The following audio files come from a larger group of 86 for this week. Double or ctrl-click individual highlighted links, below, to get single podcasts. A zip file of all 19 podcasts converted to 1.5x speed will download here for four months. Other groups of podcasts are discussed at the end of this episode.
Alternative Medicine 30 mins – “In this edition of Medscape One-on-One, Eric J. Topol, MD, and Paul A. Offit, MD, discuss Offit’s new book, Do You Believe in Magic? The Sense and Nonsense of Alternative Medicine. In his book, Dr. Offit takes a look at the billion-dollar, unregulated supplement, vitamin, and alternative medicine industries.” At the link find the title, “Do You Believe in Magic? Topol, Offit on Alternative Medicine ,” right-click “Media files 811569.mp3” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu. (Transcript is available here.)
Arab Uprising Implications 50 mins – Former US Ambassador to Tunisia Gordon Gray discusses the impact of the so-called Arab Spring uprisings. One contribution has been the size of the under-35 age group — 31% in the UK, 42% in Tunisian and 65% in Yemen. Pervasive and blatant corruption by elite members of society coupled with extensive poverty also fueled uprisings. Some rulers fled, some did not and some responded with changes, while others attempted severe repression with the military. Anti-Americanism was not an element, although present. The dynamic nature of the aftermath in each case makes predictions difficult. At the link right-click “Listen” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Cleanliness in America 53 mins – “…we haven’t always thought of what it is to be “clean” in quite the same ways. So in this episode, we dig into the changing ways Americans have defined what it is to be clean. We’ll meet an 18th-century Pennsylvania woman who didn’t immerse herself in water for 28 years, and ask how Americans like her kept clean without getting wet. We’ll also hear about the campaign to clean up New York City in the mid-19th century, and question the extent to which germ theory really revolutionized sanitary practices. And we’ll consider a dark chapter in the history of cleanliness, when social reformers in the early 20th-century set out to “sanitize” America’s racial profile.'” At the link right-click “Download” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Community Broadband Act 23 mins – “We are excited to continue our history series with Jim Baller of the Baller Herbst Law Firm. This is Jim’s third time on the program, having joined us for Episode 57 and Episode 63. We continue our discussion with a recap of the events of 2004, including Jim’s work with Lafayette to find a compromise to the ALEC bill that would have effectively banned municipal networks in Louisiana and the Verizon-led campaign to prevent Pennsylvania communities from following the muni fiber path of Kutztown. We discuss several of the state battles over the years and the near passage of the Community Broadband Act by the U.S. Congress. Also, how some of the big telecom carriers started to invest in FTTH [Fiber To The Home] after the model was proved by community networks. We’ll have Jim back for future shows as we continue charting the history of community owned networks.” At the link find Episode 67, right-click in the body where it says “… download this Mp3 file…” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Dungeons and Dragons 52 mins – “Decades before social media, there was Dungeons & Dragons. Since the 70s the collaborative game has been the center of one of the original nerd subcultures. And while you may imagine that Paladins, Thieves and Clerics battling Orcs and Hobgoblins is a thing of the past, there are still millions of fans. Journalist David Ewalt is one of them. He’s written a book that chronicles the history of D&D and Friday, he joins guest host Terry Gildea to talk about the influence of this popular (and widely misunderstood) game.” At the link right-click “Listen” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Food Failings 54 mins – “Michael Enright speaks with two maverick thinkers on food: Thomas Pawlick, the author of “The End of Food“, and Gary Taubes, the author of “Why We Get Fat” [note the 895 reviews]. Pawlick argues the nutritional value of commercialized food is declining, up to 50%, and many undesirable materials, such as salt, are being added. He suggests we avoid supermarkets and agrees with Wendell Berry who says we’ve become separated from our food. People may live longer, but that is reversing. We need to be scared into using more expensive but more nutritious local food. Taubes adds his concern by advising obesity is caused by insulin changes driven by increased carbohydrate consumption. At the link find the title, “The Enright Files – Food,” right-click (there or here) “Download The Enright Files – Food” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Higgs Boson Value 33 mins – “A replay of two book interviews related to this week’s Nobel Prize for physics.” Sean Carroll, author of the popular The Particle at the End of the Universe: … says it’s the field that’s important, not the particle. All particles come from fields, so field theory is the heart of this matter. Magnetic and gravity fields are popular examples of fields. The Higgs field differs because it interacts with all other fields and is what causes a particle to have mass. The boson aspect is a vibration in the Higgs field. At the link find the title, “Nobel Prize Bonus podcast,” right-click “Media files quirksaio 20131008 67457.mp3” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Institutional Racism 28 mins – “White Coat, Black Art looks at whether first nations patients sometimes get second-class health care.” An inside look and difficult look at how even highly trained medical professionals are affected by stereotyping. At the link find the title, “WCBA First Nations Patients: Second-Class Care,” right-click on “Media files whitecoat 20131005 19082.mp3” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
