Longitude (Encore)
Navigation on the open ocean is extremely difficult. It is a skill that takes years to master. Even with years of skill, an experienced mariner was still able to ground their ship on an unseen reef,...
4 Okt 20219min
The Four Great Inventions of Ancient China
As I have mentioned in many episodes of this podcast, there are a great many things that were originally invented in Ancient China. There are literally hundreds of inventions that were developed in Ch...
3 Okt 202111min
The Korean Demilitarized Zone
In the early 1950s, war ravaged the Korean peninsula. However, the fighting ceased on July 27, 1953. Both sides of the conflict pulled back from the front and created a buffer zone 4 kilometers or 2.5...
2 Okt 202111min
The Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread (Encore)
You probably heard the expression that something is “the greatest thing since sliced bread”. Well did you ever wonder what the greatest thing was before sliced bread? Or why we measure greatness in ...
1 Okt 20218min
Year One
I am speaking these words in the year 2021. You might be listening to them in a different year, but whatever year you happen to be in right now, it will be a year using the same number convention for ...
30 Sep 202112min
How Close Were the Nazis to Making an Atomic Bomb?
During the second world war, one of the biggest efforts of the war was the Manhattan Project: the secret American program to create an atomic bomb. The scientists and staff of the Manhattan Project ...
29 Sep 202113min
Alexandria
In the year 331 BC, fresh from his conquest of Egypt, Alexander the Great established a new city in Egypt named after himself. This new city, situated on the shore of the Mediterranean Sea, at the e...
28 Sep 202112min
Survivorship Bias
During World War II, the US Army assigned statistician Abraham Wald the task of statistically figuring out where extra armor should be added to American bombers. After analyzing the evidence and shar...
27 Sep 202110min
