The Times They Are a-Changin'

Summary

Radiolab Episode Summary: "The Times They Are a-Changin'"

Radiolab, hosted by Lulu Miller and Latif Nasser, delves deep into the enigmatic concept of time in the episode titled "The Times They Are a-Changin'." This episode explores the fluidity of time through scientific discoveries, historical insights, and imaginative discussions that challenge our conventional understanding of days, years, and the very fabric of time itself.

---

1. Introduction to the Flexibility of Time

[21:25] Latif Nasser:
"We are discussing the flexibility, the surprising flexibility of time."

Latif Nasser sets the stage by introducing the episode's central theme: the malleable nature of time. He emphasizes that while we perceive time as a constant, scientific findings suggest otherwise.

---

2. Coral Clocks: Unlocking Ancient Timekeeping

[05:02] Emily Grassley:
"You're listening to Radiolab."

The episode delves into the groundbreaking research conducted by paleontologist Professor John Wells. By studying coral fossils, Wells discovered that ancient corals possessed more daily growth lines than present-day counterparts.

[08:07] Jad Abumrad:
"And that's where the piece of this story is just so fascinating."

Wells observed that while modern corals typically exhibit around 365 daily growth lines corresponding to days in a year, ancient corals from the Devonian period showed approximately 400 lines. This discrepancy indicated that more days existed in a year millions of years ago.

[09:24] Jad Abumrad:
"There are actually calendars and clocks inside each of these things. You just have to know how to read them."

The growth lines in corals served as natural calendars, meticulously recording environmental changes and offering a window into Earth's chronological past.

---

3. Earth's Rotation Slowing Down: The Moon's Influence

[13:09] Neil Shubin:
"And so it sort of tugs us around in a kind of hefty way."

The conversation shifts to the gravitational interplay between Earth and the Moon. Neil Shubin explains how this celestial dance is gradually slowing Earth's rotation.

[14:20] Neil Shubin:
"According to Chris, Earth is spinning faster than the Moon is orbiting it."

This gravitational tugging results in progressively longer days. Currently, Earth's rotation is slowing at about 1.7 milliseconds each century, meaning each subsequent day is imperceptibly longer than the last.

[15:03] Robert Krulwich:
"1.7 milliseconds each century."

While the change is minuscule on a daily scale, over millions of years, it accumulates significantly, altering the very structure of time as measured by days and years.

---

4. Implications of a Changing Earth-Moon System

[16:15] Neil Shubin:
"The Moon is getting a worm's distance further away from us every year."

As Earth’s rotation slows, the Moon gradually drifts away, moving approximately two inches further each year. This movement affects not only the length of our days but also the stability of Earth's axial tilt and, consequently, our climate patterns.

[16:21] Andy Mills:
"And he says if you go back about 4 billion years, the Moon was about 10 times closer than it is now."

This proximity would have rendered the Moon drastically different in appearance and influence, possibly leading to significantly shorter days and heightened tidal forces.

---

5. Speculative Scenarios: Manipulating Time

In a more whimsical segment, Andy Mills and astrophysicist Chris Impey engage in a playful discussion about altering the perception of time through physical actions.

[22:42] Chris Impey:
"If you started walking on the equator, depending on which direction you walked, your day will either last longer or shorter."

They explore the hypothetical scenario where walking westward at high speeds could lengthen one's day, while eastward movement could shorten it. The conversation humorously touches on the impracticality and extreme physical demands such actions would entail.

[25:10] Andy Mills:
"Usain Bolt carries a rooster on Venus. He does a remarkably fast sprint. The rooster, having started the run in the middle of the day, well past the crowing period, feels a strange compulsion to crow two hours into the run."

This imaginative dialogue underscores the episode's exploration of time's relativity, blending scientific concepts with creative storytelling to illustrate how our perception of time can be both fixed and fluid.

---

6. Reflections on Time's Evolution

[15:24] Jad Abumrad:
"Everything that we take for granted as normal in our world... all that has dramatically changed over the course of the history of our planet."

Jad Abumrad reflects on the transient nature of what we consider permanent, emphasizing that time itself is a dynamic entity, continually shaped by cosmic and terrestrial forces.

