"Boring since Titanic"?? He was godawful in Titanic. Blood Diamond or Departed FTW.

The very fact that you are reading this sentence, contemplating whether you want to listen to this podcast, means that you are living out a fantasy from a previous generation's cyberpunk novel.

However you made it here, however you got these words into your brain, you did so by diving through data streams first cooked up by delirious engineers downing late-night coffees, wandering deep within rows of data tape unspooling from jerky, spinning platters.

We've been dreaming of this life for a long time, since before the vacuum tubes and punchcards of the '40s, and now that we are here, some people are worried that the tech will, at best, make us lazy, and at worst make us stupid.

Is all this new technology improving our thinking or dampening it? Are all these new communication tools turning us into navel-gazing human/brand hybrids, or are we developing a new set of senses that allow us to benefit from never severing contact with the people most important to us?

That's the topic of this episode of the You Are Not So Smart Podcast, and to answer these questions we welcome this episode's guest, Clive Thompson, who is the author of Smarter Than You Think: How Technology is Changing Our Minds for the Better. As the title suggests, he disagrees with the naysayers, and his book is an impressive investigation into why they are probably (thankfully) wrong. Thompson is a journalist whose work can be found published in Wired, The Washington Post, and the New York Times Magazine. You can learn more about him at his website, CollisionDetection.Net.

After the interview, I discuss a news story about research into how the way you walk can encourage or discourage criminals to attack you.

In every episode, before I read a bit of self delusion news, I taste a cookie baked from a recipe sent in by a listener/reader. That listener/reader wins a signed copy of my new book, “You Are Now Less Dumb,” and I post the recipe on the YANSS Pinterest page. This episode’s winner is Joye Swan who submitted a recipe for chewy rosemary sugar cookies. Send your own recipes to david {at} youarenotsosmart.com.

013 - Technology - Clive Thompson

Read by Fred Sanders

From Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Will Bunch, the epic untold story of college—the great political and cultural fault line of American life

"This book is simply terrific." —Heather Cox Richardson, publisher of the "Letters from an American" Substack

"A must-read." —Nancy MacLean, author of Democracy in Chains

Today there are two Americas, separate and unequal, one educated and one not. And these two tribes—the resentful “non-college” crowd and their diploma-bearing yet increasingly disillusioned adversaries—seem on the brink of a civil war. The strongest determinant of whether a voter was likely to support Donald Trump in 2016 was whether or not they attended college, and the degree of loathing they reported feeling toward the so-called “knowledge economy of clustered, educated elites. Somewhere in the winding last half-century of the United States, the quest for a college diploma devolved from being proof of America’s commitment to learning, science, and social mobility into a kind of Hunger Games contest to the death. That quest has infuriated both the millions who got shut out and millions who got into deep debt to stay afloat.

In After the Ivory Tower Falls, award-winning journalist Will Bunch embarks on a deeply reported journey to the heart of the American Dream. That journey begins in Gambier, Ohio, home to affluent, liberal Kenyon College, a tiny speck of Democratic blue amidst the vast red swath of white, post-industrial, rural midwestern America. To understand “the college question,” there is no better entry point than Gambier, where a world-class institution caters to elite students amidst a sea of economic despair.

From there, Bunch traces the history of college in the U.S., beginning with the first technical schools, through the landmark GI Bill, and the culture wars of the 60’s and 70’s, which found their start on college campuses. We see how resentment of college-educated elites morphed into a rejection of knowledge itself—and how the explosion in student loan debt fueled major social movements like Occupy Wall Street. Bunch then takes a question we need to ask all over again—what, and who, is college even for?—and pushes it into the 21st century by proposing a new model that works for all Americans.

The sum total is a stunning work of journalism, one that lays bare the root of our political, cultural, and economic division—and charts a path forward for America.

After the Ivory Tower Falls by Will Bunch

Wall Street Journal's Josh Zumbrun details how airlines get rid of certain passengers on a flight and how passengers can fight against this issue.

The Science Behind Who Airlines Bump From a Flight—and How to Exploit It

Aug 19 Daily Briefing with Jake Johannsen

Ep 501 Dystopian Delights

Mekki, Benjamin et Grace ont fait des études universitaires en France avant de tenter d’intégrer le monde du travail. Qu’on soit Algérien, Camerounais ou Franco-Congolaise, les opportunités en tant que Noir ou Maghrébin sont-elles différentes d’un pays à l’autre, d’un continent à l’autre ?

La route de l'Eldorado
Ils et elles ont quitté leur pays pour la France avant de choisir de s’installer au Canada. Ils et elles nous racontent la France, son accueil, ses opportunités, mais aussi ses blocages. Après leur expérience française ils ont finalement atterri à Montréal, Ottawa ou Vancouver, où Halima Elkhatabi les a rencontrés. Après la Route du Bled, Halima Elkhatabi tisse avec finesse onze récits qui racontent un double exil avec émotion et lucidité. Une coproduction ARTE Radio - Radio Canada qui permet de passionnants regards croisés sur la France et la Canada.

Enregistrements : 2021 - Entretiens et prises de son : Halima Elkhatabi - Réalisation et mixage : Charlie Marcelet - Musiques originales : Samuel Hirsch - Illustration : Lola Penicaud - Production : Radio-Canada OHdio, ARTE Radio

La route de l'Eldorado (3/5) : Une lumière au bout du voyage

Raven Hyphen Sigh'Moan is still acting a damn fool.

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The Name Game

Doug shares the audio from the opening moments of The Benson Movie Interruption of "Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory."

P.S. I Love You

Frankie isn’t a real Media Influencer, but the Government saw the 500k followers he bought for his Instagram profile and arrested him anyway. Now he’s in a Media internment Camp.

Written by Benjamen Walker, with help from Louis Kornfeld.
Produced by Jonathan Mitchell

Part 2 is available now on Benjamen Walker's Theory of Everything.
https://toe.prx.org/2017/06/influencers-part-ii-of-ii/

The Truth

Influencers (part I of II)

Doug reads your message. Yes, one message.

American Pie

We’re fresh off ‘Green Book’ achieving its dream Oscar night (CONGRATULATIONS you made-up Hero Dad Story you!!!). But this week’s episode is about EVERY Oscars ceremony. Why? Because the Oscars dictate most of your movie-watching year: October-December = “good movies”, January-February = “failed attempts at good movies”, summertime = “movies seeking the big green Oscar better known as MONEY.” So we asked ourselves a question. We asked what might happen if the Oscars stopped dictating that schedule? And what if they stopped dictating it because the Oscars stopped happening at all, freeing up all of pop culture to function differently (and maybe function better)? On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, please enjoy the oracular brilliance and Hollywood wisdom of comedians/podcasters Caitlin Gill, Dan Hopper, Amy Nicholson, and Danielle Radford, who joined Alex Schmidt for this LIVE episode from the UCB Sunset Theatre in Los Angeles. They’ll dig into the biggest possible pop culture thought experiment: what would happen if the Oscars went away. Footnotes: http://www.cracked.com/podcast/what-would-happen-if-oscars-went-away/

What Would Happen If The Oscars Went Away?

Scientist.

Looking for the archives? All episodes older than 6 months can be found exclusively on Howl.FM, ad-free. Use promo code ‘Earwolf’ for a 30-day free trial.

What Would Happen If The Oscars Went Away?

The Cracked Podcast

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