The Week Ahead on the CMS

By On July 2, 2012 · 6 Comments

MONDAY: The Philosophy of First Contact - If Earth picks up a signal from E.T., Paul Davies is likely to get one of the first calls. He’s head of SETI’s post-detection task force and has thought a lot about what comes next after Earth makes first contact. We’ll also speak to astronomers from Vatican’s Observatory in Tucson, Arizona.

TUESDAY:Earworms - At some point, you’ve probably fallen victim to earworms – those songs that get stuck in your head and just won’t get out. We’ll explore why some songs stick and why others don’t. What makes a melody memorable? Why can’t you get chorus of “Call Me Maybe” out of your head? And what can we learn from music memory? Daniel Levitin, a record-producer-turned neuroscientist, explains. 

WEDNESDAY — Special holiday programming. Mr. Dankosky’s Treehouse. Episode 144: “Houston, We Have a Solution!” Mr. Dankosky and the animals take a bus trip to Houston and, due to a series of misunderstandings, wind up at the Gentleman’s Splendor Club where they are subsequently netted in a police raid. Mrs. Otter and Orangutan Jane are mistaken for pole dancers, and the whole thing gets pretty tense until Ed the Egret makes a heartfelt speech about believing the best in others.  Mr. Dankosky asks the police to grant his group  “the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them.” Hyena Harry says they’re already at a station, and everyone laughs. The police and the animals watch the fireworks together. Musical guest: Chamillionaire

THURSDAY: The TV Remote. It seems like every week there’s a new cell phone or computer design that gets released, but for the past 50 years, TV remotes haven’t changed much. They’re fat and have a lot of buttons you never press. There’s probably about four or five sitting on your coffee table right now. So how did the TV remote get so awful and confusing? We’ll talk to design experts about the history of the TV remote and our ongoing love-hate relationship with it. 

FRIDAY: The Nose - The real Nose. Is back.

 

 
 
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6 Responses to The Week Ahead on the CMS

  1. Richard says:
    July 2, 2012 at 10:26 am

    The Vatican Observatory?

    A chance to set the Galileo story straight (which us quite unlike the popular retelling) and to talk about LUCIFER.

    http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2010-04/devil-named-telescope-helps-astronomers-see-through-darkness

  2. ET says:
    July 2, 2012 at 11:26 am

    Here’s one thing I don’t really get about this search for extraterrestrial life. There’s all sorts of other intelligent life right here on Earth, i.e., dolphins, whales, pot-bellied bigs etc… and yet, we can’t communicate with any of them on a meaningful level. I mean, we’re pretty sure whale songs mean something, but we don’t really know what. And we can communicate with dogs, but only to the extent of “sit, beg, lay down.” Even with regard to our closest ancestors, apes and gorillas, we can only teach the most rudimentary of sign language. We always hear that “mathetmatics is the universal language” but, funnily enough, no other animals here on earth seem much interested in it.

    So given that we live on a planet teeming with life, and can barely communicate with any of it, what makes SETI people so cocksure that we’ll have better luck on ANOTHER PLANET!?

    • Richard says:
      July 2, 2012 at 12:52 pm

      Whale Songs?

      Wait. I feel a hokey moment coming on. How about a viewing of Star Trek IV the “Save the Whales” movie?

      Easily the best of the movies for capturing the 60s oeuvre.

  3. Cynical Susan says:
    July 2, 2012 at 11:53 am

    “So given that we live on a planet teeming with life, and can barely communicate with any of it,…”

    AND considering that we don’t treat it all that well (bison, sharks, whales, wolves, etc. etc.), if we find life that isn’t as heavily armed as we are, will we blow it all to pieces?

  4. Todd Zaino says:
    July 2, 2012 at 3:29 pm

    The bison, whales, sharks, and wolves will all be fine. I’d like to arm female fetuses, and US Border Patrol officers with better weapons than those sent by Eric Holder to Mexican drug cartels. While I personally have nothing against whales, and wolves, border patrol agent saftey, and preventing female infanticide have always seemed far more important to me.

  5. equality 7-2521 says:
    July 3, 2012 at 1:15 pm

    Has anyone been in touch with the Mummers? I’d start my search for ET’s with them. And why do mathematicians treat that theory as absolute God while it defies human logic at times? Would ET’s view existance as binary? Is curiosity universal? Perhaps we are looking to commune with an existance that has the realative traits of a rock or a pile of feces.

    I don’t know, and why would we be of interest to anything else which may be out there? Who would want to communicate with the possibility of having to deal with a pretentious sounding Englishman?

    How egocentric we are.