Episodes

  • Downstream: Trains Are Better Than Cars. Here’s Why w/ Gareth Dennis

    Downstream: Trains Are Better Than Cars. Here’s Why w/ Gareth Dennis
    Nov 25 2024
    While the first modern trains were built in the early 19th century – more people travel by rail today than ever before. Not only have passenger numbers risen in the UK but the likes of China, Iran and Uzbekistan now have high-speed networks. On this episode of Downstream, Aaron Bastani is joined by author and […]
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    1 hr and 34 mins
  • Novara FM: The New Space Race Is an Arms Race w/ Daniel Deudney

    Novara FM: The New Space Race Is an Arms Race w/ Daniel Deudney
    Nov 22 2024
    In October 2024, SpaceX caught a rocket. An astonishing feat of engineering, it took humanity one giant leap closer to the era of everyday space travel – and possibly one small step closer to its own obliteration. Despite a long list of treaties attempting to prevent it, space is now a militarised zone. Nuclear-laden ICBMs and […]
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    1 hr and 8 mins
  • Downstream IRL: There’s No Such Thing As Green Capitalism w/ Andreas Malm

    Downstream IRL: There’s No Such Thing As Green Capitalism w/ Andreas Malm
    Nov 18 2024
    Global heating is a serious problem, but the question of just how urgently to fight it is a fraught one. Should 2C or 1.5C of warming be our limit? Or can we blow past these limits now, and come back down to them later, using technology to pull carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere? There’s […]
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    37 mins
  • ACFM Trip 47: Disruption

    ACFM Trip 47: Disruption
    Nov 17 2024
    Disruption is a byword for success in the tech industry, but when it affects people’s daily routines – say, when JSO activists are slow-marching down a road – it becomes nothing short of criminal. On this Trip, Jem, Nadia and Keir unpack the political uses and abuses of disruption and the ‘creative destruction’ inherent to capitalism. […]
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    1 hr and 28 mins
  • Novara FM: How MAGA Went Mainstream w/ Joshua Citarella

    Novara FM: How MAGA Went Mainstream w/ Joshua Citarella
    Nov 15 2024
    In 2016, the alt-right seemed to come from the internet and infest politics. In 2024, the internet and politics have become identical. Are we swimming in the world the alt-right built for us? Perhaps no one knows the world of online politics better than Joshua Citarella, an artist and political theorist whose 2018 book Politigram and […]
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    1 hr and 18 mins
  • Downstream: What the Roman Empire Tells Us About the Collapse of the West W/ Peter Heather and John Rapley

    Downstream: What the Roman Empire Tells Us About the Collapse of the West W/ Peter Heather and John Rapley
    Nov 13 2024
    Everyone knows that the Roman Empire rose, then fell. Historians don’t all agree on the reasons for the collapse, but their misunderstandings can shed plenty of light on the current state of the world, according to the authors of How Empires Fall: Rome, America and the Future of the West. Peter Heather, a historian of […]
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    1 hr and 30 mins
  • Novara FM: What’s Next for AI Now It’s Ingested the Entire Internet? w/ Marek Poliks

    Novara FM: What’s Next for AI Now It’s Ingested the Entire Internet? w/ Marek Poliks
    Nov 7 2024
    The rise of artificial intelligence will bring about a planetary-scale shift in human life and politics – and, it seems, a lot of weird social media spam. But for all the grand pronouncements from techno-utopians and pessimists alike, the reality is that there’s still much to be decided about the future that AI portends. At the […]
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    1 hr and 25 mins
  • Downstream: Could Israel Become A Failed State? w/ Ilan Pappé

    Downstream: Could Israel Become A Failed State? w/ Ilan Pappé
    Nov 5 2024
    War is spreading throughout West Asia, a situation understood by many observers as an outgrowth of Israeli expansionism. In a return visit to Downstream, historian Ilan Pappé provides a century’s worth of context to the unfolding crisis. He talks to Aaron to talk about the lack of a viable left in Israel, why nation-states haven’t […]
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    1 hr and 21 mins