A relaxing trip to Japan turns into an accidental run down a double black diamond, a mathematician solves “impossible” problems because nobody told him they were impossible, and the internet once again decides missing scientists must mean UFOs. This week, we bounce between snowboarding psychology, statistical legend, conspiracy flavoured mystery, gluten confusion, and a concrete dome full of radioactive waste sitting in the Pacific like a problem everyone keeps hoping will stay quiet.
The Double Black Diamond You Did Not Consent To
We start on the snow, with the kind of situation that makes you realise how much of fear is just signage. Will and Rod tell the story of ending up on a slope in Japan that was very much not the gentle cruise they thought they were signing up for. And once you are already on it, you either freeze, fall, or somehow get down.
It is funny, but it also lands on a real idea. Your brain sets limits based on what it thinks is possible. If you do not know something is “too hard”, you sometimes just do it anyway. Not elegantly. Not confidently. But you do it. Which is a useful life lesson, and also a strong argument for not reading the warning labels until after you have survived.
George Dantzig and the Power of Not Knowing the Odds
Then we head into one of the most comforting academic stories ever told. George Dantzig walks into a class late, sees two problems on the board, assumes they are homework, and solves them. Later he finds out they were famous unsolved statistical problems. Which is the nerdiest version of accidentally snowboarding down a nightmare slope and living to tell the tale.
The point is not that ignorance is always good. The point is that expectations are powerful. If everyone tells you something is impossible, you approach it like it is impossible. If you think it is just the next task on the list, you give it a proper crack. Sometimes the difference between “breakthrough” and “never attempted” is just not being warned.
Missing Scientists, UFO Whispers, and America’s Favourite Genre
After that, the mood swings darker, because we get into stories about scientists who have disappeared and the conspiracy ecosystem that grows around cases like that. Add a few military secrets, a few top secret projects, and a few people online who have watched too many documentaries at 2am, and suddenly everything is UFO adjacent.
Are there real mysteries in the world? Yes. Are there real reasons people disappear that have nothing to do with aliens? Also yes. The episode sits in that uncomfortable space where you can acknowledge the strangeness without letting your brain sprint straight into the arms of the most dramatic explanation available.
Gluten, Belief, and the Body Being Annoyingly Suggestible
Then we move into the gluten conundrum, where a lot of people report feeling genuinely awful after eating it, even when they do not have coeliac disease. The science around non coeliac gluten sensitivity is messy, and part of the story may involve expectation and belief shaping physical symptoms. Not “it is all in your head” in a dismissive way. More “your brain and gut are in constant conversation and sometimes the brain is a bit too persuasive”.
It is a reminder that bodies are complicated, diet culture is loud, and medical certainty is not always available on demand. Sometimes the best you can do is test carefully, stay curious, and avoid turning one person’s experience into a universal rule.
The Concrete Dome in the Marshall Islands, and the Problem Under It
Finally, we head into the Pacific, where the legacy of US nuclear testing is still sitting there in physical form. Radioactive waste in the Marshall Islands was sealed under a concrete dome, which sounds like a solution until you remember it is in the ocean, on a planet with rising seas, storms, and time. Lots and lots of time.
It is one of those stories that makes the past feel uncomfortably present. A temporary fix dressed up as a permanent one. A reminder that you can bury consequences, but you cannot delete them.
So that is the week. Accidental courage on a snowboard, accidental genius in a classroom, missing scientists turned into conspiracy content, gluten as a modern mystery, and a radioactive dome that nobody wants to think about too hard. Keep an open mind, keep a sceptical filter, and if possible, check the slope rating before you commit.
CHAPTERS:
00:00 Science Snack Intro
00:43 Snowboarding The Hard Way
02:48 Expectations And Limits
03:16 Dantzig And The Simplex
06:02 Accidental Unsolved Problems
09:26 Never Tell Me The Odds
10:04 Missing General UFO Links
12:52 List Of Scientist Cases
16:28 Politics And FBI Probe
18:07 Conspiracy Dots And Anti Gravity
21:05 Flood The Zone Meteorology Tease
22:10 Hurricanes Go Backwards
23:02 Weather Control Conspiracies
25:02 Meteorologists Under Threat
27:47 Lessons From Misinformation
28:40 Nuclear Tests In Paradise
30:34 Inside The Runit Dome
34:20 Cracks Leaks And Sea Rise
36:57 Good Gluten News
40:19 Gluten Sensitivity Reality Check
42:35 Nocebo FODMAPs And Advice
46:16 Wrap Up
SOURCES:
https://futurism.com/conspiracy-meteorologists-hurricanes
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/07/marjorie-taylor-greene-hurricane-helene
https://futurism.com/space/fbi-investigating-deaths-disappearances-top-scientists
https://futurism.com/space/another-military-ufo-guy-died
https://www.sciencealert.com/this-infamous-radioactive-tomb-is-leaking-and-experts-are-worried
-
[00:00:03] Will: It is time for a little bit of science. I'm will grant an associate professor in science communication at the Australian National University.
[00:00:12] Rod: and I'm Rod Lambert. I'm a 30 year science communication veteran with a mind of a teenage boy.
[00:00:17] Will: and today. Well, we've been at the Beach Large Hadron Collider.
[00:00:22] Rod: Yeah. Drinking in swimming cocktails. In fact, I'm still there. I dunno where you
[00:00:27] Will: are of, uh, isotopes and science and stuff like that. So [00:00:30] rather than giving you our regular pile of science, we've
[00:00:33] Rod: saved you something delicious. We've been scrolling away little snippets throughout the millennium and you're gonna get a bunch of those right now.
[00:00:41] It's gonna be fab.
[00:00:42] Will: Enjoy. So a number of years ago, I was snowboarding in a Japanese resort that was less touristy and popular, so it was a little bit wilder. There was-
[00:00:53] Oh, you went to the hipster one.
[00:00:54] Rod: I, I went
[00:00:55] Will: to
[00:00:55] Rod: the
[00:00:55] Will: hipster one. You
[00:00:58] Rod: weren't like, you weren't like the mainstream kids that go to everywhere. I didn't know that until we [00:01:00] got there.
[00:01:00] I got there and I was like, "Holy shit." Are you sure? Yeah, yeah, I didn't... I was just, my better half said, "Let's go to this one, apparently not as many tourists" When we got there, it was like, that was true. So there was a lot less English. The maps were a little harder to interpret, maybe a little less detailed-
[00:01:12] Will: Okay
[00:01:13] Rod: of the runs. So we're switching around through the trees, we're having a great time, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then we decide, you know, it's time to go back to the only building where they served food Have a nice icy beer, have some katsudon and, um, you know, think about what a great day it was. So we started looking at this not brilliant map for a way back, [00:01:30] and I was like, "Okay, there seem to be two ways from where we are to go back.
[00:01:32] One is long, windy, but
[00:01:34] Will: easier." Ooh.
[00:01:35] Rod: I
[00:01:35] Will: took the path less traveled.
[00:01:37] Rod: Exactly. And one is not long and windy. It's shorter, but it's probably looks a bit steeper, a bit bumpier. There's wolves. There are wolves, uh, giant spiders, and people with laser guns.
[00:01:44] Will: Yeah. Yeah, totally.
[00:01:46] Rod: It was steeper and a bit bumpier,
[00:01:48] Will: and we thought-
[00:01:48] Rod: Yeah, sure.
[00:01:49] Sure ... it's quicker. We'll go down that way. It should be fine. So as we're going down, I was like, "Oh, this is-"
[00:01:52] Will: Collective decision?
[00:01:53] Rod: Yeah.
[00:01:54] Will: Okay.
[00:01:54] Rod: Yeah. Yeah. So we're heading down, and I'm like, "Oh, this is actually really steep, and these aren't bumps. These are [00:02:00] moguls" And for those who are listening about snow, very deliberate bumps that trap you in- And you are
[00:02:03] Will: both snowboarders?
[00:02:04] Rod: We're both snowboarders.
[00:02:05] Will: Yeah.
[00:02:05] Rod: And we're getting down there, and I'm like, "I can just put on my big boy pants, and I'll do it. It's cool." You know? And so I'm doing turns, and I'm not falling over. I'm not landing on my butt. I'm not doing, for you snowboard people, falling leaf, where you just kind of waft down without turning.
[00:02:16] You get to the bottom, I'm like, "This is pretty cool." And then I see a sign that says, "Oh, this is a double black diamond expert run."
[00:02:22] Will: Oh, nice.
[00:02:23] Rod: And I'm like, "I'm-"
[00:02:23] Will: You accidentally did the double black diamond
[00:02:25] Rod: expert. Expert international. International. And I'm like, "
[00:02:28] Will: That's-" Olympic gold medal,
[00:02:29] Rod: you know- [00:02:30] Exactly.
[00:02:30] And that- ...
[00:02:30] Will: murder ...
