Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford
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Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford
We tell our children unsettling fairy tales to teach them valuable lessons, but these Cautionary Tales are for the education of the grown ups – and they are all true. Tim Harford (Financial Times, BBC, author of “The Data Detective”) brings you stories of awful human error, tragic...
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Schrödinger's Spy: Businessman, Fraud, or Russian Agent? - with Sam Jones
When the Financial Times uncovered the billion-dollar Wirecard fraud, it seemed like the story was over. But then the company’s Chief Operating Office...
Missing Fish and Fatal Feasts: Ritual and Ruin at the Sun King’s Table
In the gilded court of Louis XIV, 17th Century France, manners are everything. Where to sit, how to eat, what to wear - any misstep is costly. No one...
Don't Panic! Douglas Adams' Guide to Tomorrow - with Arvind Ethan David
Writer Douglas Adams, best known for The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, used science fiction and satire to warn us about potential dangers in our f...
A Deadly Day at the Races: What Radical Protest Can and Cannot Do
After years of campaigning for votes for women, the Suffragettes emerge at the turn of the 20th Century. Their motto, 'Deeds Not Words', heralds the s...
True Lies and Genuine Fakes
In 1998, an art gallery gets a mysterious phone call. The caller claims they have been fooled by a master forger and that many of their prized paintin...
Stalling for Survival - A Lonely Fight Against a Deadly Medicine
In 1960, FDA scientist Frances Oldham Kelsey is tasked with approving an application for a mild sedative to be sold in America. The drug is popular ac...
Announcing: The Cautionary Club
Do you want more Cautionary Tales episodes in your life? Do you want access to behind the scenes stories and bonus conversations with Tim? Do you want...
Disaster Favours the Daring: Shipwreck at Honda Point
In 1923, legendary navigator Captain Dolly Hunter led a squadron of warships into America’s worst peacetime naval catastrophe. The mission was suppose...
Paradise Poisoned: How Utopias Fall Apart
Dore Strauch and Friedrich Ritter make an unconventional couple, united by their contempt for shoes, root vegetables and, above all, society. In 1929...
"Genius Still Unrecognised" - The Worst Poet in the World
William McGonagall's poems are something else. The jarring meter, the banal imagery, the awkward rhymes: they made him a laughing stock in 19th Centur...
Office Hell: The Demise of the Playful Workspace (Classic)
In the early 90s, cutting-edge advertising agency Chiat/Day announced a radical plan, aimed at giving the company a jolt of creative renewal. They wou...
Number Fever: How Pepsi Nearly Went Pop (Classic)
Pepsi twice ended up in court after promotions went disastrously wrong. Other big companies have fallen into the same trap - promising customers rewar...
Fire at The Beverly Hills Supper Club (Update)
It's been five years since Cautionary Tales ran a mini-series about the Covid-19 pandemic, exploring the lessons we were learning in real time as the...
"Captain Kirk Forgot to put the Machine on Stun"
Lying on the cold metal table, Voyne Ray Cox knew the drill. This was his ninth round of cancer treatment - which is why he was certain that what happ...
"I get in trouble when I say things like this" - Michael Lewis on Sam Bankman-Fried
Acclaimed author Michael Lewis discusses his time with Sam Bankman-Fried and why he thinks both high finance and Effective Altruism shaped the 'Crypto...
Grand Theft Automated: How to Save a Trillion Lives
A radical thought experiment transforms the lives of a new breed of philanthropists, as they follow the logic of altruism to extraordinary lengths. Th...
The Man who Solved Kindness
George Price is on a mission to prove that human kindness is real. He's seen the latest research suggesting any altruism is ultimately selfish and fin...
The Shark That Ate Hollywood: Jaws at 50
Steven Spielberg thought his career was finished. He was behind schedule, his actors were fighting, the crew were mutinous and worst of all, his shark...
Le Mans 55: The Deadliest Race
The annual Le Mans 24 Hour race brings in hundreds of thousands of spectators to watch the giants of motor racing put their endurance to the ultimate...
The Nazis, the Bomb, and the Woman that Science Forgot
Lise Meitner has fought for her entire life to be seen as a scientist, slowly building a career as a nuclear physicist in Berlin. When Adolf Hitler ri...
