Joshua Gans, "The Pandemic Information Gap and the Brutal Economics of Covid-19" (MIT Press, 2020)
As the COVID-19 pandemic took hold in March, a self-isolating and easily distracted economist resolved to take himself in hand. "I decided I would do what I was good at: I would write a book" about th...
17 Nov 202035min
Ido Hartogsohn, "American Trip: Set, Setting, and the Psychedelic Experience in the Twentieth Century" (MIT Press, 2020)
Are psychedelics invaluable therapeutic medicines, or dangerously unpredictable drugs that precipitate psychosis? Tools for spiritual communion or cognitive enhancers that spark innovation? Activators...
13 Nov 20201h 3min
Robert Plomin, "Blueprint: How DNA Makes Us Who We Are" (MIT Press, 2019)
Have you ever felt, “Oh my God, I’m turning into my mother (or father)!” ? Robert Plomin explains why that happens in Blueprint: How DNA Makes Us Who We Are (MIT Press, 2019).A century of genetic rese...
22 Okt 20201h 8min
Jonathan Haber, "Critical Thinking" (The MIT Press, 2020)
In this episode, I speak with fellow New Books in Education host, Jonathan Haber, about his book, Critical Thinking (The MIT Press, 2020).This book explains the widely-discussed but often ill-defined ...
15 Sep 202059min
David Haig, "From Darwin to Derrida: Selfish Genes, Social Selves, and the Meanings of Life" (MIT Press, 2020)
In his book, From Darwin to Derrida: Selfish Genes, Social Selves, and the Meanings of Life (MIT Press), evolutionary biologist David Haig explains how a physical world of matter in motion gave rise t...
10 Sep 202042min
Katie Day Good, "Bring the World to the Child: Technologies of Global Citizenship in American Education" (MIT Press, 2020)
Even before the Covid-19 pandemic, boosters of digital educational technologies emphasized that these platforms are vital tools for cultivating global citizenship, connecting students across borders, ...
17 Aug 202036min
Austin Choi-Fitzpatrick, "The Good Drone: How Social Movements Democratize Surveillance" (MIT Press, 2020)
The Good Drone: How Social Movements Democratize Surveillance (MIT Press), by Austin Choi-Fitzpatrick, demonstrates that this technology – which is mostly associated with covert surveillance and remot...
14 Aug 202040min
Satyan Devadoss, "Mage Merlin's Unsolved Mathematical Mysteries" (MIT Press, 2020)
There are very few math books that merit the adjective ‘charming’ but Mage Merlin's Unsolved Mathematical Mysteries (MIT Press, 2020) is one of them. Satyan Devadoss and Matt Harvey have chosen a trul...
13 Aug 202054min
