Welcome back to the home of the oxymoron. Evil genius. He asked the newspaper to print his obituary early so he'd enjoy it. That's like hiding at your own funeral. Yeah, it's a big, great gig. I'm Russell Kane. Join me to weigh in on whether the biggest players in history are more evil or genius. Becoming that rich, I'd say that at some level of genius. It also helps that it's a long time ago, right?

It's like the podcast version of telling your kids the ice cream van plays music when it's out of ice cream.

Listen to evil genius on BBC Sounds.

This is a download from the BBC.

For more information and our terms of use, go to BBC.co.uk slash radio three.

Welcome to Freethinking, Radio Three's annual festival of ideas.

And the only place where the phrase free and frank exchange of views isn't a euphemism for some kind of punch-up,

this intellectual promiscuity is being practiced by philosophers,

scientists, novelists, politicians and poets,

and it takes place on your radio online and here

on the high escarpments of the sage gateshead,

where this year's freethinking lecturer is poised to grab the lectern with both hands.

If there is such a thing as the global village, then Mary Robinson is one of its wise women.

Officially, she's part of a group called the elders, a gang of senior religious and political leaders

who use what they describe as moral force to work for peace and for human rights.

Desmond Tutu, Grace and Michelle, Kofi Annan and Jimmy Carter are some of her co-workers.

Before she was an elder, though, Mary Robinson was pretty young, only 25 in 1969

when she gained both a law professorship at Trinity College Dublin and a seat in the

Irish Senate. But the world at large took notice of her in her 40s and in roles that arguably

gave her influence rather than power, as founder of her own climate justice foundation,

as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, a job

she took on in 1997, and as President of Ireland. In 1990, she became the first woman to hold

...