Soda Politics, Too Big to Know, Tone of Voice In Relationships

Soda Politics (9:50) Marion Nestle, Ph.D., Professor in the Department of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health at New York University, is a leading advocate for better food safety in the U.S. If you’ve watched a recent sporting event, from the super bowl, to the current NCAA basketball tournament, to NASCAR races and even the Olympics, you’ve noticed the aggressive sponsorships from leading beverage companies--namely Coca-Cola and PepsiCo. Numerous athletes are spokesmen for these products, and it strikes some as just a bit odd. It has become common knowledge that soda is unhealthy, full of sugar and leads to health challenges like obesity, diabetes, and poor dental hygiene. So why are sporting events and athletes--seemingly active and fit people--the faces of products they likely don’t even drink? Soft drinks seem like a basic product--simply sugared water--but according to Dr. Nestle, soda is all about race and class in America. She shares with us more about the business and threat the beverage industry poses on our nation’s health, outlined in her book, "Soda Politics: Taking on Big Soda (And Winning)".  Too Big to Know (58:07) David Weinberger, Ph.D., is a senior researcher at the Berkman Center at Harvard University. He has been a philosophy professor, journalist, strategic marketing consultant, Internet entrepreneur and a Franklin Fellow at the US State Department. According to Google, the search engine performs over 3.5 billion searches per day. That’s about 40,000 searches per second. With all this information, one truly important question to consider, one that you can’t search on Google, is this: what are we really learning? Dr. David Weinberger is the author of “Too Big To Know: Rethinking Knowledge Now that Facts Aren’t the Facts, Experts are Everywhere and the Smartest Person in the Room is the Room.” Dr. Weinberger with some ideas on how to manage all the information at our fingertips.  Tone of Voice In Relationships (1:52:41) Brian Baucom, Ph.D., an assistant Professor of Clinical Psychology at the University of Utah. A computer algorithm developed by a team of U.S. researchers can predict marital success more accurately than human behavioral experts using only the tone of voice couples use when communicating with each other during couples counseling sessions. Dr. Brian Baucom was a member of this research team and discusses the results.