The Armen Show

“Our brains are the most complex machines known to humankind, but they have an Achilles heel: the very molecules that allow us to exist can also sabotage our minds. Here are gripping accounts of unruly molecules and the diseases that form in their wake.” On episode 349 of The Armen Show, we have guest Dr. Sara Manning Peskin, author of “A Molecule Away from Madness: Tales of the Hijacked Brain”. Dr. Sara Manning Peskin received her undergraduate degree in biochemistry from Harvard University, where she graduated magna cum laude prior to moving to Philadelphia. She received her doctor of medicine, along with a master’s degree in cellular and molecular biology, from the University of Pennsylvania. She went on to complete residency and fellowship in neurology at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, where she now works both in the Penn Memory Center and the Penn Frontotemporal Dementia Center. She’s particularly interested in narrative medicine and teaching the lay public about neurologic afflictions. She has published work in The New York Times and The Boston Globe Magazine.

What is the difference between a citizen and a consumer? How can we become more involved in our society than we currently are? On episode 348, Jon Alexander and Ariane Conrad of the book Citizens join to discuss this concept, as well as steps in the writing process, and being a support for a creative. In 2014, Jon Alexander co-founded the New Citizenship Project with Irenie Ekkeshis, a former adland colleague. Their mission was to figure out how to use their skills not just to sell stuff to Consumers, but to involve people in the decisions that affect their lives as Citizens. Working with Ariane Conrad, a best-selling writer who has built a career turning big ideas into books that change the world, Jon drew on all his experience with NCP, studied the best of what’s going on all over the world, and interrogated three Masters degrees-worth of knowledge to pull this together. He truly believes that we humans are collaborative, creative, caring Citizens by nature – and if we give ourselves and each other the chance, we can fix this. Ariane Conrad is an editorial consultant and coach known as the Book Doula. She nurtures world-changing ideas and the people behind them. Together, they craft effective messages, strategies, and trajectories. Together, they write nonfiction books that are accessible and compelling.

Is there an intimacy famine in place at this time? Are people short of touch and connection that is vital for a healthy life? Indeed, “millions of people around the world are not getting the physical, emotional, and intellectual intimacy they crave.” Behavior scientist Dr. Michelle Drouin joins on episode 347 of the show to cover topics in relation to this famine that is in place. Dr. Michelle Drouin (B.A. Cornell University; Ph.D. University of Oxford) is a psychology professor, forensic consultant, expert witness, and internationally-recognized researcher and speaker on issues related to technology, relationships, couples, and sexuality, including issues related to addiction and partner violence. Dr. Drouin’s research has attracted international attention, and she regularly does interviews for television, radio, newspapers, and magazines. She is Professor of Psychology at Purdue University-Fort Wayne and Senior Research Scientist at the Parkview Mirro Center for Research and Innovation.

Singer, songwriter, and voiceover artist Christina Aguinaga joins on episode 346, recorded with a great backdrop of the greenery and mountains. From her bio, “I’ve been using my voice for as long as I can remember. I grew up reading stories to my brother and sister, especially since we joined the reading program at the local library. I was introduced to Aesop’s Fables, Grimm’s Fairy Tales, the Poetry of Shel Silverstien, and so much more. It wasn’t long after that I started singing, dancing, and acting professionally in regional and dinner theater in Orange and Los Angeles County, California. When I was a featured performer in the productions for Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines, I was influenced by the musicians on the cruise ships to start listening to all kinds of music. However, it was the mesmerizing combination of melodies and lyrics that captivated me most and perpetually altered my perspective. I wanted to share my own stories in that medium. Fortunately, I was encouraged to further my studies in songwriting, composition, and audio engineering so that I could write and record my own music. As a result, I went on to receive my BA in Music Technology from California State University, Dominguez Hills where I also completed my single subject teaching credential in music. I continue to teach private music lessons and provide my performance services for restaurants, country clubs, churches, private parties, and weddings in Southern California. I have also had a residency as a solo singer and pianist at the XIV Hakone Rikyu in Hakone, Japan.  I started using my voice not only to speak about music, but about all the things that matter to me by providing voiceover, collaborating on copy, and writing commercial jingles for small businesses whose innovations consciously contribute to a happier, healthier, and more sustainable world. The cauldron of my creativity is ever evolving.” Here is a link to her home page.

