The Hidden Brain is about to become a little more front and center. The Morning Edition segment-turned-podcast makes its debut as a weekly radio show this weekend on NPR stations (including WUWM).
The show, hosted by NPR's Shankar Vedantam, takes research on social science topics and translates it in such a way that it offers listeners a clearer idea of how that research intersects with everyday lives. Since the podcast debuted, it's taken on a wide range of subjects, from the science of ignorance, to how people use free speech arguments, to the role of regret in our lives.
Its host sees the new program serving a role for both the lay public and for the scientists who conduct the research.
"We often talk about income and wealth inequality in our world," Vedantam says. "And of course those are very important to talk about. But there's an even bigger disparity, which is the disparity of knowledge. There are people in the world who know a great deal about many things, and these pieces of knowledge have huge applications in our daily lives.
"But very often we don't know that someone sitting in some university somewhere has come up in some ways with an insight that can help us lead our lives better."
NPR's Hidden Brain will air at 11:00 a.m. Sundays on WUWM, beginning October 8th.
