Episodes in english

How do we experience the world around us and should we trust these experiences? In this episode, we talk to Dr. James Cooke, who is a neuroscientist at UCL. He is researching the issue of perception, how our brain interprets the world, not to mention all the additional problems that consciousness brings along for the ride. 

Through his work, he is attempting to resolve the so-called "hard problem" of consciousness, proposed by David Chalmers, through a novel approach, called the Living Mirror Theory of Consciousness. 

We talk about philosophical zombies, mirrors, and more – you'll hear it all in the episode!

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Как възприемаме света около нас и да се доверяваме ли на преживяванията си? В този епизод говорим с д-р Джеймс Кук, невроучен от University College London. Той изследва въпросите за възприятието и всички проблеми, които съзнанието вкарва в този разговор.

С него обсъждаме "трудния проблем" на съзнанието – защо имаме лични изживявания и усещания – и неговият иновативен подход към решаването му, теорията за "живото огледало" (Living Mirror Theory of Consciousness).

Говорим си за философски зомбита, огледала и още много - чуйте повече в епизода! 

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Допълнителни бележки към епизода: ratio.bg/podcast/267

Ако това, което правим, ви харесва, подкрепете Ratio тук: ratio.bg/support

EP267 - Living Mirror [w/ James Cooke]

---The episode is in English - scroll down for the English description.---

Трудно е да повярваме, че никъде другаде в огромната Вселена няма интелигентни същества. Но ако имаше, защо не сме ги виждали досега? А дали не сме?
 
През 2017 учени засякоха първият междузвезден посетител в Слънчевата система - обектът Оумуамуа. Веднага след това започнаха активни дебати между учени и астрономи какво представлява той. Но един астрофизик повече от всеки друг изрази мнението, че това може би е бил първият пример за апарат с извънземен произход. Това е Ейбрахам (Ави) Льоб – астрофизик, завеждащ департамента по Астрофизика в Харвард, а освен това, оказва се, и с български корени. 

Ще ви срещнем с Ави Льоб за един ексклузивен разговор, в който ще обсъдим както Оумуамуа, така и като цяло предизвикателствата пред търсенето на интелигентен живот в Космоса. В интервюто ще научите:
— С какво е уникален обектът Оумуамуа и дали можем да очакваме още като него?
— Как всъщност можем да сме сигурни дали един обект е космически кораб? С какви инструменти можем да си послужим за такъв анализ?
— Ако някога открием извънземен живот, това ще бъде ли държано в тайна от обществото?
— Какво представлява космическата археология?
— Какво са проектите Лира, Галилей и Breakthrough Starshot?

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Книгата Extraterrestrial, в която Ави Льоб излага цялата си теория за обекта Оумуамуа и която веднага се превърна в бестселър в САЩ, може да откриете в магазина на Ratio: https://shop.ratio.bg/product/avi-loeb-extraterrestrial/

Допълнителни бележки към епизода: ratio.bg/podcast/270

Ако това, което правим, ви харесва, подкрепете Ratio тук: ratio.bg/support

--- IN ENGLISH ---
It's hard to believe that we are the only species in the vast Universe that possesses higher intelligence and technological power. But if that's not true, why haven't we seen alien life? Or have we?

In 2017, scientists saw the first interstellar object to come into the Solar System. It was called Oumuamua. There are still numerous debates about the nature of this mysterious object. But one astrophysicist spearheaded the controversial idea that this might be an extraterrestrial apparatus. This was Abraham (Avi) Loeb – the head of the Astrophysics department of Harvard University.

In this exclusive talk with Avi Loeb, we'll discuss Oumuamua and the challenges of searching for extraterrestrial life. You'll hear:
— What makes Oumuamua unique and what more can we expect from it?
— How would we even know if an object is an alien spaceship? What tools can help us in this analysis?
— If we ever find extraterrestrial life, can this news be hidden from the public?
— What is space archeology?
— What are the projects Lyra, Gallileo, and Breakthrough Starshot?

EP270 – Oumuamua and searching for extraterrestrial life [w/ Avi Loeb]

--- The episode is in English – scroll down for the English description. ---

На фаталния петък 13-и ви срещаме с фаталния Сабин Роман, който работи върху дългосрочно моделиране на еволюцията на обществата. С него обсъждаме рисковете от пълен разпад на обществото, каквото го познаваме днес. Кои са точките на най-голямо напрежение и възможните сценарии ще чуете в разговора.

От епизода ще научите:
— Дали Сабин е истинският Хари Селдън?
— Какво прави един физик в света на социалните науки?
— Как можем да сведем еволюцията на човечеството до математически модел?
— Близо ли сме до колапс на цивилизацията?
— Кои са най-вероятните „виновници“ за разпада на човечеството?

