Probably Science
541 episodes - English - Latest episode: 11 days ago - ★★★★★ - 609 ratingsProfessional comedians with so-so STEM pedigrees take you through this week in science. Incompetently. Featuring hosts Matt Kirshen, Andy Wood (and sometimes Jesse Case or Brooks Wheelan) along with a rotating cast of special guests from the worlds of comedy and science.
Homepage Apple Podcasts Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed
Episodes
Episode 527 - Joshua Snyder
April 14, 2024 21:42 - 1 hour - 48 MBComedian Joshua Snyder (@nerdyvirgin) joins Matt, Jesse and Andy to talk about Bobcat Goldthwait headlining To 29 and Beyond, Jesse's love life, building a guitar, a lack of solar eclipse whimsy, the Star Trek punk on a bus, toxic epi-pens in space, a mouse with legs instead of genitals, dog comprehension, the great podcast Free With Ads and a SPATS update.
Episode 526 - Carmen Morales
April 03, 2024 00:12 - 1 hour - 50.3 MBComedian Carmen Morales (@TheFunnyCarmen) joins Andy, Jesse and Matt to talk about Matt's chipped tooth, the pros and cons of home dentistry, a nuclear fusion record, CRISPR and HIV, Andy's friend's Pioneertown-to-Big Bear breakdown, a million mice eating seabirds alive, letdowns from CBD, Carmen on HBO, updates from the Large Hadron Collider and our live event To 29 and Beyond, taking place June 7th and 8th.
Episode 525 - Marcus Monroe
March 24, 2024 00:40 - 1 hour - 45.9 MBComedian/juggler Marcus Monroe (@marcusmonroe) joins Jesse, Matt and Andy to talk about inventing the knorch, siteswap juggling notation, getting banned from Delta Airlines, a Montana man pleading guilty to creating massive franken-sheep, getting helium from the moon and To 29 and Beyond, now taking place June 7th and 8th.
Episode 524 - Tara Flynn
March 10, 2024 21:31 - 1 hour - 49 MBActress/writer Tara Flynn returns to the show to talk with Matt, Jesse and Andy about having no sense of smell, Renaissance Faires, the magic of the Irish, fake Scottish Wikipedia, fake grunge slang, a death ray science project, a fish as loud as an elephant, boiling water to remove microplastics, a 13,000-year-old sand dune, Liver King, Oscar talk, To 29 and Beyond coming to 29 Palms on June 1st and Tara's podcast Now You're Asking.
Episode 523 - Adam Newman
March 03, 2024 20:58 - 1 hour - 55.4 MBComedian/musician Adam Newman (@adam_newman) joins Andy, Matt and Jesse to talk about sweep picking, Antarctic scientists developing their own accent, Adam and Jesse's dreadlock pasts, Adam's upcoming special Jew Versus The Volcano, Purim talk, how humans lost their tails, the Willy Wonka AI experience debacle in Glasgow and its insane script, Wake Up and Smile, the upcoming live event To 29 and Beyond and Adam's podcast PuzzyBoyz.
Episode 522 - Wendy Liebman
February 22, 2024 21:18 - 1 hour - 44.9 MBComedy legend Wendy Liebman (@WendyLiebman) joins Matt, Jesse and Andy to talk about Wendy and Jesse's Letterman overlap, Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist, Wendy's psychology background and transition into comedy, the evolutionary advantage of ADHD, bizarre AI rat genitalia, using AI to advance fusion research, OpenAI's amazing/terrifying Sora breakthrough and Will Smith actually eating spaghetti.
Episode 521 - Jeffrey Baldinger
February 10, 2024 16:10 - 1 hour - 27 MBComedian Jeffrey Baldinger (@Jeffbaldinger) joins Matt and Jesse to talk about earthquakes, Santa Claus' dad, a strange new type of star in the middle of our galaxy and distinguishing between earthquakes and nuclear tests.
Episode 520 - Matt Knudsen
February 04, 2024 22:38 - 1 hour - 45.9 MBComedian, actor and author Matt Knudsen (@mattknudsen) returns to the podcast to talk about his new book Have I Seen You In Anything?, working on soap operas, being in an iconic I Think You Should Leave sketch, going back to school, learning to tap dance, testosterone reducing the Audience Effect and a bat that uses its huge penis as an arm.