[00:02:30] Rod: that is not what I am. There's-- That's not me. That's not... I would never classify myself that way. But now
[00:02:35] Will: you are. Yes, of course.
[00:02:36] Rod: No, not at all. I wouldn't afterwards either.
[00:02:37] Will: And then Kurt Cobain was at the bottom.
[00:02:38] Rod: Was he? He wasn't a snowboarder. He died too young. That's what he told me when I met him.
[00:02:42] Will: Oh.
[00:02:42] Rod: Thank you. But I remember clearly thinking, if at the top you'd said to me to go down this, it's a double black diamond, blah, blah, blah, I would've said, "Fuck that. I'm going the other way."
[00:02:49] Will: Indeed.
[00:02:50] Rod: No way in shit I would've done it. So why I'm telling you this is, there's a whole bunch of work in psychology about how we're affected by preexisting expectations of what's possible.
[00:02:58] Will: Yeah. Okay.
[00:02:59] Rod: And there's another [00:03:00] area which is sort of half theoretical and half practical, you know, about upper limits and how we get in our own way about stuff because we think too hard or we worry about stuff, et cetera. And I was recently reminded of this wild and classic case, a guy called George Dantzig.
[00:03:12] Now, not like Glenn Danzig of the famous band Danzig because he's got a T in the name, whereas Glenn Danzig doesn't.
[00:03:17] Will: I don't know either of the people. No, me neither. So tell me more about the George one.
[00:03:19] Rod: So George, he got his PhD in your mathemagics, mathematics, in the first half of the 20th century, early-ish, in towards the middle.
[00:03:26] He joined the US Air Force as a mathematical advisor. [00:03:30] Wow. I know. And this is pre or early World War II. They asked him to work on methods for improving planning processes, to do things like sort out inputs and outputs, people, money, gear, et
[00:03:39] Will: cetera. Oh, that's way more boring than I thought.
[00:03:41] Rod: It really is.
[00:03:42] But the, the idea was to reduce costs, inflict the biggest bang for buck so you could- Okay. Yeah ... you know, maximize stuff. Maximum efficiency, lot of moving parts to maximize efficiency.
[00:03:50] Will: Yeah.
[00:03:50] Rod: It's complicated.
[00:03:50] Will: It's an air force.
[00:03:51] Rod: It is an air force in a time of war.
[00:03:53] Will: Yeah, indeed.
[00:03:54] Rod: So a lot of resources, a lot of shit, a lot of unexpected changes.
[00:03:57] Yeah.
[00:03:57] Will: Maths can help.
[00:03:58] Rod: Maths can help. So his [00:04:00] original example of this, he was aimed to find the best way to assign, apparently 70 people to 70 jobs. I don't have the details.
[00:04:06] Will: 70 people- 70 people to 70 jobs? 70
[00:04:07] Rod: people, 70 jobs.
[00:04:08] Will: Why 70?
[00:04:09] Rod: I don't know. I don't know. I
[00:04:10] Will: mean, I understand why the same number.
[00:04:12] Rod: I don't know.
[00:04:12] For just for some reason, that was one of his early-
[00:04:14] Will: As I was going through some tithes, I met 70 people with 70 jobs- Seven wives ... and 70 wives.
[00:04:19] Rod: Kittens, cat, uh.
[00:04:20] Will: Yeah.
[00:04:21] Rod: How many were going there? Just me.
[00:04:22] Will: Yeah. Wow. That's how you solve maths.
[00:04:24] Rod: Bamby, yeah.
[00:04:24] Will: You just, it's trick questions.
[00:04:25] Rod: Yeah, yeah, you're fucking with me.
[00:04:27] It was the surgeon's daughter The surgeon [00:04:30] was a woman. There is no trolley. So apparently it would take, to actually test every permutation of this would take humongous amounts of computing power. Oh,
[00:04:39] Will: sure.
[00:04:40] Rod: And one source said possib- the number of possible configurations exceeds the number of particles in the universe.
[00:04:45] Will: Sure. Yeah, like 70 times 69 times 68. Well, yeah. Yeah, cool. Your
[00:04:49] Rod: factorials.
[00:04:50] Will: But, but I think surely the normal approach to this is mostly it doesn't matter, like, 'cause half of the jobs, you know, you just put someone in it.
[00:04:58] Rod: I don't know. Just do
[00:04:58] Will: it. And, and
[00:04:59] Rod: just- You can dig a hole, [00:05:00] and you c- also... No, apparently not.
[00:05:01] Apparently there was, there were, there were some, y- your details and- Mm-hmm ... your things. So he got on with it, and by doing this and finding a way to do it well, he pioneered the simplex algorithm.
[00:05:10] Will: Mm-hmm.
[00:05:11] Rod: And I mean, I know you know it, and I know it, but it's the foundation, obviously, of linear programming, right?
[00:05:15] Okay. Yeah. Very complicated. I started to read about it. I was like, I can't get my head around it. Betty had explained it. The bottom line is, like, what does it do? The important thing is what does it do? If you look at the Air Force problem as a linear program and apply us- this simplex algorithm, it takes moments to find the optimum [00:05:30] solution, the best way to allocate resources to get the job done, et cetera.
[00:05:33] That's
[00:05:34] Will: the bottom line. You have 70 workers, it can put them in the, the best way.
[00:05:35] Rod: The best way they should do it, blah, blah, blah, blah. Okay. It drastically reduces the number of possible optimum solutions that need to be checked. So it cuts down the field and goes, "Okay, these are the, these are the ones that are left."
[00:05:45] Will: And that's why America won the war?
[00:05:46] Rod: 100%. This is, that's the end of the story. Great. Next, hit the button. So his method for optimizing the system has become the backbone of all kinds of logistics even today. Modern algorithms do this, from airline routes, delivery networks, et cetera. But it was kept secret till 1947, but [00:06:00] since then, everyone's using it.
[00:06:00] But why does this have to do with snowboarding and being confident beforehand or not knowing the odds? When Dunsink was at grad school in Berkeley, 1939, he's running late for a statistic lecture.
[00:06:10] Will: Mm-hmm.
[00:06:11] Rod: Runs into the room, and he sees the homeb- homework's already been written on the blackboard. So he writes it down, he goes, "Okay, there's two problems to be solved.
[00:06:16] No worries, I'll take 'em home. I'll get onto them." And he thought, "Fuck, they're a bit harder than usual, but that's cool. I'll get into them."
[00:06:21] Will: Ah, okay.
[00:06:22] Rod: So it took him a few days, but he worked them out. He runs in the, when he's finished, and he hands them to his professor, and he was worried that he'd hand them in late.
[00:06:28] So he [00:06:30] apologizes to Neyman, his professor, for taking too long.
[00:06:32] Will: Generally just apologized, fine.
[00:06:33] Rod: Yeah, he's just like, "I'm so sorry. The problems were a little harder than usual," but I asked him if he still wanted the submission. And he said, "Yeah, put it on my desk."
[00:06:39] Will: Yep.
[00:06:40] Rod: He was worried about doing this 'cause apparently his desk was covered in papers and stuff.
[00:06:44] Will: He's a maths professor.
[00:06:44] Rod: Yeah. So he's just like, "Ah, w- but that means I'm gonna be later than ever." And like, "Eh, anyway, I've handed in my assignment." About six weeks later, there's a knock on his door one Sunday morning. He and his wife are woken up like, "Who the fuck's knocking on the door?"
[00:06:55] Will: A maths professor.
[00:06:56] Rod: A maths professor was knocking on his door. Your, your
[00:06:58] Will: work. I, I'm, I'm gonna jump ahead for a [00:07:00] second here. Yeah. It's, it's Good Will Hunting. "Your maths was so good, I had to come and knock on your door on a Sunday morning." This was
[00:07:04] Rod: literally the inspiration for Good Will Hunting.
[00:07:07] Will: I But also, I just gotta pause for a second.
[00:07:12] Yeah. And, and I am someone who marks papers. I've had good papers. I love good student papers, but I have never gone, "You know, I gotta go knock on their door on a Sunday morning."
[00:07:20] Rod: It's 'cause we're not allowed to know where they live. Otherwise- Otherwise ... I would, I would've done it 40 times.
[00:07:23] Will: You
[00:07:24] Rod: Easily. "Hi, I'm here."
[00:07:28] "Why?" That was a really [00:07:30] good essay.
[00:07:31] Will: It was,
[00:07:32] Rod: it was
[00:07:32] Will: so good. Could you go away? You're creeping me out. It was so good. I just-
[00:07:34] Rod: Is your wife here?
[00:07:35] Will: Like, the world has changed. It has. The world, like- Yes ... the idea that you would just go, "Your paper was so good, I've got to wake you up." "
[00:07:42] Rod: Hi." "Hello." "Well done." So apparently he, the reason he turned up, he had the papers in his hand, he said, "I've just written an introduction to one of your papers," this dude had never written any, "Read it through so I can send it out for publication immediately."
[00:07:53] Will: "I'm gonna publish your student essay."
[00:07:55] Rod: Immediately. Immediately. The solution to one of the two problems. 'Cause it turned out the problems on the blackboard [00:08:00] that he'd solved thinking they were homework, were actually two famous unsolved problems in statistics. So- That
[00:08:04] Will: is so The Good Will Hunting. I know.
[00:08:05] Rod: That's
[00:08:05] Will: awesome.
[00:08:06] Rod: That is so- This is exactly
[00:08:07] Will: it. That is awesome. Okay. I'm, I'm happy with that.
[00:08:09] Rod: So Dantzig kind of went, "Huh, there you go." "
[00:08:11] Will: Huh, I can do maths." "
[00:08:13] Rod: Yeah, I'm pretty good at it, stats." A year later, he wasn't sure what to do for his PhD thesis. His supervisor said, "Just put those two solutions together in a binder, we'll call that your PhD."
[00:08:21] Will: Nice.
[00:08:22] Rod: Which is pretty good. So the second paper came out- I would have
[00:08:23] Will: tried to do something new.
[00:08:24] Rod: No, no need.
[00:08:26] Will: It's 90- No, no, generally, as someone who looks after PhD programs, it's nice he did it before. What have you [00:08:30] done for me lately? In the 2020s. What have you done for me lately? Not
[00:08:32] Rod: for you.
[00:08:33] Will: Is the number one question of PhD programs.
[00:08:35] Rod: Of the discipline. It's the discipline. When there, there was, no one knew anything in the 1940s, '30s.
[00:08:39] Will: Yeah, you still gotta do something new.
[00:08:40] Rod: He did.
[00:08:40] Will: What have you done for me lately?
[00:08:42] Rod: He solved those two problems.
[00:08:43] Will: This is why I would be a better supervisor of Good Will Hunting.
[00:08:46] Rod: And maths.
[00:08:46] Will: Yeah.
[00:08:47] Rod: So 1950, the second paper came out for the second problem.
[00:08:50] So there's a maths master called Abraham Wald. He sent a letter with the final proofs of the paper to, uh, a journal called The Annals of Mathematical Statistics. Someone had told him, "Hang on a minute, this dude [00:09:00] Dantzig already did that in his PhD." So he tells Dantzig this is happening, and Dantzig says, "That's cool.
[00:09:05] Why don't we publish it together?" So Wald says, "No worries," just drops his name in as co-author, sends off the proofs, and boom, that's his second paper. So, uh, the accidental homework and him not knowing that these things were unsolved, tricky problems, meant that he didn't think about whether he could or couldn't- That's-
[00:09:20] should or shouldn't, and he said, uh, interview in the '80s, "If I'd known the problems were not homework, but famous unsolved problems, I probably wouldn't have even thought I could do them." Yeah. So [00:09:30] this is why I say, my takeaway from this is the Han Solo approach. Never tell me the odds. So- Just get on with it
[00:09:35] Will: and just stumble your way into Olympic snowboarding. Just-
[00:09:39] Rod: 100% ...
[00:09:39] Will: just accidentally don't know anything, and then just fall down the- And you're like, "I
[00:09:42] Rod: won? I won?"
[00:09:44] Will: I, that is a great story. That is, that is very cool. I do like that concept.
[00:09:48] Rod: The snowboard, but also the maths. That was good, too.
[00:09:50] Will: No, it's very, it's very nice.
[00:09:51] Yeah. Yeah. You
[00:09:51] Rod: know?
[00:09:51] Will: Yeah. Do some hard problems.
[00:09:53] Rod: Just don't-
[00:09:53] Will: And-
[00:09:54] Rod: Don't get, don't let anyone tell
[00:09:56] Will: you whether it's possible ... um, uh, academics and teachers out there, uh, go out and knock on your [00:10:00] students' doors at, uh-
[00:10:01] Rod: On Sunday mornings ... on
[00:10:01] Will: Sunday morning.
[00:10:02] Rod: Early, with a paper in your hand, 'cause that will probably mitigate the disaster that's coming.
[00:10:06]
[00:10:07] Rod: February 27th, this very year, Air Force Major General, brackets retired, William Neil McCasland left his Alba- Albuquerque house with his gun and his wallet-
[00:10:21] Will: Mm-hmm ...
[00:10:22] Rod: and he disappeared. He was an Air Force research lab commander, and he once worked at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, which [00:10:30] apparently or allegedly is steeped in UFO stuff.
[00:10:33] Will: Okay.
[00:10:34] Rod: Um, and just on the side, while he was, uh... One of the people he worked with was a former NASA scientist who went missing in 2025. After he disappeared, his wife gets on the Facebooks.
[00:10:45] Will: Sure.
[00:10:46] Rod: And she says, "It's true that Neil..." She uses his middle name, apparently, so they're a fucking cool couple.
[00:10:50] Will: It's, it's a thing people do.
[00:10:51] Rod: Fucking middle name. I don't. Do you?
[00:10:54] Will: You, you literally announced your n- middle name at the beginning of this podcast.
[00:10:57] Rod: But you don't refer to me by my middle name. You can if you want, but you don't. You [00:11:00] don't remember what it is. So it's true, she says, that Neil had a brief association with the UFO community.
[00:11:04] You're thinking, aren't you?
[00:11:05] Will: Guffit.
[00:11:05] Rod: It's Guffit. Frogs. He had a brief association with the UFO community, but this connection is not a reason for someone to abduct him. No one said abduct, but she did. No. Neal does not have any special knowledge about the ET bodies and debris from the Roswell crash stored at Wright Pat.
[00:11:23] Wright Pat's an air base. No.
[00:11:24] Will: No. Okay.
[00:11:25] Rod: She's just saying. She's just saying.
[00:11:27] Will: She's saying. He worked there, but he was in a different [00:11:30] department from all of the alien stuff that was
[00:11:31] Rod: there. Yeah, and it was only brief and whatever. Like, back off. Back off. By March of 2026, so a month later, the FBI had joined the search for the general.
[00:11:39] Will: Yep.
[00:11:40] Rod: You worried yet?
[00:11:41] Will: No.
[00:11:42] Rod: Me
[00:11:42] Will: neither. No, I wanna know. I mean, I'd be worried if I was emotionally connected to him, but you, you haven't given me enough to care.
[00:11:48] Rod: I'm not going to.
[00:11:49] Will: Okay.
[00:11:50] Rod: You gotta work out what you care about on your own, man. It's about time. You're 28 years old. Conspiracy theorists started to go, you know, bug fuck crazy, 'cause there was no doubt the FBI coming in was evidence that [00:12:00] this was foul play.
[00:12:01] Will: Mm.
[00:12:01] Rod: Not that he just happened to wander off or whatever.
[00:12:02] Will: Uh, no, it's a general. I think, uh- He
[00:12:04] Rod: is a gen- a retired general.
[00:12:06] Will: Oh, yeah, that's true.
[00:12:07] Rod: They don't yawn a lot, so their cerebrospinal fluid goes in all directions. Um, it turns out both Caslen and the missing NASA scientist are among cases being investigated for potential connections to each other.
[00:12:20] So these are just two of them, and in fact, it's just been announced, I mean, literally just been announced very recently, this very month, the FBI is looking for any connections among the recent deaths and disappearances [00:12:30] of at least 10 scientists who had ties to government science projects or other sensitive information.
[00:12:35] Will: Wow. Wow.
[00:12:38] Rod: Yeah, I know, right?
[00:12:38] Will: Wow.
[00:12:39] Rod: Is your spine tingling? Are you scared?
[00:12:40] Will: Kinda. I mean- Are
[00:12:41] Rod: you a bit worried?
[00:12:41] Will: I, uh, yeah, I'm, I'm sorry for them individually, of course.
[00:12:44] Rod: Are
[00:12:44] Will: you? Uh, yes. No, absolutely. I
[00:12:46] Rod: thought you weren't emotionally invested.
[00:12:47] Will: No, I am. No, no, I very much am. But, but- ... th- there is a moment where you go, "Oh, we're living in a movie.
[00:12:53] This is, this is-
[00:12:53] Rod: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. So here are some of them: July 2023, a NASA JPL, Jet Propulsion Lab, [00:13:00] scientist, Michael David Hicks, he studied comets and asteroids, died of a still unknown cause.
[00:13:06] Will: Okay.
[00:13:08] Rod: 2024, Frank Maiwald died. Couldn't find out how. He was a JPL aff- uh, affiliated space research specialist who did papers on things like mass spectrometry and remote sensing instruments.
[00:13:20] Will: Hmm. Okay. I mean, these are, these are just scientists. Like,
[00:13:24] Rod: okay. Just the facts, man. Just the facts.
[00:13:25] Will: Yeah.
[00:13:25] Rod: 2025, Monica Reza, was a, she's a metallurgist and materials engineer [00:13:30] at JPL again.
[00:13:31] Will: Yeah.
[00:13:31] Rod: Disappeared while hiking in Los Angeles.
