Latest / Space Nuts: Astronomy Insights & Cosmic Discoveries / Cosmic Dust in a Jar, Volcanic Eruptions on Io & Following the Coal to Find Extraterrestrial Life

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Cosmic Dust in a Jar, Volcanic Eruptions on Io & Following the Coal to Find Extraterrestrial Life · Space Nuts: Astronomy Insights & Cosmic Discoveries

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hi there, thanks for joining us. This is Space Nuts.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: My name is Andrew Dunkley and it's always good to
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: have your company. I hope you're well. Coming up on
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: this episode we will be discussing these things. A Sydney
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: PhD student has created cosmic dust in a jar, probably
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: not quite a jar, but pretty close to a jar.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: So how did they do it? And what does this mean?
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: Does it mean we'll never have to go out the
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: space again? Possibly? Anyway, that's a really good story, this one.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: Because I'm a bit of a volcano junkie. Simultaneous volcanic
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: eruptions have been recorded on EO, one of Jupiter's moons,
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: and it's a very rare event. In fact, I think
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: it's the first time it's been recorded as far as
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: I'm aware.
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: So we'll look at that, and here.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: Is a line for the ages, find the coal, and
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: we find the people. That's all coming up in this
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: episode of Space Nuts back of the Channel ten nine
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: ignition Space Nuts or three two Space Nurse, as I
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: report it, mels good and here to unravel the revelment
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: that is all of those stories is Professor Fred Wat's,
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: an astronomer at large.
• 1:21
  Speaker 3: Hello Fred, Andrew. I can easily ruvel them all up again.
• 1:27
  Speaker 3: I can tell you make them even more revel than
• 1:29
  Speaker 3: they were to start with. Yes, well, you know, we
• 1:32
  Speaker 3: don't strive for excellence here.
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: We never have.
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: It's all about adequacytable.
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: Sometimes we don't even make adiquousy. No, probably not no, But.
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: Some quirky stories today, And I'm very excited about this
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: first one because this, I mean, I joked about us
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: not having to go back into space and you know,
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: intercept asteroids and collect junk from them, because this kind
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: of does it for us, and you don't have to
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: leave the planet. The Sydney pH d student creating cosmic dust.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: This is quite extraordinary.
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: It is.
• 2:12
  Speaker 3: It's actually a great story, and it's nice that it's
• 2:15
  Speaker 3: got you know, it's got a local flavor to it
• 2:20
  Speaker 3: because of the Sydney University connection. I used to have
• 2:23
  Speaker 3: an honorary professorship at Sydney University, but I think it's lapsed.
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: I think they've got rid of me.
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: So as never mind of them, still like dishonoring a chick,
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: still happy to sing their praises. Sydney University is pretty good,
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: particularly my dad went there. Yeah, that's good anyway, what's
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: it all about. It's about a bit of a mystery
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: because we now know.
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: That, you know, a lot of the.
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: Complex organic molecules that we often talk about as the
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: building blocks of life, the amino acids and all of
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: those sorts of things, we know that they are found
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: in space. But what's not been clear is well, two
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: things not clear. One is did they find their way
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: to Earth? And maybe you know, when we find these chemicals,
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: for example, in meteors and in comets, maybe yes, there
• 3:24
  Speaker 3: have been collisions that have brought them to Earth. So
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: that's a fairly logical step. But the big question has
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: been how do they form in the depths of space
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: enough quantities that they're quite commonplace? And we know they
• 3:37
  Speaker 3: are because we can see a lot.
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: Of these.
