Author Archives: forthrightradio

Bruce Gourley Americans United for Separation of Church and State

This edition of Forthright Radio marks the 20th anniversary of the first program that day after Thanksgiving in 2004. I am deeply grateful to Mendocino County Public Broadcasting, KZYXfm, and all the listeners who support community radio, for having given me the opportunity to host and produce Forthright Radio.

Bruce Gourely is an historian specializing in American History and the editor of Church & State magazine, the publication of Washington D.C. based Americans United for Separation of Church and State. He is an award winning author and photographer. Among his nine books are Crucible of Faith and Freedom: Baptists and the American Civil War; Diverging Loyalties: Baptists in Middle Georgia During the American Civil War. He also owns and operates the website, Yellowstone.net.

I recently had the opportunity to hear Bruce Gourely speak right after the recent election, and I immediately invited him to share his thoughts as an historian and a person dedicated to to preserving our First Amendment rights to help prepare us for what will surely be challenging times ahead. We spoke with him on November 19th, 2024 in the Beyond the Deep End studio.

Articles pertinent to this interview:

From the Massachusetts Bay Colony’s ‘Body of Liberties’ to today’s ‘Moms for Liberty’: A brief history of the anti-freedom parental rights movement https://www.au.org/the-latest/church-and-state/articles/from-the-massachusetts-bay-colonys-body-of-liberties-to-todays-moms-for-liberty-a-brief-history-of-the-anti-freedom-parental-rights-movement/

Supreme theocrats: The anti-freedom, anti-life, biblical worldview of the Christian Nationalist majority on the nation’s highest court https://www.au.org/the-latest/church-and-state/articles/supreme-theocrats-the-anti-freedom-anti-life-biblical-worldview-of-the-christian-nationalist-majority-on-the-nations-highest-court/

Legislating inequality: The Christian Confederate roots of Project 2025 https://www.au.org/the-latest/church-and-state/articles/legislating-inequality-the-christian-confederate-roots-of-project-2025/

The passing of Pat Schroeder reminds us how far we’ve come https://gazette.com/politics/pat-schroeder-women-trailblazer/article_a09b6882-c38f-11ed-82ef-833044f03ea3.html

““The women in Congress had to wage virtually every battle alone,” Schroeder wrote in her memoir of those early years, “whether we were fighting for female pages (there were none) or a place where we could pee.”
That’s right. For many years, women didn’t have a bathroom off the House floor like the men did. When Schroeder was there, women were forced to use the restroom inside the women’s reading room far off on another floor. Female members of the House didn’t get a women’s bathroom off the House floor until 2011.”

Education or indoctrination? As public schools go back into session, Americans United fights a rising tide of state-sponsored religion https://www.au.org/the-latest/church-and-state/articles/education-or-indoctrination-as-public-schools-go-back-into-session-americans-united-fights-a-rising-tide-of-state-sponsored-religion/

Federal Judge Blocks Louisiana Law Requiring Ten Commandments in Classrooms https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/12/us/louisiana-ten-commandments-ruling.html?searchResultPosition=

Thou shalt not bear false witness https://www.au.org/the-latest/church-and-state/articles/thou-shalt-not-bear-false-witness/

Texas Education Board Backs Curriculum With Lessons Drawn From Bible https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/19/us/texas-bible-curriculum-public-schools.html

Abortion clinics can stay open; judge extends block on license requirement for now https://dailymontanan.com/2024/11/18/abortion-clinics-can-stay-open-judge-extends-block-on-license-requirement-for-now/

Judge strikes down Wyoming’s anti-abortion laws in victory for rights advocates https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/19/wyoming-anti-abortion-laws-struck-down-pills

As nuns disappear, many Catholic hospitals look more like megacorporations https://dailymontanan.com/2024/11/17/as-nuns-disappear-many-catholic-hospitals-look-more-like-megacorporations/

Judge hears case over Montana rule blocking trans residents from changing sex on birth certificate https://montanafreepress.org/2024/11/15/judge-hears-case-over-montana-rule-blocking-trans-residents-from-changing-sex-on-birth-certificate/

Voters Poised to Reject Private School Vouchers in Three States https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/07/us/private-school-funding-election-rejection.html

Trump Wants to Shut Down the Department of Education? Is That Possible? https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/10/us/shut-down-department-of-education-trump.html

