Comedian Beth Stelling joins Matt and Andy this week for a special late-night recording in Andy's bedroom to talk about Google's mapping of the human body, Slim Goodbody, bats navigating via polarized light, real 3D vs. fake 3D, Stellaluna and megabats, gecko orgies in space and the cancer-fighting effects of cat poop.
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Comedian/director Jordan Brady and his rapping, backflipping son Ben join the festivities with Matt, Andy and Jesse this week to discuss Jordan's invention of "bow-chicka-wow-wow," Matt's Last Comic Standing experience, living on the cheap while filming I Am Road Comic, Lacerta lizard people, Pluto possibly getting reinstated as a planet, suspended animation for gunshot victims, fish-eating spiders, grolar bears, improving your sense of smell with the help of booze, good news and bad news about AIDS, a new way for the Chinese to extract sperm, Andy's video cracking the Morrissey Code and the gang's upcoming appearance at the LA Podcast Festival, September 26-28.
Buy Jordan's new movie I Am Road Comic here for just $5!
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Friend of the show and past guest TJ Chambers rejoins the festivities this week to talk with Matt, Jesse and Andy about listener-made indie video games, Brooks news, delicious Lagunitas IPA, chimpanzee fads, The short films of TJ Chambers, bear fellatio, the origins of Winnie the Pooh, a massive ocean inside Earth, an invisibility cloak for the sense of touch, the debatable cancer-prevention effects of farts, a real-world warp drive and the upcoming Los Angeles Podcast Festival.
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Probably History is back! New listeners to Probably Science may not know this, but when you subscribe to ProbSci you also occasionally get a dose of almost-history courtesy of Jesse Case, Richard Bain and Andy Wood. This week they welcome guest comedian and gamer David Cope as they set their sights on the 60+ year history of video/computer gaming, discussing OXO, Tennis for Two, Computer Space, the dude behind Chuck E. Cheese and Atari, the 1972 home console made by Magnavox, the Father of Video Games, Verbot: The 1980s voice-activated robot, Mortal Kombat tactics, Andy's stint working for Xbox, the Rockafire Explosion documentary, Brad Dourif's over-the-top performance in Myst 3: Exile, David and Richard's console recommendations, Leeroy Jenkins, The Call of The Blade, and Braid, the game that everyone agrees you should play.
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Comedian Renee Gauthier and nuclear physicist/comedian Dr. Kevin Peter Hickerson join Matt and Andy this week to talk about Matt's inability to wink, the actual cost of going to the moon, Renee's dance lessons, Kevin's study of neutrinos, shielding your experiments with lead from sunken Roman ships, a computer that may or may not have passed the Turing test, a massive ocean inside the Earth, the tongue strength of a horned frog and the upcoming PhD Movie sequel that you can help support.
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It's an episode of actual science this week, as Jesse, Matt and Andy welcome primatologist/anthropologist and UCLA postdoctoral research fellow Dr. Christopher Schmitt to the podcast to introduce us to the world of primates and teach us why capucin monkeys stick their fingers in each other's eyes, how to collect howler monkey urine, why certain primates are getting obese, and why it's best not to take selfies with hippo corpses when there are lions around.
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British comedian, actor, writer and radio personality Adam Buxton makes his first Probably Science appearance to chat with the gang about sci-fi coverage of the papal inauguration, the history of the Shriners, deciding on a uniform for an evil empire, Jaundice Shitstone, the counting skills of black bears, Glands of Montgomery, whether female-named hurricanes are actually deadlier, how chimps beat humans at game theory, a recently discovered mega-Earth 560 light years away, Jesse's incredible Rocky impressions and Adam's hilarious show 'Bug.'
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Comedian/podcaster/director/writer/producer/Viner Jason Nash returns to the show this week just ahead of the release of his first feature film to talk with the gang about his recent Ron & Fez appearance, the upcoming movie Jason Nash Is Married that Andy produced, shooting scenes with Andy Richter and Jon Benjamin at Bluebell, erasing memories and bringing them back, more reasons why sleep is good for your memory, Jason’s upcoming appearance on Funniest Wins, new information on how the Moon was formed, asking listeners to help us record the podcast in zero gravity, the reason why Facebook bums you out, the discovery of the largest dinosaur ever and how changing your facial expression changes first impressions.
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British comedy writer Sarah Morgan collaborated with Probably Science's own Matt Kirshen on BBC Radio 4's Bigipedia, and as she was stateside this week for MaxFunCon we were lucky enough to have her join the proceedings to chat about teaching British comedy, the lyrical prowess of Boynie Toypin, head trauma that created a math savant, children's natural skepticism of circular arguments, Jesse's nightmarish stuffed animals, turning light into matter, why we still don't understand static electricity, Matt chipping his teeth in a children's science museum, the protein that unites sperm and egg, and our first on-air earthquake.
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Comedian, host of the podcast Hang Out With Me and literal master of linguistics Myq Kaplan joins Matt, Jesse and Andy this week to chat about birthday shenanigans, John Lennon's true assassin Stephen King, Myq's new album Small, Dork, and Handsome, competing against a computer in a joke-off, a smartphone app that detects bipolar mood swings by the sound of your voice, why octopuses' tentacles don't stick to themselves, how holding a hot beverage makes you cooperative and making sperm precursors from the skin cells of infertile men.