• 3:43
  Speaker 3: Basically these chemicals. It deep in the dust and gas
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: clouds that we often analyze, things like the nebulae which
• 3:52
  Speaker 3: have got not just gas in them, blowing gas, but
• 3:55
  Speaker 3: often clouds of dust as well. And dust is very
• 3:58
  Speaker 3: well studied by astronomers using infrared and radio telescopes. In fact,
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: one of my close friends who was one of my
• 4:06
  Speaker 3: fellow students hundreds of years ago at Saint Andrews made
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: his career in studying cosmic dust and the contents of
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: that and looking at the way these chemicals come together
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: or have been brought together. The question is how do
• 4:21
  Speaker 3: they come together? And that's the question that's been asked
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: by a team at Sydney University, including the PhD candidate
• 4:31
  Speaker 3: who's I think she might be the lead author on
• 4:35
  Speaker 3: this paper, Linda Losudo. She has essentially created this synthetic
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: version of the cosmic dust that are infrared and radio
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: astronomy colleagues measure in clouds of gas and dust. She's
• 4:54
  Speaker 3: created it, synthesized it in the laboratory, probably as you said,
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: in a jar, with other things as well. And the
• 5:06
  Speaker 3: extraordinary thing is that what she's created seems to match
• 5:09
  Speaker 3: what these carbonaceous dust particles tell us in space. In
• 5:16
  Speaker 3: other words, you know, it seems like a very accurate synthesis.
• 5:21
  Speaker 3: So what she did was took a set of gases
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: quite simple nitrogen, carbon dioxide and acetylene which also contains
• 5:34
  Speaker 3: hydrogen oxygen, these gases in a tube and then basically
• 5:40
  Speaker 3: irradiated them with very intense electrical energy. They put ten
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: thousand vaults into the tube, which was almost in a vacuum,
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: so the pressures are very low, and you actually, if
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: you do that, you get these glow discharge phenomena, You
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: get colors appearing from the exciting X citation of the atoms.
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: But what she also found was that on silicon basically sorry,
• 6:11
  Speaker 3: not silicon, silicate silicate fingers within the within the tube,
• 6:17
  Speaker 3: they found these tiny particles of dust forming, and when
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: they analyze them, they've got exactly the same chemical signature
• 6:27
  Speaker 3: as these dust clouds in space. And so what they're
• 6:31
  Speaker 3: saying is that these basically these chemicals do form in
• 6:38
  Speaker 3: the kind of high energy environment that you find around
• 6:43
  Speaker 3: for example, a white dwarf star that's beaming out ultraviolet radiation,
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: or in the aftermath of a super and ova, where
• 6:51
  Speaker 3: you've got a sort of neutron star which is also
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: got high energy processes because the you know, the supernova
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: explosion itself creates shockway and things of that sort. So
• 7:01
  Speaker 3: she's basically mimicking those conditions and finding that what she
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: gets in the jar is what you get in space
• 7:07
  Speaker 3: when you see those conditions. So it's a really nice
• 7:09
  Speaker 3: piece of work, and congratulations to that.
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes, indeed, and I mean I was probably being
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: a bit silly suggesting that this is going to replace
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: the need to go out and catch asteroids and have
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: a scratch around on the surface. We still need to
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: do that because they're not all identical. There's going to
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: be things to learn from various missions in the future,
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: which we've already seen come to fruition in a couple
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: of cases. But I suppose what she's done is she's
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: opened a door to learning how things happen way out
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: in space where we can't even get and maybe coming
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: up with ways of looking at these mysteries at a
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: local level and kind of putting a bit more light
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: on them.
• 8:03
  Speaker 3: I suppose, Yeah, that's right, to study them better. And
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: you know, I'm sure this is just the beginning of
• 8:11
  Speaker 3: a series of experiments that will produce some really interesting results,
• 8:15
  Speaker 3: might maybe even give us molecules that are actually closer
• 8:19
  Speaker 3: to life molecules than they've already found. So I think
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: I think it's a very promising avenue of research.
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: It coincides with a story I read last week that
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: had nothing to do with astronomy or space dust, but
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: it was a science story about a bloke who went
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: to a river and took a handful of mud, shoved
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: it in a jar and then sealed it off from
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: the rest of the world. And he just filled it
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: with water and just put it to one side, and
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: he left it, and he covered it up, and he
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: didn't go back for a couple of months, I think
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: it was. And when he came back, it had created
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: its own balanced ecosystem, completely separate from the rest of
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: the world. New life had come and gone, and a
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: species had become dominant, some kind of slug.
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: You know. It really does.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: Make you wonder how life hasn't been found anywhere else
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: yet if that can be done with a blob of
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: mud from a river in a sealed jar. I mean,
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: if you opened it, it all dies because they've created their
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: own world. But it was an amazing story. I was
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: captivated by it that I didn't think it was possible.
