Origin Stories
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Origin Stories
Explore human evolution one story at a time. This award-winning show blends storytelling with science that will change your understanding of who we are.
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90 episodi
Origin Stories x The Science Podcast
This episode features two stories from the Science Podcast. First, Science writer Ann Gibbons tells the story of three ancient hominin species that li...
Can a Human Outrun a Horse?
This is a story about sweat, survival, speed, and the peculiar ways running may have shaped us as humans. Armed with a hydration vest, a dream, and pa...
The Origin Story of Origin Stories - 10th Anniversary
After 10 years of exploring the stories behind breakthrough science, it's time to tell our own origin story! In this special anniversary episode, we'r...
The Shanidar Cave Neanderthals
Shanidar Cave is a unique archaeological site in Kurdistan where scientists found the remains of 10 Neanderthal men, women, and children. Some of thes...
Fatherhood
Easter Service: Our faith is founded on the resurrection of Jesus. If He was not raised from the dead, then He was merely a prophet or a good teacher...
Top Human Origins Discoveries of 2024
2024 was another amazing year in human origins research. In this episode, three Leakey Foundation grantees (and one podcast host) share their picks fo...
Lucy
In this episode, we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the discovery of Lucy, one of the most iconic and important scientific discoveries ever made. Pa...
Ape Medicine
Are humans the only animals that practice medicine? In this episode, two scientists share surprising observations of orangutans and chimpanzees treati...
The First Story
Over 50,000 years ago on what is now the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, someone climbed a towering rock formation and painted a mysterious image on a...
Understanding Neanderthals
Early prehistorians had little more than stones and bones to work with as they tried to piece together the story of the Neanderthals, but today’s rese...
The Story of Human Hair
Why do humans have most of our hair on our heads, not our bodies? Why do we have so many varieties of hair color, thickness, and curliness? Dr. Tina L...
The Musical Ape
Music is universal in all human cultures, but why? What gives us the ability to hear sound as music? Are we the only musical species–or was Darwin rig...
Custodian of the Ancestors
What is it like to be responsible for the safekeeping of the ancestors of everyone in the world? In this episode, we travel to the National Museum of...
A Brief History of Bling
Travel through 50,000 years of human history following clues hidden inside beads made from ostrich eggshells. In this episode, researchers Jennifer Mi...
Top Human Origins Discoveries of 2023
2023 was another exciting year in human origins research! Fossil discoveries and long-term primate studies expanded our understanding of what makes us...
Siblings
Sibling relationships can include everything from love and support–to tension, competition, and conflict. They might also play a fundamental role in t...
Motherhood
Humans invest enormous amounts of time and energy into bringing up our babies. This unique investment is a fundamental part of what it means to be hum...
Boomplaas Cave - Bonus Interview
How did climate change impact ancient human behavior? This is one of the questions Justin Pargeter and his team are investigating at a site called Boo...
Field School Diaries
This special episode takes you inside the world of archaeology students at Boomplaas Cave, one of South Africa’s flagship human evolution research sit...
The Hobbit
In this episode, we explore the fascinating tale of the Hobbit, an unexpected fossil find that shook the world's understanding of human evolution. Joi...
A Giganto Mystery
Dr. Kira Westaway is part of an international research team working to solve the mystery of Gigantopithecus, the largest ape that ever walked the eart...
The New Metabolism
How do human bodies use energy? In this episode, Leakey Foundation grantee Dr. Herman Pontzer shares groundbreaking research that upends our understan...
Top Human Origins Discoveries of 2022
2022 was another exciting year in human origins research! New fossil discoveries and ancient DNA research expanded our understanding of the past. We l...
Origin Stories is back!
We've been hard at work on a new season of stories about how we became human. Origin Stories returns on January 31 with monthly episodes!
First Steps at Laetoli
In this episode, we explore five strange fossilized footprints found by Mary Leakey at the site of Laetoli in Tanzania. Decades after their original d...
Discovering Us
In this episode, we talk with Evan Hadingham, senior science editor for the PBS program NOVA. His new book, Discovering Us: 50 Great Discoveries in Hu...
Top Human Origins Discoveries of 2021
2021 was a big year in science! Fossil discoveries introduced new relatives to our family tree, new findings added fascinating twists to the human sto...
Episode 58: Biruté Mary Galdikas - 50 Years with Orangutans
As a young girl, Biruté Mary Galdikas dreamed of going to the forests of Southeast Asia to study the least-known of all the great apes, the elusive or...
Entre Chien et Loup: How Dogs Began
Scientists agree that dogs evolved from wolves, but exactly how and when that happened is hotly contested. In this episode, Origin Stories contributor...
Bonus Episode: Short and Sweat
Learn about the evolution of our extraordinary ability to cool ourselves down. Biological anthropologist Andrew Best discusses the past, present, and...
Episode 55: Monkeys Get Creative
Producer and scientist Kevin McLean travels to an island off the coast of Panama where researchers have found an isolated group of monkeys with a crea...
Episode 54: The Obstetrical Dilemma
The widely-held idea known as the “obstetrical dilemma” is a hypothesis that explains why babies are so helpless, and why childbirth is so difficult f...
Sleep and the Moon
Sleep is one of the defining traits of human life. It's also one of the most mysterious. Dr. Horacio de la Iglesia is a neurobiologist who's on a ques...
How to Study an Endangered Species
What is it like to study an endangered species like chimpanzees, knowing they may go extinct within your lifetime?
Leakey Foundation grantee Dr....
Episode 51: The Teeth Remember
Your life story is hidden in your teeth. The days, weeks, years, and stressful events of your life are recorded in tiny timelines that can be read by...
Episode 50: Understanding Neanderthals
Early prehistorians had little more than stones and bones to work with as they tried to piece together the story of the Neanderthals, but today’s rese...
Episode 49: Exercise
If exercise is healthy, why do so many people avoid doing it? If we're born to be active, why is it so hard to keep your New Year's resolutions about...
Episode 48: Ancestor (rerelease)
In 2017, Dr. Isaiah Nengo announced the discovery of a 13 million-year-old fossil ape found in Kenya. This remarkable fossil, nicknamed Alesi, was fro...
Episode 47: Skin
Variation in human skin color has fascinated and perplexed people for centuries. As the most visible aspect of human variation, skin color has been us...
Episode 46: Interview with María Martinón-Torres
September 30 is International Podcast Day and on this episode, we’re handing things over to producer Lucía Benavides, who sat down with Leakey Foundat...