Jane Goodall has seen wild chimpanzees dance and bristle with excitement around roaring waterfalls — and she thinks it’s an experience of awe and wonder — and possibly a precursor to animistic religion.  But can we ever know why our ancient human ancestors developed spiritual beliefs? Can evolutionary science uncover the roots of religion?   At some point our ancestors went from admiring waterfalls to worshipping them - and all kinds of spirits and gods. They developed sacred rituals and turned stones into totems. And then came the Battle of the Gods.  This was produced in partnership with the Center for Humans and Nature, an organization that brings together scholars from a diversity of disciplines to think creatively about our relationships with nature and each other. What do you think evolution can tell us about love and morality? Share your thoughts at humansandnature.org. This episode

We take a look at the romantic tropes of modern love and how they’re changing. Do the old dreams of true love and happiness ever after fit our new lives and new identities? Original Air Date: February 13, 2021 Guests:  Logan Ury — Angelo Bautista — Jane Ward — Angela Chen — Bara Jichova Tyson Interviews In This Hour:  The New Coffee Date: COVID-1

The bond we share with dogs runs deep. The satisfaction of gentle head scratches or a round of playing fetch is simple and pure, but in other ways, the connection we have is truly unknowable. How do dogs make our lives better? How do they think? And how do we give them the lives they deserve?   Original Air Date: February 05, 2022 Guests:  Blair Braverman — Quince Mountain — Donna Haraway — Sarah Miller Interviews In This Hour:  <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/adventure-goofiness-and-trail-snacks-stories-dog-mushers-journal" rel="n

Is there a better way to talk about death? And to grieve? So many people have died during the pandemic — 4.8 million and counting — that we're living through a period of global mourning. And some people — and certain cultures — seem to be better prepared to handle it than others. Original Air Date: June 19, 2021 Guests: Heather Swan — Gillian O'Brien — Charles Monroe-Kane — Gabe Joyner — Rafael Campo Interviews In This Hour: <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/inter

When things don't go the way they're supposed to — viruses, star systems, presidents, even fish — we're often desperate to explain the chaos. In this episode, we search for order in the universe. Original Air Date: August 08, 2020 Guests: Patrik Svensson — Lulu Miller — Alexander Boxer — Margaret Wertheim — S. James Gates Jr. Interviews In This Hour: The Weird World

Sharing of personal pronouns has become standard practice on resumes, business cards, email signatures and more. And that’s just one sign of an increasingly widespread shift in how we think about gender. So what’s next? And what would it take to actually celebrate gender freedom? To have trans joy? Original Air Date: January 15, 2022 Guests: Jules Gill-Peterson — Big Freedia — Torrey Peters — Akwaeke Emezi Interviews In This Hour: The Long History of

The pandemic has made it clear that parents are walking a tightrope with no safety net. We talk to parents about how they want to change the system, what it's like to raise black boys in a time of racial injustice, and how we might learn from ancient cultures to improve our parenting skills. Original Air Date: May 22, 2021 Guests: Alissa Quart — Brittany Powell — Michaeleen Doucleff — Amaud Jamaul Johnson — Cherene Sherrard Interviews In This Hour: <p

Clocks and calendars chop time into increments – minutes, hours, days, years. It’s efficient, and it helps us get to meetings on time. But when we invented artificial time, we gave up natural time, and a deep sense of connection to the larger universe. What does time feel like when you stop counting it? Original Air Date: January 04, 2020 Guests: Alexander Rose — Douglas Rushkoff — Wade Davis — Brian Swimme — Laura Williams — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/people/rachel-sussman" rel="nofollo

What if the most unselfish thing you could do was to pursue pleasure? To look for delight? To feel joy? We make the case for the transformative power of joy, pleasure and delight. Original Air Date: October 12, 2019 Guests: Ross Gay — Kathryn Bond Stockton — Laurie Santos — Lynne Segal Interviews In This Hour: 365 Days Of Delight: A Poet's Guide To Finding Joy — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/queer-theorist-ecstatic-kissing

Ever want to quit your job, leave the rat race behind, and head back to the land? Buy an old farmhouse or build a solar-powered home and live self-sufficiently on a few acres of your very own? Generations before you have shared that dream. The reality is more complicated. Even owning your own land is an ethical minefield.  Original Air Date: December 18, 2021 Guests: Makenna Goodman — Simon Winchester — Hayden King Interviews In This Hour: Can you live off the land and still live ethically? — <a href="https://www.ttbo

