Love these videos. The effort you put in (and your team as I've learned through other comments) really brings these papers to a wider audience that wouldn't normally have the knowledge or attention span to find them on their own. I've a lot of respect for the work you guys have done!
My father often said if a "scientist, engineer, or expert" could not teach their subject to a freshman in high school they probably did not know their subject as well as they thought. I had a number of calculus professors none of them actually could tell me why I would want to use it in the "real" world. I finally read a book by Silvanious P Thompson (calculus made easy) From his book I actually learned where to spot a place or condition where I could say "hey I could use calculus for this"...... Ms. Hossenfelder you do this for physics and todays technology's. You do not talk down to us but talk us up to a higher level. Thank you.
Pops was probably just a shitty teacher. I see the opposite problem to the one you describe... People that really know their craft have a harder time explaining it to someone than some yoyo with Dunning Kruger on youtube. This is because someone neck deep in something realizes all the gotchas in anything they might say about it and have all the little tangents to deal with as they explain it. Your average everyday idiot isn't even aware of these issues, nevermind has them on their tongue to give to someone in an explanation. Also, those that can, do. Those that can't, teach instead. 🤷♂️
Sabine, I just wanted to say how well-written I find your videos. There's some real effort you are putting into the news here. I particularly liked the comparison to quantum states to lying on one's couch. I always enjoy your work. Normally I use these comments to say something like 'I was going to reproduce that superconductor claim--but then things got really busy at work'. But for once I thought I should tell you how much I enjoy these videos and why.
Thanks, I really appreciate this. Yes, it's quite some effort. Tbh I've thought of giving up the science news because of that, so it's good to know it's worth it!
@@SabineHossenfelder I would consider, instead of writing out the script ahead of time, to attempt speaking on each subject extemporaneously. The results are often close to what a so-called 'polished effort' would be. And extemporaneous speaking often adds a difficult to define sense of personal connection that would not otherwise be present. It sounds counter-intuitive, I know. But having a small list of bullet points you wish to cover on the desk in front of you, which you expand upon as you speak can be produce very impressive results when public speaking. And plus there is a bonus, the time involved on each topic is greatly reduced. Thanks again, and I hope you continue the great work you are doing.
I have been a casual follower of your work for many years, and I wanted to express my admiration for the way you have evolved and your ability to challenge fundamentalistic ideas and thought processes within the scientific community. Your approach to healthy criticism in scientific discussions and news-related articles is truly commendable. Thank you for your hard work.
If it's ever used for anything, it'll be for the first of those. Why use such a convoluted and costly technique for a mundane task that can be easily and effectively accomplished with a simple camera with M.L. face recognition? Tinfoil hats off gents
I think it will be a long long long time until that is cheaper than a huge amount of other methods to check if you were at work. Like cameras. Also, the fact that our DNA is EVERYWHERE is not a good hint that it can be used to localize someone. Sounds more like you need to walk into your workspace once, and they will find your dna there for a long time.
I really enjoy the desk setup & treating the scientific news in catchy sarcastic way's. I mean science is so awesome that what is the point if we aren't goofing around while we learn thing's?
2:28 Because regulators always know what's best for us, are never corrupt, have the best intentions, always act ethically, are totally competent, never make mistakes, etc.
About “green” flying: I think that nobody really wants to fly, they just want to get to a far away place as quickly as possible. Why? Because they are impatient, time is money or life is too short. But if we all had more time, then they could travel on a train or similar ground based environmentally friendlier way. So, if we all work less by getting more things automated, we would have more free time and we could use more environmentally friendly travel methods.
Last or two years ago, I was doing my best to find someone explaining what D-Wave actually does and how it works. I couldn't find that information, even from them.
The major problem with trying to pass laws about future tech is that there is ALWAYS m-o-r-e future tech on the way which will invalidate your law by doing its evil deeds, if any, in a way you did not anticipate. We are learning about the world and how to manipulate it too fast for any kind of rules other than: "If you hurt somebody, we will find you and make you VERY sorry." Punishment rather than prevention, but it is based on the bad results, not the methods of getting them, which will be -- already are in many situations -- enormous in number.
It is a good question indeed. I wonder how easy is it to separate the DNA you're interested in from what you're not interested in. I think in terms of criminal evidence, much of the DNA is recovered from clothing, furniture, and bodily fluids, so usually the perpetrator and victim's DNA would be the dominant ones in the sample. If it's easy to count the relative abundance, I think it would help ensure that the neighbour down the road isn't implicated because a skin cell blew in through the window. I imagine much of this depends on the methods being used to collect and sequence the DNA.
My guess, as neither a lawyer nor a scientist, is that it could be used to eliminate suspects but not be used to convict anyone. Or maybe the other way around? Don't bother me with these hypotheticals anymore. They make my head hurt.
Discussing BlackGem, it's worth noting that the gravitational wave interferometers give preliminary warning of where to look for visual events. The gravitational waves travel at c through *all* mediums, whereas light from the same source is affected by, for example, the gravitational lensing of interfering galaxies and thus is a bit less than c. These events are so far away that, if I understand correctly, the difference is significant enough to give advance warning of where to point the telescope.
Questions for any Shotgun DNA sequencing experts out there (the first news item): What is the lowest concentration of DNA detection in air/water/soil? What confidence levels are there in individual DNA reads? Confidence as a function of multiple DNA reads? Signal to noise effects? Cost/speed to run samples through the shotgun sequencing method?
One thing I'd like to see tested with "AI predicted crime analysis" is, say they think they have a model that can predict where and when crime is more likely to occur. If they then monitor that area more closely than usual, then chances are, they _will_ find more crime there, because they are looking harder. For the study to work well, they would need to ensure that no added attention was brought to the predicted area, and then see how much was found there relative to baseline.
Weird example but that reminds me a lot of the marvel comic series Civil War, in which they discover a teenager with the super power of predicting the future. They later find out that the superhero can't actually predict the future, but instead just see what is the most likely thing that would happen. The problem with that is that once they start to act on any of the predictions it immediately becomes the most likely thing to happen by default, making all the hero's argue about whether or not those things would still happen if they just did nothing.
A friend of mine, a business development consultant, works on a project for using CO2 captured from cement production and H2 produced by electrolysis by excess wind power to produce synthetic aviation fuel. He doesn't see how '30 targets could possibly be met, either. As for biofuels, I think that the only acceptable avenues are algae and agricultural _waste,_ but we have not cracked efficient fermentation of cellulose and lignin yet. Not good.
@@Thomas-gk42 But not drive instead. Battery-electric cars help a bit, but then "greens" come and shut down perfectly good nuclear power plants and are then oh-so-shocked that they are replaces by coal fired ones. Not even EU power grid is green as much as it can be, so ever trains carry _some_ carbon footprint. I personally try to visit my clients as rarely as possible, which is made possible by new habits we developed during Covid lock-down.
