Rationally Speaking #88 - Mario Livio on Brilliant Blunders

Rationally Speaking Podcast

New York City Skeptics

Society & Culture, Skepticism, Science, Philosophy

4.6 • 787 Ratings

🗓️ 3 June 2013

⏱️ 43 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The next time you're kicking yourself for some stupid mistake, remember: Even history's genuises screw up! Astrophysicist and author Mario Livio joins this episode of Rationally Speaking to talk about his latest book, "Brilliant Blunders: From Darwin to Einstein - Colossal Mistakes by Great Scientists That Changed Our Understanding of Life and the Universe." Learn about why Darwin's theory of natural selection "shouldn't" have worked, why Einstein was confused about the role of aesthetics in physics, why Hoyle stubbornly refused to change his mind about a "steady state" universe -- and why those mistakes are central to scientific progress.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Rationally speaking is a presentation of New York City skeptics dedicated to promoting critical thinking, skeptical inquiry, and science education.
0:22.6	For more information, please visit us at NYCCEceptics.org.
0:36.2	Welcome to rationally speaking, the podcast where we explore the borderlands between reason and nonsense.
0:41.4	I am your host, Massimo Pilucci.
0:43.3	And with me, as always, is my co-host, Julia Galev.
0:45.9	Julia, what are we going to talk about today?
0:48.1	Well, Massimo, today we are pleased to feature a guest.
0:51.0	Mario Livio is an astrophysicist at the Space Telescopic Science Institute in Baltimore,
0:56.5	Maryland. He's also a popular lecturer and the best-selling author of several books, including
1:02.4	the accelerating universe and the golden ratio, the equation that couldn't be solved. And most
1:07.5	recently, a book called Brilliant Blundersers from Darwin to Einstein, colossal mistakes by
1:12.7	great scientists that changed our understanding of life in the universe. And that's what we are
1:17.3	going to focus on in our discussion today. Mario, welcome. Thank you. Thank you for having me.
1:23.4	So I bet that our readers, listeners, rather, would be particularly interested to hear what you think Darwin's blunder was in formulating his theory of natural selection, because I at least was very surprised when I saw in the blurb about your book that you thought Darwin made an error.
1:44.5	Yeah, well, it's not just that I thought that he really made an error.
1:49.6	Yes, right. That's fair. After reading it, I found that that was an objectively fair
1:56.8	interpretation, but if you could lay it out. Yes, so basically, I mean, at Darwin's time, they didn't know much about genetics.
2:06.4	And of course, we cannot blame Darwin for that.
2:08.9	Nobody knew about genetics at the time.
2:11.9	The problem was, and this is where he made a blunder, was that what he didn't realize that with the theory
2:20.5	of heredity that existed at the time, natural selection simply would not have worked at all.
2:29.5	And I can explain, you know, how that works if you want to hear it right now or if you want to ask about it later.
	...

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