Henry Alford believes that old people are wise. And to prove it, he interviewed many people over the age of seventy, including Phyllis Diller, Harold Bloom and a retired aerospace engineer who eats food out of the garbage. The result is Alford's new book, "How to Live: A Search for Wisdom from...Read more
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Episode Archives
Whose Islam is it anyway? Is Islam for the Jihadists or the Sufis? The Indonesians, the Saudis? And what about a Muslim convert in say, Iowa? This time on To the Best of Our Knowledge, a closer at who's claiming, and reclaiming, Islam. From the Sufi spiritualism of a Senegalese pop star to the...Read more
Original Air Date:
February 07, 2010
It killed off its star after only forty minutes in the most violent scene in American film to date. Fifty years after its original release, Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho" still has the power to shock. Film critic David Thomson tells us the story behind the making of "Psycho" and how Hitchcock...Read more
Original Air Date:
January 31, 2010
A Florida housewife named Katie has an unusual affliction. Occasionally, for no rhyme or reason, thin pieces of gold colored foil appear spontaneously on her skin. Paranormal researchers are stumped. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, exploring magic. From tales of the paranormal to...Read more
Original Air Date:
December 20, 2009
Remember Kyoto? Now it's Copenhagen. The UN's current climate treaty, the Kyoto Protocol, was never ratified by the US. And now, we're in the hot seat. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we'll talk with Gaia theorist James Lovelock and Whole Earth Catalogue founder Stewart Brand. Also...Read more
Original Air Date:
December 06, 2009
Lynda Barry rules the pages of the alternative press as the Queen of Comics. Her new book is about liberating the creative process. Barry believes that deep down we're all artists, if we could just get out of our own way. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge we'll talk about channeling...Read more
Original Air Date:
November 22, 2009
The Internet is a free flow of ideas where everyone can say whatever they want. But for all its splashy graphics and Flash animation, there's one thing that makes the Internet looks the same. Its name is Verdana. And it's a font. We'll talk with Matthew Carter, the designer of Verdana, the...Read more
Original Air Date:
November 01, 2009
Words like "America" and "globalization" often conjure up images of protest and conflict around the world. It's the U.S. v. Them. Either you're for us or against us. But things aren't always so black and white. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, Soap Opera in China, hip hop in Africa...Read more
Original Air Date:
October 11, 2009
When David Foster Wallace committed suicide in September of 2008, there was a tsunami of grief. Readers, writers and critics poured out their sorrows in print and online. If you hadn't been paying attention for all the love for DFW, the response might have caught you by surprise. Wallace's hyper...Read more
Original Air Date:
August 23, 2009
He's been described as "the most remarkable mind on the planet" and one of the world's "100 living geniuses." Daniel Tammet lives with high-functioning autistic savant syndrome. He's able to recite the mathematical constant Pi to over 22,500 decimal places from memory. But Tammet says that the...Read more
Original Air Date:
August 02, 2009
Religion was supposed to be dying. But God is making a comeback in countries around the world, from Russia to China to Turkey. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we'll get the story behind this global revival of faith. And tell you the remarkable saga of a group of Christian and...Read more
Original Air Date:
July 19, 2009
How much do you know about the place where you live? You probably know your neighbors, your local schools, the grocery store... but can you describe what your neighborhood looked like before there were houses in it? Can you name the native birds and plants and insects? How much local history can...Read more
Original Air Date:
May 24, 2009
Why are we in Afghanistan? To destroy the Al-Qaeda? To make sure the Taliban doesn't get back in power? Both? What is the economic impact of the war on the US economy? And, just what would victory in Afghanistan look like anyway? The Obama Administration's refocusing the US military. But after...Read more
Original Air Date:
May 10, 2009
Something's going on with America's dogs. For one thing, they're moving in with us. Forget the backyard dog house – last year, some 47 percent of dog owners reported that their canines slept on the bed with them. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we'll meet Michael Schaffer. He's...Read more
Original Air Date:
April 12, 2009
On a remote high desert mountain top in Eastern Nevada they're building a clock. But not just any clock – a monument sized all mechanical clock that will run for ten thousand years. It's built as an icon to long-term thinking. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we'll face time. We'll...Read more
Original Air Date:
March 15, 2009
Depending on who you ask, the teenage years are either a wasteland of misery or the best years of your life. For most of us, it's somewhere in between. But what makes the teens such emotional dynamite? One scientist says the teen years exist to grow and organize our huge human brains. In this...Read more
Original Air Date:
March 08, 2009
How did our economists miss it? We're in a full-on economic crisis. Where was the warning? In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, a look at the so-called dismal science. We'll talk with the winner of the 2008 Nobel Prize for Economics on why the alarm bells never rang. And, why is it that...Read more
Original Air Date:
February 01, 2009
Imagine the loneliest place you can think of. For Robert Kull, that place was an island off the coast of Patagonia. A place where the barometer dipped and the wind howled off the ocean. Kull spent a year there, exploring complete solitude and seeking the answers to spiritual questions that had...Read more
Original Air Date:
February 01, 2009
Put on your Blaze Orange and your waterproof boots, we're heading into the woods! Hunting is one of the oldest human activities, and despite markets full of food and TV nature specials about a world of oneness among species, hunting remains very popular. In this hour of To the Best of Our...Read more
Original Air Date:
January 18, 2009
Jill Bolte Taylor is a Harvard-trained brain scientist who suffered a crippling stroke. What's remarkable about her story is that she watched - in clinical detail - what was happening to her own mind and body while she was having the stroke. As her body shut down, she felt strangely euphoric....Read more
Original Air Date:
September 21, 2008
In Baltimore, Maryland, there's an octopus that likes to play with toys. In Vienna, Austria, there's a border collie with a vocabulary of 340 words - more than many toddlers. Southeast Asia is home to dozens of elephants who like to paint. Re-thinking animal intelligence--not only are they...Read more
Original Air Date:
July 13, 2008
Men are under siege. They might be the stronger sex, but as far as cultural clout goes, they get the short end of the stick. One writer says the feminist movement lost its way and ended up making men the enemy. Is it time to save the males? Also, we remember the madcap genius of one of America's...Read more
Original Air Date:
June 29, 2008
When the war in Iraq started, over 770 journalists went with Coalition troops. 5 years later there are fewer than 20. What happened? In this hour of To The Best Of Our Knowledge, the embed system. How can journalists accurately report on the very soldiers who protect them? Has the US military...Read more
Original Air Date:
June 15, 2008
Every mom deserves something special on Mother's Day. We can't fix you breakfast in bed or drop by with coffee and muffins – though here's hoping someone in your life does! - but we can serve up a radio show. What do women want to say to each other about what it's like to be a mom.Read more
Original Air Date:
May 11, 2008