Aspen Ideas to Go – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Technical and general information from the podcast's RSS feed.

Aspen Ideas to Go

The Aspen Institute

Society & Culture

Frequency: 1 episode/7d. Total Eps: 608

Aspen Ideas to Go is a show about bold ideas that will open your mind. Featuring compelling conversations with the world’s top thinkers and doers from a diverse range of disciplines, Aspen Ideas to Go gives you front-row access to the Aspen Ideas Festival.

Read moreCollapse

Site

RSS

Recent rankings

Latest chart positions across Apple Podcasts and Spotify rankings.

Apple Podcasts

No recent rankings available

Spotify

No recent rankings available

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

Links found in episode descriptions and other podcasts that share them.

See all

https://twitter.com/aspenideas
77 shares
https://twitter.com/aspenideas?lang=en
24 shares

RSS feed quality and score

Technical evaluation of the podcast's RSS feed quality and structure.

See all

RSS feed quality

To improve

Score global : 63%

Publication history

Monthly episode publishing history over the past years.

Year

Latest published episodes

Recent episodes with titles, durations, and descriptions.

See all

Are We Alone Out There?

Episode 544

Wednesday, June 18, 2025 • Duration 48:32

In the 1990s, scientists unearthed a striking discovery – there are planets outside of our own solar system. Turns out, many of these planets are in a habitable zone capable of supporting water and oxygen. “The current estimate is about one sextillion habitable planets across the universe,” says Garett Graff, author of UFO: The Inside Story of the US Government’s Search for Alien Life Here – and Out There. Given the huge number of planets and the vastness of the universe itself, it seems likely intelligent life could exist (or may have already come and gone). Graff leads a discussion with Bill Nelson, former administrator of NASA and former congressman, Jackie Faherty, senior research scientist at the American Museum of Natural History, and Paul Sutter, astrophysicist and theoretical cosmology professor at Stonybrook University. This discussion was originally recorded at the 2024 Aspen Ideas Festival.

Read moreCollapse

One Family Size Doesn’t Fit All

Episode 543

Wednesday, June 11, 2025 • Duration 54:40

The nuclear family structure that Americans think of as traditional is actually a relatively recent convention. And for a lot of folks, it isn’t quite working. More and more people are rethinking who they want to live with and how they want to raise children, and are willing to brave legal hurdles and social stigma to give something else a try. Jaymes Black is the CEO of the organization Family Equality, which works to help LGBTQ+ families thrive. They join NPR producer and editor Rhaina Cohen, the author of “The Other Significant Others: Reimagining Life with Friendship at the Center,” for this talk on choosing the family that works for you. Podcast host Kelly Corrigan of “Kelly Corrigan Wonders” moderates the conversation, which was recorded at the 2024 Aspen Ideas Festival. “The Other Significant Others” comes out in paperback on June 17.

Read moreCollapse

Alynda Segarra: The Poetic Journeys of Hurray for the Riff Raff

Episode 534

Wednesday, April 9, 2025 • Duration 54:26

Some musicians start with formal lessons and daily practice and some get hooked by picking up a washboard between hopping train cars across the country. Alynda Segarra is the latter type, and it led them to a new life dedicated to music and community in their adopted home of New Orleans. As the band Hurray for the Riff Raff, Segarra has been making music beloved by critics and fans since 2008 and is still going strong. Their most recent album, “The Past is Still Alive,” came out last year. They sat down with poetry professor and host of the PBS series “Poetry in America,” Elisa New, at the 2024 Aspen Ideas Festival to talk about writing lyrics, making music and finding their place in America. We’re bringing you the conversation for National Poetry Month.

aspenideas.org

Read moreCollapse

ENCORE: What the Ancients Got Right about Happiness

Episode 444

Wednesday, January 18, 2023 • Duration 43:40

People have been thinking about happiness for thousands of years. In fact, ancient thinkers came up with strategies for cultivating pleasures over a lifetime, or creating a lasting capacity to take joy in the world. This long-term flourishing is different from immediate pleasures — it’s a richer notion of happiness. Laurie Santos is a professor of psychology at Yale and an expert on human cognition and the cognitive biases that impede better choices. She’s joined by Yale philosophy professor Tamar Gendler. Their conversation sheds light on the modern science behind ancient discoveries.

aspenideas.org

Read moreCollapse

The Invisible Kingdom of Chronic Illness

Episode 443

Wednesday, January 11, 2023 • Duration 51:09

The pain and discomfort brought on by a newly-developed chronic illness can be exhausting. On top of symptoms, millions of people also have frustrating and belittling encounters with the medical system while on a quest to diagnose and treat their illnesses. Journalist Meghan O’Rourke was one of them, and it took her more than a decade to convince a doctor to run the tests that would finally explain what she was experiencing. That journey led to treatments and improved health, and also became the basis for her latest book, “The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness.” She talks with Yale internal medicine professor and author of the New York Times Magazine “Diagnosis” column, Lisa Sanders, about the process of illuminating the often disconnected and isolated community of chronically ill people. As O’Rourke explains, simple recognition can go a long way for patients facing the unknown, but even that is frequently hard to come by. In this conversation from Aspen Ideas: Health, she uses research, scientific analysis and storytelling to chart a course for a medical system that digs deeper for answers and does better for these patients.

aspenideas.org

Read moreCollapse

What if Wanting Less Gets You More?

