EVSN: Escape Velocity Space News Dr. Pamela Gay, Erik Madaus, Beth Johnson, Ally Pelphrey
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Get your weekly dose of all that's new in space and astronomy with Escape Velocity Space News. The sky is not the limit, as we bring you the latest scientific discoveries and rocket launches. EVSN is brought to you by the team behind CosmoQuest at the Planetary Science Institute, and features hosts Dr. Pamela L. Gay and Erik Madaus with special guest interviews by Beth Johnson and audio engineering by Ally Pelphrey. EVSN is supported through Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/CosmoQuestX.
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Grindavik, Iceland, and Volcanoes with Dr. Melissa Scruggs
As you know, our team loves volcanoes, and since we’ve been focused on Iceland for months, we brought in Dr. Melissa Scruggs (aka VolcanoDoc on Twitch) for a chat about Grindavik and all things volcanic in Iceland.
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Stability, Instability, Drama, and How We are Space Stuff
It is possible to buy stickers, sweatshirts, mugs, and other stuff and things emblazoned with the simple phrase, “We are star stuff”. This phrase was popularized by Carl Sagan, and it serves as a gentle reminder that all the complex atoms - by which I mean most everything heavier than helium - found their start either in the nuclear core of a star or in the nuclear explosions of a dying star or stars. But, as with so many things, the truth is much more complicated than the meme.
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Early Black Holes Formed Before Stars?
One of the unexpected realities of JWST is the discovery that we have really been asking the wrong questions in many astronomy areas. For instance: we generally asked how supermassive black holes and galaxies formed, with a basic assumption that these things happened in some interrelated process. We thought stellar mass black holes came from stars and that there might have been tiny primordial black holes that evaporated away, but that was it. Closed case. Black holes formed with all the normal structures we experience today. Except that now, JWST’s observations require us to find a way to accelerate the formation of those structures, and one way to do that is to seed the universe with black holes.
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Yes, Scientists DO Look at the (Dark Energy Survey) Data
Every time I get the digital “why can’t you scientists just look at the data” lecture, I wonder what people think scientists do. All we do is look at data, and when that data tells us our understanding of the universe is wrong, we’re pretty good at accepting the data and throwing out our false understandings… even when the data makes our life a whole lot harder. Such is the case with the accelerating rate of expansion of the Universe...
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Celebrating the Mars Robots that Could
Robots on Mars have a long history of exceeding all possible expectations. From Spirit and Opportunity lasting far beyond their planned 90-day missions to Ingenuity lasting 72 flights out of a planned five, these craft have become so beloved that we mourn their missions ending. Today, while we recognize NASA's Day of Remembrance, we also celebrate all the Mars missions that have done more than expected.
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The Compass (Sometimes... Kinda) Points North
If you take a compass and follow its pointy little needle, you will end up in Northern Canada but not at the North Pole. If you have a boat, you'll end up on Ellesmere Island wondering where Santa is hiding. The fact that the rotational north pole of the Earth and the magnetic pole of the Earth don’t align means that if you want to actually get to the Earth’s rotational North Pole - the one the pole sticks out of on your globe - you have to look up corrections online and veer a little bit in whatever direction the correction happens to be at the moment. And if you are catching this show sometime far, far in the future, then Ellesmere Island that is true in early 2024 is likely no longer true.
Customer Reviews
Turn it up!
I’ve followed Pamela Gay ever since she was part of the Slacker Astronomy podcast. She is a wonderful science educator and I’m always happy to let her put science in my brain. My one criticism is the low volume level of the podcast. Not only is it way lower than any of the other podcasts I regularly listen to (including Astronomy Cast), but it’s also much lower than the ads in each episode. I have to turn it up to hear only to have my ears assaulted when an ad comes on. I turn it down for the ad but then have to crank it up again once the ad is finished. Can things be leveled out it bit? Otherwise, great podcast!
Love the show but fix the audio levels
I love science podcasts and I have been listening to all of Dr Pamala Gay’s fantastic work for years. From the very beginning of Astronomy Cast I’ve been hooked. Lately I’ve noticed that this show needs to up the audio levels on Pamela’s voice. Every time the commercials come on I wince from how loud it gets because I have to turn it up high to hear Pamela. 6 stars if you fix that problem. Otherwise I love the show.
Raise the speakers’ audio
While I love the content, the audio levels are frustrating. (Hand-on-forehead).
When mixing in the speakers’ audio, please raise speakers’ volume. If you compare it to other podcasts audio levels, speaker audio is very, very low. Audio level of intro music and other fill/transitions is ok. But audio of those speaking is barely audible.
When listening to multiple podcasts and arriving at this one, after the intro in this podcast, I have to increase the volume by 1/3 to hear the speaker’s voice, then when a filler/ad comes on, lower the volume or it is too loud, then raise the volume again again by 1/3 to hear speakers’ voices.
You can easily compare the audio decibel levels with other podcasts and this one using an audio meter. Normalize voice levels please. Don’t change the transition/ad/filler audio levels. Those are fine.