@@bazoo513 you're talking about Germany? Yes, I'm one of those 'Greens', but I totally agree with you. At last, Sabine convinced me. Her videos about nuclear power are very accurate and balanced, though she has your opinion. Anyhow, these last three plants won't save the world or Germany, and Uranium is a rare resource, not available in Europe. You go from the dependence on Russia to some obscure islamistic regimes in Africa. I myself happily do most of my ways by bike. The solutions lie on the table, it's the egoism of the population that's obstructive.
@Thomas-ws6lk To be fair, there's no excuse for Frau Merkel to collect cheap brownie points by closing those plants, and here I am blaming Greens as if that eas all their fault. (They produce some 6% of German total capacity, IIRC - now some of the deficit is imported from France - also nuclear. Talk about irony.) I worked on a pilot plant to extract uranium from, wait for it, coal fired plant ash. There are a lot such "low grade" sources. Heck, seawater is one. Then there are various variants of Thorium cycle, breeders using natural uranium or even _spent_ light water cycle fuel. Options are numerous. I don't think we will make it without nuclear. Many storage technologies for renewable are in perpetual demonstration stages, some rather harebrained. We chronically lack in expensive and politically sensitive continent scale terawatt scale grids... Well, perhaps geothermal.. I don't feel optimistic today...
8:40 - Sabine, I love how you snuck quantum field theory into your call - and did so in a way that went right over Einstein's head! Your phone cord is twisted right-hand but contains a left-handed middle segment that starts over Einstein’s head and ends in front of your forearm. The persistent transitions at either end of the middle segment form a _soliton_ and _anti-soliton_ pair. Like particles and antiparticles in quantum field theory, these represent an excited state of the phone cord “vacuum” and annihilate if they come back together. You've snuck in a beautifully visual example of one of the simplest possible pair creation-annihilation operators - the operators that are foundational to particle field theory!
Pepperidge Farm remembers when it was a joke poking fun at American cop/detective shows and their techno-B.S. for things that didn't really exist yet. Yet somehow they've managed to pull it off in a rudimentary way.
@@pauljs75 I was thinking the same it was a joke and now it became a reality even though the AI is technically making synthetic data so it's not necessarily evidence per day.
Dogs are feeling a bit down these days. They used to be the best at sniffing out evidence, but now they're thinking, "Well, there goes our detective career. We can't compete with by-catching DNA!"
The quantum computer reminds me of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, feels like the bit about the question being harder to compute then the answer has predicted Quantum computing
On e-fuels, you previous stated that using liquid H2 is too heavy to use in aircraft, but liquid H2 has an energy density of 70.99 MJ/Kg and Jet A fuel is 43.15 MJ/Kg. I don’t know how other weight differences like fuel tanks needed or weight between turboprop engines versus fuel cell? Hydrogen must be made in massive quantities to produce green steel and green ammonia in the future. Also, they have been making real progress in designing fuel cells that are iridium and platinum free. This is an answer from Dr ChatGPT. I just downloaded the app. I, so far, love the thing. Yes, it is possible to build a fuel cell that doesn't use iridium or platinum as a catalyst. While iridium and platinum are commonly used catalysts in fuel cells due to their high activity and stability, researchers have been exploring alternative catalyst materials that are more abundant and cost-effective. Several non-precious metal catalysts have shown promising results, such as materials based on iron, cobalt, nickel, and their alloys. These catalysts can exhibit good catalytic activity for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) or hydrogen oxidation reaction (HOR) in fuel cells. Additionally, carbon-based materials, including carbon nanotubes, graphene, and various carbon composites, have been investigated as catalyst supports. By optimizing the composition, structure, and surface properties of these alternative catalysts, researchers aim to enhance their efficiency and durability, making them viable alternatives to iridium and platinum. While significant progress has been made in this area, further research and development are still needed to improve the performance of non-precious metal catalysts and make them commercially viable for fuel cell applications.
Just like nobody could reproduce Pons and Fleischman's cold fusion results. I never believe it until it's been done by multiple independent groups in separate institutions.
@@solconcordia4315 i don't understand why physicist fake their claim about making superconductors and publish paper Do they don't understand that their false claim can be easily exposed
@@pauldirc.. Success in making room-temperature "high temperature" superconductor(s) in hopefully near-ambient pressure will be an important notorious breakthrough. Due to the intense interests, some physicists just want to gain fame, regardless of its being good or bad. Our one-term Loser former President Donald John Trump likes this way of becoming famous and infamous, too. He's definitely a World Leader !
@@pauldirc.. Success in making room-temperature "high temperature superconductor(s) in hopefully near-ambient pressure will be an important notorious breakthrough. Due to the intense interests, some physicists just want to gain fame, regardless of its being good or bad. Our one-term Loser former President Donald John Trump likes this way of becoming famous and infamous, too. He's definitely a World Leader !
6:45 On alternatives to liquid fuels Electrolysis of Water. To convert water to hydrogen and oxygen requires 1.223 volts, This reaction is simply H20 +2e- -> H2 + 1/2O2 + 2e-. In simple terms the break even point of the reaction is 2e- at 1.223 volts. However at this voltage the reaction would take an infinite amount of time to proceed, the reason is that the conductivity of the water is poor and ions in the solution need to move around, so some energy needs to be placed into heat to get things to move, thus typically its 1.5 volts. Economics of Electric Hydrogen Production. How much power is needed? A mole of hydrogen gas weighs 2 grams, roughly 498 moles per kilogram, and a moles is 6.022E23 molecules. This is roughly 6 x 10^26 electrons per kilogram. An Ampere is 6.22 E 18 charges per second past a point. Thus we need 10E8 amps to generate a kg of hydrogen. this multiplied by the voltage = power 1.5E8. But if we divide this by 3600 we get kw hours required. This is 42 kw hours required. The typical high end industrial production of hydrogen is 52 kWh/kg. Lets say we are going to produce hydrogen in southern Arizona. The cost of electricity is about 0.17$ per kWh. Therefore using a 52 kWh/kg method is going to cost 8.84$/kg. But as we need also water we need to add another 10 cents and also we need to pay for transportation. So lets just say 10$ per kilogram. So lets consider a 787 dreamliner. 787-8 440 passenger economy jet. 101,600 kg of fuel for roughly 11,000 km. So this roughly computes to 10kg of fuel per km. Divided between each passenger of a jam-packed 787 its roughly 0.02 kg/passenger-km. So lets consider how much this cost is going to be per 1000 km . Roughly 20kg x cost of jet fuel($2.30/gallon) / (density (0.804) * l/gallon (3.795))= Lets simplify = kg/liter * liter/gallon = kg/gallon = 3.02 kg/gallon. This converts to roughly 0.756$/kg Again we are talking here best case scenarios. This gives the airlines a couple of decades to improve performance. 