Colorado parolee who refused to take part in Christian worship wins settlement https://www.au.org/the-latest/church-and-state/articles/colorado-parolee-who-refused-to-take-part-in-christian-worship-wins-settlement/

Supreme Court abortion ruling fails to provide protection, AU says https://www.au.org/the-latest/church-and-state/articles/supreme-court-abortion-ruling-fails-to-provide-protection-au-says/

‘Partisan politics’: how efforts to overturn the Johnson amendment could upend campaign finance https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/14/johnson-amendment-campaign-finance

Christian Nationalist Podcasters Want to Take Over Tennessee County https://www.newsweek.com/christian-nationalists-plans-community-tennessee-county-1987879

Revealed: trans rights case at US supreme court features doctors previously discredited by judges https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/nov/21/supreme-court-trans-rights-doctors-testimonies-bias

Trump’s Pentagon pick Hegseth wrote of US military taking sides in ‘civil war’ https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/22/trump-defense-secretary-pete-hegseth-book

Republican bathroom bill targets Congress’s first transgender member https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/19/sarah-mcbride-congress-bathroom-bill-transgender

A lawsuit of biblical proportions: Americans United representing parents, students, teachers and clergy in challenge to Oklahoma state superintendent’s plan to force Bibles into public schools https://www.au.org/the-latest/church-and-state/articles/a-lawsuit-of-biblical-proportions-americans-united-representing-parents-students-teachers-and-clergy-in-challenge-to-oklahoma-state-superintendents-plan-to-force-bibles-into-public-schools/

Oklahoma Students Mandated To Watch Video Announcing New Religious Department https://www.huffpost.com/entry/bc-us-religious-freedom-office-oklahoma_n_6738e2bae4b0520a467732ca

Louisiana students who were sent to church will be able to pursue legal action https://www.au.org/the-latest/church-and-state/articles/louisiana-students-who-were-sent-to-church-will-be-able-to-pursue-legal-action/

Opinion analysis: Court rules that religious schools cannot be excluded from state funding for private schools https://www.scotusblog.com/2020/06/opinion-analysis-court-rules-that-religious-schools-cannot-be-excluded-from-state-funding-for-private-schools/

South Carolina Supreme Court strikes down school voucher plan https://www.au.org/the-latest/church-and-state/articles/south-carolina-supreme-court-strikes-down-school-voucher-plan/

M. V. Ramana NUCLEAR IS NOT THE SOLUTION: The Folly of Atomic Power in the Age of Climate Change

Professor M. V. Ramana, a physicist by training, is Simons Chair in Disarmament, Global and Human Security and the director of the graduate program at the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs, University of British Columbia, Vancouver. He previously worked at the Nuclear Futures Laboratory and the Program on Science and Global Security, both at Princeton University. He is a member of the International Panel on Fissile Material, The International Nuclear Risk Assessment Group, and the team that produces the annual World Nuclear Industry Status Report. His earlier books are The Power of Promise: Examining Nuclear Energy in India, and Bombing Bombay? Effects of Nuclear Weapons and a Case Study of a Hypothetical Explosion.

Increasingly alarmed by more and more reports of well respected climate scientists, such as James Hansen, who promote nuclear energy as an important part of responding to rapidly increasing climate catastrophes, we spoke with Professor Ramana via Skype on November 4, 2024 about his latest book, NUCLEAR IS NOT THE SOLUTION: THE FOLLY OF ATOMIC POWER IN THE AGE OF CLIMATE CHANGE, published by Verso.

Articles pertinent to this interview:

Meta signs deal with nuclear plant to power AI and datacenters for 20 years https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jun/03/meta-nuclear-power-ai

Dangerous Hype: Big Tech’s Nuclear Lies https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/11/01/big-techs-nuclear-lies/

Biden Tees Up 2 More Major Nuclear Power Wins for Trump https://www.huffpost.com/entry/biden-nuclear-pledge-climate-summit_n_67352fc1e4b0958bad3e15f4

The Cost of a Nuclear Arsenal https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/02/opinion/nuclear-arsenal.html

The Price https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/10/10/opinion/nuclear-weapons-us-price.html

Three Mile Island, Notorious in Nuclear Power’s Past, May Herald Its Future https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/30/business/energy-environment/three-mile-island-nuclear-energy.html

