Bioneers: Revolution From the Heart of Nature
520 episodes - English - Latest episode: 10 days ago - ★★★★★ - 180 ratingsThe Bioneers: Revolution from the Heart of Nature is an award-winning series featuring breakthrough solutions for people and planet. The greatest social and scientific innovators of our time celebrate the genius of nature and human ingenuity. The kaleidoscopic scope covers biomimicry, ecological design, social and racial justice, women’s leadership, ecological medicine, indigenous knowledge, spirituality and psychology. It’s leading-edge, hopeful, charismatic, provocative, timely and timeless – like nothing you’ve heard before.
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Episodes
Psychedelic Empowerment and the Environmental Crisis: Re-Awakening Our Connection to the Gaian Mind
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 32 minutesThe late Terence McKenna was one of the most extraordinary personalities ever associated with visionary plants. One of the most gifted orators of the late 20th Century, he was a fascinatingly paradoxical figure: an absolutely charming but somewhat misanthropic mystic, a blindingly erudite genius who never achieved mainstream recognition, and a down-to-earth guy who advanced a range of astonishing prophetic scenarios. He brought verve and excitement to this field, and, since his tragic death i...
Climate Strategies from the Ground Up | Eriel Deranger, Adrianna Quintero, Annie Leonard, Christiana Wyly, and Osprey Orielle Lake
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourFour extraordinary women leaders share their perspectives on how to break through the stalemates that impede progress to build a world in which we can all thrive. They work in different spaces – from challenging governments and corporations to defending Indigenous people’s rights, education reform, movement building and investing in green businesses. With: Eriel Deranger, Communications Manager of the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation; Adrianna Quintero, Senior Attorney with the Natural Resour...
Climate Intensive – Natural Systems And Working Lands
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 58 minutesClimate change is showing us over and over again that nature bats last. The carbon sequestration potential of natural systems and managed agricultural landscapes is vast, representing nearly one third of the greenhouse gas emissions reductions we need to see. Transforming our food system represents another huge opportunity to reduce our overall greenhouse gas output. The real question is: how we can act on all this potential? Featuring: Greg Watson, Director of Policy and Systems Design, Schu...
Becoming Fully Human: The Covenant of the Original Instructions | Winona LaDuke, John Trudell and Evon Peter
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesThe Original Instructions represent the ancient empirical wisdom of Traditional Ecological Knowledge earned over generations and millennia by people living closely with the land and each other. They also comprise disarmingly simple counsel: be thankful, enjoy life and attend to the inner pollution that results in outer pollution. Indigenous leaders Winona LaDuke, John Trudell and Evon Peter voice these ancient instructions, which hold the keys to our survival as a species in the historic tran...
Honoring the Heritage of Black Farmers: On the Land | J.L. Chestnut
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 28 minutesBlack farmers have been leaving the land at three and a half times the rate of other farmers. It turns out that this loss of black farmers is due less to farming policies and practices than it is to generations of institutional racism. Civil Rights attorney J.L. Chestnut, in a brilliant and emotional speech, tells the story of the successful historic litigation against the USDA on behalf of these farmers.
Connecting the Drops: Restoring Ecology and Social Ecology in Los Angeles | Andy Lipkis
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesCould Los Angeles stop draining water from the Colorado River and the Sacramento Delta to become self-sufficient? That's a question that Andy Lipkis and his organization Tree People are tackling in an unprecedented alliance with public works agencies. Their work proves that the more we learn about how ecosystems operate, the more sustainably we can design our cities.
A Fantastic Object: Social Capitalism and the United States of Europe | Steven Hill
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutes“And so, the idea was how do you harness this capitalist engine to create a more broadly shared prosperity? And once they decided to do that, then they said, well, what do we do with this wealth if we’re going to make it more broadly shared? Do we just have everyone make more income? And they said, no. It makes more sense; let’s think about what are the things that people need in their lives.” Despite suffering severe shocks from the 2008 global economic and banking crisis, nations of the Eur...
