Festive trash talk
Unexpected Elements
BBC
4.4 • 566 Ratings
🗓️ 27 December 2024
⏱️ 50 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
December is a time of celebration, family feuds, and now scientific rivalries. It's also one of the most wasteful months of the year, with festivities in full swing across the globe. No wonder the world is overflowing with rubbish—both literal and metaphorical!
Unexpected Elements dives headfirst into the scientific bin to wallow in waste. Could worms be the unexpected heroes of our plastic pollution crisis? How much garbage have we jettisoned into space? And why is part of our very own genome called "junk DNA"?
But it’s not all rubbish, we’re also talking trash. While celebrations can bring people together, spending too much time with loved ones can lead to tense moments. Rafi Kohan shares expert tips on how to outsmart your opponent during a heated board game debate.
And don’t think trash talk is limited to sports fields. The world of science has its share of drama, too. We’ll explore some of history’s most scandalous squabbles with scientists behaving badly.
Come waste an hour with us on Unexpected Elements!
Presenter: Caroline Steel, with Chhavi Sachdev and Candice Bailey Producers: Harrison Lewis, Imaan Moin, Alice Lipscombe-Southwell, William Hornbrook and Eliane Glaser Sound engineer: Gavin Wong
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Oh, hello. You have chosen a BBC podcast, but before you listen to it, we thought you might |
| 0:04.7 | like our podcast too. You might. You might. It is called Sightracked with me, Nick Grimshaw. |
| 0:09.2 | And me, Annie Mack. And we talk about the week in music. All the news, all the cultural |
| 0:14.0 | happenings in the UK and beyond. And great guests. And it's on BBC Sounds. Yes, where you can |
| 0:19.7 | also enjoy lots of playlists, music mixes and |
| 0:22.6 | live radio. Everything from my six music breakfast show to Radio 3 Unwind. But obviously start with |
| 0:29.3 | our podcast sidetrack. Obviously. Obviously. So if you like music, listen on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:39.8 | Recently, Marnie and I visited a farm just outside Edinburgh. |
| 0:44.2 | Not for a fun day out, though it was, |
| 0:46.5 | but because we're trying to figure out |
| 0:48.2 | which animal has the worst carbon footprint. |
| 0:52.0 | Marnie reckons it's us humans |
| 0:53.8 | and I'm looking to knock us out of the top spot. |
| 0:57.8 | Cows seem like obvious contenders, so we met Elaine, a brilliant scientist looking to make |
| 1:03.1 | beef production better for the environment. Elaine monitors how much gas cows produce to find |
| 1:09.6 | the individuals which emit the least methane, a greenhouse |
| 1:12.9 | gas. With this data, farmers can breed less gassy cattle. And it's a crucial mission. Elaine revealed |
| 1:20.5 | that cows produce more greenhouse gases than any other area of agriculture. As we left, |
| 1:30.3 | Marnie and I felt hopeful about science's role in tackling climate change, and I was sure we'd found the animal with the worst carbon footprint. |
| 1:36.7 | But on the train home, Marnie pointed out, the cows are only there because we've bred them. |
| 1:42.7 | So, once again, humans take the top spot, and Marnie was right. |
| 1:48.3 | I'm Caroline Steele from the BBC World Service. |
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