WEBVTT - Nebula in a Box 0:00:03.800 --> 0:00:06.680 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:06.680 --> 0:00:13.720 Works dot com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:13.760 --> 0:00:16.200 My name is Robert Lamb and my name is Julie Douglas. 0:00:16.480 --> 0:00:18.680 First of all, before I get going, I apologized my 0:00:18.760 --> 0:00:20.960 voice sounds a little weird on this particular episode. I 0:00:21.280 --> 0:00:24.080 recently had some oral surgery to get some losing teeth out, 0:00:24.120 --> 0:00:27.400 so I found a little mealy. Now that's why, Julie 0:00:27.440 --> 0:00:29.920 tell me this. Have you seen a little movie called 0:00:29.920 --> 0:00:33.400 The Blob? Oh, my goodness, very long time ago. Yeah, 0:00:33.400 --> 0:00:35.080 I had the classic black and white. No, I guess 0:00:35.080 --> 0:00:36.640 it was in color the Virgin I saw his color 0:00:36.680 --> 0:00:40.480 as anyway. Steve McQueen in an early role acting, yeah, 0:00:40.680 --> 0:00:45.240 acting opposite a little ball of interstellar good that falls 0:00:45.280 --> 0:00:48.519 to Earth. Inside of this meat cute little meteorite, an 0:00:48.520 --> 0:00:51.120 old man pokes it with a stick, cracks up in 0:00:51.120 --> 0:00:52.880 like an egg, and then he pokes it with a stick, 0:00:52.920 --> 0:00:55.240 of course, because that's what you do when you encounter 0:00:55.560 --> 0:00:59.000 potentially volatile substances from another world. We can't help ourselves. 0:00:59.280 --> 0:01:01.000 We need to know. So it crawled down his arm 0:01:01.080 --> 0:01:03.600 and starts eating it, and then it eats more and more, 0:01:03.640 --> 0:01:06.039 and it just grows and grows into this colossal life 0:01:06.080 --> 0:01:09.000 form that everyone has to deal with. And if you 0:01:09.000 --> 0:01:12.000 haven't seen it, do check it out. Awesome the music 0:01:12.080 --> 0:01:15.440 by Bob bat I believe, are you kidding? Buck Rat 0:01:15.480 --> 0:01:20.680 did that? Yeah? Yeah, it's a nice little gem of 0:01:20.720 --> 0:01:22.120 the turn. When you do that, I feel like I 0:01:22.120 --> 0:01:25.160 need a martini. Yeah, it is definitely a Martini worthy 0:01:25.280 --> 0:01:27.520 that of music. But the idea of this movie that 0:01:27.720 --> 0:01:29.280 is central to what we're gonna talk about here, and 0:01:29.280 --> 0:01:31.880 they're not central, but you know, we're kicking off with 0:01:32.120 --> 0:01:36.320 the idea that life could come here sort of accidentally 0:01:36.400 --> 0:01:40.000 from another world and then grow into something big. And 0:01:40.040 --> 0:01:42.760 we have talked about this in roundabout ways. We talked 0:01:42.800 --> 0:01:45.480 about what happens when a star dies, right, and we 0:01:45.520 --> 0:01:48.840 talked about star dust all this stuff that rejects into 0:01:48.840 --> 0:01:51.200 the universe and how those are the building box. But 0:01:51.760 --> 0:01:54.800 what remains is this question of how exactly here on 0:01:54.880 --> 0:02:01.920 Earth did these chemicals become complex organisms. So we're gonna 0:02:01.920 --> 0:02:04.480 talk a little bit today about this. And there's a 0:02:04.480 --> 0:02:07.600 great article by Andrew Grant and I believe it's called 0:02:07.680 --> 0:02:11.000 Cosmic Blueprint for Life that details some of what we're 0:02:11.000 --> 0:02:13.160 going to talk about today. So let's fast forward back 0:02:13.160 --> 0:02:15.600 to the star way before we even get to the 0:02:15.600 --> 0:02:18.680 blob days and the old man Uh losing his arm 0:02:18.800 --> 0:02:22.440 to space Shelley distantly both in time and space. A 0:02:22.560 --> 0:02:26.000 star dies, Okay, it runs out of its nuclear fuel 0:02:26.520 --> 0:02:29.880 and it becomes unstable. All right, there's no longer enough 0:02:30.200 --> 0:02:33.720 fuel to keep up this colossal creation that is a star. 0:02:33.800 --> 0:02:36.480 It's this enormous engine, and if it doesn't have fuel 0:02:36.520 --> 0:02:40.280 to burn, it becomes unstable and it collapses or it explodes. 