Past Events

In conjunction with the NOVA's film Addiction, this talk about the opioid crisis was held jointly by Boston's Cafe Sci and the MIT Museum. It featured a panel whose expertise could raise awareness of the issues created by the deadliest drug epidemic in U.S. history.

A dialogue with industry experts about entrepreneurship in the cannabis industry. MITEF invites you to discuss the current and future state of Cannabis technology. They've brought together cannabis cognoscenti from across business, community, academia, and technology to offer a range of views, insights, and opinions for how best to face the brave new world of legalized cannabis. Image: Pexels.com

Boston's [LivableStreets Alliance](https://www.livablestreets.info/ "Liveable Streets") envisions a world where streets are safe, vibrant public spaces that connect people to the places where they live, work and play. Ten innovative transportation and community thinkers take the stage and share their big ideas with rapid-fire precision in this 8th Annual StreetTalk 10-in-1. Topics include: Weird Advocacy That Worked and Didn't with Transit Alliance Miami; Designing Playful Cities; Bringing Autonomous Vehicles to Boston's Streets; Evaluating Boston's Bike Network in Terms of Low-Stress Accessibility and Access to Jobs and Other Destinations, Lessons from Mexico City and more. Image: [WikiMedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MBTA_Bus,_Boston_(4309947480).jpg )

The New England Patriots have become a dynasty, though it didn’t begin that way. Love them or hate them, Pats have captured this country’s attention like no other franchise.

Born in Dublin in 1969, Emma Donoghue is an award-winning writer in many genres who makes her home in Canada. She is best known for her 2010 novel _Room_ (shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize) and its film adaptation in 2015, for which she was nominated for Academy, Golden Globe and Bafta Awards. Donoghue works in fiction both contemporary and historical, long-form and short, for adults and most recently for younger readers, with _The Lotterys_ series. She also increasingly writes for the screen, adapting her own books as well as those of others for TV and film, as well as developing original projects.

Enjoy this living history experience to mark the 186th birthday of author Louisa May Alcott. Jan Turnquist, performer and director of Orchard House (the Alcott family's historic home in Concord, MA), brings to life Alcott's life in stories - from her unconventional upbringing in poverty, to the family love that inspired her to write the American classic _Little Women_. As an added feature, Jan shares stories from her own experience working as a research consultant and an extra on the forthcoming (2019) [Columbia Pictures version of Little Women](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3281548/ "IMDB Little Women 2019"), starring Saoirse Ronan, Emma Watson, Florence Pugh, Eliza Scanlen, Timothée Chalamet, Laura Dern, Bob Odenkirk, Chris Cooper, and Meryl Streep. This event has been made possible with funding from the Lowell Institute.

Drawing on his work with skinheads, neo-Nazis and KKK members, sociologist Michael Kimmel considers the root causes of this addiction and how to bring marginalized men back from society’s extremist edge. He is joined by former neo-Nazis Frank Meeink and Tony McAleer, two men who can speak personally to the violence they conducted and how they are devoting their lives now to healing from their pasts and speaking publicly to prevent others from exploring that path. Image by [Evan Nesterak](https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=61723994 "") - White supremacists clash with police, CC BY 2.0,

Dr. Andrew Rosenberg discusses how the present U.S. administration impedes environmental and health regulations, rejects facts about climate change, and undermines the work of science-related government agencies. He also offers suggestions for what an informed public can do to diminish resistance to scientific facts and information.

David Kaplan is the former legal affairs editor at Newsweek. His book _The Most Dangerous Branch: Inside the Supreme Court's Assault on the Constitution_ is based on exclusive interviews with the justices and dozens of their law clerks. Kaplan provides fresh details about life behind the scenes at the Court, from Clarence Thomas’s simmering rage, to Antonin Scalia’s death, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s celebrity. Kaplan shows the justices’ aggrandizement of power over the decades—from _Roe v. Wade_ to _Bush v. Gore_ to _Citizens United_, to rulings during the 2017-18 term. Conservative and liberal justices alike are shown to be guilty of overreach. Image: Book Cover

Since 1945, Pax Americana has promised peaceful international relations and an open economy, buttressed by U.S. military power. But in championing "America First," President Trump has advocated selective U.S. engagement, in which foreign commitments are limited to areas of vital U.S. interest and economic nationalism is the order of the day. Allies and challengers alike are paying close attention. Ambassador Daalder and Dr. Lindsay have co-authored the book, The Empty Throne: America's Abdication of Global Leadership, released October 16, 2018. The book discusses the apparent disruption to the world order that the United States fashioned from the ruins of WWII and that produced unprecedented global stability, prosperity and democratic consensus. Critics argue that Donald Trump's America First Policy threatens this world order, yet, the authors maintain, this order has been fraying for years. Photo credit: [Joyce N. Boghosian/The White House](https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/photos-of-the-week-033018/ "")