The Disappearing Spoon: a science history podcast with Sam Kean

Astronomer Jules Janssen was desperate to escape the siege of Paris in 1870 and observe an eclipse in Africa—work that he hoped would confirm his discovery of a brand new element in the Sun, helium. So he devised a plan to escape the city in a hot-air balloon, despite promises by the German army to shoot him as a spy if he dared try... Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Transcribed - Published: 9 December 2025

In the 1970s, paramedic units were illegal in the United States. One (very bad) television show, Emergency!, set out to change that—and saved tens of thousands of lives in the process.

Transcribed - Published: 2 December 2025

The work of Richard Meinertzhagen helped convince biologists that the Forest Owlet of India had gone extinct. But after Meinertzhagen’s frauds were exposed, one biologist grew obsessed with finding out whether it just might be alive still. (Part 2 of 2)

Transcribed - Published: 18 November 2025

He was a brilliant ornithologist—and a spy so colorful that James Bond was based on him. Richard Meinertzhagen was also a liar and a thief, and perpetrated the biggest fraud in biology history. Episode below!

Transcribed - Published: 11 November 2025

Taxonomy has a sadly ugly history of naming species after despicable people—even Adolf Hitler. Given the controversy these names generate, there have been many calls to drop them. But taxonomists have so far resisted most of these efforts, for reasons both good and bad...

Transcribed - Published: 4 November 2025

The eagle that made John James Audubon famous, the Bird of Washington was nothing but an elaborate lie. Fawning biographers have suppressed this fact for years, but careful historical work has unraveled the Audubon legend, and shown that much of his life, and work, was built on deceit. (Part 2 of 2)

Transcribed - Published: 28 October 2025

After several heartbreaking setbacks, John James Audubon’s career was in ruins—until he hatched a desperate plan to win new patrons. It involved a rare American eagle, the Bird of Washington. And when the gamble paid off, it made Audubon the most famous ornithologist in history...

Transcribed - Published: 21 October 2025

The Ig Nobel Prize is the bizarro cousin of the Nobel Prize—awarded for odd or unusual research “that first makes you laugh, then makes you think.” Some scientists hate them, and have refused to accept the award. But they’ve grown into a beloved institution—and one with some surprising benefits to science.

Transcribed - Published: 14 October 2025

Winning a Nobel Prize is a good thing—mostly. But surprisingly often, Nobel laureates go kooky and start promoting bizarre things like homeopathy, ESP, AIDS denialism, and worse. Psychologists are starting to understand why...

Transcribed - Published: 6 October 2025

A preview of my brand new book, Dinner with King Tut!

Transcribed - Published: 24 June 2025

Nazism was a society-wide catastrophe for Germany, but some professions deserve more blame than others. In particular, there was a surprisingly large percentage of doctors and engineers among the Nazis. Sociologists and historians have now worked out why.

Transcribed - Published: 27 May 2025

When Charles Dickens published Bleak House in 1852, he included a scene where one character spontaneously combusts. 🔥 🔥 🔥 Readers loved it, but one of Dickens’s good friends—a former scientist—blasted Dickens for his scientific ignorance. It ignited one of the strangest controversies in literary history.

Transcribed - Published: 20 May 2025

It was one the largest epidemics in American history: 30,000 people paralyzed over a few months in 1930. A dogged epidemiologist eventually traced the cause to adulterated bottles of an illegal liquor/medicine called “jake.” Yet the epidemic is almost completely forgotten. About the only place it survived was in blues songs...

Transcribed - Published: 13 May 2025

Asbestos was once considered a miracle substance—a wonder of the modern age, due to its role in stopping the fires that once plagued every major city. Unfortunately, it also shreds people’s lungs. Most countries were willing to live with that trade-off, until a crusading doctor named Irving Selikoff made it his life's mission to get asbestos banned.

Transcribed - Published: 6 May 2025

Rickets was once a devastating disease: up to 90 percent of the children showed symptoms in some cities, including bent spines and bowed legs, and it resulted in many women dying during childbirth. The search for the cause of rickets took decades, and ended with a startling discovery—that much like plants, human beings had the ability to photosynthesize.

Transcribed - Published: 29 April 2025

Leonard Darwin had a lot to live up to. He was the son of the legendary Charles, and several siblings proved to be brilliant scientists as well. But Leonard never quite measured up as a mediocre military officer and two-bit politician. In his fifties, he pronounced his life a “failure.” But in his sixties, he finally found his calling—the dark pseudoscience of eugenics, a field he embraced in part to prove that he wasn’t the failure he imagined.