[15:38] Andy Mills:
"So this moondance does not affect the ticking of time. It just affects what we choose to call a day."

This poignant observation highlights the distinction between the physical passage of time and the human constructs we use to measure and comprehend it.

---

Conclusion: Embracing Time's Fluidity

The episode culminates with a profound understanding that time, while seemingly steadfast, is subject to change through natural processes and celestial mechanics. Radiolab invites listeners to ponder the intricate dance between Earth and the Moon, the subtle elongation of days, and the broader implications for life and civilization.

[17:42] Latif Nasser:
"We will continue to unravel the mysteries of time and its everlasting impact on our existence."

In "The Times They Are a-Changin'," Radiolab masterfully intertwines scientific inquiry with philosophical musings, offering a comprehensive exploration of time's mutable essence and its profound significance in shaping our world.

Transcript

[Latif Nasser]

Radiolab is supported by Dell Shop Dell Technologies Black Friday event for their lowest prices of the year. The Future is on sale today with limited time deals on select PCs like the XPS 16 that accelerate AI with Intel Core Ultra processors. Black Friday is their biggest sale of the year and the best time to upgrade. But it's only here for a limited time. Shop [e-mail] deals that's Dell. Radiolab is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy to see if you could save when you bundle your home and auto policies. Try [e-mail] Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.

[Jad Abumrad]

Listener supported WNYC Studios.

[Lulu Miller]

Imagine your arms.

[Robert Krulwich]

Break off and your flesh turns to poison.

[Lulu Miller]

And your body begins turning strange colors.

[Emily Grassley]

Bright yellow and tangerine orange.

[Neil Shubin]

And you suddenly get really good at math.

[Lulu Miller]

Bugs can do math.

[Chris Impey]

Mm.

[Lulu Miller]

There is a whole new season of terrestrials coming. Radiolab's family friendly, ever so occasionally musical series about nature. On each episode we tell you a story about a creature that may seem fantastical. It was like unbelievable, but is entirely true.

[Andy Mills]

Oh my goodness.

[Lulu Miller]

And this season we scoured high and low all over the globe.

[Andy Mills]

Underwater, in the desert, in the wind.

[Jad Abumrad]

Underground, up to the Arctic.

[Lulu Miller]

Oh, it is cold, braving, dangerous terrain.

[Andy Mills]

All right. Mud's getting deeper down here, guys.

[Lulu Miller]

Wild beasts.

[Emily Grassley]

It bit me several times. There was blood everywhere.

[Lulu Miller]

And our own confusion. So honey doesn't come out of bees?

[Andy Mills]

No, it doesn't come out of bees.

[Lulu Miller]

To uncover.

[Andy Mills]

Wow.

[Lulu Miller]

The overlooked.

[Andy Mills]

Look at them.

[Emily Grassley]

Overlooked creatures.

[Lulu Miller]

It's like a fur ball the size of a grapefruit.

[Andy Mills]

They are dancing on the comb.

[Lulu Miller]

Which is extremely beautiful. And overlooked storytellers.

[Emily Grassley]

I didn't really speak much.

[Lulu Miller]

Or really at all.

[Jad Abumrad]

I didn't speak at all.

[Lulu Miller]

Waiting quietly beneath our noses.

[Emily Grassley]

There's moments where you are made to feel different.

[Lulu Miller]

You have life changing secrets to share. It totally upended everything we know about what we think of as an organism. What a witchy little ritual. Join us for a nature walk that just might get you to fall in love with this place again.

[Andy Mills]

Woo.

[Latif Nasser]

This hippo's barely up to my waist.

[Lulu Miller]

I mean, how realistic is it? Do you think that we could get humans hibernating in like 20 years?

[Emily Grassley]

I think that it would be possible.

[Lulu Miller]

Ooh, maybe. I don't know. Come hang out with us.

[Jad Abumrad]

Ho ho.

[Lulu Miller]

We grow together better than a loho See if we're for you. Grow together better than a lo Terrestrials. Radiolab's ever so occasionally musical series, All About Nature, hosted by me, Lulu Miller. Kids and adults, welcome. All right, good luck.

