Commonwealth Club of California Podcast

Extreme weather in the wake of climate change, causing wildfires, drought and flooding, threatens to turn the American West into a region hostile to human habitation—a “Great American Desert” as early U.S. explorers once mislabeled it. Bruce Cain suggests that the unique complex of politics, technology and logistics that once won the West must be rethought and reconfigured to win it anew in the face of these accelerating threats. These challenges are complicated by the region’s history, the deliberate fractiousness of the American political system, and the idiosyncrasies of human behavior. Cain analyzes how, in spite of coastal flooding and spreading wildfires, people continue to move into, and even rebuild in, risky areas, how local communities are slow to take protective measures, and how individual beliefs, past adaptation practices and infrastructure, and complex governing arrangements across jurisdictions combine to flout real progress. Driving this analysis is Cain’s conviction that understanding the habits and politics that lead to procrastination and obstruction is critical to finding solutions and making necessary adaptations to the changing climate. In his new book Under Fire and Under Water, Cain offers a detailed look at the rising stakes and urgency of the various interconnected issues. Join us in-person to hear Cain lay out the rethinking and reengineering that will allow people to live sustainably in the American West—even under the conditions caused by future global warming. MLF ORGANIZER George Hammond A Humanities Member-led Forum program. Forums at the Club are organized and run by volunteer programmers who are members of The Commonwealth Club, and they cover a diverse range of topics. Learn more about our Forums. This program is part of our Good Lit series, underwritten by the Bernard Osher Foundation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The 28th annual Conference of the Parties, COP28, opens this week in Dubai. For the 28th time, the nations of the world have gathered to see what progress they can make on addressing the increasingly global climate crisis. It’s fair to wonder why, after three decades, we still haven’t taken the collective action necessary. And it’s equally fair to wonder why diplomats continue to bother with what Greta Thunberg famously called “blah, blah, blah.” This year’s COP marks the first “Global Stocktake,” an assessment of how the nations of the world are doing compared to the emissions-cutting commitments they made in Paris. The answer? Not well. And with COP28 being hosted by a major oil and gas producing nation and led by an industry executive, what hope is there for progress? Guests: Daniel Esty, Professor of Environmental Law & Policy, Yale Law School Ben Stockton, Investigative Reporter Aisha Khan, Chief Executive, Civil Society Coalition for Climate Change This episode features a segment from Contributing Reporter Rabiya Jaffrey. For show notes and related links, visit our website. 📞 Call us at (650) 382-3869 to share your clothing story for a chance to be featured on an upcoming episode! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The whole goal of physics is to explain what we observe. For centuries, physicists believed that observations yielded faithful representations of what is out there. But when they began to study the subatomic realm, they found that observation often interferes with what is being observed―that the act of seeing changes what we see. The same may also be true about cosmology: our view of the universe may be inevitably distorted by observation bias. And so whether they’re studying subatomic particles or galaxies, physicists might need to first explain consciousness. Searching to answer that question, George Musser turned to neuroscientists and philosophers of the mind. Neuroscientists have built up ever-better understandings of the structure of the brain. Musser asks whether that could help physicists better understand the levels of self-organization they observe in other systems. At the same time, physicists are trying to explain how particles organize themselves into the objects we perceive around us. So Musser also has asked whether those discoveries could help explain how neurons produce our conscious experiences. Join us for a special online-only program in which Musser tackles the potential interconnections between quantum mechanics, cosmology, human consciousness and artificial intelligence, providing a revelatory exploration of how a "theory of everything" may very well depend upon our understanding of the human mind. NOTES A Humanities Member-led Forum program. Forums at the Club are organized and run by volunteer programmers who are members of The Commonwealth Club, and they cover a diverse range of topics. Learn more about our Forums. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For more than five decades, Ms. magazine has been a beacon of feminist ideas, sparking conversations and setting the stage for transformative discussions on women's rights, equality and empowerment. As the first magazine to feature prominent American women demanding the repeal of laws that criminalized abortion, explain and advocate for the Equal Rights Amendment, rate presidential candidates on women’s issues, feature domestic violence and sexual harassment on its cover, and commission and publish a national study on date rape, the voice of Ms. has shaped modern day feminism and many contemporary issues. Join us in a celebration of Ms. at The Commonwealth Club as our featured speakers Katherine Spillar (Ms. executive editor), Dr. Sophia Yen (CEO and co-founder of Pandia Health), Hon. Betty Yee (former California state controller), and Aimee Allison (founder and president of She the People) explore the voices that