Remembering Frank Drake, History of Air Conditioning. Sep 9, 2022, Part 2

Science Friday

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🗓️ 9 September 2022

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The Hot And Cold Past Of The Air Conditioner

In the Northeast, the leaves have started changing colors, heralding the season of pumpkins, sweaters, and the smell of woodsmoke. But in some parts of the country, the heat hasn’t let up. In cities like Dallas, Phoenix, and Miami, temperatures were up in the high 80s and low 90s this week—and with climate change, the U.S. is only getting hotter.

But humans have come up with an ingenious way to keep the heat at bay: air conditioning. Widely considered one of the greatest engineering achievements of the 20th century, the technology has transformed how and where people live—and it’s prevented countless deaths. But it comes at a cost, and if we’re going to keep up with a warming climate, we’re going to need some other tricks to stay cool.

Remembering Frank Drake, Who Listened To The Cosmos

Last week, astronomer and SETI pioneer Dr. Frank Drake died at the age of 92. Dr. Drake was a key figure in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence—from Project Ozma in 1960, to the founding of the SETI Institute. He collaborated on the ‘Golden Record’ that Earth sent to the stars on board the Voyager space probes. Drake also created a mathematical way of estimating the probability of discovering signs of intelligent life, a calculation that became known as the Drake Equation, and spent years advocating for the search for alien life.

Drake appeared on Science Friday many times over the years. Here, in excerpts from conversations recorded in 2010 and 2016, he talks with Ira about the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, and his role with the Voyager Golden Record project. Our condolences to his family, friends, and colleagues.

Transcripts for each segment will be available the week after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is Science Friday, I'm Irif Lato. Later in the hour, remembering the life and work of
0:05.2	Settie Pioneer Frank Drake. But first, Labor Day marks the unofficial end of summer, right?
0:11.9	But even as we look forward to pumpkin pie and cozy sweaters,
0:15.8	parts of the country are still gripped by stifling heat. For example, California,
0:21.4	high temperature records have been set this past week, reaching as high as 116 in Livermore,
0:27.5	just outside of San Francisco. And we've seen the deadly impact of hot weather in Europe and Asia
0:33.7	all summer long. A new poll by Gallup shows that this extreme heat has a negative impact on people
0:40.0	sense of well-being around the world. And since global warming means it's still going to keep getting
0:45.7	hotter, the only tool many people have to survive is air conditioning. Named one of the greatest
0:52.5	engineering achievements of the 20th century by the National Academy of Sciences, air conditioning
0:58.6	has completely transformed how and where we live. Last year in collaboration with St. Louis
1:04.6	Public Radio, we took a look back at more than a century of AC and what it means to live without it.
1:11.6	Here's that story reported by Ella Federer and Shaila Farzen.
1:15.4	In the summer of 1904, visitors to the world's fair in St. Louis were in for a rare treat.
1:22.8	And it wasn't the giant Ferris wheel or the elephant made of almonds, those were both fantastic.
1:28.8	It wasn't the obvious kind of fun really or anything you could see or touch. It was something that you
1:35.0	felt. So imagine this. It's August and you've come all the way to St. Louis to see the absolute
1:42.4	cutting edge in human achievement. Maybe you checked out the aeronautics competition or the X-ray
1:48.1	machine that could look right inside you. But by late afternoon, you've been wandering for hours.
1:56.0	You're milling through these crowds and it's hot and it's humid. You're just melting when you
2:02.9	step into this one building, the Missouri State Building. And inside, it feels so good.
2:15.8	Because tucked in the basement is a 30 ton refrigeration plant, allegedly capable of dropping
	...

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