The Wow! Signal Podcast: Recent Episodes
Paul Carr
The Wow!Signal Podcast examines a wide range of issues from a scientific perspective through the lens of the search for intelligent life from other worlds.
Interview recorded: 11 July 2021
Released: 16 July 2021
Duration: 21 minutes, 33 seconds
Beatriz Villarroel discusses her latest VASCO paper in Nature Scientific Reports, "Exploring nine simultaneously occurring transients on April 12th 1950."
Links: Villarroel+ , Exploring Nine simultaneously occurring transients on April 12th 1950.
Burst 19: Our Sky Now and Then (August 2016)
Episode 41: The Vanishing Sources with Beatriz Villarroel (November 2019)
The Vanishing & Appearing Sources during a Century of Observations project: I. USNO objects missing in modern sky surveys and follow-up observations of a "missing star
The Palomar Digital Sky Survey
Gran Telescopio Canarias
The United States Nuclear Testing Program
Credits Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Ahleuchatistas and Erika Lloyd
Released: 4 February 2021
Duration: 58 minutes 44 seconds
Co-hosts Paul Carr and Daniela DePaulis are joined by author Thomas Moynihan. The subject is the idea of human extinction and how it evolved into our present day understand of Existential Risk.
Guest Bio: I am a writer and researcher from the UK. In 2019, I completed a PhD at Oriel College on the history of human extinction. Currently, I am a visiting Research Associate in History at St Benet's College, Oxford University, and I am working for Oxford's Future of Humanity Institute with a grant from the Berkeley Existential Risk Initiative.
I am interested in the history of existential risk and of existential hope: that is, how people first came to understand the perils and promises that face us as a species. I see this as the central philosophical drama of the modern world: how we came to appreciate our position—and precarity—as intelligent beings within an otherwise seemingly silent and sterile universe.
My goal is to reveal how contemporary research into global risks can be seen as part of the wider story of our ‘coming of age’ as a civilisation and a species.
Links: Thomas Moynihan - https://thomasmoynihan.xyz
X-Risk at MIT Press: https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/x-risk
Mary Shelley - The Last Man
Churchill - Shall We All Commit Suicide?
The Order of the Dolphin
Frank Drakę: A Speculation on the Influence of Biological Immortality on SETI
Natural Selection of Stellar Civilizations by the Limits of Growth
The Jaws of Darkness
The Ethics of METI
Credits: Co-hosts: Paul Carr and Daniela De Paulis
Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Sun Ra and his Intergalactic Solar Arkestra, DJ Spooky
Released: 28 November 2020
Duration: 70 minutes, 39 seconds
Co-hosts Paul Carr and Daniela De Paulis engage philosopher Chelsea Haramia on the ethics of sending signals into space that might be received by intelligent beings in the cosmos.
For more information about this episode, include a rich set of links, please see the blog entry for Episode 48 at:
https://wowsignalpodcast.com
Guest Bio Chelsea Haramia received her PhD in philosophy from the University of Colorado at Boulder, where she specialized in ethics. She is now an assistant professor in the philosophy department at Spring Hill College. She is also co-editor of the online journal 1000-Word Philosophy, which houses a growing set of original 1000-word essays on philosophical questions, figures, and arguments aimed at an audience of philosophers and non-philosophers alike. She has published in the areas of normative ethics, bioethics, animal ethics, aesthetics, feminist philosophy, and astrobiology ethics. Her current work involves ethical and metaethical analyses of space exploration and of the search for intelligent life in particular.
Credits: Co-hosts: Paul Carr and Daniel De Paulis
Producer: Paul Carr
Music: DJ Spooky, Nest, Erika Lloyd.
The Wow! Signal is published under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike license.
Released: 7 November 2020
Duration: 57 minutes, 36 seconds
Co hosts Paul Carr and Daniela De Paulis welcome space historian David Skogerboe to talk about the pro-space activism of Arthur C. Clarke.
Guest Bio: David Skogerboe is a space historian and science communicator. He recently earned his MSc in the History and Philosophy of Science from Utrecht University in the Netherlands, where he focused his research on the intersection of space science, science fiction, and science communication. During his masters, he interned at the NASA History Division in Washington DC, where he spent countless hours perusing the most interesting historical reference collections on the planet. He is presently a freelance writer and editor while he awaits the emergence of his first child, and he hopes to soon begin a PhD and a fruitful career as a professional nerd.
Links: The Godfather of Satellites: Arthur C. Clarke and the Battle for Narrative Space in the Popular Culture of Spaceflight, 1945-1995, David Skogerboe, full master's thesis
Apollo 12: Why Don't You Know Me? You Should., David Skogerboe, NASA News & Notes
Wireless World Feb. & Oct. 1945, Scans of Clarke's articles proposing the geostationary satellite
How the World Was One: Beyond the Global Village, Arthur C. Clarke (1992), Clarke's overview of the impact of communication technology on society
The Making of a Moon: The Story of the Earth Satellite Program, Arthur C. Clarke (1957), Clarke's pre-history of satellite technology, first published before Sputnik
The Fountains of Paradise, Arthur C. Clarke (1979), Clarke's sci-fi that features the space elevator and "project clean-up"
Arthur C. Clarke's official website
An expansive bibliography of Clarke's work. An impressive reminder of just how hard he pushed to propel humans into space, and keep them there.
Credits: Co-hosts: Paul Carr and Daniela De Paulis
Music: DJ Spooky and Lloyd Rogers
Released: 6 April 2020
Duration: 53 minutes, 55 seconds
Author and podcaster Wade Roush talks about his forthcoming book from MIT Press, Extraterrestrials. The book covers astrobiology, SETI, the Fermi paradox and more for a literate but non-specialist audience.
WADE ROUSH, a Boston-based science and technology journalist, is a columnist at Scientific American and the producer and host of Soonish, an independent podcast about the future. He has served as Boston bureau reporter for Science, senior editor and San Francisco bureau chief at MIT Technology Review, chief correspondent and San Francisco editor for Xconomy, and acting director of MIT’s Knight Science Journalism program. He holds a PhD in the history and social study of science and technology from MIT.
For more information, please visit us at https://wowsignalpodcast.com
Links: The Extraterrestrial page at MIT Press
Six Strange Facts about Oumuamua
Sofia Sheikh and the Nine Axes
The Vanishing Sources
Where is Everybody?
Stephen Webb's Book on the Fermi Paradox
Natalie Cabrol
Seth Shostak on the Zoo Hypothesis
The MIT Technology Review
The Hub and Spoke Podcast Network
The Soonish podcast
The podcast contact page
Wow! Signal Live
Credits Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Lloyd Rogers and Jason Robinson
The Wow! Signal is released under the Creative Commons Attribution License
Released: 31 March 2020
Duration: 54 minutes, 8 seconds
Co-hosts Paul Carr and Daniela DePaulis welcome Dr. Paola Castaño to talk about her research among the science teams working on the International Space Station.
