The Sunday Read: ‘Has the Amazon Reached Its “Tipping Point”?’
29 January 2023 - 58 minsIn the past half-century, 17 percent of the Amazon — an area larger than Texas — has been converted to croplands or cattle pasture. Less forest means less recycled rain, less vapor to cool the air, less of a canopy to shield against sunlight. Under drier, hotter conditions, even the lushest of Amazonian trees will shed leaves to save water, inhibiting photosynthesis — a feedback loop that is only exacerbated by global warming.
According to the Brazilian Earth system scientist Carlos Nobre, if deforestation reaches 20 to 25 percent of the original area, “flying rivers” — rain clouds that recycle the forest’s own moisture five or six times — will weaken enough that a rainforest simply will no...
Series Episodes
'The Interview': Miley Cyrus Told Us to Ask Her Anything
The Grammy-winning singer on overcoming child stardom, accepting her parents and being in control. Also, check us out on YouTube! To watch our videos, go to: youtube.com/@theinterviewpodcast
55 mins
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Did a Wine Importer Just Sink Trump’s Trade War?
A panel of federal judges ruled on Wednesday that many of President Trump’s tariffs were illegal, a decision that has threatened to derail his trade agenda. Victor Schwartz, the wine importer at the center of the case, explains why he decided to take on the president, and Jeanna Smialek, the Brussels bureau chief for The Times, discusses what options Mr. Trump has to save his trade war.
23 mins
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Harvard Is Trying to Resist Trump. It Might Not Be Working.
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28 mins
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R.F.K. Jr. Sends a Message on Vaccines
The Trump administration on Tuesday bypassed the traditional system of vaccine guidance and abruptly ended the government’s recommendation that two key groups of Americans receive vaccinations against Covid. Apoorva Mandavilli, a science and global health reporter at The New York Times, discusses what could be a turning point in public health.
28 mins
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A New Front Line for Abortion Rights
After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, abortions in the United States actually went up, in part because of a novel legal strategy that pitted blue states against red states. Pam Belluck, who covers health and science for The Times, discusses that strategy and explains how proceedings against a New York doctor could take it apart.
25 mins
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‘Modern Love’: Why Boys and Men Are Floundering, According to Therapist Terry Real
A session with Terry Real, a marriage and family therapist, can get uncomfortable. He’s known to mirror and amplify the emotions of his clients, sometimes cursing and nearly yelling, often in an attempt to get men in touch with the emotions they’re not used to honoring. Real says men are often pushed to shut off their expression of vulnerability when they’re young as part of the process of becoming a man. That process, he says, can lead to myriad problems in their relationships. He sees it as his job to pull them back into vulnerability and intimacy, reconfiguring their understanding of masculinity in order to build more wholesome and connected families. In this episode, Real explains why vulnerability is so essential to healthy masculinity and why his work with men feels more urgent than ever. He explains why he thinks our current models of masculinity are broken and what it will take to build new ones. This episode was inspired by a New York Times Magazine piece, “How I Learned That the Problem in My Marriage Was Me” by Daniel Oppenheimer. For more Modern Love, search for the show wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Wednesday.
37 mins
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