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To The Best Of Our Knowledge

It's a post-apocalyptic novel that's been compared to Stephen King's "The Stand" and Cormac McCarthy's "The Road." It covers a vast time span and features a different kind of vampire, known as "virals." It's called "The Passage" and it's one of this summer's hottest books. We'll meet the author...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

There are people in the world who love books – and there are people who would kill for books.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the pleasures and perils of book collecting.  We’ll go on the road with veteran book buyers Lawrence and Nancy Goldstone.  And, we’ll meet...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Malcolm Gladwell is living proof that a new hairstyle can change your life. After he grew out his hair, people started treating him differently. He racked up speeding tickets. He was surrounded by policemen who thought he was a rapist on the loose.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge,...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

How do you win friends and influence people if you're an immigrant from Leningrad who's bullied at school?   You write your way to friendship.  That's what Gary Shteyngart did. We meet him in this hour as we explore creative writing.  Also, the connection between alcohol and creativity.  And how...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Imagine a country where Islam is the dominant religion but Christians, Jews and Muslims still live together peacefully – a place where philosophers from all three religions talk and debate openly. Well, there was once such a culture in the Middle Ages. For centuries, Al Andalus was the beacon of...Read more

guns and the forefathers

Guns are a part of our national mythology. Just consider the Western, Annie Oakley, Daniel Boone -- it's hard to deny the role guns had in shaping America.

But what if all those stories were exaggerated at best? What if the gun myth was created in the 19th ...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

President Obama's surrounded by science advisors. So you might figure he doesn't need to know much about physics, but you'd be mistaken. How is a President supposed to assess the risk of a "dirty bomb," or weigh the pros and cons of various energy sources, from solar power to nuclear energy?...Read more

dog

The way we think about animals often defies logic.  In America, dogs may sleep on our beds, but in Korea, they often end up on the dinner plate.  Some people may be horrified by a pet boa constrictor's appetite for live mice, but a cat that roams outside is a far deadlier killer. And...Read more

a man becomes a living cereal bowl

What do the opening notes of Beethoven’s “Symphony Number Five” and a rabbit named Oolong balancing a pancake on his head have in common?  They’re both examples of memes – units of culture that are imitated and, as a result, copied from one brain to another.  Are memes the driving...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Many of us first met Islam on 9/11 with planes slamming into the World Trade Center – not a very good first impression. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, a proper introduction, as we talk with Muslims and Westerners who are redefining our relationship. From a Danish cartoonist with a...Read more

lily-ads

Brutal storms, rising seas, drought... you've seen the headlines. Our climate changed future seems pretty scary. But do all the messages about climate catastrope keep people from taking action to slow carbon emmissions or prepare for changing weather? What would happen if we...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

For all the amazing discoveries that scientists have made, the cosmos is still full of mysteries - from dark matter to quantum entanglement. Will physicists ever explain the universe, or is it fundamentally unknowable? We explore the frontiers of physics and ponder what it means to live with...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Do you believe in magic?  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge we’ll talk with some people who do.  Join us for a conversation with America’s favorite witch – Starhawk.  And uncover your own inner wizard!  What Merlin, Dumbledore and Gandalf have to teach us all about living a life...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

His critics called him a war criminal.  Robert McNamara himself has said the Vietnam War was a colossal mistake.  So should he take the blame for leading America’s war in Vietnam?  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, filmmaker Errol Morris talks about war and morality... and his...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

According to George Bernard Shaw, the seven deadly sins are food, clothing, firing, rent, taxes, respectability and children.  This time on To the Best of Our Knowledge, we’ll explore the more traditional Seven Deadly Sins.  Musician Joe Jackson will tell us how lust, gluttony and the other sins...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Have you ever thought about disappearing... wiping out your old identity and starting fresh, with a new name, a new life, a new self? In this hour we try to find out how to disappear completely. You too can vanish without a trace! Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

It's time to wish you a Happy 2006 – if you use the Gregorian Calendar. And a Happy 1427 by the Islamic calendar, or a Fruitful 4704 in China, where it's the Year of the Dog. But then, if you accept the Big Bang Theory, let us wish you a Happy 13 Billion, 700 Million. However you calculate it,...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

The Pentagon has something new: a microwave mounted on a Humvee that shoots an energy beam cooking everything in its path.  Is this a new weapon in our war on terrorism?  No, it’s the Marines’ “non-lethal” device for crowd control.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge,...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Anne D. LeClaire was walking along the beach on Nantucket Sound when she heard a voice. The voice said, "Sit in silence." LeClaire turned to look but there was no one there. Anne D. LeClaire talks about this experience seventeen years ago and how it inspired her to remain silent for two days...Read more

a man near the Mississippi

The Mississippi River is an American icon. It's a body of water that’s been shaped as much by cultural processes as by environmental ones. From the state lines it draws to its role in literature and the arts, it’s a river that flows deep in the American psyche.

This episode is about the...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Atheists have been called the most hated minority in America, but recent atheist manifestos by Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris have all made the bestseller list. Have these atheists changed our thinking about religion? In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the New...Read more

a mosquito takes over the world

As the Zika virus continues to make headlines, consensus is slowly growing among scientists that it’s showdown time for the mosquito.  Time to marshal the technology to wipe them off the face of the earth.  Which seems pretty extreme.  Doesn’t it?

So, should we bio-...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

It’s up for debate whether or not the business of America is business.  But like it or not, corporate culture touches us all.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the quirky online marketplace that brings together buyers and sellers from all over the world.  But is e-bay really the...Read more

an abstract glass shape

Physicist Lawrence Krauss says science can finally explain the age-old mystery: How can something come out of nothing?  Or, to be more specific, how can the Big Bang pop out of empty space?  Krauss also set off an intellectual brawl by saying theologians and philosphers have nothing...Read more

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