The Olympics is all about flying the flag for your home country, shoulder to shoulder with your team-mates. But what if you have no team-mates? At this year’s Olympic games, four countries had just one competitor. Like Sean Gill from Belize, Somalian runner Ali Idow Hassan, or Romano Püntener, a mountain-biker representing Liechtenstein. This got us thinking about the only one. The panel discuss what it must be like to be an ‘Endling’ – the last remaining animal of an otherwise extinct species, and wonder if there might be ways to bring them back. We delve into the intriguing psychology behind the urge to collect things, why collectors are so entranced by rare items, and how the psychological pull of ‘exclusivity’ and ‘limited editions’ can make us vulnerable to marketing scams. And what about a baby, born of only one parent? A ‘virgin birth’ – a miracle perhaps? Not so, as we discover that females giving birth without any help from males is surprisingly common. It is called Parthenogenesis, and although humans cannot do it, a dizzying array of animals can. Alexis Sperling from the University of Cambridge explains the science. News montage sources: Channel 5 Belize, BBC News Presenter: Marnie Chesterton with Chhavi Sachdev and Andrada Fiscutean Producer: Emily Knight with Florian Bohr, Julia Ravey Sound engineer: Emily Preston
So this week, I found myself staring at an extraordinary photo.
It's a picture of a huge celebration on the streets of central Paris.
No, not from the Olympics, but from 80 years earlier.
As the French reclaimed their capital from the Nazis, the allied leaders were keen to choreograph this event correctly, in inverted commas here.
The french leader, Charles de Gaulle, wanted the liberation to be run by french soldiers.
The Americans said, fine, but they have to be white.
This proved difficult to organize, given that the majority of french troops at this point came from the french colonies in Africa.
Black troops fighting in Paris were confined to barracks for the liberation event, apart from 22 year old Georges Duxon from Gabon, who seems to have not got the message.
So here he is, preserved in black and white history, arm in a sling, marching alongside the french president as an official.
Manhandles him out of the shot.
Hes just one man, but hes also the key to understanding that black fighters were being written out of history as it was taking place.
His presence makes me realize that I need to rewrite the story I currently have in my head of the last world War.
I'm Marnie Chesterton from the BBC World Service.
This is unexpected elements, and I'm joined, as usual, by a couple of excellent science, health, or tech journalists who'll be helping me sift through the stories of the week.
In Bucharest, Romania, we have Andrade Fiskatan.
Hello.
Hi, Mari.
It's great to be here.
And in Mumbai, India, we have Javi Sachdev.
Lovely to see you, Javi.