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: I thought, if you cut off the outside world, that
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: would be the end of it. But no, they created
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: their own eco system and their own environment and their
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: own atmosphere, and yeah, it worked. I didn't think it
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: was possible. Now kids are going to be going out
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: filling jars with mud and seiling them up.
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: This is what's a fascinating experiment.
• 10:04
  Speaker 3: Yeah, if you wait a few million years, you john
• 10:06
  Speaker 3: like you know, Evolver a dinosaur or something like that World.
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: Cood miniature one. You never know. That's a fascinating story
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: and this one is too, and you can read about
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: it at fizz dot org. And I think the paper
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: was published in the Lost It there you go. I
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: saw it there a minute ago, but there was a
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: paper publisher the Astrophysical Journal there you are, so look
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: out for that one. This is Space Narts with Andrew
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: Dunkley and Professor Fred what's an Let's take a break
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: from the show to tell you about our sponsor in Cogny.
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• 12:14
  Speaker 1: Now this next story is just as fascinating. I guess
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: most people will have heard of the moon Eo, which
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: orbits Jupiter. It's a very very interesting and somewhat foreboding place.
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: It's just absolutely covered in volcanoes and they erupted quite
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: a lot. But what's happened in this case is they
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: have had five volcanoes erupt simultaneously, which has kind of
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: got them wondering what's going on inside.
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: Exactly. That's right. In fact, that's the story in the Nutsha.
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: So yes, the innermost of the large moons of Jupiter,
• 12:56
  Speaker 3: the ones that were discovered by Galileo Buck in sixteen ten.
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: It's the nearest one to the planet, and that means
• 13:05
  Speaker 3: it feels the strongest and most disruptive, if I can
• 13:12
  Speaker 3: put it that way, gravitational pull from Jupiter. So it's
• 13:16
  Speaker 3: constantly being squashed and squeezed by the gravitation of Jupiter,
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: and that's what we think is the reason behind it's
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: very active and dynamic volcanism. It is the most volcanically
• 13:30
  Speaker 3: active body in the Solar System. It's not the one
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: covered with the most volcanoes. That's actually Venus. But Venus
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: may be maybe inactive. Now we don't actually know whether
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: Venus's volcanoes are still active. You and I've talked about
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: that before, but we definitely know that the ones on
• 13:49
  Speaker 3: EO are because we've seen them on many occasions and
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: the results that have brought this story to uh, you know,
• 14:01
  Speaker 3: to the science media. I have come from our old
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: friend Juno. The spacecraft, the orbiting spacecraft NASA spacecraft, which
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: is in orbit around around Jupiter, and it's captured basically
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: infrared images of the southern polar region of EO, and
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: has realized that there are five volcanoes going off at
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: the same time. It's so it is really quite an
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: extraordinary thing, quite a coincidence. These these volcanoes, they are
• 14:41
  Speaker 3: all in the southern south polar region of EO. He
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: is about the same size as our moon. It's not
• 14:49
  Speaker 3: a small world. So what they've what they've done is
• 14:55
  Speaker 3: tried to work out what that means if you've got
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: first of all, a very violent eruption, that was what
• 15:05
  Speaker 3: drew their attention to this event, but the fact that
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: nearby there were others in sync with the main volcano.
• 15:18
  Speaker 3: So what I think is coming out of this is
• 15:22
  Speaker 3: the suggestion of a porous or spongy interior for EO,
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: rather than a solid body as was thought before. And
• 15:32
  Speaker 3: that might mean that there's some sort of like almost
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: like a liquid magma reservoir. There's actually big enough that
• 15:39
  Speaker 3: it pokes through the cruster EO in a number of
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: different places. And so you've got several volcanoes all erupting
• 15:46
  Speaker 3: simultaneously what they call interconnected magma chambers, which would allow
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: for these highly lava rich eruptions to take place simultaneously,
• 15:59
  Speaker 3: and so it it sort of calls into question the
• 16:02
  Speaker 3: old idea about the interior of EO, which was thought
• 16:07
  Speaker 3: to be fairly solid. But if it's kind of porous
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: and spongy, then that might explain why we're seeing these
• 16:15
  Speaker 3: phenomena of such volcanic activity.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's not the same kind of activity as
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: we see on Earth with our volcanic eruptions, you know,
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: which is to go to Well, EO, it's being really
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: squashed by the gravitational pool of Jupiter, isn't it. Is
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: that what's mainly like you squeeze the sponge and all
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: the stuff comes out, Is that what's happening.
