Think from KERA

With the 50th anniversary of Earth Day this spring, environmentally-minded people are thinking about how our relationship to the natural world has evolved. This hour, host Krys Boyd talks with a writer who investigates the stories of raw materials harvested in the wild. We’ll also hear from a former bug-spray developer who advocates for the “tiny lives” he once helped to exterminate. And an ecologist reveals what modern industries can learn from indigenous cultures about protecting the environment.

New Yorker staff writer Lawrence Wright was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for The Looming Tower,” his nonfiction book chronicling the rise of al-qaeda. And with a new novel, he’s once again chillingly prescient. Wright joins host Krys Boyd to talk about his fiction focused on a pandemic upending the world, written months and months before our current crisis. The book is called “The End of October: A Novel.”

When fingers around the world pointed at China for not containing the coronavirus, Asians everywhere – including many Asian Americans – felt the sting. Cathy Park Hong, poetry editor of the New Republic and a professor at Rutgers-Newark University, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about the stereotypes, suspicions, successes, and fears wrapped up in her identity, which she recounts in her new essay collection “Minor Feelings: An Asian-American Reckoning.”

In the heart of Texas oil country, in downtown Midland, there’s a locally-famous digital sign. Each day it displays the price of crude. In 2008, it displayed $100 a barrel for the first time. On April 20, it read “Negative oil??” Jim Krane,Wallace S. Wilson Fellow for Energy Studies at Rice University’s Baker Institute, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about the collapse of oil futures, what happened to demand, and how problems in the energy sector affect the larger economy.

There’s a race to see which — if any — anti-viral drugs might be effective against COVID-19. But while we’re focused on viruses, we can’t let our guard down against bacteria. Muhammad H. Zaman, Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professor of Biomedical Engineering and International Health at Boston University, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about antibiotic-resistant superbugs and why he’s worried we could face yet another public health threat. His book is called “Biography of Resistance: The Epic Battle Between People and Pathogens.”

Before the pandemic, we joked about having a case of “the Mondays.” Now, during shelter-at-home, can we even remember which day Monday is? Shayla Love, a senior staff writer at Vice, joins host Krys Boyd to talk about the psychology of why we’re all a little disoriented since our 9-to-5 routine disappeared. Her article “Time is Meaningless Now” was recently published by Vice.

Sometimes a deep look into someone else’s life can help us to better understand our own. Lulu Miller, co-founder of NPR’s“Invisibilia,” joins host Krys Boyd to talk about her study of the first president of Stanford University, a taxonomist obsessed with fish, and how his discoveries — and ultimately his intellectual myopia — helped her to make sense of her own world. Her new book is called “Why Fish Don’t Exist: A Story of Loss, Love, and the Hidden Order of Life.”

The 2020 presidential election is down to a two-man race. And while one of those men is on TV every day, the other is trying to figure out how to stay relevant. Amy K. Dacey is executive director of the Sine Institute of Policy & Politics at American University, and she joins host Krys Boyd to analyze Joe Biden’s presumptive nomination, what leadership and campaigning during the pandemic will look like, and strategies he’ll use to reach voters.

Living to a ripe old age is everyone’s goal – and researchers are developing new techniques to have us functioning at a high level even in our later years. Daniel Levitin is a professor of psychology and neuroscience at McGill University, and he joins host Krys Boyd to talk about what he calls human life’s two stages: “healthspan” and “disease span,” and explain how brain science can promote the former. His book is called “Successful Aging: A Neuroscientist Explores the Power and Potential of Our Lives.”

When the world is full of bad news, pop culture can at least provide a respite. Host Krys Boyd talks with comedian and “Daily Show” correspondent Roy Wood Jr. about how to be funny in such a serious time. We’ll also talk with Nate Sloan and Charlie Harding – co-hosts of the podcast “Switched on Pop”– about how pop music reflects the age in which it’s created. And we’ll finish up talking with a television critic about how binge-watching changes the viewing experience.