Worlds Awaiting

Guest: Caroline Light, PhD, Senior Lecturer, Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality, Harvard University, Author, “Stand Your Ground: A History of America’s Love Affair with Lethal Self-Defense”  At least half of states have "Stand Your Groung Laws," giving people the right to use deadly force in defending themselves. But a recent shooting in Florida underscores why these laws are controversial: a white man starts an argument with a black woman in a parking lot. The woman’s boyfriend – also black – comes out and shoves the white man. The white man pulls out a gun, shoots and kills the black man, and has yet to be charged with any crime because Florida has a law that gave him the right to defend himself with deadly force.

Guest: Marion Nestle, PhD, MPH, Paulette Goddard Professor of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health, Emerita, New York University When you reach for the milk to pour on your cereal, what kind of milk is it? Soy, almond, cashew, oat, rice, hemp? Or is it milk milk? The head of the US Food and Drug Administration, Scott Gottlieb, recently noted at a Politico event that maybe the FDA hasn’t been properly enforcing its definition of milk, which includes a reference to coming from a “lactating animal.” We all know almonds don't lactate, so what does the "milk" mean in products like almond milk?

Guest: Rebecca DeSchweinitz, PhD, Professor of History at Brigham Young University The Justice Department has reopened its investigation into the murder of Emmett Till, who was a 14-year old African American boy lynched in Mississippi in 1955. While Emmett Till’s murder helped galvanize the Civil Rights Movement, a white jury and judge acquitted the two white men charged with his killing. So why is the case being reopened now after so many years?

Guest: Frans von der Dunk, PhD, Professor of Space Law, University of Nebraska-Lincoln; Director, Black Holes BV Consultancy A new era has arrived in space exploration where private companies like Space X and Blue Origin are racing alongside NASA and other governments to return to the Moon, colonize Mars, harvest minerals from space and send tourists into orbit. Who polices what goes on in space? Or is the Wild West: take what you can claim, first-come-first-served, every astronaut for herself?

Guest: Ryan Montgomery, Ultra-trail Runner According to legend, a Greek messenger was the first to run the distance of a marathon, after which he died from overexertion. That’s probably just a legend, but running 26.2 miles would be enough to make me wish I was dead. So what’s up with ultra-marathoners, covering distances up to 135 miles in single stretch, often over steep mountains?