Under the Sea Science Venting

**Dr. Kiki** (0:00)
This is Twist. This Week in Science, episode number 1060, recorded on Wednesday, May 27th, 2026
Under the Sea Science Venting. Woohoo, we're going to have so much fun. I'm Dr. Kiki, and tonight on the show, we're going to fill your head with deep seas, deep octopodes, and cucumber bits. But first, thanks to our amazing Patreon sponsors for their generous support of Twist. You can become a part of the Patreon community at patreon.com/thisweek in Science. Disclaimer, disclaimer, disclaimer.
Under the Sea. It's not just wetter, it's under more pressure, inhospitable to humans, while a haven for crustaceans, tube worms, and more. Thousands of species, biodiversity galore. Yet, that's not the draw in our tech obsessed age. We love something shiny. Could it make someone some money? Probably a lot more than we make here on This Week in Science. Coming up next.

**Blair** (1:49)
Good science to you, Kiki.

**Dr. Kiki** (1:51)
And a good science to you too, Blair, Andrew, and everyone out there. Welcome to this week's episode of This Week in Science. We are back once again to talk about all the science that we see fit to bring to this weekly program.
We are joined by our guest this evening, Dr. Andrew Thaler, who is going to be talking with us about the deep sea this evening. Thanks for joining us.

**Dr. Andrew Thaler** (2:19)
Thank you so much for having me.

**Dr. Kiki** (2:21)
You're welcome. But we do have some other fun things on the show tonight. Blair, what did you want to bring to talk about in the animal corner?

**Blair** (2:31)
Oh, I have how wildlife are watching us, not just the other way around. I have a new tiny deep sea octopus and time permitting the mirror test again for the show.

**Dr. Kiki** (2:46)
Yet again, you love talking about it, so let's talk about it.
I brought some stories, just a couple of stories for the end of the show. One about cucumber bits, oh, those lovely sea cucumbers. What did we not know about them? I'll tell you towards the end of the show. Also, there's a study about back rooms, subreddits, subreddit back rooms.

**Blair** (3:13)
What are they talking about?

**Dr. Kiki** (3:14)
There's a whole movie coming out or that's already out now.
It's very, very fancy stuff. So hopefully, we'll get to that at the end of the show. And the interesting philosophy, psychology of these back rooms.
But without any further ado, everyone, if you are not yet subscribed to This Week in Science, you should be, no, you can be, head over to your favorite podcast directory and look for This Week in Science. We are a podcast that releases once a week. If you are not already, if your friends are not subscribed, get them to subscribe. You can also listen to us live streaming, broadcasting every week, Wednesdays, 8 p.m. Pacific time-ish, over on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitch. Look again for This Week in Science. We're over in those places. If you want to get to our website, go visit twist.org, that's where we also have our Patreon and the link to our Zazzle store if you are interested in finding ways to support this show in an ongoing fashion. But now it's time. It's time for the science.
I already briefly said that Dr. Thaler is visiting us today for an interview. I cannot speak this evening. I'm doing my best.
You're doing great. I'm working at it. Yeah. Andrew is a deep sea ecologist, conservation technologist, and ocean educator. He's been the editor-in-chief of the blog Southern Fried Science for over 15 years, and is the co-founder of OpenCTD, which is an open source ocean monitoring platform. Welcome once again to the show.

**Dr. Andrew Thaler** (5:02)
Thank you so much. I'm very excited to be here.

**Dr. Kiki** (5:05)
I'm excited that you're here too. Do you realize how long it has been since the last time that I interviewed you?

**Dr. Andrew Thaler** (5:13)
I don't. It's been a long time.

**Dr. Kiki** (5:19)
Well, maybe you want to... I'm just going to grab a moment from this little YouTube video.

**Dr. Andrew Thaler** (5:29)
No, is it 18 years ago? I think we met 18 years ago.

**Dr. Kiki** (5:34)
Something like that. Yeah. So I interviewed you back when I was doing Dr. Kiki Science Hour on the Shrek Network. And so I found the code 102, which was, I believe, 14 years ago.
It was a much smaller structure at much smaller scales. And when not oceans in. Yeah.

**Dr. Andrew Thaler** (6:01)
Just questions about what would affect the ocean were based on models of kind of what happens when sea level rise affects the ocean or what happens when overfishing affects the ocean.