500 episodes listed below
Scholarly books, patiently made public.
New Books in Science, Technology, and Society is an interview channel built around recent scholarly books and patient explanation. Its conversations move from AI robotics and cyber conflict to science fiction planets, historical art materials, online teaching, innovation, and theories of play.
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New Books in Science, Technology, and Society is built around long-form conversations with authors of recent scholarly books. The format is plain and deliberate. Episodes often begin by naming the book, placing it in context, and asking the guest to explain the path that led to the research. From there, the conversation tends to widen. A book on Russia's hybrid warfare becomes a discussion of cybercrime, ransomware, sanctions, social media narratives, Ukraine, and the difficult boundary between criminal groups and state strategy. A book on AI and robotics becomes a way to think about work, inequality, erratic creativity in large language models, science fiction, and the guardrails humans may need around automation. The channel is comfortable with specialized language, but it usually slows down enough to define the terms that matter. It also has a strong sense of example. Science fiction planets lead into real astronomy, from Mars myths and Percival Lowell to water molecules, icy moons, and the possibility of ocean worlds. Historical art techniques become a route into recipes for inks, paints, and dyes before modern supply chains made materials easy to buy. Online teaching is treated not as software logistics alone, but as a question of emotional tone, student connection, and the texture of asynchronous classrooms. Episodes on innovation, the dot-com era, and games add management history and cultural theory to the mix. The show is not trying to entertain through speed. Its value is accumulation: patient questions, long answers, and enough room for an argument to change shape as it meets evidence. The channel's breadth can feel eclectic, but the through-line is clear. Science and technology are presented as social facts, embedded in institutions, stories, classrooms, markets, art materials, and everyday judgment.
Made for: Designed for serious generalists, students, researchers, educators, and book-minded listeners who enjoy careful conversations about science, technology, culture, and society. It works best for people who prefer context and explanation over compressed takes.
What sets it apart: The channel's strength is its range: cyber strategy, AI robotics, science fiction worlds, historical art materials, online pedagogy, innovation history, and game studies can all sit under the same editorial roof. It lets authors develop their arguments at length while keeping the questions accessible.
This podcast is a channel on the New Books Network. The New Books Network is an academic audio library dedicated to public education. In each episode you will hear scholars discuss their recently published research with another expert in their field. Discover our 150+ channels and browse our 28,000+ episodes on our website: newbooksnetwork.com Subscribe to our free weekly Substack newsletter to get informative, engaging content straight to your inbox: https://newbooksnetwork.substack.com/ Follow us on Instagram and Bluesky to learn about more our latest interviews: @newbooksnetwork Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/science-technology…
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Author interviews reveal how historical arguments about technology, conflict, science, and culture are assembled from evidence and interpretation.
New Books in Science, Technology, and Society turns recently published research into patient author interviews, with hosts asking how an argument was built and what its evidence changes.
A supposed Martian canal becomes an imagined civilization, and your reading list gets another detour.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
DarkSide, Colonial Pipeline, and the media layer of Russian hybrid warfare.
The discussion links Russia's hybrid warfare against the West to cybercrime, propaganda, and the way the two reinforce one another. A guest with background in nuclear weapons policy, cybersecurity, and espionage studies gives the conversation a broad frame, while Colonial…
A calm, useful discussion of AI, robotics, work, and the human stakes.
Kyle Murray talks through Automata, coauthored with Ibrahim Gideon, as a book that sits between artificial intelligence, robotics, and the future of work. The conversation does not treat automation as a simple replacement story.
Science fiction is weighed against real astronomy, with planets, moons, and water opening up the larger question of habitability.
Keith Cooper's New Books Network discussion treats science fiction as a useful path into planetary science, moving from Tatooine, Dune, and ocean worlds to Mars, Percival Lowell's canal idea, H.G. Wells, Europa, Ganymede, and water in Venus's atmosphere.
A grounded case for keeping asynchronous classes humane.
Flower Darby makes a plainspoken case that asynchronous teaching still carries emotional weight, and that the instructor shapes that atmosphere more than the software does.
A dog running toward someone frames a sharp discussion of play as judgment in context.
Peter's The Impossible Reversal approaches play as something judged in the moment, not simply defined in advance. Its clearest thread follows the question of when an action begins to mean play, especially as the discussion moves through Homo Ludens and the limits of any single…
A measured look at play as a cultural technology shaped by chance, theory, and power.
Play comes across here as more than a harmless break from serious life. Peter follows the way playful practices can harden into technologies, shaped by chance lines of cause and effect and gradually drawn into systems of power.
Forensic science, family pressure, and the politics of proving atrocities.
Alexa Hagerty's Still Life with Bones: Genocide, Forensics, and What Remains presents forensic science in Argentina as a political act rather than a neutral one.
Japanese history, told with sources and bite.
Italian art history, walked room by room.
This episode features an interview with Dr.
Kelly McFall interviews Alexa Hagerty about her book 'Still Life with Bones,' which explores forensic anthropology in Guatemala and Argentina.
This episode features an interview with Honghong Tinn about her book 'Island Tinkerers: Innovation and Transformation in the Making of Taiwan's Computing Industry' published by MIT Press in 2024.
Rudolf Inders interviews Peter MacDonald about his book 'The Impossible Reversal: A History of How We Play'.
Steven Sikiewicz speaks with Kristen Studdart about Russia's Hybrid Warfare Offensive Against the West.
Alfred Marcus speaks with Kyle Murray about Automata, a book on AI-integrated robotics and the future of work.
Melcher opens with Keith Cooper and Amazing Worlds of Science Fiction and Science Fact.
This episode features an interview with Nabil Ali about his book 'Gold from Newton's Apple Tree: Historical Recipes for Natural Inks, Paints, and Dyes', exploring how artists created art materials before modern options were available.
This episode features an interview with David Kirsch, an associate professor of management and entrepreneurship, discussing the Dot Com Bubble and Bust as part of a historical exploration of the 1990s.
Flower Darby discusses The Joyful Online Teacher: Finding Our Fizz in Asynchronous Classes and makes the case that asynchronous classes still need emotional presence.
This episode features an interview with Alberto Galasso about his book on managing innovation and technology capital in organizations.
New Books in Game Studies hosts Rudolf Inners and guest Peter McDonald discuss The Impossible Reversal, published by the University of Minnesota Press, as a history of play from Fluxus experiments to SimCity.
This episode explores the intersection of caste and technology through an interview with scholars Murali Shanmugavelan and Sareeta Amrute, examining how caste operates and travels both within and outside South Asia.
This episode features an interview with author Vojta Hybl about his book 'Rocks: A Guide to the Stones Around Us and the Stories They Tell' on the NewBooks Network podcast.