On Being with Krista Tippett: religion, meaning, ethics, and ideas -- on public radio and online [OnBeing.org]

May 17, 2012
Michael McCullough describes science that helps us comprehend how revenge came to have a purpose in human life. At the same time, he stresses, science is also revealing that human beings are more instinctively equipped for forgiveness than we've perhaps given ourselves credit for. Knowing this suggests ways to calm the revenge instinct in ourselves and others and embolden the forgiveness intuition.
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About the Image

"Cool Jeweled Dreams (Oceans in the Sky)" accompanied by the photographer's caption: "And suddenly, they could reach out and touch their dreams, for God had made the impossible… possible.

(photo: Jamie Naughton)

In the Know:

» When a Jain Marries a Bengali: An Indian Love Story That Defied Tradition
"The more important thing which spoke to me — above love and all that — was that I had to live for my own identity. I wanted to stand on my own two feet and do what was right, regardless of any social pressure."
—Ashok Jain

» The End of Racial and Religious Profiling in America?
"In ending racial and religious profiling and ensuring our civil-rights are protected, it is important to remember that we are not compromising our security; instead, we are enhancing our safety and building stronger working relationships between law enforcement and community members."
—Nadia S. Mohammad

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1»
Sarah Kay Performs "Hiroshima" on Nantucket
Sarah Kay's poem "Hiroshima" ends this week's show. How we even knew that this audio existed came about as a result of a serendipitous invitation to The Nantucket Project.

2»
Sarah Kay Performs "B" at the Bowery
We hijacked the audio from this performance of "B" for this week's podcast featuring our interview with spoken word poet Sarah Kay.

3»
When a Jain Marries a Bengali: An Indian Love Story That Defied Tradition
Thirty-four years after he first defied India's caste system to "marry up," a Jain man talks about the perseverance and difficulties of marrying outside his caste in India.

4»
Enhancing YouTube Audio of Sarah Kay's "Tshotsholoza" for Public Radio
Making quality public radio and illustrating a guest's point can be a tricky. Take, for instance, the poem going into the midpoint break of our interview with Sarah Kay. The clip is excerpted from Ms. Kay's June 2010 performance of "Tshotsholoza" at the Acumen Fund's *spark! event in New York City.

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Counting the Omer in the Modern Day
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Upcoming Shows:

Mathematics, Purpose, and Truth
(May 31, 2012)

As a theoretical physicist, Janna Levin probes whether the universe is finite or infinite. As a novelist, she explored the separate but parallel lives of two influential 20th-century scientists: Kurt Gödel and Alan Turing. Their work laid the foundations for computer intelligence while challenging fundamental notions about how we can know what is true.