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Joe and Mark consider recent advances in drone technology and AI that may soon lead to the chilling prospect of fully autonomous weapons coming to a battlefield near you.  Given the likelihood that a rogue state or non-state actor will inevitably open Pandora’s box, how might this technology change warfare, and what can we do about it? (Recorded May 7, 2021.)

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"I saw it with my own eyes' – but is that still good enough?  Mark and Joe explore deepfake technology and its many applications—some arguably positive, others unquestionably scary and problematic.  In a world where seeing is no longer believing, what does the truth look like, and how do we know what’s real? (Recorded April 23, 2021.)

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Climate change is forcing us to consider monumental changes to our way of life, including rethinking the wildly inefficient and unconscionably wasteful way we produce meat.  Which begs the question: are hamburgers toast?  Joe and Mark chew on the likelihood of conventional meat being replaced by a new generation of plant-based substitutes, lab-grown delicacies, and everything else that might reside in the future of meat. 

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Since 2004, more than 1,300 communities in the USA have lost a newspaper,  and when the daily paper is a thing of the past it will be replaced by ... what, exactly, and what might be the implications for our democracy?  Mark and Joe survey the landscape of “news deserts” and speculate about what might lie ahead.

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Joe and Mark consider the Congressional resolution that has progressive hearts aflutter, while conservatives are in a tizzy at the prospect of losing access to the hamburger-industrial complex.  Is the Green New Deal a slogan, legislation, or something in-between, and might it someday become the law of the land? (Recorded March 12, 2021.)

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Mark and Joe trace the history of the Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, from its genesis in the 1920s through the ratification wars of the 1970s, and try to guess whether recent efforts to get it across the finish line are likely to  succeed. (Recording date: February 26, 2021.)

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Why do some people lose their memories?  When you lose your memory, what is it that you’re losing?   Joe and Mark discuss the umbrella of neurocognitive disorders known familiarly as dementia, as well as the way memory works and why we forget.  Will you remember reading this blurb? ( (Recorded February 12, 2021.)

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The recent federal antitrust lawsuits against Facebook and Google mark a rare area of agreement in our polarized political culture.  Seemingly everybody wants to do something about Big Tech, though for very different reasons.  But should these companies be broken up?  Mark and Joe take quick tour through the history of antitrust and examine the pros and cons of breaking up Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google. (Recorded Jan. 31, 2021.)

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Without inhaling, Joe and Mark catch a whiff of the best arguments for and against legalizing drugs.  Includes a brief history of drug use in the USA, a chronicle of the ill-advised "War on Drugs," and how the topic of legalization lends itself to strange political bedfellows. (Recorded Jan. 15, 2021.)

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Mark and Joe slide into Major League Baseball’s surprising decision to integrate the Negro Leagues with the major leagues.  Is it even feasible to combine the statistical records of different leagues playing at different times under different conditions, and might baseball’s gesture inadvertently diminish the ballplayers of color that it was meant to honor? (Recorded Jan. 1, 2021.)