Perpetual Notion Machine

Tonight’s show on December 26 is the last one of the year 2019 for the Perpetual Notion Machine. So, we’d like to reminisce with some of our favorite shows from the year. Joining PNM’er Dennis Shaffer is PNM’er Kelly Schwartz and PNM’er and engineer Kevin Lauterjung. Perhaps one of the most important topics covered by PNM was the rarely discussed, but prevalent, occurrences of harassment in the sciences. Kelly interviewed Erika Marin-Spiotta, a UW-Madison geoscientist, in a show that aired July 11. Then, we discussed a show that Kevin and PNM’er Joe Skarlupka did with “xkcd” webcomic creator Randall Munroe, who is also the author of the book How To: Absurd Scientific Advice for Common Real-World Problems. That very entertaining interview took place on September 12. And finally, another important issue related to science occurred in January – the government shutdown and how science funding would be affected. Kelly was joined by Matt Blackburn and Josh Mitchell, also students in the sciences. They discussed in this show that aired January 17 the importance and benefits of science research in academia.

Along with our discussion, we’ll play short clips from each of these shows. But check out the full audio of each show in the PNM webpage, and all of the other shows from 2019.

Have a good New Year’s and a good 2020!

At this time of year during the holidays, meals and food are often the center of family get-togethers. So, tonight, the Perpetual Notion Machine discusses the nitty gritty of food microbiology and food safety. Joining PNM’ers Joe Skarlupka and Aryel Clarke is Adam Borger, a one-time corporate food microbiologist, and now the Outreach Program Manager for the UW Food Research Institute. What’s interesting is that microbiology factors into food processing at various levels, but also in studying the dangers that can happen to food. Adam refers to this as “the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.” The Good are the good microorganisms and chemistry in creating that tasty beer and cheese. The Bad are the bad bacteria and organisms, like E. coli and salmonella, infecting food. And the ugly are generally contamination from spoilage. And not only does Adam explain the microbiology from the food source to the processing and the packaging, he provides tips to our listeners in how to handle the food in the kitchen.

So, have a Merry Christmas and New Year’s, but also be safe at mealtime.

For this episode, PNM-ers Kevin Lauterjung and Kelly Schwartz sit down with Electrical and Computer Engineering graduate students Kyle Daruwalla and Stephen Dennison, to discuss the controversy over Dr. Akbar Sayeed and the death of his former student Dr. John Brady, as well as broader issues pertaining to graduate student labor. We talk about the unique nature of graduate labor, and efforts underway to prevent repeated abuses.

Our conversation refers to a Wisconsin Journal article and WORT coverage of Akbar Sayeed and John Brady, as well as campus policies and efforts by the TAA. While we didn’t specifically cover them, mentoring and oversight guidelines have been developed elsewhere.

(Soundcloud photo courtesy Michelle King)

Katherine Hamilton, Chair, 38 North Solutions is coming to Madison to headline the RENEW Wisconsin Renewable Energy Summit on January 16, 2020.   Heather talks with Katherine about trends in federal policy and global economic drivers as they relate to renewables.  They discuss solar tax credits, trends in electricity storage and efforts by states to develop forward looking clean energy policies.

In her keynote address at the Wisconsin Renewable Energy Summit,  Katherine will offer a global perspective on clean energy before zeroing in on Wisconsin’s role, opportunity, and strategies for advancing this industry.

Katherine has been listed on the #Solar100 board by kWh Analytics and received a Cleanie Award as Entrepreneur of the Year in 2018. Katherine served as President of the GridWise Alliance, advocating for nearly $5 billion in funding for smart grid projects in the Recovery Act.

At the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Katherine led buildings research and then managed government relations in Washington, DC. Katherine spent a decade at Virginia Power, designing overhead and underground electrical systems for commercial and residential developments.  Katherine studied electrical engineering at Northern Virginia Community College and holds degrees from Cornell University and the Sorbonne. Katherine is part of The Energy Gang podcast through Greentech Media.

For this episode of Perpetual Notion Machine, we share a special segment of a new podcast, called In a Perfect Policy, produced by Catalysts for Science Policy, or CaSP. The interview is from the first episode of the first season of the podcast, both of which–episode and season–focus on impacts of STEM on underrepresented groups, and features Jo Handlesman and Derrick Smith from the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery (WID). The interview by CaSP’s Jenny Bratburd and Caitlin Warlick-Short covered barriers to women and minorities in STEM, data bias, impacts on underrepresented groups, and efforts underway to right the ship of academia.

Find more information about the WID, CaSP, and In a Perfect Policy.