Слушайте ни, за да разберете и какви са приликите между планирането на продажби и предвиждането на социални процеси, как се оптимизират технологиите за предсказване и какво общо има Ренесансът с всичко това.

---In English---
On this Friday the 13th we introduce you to Sabin Roman – a „fatallistic“ scientist tasked with the long-term modelling of societal evolution. Together, we discussed the risks of societal collapse. Hear the episode to learn which are the key points of tension and whether or not there is a way forward.

You’ll hear:
— Is Sabin the real Harry Seldon?
— What is a mathematical physicist doing in social sciences?
— Can we simplify down human evolution to a mathematical model – and is that simplifying at all?
— Are we close to a societal collapse now?
— Which are the most likely culprits of humanity’s fall?

You’ll also learn if sales forecasting is similar to social forecasting, how we optimize predictive technologies, and what does the Renaissance have to do with it.

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Допълнителни бележки към епизода: ratio.bg/podcast/291

Ако това, което правим, ви харесва, подкрепете Ratio тук: ratio.bg/support

EP291 – Societal Collapse [w/ Sabin Roman]

---The episode is in English – scroll down for the English description.---

„Не знаем от какво е направена по-голямата част от Вселената и това е някак неловко.“ Това каза теоретичният физик Ави Льоб в началото на разговора ни – след което прекара още час да ни разказва за нещата, които все пак знаем за черните дупки.

От Ави ще научите:
— Какво е общото между черните дупки и облачното съхранение на данни?
— Колко голяма или малка може да е една черна дупка?
— Къде всъщност се крие парадоксът в информационния парадокс на Хокинг?
— Какво имат предвид учените под „информация“, когато става дума за черни дупки?
— Как черните дупки могат да са космати?
— Как умират черните дупки?
— Какво ще видите, ако ваш приятел скочи в черна дупка?
— Какви сходни въпроси поставят пред нас черните дупки и отходните канали?

---In English---
„We don’t know what most of the universe is made of and this is a bit embarrassing.“ This is what the theoretical physicist Avi Loeb said at the start of our conversation. Then he went on to tell us what we actually know about black holes for an hour.

From our conversation, you’ll learn:
— Are black holes the data cloud storage of the universe?
— How big or small a black hole can be?
— What exactly is the paradox behind Hawking’s information paradox?
— And what do scientists mean by “information” when we talk about black holes?
— Did you know that black holes also have hair?
— How do black holes die?
— What will you see if one of your friends jumps into a black hole?
— What are the commonalities between black holes and sewage?

EP314 – Black holes [w/ Avi Loeb]

We recently held our second big event this year - and our biggest one to date! We welcomed several interesting speakers, one of which was dr. Steven Goldfarb. Steven is a particle physicist working on the ATLAS experiment in CERN and ATLAS’s Outreach and Communication Coordinator. As such, he has been overseeing the worldwide communication of the Higgs boson discovery of 2012 and speaks at major popular science events basically everywhere.

At our event, he spoke about the work at the LHC and such sexy topics as dark matter and dark energy - you know, those 95% of our Universe we basically know nothing about. In the interview, we go to a bunch of crazy places such as fake news, politics, how to communicate science, how science is perceived by society.. oh, and obviously there’s a bunch of Trump, as well. Listen in!

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If you enjoy our content, you can support us through patreon.com/ratiobg.

EP2 – [ENG] Truth, Trump, and teepees [w/ Steven Goldfarb]

Our guest for this episode is Greg Dunn, a neuroscientist turned artist. Together with his co-conspirator, the physicist Brian Edward, they created what can be described as probably the most dynamic artistic representation of our brain. Before listening to this, just go online and check out the project Self-Reflected: http://www.gregadunn.com/self-reflected/

Beyond his sciencey and artistic qualities, Greg is also a fantastic speaker - he did a talk with us in August, he did it in Bulgarian no less. He visits Bulgaria with his wife who's from around here and in the past few years mastered some excellent Bulgarian. Here's a link to that talk, as well: https://www.facebook.com/ratio.bg/videos/1406415032746502/

Thankfully, we decided to keep this one in English.

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If you like what we're doing, you can support us at patreon.com/ratiobg.

EP4 - [ENG] Art, the brain, and cocaine with the Dalai Lama [w/ Greg Dunn]

This episode goes deep into the neural pathways of the brain. Together with neuroscientist/artist Greg Dunn, we talk about senses, consciousness - and a sprinkle of capitalism.

Listen to the episode to hear us discuss (and be on polar opposites of) questions like: 

* How sensory deprivation feels and what are the reasons it works the way it does?
* Meditation and how learning more about the practice can help us understand consciousness?
* Can Karma be interpreted as a more scientific notion of habitual behavior?

