Latest Academic podcast Podcast Episodes
Vladimir Putin’s Number One Enemy With Bill Browder
Big Brains - January 27, 2020 10:00 - 25 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsUniversity of Chicago alumnus Bill Browder’s story sounds like the plot of a Hollywood thriller—except it’s all true. He just wanted to be a businessman, but his experience as a foreign investor in Russia would push him to become an international activist. Today, Browder, AB’85, travels the gl...
How Google and Facebook Are Ruining Capitalism, with Luigi Zingales
Big Brains - January 13, 2020 10:00 - 26 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsUniversity of Chicago economist Luigi Zingales often says that only an immigrant like himself can really appreciate American capitalism. In his native Italy, Zingales says what you know and what you do are far less important that who you know and what you do for them. But in the last decade, ...
How Quantum Technology Could Change Our Future With David Awschalom
Big Brains - December 30, 2019 10:00 - 19 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsIn October of 2019, Google announced their supercomputer had reached quantum supremacy. With that announcement, and as we take a short break for the holidays, we thought we should replay a prior Big Brains episode for you with David Awschalom, one of the world's leading quantum scientists. Aws...
The Myths Of Millennial Voters With Cathy Cohen
Big Brains - December 16, 2019 10:00 - 20 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsEvery election year, poll after poll tries to predict where millennials stand politically. As we head into 2020, we'd like to replay this episode with Prof. Cathy Cohen who says some of our assumptions about what issues matter to young people are all wrong. Cohen’s innovative survey of millenn...
Why Some Nations Prosper and Others Fail, with James Robinson
Big Brains - December 02, 2019 10:00 - 27 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsIt’s a simple question to ask, but seems impossible to answer: What causes one nation to succeed and another to fail? What exactly are the origins of global inequality? There are few people who have spent more time trying to answer this question than Prof. James Robinson. Robinson’ first book,...
The Hunt for Alien Life and Exoplanets, with David Charbonneau
Big Brains - November 18, 2019 10:00 - 21 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsSince the beginning of human history, we’ve looked up at the stars and wondered: Are we alone? No other generation has been able to find an answer, but David Charbonneau thinks we may be the first. He’s an astronomer at Harvard University and a recipient of an honorary degree from the University...
Why Chasing The Good Life Is Holding Us Back With Lauren Berlant
Big Brains - November 04, 2019 10:00 - 24 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsFor most Americans, the driving force in their personal and public life is a desire to attain the “good life”. But what if our attachment to that desire is the very thing holding us back? Lauren Berlant is a theorist and English professor at the University of Chicago and the author of “Cruel Opt...
Saving Our Cities By Studying A Million Neighborhoods With Luis Bettencourt
Big Brains - October 23, 2019 09:00 - 23 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsIn the last decade, there has been a mass migration of people into urban areas across the globe. This rapid urbanization has been increasingly unsustainable for our cities and it’s projected to get worse in the next decade. University of Chicago scholar Luis Bettencourt is tackling this globa...
Why Talking to Strangers Will Make You Happier With Nicholas Epley
Big Brains - October 07, 2019 09:00 - 24 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsIf you could have any superpower, what would it be? Most people say they’d want to read minds. But Prof. Nicholas Epley of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business says you already have that power: You just need to use it. Epley’s research has focused on the ways our minds understand...
Leading Presidential Scholar Analyzes Trump Impeachment
Big Brains - September 27, 2019 22:00 - 19 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsIt’s been a historic week, with news that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has officially opened an impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump. There’s no better expert to examine the recent events in Washington than Prof. William Howell, one of the leading scholars on the power of the American...
The Politics of Archaeology In Iraq With Christopher Woods
Big Brains - September 23, 2019 09:00 - 24 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsThe looting of the National Museum of Iraq in Baghdad became one of the defining moments of the second Iraq War. Christopher Woods, the director of the Oriental Institute, one of the world’s foremost research centers on the ancient Near East, says that in moments like these when archaeology and ...
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg On Polarization, Discrimination and Her Favorite Dissent
Big Brains - September 09, 2019 23:41 - 57 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsOne of the incredible perks of making a podcast at a place like the University of Chicago is the opportunity to feature some of the incredible guests who speak on our campus. This week, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was here for a conversation hosted by Katherine Baicker, dean of ...
Why Your Social Life is a Matter of Life and Death with Linda Waite
Big Brains - August 26, 2019 09:00 - 22 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsIs it possible that having lunch with your friends is just as important in keeping you alive as exercising? That’s what University of Chicago professor Linda Waite is arguing. Her first of its kind research into social well-being has provided key insights into how our social lives affect our phy...
Revolutionizing Economics By Studying People In The Real World With John List
Big Brains - August 12, 2019 09:00 - 28 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsIf you’ve played Candy Crush, flown on United Airlines, or taken an Uber or Lyft, you’ve been in one of Prof. John List’s experiments without even knowing it. List has revolutionized economics research through his pioneering use of field experiments. A field experiment is conducted in the real w...
The Unknown History Of The White Power Movement With Kathleen Belew
Big Brains - July 29, 2019 09:00 - 27 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsWe're taking a summer break during July, but we'll be back in August with new episodes telling the stories of leading research with some of the world's greatest minds. During the break, we'll be bringing you updated versions of prior episodes. The revelation for historian Kathleen Belew came w...