Conspiracy of Ancestors: The Indigeneity Essentials | Dr. Melissa Nelson
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutes"A worldview that understands indigeneity is a paradigm of regeneration, a worldview rooted in enduring values in what we call our original instructions, common themes of reciprocity, of gratitude, of responsibility, of generosity, of forgiveness, of humility, of courage, of sacrifice, and of course love. But these values are not just words, we need to live them." We’re all indigenous to planet Earth, but we’ve not been acting that way. Cultural ecologist, indigenous scholar and activist Dr. ...
An Oil Spill Runs Through It: Corporate Power and the Sliming of American Democracy...
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 28 minutesAn Oil Spill Runs Through It: Corporate Power and the Sliming of American Democracy | Jeff Clements, John Bonifaz, and Dr. Riki Ott
Intelligence in Nature: Coming Full Circle | Jeremy Narby
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesWhat do octopuses, bees, plants and slime molds have in common with human beings? For one thing, they exhibit the ability to solve problems and make decisions. Author and anthropologist Jeremy Narby reveals his astonishing research on the profound intelligence active throughout nature. After all, how could people be intelligent if the nature that created us were not even more intelligent?
"Four Changes" by Gary Snyder
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 35 minutesIn July 2016, Jack Loeffler recorded Gary Snyder reading his updated version of 'Four Changes' in his home. This recorded version was prepared for and included in a major exhibition held at the History Museum of New Mexico at the Palace of the Governors in Santa Fe. The exhibition was entitled 'Voices of Counterculture in the Southwest', and Snyder's rendering of 'Four Changes' aptly conveyed how deeply the counterculture movement helped nurture the emerging environmental movement. The impact...
Studying the Healing Potential Of Psychedelics
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourHosted by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). New research is providing a provocative look at the healing potential of certain psychedelic substances, possibly yielding a scientific foundation for re-evaluating public policies of prohibition and repression. With Ralph Metzner, consciousness explorer whose groundbreaking books include The Psychedelic Experience and Green Psychology; Rick Doblin, MAPS founder/President; and Valerie Mojeiko, a MAPS analyst of the he...
Bending Toward Justice: The Arc of Black Lives Matter
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesIn 2018, Patrisse Cullors, co-founder of Black Lives Matter shared a moving speech at a Bioneers Conference. Cullors is a performance artist and award-winning organizer from Los Angeles, and is one of the most effective and influential movement builders of our era. She was a key figure in the fight to force the creation of the first civilian oversight commission of the LA Sheriff’s Department, but is most widely known as one of the three original co-founders of Black Lives Matter and for her ...
Excerpt from Matthew Dillon of Seed Matters at Bioneers 2012
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 6 minutesShort excerpt from Matthew Dillon of Seed Matters at Bioneers 2012, on how grassroots seed saving is an important political act.
The Cutting Edge of Psychedelics Research | Kathleen Harrison, Ralph Metzner, Charles Grob, Mariavittoria Mangini, Ph.D., and Alicia Danforth
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourUntil recently, it has been very difficult to get approval for serious research into “mind-manifesting” plants and drugs. Leading figures in the field describe that potential and the status of current research. Hosted by Kat Harrison; with Ralph Metzner, Charles Grob, Mariavittoria Mangini, Ph.D., and Alicia Danforth.
Aligning Business with Biology: Breakthrough Eco-nomics | Amory Lovins & Jason Clay
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesBioneers are successfully employing the economics of nature to demonstrate how we can solve two of our most intractable environmental challenges: energy and agriculture. In a few decades, the U.S. can get completely off oil, as physicist Amory Lovins convincingly shows. Economist and anthropologist Jason Clay presents profitable examples of modeling nature's economics, from clean shrimp farms in Asia to healthy potatoes in Wisconsin.
