Life Examined

We all have characteristics unique to ourselves, from our intelligence and sexual orientation to our height, weight and food preferences. Where do these traits come from? Are we genetically pre-programmed? What can we learn from studying twins? Why do they display so many similar characteristics even when raised apart? Beyond hereditary and experience, is there also something else in the mix that...

Jonathan Bastian talks with Ross Gay , poet, essayist, and professor of English at Indiana University. Author of “ The Book of Delights ,” Gay’s latest collection of essays and poems is “ Inciting Joy ,” in which he ponders sources of joy, from caring for his father, to skateboarding, gardening, and playing pickup basketball.  “Joy is what emerges from our tending to one another through the diffic...

Jonathan Bastian talks with Carl Safina , naturalist, marine ecologist, and founding president of The Safina Center at Stony Brook University in New York , about the beauty and wonder of the natural world. Author of several books including “ Beyond Words: What Animals Think And Feel ” and, most recently, “ Becoming Wild: How Animal Cultures Raise Families, Create Beauty, and Achieve Peace ,” Safin...

Jonathan Bastian talks with Dr. Anna Lembke , director and chief of the Stanford Addiction Medicine Dual Diagnosis Clinic , about the role of dopamine in the brain. She also offers advice on keeping the pursuit of pleasure in check and maintaining balance and contentment, and discusses her New York Times bestseller “ Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence .” “We're living in an...

Clinical Psychologist Julia Rucklidge discusses the role of nutrition in treating and preventing mental health disorders. Author Michael Moss talks about how food is being designed to keep us wanting more. Get full access to Life Examined at lifeexamined.substack.com/subscribe

Jonathan Bastian talks with Kieran Setiya , professor of philosophy at Massachusetts Institute of Technology about some best practices when it comes to coping with pain, loneliness, loss, and failure. Setiya’s latest book is Life Is Hard: How Philosophy Can Help Us Find Our Way .  “Let's never stop acknowledging that life is hard, not in a bleak way, but I hope, in the end, a constructive way,” Se...

Philosopher Alain de Botton shares his thoughts on love and relationships. Psychologist Tracy Dennis-Tiwary explains why  anxiety is on the rise. Get full access to Life Examined at lifeexamined.substack.com/subscribe

Philosopher Will MacAskill argues that protecting the future of humanity is the moral priority of our time. Historian Tyrone McKinley Freeman explains philanthropy’s rich tradition within the African American community. Get full access to Life Examined at lifeexamined.substack.com/subscribe

Psychiatrist Wesley Boyd talks about the challenges of accessing mental health care. Writer Charlotte Cowles describes her own experience seeking therapy for the first time. Get full access to Life Examined at lifeexamined.substack.com/subscribe

Economist Russ Roberts discusses the challenges of using rationality when facing big life decisions. Entrepreneur Susannah Furr discusses navigating and thriving with uncertainty. Get full access to Life Examined at lifeexamined.substack.com/subscribe

Jonathan Bastian talks with cultural psychologist Batja Gomes de Mesquita , author of “ Between Us: How Culture Creates Emotions ” who makes the case that emotions are not innate but are rather shaped but our surroundings and cultures, made as we live our lives together. Later, Rosalind Picard , founder and director of the Affective Computing research group at the MIT Media Lab , explains how adva...

Jonathan Bastian talks with Daniel Bergner, contributing writer for the New York Times, about his brother’s struggle with bipolar disorder and how the search for a better understanding inspired his latest book, “ The Mind and the Moon: My Brother’s Story, the Science of Our Brains, and the Search for Our Psyches .” “The propulsion of the book is just acknowledging and dealing with that family fear...