0:02:40.360 --> 0:02:42.280 This is where we get things like black holes, but 0:02:42.360 --> 0:02:45.680 it's also where we get supernovous So in this case, 0:02:45.720 --> 0:02:48.360 the star explodes, and when it does, it expels a 0:02:48.480 --> 0:02:54.200 shell of stearing hot atoms. This includes things like hydrogen, carbon, oxygen, 0:02:55.000 --> 0:02:58.480 and some of those rogue atoms float into nearby gas 0:02:58.480 --> 0:03:01.040 clouds and they stick to the fine grains of dust there. 0:03:01.680 --> 0:03:05.160 Now it's very cold here, we're talking negative degrees fahrenheit, 0:03:05.639 --> 0:03:09.120 and there this process called acretion begins to take place. 0:03:09.280 --> 0:03:11.239 I think we've discussed this before, and we definitely discuss 0:03:11.280 --> 0:03:12.800 it in one of our Stuff to Blay your Kid's 0:03:12.840 --> 0:03:15.639 Mind episodes we did. We talk about gravity and how 0:03:15.680 --> 0:03:19.080 it stirs things to lie. So you have these particles, 0:03:19.400 --> 0:03:23.640 they float around, They float around and onto each other, 0:03:23.720 --> 0:03:25.920 and it's like a snowball rolling down a mountain. Two 0:03:26.000 --> 0:03:28.200 particles come together to form a slightly bigger particle, and 0:03:28.200 --> 0:03:30.799 then they pull in other particles. Their mass is growing, 0:03:30.800 --> 0:03:33.920 their gravitational pull is growing, and eventually we end up 0:03:33.960 --> 0:03:37.600 with a very young star that is being born out 0:03:37.600 --> 0:03:41.120 of this ejected material. So the simple items of hydrogen, carbon, 0:03:41.160 --> 0:03:46.320 and oxygen become complex organic molecules, and it's these carbon 0:03:46.400 --> 0:03:50.000 bearing compounds that become the raw material for life, and 0:03:50.120 --> 0:03:53.840 planets eventually actually form from these materials. We say all 0:03:53.840 --> 0:03:56.600 of this because again we're trying to get to well, 0:03:56.640 --> 0:04:00.360 how exactly then did life on Earth here occur? Because 0:04:00.400 --> 0:04:04.440 we understand how the planets formed, but us sitting here 0:04:04.800 --> 0:04:08.880 as crazy complex beings that came from these rudimentary, single 0:04:09.160 --> 0:04:11.880 bacterial cells. How did this happen? So this brings us 0:04:11.880 --> 0:04:16.880 to a little concept called panspermia, which is ja, yeah, 0:04:17.480 --> 0:04:21.120 in a nutshell, we're talking about the blob scenario, the 0:04:21.160 --> 0:04:23.560 idea that life could travel to another planet in the 0:04:23.600 --> 0:04:27.400 form of say, a meteorite. So we can thank Fred 0:04:27.440 --> 0:04:30.640 Hoyle for this. He was a British cosmologist, and he 0:04:30.680 --> 0:04:33.400 actually wrote in nine fifty seven science fiction novel called 0:04:33.440 --> 0:04:37.799 The Black Cloud Right which actually informed his ideas on spermia. 0:04:37.880 --> 0:04:39.760 The novel which I haven't read, but it's a great 0:04:39.760 --> 0:04:43.040 example of great scientific minds are very much have science 0:04:43.080 --> 0:04:46.320 fiction on their minds, and it dealt with intelligent dust 0:04:46.320 --> 0:04:49.240 clouds in space. He ends up forming this idea of 0:04:49.279 --> 0:04:52.200 pan spermia. Starting in the nineteen sixties, he writes a 0:04:52.200 --> 0:04:55.880 series of academic papers describing how bacterial cells could make 0:04:55.920 --> 0:04:59.680 their way from interstellar dust grains to comets and eventually 0:04:59.680 --> 0:05:02.280 down to planet spike Earth. Okay, so it's the sixties. 0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:05.480 People think he's nuts because nobody thought that pre bike 0:05:05.600 --> 0:05:10.000 molecules or microbes could survive in the harsh vacuum of space. 0:05:10.600 --> 0:05:12.400 You know, it was assumed that space was too cold 0:05:12.440 --> 0:05:16.040 and too low density for any sort of molecule to form. 0:05:16.080 --> 0:05:17.800 But now we know that's not the case. We know 0:05:17.880 --> 0:05:22.320 that it's possible. For instance, the nine two pound meteorite 0:05:22.760 --> 0:05:26.359 hurtled to the ground in Australia and they did some 0:05:26.400 --> 0:05:28.560 analysis on it, and they found that the rock containing 0:05:28.600 --> 0:05:32.279 millions of organic compounds, including amino acids a nucleo basis, 0:05:32.640 --> 0:05:34.920 which we'll talk about in a little while. I don't 0:05:34.960 --> 0:05:38.080 want to jump the gun there, but that's really exciting information. 