Remember when reading still felt magical? When a book could sweep you off your feet into another world? It might be that the best way to find your way back the magic is through a kid’s book. We talk to authors about Wonderland, magic wands, unicorns and other children's stories that inspire. Original Air Date: May 01, 2021 Guests:  Katherine Rundell — Quan Barry — Enrique Salmon — Ebony Thomas — LL McKinney — Lulu Mi

Whether you know it or not, your closets are filled with personal information. About your identity, your values, your personality. And every day, you wear it all right out the door for the whole world to see. Do you think about what are you saying with your clothes? Original Air Date: March 16, 2019 Guests:  Angelo Bautista — Avery Trufelman — Carolyn Smith — agnès b. — Jo Paoletti Interviews In This Hour:  <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/finding-your

We’re in the holiday season of the worst pandemic of our lives. Canceling our gatherings is the safe thing to do. But, how can we still — creatively and safely — connect with the people we love? Maybe there are some opportunities for us this year, too. Original Air Date: November 28, 2020 Guests:  Priya Parker — Stanley Weintraub — Peter Reinhart — Helen Macdonald — Gregg Krech Interviews In This Hour:  <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/pandemic-holiday

There are old folktales and legends of people who can become animals. Animals who can become people. And there’s a lesson for our own time in those shapeshifting stories — a recognition that the membrane between what's human and more-than-human is razor thin. Original Air Date: November 20, 2021 Guests:  Sharon Blackie — David Abram — Chris Gosden — Stephen Graham Jones Interviews In This Hour:  Reclaiming the fierce women who ar

After a pandemic year of social isolation, we knew loneliness would be a problem. But public health officials have been warning for years that in countries all over the world, rates of loneliness are skyrocketing. How did loneliness become a condition of modern life? Original Air Date: April 10, 2021 Guests:  Jason Rohrer — Samantha Rose Hill — Claudia Rankine Interviews In This Hour:  My Friend Samantha (The A.I.) — How Lo

Colonization in Africa was much more than a land grab. It was a project to replace — and even erase — local cultures. To label them inferior. Music, arts, literature and of course language. In other words, it permeated everything. So how do you undo that? How do you unlearn what you’ve been forced to learn? In this hour, produced in partnership with the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes (CHCI) and Africa is a Country — we learn what it means to decolonize the mind. Original Air Date: March 20, 2021 Guests:  Adom Getachew — Simon Gikandi — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/people/ngugi-wa-thiongo" r

As a culture we’ve long been fascinated by witchcraft, with witches through the ages practicing magic and making spells. Even through the spread of misinformation, and when they’ve been hunted and silenced. We take you from the 17th century to the online witch communities of today.   Original Air Date: October 30, 2021 Guests:  Honey Rose — Rivka Galchen — Chris Gosden — Quan Barry Interviews In This Hour:  WitchTok, the super-connected coven — <

Rustling of leaves, sploshing of water, birds calling, bees buzzing. Wherever you live — city or country, East coast, West coast, or in between — we share common, contemplative experiences on our walks outside. In this hour, we assemble a sonic guide to finding solace in nature. Original Air Date: May 09, 2020 Guests:  William Helmreich — David Rothenberg — Laura Dassow Walls — Robert Moor — Nate Staniforth — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/people/andreas-weber" rel="nofollow" target

If you had to travel 500 miles across country, on foot, with no map, no GPS, without talking to anyone — to a destination you've never seen, could you do it? It sounds impossible, but millions of creatures spend their lives on the move, migrating from one part of the Earth to another with navigation skills we can only dream of. How do they do it — and what can we learn from them? Original Air Date: July 25, 2020 Guests:  Moses Augustino Kumburu — David Wilcove — Stan Temple — David Barrie — Soni

Music crosses boundaries between traditional and modern, local and global, personal and political. Take jazz — a musical form born out of forced migration and enslavement. We typically think it originated in New Orleans and then spread around the world. But today, we examine an alternate history of jazz — one that starts in Africa, then crisscrosses the planet, following the movements of people and empires -- from colonial powers to grassroots revolutionaries to contemporary artists throughout the diaspora. This history of jazz is like the music itself: fluid and improvisatory.   In this hour, produced in partnership with the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes (CHCI) — a global consortium of 270 humanities centers and institutes — we hear how both African and African-American music have shaped the sound of the world today.   Original Air Date: July 04, 2020

