The New School at Commonweal: Ecology, Culture, Inner Life

Richard Grossman - The Tao of Ralph Waldo Emerson

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:43:49 -0800

Richard Grossman is an essayist, psychotherapist, medical educator, and former book publisher. The six books he has written include The Tao of Emerson and A Year with Emerson, which won the Umhoefer Prize for achievement in the humanities, awarded by the Arts and Humanities Foundation. He has read Emerson daily for over 50 years.

Emerson (1803-82) has been called "the George Washington of American Literature". He was a philosopher, essayist, poet, lecturer, and journal-keeper. An enchanted nature lover, he thought nothing of a 40 mile walk. A universal reader, Emerson drew on Plato, the Bhagavad Gita, the ancient Persian poets, the Quakers, Goethe, and Montaigne -- and hundreds of other masters of classical and contemporary thought. His admirers and friends included Carlyle, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Margaret Fuller and the Alcotts. He balanced materialism and idealism, science and soul, objectivity and subjectvity, the majestic heights of human achievement and the sacred dignity of every woman and man. He was a leader of the Transcendentalist movement in Boston, an abolitionist long before abolitionism was popular, and an absolute believer in the power of following one's own unique destiny.

Grossman considers Emerson a precursor of contemporary humanistic and transpersonal psychology. In 1970 Michael Murphy of Esalen Institute told Grossman about Roberto Assagioli, the Italian psychologist and founder of the transpersonal psychology called Psychosynthesis. Grossman published Assagioli's books Psychosynthesis and The Act of Will in America. Grossman himself entered Psychosynthesis training to become a psychotherapist. He found deep resonances between Assagioli and Emerson.

Colin Greer - President of the New World Foundation

Mon, 22 Feb 2010 14:05:21 -0800

Dr. Colin Greer has been the President of The New World Foundation since 1985. He was a Professor at Brooklyn College, CUNY, and has written several books. Colin Greer has participated in and directed several studies of U.S. immigration and urban schooling policy and history (at Columbia University and CUNY), and Chairs numerous organizations.

Dr. Colin Greer has been the President of The New World Foundation since 1985. Formerly, he was a Professor at Brooklyn College, CUNY.

He is the author (with Herbert Kohl) of The Plain Truth of Things and A Call to Character. Other books include: What Nixon is doing to Us; The Solution is Part of the Problem; After Reagan What?; and The Divided Society. He is best known for The Great School Legend and Choosing Equality: The Case for Democratic Schooling (which won the American Library Association’s Eli M. Oboler Intellectual Freedom Award). He was a founding editor of Change Magazine and Social Policy Magazine. He is a contributing editor to Parade Magazine.

Dr. Greer participated in and directed several studies of US Immigration and urban schooling policy and history (at Columbia University and CUNY). He wrote briefing papers on philanthropy and government for First Lady, Mrs. Hillary Clinton, and on education policy for Senator Paul Wellstone. He chaired the President’s White House Fellows Program (1992-4) and chaired the Funders Committee for Citizen Participation (for 10 years). He currently chairs The LARK Theater Company (NYC), and Culture Project (NYC). He serves on the Boards of the Center for Social Inclusion, The Opportunity Agenda, the Teachers and Writers Collaborative (NYC), New York City Interfaith Center, Tikkun Magazine (California), openDemocracyUSA (US/UK), and the American Institute for Mental Imagery.
Colin Greer also writes poetry, plays and non-fiction, and now also writes a blog on this website.

Thomas Kirsch, M.D. - THE RED BOOK: Reflections on Jung and the Jungians

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 13:41:09 -0800

THE RED BOOK, published in 2009 for the first time, is Carl Jung's richly illustrated record of his descent into his inner world, created in a period of personal crisis following his break with Sigmund Freud. A surprise best seller, THE RED BOOK has been reviewed in major periodicals around the world.

THOMAS KIRSCH has a deep knowledge of Jung and the Jungian movement. Born to two first generation Jungian analysts, Kirsch knew Jung as a child. He has served as president of the C.G. Jung Institute of San Francisco and the International Association of Analytical Psychology. He taught Jungian psychology in the Department of Psychiatry at Stanford Medical Center for many years, and is the author of an acclaimed study of the Jungian movement, The Jungians.

Robert Bray - Healing Traumatic Stress Disorders with Thought Field Therapy

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 13:00:11 -0800

Robert Bray has devoted his life’s work to the service of others.

Born in San Diego, Bob spent his childhood years in the Midwest before returning to San Diego as a junior in high school. Following college at San Diego State University, Bob spent a couple of seasons as a firefighter with the Cleveland National Forest, and also worked as a seasonal lifeguard with the City of San Diego.

Over the years Bob has been an avid volunteer with many community service organizations, both locally and nationally. Currently he is a volunteer with The American Red Cross, San Diego Chapter - Disaster Mental Health Specialist Team CA-3, and has been deployed to disaster sites such as Hurricane Katrina to assist relief efforts and provide counseling for those in need, in times of crisis.

Currently Bob has a successful psychotherapy practice in San Diego where he sees clients and offers periodic workshops based on his book, Heal Traumatic Stress NOW-Complete Recovery with Thought Field Therapy, No Open Wounds. Bob is also an adjunct faculty member at San Diego State University, School of Social Work, where he may teach one or two classes per semester. He has been married to his wife Diane for 30 years and enjoys time with friends, travelling, and life in San Diego.

To contact Bob, call his offices at 619-283-1116, or 1-888-983-8273, or e-mail: rlbray@rlbray.com. You may also click on the Contact Form to send a confidential message to Bob directly.

Edd Conboy - Healing People, Healing Organizations

Sun, 24 Jan 2010 10:05:38 -0800

A conversation with Edd Conboy on psychotherapy, trauma, learning organizations, The Whitman Institute, social entrepreneurs and the Jesuit model of social change

Edd Conboy's bio:
http://www.councilforrelationships.org/staff/bio_conboy_edd.htm

Nicolette Hahn Niman and Bill Niman - Righteous Porkchop: Finding a Life and Good Food Beyond Factory Farms

Mon, 28 Dec 2009 08:01:48 -0800

Nicolette Hahn Niman is rancher, attorney and writer. Much of her time is spent speaking and writing about the problems of industrialized livestock production, including the book "Righteous Porkchop: Finding a Life and Good Food Beyond Factory Farms" (HarperCollins, 2009) and three essays she has written on the subject for the New York Times.

Bill Niman is a cattle rancher in Northern California, proprietor of BN Ranch, and Founder of the natural meat company Niman Ranch, Inc. He was a member of the Pew Foundation's National Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production, which released recommendations for reform of the nation's livestock industry in April 2008.

Fritjof Capra - The Science of Leonardo, and Other Topics

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 20:46:52 -0800

Fritjof Capra, Ph.D., physicist and systems theorist, is a founding director of the Center for Ecoliteracy in Berkeley, California, which is dedicated to promoting ecology and systems thinking in primary and secondary education. He is on the faculty of Schumacher College, an international center for ecological studies in the UK. Dr. Capra is the author of several international bestsellers, including The Tao of Physics , The Web of Life, and The Hidden Connections: A Science for Sustainable Living. His most recent book, The Science of Leonardo, was published in paperback by Anchor Books in December 2008. www.fritjofcapra.net.

Under Our Skin - "It's About Lyme," a Conversation with Andy Abrahams Wilson and Win Bertrand, Eric Karpeles, Guest Moderator

Sun, 06 Dec 2009 21:29:59 -0800

A two-part community awareness program for the town of Bolinas, this event was a chance to learn more about one of the fastest growing epidemics in our world today. How does one contract Lyme? What is the protocol once one is infected? What is the long range prognosis for recovery? What is the nature of chronic Lyme disease? These are among the issues to be raised and discussed, in a context of information presented and treatments explored.