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See the shownotes at ratio.bg/podcast/19

We want to thank our sponsors from SBTech - you can learn more about them at sbtech.com/careers

If you like the podcast, you can support us at patreon.com/ratiobg

EP19 - Mindfulness deprivation [w/ Greg Dunn]

Our guest in this episode is Zach Dickeson, a geologist working at the Natural History Museum in London. Zach came to Sofia for one of our Ratio events where he talked about his research on signs of past liquid water on Mars.

During our podcast talk, we covered other questions, as well:
* How realistic are Elon Musk's plans to terraform Mars?
* How three missions will work in unison to bring us the first samples of Martian soil?
* What is the right approach in leading science discussions and is the most important bit to win?
* How do we choose the names of rovers and other space apparatuses going to Mars?

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See the shownotes at ratio.bg/podcast/24

We want to thank our sponsors from SBTech - you can learn more about them at sbtech.com/careers

If you like the podcast, you can support us at patreon.com/ratiobg

EP24 - Water, gas imports, and nuclear missiles to Mars [w/ Zach Dickeson]

In this episode, we talk to Michael Marshall. Michael is the project director for the Good Thinking Society and the Vice President of the Merseyside Skeptics Society. He recently spoke in Sofia about the campaign against NHS homeopathy funding his team organized.

In this episode you’ll hear us discuss:
- How can we promote rational thinking in the media by abiding to the narrative needs of journalists
- What can skeptics do to make their events more inclusive?
- What are the weirdest beliefs Michael has heard on his podcast “Be Reasonable”?

Listen to this talk about public policy, flat and hollow earth, and the Venusian ships Nazis used.

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You'll find the show notes at ratio.bg/podcast/25

We want to thank our sponsors from SBTech - you can learn more about them at sbtech.com/careers

If you like the podcast, you can support us at patreon.com/ratiobg

EP25 - Homeopathy, human conversation, and Nazi/Venus diplomatic relations [w/ Michael Marshall]

We knew this episode will take a turn for the weird because our guest is Brain Sharpless, a clinical psychologist with a special interest in strange psychological disorders.

We started off talking about Freud and we went all the way to the following topics:
- Do clinical psychologists really sit in armchairs smoking pipes?
- How can a person suffering from panic attacks get better in a couple of sessions?
- What's the evidence that psychotherapy works at all?
- What good news about human nature can we derive from the two World Wars?

EP27 - Freud, panic attacks, and World Wars [w/ Brian Sharpless]

This episode was recorded live after Simon Singh’s presentation at the Sofia Science Festival. 

We only had a short time to talk with the physicist/mathematician/author and we ventured straight into:
 - the key qualities in both scientists and artists
 - the reasons why we still need pure science
 - the aesthetics of equations
 - the characteristics of modern cryptography (explained with treasure chests!)

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You'll find the show notes at ratio.bg/podcast/30

We want to thank our sponsors from SBTech - you can learn more about them at sbtech.com/careers

If you like the podcast, you can support us at patreon.com/ratiobg

EP30 - Theorems, aesthetics, and codes [w/ Simon Singh]

This week you’ll hear our discussion with Robin Andrews, a vulcanologist and science journalist extraordinaire.

Robin, being an avid volcano aficionado, rushed us through a number of topics:
- Which are the most badass volcanoes on Earth?
- What do volcanoes look like on other planets?
- What's the only case of a person surviving after falling in a volcano?
- How do we know if a volcano is "due to erupt" and why a real scientist would never use that phrase? 

We've also learned how new technologies help us save people from volcanoes in a weird real-life drone-enabled version of Frogger. Even if you already knew there's no big difference between lava and magma, you'll still learn something new. Check it out!

EP36 - Don't Lick the Lava [w/ Robin Andrews]

In this episode, we talk with Gili Ron, an architect, algorithmic designer, and artist. We spoke about the many, often imperceptible but substantial ways in which design and architecture have an impact on our daily life. 

We asked Gili:
— What is algorithmic design and what it brings to our world today?
— How design affects personal mood and community wellbeing?
— How big is too big when it comes to both cities and individual buildings?
— What place do monuments from the past have in our future?

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You'll find the show notes at ratio.bg/podcast/41

If you like the podcast, you can support us at patreon.com/ratiobg

EP41 - Urban architecture, from kibbutz to Kreuzberg [w/ Gili Ron]

If you're familiar with our guest, it'll come as no surprise that we talked to him about dinosaurs.

Steve went past the topics of his bestselling book "The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs" and told us:

— What are the weirdest theories about dinosaur extinction (including cataracts and locusts)?
— How did dinosaurs procreate?
— How did feathers and wings evolve in dinosaurs?
— What other interesting topics does paleontology cover?

Listen to us for your weekly helping of dino-trivia and a special movie recommendation from our host Petko.

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All the show notes are at ratio.bg/podcast/46.

You can support us on Patreon: patreon.com/ratiobg

EP46 - Dinosaurs with cataracts and sewer rats [w/ Steve Brusatte]

In this episode, we look back at our ancient ancestors and uncover the marks they left in our genes. 

