Best Radio Website
NZ Radio Awards 2009
15 March, 2010
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150 years ago, Charles Darwin's ideas about evolution were first announced in public - to a meeting of the Linnean Society in London. Oddly, almost no one noticed! now we look at his ideas and the impact they have made.
Lecture 1 Darwin and the Evolution of an Idea - Professor Lloyd Spencer Davis, University of Otago
In the last 2000 years there has been one idea, above all else, that has altered the way we view the world and our place in it. That idea is evolution by natural selection and the originator of the idea was Charles Darwin.
NRP846/1 CD $30.00
Professor Rainey paints a picture of life's evolution from the perspective of major evolutionary transitions, including that from solitary organisms to societies.
NRP846/2 CD $30.00
Lecture 3 The Principle of Evolution: Absolute Simplicity - Professor David Penny CNZM FRSNZ, Research Director, Allan Wilson Centre for Molecular Ecology and Evolution, Massey University
Can we find anything in biology that is not understandable, or not explainable, by the things we can observe and measure in the present? Evolution is, by far, the simplest possible way of understanding ourselves, our past and our future.
NRP846/3 CD $30.00
Lecture 4 The Fossil Record - Professor Alan Cooper, Director, Australian Centre for Ancient DNA, The University of Adelaide
How should we interpret what the fossil record tells us about evolution - both in general and with regard to how New Zealand has ended up as it is today?
NRP846/4 CD $30.00
Lecture 5 Evolutionary Psychology - Professor Russell Gray, The University of Auckland
Attempts to explain human behaviour in evolutionary terms have amixed history. Today, crude social Darwinian and socio-biological explanations are increasingly being replaced by richer, more complex theories.
NRP846/5 CD $30.00
Lecture 6 The storytelling Ape: Evolution, Art, Story and Culture - Professor Brian Boyd, The University of Auckland
Brian Boyd will focus on art, perhaps the feature of human behaviour that might seem to have least to do with a struggle for existence. Can biology explain why art (music, dance, visual art, storytelling and verse) is a human universal? Why do we so compulsively invent and engage with stories we know to be untrue?
NRP846/6 CD $30.00
Boxed set 6 CD's NRP846 $75.00
National Radio in conjunction with the Royal Society of New Zealand presents a six-part series about climate, life, extinction, the great migrations, the rise of civilization, human diseases, and asks the Big Question: what happens now?
CD 1 Why the planet Earth is just right for us – or is it?
For only a brief period of time the Earth conditions have been just right for life …however in the long term the earth will become inhabitable with variations in the climate. With Leo Gene Peters, Tim Nash, Lionel Carter and David Wharton.
NRP785/1 CD $30.00
CD 2 The Next Extinction
99% of all species are now extinct. What was the cause of these extinction? Who were the victims? What was the effect upon the world? With Dr Hamish Campbell and David Armstrong.
NRP785/2 CD $30.00
CD 3 Great Migrations
Human took 150,000 years to travel from Africa to Aotearoa. We look at what happened along the way. Actor Nick Blake talks with Prof David Penney and Prof Russell Gray.
NRP785/3 CD $30.00
CD 4 Rise of the Thinkers
There is no doubt we have become intelligent – we have extraordinary technologies now to show for it. Together we have achieved these things and more .. but have we been wise? Tim Spite works with scientists Charles Higham, Kim Sterelny and others.
NRP785/4 CD $30.00
CD 5 A plague upon their houses
The more we adapt our lives to avoid pathogens and plagues the more they adapt. Is their rate of evolution increasing? Is it out striping ours? Will they beat us in the end? With Goeff Pinifield, Michael Baker and Miles Fairburn.
NRP785/5 CD $30.00
CD 6 We are the ones we’ve been waiting for
What is going on with planet of ours? The paper reports of melting ice caps and unprecedented weather extremes. We see alarming images of retreating glaciers and diminishing forest arrears and the extinction of Species. Jo Randerson talks with Prof Paul Callaghan.
NRP785/6 CD $30.00
NRP785 6 CD set $75.00
The Transit of Venus on June 8 th 2004 saw the planet Venus moving across the face of the Sun. Lasting about six hours, the entire transit was visible from Europe, the Middle East , most of Africa and Asia however it was not visible in NZ as it began after 5 pm and ended about 11.30pm
This a very rare planetary alignment, the last being some 121 years ago. To note the event in 2004, the Royal Society of New Zealand, in association with Radio New Zealand , presented a series of six lectures covering the broad themes related to the Transit of Venus.
CD1 How The Land Got Here
Dr. Hamish Campbell - the split from Gondwanaland and the development of our unique flora and fauna. Introduction by poet Chris Orsman of Wellington.
NRP 663.1 CD $30.00
CD2 The Ancients And The Stars
Dr. Richard Hall - Stonehenge. How the ancients, from Babylonians to Polynesians, interpreted and used the stars. Stonehenge in Britain and the construction of Stonehenge Aotearoa in the Wairarapa. Introduction by Dr. Grant Christie.
NRP 663.2 CD $30.00
CD3 Pacific Voyaging And Navigation
Dr. Peter Adds - Maori studies, Victoria University of Wellington. Introduction by science historian Dr. John Stenhouse.
NRP 663.3 CD $30.00
CD4 Science In Cook’s Time
Dr. Duncan Steel - Science in the age of enlightenment, the quest to find the distance to the Sun. longitude. Intro by John Hisco, President of the Astronomical Society of South Australia.
NRP 663.4 CD $30.00
CD5 Cook’s First Voyage
Dame Anne Salmond - First encounters between Maori and Europeans. Introduction by Prof. David Mackay, Deputy Vice Chancellor, Victoria University of Wellington.
NRP 663.5 CD $30.00
CD6 Voyages In Time And Space
Prof. Paul Callaghan - What are the challengers now? The search for dark matter, other life and other universes.
With Alan MacDiarmid. Professor of Physical Sciences, Vic Uni of Wellington .
NRP 663.6 CD $30.00
NRP 663 6 CD set $75.00
Where does personality come from and what makes us who we are?
By Paul Broks and Dr Mark Lythgoe
How can we avoid the fate of being reduced to a few breeding pairs in the Arctic?
By Lord Martin Rees and Dr James Lovelock
What are quarks and how can you see them at the heart of the subatomic world? And what does quantum mechanics have to do with the mystery and origins of life?
By Frank Close and Johnjoe McFadden
How can we reduce our reliance on oil and over-production of greenhouse gases to avoid catastrophic climate change?
By Sir David King and Douglas Parr
4 CD set $75.00
Professor Alan Heeger, Hideki Shirakawa and Professor Alan MacDiarmid, three of today's most distinguished international scientists response to questions from three secondary school pupils and three Victoria University student about where science is heading?
NRP610 CD $30.00
Renown for splitting the atom. John Campbell tells us how this man has earned immortal fame overseas and his origins in New Zealand. Then we hear Rutherford speak.
CD9336 CD $30.00
New Zealand's largest earthquake in European times struck the the centre of the country almost 150 years ago. Although the later Murchison and Napier earthquakes claimed more lives, neither created more upheaval than the Wairarapa- Wellington shake of 1855. Earth scientist Rodney Grapes recreates the event and Jack Perkins explores its significance for modern Wellington.
CD2008 CD $30.00
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