The Serious Search For Extraterrestrial Life We are thrilled and honored to have the esteemed Astronomer AVI LOEB join us for this week’s very special thought experiment. Avi says, “Asking ‘what if’ is my job!” Yes, friends, we have a genuine Professional IFFer in the house! The founder of THE GALILEO PROJECT joins us to play out a thought experiment: let’s imagine how this experiment — a serious SCIENTIFIC search for VERIFIABLE evidence of Extraterrestrials — might play out. Avi reveals the dif...
Sep 24, 2021•1 hr 4 min
Luis, Mike and Rather specialize in discussing UFO's with skeptics and believers, and through laughter, love and logic, bringing people together to find common ground in our shared fascination and joy for imagination and the pursuit of science. Does the stigma around UFO's, even if logical, help science or hurt it? Can science communicators harness the incredible interest in UFO's for the benefit of science? Is the UFO debate an opportunity for learning how to discuss difficult issues by learnin...
Aug 31, 2021•1 hr 12 min
Terraforming via MOLE? In this encore presentation of one of our most popular episodes -- when we tried out a new format called "Fantastic Voyage" -- Captain GABY takes us to the RED PLANET, and has brought along some of her favorite animals, naked mole rats, to help make the place livable, lovable, and lucrative. Who needs Elon Musk when you have naked mole rats leading the way? Is it possible to bring these real life creatures to Mars to slowly terraform it, cultivating the land from underneat...
Aug 20, 2021•56 min
WHALES spend their entire lives inside a medium, water, in which they can’t actually breathe. So throughout the day, and the night, they have to swim to the surface to take a breath of that sweet, sweet ocean air… or they die! We humans, and other land lubber mammals like us, are spoiled, just inhale, anytime you want, and… problem solved. But — What The IF humans had to breathe by dunking our head in water? The amazing Dr. Vanessa Pirotta joins us from Sydney, Australia to take us into the wet ...
Aug 15, 2021•1 hr 2 min
Got an IF of your own? Want to have us consider your idea for a show topic? Send YOUR IF to us! Email us at feedback@whattheif.com and let us know what's in your imagination. No idea is too small, or too big! --- Want to support the show? Click a rating or add a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app! itunes.apple.com/podcast/id1250517051?mt=2&ls=1 Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe at WhatTheIF.com Keep On IFFin', Philip, Matt & Gaby
Aug 06, 2021•1 hr 13 min
NO HOME TO PHONE! What The IF... there were NO ALIENS in the universe? No life anywhere except Earth. You want a planet with life? You’re standing on it, and THAT’S ALL ya get! CHRIS COGSWELL joins us to imagine how life on Earth would be affected by the proof that LIFE DOESN’T FIND A WAY, it’s no where, nothing to be found, nothing to see here, go home to your blue planet, that’s the only place anything lives in the entire universe. Chris is the host and creator of THE MAD SCIENTIST PODCAST, a ...
Jul 30, 2021•1 hr 4 min
What The IF... you could see the TRUE SCALE of the Universe? We imagine entering the notorious torture device from he dastardly mind of the great Douglas Adams. Tune in to find out how it feels, and bring a BIG EGO and a hunger for fairy cake because this is a mind expanding adventure if you have a tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny HUMAN MIND. Don't Panic! ---- Got an IF of your own? Want to have us consider your idea for a show topic? Send YOUR IF to us! Email us at feedback@whattheif.com and let us...
Jul 23, 2021•49 min
Matt's away and the team trashes the studio with a teetotaling, time traveling, mixer of the mind! We're joined by our Senior Research intern, Gabi Vardanega who has brought along her friend, the brilliant Laura Marques da Silva who has contributed a bunch of fabulous show ideas for us over the past year. To celebrate their post-pandemic summer break at NYU, we surf through the multiverse, exploring one of Laura's favorite IF's: TIME TRAVEL. In this more freeform, summer style show we share our ...
Jul 16, 2021•42 min
In honor of Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos putting their butts on the launch pad, we salute the spirit of hot rods in space with this encore presentation of one our most popular episodes. Fasten your safety belt and -- aw, screw it, just hop in and hit the gas, let's goooooooo!!! --- Using gravity waves, Astronomers announced they discovered two neutron stars colliding in an epic explosion! Forbes Magazine's favorite fact about this natural wonder is that the event created 28 Octillion Dollars w...
Jul 09, 2021•37 min
Water, water... nowhere! An IF from YOU, our audience! Super Uber Duper IFFer Kyle CRICHTON writes in and asks, What The IF... there were NO OCEANS? Perhaps Kyle wrote this while on the way to the beach? No parking at the shore is bad enough, but no shore are the shore? Yikes! Of course it all happened one dark and stormy night when Aliens came by and slurped our oceans away to feed their voracious thirst -- the ultimate BIG GULP. But the next morning when we all wake up to see the parched basin...