Big Fire Breaks Out at Nuclear Submarine Plant in Britain https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/30/world/europe/fire-nuclear-submarine-uk.html

Why even environmentalists are supporting nuclear power today https://www.npr.org/2022/08/30/1119904819/nuclear-power-environmentalists-california-germany-japan

Robot retrieves radioactive fuel sample from Fukushima nuclear reactor site https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/nov/02/robot-retrieves-radioactive-fuel-sample-from-fukushima-nuclear-reactor

Japanese nuclear reactor which survived earthquake that badly damaged Fukushima power plant restarts https://www.sfgate.com/news/world/article/japanese-nuclear-reactor-which-survived-19870742.php

Donald Trump can’t stop global climate action. If we stick together, it’s the US that will lose out https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/07/donald-trump-cant-stop-global-climate-action-if-we-stick-together-its-the-us-that-will-lose-out

Trump voters want a revolution. It’s time for progressives to offer their own https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/07/trump-voters-revolution-politics-right

Our mistake was to think we lived in a better country than we do https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/07/us-progressive-election-trump-maga

Tsunehisa Katsumata, Top Executive in Power Plant Meltdown, Dies at 84 https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/01/business/tsunehisa-katsumata-dead.html

Richard A. Fineberg, Relentless Skeptic of Alaska Pipeline, Dies at 83 https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/01/climate/richard-a-fineberg-dead.html

Yael Bridge THE BIG SCARY “S” WORD & Lois Lipman FIRST WE BOMBED NEW MEXICO https://forthright.media/2024/05/24/yael-bridge-the-big-scary-s-word-lois-lipman-first-we-bombed-new-mexico/

Arlie Russell Hochschild STOLEN PRIDE: Loss, Shame, and the Rise of the Right

Arlie Russell Hochschild is University of California Berkeley Professor Emerita of Sociology. She is the author of many groundbreaking books, including THE SECOND SHIFT, WORKING FAMILIES AND THE REVOLUTION AT HOME; THE TIME BIND, WHEN WORK BECOMES HOME AND HOME BECOMES WORK; and her best selling book, STRANGERS IN THEIR OWN LAND, ANGER AND MOURNING ON THE AMERICAN RIGHT, was a National Book Award finalist. In addition to her many honorary degrees from Harvard, and European universities, She also received the Ulysses medal from University College, Dublin, and the Helmholtz Medal from the Berlin Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities. And if that weren’t enough, she was inducted into the California Hall of Fame in 2022.

Her most recent book is STOLEN PRIDE: LOSS, SHAME, AND THE RISE OF THE RIGHT, published by The New Press in September, 2024. In it she explores the question, what happens when a proud people in a hard-hit region suffers the deep loss of pride and are confronted with a powerful political appeal that makes it feel “stolen?” Dr. Hochschild, prompted by CA Democratic Congressman Ro Khanna, who was working with KY-5th District Republican Congressman, Hal Rodgers, went to Pikeville in the heart of Appalachia in his district, which is the whitest and second poorest in the United States. 30 years ago, it was in the political center, but in 2016 and 2020, Trump received 80% of the district’s vote.

26 year old Neo-Nazi, Matthew Heimbach, sought a permit for a white supremacist march to be held there on April 30, 2017. It turned out to be a trial run for the August Unite the Right Rally in Charlottesville, for which he was a core organizer. He is just one of the people she interviewed and followed, and whose character actually evolved in surprising ways. We spoke with Arlie Russell Hochschild from her home in Berkeley, CA via Skype on October 22, 2024.

In honoring the passing of Fernando Valenzuela, hero for Dodgers and Mexican baseball fans, who died on October 22, at age of 63, and whose team, the LA Dodgers face the New York Yankees in the first game of the World Series that evening, we ended this edition with beloved poet/publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s ode to Latino baseball, “Baseball Canto.”

David Daley ANTIDEMOCRATIC: INSIDE THE FAR RIGHT’S 50 YEAR PLOT TO CONTROL AMERICAN ELECTIONS

David Daley is the author of the national bestseller Ratf**ked: Why Your Vote Doesn’t Count, which has been credited for kick-starting the national drive to end gerrymandering; and Unrigged: How Americans Are Battling Back to Save Democracy.

