Climate change will make us pay - LSE

On the podcast of the London School of Economics (LSE public lectures and events) was a lecture by Professor Geoffrey Heal held on May 6th: Controversies in the Economics of Climate Change. In this lecture Heal goes over the economic cost climate change will cause.

His starting point is that the scientific question about Climate Change has largely been decided. There is wide consensus the climate is changing. Heal's subject is to take these established facts and evaluate, as well as possible, what the cost of these changes are. He emphasizes that these issues are still widely debated, hence the controversies of climate change, but the way he deals with them is by suggesting that only the size of the cost is debatable. There will be costs and they are enormous.

His analysis range from rather accurate like his esteem that the costs of the rising sea level will go over 1% of GDP, to completely unknown. The damages to the ocean, the warming of the climate are factors that he thinks are hard to enumerate. natural disasters and the disappearance of a multitude of species are impossible to range. On all accounts the costs are gigantic. It is not a happy lecture for the worried. Yet one, I feel, you must have heard.

On a side note. LSE also had a lecture called Urban Nomads which pays attention to the enormous stream of migration within China. The audio of this lecture is rather poor, the content is secondary (we listen in on a tape that is being played) and the subject is handled in a very anecdotal fashion. I cannot recommend this particular issue of LSE's podcast.

More LSE Events:
Nudge: decision architecture,
The EU and the Middle East,
The British Mandate in Palestine,
Iran Today,
Science and Religion.

Whale evolution - In Our Time

BBC's In Our Time deserves a review nearly every week. Not always I manage in the same week and as you all know by now: at the end of the week, the podcast has already disappeared from the feed and can only be heard in stream. Such is already the fate of last week's program about The Siege of Vienna. This week's program had me interested immediately and I managed to listen to it this weekend and so here is the review in time.

Melvyn Bragg and his guests addressed The Whale: a History. The whale had long been rather an anomaly in the animal kingdom, a creature that was not easy to fit into any of the categories in the tree of species. New finds and new technologies have helped establish new insights that reveal the evolution of the whale and in a very accessible, concise and interesting way the program orders this for us. At the beginning it is promised, in a way, that we will see how the whale is a kind of champion of evolution and by the end we come full circle and this is summarized completely.

This champion of evolution shows what evolution is capable of. It evolves all the sorts of adaptations it needs in its exceptional environment, the ocean, whereby its appearance takes it far away from its origins and its kin and only series of fossil finds and microbiology and retrace this. And so we learn how the whale is actually part of the strain of hoofed animals, just like horses and deer. In the show it is likened to seals, otters, beavers and eventually we learn what is its closest living relative: the hippopotamus. Very exciting and very well done.

More In Our Time:
Magna Carta,
BBC's In Our Time - always recommended,
Brave New World,
Rafael's School of Athens and the depiction of Plato and Aristotle,
The Boxer Rebellion.

James Mann about Ronald Reagan - UChannel

The fascinating thing about the 1980's for me is that I vividly remembered them, was a fanatic newspaper reader at the time and that the 1980's are becoming part of history. And then, when historians speak of events in the 1980's I relive the era and also receive new perspectives on my own perception. A case in point is when James Mann speaks about his book The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan: A History of the End of the Cold War.

James Mann was a guest speaker at Princeton University in the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs in April 2009 where he spoke of his new book (UChannel Podcast). Even if he is not the most engaging speaker - he retells some of the parts of his book en research in a seemingly random fashion - the experience is still very exciting. At least for me. At the time, I never felt Reagan was worried about the Cold War and happily seizing the opportunity to make deals with Gorbachev. Mann shows in many entertaining anecdotes that this is so.

If you like this lecture by James Mann, you will enjoy all the more the interview he gave to Marshall Poe on New Books in History. In both podcasts you will learn the backstory, among others, of Reagan's famous line in Berlin: Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall! I keep hearing this with Pink Floyd in the backdrop (I told you I am from the eighties), but if aything was torn down that day, it was Erich Honecker - listen and find out.

More UChannel Podcast:
Disasters and Peace,
Enclosing the commons of the mind,
Middle East challenges,
Good climate for everyone (global warming),
Robots and War.

