Mind Control

Guest: Ivan E de Araujo, Professor, Neuroscience, Nash Family Department of Neuroscience, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital, New York

Using a technique called optogenetics, researchers were able to manually activate the neurons responsible for hunting, biting, and killing in mice brains.

Home Sweet Spaceship

Guest: Tibor Balint, Principal Human Centered Designer, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory

When you’re traveling far away, a pillow can be the coziest and softest reminder of home you bring with you. For astronauts planning on leaving our planet to travel to Mars, designers are advocating for incorporating pillows and other familiar environmental aspects into space shuttles to help the psychological well-being of these “long-distance” travelers.

When Soldiers Died of Nostalgia

Guest: Thomas Dodman, Assistant Professor of French, Columbia University, and author, “What Nostalgia Was: War, Empire, and the Time of a Deadly Disease”

Nostalgia is a human response to change and today our media, toys, clothes, are saturated with nostalgia. In the early 19th century, though, nostalgia was a diagnosable disease, allegedly responsible for hundreds of deaths.

The Industrial Revolution Provides Clues About Tomorrow's Jobs

Guest: Carl Benedikt Frey, Oxford Martin Citi Fellow, Oxford University, and author, "The Technology Trap: Capitol, Labor and Power in the Age of Automation"

We live in a modern technological revolution that is shaping our global job markets, economies, and balances of power in what appears to be unprecedented ways. However, examining how our world changed due to the Industrial Revolution suggests how we can navigate a world saturated with artificial intelligence.