Citizen Science: DIY Knowledge To and From the People
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourActivists, scientists and grassroots groups are leveraging new technology and collaborative networks to accurately monitor the quality of the environment, expose governmental and corporate abuses, and enable large-scale ecological research to understand the web of life in the age of climate disruption. Hosted by Teo Grossman, Bioneers Director of Strategic Network Initiatives. With: Severine v T Fleming, Farm Hack; Shannon Dosemagen, founder/President, New Orleans-based Public Laboratory for ...
Cultivating Dynamic Power, Catalyzing the Movement | J. Miakoda Taylor
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourWhat if we stop perceiving power and privilege as limited commodities? How do we collaborate in ways that generate dynamic power and create win-win strategies? Join J. Miakoda Taylor, Founding Director of Fierce Allies, in this interactive exploration.
Kimberlé Crenshaw on the Origins of the #SayHerName Campaign
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 11 minutesAt the Bioneers Conference in 2016, we spoke with visionary law professor and changemaker Kimberlé Crenshaw. A respected attorney, Crenshaw popularized the concept of intersectionality and was instrumental in the creation of the #SayHerName campaign to raise awareness about the many women and girls who are killed by the police.
Generation Green: Fulfilling the Promise of Jobs and Justice | Jerome Ringo and Billy Parish
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesClimate change. Energy crisis. Economic collapse. We live in a time of unprecedented global crisis and opportunity. There's a monumental amount of work to be done to make the transition to a restored world, yet young people are unemployed at astonishingly high rates. How can we unlock the green economic opportunities that will open the door to doing well by doing good for generation green and generations to come? Join Apollo Alliance president Jerome Ringo and clean energy leader Billy Parish...
Thanksgiving in the Cosmos: The Next Enlightenment |
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 28 minutesThe world has entered a period of radical creative destruction — of breakdown and breakthrough. The very fate of human civilization hangs in the balance. Where have we gone so wrong? Could it be our cosmology itself, our view of our place in the natural and cosmic order? As author Richard Tarnas observes, “World views create worlds.” Is a fundamental transformation of our civilization’s world view the gateway to our survival and flourishing as a species? In this Bioneers audio special, we tak...
Future Generations Are Screaming: The Clean Energy Climate Challenge | Susan Marshall, John Fogarty, Alec Loorz, and James Hansen
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourThe climate crisis is a crisis of governance and leadership. Will we move rapidly enough to realign our policies, politics and economy to stabilize the climate? Creative and innovative people from all walks of life are stepping forward to address the greatest challenge humanity has ever faced. Community organizers Susan Marshall and John Fogarty are taking power local. Youth advocate Alec Loorz is mobilizing young people worldwide for the defining issue of their lives. NASA's chief climatolog...
From Soap Operas to Avatars: Digital Diplomacy and Making Fiction into Fact | Rita J. King and Joshua S. Fouts
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesImagine this: A popular character on a Spanish-language soap opera resonates so deeply with viewers that they become empowered and educated about literacy. Avatars in the virtual world called Second Life enable people of all faiths to better understand and respect Islamic culture. Digital and media entrepreneur William Ryerson effectively uses innovative media for social change. Digital citizen diplomats Joshua S. Fouts and Rita J. King design virtual games that help foster vibrant community ...
Daughters of Thoreau: Not Too Well Behaved | Julia Butterfly Hill, Diane Wilson, and Terri Swearingen
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 28 minutesOn his deathbed Henry David Thoreau said his only regret was being too well behaved. Julia Butterfly Hill, Diane Wilson and Terri Swearingen, three of the most imaginative, inspiring and courageous direct action heroines of our era share their experiences and show us how courage and commitment can stop mountains from being moved.
Circles of Concern: The Secret Sauce of Social Movements | john a. powell and Manuel Pastor
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 27 minutesFrom nature’s viewpoint, people are one species. Categories such as race, class, nation, religion and even many gender roles are human constructs. Yet the world is riven by exploitation and violence driven by these perceived divisions at an epic moment of demographic change toward the U.S. becoming a majority minority nation. john a. powell, Director of U.C. Berkeley’s Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society, and Manuel Pastor, Director of the Program for Environmental and Regional Eq...
