UnDisciplined
261 episodes - English - Latest episode: 7 days ago - ★★★★★ - 7 ratingsEach week, UnDisciplined takes a fun, fascinating and accessible dive into the lives of researchers and explorers working across a wide variety of scientific fields.
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Episodes
UnDisciplined: How do you land on an asteroid?
April 18, 2024 17:42 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBIn The Asteroid Hunter, Dante Lauretta chronicles the quest to retrieve a sample from Bennu, which is one of the large asteroids that is most likely to collide with the Earth.
UnDisciplined: Can a personal creed help young people connect in a rapidly changing world?
April 11, 2024 22:37 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBThe young adults who comprise Generation Z live in a world of far less violent crime relative to the generation before them. So, why are so many of them struggling? Educator John Creger thinks he has part of the answer: They often need help understanding who they are in this world.
UnDisciplined: Why do people police language?
April 04, 2024 18:37 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBAnne Curzan might seem like a strange sort of English teacher. The veteran professor doesn’t believe in “right” and wrong” when it comes to grammar. Rather, she wants people to be able to make informed choices about language.
UnDisciplined: How long can apes remember each other’s faces?
March 28, 2024 19:34 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBLaura Lewis met a bonobo named Louise as part of a study on the capacity of bonobos to remember the faces of apes they’d spent time with decades earlier. And Louise remembered.
UnDisciplined: What is it like to leave an evangelical church?
March 21, 2024 21:42 - 23 minutes - 31.6 MBLike many Americans, Sarah McCammon grew up in a deeply evangelical family, where she was plagued by fears and deep questions about her belief system, but scared to leave.
What is it like to leave an evangelical church?
March 21, 2024 21:42 - 23 minutes - 31.6 MBLike many Americans, Sarah McCammon grew up in a deeply evangelical family, where she was plagued by fears and deep questions about her belief system, but scared to leave.
UnDisciplined: Is there more undiscovered life in the Great Salt Lake?
March 14, 2024 21:09 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBUntil recently, nematodes weren’t known to live in the Great Salt Lake. And, in fact, very little lives there — because the lake’s salinity makes most life untenable. But, as it turns out, these tiny worms were doing just fine.
UnDisciplined: What’s ‘fair’ when it comes to climate action?
March 07, 2024 19:44 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBWhen humans debate climate policy, the questions asked are often posed in terms of what will work best. Fairness isn’t always, or even often, taken into account. But Stacia Ryder thinks that needs to change.
UnDisciplined: Are food companies responsible for the epidemic in diabetes, cancer and dementia?
February 29, 2024 18:29 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBUltra-processed food and the companies that produce them contribute significantly to the epidemic in diabetes, cancer, dementia, and other chronic disease. Is it time to regulate these products like tobacco? And will it take a class action suit to make that happen? Erik Peper believes so.
UnDisciplined: Why do humans use the past to inform the future?
February 22, 2024 23:12 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBMemory is not a rigid, static picture of what came before. Rather, it’s a nebulous, ever-changing conceptualization of who we were, what we believed, what happened to us, and what was happening around us.
UnDisciplined: Robots, AI and the future of human connection
February 15, 2024 19:27 - 25 minutes - 23.7 MBThere is precedent for humans connecting with other living things, like getting attention, love, and companionship from dogs and cats and a few other animals that have been domesticated to provide partnership. Now, there’s a new option for meeting this need — social robots — who may end up being even better at fulfilling the human desire for connection.
UnDisciplined: Should species be named after horrible people?
February 08, 2024 17:38 - 25 minutes - 23.7 MBWhen an Austrian bug collector discovered a new species of beetle in the 1930s, he bestowed upon it the name of a person he greatly admired. He called it Anophthalmus hitleri — and sent Adolf Hitler a note announcing the onomastic tribute. After nearly 90 years, should species still be named after horrible people?
UnDisciplined: Can you still travel the roads that Julius Caesar built?
February 01, 2024 20:36 - 25 minutes - 23.7 MBLong before Julius Caesar became one of the most powerful rulers in the world, he was a relatively unknown curator of the Via Appia, a road stretching from Rome on the Tyrrhenian Coast to the Salento Peninsula on the Adriatic Sea. Our guest John Keahey traversed the Via Appia, and he joins us to talk about it.
UnDisciplined: What have we learned from 50 years of the Endangered Species Act?
