Philosophy, Ideas, Critical Thinking, Ethics & Morality: The Creative Process: Philosophers, Writers, Educators, Creative Thinkers, Spiritual Leaders, Environmentalists & Bioethicists

Leah Thomas is an intersectional environmental activist and eco-communicator based in Southern California. She’s passionate about advocating for and exploring the relationship between social justice and environmentalism and was the first to define the term “Intersectional Environmentalism.” She is the founder of @greengirlleah and The Intersectional Environmentalist platform. Her articles on this topic have appeared in Vogue, Elle, The Good Trade, and Youth to the People and she has been featured in Harper’s Bazaar, W Magazine, Domino, GOOP, Fashionista, BuzzFeed, and numerous podcasts. She has a B.S. in Environmental Science and Policy from Chapman University and worked for the National Park Service and Patagonia headquarters before pursuing activism full time. She lives in Carpinteria, California. She is the author of The Intersectional Environmentalist: How to Dismantle Systems of Oppression to Protect People + Planet, and Winner of the Creative Force Foundation Award 2023."Learning about environmentalism in school, you look at specific figures like John Muir, etc. And I wanted people to also have that association when it came to the environmental justice movement because I think sometimes that really is a helpful learning tool for students.So in particular, Hazel M. Johnson, I'm so fascinated by her because she's often not really written about in environmental textbooks at all. She was just a woman in Chicago who had no environmental experience, but she started realizing that a lot of people in her community, including her husband, were getting all sorts of forms of cancers and other heart diseases and things like that at what she suspected were alarming rates. So when she investigated, she found that her neighborhood was built on top of toxic waste and other things, and she defined this term called a toxic doughnut that her community and so many other communities that were similar to hers that were lower income and primarily Black neighborhoods that were formerly redlined were surrounded by a toxic doughnut of waste, of landfills, highways running through their neighborhoods, and sometimes even buried radioactive waste, etc.So she was one of the first people who really made a stir about this, and I think something that's really cool in her work, and then also Dr. Robert Bullard, to formalize that research or that hunch that she had and produced the first study on toxic waste and race and really made the field of environmental justice is that they also were really just faith-based people that spoke about this amongst their churches.And I think again, that's something that's really cool because in the environmental or scientific community, sometimes people do try to separate faith advocacy from science. However, these are people who were mobilizing in their churches and talking about it in their sermons and seeing how they could transform their communities to be better for people and the planet.So I think it's just a great story, and I really want people to know the names of people like Hazel Johnson and Dr. Robert Bullard just like they know the names of people like John Muir because they've done such a beautiful job, and I want their legacies to be remembered."www.intersectionalenvironmentalist.com www.instagram.com/greengirlleah www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/leah-thomas/the-intersectional-environmentalist/9780316281935/?lens=voraciousSeason 2 of Business & Society focuses on CEOs , Sustainability & Environmental Solutions Business & Society is a limited series co-hosted by Bruce Piasecki & Mia Funkwww.oneplanetpodcast.org

"I'm not against AI. I'm not against technology. I'm not against enhancements. You wear glasses. I wear glasses. That enhances your body, but you want to enhance yourself in such a way that you are following your humanity to the next step?There's no reason that tools can't improve your humanity, but to go beyond your humanity or away from your humanity is a mistake. And so, until we ask ourselves these central basic questions. What am I? What am I doing here? How can we know whether we should use a machine or not? Because there's always going to be some billionaire idiot who thinks he's the smartest person on earth telling us we've got to implant this thing in our brain, or we're going to be less than the guy next to us."What makes a good drama? What advantages do human storytellers have over their AI counterparts? Where do ideas come from? And what do spiritual beliefs share with artists' faith in the creative process?Andrew Klavan is the author of such internationally bestselling crime novels as True Crime, filmed by Clint Eastwood, Don’t Say A Word, filmed starring Michael Douglas, Empire of Lies and When Christmas Comes. He has been nominated for the Mystery Writers of America’s Edgar Award five times and has won twice. He wrote the screenplays to A Shock to The System starring Michael Caine, One Missed Call starring Edward Burns, and Gosnell: The Trial of America’s Biggest Serial Killer starring Dean Cain. His essays have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times, his political satire videos have been viewed by tens of millions of people, and he hosts a popular podcast The Andrew Klavan Show at the Daily Wire. He is also the author of a memoir about his religious journey The Great Good Thing: A Secular Jew Comes to Faith in Christ and the USA Today bestseller The Truth and Beauty: How the Lives and Works of England's Greatest Poets Point the Way to a Deeper Understanding of the Words of Jesus. His latest crime novel is The House of Love and Death, the third book in the Cameron Winter series.www.andrewklavan.comwww.amazon.com/House-Death-Cameron-Winter-Mysteries/dp/1613164467www.creativeprocess.infowww.oneplanetpodcast.orgIG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

