Short Wave

Check out NPR’s newest podcast, Machine Gods. It’s the official podcast of the singularity, meaning — the hypothetical future when machines will outpace our own intelligence…and our control. Whether you think that future is coming or not, hosts Kevin Roose and Casey Newton are here to help you understand the people trying to build it… and how their technology works. 

On this episode, listen to their exclusive interview with safety researchers who were fired by OpenAI. 

Interested in more technology and AI news? Email us your question at shortwave@npr.org.

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Does swinging a lightsaber help us learn? New research from Florida Atlantic University and Brown University found that movement dramatically helps with certain kinds of complex learning. The research was published in the journal Science Advances. 

Interested in more science involving video games? Email us your question at shortwave@npr.org.

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If you’ve ever seen a crime show, you probably know how the plot unfolds: A victim is found, an investigation ensues and police conduct a high-stakes search for the culprit. Detectives and crime lab techs collect hair, examine bullet casings and photograph bloodstains. But just how reliable are these clues – and does science back them up? Well, today on the show, with the help of legal expert Chris Fabricant, we’re diving into which of these forensic techniques are junk “science”, which we should be more cautious about – and why all of them haunt the legal system.

Interested in more crime and pop science? Email us your question at shortwave@npr.org.

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It’s been just over two years since the rise of Make America Healthy Again, or MAHA. The movement united a coalition of moms, wellness influencers and voters across the political spectrum over concerns about chronic illness and childhood diseases. And when Robert F. Kennedy Jr. took over as Secretary of Health and Human Services, it seemed like MAHA would be front and center in Washington.

But as we approach the midterm elections, has the Trump administration made good on the MAHA agenda? On today’s episode, we dig into what’s changed, what hasn’t and what that means for your health.

Interested in more health science? Email us your question at shortwave@npr.org.

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It feels like everyone we know is talking about the new documentary You Can See Everything. It tracks the effort of comedian and documentarian Nathan Fielder to suss out how deceptive Elizabeth Holmes, disgraced founder of the company Theranos, is. And after watching the film, we all left the theater wondering -- what could we see? How possible is it to ever really spot someone lying? So we of course called up an expert in deception and counter-deception research, Maria Hartwig, a professor of psychology at CUNY, the City University of New York. 

For more on sussing out a liar, check out our episode about what's wrong with the polygraph.

Interested in more deep dives on the science behind pop culture blockbusters? Email us your question at shortwave@npr.org.

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