Ed Yong explores the hidden realms and senses of the animal kingdom. David Peña-Guzmán discusses the dream world of animals and what goes on when they sleep. Get full access to Life Examined at lifeexamined.substack.com/subscribe

In the wake of the pandemic, there is much to be done to restore human connectivity, but loneliness is hardly a new phenomena. Long periods of isolated living in an increasingly virtual world is taking a toll on our health.  Get full access to Life Examined at lifeexamined.substack.com/subscribe

Jonathan Bastian talks with philosopher Kieran Setiya , author of “Midlife: A Philosophical Guide”   about the meaning and feeling of hitting midlife and how philosophy helped provide answers to Setiya’s own anxieties and perceived failures. Later, Geoff Dyer, author of “The Last Days of Roger Federer And Other Endings” examines what it means to give up something you love and why last works and be...

Jonathan Bastian talks with Sam Knight , staff writer for the new Yorker, about his latest book, “ The Premonitions Bureau: A True Account of Death Foretold. ” Knight tells the true story of British psychiatrist John Barker, who after learning that several people had predicted the 1966 Aberfan disaster in Wales, became convinced that premonitions and the ability to see into the future were real. “...

On this week’s Life Examined, we’re teaming up with KCRW’s Bodies podcast . In “ Do Less Harm ,” the second episode of the new season, producer Hannah Harris Green travels to West Virginia, where despite government push back, activists are handing out clean needles and the opioid overdose medication Narcan. Host Jonathan Bastian talks with Green and Bodies creator and host Allison Behringer about...

Jonathan Bastian talks with Robert Macfarlane , fellow at Emmanuel College at Cambridge University , about his love of the mountains and his latest fascination with the subterranean world, which is the subject of his latest book, “ Underland: A Deep Time Journey .”  “I'm fascinated by where matter meets metaphor,” Macfarlane says. “The underworld is … this unbiddable, scarcely known, deep ground t...

Cathy O’Neil talks about the increase and profiteering in public shaming. Siva Vaidhyanathan asks whether shame is an effective tool against racism and to promote social justice. Get full access to Life Examined at lifeexamined.substack.com/subscribe

Primatologist Frans de Waal examines the significance of biology and culture on gendered behavior, and neuroscientist Lise Eliot debunks the theory that the male and female brains are different. Get full access to Life Examined at lifeexamined.substack.com/subscribe

Jonathan Bastian talks with Clive Wynne , psychologist and founder of the Canine Science Collaboratory at Arizona State University , about the science behind studying dogs and what makes them so unique. Wynne, also the author of “ Dog is Love: Why and How Your Dog Loves You ,” says that, “dogs, like ourselves, have a capacity, drive, and desire to have strong emotional bonds with members of other...

Jonathan Bastian talks with Tracy Dennis-Tiwary , professor of psychology and neuroscience and director of the Emotion Regulation Lab at Hunter College , about the anxiety epidemic and her book “ Future Tense; Why Anxiety Is Good for You (Even Though It Feels Bad) .” “Anxiety is a feature of being human,” Dennis-Tiwary says. “It’s not a bug, it's not a malfunction. We can learn and work through it...

Jonathan Bastian talks with Steve Leder, the senior Rabbi of Wilshire Boulevard Temple in Los Angeles about tragedy, grief, and the loss of a child in the aftermath of the massacre in Uvalde, Texas. Rabbi Leder also discusses his new book “ For You When I Am Gone: Twelve Essential Questions to Tell a Life Story ,” the legacy we leave behind when we die, and the writing of an “ethical will.” Delve...

For hundreds of years, doctors and scientists have grappled with  understanding schizophrenia. It’s a mysterious mental illness characterized by delusions, hallucinations, paranoia, and disorganized speech. Understanding what caused the condition remained rudimentary, and there was a period when therapists blamed parents, and especially mothers, for contributing to the condition. KCRW hears the he...

Jonathan Bastian talks with writer, lecturer, and author Susan Cain about the sweet joy of sadness. Cain, author of “ Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole ,” reflects on the touch of sweetness that comes from sadness and despair and shares how a greater acceptance of these emotions can be beneficial and even therapeutic. Delve deeper into life, philosophy, and what makes us human by j...