What makes a good drama? What advantages do human storytellers have over their AI counterparts? Where do ideas come from? And what do spiritual beliefs share with artists' faith in the creative process?Andrew Klavan is the author of such internationally bestselling crime novels as True Crime, filmed by Clint Eastwood, Don’t Say A Word, filmed starring Michael Douglas, Empire of Lies and When Christmas Comes. He has been nominated for the Mystery Writers of America’s Edgar Award five times and has won twice. He wrote the screenplays to A Shock to The System starring Michael Caine, One Missed Call starring Edward Burns, and Gosnell: The Trial of America’s Biggest Serial Killer starring Dean Cain. His essays have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times, his political satire videos have been viewed by tens of millions of people, and he hosts a popular podcast The Andrew Klavan Show at the Daily Wire. He is also the author of a memoir about his religious journey The Great Good Thing: A Secular Jew Comes to Faith in Christ and the USA Today bestseller The Truth and Beauty: How the Lives and Works of England's Greatest Poets Point the Way to a Deeper Understanding of the Words of Jesus. His latest crime novel is The House of Love and Death, the third book in the Cameron Winter series."I'm not against AI. I'm not against technology. I'm not against enhancements. You wear glasses. I wear glasses. That enhances your body, but you want to enhance yourself in such a way that you are following your humanity to the next step?There's no reason that tools can't improve your humanity, but to go beyond your humanity or away from your humanity is a mistake. And so, until we ask ourselves these central basic questions. What am I? What am I doing here? How can we know whether we should use a machine or not? Because there's always going to be some billionaire idiot who thinks he's the smartest person on earth telling us we've got to implant this thing in our brain, or we're going to be less than the guy next to us."www.andrewklavan.comwww.amazon.com/House-Death-Cameron-Winter-Mysteries/dp/1613164467www.creativeprocess.infowww.oneplanetpodcast.orgIG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

“So I wrote this book and it was a lot of fun because I had to learn so much. The book examines three iconic teachers: Confucius, Socrates, and Jesus. And I look at how each of those teachers encourage a certain kind of student. The student as follower, someone who will take on the path that you've developed. In the case of Socrates, the student as critical interlocutor or critical conversation partner, someone who will, in dialogue with you, learn what they don't know, how to take things apart. And in the case of Jesus and the apostles, I look at trying to imitate a way of life to transform themselves to strive towards being the kind of person that Jesus incarnated. And so that's the beginning of the book, these models of studenthood, if I could use that word, and being a teacher. And then I look at the way in which these ideas reverberate in the West across a long period of time. So I'm interested in the idea of the student before there were schools. What did we expect young people to learn even when they weren't going to school?”What is the purpose of education? How are we educating students for the future? What is the importance of the humanities in this age of AI and the rapidly changing workplace?Michael S. Roth is President of Wesleyan University. His books include Beyond the University: Why Liberal Education Matters and Safe Enough Spaces: A Pragmatist’s Approach to Inclusion, Free Speech, and Political Correctness on College Campuses. He's been a Professor of History and the Humanities since 1983, was the Founding Director of the Scripps College Humanities Institute, and was the Associate Director of the Getty Research Institute. His scholarly interests center on how people make sense of the past, and he has authored eight books around this topic, including his latest, The Student: A Short History.https://www.wesleyan.edu/academics/faculty/mroth/profile.htmlhttps://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300250039/the-student/www.wesleyan.eduhttps://twitter.com/mroth78www.creativeprocess.infowww.oneplanetpodcast.orgIG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

