Best Jad Abumrad Podcasts (2023)

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Radiolab

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Smog Cloud Silver Lining 31:49

2h ago31:49

31:49

Summer 2023 was a pretty scary one for the planet. Global temperatures in June and July reached record highs. And over in the North Atlantic Sea, the water temperature spiked to off-the-chart levels. Some people figured that meant we were about to go over the edge, doomsday. In the face of this, Hank Green (a long time environmentalist and science …

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Radiolab

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Driverless Dilemma 41:20

6d ago41:20

41:20

Most of us would sacrifice one person to save five. It’s a pretty straightforward bit of moral math. But if we have to actually kill that person ourselves, the math gets fuzzy. That’s the lesson of the classic Trolley Problem, a moral puzzle that fried our brains in an episode we did almost 20 years ago, then updated again in 2017. Historically, th…

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Radiotopia Presents: Bot Love

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Dear Alana from Tenderfoot TV 34:16

6d ago34:16

34:16

From tenderfoot.tv comes a new compelling podcast about 24-year-old Alana Chen who disappeared from Boulder, Colorado in 2019. She left behind two dozen journals chronicling a deep faith, her love of the outdoors, and her dream of becoming a nun. Alana also kept a secret, one that put her dream at risk. In this first episode, Simon travels to Bould…

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Radiolab

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Born This Way? 1:10:35

13d ago1:10:35

1:10:35

Today, the story of an idea. An idea that some people need, others reject, and one that will, ultimately, be hard to let go of. Special Thanks to Carl Zimmer, Eric Turkheimer, Andrea Ganna, Chandler Burr, Jacques Balthazart, Sean Mckeithan, Joe Osmundson, Jennifer Brier, Daniel Levine-Spound, Maddie Sofia, Elie Mystal, Heather Radke EPISODE CREDITS…

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Radiolab

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Touch at a Distance 51:34

20d ago51:34

51:34

In this episode from 2007, we take you on a tour of language, music, and the properties of sound. We look at what sound does to our bodies, our brains, our feelings… and we go back to the reason we at Radiolab tell you stories the way we do. First, we look at Diana Deutsch’s work on language and music, and how certain languages seem to promote musi…

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Radiolab

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Rumble Strip: Finn and the Bell 38:28

27d ago38:28

38:28

A couple years ago, our producer Annie McEwen listened to an audio documentary that, she said, “tore my heart wide open.” That episode , “Finn and the Bell,” (https://zpr.io/TDjwQuXFDSz6) by independent producer Erica Heilman (maker of the podcast Rumble Strip), went on to win some of the biggest awards in audio (including a Peabody, https://zpr.io…

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Radiotopia Presents: Bot Love

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Introducing Weight For It from Radiotopia and ohitsBigRonStudios 12:14

28d ago12:14

12:14

In this episode, we’re introducing our Radiotopia Presents listeners to a brand new show out now from Radiotopia. It’s called Weight For It. Weight For It unpacks the nuanced thoughts of fat folks, and of all folks who think about their weight all the time. Through narrative storytelling, and some memoir, host Ronald Young Jr. hopes to have the con…

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Radiolab

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The Wubi Effect 57:32

1M ago57:32

57:32

When we think of China today, we think of a technological superpower. From Huawei and 5G to TikTok and viral social media, China is stride for stride with the United States in the world of computing. However, China’s technological renaissance almost didn’t happen. And for one very basic reason: The Chinese language, with its 70,000 plus characters,…

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Radiolab

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The Internet Dilemma 37:09

1M ago37:09

37:09

Matthew Herrick was sitting on his stoop in Harlem when something weird happened. Then, it happened again. And again. It happened so many times that it became an absolute nightmare—a nightmare that haunted his life daily and flipped it completely upside down. What stood between Matthew and help were 26 little words. These 26 words, known as Section…