The women of Afghanistan are elected officials, school teachers, actors, TV contest winners, ancient rug weavers, and whisperers of forbidden poetry. The Taliban are starting to put down their thumb. But these women want you to know they are more than the timid victim under a burqa. Original Air Date: October 02, 2021 Guests:  Humaira Ghilzai — Eliza Griswold — Anna Badkhen — Rafia Zakaria Interviews In This Hour:  What's the future of culture i

We’ve all been changed by the experience of living through a pandemic. We figured out how to sanitize groceries, mute ourselves on Zoom and keep from killing our roommates. But we’re also tackling bigger, existential questions — how can we, individually and collectively, find meaning in the experience of this pandemic? Original Air Date: May 23, 2020 Guests:  David Kessler — Tyrone Muhammad — Nikki Giovanni — John Kaag — Alice Kaplan Interviews In This Hour:  <a

Using a complex network of chemical signals, trees talk to each other and form alliances with fellow trees, even other species. In fact, whole forests exist as a kind of superorganism. And some trees are incredibly old. Did you know a single bristlecone pine can live up to 6,000 years? And the root mass of aspens might live 100,000 years? We explore the science and history of trees and talk with Richard Powers about his epic novel "The Overstory." Original Air Date: April 28, 2018 Guests:  Mark Hirsch — Richard Powers — Suzanne Simard — Amos Clifford — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/

For all the commentary, the sorrow and rage, all the second-guessing about everything that followed, it’s still hard to fathom what happened on 9/11. Photographer James Nachtwey was in New York that day, and he took some of the iconic photos of the Twin Towers as they crumbled. "I’ve actually never gotten over it," he says. On the twentieth anniversary of 9/11, Nachtwey reflects on his life as a war photographer, and we consider the deep history of war itself. We also examine a very difficult question: Is war ever worth it? Original Air Date: September 11, 2021 Guests:  James Nachtwey — David Shields — Leymah Gbowee — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/people/margaret-macmi

Before the time of commercial flights and road trips, we traveled to far off places without taking a single step. All you had to do was open a book. From Africa to England, to a kamikaze cockpit, and to realms of fantasy. Books aren’t just books. They’re passports to anywhere. Original Air Date: March 14, 2020 Guests: Philip Pullman — Ruth Ozeki — Robert Macfarlane — Petina Gappah Interviews In This Hour: Philip Pullman on 'The Pocket Atlas of

Not everyone has a nice, big yard to stretch out in while sheltering in place from COVID-19. But maybe you don't need one. People are using virtual spaces to live out the real experiences they miss — like coffee shops, road trips, even building your own house on a deserted island, or Walden Pond. In a world where we're mostly confined to our homes and Zoom screens, does the line between virtual and real-life space mean much anymore? Original Air Date: May 16, 2020 Guests: Mark Riechers — Tracy Fullerton — Simon Parkin — Jane McGonigal — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/people/donald-

Over the past decade, plant scientists have quietly transformed the way we think of trees, forests and plants. They discovered that trees communicate through vast underground networks, that plants learn and remember. If plants are intelligent beings, how should we relate to them? Do they have a place in our moral universe? Should they have rights? Human identity cannot be separated from our nonhuman kin. From forest ecology to the human microbiome, emerging research suggests that being human is a complicated journey made possible only by the good graces of our many companions. In partnership with the Center for Humans and Nature and with support from the Kalliopeia Foundation, To The Best Of Our Knowledge is exploring this theme of "kinship" in a special

One of the toughest things about trying to understand climate change – arguably the most important story of our time - is wrapping our minds around it. To even imagine something so enormous, so life-changing, we need a story. Some characters, a metaphor, and even some lessons learned. For that, we turn to the novelists and journalists telling the story of climate change – as we – and our children – live it. Original Air Date: August 14, 2021 Guests: Alice Bell — Lydia Millet — Lidia Yuknavitch — John Lanchester Interviews In This Hour: <a href="https:

We all miss touching things — groceries, door knobs, hands, faces. And most of all, skin. The living tissue that simultaneously protects us from the world, and lets us feel it. In this episode, the politics, biology, and inner life of your skin. Original Air Date: April 18, 2020 Guests: Angelo Bautista — Tiffany Field — Alissa Waters — Nina Jablonski Interviews In This Hour: My Problem With Skincare — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/even-durin

What does it take to win Olympic gold? To become "the world's fastest human"? This hour, Olympic fame, the politics of sports, and the science of running. Original Air Date: July 31, 2021 Guests: John Carlos — Gretchen Reynolds — Mark McClusky — Michael Powell Interviews In This Hour: The Fist and the 1968 Olympics — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/walk-run-swim-or-bike-most-important-exercise-merely-movement" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"

