Big Picture Science

    The surprising connections in science and technology that give you the Big Picture. Astronomer Seth Shostak and science journalist Molly Bentley are joined each week by leading researchers, techies, and journalists to provide a smart and humorous take on science. Our regular "Skeptic Check" episodes cast a critical eye on pseudoscience.

  • The Best Things in Life are Tree(s)

  • The Ocean's Genome

  • Night Flight

  • Skeptic Check: Naomi Klein

  • Extraordinary Ordinary Objects*

  • Spotlight on SETI ep 4: Chenoa Tremblay

  • 2024: Our Space Odyssey

  • A Real Gas

  • Going Multicellular

  • Skeptic Check: Near Death Experiences

  • Spotlight on SETI ep 3: Pascal Lee

  • Beyond the Periodic Table

  • Amazing Amazonia

  • Fuhgeddaboudit**

  • How Hot is Too Hot?*

  • Platypus Crazy*

  • Spotlight on SETI ep 2: Nathalie Cabrol

  • Skeptic Check: String Theory

  • We'll Always Have Parasites

  • Measure For Measure

  • Skeptic Check: Cell Phone Bans

  • Cold Comfort

  • Introducing Spotlight on SETI!

  • Shipwrecks

  • Calling All Aliens*

  • Life in the Solar System

  • Catching Fire

  • Not Just a Phage

  • Skeptic Check: Is Social Media Harming Kids?

  • Animal Alphabets

  • Allergy Reason*

  • CRISPR Mosquitoes*

  • Don't Lighten Up

  • Aliens Now

  • Skeptic Check: The Body Electric*

  • Flower Power*

  • Animals Being Jerks*

  • Post Social Media*

  • Skeptic Check: Feeling Risky*

  • Beyond the Standard Model

  • The Play's the Thing

  • Nuts and Bolts

  • Phreaky Physics*

  • De-Permafrosting*

  • For the Birds*

  • Fungi Fear*

  • Coffee of the Future

  • When the Moon Hits Your Eye

  • Skeptic Check: Asteroid Mining

  • Feet Don't Fail Me

  • Lady Parts**

  • Tomb with a View*

  • Lithium Valley

  • Alien Says What?

  • The Wrong Stuff

  • Skeptic Check: Hypnosis*

  • Inside Planets

  • Tech in Check

  • Your Mind on Movies

  • Eclectic Company

  • Iron, Coal, Wood**

  • The Ocean's Genome

  • Skeptic Check: Naomi Klein

  • End of Eternity**

  • In Living Color

  • The T-Rex Files

  • Neanderthal in the Family**

  • Night Flight

  • Extraordinary Ordinary Objects

  • Like Lightning*

  • Skeptic Check: Worrier Mentality*

  • Going Multicellular

  • How Hot is Too Hot?

  • Skeptic Check: Near Death Experiences

  • Into the Deep*

  • What's a Few Degrees?

  • Building a Space Colony*

  • Talk the Walk*

  • A Twist of Slime*

  • Granting Immunity*

  • Skeptic Check: UFO Conspiracy

  • We'll Always Have Parasites

  • Measure For Measure

  • Fantastic-er Voyage*

  • Dinosaurs' Last Gasp*

  • Allergy Reason

  • Made for Mars

  • Skeptic Check: NASA UFO Study

  • The Ears Have It*

  • Skeptic Check: The Body Electric

  • Life in the Solar System

  • Let's Stick Together*

  • Skeptic Check: Shroom With a View*

  • Catching Fire*

  • Finding Endurance*

  • The Latest Buzz*

  • CRISPR Mosquitoes

  • Skeptic Check: Feeling Risky

  • Calling All Aliens

  • Make Space for Animals*

  • Skeptic Check: Do Your Own Research*

  • Flower Power

  • Lady Parts*

  • Waste Not [rebroadcast]

  • Post Social Media

  • Fungi Fear

  • Math's Paths [rebroadcast]

  • Wondery Presents: Frozen Head

  • Skeptic Check: Understanding UAPs

  • Vaccine Inequity

  • Testing Your Metal (rebroadcast)

  • Melting Down (rebroadcast)

  • Coming to Our Animal Senses (rebroadcast)

