The Why? Curve

Should we be allowed to take our own lives? Should doctors or friends be allowed to help us? For the first time in a decade, MPs have a bill to consider on assisted dying. Parliament and the cabinet is split, and there are vigorous campaigns on both sides. Will it open the door to euthanasia for convenience, with old people and the disabled pressured not to be a burden? Or is it a measure of compassion for the suffering and the desperate? Phil and Roger talk through the new bill and its limitations with Dr Sam Carr of the Centre for Death and Society at Bath University.

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How ready are we for the results of climate change? While leaders talk at COP29 about lessening global warming, some of the extreme weather predicted by scientists is already here. The hundreds dead in the Valencia floods suggest governments need to do more to keep us safe. Do we need to build differently, or live in more secure places? Can we be adequately protected from the increasing numbers of wildfires or hurricanes? Phil and Roger get the latest research from Ilan Kelman, Professor of Disasters and Health at University College London

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The Donald is back. Another Trump presidency - with a Republican-dominated congress. So how will a world that looks back on 2016-2020 and shudders, deal with a volatile, unpredictable narcissist, who is now also convicted felon, in the White House? What will it mean for Ukraine, for Gaza, for China, for Europe? Paul Whiteley, Emeritus Professor of Government at the University of Essex, walks Phil and Roger through the likely challenges of Trump 2.0 for a world he says is now in a much more dangerous place.

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Just days from one of the most divisive and consequential elections in US history, what are the chances of a second Trump presidency, or the first woman being installed in the White House? And how true are the alarming predictions of what it might mean for America and for the world? Dr Thomas Gift, Associate Professor of Political Science at UCL and founding director of its Centre on American Politics, tells Phil and Roger the vote is too close to call, with unpredictable changes of allegiance from traditional allies on both sides of the political divide. And Dr Gift has personal experience of what’s happening in the most important swing state - Pennsylvania.

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Hard times and hard choices, but the Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, seems determined to inflict pain on consumers, taxpayers and businesses in the short term, to plug what she says is a £40bn hole in the nation's finances. But does she need to? And is she going to hit the right targets, given that she has boxed herself in by committing not to raise income tax, VAT or National Insurance on employees? And is recalculating national debt by taking into account assets a sensible way of allowing her to borrow more - without spooking lenders? Simon French, Chief Economist and Head or Research at Panmure Liberum, tells Phil and Roger what she could and should do in Labour's first budget.

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Why do so many of us opt to go under the knife to change our appearance? Cosmetic surgery is having a boom, with injections as well as scalpels and offering cheaper and barely-regulated treatments. It can be dangerous as well as pricey, and often ineffective, so why do it? Is it down to a distorted perception of beauty, conditioned by social media and reality TV? Does it need more regulation, as well as a push to ease social pressures? Phil and Roger ask Ruth Holliday, Professor of Gender and Culture at Leeds University, and co-author of the book "Kitsch! Cultural Politics and Taste" 

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A year after October 7 and the landscape shaped over decades is irrevocably changed - Palestinians and Israelis killed in unprecedented numbers, Hezbollah and Hamas decapitated, Iran humiliated. And no end in sight to the bloodshed and destruction. So where have the pieces fallen? What chance of any kind of ceasefire on any front?What hope for the remaining Israeli hostages? Will things change further after the election hiatus in the US - Israel's biggest backer? Can Prime Minister Netanyahu cling to power indefinitely? Simon Mabon, Professor of International Politics at Lancaster University, tells Phil and Roger what the next year might bring

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The Tory ship seems rudderless, and the vote for a new captain less than enthralling. After their underwhelming Birmingham conference, what hope is there for the Conservatives - hitherto the most successful political organisation in Europe? With the fewest MPs in its history, and missing many of the former big beasts of Toryism, does the party’s salvation lie in lurching further to the right to win back supporters from Reform? Or is the safe ground in the centre where the Lib Dems have drained their vote? Phil and Roger get the views of Tim Bale, Professor of Politics at Queen Mary University of London, and Thor of “The Conservative Party After Brexit: Turmoil and Transformation”

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The Labour Party in government for the first time in 14 years, but this week’s party conference seemed an exercise in damage control rather than celebration - delegates voting against the cabinet on winter fuel payments, and cabinet ministers having to announce they won’t accept any more free clothes or glasses. How did the honeymoon end so soon? Or is the scale of the problems they have inherited so daunting it requires harsh medicine that will never make them popular? With such a huge parliamentary majority, do they, in any case, need to care? Matthew Flinders, Professor of Politics at the University of Sheffield, tells Phil and Roger their biggest problem is the lack of an overall strategic vision.

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Are we all failing to become adults? Does the world treat us as if we need to be told to carry a water bottle on a train, or hold onto a handrail, or that a bag of nuts may contain…. nuts? The way our politics and culture like simple messages and avoid challenge or risk or complexity suggests to some that we are becoming an infantile society, incapable of understanding nuance or facing the world of adults. Phil and Roger talk about all this with Keith Hayward, Professor of Criminology at the University of Copenhagen, and author of the book ”Infantilised: How Our Culture Killed Adulthood”.  

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