[00:13:33] Will: Sure, that happens.
[00:13:34] Rod: It does. Um, also December of that year, '25, Nuno Lo- IIRAIRA, it's a name, theoretical physicist and director of MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center, murdered in his home in Massachusetts.
[00:13:48] Will: Oh.
[00:13:51] Rod: 2026 February, uh, other than our General McCasland, Carl Grillmair was a Caltech astronomer who studied distant exoplanets, shot and killed outside his [00:14:00] home near LA. April 6 this year-
[00:14:03] Will: I mean, I'm, uh, look, I am-
[00:14:06] Rod: Just giving you some facts ...
[00:14:07] Will: you know, I, and I wanna hear the rest. I just, I just, there, there is a chunk of violence in America that I, I, I kinda feel like-
[00:14:12] Rod: That's
[00:14:12] Will: just what happens
[00:14:13] this is just the norm
[00:14:13] Rod: People just get shot and shit?
[00:14:14] Will: Yeah.
[00:14:15] Rod: It's hard to say. Uh, that's America. April 20-- A- April 6 this year, Nick Pope, he dies at the age of 60 from esophageal cancer. So who gives a shit? He was in the UK, but whatever. Um, and it was just cancer. But-
[00:14:29] Will: What, [00:14:30] wh- why would you say all those things?
[00:14:31] But anyway ... '
[00:14:31] Rod: cause it's like, who, why would you bring him up? He's just some guy- Yeah ... in the UK and was cancerous, and he was 60. It's like, well, okay. But it turns out he had investigated, uh, unexplained aerial phenomena on behalf of the UK's Ministry of Defence.
[00:14:43] Will: Mm.
[00:14:43] Rod: Wrote books on UFO sightings, countless TV appearances.
[00:14:47] Will: I didn't think you could say countless books.
[00:14:48] Rod: Countless books. Might be, I don't know how many. Let's say six.
[00:14:51] Will: It's, it's a lot- Six ... to get to countless books. Countless-
[00:14:54] Rod: That
[00:14:54] Will: is a fuckload of books ... like, I feel like-
[00:14:55] Rod: How many?
[00:14:55] Will: Oh, no, 800 ... there's too many books if you
[00:14:59] Rod: have to countless. 800. 900.
[00:14:59] Will: You're not [00:15:00] taking care.
[00:15:00] No. Like, if you have countless children, like, that's not good. That's, that's not good.
[00:15:04] Rod: Even Elon can count... Oh, maybe.
[00:15:06] Will: No, Elon doesn't know.
[00:15:07] Rod: He doesn't know. So yeah, lots of these TV appearances. He likened himself in his, um, autobiography back in '96, called "Open Skies and Closed Minds", he likened himself to Fox Mulder from, you know- Yeah, sure
[00:15:18] "The X Files"- Sure ... obviously. And he's apparently, this is the, quote, "Much fêted speaker on the ufology lecture circuit." So he was in the, in the game. Now, I'm not sure if he's part of the FBI's ongoing investigation, [00:15:30] but it smells like he might be.
[00:15:31] Will: Mm-hmm.
[00:15:32] Rod: So his, uh, high-profile involvement into these unexplained sightings is something that, let's say, certain types of folks might connect with the other ones I've mentioned.
[00:15:42] But of course, there's nothing to see here, right? There's nothing to see. This is just coincidence. Americans get shot, people disappear. Do
[00:15:47] Will: you, I mean, how many people are we talking in the comm- I, I j- I j- I, I get having a pattern here. Like, um-
[00:15:52] Rod: Sure ...
[00:15:53] Will: so th- there's a very similar thing, and I talked to you about it a little while ago.
[00:15:56] Um, the, it's a great Wikipedia page, the pattern of [00:16:00] mysterious deaths in Russia.
[00:16:01] Rod: Yeah.
[00:16:01] Will: Um, you know, where a lot of, lot of
[00:16:03] Rod: people- Defenestration ... yeah. All defenestration.
[00:16:05] Will: Yeah, falling out of a window- Yeah ... when they're quite close to Putin.
[00:16:08] Rod: So they're into UFOs too?
[00:16:11] Will: But we can say there's a pattern there.
[00:16:14] Rod: But maybe there isn't, right?
[00:16:15] Will: But I don't know, it's just, it also depends on the size of community we're talking about and like- Absolutely. It's
[00:16:19] Rod: like you say, nothing to
[00:16:20] Will: see here, right? Like- Nothing to see here ... if there's, if there's 100,000 UFO researchers in the US- Mm ... what's the, what's the death rate in that anyway?
[00:16:26] Rod: Seven.
[00:16:27] Will: Sure.
[00:16:27] Rod: There's 10.
[00:16:28] Will: Hmm. [00:16:30]
[00:16:30] Rod: Look, so yeah, you're right. Again, nothing to see here. Oh, although, so these case, cases were highlighted by Donald Trump and Republican lawmakers.
[00:16:36] Will: Oh, okay.
[00:16:37] Rod: Huh? And the r- the lawmakers suggested there could be a possible sinister connection between a string of mysterious deaths and disappearances-
[00:16:43] Will: Oh, okay
[00:16:44] Rod: which could represent a grave threat to US national security and to US personnel with access to scientific secrets.
[00:16:50] Will: Wow.
[00:16:50] Rod: Huh?
[00:16:51] Will: Mm.
[00:16:52] Rod: A couple of weeks ago, the House Oversight Committee, they pointed to reports alleging that at least 10 individuals who had a connection to US secret, [00:17:00] uh, US nuclear secrets or rocket tech have died or mysteriously vanished in recent years.
[00:17:05] Will: Mm.
[00:17:06] Rod: And they announced it was seeking information from the Department of Energy, Department of War, the FBI, and NASA about the scientists and other personnel connected to US nuclear secrets or rocket tech who have died or mysteriously vanished in recent years.
[00:17:21] Will: We've jumped from UFOs to, uh, energy and rocket tech, where I can, I can imagine-
[00:17:26] Rod: UFOs
[00:17:27] Will: Just to pause. Mm. Just to pause. Like, [00:17:30] uh, an opposing military might go, "Okay, if we can slow down their top scientist in-
[00:17:35] Rod: Sure ...
[00:17:35] Will: in, in a rocket or something like that."
[00:17:38] Rod: It's all connected, man.
[00:17:39] Will: I- UFOs.
[00:17:40] Rod: UFOs.
[00:17:40] Will: No, but I can give like a defense-based purpose for that. Like, you know- You could ... you imagine a rival, China or whatever, Russia, they're like, "Okay, let's, America's about to develop this new secret laser death weapon."
[00:17:52] Sure. "And, and it's all in the mind of scientist X." Let's
[00:17:55] Rod: kill some
[00:17:55] Will: of them. "Let's... Scientist..." Yeah, definitely.
[00:17:56] Rod: Or disappear them.
[00:17:57] Will: Yeah, exactly. Fine, but I think [00:18:00] who's the, what's the UFO motive here?
[00:18:02] Rod: You gotta remember also the FBI is spearheading the effort to look for the connections-
[00:18:06] Will: Yeah ...
[00:18:06] Rod: into the missing scientists, and that's from their own statement.
[00:18:09] Okay. They're spearheading it. So let's take a deep breath.
[00:18:12] Will: I have.
[00:18:13] Rod: And yawn.
[00:18:13] Will: I've well, well deep breathed.
[00:18:15] Rod: You do. What do we actually know? We know the nature of their jobs was connected, or at least connectable.
[00:18:22] Will: Connectable.
[00:18:22] Rod: Um, that's my language. Connectable. You, you could connect them.
[00:18:25] Will: Like, like in this modern world, like-
[00:18:28] Rod: What isn't?
[00:18:29] Will: Indeed.
[00:18:29] Rod: [00:18:30] For aren't we all? Uh, we know a bunch of them, but not all of them died of natural causes or at least seem to. And none of the incidents occurred before 2022. Or another way of putting that is after 2022.
[00:18:44] Will: I mean, by definition, you're looking at some incidents that- Join the dots, man ... occurred after 2022.
[00:18:48] Let's not look at incidents in 2020. Like-
[00:18:50] Rod: No, join the dots, man.
[00:18:51] Will: Join some dots that I've put in a circle for you. I'm, I'm- Join
[00:18:54] Rod: the dots, man ... I'm
[00:18:55] Will: making s- Jesus.
[00:18:57] Rod: I mean, it's all laying itself out now, right?
[00:18:59] Will: I, I'm [00:19:00] just not good at conspiracy theories. Like, I'm just-
[00:19:02] Rod: You're not suspicious enough. You think everyone's good.
[00:19:04] Will: I, I kinda do.
[00:19:06] Rod: They're going to say, "It seems there's no credible evidence of any foul play that connects these deaths and disappearances." Regardless, the list, according to conspiracy theory people, it keeps on growing. It's not just the 10. Like just recently, the Daily Mail in the UK, the, you know, the, uh, newspaper of record for this, they reckon they found the 11th person.
