Some recommendations from yesterday’s radio schedule. Variety of topics.
Going through the day, these are worth listening to in the next week.
09:00 – Inside The Ethics Committee
Interesting strand anyway, but a very compelling example relating to the ethical considerations surrounding a kidney transplant.
Joan Bakewell discusses the thorny ethical issues in the real life case of a young woman called Charlotte who needs a kidney transplant.
Since her kidneys failed she has to spend every night attached to a dialysis machine. Dialysis is by no means perfect and her long term outlook is bleak. Doctors do not expect her to be alive in a decade. Her only hope is a kidney transplant from a living donor.
But Charlotte is an extremely high risk patient. She suffers from a severe form of antiphospholipid syndrome or ‘sticky blood’. There is a high chance that a transplanted organ will fail if it is transplanted into Charlotte, and she could even lose her life.
11:00 – Crossing Continents: Pakistan
What’re the dangers of young Pakistanis becoming radicalised.
16:30 – Material World
Scientific discussion including Swine Flu, Tamiflu, vaccines and how they both work. Also articles relating to the 40th anniversary of the moon landings, the 400th anniversary of the moon map, and how we’re able to measure the distance from the earth to the moon.
Among the cargo Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin took to the Moon on Apollo 11 in 1969 was an array of mirrors that are still, 40 years on, at the forefront of science. By bouncing laser beams of light off the mirrors, scientists are now able to measure the Moon’s position to an accuracy of one millimetre. They have already shown that the Moon is receding at a speed of nearly four centimetres every year. But with these more precise measurements they can even test whether Einstein got his theory of gravity absolutely right.
18:30 – Shappi Talk
For some reason I’d convinced myself I wouldn’t like this, so I haven’t listened to it before episode 3. Turns out it’s actually quite good stand up.
Comedy series in which Shappi Khorsandi examines what it is like growing up in multi-cultural families.
Shappi discusses religion with Bengali comic Paul Sinha and chats to former mayor of London Ken Livingstone.
20:00 – The Report: Anatomy Of An Asylum Housing Row
How does evidence get swallowed up by prejudice? Interesting look into a specific couple of examples in Birmingham where the facts haven’t stopped people coming to unsupported conclusions. There’s a BBC News article around it here. Key Phrase? “It’s common knowledge”.
British homes for British people: planned changes to the way social housing is allocated would give greater priority to those waiting the longest. Phil Kemp investigates whether this represents a fairer system or ‘dog whistle’ politics.
20:30 – In Business: Let’s Start A Bank
Peter Day looks into the various alternatives to the mainstream banks. Person to person lending, corporations expanding to banking, post banks, and more.
Now might be a very good time to start a brand new bank, unencumbered by the toxic loans and the government bailouts of most of the old ones. Peter Day finds out from the experts how to start a bank as well as how not to do it.
23:00 – Bigipedia
This shouldn’t work. It’s a satire of Wikipedia on the radio. Oddly though, it does.
The omniscient friend you know from your computer and laser watch takes over Radio 4 for 30 minutes in a unique experiment in broadwebcasting.