Ockham’s Razor

When a lot of us first heard of drones a couple of decades ago, it was about their use in military operations.

Now people use them to take photos of their neighbours or maybe even get pizzas delivered.

But Vanya Bosiocic has a much more important – and constructive – use for drones.

What's your favourite animal? It doesn't matter really — because this talk is about to change your mind.

Carol Palmer, who's based in Darwin, studies marine megafauna. Yes, dolphins and whales live in the waters of northern Australia! And she's about to convince you that the most charming animal on the planet is the false killer whale.

We know climate change is bad for the health of the planet, and many of the species that live on it. That includes us humans.

Bushfires, heat waves, flooding — they all have human health impacts.

Sounds bleak, doesn't it? But today, we're hearing from someone who says if we're prepared to take a level look at this challenge, there are ways we can better meet it.

Do you know someone on the autism spectrum? Perhaps you are on it yourself. This episode, we're hearing from a speaker who says we need to be better at diagnosing autism as early as possible — not to medicalise people, but to ensure we're making a world that supports and includes them.

What does it take to bring an extinct species back from the dead? Well, sometimes — a Woman's Day magazine.

This week, we're hearing from Tyrone Lavery, a detective who hunts — in a good way — for lost Australian mammals. And he's on particular lookout for a sweet little native mouse.

How are your knees feeling? There's a pretty good chance one or both of them are sore — after all, knee osteoarthritis is a leading cause of disability globally, and Australia's no exception.

Trouble is, we don't really have any way of treating it. But never fear — this week we're hearing from someone who's bringing her engineering background to take a peek inside dodgy knees and see what it might take to fix them.

What does it take to survive on the driest inhabited continent on Earth? Indigenous people have tens of thousands of years of knowledge about this, but their place in the conversations about water planning and management are often tokenistic at best, or worse, completely absent.

Bradley Moggridge wants to change that. He's a Kamilaroi man and hydrogeologist, and he knows Indigenous knowledge needs to be central to Australia's water future.

Don't you love tipping your head back on a clear, dark night, and seeing those silvery stars twinkling above you? We know in our brains that they're giant balls of burning gas, even though they look like fairy dust scattered across the sky.

And the reason we know this is because of the science of astronomy.

This week we're hearing from an astronomer about the incredible discoveries her field has managed to uncover, and what the next generation of radio astronomy might achieve… right here in Australia.

You probably have a favourite colour, flower, or song. But do you have a favourite parasite?

Shokoofeh Shamsi does - although she studies parasites for a living, so maybe that makes a bit more sense.

The bad news for the rest of us who don't spend a lot of time thinking about this stuff? Her favourite parasites live in many Australians' favourite food.

We know that exercise is good for us — good for our muscles and bones and mental health. But what if it's good for other parts of us as well? Research is showing that exercise releases molecular signals that can protect our eyes from diseases like age-related macular degeneration. The next step is to figure out how to harness these benefits, which is exactly what Dr Joshua Chu-Tan is on a mission to do.