Emily Oster is a professor of economics at Brown University and the author of the 2021 book The Family Firm: A Data-Driven Guide to Better Decision Making in the Early School Years. She makes a fascinating case: well-run companies have a clear mission, they make decisions deliberately, and they have processes that keep things running smoothly. So why don't we apply that same intentionality to our family lives? Then we’ll hear from Christina and Ryan Hillsberg, a husband-and-wife team of former CIA officers. They share how lessons from intelligence work can help us raise resourceful, self-sufficient children.

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Capitalism shapes everything about our lives — the way we work, the cities we live in, the goods we consume. But where did it come from, and where is it headed?

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Max Telford is a leading evolutionary biologist who's spent his career tracing the deepest roots of life itself. His new book is called The Tree of Life: Solving Science's Greatest Puzzle, and he joins us today to share some of his big ideas in just a moment. In the second half of the show, we'll hear big ideas from the 2023 book Planta Sapiens, exploring the surprising intelligence hidden in the plants all around us.

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Melissa Bernstein, co-founder of the beloved toy company Melissa & Doug, has spent decades discovering what it means to build a business that's true to who you are. Her new book is called The Heart of Entrepreneurship: Crafting Your Authentic Recipe for Success, and she'll join us to share some of her big ideas in the first half of today's show. After that, we'll hear from Catalina Daniels and James Sherman. They went inside eighteen companies founded by Harvard Business School graduates to uncover the lessons that actually lead to success.

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First up, Ann Tashi shares key insights from her book Traveling in Bardo: The Art of Living in an Impermanent World. And later in the show, we'll hear from Rachel Macy Stafford, New York Times bestselling author of 2023’s Soul Shift, who'll show us how small, incremental changes can help us rediscover what truly brings us joy.

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First, Colin Woodard argues that where you are in the country determines how you live and how you'll die. Then Luke Shaefer tells us how America's most disadvantaged communities aren't where we think they are, and what their shared history reveals about inequality in this country.

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When was the last time you actually thought about the air around you? Unless you're stuck in a windstorm or gasping after a run, probably never. But it turns out that this invisible element — whether it's blowing across continents or flowing through your lungs — has shaped human history in some pretty remarkable ways.

Simon Winchester is the New York Times bestselling author of books like The Professor and the Madman and Krakatoa. His new book is called The Breath of the Gods: The History and Future of the Wind, and he'll join us with some of his big ideas in just a moment.

And later in the show, we'll hear from James Nestor, author of the 2020 book Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art, who'll show us how modern humans have forgotten how to breathe properly — and what that's costing us.

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First up, Harvard economist John Campbell on how to make the financial system work better for you. His new book, co-written with Tarun Ramadorai, is Fixed: Why Personal Finance Is Broken and How to Make It Work for Everyone. Later in the show, Lauren Simmons offers us a practical, empowering roadmap for building financial wellness right now.

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Up first, we hear from Jonathan Gluck, author of An Exercise in Uncertainty. And then Suleika Jaouad shares key insights from Between Two Kingdoms.

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Act One: The Joy of Solitude: How to Reconnect with Yourself in an Overconnected World by Robert Coplan

Act Two: Arrangements in Blue Notes by Amy Key

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