Radiolab is on a curiosity bender. We ask deep questions and use investigative journalism to get the answers. A given episode might whirl you through science, legal history, and into the home of someone halfway across the world. The show is known for innovative sound design, smashing information into music. It is hosted by Lulu Miller and Latif Nasser.
What this show covers
Cold Warneuroscienceanimal behaviorhuman understandingSteve Strogatztechnology ethicsAImathematicsfMRIragtimemusictalentgrassbiologyhuman history
What listeners will find here
When AI cracks elite math, what happens to human understanding?
Mathematics takes center stage as Steve Strogatz confronts AI’s leap from weak arithmetic to solving problems that stump top mathematicians. The episode explores what it could mean if machines start overtaking one of humanity’s deepest ways of making sense of the world.
A ragtime pianist takes on a brain scan—and does the seemingly impossible
This episode follows ragtime pianist Bob Milne as neuroscientist Kerstin Betterman tests a talent that seems to defy how the brain should work. What starts as a challenge inside an fMRI machine turns into a deeper look at musical multitasking and an ability science can’t explain.
How grass quietly shaped the planet, the human body, and daily life
Grass is the subject here, not as background scenery but as a force in human history. Molly Webster talks with biologist and writer David George Haskell about how this ordinary plant may have transformed what we eat, how our bodies are shaped, and even how we perceive the world.
A quest to find the sweetest thing on Earth
Sweetness is the episode’s central mystery, sparked by a child’s simple question and pursued through berries, lab-made sugar substitutes, and familiar pantry ingredients. Along the way, it explores how taste works, why sweetness is more complicated than it seems, and what people will do to chase an extreme flavor.
A pregnancy at the edge of viability, and the impossible choices that followed
This episode follows Kelley Benham and Tom French after their daughter is born at 23 weeks and 6 days. Over the course of an hour, it explores the medical and moral questions their family faced around survival, suffering, and what it means to help.
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