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Science

Physical Attraction

Thomas

Physical Attraction is the show that explores topics in science, technology, and the future - from a physicist's perspective. From the birth of stars to the end of the world, from interviews with experts to meticulously-researched deep dives, we'll explore the topics that shape our world.

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  • 20 episodes
  • Updated Mar 9, 2022

Episodes20

Newest first
  • Mar 9, 2022 · 40 min

    Climate 201: Climate Doomism (II)

    In the last episode, we briefly introduced "climate change doomers" and some of their misleading claims. In this episode, I talk about despair, and why we cannot give in to it.

  • Feb 21, 2022 · 49 min

    Climate 201: Climate Doomism (I)

    We're going there. In this episode, I discuss why civilization is not going to imminently collapse due to climate change, explain why doomism is a new form of denialism, and debunk some of its most misleading claims.

  • Feb 8, 2022 · 36 min

    UNLOCKED: Book Club: Tim Wu's The Attention Merchants

    A new episode released from behind the Patreon paywall. This episode, we'll review and discuss some of the issues raised by Tim Wu's The Attention Merchants, a book that details the history of the advertising industry.

  • Jan 24, 2022 · 41 min

    Climate 201 NETS XI: Direct Air Capture, p2 and NETS conclusion

    In this episode, we will continue our analysis of Direct Air Capture and conclude the series on negative emissions - crucial component of decarbonisation, or a techno-utopian distraction from the real problems we face? [Don't expect an actual answer]

  • Jan 10, 2022 · 37 min

    Climate 201 NETS X: Direct Air Capture, part 1

    Direct Air Capture - machines that suck carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. Could this be the solution to a scaleable negative emissions industry? We'll discuss the pros and cons of the technology in this episode.

  • Dec 28, 2021 · 40 min

    BONUS: Black Mirror IRL pilot - Be Right Back

    Hi all! This is a slightly special bonus episode. Some years ago I had plans for another series "Black Mirror IRL", which was going to be a series of episodes looking into the technologies mentioned and featured in the Netflix Series Black Mirror. Is anyone working on these technologies in real life? What would their potential social implications be if they were developed? How scientifically feasible would it actually be to develop something like this? The plan would be to explore one technology alongside each episode of the show. However, time has passed and I've moved onto other projects, and now I have nowhere near enough time to finish this series alongside everything else, so I only ever got around to recording a single, pilot episode for that putative series, which has been sitting on my hard drive for ages. Rather than let it go to waste - as it could be years if ever before I get back around to this project again - I am releasing it as a bonus episode for you to enjoy. But one thing I would say is that I would really appreciate your feedback on this episode. Do you think the series is a good idea? Would you like to see more episodes along these lines? How do you think I could improve it? Any and all suggestions are gratefully received. Maybe someday the series as a whole will return. Thank you all as ever for your support for the show.

  • Nov 29, 2021 · 30 min

    Climate 201, NETS IX: Ocean Iron Fertilization

    "Give me a tanker full of iron, and I'll give you a new Ice Age." It might sound like something Hank Scorpio would say, but this episode will deal with the very real idea of stimulating plankton blooms to remove CO2 from the atmosphere - ocean iron fertilization.

  • Nov 16, 2021 · 29 min

    Climate 201: NETS VIII: Enhanced Weathering

    How could grinding up rocks and sprinkling the dust over vast areas help to combat climate change? In this episode, we deal with "enhanced weathering" as a potential source of negative emissions.

  • Nov 1, 2021 · 51 min

    Climate201 NETS VI: Planting Trees and Afforestation

    Mention carbon capture, and the refrain you'll often hear is "why invent a machine that captures CO2? We already have one - it's called a tree." But is large-scale afforestation as a negative emissions solution so simple? We dig into its potential in this episode of our series on negative emissions.

  • Oct 18, 2021 · 55 min

    Climate 201: NETS V: Carbon Capture, Utilisation, and Storage

    N/B: Owing to a ridiculously hectic schedule until the end of the year, episodes will continue to be released on a fortnightly basis until further notice - thanks for understanding. We hear an awful lot about carbon capture, utilisation, and storage as a technology that could help to mitigate climate change. In this episode, we review the science, the policy, existing CCS plants, and the potential for the captured carbon to be utilised. Will CCS ever materialise?

  • Sep 13, 2021 · 44 min

    Climate 201: Negative Emissions (II): We'll Always Have Paris?

    Increasing levels of negative emissions are envisioned by models in climate-change scenarios that are compatible with the Paris Agreements. In this episode, we talk about some of the geopolitical implications for trying to deliver this, and the alternative futures that we can envision. Do "thinly-veiled techno-utopias shore up the Paris Agreement?"

  • Sep 6, 2021 · 43 min

    Climate 201: Negative Emissions I: The Last Thing We Should Be Talking About?

    Negative emissions technologies (NETs), also called carbon dioxide removal (CDR), are seen by many as an increasingly essential part of climate change mitigation. Many of the scenarios that the IPCC suggests for meeting the Paris Agreement goals suggest that we will suck billions of tonnes of CO2 out of the atmosphere by the end of the century - using technology which has barely made it past the pilot project stage. In this episode, I ask: how did we get here?

  • Aug 16, 2021 · 33 min

    Cosmology, VII: Cosmological Contradictions

    In this episode, we discuss the ongoing battle throughout the 1930s and 1940s between those who believed in a steady-state Universe, and those who thought it was expanding - and how it took more observations to overcome these cosmological contradictions.

  • Aug 7, 2021 · 45 min

    TT: Climate, CCS Struggles as Adaptation Stalls

    To close out this series of news episodes, we discuss the depressing failure of carbon capture and storage projects in Australia, as well as the far-too-slow approach to climate change adaptation across the world.