  • Webb Feat (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: 5G (rebroadcast)

  • Tomb with a View

  • Keeping Humans in the Loop (rebroadcast)

  • Is Life Inevitable [rebroadcast]

  • Vaccine Inequity

  • Your Inner Tree (rebroadcast)

  • Fuhgeddaboudit (rebroadcast)

  • Lady Parts

  • Skeptic Check: AI Comes Alive

  • The T-Rex Files

  • Animals Being Jerks (rebroadcast)

  • Phreaky Physics (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Data Bias (rebroadcast)

  • De-Permafrosting

  • Like Lightning

  • Coming to Our Animal Senses

  • Skeptic Check: Heal Thyself (rebroadcast)

  • Platypus Crazy (rebroadcast)

  • Rip Van Winkle Worm (rebroadcast)

  • Webb Feat

  • Building a Space Colony

  • Skeptic Check: Shared Reality (rebroadcast)

  • Sci-Fi From the Future (rebroadcast)

  • Flush with Excitement (rebroadcast)

  • Feet Don't Fail Me (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Hypnosis

  • Fantastic-er Voyage

  • Dinosaurs' Last Gasp

  • DNA is Not Destiny (rebroadcast)

  • For the Birds (rebroadcast)

  • End of Eternity (rebroadcast)

  • Neanderthal in the Family (rebroadcast)

  • Catching Fire

  • Skeptic Check: Dr. Oz

  • In Living Color (rebroadcast)

  • Eclectic Company (rebroadcast)

  • Finding Endurance

  • Go With the Flow (rebroadcast)

  • The Latest Buzz

  • Nuclear Worries

  • Identity Crisis (rebroadcast)

  • You Are Exposed (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: 5G

  • Melting Down

  • Iron, Coal, Wood

  • Skeptic Check: Do Your Own Research

  • Bare Bones (rebroadcast)

  • Make Space for Animals

  • Testing Your Metal

  • Into the Deep (rebroadcast)

  • What's a Few Degrees?

  • Mycology Education (rebroadcast)

  • Attack of the Mutants

  • Hubble and Beyond (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Identifying UAPs

  • Talk the Walk (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Shroom With a View (rebroadcast)

  • Suitable For Life?

  • Your Inner Tree

  • Dimming the Sun

  • Skeptic Check: Brain Gain (rebroadcast)

  • Radical Cosmology (rebroadcast)

  • Fuhgeddaboudit

  • Home Invasions (rebroadcast)

  • AI: Where Does It End? (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Science Denial [rebroadcast]

  • Animals Being Jerks

  • De-Permafrosting

  • True Grit (rebroadcast)

  • You've Got Whale (rebroadcast)

  • Phreaky Physics

  • Skeptic Check: Anti-Vax

  • Platypus Crazy

  • A Twist of Slime (rebroadcast)

  • New Water Worlds (rebroadcast)

  • Cicadas and Zombie Seeds

  • Skeptic Check: Pentagon UFO Report

  • Skeptic Check: Science Breaking Bad (rebroadcast)

  • After The Plague

  • Flush With Excitement

  • The Ears Have It (rebroadcast)

  • Air Apparent (rebroadcast)

  • Feet Don't Fail Me

  • Skeptic Check: Rational Lampoon (rebroadcast)

  • For the Birds

  • End of Eternity

  • Skeptic Check: Flat Earth (rebroadcast)

  • Waste Not (rebroadcast)

  • Venom Diagram (rebroadcast)

  • Volcanic Mind Melt

  • Skeptic Check: Useful Delusions

  • Neanderthal in the Family

  • DecodeHer (rebroadcast)

  • In Living Color

  • Eclectic Company

  • Creature Discomforts (rebroadcast)

  • Granting Immunity (rebroadcast)

  • Mars Attracts

  • Iron, Coal, Wood

  • Skeptic Check: Shared Reality

  • Supercomputer Showdown (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Betting on Pseudoscience (rebroadcast)

  • Headed for Trouble (rebroadcast)

  • For Good Measure (rebroadcast)

  • Handling the Holidays (rebroadcast)

  • Fire Clouds and Ice-teroids

  • Skeptic Check: Shroom with a View

  • Bare Bones

  • Into the Deep

  • Sex Post Facto (rebroadcast)

  • Time Travel Agents (rebroadcast)

  • The Other Living World (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Stay Skeptical

  • What's a Few Degrees?