[Jad Abumrad]

Thank you.

[Lulu Miller]

Get busy. I don't know.

[Jad Abumrad]

Oh, my goodness.

[Lulu Miller]

All new episodes coming in September. Terrestrials on the radio lab for kids feed wherever you cast your pods.

[Andy Mills]

Yeah, it sounds like a whole little party.

[Latif Nasser]

Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, good night. Depending on where you are, when you are. This is Radiolab. I'm Latif Nasser talking to you from right now, which is not your right now, even though you are hearing it right now. Anyway, I have an episode for you, one we made a few years ago. It is both timeless and time. Full time, centric is maybe a better word. It's an episode about time. Because the vast majority of us, no matter our philosophy of time, whether you think of it as linear or cyclical, time feels static, right? Like, no matter what you use to measure it. A second, a year, a millennium. Those are constant units, right? Like taking away the same amount. Not so fast. The times, as they say, are a changin'set. Your watches and let's go.

[Andy Mills]

Yeah. Wait, you're listening. Okay. All right.

[Lulu Miller]

Okay.

[Jad Abumrad]

All right.

[Emily Grassley]

You're listening to Radiolab.

[Jad Abumrad]

Radiolab from wnyc.

[Andy Mills]

Rewind.

[Robert Krulwich]

Hey, I'm Jad Abumrad.

[Andy Mills]

I'm Robert Krulwich. I want to tell you a story about a discovery I made. Not me, I just learned about it from other people. But it has made me completely reconsider what a year means, and specifically how big, how big a year really is.

[Robert Krulwich]

How big a year what?

[Andy Mills]

How big a year really is.

[Robert Krulwich]

I do not know. How is a year?

[Latif Nasser]

How long?

[Andy Mills]

Well, if you are confused now, I think I can confuse you even more. I am going to begin this investigation by introducing you to a little creature in the sea called a coral.

[Jad Abumrad]

Coral is a shelly animal, a little creature.

[Andy Mills]

That's Neil Shubin.

[Jad Abumrad]

I'm a paleontologist, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Chicago. Just like a clam has an animal, a clam shell has an animal inside it. So do corals.

[Andy Mills]

A little fleshy, wormy thing.

[Jad Abumrad]

Exactly. And it wears its skeleton on the outside. And because they sit in the same place for their whole life, they're really sensitive to local environmental changes.

[Andy Mills]

Meaning what?

[Jad Abumrad]

Think about it this way. Let's just sort of think about what happens to a creature as it lives its life in the water, which is what these things do, you know, we live in a world of cycles, of cycles, on cycles. Temperature rises and falls, light rises and falls. The Tides rise and fall several times in the course of a day. So you think about what that means for creatures living in water.

[Andy Mills]

What it means for corals, says Neil.

[Jad Abumrad]

Is that they're growing, they're slapping on new skeleton, if you will, new shell.

[Andy Mills]

In time with these cycles of rise and fall, of light and dark, hot and cold, and.

[Robert Krulwich]

Hello.

[Andy Mills]

Hello.

[Emily Grassley]

Hi.

[Andy Mills]

You can actually see these changes written onto their shells, maybe into their shells. Emily.

[Emily Grassley]

Andy.

[Andy Mills]

And that's why Andy Mills and I called up our pal Emily Grassley, whose job is. What are they?

[Emily Grassley]

I am the Chief Curiosity Correspondent of the Field Museum in Ch.

[Andy Mills]

That's your actual title, the Chief Curiosity Correspondent.

[Emily Grassley]

Yes, it is.

[Andy Mills]

You brought some corals, did you?

[Emily Grassley]

We have many corals. We have corals all over the studio desk right now. All right, all right, let's cut. Cut it.

[Andy Mills]

Because when you cut into these shells.

[Emily Grassley]

Oh, it's warm.

[Chris Impey]

We have a little bit of water. We can spritz it on there, cool.

[Andy Mills]

It off right off. You can see a pattern. You see these gray stripes, and they're all.

