Radiolab - Revising the Fault Line

A new tussle over an old story, and some long-held beliefs, with neurologist and author Robert Sapolsky. Four years ago, we did a story about a man with a starling obsession that made us question our ideas of responsibility and justice. We thought we’d found some solid ground, but today Dr. Sapolsky shows up and takes us down a rather disturbing rabbit hole. Support Radiolab by becoming a member today at Radiolab.org/donate.

Duration: 51m
Broadcast on: 27 Jun 2017
Audio Format: other

A new tussle over an old story, and some long-held beliefs, with neurologist and author Robert Sapolsky.

Four years ago, we did a story about a man with a starling obsession that made us question our ideas of responsibility and justice. We thought we’d found some solid ground, but today Dr. Sapolsky shows up and takes us down a rather disturbing rabbit hole.

Support Radiolab by becoming a member today at Radiolab.org/donate.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

WNYC Studios is supported by ODU. When you buy business software from lots of vendors, the costs add up and it gets complicated and confusing. ODU solves this. It's a single company that sells a suite of enterprise apps that handles everything from accounting to inventory to sales. ODU is all connected on a single platform in a simple and affordable way. You can save money without missing out on the features you need. Check out ODU at ODOO.com. That's ODOO.com. WNYC Studios is supported by WYSE. WYSE, the smart way to manage the currencies you need around the world. With a WYSE account, you can send, spend, and receive in up to 40 currencies, with only a few simple taps. Be smart, get WYSE. Download the WYSE app today. Terms and conditions apply. Wait, you're listening? Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. So we're going to start with a story from our producer, Pat Walters, about a couple. Oh, my word. Okay. So I mentioned a couple episodes ago, by the way, this is JAD Radio Lab that we'll be bringing back some episodes back. And at the flow from time to time, episodes that we haven't stopped thinking about, that feel truer to us now than before, maybe the opposite. You know, episodes that we still end up getting into fights with people about. And a couple years ago, we ran a story about a guy named Kevin, and a little bit more recently. Hello, Robert, are you there? Yes. Great. Jan will be here in just a sec. Robert Sapolsky, a neuroscientist at Stanford, who Robert Crowech and I have had on the show many times, but he recently wrote a book in which he makes an argument that really tries to kind of just explode that story in a way that we found sort of interesting. It was just my hunch that it plays near a lot of your buttons. Sure does. So what we did was we sent him that piece, hadn't listened to it. And actually what we'll do now is replay that piece, and then at the end, we'll come back and, well, a little bit of a fight about it. So we're going to start with a story from our producer, Pat Walters, about a couple. Oh, my word. That's the lady. I'm Janet. This is the guy. So I don't need you to introduce yourself. That's usually the thing we do, but we're not telling people who you are. We're going to call him Kevin. Kevin. Yeah. Yeah.

Transcription truncated.