Shamanic Plant Messengers And The Fate Of The Earth
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourIn this fascinating conversation, author and anthropologist Wade Davis and ethnobotanist Kathleen Harrison delve into the fascinating human relationship to consciousness altering plants, delving into the use of coffee, cacao, peyote, ayahuasca, and psilocybin by ancient and contemporary peoples, and the relevance these relationships may have for current human predicaments.
The Green-Collar Economy: Jobs, Justice and Prosperity | Van Jones and Majora Carter
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesJust how dumb do they think we are? Who would believe that destroying the ecosystems on which all life depends, while dis-employing more and more people, is somehow good for the economy? But exactly that fiction of jobs versus the environment has been successfully marketed to us. Community organizers Van Jones and Majora Carter propose a radically simple solution for both environmental destruction and social inequality: Bring the rising green revolution to low-income, urban America.
Carbon Farming: Soil Not Oil
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourSequestering soil carbon is a critically important way to mitigate climate change. Hosted by John Roulac, founder and CEO of the groundbreaking organic superfood company, Nutiva. With: rancher John Wick, co-founder of the exemplary Marin Carbon Project, developing ways to increase durable carbon on his grazed grassland while increasing biodiversity and soil fertility and capturing the scientific data. Recorded Saturday, October 17, 2015 at the National Bioneers Conference in San Rafael, Calif...
Security by Design: Environmental Security is Homeland Security | Amory Lovins and David Orr
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutes"Three-quarters of our military expenditure is for forces whose primary mission is intervention in the Persian Gulf. If we got off the oil, we wouldn't need most of the forces we have, it would be a very different world, and I think a much safer as well as a fairer and richer one." The concept of national security is moving beyond bullets, bombs, soldiers and warcraft to encompass the country’s internal resilience, health and environmental sustainability. What’s needed, say two leading enviro...
Carbon, Climate, Food and Fiber | Rebecca Burgess, Ariel Greenwood and Guido Frosini
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 26 minutes“Our soils have a carbon debt. Our atmosphere is gushing with carbon. The carbon over our heads is literally in the wrong place.”… Rebecca Burgess The solution to climate change is under our feet. Rebecca Burgess, of the Fibershed Project, explains how drawing carbon from the atmosphere and capturing it in the soil can reverse climate change. Rebecca, who is developing climate friendly local clothing production and carbon farming certification for her suppliers, is joined, in this excerpt fro...
Carbon, Climate, Food and Fiber | Rebecca Burgess, Ariel Greenwood and Guido Frosini
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 26 minutes“Our soils have a carbon debt. Our atmosphere is gushing with carbon. The carbon over our heads is literally in the wrong place.”… Rebecca Burgess The solution to climate change is under our feet. Rebecca Burgess, of the Fibershed Project, explains how drawing carbon from the atmosphere and capturing it in the soil can reverse climate change. Rebecca, who is developing climate friendly local clothing production and carbon farming certification for her suppliers, is joined, in this excerpt fro...
Green-Collar Justice: Another World Is Possible | Omar Freilla and Justin Green
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 28 minutesOne person's trash is another person's treasure, as the saying goes. Entrepreneur and activist Omar Freilla and "deconstruction" business owner Justin Green are solving for pattern: By working to eliminate waste, they are creating green collar jobs and improving the environment in some of the nation's most underserved communities.
Awakening the Genius in Everyone: When the Calling Keeps Calling | Michael Meade
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 27 minutesRenowned storyteller, performer, author, activist and scholar Michael Meade weaves threads of timeless wisdom traditions into myths for today’s global crisis. Meade says each of us is woven into the soul of the world, and we’re uniquely needed at this mythic moment to become active agents in the co-creation, re-creation and re-imagination of culture and nature.