What is the purpose of education? How are we educating students for the future? What is the importance of the humanities in this age of AI and the rapidly changing workplace?Michael S. Roth is President of Wesleyan University. His books include Beyond the University: Why Liberal Education Matters and Safe Enough Spaces: A Pragmatist’s Approach to Inclusion, Free Speech, and Political Correctness on College Campuses. He's been a Professor of History and the Humanities since 1983, was the Founding Director of the Scripps College Humanities Institute, and was the Associate Director of the Getty Research Institute. His scholarly interests center on how people make sense of the past, and he has authored eight books around this topic, including his latest, The Student: A Short History.“There's definitely a shift that occurs in the West from education is really giving you the ability to take your place in society, to education as being able to create your space in society. And so for most of human history in the West, education was to show you where you would fit in, and you may have had a couple of options or not, but you were going to fit in, and you were educated in such a way as to enable that fitting. In the modern period that changes. It's less about fitting in than it is about opening a space for flourishing or for creativity or freedom. And I spend a fair amount of time in the book on college students and those privileged folks who get to extend their formal education in ways that are supposed to open themselves up to creativity, transformation, and eventually participation in the system. That creates their schools in the first place.”https://www.wesleyan.edu/academics/faculty/mroth/profile.htmlhttps://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300250039/the-student/www.wesleyan.eduhttps://twitter.com/mroth78www.creativeprocess.infowww.oneplanetpodcast.orgIG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

"Being worried about the future is just that, it's worrying. Think about how much time and energy you spend worrying about stuff that hasn't happened, and maybe even never will. But what if you instead put all of your energy towards the creation of a positive and lasting future?I think the most important thing that I would like young people to know is that they can build their future. That they have the power and they have the agency to shape their future and they have the ability and the power when working with others to have an even broader impact.The thing that scares me the most about the future is when people give up that agency and they let other people design their futures for them. For me, I think it's incredibly powerful to go to young people and say you can do it. But also you need to tell me what you want. And I think empowering them to have a vision for the future, that's why I spend so much time in schools and talking to young people because it's those visions that I think are incredibly important."Brian David Johnson is Futurist in Residence at Arizona State University’s Center for Science and the Imagination, a professor in the School for the Future of Innovation in Society, and the Director of the ASU Threatcasting Lab. He is Author of The Future You: How to Create the Life You Always Wanted,  Science Fiction Prototyping: Designing the Future with Science Fiction, 21st Century Robot: The Dr. Simon Egerton Stories, Humanity in the Machine: What Comes After Greed?, Screen Future: The Future of Entertainment, Computing, and the Devices We Love.https://csi.asu.edu/people/brian-david-johnson/www.creativeprocess.infowww.oneplanetpodcast.orgIG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

Brian David Johnson is Futurist in Residence at Arizona State University’s Center for Science and the Imagination, a professor in the School for the Future of Innovation in Society, and the Director of the ASU Threatcasting Lab. He is Author of The Future You: How to Create the Life You Always Wanted,  Science Fiction Prototyping: Designing the Future with Science Fiction, 21st Century Robot: The Dr. Simon Egerton Stories, Humanity in the Machine: What Comes After Greed?, Screen Future: The Future of Entertainment, Computing, and the Devices We Love."Being worried about the future is just that, it's worrying. Think about how much time and energy you spend worrying about stuff that hasn't happened, and maybe even never will. But what if you instead put all of your energy towards the creation of a positive and lasting future?I think the most important thing that I would like young people to know is that they can build their future. That they have the power and they have the agency to shape their future and they have the ability and the power when working with others to have an even broader impact.The thing that scares me the most about the future is when people give up that agency and they let other people design their futures for them. For me, I think it's incredibly powerful to go to young people and say you can do it. But also you need to tell me what you want. And I think empowering them to have a vision for the future, that's why I spend so much time in schools and talking to young people because it's those visions that I think are incredibly important."https://csi.asu.edu/people/brian-david-johnson/www.creativeprocess.infowww.oneplanetpodcast.orgIG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

"I think people need to remember consciousness. I think it's the most central aspect of our existence. And I think we need to remember to appreciate that felt quality of experience and know what it is and know what it is not. So as we move forward and deliberate over the human future and grasp machine intelligence and see it increasing and improving, we need to understand what's distinctive about us. And I think having a better scientific and philosophical understanding of these questions is very important."Will AI become conscious? President Biden has just unveiled a new executive order on AI — the U.S. government’s first action of its kind — requiring new safety assessments, equity and civil rights guidance, and research on AI’s impact on the labor market. With this governance in place, can tech companies be counted on to do the right thing for humanity? Susan Schneider is a philosopher, artificial intelligence expert, and founding director of the Center for the Future Mind at Florida Atlantic University. She is author of Artificial You: AI and the Future of Your Mind, Science Fiction and Philosophy: From Time Travel to Superintelligence, and The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness. She held the NASA Chair with NASA and the Distinguished Scholar Chair at the Library of Congress. She is now working on projects related to advancements in AI policy and technology, drawing from neuroscience research and philosophical developments and writing a new book on the shape of intelligent systems.www.fau.edu/artsandletters/philosophy/susan-schneider/index www.fau.edu/future-mind/www.creativeprocess.infowww.oneplanetpodcast.orgIG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