  • Geology is Destiny (rebroadcast)

  • Talk the Walk

  • Mycology Education

  • Hubble and Beyond

  • Life on Venus?

  • Space: Why Go There? (rebroadcast)

  • Home Invasions

  • The X-Flies (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Worrier Mentality (rebroadcast)

  • Math's Paths (rebroadcast)

  • On Thin Ice (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Know-It-Alls

  • Something in the Air

  • COVID Curiosities

  • Creative Brains (Rebroadcast)

  • Animals Like Us (rebroadcast)

  • Let's Stick Together (rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Data Bias (rebroadcast)

  • Race and COVID

  • Soap, Skin, Sleep

  • Gained in Translation (rebroadcast)

  • Vaccine, When?

  • To the Bat Cave

  • Is Life Inevitable? (Rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Covid Conspiracy

  • Treating the Virus

  • The Other Living World

  • Zombies, Bigfoot, and Max Brooks

  • Let's Take a Paws

  • How Bad Does It Have to Get?

  • It's In Material [rebroadcast]

  • Skeptic Check: Pandemic Fear

  • DecodeHer [rebroadcast]

  • AI: Where Does it End?

  • Climate Changed

  • Frogs' Pants (Rebroadcast)

  • Skeptic Check: Science Denial (rebroadcast)

  • A Twist of Slime

  • The Ears Have It

  • Perpetual Emotion Machine [rebroadcast]

  • Your Brain's Reins [rebroadcast]

  • Skeptic Check: Heal Thyself [rebroadcast]

  • Handling the Holidays

  • Waste Not

  • Shell on Earth

  • Yule Like This

  • Skeptic Check: Betting on Pseudoscience

  • Stopping Ebola

  • Radical Cosmology

  • Supercomputer Showdown

  • Skeptic Check: Rational Lampoon

  • Nobel Efforts

  • Go With the Flow

  • Battling Bacteria

  • Headed For Trouble

  • Keeping Humans in the Loop

  • Rip Van Winkle Worm

  • For Good Measure

  • Skeptic Check: Data Bias

  • Skeptic Check: Brain Gain

  • True Grit

  • Granting Immunity

  • Sci-Fi From the Future

  • Skeptic Check: Flat Earth

  • Let's Stick Together

  • Math's Paths

  • DNA is Not Destiny

  • Nailing the Moon Landing

  • Animals Like Us

  • You've Got Whale

  • It's Habitable Forming

  • Creature Discomforts

  • Skeptic Check: Worrier Mentality

  • New Water Worlds

  • Is Life Inevitable?

  • Rethinking Chernobyl

  • Identity Crisis

  • Gained in Translation

  • Free Range Dinosaurs

  • DecodeHer

  • You Are Exposed

  • Skeptic Check: Political Scientist

  • Hawkingravity

  • High Moon

  • We Are VR

  • Skeptic Check: Astrology Ascending

  • Meet Your Robot Barista

  • The X-Flies

  • Space: Why Go There?

  • Skeptic Check: Science Breaking Bad

  • Creative Brains

  • Bacteria to the Future

  • Space Rocks!

  • Skeptic Check: Science Denial

  • Rerouting... Rerouting

  • Air Apparent

  • Wonder Women

  • Skeptic Check: Heal Thyself

  • DNA: Nature's Hard Drive

  • Angles of a Hack

  • Plan of a Hack

  • Too Big To Prove

  • It's In Material

  • On Thin Ice

  • What Goes Around

  • Frogs' Pants

  • Perpetual Emotion Machine

  • Imagining Planets

  • Time on Your Side

  • Your Brain's Reins

  • What Have You Got To Move

  • Brain Dust

  • Skeptic Check: Your Inner Lab Coat

  • Quantum: Why We Want 'Em

  • Skeptic Check: New UFO Evidence

  • DIY Spaceflight

  • Geology is Destiny

  • Are Animals Really That Smart?