Just Like A Woman: Nature, Chemicals and the Feminization of Science | Charlotte Brody
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesThere is a fundamental need to restore a female perspective to the male-dominated world of science. Is it any accident that the first person to sound the alarm about chemical pollution was Rachel Carson, a woman? These dangerous chemicals are “feminizing” all us critters by disrupting our hormone balances. How did we get here? And what can we do about it? Environmental health advocate Charlotte Brody suggests that female scientists, with a different way of seeing problems and solutions, may l...
Awakening the Genius in Everyone: When the Calling Keeps Calling | Michael Meade
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 27 minutesRenowned storyteller, performer, author, activist and scholar Michael Meade weaves threads of timeless wisdom traditions into myths for today’s global crisis. Meade says each of us is woven into the soul of the world, and we’re uniquely needed at this mythic moment to become active agents in the co-creation, re-creation and re-imagination of culture and nature.
The Healing Potential of Psychedelics: Breakthroughs in Research
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourAfter decades of the repression and demonization of these substances, research trials around the country have been achieving remarkable results that validate the profound healing potential of psychedelics such as psilocybin and MDMA. Mounting evidence suggests they positively address such varied conditions as end-of-life anxiety, PTSD, and cluster headaches. Hosted by J.P. Harpignies, Bioneers Conference Associate Producer. With: Robert Barnhart, filmmaker of A New Understanding: The Science ...
Formless Warriors: 21st Century Wisdom from Old-Growth Cultures | Enei Begaye, Dune Lankard and Hawk Rosales
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesFor thousands of years, First Peoples have successfully managed the complex reciprocal relationships between biological and human cultures using Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK). Yet no prior human civilization has ever faced the globalized ecological collapse occurring now. In the face of unprecedented pressures on their homelands and ways of life, indigenous leaders Enei Begaye, Dune Lankard, and Hawk Rosales are organizing in new ways to protect the environment--and spread their know...
Awakening Genius in Your Life | Michael Meade and John Densmore
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourIf people are to find creative ways of living together and healing both culture and nature, the awakening of individual genius may be the deepest and most imaginative way to approach the seemingly impossible tasks that face contemporary cultures. With: Michael Meade and John Densmore.
Genetic Engineering or Genetic Roulette? | Kenny Ausubel, Andrew Kimbrell & Luke Anderson
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 28 minutesWhat lies behind the fascination to tinker with the building blocks of life? Kenny Ausubel and Andrew Kimbrell shed light on the disturbing genetic engineering debate and activist Luke Anderson reports from the successful campaign that has derailed the spread of "biological pollution" in Great Britain and Europe.
A Sense of Wonder: Ecological Literacy and the Facts of Life | Fritjof Capra, Zenobia Barlow and Esther Cook
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesDoes our very survival now depend on our ability to understand the facts of life - nature's operating instructions - and how to live by them? Join the Center for Ecoliteracy's Fritjof Capra, Zenobia Barlow and Esther Cook to learn how experiential, participatory education in the environment is revolutionizing education from kindergarten through high school through an education of the heart. (pic from rawpixel.com)
Going Locavore: Urban Food Innovation and Community Transformation | Michael Pollan and Oran Hesterman
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesOur misbegotten industrial food system is one of our greatest vulnerabilities. Its dangerously fossil-fueled, toxic, monocultural and centralized. The real cost of cheap food is very high to both people and planet. Urban food innovators are designing vibrant new local food economies built on environmental and ecological integrity, sustainability, diversity and equity. Join author Michael Pollan, Fair Food Foundation CEO Oran Hesterman, faith-based change-maker James Ella James and student lea...
Lifting Women’s Voices in the Media: Tools, Models and Practices
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourJoin a diverse circle of women media-makers to hear how each learned to trust her own voice. They share stories and discuss effective strategies that can be applied to lift the voices of women of every age and perspective. Hosted by Jodie Evans, women’s media champion. With: Jensine Larsen, founder of World Pulse; Neema Namadamu, internationally renowned Congolese civil society leader, founder of Hero Women Rising; Nicole Middleton, GlobalGirl Media activist. Recorded Friday, October 16, 2015...
