history – Page 23

BBC Radio 3 talks about Life, But Not As We Know It

SFFaudio Online Audio

BBC Radio 3 has an intriguing program available through their Listen Again service. A three part series about the consequences of the existence of alien life…

The Essay – Life, But Not As We Know It
3 Radio Broadcasts – Approx. 45 Minutes [DOCUMENTARY]
BROADCASTER: BBC Radio 3
BROADCAST: July 16th, 18th and 19th 2007
A biologist, a writer and a philosopher each explore their fascination with the notion of extraterrestrial intelligence and what such a discovery could mean for the future of humanity.

Part 1 – “Biologist Jack Cohen on why the discovery of aliens would change our view of biology, evolution and organised religion.”

Part 2 – “Writer Andrew Crumey delves into our literary past to discover a fascination with alien life dating back to the middle ages and beyond.”

Part 3 – “Philosopher Nick Bostrom explains why he believes that the discovery of aliens would be a disaster for the future of humanity and lead to the end of civilisation as we know it.”

All three parts are available HERE via the BBC Radio 3 Listen Again service for the next few days or so.

posted by Jesse Willis

Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History podcast – absolute must listen episode

SFFaudio Online Audio

Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History podcast is awesome – Carlin literally puts awe into his performances. His podcast is all about the things he finds interesting in history. Thankfully, with his latest show, “Steppe Stories,” I now have a chance to tell you about his podcast. It seems that Carlin is a Science Fiction and Fantasy fan as well as a history fan. In his latest podcast Carlin explores the people of the Asiatic steppe. How meeting with them was like meeting aliens – very much like the “first contact” theme from so many Science Fiction stories. And who knew that Robert E. Howard’s Red Sonja of Rogatino, and the Marvel/Dynamite Entertainment‘s Hyrkanian version of Red Sonja, weren’t as unlikely as they appear? Dan Carlin, that’s who! The mythical half-man/half-horse Centaurs? The fabled Amazon warriors? Yep, they’re from the steppe too!

Listen in to the show “Steppe Stories” |MP3| and if you’re a fan of history, as all good SF and F fans should be, subscribe using the following feed – you won’t be sorry:

http://www.dancarlin.com/dchh.xml

posted by Jesse Willis

Have you heard The Radio Adventures of Doctor Floyd podcast?

SFFaudio Online Audio

Clearly we’ve been remiss. How could we not have posted about the long-running The Radio Adventures Of Doctor Floyd podcast previously? This is a Parsec Award winning show! It has been running on the net since 2004! And there’s been nary a word about it on SFFaudio! How can this be? Clearly this is the work of the evil Dr. Steve! “But who is this Dr. Steve?” You ask. Ah, there’s the rub…

Dr. Steve is an evil mastermind and the arch-nemesis of Dr. Floyd and his stalwart crew of time traveling heroes. Dr. Floyd also happens to be the main character in a short audio drama series unique to podcasting. This is a kid-friendly show that draws inspiration from the animated Rocky & Bullwinkle Show. In almost every episode one historical character or another is featured prominently. Here’s the premise:

When his Time and Space Travel Device is stolen by the evil mastermind Dr. Steve and his sock-shaped assistant Fidgert…Dr. Floyd, his young protégé Dr. Grant and their faithful robot companion C.H.I.P.S. must do what they can to get it back. Bent on achieving fame and fortune, Dr. Steve plans to race through history stealing historical items and then returning to the future to sell them on eBay. Can Dr. Floyd and his crew thwart the evil machinations of Dr. Steve and Fidgert?

The website for The Radio Adventures Of Doctor Floyd is well worth visiting. Subscriptions to the podcast are via this feed:

http://www.doctorfloyd.com/blog/rss.xml

Enjoy!

posted by Jesse Willis

Listen to "The History Of Utopias" on Open Source with Christopher Lydon

SFFaudio Online Audio

Open Source with Christopher Lydon, the Public Radio International show, has an informative discussion on “The History Of Utopias”.
Download the show |MP3|

We are more interested in the long history of Utopias (and dystopias, their evil twins) — and how they’ve always reminded us about our most urgent desires, dreams, fears, and obsessions. These stories are nothing new: from Eden and Plato to Swift and More, from Orwell to Skinner to Dick to Atwood, we’ve been imagining the best (and worst) of all possible worlds for a long, long time. And those imaginings have obviously changed a lot over time.

Subscribe to the podcast:

http://www.radioopensource.org/wp-rss2.php?cat=18

posted by Jesse Willis

Documentary on The Tunguska Event set to air on Boxing Day

SFFaudio News

Bill DeSmedt, author of the SFFaudio Essential podiobook Singularity wrote in to say that there’s a cool documentary set to air on The History
Channel.

Sez Bill: “As if Christmas weren’t apocalyptic enough…”

THE HISTORY CHANNEL:
Tuesday, December 26 10:00 PM
Wednesday, December 27 02:00 AM

At 7:15AM on June 30, 1908, a giant fireball, as bright the Sun, explodes in the Siberian sky with a force a thousand times greater than the Hiroshima bomb. It decimates 1,000 square miles of forest–over half the size of Rhode Island, and was the biggest cosmic disaster in the history of civilization. What caused the apocalyptic fire in the sky? Over a hundred theories surround what is called the Tunguska event, varying from asteroids and comets to black holes and alien spaceships. Most scientists agree the Tunguska event will happen again, and next time, the human toll could be unimaginable. Now, NASA and other organizations race against time to stop the next planet killer before it ignites Armageddon.

Those planning on listening to Singularity, check this out, it’ll give you a primer.

Thanks Bill!

posted by Jesse Willis

While you’re at it, check out HistoryPodcast #31…

Online Audio

History Podcast While you’re at it, check out HistoryPodcast #31 H.P. Lovecraft. It was released way back in November 2005 but it is still available for download. The sound quality isn’t the best and the pronunciation is really atrocious, but it is worth the listen.

HistoryPodcast #31 – H.P. Lovecraft
Read by Jason Watts
1 MP3 (12.9 MB) – 13 Minutes 56 Seconds [UNABRIDGED]
Podcaster: HistoryPodcast
Podcast: Nov 9th 2005

You can directly download the MP3 file HERE.

posted by Jesse