[Emily Grassley]

I mean, they're all different variations of gray, but some are really dark gray and some are tan.

[Andy Mills]

They're like bands running either through or across the shell.

[Emily Grassley]

They kind of radiate out like the bands of a tree.

[Andy Mills]

And between the bands, there are spaces. You got a stripe, then a space, a stripe, then a space, a stripe, then a space.

[Emily Grassley]

But when you hold it up close.

[Andy Mills]

To your eye, if you look closer, in between the stripes, you can see sort of.

[Emily Grassley]

Wow. You can see the lines. Wow.

[Andy Mills]

You can see that the spaces are filled with faint little lines.

[Jad Abumrad]

And that's where the piece of this story is just so fascinating.

[Andy Mills]

Because in 1962, a paleontologist, Professor John Wells, was looking at some corals just like these.

[Jad Abumrad]

He was just sitting there saying, okay, well, what can we figure out from coral shells? So what he did is he did something really simple. He says, well, golly gee, why don't.

[Andy Mills]

I count the number of little lines between these bands? Just, you know, just to see. So he starts counting as, you know, 100, 200 lines, 300, 310, 320.

[Jad Abumrad]

And every time he counted, he got a number around. Around 360, 365.

[Robert Krulwich]

Wait a second.

[Andy Mills]

Familiar number? No.

[Jad Abumrad]

Doesn't take a whole lot of inference that, hey, maybe those individual rings represent.

[Andy Mills]

A daily pattern, meaning each of these little lines actually equaled a day.

[Robert Krulwich]

And why they're not just making a gray mark after 365.

[Andy Mills]

No.

[Robert Krulwich]

What are the gray lines?

[Andy Mills]

Well, the thicker Lines are the times of the year when the coral grows a lot. But if you've got a summer coral, then it grows a lot in one summer, then it goes quiet, then it grows a lot the next summer. So that's, again, that marks a year. Those big bands are kind of like, happy New Year. Happy New Year. Happy New Year.

[Jad Abumrad]

There are actually calendars and clocks inside each of these things. You just have to know how to read them.

[Andy Mills]

So this guy, Professor Wells, what he.

[Jad Abumrad]

Did was then, this is the really bold bit I thought, which is he then said, well, okay, that's a living Carl. Let's look at some fossils.

[Andy Mills]

He was, after all, a paleontologist, you.

[Jad Abumrad]

Know, so he was at Cornell University, and Cornell University is surrounded by rocks around 370 or so million years old. And he collected some nice corals, and there are a lot of nice coral fossils known from there.

[Andy Mills]

And he opened up these ancient skeletons.

[Jad Abumrad]

And he did the count.

[Andy Mills]

Found 100 days, 200 days.

[Jad Abumrad]

He was expecting 300 days, 360 to 365, 368. Then, lo and behold, he found 400 between 400 and 410.

[Robert Krulwich]

Really?

[Jad Abumrad]

Yeah. And he looked at lots of specimens.

[Andy Mills]

That number, the 400 number, kept showing up.

[Robert Krulwich]

What does that mean?

[Andy Mills]

Well, that means that it's now reasonable to think that back in the day, 380 million years ago, there were more days in a year. And he published a paper saying more or less that. And right away, clam scientists said, well, if that's true for corals, then it's got to be true for my animal, the clam. And the oyster people said, well, it's got to be true for oysters and mussel folks. Has got to be true for mussels.

[Jad Abumrad]

This paper set off a bit of a cottage industry of folks applying this technique to other species. In looking at these other species, they found that the general trend is absolutely.

[Andy Mills]

Correct, that when you compare modern animals to ancient animals, you will find they record the old ones more days in a year.

[Jad Abumrad]

So you go back to a time period called the Ordovician, which is about 450 million years ago. A typical year had about 415, 410 days in it, really. If you go to the time period I work on in the Devonian, about 360 million years, probably about 400. So what you see is the number of days in a year has declined from over 400 to what we have now, which is 365.

[Andy Mills]

That's really. So we have lost 40 days since the.

[Jad Abumrad]

Yeah, since creatures first started to walk on land.