Transcribed - Published: 22 April 2025

A young woman in the mid-1900s couldn’t take an at-home pregnancy test. Instead, she sent a vial of urine to a clinic, where a technician would, of all things, inject it into a frog, and hormones in the urine would cause the frog to lay eggs. This frog-based test was far faster, easier, and cleaner than any pregnancy test before, and it shifted power for family planning from doctors to women themselves.

Transcribed - Published: 15 April 2025

After scientists had a handle on how many chromosomes humans have, other researchers began exploring whether certain ailments might be caused by chromosomal abnormalities. To this end, a French cardiologist discovered that Down syndrome was caused by the presence of an extra chromosome in humans. But a colleague stole credit for her work, and the battle over their legacies continues to this day, in part because the colleague is on track to become a certified Catholic saint.

Transcribed - Published: 8 April 2025

It seems like a simple question: how many chromosomes do human beings have? But getting an accurate count proved surprisingly hard for much of last century. In fact, virtually every textbook once cited an incorrect number, until in 1956, a fiery Indonesian scientist finally determined the true count—and had to battle his boss over who would receive credit for this legacy-making discovery.

Transcribed - Published: 1 April 2025

The 1910 return of Halley’s comet was greeted with rapture around the world—at least at first. Due to irresponsible speculation by scientists about the theoretical dangers of a close encounter with a comet, many people grew terrified of Halley’s approach and took drastic measures. They fled their homes, hid out in wells or caves, even committed suicide. It’s a grave reminder of scientific communication gone very wrong.

Transcribed - Published: 25 March 2025

It’s the 80th anniversary of the Dutch Hongerwinter during World War II, which led to widespread starvation, and an inadvertent breakthrough in treating deadly celiac disease. Podcast season finale below: Our Sponsors: * Check out Uncommon Goods: https://uncommongoods.com/SPOON Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 10 December 2024

After 40 years of studying snakes, Karl Schmidt finally suffered his first bite. And when he did, he kept a gruesome diary to document the suffering and danger—right up to the edge of death... Our Sponsors: * Check out Uncommon Goods: https://uncommongoods.com/SPOON Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 3 December 2024

Parasites can force animals to do nefarious things by manipulating their minds—including, uncomfortably, the minds of human beings. Our Sponsors: * Check out Uncommon Goods: https://uncommongoods.com/SPOON Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 19 November 2024

In refusing to approve the drug thalidomide, FDA scientist Frances Oldham Kelsey spared thousands of babies from deadly birth defects and revolutionized drug research. But was her legacy all good? Our Sponsors: * Check out Uncommon Goods: https://uncommongoods.com/SPOON Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 12 November 2024

Japanese physicist Fusa Miyake has sparked a revolution in archaeology by studying radioactive tree rings—work that also terrifies astronomers, who fear it foretells doom for our civilization. Our Sponsors: * Use offer code SPOON at uncommongoods.com for 15% off! Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 4 November 2024

A woman who drowned in Paris became one of the most famous faces in the world as the model for CPR dummies, saving millions of lives and inspiring artists from Pablo Picasso to Michael Jackson—all while remaining completely unknown. Our Sponsors: * Use offer code SPOON at uncommongoods.com for 15% off! Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 29 October 2024

In the early 1800s, the first Egyptian mummies in Europe served as a crucial test for evolution—a test that, according to people then, evolution flunked. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 22 October 2024

In the 1800s, mummies found their way into everything from fertilizer to food, and were especially prized as medicine. Mummymania was a strange time... Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 15 October 2024

How did a man who developed a Nobel Prize–worthy idea (green-fluorescing protein, GFP) end up driving a shuttle van for a living, and missing the Prize completely? Therein lies a sad story... Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 8 October 2024

Physicist Gyorgy Hevesy had a talent for tricks and stunts—including one that prevented Nazi stormtroopers from stealing a gold Nobel Prize. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 30 September 2024

A summer bonus episode: Russ Schnell's professors mocked him for believing that plants somehow caused hailstorms. He not only proved them wrong, but uncovered profound connections between life, earth, and the air above... Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 26 June 2024

Ahead of the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings, a look at the surprisingly important role science played in shaping—and remaking—an invasion that could have easily been a disaster... Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 14 May 2024

