1
00:00:06,360 --> 00:00:09,720
Speaker 1: How do some bees make meat honey? What are tapeworms

2
00:00:09,800 --> 00:00:10,959
Speaker 1: up to in my tummy?

3
00:00:11,160 --> 00:00:14,920
Speaker 2: Can light escape from a black hole? What process produces coal?

4
00:00:15,320 --> 00:00:18,479
Speaker 1: Did Franklin hang that key from a kite? Why is

5
00:00:18,600 --> 00:00:20,160
Speaker 1: dark chocolate better than white?

6
00:00:20,360 --> 00:00:24,040
Speaker 2: How do moles smell underwater? Why is the planet getting hotter?

7
00:00:24,400 --> 00:00:27,280
Speaker 1: How can humans live on Mars? What's the hold up

8
00:00:27,360 --> 00:00:28,360
Speaker 1: with flying cars?

9
00:00:28,680 --> 00:00:32,440
Speaker 2: The current state of space law? The powerful mantis, shrimp claw?

10
00:00:32,800 --> 00:00:38,279
Speaker 1: Biology, physics, archaeology, forestry, really anything other than chemistry?

11
00:00:38,560 --> 00:00:41,600
Speaker 2: What diseases do you get from your cat? Well, we'll

12
00:00:41,640 --> 00:00:43,120
Speaker 2: find the answers to all of that.

13
00:00:43,720 --> 00:00:45,760
Speaker 1: Whatever question keeps you up at night.

14
00:00:45,760 --> 00:00:48,000
Speaker 2: Daniel and Kelly's answer will make it right.

15
00:00:48,479 --> 00:00:52,480
Speaker 1: Welcome to another Listener Questions episode on Daniel and Kelly's

16
00:00:52,560 --> 00:00:53,800
Speaker 1: Extraordinary Universe.

17
00:01:07,440 --> 00:01:07,600
Speaker 3: Hi.

18
00:01:07,720 --> 00:01:10,479
Speaker 2: I'm Daniel, I'm a particle physicist, and I've never read

19
00:01:10,480 --> 00:01:12,240
Speaker 2: a poem on the podcast before.

20
00:01:12,720 --> 00:01:12,920
Speaker 4: Hi.

21
00:01:13,120 --> 00:01:15,959
Speaker 1: I'm Kelly Wiener Smith. And my husband just assumed that

22
00:01:16,000 --> 00:01:17,760
Speaker 1: I'd be so bad at writing poems that when I

23
00:01:17,800 --> 00:01:19,640
Speaker 1: read it out loud to my daughter, he left the

24
00:01:19,760 --> 00:01:22,600
Speaker 1: room just so that he wouldn't be embarrassed. But you

25
00:01:22,640 --> 00:01:24,640
Speaker 1: know what, I had fun.

26
00:01:25,160 --> 00:01:28,399
Speaker 2: I hope he's blushing somewhere. Whenever he's listening to this, he.

27
00:01:28,400 --> 00:01:31,200
Speaker 1: Might skip all of our Listener Questions episodes from here

28
00:01:31,240 --> 00:01:33,680
Speaker 1: on out. But that's all right. I had a good time.

29
00:01:33,760 --> 00:01:36,199
Speaker 2: Well that's too bad, because those are my favorite episodes.

30
00:01:36,240 --> 00:01:39,479
Speaker 2: I love hearing what people are wondering about, helping them

31
00:01:39,640 --> 00:01:43,120
Speaker 2: unravel their confusion and getting to the topics that are

32
00:01:43,160 --> 00:01:46,320
Speaker 2: really in people's minds. It's my favorite way to interact

33
00:01:46,319 --> 00:01:47,000
Speaker 2: with our audience.

34
00:01:47,640 --> 00:01:50,720
Speaker 1: I love it as well, and I'm particularly excited about

35
00:01:50,760 --> 00:01:53,919
Speaker 1: this Listener Questions episode. You know, one because my daughter's

36
00:01:54,000 --> 00:01:57,480
Speaker 1: questions included and that's pretty cute. But two because we

37
00:01:57,520 --> 00:02:00,040
Speaker 1: got a biology question for me that I was she

38
00:02:00,160 --> 00:02:03,040
Speaker 1: is completely unaware of this group of species and they're

39
00:02:03,080 --> 00:02:05,760
Speaker 1: so creepy and right up my alley and it was

40
00:02:05,800 --> 00:02:06,440
Speaker 1: so much fun.

41
00:02:06,680 --> 00:02:08,520
Speaker 2: All right, Well, let's not waste any more time. Let's

42
00:02:08,520 --> 00:02:11,640
Speaker 2: dig into it today. We have questions about seasons on

43
00:02:11,840 --> 00:02:16,680
Speaker 2: Binary Star systems, about meat, wasp honey, and about how

44
00:02:16,760 --> 00:02:18,600
Speaker 2: gravity actually works.

45
00:02:19,080 --> 00:02:19,760
Speaker 1: Let's do it.

46
00:02:19,880 --> 00:02:22,600
Speaker 2: So our first question is from Aida. She's ten years

47
00:02:22,639 --> 00:02:25,080
Speaker 2: old and she lives in Virginia, and I think she

48
00:02:25,200 --> 00:02:26,440
Speaker 2: knows Kelly pretty well.

49
00:02:26,760 --> 00:02:28,880
Speaker 1: Great place to live, I'll just throw that in there.

50
00:02:30,400 --> 00:02:31,480
Speaker 2: Here's Ada's question.

51
00:02:32,360 --> 00:02:35,640
Speaker 5: Hi. I'm Ada, I'm ten years old. I have a

52
00:02:35,720 --> 00:02:39,160
Speaker 5: question for you. What would seasons be like if you

53
00:02:39,200 --> 00:02:41,679
Speaker 5: were on a planet in a solar system that had

54
00:02:41,680 --> 00:02:43,200
Speaker 5: two sons? Thank you?

55
00:02:43,840 --> 00:02:45,959
Speaker 2: All right? I like how she gets right to the point.

56
00:02:46,400 --> 00:02:48,600
Speaker 1: Yes, she's very succinct. I like that too.

57
00:02:48,880 --> 00:02:51,840
Speaker 2: Is she reading a book about life on a solar

58
00:02:51,880 --> 00:02:53,600
Speaker 2: system with two sons? Or where do you think this

59
00:02:53,720 --> 00:02:54,560
Speaker 2: question came from?

60
00:02:54,680 --> 00:02:57,040
Speaker 1: Gosh, you know, I'm sure it didn't come out of nowhere,

61
00:02:57,200 --> 00:03:00,400
Speaker 1: but I don't know where she heard about solarsis with

62
00:03:00,440 --> 00:03:03,640
Speaker 1: two suns. That sparkedness. Could have been science class at school.

63
00:03:03,840 --> 00:03:06,359
Speaker 2: Maybe she's writing a science fiction novel and she needs

64
00:03:06,520 --> 00:03:07,800
Speaker 2: some science consultation.

65
00:03:08,280 --> 00:03:10,600
Speaker 1: That's right, Yes, and she reached out to the right person.

66
00:03:10,880 --> 00:03:14,919
Speaker 2: Yeh, she certainly did. So let's dig into it first.

67
00:03:15,000 --> 00:03:18,440
Speaker 2: Let's remind ourselves why we have seasons on Earth, and

68
00:03:18,440 --> 00:03:21,239
Speaker 2: then we can teleport ourselves mentally to a solar system

69
00:03:21,240 --> 00:03:24,480
Speaker 2: with two stars and think about that one. So, on Earth,

70
00:03:24,520 --> 00:03:26,680
Speaker 2: the reason we have seasons is because the Earth is

71
00:03:26,760 --> 00:03:29,880
Speaker 2: tilted right. The Earth goes around the Sun, and there's

72
00:03:29,919 --> 00:03:32,040
Speaker 2: a plane there where all the planets go around the

73
00:03:32,120 --> 00:03:35,640
Speaker 2: Sun in the same plane, and the Earth also spins,

74
00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:39,000
Speaker 2: but the axis that it spins on is not perfectly

75
00:03:39,000 --> 00:03:42,960
Speaker 2: perpendicular to the plane of its orbit, so it's tilted

76
00:03:43,040 --> 00:03:45,800
Speaker 2: a little bit. It like leans over. Now, the Earth

77
00:03:45,880 --> 00:03:48,360
Speaker 2: is a sphere, so you know what is really leaning.

78
00:03:48,400 --> 00:03:50,800
Speaker 2: It's still a sphere when it's tilted. But what's leaning

79
00:03:50,840 --> 00:03:53,840
Speaker 2: is that axis of spin, that axis that controls the

80
00:03:53,920 --> 00:03:56,520
Speaker 2: day night cycle. So what's closer to the Sun is

81
00:03:56,520 --> 00:03:59,360
Speaker 2: the Northern hemisphere the spin lets you define a northern

82
00:03:59,400 --> 00:04:02,520
Speaker 2: and the southern hemisphere, Then the Northern hemisphere is closer

83
00:04:02,560 --> 00:04:05,080
Speaker 2: to the Sun during the summer, and the Southern hemisphere

84
00:04:05,240 --> 00:04:08,600
Speaker 2: is further from the Sun during the Northern hemisphere summer

85
00:04:08,880 --> 00:04:11,800
Speaker 2: and the Southern hemisphere's winter. It's not actually accurate to

86
00:04:11,800 --> 00:04:14,200
Speaker 2: say that the Northern hemisphere is any closer to the Sun.

87
00:04:14,520 --> 00:04:17,240
Speaker 2: Is just more exposed to the Sun because it's leaning

88
00:04:17,320 --> 00:04:18,760
Speaker 2: that direction, got it?

89
00:04:18,800 --> 00:04:20,200
Speaker 1: And you know, I've got to admit that every once

90
00:04:20,200 --> 00:04:21,880
Speaker 1: in a while, when I talk to like the few

91
00:04:21,880 --> 00:04:24,920
Speaker 1: friends I have in Australia, I still forget that they're

92
00:04:24,960 --> 00:04:27,880
Speaker 1: experiencing the opposite season that we are up here in

93
00:04:27,960 --> 00:04:30,880
Speaker 1: North America. And we regularly have a disconnect.

94
00:04:31,240 --> 00:04:34,039
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. And so if we didn't have a tilt.

95
00:04:34,080 --> 00:04:38,279
Speaker 2: For example, if the Earth's axis of rotation was perfectly

96
00:04:38,279 --> 00:04:41,760
Speaker 2: perpendicular to the plane of its orbit, then you wouldn't

97
00:04:41,760 --> 00:04:44,200
Speaker 2: have any seasons. You just always have I guess spring

98
00:04:44,320 --> 00:04:47,559
Speaker 2: or fall. Right, the days would be the same length

99
00:04:47,600 --> 00:04:50,320
Speaker 2: all year round. Going around the Sun wouldn't change your

100
00:04:50,320 --> 00:04:51,600
Speaker 2: experience at all.

101
00:04:51,720 --> 00:04:55,440
Speaker 1: No seasons, totally boring, just like living in California. You

102
00:04:55,520 --> 00:04:57,560
Speaker 1: knew where that was going halfway through the sentence.

103
00:05:00,279 --> 00:05:03,880
Speaker 2: Exactly, we'd all be happy all year long, right, it'd

104
00:05:03,920 --> 00:05:08,280
Speaker 2: be amazing, so dull. And there are other tiny factors

105
00:05:08,320 --> 00:05:11,680
Speaker 2: that also affect the weather and the seasons, things like

106
00:05:11,760 --> 00:05:14,640
Speaker 2: the elliptical orbit, or the Earth doesn't orbit in a

107
00:05:14,680 --> 00:05:17,400
Speaker 2: perfect circle around the Sun. It's an ellipse, which means

108
00:05:17,400 --> 00:05:19,960
Speaker 2: sometimes it is closer to the Sun and sometimes it's

109
00:05:20,000 --> 00:05:23,000
Speaker 2: further from the Sun. But this is a smaller factor

110
00:05:23,080 --> 00:05:26,360
Speaker 2: than the tilt, which really dramatically changes how many hours

111
00:05:26,400 --> 00:05:29,599
Speaker 2: of sunlight you get every day. The Earth is closest

112
00:05:29,600 --> 00:05:32,400
Speaker 2: to the Sun in January and furthest from the Sun

113
00:05:32,480 --> 00:05:35,800
Speaker 2: in July, so actually that counters the effect. It makes

114
00:05:35,800 --> 00:05:39,520
Speaker 2: the summer slightly less severe and the winter's slightly less severe.

