Commonwealth Club Of California Podcast

The past three years of the pandemic and the widespread practice of working from home have had a huge impact on our cities, businesses, individuals, and real estate of all types around the world. What will the future look like when considering long-term trends in population, employment, office attendance, housing prices, and other factors? Join us for a special presentation featuring the results of a new McKinsey Global Institute (MGI) report, "Empty spaces and hybrid places: The pandemic’s lasting impact on real estate." MGI Director Jonathan Woetzel will take the lead in a discussion of the report's findings and implications, such as the ripple effects of hybrid work on the way we live, work, and shop; the resulting impact on demand for office, residential, and retail space in cities; and how urban stakeholders can adapt to the new reality. He will be joined by Peter Calthorpe, urban design and planning principal at HDR. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When Joe Biden took his oath of office, the trajectory of his presidency—and the fate of our nation—remained unknown. Thousands of Americans were still sick with COVID, former presidents and first ladies sat masked on the balcony of the Capitol building—while Biden’s predecessor was notably absent. Just two weeks prior, the same building was under siege by a group of insurrectionists who sought to overturn the results of the 2020 election. On top of it all, suffering from the many unforeseen consequences of the pandemic, the American economy faced a looming economic crisis.  As a staff writer for The Atlantic, Franklin Foer had exclusive access to Biden and his inner circle. Foer revisits the challenging and consequential formative years of the Biden presidency from an insider’s perspective in his forthcoming book, The Last Politician. Join us for a conversation with one of our nation’s leading political journalists as we cover topics ranging from the withdrawal of the last troops from Afghanistan, to the war

Congressman Ro Khanna has made a name for himself as a pragmatic progressive and critic of Big Oil. He grilled oil company CEOs under oath and helped negotiate with Senator Joe Manchin to keep climate policy in the Inflation Reduction Act, the biggest piece of climate legislation ever passed in the United States. Despite being one of the more progressive voters in Congress, Khanna has a reputation for coalition building; he got more bills passed than any other Democrat during the previous administration. Now that Republicans control the House of Representatives and are looking to claw back climate provisions of the IRA, what levers can he still pull to address the climate crisis?  Guest: Ro Khanna, U.S. Congressman For show notes and related links, visit our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are you one in a million? One in a billion? What if an app could pick you out of a crowd based on your face alone?  New York Times tech reporter Kashmir Hill was skeptical when she got a tip about a mysterious app called Clearview AI that claimed it could, with 99 percent accuracy, identify anyone based on just one snapshot of their face. The app could supposedly scan a face and, in just seconds, surface every detail of a person’s online life: their name, social media profiles, friends and family members, home address, and photos that they might not have even known existed. If it was everything it claimed to be, it would be the ultimate surveillance tool, and it would open the door to everything from stalking to totalitarian state control. Could it be true? Hill tracked the improbable rise of Clearview AI and its astounding collection of billions of faces from the internet. Google and Facebook decided that a tool to identify strangers was too radical to release, but Clearview forged ahead, sharing the app wit

Who is the most successful woman ever to compete on "Jeopardy"? Amy Schneider’s impressive 40-game winning streak was accompanied by an even greater prize—the joy of being herself on national television and blazing a trail for openly queer and transgender people around the world. Her new memoir, In the Form of a Question: The Joys and Rewards of a Curious Life explores some of the innumerable topics that have fascinated Amy throughout her life—books and music, Tarot and astrology, popular culture and computers, sex and relationships—but they all share the same purpose: to illustrate, and celebrate, the results of a lifetime spent asking, why? Join Amy as she returns to The Commonwealth Club and shares her singular journey that led to becoming an unlikely icon and hero to millions.  NOTES This program is part of our Good Lit series, underwritten by the Bernard Osher Foundation. See more  Michelle Meow Show programs at The Commonwealth Club of California. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adc

Jane Fonda has spent the last several decades fighting for Indigenous peoples' rights, economic justice, LGBTQ rights, peace, gender equality and more. Now, she is devoting herself to the climate emergency, beginning with Fire Drill Fridays, the national movement to protest government inaction on climate change she started in October 2019. Now, through the Jane Fonda Climate PAC, she is focused on defeating political allies of the fossil fuel industry. At 85, Fonda continues to fight for the most vulnerable among us, consistently pointing out the intersection between the myriad of causes. What keeps the iconic Jane Fonda going strong? Guest: Jane Fonda, actor, activist For show notes and related links, visit https://www.climateone.org/audio/jane-fonda-lifetime-activism Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Feel like you are always running out of time? What would you do differently with an extra 25 years of longevity to build a fulfilled life?  Please join us for a conversation on making the most of our increased longevity and designing lives with greater well-being, meaning and purpose. Dr. Laura Carstensen and Mark T. Johnsen will touch on the multiple facets of building a wealthier life with increased life spans. Health—align health spans to life spans: One-hundred-year lives are quickly becoming commonplace, but healthy long lives require us to consider what we should be doing at all life stages to promote well-being.  Career—working more flexible years to provide well-being beyond just financial stability: Having a fulfilling career helps give us a sense of purpose but can also be taxing on us in this fast-paced world, particularly when we have so many obligations to our families, friends and communities. How should we be thinking of education and work in order to foster meaningful and healthy career spans?

