Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda
335 episodes - English - Latest episode: 1 day ago - ★★★★★ - 3.4K ratingsLearn to connect better with others in every area of your life. Immerse yourself in spirited conversations with people who know how hard it is, and yet how good it feels, to really connect with other people – whether it’s one person, an audience or a whole country. You'll know many of the people in these conversations – they are luminaries in our culture. Some you may not know. But what links them all is their powerful ability to relate and communicate. It's something we need now more than ever.
Homepage Apple Podcasts Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed
Episodes
Chris French: Would you believe it?
July 09, 2024 03:30 - 41 minutes - 37.5 MBWhen we experience things that seem beyond explanation, are they evidence of the supernatural? Or instead, a quirk of our brains? A skeptical but open-minded psychologist has some entertaining answers.
Cady Coleman: Sharing Space
July 02, 2024 03:30 - 39 minutes - 36.2 MBSharing her experiences of three space missions – including 159 days as the only woman on the 6-person crew of the International Space Station – Cady Coleman also shares lessons about getting along:valuable insights for the rest of us down here on earth.
Charles Duhigg: Connecting and Communicating
June 25, 2024 03:30 - 39 minutes - 36.4 MBAlan and the author of a new book called Supercommunicators share their thoughts on what makes a great conversation. The result? A great conversation!
When Small is Big News
June 18, 2024 03:30 - 38 minutes - 35.2 MBThe world of the very small is very different from the one we are familiar with. (Gold for instance turns red.) Chad Mirkin and Robert Langer’s skills in crafting this bizarre micro-world into medical breakthroughs earned them the 2024 Kavli Prize in nanotechnology.
David Charbonneau and Doris Tsao: Looking for Something Familiar
June 12, 2024 14:05 - 40 minutes - 37.5 MBHe is searching space for planets that are something like ours. She is searching brains to discover how we recognize things. They are both 2024 Kavli laureates – Charbonneau awarded the prize for astrophysics, Tsao for neuroscience.
David Jewitt and Jane Luu: Is Pluto All Alone Out There?
June 04, 2024 03:30 - 38 minutes - 35.2 MBThat was the question two determined astronomers set out to answer. A frustrating five-year search revealed that Pluto, long thought to be a small, lonely planet on the outer fringes of the solar system, is in fact part of a huge ring of debris left over from the solar system’s birth.
Carla Shatz and Marcus Raichle: Brainwaves
May 28, 2024 03:30 - 41 minutes - 37.9 MBBetween them these two neuroscientists changed the way we think of our brains. Their insights are now opening new ways to tackle the problems our brains face as they age, including neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s.
Fred Guttenberg and Joe Walsh: Two Dads Defending Democracy
May 21, 2024 03:30 - 40 minutes - 37.4 MBOnce sworn enemies in TV appearances and on social media, Fred Guttenberg and Joe Walsh got together privately and realized there is much that unites them. They are now on a tour of college campuses hoping to share their success in bridge-building with others divided by hate.
Craig Venter: Oceans of Genes
May 14, 2024 03:30 - 37 minutes - 34.5 MBAboard his 100 ft sailboat, the geneticist famed for his work deciphering human genes spent 15 years sailing the world’s oceans, discovering millions of unknown genes in the microbes that live there – genes that could lead to new sources of energy, food and medicine.
Adam Moss: What Makes it Art?
May 07, 2024 03:30 - 40 minutes - 37.1 MBAfter a successful career as an award-winning magazine editor, Adam Moss decided to put it all aside to pursue a passion for painting. He became pretty good; but something was missing. His struggle to understand what that something was led him to his new book, The Work of Art.
Kelly and Zach Weinersmith: A Second Home on Mars?
April 30, 2024 03:30 - 41 minutes - 37.9 MBShould we be planning to establish settlements on the moon and Mars? To many, including a couple of billionaires, the idea has become almost an obsession. An unlikely husband and wife duo has spent years digging deeply into plans to colonize space. Their conclusion: not so fast.
Rebecca Boyle: Moonstruck
April 23, 2024 03:30 - 40 minutes - 37.3 MBWe exist because of the moon. Rebecca Boyle relates the amazing story of how the moon, born of a cataclysmic collision with an infant earth, has shaped our history, our evolution, and even our very existence.
