The Origins Podcast with Lawrence Krauss

Six months or so ago, I had a fascinating interview/discussion with Stephanie Canizales about her book, Sin Padres, Ni Papeles, which described her five year PhD project interviewing young people who had migrated from Central America as undocumented and unaccompanied minors in pursuit of a better future. These children were sent by their parents because they had no other choice, either to protect their lives from violence or because they had no means to support them at home.

Once these children arrived in the US they were met by either impoverished relatives who often couldnt support them. With no access to education or any legal means of supporting themselves they were forced to take low-wage jobs just to survive.

I believe our society should be judged not by how well we keep people out, but how well we treat people when they are here. The story of these children is heart wrenching, and raises many complex issues, which may challenge previous notions you may have about such things as child welfare laws, about how we treat these young people who were driven here not out of choice, but through necessity, and who our society largely abandons once they arrive.

Because of the vicissitudes of international affairs and other unexpected factors, we were not able to release this dialogue before now. But perhaps there could be no more opportune time to address this issue. Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia came to this country as a 16 year old, a minor sent by his family to protect him from local gangs. In the intervening 14 years in the United States he was never charged or convicted of a crime, just as he had never been so charged or convicted in his home country of El Salvador. He had a job, and had several children with his US citizen wife. Nevertheless, he was recently illegally deported, without any trial, back to a maximum security prison in El Salvador, leading to a vigorous public debate.

During the public discussions, Kilmar, and other illegal immigrants have been vilified for the acts of desperation that led them to enter the US illegally. But very little has been discussed about the harrowing challenges people like Kilmar met when they arrived here, alone, as children. My discussion with Stephanie will hopefully add a new dimension to the current public debate on this issue, focusing on real people rather than statistics, and on both the causes for the recent illegal migration to the US, and also the actual impact both on the country and on the immigrants while they live in the US.

In so doing, I hope this expands your perspective of this complex problem, which is, after all, one of the purposes of this podcast, and of the Origins Project Foundation.

As always, an ad-free video version of this podcast is also available to paid Critical Mass subscribers. Your subscriptions support the non-profit Origins Project Foundation, which produces the podcast. The audio version is available free on the Critical Mass site and on all podcast sites, and the video version will also be available on the Origins Project YouTube.

I’m excited to announce the third episode of our new series, What’s New in Science, co-hosted by Sabine Hossenfelder. Once again, Sabine and I each brought a few recent science stories to the table, and we took turns introducing them before diving into thoughtful discussions. It’s a format that continues to spark engaging exchanges, and based on the feedback we’ve received, it’s resonating well with listeners.

This time, we covered a wide range of intriguing topics. We began with the latest buzz from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument suggesting that dark energy might be changing over time. I remain skeptical, but the possibility alone is worth a closer look. We followed that with results from the Euclid space telescope, which has already identified nearly 500 strong gravitational lensing candidates—an impressive yield from just the early data.

We also returned to quantum computing, comparing the hype around Microsoft’s recent claims to Amazon’s quieter but arguably more meaningful development—a chip with built-in error correction, which could mark real progress toward scalable systems. From there we went to Earth, where a team at Princeton reported a result that almost sounds like a perpetual motion machine: using the Earth’s magnetic field to generate electric current. It’s not going to power the grid, but it raises fascinating questions.

And of course, we couldn’t resist discussing a new round of exotic claims about hidden structures beneath the Pyramids of Giza, before wrapping up with a reanalysis of decade-old data from the Curiosity rover on Mars. It suggests the presence of organic compounds that might hint at life—but as always, the story is more complicated.

It was another lively and thoughtful exchange, and I hope you’ll enjoy it as much as we did.

As always, an ad-free video version of this podcast is also available to paid Critical Mass subscribers. Your subscriptions support the non-profit Origins Project Foundation, which produces the podcast. The audio version is available free on the Critical Mass site and on all podcast sites, and the video version will also be available on the Origins Project YouTube.

The Origins Podcast began with a bang, a Big Bang. Over the first month of our recording, we traveled to two continents, and 4 cities and recorded 16 episodes in 22 days. It was a whirlwind, and one of the most amazing experiences I can recall. While in London, we took advantage of the amazingly gracious acceptance by Ricky Gervais to appear on the podcast. It was a day I will always remember.

