The Apple Seed

Guest: Wayne McCormack, JD, Professor of Law, SJ Quinney College of Law, University of Utah

Guest: Jennifer Adams, Author, "Baby Lit: Peter Pan" and Staff, The King's English Bookshop Charles Frazier’s hugely successful historical novel “Cold Mountain” is about a Confederate soldier who walks away from the war because he no longer believes in it.  Frazier’s latest historical novel, “Varina,” is also set in the Civil War, and in this story we get inside the head of Varina Davis, the wife of the president of the southern Confederate States, Jefferson Davis. Despite being First Lady of the Confederacy, she doesn’t believe in the cause of the South either.

Guest: Christopher Ferguson, PhD, Professor of Psychology, Stetson University If you feel the urge to check your phone, you may be familiar with the twinge of guilt, the thought that you may be addicted to your device. Well, you can relax, says psychologist Christopher Ferguson. Most of the fear about technology addiction is hype at this point. And no, your cell phone is not as addictive as cocaine.

Guest: Alexis Hiniker, PhD, Assistant Professor of Human Computer Interaction in the Information School, and Director, User Empowerment Lab, University of Washington Phones, tablets, computers and game consoles are so ubiquitous that it’s impossible to shield kids from their allure. Parents feel like they’re losing the war over screen time – they’re certainly losing many daily battles with their kids over when to put the device down. And the people who design the apps and games on those devices are tipping the scales against parents. Alexis Hiniker’s research in Human Computer Interaction at the University of Washington shows how much difference some simple design changes could make for families.

Guest: Shane Snow, Tech Journalist, Entrepreneur, and Author of “Dream Teams: Working Together Without Falling Apart” As dream teams go, this one’s legendary: the 1980 US Olympic Hockey team. The Miracle on Ice, it was called. A bunch of American college players somehow defeats the four-time defending gold-medal winning Soviet Team by one goal in the final seconds of the game. But, what if the Americans weren’t the dream team in this scenario? What if the Russians are the team we should be taking our cues from? That’s Shane Snow’s argument in his new book, “Dream Teams: Working Together Without Falling Apart.”