0:05:38.720 --> 0:05:41.479 And similar meteorites like the one that crashed landed on 0:05:41.520 --> 0:05:45.000 Australia and comments would have blanketed the Earth with organic 0:05:45.080 --> 0:05:47.400 chemicals from the time the Earth was born about four 0:05:47.440 --> 0:05:50.120 point five billion years ago until the era when life 0:05:50.120 --> 0:05:53.960 appeared a few hundred million years later. Okay, So for 0:05:54.000 --> 0:05:56.719 everybody listening out there, the idea again is that this 0:05:56.880 --> 0:06:00.000 material is hitching a ride on a comet or a meeting. 0:06:00.000 --> 0:06:02.640 All right, crash landing on Earth and boom, we start 0:06:02.720 --> 0:06:07.560 to get a proliferation of life. But there is another theory, 0:06:07.680 --> 0:06:11.120 and that talks about how life could organically just or 0:06:11.160 --> 0:06:14.640 spontaneously I suppose you could say, happen here on Earth. 0:06:14.800 --> 0:06:16.680 And for this we need to turn to Stanley Miller 0:06:16.720 --> 0:06:19.839 and Herald Urray. That's right. These are researchers who prepared 0:06:19.880 --> 0:06:24.039 a closed system of glass flasks and tubes and injected 0:06:24.040 --> 0:06:28.920 a gaseous mixture of methane, ammonia, hydrogen, water. And now 0:06:28.920 --> 0:06:31.080 these are four basic compounds that were thought to be 0:06:31.120 --> 0:06:35.520 abundant in Earth's primitive atmosphere, and then they applied an 0:06:35.520 --> 0:06:39.200 electric current to simulate a lightning strike that would have 0:06:39.240 --> 0:06:42.880 occurred on Earth in those primitive days as well, and 0:06:43.400 --> 0:06:45.800 lo and behold, within a week they have produced several 0:06:45.880 --> 0:06:50.760 prebiotic compounds which then produced amino acids. So this is 0:06:50.800 --> 0:06:52.800 the same concept that we discussed in our Stuff of 0:06:53.000 --> 0:06:56.640 Your Kid's Mind episode. We're talking about this early ancient ocean. 0:06:56.800 --> 0:06:59.560 And then you have volcanic activity which is stirring electrical 0:06:59.560 --> 0:07:03.760 activity in the atmosphere, lightning strike, life begins to bubble, right, 0:07:03.760 --> 0:07:06.279 and there's like a little pool of water around that volcano, right, 0:07:06.440 --> 0:07:10.120 frankenste scenario exactly exactly, which I love. So here's the 0:07:10.120 --> 0:07:12.840 great thing. It produces amino acids and these are fundamental 0:07:12.920 --> 0:07:15.160 units of proteins, really important, right if you want to 0:07:15.160 --> 0:07:18.360 create some life. But it did not produce nucleo bases, 0:07:18.400 --> 0:07:22.040 which we talked about being present on that comet in Australia. 0:07:22.480 --> 0:07:25.640 These are the molecular building box of DNA and RNA. 0:07:25.800 --> 0:07:27.760 This is the stuff that gets passed on the genetic 0:07:27.760 --> 0:07:32.679 information to help propagate life. Also, the researchers simulating early 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:36.880 atmosphere with gases containing hydrogen. They used hydrogen, which reacts 0:07:36.880 --> 0:07:40.200 easily as opposed to carbon dioxide, a gas that's far 0:07:40.280 --> 0:07:43.920 less reactive but was probably much more plentiful at the time. 0:07:44.200 --> 0:07:46.840 So people kind of said, I'm not sure, this is 0:07:46.880 --> 0:07:51.080 a really interesting experiment, but it doesn't quite stimulate the 0:07:51.120 --> 0:07:54.400 actual conditions of Earth, what we think what was going 0:07:54.440 --> 0:07:57.080 on in primitive Earth at that time. So we end 0:07:57.160 --> 0:08:00.920 up looking outward again for potential signs how life ends 0:08:01.040 --> 0:08:02.960 up coming to be. In this case, let's look to 0:08:03.000 --> 0:08:07.120 astronomer Loose Snyder. Now, Snyder knew that the chemical compounds 0:08:07.160 --> 0:08:10.000 are die polar. They have a positively charged side and 0:08:10.040 --> 0:08:13.520 they have a negatively charged side, and these charged particles 0:08:13.600 --> 0:08:18.560 in motion release energy. So he theorized that some of 0:08:18.600 --> 0:08:21.440 these would spin like batons and create a faint radio 0:08:21.480 --> 0:08:24.400 wave signal, and that this would be perceivable from Earth 0:08:24.440 --> 0:08:26.680 with the right equipment. This is such a cool idea 0:08:26.760 --> 0:08:29.640 that someone seized on. This I think is just amazing 0:08:29.880 --> 0:08:33.160 because this is a way to actually measure your model right. 