Episode 519 - Leah Bonnema
January 21, 2024 23:32 - 1 hour - 45.5 MBComedian Leah Bonnema (@LeahBonnema) joins Matt, Jesse and Andy to talk about Matt and Leah's road gig adventure, Jesse being snowed in, going to the bathroom outside, the science behind the munchies, Japan's Moon Sniper making contact with the lunar surface, Leah's love of Love Island, 45,000-year-old tools and bones found in eastern Asia, the Levallois technique and everyone's lack of awareness of Bill Knapp's.
Episod 518 - Moshe Kasher
January 12, 2024 03:36 - 1 hour - 57.3 MBComedian and author Moshe Kasher (@moshekasher) returns to the show to talk with Andy, Jesse and Matt about his upcoming book Subculture Vulture, chronicling his deep involvement in the seemingly disparate worlds of Hasidic Judaism, deaf culture, comedy, sobriety, rave culture and Burning Man, as well as digging into the possible de-extinction of the dodo.
Episode 517 - Kim McVicar
December 30, 2023 23:24 - 1 hour - 49.1 MBComedian Kim McVicar (@KimMcVicar) joins Andy, Matt and Jesse to talk about famous hecklers, Kim's dancing background, musicals and their parodies, coin flips not being as 50/50 as you think, neanderthal early birds, Daylight Saving Time talk, holiday penile fractures and the crazy waves hitting the west coast right now.
Re-release - AI Alignment with Dr. Stuart Russell
December 23, 2023 19:51 - 1 hour - 42.1 MBWhile the gang take a little holiday break, we thought it was worth revisiting Andy's conversation with AI researcher and UC Berkeley Professor of Computer Science Stuart Russell from wayyyyy back in 2019. Now that we're well into the era of generative artificial intelligence, it's interesting to look back at what experts were saying about AI alignment just a few years ago, when it seemed to many of us like an issue we wouldn't have to tackle directly for a long time to come. As we face down...
Episode 516 - Shane Torres
December 18, 2023 00:47 - 1 hour - 48.9 MBComedian Shane Torres (@shanetorres) returns to the show to talk with Matt, Jesse and Andy about his new special The Blue Eyed Mexican, his unique Covid experience, more SPATS chats, finding the lost space tomato, what happens when you take your gun into an MRI scanner, someone else who wasn't as lucky with the MRI, the most extreme rogue wave on record, and the sound that warns a tornado is coming.
Episode 515 - Ryan Conner
December 07, 2023 21:42 - 1 hour - 50.4 MBComedian and author Ryan Conner (@rconnercomedy) returns to the show to talk with Matt, Jesse and Andy about his porn doppelganger, the process of researching and writing his new satirical novel The Party, an AI ProbSci ripoff, SpaceX rockets punching holes in the sky, deep brain stimulation to help TBI patients and a tree-dwelling shrimp found in the Cyclops Mountains.
Episode 514 - Dustin Ybarra
November 28, 2023 03:23 - 1 hour - 56.8 MBComedian Dustin Ybarra (@dustin_ybarra) joins Jesse, Andy and Matt to talk about the recent Formula 1 race in Las Vegas, Erdős–Bacon numbers, the first mammal embryos grown in space, space travel's effect on erectile dysfunction, trying to deter orcas with heavy metal, a message laser-beamed from 10 million miles away, the rise of 6G and the ouster and return of OpenAI's Sam Altman after a rumored AGI breakthrough.
Episode 513 - Jenny Zigrino
November 18, 2023 18:51 - 1 hour - 53.2 MBComedian Jenny Zigrino (@jennyzigrino) joins Jesse, Andy and Matt to talk about skunks, the Vegas F1 race, smelling in stereo, the upside of anger in completing tasks, dominant eyes, Iceland volcanos and the ultra-creepy hamster test or sperm penetration.