Episode 442

Wednesday, January 4, 2023 • Duration 51:28

Most of us know where to find quick hits of pleasure and enjoyment. But what about satisfaction that lasts for years, or decades, or a lifetime? It can be tempting to think the secret lies in pursuing more—more money, more accomplishments, more friends, more stuff—but we have overwhelming evidence that more doesn’t work. Maybe the secret is…wanting less? Arthur Brooks teaches classes on happiness at Harvard Business School, and is the author of the New York Times bestseller “From Strength to Strength,” among many other popular books and essays. He draws from the latest research in psychology, neuroscience, behavioral economics, and other disciplines to explain why our biology pushes us to accumulate and pursue but doesn’t have our long-term best interests in mind. The good news is we can circumvent that hard-wiring by shifting our perspectives, pointing in a new direction, and chipping away at what we’ve built up on the outside to find our true selves within.

aspenideas.org

Read moreCollapse

The Promise and Pull of Psychedelic Therapy

Episode 441

Thursday, December 22, 2022 • Duration 01:01:03

Psychedelics are emerging from a period of prohibition and association with counterculture into the rigorous world of medical research and treatment. The potential outcomes for people suffering from difficult-to-treat mental ailments, such as PTSD and depression, are exciting, but the landscape is complex. The line between recreational and therapeutic use is muddy, and professionals trained to guide us through psychedelic experiences and legislative debates on legalization are few and far between. Professor Rachel Yehuda has contributed groundbreaking research to the field of PTSD and intergenerational trauma, and began incorporating psychedelic therapy into her studies a few years ago. She joined nurse practitioner and professor Andrew Penn, also a researcher and an advocate for the perspective of nurses in psychedelic therapy, and Jeeshan Chowdhury, a biopharmaceutical entrepreneur working on psychedelics and addiction care, for an informative and nuanced conversation about the cutting edge of psychedelic-assisted therapy. Doctor and podcast host Shoshana Ungerleider moderates the discussion.

aspenideas.org

Read moreCollapse

BONUS: How to Influence People

Episode 440

Saturday, December 17, 2022 • Duration 13:47

Professor Zoe Chance, who teaches the most popular class at the Yale School of Management, illuminates the skills and strategies necessary to improve your natural ability to persuade.

Tell us what you think about this episode by taking this quick survey.

aspenideas.org

Read moreCollapse

Hacked! Medical Devices at Risk

Episode 439

Wednesday, December 14, 2022 • Duration 49:53

Cybersecurity gaps in the technological systems that run our lives are becoming more and more apparent. Hardly a day goes by that we don’t hear about another major institution hit with an attack. Many hospitals and healthcare organizations have suffered interruptions of service because of cyber hacks and ransomware, and the consequences for patients can literally be life or death. But could these kinds of threats go even deeper? What happens when we implant internet-connected devices into our bodies, like pacemakers and defibrillators? Electrical engineer and professor Kevin Fu researches medical device cybersecurity, and uses threat modeling to game out and catch every possible weak spot before the unthinkable happens to a patient. Jessica Wilkerson works on the regulation and enforcement side, developing policy at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for safe and effective medical devices. Vivian Schiller, the executive director of Aspen Digital, moderates a conversation between the two about what it takes to ensure safety against increasingly sophisticated bad actors when the stakes couldn’t be higher, and the exact methods and scenarios are unknown.

aspenideas.org

Read moreCollapse

BONUS: Rebuilding Trust in Science

Episode 438

Saturday, December 10, 2022 • Duration 11:23

The pandemic amplified political polarization. As doctors learned more about COVID-19, protocols changed and people started to question the guidance. Science itself, came under scrutiny. CPR Audio Innovations producer Emily Williams shares a conversation with Dr. Ashish Jha, a White House COVID-19 response coordinator.

Tell us what you think about this episode by taking this quick survey.

aspenideas.org

Read moreCollapse

Aspen Ideas to Go – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Recent rankings

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

RSS feed quality and score

Publication history

Latest published episodes

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Aspen Ideas to Go – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Recent rankings

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

Twitter2

Facebook3

RSS feed quality and score

Publication history

Latest published episodes

Similar podcasts and content

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Twitter2

Facebook3

Apple Podcast67