0.756x20 = or 15.12$ per 1000km. We are also not considering empty seats on jets or costs associated with transporting craft for repairs, short haul flights in networks, etc. This is just best case scenarion. Lets then look at hydrogen. Combustion energy for hydrogen is 141 Mj/kg of hydrogen and for kerosene is 46 Mj/kg. So that hydrogen is about 3 times the specific combustion energy of Jet Fuel. But its 13 times more expensive, so that the cost per 13*46/142 = 4.2 x cost (Jet fuel) The translates to roughly 4.2 x 15.12 = 64$/1000 km or about 0.064$ per km. However there is a problem, while specific combustion energy of hydrogen is three times higher, its density under compression is 8 times less, so that we need rougly 200 percent more space in the craft to store hydrogen. Since the jet fuel is stored in the wings with a small tank in the fuselage, the movement of fuel mass to the fuselag is going to alter wingloading and stress. The hydrogen also requires bulkier and more massive storage tanks. The net effect is a reduction in the number of passengers by as much as 30%. Consequently Airlines will need either bigger planes or more craft. This will raise cost to about 0.1$ per mile. So imagine flying from say Madrid to Tokyo. The distance is about 12000 km given air routing. The hydrogen fuel cost would be approximately 2400$ for a round trip requiring at least one stopover. The ticket for round trip would be on the order of 4 to 6 thousand dollars. The intangible costs of Hydrogen power as an alternative energy source. So lets imagine that a single Spaniard needs to travel to Tokyo once per year. 2400$ hydrogen divided by means he will need to take 240kg of hydrogen on the plane with him. That translates to 13,000,000 kWh of electric. No problem, Madrid is near Africa and Africa has alot of sun. So lets see, during that year how much solar energy we can generate 8 x 365.25 hours = 2922 hours per year, however solar panels can only generate about 0.325 kWh per meter^2. This translates roughly to 1000 kWh per year per square meter. This passenger needs 13,000 square meters of panels. But there's a problem. Africa may have alot of land and sun, Saami Russia does not have alot of sun and Tokyo Japan does not have alot of land. So that hydrogen needs to come from elsewhere. We can reroute the flight to Dubia, which is close to Saudi Arabia that has another big desert, Add another couple thousand panels. So lets consider 15,000 meters of land is, that is roughly 1/66th of a square kilometer. To have a daily flight between madrid and tokyo with 330 passengers x 365 days per year that one flight would require 1825 sq km of sunlite desert half of which needs to be in the rather sun poor/land poor region of the NW Pacific. Japan is stranded by hydrogen fuel air travel economy. And so now we see the problem with hydrogen. Its not so much the cost of hydrogen, its the development of an alternative energy source to generate it. Even if we could get fuel production and solar efficiency to 100% we still need nearly a square kilometer of land per 1 round trip flight of a fully loaded aircraft. Solutions. 1. Slower more bouyant craft, use of light weight solar panels on craft 2. Hydrogen fuel cells instead of burning, requires 2 magnitudes more powerful cells. 3. Combinations of solar electric ground transportation and air transportation. The ultimate problem with Air travel is simply that there is 2 magnitudes more air travel than any best case scenario hydrogen economy can support as a consequence we will have to continue to use kerosene based fuels on the routes that that are kg/distant effecient and get rid of all of those that are not. We have to remember, the solar economy will have to be prioritized. 1. Energy for fertilizer and food production, commercial transportation, and essential commerce 2. Energy for public safety (Water systems, sewage systems, garbage collection, administrations, fire protection, police,hospitals) 3. Energy for home cooking and refridgeration. 4. Energy for transportation and non-essential commerce, air conditioning, hot water heating 5. Energy for elective transportation, travel and recreation industries. Also, in a hydrogen economy, nuclear energy is not a choice, its an imperative. There is simply no way without wind power and nuclear to have stop-gap hydrogen production without additional non-solar production. In addition hydrogen will have to be diverted toward conversion of CO2 into hydrocarbons for the plastics industry. Many have argued we can use biofuels. Right now solar hydrogen production is about 15% land efficient. Biofuel production is about 0.1% land efficient and require two magnitudes more water. Biofuels are not an option, but innovation in biofuel production in marine economies may contribute. Hydrothermal development in Japan will help. And wind power in places with low winter sunlight levels also helps.
Biofuels are the LEAST sustainable, inefficient, and most anti-social. It competes with food crops and requires industrial scale petroleum fuel fertilizer to even be profitable.
I worked on hardware for the inertial fusion confinement project at Sandia National Laboratory 40 years ago. The short version: controlled fusion isn't easy. I won't live to see any fusion process that can actually produce more usable energy than it takes to operate.
Thanks for your entertaining high quality content. Regarding actual developments in new energy technologies, you might want to consider a look into the "NET-Journal" (Jupiter Verlag). I wonder for example, how "Low Energy Nuclear Reaction" (LENR) Technology (cf. Andrea Rossi) barely finds recognition in public perception despite their long provided proof of work. Also the cheap and easy on demand production of Hydrogen by ultrasonic frequencies is basically unheard of. Would you cover these, if you had sources?
The first time I read the term "quantum advantage" I thought it was a joke referring to the advantage being too small yet. Excellent video as always btw.
"That could be a bad idea... Or a really bad idea." LOL! It's interesting how the EU is trying to get ahead of these issues by regulating giant tech companies and fields like AI, while here in North America we don't even think about potential problems. We're like "Let's use AI to save fifty cents on each transaction! Problems? Eh, they'll work themselves out."
I love your videos. And just to let you know, my teacher's assistant, who has degrees in both physics and math and worked in Antarctica, loves your videos as well. He thinks you are the bomb (not the nuclear one though). :)
it costs 90 bucks for a flongle and ~100 for the reagents for eDNA, and as you scale up you can run multiple samples on a single flow cell (so it scales insanely) and you can look back in time on old samples (unlike qPCR tests) getting a way to regulate how someone could run a survey would be a good idea if cops learn about it... are people allowed to sniff your property's area for DNA without probable cause?
11:50 "They hope that more energy comes out than goes in" So......inertial fusion is like a Super Ball. "A Super Ball or Superball is a toy bouncy ball based on a type of synthetic rubber invented in 1964 by chemist Norman Stingley. It is an extremely elastic ball made of Zectron, which contains the synthetic polymer polybutadiene as well as hydrated silica, zinc oxide, stearic acid, and other ingredients. This compound is vulcanized with sulfur at a temperature of 165 °C (329 °F) and formed at a pressure of 3,500 psi (24 MPa). The resulting Super Ball has a very high coefficient of restitution, and if dropped from shoulder level on a hard surface, a Super Ball bounces nearly all the way back; thrown down onto a hard surface by an average adult, it can fly over a three-story building." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Ball
Don't the researchers realize the pellet fusion idea is going down the same path as gunpowder engines? It does not scale well... Also, they are still relying on a very finite and quite rare resource.
The story of 0 Carbon emissions Commercial Aviation, is just the stereotypical case of window dressing for the Planet! Set some astounding targets for the mid term, set up some futuristic sounding/looking webpage, don’t tell anyone exactly what you’ll be doing to get there, with all the data and sources, don’t produce regular updates on the progress toward the objective, et voilà you’ve got your “green” chop!