Jul 02, 2021•53 min
The brilliant astrophysicist and master teacher HAKEEM OLUSEYI takes us into one of the most astounding IF's we have ever experienced. In a tour de force of imagination, Dr. Oluseyi helps us appreciate the unimaginably titanic scale of the Universe by asking us to imagine being unimaginably microscopic and instead of looking out at the Milky Way galaxy... these astronomers are inside... YOU! This is a fantastic voyage that takes you from the size of the electron, to the stars, to the scale of th...
Jun 25, 2021•58 min
NASA just announced a new mission to VENUS... how'd that happen? Did you know that you can play a role in exploring space? Yep. With a simple phone call you can keep space missions alive, and growing, and exploring! WHO YA GONNA CALL? The hardest working man in planetary politicking is here to show us how: CASEY DREIER, The Planetary Society's Senior Space Policy Advisor and Chief Advocate. A lot of people don't know that ROCKETS are PEOPLE powered, and you play a role in lighting the fuse, shou...
Jun 18, 2021•1 hr 12 min
No muss, no sex, no fuss! Today's show is ripped from the headlines. Science Magazine reports: "An aquarium accident may have given this crayfish the DNA to take over the world" By Elizabeth Pennisi (https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/02/aquarium-accident-may-have-given-crayfish-dna-take-over-world?utm_campaign=ScienceNow&utm_source=Contractor&utm_medium=Facebook) And so, IFFed from the Headlines, we bring you, "What The IF people reproduced asexually?" Which means, ladies and gentleme...
Jun 11, 2021•58 min
An exhilarating, encore bonus show: Our listeners, the IFFers of the world, share their questions, comments, reactions and rants. The fantastic whirlwind of listener mail that Philip jousted and parried following the episode "Secrets Of Making A UFO DOCUMENTARY". A wide range of brilliant and bonkers thoughts from our audience! --- Got an IF of your own? Want to have us consider your idea for a show topic? Send YOUR IF to us! Email us at feedback@whattheif.com and let us know what's in your imag...
Jun 04, 2021•38 min
Hi, Philip here, your humble narrator. In the wake (ahem) of the US Navy Tic Tac UFO's being in the news again, and following up on our awesome show last week with Mick West, I wanted to repost this very popular special episode. I am a documentary filmmaker and have made a number of science oriented films, including an extensive investigation into UFO's which I edited with Peter Jenning's at ABC News. One of the chapters I edited in that 2 hour documentary was a scientific investigation of the "...
Jun 04, 2021•1 hr 5 min
WE ARE NOT ALONE in having bad breath! Tic Tacs are here to freshen our planet with a delightful minty taste. But seriously folks, WTF is going on with the startling images of mysterious tic tac shapes appearing on the US NAVY ship based radar, and on the infrared VIDEO SCREENS of their fighter planes, and in front of the eyes pilots. These images have, incredibly and almost uniquely in the history of UFOs, been featured in the NEW YORK TIMES and on the legendary CBS News program, 60 MINUTES, an...
May 28, 2021•1 hr 6 min
Chris Carberry is back with more tales from the research labs where spirits are being crafted for... SPACE! And we're not just limited to one industry on this show, Chris introduces us to the exciting, burgeoning world of SMALL BUSINESS in space! Entrepreneurs big and small have opportunities for getting into the space race, and doing their part to invest, invent, and innovate our way to Mars and the stars. Every aspect of life outside of Earth is ripe for your imagination and creativity, learn ...
May 21, 2021•47 min
Ahoy! Our listener, Super IFFer Miguel submitted a delightful sea shanty about the physics of the SUN, created by the awesome sci-pirates at the NASA Goddard Space Center. And so we drank ourselves into a quantum stuper and had to ask, dude, What The IF you could FEEL THE SOLAR WIND? Surfs up, sails up, science UP -- let's ride, mates! Got an IF of your own? Want to have us consider your idea for a show topic? Send YOUR IF to us! Email us at feedback@whattheif.com and let us know what's in your ...
May 14, 2021•56 min
Our listener, and Super Duper IFFer, Daniel asks What The IF neighbors had tanks? Imagine the block parties? No, imagine the block battles! What happens in an ecosystem when evolution spirals out of control? How fit is FIT when survival is at stake? Gaby and Matt share lessons from Darwin and we imagine how having annoying neighbors might eventual fuel the colonization of the solar system! What The IF? Got an IF of your own? Want to have us consider your idea for a show topic? Send YOUR IF to us...
May 07, 2021•21 min
In honor of the announcement that NASA has chosen SPACE-X to build the Artemis lunar lander... and also in honor of Philip’s receiving his second shot of the Pfizer vaccine, we present this encore presentation! (Shh, what I really mean is that this shot has knocked me out good and I’ve got VAX HANGOVER and am stuck in bed until it passes. Don’t get me wrong, PRAISE SCIENCE for the vax! And... enjoy this super fun, very popular episode! — PS) —- It's Opposite Apollo Day! Our special guest today i...
