Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda

🎧 Sheila Nevins on Age, Sex, Love, Life, and Everything Else | Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda

Listened to Sheila Nevins on Age, Sex, Love, Life, and Everything Else by Alan Alda from Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda

Sheila Nevins has explored the human condition in the thousand or so documentaries she produced for HBO. From more than 30 years of telling us stories about ourselves, to her experience as a woman in the workplace, Sheila has plenty to say about communicating. And she never holds back. In this delightful episode, Alan Alda talks with Sheila about her life, how she feels about aging, the #MeToo movement, sex, divorce, documentaries, storytelling, and just about everything else! This episode is sponsored by Calm. Check out www.calm.com/alda for more details.

I always forget that Sheila is as old as she is. She does have a great sense of humor.

She makes an interesting point about humility that people with power (and especially within the entertainment industry) should be aware of and work to improve.

Most shocking was the story she tells about her me too moment and how she viewed it. Definitely a perspective I wouldn’t have expected.

Her perspective about looking at individuals as a way into human problems and making documentaries is similar to a philosophy I remember hearing from Masha Gessen in an interview that Jeffrey Goldberg did with her. The upshot is that, especially for righting wrongs and general atrocities, focusing a story on a particular individual has a lot more power than focusing on the nameless and faceless masses. Sheila’s example of the Holocaust survivor is a particular apt one. (As I think about it Masha would be a great interview for this podcast.)

In fact, I recently watched an immigration related documentary on Frontline and while I didn’t personally find the lead woman very relate-able or sympathetic, I was still pissed off at the process because her individual story was still so powerful.

This general ideal also reminds me of the gut-punch scene at the end of the film A Time To Kill (1996) [spoiler alert] which ends with the command to the jury “Now imagine she’s white.”

🎧 Steven Strogatz Bonus – What to Do When Things Keep Changing! | Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda

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Alan Alda wanted to get off the island quickly. Steven Strogatz explains how an 18th century British clergyman could have helped. In this short bonus episode, Steven helps Alan understand something that he’s wondered about for years.

Quadrilateral equation?? Did he mean the Pythagorean theorem?

There’s a reasonable basic discussion of Bayesian statistics here.

🎧 Steven Strogatz Says You Can Understand Math | Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda

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Steven Strogatz possesses a special ability to see into the unseen. How does he do it? Steve is a world class mathematician, who sees through the window of math. But, lucky for us, he’s also a world class communicator. An award-winning professor, researcher, author, and creative thinker, Steve can help anyone (even Alan Alda) understand some of the unseen world of numbers. In this episode, Alan and Steven start from zero, not the number, but from a place of not knowing anything. He emerges from the darkness for a moment as Steve actually gets Alan to understand something that’s always mystified him. Steven's latest book, "Infinite Powers: How Calculus Reveals the Secrets of the Universe," is now available online and at all major book sellers.

While doing a good job of warming people up to math there was still a little bit too much “math is hard” or “math is impenetrable” discussion in the opening here. We need to get away from continuing the myth that math is “hard”. The stories we tell are crucially important here. I do like the fact that Alan Alda talks about how he’s been fascinated with it and has never given up. I’m also intrigued at Strogatz’ discussion of puzzling things out as a means of teaching math–a viewpoint I’ve always felt was important. It’s this sense of exploration that has driven math discovery for centuries and not the theorem-proof, theorem-proof structure of math text books that moves us forward.

I’ve always thought that Euler and Cauchy have their names on so many theorems simply because they did a lot of simple, basic exploration at a time when there was a lot of low hanging mathematical fruit to be gathered. Too many math books and teachers mythologize these men for what seems like magic, yet when taught to explore the same way even young children can figure out many of these same theorems for themselves.

If we could only teach the “how to do math” while children are young and then only move to the theorem-proof business later on as a means of quickly advancing through a lot of history and background so that students can get to the frontiers of math to begin doing their own explorations on their own again we would be far better off. Though along that path we should always have at least some emphasis on the doing of math and discovery to keep it at the fore.

🎧 Rachael Ray on Communicating Through the Medium of Food | Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda (ART19)

Listened to Rachael Ray on Communicating Through the Medium of Food from Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda (ART19)

Rachael Ray knows how to relate over food. When she cooks, she's always thinking about her audience and how to communicate a message through the medium of food. Her energy and talent have led her to create a billion dollar lifestyle empire, built around the concept of fun, healthy, and joyous experiences with food. In this episode of Clear+Vivid, Rachael Ray and Alan Alda cook up some pasta together and enjoy a lively conversation around the dinner table!

This interview gives me a lot more respect for Rachel Ray and what she’s doing. On the surface she might appear to be too bright and too bubbly, but underneath she’s doing what all of the more serious-seeming foodies on television are doing (albeit perhaps even more successfully)–she’s just targeting a far different audience. But also now that I know this, I’m secretly wishing she would be doing some programming targeted directly at me.

I’ve been aware of Alan Alda’s work in the areas of science communication for a while, but his podcast and the subtle questions he’s asking are giving me greater respect for what he’s doing as well. We need several thousand more of him. We also need better curricula to improve these issues among scientists themselves. I remember needing to take at least three credits of writing intensive courses in college (far too few, but at least it was something), but it would be nice if all scientists and engineers were forced to have more basic training in communication at the lower levels.

🎧 W. Kamau Bell on How He Communicates with Racists by Alan AldaAlan Alda from Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda (ART19)

Listened to W. Kamau Bell on How He Communicates with Racists by

Alan Alda from Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda (ART19)

W. Kamau Bell, the host of CNN's "United Shades of America,” describes his show as giving people a “microphone” and “public square to tell their version of the story.” Putting it plainly, he's said his greatest gift as a communicator is in knowing, “... how to shut the f*ck up and let people talk.” Kamau is a gifted stand up comedian who delivers his comedy through a socio-political lens. In this episode of Clear+Vivid, Alan Alda asks W. Kamau Bell about his approach to comedy and how it's possible to talk with someone who you genuinely disagree with, like a member of the KKK — and still find relatable qualities, even humor. Before they finish, Kamau surprises Alan with a guest of his own!

How can you not love W. Kamau Bell? This reminds me that I still ought to get back to watching his show more regularly instead of letting it fester on my DVR. This is my first episode of Alda’s podcast, but he has an excellent interview style and he’s obviously got some interesting guests. The broader topic of communication and conversation is also an intriguing one to me. I’ve added it to my podcast list to catch up on past and future episodes.

Hat tip: @sciphi