Modern Notion

Modern Notion

The radio extension of ModernNotion.com, a website for the ultra-curious that finds the science behind the story and the truth in every tale. It’s your middlebrow library for highbrow ideas. We tell stories about history, science, technology, culture and life.

Episodes

This Salon in New York Is the Ground Zero of Brazilian Waxing

December 17, 2015 • 8 mins
On today’s episode of Modern Notion, we visit the salon in New York that originated Brazilian waxing. Jonice Padilha, one of the seven sisters behind Manhattan’s J Sisters salon, speaks to reporter Renee Gross about how the salon came up with the idea of taking it all off. From there, the trend took off—you’ll have…
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Mapping the Human Body

December 1, 2015 • 29 mins
What if we looked at the human body as a landscape, and mapped its features using a cartographer’s eye? That’s what Dr. Gavin Francis does in his new book, Adventures in Human Being: A Grand Tour from the Cranium to the Calcaneum (Basic Books, October 2015). On this episode of Modern Notion we dive into some…
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Cheddar: It’s Nothing to Cheese At

November 24, 2015 • 29 mins
Our guest on today’s (new! improved! weekly!) Modern Notion is Gordon Edgar, the longtime cheesemonger at Rainbow Cooperative Grocery in San Francisco. Gordon turns his attention to a specific kind of cheese in his new book, Cheddar: A Journey to the Heart of America’s Most Iconic Cheese (Chelsea Green, October 2015). In the midst of a cheese renaissance, Gordon…
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Announcement from Modern Notion

October 27, 2015 • 1 min
Listen for a quick update on what’s happening at Modern Notion.
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Winston Churchill, War Correspondent

October 21, 2015 • 50 mins
On today’s show, we’re talking with author Simon Read about Winston Churchill—but probably not the Winston Churchill you already know. In his book, Winston Churchill Reporting: Adventures of a Young War Correspondent (Da Capo Press, October 2015), Read explores the five years Churchill spent as a war correspondent, which took him around the world, from Cuba…
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Deathwatch Beetles and Other Creepy Crawlies

October 21, 2015 • 50 mins
On today’s show, our guest is Dave Goulson, a professor of biological sciences and the founder of the Bumblebee Conservation Trust in the UK. Goulson recently wrote a memoir of sorts about a farm he bought in France, called A Buzz in the Meadow: The Natural History of a French Farm (Picador, April 2015). For the last…
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Was the CIA behind JFK’s Assassination?

October 19, 2015 • 50 mins
On today’s episode of Modern Notion Daily, our guest is David Talbot, the former CEO and editor-in-chief of Salon.com. Talbot has written a new book, The Devil’s Chessboard: Allen Dulles, the CIA, and the Rise of America’s Secret Government (Harper, October 2015). Dulles was the director of the CIA until President John F. Kennedy fired him; and…
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Ambiguity May or May Not Be a Good Thing

October 16, 2015 • 50 mins
Jamie Holmes is our guest today, talking about his new book Nonsense: The Power of Not Knowing (Crown, October 2015). Holmes argues that embracing ambiguity can help us lead more productive and happier lives. Also on the show, reporter Lila Cherneff visits a zebrafish lab on Mount Desert Island in Maine to learn about the science of…
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Why Aren’t More Women Pursuing STEM Careers?

October 15, 2015
On today’s show, novelist and English professor Eileen Pollack is discussing her new book, The Only Woman in the Room: Why Science Is Still a Boys’ Club (Beacon Press, September 2015). Pollack graduated from Yale with a bachelor’s degree in physics, but she believes that a lack of encouragement, and even active discouragement, led her to…
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Learn to Fight Like a Navy SEAL

October 14, 2015
On today’s show, our guest is Clint Emerson, author of 100 Deadly Skills: The SEAL Operative’s Guide to Eluding Pursuers, Evading Capture, and Surviving Any Dangerous Situation (Touchstone, October 2015). Emerson uses his experiences a Navy SEAL to give tips on how to stay ahead of “the bad guys”—mostly by using “bad guy” tactics. He gives detailed…
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Are Public Libraries Disappearing?

