Tag Archives: Science in Society

Scholars’ Circle – Author interview, On Disinformation, How to Talk to a Science Denier and Science Communication in a Crisis – July 30, 2023

Science is under attack. Who and what are behind the attacks? While we face catastrophic climate change and other pending disasters, how can we restore the public’s understandings about scientific realities? We explore disinformation and ways to communicate with non-scientists to loosen the grip the disinformants have on so many people. [ dur: 58mins. ]

  • Lee McIntyre is with us. He is a Research Fellow at the Center for Philosophy and History of Science at Boston University and a recent Lecturer in Ethics at Harvard Extension School. He is the author of How to Talk to a Science Denier , Post-Truth, and the forthcoming On Disinformation (MIT Press, August 2023),
  • Christopher Reddy is a senior scientist in the Department of Marine Chemistry and Geochemistry at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and faculty member at MIT of the MIT/Woods Hole program in oceanography. He is the author of SCIENCE COMMUNICATION IN A CRISIS: An Insider’s Guide (Routledge; May 10, 2023).

This program is produced by Ankine Aghassian, Doug Becker, Melissa Chiprin and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Side effects of google and facebook businesses -/- Teaching children civics and community – October 14, 2018

First, are Google and Facebook increasing income inequality, harming the arts and damaging democracy? Our guests says yes. [ dur: 44 mins. ]

Then, how one university professor is teaching children about community, civics, empathy and giving. [ dur: 14 mins. ]

This program is produced with contributions from the following volunteers: Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Anaïs Amin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Future of Food, part 2 of 2 -/- use and misuse of DNA and private data – June 10, 2018

First, with climate change, contamination and host of stressors on the planet, how will we feed a growing population? What are the politics of food? In this second part of this symposium on food, we look at solutions and the changes we need to make to be sure a system is just, sustainable and resilient. [ dur: 28 mins. ]

  • Michael Carolan is a Professor of Sociology and Associate Dean of Research for the College of Liberal Arts at Colorado State University. He has authored and coedited books including Reclaiming Food Security; The Sociology of Food and Agriculture; The Real Cost of Cheap Food; Food Utopias: Reimagining Citizenship, Ethics and Community; and Biological Economies: Experimentation and the Politics of Agrifood Frontiers.
  • Richard Le Heron is a Professor of Geography in the School of Environment at the University of Auckland. His has coauthored and coedited books including Knowledge, Industry and Environment: Institutions and Innovation in Territorial Perspective; Economic Spaces of Pastoral Production and Commodity Systems: Markets and Livelihoods; Agri-Food Commodity Chains and Globalising Networks; and Biological Economies: Experimentation and the politics of agri-food frontiers.
  • Nicolas Ian Lewis is an Associate Professor in the School of Environment at the University of Auckland. He coedited the book Biological Economies: Experimentation and the politics of agri-food frontiers and has authored book chapters including ‘Constructing economic objects of governance: the New Zealand wine industry’ in Agri-Food Commodity Chains and Globalising Networks.
  • Anastasia Telesetsky is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Law at the University of Auckland. She has coauthored and coedited the books The International Law of Disaster Relief; Ecological Restoration in International Environmental Law; and Marine Pollution Contingency Planning, State Practice in Asia-Pacific States.

Then, we explore how DNA and other private data can be used and misused in law enforcement, health care and employment. [ dur: 30 mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

  • Ellen Wright Clayton is a Professor of Law at the Vanderbilt University School of Law, and Professor of Health Policy and Co-Founder of the Center for Biomedical Ethics and Society at the Vanderbilt University Medical School. She is co-author of the book Bioethics and Law and co-author of the research publication Privacy and Security in the Genomic Era, Imagined Futures: Capturing the Benefits of Genome Sequencing for Society, and The Legal Risks of Returning Results of Genomics.
  • Mark A. Rothstein is Chair of Law and Medicine and is the Founding Director of the Institute for Bioethics, Health Policy and Law at the University of Louisville School of Medicine. He is the co-author of Genetics: Ethics, Law and Policy, the editor of Genetic Secrets: Protecting Privacy and Confidentiality in the Genetic Era and co-editor of Behavioral Genetics: The Clash of Culture and Biology.
  • Dennis McNevin is a Professor of forensic genetics in the Centre for Forensic Science at the University of Technology Sydney. He is co-author of the research publications Predictive DNA analysis for bio-geographical ancestry, Forensic DNA phenotyping: Developing a model privacy impact assessment, and Prediction of bio-geographical ancestry from genotype: a comparison of classifiers.

