Ever want to chuck everything and just live your dream? In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge we meet several people who are doing just that. One of them's a hot young actor, starring in a smash Broadway musical. Another is a middle-aged husband and father who published a small magazine...Read more
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Episode Archives
Physicist Brian Greene sees an elegant universe – one where even baking a batch of cookies can yield surprising lessons about the fabric of the universe, or watching an egg splatter suggests a model for the Big Bang theory. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, thoughts from one of the...Read more
Lilydale, New York isn’t your average small town. In Lilydale, people say ghosts walk the streets and the neighbors can talk to the dead. No, this is not fiction. 20-thousand visitors a year travel to Lilydale to consult the largest community of mediums in the world. Is it all a gigantic...Read more
Rising sea levels, brutal storms and droughts, record temperatures...is there anything we can do about climate change? As world leaders gather at the Paris Climate Summit, we consider a range of proposals - from geoengineering and new green technology to a post-carbon economy. Read more
Politics has such a bad reputation it’s a wonder anyone would run for office. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we’ll hear from a few people who are out to transform the way we do politics. Also activist Si Kahn talks about the art of the political song. And we’ll look back at one...Read more
Worried about your kids spending too much time in front of the television, what do you do? Tell them to turn off the TV. Unless you're Mark and Nancy Jacobson. They packed up their three children and took them around the world for three months. The Jacobsons visited the burial pyres in the...Read more
Science and the Search for Meaning: Five Questions, Part 3: Does the Soul Still Matter?
For centuries, we’ve been told the soul is what makes each of us unique. It’s why we have moral responsibility. And it’s the part of us that lives on after we die. ...Read more
Are humans innately violent? If you stripped the civilization out of us, just how bad would we be?Read more
Who did the press hail as the conqueror of the air? Alberto Santos-Dumont, who flew around the Eiffel Tower while Jules Verne and H.G. Wells watched and wondered. He even tied his “personal airship” to the lamp posts outside restaurants in Paris, and worked to revolutionize transportation. ...Read more
On February 13th, 1945 Kurt Vonnegut and other American POWs were hiding in a cellar during the firebombing of Dresden. They were remarkably lucky, as 135,000 people died that night. During the bombing one soldier said, “I wonder what the poor people are doing tonight?” Nobody laughed but, as...Read more
Tenzin Palmo isn’t your ordinary Englishwoman. For twelve years she boiled snow for drinking water, lived without heat and electricity, and spent 12 hours a day propped up in a wooden box. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, a Buddhist nun recalls her years of meditation in a lonely...Read more
Read any good life-list books lately? How about "1,000 Places You Must Visit Before You Die?" or "1,001 Movies You Must See Before You Die." There's no shortage of "life-list" books to read these days. What's next? "1,000 Life-List Books You Must Read Before You Die"? Probably. We'll explore...Read more
Are we running out of water? Science writer Fred Pearce thinks so. He's traveled the world to investigate the current state of crucial water sources. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge Pearce talks about the defining crisis of the twenty-first century. Also, we'll explore the social...Read more
Think that a TV series based on the Coen Brothers' 1996 black comedy crime thriller, "Fargo," is a bad idea? Then you haven't seen "Fargo," The TV series. Creator and showrunner Noah Hawley talks about how he transformed the iconic film into the critically-acclaimed, award-winning TV series.Read more
One of the top-selling songs last year was by rapper Kanye West. But it wasn’t hardcore hip-hop, it was a gospel song called “Jesus Walks.” In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the rebirth of Gospel Music. We’ll look at where gospel came from and where it’s going. And, we’ll feel...Read more
It’s the most contested piece of real estate on Earth. Jews know it as the Temple Mount. Muslims call it Al-Aqsa. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the controversy over this sacred site in Jerusalem’s Old City. Also, why the Temple Mount inspires apocalyptic visions for some...Read more
Nicola Griffith wanted to fight back. A lesbian activist well-versed in the martial arts, Griffith knew she had the moves. But when her friend was attacked in a bar, she couldn't bring herself to hurt her attacker. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the deadly, deep-minded lesbian...Read more
One day, an IRS auditor named Harold Crick wakes up to discover a voice in his head – a female voice narrating his life. That's the premise of the film, "Stranger Than Fiction." In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we'll meet the man who wrote the screenplay. Also, the story of Orson...Read more
Reading a good book may be the most fun you can have sitting down. Books can be a hobby or a passion, an interest or an obsession. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, tales from book world. A former bookseller takes us to Hay on Wye - the Welsh town that’s well on its way to...Read more
Want to learn a second or third language? You don’t have to slave away in a French seminar – it only takes a minute or two to pick up “ob.” Next time on tob-oo thob-ah bob-est ob-of ob-our knob-ow-lob-edge. Or should I say To the Best of Our Knowledge, word games, and secret...Read more
Albert Einstein died more than half a century ago, but there's still a raging debate over what he thought about religion. He once said "Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind." In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, what exactly did Einstein conclude about...Read more
Good house-keeping used to go hand-in-hand with good citizenship. And remember the phrase, "cleanliness is next to godliness"? In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, thoughts on the art of keeping house. We'll talk about the science of dust, meet the Queen of Clutter, and hear novelist...Read more
American leaders say the fight against Osama bin Laden is not a religious war, but are they right? In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the deep divide between fundamentalists and the secular world. Also, a look at true believers in America - from the Holy Rollers of...Read more
Have you ever heard of Bibleman, the Caped Christian? This evangelical superhero quotes scripture while fighting villains. There's a Bibleman video series, as well as a live show, toys, and a computer game. Bibleman is just part of the seven-billion-dollar Christian pop culture industry. In...Read more