115
00:05:39,800 --> 00:05:43,040
Speaker 1: Is that why the year starts in January? Or did

116
00:05:43,080 --> 00:05:45,040
Speaker 1: that have nothing to do with the calend No.

117
00:05:45,000 --> 00:05:50,640
Speaker 2: That's totally random. Yeah, Oka's totally right. And also the

118
00:05:50,680 --> 00:05:53,520
Speaker 2: Earth tilt processes a little bit. It's not always in

119
00:05:53,560 --> 00:05:56,279
Speaker 2: the same direction. It itself rotates a little bit, like

120
00:05:56,320 --> 00:05:59,560
Speaker 2: a wobbly top. These are small factors, and that's affected

121
00:05:59,560 --> 00:06:01,960
Speaker 2: by like the Jupiter and all sorts of other stuff.

122
00:06:02,200 --> 00:06:04,960
Speaker 2: So mostly the Earth has seasons because it's tilted, So

123
00:06:05,000 --> 00:06:07,160
Speaker 2: the northern hemisphere is getting more light and the southern

124
00:06:07,200 --> 00:06:10,320
Speaker 2: hemisphere is getting less light during the northern hemisphere summer.

125
00:06:10,600 --> 00:06:13,200
Speaker 2: All right, but that's a simple system, single planet going

126
00:06:13,240 --> 00:06:16,680
Speaker 2: around a single star. So what about a binary star

127
00:06:16,720 --> 00:06:18,480
Speaker 2: system in Ada's mind?

128
00:06:18,680 --> 00:06:20,160
Speaker 1: Can I back you up for a second? Are most

129
00:06:20,240 --> 00:06:22,799
Speaker 1: planets tilted so like the Moon has a very little

130
00:06:22,800 --> 00:06:25,560
Speaker 1: bit of a tilt. Is Earth weird having a twenty

131
00:06:25,680 --> 00:06:27,039
Speaker 1: three point four degree tilt?

132
00:06:27,400 --> 00:06:29,480
Speaker 2: It's not weird to have a tilt like Urinus is

133
00:06:29,520 --> 00:06:33,440
Speaker 2: tilted much more dramatically ninety seven degrees, basically totally on

134
00:06:33,520 --> 00:06:36,520
Speaker 2: its side. Other planets are tilted more or less. The

135
00:06:36,560 --> 00:06:40,120
Speaker 2: tilt we think comes from being hit. Like everything in

136
00:06:40,120 --> 00:06:43,520
Speaker 2: the Solar System formed together from a big swirl. That's

137
00:06:43,560 --> 00:06:46,280
Speaker 2: why everything is rotating in the same plane, and most

138
00:06:46,320 --> 00:06:48,520
Speaker 2: of the planets are spinning in the same direction they

139
00:06:48,520 --> 00:06:51,359
Speaker 2: move around the Sun, which is the same direction that

140
00:06:51,400 --> 00:06:54,039
Speaker 2: the Sun is spinning itself. The whole Solar system is

141
00:06:54,080 --> 00:06:57,599
Speaker 2: one big swirl, which then coalesces into a star and

142
00:06:57,680 --> 00:07:00,479
Speaker 2: planets which all have the same swirl. But then you

143
00:07:00,520 --> 00:07:02,760
Speaker 2: can get hit by something from outside the Solar system

144
00:07:02,920 --> 00:07:04,840
Speaker 2: and it can knock you off axis a little bit.

145
00:07:05,080 --> 00:07:07,520
Speaker 2: So we think that's probably the source of the Earth's tilt,

146
00:07:07,600 --> 00:07:09,440
Speaker 2: and other planets tilt as well.

147
00:07:09,840 --> 00:07:12,400
Speaker 1: With all the stuff that's colliding, Would it be reasonable

148
00:07:12,440 --> 00:07:15,080
Speaker 1: to expect that having no tilt would be rare because

149
00:07:15,120 --> 00:07:17,680
Speaker 1: there's so many collisions that probably knock you off angle.

150
00:07:17,960 --> 00:07:20,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, As the Solar system forms, it's a little chaotic

151
00:07:20,160 --> 00:07:22,480
Speaker 2: and things hit each other, so the average tilt is

152
00:07:22,560 --> 00:07:25,240
Speaker 2: going to be zero, but it's unlikely for everything to

153
00:07:25,280 --> 00:07:28,240
Speaker 2: have exactly zero tilt. Got it just the same with it,

154
00:07:28,280 --> 00:07:31,200
Speaker 2: Like all the solar systems in the galaxy on average

155
00:07:31,200 --> 00:07:34,120
Speaker 2: have zero tilt relative to the plane of the galaxy,

156
00:07:34,440 --> 00:07:36,560
Speaker 2: but most of them are tilted relative to the plane

157
00:07:36,600 --> 00:07:39,440
Speaker 2: of the galaxy. They're not all aligned with the actual

158
00:07:39,520 --> 00:07:40,760
Speaker 2: rotation of the galaxy.

159
00:07:40,880 --> 00:07:43,480
Speaker 1: All right, So let's move on to systems with two sons.

160
00:07:43,840 --> 00:07:46,680
Speaker 2: All right. So system with two sons sound exotic, right,

161
00:07:46,680 --> 00:07:49,840
Speaker 2: You're like, ooh wow, two sons, how cool, But the

162
00:07:49,880 --> 00:07:52,680
Speaker 2: truth is that they're not actually that rare. Binary star

163
00:07:52,720 --> 00:07:56,240
Speaker 2: systems are all over the galaxy. It's a significant fraction

164
00:07:56,760 --> 00:07:59,480
Speaker 2: of the stars in our galaxy have a partner star.

165
00:08:00,040 --> 00:08:02,240
Speaker 2: And the reason is that that big cloud of gas

166
00:08:02,240 --> 00:08:04,880
Speaker 2: that collapses to give you a star usually it's part

167
00:08:04,920 --> 00:08:07,960
Speaker 2: of a much bigger cloud. So stars are born together.

168
00:08:08,400 --> 00:08:12,040
Speaker 2: Often you have two, three, four, five stars all born together,

169
00:08:12,400 --> 00:08:15,840
Speaker 2: which begin a complicated swirl as they're forming. So you

170
00:08:15,880 --> 00:08:17,920
Speaker 2: have these nurseries. We have a lot of star forming

171
00:08:18,000 --> 00:08:21,440
Speaker 2: happening at the same time, and so stars are born

172
00:08:21,480 --> 00:08:23,320
Speaker 2: with partners. And the reason we have a lot of

173
00:08:23,320 --> 00:08:26,480
Speaker 2: binary star systems is that it's basically the most number

174
00:08:26,480 --> 00:08:28,200
Speaker 2: of stars you can have in a system and have

175
00:08:28,280 --> 00:08:31,280
Speaker 2: it be stable. Like you can have two things orbiting

176
00:08:31,280 --> 00:08:33,160
Speaker 2: each other and have that be stable, like the Earth

177
00:08:33,160 --> 00:08:36,040
Speaker 2: and the Sun or a star and another star. But

178
00:08:36,120 --> 00:08:39,600
Speaker 2: you add a third object and it becomes chaotic, it

179
00:08:39,640 --> 00:08:43,840
Speaker 2: becomes really complicated and unstable. So if you have three stars,

180
00:08:43,840 --> 00:08:46,400
Speaker 2: for example, what's very likely to happen is one of

181
00:08:46,400 --> 00:08:48,000
Speaker 2: them is going to get ejected and you're going to

182
00:08:48,080 --> 00:08:49,960
Speaker 2: end up with a single star and then a pair

183
00:08:50,000 --> 00:08:52,600
Speaker 2: of stars. So you have a lot of binary star

184
00:08:52,640 --> 00:08:57,080
Speaker 2: systems out there, not very many trinary systems or quaternary systems,

185
00:08:57,200 --> 00:09:00,000
Speaker 2: or not even know the descriptions for five or more stars.

186
00:09:01,080 --> 00:09:03,280
Speaker 1: So why is it more likely to get ejected than

187
00:09:03,320 --> 00:09:05,760
Speaker 1: to get pulled into one of the other two stars

188
00:09:05,760 --> 00:09:07,680
Speaker 1: and then just make like, I don't know, a big star,

189
00:09:07,880 --> 00:09:08,880
Speaker 1: a big explosion.

190
00:09:10,880 --> 00:09:13,200
Speaker 2: Yeah, well that could happen also, but you know, stars

191
00:09:13,240 --> 00:09:16,480
Speaker 2: are small compared to the distances between them, and so

192
00:09:16,679 --> 00:09:20,120
Speaker 2: actual collisions are pretty unlikely, but they can spiral in

193
00:09:20,160 --> 00:09:22,680
Speaker 2: and combine. That certainly does happen as well, But there's

194
00:09:22,720 --> 00:09:25,640
Speaker 2: just many more outcomes where they get ejected, and just

195
00:09:25,679 --> 00:09:27,720
Speaker 2: like in our Solar system, there's been chaos. We think

196
00:09:27,760 --> 00:09:31,079
Speaker 2: probably there was another giant planet which got ejected from

197
00:09:31,120 --> 00:09:34,240
Speaker 2: the Solar System because of the interaction between all the planets.

198
00:09:34,360 --> 00:09:36,520
Speaker 2: So you have a lot of binary star systems out there,

199
00:09:37,080 --> 00:09:39,080
Speaker 2: and then you have to think about the planets around

200
00:09:39,080 --> 00:09:42,720
Speaker 2: those binary stars, and it becomes tricky already because now

201
00:09:42,880 --> 00:09:45,160
Speaker 2: the planet is sort of like that third object. So

202
00:09:45,160 --> 00:09:47,320
Speaker 2: you might wonder like, hey, isn't the planet just going

203
00:09:47,360 --> 00:09:49,760
Speaker 2: to get ejected the way like a third star would

204
00:09:49,800 --> 00:09:52,480
Speaker 2: get ejected, And the answer is yes, it's not easy

205
00:09:52,520 --> 00:09:55,800
Speaker 2: to have planets around binary stars in a stable way.

206
00:09:56,160 --> 00:09:58,080
Speaker 2: There's two ways to do it, and both of them

207
00:09:58,440 --> 00:10:01,520
Speaker 2: basically make it look more like a binary star system.

208
00:10:01,960 --> 00:10:04,240
Speaker 2: So one solution is you have the two stars near

209
00:10:04,280 --> 00:10:07,040
Speaker 2: each other and the planet is far away, so it's

210
00:10:07,040 --> 00:10:09,280
Speaker 2: sort of like, yeah, there are three objects there, but

211
00:10:09,360 --> 00:10:12,240
Speaker 2: really it's sort of a nested set of binary systems.

212
00:10:12,480 --> 00:10:14,079
Speaker 2: You have like the stars on one side and the

213
00:10:14,120 --> 00:10:16,959
Speaker 2: planet that are orbiting each other, and then inside the

214
00:10:17,000 --> 00:10:19,960
Speaker 2: sort of star system, you have two stars moving near

215
00:10:20,000 --> 00:10:23,520
Speaker 2: each other. That's one situation, basically, like replace the Sun

216
00:10:23,559 --> 00:10:26,080
Speaker 2: with two stars close to each other or closer to

217
00:10:26,160 --> 00:10:29,400
Speaker 2: each other than to the planet. The other possible configuration

218
00:10:29,880 --> 00:10:31,400
Speaker 2: is you have a star and a planet like the

219
00:10:31,400 --> 00:10:33,280
Speaker 2: Earth and the Sun, and then you have another star

220
00:10:33,360 --> 00:10:36,480
Speaker 2: that's much further away, so like put a star near

221
00:10:36,559 --> 00:10:39,600
Speaker 2: Pluto or something much further from the Earth than the

222
00:10:39,600 --> 00:10:42,760
Speaker 2: Sun and then it's far enough away that it's not unstable.