Building Power from the Rubble: How Frontline Communities in El Salvador Are Creating | Mariel Nanasi, Estela Hernández, Karolo Aparicio, and
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourA movement of rural communities in El Salvador called La Coordinadora has led the way in community-based disaster preparedness, building a grassroots democracy movement, and influencing national policy. It’s featured in the new film and book This Changes Everything by Naomi Klein and Avi Lewis. Hosted by Mariel Nanasi, Executive Director/President, New Energy Economy. With: Estela Hernández, El Salvadoran Congresswoman; Karolo Aparicio, Executive Director, EcoViva, La Coordinadora’s U.S. sist...
Eco-Regional Design: Place Is the Space | Kirsten Schwind, David Orr, and Louise Bedsworth
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourHow do we align political governance with ecological realities rooted in watersheds, foodsheds, culturesheds and regional economies? Hosted by: Kirsten Schwind, Bay Localize. With: David Orr, Distinguished Professor of Environmental Studies and Politics at Oberlin College; Louise Bedsworth, Deputy Director, California Governor’s Office of Planning and Research.
Ecological Medicine: Healing Health Care | Andrew Weil, M.D. & Charlotte Brody
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesDid medicine's separation from nature propel our health care system into its current crisis? Join Dr. Andrew Weil and nurse and health activist Charlotte Brody as they describe how Ecological Medicine reunites the interdependence of medicine and nature, and restores the feminine principle in healing.
Ecological Design: On the Ground and in the Water | John Todd & David Orr
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesJohn Todd, an ecological designer in the field of biomimicry, imitates nature's evolutionary genius to serve human ends harmlessly, using nature's processes as the design for buildings, technologies and practical solutions to environmental devastation. Educator David Orr suggests that true ecological design can take place only in a society willing to ask, "How would nature do it?"
Eco-Governance | Kirsten Schwind, Jessie Lerner, and Trathen Heckman
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 1 hourWhat does governance look like when it aligns with the ground truths of nature? How does culture change? What models exist? Hosted by Kirsten Schwind, co-founder/Director of Bay Localize. With: Jessie Lerner, Executive Director, Sustain Dane in Madison, Wiscon- sin, a state with eco-municipalities based on Sweden’s model; Trathen Heckman, Board President, Transition U.S., founder of Daily Acts.
Intelligence in Nature: Jeremy Narby interviewed by J.P. Harpignies
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 14 minutesAnthropologist Jeremy Narby’s life’s work has involved reconciling Western scientific views and assumptions with those of Indigenous cultures around the world. In this interview excerpt, Bioneers Senior Producer and author J.P. Harpignies talks to Narby about intelligence in nature, the limitations of language and more.
From Kingdom to Kin-dom: Acting As If We Have Relatives | Brock Dolman, Paul Stamets and Brian Thomas Swimme
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 29 minutesFrom the microbes to the mammals, all life shares far more in common than what makes us different. In other words, it’s all relatives. If we knew that literally we are water, that we are mushrooms, that we are stardust—instead of shredding the web of life, might we start acting as if we have relatives? Bioneers Brock Dolman, Paul Stamets and Brian Thomas Swimme reveal inspiring reflections in the gene pool that show life as a kin-dom, not a kingdom.
A Karmic Moment: Why Men Must Step Up Now to End Rape Culture | Eve Ensler
January 01, 2022 07:00 - 6 minutesIn October 2016, before Trump was elected, Eve Ensler gave a visionary call at the Bioneers conference for men to put ending rape culture front and center in their lives and work. Candidate Trump, said Eve, is a phenomenon – something larger than the person - because he’s channeling the unprocessed darkness in the environment and swirling it into ever-greater darkness. He’s carrying our collective karma, and we can change that. Since then, serial scandals have continued to escalate until the ...