The community gathered after a screening of "Under Our Skin" for a discussion between the film's director/producer Andy Abrahams Wilson and Win Bertrand, MD of Gordon Medical Associates in Santa Rosa, followed by a question and answer session. Eric Karpeles and Michael Lerner hosted.

TKV Desikachar and Kate Holcombe - A Conversation on Healing Yoga

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 09:44:19 -0800

TKV Desikachar is the son and foremost student of the legendary yoga master T Krishnamacharya -- teacher of Patthabi Jois, BKS Iyengar, and Indra Devi.
Kate Holcombe is a senior student of Mr. Desikachar and founder of the Healing Yoga Foundation in San Francisco.
For over 45 years, TKV Desikachar has devoted himself to teaching yoga and making it relevant to people from all walks of life and with all kinds of abilities. His teaching method is based on T Krishnamacharya's fundamental principle that yoga must always be adapted to an individual's changing needs in order to derive the maximum therapeutic & personal benefit. In addition to the three decades of yoga training he received from his father, TKV Desikachar holds a degree in structural engineering. He is one of the world's foremost teachers of yoga and a renowned authority on the therapeutic use of yoga. We invite you to visit the Healing Yoga Foundation website.

Walter Murch - The Music of the Spheres: Rediscovering the Harmonic Relationship Among the Planets

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 11:00:02 -0800

Note: This conversation relied heavily on Mr. Murch's visual presentation, which is unavailable. Still, we found the conversation so compelling as to make it available for listening. Please familiarize yourself with the article link below for further understanding of Walter's work in this area.

Walter Murch is an Academy Award winning film editor and sound designer who has done celebrated work with George Lucas, Francs Ford Coppola, Anthony Minghella, and others. He is the subject of Michael Ondaatje's "The Conversations," based on their dialogues when Murch was editing Minghella's The English Patient (based on Ondaatje's novel). He has written an acclaimed book on film editing, In the Blink of an Eye. But his greatest historical contribution may yet prove to be in astronomy, where he has refined and rehabilitated an ancient observation that the planets and moons in our solar system are arranged in a harmonic relationship that gives scientific expression to the concept of "the music of the spheres." Please prepare for this conversation with this astonishingly interesting polymath by reading the interview with Murch at http://bldgblog.blogspot.com/2007/04/heliocentric-pantheon-interview-with.html

Catharine A. MacKinnon - Are Women Human? Reflections on Sexual Violence

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 20:55:10 -0700

Catharine A. MacKinnon is America's foremost feminist legal scholar and a leading public intellectual and political philosopher. She has made major contributions to law and public policy on equality, sexual harassment, pornography, trafficking, rape, and genocide. MacKinnon is a lawyer, teacher, writer, and activist on sex equality domestically and internationally. She is Elizabeth A. Long Professor of Law at the University of Michigan, The James Barr Ames long-term visitor at Harvard Law School, and Special Gender Adviser to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court. She has taught at twelve law schools including Yale, Stanford, Chicago, Osgoode Hall (Toronto), Columbia, and Hebrew University (Jerusalem) and been a fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study (Berlin, 1992-3) and the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (Stanford, 2005-6). Widely published in many languages (three of which she speaks in addition to English) her dozen books include Sex Equality (2001/2007), Toward a Feminist Theory of the State (1989), Only Words (1993), Sexual Harassment of Working Women (1979), and most recently, Women’s Lives, Men’s Laws (2005) and Are Women Human? (2006). MacKinnon created the concept that sexual abuse violates equality rights, pioneering the legal claim for sexual harassment as sex discrimination and, with Andrea Dworkin, recognition of the harms of pornography as civil rights violations. The Supreme Court of Canada has largely accepted her approach to equality, hate speech, and pornography. Representing Bosnian women survivors of Serbian genocidal sexual atrocities, she established legal recognition of rape as an act of genocide and won with co-counsel a $745 million verdict at trial. She works with Equality Now, an international NGO promoting sex equality worldwide, and the Coalition against Trafficking in Women (CATW). Empirical studies document that Professor MacKinnon is one of the most widely-cited legal scholars in the English language.

Keith Block - Life Over Cancer: A Program for Integrative Cancer Treatment

Sat, 05 Sep 2009 19:05:53 -0700

Andrew Weil, M.D., writes in his preface: “Life Over Cancer sets the course for what I believe is the future of successful cancer treatment,” “I believe in Keith’s program and would go to the Block Center if I were facing a diagnosis of cancer. It is where I have sent and will continue to send my friends and family members,” and “Life Over Cancer is the program every cancer patient deserves in order to have the best chance for recovery and restoration of health.”

Keith's book-cover says:

"Dr. Keith Block is at the global vanguard of innovative cancer care. As medical director of the Block Center for Integrative Cancer Treatment in Evanston, Illinois, he has treated thousands of patients who have lived long, full lives beyond their original prognoses. Now he has distilled almost thirty years of experience into the first book that gives patients a systematic, research-based plan for developing the physical and emotional vitality they need to meet the demands of treatment and recovery.

Based on a profound understanding of how body and mind can work together to defeat disease, this groundbreaking book offers:

• Innovative approaches to conventional treatments, such
as “chronotherapy”–chemotherapy timed to patients’ unique circadian rhythms for enhanced effectiveness and reduced toxicity

• Dietary choices that make the biochemical environment hostile to cancer growth and recurrence, and strengthen the immune system’s ability to attack remaining cancer cells

• Precise supplement protocols to tame treatment side effects, relieve disease-related symptoms, and modify processes like inflammation and glycemia that can fuel cancer if left untreated

• A new paradigm for exercise and stress reduction that restores your strength, reduces anxiety and depression, and supports the body’s own ability to heal

• A complete program for remission maintenance–a proactive plan to make sure the cancer never returns

Also included are “quick-start” maps to help you find the information you need right now and many case histories that will support and inspire you. Encouraging, compassionate, and authoritative, Life over Cancer is the guide patients everywhere have been waiting for."

Keith is a longtime Commonweal friend and an extraordinary resource for cancer patients and health professionals. He will be accompanied by Mark Renneker, M.D., also a longtime Commonweal friend and an equally eminent investigator of medical treatments for a wide range of serious illnesses. Don't miss this special opportunity to learn from one of the foremost pioneers of integrative cancer treatments.

Michael Lerner
President, Commonweal

Hanford Woods - What Is Art? Reading Shakespeare's 'Hamlet' and Tolstoy's 'What Is Art?'

Sat, 01 Aug 2009 21:48:38 -0700

Hanford Woods teaches Shakespeare at Dawson College in Montreal and is a longtime Bolinas resident. Eric Karpeles is a new Bolinas resident and recently spoke for The New School on "Paintings in Proust." We recommend reading "Hamlet" and "What Is Art?" (both available on Internet!) in advance of the conversation.

Russell Jaffe, MD - The Alkaline Way: Diet, Supplements, Detoxification, and Real Health Care Reform

Thu, 30 Jul 2009 21:37:58 -0700

We have (again!) a special opportunity for a conversation with a remarkable Commonweal friend, Russell Jaffe, M.D. Russ talks with us about "The Alkaline Way: Diet, Supplements, Detoxification, and Real Health Care Reform." Trained in Clinical Pathology at the National Institutes of Health, Russ served on the permanent NIH staff as a practicing molecular biologist and molecular pathologist. In the course of his later career, Russ has worked extensively in optimal health, nutrition, Oriental Medicine, and color and music therapy. He was the founding Chairman of the Scientific Committee of the American Holistic Medical Association. In 1984, Dr. Jaffe developed the lymphocyte response assays (LRA) by ELISA/ACT tests. These tests enable physicians to examine the responses of patients' immune systems to challenges. He is also the founder of Perque, a nutritional supplement company.