International Commerce 68 mins – “On the ancient Silk Road, treasure-laden caravans made their arduous way through deserts and mountain passes, establishing trade between Asia and the civilizations of Europe and the Mediterranean. Today’s electronic Silk Roads ferry information across continents, enabling individuals and corporations anywhere to provide or receive services without obtaining a visa. But the legal infrastructure for such trade is yet rudimentary and uncertain. If an event in cyberspace occurs at once everywhere and nowhere, what law applies? How can consumers be protected when engaging with companies across the world? In his new book The Electronic Silk Road Anupam Chander — Director of the California International Law Center and professor of law at the University of California, Davis — discusses the urgent questions of law and policy raised by the new trade routes of the Internet.” At the link right-click “MP3” beside “Download” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Ivory Poaching 5 mins – “Elephant Action League recently completed a two-year investigation into illegal poaching in Africa. And it led to al-Shabab, the Islamic militant group in Somalia that raided and occupied Nairobi’s Westgate Mall for several days last month. Al-Shabab is buying illegal ivory from poachers, says Crosta. His group documented an estimated one to three tons of ivory going into Somalia each month through al-Shabab traders. He says that’s a lot of money, “enough to fund of up to 40 percent of the monthly salary of Shabab’s estimated 5,000 fighters.'” At the link you can watch the video program, but not download; however, it’s included in the zip file noted at the start of this episode.
Money Transfers 22 mins – “So we’re making a T-shirt and we do this Kickstarter campaign and we raise $590,807 (which, really, we can’t thank you enough). It turns out the money collected on Kickstarter is handled by Amazon. Great, we figure: This is the company that will sell you anything on the planet and get it you you the next day. And what we need in this case isn’t even a thing, really. We just need Amazon’s bank to send money electronically to a checking account at Chase bank. It’s just information traveling over wires. How long could it take: A minute? An hour? It took five days. On today’s show: Why the invisible pipes that move money around America are so slow. (And why the ones in England are so much faster.)” At the link find the title, “#489: The Invisible Plumbing Of Our Economy,” right-click “Media files npr_229341387.mp3” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
NSA Surveillance for Lawyers 38 mins – “Edward Snowden’s leaks about NSA surveillance have been a hot topic in the media for the last few months. But what do lawyers, specifically, need to worry about? The answer is: a lot. On this edition of Digital Detectives, hosts Sharon D. Nelson, Esq. and John W. Simek take the stage and examine NSA surveillance as it relates to lawyers. Tune in for an overview of Snowden and the NSA surveillance controversy, how effective (or ineffective) encrypting data is, whether the surveillance is having a chilling effect on lawyers, how to abide by the Model Rules of Professionalism 1.6, and an answer to the underlying question – has George Orwell’s dystopia, 1984, arrived a few decades late?” At the link right-click “Download” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Nuclear Science 30 mins – “In a rebroadcast from March 14, 2010, Keith talks with Heino Nitsche, a nuclear chemist at the Department of Chemistry, the University of California at Berkeley. Heino believes we should put aside the unnecessary fears many of us have about nuclear energy. He talks about controlling the fission process so that it simply produces energy and doesn’t turn into a bomb. Heino also explains how nuclear waste can be recycled as fuel instead of being stored underground for thousands of years.” At the link right-click “Listen” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Pregnant Economist 61 mins – “Emily Oster of the University of Chicago and author of Expecting Better talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about her book on pregnancy and the challenges of decision-making under uncertainty. Oster argues that many of the standard behavioral prescriptions for pregnant women are not supported by the medical literature. The conversation centers around the general issue of interpreting medical evidence in a complex world using pregnancy advice as an application. Alcohol, caffeine, cats, gardening and deli-meats and their effect on pregnant women are some of the examples that come up. The conversation closes with a discussion of Oster’s work on hepatitis-B and the male-female birth ratio.” [Eighty-nine of 195 reviewers on Amazon gave it one-star; controversial?] At the link