Best Dan Yu Podcasts (2025)

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S8 Ep150: 3/3. The Regicide Debate — Gaius and Germanicus examine the history and implications of killing monarchs and emperors, particularly regarding modern political leadership. Germanicus uses the ... 19:18

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30m ago19:18

19:18

3/3. The Regicide Debate — Gaius and Germanicus examine the history and implications of killing monarchs and emperors, particularly regarding modern political leadership. Germanicus uses the execution of Charles I in 1649following the English Civil War as the seminal regicide precedent; Charles I was executed publicly after refusing to defend himse…

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S8 Ep150: 2/3. The Civic Communion Debate — Gaius observes that despite ceremonial declarations of national strength, the United States remains profoundly fragmented domestically. Germanicus presents French ... 12:29

6m ago12:29

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2/3. The Civic Communion Debate — Gaius observes that despite ceremonial declarations of national strength, the United States remains profoundly fragmented domestically. Germanicus presents French philosophical recommendations for "Civic Communion," emphasizing shared, major institutions—Religion, Military, Education, Healthcare—where citizens belo…

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S8 Ep150: 1/3. The Peace Debate — In a Londinium wine bar during a storm in 91 AD, Gaius and Germanicus philosophize about service and contemporary geopolitics, centering on the modern concept of "peace ... 13:40

16h ago13:40

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1/3. The Peace Debate — In a Londinium wine bar during a storm in 91 AD, Gaius and Germanicus philosophize about service and contemporary geopolitics, centering on the modern concept of "peace," particularly regarding Ukrainedespite ongoing conflicts in Venezuela and Hezbollah rearmament. Germanicus asserts that "peace" functions as a euphemism for…

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S8 Ep149: 8/8. Conservation Battles: From the Extinction of the Ivory Bill to the Political Fight over Wolves — Dan Flores — The twentieth century witnessed simultaneous conservation efforts and continuing ... 10:04

21m ago10:04

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8/8. Conservation Battles: From the Extinction of the Ivory Bill to the Political Fight over Wolves — Dan Flores — The twentieth century witnessed simultaneous conservation efforts and continuing ecological tragedy, notably the probable extinction of the iconic ivory-billed woodpecker following industrial logging of its remaining habitat. Florescre…

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S8 Ep149: 7/8. The Western Safari, Sheridan's Irony, and the Scientific Ignorance Driving the Wolf Slaughter — Dan Flores — The mid-nineteenth-century American West became a safari destination for wealthy ... 10:34

23m ago10:34

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7/8. The Western Safari, Sheridan's Irony, and the Scientific Ignorance Driving the Wolf Slaughter — Dan Flores— The mid-nineteenth-century American West became a safari destination for wealthy European nobility who engaged in serial, unjustified massacres of wildlife, meticulously recording kill counts as trophy tallies. Flores documents a histori…

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S8 Ep149: 6/8. The Great Slaughter: Audubon's Regret and the Lewis and Clark Grizzly Massacre — Dan Flores — The opening of the American West initiated an unprecedented destruction of animal populations ... 6:54

13m ago6:54

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6/8. The Great Slaughter: Audubon's Regret and the Lewis and Clark Grizzly Massacre — Dan Flores — The opening of the American West initiated an unprecedented destruction of animal populations. Flores documents that John James Audubon, while initially killing wildlife subjects for his ornithological artwork, eventually expressed profound regret reg…

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S8 Ep149: 5/8. Thoreau, Extinction Denial, and the Destruction of America's Beaver Engineers — Dan Flores — Nineteenth-century intellectuals including Henry David Thoreau lamented the systematic extermination ... 11:54

22m ago11:54

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5/8. Thoreau, Extinction Denial, and the Destruction of America's Beaver Engineers — Dan Flores — Nineteenth-century intellectuals including Henry David Thoreau lamented the systematic extermination of iconic American fauna. Flores documents that the concept of species extinction was initially incomprehensible to European ideology, which posited a …

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S8 Ep149: 4/8. The Second Eurasian Invasion: Herding Culture, Wolves, and the Birth of the Global Market Economy — Dan Flores — European colonists expressed astonishment regarding the extraordinary abundance ... 8:19

14h ago8:19

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4/8. The Second Eurasian Invasion: Herding Culture, Wolves, and the Birth of the Global Market Economy — Dan Flores — European colonists expressed astonishment regarding the extraordinary abundance of American wildlife following the catastrophic population decline of Native American societies. Flores explains that European settlers possessed a dist…

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S8 Ep149: 3/8. Ten Thousand Years of Kinship: Native American Hunter-Gatherers and Ecological Balance — Dan Flores — Following the Pliocene extinction event, North America entered a 10,000-year period ... 12:16

