You're the Expert, starring Richard Primack!

Posted by Amanda Gallinat 

A few weeks ago, I had the rare experience of watching three comedians try to guess what my advisor, Dr. Richard Primack, studies for a living. I watched on from the audience of the radio show “You’re the Expert” as the comedians— who didn’t seem to mind being laughed at— asked strange and occasionally insightful questions about climate change.

I highly recommend listening to the whole show, here:  

You're the Expert on iTunes

During the opening game of 20 questions, the comedians determined that Dr. Primack uses a notebook, that the notebook is college-ruled, and then eventually one of them guessed he was an environmentalist-- close enough to end the round! Many games followed, my favorite of which had the comedians guessing whether a comment was written on a website for climate change skeptics or a LOST message board.

As host Chris Duffy pointed out, Dr. Primack demonstrated a real talent for steering the conversation back to useful information, which comes in handy when you are outnumbered by comedians. 

Left to right: Richard Primack crystallizes climate change for host Chris Duffy and comedians Myq Kaplan and Lori Strauss (photo by Liz Shea)