On being

Xavier Le Pichon, one of the world's leading geophysicists, helped create the field of plate tectonics. A devout Catholic and spiritual thinker, he raised his family in intentional communities centered around people with mental disabilities. He shares his rare perspective on the meaning of humanity -- a perspective equally informed by his scientific and personal encounters with fragility as a fundament of vital, evolving systems. Le Pichon has come to think of caring attention to weakness as an essential quality that allowed humanity to evolve.

See more at www.onbeing.org/program/fragility-and-evolution-our-humanity/101

Xavier Le Pichon — Fragility and the Evolution of Our Humanity (Aug 16, 2012)

An expansive reflection on work, education, and civic imagination with an esteemed researcher and teacher at UCLA and a poetic writer. We explore his perspective, through life and scholarship, on hard subjects that drive to the heart of who we are -- literacy, schooling, social class, and the deepest meaning of vocation.

See more at: www.onbeing.org/program/meaning-intelligence/208

Mike Rose — The Meaning of Intelligence (Aug 30, 2012)

An original and helpful voice on this landscape of digital connection for which there are no maps. Seth Godin is a singular thought leader and innovator in what he describes as our post-industrial, post-geography "connection economy." Rather than merely tolerate change, he says, we are all called now to rise to it. We are invited and stretched in whatever we do to be artists — to create in ways that matter to other people.

Seth Godin — The Art of Noticing, and Then Creating (Jan 24, 2013)

The coming stage of evolution, Teilhard de Chardin said, won't be driven by physical adaptation but by human consciousness, creativity, and spirit. We visit with his biographer Ursula King, and we experience his ideas energizing New York Times Dot Earth blogger Andrew Revkin and evolutionary biologist David Sloan Wilson.

See more at www.onbeing.org/program/teilhard-de-chardins-planetary-mind-and-our-spiritual-evolution/4965

Ursula King, Andrew Revkin + David Sloan Wilson — Teilhard de Chardin's Planetary Mind

The coming stage of evolution, Teilhard de Chardin said, won't be driven by physical adaptation but by human consciousness, creativity, and spirit. We visit with his biographer Ursula King, and we experience his ideas energizing New York Times Dot Earth blogger Andrew Revkin and evolutionary biologist David Sloan Wilson.

See more at http://www.onbeing.org/program/teilhard-de-chardins-planetary-mind-and-our-spiritual-evolution/4965

[Unedited] Andrew Revkin with Krista Tippett

http://www.onbeing.org/program/on-exoplanets-and-love/5029

A mission scientist with NASA's Kepler Space Telescope, Natalie Batalha hunts for exoplanets — Earth-sized planets beyond our solar system that might harbor life. She speaks about unexpected connections between things like love and dark energy, science and gratitude, and how "exploring the heavens" brings the beauty of the cosmos and the exuberance of scientific discovery closer to us all.

On Exoplanets and Love: Natalie Batalha on Science That Connects Us to One Another (Feb 14, 2013)

Fairy tales don't only belong to the domain of childhood. Their overt themes are threaded throughout hit TV series like Game of Thrones and True Blood, Grimm and Once Upon a Time. These stories survive, says Maria Tatar, by adapting across cultures and history. They are carriers of the plots we endlessly re-work in the narratives of our lives -- helping us work through things like fear and hope. Read more at the episode page: http://www.onbeing.org/program/the-great-cauldron-of-story-maria-tatar-on-why-fairy-tales-are-for-adults-again/5073

Maria Tatar — The Great Cauldron of Story: Why Fairy Tales are for Adults Again (Mar 13, 2013)

Listen to the magical music of the humpback whales and hear Katy Payne's recordings of elephants in the Dzanga forest clearing from 2002. 

Slowed down solo whale

Tower  Whales

Distant Whale

Three whale trip

Dzanga elephants: morning

Dzanga elephants: night

Katy Payne is an acoustic biologist with a Quaker sensibility. From the wild coast of Argentina to the rainforests of Africa, she discovered that humpback whales compose ever-changing songs and that elephants communicate across long distances by infrasound. Here, she reflects on life in this world through her experiences with two of the most exotic creatures. 

Read more at: http://www.onbeing.org/program/whale-songs-and-elephant-loves/241

Katy Payne — Whale Songs and Elephant Loves (Mar 21, 2013)

Read more about this audio excerpt from a blog post at our website: 
http://www.onbeing.org/blog/gift-stuttering-and-animals/4311

Alan Rabinowitz on The Gift of Stuttering

A profound stutter as a child left Alan Rabinowitz virtually unable to communicate and to prefer animals to people. Now a conservationist of tigers and jaguars, an explorer of the world's last wild places, he has extraordinary insight into both animals and the human condition. 

See more at www.onbeing.org/program/voice-animals/60

Alan Rabinowitz — A Voice for the Animals (April 18, 2013)

One of the values of science is to make us uncomfortable says Lawrence Krauss. The particle physicist explains why we should all care about dark energy and the Higgs Boson particle. Science literacy matters, and, more importantly, he suggests we should take joy in science — just as we cultivate enjoyment of arts we may not completely comprehend.

http://www.onbeing.org/program/our-origins-and-the-weight-of-space-with-lawrence-krauss/5216


Lawrence Krauss — Our Origins and the Weight of Space

New York poet laureate Marie Howe reads her poem "The Meadow" during an interview with Krista Tippett. This poem is included in On Being's show "The Poetry of Ordinary Time." Download the mp3 of the produced show at onbeing.org.

"The Meadow" by Marie Howe

http://www.onbeing.org/program/creativity-and-everyday-brain/1879

With new techniques of brain imaging, neuroscientist Rex Jung and his colleagues are gaining a whole new view of the differences and the interactions between intelligence, creativity, and personality: 

"With intelligence, there's the analogy I've used is there's this superhighway in the brain that allows you to get from point A to point B. With creativity, it's a slower, more meandering process where you want to take the side roads and even the dirt roads to get there."

How do we prime our brains to take the meandering mental paths necessary for creativity? Rex Jung unsettles some old assumptions, and suggests some new connections between creativity and family life, creativity and aging, creativity and purpose.

Rex Jung — Creativity and the Everyday Brain (May 2, 2013)

For Mother's Day, the celebrated Jewish-Buddhist teacher and psychotherapist, mother, and grandmother: Sylvia Boorstein. The best way to nurture children's inner lives, she says, is by taking care of our own inner selves for their sake. At a public event in suburban Detroit, Krista Tippett draws out the warmth and wisdom of Ms. Boorstein, and, in a light-hearted moment that is an audience pleaser, Ms. Boorstein shares what GPS might teach us about "recalculating" and our own inner equanimity.

See more at http://www.onbeing.org/program/what-we-nurture-with-sylvia-boorstein/242

On being

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