The climate crisis can be difficult to cover in a way that most people can relate to. The mechanism of harm goes from a person's gas car or stove to the Earth's atmosphere and back again in the form of floods and fires. That's why true stories of individuals and families experiencing the fallout of the climate crisis can be so impactful. They help us relate to each other on a more direct level, the way humans naturally do: person to person. Covering Climate Now Journalism Award winners Naomi Klein and Carolyn Beeler bring those stories to light.  This episode was produced in collaboration with Covering Climate Now. Guests:  Carolyn Beeler, Environment Reporter, Editor, The World Naomi Klein, author, social activist For show notes and related links, visit https://www.climateone.org/audio/naomi-klein-and-carolyn-beeler-covering-big-ideas-and-personal-stories Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Bay Lights by artist Leo Villareal first went live on March 5, 2013. Exactly one decade later, the beloved artwork went dark. Ben Davis is the driving force behind The Bay Lights and the effort to bring the artwork back with twice the number of LEDs in a radically accessible new configuration. With the project 75 percent funded—and $2.5 million more needed to proceed—Davis will reveal what's next for the historic effort: organizational vulnerability.  Davis is the founder and leader of Illuminate, the art nonprofit behind many of San Francisco's large-scale and iconic public artworks, including lighting The Pink Triangle on Twin Peaks, activation of the Golden Mile on JFK Promenade, the Summer of Love lighting on the Conservatory of Flowers, Grace Light in Grace Cathedral, the revival of the Golden Gate Bandshell, and the series of giant laser art installations across San Francisco this summer.  Davis will also talk about his vision for San Francisco as the City of Awe.  The program talk will be followed

Fourteen years after receiving its permit, the nation’s first new nuclear reactors in decades just fired up in Georgia. Massive, traditional nuclear reactors like this have faced so many cost overruns and construction delays that the investment market for them all but vanished. Despite a handful of recent technical breakthroughs in fusion power, its promise of virtually limitless power remains just a promise. But could a new wave of small, modular fission reactors bring new carbon-free power onto the market faster and cheaper (and safer?) than traditional nuclear plants in time to help the world decarbonize? Guests: Melissa Lott, Senior Research Scholar and the Senior Director of Research at the Center on Global Energy Policy, Columbia University Jacopo Buongiorno, TEPCO Professor of Nuclear Science and Engineering, MIT  Allison MacFarlane, Director of the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs, University of British Columbia; Former Chair, Nuclear Regulatory Commission For show notes and related links,

In recent years, political and social turbulence have given rise to a new urgency around civics education in the United States. Civic leaders, educators and politicians across the ideological spectrum claim that reviving civics in schools will compensate for decades of neglect and ensure the future of our fragile democracy. But more civics learning doesn’t necessarily mean better civics learning. Even when civics is taught, it is typically relegated to history-social science classes, isolating it from core subjects and offering students limited support to help them understand and act on the real-world issues they see and experience in their everyday lives. "Civics Across the Curriculum" brings together a panel of educators whose teaching and research offer new possibilities for making civics education relevant and impactful. Rather than treating it as a discrete content area, they use disciplines as varied as math, literature and gender studies to help students investigate and reason about complex civic issue

Join us for a discussion with journalist Katie Hafner, who covers scientific advances, especially those by women, and her husband, Dr. Robert Wachter of UCSF, who is on the forefront of the digital transformation of health care and has been influential in advancing public understanding of the COVID crisis. Dr. Wachter coined the term “hospitalist” in 1996 and has overseen that medical specialty, the fastest growing specialty in modern medical history. His tweets on COVID-19 have been a trusted source of information on the clinical, public health, and policy issues surrounding the pandemic, garnering more than 500 million views. Hafner and Wachter are at the center of advancing public understanding of science and health care through various media. We will discuss Hafner’s popular "Lost Women of Science" podcast, her groundbreaking nonfiction books, and her recent switch to fiction with The Boys. We’ll also discuss Dr. Wachter’s perspective on COVID—including lessons learned—as we enter a new phase of the pande

Since the industrial revolution, the global north has seen massive economic growth. Yet that growth has been linked to increasing greenhouse gas emissions. We also live on a planet with finite resources, so it's hard to believe that we can continue to consume resources and release emissions and not sail right past our collective climate goals. That’s why some people are starting to rethink perpetual economic growth as the best measure of a healthy economy. But what would an economy focused on metrics other than growth look like?   Guests:  Anuna De Wever, Climate and Social Justice activist Leigh Phillips, journalist and author of Austerity Ecology & The Collapse-Porn Addicts Marieke van Doorninck, Director, Kennisland, former Deputy Mayor, Amsterdam For show notes and related links, visit https://www.climateone.org/audio/rethinking-economic-growth-wealth-and-health Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Famed astronomer Avi Loeb returns to The Commonwealth Club to answer some of the biggest questions facing humankind: How do we prepare ourselves for interaction with interstellar extraterrestrial life? And can our species itself become interstellar? Loeb, the longest-serving chair of Harvard's Astronomy Department, shook the scientific community when he theorized that our solar system had been visited by a piece of advanced alien technology from a distant star. The object, dubbed 'Oumuamua, sparked worldwide discussions and arguments, and Loeb was at the center of it all.  Now, in his new book Interstellar, Loeb builds on that original idea and asks, What's next? He gives a call to arms that reimagines the idea of contact with extraterrestrial civilizations. Dismantling our science-fiction-fueled visions of a human and alien life encounter, he provides a blueprint for how such an interaction might actually occur, resetting our cultural understanding and expectation of what it means to identify an extraterrest

