What Stories Are Written in The Rock Beneath Us? With Dr Anjana Khatwa

Linda Yueh, renowned economist, broadcaster and author of The Great Economists, in conversation with Jesse Norman, MP for Hereford and South Herefordshire and author of Adam Smith: What He Thought, and Why it Matters, discussed the transformative legacies of history's great economists, from Adam Smith to Karl Marx. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

6 Sep 201842min

Tom Baldwin, former Director of Communications for the UK Labour Party under Ed Miliband and author of Ctrl Alt Delete, has spent the best part of three decades at the centre of politics and journalism. In a wide-ranging conversation with Nina Shick, Director of Data and Polling at Rasmussen Global, they explored the toxic relationship between today's politics, the media, and the new information age. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

30 Aug 201851min

Tim Marshall, renowned journalist and author of Divided, in conversation with the Times diplomatic correspondent Catherine Philp, examine the fault lines that will shape our world for years to come. Walls are going up around the world. Nationalism and identity politics are on the rise once more. What are the causes of this new era of division?  Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

23 Aug 201850min

Jamie Susskind, author of Future Politics, in conversation with the New Statesman's Helen Lewis, discuss how digital technology will radically transform how we live together, exploring how the very concepts of democracy, liberty, justice and power could be fundamentally changed by tech. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

16 Aug 201846min

Journalist James Bloodworth spent six months working undercover across Britain, taking on some of the country's most gruelling and menial jobs for his recent book Hired: Six Months Undercover in Low-Wage Britain. In this Intelligence Squared podcast in conversation with the RSA's Matthew Taylor, he discussed his findings from Amazon's warehouses to the care industry to the taxicabs of Uber. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

9 Aug 201851min

Referencing the latest research on the science of sexuality, Tom Whipple talks about dating apps, Love Island, the relative testicle size of bonobos and chimpanzees, and gay penguins, to throw light on why men and women behave the way they do when it comes to love and sex. He was in conversation with Rosamund Urwin about his book X and WHY: The rules of attraction: why gender still matters.  Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

2 Aug 201859min

Blockchain, the technology on which Bitcoin is based, has gone mainstream. Evangelists describe it as a thrilling and versatile foundation that will revolutionise everything from finance to governance. But is it really the radical new paradigm its adherents claim? We were joined on stage by Jamie Bartlett, one of the UK’s leading thinkers on the politics and social influence of the internet; Primavera De Filippi, expert on the legal challenges and opportunities of blockchain technologies and author of Blockchain and The Law; David Gerard, author of the news blog and book Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain: Bitcoin, Blockchain, Ethereum & Smart Contracts; and Vít Jedlička, founder and first elected president of the Free Republic of Liberland, which aims to be the first country to base its government structure on blockchain technology. The event was chaired by BBC Economics Editor Kamal Ahmed. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

27 Juli 20181h 2min

More humans than ever before live in cities. Technology is now being rolled out across the world’s urban areas, making day-to-day city living more pleasant, more efficient and more sustainable. For example, traffic flows are being improved by sensors that detect snarl-ups, allowing a central computer to coordinate traffic lights and even change the direction of a highway during rush hour – saving commuters time and lowering the pollution caused by stop-start congestion. Smart energy meters are allowing the power companies to provide the energy we need from the best sources, at the right times of day. But what we’re already seeing is just the beginning. By using computing, automation and big data, the cities of tomorrow will be transformed by practical, disruptive solutions, helping us tackle the energy challenge and achieve a lower carbon future. But there’s a flip side to letting technology take over the way our cities are run. Automation opens up systems like traffic, communications and power to hackers and hijackers. Increasing reliance on AI systems and complex networks makes us more vulnerable when outages occur. And the collection of data about you and your life from millions of sensors across the city raises serious concerns about personal freedom. And then there’s the question of what kind of places we actually want to live in. Most of the urban areas people flock to are attractive because of their charm, their history and their sheer haphazardness; will smart-city technology inevitably rationalise these charms away? And let’s not forget that many of the most urgent challenges facing cities, such as inequality and crime, will never be solved by endless number-crunching and smartphone apps. So what do we really want from our cities? The kind of connectivity that comes from technology, making our cities smooth-functioning and sustainable? Or the deeper human connection and sense of meaning that technology can never provide? We were joined by Anjana Ahuja, the award-winning science writer ; Jamie Bartlett, one of the UK's leading thinkers on the politics and social influence of the internet; Finlay Clark, UK Country Manager of the crowd-sourced traffic and navigation app Waze; and Stephen Lorimer, Smart London Strategy and Delivery Officer at the Greater London Authority. The debate was chaired by comedian, actor and television presenter Alexander Armstrong. This event, hosted by Shell in partnership with Intelligence Squared, brought together big thinkers from diverse backgrounds to debate how the digital revolution taking place in our cities is impacting our lives. Join us to learn how together we can #makethefuture today. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

20 Juli 201848min