Woke Points

This week Ted and Marni welcome author, professor, and evolutionary biologist Rob Brooks to the podcast to provide a scientifically informed perspective on human/AI relationships particularly when it comes to intimacy. Rob's knowledge of human evolutionary behavioral patterns provides a rich context to understand how we currently interact with technology and the potential future for those interactions.

If you listened last week and wondered, what can scientific research tell us about sex robots then this episode is for you!

Buy Rob's Book: Artificial Intimacy: Virtual Friends, Digital Lovers, and Algorithmic Matchmakers

Other resources from this episode:
The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires
 The Attention Merchants: The Epic Scramble to Get Inside Our Heads

Thank you to Inny PDX for the music!

Woke Points uses affiliate links for purchases made with the excellent Bookshop.org, so if you purchase books through these links you help sustain both our podcast *and* independent bookstores across the country — thank you!

Enjoying season 2?
Please stay subscribed and continue to follow us to stay apprised of updates and new episodes!

Follow Woke Points:
@wokepointspod on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.

Help keep Woke Points going & growing with support through Buy Me a Coffee

Have feedback and/or topic suggestions to share? email: [email protected] 

In this episode, Marni and Ted stutter and blush while doing their best to discuss the promise and peril of humanoid sex robots. Are they a solution for socially incompatible sexual drives? Will they lead to even worse abuses in human sexual interactions? We don't know, but we are still going to discuss these and more questions.

If you enjoy the schadenfreude of eavesdropping on folks in the midst of a very awkward conversation, then this is the episode for you!

Resources from this episode:
Love and Sex with Robots
Sex, Robots, and Vegan Meat
Would Child Sex Robots Stop Pedophilia?
Can Child Sex Dolls Keep Pedophiles from Offending?
It's 2023, Where are the Sex Robots?
Can Today's Sex Robots Offer a Relationship?

Thank you to Inny PDX for the music!

Woke Points uses affiliate links for purchases made with the excellent Bookshop.org, so if you purchase books through these links you help sustain both our podcast *and* independent bookstores across the country — thank you!

Enjoying season 2?
Please stay subscribed and continue to follow us to stay apprised of updates and new episodes!

Follow Woke Points:
@wokepointspod on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.

Help keep Woke Points going & growing with support through Buy Me a Coffee

Have feedback and/or topic suggestions to share? email: [email protected] 

This week Ted and Marni welcome Dr. Jennifer Rubenstein, Associate Professor of Politics at The University of Virginia and author of Between Samaritans and States to the podcast. Jenn brings a much needed informed perspective on the multitude of approaches to charitable giving and how we each can all evaluate our own giving practices.

If you listened last week and wondered "but what would someone with demonstrated knowledge about this topic say?" this week's interview is for you!

Buy Jen's book! Between Samaritans and States: The Political Ethics of Humanitarian INGOs

Other resources from this episode:
Small Money Donating as Democratic Politics
The Lessons of Effective Altruism

Thank you to Inny PDX for the music!

Woke Points uses affiliate links for purchases made with the excellent Bookshop.org, so if you purchase books through these links you help sustain both our podcast *and* independent bookstores across the country — thank you!

Enjoying season 2?
Please stay subscribed and continue to follow us to stay apprised of updates and new episodes!

Follow Woke Points:
@wokepointspod on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.

Help keep Woke Points going & growing with support through Buy Me a Coffee

Have feedback and/or topic suggestions to share? email: [email protected] 

In this episode, Marni and Ted discuss the Effective Altruism movement and whether or not there is a "right" or "most effective" approach to charitable giving.  Content note - this episode is NOT about Sam Bankman-Fried.

If you've ever wondered whether you could make more of every dollar you donate, then this episode is for you.

Welcome to a new era of Woke Points! We will now be serving up episodes weekly with the Ted and Marni convo one week, followed by our expert interview on the same topic the next week.

Resources from this episode:
Giving What We Can
How to do Good Better
The Lessons of Effective Altruism

Thank you to Inny PDX for the music!

Woke Points uses affiliate links for purchases made with the excellent Bookshop.org, so if you purchase books through these links you help sustain both our podcast *and* independent bookstores across the country — thank you!

Enjoying season 2?
Please stay subscribed and continue to follow us to stay apprised of updates and new episodes!

Follow Woke Points:
@wokepointspod on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.

Help keep Woke Points going & growing with support through Buy Me a Coffee

Have feedback and/or topic suggestions to share? email: [email protected] 

In this episode, Marni and Ted discuss the challenges faced by night owls in a world designed for early birds. Many people are at their most productive or creative late in the day and even into the night, but are squeezed into the modern world's 9 - 5 structure. Can we create more opportunities for night owls to soar?

Following Ted and Marni's moderately informed discussion, Haley Shapley, a writer and editor who has recently been researching night owls, joins the conversation to provide a more data-driven perspective. Haley and Ted have some fun razzing Marni for being a real "Normy" who is most productive from 7 am - Noon, and at points the convo devolves into a real "hoo's-hoo" of a support group for the owls on the call.

If you've ever dreamed of a world where work starts at 5pm and ends at 1am, or for even a single self-help author to suggest something like this instead of the usual advice to "wake before the sun", then this episode is for you.

Connect with Haley via:
Her Website
Instagram
Twitter
Buy her book, Strong Like Her

Resources from this episode:
The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity

Thank you to Inny PDX for the music!

Woke Points uses affiliate links for purchases made with the excellent Bookshop.org, so if you purchase books through these links you help sustain both our podcast *and* independent bookstores across the country — thank you!

