Science Movie Club: 'Contact'

FromShort Wave

Start listening View podcast show

Science Movie Club: 'Contact'

FromShort Wave

ratings:

Length:

13 minutes

Released:

May 21, 2020

Format:

Podcast episode

Description

Yes, there actually are astronomers looking for intelligent life in space. The 1997 film adaptation of Carl Sagan's 'Contact' got a lot of things right ... and a few things wrong. Radio astronomer Summer Ash, an education specialist with the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, breaks down the science in the film.

Released:

May 21, 2020

Format:

Podcast episode

Titles in the series (100)

New discoveries, everyday mysteries, and the science behind the headlines — all in about 10 minutes, every weekday. It's science for everyone, using a lot of creativity and a little humor. Join host Maddie Sofia for science on a different wavelength.

Skip carousel

Introducing Short Wave: Short Wave, NPR's new daily science podcast, starts October 15th. Join host Maddie Sofia, Monday through Friday. Subscribe now. by Short Wave
2 min listen
Most U.S. Dairy Cows Come From 2 Bulls. That's Not Good.: Why it's a problem that cows are so genetically similar, and what scientists are trying to do about it. by Short Wave
9 min listen
The Squishy Science Behind ASMR: A trend for some is a sensory pleasure-trigger for others. by Short Wave
11 min listen
Kicking The Habit With 'Shrooms: How could a magic mushroom trip help people beat addiction? We talk to a patient who used a chemical in 'shrooms to help her quit smoking. by Short Wave
10 min listen
When A Listener Calls...: Why do some people seek out scary experiences? Turns out, some of us may be more wired to crave the thrill. by Short Wave
11 min listen
The Zombies That Walk Among Us: Ed Yong, science reporter for The Atlantic, creeps us out with real zombies of the animal kingdom. by Short Wave
10 min listen
Logging 'The Lungs' of North America: The Trump administration wants to eliminate a ban on logging in the Tongass National Forest. We talk to an Alaskan worried about the future of the largest U.S. rainforest. by Short Wave
10 min listen
Exploring The Rainforest With 'TreeTop Barbie': Pioneering ecologist Nalini Nadkarni takes us up into the canopy — the area above the forest floor — where she helped research and document this unexplored ecosystem. by Short Wave
13 min listen
A Revolutionary Experiment To Edit Human Genes: A groundbreaking gene-editing technique could change the way we treat genetic diseases. by Short Wave
13 min listen
Wildfire Season Is Here To Stay: Californians face a terrible new normal as wildfire season grows longer and more intense. We explore three key factors at the heart of the state's high wildfire risk. by Short Wave
9 min listen
Meet Two MacArthur 'Genius Grant' Scientists: The MacArthur Foundation "genius grant" winners were announced this fall. Meet two who study oceans. by Short Wave
11 min listen
Randall Munroe's Absurd Science For Real-World Problems: The cartoonist behind the popular Internet comic <em>xkcd </em>has a new book called <em>How To: Absurd Scientific Advice for Common Real-World Problems.</em> by Short Wave
10 min listen
Adversarial AI: University and military researchers are studying how attackers could hack into AI systems by exploiting how these systems learn. It's known as "adversarial AI." by Short Wave
10 min listen
What We Know (And Don't) About The Dangers Of Vaping: Amid an outbreak of lung injury cases, there's a new spotlight on vaping. by Short Wave
10 min listen
Bye Bye, Bei Bei: Giant Panda Heads to China: The Smithsonian's National Zoo is bidding farewell to Bei Bei. The 4-year-old giant panda will be sent to China on Tuesday, Nov. 19. by Short Wave
11 min listen
Uganda's Solution For Treating Extreme Pain: Uganda has come up with a low-tech solution to treat patients in a lot of pain: drinkable liquid morphine. Nurith Aizenman tell us how this model works. by Short Wave
11 min listen
You Asked About The Flu: How can you tell if you have the flu or a cold? Why does your arm hurt after a flu shot? Can getting the shot give you the flu? We answer your flu-related listener questions. by Short Wave
11 min listen
Finally, An All-Female Spacewalk: We hear from NASA astronauts Christina Koch and Jessica Meir. They completed the first all-female spacewalk last week. by Short Wave
12 min listen
Seen Any Nazi Uranium? These Researchers Want To Know: Nazi Germany tried to build a nuclear reactor. How evidence of that effort was almost lost to history. by Short Wave
13 min listen
The U.S. Wants Out Of The Paris Agreement: It's official. The U.S. has notified the United Nations it wants to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, the global accord to fight climate change. by Short Wave
9 min listen
That Revolutionary Gene-Editing Experiment? So Far So Good.: Gene-edited 'supercells' appear to be making progress. by Short Wave
13 min listen
Life After Whale Death: What happens after a whale dies? Their carcasses, known as "whale falls," provide a sudden, concentrated source of food for organisms in the deep sea. by Short Wave
10 min listen
Crows Don't Forget: We learn some crow facts and leave it to you — do crows deserve their creepy reputation? by Short Wave
9 min listen
An Eyewitness to Extinction: When Karen Lips started studying frogs in Central America as a grad student, she had no idea she'd have a front-row seat to a catastrophic animal die-off. by Short Wave
9 min listen
The Evolution Of HIV Treatment: A lot has changed since the first cases of AIDS were reported in 1981. We explore the evolution of treating HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, with Dr. Maggie Hoffman-Terry. by Short Wave
12 min listen
Can Global Shipping Go Zero Carbon?: A lot of the stuff we buy in the U.S. comes by ship — ships that use a particularly dirty kind of fuel. Now a big shipping company says it wants to go zero carbon. by Short Wave
11 min listen
Saving Water One Flush At A Time: Moving human waste more efficiently down a toilet bowl could be one solution for reducing water consumption. For World Toilet Day, we bring you an episode full of toilet science. by Short Wave
10 min listen
Fighting An Insect Invasion With... An Insect Invasion: An invasive species has no significant natural predators here. Yet. by Short Wave
10 min listen
The Mind-Bending Ascent Of Helium — And Why It's Running Low: Helium is the second-most common element in the cosmos, but it's far rarer on planet Earth. by Short Wave
13 min listen
What Happened To The American Chestnut Tree?: A blight destroyed the American Chestnut Tree in the 20th century. Scientist have been altering the tree's genome to bring it back. by Short Wave
13 min listen