He returned to discuss his assiduously researched, well written and important latest book, ANTIDEMOCRATIC: INSIDE THE FAR RIGHT’S 50 YEAR PLOT TO CONTROL AMERICAN ELECTIONS, published by Mariner Books. It follows on the themes of those earlier books, and it couldn’t be coming at a more crucial time in our nation’s history’s, as we reel towards this tumultuous 2024 election, as democracy itself seems to be on the brink.

In addition to his books, David’s journalism has appeared in the New Yorker, the Atlantic, New York Times, Washington Post, and The Guardian, and he is the former editor in chief of Salon.com, as well as a senior fellow at FairVote. He has taught journalism and political science at Wesleyan University, Boston College, Smith College and the University of Georgia. We spoke with him via Skype on September 26, 2024.

Links to some articles pertinent to this interview:

There’s a danger that the US supreme court, not voters, picks the next president https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/sep/17/us-supreme-court-republican-judges-next-president Millions of Americans will vote this fall – but six Republican justices might have the final say, in a Bush v Gore redux

There’s a fair way to ensure third-party candidates don’t ‘spoil’ the US election https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/aug/28/presidential-election-ranked-choice-voting Two states have already adopted ranked-choice voting, a nonpartisan fix to our outdated electoral system

The election deniers with a chokehold on Georgia’s state election board https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/sep/26/georgia-board-of-elections-election-deniers

An ‘Utterly Bonkers’ Miscarriage of Justice in Texas https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/26/opinion/texas-erma-wilson-marcellus-williams.html

David S. Tatel VISION: A Memoir of Blindness and Justice

In this edition of Forthright Radio our guest is retired Federal Circuit Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, David S. Tatel. After many years as a civil rights attorney in private practice and public service, he was nominated by President Bill Clinton in June of 1994 to the seat vacated by Judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg, when she ascended to the Supreme Court. After only a one hour hearing and unanimous vote by the Senate Judiciary Committee, he was confirmed by the full Senate in a voice vote. In the 1970s, he was the founding Director of the Chicago Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, and then director of the national Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. During the Carter Administration, he served as the Director of the Office for Civil Rights in the Department of Health, Education and Welfare. By that time, he was fully blind, after the gradually progressing deterioration of his vision due to the genetic condition, retinitis pigmentosa.

His book, VISION: A MEMOIR OF BLINDNESS AND JUSTICE, was published by Little, Brown and Company in June of 2024. It’s the story of one individual’s journey in the service of justice through many historical moments – from John F. Kennedy, who inspired him to the nobility of public service, through the Donald J. Trump’s administration’s harangues against “The Deep State” and the mockery of the very idea of service, to his decision to retire from the bench during the Biden administration, so as not to repeat the strategically tragic decision of his friend, Ruth Bader Ginsberg, not to retire. As you will hear in this interview, the lack of judicial restraint by the Republican appointees of the current Supreme Court, and their ideological overturning of well established precedents in civil rights and environmental cases contributed to his decision to retire when he did from that position he loved.

But it’s not just a memoir of his legal experiences or philosophy. It’s a very human love story – for his wife of almost 60 years, his four children, and most recently, his guide dog, Vixen, as well as a memoir of his blindness, vulnerability, and rising above disability to his decades of public service.

We spoke with Judge Tatel via Skype from his home in rural Virginia on August 19, 2024.

Hamilton Nolan THE HAMMER: Power, Inequality, and the Struggle for the Soul of Labor

Hamilton Nolan is a labor journalist, author, and organizer, who has been writing about labor issues for over 2 decades. As well as writing for In These Times, the Guardian and elsewhere, he organized the first on-line writers union In 2015, while working at the Gawker site. He has a substack blog under the tag, How Things Work.

His book, THE HAMMER: POWER, INEQUALITY, AND THE STRUGGLE FOR THE SOUL OF LABOR, was published by Hachette in February, 2024. We spoke with him on August 5, 2024 via Skype.

