Audio distraction: podcasts, audio books, radio on demand

[RuthT]

If you like detective light fiction, Sarah Paretsky’s VI Warshawski is on Sounds atm. Bonus is Kathleen Turner playing VI - a great action character who gets herself into scrapes along the way. 6 30 min episodes

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/brand/b00f85ps

 

[shak8]

Important consideration! For me this one usually fits the bill, helped further by the speaker having a soothing voice:
The History of English Podcast - the spoken history of a global language.

I started listening to episode 151 today. It mentions the origins of the Royal Colleges in the 1500s, medical turf war shenanigans, and how doctors wanted to keep medical knowledge exclusive to their own ranks and most certainly not have ordinary folks get access to their medical books - all very topical with NICE and all the associated toy throwing. Plus ça change...

It also mentioned that a Middle English term for doctor was 'leech'

https://historyofenglishpodcast.com/2021/08/29/episode-151-sick-to-death/

Transcripts available. Note that since history is involved there are a few heads rolling, and not of the metaphorical kind.

Love these! Thanks so much. And yes, such a good voice, well-rehearsed too.

 

[Ravn]

Love these! Thanks so much. And yes, such a good voice, well-rehearsed too.

Glad you like it. The good news is there's a lot of it. Took me about 2 years to work my way through all the back episodes, starting with the Proto-Indo-Europeans and the podcast has only reached the 1500s. Many more centuries to come.

 

[Mariaba]

I've been listening to Jenny Rowbory's new book of poetry called 'We are the Winter People'. It's so soothing & meditative to listen to. I just love it.

 

[Ravn]

Have recently discovered the Mind Chat podcast. Memory problems make it a bit hard going for me at times. It's not easy trying to follow a complex argument when you forget the first part long before you reach the end of a long sentence, frustrating. But fascinating discussions.

Philip Goff is a philosopher who thinks consciousness pervades the universe. Keith Frankish is a philosopher who thinks consciousness* doesn't even exist. From their very different perspectives, Keith and Philip interview leading scientists and philosophers of consciousness, engaging and debating in a friendly way in pursuit of truth. Mind Chat aims to be highly accessible, allowing those with no background in science and/or philosophy to get a grip on the cutting edge of the field.

*To be more precise, Keith thinks *phenomenal* consciousness doesn't exist, although he does think consciousness exists in other senses. What is phenomenal consciousness? Watch Mind Chat and you'll find out!

I'm listening to the audio version on my podcast app but couldn't find a direct link so the quote and link are from the Youtube channel.

https://www.youtube.com/c/MindChat/videos

@Jonathan Edwards - I expect you are familiar with most of the hypotheses and interviewees just by looking at their names. I'd be interested to know which of them, in your view, are the least wrong (yep, shamelessly trying to pigeonhole you )

 

[Amw66]

Really interesting radio programme on non human intelligence.


https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001bcnc

 

[Ravn]

In the spirit of know thy enemy I listened to this podcast about FND, part of a series of continuing medical education for neuropsychologists.

It's a good introduction to FND for people like me who've largely ignored this topic to date (apart from noting that the field seems to have been captured by BPS types with poor grasp of sound scientific methodology).

The podcast covers the history as well as the latest thinking on pathophysiology and treatment. Not unexpectedly plenty to disagree with but also moments of amusement of sorts. Like learning that the interviewee, a leading FND eminence, no longer uses the hardware-software analogy we're still being asked to swallow.

Most interesting though was the striking dissonance between what's happening in (some of the) research into pathophysiology and what's happening in the clinic.

It appears at least some researchers define 'functional' simply as no tissue damage visible with current technology, and from there go out to explore in two main directions. One, are there tissue abnormalities after all and can they be detected with better technology? Two, what sort of brain signalling abnormalities could be causing the observed signs and symptoms? There is some evidence for both but for now it's a mess of all manner of inconsistent group-level abnormalities (sounds familiar somehow).

Both those research paths strike me as sensible avenues to pursue (if done rigorously).

But when it comes to treatment we're right back to CBT used to convince patients they can function normally. Which cures some patients in 5 days! Sadly for many patients treatment doesn't work very well... Some patients are cured overnight! Treatment may not address the underlying issue and not work long term... Somehow the interviewee holds all of these views simultaneously.

Two more episodes on FND are planned but I think I might give those a miss

https://www.navneuro.com/108/

Incidentally, what I was really looking for was a podcast to help me refresh my memory on working memory. In case anyone's interested, episode 102 in this same podcast series discusses one of the more influential models by Baddeley. It's quite technical but a lot easier on the blood pressure than the FND episode https://www.navneuro.com/102/

 

[Sean]

Thanks for taking one for the team.

 

[Ravn]

In the spirit of know thy enemy I listened to this podcast about FND, part of a series of continuing medical education for neuropsychologists.
[...]
Two more episodes on FND are planned but I think I might give those a miss

https://www.navneuro.com/108/

In case anyone did go/goes on to listen to the FND podcast above I recommend following up with this one by the Norwegian ME association for balance. Nothing new in it for most of us but always nice to listen to Brian Hughes

Stigmas surrounding ME

ME is a disease that affects thousands of people in different ways. Patients live with various degrees of exhaustion and reduced life quality. At the same time, a lot of people with ME experience mistrust from society.

In this episode, Doctor Brian M. Hughes, professors of Psychology at the University of Galway, Ireland, will be joining us in discussing the stigmas surrounding ME. He is a specialist in stress psychophysiology, and one of the world's most experienced and honored scientists on ME. He talks about some of the challenges ME patients face in today`s society, how society impacts the illness, and how we should move forward. The host is Margrethe Gustavsen.

https://shows.acast.com/leve-med-me/episodes/stigmas-surrounding-me

 

[Ravn]

Podcast:
The Dissenter, episode 923, Nicholas Brown: How to Spot Bad Science

Most of us here are all too familiar with poor science so not much new or surprising in this podcast, maybe apart from the argument that we need less science and fewer scientists, but still an interesting listen and it could be a good podcast to point people to if they don't believe you when you're railing about all the bad science out there or they want to lump you in with the conspiracy theorists for making such a claim. Long interview though, about 2 hours, nothing about bad ME science unfortunately

The interviewee is Nick Brown who'll be familiar to some members as one of the people working on exposing dodgy papers. Hilda Bastian gets a brief mention as one of the rare people who let herself be convinced by the evidence to change her views significantly

I'll give the Youtube link because it has all the relevant links and time stamps some of which don't show in my podcast app

RECORDED ON NOVEMBER 15th 2023. Dr. Nicholas Brown is a Researcher at Linnaeus University, Sweden. He works on developing new research methods in psychology and on applying meta-scientific perspectives on psychology as a science. In this episode, we start by discussing conceptual and methodological issues with positive psychology and the study of well-being, and go through critiques of Lyubomirsky’s “happiness pie”, and happiness surveys. We also address methodological flaws with studies on the link between genetics and well-being, sadness and color perception, and predicting heart disease from Twitter language. We then discuss where bad science stems from, and talk about incentives, issues with the publishing system, and how bad science goes unchecked. Finally, we talk about the idea of trusting the experts, and rules of thumb to evaluate scientific evidence.

 

[rvallee]

Hilda Bastian gets a brief mention as one of the rare people who let herself be convinced by the evidence to change her views significantly

Then back again, I guess. Hard to say, really, but this is what it looks like to me. Nothing to dispute that anyway, while everything points to it.

 

[Fleur]

Just found a treasure trove I'm loving.
BBC World Service - World Book Club. I assume, since it's World Service, it's available everywhere. I hope so.

There are 118 episodes available, each under half an hour. The presenter, Harriet Gilbert, introduces the book and author, and hosts a discussion of the book in which people from around the world ask the author questions. So far I've listened to 8 episodes, with authors as varied as Umberto Eco, Philip Pullman, Kazuo Ishiguro, Arundhati Roy, and Ruth Rendell.

You don't have to have read the book - I've read some, not others. I find it fascinating hearing authors reading bits from their books and answering questions varying from how they got their ideas, how they see certain characters, and how they go about writing.

Edit: I've just discovered that the first 5 I listened to were 26 minutes each. The rest seem to be 55 minutes. Good - they will last longer. By the time I get to the end of all of them, I will have forgotten the first ones and be able to start again!

Thanks for posting this, Trish

Following your recommendation I have now listened to several of these and I have been inspired to read one of the books:

Girl with a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier.

It arrived today and I was pleased to see on first glance that it is not too long and the print is not too small.

I have read another book by her called, A Single Thread which I very much enjoyed.

I agree that it was fascinating to have an insight into the authors thoughts etc and will definitely be listening to more of the podcasts.