Global Samud Flotilla activists detained by Israel and taunted by minister

The Radio National Hour

Fran Kelly brings you compelling conversations on issues that challenge,entertain and inspire us.

AI the Australian way - Albanese announces plan to regulate tech future

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has opened the Office of Artificial Intelligence, tasked with creating new standards governing the technology. Johanna Weaver, executive director of the Tech Policy Design Institute, says its an important step towards determining what our AI future looks like and who gets to build it. The words discounts and diamonds don’t usually go together but the world’s largest miner De Beers is slashing prices for their precious gems as demand for cheaper, lab grown versions takes off. Diamond expert Edahn Golan says the decline in demand is a combination of shifting demographics and cost of living pressures.  And Australia’s ‘sorceress of percussion’; the prodigiously talented, award winning percussionist Claire Edwards

Are we now in a post-literacy world?

The US has vowed to dismantle the International Criminal Court, declaring it a rogue force that threatens every aspect of America’s political and legal systems. Former ICC special advisor and UTas Professor of law Tim McCormack says the Trump administration is completely misrepresenting the way the court operates.  Australia sends more than 27 million tonnes of construction and demolition waste to landfill every year. Architect Alex Symes believes that has to change — and he's turning a 120 year old terrace into a working demonstration of how renovation can be done with less waste, fewer new materials and a smaller environmental footprint. Its dramatic. We’ll take a visit to his house to find out just what that looks like.  The end of reading is here; that’s the stark claim in a new essay published by The Atlantic charting the decline in reading and comprehension and the profound impact it's already having on our brains, even the bestsellers have shorter sentences than they did 50 years ago.

'Honoury Aussie' Sam Neill dies aged 78

He was the New Zealand actor we claimed with pride; Sam Neill, star of film and television, has died at the age of 78 in Sydney. In a career spanning six decades he starred in the blockbuster Jurassic Park franchise, the Oscar winning film The Piano and played opposite Hollywood luminaries like Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. His good friend and fellow actor Heather Mitchell says he loved Australia, and he cherished and loved people. The US and Iran are sliding back into a state of all-out-war less than a month after a ceasefire and Memorandum of Understanding to progress peace talks was agreed. At issue is a disagreement over the passage of vessels through the Strait of Hormuz, with Iran insisting they have the power to decide who comes and who goes. Dr Dania Thafer Executive Director of Gulf International Forum says Iran is seeking to become a regional hegemon.  More than a decade after ISIS launched its genocidal campaign against the Yazidi people, thousands are still waiting for justice. Later this year a Community-Based Truth Commission will be convened in the German Bundestag in a bid to force countries and organisations to reckon with these atrocities and prosecute perpetrators. Aldo Zammit-Borda, Professor of Law at City St George's, University of London is among the experts running the commission.

This timing and navigation expert warned Telstra about the glitch that shutdown the network

Telstra prides itself on connecting Australians but this week a software glitch caused the nation’s largest telecommunications network to crash - bringing trains and cabbies to a halt, shutting down businesses, and preventing hundreds of people from calling Triple Zero. Turns out it was all about the timing and Swinburne University Professor Allison Kealy warned the telco of this vulnerability in their system earlier this year. NAIDOC week is celebrating half a century, a movement forged in resistance, elevating and celebrating Indigenous culture, language and art. Zoe Cassim program Director at the Indigenous Literacy Foundation, and Joe Ross, author of the children's book Winthali and the CEO of the Bunuba Cultural Conservation Institute joined us to talk about how they're using technology is bringing Indigenous children’s books to remote communities and libraries across Australia. And the bass clarinet, long maligned as the grumpy cousin of the woodwind family, is the star attraction at a forthcoming show by The Sydney Symphony Orchestra. Alex Morris, principal bass clarinet performs for The Radio National Hour.