The Sunni-Shia divide and the future of Islam

APM's Speaking of Faith frequently airs reruns of old shows and then republish them in the podcast feed also. This week the interview Krista Tippett had with Vali Nasr was published again. Last year I wrote about this issue and here is the review once more:

In the latest edition of Speaking of Faith, Krista Tippett speaks with Vali Nasr, Islam expert in the US or Iranian descent. (The Sunni-Shia divide and the future of Islam) Nasr and Tippett delve into the divide between Sunni and Shia that make up a 90 and respectively 10% of Muslims in the world. However, this division is not evenly dispersed. In Iran 90% are Shia and in Iraq 60%. Elsewhere Shia are a minority by far, if existent at all. (transcript, full interview)

Little attention is awarded to what makes up the divide and what are the cultural and historical differences. What Nasr has come to speak of is the effect on the world that the regime change in Iraq has. Iraq had been ruled by the Sunni minority, but American intervention has brought a fledgling democracy a majority rule. Not only does this mean for Iraq, the Shia suddenly find themselves in power, it also enhances the power of Iran, the previously only Shia ruled state. It also brings the Shia influence into the Middle-East, into the Arab world and has put Shia power on the map for the whole world, Muslim or not. Where Shia was formerly unknown or ignored, it has become a power to reckon with. And where Shia people accepted their submissive position, the idea is rising that political power is an availability for them.

The change in Iraq was triggered by force, because the Americans, as Nasr with tangible disappointment continues to point out, thought they could fast-track Iraq to western society. However, as impossible as it is to fast track any development in whole countries, let alone cultures, the power change has only revealed and unleashed old fashioned tribalism. In spite of that, no more and no less, Islam on the whole is struggling with modernity. In Nasr's mind, modernity will eventually find its way in to Islam, but not for another 60 or 100 years.

More Speaking of Faith:
Wangari Maathai,
Rumi,
The story and God,
The Buddha in the world,
Doubt.

American Exceptionalism - NBIH

In many nations people have the idea their nation is special and quite a few will not be especially modest in conversation about it. The podcast New Books In History takes on this trait where the United States is concerned. Guest Godfrey Hodgson wrote a book about American Exceptionalism and host Marshall Poe interviews him.

Poe makes sure Hodgson systematically takes on the idea and splits it up in 'American Messianism', the ideology that America is special and the factual question: whether America has a significantly different history from other nations and stands out on exceptional values (freedom and democracy) and achievements (winning all world wars, one, two and three).

As can be expected Hodgson attempts to counter these two ideas extensively and while this may seem annoying for the average American listener (I guess non-Americans will feel rather pleased, but their turn will come one day as well), the interview is actually very worthwhile and entertaining. Neither Poe nor Hodgson really bash the country, should you be afraid.

More NBIH:
The Great War in short,
How Rome Fell,
Glancing over the backlog,
Jews in the Russian army,
Who will write our history?.

History 131

On The Podcast Parlor in one of the forum discussions a remark was made that almost everybody agreed to. Podcasts that are recordings of live lectures have a lot of issues, mostly with audio, but also others, and as a result of that are seemingly more difficult to follow. However, their being live makes up for this, they are actually more easy to follow than crisp recorded monologues.

And so, on the subject of American History, where I have reviewed Gretchen Reilly's series (Before 1870 and After 1870), she has the advantages of good audio, but the drawback of not being live. I am beginning to compare this to two history courses from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, which actually were also recommended on The Podcast Parlor: David Hoogland Noon's History 131 and History 132. (History 131 feed, History 132 feed)

I have made a beginning of History 131 and am learning a lot about the early history of North America (before 1776) a lot of which I know next to nothing about. Professor Hoogland Noon gives a lot of interesting information. The Americas' development and their place in European conflicts and their influx of people from Europe and of course, sadly, from Africa comes out very detailed. Some people enjoy the professor's quirky love of eccentric days on the calendar, but if you do not, they make up only a warm up five minutes of the lectures. I guess he needs it to overcome his nervousness. After that he is off and quite good.

More American History:
Gilder Lehrmann history podcasts,
American Independence (in Hebrew),
US History since 1877 (Gretchen Reilly),
American History before 1870 (Gretchen Reilly),
Religion and Law in US society (UCSD).