The United Nations recently predicted that the world's population will grow to nine billion by 2050 and ten billion by the end of the century. Whilst news of population growth is often greeted with panic and dismay Danny Doring, a human geographer at the Oxford University Centre for the Environment, argues that, in fact, there's nothing to fear in the future, because the population bomb has already diffused. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Recorded...
Sep 18, 2013•19 min
We might think the web is something different, another world somewhere out there - or indeed in our devices - but as Emily Bell argues, the web is actually mapped onto our physical world: the real and the virtual are the same thing. Emily spent almost twenty years working at the Observer and then the Guardian, setting up Media Guardian website in 2000. Three years ago she and her family moved to New York and Emily became the Director of the Tow Centre for Digital Journalism at Columbia Journalis...
Sep 11, 2013•19 min
In the 1990s, author Alan Bissett was a lad and women were 'birds'. In a frank and personal account, Alan talks about why he turned to the work of the late American radical feminist Andrea Dworkin after becoming concerned over his use of internet pornography. He dissects elements of what he describes as our "sex saturated culture" and argues that men need to start engaging with feminism for the good of all. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Recorded ...
Sep 04, 2013•18 min
Greg Votolato confesses his addiction to cars while arguing for more sustainable designs to meet our desire for status and private space. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their thinking on the trends and ideas in culture and society in front of a live audience. Producer: Sheila Cook.
Aug 28, 2013•20 min
Yasmin Hai says it's not Western foreign policy that is radicalising British Muslims but more pedestrian psychological factors closer to home. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their thinking on the trends and ideas in culture and society in front of a live audience. Producer: Sheila Cook.
Aug 21, 2013•19 min
Jad Adams thinks we're dealing with homelessness less well than in the 1930s. Speaking from his experience helping homeless people, he argues that current policy - which he says ties the homeless to hostels funded by their benefits - is not the answer. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their thinking on the trends and ideas in culture and society in front of a live audience.
Aug 14, 2013•17 min
Andrew Graystone speaks from personal experience to argue that we're using the wrong language to talk about cancer. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their thinking on the trends and ideas in culture and society in front of a live audience.
Aug 07, 2013•19 min
Advertising guru Kevin Allen tells a tale of missing cutlery on passenger jets to show where business leaders go wrong. Success, he says, belongs to the "buoyant" leader, riding high on the esteem of the workforce, rather than ruling by fear. Four Thought is a series of thought-provoking talks combining personal stories with ideas of contemporary relevance. Speakers air their thinking in front of a live audience, hosted by David Baddiel.
Jul 03, 2013•19 min
Social anthropologist Jamie Tehrani sees our obsession with celebrity culture as a result of our maladapted brains. Four Thought is a series of thought-provoking talks which combine personal stories with ideas of contemporary relevance. Speakers air their thinking in front of a live audience, hosted by David Baddiel.
Jun 26, 2013•15 min
Economist Judith Shapiro argues that the next steps towards equality for women will be far harder than those which went before. Four Thought is a series of thought-provoking talks which combine personal stories with ideas of contemporary relevance. Speakers air their thinking in front of a live audience, hosted by David Baddiel. Producer: Sheila Cook.
Jun 19, 2013•21 min
Dick Moore calls for urgent action to tackle the problems of adolescent mental health. Driven by personal experience, he sees a growing need for society to provide young people with more emotional support. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their latest thinking on the trends and ideas in culture and society in front of a live audience.
Jun 12, 2013•18 min
Steven Poole argues that we should resist the modern message, from pop science and brain scans, that humans are irrational creatures, driven by instant judgement and primordial urges. Instead, he says we should stand up together and say we can think, and that's what makes us human. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their latest thinking on the trends and ideas in culture and society in front of a live audience. It is recorded in fron...
Jun 05, 2013•19 min
Anna Woodhouse explores what looking through glass and glasses means for us. When she was a call centre worker Anna could see the towers of Leeds University through the window of her high rise block on a Leeds council estate. For her, this symbolised both possibility and disconnection from the object of her desire. When she eventually left the estate, she completed a study on the place of glass in our culture. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speake...
May 29, 2013•19 min
Henry Stewart argues that bad management blights the working lives of millions of people, and that the solution is to let everyone choose their own bosses. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their latest thinking on the trends and ideas in culture and society in front of a live audience at Somerset House. Producer: Giles Edwards.
May 22, 2013•19 min
The science writer Emma Byrne argues that, far from tuning out, we should listen carefully when people swear, because they often do so for good reasons. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their latest thinking on the trends and ideas in culture and society in front of a live audience at Somerset House. Producer: Giles Edwards.
May 15, 2013•17 min
Stewart Henderson argues that a lack of poetry in politics is fuelling disengagement. He draws on past and current speeches from Winston Churchill to Aneurin Bevan and David Cameron to Ed Miliband to make the case for putting poetry back in political rhetoric. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their latest thinking on the trends and ideas in culture and society in front of a live audience. It is recorded in front of a live audience a...
May 08, 2013•19 min
Daniela Papi explores the dark side of volunteering overseas, and asks how local people and wealthy 'voluntourists' alike can ensure a positive experience. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their latest thinking on the trends and ideas in culture and society in front of a live audience at Somerset House. Producer: Giles Edwards.