You made that twitter joke like it's not *actually* what Elon wants... 😂😂 Clever bit~! You hit the nail on the head, if folks could acquire facts (in unbiased language) to queries, and people could be bothered(or allowed) to ask more than just one or two questions about a subject (a.k.a. support exploratory logic over identity validation) and be confident they were presented complete information for the query, you are right~!
Everyone seems to skip past an obvious and 100% effective way to reduce emissions from air travel. That is, humans cutting way back on or even eliminating nonessential travel. We're at the point where everyone knows (or at least strongly suspects) we're not going to meet the necessary reductions by 2050 by way of technological advances. That doesn't become a problem if we help technology out a bit by simply reducing or eliminating unnecessary air travel.
A publicly-accessible computer system that would tell people whether something was true is an idea I posted on the Worldbuilding Stack Exchange a few years ago. Interested people can read the ideas and discussions there.
Depends on sensitivity of the method used. PCR can amplify any amount of DNA for sure but it would end up also amplifying random contaminants from the laboratory so such high sensitivity method is very impractical. Also the DNA samples relevant for criminal investigation are high enough concentration to not require that much sensitivity. Low concentration samples are thus much more unreliable and hard to make use of unless investigatirs can be equipped in a way to not contaminate the evidence with trace DNA.
Maybe floating swales could be used for biofuel production? Basically it would pull waste-stream nutrients from other agriculture out of river systems, and still provide a usable crop without having excessive land impact. It might be a thing to look into. Also I'm surprised that somebody figured out a way to make the Red Dwarf "Enhance" meme into a viable thing (at least within the limitations of source imaging).
I'm changing my mind about the most realistic fusion technology. I always thought that magnetic field confinement would have been the final winning solution. But after having seen the damage to the confinement chamber, the amount of useless plasma, and the enormous damage created by all the fast neutrons, I'm starting to believe that inertial confinement is much less challenging from an engineering point of view. Thank you for the weekly science news, Dr. Hossenfelder, it's highly appreciated. Greetings from the UK, Anthony
@@raybod1775nertial confinement is similar to the tried-and-true idea of the internal combustion engine confining and extracting work from very rapid mini-explosions. It may be wasteful and inefficient but it may well be easier done. Besides, the fuel in seawater is abundant. Israel being on the shore of the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea may have potential for producing deuterium efficiently, assisted by the sun's energy (Israel has fairly low latitude). Another thing which comes readily to mind is: you gripe about fast neutrons but can they be channel towards making deuterium and tritium directly from their bombarding hydrogen ? Deuterium and tritium can function as fusion fuels. Having more fuel can alleviate the problem of magnetic confinement's wasting plasma. What about electric confinement because magnetic fields are really only components of varying electric fields ? Neutrons have spin so magnetic fields can steer them.
"Superconductor Experiment Fails to Replicate"... OK, but I still don't know "what" it fails to replicate. I even wonder whether an experiment can "replicate" anything, or whether it's the people conducting the experiment who are supposed to replicate things, perhaps a result, an outcome, or something like that. I don't even belive that experiments can do anything, let alone "replicate".
What about reforesting in semiarid regions natural processes such as cattle/roaming:grazing. I watched a ted talk on this by an expert and it has some potential.
This statements like: "this and this activity will contribute 0.1 C temperature rise until this date" are completely baseless. Please don't use them without some qualifiers like "allegedly"
Yeah, that needs to be regulated immediately. Otherwise, everywhere you go there will be sniffers to track everyone even if they don't carry a phone. Would also be used to detect potential health issues in prospective employees and so on and so on.
That DNA can be detected in the air, is a brilliant tool in forensic science. The DNA from a murderer left in the air over the victim's body, could be used to identify the murderer.
"Superconductor Discovery Meets with Resistance" I hope whoever wrote that got a raise.
I wish Sabine would once wear a blouse without a bra
No, but they did get the career as a comedian they always wanted.
I hope you never run a business with that sort of thinking or you will go bankrupt quickly.
I swear if it were chat GPT....
It was her, and she did
Thank you for working so hard for your audience
Thank you for your support, it's much appreciated by the entire team!
Love these videos. The effort you put in (and your team as I've learned through other comments) really brings these papers to a wider audience that wouldn't normally have the knowledge or attention span to find them on their own. I've a lot of respect for the work you guys have done!
😊❤
Loved the Quanta Magazine headline at about 9:09: "Room-Temperature Superconductor Discovery Meets With Resistance".
Great video as usual, Sabine.
Yes, it's just wonderful
My father often said if a "scientist, engineer, or expert" could not teach their subject to a freshman in high school they probably did not know their subject as well as they thought. I had a number of calculus professors none of them actually could tell me why I would want to use it in the "real" world. I finally read a book by Silvanious P Thompson (calculus made easy) From his book I actually learned where to spot a place or condition where I could say "hey I could use calculus for this"...... Ms. Hossenfelder you do this for physics and todays technology's. You do not talk down to us but talk us up to a higher level. Thank you.
I remember the problem of minimizing the cardboard used for making a pizza box for a round pizza. Yes, calculus can help one make money.
Pops was probably just a shitty teacher. I see the opposite problem to the one you describe... People that really know their craft have a harder time explaining it to someone than some yoyo with Dunning Kruger on youtube.
This is because someone neck deep in something realizes all the gotchas in anything they might say about it and have all the little tangents to deal with as they explain it.
Your average everyday idiot isn't even aware of these issues, nevermind has them on their tongue to give to someone in an explanation.
Also, those that can, do.
Those that can't, teach instead. 🤷♂️
Sabine, I just wanted to say how well-written I find your videos. There's some real effort you are putting into the news here. I particularly liked the comparison to quantum states to lying on one's couch. I always enjoy your work. Normally I use these comments to say something like 'I was going to reproduce that superconductor claim--but then things got really busy at work'. But for once I thought I should tell you how much I enjoy these videos and why.
Thanks, I really appreciate this. Yes, it's quite some effort. Tbh I've thought of giving up the science news because of that, so it's good to know it's worth it!
@@SabineHossenfelder it absolutely is. Giving up science news because of the work involved would be understandable but also a real shame.
@@SabineHossenfelder th-cam.com/video/5DumLW1hwr0/w-d-xo.html
@@SabineHossenfelder I would consider, instead of writing out the script ahead of time, to attempt speaking on each subject extemporaneously. The results are often close to what a so-called 'polished effort' would be. And extemporaneous speaking often adds a difficult to define sense of personal connection that would not otherwise be present. It sounds counter-intuitive, I know. But having a small list of bullet points you wish to cover on the desk in front of you, which you expand upon as you speak can be produce very impressive results when public speaking. And plus there is a bonus, the time involved on each topic is greatly reduced. Thanks again, and I hope you continue the great work you are doing.
I'm always looking forward to the science news videos, despite the systematic lack of gobbledygook.
I have been a casual follower of your work for many years, and I wanted to express my admiration for the way you have evolved and your ability to challenge fundamentalistic ideas and thought processes within the scientific community. Your approach to healthy criticism in scientific discussions and news-related articles is truly commendable. Thank you for your hard work.
