Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford Pushkin

Air traffic controllers are meant to stop aircrafts from flying into one another... and if they fail, computer systems are installed to warn pilots of a coming collision. But sometimes these humans and computers give conflicting and confusing advice. Who to believe?

When a cargo plane and a Russian airliner collided in just such a situation, the authorities scrambled to work out how to prevent a repeat of the disaster... but a grieving father decided to seek revenge on those he held responsible. 

For a full list of sources for this episode, go to timharford.com.
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Cautionary Conversation: When a small-town detective gets a tip about a missing woman, he believes he's uncovered a highly-trained chameleon: a foreign spy. Soon, Esther Reed is on the Secret Service's Most Wanted list, and a nationwide manhunt has commenced. But all is not as it seems.

Jake Halpern joins Tim Harford to talk about the latest season of his Pushkin podcast Deep Cover: Never Seen Again. They discuss the dangers of incrementally increasing lies; how and why certain stories are escalated up the media "food chain"; and what it takes to lead a double life.
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In the early 90s, cutting-edge advertising agency Chiat/Day announced a radical plan, aimed at giving the company a jolt of creative renewal. They would sweep away corner offices and cubicles and replace them with zany open spaces, as well as innovative portable computers and phones. A brand new era of “hot-desking” had arrived.

Problems quickly began. Disgruntled employees found themselves hauling temperamental, clunky laptops and armfuls of paperwork all over the office; some even had to use the trunks of their cars as filing cabinets. Soon, the unhappy nomads had had enough.

Bad execution was to blame for the failure of this “playful” workspace. But Chiat/Day had made another mistake here, too – one that was more serious, more fundamental and altogether more common.

For a full list of sources for this episode, go to timharford.com.


Listener questions

Tim is taking your questions. Do you have any queries about one of the stories we've covered? Are you curious about how we make the show? Send in your questions, however big or small, and Tim will do his best to answer them in a special Q&A episode.

You can email your question to tales@pushkin.fm or leave a voice note at 914-984-7650. Please be aware that if you're calling from outside the US international rates will apply.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

With the 95th Academy Awards just around the corner, Tim Harford looks back at a basic lesson. Galileo tried to teach us that adding more and more layers to a system intended to avert disaster often makes catastrophe all the more likely. This principle has been ignored in nuclear power plants, financial markets and at the Oscars... all resulting in chaos.

For a full list of sources for this episode, go to timharford.com.


Listener questions

Tim is taking your questions. Do you have any queries about one of the stories we've covered? Are you curious about how we make the show?  Send in your questions, however big or small, and Tim will do his best to answer them in a special Q&A episode.

You can email your question to tales@pushkin.fm or leave a voice note at 914-984-7650. That's a US number, so please be aware that if you're calling from outside the US international rates will apply.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Cautionary Conversation: Celebrated physicist Professor Paul Frampton was on his way to Brussels to meet the love of his life, swimwear model Denise Milani. Or so he thought. When he found himself in jail, he realized he’d fallen prey to a confidence trickster.

Tim Harford is joined by Maria Konnikova - journalist, psychologist and best-selling author - to talk about swindlers: what motivates them; what they look for in their victims; and how to avoid being conned altogether.


Listener questions

Tim is taking your questions. Do you have any queries about one of the stories we've covered? Are you curious about how we make the show?  Send in your questions, however big or small, and Tim will do his best to answer them in a special Q&A episode.

You can email your question to tales@pushkin.fm or leave a voice note at 914-984-7650. That's a US number, so please be aware that if you're calling from outside the US international rates will apply.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Steve Jobs called It “the most amazing piece of technology since the PC.” According to Jeff Bezos It was not only “revolutionary,” but infinitely commercial. It was a fiendishly clever and massively hyped invention. But in the end It — also known as the Segway — was a failure.

What makes an invention useful and valuable? Jimi Heselden’s pragmatic brainchild the Concertainer might hold the answers. First used to shore up the collapsing walls of a canal, it ultimately solved problems that Jimi had never even imagined.

For a full list of sources for this episode, go to timharford.com

If you’d like to keep up with the most recent news from this and other Pushkin podcasts, be sure to sign up for our email list at pushkin.fm.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.