A massive earthquake strikes Chile. We’ll ask seismologists what’s going on, and look at Chile’s response.

Much of the country has seen a strange winter. We’ll ask how weather patterns relate to climate change.

Prozac versus placebo. New studies say that for many people antidepressants may not work much better than sugar pills. We’ll hear the debate.

Patenting human genes. We’ll hear the debate around a legal challenge to the idea of human genes as intellectual property.

Big science thinker John Brockman asked scientists around the world one question: what breakthrough will change everything? We’ve got their answers.

Anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss, who profoundly challenged the understanding of human cultures, has died at the age of 100. We’ll look back at his work and its meaning.

Forget summer heat. We’re talking glaciers, igloos, blizzards, and adventures in the world’s coldest places.

We’ll look at a nation moving from instant gratification to an age of thrift, and the psychology of self-control.

We talk with top neuroscientist Bruce Hood about his new book, “SuperSense: Why We believe in the Unbelievable.”

Alaska’s Mt. Redoubt is one active volcano. And other volcanoes are roaring or rumbling. We’ll ask vulcanologists what’s going on.

Galileo Galilei and Pope Urban VIII, back, onstage, in a play by Richard Goodwin. Faith and science tangle again.

What Would Be the Military Response?
Many people are confident that, sequestered deep within the cryptic machinery of the United States Department of Defense, are plans and personnel ready to deal with the aftermath of discovering extraterrestrials. It’s a pleasant assumption, and one that gains currency from the fact that, a half century ago, [...]

Heavens and Hells and more – a top neuroscientist offers forty ways to imagine the afterlife.

“CSI” it’s not. A new report on crime labs from the National Academy of Sciences calls into question decades of forensic techniques. We’ll investigate.

Sylvia Earle has spent a lifetime exploring ocean depths. She tells us about her new brainchild, Google Ocean, and the bottom of the deep blue sea.

Stem cell researchers are making up for lost time, and looking forward to big medical breakthroughs. We’ll talk with two top scientists on the leading edge of stem cell research.

Pharmaceutical companies – and some scientists – are pushing to make drugs like Adderall and Ritalin mainstream performance enhancers.

President Obama has pledged to “restore science to its rightful place.” We’ll ask what that means, for America – and the future of science.

We’ll talk with the field biologist who tracks new threats, to jungle and stream, before they become pandemic.

Descartes said “I think, therefore I am.” Bestseller Russell Shorto reminds us it’s more complicated than that, in his new tale of faith, reason, and “Descartes’ Bones.”