[00:19:25] Okay,
[00:19:25] Will: okay.
[00:19:26] Rod: And also a UFO-linked scientist. 2022, [00:19:30] 34-year-old Amy Eskridge died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. How was she connected? She'd been investigating anti-gravity technology.
[00:19:38] Will: Oh, anti-gravity technology. I
[00:19:39] Rod: know. I know.
[00:19:41] Will: Look, I don't want to be that guy. I don't want to be that guy, but I would say there must be some sort of correlation between- Yeah
[00:19:51] people investigating- There is ... things that, um, most normal physics would say, "No, that's not a thing."
[00:19:58] Rod: Yeah.
[00:19:59] Will: And, you [00:20:00] know-
[00:20:00] Rod: And the, and the truth ...
[00:20:00] Will: and, and, no, and potential unstable mind.
[00:20:05] Rod: The truth. You're such a hater. You used to- I
[00:20:08] Will: don't wanna be mean here,
[00:20:09] Rod: but- You used to believe in
[00:20:10] Will: people. I don't wanna be mean.
[00:20:11] Rod: And by used to, I mean a minute and a half ago, you believed in people. Obviously, in some way, it's, it's obviously all coincidences, right? It's all coincidence. Yeah. It's what they want you to think.
[00:20:21] Will: Oh, God.
[00:20:22] Rod: It's what they want you to think. And honestly, I was almost too nervous to bring you this story.
[00:20:26] Will: Yeah, you're gonna get assassinated now because you talked about- Or I
[00:20:28] Rod: could disappear with my gun [00:20:30] and my passport
[00:20:30] Will: you talked about... Like, look, come, come back when there's 12, and then I'll be-
[00:20:34] Rod: I reckon that could be, like, next week.
[00:20:35] Will: No, I just, I just, they're not in a community. Like you said, there's some rocket people, and there's some- You can't tell them how to identify ... exobiologists-
[00:20:42] Rod: Maybe
[00:20:42] Will: there are ... and there's some UFO people.
[00:20:44] Rod: And anti-gravity.
[00:20:45] Will: And anti-gravity people are
[00:20:47] Rod: And the pommy guy who-
[00:20:48] Will: So- ... socks Moulder ... so, so, so what we've got here, a bunch of scientists and a bunch of pseudo-scientists-
[00:20:55] Rod: And a general ...
[00:20:56] Will: have died or disappeared.
[00:20:58] Rod: Yes. [00:21:00] It'll, it... See, when you put it that way, you can see it, right? You can see it. It all makes sense.
[00:21:07]
[00:21:09] Rod: Anyone who gets any news knows that there's been a bunch of your higher MAGA faithfuls That have been abandoning the dear leader. Tucker Carlson, he's the-- my favorite latest one. Tucker Carlson is, uh, renouncing and apologizing for having voted for the denoir Trump, and a close second is, I think for me, Marjorie Taylor Greene, good old MTG.
[00:21:29] And some of the [00:21:30] mainstream and social media's giving them all these props, like, "Good for you," you know, "You've seen the light," et cetera, et cetera. I get it, but I also say, "Well, get fucked because, you know, you backed an idiot and you've been trouble, and you supported evil forever." Also, you remember Steve Bannon famously spoke about flooding the zone with shit as a deliberate tactic to keep people off balance, to distract from their actual agendas and all that sort of good stuff, and we know pretty damn well it works.
[00:21:55] So I thought I'd give us a quick reminder of one part of that shit zone from the [00:22:00] past, which bizarrely focuses on the noble, unimpeachable science of meteorology. Okay, I promised a time trip, a time travel trip, back, back in history. We're gonna go back to twenty twenty-four. Ah. Four, four, four. So it was a horrible American hurricane season in twenty twenty-four.
[00:22:18] Will: Oh, yeah.
[00:22:19] Rod: And two of the biggies, Helene and Milton, two separate hurricanes. They weren't related. Milton was unusually big, long, and strong. [00:22:30] It was-- it's also, it was kinda wrong, like it moved in the wrong direction. So it went from, it formed- Was it like a
[00:22:35] Will: backwards hurricane
[00:22:36] Rod: or was it like a- Yeah, yeah, it spun.
[00:22:36] No, it, it, it moved from the west to the east. So it formed in the west across the Gulf and moved to the east, which is very rare for a hurricane. Very unusual. That's unusual. So that was odd. So the bottom line, according to climate scientists, I'll paraphrase the ninety million reports, "Warmer oceans make for more powerful and destructive storms and more chaotic weather patterns."
[00:22:54] And
[00:22:54] Will: also backwards.
[00:22:55] Rod: And backwards storms.
[00:22:55] Will: And also backwards. Like
[00:22:56] Rod: Or, or more
[00:22:57] Will: ts- I mean, more powerful and more, more chaotic. I, I, I [00:23:00] think we've heard that before. Yeah, yeah. That's good, but, but also backwards. That
[00:23:03] Rod: would be- Also, they're gonna go in the wrong direction. So conspiracy theorists, of course, worked out what was really going on here.
[00:23:09] Will: How did they help?
[00:23:10] Rod: Well, for starters, they picked up that it was a, a collusion among dark government forces, obviously. It would appear they can control the weather.
[00:23:16] Will: Yeah, y- yeah.
[00:23:18] Rod: So after Helene, and a bit more after Milton, Marjorie Taylor Greene was one of the leading dumbs, and she said on X, "Yes, they can control the weather.
[00:23:25] It's ridiculous for anyone to lie and say it can't be done." So proof positive. And there's also [00:23:30] apparently theories like this. So in October in the US, bird migration is really big.
[00:23:34] Will: Sure.
[00:23:35] Rod: And it causes some of the weather radar images to be all fuzzy.
[00:23:39] Will: Oh, right. Okay.
[00:23:40] Rod: So in twenty twenty-four, conspiracy theorists said, "Oh, well, obviously the fuzzy images were caused by lasers heating up the atmosphere to create hurricanes."
[00:23:48] So they are making bad weather- Mm. And controlling it. But also, not only can they, but they also refuse to control it. Apparently, you can fix hurricanes and things like this by doing stuff like, and this is one, one argument was, "The [00:24:00] government used chemtrails to spray our skies with chemicals to steer Helene into the mountains of North Carolina."
[00:24:05] Will: That would be great. Like-
[00:24:07] Rod: Amazing.
[00:24:07] Will: Like steer it into the mountains, except for the people that live in the mountains.
[00:24:10] Rod: Yeah, and the birds.
[00:24:13] Will: But I do like-- I mean, I've heard before, uh, well, I think we've talked in the past about, you know, government attempts to use a nuke to stop a hurricane or something. But I like to steer it, you know- Steer it
[00:24:20] we're, we're doing a more gentle thing here. Steer it. This is, this is more a nurse and yoke situation.
[00:24:24] Rod: It really is. It's like, "Come along, come along." Um, giant fans is another one. Should use giant fans. And as you [00:24:30] mentioned, very popular in America, in any large, you know, military force, overwhelming force like snuff out a hurricane using a nuke.
[00:24:37] But they chose not to- Yeah ... obviously. So we got a, a bunch of quotes. Some of these come from Rolling Stone magazine. So meteorologist Matthew Cappucci, he said, "Look, the idea that we can even influence something that big, never mind direct it, is so outlandish, it's almost sadly funny."
[00:24:53] Will: Yeah. '
[00:24:54] Rod: Cause an average hurricane's life cycle burns through the energy of about ten thousand nuclear bombs.
[00:24:59] Will: Sure. [00:25:00] But we've got that many.
[00:25:01] Rod: Probably do, but that's only one storm.
[00:25:04] Will: Yeah. Okay.
[00:25:05] Rod: Even back in '24, meteorologists had heard all the climate change conspiracy and denial theories around. But this one got a bit different 'cause according to Cappucci, apparently overnight, ideas that once would've been ridiculed as, as fringe, outlandish, crazy, are suddenly becoming mainstream and was making his job a lot more difficult.
[00:25:22] Will: Oh, yeah.
[00:25:23] Rod: Which isn't good. "People are just so far gone," he says, "it's honestly making me lose all faith in humanity." So [00:25:30] he's having a bad time at work-
[00:25:31] Will: Okay ...
[00:25:32] Rod: in the past. Um, so there, there started to be reports of meteorologists getting insane messages, a lot of them over X, AKA Twitter. They were getting messages.
[00:25:41] They were kept-- They were being subjected, they say, to a deluge of harassment, misinformation riddled retorts, and even outright death threats.
[00:25:48] Will: Yeah.
[00:25:49] Rod: So you may remember this, the meteorologist getting death threats. "Stop lying about the government controlling the weather," that people would say, "or else." Or else.
[00:25:59] So this [00:26:00] meteorologist, Katie Nickolaus. So on Twitter, she corrected a bloke who said, "Category five hurricanes can turn into category six, at which point it becomes a tornado."
