Weather forecasting, Young people and politics
Thinking Allowed
BBC
4.4 • 997 Ratings
🗓️ 10 February 2016
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Weather forecasting: Laurie Taylor explores a scientific art form rooted in unpredictability. He talks to Phaedra Daipha, Assistant Professor of Sociology at Rutgers University, who spent years immersing herself in a regional office of the National Weather Service in America. How do forecasters decide if a storm is to be described as severe or hazardous; or a day is breezy or brisk? Do they master uncertainty any better than other expert decision makers such as stockbrokers and poker players? Charged with the onerous responsibility of protecting the life and property of US citizens, how do they navigate the uncertain and chaotic nature of the atmosphere?
Also, young people, populism and politics. How do young Europeans regard the political process and are they more attracted to populist ideologies than their older counterparts? Gary Pollock, Professor of Politics at Manchester Metropolitan University, has used survey evidence from 14 European countries, to explore the mixture of political positions held by young people, finding they don't map easily on to the typical 'left-right' spectrum.
Producer: Jayne Egerton.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is a Thinking Aloud Podcast from the BBC and for more details in our terms of use and much, |
| 0:06.2 | much more about thinking aloud. Go to our website at BBC.K. Hello. |
| 0:15.0 | Hello. |
| 0:19.0 | blocking the main A64 road from Tadcaster into York was on the face of it a pretty, well a pretty |
| 0:24.6 | daffed idea but for a brief time it worked well enough to allow me to believe I could |
| 0:28.4 | well become a leading figure a sort of what Taylor if you like in a populist uprising. We, well that's me and a mixed bag of academics and university students, blocked the road with big arrowed signs bearing the legend the The Other Side of York. |
| 0:44.0 | And those motorists who followed our signs rather than barging pass were directed around |
| 0:47.6 | a couple of the cities large and relatively insolubrious council estates, |
| 0:52.1 | before being finally led into the tourist spots of the |
| 0:55.4 | central city. Well we did rather expect that residents on the estate would be so |
| 0:59.6 | inspired by our determination to publicize the less glamorous side of York that they rise up in |
| 1:04.8 | their thousands to demand better conditions, quicker repairs, lower rents. |
| 1:10.3 | But the good people of York singularly failed to rise. |
| 1:14.4 | A disappointing outcome which I recalled, |
| 1:16.4 | as I was reading a new research paper on the contemporary appeal of populism |
| 1:20.5 | to young people in the UK and in 13 other European countries. |
| 1:25.0 | But how do you map such an attitude? |
| 1:27.0 | Well, you ask questions. |
| 1:29.0 | You ask the members of your sample whether they agree or strongly disagree |
| 1:34.4 | with statements like these. |
| 1:36.5 | Foreigners should not be allowed to buy land in this country. |
| 1:40.0 | When jobs were scarce employers should give priority to their own people over foreign workers. |
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