For more information, please visit our blog at https://wowsignalpodcast.com
Guest Bio Paola Castaño is a sociologist of science. She recently completed a Newton International Fellow funded by The British Academy at Cardiff University and is working on a book about the meanings and valuations of scientific research on the International Space Station. On the basis of ethnographic work following the life course of experiments sent to the station, the book examines the fields of particle physics, plant biology and biomedical research. She has a PhD in sociology from the University of Chicago, and has been a postdoctoral researcher at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum in Washington DC, the Free University of Berlin, and Waseda University in Tokyo.
Links: The International Space Station goes under the microscope
Human Research Program Investigators’ Workshop 2020: Day 1
Cosmic-ray positron fraction measurement from 1 to 30 GeV with AMS-01
Scott Kelly’s genes and NASA’s twin study on him, explained
Keyworkers
Daniela De Paulis on the Unseen Podcast
Daniela De Paulis discusses Cogito in Episode 35.
Cogito in Space
Castaño's article on Cogito
The Wow! Signal podcast on Reddit
Our YouTube Channel
Credits: Co-hosts: Paul Carr and Daniela De Paulis
Producer: Paul Carr
Music: DJ Spooky, Blue Dot Sessions, Lee Maddeford, and Lloyd Rogers
Released: 20 March 2020
Duration: 31 minutes, 42 seconds
Astronomer David Blank responded to our invitation to comment on the Villarroel+ paper we covered in Episode 41, which he describes as "very fascinating."
Links The VASCO project: I. USNO objects missing in modern sky surveys and follow-up observations of a "missing star"
Dorrit Hoffleit and her autobiography: Misfortunes as Blessings in Disguise
Bradley Schaefer and the Harvard Plates
Josh Grindlay, PI of DASCH
The Very Large Array Sky Survey
The VASCO Citizen Science Project
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Lloyd Rogers
Released: 22 January 2020
Live recording: 20 January 2020
Duration: 66 minutes 45 seconds
Thread: Astronomy and Astrophysics
Host Paul Carr along with Daniela De Paulis and Ciro Villa welcome astronomer Stella Kafka, director of the American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO). We talk about the recent and possibly unprecedented dimming of Betelgeuse, among many other astronomy topics.
For complete show notes, please visit https://wowsignalpodcast.com
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Panelists: Daniela De Paulis, Ciro Villa
Music: Claudio Nuñes, Felipe Sarro (playing Ravel)
Software: Zoom, OBS, Auphonic, Reaper, OS X Mojave
Hardware: Apple, Shure, Focusrite, Cloud, Elgato, Logitech
Released:
Duration: 55 minutes, 36 seconds
Adam Dipert is a veteran circus performer and dancer who recently received his PhD in physics from Arizona State University. Her has brought his various interests together by researching human movement in microgravity. We are going to let him tell you all about that.
Adam will be presenting about this work at the Conference for Research on Choreographic Interfaces in Providence, Rhode Island, USA at Brown University, March 5-7 2020. Link to conference here: http://www.choreotech.com/vision Links: Flower Sticks
Zero G
Kitsou Dubois
Orienting Beyond Gravity: Training with Kitsou Dubois
Partner Stilting Acrobatics
A video of Adam in Zero G
Skylab Astronauts Doing Gymnastics in Zero G
The Froude Number
Kristina isabelle
Credits: Co-hosts: Daniela DePaulis and Paul Carr
Producer Paul Carr
Music: DJ Spooky
This podcast is released under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike license.
Released: 11 December 2019
Duration: 48 minutes, 30 seconds
Co-hosts Daniela DePaulis and Paul Carr welcome Julia DeMarines (@LifeNSpace) to talk about bouncing radio signals off the moon. Julia is involved in a moon bounce research project for Berkeley SETI, and Daniela has used moonbounce in her art projects, including Cogito.
We also get into a discussion of METI, and the importance of message composition to humans.
For more information, please visit https://wowisgnalpodcast.com
Guest bio: Julia DeMarines is an Astrobiologist and science communicator working at the UC Berkeley SETI Research Center and with Blue Marble Space. She is a 2019 National Geographic Explorer and 2018 Grosvenor Teacher Fellow, and a 2019 AGU Voices for Science advocate. Her research involves detecting life in the Universe through biosignatures and technosignatures and the ethics of sending powerful, intentional messages into space. She is passionate about inspiring the next generation of scientists and teaches to underserved students around the world through the Ad Astra Academy. Julia also runs her own outreach events called “Space in Your Face!” – a space variety show involving comedy, local artists, and cover songs.
http://juliademarines.com/
Twitter: @LifeNspace
Instagram: @mote_of_dust
Facebook: @JuliaDeMarines
Links Sullivan (1979), Radio leakage and eavesdropping
Sullivan and Knowles(1985), Lunar Reflections of Terrestrial Radio Leakage.
DeMarines+ (2019), Observing the Earth as a Communicating Exoplanet
The One Earth Message
The LUVOIR telescope
The HabEx Observatory
HawkEye 360
David Grinspoon's appearances on this podcast: first, second, third.
Andrew Siemion's appearances: first, second.
Follow Us on Twitter.
Our Discord Server
Dream of the Open Channel
Credits: Co-hosts: Daniela DePaulis and Paul Carr
Producer: Paul Carr
Music: DJ Spooky, Jason Robinson, George Hrab
Software: Zoom, Loopback, Reaper, Focusrite, Auphonic, OS X Mojave
Hardware: Shure, Cloud,Focusrite, Apple.
This podcast is released under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike license.
Released: 15 November 2019
Duration: 42 minutes, 24 seconds
Our guest on Burst 19 in 2016, Dr. Beatriz Villarroel, returns to give us an update on the vanishing star, following the release of a new paper detailing a much more ambitious project along the same lines that finds a number of new candidate objects.
For more information, please visit https://wowsignalpodcast.com
Links: Burst 19: Our Sky Now and Then
Villarroel+: The Vanishing & Appearing Sources during a Century of Observations project: I. USNO objects missing in modern sky surveys and follow-up observations of a "missing star"
The POSS-I Survey
Pan-STARRS
Chasing Disclosure (work of fiction that mentions the earlier research)
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: DJ Spooky and Jason Robinson
Announcer: Erin Carr
This podcast is released under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-alike license.
Released: 16 October 2019
Duration: 54 minutes, 51 seconds
Interstellar Languages is a forthcoming book about the human quest to craft messages that can be understood across interstellar distances. We may want to tell ET about ourselves, or it may be help ET send message to us that we will know how to interpret.
Daniel Oberhaus is a staff writer at Wired Magazine, where he covers space and energy. His first book, Extraterrestrial Languages, will be released by MIT Press on October 22, 2019. For more information, please visit wowsignalpodcast.com
Support the podcast at Patreon.com.
Links MIT Press Page for Interstellar Languages
Daniela DePaulis
The 2017 Sonar message
There is Here
The Risks of METI and Religious Aliens
The Question: the ontological status of mathematics
Credits Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Co-Host: Daniela DiPaulis
Music: DJ Spooky, Jason Robinson, George Hrab
Announcer: Erin Carr
The Wow! Signal is released under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike license
Released: 29 September 2019
Duration: 49 minutes, 52 seconds
Download Sofia's paper here: https://arxiv.org/abs/1908.02683
A conversation with SETI researcher Sofia Sheikh about how we should evaluate technosignature search strategies. We cover three examples of technosignature searches and their relative advantages.
