Daily Schedule

For today's show we're replaying some favorite interviews from the past few months. Tim Flannery gives us a history of planet earth—from its origins as a galactic cloud of dust to the rise of us, Homo sapiens. Diane Ackerman talks about her husband Paul West’s debilitating stroke and road to recovery. Environmental writer Eugene Linden tells us about the few remaining indigenous cultures that have refused to join the modern world. And Sarah Vowell describes the Americanization of Hawaii in the late 19th century.

Stories of unintended consequences -- from a psychologist who may have helped create a terrorist, to a toxic lake that spawned new life.

NPR’s Scott Simon reports on the world’s top news, features and entertainment to your Saturday morning. 

The NPR news quiz where the panelists are funny, the limericks are lyrical and you get to shout answers at your radio. Hosted by Peter Sagal.

Vince Gilligan, creator of Breaking Bad, explains how his feel-bad television series (about a meth-dealing high school teacher with cancer) can inspire so much love from audiences and critics. The Normal Heart finally opens on Broadway, a quarter-century after its first performance, and its account of the early years of the AIDS epidemic ...

Acclaimed musician and songwriter Chris Thile welcomes a wide range of well-known and up-and-coming talent to share the stage and create a beautiful listening experience on his variety show, Live from Here.

ThisAmericanLife: Themed, offbeat, (mostly) true stories that shed new light on the extraordinary side of everyday life. Host Ira Glass and a regular cast of personalities, including David Sedaris, Sarah Vowell and Mike Birbiglia, bring the best of nonfiction storytelling to the radio. 

Hear some ambient electro-acoustic music by composer, pianist, and self-taught studio manipulator Jon Hopkins on this edition of New Sounds.  Hopkins' music toes the lines between many genres, merging digital dance-trance coldness with shimmering deep textures.