[Andy Mills]

So now comes the obvious question. Why? Why would there be more days then than there are now?

[Robert Krulwich]

Okay, wait a second, wait a second, wait a second, wait a second. So a year is a trip around the sun.

[Andy Mills]

That's a trip. That's right.

[Robert Krulwich]

And days are when we spin around and says we're going around the Sun. Okay, so maybe if you want to squeeze more days into a year, maybe it just means the trip around the sun took longer back then.

[Andy Mills]

Well, if you ask astronomers about that, I asked Chris Impey at the University of Arizona, and he says there's no.

[Neil Shubin]

Sense that the length of time it takes the Earth to orbit the sun is changing because the Earth's orbit around.

[Andy Mills]

The sun is basic physics, and it hasn't really changed significantly. He's pretty sure of that.

[Robert Krulwich]

So then what is it?

[Andy Mills]

Well, Chris says the answer takes us back about four and a half billion years to a time when the Earth was very young.

[Neil Shubin]

So there was this crazy period of time lasting about 50 million years, which.

[Andy Mills]

They called the Great Bombardment period.

[Neil Shubin]

There was still a lot of debris left over from the formation of the solar system. So the meteor impact rate was thousands of times higher. The Earth was still like a tacky magma. And so there was hail, brimstone, endless rain. I mean, kind of crazy time, really. And a bit of that mayhem, of course, we think gave birth to the Moon.

[Andy Mills]

There was a huge collision, and a rock about the size of Mars banged into us, flung a hunk of Earth shrapnel into orbit, and those pieces coalesced and became our moon, which is now sort of parked right next to us.

[Neil Shubin]

And so it sort of tugs us around in a kind of hefty way.

[Andy Mills]

And I thought we tugged the Moon.

[Neil Shubin]

Oh, it works both ways. You know, we tug the moon and the moon tugs us, and the force is actually equal.

[Jad Abumrad]

So it's kind of like a dance.

[Neil Shubin]

It's a dance.

[Andy Mills]

I tug the moon and the moon tugs me.

[Neil Shubin]

Exactly. It's a celestial waltz.

[Andy Mills]

And it's that dance, that waltz, that explains why the Earth used to have 450 days in a year, then 400 days in a year, and now only 365.

[Robert Krulwich]

Well, I don't. I don't see how this explains anything.

[Andy Mills]

Well, first of all, let's just remember what a day is. A day is a full spin of the planet from the sun coming up in the morning, then going down, coming up the next morning. So one spin, a total spin, equals a day. Yes, we all know that now, Today, we make 365 of these spins as we orbit the Sun. That would be a year, right? But back when the Earth was born, when it was all by itself dancing alone, that in those days it spun faster. It was making more of these spins as it went round the sun. So a year had more days in it. But then along comes the Moon to join the dance. And now, here's the key.

[Neil Shubin]

According to Chris, Earth is spinning faster than the Moon is orbiting it.

[Andy Mills]

A dance partner takes a month to come around us. We take fume, 24 hours. Fume. And you know how it is. When you're dancing with a partner who's slower than you are, then you have to. You have to tug them along, which is what has happened here gravitationally. We are constantly tugging the Moon along. It is constantly dragging us down. There's a transfer of energy here that over billions of years has caused the Earth's spin to slow down just a little bit, a teeny, teeny bit. And as the spin has slowed, well, our days have gotten longer.

[Neil Shubin]

And if you do the math, you calculate that the day is Getting longer by 1.7 milliseconds each century.

[Robert Krulwich]

1.7 milliseconds each century.

[Andy Mills]

What this means on a daily basis is that today was 54 billionths of a second longer than yesterday. And the day before that was 54 billionths of a second longer than the day before. And the day before that was 54 billionths of a second longer than the day before that, which was 54.

[Jad Abumrad]

And if you extrapolate that out over the millions of years people like me think about.

[Andy Mills]

That's Neal Shubin again, the paleontologist.

[Jad Abumrad]

That becomes quite significant. So you're telling me that today is.

[Robert Krulwich]

The shortest day of the rest of my life?

[Neil Shubin]

Yes.