Summer's over and fall is about to begin. Come on out to our beautiful headquarters on San Francisco's waterfront for an end-of-summer Week to Week political roundtable! At Week to Week, we're dedicated to the lively and informed discussion of politics—with a good sense of humor—as a platform for healthy involvement in the issues that drive our society. The Commonwealth Club's Week to Week Political Roundtable and social hour, now in its 12th year, will take a look at the politics of the day—the issues, the people, and the trends affecting our political world. Come early before the program and enjoy some wine and snacks with others, then grab a seat in the auditorium to hear our panel of political experts discuss the latest developments with knowledge, civility and humor. NOTES See other upcoming Week to Week political roundtables, as well as audio and video of past Week to Week programs. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today’s world, the acceleration of megatrends—increasing longevity and the explosion of technology, among many others—is transforming life as we know it. Leading sociologist and business economist Mauro F. Guillén explains that a new postgenerational workforce known as “perennials”—individuals who are not pitted against each other either by their age or experience—will level the playing field so everyone has a chance at living a rewarding life. He argues that outmoded terms like Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z have long been used to pigeonhole us into rigid categories and life stages that artificially prevent people from reaching their full potential. Join us as Guillén reveals how this generational revolution will impact young people just entering the workforce as well as those who are living and working longer. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stories are the way we remember, the way we share knowledge, the way we play out possible outcomes. Climate fiction imagines dark or bright futures depending on how we address the climate crisis. And there’s a healthy debate about what kind of stories move more people to act: dark tales of a scary climate future or positive versions of a greener, more just world. “I think that if you want to create change in a democratic society, people have to believe that there is actually a threat,” says author Paolo Bacigalupi. Telling inclusive fictional stories of climate realities can also help us process the disruptions our world is experiencing, explore avenues for solutions, and become inspired to take our own form of action.  Guests: Paolo Bacigalupi, author, “The Water Knife”  Denise Baden, Green Stories Project; Professor of Sustainable Business at the University of Southampton; author, “Habitat Man” Tory Stephens, Climate Fiction Creative Manager, Grist This episode also features an excerpt of the audio recordin

Two eclipses of the sun are coming to North America during the 2023–24 school year—an annular (“ring of fire”) eclipse on October 14, 2023 and a total eclipse on April 8, 2024. People in two narrow paths will have the full eclipse experience each time. Everyone else (an estimated 500 million people, including all of us in the Bay Area) will see a nice partial eclipse, where the moon covers a good part of the sun. Dr. Andrew Fraknoi will describe how eclipses come to be (and why they are total only on Earth), what scientists learn during eclipses, exactly when and where the eclipses of 2023 and 2024 will be best visible, and how to observe the eclipses and the sun safely.  MLF ORGANIZER George Hammond NOTES A Humanities Member-led Forum program. Forums at the Club are organized and run by volunteer programmers who are members of The Commonwealth Club, and they cover a diverse range of topics. Learn more about our Forums. In Association with Wonderfest. Everyone who attends this program in person will receive a

As the build out of infrastructure for electric passenger vehicles gets underway, another segment of transportation is just starting down the road to electrification: heavy duty trucks. It’s one of the hard-to-decarbonize parts of our economy. Right now, nearly all long-haul trucks run on fossil fuels. And if we continue with business as usual, freight will become the highest-emitting part of the transportation sector by 2050. That’s why seven states, led by California, have mandated that an increasing number of zero-emission trucks be sold between now and 2035. What does the road to zero emissions trucking look like?  Guests:  Ray Minjares, Heavy-Duty Vehicles Program Director, International Council on Clean Transportation  Mike Roeth, Executive Director, North American Council for Freight Efficiency Chris Shimoda, Senior Vice President, California Trucking Association Adam Browning, Executive VP, Forum Mobility Rudy Diaz, CEO, Hight Logistics This episode features a freelance piece from Emily Cohen in Wyom

Michelle Meow will sit down with American actress and transgender activist Shakina, to discuss the current state and future of the transgender arts and how we can uplift and support their community.  Join us for this free program in Palo Alto! This program is part of a collaboration with TheatreWorks New Works Festival: Songs and Stories with Shakina. Please visit https://theatreworks.org/new-works/nwf/shakina/to find out more about how to participate in other events after this program has concluded.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices