Sebastian Junger is the author of The Perfect Storm, War, Tribe, Freedom, and most recently In My Time of Dying: How I came face to face with the idea of an afterlife.

We discuss…

* Sebastian’s literary heroes

* Sebastian’s literary motivations

* The state of Sebastian’s “tribal health.”

* The wealthier the neighborhood, the weaker the community?

* How big spaces pull us apart—as discussed in Sebastian’s recent essay, “The Great Abandonment.”

* The virtues of stoicism

* American Psychological Association on traditional masculinity: “The main thrust of the subsequent research is that traditional masculinity—marked by stoicism, competitiveness, dominance and aggression—is, on the whole, harmful.”

* What’s a definition of what manhood is (existentially speaking)?

* Sebastian’s viral Substack post: Young Men and How the Democrats Lost Them

* Harvard Professor pushed out for using words like male and female.

* Fighting words and uplifting voices from Democrats: Talarico on Colbert & Jon Ossoff

* Marie Gluesenkamp Perez on Ezra Klein

* Voting, jury duty, and giving blood: symbolic gestures of national connection

* I propose some radical ideas to simulate tribal dynamics in a more populous, peacetime world.

* Sebastian’s NDE (Near Death Experience) which led him down a scientific journey to understand the un-understandable

* I turn on the hot lights and ask Sebastian: are NDE visions a product of biology or a consciousness that’s not entirely contained in the brain?

* How Sebastian explains death and the afterlife to his children.

* Sebatian recommends:

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Sebastian Junger is the author of The Perfect Storm, War, Tribe, Freedom, and most recently In My Time of Dying: How I came face to face with the idea of an afterlife.

We discuss…

• Sebastian’s literary heroes
• Sebastian’s literary motivations
• The state of Sebastian’s “tribal health.”
• The wealthier the neighborhood, the weaker the community?
• How big spaces pull us apart—as discussed in Sebastian’s recent essay, “The Great Abandonment.”

• The virtues of stoicism
• American Psychological Association on traditional masculinity: “The main thrust of the subsequent research is that traditional masculinity—marked by stoicism, competitiveness, dominance and aggression—is, on the whole, harmful.”
• What’s a definition of what manhood is (existentially speaking)?
• Sebastian’s viral Substack post: Young Men and How the Democrats Lost Them
• Harvard Professor pushed out for using words like male and female.
• Fighting words and uplifting voices from Democrats: Talarico on Colbert & Jon Ossoff 
• Marie Gluesenkamp Perez on Ezra Klein

• Voting, jury duty, and giving blood: symbolic gestures of national connection
• I propose some radical ideas to simulate tribal dynamics in a more populous, peacetime world.
• Sebastian’s NDE (Near Death Experience) which led him down a scientific journey to understand the un-understandable
• I turn on the hot lights and ask Sebastian: are NDE visions a product of biology or a consciousness that’s not entirely contained in the brain?
• How Sebastian explains death and the afterlife to his children.
• 
  

Jacob Savage is a former screenwriter, a freelance writer, and a ticket scalper based in Los Angeles. His essay, “The Lost Generation,” about the systematic discrimination of white millennial men in the industries of academia, media, and publishing, was one of the most talked about essays of 2025.

Roman Dial is a scientist, adventurer, and author based in Alaska. His scientific work has appeared in journals like Science and Nature. He’s a pioneer of packrafting— using lightweight boats to explore remote rivers and landscapes that were previously unreachable. And he’s the author of The Adventurer’s Son, a memoir about the love of exploration, the bond between parent and child, and his two-year search for his son.

Nancy Rommelmann is a journalist and an author of many books, including her latest, Forty Bucks and a Dream: a collection of nonfiction pieces about her time in Los Angeles. She is also the co-host of one of my favorite podcasts—Smoke 'Em If You Got 'Em.

We discuss….

