Think from KERA

Having a conversation with people on the other side of the political spectrum can feel like a waste of time. And so we wall ourselves in through our friend groups and social media feeds. Justin Lee joins us to talk about strategies for actually engaging with people with whom you don’t share common ground. His book is called “Talking Across the Divide: How to Communicate with People You Disagree with and Maybe Even Change the World” (Tarcher Perigee).

For three years, Michael McFaul served as the Obama administration’s ambassador to Russia. And he made headlines when President Trump suggested he might be willing to allow Kremlin officials to interrogate the former ambassador following the Helsinki summit with Vladimir Putin. McFaul joins us to talk about the precedent that could set – and the current state of U.S.-Russia relations. His new book is called“From Cold War to Hot Peace: An American Ambassador in Putin’s Russia”(Houghton Mifflin Harcourt).

For more than 50 years, the medical community has tried to create an artificial heart. Texas Monthly executive editor Mimi Swartz joins us to talk about the challenges of creating a heart – and why the only option for patients in need of one remains a transplant. Her new book is called “Ticker: The Quest to Create an Artificial Heart” (Crown Publishing). She’ll talk about it tonight at Interrabang Books in Dallas.

Cities across America are struggling with what to do with their monuments to Jefferson Davis, Stonewall Jackson, Robert E. Lee and other leaders of the Confederacy. University of Pittsburgh historian Kirk Savage joins us to talk about that question – and about how these markers came to dominate public spaces. His new book is called“Standing Soldiers, Kneeling Slaves: Race, War, and Monument in Nineteenth-Century America”(Princeton University Press).

Officials in California are warning that the largest of the state’s wildfires won’t be contained until September. The fires have already consumed hundreds of thousands of acres of land and caused billions of dollars in damages. Richard Manning joins us to explain why these fires are becoming increasingly common – and if it’s possible to prevent them. His story about wildfires appears in the current issue of Harper’s magazine.

As the world’s population edges closer to 8 billion, scientists are at work figuring out how to feed all those mouths. Stephen Hall joins us to talk about how gene editing may be the solution. His story “CRISPR Can Speed Up Nature: And Change How We Grow Food” appears in Wired magazine.

In the 1980s, scientists began to thoroughly understand the potential dangers of climate change. Nathaniel Rich joins us to talk about the many reasons why that understanding wasn’t put into action – and how that delay has only increased the pressure on current scientists and policymakers. His story “Losing Earth: The Decade We Almost Stopped Climate Change” appears in The New York Times magazine.

The map of the world feels fairly settled. There are a number of spots across the globe, however, that operate like countries without formal recognition. Slate staff writer Joshua Keating joins us to talk about these self-proclaimed nations, which he writes about in “Invisible Countries: Journeys to the Edge of Nationhood”(Yale University Press).

Incumbent Sen. Ted Cruz leads challenger Beto O’Rourke by just two points. That’s according to this year’s Texas Lyceum poll, released last week. Joshua Blank oversaw the polling, and he joins us to talk about the political climate in Texas – and about how Texans view another important topic: healthcare.

Dr. Joseph Lange may well have been on the cusp of ending HIV when his Malaysian Airlines flight was shot down by pro-Russian rebels in 2014. Dr. Seema Yasmin joins us to talk about Lange’s research into how the virus is transferred from mother to child – and about how his death has slowed progress towards a cure. Yasmin’s new book is called“The Impatient Dr. Lange: One Man’s Fight to End the Global HIV Epidemic”(Johns Hopkins University Press).