For writer and educator Parker Palmer, solitude is essential to recharging and gaining new perspective on life. He's just returned from a week-long retreat in the winter woods of Wisconsin, and stopped by our studio to talk about what what he gains from being alone.
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Audio
Roy Kaplan tells Steve Paulson what really happens to those people who hit the lottery.
Late in lafe, former Defense Secretary Robert McNamara admitted the Vietnam War was a huge mistake, but he always avoided questions of personal responsibility. Docmentary filmmaker Errol Morris reflects on McNamara's struggle with his own conscience.
Sapphire performs several of her poems and tells Judith Strasser why she enjoys working in some very old poetic forms such as the villanelle.
Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt says despite what we believe, our political beliefs aren't always as well reasoned as we think.
Have you got a nose for the new? Do you make fast decisions, based on incomplete information? Do you lose your temper quickly? Are you bored a lot? Do you thrive in chaotic situations? You might be a born seeker… what Winifred Gallagher calls a neophiliac.
Take the quiz. Are you a neophiliac?
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/13/the-well-quiz-how-adventurous-are-you/
Falling in love is easy. Staying in love for 30 or 40 years takes some skill. Social psychologist Arthur Aron identifies some of the techniques devoted couples use to keep the spark alive. Aron's the psychologist who figured out how to build intimacy in just 36 questions. He gives us some more lab-tested tips for keeping the love you find.
How do you get an atheist neuroscientist interested in spirituality? For Sam Harris, it started with LSD and other psychedelic drugs. They got him interested in mindfulness, meditation and consciousness. With a new book out called Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion, he talked with TTBOOK about atheism and mystery. Here are some of the interview highlights, and the audio of the complete conversation.
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