Free Food For Thought

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Synopsis

Free Food for Thought is a student-run, student focused podcast that seeks to feed intellectual curiosity. We will interview renowned speakers, passionate students, and anyone else we think has an idea worth hearing!

Episodes

  • Julie Sze

    02/11/2018 Duration: 23min

    "The community-based approach and scholar-activism makes [environmental] research better. It makes the science better, it makes the policy better...For me, there is no research that doesn't take those voices seriously." Skip and Will sat down with Julie Sze to discuss environmental justice, American studies, and her work as a scholar-activist.

  • Joshua White

    30/10/2018 Duration: 22min

    "The U.S. government still moves relatively slowly in its analysis [of unfolding events]. It’s only starting to think about how to tap the wide array of information that’s on social media. And by following it, you can know things faster than the CIA, and that’s important for those of us who are now on the outside looking at developments in these countries.” Bryn and Nandeeni sat down with Joshua White to discuss Situation Room meetings with President Obama, elections in Pakistan and Bangladesh, and heightened military competition in the Indian Ocean.

  • Emma Dench

    26/10/2018 Duration: 24min

    “My immediate reaction is to find [the Romans] really repulsive. But then they get at you. Sometimes when you are reading Roman literature, they say something super thoughtful that you really can relate to and then you are sucked back in again.” Emma Dench sat down with Skip and Zach to discuss the multiculturalism of Ancient Rome, her decision to move to the United States, and using the Romans’ mistakes to identify blind spots in America today.

  • Ted Scheinman

    24/10/2018 Duration: 22min

    “There’s a lot of continuity between fan communities. Generally they tend to have more in common than they differ from each other. But I think Austen is in some ways unique, or at least rare, because she is...a focus of fandom who also gives you keys about how to interact with the people you find yourself in company with.” Ted Scheinman sat down with Will and Shiv to discuss Jane Austen's enduring impact, covering climate change with Pacific Standard Magazine, and the power of writing.

  • Liz Thomas

    19/10/2018 Duration: 19min

    "I think of the trail as a great leveler...the sort of things that divide us, that become our identity, like what car you drive or even what job you have, go away. You can connect with people at a very basic human level...it really makes people reflect on who they are." Liz Thomas, CMC '07, sat down with Bryn and Zach to discuss hiking thousands of miles alone, her advocacy work on behalf of environmental conservation, and getting hooked on urban hiking.

  • Erwin Chemerinsky

    16/10/2018 Duration: 23min

    “The Constitution always has been, and hopefully always will be, a living Constitution. Otherwise, it would be absurd for us to be governed by a document that was written in the 1787 for an agrarian slave society.” Erwin Chemerinsky sat down with Zach and Skip to speak about his work as a professor and dean at UC Berkeley’s Law School, why hate speech is protected under the Constitution, and his case against the Supreme Court.

  • Tina Nguyen

    12/10/2018 Duration: 21min

    “I’ll visit the New York Times and I’ll visit Breitbart and I’ll visit Drudge. They’re all really the same news, except that the headlines are completely different. That’s kind of the trick you need to understand when you’re exploring partisan media.” Tina Nguyen, CMC '11, sat down with Shiv and Skip to discuss her viral review of the Trump Grill for Vanity Fair (and the President's response), covering alt-right conspiracy theories, and her time at Claremont McKenna writing for all three on-campus student publications.

  • Robert Pearl

    09/10/2018 Duration: 21min

    "At times of great reward or great fear, we have a shift. Our perception changes, and we're not able to see the facts. And I think health care is the classic example of that." Robert Pearl sat down with Skip and Zach to talk about health care policy, price gouging in the pharmaceutical industry, the anti-vaccine movement, and fundamental problems with the culture of medicinal practice.

  • Jonah Goldberg

    05/10/2018 Duration: 26min

    "Democracy is about disagreement, not agreement." Jonah Goldberg sat down with Skip and Will to talk about American democracy, echo chambers, and the state of journalism.