Articles pertinent to this interview:

Unions and Antitrust Are Peanut Butter and Jelly https://www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/unions-and-antitrust-are-peanut-butter

How the “Working Class Republican” Scam Works https://substack.com/home/post/p-146882549

Capitalism’s Washing Machine https://www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/capitalisms-washing-machine

You Patsy https://www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/you-patsy

‘Stand your butt up’: Republican senator challenges Teamsters chief to fight during hearing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWN0zbjdDVA

A Transcript of Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts’ Speech About Our “Second American Revolution” https://www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/a-transcript-of-heritage-foundation

Onward, Christian Soldiers—To War! https://inthesetimes.com/article/national-conservatism-conference-2024-trump-gop

Housing Is The Economy https://www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/housing-is-the-economy

Dissident Group Wins Amazon Union Leadership Vote https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/30/business/economy/amazon-labor-union-election.html

Trump claims he’s pro-worker. Project 2025 will gut labor rights https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/aug/04/project-2025-trump-unions-overtime-pay

US chip factory workers say it’s a ‘struggle to survive’ on their wages as industry booms https://www.theguardian.com/business/article/2024/aug/05/chip-factory-workers-wages

13,500 US hotel workers hold strike votes over pay and conditions https://www.theguardian.com/business/article/2024/aug/06/hotel-workers-strike-vote

Randy Kehler, 80, Dies; Peace Activist Inspired Release of Pentagon Papers https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/01/us/politics/randy-kehler-dead.html

High School Project on Genocide Was a Portent of Real-Life Events https://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/23/education/23education.html

Timothy Winegard THE HORSE: A GALLOPING HISTORY OF HUMANITY

In this episode we share our interview with best selling author and Colorado Mesa University History Professor, Timothy Winegard. His latest book, THE HORSE: A GALLOPING HISTORY OF HUMANITY, is being published by Dutton on July 30, 2024. His five earlier books include THE MOSQUITO: A HUMAN HISTORY OF OUR DEADLIEST PREDATOR; THE FIRST WORLD OIL WAR; and FOR KING AND KANATA: CANADIAN INDIANS AND THE FIRST WORLD WAR.

We spoke with Professor Winegard about his fascinating book, THE HORSE: A GALLOPING HISTORY OF HUMANITY, on July 24, 2024, but a warning: the past two weeks since our most recent Forthright Radio had been characterized by technical breakdowns on several fronts. Without going into too many details, our Forthright Radio email address of many years became completely inaccessible on July 10th. Since July 12th, the computer had been elsewhere being worked on in the hope of retrieving the email information from it, but without success. Mere hours before our interview was scheduled,we got the computer back, but software we had been using for years, and which had been working when the computer was relinquished, no longer worked.

The reason we’re sharing this is because the audio software with which we record interviews was malfunctioning. We could hear and record Professor Winegard, but he couldn’t hear us, nor would the equipment record us. So, we had to do the interview recording him via Skype, and his listening to our questions via our ancient, failing land line phone. Bad as the audio quality of our questions is, Professor Winegard’s voice is of the quality you have come to expect. We are especially grateful to him for his patience and willingness to engage under such conditions.

The good news is that after our interview, the problems were located and remediated, so with any luck, this won’t happen again.

As for the Forthright Radio email address, that is sadly gone, never to return. However, we can still be contacted via the program’s website forthright.media contact page.

The Return of the Ojibwe Pony, the Midwest’s Native Horse https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/return-of-the-ojibwe-pony-the-midwests-native-horse?utm_source=pocket-newtab-en-us

Amanda Jones THAT LIBRARIAN: The Fight Against Book Banning in America

What if you attended your local small town public library board meeting to speak out against book censorship and soon found your reputation smeared by people from an entirely different county with lurid and untrue allegations that go viral, alleging that you advocate teaching anal sex to 11 year olds?

That’s what happened in July of 2022 to award winning Middle School librarian, Amanda Jones, which she writes about in her forthcoming book, THAT LIBRARIAN: THE FIGHT AGAINST BOOK BANNING IN AMERICA. Among her many awards are the 2021 School Librarian of the Year and the 2023 American Association of School Librarians’ Intellectual Freedom Award, as well as the American Library Association’s Paul Howard Award for Courage.

The group who singled her out of the thirty or so other people who spoke against book censorship at that Livingston Parish public library meeting, is Citizens for a New Louisiana, whose leader is Michael Lunsford. His confederate, Ryan Thames, operates the Facebook page, “Bayou State of Mind,” which posted mean, fallacious memes about her repeatedly, so she sued them for defamation of character.

We spoke with Amanda Jones on July 5, 2024 via Skype, but before we share our conversation, we begin with what she actually said on July 22, 2022, that made her the focus of the ire of reactionary, Christian Nationalist agitators.