223
00:10:43,200 --> 00:10:46,439
Speaker 2: Then you have like again a nested set of binary systems.

224
00:10:46,440 --> 00:10:50,079
Speaker 2: You have three objects, but really it's like two objects

225
00:10:50,120 --> 00:10:52,960
Speaker 2: acting as one and then in a binary system with

226
00:10:53,000 --> 00:10:53,920
Speaker 2: the third object.

227
00:10:54,120 --> 00:10:57,320
Speaker 1: Okay, so then let's talk about seasons. In the first

228
00:10:57,320 --> 00:10:59,439
Speaker 1: scen area, where you have two stars that are right

229
00:10:59,480 --> 00:11:02,480
Speaker 1: next to each other, do they act like one just

230
00:11:02,920 --> 00:11:06,320
Speaker 1: megastar when you sort of aggregate their effects.

231
00:11:05,920 --> 00:11:08,360
Speaker 2: Yeah, they act like one megastar. It's going to be

232
00:11:08,520 --> 00:11:11,000
Speaker 2: very similar to as if you had one bigger star.

233
00:11:11,559 --> 00:11:13,679
Speaker 2: It's going to be different and more dramatic in terms

234
00:11:13,679 --> 00:11:17,720
Speaker 2: of like sunrise and sunset. Sunrise will be longer and

235
00:11:17,800 --> 00:11:19,920
Speaker 2: sunset will be longer, and there'll be times when you

236
00:11:19,960 --> 00:11:22,480
Speaker 2: have like one star above the horizon and one below,

237
00:11:22,960 --> 00:11:24,640
Speaker 2: so you could have effects like you could have a

238
00:11:24,640 --> 00:11:27,240
Speaker 2: sunrise where there's already a star in the sky, and

239
00:11:27,320 --> 00:11:30,840
Speaker 2: then you have basically two sunsets, one more dramatic than

240
00:11:30,880 --> 00:11:32,800
Speaker 2: the next. So that would be really cool, but it

241
00:11:32,800 --> 00:11:36,240
Speaker 2: wouldn't really affect the seasons very much, right because the

242
00:11:36,280 --> 00:11:39,559
Speaker 2: planet's relationship to the star is basically the same. If

243
00:11:39,600 --> 00:11:41,360
Speaker 2: you have a tilt and you have an orbit that's

244
00:11:41,400 --> 00:11:44,559
Speaker 2: going to determine your seasons. So in that situation where

245
00:11:44,559 --> 00:11:46,680
Speaker 2: you have a planet around a binary star system where

246
00:11:46,679 --> 00:11:48,439
Speaker 2: the stars are close to each other and further from

247
00:11:48,440 --> 00:11:50,480
Speaker 2: the planet, the seasons are going to be very much

248
00:11:50,600 --> 00:11:51,440
Speaker 2: like here on Earth.

249
00:11:51,920 --> 00:11:53,720
Speaker 1: I feel like it would be amazing to wake up

250
00:11:53,720 --> 00:11:56,680
Speaker 1: to a sunrise with two stars in the horizon. That

251
00:11:56,760 --> 00:11:59,640
Speaker 1: sounds really cool. But all right, So then our second scenario,

252
00:11:59,720 --> 00:12:01,840
Speaker 1: you say, there's one sun that's kind of close to

253
00:12:01,880 --> 00:12:05,200
Speaker 1: the planet and another sun that's super far out. Is

254
00:12:05,240 --> 00:12:08,679
Speaker 1: it far enough out that it doesn't really impact climates

255
00:12:08,960 --> 00:12:10,560
Speaker 1: and seasons anymore?

256
00:12:11,280 --> 00:12:14,520
Speaker 2: Unfortunately? Yeah, So the boring answer is for there to

257
00:12:14,559 --> 00:12:16,800
Speaker 2: be a planet in this situation, that star has to

258
00:12:16,840 --> 00:12:19,080
Speaker 2: be kind of far away. The closer you get it,

259
00:12:19,120 --> 00:12:21,640
Speaker 2: the more dramatic and the impact on seasons and day

260
00:12:21,720 --> 00:12:25,480
Speaker 2: night stuff, etc. But also the more unstable it is. Like,

261
00:12:25,559 --> 00:12:27,520
Speaker 2: if you have the planet be the same distance from

262
00:12:27,559 --> 00:12:30,360
Speaker 2: both stars, so it's like very dramatic, then that system

263
00:12:30,400 --> 00:12:33,640
Speaker 2: is totally unstable and it's not gonna last for very long.

264
00:12:34,080 --> 00:12:36,360
Speaker 2: So you got to push that second star kind of

265
00:12:36,400 --> 00:12:39,240
Speaker 2: far away, which means really it's gonna be in the

266
00:12:39,280 --> 00:12:42,280
Speaker 2: sky more like a bright star. Than a real sun

267
00:12:42,480 --> 00:12:45,480
Speaker 2: and not really gonna affect your seasons. You're gonna have

268
00:12:45,720 --> 00:12:49,520
Speaker 2: one totally dominant star and then a second star that's

269
00:12:49,559 --> 00:12:52,280
Speaker 2: gonna sometimes make the night a little brighter or even

270
00:12:52,280 --> 00:12:54,200
Speaker 2: the day a little brighter, but it's not gonna have

271
00:12:54,200 --> 00:12:56,720
Speaker 2: that much effect. But you know, in a science fiction

272
00:12:56,800 --> 00:12:59,680
Speaker 2: sort of inspiration, we can move that second star in

273
00:12:59,800 --> 00:13:02,280
Speaker 2: as as much as possible and pretend that it does

274
00:13:02,360 --> 00:13:05,760
Speaker 2: have some impact because there's some crazy dynamics that happen

275
00:13:05,840 --> 00:13:06,720
Speaker 2: in that scenario.

276
00:13:07,040 --> 00:13:09,800
Speaker 1: Okay, let's go for it. What is that like super winter?

277
00:13:12,960 --> 00:13:15,760
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. If you think about the periods when you

278
00:13:15,800 --> 00:13:18,360
Speaker 2: have sunlight, that really is what determines the seasons. Right

279
00:13:18,480 --> 00:13:21,480
Speaker 2: in a single star, single planet system, it's the number

280
00:13:21,520 --> 00:13:24,360
Speaker 2: of hours per day of sunlight you get that determine

281
00:13:24,400 --> 00:13:26,520
Speaker 2: the seasons. And in the summer you're getting more sun.

282
00:13:26,600 --> 00:13:28,720
Speaker 2: In the winter, you're getting less sun. Now put that

283
00:13:28,800 --> 00:13:31,520
Speaker 2: second star around, say we have the second star, you know,

284
00:13:31,600 --> 00:13:35,000
Speaker 2: in Mars orbit or something crazy, then you're going to

285
00:13:35,080 --> 00:13:37,600
Speaker 2: be getting sunlight all sorts of weird configurations, like there

286
00:13:37,640 --> 00:13:41,000
Speaker 2: can be parts of the year where each star is

287
00:13:41,080 --> 00:13:44,320
Speaker 2: illuminating a different side of the planet. Put the planet

288
00:13:44,360 --> 00:13:46,960
Speaker 2: between the two stars. Right, they're all in a line.

289
00:13:47,000 --> 00:13:49,800
Speaker 2: You have star, planet Star, then every part of the

290
00:13:49,840 --> 00:13:52,720
Speaker 2: surface is seeing a star. Right, It's like the whole

291
00:13:52,760 --> 00:13:56,920
Speaker 2: world has noon at the same time, right, which would

292
00:13:56,960 --> 00:13:59,920
Speaker 2: be crazy. So you have periods where the whole planet

293
00:13:59,960 --> 00:14:03,840
Speaker 2: is seeing star, and then other scenarios where like in

294
00:14:03,880 --> 00:14:06,839
Speaker 2: a line it goes star star planet where half of

295
00:14:06,880 --> 00:14:09,640
Speaker 2: the planet is seeing both stars at the same time,

296
00:14:10,120 --> 00:14:12,960
Speaker 2: and if they're both pretty close, that's gonna be superday.

297
00:14:13,040 --> 00:14:16,480
Speaker 2: That's like super noon, right, and that's gonna be very intense,

298
00:14:16,760 --> 00:14:19,440
Speaker 2: super duper hot. And also you'll get a weird effect

299
00:14:19,440 --> 00:14:23,240
Speaker 2: there where potentially the stars eclipse each other. So like

300
00:14:23,320 --> 00:14:25,640
Speaker 2: you know, we have solar eclipses and lunar eclipses, this

301
00:14:25,680 --> 00:14:28,600
Speaker 2: would be like a stellar eclipse where one sun is

302
00:14:28,640 --> 00:14:31,680
Speaker 2: behind the other sun briefly. That would be awesome.

303
00:14:31,880 --> 00:14:32,640
Speaker 1: Don't look at either.

304
00:14:36,000 --> 00:14:38,040
Speaker 2: But I actually looked up a simulator to try to

305
00:14:38,040 --> 00:14:40,640
Speaker 2: figure out exactly what would happen through the year, and

306
00:14:40,720 --> 00:14:44,480
Speaker 2: it depends crucially on the orbit of that second star.

307
00:14:45,040 --> 00:14:47,720
Speaker 2: If that second star has a period of about a year,

308
00:14:47,840 --> 00:14:50,880
Speaker 2: like the same as the planet's orbit, then you're gonna

309
00:14:50,880 --> 00:14:53,160
Speaker 2: have a regular cycle. But you're gonna have times in

310
00:14:53,160 --> 00:14:55,840
Speaker 2: the year where even at the equator you have no darkness,

311
00:14:55,880 --> 00:14:57,960
Speaker 2: like you see one sun and the planet spins and

312
00:14:57,960 --> 00:15:00,560
Speaker 2: you see the other sun. And so that's going to

313
00:15:00,640 --> 00:15:03,280
Speaker 2: be very summary, right, because it's all about the hours

314
00:15:03,320 --> 00:15:05,760
Speaker 2: of sunlight you get and other parts of the year

315
00:15:05,920 --> 00:15:07,960
Speaker 2: where you're seeing both suns at the same time, so

316
00:15:07,960 --> 00:15:11,120
Speaker 2: you're getting fewer hours of daylight, but they're more intense,

317
00:15:11,160 --> 00:15:15,080
Speaker 2: they're brighter. So you're gonna have these really weird periods.

318
00:15:15,280 --> 00:15:17,200
Speaker 2: I don't know how the plants would respond to that,

319
00:15:17,320 --> 00:15:18,920
Speaker 2: or how you would evolve in that kind of.

320
00:15:18,880 --> 00:15:21,360
Speaker 1: Configuration circadian rhythms, mm hmm.

321
00:15:21,680 --> 00:15:23,720
Speaker 2: It's gonna be a total mess, but it would be regular,

322
00:15:24,240 --> 00:15:26,520
Speaker 2: you know. And if, for example, the second star has

323
00:15:26,560 --> 00:15:29,400
Speaker 2: a longer period, it takes longer to go around that

324
00:15:29,480 --> 00:15:33,400
Speaker 2: first star and the planet, then its affects can slide

325
00:15:33,560 --> 00:15:35,920
Speaker 2: through the year, right, It's not like every June we

326
00:15:36,000 --> 00:15:39,760
Speaker 2: have double sun, every January we have one sun. It

327
00:15:39,840 --> 00:15:43,240
Speaker 2: can slowly offset and that must really affect like the

328
00:15:43,280 --> 00:15:46,240
Speaker 2: development of a civilization, you know, because we use the

329
00:15:46,360 --> 00:15:49,920
Speaker 2: regular seasons, and the regular day night cycle really is

330
00:15:49,920 --> 00:15:52,480
Speaker 2: a way to tell time. So either you have to

331
00:15:52,520 --> 00:15:55,120
Speaker 2: have much more complex mathematics before you can even begin

332
00:15:55,200 --> 00:15:57,600
Speaker 2: to use a calendar and develop it. Or maybe you

333
00:15:57,640 --> 00:15:59,960
Speaker 2: get some art or quicker because the calendar is more

334
00:16:00,040 --> 00:16:03,920
Speaker 2: complicated and it inspires more interesting mathematics. But the short

335
00:16:03,920 --> 00:16:06,120
Speaker 2: answer is that the seasons are going to be intense

336
00:16:06,200 --> 00:16:09,320
Speaker 2: and complicated, and it depends on a lot of the details,

337
00:16:09,360 --> 00:16:12,640
Speaker 2: exactly how fast that second star goes around the first star.