Sofia Sheikh is a third-year graduate student at the Pennsylvania State University working with Dr. Jason Wright. She did her undergraduate work at the University of California, Berkeley, where she became involved with the Breakthrough Listen Initiative. Her work incorporates both theoretical approaches to the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) and observational radio searches for technosignatures. She intends to be the first woman to complete a SETI PhD thesis.
Links The Nine Axes of Merit
Andrew Siemion on SETI at the SKA
Breakthrough Listen
The Truth about Alien Megastructures
Sonar Calling GJ273B
Credits Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Announcer: Erin Carr
Music: DJ Spooky, Erika Lloyd, Jason Robinson
Hardware: Shure, Audio Technica, Pro Art, Behringer, Focusrite, Apple.
Software: Skype, Loopback, Reaper, Auphonic Desktop
Hosting: Libsyn
Released: 18 February 2019
Duration: 6 minutes, 48 seconds
Paul Carr summarizes why we want to know more about this star, and how you can get involved.
Links: Please see wowsignalpodcast.com for the most detailed information.
The Most Mysterious Star in the Universe (Tabby's TED Talk)
Tabby's Star for the Perplexed, Part 1
The Slow and Fast Dimming of Tabby's Star (Brad Schaefer)
Ben Montet Makes a Star Weirder
The KIC8462852_Analysis subreddit
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: DJ Spooky
Released: 10 February 2019
Duration: 16 Minutes, 51 Seconds
Abraham Loeb and Shmuel Bialy kicked up a kerfuffle when they wrote a paper suggesting that one possible explanation for ‘Oumuamua was that it could be an artificial object, in other words, an alien spacecraft—specifically, a lightsail. The two have been praised for their boldness and condemned for their recklessness, but little has been said concerning the possibility of detecting a lightsail as a technosignature in comparison to detecting a “conventional” technosignature such as the radio and laser beacons that SETI searches for. When we look out into the universe for signs of intelligence, if there are technosignatures to be seen, what technologies ought we to expect to be the most common?
Links Stagnant Supercivilizations and Interstellar Travel
“Could Solar Radiation Pressure Explain ‘Oumuamua’s Peculiar Acceleration?” Bialy and Loeb
Predictably, online media go nuts over ‘Oumuamua and Harvard scientists; “Scientists are perfectly happy to publish an outlandish idea.” by Eric Berger
Breakthrough Starshot
lightsail (Wikipedia)
The Interstellar Age: The Story of the NASA Men and Women Who Flew the Forty-Year Voyager Mission by Jim Bell
NASA Voyager 2 Could Be Nearing Interstellar Space
The Great Filter—Are We Almost Past It? by Robin Hanson
SETI as a Process of Elimination
Credits Written and Presented by: Nick Nielsen
Postproduction: Paul Carr
Music: DJ Spooky
This podcast episode is released under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike license
A not quite so short announcement from the producer of the Unseen Podcast and the Wow! Signal. This is for those who have not seen the video.
Unseen Podcast Episode Planning Sheet
Released: 24 April 2018
Duration: 10 minutes, 1 second
Paul Carr talks about today's much more accurate distance estimate to Boyajian's Star from Gaia Data Release 2, and what, if anything, this rules out.
Links: Clemens+ (2018) - Proper Motion of the Faint Star near KIC 8462852 (Boyajian's Star) - Not a Binary System
Boyajian+ (2015) - Where's the Flux?
Interview with Brad Schaefer
Ben Montet Makes a Star Weirder
Castelaz and Barker (2018) - KIC 8462852: Maria Mitchell Observatory Photographic Photometry 1922 to 1991
Gaia DR2
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 23 April 2018
Duration:12 minutes, 21 seconds
Paul Carr reviews what has been happening over the Winter and early Spring with respect to Boyajian's Star. We review the Winter observations, the Castelaz and Barker paper, and the two surprise March dips, Caral-Supe and Evangeline. We also talk about the upcoming Gaia Data Release 2 and what it might mean.
Links Burst 24 and Burst 25
KIC 8462852: Maria Mitchell Observatory Photographic Photometry 1922 to 1991
Where's The Flux?
Bruce Gary's Boyajian's Star Page
Boyajian's R
Gaia DR2
Credits Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 6 February 2018
Duration: 24 minutes, 48 seconds
A hundred years ago cosmologists were struggling to understand the nature and structure of the universe, and at the heart of this struggle was the island universe hypothesis. Today we find ourselves confronted with a similar question posed at a far greater scale. In order to resolve our cosmic archipelago problem we will have to attempt to reconstruct a history of our universe as a part of a far larger cosmological system, and to do this we will have to extend cosmology beyond the observable universe -- but what, exactly, is the observable universe?
Links:
The Cosmic Archipelago, Part I
The Cosmic Archipelago, Part II
Normal science
The Snapshot Effect
Radio Technology and Existential Risk
Boyajian's Star (KIC 8462852)
Supernova iPTF14hls
Przybylski's Star
Scientific Historiography: Past, Present, and Future
The Face of the Past The Face of the Past, Part Two Credits: Writer and Host: Nick Nielsen
Producer and Announcer: Paul Carr
Music: by kind permission of the artist, Jason Robinson
The Wow! Signal is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike license.
Released: 25 January 2018
Duration: 21 minutes, 51 seconds
A hundred years ago cosmologists were struggling to understand the nature and structure of the universe, and at the heart of this struggle was the island universe hypothesis. Today we find ourselves confronted with a similar question posed at a far greater scale. As we confront these great questions of cosmology, whether a hundred years ago or today, we find ourselves faced with as many philosophical questions as scientific questions when we challenge the boundaries of our understanding. In Part II we focus on cosmological scales of time and what this means for human observation of a very old universe.
Links: The Realm of the Nebula, Edwin Hubble Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens, Immanuel Kant The Great Debate The Scale of the Universe, Shapley and Curtis The 1920 Shapley-Curtis Discussion: Background,Issues, and Aftermath, V. Trimble NGC 6822, a remote stellar system, Edwin Hubble
F. H. Bradley deep time Stellar Movements and the Structure of the Universe, Arthur Eddington The Retrodiction Wall Addendum on the Retrodiction Wall Eternity in six hours: Intergalactic spreading of intelligent life and sharpening the Fermi paradox, Stuart Armstrong and Anders Sandberg
The End of Cosmology? Lawrence M. Krauss and Robert J. Scherrer Credits: Writer and Host: Nick Nielsen
Voiceover and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 21 January 2018
Duration: 19 minutes
A hundred years ago cosmologists were struggling to understand the nature and structure of the universe, and at the heart of this struggle was the island universe hypothesis.
Today we find ourselves confronted with a similar question posed at a far greater scale. As we confront these great questions of cosmology, whether a hundred years ago or today, we find ourselves faced with as many philosophical questions as scientific questions when we challenge the boundaries of our understanding. In Part I we focus on the original problems of constructing the cosmological distance ladder.
