Is it Possible To Learn While You Dream?

Who's Got The Best Ice Cream in New England?

250 years ago,  Americans weren’t just fighting the British – they also had smallpox to contend with. Edgar talks with GBH’s Jennifer Moore and Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai from the Mass. Historical Society to talk smallpox in the time of the American revolution. Then: What makes New England ice cream stands the cream of the crop? (Sorry.) Edgar meets Elijah & Kendra Richards, co-creators of the TikTok ice cream review channel MooEngland Diaries & fields calls from listeners.  And Mass Audubon director of bird conservation John Herbert takes us on a tour of Broadmoor Wildlife Sanctuary.

Will A.I. Cyborgs Outlast Us All?

Edgar kicks us off with  another round of our A.I. news & ethics panel with Nir Eisikovits & J Hughes from the podcast Prosthetic Gods, and Harvard A.I. researcher Elena Glassman.  Then, GBH’s Gal Tziperman-Lotan returns with Four Things To Know for June 2nd, 2026. And ending our show, it’s the June edition of Stargazer’s Guide with astrophysicist Anjali Tripathi.

How Do I Start A Start-Up?

On Saturday, a meteor crashed into the ocean off the coast of Cape Cod. Sky & Telescope senior editor Kelly Beatty joins to explain what we know (and don’t) about what exactly happened, how rare this is, and other pressing meteor questions.  Then: Whoop has become a darling in the landscape of Boston tech startups, with a pre-IPO valuation of over 10 billion. How rare is their story, and how does a tech startup make it to the big-leagues? We’ll talk with Boston Globe tech business reporter Aaron Pressman, and Jeffrey Bussgang from Harvard Business School.  And we end by exploring the so-called “gamification" of sleep, with apps that track & measure health data. Are these apps & tools making us any healthier? Edgar talks with Tony Cunningham, who directs the Center for Sleep and Cognition [https://www.bidmc.org/research/research-by-department/psychiatry/center-for-sleep-and-cognition/personnel] at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

What's It Take To Bee A Spelling S-T-A-R?

First up, It’s ICYMI, our menagerie of misfit news week-in-review panel. We’ll talk with Axios’ Mike Deehan and freelance journalist Megan Johnson about the Enhanced Games in Vegas, a Bangladeshi buffalo that looks eerily like our 47th president, and if “you can’t beat Boston” is in fact the best promotional slogan for the city. Then, we talk about the new podcast Fighting Crime. The podcast details the social and economic impact of our obsession with true crime. It's hosted by former GBH’er and former host of Try This at the Washington Post, Cristina Quinn. We'll talk with her about the launch and what we can look forward to.  Lastly, this week was the Scripps National Spelling Bee. Three Massachusetts kids joined the competition, Edgar will meet two of them. Twelve year-olds Adarsh Venkannagari and Sanjay Malhotra Zoom in together from their hotel in D.C.

Does History Have A Lesson For Today's College Grads?

First up, BU Misinformation Researcher Joan Donovan walks us through a few stories that've made headlines this week.  Then, Edgar chats with UMass Boston labor historian Nick Juravich and economist Elise Gould about how this current job market stacks up against others throughout history.  Lastly, we're peeking into the fitness programming of GBH past, with Sammy Driscoll & Peter Higgins from the GBH Archives.