Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda

AI generated voices like Alexa and Siri are now so much a part of our everyday experience that disembodied chatbots that talk are edging ever closer to being accepted as real. And not for the first time: attempts to generate artificial human voices date back over two centuries. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal da...

Stories of the discovery that the air is full of invisible life – and how that discovery was tragically overlooked when the covid pandemic struck. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

His far-reaching career acting, writing and producing on television and film spans voicing a sloth in the movie Ice Age to hosting a PBS series on the untold history of Latinos in the US. He’s fast talking, funny, outspoken and possesses a rare quality in his acting – on display in his new movie Bob Trevino Likes It. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information abo...

Alan and Clear and Vivid’s executive producer Graham Chedd chat about and play clips from some of the shows coming up in season 29. Guests include actor John Leguizamo, science writer Carl Zimmer, and astrophysicist Mario Livio. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

A chat with an actor who does it all. After recovering from a near fatal fall on stage as his career was beginning, Bill Pullman has not only had a busy and award-winning career on stage, screen and television, he’s also getting into science communication  – while working on a one-man play and making hard cider for his friends and neighbors. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswiz...

How the letters in the acronym TALK can have a profound effect on the next conversation you have. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

A psychiatrist, engineer and neuroscientist, Kaf Dzirasa is researching ways to reengineer the brain to make it better able to cope with stress and so improve mental health. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Artificial intelligence is poised to reshape our world, in many ways for the better. But the gains come with great risks – above all that its seductive appeal lulls us into believing that AI machines know better than we do. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

His new book  Revenge of The Tipping Point  takes a fresh look at the tipping points of social change he opened our eyes to 25 years ago  –­ and unearths unexpected explanations for such new questions as: what really drove the opioid crisis, why diversity matters, and why Harvard University has a women’s rugby team. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information abou...

In a remarkable and illuminating tour de force, the novelist recently took a fresh look at her best-known book, going through it line by line and annotating it with handwritten notes in the margins – notes on things she both loved and hated. “It shows,” she says, “a lot about how to write a novel.” Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection a...

The answer, regrettably, is unbelievable. That is, unbelievable to most of us, because we cannot imagine a universe – including ourselves – made of waves. Quantum physicist Matt Strassler braves the task of convincing Alan he is a collection of waves, and in doing so helps Alan answer a question that’s haunted him for more than a decade. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.co...

Her new book,  Linguaphile: A Life of Language Love  is an ode to the power of language to both shape us and be shaped by us. It’s informed by her own experience with languages: she spoke five before learning English as an immigrant to Canada as a child. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The 500 feet of wiring packed into fruit fly’s brain has been fully mapped – giving insights into how the more that 300,000  miles  of wiring packed into your brain generates your thoughts, feelings, perceptions and actions. These insights could also lead to novel treatments for the diseases caused when the wiring goes wrong. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for inform...

In 1925, a trial in a small town in Tennessee riveted the nation. In the dock was a young man named John Scopes, charged with violating a state law outlawing the teaching of evolution. The trial exposed fault lines in society that are opening again today, a century later. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for...

Music can lift our spirits, bring us to tears, spark our creativity, pace our workouts. Neuroscientist and musician Daniel Levitin explores all these benefits of music – and adds the recent scientific evidence that in some chronic medical conditions, music is medicinal. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for a...

Alan and Clear and Vivid’s executive producer Graham Chedd chat about and play clips from some of the shows coming up in season 28. A major theme of the season is language –from babies picking up clues about  their mother’s language while still in the womb, to male fruit flies singing courtship songs to female fruit flies, to a best-selling novelist second guessing some of the language she used in...

Offsprings of the Earth – Earthlings – we are most of us ignorant of the 3.5 billion years of experiments our planet has been through to produce us. Yet the story is there in the rocks all around us – if only we can decipher what they have to say. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

So much of our communication is spontaneous and yet we never really learn or are taught how to do it well – we’re just expected to do it. How to avoid being tongue-tied, whether when called upon to give an impromptu speech or when sitting next to a stranger at a dinner party. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data...

Eliciting the story behind a patient’s visit to the hospital can lead to better diagnosis and treatment than medical tests alone – and also reveals much of what needs fixing in health care today. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Alan’s fleeting thought while chasing a spider around the floor sparked a conversation with an animal minds expert who argues that many more creatures than we imagine are conscious. What could this mean for our relationship with the rest of the animal kingdom – including those that annoy us and those we eat? Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our co...

Good analogies led to cheaper cars and Apple computers; bad ones to lives wasted and lost. And while puns might not always make you smile (or grimace), they helped pave the way for written language. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

As a Black graduate student disillusioned with academia, she founded Minorities in Shark Science (MISS). She now pursues her passion for sharks and outreach to a public fearful of sharks as a successful independent researcher. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

For most of us who live in the “tame” modern world, a reminder of how we can refresh ourselves by experiencing the wild world – even the wild world of our backyard or city streets. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

His research figuring out how our brains make moral judgments has led to two on-line games: One aimed at overcoming political animosity (and that’s fun to play!); the other to satisfy both your head and your heart when you donate to charity. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Most of us have no idea how others – even our friends and neighbors – spend their days at work. What’s it really like to be a plumber, a marriage counselor, an ice cream truck owner, an author of mystery novels? In his podcast Dan Heath talks to workers in dozens of different jobs to find out What It’s Like to Be. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about...