October 13, 2015
On today’s episode of Modern Notion Daily, our guest is Wayne Wiegand, author of Part of Our Lives: A People’s History of the American Public Library (Oxford University Press, October 2015). Wiegand argues that libraries are about much more than books: they’re a community meeting place. And to answer the question in the headline: they’re not going anywhere.…
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Your Microbiome Could Be the Key to Healthy Living

October 12, 2015
On today’s episode of Modern Notion Daily, we’re talking with Tim Spector, a professor of genetic epidemiology at Kings’ College London and author of The Diet Myth: Why the Secret to Health and Weight Loss Is Already in Your Gut (The Overlook Press, September 2015). Using twin studies, and testing out various diets for himself, Spector has…
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White Powders and Clear Liquids: Looking at 75 Food Additives

October 9, 2015
The guests on today’s Modern Notion Daily show are Steve Ettlinger and Dwight Eschliman, coauthors of Ingredients: A Visual Exploration of 75 Food Additives and 25 Food Products (Regan Arts, September 2015). Ettlinger, who had previously written about artificial ingredients in his book Twinkie Deconstructed, teamed up with Eschliman, a photographer who has deconstructed food in previous visual…
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A Primer on the Colorful History of Hawaii

October 8, 2015
Our guest on Modern Notion Daily is Susanna Moore, author of Paradise of the Pacific: Approaching Hawaii (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, September 2015). The book was recently longlisted for the 2015 National Book Award. Moore details the history of the archipelago, first inhabited by humans in the sixth century. We’ll learn about the origin of the…
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The House of Twenty Thousand Books

October 7, 2015
On today’s episode of Modern Notion Daily, our guest is Sasha Abramsky, author of The House of Twenty Thousand Books (New York Review Books, September 2015). Abramsky recalls his grandparents’ London home, filled with a vast rare book collection—but more importantly, he remembers the ideas discussed among those treasured volumes. Later in the hour, reporter Jessie Wright-Mendoza…
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The Dark Underbelly of California Winemaking

October 6, 2015
Our guest on today’s episode of Modern Notion Daily is Frances Dinkelspiel, author of Tangled Vines: Greed, Murder, Obsession, and an Arsonist in the Vineyards of California (St. Martin’s Press, October 2015). Dinkelspiel was intrigued by the 2005 arson of Wines Central, which destroyed hundreds of millions of dollars worth of wine. But ultimately, her journey…
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Judy, the Only Canine POW in World War II

October 2, 2015
On today’s show, our guest is Robert Weintraub, author of No Better Friend: One Man, One Dog, and Their Extraordinary Story of Courage and Survival in WWII (Little, Brown and Company, May 2015). This is the story of Judy, a pointer dog who was a Japanese POW. She befriended Frank Williams, a British POW, and the two…
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The Volcano That Caused Three Years of Bad Weather

October 1, 2015
On today’s Modern Notion Daily podcast, our guest is Gillen D’Arcy Wood, author of Tambora: The Eruption That Changed the World (Princeton University Press, paperback September 2015). In 1815, the Tambora volcano on Sumbawa (part of Indonesia) erupted for three days, producing volcanic ash that was absorbed into the Earth’s atmosphere and stratosphere. People blame this…
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Why You Should Be Death-Positive

September 30, 2015
Our guest on today’s episode of Modern Notion Daily is Caitlin Doughty, a mortician and author of Smoke Gets in Your Eyes: And Other Stories from the Crematory (W. W. Norton & Co., paperback September 2015). Doughty promotes “death positivity”—which does not mean you should be happy when a loved one dies, but that you should embrace the…
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A History of Gay Rights (or Lack Thereof) in America

September 29, 2015
On Modern Notion Daily, our guest is Lillian Faderman, author of The Gay Revolution: The Story of the Struggle (Simon & Schuster, September 2015). Faderman starts this detailed account of the treatment of LGBT people and communities in the 1950s, when police raided gay bars and prosecuted people for their sexuality in courts of law. How did we…
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