Kristin Matthews, an English professor at BYU, joins the show to discuss the frenzied culture of reading during the Cold War and other times of national uncertainty.

Adam Bradley, author of The Poetry of Pop, joins us to discuss the lyrical power of popular music and the mechanics of its appeal.

Can we stop catastrophes--nuclear war, financial meltdowns, climate disasters--before they happen? R.P. Eddy, coauthor of "Warnings: Finding Cassandras to Stop Catastrophes," thinks we can. We just have to find and listen to our modern-day Cassandras.

Is being invulnerable to suffering something we actually want? Definitely not, says Todd May, a philosophy professor at Clemson University. He joins us to discuss the ideas his book, A Fragile Life: Accepting Our Vulnerability.

Marcus Smith speaks with a historian about Benjamin Lay, an eighteenth-century Quaker dwarf who was one of America's first abolitionists.

Trebbe Johnson, writer and founder of Radical Joy for Hard Times, discusses our fractured relationship with the environment and how to find joy and connection in damaged places.

Aubrey Streit Krug from The Land Institute in Salina, Kansas talks about the ground—soil, plants, roots—and the practical and metaphorical dimensions of its role in preserving a human future.

Kristen Renwick Monroe has spent her career trying to answer this question: why do some people courageously rebel against an oppressive regime such as Nazi Germany, while others go along with and support evil leaders.  She discusses what she has learned about moral choice today with host Marcus Smith.

Marcus Smith visits with an expert in Judaism about new Jewish communities sprouting up around the world in places like Cameroon, Ghana and India.

Philosopher Henrik Syse shares his thoughts about using the memory of trauma to form universal connections rather than fuel conflict.