Ricky had appeared in our film, The Unbelievers, which followed me and Richard Dawkins around the world. Gus and Luke Holwerda, who directed and filmed that movie helped create The Origins Podcast, and for the first year, filmed all the episodes. Ricky graciously agreed to appear in front of their cameras one more time, and joined us at what was then New College of Humanities, where I was a visiting Professor.

From the moment he arrived, it was clear it was going to be great. As he had been when we filmed The Unbelievers Ricky claimed to be nervous and was worried he would appear ignorant. He needn’t have worried. Maybe that is one of the reasons he is so good at what he does, because he worries about rising to the challenge.

We discussed his early life, his love of science, his early interest in biology and then philosophy, then the science of comedy, the comedy of religion, and the need for free speech. He then proceeded to demand a mind-bending, personal science lesson from me. It was amazing. He was amazing. Enjoy this, our first rebroadcast of a classic Origins Podcast Episode that is worth watching once again. Enjoy.

As always, an ad-free video version of this podcast is also available to paid Critical Mass subscribers. Your subscriptions support the non-profit Origins Project Foundation, which produces the podcast. The audio version is available free on the Critical Mass site and on all podcast sites, and the video version will also be available on the Origins Project YouTube.

The response to our first What’s New in Science has been very strong. What was not clear however, is that in this new series, Sabine Hosenfelder is my co-host, not my guest. As a result, we have changed things up a bit, and we are thrilled with the results. Both Sabine and I separately chose three science news items, and we alternated introducing them. After the introduction we had a spirited discussion about each. The topics included, the buzz around topological quantum computers, search for water on the moon, a new Google AI scientist, new optimistic models suggest a major ocean current may not be near its tipping point due to Climate change, searching for quantum fluctuations in space and time with interferometers, and the purported discovery of the very first stars in the Universe. We had a spirited discussion of these developments, and then topped it off with a discussion about a video that Sabine had posted that went viral, about the present and future of particle physics.

Our discussion was exactly what I think is needed, and not present elsewhere on the internet, namely, in depth discussions of topics in the news where the details are fleshed out and the wheat separated from the chaff—no holds barred. In addition, the news is so topical that it changes between our recording, and the episode release. For example, on the day of our recording, a new private spacecraft had just successfully landed near the South Pole of the Moon to drill for evidence of water. We discussed why this is of interest, and it still is. However, the spacecraft isn’t. The day after our discussion it was announced that the spacecraft had since toppled over and its batteries had died. While this mission failed, the purpose of the mission remains important, and therefore the discussion we had can provide useful perspective to assess future mission claims.

We look forward to getting your feedback on our new format, and also encourage you to send us ideas for news items in our next podcast. With your support, I believe this new monthly addition to the Origins Podcast lineup may become one of the most valuable parts of our whole program. Enjoy!

As always, an ad-free video version of this podcast is also available to paid Critical Mass subscribers. Your subscriptions support the non-profit Origins Project Foundation, which produces the podcast. The audio version is available free on the Critical Mass site and on all podcast sites, and the video version will also be available on the Origins Project YouTube.

Elizabeth Weiss's recent book, On the Warpath, chronicles her efforts to keep anthropology from falling prey to ideology, even as she curated a collection of ancient skeletons at San Jose State University. She and I had a chance to discuss her new book, and some of the ridiculous ways in which myth and superstition, and modern PC nonsense are intruding on the scientific study of humans and their ancestry. These included having a session the sex of skeletons being cancelled from a meeting of the American Anthropological Association because its leadership now insisted sex isn’t binary, and the fact that the American Museum of Natural History warns visitors that certain artifacts have powerful supernatural characteristics.

Many of her efforts have been to fight inappropriate repatriation of ancient bones to groups whose genetic relationship to these distant hominid ancestors is tenuous at best. It was this that caused her to lose her curations position at her University and eventually to retire from academia.

It was a pleasure to talk common sense, and the importance of science for our understanding of the human condition with her. I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did.

As always, an ad-free video version of this podcast is also available to paid Critical Mass subscribers. Your subscriptions support the non-profit Origins Project Foundation, which produces the podcast. The audio version is available free on the Critical Mass site and on all podcast sites, and the video version will also be available on the Origins Project YouTube.