More Episodes from Short Wave

Skip carousel

Deer Are Expanding North. That Could Hurt Some Species Like Boreal Caribou by Short Wave
9 min listen
The Mysterious "Great Attractor" Pulling Our Galaxy Off Course by Short Wave
13 min listen
How The New Catan Board Game Can Spark Conversations On Climate Change by Short Wave
12 min listen
10 Years After Flint, The Fight To Replace Lead Pipes Continues by Short Wave
13 min listen
Beavers Can Help With Climate Change. So How Do We Get Along? by Short Wave
14 min listen
Sustainable Seafood Is All Around You — If You Know Where To Look by Short Wave
14 min listen
An 11-Year-old Unearthed Fossils Of The Largest Known Marine Reptile by Short Wave
9 min listen
The Nightmarish Worm That Lived 25 Million Years Longer Than Researchers Thought by Short Wave
13 min listen
How The Brain Experiences Pleasure — Even The Kind That Makes Us Feel Guilty by Short Wave
14 min listen
What To Know About The New EPA Rule Limiting 'Forever Chemicals' In Tap Water by Short Wave
13 min listen
The Order Your Siblings Were Born in May Play a Role in Identity and Sexuality by Short Wave
12 min listen
How Climate Change And Physics Affect Baseball by Short Wave
12 min listen
The "Barcodes" Powering These Tiny Songbirds' Memories May Also Help Human Memory by Short Wave
9 min listen
How To Make The Most Of Next Week's Solar Eclipse by Short Wave
13 min listen
The Two Sides Of Guyana: A Green Champion And An Oil Producer by Short Wave
16 min listen
The Shy Rodents Lost To Science by Short Wave
13 min listen
Shots Are Scary. But They Don't Have To Be. by Short Wave
13 min listen
What's It Like To Live In Space? One Astronaut Says It Changes Her Dreams by Short Wave
12 min listen
The Evolutionary Mystery Of Menopause ... In Whales by Short Wave
10 min listen
Syphilis Cases Are Rising In Babies. Illinois Has A Potential Solution by Short Wave
13 min listen
A Tale Of Two Bengali Physicists by Short Wave
13 min listen
Are We On The Brink Of A Nuclear Fusion Breakthrough? by Short Wave
13 min listen
What We Know About Long COVID, From Brain Fog to Fatigue by Short Wave
13 min listen
The Science Of Atomic Bombs At The Heart Of 'Oppenheimer' by Short Wave
12 min listen
The "Shocking" Tactic Electric Fish Use to Collectively Sense the World by Short Wave
9 min listen
The Recent Glitch Threatening Voyager 1 by Short Wave
12 min listen
The Evolution Of Cancer Treatment by Short Wave
14 min listen
Could Dune Really Exist? What Scientists Think of Our Favorite Sci-Fi Worlds by Short Wave
14 min listen
Is It Possible To Feed To World Sustainably? by Short Wave
11 min listen
In Light of The Alabama Court Ruling, A Look At The Science Of IVF by Short Wave
13 min listen

