The Ongoing Transformation

Our miniseries Not Now, But Soon challenges the stories we often tell about disasters and explores how we can use speculative fiction to create better futures and policies.On our final episode of this season, host Malka Older examines the role art and fiction play in understanding war. She talks with art and culture historian Brigitte van der Sande, who has spent 25 years studying how war is represented in art—research that brought her to many active conflict zones. Van der Sande discusses how art humanizes the victims of war and spurs action, and how humor and imagination can be forces for resistance. Resources: “Inside Hell We Build Paradise.” Read more about van der Sande’s visit to Rojava, Syria, as part of efforts to build democracy in the region. Check out Other Futures, a multidisciplinary festival that presents speculative visions of the future, founded by van der Sande in 2018. See artwork mentioned in this episode: “The Eyes of Gutete Emerita” and “Soft Target.”Learn more about van der Sande’s latest project, Culture House FKA the Cannibals. This podcast is part of the Future Tense Fiction project, a speculative fiction series that uses imagination to explore how science and technology will shape our future. Read the short stories from the series published by Issues in Science and Technology.

Our miniseries Not Now, But Soon challenges the stories we often tell about disasters and explores how we can use speculative fiction to create better futures and policies.On this episode, host Malka Older is joined by Nasir Andisha, ambassador and permanent representative of Afghanistan to the United Nations, to reimagine Afghanistan and the stories we tell about its past, present, and future. As ambassador, Andisha represents the people—not the current government—of a country that has been navigating disaster for decades. He shares the story of what it’s like to lose his nation while continuing to advocate for its people.ResourcesVisit Nasir Andisha’s website to learn more about human rights, policy, and Afghanistan’s challenges.This episode features brief audio snippets from the BBC and Inside Edition. This podcast is part of the Future Tense Fiction project, a speculative fiction series that uses imagination to explore how science and technology will shape our future. Read the short stories from the series published by Issues in Science and Technology.

Our miniseries Not Now, But Soon challenges the stories we often tell about disasters and explores how we can use speculative fiction to create better futures and policies.On this episode, host Malka Older examines the stories behind statistics with Julisa Tambunan, deputy executive director of Equal Measures 2030, a global feminist coalition. Tambunan uses data to advocate for policies that center the lived experiences of women, girls, and underrepresented minorities. She explains why gender inequality is a disaster and how collecting better data—both statistics and stories—can help create a better future for everyone. ResourcesVisit Equal Measures 2030 to learn more about achieving gender equality through data-driven advocacy. This podcast is part of the Future Tense Fiction project, a speculative fiction series that uses imagination to explore how science and technology will shape our future. Read the short stories from the series published by Issues in Science and Technology.

Our miniseries Not Now, But Soon challenges the stories we often tell about disasters and explores how we can use speculative fiction to create better futures and policies. On this episode, host Malka Older explores food systems with investigative journalist Thin Lei Win. Win shares her experience growing up in Myanmar, and how that has shaped how she sees the intersection between food production, climate, and disasters. This podcast is part of the Future Tense Fiction project, a speculative fiction series that uses imagination to explore how science and technology will shape our future. Read the short stories from the series published by Issues in Science and Technology.  ResourcesFollow Win’s weekly newsletter, Thin Ink, to learn more about food, climate and where they meet. Get started with her newsletter with these articles: “Moonstruck”: a critique of the focus of the food system’s focus on technology and productivity to solve food insecurity, at the expense of equity. “A System Under Strain”: a roundup of recent reports on food systems. Win coordinated The New Humanitarian’s series on emerging hunger hotspots as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Find more of Win’s food system investigations at Lighthouse Reports. “The Hunger Profiteers”: how financial speculation could be fueling hunger. “Farmers Protest, Who Gains?”: Who is leading the farmers’ protest in Europe and are they truly representative of farmers? Visit Kite Tales to read stories from Myanmar’s people in their own words.

Our new miniseries, Not Now, But Soon, challenges the stories we often tell about disasters, and explores how we can use speculative fiction to create better futures and policies. On our first episode, host Malka Older talks to Steven Gonzalez, an anthropologist of technology who researches the human labor behind data centers. Gonzalez is also a speculative fiction writer under the byline E. G. Condé. He is one of the creators of Taínofuturism, which incorporates Indigenous Caribbean traditions to imagine futures from a radically different perspective. His novella, Sordidez, explores how survivors’ efforts to rebuild after a hurricane intersects with oppression and conflict in a future Caribbean. In this episode, Gonzalez compares these different types of disasters: the dramatic and immediate impacts of the hurricane, and the slower, steadier, and often overlooked disasters of environmental destruction, resource depletion, and exploitation of human labor associated with our internet infrastructure. Resources: Visit Steven Gonzalez’s website to learn more about the impacts of cloud computing. Find Gonzalez’s fiction under the byline E.G. Condé. Check out his novella, Sordidez, winner of the Indie Ink Award for "Writing the Future We Need: Latinx/Latine Representation by a Latinx/Latine author." This podcast is part of the Future Tense Fiction project. Read all Future Tense Fiction stories here.

