Tag Archives: Science / Technology

Scholars’ Circle – Use of Software Algorithms to create Artificial Intelligence that inform institutions, why should we be wary? – January 1, 2023

December 31, 2022 host

Algorithms reflect the biases of the society in which they exist and the programmers who create them. There has been a social and political reaction against their use. How do algorithms govern social and political interactions? What is the most proper use of algorithms? And what are the biases that persist in their use? [ dur: 58mins. ]

Tina Eliassi-Rad is a Professor of Computer Science at Northeastern University. She is also a core faculty member at Northeastern’s Network Science Institute and the Institute for Experiential AI. She is the author of Measuring Algorithmically Infused Societies and What Science Can Do for Democracy: A Complexity Science Approach.
Damien Patrick Williams is an assistant professor in Philosophy and Data Science at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. He is the author of Why AI Research Needs Disabled and Marginalized Perspectives, Fitting the description: historical and sociotechnical elements of facial recognition and anti-black surveillance, and Constructing Situated and Social Knowledge: Ethical, Sociological, and Phenomenological Factors in Technological Design. Damien is member of the Project Advisory Committee for the Center for Democracy and Technology’s Project on Disability Rights and Algorithmic Fairness, Bias, and Discrimination, and the Disability Inclusion Fund’s Tech & Disability Stream Advisory Committee.
Henning Schulzrinne is Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Colombia University. He is the co-author of Mobility Protocols and Handover Optimization: Design, Evaluation and Application, Bridging communications and the physical world and Future internets escape the simulator. He was nominated as Internet Hall of Fame Innovator in 2013. He was Chief Technology Officer for the FCC under the Obama Administration.

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

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – Deep Listening to Sounds of Nature; Actual History in American Thanksgiving Story – November 27, 2022

November 27, 2022 host

How does deep listening to nature promote biodiversity and a deeper relationship with the natural world?

Book Cover of Civil War by Other Means has an red X on the title of the book

We discuss the book THE SOUNDS OF LIFE: How Digital Technology Is Bringing Us Closer to the World of Animals and Plants. [ dur: 34mins. ]

Karen Bakker is Professor of Geography and Associate at the Institute for Resources, Environment, and Sustainability at the University of British Columbia. She is Visiting Professor at Harvard University’s Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. She is the author of Smart Earth: A meta-review and implications for environmental governance, The human right to water revisited (in The Right to Water), and THE SOUNDS OF LIFE: How Digital Technology Is Bringing Us Closer to the World of Animals and Plants.

References to clips of nature sound recordings included in the interview with Karen Bakker :

The American Thanksgiving story is one of cooperation and coexistence between white European settlers and the native peoples. But the real story is much darker.
How does this Thanksgiving narrative get the history wrong?

We discuss the history, the memory, and the meaning of Thanksgiving in the contemporary relationship between the United States and Indigenous people. [ dur: 24mins. ]

Robert J. Miller is Professor of Law at Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law. He is Interim Chief Justice at Pascua Yaqui Tribe Court of Appeals. He is the author of American Indian Sovereignty versus the United States (in Handbook of Critical Indigenous Studies) and the forthcoming A Promise Kept: The Muscogee (Creek) Nation and McGirt v. Oklahoma. He is an enrolled citizen of the Eastern Shawnee Tribe.

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

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – Use of Earth’s Magnetic Field by Birds and Animals ; Examining Human’s relationship with Animals – January 2, 2022

January 1, 2022 host

First, how do birds, bees, whales and turtles all use the earth’s magnetic field to guide their behavior? [ dur: 17mins. ]

Andres Vidal Gadea is Professor of Molecular Neuroethology at Illinois State University. He is the co-author of Magnetosensitive neurons mediate geomagnetic orientation in Caenorhabditis elegans and Factors that influence magnetic orientation in C. elegans. JCPA.

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

Human history has been drastically changed by our relationship with animals. So much so that our next guest says it would be a different world if not for our intimate bonds with animals. How have they changed us and the world we live in? [ dur: 41 mins. ]

Brian Fagan is Professor Emeritus of Archaeology at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He has authored more than two dozen books, including The Intimate Bond: How Animals Have Shaped Human History, Fishing: How the Sea Fed Civilization and co-authored with Nadia Durrani Climate Chaos: Lessons of Survival from our Ancestors. His website is: http://brianfagan.com/

This show was recorded on August 29, 2015

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

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – Algorithms, how do they make biased decisions? – November 14, 2021