0:08:33.200 --> 0:08:35.160 And you also, I believe, said that each type of 0:08:35.200 --> 0:08:38.480 molecule should have its own unique energy signature, broadcasting a 0:08:38.559 --> 0:08:42.599 specific set of frequencies that could be detected and identified 0:08:42.600 --> 0:08:45.480 by astronomers. So within a few years they identified dozens 0:08:45.480 --> 0:08:50.079 of these things. They discovered interstellar formaldehyde in ninety nine, 0:08:50.200 --> 0:08:52.839 and since that point astronomers have identified more than one 0:08:53.240 --> 0:08:56.839 and fifty molecules in deep space, mostly by using radio telescopes, 0:08:56.960 --> 0:08:59.920 and this is interesting to space. Chemicals that were found 0:09:00.120 --> 0:09:03.480 just the past few years include the sweet which is 0:09:03.480 --> 0:09:06.640 a sugar glycoli hide which I just fluttered but to 0:09:06.800 --> 0:09:09.680 get the idea, the fragrant which is ethel formate which 0:09:09.679 --> 0:09:13.679 smells like rum, and the explosive fulminic acid. Use some 0:09:13.800 --> 0:09:16.840 debtonators and weirdly enough gold flagger. I don't know how 0:09:16.880 --> 0:09:22.320 that worked out there, right, do you where? Okay? So 0:09:22.400 --> 0:09:24.559 this is just really interesting that they figured out these 0:09:24.640 --> 0:09:28.160 energy signatures and they were able to pinpoint all of 0:09:28.200 --> 0:09:31.599 these different molecules. The whole field of astrochemistry kind of 0:09:31.720 --> 0:09:34.880 rises from this, right. And so then there's another astronomer. 0:09:35.000 --> 0:09:37.360 His name is Jay Mayo Greenberg of the University of 0:09:37.440 --> 0:09:40.040 Leiden in the Netherlands, and he found that there weren't 0:09:40.160 --> 0:09:43.160 just free floating gas molecules in space as they had 0:09:43.160 --> 0:09:45.680 observed in the nebula. The reason why we're talking about 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:47.040 this too, is because we're trying to get to this 0:09:47.160 --> 0:09:52.040 idea of where again are these compounds beginning and how 0:09:52.080 --> 0:09:54.520 are they getting to the Earth. So if you look 0:09:54.559 --> 0:09:56.439 at the nebula and you say, well, here are these 0:09:56.480 --> 0:09:59.960 chemicals that some of which can create the building block 0:10:00.360 --> 0:10:02.679 here on Earth, how is that actually happening? What sort 0:10:02.720 --> 0:10:04.800 of interplay? It's one thing they have to figure out 0:10:04.840 --> 0:10:06.920 how they hits the ride here, but where did they 0:10:06.920 --> 0:10:08.680 come from to begin with? Right, So you're thinking about 0:10:08.679 --> 0:10:11.160 these floating gas molecules in space, and then he begins 0:10:11.160 --> 0:10:13.280 to ponder the dust and the nebulas, as well as 0:10:13.280 --> 0:10:17.360 the microscopic grains of carbon and silicon, and then he says, 0:10:17.760 --> 0:10:21.400 what would happen if interstellar gas molecules like from Aldehad 0:10:21.559 --> 0:10:25.720 collided with frigid grains of dust. They'd freeze their instantly, 0:10:25.840 --> 0:10:29.280 he decided, and they'd create another kind of environment which 0:10:29.280 --> 0:10:31.560 there would be chemical reactions. Again, these chemical reactions are 0:10:31.600 --> 0:10:33.640 really important, okay, because this is what's happening. This is 0:10:33.640 --> 0:10:36.839 that Frankenstein moment to a certain degree that's creating life. 0:10:37.200 --> 0:10:40.280 And he's thinking about the starlight also interacting with this, 0:10:41.040 --> 0:10:44.560 and he begins to think infrared telescopes could help us 0:10:44.600 --> 0:10:47.480 with this, and he was thinking, Okay, let's point them 0:10:47.520 --> 0:10:51.240 at