• 16:43
  Speaker 3: Well, yes, it's almost like that, that's right, you're right,
• 16:47
  Speaker 3: as I said, it's the gravitational squashing and squeezing that
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: that being so close to Jupiter provides what we call
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: tidal forces, that in the tidal effect. So yes, and
• 16:59
  Speaker 3: you know, it's as though all the volcanoes in the Mediterranean,
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: for example, suddenly started.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: Erupting at once.
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: Vesuvius and and you know the other ones that are
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: in that region Stromboli. Yes, yeah, that's right, that's the news.
• 17:20
  Speaker 3: Thinking of all of those if they all suddenly started
• 17:24
  Speaker 3: spearing out stuff at once, that would suggest something going
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: on as we've got apparently on EO. But is a
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: very different world from the Earth is and you know,
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: and part part of the reason for that is this
• 17:37
  Speaker 3: external gravitational stress that comes from Jupiter.
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a it's a very toxic world, isn't it.
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: It's not. It's not a nice place. You wouldn't want
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: to wander around them on it.
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: Well, it's mostly sulfur sulfur deposits that have come from
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: these volcanoes. Yeah, well, yeah, it's yeah, it actually is
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: a that's a nice thought experiment. Just to imagine what
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: it would be like wandering around on EO. I think
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: it might be quite quite an interesting experience.
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: Wouldn't smell very nice?
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: No, neither would you probably if you know to over
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: the volcanoes and the lava lakes. It's got lava lakes,
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: big pools of lava that we know about too, So.
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: Yes, an extraordinary world.
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's got over four hundred active volcanoes apparently. Yeah,
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: that's right. That's amazing. Now you said it was about
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: the same size as the Moon. Here's another thought experiment.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: If you would have swap the Moon and EO, if
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: you could just somehow, you know, but one way or
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: the other reason vice versa. What would happen to EO
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: orbiting Earth and what would happen to the Moon orbiting Jupiter.
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: I think the Moon would turn into EO and EO
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: would turn into the Moon, because yeah, because they you
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: know that. Yes, there might be compositional differences and things
• 18:59
  Speaker 3: of that sort, but it really is the it's the
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: environment that dictates why EO is so volcanically active, and
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: the Moon of course in a much much more benign environment. It's,
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: in fact the main we do see evidence of large
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: scale volcanism on the Moon. That's where the Maria came from.
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: The so called seas on the near side of the Moon,
• 19:24
  Speaker 3: these dark, darker areas. They are the result of basalt
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: flows of lava flows. But that is from a period
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: a long long time ago, and the heat was probably
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: driven more by impact by bombardment during the late Heavy
• 19:41
  Speaker 3: bombardment when a lot of stuff was hitting the Moon
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: and the Earth too. But Earth of course has plate tectonics,
• 19:47
  Speaker 3: so the evidence of all that's gone. Whereas it's still
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: around on the Moon. But since that period three and
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: a half four billion years ago, things have been pretty
• 19:57
  Speaker 3: quiet on the Moon. But if you put it where
• 19:59
  Speaker 3: EO is, know, I'm sure it would turn into another EO.
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: Yet, well, I wondered, And yeah, that is interesting because
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: we're pretty glad it won't happen. But then again, if
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: you did, if you did swap them, it would make
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: Artemis to a really interesting mission.
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: I certainly would.
• 20:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you would imagine having to pick your way between
• 20:20
  Speaker 3: the volcanoes before you learned your air sex starship.
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: On the moon.
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: Absolutely, And I also read that part of that gravitational
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: tug of war that causes the volcanism on EO is
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: also attributable to Europa and Ganny Mate. Apparently they have
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: a part of the plan in it as well. So
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: poor old EO is getting bounced around like a ping
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: pong boar, which is messy as it turns out.