Eric Karpeles - My Book is a Painting - Marcel Proust & the Resonance of the Visual Image

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 13:12:13 -0700

Eric Karpeles, author of Paintings in Proust, presented an illustrated talk entitled "My book is a painting: Marcel Proust & the Resonance of the Visual Image." This conversation was recorded on June 12th, 2009. A PDF of the visual presentation is available at:
http://commonweal.org/new-school/audiofiles/podcast/61e_karpeles_TNS_2.pdf

Paintings in Proust has received considerable acclaim in the US, Britain and France, where the French edition sold out its first printing in three weeks. Salman Rushdie called it his favorite book of the year. The NY Times claimed the book elicited "the literary equivalent of a hosanna." A NY Observer critic wrote that the work is "authoritative, intelligent, amusing, and can be enjoyed without prior exposure to Proust." The same can be said about Eric's talk, which, while specifically about Proust, is also generally about the mind of the artist and the creative process.

Jeffrey and Leila Masson - A Conversation on Freud, Animal's Emotional Lives and Environmental Factors in Human Development

Tue, 23 Jun 2009 11:17:01 -0700

Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson is a writer who lives with his family in New Zealand. He has been a professor at several universities in Canada and America. After serving as Projects Director of the Sigmund Freud Archives, he wrote a series of books critical of psychiatry and therapy. In the 1990s he turned his attention to animals, and in particular, their emotional lives. His book 'When Elephants Weep' became an international best seller, as was 'Dogs Never Lie About Love'. Since those two books he has published 6 more books about animals. Jeff believes:

"When animals are no longer colonized and appropriated by us, we can reach out to our evolutionary cousins. Perhaps then the ancient hope for a deeper emotional connection across the species barrier, for closeness and participation in a realm of feelings now beyond our imagination, will be realized."

Dr. Leila Masson is a pediatrician interested in disease prevention through healthy nutrition and life style. Her goal is to help her two sons and her husband - and all her patients - to live in optimal health. Dr. Masson provides biomedical treatment for children on the autistic spectrum, a wholistic approach to behaviour and learning challenges, as well as assessment and treatment of children with allergies and other pediatric health problems. Dr. Masson's aim is to treat the whole child, not just the symptom, and to support the family on their path to better health.

Cindy Sage and Nancy Evans - Wireless or Wellness - A Conversation on EMFs and technology

Sun, 24 May 2009 20:30:42 -0700

New wireless technologies have changed the face of the world in the last decade. Cell and cordless phones, and the wireless towers that send their signals around town have very real bioeffects. Decision-makers and the public are just learning about possible health risks. What can you do to help protect your health? These and other important topics will be covered by Cindy Sage, Sage Associates, Co-Editor of the BioInitiative Report. She and 14 other scientists and public health experts have written a definitive report on the science and public health implications of wireless technologies. She will discuss the report and answer your questions about wireless.

Cindy Sage is the owner of Sage Associates, Montecito, CA. She also is a Research Fellow at Orebro University Hospital, School of Health and Medical Sciences, Department of Oncology, Orebro, Sweden.

Nancy Evans is a health science writer and editor with more than three decades of experience in health science publishing. She is an honorary member of Sigma Theta Tau, the international honor society in nursing.

Julia Brody, Silent Spring Institute - Endocrine Disruptors in Indoor & Outdoor Air

Wed, 29 Apr 2009 11:20:05 -0700

Julia Brody is a leader in research on environmental pollutants and breast cancer and in public engagement in science. She is the executive director of Silent Spring Institute, a research organization dedicated to studying the links between the environment and women's health, especially breast cancer.

Dr. Julie Brody and her team at the Silent Spring Institute in Massachusetts are well-known pioneers in exploring linkages between toxic chemicals exposures and breast cancer, prompted by the high incidence of breast cancer in Cape Cod. Upholding the legacy of Rachel Carson in exploring how environmental threats contribute to disease incidence, Brody has produced compelling results from her work in Cape Cod, where she has tested 120 homes and their inhabitants for levels of toxicants. Recent work has brought her team to Richmond and Bolinas where the team as tested a number of homes for the presence of toxic chemicals in indoor and outdoor air.

Householders in both towns found the results surprising. Like most people, they assumed that exposures to toxicants occurred primarily if one were to live near an industrial area, a military facility or near the site of some sort of chemical accident. Brody s research indicates that many of us may be additionally exposed to toxicants through the use of products we use everyday, products such as cleaners, personal care products, paints, solvents, or the materials we use in constructing our houses.

Mark Gerzon - Decision Making as if Consciousness Matters

Wed, 11 Mar 2009 14:44:41 -0700

Mark Gerzon, a leader in building global community and conflict resolution, believes critical decisions are often deeply flawed because they are made in settings that neglect the importance of nurturing a consciousness that elicits our deepest wisdom. His passion is designing environments that meet Einstein's transformative challenge: to ensure that we do not try to solve problems on the same level awareness at which they were created. Join us for a very special New School Conversation.

Mark Gerzon is Founder and President of Mediators Foundation and author of 'Leading Through Conflict: How Successful Leaders Transform Differrences into Opportunities'.

You are also invited to visit EastWest institute website ...'working to make the world a safer place by addressing the seemingly intractable problems that threaten regional and global stability.'

David Servan-Schreiber - A Conversation on Healing

Tue, 30 Dec 2008 16:39:21 -0800

David Servan-Schreiber, author of "Healing Without Freud or Prozac", "Instinct to Heal" and "Anticancer, A New Way of Life". Michael Lerner conducted this interview on Friday, December 5, 2008

Terry Tempest Williams - Finding Beauty in a Broken World

Sat, 13 Dec 2008 10:16:43 -0800

Don’t miss this extraordinary opportunity to hear Terry Tempest Williams, one of the most exquisite and powerful voices for healing ourselves and the earth. Terry has been called “a citizen writer” who speaks out eloquently on behalf of an ethical stance toward life. A gifted naturalist and fierce advocate for freedom of speech, Terry has shown us how environmental issues are social issues that ultimately become matters of justice. “So here is my question,” she asks, “what might a different kind of power look like, feel like, and can power be redistributed equitably even beyond our own species?”

James Gordon, M.D. - Life Lessons in Healing: Cancer, Trauma, and Mind-Body Medicine

Sat, 13 Dec 2008 10:23:39 -0800

Jim Gordon is one of America's leading authorities in mind-body medicine. He founded the influential Cancer Guides training program, sponsors the premier Food as Medicine training, and conducts Healing the Wounds of War trainings in Israel, Gaza and other conflict zones. Jim Gordon is the Founder and Director of The Center for Mind-Body Medicine (CMBM), a Clinical Professor in the Departments of Psychiatry and Family Medicine at Georgetown Medical School, and recently served as Chairman of the White House Commission on Complementary and Alternative Medicine Policy.

Therese Poulsen - Yoga For Trauma

Thu, 16 Oct 2008 17:44:04 -0700

Therese Poulsen is the founder and director of Breath of Hope Foundation, through which she brings yoga and integrative healing to children traumatized by natural disasters or war in Sri Lanka, Indonesia and other countries in the Global South. Therese has been teaching yoga and integrative approaches to healing for over two decades.

Stephen Viederman - A Conversation on Socially Responsible Investing

Fri, 10 Oct 2008 15:17:22 -0700

Stephen Viederman* is the former president of the Jessie Smith Noyes Foundation, from which he retired in April 2000. During his tenure the Foundation became a leader in mission-related investing, an effort to reduce the dissonance between the foundation’s investments and its grant-making values through portfolio screening, shareholder activity, and mission-related venture capital investing. This effort was widely recognized by the national press, including the New York Times, a variety of finance and business journals, as well as the philanthropic press. In 1996 he co-founded the Foundation Partnership on Corporate Responsibility. He has also lectured extensively on these issues in North America, Europe and Asia.

Mr. Viederman continues his involvement as a member of the board and finance committee of the Needmor Fund, the Council for Responsible Public Investment, the advisory committees of Innovest Strategic Value Advisers, SustainAbility (UK), the Aurora Institute (Canada), and the Hawaii Capital Stewardship Initiative, and through consulting.