some dust clouds, and he actually finds dips at 0:10:51.280 --> 0:10:56.800 specific frequencies corresponding to molecules including methanol, ammonia, and water ice. 0:10:57.040 --> 0:10:58.760 So what we need here is an experiment, right, what 0:10:58.880 --> 0:11:01.720 we need here is a in a box. And I'm 0:11:01.760 --> 0:11:03.800 surprised we didn't do this one for stuff to blow 0:11:03.840 --> 0:11:06.120 your kid's mind. It sounds so easy. He turns to 0:11:06.240 --> 0:11:09.240 a man by the name of Lewis Alamandalo. He is 0:11:09.280 --> 0:11:13.360 a Berkeley PhD Graduate in low temperature chemistry, so perfect 0:11:13.360 --> 0:11:16.959 person to turn into this. And Almondalo recreates the kinds 0:11:16.960 --> 0:11:19.679 of reactions that might take place and with these microscopic 0:11:19.840 --> 0:11:22.160 icy grains, and this Zali does it. First of all, 0:11:22.200 --> 0:11:25.160 he gets the equipment together to chill a shoebox sized 0:11:25.240 --> 0:11:28.880 chamber in a near vacuum, so he pressurizes it to 0:11:29.040 --> 0:11:34.199 within several degrees of absolute zero, so vacuumized as cold 0:11:34.320 --> 0:11:38.280 as possible. Then he uses a plasma lamp to fire 0:11:38.360 --> 0:11:41.400 beams of ultra violent light into that chamber, and this 0:11:41.440 --> 0:11:44.360 is supposed to mimic the radiation that's present in a 0:11:44.520 --> 0:11:47.960 planet or star forming region of a dust cloud. And 0:11:48.000 --> 0:11:50.800 then he adds a gases mixture of simple molecules to 0:11:50.880 --> 0:11:52.880 mimic the same composition that you would see in those 0:11:52.880 --> 0:11:55.600 interstellar clouds. Then he sets back and he watches the 0:11:55.640 --> 0:11:58.280 magic happen, or the science as it were. That's right. 0:11:58.400 --> 0:12:01.400 What does reveal is that not only that some chemicals 0:12:01.800 --> 0:12:05.320 reactions really do occur, it's extremely low temperatures because again 0:12:05.400 --> 0:12:07.920 remember back to the nineteen sixties people five, it's way 0:12:07.960 --> 0:12:10.720 too cold for anything really to be happening. So he 0:12:10.760 --> 0:12:13.640 plays out this idea that yes, actually chemical reactions can 0:12:13.679 --> 0:12:18.200 occur at extremely light temperatures minus fo degrees fahrenheit, but 0:12:18.280 --> 0:12:22.280 also that these reactions produce other reactive chemicals, thereby providing 0:12:22.320 --> 0:12:26.360 the spark really important for molecular hookups here. So this 0:12:26.480 --> 0:12:29.000 nebula in the box experiment has been done over and 0:12:29.040 --> 0:12:34.880 over again and recently has yielded intricate molecular rings containing carbon, nitrogen, 0:12:35.000 --> 0:12:39.280 and hydrogen fatty acid like molecules that's so cool that 0:12:39.360 --> 0:12:42.760 look and behave like the membranes protecting living cells and 0:12:42.840 --> 0:12:47.000 nucleic acids or nucleotides. The primary components of RNA in DNA. 0:12:47.520 --> 0:12:50.959 So again we're getting back to this idea of chicken 0:12:50.960 --> 0:12:53.160 and egg, although in this case it's more like, is 0:12:53.200 --> 0:12:55.440 that the nebula is that the comet? Or did it 0:12:55.480 --> 0:12:58.560 happen here on Earth? Could these reactions be happening in 0:12:58.880 --> 0:13:02.480 these interstellar us clouds and these very chilling environments, right, 0:13:02.520 --> 0:13:05.920 and being ejected out in the form of a comet 0:13:06.440 --> 0:13:08.840 in landing here on Earth sort of kind of ready made, 0:13:08.960 --> 0:13:10.839 you know, sort of like your microwave meal ready for 0:13:10.880 --> 0:13:12.320 Earth out of the box. In a way, this kind 0:13:12.320 --> 0:13:14.880 of drives with the blob because at the end of 0:13:14.920 --> 0:13:17.439 the blob they learned that they can't quite actually kill 0:13:17.520 --> 0:13:19.160 the blob, but what they can do is that they 0:13:19.160 --> 0:13:21.599 can freeze it with I think they were using fire extinguishers, 0:13:21.640 --> 0:13:25.559 which was weird. No, surely not, that wouldn't make scientific sense. 