• Nancy’s favorite books.
• Nobody “snows you” like your kids.
• What percent sociopath are you?
• If you got a voucher for a free strip-o-gram, would you take it?

• Team Sarah (yes to love life writing) vs Team Nancy (not as much so)

• I ask why and how “Sarah and Nancy work as a podcasting duo.”
• Smoke Em Dramas:
  Sarah and Nancy debating “negging.”
  Nancy and Walter Kirn debating Viktor Orbán.
  Sarah’s botched introduction to Michael Tracey. 
• Nancy writing about the Ristretto Roasters saga.
• Where the “Hot for Due Process” swag idea was borne.
• The art of not falling apart: having something important and unselfish to do?
• The first of the Musings of the Night Nurse series.

Music by Duncan Barrett, who you can follow and listen to, here and here.

Sean Gerrity is the co-founder and former CEO of American Prairie—a giant wildlife refuge in the making in Montana, which I hiked and kayaked this past August. Sean is the host of The Answers Are Out There podcast in which he interviews leaders who’ve taken on bold conservation projects. He’s the author of Wild on Purpose: The American Prairie Story and the Art of Thinking Bigger.

• Some of Sean’s favorite things: musician Ry Cooder, Sapiens by Yoval Noah Hariri, Travels with Charley, East of Eden, A Short Walk In the Hindu Kush by Eric Newby, Decisive by Chip and Dan Heath, and…
• Sean’s podcast interview with Violet Sage Walker — a Northern Chumash Tribal Leader — celebrating America’s Newest Large-Scale Marine Sanctuary.
• Are we in a rewilding renaissance?
• How well known is American Prairie? Is it’s under-knownness due to the noise of the modern day information flow?
• Is today the best of times (lots of exciting conservation opportunities) and the worst of times (the overwhelming negativity funneled into our brains).
• 192 out of 196 countries signing up to achieve vision of 30% of the world saved for nature by 2030.
• The big four things for helping the environment:    
  • Stabilize global human population
  • Accelerate transition to green energy
  • Rewild
  • Redo how we do agriculture

   

• Fundraising: is it as unpleasant as it sounds?
• The art of risk-taking—analyze the risk so deeply the risk is no longer a risk?
• Do our schools need to teach “risk analysis” in their curriculums?
• MT. Gov. Greg Gianforte’s letter to the BLM opposing American Prairie’s use of bison.
• I pitch a book idea to Sean.
• American Prairie’s “Wild Sky” program, which involves paying landowners for photographic evidence of wildlife on their property, plus some wildlife friendly fencing.
• How there could be 30-40 more American Prairie-like projects, just across the American West.
• Chumash National Marine Sanctuary—4500 square miles of protecting marine habitat.
• Klamath River Dam Removal—over 400 miles of river protected.
• On how originality is overrated.
• Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing:
• George Catlin proposing a park way back in the 1830s.
• The Tarras Valley Nature Reserve project. Here’s Sean’s podcast interview with them.
• Will American Prairie need to evolve into more like a multi-entity committee in the future?
• I get Sean’s thoughts on de-extinction.

Melanie Kaplan’s work has appeared in The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and National Parks magazine. She’s a former Knight Science Journalism fellow at MIT. Her new book, Lab Dog, tells the story of Hammy — a beagle rescued from a research lab — and follows Melanie’s journey to uncover what really happens to the thousands of dogs used in biomedical and consumer testing in the United States.

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We discuss…

• The first non-humans we fell in love with.
• What have we gotten from testing lab animals?

• Trump admin. moving us away from animal research?
• What products are still being used on lab dogs? (Bug spray)
• How to write a book about hard things (animal torture) and make it readable.