Mark Finser - A Conversation on Social Finance

Sat, 27 Sep 2008 10:03:09 -0700

Mark A. Finser is Chair of the Board of RSF Social Finance. RSF Social Finance provides innovative investing, lending, and philanthropic services to catalyze the growth of organizations creating a more sustainable future. Mark grew RSF's assets from $6,000 in 1984 to $120M today. Since 1984, RSF has made a total of $130M in mission-related loans to social enterprises. Mark brings communities of philanthropists and socially responsible investors together to further RSF's mission: to transform the way we work with money. Mark serves on the governing boards of the following organizations: New Resource Bank, an innovative community bank that serves green and sustainable companies; Investor's Circle Foundation, a non-profit, national angel investor group that invests in socially responsible companies; and B Lab, a non-profit organization supporting B Corporations which are a new type of corporation meeting specific social and environmental performance standards.

Mark is an advisor to the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE) and Sophia House, a shelter for homeless mothers and children. He leads TBL Capital, a sustainable venture fund he founded in 2007. Mark has a lifelong interest in biodynamic agriculture, integrative medicine, and meditation. He lives with his family in Mill Valley, California.

Paul Hawken - Life Lessons in Sustainability and Resilience

Sun, 14 Sep 2008 07:46:16 -0700

Paul Hawken is an environmentalist, entrepreneur and author. Paul heads the Natural Capital Institute www.NaturalCapital.org, which has created a hub for global civil society www.WiserEarth.org, a collaboratively written, free content, open source networking platform that links NGOs, funders, business, government, social entrepreneurs, students, organizers, academics, activists, scientists and citizens.

Jed Emerson - Blended value

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 20:49:33 -0700

Jed Emerson (jed.emerson@generationim.com) is a Senior Fellow with Generation Foundation, of Generation Investment Management (London, UK), and a fellow with the Said Business School at Oxford University.

He has published widely on issues related to how we create, invest in and manage value. He lives in the Colorado high country with his two dogs, Pearl and Rasta, and Lakota, his horse...

Jerry Mander - Will Globalization Soon Be Over?

Sat, 30 Aug 2008 17:35:59 -0700

Jerry Mander is the founder and director of the International Forum on Globalization (IFG) a "think tank" and activist community with Board and Associate members on every continent. IFG has focused since 1994 on exposing the negative impacts of economic globalization on nature, human communities, equity, and democracy. IFG publishes reports, positions papers, and books, and also produces private and public education events, from private strategic seminars to large teach-ins. Best known among these were the huge events in Seattle in 1999 in opposition to the World Trade Organization. IFG has been generally credited with being among the leading international organizations that have defined, articulated and acted on a comprehensive critique of economic globalization.

Steve Matson & Students of the Regenerative Design Institute - Mapping Local Resilience in Bolinas

Tue, 08 Jul 2008 21:50:12 -0700

"Mapping Local Resilience in Bolinas: Looking back through the Bolinas Community Plan history and Looking forward to the answers we'll need for a thriving future." Steve Matson and students of the Regenerative Design Institute in conversation with Michael Lerner. Co-sponsored by The New School and Mainstreet Moms. This event was held at Commonweal on Tuesday, July 1, 2008.

Participants came for images and stories from the pioneering Bolinas Community Plan "old guard" days. Steve Matson showed his beautiful and evolving maps, and explained how he and the Regenerative Design students at the Commonweal Garden have started to visualize more local economy, diverse and creative food production, wild paths for wildlife, community-building, and more -- on paper.

Michael Samuels, MD - Demeter, Buddha and the Bears: The Ancient Roots of Contemporary Spiritual Healing

Fri, 16 May 2008 20:05:18 -0700

Michael Samuels is the founder and director of Art As a Healing Force, a project started in 1990 devoted to healing oneself, others, the community and the earth with creativity and art making. Michael teaches Art and Healing at San Francisco State University, Institute of Holistic Studies. He is a bear dancer with the Chumash People. He has used creativity, art and guided imagery with patients with life threatening illness and life crises for over thirty years in private practice and in consultation. He lectures and does workshops nationwide for physicians, nurses, artists, and patients on how to use creativity and spirituality in healing. He has organized many nationwide conferences on creativity and healing and visited and participated in projects in hospitals where creativity, art and music are used with patients. Michael is currently working on a book on Native American Healing and a book on Animals and Spirituality. He is the author of 21 books including the best selling Well Body Book, Well Baby Book, Well Pregnancy Book and Seeing With the Mind's Eye, one of the first books on guided imagery. Seeing With the Mind's Eye was named as one the 10 most influential health books.

The Eleusian Mysteries, the story of Demeter and her daughter Persephone, was the most important art and healing ritual for consciousness transformation in history. The mysteries were enacted in ancient Greece for 2000 years. The Tibetan Buddha realms provide the technology of guided imagery and were the high point of body, mind and spirit technology for thousands of years. The Bear Dance conducted currently in southern California has healed the Chumash people for thousands of years. These three rituals help us understand how we can heal patients with spiritual tools in present day medicine. Dr. Michael Samuels is currently working with all three forms to develop a contemporary spiritual technology to aid in healing patients today.

Bill Drayton - Everyone A Changemaker

Mon, 04 Aug 2008 07:55:48 -0700

Bill Drayton is a social entrepreneur. He is the founder of Ashoka, Youth Ventures, and Get America Working -- three deeply complementary efforts to make the world a better place. Ashoka, the oldest and larger of these ventures, has created a global community of social entrepreneurs in over 70 countries around the world. Bill talks about these three projects in this extended interview with Michael Lerner.

Bill has been a social entrepreneur since he was a New York City elementary school student. He was born to a mother who emigrated from Australia as a young cellist and an American father who, also unafraid to step into the unknown, became an explorer at an equally young age. Public service and strong values run through the stories of both parents' families. These family influences, the rich diversity and openness of life in Manhattan-as well as America's deep cultural concern with equity, which flourished during the Civil Rights years-all interacted with one another and with Bill's temperament to plant Ashoka's earliest roots.

Annie Leonard - The Story of Stuff

Fri, 21 Mar 2008 07:27:04 -0700

From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It'll teach you something, it'll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.

Annie Leonard is an expert in international sustainability and environmental health issues, with more than 20 years of experience investigating factories and dumps around the world. Coordinator of the Funders Workgroup for Sustainable Production and Consumption, a funder collaborative working for a sustainable and just world, Annie communicates worldwide about the impact of consumerism and materialism on global economies and international health.

Geoff Lawton & Penny Livingston-Stark - A Conversation on Permaculture

Thu, 20 Mar 2008 12:58:04 -0700

Geoff Lawton is a world-renowned permaculture practitioner. He emigrated from England to Australia and studied permaculture with the originator, Bill Mollison, in Tasmania. He founded the Permaculture Research Institute www.permaculture.org.au
on Tagari Farm in New South Wales, Australia, a 147-acre farmstead previously developed by Mollison. Since 1985, Geoff has designed and implemented permaculture projects in 18 countries for private individuals and groups, communities, governments, aid organizations, and multinational corporations. He has taught the Permaculture Design Certificate course in 20 countries.

This program is hosted by Penny Livingston-Stark. Penny is internationally recognized as a prominent permaculture teacher, designer and speaker.

Lloyd Kahn - What Really Happened in the '60s

Sun, 09 Mar 2008 14:10:34 -0700

Lloyd Kahn creates visually exquisite and conceptually visionary books about the buildings we live in. His most recent book is Home Work: Handbuilt Shelter. A longtime Bolinas resident, Lloyd was living in San Francisco in the 1960s and has a powerful narrative about what he believes really happened between 1963 and 1967. He has some wonderful visual images that capture that iconic moment in time. Lloyd spoke about the decade and shared some slides from Home Work -- evidence that the power of the 1960s lives on in the buildings visionary home builders are still creating today.