0:13:25.920 --> 0:13:28.520 But at any rate, they chill this thing down. They 0:13:28.559 --> 0:13:30.120 strapped to a helicopter and they take it to the 0:13:30.120 --> 0:13:32.360 North Pole. But he does not kill it. It just 0:13:32.400 --> 0:13:34.520 preserves it. So even here we see the idea that 0:13:34.640 --> 0:13:38.000 the life interstellar life would be able to sustain very 0:13:38.000 --> 0:13:41.800 low temperatures. Well, and there's an Emory University astro chemist 0:13:41.880 --> 0:13:45.480 by the name of Susannah Witticus Weaver, and she threw 0:13:45.520 --> 0:13:48.360 a series of models and experiments has demonstrated that ultra 0:13:48.440 --> 0:13:52.360 violet radiation can break chemical bonds and split molecules into 0:13:52.400 --> 0:13:56.800 highly reactive fragments called radicals. And this is important because 0:13:56.800 --> 0:14:01.160 again in this nebula, you're seeing the possibility that these 0:14:01.200 --> 0:14:03.800 more complex chemical reactions can be happening. And there's a 0:14:03.800 --> 0:14:06.000 possibility that again, is that this is the spark of 0:14:06.040 --> 0:14:08.120 life happening. All right, we're gonna take a quick break 0:14:08.120 --> 0:14:10.040 and then we're gonna get back to all this. So 0:14:10.640 --> 0:14:17.920 hanging there one second and we're back. The realmifications here 0:14:18.000 --> 0:14:21.000 are not all just either far off in time or 0:14:21.040 --> 0:14:23.240 far off in space. For instance, we can look at 0:14:23.280 --> 0:14:26.200 the moon Titan, one of the Saturn's moons, and here 0:14:26.240 --> 0:14:28.080 we see the based on some of the research, we 0:14:28.280 --> 0:14:31.400 definitely see the potential for these organic compounds. Is this 0:14:31.480 --> 0:14:33.520 the one that has the atmosphere that is similar to 0:14:33.560 --> 0:14:36.360 the Earth, but it's like in slow mo Yeah, it 0:14:36.360 --> 0:14:39.760 has a thick methane tinged atmosphere and it's reminiscent in 0:14:39.960 --> 0:14:44.280 early from early Earth atmosphere and it has pools of 0:14:44.360 --> 0:14:47.840 hydrocarbons on its surface, the only known bodies of liquid 0:14:47.880 --> 0:14:50.880 on any other world than our own. So astrobiologists and 0:14:50.960 --> 0:14:53.360 astro chemists have been very interested in Titan for some 0:14:53.440 --> 0:14:56.240 time now. Yeah, because the idea again is that this 0:14:56.360 --> 0:14:58.680 is a snapshot of what the Earth may have looked 0:14:58.680 --> 0:15:01.080 like billions of years ago, and that we can begin 0:15:01.160 --> 0:15:05.160 to observe, although slow mo, these reactions, and this is 0:15:05.200 --> 0:15:07.200 what they're trying to get at. They want to know 0:15:07.280 --> 0:15:09.680 what's going on four billion years ago. That's why they're 0:15:09.680 --> 0:15:12.160 creating a nebulent a box, and they want to know 0:15:12.440 --> 0:15:15.400 where did this material come from. We know that some 0:15:15.480 --> 0:15:18.960 meteorites contain a menial acids in nucleo bases, But the 0:15:19.040 --> 0:15:22.720 idea is did they get scooped up those molecules from 0:15:22.760 --> 0:15:27.520 dust clouds and then created them later on their interplanetary course, 0:15:28.280 --> 0:15:30.800 or were they again ready made out of the box 0:15:30.880 --> 0:15:33.560 as soon as they landed here, Which leads to this question, 0:15:33.760 --> 0:15:36.840 how common could life in the university. That's what we 0:15:36.880 --> 0:15:39.480 really want to get to, right, Yeah, that's the big question. 0:15:39.560 --> 0:15:41.480 It's life. Is it just a sort of a one 0:15:41.480 --> 0:15:44.480 in a billion fluke? Is there a higher potential for 0:15:44.640 --> 0:15:47.440 life on other worlds as we continue to expand out 0:15:47.440 --> 0:15:50.360 into the galaxy, are we going to be surprised or 0:15:50.360 --> 0:15:53.600 are we going to be disappointed by the presence of life? Well, 0:15:53.600 --> 0:15:57.200 and Andrew Grant says that if meteorites create most of 0:15:57.200 --> 0:16:00.440 the direct chemical precursors of life are still or system 0:16:00.560 --> 0:16:03.760 might be an unusual case if we're dependent on the 0:16:03.800 --> 0:16:08.760 meteorites for really creating the chemical reactions. Right, but but 0:16:08.760 --> 0:16:12.400 but but if