Why do disasters happen? How do we rebuild after a disaster? What lessons can we learn from them? Our new miniseries, Not Now, But Soon, challenges the stories we often tell about disasters, and explores how we can use speculative fiction to create better futures and policies. In this trailer episode, Lisa Margonelli introduces miniseries host Malka Older, an author, humanitarian aid worker, and disaster researcher. Older explains how she became involved in disaster work, and what disasters can teach us about society and our values. Not Now, But Soon premieres on September 16. This miniseries is part of the Future Tense Fiction project, a collaboration between Issues and ASU’s Center for Science and the Imagination.Resources Rethink disasters by reading Malka Older’s Issues piece, “Disasters.” Check out Older’s Future Tense Fiction story, “Actually Naneen.” Find more of Older’s publications on her website, including Infomocracy, a cyberpunk political thriller, and ...and Other Disasters, a collection of short fiction and poetry centered around disasters. Watch Older discuss how speculative fiction can be used to create better policies in the Issues event, “How Can Science Fiction Help Design Better Science and Tech Policies?”

People know that their pets are unique individuals. Each dog has his or her own quirks, likes, and dislikes. But what about cormorants? Research reveals that wild animals are just as uniquely individual as our pets. Rats show empathy. Crows can hold grudges. Even termites have different personalities. What would it mean if society took animal intelligence and self-awareness seriously? Lisa Margonelli explores this question with Brandon Keim, author of the recent book Meet the Neighbors: Animal Minds and Life in a More-than-Human World. Keim also wrote about animal intelligence and what it might mean for policy for Issues in the Spring 2025 issue. In this episode, Keim discusses animal personhood, movements around animal representation, and cormorants—one named Cosmos in particular. This is our last episode before our summer break, but we will be back in September with a miniseries about rethinking disasters. Write to us at podcast@issues.org with your thoughts on this season and other ideas you’d like us to explore. Subscribe to the podcast and our newsletter to be the first to hear when we return. Resources: Learn more about animal individuality by reading Brandon Keim’s book, Meet the Neighbors: Animal Minds and Life in a More-than-Human World.Keim explores the policy impacts of new research on animal intelligence in his Issues piece, “When That Chickadee Is No Longer ‘A Machine With Feathers.’”Visit Keim’s website to find more of his work.

Think tanks are a vital part of the policy ecosystem, but what do they do? In this installment of Science Policy IRL, host Jason Lloyd talks to Neil Chilson, head of AI policy at the Abundance Institute. He has been involved in science and technology policy for his whole career, previously practicing telecommunications law and serving as the Federal Trade Commission’s chief technologist.In this episode, Chilson discusses what it’s like to work at a policy think tank, the questions about artificial intelligence that motivate his work, and why he is optimistic about our technological future. ResourcesCheck out Neil Chilson’s book, Getting Out Of Control: Emergent Leadership in a Complex World.Find more of Chilson’s work on his website and explore his Substack, including: “Red Teaming AI Legislation: Lessons from SB 1047”: How the concept of “red teaming” can be applied to creating legislation. “10 Years After the Best Tech Policy Movie Ever”: Lessons from The Lego Movie for emergent leadership.Learn more about the Abundance Institute’s vision for artificial intelligence policy by reading their recommendations here. 

David Goodman, an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins and director of the Adult Attention Deficit Disorder Center, shares his insights on adult ADHD. He reveals that ADHD doesn't just fade away after childhood and discusses the complexities of diagnosis and treatment. Goodman highlights the transformative impact of effective therapies and emphasizes the need for a spectrum approach to understanding symptoms. He also addresses the importance of ongoing research, particularly focusing on women and older adults, to improve diagnosis and care.

Kelvin Droegemeier, a longtime leader in science policy, joins host Megan Nicholson for this installment of Science Policy IRL. Droegemeier began his career as a research meteorologist and went on to serve in many different leadership roles in state and federal government. He directed the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy from 2019–2021, served on the National Science Board from 2004–2016, and served on the Oklahoma Governor’s Science and Technology Council from 2011–2019. He is currently a professor and Special Advisor to the Chancellor for Science and Policy at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. On this episode, Droegemeier shares what it’s like to work on science policy at the state and federal levels, discusses what he sees as the pressing science policy issues of our time, and reflects on his leadership roles in academia and government. Resources:Read Kelvin Droegemier’s book, Demystifying the Academic Research Enterprise: Becoming a Successful Scholar in a Complex and Competitive Environment, to gain a better understanding of how the academic research enterprise works. Check out the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine project on Improving the Regulatory Efficiency and Reducing Administrative Workload to Strengthen Competitiveness and Productivity of US Research. Read Science, the Endless Frontier by Vannevar Bush and Issues’s project marking the anniversary of that report, The Next 75 Years of Science Policy, to learn more about the structure of scientific research in the United States. The National Science Board’s Science and Engineering Indicators provide important metrics to understand the current state of science and engineering. What is the future of American science and technology? Check out Vision for American Science and Technology (VAST) for a potential roadmap.