Humanize Me

Does the mind have an immune system? It turns out it does, according to Andy Norman, who applies the emerging science of cognitive immunology to our divided, post-truth culture. In this conversation with Bart Campolo, Andy is pushed to explain how the concepts in his book 'Mental Immunity' can help people navigate our chaos of disinformation, propaganda, hate, and division.

Bart and John talk about the current status of life in a waning pandemic, including: the psychology of lockdown, the permanency or otherwise of the changes, appetite for social life, impact on infants and high school seniors, the prospect of a rebounding economy and whether or not we took advantage of the 'magic' of the pause.

Before recent events in Israel and Palestine, Bart Campolo had this conversation with Salwa and Gerard of an organization called Military Court Watch in Jerusalem. In it, we hear about Salwa's experiences growing up in the region, and what drew Gerard to working there as an attorney. There are no easy answers about the conflict there, and we don't offer any in this episode. But human rights, humanist ideas and a focus on children are highlighted in a very insightful way.

Bart and John discuss the a question from a listener called Paolo about believing in miracles. Even though he has many issues with the rational case for Christianity, Paolo's own experiences make him inclined to hold onto his faith. And let's be honest, we live in a world where weird things sometimes happen. Do you believe in miracles?

Johann Hari is an international best-selling author, journalist and thinker who has written two books we especially love: Chasing the Scream (about drugs and addiction) and Lost Connections (about what produces depression). So he may be one of the most fitting guests we've had. In this conversation with Bart Campolo, Johann talks about the purpose of pain, the value of community, understanding despair, how people learn social skills and friendship, why our intuitions on addiction may bewrong and our intuitions on depression may be right, the psychological poisons in our culture, releasing shame as an antidepressant, and much more. All things Johann can be found at JohannHari.com.

...in the nicest possible way. On a recent episode, Bart Campolo casually referred to a bar full of people you might like to strike up a conversation with, saying, 'There's a woman, there's a man, there's a woman who used to be a man.' A trans woman called Rya wrote us an email, in the process giving us the perfect model for how to address someone you disagree with. It was so perfect we thought we'd share it. Also on this episode, the music of New Tycoon (a song called Ancient from the album Wholiness).

How do we recapture political nuance, thoughtfulness and open-mindedness at a time when alternative media has hooked us on politics and broke our democracy? Claire Potter is a Professor of History and co-Executive Editor of Public Seminar at The New School for Social Research in Greenwich Village, New York City. In this conversation, she and Bart Campolo talk about the state of our political discourse and the attitudes that can promote the change we all want to see.

Bart talks to Joe Blankholm, a professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, who with his colleagues is conducting a survey of secular communities across the United States. Take the survey at http://secularcommunities.com/scs