Links: The Realm of the Nebula, Edwin Hubble Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens, Immanuel Kant The Great Debate The Scale of the Universe, Shapley and Curtis The 1920 Shapley-Curtis Discussion: Background,Issues, and Aftermath, V. Trimble NGC 6822, a remote stellar system, Edwin Hubble
F. H. Bradley deep time Stellar Movements and the Structure of the Universe, Arthur Eddington The Retrodiction Wall Addendum on the Retrodiction Wall Eternity in six hours: Intergalactic spreading of intelligent life and sharpening the Fermi paradox, Stuart Armstrong and Anders Sandberg
The End of Cosmology? Lawrence M. Krauss and Robert J. Scherrer Credits: Writer and Host: Nick Nielsen
Producer and Voiceover: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 3 January 2018
Duration: 15 minutes, 37 seconds
Host Paul Carr goes over the new paper by Tabetha Boyajian and 206 coauthors: The First Post-Kepler Brightness Dips of KIC 8462852.
Links: Burst 13 - Tabby's Star for the Perplexed, part 1
Burst 23 - Tabby Boyajian's on Elsie
Burst 24 - The Summer of Tabby's Star
Where's The Flux
The KIC 8462852 subreddit
The KIC 8462852 subreddit wiki
The Dream of the Open Channel
AAVSO
Boyajians_R
Credits: Host, producer, writer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 31 December 2017
Duration: 65 minutes, 20 seconds
Daniela DePaulis and Nick Nielsen in conversation with Frank White on the Overview Effect.
Detailed show notes To Be Supplied. Please see wowsignalpodcast.com for more information.
Released: 3 December 2017
Duration: 11 minutes 43 seconds
Host Paul Carr covers some recent developments with respect to Boyajian's Star, especially the 4 dips of the Summer of 2017.
Links: wherestheflux.com
Burst 23 - Tabby Boyajian discusses Elsie
Where Is the Flux Going? The Long-Term Photometric Variability of Boyajian's Star
Extinction and the Dimming of KIC 8462852
Optical Polarimetry of KIC 8462852 in May-August 2017
Modelling the KIC8462852 light curves: compatibility of the dips and secular dimming with an exocomet interpretation
NEOWISE
The script for the episode
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 16 November 2017
Duration: 48 minutes, 5 seconds
Host Paul Carr talks to Douglas Vakoch of METI.org about a recent transmission using a powerful radar transmitter to the star GJ 273, which has a super-Earth planet circling it in the habitable zone.
Links: GJ 273 on SIMBAD
The HARPS search for southern extra-solar planets XLI. A dozen planets around the M dwarfs GJ 3138, GJ 3323, GJ 273, GJ 628, and GJ 3293
GJ 273 in the Open Exoplanet Catalog
Sonar Barcelona
EISCAT Tromso Site
The Story of Lincos
The Unseen Podcast
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: DJ Spooky, Jason Robinson
Announcer: Erin Carr
Released: 14 November 2017
A short note from Paul Carr to please stay tuned for more content. Sorry for the lull, but we are not fading - we wouldn't do that to you.
Meanwhile, if you haven't already, check out the Unseen Podcast.
Released: 3 September 2017
Duration: 62 minutes, 37 seconds
Host Daniela De Paulis along with Paul Carr in conversation with artist Jon Lomborg, designer of Carl Sagan's Voyager Golden Record, on his new crowdfunded project, the One Earth Message.
Links: The One Earth Message Kickstarter
The New Horizons Mission
The Voyager Golden Record
Lincos
Credits: Host and co-producer: Daniela De Paulis
Co-producer: Paul Carr
Music: DJ Spooky, Erika Lloyd
Announcer: Erin Carr
Released: 5 June 2017
Duration: 18 minutes 33 seconds
Paul Carr talks with Tabetha Boyajian about the flurry of observations of KIC 8462852 conducted when the star dipped in brightness last month, and what might happen in the near future.
Links: /r/KIC8462852
The Subreddit FAQ
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 19 May 2017
Duration: 12 minutes 57 seconds
Host Paul Carr provides some brief remarks and one or two speculations about the dimming of Tabby's Star that began today.
Links: The Reddit Discussion Forum
Jason Wright's Video
Tabby's Star for the Perplexed Part 1
The Wow! Signal podcast is distributed under the Creative Commons/Attribution Share-Alike license.
Released: 13 February 2017
Duration:90 minutes, 38 seconds
In this episode we explore Messaging Extraterrestrial Intelligence, or METI, with METI.org President Douglas Vakoch and interdisciplinary artist Daniela de Paulis. Nick Nielsen joins us for a discussion of Daniela's new project Cogito - how do we send our thoughts into the cosmos?
Links: The Pioneer Plaques
The Drake Arecibo Message
The Voyager Golden Record
METI.org Strategic Plan
The Zoo Hypothesis
Daniela de Paulis on the Unseen Podcast
Project Cognos
Dwingeloo Radio Observatory
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Co-hosts: Daniela de Paulis and Nick Nielsen
Music: DJ Spooky, George Hrab, Erika Llloyd
Voiceover: Erin Carr
The Wow! Signal podcast is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike license.
Released: 2 January 2017
Duration: 15 minutes, 37 seconds
Based upon a Dream of the Open Channel blog entry, we discuss why there may not be any galaxy-scale megastructures, but what sort of stellar class megastructures could we possibly observe out there.
Please visit wowsignalpodcast.com for more information about this podcast.
Links: Why Search?
The Jaws of Darkness
Glimpsing Heat from Alien Technologies
GHAT III: The Reddest Extended Sources from WISE
The Tully-Fisher relation as a probe of Dysonian astroengineering in disk galaxies
Earth in Human Hands
Searching for Cost Optimized Interstellar Beacons
Wow! Signal Bursts
Credits: Host, Writer and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
The Wow! Signal Podcast is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike license.
Released: 28 November 2016
Duration: 59 minutes, 2 seconds
Astrobiologist and Author David Grinspoon joins us to talk about his new book, Earth in Human Hands - Shaping Our Planet's Future. Following all the great demotions, humanity is about to get a great promotion - and we're not ready for it, but we have no choice.
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Announcer: Erin Carr
Music: DJ Spooky, Erika Lloyd, George Hrab
Recorded: 14 September 2016
Released: 14 September 2016
Duration:22 minutes, 22 seconds
Astronomer Tabetha "Tabby" Boyajian joined Paul Carr, Roger Wehbe, and Rusty Schweikart in a Google Hangout to talk about the implications of the Gaia Data Release 1 for a better understanding of KIC 8462852.
Links: Gaia Parallax for KIC 8462852 is 2.554887 mas
Jason Wright: What Could be Going on with Boyajian's Star? Part X: Wrap-up and Gaia's Promise
Credits: Producer and Host: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 8 August 2016
Duration:47 minutes 44 seconds
Host Paul Carr talks to CalTech astronomer Ben Montet,who has, with his colleague Joshua Simon, just published the result that Tabby's Star (KIC 8462852) dimmed considerably over the four year course of the Kepler Space Telescope prime mission.