Lloyd Kahn is the editor and publisher of Shelter Publications in Bolinas, California. He was formerly the shelter editor for the Whole Earth Catalog, the editor of the 1973 book Shelter. Shelter Publications has been in business for 37 years and has also published the international bestseller Stretching, by Bob Anderson. Their latest book is The Barefoot Architect: A Manual On Green Building.

Binka Le Breton, writer and lecturer on environmental and human rights.

Fri, 29 Feb 2008 16:09:28 -0800

Binka Le Breton lives on a Brazilian rainforest farm, runs the Iracambi Rainforest Research Center, lectures and broadcasts internationally on rainforest and slavery topics, is president of Amigos de Iracambi, is on the board of directors of the Keystone Center and, in her spare time, writes books. Binka's most recent book, The Greatest Gift: The Courageous Life and Martyrdom of Sister Dorothy Stang, is based on the 40 years Sister Dorothy Stang spent aiding in the struggle of poor farmers for land rights against logging and development companies in Brazil.

Gary Cohen - Green Chemistry, Green Materials, Green Energy: Recipe for a Toxic Free Future

Wed, 30 Jan 2008 20:07:59 -0800

Gary Cohen is one of the foremost strategists and activists in the international community of those seeking to move us toward a world free of toxic chemicals. Gary is a Founder and Co-Executive Director of Health Care Without Harm, the international campaign for environmentally responsible healthcare.

Gary is also the Executive Director of the Boston-based Environmental Health Fund, which works on domestic and global chemical safety issues. Gary is a member of the International Advisory Board of the Sambhavna Clinic and Documentation Center in Bhopal, India, which provides free medical care to the survivors of the Union Carbide gas disaster in Bhopal. He has been working on environmental health issues for twenty years and has published numerous articles on environmental health issues in the United States and India. Gary is an advisor to the John Merck Fund on issues of environmental health and a co-founder of Green Harvest Technologies, a bio-based materials start up. He was awarded the Skoll Global Award for Social Entrepreneurship in 2006 and the Frank Hatch Award for Enlightened Public Service Award in 2007.

This conversation was recorded in front of a live audience.

Carl Anthony - Thought Leader in Environmental Justice, A Live Community Gathering

Wed, 23 Jan 2008 19:09:02 -0800

Carl Anthony is one of the preeminent thought leaders in environmental justice in the United States. He is the Founder and was for 12 years was the Executive Director of the Urban Habitat Program, one of the oldest environmental justice organizations in the country. Until recently he was a Ford Foundation Program Officer in the Community and Resource Development unit. He is currently a Visiting Scholar/Ford Foundation Senior Fellow in the Department of Geography at the University of California Berkeley.

The mission of Urban Habitat is to promote multicultural urban environmental leadership for sustainable, socially just communities in the San Francisco Bay Area. With a colleague, Luke Cole at the California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation, he published and edited the Race, Poverty and Environment Journal, the only environmental justice periodical in the country.

This conversation was recorded before a live audience.

Ursula Goodenough, Ph.D. - The Sacred Depths of Nature

Sat, 19 Jan 2008 13:33:58 -0800

Ursula Goodenough is Professor of Biology at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. She is the author of "The Sacred Depths of Nature" (Oxford University Press, 1998), which offers religious perspectives on our scientific understandings of nature, particularly biology at a molecular level.

In 1989, Ursula joined the Institute on Religion in an Age of Science (IRAS) and served continuously on its council and as its president for four years. She has presented papers and seminars on science and religion in numerous arenas, co-chaired five IRAS conferences on Star Island currently serves on the editorial board of Zygon.

As well as her biology courses, Ursula co-teaches The Epic of Evolution, with a physicist and a geologist, for non-science students. Her research has focused on the cell biology and (molecular) genetics of the sexual phase of the life cycle of the unicellular eukaryotic green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii and, more recently, on the evolution of the genes governing mating-related traits. Ursula was educated at Radcliffe and Barnard Colleges, Columbia University and Harvard University. She did two years of postdoctoral work at Harvard, and was Assistant and Associate Professor of Biology at Harvard from 1971-1978 before moving to Washington University.

Ursula has written three editions of a widely adopted textbook, Genetics, and has served in numerous capacities in national biomedical arenas, including service on the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) review panels, membership on committees of the National Research Council (NRC), editorial boards for several professional journals, and many positions in the American Society for Cell Biology, including the presidency.

Dr. Martha Herbert - Can Autistic Children Recover? The New Paradigm of Autism Research and Treatment

Fri, 18 Jan 2008 15:53:31 -0800

A pediatric neurologist and a brain development researcher, Dr. Martha Herbert's main focus is autism. She received the first Cure Autism Now Innovator Award and directed the Cure Autism Now Foundation's Brain Development Initiative. She is the Co-Chair of the Environmental Health Advisory Board of the Autism Society of America and directs their Treatment Guided Research Initiative (TGRI). Her research program includes studying what makes some autistic brains unusually large and how the parts of the brain are connected and coordinated with each other. To this end Martha utilizes multimodal imaging techniques including MRI, EEG and MEG, is particularly interested in using imaging, in coordination with clinical observation, metabolic biomarkers and animal studies, in shedding light on the physiological level of changes in autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders, and on potential domains of plasticity and targets for intervention.

Martha is a member of the MGH Center for Morphometric Analysis, and an affiliate of the Harvard-MIT-MGH Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging. She is director of the TRANSCEND Research Program, Treatment Research and Neuroscience Evaluation of Neurodevelopmental Disorders. Martha earned her medical degree at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. Prior to her medical training she obtained a doctoral degree at the University of California, Santa Cruz, studying evolution and development of learning processes in biology and culture in the History of Consciousness program, and then did postdoctoral work in the philosophy and history of science. Martha trained in pediatrics at Cornell University Medical Center and in neurology and child neurology at the Massachusetts General Hospital, where she has remained.

Paul J. Growald - The Way of the Bees (and Other Pollinators)

Wed, 16 Jan 2008 17:15:35 -0800

Investor, venture philanthropist and beekeeper, Paul Growald, is Chairman and Founder of the Coevolution Institute and its Pollinator Partnership including the North American Pollinator Protection Campaign, a collaboration of more than 120 groups that is the principal center of work to protect pollinating animals throughout the Americas. He is also a Trustee of the Rockefeller Family Fund and donor/advisor to the Growald Family Fund. His main philanthropic interests are in the conservation of ecosystem services as exemplified by pollinators, in the minimization, mitigation and management of climate change, and in policies and politics that impact conservation.

Virginia Veach, Ph.D. - A Life Exploring Healing

Fri, 02 Nov 2007 17:58:56 -0700

Virginia Veach is a physical therapist and psychotherapist who has worked extensively with people with cancer and many other life-threatening diseases. In this conversation with Michael Lerner, she describes how she does her work and some of the major influences on the development of her unique approach to healing.

Nancy E. Adler, PhD - How Increasing Income Disparities Affect Health

Sun, 04 Nov 2007 17:43:04 -0800

Nancy Adler is Professor of Psychology at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), Vice-Chair of the Department of Psychiatry, and Director of the Center for Health and Community. Nancy came to UCSF to initiate a graduate program in Health Psychology. She has served as director of that program, an NIMH-sponsored postdoctoral program in "Psychology and Medicine: An Integrative Research Approach," and a new postdoctoral "Health and Society Scholars Program" funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Nancy has been awarded the UCSF Chancellor's Award for Advancement of Women and the George Sarlo Prize for excellence in Teaching, and the Outstanding Contribution to Health Psychology award from the American Psychological Association, Division of Health Psychology. She is a member of the Institute of Medicine (IOM) and is currently the Chair of an IOM committee on psychosocial services for cancer survivors.