DNA in the air - could be used to find endangered species, could be used to check if you were at work on time. I wonder what it will be used for.
Gonna invest in ozone
If it's ever used for anything, it'll be for the first of those. Why use such a convoluted and costly technique for a mundane task that can be easily and effectively accomplished with a simple camera with M.L. face recognition? Tinfoil hats off gents
I recommend using the DNA to reconstruct what the persons that visited the beach yesterday looked like.
Hunting the last pocket of humanity with the Spot T1000.
I think it will be a long long long time until that is cheaper than a huge amount of other methods to check if you were at work. Like cameras. Also, the fact that our DNA is EVERYWHERE is not a good hint that it can be used to localize someone. Sounds more like you need to walk into your workspace once, and they will find your dna there for a long time.
The best channel on TH-cam
along with Anton
If you like misinformation
Thanks for the news, Sabine! 😊
Stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊
@Sabine Thank you for "being a news anchor", it is a service to the public! Your work is much appreciated.
I really enjoy the desk setup & treating the scientific news in catchy sarcastic way's. I mean science is so awesome that what is the point if we aren't goofing around while we learn thing's?
2:28 Because regulators always know what's best for us, are never corrupt, have the best intentions, always act ethically, are totally competent, never make mistakes, etc.
About “green” flying: I think that nobody really wants to fly, they just want to get to a far away place as quickly as possible. Why? Because they are impatient, time is money or life is too short. But if we all had more time, then they could travel on a train or similar ground based environmentally friendlier way. So, if we all work less by getting more things automated, we would have more free time and we could use more environmentally friendly travel methods.
This is rapidly becoming one of my favorite youtube channels. This platform needed a well informed science news segment like this 👌
Great stuff love it, hooray Sabine!
Last or two years ago, I was doing my best to find someone explaining what D-Wave actually does and how it works. I couldn't find that information, even from them.
Thank you thank you thank you thank you!!!!!!!❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤I love your show, please don't stop, more more more!!!👍👍👍👍❤❤❤❤
I love the way Sabine pronounces "committee" similar to "comedy." All too often, this is true. Thank you for all that you do!
I actually heard "comity" at first.
@@Duiker36 Let's hope that yours becomes the norm instead of mine!
Thank you Sabine. 😊
The major problem with trying to pass laws about future tech is that there is ALWAYS m-o-r-e future tech on the way which will invalidate your law by doing its evil deeds, if any, in a way you did not anticipate. We are learning about the world and how to manipulate it too fast for any kind of rules other than: "If you hurt somebody, we will find you and make you VERY sorry." Punishment rather than prevention, but it is based on the bad results, not the methods of getting them, which will be -- already are in many situations -- enormous in number.
Wonderful video, Sabine! Thanks for all you do!
Professional, engaging, illuminating and appealing. This is a mainstay of science news for me. Kudos!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
wonderful video as always sabinee!
Just found this channel it’s great to hear real science no bias no social media agenda
Could the presence of human DNA in the atmosphere jeopadize the use of DNA evidence in criminal cases?
That's an excellent question. I don't remember them discussing this in the paper.
It is a good question indeed. I wonder how easy is it to separate the DNA you're interested in from what you're not interested in. I think in terms of criminal evidence, much of the DNA is recovered from clothing, furniture, and bodily fluids, so usually the perpetrator and victim's DNA would be the dominant ones in the sample. If it's easy to count the relative abundance, I think it would help ensure that the neighbour down the road isn't implicated because a skin cell blew in through the window. I imagine much of this depends on the methods being used to collect and sequence the DNA.
My guess, as neither a lawyer nor a scientist, is that it could be used to eliminate suspects but not be used to convict anyone. Or maybe the other way around? Don't bother me with these hypotheticals anymore. They make my head hurt.
@@FB-no4lr I think this is correct, I think it's about abundance of a particular genome in a sample.
If they have enough DNA 🧬 to specify a person, they are very unlikely to have a false positive from air DNA 🧬.
Loved your joke about knowing more what's going on and other galaxies than what is going on on our own planet!! 😂😂😂
Thanks for the episode!
Always look forward to new Sabine! I listened to her book, existencial physics and really enjoyed it!
Yes, so surprised and excited about
Thanks for the video :)
Really Love your channel and the way u explain everything
Yippee, my science news for the week.
13:32 that makes me feel so much better..
Discussing BlackGem, it's worth noting that the gravitational wave interferometers give preliminary warning of where to look for visual events. The gravitational waves travel at c through *all* mediums, whereas light from the same source is affected by, for example, the gravitational lensing of interfering galaxies and thus is a bit less than c. These events are so far away that, if I understand correctly, the difference is significant enough to give advance warning of where to point the telescope.
The part about reading trace amounts of dna is a critical step in producing the dystopia described in the movie “Gattaca”.
...and at the same time make the story on the movie impossible 😅
The best kind of news. Danke, Sabine.
D-Wave's quantum annealing computer has the amazing ability to model a quantum annealing computer. (hey, this is better than MS and big Gs efforts...)
Thank you for the video.
Questions for any Shotgun DNA sequencing experts out there (the first news item): What is the lowest concentration of DNA detection in air/water/soil? What confidence levels are there in individual DNA reads? Confidence as a function of multiple DNA reads? Signal to noise effects? Cost/speed to run samples through the shotgun sequencing method?
One thing I'd like to see tested with "AI predicted crime analysis" is, say they think they have a model that can predict where and when crime is more likely to occur. If they then monitor that area more closely than usual, then chances are, they _will_ find more crime there, because they are looking harder. For the study to work well, they would need to ensure that no added attention was brought to the predicted area, and then see how much was found there relative to baseline.
Weird example but that reminds me a lot of the marvel comic series Civil War, in which they discover a teenager with the super power of predicting the future. They later find out that the superhero can't actually predict the future, but instead just see what is the most likely thing that would happen. The problem with that is that once they start to act on any of the predictions it immediately becomes the most likely thing to happen by default, making all the hero's argue about whether or not those things would still happen if they just did nothing.
@@toastedmatt9387 Truly the ChaGTP of superpowers.
A friend of mine, a business development consultant, works on a project for using CO2 captured from cement production and H2 produced by electrolysis by excess wind power to produce synthetic aviation fuel. He doesn't see how '30 targets could possibly be met, either.
As for biofuels, I think that the only acceptable avenues are algae and agricultural _waste,_ but we have not cracked efficient fermentation of cellulose and lignin yet.
Not good.
No😢, we should stop flying whenever possible
@@Thomas-gk42 But not drive instead. Battery-electric cars help a bit, but then "greens" come and shut down perfectly good nuclear power plants and are then oh-so-shocked that they are replaces by coal fired ones. Not even EU power grid is green as much as it can be, so ever trains carry _some_ carbon footprint.
I personally try to visit my clients as rarely as possible, which is made possible by new habits we developed during Covid lock-down.
@@bazoo513 you're talking about Germany? Yes, I'm one of those 'Greens', but I totally agree with you. At last, Sabine convinced me. Her videos about nuclear power are very accurate and balanced, though she has your opinion. Anyhow, these last three plants won't save the world or Germany, and Uranium is a rare resource, not available in Europe. You go from the dependence on Russia to some obscure islamistic regimes in Africa. I myself happily do most of my ways by bike. The solutions lie on the table, it's the egoism of the population that's obstructive.
@Thomas-ws6lk To be fair, there's no excuse for Frau Merkel to collect cheap brownie points by closing those plants, and here I am blaming Greens as if that eas all their fault. (They produce some 6% of German total capacity, IIRC - now some of the deficit is imported from France - also nuclear. Talk about irony.)
I worked on a pilot plant to extract uranium from, wait for it, coal fired plant ash. There are a lot such "low grade" sources. Heck, seawater is one. Then there are various variants of Thorium cycle, breeders using natural uranium or even _spent_ light water cycle fuel. Options are numerous.
I don't think we will make it without nuclear. Many storage technologies for renewable are in perpetual demonstration stages, some rather harebrained. We chronically lack in expensive and politically sensitive continent scale terawatt scale grids...
Well, perhaps geothermal..
I don't feel optimistic today...
it still brings us one step closer to figuring out how to make fusion work for energy production.
I like the gradient look. It's very scientific in style.
8:40 - Sabine, I love how you snuck quantum field theory into your call - and did so in a way that went right over Einstein's head!
Your phone cord is twisted right-hand but contains a left-handed middle segment that starts over Einstein’s head and ends in front of your forearm.
The persistent transitions at either end of the middle segment form a _soliton_ and _anti-soliton_ pair. Like particles and antiparticles in quantum field theory, these represent an excited state of the phone cord “vacuum” and annihilate if they come back together.
You've snuck in a beautifully visual example of one of the simplest possible pair creation-annihilation operators - the operators that are foundational to particle field theory!
Thanks Sabine and team, great video as always, the perfect mid-week pick-me-up
And love that shirt, pretty spectrumy 😅
Thank you
In 2023 did we really just get to the point where we can say “computer zoom in…enhance zoom…reconstruct reflection” “Jim, we got him”.
And knowing how truthful AI is, it would preferentially reconstruct people as celebrities or something.
Pepperidge Farm remembers when it was a joke poking fun at American cop/detective shows and their techno-B.S. for things that didn't really exist yet. Yet somehow they've managed to pull it off in a rudimentary way.
@@pauljs75 I was thinking the same it was a joke and now it became a reality even though the AI is technically making synthetic data so it's not necessarily evidence per day.
Thank you
Sabine really was hyped on that telephone ringing 😂😂
btw, does anyone here know her phone number?... asking for a friend.
Dogs are feeling a bit down these days. They used to be the best at sniffing out evidence, but now they're thinking, "Well, there goes our detective career. We can't compete with by-catching DNA!"
"Asking people to think ahead works really well." hahahahahahah
😀 Really curious and informative !!!
The quantum computer reminds me of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, feels like the bit about the question being harder to compute then the answer has predicted Quantum computing
Good Morning, Sabine! 💖 Beautiful Day!
How to get away with murder? Catching mixed up DNA? No more coffee cups. Now you can dust the air😂
Cool shirt, Dr. Hossenfelder!
On e-fuels, you previous stated that using liquid H2 is too heavy to use in aircraft, but liquid H2 has an energy density of 70.99 MJ/Kg and Jet A fuel is 43.15 MJ/Kg. I don’t know how other weight differences like fuel tanks needed or weight between turboprop engines versus fuel cell?
Hydrogen must be made in massive quantities to produce green steel and green ammonia in the future.
Also, they have been making real progress in designing fuel cells that are iridium and platinum free.
This is an answer from Dr ChatGPT. I just downloaded the app. I, so far, love the thing.
Yes, it is possible to build a fuel cell that doesn't use iridium or platinum as a catalyst. While iridium and platinum are commonly used catalysts in fuel cells due to their high activity and stability, researchers have been exploring alternative catalyst materials that are more abundant and cost-effective.
Several non-precious metal catalysts have shown promising results, such as materials based on iron, cobalt, nickel, and their alloys. These catalysts can exhibit good catalytic activity for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) or hydrogen oxidation reaction (HOR) in fuel cells. Additionally, carbon-based materials, including carbon nanotubes, graphene, and various carbon composites, have been investigated as catalyst supports.
By optimizing the composition, structure, and surface properties of these alternative catalysts, researchers aim to enhance their efficiency and durability, making them viable alternatives to iridium and platinum. While significant progress has been made in this area, further research and development are still needed to improve the performance of non-precious metal catalysts and make them commercially viable for fuel cell applications.
"TruthGPT" sounds like a good idea to me, as long as the software can't be corrupted and if it worked... Politicians would not like it much though
Not using enough Nitrogen is a nice way to say the other team is full of hot air.
The change in color may still be an interesting phenomenon to be understood in quantum theory's terms.
Just like nobody could reproduce Pons and Fleischman's cold fusion results. I never believe it until it's been done by multiple independent groups in separate institutions.
@@solconcordia4315 i don't understand why physicist fake their claim about making superconductors and publish paper
Do they don't understand that their false claim can be easily exposed
@@pauldirc..
Success in making room-temperature "high temperature" superconductor(s) in hopefully near-ambient pressure will be an important notorious breakthrough.
Due to the intense interests, some physicists just want to gain fame, regardless of its being good or bad.
Our one-term Loser former President Donald John Trump likes this way of becoming famous and infamous, too. He's definitely a World Leader !
@@pauldirc..
Success in making room-temperature "high temperature superconductor(s) in hopefully near-ambient pressure will be an important notorious breakthrough.
Due to the intense interests, some physicists just want to gain fame, regardless of its being good or bad.
Our one-term Loser former President Donald John Trump likes this way of becoming famous and infamous, too. He's definitely a World Leader !
6:45 On alternatives to liquid fuels
Electrolysis of Water.
To convert water to hydrogen and oxygen requires 1.223 volts, This reaction is simply H20 +2e- -> H2 + 1/2O2 + 2e-. In simple terms the break even point of the reaction is 2e- at 1.223 volts. However at this voltage the reaction would take an infinite amount of time to proceed, the reason is that the conductivity of the water is poor and ions in the solution need to move around, so some energy needs to be placed into heat to get things to move, thus typically its 1.5 volts.
Economics of Electric Hydrogen Production.
How much power is needed?
A mole of hydrogen gas weighs 2 grams, roughly 498 moles per kilogram, and a moles is 6.022E23 molecules. This is roughly 6 x 10^26 electrons per kilogram. An Ampere is 6.22 E 18 charges per second past a point. Thus we need 10E8 amps to generate a kg of hydrogen. this multiplied by the voltage = power 1.5E8. But if we divide this by 3600 we get kw hours required. This is 42 kw hours required. The typical high end industrial production of hydrogen is 52 kWh/kg. Lets say we are going to produce hydrogen in southern Arizona. The cost of electricity is about 0.17$ per kWh. Therefore using a 52 kWh/kg method is going to cost 8.84$/kg. But as we need also water we need to add another 10 cents and also we need to pay for transportation. So lets just say 10$ per kilogram.
So lets consider a 787 dreamliner.
787-8 440 passenger economy jet.
101,600 kg of fuel for roughly 11,000 km.
So this roughly computes to 10kg of fuel per km. Divided between each passenger of a jam-packed 787 its roughly 0.02 kg/passenger-km.
So lets consider how much this cost is going to be per 1000 km . Roughly 20kg x cost of jet fuel($2.30/gallon) / (density (0.804) * l/gallon (3.795))=
Lets simplify
= kg/liter * liter/gallon = kg/gallon = 3.02 kg/gallon. This converts to roughly 0.756$/kg
Again we are talking here best case scenarios. This gives the airlines a couple of decades to improve performance. 0.756x20 = or 15.12$ per 1000km. We are also not considering empty seats on jets or costs associated with transporting craft for repairs, short haul flights in networks, etc. This is just best case scenarion.
Lets then look at hydrogen. Combustion energy for hydrogen is 141 Mj/kg of hydrogen and for kerosene is 46 Mj/kg. So that hydrogen is about 3 times the specific combustion energy of Jet Fuel. But its 13 times more expensive, so that the cost per 13*46/142 = 4.2 x cost (Jet fuel) The translates to roughly 4.2 x 15.12 = 64$/1000 km or about 0.064$ per km.
However there is a problem, while specific combustion energy of hydrogen is three times higher, its density under compression is 8 times less, so that we need rougly 200 percent more space in the craft to store hydrogen. Since the jet fuel is stored in the wings with a small tank in the fuselage, the movement of fuel mass to the fuselag is going to alter wingloading and stress. The hydrogen also requires bulkier and more massive storage tanks. The net effect is a reduction in the number of passengers by as much as 30%. Consequently Airlines will need either bigger planes or more craft. This will raise cost to about 0.1$ per mile. So imagine flying from say Madrid to Tokyo.
The distance is about 12000 km given air routing. The hydrogen fuel cost would be approximately 2400$ for a round trip requiring at least one stopover. The ticket for round trip would be on the order of 4 to 6 thousand dollars.
The intangible costs of Hydrogen power as an alternative energy source.
So lets imagine that a single Spaniard needs to travel to Tokyo once per year.
2400$ hydrogen divided by means he will need to take 240kg of hydrogen on the plane with him. That translates to 13,000,000 kWh of electric. No problem, Madrid is near Africa and Africa has alot of sun. So lets see, during that year how much solar energy we can generate 8 x 365.25 hours = 2922 hours per year, however solar panels can only generate about 0.325 kWh per meter^2. This translates roughly to 1000 kWh per year per square meter. This passenger needs 13,000 square meters of panels. But there's a problem. Africa may have alot of land and sun, Saami Russia does not have alot of sun and Tokyo Japan does not have alot of land. So that hydrogen needs to come from elsewhere. We can reroute the flight to Dubia, which is close to Saudi Arabia that has another big desert, Add another couple thousand panels. So lets consider 15,000 meters of land is, that is roughly 1/66th of a square kilometer. To have a daily flight between madrid and tokyo with 330 passengers x 365 days per year that one flight would require 1825 sq km of sunlite desert half of which needs to be in the rather sun poor/land poor region of the NW Pacific. Japan is stranded by hydrogen fuel air travel economy.
And so now we see the problem with hydrogen. Its not so much the cost of hydrogen, its the development of an alternative energy source to generate it. Even if we could get fuel production and solar efficiency to 100% we still need nearly a square kilometer of land per 1 round trip flight of a fully loaded aircraft.
Solutions.
1. Slower more bouyant craft, use of light weight solar panels on craft
2. Hydrogen fuel cells instead of burning, requires 2 magnitudes more powerful cells.
3. Combinations of solar electric ground transportation and air transportation.
The ultimate problem with Air travel is simply that there is 2 magnitudes more air travel than any best case scenario hydrogen economy can support as a consequence we will have to continue to use kerosene based fuels on the routes that that are kg/distant effecient and get rid of all of those that are not.
We have to remember, the solar economy will have to be prioritized.
1. Energy for fertilizer and food production, commercial transportation, and essential commerce
2. Energy for public safety (Water systems, sewage systems, garbage collection, administrations, fire protection, police,hospitals)
3. Energy for home cooking and refridgeration.
4. Energy for transportation and non-essential commerce, air conditioning, hot water heating
5. Energy for elective transportation, travel and recreation industries.
Also, in a hydrogen economy, nuclear energy is not a choice, its an imperative. There is simply no way without wind power and nuclear to have stop-gap hydrogen production without additional non-solar production. In addition hydrogen will have to be diverted toward conversion of CO2 into hydrocarbons for the plastics industry.
Many have argued we can use biofuels. Right now solar hydrogen production is about 15% land efficient. Biofuel production is about 0.1% land efficient and require two magnitudes more water. Biofuels are not an option, but innovation in biofuel production in marine economies may contribute. Hydrothermal development in Japan will help. And wind power in places with low winter sunlight levels also helps.
Sabine throws call backs like like inertial fusion
IN germany I just saw a van carrying the label "skynet" utterly unironically. it was tech support
Biofuels are the LEAST sustainable, inefficient, and most anti-social. It competes with food crops and requires industrial scale petroleum fuel fertilizer to even be profitable.
Ok, but your consequence? Stop flying whenever possible is the solution
@Thomas biofuels were never necessary. If you remove subsidies, then they would only be profitable in times of fuel scarcity.
I worked on hardware for the inertial fusion confinement project at Sandia National Laboratory 40 years ago. The short version: controlled fusion isn't easy.
I won't live to see any fusion process that can actually produce more usable energy than it takes to operate.
Thanks for your entertaining high quality content. Regarding actual developments in new energy technologies, you might want to consider a look into the "NET-Journal" (Jupiter Verlag). I wonder for example, how "Low Energy Nuclear Reaction" (LENR) Technology (cf. Andrea Rossi) barely finds recognition in public perception despite their long provided proof of work. Also the cheap and easy on demand production of Hydrogen by ultrasonic frequencies is basically unheard of. Would you cover these, if you had sources?
Thanks Sabine.
The first time I read the term "quantum advantage" I thought it was a joke referring to the advantage being too small yet. Excellent video as always btw.
Hi,
You never heard of the term "atomic conductivity "?
@@arryritalinni actually, no. haha. What does that mean?
Thanks for the relevant background images; if not for them, I'd still be confused as to how the "weed" DNA survived combustion...
"That could be a bad idea... Or a really bad idea." LOL!
It's interesting how the EU is trying to get ahead of these issues by regulating giant tech companies and fields like AI, while here in North America we don't even think about potential problems. We're like "Let's use AI to save fifty cents on each transaction! Problems? Eh, they'll work themselves out."