Links: Montet and Simon, KIC 8462852 Faded Throughout the Kepler Mission
Interview with Bradley Schaefer on Dimming of Tabby's Star
Boyajian, et. al., KIC 8462852 - Where's The Flux?
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Announcer:Erin Carr
Music: DJ Spooky, Jason Robinson, Erika Lloyd
Released: 31 July 2016
Duration: 24 minutes, 11 seconds
Host Paul Carr discusses the recent paper "Our Sky Now and Then" with lead author and astronomer Beatriz Villarroel,a PhD student at the University of Upsalla in Sweden, Ms. Villarroel's team was undertaking an alternative approach to SETI, looking for evidence of effects in astronomical data that could not be due to natural effects.
Links: Our Sky Now and Then
The USNO B1.0 Catalog
The Sloan Digital Sky Survey
The Lost Star (Vizier)
The Nearby Infrared WISE object
Jason Wright: A WISE Search for Large Extraterrestrial Civilizations
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 28 July 2016
Duration: 43 minutes, 45 seconds
James Garrison speaks with latest holder of the Library of Congress Baruch Blumberg chair of astrobiology, Nathaniel Comfort. His current book project is the biography of DNA.
Links: Mike Russell
New Study Outlines "Water World" Theory of the Origin of Life
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Dr. Barbara McClintock
Steven Benner
Credits: Host: James Garrison
Producer: Paul Carr
Announcer: Erin Carr
Music: DJ Spooky and Frank Dorritke
Released: 4 July 2016
Duration: 20 minutes, 41 seconds
SETI research is much like the traditional task of a tracker, who seeks the spoor of elusive quarry through a wilderness. In the search for life, intelligence, and exocivilizations we find ourselves in the position of seeking the spoor of these higher emergent complexities in the cosmological wilderness.
Links: SETI as a Process of Elimiation (Wow! Signal Burst) SETI as a Process of Elimination (Medium post) The Eerie Silence: Renewing our Search for Alien Intelligence, Paul Davies The Wilderness Hypothesis (Wow! Signal Burst) The Halos of Vanished Civilizations (Wow! Signal Burst)
Another Astrobiological Thought Experiment (Tumblr post)
Credits: Writer and Presenter: Nick Nielsen
Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 22 June 2016
Duration: 41 minutes, 19 seconds
Daniela De Paulis hosts a conversation with the team producing the crowdfunded feature-length SETI documentary Earthlings Quest, and one of the scientists profiled in the film, Douglas Vakoch. We urge you to consider contributing to the Kickstarter for this film.
- opening
- Paulina's intro
- introduction to the Earthling's Quest team: Alexander Ryneus and Per Bifrost (film co-directors), and Malla Grapengiesser (producer).
- Introduction of Douglas Vakoch
- Introduction on SETI and METI
- What is the focus of the documentary?
- Why is SETI so timely
- Possibilities of finding extraterrestrial intelligent life
- Why should we contact other life forms?
- Should we be afraid?
- closing remarks
- Brief announcements
- outro
Links: METI Interinational
The SETI Institute
The Earthling's Quest Kickstarter
Credits: Host: Daniela De Paulis
Producer: Paul Carr
Announcer: Erin Carr
Music: DJ Spooky, Erika Lloyd, George Hrab
Released: 27 May 2016
Duration: 67 minutes, 16 seconds
We interview LSU astronomer Bradley Schaefer about why is sticking to his guns about the century-long dimming of Tabby's Star (KIC 8462952), why some popular explanations fail, and what can be done to further explore the reason that this star's behavior is so behavior. In particular, Brad wants to encourage us to contribute to Tabetha Boyajian's kickstarter to buy telescope time to monitor the star.
Links: The Fast and Slow Dimming of Tabby's Star
Tabby's Star for the Perplexed, Part 1
The Most Mysterious Star in the Universe
Brad Schaefer: KIC 8462852 Faded at an Average Rate of 0.165+-0.013 Magnitudes Per Century From 1890 To 1989
Brad Schaefer on Centauri Dreams: Further Thoughts on the Dimming of KIC 8462852
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Announcer: Erin Carr
Music: DJ Spooky, George Hrab
The Wow! Signal is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Released: 18 May 2016
Durations: 3 minutes, 33 seconds
A short Burst to briefly explain today's development and to ask listeners to seriously consider donating to the new Kickstarter to monitor KIC 8462852 with a network of telescopes using standardized photometry. The hope is that we will reliably catch the star in the act of dimming. Please share this and the link to the kickstarter widely. Together, we can catch Tabby's Star in the act.
Links: The Most Mysterious Star in the Universe
Tabby's Star for the Perplexed, Part 1 (Burst 13)
Interview With Tabetha Boyajian (Season 3, Episode 4)
Interview with Stella Kafka of the AAVSO (Season 3, Episode 5)
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Postprocessing: Auphonic.com
Hosting: Libsyn.com
The Wow! Signal is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike license
Released: 3 May 2016
Duration: 35 minutes, 43 seconds
Stella Kafka, director of the American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO) tells us about how her organization observes variable stars and how they hope to catch Tabby's Star (KIC 8462852) in the act of dimming. Also, a brief update on Bradley Schaefer's work.
- Intro music: Dark Skies by DJ Spooky
- Intro announcement
- Welcome and quick summary
- Brief update on Bradley Schaefer's updated preprint
- Stella Kafka bio
- Interview with Stella Kafka
- Wrap up interview
- Nagging, begging, pleading
- Thanking Patrons
- Outro music: Ockham's Shaving Kit by George Hrab
Links please see wowsignalpodcast.com for a full set of links
AAAVSO.org
Donate to the AAVSO
Tabby's Star for the Perplexed, part 1
The Fast and Slow Dimming of Tabby's Star
Interview with Tabetha Boyajian
Script for this episode
Support us on Patreon
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: DJ Spooky, Jason Robinson, Erika Lloyd, George Hrab
Announcer: Erin Carr
Hardware: Shure, Pro Art, Focusrite, Apple
Software: Skype, Reaper, Loopback, OS X Yosemite
Postprocessing: Auphonic.com
Hosting: Libsyn.com
Released: 6 April 2016
Duration: 43 minutes, 45 seconds
Thread: Astronomy and Astrophysics
In Tabbys' Star for the Perplexed Part 1, we explained why this is puzzling star. In Part 2, we talked about some of the explanations put forth and their weaknesses. In the third and last (for now) part of the series, we talk to Tabby herself, and she answers several reasonably informed questions about her team's work, past, present and future.
- Introduction
- Interview with Yale's Tabetha "Tabby" Boyajian concerning KIC 8462852
- Frequently Asked Questions
- Some of the better speculative solutions
- Wrap up
- Thanking Patreon Subscribers
- Nagging, Begging
- We want to hear from you
- Outro
Links: Boyajian, et. al., Planet Hunters IX: KIC 8462852 - Where's the Flux?
Tabby's Star for the Perplexed (blog post)
Tabby's Star for the Perplexed, Part 1
Tabby's Star for the Perplexed, Part 2
Schaefer, KIC 8462852 Faded at an Average Rate of 0.165 +/- 0.014 Magnitudes Per Century from 1890 to 1989.