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Radiolab

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Right to be Forgotten 54:18

2M ago54:18

54:18

In online news, stories live forever. The tipsy photograph of you at the college football game? It’s there. That news article about the political rally you were marching at? It’s there. A charge for driving under the influence? That’s there, too. But what if... it wasn’t? Several years ago a group of journalists in Cleveland, Ohio, tried an experim…

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Radiolab

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Little Black Holes Everywhere 34:52

2M ago34:52

34:52

In 1908, on a sunny, clear, quiet morning in Siberia, witnesses recall seeing a blinding light streak across the sky, and then… the earth shook, a forest was flattened, fish were thrown from streams, and roofs were blown off houses. The “Tunguska event,” as it came to be known, was one of the largest extraterrestrial impact events in Earth’s histor…

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Radiotopia Presents: Bot Love

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Introducing Hang Up from Radiotopia 45:22

2M ago45:22

45:22

Today we’re introducing our Radiotopia Presents listeners to a brand new dating game show, out now from Radiotopia. It’s called Hang Up. In each season, one person (the Star) is matched with six prospective love interests (the Callers). They go on dates over the phone and never see each other. After the dates, the Star chooses one person to “hang u…

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Radiolab

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The Right Stuff 41:02

2M ago41:02

41:02

Since the beginning of the space program, we’ve expected astronauts to be fully-abled athletic overachievers—one-part science geeks, two-part triathletes—a mix the writer Tom Wolfe called “the right stuff.” But what if, this whole time, we’ve had it wrong? In this episode from 2022, reporter Andrew Leland joins blind Linguistics Professor Sheri Wel…

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Radiolab

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The Fellowship of the Tree Rings 29:15

2M ago29:15

29:15

At a tree ring conference in the relatively treeless city of Tucson, Arizona, three scientists walk into a bar. The trio gets to talking, trying to explain a mysterious set of core samples from the Florida Keys. At some point, they come up with a harebrained idea: put the tree rings next to a seemingly unrelated dataset. Once they do, they notice s…

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Radiolab

1
Man Against Horse 56:33

3M ago56:33

56:33

This is a story about your butt. It’s a story about how you got your butt, why you have your butt, and how your butt might be one of the most important and essential things for you being you, for being human. In this episode from 2019, Reporter Heather Radke and Producer Matt Kielty talk to two researchers who followed the butt from our ancient beg…

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Radiolab

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The Cataclysm Sentence 1:13:01

3M ago1:13:01

1:13:01

Sad news for all of us: producer Rachael Cusick— who brought us soul-stirring stories rethinking grief (https://zpr.io/GZ6xEvpzsbHU) and solitude (https://zpr.io/eT5tAX6JtYra), as well as colorful musings on airplane farts (https://zpr.io/CNpgUijZiuZ4) and belly flops (https://zpr.io/uZrEz27z63CB) and Blueberry Earths (https://zpr.io/EzxgtdTRGVzz)—…

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Radiotopia Presents: Bot Love

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Dreamtown: The Story of Adelanto 34:21

3M ago34:21

34:21

Today we share the first episode of a new series, Dreamtown, from our friends at Crooked Media. Bug’s Plan. It’s 2014. Adelanto is a bankrupt city in the California desert known for its massive detention centers and not much else. Then, a stranger comes to town with a wild idea to make Adelanto great again: Become the first city in Southern Califor…

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Radiolab

1
Americanish 1:13:34

3M ago1:13:34

1:13:34

Given reporter Julia Longoria’s long love affair with the Supreme Court, it’s no surprise she’s become the new host of More Perfect (https://zpr.io/4R9fMg9gJ96k), a show all about how the Supreme Court got to be so… supreme. This week, we talk to Julia about her journey to the host seat, and we highlight an episode she produced for Radiolab in 2019…

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Radiotopia Presents: Bot Love

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Father's Day with The Heart 52:18

