RadiolabRadiolab is on a curiosity bender. We ask deep questions and use investigative journalism to get the answers. A given episode might whirl you through science, legal history, and into the home of someone halfway across the world. The show is known for innovative sound design, smashing information into music. It is hosted by Lulu Miller, and Latif Nasser.
Radiolab is on a curiosity bender. We ask deep questions and use investigative journalism to get the answers. A given episode might whirl you through science, legal history, and into the home of someone halfway across the world. The show is known for innovative sound design, smashing information into music. It is hosted by Lulu Miller, and Latif Nasser.
In an episode we first aired in 2014, we meet a man named Dennis Conrow, who was stuck. After a brief stint at college, he'd spent most of his 20's back home with his parents, sleeping in his childhood room. And just when he finally struck out on his own, fate intervened. He lost both his parents to cancer. So Dennis was left, back in the house, alone. Until one night when a group of paranormal investigators showed up at his door and made him realize what it really means for a house, or a man, to be haunted. We have some exciting news! In the "Zoozve" episode, Radiolab named its first-ever quasi-moon, and now it's your turn! Radiolab has teamed up with The International Astronomical Union to launch a global naming contest for one of Earth's quasi-moons. This is your chance to make your mark on the heavens. Vote on your favorites starting in November: https://radiolab.org/moon EPISODE CREDITS: Reported by Matt Kielty with help from Andy Mills Produced by Matt Kielty with help from - Maria Paz Gutiérrez Original music and sound design contributed by - Matt Kielty Signup for our newsletter!! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)! Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today. Follow our show on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing radiolab@wnyc.org. Leadership support for Radiolab's science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation Initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
As the US Presidential Election nears, Radiolab covers the closest we ever came to abolishing the Electoral College. In the 1960s, then-President Lyndon Johnson approached an ambitious young Senator known as the Kennedy of the Midwest to tweak the way Americans elect their President. The more Senator Birch Bayh looked into the electoral college the more he believed it was a ticking time bomb hidden in the constitution, that someone needed to defuse. With overwhelming support in Congress, the endorsement of multiple Presidents, and polling showing that over 80% of the American public supported abolishing it, it looked like he might just pull it off. So why do we still have the electoral college? And will we actually ever get rid of it? Special thanks to Jesse Wegman, the University of Virginia's Miller Center, Sarah Steinkamp at DePauw University, Sara Stefani at Indiana University Libraries, Olivia-Britain-Toole at Clemson University Special Collections, Tim Groeling at UCLA, Samuel Wang, Philip Stark, Walter Mebane, Laura Beth Schnitker at University of Maryland Special Collections, Hunter Estes at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, and the folks at Common Cause. We have some exciting news! In the "Zoozve" episode, Radiolab named its first-ever quasi-moon, and now it's your turn! Radiolab has teamed up with The International Astronomical Union to launch a global naming contest for one of Earth's quasi-moons. This is your chance to make your mark on the heavens. Vote on your favorites starting in November: https://radiolab.org/moon EPISODE CREDITS: Reported by - Latif Nasser and Matt Kielty Produced by - Matt Kielty and Simon Adler Original music and sound design contributed by - Matt Kielty, Simon Adler, and Jeremy Bloom Mixed by - Jeremy Bloom Fact-checking by - Diane Kelly and Edited by - Becca Bressler and Pat Walters EPISODE CITATIONS: Articles - Harry Roth, "Civil Rights Icon Defended the Electoral College Forty Years Ago" (https://zpr.io/jmS5buEGxBzU) Frederick Williams, "The Late Senator Birch Bayh: Best Friend of Black America," (https://zpr.io/NDiAgcK5UPhX) Christopher DeMuth, "The Man Who Saved the Electoral College" (https://zpr.io/PgneafdmWBVA) Books - Jill Lepore, These Truths: A History of the United States (https://zpr.io/FyzMJAY8G7qe) Robert Blaemire, Birch Bayh: Making A Difference (https://www.blaemire.us/) Alex Keyssar, Why Do We Still Have the Electoral College? (https://zpr.io/kSf9uBQ7FHwa) Let The People Pick the President: The Case for Abolishing The Electoral College (https://zpr.io/mug4xcMqeZCw) by Jesse Wegman Videos: CGP Grey series on The Electoral College (https://www.cgpgrey.com/the-electoral-college) Birch Bayh speech about the Electoral College (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrAZVx7tekU) (from Ball State University Library which has many more Birch Bayh archival clips) Birch Bayh's campaign jingle: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcvnS5zaxC4 Signup for our newsletter!! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)! Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today. Follow our show on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing radiolab@wnyc.org. Leadership support for Radiolab's science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation Initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
Back in 2018, when this episode first aired, there was a feeling that democracy was on the ropes. In the United States and abroad, citizens of democracies are feeling increasingly alienated, disaffected, and powerless. Some are even asking themselves a question that feels almost too dangerous to say out loud: is democracy fundamentally broken? Today on Radiolab, we ask a different question: how do we fix it? We scrutinize one proposed tweak to the way we vote that could make politics in this country more representative, more moderate, and most shocking of all, more civil. Could this one surprisingly do-able mathematical fix really turn political campaigning from a rude bloodsport to a campfire singalong? And even if we could do that, would we want to? Special thanks to Rob Richie (and everyone else at Fairvote), Don Saari, Diana Leygerman, Caroline Tolbert, Bobby Agee, Edward Still, Jim Blacksher, Allen Caton, Nikolas Bowie, John Hale, and Anna Luhrmann and the rest of the team at the Varieties of Democracy Institute in Sweden. And a very special thanks to Rick Pickren, for allowing us to use his rendition of State of Maine, Maine's state anthem. Check that out, and all his other state anthems on Spotify or Youtube. EPISODE CREDITS: Reported by - Latif Nasser, Simon Adler, Sarah Qari, Suzie Lechtenberg and Tracie Hunte Produced by - Simon Adler, Matt Kielty, Sarah Qari, and Suzie Lechtenberg Original music and sound design contributed by - Simon Adler Our newsletter comes out every Wednesday. It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)! Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today. Follow our show on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing radiolab@wnyc.org. Leadership support for Radiolab's science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation Initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
In 1987, Gary Hart was a young charismatic Democrat, poised to win his party's nomination and possibly the presidency. Many of us know the story of what happened next, and even if you don't, it's a familiar tale. Back in 2016, we examined how, when this happened, politicians and political reporters found themselves in uncharted territory. And with help from author Matt Bai, we looked at how the events of that May shaped the way we cover politics, and expanded our sense of what's appropriate when it comes to judging a candidate. In the wake of the 2016 election, and in the throes of our current political moment, it would seem we've come full circle in the weirdest way. So we sat down with Brooke Gladstone, co-host of our sister show here at WNYC, On the Media, to talk about why sex scandals don't matter anymore. We have some exciting news! In the "Zoozve" episode, Radiolab named its first-ever quasi-moon, and now it's your turn! Radiolab has teamed up with The International Astronomical Union to launch a global naming contest for one of Earth's quasi-moons. This is your chance to make your mark on the heavens. Submit your name ideas now through September, or vote on your favorites starting in November: https://radiolab.org/moon EPISODE CREDITS: Reported by - Simon Adler with help from - Jamie York Produced by - Simon Adler Update produced by Rebecca Laks Signup for our newsletter!! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)! Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today. Follow our show on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing radiolab@wnyc.org. Leadership support for Radiolab's science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation Initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
As dead as they seem, tree stumps are hubs of life and relationships. Co-host Lulu Miller is back with another season of her hit spinoff show Terrestrials, and to celebrate, we're sharing the first episode with you. From stumps to snags, dead wood provides habitat for rodents, falcons, insects, and even humans. Stumps hold together the forest floor, give hunting perches to birds of prey in flatlands, prevent erosion and the encroachment of invasive species, usher in sunlight, provide nutrients, store renewable fuel, and hold onto stories human beings might have forgotten. Without these ghosts of trees past, nothing would be the same. Scottish author, artist and lover of tree stumps, Dr. Amanda Thomson, leads Lulu on a "tour de stumps," a journey across space and time to learn about some of the most magical stumps on the planet. We have some exciting news! In the "Zoozve" episode, Radiolab named its first-ever quasi-moon, and now it's your turn! Radiolab has teamed up with The International Astronomical Union to launch a global naming contest for one of Earth's quasi-moons. This is your chance to make your mark on the heavens. Vote on your favorite names starting in November at https://radiolab.org/moon Visit the Terrestrials website (https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab-kids/projects/terrestrials) to learn more about the show, meet our team, listen to the songs and discover fun activities, drawing prompts, music how-tos and games that educators, parents and families might enjoy together.If you'd like to "badger" a future expert, suggest story ideas or feedback, email us at terrestrials@wnyc.org. Listen to just the songs (https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab-kids/just-the-songs) from Terrestrials. EPISODE CREDITS: Reported by - Ana González and Lulu Miller with help from - Alan Goffinski Produced by - Ana González Original music from - Alan Goffinski Sound design by - Mira Burt-Wintonick Mixing by - Joe Plourde Fact-checking by - Natalie Middleton and Edited by - Mira Burt-Wintonick Signup for our newsletter!! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)! Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today. Follow our show on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing radiolab@wnyc.org. Leadership support for Radiolab's science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation Initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
Today we follow a sleuth who has spent over a decade working to solve an epic mystery hiding in plain historical sight: did anyone survive the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79AD? Tired of hearing the conventional narrative that every Pompeiian perished without any evidence to back it up, Classicist Steven Tuck decides to look into it himself. Although he is nearly two millennia late to ground zero, he uses all the available evidence to reimagine the disaster from the perspective of the people on the ground. Could anyone have survived the volcano? If they did, could they have survived what came after that: earthquakes, tsunamis, pumice stones hurtling like missiles from the sky? If someone did survive, what happened to them after that??! To find out we have to think, feel and possibly even eat like Ancient Romans. An against-all-odds story of a disaster without warning, a mass disappearance without a trace, and oddly, a particularly stinky fish sauce, care of special guest Chef Samin Nosrat. We have some exciting news! In the "Zoozve" episode, Radiolab named its first-ever quasi-moon, and now it's your turn! Radiolab has teamed up with The International Astronomical Union to launch a global naming contest for one of Earth's quasi-moons. This is your chance to make your mark on the heavens. Submit your name ideas now through September, or vote on your favorites starting in November: https://radiolab.org/moon EPISODE CREDITS: Reported by - Latif Nasser with help from - Annie McEwen and Ekedi Fausther-Keys Produced by - Annie McEwen Recording help from - Adam Howell Voice acting by - Brandon Dalton Original music and sound design contributed by - Jeremy Bloom and Annie McEwen with mixing help from - Arianne Wack and Hosting Helo from - Sarah Qari Fact-checking by - Emily Krieger and Edited by - Pat Walters EPISODE CITATIONS: Recipes - Ancient Roman recipe for garum (https://zpr.io/gMNmXcNZUhZg). Read more about garum here (https://zpr.io/4gh939TxCRpZ) or in Sally Grainger's book The Story of Garum: Fermented Fish Sauce and Salted Fish in the Ancient World Articles - On Pliny's letters and the eruption including a reanalysis of the date of the eruption, Pedar Foss, Pliny and the Eruption of Vesuvius (https://zpr.io/kQH49ttRawNZ) Documentaries - A recent PBS documentary, Pompeii: The New Dig (https://zpr.io/LV9sWKc4vbQ8) including segments on Steven Tuck's work. Photos and Maps - To trace building locations or names of home owners as well as photos of every square inch of Pompeii: https://pompeiiinpictures.com/pompeiiinpictures/ From Steven Tuck: "If someone has an otherwise unbeatable case of insomnia, my preliminary publication of findings is in Reflections: Harbour City Deathscapes in Roman Italy and Beyond" (https://zpr.io/3pETS53A9CtF) Brief description of the casts and casting process of the remains found at Pompeii: https://pompeiisites.org/en/pompeii-map/analysis/the-casts/ Maps of the Ancient Roman world that you can use to trace some of the land and sea routes discussed in the episode: https://orbis.stanford.edu Signup for our newsletter! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)! Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today. Follow our show on Instagram, X, formerly Twitter and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing radiolab@wnyc.org. Leadership support for Radiolab's science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation Initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
