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Think: Episode Archives


  • Propaganda and U.S. Public Relations

    Does the United States Government use propaganda for public relations? According to Nancy Snow, associate professor of communications at California State University in Fullerton and adjunct professor at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication, “we’re living in the age of manipulation of rhetorical labels…and losing our ability to lead in the world […]

  • Technology, Warfare, and the Course of History

    How will a new Secretary of Defense handle the situation in Iraq? What are the bottom line suggestions of the Baker/Hamilton Iraq Study Group? What changes are in store for the U.S. military in the short and long term? Max Boot, senior fellow in national security studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and author […]

  • Celebrating the End of Life

    You probably haven’t given it much thought, but it’s something we all have to do eventually. We all die and each of us must inhabit some sort of “final disposition.” Writer Michelle Cromer traveled across the country and talked to families and entrepreneurs to investigate the options – from being shot into space to being […]

  • Senate Armed Services Committee Hearings

    The second hour of Think will be pre-empted today to bring you NPR’s live coverage of the Senate Armed Services Committee’s hearings on the nomination of Robert Gates to be United States Secretary of Defense.

  • From The Archives: Can This Guy Save The Defense Department?

    What can we expect from the newly nominated Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates? On November 15th, we talked with Texas Monthly Senior Executive Editor Paul Burka, who profiled Gates for the November issue of Texas Monthly.

  • The Pakistan – U.S. Relationship

    How does Pakistan view the Pakistan – U.S. relationship? What can America do to help Pakistan control religious extremism, counter terrorism, and forge a lasting and constructive relationship with India? We’ll talk this hour with His Excellency Mahmud Ali Durrani, Ambassador of Pakistan to the United States.

  • How Capitalism Can Save American Health Care

    Can the free-market economy improve America’s health care system? Dr. David Gratzer thinks so. We’ll spend the hour Gratzer, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, whose new book is “The Cure: How Capitalism Can Save American Health Care” (Encounter Books, 2006).

  • Nature, Nurture, and Our Universal Sense of Right and Wrong

    We all know the difference between right and wrong, but why do we know that one action is morally superior to another? Philosophers and scientists have long argued that our ability to reason, coupled with our education and socialization have developed the “moral compass” which guides each of us through life. Harvard biologist Marc D. […]

  • Alternatives to a Hectic and Expensive Holiday

    How will you celebrate the holidays this year? Will you max out your credit cards buying gifts for everyone you know? Will you celebrate an “Alt-Christmas” by baking cookies for everyone or making your gifts by hand? How do you plan to handle the stress of the holidays? We’ll spend this hour with Nicole Berckes […]

  • Catastrophe, Creativity, and the Renewal of Civilization

    It’s been said that every cloud has a silver lining, but what exactly is good about the breakdown of a society and what leads to that breakdown in the first place? Political scientist Thomas Homer-Dixon will join us this hour to discuss his new book “The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity, and the Renewal of […]