January 25, 2024 23:34 - 25 minutes - 23.7 MBA new book by Lowell Baier is not just a history of The Endangered Species Act, but an explanation of what’s gone right and what’s gone wrong in the implementation of this historic federal statute.
UnDisciplined: Were Utah’s pioneers slave owners?
January 18, 2024 19:45 - 25 minutes - 23.7 MBSlavery in the United States is often thought to be an institution of the American South, but western states played a part as well. In Utah, a law passed in 1852 made slavery and the slave trade legal, and this law was passed under the urging of the first territorial governor, Brigham Young. Historian Paul Reeve joins the program to discuss newly unearthed documents about Brigham Young and Utah's history.
UnDisciplined: Navigating the future of the global water crisis
January 11, 2024 19:55 - 25 minutes - 23.7 MBWater crises are nothing new. Indeed they’ve influenced the very course of human history again and again but we’ve never had a planet with 10 billion people on it before, and so can we solve the water crisis at a global scale?
UnDisciplined: How bugs may help us get to Mars
January 04, 2024 18:49 - 25 minutes - 23.7 MBIf we are going to go to Mars, we’re going to need to bring a lot of things that we need to live that the red planet, so far as we can tell, just doesn’t have... and that includes bugs.
UnDisciplined: How inclusivity benefits men and women on the autism spectrum
November 18, 2023 19:21 - 26 minutes - 35.7 MBAutism Spectrum Disorder exists on a continuum of behaviors, capabilities, and deviations from norms — and for a very long time, that spectrum didn't include much space for girls.
UnDisciplined: Rethinking sexual harassment prevention in the workplace
November 12, 2023 03:00 - 26 minutes - 35.7 MBAlmost all large organizations — from government entities to universities to private businesses — engage in sexual harassment prevention training. And yet the problem persists.
UnDisciplined: With natural disasters rising in frequency, the US needs to rethink emergency management
November 03, 2023 02:50 - 26 minutes - 35.7 MBThe recent disaster in Maui was the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century, and it has highlighted a gaping hole in the country's disaster response.
UnDisciplined: Why you should become a 'student of seed'
October 28, 2023 15:17 - 26 minutes - 35.7 MBConsider for a moment what our world would look like without seeds.
UnDisciplined: Carl Nassib came out while playing in the NFL - here's what the media thought about it
October 20, 2023 01:06 - 26 minutes - 35.7 MBThere are no openly gay players in any of the five major men's sports leagues in the United States. But that's not because there are no gay players in those leagues.
UnDisciplined: The surprising side of climate change - why you don't have to fear the future
October 06, 2023 16:47 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBThere's a force that people don't think much about — the existential terror of accepting the truth about global warming. But what if we didn't have to be afraid?
UnDisciplined: How the Great Salt Lake is becoming hostile to life
September 29, 2023 03:48 - 26 minutes - 36.6 MBAs the Great Salt Lake has shrunk in recent years, it has become an increasingly hostile place to life of all kinds.
UnDisciplined: How to protect yourself and your home from wildfires
September 21, 2023 22:16 - 26 minutes - 35.7 MBUnder climate warming, the risk of wildfires is increasing. So, we're all going to need to adapt.
UnDisciplined: The economic evolution of an icon
September 14, 2023 21:23 - 25 minutes - 35.7 MBThe top-grossing movie of 2023 is a movie about a doll that is known for creating toxic expectations about girls' bodies and also paving the way for girls to be anything they want.
UnDisciplined: Clenched fists and full beards: two pieces of evidence suggesting humans evolved to fight
September 07, 2023 18:24 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBHumans have evolved to do lots of things. And one thing scientists are now coming to recognize is that we also evolved to fight — with each other.
UnDisciplined: This asteroid is about to pass dangerously close to Earth
August 31, 2023 23:57 - 20 minutes - 28.7 MBThe OSIRIS-Rex mission has picked up a piece of the asteroid Bennu projected to pass close to Earth. Precautionary? Maybe. But there's a big enough risk that we're doing something about it.
UnDisciplined: 'It's one of the most lonely feelings': The realities of mainstream schooling for deaf children
August 24, 2023 17:56 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MB85% of deaf children attend mainstream public schools and many deaf advocates will say this is a good thing, but good intentions and good educational practices are two different things.