Nancy's earlier research examined the utility of decision models for understanding health behaviors with particular focus on reproductive health. This work identified determinants of consequences of unwanted pregnancy. Her current work examines the pathways from socioeconomic status (SES) to health. As director of the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on SES and Health, she coordinates research spanning social, psychological and biological mechanisms by which SES influences health. Within the network she has focused on the role of subjective social status in health.

Krista Tippett - Speaking of Faith

Thu, 11 Oct 2007 00:54:29 -0700

"Speaking of Faith," with Krista Tippett, host of the radio program Speaking of Faith, October 11th, 2007. Michael Lerner conducted this interview.

Krista Tippett

A journalist and former diplomat, Krista Tippett came up with the idea for Speaking of Faith while consulting for the internationally renowned Institute for Ecumenical and Cultural Research at Saint John's Abbey and University in Collegeville, Minnesota. She has hosted and produced the program since the Speaking of Faith project began as an occasional feature in 2000, before taking on its current form as a national weekly program in 2003.

Tippett is a graduate of Yale Divinity School and a former Fulbright Scholar. She has reported and written for The New York Times, Newsweek, the BBC, and other international news organizations. Tippett also served as special assistant to the U.S. ambassador to West Germany. In 2007, Viking published her first book, Speaking of Faith—Why Religion Matters, and How to Talk About It. Of that book and her program, journalist and author Yossi Klein Halevi has written, "there is no more trustworthy guide to the challenges of faith in a dangerous world than Krista Tippett."

Paul Gorman - Executive Director of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment (NRPE) : Part 1

Fri, 05 Oct 2007 00:29:17 -0700

Part 1: Paul Gorman, founder and Executive Director of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment since 1993, received the Heinz Award for the Environment in 1999. Mr. Gorman, a graduate of Yale and Oxford University, worked in the U.S. Congress and served as press secretary and speechwriter to Senator Eugene McCarthy in the 1968 presidential campaign. He taught at the City University of New York, Sarah Lawrence College and Adelphi University, hosted a public radio program for 29 years and co-authored How Can I Help? From 1985-91, Mr. Gorman served as the Cathedral of St. John the Divine's Vice President for Program, overseeing community-based initiatives and helping organize international conferences on religion and environment in Assisi, Oxford and Moscow.

Paul Gorman - Executive Director of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment (NRPE) : Part 2

Fri, 05 Oct 2007 00:25:19 -0700

Part 2: Paul Gorman, founder and Executive Director of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment since 1993, received the Heinz Award for the Environment in 1999. Mr. Gorman, a graduate of Yale and Oxford University, worked in the U.S. Congress and served as press secretary and speechwriter to Senator Eugene McCarthy in the 1968 presidential campaign. He taught at the City University of New York, Sarah Lawrence College and Adelphi University, hosted a public radio program for 29 years and co-authored How Can I Help? From 1985-91, Mr. Gorman served as the Cathedral of St. John the Divine's Vice President for Program, overseeing community-based initiatives and helping organize international conferences on religion and environment in Assisi, Oxford and Moscow.

David Bonbright - Saving the World? What International Philanthropy Can and Cannot Do

Sat, 22 Sep 2007 23:20:51 -0700

A New School conversation with David Bonbright, Director of Keystone Accountability, recorded September, 20th, 2007. Michael Lerner conducted this interview.

David Bonbright has been an international grantmaker with the Ford Foundation in Africa during the end of apartheid and with the Aga Khan Development Network in pre- to post-911 Pakistan, Tajikistan and Afghanistan. Originally from Ross, California, David is based in London with his talented South African filmmaker wife, Elaine Proctor. His mission in recent years, through a project he calls Keystone Accountability, has been to create a better way for foundations, non-governmental organizations, philanthropists and other civil society actors to evaluate the actual effectiveness of third sector projects.

Richard Tarnas, Ph.D. - Cosmos and Psyche: Intimations of a New World View

Fri, 14 Sep 2007 13:13:46 -0700

Richard Tarnas, is a professor of philosophy and cultural history at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, where he founded the graduate program in Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness. He also teaches psychology and cultural history at Pacifica Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara. A graduate of Harvard University and Saybrook Institute, and formerly the director of programs at Esalen Institute, he is the author of The Passion of the Western Mind, a history of the Western world view from the ancient Greek to the postmodern that became both a best seller and a required text in many universities. His most recent book, Cosmos and Psyche: Intimations of a New World View, received the Book of the Year Prize from the Scientific and Medical Network. It has just been released in paperback by Penguin Putnam.

Rachel Kyte - Investing in Women, Equity and Sustainability—a World Bank Perspective

Thu, 06 Sep 2007 00:33:20 -0700

Rachel Kyte, a British national, became Director of the Environment and Social Development Department at the International Finance Corporation (IFC) in January 2004. Since joining the department she has stewarded the development and adoption of the new sustainability policy, performance standards and disclosure policy for IFC and overseen an overhaul in internal systems and procedures to support the strategic importance IFC places on environmental and social sustainability. The IFC's new Performance Standards serve as a basis for Equator Principles which have now been adopted by over 50 financial institutions.

Michael Lerner conducted this interview.

Teddy Cruz - Beyond Borders: Local Architectural and Urban Planning Solutions for Global Political and Social Problems

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 10:26:52 -0700

Recorded July 26th, 2007. Chris Desser conducted this interview.

California architect Teddy Cruz's work dwells at the border between San Diego and Tijuana, Mexico, inspiring a practice and pedagogy that emerges out of the particularities of this bicultural territory and the integration of theoretical research and design production. He has taught and lectured in various universities in the U.S. and Latin America, and in 1994 he conceived and began the LA/LA Latin America / Los Angeles studio, an experimental summer workshop at SCI-Arc in Los Angeles. During 2000-05, he was associate professor in the school of architecture at Woodbury University in San Diego where he began Border Institute (BI) to further research the urban phenomena at the border between the US and Mexico. He has been recently appointed associate professor in Public Culture and Urbanism in the Visual Arts Department at the University of California, San Diego. His firm, Estudio Teddy Cruz, was selected among eight other firms as one of the national "Emergent Voices" in architecture by the Urban League in New York City.

Chris Desser is a fellow at the Tomales Bay Institute, a think tank focused on developing the concept of The Commons as an overarching analytical structure organizing across sectors and disciplines. She served on the California Coastal Commission and the San Francisco Commission for the Environment. In 2003, she co-founded Women's Voices, Women Vote, a project that successfully increased the participation of single women in the electoral process. Chris was the director of the Funder's Working Group on New Technology, an association of foundations concerned with the environmental, cultural and political implications of emerging technologies such as biotechnology and nanotechnology. She was co-editor of Living with the Genie: Technology and the Quest for Human Mastery (Island Press, 2003).

Arisika Razak and Carol Densmore - Birth and the Healing Wisdom of Earth-Based Traditions

Thu, 19 Jul 2007 10:41:03 -0700

Arisika Razak, RN, CNM (Certified Nurse Midwife), MPH, Program Director, Integrative Health Studies at the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) and Carol Densmore, CNM, MPH, Director of the Cambridge Health Alliance Doula Program, July 20th, 2007

Arisika Razak's work integrates the disciplines of Women's Studies/ Women's Spirituality, and Women's Health and Spiritual Dance, through the incorporation of the teachings of earth-based spiritual traditions, women's spirituality, and women's health into the language of movement and dance.

She has worked as a nurse midwife, health care provider, and health care administrator for over 25 years, serving as staff nurse-midwife and director of the Nurse-Midwife Service at Highland Hospital in Oakland; director of the Alameda County Pre-term Delivery Prevention Project, and Assistant Administrator for Ancillary services at Cowell Hospital, UC Berkeley.

