Listen in to Steve Strogatz discussing his friendship with his high school mathematics teacher Don Joffray on WNYC’s RadioLab. Their relationship was conducted mostly by letters and shared love of mathematical problems. As WNYC notes, “Steve explains how numbers can connect you and where they fall short.”
Also, WNYC linked through to this video of Steve making a presentation. It is very touching and shows lots of the letters.
Have a listen to this conversation between PUP author Viktor Mayer-Schonberger and Mark Memmott of NPR’s The Two-Way blog. Mark writes on the blog:
I came upon Mayer-Schonberger’s thinking in Wired magazine. His premise intrigued me because I’ve always wanted to know what the world looked like thousands of years ago, what great historical figures sounded like — and what life was like for my grandparents and other ancestors I never knew. Here was someone making the case that there might be a downside to my thinking.
We spoke by telephone — Mayer-Schonberger was in Seattle. He was sympathetic to my thinking, but argued that it’s not good if “whatever we do, whatever images are taken of us, will be around for decades to come” — and available to use against us.
BALANCE OF NATURE author John Kricher was interviewed on Kathleen Dunn last Tuesday, July 28. He took questions from listeners and explained the myth behind ecological self-mitigation. Scroll down to the 10:00 am spot here to listen!
Timothy Geithner is having trouble selling his house. The Daily Show calls upon “legendary housing economist” Bob Shiller, author of The Subprime Solution and Animal Spirits for advice… on Geithner’s bathroom tiles. Enjoy the clip below.
Economists at the World Bank calculate that 2.5 billion people live on $2 a day, but what exactly does that mean? In the developed world, living on so little would be almost unthinkable. For 40 percent of the global population, $2 a day is a reality that must, somehow, be made to work.
In Portfolios of the Poor, Daryl Collins and co-author Jonathan Morduch uncover the surprisingly complex financial lives of the most destitute people.
Darius Rejali, author of Torture and Democracy, was interviewed on All Things Considered about the DOJ torture memos. He responds specifically to the assertion that the interrogation techniques described were “safe”. From the show’s description:
The memo goes on to explain the basis for this assertion. According to Bybee, the government is confident that these techniques are safe for one very simple reason.
For a number of decades, Bybee writes, the government has been systematically using almost all of these techniques against more than 26,000 of our own people: soldiers participating in a program intended to teach them how to survive capture by a hostile enemy. Only a very small portion of those soldiers, the memo goes on to say, experienced any negative psychological repercussions.
Jeremy Mynott, former Chief Executive of Cambridge University Press, sat down with Australian Broadcast’s Saturday Extra over the weekend to discuss Birdscapes and the myriad ways humans imagine and interact with birds. Listen in here.
John Tyler Bonner, Princeton University Professor Emeritus and author of THE SOCIAL AMOEBAE: The Biology ofCellular Slime Molds, sat down to discuss the tiniest players in life’s drama.
PUP author Russ Roberts (The Price of Everything) and Arnold Kling discuss the current economic pickle. Can the government get us out of this mess? Watch it below!
Amar Bhidé, of Columbia University and author of The Venturesome Economy, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the role of entrepreneurship and innovation in a global economy. Listen in here.
Skip Gates dropped by TODAY this morning to chat with Meredith Vieira about his PBS Documentary, “Looking for Lincoln” which airs tonight on most PBS stations (9:00 pm EST).
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