1. "Choice"

Logic and emotion aren't the only forces that guide our decisions. This hour of Radiolab, we turn up the volume on the voices in our heads, and try to make sense of the babble. Forget free will, some important decisions could come down to a steaming cup of coffee.




2. "Sperm"

Sperm carry half the genes needed for human life. In this hour of Radiolab, some basic questions and profound thoughts about reproduction.

To begin: why so many sperm? We turn to the animal kingdom for answers, which lands us on a tour of sperm battles in ducks, flying pig sperm, and promiscuous whippoorwills. Next, we ponder fatherhood, and wonder...in a world where sperm can be frozen and kept for all eternity...what the future holds for men. We end quietly, in a stark sonic space with a widow struggling to keep some essence of her husband alive.




3. "Race"

This hour of Radiolab, a look at race. 

When the human genome was first fully mapped in 2000, Bill Clinton, Craig Venter, and Francis Collins took the stage and pronounced that "The concept of race has no genetic or scientific basis." Great words spoken with great intentions. But what do they really mean, and where do they leave us? Our genes are nearly all the same, but that hasn't made race meaningless, or wiped out our evolving conversation about it.




4. "Diagnosis"

Humans love to solve problems. In this hour of Radiolab, diagnosis--our attempt to find out what's wrong, and give it a label.

In this day and age, we have astonishing technology--chemicals and computers and machines that can pinpoint things imperceptible to our senses. But humans aren't obsolete--intuition and creativity still lead the way both in discovering the nature of the problem, and in dealing with that knowledge.




5. "Yellow Fluff and Other Curious Encounters"

The quest for scientific knowledge is one of the great and noble pursuits of humankind. It's also one of the most dangerous, frustrating, ego-driven, transcendent, dirty, sublime, tedious, demoralizing, inspiring...you get the idea. This hour, stories of love and loss in the name of science.