Episode Archives

Filter episodes by the year they originally aired.
military helmet

The US will pull troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2016, leaving behind an enemy they've fought for more than a decade. This week, we explore Afghanistan's Taliban insurgency and find out what motivates them.Read more

game over

Parents worry that their kids spend too much time playing video games, but according to one new study, if you need surgery, you want the surgeon who grew up with a game controller in one hand.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, why the future belongs to gamers.  Imagine a...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Boots on the Ground: Stories from the War in Iraq

Part Two

 

On March 20, 2003, the U.S. invaded Iraq. More than 6 years later, we're still there. What happened? Were we prepared? We'll talk with the planners of the War in Iraq. From...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

It's the sesquicentennial of the Civil War -- it's been 150 years since that epic war began.   Americans will commemorate and remember it from different points of view. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, Remembering the Civil War.   We'll talk about soldiers' experiences on the...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

If grocery shopping isn’t your thing, here’s a new way to put food on the table: try sticking your arm under a rock until a big ol’ catfish clamps onto to you.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, noodling for catfish and other southern pastimes.  Also, Texas singer Steve Earle’s...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Memory and ForgettingDo you think your memory is a record of what actually happened?  Chances are, it's not.  New scientific findings show that with every act of remembering, our brains...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Today most of what we read is on a screen.  So here's the question: Is there something different -- something better -- about reading a physical book?  Or does it matter?  We explore slow reading, e-reading, bibliotherapy and a novel that unfolds within another novel.Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Wallace Stegner put it this way. “National Parks are the best idea we ever had.”  This weekend, the National Park Service celebrates its birthday by making the parks free for a day. We're celebrating with an hour on the history and politics of national parks.  And we'll meet some folks whose...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Barbara Moss needed a new face.  Her mouth was so deformed she could pop a baby’s fist between her teeth and out again without opening her jaw.  As a girl, she prayed for just a little bit of beauty.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, one woman discovers her true face.  Also, why men...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

A Swedish environmentalist believes we really should give back to the earth, even after we’ve died.  Her company is trying to replace cremation with a technologically-enhanced form of organic composting, and she’s already got the support of King Carl Gustav and the Church of Sweden.  In this...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Fifty Years ago James Watson and Francis Crick made history when they cracked the code for DNA. Watson was only 24 years old, and by no means the smartest scientist around. So why do some scientists make great discoveries? In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, James Watson talks about...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

With hundreds of millions of people moving into cities, we're wondering what shapes urban cultures. In this hour, Nobel Laureate Orhan Pamuk talks about how Istanbul shaped his writing. One historian argues that early liberal philosophies from Amsterdam shaped the United States. And we check in...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Everyone in your Facebook feed is falling for fake news–sharing it even when there's no way it can be true. They keep falling for it. But not you, right? You’re smart, well-educated. You can tell the difference. Or can you?Read more

woman on a mountain

We’re all a little bit wild inside, but how often do we let it out? If you've been spending too much time indoors in front of a screen, maybe it's time for a dose of the real thing.  This week,stories of people who found strength, wonder and joy by heading into the wild.Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

James Tiptree Jr. wrote some of the most critically-acclaimed science fiction stories in the 1960's and 1970's....classics like "Houston, Houston, Do You Read?" and "The Women Men Don't See." But James Tiptree was actually the pseudonym of a 61-year-old woman, Alice B. Sheldon. In this hour of...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Remember those great cars from the Fifties?  The Redscare Phantom Witchhunter and the Bongo Beatnik Ferlinghetti TurboHipster?  If you don’t recall them rolling off Detroit’s assembly lines, there’s a perfectly good reason.  They never existed, except in the imagination of writer and illustrator...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

It seems everyone has something to say about motherhood.  A lot of people have advice.  Others just have... issues.   In this hour of To The Best of Our Knowledge -- the tricky topic of motherhood.   Linda Gray Sexton remembers her mother, the troubled poet Anne...Read more

An independent woman.

For the first time in American history, young women are choosing independence over marriage.  Single women today outnumber married women and have more political power than ever before.  It's what Susan B. Anthony, Margaret Sanger and other feminist icons predicted.  This hour, how...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Malcolm Gladwell knows how to succeed in show business without really trying -- write a story for The New Yorker about a psychiatrist who studies serial killers. Then a playwright will take some of the words from your article and use them in a Broadway play. Next time on To the Best of Our...Read more

farm fields

The Back to the Land spirit of the 60s lives on today, in the proliferation of farmer's markets, and the increased interest in sustainability and growing our own food.  From the fight to end food waste in America to the art of living small, we'll find out what the Back to the Land spirit...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Next time you catch an old episode of the Flying Nun, you may want to pay attention.  Because today’s convents are closing.  The average nun is seventy years old, and even devout sisters often have to bite their tongues when they talk about the pope.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Whether black from a bottomless cup or as a Frappuccino mocha skim latte, it’s our culture’s elixir, coffee.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, java, joe, or a cup of mud.  Most of us drink it everyday, but few of us know the effects it has on the world’s economy, or even...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Do you get eight hours of sleep a night?  If not, join the millions of sleep-deprived Americans stumbling through life half-awake.  Scientists say our national sleep debt may be behind the epidemics of diabetes and obesity – maybe even cancer.  In this hour of To the Best of Our...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

The sky is black. The wind’s picking up.  The hurricane is coming.  Nothing you can do about it.  But wait!  Scientists from Dyn-o-Storm fly into the hurricane.  They release a chemical that stops the hurricane dead in its tracks.  Next time on To the Best of Our Knowledge, should we?  Just...Read more

Pages