Epizódok
- Who Keeps Winding the Doomsday Clock?
“Uh oh,” said several Manhattan Project scientists after they helped build a bomb and then it got used. They jumped to stop it from ever being used again. Solution: a newsletter. Through a somewhat convoluted chain of e…
- Can "Scams" Be a Doom?
Scams are old. Mesopotamia old. Snake oil old. They haven’t doomed us yet. But investigative journalist Joseph Cox of 404 Media sees something changing: new technology is making the oldest cons more personal, more convi…
- Just a Minor Sun Explosion
In 1859, the sky turned blood-red, telegraph machines sparked and chattered, and some of their batteries exploded. Then humanity responded by building a civilization that runs on electricity, satellites, GPS, internet c…
- The Everything Vaccine
From mild runny noses to savage pandemics, viruses and other pathogens have tormented humans for all of history. We are locked in a perpetual race against tiny shapeshifting enemies that mutate, spread, and occasionally…
- What Ever Happened to the Ozone Hole?
A dark blue wound across the bottom of the world — that’s what NASA images showed in the 1980s. It was a hole in the ozone layer, eight million square miles across. Human activity and convenience had quietly, but rapidl…
- Why America Wants More Nukes
The best defense against nuclear weapons is nuclear weapons, according to the logic of deterrence. It has guided US defense policy for nearly 80 years. So, shouldn’t more nukes prevent nuclear war even more? For the fir…
- Did AI Just Escape?
Egy rendkívüli epizódban Ben Bradford három ellentmondásos elbeszélést követ nyomon egy szokatlan kibertámadással kapcsolatban, amelyet egy OpenAI által fejlesztett mesterséges intelligencia hajtott végre. A mesterséges…
- Now I'm Scared of Cyborgs
For more than a century, science fiction has imagined cyborgs: humans fused with machines to outrun the limits of the body. They show up in Edgar Allan Poe, in the gleaming menace of Darth Vader, in Halo’s armored super…
- We Are Losing the Moon
The moon is drifting away. What does it mean? What do we do? With help from a poet, a space security expert, and the former chief scientist of NASA, Ben Bradford explores what the moon has done for Earth (tides, myths,…
- Asteroids! The Doom We're Best At
Az Asteroidák! A vég, amihez a legjobban értünk című epizód a Földet ért aszteroida-becsapódások pusztító erejét vizsgálja, beleértve a tömeges kihalásokat és a Hold keletkezését. Az epizódban szó esik a veszély korai f…
- Our Vision of the Post-Apocalypse Is Wrong
What would it take to survive after "the end of the world?" A whole culture of prepping often focuses on a familiar fantasy: grab the gear, flee the city, defend the bunker, survive alone. Anthropologist and survival in…
- Is Geoengineering A Good Idea?
The planet is heating up, every plan to stop it has fallen short, and growing group of scientists has started to ask a stranger question: what if we grabbed the thermostat ourselves? Ben Bradford investigates geoenginee…
- The True AI Threat is People
Hamza Chaudhry, a nemzetbiztonsági szakértő, a mesterséges intelligencia (MI) legfőbb veszélyének az embereket tartja, nem pedig az önállóan működő gyilkos robotokat. Kiemeli, hogy az MI-t rosszindulatú szereplők, vagy…
- Is the World Ending or Are We Just Online?
Are we living through the end times or the best moment in human history? Novelist and internet veteran Jason Pargin argues you have spent your life inside a “literal reverse apocalypse” — and if you don’t see it, he kno…
- Are We Going the Way of the Roman Empire?
Historically, societies fall. Civilizations collapse. But is that what’s happening now in the United States? With the help of historians, a former CIA-funded researcher on political instability, and one grumbling dad, B…
- We Try and Kill the Internet
The internet is how you get your news, your paycheck, your groceries, your banking, and sometimes your drinking water. Humanity has quietly handed over the keys to civilization to a network most of us don't understand a…
- Past Dooms That Didn't Arrive
People have been predicting the end of the world forever. They’ve always been wrong. Maybe we’re wrong today, too. So, we’re looking back at three past dooms predicted in the 20th century, none of which arrived as adver…
- How To Survive a Nuclear War
The air raid sirens scream (actually, they don’t work anymore). An emergency alert goes out, because … nuclear missiles are in-bound. It’s happening! How do we survive (non-Hollywood edition)? From diving into crumbling…
- How Do You Kill a Mosquito?
Mosquitoes are little jerks. They suck your blood to make more mosquitoes, spread deadly diseases like malaria and dengue, and have killed more humans than any other creature in the history of Earth. But now, we can fig…
- Supervolcano!
A supervolcano burbles under Yellowstone National Park. Enormous. Real. According to the internet’s most excitable corners, just itching to turn America into charcoal any minute now. Ben Bradford investigates what super…
- Let’s Design the AI That Kills Us All
Maddeningly, even some researchers building artificial intelligence see it as a potential existential threat on par with nuclear war. Ben Bradford follows three simple steps that could lead an AI to turn on humanity and…
- How To Start a Nuclear War
Humanity has repeatedly brought itself to the brink of nuclear war. Which raises a question: if everyone who can launch a nuke knows that could end the world, why does nuclear war still feel plausible? Ben explores how…
- Introducing Are We Doomed?
Grin at the apocalypse and find out with this curious, irreverent weekly podcast exploring the biggest dangers to our society and our species. From nuclear war and societal collapse to rogue AI and the moon drifting off…