Approximately every eleven years, our sun experiences a cycle in which its magnetic poles flip. During this cycle, solar flares and sunspot activity increase, and then the sun returns to a state of relative calm. These solar cycles have been tracked for over two hundred years and are among the best-recorded aspects of solar astronomy. …
Podcast Transcript One of the most powerful forces in economics and finance is compound interest. Not everyone understands compound interest, even though they may reap its benefits or suffer its consequences. Compounding has the potential to build fortunes and wreck empires. The effects of compounding are also not limited to interest payments. It can apply …
Podcast Transcript Every day, billions of people around the world wake up and have breakfast. Breakfast is very different than the other meals you eat in a day. The types of food that people consume for breakfast are usually much more narrow than what they might be for lunch or dinner. Moreover, the way we …
Podcast Transcript Two of the United States’s most distant territories are located in the Western Pacific Ocean: Guam and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. Despite being separate political entities today, the two groups of islands have a shared geography, history, and culture. Today, they find themselves on the doorstep of Asia and straddling …
Podcast Transcript On December 25, 2021, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope was launched from the European Space Agency launch center in French Guyana. After six months of testing and configuring the telescope, in July of 2022, its first images were transmitted. Since then, we have received a flood of images and data that have caused …
Podcast Transcript From 1899 to 1900, China underwent a widespread and violent uprising. The revolt, a reaction against China’s exploitation by foreign powers, was decades in the making. In response to the revolt, a group of eight nations joined together to put down the rebellion and ultimately subjected China to yet another humiliating treaty. The …
Podcast Transcript In late 1944, the Allies were on a roll, and Germany was on the ropes. Some Allies, considering how fast they were advancing, thought the war might be over by Christmas. However, Hitler had a plan. He would engage in one last desperate battle, which he thought would turn the tide of the …
Podcast Transcript For centuries, sailors told tales of gigantic waves that they encountered at sea, and for centuries, scientists didn’t believe them. However, over time, evidence began to pile up, which suggested that the legends of these freak waves were, in fact, true. These waves are rare, still not well understood, and terrifying to ships …
Podcast Transcript In the 1860s, one of the bloodiest wars in the Western Hemisphere took place….and it wasn’t the US Civil War. It was a war between Paraguay and an alliance of Uruguay, Argentina, and Brazil, and it was one of the bloodiest ever fought in Latin America. It was a conventional war that resulted …