Doris Kearns Goodwin: In the Rooms Where it Happened
April 16, 2024 03:30 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBHer new book tracks the momentous events of the 1960s when her husband, Dick Goodwin, worked closely with both JFK and LBJ, and Doris worked with LBJ, as the two very different presidents shaped the future.
Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda - Season 25 trailer
April 09, 2024 03:30 - 21 minutes - 19.4 MBAlan and Executive Producer Graham Chedd chat about and play excerpts from Alan's conversations with some of the guests in the new season, beginning next week. Guests include newspaper editor Adam Moss; science journalist Rebecca Boyle; and writers Kelly and Zach Weinersmith.
Stephen Dubner: Feynman on Our Mind
April 02, 2024 03:30 - 39 minutes - 36.5 MBStephen Dubner, host of Freakonomics Radio, has long been fascinated by the great physicist Richard Feynman. As has Alan. Stephen has devoted a year to making a remarkable podcast series on Feynman, and Alan has played Feynman on the stage for a year. They compare notes on what they’ve come to learn about him.
Remembering Frans de Waal
March 27, 2024 16:00 - 16 minutes - 14.9 MBIn this special episode of Clear and Vivid we reflect on Frans’ life-long commitment to revealing how much we humans have in common with our primate cousins.
Justice Stephen Breyer: Understanding What They Meant
March 26, 2024 03:30 - 39 minutes - 36.6 MBWhen interpreting the Constitution, the dangers of relying solely on the words and what they meant at the time, without taking into account the purpose and values expressed in those words.
Shohini Ghose: Women’s Time and Space
March 19, 2024 03:30 - 39 minutes - 36.6 MBA leading physicist herself, Shohini Ghose has wonderful stories about the trials and triumphs of the many mostly unsung women whose work helped open up the universe.
Tali Sharot: Take Another Look
March 12, 2024 03:30 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBWe can get used to things to the point where even something we once thought wonderful can lose its luster. More sinister, we can also get used to the drip, drip of falsehoods till we become dulled to their danger. How to overcome habituation, and even take advantage of it.
Keith Houston: There’s More to Writing Than Words.
March 05, 2024 04:30 - 38 minutes - 35.3 MBThe intriguing stories behind the often weird and baffling origins of punctuation and other symbols we use to communicate. And it’s not just commas, colons and periods. There are pilcrows, octothorps, interrobangs and a whole menagerie more.
Terry Greiss: Acting to Connect
February 27, 2024 04:30 - 39 minutes - 36.5 MBThe Irondale Ensemble Project, a theater company rooted in improvisation, created a program to help police and community build trust and mutual understanding through theater games.
Robert Sapolsky: You Have No Choice
February 20, 2024 04:30 - 41 minutes - 37.6 MBYou may think you were free to choose that chocolate ice cream over the vanilla. But maybe the choice was made for you before you were even born – that the free will you believe you are exercising in your everyday decisions is an illusion.
Tom Hanks: Making a Book About Making a Movie
February 13, 2024 04:30 - 38 minutes - 35.6 MBAnd what a book it is, a rich sprawling novel called The Making of Another Major Motion Picture Masterpiece, which Tom himself describes as a “primer on the long slog of bringing an idea from somebody’s head to a theater near you.”
Paul Bloom: Can AI be Moral?
February 06, 2024 04:30 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBWhy can’t AI bots be made to be good, to be moral, so they’ll help us and not do harmful or terrible things? But just whose moral values would we want them to have? And what if they become too moral?
Eric Schmidt: AI: The Good, the Bad and the Scary.
January 30, 2024 04:30 - 40 minutes - 37 MBHe was for many years the CEO of Google where he had a bird’s eye view of the dramatic evolution of artificial intelligence. And while he is alarmed by the many dangers of AI, especially its ability to create fake people in this election year, he is also enthusiastic about the huge opportunities he sees for AI benefitting medicine, education and the tackling of global problems like climate change.
