Mel Brooks’ play “The Producers” is Broadway’s biggest hit in years, but it’s not for everyone – not at a hundred bucks a ticket. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, does theater still matter? We’ll talk with playwright Wendy Wasserstein and critic Frank Rich. Also, Samuel Beckett’s...Read more
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Episode Archives
In case it’s not obvious: we LOVE books on TTBOOK. But we’re also incredibly picky about which books we choose for interviews.Read more
Have you ever been to "Reloville"? Or maybe you live there. There's more than one. You can find them in Atlanta, Dallas and Denver, among other places. "Relovilles" are the sprawling subdivisions where mid-level managers and executives live – for a few years before they uproot their families and...Read more
In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the mystique of Native Americans. We hear they’re close to the land; they have sacred knowledge. But Indian writer Sherman Alexie says that’s bunk, that the “the whole New Age movement is based on as many stereotypes as genocide was.” What makes a...Read more
Popular myths, urban legends and just plain lies. Why do we persist in believing things that just aren't true?Read more
What’s your billion dollar idea? You know, the one that’s going to change the world? America’s the land of invention, right? And it’s that can-do spirit that makes this country great. But America’s no longer the global innovation giant it once was.
Where have you gone, Thomas Edison?Read more
Author, Author
Part Two
It's been called divine and it's been called disgusting. it's arguably one of the most important books of all time. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, Vladimir Nabokov's "Lolita" as we ask the...Read more
Every sixty seconds, 259 new people show up in the world's cities. No one is building housing for them. No government is planning for them. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge we'll explore the evolving city in a world of a billion squatters, with another billion on the way.Read more
Photographers capture heartache and agony. What does it mean for them? And what does it mean for us, those viewing the photos? Do these images create empathy? Compassion? Or something else?Read more
Dreams can be a pleasant diversion from the daily grind or something with the potential to transform, entertain, and even heal. On this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the power of dreams and the science of sleep.Read more
Every person on earth is unique and special, but some people – maybe one in a hundred – are autistic. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge we get to know a few autistic people with Asperger's Syndrome. We'll hear what it's like to try to live in the world when you have visionary...Read more
Oh, city living. The crush of people, the crowd of buildings, the empty lots, the garbage-strewn slums.
More than half of us will be living urban by 2050. How will we manage?Read more
Even now, the oceans of the world are terra incognita. We’ve explored only 5-10 percent of them on a planet mostly comprised of water. What we’re missing couldsurprise us. This hour, we explore the mysteries of the deep. We’ll hear about the oceans’ oddest creatures...Read more
"Being a man, like being a woman, is something you have to learn." That's what Aaron Raz Link says. And Link should know. He began life as a girl named Sarah. And he started a new life as a gay man twenty-nine years later. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we'll meet Aaron Raz Link,...Read more
We’ve all heard we live in “the information age,” but what does this mean? We’ll give you a short history of information – from talking drums onward. But do we now have too much information? We’ll hear how information overload is actually re-wiring our brains. Also, the new theory in physics...Read more
The Paleo Diet. Running barefoot. Look around, the modern caveman is among us.Read more
Boots on the Ground: Stories from the War in Iraq
Part One
Iraq. April 6, 2004. This day marked the Marines' heaviest fighting since Vietnam and was the start of the Iraqi insurgency. By the end of the day more than 40 Marines and...Read more
Where did we come from, and where are we going? Whether it's the Garden of Eden and Armageddon, or the Big Bang and the Big Freeze, we can't help but ponder our place in the universe. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we consider the universal course of time, from the beginning to...Read more
Piano lessons. For many of us those two words evoke only bad memories from our childhood. Piano lessons are shorthand for the oppression of children by mean and tyrannical adults. And no one captures this better than Dr. Seuss, the champion of all kids, underdogs and Whozits. In this hour of To...Read more
What would you die for? And what are you willing to kill for? Democracy?On this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the meaning of democracy. We’ll hear from writers Alice Walker, Sherman Alexie, Isabel Alende and Margaret Atwood. Also, tomorrow’s citizens. Are schools giving children...Read more
In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, James Bradley remembers his father the war hero, who helped raise the flag on Iwo Jima. Martin Amis comes to terms with his famous father – the writer Kingsley Amis. And the story of a military father who was an officer but no gentleman...Read more
Forty years ago the streets of Chicago exploded as police clashed with anti-war protesters at the Democratic National Convention. It's one of the momentous events that defined the Sixties. Or is it? Some historians now say the rise of the conservative movement is what truly made history in the...Read more