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!