[00:26:09] Will: Oh, okay. I'm not sure that's the same thing.
[00:26:12] Rod: No. None, none of that's right.
[00:26:14] Will: Yeah.
[00:26:14] Rod: There apparently she says-- she corrects him. There are-- "These are different storms with different processes.
[00:26:21] Though hurricanes can produce tornadoes, it doesn't affect the overall category rating." Like it makes no sense- Okay ... to rate them higher. Pretty innocuous [00:26:30] pushback.
[00:26:30] Will: Yep.
[00:26:31] Rod: She goes on to say, "Anything above a Category 5 would be a tornado." That's not true either. Nickolaus tweeted, "Listen, if you keep saying this sort of stuff, I'm gonna scream into an abyss."
[00:26:39] So she was getting shitty. So after she'd been interviewed by Rolling Stone, someone messaged her, it looked like on Twitter, "Stop the breathing of those that made them and their affiliates," referring to the people who are creating hurricanes and trying to- Stop
[00:26:52] Will: the breathing.
[00:26:53] Rod: Stop the breathing So she replies, "Murdering meteorologists won't stop hurricanes.
[00:26:59] I can't believe I just had [00:27:00] to type that." Anyway, Capucci goes back, back to our, our man Capucci, "Nowadays, there's so much bad information out there that if we spent our time getting rid of it, we'd have no more time to do anything else." So one of the big problems they say is people won't believe or they'll misunderstand the warnings or the potential danger.
[00:27:17] They'll hear it and go, "That's just bullshit," so they'll stay. And of course, they don't trust the experts who are advising them, and that's increasing. So God, we were dumb in the past 'cause we fixed that. That was 2024. Now- [00:27:30] Now ... I, I think we're fine 'cause we haven't had another one of those hurricanes, I don't think.
[00:27:34] So climate's fine and, um, yeah, it's all good.
[00:27:42] The past is another country.
[00:27:43] Will: Oh my God. Okay.
[00:27:50] Rod: So what do you take away from this? Um, here's what I take away. There is no science expertise that's safe from danger 'cause MAGA's huge success at flooding the zone full of shit. It's just-- There's [00:28:00] no way to... You can't help it. If they're gonna pick on meteorologists, they're gonna pick on anyone.
[00:28:05] Will: Really?
[00:28:05] Rod: Really.
[00:28:05] Will: Making rockets?
[00:28:07] Rod: What do you mean making rockets?
[00:28:08] Will: Or the science of extracting money from the Earth?
[00:28:13] Rod: They're still not safe. For some reason, they'll be like, "One of your children is identifying differently, and we'll have them destroyed." Suddenly, all physics is dead. There's also no limit to what motivated and angry and disenfranchised people will believe in, obviously, if it aligns with their bigger fears, and literally even when it [00:28:30] puts them or others or loved ones literally in the path of a hurricane.
[00:28:34] I mean, that's pretty extreme. That's a bunch of my takeaways from this story, and there are probably 20 more, but you know, listeners can dial in and tell us about that.
[00:28:42]
[00:28:44] Rod: Of the 67 nuclear bomb tests that the US conducted in the Marshall Islands back in the '40s and '50s I love how many they did Fucking so many Like, like they did so many 67 No, no, no, but that's just in the Marshall Islands That's, that's just there, yeah Like, like if ... There, there's a [00:29:00] great website I remember seeing years ago that did, did a, like a bomb going off ev- every second or something to represent all the tests.
[00:29:06] Will: Oh, it's terrible. And it goes so long, so hard. Yeah Like, they, they did so many tests. Yeah, you had to go to bed, come back, and watch And it's like, what are you demonstrating here? They keep going boom. Yeah. They keep going boom. But this is the early days of that, so they didn't quite know yet. Yeah. But I reckon, um, none of these, they, they all had names, but my favorite name, the most apt name I think was the one called Cactus.
[00:29:27] Cactus? Yeah. And for your- Now, what, what are you calling a, [00:29:30] a nuclear bomb test? Detonating, in the air, a bomb. No, don't ... Give it a name. Cactus. Oh. I'd, I'd call it, like, Keith, Neville, and Jacinta. No, absolutely. Yeah. No, yes, absolutely. Mr. Bomb. Mr. Bomb. Actually, the biggest one ever is Tsar Bomba. Tsar Bomba. Like, as in, like, Tsar, you know, the Russian king.
[00:29:51] Rod: Oh, Tsar. I thought you were doing like Jar Jar Binks. Tsar. Yeah, you, you just couldn't hear it through the microphone. Tsar. I thought you were doing Jar Jar Binks. Tsar Bomba. Indeed, that's what, how they pronounce- A bigger boomba, [00:30:00] Tsar Bomba ... that's how Stalin pronounced it. He's like- Can you imagine ... "We're making a Tsar Bomba" "Weesa gonna make a bigger boom boom."
[00:30:07] No, Mr. Stalin. I don't know if Jar Jar Binks worked for Stalin, but I like that universe. He might as well. There, there is one universe somewhere where- He's pretty fucking evil. He might as well have worked for Stalin. Anyway, look, this one was called Cactus, and for younger or non-Australian listeners, cactus is a slang in this country for a thing or a situation- It's cactus
[00:30:25] totally fucked. So most estimates put the Hiroshima bomb, Hiroshima, [00:30:30] at 15 kilotons. Cactus was about 18. All right. It's a fair bit. But, but a baby on the ba- on the scale. Like- Oh, yeah, they're much bigger. But this was let off on Runit Island in the Marshall Islands, and I'm gonna show you a little picture.
[00:30:42] Will: Oh, Marshall Islands, one of those beautiful atolls, like a, like- This is a little atoll. Well, this is one of the many atolls ... edge, e- little islands on a, on a, like a, a, a, the edge of a circle sort of thing On the edge of a circle, exactly. Yeah. The diameter of a circle, and this one you can see two points listed there.
[00:30:55] Rod: They're about 20 Ks apart. Yeah, yeah. So it's not huge. It's not huge. You try swimming across? No. [00:31:00] No. I wouldn't- So there you go ... I, I wouldn't walk that far. So there you go. I'm not saying ... I'm not, I'm not, I'm not dissing their island. It's wonderful. It's wonderful. But it's not huge in, in the context of letting off a bomb, the nuclear.
[00:31:14] As they- They call it in La France ... as they call it in the, uh, in the situation room in the White House. Um, so the mushroom cloud went six kilometers into the sky. Mm-hmm. Which is a fair bit. So once it had settled down, at least a bit, but not a lot I don't think, the US military with a [00:31:30] bunch of locals in basically gumboots and tank tops- Go-go locals.
[00:31:33] Yeah. "Get in there, we'll give you money, real American dollars. We're gonna clean it up a bit. We're gonna fill the 10-meter deep cactus crater with contaminated soil and other bits of stuff that came from it." Yeah, I think. Sure. Put ... You know, clean up after yourself. So by the time they'd finished testing, not just the cactus, but all these others in the area, there were about, this is great, 120,000 tons of tainted material that ended up being dumped in the cactus crater.
[00:31:56] Will: Okay. That's all though. That's all. Okay. Uh, including lethal [00:32:00] quantities of plutonium 239. Sure. Which has a half-life of, wanna have a crack? Four million years. You're close. 24,000. Okay. Pretty much human lifespan. Yeah, yeah. One or two generations. So then we get to 1977 and 1980, in between those years they decided they needed to do more than just pop this into a little crater, so they built the Runnit Dome- Mm-hmm
[00:32:21] Rod: as a temporary solution, in huge air quotes. 115 meters across. It's a big fucking dome. Here's how elaborate it was. There's like one, [00:32:30] two, three, four, five, six, seven, technically eight layers to this dome- Whoa ... and the blow, the blower part makes it look like some kind of- So this is like there's a crater and they've covered w- covered the- They've done all those things.
[00:32:40] There's edging materials, there's- With a compact, uh ... Like, wow, what even is that? Very elaborate, right? Different bits of concrete? Mm. It's like concrete on concrete. And w- it's basically eight layers of concrete. Yeah, with a bit of metal and stuff. Oh, yeah, okay. Bit of metal. It's fucking huge. I mean, if you look at that top photo, those tiny little dots on it are people.
[00:32:57] It's big. No, I can't see those people. [00:33:00] Exactly. Tiny little dots you'll see just. You need your glasses. And that's what it looks like in its natural environment. So anyway, look, it's, it's quite an idyllic thing. The, the thing's huge. It's 115 meters across. Like, there's a lot to it. Yeah. So, um, thanks for your service.
[00:33:14] They built the crater. It's done. They've done the dome. It's concrete over. All sweet. Problem fixed. Yeah. But underneath the crater is a bit of what the, what we would call your porous coral sediment. Porous is a pretty important word. Yeah, I think so. Okay. That part of the crater is unlined. [00:33:30] There's all these layers, but it's not basically well lined at that level, because why would you?
