There’s no perfect substitute for human blood

Life-saving advancements have come a long way, but engineering artificial blood has been a challenge. Nicola Twilley is a New Yorker contributor and co-host of the podcast Gastropod. She talks to Krys Boyd about the breakthroughs — and setbacks — in the quest for artificial blood, why it’s needed more than ever, and why eyes are on Big Pharma to finance it. Her article is “The Long Quest for Artificial Blood.” Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

 The narrative is that private companies are buying up single-family homes and driving up prices — but the data doesn’t really back that idea up. Eric Levitz is a senior correspondent at Vox, and he joins host Krys Boyd to discuss how only about a half of 1 percent of homes are owned by institutional investors, why private equity might actually keep rents down and neighborhoods more diverse, and why he feels like a new housing bill in Congress could do more harm than good. His article is “The ‘populist’ crusade to make the suburbs more segregated and expensive.”  Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

 Leaders of the Right say they want to re-balance higher education — but even within the ranks the movement is divided as to what that really means. Len Gutkin, editor of The Chronicle Review, joins host Krys Boyd to discuss why some feel a return to the classics is a strategy to even out Left-leaning college campuses, why red-state legislatures don’t feel that goes far enough, and what this argument is doing to academic freedom. His article is “The Right's Academic Civil War” was published by The Chronicle of Higher Education.  Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

DEI is being dismantled, what comes next for those interested in working toward equality? Kenji Yoshino is Chief Justice Earl Warren Professor of Constitutional Law at the NYU School of Law and the faculty director of the Meltzer Center for Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging. He joins host Krys Boyd to discuss why, though counterintuitive, opening programs up to all people does help minority groups, how the language of DEI backfired and how to build a “multicultural meritocracy.” His book, written with David Glasgow, is “How Equality Wins: A New Vision for an Inclusive America.” Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

If you were given thousands of dollars in free money to gamble, would you find yourself a little — or a lot — addicted to the games? McKay Coppins, staff writer at The Atlantic, joins host Krys Boyd to discuss how his magazine gave him $10,000 to use as seed money as he explored the rise of online sports gambling, why he was surprised at how much the gambling interfered with his family life and sleep and how he received special dispensation from his church to take part in the experiment. His article is “My Year as a Degenerate Gambler.” Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Taxing billionaires to make up budget shortfalls is a popular idea — but maybe non-billionaires should think again? Megan McArdle is a Washington Post columnist, and she joins host Krys Boyd to discuss why the idea of a billionaire wealth tax is generating buzz around Capitol Hill, why she feels it’s a short-sided idea, and to explain just how much cash these policies would potentially generate. Her recent piece on the topic is “The myth of the billionaire wealth tax.” Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Plenty of crime dramas and horror films feature a psychopath on a rampage. That diagnosis, however, might be the real fiction. Rasmus Rosenberg Larsenis is assistant professor of forensic epistemology and philosophy of science at the University of Toronto Mississauga in Canada and an affiliated scientist at the National Center for Ontological Research in the U.S. He is also the author of “Psychopathy Unmasked: The Rise and Fall of a Dangerous Diagnosis.” He joins host Krys Boyd to discuss why psychopathy isn’t real, how that diagnosis came about, and why even serial killers don’t have all the traits we assume they do. His companion piece to his book, “There are no psychopaths,” was published in Aeon. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

The arguments for selling off public lands range from generating money from drilling to building housing – but it actually might be more cost effective to leave these spaces alone. Kyle Manley is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Colorado Boulder’s Earth Lab. He joins host Krys Boyd to make the case for leaving public lands as-is, why plans for affordable housing are unrealistic and how we can put a dollar value on ecological impact. His article “The true worth of America’s public lands” was published in Scientific American. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

If your kid has a meltdown over the shape of chicken nuggets, just know kids at the turn of the last century devoured organ meat. Helen Zoe Veit is a historian and associate professor of history at Michigan State University, where she is the director of the What America Ate and the America in the Kitchen projects. She joins host Krys Boyd to discuss why kids used to have a much more varied diet, the industries that created “kid food” that we now think of as standard fare and why carting around an endless supply of snacks is killing adventurous palates. Her book is called “Picky: How American Children Became the Fussiest Eaters in History.” Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Friendliness is a Canadian hallmark, so perhaps it’s surprising that our neighbors to the north are drawing the Trump administration’s ire. Drew Fagan, professor in the Monk School at the University of Toronto and a visiting professor at Yale University, joins host Krys Boyd to discuss why one of our largest trading partners has found itself in the crosshairs of President Trump, what tariffs and trade deals have done to shape the relationship through the years and how Canada is responding. His article in Policy is “The Big Split: How Canada and the United States Pulled Together, Then Apart.”   Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices