The Colin McEnroe Show

Numbers are so fundamental to our understanding of the world around us that we maybe tend to think of them as an intrinsic part of the world around us. But they aren't. Humans invented numbers just as much as we invented all of language.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I have traveled to three foreign countries since President Trump was elected. While I have always been proud to be American, even as I criticize much in my country, I was humbled by what people thought of America in the countries I visited. They were puzzled by our health care system, and appalled by our guns and voter apathy. Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Radiation is everywhere. It's emitted by our sun, by cat litter, by bananas and occasionally by nuclear bombs. It's even emitted by you, and by me, and by every living (and dead) person in the world. So why are we so scared of something so prevalent in our everyday lives?Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Perhaps the most surprising thing about the Amazons of ancient Greek mythology is that they were not entirely mythical. While many of the deeds and details ascribed to these women warriors were imagined, the Amazons themselves were inspired by a real-life horse-riding tribe of nomads called the Scythians.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Siri, Alexa, Cortana, Google Assistant, etc. These are just the beginning of what experts believe will be a future filled with verbally interactive, digital and robotic assistants. And as we become more accustomed to interacting with machines, the machines are becoming more life-like.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

When I hear the word "diorama," the first thing I think of is Mr. Mack’s fifth grade class and painting hills and grass and clouds and a fence into a shoebox and making little cardboard cut outs of Lassie and the boy she loved. God, I hated that stuff.The second thing I think of is a place like the Peabody Museum in New Haven and their incredibly, obsessively, over-the-toply detailed dioramas of the plant and wildlife of Connecticut.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Flags have been in the news a lot lately. South Carolina removed the Confederate flag from its Statehouse and one Missouri county threatened to lower the flags at their courthouse for one full year to mourn the Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage. I'm in awe of the emotions a simple flag can evoke. On the surface, it's a piece of cloth with pretty colors and designs. Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's just a dance, right?Actually, maybe that's the last thing the prom is. Maybe the photo is even more important, because it freezes you. It's your chance, as high school trickles away, to say "This is who I am. This will be who I was."We've been looking at prom photos by Mary Ellen Mark, who will be on our show today, and they're striking in the range of emotional states they convey. We see joy, hesitation, confidence, detachment and some flat-out haunted looks.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You remember the dress, right? In case you don't: Three years ago, a poorly-lit photograph of a dress pretty much tore the internet to pieces. Some people saw a black-and-blue dress; some people saw a white-and-gold dress. The black-and-blue-dress people couldn't understand how the white-and-gold-dress people were living their lives; the white-and-gold-dress people called the black-and-blue-dress people "fake news" (no they didn't).Well, this week there's a new the dress. Except it's a the dress for your ears, not your eyes. It's an audio file. Some people hear the word "laurel." Some people hear the non-word "yanny." And the dispute over which word is right and which word is wrong is very important (no it isn't).Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Sarah Kendzior predicted that the conditions she witnessed in 2013 from her home in America's overlooked heartland would lead to the rise of a candidate like Donald Trump. She was one of the few that saw it coming.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.