Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford

You can gamble on horses or on the turn of a card - but Daniel Gould made a living betting on the outcome of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. Daniel made a profit because he studied the voting history of the competition, as well as the cultural and geo-political factors that predict which songs will triumph and which will score "nil point".    

In 2018, Daniel was so sure of his system of reducing the risk that he took out a loan on his home and bet it on Israel's song to win...  only to see the entry from Cyprus suddenly rocketing up the leader board. Was Daniel about to lose everything?

For a full list of sources used in this episode visit Tim Harford.com

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Anna Marie Jarvis wanted a national holiday to honor the dedication and sacrifice of America's mothers. She wasn't the first person to propose a Mother's Day - but her campaign caught the imagination of the people and the ears of the politicians.

Congress officially recognised Jarvis's Mother's Day in 1914 - but the indefatigable campaigner had allied herself with businessmen with vested interests in such an annual event. Mother's Day soon span out of its creator's control and caused an embittered Jarvis no end of heartache.      

For a full list of sources used in this episode visit Tim Harford.com

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It could cure any 'female ailment' - even cancer - said the adverts. But Lydia E. Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound was, in fact, just a concoction of herbs and alcohol of no proven medicinal merit. That didn't stop desperate American women from buying bottles of the stuff - and writing to Lydia Pinkham for medical advice.  

Why did her customers shun 'expert' doctors and opt instead for quack medicines? And why, when Lydia Pinkham finally came in for criticism, did no one question the efficacy of her vegetable compound?  

For a full list of sources for this episode, go to timharford.com.

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Cautionary Conversation: In 1990, a small extremist group launched a nerve gas attack on passengers riding the Tokyo subway. Thousands of people were hurt, more than a dozen died. At the time, such use of a chemical weapon seemed new and uniquely terrifying.

But advances in biology mean that today it's possible such a group could create a virus like Covid... with the potential to kill millions. What are the dangers and what can we do to combat them? Tim Harford talks to writer Michael Specter about his new book Higher Animals: Vaccines, Synthetic Biology and the Future of Life.

(Higher Animals: Vaccines, Synthetic Biology and the Future of Life is is available now at Pushkin.fm, Audible, or wherever audiobooks are sold.) 

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Air traffic controllers are meant to stop aircrafts from flying into one another... and if they fail, computer systems are installed to warn pilots of a coming collision. But sometimes these humans and computers give conflicting and confusing advice. Who to believe?

When a cargo plane and a Russian airliner collided in just such a situation, the authorities scrambled to work out how to prevent a repeat of the disaster... but a grieving father decided to seek revenge on those he held responsible. 

For a full list of sources for this episode, go to timharford.com.

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Cautionary Conversation: When a small-town detective gets a tip about a missing woman, he believes he's uncovered a highly-trained chameleon: a foreign spy. Soon, Esther Reed is on the Secret Service's Most Wanted list, and a nationwide manhunt has commenced. But all is not as it seems.

Jake Halpern joins Tim Harford to talk about the latest season of his Pushkin podcast Deep Cover: Never Seen Again. They discuss the dangers of incrementally increasing lies; how and why certain stories are escalated up the media "food chain"; and what it takes to lead a double life.

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In the early 90s, cutting-edge advertising agency Chiat/Day announced a radical plan, aimed at giving the company a jolt of creative renewal. They would sweep away corner offices and cubicles and replace them with zany open spaces, as well as innovative portable computers and phones. A brand new era of “hot-desking” had arrived.

Problems quickly began. Disgruntled employees found themselves hauling temperamental, clunky laptops and armfuls of paperwork all over the office; some even had to use the trunks of their cars as filing cabinets. Soon, the unhappy nomads had had enough.

Bad execution was to blame for the failure of this “playful” workspace. But Chiat/Day had made another mistake here, too – one that was more serious, more fundamental and altogether more common.

For a full list of sources for this episode, go to timharford.com.

Listener questions

Tim is taking your questions. Do you have any queries about one of the stories we've covered? Are you curious about how we make the show? Send in your questions, however big or small, and Tim will do his best to answer them in a special Q&A episode.

You can email your question to [email protected] or leave a voice note at 914-984-7650. Please be aware that if you're calling from outside the US international rates will apply.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

With the 95th Academy Awards just around the corner, Tim Harford looks back at a basic lesson. Galileo tried to teach us that adding more and more layers to a system intended to avert disaster often makes catastrophe all the more likely. This principle has been ignored in nuclear power plants, financial markets and at the Oscars... all resulting in chaos.

For a full list of sources for this episode, go to timharford.com.

Listener questions

Tim is taking your questions. Do you have any queries about one of the stories we've covered? Are you curious about how we make the show?  Send in your questions, however big or small, and Tim will do his best to answer them in a special Q&A episode.

You can email your question to [email protected] or leave a voice note at 914-984-7650. That's a US number, so please be aware that if you're calling from outside the US international rates will apply.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Cautionary Conversation: Celebrated physicist Professor Paul Frampton was on his way to Brussels to meet the love of his life, swimwear model Denise Milani. Or so he thought. When he found himself in jail, he realized he’d fallen prey to a confidence trickster.

Tim Harford is joined by Maria Konnikova - journalist, psychologist and best-selling author - to talk about swindlers: what motivates them; what they look for in their victims; and how to avoid being conned altogether.

Listener questions

Tim is taking your questions. Do you have any queries about one of the stories we've covered? Are you curious about how we make the show?  Send in your questions, however big or small, and Tim will do his best to answer them in a special Q&A episode.

You can email your question to [email protected] or leave a voice note at 914-984-7650. That's a US number, so please be aware that if you're calling from outside the US international rates will apply.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Steve Jobs called It “the most amazing piece of technology since the PC.” According to Jeff Bezos It was not only “revolutionary,” but infinitely commercial. It was a fiendishly clever and massively hyped invention. But in the end It — also known as the Segway — was a failure.

What makes an invention useful and valuable? Jimi Heselden’s pragmatic brainchild the Concertainer might hold the answers. First used to shore up the collapsing walls of a canal, it ultimately solved problems that Jimi had never even imagined.

For a full list of sources for this episode, go to timharford.com

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