10m ago12:16

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3/8. Ten Thousand Years of Kinship: Native American Hunter-Gatherers and Ecological Balance — Dan Flores — Following the Pliocene extinction event, North America entered a 10,000-year period characterized by hunter-gatherer societies achieving sophisticated ecological equilibrium. Flores documents that Native American peoples consciously maintained…

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S8 Ep149: 2/8. Clovis Culture and the American Extinction: Early Humans as Ecological Simplifiers — Dan Flores — The Clovis culture, emerging approximately 13,000 years ago, rapidly spread across North ... 7:11

12m ago7:11

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2/8. Clovis Culture and the American Extinction: Early Humans as Ecological Simplifiers — Dan Flores — The Clovis culture, emerging approximately 13,000 years ago, rapidly spread across North America in a remarkably brief timeframe. Flores connects the Clovis expansion to the "American extinction," wherein large megafauna including mammoths disappe…

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S8 Ep149: 1/8. The Deep History of North American Mammals and the Arrival of Human Predators — Dan Flores — Flores's book Wild New World examines North American fauna spanning 66 million years, detailing ... 11:32

13m ago11:32

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1/8. The Deep History of North American Mammals and the Arrival of Human Predators — Dan Flores — Flores's book Wild New World examines North American fauna spanning 66 million years, detailing the evolutionary processes and intercontinental migration patterns that created the diverse Pliocene animal assemblage. Flores argues that Eurasian animals …

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S8 Ep149: 8/8. Global Bird Consciousness and Human Responsibility — Steven Moss — Moss concludes by emphasizing that birds represent profound indicators of planetary ecological health and human stewardship ... 8:42

14m ago8:42

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8/8. Global Bird Consciousness and Human Responsibility — Steven Moss — Moss concludes by emphasizing that birds represent profound indicators of planetary ecological health and human stewardship. Moss argues that human societies have repeatedly demonstrated catastrophic ecological mismanagement—from deliberate species eradication campaigns to inad…

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S8 Ep149: 7/8. The Snowy Egret, The Emperor Penguin, and the Climate Canary — Steven Moss — Moss describes the beautiful Snowy Egret, nearly driven to extinction during 19th-century "plumage wars," when ... 10:53

16m ago10:53

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7/8. The Snowy Egret, The Emperor Penguin, and the Climate Canary — Steven Moss — Moss describes the beautiful Snowy Egret, nearly driven to extinction during 19th-century "plumage wars," when its feathers, priced equivalently to gold, were harvested for women's millinery fashion. Moss emphasizes that the resulting systemic cruelty toward birds cat…

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S8 Ep149: 6/8. Mao's Sparrow Campaign and the Worst Human-Created Disaster — Steven Moss — Moss recounts Chairman Mao's 1958 order for systematic extermination of the Tree Sparrow, predicated on the erroneous ... 8:44

17m ago8:44

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6/8. Mao's Sparrow Campaign and the Worst Human-Created Disaster — Steven Moss — Moss recounts Chairman Mao's 1958 order for systematic extermination of the Tree Sparrow, predicated on the erroneous belief that sparrows consumed excessive grain supplies. Moss documents that the Chinese population executed massive killing campaigns, often exhausting…

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S8 Ep149: 5/8. Guano, Tragedy, and the Rise of Intensive Farming — Steven Moss — Moss discusses seabird guano (nutrient-rich droppings), first recognized as a valuable resource by the Incas and subsequently ... 9:05

19m ago9:05

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5/8. Guano, Tragedy, and the Rise of Intensive Farming — Steven Moss — Moss discusses seabird guano (nutrient-rich droppings), first recognized as a valuable resource by the Incas and subsequently monetized by William Gibbs, who accumulated immense wealth trading guano from arid Peruvian islands. Moss emphasizes that guano harvesting occurred under…

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S8 Ep149: 4/8. The Dodo and the Legacy of Extinction — Steven Moss — Moss examines the Dodo as the iconic symbol of species extinction, despite extinction being conceptually incomprehensible to contemporary ... 8:33

32m ago8:33

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4/8. The Dodo and the Legacy of Extinction — Steven Moss — Moss examines the Dodo as the iconic symbol of species extinction, despite extinction being conceptually incomprehensible to contemporary observers when the species disappeared from Mauritius. Moss explains that the Dodo, having evolved flightless on a predator-free island, was exterminated…

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S8 Ep149: 3/8. Darwin's Finches: The Evolution Myth and the Speed of Adaptation — Steven Moss — Moss corrects widespread misconceptions regarding Darwin's Finches, noting that Charles Darwin collected ... 11:02

10m ago11:02

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3/8. Darwin's Finches: The Evolution Myth and the Speed of Adaptation — Steven Moss — Moss corrects widespread misconceptions regarding Darwin's Finches, noting that Charles Darwin collected the specimens but failed to properly label their specific island origins, and subsequently employed pigeons rather than finches to explain evolutionary mechani…

