Afternoons for Monday 7 August 2017

Short Story Club

This week's story is Fiona Farrell's Paradise Ducks

1:10 First song

1:15 Sir John Key to receive Honorary Doctorate 

Sir John Key is set to receive an Honorary Doctorate from University of Canterbury. Sir John, graduated from the university in 1983 with a Bachelor of Commerce degree majoring in Accountancy. And of course, was the Prime Minister of New Zealand for eight years and Leader of the National Party for 10 years. He will receive a Doctor of Commerce (honoris causa) honorary degree. University of Canterbury Chancellor is Dr John Wood.

1:25 Looking to earth for signs of life on Mars

It's the big question... is there life on Mars? But should we be looking at how life started on Earth and get to where it is today, in order to answer it?

Professor Ian Hawes is an aquatic biologist. He was one of the first scientists to tackle the minus-50 degree challenge of an Antarctic winter. He's giving his Inaugural Professorial Lecture 'Windows to other worlds: Antarctic lakes, astrobiology and milestone moments for life on ancient Earth'.

1:35 Learning from the best at Disfrutar

Auckland chef Jasbir Kaur has just returned from a three-and-a-half-month stint working at Michelin starred restaurant. Disfrutar, in Barcelona.

Known for its eleborate 30 course meals, Disfrutar is rated one of the world's top restaurants and is so popular it's booked a year in advance.

1:40 Hidden Figures

Today Lillian Grace from Figure.nz delves into the figures held about the people of the Chatham Islands

1:45 Great album

We're listening to great debut albums this week and launch off with The Cars

2:10 Television Critic Alex Casey

Alex talks about some of the on-demand content she has been watching while on holiday.

Game of Thrones (Sky and Neon)

Search Party (Lightbox)

Friends from College (Netflix)

Grace and Frankie (Netflix)

2:30 Expert feature: how to fly a plane

Is it true you have to have perfect eyesight to become a pilot? And how on earth do such big heavy planes get off the ground anyway?

Air NZ chief captain David Morgan is our expert guest today, he tells us how to fly a plane.

Captain Morgan is Air New Zealand's chief pilot as well the operations integrity and standards officer. He has spent three decades flying the friendly skies with our national carrier.

He tells us how being a pilot was a childhood dream, and how he still loves to fly, even though he doesn't do it as often as in the past.

3:10 Why is what makes us human

A simple three letter word is the key driver of science, art and technology. Why is what makes us human.

Astrophysicist Mario Livio spent 20 years working on the Hubble telescope  and contemplating the universe. 

A few years ago he became curious about curiosity and has looked into the latest research to help us understand the origins of curiosity and how it works - including just what is happening in our brains when we simply need to know how something works or love learning something new for the sheer joy of it>

Mario Livio shows us how to keep asking questions and searching for knowledge in his new book is called Why What Makes us Curious. 

3:35 Voices

3:45 The Pre-Panel Story of the Day and One Quick Question

4:05 The Panel with Alexia Russell and Tainui Stevens