We spoke with Dr. Jonathan Pettitt, professor of Genetics at the University of Aberdeen and discussed:
— What is the connection between Homo Sapiens, Neanderthals, and Denisovans?
— Which is Jonathan's favorite hominin (because of course, he has one)?
— Can we pinpoint some specific traits our ancestors had, and we don’t?
— Which living organism has the most complex genome and what is junk DNA?
— What are the genetic benefits of being funny or crying?
— Can we build a genetic map of the world?

Turns out we may well be the prehistoric sissies - but we got all the way to recording podcasts like this one.

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All the show notes are at ratio.bg/podcast/54

You can support us on Patreon: patreon.com/ratiobg

EP54 - Prehistoric sissies [w/ Jonathan Pettitt]

In this episode we discuss what is human optimization and how often do we update our chromosomes.

Martin Moder tells us:
— What's the link between rats and xenophobia?
— Can we create babies that are ripped?
— Whose intelligence do adopted children inherit - that of their birth or foster parents?
— Why creativity is one step away from schizophrenia and anorexia?

Martin also explained why there is not one ideal genome and what is the best way to optimize yourself starting today. Give it a listen!

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All the show notes are at ratio.bg/podcast/60

You can support us on Patreon: patreon.com/ratiobg

EP60 - Muscled babies [w/ Martin Moder]

If you're looking for a feel-good conversation, this is not it! But our ginger-beer-fueled discussion with science fiction writer Peter Watts makes some interesting points to think about - even when you don't agree with them.

What started off with a discussion on space passion crimes, went into many different directions like:
— what is the most efficient way to cut down on your carbon emissions (spoilers: you're not gonna like the answer)
— do rich people worry about the end of civilization as we know it and what plans do they have
— how can we change personality traits with gut bacteria transplants
— are we ready for a "Hail Mary" type of plan to save the planet and ourselves - like rewiring our brains

"The avalanche has already started, it is too late for the pebbles to vote." You'll only grasp why Peter quoted "Babylon 5" if you give this episode a listen!

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All the show notes are at ratio.bg/podcast/63

You can support us on Patreon: patreon.com/ratiobg

EP63 - We can't be saved [w/ Peter Watts]

In this episode, we talk to the biologist Matthew Cobb about the different theories about the brain and consciousness. 

We discussed Matthew's early career, which involved getting drunk for science and continued on to:
— Why does Matthew think materialism is the soundest approach to understanding the brain?
— What are the implications of determinism on the punitive law system?
— Can dogs be left- or right-handed?
— What does a dead salmon teach us about the way we set up scientific experiments?
— Is being female genetically determined?
— What does "your brain on drugs" really look like?

Listen to the episode to learn more!

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All the show notes are at ratio.bg/podcast/69

You can support us on Patreon: patreon.com/ratiobg

EP69 - Your brain, materialism, and dead salmon [w/ Matthew Cobb]

Our conversation with CERN’s Achintya Rao started with everyday life under COVID-19 and went into the deep mysteries of the universe.

In the conversation, we discussed:
— how do you talk about fundamental physics to laypeople (like Petko)
— how can we bridge science and spirituality
— what’s the justification for investing in large-scale scientific projects
— what is the ROI of fundamental science 
— what experiments are being conducted at CERN right now?
— what is Achintya‘s favorite antimatter hypothesis being tested now

We also casually invoked Feynman, Dawkins, and the Pope. Listen up!

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All the show notes are at ratio.bg/podcast/94

You can support us on Patreon: patreon.com/ratiobg

EP94 - Understanding the universe at one coffee per year [w/ Achintya Rao]

The human body is inhabited by a complex and rich community of microorganisms. They form the basis of our health and mood. Scientists today constantly learn more about this microflora and its impact on our immune system. They're close to giving us medicine that will improve our chances of combatting different illnesses and pathogens. To learn more, we turn to Dr. Lindsay Hall.

Together, we tackled some important questions:
— What is the difference between the microbiota and the microbiome?
— What is actually the microbiome and what do we know about it?
— How does the microbiome affect the immune system?
— How can we cultivate a rich and healthy gut flora?
— What should we munch on and what foods to shun away from?
— What are the new treatments that can be developed based on current microbiome research?

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All the show notes are at ratio.bg/podcast/105

You can support us on Patreon: patreon.com/ratiobg

EP105 - The Life in Our Guts [w/ Lindsay Hall]

Подкастите на Ratio са аудио и видео портал към света на науката, технологиите, философията и културата. В шест различни серии разглеждаме всичко – от последните научни открития до пресечните точки между изкуството и технологиите. Ако сте любопитни за света и искате да чуете нови гледни точки, Ratio Podcasts е мястото, където науката среща любопитството.

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