6 episodes

Every week in Brain Train, an expert is asked about their specialist subject - then the following week, the expert becomes the novice, asking an expert in a totally different subject what they've always wanted to know. This process repeats in a glorious Brain Train!

Brain Train Podcast Martin Zaltz Austwick and Alice Bell

    • Science
    • 4.9 • 7 Ratings

Every week in Brain Train, an expert is asked about their specialist subject - then the following week, the expert becomes the novice, asking an expert in a totally different subject what they've always wanted to know. This process repeats in a glorious Brain Train!

    Brain Train #18 - James Coglan gets inside the mind of Bees with Elli Leadbeater

    Brain Train #18 - James Coglan gets inside the mind of Bees with Elli Leadbeater

    This episode, killer robot designer James Coglan wants to know whether he can harness the power of insect intelligence to carry out his evil plans. Elli Leadbeater from Royal Holloway University stalls for time until the cops arrive.

    • 26 min
    Brain Train #17 - Rachel Souhami asks James Coglan about Killer Robots

    Brain Train #17 - Rachel Souhami asks James Coglan about Killer Robots

    Brain Train driver Alice Bell steps aside and hands her whistle over, as our new co-host, museums polymath Rachel Souhami, steps up to the plate. It’s like when The Doctor regenerates.

    In her inaugural episode, Rachel asks programmer James Coglan whether computers are going to kill us all, and host Martin Zaltz Austwick worries about robots kicking down his door.

    • 28 min
    Brain Train Podcast #16 - Charlotte Riley talks voting and fairness with Chris Good

    Brain Train Podcast #16 - Charlotte Riley talks voting and fairness with Chris Good

    On the eve of the Scottish Referendum, (thoroughly) modern historian Charlotte Riley ask pure mathematician Chris Good about the fairness of voting systems, host Alice Bell steers them onto sewage, badgers and her aunts, and Chris wonders aloud whether he'll ever see a locally compact first countable Dowker Space in ZFC his lifetime. There is literally something for everyone.

    • 26 min
    Brain Train Podcast #15 - Justin Bates and Charlotte Riley

    Brain Train Podcast #15 - Justin Bates and Charlotte Riley

    This episode, tenancy lawyer Justin Bates asks Charlotte Riley why cold war USA and USSR came together to condemn Britain in 1956 over an Egyptian canal. What happened next may surprise you*.

    Alice Bell hosts and writes clickbait tweets.

    *she provided a really fascinating explanation of the Suez crisis

    • 29 min
    Brain Train Podcast #14 - Caitjan Gainty and Justin Bates

    Brain Train Podcast #14 - Caitjan Gainty and Justin Bates

    Caitjan Gainty is guided by housing lawyer Justin Bates through the tangled wreckage that once was tenants' rights in England and Wales. Brain train engineer Martin Zaltz Austwick cracks his knuckles loudly on-mic and nibbles bourbons despondently.

    • 27 min
    Brain Train Podcast #13 - Camilla Sutherland and Caitjan Gainty

    Brain Train Podcast #13 - Camilla Sutherland and Caitjan Gainty

    This episode artist Camilla Sutherland diagnoses the state of American health insurance with medical historian Caitjan Gainty, in a touching and personal story of baby scans and economics.

    • 25 min

Customer Reviews

4.9 out of 5
7 Ratings

7 Ratings

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