The Missing Link In Evolution with Neil Shubin
Big Brains - July 15, 2019 09:00 - 26 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsEvolutionary biologist Neil Shubin spent six years in the Arctic searching for a fossil that could be a missing link between sea and land animals. Shubin shares the story behind his discovery of Tiktaalik, what it has meant for the understanding of human evolution, and how it has impacted the fu...
Guest Show - No Jargon
Big Brains - July 01, 2019 09:00 - 30 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsWe're taking a summer break during July, but we'll be back in August with new episodes telling the stories of leading research with some of the world's greatest minds. During the break, we'll be bringing you updated versions of prior episodes. This week, we have a guest episode of the No Jargo...
Trump and the Changing Power of the Presidency with William Howell
Big Brains - June 17, 2019 09:00 - 26 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsIf you want to better understand how Trump has forever changed the American presidency, the history of impeachment, or how to fix the dysfunction in our government, it’s best to go to an expert. Prof. William Howell is one of the leading scholars on presidential powers. On this episode, Howell...
How the Loss of Community Threatens Society With Raghuram Rajan
Big Brains - June 03, 2019 09:00 - 23 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsUChicago economist Raghuram Rajan became infamous for predicting the 2008 financial collapse three years before it happened. Rajan says that there are three pillars in our society: the state, the markets and the community. In his new book, he traces the history of how the state and markets hav...
The Science of Conspiracy Theories And Political Polarization With Eric Oliver
Big Brains - May 20, 2019 09:00 - 26 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsThe “birthers”, “Pizzagate”, anti-vaxxers. Since the election of Donald Trump, it’s seemed that belief in conspiracy theories is on the rise. At the same time, our polarization is worse than ever. People can hardly even maintain a conversation across political or cultural lines. Could the underl...
A Modern Medical Miracle with Drs. Valluvan Jeevanandam and Talia Baker
Big Brains - May 06, 2019 09:00 - 22 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsDoctor Valluvan Jeevanandam says that transplantation is a “spiritual journey.” One person’s tragic loss leads to the another’s second chance at life. But not all transplants are the same. In 2018, patients Daru Smith and Sarah McPharlin were both waiting on the donor list for not one but thre...
An Archaeological Riddle In The Sahara With Paul Sereno
Big Brains - April 15, 2019 09:00 - 26 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsWhen dinosaur hunter and paleontologist Paul Sereno discovered an ancient mass gravesite in the sands of the Sahara, he knew he had to excavate and save that history and heritage. Sereno has always said paleontology and archeology are adventures with a purpose. If the discovery of that ancient...
Tiny Creatures, Big Discoveries With Nipam Patel
Big Brains - April 01, 2019 09:00 - 27 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsSince the late 1800s, if you were serious about studying biology you went to the Marine Biological Laboratory. The discoveries made there have led to world-changing applications in biology, medicine and neurology. The newly appointed MBL director, Nipam Patel, knows a lot about studying organi...
The Hidden Dangers of Artificial Intelligence with Ben Zhao
Big Brains - March 18, 2019 09:00 - 21 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsThe development of artificial intelligence has begun to feel inevitable and promising. But University of Chicago computer scientist, Ben Zhao, has spent much of his career testing how the security of these systems can break down. Zhao’s study involving Yelp reviews generated by A.I. show how t...
Lessons From Our Country’s Largest School Closing with Eve L. Ewing
Big Brains - March 04, 2019 10:00 - 26 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsIn her book Ghosts In The Schoolyard, University of Chicago scholar Eve Ewing asks a central question about the 2013 mass closings of Chicago Public Schools: If the schools were so bad, why did people fight so hard to save them? Her investigation is a deep and nuanced investigation of the pub...
Lessons From Our Country’s Largest School Closing with Eve L. Ewing
Big Brains - March 04, 2019 10:00 - 26 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsIn her book Ghosts In The Schoolyard, University of Chicago scholar Eve Ewing asks a central question about the 2013 mass closings of Chicago Public Schools: If the schools were so bad, why did people fight so hard to save them? Her investigation is a deep and nuanced investigation of the pub...
Simple Solutions To Address Social Issues with Harold Pollack
Big Brains - February 18, 2019 10:00 - 21 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsUniversity of Chicago Professor Harold Pollack may be famous for his “financial index card”, but it’s his application of simple solutions to complex issues that’s reshaping how we tackle crime and healthcare. What can be done to reduce the number of people who end up in jail for failing to app...
What We’re Getting Wrong About Millennials With Cathy Cohen
Big Brains - February 04, 2019 10:00 - 20 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsEvery election year, poll after poll tries to predict where millennials stand politically. But Prof. Cathy Cohen of the University of Chicago says some of our assumptions about what issues matter to young people are all wrong. Cohen’s innovative survey of millennials, GenForward, is a first of...
What Ripples in Space-Time Tell Us About the Universe with Daniel Holz
Big Brains - January 21, 2019 10:00 - 22 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsAll around us in the universe, stars and black holes are smashing into each other with tremendous force. These events are so powerful that they literally ripple the fabric of space-time—and these ripples, called gravitational waves, travel hundreds of millions of light-years across the universe....
Vietnam and the Rise of the White Power Movement with Kathleen Belew
Big Brains - January 07, 2019 09:00 - 27 minutes ★★★★★ - 358 ratingsThe revelation for historian Kathleen Belew came while researching a 1979 anti-Ku Klux Klan rally in Greensboro, North Carolina that turned deadly when five members were murdered by a group of Klansmen and neo-Nazis. Belew was struck by the reflection of the killers, some of them Vietnam War ...
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