Give Politicians a Raise, Smuggle Smartphones into School, and go Full Donk! Cautionary Questions with Risky Business
Can game theory be used to win a world cup? Can you pay the way out of political corruption? And are there winning strategies in life we don't use bec...
Roosevelt and the Renegade (Panama Disaster 2)
Sixteen years have passed since Ferdinand De Lesseps' catastrophic failure in Panama and the dramatic collapse of the French Panama Canal company. Now...
The Great Frenchman's Folly (Panama Disaster 1)
Ferdinand De Lesseps, "the Great Frenchman", is convinced that he is the man to build the Panama Canal. No, he isn't an engineer and, no, he's never a...
Lab Leak: Could Smallpox Come Back?
In 1978 the world is on the brink of declaring victory over smallpox. No cases have been seen for months, and it looks like the end for a deadly, pain...
"Dangerously Near to Absolute Perfection"
In 1900, two friends in the flourishing Arts and Crafts Movement in London share a vision: to print the ultimate edition of the Bible. Together they c...
Buried by the Wall Street Crash (Classic)
Cautionary Tales returns with a new episode on May 2nd.
Both of the world’s greatest economists, Irving Fisher and John Maynard Keynes,...
Presenting: You Must Remember This - Alfred Hitchcock
Here's a special episode from our friends at You Must Remember This. Hitchcock’s most iconic decade— a decade of Technicolor grandeur and peril inflic...
“I love being the person who doesn’t know anything” - Why Steven Levitt has swapped academia for podcasting
20 years ago, a book called Freakonomics became an instant bestseller and worldwide sensation. Tim Harford got his hands on the first copy that Steve...
The Old Man and the Wrecking Crew
When Britain entered its first Covid-19 lockdown in March 2020, many found comfort in evoking the British wartime spirit. A timely hero emerged - Capt...
Houdini: The Phone Call from the Coffin (Part 3)
Fearing for his life, Harry Houdini leaves secret codes with his loved ones, promising to use them in any post-mortem messaging. In 1926, Houdini's de...
Houdini's Detective and her 1500 Dead Husbands (Part 2)
Harry Houdini finds an ally in his fight against spiritualism, a brilliant detective called Rose Mackenberg, who'll do whatever it takes to expose a f...
Houdini: A Message from the Spirits (Part 1)
Harry Houdini is remembered today for his legendary escapes and illusions, but he also had a lifelong obsession with the paranormal. After dabbling in...
Would You Trust a Gangster Nanny? - Cautionary Questions with Rachel Botsman
Do we trust our fitness trackers too much? How do fraudsters gain our faith? Why do people trust podcasters? And would you trust a drug dealing nanny...
Lights, Camera, Tax Break
When Ernest Borgnine gets his big break in Hollywood, he can hardly believe his luck. But soon he discovers his supposed star vehicle, Marty, is not t...
The Nursery Rhyme That Ruined a Rock Band
"Down Under" was huge. This jokey ode to legendary Australian wanderlust helped Men at Work win a Grammy and was a key part of the band's creative leg...
The Widow Who Disrupted Champagne (with Ben Walter)
Tim Harford is joined by Ben Walter, CEO of Chase for Business and the host of "The Unshakeables" podcast, to explore the story of the trailblazing Wi...
The Thrill and the Drop: A First Date Rollercoaster
Leah Washington and her new boyfriend Joe Pugh are on their first day out together. They're at Alton Towers theme park, where they've chosen to ride t...
Dr. Brinkley's Miracle Cure For Impotence (with Betwixt The Sheets)
Cautionary Conversation: In the 1920s, a conman convinced America that goat testicles were the secret to male virility. Tim Harford and Dr Kate Lister...
The Night of the Mugger
Winston Trew has just been arrested for mugging. It's 1972 and the crime has recently made its way to Britain from the United States. Dangerous thugs,...
Missing on "Dead Mountain": A Cold War Cold Case
In the bleak Russian winter of 1959, nine experienced hikers led by Igor Dyatlov set out on an expedition. None of them made it back alive.
When...