We are often told that we can be happy, if we try hard enough. By shifting our mindset, changing our lifestyles, or even writing a gratitude journal – happiness is waiting for all of us! But, what does science say?

Happiness

Science journalist Wendy Zukerman dissects the latest fad framing itself as scientific fact, wading through the mass of information so you don't have to.

Science

Science Vs is moving to a new home in New York City. New episodes be available on a different iTunes feed! If you get lost head to Wendy's twitter @wendyzuk or the Science Vs' Facebook page: facebook.com/sciencevspodcast. We hope to see you soon. Also, you can find more ABC science-y goodness with Dr Karl on Triple J here: https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/dr-karl-on-triplej/id73331325?mt=2

Science Vs The Next Chapter

Dr Neil deGrasse Tyson is the director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History. But, most know him as the host  of the documentary series Cosmos and podcast StarTalk. Neil gained infamy as the killer of Pluto. For almost a decade, he has been the face behind Pluto’s demise from planet to dwarf planet. So, he gets a lot of hate mail from pissed off kids. Here, Neil talks to science journalist Wendy Zukerman about why he fell in love with space, representing minorities in science, the anti-science movement, religion and, yes, being Pluto's murderer.

NB: Wendy accidentally read out Neil's tweet about religion to say that he jokingly tweeted he was Greek Orthodox, when it should have been "Geek Orthodox". She's very frustrated both that she got it wrong, and didn't share an amazing pun. Sorry. It's been amended. 
More information

Mr Universe (The Saturday Paper) https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/2015/08/01/mr-universe-neil-degrasse-tyson/14383512002184 

Neil deGrasse Tyson Australian Tour http://thinkinc.org.au/events/an-evening-with-dr-neil-degrasse-tyson/ 

Neil deGrasse Tyson on Race https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQLtPWPqsjA

Pluto's not a planet? Only in New York (New York Times)  http://www.haydenplanetarium.org/tyson/media/pdf/Pluto's_Not_a_Planet.pdf

Neil deGrasse Tyson (Extended Interview)

Science is supposed to be an unbiased way to uncover nature’s secrets. Through blinded experiments, rigorous peer review and replication – we’ve been told that by using the scientific method we’ll find trustworthy facts. But, with many scientific findings largely regarded as ‘wrong’, is science broken? To find out, science journalist Wendy Zukerman speaks to Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson, Prof. Ivan Oransky, Prof. Barton Zwiebach, Ass. Prof. Alex Holcombe and Dr Alice Williamson.

As a quick clarifying point, in our discussion on statistics we mention that a 95 per cent confidence interval means that 1 in 20 individual findings are wrong. The word 'findings' here means individual experiments, not publications. 

More information

Believe it or not: how much can we rely on published data on potential drug targets? http://www.nature.com/nrd/journal/v10/n9/full/nrd3439-c1.html 

Why Most Published Research Findings Are False  http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.0020124 

False-Positive Psychology - Undisclosed Flexibility in Data Collection and Analysis Allows Presenting Anything as Significant
(The Wiggle’ s Study) http://pss.sagepub.com/content/22/11/1359.full

We are often told that we can be happy, if we try hard enough. By shifting our mindset, changing our lifestyles, or even writing a gratitude journal – happiness is waiting for all of us! But, what does science say? To find out, science journalist Wendy Zukerman speaks to Prof. Paul Frijters, Ass. Prof. Dianne Vella Brodrick and Dr. Emiliana Simon-Thomas. We’re also joined by the author of The Happiness Myth, Jennifer Michael Hecht, as well as comedian Gen Fricker.

More information

Positive psychology interventions: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled studies http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2458/13/119/ 

Subjective well-being and adaptation to life events: a meta-analysis. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22059843 

A dark side of happiness? http://gruberpeplab.com/pdf/GruberMaussTamir_2011_DarkSideHappiness.pdf

HILDA Survey https://www.melbourneinstitute.com/downloads/hilda/Stat_Report/statreport_2015.pdf

Are some of us born gay? People have argued that sexuality is determined before birth, while others believe the environment has a role to play here. So, what does the science say? To find out Wendy Zukerman spoke to Prof. Jenny Graves, Prof. Jacques Balthazart, Prof. William Rice, Dr. Ilan Dar-Nimrod as well as comedians Tom Ballard, Rhys Nicholson and Kyran Wheatley.

More Information

Minireview: Hormones and Human Sexual Orientation by Jacques Balthazart http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3138231/ 

Genetic study into male homosexuality http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25399360 

Sexual orientation in women with congenital adrenal hyperplasia 
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18157628

Happiness

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