338
00:16:12,880 --> 00:16:16,520
Speaker 1: I wonder if it would hinder the establishment of civilizations,

339
00:16:16,600 --> 00:16:18,800
Speaker 1: because like being able to plan things like when you

340
00:16:18,800 --> 00:16:21,680
Speaker 1: plant your crops seems really important. I wonder if we'd

341
00:16:21,720 --> 00:16:24,560
Speaker 1: all be like wanderers because planning just isn't worth even trying,

342
00:16:24,680 --> 00:16:26,200
Speaker 1: but really fun to think about it. You know, there's

343
00:16:26,200 --> 00:16:27,640
Speaker 1: got to be a couple of sci fi novels in.

344
00:16:27,600 --> 00:16:31,320
Speaker 2: There, Yeah, exactly. And you know there's the famous book

345
00:16:31,320 --> 00:16:34,840
Speaker 2: The three Body Problem, where they have essentially this question,

346
00:16:35,080 --> 00:16:37,720
Speaker 2: except it's actually the four body problem because they have

347
00:16:37,880 --> 00:16:40,720
Speaker 2: three stars and a planet. I don't know why they

348
00:16:40,840 --> 00:16:43,160
Speaker 2: like couldn't figure out how to count to three. It's

349
00:16:43,200 --> 00:16:45,840
Speaker 2: already complicated enough with two stars. You don't need a

350
00:16:45,880 --> 00:16:46,440
Speaker 2: third star.

351
00:16:47,840 --> 00:16:51,800
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, when Ada's done with her math homework, will

352
00:16:51,920 --> 00:16:54,720
Speaker 1: have her listen to this explanation and hear what she

353
00:16:54,800 --> 00:16:55,360
Speaker 1: had to say.

354
00:16:56,240 --> 00:16:58,120
Speaker 2: Maybe we should have her on in real time for

355
00:16:58,160 --> 00:17:03,680
Speaker 2: a follow up. Let's do it, hi Ada, thanks very

356
00:17:03,760 --> 00:17:06,760
Speaker 2: much for your question. I was curious what you thought

357
00:17:06,800 --> 00:17:10,040
Speaker 2: about our answer and if you have any follow up questions.

358
00:17:10,440 --> 00:17:17,399
Speaker 5: I understood like what I heard when I listened to

359
00:17:17,520 --> 00:17:24,000
Speaker 5: the podcast, m H. And I do have one follow

360
00:17:24,080 --> 00:17:24,920
Speaker 5: up question.

361
00:17:25,640 --> 00:17:26,560
Speaker 2: Oh goodie, what is it?

362
00:17:26,920 --> 00:17:27,000
Speaker 6: So?

363
00:17:28,040 --> 00:17:35,560
Speaker 5: Was our sun in this our source system like part

364
00:17:35,560 --> 00:17:38,560
Speaker 5: of a different source system and then was it ejected

365
00:17:38,760 --> 00:17:43,720
Speaker 5: out or was it just not like that?

366
00:17:45,119 --> 00:17:48,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a great question. Unfortunately we don't know the answer.

367
00:17:48,560 --> 00:17:52,000
Speaker 2: Most stars are born with other stars nearby. There's like

368
00:17:52,040 --> 00:17:55,919
Speaker 2: sibling stars sometimes two, three, five, seven, as part of

369
00:17:55,960 --> 00:17:59,240
Speaker 2: a big nursery, and then they're separated, as you know,

370
00:17:59,359 --> 00:18:02,760
Speaker 2: gravity lings them around. But we don't know the history

371
00:18:02,760 --> 00:18:05,639
Speaker 2: of our star that far back, so probably it was

372
00:18:05,680 --> 00:18:08,840
Speaker 2: born with other stars, but we don't actually know. Maybe

373
00:18:08,840 --> 00:18:11,440
Speaker 2: one day we'll figure out some way to figure it out,

374
00:18:11,480 --> 00:18:13,720
Speaker 2: but for now we don't know the answer. Thank you,

375
00:18:14,320 --> 00:18:15,399
Speaker 2: thanks so much for your question.

376
00:18:32,600 --> 00:18:36,200
Speaker 1: All right, so now for something absolutely totally different, we

377
00:18:36,280 --> 00:18:40,480
Speaker 1: have a fantastic question from listener James Palmer, and it

378
00:18:40,560 --> 00:18:44,440
Speaker 1: is a question about meat bees otherwise known as vulture bees,

379
00:18:44,480 --> 00:18:47,159
Speaker 1: which I had not heard of, but is absolutely right

380
00:18:47,240 --> 00:18:49,240
Speaker 1: up my alley. So let's hear the question.

381
00:18:50,040 --> 00:18:52,679
Speaker 4: Hey, Kelly and Daniel, I have a burning desire to

382
00:18:52,760 --> 00:18:55,959
Speaker 4: know everything about meat wasps. I just heard about them,

383
00:18:56,000 --> 00:18:57,800
Speaker 4: and I feel like there's a lot to discuss here,

384
00:18:58,119 --> 00:19:00,600
Speaker 4: Like apparently they are carnivorous and the eat on like

385
00:19:00,720 --> 00:19:03,840
Speaker 4: flesh and like maybe it's rotting. Then they use that

386
00:19:03,960 --> 00:19:09,679
Speaker 4: to make their honey and stuff like meat honey. Please

387
00:19:09,800 --> 00:19:11,320
Speaker 4: tell me everything.

388
00:19:12,119 --> 00:19:15,919
Speaker 1: Meat honey, Daniel. You're dying to know about meat honey.

389
00:19:16,000 --> 00:19:16,160
Speaker 4: Right.

390
00:19:16,480 --> 00:19:18,080
Speaker 2: Well, you know, we have lots of different kinds of

391
00:19:18,080 --> 00:19:20,800
Speaker 2: honey here in California, and often it's sold to us

392
00:19:21,000 --> 00:19:23,720
Speaker 2: by promoting the kind of flowers that the bees visit,

393
00:19:23,800 --> 00:19:26,960
Speaker 2: like ooh, this is lavender honey or wildflower honey, and

394
00:19:27,000 --> 00:19:29,920
Speaker 2: you're supposed to imagine that you can taste the lavender

395
00:19:30,359 --> 00:19:32,520
Speaker 2: as you're eating the honey. And so I'm wondering, now,

396
00:19:32,920 --> 00:19:35,600
Speaker 2: meat bee honey, is it gonna taste like pepperoni or

397
00:19:35,640 --> 00:19:36,119
Speaker 2: what's going on?

398
00:19:36,200 --> 00:19:39,200
Speaker 1: Oh gosh, you know, to be honest, I would never

399
00:19:39,280 --> 00:19:42,600
Speaker 1: try it. But there's not a lot of honey that

400
00:19:42,760 --> 00:19:45,159
Speaker 1: is meat honey. So there's a lot of bees that

401
00:19:45,240 --> 00:19:49,119
Speaker 1: make something called honey, but there's only three species that

402
00:19:49,160 --> 00:19:52,840
Speaker 1: do this meat honey thing exclusively. So I think maybe

403
00:19:52,880 --> 00:19:55,880
Speaker 1: we should start with how honey is made. Yea, because

404
00:19:55,960 --> 00:19:57,760
Speaker 1: I actually didn't understand this very well.

405
00:19:57,880 --> 00:20:00,880
Speaker 2: I have this naive understanding that like bee eat pollen

406
00:20:01,040 --> 00:20:03,719
Speaker 2: and then do something internally and then vomit up honey.

407
00:20:03,800 --> 00:20:04,480
Speaker 2: How wrong is that?

408
00:20:04,800 --> 00:20:07,720
Speaker 1: Yeah? I thought that too, Okay, totally, like almost one

409
00:20:07,800 --> 00:20:09,800
Speaker 1: hundred percent. Okay, so that was my thought too. Okay,

410
00:20:09,840 --> 00:20:12,639
Speaker 1: So let's start with the European honey bees as an example. Okay,

411
00:20:12,760 --> 00:20:15,960
Speaker 1: So this is APIs Melfera, and what they do is

412
00:20:16,000 --> 00:20:18,119
Speaker 1: they go out and they go to flowers, and the

413
00:20:18,160 --> 00:20:22,960
Speaker 1: flowers produce both nectar, which is like sugar water, and pollen,

414
00:20:23,359 --> 00:20:25,400
Speaker 1: which has a lot of protein. And so these fill

415
00:20:25,480 --> 00:20:28,720
Speaker 1: two very different rolls for the bees. So they get

416
00:20:28,760 --> 00:20:31,879
Speaker 1: their carbohydrates from the nectar, okay, and that's gonna become honey,

417
00:20:32,400 --> 00:20:35,240
Speaker 1: and then the pollen is their protein source. And sometimes

418
00:20:35,280 --> 00:20:37,600
Speaker 1: the pollen like gets in the honey. It almost sounds

419
00:20:37,600 --> 00:20:42,639
Speaker 1: like it's accidental, but mostly the honey is from the nectar.

420
00:20:43,119 --> 00:20:44,080
Speaker 1: Not from the pollen, but.

421
00:20:44,000 --> 00:20:46,080
Speaker 2: The bees also eat the pollen. I thought the pollen

422
00:20:46,160 --> 00:20:48,159
Speaker 2: was incidental and going along for a ride, and it

423
00:20:48,200 --> 00:20:50,119
Speaker 2: was part of the plants deal with the bees, Like

424
00:20:50,320 --> 00:20:52,440
Speaker 2: you can eat the nectar, but then I'm gonna get

425
00:20:52,440 --> 00:20:54,520
Speaker 2: the pollen all over you and you're gonna drop it

426
00:20:54,560 --> 00:20:56,560
Speaker 2: on another flower and help us reproduce.

427
00:20:57,080 --> 00:20:59,720
Speaker 1: No, they eat it too. Oh no, they eat it

428
00:20:59,760 --> 00:21:02,560
Speaker 1: and they feed it to like the baby bees, and

429
00:21:02,600 --> 00:21:05,119
Speaker 1: so it's like a very important protein source. I didn't

430
00:21:05,119 --> 00:21:08,000
Speaker 1: know that either. And actually there's four different kinds of bees.

431
00:21:08,040 --> 00:21:11,199
Speaker 1: There's the honey bees, the orchid bees, the bumblebees, and

432
00:21:11,280 --> 00:21:14,919
Speaker 1: the stingless bees. And they're all categorized by having what

433
00:21:14,960 --> 00:21:19,199
Speaker 1: are called corbicula and these are like chunky thighs with

434
00:21:19,400 --> 00:21:22,680
Speaker 1: like a way to like stick the pollen on there.

435
00:21:23,080 --> 00:21:25,119
Speaker 1: And so like I saw a bee on one of

436
00:21:25,119 --> 00:21:26,919
Speaker 1: our flowers the other day and I was like, what

437
00:21:27,080 --> 00:21:29,560
Speaker 1: is this orange? Like it's like they've got bling on

438
00:21:29,600 --> 00:21:31,840
Speaker 1: their hips. I know, as an ecologist, I should have

439
00:21:31,840 --> 00:21:34,159
Speaker 1: been like mortified that I didn't know what this was already.

440
00:21:34,160 --> 00:21:36,800
Speaker 1: But anyway, those are like four carrying pollen around so

441
00:21:36,840 --> 00:21:37,760
Speaker 1: they can bring it back to the.

442
00:21:37,720 --> 00:21:40,040
Speaker 2: Hive, I see, And so do the plants get anything

443
00:21:40,040 --> 00:21:41,840
Speaker 2: out of it? I thought bees were pollinators.

444
00:21:42,080 --> 00:21:44,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think some of it still like falls off

445
00:21:44,560 --> 00:21:47,360
Speaker 1: and lands in the right place, so the pollination still happens.

446
00:21:47,359 --> 00:21:50,520
Speaker 1: But the bees aren't moving the pollen around as a favor.

