Listening ideas for 26 March 2011

Philosopher's Zone
Who was Gilles Deleuze?
Gilles Deleuze, who died by his own hand in 1995, was one of the most influential and prolific French philosophers of the second half of the twentieth century. He wrote influentially not just on philosophy, but on literature, film, fine art and the environment as well. But his writing style - highly allusive, peppered with neologisms - is not easy-going. This week, we try to get to grips with a significant and important thinker.
(review, feed)

Science Friday
Hour 1: Building Blocks of Life, Pre-Clovis Americans, Return of Project Mohole
New analysis of an old spark flask biochemistry experiment, hunting for traces of Americas first inhabitants, drilling to the mantle of the Earth.
Hour 2: Computers and Emotions, Richard Feynman, Spacesuit Design
Measuring emotions via technology, a biography of physicist Richard Feynman, and a look at Apollo-era space suit design.
(review, feed)

Harvard thinks big

Here is a challenge: have a scientist with a great idea to summarize it in a ten minute lecture. Harvard has done it in the series Harvard Thinks Big. The crash lectures mounted all one after the other in a one night event and they recorded this on video for us to enjoy in video podcast.

It is too bad the quality of the sound and visuals were botched. If this was an attempt by Harvard to do something similar to TED Talks it miserably failed as far as the presentation is concerned. For the content, there is more to say. Go watch and enjoy. (feed)

I learned from this series from Open Culture one of the blogs I follow for being informed about great academic free content on-line