In this hour, why it's so hard to think straight about animals. We start with psychologist Hal Herzog, author of Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat: What it's so Hard to Think Straight About Animals. He talks to Anne Strainchamps about his own mixed feelings.
Next, journalist John Woestendiek is the author of Dog, Inc. which explores the bizarre tale of Bernan McKinney. Steve Paulson was fascinated by this story of the man who received the first commercially cloned dog.
Then, Jaron Lanier is famous for popularizing "virtual reality" and his recent book You Are Not a Gadget makes him one of the go-to thinkers about computers and society. So why is he in a program about animals? As he tells Anne Strainchamps, it's because he loves cephalopods - like the squid and the octopus.
After that, novelist T.C. Boyle has made a career out of finding loaded subjects for his fiction. In his new novel When the Killing's Done the face-off is between an animals rights activist and a biologist. He tells Jim Fleming the animal lover, however, is not a very nice guy.
Finally, Barbara King is an anthropologist who studies monkeys and apes, but she also loves the pets she and her husband live with at home. She tells Steve Paulson human and animal history is so intertwined it's hard to imagine one species without the other. [Broadcast Date: March 22, 2012]
(Tags : To the Best of Our Knowledge: Animals and Us Jim Fleming Audiobook, Jim Fleming Audio CD )