have shaped feminism and continue to shape our world. About the Speakers Aimee Allison is the founder and president of She the People, a national organization that elevates the voice and power of women of color as leaders of a new political and cultural era. She organized and moderated the nation’s first presidential forum for women of color in 2019. Katherine (Kathy) Spillar is the executive editor of Ms. and editor of and contributor to 50 Years of Ms: The Best of the Pathfinding Magazine that Ignited a Revolution. She is also the executive director of Feminist Majority Foundation and Feminist Majority, national organizations working for women’s equality, empowerment and nonviolence; one of the founders, she has been a driving force in executing the organizations’ diverse programs securing women’s rights both domestically and globally since its inception in 1987. Hon. Betty Yee has served as the female vice chair of the California Democratic Party since May 2021 and also recently served as California state controller from 2015 to 2023. She has 35 years of experience in state and local finance and tax policy. Sophia Yen, M.D., M.P.H. is the CEO and co-founder of birth control delivery service Pandia Health and has a passion for making women’s lives easier, preventing unplanned pregnancies, and educating women about Periods Optional. She also serves as a clinical associate professor at Stanford Medical School in the Department of Pediatrics in the Division of Adolescent Medicine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“The Influence of Environmental Activism on Gen Z Voting” unites four environmental leaders from a variety of backgrounds for a thought-provoking discussion about environmental activism and civic engagement. Representing the voices of student activists as well as professional environmentalists, our speakers will explore the movement’s impact on voting and youth turnout in recent elections and discuss the strength of environmental activism as a form of civic engagement. Accomplished leaders in their own right, panelists will share their personal journeys and provide key takeaways from the intersection of environmentalism and politics, to inspire the next generation of voters and citizen leaders. This event is part of the Creating Citizens Speaker Series at UC Berkeley, a partnership between The Commonwealth Club, the Associated Students of the University of California Vote Coalition, and the University of California National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement. The series gives UC Berkeley students and community members opportunities to listen to and ask questions of leading minds in politics, media and education as they learn how to become better, more involved citizens. We look forward to welcoming community members and students from around the Bay Area to participate in this riveting conversation and to join us for future programs in the Creating Citizens Speaker Series. This program is part of The Commonwealth Club’s civics education initiative, Creating Citizens. Produced in partnership with the EAVP Vote Coalition. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Most Americans support climate action, but you wouldn’t know it from Congress or the courts – or from most of the media. People on both the left and the right experience the same devastating floods, the same life-threatening heatwaves and the same catastrophic wildfires. Yet individuals tend to socialize within insulated political tribes, operate in completely different information bubbles and see the problems and solutions through different lenses. How can we learn to bridge ideological divides, develop trust, and find the common ground needed to rebuild respectful civil discourse? Guests: John Curtis, U.S. Rep., Utah (R) Joan Blades, Co-founder, LivingRoomConversations.org John Gable, Co-founder, AllSides.com For show notes and related links, visit Climate One's website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When the Library of Congress (LoC) was authorized in 1800, its first collection consisted of 740 books and three maps. Today, located on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., the Library of Congress is the largest library in the world. Housing about 173 million items and employing more than 3,000 employees, the LoC is led by Dr. Carla Hayden, the first woman and first Black librarian of Congress. She assumed her position on September 14, 2016. and is only the 14th person to hold this position in 221 years. Serving as the main research arm of the U.S. Congress and housing the U.S. Copyright Office, the LoC gets direct appropriations from Congress to fund its work. But it also receives gifts and private donations that support a broad range of activities by the library, including hundreds of projects that have been supported by the James Madison Council's philanthropic members. Find out about this important national institution, how it works, why it receives hundreds of thousands of in-person visitors and more than 150 million online visitors a year, and the role it plays in a knowledge-based society. Join us for an inside look at the nation's library. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What do two of the youngest city councilmembers in California have in common? Both believe that young people belong in politics. Creating Citizens, The Commonwealth Club’s education initiative, is excited to host Oakland Councilmember Janani Ramachandran and South San Francisco Councilmember James Coleman as they talk with high school students about the role of young people in civic life. Both city councilmembers, born and raised in the communities they now serve, find themselves as the youngest members of their respective city councils. As they work to empower their communities, they find they must constantly navigate a much older political ecosystem that isn’t always the most welcoming to young faces. The councilmembers will be joined in conversation with Dr. Stephen Morris. Dr. Morris, the CEO and co-founder of the Civic Education Center, has spent more than 20 years working in education. Together, they will discuss local government and how everyone, from politicians to students, can work with people with whom they disagree. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“There is one skill that lies at the heart of any healthy person, family, school, community organization, or society: the ability to see someone else deeply and make them feel seen—to accurately know another person, to let them feel valued, heard, and understood.” —David Brooks Really knowing another person is not something people seem to do well. All around us are people who feel invisible, unseen, misunderstood. David Brooks set out to help people do better, posing questions that are essential: If you want to know a person, what kind of attention should you cast on them? What kind of conversations should you have? What parts of a person’s story should you pay attention to? Brooks draws from the fields of psychology and neuroscience and from the worlds of theater, philosophy, history, and education to present a welcoming, hopeful, integrated approach to human connection. He brings that message to The Commonwealth Club, to help people become more understanding and considerate toward others, and to find the joy that comes from being seen. Along the way he offers a possible remedy for a society that is riven by fragmentation, hostility and misperception. How can we look somebody in the eye and see something large in them, and in turn, see something larger in ourselves? To find out, join us in Silicon Valley as David Brooks explains. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As government officials, diplomats and business leaders from across the Asia-Pacific converge in San Francisco for APEC 2023 Leaders Week, the question on everyone’s lips is: What next for the U.S.-China relationship? Amid the climate crisis, which necessitates urgent energy transition, how do the two largest economies work together against the backdrop of geopolitical tension? Where does California—the world’s fifth largest economy, a green energy leader and oriented toward Asia across the Pacific—fit in? Governor Gavin Newsom’s October trip to China underscored the critical relationship between the Golden State and China. California has many trade, technology development, and business relationships with China related to clean energy. At the same time, the United States is broadly looking to reduce reliance on China for products, talent and innovations through many policy incentives for local content and domestic manufacturing and broader policy efforts. How will this trend of localization play out in California, and what does this mean for California to meet its ambitious climate and clean energy targets? As APEC dialogues unfold, join us to analyze the degree of linkages between China and California in low-carbon energy and the implications for policy at the state, federal and multilateral levels. Co-presented by UC San Diego's 21st Century China Center & Commonwealth Club World Affairs of California. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Colleges and universities across the country are the scenes of controversy these days, with students, faculty, lawmakers and donors all seemingly locked in high-volume debate over campus rights, free speech, human rights and international conflicts. Almost every institution of higher education touts its ability to set its graduates on a course for successful careers in their desired fields. Also high on the list of their brags are the cultural life and sports teams on campus. But colleges and universities have also played important roles in the curation and development of values in our society. Whether they are religious or secular institutions, public or private, their graduates go out into the world not only armed with job skills and networks of friends but also having been exposed to values instruction in many ways. Sometimes our colleges and universities are out of step with the rest of the country in terms of the nation's values; other times, they preserve and deepen values that most Americans hold dear. Just what is the role of these institutions when it comes to American values—in teaching, in challenging, in deepening those values? What exactly are the American values at issue here? Who's succeeding, and what still needs to be done? Join us for a special program addressing these important issues. This program is part of our American Values Series, underwritten by Taube Philanthropies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

One of the most common questions people ask about climate is: what can I do? Since time is one of our most valuable resources – and we spend so much of our time at work – changing jobs may be the most effective individual climate action a person can take. Those changes could be big or small: Leaving the oil and gas industry for geothermal, or helping to bring down the emissions where you already work. The truth is, almost any job can be a climate job. But how do people actually make the transition from dirty jobs to clean? What do climate positive job transitions really entail? Guests: Caroline Dennett, Director, CLOUT Ltd Arvind Ravikumar, Co-Director, Energy Emissions Modeling and Data Lab, University of Texas, Austin Jennifer Anderson, Carbon Removal Geologist, Charm Industrial Emma McConville, Development Geoscience Lead at Fervo Energy Nathanael Johnson, Electrician For show notes and related links, visit our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A Special Program for Families 家族向け特別プログラム “This is what we did. How did it happen? How could we?” – Dorothea Lange 「これが私たちがやったことです。