Project Save the World's Fall 2021 Talk Shows

All the video talks on this list can be seen on your computer, tablet, or smartphone at Project Save the World’s website: tosavetheworld.ca. At the top of our home page, just type into the search bar the title of a show, the episode number, or the name of a speaker. These conversations are also accessible on the page as audio podcasts and (often) as transcripts. There is also a comment column where you are invited to discuss the show, after watching it, hearing it, or reading the transcript. If someone replies to your comment, we will let you know.

336 Being a World Citizen (David Gallup)
David Gallup is president of the World Service Authority, which was founded by the world citizen Garry Davis. Its passports help refugees travel internationally.

337 Israel Palestine Jordan? (Alon Ben Meir and Bernard Dreano)
Alon Ben Meir is a professor at NYU; Bernard Dreano is a French expert on the Middle East. They see confederation as the solution to IsraeliPalestinian conflict.

338 Organizing and Teaching Peace (David Cortright)
David Cortright was the leader of SANE in opposing nuclear weapons. He is a retired professor of peace studies at Notre Dame, and writes about sanctions.

339 Old Peaceniks Update Debate (Eric Walberg)
Eric Walberg and Metta Spencer were on different sides of a divide within the global peace movement during the 1980s. Here’s where they stand today.

340 Autocratic India (Dilip Simeon and Subir Guin)
Dilip Simeon is a historian in Delhi who discusses the current political trends in India as the current version of the Hindutva nationalist movement.

*341 Teaching about Nuclear Weapons (Andrew Futter)
Andrew Futter teaches about nuclear weapons at the University of Leicester in UK. We discuss whether AI could launch nuclear war, and new technological threats.

342 Geopolitics and Civil Resistance (Michael Beer, Martin Klein, and Paul Maillet)
Michael Beer works with Nonviolence International; Martin Klein is a retired professor of African history; Paul Maillet is a retired colonel and peace ethicist.

343 Hanford and Mayak (Nadezhda Kutepova and Trisha Pritikin)
Nadezhda Kutepova was born in Mayak, Trisha Pritikin in Hanford, both in the place where their countries made plutonium. As lawyers, they defend the victims.

344 Asian Geopolitics in 2021 (James Dorsey)
James Dorsey is a journalist who has long covered the Middle East and Asia. Here he describes the relations among states and jihadist since the Taliban’s victory.

345 The World in September 2021 (Stephen Salter, Pauline Rosenau, Alyn Ware, Charles David Tauber, and others)
In this Global Town Hall we discuss cloud brightening, comparative health care systems, farms in India, a campaign against nuclear weapons and climate change.

346 Social Democracy (Ed Broadbent)
Ed Broadbent led the NDP for 15 years, then the government-funded institute Rights and Democracy and now the Broadbent Institute, which promotes social democracy.

347 Local and Transnational Peace Work (Neil Arya, Jonathan Down, and Alan Haber)
Neil Arya and Jonathan Down are leaders in the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War—Canada, and Alan Haber organizes events in Michigan.

348 War Child in Canada (Samantha Nutt)
Samantha Nutt founded and manages War Child Canada, an NGO that supports 500,000 youth in war-torn areas. We discuss their “catching up” radio school courses.

349 Laws Against the Bomb (John Burroughs)
John Burroughs works in NY with Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy, based at the UN. He discusses international laws determining the legality of using nuclear weapons.

350 New Wars and Human Security (Mary Kaldor)
Mary Kaldor sees “new” wars (e.g. the Afghanistan one) as unlike WW 1 or 2. Her proposed alternative, human security, would have the UN address crisis situations.

351 Methane (Peter Wadhams)
Peter Wadhams, a leading expert on sea ice, looks for solutions (e.g., cloud brightening and iron aerosols) to the release of methane from the shallow Siberian Sea.

352 Nuclear, NATO, and Climate (Rebecca Johnson, Ward Wilson, and Danny Harvey)
Rebecca Johnson, Ward Wilson, and Danny Harvey see this decade as decisive for solving nuclear weapons and the climate. Must a country quit NATO to join TPNW?

