visit newscientist.com.
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Fish you wear like a gas mask, moss that turns a robot sentient and critters that will eat your rash – all these oddities and more cohabit on the planet Vesta, the setting for the animated miniseries Scavengers Reign, where a group of human space travellers must innovate with what they find in the landscape to survive. While all this sounds fantastical, there are many parallels with Earth’s ecosystem and the way we regularly borrow technology from the natural world.
New Scientist physics reporter Karmela Padavic-Callaghan often writes about biomimicry and bio-inspired devices and has been fascinated by the symbiotic, connected ecosystem the show portrays.In this episode, they speak to biophysicist Saad Bhamla and ecologist Meghan Brown about the the science that underpins the series and how surprisingly close to reality some of the ecological interactions are. Plus how even fantastical fiction can shape a scientific mind.
To read about subjects like this and much more, visit newscientist.com.
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There’s no moon like our moon. A celestial body twinned with Earth, the moon guides the tides, stabilises our climate, leads the rhythms of animal behaviour and has long been a source of wonder and awe.
Our Moon: How Earth's Celestial Companion Transformed the Planet, Guided Evolution, and Made Us Who We Are, is a new book from science journalist Rebecca Boyle. In it she takes an intimate look at our satellite and how it’s influenced everything from our species’ understanding of long cycles of time to the development of science itself.
In this episode, Christie Taylor speaks to Boyle about many wonderful and lesser known facts about the moon, like the magic of solar eclipses and how it’s only by chance that we get to experience them. Plus, how the moon may have been responsible for war-time tragedy – and even our own evolution.
To read about subjects like this and much more, visit newscientist.com.
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Philip Pullman had been writing books for years before he became a global sensation with the His Dark Materials trilogy. The story of two children crossing into parallel worlds in a quest to understand the nature of reality and humanity, the novels draw on fantasy as well as theology, physics and neuroscience, and are strongly influenced by the work of William Blake and John Milton. He is following up the trilogy with three more books, the second of which, The Secret Commonwealth, was published in 2019. New Scientist’s Rowan Hooper met with Pullman at his home in Oxford. https://www.newscientist.com/podcasts
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We have one decade left to change our ways, to curb carbon emissions and unsustainable practices that are heating the planet and destroying biodiversity. Rebecca Shaw is chief scientist of conservation charity WWF, and as a graduate student she set up the world’s first climate change ecology experiment, in the Rocky Mountains. Big Interview host Rowan Hooper met her in London before the coronavirus lockdown to talk about staying positive amid the inaction on climate change and biodiversity, about her life in biology and about her hopes for the future. https://www.newscientist.com/podcasts
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Caroline Criado-Perez is a British feminist, activist, author and journalist. Last year, she made waves with her book, Invisible Women. In that, she described how women get overlooked in many different areas of life, from government policies and urban planning, to transport algorithms and even medical research. She showed that there’s an underlying assumption that the male body and the male experience is the default, and the female experience is some kind of unusual outlier - rather than representing half the world’s population. Our reporter Clare Wilson wanted to know how these systematic biases are impacting on women as the world copes with coronavirus. For example, as Criado Perez says, coronavirus affects men and women differently, and many countries are not collecting sex-disaggregated data on covid-19. https://www.newscientist.com/podcasts
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The latest episode of The big interview features climate activist Greta Thunberg. Arguably one of the world’s most influential people, and certainly one of the most famous teenagers, Greta launched the school strikes for climate in 2018, which have since gone global. Her strike started outside the Swedish parliament when she was 15. Since then she’s addressed the United Nations and been nominated twice for the Nobel Peace Prize. Now, because of the global threat of coronavirus, she’s taken her activism, and the strikes, online. In a wide-ranging and intimate conversation, New Scientist's Adam Vaughan spoke to Greta about coronavirus, her dawning understanding at eight years old about the climate crisis, how she was raised, and what it’s like being so famous. https://www.newscientist.com/podcasts
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Brian Greene is an American theoretical physicist, mathematician and string theorist. Despite tackling some of the most ‘out there’ questions in science, Brian is able to break down his work into relatable information. A multiple bestselling author, his latest book is ‘Until The End of Time: Mind, Matter and our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe’. In this engaging conversation, Brian explains his belief that there is no definitive meaning to life, and suggests that people should focus on how incredible it is that we exist at all. Despite acknowledging that many of the questions he raises in his career will probably remain unanswered for centuries, Brian says the hope of gleaning some insight into the universe’s big unknowns is what keeps him going. He digs into every area of existence imaginable, from questions of life, religion, the flow of time and the origin of the universe. This conversation will make you question everything you know about yourself – Do you have free will? Are you truly conscious? – and yet you’ll still come away feeling empowered.
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Christiana Figueres and Tom Rivett-Carnac are two of the most influential people in the global climate movement, and led the negotiations for the historic Paris Agreement in 2015. In their new book, ‘The Future We Choose’, they set out the best and worst case scenarios for the future of our planet, based on the decisions we make now on carbon emissions. In this passionate conversation, Christiana makes it clear that the power to change the world is in our hands, saying. “We have to unleash our stewardship of this planet, to bring it back into the safe zone.” Tom explains the excitement of being at the fulcrum of such an urgent cause, with the chance to do something remarkable, adding that “people need to realise the privilege of living at this moment”. Christiana and Tom tell host Rowan Hooper how they met, how they both came to practice Buddhism, and what their hopes are for the future of the planet. Find out more at www.newscientist.com. And you can hear Christiana and Tom’s podcast, Outrage & Optimism, here.
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