[Andy Mills]

Andy worries about these things.

[Jad Abumrad]

Well, you're not gonna live longer because of this, I'm sorry to say, but no.

[Andy Mills]

So this moondance does not affect the ticking of time. It just affects what we choose to call a day. And by the way, one of the consequences of this dance is we lose a little energy to our moon every year. And the Moon picks up a little energy from us because these things are always equal. Think about, like, when you throw a ball. The more energy you use, the further the ball is away from you. Well, as we add a little more energy to the Moon, the Moon very slyly moves a little further away from us every year. It's about a couple of inches, according to Chris.

[Neil Shubin]

The length of a worm, really.

[Andy Mills]

So the Moon is getting a worm's distance further away from us every year.

[Neil Shubin]

Yeah.

[Andy Mills]

And he says if you go back about 4 billion years, the Moon was.

[Neil Shubin]

Originally about 10 times closer than it is now. 10 years closer. Imagine the Moon looking 10 times bigger than it does now. That would have been crazy. Also, the days would have been six hours long.

[Robert Krulwich]

Six hours long.

[Jad Abumrad]

To me, what this says is that everything that we take for granted as normal in our world, ice at the poles, seas in certain places, continents configured the way they are, the number of days in a year, all that is subject to change. And all that has changed, all that has dramatically changed over the course of the history of our planet. And that includes how we measure time itself. So, you know, when I'm sitting in a hole in the middle of the Arctic digging out a fish fossil every now and then, you know, I pinch myself and say, here I am in the Arctic digging out a fish fossil that lived in an ancient subtropical environment. You know, the juxtaposition between present and past sometimes is utterly mind blowing, but it's very informative about our own age and that we, you know, we take. We think things are eternal, but they're not. Everything is subject to change. Change is the way of the world.

[Latif Nasser]

We are going to change now to a break, but we've got more coming up after that.

[Emily Grassley]

Radiolab is supported by BetterHelp. As many of us are reflecting on what we're thankful for this month, we often forget to express gratitude to someone very near and dear to us, ourselves. It can be hard, or not, always at the top of our minds to remind ourselves that we're doing our best to make sense of the world and to live our lives, and that it's not easy. So let this be a reminder to send some love and thanks to the people in your life, including you. If you need some guidance with this, therapy can help. Working with a therapist can be a great way to reflect and develop coping mechanisms, among other valuable tools. If you're thinking of starting therapy, give BetterHelp a try. It's entirely online, designed to be convenient, flexible and suited to your schedule. So just fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist and switch therapists anytime for no additional charge. Let the gratitude flow with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com Radiolab today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp. H E L P.com Radiolab.

[Latif Nasser]

Radiolab is supported by Made in Cookware. As a Radiolab listener, you know we like to nerd out and explore things like how seagulls from the 1970s shook up our understanding of what's natural in all of us animals and how far the moon actually is. The usual Made In Cookware is into exploration too, creating products that help us answer questions like have you wanted to cook lobster but balked because the process seemed too intimidating? When it comes to picking the right ones and what tools you need to dig in, it can seem like a lot. Armed with Made In's Stainless Clad stock pot and their how to Cook Lobster blog post, there's no need to be afraid. With their professional grade stainless clad, carbon steel, nonstick and enameled cast iron cookware collections, Made in lets you focus on memorable meals. Cook like a pro with Made In. For full details, visit madeincookware.com that's M A D E incookware.com WNYC Studios is.

[Brooke Gladstone]

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[Jad Abumrad]

Hey, Jon Favreau here. There's no shortage of political takes in 2024, but quantity doesn't cut it. We need a better conversation about the latest, biggest election of our lives. On Pod Save America, me and my co host cut through the noise to help you figure out what matters and how you can help. Every Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday, Pod Save America is breaking down the political that makes us laugh, cry, and snap our laptops in half. Expensive year for laptops. Make sure to check out new episodes of Pod Save America on your favorite podcast platform or our YouTube channel now.