Carol Densmore brings 25 years of experience in education, program development, and clinical care to her current position as the Director of the Cambridge Health Alliance Doula Program in Cambridge, Massachusetts. This unique, multicultural program offers emotional, social, and educational support for childbearing women at the Cambridge Birth Center and Cambridge Hospital. She has attended births in Boston area hospitals and homes, a Mexican border birth center and an Indian desert village. In India, she traveled extensively and researched the training of village health workers and traditional midwives. Carol is interested in the impact of culturally sensitive social support on women's access to their own healing resources and existing health services, as well as the power of support to affect the success of health promotion measures and outcomes. She holds Master's Degrees in Education and in Public Health from Boston University and is a Certified Nurse Midwife.

Mary Evelyn Tucker and John Grim - Living Cosmologies: Nature and Spirit Converging

Tue, 17 Jul 2007 11:43:29 -0700

Mary Evelyn Tucker is a Senior Lecturer and Senior Scholar at Yale University where she has appointments in the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies as well as the Divinity School and the Department of Religious Studies. She is a co-founder and co-director with John Grim of the Forum on Religion and Ecology. Together they organized a series of ten conferences on World Religions and Ecology at the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard Divinity School. She is the author of Worldly Wonder: Religions Enter Their Ecological Phase (Open Court Press, 2003) and many other books.

As a professor of religion John Grim taught courses in Native American and Indigenous religions, religion and ecology, ritual, and mysticism in the world's religions. He is currently a visiting scholar at the Institution of Social and Policy Studies, Yale University and President of the American Teilhard Association. His published works include: The Shaman: Patterns of Religious Healing Among the Ojibway Indians (University of Oklahoma Press, 1983) and, with Mary Evelyn Tucker, a co-edited volume entitled Worldviews and Ecology (Orbis, 1994, 5th printing 2000).

Peter Kingsley - Finding What Is Real

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:31:04 -0700

Peter Kingsley is internationally recognized for his groundbreaking work on the origins of western spirituality, philosophy and culture. He is the author of the books "Ancient Philosophy Mystery and Magic": "Empedocles and Pythagorean Tradition", "In the Dark Places of Wisdom", and "Reality".

Jacob Needleman - Why Can't We Be Good?: Overcoming Obstacles To Our Higher Ideals

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 11:08:56 -0700

Jacob Needleman is a professor of philosophy at San Francisco State University and the author of many books, including The American Soul, The Wisdom of Love, Time and the Soul, The Heart of Philosophy, Lost Christianity, and Money and The Meaning of Life. In addition to his teaching and writing, he serves as a consultant in the fields of psychology, education, medical ethics, philanthropy, and business, and has been featured on Bill Moyers's acclaimed PBS series A World of Ideas. Steve Heilig conducted this interview. Steve Heilig is the Director of Public Health and Education for The San Francisco Medical Society and a Research Associate for The Collaborative on Health and the Environment (CHE) at Commonweal.

Parker Palmer - The Politics of the Brokenhearted: On Holding the Tensions of Democracy

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:14:31 -0700

Parker Palmer, Founder and Senior Advisor of the Center for Courage & Renewal and author of several books including, Let Your Life Speak: Listening for the Voice of Vocation and A Hidden Wholeness: The Journey Toward an Undivided Life, served for fifteen years as Senior Associate of the American Association of Higher Education. He now serves as Senior Advisor to the Fetzer Institute. He founded the Center for Courage & Renewal, which oversees the "Courage to Teach" program for K-12 educators across the country and parallel programs for people in other professions, including medicine, law, ministry and philanthropy.

Charlotte Brody, RN And Dr. Rachel Naomi Remen - Making Change as Treatment for Despair

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 11:18:06 -0700

Charlotte Brody, RN, is Executive Director of Commonweal, and a founder and former Executive Director of Health Care Without Harm, an international coalition of 443 organizations in 52 countries working to make health care more environmentally responsible and sustainable. She is also on the Steering Committee of the Safe Cosmetics Campaign. A registered nurse and mother of two, Charlotte has served as the Organizing Director for the Center for Health, Environment and Justice in Falls Church, Virginia, the Executive Director of a Planned Parenthood affiliate in North Carolina and the Coordinator of the Carolina Brown Lung Association, an occupational safety and health organization focused on cotton textile workers.

Rachel Naomi Remen, MD, is Founder and Director of the Institute for the Study of Health and Illness at Commonweal and Clinical Professor of Family and Community Medicine at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine. She is Founder and Director of The Healer's Art Curriculum, which was featured in US News & World Report in 2002 and 2005 and is presently taught in 54 medical schools here and abroad. Her intensive CME programs have enabled thousands of physicians to deepen their sense of calling and service. Dr. Remen is the author of the New York Times bestseller Kitchen Table Wisdom: Stories That Heal (Riverhead Books, 1996) and the national bestseller, My Grandfather's Blessings: Stories of Strength, Refuge and Belonging (Riverhead Books, 2000).

Sandra Steingraber - Healing Inside Out: A Poet's Quest, A Mother's Journey

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 13:44:59 -0700

Sandra Steingraber, Ph.D., ecologist, cancer survivor, and author of Living Downstream and Having Faith, received her doctorate in biology from the University of Michigan and master's degree in English from Illinois State University. She is the author of Post-Diagnosis, a volume of poetry, and coauthor of a book on ecology and human rights in Africa, The Spoils of Famine. She has taught biology at Columbia College, Chicago, held visiting fellowships at the University of Illinois, Radcliffe/Harvard, and Northeastern University, and served on President Clinton's National Action Plan on Breast Cancer.

Rachel Kessler and Dr. Rachel Naomi Remen - Nurturing the Inner Life in Education

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:23:39 -0700

Rachael Kessler is recognized by Daniel Goleman as a "leader in a new movement for emotional literacy," and has developed a framework for nurturing the inner life of students and teachers that honors the interests of educators, parents, and policy-makers. Her groundbreaking book, The Soul of Education: Helping Students Find Connection, Compassion, and Character at School (ASCD 2000), was distributed to over 110,000 educators worldwide. Her work has been endorsed by educators across the spectrum of religious and political belief, progressive to conservative, fundamentalist to agnostic. Howard Gardner wrote that her "examination of the quest for meaning among today's adolescents is both daring and needed."

Rachel Naomi Remen, MD, is Founder and Director of the Institute for the Study of Health and Illness at Commonweal and Clinical Professor of Family and Community Medicine at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine. She is Founder and Director of The Healer's Art Curriculum, which was featured in US News & World Report in 2002 and 2005 and is presently taught in 54 medical schools here and abroad. Her intensive CME programs have enabled thousands of physicians to deepen their sense of calling and service.

Pete Myers, Ph.D. - Environmental Health Science: Human and Ecosystem Health

Mon, 07 May 2007 12:00:00 -0700

Pete Myers, Ph.D. is founder, CEO, and chief scientist of Environmental Health Sciences in Charlottesville, Virginia. He is also coauthor of Our Stolen Future (1996), which explores the threats posed by man-made chemical contaminants to fetal development and human health, and he is Senior Advisor to the United Nations Foundation (Washington, DC). From 1990-2002 Myers was director of the W. Alton Jones Foundation, a private foundation supporting efforts to protect the global environment and to prevent nuclear war. He received his Ph.D. in zoology from the University of California, Berkeley, and lives in Virginia.

Rick Ingrasci, M.D., M.P.H. - Joy, Social Intelligence & the Ethical Imagination, A New School Event

Thu, 19 Apr 2007 12:00:00 -0700

Rick Ingrasci, M.D., M.P.H., is a healer and activist who has been involved in consciousness exploration and social transformation since the mid 60s. Ingrasci has a strong background in psychiatry, holistic medicine, and community development. He co-founded Physicians for Social Responsibility, the American Holistic Medical Association, Interface, and Hollyhock, a retreat center in British Columbia. He is the co-author of "Chop Wood, Carry Water: A Guide to Finding Spiritual Fulfillment in Daily Life."

Nipun Mehta - Invisible Revolution of the Inner-net

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:31:59 -0700

Nipun Mehta, Co-founder of CharityFocus.org on the "Invisible Revolution of the Inner-net."