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, you won't want to play ping.
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: Pong with it, though, No, no, definitely not. It would
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: definitely pong.
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: For certain I wish I could say I flied you
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: that line, but I'm afraid I didn't.
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: Yes, that's all it goes if you would like to
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: read up on that story, It's on the Daily Galaxy website,
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: and I'm sure you'll be able to find a paper
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: about it somewhere.
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: As well, because I forgot the look.
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: I usually look these things up, and some people do
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: like to read the papers, but I didn't do it
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: in this case. And I'm doing what's called padding right
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: now so that I can actually find where the paper's
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: been published and then tell you, because you'll think I'm amazing,
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: but no, I've got no idea. Yes I have. It's
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: been published in Planet.
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: That's an old radio trick.
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: That is, where there's something you need to say and
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: you have quite quite got your finger on the button,
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: but you just the track away until you find it.
• 21:49
  Speaker 3: It's that you patter away, but you're doing that then
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: on autopilot, and you're never quite sure what's going to
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: come out.
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: Now, that's true, yeah, But where it is it is
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: available the paper at JGR Planets.
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: This is Space Nuts.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: Andrew Dunkley here with Professor Fred Watson. That's one of
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: the better. We've had a couple of cardiac reff down
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: here too.
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: Be space Nuts.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: Now. Our final story, Fred, is a really good one.
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: As well, and I love the way they've sort of
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: spun this one. We've talked before about the search for
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: extraterrestrial life and whether or not there are intelligent communication
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: capable beings somewhere else in the universe. This new study
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: or theory or whatever you want to call it that's
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: been published in the International Journal of Astrobiology, by the way,
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: is basically saying that if we can find the coal,
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: we will find the people. They've got a really interesting
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: theory and I think it probably does have some street cred.
• 23:12
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right. The normal mantra we talk about is
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: follow the water, but in this case it's followed the coal.
• 23:18
  Speaker 3: And the difference is that following the water, we hope
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: will lead you lead us to living organisms, whereas following
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: the coal might lead you to eat.
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: And it's all all this all.
• 23:31
  Speaker 3: This article is saying, really, is that we as an
• 23:37
  Speaker 3: intelligent species and with a fairly high degree of technology
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: you and I are using right now that has only
• 23:48
  Speaker 3: come about because of the coal reserves that we find
• 23:54
  Speaker 3: on the planet and what that and the reason for
• 23:58
  Speaker 3: that is that it, you know, the coal basically fuel
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: the industrial revolution in North America.
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: The UK, and Europe.
• 24:07
  Speaker 3: That was in fact, the world I grew up in
• 24:09
  Speaker 3: Andrew was still fueled by coal. It was a very
• 24:13
  Speaker 3: coal dependent environment that I lived in. You've got to
• 24:21
  Speaker 3: have coal in order to gain enough heat to be
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: able to forge steel. Then your steel needs to be
• 24:30
  Speaker 3: honed and treated in such a way that you can
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: actually keep going and finding more fossil fuel, like oil,
• 24:37
  Speaker 3: for example, with drill bits. So all of that stuff
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: they say comes actually from the fact that there were
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: coal deposits not too far from the surface of the
• 24:48
  Speaker 3: planet just the time that we were we as a
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: species were emerging and recognizing the possibilities of the industrial revolution.
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: It wasn't called that then. And in fact, here's a quote,
• 25:05
  Speaker 3: and I'm quoting here again from fizz dot org. Without
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: access to coal, our own civilization would never have been
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: able to harness deep deposits of oil and gas and
• 25:15
  Speaker 3: in turn generating our feet and electricity to melt steel.
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: This enabled the development of radio telescopes that today dot
• 25:23
  Speaker 3: our own planet, which can send and receive messages across
• 25:25
  Speaker 3: interstellar space. So what they're saying is they're linking our
• 25:30
  Speaker 3: technological prowess to this sort of accident. Almost that we
• 25:36
  Speaker 3: had these coal beds laid down seventy or so million
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: years ago that are kind of just at the right
• 25:46
  Speaker 3: time for us to or were at the right time
• 25:49
  Speaker 3: for them to have turned into coal and for that
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: coal to be available near the surface so that we
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: as a species could actually mine it and basically make
• 26:02
  Speaker 3: use of it. What the authors of this article say
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: is that if humans or some things like humans had
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: evolved earlier than we did, then.