Will AI become conscious? President Biden has just unveiled a new executive order on AI — the U.S. government’s first action of its kind — requiring new safety assessments, equity and civil rights guidance, and research on AI’s impact on the labor market. With this governance in place, can tech companies be counted on to do the right thing for humanity? Susan Schneider is a philosopher, artificial intelligence expert, and founding director of the Center for the Future Mind at Florida Atlantic University. She is author of Artificial You: AI and the Future of Your Mind, Science Fiction and Philosophy: From Time Travel to Superintelligence, and The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness. She held the NASA Chair with NASA and the Distinguished Scholar Chair at the Library of Congress. She is now working on projects related to advancements in AI policy and technology, drawing from neuroscience research and philosophical developments and writing a new book on the shape of intelligent systems."I think people need to remember consciousness. I think it's the most central aspect of our existence. And I think we need to remember to appreciate that felt quality of experience and know what it is and know what it is not. So as we move forward and deliberate over the human future and grasp machine intelligence and see it increasing and improving, we need to understand what's distinctive about us. And I think having a better scientific and philosophical understanding of these questions is very important."www.fau.edu/artsandletters/philosophy/susan-schneider/index www.fau.edu/future-mind/www.creativeprocess.infowww.oneplanetpodcast.orgIG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

What will the future look like? What are the risks and opportunities of AI? What role can we play in designing the future we want to live in?Voices of philosophers, futurists, AI experts, science fiction authors, activists, and lawyers reflecting on AI, technology, and the Future of Humanity. All voices in this episode are from our interviews for The Creative Process & One Planet Podcast.Voices on this episode are:DR. SUSAN SCHNEIDER American philosopher and artificial intelligence expert. She is the founding director of the Center for the Future Mind at Florida Atlantic University. Author of Artificial You: AI and the Future of Your Mind, Science Fiction and Philosophy: From Time Travel to Superintelligence, and The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness. www.fau.edu/artsandletters/philosophy/susan-schneider/indexNICK BOSTROM Founder and Director of the Future of Humanity Institute, University of Oxford, Philosopher, Author of NYTimes Bestseller Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies. Bostrom’s academic work has been translated into more than 30 languages. He is a repeat main TED speaker and has been on Foreign Policy’s Top 100 Global Thinkers list twice and was included in Prospect’s World Thinkers list, the youngest person in the top 15. https://nickbostrom.com https://www.fhi.ox.ac.ukBRIAN DAVID JOHNSONFuturist in residence at Arizona State University’s Center for Science and the Imagination, a professor in the School for the Future of Innovation in Society and the Director of the ASU Threatcasting Lab. He is Author of The Future You: How to Create the Life You Always Wanted, Science Fiction Prototyping: Designing the Future with Science Fiction, 21st Century Robot: The Dr. Simon Egerton Stories, Humanity in the Machine: What Comes After Greed?, Screen Future: The Future of Entertainment, Computing, and the Devices We Love.https://csi.asu.edu/people/brian-david-johnsonDEAN SPADE Professor at SeattleU’s School of Law, Author of Mutual Aid, Building Solidarity During This Crisis (and the Next), and Normal Life: Administrative Violence, Critical Trans Politics, and the Limits of Law.www.deanspade.netALLEN STEELEScience Fiction Author. He has been awarded a number of Hugos, Asimov's Readers, and Locus Awards. of the Coyote Trilogy, Arkwright, and other books. His books include Coyote Trilogy and Arkwright. He is a former member of the Board of Directors and Board of Advisors for the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. He has also served as an advisor for the Space Frontier Foundation. In 2001, he testified before the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics of the U.S. House of Representatives in hearings regarding space exploration in the 21st century.www.allensteele.comwww.creativeprocess.infowww.oneplanetpodcast.orgIG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast