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Alan Turing – In Our Time
- simonh 6y agoI can’t recommend the In Our Time podcast enough. It’s a fabulous library of high quality discourse.
- fanf2 6y agoOne of the great things about In Our Time is the breadth of topics: at the end of an episode about ancient Roman history, Melvyn will say that next week they will be talking about particle physics, and after an episode about palaeontology he will say next week they are talking about a 19th C. novelist. Fantastic :-) They have an absolutely huge library of old editions of the programme. I quite like looking at their twitter feed https://twitter.com/bbcinourtime https://twitter.com/bbcinourtime for suggestions about old episodes to listen to, because it gives me some of the randomness of listening to the latest weekly edition.
- nubbins 6y agoI love this podcast for anything in British history or literature. The aristocracy episode was particularly interesting. But the further afield it gets from that I feel like I don't come away having learned much about the history. He'll make random talking points like "Ghengis Kahn is remembered as a great conqueror" and then 3 phDs try to use that as a jumping off point to say something intelligent but end up arguing in different directions.
- TheGallopedHigh 6y agoIf you’re into British history checkout of “fall of civilizations” podcast on YouTube and other podcast apps. The first episode is of how Rome departed Britain
- throwawaylolx 6y agoThat's a very ungenerous characterisation of the show. Melvyn is very careful to keep a coherent progression in each episode, and he invites experts in fields relevant to the topic at hand. Among the ~1,000 episodes I'm sure there are some weak ones, but the way you frame it is as if British academics are not capable of discussing topics outside of their own culture or Melvyn is some amateur host who just wants to hear some pop history fun facts.
- nubbins 6y agoPossibly I am judging too harshly on a few weaker podcasts (though isn't that always the risk when a show has so many episodes) but "pop history fun facts" is how I would characterize a lot of the non Western ancient/medieval history episodes. 45 minutes on "the Samurai" feels a little thin when we have no background on Japan prior to that episode. And "Maths in the early Islamic World" was really frustrating how sometimes the guests are in the middle of making an interesting technical point and he interrupts with a totally different question.
- gherkinnn 6y agoAbsolutely. I’ve learned a tonne of things I never knew where interesting. Knowledgeable guests and a wide range of topics. It’s rare that I retain as much information as with this podcast. And Melvyn Bragg, the host, is such a character. I’d listen to it for him alone.
- TheGallopedHigh 6y agoI’m the beginning I tended to dislike him but he has definitely grown on me over time
- DC-3 6y agoIt's wonderful. Melvyn is an excellent 'man on the Clapham omnibus' - quietly intellectual, ever inquisitive, but never looking to show off his own knowledge and always more than happy to cede the limelight to the academics whom he hosts. He did struggle to follow along just a little bit in the P vs NP episode, though :-) Worth a listen for the HN crowd if only to see what trying to get to grips with computational complexity feels like to a true outsider.
- OJFord 6y agoOoh I didn't know these were so easily available online. I wake up to Radio 4 and quite often there's something interesting that I wish I were more awake for, or that I didn't have to abandon for a shower and a stand-up. I should just restart from the web player later on those days. Reading about Turing and visiting Bletchley is entirely responsible for me becoming a software engineer after a childhood of laser-focussed intent on electronics. Fascinating period, genius, and acceleration of the field - if you think computers went from being women to commercial machines basically (be lenient) resembling what we have today in, say, just twenty years from '35.
- kennywinker 6y agoIn our time episodes are also available as a podcast https://castro.fm/podcast/2b5f1391-0ea8-488b-8220-8bb43c7e42ca https://castro.fm/podcast/2b5f1391-0ea8-488b-8220-8bb43c7e42... :)
- tonyedgecombe 6y agoOr direct from the BBC: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qykl/episodes/downloads https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qykl/episodes/downloads
- hermitdev 6y agoNice that this is available to download outside of the UK (I'm in the US). I've already downloaded this and will listen tomorrow. I was under the impression that the BBC region locked such downloads to the UK due to their public funding.
- OJFord 6y agoWe need to pay a licence fee for the television (online or not) but not radio. Television licence isn't connected to BBC iPlayer (online BBC television live/VoD stream) accounts, so I think the region lock is just a lazy way to prevent people who certainly don't pay the licence fee from accessing the content. Since radio doesn't require a licence, no account, and anyone can access online. (Or offline if you manage to pick it up. Or DAB. Or the World Service, but quick search suggests it doesn't air In Our Time.)
- jstanley 6y agoThis seems to be gated behind a login wall? Is there an alternative source?
- lambertsimnel 6y agoThere's also an MP3 download without login here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qykl/episodes/downloads https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qykl/episodes/downloads
- hansjorg 6y agoIn Our Time episodes are also available as a podcast "from wherever you get your podcasts". There's a feed with all episodes and then there are separate feeds for each of history, science, culture, religion and philosophy.
- djaque 6y agoI remember watching some sort of British documentary on Alan Turing on youtube when I was in high school. It had interviews from all of the people that knew him during his lifetime. This was long before his story was popularized by "The Imitation Game" and so I can't find it now that there is so much other content. Does anybody else remember it? It was one of the good ones. From what I remember, the "asshole genius" trope was greatly played up for the film and he was much more human than that even with the treatment he endured.
- gherkinnn 6y agoJust listened to it last night. What an extraordinary man.
- kenver 6y agoFor those interested in this series, you might also like Desert Island Disks, which is a series that's been going for about 70 years with over 2000 episodes: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qnmr/episodes/player https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qnmr/episodes/player It's a great listen for short drives and commutes.
- omosubi 6y agoIn Our Time is great - a recent favorite was the episode on bird migrations. I had no idea that topic was so fascinating!
- tmpfs 6y agoI highly recommend this series of podcasts. I think i have listened to nearly all of them now. Melvyn Bragg is an acquired taste, at first i didn't like the way he interjects very much but now i am used to his style it's fine. The main attraction is the calibre of his guests who tend to be excellent. Some people have had problems with the direct downloads in the UK, i think maybe only streamed in the UK. I find it odd (ironic?) that it can be easier to get BBC content abroad! I particularly like the physics podcasts. The Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximal[1] is one of my favourites. [1] https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/topics/Paleocene%E2%80%93Eocene_Thermal_Maximum https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/topics/Paleocene%E2%80%93Eo...
- rstuart4133 6y agoThanks. Now I've listened to [1], I can see why it's one of your favourites. Enlightening to say the least.