One doctor’s controversial crusade to keep men and women out of prison through nose jobs, eye lifts, and other plastic surgery. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 7 May 2024

In 1959, nine Russian hikers mysteriously died on a trek through the snowy wilderness—fueling a half-century of hysterical conspiracies. Has science finally cracked the case? Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 30 April 2024

After a tenure dispute, mechanical engineer Valery Fabrikant murdered four colleagues in cold blood at his university in Montreal. So why is he still allowed to publish scientific papers? Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 23 April 2024

Chemist Justus von Liebig was perhaps the most famous scientist in the world in the mid-1800s—but quickly became infamous for his role in the killing of four starving infants. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 16 April 2024

Patient after patient died under the care of a single nurse in Holland. So why did so many statisticians think Lucia de Berk was innocent? Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 9 April 2024

Rama IV of Siam (from the “King and I” musical) used an eclipse to save his kingdom from greedy colonial powers. But it cost him his own life in the end. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 2 April 2024

One Brazilian man’s brain damage transformed him into a selfless giver. So why did he infuriate so many people—and what does his case say about the biological roots of generosity? Our Sponsors: * Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: https://www.rosettastone.com/ Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 26 March 2024

Jack Parsons was a devil-worshipping FBI rat who led a sex cult and was bosom buddies with L. Ron Hubbard. He was also one of the most important rocket scientists in history. (Episode 2 of 2) Our Sponsors: * Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: https://www.rosettastone.com/ Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 19 March 2024

Jack Parsons was a devil-worshiping FBI rat who led a sex cult and was bosom buddies with L. Ron Hubbard. He was also one of the most important rocket scientists in history. (Episode 1 of 2) Our Sponsors: * Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: https://www.rosettastone.com/ Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 12 March 2024

Who put the cheese in your stuffed-crust pizza? Or cows on a Caribbean island? And when more than half the world's population can't actually digest milk, is it really essential for a healthy diet? On a trip through time and taste—to dairy-obsessed Bulgaria, colonial Trinidad and Tobago and the ‘Got Milk?’ era—we explore humanity's millennia-long relationship with milk. Listen to Don't Drink the Milk wherever you get your podcasts! https://pod.link/1704462801 Also on YouTube! https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLpBAZYDqAE8nzvIRx2dApgkDi3zkSe3GS Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 16 January 2024

In 1878, two Paris dandies murdered an old woman—and blamed Charles Darwin for their crime. But the wild scandal that followed only solidified Darwin as the greatest scientist of his age... Our Sponsors: * Check out Drizly: https://drizly.com * Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: https://www.rosettastone.com/ Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 14 November 2023

Americans happily ate monosodium glutamate for decades. Then one (possibly fake) letter sparked mass hysteria over “Chinese Restaurant Syndrome”, and the bogus MSG scare was born... Our Sponsors: * Check out Drizly: https://drizly.com * Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: https://www.rosettastone.com/ Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 7 November 2023

Scientists have confirmed five basic human tastes—sweet, salty, bitter, sour, and umami. But is that all? Debate now rages about adding a sixth or seventh or even eighth(!) to the Big Five... Our Sponsors: * Check out Drizly: https://drizly.com Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 31 October 2023

James Mellaart discovered one of the most important archaeological sites ever, Çatalhöyük in Turkey. But his lust for treasure—and a penchant for fraud—led him to throw it all away... Our Sponsors: * Check out Drizly: https://drizly.com * Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: https://www.rosettastone.com/ Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 24 October 2023

He helped launch the British Empire and spawned a public-health epidemic that killed hundreds of millions of people. Blame him for the lost colony of Roanoke, too. Thomas Harriot has a lot to answer for... Our Sponsors: * Check out Drizly: https://drizly.com * Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: https://www.rosettastone.com/ Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 17 October 2023

She helped discover arguably the most important drug in history. And she got zero credit. They called her Moldy Mary—but she turned that insult into triumph... Our Sponsors: * Check out Drizly: https://drizly.com * Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: https://www.rosettastone.com/ Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 10 October 2023

As recent submersible tragedies reveal, it’s harder to reach extreme ocean depths than the Moon. Meet the people who got there first—and barely lived to tell to the tale... Our Sponsors: * Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: https://www.rosettastone.com/ Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 3 October 2023

You wouldn’t think a lanky, awkward balloon geek would inspire Hollywood. But the death-defying Auguste Piccard was a worthy namesake for Jean-Luc Picard of Star Trek fame... Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Transcribed - Published: 26 September 2023