447
00:21:50,960 --> 00:21:55,200
Speaker 1: It's more like incidental. So that's how nature. No one

448
00:21:55,200 --> 00:21:57,520
Speaker 1: helps anyone out in nature unless they have to, all right.

449
00:21:57,560 --> 00:22:00,560
Speaker 2: So bees drink pollen and then they use that to

450
00:22:00,600 --> 00:22:02,479
Speaker 2: make the honey. How do they actually make the honeyes

451
00:22:02,480 --> 00:22:04,679
Speaker 2: that inside the bee? Or is that in one of

452
00:22:04,680 --> 00:22:06,520
Speaker 2: their little hexagonal cooking vats.

453
00:22:07,200 --> 00:22:09,960
Speaker 1: Bees drink nectar. They don't drink the pollen.

454
00:22:10,119 --> 00:22:11,880
Speaker 2: Oh sorry, right, yes, okay.

455
00:22:11,680 --> 00:22:14,199
Speaker 1: That's okay. Or they sometimes drink a honeydew, which is

456
00:22:14,240 --> 00:22:17,720
Speaker 1: this like sweet fluid produced by insects as like a

457
00:22:17,760 --> 00:22:21,560
Speaker 1: way to attract organisms that like protect them from natural enemies.

458
00:22:21,960 --> 00:22:24,680
Speaker 1: They collect it in this special organ where they collect

459
00:22:24,720 --> 00:22:27,080
Speaker 1: all of this sugary water, and you know, they can

460
00:22:27,200 --> 00:22:29,119
Speaker 1: use it a little bit for like their flight to

461
00:22:29,119 --> 00:22:31,680
Speaker 1: get from place to place, but they're you know, trying

462
00:22:31,720 --> 00:22:33,440
Speaker 1: to bring it back to the hive. So they fill

463
00:22:33,520 --> 00:22:35,520
Speaker 1: up this organ and I think that something like half

464
00:22:35,560 --> 00:22:38,480
Speaker 1: of their body weight can end up being this sugary water.

465
00:22:39,359 --> 00:22:43,439
Speaker 1: But the sugary water is nowhere near concentrated enough to

466
00:22:43,480 --> 00:22:45,119
Speaker 1: be honey. So what they do is they bring it

467
00:22:45,160 --> 00:22:48,800
Speaker 1: back to the hive and they regurgitate it to bees

468
00:22:48,920 --> 00:22:51,480
Speaker 1: whose job it is to try to get some of

469
00:22:51,520 --> 00:22:55,159
Speaker 1: the water out and concentrate the sugars more. And so

470
00:22:55,560 --> 00:22:59,399
Speaker 1: those bees they like start kind of partially regurgitating it

471
00:22:59,440 --> 00:23:02,200
Speaker 1: and blowing these like bubbles that increase the surface area,

472
00:23:02,320 --> 00:23:04,800
Speaker 1: so some of the water evaporates off it.

473
00:23:04,880 --> 00:23:08,800
Speaker 2: Didn't know that the physics of honey look at that, Yes, right, And.

474
00:23:08,800 --> 00:23:11,600
Speaker 1: I hadn't imagined that so much of honey involved vomit.

475
00:23:11,680 --> 00:23:15,280
Speaker 1: But there you go, so much fun hanging out with biologists.

476
00:23:16,280 --> 00:23:19,280
Speaker 2: When I'm vomiting, I'm not busy also trying to concentrate

477
00:23:19,280 --> 00:23:22,080
Speaker 2: it and evaporate it. So I have like gooey or vomit.

478
00:23:22,359 --> 00:23:23,520
Speaker 2: I guess that's what a bee does.

479
00:23:24,119 --> 00:23:28,320
Speaker 1: I mean, you're not so great at multitasking. Too bad.

480
00:23:28,400 --> 00:23:30,000
Speaker 2: I'll work on that. I'll work on that. You know,

481
00:23:30,240 --> 00:23:32,760
Speaker 2: good to have goals. Yeah, all right, So bees vomit

482
00:23:32,840 --> 00:23:36,240
Speaker 2: up the nectar, and then other specialized bees help evaporate

483
00:23:36,320 --> 00:23:38,959
Speaker 2: and concentrate it into honey. So that mean that honey

484
00:23:39,040 --> 00:23:42,560
Speaker 2: is just nectar that's been concentrated down or is there

485
00:23:42,600 --> 00:23:44,120
Speaker 2: some fermentation that also happens.

486
00:23:44,359 --> 00:23:47,680
Speaker 1: That's just one of the stages of evaporation that gets

487
00:23:47,680 --> 00:23:49,040
Speaker 1: a little bit of the water out, and then when

488
00:23:49,040 --> 00:23:51,639
Speaker 1: they store it in the combs, like the you know,

489
00:23:51,680 --> 00:23:54,840
Speaker 1: honey combs, I'm under the impression that some more evaporation

490
00:23:54,920 --> 00:23:57,320
Speaker 1: happens there. So bees produce a little bit of heat

491
00:23:57,480 --> 00:23:59,840
Speaker 1: by like, you know, shaking their wings really fast. That

492
00:23:59,880 --> 00:24:03,880
Speaker 1: also produces some airflow over the honeycombs, and that combination

493
00:24:03,960 --> 00:24:07,199
Speaker 1: of heat and then air moving throughout the colony and

494
00:24:07,200 --> 00:24:09,920
Speaker 1: then sort of back out of the hive, that finishes

495
00:24:09,960 --> 00:24:12,120
Speaker 1: evaporating off the water until you get to a point

496
00:24:12,119 --> 00:24:15,159
Speaker 1: where you've got enough concentrated sugar that you've got honey.

497
00:24:15,960 --> 00:24:16,879
Speaker 2: Wow. Fascinating.

498
00:24:17,240 --> 00:24:18,919
Speaker 1: Yeah, I didn't know any of that. That was awesome.

499
00:24:19,000 --> 00:24:21,320
Speaker 2: So then it makes sense that if I'm eating the

500
00:24:21,359 --> 00:24:24,000
Speaker 2: honey from bees that visited lavender, it shit tastes like

501
00:24:24,040 --> 00:24:27,280
Speaker 2: lavender because it really is like concentrated lavender nectar.

502
00:24:27,560 --> 00:24:32,119
Speaker 1: If lavender nectar smells like lavender, I don't know that

503
00:24:32,200 --> 00:24:34,360
Speaker 1: it does. And I'm one of those people who has

504
00:24:34,359 --> 00:24:36,880
Speaker 1: had honey from different places and been like, it's all

505
00:24:36,880 --> 00:24:39,679
Speaker 1: honey to me. I don't have a delicate paletate.

506
00:24:39,760 --> 00:24:42,679
Speaker 2: Okay, So now tell us about meat wasps. Where do

507
00:24:42,760 --> 00:24:44,679
Speaker 2: they get their supplies to make honey?

508
00:24:45,040 --> 00:24:45,399
Speaker 1: Okay?

509
00:24:45,480 --> 00:24:47,800
Speaker 2: So I'm terrified of this answer, by the way.

510
00:24:48,200 --> 00:24:51,280
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right. So the best honeymakers are the European

511
00:24:51,320 --> 00:24:53,320
Speaker 1: honey bees, the best in terms of like producing honey

512
00:24:53,359 --> 00:24:55,760
Speaker 1: that humans like, but a bunch of other kinds of

513
00:24:55,760 --> 00:24:58,399
Speaker 1: bees they make similar honey, but often their honey is

514
00:24:58,480 --> 00:25:02,320
Speaker 1: nowhere near as like concentrated with sugars. It's more watery.

515
00:25:02,880 --> 00:25:05,159
Speaker 1: And there's a group of bees called the stingless bees,

516
00:25:05,240 --> 00:25:07,560
Speaker 1: and now we're getting closer to the vulture bees. So

517
00:25:08,000 --> 00:25:11,359
Speaker 1: the stingless bees they make honey, but their honey tends

518
00:25:11,359 --> 00:25:13,760
Speaker 1: to be more watery, and instead of storing it in

519
00:25:13,800 --> 00:25:18,040
Speaker 1: those combs, they make these little waxy pots, and it's

520
00:25:18,080 --> 00:25:20,640
Speaker 1: harder to get it out of those waxy pots, and

521
00:25:21,000 --> 00:25:24,159
Speaker 1: it's like more watered down when you do. So people

522
00:25:24,200 --> 00:25:28,440
Speaker 1: did still keep these bees for sugary fluids, but as

523
00:25:28,440 --> 00:25:30,359
Speaker 1: soon as honey bees came along, a lot of the

524
00:25:30,359 --> 00:25:32,920
Speaker 1: stingless bees that do this more watered down, harder to

525
00:25:32,960 --> 00:25:36,919
Speaker 1: get honey, they became less popular to culture. But so

526
00:25:37,000 --> 00:25:40,720
Speaker 1: these stingless bees, they also get their nectar from flowers,

527
00:25:40,760 --> 00:25:45,600
Speaker 1: but there's a group in the genus Trigona where they

528
00:25:45,720 --> 00:25:48,879
Speaker 1: seem like they're less interested in flowers. So instead of

529
00:25:48,920 --> 00:25:52,800
Speaker 1: going to flowers for nectar, they get their sugars from

530
00:25:52,800 --> 00:25:55,800
Speaker 1: things like rotting fruits. They'll like take the sugars from that.

531
00:25:56,560 --> 00:26:01,200
Speaker 1: And instead of getting pollen, they get their protein from

532
00:26:01,359 --> 00:26:04,080
Speaker 1: dead animals, dead vertebrates in particular.

533
00:26:04,240 --> 00:26:06,160
Speaker 2: I see. So that's why they're called vulture bees, because

534
00:26:06,240 --> 00:26:08,919
Speaker 2: vultures are scavengers. They don't kill anything. They eat already

535
00:26:08,960 --> 00:26:11,280
Speaker 2: dead stuff. So these vulture bees will get their protein

536
00:26:11,760 --> 00:26:13,520
Speaker 2: not from pollen, but from dead animals.

537
00:26:13,520 --> 00:26:16,120
Speaker 1: You're saying, that's right. And they'll get their sugar, which

538
00:26:16,160 --> 00:26:18,159
Speaker 1: they used, you know, like make their honey stuff. They

539
00:26:18,160 --> 00:26:22,199
Speaker 1: get that from things like writing fruit are free they find, Okay,

540
00:26:22,280 --> 00:26:25,919
Speaker 1: So then the question is do they make meat honey?

541
00:26:26,880 --> 00:26:31,520
Speaker 1: This is important and the answer I think is maybe.

542
00:26:31,880 --> 00:26:32,040
Speaker 6: Oh.

543
00:26:32,080 --> 00:26:32,320
Speaker 2: Really.

544
00:26:32,560 --> 00:26:35,639
Speaker 1: So there's only three species of these vulture bees, and

545
00:26:35,680 --> 00:26:37,800
Speaker 1: they're all in the same genus, they're all closely related.

546
00:26:38,119 --> 00:26:40,800
Speaker 1: It does turn out that there's a fair number of

547
00:26:40,840 --> 00:26:44,200
Speaker 1: stingless bees that where like, if meat is left out,

548
00:26:44,240 --> 00:26:46,479
Speaker 1: they'll go ahead and get some protein from it, but

549
00:26:46,520 --> 00:26:48,960
Speaker 1: they're not required to get protein from it, so they're

550
00:26:48,960 --> 00:26:52,200
Speaker 1: called facultatively necrophagic, which means they'll like eat dead stuff

551
00:26:52,200 --> 00:26:53,760
Speaker 1: when they've got the chance, but they don't have to.

552
00:26:54,359 --> 00:26:58,400
Speaker 1: But these vulture bees are obligately necrophagic, so they have

553
00:26:58,440 --> 00:27:01,040
Speaker 1: to eat dead stuff. And currently they're really good at it,

554
00:27:01,080 --> 00:27:03,360
Speaker 1: Like they've got ways to sort of attract other members

555
00:27:03,359 --> 00:27:05,679
Speaker 1: to come so that they can like very quickly with

556
00:27:05,760 --> 00:27:09,960
Speaker 1: these specialized mouth parts scrape a bunch of like rotting flesh.

