Free Forum with Terrence McNally

The chaos Trump is creating in Southern California is a distraction from the other cruel, careless, and destructive actions of his administration. The assault on higher education and Harvard University in particular will cost us enormously, especially in terms of medicine and science. Here’s my 2012 conversation with Don Ingber, founding director of Harvard’s Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, who has emerged as one of the leading voices defending science and attacking White House cuts to research. Following this conversation you’re about to hear, I was hired by the Wyss Institute to host and co-produce Disruptive, a 17 episode podcast series, honored by the Webbies as one of the five top science podcasts of 2017. Search Disruptive, Terrence McNally to find the series at numerous sites.

Today’s conversation with Turing Award-winning computer scientist LESLIE VALIANT explores a question I find myself returning to over and over again – What makes us human? What unique abilities have allowed homo sapiens to succeed, flourish, and dominate – knowing it’s not our size, strength, or speed. His new book, THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EDUCABLE: A NEW THEORY ON HUMAN UNIQUENESS, has added timeliness, as we confront a crisis of social mistrust as well as the threats and promise of AI. Valiant-03-31-2025 Transcript [http://aworldthatjustmightwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Valiant-03-31-2025-transcript-polished-1.pdf]

With the recent death of Pope Francis and the election of Leo XIV, feels like a good time to talk with best-selling author ELAINE PAGELS about her new book, MIRACLES AND WONDER: The Historical Mystery of Jesus. In it, she asks: Why is Jesus said to have had a virgin birth? Why do we say he rose from the dead? Did his miracles really happen and, if so, what did they mean? And finally, how did a poor young Jewish man and failed Messiah inspire a religion that has persisted and grown for 2000 years? Professor Emeritus of Religion at Princeton, Pagels has won Rockefeller, Guggenheim, and MacArthur Fellowships, as well as the National Book Award. You can learn more at elaine-pagels.com [http://elaine-pagels.com/]. Elaine Pagels-04-23-2025-Transcript [http://aworldthatjustmightwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Elaine-Pagels-04-23-2025-Transcript.pdf]

While Trump is in the Middle East making family business deals, House Republicans today proposed their tax cut bill, with a price tag of nearly $5T, paid for with cuts to Medicaid, food stamps, green energy programs, and everything else DOGE took a chainsaw to. But who actually pays taxes these days? The US is now the world’s second largest tax haven, moving ahead of Switzerland, and trailing only the Cayman Islands. Here’s my 2021 conversation with CHUCK COLLINS, who directs the Program on Inequality and the Common Good at the Institute for Policy Studies and co-edits their newsletter, Inequality Weekly. We talk about his latest book, THE WEALTH HOARDERS: How Billionaires Pay Millions to Hide Trillions. You can learn more at inequality.org [http://inequality.org/]

I don’t say I'm concerned about “the environment.” Rather I see our goal as a healthy relationship with the rest of nature. PAUL HAWKEN’s new book CARBON: The Tree of Life takes a step back from the problem-solving approach of most of his work. He calls us to a deeper understanding of our place in the scheme of things as absolutely essential not just to deal effectively with the climate crisis, but with most of the other ways we fall short of what’s possible in our individual lives as well as the larger world. His two previous books: DRAWDOWN: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming and REGENERATION: Ending the Climate Crisis in One Generation. You can learn more at paulhawken.com [http://paulhawken.com] Transcript - PAUL HAWKEN [http://aworldthatjustmightwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Transcript-PAUL-HAWKEN.pdf]