Futureproof with Jonathan McCrea

For us humans, our overall sensory capabilities - the scope of our sense of smell, our sight, our hearing, and touch - feels all-encompassing, like there’s nothing more that we could possibly conceive of that would change how we experience the world around us.

But that’s dead wrong. And this is an illusion that we share with every animal and insect in the world.

But what we might humans lack in one area of perception, another animal or insect might excel.

So, what are we missing?

Ed Yond, science journalist and author of ‘An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us’ joins Jonathan to discuss.

Dr. Ruth Freeman, Director of Strategy and Communications at Science Foundation Ireland & Dr. Shane Bergin, Physicist and Assistant Professor in Science Education at UCD also joined Jonathan for this week's episode of Newsround.

We have a complex relationship with psychedelics.

To some, they can be gateways to a higher level of consciousness, to others, a poison that should be stamped out.

Regardless of where you stand though, the fact that our brains are capable of creating these fluid, dynamic, altered states of perception seemingly on their own is pretty cool.

But can these experiences be created with light flashes instead of chemicals? And if so, what might we learn from them?

Fiona Macpherson, Professor of Philosophy, and Director of the Centre for the Study of Perceptual Experience at the University of Glasgow and a part of the creative team behind The Dream Machine joins Jonathan to discuss.

The biggest story this week was the release of some absolutely spectacular views of the cosmos from the James Webb Space Telescope, which include the deepest infrared view of our universe that has ever been taken.

Joining Jonathan to discuss this incredible achievement is one Irish person who has been involved in the project for two decades, Professor Tom Ray, Director of the School of Cosmic Physics at the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies.

There's much to admire about birds. They can soar through the skies, build durable nests, sing the most beautiful songs, and possess a visual acuity that is truly something to behold.

But when it comes to their other senses how do they fare?

For a long time, it was widely believed that birds had none, but that didn't sit right with Danielle J. Whittaker, Evolutionary Biologist, Managing Director of the COLDAX Center for Oldest Ice Exploration, and author of ‘The Secret Perfume of Birds: Uncovering the Science of Avian Scent’.

She joins Jonathan to discuss.

How do we get someone to change their mind?

Is it by arguing them into submission or is it by letting them explain the story about how they arrived at that point of view?

What is the underlying brain chemistry of how opinions change?

A new book titled ‘How Minds Change’ delves into these questions.

The author, David McRaney, joins Jonathan to discuss.

Annie Jacobsen, author of 'The Pentagon's Brain: An Uncensored History of DARPA, America's Top-Secret Military Research Agency' joins Jonathan to discuss the history of the US Defense Department's most secret, most powerful, and most controversial military science R&D agency.

First broadcast July 9th 2016

For most of us, our image of what goes on in an operating theatre comes from television and movies; we think scalpels, scrubs, facemasks, and beeping heart monitors, etc.

What we don’t envisage, is robots and augmented reality glasses but increasingly modern surgery is incorporating these and other cutting-edge technologies into their systems and procedures.

So just what does the operating theatre of 2022 look like?

Connor Green is Consultant Orthopaedic Surgeon at the National Orthopaedic Hospital Cappagh. He joins Jonathan to discuss.

If you’ve seen classic B Movies like 1954’s 'Them' or the criminally underappreciated classic, 'Starship Troopers', the words “Insect Warfare” probably conjure up some specific, likely silly imagery.

But insects have featured in human conflicts in very real and often terrifying ways since the beginning of the historical record and likely, long before it.

Jeffrey Lockwood is Professor of Natural Sciences and Humanities at the University of Wyoming and the author of 'Six-Legged Soldiers: Using Insects as Weapons of War'.

He joins Jonathan to discuss,

Catherine McGuinness, Zoologist and Educational Assistant at the National Museum of Ireland & Dr. Lara Dungan also joined Jonathan for Newsround.

We conventionally think of time as something simple and fundamental that flows uniformly, independently from everything else, from the past to the future, measured by clocks and watches.

In the course of time, the events of the universe succeed each other in an orderly way: pasts, presents, futures.

The past is fixed, the future open. . . . And yet all of this has turned out to be false.

Carlo Rovelli is Director of the Quantum Gravity Group of the Centre de Physique Théorique (CPT) of the Aix-Marseille University and author of 'The Order of Time', he joined Jonathan to discuss.

First aired 21/7/2018

We here at Futureproof don't need to tell you that biodiversity is in crisis.

This is true in our seas as much as in our oceans, and despite that, only 2% of our waters are designated "Marine Protected" areas but a national campaign called 'Fair Seas' is trying to change that.

Joining Jonathan to discuss is Regina Classen, Marine Policy and Research Officer with the Irish Wildlife Trust and co-author of the 'Fair Seas' report, 'Revitalising Our Seas'.