We are Made of Star Stuff: Jocelyn Bell Burnell at TEDxVienna (Transcript)

Jocelyn Bell Burnell – TEDx Talk TRANSCRIPT

I have a slight problem, but the show is going on.

My blood is red. Is Viennese blood red? I suspect it is.

Why is blood red? Does anybody know? Can you tell me?

(Audience) It’s iron.

It’s iron, yes. It’s iron in the hemoglobin, in our bloodstream, that makes the blood red. Iron is one of the chemical elements, and I’m going to talk about that in a moment.

But, just first, tomato ketchup. We’ll hear more about tomatoes later.

Back to the chemical elements and iron. It is, indeed, one of the chemical elements, and even if you’re not a chemist, you probably know of some others.

An answer given by a student in an exam: [H2O is hot water and CO2 is cold water].

So, you know what H2O is?

(Audience) Water.

Water.

CO2?

(Audience) Carbon dioxide

Carbon dioxide

So, we’ve got here another three chemical elements: hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon.

And while we’re dealing with student exam questions, here’s another one about water: Water is composed of two gins.

[Water is composed of two gins, Oxygin and Hydrogin] [Oxygin is pure gin. Hydrogin is water and gin]

These answers come from the United States of America, but… It’s a wonderful resource of all sorts of amazing things that come true. Maybe some of you recall seeing a diagram like this in school chemistry laboratories. You can see it in other places, too, even these days on tea towels, mugs, bags, pens.