LCOGT
The Swift Mission
The AAVSO
Planet Hunters
KIC8462852 Subreddit
Centauri Dreams
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
VO: Erin Carr
Music: DJ Spooky and Sleep Research Facility
The spoken content of the Wow! Signal is distributed under the
Released: 31 March 2016
Duration: 13 minutes, 21 seconds
Paul Carr continues with our series explaining just what is so puzzling about Tabby's Star, aka KIC 8462852. In this part we talk about some of the candidate explanations, including alien megastructures, including a Dyson Swarm.
Links Please see wowsignalpodcast.com
The Slow and Fast Dimming of Tabby's Star
AstroWright
Credits: Written, Produced, and Voiced by Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 16 March 2016
Duration: 13 minutes, 25 seconds
Science does not occur in a vacuum, and this is doubly true in the case of SETI, which is said to suffer from a "giggle factor." How does social context shape the scientific research program of SETI? The public at times shows great interest in SETI, but this attention can cut two ways, both benefiting and harming the discipline. Nowhere is this more true than in funding for SETI research.
Credits:
Written and Read by: Nick Nielsen
Producer and VO: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 14 March 2016
Duration:22 minutes, 55 seconds
We talk to Netherlands astronomer Jason Hessels, corresponding author on a recent paper in Nature describing a repeating fast radio burst. For more information please visit wowsignalpodcast.com
Links: A Repeating Fast Radio Burst
The Unseen Podcast Discussion of FRBs
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 10 March 2016
Duration: 18 minutes, 1 second
In Part 1, Paul Carr provides a non-technical explanation of why the star informally known as Tabby's Star (KIC 8462852) is so perplexing after all. What was observed, and why doesn't it fit a conventional explanation?
Please see our companion blog post at Dream of the Open Channel.
Written, Produced and Read by Paul Carr
Music by Jason Robinson
Released: 13 February 2016
Duration:20 minutes, 35 seconds
Nick Nielsens's show notes:
In so far as SETI is a science -- and it aspires to be a science even as its critics argue that it falls short -- should its emphasis fall upon confirmation or disconfirmation? I argue that the falsification of narrowly formulated hypotheses about exocivilizations can both demonstrate the scientificity of SETI as well as refine our conception of exocivilizations, hence refining our idea of the exact nature of the object of our search. The origin of this Wow! Signal Burst (now revised and updated so that little remains of the original except the central idea) is a blog post that I wrote some time ago, SETI as a Process of Elimination, which was part of a series of posts about SETI, including Methodological Naturalism and the Eerie Silence, Why the Fermi Paradox Must be Taken Seriously, Addendum on the Fermi Paradox, The Visibility Presumption, and Searching the Sky.
Credits Written and Read by: Nick Nielsen
Producer and VO: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 6 February 2016
Duration: 22 minutes, 18 seconds
An edited interview with Dr. Josh Grindlay concerning the use of measurements of star brightness from the Digital Access to a Sky Century @HArvard to measure the dimming (or not) of Tabby's Star over a Century. Grandly critiques Hippke's paper that found dimming in several stars in the DASCH data, and also Schaefer's claim that Tabby's Star (KIC 8462852) is slowly dimming.
Links: Boyajian, et. al. Planet Hunters X. KIC 8462852 - Where's the Flux?
Schaefer: KIC 8462852 Faded at an Average Rate of 0.165+-0.013 Magnitudes Per Century From 1890 To 1989
Hippke and Angerhausen: KIC 8462852 did likely not fade during the last 100 years
Digital Access to a Sky Century at Harvard
Landolt Standard Stars
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson and Erika Lloyd
Released: 14 January 2016
Duration: 62 minutes 4 seconds
Host Paul Carr talks to Dr. Bradley Schaefer about his research showing a dramatic dimming of Tabby's Star over a century. This all but rules out any explanation anyone has put forth so far for the short term dimming of the star found in the Kepler data by Boyajian, et. al.
Links
KIC 8462852 Faded at an Average Rate of 0.165+-0.013 Magnitudes Per Century From 1890 To 1989
Credits Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Dj Spooky, Jason Robinson, Mike Griffin, George Hrab
Released: 3 December 2015
Duration: 13 minutes, 43 seconds
Is the cosmos a trackless wilderness in which apex predators, in the form of advanced extraterrestrial intelligences (ETIs), roam at will, and vulnerable civilizations (like ours) learn to maintain a low profile? Nick Nielsen considers some variations on the theme of the 'zoo hypothesis' of John Ball, each being a response to the Fermi paradox, and how we might prefer to 'play dead' as a civilization given the potential dangers of the cosmos primeval.
Links The Zoo Hypothesis by John Ball (PDF)
The Wilderness Hypothesis post at the Grand Strategy Annex
Another Astrobiological Thought Experiment and a Comment Response
If the Universe is Teeming with Aliens, Where is Everybody?
Observational Signatures of Self Destructive Civilizations
The Cosmos Primeval
Credits Writer and Presenter: Nick Nielsen
Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 21 November 2015
Duration: 15 minutes, 30 seconds
Nick Nielsen talks about what we might observe from long dead ET civilizations.
Links Nick Nielsen's Blog Post
How Old is ET?
The Relative Rate of LGRB Formation as a Function of Metallicity
Observational Signatures of Self Destructive Civilizations
Credits Written and Read by: Nick Nielsen
Producer: Paul Carr
Music: Jason Robinson
Released: 17 November 2015
Duration 6 minutes, 18 seconds
Paul Carr briefly discusses a few issues that asteroid mining raises, at least in part responding to an Unseen Podcast blog post comment by "Khani":
- Mining operations around PHAs
- Conflicts over claims
- Conflicts over the same asteroid
- What exactly is necessary to establish a claim?
- An interplanetary court
Music by Jason Robinson
Links: The Science of Asteroid Mining with Martin Elvis
Unseen Podcast Episode 33 - Extract the Resource
Released: 2 November 2015
Duration: 53 minutes, 33 seconds
Host Paul Carr interviews Dr. Martin Elvis of the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Martin Elvis has a substantial background in high energy astronomy and astrophysics, studying quasars and other huge, highly energetic phenomena deep in the universe. He tells us why he has turned his attention to asteroid mining, and explains his model for determining how many asteroids we should be going after, and how we can find them. There is a case for much better surveillance of Near Earth Objects (NEOs) using space based infrared cameras. Today's sophisticated solid-state Gamma Ray and X-ray spectrometers can give us quick spectra that determine elemental composition. Also, the Earth often has temporary moons, but catching then in the act is tricky.
Links: Martin Elvis - How Many Ore Bearing Asteroids?
Martin Elvis and Thomas Esty - How Many Assay Probes to Find One Ore Bearing Asteroid?
The NEOCAM sensor
NEOCAM (.pdf file)
NASA - General Information on Asteroids
The NEAR mission
Planetary Resources: Asteroid Composition
The Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Season 2 - Episode 8: Incoming Asteroid!
