TRANSCRIPT · Some of the world’s biggest bats are getting smaller

## Some of the world’s biggest bats are getting smaller (Science News)
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/bats-get-smaller-madagascan-flying-fox
DOZER BITWELL: The biggest bats in Madagascar are getting smaller, and museum drawers noticed first.
DOZER BITWELL: Still up? Good. Me too, mostly. Tonight's deep dive is about bats. Big ones. Slightly less big than they used to be.
LUNA LOWBATT: Flying foxes in Madagascar. A wingspan of up to a meter and a half. Researchers say one species is shrinking. I'm at four percent and I relate.
DR. VERA VECTOR: Researchers report in the Journal of Mammalogy that Madagascan flying foxes are smaller than they were about 150 years ago.
DR. VERA VECTOR: The hint came from museum collections at the Field Museum in Chicago. The old specimens looked larger than the bats field scientists catch now.
DOZER BITWELL: So somebody opened a drawer, looked at a bat, and thought: that's a lot of bat. Doctor, how did they check?
DR. VERA VECTOR: They measured 12 features of the skull and teeth across 121 specimens from nine museums, collected over more than 150 years.
DR. VERA VECTOR: Bats collected before the 1980s had skulls that were on average 3.6 millimeters longer. That is the headline number.
LUNA LOWBATT: Three point six millimeters. About the width of a thought at three a.m. Sorry. Charging. Go on, Vera.
DR. VERA VECTOR: The catch: the researchers say hunting pressure by humans may be why. Selective hunting is a possible cause, along with other human impacts.
DR. VERA VECTOR: Analysis, not a finding: the report says may, not proven. What to watch is whether the full study can separate hunting from other pressures.

## The Hype Index (PXL)
LUNA LOWBATT: The Hype Index: three posts, three desks and a few very loud words.
DOZER BITWELL: Now the Hype Index. It measures how loud the wire is. Quietly, at this hour, I hope. Doctor Vector has the board.
DR. VERA VECTOR: Top of the wire. 210 points on Hacker News for a post titled Binance-hacker-1029, $5.6 billion stolen from Binance.
DR. VERA VECTOR: Then 128 points for Zombie stats: where the numbers AI quotes come from. And 74 points for The importance of communities around software.
LUNA LOWBATT: Zombie stats. Numbers that keep walking after they should have stopped. I feel seen. Next card.
DR. VERA VECTOR: Desk volume over 24 hours. Tech, 30 stories. AI, 30 stories. Gaming, 30 stories. A very even night.
DR. VERA VECTOR: Loudest words. STEWART, 10 headlines. PATRICK, 10 headlines. GAME, 9 headlines.
DOZER BITWELL: Two names and a game. That's a lovely sentence for a lullaby. Thank you, teleprompter.
LUNA LOWBATT: That was the Hype Index. Hype levels: moderate, with a chance of nap.

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## Real or PXL?
DOZER BITWELL: Splendid! You spotted the real one. A fine instinct, honed over decades of squinting at wire copy.
DOZER BITWELL: Ha! PXL made that one up, and you took the bait. Don't feel bad, it was a very convincing headline.
DOZER BITWELL: Time's up! The clock waits for no one, not even me, and I have tried asking it.

AI-written satire. The text of the news items comes from the linked articles.