  • Weather Vain

  • DIY Diagnosis

  • With All Our Mites

  • Time Travel Agents

  • Skeptic Check: Nibiru! (Again!)

  • Venom Diagram

  • Sex Post Facto

  • On Defense

  • Skeptic Check: Aliens - The Evidence

  • Born Legacy

  • Elements Never Forget

  • Musical Universe

  • Skeptic Check: Busting Myths with Adam Savage

  • Caught in a Traps

  • Eclipsing All Other Shows

  • Skeptic Check: How Low Can You Go?

  • Science Fiction

  • Gene-y in a Bottle

  • The Crater Good

  • 100% Invisible

  • Eve of Disruption

  • Spacecraft Elegy

  • Skeptic Check: Glutenous Maximus

  • Winging It

  • Cosmic Conundra

  • Skeptic Check: Not So Sweet

  • Thinking About Thinking

  • Going All to Species

  • Skeptic Check: Amelia Earhart

  • No Face to Hide

  • The Light Stuff

  • The Fix is In

  • Skeptic Check: Fear Itself

  • What Lies Beneath

  • And To Space We Return

  • Hidden History

  • Moral's Law

  • Skeptic Check: Science and the Election

  • Skeptic Check: Skeptic Seth

  • The Evolution of Evolution

  • Asteroids!

  • They Know Who You Are

  • Are We Over the Moon?

  • Skeptic Check: After the Hereafter

  • Raising the Minimum Age

  • Microbes: Resistance is Futile

  • Science Fiction True

  • Skeptic Check: The Me in Measles

  • Surviving the Anthropocene

  • How to Talk to Aliens

  • Shocking Ideas

  • Living Computers

  • Moving Right Along

  • Surfeit of the Vitalest

  • Tale of the Distribution

  • Who's Controlling Whom?

  • Land on the Run

  • Replace What Ails You

  • Apt to Adapt

  • A Stellar Job

  • You Think; You're So Smart

  • Look Who's Not Talking

  • Happily Confused

  • Climate Conversation

  • Skeptic Check: Paleo Diet

  • Skeptic Check: Check the Skeptics

  • Smiley Virus

  • Space for Everyone

  • Martian Madness

  • Skeptic Check: What, We Worry?

  • Stranded

  • The Pest of Us

  • Solar System Vacation

  • Skeptic Check: Are You Sure You're Sure?

  • Forget to Remember

  • Dogged Pursuit of Pluto

  • What the Hack

  • Skeptic Check: Evolutionary Arms Race

  • It's All Relative

  • Math's Days Are Numbered

  • Invisible Worlds

  • Life in Space

  • Skeptic Check: Monster Mashup

  • Power to the People

  • Mars-Struck

  • Sesquicentennial Science

  • Digging Our Past

  • Skeptic Check: Mummy Dearest

  • Big Questions Somewhat Answered

  • Meet Your Replacements

  • Skeptic Check: Got a Sweet Truth?

  • Shocking Ideas

  • Long Live Longevity

  • This Land Is Island

  • Sounds Abound

  • Skeptic Check: Friends Like These

  • What's the Difference?

  • As You Were

  • Skeptic Check: Is It True?

  • A Sudden Change in Planets

  • Welcome to Our Labor-atory

  • ZZZZZs Please

  • De-Extinction Show

  • Eye Spy

  • Skeptic Check: About Face

  • Deep Time

  • Time for a Map

  • What Do You Make Of It?

  • A New Hope for Life In Space

  • We Can Rebuild It

  • Our Tasteless Show

  • That's Containment!

  • Since Sliced Bread

  • Do the Math

  • We Heart Robots

  • Before the Big Bang

  • Gene Hack, Man

  • Skeptic Check: Zombies Aren't Real

  • Can We Talk?

  • Animal Instinct

  • Group Think

  • Some Like It Cold

  • Math's Days Are Numbered

  • Skeptic Check: Science Blunders

  • The Heat is On

  • Life Back Then

  • Shutting Down Science

  • Skeptic Check: War of the Worlds

  • Emergence

  • You Say You Want an Evolution?