Tonight, the Perpetual Notion Machine is so honored to have Dr. Jo Handelsman as our guest. Jo has an extensive resume in the sciences that includes Director of the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery (WID), a Vilas Research Professor in plant pathology at UW-Madison, induction into the National Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2019, science advisor in the Obama White House from 2014 to 2017, editor and chief of the academic journal DNA and Cell Biology, and author of several books. In a discussion with PNM’s Kelly Schwartz, Jo talks about how WID promotes diversity in the sciences, and how the sciences differ between government in the White House and academia. Also, Jo discusses her research in microbiology and microbial ecology, and how much we didn’t really know back when she first got started. One advance is the notion of precision medicine; the microbiome can be so diverse, even more so than the genome, that every person can be unique in that medicine needs to be precise for EACH individual. Another of Jo’s research interests is soil biology and conservation. Microbiome processes occur in the soil, much like in human beings. But soil erosion is at an all-time high, and those processes that make the soil rich and productive are dying out.

Next year, 2020, WID celebrates its 10 year anniversary. Events will be held throughout the year. To obtain details as events are announced, keep visiting the WID website at wid.wisc.edu.

Tonight, the Perpetual Notion Machine examines the many intricacies of spoken accents, that is, how people speak and pronounce words and phrases in different parts of the country, but we mostly focus on the Midwest and Wisconsin. Our guest is Joe Salmons, a professor in language sciences at UW-Madison and Director of the Center for the Study of Upper Midwestern Cultures. Joe tells PNM’er Dennis Shaffer that how different accents originated in different parts of the country can be complicated. But generally, as our ancestors immigrated to America from their native land, people continued their native speaking patterns as they learned English. But, in the Midwest, people came not only from foreign lands, but from Eastern and Southern regions of the U.S. This hodgepodge created a melting pot of all sort of accents. For instance, “cot” became how you say “caught”. Then there’s “dat” for “that” and “dere” for “there”. Another that seems a Wisconsin original is “ag” or “eg”.

The center that Joe is director has many areas of study, including the Wisconsin Englishes Project.

Also, the website Babbel has a very good webpage on the accents of Midwestern American English.

This Babbel webpage also includes a map that divides Midwestern accents into three broad, general regions:

Tonight, the Perpetual Notion Machine continues a group discussion of science in the movies by focusing on just one movie – the 1982 thriller The Thing starring Kurt Russell. The group includes Kelly Schwartz, Aryel Clarke, Keven Lauterjung, and Matt Blackburn. This is a John Carpenter production based on a 1938 novella by John W. Campbell Jr. and the original 1951 movie The Thing from Another World. The Thing takes place at an isolated research station on a cold, snowy, and dark Antarctica. And this setting provides a major part of the terror. Science can help explain how the isolation and cold can disrupt a person’s mental acuteness and create paranoia, despite the presence of an alien being. But how can science explain how this creature can mimic existing human beings? And how do these “mimics” interact so well with their human colleagues, just through observation? Only by the science of testing each person’s blood with the heat from the flamethrower could they discover who was alien and who was human.

Here’s a YouTube clip from the The Thing: link to the clip

Tonight, the Perpetual Notion Machine looks into Artificial Intelligence and the problem of control, which, according to our guest, could be more real than fiction. Stuart Russell has written the book Human Compatible: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Control. Stuart is professor of Computer Science at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a fellow of various societies, including the American Association for Artificial Intelligence, and is co-author of the definitive college textbook on AI called Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach.

Stuart informs PNM’er Dennis Shaffer that past and current AI research isn’t trying to duplicate or simulate human intelligence. That would be way too complex to achieve since even humans don’t know everything about human intelligence. But Stuart does admit that super intelligent machines will happen sometime in the future. Even today, some advanced machines have the capacity for learning, which can sometimes lead to severe problems. Stuart warns that unless developers consider fail-safe options, super intelligent machines may be impossible to control. He suggests instilling machines with uncertainty about their true objectives so that they remain provably deferential to humans, forever.

For those of you interested in some more info, check out this article from Quanta magazine on whether Machines Beat Humans.

And here’s another one from the Future of Life Institute on AI’s benefits and risks.

Tonight, the Perpetual Notion Machine has another group discussion with a few of the PNM nerds. In attendance are Kelly Schwartz, Aryel Clarke, Matt Blackburn, and Dennis Shaffer. First, Kelly gives us a preview of the Wisconsin Science Festival, running today, October 17, through Sunday, October 20. This is not just in Madison, but all across the state of Wisconsin. But, here in Madison on Friday night, Science on the Square occurs at various venues. For instance, Genna’s Cocktail Lounge will celebrate women in science. Also Friday night is the science trivia trolley ride. On Saturday, Kids in the Rotunda has dozens of presentations and demonstrations for the kids. One of the highlights of several main events during the festival is a presentation Saturday night by Kyle Hill on the Science of Star Wars. Kyle is a science communicator who likes to bust myths related to science. And he is the creator and host of the YouTube science show Because Science. So, Star Wars got us thinking about some science-related circumstances. Like, what is the Force and the Dark Side all about? Something mystical or genetic? What do you think?

Below is the audio clip from a PNM show which originally aired May 1, 2008. It’s part of an interview with Sidney Perkowitz, the author of the book Hollywood Science, and his take on science in movies. We hope you enjoy it!