Paul Campos is the author of “The Obesity Myth: Why America’s Obsession with Weight Is Hazardous to Your Health.”
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Audio
John Hasse gives Jim Fleming several examples of patriotic music and talks about the various ways they’ve been used. They explore some suggested alternatives to the national anthem.
Ed Boyden, a researcher at MIT, is at the forefront of a new science that aims to map and even heal the brain with light. It’s called optogenetics, and the journal Science has called it one of the great insights of the 21st century. It’s in its early days, but the goal is to one day be able to take a disease like depression, PTSD, or epilepsy and, using bursts of light, just turn it off -- the same way you’d fix a software glitch in a computer.
Michael Pollan tells Judith Strasser where the American front lawn came from, and what it has come to symbolize.
Feminist film critic Molly Haskell talks about how Hollywood has treated the subject of writer’s block, and we hear clips from “Adaptation” and “Barton Fink.”
Would you prefer to die in your sleep? Turns out, more people who weighed in on our three deaths question chose that option. Many of the people who shared their choices also took the time to write about why they were making their choice. You can read a selection of their responses here, and get some analysis of who wrote and - perhaps - why.
Robert Logan is the author of "Understanding New Media: Extending Marshall McLuhan." He talks to Anne Strainchamps about their friendship and the great man's work.
Katharine Rogers tells Jim Fleming that there’s a lot more to Oz than the Wizard, and that Baum always loved the theater and would have been thrilled by the Judy Garland movie.
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