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Cautionary Tales

Pushkin Industries

We tell our children unsettling fairy tales to teach them valuable life lessons, but these Cautionary Tales are for the education of the grown ups – and they are all true. Tim Harford (Financial Times, BBC, author of “Messy” and “The Undercover Economist”) brings you stories of awful human error, tragic catastrophes, daring heists and hilarious fiascos. They'll delight you, scare you, but also make you wiser. Featuring original music and an award-winning cast including Alan Cumming and Archie Panjabi (The Good Wife), Toby Stephens (Die Another Day), Russell Tovey (Quantico) – and Malcolm Gladwell.

Episodes

Cautionary Tales Presents: Brave New Planet

Oct 12 2020 • 0 MIN

Introducing Brave New Planet, a seven-part series that delves deep into powerful technologies changing our world. They have amazing potential upsides, but we can’t ignore the serious risks. Hosted ...

BONUS: Storks, Smoking and the Power of Doubt

Sep 16 2020 • 0 MIN

It's easy to mock statistics or cast doubt on them... but we do so at our peril. Undermining our trust in facts and figures can cause great harm, and even death. We should guard against it. Tim Har...

How To End A Pandemic

Jul 17 2020 • 0 MIN

The eradication of smallpox is one of humanity's great achievements - but the battle against the virus was fought by the most unlikely of alliances. How did the breakthrough happen - and can we gua...

That Turn To Pascagoula

Jul 10 2020 • 0 MIN

For years, people had warned that New Orleans was vulnerable - but when a hurricane came close to destroying the city, the reaction was muted. Some people took the near miss as a warning - others, ...

The Village of Heroes

Jul 3 2020 • 0 MIN

It looked like any ordinary roll of cloth, but it brought the dreaded plague to the village of Eyam. First it killed the tailor, then resident after resident succumbed. To stop the spread of the di...

The Spreadsheet of Life and Death

Jun 26 2020 • 0 MIN

Clive had a deadly form of cancer, but fortunately there was a new drug to treat it. Imagine his anger when he was told the treatment was too expensive. He’d entered a world where unique human live...