SGU Episode 283

Introduction
You're listening to the Skeptics' Guide to the Universe, your escape to reality.

Piltdown Anniversary

 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piltdown_Man

Hydrogen Production

 * http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=hydrogen-production-comes-natu

Voyager 1 Leaves Solar System

 * http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-12-solar-voyager-spacecraft.html

Slushball Earth

 * http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11992299

Question #1 - Alien Plants vs Animals
"I was wondering why almost all you come across regard extra terrestrial life it seems to almost exclusively be focused on alien animal life? Why not alien Plants? What would it mean if we found a moon or planet with alien plant life, but no animals. Is that even possible? Or vice versa? Is it just that the idea of Little Grey Men are sexier than Martian Ferns? Obviously there are some basic fundamentals I fail to understand on the distinction between the plants and animals. So how much of one is there? In a way it almost appears as if the two are alien life forms with a symbiotic and side by side relationship. What is a distinction that separated life into the plant and animal kingdoms? Is there a common ancestor to both? At the base level the search for alien life for a time before a distinction? If they did find a Fern on Mars, some how it just doesn't seem as exciting as say a Martian Worm. PS. My example was originally a Martian flower, but for obvious reasons that was a bad example. Brendan Melbourne Australia"

Interview with Dan Gardner

 * Author of Future Babble

Science or Fiction
Item #1: A new study demonstrates that it is possible to become drunk from dunking one's feet in alcohol for several hours. Item #2: The atomic weights of 10 elements, including hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen, have recently been changed on the official periodic table of elements. Item #3: Scientists report the finding that cichlid fish have 5 different cones for seeing color, the most known for any vertebrate.

Who's That Noisy

 * Answer to last week: Finneas and Ferb

Quote of the Week
"'My practice as a scientist is atheistic. That is to say, when I set up an experiment I assume that no god, angel or devil is going to interfere with its course; and this assumption has been justified by such success as I have achieved in my professional career. I should therefore be intellectually dishonest if I were not also atheistic in the affairs of the world.' - J.B.S. Haldane"