right-click “Download” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Tar Sands Pipeline 5 mins – “Canada has the third largest oil reserves in the world, after Saudi Arabia and Venezuela, mainly in its Alberta province. Until recently, the very heavy crude mixed with sand, clay minerals and water was too expensive to process. That’s no longer true, but the government is having another problem – finding any path to move that oil to a coast to export it. Plans to build pipelines to the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean are in question due to environmental concerns. Now, a new front is opening in the effort to move oil out of Canada’s tar sands… Christine McKeen has a front-row seat to the controversy. McKeen opens a gate to a hayfield by her house on the outskirts of Canada’s capital, Ottawa… She points to two little stakes on the road. “That indicates the pipeline,” she says. The pipeline that crosses the land was actually built years ago to carry natural gas to Canada’s interior from the Atlantic coast. Now, the company TransCanada wants to put the old line to a new use. It wants to reverse its flow and add hundreds of miles of new pipeline. TransCanada would convert the line to carry oil in the opposite direction, from the tar sands of Alberta east for export to world markets. The project, called Energy East, would run right through Ottawa, Montreal, Quebec City, and a number of First Nations, or native American, lands. Like many along the route, McKeen wants no part of it. She worries about spills of the tar sand’s thick, gooey oil, like one that happened three years ago in Michigan….” At the link find the title, “Canada takes another run at finding a pipeline for its tar sands oil,” right-click “Media files 101020137.mp3” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Watson Apps 24 mins – “What’s Watson the supercomputer up to these days? We examine how this Jeopardy champion has gone from winning game shows to changing health care, finance, and education.” At the link right-click “Download” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Weight Loss Microbe 2 mins – “Of all the bacteria in and on our bodies that we need for good health, there’s one that may determine whether some people are obese. The bacterium called Akkermansia muciniphila is in the layer of mucous that coats the surface of the lining of the intestinal tract. In a healthy person, this bacterium comprises 3-5% of all bacteria present, which is a lot. A recent study found the amount of these bacteria in your intestinal tract is highly correlated with your body weight. This means that low numbers of it are correlated with obesity and Type 2 diabetes, and high numbers are linked to a healthy weight.” At the link right-click “MP3” just under the title and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Wendell Berry Environmentalist 57 mins – “This week on Moyers & Company in a rare television interview, Bill talks to visionary, author and farmer Wendell Berry to discuss a sensible, but no-compromise plan to save the Earth. We also examine the critical role of honey bees in our food supply and the threats they face in The Dance of the Honey Bee. And after the antics in Washington this week, Bill shares his views on the government shutdown. Wendell Berry, one of America’s most influential writers who has written more than 40 novels, books of poetry, short stories and essays, has become an outspoken advocate for revolution. He’s calling for immediate action to end industrial farming and return to the sustainable farming methods of years past. In his interview with Bill, Berry says: “People who own the world outright for profit will have to be stopped; by influence, by power, by us.” At the link find the title, “Full Show: Wendell Berry, Poet & Prophet,” right-click (there or here) “Play Now” and select “Save Link As” from the pop-up menu.
Women at Work Post WWII 53 mins – “University of Maryland professor Robyn Muncy analyses the lives of American women in the period after World War II through the late 20th century, focusing on their experiences in the labor market. Professor Muncy argues that women did not leave the workforce after World War II as popularly believed, but were forced out of the higher paying positions they acquired during the war and into lower paying jobs. The University of Maryland is in College Park.” At the link you can watch the video program, but not download; however, the audio version is included in the zip file noted at the start of this episode. =============================================================== ARCHIVE Jan-Jun 2013 files in 18 zip segments (832 podcasts) and a pdf list are here. Jan-Jun 2012 files in 8 segments (362 podcasts) and a pdf list are here, and 591 for Jul-Dec here. For 2011 a list and 5 segments 184 podcasts. For 2010 and earlier 64 podcasts are listed in this PDF and are zipped here as Part 1 and Part 2. (Dead links in old episodes are due to updating; try a current episode.) Over 160 feeds used to prepare this weekly blog are harvested with Feedreader3. The feeds are available in this opml file which Feedreader can import. A PDF list of feeds is here. Free Commander is used to compare old with new downloads to remove duplicates. MP3 Speed Changer is used to boost playback speed to 1.5x. A speed listening background article is here. Please comment on any problems with the links and downloads. Thanks for visiting.
Media Mining Digest 