353 No First Use (Tariq Rauf)
Tariq Rauf, working at the IAEA in Vienna, discusses the rationales for and against promoting the adoption of No First Use policies by nuclear weapons states.

354 Great Renewable Energy in Ontario (Angela Bischoff and Michael Barnard)
Michael Barnard and Angela Bischoff discuss the previous successes of Ontario governments in promoting renewable fuels, and the causes of the recent reversals.

355 Fertilizer (Ralph Martin)
Ralph Martin studies organic farming, which does not use fertilizer, except manure. He favors pasture-fed beef, not meat from corn—but we waste 40% of all food.

356 Who’s Protecting Ontario’s Oldest Trees? (Dolf Wynia, John Bacher, and Eric Davies)
Dolf Wynia, Eric Davies, and John Bacher work to save old forests.

357 Before COP26 (Claire Adamson, Barbara Birkett, William Ryerson, and Doug Saunders)
The guests share their worries about climate issues that they think should (but may not) be addressed in Glasgow at COP26.

358 Why You Need a Market for Biochar (Johannes Lehmann)
Johannes Lehmann studies biochar and its Brazilian precursor, Terra Preta, which the Indigenous peoples created thousands of years ago by charring household waste and burying it.

359 If You Are Building Weapons, You Need a New Job (Kelsey Gallagher)
Kelsey Gallagher is a researcher at Project Ploughshares. He focuses on Canada’s participation in the global arms trade. In 2014, Canada began selling light armoured vehicles to Saudi Arabia.

360 What Can Replace Capitalism? (Alain Deneault)
Alain Deneault is an expert on Simmel’s theories about money, but this conversation was mainly about the probable global catastrophes, which he attributes to capitalism.

361 Will China Keep its No First Use Policy? (Ellen Judd, William Geimer, and Aaron Tovish)
Often the question arises whether China will adhere forever to its policy of never being first to use nuclear weapons. Ellen Judd sees no reason why it would change, and Aaron Tovish agrees.

362 What has The Group of 78 Done for You?
Tim Brodhead, Roy Culpeper, Richard Harmston, and Peter Meincke are all long-time members of a progressive Ottawa organization, The Group of 78. Now celebrating the group’s 40th anniversary, they reminisce about its founding and its various activities.

363 Who’s Controlling the Internet?
Bruce Schneier teaches cyber security policy at Harvard. He says offence is far easier than defence. Legal reforms are needed that will hold manufacturers responsible for software.

364 Why You Should Major in Peace (Barbara Wien)
Barbara Wien is a professor of peace studies at American University. She has long been engaged in creating similar programs at other universities.

365 Global Town Hall October 2021 (Robert Read, Rose Dyson, Dale Dewar, Ayah Stretch, Richard Denton, Alan Haber, and others)
Robert Read, Rose Dyson, Dale Dewar, Richard Denton, and Alan Haber attended our town hall. We discussed anti-vax ideas, plastic disposal by bacteria), climate change attitudes in Russia, divestment of fossil fuels.

366 Can Organic Farms Feed Us All? (Tony McQuail)
Tony McQuail is an organic farmer; Jill Carr-Harris works for the landless in India. Organic farms do not use chemical fertilizers, but 50% of all food is there because of fertilizer.

367 Your Food and Things that Fall from the Sky (Claudia Wagner-Riddle)
Claudia Wagner-Riddle is an agrometeorologist; she studies how agriculture affects climate change—both the production of plants and animals. Here, she discusses soil health and various challenges associated with agriculture, including methane emissions from cows and the environmental impacts of synthetic fertilizers.

368 Why Save the Swamps? (Edward Struzik)
Edward Struzik mainly studies the Arctic, but his new book, Swamplands, covers squishy places that produce peat—a substance that sequesters vastly more carbon than even tropical rainforests.

369 The Warrior’s Conscience (Corey Levine, Olivia Ward, and Tariq Rauf)
Corey Levine and Olivia Ward have both worked in Afghanistan. Tariq Rauf tracks nuclear weapons technology in various countries. He cites “The Cost of War,” and we discuss drone killings.

