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Biology and Evolution
Princeton UP Ideas Podcast October 1, 2023

Free Agents

How Evolution Gave Us Free Will

Kevin J. Mitchell

Hosted by Mark Klobas
Scientists are learning more and more about how brain activity controls behavior and how neural circuits weigh alternatives and initiate actions. As we probe ever deeper into the mechanics of …

Biology and Evolution

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Interviews with biologists and evolutionary scientists about their new books.

Science September 8, 2023

Fascination of Science

60 Encounters with Pioneering Researchers of Our Time

Herlinde Koelbl

Hosted by Caleb Zakarin
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An intimate collection of portraits of internationally renowned scientists and Nobel Prize winners, paired with interviews and personal stories. What makes a brilliant scientist? Who are the people behind the …
The Future of . . . with Owen Bennett-Jones August 26, 2023

The Future of Talking

A Discussion with Shane O'Mara

Shane O'Mara

Hosted by Owen Bennett-Jones
Talking is a defining part of what makes us human – we are almost constantly in dialogue but what purpose does all this conversation serve? Both for the individual and …
Environmental Studies August 22, 2023

Tree Thieves

Crime and Survival in North America's Woods

Lyndsie Bourgon

Hosted by Brian Hamilton
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In Tree Thieves: Crime and Survival in North America's Woods (Little, Brown Spark, 2022), Lyndsie Bourgon takes us deep into the underbelly of the illegal timber market. As she traces three timber …
Environmental Studies August 20, 2023

Routledge Handbook of Rewilding

Sally Hawkins, Ian Convery, Steve Carver, and Rene Beyers

Hosted by Isobel Akerman
Routledge Handbook of Rewilding (Routledge, 2022) provides a comprehensive overview of the history, theory and current practices of ‘rewilding’. Rewilding offers a transformational paradigm shift in conservation thinking, and as …
Princeton UP Ideas Podcast August 15, 2023

Alien Worlds

How Insects Conquered the Earth, and Why Their Fate Will Determine Our Future

Steve Nicholls

Hosted by Mark Klobas
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Life on Earth depends on the busy activities of insects, but global populations of these teeming creatures are currently under threat, with grave consequences for us all. Steve Nicholls' book Alien …
Science, Technology, and Society August 11, 2023

Darwinism as Religion

What Literature Tells Us about Evolution

Michael Ruse

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh
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The Darwinian Revolution--the change in thinking sparked by Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species, which argued that all organisms including humans are the end product of a long, slow …
Science July 13, 2023

How to Speak Whale

A Voyage into the Future of Animal Communication

Tom Mustill

Hosted by Frances Sacks
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What if animals and humans could speak to one another? Tom Mustill—the nature documentarian who went viral when a thirty‑ton humpback whale breached onto his kayak—asks this question in his …
Academic Life June 29, 2023

The Killer Whale Journals

Our Love and Fear of Orcas

Hanne Strager

Hosted by Christina Gessler
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Like wolves, orcas have been loved and loathed throughout history. What created this complicated relationship between humans and whales? And have we changed our attitudes toward them and their habitat …
Science June 24, 2023

The World Before Us

The New Science Behind Our Human Origins

Tom Higham

Hosted by Melek Firat Altay
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Fifty thousand years ago, Homo sapiens was not the only species of humans in the world. There were also Neanderthals in what is now Europe, the Near East, and parts …
Science June 23, 2023

How Kant Matters for Biology

A Philosophical History

Andrew Jones

Hosted by Özlem Yilmaz
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Kant denied biology the status of a proper science, yet his account of the organism profoundly influenced a range of intellectual disciplines.  Andrew Jones's How Kant Matters for Biology: A Philosophical History …
MIT Press Podcast June 15, 2023

Prehension

The Hand and the Emergence of Humanity

Colin McGinn

Hosted by MIT Press
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Prehension is a hymn to the hand. In Prehension, Colin McGinn links questions from science to philosophical concerns to consider something that we take for granted: the importance of the …
MIT Press Podcast June 11, 2023

The Human Advantage

A New Understanding of How Our Brain Became Remarkable

Suzana Herculano-Houzel

Hosted by MIT Press
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Humans are awesome. Our brains are gigantic, seven times larger than they should be for the size of our bodies. The human brain uses 25% of all the energy the …
Medicine June 9, 2023

The Curious Human Knee

Han Yu

Hosted by Rachel Pagones
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Where would we be without the knee? This down-to-earth joint connecting the thigh and the lower leg doesn’t receive the attention it deserves. Yet, as The Curious Human Knee (Columbia UP …
Science June 7, 2023

Not Just for the Boys

Why We Need More Women in Science

Athene Donald

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh
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Why are girls discouraged from doing science? Why do so many promising women leave science in early and mid-career? Why do women not prosper in the scientific workforce? Not Just …
Science, Technology, and Society May 29, 2023

The Possibility of Life

Science, Imagination and Our Vision of the Cosmos

Jaime Green

Hosted by John Traphagan
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In this episode we talk to Jaime Green about her superb cultural and scientific exploration of alien life and the cosmos. It examines how the possibility of life on other planets shapes our understanding …
History of Science May 20, 2023

Split and Splice

A Phenomenology of Experimentation

Hans-Jörg Rheinberger

Hosted by Victor Monnin
In Split & Splice: A Phenomenology of Experimentation (University of Chicago Press, 2023), Hans-Jörg Rheinberger, director emeritus at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin, investigates …
The Future of . . . with Owen Bennett-Jones May 19, 2023

The Future of the Human Heart

A Discussion with Vincent M. Figueredo

Vincent M. Figueredo

Hosted by Owen Bennett-Jones
Long considered the most important of all organs, the human heart has fascinated artists and scientists alike. Listen to cardiologist Vincent Figueredo discuss knowledge of and attitudes towards the heart …
Princeton UP Ideas Podcast May 15, 2023

Period

The Real Story of Menstruation

Kate Clancy

Hosted by Mark Klobas
Menstruation is something half the world does for a week at a time, for months and years on end, yet it remains largely misunderstood. Scientists once thought of an individual's …
MIT Press Podcast May 9, 2023

Mikkael A. Sekeres on the Drugs Fighting Leukemia

Pharmacological Histories Ep. 2

Mikkael A. Sekeres

Hosted by MIT Press
This episode offers an insight into the work of leading cancer specialist and author of When Blood Breaks Down, Mikkael A. Sekeres. 1 in 2 people will develop cancer in …