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BBC Inside Science

Earth's Core; What Can Chemistry Do for Us?; Ocean Acidification; Darwin Day

BBC Inside Science

BBC

Technology, Science

4.51.3K Ratings

🗓️ 12 February 2015

⏱️ 29 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Adam Rutherford explores new insights into what lies at the very centre of the Earth. New research from China and the US suggests that the innermost core of our planet, far from being a homogenous iron structure has another, distinct region at its centre. He talks to the study's lead researcher Xiangdong Song and to geophysicist Simon Redfern about what this inner-inner core could tell us about the very long history of the Earth and the long suspected swings in the earth's magnetic field.

Professor Andrea Sella, from University College London is a recipient of the Royal Society's Michael Faraday Prize, in recognition, like Faraday himself, of exemplary science communication to the lay public. Andrea gave his prize lecture this week, describing chemistry as one of the 'crowning intellectual achievements of our age'. How justified is the claim? What have chemists ever done for us?

The sea forms the basis of ecosystems and industries, and so even subtle changes to the waters could have serious knock on effects. Dr Susan Fitzer from the University of Glasgow has been wading into Scottish lochs to study shelled creatures; they form a vital basis for marine ecosystems and the global food industry. But what effects could ocean acidification have on this vital organism?

And to mark Darwin Day Adam Rutherford examines the origins of Creationism and its most recent variation Intelligent Design. Why do opinion polls in the US routinely find that about half of the population denies the truth of Darwin's theory and believes instead that humans were created supernaturally by God at some point within the last few thousand years? He hears from historian Thomas Dixon, and from Eugenie Scott, former director of the National Centre for Science Education - a US organisation committed to keeping evolution (and now climate change) in the US schools' curriculum.

Producer: Adrian Washbourne.

Transcript

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0:00.0

Choosing what to watch night after night the flicking through the endless

0:06.8

searching is a nightmare we want to help you on our brand new podcast off the

0:11.8

telly we share what we've been watching

0:14.0

Cladie Aide.

0:16.0

Load to games, loads of fun, loads of screaming.

0:19.0

Lovely. Off the telly with me Joanna Paige.

0:21.0

And me, Natalie Cassidy, so your evenings can be a little less searching

0:25.7

and a lot more watching. Listen on BBC Sounds.

0:29.2

Hello You, I'm Adam Rutherford and this is the podcast of Inside Science from the BBC first

0:34.8

broadcast on the 12th of February 2015 which is the birthday of my hero Charles Darwin and so

0:41.6

we have a Darwin Day special, but for podcast listeners only hears a quick

0:45.8

quiz. Here are five Darwin statements. One, he once ate an armadillo. Two, he played the bassoon to earthworms.

0:55.0

Three, he had a wooden slide built for the central staircase in his home in Down House.

1:00.0

Four, as an experiment in imprinting in Nodificus birds, he once kept a duckling in his voluminous beard,

1:07.0

and five, he was mocked on the beagle for being a godbothera.

1:11.0

Only one of those is untrue. BBC Inside Science at BBC.co. UK is the email address

1:18.0

no prizes other than my eternal respect, terms and conditions at BBC.co.

1:23.2

UK slash Radio 4.

1:25.0

The 12th of February is Charles Darwin's birthday

1:28.0

and today's program is chock full of grandeur of which I think he'd approve. No individual has contributed more to our

1:35.0

understanding of life than him and that is well worth a doffed cap. So we've got a

1:39.7

tangled bank of Darwinalia, muscles and how they make their shells,

...

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