This program is produced with generous contribution from Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Anaïs Amin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Propaganda in democratic society -/- Silencing science, how and why – December 31, 2017

First, how does propaganda work, particularly in democratic settings? This is part 1 of our 2 part interview with Professor Jason Stanley. ( Hear Part 2 )[ dur: 26 mins. ]

  • Jason Stanley is Professor of Philosophy at Yale University. He is the author of How Propaganda Works , Know How and Knowledge and Practical Interests (Lines of Thought)

Then, what are the ways cience is being silenced? And to what end? We gain insight from Professor Shaun Hendy. [ dur: 32 mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit:  TheBigQ

  • Shaun Hendy, Professor of Physics at University of Auckland, New Zealand. He is the author of Silencing Science.

This program is produced with generous contribution from Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Are Google and Facebook increasing income inequality and damaging democracy and art -/- Teaching Children about community, Giving and Empathy – December 3, 2017

First, are Google and Facebook increasing income inequality, harming the arts and damaging democracy? Our guests says yes. [ dur: 44 mins. ]

  • Jonathan Taplin was the founding director of the USC Annenberg Innovation Lab and an Oscar nominated filmmaker, a music manager and author. He is the author of Move Fast and Break Things: How Facebook, Google, and Amazon Cornered Culture and Undermined Democracy.

Then, how one university professor is teaching children about community, civics, empathy and giving. [ dur: 14 mins. ]

  • Ann Crigler is Professor of Political Science at USC. She is the co-author of Common Knowledge: News and the Construction of Political Meaning and Crosstalk: Citizens, Candidates and the Media in a Presidential Campaign, and the co-editor of Rethinking the Vote: The Politics and Prospects of American Election Reform and The Affect Effect: Dynamics of Emotion in Political Thinking and Behavior

This program is produced with generous contribution from Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Propaganda in democratic society -/- Silencing science, how and why – January 22, 2017

First, how does propaganda work, particularly in democratic settings? This is part 1 of 2 part interview with Professor Jason Stanley. ( Hear Part 2 )[ dur: 26 mins. ]

Then, what are the ways that science is being silenced? and to what end? We get insight from Professor Shaun Hendy. [ dur: 32 mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

  • Shaun Hendy, Professor of Physics at University of Auckland, New Zealand. He is the author of Silencing Science.

Find books authored by our guest scholars on this Book Shelf .

This program is produced with generous contribution from Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle-New Media affects Politics-/-Science and Politics-October 25th, 2015

First, can new media change power relations? We speak with Rory O’Connor. [ dur: 27 mins. ]

  • Rory O’Connor is an author, filmmaker and journalist. He is the author of “Friends, Followers and the Future: How Social Media are Changing Politics, Threatening Big Brands, and Killing Traditional Media ” . He is the co-author of “Shock Jocks: Hate Speech and Talk Radio: America?s Ten Worst Hate Talkers and the Progressive Alternatives” and “Nukespeak: The Selling of Nuclear Power in America“.

Then, on the Scholars’ Circle, in the face of looming public health and sustainability, we look at the intersection of science and politics. [ dur: 31mins. ]

  • Naomi Oreskes is Professor of the History of Science and Affiliated Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University. She is the co-author of “ Science and Technology in the Global Cold War“, “The Collapse of Western Civilization: A View from the Future“, and “Merchant of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming
  • David H. Guston is Professor of Political Science and Co-Director of the Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes at Arizona State University. He is Principal Investigator and Director of the Center for Nanotechnology in Society at Arizona State University and author of “Between Politics and Science: Assuring the Integrity and Productivity of Research“, co-author of “Informed Legislatures: Coping with Science in a Democracy“, and he has co-edited “Shaping the Next Generation of Science and Technology Policy“.
  • Mark B. Brown is Professor in the Department of Government at California State University, Sacramento. He is the author of “Science in Democracy: Expertise, Institutions, and Representation“.