Episode 512 - Steve Benaquist
November 05, 2023 18:12 - 1 hour - 48.7 MBComedian Steve Benaquist (@stevebenaquist) joins Andy, Matt and Jesse to talk about Halloween, Unversal Monsters, neck bolts, Frankenstein's Doug, sandbagging, goldbricking, carpetbagging and teetotaling, a radioactive toy from the 1950s, an unfortunate pig heart update, people who can't feel pain, Frozen Dead Guy Days, physics-defying sperm, a wind-powered car that goes faster than the wind, a tiny particle accelerator and Andy's Airbnb.
Episode 511 - Aparna Nancherla
October 28, 2023 20:16 - 1 hour - 47.6 MBComedian Aparna Nancherla (@aparnapkin) joins Matt, Jesse and Andy to talk about her new book Unreliable Narrator, the ubiquity of impostor syndrome in Hollywood, childhood memories of carob, a new insanely hot pepper, roosters recognizing themselves in mirrors, a drunk dude fighting his reflection, and AI besting humans at Street Fighter.
Episode 510 - Dave Hill
October 20, 2023 06:30 - 1 hour - 50.3 MBComedian, musician and now author Dave Hill (@mrdavehill) joins Jesse, Andy and Matt to talk about his lifelong love of hockey, his new book The Awesome Game, bowling lane oil patterns, figuring out how cats purr, bespectacled chickens, and the first-ever fine issued for space junk.
Episode 509 - Kevin Kataoka and Brian Malow
October 11, 2023 02:19 - 1 hour - 24.1 MBAndy's away, but Matt and Jesse are joined by Kevin Kataoka and returning guest Brian Malow to talk about pseudolegal grifts! Why you shouldn't talk to the police! Scientists who've grown a human embryo! Brian May side projects! Hedy Lamarr's inventions! Military subterfuge and ghost armies! And sailing a satellite out of orbit! You can join our Patreon to hear a bonus story about NFL jersey numbers.
Episode 508 - Pallavi Gunalan
October 06, 2023 02:19 - 1 hour - 43.1 MBComedian/biomedical engineer Pallavi Gunalan (@PallaviGunalan) joins Matt, Jesse and Andy to talk about her path from science to comedy, working on open-source ventilators, the oldest living skydiver, the oldest surfer, growing human kidneys in pigs, the surprising intelligence of jellyfish and a misread of one of Newton's laws.
Episode 507 - Andy, Jesse and Matt
September 27, 2023 22:00 - 1 hour - 46.5 MBAndy's back from Burning Man to give the gang an update on how not big of a deal the rain was and to talk about Jesse's love of the band Ghost, middle-age music obsessions, the viral sensation "Sitting" by Brian Jordan Alvarez, debunking a Da Vinci tree rule (and figuring out what, exactly, bunk is), the greatest-ever opening line of a textbook, the risks of eating a single super-hot chip and how much you'd have to pay Jesse to do it.
Episode 506 – Jesse Joyce
September 15, 2023 20:12 - 1 hour - 22.1 MBComedian, Kimmel writer and now author Jesse Joyce joins us to talk about his new book about the killer of Lincoln's killer! Plus live brain worms! The Indian moon landing! Unimpressive household robots! And who should go to Mars! Click here for a free trial of Scribd and read/listen to Jesse's book.
Episode 505 - John Fugelsang
August 22, 2023 21:20 - 1 hour - 43.1 MBComedian, actor and host of The John Fugelsang Podcast and SiriusXM's Tell Me Everything John Fugelsang (@JohnFugelsang) joins Jesse, Andy and Matt to talk about Prince's showstopping Beatles solo, reconciling science and the Bible, Russia crashing a lander into the moon, the steampunk LK lunar module, warnings of the submersible implosion, the 1970s SoCal Hurricane Kathleen, the reason it takes a while for a tan to show up and a view of Hurricane Hilary from the ISS.
Episode 504 - DeAnne Smith
August 20, 2023 22:47 - 1 hour - 45 MBComedian DeAnne Smith (@DeAnne_Smith) joins Matt, Andy and Jesse to talk about DeAnne's new special Chiweenie in a Tank Top, getting Canadian citizenship, advances in pig-human transplantation, the possibility of regrowing human teeth, the game Pizza Party and the Radiolab episode about Alpha Gal.
