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Big Ideas
The Future of Higher Education July 22, 2022

The Real World of College

What Higher Education Is and What It Can Be

Wendy Fischman and Howard Gardner

Hosted by Galina Limorenko
For The Real World of College: What Higher Education Is and What It Can Be (MIT Press, 2022), Wendy Fischman and Howard Gardner analyzed in-depth interviews with more than 2,00 …

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Interviews with scholars promoting big ideas.

Religion July 20, 2022

Postsecular History

Political Theology and the Politics of Time

Maxwell Kennel

Hosted by David Kunsman
In this thought provoking book entitled PostSecular History: Political Theology and The Politics of Time (Palgrave Macmillan, 2021), Max Kennel explores how contemporary approaches to the meaning of time and history follow …
Medicine July 20, 2022

Our Transgenic Future

Spider Goats, Genetic Modification, and the Will to Change Nature

Lisa Jean Moore

Hosted by Rachel Pagones
The process of manipulating the genetic material of one animal to include the DNA of another creates a new transgenic organism. Several animals, notably goats, mice, sheep, and cattle are …
Military History July 18, 2022

Why Humans Fight

The Social Dynamics of Close-Range Violence

Siniša Malešević

Hosted by Christian Nielsen
In his book Why Humans Fight: The Social Dynamics of Close-Range Violence (2022, Cambridge University Press), Siniša Malešević emphasises the centrality of the social and historical contexts that make fighting …
American Studies July 13, 2022

The Future of Decline

Anglo-American Culture at Its Limits

Jed Esty

Hosted by Brittney Edmonds
As the US becomes a second-place nation, can it shed the superpower nostalgia that still haunts the UK? The debate over the US's fading hegemony has raged and sputtered for …
Science, Technology, and Society July 11, 2022

The Digital Republic

On Freedom and Democracy in the 21st Century

Jamie Susskind

Hosted by Austin Clyde
From one of the leading intellectuals of the digital age, The Digital Republic: On Freedom and Democracy in the 21st Century (Pegasus Books, 2022) is the definitive guide to the great …
Environmental Studies July 5, 2022

A People's Green New Deal

Max Ajl

Hosted by Eyad Houssami
The idea of a Green New Deal was launched into popular consciousness by US Congressperson Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in 2018. It has become a watchword in the current era of global …
Geography July 5, 2022

The Value of a Whale

On the Illusions of Green Capitalism

Adrienne Buller

Hosted by Stentor Danielson
In this searing and insightful critique, Adrienne Buller examines the fatal biases that have shaped the response of our governing institutions to climate and environmental breakdown, and asks: are the …
Philosophy July 1, 2022

On Believing

Being Right in a World of Possibilities

David Hunter

Hosted by Robert Talisse
According to many standard philosophical accounts, beliefs are a kind of stance one takes toward a proposition. To believe that Nashville is in Tennessee is to adopt a certain attitude …
Biology and Evolution June 27, 2022

Different

Gender Through the Eyes of a Primatologist

Frans de Waal

Hosted by Galina Limorenko
In Different: Gender Through the Eyes of a Primatologist (W. W. Norton, 2022), world-renowned primatologist Frans de Waal draws on decades of observation and studies of both human and animal …
Science, Technology, and Society June 27, 2022

How to Take Over the World

Practical Schemes and Scientific Solutions for the Aspiring Supervillain

Ryan North

Hosted by Galina Limorenko
Taking over the world is a lot of work. Any supervillain is bound to have questions: What's the perfect location for a floating secret base? What zany heist will fund …
Policing, Incarceration, and Reform June 24, 2022

Gifts from the Dark

Learning from the Incarceration Experience

Joni Schwartz and John R. Chaney

Hosted by Zalman Newfield
While in no way supporting the systemic injustices and disparities of mass incarceration, in Gifts from the Dark: Learning from the Incarceration Experience (Lexington Books, 2021), Joni Schwartz and John …
Economic and Business History June 23, 2022

Why We Fight

The Roots of War and the Paths to Peace

Christopher Blattman

Hosted by Javier Mejia
In Why We Fight: The Roots of War and the Paths to Peace (Viking, 2022), Chris Blattman explains the five reasons why conflict (rarely) blooms into war, and how to interrupt that deadly …
Critical Theory June 22, 2022

Scorched Earth

Beyond the Digital Age to a Post-Capitalist World

Jonathan Crary

Hosted by Cody Skahan
In this uncompromising essay, Jonathan Crary presents the obvious but unsayable reality: our ‘digital age’ is synonymous with the disastrous terminal stage of global capitalism and its financialisation of social …
Science June 21, 2022

Plan S for Shock

Science. Shock. Solution. Speed.

Robert-Jan Smits and Rachael Pells

Hosted by Galina Limorenko
Plan S: the open access initiative that changed the face of global research.  Robert-Jan Smits and Rachael Pells's book Plan S for Shock: Science. Shock. Solution. Speed. (Ubiquity Press, 2022) tells …
Economics June 17, 2022

Spin Dictators

The Changing Face of Tyranny in the 21st Century

Sergei Guriev and Daniel Treisman

Hosted by Peter Lorentzen
Hitler, Stalin, and Mao ruled through violence, fear, and ideology. But in recent decades a new breed of media-savvy strongmen has been redesigning authoritarian rule for a more sophisticated, globally …
Economics June 15, 2022

The Sharing Economy

Its Pitfalls and Promises

Michael Munger

Hosted by Peter Lorentzen
Transactions have always taken place. For hundreds of years that 'place' was a market or, more recently, a shopping mall. But in the past two decades these physical locations have …
The Future of . . . with Owen Bennett-Jones June 14, 2022

The Future of Religion

A Conversation with Robin Dunbar

Robin Dunbar

Hosted by Owen Bennett-Jones
Of the many differences between the West and the rest of the world the issue of religiosity is one of the most striking. In the West ever fewer people belong …
Economic and Business History June 9, 2022

How the World Became Rich

The Historical Origins of Economic Growth

Mark Koyama and Jared Rubin

Hosted by Javier Mejia
Most humans are significantly richer than their ancestors. Humanity gained nearly all of its wealth in the last two centuries. How did this come to pass?  In How the World Became …
Mobilities and Methods June 8, 2022

Militarized Global Apartheid

Catherine Besteman

Hosted by Alize Arıcan
In Militarized Global Apartheid (Duke UP. 2020), Catherine Besteman offers a sweeping theorization of the ways in which countries from the global north are reproducing South Africa's apartheid system on a worldwide …