Why are we so obsessed with the future? Is it because we can't handle the present and all of our current problems, like climate change, racism and terrorism? That's one theory.Read more
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Episode Archives
Original Air Date:
January 02, 2016
Previous Airdates:
January 02, 2016
January 01, 2017
January 06, 2018
It's December and time again for the annual media ritual — the best of list. We're sharing the best of the best of To the Best of Our Knowledge. 2016, the year in interviews.Read more
Original Air Date:
December 18, 2016
Previous Airdates:
December 18, 2016
On the centennial of Shirley Jackson's birth, we explore the great literary work that she left for us — the stories and novels that continue to resonate in our culture.Read more
Original Air Date:
December 11, 2016
Previous Airdates:
December 11, 2016
You get the sense that Freeman Dyson has seen everything. He's a legendary physicist who's had a front row seat on scientific breakthroughs for the past century. Read more
Original Air Date:
December 08, 2016
Previous Airdates:
December 08, 2016
We’re living through a period of mass human migration, with people on the move all over the planet. What does it take to take an unfamiliar place and make it yours?Read more
Original Air Date:
December 04, 2016
Previous Airdates:
December 04, 2016
August 05, 2017
May 19, 2018
November 02, 2019
Hip hop created a sound that changed music, art, fashion, and politics. What's next? Diplomacy? Journalism? Education? Philosophy?Read more
Original Air Date:
November 20, 2016
Previous Airdates:
November 20, 2016
April 14, 2018
March 09, 2019
February 29, 2020
There's a lot of hand-wringing these days about the American Empire. Is it doomed to come crashing down the way the Roman Empire did?Read more
Original Air Date:
February 21, 2016
Previous Airdates:
February 21, 2016
November 20, 2016
December 23, 2017
March 30, 2019
Reading books isn't always the best way to learn. Some things you need to learn from your elders, and their wisdom has often been passed down through the generations. Read more
Original Air Date:
January 31, 2016
Previous Airdates:
January 31, 2016
November 13, 2016
April 12, 2018
November 30, 2019
How does it feel to know that the commodity everyone wants is inside your skull? This hour, we focus our attention — on attention. Read more
Original Air Date:
November 13, 2016
Previous Airdates:
November 13, 2016
How do we put the fairness and the fun back in American elections? In this hour, we present a few simple ideas for how to remake the electoral process.Read more
Original Air Date:
October 30, 2016
Previous Airdates:
October 30, 2016
August 26, 2017
November 03, 2018
H.P. Lovecraft's weird tales of cosmic horror loom large 125 years after his birth. His literary tentatcles have oozed their way into movies, books, games and graphic novels. We explore Lovecraft's life, work and legacy. Was he a literary master or a monster?Read more
Original Air Date:
October 25, 2015
Previous Airdates:
October 25, 2015
October 27, 2016
Psychologists say telling a good life story can make you happier. But do we also create an inauthentic version of ourselves if we turn everything into a narrative?Read more
Original Air Date:
October 23, 2016
Previous Airdates:
October 23, 2016
July 29, 2017
January 13, 2018
December 22, 2018
This hour, we explore our obsession with time travel. Why is such a recurring them in movies and TV shows? And what can time travel teach us about ourselves?Read more
Original Air Date:
October 09, 2016
Previous Airdates:
October 09, 2016
July 02, 2017
February 03, 2018
Fermentation revivalists share a slow food philosophy, a DIY approach to foodcraft, and a deep interest in the health of the American gut.Read more
Original Air Date:
March 15, 2015
Previous Airdates:
March 15, 2015
October 02, 2016
November 25, 2017
Can we ever get inside the mind of an animal? Can we really know how a chimp or a parrot thinks and experiences the world?Read more
Original Air Date:
September 03, 2016
Previous Airdates:
September 03, 2016
June 10, 2017
We delve into the new science of revulsion.Read more
Original Air Date:
August 28, 2016
Previous Airdates:
August 28, 2016
February 24, 2018
December 01, 2018
August 10, 2019
When suicide bombers blow up crowded marketplaces, or a lone shooter attacks a nightclub, one question we’re always left with is why. This hour, a look at the underlying psychology of political violence.Read more
Original Air Date:
July 16, 2016
Previous Airdates:
July 16, 2016
March 12, 2017
July 21, 2018
Have you ever thought about tracking down someone who bullied you when you were a child? Allen Kurzweil thought about it and actually confronted him. We'll hear his story in this hour as we explore the bullying epidemic. Also, we'll find out how the Internet has transformed bullying into a...Read more
Original Air Date:
July 03, 2016
Previous Airdates:
July 03, 2016
April 02, 2017
When you don't have a voice, when you feel like lawmakers just won't listen to you, protest is one way of capturing the world's attention. But does it work? Read more
Original Air Date:
June 26, 2016
Previous Airdates:
July 08, 2017
June 26, 2016
There are nearly 250 million migrants across the world right now. Some will be escaping war or oppression, others will be seeking out freedom or economic prosperity, but whatever the reason, the kind of life they're looking for lies across a border that's policed and restricted. What if it didn'...Read more
Original Air Date:
May 01, 2016
Previous Airdates:
May 01, 2016
January 29, 2017
We talk to two other septuagenarian musicians in addition to Moroder who are still productively making music: the 74-year-old political folk singer Buffy Sainte-Marie, and the 78-year-old minimalist composer Philip Glass.Read more
Original Air Date:
July 19, 2015
Previous Airdates:
July 19, 2015
May 01, 2016
Amidst economic devastation, producer Charles Monroe-Kane asks what it takes to survive in the Rust Belt.Read more
Original Air Date:
June 02, 2018
Previous Airdates:
April 30, 2016
October 14, 2017
June 02, 2018
March 30, 2019
September 26, 2020
More than 38 million Americans knit or crochet. Not because they crave mittens and afghans, but because they like the way knitting feels. Handwork turns out be a powerful antidote for digital overload. Read more
Original Air Date:
December 05, 2015
Previous Airdates:
April 23, 2016
December 06, 2015
April 21, 2018
June 15, 2019
We grow up scribbling with crayons and covering sidewalks with chalk, and then around middle school most of us stop. Maybe we think it's childish or just too hard. So what can we learn from the people who never stopped making art?Read more
Original Air Date:
April 17, 2016
Previous Airdates:
April 17, 2016
March 03, 2018
February 05, 2017
There's a lot of hand-wringing these days about the American Empire. Is it doomed to come crashing down the way the Roman Empire did?Read more
Original Air Date:
February 21, 2016
Previous Airdates:
February 21, 2016
November 20, 2016
December 23, 2017
March 30, 2019
You score a royal flush in poker! Do you credit your skill? Or luck? We talk with a poker champion, a game designer, an investment banker and a choreographer about how to untangle skill from luck.Read more
Original Air Date:
February 14, 2016
Previous Airdates:
February 14, 2016
May 14, 2017
June 23, 2018
September 07, 2019
Reading books isn't always the best way to learn. Some things you need to learn from your elders, and their wisdom has often been passed down through the generations. Read more
Original Air Date:
January 31, 2016
Previous Airdates:
January 31, 2016
November 13, 2016
April 12, 2018
November 30, 2019
Ah, January. Season of diets and fasts and cleanses, of "Drynuary" and "Veganuary." Why does being virtuous always seem to mean giving up pleasure?Read more
Original Air Date:
January 06, 2018
Previous Airdates:
January 04, 2015
January 17, 2016
January 01, 2017
January 04, 2018
January 05, 2019