  • Richard Blanco

    02/10/2018 Duration: 28min

    "Even when I try not to write about home, it ends up in [my work]. Even in the inaugural poem that I wrote and read for President Obama’s inauguration. I thought that was just a poem about our country...the whole poem is about our yearning to come home to our figurative home, to come home to America, to finally belong under one roof. And I was like, 'darn it, there I go again. There's the home again.'” Richard Blanco sat down with Elena and Zach to discuss his writing process, growing up Cuban-American, and building bridges through storytelling.

  • Jay Bellissimo

    28/09/2018 Duration: 22min

    "[Artificial Intelligence] is really about augmenting that intelligence, that human capability. It's not about replacing humans, it's about this new partnership between man and computer." Jay Bellissimo P'20 sat down with Kate and Shivani to examine the role of artificial intelligence in our ability to make complex decisions in the healthcare industry, the education system, and our own personal lives.

  • Gary Smith

    25/09/2018 Duration: 18min

    “I discovered all these people trying to beat the [stock] market by coming up with these flimsy theories. They’d ransack data, they’d find some correlation, and they would think it was real. That just fascinated me. And as I went on, it wasn’t just in the stock market, it's everywhere else. You find these people, they dredge the data, ransack the data…and they find these correlations which, on the face, don't make sense." Gary Smith sat down with Bryn and Will to discuss the drawbacks of artificial intelligence, today's information revolution in the context of the industrial revolution, and new monopolies forming in Silicon Valley.

  • Danielle Allen

    21/09/2018 Duration: 20min

    "We've lost track of the fact that a key set of our muscles are what we do with words...we need that engagement with that incredibly powerful part of our brain, our spirit, our thinking muscles, in order to shape the world together. So, from my point of view, the humanities and the liberal arts are fundamental to educating any person in a democracy for effective citizenship." Danielle Allen sat down with Will and Christian to talk about teaching the Declaration of Independence to low-income night students in Chicago, the importance of criminal justice reform at the state level, and how the sophistication of the Federalist Papers reveals an undeniable intellectual decline in American society today.

  • Stephen Walt

    18/09/2018 Duration: 24min

    "Overwhelmingly, the greatest threat to the United States today is internal." Stephen Walt sat down with Bryn and Will to talk about the challenges behind evaluating cyberthreats, a potential pardon of Edward Snowden, and foreign policy in the Trump administration.

  • Ron Klain

    14/09/2018 Duration: 18min

    "Political rhetoric, political themes, political messaging can really change the world, change how people really see the world, change how people really understand the world. And so that's really inspired throughout my career to be very aware of the importance of politics and campaigning, not just for winning elections, but for changing hearts and changing minds and laying a groundwork for action." Ron Klain sat down with Mel and Skip to discuss running debate preparation for President Obama, serving as White House Ebola response coordinator, and achieving change using the levers of power.

  • Sean Hagan

    09/05/2018 Duration: 22min

    "What’s great about the IMF is that it’s an institution that is constantly evolving, and it’s constantly evolving because it’s job is to manage crises and crises tend to evolve." -Sean Hagan on Free Food for Thought Will and Shivani sit down with Sean Hagan, General Counsel and Director of the Legal Department at the International Monetary Fund, to discuss the evolving role of the Fund. This episode was edited by Skip Wiltshire-Gordon.

  • Jonathan Haidt

    04/05/2018 Duration: 23min

    Sam and Zach sit down with Professor Jonathan Haidt, Thomas Cooley Professor of Ethical Leadership at New York University’s Stern School of Business.

  • Jo Scott-Coe

    29/04/2018 Duration: 13min

    Kate and Melanie sit down with Professor Jo Scott-Coe to discuss her research and writings.

  • David E. Tolchinsky

    19/04/2018 Duration: 22min

    Salonee and Nick sit down with David E. Tolchinsky, screenwriter/playwright/director and professor at Northwestern University.

  • David Frum

    21/03/2018 Duration: 24min

    “The conservative movement as I knew it is really a finished project. It doesn’t have anything useful to say to the present moment… But the conservative disposition, the conservative impulse, that will always be part of the human brain.” - David Frum on Free Food for Thought Sophia and Will sit down with David Frum, former George W. Bush speechwriter and conservative intellectual, to talk about the past, present, and future of the conservative movement.

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