370 What Sectarianism Has Done to Lebanon (Ayad Al Qazzaz and Mustafa Bahran)
Ayad Al Qazzaz and Mustafa Bahran say the current crisis in Lebanon is just one of many disasters caused by the sectarian constitution.

371 War, Prisons, and Voting (Réal Lavergne, Frank Kroncke, and Reiner Braun)
Reiner, Frank, and Metta recall the militaristic political beliefs that prevailed during their youth in World War II and afterward. Metta asks Frank, who had served time in prison during the Vietnam War for sabotaging US draft records, whether a prison run democratically would work, whether the prisoners could make rational decisions.

372 Maybe You Need More Sleep (Dave Grossman)
Dave Grossman is concerned about the increasing rates of suicide and opioid deaths, which is linked to sleep deficiency. People are sleeping less now and this can be blamed largely on video games.

373 What COP26 Didn’t Talk About (Stephen Salter and Alan Gadian)
Both Stephen Salter and Alan Gadian are British scientists who know, more than anyone else, how to solve the climate change crisis. Here, we discuss their work on cloud brightening—producing whiter clouds over the oceans to reflect sunlight back into space. We also discuss ways of removing carbon from the atmosphere.

374 Saving the Corals (Daniel Harrison)
Daniel Harrison is a scientist at Southern Cross University in Australia. He leads a project that will spray nano-particles of sea water into the air that will make clouds reflect more of the sun’s rays back into space and cool the water below. Since a large part of the Great Barrier Reef has been bleached from previous heat waves, the goal is to prevent the heat from destroying the whole ecosystem. Right now, Harrison’s team is focused on developing a nozzle that can produce the fine mist of seawater, for the size of the droplets is crucial.

375 Whose Security Should We Defend? (Monika Wohlfeld and Bob Holmes)
Monika Wohlfeld teaches at the Mediterranean Academy of Diplomatic Studies in Malta, and Father Bob Holmes leads tours to Israel and Palestine and works with the Christian Peacemakers Team in Hebron.

376 Prosecuting War Criminals (Matthew Gillett)
Matthew Gillett spent time in Afghanistan protecting victims of human rights abuse, then became a trial lawyer in The Hague for the ICC.

377 Politics of Disaster (Olivier Rubin)
Olivier Rubin is a political scientist who studies “slow beginning” disasters, rather than such sudden shocks as earthquakes. He studies antimicrobial resistance—which claims 700,000 lives each year.

378 Global Town Hall Week, November 2021 (Wendy Turner, Penney Kome, Úrsula Oswald Spring, Gray Southon, Robert Read, Adam Wynne, and others)
The monthly town hall has a long discussion—including about atmospheric rivers; foxes and beaver, especially urban ones; nuclear disarmament; and Rotary peace fellowships.

379 Climate Fatalism (Anastasia Karimova, Zachary Jacobson, Art Hunter, and Adam Wynne)
Anastasia Karimova, explains why most Russians do not worry about climate change: they distrust authorities. We talk about the peat fires in Siberia and even a mountain burning in Canada.

380 Can We Solve Global Warming in Time? (Mark Z. Jacobson)
Mark Z. Jacobson, a professor at Stanford University, has developed a model showing how its feasible for the world to shift to 100 percent clean, renewable energy. His model takes account of the emissions from fossil fuels and other pollutants that affect public health. Jacobson opposes the investment in nuclear power and criticizes the US new infrastructure bill as containing many flaws. Metta raises the question whether public opinion and political structures can change quickly enough to meet the timeline for restraining the world’s temperature in the time frame that has been accepted in COP meetings.

381 Democracy and Humanity’s Future (John Foster, Mary Ellen Francoeur, and David Harries)
John Foster knows lots about pipelines; Mary Ellen Francoeur is a Sister of Service; and David Harries worked as a peacekeeper in many countries. We talk about how to relate to undemocratic states, and then about a webinar that Harries admired—between Jane Goodall and Jonathan Granoff. Evidently, they expressed differences in their conception of human security, for Goodall wanted to include not only the human population but animals, plants, and even the non-living parts of our planet.