なぜこのようなことが起きたのか？なぜこのようなことができたのか？」―ラング·ドロティア Fueled by racist fears and wartime hysteria, the U.S. government incarcerated more than 120,000 Japanese Americans from 1942 to 1945, many of them families with children. Allowed to bring only what they could carry, the internees were removed from their homes and forced to live under armed guard in makeshift camps, treated with suspicion and hostility; imprisoned without evidence of any crime. Inflated claims of national security risks justified these actions and carefully curated images hid the truth; even today, the story is not well known. 人種差別的な恐れと戦時のヒステリ-に駆られて、1942年から1945年までに、アメリカ政府は12万人以上の日系アメリカ人を収容しました。その多くは子供を含む家族でした。彼らは手にもてるものしか持参できず、自宅から引き離され、武装警備の下で仮設キャンプで生活するよう強制されました。彼らは疑念と敵意をもって扱われ、犯罪の証拠もないのに収監されました。国家安全保障のリスクの主張がこれらの行動を正当化し、慎重に作られたイメージにより真実が隠されました。今日に至るまで、この事実はあまりよく知られていません。 In her new book for young readers, Elizabeth Partridge examines the reality of life in Manzanar, a camp in the California desert. Seen and Unseen: What Dorothea Lange, Toyo Miyatake, and Ansel Adams’s Photographs Reveal About the Japanese American Incarceration offers three photographers’ perspectives on the incarceration and illuminates the stories behind their pictures. And it invites us to consider: How could such a gross violation of civil liberties happen in a nation founded on principles of equality and justice for all? Could it happen again? 若い読者向けの新作、エリザベス・パーテリッジはカリフォルニア砂漠のマンザナー収容所での生活の現実を調査しています。『Seen and Unseen: What Dorothea Lange, Toyo Miyatake, and Ansel Adams's Photographs Reveal About the Japanese American Incarceration』は、この収容とその写真の裏にある真実の話を明らかにし、3人の写真家の視点を提供します。そして、私たちに問いかけます：平等と正義の原則に基づく国で、なぜこんなひどい市民権の侵害が起こったのか？それは再び起こる可能性があるのでしょうか？ Bring your family for a conversation with Elizabeth Partridge, who will share how she created her book and why it is so important for all of us to talk about this bitter chapter in American history when the country did not live up to its democratic ideals. Tickets include admission to the Japanese American Museum of San José, which provides a historical forum that stimulates present-day discussions on civil liberties, race relations, discrimination, and American identity. あなたの家族も一緒に、エリザベス・パーテリッジとの対話の場にご参加ください。彼女は自分の本をどのように創り上げたか、そしてなぜこの苦々しいアメリカの歴史の章について話すことが非常に重要であるかを語ります。 チケットにはサンノゼ日系アメリカ博物館への入場料が含まれています。この博物館は市民権、人種関係、差別、アメリカのアイデンティティに関する現代の議論を刺激する歴史的な施設になります。 This program is part of The Commonwealth Club’s civics education initiative, Creating Citizens. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We've all been through a lot in the past five years, but it's difficult to figure out what it all means, and how it applies to our shared existence in this democratic experiment. Heather Cox Richardson aims to remedy that. As a historian she has been examining and explaining modern events aided by her deep understanding of history and insight into the forces working for and against democracy. In her new book Democracy Awakening, Heather Cox Richardson looks at the state of American democracy and the forces that have been driving it toward authoritarianism. In whose interest is the obfuscation of history? Who benefits if Americans are turned off or prevented from taking part in democratic acts? Who and what can help change things and rededicate this country to its founding ideals? Join us in person as she explains how we got to this perilous point, what our history tells us about ourselves, and what the future of democracy can be. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On November 22, 1963, the visual images of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, arguably the most significant crime in modern day history, were seared into the permanent memories of many who were then young adults, teens or children and have continued through the ages for those who have become obsessed with the president’s death. Sixty years later, the yearning for better answers to the questions why and how continues to produce many absurd new speculations and theories to explain his death. Any detailed review of the evidence in the Warren Commission Report raises so many valid questions that ever since it was issued it has been attacked and undermined, both rationally and irrationally. But in recent years, Mark Shaw says clear answers have emerged through the eyes of Dorothy Kilgallen, the most credible journalist to cover the assassination, in fact, the only one who interviewed Jack Ruby at his 1964 trial. Based on her investigation, and his research, bestselling author Mark Shaw (The Reporter Who Knew Too Much), whose lectures about his six books touching on the assassination have attracted millions of YouTube views, returns to The Commonwealth Club of California to review what we know and what we don’t know. By doing so, the likely range of what really happened is in clearer focus, and the collateral damage to American politics and to luminaries like Kilgallen, Marilyn Monroe and Robert Kennedy are no longer obscured by distortions of history regarding those remembered images. MLF ORGANIZER: George Hammond A Humanities Member-led Forum program. Forums at the Club are organized and run by volunteer programmers who are members of The Commonwealth Club, and they cover a diverse range of topics. Learn more about our Forums. More about Mr. Shaw—the author of nearly 30 books whose body of work is being archived by his alma mater, Purdue University—may be learned at www.markshawbooks.