Dave Almandsmith
20 October 2025
Hello again, friend of science,
Yá’át’ééh dóó t’áá íiyisí nihíjí’ígíí naaltsoosí, shí k’ehjí éí.
[Navajo is the most widely spoken Native American language in the U.S.]
The Orionids Meteor Shower peaks Tuesday and Wednesday nights. Find a nice dark location miles from a city, bundle up warmly, and expect to enjoy the show peaking for several hours beginning around 11 PM, brought to you courtesy of Halley’s Comet.
SCIENCE in the CROSSHAIRS
Last May, the Executive Branch published an Executive Order titled, “Restoring Gold Standard Science.” Although much of the Executive Order seems admirable with requirements that science is “conducted in a manner that is: reproducible; transparent; communicative of error and uncertainty; collaborative and interdisciplinary; skeptical of its findings and assumptions; structured for falsifiability of hypotheses; subject to unbiased peer review; accepting of negative results as positive outcomes; and without conflicts of interest.”
Wow! That’s great.
However, the passages following clarify that agency heads appointed by the President are the ones responsible for “interpreting” whether a study conformed with the above requirements, “interpreting” what studies mean for establishing policies, and deciding what subsequent research – if any – is desirable. Simply put, political appointees can arbitrarily dismiss research findings and ‘elevate’ junk science to support policies.
[At Saturday’s “No Kings” demonstration in El Cerrito, there were numerous signs on display in support of science. A passing non-demonstrator railed, “All you are stupid. America does not have a king; not for hundreds of years.”]
ANTHROPOLOGY
PBS NOVA released the 5th and final segment of their well-produced and thoroughly enjoyable “Human” series hosted by Ella Al-Shamahi. You can stream it on TV or watch on the Internet:
- Human: Origins
- Human: Journeys
- Human: Neanderthal Encounters
- Human: Into the Americas
- Human: Building Empires
RAFFLE
Our raffle prize is the Tree of Life 1,000 piece 49×64 cm jigsaw puzzle. Just send an email before noon Friday to david.almandsmith <at> gmail <dot> com with your guess of an integer between 0 and 1,000. Last time, the random number generator generated “496” and Greg won the Caffeine mug with his guess of 500.
COSMOLOGY
When i want to better understand something in cosmology, i turn to Ethan Siegel. Just a few days ago, he was featured on Big Think responding for 2 hours to questions on the origins of the universe. I’ve broken that video down by each of the questions that were posed. Dive into the questions that intrigue you.
¿Why did you become a science communicator? – 5.5 mins
¿What are the origins of the Big Bang theory? – 17.5 mins
¿What is the difference between “Singularity” and “Hot Big Bang”? – 4 mins
¿What are the three big predictions of the “Hot Big Bang”? – 8 mins
¿How was the cosmic inflation theory discovered? – 4.5 mins
¿What is cosmic inflation? – 11 mins
¿How can we test cosmic inflation? – 8.5 mins
¿Is there a multiverse? – 38 mins
¿How will the universe end? – 15 mins
¿What was it like when the first stars began to shine? – 3 mins
¿What was it like when life first became possible? – 5.5 mins
¿How are super massive black holes formed? – 2.5 mins
¿When will the last star die? – 5 mins
¿How does the James Webb Space Telescope change our understanding of space? – 9.5 mins
¿When will the next generation of telescopes be built? – 2.5 mins
Things to Do this Week
“Bat Week” begins on Friday. There are many wonderful science-related events this week. Peruse them all on the Bay Area Science Calendar. Below are my (biased) picks.
Bay Area Bats Wednesday 5pm, Berkeley Botanical Garden – $
Virtual Skeptics in the Pub Livestream Wednesday 7 – 9pm
Nerd Nite: Time Travel; Event Design; Science of Perceiving the World Wednesday 7pm, San Francisco, $
NightLife: Día de los Muertos Thursday 6 – 10pm, San Francisco – $
Spooky Astronomy Friday 4 – 7pm, Oakland Chabot Space & Science Ctr, $
Bats Alive! Friday 6 – 8pm, Los Gatos
Electric Vehicle Frunk-or-Treat Saturday 11 – 3pm, Sunnyvale
Bay Area Science Festival Saturday 11 – 4pm, San Francisco
Bat Week: Caller ID Saturday 5:30 – 7:15pm, Alviso
BIOLOGY / ETHOLOGY
Bat Week begins on Friday so i’m featuring a study that found bats to be really nice little mammals. They cuddle; they share dinner; they groom each other; they even wrap their wings around others as they nod off to sleep. Unfortunately, they can carry a long list of zoönotic diseases: Rabies, Ebola, Marburg, SARS-CoV-2 (Covid), Nipah, Hendra, et al.
Researchers in Brasil discovered thousands of Bumblebee Catfish climbing vertical rock walls against falling water by use of hydrodynamic forces. Presumably they were on their way to breeding locations (from a course in hydrologic engineering?)
We all know that “plants” are multicelled organisms that create their ‘food’ using chloroplasts with chlorophyll. I just learned of an exception: plants without chloroplasts, also known as ‘ghost flowers.’ ¿So from where do they get nutrition? The answer is in the word that describes them. “Mycoherterotrophs” meaning “fungus another growing.” They parasitise fungi for food. ¿Who’d ah thunk?
FUN NERDY VIDEOS
Traveling through Milky Way Nurseries – ESA – 2 mins
¿To Whom Do You Listen? – Cup O’Joe – Joe Schwarcz – 4.5 mins
NASA Considers Nuking an Asteroid – Sabine Hossenfelder – 5 mins
Recycling Spent Nuclear Fuel – Star Talk – Kathryn Huff & Neil deGrasse Tyson – 7 mins
Planetary Perspective – Big Think – Ron Garan – 7.5 mins (Top Pick)
The Surprising Hornbills– Bizarre Beasts – Hank Green – 11 mins
¿Why do Quantum Computers Look Like Chandeliers? – SciShow – Stefan Chin – 12 mins
¿Why do We have Chins? – PBS Eons – Kallie Moore – 12 mins
¿Should We Revive Extinct Animals? – Cleo Abram – 16 mins
Dragonfly Nymphs are Weird – Real Science – Stephanie Sammann – 21 mins
Quantum Interpretation – Matt O’Dowd & Sabine Hossenfelder – 30 mins
Berkelium – Tales from the Periodic Table – Ron Hipschmann – 31 mins
Quantum Field Theory – Royal Institute – Sean Carroll – 56 mins
Remember to appreciate your continuing desire to learn,
Dave Almandsmith, Bay Area Skeptics
“If we teach only the findings and products of science – no matter how useful and even inspiring they may be – without communicating its critical method, how can the average person possibly distinguish science from pseudoscience?”
Carl Sagan (1934 – 1996) American astronomer, planetary scientist, and science communicator.
Upcoming Events:
Click to see the next two weeks of events in your browser.