Robert Trivers & Alec Wilkinson

SPECIAL APRIL FOOLS DAY INQUIRY: Inquiry welcomes ROBERT TRIVERS, a Professor of Anthropology and Biological Sciences at Rutgers University. His new far ranging and fascinating book is THE FOLLY OF FOOLS: THE LOGIC OF DECEIT AND SELF DECEPTION IN HUMAN LIFE. Professor Trivers takes a uniquely evolutionary approach to what may seem to the layperson as a psychological or sociological state: self-deception. Tonight, Professor Trivers describes some  non-human examples of deception. He also touches on a few of the numerous examples of deception and self-deception that occur in human love and sex relationships. Finally, as an example of self-deception on the social and corporate level, Trivers discusses the ingrained blindness of NASA that led to the Challenger and Columbia disasters.

On July 11, 1897, three brave men took off in a balloon in attempt to fly-over the North Pole. The real fate of this expedition would not be discovered for over thirty years. They were only the latest in a line of explorers who risked their lives in the brutal and unforgiving cold of the Arctic. Why did they do it? Tune in to Inquiry tonight when we talk with writer and biographer ALEC WILKINSON about his thrilling new history THE ICE BALLOON: S. A. ANDRÉE and the HEROIC AGE OF ARCTIC EXPLORATION.