557
00:27:10,160 --> 00:27:12,480
Speaker 1: Oh my god, yeah, your face is like priceless.

558
00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:14,440
Speaker 2: It should be called nightmare bees. Yikes.

559
00:27:15,280 --> 00:27:17,960
Speaker 1: Yes, it's intense pretty metals. So then it's a little

560
00:27:17,960 --> 00:27:20,320
Speaker 1: bit unclear what happens. So I found a nineteen eighty

561
00:27:20,320 --> 00:27:24,399
Speaker 1: two paper that described what they were doing, and it

562
00:27:24,560 --> 00:27:28,840
Speaker 1: said the bees masticate and consume flesh at the feeding site.

563
00:27:29,080 --> 00:27:31,680
Speaker 1: They do not carry pieces of flesh to the nest,

564
00:27:32,040 --> 00:27:36,720
Speaker 1: but appear to hydrolyze it with a secretion produced by

565
00:27:36,840 --> 00:27:40,600
Speaker 1: either mandibular or salivary glands, which gives the feeding site

566
00:27:40,600 --> 00:27:43,280
Speaker 1: a wet appearance. Side note iw.

567
00:27:44,840 --> 00:27:47,000
Speaker 2: That means they're slabbering right their slabberry and they have

568
00:27:47,040 --> 00:27:47,640
Speaker 2: meat slabber.

569
00:27:47,960 --> 00:27:50,800
Speaker 1: They've got meat slabber, and their saliva is starting the

570
00:27:50,800 --> 00:27:52,960
Speaker 1: process of breaking down the meat. That's what that means.

571
00:27:53,320 --> 00:27:56,399
Speaker 1: And that says individual bees captured well feeding, then forced

572
00:27:56,400 --> 00:27:58,840
Speaker 1: to expel the contents of their crop. So essentially they

573
00:27:58,840 --> 00:28:02,400
Speaker 1: made these meat bees. Through up, we're carrying a slurry

574
00:28:02,440 --> 00:28:06,200
Speaker 1: of flesh measuring between thirty seven and sixty five percent

575
00:28:06,280 --> 00:28:07,720
Speaker 1: dissolved solids by volume.

576
00:28:07,840 --> 00:28:10,520
Speaker 2: So a slurry of flesh. Isn't that like a nine

577
00:28:10,520 --> 00:28:12,240
Speaker 2: Inch Nails album title or something.

578
00:28:14,680 --> 00:28:16,199
Speaker 1: I feel like we have to get in touch with

579
00:28:16,280 --> 00:28:19,040
Speaker 1: prent Resnor now and find some way to convey this

580
00:28:19,119 --> 00:28:19,359
Speaker 1: to him.

581
00:28:19,520 --> 00:28:20,920
Speaker 2: Oh boy wow.

582
00:28:21,040 --> 00:28:22,640
Speaker 1: And so then the question is how do they store

583
00:28:22,680 --> 00:28:24,480
Speaker 1: it when they get back. So I've read this paper

584
00:28:24,480 --> 00:28:26,280
Speaker 1: from twenty twenty one and they were laying out some

585
00:28:26,320 --> 00:28:29,080
Speaker 1: different hypotheses for what happens. It looks like that meat

586
00:28:29,119 --> 00:28:32,320
Speaker 1: slurry gets stored in pots. Maybe it gets mixed with

587
00:28:32,359 --> 00:28:34,600
Speaker 1: some of the sugary stuff they collect. I think at

588
00:28:34,640 --> 00:28:37,200
Speaker 1: the end of the day, it's not really clear what

589
00:28:37,240 --> 00:28:40,120
Speaker 1: they do how it's stored how long it's stored, but

590
00:28:40,240 --> 00:28:43,200
Speaker 1: you probably could say they make something called meat honey,

591
00:28:43,280 --> 00:28:46,960
Speaker 1: like they're taking that flesh slurry, they're storing it in

592
00:28:47,080 --> 00:28:51,960
Speaker 1: these pots. It looks like it quote unquote matures for

593
00:28:52,000 --> 00:28:55,200
Speaker 1: about two weeks into a paste that is also a

594
00:28:55,200 --> 00:28:58,360
Speaker 1: little bit sugary. So they do appear to be making

595
00:28:58,400 --> 00:29:01,440
Speaker 1: something like meat honey. Let's go for it. Looks like

596
00:29:01,480 --> 00:29:03,320
Speaker 1: part of this process and if your wife we're here,

597
00:29:03,360 --> 00:29:05,719
Speaker 1: maybe she'd be excited about this part. Part of it

598
00:29:05,760 --> 00:29:10,840
Speaker 1: appears to involve the microbiome. So these vulture bees have

599
00:29:10,960 --> 00:29:15,520
Speaker 1: microbiomes that include acidophilic bacteria, so bacteria that do really

600
00:29:15,560 --> 00:29:20,440
Speaker 1: well in acidic environments. And you find similar categories of bacteria,

601
00:29:20,480 --> 00:29:23,560
Speaker 1: they're not the exact same species, similar categories of bacteria

602
00:29:23,920 --> 00:29:26,240
Speaker 1: in the guts of like vultures. So it seems like

603
00:29:26,280 --> 00:29:29,400
Speaker 1: there's some kinds of bacteria that team up with organisms

604
00:29:29,400 --> 00:29:32,040
Speaker 1: that eat dead flesh to sort of help process it

605
00:29:32,080 --> 00:29:34,520
Speaker 1: and maybe also help make it safer, because bacteria that

606
00:29:34,600 --> 00:29:37,600
Speaker 1: get to the flesh first start producing like toxins maybe

607
00:29:37,640 --> 00:29:41,160
Speaker 1: to ward off these competitors, and these acid loving bacteria

608
00:29:41,200 --> 00:29:43,520
Speaker 1: sort of help make it all happen, and your face

609
00:29:43,600 --> 00:29:44,440
Speaker 1: is just priceless.

610
00:29:44,520 --> 00:29:47,440
Speaker 2: Right now, I'm so glad I don't eat breakfast because

611
00:29:47,440 --> 00:29:50,040
Speaker 2: I'd be throwing it up into breakfast slurry right now,

612
00:29:50,280 --> 00:29:52,560
Speaker 2: and some bees could come along and make breakfast.

613
00:29:52,160 --> 00:29:57,520
Speaker 1: Honey, meat honey, and so James, I have to thank you.

614
00:29:57,720 --> 00:30:00,520
Speaker 1: I had never heard of these before. And let's go

615
00:30:00,560 --> 00:30:03,440
Speaker 1: ahead and hear if you learned everything you wanted to

616
00:30:03,480 --> 00:30:06,760
Speaker 1: know about meat honey, and.

617
00:30:06,680 --> 00:30:08,520
Speaker 2: If you're ever gonna eat honey again.

618
00:30:09,280 --> 00:30:10,800
Speaker 6: I think it's safe to say that you taught me

619
00:30:10,880 --> 00:30:13,360
Speaker 6: everything I asked for and a lot more. So thanks

620
00:30:13,440 --> 00:30:43,040
Speaker 6: ver so much for that, guys. I appreciate it.

621
00:30:31,520 --> 00:30:34,400
Speaker 2: All right. Our last question comes from Hans in the

622
00:30:34,400 --> 00:30:37,400
Speaker 2: Netherlands who has a nephew in Perth, and they've been

623
00:30:37,440 --> 00:30:42,000
Speaker 2: disagreeing about which direction the Earth is accelerating and how

624
00:30:42,120 --> 00:30:45,560
Speaker 2: gravity actually works. Let's hear the question from Hans.

625
00:30:46,280 --> 00:30:49,800
Speaker 3: I have a question concerning freefall, as I understand it,

626
00:30:49,920 --> 00:30:52,480
Speaker 3: when you're in freefall, you don't move it all. Instead,

627
00:30:52,640 --> 00:30:55,040
Speaker 3: the Earth is ration to watch you. Now my question

628
00:30:55,120 --> 00:30:57,520
Speaker 3: is this. I live in Howder, which is in the

629
00:30:57,520 --> 00:31:00,760
Speaker 3: rest of the Netherlands. I have a nephew in Perth, Australia,

630
00:31:01,080 --> 00:31:04,240
Speaker 3: which is roughly the opposite side of the earth. Well,

631
00:31:04,240 --> 00:31:06,080
Speaker 3: we decided to jump out of an airplane on the

632
00:31:06,120 --> 00:31:09,000
Speaker 3: same time, which way is the earth moving? Thank you

633
00:31:09,080 --> 00:31:10,120
Speaker 3: very much for your answer.

634
00:31:10,920 --> 00:31:12,880
Speaker 1: All right, so you know, maybe first we should start

635
00:31:12,880 --> 00:31:15,760
Speaker 1: with the disclaimer that you shouldn't do this unless you're

636
00:31:15,760 --> 00:31:19,800
Speaker 1: a professional. Have you ever done sky jumping or have

637
00:31:19,840 --> 00:31:20,920
Speaker 1: you ever jumped from a plane?

638
00:31:20,960 --> 00:31:23,480
Speaker 2: I one time did skydiving. Yes, I jumped from an

639
00:31:23,440 --> 00:31:26,160
Speaker 2: airplane exactly one time. And I did it one time

640
00:31:26,160 --> 00:31:28,600
Speaker 2: because I did my homework and I looked up how

641
00:31:28,640 --> 00:31:32,080
Speaker 2: often people die skydiving, and it turns out it's very

642
00:31:32,200 --> 00:31:34,720
Speaker 2: very rare to die the first time you jump, and

643
00:31:34,760 --> 00:31:37,760
Speaker 2: it's very very rare to die after like ten jumps.

644
00:31:37,920 --> 00:31:41,520
Speaker 2: But there's a danger zone between like two and nine jumps.

645
00:31:42,160 --> 00:31:44,720
Speaker 2: And my understanding is that the first time you jump,

646
00:31:44,760 --> 00:31:47,880
Speaker 2: you're very careful, you're freaked out, you check all the straps,

647
00:31:47,960 --> 00:31:50,400
Speaker 2: you're like following all the safety videos, and when you

648
00:31:50,440 --> 00:31:52,680
Speaker 2: survive that first time, you're like, oh, maybe it's not

649
00:31:52,720 --> 00:31:55,880
Speaker 2: so dangerous. And then you get sloppy. And when you

650
00:31:55,880 --> 00:31:59,040
Speaker 2: get sloppy and you're like feeling confident, that's the danger zone.

651
00:31:59,760 --> 00:32:01,880
Speaker 2: Then and if you survive like nine or ten jumps,

652
00:32:01,880 --> 00:32:04,080
Speaker 2: you become really good at it, and then you're back

653
00:32:04,080 --> 00:32:06,920
Speaker 2: in the safe zone. So I did it once. I survived,

654
00:32:07,000 --> 00:32:08,280
Speaker 2: and I'm never doing it again.

655
00:32:09,000 --> 00:32:11,680
Speaker 1: Wait, you controlled your own parachute and everything when you jumped.

656
00:32:11,760 --> 00:32:13,120
Speaker 2: I got to pull my parachute, but it was a

657
00:32:13,120 --> 00:32:15,240
Speaker 2: tandem jump of strapped to another dude who was there

658
00:32:15,280 --> 00:32:16,840
Speaker 2: to like make sure I did it right.

659
00:32:16,960 --> 00:32:18,880
Speaker 1: But yeah, when I did it, there was a dude

660
00:32:18,920 --> 00:32:20,680
Speaker 1: on my back. Okay, I mean, did you ask the

661
00:32:20,720 --> 00:32:23,080
Speaker 1: guy on your back is this your second to ninth jump?

662
00:32:23,560 --> 00:32:26,000
Speaker 1: That's the guy you need to ask. I think that's right.

663
00:32:27,080 --> 00:32:29,080
Speaker 2: It might be his second and ninth jump that day.

664
00:32:29,160 --> 00:32:31,160
Speaker 2: I think these guys go up all the time.

665
00:32:31,480 --> 00:32:33,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I think so too.