N. J. Enfield is a professor and the chair of linguistics at the University of Sydney, and a research associate in the Language and Cognition Group at the Max Planck Institute. He joins on episode 345, where we discuss his latest book Language Vs. Reality: Why Language Is Good for Lawyers and Bad for Scientists. “Enfield offers a lively exploration of the science underlying the bugs and features of language. He examines the tenuous relationship between language and reality; details the array of effects language has on our memory, attention, and reasoning; and describes how these varied effects power narratives and storytelling as well as political spin and conspiracy theories. Why should we care what language is good for? Enfield, who has spent twenty years at the cutting edge of language research, argues that understanding how language works is crucial to tackling our most pressing challenges, including human cognitive bias, media spin, the “post-truth” problem, persuasion, the role of words in our thinking, and much more.” Nick Enfield is Professor of Linguistics at the University of Sydney and director of the Sydney Social Sciences and Humanities Advanced Research Centre, and the Sydney Centre for Language Research. He is head of a Research Excellence Initiative on The Crisis of Post-Truth Discourse. His research on language, culture, cognition and social life is based on long term field work in mainland Southeast Asia, especially Laos. His recent books include Natural Causes of Language, Distributed Agency, and How We Talk. Nick has published widely in linguistics, anthropology, and cognitive science venues, and has written for the Guardian, the Times Literary Supplement, the Wall Street Journal, and Science. He is a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia, the Royal Society of New South Wales, and the Australian Academy of the Humanities.

Welcome to episode 344 of the show with Professor Justin E. H. Smith, author of The Internet Is Not What You Think It Is, joining us on the program to discuss topics from his book. “An original deep history of the internet that tells the story of the centuries-old utopian dreams behind it—and explains why they have died today. Many think of the internet as an unprecedented and overwhelmingly positive achievement of modern human technology.” Justin Erik Halldór Smith is an American-Canadian professor of history and philosophy of science at the University of Paris 7 – Denis Diderot. He has authored several books and is also a sometime contributor to The New York Times, Harper’s Magazine, n+1, Slate, and Art in America. Smith is an editor-at-large of Cabinet Magazine. Since the fall of 2020, Smith has been publishing philosophical and critical essays on his Substack newsletter, Justin E. H. Smith’s Hinternet. Smith’s primary research interests include Leibniz, early modern philosophy, history and philosophy of biology, classical Indian philosophy, and the history and philosophy of anthropology.

Cities represent a place where wildlife once chose to be, and where we have come together with wildlife in the current moment. With wildlife thriving in cities, we have the opportunity to create vibrant urban ecosystems that serve both people and animals. The Accidental Ecosystem tells the story of how cities across the United States went from having little wildlife to filling, dramatically and unexpectedly, with wild creatures. Author and Professor Peter S. Alagona joins on episode 343 to cover topics from this recent book. After earning his PhD at UCLA in 2006, Professor Alagona completed postdoctoral fellowships at Harvard and Stanford universities. Since arriving at UCSB in 2009, he has received several awards, including a National Science Foundation CAREER grant and the Harold J. Plous Award for the UCSB College of Letters and Science’s most outstanding junior faculty member. Alagona is the author of more than three-dozen publications in the areas of environmental history, geography, philosophy, and policy—including After the Grizzly: Endangered Species and the Politics of Place in California. Peter Alagona’s research focuses on the histories of land use, natural resource management, environmental politics, and ecological science in the North American West and beyond. He has particular interests in endangered species and biological diversity, and he is developing a new research and teaching initiative on the history of ideas about environmental change.

Are you able to do one thing at a time with full presence or concentration? What are categories of life that we can look at to bring this full presence to? Self-improvement author and bibliophile Thatcher Wine joins us on episode 342 of the show to detail twelve such examples from his book The Twelve Monotasks: Do One Thing At A Time. Thatcher Wine is a Self-improvement author, professional book curator, bibliophile, and founder of Juniper Books. He is mostly known for designing and creating visually appealing custom curated book libraries. The Guardian and Town & Country have referred Wine as a “celebrity bibliophile”. Wine co-authored his first book Love of Books: Designing and Curating a Home Library in 2019. The book is about curating and designing private libraries. Links: Personal Website | Instagram | Twitter | Juniper Books

When it comes to what we can learn about our senses from animals of the world, a lot is illuminated by Jackie Higgins, author of Sentient: How Animals Illuminate the Wonder of Our Human Senses. She joins on episode 341, with an array of organisms to present, along with the senses that those organisms inform us about. “From the harlequin mantis shrimp with its ability to see a vast range of colors, to the bloodhound and its hundreds of millions of scent receptors; from the orb-weaving spider whose eyes recognize not only space but time, to the cheetah whose ears are responsible for its perfect agility, these astonishing animals hold the key to better understanding how we make sense of the world around us.” Jackie Higgins is a graduate of Oxford University with an MA in zoology and has worked for Oxford Scientific Films for over a decade, along with National Geographic, PBS Nova, and the Discovery Channel. She has also written, directed, and produced films at the BBC Science Department. She lives in London. Links: Sentient on Amazon | Twitter | Simon & Schuster

Following the great success of her first novel Le Tiers Temps, French novelist and producer Maylis Besserie has continued forward with her latest novel Les amours dispersées. She joins us from France on episode 340 of the show to discuss her novels, writing, themes from the content, and shares with us some of the elements of writing freedom that exist. Maylis works as a producer for the radio channel France Culture, and her novel Le Tiers Temps won the Goncourt for first novels. It serves as an homage to Samuel Beckett and James Joyce, and was named after the retirement home where Beckett lived in the last year of his life. Links: Twitter | Wikipedia | Books on Amazon