Erwin Schrödinger – Waves, Cats, and the Question of Life
There is a particular kind of mind that cannot leave a problem alone once it has revealed a crack. Not because the mind is restless, but because the crack is an insult. It suggests…
Podcasts · In this section
20th Century
Episodes on Curie, Haber, Heisenberg, and Pauling examine twentieth-century advances in physics and chemistry alongside their medical, industrial, and ethical consequences.
Niels Bohr – The Architect of the Quantum Atom
His name is Niels Bohr, and if Max Planck opened the door to the quantum world with a reluctant step, Bohr walked through that door and began furnishing the room. He did it with…
Max Planck – The Reluctant Father of the Quantum
Enter Max Planck, a man who did not want to overthrow physics. He wanted to preserve it.
Rosalind Franklin – The Woman in the Diffraction Pattern
You’re listening to “Scientific Giants Who Changed the World.” Each episode stands beside one mind and follows a thread of curiosity until it ties to the world we inhabit. Today we meet a scientist…
Lise Meitner – Fission and the Burden of Insight
There are lives that demonstrate the greatness of science, and there are lives that reveal the price science sometimes demands—especially when the world decides that a mind is less valuable because of a name,…
Werner Heisenberg – Uncertainty at the Heart of Nature
You're listening to "Scientific Giants Who Changed the World." Each episode stands beside one mind and follows a thread of curiosity until it ties to the world we inhabit. Today we enter the quantum…
Marie Curie – The Radiance of the Invisible
You're listening to "Scientific Giants Who Changed the World." Each episode stands beside one mind and follows a thread of curiosity until it ties to the world we inhabit. Today we descend into a…
Eric Kandel – Memory in the Sea Snail
You’re listening to Scientific Giants Who Changed the World. Each episode follows one person far enough into their work that the world they changed becomes visible. Today we follow memory itself—not as a metaphor,…
Chien-Shiung Wu – The Symmetry That Failed
There is a certain kind of beauty that physicists fall in love with, and it is not the beauty of color or music. It is the beauty of symmetry. Symmetry suggests that the universe…
Linus Pauling – Bonds, Helices, and Moral Courage
You’re listening to “Scientific Giants Who Changed the World.” Each episode stands beside one mind and follows a thread of curiosity until it ties to the world we inhabit. Today we meet a scientist…