The kite in the key is going to prove the final experiment, which is that one form of this electrical fluid is the discharge of lightning. And at any time in this experiment does it get you to the future? Apparently sowas. Every time it rains anywhere in the world, there are electrons that used to be up in thesky in the clouds, that have arrived on earth. These are from ions that come out of the the rain swelled skies. The electrons want to get back to the cloud, but they're really lazy, ok? And the last thing it wants to do is move through air. Air is actually an electrical insulator. It hates moving through the air.
How does lightning work? On this episode, Neil deGrasse Tyson and comic co-host Chuck break down the legendary science and inventions of Benjamin Franklin, live with chief editor of The Benjamin Franklin Papers, Ellen Cohn and Benjamin Franklin himself!
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Thanks to our Patrons Andrew Herron, Bhargava Kandada, and Mark Roop for supporting us this week.
Photo Credit: Hansueli Krapf, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
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