MindPop 42: Polyamory
MindPop
Polyamory. If you’ve been paying any attention lately, you’ve probably heard the term. TV shows, books, magazines, and social media are abuzz with what appears to be widescale experimentation in consensual non-monogamy. But what does it mean? Where did the idea come from? How is it different than swinging, friends-with-benefits, having a side piece, or any of the other possible sexual arrangements? Christopher Gleason, author of American Poly: A History, explains.
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MindPop 41: Food Safety, Food Politics
MindPop
E. coli. Listeria. Salmonella. When you turn on the news, it's hard not to hear about some tragic outbreak caused by lettuce, or beef, or something unknown. Why do outbreaks occur with such regularity? Is a failure of big government? Or is it big business putting profits above its customers? Or is it a regulatory state that is underfunded and overtasked? Timothy Lytton, Distinguished University Professor at Georgia State University, gives us some answers.
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MindPop 40: HAL 9000
MindPop
When we think about AI, many of us have in mind HAL 9000 from the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. But AI is here and it is not quite like the movies. So what does AI look like today? How it reshaping contemporary society and government? Whose interests does it serve and, for those pessimistic about its influence, is there anything that can be done to ameliorate its negative effects? Tim Hwang, the Director of the Ethics and Governance of AI Initiative at Harvard and MIT works through the possibilities.
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MindPop 39: Solitude
MindPop
What does it mean to be alone? Is aloneness, as Thoreau said, necessary to live deliberately? Or is it perhaps a curse of modern life made worse by mass media and cultural fragmentation? In this episode, American Studies scholar Ina Bergmann talks about the cultures of solitude in past and present.
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MindPop 38: Network Error
MindPop
How should we understand public debate in the era of social media? Can the internet be salvaged for democracy promotion? Or is it a Trojan horse for a dystopian future? Phil Howard of the Oxford Internet Institute talks about social media and politics.
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MindPop 37: Truth and Post-Truth
MindPop
How do we maintain a sense of fact and reality in a post-truth age? Are there any objective and universally accepted arbiters of truth left? How can democratic government, or even democratic argument, work without a mutually accepted body of information? Oxford politics scholar Nadia Hilliard talks about truth and post-truth in American government.
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MindPop 36: A Conservative Revolution
MindPop
What was the impetus behind the American Revolution? Why were the revolutionaries who set up American institutions so concerned to protect property? What political implications does the founding moment have for today? Birmingham political historian Tom Cutterham talks about the conservative impulses in the American Revolution and what radical political change would actually mean.
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MindPop 35: Black Humanism, Black Struggle
MindPop
"What can you say about God in light of human suffering in the world?" asks Rice religion scholar Anthony Pinn. "Nothing," he says, "because there is no God." In this conversation, we talk about black humanism and its connection to black activism and empowerment. Does black humanism betray African-American cultural tradition? Can you motivate people to activism without the church community? Are humanists ready to embrace the cause of justice even when it feels like a Sisyphean task?
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MindPop 34: Taking a Knee
MindPop
Are white NFL team owners like modern slave masters? Do symbolic gestures produce fruitful political conversations? What kind of historical reckoning would be necessary for real social and political change? Williams historian Gretchen Long considers what the NFL protests signify about race in the United States today.
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MindPop 33: Politics and Hope
MindPop
How does one recover from catastrophe? Why does politics fail and how does one find courage to continue? What can be done to recover the possibilities of collective action? Intellectual historian Richard King does a deep dive into the thought of Hannah Arendt, looking for some answers.
info_outlineDavid Sehat takes a road trip with his friend Ben Wise, Associate Professor of History at the University of Florida, where they talk about ambition, midlife, and the puzzles of meaning.