ON CRISPR: The Story of Jennifer Doudna with Walter Isaacson

Here's a great episode from another show on Kaleidoscope's network, What Could Go Right?  What happens when our biological need for certainty clashes with an increasingly unpredictable world? Simone Stolzoff, author of How to Not Know, joins host Zachary Karabell to discuss why our modern intolerance for uncertainty is fueling a global anxiety crisis. Rather than seeing the unknown as a threa...

What if someone told you that you could skip years of therapy with a few mental tricks? It sounded impossible… until we found Neuro-Linguistic Programming. NLP is a form of hypnosis beloved by everyone from sex cults to the U.S. military to fortune 500 companies–yet almost no one knows it exists.  Long before she co-founded NXIVM, hypnotist Nancy Salzman encountered NLP as a radi...

In the four years since the book’s publication, CRISPR has revolutionized the world of medical treatments and possibilities. But our world has changed drastically, too. As AI’s impact grows, U.S scientists are facing funding cuts like never before. For our final episode, we bring you a live conversation between Walter Isaacson and Jennifer Doudna at the New Orleans Book Festival. In he...

As the gene editing field kept growing, so did the dangers. Back in 2018, Jennifer Doudna received an email from a Chinese scientist claiming that he had genetically edited two twin babies. The news reverberated across the world and made Doudna and her colleagues urgently consider the implications of what their discovery could mean for humanity.  Walter Isaacson sits down with Evan and tells...

Jennifer Doudna thought she had won the race. She thought she had beaten out all scientific competitors when she and her co-author had shocked the world with their groundbreaking technology for gene editing. But turned out, the race had just gotten fiercer.  Walter Isaacson sits down with Evan to talk about how one of the most cutthroat scientific competitions in biotech got started around on...

Back in the 1990s, a young microbiologist in Alicante, Spain became obsessed with a strange pattern he observed in the genes of tiny organisms — a series of inexplicable clusters. And he wasn’t alone. All around the world, a network of scientists were growing curious as to what these genetic knots could be and all of their potential functions. Their curiosity would prove to be the foun...

Earlier this year, when the world learned the news of baby KJ successfully undergoing the first personalized genetic treatment, it represented a milestone for researchers and patients. But behind this scientific feat there’s the story of the technology that made it possible, CRISPR, and one of the key pioneers behind it — Jennifer Doudna.  Evan sits down with Walter Isaacson to un...

Walter Isaacson - bestselling biographer behind Musk, Einstein and Steve Jobs - in conversation with Evan Ratliff brings you behind the scenes of The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race. The story of the third great technological revolution in modern times.   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this final episode of our series, host Evan Ratliff and biographer Walter Isaacson discuss Benjamin Franklin's remarkable late-in-life achievements-- from his last anonymous essay, to the way he empowered George Washington, to his evolution on slavery, to the beautiful way Philadelphia mourned its favorite son... oh, and they discuss Ben Franklin's favorite magic trick, too!    See omnystudio.c...

After retiring at the age of 42, Ben Franklin immersed himself in politics, taking on enormous diplomatic challenges on behalf of Pennsylvania and the colonies. In this episode, we dive into Franklin the talented statesman-- a man who emerged from his mission in England with a taste for revenge, charmed the French into supporting a burgeoning nation, and somehow found time to get involved in every...

Few people remember that Benjamin Franklin was America’s wealthiest self-made man. After being denied a formal education and then indentured to his own brother, he launched America's first media empire. But while Franklin could be a ruthless businessman, he was out for more than himself—he knew his success was predicated on a strong middle class, a new, American idea. So he started civic ventures...

From writing under pen names in the newspaper as a teenager, to the Poor Richard maxims we all know, to the autobiography he created to show the path toward American virtues, Ben Franklin literally wrote the books on what it means to be American. But how close was the real Ben Franklin to the character he created?  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

From Walter Isaacson– the bestselling biographer behind Musk , Einstein and Steve Jobs – and journalist Evan Ratliff ( Shell Games , Longform ) comes a revealing look into the life of Ben Franklin, and how his genius shaped America.  In this first episode of five, we dive into the way Franklin's scientific curiosity laid the groundwork for his approach to democracy, and how his thirst for innovati...

Introducing ON Benjamin Franklin with Walter Isaacson - an intimate behind the scenes interview to understand Benjamin Franklin’s remarkable life. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Which of Musk’s efforts will mark his legacy? Will it be Starship and his work bringing Americans back into orbit, or will it be X and his amplifications of the worst of humanity? Isaacson wrestles with his time in Silicon Valley, and relays a comparison of Jobs and Musk that’s sure to stay with you.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Be a storyteller, not a preacher. That was novelist Walker Percy’s legendary advice to a young Walter Isaacson. One he takes to heart in his work as a journalist at Time and CNN , and as a biographer of creative genius across the centuries—and in trying to capture someone as volatile as Elon Musk. He reflects on the challenges of holding the complexity of a character in his mind—and the minds of r...

What kind of titan of industry has a "giddy mode"? Or a "demon mode"? The two aspects of Musk’s personality are forces that drive his choices and behavior at work—and vectors Isaacson finds critical to understanding how Musk operates. From ripping out servers on Christmas Eve on a whim to buying Twitter against better wisdom, and reaming out staff members left right and center, we stare into the d...

Space travel, electric vehicles, future-powering batteries—the ability to push technology forward and to bring it into the world in a real way is without a doubt the best of Elon Musk. In his 600 page biography, Walter Isaacson chronicles a man with superlative engineering skills, but who “doesn’t have a fingertip feel for social emotional networks.” On this first of four episodes, Isaacson shares...

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.