May 01, 2013•17 min
Historian Mat Paskins argues that history can be made real when we bring back to life the excitement which previous generations felt at new developments: to make us, who live in our ancestors' future, feel their wonder when first confronted with future possibility. And he tells the story of two experiments - an ambitious attempt in the eighteenth century to use black sand to make steel, and his own youthful efforts to see if he could eat everything. Four Thought is a series of talks which combin...
Apr 24, 2013•17 min
Emma Woolf explores how people suffering from eating disorders might now have a proper explanation for the condition. Emma has suffered from anorexia and written and talked about it extensively. A proper explanation for her illness has remained elusive - until now. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their latest thinking on the trends and ideas in culture and society in front of a live audience. It is recorded in front of a live audie...
Apr 17, 2013•19 min
William Dalrymple introduces the Oscar-winning documentary-maker Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy, in Four Thought at the Jaipur Literature Festival. Obaid Chinoy, whose films include Saving Face, argues that although her work is reportage, she cannot be - and should not be - impartial. There is a difference, she says, "between story-telling and journalism".
Apr 10, 2013•14 min
William Dalrymple introduces Ranjini Obeyesekere in Four Thought at the Jaipur Literature Festival. Obeyesekere - the Sri Lankan writer, translator and academic - argues that "translations are often considered a second-class activity, done by hacks" but that, however imperfect the result, making a work written in one language available in another, is a profoundly important art. But there are difficult questions. Is a bad translation better than no translation? Is true translation, in fact, the a...
Apr 03, 2013•14 min
Anwar Akhtar, Director of The Samosa, argues that Pakistan should think of itself as an Asian nation, not as an Arab one. And after years of working between Britain and Pakistan, he says British Pakistanis are uniquely placed to help Pakistan embrace its multicultural history - and to create a prosperous and peaceful future with India. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine thought provoking ideas and engaging storytelling. Recorded live in front of an audience, speakers air their lates...
Jan 09, 2013•19 min
Adventurer Sally Kettle argues that hope is not helpful, and suggests some alternative strategies. Sally has twice rowed the Atlantic Ocean, and worries that hope can lead to a passive state of mind. There is nothing, she believes, like taking concrete steps to make things happen. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine thought provoking ideas and engaging storytelling. Recorded live in front of an audience, speakers air their latest thinking on the trends, ideas, interests and passions ...
Jan 02, 2013•19 min
Designer and technologist Tom Armitage argues that learning to write computer code means learning to think in a modern way, and that it should spur creativity: the possibility of doing entirely new things. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine thought provoking ideas and engaging storytelling. Recorded live in front of an audience, speakers air their latest thinking on the trends, ideas, interests and passions that affect our culture and society. Producer: Giles Edwards....
Dec 26, 2012•19 min
Georgie Fienberg believes that endless fundraising by overseas aid charities is not sustainable, and she argues that charities should want to close. Georgie is Founder of Afrikids, a charity which supports poor children in Ghana. When she started the organisation she set a deadline for closing its UK fundraising arm, so that the organisation in Ghana would be sustainable and self-sufficient. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine thought provoking ideas and engaging storytelling. Record...
Dec 21, 2012•19 min
Nancy Lublin, CEO of DoSomething.Org, discusses how the next generation are doing social activism. She describes the impact of the web on social activism, making it faster, cheaper and easier to do than ever before, and argues that this has big implications for societies around the world. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine thought provoking ideas and engaging storytelling. Recorded live in front of an audience, speakers air their latest thinking on the trends, ideas, interests and p...
Dec 12, 2012•19 min
Amber Dermont explains the benefits of an unhappy childhood. "Though my parents were caring people, I could not escape my own sense of despair," she says. She discusses the influence of sadness on the imagination, and describes how this upbringing took her on a journey that gradually helped her imagine a life for herself as a fiction writer. Four Thought is a series of talks which combine new ideas and personal stories. Speakers explain their latest thinking on the trends and ideas in culture an...
Dec 05, 2012•19 min
Model and activist Sara Ziff discusses the problems with fashion and modelling. Sara maintains that fashion modelling, far from being a glamorous profession, has a dark side. She argues that what links this dark side within the industry to its sometimes ugly public face is an unhealthy obsession with very young models. Producer: Giles Edwards.
Nov 28, 2012•19 min
Maria Popova, Editor of Brainpickings, discusses how, with the world's knowledge more readily available to us than ever before, the fragmentation of our interests is driving us to seek out more and more of what we're already interested in. How, she asks, can we master the architecture of human knowledge in a way that takes advantage of the "Information Age", yet broadens rather than contracts our intellectual and creative horizons, both as individual consumers and as publishers of information? P...
Nov 21, 2012•19 min
Ismail Einashe, who came to Britain as a child refugee from Somalia, reflects on the link between childhood war trauma suffered by young Somali men and the way some are drawn to violent gang culture. Four Thought is a series of talks offering a personal viewpoint recorded in front of an audience at the RSA in London. Producer: Sheila Cook.
Nov 14, 2012•20 min
