What Can Ancient Civilisations Teach Us About Survival? With Lizzie Wade
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Welcome to Intelligence Squared, where great minds meet. I'm producer Layla Ishmeyer. What if Apocalypse isn't the end of the world, but a chance to remake it? On today's episode, we're joined by science journalist Lizzie Wade to explore Apocalypse, her bold new book about how catastrophe has shaped. humanity's past and can help forge a more just future.
Drawing on archaeology and anthropology, Wade reframes collapse not as destruction but transformation, revealing how people have endured pandemics, climate shocks, and civilizational upheaval before and what their stories can teach us now. Joining Wade in discussion is global historian and author of On Savage Shores, Caroline Dodds Pennock. Let's join Caroline now with more. Welcome to Intelligence Squared. I'm Caroline Dodds-Pennock.
Our guest today is Lizzie Wade. Lizzie is a science journalist based in Mexico City who has written about archaeology and anthropology for science, the Atlantic, Slate, The New York Times, Eon, and others. Today we're discussing Lizzie's new book. Apocalypse, how catastrophe transformed our world and can forge new futures, a richly imagined new insight into the great human tradition of apocalypse, from the rise of Homo sapiens to the climate instability of our present. And she reveals how these cataclysmic events are not irrevocable endings, but rather transformations.
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