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S8 Ep149: 2/8. Pigeons: The Great Communicators and Wartime Heroes — Steven Moss — Moss discusses the humble pigeon as a paradoxical feral bird species possessing extraordinary homing capabilities that ... 6:29

12m ago6:29

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2/8. Pigeons: The Great Communicators and Wartime Heroes — Steven Moss — Moss discusses the humble pigeon as a paradoxical feral bird species possessing extraordinary homing capabilities that made it invaluable as a communications mechanism. Although the famous narrative of Nathan Rothschild using pigeons following the Battle of Waterloo is apocryp…

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S8 Ep149: 1/8. The Wild Turkey, the Bald Eagle, and the Illogical Nature of Bird Names — Steven Moss — Moss introduces the Wild Turkey, discussing its successful reestablishment in New England and its ... 11:17

12m ago11:17

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1/8. The Wild Turkey, the Bald Eagle, and the Illogical Nature of Bird Names — Steven Moss — Moss introduces the Wild Turkey, discussing its successful reestablishment in New England and its domestication origin in southern Mexico. Moss critiques the turkey's nomenclature as fundamentally illogical, derived from historical confusion involving exoti…

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S8 Ep151: 4/4. The Perilous Return and Legacy of OSIRIS-REx — Dante Lauretta — The sample return capsule executed its descent over the Utah desert with dramatic complications. Critical anxiety ensued when ... 5:34

13m ago5:34

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4/4. The Perilous Return and Legacy of OSIRIS-REx — Dante Lauretta — The sample return capsule executed its descent over the Utah desert with dramatic complications. Critical anxiety ensued when the drogue parachute failed to deploy at the nominal 100,000 feet altitude, invoking memories of the Genesis mission mishap. The primary main parachute dep…

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S8 Ep149: 3/4. Encountering Bennu: Unexpected Terrain and Science — Dante Lauretta — Asteroid Bennu presented surprising geological characteristics, displaying unexpectedly rocky, boulder-strewn terrain ... 14:03

38m ago14:03

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3/4. Encountering Bennu: Unexpected Terrain and Science — Dante Lauretta — Asteroid Bennu presented surprising geological characteristics, displaying unexpectedly rocky, boulder-strewn terrain rather than the predicted smooth, "beach-like" surface indicated by telescopic observations. Bennu, a dark, compositionally active object, contained abundant…

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S8 Ep149: 2/4. Naming OSIRIS-REx and Overcoming Major Hurdles — Dante Lauretta — Following successive rejections, Lauretta systematically defined the mission's core scientific objectives—Origins, Spectral ... 8:24

32m ago8:24

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2/4. Naming OSIRIS-REx and Overcoming Major Hurdles — Dante Lauretta — Following successive rejections, Lauretta systematically defined the mission's core scientific objectives—Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security—establishing the OSIRIS framework and subsequently designating the mission OSIRIS-REx(Regolith Explorer).…

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S8 Ep149: 1/4. The Genesis of the Asteroid Hunter Mission and Early Rejections — Dante Lauretta — Lauretta, hired by mentor Mike Drake at the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory (LPL), initiated the asteroid ... 9:22

38m ago9:22

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1/4. The Genesis of the Asteroid Hunter Mission and Early Rejections — Dante Lauretta — Lauretta, hired by mentor Mike Drake at the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory (LPL), initiated the asteroid sample return mission concept in 2004 following a pivotal meeting with Lockheed Martin's Steve Price. The team submitted its initial proposal to NASA in July…

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S8 Ep150: 4/4. Climate Pragmatism and Denial of Renewable Energy Constraints — Terry Anderson (Editor) — Anderson highlights Bjorn Lomborg's "climate pragmatism" framework, which advocates rational spending ... 7:50

10m ago7:50

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4/4. Climate Pragmatism and Denial of Renewable Energy Constraints — Terry Anderson (Editor) — Andersonhighlights Bjorn Lomborg's "climate pragmatism" framework, which advocates rational spending prioritizing immediate human needs rather than attempting to arrest climate change through technological transformation. Anderson confirms that genuine ma…

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S8 Ep150: 3/4. Price Discovery, Trade Policy, and Government Market Distortions — Terry Anderson (Editor) — Anderson discusses Timothy Fitzgerald's analysis demonstrating that border carbon adjustment ... 12:50

11m ago12:50

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3/4. Price Discovery, Trade Policy, and Government Market Distortions — Terry Anderson (Editor) — Andersondiscusses Timothy Fitzgerald's analysis demonstrating that border carbon adjustment mechanisms frequently disguise protectionist trade policies, aligning with the "bootleggers and Baptists" theoretical model. Anderson stresses that authentic pr…