dust clouds can manufacture these molecules on 0:16:12.440 --> 0:16:14.760 their own, and we know these dust clouds are all 0:16:14.800 --> 0:16:17.440 over the place in space, right, then life should be 0:16:17.480 --> 0:16:20.240 prevalent throughout the universe. I mean that kind of racks 0:16:20.280 --> 0:16:22.880 my world right there. Yeah, who knows how complex life 0:16:22.880 --> 0:16:24.920 we're talking about the world like Titan. Things are going 0:16:24.960 --> 0:16:27.160 to develop at a much slower pace on a world 0:16:27.200 --> 0:16:29.440 like that, And certainly not every world is going to 0:16:29.520 --> 0:16:32.640 have the Goldilocks type conditions that would be present for 0:16:32.800 --> 0:16:35.800 life to develop. And then too cold, too hot just 0:16:35.920 --> 0:16:38.880 right where also you have to factory in issues of 0:16:38.960 --> 0:16:42.320 electromagnetic shielding, how long a window are you looking at 0:16:42.400 --> 0:16:46.920 for life to develop without a catastrophic impact event occurring? Right? So, 0:16:47.000 --> 0:16:50.080 assuming that your planet had a nice position with a son, right, 0:16:50.360 --> 0:16:52.320 I'm not talking about the Earth, but a planet, and 0:16:52.440 --> 0:16:55.640 you had everything sort of in place. The idea is 0:16:55.680 --> 0:16:58.400 that any one of these dust clouds out there could 0:16:58.440 --> 0:17:00.960 give you the material to create life on one of 0:17:00.960 --> 0:17:03.720 those planets, if it has the correct conditions to support it. 0:17:04.240 --> 0:17:07.119 We come from a carbon based bias, so that's a 0:17:07.119 --> 0:17:11.200 whole other issue. Okay, So we should know more about this, 0:17:11.840 --> 0:17:14.280 I would say probably within the next decade. There's the 0:17:14.320 --> 0:17:20.080 Atacama Large Millimeter sub Millimeter Array that's short ALMA in Chile, 0:17:20.760 --> 0:17:23.840 and that's a network of sixties six radio dishes that 0:17:23.880 --> 0:17:27.640 will provide unprecedented resolution and sensitivity when it becomes fully 0:17:27.640 --> 0:17:32.040 operational later this year. There are two space based infrared observatories. 0:17:32.080 --> 0:17:36.280 There's the European Space Agencies Herschel Space Observatory and NASA's 0:17:36.359 --> 0:17:41.000 James Webb Telescope scheduled to launch in So that should 0:17:41.040 --> 0:17:44.720 allow astronomers a better way to peer into these nebula 0:17:44.840 --> 0:17:47.159 and try to figure out what's going on. Yeah, especially 0:17:47.160 --> 0:17:50.119 the gold Schlager nebula. Very interested. You want that you 0:17:50.119 --> 0:17:52.080 have that little smile in your face on newcent was 0:17:52.119 --> 0:17:56.919 coming up there but these radicals that we were discovered, 0:17:57.040 --> 0:18:00.080 just to see how those little dudes are actually acting 0:18:00.080 --> 0:18:02.560 out the ability to like take a much closer look 0:18:02.560 --> 0:18:05.760 at this and get closer to this answer about how 0:18:05.880 --> 0:18:08.440 life came to be here on earth. Pretty cool. Yeah, 0:18:08.760 --> 0:18:10.800 mind blowing stuff to be sure. All right, Well, let's 0:18:10.800 --> 0:18:13.560 call over the robot and see what kind of listener 0:18:13.560 --> 0:18:17.600 mail we have for today. Here's one from Andy Andy 0:18:17.640 --> 0:18:20.040 Writson and says, Hi, Robert and Julie, and he's responding 0:18:20.080 --> 0:18:22.640 to our Lucid Dreaming episode, which we've received a ton 0:18:22.680 --> 0:18:25.400 of comments from. And he says, I wanted to tell 0:18:25.440 --> 0:18:27.560 you that the night after I listened to the episode 0:18:27.560 --> 0:18:30.840 about Lucid Dreaming, I did, in fact Lucid dream It 0:18:30.920 --> 0:18:33.160 was a fantastic moment for me, since I've always been 0:18:33.240 --> 0:18:36.280 utterly fascinated by Lucid dreaming, but it never seriously attempted 0:18:36.280 --> 0:18:39.320 any technique. In the dream, I realized I was dreaming 0:18:39.480 --> 0:18:42.320 and had to concentrate to not wake up. I told 0:18:42.359 --> 0:18:44.840 my friend in the dream that this was a dream, 0:18:45.000 --> 0:18:47.480 and then demonstrated by making a little red ball appear 