KQED's Forum

Have you ever wondered why you keep forgetting where you put your keys? Or the name of a stranger you met at a party? It’s easy to dwell on our everyday forgetfulness, especially as we get older. But for UC Davis neuroscientist and psychologist Dr. Charan Ranganath, the more important question is “why do we remember?” He says that brains have evolved to deprioritize unimportant things in favor of...

In this era of dramatic videos of smash and grab robberies going viral and drug stores locking up many of their shelves, retail theft is getting a lot of attention. Police departments are making fewer arrests and solving fewer property crimes. Are shoplifting and “smash and grabs” really on the rise, or are we just noticing them more? Either way there is a growing movement to crack down on thieves...

Enlistment in the U.S. military has been in continuous decline since its peak during the Vietnam War. Evolving societal attitudes towards military service, as well as demographic shifts and competition from the private sector have drawn many young people away from serving. One major hurdle is the diminishing pool of eligible candidates, with factors such as obesity rates, educational requirements...

Three of five seats on the Napa County Board of Supervisors are up for grabs this year. The results could have major implications in a county known worldwide for its wine industry. The winning candidates will have to tackle controversial issues such as how and where agriculture can expand in the county, how to support the workforce, and how to protect the environment amid demand for housing and co...

When Elon Musk bought Twitter in 2022, he envisioned remaking the company into what he thought should be a “free speech platform.” What ensued was chaos, mass firings and a steep decline in advertising revenue for the already financially struggling company. In her new book “Extremely Hardcore,” Zoe Schiffer tracks Musk’s takeover of the platform, now known as X, and its effects on those who worked...

According to relationship experts, Drs. Julie and John Gottman, it is perfectly OK to go to bed angry. Sometimes a couple needs time to calm down and reset. As they note, “Fights can get intense and messy…We get hijacked by our emotions, our pasts, our old hurts. But if you can get at what’s underneath, there’s so much compassion and understanding.” In their latest book, “Fight Right,” the Gottman...

Grass-roots groups like Moms for Liberty have turned school boards into battlegrounds in California and nationwide, fighting for control over kids’ classroom discussions and reading materials – often at the expense of marginalized communities. But is this a new battle, or the latest in a line of conservative parenting movements? We talk with journalists and historians about previous education show...

San Jose, the Bay Area’s largest city, grew at the peak of car-heavy, sprawling urban planning. Most of its nearly one million residents live in single-family homes. These days, many California cities are looking for ways to concentrate more residents near transit to reduce carbon emissions, improve livability and address the Bay Area’s housing crisis. But even with the best intentions and a new m...

Cold water therapy has been around for a long time, as part of spiritual traditions and physical recovery programs for athletes. But a commercialized version known as “cold plunging” has become the latest wellness craze. Enthusiasts who embrace it as a daily practice say it has benefits ranging from boosting immunity to combating depression and improving sleep. But are these claims backed by scien...

According to a recent report from GoFundMe, the site has raised $30 billion, since 2010, for fundraising campaigns around the world. Crowdfunding, as a concept, is not new. One of the first crowdfunders was an 1885 appeal to pay for the base of the Statue of Liberty, resulting in thousands of donations, some just mere pennies. Today, donors can help pay for disaster relief, medical treatments, cla...

“A little more than 10 years ago, I began looking back at the diaries I had kept over the previous decade. I wondered if I’d changed. So I loaded all 500,000 words of my journals into Excel to order the sentences alphabetically.” That’s how author Sheila Heti describes the origins of the decade-long project that would become her latest book, “Alphabetical Diaries.” When she reviewed those sentence...

Oakland’s Brontez Purnell is so many things. As he writes in “Ten Bridges I’ve Burnt,” his new memoir in verse, “I am a troubled Negro youth in his 40s neglecting self care.” He’s also the frontman for the punk band the Younger Lovers, a dancer, a performance artist, a queer zine-maker, the author of the critically acclaimed “100 Boyfriends,” as well as a raconteur and truth seeker. He joins us to...

The Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on whether Colorado can keep former President Trump off of the state primary ballot for his actions on January 6. Meanwhile, Trump faces 91 felony counts across multiple jurisdictions in cases involving election subversion, hush money payments and the illegal handling of classified documents. We’ll talk about the legal and political implications of it all...

