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To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Are you deadline driven?  Most focused, most productive as “zero hour” approaches?  Well, what about the ultimate end, the true end of the time frame. 

Deadline, indeed. 

How does knowing that you’re going to die affect your life?  In this hour we’re minding mortality.Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Trick or Treat!  These days, that means handing out candy, but once upon a time Halloween revelers often played nasty tricks.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the real history of Halloween.  Also, why stories about monsters, ghouls and the supernatural keep popping...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

American flags are everywhere.  U.S. soldiers are once again heroes.  And some people say it’s downright unpatriotic to criticize the president or the war against terrorism.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the new meaning of patriotism and the crackdown on dissent....Read more

a man running

We run for all sorts of reasons -- to lose 10 pounds, to win an Olympic medal, or simply because it’s fun. Some even run as a spiritual practice. Today, why we run - and how far and how fast can humans go?Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Ira Glass has helped reinvent storytelling on the radio.  But he says it took him years to learn how to tell a good radio tale.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, Ira Glass ont the art of telling stories.  We’ll also visit The Moth – the mecca of storytelling in New York City.  And...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

For eons Mars has been the toast of the galaxy – and has ignited the human imagination.  The Red Planet is home to the God of War – and to little green men.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, exploring Mars.  We’ll get the latest on NASA’s new Mars missions, and take a look at the...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

The legendary movie mogul Samuel Goldwyn once said, you should never predict anything, especially the future.  But it’s human nature to go to extremes for a sneak peak of what lies around the corner.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, an astrophysicist sheds some light on...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Supersized slabs of juicy ribs cooked over a wood fire until the meat slides right off the bone. Food doesn't get more American than barbecue. It's part of our roots. And it's tangled up in our racial history. In this hour, we celebrate barbecue and explore its secret history.Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Lynne Truss created a sensation in Britain with a book whose title is a punch line: it’s a punctuation joke that says a panda is a black and white mammal and it “Eats, Shoots and Leaves.”  Rules for punctuation and a good life, in this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge.Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

The downhill skiers in Sochi know cold weather, but for real cold -- try diving into freezing water above the Arctic Circle!  In this hour, some sports too cold even for the Winter Olympics.Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

American citizens worry about suicide bombers on airplanes, but intelligence analysts say the real threat today is in cyberspace. Cyber attacks on American companies and military installations are on the rise. Could terrorist hackers take down America's power grid? Or financial networks. In...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

When Meg Gaines was diagnosed with terminal cancer, her doctor told her to go home and think about the quality, not the quantity, of her days.  Instead she grabbed him by the bow-tie and said “I don’t think you understand.  I intend to live.”  Today Meg Gaines is helping other cancer patients...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

In Japan’s ancient Edo period, the math geek was born – but it’s not who you think!  Samurai, women, children and farmers were among the original creators of the sangaku - Japanese temple geometry.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, math for the gods.  Also, can numbers unlock the...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Linus has his security blanket.  Renowned neurologist Oliver Sacks had the Periodic Table of the Elements.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, My Chemical Life.  Oliver Sacks remembers a childhood steeped in chemistry.  Also, Primo Levi survives Auschwitz, through chemistry.  And,...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

From Soup to Nuts

Part Six

Once upon a time, there was a chef who made the greatest cakes in the world. His name was Antonin Careme. But this is no fairy tale. It’s a true story of a man called the King of the Cooks. In this hour of To the Best...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Americans change their dining room tables about as often as they change their spouses, about one and a half times in their lives.  IKEA isn’t concerned about your marriage, but it does want to change the way you look at your furniture, and yourself.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

According to a "New York Times" poll he's the third most famous person in Japan, right behind Hirohito and Bruce Lee. But the truth is he's not even a person, he's a giant green, radioactive lizard named Godzilla. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge we'll explore the history of...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Say you’re in Vegas playing high-stakes poker.  You haven’t slept in days.  To make matters worse, you’re being stared down by two of the best poker players in the world.  And...you’re bluffing.  So, you bet it all to bring the pot to well over a million dollars.  In this hour of To the Best of...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

A car accident at twenty-one left John Callahan paralyzed.  He’s become a very successful cartoonist -- poking fun at disabilities and the idiosyncrasies of life.    His work has been described as “rude, shocking, tasteless, and depraved” – by his fans.  Next time on To...Read more

film junkies stare at screens

It’s Oscar season and Hollywood is once again celebrating the best films of the year. It would seem that we're a nation obsessed with movies. As a country, we spend billions of dollars to watch them every year, and celebrate them with a variety of awards ceremonies. But what separates a...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

After World War Two, existentialism was all the rage in the U.S.A.  College students rebelled by smoking European cigarettes and wearing black clothes and berets.  Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus felt that Americans were too self-confident and superficial to accept this dark, brooding...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

These days, we're becoming more and more like corporations. We outsource our individual needs for everything from dating to weight loss. We brand ourselves. We behave like individuals in competition with each other rather than people with an opportunity to collaborate. But it doesn't have to be...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Patty Loveless is a coal miner’s daughter.  And a country singer, just like her distant cousin Loretta Lynn.  When Patty Loveless’ father contracted black lung disease the family had to move to Louisville, Kentucky – so Patty’s dad could receive medical attention.  In this hour of To the Best of...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

It sounds like a deal in the ads - submit your poems, have them set to music, and start a fascinating new career as a hit songwriter.  Of course your chance of success is slim to none and you have to pay for the privilege.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the strange subculture of...Read more

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