Zócalo Public Square

Can Phoenix Become Remotely Green? by Zócalo Public Square

Can Phoenix Become Remotely Green? by Zócalo Public Square

Margaret Wertheim, “Space Versus Spirit: Why the Battle Between Science and Religion Is Driving Us Crazy”

Science and religion are often viewed as two competing and utterly opposed worldviews–one based on faith, the other on reason. Yet both are systems that attempt to make sense of the world and of humanity’s place within a wider cosmological scheme. Religions usually posit that the material realm is just one part of a larger whole that also includes an immaterial spiritual domain, while modern science speaks only of a physical realm. But at the birth of modern science in the seventeenth century no one imagined that science was articulating the whole of reality. Los Angeles-based science writer Margaret Wertheim will trace the history of how any notion of a spiritual realm was written out of Western science. She will examine the social, psychological, and cultural effects of this transformation and urge us to acknowledge the intellectual gifts we derive from both sides of this maddening divide.

Last May, Michael Tomasky published an essay in The American Prospect, the respected liberal opinion magazine he edits, that set Washington on its ear. "Party in Search of a Notion" was Tomasky’s call for the Democrats to rise above the politics of interest-group particularism and become the party of the common good. The influential essay got front-page treatment in The New York Times and is one of the most widely quoted magazine essays of the past decade. Tomasky will discuss his ideas, his critics, and the new historical opportunity for progressive politics.

The razor thin margin of its recent presidential election has left Mexico deeply divided and the future of its democracy in question. Mexican political scientist and columnist Denise Dresser visits Zócalo to discuss candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s challenge to the election’s outcome and the credibility gap that a Felipe Calderón presidency would inevitably face. Known for her bold, insightful, and unbiased commentary on Mexican politics, Dresser will share the backstory of this long and winding presidential campaign as well as deliver the definitive analysis on its historic outcome.

The subject of social class may the last taboo. No one likes to talk about it, but we spend a lot of time thinking—and worrying—about where we fit into the culture of conspicuous consumption. But is “class” really a matter of money? What do tastes and values say about our relationship to our own social class? Does anyone really believe America is a “classless society”? Does Los Angeles still subscribe to the theory of “you are your car” or has the cult of real estate become our primary mode of aspiration and personal expression? Join three of LA’s wittiest and most insightful social observers–L.A. Times columnist Meghan Daum, filmmaker Nicole Holofcener (“Friends With Money,” “Lovely & Amazing”) and author/performer Sandra Tsing Loh (“Mother on Fire,” “A Year in Van Nuys,”)– for a frank and provocative discussion about social class in Los Angeles and beyond.

Acclaimed actress, Amy Brenneman, creator and star of CBS’ hit series “Judging Amy,” and Brad Silberling, director, writer and producer whose films include “City of Angels” and “Lemony Snickett’s A Series of Unfortunate Events”, visit Zócalo to discuss what role morality plays in the creative process. Husband and wife and occasional coworkers, Brenneman and Silberling will compare notes, assess the state of their industry, and welcome audience input as they explore what kinds of responsibility artists have to both their audience and themselves.

One of America’s most formidable intellectuals, Francis Fukuyama, visits Zócalo to discuss his new book America at the Crossroads and to explain his very public break with neoconservative foreign policy. Always brilliant, incisive, and compelling, Fukuyama will outline his vision of a “Realistic Wilsonianism” that he thinks ought to guide America’s future relations with the outside world.

Are private foundations doing enough to help improve the quality of life in Los Angeles? Robert K. Ross, M.D., President and CEO of The California Endowment, the state’s largest private health foundation, will visit Zócalo to discuss the challenges the philanthropic community faces in LA.

Historian William Deverell, the director of the Huntington-USC Institute on California and the West, visits Zócalo to deliver a groundbreaking lecture on the role that the American West played in healing the wounds inflicted by the Civil War. After all, it was questions about the future of the West that provoked the war in the first place. Unable to reconcile antagonistic positions regarding the expansion of slavery into western territories, North and South capitulated to four years of catastrophic warfare. Then what? Did the post-war American West become a region in which to heal the wounds of disunion? Deverell explores themes of reunification through stories of the convalescence of individuals and the re-fashioning of what it meant to be an American after the Civil War.