Episode 503 - Jamel Johnson
August 16, 2023 18:24 - 1 hour - 49.8 MBComedian Jamel Johnson (@NonProfitComic), host of too many podcasts to count, joins Matt, Jesse and Andy to mourn Paul Reubens, discuss Amazing Larry and his deleted scene, the Cabazon dinosaurs, Sonic & Knuckles, Michael Jackson's Sonic connection, how to help striking film and TV workers, a tick bite that can cause a meat allergy, leprosy on the rise in Florida, Mars spinning (slightly) faster, crushing a design contest for kids and connecting old mice to young mice.
Episode 502 - Danny Lee "Nitro" Clark
August 08, 2023 19:08 - 1 hour - 56.6 MBAmerican Gladiator Danny Lee "Nitro" Clark joins Andy, Jesse and Matt to talk about the hit Netflix documentary Muscles & Mayhem, how his "raw meat" tryout ad-lib landed him the role of a lifetime, the analogies between management's treatment of the Gladiators and the current WGA/SAG strikes, the odd experience of seeing yourself as an action figure, nostalgia for the monoculture, Nitro's romance with Ellen Degeneres, the role genes play in determining your endurance ability, introducing hei...
Episode 501 - Bethany Dwyer
July 31, 2023 18:07 - 1 hour - 45.6 MBComedian/writer/director Bethany Dwyer (@BethanyDwyer) returns to the show to talk with Matt, Jesse and Andy about her horror film Grandpa, self-repairing metal, action movie one-liners, why dolphins and orcas won't be returning to land, the resurrection of 46,000-year-old nematodes and the list of human evolution fossils.
Episode 500 - Brooks, Jesse, Andy & Matt
July 21, 2023 21:13 - 1 hour - 46.6 MBBrooks Wheelan (@brookswheelan) returns to the podcast to celebrate 500 episodes of Probably Science and talk about Probarbenheimer, the demise of Summer Country, a new venomous snake, a solar telescope array that cost half as much as White Chicks, unlocking car doors with tennis balls and creating weather forecasts with AI.
Episode 499 - Karl Hess
July 14, 2023 02:09 - 1 hour - 45.4 MBComedian Karl Hess (@karlhess) of the podcast Yelling About Pâté and the live show Amuse Bouche returns to the show to talk with Jesse, Matt and Andy about urban legends, ancient Chinese secrets, a possible bit of alien technology that crashed into the ocean, a Cuban lung cancer treatment, Kyle Kinane getting his van stuck in Joshua Tree, the poop-filled beaches of Texas, an extremely shiny exoplanet, and the handful of companies that control the world's beer.
Episode 498 - Dan Schreiber
July 06, 2023 06:19 - 1 hour - 45 MBDan Schreiber of the podcasts No Such Thing as a Fish and The Cryptid Factor, as well as the new book The Theory of Everything Else, joins Matt and Jesse to talk about Nobelitis, using insects to turn beer waste into beef, an ancient slasher dolphin with weird teeth, using shopping cart sensors to identify stroke risk and Keith Alberstadt's bat attack.
Episode 497 - Matt, Jesse and Andy
June 22, 2023 04:19 - 1 hour - 50.5 MBOn a very special guest-less episode, Matt, Jesse and Andy talk about the fate of the OceanGate Titan, extreme undersea pressure, the curse of the Titanic, whether the Kursk could have been saved, the slightly dubious age-defying claims of a man who lived underwater for several months, the approval of lab-grown meat, Jesse and Andy's latest video game forays, what kangaroos did before they hopped, the problematic platform of RFK Jr. and Matt and Andy's wallaby encounter.
Episode 496 - John Conroy
June 18, 2023 00:09 - 1 hour - 50.9 MBComedian John Conroy (@ConroyFTW) joins Jesse, Andy and Matt to talk about Grimace's birthday, driving Ronald McDonald around, finding the building blocks of life on Enceladus, federal capital offenses, frog pants, how many people haven't tried ChatGPT and nanotattoos that don't need batteries or wires.
