Neuroscientists say that about a quarter of our mental energy is dedicated to maintaining our narrative identities. Julian Keenan says there's got to be an evolutionary benefit for all that "self".
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Audio
Sean Carroll tells Steve Paulson about new discoveries in evolutionary history, including the existence and purpose of fossil genes.
Philosopher Rebecca Goldstein says philosophy is still evolving, and continues to shape our values. She talks about her long fascination with the granddaddy of all philosophers, Plato.
Filmmakers Jon Betz and Taggart Siegel talk about their documentary "Queen of the Sun: What are the Bees Telling Us?"
The process of data sonification is exactly what it sounds like: the translation of data points into various sounds, each with unique characteristics that can change over time. So instead of turning your spreadsheets into charts and graphs, they can now be turned into a kind of music. Matt Kenney demonstrates how it's done.
Simon Wilde is one of the scientists who found a tiny, four billion year old zircon in Australia. He brought it to his colleague Joe Skullan at the University of Wisconsin and they established that it’s the oldest object on earth...
Composer Stephen Paulus sits at the piano keyboard and talks with Jim Fleming about how he developed the music for a group of six poems he set for the Festival Choir of Madison.
How do foods become trendy seemingly overnight? Journalist David Sax tracked the origins of a variety of food fads for his book, "The Tastemakers: Why We're Crazy For Cupcakes But Fed Up With Fondue."
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