Related podcast episodes

Skip carousel

Episode 162: The End is Nowhere Near Nigh, with Fred Adams: Feature Guest: Fred Adams If you thought the far distant future of our universe was going to be bleak, dreary and dark, well, you’d be right. But remember, the universe is still just a baby and it has many new experiences ahead of it. Over the many... by The Star Spot
37 min listen
The Fiery Death Plunge of Spacecraft Cassini (47): On the 15 September, 2017, after a long and happy life, the spacecraft Cassini will do (or did, depending on when you listen to this) a suicide plunge into the atmosphere of Saturn, the ringed planet. This episode is a repeat, originally released in... by Shirtloads of Science
45 min listen
Introductory Episode. by Astromedy (A Space Podcast )
23 min listen
Western Slope Skies - Stars Above, Stars Within: You may fondly remember the classic Eighties science program Cosmos, narrated… by Western Slope Skies
4 min listen
Episode 36: A Dance with Dark Matter: How can astronomers study something that nobody has ever seen? In this episode, we switch to the dark side to shine a light on one of the biggest questions in all of astrophysics: the nature of dark matter. Malena teaches us how dark matter helps galaxy ... by astro[sound]bites
43 min listen
Teaching Kids About Space w/ Dean Regas from Cincinnati Observatory by The Cosmic Companion - Astronomy, Space, Technology Advancing Humanity
25 min listen
Sci-Fi Movie Club: 'Contact': One of our favorite Science Movie Club episodes: 'Contact' featuring Jodie Foster. It was a real crowd pleaser, especially among extraterrestrials and Carl Sagan fans by Short Wave
13 min listen
14 Carolyn Porco - Why Seeing Earth From Space Matters: On Valentine's Day 1990, from more than four billion miles away, the Voyager 1 spacecraft snapped our photo. From that distance, there wasn't much to see; the resulting shot simply showed several light beams with a tiny speck in one of them. Earth. But t by Inquiring Minds
53 min listen
Watching the Births of Solar Systems by Planetary Radio: Space Exploration, Astronomy and Science
41 min listen
NGC 1316 ê 中央：星系相碰了後 ft. 阿錕 (20210126) by NASA 逐工一幅天文圖 APOD Taigi
3 min listen
Episode 34 --- Why Geology Is Crucial To Unlocking The Mysteries Of Our Solar System: Planetary geophysicist Erik Asphaug of the University of Arizona discusses what we really know about our solar system; its age; its formation; and its evolution. Asphaug also addresses some major puzzles. Is our solar system truly anomalous? Is the compo... by The Cosmic Controversy Podcast
60 min listen
Mars in opposition, with Dr Stu Clark by Instant Genius
34 min listen
204. Tī 土星跳舞 ê 極光 ft. 阿錕 (20210627) by NASA 逐工一幅天文圖 APOD Taigi
2 min listen
Planet Impact – Ian Carnelli, Programme Manager at European Space Agency (ESA) – An Inch is Bigger Than You Think: How Scientific Research Prepares us for Potential Catastrophic Asteroid Impact: The big asteroid is careening towards Earth and NASA is scrambling for a solution to save the planet, along with the help of a few of Hollywood’s biggest actors, we’ve all… by Finding Genius Podcast
22 min listen
#13 - July 2013: Your July sky guide & a competition to *win a pair of binoculars!* News on the Goldilocks Zone, 3 new interesting exoplanets, a busy time on Low Earth Orbit, Curiosity & radiation risks for Mars-bound astronauts and black holes in the... by AWESOME ASTRONOMY
58 min listen
Hal Walker: The Man Who Shot The Moon: How an instrument left on the moon by Apollo 11 astronauts helped scientist Hal Walker measure the distance to the moon and verify one of Einstein's theories. by Short Wave
13 min listen
#126 - December 2022: The Discussion: Meteor shower disappointment Lecturing course started Dr Jen’s 30th birthday party karaoke – with audio! more resources for astronomy and astrophotography over at The News: Rounding up the astronomy news in November, we... by AWESOME ASTRONOMY
68 min listen
Teaching Children Science w/ Dr. Stephanie Ryan - Astronomy News with The Cosmic Companion 3 August 2021 by The Cosmic Companion - Astronomy, Space, Technology Advancing Humanity
24 min listen
Tue. 09/15 - Life on Venus & Responsible Shrek Fans by Cool Stuff Ride Home
17 min listen
452. 動畫：奇怪 ê 電波箍仔 ft. 阿錕 (20220330) by NASA 逐工一幅天文圖 APOD Taigi
2 min listen
Weekly Space Hangout: November 3, 2021 - Juggling in Space with Physicist Dr. Adam Dipert: Be prepared to be AMAZED as we welcome Dr. Adam Dipert to the WSH. In addition to being a Postdoctoral Research Scholar in Physics at North Carolina State University, Adam has wowed audiences as a professional circus performer and juggler for nearly... by Weekly Space Hangout
56 min listen
20 years of the International Space Station: We're marking 20 years of continuous occupation of the ISS with a look at its past, present and future. by Radio Astronomy
42 min listen
The Arecibo Radio Telescope, the Largest Operational Radio Telescope in the World, is Being Decommissioned by Learning by William
26 min listen
Episode 99 Pulsars and the Detection of Gravitational Waves, with Ingrid Stairs: Feature Guest: Ingrid Stairs In February scientists announced the first ever discovery of gravitational waves, tiny distortions in the fabric of space-time predicted by Einstein exactly 100 years ago. The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave... by The Star Spot
37 min listen
Nature Pastcast, October 1993: Carl Sagan uses Galileo to search for signs of life: This year, Nature celebrates its 150th birthday. To mark this anniversary we’re rebroadcasting episodes from our PastCast series, highlighting key moments in the history of science. In the early 1990s, a team of astrophysicists led by Carl Sagan look... by Nature Podcast
13 min listen
926. 阿波羅 11 號：有去予日光照著 ft. 阿錕 (20230729) by NASA 逐工一幅天文圖 APOD Taigi
2 min listen
Lessons from the Past: This month, we read the history of Martian science in a collection of globes, and find out why it's important to understand ancient and aboriginal astronomy. We find out why some Gamma Ray Bursts (GRBs) are shrouded in darkness, discuss... by Naked Astronomy, from the Naked Scientists
64 min listen
A SECRET PLANET might exist in OUR Solar System!!! by Fun Kids Science Weekly
28 min listen
The REACH Guide to the Total Solar Eclipse by REACH A Space Podcast for Kids
11 min listen
Interview with Dr. Ann Virkki of Arecibo Observatory - Astronomy News with The Cosmic Companion Video and Podcast April 28, 2020 by The Cosmic Companion - Astronomy, Space, Technology Advancing Humanity
18 min listen

Discover this podcast and so much more

Science Movie Club: 'Contact'

Science Movie Club: 'Contact'

Description

Titles in the series (100)

More Episodes from Short Wave

Related podcast episodes