November 13, 2021 host

Tina Eliassi-Rad is a Professor of Computer Science at Northeastern University. She is also a core faculty member at Northeastern’s Network Science Institute and the Institute for Experiential AI. She is the author of Measuring Algorithmically Infused Societies and What Science Can Do for Democracy: A Complexity Science Approach.
Damien Patrick Williams is PhD candidate in the Department of Science, Technology, and Society at Virginia Tech. He is the author of Why AI Research Needs Disabled and Marginalized Perspectives, Fitting the description: historical and sociotechnical elements of facial recognition and anti-black surveillance, and Constructing Situated and Social Knowledge: Ethical, Sociological, and Phenomenological Factors in Technological Design.
Henning Schulzrinne is Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Colombia University. He is the co-author of Mobility Protocols and Handover Optimization: Design, Evaluation and Application, Bridging communications and the physical world and Future internets escape the simulator. He was nominated as Internet Hall of Fame Innovator in 2013. He was Chief Technology Officer for the FCC under the Obama Administration.

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

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – Making Lasting Peace and Funding Big Science – June 27, 2021

June 26, 2021 host

First, beyond ending war what does it take to make a lasting quality peace? [ dur: 28mins. ]

Peter Wallensteen is Professor of Peace and Conflict Research at Uppsala University, Sweden and Research Professor Emeritus of Peace Studies at Joan B Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at University of Notre Dame. He is the author of Quality Peace: Peacebuilding, Victory and World Order, Understanding Conflict Resolution: Peace, War, and the Global System and editor of the volume International Sanctions: Between Wars and Words.

Then, the birth of what we know as big science. The big money supported, cross institution collaborations that have supported both medicine and weaponry. How did science and government get so entrenched with industry, and one another? And what have been the results? [ dur: 30mins. ]

Michael Hiltzik is a Pulizer Prize winning journalist and author. He writes a daily blog appearing on latimes.com. His publications include The New Deal: A Modern History; The Plot Against Social Security, and Big Science: Ernest Lawrence and the Invention That Launched the Military Industrial Complex

Produced by the Scholars’ Circle team: Ankine Aghassian, Doug Becker, Melissa Chiprin and Sudd Dongre.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – US Political System and the 2020 Presidential Election -/- Deep Sea Mining and ecological impact – Oct 4th , 2020

October 4, 2020 host

What are the parts of the US political system that will most affect the election outcome? [ dur: 32mins. ]

Tim Fadgan is Politics and Policy Lecturer at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. He is the author of Do the best interests of the child end at the Nation’s shores: Immigration, state courts, and children in the United States.
Hans Noel is Associate Professor of Political Science at Georgetown University. He is the author of Political Ideologies and Political Parties in America, and a co-author of The Party Decides: Presidential Nominations Before and After Reform.
Jennifer Frost is an Associate Professor for History at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. She is the author of An Interracial Movement of the Poor: Community Organizing and the New Left in the 1960s and Hedda Hopper’s Hollywood: Celebrity Gossip and American Conservatism.

The search for minerals is leading some corporations to begin mining the ocean floor but scientists warn that this could devastate fragile ecosystems that will have repercussions that we still don’t understand. What is going on in the deep sea? What precautions should be taken to prevent devastating fragile ecosystems? [ dur: 26mins. ]

Craig Smith is Professor of Oceanography at the University of Hawai’i.
Verena Tunnicliffe is a marine biologist at the University of Victoria in Canada where she holds a Canada Research Chair in Deep Ocean Research.

They are co-authors of the study Deep Sea Misconceptions Cause Underestimation of Seabed-Mining Impacts.

This program is produced by the following team members: Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – Contested Presidential Election in Belarus -/- Hormonal changes in women affects use of birth control – Aug 30, 2020

August 29, 2020 host

Belarus has been rocked by protests and police crackdown following the contested presidential election in Belarus. We examine the history of Belarus and the likelihood of the continuation of the Lukashenko dictatorship. Hosted by Doug Becker [ dur: 43mins. ]

Professor Margarita Balmaceda is Professor of Diplomacy and International Relations at Seton Hall University. She is also an Associate at the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies and of the Ukranian Research Institute at Harvard University. She is the author of Living the High Life in Minsk: Russian Energy Rents, Domestic Populism and Belarus’ Impending Crisis and The Politics of Energy Dependency: Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania Between Domestic Oligarchs and Russian Pressure.
Tatsiana Kulakevich is lecturer at the University of South Florida and research fellow at USF Institute on Russia. She is the co-author of the book chapter Belarusian Political Parties: Organizational Structures and Practices. and Twenty Years in the Making: Understanding the Difficulty for Change in Belarus. Her analyses appeared in media and academic journals, including The Monkey Cage, The Conversation, The Globe Post and Belarus Digest.