0:18:47.560 --> 0:18:50.840 and disappear in my hand. I don't remember what happened afterwards, 0:18:50.920 --> 0:18:53.440 but it was still a fantastic feeling. I'm gonna credit 0:18:53.440 --> 0:18:56.760 you guys for that, so thanks all the best. Andy, Well, 0:18:56.760 --> 0:18:58.960 that is awesome. I still have not lucid dreamed my 0:18:59.000 --> 0:19:01.080 knowledge that I can remain member, and it didn't occur 0:19:01.160 --> 0:19:03.800 after we did the podcast either. So the idea that 0:19:03.840 --> 0:19:07.440 we could cover this topic and maybe grease the wheels 0:19:07.440 --> 0:19:09.800 a little for someone else to experience lucid dreaming, I 0:19:09.800 --> 0:19:12.280 think that's awesome. Yeah, we have gotten so many cool 0:19:12.359 --> 0:19:15.200 Lucid dreaming emails, a lot of them having to deal 0:19:15.400 --> 0:19:18.880 with flying and how to control I mean for someone 0:19:18.920 --> 0:19:21.040 who lucid dreams like myself. I've just been like wow 0:19:21.200 --> 0:19:22.840 that there's so many different issues that are being brought 0:19:22.920 --> 0:19:25.240 up that we'd probably do separate podcasts on I don't 0:19:25.240 --> 0:19:29.240 know that people would want exclusively a podcast about flying 0:19:29.240 --> 0:19:32.280 and lucid dreams, but it's it's pretty fascinating stuff. And 0:19:32.320 --> 0:19:34.680 then here's another one from Debbie. Debbie writes them about 0:19:34.720 --> 0:19:37.200 lucid dreaming and she says, Hi, Robert Knejulye, first off, 0:19:37.440 --> 0:19:39.720 I love your podcast. Being a psych undergrad, I really 0:19:39.720 --> 0:19:41.840 get a kick out of all the brain related podcasts. 0:19:41.840 --> 0:19:44.679 So Thanks for being so entertaining. Second, I just listened 0:19:44.760 --> 0:19:47.600 to Lucid Dreaming podcasts and that was great. It brought 0:19:47.680 --> 0:19:49.679 up a question that I've never really thought of before. 0:19:50.359 --> 0:19:52.520 While researchers are still pretty up in the air to 0:19:52.600 --> 0:19:55.200 the exact purpose of dreaming, there has been some pretty 0:19:55.240 --> 0:19:58.080 interesting studies that suggests that it may be a way 0:19:58.080 --> 0:20:01.080 to consolidate our daily activities and help to either build 0:20:01.119 --> 0:20:04.439 memories both somatic and century, and or to deal with 0:20:04.480 --> 0:20:08.080 emotional distress strain. We discussed this in a in an episode. 0:20:08.480 --> 0:20:11.320 I just wondered if all these lucid dreaming advocates who 0:20:11.359 --> 0:20:14.359 want us to stop wasting our dream time by using 0:20:14.359 --> 0:20:18.200 it for virtual reality entertainment could lead to us losing 0:20:18.280 --> 0:20:22.000 something that we need and use to help our memories consolidate. 0:20:22.359 --> 0:20:24.479 Just an idea that popped into my head while listening. 0:20:24.680 --> 0:20:26.760 It made me think of the scene from Donnie Darko 0:20:26.840 --> 0:20:29.760 where Donnie and Gretchen present the glasses that show a 0:20:29.880 --> 0:20:33.520 baby beautiful pictures when they sleep so they aren't exposed 0:20:33.520 --> 0:20:36.080 to darkness, to which the teacher asked them if they 0:20:36.160 --> 0:20:39.359 don't think the darkness is there for a reason. Thanks 0:20:39.400 --> 0:20:42.120 again for the total brain trip. Of a podcast, keep 0:20:42.200 --> 0:20:44.479 up the great work, guys, and Debby, by the way, 0:20:44.520 --> 0:20:47.240 is one of our many Australian listeners, so that's pretty awesome. 0:20:47.280 --> 0:20:49.600 And finally a little bit of listener mail related to 0:20:49.680 --> 0:20:52.639 one of the episodes we did about toilets and uh, 0:20:53.000 --> 0:20:55.720 toilets of the future. Yeah, toilets of the future, I believe, 0:20:55.760 --> 0:20:58.200 and we were able to participate in a mystery here, 0:20:58.640 --> 0:21:00.840 so him who's also from Australia, another one of our 0:21:00.840 --> 0:21:03.320 awesome Australian listeners, Wrightson and says, Dear Robert and Julie, 0:21:03.359 --> 0:21:05.679 I just finished listening to your podcast about toilets, and 0:21:05.720 --> 0:21:07.840 i'd like to thank you both for answering a toilet 0:21:07.880 --> 0:21:10.800