Find book/publication authored by our guest scholars Book Shelf .

Scholars’ Circle-Effects-of-Human-Rights-Law-/-Mysteries-of-the-Mind-May 3rd, 2015

First, how is international law changing human rights and for war? Our guest Ruti G. Teitel, a professor of comparative law, says we are moving from protecting state security to increasingly protecting individual security. These shifts are influenced by the human rights frame and reshaping the scope of what she calls humanities law. [ dur: 15 mins. ]

  • Ruti Teitel is a Professor of Comparative Law, Chair: Global Law and Justice Colloquium and Founding Co-Director of the Institute for Global Law, Justice and Policy at New York Law School and Visiting Professor at the London School of Economics. She is the author of Humanity’s Law and Transitional Justice.

​Next, science is now taking us inside the mysteries of the mind. Can the brain now interface with computers to move matter? Will scientists be able to download our memories and then reload them? [ dur: 41 mins. ]

  • Dr. Michio Kaku is​ ​a Professor of Physics at​ ​City College of New York (CUNY)​ ​and​ ​the co-creator of string field theory, a branch of string theory.​ ​He is the author o​f ​Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100​,​ Physics of the Impossible: A Scientific Explorations into the World of Phasers, Force Fields, Teleportation and Time Travel​ ​and The Future of the Mind:​ ​The Scientific Quest to Understand, Enhance, and Empower the Mind​.​

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The Scholars’ Circle Radio- April 27th, 2014

First, droughts all over the world are driving the prices of food and costing jobs as farmers are forced to cut crops from water shortages.  [ dur: 16 mins. ]

  • Lynn Ingram, professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at University of California, Berkeley. She is the co-author of The West without Water: What Past Floods, Droughts, and Other Climatic Clues Tell Us about Tomorrow.

Then, a conversation between four Nobel Laureates about science and society, and the importance of public education. Hosted by UC Berkeley. [ dur: 44 mins. ]

  • Randy W. Schekman, professor of molecular and cell biology, won the 2013 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his role in revealing the machinery that regulates the transport and secretion of proteins in our cells.
  • Saul Perlmutter, professor of physics and a faculty senior scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), led one of two teams that simultaneously discovered the accelerating expansion of the universe and was awarded the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics.
  • George Smoot, professor of physics and an astrophysicist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), led a team that obtained the first images of the infant universe ” findings that confirmed the predictions of the Big Bang theory ” and was awarded the 2006 Nobel Prize in Physics.
  • Daniel L. McFadden, professor of economics, was awarded the 2000 Nobel Prize in Economics for his development of statistical methods relating to the economic theory of “discrete choice,” tools that have been used to determine how people and organizations make choices from a distinct set of alternatives.

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The Scholars’ Circle & Insighters Radio- Mar. 3rd, 2013

First, can new media change power relations? We speak with Rory O’Connor author of, “Friends, Followers and the Future: How Social Media are Changing Politics, Threatening Big Brands, and Killing Traditional Media.” [ dur. 27mins. ]

Then, on the Scholars’ Circle, in the face of looming public health and sustainability, we look at the intersection of science and politics. [dur. 28 min. ]

  • Naomi Oreskes, Prof. History & Science, UC San Diego; Author of  “Merchants of Doubt”.
  • Prof. David Guston, Political Science, Co-director Consortium for Science, Policy & Outcomes, AZ State Univ.  Author of  “Between Politics and Science: Assuring the Integrity and Productivity of Research” .
  • Prof. Mark Brown, Gov’t & Political Science, CSU Sacrament; Author of “Science in Democracy”.

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