Sam Harris says religious certainty is not only irrational, it's dangerous. He says believing in Allah or Jesus or the God of Abraham makes no more sense than believing in Zeus.
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Audio
Stephen Greenblatt tells the remarkable story of how the discovery of an ancient poem helped launch the Scientific Revolution. Also, an excerpt from Lucretius' poem "On the Nature of Things."
The whole idea of American Exceptionalism has lost currency in recent years. But in this Dangerous Idea, cultural historian Andrew Warnes asks, What if American is exceptional after all?
Tom Shippey, author of “Tolkien: Author of the Century,” talks with Steve Paulson about the great fantasy writer’s life, the origins of hobbits, and Tolkien’s motivation for writing fantasy.
Ziauddin Sardar, a London based scholar and cultural critic, tells Steve what’s needed now is “an Islamic science” and explains what that is.
Simon Winchester tells Jim Fleming about the life of William Smith and his struggle to create the world's first geological map.
Susan Casey, author of "The Wave," tells Jim Fleming about the recent research into the phenomenon of mammoth ocean waves.
According to self-described "space dork" Andy Weir, he was just sitting around at home one day imagining a manned Mars mission — not with any goal in mind, but just as a thought experiment. Soon, he realized this would be a pretty good premise for a story. And boy was he right. His novel "The Martian" started as a series of blog posts and has become a blockbuster motion picture. In this interview, he reads excerpts from the novel and discusses the balance between pure fantasty and scientific accuracy in science fiction.
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