Doug Metzger from literatureandhistory.comThe Odyssey, Part 1 of 3. Adventure, monsters, temptresses, and a whole lot of wine-dark Aegean. Learn all about the world of Homer’s Odyssey.
This week’s guest, Ton Zylstra just celebrated his 17th year of blogging. He works as a consultant, assisting governments and private entities in being open by design, as part of a more comprehensive data governance approach. Together with his wife, he organizes a “birthday unconference,” a unique gathering which is part conference, part celebration, combining public and person interests.
Tom Woodward (@twoodwar) is Associate Director of Innovation in the @VCUALTLab. We chat about the awesome things that can happen when great educational technologists like Tom get to work with great educators. A few of those things are anth101.com, photographyismagic.com, and oh the 34,200 blogs at rampages.us!
Gettin’ Air with @hypervisible Professor of English at Macomb Community College. Self described as the “The Beavis of Twitter”, we chat about how he works to raise awareness of the absurd and abusive tech practices of various platforms and companies and how he helps his students navigate this increasingly dystopian world. “There’s always material to talk about how something sucks if you’re in the ed-tech space”.
Somehow @hypervisible blocked me on Twitter, which is a painful shame–at least for me. He’s one of the few researchers to have done so and one of the few people it’s worth having a separate account just for reading his content. I’m glad that others like Terry help to get his message out in other ways!
Chris also mentions a great list of recommended reads at 11:30 into the episode including:
Ahmed Ali Akbar talks to activist and author Tristram Stuart about using food scraps to eliminate waste.
Tristam Stuart is an international author, speaker, and campaigner on the environmental and social impacts of food. He is the founder of Feedback, an environmental campaigning organization that has worked in dozens of countries to change society’s attitude towards wasting food. His TED Talk on global food waste has reached over 1.5 million viewers.
Companion from the Latin con meaning “with” and pan meaning “bread”. I know I’ve contemplated this word before, but it does have a whole new warmth when framed in this way.
That is what beer originally was for. Preserving the calories in grains that might otherwise be wasted.
Toast Ale – a beer brand made from left over bread and grains.
Recommendation: Jeremy Cherfas may appreciate this particular episode.
Jacob Weisberg talks to David Miliband about helping refugees stay in work and in school.
David Miliband is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the International Rescue Committee (IRC) and a former Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom. He oversees IRC’s humanitarian relief operations in more than 40 war-affected countries and its refugee resettlement and assistance programs in 28 United States cities.
Anne Applebaum talks to Flavia Kleiner about how patriotic liberalism can beat xenophobic populists.
Flavia Kleiner is a Swiss political activist and co-president of a political movement called Operation Libero. Operation Libero makes a case for fundamental principles of Swiss democracy and the rule of law as vital to an enlightened understanding of what democracy needs to be effective.
Malcolm Gladwell talks to Rosanne Haggerty about ending homelessness for everyone. Forever.
Rosanne Haggerty is the President and Chief Executive Officer of Community Solutions, which assists communities throughout the US and internationally in solving the complex housing problems facing their most vulnerable residents. Earlier, she founded Common Ground Community, a pioneer in the design and development of supportive housing and research-based practices that end homelessness.
The world’s biggest challenges are #Solvable.
There are things you can do today to make yourself happier. Your life circumstances and personality aren't nearly as important as you think in deciding how happy you can be. Dr Laurie Santos explains how understanding the latest science will point you in the right direction to making you more satisfied with your life.
Mikah Sargent speaks with David Weinberger, author of Everyday Chaos: Technology, Complexity, and How We’re Thriving in a New World of Possibility about how AI, big data, and the internet are all revealing that the world is vastly more complex and unpredictable than we've allowed ourselves to see and how we're getting acculturated to these machines based on chaos.
Twitter started out like this in some sense, but ultimately closed itself off–likely to its own detriment.
Trump's media-abetted lies about his wealth; the tax preparation cartel; weaponizing FOIA and the "electability" myth.
The political press has long used the vague notion of “electability” to drive horserace coverage of presidential candidates. This week, On the Media considers how the emphasis on electability takes the focus away from the issues and turns voters into pundits. Plus, the shady dealings of the tax preparation industry, and how FOIA has been weaponized. And, how Trump duped financial journalists about his net worth in the 1980s.
1. Investigative journalist Jonathan Greenberg [@JournalistJG] on how Trump obscured his finances to wind up on the Forbes list of richest Americans — and why it mattered so much to him.
2. Dennis Ventry, professor at UC Davis School of Law, on how the tax preparation industry united to shield themselves from a publicly-funded alternative.
3. OTM producer Alana Casanova-Burgess [@AlanaLlama] speaks with Dennis Ventry, Michael Halpern [@halpsci], Eric Lipton [@EricLiptonNYT] and Claudia Polsky about a bill in California that seeks to curb the weaponization of FOIA.
4. Alex Pareene [@pareene], staff writer at The New Republic, on how the idea of "electability" has metastasized among democratic voters.
Trump's attacks on climate science; the dark money behind environmental deregulation; and the Anthropocene.
The Trump administration has ordered federal agencies to stop publishing worst-case scenario projections of climate change. This week, On the Media examines the administration’s pattern of attacks on climate science. Plus, a look at the dark money behind environmental deregulation.
1. Kate Aronoff [@KateAronoff], fellow at the Type Media Center, on the White House's suppression of climate warnings. Listen.
2. Jane Mayer [@JaneMayerNYer], staff writer at The New Yorker and author of Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right, on the billionaires supporting the modern conservative intellectual framework. Listen.
3. Jan Zalasiewicz, Anthropocene Working Group Chair, on the traces that today's humans might leave behind for future civilizations, and Benjamin Kunkel [@kunktation] on whether the Age of Capitalism might be a more appropriate term to describe our epoch. Listen.
I sort of like the idea of dating the Anthropocene from the 1950’s with the invention of the atomic bomb as it created a world-wide layer. But then the beginning of agriculture or the start of the industrial revolution also likely had world-wide effects as well.
Bob sits down with acclaimed director and documentarian Werner Herzog to discuss his latest film "Meeting Gorbachev."
Renowned director and documentarian Werner Herzog's latest filmmaking endeavor examines the legacy of the eighth and final leader of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev. For the film, Herzog sat down with the 88 year-old former General Secretary for a candid conversation about his complicated legacy. In the latest installment of Bob's Docs, Herzog joins Bob to discuss his filmmaking process and the history of the man he profiled.
The View is a sort of mythical beast, with the head of a chat show, the body of a reality show and the tail of a politics forum. And it also plays like a pro-wrestling spectacle: a lowbrow morality play with protagonists, antagonists and a lot of conflict. Ruth Graham writes in Slate that "The View is the show you watch if you want to see a former Survivor contestant debate a former professional wrestler on the morality of waterboarding. On the other hand, it’s the daytime show that debated waterboarding." Ramin Setoodeh is the author of Ladies Who Punch: The Explosive Inside Story of The View and the New York bureau chief for Variety. Bob and Setoodah talk about how a show populated with B-list celebrities has become a center of gravity for political discourse.
