1. This is one of my favorite "Fran" videos of all time. "I am not a Chemist", "I am not a Physicist", "I am not a doctor." While you might not be any of those things, you certainly have the breadth of knowledge than any of those specialists would admire, and so do I.

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2. Interestingly, to add to your point about cells and the immune system, this is the cause for Juvenile Diabetes. The immune system is not yet mature; it encounters an issue it needs to solve about beta cells found in the pancreas which aid to produce insulin, and the immune system makes a mistake and ends up killing all of the beta cells which in reality keep you healthy (non-diabetic). So, it's not just cancer this applies to, but the immune system in general, and there are so many ways for it to make mistakes — it just amazingly does a very good job at not making those mistakes on a regular basis (probably because of people in the past dying off because their immune systems made mistakes; so now, we have more people around, alive, who did actually have good enough immune systems to combat it, before 2021 medicine was around).

   Frankly, even with 2021 medicine, we don't really have a true clue about how the immune system makes those kinds of mistakes (as far as I know).

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3. I love the mad scientist hair, seriously style or super crazy sticking up and out everywhere and then put on some 'crazy eyes' and then do a full video on a more serious/technical topic. Never mention the hair and play it straight. Something like that would be great.

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4. Did you just solve the Fermi paradox? I mean maybe subsequent generations of stars will have better "metalicity" for biogenesis and the cosmos will be full of space critters. Maybe we really are among the earliest to the party because our solar system has just enough goodies to make it all happen? Nevermind 🙂

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5. I think you're wrong about the star made of water. I think the gravity and pressure would turn the water into plasma and then rip the molecules apart into O and H and, voila! new star born! also, I know stars can keep making heavier atoms and they do not collapse until they create iron, coz fusing iron wouldn't create enough force to keep the star from collapsing and that causes the star to become a supernova or something else!

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6. Hi Fran. Could you please explain the question of light, being both a particle and a wave. I can't work this out. If a Photon exists it must have mass. Everything that exists is physical. And therefore has mass. How can a photon be an exception to this? If it exists, has mass and is subject to the basic laws of physics, which one would presume apply to all matter, how is it possible for the photon to reach the absolute speed of light. You are phenomenal. Thanks.

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7. Questions for next time : I'm guessing our moon had to of been spinning early on in order to have formed itself, if so, what could have caused it to slow down in just a few 100 millions years? and Mercury having such a low melting point for a metal, does it seem to you like it's somehow an element out of place on Earth? Thanks.

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8. Great episode Fran. You might not be a whatever but you sure are smart, Thanks for the name drop of my song (I played the cowbell on the original). BTW when we started BOC we were two engineering school drop-outs.

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9. None of us were there. It’s a likely scenario but nobody was there when the universe, or our solar system began. Why do we have so many supernova fragments in our planets? How is the sun not full of space junk? With all the solid objects that have hit Jupiter, why do we call it a ball of gas? There must be a solid sphere in there somewhere.

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10. The speed of light is the ultimate speed limit within a particular reference frame (Special Relativity, 1905); however, there is no speed limit when different reference frames are compared (General Relativity, 1916). Thus, FTL is only possible if space-time can be curved into a sphere, which closes off the space-time inside the sphere from the space-time outside the sphere. This is the basis of "warp drives," in which the starship is motionless within its bubble of space-time, which itself is moving "through" un-warped space-time at velocities that can be much faster than light.

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11. I have a question for you Fran. If it ever becomes possible to travel the say 8 to ten light-years away but at say half the speed of light ie 16 to 20 years do you perceive any electronics issues with components or batteries.. if say that we could use "suspended" animation of longer periods, say 40 years would components and batteries be an issue?

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12. ok ok, "i am a scientist" cool shirt… you talk about electrons moving… however, other scientists use Frankie Benjamin conventual ideas… now, if an spacecraft came to earth and they could speak one of our languages… so whom would they set straight and which half of the scientists would look like fools…?? great info fran as usual… 😀 makes a person think

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