UnDisciplined: Romeo and Juliet — an age-old tale of love, death and pandemics
August 18, 2023 02:56 - 25 minutes - 35.5 MBRomeo and Juliet has always been about life in a pandemic, we're just starting to notice it.
UnDisciplined: What the life of Ira Hayes can teach us about the price of heroism
August 10, 2023 19:32 - 25 minutes - 35.4 MBIra Hayes has been commemorated in movies and songs, but his actual life after WWII is still shrouded in a lot of mystery.
UnDisciplined: The US is not prepared for the dangers of zoonotic diseases
July 28, 2023 18:40 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBThere is no national strategy, let alone a global one to mitigate the dangers of diseases that spread from animals to humans.
UnDisciplined: Linguists identify a new dialect emerging in South Florida
July 21, 2023 14:12 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBThere are many ways Latino people and cultures have influenced the country. Some linguists say that an entirely new American dialect is taking shape right now, in Miami.
UnDisciplined: How women changed American journalism
July 13, 2023 22:25 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBIn American history, women have largely been left out of newsrooms, so how has that changed history?
UnDisciplined: What bees can teach us about trust and collaboration
June 23, 2023 00:15 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBWhen you think about a beehive, you probably imagine the queen as the leader. But that's not actually how it works.
UnDisciplined: Are oceans the solution to the West's water woes?
June 15, 2023 17:48 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBWe still need to figure out better long term water solutions. And those discussions tend to happen with more urgency when water is scarce.
UnDisciplined: Unveiling the urban oasis — how tree planting combats rising heat in cities
June 09, 2023 19:00 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBOne of the places the world is warming the most is in our cities, as a result of the urban heat island effect. But there’s a way to combat this problem.
UnDisciplined: Here's why heat waves in our rivers are increasing – and why that's a problem
May 25, 2023 20:20 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBClimate scientists are now looking at rivers and streams. And what they're finding is that these parts of our world are warming rapidly.
UnDisciplined: How will climate change impact how animals mate and reproduce?
May 18, 2023 21:41 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBIn a rapidly warming world, hot sex just took on a whole new meaning.
UnDisciplined: The muses help those who help themselves
May 11, 2023 16:31 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBIf you've ever had writer's block then you know how desperate that experience can be. What you might not realize is that you're in very good company.
UnDisciplined: Here's why you should be optimistic about the future of climate change
May 05, 2023 00:18 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBScientists and journalists have been trying to shock people with the overwhelming weight of evidence that our planet is warming. Now perhaps a new tactic is in order – optimism for the future.
UnDisciplined: Is predictive, personalized treatment the future of medicine?
April 27, 2023 19:15 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBOur healthcare systems are designed to help people once they have a disease – not to keep them from getting sick in the first place.
UnDisciplined: How does climate change impact the geography of inequity?
April 27, 2023 18:55 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBRedlining has been illegal for 50 years, but the negative effects reverberate today. Redlined communities are more at risk under climate change.
UnDisciplined: Opioid use and recovery during the COVID-19 pandemic
April 13, 2023 20:04 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBDuring the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic there was an explosive rise in opioid deaths.
UnDisciplined: Searching for solutions
April 06, 2023 16:35 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBA very wet winter changed things and in most parts of the West, the drought seems to be over. That gives us a little bit of time to keep working on solutions to water availability.
UnDisciplined: Could whales help fight climate change?
March 30, 2023 19:56 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBThe profound decline in whale populations doesn't just change our ocean ecosystems – it might also be impacting our atmospheric climate.
UnDisciplined: Taking the unconventional path
March 23, 2023 22:19 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBA variety of studies have shown that, by the second grade, about 75 percent of girls have already developed an implicit belief that science, math and engineering are subjects that belong more to boys.
UnDisciplined: Why are book bans on the rise in the US?
March 10, 2023 00:06 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBThere are some ways in which this latest cycle of censorship is different, and perhaps even more alarming.
UnDisciplined: Is climate change making us sicker?
March 02, 2023 21:26 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBClimate change isn't just making our world incrementally warmer – its impacts are making us sicker, both physically and mentally.
UnDisciplined: The battle between danger and denial
February 23, 2023 20:52 - 25 minutes - 35.6 MBWhen the EPA told people in Globe, Arizona, that their soil was toxic and needed to be cleaned up, many residents responded in a surprising way.