Sonoma County’s airport, jail, and social services office, among other county services, are suffering from severe understaffing. According to a six-month investigative report by Sonoma’s Press-Democrat, vacancy rates for key county positions range from 25% to 41%. Burnout, turnover and early retirements are contributing to the crisis. Meanwhile, frustrated county residents seeking assistance face...

Last year, more than 20 states considered or approved legislation to limit or ban diversity, equity and inclusion programs in higher education. These efforts, supported by a network of activists, political groups and Republican operatives, are centered at the Claremont Institute, a conservative California-based think tank with ties to the Trump movement. New York Times investigative reporter Nicho...

The 49ers faithful are gearing up for another Super Bowl appearance facing the Kansas City Chiefs – a rematch from 2019 when the Chiefs won. The stakes are high for San Francisco which hasn’t claimed a Super Bowl win in 29 years. Meanwhile, Kansas City wants to clinch dynasty status with a third victory in five years. And, somehow amid all the usual talk of strategy and quarterbacks, pop princess...

There’s only one proposition on California’s March 2024 ballot, but it deals with some of the state’s biggest challenges: homelessness, substance abuse, and mental health. Proposition 1, backed by Governor Gavin Newsom, is a two-part measure: It asks voters to approve nearly $6.4 billion to increase mental health and substance abuse services and build supportive housing. It also makes big changes...

The human longing for connection – to be heard and understood – is what Rabbi Sharon Brous calls the “amen effect.” It’s the idea that we can awaken our shared humanity when we learn to talk across differences with curiosity and empathy. Rabbi Brous has for decades been ministering to members of IKAR, shepherding the Los Angeles Jewish community she co-founded as they navigate celebration and sorr...

In many Asian families, the highest compliment you can offer a dessert is, “it’s not too sweet!” Bringing in flavor profiles from Asian cultures like pandan leaves, black sesame, and ube, bakers around the Bay are reimagining Asian- American dessert offerings. There’s choux pastry covered in almond crunch and filled with durian cream or a thumbprint cookie with an umeboshi plum center. On the next...

The United States is in the middle of a massive modernization effort of its nuclear weapons, as tensions rise globally, from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to expanding arsenals in China and North Korea. Journalist Sarah Scoles set out to understand the U.S.’s biggest reinvestment in its atomic infrastructure in decades by talking with the people who work on them daily, scientists at nuclear labs. I...

Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price was elected into office in 2022 on a reform platform to root out racial and socioeconomic disparities in the county justice system and end mass incarceration. But as Oakland contends with a surge in crime and as brazen robberies and assaults shake residents, Price has become the target of a well-funded recall campaign from those who say criminals are e...

“The vibes around the return to office are not good,” says the New York Times’ Emma Goldberg, a business reporter covering workplace culture. Tens of millions of Americans — one-fourth of the workforce — are in hybrid work limbo four years after the pandemic’s onset. Across white-collar sectors, the expectations around how often workers are in-office vary workplace by workplace and even team by te...

Hundreds of thousands of people lost power in the Bay Area, streets were flooded and trees were uprooted, crushing houses and cars as winds gusts reached as high as over 100 mph in Sunday’s storm. But some of the most feared impacts, such as flooding from the Guadalupe River in San Jose, didn’t happen. We check in on how the Bay Area fared in the storm. Guests: Ezra David Romero, climate reporter,...

More and more TV households are cutting the cord and moving to streaming. In 2023 alone, pay-TV providers lost more than 5 million subscribers. But now that streaming companies have a robust subscriber base, rates are rising and commercials are making their way back into programming. Historian Kathryn Cramer Brownell says that when cable companies tried similar tactics in the 1980s, the government...

On a visit to her grandmother’s house, journalist Maya Lin Sugarman unexpectedly discovered a trove of screenplays written by her uncle Galen. She was shocked to learn that one of the screenplays was turned into a gangster movie starring Rob Lowe, and even more shocked to learn that it was based on Galen’s real life experiences as a young gang member in Oakland’s Chinatown. Maya’s podcast “Magnifi...