Podcast Episodes
Back to SearchEdward Tenner, "Why the Hindenburg Had a Smoking Lounge: Essays in Unintended Consequences" (APS Press, 2025)
Episode 2618
How did the addition of lifeboats after the Titanic shipwreck contribute to another tragedy in Chicago harbor three years later? How efficient are wi…
1 year, 3 months ago
Matthew Hongoltz-Hetling, "The Ghost Lab: How Bigfoot Hunters, Mediums, and Alien Enthusiasts Are Wrecking Science" (PublicAffairs, 2025)
Episode 2616
In this episode, New Books Network host Nina Bo Wagner talks to Matthew Hongoltz-Hetling about his recently published book The Ghost Lab: How Bigfoot…
1 year, 3 months ago
Myles Lennon, "Subjects of the Sun: Solar Energy in the Shadows of Racial Capitalism" (Duke UP, 2025)
Episode 2617
In the face of accelerating climate change, anticapitalist environmental justice activists and elite tech corporations increasingly see eye to eye. B…
1 year, 3 months ago
Brent Z. Kaup and Kelly F. Austin, "The Pathogens of Finance: How Capitalism Breeds Vector-Borne Disease" (U of California Press, 2025)
Episode 2615
The Pathogens of Finance: How Capitalism Breeds Vector-Borne Disease (University of California Press, 2025) by Dr. Brent Z. Kaup & Dr. Kelly F. Austi…
1 year, 4 months ago
Patrick Luiz Sullivan De Oliveira, "Ascending Republic: The Ballooning Revival in Nineteenth-Century France" (MIT Press, 2025)
Episode 2614
On August 27, 1783, a large crowd gathered in Paris to watch the first ascent of a hydrogen balloon. Despite the initial feverish enthusiasm, by the …
1 year, 4 months ago
Niayesh Afshordi and Phil Halper, "Battle of the Big Bang: The New Tales of Our Cosmic Origins" (University of Chicago Press, 2025)
Episode 2613
A thrilling exploration of competing cosmological origin stories, comparing new scientific ideas that upend our very notions of space, time, and real…
1 year, 4 months ago
Matthew Wisnioski on the History of the Idea and Culture of “Innovation” in the United States
Episode 2612
Peoples & Things host, Lee Vinsel, talks with Matt Wisnioski, Professor of Science, Technology, and Society at Virginia Tech, about his new book, Eve…
1 year, 4 months ago
David Zweig, "An Abundance of Caution: American Schools, the Virus, and a Story of Bad Decisions" (MIT Press, 2025)
Episode 2611
An Abundance of Caution: American Schools, the Virus, and a Story of Bad Decisions (MIT Press, 2025) is a devastating account of the decision-making …
1 year, 4 months ago
Elliot Lichtman, "The Computer Always Wins: A Playful Introduction to Algorithms through Puzzles and Strategy Games" (MIT Press, 2025)
Episode 2610
In The Computer Always Wins: A Playful Introduction to Algorithms through Puzzles and Strategy Games (MIT Press, 2025), Elliot Lichtman will teach yo…
1 year, 4 months ago
John Barr, "1960s University Buildings: The Golden Age of British Modern Architecture" (Lund Humphries, 2025)
Episode 2609
The 1960s continue to hold an almost mythical place in Western culture, particularly in Britain, where change was widespread and infiltrated many asp…
1 year, 4 months ago