#137 – Alex Filippenko: Supernovae, Dark Energy, Aliens & the Expanding Universe

Alex Filippenko is an astrophysicist and professor of astronomy at Berkeley. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors:
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EPISODE LINKS:
Alex’s Website: https://astro.berkeley.edu/people/alex-filippenko/

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OUTLINE:
Here’s the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time.
(00:00)– Introduction
(06:36)– Universe expansion
(08:00)– Dark energy
(15:28)– Scientific revolutions
(27:18)– Asteroid hitting Earth
(30:50)– Giant solar flares and the power grid
(37:50)– Elon Musk and space exploration
(42:41)– Exoplanets
(50:03)– Traveling close to the speed of light
(52:13)– Traveling faster than the speed of light
(1:00:39)– Intelligent life in the universe
(1:04:14)– Fermi Paradox
(1:13:52)– Finding alien life would be bad news
(1:18:49)– UFO sightings
(1:31:58)– Universe expansion speed
(1:36:42)– The universe is infinite
(1:40:58)– What happened before the Big Bang?
(1:45:14)– Roger Penrose
(1:48:48)– Nobel Prize for the accelerating universe
(2:10:23)– Supernova
(2:21:47)– The greatest story ever told
(2:25:44)– Richard Feynman
(2:32:37)– Meaning of life