Season 1 - Episode 8: Cosmik Debris
Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr
Guest: Martin Elvis
Music: DJ Spooky, Jason Robinson, Erika Lloyd
Postproduction: Auphonic.com
Hosting: Libsyn.com
The spoken content of this podcast is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. All music is performed with the permission of the artists.
Paul Carr very briefly pleads with you to listen to the Unseen Podcast if you are not already doing so. That is all.
Recorded: 30 September 2015
Released: 1 October 2015
Paul Carr walks us through a simple explanation of why we can't travel to the nearby stars - yet. Sorry, but space is big. Really big.
For more information, please visit the blog entry at: http://www.wowsignalpodcast.com/2015/10/burst-7-why-interstellar-space-flight.html
Music by Jason Robinson
The Wow! Signal is distributed under the Creative Commons Attributions/Share Alike license.
Released: 21 September 2015
Duration: 56 minutes, 40 seconds
Paul Carr talks to UC Berkeley SETI scientist Andrew Siemion about the exciting new SETI initiative called Breakthrough Listen.
- Introduction and context
- Interview with Andrew Siemion on Breakthrough Initiative
- Interview wrapup
- Begging and nagging
- Outro
Links
The Unseen Podcast
Breakthrough Inititative
SETI@Home
The Unseen Podcast on the Breakthrough Announcement
Andrew Siemion on SETI at the Square Kilometer Array
Credits
Host and producer: Paul Carr
Additional questions for Dr. Siemion: Nick Nielsen, Adam "Synergy" Smith
Music: DJ Spooky, Erika Lloyd, George Hrab
Release Date: 12 July 2015
Duration: 19 minutes, 58 seconds
Mike Mongo has a brief conversation with Jeff Nosanov about his innovative PERISCOPE concept to explore the caves of the moon with lasers.
For more information, please see the blog entry for this Burst: http://www.wowsignalpodcast.com/2015/07/burst-6-caves-of-moon.html
Music by Jason Robinson.
Releast Date: 8 April 2015
A recent paper, Discrete Steps in Dispersion Measures of Fast Radio Bursts, has generated a lot of excitement. Paul Carr reviews the basic facts about the 11 known FRBs and what this strange pattern might imply.
Thread(s): SETI
Host: Paul Carr
We talk to UC Berkeley’s Andrew P.V Simeon, lead author of a recent paper on what will change about SETI when the Square Kilometer Array comes online
- Intro Announcement and music (“Dark Skies” by DJ Spooky)
- Host intro to show topic
- Interview with Andrew P.V. Siemion on SETI at the SKA
- Andrew Siemion answers questions on SETI@Home
- Host wrapup
- Promo for Under the Microscope
- Begging, nagging and announcements
- Music - “Stratum 3” by Jason Robinson
- Outro announcement
The Episode’s Content Siemion, et. al., Searching for Extraterrestrial Intelligence with the Square Kilometre Array
The Square Kilometer Array
SETI@Home
boinc
The Wow! Signal Podcast The Wow! Signal podcast team
The Wow! Signal podcast Episode Plan
You should be on the Podcast
Support the Podcast at Patreon
Join our Google+ Community
Subscribe to our subreddit
Subscribe to the Podcast - never miss an episode
Buy a T-shirt
Follow Paul on Twitter
Follow the Podcast on Twitter
The Dream of the Open Channel Blog
The Music DJ Spooky
Erika Lloyd
Jason Robinson
Released 17 February 2015
Paul Carr talks to Daniel Cartin about his test paper "Upper Limits on the probability of interstellar civilization arising in the local Solar neighborhood"
Music by Jason Robinson
Daniel Cartin's earlier appearance on the Wow! Signal
Release Date: 15 February 2015
Host Tim Jones engages Tom Barbalet in a wide ranging conversation centered around his Artificial Life environment Noble Ape and its applications to space exploration.
Music by DJ Spooky and Erika Lloyd.
Detailed Show Notes
Distributed under Creative Commons AttributionShare-Alike license.
Release Date: 21 January 2015
Paul Carr talks to astrobiologist David Grinspoon and NASA physicist Geoffrey Landis about the science and technology of Venus exploration.
Detailed Show Notes
Music by Dj Spooky and George Hrab
Release Date: 14 January 2015
Paul Carr and Mike Mongo talk about the near future of the Wow! Signal Podcast and the long term future of humanity. Will we colonize Mars or the Moon? How about starships?
Detailed Show Notes
Music by DJ Spooky
Release Date: 20 December 2014
Nora Noffke, Associate Professor in the Department of Ocean, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at Old Dominion University, tells us about her recent hypothesis paper that argues that certain sedimentary structures seen by the Curiosity rover on Mars could be fossilized microbial mats.
Ancient Sedimentary Structures in the <3.7 Ga Gillespie Lake Member, Mars, That Compare in Macroscopic Morphology, Spatial Associations, and Temporal Succession with Terrestrial Microbialites Dr. Noffke's page at ODU
ODU Press Release
Music by Jason Robinson
Release Date: 7 December 2014
In this short Wow! Signal Burst, Paul Carr talks us through where we are on the seven terms in the Drake Equation, which more about what we don't know then what we know - so far.
Music: Elbow Grease by Jason Robinson
Calculating the Odds of Intelligent Alien Life (video narrated by Jill Tarter)
Host Paul Carr is joined by James Garrison and Tim Jones. Astronomer JL Galache of the IAU Minor Planet Center and author Duncan Lunan enlighten us about the threat that Near Earth asteroids pose to Earth and what we can do about it.
Music by DJ Spooky, Jason Robinson and Erika Lloyd.
Detailed Show Notes with Links
In this short Wow! Signal Burst, Mike Mongo, Astronaut Teacher, tells us about his forthcoming book, which has just completed successful crowdfunding. The Astronaut Instruction Manual for Preteens. The book is available for preorder now.
KidAstronaut.com
Theme music by Jason Robinson.
The Wow! Signal is produced by Dream of the Open Channel and distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike license.
This podcast is named after an event that took place on 15 August 1977 at the Ohio State Big Ear radio astronomy observatory. Astronomr Jerry Ehman noticed a signal that looked exactly like what they were looking for - an ET radio beacon. Was it?
We talk to Dr. Robert S. "Bob" Dixon, who was instrumental in bringing the Big Ear instrument to bear on the SETI problem, in his very first podcast interview.
We talk to planetary scientist and astrobiologist Abel Mendez about waht is presently understood about the habitability of exoplanets, and the habitable exoplanet catalog.
Is SETA really just local SETI? It makes sense to me, and to Alan Penny, coordinator of the UK SETI REsearch Network. We talk to Dr. Penny about the future of SETI. Then, we talk to another Scottish astronomer Duncan Lunan about the scientific mystery of the Long Delay Echoes. Are the LDEs from a Bracewell Probe?
Music by DJ Spooky, Jason Robinson, Erika Lloyd and George Hrab
Detailed Show Notes
The study of astrobiology projects current scientific knowledge of the living world into the wide universe and asks the questions we all want to ask: where are the best places to search for life in the universe and what should we look for? ARe we searching for exotic microbes, living beings like ourselves, or advanced robots that have taken over from their creators?
