Heads-up for 7 August 2010

Tom Tacken, the maker of Veertien Achttien, went on vacation. In order to let his audience of this Dutch, weekly biography show around World War I, not go without new shows, he uploaded three of them at once. (feed)

Edgy reviews from that podcast show the podcast review show, has made it to its 100th edition. Three new podcasts are reviewed every week. (feed)

Shrink Rap Radio
#243 – Exploring Behavioral Economics with Dan Ariely
Dan Ariely, Ph.D. is the James B. Duke Professor of Psychology and Behavioral Economics at Duke University, where he holds appointments at the Fuqua School of Business, the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, the School of Medicine, and the department of Economics. He is also a founding member of the Center for Advanced Hindsight.

In addition, Dan is the author of the New York Times Bestseller Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces that Shape Our Decisions and The Upside of Irrationality: The Unexpected Benefits of Defying Logic at Work and at Home.

Using simple experiments Dan studies how people actually act in the marketplace, as opposed to how they should or would perform if they were completely rational. His interests span a wide range of daily behaviors such as buying (or not), saving (or not), ordering food in restaurants, pain management, procrastination, dishonesty, and decision making under different emotional states. His experiments are consistently interesting, amusing, and informative, demonstrating profound ideas that fly in the face of common wisdom.
(review, feed)

Dimitar Sasselov - TED Talks

Here is video from TED Talks (feed) in which Dimitar Sasselov discusses the existence of earth-like planets in the Milky Way



More TED:
Sir Ken Robinson,
Photos that changed the world - Jonathan Klein,
Karen Armstrong on The Golden Rule,
Media revolution and the effect on power - Clay Shirky,
Shay Agassi's visionary plan to bring electric cars to the world.

Heads-up for 6 August 2010

Russian Rulers History Podcast
Episode 14 - Ivan IV - The Early Years, Part One
Young Ivan IV, Grand Prince of Moscow, serves as a figurehead ruler with his mother as Regent.
(review, feed)

Speaking of Faith with Krista Tippett (APM)
The moral math of climate change
A conversation about climate change and moral imagination with Bill McKibben, a leading environmentalist and writer who has been ahead of the curve on this issue since he wrote The End of Nature in 1989. We explore his evolving perspective on human responsibility in a changing natural world.
(review, feed)

Endless cloth - Mahabharata Podcast

After a summer break the Mahabharata Podcast has returned to publishing again. For a moment I wish to draw your attention to last episode before the break: The first dice game. There is a scene in here that was mentioned also by Vinay Lal at UCLA in of his courses on Indian History.

The dice game is a high point in one of the many story-lines within the Mahabharata. It brings together the rivaling cousins, the Pandavas and the Kauravas. And it features the beautiful Draupadi who is married to the five Pandava brothers. The professional dice player Shakuni plays on behalf of the Kauravas and wins everything, also Draupadi. Draupadi tries to make a legal case against the outcome of the game, but this is ignored.

The whole point of the affair is to publicly humiliate the innocent Draupadi. She is brought in front of the court wrapped in merely a cloth, but when they try to strip her by ripping of the drapery, they fail. As they pull the cloth, more and more of it comes off Draupadi, but she remains dressed as if she were wearing a sari of eternal length - a sure sign of here innocence of course.

More Mahabharata:
The Mahabharata Podcast,
The earliest history - A Story of India (1),
History of India - the search goes on,
History of India or Europe?

Heads-up for 5 August 2010

Witness (BBC)
Witness: Mississippi Killing
David Goodman is the brother of Andrew Goodman, one of the three civil rights workers killed in Mississippi in 1964 while taking part in Freedom Summer. For Witness, he recalls his brother's strong sense of justice and what his family lived through in the 44 days he was missing. David Goodman says it took the deaths of two whites to awake the conscience of middle America.
Witness: Ugandan Asians
Uganda Asians forced to leave the country tell "Witness" of their traumatic exodus. They speak of being stripped of their wealth, and of struggling to come to terms with life in exile far from home.
(feed)

Before the Summer is over, take a look at the courses offered by UCSD on podcast. Two of those I know well from the past and followed with great interest:
POLI 142K - Politics and Warfare by Victor Magagna (review, feed)
POLI 113A - East Asian Thought also by Victor Magagna (review, feed)

Forgotten Classics
The Riddle of the Sands - Chapter 24
In which Carruthers shows his skills at riposte.
(review, feed)

Jan Lenferink - Simek 's Nachts

In 2005 ontdekte ik podcasts. En het begon met Simek 's Nachts en een van de eerste, zo niet de eerste, podcast die ik als podcast beluisterde was Simeks interview met Jan Lenferink. Ik was meteen verkocht. Niet alleen voor podcast, maar ook voor Simek 's Nachts. Luister naar dit oude interview. In 2005 was Simek top en met Lenferink scherp en alert en dat is met de valse pesterigheid van Lenferink een adembenemend gevecht.

Natuurlijk is de oude Simek podcast (zowel de RVU podcast als de Elsevier podcast) onvindbaar geworden, maar waar mogelijk breng ik de oude afleveringen in mijn simek huffduffer feed. Behalve Jan Lenferink, is er ook een interview met Pieter Winsemius aan de feed toegevoegd.

Meer Simek 's Nachts:
Sjoerd Kooistra,
Ik ben een geraffineerde vrouw - Naema Tahir,
Fabienne (dochter van Lucia de B),
Mohammed Jabri,
Nico Frijda.