Even the most welcome gift can spark guilt, resentment, obligation or vulnerability. This hour, unwrapping the tangled emotions behind giving — and getting.Read more
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Episode Archives
We’ve been taught to ignore, stifle, or just get over anger for many years — but what if we embraced it?Read more
Original Air Date:
December 01, 2018
What's the essence of religion? God? Scripture? Moral codes? Or is it really about something more unexplainable — primal spiritual experiences?Read more
Original Air Date:
November 24, 2018
It's a long walk from the truth to the whole truth. A biographer, a poet, a memoirist and a filmmaker describe the moral struggle and personal cost involved.Read more
Original Air Date:
November 10, 2018
Covert spies painting nerve agents on doorknobs? It's not the only way to poison someone. We hear stories of radioactive paint, formaldehyde-spiked baby formula, and a beautiful garden full of plants that could kill you.Read more
Original Air Date:
October 13, 2018
Cities can be cacophonous and loud, a chaos of sonic discord. If, that is, you don't really focus your listening. People who’ve trained their ears to hear urban soundscapes in new ways hear something different.Read more
Original Air Date:
September 29, 2018
The first birth is when you arrive here, as a wet, wiggling newborn. But there may be other transitions in your life that feel just as difficult and profound. Some people actually call those passages rebirth. Read more
Original Air Date:
September 15, 2018
Fifteen years ago, David Foster Wallace died at a tragically young age. He was one of the most brilliant writers of his generation, but he now faces renewed criticism over his treatment of women, in his life and his books. Read more
Original Air Date:
September 08, 2018
It's not easy in America today to find work that matters, that’s meaningful, and that pays enough to live on. Which is the one thing we don’t talk about. What’s wrong with work — and how do we fix it?Read more
Original Air Date:
September 01, 2018
There are the female scientists you can name, and the ones forgotten by history. Like Mileva Marić-Einstein. She might just have been more brilliant than Albert was — but we'll never know. Read more
Original Air Date:
August 23, 2018
From our narrow vantage point on Earth, how can we see what's out there, beyond our skies?
Original Air Date:
August 18, 2018
Why is the world so damn cynical? Rather than surrendering to corrosive, hopeless snark, we look to some unexpected sources to make the case for sincerity.Read more
Original Air Date:
August 11, 2018
It was a dirty word 25 years ago. But now, more and more people are identifying as Socialists…in America and on the ballot.Read more
Original Air Date:
August 04, 2018
Bees are endangered, but all over the world, people are stepping up to save them — in backyards, science labs, and the abandoned lots of urban Detroit.Read more
Original Air Date:
July 28, 2018
Jeff Kripal is a highly original, even maverick, historian of religion. In this conversation — part of a collaboration with the LA Review of Books — Kripal takes Steve to where all the weird stuff we can’t explain lives ... or hides.Read more
Original Air Date:
July 26, 2018
What if the guiding principle we used in cooking, eating and growing food was love? From an Iranian-American kitchen to the chocolate forests of Ecuador, we explore new ways to express deep flavors and personal identity through food and cooking.Read more
Original Air Date:
June 30, 2018
It creeps into everything: guilt that we're not good enough, fit enough, smart enough. As we peruse Instagram, all we see is the perfection of others reflecting our own failures back at us. Why do we spend so much time feeling guilty? Should we?Read more
Original Air Date:
June 21, 2018
We live, work and play in Red and Blue tribal bubbles, filling our social media feeds with news sources that affirm our place in that order, rather than challenging it. What is that isolation doing to us? What can we do to escape it?Read more
Original Air Date:
June 16, 2018
Where do you go to find models of powerful women? The ancient world was full of them, real and mythic, but today we barely know their names. Why? This week we rediscover the women of ancient myths and legends.Read more
Original Air Date:
June 09, 2018
Across professions, half of Americans surveyed say they’re exhausted from work. More and more of us feel scrambled, tired and drained. Are we facing daily lives more prone to burnout? And what can we do about it?Read more
Original Air Date:
June 09, 2018
Amidst economic devastation, producer Charles Monroe-Kane asks what it takes to survive in the Rust Belt.Read more
Original Air Date:
June 02, 2018
Why do we have schools? To build a workforce? To create democratic citizens? Read more
Original Air Date:
May 26, 2018
If life is a play, what happens during the last act? What’s it like to live knowing you have a limited amount of time left?Read more
Original Air Date:
May 19, 2018
All over the world, nation states are splintering. Separatism is on the rise. What causes nation states to erode? And what happens when they do?Read more
Original Air Date:
May 12, 2018