Do you believe in Magic?
New Thinking for a New World - a Tallberg Foundation Podcast
02/18/21
•26m
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The pandemic has forced most of us to move from real life to virtual life—and we are mostly unhappy about the results. It’s not just that we miss the real thing, but that it's virtual alternative—endless hours on Zoom or Teams or some other platform—is such a pale imitation.
Are there different ways to use the tools? Since we may be stuck in this second best world for a while, can we find ways to make it better? Is there a cure for Zoom fatigue?
For answers, we turned to a magician. Magic used to be fundamentally physical, requiring a lot of interaction between the magician and his audience. Mark Mitton is a world class magician, whose performances produced Springsteen-like enthusiasm and engagement from those lucky enough to experience them. How did he move from three dimensions to two dimensions? What can he teach us about communicating during a pandemic?
Listen as host Alan Stoga explores how magical thinking (or, at least, a magician’s thinking) can help us through this crisis. And watch here for the queen of clubs.
Previous Episode
Worth repeating: African Possibilities
February 11, 2021
•29m
This week we want to lift an older episode we believe bears repeating. What are some of the challenges Africa faces in its future? We invite you to take a moment and rediscover this episode from August 6th, 2020.
At least so far, what plagues Africa is less Covid-19, than its consequences: collapsed economies, an industrial world that is closing to Africa, a deceleration (if not reversal) in globalization, a new “Cold War” (this time between China and the West), severe climate change, and the urgent need to grow and develop faster to serve its young, demanding population.
How can Africa cope? Are solutions—or, at least, possibilities—to be found at the local, national or regional level? Where is the needed capital?
Looking for answers, Alan Stoga talks to Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr, mayor of Sierra Leone’s capital Freetown, and Carole Wainaina, a leader of Africa50, a public, pan-African infrastructure bank.
Next Episode
High Anxiety
February 25, 2021
•34m
Even amid optimism about vaccines and declining infection rates, there is mounting evidence that the pandemic is generating a global mental health crisis. Lockdowns and social distancing reduce transmission, but have the unintended consequence of intensifying stress and anxiety, stretching social bonds, and weakening personal relationships. How do we cope with the results? Could rising levels of child abuse, spousal abuse, drug abuse, homicide and suicide leave even deeper marks than COVID itself? Do we need to think differently about mental health interventions?
Dr. Jonathan DePierro and Michael Niconchuk try to answer these questions in this week’s episode of New Thinking for a New World. DePierro is Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York and a practicing clinician; Niconchuk is a neuroscience researcher working in the Zaatari refugee camp in Jordan among other places.
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