Mansplaining

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Conservative politicians love their bogeymen, and you can make a good argument that the bogeyman du jour in American politics is critical race theory.  It’s a constant topic in conservative media and the target of legislative bans in red states all over the country.  But do its critics actually know what the term means?  Joe doesn’t think so, and so he asked Mark to mansplain it for the rest of us, with a focus on why it’s been such a lightning rod for political controversy. (Recorded March 3, 2023.)

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A growing chorus of biogerontologists thinks aging is a treatable disease rather than a natural process that leads to disease for some people.  It’s easy to be cynical about the motivation behind such thinking—that is, it simply signals  unwillingness to accept our own mortality.  But what if a focus on decelerating the aging processes would lead to the reduction or even eradication of many of the diseases that plague our aging population?  Joe and Mark weigh the evidence for and against such a proposition, and happily, you won’t die of old age while waiting for the answer. (Recorded February 17, 2023.)

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It’s been 64 years since the United States admitted any new states to the union—the longest period in our history.  Though most observers would say that the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico are at the head of the line to become our 51st and 52nd states, the case for admitting either one is not a slam dunk, especially given the anti-majoritarian tilt of current U.S. politics.  Mark and Joe consider the arguments pro and con, as well as the likelihood of the 51st state coming to be anytime soon. (Recorded February 3, 2023.)

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Given the booming numbers of people who report that they don’t belong to any religion (30% in the USA, 70% of young people in Europe), you’d think that religion is not long for this world.  But might those numbers mask the persistence of spirituality even as organized religion steadily declines?  Joe and Mark separate the wheat from the chaff and the faithful from the “nones” in scrutinizing what we gain and lose from religion’s demise, and what might fill the space in peoples’ lives that religion once occupied. (Recorded January 20, 2023.)

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The last few years have seen rapid improvement in AI’s ability to generate original text, images and music – so rapid that it got Mark thinking about what that means for the people who make their living as  writers, musicians and visual artists.  This being Mansplaining, he asked Joe about it.  Joe and Mark discuss the implications of computer-generated art, how it’s already affecting artists, and what “art” even means when it can be generated by anyone at the press of a button. (Recorded December 16, 2022)

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Pornography has been around for ages, but the worldwide web made it accessible in ways unimaginable to prior generations.  That dog-eared copy of Playboy that Joe and his friends stashed under a bush in their local park has been replaced by countless websites just a click away for practically anyone, anywhere.  Mark and Joe examine the implications of ubiquitous porn, what it means for a generation of kids who consume porn before they have sex, and what we can do about it. (Recorded December 2, 2022.)

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Mark Zuckerberg renamed his company from Facebook to Meta to signal that he’s all in on building the metaverse—the next-stage internet, betting billions that it will be the next big thing.  Will it meet his expectations, or is it the technological white whale that takes down Meta and all others who pursue it?  Joe and Mark discuss what the metaverse might look like, whether it will live up to its hype, and who might want to spend (too much) time there. 

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There’s another epidemic in America right now: an epidemic of vaping.  Just as the number of cigarette smokers was in decline, we have e-cigarettes with flavors like bubblegum and mango that make them irresistible to teenagers.  As the FDA ponders whether to formally approve e-cigs as smoking cessation devices, Mark and Joe explore whether vaping has any redeeming value or whether it’s just the nicotine-industrial complex’s newest tactic to hook a new generation of addicts. (Recorded November 4, 2022.)

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