Radio War Nerd EP #188 — Science in the Cold War, with Audra Wolfe

Mark is a great interviewer. He asks good background questions and politely interrupts the interviewee to request a clearer explanation before I get lost.

I have been watching PBS the public station on space documentaries. Really interesting! I did not know that Walt Disney worked with Von Braun to make the space race into a kids amusement park so that the Cold War space race would be acceptable to the people. It is also interesting to note that while Von Braun was brought here despite being in the Nazi party and developing the rocket that terrorized London during the war, at the same time the US deported one of the top Chinese scientists on space exploration who then became Mao´s top rocket scientist. They also deported many other scientists during the Red Scare accused of communist sympathies, one going to France to become a painter. They also said how the US used the central planning model based on the Soviets to build up the space program while denouncing it.

I'll be in New York the week of August 12th, and so will Jimmy Dore! Let's go his show! Tickets are still available for August 14th.

Radio War Nerd is a TOTALLY distinctive podcast. I listen to Media Roots Radio, UnAuthorized Disclosure, Moderate Rebels, Status Coup and Jimmy Dore. But RWN provides stimulating content grounded in an historical analysis that's superior to the other content creators I subscribe to. Every episode is very interesting and I'm always learning from Mark, John, and their guests. Thank you so much!

it's so weird for people to be talking about the Pugwash movement or how Pugwash won a Nobel prize. I'm from Nova Scotia where the town Pugwash is and what the movement is named after. And, it's like this extremely poor, rundown rural nothing. I learned about the Nobel prize thing awhile ago, but listening to this and it's even more wild than I thought. Nova Scotians only really know Pugwash as this poor rural area that is what everything its name implies it is. I'm not sure I've ever met anyone here who knew that Pugwash won a Nobel prize and lots of people just thought I was bullshitting.

For those who know nothing about Ethiopia, the youtube channel, Rare Earth, is currently doing a series videos from there. Everything from Tef to coffee (and Qat). Also donkeys. I'm not suggesting the author as a guest but if you want a look at the scenery what the people get up to, it's a good place to start.

Arthur Koestler's The Sleepwalkers (1959 [?]), a very good book, i thought.

Chomsky has largely been dethroned as the linguistic immortal of yesteryear. See the work done by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson. They started the process with Metaphors We Live By in 1977 and they've been followed by gobs of empirical research on the subject of embodied cognition. All of it largely disproving any kind of theory of universal grammar.

As for Ethiopia, have you tried asking Mohamed Hassan? He used to be the Ethiopian ambassador in Belgium but lost his accreditation because he is actually Somalian (real story). He is a walking encyclopedia and speaks about 7 languages fluently...

I haven't finished listening to the whole episode, so perhaps you mention it later, but for another example of the Feds going after Chinese scientists with baseless claims of espionage, from my own field of solid state physics, look up the story of Xi Xiaoxing. Arrested by a dozen FBI agents for relaying secrets to China only to have the charges unceremoniously dropped once the feds bothered to have some actual scientists look at their evidence.

Have you tries Thomas Mountain? He's a writer for Counterpunch that lives in Eritrea and writes about the Horn of Africa. I think his email is in the Counterpunch bio.

I'm liking the frequency those episodes are coming at.

Audra J. Wolfe Verified account @ColdWarScience: "Oh jesus the white guy says the most important thing is to appeal to the forgotten white guy"..."all white guys gonna shout"... Never mind climate change, when you two start down the rabbit hole, maybe it's time to get a horse and a big black hat and convert to Amish.

"your listeners probably don't care about science, only wars" why not both? I listened to this episode while doing real life science in a lab!

A topic close to my heart...