[Latif Nasser]

Hello again, you're listening to Radiolab. I'm Latif Nasser. We are discussing the flexibility, the surprising flexibility of time Today and in the first segment, we learned all about how coral has marked the ever changing march of time. How days were once shorter years, once longer. Now we're going to pivot to a more. I mean, I don't know, it's like taking that idea of time flexibility and just taking it to an absurd, absurd place. With our host emeritus, Robert Krulwich.

[Andy Mills]

So I just want to play you a little bit of a. Can we do this? Can we just add an end to the end? Because that's what I'd like to. I was talking to Neil Degrasse Tyson, who's an astrophysicist and who thinks about spin, which we've just thought about. Thinks about the inner solar system, which we've just thought about. So here's him and I talking about holding on to time. It's a little goofy, but here it is just for the fun of it. So if you're on Earth and you're walking around Quito on the equator, if you're walking at four miles an hour, your day will go sort of the normal way. The sun will rise behind you, go overhead, and then go down the other side.

[Chris Impey]

Well, if you're stationary. If you're stationary, 24 hour day. Yes.

[Andy Mills]

Yeah.

[Chris Impey]

If you started walking on the equator, depending on which direction you walked, your day will either last longer or shorter. Okay. So if you walk west, the faster you walk, the longer your day will become. You could walk at a pace where you have a 25 hour day, a 27 hour day. There's a speed with which you can walk on the equator in the Earth going west, where your day lasts forever, and that is the rotation rate of the Earth. You would have compensated roughly what type.

[Andy Mills]

That would be a gerbil.

[Chris Impey]

A gerbil running on a beach ball to rotating beach ball. So that would. On the top of a beach ball. So that speed for the equator is about a thousand miles an hour. So the equator moves a thousand miles an hour. And that gives. That gives us the 24 hour day. If you want to go 1000 miles an hour the opposite direction, you will stop the day. The sun will never move in the sky and you'll have a. And your day will last.

[Andy Mills]

Superman did that once, I think when he had this thing with Lois.

[Chris Impey]

Superman would have so messed up everybody on Earth for having stopped the rotation of the earth, reversed it and then set it forward.

[Andy Mills]

Yes, he did that.

[Chris Impey]

He would have scrambled all. Not anything not bolted to the Earth would have been flown off. Yeah, yeah. So depending on your latitude, any equatorial Residence. If you stop the Earth, they were going at 1000 miles an hour with the Earth. You stop the Earth and you're not seat belted to the Earth, you will fall over and roll due east. A thousand miles an hour in our mid latitudes, we're in New York, you can do the math. We moving about 800 miles an hour due east and stop the Earth. We will roll 800 miles an hour due east and crash into buildings and other things that are attached, that are.

[Andy Mills]

Attached to the Earth. Right, but let's going back to Venus now.

[Chris Impey]

Oh, you want to go to Venus? Isn't this enough for you?

[Andy Mills]

No, I wanted to. The whole point was to go to Venus because it's so different there.

[Chris Impey]

Yeah, on every way. No, it's about the same size and about the same surface gravity, but that's it. It's 900 degrees Fahrenheit. It's a runaway greenhouse effect. It is heavy volcanic activity that repaves the surface periodically. So there are very few craters on Venus, Just unpleasant in general. Unpleasant. It rotates very slowly.

[Andy Mills]

Well, that's what I want to stop. So how, how slowly does it rotate?

[Chris Impey]

No, I don't remember the exact number.

[Andy Mills]

Four miles an hour or something like that.

[Chris Impey]

Yeah, it's some very slow rate at its equator. Slow enough so that you don't need special. You don't need airplanes to stop the sun. You don't need special speed devices. You could probably trot and stop the sun on the horizon or wherever the sun is.

[Andy Mills]

So if you're that guy from Jamaica, what's his name?

[Chris Impey]

Usain Bolt.

[Andy Mills]

Usain Bolt. Like this, and you happen to be on Venus for a little while and you decide to go for a run, what happens to Hussein during the run?

[Chris Impey]

Okay, so normally the sun would rise in one direction and set in the other. Depending on which direction you chose to run in. You could reverse your day and have the sun rise in the opposite side of the sky than it normally would. But I think Venus is rotating slowly enough that you wouldn't have to be Usain Bolt. I'd have to check my numbers on this.