666
00:32:33,360 --> 00:32:35,840
Speaker 2: But it was sort of terrifying because they told us, hey,

667
00:32:35,880 --> 00:32:37,880
Speaker 2: you can change your mind at any moment. And the

668
00:32:37,920 --> 00:32:40,080
Speaker 2: friend I went with, she was standing at the edge

669
00:32:40,080 --> 00:32:43,040
Speaker 2: of the door ready to jump out, and she was like, yeah, no,

670
00:32:43,080 --> 00:32:45,440
Speaker 2: I can't do it, and they're like, no, you're doing it.

671
00:32:45,720 --> 00:32:47,240
Speaker 2: And she's like, you said I could change my mind,

672
00:32:47,280 --> 00:32:49,440
Speaker 2: and they're like, we were lying. Nobody changes their mind,

673
00:32:49,720 --> 00:32:51,360
Speaker 2: and then they pushed her out the door.

674
00:32:53,520 --> 00:32:55,360
Speaker 1: I had brought a boyfriend who you know didn't end

675
00:32:55,440 --> 00:32:57,640
Speaker 1: up marrying, maybe not surprisingly after you hear this story

676
00:32:57,880 --> 00:33:00,520
Speaker 1: for his birthday. Oh and he got to the door

677
00:33:00,560 --> 00:33:02,040
Speaker 1: and he said, I don't want to do it. And

678
00:33:02,080 --> 00:33:03,760
Speaker 1: the guy strapped to his back looked at me, and

679
00:33:03,800 --> 00:33:08,200
Speaker 1: I said, and I pointed out, and the guy jumped.

680
00:33:08,320 --> 00:33:10,440
Speaker 1: And you know, my boyfriend was happy afterwards that he

681
00:33:10,440 --> 00:33:12,840
Speaker 1: did it, but he had also tried to back out

682
00:33:12,840 --> 00:33:13,600
Speaker 1: at the last second.

683
00:33:13,920 --> 00:33:15,600
Speaker 2: So folks, when they tell you you can back out,

684
00:33:15,600 --> 00:33:17,480
Speaker 2: don't believe them if you don't want to jump, and

685
00:33:17,480 --> 00:33:19,680
Speaker 2: don't go up in the plane. Yeah, all right, but

686
00:33:19,800 --> 00:33:22,480
Speaker 2: today we are not giving advice about ways to risk

687
00:33:22,560 --> 00:33:26,120
Speaker 2: your life and get adrilline thrills. We're talking about understanding

688
00:33:26,120 --> 00:33:30,240
Speaker 2: the fundamental nature of gravity, how does it work? And Hans,

689
00:33:30,240 --> 00:33:32,600
Speaker 2: I think is responding to a conversation we had about

690
00:33:32,800 --> 00:33:36,479
Speaker 2: gravity and freefall and who's really accelerating, in which an

691
00:33:36,480 --> 00:33:39,520
Speaker 2: explanation I gave is that the Earth is accelerating up

692
00:33:39,560 --> 00:33:43,120
Speaker 2: and out towards you. You're not falling towards the Earth.

693
00:33:43,160 --> 00:33:46,280
Speaker 2: And so I think it's worthwhile to revisit that explanation

694
00:33:46,320 --> 00:33:48,200
Speaker 2: a little bit and then unpack it in the context

695
00:33:48,200 --> 00:33:49,720
Speaker 2: of Hans's question, All.

696
00:33:49,680 --> 00:33:51,200
Speaker 1: Right, let's go for it. So if you jump out

697
00:33:51,200 --> 00:33:53,720
Speaker 1: of a plane, what does Newton say is happening?

698
00:33:54,160 --> 00:33:56,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, So, from a Newton point of view, if you're

699
00:33:56,800 --> 00:33:58,800
Speaker 2: on the surface and you see somebody jump out of

700
00:33:58,840 --> 00:34:01,520
Speaker 2: an airplane, you say, is a force of gravity and

701
00:34:01,640 --> 00:34:05,680
Speaker 2: forces create acceleration. So gravity is accelerating you down towards

702
00:34:05,680 --> 00:34:08,239
Speaker 2: the surface. And that's Newton's explanation. And from the point

703
00:34:08,239 --> 00:34:09,839
Speaker 2: of view of the person on the surface, that makes

704
00:34:09,840 --> 00:34:13,560
Speaker 2: perfect sense because you see somebody's velocity and they're accelerating

705
00:34:13,600 --> 00:34:16,760
Speaker 2: because their velocity is changing, and so it looks perfectly

706
00:34:16,800 --> 00:34:19,160
Speaker 2: like there's a force there and the person is accelerating.

707
00:34:19,760 --> 00:34:21,920
Speaker 2: From the point of view of the jumper, right, they

708
00:34:22,000 --> 00:34:23,759
Speaker 2: jump out of the airplane, they see the surface of

709
00:34:23,760 --> 00:34:27,480
Speaker 2: the Earth rushing towards them. Right, they see Earth accelerating

710
00:34:27,520 --> 00:34:31,880
Speaker 2: towards them. Now, velocity is perfectly relative, right, And so

711
00:34:31,920 --> 00:34:35,319
Speaker 2: you might wonder, like, well, who's right, who is actually accelerating?

712
00:34:36,000 --> 00:34:39,040
Speaker 2: And this is where Einstein comes in, because Einstein tells

713
00:34:39,120 --> 00:34:43,640
Speaker 2: us that, like, velocity is relative, but acceleration is not.

714
00:34:44,320 --> 00:34:46,239
Speaker 2: So let's unpack what that means for a moment like

715
00:34:46,800 --> 00:34:49,759
Speaker 2: we say that distance is relative, like Kelly and I

716
00:34:49,800 --> 00:34:52,880
Speaker 2: are three thousand miles from each other right now. And

717
00:34:52,920 --> 00:34:54,759
Speaker 2: when we say distance is relative, we mean that you

718
00:34:54,800 --> 00:34:57,560
Speaker 2: have to measure it relative to somewhere else. Like I

719
00:34:57,560 --> 00:35:01,080
Speaker 2: can say I'm three thousand miles from Kelly. I can't

720
00:35:01,120 --> 00:35:04,000
Speaker 2: just say I am three thousand miles. That doesn't have

721
00:35:04,040 --> 00:35:05,680
Speaker 2: any meaning, right, I have to say what I'm three

722
00:35:05,719 --> 00:35:10,040
Speaker 2: thousand miles away from. Velocity is also relative. I can

723
00:35:10,080 --> 00:35:14,160
Speaker 2: say I have zero velocity right now relative to Kelly,

724
00:35:14,480 --> 00:35:16,839
Speaker 2: but I don't have zero velocity relative to the Sun.

725
00:35:16,960 --> 00:35:19,960
Speaker 2: And I don't have zero velocity relative to some particle

726
00:35:20,040 --> 00:35:22,520
Speaker 2: that's speeding towards the Earth at almost the speed of light.

727
00:35:22,560 --> 00:35:24,879
Speaker 2: In fact, I'm traveling at nearly the speed of light

728
00:35:24,960 --> 00:35:28,719
Speaker 2: relative to that particle, right And so velocity is only

729
00:35:28,760 --> 00:35:33,319
Speaker 2: defined relative to other stuff. And that's confusing because when

730
00:35:33,360 --> 00:35:35,480
Speaker 2: somebody jumps out an airplane, you wonder, like, well, are

731
00:35:35,480 --> 00:35:37,919
Speaker 2: they moving towards the Earth? Is the Earth moving towards them?

732
00:35:38,360 --> 00:35:41,480
Speaker 2: Both of those are perfectly valid. Because velocity is relative,

733
00:35:41,520 --> 00:35:44,360
Speaker 2: you can't say which one's actually moving. But now you

734
00:35:44,400 --> 00:35:48,520
Speaker 2: get to acceleration. Acceleration is different. Acceleration is not relative.

735
00:35:49,080 --> 00:35:52,120
Speaker 2: Velocity is relative. It's a property of a pair of objects,

736
00:35:52,160 --> 00:35:54,239
Speaker 2: me and Kelly, and me and the Earth, me and

737
00:35:54,320 --> 00:35:57,160
Speaker 2: the Sun. But acceleration is a property of an object.

738
00:35:57,239 --> 00:36:00,319
Speaker 2: I can tell if I'm accelerating. You can tell if

739
00:36:00,400 --> 00:36:03,960
Speaker 2: you're accelerating. How can you do that? Well, say, for example,

740
00:36:03,960 --> 00:36:05,719
Speaker 2: you're in a truck and you have a bowling ball

741
00:36:05,760 --> 00:36:07,759
Speaker 2: in the back of the truck. You can tell when

742
00:36:07,800 --> 00:36:09,799
Speaker 2: somebody hits the brake on the truck. You can tell

743
00:36:09,840 --> 00:36:12,480
Speaker 2: when somebody accelerates because the bowling ball in the back

744
00:36:12,520 --> 00:36:14,880
Speaker 2: of the truck will respond. What happens if you hit

745
00:36:14,920 --> 00:36:18,000
Speaker 2: the brakes, the bowling ball keeps going and will bang

746
00:36:18,120 --> 00:36:21,799
Speaker 2: into the front of the truck bed. And if you accelerate,

747
00:36:21,880 --> 00:36:24,200
Speaker 2: the bowling ball rolls backwards towards the back of the

748
00:36:24,239 --> 00:36:27,799
Speaker 2: truck bed. So you can measure your acceleration yourself. You

749
00:36:27,800 --> 00:36:30,520
Speaker 2: don't need to measure relative to the Sun or the

750
00:36:30,560 --> 00:36:33,520
Speaker 2: Earth or your podcast co host or anything like that.

751
00:36:34,080 --> 00:36:35,879
Speaker 2: So that means you can do something interesting. You can

752
00:36:35,920 --> 00:36:39,080
Speaker 2: ask like, well, is the guy who jumped out of

753
00:36:39,080 --> 00:36:42,360
Speaker 2: an airplane is he accelerating? Or is the guy on

754
00:36:42,400 --> 00:36:45,239
Speaker 2: the ground on the Earth are they accelerating because both

755
00:36:45,239 --> 00:36:48,279
Speaker 2: of them think the other one is accelerating. But Einstein says, no,

756
00:36:48,360 --> 00:36:50,320
Speaker 2: you can actually just measure it and you can tell

757
00:36:50,480 --> 00:36:51,040
Speaker 2: the answer.

758
00:36:51,280 --> 00:36:54,200
Speaker 1: And the answer is that the person who jumped is accelerating.

759
00:36:54,520 --> 00:36:58,680
Speaker 2: No, the answer is the person on the earth is accelerating. No, yes, absolutely.

760
00:36:58,719 --> 00:37:00,759
Speaker 2: Imagine you jump out an airplane and you're holding a

761
00:37:00,760 --> 00:37:03,479
Speaker 2: box with like a billiard ball in it. Right, what's

762
00:37:03,480 --> 00:37:05,520
Speaker 2: going to happen to that ball? You feel like you're

763
00:37:05,520 --> 00:37:07,399
Speaker 2: accelerating towards the surface of the Earth. But you look

764
00:37:07,440 --> 00:37:10,280
Speaker 2: at the ball. The ball is not moving inside the box.

765
00:37:10,320 --> 00:37:12,360
Speaker 2: The ball is going with you. It has exactly the

766
00:37:12,360 --> 00:37:15,480
Speaker 2: same experience you do. Now somebody on the surface of

767
00:37:15,520 --> 00:37:18,040
Speaker 2: the Earth, they have a ball in the box. That

768
00:37:18,080 --> 00:37:21,439
Speaker 2: ball is pulled towards the surface of the Earth. That's

769
00:37:21,520 --> 00:37:24,319
Speaker 2: measuring acceleration. Another way to do this is to have

770
00:37:24,360 --> 00:37:26,400
Speaker 2: a scale. So you jump out of an airplane with

771
00:37:26,400 --> 00:37:29,120
Speaker 2: a scale, and now you stand on the scale. Are

772
00:37:29,120 --> 00:37:32,000
Speaker 2: you going to measure anything? No, because there's nothing pushing

773
00:37:32,000 --> 00:37:34,960
Speaker 2: you onto the scale. Whereas if you put the scale

774
00:37:34,960 --> 00:37:36,799
Speaker 2: in the surface of the Earth and you stand on it,

775
00:37:37,120 --> 00:37:40,400
Speaker 2: you're going to measure your weight. Right, that weight is

776
00:37:40,440 --> 00:37:44,680
Speaker 2: actually measuring your acceleration. Einstein says, what's happening there is

777
00:37:44,719 --> 00:37:48,040
Speaker 2: the surface of the Earth and that scale are accelerating

778
00:37:48,160 --> 00:37:52,200
Speaker 2: up and out right. So a scale is like an accelerometer.