If you look at a mountain, you might see a skiing destination, a climbing challenge, or even a source of timber to be logged or ore to be mined. But there was a time when mountains were sacred. In some places, they still are. What changes when you think of a mountain not as a giant accumulation of natural resources, but as a living being? Today’s show is part of our project on kinship with the more-than-human world — produced in collaboration with the Center for Humans and Nature, and with support from the Kalliopeia Foundation. You’ll find more information about the project at ttbook.org/kinship and humansandnature.org. Original Air Date: July 24, 2021 Guests: John Hausdoerffer — <a h

Africans are moving into cities in unprecedented numbers. Lagos, Nigeria, is growing by 77 people an hour — it's on track to become a city of 100 million. In 30 years, the continent is projected to have 14 mega-cities of more than 10 million people. It's perhaps the largest urban migration in history. These cities are not like Dubai, or Singapore, or Los Angeles. They’re uniquely African cities, and they’re forcing all of us to reconsider what makes a city modern. And how and why cities thrive. To find out what's going on, we go to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, to talk with entrepreneurs, writers, scholars and artists. In this hour, produced in partnership with the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes (CHCI) — a global consortium of 270 humanities centers and institutes — we learn how the continent where the human species was born is building the cities of the future. Origi

Why don’t we all just take moment to acknowledge that we are collectively exhausted? The pandemic, the protests, the President’s Twitter feed — everything is exhausting. But maybe it doesn’t have to be? Original Air Date: October 24, 2020 Guests: Katrina Onstad — Emma Seppala — Richard Polt — Filip Bromberg — Lars Svendsen — Anne Helen Petersen Interviews In This Hour: <a

As audio producers, one of the most fun things we get to do is bring the soundscape of a novel to life — cue the monsters, the storms, the footsteps of a creature emerging slowly from the ocean. So that’s what we’re bringing you today: Great writers, epic sound design. Original Air Date: July 03, 2021 Guests: Nnedi Okorafor — Neil Gaiman — Lidia Yuknavitch — N. K. Jemisin — Ann Patchett — Richard Powers — <a h

There's a certain a kind of visual encounter that can be life changing: A cross-species gaze. The experience of looking directly into the eyes of an animal in the wild, and seeing it look back. It happens more often than you’d think and it can be so profound, there’s a name for it: eye-to-eye epiphany. So what happens when someone with feathers or fur and claws looks back? How does it change people, and what can it teach us? Human identity cannot be separated from our nonhuman kin. From forest ecology to the human microbiome, emerging research suggests that being human is a complicated journey made possible only by the good graces of our many companions. In partnership with the Center for Humans and Nature and with support from the Kalliopeia Foundation, To The Best Of Our Knowledge is <a href="https://ttbook.org/kinship" rel=

Is there a better way to talk about death? And to grieve? So many people have died during the pandemic — 4.8 million and counting — that we're living through a period of global mourning. And some people — and certain cultures — seem to be better prepared to handle it than others. Original Air Date: June 12, 2021 Guests: Heather Swan — Gillian O'Brien — Charles Monroe-Kane — Gabe Joyner — Rafael Campo Interviews In This Hour: <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/inter

New experiences actually rewire the brain. So after all we’ve been through this year, you have to wonder — are we different? We consider the "COVID brain" from the perspective of both neuroscience and the arts. Also, we go to Cavendish, Vermont to hear the remarkable story of Phineas Gage, the railroad worker whose traumatic brain injury changed the history of neuroscience. Original Air Date: October 10, 2020 Guests: Margo Caulfield — David Eagleman — llan Stavans Interviews In This Hour: How Phineas Gage's Fre

Once upon a time, science and magic were two sides of the same coin. Today, we learn science in school and save magic for children’s books. What if it were different? What would it be like to see the world as an alchemist? Original Air Date: September 19, 2020 Guests: Sarah Durn — Pamela Smith — William Newman — Charles Monroe-Kane — Jason Pine Interviews In This Hour: Tr

If you wrote a list of all the things you own in your house, how long would it be? We surround ourselves with possessions, but at what point do they start to possess us? Original Air Date: September 05, 2020 Guests: Angelo Bautista — Eula Biss — Adam Minter — Giles Slade — Clare Dolan Interviews In This Hour: The Magnum Opus Of Pointless Stuff — <a href="https://www.tt

