Intermission

Elon Musk has spent his career turning improbable ideas into companies that reshape the world. To some, the entrepreneur behind Tesla and SpaceX is an engineering genius whose ambitions have transformed electric cars and space travel. To others, his politics and extraordinary influence raise serious questions about the future he is building. Either way, the world’s first trillionaire is betting Tesla’s future on AI and humanoid robots, and SpaceX’s on life beyond Earth. In this season’s debut episode, Walter asks Musk about DOGE regrets, why he believes robots will solve America’s national debt, and the dark politics that have consumed his own platform, X. Along the way, Musk shares why living in a simulation demands that we all be less boring. A candid conversation about the imagination, drive and contradictions of a man determined to turn his vision into our future. Interview taped August 6, 2026. And be sure to pick up Walter Isaacson’s The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution, wherever fine books are sold. ABOUT THE HOSTWalter Isaacson is the bestselling author of biographies of Elon Musk, Jennifer Doudna, Leonardo da Vinci, Steve Jobs, Benjamin Franklin, and Albert Einstein. He is a professor of history at Tulane University and previously served as CEO of the Aspen Institute, chair and CEO of CNN, and editor of Time. He was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2023. IN THIS SEASONElon Musk (Tesla, SpaceX, xAI)Peter Thiel (Founders Fund, PayPal, Palantir)Mustafa Suleyman (Microsoft AI, DeepMind)Dario Amodei and Daniela Amodei (Anthropic)and more!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

No stone unturned. We pull out all the stops to get to the bottom of what happened to Lorenza.  Want your own taste of Sicily – grab a bottle of The Sicilian Inheritance inspired OLIVE OIL direct from Sicily to BUY - GO HERE .  Snag your copy of  THE SICILIAN INHERITANCE, the novel!  Like what you hear? Follow us @kscope_nyc on Twitter and Instagram. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The clock is ticking. We rush to Sicily to dig into the mafia and homicide records from 1916 before they are destroyed. Jo’s best friend comes along for the adventure as the archives reveal two massive holes in the Piazza family legend. Want your own taste of Sicily – grab a bottle of The Sicilian Inheritance inspired OLIVE OIL direct from Sicily to BUY - GO HERE .  Snag your copy of  THE SICILIAN INHERITANCE, the novel!  Like what you hear? Follow us @kscope_nyc on Twitter and Instagram. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

DNA results rock Jo’s world as she continues to search through more and more branches of the Piazza family tree. New revelations lead her to the world’s leading genealogy influencer, The Barefoot Genealogist who has some new plans for how to solve this murder. Want your own taste of Sicily – grab a bottle of The Sicilian Inheritance inspired OLIVE OIL direct from Sicily to BUY - GO HERE .  Snag your copy of  THE SICILIAN INHERITANCE, the novel!  Like what you hear? Follow us @kscope_nyc on Twitter and Instagram. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

One of the leading theories of Lorenza’s murder is that she was killed because she was a witch who crossed the wrong person? A strega, in Sicilian. What exactly is a Sicilian witch and what would she have done if she were one? What does it mean to call a woman a witch and why has it been used throughout history to put women in danger?  Want your own taste of Sicily – grab a bottle of The Sicilian Inheritance inspired OLIVE OIL direct from Sicily to BUY - GO HERE .  Snag your copy of  THE SICILIAN INHERITANCE, the novel!  Like what you hear? Follow us @kscope_nyc on Twitter and Instagram. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Five kilometers outside town, around a bend, near the monument of the fallen masses near a landslide is where we are told we will find the place Lorenza died. En route, we simply cannot outrun the mafia lore - from the caves in the craggy hills above us that were used as hideouts for bandits to the alleged pizza shop where the last don of Sicily was finally arrested.  Want your own taste of Sicily – grab a bottle of The Sicilian Inheritance inspired OLIVE OIL direct from Sicily to BUY - GO HERE .  Snag your copy of  THE SICILIAN INHERITANCE, the novel!  Like what you hear? Follow us @kscope_nyc on Twitter and Instagram. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This week we're going to have a brief intermission in the investigation. Trust us, there are so many more twists and turns to come. But first, we want to share a little snippet of the book that's inspired by this story. It's a novel. It's fiction. Jo made it all up. Snag your copy of  THE SICILIAN INHERITANCE, the novel!  Like what you hear? Follow us @kscope_nyc on Twitter and Instagram. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Every death in the village of Caltabellotta is handwritten in a massive book stored in the heart of the village. What we uncover inside of the book of death shifts the entire investigation. Want your own taste of Sicily – grab a bottle of The Sicilian Inheritance inspired OLIVE OIL direct from Sicily to BUY - GO HERE .  Snag your copy of  THE SICILIAN INHERITANCE, the novel!  Like what you hear? Follow us @kscope_nyc on Twitter and Instagram. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Most families send their kids to summer camp in July. Jo has packed up her entire brood of five to travel to Sicily to solve this century-old murder. Travel with us across the Atlantic to the gorgeous and dangerous island of Sicily. Want your own taste of Sicily – grab a bottle of The Sicilian Inheritance inspired OLIVE OIL direct from Sicily to BUY - GO HERE .  Snag your copy of  THE SICILIAN INHERITANCE, the novel!  Like what you hear? Follow us @kscope_nyc on Twitter and Instagram. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Journalist Jo Piazza’s family has been playing a hundred year long game of telephone about the murder of her great great grandmother Lorenza Marsala. Family members who have gone back to Sicily to discover the truth, including Jo’s dad have been shut down by authorities and threatened by seemingly supernatural forces.  But Jo is determined, maybe even a little obsessed, to cut through the stories, the lies and the mythologies to find out the truth, even if her family members don’t want her to. Want your own taste of Sicily – grab a bottle of The Sicilian Inheritance inspired OLIVE OIL direct from Sicily to BUY - GO HERE .  Snag your copy of  THE SICILIAN INHERITANCE, the novel!  Like what you hear? Follow us @kscope_nyc on Twitter and Instagram. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.