Fei-Fei Li: The Godmother of AI
January 23, 2024 04:30 - 42 minutes - 39 MBShe earned that unofficial title from her peers through her pioneering work harvesting big data to power AI, leading to the recent breakthroughs such as ChatGPT and its many successors. Her personal story is inspiring, from her childhood in China to risking her scientific career on a research gamble that might well have failed. And like a real godmother she now feels responsible for the revolution she helped launch.
Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda - Season 24 trailer
January 16, 2024 04:30 - 31 minutes - 29 MBAlan and Executive Producer Graham Chedd chat about and play excerpts from Alan's conversations with some of the guests in the new season, beginning next week. Guests include computer scientist Fei-Fei Li; former CEO of Google Eric Schmidt; and actor Tom Hanks.
Cynthia Breazeal: Her Robots Have Warmth!
January 09, 2024 04:30 - 40 minutes - 36.8 MBTheir social, communicative and emotional skills allow her robots to seamlessly collaborate with us. A pioneer in the field of social robotics, Cynthia Breazeal is now turning her focus to ensuring we understand the limits and risks of the artificial intelligence that powers those robots – that we become “AI literate.”
Abraham Amiri: From Afghanistan to the Stars
January 02, 2024 04:30 - 40 minutes - 37.2 MBAn unquenchable passion for astronomy born from gazing at the stars from a rooftop as a child led to his setting up a nationwide program in astronomy in Afghanistan. Escaping the wrath of the Taliban for the sin of teaching young women about the universe, he is now a graduate student at UCLA.
Steve Inskeep: Lessons from Lincoln
December 26, 2023 04:30 - 38 minutes - 35.1 MBA new book takes a fresh look at Abraham Lincoln’s life by recounting sixteen face-to-face encounters Lincoln had with people who differed with him, sometimes vehemently. The book not only reveals his skills as a master politician in a deeply divisive time, but also has lessons for today.
Leslie Odom Jr: Bursting Out
December 19, 2023 04:30 - 38 minutes - 35.1 MBA Tony winner for his performance as Aaron Burr in Hamilton, he is now starring on Broadway in the hit play Purlie Victorious. One of the secrets to his success: letting go.
Kate Cohen: Asks if You Need God to be Good
December 12, 2023 04:30 - 41 minutes - 37.9 MBIt took her years to admit to family and friends that she was a non-believer. But she found that pretending to believe wasn’t working. Her book is“We of Little Faith: Why I Stopped Pretending to Believe, And Maybe You Should Too."
Peter Hotez: The Deadly Rise of Anti-Science
December 05, 2023 04:30 - 41 minutes - 37.7 MBIn his new book, the doctor familiar on TV in his white coat and bow tie tells how his attempts to correct lies about covid vaccines led to death threats; while the lies themselves led to some 200,000 unnecessary deaths among those refusing vaccination.
Heather Cox Richardson: She’ll Write You a Letter
November 28, 2023 04:30 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBTwo million of us get a letter in our inboxes every morning with a calm, clarifying take on what happened yesterday— from the perspective of a historian, yet written with the intimacy of a friend.
David Brooks: How to Know a Person
November 21, 2023 04:30 - 42 minutes - 39.3 MBColumnist and author David Brooks tells how he’s changed over his 60 something years – in part through the books he’s written exploring how people see themselves and others. He shares the insights he’s gained into truly knowing the people around us.
Marcus du Sautoy: Around the World in 80 Games
November 14, 2023 04:30 - 40 minutes - 37.4 MBEnjoy playing games? You’ll enjoy them even more once renowned mathematician, Oxford University professor and avid game player Marcus du Sautoy tells Alan why they so fascinate us. And Alan tells Marcus about his favorite game – one even Marcus didn’t know.
How "Maid" Was Made
November 07, 2023 04:30 - 39 minutes - 36.4 MBStephanie Land’s lifelong passion for writing – along with a college degree she could ill afford – led to a bestselling book and a hit TV series, allowing her to escape the poverty trap ensnaring so many single mothers.
Frank Felberbaum: Don’t Forget!
October 31, 2023 03:30 - 39 minutes - 36.3 MBNot only does he have an astonishing memory himself, but Frank Felberbaum has taught thousands of others, including Alan, how to improve their memory skills – especially for putting names to faces.
Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda - Season 23 trailer
October 24, 2023 04:00 - 33 minutes - 30.9 MBAlan and Executive Producer Graham Chedd chat about and play excerpts from Alan's conversations with some of the guests in the new season, beginning next week. Guests include astronomer Abraham Amiri; memory expert Frank Felberbaum; and actor Leslie Odom Jr.
Walter Isaacson: Shadowing Elon Musk
October 17, 2023 03:30 - 43 minutes - 39.5 MBThe acclaimed biographer spent two years in Musk’s company as his subject launched rockets, built electric cars, decided to save humanity by sending us to Mars, became the richest man in the world and bought Twitter – all the while often behaving like an “absolute jerk.”
Laurel Braitman: Writing Wrongs
October 10, 2023 03:30 - 40 minutes - 37 MBA life full of adventure while struggling with grief led her to what she does so effectively today – helping doctors to level with colleagues and patients through storytelling when things go wrong.
Carl Safina: Wisdom from a Baby Owl
October 03, 2023 03:30 - 40 minutes - 37.1 MBCarl tells how rescuing a baby owl helped him and his wife get through the Covid lockdown – and how it renewed their bond with nature. There’s wisdom in it for the rest of us, too, whose relationship with the natural world is increasingly frayed.
Joe Henrich: How Culture Has Shaped Our Bodies and Brains
September 26, 2023 03:30 - 39 minutes - 36 MBHe’s fascinated by how culture has shaped our evolution – not only changing our bodies and expanding our brains but even expanding our ability to cooperate. And the more diverse a culture, the better its ability to innovate.
Kashmir Hill: Your Face Belongs to Us
September 19, 2023 03:30 - 40 minutes - 36.9 MBThat’s the title of a new book by New York Times technology reporter Kashmir Hill. Her book is both deeply researched and downright scary, as spelled out in the book’s subtitle: A Secretive Start-Up’s Quest to End Privacy As We Know it. A glimpse of your face in any photo you’ve ever uploaded can now lead to anyone discovering details of your life – both on-line and out there in the world.
Matthew Walker: Sleep REALLY Matters
September 12, 2023 03:30 - 40 minutes - 36.8 MBAuthor of a best-selling book called Why We Sleep, and host of the Matt Walker Podcast, he’s become the go-to expert on everything to do with sleep, from how it keeps both mind and body healthy to why we dream.
Maya Shankar: Beginning from an Ending
September 05, 2023 03:30 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBA brilliant violinist in her teens, her world came crashing down when an injury ended her career even as it was beginning. Remarkably, she turned that loss into a PhD in neuroscience, a stint in the White House and a popular podcast about others also navigating drastic changes in their lives.
Adam Mastroianni: Why You So Often Get It Wrong
August 29, 2023 03:30 - 42 minutes - 38.6 MBDo you believe people are worse now than they use to be? That smarter people are happier people? That you know when to quit a conversation? Wrong on all counts, according to Adam Mastroianni, a social psychologist. He’s also a professional improv performer and uses those skills teaching business school students.
Nancy Kanwisher: Your Brain is a Swiss Army Knife
August 22, 2023 03:30 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBNancy Kanwisher has discovered many areas of the brain that are specialized for one particular purpose— like recognizing faces – which is interesting to Alan because of his inability to remember the faces of people he meets. Other specialized areas include identifying food, which Alan so far has no trouble with.
Elizabeth Rush: Journey to the Doomsday Glacier
August 15, 2023 03:45 - 39 minutes - 36.6 MBShe managed to write a lyrical, moving book about her journey to a massive glacier in Antarctica that, if it collapses into the ocean, would cause a catastrophic rise in sea level. Unexpectedly, it’s also a book about her difficulty in choosing motherhood in a time of radical climate change.
Robert Klein: He Observes, We Laugh
August 08, 2023 03:30 - 40 minutes - 36.8 MBThe actor/writer/comedian has been an inspiration to comedians like Jay Leno and Jerry Seinfeld. And he’s been inspired himself by greats of the past in the exacting art of finding what’s funny in our daily lives – when observed from just the right angle.