This episode first aired back in December of 2013, and at the start of that new year, the team was cracking open fossils, peering back into ancient seas, and looking up at lunar skies only to find that a year is not quite as fixed as we thought it was. With the help of paleontologist Neil Shubin, reporter Emily Graslie and the Field Museum's Paul Mayer we discover that our world is full of ancient coral calendars. Each one of these sea skeletons reveals that once upon a very-long-time-ago, years were shorter by over forty days. And astrophysicist Chis Impey helps us comprehend how the change is all to be blamed on a celestial slow dance with the moon. Plus, Robert indulges his curiosity about stopping time and counteracting the spinning of the spheres by taking astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson on a (theoretical) trip to Venus with a rooster and sprinter Usain Bolt. We have some exciting news! In the "Zoozve" episode, Radiolab named its first-ever quasi-moon, and now it's your turn! Radiolab has teamed up with The International Astronomical Union to launch a global naming contest for one of Earth's quasi-moons. This is your chance to make your mark on the heavens. Submit your name ideas now through September, or vote on your favorites starting in November: https://radiolab.org/moon Signup for our newsletter!! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)! Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today. Follow our show on Instagram,X (formerly Twitter) and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing radiolab@wnyc.org. Leadership support for Radiolab's science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation Initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
One man secretly hands off more and more of his life to an AI voice clone. Today, we feature veteran journalist Evan Ratliff who - for his new podcast Shell Game - decided to slowly replace himself bit by bit with an AI voice clone, to see how far he could actually take it. Could it do the mundane phone calls he'd prefer to skip? Could it get legal advice for him? Could it go to therapy for him? Could it parent his kids? Evan feeds his bot the most intimate details about his life, and lets the bot loose in high-stakes situations at home and at work. Which bizarro version of him will show up? The desperately-agreeable conversationalist, the crank-yanking prank caller, the glitched out stranger who sounds like he's in the middle of a mental breakdown, or someone else entirely? Will people believe it's really him? And how will they act if they don't? A gonzo journalistic experiment for the age of AI, that's funny and eerie all at the same time. We have some exciting news! In the "Zoozve" episode, Radiolab named its first-ever quasi-moon, and now it's your turn! Radiolab has teamed up with The International Astronomical Union to launch a global naming contest for one of Earth's quasi-moons. This is your chance to make your mark on the heavens. Submit your name ideas now through September, or vote on your favorites starting in November: https://radiolab.org/moon EPISODE CREDITS: Reported by - Evan Ratliff Produced by - Sophie Bridges and Simon Adler With help from - Evan Ratliff Fact-checking by - Emily Krieger EPISODE CITATIONS: Audio: If you want to listen to more of Evan's Shell Game, you can do so here, https://www.shellgame.co/ Sign up for our newsletter!! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)! Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today. Follow our show on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing radiolab@wnyc.org. Leadership support for Radiolab's science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation Initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
First aired back in 2017, here's a show of questions and, sometimes, answers. Cause, we get a lot of questions. Like, A LOT of questions. Tiny questions, big questions, short questions, long questions. Weird questions. Poop questions. We get them all. And over the years, as more and more of these questions arrived in our inbox, what happened was, guiltily, we put them off to the side, in a bucket of sorts, where they just sat around, unanswered. But now, we're dumping the bucket out. Today, our producers pick up a few of the questions that spilled out of that bucket, and venture out into the great unknown to find answers to some of life's greatest mysteries: coincidences; miracles; life; death; fate; will; and, of course, poop. We have some exciting news! In the "Zoozve" episode, Radiolab named its first-ever quasi-moon, and now it's your turn! Radiolab has teamed up with The International Astronomical Union to launch a global naming contest for one of Earth's quasi-moons. This is your chance to make your mark on the heavens. Submit your name ideas now through September, or vote on your favorites starting in November: https://radiolab.org/moon Signup for our newsletter!! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)! Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today. Follow our show on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing radiolab@wnyc.org. Leadership support for Radiolab's science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation Initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