Enjoying season 2?
Please stay subscribed and continue to follow us to stay apprised of updates and new episodes!

Follow Woke Points:
@wokepointspod on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.

Help keep Woke Points going & growing with support through Buy Me a Coffee

Have feedback and/or topic suggestions to share? email: [email protected] 

In this episode, Marni and Ted trip into the increasingly interesting world of psychedelics - both their potential to offer transformative therapeutic treatments and what the recent popular, scientific, and regulatory discourse around them can teach us about the war on drugs.

Following Ted and Marni's moderately informed discussion, Devon Phillips, Creative Strategist at the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) joins the conversation to share what he has learned in his time working to expand cultural consciousness.

Check out:
MAPS
Psychedelic Science 2023
Devon's Instagram
MAPS Instagram
PS 2023 Instagram

Thank you to Inny PDX for the music!

Woke Points uses affiliate links for purchases made with the excellent Bookshop.org, so if you purchase books through these links you help sustain both our podcast *and* independent bookstores across the country — thank you!

Enjoying season 2?
Please stay subscribed and continue to follow us to stay apprised of updates and new episodes!

Follow Woke Points:
@wokepointspod on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.

Help keep Woke Points going & growing with support through Buy Me a Coffee

Have feedback and/or topic suggestions to share? email: [email protected] 

In this episode, Ted and Marni embrace the anxiety of discussing the complex Israel / Palestine conflict, and question why it has been such a taboo, hot-button issue, especially for those of us on the left.

Following Ted and Marni's moderately informed discussion, Mitchell Plitnick, president of ReThinking Foreign Policy and co-author, with Marc Lamont Hill,  of the book  "Except for Palestine: the Limits of Progressive Politics," joins to add context to help us think and talk about this important issue.

Check out:
Except for Palestine, by Mitchell Plitnick and Marc Lamont Hill
ReThinking Foreign Policy
Donate to the Adalah Justice Project
Gaza Sky Geeks

Thank you to Inny PDX for the music!

Woke Points uses affiliate links for purchases made with the excellent Bookshop.org, so if you purchase books through these links you help sustain both our podcast *and* independent bookstores across the country — thank you!

Enjoying season 2?
Please stay subscribed and continue to follow us to stay apprised of updates and new episodes!

Follow Woke Points:
@wokepointspod on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.

Help keep Woke Points going & growing with support through Buy Me a Coffee

Have feedback and/or topic suggestions to share? email: [email protected] 

In this episode, Ted and Marni — two childless adults — discuss the ethics of human reproduction in the midst of a global climate crisis.

Following Ted and Marni's moderately informed discussion, Jenn Marlon, Senior Research Scientist at the Yale School of the Environment and the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication (YPCCC) joins to share what her research has to say about the way Americans are thinking about climate change in relation to their life choices.

Please note that this conversation was recorded  in February 2022 before the Supreme Court overturned Roe V. Wade.

Some references from this conversation:
The I=PAT Equation
Six Americas Survey
Factfulness
Meet the Couple Who Have Forgone Children to Save the Planet
A World Without Children

Thank you to Inny PDX for the music!

Woke Points uses affiliate links for purchases made with the excellent Bookshop.org, so if you purchase books through these links you help sustain both our podcast *and* independent bookstores across the country — thank you!

Enjoying season 2?
Please stay subscribed and continue to follow us to stay apprised of updates and new episodes!

Follow Woke Points:
@wokepointspod on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.

Help keep Woke Points going & growing with support through Buy Me a Coffee

Have feedback and/or topic suggestions to share? email: [email protected] 

In this episode, Marni returns to her roots as a humane society professional and explains to Ted why the "No Kill" label adopted by many animal shelters is more complicated than you might think.

Some references from this conversation:
Consider the Lobster by David Foster Wallace
Why Euthanasia Rates at Animal Shelters have Plummeted

Support the your local humane society or municipal animal shelter. Marni knows great local organizations all over the country, feel free to email with questions about finding a reputable organization.

Let your elected officials know that you want them to support animal-friendly housing to keep more pets in their homes.

Thank you to Inny PDX for the music!

Woke Points uses affiliate links for purchases made with the excellent Bookshop.org, so if you purchase books through these links you help sustain both our podcast *and* independent bookstores across the country — thank you!

Enjoying season 2?
Please stay subscribed and continue to follow us to stay apprised of updates and new episodes!

Follow Woke Points:
@wokepointspod on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.

Help keep Woke Points going & growing with support through Buy Me a Coffee

Have feedback and/or topic suggestions to share? email: [email protected] 

In this episode, Ted and Marni interview Marie Collins about her work as an actual activist. Marie shares her experiences in activism and some advice for well-meaning progressives who want to put their energy to good use.

Referenced in this episode:
No Shortcuts: Organizing for Power in the New Gilded Age
The 3.5% Rule
You're More Powerful Than You Think
Twitter and Tear Gas: The Power and Fragility of Networked Protest
 
Support the groups that are supporting activists:
Indivisible
Sister District

Let your elected officials know what you care about — this is one important form of activism.

Thank you to Inny PDX for the music!

Woke Points uses affiliate links for purchases made with the excellent Bookshop.org, so if you purchase books through these links you help sustain both our podcast *and* independent bookstores across the country — thank you!

Enjoying season 2?
Please stay subscribed and continue to follow us to stay apprised of updates and new episodes!

Follow Woke Points:
@wokepointspod on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.

Help keep Woke Points going & growing with support through Buy Me a Coffee

Have feedback and/or topic suggestions to share? email: [email protected]