[00:33:35] Groundwater can creep in a little bit. There's ground ocean, surely. Yeah? No, when-- You with your atolls, this is unrelated, but I knew this from my Pacific times. Yeah. You get that, what they call freshwater lenses- Oh ... that sit underneath atolls- Oh ... but on top of the saltwater. Oh. So they actually separate out.
[00:33:51] So you get freshwater underground. Listener, I just bloody learned something. This is by the way. Oh my God. The f- Free bit of fact there on a little bit of science ... [00:34:00] I forgot that I knew that. Ah. It's things you pick up. Freshwater lenses, but they slowly get thinner, and things go wrong. Or, or people who didn't realize any better would poo into that water because they'd dig a hole to do a poo and then didn't realize they were poo-ing in the lens water.
[00:34:13] That's another story. So anyway, this porous coral sediment would allow water in, but only groundwater just a little bit, just to that level. No big deal. 2018, Columbia University chemist, uh, Ivana Nikolic Hughes, you would've guessed that, I [00:34:30] know, had been involved in an ongoing research looking at the persistent contamination of nuclear stuff in the Marshall Islands, and she saw firsthand the dome's a bit cracked.
[00:34:40] Will: What? Bit cracked. Let's not get hysterical. Also found elevated radiation levels and significant quantities of five different radionuclear, nu- radionuclides in soil samples from the island at just outside the dome. Could be because of leaks, or it could just be, [00:35:00] the result of haphazard nature of cleanup efforts, which also resulted in much of the waste being dumped into the lagoon.
[00:35:07] Yeah. Uh, huh. It, it looks idyllic, but maybe the glowing blue is- Yeah. Hmm. So that was 2018. Then in 2020, Los Angeles Times did a big report, and it got people a bit jazzed up It's all cool though because a marine radioactivity expert, a guy from Woods Hole Institute, Ken Buesseler, he says, "Look, radioactive leaks from the Runit Dome are relatively [00:35:30] small.
[00:35:30] Rod: So calm down." There's some leakage, but as he puts it, "As long as the plutonium stays under the dome, it won't be a large new source of radiation in the Pacific Ocean." Okay. Calm the fuck down. Fair enough. Yeah, calm down. Oh, he also says on groundwater, "A lot depends on future sea level rise and how things like storms and seasonal high tides affect the flow of water in and out of the dome."
[00:35:56] Will: Yeah. "It's a small source right now, but we need to [00:36:00] monitor it more regularly to understand what's happening, get the data directly to the affected communities in the region." So he's going, "Yeah, look, it could get worse." I mean, they're obviously seeing climate change, et cetera. I mean, most of this island is just two meters above sea level, and what I love is get the data to the affected communities.
[00:36:17] Rod: We're talking super remote places of- Yeah ... small lumps of people, a few hundred people. You can imagine going, "Oh, here's some data. You might wanna know you're living in a, in a dangerous situation where radioactivity might be floating around you. You should [00:36:30] leave." It's also not just get the data, but maybe you could help.
[00:36:33] You could help. You, you could, you could offer- Yeah ... to say, "We might have done some bad things here." Yeah. Oops. I, I'm thinking it's time to rescind the temporary status of that dome because it was considered temporary. It's 50 years later. Ah. Maybe do something. But of course- Should've got the, should've got the Romans to make the concrete.
[00:36:50] Should have, exactly. I don't think that would help if it cracked, sea water. Anyway, look, of course it would be extremely expensive, very difficult, resource intensive, et cetera, et cetera. But [00:37:00] anyway, so there you go. There's your good news story
[00:37:01]
[00:37:02] Rod: Good gluten news. K- kinda. Yay, yay, yay. Everyone, everyone loves gluten. Even the people that, you know, hate gluten or gluten does bad things to them say, like- We always love the things we hate. Yeah, exactly. Or they hate us. I, I want some me some more gluten. I was at a, a restaurant ages ago with a buddy of mine when the gluten-free thing was becoming large, and this woman...
[00:37:21] ordering pizzas, and this waitress, she says, "Oh, would you like that gluten-free?" Or, you know. Yeah. And he goes, "Could I have one with extra gluten?" Extra gluten. And I started laughing 'cause I thought, "What would, what would that look like?" [00:37:30] It's more pizza base on top. Like, it's- Just bread it up harder. I know.
[00:37:33] Will: It's like, what's-m-ca- what's the, what's the Turkish one? A pide or something like that. Yeah, you wrap the- Like seven layers. You put more of the base on top. Turducken pizza base sandwich. It's a sandwich. Like a... yeah. Calzone. Yeah. It's calzone. Calzone is extra gluten pizza. We've solved it. We didn't even know we were gonna solve a problem.
[00:37:50] Rod: So anyway, um, it's fair to say that depending on what news you follow, you know, what influences health people, et cetera, you may have at least at times in your life been a bit glary, uh, wary of gluten. Yeah. And I went through it years ago, [00:38:00] decades. My naturopath- You were the first. I was the first. You were the first to go gluten-free.
[00:38:03] I might have been second. You invented it. I might have been second. It was me. Anyway, that's my story. Good news. I'm the inventor. No, I went through it 'cause I just, I, I, I'm always interested by this 'cause yeah, so I go to my naturopath, you know, this, this was a while ago, decades. He asked me a bunch of things about my, you know, stomach-ular- Yeah
[00:38:19] situation. And why are you wearing such hippy pants? And you're like, "I, I make them." Yeah, I make them. "Would you like to buy some?" Yeah, I'll sell them. I'll swap them for services. You get six pairs of pants. Yeah, I'm in the barter economy. And a goat. Not alive, [00:38:30] but hasn't been dead long. He asked me questions about bloating, bowel motions, et cetera.
[00:38:33] At one point he says to me, "Well, how often do you fart?" And I said, "Oh, I don't know, three to five." And he goes, "A day? That's not very much." So I went, "An hour." Yeah. And then you said, "I don't have any magic underpants yet that- I don't ... count my farts." But his face went like, 'cause he literally went, "Per day? N- that's not much."
[00:38:47] And I went, "An hour." And he looks at me and he goes, "Ha. Well, you're farting too much, so-" Do doctors say that? Naturopaths. That sounds a bit- Naturopaths ... judgey folk. Well, no, no, no. Judgey people. They're just truth tellers. Too much. Straight to eye to eye. I, I love this [00:39:00] guy. He's fabulous. So he says, "Okay, here's what we're gonna do.
[00:39:02] I'm gonna analyze your hair." Oh, right. Obviously. Yeah. So he snips a piece of the hair, and he puts it in a machine that has electricity. A naturopath machine. Naturopath machine that has electricity. Is a naturopath machine based on, on legit science? I don't know. I, I th- look, I don't know. But I liked him, so, you know, and we- Fine
[00:39:18] I liked him. Fine. So he says, "Oh, okay, you got a weed allergy." Weed allergy? Wheat. Not weed, no. I love weed. Weed's good for me. Wheat allergy. So I'm not surprised 'cause I was, you know, in my 20s living in a group house with a bunch of boys in their [00:39:30] 20s, and we ate as you would expect 20-year-olds in the 1990s to eat in group houses.
[00:39:34] Pizza, pizza, pizza, bread, bread, bread. No, pizza didn't come to Australia till after the 1990s. We made our own. You what? Made your own. I know. I know. Look at you. No, we didn't. Domino's just started. Oh. What we have for dinner, it's like, "You know we're gonna order pizza. Let's stop fucking around." So, um, I tried all these things.
[00:39:47] So I went gluten-free, and then I was kind of wheat avoidant, and then I was like, "I don't care anymore," and I got mixed results. I think there were many confounds. I love your final sample. It, it- It's meh ... condition is I don't care anymore. I don't care anymore. I, I don't think that's a [00:40:00] scientific method.
[00:40:00] It's fucking hard. Going gluten-free, I me- it's, it's not easy now, but back then- Oh ... it was a nightmare. Oh. A nightmare. Oh. Also, I like beer and so I drank it. So, so you tried for, like, half a minute. Oh, no, I did the gluten-free thing for a good few months. Oh, okay. And I thought, I don't know if it's making that much difference, but it is pissing me off.
[00:40:18] Will: Did you count your farts? Yep. Were they up or down? Secret, I'll tell you next week. All right. So anyway, this, this is all because I saw a meta study recently. It was published in The Lancet, but the authors put it in the conversation, and they were talking about [00:40:30] non-celiac gluten insensitivity. Okay. So- So celiacs- Yep
[00:40:33] Rod: that's where your body's immune system actually attacks itself when it eats gluten, and it leads to inflammation, damage to the gut- Yep, yep, yep ... et cetera. And it can be quite serious for the people- Yeah ... who actually have it. Quite serious. That's less than 1% of the population. The study's basically a meta-analysis.