Then, hormones change our brain according to neuroscientists. What might these changes be? What does this mean for women taking birth control pills over the course of their child bearing years? [ dur: 14 mins. ]

Belinda Pletzer is a researcher at the Centre for Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of Salzburg, Austria. She is the co-author of many publications including, Sex and menstrual cycle influences on three aspects of attention, 50 years of hormonal contraception. Time to find out what it does to our brain and Subcortical structural changes along the menstrual cycle: beyond the hippocampus.

This program is produced by the following team members: Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – Interview with Suicide Bombers -/- Transmission of Trauma from parent to child – March 8, 2020

March 7, 2020 host

First, from broken heart to suicide bomber we explore the various drives that fuel deadly terror. [dur: 17mins. ]

Ken Ballen, author of Terrorist in Love.

Then, is the transmission of trauma multi-generational? Do the children of survivors of mass atrocities have higher risk of developing psychological disorders? What are the social and behavioral factors that result in the trauma of successive generations? We look at the impact of survivors’ post-trauma adaptational style in their children’s eyes. [ dur: 40mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

Andrei Novac is Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the University of California at Irvine, School of Medicine, and Founding Director of the Traumatic Stress Program. He is the author of the research papers Traumatic Stress and Human Behavior, Special Treatment Issues in Children of Holocaust Survivors and Free Artistic Expression: A Clinical Exploration of Resiliency and Healing After Trauma.
Yael Danieli is Director of the Group Project for Holocaust Survivors and their Children. She is the Founding Co-President of the International Network of Holocaust and Genocide Survivors and their Friends, and a Founding Director of The International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies. She is the author of the pubications International Handbook of Multigenerational Legacies of Trauma, International Responses to Traumatic Stress and the research papers Multigenerational Legacies of Trauma: Modeling the What and How of Transmission, and Differing Adaptational Styles in Families of Survivors of the Nazi Holocaust.

Produced by the Scholars’ Circle team: Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

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Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – US role in Israel and Palestinians peace promotions -/- Modern Diseases – February 16, 2020

February 15, 2020 host

What’s the role of the US in promoting peace between Israel and Palestinians? What’s the likelihood of its success? Doug Becker hosts. [ dur: 36mins. ]

Brent Sasley is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Texas, Arlington. He is the author of the book Politics in Israel: Governing a Complex Society and the Washington Post article The White House Peace Plan Puts Israel’s Concerns First – and Shortchanges Palestinians.
Fayez Hammad is Lecturer in International Relations and Middle East Studies at The University of Southern California. He is a frequent commentator on Middle East politics.

Sanitation and antibiotics have saved the lives of many, but are they also the culprits behind some of modern diseases? We might have gone overboard in killing our microbes and that may be causing some of today’s epidemics. [ dur 22mins. ]

Martin I. Blaser is Director of the Center for Advanced Biotechnology and Medicine (CABM) at Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences (RBHS). Blaser is also the Henry Rutgers Chair of the Human Microbiome and Professor of Medicine and Microbiology at the Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. He is the author of Missing Microbes : How the Overuse of Antibiotics Is Fueling Our Modern Plagues.

Produced by the Scholars’ Circle team: Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

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The Scholars' Circle Interviews

Tag Archives: Science / Technology

Scholars’ Circle – Use of Software Algorithms to create Artificial Intelligence that inform institutions, why should we be wary? – January 1, 2023

Scholars’ Circle – Deep Listening to Sounds of Nature; Actual History in American Thanksgiving Story – November 27, 2022

Scholars’ Circle – Use of Earth’s Magnetic Field by Birds and Animals ; Examining Human’s relationship with Animals – January 2, 2022

Scholars’ Circle – Algorithms, how do they make biased decisions? – November 14, 2021

Scholars’ Circle – Making Lasting Peace and Funding Big Science – June 27, 2021

Scholars’ Circle – US Political System and the 2020 Presidential Election -/- Deep Sea Mining and ecological impact – Oct 4th , 2020

Scholars’ Circle – Contested Presidential Election in Belarus -/- Hormonal changes in women affects use of birth control – Aug 30, 2020

Scholars’ Circle – Interview with Suicide Bombers -/- Transmission of Trauma from parent to child – March 8, 2020

Scholars’ Circle – US role in Israel and Palestinians peace promotions -/- Modern Diseases – February 16, 2020

By Maria Armoudian