Articles pertinent to this interview:

Librarian Fired in Books Dispute to Receive $700,000 Settlement https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/09/us/wyoming-library-settlement-book-bans-terri-lesley.html

2021 School Librarian of the Year Amanda Jones Keeps Fighting, Files Appeal of Court Decision http://2021 School Librarian of the Year Amanda Jones Keeps Fighting, Files Appeal of Court Decision

Georgia lawsuit challenges anti-LGBTQ+ book bans over ‘real harms’ https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jul/03/georgia-lawsuit-book-bans

Arkansas Law Criminalizing Librarians Ruled Unconstitutional https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ap-us-book-ban-librarians_n_6769ee23e4b04743daf033a9

Florida 7-year-old compelled to testify in book ban lawsuit https://www.politico.com/news/2024/07/23/florida-book-ban-child-testify-00170618

What Was the First Banned Book in History? https://getpocket.com/explore/item/what-was-the-first-banned-book-in-history?utm_source=firefox-newtab-en-us

Trump and Project 2025 are attacking the Department of Education. How might they reshape US schools? https://www.theguardian.com/education/article/2024/jul/04/trump-project-2025-heritage-foundation-education-department

How a Patriotic Painting Became the Internet’s Soap Box https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/03/style/norman-rockwell-freedom-of-speech-meme.html

Your Religious Values Are Not American Values https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/04/opinion/christian-nationalist-religion-america.html

Oklahoma’s State Superintendent Requires Public Schools to Teach the Bible https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/27/us/oklahoma-public-schools-bible.html

Young girl faints as Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry signs controversial Ten Commandments bill https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_XBSWQwyMQ

Louisiana now requires the 10 Commandments to be displayed in classrooms. It’s not the only terrifying state law https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/commandments-louisiana-laws-religion-republicans-b2572077.html

Featured image of Amanda Jones above: Emily Kask/NBC News

Zoë Schlanger THE LIGHT EATERS: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers a New Understanding of Life on Earth

Zoë Schlanger is an award winning environmental journalist and reporter with The Atlantic. Her book, THE LIGHT EATERS: HOW THE UNSEEN WORLD OF PLANT INTELLIGENCE OFFERS A NEW UNDERSTANDING OF LIFE ON EARTH, was published in May 2024 by Harper.

We are at a revolutionary moment in the field of botany, a veritable paradigm shift for those who pay attention to such things, and Zoë Schlanger chronicles the remapping of scientific frontiers, as one assumption after another is being proven not only to be false, but ignorant and arrogant. Along with the scientists she interviews, she explores questions such as do plants communicate with each other and even other species? Can they recognize and favor their own kin? Can they respond to visual and aural stimuli, store memories and learn? Are they conscious and intelligent? How is any of this possible lacking a brain? We asked about these and other questions when we spoke with her via Skype on June 24, 2024.

Articles pertinent to this interview:

‘Tiny Crime Fighters With Wings’: Bees Go to Work on a Virginia ‘Body Farm’ https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/21/science/body-donation-farm-virginia-death-scent.html

Scientists Find the Largest Known Genome Inside a Small Plant https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/31/science/largest-genome-fern-plant.html

Are animals conscious? How new research is changing minds https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cv223z15mpmo

Videos Show Ants Amputating Nest Mates’ Legs to Save Their Lives https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/02/science/ants-amputation-legs.html

A New Book About Plant Intelligence Highlights the Messiness of Scientific Change https://www.newyorker.com/books/under-review/a-new-book-about-plant-intelligence-highlights-the-messiness-of-scientific-change?utm_source=nl&utm_brand=tny&utm_mailing=TNY_Daily_Free_061224&utm_campaign=aud-dev&utm_medium=email&utm_term=tny_daily_digest&bxid=63b1f92250183f0ae10c0ba9&cndid=72363063&hasha=84d21cdfe18d0cd11a658c9d53f6399e&hashb=06e188f77cae68a6da1a2a975a274177f3b8a307&hashc=00628266d9531298e9eb7ccaabcc24f623d796b2c5e9e46cfbdc3eb12203466e&esrc=&mbid=CRMNYR012019

When They Hear Plants Crying, Moths Make a Decision https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/06/science/moths-hearing-plant-sounds.html