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: Cole might not have existed.
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: It might not have you know, got from the basically
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: the peat that formed call into the material that we
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: can now mine. And so that suggests that once again
• 26:37
  Speaker 3: there is you know, it's almost like good bits of
• 26:41
  Speaker 3: good luck that lead to our evolution as an intelligent species.
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: And what in turn that suggests is that once again
• 26:53
  Speaker 3: other intelligence species out there who are technically technologically able
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: may actually be very rare in there there at all.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: If if the circumstances that they're pointing to are required
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: for an intelligent species to be able to communicate, which
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: is one of the Drake equations, that's parameters, that that
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: could mean that the number of intelligence species is probably
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: even less than we would consider, or and that that's
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: a bit sobering a bit, sad Ina.
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: Well, that's right. You know, there's so many aspects of
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: the Drake equation.
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: Excuse me.
• 27:37
  Speaker 3: The only the only you know, firm parts of the
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: Drake equation that we know about is that stars do
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: form planets. Planets are very common, which was not known
• 27:48
  Speaker 3: excuse me when Frank Drake put that equation together. But yes,
• 27:54
  Speaker 3: the number of civilizations that do go on to develop
• 27:57
  Speaker 3: the technology to communicate, that is one of the one
• 28:00
  Speaker 3: of the terms in the equation. And if you don't
• 28:02
  Speaker 3: have coal, you might never get there.
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: Does that mean though, that there may be intelligent species
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: roaming planets somewhere else in the universe, but because they
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: haven't been able to do what we've done, because they
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: don't have access to, say coal, they reach a point
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: where they can't go any further. So they're wandering around
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: in their jockeys, you know, knocking dinosaurs on the head
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: or whatever they do. And that's as good as it
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: gets that.
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: Permanently in the permanently in the Stone Age, Yeah, I
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: think that is.
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: Wow. Until a coal comet lands on the planet, the
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: call for or a coke a coke asteroid bottle because
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: all that. Yeah, wasn't there a movie about that once?
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: I'd be surprised and African native got hit on the
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: head by a coke bottle and decided to return it
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: to the gods. That's a very funny film. Yes, but yes,
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: find the coll and we might find the people. It
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: does seem to have a bit of credibility that particular theory,
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: and you can read all about it at fizz dot org.
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: It's also been published in the International Journal of Astrobiology.
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: It's a fascinating story. And yeah, it does suggest that
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: there might be intelligent species out there that can't communicate
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: ever because they don't have the tools, because they can't
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: make them. So that does that is fascinating. Indeed, we're
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: just about done, Fred, thank you very much. A nice
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: quick one today.
• 29:43
  Speaker 3: It was certainly nice and also quick. Yes, you're right,
• 29:47
  Speaker 3: just louting the time. We'll chut again soon, I hope.
• 29:51
  Speaker 3: What's your name again, Andrew?
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: That's right, it's definitely not Fred, No, it's you were.
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: Going to be James there for me, and quite was
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: going on.
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: The I know Fred's already taken, so I can't have
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: that one, all right, we'll catch it next time.
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: Thanks Fred, Yeah later, I get that one a lot.
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: Professor Fred Wat's an astronomer at large joining us here
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: on Space Nuts.
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: Don't forget to visit us online.
• 30:17
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• 30:21
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• 30:24
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• 30:30
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• 30:35
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• 30:50
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• 30:54
  Speaker 1: here in the studio who couldn't be with us today
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: because he's gone looking for coal. He thinks it's going
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: to help him have better communications with his wife. Oh
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: and from me Andrew Dunkley, thanks for your company. We'll
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: see you on the next episode of Space Nuts. Bye byepauts.
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: You'll be listening to the Space Nuts podcast available at
• 31:16
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• 31:22
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• 31:25
  Speaker 1: This has been another quality podcast production from nights dot com.