Apr 30, 2021•45 min
Got an IF of your own? Want to have us consider your idea for a show topic? Send YOUR IF to us! Email us at feedback@whattheif.com and let us know what's in your imagination. No idea is too small, or too big! --- Want to support the show? Click a rating or add a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app! itunes.apple.com/podcast/id1250517051?mt=2&ls=1 Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe at WhatTheIF.com Keep On IFFin', Philip, Matt & Gaby
Apr 23, 2021•55 min
Got an IF of your own? Want to have us consider your idea for a show topic? Send YOUR IF to us! Email us at feedback@whattheif.com and let us know what's in your imagination. No idea is too small, or too big! --- Want to support the show? Click a rating or add a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app! itunes.apple.com/podcast/id1250517051?mt=2&ls=1 Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe at WhatTheIF.com Keep On IFFin', Philip & Matt
Apr 16, 2021•50 min
(Producer's note: What the if... you uploaded the wrong episode? Haha well today I found out. Nonetheless that previous episode was a great one, but here's the new one. Enjoy, and keep on Iffin'! -- Philip) Today's show was inspired by our listener and Super IFFer Charlie who wrote in from Knoxville, Tennessee and asked: "I thought how weird it would be if humans never had language to communicate and relied on basic sounds, grunts, and maybe even hand claps. So I was thinking: What the If Humans...
Apr 13, 2021•57 min
A NOTE ABOUT THIS SPECIAL REBROADCAST: In commemoration of the one year anniversary of the start of the pandemic, and in honor of our amazing new Co-IFFer, super host Gaby Paniccia, we proudly present Gaby’s debut appearance on the show. One year ago this week… it was a scary time, with so much uncertainty, and with science as our only hope of grasping what was happening. Matt had seen a livestream in which Gaby was explaining COVID-19 and all that might happen, and her gift for science communic...
Apr 02, 2021•50 min
A note about this special rebroadcast: Philip & Matt, always known for their keen eye for FASHION (just go with me on this…) found themselves fifty-three weeks ago observing that the newly minted PANDEMIC was going to change the way we comb our hair… and everything about WHAT WE WEAR! Listen to our innocence as we pondered whether this LOCKDOWN might last a few… WEEKS? Maybe a few months? A precious cultural artifact, fizzing with naïveté. We were a little bit NOSTRODOMUS, and a little bit R...
Mar 26, 2021•45 min
Our listener, and Super IFFer Supreme, Bill from Virginia asks: “WTIF we saw the return of the mysterious "Sleeping Sickness" that followed the 1918 pandemic?” Wake the IF! Join us as we imagine an outbreak in NEW YORK of this enigmatic pathogen that makes you very, very, very, very, sleepy. Sleepiness attacks THE CITY THAT NEVER SLEEPS! What could possibly go wrong? — Got an IF of your own? Want to have us consider your idea for a show topic? Send YOUR IF to us! Email us at feedback@whattheif.c...
Mar 18, 2021•49 min
Today's IF was sent to us by our awesome listener and Super IFFer Ruud Smit! Ruud asks us: "What the if our eyes could only see neutrinos?" Join Philip, Matt and Gaby on this incredible adventure into a world where creatures have eyes that are MILES, KILOMETERS, even KILOMILES long! What in the world (and on WHAT world?) would it be like to have NEUTRINO VISION? — Got an IF of your own? Want to have us consider your idea for a show topic? Send YOUR IF to us! Email us at feedback@whattheif.com an...
Mar 12, 2021•1 hr 1 min
Terraforming via MOLE? Join documentary filmmaker Philip Shane, NYU Historian of Science Matthew Stanley, and Rockefeller University virologist Gaby Paniccia as we take a fantastic journey to learn the magical wonders of biology... up close... and in living AUDIO color! --- Like the show? Share your love for the IF by dropping a review on Apple Podcasts! itunes.apple.com/podcast/id1250517051?mt=2&ls=1 Have you subscribed? Grab one (always free!) at pod.link/1250517051 and never miss an episo...
Mar 01, 2021•56 min
Welcome to our new WTIF show, where we use SCIENCE to build up -- and break down -- fabulous SCI-FI and FANTASY worlds! This week, we struggle to hear each other when we visit the gigantic city planet of CORUSCANT, the VERY NOISY capital of the STAR WARS galaxy. Hosted by documentary filmmaker Philip Shane, NYU Historian of Science Matthew Stanley, and Rockefeller University scientist Gaby Paniccia. --- Like the show? Share your love for the IF by dropping a review on Apple Podcasts! itunes.appl...
Feb 22, 2021•46 min
This week on What The If? We have a very special guest, Jo Marchant. Jo has written multiple books like Decoding the Heavens and the Shadow King. She has a new book out called "The Human Cosmos: A Secret History of the Stars"! Check it out at https://www.jomarchant.com Jo comes to our show with the question: What the IF we couldn't see the stars!? Would the cosmos even exist? Would Galileo have even championed heliocentrism?! Who knows!? So buckle up for a wild ride where we try and see the star...
Feb 19, 2021•1 hr 1 min
