Things go better with "biting the wax tadpole"? That doesn't sound right, does it? Yet that's the literal translation of Coca-Cola that Chinese shopkeepers came up with...a set of characters pronounced "ke-kou ke-la." In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge we'll explore the exotic world of...Read more
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Americans are from Mars, and Europeans are from Venus. At least that’s the view of foreign policy analyst Robert Kagan. He says Europeans no longer believe in military power, quite unlike America’s leaders. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the growing split between Europe and...Read more
“We can be bought,” they said,” but we can’t be bored.” The king and queen of American theater, Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne turned down a fantastic sum from the movies in the middle of the depression to continue to live their illusion on the stage. In this hour of To the Best of Our...Read more
One of the biggest challenges a journalist can face is reporting a story when your connection to your source is compromised. They won't talk, or they can't talk, or it's your own father. Can anyone ever uncover the truth, the whole truth, about another person?Read more
Imagine Superman, demented with age, on a final mission to save the world. Or Conan the Barbarian, civilized and living in L.A. boarding the bus with a good book. It’s all there in the poetry of Charles Harper Webb. Words fly this hour on To the Best of Our Knowledge as we take in performance...Read more
If you live in Wisconsin, chances are you've heard of the Wisconsin Idea. It's the century-old dream of sharing the best of higher education with the entire state -- bringing the values of the liberal arts, scientific knowledge and search for truth to everyone. It's a cherished tradition,...Read more
Shuttered businesses line the familiar streets of producer Charles Monroe-Kane’s hometown in the Rust Belt in northeastern Ohio. The steel mill where his father worked is shut down, locked behind chains. Opioid abuse is...Read more
How does creative work get done? When the answer finally comes to a question that's dogged you for weeks or years, where is it coming from?
In this special hour, Nathan Englander - acclaimed novelist, short story writer, playwright - is our guest...Read more
Ten years after the end of apartheid, what’s left to document the struggle? For the filmmakers of the documentary “Amandla,” there’s music. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the songs that faced down death, despair and terror on the road to equality in South Africa. Also, the...Read more
Despite the refinancing frenzy, the American Dream isn’t about real estate. It means being free to make a new life for yourself. Regardless of the place or the circumstances of your birth. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we celebrate the American Dream. We’ll meet a man who...Read more
Listen to the experts and they’ll tell you the suburbs are boring, stifling places to live, full of bad architecture. Well, more than half of all Americans now live in suburbia. Can so many people be wrong? In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, a defense of suburbs. Also, playwright...Read more
When suicide bombers blow up crowded marketplaces, or a lone shooter attacks a nightclub, one question we’re always left with is why. What ideology or belief or loyalty would compel someone to do something so horrific? This hour, a look at the underlying psychology of political violence.Read more
All the world's a stage! The Play's the thing. Fair is foul and foul is fair. Hardly a day goes by when the words that flowed so easily from Will Shakespeare's pen don't meet and greet us in the modern world. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, sweet William makes his way to the...Read more
What do you think of when you hear the word "ventriloquism"? A showman with a wisecracking wooden boy on his lap? There's more to ventriloquism than verbal jousting between a man and his dummy. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we'll explore the cultural history of ventriloquism...Read more
In February and March of 1974, the legendary science-fiction author, Philip K. Dick, had a series of religious and visionary experiences. He spent the remaining eight years of his life writing thousands of pages of notes to try to come to terms with the meaning of these strange events. In this...Read more
Science fiction offers us visions of histories we don't know -- histories of the future and the past. Today, legendary science fiction writers talk about science, utopia, and the imagination. Plus, the winners of our 3 Minute Futures fiction contest!
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Robert Olen Butler had a crazy idea. The Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist wanted to show how writers really work. So he created his own web site, pointed a camera at his word processor, and wrote...every night for three weeks. Believe it or not, thousands of people tuned in for the these...Read more
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
Imagine a scenario where universes bubble up out of black holes. Space itself can boil, and humankind may have to fight for survival by building gigantic atom-smashers the length of several star systems. That future may be closer than you think. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge,...Read more
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
Scientists are launching one of the most audacious projects ever conceived: a detailed map of the human brain, neuron by neron, synapse by synapse. For some scientists...Read more
As the Bible famously says, "there is nothing new under the sun." That's pretty bleak. If it's all been said and done before, what's left? In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, remix culture. Digital sampling, audio hacking, mash-ups… In today's music and art it's all about mix and remix...Read more
Outsiders used to be the outcasts, misfits, and under-employed. Today, they're indie, alternative and ahead of their time. Outsiders are thriving and they're changing the way we think about what is mainstream and what is alternative. You might even say that outsiders are the new insiders.Read more
Ask any babbling baby. Talking’s fun! At least it is until the grammarians get after you. But Patricia O’Connor says we can all relax, there’s nothing wrong with splitting an infinitive and there never was. In this hour of the Peabody-Award winning program To the Best of Our Knowledge we...Read more