[Andy Mills]

Oh, I don't think you would. Maybe in order to have the sun actually sort of seem to go backwards. That's what you're saying is the sun would go backwards?

[Chris Impey]

Yeah, yeah.

[Andy Mills]

So you'd be having lunch. You're Usain Bolton. You go decide now I'm going to run and the sun's going backwards towards the morning horizon.

[Chris Impey]

You can reverse the sun. That's correct.

[Andy Mills]

In fact, that is A really good reason to sprint, I think.

[Chris Impey]

Well, but who cares about the sun anymore?

[Andy Mills]

Me, if I were the same. If I go up to him, is.

[Chris Impey]

The sun telling you when to eat lunch? I don't think so. Your stomach is telling you when to eat lunch. You're saying, okay, Usain, you eat breakfast, but you want to have lunch real soon. Run so that the sun is now at the top of the sky, so now you can legally have lunch.

[Andy Mills]

No, you are not buying my poetic premises at all today.

[Chris Impey]

This is the 21st century, Jack, and the sun is. We wake by alarm clocks, not by roosters and sunlight. I'm sorry.

[Andy Mills]

I wish I could help you out by thinking.

[Chris Impey]

Let's suppose I am not going to depend on running on Venus to get the sun in the middle of the sky at my command so that I can have lunch.

[Andy Mills]

Okay. All right, but let's suppose you're a rooster and you like to crow at dawn. That's just a deep feeling.

[Chris Impey]

You could totally mess with a rooster this way.

[Andy Mills]

Yes, that's what I want to do.

[Chris Impey]

Usain Bolt carrying a rooster with him.

[Andy Mills]

Usain Bolt carries a rooster on Venus. He does a remarkably fast sprint. The rooster, having started the run in the middle of the day, well past the crowing period, feels a strange compulsion to crow two hours into the run.

[Chris Impey]

Because he ran backwards to the sunrise rather than.

[Andy Mills]

Well, he ran forwards, but the sun went backwards relatively.

[Chris Impey]

Yes, he went. Yes, he ran in the other way to reverse the sun back to sunrise. Yeah, and the rooster is gonna. Will need therapy.

[Jad Abumrad]

Step by step to the mountain top.

[Andy Mills]

We like not all at once, but one step at a time. Every day, Every day, Every day, Every day, Every day, Every day, every day. We're making one step at a time, one step at a time. Well, um, I think it's time for us to definitely go now.

[Robert Krulwich]

Yeah, we should definitely go.

[Andy Mills]

Okay.

[Robert Krulwich]

I'm Chad.

[Andy Mills]

Hi, Robert.

[Robert Krulwich]

Thanks for listening.

[Lulu Miller]

Hi. This is Danielle, and I'm in beautiful Glover, Vermont. And here are the staff credits. Radiolab was created by Jad Ebimrad and is edited by Soren Wheeler. Lulu Miller and Latif Nasser are our co hosts. Dylan Keefe is our director of sound design. Design. Our staff includes Simon Adler, Jeremy Bloom, Becca Bressler, W. Harry Fortuna, David Gable, Maria Paz Guterres Sindhu Nyanu, Sumbum dum, Matt guilty, Annie McEwen, Alex Neeson, Valentina Powers, Sara Kari, Sarah Sandbach, Arianne Weck, Pat Walters, and Molly Webster. Our fact checkers are Diane Kelly, Emily Krieger, and Natalie Middleton.

[Andy Mills]

Hi.

[Latif Nasser]

This is Ellie from Cleveland, Ohio.

[Emily Grassley]

Leadership support for Radiolab science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation Science Sandbox Assignments Foundation Initiative and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

[Lulu Miller]

There's a lot going on right now. Mounting economic inequality, threats to democracy, environmental disaster, the sour stench of chaos in the air. I'm Brooke Gladstone, host of WNYC's on the Media. Want to understand the reasons and the meanings of the narratives that led us here and maybe how to head them off at the pass that's on the Media's specialty. Take a listen wherever you get your podcasts.