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Cambridge Forum

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Cambridge Forum hosts free, public discussions that inform and engage, so that people can better explore the varied issues and ideas that shape our changing world. CF broadcasts its live events via podcasts, weekly NPR shows and online presentations via GBH Forum Network on YouTube.

http://www.cambridgeforum.org

Does COVID-19 Signal the End of the American Era?

Fri, Sep 25, 2020

Wade Davis attracted global attention with his opinion piece in Rolling Stone magazine raising this question: Does Covid-19 signal the end of the American era? Why did he ask this disturbingly profound question and why has it struck a chord around the world? Hear a conversation on the history of U.S. leadership and its unraveling. Image: Cambridge Forum

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The Rise of Environmental Illness

Fri, Jun 12, 2020

Over fifty million Americans endure environmental illnesses that render them allergic to chemicals. Innocuous staple goods from deodorant to garbage bags wreak havoc on sensitives. With over 85,000 chemicals in the environment, they perceive danger around every corner. Freelance journalist Oliver Broudy explores environmental toxicity and the community of The Sensitives — people with powerful, puzzling symptoms they believe to be resulting from exposure to chemicals, fragrances, and cell phone signals, that have no effect on “normals.” Dr. Ann McCampbell, (DrAnnMcC@gmail.com) a Santa Fe, New Mexico based environmental illness medical advocate joins the conversation, along with Stephan Bodian, a psychotherapist and spiritual teacher. Image: Book Cover

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Clint Smith: Living While Black

Fri, Jul 24, 2020

Writer, poet and teacher Clint Smith talks with Jude Nixon, Professor of English at Salem State University talk about some of the poems in "Counting Descent," and previews Smith’s forthcoming non-fiction book, "How The Word Is Passed," which explores how different sites across the country reckon with, or fail to reckon with, their relationship to the history of slavery. Image: Book Cover

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Clint Smith: Parenting While Black

Fri, Jul 24, 2020

Writer, poet and teacher Clint Smith talks with Jude Nixon, Professor of English at Salem State University. Both men are educators and fathers and their discussion explores what it means to raise children during this challenging period of the covid-19 pandemic and heightened racial tensions across the country. Image: Pexels.com

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Farming For The Future

Fri, Jun 26, 2020

This forum features three uniquely different farmers who are all equally passionate about smart and sustainable ways of growing our food. Addy Shreffler is a young but savvy farmer, who was an executive chef for several years before migrating into farming. Michael Chuisano is the owner of the Naked Farm in Marion, New York. Ronnie Cummings is an organic farming guru and member of the Regeneration International movement. Image credit: [Pexels](http://https://www.pexels.com/photo/man-walking-on-farm-1733192/)

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Living Without Working

Fri, May 29, 2020

International economist Daniel Susskind sits down to discuss his latest book, "A World Without Work: Technology, Automation and How We Should Respond." Daniel was a policy adviser for the British prime minister's strategy unit and a senior adviser in the Cabinet office of the British government. He is joined by Vikram Mansharamani, author of "Think for Yourself: Restoring Common Sense in an Age of Experts and Artificial Intelligence." Vikram is a global trend-watcher and writer who is currently lecturing at Harvard University. Mary Stack, director of Cambridge Forum, moderates the discussion.

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Locked-Down Americans: Isolation & Loneliness in 21st Century

Fri, May 15, 2020

Social distancing has been especially hard on humans, as social animals we are wired for connection. But the coronavirus pandemic didn’t cause the isolation issue it just exacerbated it. In 2018, 28% of adult households in the U.S. were single person households and 63% of the adult population remained unmarried. But we are not happier, over 35% of adult Americans report themselves to be chronically lonely, up from 20% in 1990. J. W. Freiberg’s latest book _Surrounded by Others and Yet So Alone_ looks at the problem of chronic loneliness through his unique lens as a social psychologist (PhD, UCLA) turned lawyer (JD, Harvard). His case studies are infused with the latest brain science which reveals that loneliness is actually a sensation, like hunger or thirst, not an emotion like anger, which we can talk ourselves out of. So how do we surmount this current crisis and help to create healthy connections going forward, in our own lives and in the lives of our children? Image: Book Cover

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Ainissa Ramirez: The Alchemy Of Us

Fri, May 1, 2020

In _The Alchemy of Us_, scientist and science writer Ainissa Ramirez examines eight inventions—clocks, steel rails, copper communication cables, photographic film, light bulbs, hard disks, scientific labware, and silicon chips—and reveals how they shaped the human experience. Ramirez tells the stories of the woman who sold time, the inventor who inspired Edison, and the hotheaded undertaker whose invention pointed the way to the computer. She describes, among other things, how our pursuit of precision in timepieces changed how we sleep; how the railroad helped commercialize Christmas; how the necessary brevity of the telegram influenced Hemingway’s writing style; and how a young chemist exposed the use of Polaroid’s cameras to create passbooks to track black citizens in apartheid South Africa.

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A Look At Sustainable Agriculture

Thu, Apr 16, 2020

To mark Earth Day, John Marzluff, author of _In Search of Meadowlarks_, outlines a personal approach to sustainable agriculture. Through an ornithologist’s lens, he observes current farming practices to see if we can broker a more harmonious relationship between our birds, farms, food and land. Joining the conversation is Ronnie Cummings, author of _Grassroots Rising_ and International Director of OCA, Organic Consumers Association, and Michael Chuisano, owner and farmer of The Naked Farm in New York.

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Do Morals Matter? Presidents and Foreign Policy

Tue, Apr 7, 2020

Joseph Nye, leading scholar of international relations considers presidents and their foreign policy from FDR to Trump, who come up short in the morality polls. In _Do Morals Matter?_, Nye provides a concise yet penetrating analysis of the role of ethics in U.S. foreign policy during the post-1945 era. Working through each presidency from Truman to Trump, Nye scores their foreign policy on three ethical dimensions: their intentions, the means they used, and the consequences of their decisions. Alongside this, he evaluates their leadership qualities, elaborating on which approaches work and which ones do not.

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