[00:40:45] They don't say that, but it smells like it was. 58 studies covering gluten issue symptoms under all kinds of different conditions and different ways they could arise. They focused on the immune system, the gut barrier, microbes, in the gut of course, and your, quote, "psychological explanation." So overall, [00:41:00] gluten-specific reactions were uncommon, they said, and when they do occur, the changes in symptoms from pre and post gluten, et cetera, are actually very small.
[00:41:06] So like, oh, there's not a lot of it, gluten insensitivity, non-celiac. Really? Yeah. So, so maybe there's some confounds we need to look into here. Yeah, okay. Like your FODMAPs. FODMAPs. You've heard of FODMAPs, haven't you? Hmm. Tell the listeners so then I can find out too. F... You're finding out for them. You're very, you're very nice.
[00:41:22] Fermentable, F. Olig- o- o- oligosaccharides. Oh. Simple sugars. Disaccharides, so then you've got the FOD. They're of course double [00:41:30] sugars, 'cause you've double- Oh, I'm glad I don't have to remember this. Are you gonna give it to me in English as well? Yeah, they're sugars. Monosaccharides, single molecule sugars.
[00:41:36] Yeah. Su- su- sugar. And poly, poly... Oh, it cut it off. Anyway, other sugars, but not the part that you find in booze. So your FODMAPs are a whole bunch of kinds of sugars. Wow, what an explanation this is. I know. And, and a fermentable bit, which are not gluten- Onions are fermentable. Yes. Oh, okay. Yeah. I don't know what they are.
[00:41:50] That can be onions, garlic, many fruits, beans, all soy. All of these can be FODMAPs. Okay. Are they good or- But not necessarily gluteny. Okay. Are they good or bad? Depends. Depends on you. Wow. [00:42:00] And they can give you terrible symptoms as well. We're getting such a result here. What am, what am I to do here? So you're going like, "Oh, so maybe it's gluten, but maybe it's eight million other things as well- Mm-hmm
[00:42:08] making me do the nine farts a minute." Oh, so it's not the gluten. Well, it might be, but it might not. If, if, if one was worried about the number of farting, then- Look to your- ... you ponder the gluten and you go, "Oh, no, maybe it's my other things." What about everything else as well? Great. Or not, or a combination thereof.
[00:42:22] And what, the big conclusion, one of them: some people may be truly sensitive to gluten. However, current evidence suggests it's uncommon. So that's good. But for me, the most [00:42:30] interesting bit, because, you know, I'm an extremely anciently former medical anthropology and psychology guy. Yeah, yeah, okay. Extremely, extremely long time ago.
[00:42:36] Okay. So I love anything to do with brains and health and thinking and health. Yeah, yeah. So your nocebo effect is coming in, you know. Okay. Your reverse of your placebo, they suspect. So they did these blinded trials. People had no idea whether they were eating a gluten food or a placebo. Oh, can you really fake it?
[00:42:49] Yep. People can tell. Can they? I can. You can tell. I can give you anything and you can go, like, "Gluten." I can. Could you do the percentage? Sure. Down to- Three decimal points. Screw it. Whatever We're gonna t- [00:43:00] push pause. I'm gonna get some ingredients. We're gonna find out. The, so the differences in symptoms between the two groups when people didn't know, almost no difference, like symptomatically- Okay
[00:43:09] you couldn't, you couldn't tell them apart whether they were gluten or not gluten. And many, he said many participants who believed they were gluten sensitive reacted equally or even more strongly to the placebo So they're like, "I know I'm in a gluten study. I'm eating this thing." Yep. "Ow, ow, ow, my stomach," et cetera, et cetera.
[00:43:23] Will: Even though it was a placebo. Even with the placebo. Even though- A placebo, so it didn't have gluten in it. Gluten-free. All right. I know. So conclusion from that, they say, "Combination [00:43:30] of expectancy and actual gluten intake had the largest effect on gastro intent- intestinal symptoms." So if you expected to have a problem and you did have gluten, that was the most potent effect.
[00:43:41] Rod: So the expectation accelerated and advanced effects. So you're saying, you're saying that aside from celiacs, that largely people's insensitivity to gluten is largely gonna be a cultural thing. Like they- Could, could be ... they've, they've heard that, heard that gluten makes people bad, and they're like, "Oh, it does make me bad.
[00:43:57] Will: I have a- Yeah, yeah, I've got the farts. It's like, yeah, but you just ate 17 [00:44:00] cans of chickpeas, and you drank four beers. It's like, you know, it's definitely gluten then, which it isn't. So what they say, though, be careful. Don't just dismiss your psychologicals because there's a lot going on here. Like they say, brain imaging, your expectation and your emotions activate brain regions involved in pain and threat perception.
[00:44:15] Rod: So that heightens gut symptoms. You're kind of going, "Oh, I expect this is gonna cause me trouble." You get this elevated a- Okay ... arousal, as it were, in the systems particularly related to gut sensations, and it basically amplifies all the feelings. So if you just get a slight tweak in your stomach, you're like, "Oh, fuck.
[00:44:29] It [00:44:30] really hurts, and it's, it's got to be my gluten sensitivity." Yeah, okay. Okay. So there's stuff that actually could be going on. So could mean people believe they have a gluten problem even when they're, there's shown evidence, they still don't believe, they don't. They sh- they think they have a gluten problem.
[00:44:41] They're shown that you actually didn't eat any gluten. They go, "Yeah, but I do." Mm. Like, it's really quite resistant to- Yeah, okay ... counter-programming, so to speak. So what can you do? If you, if you think you might be gluten worried- Yep ... gluten, you know, insen- sensitive. If you think you might be gluten worried.
[00:44:54] Like- Do you suspect you're gluten maimed? Let's call it gluten maimed. Really? Okay. Do you get maimed by gluten? If you wonder if you do, [00:45:00] what about getting a test? Well, there isn't a biomarker for gluten sensitivity, so you can't get a blood t- you can for celiac. Yeah. But it's just like, I'm gonna test your blood.
[00:45:06] It's definitely blood. That's it. Can't tell you anything else. So the authors say, "Here's what we recommend, cl- clinicians. Rule out celiac disease." Sure. Yeah. Rule out wheat allergy. The hair test, obviously. Optimize the quality of someone's diet. Uh, yes. Try low FODMAP diets. I've tried one of those. They're not fun.
[00:45:22] It's difficult. Only then consider four to six-week dietary supervised gluten-free trial, followed by structured reintroduction of gluten-containing foods to see whether gluten truly causes symptoms. [00:45:30] So you're probably thinking, "Fuck it," and some people do this. "I'll just avoid gluten. I'll just eat gluten-free anyway, just in case."
[00:45:35] So it turns out, I didn't know this, gluten-free foods on average are 139% more expensive than foods that aren't gluten-free and- Of course they are. 139%, not 140. That's the tax. Poor gluten-free people. I know. They also apparently can be lower in fiber and key nutrients, and they can fuck with your microbiomes and reinforce food anxiety and eating.
[00:45:54] So they're saying, "Don't preemptively do this necessarily, 'cause it might not help, and in fact, it could cause other problems, [00:46:00] including, you know, extreme poverty, et cetera." So is gluten bad or good, and are many people insensitive to gluten? The answer is yes and no, maybe, and it depends. You're welcome.
[00:46:07] What- Thank you, science. What a, what a clear thing you have given me. I know. Wow. I reckon the trick is just stay calm, man Just stay calm Then your stomach will stay calm. The moment I calmed down, I, I went down as a 20-year-old to farting only twice an hour.
[00:46:23] Will: Well, that was your little bit of science for the week.
[00:46:25] Rod: holiday edition. You're special by the pool wearing a bikini edition.
[00:46:29] Will: But because you're on [00:46:30] holiday, you know that you still have the power to give us the rating that you need to give us. Yeah,
[00:46:36] Rod: seven stars on every app. Even things that don't do podcasts.
[00:46:39] Yeah.
[00:46:39] Will: Go out there and write it on like a recipe app
[00:46:42] Rod: an Uber and Yelp. Is it Yelp still a thing?
[00:46:44] Will: I think so. I'm
[00:46:45] Rod: I don't know. I'm at a restaurant where Don't ye
[00:46:46] Will: listener, if you've got some topics that you want us to explore,
[00:46:50] Rod: tell Will.
[00:46:51] Will: How would you tell Will his
[00:46:52] Rod: number is? 0 4 0 5 oh. Uh, cheers. At a little bit of science Do com
[00:46:59] Will: au.[00:47:00]
[00:47:00] Rod: au
[00:47:00] Will: Do that. We want your stories.
[00:47:02] Rod: we wanna hear from you.
[00:47:03] Will: Lovely listener. Enjoy the pina colada.
[00:47:06] Rod: Oh and the
[00:47:08] Will: col. Pin colada.
[00:47:09] Rod: Pini Kaia Pina Pia
[00:47:10] Will: Pina Kaia of
[00:47:11] Rod: of the Clade
[00:47:12] Will: Penai. Cate.