CharityFocus is an all volunteer run 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that endeavors to leverage technology for inspiring greater volunteerism and providing meaningful volunteer opportunities for all who want them.

In January 2005, he and his wife, Guri, anteed-up. They left everything to head on an open-ended, unscripted walking pilgrimage across India to "use our hands to do random acts of kindness, use our heads to profile inspiring people, and use our hearts to cultivate truth."

Idelisse Malavé and Gihan Perera - Race, Justice And The American Dream

Tue, 03 Apr 2007 11:00:20 -0700

Idelisse Malavé, Executive Director of the Tides Foundation and Gihan Perera, Executive Director of the Miami Workers Center on "Race, Justice, and the American Dream."

Responsible for the overall management of the Tides Foundation since 1996, Idelisse Malavé works with Tides staff to deliver excellent service and create opportunities for donors to increase the impact of their grantmaking. Over a twenty-five-year career dedicated to social justice, Idelisse litigated civil rights cases with the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, represented women in family law matters, and co-authored a bestseller, Mother Daughter Revolution. She was a founding board member of the New York Women's Foundation and served as Vice President of the Ms. Foundation for Women for six years before coming to Tides.

Gihan Perera co-founded the Miami Workers Center together with Tony Romano in 1999. Gihan is a native of Sri Lanka and grew up in South Los Angeles. He is a strategist, published writer, and public speaker. Prior to founding the Center, Gihan was a union organizer, leading union recognition and contract agreement campaigns in Miami, South, and North Carolina. He began his activism at an early age and became a trainer and recruitment director for the AFL-CIO's Organizing Institute before completing college work. Gihan serves on the board of the local ACLU, PRE (Philanthropy for Racial Equality), and the Miami Light Project. He holds a bachelor's degree in International Development Studies from the University of California, Berkeley.

Chris Desser - Commons And Consciousness

Thu, 29 Mar 2007 12:00:00 -0700

Chris Desser is a fellow at the Tomales Bay Institute, a think tank focused on developing the concept of The Commons as an overarching analytical structure organizing across sectors and disciplines. She served on the California Coastal Commission and the San Francisco Commission for the Environment. In 2003, she co-founded Women's Voices, Women Vote, a project that successfully increased the participation of single women in the electoral process. Chris was the director of the Funder's Working Group on New Technology, an association of foundations concerned with the environmental, cultural and political implications of emerging technologies such as biotechnology, nanotechnology. She was co-editor of Living with the Genie: Technology and the Quest for Human Mastery (Island Press, 2003).

Sushmita Ghosh - Changemakers

Tue, 20 Mar 2007 17:27:56 -0700

Sushmita Ghosh, Past President and current member of Ashoka's Leadership Team talks about "Changemakers."

Born in India, Sushmita Ghosh was a journalist who rose through the ranks to become President Emeritus of Ashoka, the global network of social entrepreneurs. In this conversation she describes Ashoka and her new work with Changemakers, an Ashoka program that extends social entrepreneurship to a wider global community.

Chet Tchozewski - Intuition and Grantmaking

Mon, 19 Mar 2007 12:00:00 -0700

In this conversation, Chet describes the critical role intuition plays if you want to distribute small grants to thousands of grassroots organizations in over one hundred countries.

Chet Tchozewski is the founder and Executive Director of the Global Greengrants Fund, an international environmental foundation that makes small grants to grassroots environmental groups in developing nations around the globe. Since 1993 Greengrants has made in excess of 3000 grants, in over 100 countries, totaling about $10 million.

He was awarded the prestigious Robert W. Scrivner Award for Creative Philanthropy by the Council on Foundation, an award that honors grantmakers who "possess a combination of vision, principle and personal commitment to making a difference in a creative way through grantmaking."

Thomas Yeomans, Ph.D. - The Embodied Soul

Fri, 06 Apr 2007 10:06:03 -0700

Thomas Yeomans' education was first in Music, Classics, and Comparative Literature, particularly poetry, and then a sharp turn, with the advent of Humanistic and Transpersonal Psychology in the 60's in Education and Psychology.
In 1990 he founded the Concord Institute, in Concord, MA, and shifted his focus gradually from Psychosynthesis to formulating and developing Spiritual/Global Psychology. He has pursued this endeavor in the last decade and a half through teaching, training professionals, writing, and consulting to individuals and organizations. During this time he worked in various European countries as well as throughout North America, and in the 90's he helped a group of Russian doctors and psychologists from the Harmony Institute in St. Petersburg found a post-graduate training institute called the International School for Psychotherapy, Counseling, and Group Leadership.

Dean Radin, Ph.D. - Entangled Minds

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:59:43 -0700

Dean Radin, Ph.D., Senior Scientist at the Institute of Noetic Sciences discusses his book "Entangled Minds," March 5th, 2007.

In this conversation, Radin describes the surprising reach of the substantial scientific literature on psi phenomena, and wonders whether psi phenomena are not ultimately an example of the universe talking to itself.

"The concept of things being separate doesn't exist at a deep physical level. All that remains are relationships between things."

"[Entangled Minds] reframes the notion of psychic abilities from some magical power that transcends the physical universe to something that is an expected reflection of the interconnectedness of the universe itself."

Peter Warshall - The Spiritual Labor of Earth Healing, A New School Event

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 09:37:41 -0700

Peter Warshall is the Editor-At-Large for the Whole Earth Magazine and is the founder of Peter Warshall and Associates. This gathering was about "The Spiritual Labor of Earth Healing." This event was held at Commonweal on February 27th, 2007.

Peter Warshall has worked for thirty years to improve governance and effective citizen participation within local communities, balance conservation and development (especially water resources, ranching and forestry, and biodiversity), as well as teach, guide and write on natural and cultural history and what is now called sustainability. Trained as both biologist and anthropologist, Peter has taken a broad view of the complexity of societal change. While others may work as a scientist or politician, Peter has tried to bridge these realms as scientist/essayist with years of public service. He works on all socio-economic levels and with highly diverse peoples and ecosystems, believing that important beneficial change can come from many unexpected and imaginative human sources. The diverse ecosystems of northern Mexico and southern Arizona and New Mexico presently define his bi-national sense of home. He owns and runs his own small consulting group.

Fredi Kronenberg, Ph.D - Herbal Therapies and Integrative Approaches to Women's Health

Tue, 05 Aug 2008 09:33:44 -0700

Dr. Fredi Kronenberg is Professor of Clinical Physiology and Director of the Richard and Hinda Rosenthal Center for Complementary & Alternative Medicine at Columbia University, College of Physicians and Surgeons. She received her B.S. from Cornell University in neurobiology and behavior and her Ph.D. from Stanford University in physiology, where she researched thermoregulatory and reproductive physiology. Her postdoctoral research at Columbia University initiated her work in womenOs health and menopause. She is a leading expert in the endocrinology and thermoregulatory physiology of menopausal hot flashes, and alternative therapies to treat them.

Ram Dass and Dr. Rachel Naomi Remen - Aging & Dying

Tue, 06 Feb 2007 12:00:00 -0800

Ram Dass is a widely admired American spiritual teacher who suffered a disabling stroke some years ago and wrote about the experience in "Fierce Grace." Rachel Naomi Remen, MD, is Founder and Director of the Institute for the Study of Health and Illness at Commonweal and Clinical Professor of Family and Community Medicine at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine. Now living on Maui, Ram Dass talked with Rachel Naomi Remen and Michael Lerner about what his stroke taught him, and how he now works with others around issues of healing, aging and dying.

Ted Schettler, M.D., Medical Director of the Science and Environmental Health Network and Chair of the Science Working Group of the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, Recorded February 5th, 2007.

Mon, 05 Feb 2007 12:00:00 -0800

This talk describes how his exploration of the effects of chemical contaminants on environmental health have led him into a comprehensive perspective on the interaction of genes, gene expression, nutrition, stress, income disparities, chemicals, and many other factors in human health.