779
00:37:53,040 --> 00:37:54,800
Speaker 2: And so when you jump out of an airplane, you

780
00:37:54,840 --> 00:37:57,680
Speaker 2: can measure that you're not accelerating. You're in free fall.

781
00:37:58,120 --> 00:38:00,520
Speaker 2: There is no gravitational force on you, because there is

782
00:38:00,560 --> 00:38:04,120
Speaker 2: no gravitational force on the surface of the Earth. What

783
00:38:04,160 --> 00:38:07,000
Speaker 2: you're measuring is not the force of gravity. The weight

784
00:38:07,160 --> 00:38:10,600
Speaker 2: doesn't measure the force of gravity. It measures the acceleration

785
00:38:10,760 --> 00:38:14,240
Speaker 2: of the surface of the Earth up and out away

786
00:38:14,280 --> 00:38:15,720
Speaker 2: from the center of the Earth.

787
00:38:16,080 --> 00:38:20,240
Speaker 1: That's counterintuitive, yeah, exactly, but it actually makes much more sense.

788
00:38:20,760 --> 00:38:23,719
Speaker 2: The way to think about forces and acceleration and gravity

789
00:38:23,960 --> 00:38:28,040
Speaker 2: is to remember that there can be apparent forces like say,

790
00:38:28,080 --> 00:38:30,680
Speaker 2: for example, you have a merry go round and somebody

791
00:38:30,719 --> 00:38:34,160
Speaker 2: spins the merry go round. You feel this force pushing

792
00:38:34,200 --> 00:38:36,360
Speaker 2: you off the merry go round, right, But there's no

793
00:38:36,520 --> 00:38:39,480
Speaker 2: force there. There's nobody pushing on you. It feels like

794
00:38:39,520 --> 00:38:41,719
Speaker 2: there's a force. There's an apparent force what we call

795
00:38:41,760 --> 00:38:45,279
Speaker 2: in physics a pseudo force, because you're accelerating, because you're

796
00:38:45,400 --> 00:38:49,560
Speaker 2: rotating creates this pseudo force. So some things in the

797
00:38:49,640 --> 00:38:52,520
Speaker 2: universe can create these pseudo forces that make it seem

798
00:38:52,560 --> 00:38:54,839
Speaker 2: like there's a force when there isn't really one. And

799
00:38:54,880 --> 00:38:58,719
Speaker 2: that's what space does. That's what gravity is. Gravity isn't

800
00:38:58,719 --> 00:39:01,560
Speaker 2: a force. It's just that space is bent in certain ways,

801
00:39:01,920 --> 00:39:05,000
Speaker 2: and objects like to follow the curvature of that space. So,

802
00:39:05,080 --> 00:39:08,719
Speaker 2: for example, near a huge mass, space is bent and

803
00:39:08,840 --> 00:39:12,160
Speaker 2: objects like to follow the curvature of space, which brings

804
00:39:12,200 --> 00:39:15,279
Speaker 2: them towards the center of that mass. You jump out

805
00:39:15,320 --> 00:39:18,160
Speaker 2: of an airplane, space is curved there. Because you're near

806
00:39:18,200 --> 00:39:21,560
Speaker 2: the Earth and your natural motion is towards the surface

807
00:39:21,640 --> 00:39:24,520
Speaker 2: of the Earth, and you need acceleration. You need a

808
00:39:24,560 --> 00:39:27,680
Speaker 2: force to prevent you from moving in free fall, to

809
00:39:27,760 --> 00:39:30,600
Speaker 2: work against the motion of space and time. So I

810
00:39:30,680 --> 00:39:32,879
Speaker 2: understand Hans's question. Hans is like, hold on, you're saying

811
00:39:32,880 --> 00:39:36,000
Speaker 2: the Earth is accelerating. How can it be accelerating up

812
00:39:36,160 --> 00:39:39,440
Speaker 2: in the Netherlands and up from Perth? Right, it seems

813
00:39:39,440 --> 00:39:41,960
Speaker 2: like it's going in two directions. And that's because you're

814
00:39:41,960 --> 00:39:45,000
Speaker 2: thinking about the Earth as a single sphere moving in

815
00:39:45,000 --> 00:39:48,240
Speaker 2: one direction or moving in the other direction. Instead, imagine

816
00:39:48,280 --> 00:39:51,480
Speaker 2: it as a sphere with variable radius. Gravity is trying

817
00:39:51,520 --> 00:39:54,279
Speaker 2: to shrink the Earth down into a dot, and the

818
00:39:54,320 --> 00:39:56,839
Speaker 2: structure of the Earth is pushing back up and out

819
00:39:56,960 --> 00:39:59,920
Speaker 2: in every direction. So the answer is that it's accelera

820
00:40:00,440 --> 00:40:02,960
Speaker 2: up and out in the Netherlands and up and out

821
00:40:03,000 --> 00:40:06,319
Speaker 2: in Perth. Both are out away from the center. If

822
00:40:06,360 --> 00:40:09,400
Speaker 2: there wasn't that acceleration, if the whole Earth was just

823
00:40:09,440 --> 00:40:12,719
Speaker 2: a bunch of particles following the curvature of space time,

824
00:40:12,760 --> 00:40:14,840
Speaker 2: it would collapse into a black hole. That's what gravity

825
00:40:14,880 --> 00:40:18,880
Speaker 2: wants to do. It gathers stuff together because it bends space,

826
00:40:18,960 --> 00:40:21,120
Speaker 2: and then the motion of those particles follows that bend

827
00:40:21,200 --> 00:40:24,200
Speaker 2: space and things fall together. So Earth has to push

828
00:40:24,320 --> 00:40:28,000
Speaker 2: up and out just to maintain the same distance from

829
00:40:28,040 --> 00:40:31,319
Speaker 2: the center. So it's counterintuitive because now I'm saying you

830
00:40:31,400 --> 00:40:35,200
Speaker 2: have to accelerate just to maintain a constant distance from

831
00:40:35,200 --> 00:40:38,319
Speaker 2: the center of the Earth. That's very counterintuitive, but it's

832
00:40:38,360 --> 00:40:41,680
Speaker 2: true because their natural motion is to fall in towards

833
00:40:41,680 --> 00:40:44,440
Speaker 2: the center, and you have to accelerate, which means counter

834
00:40:44,600 --> 00:40:49,080
Speaker 2: your motion relative to gravity, to avoid doing that. So, yeah, Hans,

835
00:40:49,080 --> 00:40:52,120
Speaker 2: the Earth is accelerating up under you and up under

836
00:40:52,160 --> 00:40:53,160
Speaker 2: your nephew in Perth.

837
00:40:53,600 --> 00:40:55,720
Speaker 1: Who does that make right? That's the important question.

838
00:40:58,360 --> 00:41:00,360
Speaker 2: Let's just all sit down over a night, play the

839
00:41:00,440 --> 00:41:02,160
Speaker 2: meat honey and work it out.

840
00:41:02,400 --> 00:41:05,960
Speaker 1: Oh no, let's never do that. Let's never ever do that,

841
00:41:06,560 --> 00:41:08,479
Speaker 1: or at least let's not be told that we're eating

842
00:41:08,520 --> 00:41:10,120
Speaker 1: meat honey if that's what we're having.

843
00:41:10,239 --> 00:41:12,080
Speaker 2: All right. Well, I hope that cleared it up for Hans.

844
00:41:12,360 --> 00:41:14,640
Speaker 2: Let's send him o answer and see if he's got

845
00:41:14,640 --> 00:41:15,920
Speaker 2: some follow up questions.

846
00:41:16,360 --> 00:41:19,760
Speaker 3: Hi, Daniel and Katie, thank you very much for your answer.

847
00:41:20,120 --> 00:41:24,279
Speaker 3: It was very enlightening. It still seemed somewhat counterintuitive to me,

848
00:41:24,520 --> 00:41:26,719
Speaker 3: but I believe I can now understand what you mean,

849
00:41:27,600 --> 00:41:30,200
Speaker 3: in particular the idea that you shouldn't see the Earth

850
00:41:30,280 --> 00:41:33,080
Speaker 3: as a solid object, but as a constant moving against

851
00:41:33,120 --> 00:41:36,920
Speaker 3: gravity to maintain the shape instantly. This reminds me of

852
00:41:36,960 --> 00:41:39,200
Speaker 3: Alison Wonderland. You have to run to stay in place.

853
00:41:39,920 --> 00:41:41,920
Speaker 3: I hope this makes any sense to you. Thank you

854
00:41:42,000 --> 00:41:43,320
Speaker 3: very much again, Hans.

855
00:41:43,760 --> 00:41:46,879
Speaker 1: Well, thanks to everybody who submitted a question. Please, we

856
00:41:46,920 --> 00:41:50,279
Speaker 1: want more people to submit more questions, and if you've

857
00:41:50,320 --> 00:41:52,520
Speaker 1: got a question you want to share, you can send

858
00:41:52,520 --> 00:41:54,480
Speaker 1: it to us through our discord and you can find

859
00:41:54,480 --> 00:41:56,520
Speaker 1: the link to that on our website, or you can

860
00:41:56,560 --> 00:41:59,320
Speaker 1: send us an email at Questions at Daniel and Kelly

861
00:41:59,440 --> 00:42:00,000
Speaker 1: dot org.

862
00:42:00,160 --> 00:42:02,120
Speaker 2: All right, and if you're still listening, we have one

863
00:42:02,160 --> 00:42:04,680
Speaker 2: more request for you. We want to know more about you,

864
00:42:04,880 --> 00:42:07,200
Speaker 2: not just what you're wondering in your questions about the universe.

865
00:42:07,239 --> 00:42:09,000
Speaker 2: We want to know who you are, what you listen to,

866
00:42:09,440 --> 00:42:10,880
Speaker 2: where you like to live, and what you do in

867
00:42:10,960 --> 00:42:12,640
Speaker 2: your spare time so we can get to know you

868
00:42:12,719 --> 00:42:15,280
Speaker 2: a little better. We have a survey for our listeners.

869
00:42:15,320 --> 00:42:17,239
Speaker 2: If you have a few minutes, we would love to

870
00:42:17,320 --> 00:42:19,359
Speaker 2: hear some more about you. You can find a link

871
00:42:19,400 --> 00:42:22,920
Speaker 2: to the survey on our website www dot danieland Kelly

872
00:42:23,200 --> 00:42:23,839
Speaker 2: dot org.

873
00:42:24,120 --> 00:42:35,720
Speaker 1: Thanks everyone. Daniel and Kelly's Extraordinary Universe is produced by iHeartRadio.

874
00:42:35,920 --> 00:42:38,440
Speaker 1: We would love to hear from you, We really would.

875
00:42:38,600 --> 00:42:41,359
Speaker 2: We want to know what questions you have about this

876
00:42:41,560 --> 00:42:43,240
Speaker 2: Extraordinary Universe.

877
00:42:43,360 --> 00:42:46,320
Speaker 1: We want to know your thoughts on recent shows, suggestions

878
00:42:46,320 --> 00:42:49,319
Speaker 1: for future shows. If you contact us, we will get

879
00:42:49,360 --> 00:42:49,759
Speaker 1: back to you.

880
00:42:50,000 --> 00:42:53,480
Speaker 2: We really mean it. We answer every message. Email us

881
00:42:53,560 --> 00:42:56,680
Speaker 2: at questions at Danielankelly.

882
00:42:55,800 --> 00:42:57,880
Speaker 1: Dot org, or you can find us on social media.

883
00:42:57,960 --> 00:43:01,759
Speaker 1: We have accounts on x, Instagram, Blue Sky and on

884
00:43:01,840 --> 00:43:03,799
Speaker 1: all of those platforms. You can find us at D

885
00:43:04,239 --> 00:43:05,720
Speaker 1: and K Universe.

886
00:43:05,880 --> 00:43:07,399
Speaker 2: Don't be shy, write to us,