  • Skeptic Check: Follywood Science

  • Catch a Wave

  • Rife with Life

  • Getting a Spacelift

  • Material Whirl

  • Exoplanets

  • Cosmos: It's Big, It's Weird

  • Skeptic Check: Hostile Climate

  • Stomach This

  • Skeptic Check: Forget with the Program

  • Seth's Wine Cellar

  • Anthropocene and Heard

  • Happy Daze

  • Whodunit, Who'll Do It?

  • Say La Vie

  • Skeptic Check: Science Blunders

  • Whither the Weather?

  • Ultimate Hook Up

  • Skeptic Check: They're Baack!

  • Remembers Only

  • Before the Big Bang

  • Doomsday Live, Part 2

  • Doomsday Live, Part I

  • No Expiration Date

  • Going Global

  • Space Archaeology

  • As the Worlds Turn

  • [Rectangular Container] Thinking

  • Skeptic Check: Mysterious Illness

  • Big Data

  • Skeptic Check: Energy Vortex

  • Oh, Rats!

  • The Invisible In-Between

  • Skeptic Check: Monsters, Magic, and Music

  • A.I. Caramba!

  • A Martian Curiosity

  • Fuel's Paradise

  • Olympics for the Rest of Us

  • Animal Instinct

  • Nano Nano

  • Seth's Storm Shelter

  • Skeptic Check: OMG, GMO?

  • Can We Talk?

  • Better Mousetrap

  • Mass Transits

  • To Earth and Back

  • That's So Random!

  • Early Adapters

  • Humans Need Not Apply

  • Second That Emotion

  • Found in Space

  • Seth's Cabinet of Wonders

  • Skeptic Check: Prog-Not-Stication

  • Skeptic Check: Saucer's Apprentice

  • Aware Am I?

  • Wired for Thought

  • Light, the Universe, and Everything

  • Skeptic Check: Superstition

  • Sensor Sensibility

  • Going Viral

  • Science's Alliances

  • Skeptic Check: Dubiology

  • We've Got You Made

  • Blame it on Bacterio

  • NASA or What?

  • Bug Off!

  • Happy Daze

  • Skeptic Check, Beast Of

  • Rend Me Your Ears

  • Seth's Tool Shed

  • Into the Unknown

  • Home Brew Science

  • Swarm in Here... or Is It Just Me?

  • Skeptic Check: Plotting Along

  • Written in Code

  • Cell! Cell!

  • Water the Chances

  • Know Laughing Matter

  • The Big Picture

  • Alien Invasion

  • Physics Phrontiers

  • Thanks for the Memories

  • Skeptic Check: Mayhem and Octoberhem

  • Big, Really Big

  • Skeptic Check: Swimming in Denial

  • Sex and the SETI

  • Who's on First?

  • Eureka!

  • Skeptic Check: Diluted Thinking

  • Outta This World

  • Skeptic Check: ESP or Think Again

  • Gone Missing!

  • You've Got Sol!

  • That's So Random!

  • Do Computers Byte?

  • Seth's Storage Locker

  • Skeptic Check: Cell Phone Danger

  • Method to Our Mathness

  • Early Adapters

  • Extreme Geology

  • Humans Need Not Apply

  • Off to the Traces

  • Earth: A Millennium Hence

  • Earth: A Century Hence

  • Skeptic Check: Sheer Lunacy

  • What Makes Us Human Part II: Adaptability

  • What Makes Us Human Part I: Others

  • Say What?

  • Rxs Get Personal

  • What's Your Poison?

  • Grave Matters

  • Skeptic Check: Playing Doctor

  • Seth's Garage

  • Life of Brain

  • Skeptic Check: Fraudcast News

  • Robots Call the Shots

  • Seas the Moment

  • Habitats Not For Humanity

  • Seth's Crawl Space

  • Skeptic Check: Conspiracy!

  • SETI: Now What?

  • Skeptic Check: Climate Clamor

  • You've Been Slimed!

  • Space Race 2.0

  • Pave New Worlds

  • It's the Science, Cupid!

  • Time's Mysteries Part II: Warping Time

  • Time's Mysteries Part I: Marking Time

  • Journey to a Black Hole

  • A Man, A Planet, A Tenal: Panama!

  • Skeptical Sunday: The Gospel According to SETI

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