In this episode we meet Steven Dick and Betul Kacar, two astrobiologists from different backgrounds who are exploring these questions in different ways.
Detailed Show Notes
This is the conversation between Paul Carr and "Eric the Red" previsiouly split into two parts, not provided here in a single part, with no additional edits. This is not an official episode.
Host Mike Mongo talks to futurist librarian Heath Rezabek about preserving humanity's knowledge into the far future. Paul Carr talks to economist and former AI researcher Robin Hanson about a possible future in which huans exist, but aren't very important. Will AI put us all out of a job, and what will that mean to us if so?
A special Towel Day episode of the Wow! Signal featuring a roundtable discussion of the work, inspired ideas and philosophical jokes of Douglas Adams. Panelists are Nichols Joll, Jeremy Hunsberger, Ben Brockert, Mike Mongo and Jim Cavera.
Music by Stephen Moore and Eben Brooks
See Detailed Show Notes
We talk to Dr. Daniel Cartin about his recent follow up to Geoffrey Landis' percolation framework for understanding the Fermi Paradox. We also talk about the life span of technological civilizations, and how accidental contact could be important to understanding how this life span could increase over time.
See the Detailed Show Notes
Season 2, Episode 1
Released 19 March 2014
Exploration for exoplanets with the Kepler telescope and trying to find laser pulses from distant civilizations with planet hunting legend Geoff Marcy. ESA's Ana Heras tells us about the science goals of ESA's proposed PLATO mission.
See Show Notes
In this special hiatus episode, we present an edited recording of a hangout the team had on November 24th 2013, in which we discussed ideas for topics and guests in Season 2. It's a chance for listners to meet the new team and get a sense of what's coming up.
The Wow! Signal Podcast team members are: Paul Carr, Jim Cavera, Jude Hollingsworth, Ron Jeffries, and Mike Mongo.
We hope you'll comment here or join our Google+ community.
Links:
Icarus Interstellar
100 Year Starship
The B612 Foundation
This episode again picks up the thread of Episode 5 - the Search for Extraterrestrial Artifacts, or SETA. We talk to scientist and space entrepreneur Ben McGee about this paper on Xenoarchaeology,or the search for ancient alien artifacts, and to Dr. H. Paul Shuch about the experimental website Invitation to ETI at ieti.org.
Music by Sleep Research Facility, Curlew and DJ Spooky.
The Wow! Signal Podcast podcasting seal of approval for this episode: Singularity 1-on-1 by Nikola Danaylov.
The Fermi Paradox, Part 2, with Unverse Today's Fraser Cain and University of Edinburgh's Duncan Forgan.
Links:
Episode 2 - the Fermi Paradox with Geoffrey Landis
Universe Today
Duncan Forgan
Duncan Forgan et. al. , The Effect of Probe Dynamics on Galactic Exploration Timescales
The Music
Ahleuchatistas
DJ Spooky
Jason Robinson
John Baez and Mark Egan's Telesto
Release Date: 25 June 2013
The subject is asteroid mining by humans and others.
Guests:
Duncan Forgan, scientist at the University of Edinburgh, talks about how we could detect ET asteroid mining.
Isaac Stott, CEO of Stott Space, abouthis compaine's ambitious plans for beating the big boys to to the punch.
Ben Wright McGee: scientist, writer and space entrepeneur about how asteroid mining could work and why.
A little music by DJ Spooky, with musical contributions by Ahleuchatistas, JAson Robinson and Mike Griffin.
On May 11th 2013 I sat down with skeptic Bing Garthright to talk about his impressions of UFOCon 13. This led to some interesting stories of his days as a NICAP UFO investigator, as well as some measured - and often very positive - thoughts about the speakers he had just heard.
The fourth Wow! Signal Podcast podcasting seal of approval for podcasts is awarded to: The Brain Science Podcast by Virginia Campbell.
Music by Ahleuchatistas and Jason Robinson.
We talk to Seth Shostak of the SETI Institute about the past, present and future of the Searchfor Extraterrestrial Intelligence. We alos award the third Wow! Signal podcast podcasting seal of approval to: the Weekly Weinersmith. Music is mostly by Cuneiform artist Jason Robinson.
The Search for Bracewell Probes, Part 1.
An introduction to the Search for Bracewell Probes, with a liberal sprinkling of music by DJ Spooky (aka Paul D. Miller) from his album "Song of a Dead Dreamer."
In part 1, I cover what the hypothetical thing called a Bracewell Probe is, and discuss some of the variables that might affect whether or not it would be possible for us to to detect one in our own solar system. We don't know whether they exist, but if they do, we want to find them....
The second Wow! Signal Podcast seal of approval for podcasting is awarded to Oh, No, Ross and Carrie!
Links
Oh No, Ross and Carrie.
The Music
DJ Spooky
Jason Robinson
Sleep Research Facility
George Hrab
A conversation about alien life with Dr. David Grinspoon, author of Lonely Planets. We talked about his career as ab astrobiologiest, about the habitability throughout the solar system from Venus to the moons of Saturn, a proposed Venus ballon, the Curiosity rover on Mars, his upcoming book, his band, and more.
Links
David Grinspoon's website, funkyscience.net
Lonely Planets - the Natural Philosophy of Alien Life
The Episode 4 Script
Carl Sagan on the Drake Equation (video)
Musical Contributors:
Jason Robinson
Ahleuchatistas
George Hrab
Mike Griffin
I speak to Nikola Danaylov of the Singularity Weblog about the future of humanity. This is the first in a series on the future of humanity for this podcast. We discuss transhumanism, the singularity, colonization of the universe, and Lance Armstrong, among others.
Links
Podcast Script
The Singularity Weblog
Singularity One-on-One Podcast
Mike Griffin
Hypnos
Ahleuchatistas
Cuneiform Records
Subscribe to this Podcast
Be on the Podcast
Contact
There is no persuasive evidence that aliens from other star systems have ever visited our planet - situation Michael Hart dubbed "Fact A." However, as Enrico Fermi pointed outi n 1950, this is something of a surprise. This podcast is the first in a series examining what has become known as the Fermi Paradox.
We'll talk to award winning SF author and NASA scientist Geoffrey Landis about one of his proposed solutions to this paradox, and set the stage for further explorations. We'll also sample some powerful music by 21st Century Jazz artist Jason Robinson from his new CD "Tiresian Symmetries" and experimental sound sculptor Sleep Research Facility from the new CD "Stealth," based on sounds recorded in a B2 bomber hangar in the UK.
Links:
Geoffrey Landis
The Fermi Paradox: An Approach Based on Percolation Theory by Geoffrey Landis
Jason Robinson
Cuneiform Records
Sleep Research Facility
The Drake Equation (SETI Institute)
The Fermi Paradox, part 1 (Dream of the Open Channel)
Be on the Podcast
Contact
Episode 1 of the Wow!Signal Podcasts is out and available! Author and researcher Antonio Paris of aerial-phenomenon.org joins us to discuss what is wrong with UFOlogy and what can be done to revive it for the 21st century.