Tom Sutcliffe and guests discuss how we solve problems and imagine the future. While many people now point to the potential of AI, the prize winning writer Naomi Alderman is interested in the messy magic of human thinking. In the forthcoming BBC Radio 4 series, Human Intelligence she tells the stories of the people – with all their ingenuity and foibles – who built the modern world.
Across history human cultures have devised a wide range of practices to understand, and discover, the mysteries of the past, present and future. The exhibition Oracles, Omens and Answers (at the Bodleian Library, Oxford, until April 2025), co-curated by Dr Michelle Aroney showcases the art of divination. From the use of cards, beads and spiders, to studying the stars, weather and palm lines people have sought ways to clarify and predict the world around them.
Human imagination is not just the tool of fiction writers, but something that’s vital to navigate the world; to reminisce, anticipate and plan for the future. But how does it work? The neurologist Adam Zeman explores the very latest scientific studies in the world of the imagination, in his new book, The Shape of Things Unseen.
Tokyo, Japan, is currently the largest city in the world, with a total metropolitan population of over 37 million people.
However, it wasn’t always the case.
In fact, unlike many great cities of the world, Tokyo’s roots do not go back to ancient times. Its importance as a city is relatively recent, historically speaking.
During the war, it was almost completely destroyed yet has come back to be a major center of technology, culture, and finance.
Learn more about Tokyo and how it became the most populous city in the world on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.
Go to quince.com/daily for 365-day returns, plus free shipping on your order!
ButcherBox
New users that sign up for ButcherBox will receive 2 lbs of grass-fed ground beef in every box for the lifetime of their subscription + $20 off your first box when you use code daily at checkout!
... and he might actually be right! Listen in and hear why.
OA1105 - Harvard Law professor and anti-corruption advocate Lawrence Lessig is almost certainly the only person on Earth to have had a personal relationship with both visionary hacker Aaron Swartz and former Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia. We warmly welcome Professor Lessig back to OA to share--among many other things--his experiences with each of these very different people, why he remains optimistic about campaign finance reform going into the second Trump administration, and the originalist argument against Super PACs.
We’ll start remembering the 39th and longest-living U.S. president — who died over the weekend at age 100.
Then, we’ll tell you about one of the deadliest aviation disasters in years: what video does — and doesn’t — tell us about the passenger plane that crashed in South Korea, killing 179 people.
Plus, dozens of tornadoes hit the southern U.S. over the weekend, President-elect Trump weighed in on the TikTok ban set to take effect next month, and when and where you can watch the record-breaking Wicked movie from home.
Those stories and even more news to know in about 10 minutes!
Join us every Mon-Fri for more daily news roundups!
This episode is brought to you by hiya. Receive 50% off your first order at hiyahealth.com/newsworthy. Get your kids the full-body nourishment they need to grow into healthy adults!
And by Quince. Get cozy in Quince's high-quality wardrobe essentials. Go to Quince.com/newsworthy for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns!
Whether it's turning on your favorite album during a traffic-heavy commute or getting lost in your favorite book before bed – art helps us cope with the stresses of everyday life.
But how does the role of art shift when your way of life is turned upside down in an instant? That's what happened to Slava Leontyev, his wife, Anya, and their friend Andrey when Russia invaded Ukraine. Instead of leaving, the three Ukrainian artists chose to fight erasure and Russian aggression through their work.
A new documentary called "Porcelain War" follows their journey surviving and defending their country while holding onto their humanity.
The thick-billed parrot is the only surviving parrot species native to the United States. These brightly colored birds once roamed across the American Southwest and as far south as Venezuela — but today, the only wild population remaining lives high in the forests of Mexico's Sierra Madre mountains.
There are some new funds that track stock trading by members of Congress and their family. So we thought, why don't we get in on that?
Today on the show, we crack open the Planet Money Investment Jar to learn more about how our political leaders play the market, investing in funds tracking Democratic and Republican stock trades.
Whether Congressional stock trading should be limited is a hotly debated matter. So to test whether lawmakers are beating the market, Dartmouth College economist Bruce Sacerdote and his co-authors pitted lawmakers' stock picks against reindeer at a Christmas-styled theme park.
Trust us for this ride! It'll all make sense with some intriguing results.
Percival Everett is a prolific author – his 2001 book Erasure was recently adapted into the Oscar-winning film American Fiction. But his latest book, James, expands on a story readers around the world already know: Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn. In today's episode, Everett speaks with NPR's Andrew Limbong about why he wanted to reframe the classic novel from the perspective of the enslaved titular character, why he doesn't think of his new work as a direct response to Twain, and why he doesn't buy into the controversy surrounding the original.
To listen to Book of the Day sponsor-free and support NPR's book coverage, sign up for Book of the Day+ at plus.npr.org/bookoftheday
Former president Jimmy Carter has died. He was 100 years old. In today's episode, two books examine Carter's career in the White House and beyond. First, NPR's Steve Inskeep speaks with historian Kai Bird about The Outlier, a biography that argues that Carter's deregulation of several industries, his social legislation and his foreign policy made his one-term presidency exceptionally productive. Then, a conversation from the vault between NPR's Eric Westervelt and Carter himself about his memoir, A Full Life.
To listen to Book of the Day sponsor-free and support NPR's book coverage, sign up for Book of the Day+ at plus.npr.org/bookoftheday