3M ago52:18

52:18

We have a treat for you this Fathers Day—an episode from Radiotopia’s The Heart. In the latest season titled DAD, The Heart brings you a different kind of love story, one between a father and daughter. In this first episode, Kaitlin tells the story of her relationship with her dad from birth to adulthood. As she matures into adulthood, she grapples…

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Radiolab

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Beware the Sand Striker 29:20

3M ago29:20

29:20

Shipworms. Hairy Chested Yeti Crabs. Parasitic Barnacles in the cloaca of Greenland Sharks. These are the types of creatures Sabrina Imbler, a columnist at Defector, likes to write about. The stranger, the better. In this episode, Imbler discusses how they balance maintaining scientific rigor while also drawing inspiration and metaphor from the ani…

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Radiolab

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Eye in the Sky 37:42

4M ago37:42

37:42

Ross McNutt has a superpower: he can zoom in on everyday life, then rewind and fast-forward to solve crimes in a shutter-flash. But should he? In 2004, when casualties in Iraq were rising due to roadside bombs, Ross McNutt and his team came up with an idea. With a small plane and a 44 megapixel camera, they figured out how to watch an entire city a…

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Radiolab

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The Seagulls 38:06

4M ago38:06

38:06

In the 1970s, as LGBTQ+ people in the United States faced conservatives whose top argument was that homosexuality is “unnatural,” a pair of young scientists discovered on a tiny island off the coast of California a colony of seagulls that included… a significant number of female homosexual couples making nests and raising chicks together. The artic…

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Radiolab

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On the Edge 42:20

4M ago42:20

42:20

At the 1998 Olympics in Nagano, Japan, one athlete pulled a move that, as far as we know, no one else had ever attempted. In this episode, first aired in the Spring of 2016, we tell you about Surya Bonaly. Surya was not your typical figure skater: she is black, she is athletic, and she didn’t seem to care about artistry. Her performances—punctuated…

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Radiolab

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Family People 1:03:47

4M ago1:03:47

1:03:47

In 2021, editor Alex Neason's grandfather passed away. On his funeral program, she learned the name of his father for the first time: Wilson Howard. Not Neason. Howard. And when she asked her family why his last name was different from everybody else's, nobody had an answer. In this episode, we tag along as Alex searches for answers through swampy …

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Radiotopia Presents: Bot Love

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A Mother's Day Revisit with My Mother Made Me 30:37

4M ago30:37

30:37

In honor of Mother's Day, we revisit the first episode of author Jason Reynolds’ audio memoir, My Mother Made Me, featuring (and celebrating) one of our favorite mothers–Isabell Reynolds. It’s a wonderful introduction to Jason and a love letter to his mother, Isabell. We hope you enjoy – and maybe share with a mother figure in your life. My Mother …

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Radiolab

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The War on Our Shore 1:01:08

4M ago1:01:08

1:01:08

Foreign enemies have seldom brought war to U.S. soil… right? In this episode from 2017, we tell you strange stories of foreign enemies landing on our shore. From bombs floating across the country without a sound (or even a discussion), to Nazi prisoners of war leading placid lives in towns nationwide, listen to how war quietly wormed its way into t…

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Radiolab

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Ologies: Dark Matters 35:41

5M ago35:41

35:41

Testudinology. Enigmatology. Hagfishology. Raccoonology. Meteorology. Chronobiology. Chickenology. Delphinology. Bryology. Vampirology. Zymology. Echinology. Screamology. Melaninology. Dolorology.In this episode, we introduce you to one of our all-time favorite science podcasts. Ologies. A show that’s a kindred spirit to ours, but also… very differ…

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Radiolab

1
The Golden Rule 22:41

5M ago22:41

22:41

At first glance, Golden Balls was just like all the other game shows — quick-witted host, flashy set, suspenseful music. But underneath all that, each episode asked a very serious question: can you ever really trust another person? Executive producer Andy Rowe explains how the show used a whole lot of money and a simple set of rules to force us to …

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