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Feed your mind. Be provoked. One big idea at a time. Your brain will love you for it. Grab your front row seat to the best live forums and festivals with Natasha Mitchell.
613 Episodes
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You would think that times of intense progress and technological innovation are good for societies, but history shows that's when revolutions happen. Author and prominent CNN TV host Fareed Zakaria explains how rapid transformation of economy through technology often leads to an identity crisis and upheaval against the establishment. It's just too much too quickly. Sounds familiar? Yes – we in the middle of one. But Fareed Zakaria is optimistic it will all end well.
Since the announcement of the AUKUS plan for nuclear submarines, we’ve been hearing a lot about Australia’s maritime security. But as an island “girt by sea”, that security depends on much more than our military capability.
Australia's unique biodiversity, a product of almost 50 million years of glorious evolutionary isolation, is in freefall. The threats are not just the rabbits, the cane toads, the cats and foxes – the common culprits. Let's not forget the small but impactful smooth newt or the fierce red fire ants, and the many invasive weeds. Twenty new weeds will establish in the wild in Australia this year – and every year to come … unless things change. But is it possible to stop this ongoing invasion? How do we go about it?
Join Natasha Mitchell and guests for a robust conversation about forging a shared future between Black and White Australians through deeper understanding. Indigenous curator Margo Neale thought her nickname was "Abo" when she was a little girl. She didn't understand it was racist. Writing on politics and race for decades, David Marr thought he knew a lot — until he unearthed an family story. Thomas Mayo is thinking deeply about what's possible for Black and White Australia after the Voice referendum.
For more than half a century, the Anglican Diocese of Newcastle allowed and covered up an extensive network of paedophile priests who sexually abused hundreds of children in their care.
Through sinister marketing and loose regulation, the tobacco industry has hooked a whole new generation of kids on smoking. How did it come to this, and will the federal government’s new laws to crack down on vaping actually work?
What lessons can we learn from J. Robert Oppenheimer and the development of the nuclear bomb? How should we govern and legislate new technologies that have the power to change the world? Like nuclear technology in the mid of last century, now large digital platforms and generative AI are putting humanity at the threshold: progress or possible exploitation and abuse? How can we regulate cutting-edge technology on a global stage?
Smaller conflicts than those we're witnessing right now have set off world wars. Who will be the crucial superpowers and super peacemakers in the next five years? Get your head around the major machinations and manoeuvres with Natasha Mitchell and guests.
We are living in an "age of crises," says former New Zealand prime minister, Helen Clark. With her leadership experience and expertise in governance, politics, and policy, Helen Clark and a panel of health and international relation experts explore the challenges facing the world today and what is needed to achieve a healthier and thriving future for all. While it's easy to feel overwhelmed by complex problems, speaking up about inequality can make a difference. Helen Clark urged everyone to "raise the issues, never give up, and relentlessly campaign".
Women’s refuges are now a central part of our response to family violence, with hundreds operating across Australia. But that hasn't always been the case.
1As Donald Trump makes his case for re-election in 2024, under a cloud of criminal prosecutions, how can journalists better cover such a norm-busting and rule-breaking political figure?
New York writer Jonathan Rosen’s memoir The Best Minds: a story of friendship, madness, and the tragedy of good intentions is a story of tenderness, heartache, and horror as he explores the vexed tensions between civil rights, medical power, and the complexities of recognising and treating severe psychotic illness. He joined Natasha Mitchell with psychiatrist Patrick McGorry for a powerful conversation at the 2024 Adelaide Writers Week. In light of the recent Bondi shopping centre killings, this discussion recorded just prior was sadly prescient, but deeply insightful.
You don't need that dress, you need a hug. Or so says fashion activist and writer, Aja Barber.
It took 400,000 people to land man to the moon. And it's using that example as inspiration that the influential Italian American economist Mariana Mazzucato argues we can change capitalism.
Could Asia Pacific be with China within a couple of years? Is the independence of Taiwan worth for Australia to get involved? Would Indonesia be a better security partner for Australia than the US? On Big Ideas, a panel of foreign policy experts dissect evolving dynamics of South East Asia and offer insights into how Australia can navigate the delicate diplomatic dance with the two global giants and emerging regional powers. There are many different views on Australia's geopolitical position and the implications for its strategic future.
Join host Natasha Mitchell and guests for some straight talk that cuts through spin and jargon. Has the way politicians speak ever made you shout at the television, feel bamboozled, helpless, or shut out of democratic debate over our shared future? Pollie-talk can make important issues opaque, the inequitable seem fair, and the fair seem inequitable. Hear from Richard Denniss (author of Econobabble: How to decode political spin and economic nonsense), Yanis Varoufakis (author of Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism), Joelle Gergis (author of Humanity's Moment: A Climate Scientist's Case for Hope) and Thomas Keneally (Schindler's List).
Only 50 years ago, if you were 60 years old your chance of dying was the same as an 80-year-old's today. Thanks to progress in medical technology, you can live longer than ever before. Quantum technology and quantum screening, modelling with digital twins, harvesting the power of AI and real time monitoring of your molecules – a panel of health experts discusses the new frontiers in the development of drugs and health technology.
Gender equality isn't just about equal pay, it's a health and safety issue. Women perceive safety very differently to men, and that's why they need a seat at the table when policies are being nutted out. Just a month after Australia gets its first Gender Equality Strategy, Stephanie Copus Campbell speaks about her first-hand experience on women's rights and discrimination in Papua New Guinea and many other countries in the region — and her observations as the international Ambassador for Gender Equality. Her verdict: we are going backwards worldwide.
How valuable are trees as an alternative crop? And what's the role of agroforestry in the future of sustainable farming?
They use of shark nets to protect us from sharks is highly controversial. Do they work, what do they do to marine life, are there alternatives, and why are sharks so political? Join Natasha Mitchell and guests at the 2024 Ocean Lovers Festival for a robust interrogation of of an issue that ignites passions.
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