• What’s so special about beagles?
• I share my own non-human love stories.
• How my parents didn’t curate my boyhood media consumption, leading to scenes like this one being forever burned into my memory:

• Should there be a memorial for all the lab animals?
• 
  
• Ken wonders if Melanie has a long roster of correspondents, thereby possibly rendering their penpalship insignificant.
• Who would Melanie be penpals with, living or dead, if she had the choice?
• Who is the grand-mommy of book blurbers?
• What is the real America (grocery stores vs. newsfeeds)?
• Marc Maron’s final podcast with Barack Obama.
• What’s in a “Canadiano?”

Louis Dalton Hall is the author of In Green: Two Horses, Two Strangers, a Journey to an end of the Land. He is also the founder of Big Hoof, an organization that organizes horseback rides and raises money for charity. We discuss:

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• The Great Plains Trail. (Here’s my old Backpacker article on the GPT.)
• What sets Fifers apart from the rest of the Scottish?

• Louis’s travel writing inspirations: Black Spring by Henry Miller; As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning by Laurie Lee; Sophy Roberts; Jan Brokken; Bruce Chatwin.
• Is Don Quixote still readable?
• What is our relationship with the horse? Masters/parents/friends?
• I ask Louis some intrusive questions like: What do you think about the shape your life is taking? Do you have a rich uncle?
• The difficulty of writing about a romantic experience.
• Guilt as a motivational force.
• Louis’s next adventure. (Mules and possibly America.)

Paul Robbins is America’s foremost authority on the lawn. He is the author of Lawn People: How Grasses, Weeds, and Chemicals Make Us Who We Are. He is the dean of the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

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We discuss:

• Is Paul the Cary Elwes of academia?

• Julie Guthman’s work on pathogens, chemicals, and strawberries.
• What is a “lawn person?”
• Is the American lawn care industry taking advantage of us (and taking our money) because of our lawn guilt?
• Are suburban American lawns… communal?
• Penn Jillette (of “Penn and Teller”) and his show “Bullshit!” Here’s the episode about the lawn.
• Should environmentalists and libertarians unite to regain control over their lawns?
• Should “weed” be the next problematic word that becomes outmoded and ostracized (such as “retarded”) from the English language?
• “A weed is a plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Are we on the verge of reinventing the American lawn? Or will it be more of the same?
• Redddot Phase 1
• What would it take to build a biobank for all living animals?

• Paul’s article on biobanks and indigenous data sovereignty.
• Is the American chestnut tree resurrection… dead?
• Paul’s co-written essay on John Muir’s Tormented Landscape.
• Is our urge to conserve nature tied to North Americans’ complicity in removing Native Americans?
• I ask Paul, should I think of myself as a “settler?”
• I talk about rolling my eyes at land acknowledgements and Paul makes the case for them.

Daniel Oppenheimer is a cultural and political critic, the author of Exit Right: The People Who Left the Left and Reshaped the American Century, and the host of the Eminent Americans Podcast.

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We discuss…

• Dan’s terrific NYT Magazine story, “How I Learned That The Problem In My Marriage Was Me.”
• Why some people expose themselves in front of a therapy audience (exhibitionism + desperation + wanting a really good therapist?)
• How epiphanies are a dime a dozen
• Terry Real’s I Don’t Want to Talk About It
• On raging near golf courses and roundabouts
• David Eddings, fantasy writer
• A Mitt Romney favorite and a good sci-fi book (not so much a good movie):
• The gravitational pull of a good series. Dan’s latest obsession—Dungeon Crawler Carl.

• Peggy McIntosh’s “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack”
• Patriarchy—a term suffering from “concept creep?”
• How the Left needs to get comfortable with asserting power again
• It’s Time to Fight Dirty: How Democrats Can Build a Lasting Majority in American Politics
• I have a dream: a left wing made up of normies. But also, get me some of that rhydonium:
• The “Are Monkeys Inherently Racist?” episode that made me unfollow the Blocked and Reported podcast.
• What needs to be said to a lot of podcasters beating dead horses and triggering our outrage:
• Dan talking about the legacy of Rush Limbaugh
• Dan chatting withBlake Smith.