WS More or Less: How Many Animals are Born Every Day?
More or Less: Behind the Stats
BBC
4.6 • 3.5K Ratings
🗓️ 10 June 2018
⏱️ 16 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
From penguins to nematodes, is it possible to count how many animals are born around the world every day?
That’s the question one 10-year-old listener wants answered, and so reporter Kate Lamble sets off for the zoo to find out. Along the way, she discovers that very, very small animals are much more important than very, very big animals when it comes to the sums.
(09.05) Artificial Intelligence or A.I. has been hailed as the answer to an easier life – but will it really make the world a better place, or just reinforce existing prejudices? Tim Harford speaks to author Meredith Broussard about ‘techno-chauvinism’.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know. |
| 0:04.6 | My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds. |
| 0:08.4 | As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable |
| 0:14.3 | experts and genuinely engaging voices. What you may not know is that the BBC |
| 0:20.4 | makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars, |
| 0:24.6 | poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories and that's just a few examples. |
| 0:29.7 | If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected, find your next podcast over at BBC Sounds. |
| 0:36.0 | Hello, this is Tim Harford and this is the Shorter World Service Edition of more or less. |
| 0:42.0 | An apology to our most loyal listeners if you listen to the |
| 0:45.6 | Radio 4 version of this program a few weeks ago you will have heard an item |
| 0:51.2 | about how many animals are born around the world, well we're repeating |
| 0:55.4 | that item in this podcast. |
| 0:57.8 | So if you don't want to hear it again, jump ahead towards the end of the program. Hello and welcome to more or less on the BBC World Service, |
| 1:11.0 | we're the program that explores the pliability of statistics and the fickleness of facts, and I'm Tim Harford. |
| 1:17.0 | We're fortunate in having incredibly loyal listeners who email more or less at BBC.co. UK to ask us all sorts of brain ticklers and mind |
| 1:26.8 | puzzlers. One such question came from 10 year old Felix. |
| 1:30.6 | Hello, I know it's Felix and I want to know how many animals are born every day in the world. |
| 1:36.8 | Good question. |
| 1:37.8 | But first things first, what do we consider an animal? |
| 1:41.6 | The Oxford English Dictionary defines an animal as... |
| 1:44.0 | A living organism which feeds on organic matter, typically having specialized sense organs and |
| 1:51.6 | nervous system and able to respond rapidly to stimuli. |
... |
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