Episode 495 - Anna Valenzuela
June 09, 2023 20:43 - 1 hour - 51.6 MBComedian Anna Valenzuela (@annavisfunny) joins Matt, Jesse and Andy to talk about her myriad jobs including trolley operator and karate instructor, China's space monkey sex plans, why race car drivers blink at the same point on the track and why Michael Caine never blinks at all.
Episode 494 - Izzy Salhani
May 27, 2023 00:00 - 1 hour - 42.8 MBComedian and comic book author Izzy Salhani (@luckysalhani) joins Jesse, Matt and Andy to talk about bear-baiting, fighting a bunch of kids, a Renaissance fair accident, clay quality, octopus-inpired camouflage ink, Richard Branson's rocket plane taking to the skies again, orcas learning to attack boats and orca fads.
Episode 493 - Liz Miele
May 16, 2023 21:28 - 1 hour - 56.2 MBComedian Liz Miele (@lizmiele) returns to the show to talk about her tour documentary Jet-Lagged, growing up in a veterinarian household, Australian wildlife adventures, a koala chlamydia vaccine, aesthetic scrotal preferences, an Onion classic, Liz's book Why Cats Are Assholes, gymnastics limitations and exceeding astrophysics limitations.
Episode 492 - Dr. Heather Berlin
May 13, 2023 19:23 - 1 hour - 50.7 MBNeuroscientist and clinical psychologist Dr. Heather Berlin (@heather_berlin) joins Matt, Jesse and Andy to talk about hosting the upcoming PBS series Your Brain, the hard problem of consciousness, evolutionary mismatches, panic attack strategies, flow state performance, debating Deepak Chopra about god, the Stanford marshmallow experiment, impulse control, the downside of getting a hangry judge, debunking brain myths, creating consciousness in different substrates, the thermal grill experim...
Episode 491 - Jon Gabrus
May 05, 2023 18:49 - 1 hour - 58.2 MBComedian and host of the podcasts High and Mighty and ActionBoyz Jon Gabrus (@Gabrus) joins Matt, Jesse and Andy to talk about his hilarious show 101 Places to Party Before You Die, the WGA strike, whether AI can write a 30 Rock scene, the shrinking middle class in entertainment, buffet memories, the benefits of an all-female Mars mission team, curing parrot loneliness with video calls, the insane number of pet birds in the US and advice for a precocious young listener.
Episode 490 - Andrew Weinberg
April 22, 2023 18:51 - 1 hour - 56.8 MBLongtime Conan writer and co-creator of Eagleheart Andrew Weinberg joins Andy, Jesse and Matt to talk about his ridiculously funny new show Jury Duty, which follows the workings of a jury trial through the eyes of Ronald Gladden, a juror who is unaware the entire case is fake, the insane hoops they had to jump through to bring the show to life, the truth about weed and creativity, and the unsurprising link between arousal and a desire to have sex with a robot.
Episode 489 - Andy Hendrickson
April 12, 2023 16:06 - 1 hour - 46 MBComedian Andy Hendrickson (@andyhendrickson) joins Jesse, Matt and Andy to talk about magic tricks that only work on monkeys with opposable thumbs, how mirrors know where eggs are, a math formula for achieving orgasm, how quickly you can create false memories and Andy's neighbor Tony's commentary track on Birdemic 3.
Episode 488 - Nate Craig
April 07, 2023 03:03 - 1 hour - 43.6 MBComedian Nate Craig (@hypeman) returns to the podcast to talk about a deadly fungal infection, terrible maps, building cities on shaky ground, the history of plate tectonics, nanoplastics interfering with chicken embryos and a 3D-printed cake.
Episode 487 - Noman Hosni
March 28, 2023 00:41 - 1 hour - 54.2 MBComedian Noman Hosni (@NomanHosni) joins Matt, Jesse and Andy to talk about Tunisia, bad fan art, hair transplants, a bad embryo swap, Paris' City of Science and Industry, a blood test for anxiety, storing carbon dioxide in the ocean as baking soda, how much lift the space shuttle lander can generate and mapping the brain of a fruit fly.
