Parties in the Graveyard: Day of the Dead vs Halloween

Guest: LaShawn Williams, LCSW, MPA, Professor of Social Work, Utah Valley University Last week there was an event commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Kerner Commission report which blamed systemic discrimination and white supremacist views for fomenting frustration that led young blacks around the country to riot in urban centers. Fifty years later, one in five Americans believes racism is not a problem in the United States – that’s according to a Pew Research survey released in the last two weeks.

Guest: Charlotte-Rose Millar, Postdoctoral Researcher, Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities at the University of Queensland, Author of “Witchcraft, the Devil and Emotions in Early Modern England” It’s the time of year when witches come out, resting on porches, leaning over bubbling cauldrons on suburban lawns, flying through the air on broomsticks in silhouette. We’re talking about Halloween décor, of course. But, there is some really serious, dark history surrounding witches. Thousands of women – and some men, even – were executed for the crime of witchcraft in Renaissance Europe. We had the Salem witch trials in the US, too.  So how did witches become a fun holiday oddity?

Guest: Susan Rodiek, Associate Professor of Architecture, Texas A&M University There are all kinds of brain training programs out there promising to help delay the onset of memory loss and dementia as we age. But an effective solution may be as close as your backyard or windowsill. Researchers from Texas A&M University and the University of Hyogo in Japan have found simple gardening activities may provide a benefit to aging brains.

Guest: George Stone, Editor in Chief, National Geographic Traveler National Geographic just released the second edition of “Journeys of a Lifetime: 500 of the World’s Greatest Trips.” Flipping through the pages makes people want to run out of the office right now and jump on the next flight out.

Guest: Douglas Eck, Principal Scientist, Google, Creator of the Google Magenta Project If computers could listen to music like people do — hundreds and hundreds of hours of music of very different styles — could they absorb patterns that would help them learn to write and perform music that humans would enjoy listening to? Might computers get so good at composing music they’ll replace humans composers?