Coming to Our Animal Senses

Big Picture Science

Animals experience the world differently. There are insects that can see ultraviolet light, while some snakes can hunt in the dark thanks to their ability to sense infrared. Such differences are not restricted to vision: Elephants can hear subsonic sounds, birds navigate by magnetism, and your dog lives in a world marked by odors. In this episode, we speak to science journalist Ed Yong about how other creatures sense the world. Could we ever understand what it’s like to have the hearing of a bat or the sight of a hawk?

Guest:

Ed Yong – Science writer for The Atlantic whose coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic earned him a Pulitzer Prize in explanatory journalism. He is the author of, “An Immense World: How

Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us.”

Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake

Originally aired September 5, 2022

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