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Matt and Andy venture to Portland this week for a live Probably Science from the seventh annual Bridgetown Comedy Festival featuring comedian/director/actor Paul Provenza and cyborg anthropologist Amber Case, who join together to discuss the early days of Comedy Central, confusing The Aristocrats with The Aristocats, Alan Dershowitz consulting on Kids Court, why we're all cyborgs now, computer-induced junk sleep, Andy's discovery about the house he owned in Portland, digital hoarding and royal portraits as proto-Internet dating profile pics.
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With Andy off to Portland, and the scheduled guest being drunk, Matt and Jesse take matters into their own hands! This week, the two of them fumble their way through the topics of: their local Renaissance fair! Hitler's Parkinson's! Peeing outdoors! How to build a pyramid! Lab rat sexism! Cheating at Rock, Paper, Scissors! Traumatic sleepovers! New Elements! Meeting Buzz Aldrin! Also, Stephen Hawking is scared of the robot takeover!
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The always funny Auggie Smith returns to the podcast this week on what can safely be described as an unfortunate day in the neighborhood. That didn't stop some actual science from being discussed, including the reinvention of the axe, a study that reveals the best way for men to dance, a hacky plant that copies other plants, making graphene in a blender, babies who cry to keep from having siblings, glow-in-the-dark roads in the Netherlands and the electric shock quick reflex game that hurts more than you'd expect.
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Radio personality, author, trivia whiz and cancer survivor Bryan Bishop joins Matt, Andy and Jesse this week to talk about his upcoming book Shrinkage: Manhood, Marriage, and the Tumor That Tried to Kill Me, doctors with less-than-perfect bedside manner, tips on dealing with your own tumor, alternative medicine and the placebo effect, the tumor-shrinking magic of Avastin, the relative merits of MRIs and CT scans, the lunacy of David Arquette, Ringo Starr songs that may have been written by George Harrison, taking home $100,000 on Who Wants To Be a Millionaire and the evolutionary reason why beards are over.
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Popular science communicator, blogger, fellow podcaster, former real scientist and current excellent person Cara Santa Maria joins Andy, Jesse and Matt at Bluebell Ranch to talk bath salt accuracy, loud chewing, Andy's association with the Hillary Clinton shoe-thrower, brain percentages, penis bees, vagina-sewing, mouse muscle growth, cockroach nanobots and pain faces.
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Recent Nashville-to-Los Angeles transplant Beth Donahue makes her first Probably Science appearance this week, giving her take on LA and chatting with the gang about the debunked stem cell acid bath story, Matt's airplane black box ideas, the fat-burning cream doctors don't want you to know about, liquid water on one of Saturn's moons, women who stay up late and take big risks, Jesse's butt problems, Beth's sleep apnea pacemaker, and what to do if you find $600 on the street.
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The whole gang is back together this week, welcoming Irish comedian, actress and voice artist Tara Flynn to the proceedings to talk about Fleet Week, Jesse spraying himself with urine before a callback, saving the government $400 million by changing fonts, carving off a sliver of Irish Spring soap, a MacGyver microscope that only costs fifty cents, the possibly bullshit phenomenon of autonomous sensory meridian response, a 3D-printed skull, Tara's lack of a sense of smell, the influence of CK1 (not the perfume) on our circadian rhythms, graphene contact lenses that let you see in the dark, the 5 second rule, and Andy's almost-revolutionary inventions.
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To help us make sense of the biggest cosmology story of recent years, we invited three of our favorite physicists back to the show. Matt and Jesse are joined by an in-studio Dr. Larry Price, and, thanks to technical wizardry, NYC-dwelling Prof. Janna Levin and a Washington State-based Dr. Jamie Rollins, as they talk us through The Big Bang, what Inflation means, what this BICEP2 experiment did, whether it's important, what the Asian guy with the champagne meant when he said “It's five sigma at point two” to the Russian man and woman in that viral video, what was going on with that colder-than-absolute-zero story we didn't understand last week, whether academic journals are glory hunters, how multiverses fit in with this Inflation thing, and what we should take away from the whole story. And Andy missed all this to make sure a TV show about skaters getting hit in the testicles got made.
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We're going Dutch on this week's episode, as Netherlands-based comedian Stefan Pop stops by Bluebell Ranch with TV camera crew in tow, joining writer/comedian Rylee Newton to talk about Dutch insults, the health benefits of orange light, medieval multiverse theories, lightning as a predictor of earthquakes, temperatures below absolute zero and how neanderthals might have yelled.
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You've seen comedian and actor Jimmy Shubert in The Italian Job, Reno: 911!, Mr. & Mrs. Smith and King of Queens, among many other credits, and he joins Just For Laughs Montreal and SF Sketchfest veteran Matt Davis to talk with the gang about baby tumors that have teeth, Brooks Wheelan's 12 Years a Slave sketch on SNL, dark matter that may have killed off the dinosaurs, a drug that cures heroin overdoses, Nick Doody opening for Bill Hicks, Italian robots that can tell when you're lying and the upcoming Krullapalooza charity benefit show with Zach Galifianakis, Tig Notaro and Patton Oswalt.
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