The pandemic has made it clear that parents are walking a tightrope with no safety net. We talk to parents about how they want to change the system, what it's like to raise black boys in a time of racial injustice, and how we might learn from ancient cultures to improve our parenting skills. Original Air Date: May 22, 2021 Guests: Alissa Quart — Brittany Powell — Michaeleen Doucleff — Amaud Jamaul Johnson — Cherene Sherrard Interviews In This Hour: <p

A new generation of Black farmers are working to reclaim land, hoping to grow justice along with vegetables and plants. Original Air Date: August 22, 2020 Guests: Leah Penniman — Savi Horne — Venice Williams — Marcia Chatelain Interviews In This Hour: How Black Farmers Lost 14 Million Acres of Farmland — And How They're Taking It Back — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/when-you-hold-land

We owe our past and future existence on Earth to fungi. Some can heal you, some can kill you, and some can change you forever. And the people who love them are convinced that mushrooms explain the world. Original Air Date: June 08, 2019 Guests: Lawrence Millman — Paul Stamets — Eugenia Bone — Michael Pollan — Dennis McKenna — Robin Carhart-Harris Interviews In This Hour:

Remember when reading still felt magical? When a book could sweep you off your feet into another world? It might be that the best way to find your way back the magic is through a kid’s book. We talk to authors about Wonderland, magic wands, unicorns and other children's stories that inspire. Original Air Date: May 01, 2021 Guests: Katherine Rundell — Quan Barry — Enrique Salmon — Ebony Thomas — LL McKinney — Lulu Mil

When things don't go the way they're supposed to — viruses, star systems, presidents, even fish — we're often desperate to explain the chaos. In this episode, we search for order in the universe. Original Air Date: August 08, 2020 Guests:  Patrik Svensson — Lulu Miller — Alexander Boxer — Margaret Wertheim — S. James Gates Jr. Interviews In This Hour:  The Weird Worl

What if the most unselfish thing you could do was to pursue pleasure? To look for delight? To feel joy? We make the case for the transformative power of joy, pleasure and delight. Original Air Date: October 12, 2019 Guests:  Ross Gay — Kathryn Bond Stockton — Laurie Santos — Lynne Segal Interviews In This Hour:  365 Days Of Delight: A Poet's Guide To Finding Joy — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/queer-theorist-ecstatic-kissi

After a pandemic year of social isolation, we knew loneliness would be a problem. But public health officials have been warning for years that in countries all over the world, rates of loneliness are skyrocketing. How did loneliness become a condition of modern life? Original Air Date: April 10, 2021 Guests: Jason Rohrer — Samantha Rose Hill — Claudia Rankine Interviews In This Hour: My Friend Samantha (The A.I.) — How Lone

Millions of people are caring for someone with severe memory loss, trying to find ways to connect. One of the best ways anyone has found is music. We examine the unexpected power of song to supercharge the human mind. Original Air Date: August 17, 2019 Guests: Shannon Henry Kleiber — Oliver Sacks — Francine Toder — Anne Basting Interviews In This Hour: The Power Of Music And Memory: 'Music Was Waking Up Som

It's easy to take seeds for granted, to assume that there will always be more corn or wheat or rice to plant. But as monocropping and agribusiness continue to dominate modern farming, are we losing genetic diversity, cultural history, and the nutritional value of our food? We speak to farmers, botanists and indigenous people about how they are reclaiming our seeds. Original Air Date: September 14, 2019 Guests: Bob Quinn — Robin Wall Kimmerer — Seth Jovaag — Cary Fowler Interviews In This Hour: <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/where-did-we-go-wro

Colonization in Africa was much more than a land grab. It was a project to replace — and even erase — local cultures. To label them inferior. Music, arts, literature and of course language. In other words, it permeated everything. So how do you undo that? How do you unlearn what you’ve been forced to learn? Original Air Date: March 20, 2021 Guests: Adom Getachew — Simon Gikandi — Ngugi wa Thiong’o Interviews In This Hour: Reckon with the Past To Decolonize the Future — <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/reclaiming-hidden-hi

DNA tests are uncovering family histories. In some cases they're also revealing mixed bloodlines and the buried history of slavery. For African Americans, this can be emotionally-charged. What do you do when you find out one of your direct ancestors was a slave owner? And does it open the door to new conversations about racial justice and social healing? Original Air Date: March 10, 2018 Guests: Alex Gee — Erin Hoag — Annette Gordon-Reed — Anita Foeman Interviews In This Hour: <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/how-do-you-know-ruben-gee" rel="nofoll