BlackGem telescope. We have an instrument that can pinpoint a disturbance in the force! 🤓😎💚♾️
Disturbances that occurred long, long ago in galaxies far, far away. (Due to the finite speed of light and gravitational waves.)
@@brothermine2292 this is the way?🤓💚♾️
I love your videos. And just to let you know, my teacher's assistant, who has degrees in both physics and math and worked in Antarctica, loves your videos as well. He thinks you are the bomb (not the nuclear one though). :)
Cooking oil, Diesel, Kerosene are all the same weight, just have different lubrication additives.
it costs 90 bucks for a flongle and ~100 for the reagents for eDNA, and as you scale up you can run multiple samples on a single flow cell (so it scales insanely) and you can look back in time on old samples (unlike qPCR tests)
getting a way to regulate how someone could run a survey would be a good idea if cops learn about it... are people allowed to sniff your property's area for DNA without probable cause?
Experiments may or may not *be replicated,* but they don't, as a rule, *replicate.*
11:50 "They hope that more energy comes out than goes in"
So......inertial fusion is like a Super Ball.
"A Super Ball or Superball is a toy bouncy ball based on a type of synthetic rubber invented in 1964 by chemist Norman Stingley. It is an extremely elastic ball made of Zectron, which contains the synthetic polymer polybutadiene as well as hydrated silica, zinc oxide, stearic acid, and other ingredients. This compound is vulcanized with sulfur at a temperature of 165 °C (329 °F) and formed at a pressure of 3,500 psi (24 MPa). The resulting Super Ball has a very high coefficient of restitution, and if dropped from shoulder level on a hard surface, a Super Ball bounces nearly all the way back; thrown down onto a hard surface by an average adult, it can fly over a three-story building."
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Ball
Asking people to think ahead works very well. lol, you tell the best jokes.
Don't the researchers realize the pellet fusion idea is going down the same path as gunpowder engines?
It does not scale well... Also, they are still relying on a very finite and quite rare resource.
The story of 0 Carbon emissions Commercial Aviation, is just the stereotypical case of window dressing for the Planet! Set some astounding targets for the mid term, set up some futuristic sounding/looking webpage, don’t tell anyone exactly what you’ll be doing to get there, with all the data and sources, don’t produce regular updates on the progress toward the objective, et voilà you’ve got your “green” chop!
I missed the "under pressure" thing.. @ 09:33
That's right 😢😊
You made that twitter joke like it's not *actually* what Elon wants... 😂😂 Clever bit~!
You hit the nail on the head, if folks could acquire facts (in unbiased language) to queries, and people could be bothered(or allowed) to ask more than just one or two questions about a subject (a.k.a. support exploratory logic over identity validation) and be confident they were presented complete information for the query, you are right~!
I'm hereby starting a petition to stop people from trying to shoehorn scientific names into bad acronyms
Not only science, it's a world wide pandemia and a part of collective stupidity, luckily the harmless part.
Everyone seems to skip past an obvious and 100% effective way to reduce emissions from air travel. That is, humans cutting way back on or even eliminating nonessential travel. We're at the point where everyone knows (or at least strongly suspects) we're not going to meet the necessary reductions by 2050 by way of technological advances. That doesn't become a problem if we help technology out a bit by simply reducing or eliminating unnecessary air travel.
Yep... Since "Brave new world" to "Gattaca"... the future is DIRE
A publicly-accessible computer system that would tell people whether something was true is an idea I posted on the Worldbuilding Stack Exchange a few years ago. Interested people can read the ideas and discussions there.
Love the cool top!!
Doesn't airborne DNA have implications for secondary DNA transfer contaminating crime scenes?
Depends on sensitivity of the method used. PCR can amplify any amount of DNA for sure but it would end up also amplifying random contaminants from the laboratory so such high sensitivity method is very impractical.
Also the DNA samples relevant for criminal investigation are high enough concentration to not require that much sensitivity. Low concentration samples are thus much more unreliable and hard to make use of unless investigatirs can be equipped in a way to not contaminate the evidence with trace DNA.
@@nova_supreme8390 I thought PCR has been used in some investigations?
Maybe floating swales could be used for biofuel production? Basically it would pull waste-stream nutrients from other agriculture out of river systems, and still provide a usable crop without having excessive land impact. It might be a thing to look into.
Also I'm surprised that somebody figured out a way to make the Red Dwarf "Enhance" meme into a viable thing (at least within the limitations of source imaging).
I'm changing my mind about the most realistic fusion technology. I always thought that magnetic field confinement would have been the final winning solution.
But after having seen the damage to the confinement chamber, the amount of useless plasma, and the enormous damage created by all the fast neutrons, I'm starting to believe that inertial confinement is much less challenging from an engineering point of view.
Thank you for the weekly science news, Dr. Hossenfelder, it's highly appreciated.
Greetings from the UK,
Anthony
Fusion is only 30 years away!
@@raybod1775
Everyday I get fusion energy from the sun, although it may have been from the near present or eons past.
@@raybod1775nertial confinement is similar to the tried-and-true idea of the internal combustion engine confining and extracting work from very rapid mini-explosions. It may be wasteful and inefficient but it may well be easier done.
Besides, the fuel in seawater is abundant. Israel being on the shore of the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea may have potential for producing deuterium efficiently, assisted by the sun's energy (Israel has fairly low latitude).
Another thing which comes readily to mind is: you gripe about fast neutrons but can they be channel towards making deuterium and tritium directly from their bombarding hydrogen ? Deuterium and tritium can function as fusion fuels.
Having more fuel can alleviate the problem of magnetic confinement's wasting plasma. What about electric confinement because magnetic fields are really only components of varying electric fields ?
Neutrons have spin so magnetic fields can steer them.
"Superconductor Experiment Fails to Replicate"... OK, but I still don't know "what" it fails to replicate. I even wonder whether an experiment can "replicate" anything, or whether it's the people conducting the experiment who are supposed to replicate things, perhaps a result, an outcome, or something like that. I don't even belive that experiments can do anything, let alone "replicate".
Sabina Hossenfelder, once again making high intelligence cool.
Double helix in the sky tonight...Steely Dan knew this in the 70s.
All this awesome science news, and what does my brain take away from it? I have the "Junior Birdman" song stuck in my head.
What about reforesting in semiarid regions natural processes such as cattle/roaming:grazing. I watched a ted talk on this by an expert and it has some potential.
Gee but that went quick! Thanks for the science news Prof H! Love it!
This statements like: "this and this activity will contribute 0.1 C temperature rise until this date" are completely baseless. Please don't use them without some qualifiers like "allegedly"
0:50 This has been known for ages, in fact Rafiki used this method to deduct that Simba is still alive
Hi, just amazing, great good news. ....
Yeah, that needs to be regulated immediately. Otherwise, everywhere you go there will be sniffers to track everyone even if they don't carry a phone. Would also be used to detect potential health issues in prospective employees and so on and so on.
That DNA can be detected in the air, is a brilliant tool in forensic science. The DNA from a murderer left in the air over the victim's body, could be used to identify the murderer.
In the CSI series the glossy reflection thing has been around for years