logo
episode-header-image
Aug 2024
1h 12m

Speleology (CAVES) with Gina Moseley

ALIE WARD
About this episode

Caves! Caverns! Grottos! Crystals! Let's get down and dirty with Speleology with explorer, researcher, professor, and paleoclimatologist Dr. Gina Moseley. She shares what it’s like to spend a week straight in a cave, safety tips, climate research breakthroughs, and the deepest and darkest caves. Also: stalactites, stalagmites, cave clouds, show caves, who counts as a spelunker, what ancient climate science can tell us about our current sticky situation, cave diving, cave rescues, creepy caves, gated caves, old school versus new school cave mapping, if cavers ever lose their damn minds down there, and why nothing beats the longing for the underground. Grab a friend and wear a helmet. We’re goin’ in. 

Follow Dr. Gina Moseley on GoogleScholar

A donation went to the British Cave Rescue Council

More episode sources and links

Smologies (short, classroom-safe) episodes

Other episodes you may enjoy: Chiropterology (BATS), Indigenous Pedology (SOIL SCIENCE), Geology (ROCKS), Disasterology (DISASTERS), Metropolitan Tombology (PARIS CATACOMBS), Fearology (FEAR)

Sponsors of Ologies

Transcripts and bleeped episodes

Become a patron of Ologies for as little as a buck a month

OlogiesMerch.com has hats, shirts, hoodies, totes!

Follow @Ologies on Instagram and X

Follow @AlieWard on Instagram and X

Editing by Mercedes Maitland of Maitland Audio Productions and Jacob Chaffee

Managing Director: Susan Hale

Scheduling Producer: Noel Dilworth

Transcripts by Aveline Malek 

Website by Kelly R. Dwyer

Theme song by Nick Thorburn

Up next
Oct 8
Haunted Hydrology (SPOOKY LAKES) with Geo Rutherford
Mudbank bones. River wrecks. Salty seas. Pink ponds. Poison dust devils. Steamy streams.. It’s Haunted Hydrology with your favorite Spooky Lakes ambassador, the artist and author Geo Rutherford who is widely known as Geodesaurus. Geo covers the dark history of The Great Lakes, a ... Show More
1h 13m
Oct 1
Serpopsychology (WHAT’S CREEPY?) with Frank McAndrew
Are you creepy? How would you know? What’s “creepy” as opposed to scary or eerie? We talk to the pioneer of this research, Serpopsychologist, Dr. Frank McAndrew, a professor emeritus at Knox College. We chat: dates that give you the willies, Weary Willie the Clown, haunted dolls, ... Show More
1h 9m
Sep 24
Revolutionology (REBELLIONS & SOCIAL CHANGE) with Jack Goldstone
Storming the Bastille. Facing off with tanks. Canceling a streaming subscription. We’re talking protests, boycotts, insurrections, and demonstrations. Scholar, professor, and actual real life Revolutionologist Dr. Jack Goldstone lays out the whys – and the hows. What revolts have ... Show More
1h 30m
Recommended Episodes
Jan 2025
The Darkest Dark
We fall down the looking glass with Sönke Johnsen, a biologist who finds himself staring at one of the darkest things on the planet. So dark, it’s almost like he’s holding a blackhole in his hands. On his quest to understand how something could possibly be that black, we enter wo ... Show More
26m 28s
Mar 2025
Underground Flood: Climbing Through Caves
An expedition to the deepest known cave in the world goes suddenly wrong. In 1977, British caver Dick Willis and his companions descend into the dark heart of the French Pyrenees. But with the three friends thousands of feet underground, an electrical storm breaks out on the surf ... Show More
53m 55s
Dec 2024
Palaeolithic Cave Art (Radio Edit)
Greg Jenner is joined in the Palaeolithic era by Dr Isobel Wisher and comedian Seán Burke to learn about cave art.Tens of thousands of years ago, human ancestors all over the world began drawing and painting on cave walls, carving figurines, and even decorating their own bodies. ... Show More
28m 9s
Apr 2025
The Age of Aquaticus
For years, scientists thought nothing could live above 73℃/163℉. At that temperature, everything boiled to death. But scientists Tom Brock and Hudson Freeze weren’t convinced. What began as their simple quest to trawl for life in some of the hottest natural springs on Earth would ... Show More
43 m
Jun 2024
Danny Hillman: Gunung Padang, The Oldest Pyramid on Earth
According to Natawidjaja, the data that supports their findings shows that the Gunung Padang pyramid is a bit like a three-layer cake, and each layer was built thousands of years apart. He says the most recent layer, known as Unit-1, was constructed about 3,000 years to 4,000 yea ... Show More
1h 8m
Apr 2024
World’s oldest forest fossils
The world’s oldest fossilised forest was uncovered in Somerset last week. We head to palaeobotanist, Dr Christopher Berry’s, lab at Cardiff University to learn about these cladoxylopsids. They lived 390 million years ago and although they are not the ancestors of today’s trees, t ... Show More
28m 14s
Dec 2021
Top Human Origins Discoveries of 2021
2021 was a big year in science! Fossil discoveries introduced new relatives to our family tree, new findings added fascinating twists to the human story, and breakthroughs in research methods opened new worlds to explore. In this episode, five scientists discuss their favorite hu ... Show More
31m 16s
Oct 2024
The world's longest treasure hunt
After 31 years, a mammoth treasure hunt consisting of solving eleven cryptic clues has finally concluded. A replica of the final prize – a golden owl – was dug up in France, leaving fellow treasure hunters both disappointed and relieved. Inspired by this pursuit, the Unexpected E ... Show More
49m 29s
Oct 2022
Robyn D'Avignon, "A Ritual Geology: Gold and Subterranean Knowledge in Savanna West Africa" (Duke UP, 2022)
In A Ritual Geology: Gold and Subterranean Knowledge in Savanna West Africa (Duke University Press, 2022), Robyn d’Avignon, Assistant Professor of History at NYU, retraces the history of gold mining and orpaillage along the geological formation known as the West African Birimian ... Show More
1h 4m
Nov 2024
The Secrets & Science of the Lost Monster Files
Lost Monster Files airing on Discovery reinvestigates some of the most compelling unknown creature cases of the founder of cryptozoology, Ivan Sanderson! Cryptozoologist Brittany Barbieri and field scientist Charlie Mewshaw had a rare opportunity to explore Sanderson’s recently u ... Show More
1h 4m