Episode 486 - Sarah Lane
March 17, 2023 22:18 - 1 hour - 50.2 MBHost of Daily Tech News Show Sarah Lane (@sarahlane) joins Jesse, Matt and Andy to talk about ballerina doppelgangers, Tom Cruise stunts, Cocaine Bear, accidentally ending up on the air, bumblebees learning to solve puzzles by watching their friends, talkin' transoms, more medical tourism, Meta's VR play and DuckDuckGo's new AI-assisted search.
Episode 485 - AI Talk with Kevin Roose
March 08, 2023 02:08 - 1 hour - 49.3 MBNew York Times technology columnist and host of the Hard Fork podcast Kevin Roose (@kevinroose) joins Andy, Jesse and Matt to talk about his infamous, amorous encounter with Bing Chat/Sydney, Sydney's response to his story, getting backhanded compliments from John Oliver, how ChatGPT was dismissed by its own creators, generative AI and the future of deepfakes, AI's capability overhang, explaining LLMs' weirdness with the Waluigi effect, artists' lawsuits over training AI on their creations, ...
Episode 484 - Amanda Brooke Perrin
February 24, 2023 00:16 - 1 hour - 48.5 MBComedian and writer Amanda Brooke Perrin (@brookeperrin) joins Matt, Andy and Jesse to discuss haboobs, a Tony update, a 2200-year-old flush toilet found in China, DIY Poo-Pourri, how soft food gave us the F-word, Andy's consonant invention, ChatGPT developing a theory of mind, and dolphin handjobs.
Episode 483 - Erica Spera
February 13, 2023 20:01 - 1 hour - 52.9 MBComedian Erica Spera (@Spericaa) joins Andy, Jesse and Matt to talk about almost going into dentistry, prehistoric teeth, Andy's Mexican dental tourism, what we're supposed to call mummies now, monster cereals, AI Seinfeld's heel turn, Roko's basilisk, mummy chemicals, ancient stone tools and more stone tools and Soylent.
Episode 482 - Jo Rou
February 04, 2023 02:09 - 1 hour - 41.8 MBComedian/filmmaker Jo Rou (@awkwardlyjazzy) joins Jesse, Matt and Andy to discuss Santana's answer to Beats by Dre, the mystery of a gibbon immaculate conception solved, the tiny radioactive capsule that went missing in the outback, detecting cancer with customer loyalty cards, airbrushing Boris Johnson, Jesse's bad business ideas, the Snickers dick vein, World War I talk, the awful new show Power Slap and Jo's sitcom I Adore Dolores.
Episode 481 - Misophonia with Dr. Jane Gregory and Steve Hall
January 23, 2023 21:13 - 1 hour - 48.2 MBClinical psychologist and misophonia researcher Dr. Jane Gregory (@drjanegregory) and comedian Steve Hall (@astevehall) return to the show to talk with Matt, Jesse and Andy about Jane's work studying misophonia, what to do if your spouse's breathing drives you insane, and what's on the horizon for treating the condition. Trigger non-warning: This episode contains NO examples of misophonia-triggering sounds. That we know of.
Episode 480 - Michael Magid
January 16, 2023 21:48 - 1 hour - 51.8 MBComedian, goalkeeper and coach Michael Magid (@michaelmagid) joins Andy, Matt and Jesse to discuss Michael's football (soccer) podcast Inside the 18, his new social network The Union, quitting your gym with the help of AI, a Tesla that caused a pileup, a Tesla that thwarted a triple murder-suicide, fires in electric vs. gas cars, a breakthrough in reversing aging in mice, ripped old guys, Matt Braunger's Weight Smashers sketch, lab-grown retinal eye cells to treat blindness and Matt and Andy...
Episode 479 - Christina Martin
January 07, 2023 02:49 - 55 minutes - 38.1 MBComedian turned author Christina Martin (@christinamartin) joins Jesse, Matt and Andy to talk about atmospheric rivers, shared names, Christina's book Ashes to Admin: Tales from the Caseload of a Council Funeral Officer, putting on funerals for unidentified decedents, the return of a comet after 50,000 years, Newton's madness, Heaven's Gate sneaker collection, reversing erectile dysfunction in pigs and a real horror show of a pig.