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As cities across the country grapple with a persistent homelessness crisis, a leading advocate offers a compassionate look at the problem, the people, and the possible solutions—including what you can do to help. Kevin Adler returns to The Commonwealth Club to provide an urgent look at homelessness in America, showing us what we lose—in ourselves and as a society—when we choose to walk past and ignore our neighbors in shelters, insecure housing, or on the streets. Adler is the co-author of When We Walk By, which argues that we have sacrificed our humanity by ignoring, downplaying, and refusing to address the homelessness problem. The authors offer an evidence-based people-first approach and community-driven solutions, and they lay out some practical steps that individuals can take to address homelessness. Kevin Adler is an award-winning social entrepreneur, nonprofit leader, and author. Since 2014, he has served as the founder and CEO of Miracle Messages, a nonprofit organization that helps people experiencing homelessness rebuild their social support systems and financial security, primarily through family reunifications, a phone buddy program, and basic income pilots. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Cancel culture—the term and the practice—has left its mark on American culture, business, academia and society at all levels over the past few years. Was it inevitable? Is it permanent? Or is it, as authors Greg Lukianoff and Rikki Schlott argue, a dysfunctional part of how Americans battle for power, status and dominance? They say it is just a symptom of a much larger problem: the use of cheap rhetorical tactics to "win" arguments without actually winning arguments. Drawing on data and research on the phenomenon of cancel culture and how it works, along with many examples of how both the left and the right use it to silence their enemies, Lukianoff and Schlott have concrete steps to offer that they say can reclaim a free speech culture in every realm. Lukianoff and Schlott, authors of the bestselling Coddling of the American Mind, return with their new book The Canceling of the American Mind. Join us to hear their description of cancel culture and their prescription for curing it. NOTES All in-person attendees will receive a copy of The Canceling of the American Mind compliments of the Ken & Jaclyn Broad Family Fund. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Climate affects everyone, but not equally. Those affected first and worst are often the same communities that suffer from housing and income inequality, and climate and societal injustice. Rev. Lennox Yearwood, Jr. has made striving for social, economic, and climate justice his lifelong pursuit. Rising to prominence in the Hip Hop community, Yearwood brought like-minded artists and creatives together to advocate for justice with the Hip Hop Caucus by harnessing the power of film, podcasts and comedy. We discuss the role of his faith, his partnership with billionaire Michael Bloomberg, and the underlying belief in our human ability to keep improving that drives his activism. Guests: Rev. Lennox Yearwood, Jr., CEO, Hip Hop Caucus Jacqueline Patterson, Executive Director, Chisholm Legacy Project For show notes and related links, visit our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Arts Member-led Forum and San Francisco Opera’s Department of Diversity, Equity and Community invite you to a powerful and thought-provoking panel discussion. As home to one of the largest Muslim populations in the United States, the Bay Area might have special interest in the 2023 Pulitzer Prize winner for music, Omar, by Grammy Award-winning artist Rhiannon Giddens and composer Michael Abels.The production runs November 5–21 at the War Memorial Opera House. A true story of an astonishing journey enshrined in a 200-year-old autobiography of enslaved Islamic scholar Omar Ibn Said in the Carolinas, who publicly records his story in Arabic—evidencing the act of writing as the preservation of identity. Omar is a sweeping canvas of text, Christian and Islamic faith, profoundly realized in Kaneza Schaal’s transcendent production embodying the horrors of the “Middle Passage,” prison life, plantation traumas and creative human spirit. MLF ORGANIZER: Anne W. Smith An Arts Member-led Forum program. Forums at the Club are organized and run by volunteer programmers who are members of The Commonwealth Club, and they cover a diverse range of topics. Learn more about our Forums. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Take a walk on the warped side with this in-person program featuring stars in their respective fields. The new book The Warped Side of Our Universe is the result of the collaboration of Nobel Laureate Kip Thorne and award-winning artist Lia Halloran. It brings to vivid life the wonders and wildness of our universe’s “Warped Side”―objects and phenomena made from warped space and time, from colliding black holes and collapsing wormholes to twisting space vortices and down-cascading time. Through poetic verse and otherworldly paintings, the scientist and the artist explicate Thorne’s and his colleagues’ astrophysical discoveries and speculations, with an epic narrative that asks: How did the universe begin? Can anything travel backward in time? And what weird and marvelous phenomena inhabit the "warped side"? In their book, Thorne and Halloran take readers on an Odyssean voyage using epic verse and more than 100 pulsating paintings to shed light on time travel, black holes, gravitational waves and the birth of the universe. Join us in-person to hear them share tales of the warped side. MLF ORGANIZER George Hammond A Humanities Member-led Forum program. Forums at the Club are organized and run by volunteer programmers who are members of The Commonwealth Club, and they cover a diverse range of topics. Learn more about our Forums. In Association with Wonderfest. This program is part of our Good Lit series, underwritten by the Bernard Osher Foundation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices