Strange Science: Time Travelers, Head Transplants, & Black Holes

What this episode covers

In this episode of Strange Matters we talk about three cases of bizarre and weird science topics. First up Eric discusses the conspiracy behind the Large Hadron Collider. This underground particle accelerator was constructed with hopes of discovering the elusive Higgs Boson particle. Some believe that the discovery of this particle would create a cataclysmic event that would destroy the space-time continuum. Suspiciously, in recent years it has been plagued by a series of unfortunate setbacks. A baguette found on a circuit board caused one of the super coolers to overheat, then a strange individual was found snooping around the CERN facilities. Eloi Cole claimed to have come back from the future in an attempt to sabotage the collider. However when he was whisked away to the nearby mental institute he later disappeared. Could this individual really be from the future sent back in an attempt to save the future from its own destruction? Next up Sean presents a series of bizarre experiments that involve transplanted animal’s heads. A Soviet scientist named Vladimir Demikhov, who was well known for pioneering organ transplant surgeries, also lead a series of experiments in which he created two headed dogs. Though strange, he thought the techniques learned in this surgeries would benefit humans in the future. His work inspired an American Doctor, Robert White, who performed several surgeries in which he transplanted one monkey’s head onto another’s body. His hope was that with time this could lead to the ability in humans of being able to transplant heads onto fresh new bodies. Finally, Ethan discusses the findings of “hair-like” structures on the outer rims of black holes. World renowned physicist, Stephen Hawking, and colleagues claim that this finding means the possibility of information storage in regards to what black holes consume. As science progresses we have gone from the beliefs that all objects in black holes cease to exist after consumption never to be found again to now having good reason to believe that we may be able to extract information from the beginnings of black holes to reveal their histories and origin. Though we have come this far, we have barely scratched the surface of understanding how black holes function and the purpose they serve in our universe. iTunes | Stitcher | Facebook Page | Twitter

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